BBKB^^HHBHlHHW&ll 
 
 OQOQOaO 
 
GEORGE DWELLS ARMES 
 
 MEMORIAL LIBRARY * * * 
 ST1LE5 HALL. .BERKELEY 
 
 LIBRA.RY 
 
 OF THE 
 
 UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA. 
 
 GIFT OF 
 
 Y. M. C. A. OF U. C. 
 
 Accession 1.Q.JL7.5.6 Class Q 
 
FAVORITE AUTHORS 
 
 IN PROSE AND POETRY 
 
 THREE VOLUMES IN ONE 
 
 illustrate* 
 
 FAVORITE AUTHORS 
 HOUSEHOLD FRIENDS 
 ' GOOD COMPANY 
 
 -CTB: 
 
 OF r 
 
 UNIVERSITY 
 
 BOSTON 
 
 JAMES R. OSGOOD AND COMPANY 
 1885 
 
COPYRIGHT, 1860, 1863, 1865, BY TICKNOR AND FIELDS 
 1884, BY JAMES R. OSGOOD & Co. 
 
 All rights reserved. 
 
 -press: 
 JOHN WILSON AND SON, CAMBKIDGK. 
 
FAVORITE AUTHORS 
 
 * 
 
 A COMPANION-BOOK OF PROSE 
 AND POETRY 
 
 " My Books, my best companions " 
 
 FLETCHER 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE : A Virtuoso's Collection 1 
 
 ALFRED TENNYSON: Dora . . . . . . 21 
 
 SIR WALTER SCOTT : A Tale of Witchcraft . . .27 
 
 ROBERT BROWNING : One Word More . . 37 
 
 ALEXANDER SMITH : In a Skye Bothy .... 45 
 
 JAMES GATES PERCIVAL : Ruins .... 66 
 
 MRS. JAMESON : A Revelation of Childhood ... 71 
 
 CHARLES SPRAQUE : To Montague .... 89 
 
 BARRY CORNWALL: The Man-Hunter .... 91 
 
 GERALD MASSEY: The Norseman .... 106 
 
 EDMUND BURKE : The Druids . . . . ' . 109 
 
 JOHN G. WHITTIER: The Witch's Daughter . . 123 
 
 LEIGH HUNT: The Old Lady, and The Old Gentleman 131 
 
 WILLIAM MOTHERWELL: A Sabbath Summer Noon . 140 
 
 MARY RUSSELL MITFORD : The Incendiary . . 145 
 
IV CONTENTS. 
 
 JOHN G SAXE: Wishing 159 
 
 CHARLES ROBERT LESLIE: The Great Portrait-Painters 161 
 WALTER SAVAGE LANDOR: To Age . . . .184 
 MATTHEW ARNOLD : The Youth of Man ... 1 85 
 DR. ARNOLD: Hannibal's March into Italy . . .18!) 
 HENRY W. LONGFELLOW: The Monk Felix . . 211 
 THOMAS DE QUINCEY: A Mountain Catastrophe . .216 
 RALPH WALDO EMERSON: Threnody . . . 240 
 JOHN G. LOCKHART : Last Days of Sir Walter Scott . 249 
 OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES : The New Eden . . 2G5 
 
 JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL : Cambridge Worthies Thirty 
 
 Years Ago 270 
 
 BETTINA VON ARNIM: Beethoven .... 204 
 
 SIR PHILIP SIDNEY: A Song from the Arcadia . . 300 
 
UNIVERSITY 
 
 OF 
 
 A VIRTUOSO'S COLLECTION 
 
 BY NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. 
 
 THE other clay, having a leisure hour at my disposal, 1 
 stepped iuto a new museum, to which my notice was 
 casually drawn by a small and unobtrusive sign : " To BE 
 
 SEEN HERE, A VIRTUOSO'S COLLECTION." Such was the 
 
 simple yet not altogether unpromising announcement that 
 ' turned my steps aside for a little while from the sunny side- 
 walk of our principal thoroughfare. Mounting a sombre 
 staircase, I pushed open a door at its summit, and found 
 rsyself in the presence of a person, who mentioned the mod- 
 erate sum that would entitle me to admittance. 
 
 " Three shillings, Massachusetts tenor," said he. " Xo, I 
 mean half a dollar, as you reckon in these days." 
 
 "While searching my pocket for the coin, I glanced at the 
 doorkeeper, the marked character and individuality of whose 
 aspect encouraged me to expect something not quite in the 
 ordinary way. He wore an old-fashioned great-coat, much 
 faded, within which his meagre person was so completely 
 enveloped, that the rest of his attire was undistingulshable. 
 But his visage was remarkably wind-flushed, sunburnt, and 
 weather-worn, and had a most unquiet, nervous, and appre- 
 hensive expression. It seemed as if this man had some all- 
 important object in view, some point of deepest interest 
 to be decided, some momentous question to ask, might he 
 but hope for a reply. As it was evident, however, that I 
 i 
 
2 NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. 
 
 coulil have nothing to do with his private affairs, 1 passed 
 through an open doorway, which admitted me into the exten- 
 sive hall of the museum. 
 
 Directly in front of the portal was the bronze statue of a 
 youth with winged feet. He was represented in the act of 
 flitting away from earth, yet wore such a look of earnest 
 invitation that it impressed me like a summons to enter the 
 hall 
 
 " It is the original statue of Opportunity, by the ancient 
 sculptor Lysippus," said a gentleman who now approached 
 me. " I place it at the entrance of my museum, because it 
 is not at all times that one can gain admittance to such a 
 collection." 
 
 The speaker was a middle-aged person, of whom it was 
 not easy to determine whether he had spent his life as a 
 scholar or as a man of action ; in truth, all outward and ob- 
 vious peculiarities had been worn away by an extensive and 
 promiscuous intercourse with the world. There was no mark 
 about him of profession, individual habits, or scarcely of 
 country ; although his dark complexion and high features, 
 made me conjecture that he was a native of some southern 
 clime of Europe. At all events, he was evidently the vir- 
 tuoso in person. 
 
 " With your permission," said he, " as we have no descrip- 
 tive catalogue, I will accompany you through the museum, 
 and point out whatever may be most worthy of attention. In 
 the first place, here is a choice collection of stuffed animals." 
 
 Nearest the door stood the outward semblance of a wolf, 
 exquisitely prepared, it is true, and showing a very wolfish 
 fierceness in the large glass eyes which were inserted into 
 its wild and crafty head. .Still it was merely the skin of a 
 wolf, with nothing to distinguish it from other individuals of 
 that unlovely breed. 
 
 "How does this animal deserve a place in your collec 
 tion ? " inquired I. 
 
A VIRTUOSO'S COLLECTION. 3 
 
 It is the wolf that devoured Little Red Riding Hood," 
 answered the virtuoso ; " and by his side with a milder 
 and more matronly look, as you perceive stands the she- 
 wolf that suckled Romulus and Remus." 
 
 k - All, indeed ! " exclaimed I. " And wliat lovely lamb is 
 this with the snow-white fleece, which seems to .e of as 
 delicate a texture as innocence itself?" 
 
 " Methinks you have but carelessly read Spenser/ replied 
 my guide, " or you would at once recognize the ' milk-white 
 lamb ' which Una led. But I set no great value upon the 
 lamb. The next specimen is better worth our notice." 
 
 u What ! " cried I, " this strange animal, with the black 
 head t of 9fi ox upon the body of a white horse ? Were u 
 possible to suppose it, I should say that this was Alexander's 
 steed Bucephalus." 
 
 " The same," said the virtuoso. " And can you likewise 
 give a name to the famous charger that stands beside hi.n ? '' 
 
 Next to the renowned Bucephalus stood the mere skeleton 
 of a horse, with the white bones peeping through his ill- 
 conditioned hide ; but, if my heart had not wanted towards 
 that pitiful anatomy, I might as well have quitted the museum 
 at once. Its rarities had not been collected with pain and 
 toil from the four quarters of the earth, and from the depth 3 
 of the sea, and from the palaces and sepulchres of ager, ic 
 those who could mistake this illustrious steed. 
 
 " It is Rosinante ! " exclaimed I, with enthusiasm. 
 
 And so it proved. My admiration for the n^ble and 
 gallant horse caused me to glance with less interest at- the 
 other animals, although many of them might Iiave deserved 
 the notice of Guvier himself. There was the donkey which 
 Peter Bell cudgelled so soundly, and a brother of the same 
 species who had suffered a similar infliction from the ancient 
 prophet Balaam. Some doubts were entertained, however, 
 as to the authenticity of the latter beast. My guide pointeu 
 out the venerable Argus, that faithful dog of Ulysses, and 
 
NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. 
 
 another dog, (for so the skin bespoke it,) which, though 
 Imperfectly preserved, seemed once to have had three heads. 
 It was Cerberus. I was considerably amused at detecting 
 in an obscure corner the fox that became so famous by the 
 loss of his tail. There were several stuffed cats, which, as a 
 dear lover of that comfortable beast, attracted my affection- 
 ate regards. One was Dr. Johnson's cat Hodge ; and in the 
 same row stood the favorite cats of Mahomet, Gray, and 
 "Walter Scott, together with Puss in Boots, and a cat of very 
 noble aspect who had once been a deity of ancient Egypt, 
 Byron's tame bear came next. I must not forget to mention 
 the Erymanthean boar, the skin of St. George's dragon, and 
 that of the serpent Python ; and another skin with beauti- 
 fully variegated hues, supposed to have been the garment 
 of the " spirited sly snake " which tempted Eve. Against 
 the walls were suspended the horns of the stag that Shake- 
 speare shot ; and on the floor lay the ponderous shell of the 
 tortoise which fell upon the head of JEschylus. In one row, 
 as natural as life, stood the sacred bull Apis, the " cow with 
 the crumpled horn," and a very wild-looking young heifer, 
 which I guessed to be the cow that jumped over the moon, 
 She was probably killed by the rapidity of her descent As 
 I turned away, my eyes fell upon an indescribable monster, 
 which proved to be a griffin. 
 
 " I look in vain," observed I, " for the skin of an animal 
 which might well deserve the closest study of a naturalist, 
 the winged horse Pegasus." 
 
 " He is not yet dead," replied the virtuoso ; " but he is so 
 hard ridden by many young gentlemen of the day that I 
 hope soon to add his skin and skeleton to my collection." 
 
 We now passed to the next alcove of the hall, in which 
 was a multitude of stuffed birds. They were very prettily 
 arranged, some upon the branches of trees, others brooding 
 upon nests, and others suspended by wires so artificially that 
 they seemed in the very act of flight. Among them was s 
 
A. VIBTUOSO'S COLLECTION. 5 
 
 white dove, with a withered branch of olive-leaves in her 
 mouth. 
 
 " Can this be the very dove," inquired I, " that brought 
 the message of peace and hope to the tempest-beaten pas- 
 sengers of the ark ? " 
 
 " Even so," said my companion. 
 
 " And this raven, I suppose," continued I, " is the same 
 that fed Elijah in the wilderness." 
 
 "The raven? No," said the virtuoso; "it is a bird of 
 modern date. He belonged to one Barnaby Rudge ; and 
 many people fancied that the Devil himself was disguised 
 under his sable plumage. But poor Grip has drawn his last 
 cork, and has been forced to * say die ' at last. This other 
 raven, ha'rdly less curious, is that in which the soul of King 
 George I. revisited his lady love, the Duchess of Kendall." 
 
 My guide next pointed out Minerva's owl and the vulture 
 that preyed upon the liver of Prometheus. There was like- 
 wise the sacred ibis of Egypt, and one of the Stymphalides 
 which Hercules shot in his sixth labor. Shelley's skylark, 
 Bryant's water-fowl, and a pigeon from the belfry of the Old 
 South Church, preserved by N. P. AVillis, were placed on 
 the same perch. I could not but shudder on beholding 
 Coleridge's albatross, transfixed with the Ancient Mariner's 
 crossbow shaft. Beside this bird of awful poesy stood a 
 gray goose of very ordinary aspect. 
 
 " Stuffed goose is no such rarity," observed I. " Why do 
 you preserve such a specimen in your museum ? " 
 
 " It is one of the flock whose cackling saved the Rompn 
 Capitol," answered the virtuoso. " Many geese have cackled 
 and hissed both before and since ; but none, like those, have 
 clamored themselves into immortality." 
 
 There seemed to be little else that demanded notice in 
 this department of the museum, unless we except Robinson 
 Crusoe's parrot, a live phosnix, a footless bird of paradise, 
 and a splendid peacock, supposed to be the same that onr*> 
 
6 NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. 
 
 contained the soul of Pythagoras. I therefore passed to the 
 next alcove, the shelves of which were covered AN ith a mis- 
 cellaneous collection of curiosities, such as arc usually found 
 in similar establishments. One of the first tilings that took 
 my eye was a strange-looking cap, woven of some substance 
 that appeared to be neither woollen, cotton, nor linen. 
 
 " Is that a magician's cap ? " I asked. 
 
 " No," replied the virtuoso ; " it is merely Dr. Franklin's 
 cap of asbestos. But here is one which, perhaps, may suit 
 you better. It is the wishing-cap of Fortunatus. Will you 
 try it on ? " 
 
 " By no means," answered I, putting it aside with my 
 hand. " The day of wild wishes is past with me. I desire 
 nothing that may not come in the ordinary course of Provi- 
 dence." 
 
 " Then probably," returned the virtuoso, " you will not be 
 tempted to rub this lamp ? " 
 
 While speaking, he took from the shelf an antique brass 
 lamp, curiously wrought with embossed figures, but so cov- 
 ered with verdigris that the sculpture was almost eaten 
 away. 
 
 " It is a tnousand years," said he, " since the genius of this 
 lamp constructed Aladdin's palace in a single night. But 
 he still retains his power ; and the man who rubs Aladdin's 
 .amp has but to desire either a palace or a cottage." 
 
 u I might desire a cottage," replied I ; " but I would have 
 it founded on sure and stable truth, not on dreams and fan- 
 tasies. I have learned to look for the real and true." 
 
 My guide next showed me Prospero's magic wand, broken 
 into three fragments by the hand of its mighty master. On 
 the same shelf lay the gold ring of ancient Gyges, which 
 enabled the wearer to walk invisible. On the other side of 
 the alcove was a tall looking-glass in a frame of ebony, but 
 veiled with a curtain of purple silk, through the rents of 
 which the gleam of the mirror was perceptible. 
 
A VIRTUOSO'S COLLECTION 7 
 
 " This is Cornelius Agrippa's magic glass," observed the 
 virtuoso. " Draw aside the curtain, and picture any human 
 form within your mind, and it will be reflected in the mir- 
 ror." 
 
 " It is enough if I can picture it within my mind," an- 
 swered I. "Why should I wish it to be repeated in the 
 mirror? But, indeed, these works of magic have grown 
 wearisome to me. There are so many greater wonders in 
 the world, to those who keep their eyes open and their sight 
 undimmed by custom, that all the delusions of the old sorcer- 
 ers seem flat and stale. Unless you can show me something 
 re0!Iy curious, I care not to look farther into your museum." 
 
 " Ah, well, then," said the virtuoso, composedly, " perhaps 
 you may deem some of my antiquarian rarities deserving of 
 a gknce." 
 
 He pointed out the iron mask, now corroded with rust ; 
 and my heart grew sick at the sight of this dreadful relic, 
 which had shut out a human being from sympathy with his 
 race. There was nothing half so terrible in the axe that 
 beheaded King Charles, nor in the dagger that slew Henry 
 of Navarre, nor in the arrow that pierced the heart of Wil- 
 liam Rufus, all of which were shown to me. Many of the 
 articles derived their interest, such as it was. from having 
 been formerly in the possession of royalty. For instance, 
 here was Charlemagne's sheep-skin cloak, the flowing wig of 
 Louis Quatorze, the spinning-wheel of Sardanapalus, and 
 King Stephen's famous breeches which cost him but a crown. 
 The heart of the Bloody Mary, with the word " Calais " 
 worn into its diseased substance, was preserved in a bottle of 
 spirits ; and near it lay the golden case in which the queen 
 of Gustavus Adolphus treasured up that hero's heart. 
 Among these relics and heirlooms of kings I must not forget 
 the long, hairy ears of Midas, and a piece of bread which 
 had been changed to gold by the touch of that unlucky mon- 
 arch. Accl as Grecian Helen was a quf-en, it may here be 
 
8 NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. 
 
 mentioned that I was permitted to take into my hand a lock 
 of her golden hair and the bowl which a sculptor modelled 
 from the curve of her perfect breast. Here, likewise, was 
 the robe that smothered Agamemnon, Nero's fiddle, the Czar 
 Peter's brandy-bottle, the crown of Seniiramis, and Canute's 
 sceptre which he extended over the sea. That my own land 
 may not deem itself neglected, let me add that I was favored 
 wit i a sight of the skull of King Pliilip, the famous Indian 
 chief, whose head the Puritans smote off and exhibited upon 
 u pole. 
 
 " Show me something else," said I to the virtuoso. 
 " Kings are in such an artificial position, that people in the 
 ordinary walks of life cannot feel an interest in their relics. 
 If you could show me the straw hat of sweet little Nell, I 
 would far rather see it than a king's golden crown." 
 
 " There it is," said my guide, pointing carelessly with his 
 staff to the straw hat in question. " But, indeed, you are 
 hard to please. Here are the seven-league boots. Will you 
 try them on ? " 
 
 " Our modern railroads have superseded their use," an- 
 swered I ; " and as to these cowhide boots, I could show you 
 quite as curious a pair at the Transcendental community in 
 Roxbury." 
 
 We next examined a collection of swords and other weap- 
 ons, belonging to different epochs, but thrown together with- 
 out much attempt at arrangement. Here was Arthur's sword 
 Excalibar, and that of the Cid Campeador, and the sword of 
 Brutus rusted with Caesar's blood and his own, and the sword 
 of Joan of Arc, and that of Horatius, and that with which 
 Virginius slew his daughter, and the one which Dionysius 
 suspended over the head of Damocles. Here also was Ar- 
 ria's sword, which she plunged into her own breast, in order 
 to taste of death before her husband. The crooked blade of 
 Saladin's cimeter next attracted my notice. I know not by 
 what chance, but bo it happened, that the sword of one of oui 
 
A VIRTUOSO'S COLLECTION. 9 
 
 militia-generals was suspended between Don Quixote's lance 
 and the brown blade of Hudibras. My heart throbbed high 
 at the sight of the helmet of Miltiades and the spear that 
 was broken in the breast of Epaminondas. I recognized 
 the shield of Achilles by its resemblance to the admirable 
 cast in the possession of Professor Felton. Nothing in this 
 apartment interested me more than Major Pitcairn's pistol, 
 the discharge of which, at Lexington, began the war of the 
 Revolution, and was reverberated in thunder around the land 
 for seven long years. The bow of Ulysses, though unstrung 
 for ages, was placed against the wall, together with a sheaf 
 of Robin Hood's arrows and the rifle of Daniel Boone. 
 
 "Enough of weapons," said I, at length; "although I 
 would gladly have seen . the sacred shield which fell from 
 heaven in the time of Numa. And surely you should obtain 
 the sword which Washington unsheathed at Cambridge. 
 But the collection does you much credit. Let us pass on." 
 
 In the next alcove we saw the golden thigh of Pythago- 
 ras, which had so divine a meaning ; and, by one of the queer 
 analogies to which the virtuoso seemed to be addicted, this 
 ancient emblem lay on the same shelf with Peter Stuyve- 
 sant's wooden leg, that was fabled to be of silver. Here was 
 a remnant of the Golden Fleece, and a sprig of yellow leaves 
 that resembled the foliage of a frost-bitten elm, but was duly 
 authenticated as a portion of the golden branch by which 
 ^Eneas gained admittance to the realm of Pluto. Atalanta's 
 golden apple and one of the apples of discord were wrapped 
 in the napkin of gold which Rhampsinitus brought from Ha- 
 des ; and the whole were deposited in the golden vase of 
 Bias, witli its inscription : " To THE WISEST." 
 
 " And how did you obtain this vase ? " said I to the vir- 
 tuoso. 
 
 " It was given me long ago," replied he, with a scornful 
 expression in his eye, " because I had learned to despise all 
 things." 
 
10 NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. 
 
 It had not escaped me that, though the virtuoso was evi- 
 dently a man of high cultivation, yet he seemed to lack sym 
 pathy with the spiritual, the sublime, and the tender. Apart 
 from the whim that had led him to devote so much time, 
 pains, and expense to the collection of this museum, he im- 
 pressed me as one of the hardest and coldest men of the 
 world whom I had ever met. 
 
 " To despise all things ! " repeated I. " This, at best, is 
 the wisdom of the understanding. It is the creed of a man 
 whose soul, whose better and diviner part, has never beeb 
 awakened, or has died out of him." 
 
 " I did not think you were still so young," said the vir- 
 tuoso. " Should you live to my years, you will acknowledge 
 that the vase of Bias was not ill bestowed." 
 
 Without further discussion of the point, he directed my 
 attention to other curiosities. I examined Cinderella's little 
 glass slipper, and compared it with one of Diana's sandals, 
 and with Fanny Elssler's shoe, which bore testimony to the 
 muscular character of her illustrious foot. On the same 
 shelf were Thomas the Rhymer's green velvet shoes, and 
 the brazen shoe of Empedocles which was thrown out of 
 Mount JEtna. Anacreon's drinking-cup was placed in apt 
 juxtaposition with one of Tom Moore's wine-glasses and 
 Circe's magic bowl. These were symbols of luxury and 
 riot ; but near them stood the cup whence Socrates drank 
 his hemlock, and that which Sir Philip Sidney put from his 
 death-parched lips to bestow the draught upon a dying sol- 
 dier. Next appeared a cluster of tobacco-pipes, consisting 
 of Sir Walter Raleigh's, the earliest on record, Dr. Parr's, 
 Charles Lamb's, and the first calumet of peace which was 
 ever smoked between a European and an Indian. Among 
 other musical instruments, I noticed the lyre of Orpheus and 
 those of Homer and Sappho, Dr. Franklin's famous whistle, 
 the trumpet of Anthony Van Corlear, and the flute which 
 Goldsmith played upon in his rambles through the French 
 
A VIRTUOSO'S COLLECTION. 11 
 
 provinces. The staff of Peter the Hermit stood ii. a corner 
 with that of good old Bishop Jewel, and one of ivory, which 
 had belonged to Papirius, the Roman Senator. The pon- 
 derous club of Hercules was close at hand. The virtuoso 
 showed me the chisel of Phidias, Claude's palette, and the 
 brush of Apelles, observing that he intended to bestow 
 the former either on Greenough, Crawford, or Powers, and. 
 the two latter upon Washington Allston. There was a small 
 vase of oracular gas from Delphos, which I trust will be 
 submitted to the scientific analysis of Professor -Silliman. I 
 was deeply moved on beholding a vial of the tears into which 
 Niobe was dissolved ; nor less so on learning that a shapeless 
 fragmenUof salt was a relic of that victim of despondency 
 and sinful regrets, Lot's wife. My companion appeared 
 to set great value upon some Egyptian darkness in a black- 
 ing-jug. Several of the shelves were covered by a collec- 
 tion of coins, among which, however, I remember none but 
 the Splendid Shilling, celebrated by Phillips, and a dollar's 
 worth of the iron money of Lycurgus, weighing about fifty 
 pounds. 
 
 Walking carelessly onward, I had nearly fallen over a 
 huge bundle, like a pedler's pack, done up in sackcloth, 
 and very securely strapped and corded. 
 
 " It is Christian's burden of sin," said the virtuoso. 
 
 " O, pray let us open it ! " cried I. " For many a year 
 I have longed to know its contents." 
 
 " Look into your own consciousness and memory," replied 
 the virtuoso. "You will there find a list of whatever it 
 contains." 
 
 As this was an undeniable truth, I threw a melancholy 
 look at the burden and passed on. A collection of old gar- 
 ments, hanging on pegs, was worthy of some attention, es- 
 pecially the shirt of Nessus, Caesar's mantle, Joseph's coat 
 of many colors, the Vicar of Bray's cassock, Goldsmith's 
 peach-bloom suit, a pair of President Jefferson's scarlet 
 
1* NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. 
 
 breeches, John Randolph's red-baize hunting-sin it, the drab 
 small-clothes of the Stout Gentleman, and the rags of the 
 " man all tattered and torn." George Fox's hat impressed 
 me with deep reverence as a relic of perhaps the truest 
 apostle that has appeared on earth for these eighteen hun- 
 dred years. My eye was next attracted by an old pair of 
 shears, which I should have taken for a memorial of some 
 famous tailor, only that the virtuoso pledged his veracity that 
 they were the identical scissors of Atropos. He also showed 
 me a broken hour-glass which had been thrown aside by 
 Father Time, together with the old gentleman's gray fore- 
 lock, tastefully braided into a brooch. In the hour-glass was 
 the handful of sand, the grains of which had numbered the 
 years of the Cumaean sibyl. I think that it was in this 
 alcove that I saw the inkstand which Luther threw at the 
 Devil, and the ring whi^h Essex, while under sentence of 
 death, sent to Queen Elizabeth. And here was the blood- 
 incrusted pen of steel with which Faust signed away his 
 salvation. 
 
 The virtuoso now opened the door of a closet, and showed 
 me a lamp burning, while three others stood unlighted by its 
 side. One of the three was the lamp of Diogenes, another 
 that of Guy Fawkes, and the third that which Hero set forth 
 to the midnight breeze in the high tower of Abydos. 
 
 " See ! " said the virtuoso, blowing with all his force at the 
 lighted lamp. 
 
 The flame quivered and shrank away from his breath, but 
 clung to the wick, and resumed its brilliancy as soon as the 
 blast was exhausted. 
 
 " It is an undying lamp from the tomb of Charlemagne," 
 observed my guide. " That flame was kindled a thousand 
 years ago." 
 
 " How ridiculous to kindle an unnatural light in tombs ! " 
 exclaimed I. " We should seek to behold the dead in the 
 light of heaven. But what is the meaning of this chafing- 
 dish of Blowing coals ? " 
 
A VIRTUOSO'S COLLECTION. 13 
 
 '* That." answered the virtuoso, " is the original fire which 
 Prometheus stole from heaven. Look steadfastly into it, 
 and you will discern another curiosity." 
 
 I gazed into that fire, which, symbolically, was the origin 
 of all that was bright and glorious in the soul of man, and 
 in the midst of it, behold, a little reptile, sporting with evi- 
 de nt enjoyment of the fervid heat ! It was a salamander. 
 
 " What a sacrilege ! " cried I, with inexpressible disgust. 
 " Can you find no better use for this ethereal fire than to 
 cherish a loathsome reptile in it ? Yet there are men who 
 abuse the sacred fire of their own souls to as foul and 
 guilty a purpose." 
 
 The virtuoso made no answer except by a dry laugh and 
 an assurance that the salamander was the very same which 
 Benvenuto Cellini had seen in his father's household fire. 
 He then proceeded to show me other rarities ; for this closet 
 appeared to be the receptacle of what he considered moet 
 valuable in his collection. 
 
 " There," said he, " is the Great Carbuncle of the White 
 Mountains." 
 
 I gazed with no little interest at this mighty gem, which it 
 had been one of the wild projects of my youth to discover. 
 Possibly it might have looked brighter to me in those days 
 than now ; at all events, it had not such brilliancy as to detain 
 me long from the other articles of the museum. The virtu- 
 oso pointed out to me a crystalline stone which hung by a 
 gel 1 chain against the wall. 
 
 * That is the philosopher's stone," said he. 
 
 " And have you the elixir vitne which generally accompa- 
 nies it ? " inquired I. 
 
 " Even so ; this urn is filled with it," he replied. " A 
 draught would refresh you. Here is Hebe's cup ; will you 
 quaff a health from it?" 
 
 My heart thrilled within me at the idea of sach a reviving 
 draught ; for methought I had great need of it after travel 
 
14 NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. 
 
 ling so far on the dusty road of life. But I kucnv not whether 
 it were a peculiar glance in the virtuoso's eye. or the circum- 
 stance that this most precious liquid was contained in an an- 
 tique sepulchral urn, that made me pause. Then came many 
 a thought with which, in the calmer and better hours of life, 
 I had strengthened myself to feel that Death is the very 
 friend whom, in his due season, even the happiest mortal 
 should be willing to embrace. 
 
 " No ; I desire not an earthly immortality," said I. 
 " Were man to live longer on the earth, the spiritual would 
 die out of him. The spark of ethereal tire would be choked 
 by the material, the sensual. There is a celestial something 
 within us that requires, after a certain time, the atmosphere 
 of heaven to preserve it from decay and ruin. I will have 
 none of this liquid. You do well to keep it in a sepulchral 
 urn ; for it would produce death while bestowing the shadow 
 of life." 
 
 " All this is unintelligible to me," responded my guide, 
 with indifference. " Life earthly life is the only good. 
 But you refuse the draught ? Well, it is not likely to be 
 offered twice within one man's experience. Probably you 
 have griefs which you seek to forget in death. I can enable 
 you to forget them in life. Will you take a draught of 
 Lethe?" 
 
 As he spoke, the virtuoso took from the shelf a crystal 
 vase containing a sable liquor, which caught no reflected 
 i nage from the objects around. 
 
 " Not for the world ! " exclaimed I, shrinking back. " I 
 r-an spare none of my recollections, not even those of error 
 or sorrow. They are all alike the food of my spirit. As 
 well never to have lived as to lose them now." 
 
 Without further parley we passed to the next alcove, the 
 shelves of which were burdened with ancient volumes and 
 with those rolls of papyrus in which was treasured up the 
 eldest wisdom of the earth. Perhaps the most valuable 
 
A VIRTUOSO'S COLLECTION. 15 
 
 work in the collection, to a bibliomaniac, was the Book of 
 Hermes. For my part, however, I would have given a 
 higher price for those six of the Sibyl's books which Tarquiii 
 refused to purchase, and which the virtuoso informed me he 
 had himself found in the cave of Trophonius. Doubtless 
 these old volumes contain prophecies of the fate :f Rome, 
 both as respects the decline and fall of her temporal empire 
 and the rise of her spiritual one. Not without value, like- 
 wise, was the work of Anaxagoras on Nature, hitherto sup 
 posed to be irrecoverably lost, and the missing treatises of 
 Longinus, by which modern criticism might profit, and those 
 books of Livy for which the classic student has so long sor- 
 rowed without hope. Among these precious tomes I observed 
 the original manuscript of the Koran, and also that of the 
 Mormon Bible in Joe Smith's authentic autograph. Alex- 
 ander's copy of the Iliad was also there, enclosed in the 
 jewelled casket of Darius, still fragrant of the perfumes 
 which the Persian kept in it. 
 
 Opening an iron-clasped volume, bound in black leather, 1 
 discovered it to be Cornelius Agrippa's book of magic ; and 
 it was rendered still more interesting by the fact that many 
 flowers, ancient and modern, were pressed between its leaves. 
 Here was a rose from Eve's bridal bower, and all those red 
 and wliite roses which were plucked in the garden of the 
 Temple by the partisans of York and Lancaster. Here was 
 Halleck's Wild Rose of Alloway. Cowper had contributed 
 a Sensitive-Plant, and Wordsworth an Eglantine, and Burns 
 a Mountain Daisy, and Kirke Wliite a Star of Bethlehem, 
 and Longfellow a Sprig of Fennel, with its yellow flowers. 
 James Russell Lowell had given a Pressed Flower, but fra- 
 grant still, which had been shadowed in the Rhine. There 
 was also a sprig from Southey's Holly-Tree. One of the 
 most beautiful specimens was a Fringed Gentian, which 
 had been plucked and preserved for immortality by Bryant. 
 From Jones Very, a poet whose voice is scarcely heard 
 
16 NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. 
 
 among us by reason of its depth, there was a Windflower 
 and a Columbine. 
 
 As I closed Cornelius Agrippa's magic volume, an old, 
 mildewed letter fell upon the floor. It proved to be an au- 
 tograph from the Flying Dutchman to his wife. I could 
 linger no longer among books ; for the afternoon was waning, 
 and there was yet much to see. The bare mention of a few 
 more curiosities must suffice. The immense skull of Poly- 
 phemus was recognizable by the cavernous hollow in the 
 centre of the forehead where once had blazed the giant's 
 single eye. The tub of Diogenes, Medea's caldron, and 
 Psyche's vase of beauty were placed one within another. 
 Pandora's box, without the lid, stood next, containing noth- 
 ing but the girdle of Venus, which had been carelessly flung 
 into it. A bundle of birch rods which had been used by 
 Shens tone's schoolmistress were tied up with the Countess 
 of Salisbury's garter. I know not which to value most, a 
 roc's egg as big as an ordinary hogshead, or the shell of the 
 egg which Columbus set upon its end. Perhaps the most 
 delicate article in the whole museum was Queen Mab's 
 chariot, which, to guard it from the touch of meddlesome 
 fingers, was placed under a glass tumbler. 
 
 Several of the shelves were occupied by specimens of 
 entomology. Feeling but little interest in the science, 1 
 noticed only Anacreon's grasshopper, and a humble-bee which 
 had been presented to the virtuoso by Ralph Waldo Emerson. 
 
 In the part of the hall which we had now reached I ob- 
 served a curtain, that descended from the ceiling to the floor 
 in voluminous folds, of a depth, richness, and magnificence 
 which I had never seen equalled. It was not to be doubted 
 that this splendid though dark and solemn veil concealed a 
 portion of the museum even richer hi wonders than that 
 tlirough which I had already passed ; but, on my attempting 
 to grasp the edge of the curtain and draw it aside, it proved 
 to be an illusive picture. 
 
A VIRTUOSO'S COLLECTION. 17 
 
 " You need not blush/' remarked the virtuoso ; " for that 
 same curtain deceived Zeuxis. It is the celebrated painting 
 of Parrhasius." 
 
 In a range with the curtain there were a number of other 
 choice pictures by artists of ancient days. Here was the fa- 
 mous cluster of grapes by Zeuxis, so admirably depicted that 
 it seemed as if the ripe juice were bursting forth. As to 
 the picture of the old woman by the same illustrious painter, 
 and which was so ludicrous that he himself died with laugh- 
 inn at it, I cannot say that it particularly moved my risibility. 
 Ancient humor seems to have little power over modern mus- 
 cles. Here, also, was the horse painted by Apelles, which 
 livinjr liprses neighed at ; his first portrait of Alexander 
 the Great ; and his last unfinished picture of Venus asleep. 
 Each of these works of art, together with others by Parrha- 
 sius, Timantlies, Polygnotus, Apollodorus, Pausias, and Pam- 
 philus, required more time and study than I could bestow for 
 the adequate perception of their merits. I shall therefore 
 leave them undescribed and uncriticised, nor attempt to 
 settle the question of superiority between ancient and mod- 
 ern art. 
 
 For the same reason I shall pass lightly over the speci- 
 mens of antique sculpture which this indefatigable and for- 
 tunate virtuoso had dug out of the dust of fallen empires. 
 Here was ^Etion's cedar statue of ^Esculapius, much de- 
 cayed, and Alcon's iron statue of Hercules, lamentably 
 rusted. Here was the statue of Victory, six feet high, which 
 the Jupiter Olympus of Phidias had held in his hand. Here 
 was a forefinger of the Colossus of Rhodes, seven feet in 
 length. Here was the Venus Urania of Phidias, and other 
 images of male and female beauty or grandeur, wrought by 
 sculptors who appear never to have debased their souls by 
 the sight of any meaner forms than those of gods or godlike 
 mortals. But the deep simplicity of these great works was 
 not to be comprehended by a mind excited and disturbed, as 
 
18 NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. 
 
 mine was, by the various objects that had recently been pre- 
 sented to it. I therefore turned away with merely a passing 
 glance, resolving on some future occasion to brood over each 
 individual statue and picture until my inmost spirit should 
 feel their excellence. In this department, again, I noticed 
 the tendency to whimsical combinations and ludicrous analo- 
 gies which seemed to influence many of the arrangements of 
 the museum. The wooden statue so well known as the 
 Palladium of Troy was placed in close apposition with the 
 wooden head of General Jackson which was stolen a few 
 years since from the bows of the frigate Constitution. 
 
 We had now completed the circuit of the spacious hall, 
 and found ourselves again near the door. Feeling somewhat 
 wearied with the survey of so many novelties and antiqui- 
 ties, I sat down upon Cowper's sofa, while the virtuoso threw 
 himself carelessly into Rabelais's easy-chair. Casting my 
 eyes upon the opposite wall, I was surprised to perceive the 
 shadow of a man nickering unsteadily across the wainscot, 
 and looking as if it were stirred by some breath of air that 
 found its way through the door or windows. No substantial 
 figure was visible from which this shadow might be thrown ; 
 nor, had there been such, was there any sunshine that would 
 have caused it to darken upon the wall. 
 
 " It is Peter Schlemihl's shadow," observed the virtuoso, 
 " and one of the most valuable articles in my collection." 
 
 " Methinks a shadow would have made a fitting doorkeeper 
 to such a museum," said I ; " although, indeed, yonder figure 
 has something strange and fantastic about him, which suits 
 well enough with many of the impressions which I have 
 received here. Pray, who is he ? " 
 
 While speaking, I gazed more scrutinizingly than before 
 at the antiquated presence of the person who had admitted 
 me, and who still sat on his bench with the same restless 
 aspect, and dim, confused, questioning anxiety that I had 
 noticed on my first entrance. At this moment lie looked 
 
A VIRTUOSO'S COLLECTION. 19 
 
 eagerly toward us, and, half starting from liis seat, addressed 
 me. 
 
 " I beseech you, kind sir," said he, in a cracked, melan- 
 choly tone, " have pity on the most unfortunate man in the 
 world. For Heaven's sake, answer me a single question ! 
 Is this the town of Boston ? " 
 
 " You have recognized him now," said the virtuoso. " It 
 is Peter Rugg, the missing man. I chanced to meet him 
 the other day still in search of Boston, and conducted him 
 hither ; and, as he could not succeed in finding his friends, I 
 have taken him into my service as doorkeeper. He is some- 
 what too apt to ramble, but otherwise a man of trust and 
 integrity.'** 
 
 " And might I venture to ask," continued I, " to whom am 
 I indebted for this afternoon's gratification ? " 
 
 The virtuoso, before replying, laid his hand upon an an- 
 tique dart or javelin, the rusty steel head of which seemed 
 to have been blunted, as if it had encountered the resistance 
 of a tempered shield, or breastplate. 
 
 " My name has not been without its distinction in the 
 world for a longer period than that of any other man alive," 
 answered he. " Yet many doubt of my existence ; perhaps 
 you will do so to-morrow. This dart which I hold in my 
 hand was once grim Death's own weapon. It served him 
 well for the space of four thousand years ; but it iell bluuteJ 
 as you see, when he directed it against my breast." 
 
 These words were spoken with the calm and cold courtesy 
 of manner that had characterized this singular personage 
 throughout our interview. I fancied, it is time, that there 
 was a bitterness indefinably mingled with his tone, as of one 
 cut off from natural sympathies and blasted with a doom that 
 had been inflicted on no other human being, and by the re- 
 sults of which he had ceased to be human. Yet, withal, it 
 seemed one of the most terrible consequences of that doom 
 that the victim no longer regarded it as a calamity, but had 
 
2(J NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. 
 
 finally accepted it as the greatest good that could lave 
 befallen him. 
 
 " You are the Wandering Jew ! " exclaimed I. 
 
 The virtuoso bowed, without emotion of any kind, for, by 
 centuries of custom, he had almost lost the sense of strange- 
 ness in his fate, and was but imperfectly conscious of the 
 astonishment and awe with which it affected such as are 
 capable of death. 
 
 " Your doom is indeed a fearful one ! " said I, with irre- 
 pressible feeling and a frankness that afterwards startled me ; 
 " yet perhaps the ethereal spirit is not entirely extinct under 
 all tliis coiTupted or frozen mass of earthly life. Perhaps 
 the immortal spark may yet be rekindled by a breath of 
 heaven. Perhaps you may yet be permitted to die before it 
 is too late to live eternally. You have my prayers for such 
 a consummation. Farewell." 
 
 " Your prayers will be in vain," replied he, with a smile of 
 cold triumph. " My destiny is linked with the realities of 
 earth. You are welcome to your visions and shadows of a 
 future state ; but give me what I can see, and touch, and 
 understand, and I ask no more." 
 
 " It is indeed too late," thought I. " The soul is dead 
 within him." 
 
 Struggling between pity and horror, I extended my hand, 
 to which the virtuoso gave his own, still with the habitual 
 courtesy of a man of the world, but without a single heart- 
 throb of human brotherhood. The touch seemed like ice, 
 yet I know not whether morally or physically. As I de- 
 paried, he bade me observe that the inner door of the hall 
 was constructed with the ivory leaves of the gal-sway 
 through which JEneas and the Sibyl had been disn ir>sed 
 from Hades. 
 
DORA. 
 
 BY ALFRED TENNYSON. 
 
 WITH Fanner Allan at the farm abode 
 % William and Dora. William was his son, 
 And she his niece. He often looked at them, 
 And often thought, " I '11 make them man and wife." 
 Now Dora felt her uncle's will in all, 
 And yearned towards William ; but the youth, because 
 He had been always with her in the house, 
 Thought not of Dora. 
 
 Then there came a day 
 
 When Allan called his son, and said, " My son : 
 I married late, but I would wish to see 
 My grandchild on my knees before I die : 
 And I have set my heart upon a match. 
 Now therefore look to Dora ; she is well 
 To look to ; thrifty too beyond her age. 
 She is my brother's daughter : he and I 
 Had once hard words, and parted, and he died 
 In foreign lands ; but for his sake I bred 
 His daughter Dora : take her for your wife ; 
 For I have wished this marriage, night and day, 
 For many years." But William answered short 
 " I cannot marry Dora ; by my life, 
 I will not many Dora," Then the old man 
 Was wroth, and doubled up his hands, and said 
 
22 ALFRED TENNYSON. 
 
 " You will not, boy ! you dare to answer thus ! 
 But in my time a father's word was law, 
 And so it shall be now for me. Look to 't ; 
 Consider, William : take a month to think, 
 And let me have an answer to my wish ; 
 Or, by the Lord that made me, you shall pack, 
 And nevermore darken my doors again ! " 
 But William answered madly ; bit Ids lips, 
 And broke away. The more he looked at her, 
 The less he liked her ; and his ways were harsh ; 
 But Dora bore them meekly. Then before 
 The month was out he left his father's house, 
 And hired himself to work within the fields ; 
 And half in love, half spite, he wooed and wed 
 A laborer's daughter, Mary Morrison. 
 
 Then, when the bells were ringing, Allan called 
 His niece and said : " My girl, I love you well ; 
 But if you speak with him that was my son, 
 Or change a word with her he calls his wife, 
 My home is none of yours. My will is law." 
 And Dora promised, being meek. She thought, 
 " It cannot be : my uncle's mind will change ! " 
 
 And days went on, and there was born a boy 
 To William ; then distresses came on him ; 
 And day by day he passed his father's gate, 
 Heart-broken, and his father helped him not. 
 But Dora stored what little she could save, 
 And sent it them by stealth, nor did they know 
 Who sent it ; till at last a fever seized 
 On William, and in harvest-time he died. 
 
 Then Dora went to Mary. Mary sat 
 And looked with tears upon her boy, and thought 
 
DORA. 23 
 
 Hard tilings of Dora. Dora came and said : 
 
 " I have obeyed my uncle until now, 
 
 And I have sinned, for it was all through me 
 
 This evil came on William at the first. 
 
 But, Mary, for the sake of him that 's gone, 
 
 And for your sake, the woman that he chose, 
 
 Aw 1 for this orphan, I am come to you : 
 
 y ji, know there has not been for these five years 
 
 So full a harvest : let me take the boy, 
 
 And I will set him in my uncle's eye 
 
 Among the wheat ; that when his heart is glad 
 
 Of the full harvest, he may see the boy, 
 
 And bless him for the sake of him that 's gone. 
 
 And Dora took the child, and went her way 
 Across the wheat, and sat upon a mound 
 That was unsown ; where many poppies grew. 
 Far off the fanner came into the field, 
 And spied her not ; for none of all his men 
 Dare tell him Dora waited with the child ; 
 And Dora would have risen and gone to him, 
 But her heart failed her ; and the reapers reaped, 
 And the sun fell, and all the land was dark. 
 
 But when the morrow came, she rose and took 
 The child once more, and sat upon the mound ; 
 And made a little wreath of all the flowers 
 That grew about, and tied it round his hat 
 To make him pleasing in her uncle's eye. 
 Then when the farmer passed into the field 
 He spied her, and he left his men at work, 
 And came and said, " Where were you yesterday ? 
 Whose child is that ? What are you doing here ? " 
 So Dora cast her eyes upon the ground, 
 And answered softly, " This is William's child ! " 
 
24 ALFRED TENNYSON. 
 
 " And did I not," said Allan, " did I not 
 
 Forbid you, Dora ? " Dora said c.gain : 
 
 " Do with me as you will, but take the child, 
 
 And bless him for the sake of him that 's gone ! n 
 
 And Allan said, " I see it is a trick 
 
 Got up betwixt you and the woman there. 
 
 I must be taught my duty, and by you ! 
 
 You knew my word was law, and yet you dared 
 
 To slight it. Well for I will take the boy ; 
 
 "But go you hence, and never see me more." 
 
 So saying, he took the boy, that cried aloud 
 And struggled hard. The wreath of flowers fell 
 At Dora's feet. She bowed upon her hands, 
 And the boy's cry came to her from the field, 
 More and more distant. She bowed down liei head, 
 Remembering the day when first she came, 
 And all the things that had been. She bowed down 
 And wept in secret ; and the reapers reaped, 
 And the sun fell, and all the land was dark. 
 
 Then Dora went to Mary's house, and stood 
 Upon the threshold. Mary saw the boy 
 "Was not with Dora. She broke out in praise 
 To God, that helped her in her widowhood. 
 And Dora said, " My uncle took the boy ; 
 But, Mary, let me live and work with you : 
 He says that he will never see me more." 
 Then answered Mary, " This shall never be, 
 That thou shouldst take my trouble on thyself: 
 And, now I think, he shall not have the boy, 
 For he will teach him hardness, and to slight 
 His mother; therefore thou and I will go, 
 And I will have my boy, and bring him home , 
 And I will beg of him to take thee back ; 
 
DORA. 25 
 
 But if he will not take thee back again, 
 Then thou and I will live within one house, 
 And work for William's child, until he grows 
 Of age to help us." 
 
 So the women kissed 
 
 Each other, and set out and reached the farm. 
 The door was off the latch : they peeped and saw 
 The boy set up betwixt his grandsire's knees, 
 Who thrust him in the hollows of his arm, 
 And clapt him on the hands and on the cheeks, 
 Like one that loved him ; and the lad stretched out 
 And babbled for the golden seal that hung 
 From Allan's watch, and sparkled by the fire. 
 Then they came in ; but when the boy beheld 
 His mother, he cried out to come to her : 
 And Allan set him down, and Mary said : 
 
 " Father ! if you let me call you so 
 I never came a-begging for myself, 
 Or William, or this child ; but now I come 
 For Dora : take her back ; she loves you well. 
 
 Sir, when William died, he died at peace 
 With all men ; for I asked him, and he said, 
 He could not ever rue his marrying me. 
 
 1 had been a patient wife : but, Sir, he said 
 That he was wrong to cross his father thus : 
 
 1 God bless him ! ' he said, ' and may he never know 
 The troubles I have gone through ! ' Then he turned 
 His face and passed unhappy that I am ! 
 But now, Sir, let me have my boy, for you 
 Will make him hard, and he will learn to slight 
 His father's memory ; and take Dora back, 
 And let all this be as it was before." 
 
 So Mary said, and Dora hid her face 
 By Mary. There was silence in the room ; 
 
26 ALFRED TENNYSON. 
 
 And all at once the old man burst in sobs : 
 
 " I have been to blame to blame ! I have killed my son ! 
 
 I have killed him ! but I loved him my dear son ! 
 
 May God forgive me ! I have been to blame. 
 
 Kiss me, my children ! " 
 
 Then they clung about 
 
 The old man's neck, and kissed him many times. 
 And all the man was broken with remorse, 
 And nil his love came back a hundred-fold; 
 And for three hours he sobbed o'er William's child, 
 Thinking of William. 
 
 So those four abode 
 
 Within one house together ; and as years 
 Went forward, Mary took another mate ; 
 But Dora lived unmarried till her death. 
 
A TALE OF WITCHCRAFT 
 
 BY SIR WALTER SCOTT. 
 
 MARGARET BARCLAY, wife of Archibald Dein. 
 burgess of Irvine, had been slandered by her sister 
 in-la\v. Janet Lyal, the spouse of John Dein, brother of 
 Archibald, and by John Dein himself, as guilty of some act 
 of theft. Upon this provocation Margaret Barclay raised an 
 action of slander before the church court, which prosecution, 
 after some procedure, the kirk-session discharged, by direct- 
 ing a reconciliation between the parties. Nevertheless, al- 
 though the two women shook hands before the court, yet the 
 said Margaret Barclay declared that she gave her hand only 
 in obedience to the kirk-session, but that she still retained 
 her hatred and ill-will against John Dein and his wife Janet 
 Lyal. About this time the bark of John Dein was about to 
 sail for France, and Andrew Train, or Tran, Provost of the 
 burgh of Irvine, who was an owner of the vessel, went with 
 him, to superintend the commercial part of the voyage. Two 
 other merchants of some consequence went in the same ves- 
 sel, with a sufficient number of mariners. Margaret Barclay, 
 the revengeful person already mentioned, was heard to im- 
 precate curses upon the provost's argosy, praying to God 
 that sea nor salt-water might never bear the ship, and that 
 partans (crabs) might eat the crew at the bottom of the sea 
 When, under these auspices, the ship was absent on her 
 voyage, a vagabond fellow, named John Stewart, pretending 
 
28 SIR WALTER SCOTT. 
 
 to have knowledge of jugglery, and to possess the power of 
 a spaeman, came to the residence of Tran, the provost, and 
 dropped explicit hints that the ship was lost, and that the 
 good woman of the house was a widow. The sad truth was 
 afterward learned on more certain information. Two of the 
 seamen, after a space of doubt and anxiety, arrived with the 
 melancholy tidings that the bark of which John Dein was 
 skipper and Provost Tran part-owner had been wrecked on 
 the coast of England, near Padstow, when all on board had 
 been lost, except the two sailors who brought the notice. 
 Suspicion of sorcery, in those days easily awakened, was 
 fixed on Margaret Barclay, who had imprecated curses on 
 the ship ; and on John Stewart, the juggler, who had seemed 
 to know of the evil fate of the voyage before he could have 
 become acquainted with it by natural means. 
 
 Stewart, who was first apprehended, acknowledged that 
 Margaret Barclay, the other suspected person, had applied 
 to him to teach her some magic arts, " in order that she might 
 get gear, kye's milk, love of man, her heart's desire on such 
 persons as had done her wrong, and, finally, that she might 
 obtain the fruit of sea and land." Stewart declared that he 
 denied to Margaret that he possessed the said arts himself, 
 or had the power of communicating them. So far was well ; 
 but, true or false, he added a string of circumstances, whether 
 voluntarily declared or extracted by torture, which tended to 
 fix the cause of the loss of the bark on Margaret Barclay. 
 He had come, he said, to this woman's house in Irvine, 
 shortly after the ship set sail from harbor. He went to 
 Margaret's house by night, and found her engaged, with other 
 two women, in making clay figures ; one of the figures was 
 made handsome, with fair hair, supposed to represent Pro- 
 vost Tran. They then proceeded to mould a figure of a ship 
 in clay, and during this labor the Devil appeared to the 
 company in the shape of a handsome black lapdog, such as 
 ladies u=e to keep He added that the whole party left the 
 
A TALE OF WITCHCRAFT. 29 
 
 house together, and went into an empty waste-house nearer 
 the seaport, which house he pointed out to the city magis- 
 trates. From this house they went to the seaside, followed 
 by the black lapdog aforesaid, and cast hi the figures of claj 
 representing the ship and the men ; after which the sea raged 
 roared, and became red like the juice of madder in a dyer'* 
 caldron. 
 
 This confession having been extorted from the unfortunate 
 juggler, the female acquaintances of Margaret Barclay were 
 next convened, that he might point out her associates in form- 
 ing the charm, when he pitched upon a woman called Isobel 
 Insh, or Taylor, who resolutely denied having ever seen him 
 before. v She was imprisoned, however, in the belfry of the 
 church. An addition to the evidence against the poor old 
 woman Insh was then procured from her own daughter, Mar- 
 garet Tailzeour, a child of eight years old, who lived as ser- 
 vant with Margaret Barclay, the person principally accused. 
 This child, who was keeper of a baby belonging to Margaret 
 Barclay, either from terror, or the innate love of falsehood 
 which we have observed as proper to childhood, declared, 
 .that she was present when the fatal models of clay were 
 formed, and that, in plunging them in the sea, Margaret Bar- 
 clay, her mistress, and her mother, Isobel Insh, were assisted 
 by another woman, and a girl of fourteen years old, who 
 dwelt at the town-head. Legally considered, the evidence 
 of this child was contradictory, and inconsistent with the con- 
 fession of the juggler, for it assigned other particulars and 
 dramatis persona in many respects different. But all was 
 accounted sufficiently regular, especially since the girl failed 
 not to swear to the presence of the black dog, to whose ap- 
 pearance she also added the additional terrors of that of a 
 black man. The dog also, according to her account, emitted 
 flashes from its jaws and nostrils, to illuminate the witches 
 during the performance of the spell. The child maintained 
 this tory even to her mother's face only alleging that Isobel 
 
.".0 SIR WALTKR SCOTT. 
 
 Insli remained behind in the waste-house, and was not pres- 
 cut when tlic images were, put into the sea. Kor her own 
 countenance and presence on the occasion, and to insure her 
 secrecy, her mistress promised her a pair of new shoes. 
 
 John Stewart, being re-examined, and confronted with the 
 child, was easily compelled to allow that the "little smatoh- 
 et" was there, and to give; that marvellous account of hid 
 correspondence with Klfland, which we have given else- 
 where.. 
 
 The conspiracy thus far, ;us they conceived, disclosed, the 
 magistrates and ministers wrought hard with Jsohel Insh, tc 
 prevail upon her to tell the, truth ; and she at len-jth acknowl- 
 edged her presence at the time when the models of the ship 
 and mariners were destroyed, but endeavored 80 to modify 
 her declaration as to deny all personal accession to the guilt. 
 This poor creature almost admitted the supernatural powers 
 imputed to her, promising liailie Dunlop (also a mariner), 
 by whom she was imprisoned, that if he would dismi.-s her, 
 he should never make a had voyage, hut have success in all 
 his dealings by sea and land. She was finally brought to 
 promise that she would fully confess the whole that she knew 
 of the affair on the morrow. 
 
 But finding herself in so hard a strait, the unfortunate 
 woman made use of the darkness to attempt an escape. 
 AVith this view she got out by a hack window of the belfry, 
 although, says the report, there were "iron bolts, locks, and 
 fetters on her"; and attained the roof of the church, where, 
 losing her footing, she sustained a severe fall, and was greatly 
 bruised. IJcing apprehended, ]>ailie Dunlop again urged 
 her to confess; but the poor woman was determined to ap- 
 peal to a more merciful tribunal, and maintained her inno- 
 cence to the last minute of her life, denying all that she had 
 formerly admitted, and dying five days after her fall from 
 the roof of the church. The inhabitants of Irvine attributed 
 her death to poisqn. 
 
A TALE OF WITCHCRAFT. .') 1 
 
 The seem thicken, for a commission was grunted 
 
 for the trial of the two remaining persons accused, namely, 
 Stewart the juggler and Margaret Barclay. The day of 
 trial being arrived, the following singular events took place, 
 which we give as stated in the record. 
 
 " My Lord and Earl of Kglintoune (who Iwelln -vitliin 
 the space of one mile to the said burgh), having eomo 
 to the said burgh at the earnest request of the said Justices, 
 .ing to them of his lordship's countenance, concur- 
 and assistance, in trying of the aforesaid devilish 
 practices, conform to the tenor of the foresaid commission, 
 the said John Stewart, for his better preserving to the 
 day of the'^issize, was put in a sure lockfast booth, where 
 no manner of person might have accc.-s to him till the 
 -Siting of the Justice Court, and for avoiding of putting 
 violent hands on himself, he was very strictly guarded, and 
 fettered by the arms, as use is. And upon that same day 
 of the assize, about half an hour before the downsitting oi' 
 the Justice Court, Mr. David Dickson, minister at Irvine, 
 and Mr. George Dunbar, minister of Air, having gone to 
 him, to exhort him to call on his God for mercy for his by- 
 gone wicked and evil life, and that God would of his infinite 
 mercy loose him out of the bonds of the Devil, whom he 
 had served these many years bygone, he acquiesced in their 
 prayer and godly exhortation, and uttered these words : ' I 
 am so straitly guarded, that it lies not in my power to get rny 
 hand to take off my bonnet, nor to get bread to my mouth.' 
 And immediately after the departing of the two ministers 
 from him, the juggler being sent for at the desire of my Lord 
 of Kglintoune, to be confronted with a woman of the burgh 
 of Air, called Janet Bous, who was apprehended by the 
 rates of the burgh of Air for witchcraft, and sent to 
 the burgh of Irvine purposely for that affair, he was found 
 by the burgh officers who went about him, strangled and 
 hanged by the cruik of the door, with a tail of hemp, or 
 
32 ,:>iR WALTER SCOfT. 
 
 a string made of hemp, supposed to have been his garter 
 or string of his bonnet, not above the length of two span 
 long, his knees not being from the ground half a span, 
 and was brought out of the house, his life not being totally 
 expelled. But, notwithstanding of whatsoever means used 
 in the contrary for remeid of his life, he revived not, but 
 so ended his life miserably, by the help of the Devil his 
 master. 
 
 " And because there was then only in life the said ulaaga- 
 ret Barclay, and that the persons summoned to pass upon her 
 assize, and upon the assize of the juggler, who, by the help 
 of the Devil his master, had put violent hands on himself, 
 were all present within the said burgh ; therefore, and for 
 eschewing of the like in the person of the said Margaret, 
 our sovereign lord's justices in that part, particularly above- 
 named, constituted by commission, after solemn deliberation 
 and advice of the said noble lord, whose concurrence and 
 advice was chiefly required and taken in this matter, con- 
 cluded with all possible diligence before the downsitting of 
 the Justice Court, to put the said Margaret in torture ; in 
 respect the Devil, by God's permission, had made her asso- 
 ciates, who were the lights of the cause, to be their own 
 burr toes (slayers). They used the torture underwritten, as 
 being most safe and gentle (as the said noble lord assured 
 the said justices), by putting of her two bare legs in a pair 
 of stocks, and thereafter by onlaying of certain iron gauds 
 (bars), severally, one by one, and then eiking and augment- 
 ing the weight by laying on more gauds, and in easing of 
 her by offtaking of the iron gauds one or more, as occasion 
 offered, which iron gauds were but little short gauds, and 
 broke not the skin of her legs, &c. 
 
 " After using of the which kind of gentle torture, the said 
 Margaret began, according to the increase of the pain, to 
 cry, and crave for God's cause to take off her sliins the fore- 
 said irons, and she should declare truly the whole matter 
 
A TALE OF WITCHCRAFT. 33 
 
 Which being removed, she began at her former denial : and 
 being of new assayed in torture as of befoir, she then uttered 
 these words : ' Take off, take off, and before God I shall 
 show you the whole form ! ' 
 
 " And the said irons being of new, upon her faithful! 
 promise, removed, she then desired my Lord of Eglintoune, 
 the said four justices, and the said Mr. David Dickson, min- 
 ister of the burgh, Mr. George Dunbar, minister of Ayr, 
 and Mr. Mitchell Wallace, minister of Kilmarnock, and Mr. 
 John Cunninghame, minister of Dairy, and Hugh Kennedy, 
 provost of Ayr, to come by themselves, and to remove all 
 others, and she should declare truly, as she should answer to 
 God, the whole matter. Whose desire hi that being fulfilled, 
 she made her confession in this manner, but (i. e. without) 
 any kind of demand, freely, without interrogation ; God's 
 name by earnest prayer being called upon for opening of 
 her lips, and easing of her heart, that she, by rendering of 
 the truth, might glorify and magnify his holy name, and dis- 
 appoint the enemy of her salvation." Trial of Margaret 
 Barclay, $c., 1618. 
 
 Margaret Barclay, who was a young and lively person, 
 had hitherto conducted herself like a passionate and high- 
 tempered woman innocently accused, and the only appear- 
 ance of conviction obtained against her was, that she carried 
 about her rowan-tree and colored thread, to make, as she 
 said, her cow give milk, when it began to fail. But the 
 gentle torture a strange junction of words recommended 
 as an anodyne by the good Lord Eglinton, the placing, 
 namely, her legs in the stocks, and loading her bare shins 
 with bars of iron, overcame her resolution : when, at her 
 screams and declarations that she was willing to tell all, the 
 weights were removed. She then told a story of destroying 
 the ship of John Dein, affirming that it was with the pur- 
 pose of killing only her brother-in-law and Provost Tran, 
 and saving the rest of the crew. She at the same time in- 
 
 3 
 
34 SIR WALTER SCOTT. 
 
 volved in the guilt Isobel Crawford. This poor woman was 
 also apprehended, and, in great terror, confessed the imputed 
 crime, retorting the principal blame on Margaret Barclay 
 herself. The trial was then appointed to proceed, when 
 Alexander Dean, the husband of Margaret Barclay, ap- 
 peared in court with a lawyer to act in liis wife's behalf. 
 Apparently, the sight of her husband awakened some hope 
 and desire of life, for when the prisoner was asked by the 
 lawyer whether she wished to be defended, she answered, 
 '* As you please. But all I have confessed was in agony of 
 torture ; and, before God, all I have spoken is false and 
 untrue." To which she pathetically added, " Ye have been 
 too long in .coming." 
 
 The jury, unmoved by these affecting circumstances, pro- 
 ceeded upon the principle that the confession of the accused 
 could not be considered as made under the influence of tor- 
 ture, since the bars were not actually upon her limbs at the 
 time it was delivered, although they were placed at her 
 elbow, ready to be again laid on her bare shins, if she was 
 less explicit in her declaration than her auditors wished. 
 On this nice distinction, they in one voice found Margaret 
 Barclay guilty. It is singular that she should have again 
 returned to her confession after sentence, and died affirming 
 it ; the explanation of which, however, might be, either 
 that she had really in her ignorance and folly tampered 
 with some idle spells, or that an apparent penitence for her 
 offence, however imaginary, was the only mode in which she 
 could obtain any share of public sympathy at her death, or 
 a portion of the prayers of the clergy and congregation, 
 which, in her circumstances, she might be willing to pur- 
 chase, even by confession of what all believed respecting 
 her. It is remarkable, that she earnestly entreated the 
 magistrates that no harm should be done to Isobel Craw- 
 ford, the woman whom she had herself accused. This un- 
 fortunate young creature was strangled at the stake, and her 
 
A TALE OF WITCHCRAFT. 35 
 
 body burned to ashes, having died with many expressions of 
 religion and penitence. 
 
 It was one fatal consequence of these cruel persecutions, 
 that one pile was usually lighted at the embers of another. 
 Accordingly, in the present case, three victims having al- 
 ready perished by this accusation, the magistrates, incensed 
 at the nature of the crime, so perilous as it seemed to men 
 of a maritime life, and at a loss of several friends of their 
 own, one of whom had been their principal magistrate, did 
 not forbear to insist against Isobel Crawford, inculpated by 
 Margaret Barclay's confession. A new commission was 
 granted for her trial, and after the assistant minister of Ir- 
 vine, Mr.JDavid Dickson, had made earnest prayers to God 
 for opening her obdurate and closed heart, she was subjected 
 to the torture of iron bars laid upon her bare shins, her feet 
 being in the stocks, as in the case of Margaret Barclay. 
 
 She endured this torture with incredible firmness, since 
 she did " admirably, without any kind of din or exclamation, 
 suffer above thirty stone of iron to be laid on her legs, never 
 shrinking thereat in any sort, but remaining, as it were, 
 steady." But in shifting the situation of the iron bars, and 
 removing them to another part of her shins, her constanc-y 
 gave way; she broke out into horrible cries (though nol 
 more than three bars were then actually on her person) 
 of "Tak aff! tak aff!" On being relieved from the tor- 
 ture, she made the usual confession of all that she was 
 charged with, and of a connection with the Devil which had 
 subsisted for several years. Sentence was given against her 
 accordingly. After this had been denounced, she openly 
 denied all her former confessions, and died without any 
 sign of repentance, offering repeated interruptions to the 
 minister in his prayer, and absolutely refusing to pardon the 
 executioner. 
 
 This tragedy happened in the year 1613, and recorded as 
 it is very particularly, and at considerable length, forms the 
 
36 SIR WALTER SCOTT. 
 
 most detailed specimen I have met with, Df a Scottish trial 
 for witchcraft, illustrating, in particular, how poor wretches 
 abandoned, as they conceived, by God and the world, de- 
 prived of all human sympathy, and exposed to personal tor- 
 tures of an acute description, became disposed to throw away 
 the lives that were rendered bitter to them, by a voluntary 
 confession of guilt, rather than struggle hopelessly against 
 go many evils. Four persons here lost their lives, merely 
 because the throwing sorae clay models into the sea, a fact 
 told differently by tho vitnesses who spoke of it, corresponded 
 with the season, for no day was fixed, in which a particular 
 vessel was lost. It is scarce possible that, after reading such 
 a story, a man of sense can listen for an instant to the evi- 
 dence founded on confessions thus obtained, which has been 
 almost the sole reason by which a few individuals, even in 
 modern times, have endeavored to justify a belief in the 
 existence of witchcraft. 
 
 The result of the judicial examination of a criminal, when 
 extorted by such means, is the most suspicious of all evidence, 
 and even when voluntarily given, is scarce admissible, with- 
 out the corroboration of other testimony. 
 
ONE WORD MORE. 
 
 TO E. B. B. 
 
 BY ROBERT BROWNING. 
 
 fTlHERE they are, my fifty men and women 
 
 Naming me the fifty poems finished I 
 Take them, Love, the book * and me together. 
 Where the heart lies, let the brain lie also. 
 
 n. 
 
 Rafael made a century of sonnets, 
 
 Made and wrote them in a certain volume 
 
 Dinted with the silver-pointed pencil 
 
 Else he only used to draw Madonnas : 
 
 These, the world might view, but One, the volume. 
 
 Who that one, you ask ? Your heart instructs you. 
 
 Did she live and love it all her lifetime ? 
 
 Did she drop, his lady of the sonnets, 
 
 Die, and let it drop beside her pillow 
 
 Where it lay in place of Rafael's glory, 
 
 Rafael's cheek so duteous and so loving, 
 
 Cheek, the world was wont to hail a painter's, 
 
 Rafael's cheek, her love had turned a poet's ? 
 
 * Referring to his volume of Poems entitled " Men and Women." 
 
38 ROBERT BROWNING. 
 
 III. 
 
 You and I would rather read that volume, 
 (Taken to his beating bosom by it,) 
 Lean and list the bosom-beats of Rafael, 
 Would we not ? than wonder at Madonnas 
 . Her, San Sisto names, and Her, Foligno, 
 Her, that visits Florence in a vision, 
 Her, that 's left with lilies in the Louvre 
 Seen by us and all the world in circle. 
 
 IV. 
 
 You and I will never read that volume. 
 
 Guido Reni, like his own eye's apple 
 
 Guarded long the treasure-book and loved it. 
 
 Guido Reni dying, all Bologna 
 
 Cried, and the world with it, " Ours the treasure! 1 
 
 Suddenly, as rare things will, it vanished. 
 
 v. 
 
 Dante once prepared to paint an angel : 
 Whom to please ? You whisper, " Beatrice." 
 While he mused and traced it and retraced it, 
 (Perad venture with a pen corroded 
 Still by drops of that hot ink he dipped for, 
 When, his left-hand i' the hair o' the wicked, 
 Back he held the brow and pricked its stigma, 
 Bit into the live man's flesh for parchment, 
 Loosed Mm, laughed to see the writing rankle, 
 Let the wretch go festering through Florence,) 
 Dante, who loved well because he hated, 
 Hated wickedness that hinders loving, 
 Dante standing, studying his angel, 
 In there broke the folk of his Inferno. 
 Says he, " Certain people of importance " 
 
ONE WORD MORE. 39 
 
 (Such he gave his daily, dreadful line to) 
 Entered and would seize, forsooth, the poet. 
 Says the poet, " Then I stopped my painting." 
 
 VI. 
 
 You and I would rather see that angel, 
 Painted by the tenderness of Dante, 
 Would we not ? than read a fresh Inferno. 
 
 vn. 
 
 You and I will never see that picture. 
 Whilq he mused on love and Beatrice, 
 While he softened o'er his outlined angel, 
 In they broke, those " people of importance " : 
 We and Bice bear the loss forever. 
 
 vm. 
 What of Rafael's sonnets, Dante's picture ? 
 
 rx. 
 
 This : no artist lives and loves that longs not 
 
 Once, and only once, and for One only, 
 
 (Ah, the prize !) to find his love a language 
 
 Fit and fair and simple and sufficient 
 
 .Using nature that 's an art to others, 
 
 Not, this one time, art that 's turned his nature. 
 
 Ay, of all the artists living, loving, 
 
 None but would forego his proper dowry, 
 
 Does he paint ? he fain would write a poem, 
 
 Does he write ? he fain would paint a picture. 
 
 Put to proof art alien to the artist's, 
 
 Once, and only once, and for One only, 
 
 So to be the man and leave the artist, 
 
 Save the man's joy, miss the artist's sorrow. 
 
40 ROBERT BROWNING. 
 
 Wherefore ? Heaven's gift takes earth's abatement ! 
 
 He who smites the rock and spreads the water, 
 
 Bidding drink and live a crowd beneath him, 
 
 Even he, the minute makes immortal, 
 
 Proves, perchance, his mortal in the minute, 
 
 Desecrates, belike, the deed in doing. 
 
 While he smites, how can he but remember, 
 
 So he smote before, in such a peril, 
 
 When they stood and mocked, " Shall smiting help us ? ' 
 
 When they drank and sneered, " A stroke is easy ! " 
 
 When they wiped their mouths and went their journey, 
 
 Throwing him for thanks, " But drought was pleasant." 
 
 Thus old memories mar the actual triumph ; 
 
 Thus the doing savors of disrelish ; 
 
 Thus achievement lacks a gracious somewhat ; 
 
 O'er-importuned brows becloud the mandate, 
 
 Carelessness or consciousness, the gesture. 
 
 For he bears an ancient wrong about him, 
 
 Sees and knows again those phalanxed faces, 
 
 Hears, yet one time more, the 'customed prelude, 
 
 " How should'st thou, of all men, smite, and save us ? " 
 
 Guesses what is like to prove the sequel, 
 
 " Egypt;' 8 flesh-pots, nay, the drought was better." 
 
 XI. 
 
 O, the crowd must have emphatic warrant ! 
 Theirs, the Sinai-forehead's cloven brilliance, 
 Right-arm's rod-sweep, tongue's imperial fiat 
 Never dares the man put off the prophet 
 
 XII. 
 
 Did he love one face from out the thousands, 
 (Were she Jethro's daughter, white and wifely. 
 
ONE WORD MORE. 41 
 
 Were she but the ^Ethiopian bondslave,) 
 He would envy yon dumb, patient camel, 
 Keeping a reserve of scanty water 
 Meant to save his own life in the desert ; 
 Ready in the desert to deliver 
 (Kneeling down to let his breast be opened) 
 Hoard and life together for his mistress. 
 
 xm. 
 
 I shall never, in the years remaining, 
 
 Paint you pictures, no, nor carve you statues, 
 
 Make you music that should all-express me ; 
 
 So it seems : I stand on my attainment. 
 
 This of verse alone, one life allows me ; 
 
 Verse and nothing else have I to give you. 
 
 Other heights in other lives, God willing, 
 
 All the gifts from all the heights, your own, Love ! 
 
 XIV. 
 
 Yet a semblance of resource avails us, 
 
 Shade so finely touched, love's sense must seize it. 
 
 Take these lines, look lovingly and nearly, 
 
 Lines I write the first time and the last time. 
 
 He who works in fresco, steals a hair-brush, 
 
 Curbs the liberal hand, subservient proudly, 
 
 Cramps his spirit, crowds its all in little, 
 
 Makes a strange art of an art familiar, 
 
 Fills his lady's missal-marge with flowerets. 
 
 He who blows through bronze, may breathe through silver, 
 
 Fitly serenade a slumbrous princess. 
 
 He who writes, may write for once, as I do. 
 
 xv. 
 
 Love, you saw me gather men and women, 
 Live or dead or fashioned by my fancy, 
 
42 EGBERT BROKING. 
 
 Enter each and all, and use their service, 
 
 Speak from every mouth, the speech, a poem. 
 
 Hardly shall I tell my joys and sorrows, 
 
 Hopes and fears, belief and disbelieving : 
 
 I am mine and yours, the rest be all men's, 
 
 Karshook, Cleon, Norbert and the fifty. 
 
 Let me speak this once in my true person, 
 
 Not as Lippo, Roland, or Andrea, 
 
 Though the fruit of speech be just this sentence, 
 
 Pray you, look on these my men and women, 
 
 Take and keep my fifty poems finished ; 
 
 Where my heart lies, let my brain lie also ! 
 
 Poor the speech ; be how I speak, for all things. 
 
 XVI. 
 
 Not but that you know me ! Lo, the moon's self! 
 Here in London, yonder late in Florence, 
 Still we find her face, the thrice-transfigured. 
 Curving on a sky imbrued with color, 
 Drifted over Fiesole by twilight, 
 Came she, our new crescent of a hair's-breadth. 
 Full she flared it, lamping Samminiato, 
 Rounder 'twixt the cypresses and rounder, 
 Perfect till the nightingales applauded. 
 Now, a piece of her old self, impoverished, 
 Hard to greet, she traverses the house-roofs, 
 Hurries with unhandsome thrift of silver, 
 Goes dispiritedly, glad to finish. 
 
 XVII. 
 
 What, there 's nothing in the moon noteworthy ? 
 Nay, for if that moon could love a mortal, 
 Use, to charm him, (so to fit a fancy,) 
 All her magic, ('t is the old sweet mythos,) 
 She would turn a new side to her mortal, 
 
ONE WORD MORE. 4i 
 
 Side unseen of herdsman, huntsman, steersman, 
 
 Blank to Zoroaster on his terrace, 
 
 Blind to Galileo on his turret, 
 
 Dumb to Homer, dumb to Keats, him, even ! 
 
 Think, the wonder of the moonstruck mortal, 
 
 "When she turns round, comes again in heaven, 
 
 Opens out anew for worse or better ? 
 
 Proves she like some portent of an iceberg 
 
 Swimming full upon the ship it founders, 
 
 Hungry with huge teeth of splintered crystals ? 
 
 Proves she as the paved-work of a sapphire 
 
 Seen by Moses when he climbed the mountain ? 
 
 Moses, Aaron, Nadab, and Abihu 
 
 Climbed and saw the very God, the Highest, 
 
 Stand upon the paved-work of a sapphire. 
 
 Like the bodied heaven in his clearness 
 
 Shone the stone, the sapphire of that paved-work, 
 
 "When they ate and drank and saw God also ! 
 
 XVIII. 
 
 What were seen ? None knows, none ever shall know. 
 
 Only this is sure, the sight were other, 
 
 Not the moon's same side, born late in Florence, 
 
 Dying now impoverished here in London. 
 
 God be thanked, the meanest of his creatures 
 
 Boasts two soul-sides, one to face the world with, 
 
 One to show a woman when he loves her. 
 
 XIX. 
 
 This I say of me, but think of you, Love ! 
 
 This to you, yourself my moon of poets ! 
 
 Ah, but that 's the world's side, there 's the wonder 
 
 Thus they see you, praise you, think they know you. 
 
 There, in turn I stand with them and praise you. 
 
44 ROBERT BROWNING. 
 
 Out of my own self, I dare to phrase it 
 But the best is when I glide from out them, 
 Cross a step or two of dubious twilight, 
 Come out on the other side, the novel 
 Silent silver lights, and darks undreamed of, 
 Where I hush and bless myself with silence. 
 
 xx. 
 
 O, their Rafael of the dear Madonnas, 
 0, their Dante of the dread Inferno, 
 Wrote one song and in my brain I sing it, 
 Drew one angel borne, see, on my bosom ! 
 
IN A SKYE BOTHY. 
 
 BY ALEXANDER SMITH. 
 
 MAN is an ease-loving animal, with a lingering affec- 
 tion 'Cor Arcadian dales ; under the shadow of whose 
 trees shepherd boys are piping " as they would never grow 
 old." Human nature is a vagabond still, maugre the six 
 thousand years of it, and amuses itself with dreams of soci- 
 eties free and unrestrained. It is this vagabond feeling 
 in the blood which draws one so strongly to Shakespeare. 
 That sweet and liberal nature of his blossomed into all 
 wild human generosities. "As You Like It" is a vaga- 
 bond play ; and, verily, if there waved in any wind that 
 blows upon the earth a forest, peopled as Aj-den's was in 
 Shakespeare's imagination, with an exiled king drawing 
 the sweetest, humanest lessons from misfortune, a melan- 
 choly Jaques stretched by the river's brink, moralizing on 
 the bleeding deer, a fair Rosalind chanting her saucy 
 cuckoo song, fools like Touchstone (not like those of our 
 acquaintance, reader), and the whole place from centre to 
 circumference filled with mighty oak-bolls, all carven with 
 lovers' names ; I would, be my worldly prospects what they 
 may, pack up at once and join that vagabond company. For 
 there I should find more gallant courtesies, finer sentiments, 
 completer innocence and happiness, than I am like to dis- 
 cover here, although I search for them from shepherd's cot 
 to king's palace. Just to think how these people lived 
 
46 ALEXANDER SMITH. 
 
 Carelessly as the blossoming trees, happily as the singing 
 birds ; time measured only by the acorn's patter on the 
 fruitful soil. A world without debtor or creditor ; passing 
 rich, yet with never a doit in its purse ; with no sordid 
 cares, no regard for appearances ; nothing to occupy the 
 young but love-making; nothing to occupy the old but 
 listening to the " sermons in stones," and perusing the 
 musical wisdom which dwells in " running brooks." Ar- 
 den forest, alas ! is not rooted in the earth : it draws 
 sustenance from a poet's brain ; and the light asleep on 
 its leafy billows is that " that yet never was seen on sea or 
 shore." But one cannot help dreaming of such a place, and 
 striving to approach as nearly as possible to its sweet 
 conditions. 
 
 I am quite alone here : England may have been invaded 
 and London sacked for aught I know. Several weeks 
 since, a newspaper, accidentally blown to my solitude, in- 
 formed me that the Great Eastern had been got under 
 weigh, and was then swinging at the Nore. There is great 
 joy, I perceive. Human nature stands astonished at itself; 
 felicitates itself on its remarkable talent, and will for 
 months to come purr complacently over its achievement in 
 magazines and reviews. A fine world, messieurs, that will 
 attain to heaven if in the power of steam. A very line 
 world ; yet for ah 1 that, I have withdrawn from it for a 
 time, and would rather not hear of its remarkable exploits. 
 In my present mood I do not value them that coil of vapor 
 on the brow of Blavin, which, as I gaze, smoulders into 
 nothing in the fire of sunrise. 
 
 Goethe, in his memorable book, '* Truth and Poetry," 
 informs his readers that in his youtli he loved to shelter 
 himself in the Scripture narratives, from the marching and 
 counter-marching of armies, the cannonading, retreating, 
 and fighting, that lay everywhere around him. He shut 
 his eyes, as it were, and a whole war-convulsed Europe 
 
IN A SKYE BOTHY. 47 
 
 wheeled away into silence and distance, and in its place, 
 lo ! the patriarchs, with their tawny tents, their man-ser- 
 vants and maid-servants, and countless flocks in impercep- 
 tible procession whitening the Syrian plains. In this my 
 green solitude, I appreciate the full sweetness of the pas- 
 sage. Everything here is silent as the Bible plains them- 
 selves. I am cut off from former scenes and associates as 
 by the sullen Styx and the grim ferrying of Charon's boat. 
 The noise of the world does not touch me. I live too far 
 inland to hear the thunder of the reef. To this place no , 
 postman comes, no tax-gatherer. This region never heard 
 the sound of the church-going bell. The land is pagan as 
 when the yellow-haired Norseman landed a thousand years 
 ago. I almost feel a pagan myself. Not using a notched 
 stick, I have lost all count of time, and don't know Satur- 
 day from Sunday. Civilization is like a soldier's stock; it 
 makes you carry your head a good deal higher, makes the 
 angels weep a little more at your fantastic tricks, and half 
 suffocates you the while. I have thrown it away, and 
 breathe freely. My bed is the heather, my mirror the 
 stream from the hills, my comb and brush the sea-breeze, 
 my watch the sun, my theatre the sunset, and my evening ser- 
 vice not without a rude natural religion in it watching 
 the pinnacles of the hills of Cuchullin sharpening in intense 
 purple against the pallid orange of the sky, or listening to 
 the melancholy voices of the sea-birds and the tide ; that 
 over, I am asleep till touched by the earliest splendor of 
 the dawn. I am, not without reason, hugely enamored of 
 my vagabond existence. 
 
 My bothy is situated on the shores of one of the lochs 
 that intersect Skye. The coast Ls bare and rocky, hollowed 
 into fantastic chambers : and when the tide is making, every 
 cavern murmurs like a sea-shell. The land, from frequent 
 rain green as emerald, rises into soft pastoral heights, and 
 about a mile inland soars suddenly up into peaks* of baa- 
 
48 ALEXANDER SMITH. 
 
 tard marble, white as the cloud under which the lark sings 
 at noon, bathed in rosy light at sunset. In front are the 
 Cuchullin hills and the monstrous peak of Blavin ; then 
 the green Strath runs narrowing out to sea, and the Island 
 of Rum, with a white cloud upon it, stretches like a gigan- 
 tic shadow across the entrance of the loch, and completes 
 the scene. Twice every twenty-four hours the Atlantic tide 
 sets in upon hollowed shores ; twice is the sea withdi awn, 
 leaving spaces of green sand on which mermaids with 
 .golden combs might sleek alluring tresses ; and black rocks, 
 heaped with brown dulse and tangle, and lovely ocean 
 blooms of purple and orange ; and bare islets, marked 
 at full of tide by a glimmer of pale-green amid the univer- 
 sal sparkle, where most the sea-fowl love to congregate. 
 To these islets, on favorable evenings, come the crows, and 
 sit in sable parliament ; business despatched, they start into 
 air as at a gun, and stream away through the sunset to 
 their roosting-place in the Armadale woods. The shore 
 supplies for me the place of books and companions. Of 
 course Blavin and Cuchullin hills are the chief attractions, 
 and I never weary watching them. In the morning they 
 wear a great white caftan of mist ; but that lifts away before 
 noon, and they stand with all their scars and passionate 
 torrent-lines bare to the blue heavens ; with perhaps a soli- 
 tary shoulder for a moment gleaming wet to the sunlight. 
 After a while a vapor begins to steam up from their abysses, 
 gathering itself into strange shapes, knotting and twisting 
 itself like smoke ; while above, the terrible crests are now 
 lost, now revealed, in a stream of flying rack. In an hour 
 a wall of rain, gray as granite, opaque as iron, stands^ up 
 from the sea to heaven. The loch is roughening before 
 the wind, and the islets, black dots a second ago, are 
 patches of roaring foam. You hear the fierce sound of 
 its coming. The lashing tempest sweeps over you, and 
 looking behind, up the long inland glen, you can see on 
 
IN A SKYE BOTHY. 49 
 
 the birch woods, and on the sides of the hills, driven on the 
 wind, the white smoke of the rain. Though fierce as a 
 charge of Highland bayonets, these squalls are seldom of 
 long duration, and you bless them when you creep from 
 your shelter, for out comes the sun, and the birch woods 
 are twinkling, and more intensely flash the levels of the 
 sea, and at a stroke the clouds are scattered from the wet 
 brow of Blavin, and to the whole a new element is added, 
 the voice of the swollen stream as it rushes over a hun- 
 dred tiny cataracts, and roars river-broad into the sea, mak- 
 ing turbid the azure. Then I have my amusements in 
 this solitary place. The mountains are of course open, and 
 this morning at dawn a roe swept past me like the wind, 
 nose to the dewy ground, " tracking," they call it here. 
 Above all, I can wander on the ebbed beach. Hogg 
 speaks of that 
 
 " Undefined and mingled hum, 
 Voice of the desert, never dumb." 
 
 But far more than the murmuring and insecty air of the 
 moorland, does the wet chirk-chirking of the living shore 
 give one the idea of crowded and multitudinous life. Did 
 the reader ever hunt razor-fish ? not sport like tiger- 
 hunting, I admit ; yet it has its pleasures and excitements, 
 and can kill a forenoon for an idle man agreeably. On the 
 wet sands yonder the razor-fish are spouting like the foun- 
 tains at Versailles on a fete day. The sly fellow sinks on 
 discharging his watery feu de joie. If you are quickly 
 after him through the sand, you catch him, and then comes 
 the tug of war. Address and dexterity are required. If 
 you pull vigorously, he slips out of his sheath a " mother- 
 naked " mollusk, and escapes. If you do your spiriting 
 gently, you drag him up to light, a long, thin case, with a 
 white fishy bulb protruding at one end like a root, Rinse 
 him in sea-water, toss him into your basket, and plunge 
 
 4 
 
50 ALEXANDER SMITH. 
 
 after another watery flash. These razor-fish are excellent 
 eating, the people say ; and when used as bait, no fish that 
 swims the ocean stream, cod, whiting, haddock, flat skate 
 broad-shouldered, crimson bream, not the detested dog- 
 fish himself, this summer swarming in every loch and be- 
 cursed by every fisherman, can keep himself off the 
 hook, and in an hour your boat is laden with glittering 
 spoil. Then if you take your gun to the low islands, 
 and you can go dry-shod at ebb of tide, you have your 
 chance of sea-fowl. Gulls of all kinds are there, dookers 
 and divers of every description ; flocks of shy curlews, 
 and specimens of a hundred tribes, to which my limited 
 ornithological knowledge cannot furnish a name. The 
 Solan goose yonder falls from heaven into the water like 
 a meteor-stone. See the solitary scart, with long, narrow 
 wing and outstretched neck, shooting toward some distant 
 promontory ! Anon, high overhead, come wheeling a 
 covey of lovely sea-swallows. You fire ; one flutters down 
 never more to skim the horizon or to dip in the sea 
 sparkle. Lift it up; is it not beautiful? The wild keen 
 eye is closed, but you see the delicate slate-color of the 
 wings, and the long tail-feathers white as the creaming 
 foam. There is a stain of blood on the breast, hardly 
 brighter than the scarlet of its beak and feet. Lay it 
 down, for its companions are dashing round and round, 
 uttering harsh cries of rage and sorrow ; and had you the 
 heart, you could shoot them one by one. At ebb of tide 
 wild-looking children, from turf-cabins on the hillside, come 
 down to hunt shell-fish. Even now a troop is busy ; how 
 their shrill voices go the while ! Old Effie, I see, is out 
 to-day, quite a picturesque object with her white cap and 
 red shawl. With a tin can in 'one hand, an old reaping- 
 hook in the other, she goes poking among the tangle. Let 
 us see what sport she has had. She turns round at our 
 salutation, very old, old almost as the worn rocks around 
 
IX A SKYE BOTHY. 51 
 
 She might ha\ e been the wife of Wordsworth's " Leech- 
 gatherer." Her can is sprawling with brown crabs ; and 
 opening her apron, she exhibits a large black and blue 
 lobster, a fellow such as she alone can capture. A queer 
 woman is Effie, and an awsome. She is familiar with 
 ghosts and apparitions. She can relate leg-ends that have 
 power over the superstitious blood, and with little coaxing 
 will sing those wild Gaelic songs of hers, of dead lights 
 on the sea, of fishing-boats going down in squalls, of un- 
 buried bodies tossing day and night upon the gray peaks 
 of the waves, and of girls that pray God to lay them by 
 the sides of their drowned lovers ; although for them should 
 never risa mass nor chant, and although their flesh should 
 be torn asunder by the wild fishes of the sea. 
 
 Rain is my enemy here, and at this writing I am suffer- 
 ing siege. For three days this rickety dwelling has stood 
 assault of wind and rain. Yesterday a blast breached the 
 door, and the tenement fluttered for a moment like an um- 
 brella caught in a gust. All seemed lost, but the door was 
 got to again, heavily barred across, and the enemy foiled. 
 An entrance, however, had been effected ; and that por- 
 tion of the attacking column which I had imprisoned by 
 my dexterous manoeuvre, maddening itself into whirlwind, 
 rushed up the chimney, scattering my turf fire as it went, 
 and so escaped. Since that time the windy columns have 
 retired to the gorges of the hills, where I hear them howl 
 at intervals ; and the only thing I am exposed to is the 
 musketry of the rain. How viciously the small shot pep- 
 pers the walls ! Here must I wait till the cloudy arma- 
 ment breaks up. One's own mind is a dull companion in 
 these circumstances. Sheridan, wont with his talk to 
 brighten the table more than the champagne ; whose mind 
 was a phosphorescent sea, dark in its rest, every movement 
 a flash of splendor, if cooped up here, begirt with this 
 murky atmosphere, would be dull as a Lincoln fen uneu- 
 
52 ALEXANDER SMITH. 
 
 livened by a single will-o'-the-wisp. Books are the only 
 refuge on a rainy day ; but in Skye Bothies books are rare 
 To me, however, the gods have proved kind, for in my sore 
 need I found on a shelf here two volumes of the old 
 Monthly Review, and have sauntered through these dingy 
 literary catacombs with considerable satisfaction. What a 
 strange set of old fogies the writers ! To read them is like 
 conversing with the antediluvians. Their opinions have 
 fallen into disuse long ago, and resemble to-day the rusty 
 armor and gimcracks of a curiosity-shop. These essays 
 and criticisms were thought brilliant, I suppose, when they 
 appeared last century, and authors praised therein con- 
 sidered themselves rather handsome flies, preserved in pure 
 critical amber for the inspection of posterity. The volumes 
 were published, I notice, from 1790 to 1792, and exhibit a 
 period of wonderful literary activity. Not to speak of 
 novels, histories, travels, farces, tragedies, upwards of two 
 hundred poems are brought to judgment. Plainly, these 
 Monthly Reviewers worked hard, and on the whole with 
 spirit and deftness. A proper sense of the importance of 
 their craft had these gentlemen ; they laid down the law 
 with great gravity, and from critical benches shook their 
 awful wigs on offenders. How it all looks now ! " Let us 
 indulge ourselves with another extract," quoth one, " and 
 contemplate once more the tear of grief before we are 
 called upon to witness the tear of rapture." Both tears 
 dried up long ago, as those that sparkled on a Pharaoh's 
 cheek. Hear this other, stern as Rhadamanthus ; behold 
 Duty steeling itself against human weakness ! " It grieves 
 us to wound a young man's feelings ; but our judgment 
 must not be biassed by any plea whatsoever. Why will 
 men apply for our opinion, when they know that we cannot 
 be silent, and that we will not lie ? " Listen to this prophet 
 in Israel, one who has not bent the knee to Baal, and say 
 if there is not a touch of hopeless pathos in him : " Fine 
 
IN A SKYE BOTHY. 53 
 
 woixls do not make fine poems. Scarcely a month passes 
 in which we are not obliged to issue this decree. But in 
 these days of universal heresy, our decrees are no more 
 respected than the Bulls of the Bishop of Rome." O that 
 men would hoar, that they would incline their hearts to 
 wisdom ! The ghosts of the dim literary Hades are get- 
 ting tiresome, and as I look up, lo! the rain has ceased, 
 from sheer fatigue : great white vapors are rising from the 
 damp valleys ; and, better than all, pleasant as Blucher's 
 cannon on the evening of Waterloo, the sound of wheels 
 on the boggy ground ; and just when the stanched rain- 
 clouds are burning into a sullen red at sunset, I have a 
 visitor in my Bothy, and pleasant human intercourse. 
 
 Broadford Fair is a great event in the island. The little 
 town lies on the margin of a curving bay, and under the 
 shadow of a somewhat celebrated hill. On the crest of it 
 is a cairn of stones, the burying-place of an ancient Scan- 
 dinavian woman, tradition informs me, whose wish it was 
 to be laid high up there, that she might sleep right in the 
 pathway of the Norway wind. In a green glen, at its base, 
 stand the ruins of the House of Corrichatachin, where Bos- 
 well had his share of four bowls of punch, and went to bed 
 at five in the morning, and, awakening at noon with a severe 
 headache, saw Dr. Johnson burst in upon him with tLe 
 exclamation, " What, drunk yet!" "His tone of voice w.'js 
 not that of severe upbraiding," writes the penitent Bozzy, 
 " so I was relieved a little." Broadford is a post-town of 
 about a dozen houses, and is a place of great importance. 
 If Portree is the London of Skye, Broadford is its Man- 
 chester. The markets, held every three months or so, take 
 place on a patch of moorland about a mile from the village. 
 Not only are cattle sold and cash exchanged for the same, 
 but there a Skye farmer meets his relations, from the brother 
 of his blood to his cousin forty times removed. To these 
 meetings he is irawn, not only by his love of coin, but by 
 
54 ALEXANDER SMITH. 
 
 his love of kindred, and the Broadford Mail and tiie 
 Portree Advertiser lying yet in the womb of time by his 
 love of gossip also. The market is the Skyeman's ex- 
 change, his family gathering, and his newspaper. From 
 the deep sea of his solitude he comes up to breathe there, 
 and, refreshed, sinks again. This fair at Broadford I re- 
 solved to see. Starting early in the morning, my way for 
 the most part lay through a desolation where Nature seemed 
 deteriorated, and at her worst. Winter could not possibly 
 sadden the region ; no spring could quicken it into ^owc: s. 
 The hills wear but for ornament the white streak of the 
 torrent; the rocky soil clothes itself in heather to which 
 the purple never comes. Even man, the miracle-worker, 
 who transforms everything he touches, who has rescued a 
 fertile Holland from the waves, who has reared a marble 
 Venice from out salt lagunes and marshes, is defeated here. 
 A turf hut, with smoke issuing from the roof, and a patch 
 of sickly green around, which will ripen by November, is 
 all that he has won from Nature. Gradually, as I pro- 
 ceeded, the aspect of the country changed, began to ex- 
 hibit traces of cultivation ; and erelong the red hill with 
 the Norwegian woman's cairn a-top rose before me, sug- 
 gesting Broadford and the close of the journey. The roads 
 were filled with cattle, driven forward with oath and shout. 
 Every now and then, a dog-cart came skirring along, and 
 infinite the confusion, and loud the clamor of tongues, when 
 one or other plunged into a herd of sheep, or skittish 
 " three-year-olds." At the entrance to the fair, the horses 
 were taken out of the vehicles, and left, with a leathern 
 thong tied round tneir forelegs, to limp about in search of 
 breakfast. As you advance, on either side of the road 
 stand hordes of cattle, the wildest looking' creatures, black, 
 white, dun, and cream-colored, with fells of hair hanging 
 over their savage eyes, and graced with horns of prepos- 
 terous dimensions. Horses neighed from their stakes, the 
 
IN A SKYE BOTHY. 55 
 
 owners looking out for customers. Sheep were there, too, 
 in restless masses, scattering hither and thither like quick- 
 silver, with dogs and men flying along their edges, excited 
 to the verge of insanity. What a hubbub of sound ! "What 
 lowing and neighing ! what bleating and barking ! It was 
 a novel sight, that rude, primeval traffic. Down in the 
 hollow ground tents had been knocked up since dawn ; 
 there potatoes were being cooked for drovers who had been 
 travelling all night; there, also, liquor could be had. To 
 these places, I observed, contracting parties invariably re- 
 paired to solemnize a bargain. Booths ranged along the 
 side of the road were plentifully furnished with confections, 
 ribbons, 'and cheap jewellery ; and as the morning wore on, 
 around these the girls swarmed thickly, as bees round sum- 
 mer flowers. The fair was running its full career of bar- 
 gain-making and consequent dram-drinking, rude flirtation, 
 and meeting of friend with friend, when up the middle of 
 the road, hustling the passengers, terrifying the cattle, came 
 three misguided young gentlemen medical students, I 
 opined engaged in botanical researches in these regions. 
 Evidently they had been "dwellers in tents." One of 
 them, gifted with a comic genius, his companions were 
 desperately solemn, at one point of the road, threw back 
 his coat, in emulation of Sambo when he brings down the 
 applauses of the threepenny gallery, and executed a shuffle 
 in front of a bewildered cow. Crummie backed and shied, 
 bent on retreat. He, agile as a cork, bobbed up and down 
 in her front, turn whither she would, with shouts and hideous 
 grimaces, his companions standing by the while like mutes 
 at a funeral. That feat accomplished, the trio staggered 
 on, amid the derision and scornful laughter of the Gael. 
 Lifting our eyes up out of the noise and confusion, there 
 were the solitary mountain-tops and the clear mirror of 
 Broadford Bay, the opposite coast sleeping green in it with 
 all its woods ; and lo ! the steamer from the South sliding 
 
56 ALEXANDER SMITH. 
 
 in, with her red funnel, breaking the reflection with a tract 
 of foam, and disturbing the far-off morning silence with the 
 thunder of her paddles. By noon, a considerable stroke of 
 business had been done. Hordes of bellowing cattle were 
 being driven off toward Broadford, and drovers were rush- 
 ing about in a wonderful manner, armed with tar-pot and 
 stick, smearing their peculiar mark upon the shaggy hides 
 of their purchases. Rough-looking customers enough, these 
 fellows, yet they want not means. Some of them, I am 
 told, came here this morning with five hundred pounds in 
 their pockot-books, and have spent every paper of it, and 
 this day three months they will return with as large a sum. 
 By three o'clock in the afternoon the place was deserted 
 by cattle, and fun and business gathered round the booths 
 and refreshment tents, the noise increasing every hour, and 
 towards evening deepening into brawl and general combat. 
 During the last few weeks I have had opportunity of wit- 
 nessing something of life as it passes in the Skye wilder- 
 nesses, and have been struck with its self-containedness, not 
 less than with its remoteness. A Skye family luus every- 
 thing within itself. The bare mountains yield them mutton, 
 of a flavor and delicacy unknown in the south. The copses 
 swarm with rabbits ; and if a net is set over night at the 
 Black Island, there is abundance of fish to breakfast. The 
 farmer grows his own corn, barley, and potatoes, digs his 
 own peats, makes his own candles ; he tans leather, spins 
 cloth shaggy as a terrier's pile, and a hunchback artist on 
 the place transforms the raw materials into boots or shep- 
 herd garments. Twice every year a huge hamper arrives 
 from Glasgow, stuffed with all the little luxuries of house- 
 keeping, tea, sugar, coffee, and the like. At more fre- 
 quent intervals comes a ten-gallon cask from Greenock, 
 whose contents can cunningly draw the icy fangs of a north- 
 easter, or take the chill out of the clammy mists. 
 " What want they that a king should have? " 
 
IN A SKYE BOTHY. 57 
 
 And once a week the Inverness Courier, like a window sud- 
 denly opened on the roaring sea, brings a murmur of the 
 outer world, its politics, its business, its crimes, its literature, 
 its whole multitudinous and unsleeping life, making the 
 stillness yet more still. To the Isle'sman the dial face of 
 the year is not artificially divided, as in cities, by parlia- 
 mentary session and recess, college terms or vacations, short 
 and long, by the rising and sitting of courts of justice uor 
 yet, as in more fortunate soils, by imperceptible gradations 
 of colored light, the green flowery year deepening into the 
 sunset of the October hollyhock, the slow reddening of bur- 
 dened orchards, the slow yellowing of wheaten plains. 
 Not by any of these, but by the higher and more affecting 
 element of animal life, with its passions and instincts, its 
 gladness and suffering ; existence like our own, although in 
 a lower key, and untouched by its solemn issues ; the same 
 music and wail, although struck on ruder and uncertain 
 chords. To the Isle'sman, the year rises into interest 
 when the hills, yet wet with melted snows, are pathetic 
 with newly-yeaned lambs, and completes itself through the 
 successive steps of weaning, fleecing, sorting, fattening, sale, 
 final departure, and cash in pocket. The shepherd life is 
 more interesting than the agricultural, inasmuch as it deals 
 with a higher order of being ; for I suppose apart from 
 considerations of profit a couchant ewe, with her you eg 
 one at her side, or a ram, " with wreathed horns superb," 
 cropping the herbage, is a more pleasing object to the aes- 
 thetic sense than a field of mangold-wurzel, flourishing ever 
 so gloriously. The shepherd inhabits a mountain country, 
 lives more completely in the open air, and is acquainted 
 with all phenomena of storm and calm, the thunder-smoke 
 coiling in the wind, the hawk hanging stationary in the 
 breathless blue. He knows the faces of the hills, recog- 
 nizes the voices of the torrents as if they were children of 
 his own, can unknit their intricate melody, as he lies with 
 
58 ALEXANDER SMITH. 
 
 his dog beside him on the warm slope at noon, separating 
 ione from tone, and giving this to iron crag, that to pebbly 
 oottom. From long intercourse, every member of his flock 
 wears to his eye its special individuality, and he recognizes 
 the countenance of a " wether " as he would the counte- 
 nance of a human acquaintance. Sheep-farming is a pic- 
 turesque occupation; and I think a cataract of sheep de- 
 scending a hillside, now gathering into a mighty pool, now 
 emptying itself in a rapid stream, the dogs, urged more 
 6y sagacity than by the shepherd's voice, flying along the 
 sdges, turning, guiding, changing the shape of the mass, 
 one of the prettiest sights in the world. But the most 
 affecting incident of shepherd life is the weaning of the 
 lambs ; affecting, because it reveals passions in the " fleecy 
 fuois," the manifestation of which we are accustomed to 
 consider ornamental in ourselves. From all the lulls men 
 and dogs drive the flocks down into a fold, or fank, as it 
 is called ncre, consisting of several chambers or compart- 
 ments. Into uiese compartments the sheep are huddled, 
 and then the separation takes place. The ewes are re- 
 turned to the mountains, the lambs are driven away to 
 some spot where tne pasture is rich, and wheie they are 
 watched day and nigiit. Midnight comes with dews and 
 stars ; the troop is couched peacefully as the cloudlets of 
 a summer sky. Suddenly they are i-cstless, ill at ease, 
 goaded by some sore unknown want, jt*d evince a dispo- 
 sition to scatter in every direction ; out rhe shepherds are 
 wary, the dogs swift and sure, and attei A little while the 
 perturbation is allayed, and they rest ag*an. Walk up 
 now to the fank. The full moon is riding between the 
 hills, filling the glen with lustre and floating mysterious 
 glooms. Listen ! You hear it on every sidt* uf you, till 
 it dies away in the silence of distance, the ntt^y Rachel 
 weeping for her children. The turf walls of the tetrk are 
 in shadow, but something seems to be moving thei-e. As 
 
IN A SKYE BOTHY. 59 
 
 you approach, it disappears with a quick, short bleat, and 
 a hurry of tiny hooves. Wonderful mystery of instinct ! 
 Affection all the. more touching that it is so wrapt in dark- 
 ness, hardly knowing its own meaning ! For nights and 
 nights the creatures will be found haunting about these 
 turfen walls, seeking the young that have been taken 
 away. 
 
 But my chief delight here is my friend and neighbor, 
 Mr. Maclan. He was a soldier in his youth : is now 
 very old, ninety and odd, I should say. He would 
 strike one with a sense of strangeness in a city, and among 
 men of the present generation. Here, however, he creates 
 no surprise*; he is a natural product of the region, like the 
 red heather, or the bed of the dried torrent He is a 
 master of legendary lore. He knows the history of every 
 considerable family in the island ; he circulates like sap 
 through every genealogical tree ; he is an enthusiast in 
 Gaelic poetry, and is fond of reciting compositions of native 
 bards, his eyes lighted up, and his tongue moving glibly 
 over the rugged clots of consonants. He has a servant 
 cunning upon the pipes, and, dwelling there for a week, I 
 heard Ronald often wandering near the house, solacing 
 himself with their music ; now a plaintive love-song, now 
 a coronach for chieftain borne to his grave, now a battle 
 march, the notes of which, melancholy and monotonous at 
 first, would all at once soar into a higher strain, and then 
 hitrry and madden as beating time to the footsteps of the 
 charging clan. I am the fool of association ; and the tree 
 under which a king has rested, the stone in which a banner 
 was planted on the morning of some victorious or disas- 
 trous day, the house in which some great man first saw the 
 light, are to me the sacredest things. This slight, gray, 
 keen -eyed man the scabbard sorely frayed now, the blade 
 sharp and bright as ever gives me a thrill like an old 
 coin with its half obliterated effigy, a Druid stone on a 
 
60 ALEXANDER SMITH. 
 
 moor, a stain of blood on the floor of a palace. He stands 
 before me a living figure, and history groups itself behind 
 by way of background. He sits at the same board with 
 me, arid yet he lifted Moore at Corunna, and saw the gal- 
 lant dying eyes flash up with their last pleasure when the 
 Highlanders charged past. He lay down to sleep in the 
 light of Wellington's watch-fires in the gorges of the piny 
 Pyrenees ; around him roared the death thunders of Water- 
 loo. There is a certain awfulness about very old men ; 
 they are amongst us, but not of us. They crop out of the 
 living soil and herbage of to-day, like rocky strata bearing 
 marks of the glacier or the wave. Their roots strike 
 deeper than ours, and they draw sustenance from an earlier 
 layer of soil. They are lonely amongst the young ; they 
 cannot form new friendships, and are willing to be gone. 
 They feel the " sublime attractions of the grave " ; for the 
 soil of churchyards once flashed kind eyes on them, 
 heard with them the chimes at midnight, sang and clashed 
 the brimming goblet with them ; ami the present Tom and 
 Harry are as nothing to the Tom and Harry that swag- 
 gered about and toasted the reigning belles seventy years 
 ago. We are accustomed to lament the shortness of life ; 
 but it is wonderful how long it is notwithstanding. Often a 
 single life, like a summer twilight, connects two historic 
 days. Count back four lives, and King Charles is kneeling 
 on the scaffold at Whitehall. To hear Mad an speak, one 
 could not help thinking in this way. In a short run across 
 the mainland with him this summer, we reached Culloden 
 Moor. The old gentleman with a mournful air for he is 
 a great Jacobite, and wears the, Prince's hair in a ring 
 pointed out the burial-grounds of the clans. Struck with 
 his manner, I inquired how he came to know their red 
 resting-places. As if hurt, he drew himself up, laid his 
 hand on my shoulder, saying, " Those who put them in told 
 me." Heavens, how a century and odd years collapsed, 
 
IX A SKYE BOTHY. 61 
 
 and the bloody field, the battle-smoke not yet cleared 
 away, and where Cumberland's artillery told the clansmen 
 sleeping in thickest swaths, unrolled itself from the 
 horizon down to my very feet ! For a whole evening he 
 will sit and speak of his London life ; and I cannot help 
 contrasting the young officer, who trod Bond Street witli 
 powder in his hair at the end of last century, with the old 
 man living in the shadow of Blavin now. 
 
 Dwellers in cities have occasionally seen a house that 
 has the reputation of being haunted, and heard a ghost story 
 told. Most of them have knowledge of the trumpet-blast 
 that sounds when a member of the Airlie family is about 
 to die. Some few may have heard of the Irish gentleman 
 who, seated in the London opera-house on the night his 
 brother died, heard above the clash of the orchestra and the 
 passion of the singers, the shrill warning keen of the banshee, 
 an evil omen always to him and his. City people laugh 
 when these stories are told, even although the blood should 
 run chill the while. Here, one is steeped in a ghostly at- 
 mosphere : men walk about here gifted with the second 
 sight. There has been something weird and uncanny about 
 the island for some centuries. Douglas, on the morning of 
 Otterbourne, according to the ballad, was shaken unto super- 
 stitious fears : 
 
 " But I hae dreamed a dreary dream, 
 
 Beyond the Isle of Skye ; 
 I saw a dead man win a fight, 
 
 And I think that man was I." 
 
 Then the island is full of strange legends of the Norwe- 
 gian times and earlier, legends it might be worth Mr. 
 Dasent's while to take note of, should he ever visit the rainy 
 Hebrides. One such legend, concerning Ossian and his 
 poems, struck me a good deal. Near Mr. Maclan's place 
 is a ruined castle, a mere hollow shell of a building, Dun- 
 Bcaith by name, built in Fingalian days by the chieftain 
 
02 - ALEXANDER SMITH. 
 
 Cuclmllin, and so called in honor of his wife. The pile 
 crumbles over the sea on a rocky headland bearded by 
 gray green lichens. The place is quite desolate, and sel- 
 dom visited. The only sounds heard there are the sharp 
 whistle of the salt breeze, the bleat of a strayed sheep, the 
 cry of wheeling sea-birds. Maclan and myself sat one sum- 
 mer day on the ruined stair. The sea lay calm and bright 
 beneath, its expanse broken only by a creeping sail. Across 
 the loch rose the great red lull, in the shadow of which 
 Boswell got drunk ; on the top of which is perched the 
 Scandinavian woman's cairn. And out of the bare blue 
 heaven, down on the ragged fringe of the Coolin hills, flowed 
 a great white vapor gathering in the sunlight in mighty 
 fleece on fleece. The old gentleman was the narrator, and 
 the legend goes as follows : The castle was built by Cu- 
 chullin and his Fingalians in a single night. The chief- 
 tain had many retainers, was a great hunter, and terrible 
 in war. Every night at feast the minstrel Ossian sang his 
 exploits. Ossian, on one occasion, in wandering among the 
 hills, was struck by sweet strains of music that seemed to 
 issue from a green knoll on which the sun shone tempt- 
 ingly. He sat down to listen, and was lulled asleep by 
 the melody. He had no sooner fallen asleep than the knoil 
 opened, and he beheld the under-world of the fairies. That 
 afternoon and the succeeding night he spent in revelry, 
 and in the morning he was allowed to return. Again the 
 music sounded, again the senses of the minstrel were steeped 
 in forgetfulness. And on the sunny knoll he awoke a gray- 
 haired man ; for in one short fairy afternoon and evening 
 had been crowded a hundred of our human years. In his 
 absence, the world had entirely changed, the Fingalians 
 were extinct, and the dwarfish race, whom we call men, 
 were possessors of the country. Longing for companion- 
 ship, Ossian married the daughter of a shepherd, and in 
 process of time a little girl was born to him. Years passed 
 
IN A SKYE BOTHY. 63 
 
 on ; his wife died, and his daughter, woman grown now, 
 married a. pious man, for the people were Christianized 
 by this time, called, from his love of psalmody, Peter 
 of the Psalms. Ossian, blind with age, went to reside with 
 his daughter and her husband. Peter was engaged all 
 day in hunting, and when lie came home at evening, and 
 when the lamp was lighted, Ossian, sitting in a warm 
 corner, was wont to recite the wonderful songs of . iis 
 youth, and to celebrate the mighty battles and hunting 
 Teats of the big-boned Fingalians. To these songs Peter 
 of the Psalms gave attentiye ear, and being something of 
 a peuman >% carefully inscribed them in a book. One day 
 Peter had been more than usually successful in the chase, 
 and brought home on his shoulders the carcass of a huge 
 stag. Of this stag a leg was dressed for supper, and when 
 it was picked bare, Peter triumphantly inquired of Ossian, 
 " In the Fingalian days you speak about, killed you ever 
 a stag so large as this ? " Ossian balanced the bone in 
 his hand ; then, sniffing intense disdain, replied, " This 
 bone, big as you tln'nk it, could be dropped into the hollow 
 of a Fingalian blackbird's leg." Peter of the Psalms, en- 
 raged at what he conceived an unconceivable crammer on 
 the part of his father-in-law, started up, swearing that he 
 would not ruin his soul by preserving any more of his 
 lying songs, and flung the volume in the fire ; but his wife 
 darted forward and snatched it up, half-charred, from the 
 embers. At this conduct on the part of Peter, Ossian 
 groaned in spirit, and wished to die, that he might be 
 saved from the envy and stupidities of the little people, 
 whose minds were as stunted as their bodies. When he 
 went to bed he implored his ancient gods for he was 
 a sad heathen to resuscitate, if but for one hour, the 
 hounds, the stags, and the blackbirds of his youth, that he 
 might astonish and confound the unbelieving Peter. His 
 prayers done, he fell on slumber, and just before dawn a 
 
64 ALEXANDER SMITH. 
 
 weight upon his breast awoke him. To his great joy, he 
 found that his prayers were answered, for upon his breast 
 was crouched his favorite hound. He spoke to it, and the 
 faithful creature whimpered and licked his face. Swiftly 
 he called his little grandson, and they went out with the 
 hound. When they came to the top of an eminence, Ossian 
 said, " Put your fingers in your ears, little one, else I 
 will make you deaf for life." The boy put his fingers in 
 his ears, and then Ossian whistled so loud that the whole 
 world rang. He then asked the child if he saw anything. 
 ' k O, such large deer ! " said the child. " But a small herd, 
 by the sound of it," said Ossian ; u we will let that herd 
 pass." Presently the child called out, ' k 0, such large 
 deer!" Ossian bent his ear to the ground to catch the 
 sound of their coming, and then, as if satisfied, let slip 
 the hound, who speedily tore down seven of the fattest. 
 When the animals were skinned and laid in order, Ossian 
 went towards a large lake, in the centre of which grew a 
 remarkable bunch of rushes. He waded into the lake, 
 tore up the rushes, and brought to light the great Finga- 
 lian kettle, which had lain there for more than a century. 
 Returning to their quarry, a fire was kindled ; the kettle 
 containing the seven carcasses was placed thereupon ; and 
 soon a most savory smell was spread abroad upon all the 
 winds. When the. animals were stewed, after the approve. I 
 fashion of his ancestors, Ossian sat down to his repa. t. 
 Now as, since his sojourn with the fames, he had never 
 enjoyed a sufficient meal, it was his custom to gather up 
 the superfluous folds of his stomach by wooden splints, 
 nine in number. As he now fed and expanded, splint 
 after splint was thrown away, till at last, when the kettle 
 was emptied, he lay down perfectly satisfied, and silent as 
 ocean at the full of tide. Recovering himself, he gathered 
 all the bones together, set fire to them, till the black 
 smoke which arose darkened the heaven. " Little one," 
 
IN A SKYE BOTHY. 65 
 
 then said Ossian, " go up to the knoll, and tell me if you 
 see anything." '" A great bird is flying hither," said the 
 child; and immediately the great Fingalian blackbird 
 alighted at the feet of Ossian, who at once caught and 
 throttled it. The fowl was carried home, and was in the 
 evening dressed for supper. After it was devoured, Ossian 
 called for the stag's thigh-bone \shk.h had been the original 
 cause of quarrel, and, before the face of the astonished and 
 convicted Peter of the Psalms, dropped it in the hollow of 
 the blackbird's leg. Ossian died on the night of his tri- 
 umph, and the only record of his songs is the volume which 
 Peter in his rage threw into the fire, and from which, when 
 half consumed, it was rescued by his wife. 
 
 I am to stay with Mr. Maclan to-night. A wedding has 
 taken place up among the hills, and the whole party have 
 been asked to make a night of it. The mighty kitchen has 
 been cleared for the occasion ; torches are stuck up ready 
 to be lighted ; and I ab-eady hear the first mutterings of 
 the bagpipe's storm of sound. The old gentleman wears 
 a look of brightness and hilarity, and vows that he will 
 lead off the first reel with the bride. Everything is pre- 
 pared ; and even now the bridal party are coming down 
 the steep hill road. I must go out to meet them. To-mor- 
 row I return to my bothy, to watch the sunny mists congre- 
 gating on the crests of Blavin in radiant billow on billow, 
 and on which the level heaven seems to lean. 
 
RUINS. 
 
 BY JAMES GATES PERCIVAL. 
 
 EARTH is a waste of ruins ; so I deemed, 
 When the broad sun was sinking in the sea 
 Of sand that rolled around Palmyra. Night 
 Shared with the dying day a lonely sky, 
 The canopy of regions void of life, 
 And still as one interminable tomb. 
 The shadows gathered on the desert, dark 
 And darker, till alone one purple arch 
 Marked the far place of setting. All above 
 Was purely azure, for no moon in heaven 
 Walked in her brightness, and with snowy light 
 Softened the deep intensity, that gave 
 Such awe unto the blue serenity 
 Of the high throne of gods, the dwelling-place 
 Of suns and stars, which are to us as gods, 
 The fountains of existence and the seat 
 Of all we dream of glory. Dim and vast 
 The ruins stood around me, temples, fanes, 
 Where the bright sun was worshipped, where the} gave 
 Homage to Him who frowns in storms, and rolls 
 The desert like an ocean, where they bowed 
 Unto the queen of beauty, she in heaven 
 Who gives the night its loveliness, and smiles 
 Serenely on the drifted waste, and lends 
 
RUINS. 67 
 
 A silver softness to the ridgy wave 
 Where the dark Arab sojourns, and with tales 
 Of love and beauty wears the tranquil night 
 In poetry away, her light the while 
 Falling upon him, as a spirit falls, 
 Dove-like or curling down in flame, a star 
 Sparkling amid his flowing locks, or dews 
 That melt in gold, and steal into the heart, 
 Making it one enthusiastic glow., 
 As if the God were present, and his voice 
 Spake on the eloquent lips that pour abroad 
 A gush of inspiration, bright as waves 
 Swelling around Aurora's car, intense 
 "With passion as the fire that ever flows 
 In fountains on the Caspian shore, and full 
 As the wide-rolling majesty of Nile. 
 
 Over these temples of an age of wild 
 And dark belief, and yet magnificent 
 In all that strikes the senses, beautiful 
 In the fair forms they knelt to, and the domes 
 And pillars which upreared them, full of life 
 In their poetic festivals, when youth 
 Gave loose to all its energy, in dance, 
 And song, and every charm the fancy weaves 
 In the soft twine of cultured speech, attuned 
 In perfect concord to the full-toned lyre : 
 When nations gathered to behold the pomp 
 That issued from the hallowed shrine in choirs 
 Of youths, who bounded to the minstrelsy 
 Of tender voices, and all instruments 
 Of ancient harmony, in* solemn trains 
 Bearing the votive offerings, flowing horns 
 Of plenty wreathed with flowers, and gushing o'er 
 With the ripe clusters of the purple vine, 
 
68 JAMES GATES PERCIVAL. 
 
 The violet of the fig, the scarlet flush 
 Of granates peeping from the parted rind, 
 The citron shining through its glossy leaves 
 In burnished gold, the carmine veiled in down, 
 Like mountain snow, on which the living stream 
 Flowed from Astarte's minion, all that hang 
 In Eastern gardens blended, while the sheaf 
 Nods with its loaded ears, and brimming bowls 
 Foam with the kindling element, the joy 
 Of banquet, and the nectar that inspires 
 Man -with the glories of a heightened power 
 To feel the touch of beauty, and combine 
 The scattered forms of elegance, till high 
 Rises a magic vision, blending all 
 That we have seen of glory, such as drew 
 Assembled Greece to worship, when the form, 
 Who gathered all its loveliness, arose 
 Dewy and blushing from the parent foam, 
 Than which her tint was fairer, and with hand 
 That seemed of living marble parted back 
 Her raven locks, and upward looked to Heaven, 
 Smiling to see all Nature bright and calm ; 
 Over these temples, whose long colonnades 
 Are parted by the hand of time, and fall 
 Pillar by pillar, block by block, and strew 
 The ground in shapeless ruin, night descends 
 Unmingled, and the many stars shoot through 
 The gaps of broken walls, and glance between 
 The shafts of tottering columns, marking out 
 Obscurely, on the dark blue sky, the form 
 Of Desolation, who hath made these piles 
 Her home, and, sitting with her folded wings, 
 Wraps in her dusty robe the skeletons 
 Of a once countless multitude, whose toil 
 Reared palaces and theatres, and brought 
 
RUINS. 69 
 
 All the fair forms of Grecian art to give 
 Glory unto an island girt with sands 
 As barren as the ocean, where the grave 
 And stately Doric marked the solemn fane 
 Where wisdom dwelt, and on the fairer shrine 
 Of beauty sprang the light Ionian, wreathed 
 With a soft volute, whose simplicity 
 Becomes the deity of loveliness, 
 Who with her snowy mantle, and her zone 
 Woven with all attractions, and her locks 
 Flowing as Nature bade them flow, compels 
 The sterner Powers to hang upon her smiles. 
 And tifere the grand Corinthian lifted high 
 Its flowery capital, to crown the porch 
 Where sat the sovereign of their hierarchy, 
 The monarch armed with terror, whose curled locks 
 Shaded a brow of thought and firm resolve, 
 Whose eye, deep sunk, shot out its central fires, 
 To blast and wither all who dared confront 
 The gaze of highest power ; so sat their kings 
 Enshrined in palaces, and when they came 
 Thundering on their triumphal cars, all bright 
 With diadem of gold, and purple robe 
 Flashing with gems, before their rushing train 
 Moving in serried columns fenced in steel, 
 The herd of slaves obsequious sought the dust, 
 And gazed not as the mystic pomp rolled by. 
 Such were thy monarchs, Tadmor ! now thy streets 
 Are silent, and thy walls o'erthrown, no voice 
 Speaks through the long dim night of years, to tell 
 These were once peopled dwellings ; I could dream 
 Some sorcerer in his moonlight wanderings reared 
 These wonders in an hour of sport, to mock 
 The stranger with the show of life, and send 
 Thought through the mist of ages, in the search 
 
70 JAMES GATES PERCIVAL. 
 
 Of nations who are now no more, who lived 
 
 Erst in the pride of empire, ruled and swayed 
 
 Millions in their supremacy, and toiled 
 
 To pile these monuments of wealth and skill, 
 
 That here the wandering tribe might pitch its tents 
 
 Securer in their empty courts, and we, 
 
 "Who have the sense of greatness, low might kneel 
 
 To ancient mind, and gather from the torn 
 
 And scattered fragments visions of the power, 
 
 And splendor, and sublimity of old, 
 
 Mocking the grandest canopy of heaven, 
 
 And imaging the pomp of gods below. 
 
A REVELATION OF CHILDHOOD. 
 
 (FROM A LETTER.) 
 BY MRS. JAMESON. 
 
 I WILL here put together some recollections of 
 child-life*; not because it was in any respect an excep- 
 tional or remarkable existence, but for a reason exactly the 
 i everse, because it was like that of many children ; at least 
 I have met with many children who throve or suffered from 
 the same or similar unseen causes even under external con- 
 ditions and management every way dissimilar. Facts, there- 
 fore, which can be relied on, may be generally useful as 
 Iiints towards a theory of conduct. What I shall say here 
 fehall be simply the truth so far as it goes ; not something 
 between the false and the true, garnished for effect, not 
 something half remembered, half imagined, but plain, ab- 
 solute, matter of fact. 
 
 No ; certainly I was not an extraordinary child. I have 
 had something to do with children, and have met with 
 several more remarkable for quickness of talent and pre- 
 cocity of feeling. If anything in particular, I believe I was 
 particularly naughty, at least so it was said twenty tunes 
 a day. But looking back now, I do not think I was par- 
 ticular even in this respect ; I perpetrated not more than 
 the usual amount of mischief so called which every 
 lively, active child perpetrates between five and ten years 
 old. I had the usual desire to know, and the usual 
 
72 MRS. JAMESON. 
 
 to learn ; the usual love of fairy-tales, and hatred of French 
 exercises. But not of what I learned, but of what I did not 
 learn ; not of what they taught me, but of what they could 
 not teach me ; not of what was open, apparent, manageable, 
 but of the under-current, the hidden, the unmanaged or 
 unmanageable, I have to speak, and you, my friend, to he.ir 
 and turn to account, if you will, and how you will. As \ve 
 grow old the experiences of infancy come back upon us 
 with a strange vividness. There is a period when the oxer- 
 flowing, tumultuous life of our youth rises up between us 
 and those first years ; but as the torrent subsides in its bed, 
 we can look across the impassable gulf to that haunted fairy- 
 land which we shall never more approach, and never more 
 forget ! 
 
 In memory I can go back to a very early age. I per- 
 fectly remember being sung to sleep, and can remember 
 even the tune which was sang to me, blessings on the 
 voice that sang it ! I was an affectionate, but not, as I now 
 think, a lovable nor an attractive child. I did not, like the 
 little Mozart, ask of every one around me, " Do you love 
 me ? " The instinctive question was, rather, " Can I love 
 you ? " Yet certainly I was not more than six years old 
 when I suffered from the fear of not being loved where I 
 had attached myself, and from the idea that another was 
 preferred before me, such anguish as had nearly killed me. 
 Whether those around me regarded it as a fit of ill-temper, 
 or a fit of illness, I do not know. I coidd not then have 
 given a name to the pang that fevered me. I knew not the 
 cause, but never forgot the suffering. It left a deeper 
 impression than childish passions usually do ; and the recol- 
 lection was so far salutary, that in after life I guarded 
 myself against the approaches of that hateful, deformed, 
 agonizing thing which men call jealousy, as I would from 
 an attack of cramp or cholera. If such self-knowledge has 
 
A REVELATION OF CHILDHOOD. 73 
 
 not saved me from the pain, at least it has saved me from 
 the demoralizing effects of the passion, by a wholesome 
 terror, and even a sort of disgust. 
 
 With a good temper, there was the capacity of strong, 
 deep, silent resentment, and a vindictive spirit of rather a 
 peculiar kind. I recollect that when one of those set over 
 me inflicted what then appeared a most horrible injury 
 and injustice, the thoughts of vengeance haunted my fancy 
 for months ; but it was an inverted sort of vengeance. 
 I imagined the house of my enemy on fire, and rushed 
 through the flames to rescue her. She was drowning, and 
 I leaped into the deep water to draw her forth. She was 
 pining in prison, and I forced bars and bolts to deliver her. 
 If this were magnanimity, it was not the less vengeance ; 
 for, observe, I always fancied evil, and shame, and humilia- 
 tion to my adversary ; to myself the role of superiority and 
 gratified pride. For several years this sort of burning re- 
 sentment against wrong done to myself and others, though it 
 took no mean or cruel form, was a source of intense, untold 
 suffering. No one was aware of it. I was left to settle it ; 
 and my mind righted itself I hardly know how ; not cer- 
 tainly by religious influences, they passed over my mind, 
 and did not at the time sink into it, and as for earthly 
 counsel or comfort, I never had either when most needed. 
 And as it fared with me then, so it has been in after life ; so 
 it has been, must be, with all those who, in fighting out alone 
 the pitched battle between principle and passion, will accept 
 no intervention between the infinite within them and the 
 infinite above them ; so it has been, must be, with all strong 
 natures. Will it be said, that victory in the struggle brings 
 increase of strength ? It may be so with some who survive 
 fhe contest ; but then, how many sink ! how many are crip- 
 pled morally for life ! how many, strengthened in some par- 
 ticular faculties, suffer in losing the harmony of the char- 
 acter as a whole ! This is one of the points in which the 
 
71 Mi:S. JAMKSON. 
 
 matured mind may help the childish nature at strife with 
 It is impossible, to say how Car this sort of vindictive- 
 ni'dif have |)ciictrafc(l and hardened into the char- 
 acter, if I ha<! hi-en of a timi<l or retiring nature. It was 
 expelled ;it last by no outer influences, but by a growing 
 sense of power and self-reliance. 
 
 In regard to truth always such a difficulty in education 
 I certainly had, as a c[iild, and like, most children, con- 
 fused ideas about it. I had a more distinct and absolute 
 idea of honor than of truth, a mistake into which our 
 conventional morality leads those who educate and those 
 who arc educated. I knew very well, in a general way, 
 that to tell a lie was wicked; to lie for my own profit or 
 pleasure, or to the hurt of others, was, according to my 
 infant code of morals, worse than wicked, it was dishonor- 
 able. But I had no compunction about telling fictions; 
 inventing aoenes and circumstances which I related ns real, 
 and with a keen sense of triumphant enjoyment in seeing 
 the listener taken in by a most artful and ingenious concate- 
 nation of impossibilities. In this respect " Ferdinand Men- 
 dez Pinto, that liar of the first magnitude," was nothing in 
 comparison to me. I must have been twelve years old 
 before my conscience was first awakened up to a sense of 
 the necessity of truth as a principle, as well as its holiness 
 as a virtue. Afterwards, having to set right the minds of 
 others cleared my own mind on this and some other impor- 
 tant points. 
 
 I do not think I was naturally obstinate, but remember 
 gomg without food all day, and being sent hungry and 
 exhausted to bed, because I would not do some trifling 
 thing required of me. I think it was to recite some lines 
 1 knew by heart. I was punished as wilfully obstinate ; 
 but what no one knew then, and what I know now as the 
 
A REVELATION OF CHILDHOOD. 75 
 
 feet, was, tliat after refusing to do what was require 1, and 
 bearing anger and threats in consequence, I lost the power 
 to do it. I became stone : the will was petrified, and I 
 absolutely could not comply. They might have hacked me 
 in pieces before my lips could have unclosed to utterance. 
 The obstinacy was not in the mind, but on the nerves ; and 
 I am persuaded that what we call obstinacy in children, 
 and grown-up people too, is often something of this kind, 
 arid that it may be increased by mismanagement, by per- 
 sistence, or what is called firmness in the controlling power, 
 into disease, or something near to it 
 
 There was* in my childish mind another cause of Buffer- 
 sides those I have mentioned, less acute, but more 
 permanent, and always unacknowledged. It was fear, 
 fear of darkness and supernatural influences. As long as 
 I can remember anything, I remember these horrors of my 
 infancy. How they had been awakened I do not know ; 
 they were never revealed. I had heard other children 
 ridiculed for such fears, and held my peace. At first these 
 haunting, thrilling, stifling terrors were vague ; afterwards 
 the form varied ; but one of the most permanent was the 
 ghost in Hamlet. There was a volume of Shakespeare 
 lying about, in which was an engraving I hz*ve not seen 
 since, but it remains distinct in my mind as a picture. On 
 one side stood Hamlet with his hair on end, literally " like 
 quills upon the fretful porcupine," and one hand with all 
 the fingers outspread. On the other strided the ghost, 
 encased in armor with nodding plumes ; one finger point- 
 ing forwards, and all surrounded with a supernatural light. 
 
 that spectre! for three years it followed me up and 
 down the dark staircase, or stood by my bed: only the 
 blessed light had power to exorcise it. How it was that 
 
 1 knew, while I trembled and quaked, that it was unreal, 
 never cried cut, never expostulated, never confessed, I do 
 
76 MRS. JAMESON. 
 
 not know. The 'figure of Apollyon looming over Christum, 
 which I had found in an old edition of the <% Pilgrim's 
 Progress," was also a great torment. But worse, perhaps, 
 were certain phantasms without shape, tilings like the 
 vision in Job, " A spirit passed before my face ; it stood 
 still, hit I could not discern the form thereof" : and if 
 not intelligible voices, there were strange, unaccountable 
 sounds filling the air around with a sort of mysterious life. 
 In daylight I was not only fearless, but audacious, inclined 
 to defy all power and brave all danger, that is, all danger 
 I could see. I remember volunteering to lead the way 
 through a herd of cattle (among which was a dangerous 
 bull, the terror of the neighborhood) armed only with a 
 little stick; but first I said the Lord's Prayer fervently. 
 In the ghastly night I never prayed ; terror stifled prayer. 
 These visionary sufferings, in some form or other, pursued 
 me till I was nearly twelve years old. If I had not pos- 
 sessed a strong constitution and a strong understanding, 
 which rejected and contemned my own fears, even while 
 they shook me, I had been destroyed. How much weaker 
 children suffer in this way I have since known, and have 
 known how to bring them help and strength, through sym- 
 pathy and knowledge, the sympathy that soothes, anJ 
 does not encourage, the knowledge that dispels, and does 
 not suggest, the evil. 
 
 People, in general, even those who have been much in- 
 terested in education, are not aware of the sacred duty of 
 truth, exact truth in their intercourse with children. Limit 
 what you tell them according to the measure of their fac- 
 ulties ; but let what you say be the truth. Accuracy, not 
 merely as to fact, but well-considered accuracy in the use 
 of words, is essential with children. I have read some 
 wise book on the treatment of the insane, in which absolute 
 veracity and accuracy in speaking is prescribed as a cura- 
 tive principle ; and deception for any purpose is deprecated 
 
A REVELATION OF CHILDHOOD. 77 
 
 as almost fatal to the health of the patient. New. it is a 
 good sanitary principle, that what is curative is preventive ; 
 and that an unhealthy state of mind, leading to madness, 
 may, in some organizations, be induced by that sort of 
 uncertainty and perplexity which grows up where the mind 
 has not been accustomed to truth in its external relations. 
 It is like breathing for a continuance an impure or con- 
 fined air. 
 
 Of the mischief that may be done to a childish mind by 
 a falsehood uttered in thoughtless gayety, I remember an 
 absurd and yet a painful instance. A visitor was turning 
 over, for a little girl, some prints, one of which represented 
 an Indian widow springing into the fire kindled for the 
 funeral pile of her husband. It was thus explained to 
 the child, who asked, innocently, whether, if her father 
 died her mother would be burned ? The person to whom 
 the question was addressed, a lively, amiable woman, was 
 probably much amused by the question, and answered 
 giddily, " O, of course, certainly ! " and was believed 
 implicitly. But thenceforth, for many weary months, the 
 mind of that child was haunted and tortured by the image 
 of her mother springing into the devouring flames, and 
 consumed by fire, with all the accessories of the picture, 
 particularly the drums beating to drown her cries. In a 
 weaker organization, the results might have been perma- 
 nent and serious. But to proceed. 
 
 These terrors I have described had an existence ex- 
 ternal to myself: I had no power over them to shape 
 ;hem by my will, and their ' power over me vanished 
 gradually before a more dangerous infatuation, the pro- 
 pensity to reverie. The shaping spirit of imagination be- 
 gan when I was about eight or nine years old to haunl 
 my inner life. I can truly say that, from ten years old to 
 fourteen or fifteen, I lived a double existence ; one out- 
 ward, linking me with the external sensible world, the 
 
78 MRS. JAMESON. 
 
 other inward, creating a world to and for itself, conscious 
 to itself only. I carried on for whole years a series of 
 actions, scenes, and adventures ; one springing out of an- 
 other, and colored and modified by increasing knowledge. 
 This habit grew so upon me, that there were moments 
 as when I came to some crisis in my imaginary adven- 
 tures when I was not more awake to outward tilings 
 Mian in sleep, scarcely took cognizance of the beings 
 around me. When punished for idleness by being placed 
 in solitary confinement (the worst of all punishments for 
 children), the intended penance was nothing less than a 
 delight and an emancipation, giving me up to my dreams. 
 I had a very strict and very accomplished governess, one 
 of the cleverest women I have ever met with in my life ; 
 but nothing of this was known or even suspected by her, 
 and I exulted in posse sing something which her power 
 could not reach. My reveries were my real life : it was 
 an unhealthy state of things. 
 
 Those who are engaged in the training of children will 
 perhaps pause here. It may be said, in the first place, 
 How are we to reach those recesses of the inner life 
 which the God who made us keeps from every eye but his 
 own ? As when we walk over the field in spring we are 
 aware of a thousand influences and processes at work of 
 which we have no exact knowledge or clear perception, 
 yet must watch and use according, so it is with educa- 
 I ion. And, secondly, it may be asked, if such secret pro- 
 cesses be working unconscious mischief, where the remedy ? 
 The remedy is in employment. Then the mother or the 
 teacher echoes, with astonishment, " Employment ! the child 
 is employed from morning till night ; she is learning a 
 dozen sciences and languages ; she has masters and lesson? 
 for every hour of every day ; with her pencil, her piano, 
 her books, her companions, her birds, her flowers, what 
 can she want more ? " An energetic child even at a very 
 
A REVELATION OF CHILDHOOD. 79 
 
 early age, and yet further as the physical organization is 
 developed, wants something more and something better; 
 employment which shall bring with it the bond of a higher 
 duty than that which centres in self and self-improvement ; 
 employment which shall not merely cultivate the under- 
 standing, but strengthen and elevate the conscience ; em- 
 ployment for the higher and more generous faculties ; 
 employment addressed to the sympathies ; employment 
 which has the aim of utility, not pretended, but real, ob- 
 vious, direct utility. A girl who as a mere child is not 
 always being taught or being amused, whose mind is early 
 restrained by the bond of definite duty, and thrown out of 
 the limit o^ self, will not in after years be subject to fancies 
 that disturb or to reveries that absorb, and the present and 
 the actual will have that power they ought to have as com- 
 bined in due degree with desire and anticipation. 
 
 The Roman Catholic priesthood understand this well 
 employment, which enlists with the spiritual the sympa- 
 thetic part of our being, is a means through which they 
 guide both young and adult minds. Physicians who have 
 to manage various states of mental and moral disease un- 
 derstand this well ; they speak of the necessity of employ- 
 ment (not mere amusement) as a curative means, but of 
 employment with the direct aim of usefulness, apprehended 
 and appreciated by the patient, else it is nothing. It is 
 the same with children. Such employment, chosen with 
 reference to utility, and in harmony with the faculties, 
 would prove in many cases either preventive or curatire. 
 In my own case, as I now think, it would have been both. 
 
 There was a time when it was thought essential that 
 women should know something of cookery, something of 
 medicine, something of surgery. If all these things are 
 far better understood now than heretofore, is that a reason 
 why a well-educated woman should be left wholly ignorant 
 of them ? A knowledge of what people call " common 
 
80 MRS. JAMESON. 
 
 tilings," of the elements of physiology, of the conditions 
 of health, of the qualities, nutritive or remedial, of sub- 
 stances commonly used as food or medicine, and the most 
 economical and the most beneficial way of applying both, 
 these should form a part of the system of every girls' 
 school, whether for the higher or the lower classes. At 
 present you shall see a girl studying chemistry, and attend- 
 ing Faraday's lectures, who would be puzzled to compound 
 a rice-pudding or a cup of barley-water: and a girl who 
 could work quickly a complicated sum in the Rule of Three, 
 afterwards wasting a fourth of her husband's wages through 
 want of management. 
 
 In my own case, how much of the practical and sympa- 
 thetic in my nature was exhausted in airy visions ! 
 
 As to the stuff out of which my waking dreams were 
 composed, I cannot tell you much. I have a remembrance 
 that I was always a princess heroine in the disguise of a 
 knight, a sort of Clorinda or Britomart, going about to re- 
 dress the wrongs of the poor, fight giants and kill dragons ; 
 or founding a society in some far-off solitude or desolate 
 island, which would have rivalled that of Gonsalez, where 
 there were to be no tears, no tasks, and no laws, except 
 those which I made myself, no caged birds nor tormented 
 kittens. 
 
 Enough of the pains, and mistakes, and vagaries of 
 childhood ; let me tell of some of its pleasures equally un- 
 guessed and unexpressed. A great, an exquisite source of 
 enjoyment arose out of an early, instinctive, boundless de 
 light in external beauty. How this went hand in hand with 
 my terrors and reveries, how it could coexist with them, I 
 cannot tell now it was so ; and if this sympathy with the 
 external, living, beautiful world had been properly, scien- 
 tifically cultivated, and directed to useful definite purposes, 
 it \\ ould have been the best remedy for much that was mor- 
 
A REVELATION OF CHILDHOOD. 81 
 
 bid ; this was not the case, and we were, unhappily for me, 
 loo early removed from the country to a town residence. I 
 can remember, however, that in very early years the appear- 
 ances of nature did truly " haunt me like a passion " ; the 
 stars were to me as the gates of heaven ; the rolling of the 
 wave to the shore ; the graceful weeds and grasses bending 
 before the breeze as they grew by the wayside ; the minute 
 and delicate forms of insects ; the trembling shadows of 
 boughs and leaves dancing on the ground hi the highest 
 noon ; these were to me perfect pleasures, of which the 
 imagery now in my mind is distinct Wordsworth's poem 
 of " The Daffodils," the one beginning 
 
 ** " I wandered lonely as a cloud," 
 
 may appear to some unintelligible or overcharged, but to me 
 it was a vivid truth, a simple fact ; and if Wordsworth had 
 been then in my hands, I think I must have loved him. It 
 was this intense sense of beauty which gave the first zest to 
 poetry : I loved it, not because it told me what I did not 
 know, but because it helped me to words in which to clothe 
 my own knowledge and perceptions, and reflected back the 
 pictures unconsciously hoarded up in my mind. This was 
 what made Thomson's " Seasons " a favorite book when I 
 first began to read for my own amusement, and before I 
 could understand one half of it ; St. Pierre's " Indian Cotr 
 tage " (" La Chaumiere Indienne ") was also charming, 
 either because it reflected my dreams, or gave me new stuff 
 for them in pictures of an external world quite different 
 from that I inhabited, palm-trees, elephants, tigers, dark- 
 turbaned men with flowing draperies ; and the " Arabian 
 Nights " completed my Oriental intoxication, which lasted 
 for a long time. 
 
 I have said little of the impressions left by books, and of 
 my first religious notions. A friend of mine had once the 
 wise idea of collecting together a variety of evidence as to 
 6 
 
82 MRS. JAMESON. 
 
 the impressions left by certain books on childish or imma- 
 ture minds. If carried out, it would have been one of the 
 most valuable additions to educational experience ever made. 
 For myself, I did not much care about the books put into 
 my hands, nor imbibe much information from them. I had 
 a great taste, I am sorry to say, for forbidden books ; yet it 
 was not the forbidden books that did the mischief, except in 
 their being read furtively. I remember impressions of vice 
 and cruelty from some parts of the Old Testament and 
 Goldsmith's " History of England," which I shudder to re- 
 call. Shakespeare was on the forbidden shelf. I had read 
 him all through between seven and ten years old. He 
 never did me any moral mischief. He never soiled my 
 mind with any disordered image. What was exceptionable 
 and coarse in language I passed by without attaching any 
 meaning whatever to it. How it might have been if I had 
 read Shakespeare first when I was fifteen or sixteen, I do 
 not know; perhaps the occasional coarseness and obscuri- 
 ties might have shocked the delicacy or puzzled the intelli- 
 gence of that sensitive and inquiring age. But at nine or 
 ten I had no comprehension of what was unseemly ; what 
 might be obscure in words to wordy commentators, was to 
 me lighted up by the idea I found or interpreted for myself, 
 right or wrong. 
 
 No ; I repeat, Shakespeare bless him ! never did me 
 any moral mischief. Though the Witches in Macbeth 
 troubled me, though the Ghost in Hamlet terrified me 
 (the picture, that is, for the spirit hi Shakespeare was sol- 
 emn and pathetic, not hideous), though poor little Arthur 
 cost me an ocean of tears, yet much that was obscure, 
 and all that was painful and revolting, was merged on the 
 whole in the vivid presence of a new, beautiful, vigorous 
 living world. The plays which I now think the most won- 
 derful produced comparatively little effect on my fancy : Ro- 
 me 3 and Juliet, Othello, Macbeth, struck me then less than 
 
A REVELATION OF CHILDHOOD. 83 
 
 the historical plays, and far less than the Midsummer 
 Night's Dream and Cymbeline. It may be thought, per- 
 haps, that FUstaff is not a character to strike a child, or to 
 be understood by a child : no ; surely not. To me Fal- 
 staff was not witty and wicked, only irresistibly fat and 
 funny ; and I remember lying on the ground rolling with 
 laughter over some of the scenes in Henry the Fourth, 
 the mock play, and the seven men in buckram. But the 
 Tempest and Cymbeline were the plays I liked best and 
 knew best. 
 
 Altogether, I should say that in my early years books 
 were known to me, not as such, not for their general con- 
 tents, but for some especial image or picture I had picked 
 out of them and assimilated to my own mind and mixed up 
 with my own life. For example, out of Homer's Odyssey 
 (lent to me by the parish clerk) I had the picture of Xasi- 
 caa and her maidens going down in their chariots to wash 
 their linen : so that when the first time I went to the Pitti 
 Palace, and could hardly see the pictures through blinding 
 tears, I saw that picture of Rubens, which all remember 
 who have been at Florence, and it flashed delight and re- 
 freshment through those remembered childish associations. 
 The Sirens and Polypheme left also vivid pictures on my 
 fancy. The Iliad, on the contrary, wearied me, except the 
 parting of Hector and Andromache, in which the child, 
 scared by its father's dazzling helm and nodding crest, re- 
 mains a vivid image in my mind from that time. 
 
 The same parish clerk a curious fellow in his way 
 lent me also some religious tracts and stories, by Hannah 
 More. It is most certain that more moral mischief was done 
 to me by some of these than by all Shakespeare's plays to- 
 gether. These so-called pious tracts first introduced me to a 
 knowledge of the vices of vulgar life and the excitements of 
 a vulgar religion, the fear of being hanged and the fear 
 of hell became coexistent in my mind ; and the teaching 
 
84 MRS. JAMESON. 
 
 resolved itself into this, that it was not by be.Vig naughty, 
 but by being found out, that I was to incur the risk of both. 
 My fairy world was better ! 
 
 About religion ; I was taught religion as children used 
 to be taught it in my younger days, and are taught it still in 
 some cases, I believe, through the medium of creeds and 
 catechisms. I read the Bible too early, and too indiscrim- 
 inately, and too irreverently. Even the New Testament 
 was too early placed in my hands ; too early made a lesson- 
 book, as the custom then was. The letter of the Scriptures 
 the words were familiarized to me by sermonizing and 
 dogmatizing, long before I could enter into the spirit. Mean- 
 time, happily, another religion was growing up in my heart, 
 which, strangely enough, seemed to me quite apart from that 
 which was taught, which, indeed, I never in any way 
 regarded as the same which I was taught when I stood up 
 wearily on a Sunday to repeat the collect and say the cate- 
 chism. It was quite another thing. Not only the taught 
 religion and the sentiment of faith and adoration were never 
 combined, but it never for years entered into my head to 
 combine them ; the first remained extraneous, the latter had 
 gradually taken root in my life, even from the moment my 
 mother joined my little hands in prayer. The histories out 
 of the Bible (the Parables especially) were, however, en- 
 chanting to me, though my interpretation of them was in 
 some instances the very reverse of correct or orthodox. To 
 my infant conception our Lord was a being who had come 
 down from heaven to make people good, and to tell them 
 beautiful stories. And though no pains were spared to 
 indoctrinate me, and all my pastors and masters took it for 
 granted that my ideas were quite satisfactory, nothing couM 
 be more confused and heterodox. 
 
 It is a common observation that girls of lively talents are 
 apt to grow pert and satirical. I fell into this danger when 
 
A REVELATION OF CHILDHOOD. 85 
 
 about ten years old. Sallies at the expense of certain peo- 
 ple, ill-looking, or ill-dressed, or ridiculous, or foolish, had 
 been laughed at and applauded in company, until, -without 
 being naturally malignant, I ran some risk of becoming so 
 from sheer vanity. 
 
 The fables which appeal to our higher moral sympathies 
 may sometimes do as much for us as the truths of science. 
 So thought our Saviour when he taught the multitude in 
 parables. 
 
 A good clergyman who lived near us, a famous Persian 
 scholar, took it into his head to teach me Persian, (I was 
 then about seven years old,) and I set to work with infinite 
 delight and. earnestness. All I learned was soon forgotten ; 
 but a few years afterwards, happening to stumble on a 
 volume of Sir William Jones's works, his Persian gram- 
 mar, it revived my Orientalism, and I began to study it 
 eagerly. Among the exercises given was a Persian fable 
 or poem, one of those traditions of our Lord which are 
 preserved in the East. The beautiful apologue of " St. 
 Peter and the Cherries," which Goethe has versified or 
 imitated, is a well-known example. This fable I allude to 
 was something similar, but I have not met with the original 
 these forty years, and must give it here from memory. 
 
 " Jesus," says the story, " arrived one evening at the 
 gates of a certain city, and he sent his disciples forward to 
 prepare supper, while he himself, intent on doing good, 
 walked through the streets into the market-place. 
 
 " And he saw at the corner of the market some people 
 gathered together looking at an object on the ground ; and 
 he drew near to see what it might be. It was a dead dog, 
 with a halter round his neck, by which he appeared to have 
 been dragged through the dirt ; and a viler, a more abject, 
 a more unclean thing never met the eyes of man. 
 
 " And those who stood by looked on with abhorrence- 
 
86 MRS. JAMESON. 
 
 " l Faugh ! ' said one, stopping his nose ; ' it pollutes the 
 air.' * How long,' said another, ' shall this foul beast offend 
 our sight ? ' ' Look at his torn hide/ said a third ; ' one 
 could not even cut a shoe out of it.' ' And his ears/ said a 
 fourth, ' all draggled and bleeding ! ' ' No doubt,' said a 
 fifth, he hath been hanged for thieving ! ' 
 
 " And Jesus heard them, and looking down compas- 
 sionately on the dead creature, he said, * Pearls are not 
 equal to the whiteness of his teeth ! ' 
 
 " Then the people turned towards him with amazement, 
 and said among themselves, ' Who is this ? this must be 
 Jesus of Nazareth, for only HE could find something to pity 
 and approve even in a dead dog ' ; and being ashamed, they 
 bowed their heads before him, and went each on his way." 
 
 I can recall, at this hour, the vivid, yet softening and 
 pathetic impression left on my fancy by this old Eastern 
 story. It struck me as exquisitely humorous, as well as 
 exquisitely beautiful. It gave me a pain in my conscience, 
 for it seemed thenceforward so easy and so vulgar to say 
 satirical things, and so much nobler to be benign and 
 merciful, and I took the lesson so home, that I was in great 
 danger of falling into the opposite extreme, of seeking 
 the beautiful even in the midst of the corrupt and the 
 repulsive. Pity, a large element in my composition, might 
 nave easily degenerated into weakness, threatening to sub- 
 vert hatred of evil in trying to find excuses for it ; and 
 whether my mind has ever completely righted itself, I am 
 not sure. 
 
 Educators are not always aware, I think, how acute are 
 the perceptions, and how permanent the memories of chil- 
 dren. I remember experiments tried upon my temper and 
 feelings, and how I was made aware of this, by their being 
 repeated, and, in some instances, spoken of, before me. 
 Music, to which I was early and peculiarly sensitive, was 
 
A REVELATION OF CHILDHOOD. 87 
 
 sometimes made the medium of these experiments. Dis- 
 cordant sounds were not only hateful, but made me turn 
 white and cold, and sent the blood backward to my heart ; 
 and certain tunes had a curious effect, I cannot now ac- 
 count for : for though, when heard for the first time, they 
 had little effect, they became intolerable by repetition ; they 
 turned up some hidden emotion within me too strong to be 
 borne. It could not have been from association, which I 
 believe to be a principal element in the emotion excited by 
 music. I was too young for that. What associations could 
 such a baby have had with pleasure or with pain ? Or 
 could it be possible that associations with some former state 
 of existence awoke up to sound ? That our life " hath 
 elsewhere its beginning, and cometh from afar," is a belief, 
 or at least an instinct, in some minds, which music, and only 
 music, seems to thrill into consciousness. At this time, 
 when I was about five or six years old, Mrs. Arkwright, 
 she was then Fanny Kemble, used to come to our house, 
 and used to entrance me with her singing. I had a sort of 
 adoration for her, such as an ecstatic votary might have for 
 a Saint Cecilia. I trembled with pleasure, when I only 
 heard her step. But her voice ! it has charmed hundreds 
 since ; whom has it ever moved to a more genuine passion 
 of delight than the little child that crept silent and tremu- 
 lous to her side ? And she was fond of me, fond of sing- 
 ing to me, and, it must be confessed, fond also of playing 
 these experiments on me. The music of " Paul and Vir- 
 ginia " was then in vogue, and there was one air a very 
 simple air in that opera, which, after the first few bars, 
 always made me stop my ears and rush out of the room. 
 I became at last aware that this was sometimes done by 
 particular desire to please my parents, or amuse and inter- 
 est others by the display of such vehement emotion. My 
 infant conscience became perplexed between the reality of 
 the feeling and the exhibition of it. People are not always 
 
88 MRS. JAMESON. 
 
 aware of the injury done to children by repeating before 
 them things they say, or describing things they do : words 
 and actions, spontaneous and unconscious, become thence- 
 forth artificial and conscious. I can speak of the injury 
 done to myself, between five and eight years old. There 
 was some danger of my becoming a precocious actress, 
 danger of permanent mischief such as I have seen done to 
 other children, but I was saved by the recoil of resistance 
 and resentment excited in my mind. 
 
 This is enough. All that has been told here refers to a 
 period between five and ten years old. 
 
TO MONTAGUE, 
 
 AT THIRTY-THREE. 
 
 BY CHARLES SPRAGUE. 
 
 ONO, 1 11 not forget the day, 
 It claims, at least, a hallowed hour 
 A sparkling cup, an honest lay, 
 
 Sacred to Friendship's soothing power. 
 
 % 
 *T is not all ice, this heart of mine, 
 
 One throb is warm and youthful still ; 
 That throb, dear MONTAGUE, is thine, 
 Nor age nor grief that throb can chill. 
 
 How often sung, and yet how sweet 
 
 To dwell upon the days of old ! 
 Our guiltless pleasures to repeat, 
 
 Ere in the world our hearts grew cold ! 
 
 Fond memory wakes ! each pulse beats high { 
 Like some sweet tale past joys come o'er, 
 
 The years of ruin backward fly, 
 
 And I am young and gay once more. 
 
 Friend of my soul ! in this poor verse 
 
 Let one untutored tribute live ; 
 Here let my tongue my love rehearse ; 
 
 T is all, alas ! I have to give 
 
90 CHARLES SPRAGUE. 
 
 O, if from time's wide-yawning grave 
 There 's aught of mine that I could free, 
 
 One line from dull oblivion save, 
 
 T would be the line that tells of thee. 
 
 Though to the busy world unknown 
 Each noble act that shrinks from fame, 
 
 Goodness its favorite son shall own, 
 And orphan lips shall bless his name. 
 
 Thou 'rt the small stream, that silent goes, 
 By earth's cold, plodding crowd unseen, 
 
 Yet, all unnoticed though it flows, 
 Its banks are clothed in living green. 
 
 We met in that bright, sunny time, ^ 
 When every scene was fresh around, 
 
 And youth's warm hour and manhood's prime 
 Have blessed the tie that boyhood bound. 
 
 Though oft of valued friends bereft, 
 
 I bend, submissive, to the doom ; 
 For thou, the best, the best, art left, 
 
 To cheer my journey to the tomb. 
 
 And now, the dear ones ot our race 
 Have come to live our pleasures o'er ; 
 
 A lovely troop, to fill our place, 
 
 And weep for us when we 're no more. 
 
 Ever, O ever may they keep 
 
 The holy chain of friendship bright, 
 
 Till, rich in all that 's good, they sleep 
 
 With us through death's long, dreamless night. 
 
THE MAN-HUNTER. 
 
 BY BARRY CORNWALL. 
 
 IT can scarcely be more than eighteen months ago, that 
 two Englishmen met together unexpectedly at the little 
 town or city of Dessau. The elder was a grave person, in 
 no way remarkable; but the younger forced observation 
 upon him. He was a tall, gaunt, bony figure, presenting the 
 relics of a formidable man, but seemingly worn with travel 
 and oppressed by weighty thoughts. He must once have 
 been handsome ; and he was even now imposing. But pov- 
 erty and toil are sad enemies to human beauty ; and he had 
 endured both. Nevertheless, the black and ragged elf-locks 
 which fell about his face could not quite conceal its noble 
 proportions ; and, although his cheek was ghastly and macer- 
 ated, (perhaps by famine,) there was a wild, deep-seated 
 splendor glowing in his eye, such as we are apt to ascribe 
 to the poet when his frenzy is full upon him, or to the 
 madman when he dreams of vengeance. 
 
 The usual salutations of friends passed between them, 
 and they conversed for a short time on indifferent subjects ; 
 the elder, as he spoke, scrutinizing the condition of his ac- 
 quaintance, and the other glancing about from time to time, 
 with restless, watchful eyes, as though he feared some one 
 might escape his observation, or else might detect himself. 
 The name of the elder of these men was Denbigh : that 
 of the voun^er has not reached me. "We will call him 
 
92 BARRY CORNWALL. 
 
 Gordon. It was the curiosity of the first-mentioned that. 
 after a reasonable period, broke out into inquiry. (They 
 were just entering the public room of the Black Eagle at 
 Dessau.) 
 
 "But what has brought you here?" said he. "I left 
 you plodding at a merchant's desk, with barely the means 
 of living. Though a friend, you would never let mo 
 please myself by lending you money ; nor would you be 
 my companion down the Rhine, some three years ago. 
 You professed to hate travelling. Yet I find you here, 
 a traveller evidently, with few comforts. Come, be plain 
 with me. Tell me, what has brought you hither ? Or 
 rather what has withered and wasted you, and made your 
 hair so gray? You are grown quite an old man." 
 
 " Ay," replied Gordon ; " I am old, as you say, old 
 enough. Winter is upon me, on my head, on my heart ; 
 both are frozen up. Do you wish to know what brought 
 me here ? Well, you have a right to know ; and you shall 
 be told. You shall hear a tale." 
 
 " A true one ? " inquired Denbigh, smilingly. 
 
 " True ! " echoed the other ; " ay, as true as hell, as 
 dark, as damnable, but peace, peace ! " said he, checking 
 himself for a moment, and then proceeding in a hoarse, 
 whispering, vehement voice, " all that in time. We must 
 begin quietly, quietly. Come, let us drink some wine, 
 and you shall see presently what a calm historian I am." 
 
 Wine, together with some more solid refreshments, were 
 accordingly ordered. Gordon did not taste the latter, but 
 swallowed a draught or two of the bold liquid, which 
 soemed to still his nerves like an opiate. He composed 
 himself, and indeed appeared disposed to forget that there 
 was such a thing as trouble in the world, until the impa- 
 tience of his friend (which vented itself in the shape of 
 various leading questions) induced him to summon up his 
 recollections. He compressed his lips together for a mo- 
 
THE MAN-HUNTER. 93 
 
 inent, and drew a short, deep breath, through his inflated 
 nostrils ; but otherwise there was no preface or introduction 
 to his story, which commenced nearly, if not precisely, in 
 the following words : 
 
 "About three years ago, a young girl was brought to 
 one of those charitable institutions in the neighborhood of 
 London, where the wretched (the sinful and the destitute) 
 find refuge and consolation. She was, you may believe me, 
 beautiful ; so beautiful, so delicate, and, as I have said, so 
 young, that she extorted a burst of pity and admiration 
 from people long inured to look upon calamity. 
 
 " She was attended by her mother, a widow. This 
 woman differed from her child ; not merely in age or 
 feature. She was, in comparison, masculine ; her face was 
 stern ; her frame strong and enduring ; she looked as 
 though hunger and shame had been busy with her, as 
 though she had survived the loss of all tilings, and passed 
 the extreme limits of human woe. Once for I knew 
 her she would have disdained to ask even for pity. O, 
 what she must have borne, in body, in mind, before she 
 could have brought herself to become a suppliant there ! 
 Yet there she was, she, and her youngest born in her 
 hand, beggars. She presented her child to the patronesses 
 of the institution ; and, with an unbroken voice, prayed 
 them to take her in for refuge. 
 
 " The common questions were asked, the who, the whence, 
 the wherefore, &c. Even something more than common 
 curiosity displayed itself in the inquiries, and all was an- 
 swered with an unflinching spirit. The mother's story was 
 sad enough. Let us hope that such things are rare in 
 England. She was the widow of a military man, an officer 
 of courage and conduct, who died in battle. If we could 
 live upon laurels, his family need not have starved. But 
 the laurel is a poisonous tree. It is gay and shining, and 
 undecaying ; but whoso tasteth it dies ! Xo mattei now* 
 
94 BARRY CORNWALL. 
 
 The widow and three children were left almost without 
 money. The father had indeed possessed some little prop- 
 erty ; but it consisted of bonds, or notes, or securities of a 
 transferable nature ; and was intrusted (without receipt or 
 acknowledgment) to a villain. The depositary used it 
 for his own purposes ; denied his trust ; and, with the cold- 
 ness of a modern philosopher, saw his victims thrust out of 
 doors, to starve ! A good Samaritan gave them bread and 
 employment for a few weeks ; but he died suddenly, and 
 they were again at the mercy of fortune. 
 
 * It was now that the mother felt that her children looked 
 up to her for life. And she answered the appeal as a 
 mother only can. She toiled to the very utmost of her 
 strength : nothing was too much, nothing too base or menial 
 for her. She worked, and watched, and endured all tilings, 
 from all persons ; and thus it was that she obtained coarse 
 food for her young ones, sometimes even enough to sat- 
 isfy their hunger ; till at last the eldest boy became useful, 
 and began to earn money also ; and then they were able 
 almost daily to taste bread ! It is a wonder how they 
 lived, how they shunned the vices and squalid evils which 
 beset the poor. But they did so. They withstood all 
 temptations. They felt no envy nor hatred for the great 
 and fortunate. The sordid errors of their station never 
 fastened on them. They grew up honest, liberal-minded, 
 courageous. They wanted not even for learning, or at 
 least knowledge. For, after a time, a few cheap books 
 were bought or borrowed, and the ambition which the 
 mother taught them to feel served the boys in place uf 
 instructors. They read and studied. After working all 
 day, (running on errands, hewing wood, and drawing water,) 
 these children of a noble mother sat down to gather learn- 
 ing; never disobeying, never murmuring to do what she, 
 to whom they owed all things, commanded them to achieve. 
 Yet, little merit is due to them. It was she, the incompar- 
 
THE MAN-HUNTER. 95 
 
 able mother, who did all ; saved, supported, endured all 
 for her children's sake, for her dead husband's sake, and for 
 the disinterested love of virtue! 
 
 " I know not what frightful crimes some progenitor might 
 have committed, what curse he might have brought upon 
 this race ; but if none, in the name of God's mercy, why, 
 (when they had been steeped in baseness and po^ erty to the 
 lips,) why was a curse more horrible than all to come upon 
 them ? Poor creatures ! had they not endured enough ? 
 TThat is the axe or the gibbet to the daily never-dying pain 
 which a mother feels who sees her children famishing away 
 before her ? Sickness, cold, hunger, the contempt of friends, 
 the hate or indifference of all the world besides, the perpet- 
 ual heart-breaking toil and struggle to live ! to get bread, 
 yet often want it ! Was not all enough ? I suppose not ; 
 for a curse greater than all fell upon them. 
 
 " A friend, ha, ha, ha ! let me use common words, 
 a friend of the elder son (who had, by degrees, risen to be 
 a manufacturer's clerk), visited them at their humble abode. 
 He was rich, he was, moreover, a specious youth, fair and 
 florid, such as young girls fancy ; but as utterly hard and 
 impenetrable to every touch of honor or pity as the stone 
 we tread upon. He I must make short work of this 
 part of my story he loved the young sister of his friend, 
 or rather he sought her with the brutal appetite of an ani- 
 mal. He talked, and smiled, and flattered her, (she was 
 a weak thing, and his mummery pleased her) : he brought 
 presents to her mother, and, at last, ruin and shame upon 
 herself. She was so young, not fifteen years of age ! 
 But this base and hellish slave had no mercy on her inno- 
 cent youth, no respect for her desolate condition. He 
 ruined her 0, there were horrid circumstances ! force, 
 and fraud, and cruelty of all kinds, that I will not touch 
 upon. It is sufficient to say that her destruction was 
 achieved, and all her family In his power. The child 
 
9G BARRY CORNWALL. 
 
 (herself now about to be a mother) meditated death. She 
 was timid, however, and shrank from the vague and gloomy 
 terrors of the grave. So she lived on, pale and humbled, 
 uttering no complaint, and disclosing no disgrace, until 
 her mother noticed her despondency, and reproached her 
 for it. With a trembling heart trembling at she knew 
 not what she inquired solemnly the cause of all this 
 woe. The girl could not stand those piercing looks. The 
 mother whom she had obeyed, not only with love, but in 
 fear also, commanded a disclosure, and the poor victim 
 sunk on her knees before her. She told her sad story 
 with sobs and streaming eyes, and with her figure abased 
 to absolute prostration. Her parent listened (she would 
 rather have listened to her own death-warrant), looked 
 ghastly at her for a minute, and reproached her no more ! 
 Some accident, some intermission of employment, (I for- 
 get what,) made it impossible to support the poor fallen 
 child with proper care. This inability it was, joined to a 
 wish to keep her shame secret, that carried the mother 
 and daughter to the charitable place of which I have 
 spoken. And there the child was deposited, under a 
 feigned name, to undergo the pangs of childbirth. 
 
 " But the sons ! Do you not ask, where are they ? Ha, 
 ha ! I am coming to that. They knew nothing, sus- 
 pected nothing, till all the mother's plans were effected ; 
 and then, with a gloomy countenance, and a voice troubled 
 to its depths with many griefs, she told them ALL." 
 
 " How did they bear it ? What did they say or do ? " 
 inquired Denbigh, breaking silence for the first time since 
 the commencement of the story. Gordon answered : 
 
 " Her communication was, at first, absolutely unintelli- 
 gible. It was so sudden, and so utterly unsuspected, thai 
 it bore the character of a dream or a fable. They stood 
 bewildered. But when the truth, the real, bad, terrible 
 truth became plain, when it was repeated with more 
 
THE MAX-HUXTER. 97 
 
 particulars, and made frightfully distinct, the eldest son 
 burst into a rage of words. The younger, a youth of 
 more concentrated passions, started up, opened his mouth 
 as though he would utter some curse ; but instantly fell 
 dead on the floor." 
 
 " Good G d ! " interrupted Denbigh again, " and did he 
 die ? " 
 
 " No," replied the other, " he but appeared to die. Did 
 I say ' dead ' ? No ; I was wrong. He was not irrecov- 
 erably dead. By prompt help he was revived. In the 
 struggle between life and death blood burst from his 
 mouth and from his nose, and he felt easier. Perhaps 
 the oath which he at that moment was prescribing to 
 himself the fierce, implacable, unalterable determination 
 which his soul was forming tranquillized his spirit; for 
 he awoke to apparent calmness, and expressed himself 
 resigned. But he was not so to be satisfied. Patience, 
 resignation, forgiveness, these are good words: they 
 are virtues, perhaps ; but they were not his. He was of 
 a fiery spirit " 
 
 " Like yourself," said Denbigh, trying to smile away 
 the painful impression which the story was producing on 
 his mind. 
 
 " Ay, like myself, sir," was the fierce answer. " He 
 thought that vengeance, where punishment was manifestly 
 due, was scarcely the shadow of a crime ; and / think so 
 too. He swore, silently, but solemnly, (and invoked all 
 Heaven and Hell to attest his oath,) that he would thence- 
 forward have but one object, one ambition ; and this was 
 REVENGE ! He swore to take the blood of the betrayer, 
 and he did." 
 
 " When ? where ? " asked Denbigh, quicldy. 
 
 " Let us take some wine," said Gordon ; " I am speaking 
 now," continued he, after he had drunk, " of what must be. 
 The future is not yet come. But as sure as I see you be- 
 
98 BARRY CORNWALL. 
 
 fore me, so surely do I see the consummation of this re- 
 venge. There is a fate in some things : there is one in this 
 Do you remember the story of the Spaniard Aguirra ? " 
 
 " No ! " answered the other. 
 
 " Yet, it is well known, it is true, it is memorable, 
 and it deserves to be remembered ; for (except in the one 
 instance of which I now speak) it stands alone in the cata- 
 logue of extraordinary events. You shall hear it presently, 
 if it be only to rescue, by a parallel case, my story from the 
 character of a fiction. At present, let it suffice to say, that 
 sure as was Aguirra's vengeance, so sure shall be MINE ! " 
 
 " Yours ! " exclaimed Denbigh, " do I hear aright ? " 
 
 " Ay, open your ears wide. I am the Revenger ! My 
 family it is who owe Fortune so little, to whom vengeance 
 owes so much ! My mother and her famished brood it was 
 of whose sufferings I have spoken, and whose injuries I am 
 destined to revenge." 
 
 " But the villain ? " inquired Denbigh. 
 
 " You do well to bring me back to him. Yet think not 
 that I for a moment forget him. He fled when he knew, 
 nay, before he knew, when he but surmised that we had 
 discovered his villany. He collected money together, and 
 left his country. But I was soon upon his track. I too had 
 gathered some hard earnings, and my brother more ; and 
 with these united, I commenced a desperate pursuit. I will 
 not weary you by recounting the many difficulties of my task ; 
 how many thousand miles I have journeyed barefoot, with 
 little clothing, with less food (for I was forced to economize 
 my poor means) ; how for three years I have been generally 
 a beggar for my bread, a companion with the unsheltered 
 dog ; how I have been wounded, robbed, and even once im- 
 prisoned. That fortunately was but for a day, or it might 
 have overthrown my plans of vengeance. Thanks to the 
 furies, it did not ; I followed him, over all countries, from 
 Moscow to Madrid, from the Baltic to the Carpathians, He 
 
THE MAN-HUNTER. 99 
 
 fled with a sense, with a knowledge, that I was forever on his 
 track. He slept trebly armed, locked in and barred from all 
 access. He has been known to rise at night, and take flight 
 for a distant land. But, with the unerring sense of a blood- 
 hound, I was always after him. I was sure of him. He 
 never escaped me. No disguise, no swiftness of journeying, 
 no digressions from the ordinary path, no doubles, nor turn- 
 ings, nor common feints, such as the hunted beast resorts to 
 in his despair, availed him. Wherever he was there was 
 I! not so soon perhaps, but quite as surely. 
 
 " Twenty times I have been near meeting him alone, and 
 consummating my purpose. But one thing or other perpet- 
 ually intervened. A casual blow, without the certainty of 
 its being fatal, would have been nothing. He might have 
 recovered, he might have lived to see me proclaimed a 
 malefactor, and have borne evidence against me ; and then 
 he would have triumphed, and not I. I resolved to make 
 surer work ; to see that he should die ; and for myself, I 
 determined to live, for some time at least, in order to en- 
 joy the remembrance of having accomplished one deed of 
 justice. 
 
 " I said that I would not weary you with a narrative of 
 my travels and a repetition of my failures. But one adven- 
 ture amongst many occurs to me, somewhat differing from 
 the rest, and you shall hear it. One of my transits was across 
 the whole face of Europe ; from an obscure town in Flan- 
 ders to the Porte. I had scarcely reached the Fanar 
 (where I was housed by a Greek, whom I had served in an 
 accidental affray), when I fell sick of a fiery distemper, 
 some plague or fever begot in those burning regions, which 
 sometimes destroys the native and almost always the luckless 
 stranger. In my extremity, my kind hosts sent for a physi- 
 cian, a, converted Jew. He came and heard my ravings, 
 and let tne sickness deal with me as it chose. Some words, 
 however, which I threw out in my delirium (at his second 
 
100 BARRY CORNWALL. 
 
 visit) excited his curiosity ; and coming, as they d.d, from a 
 Frank, he was induced to communicate them to an English- 
 man who lodged in his house. This Englishman was the 
 fiend, the fugitive, whom I had chased so long in vain. A 
 few words and a lump of gold concluded a bargain ; and 
 the next time the scowling Issachar came to my bedside, he 
 ordered a cup of coffee for his patient. I had at that time 
 recovered my senses, and became suddenly and sensitively 
 awake to everything about me. I saw the renegade take a 
 powder from his vest, and, after looking round to see that 
 all was clear, put it, with a peculiar look, into the cup. '/ 
 is poison,' I said to myself; and by a sudden effort (while 
 the Israelite's back was turned), I forced myself upwards, 
 and sat, like a corpse revived, awaiting his attention. After 
 he had drugged the draught, he turned round suddenly and 
 beheld me. There I was, unable to speak indeed, but 
 ghastly and as white as stone, threatening and grinning, and 
 chattering unintelligible sounds. He was staggered; but 
 recovering himself with a smile, he tendered the detestable 
 potion. I had just strength enough to dash it out of his 
 hand, and sank on the bed exhausted. When I recovered I 
 found myself alone ; nor did I ever again see my physician. 
 " I do not complain of this. Life for life is an equal 
 stake. I knew the game which I was playing. Death for 
 one or both of us, that was certain. Quiet for him, at all 
 events (upon the earth or within it) ; perhaps revenge for 
 me. I was not angry at this attempt on my life. I liked it 
 better, in truth, than hunting day after day, week after week, 
 a flying, timorous, unresisting wretch. The opposition, the 
 determination he evinced to strike again, spurred me on. 
 It afforded a relief to my perpetual disappointment ; it 
 checkered the miserable monotony of my life. Sometimes I 
 had almost felt compassion for my harassed and terrified 
 enemy, and generally contempt. But now an adder was 
 before me. It rose up, and strove to use its fangs, and was 
 
THE MAX-HUXTER. 101 
 
 no longer to be trod on without peril. The?e thoughts, 
 strange as it may seem, contributed to my recovery. I grew 
 tranquil and well apace; 'and when I was fit to travel, I 
 found that my foe had quitted precipitately the banks of the 
 Bosphorus. 
 
 I had little difficulty in learning his route ; for my 
 Greek had his national subtilty, and did not spare money to 
 set rne on the track. The Jew doctor (he had a second 
 bribe) said that he had overheard my victim bargaining 
 with a Tartar courier to conduct him to Vienna. Upon this 
 hint, I set off on my dreary journey through the Ottoman 
 Empire and its huge provinces, Roumelia, Wallachia, 
 Transylvanifu I traversed the great uncultivated plains of 
 Turkey ; I crossed the Balkan and the muddy Danube ; 
 escaped the quarantine of the Crapaks ; and finally dis- 
 mounted at Vienna, just as a carriage was heard thundering 
 along the Presburg road containing a traveller to whom 
 haste was evidently of the last importance. 'T WAS HE ! 
 I saw him ; and he saw me. He saw me, and knew in 
 a moment that all his toilsome journey was once more in 
 vain. I saw him grow pale before me, and I triumphed. 
 Ha ! ha ! that night I was joyful. I ate, and drank, and 
 dreamt, as though I had no care or injury upon me. The 
 next morning I looked to see that my dagger was sharp, 
 and my pistols primed, and set out on foot to decoy my foe 
 into a quiet place, fit for the completion of my purpose. 
 But I failed, as I had failed often before. I beset him, I 
 tried to surprise him ; I kept him in incessant alarm ; but 
 the end was still the same. He was still destined to escape 
 me, and I to remain his pursuer. 
 
 " How it was that he retained his senses, that he had still 
 spring of mind to fly and hope to escape pursuit, is a 
 mystery to me. I have often wondered that he did not 
 bare his throat before me, and end his misery ; as those who 
 grow dizzy on a precipice, cast themselves from it, and find 
 
102 BARRY CORNWALL. 
 
 refuge from their intolerable fears in death. But no ; his 
 love of life, his fear (caused by that love of life), were so 
 great, so insuperable, that they never seemed capable, as in 
 ordinary cases, of sinking into indifference or despair. He 
 had no moral, no intellectual qualities, no courage of any 
 sort. Yet by his fear alone, he became at times absolutely 
 terrific. His struggles, his holding on to life, (when nothing 
 was left worth living for,) his sleepless, ceaseless activity 
 in flight, assumed a serious and even awful character. He 
 pursued his purpose as steadily and as unflinchingly a* I 
 pursued mine. Terror never stopped him ; hope never for- 
 sook him. From one end of the world to the other lie fled 
 
 backwards and forwards, this way, and that he fled, 
 and fled ; not dropping from apprehension, like the dove or 
 the wren ; but still keeping on his way, like some fierce bird 
 of prey, who, driven from one region, will still seek another, 
 and another, and fight it out to the last extremity. So 
 frightful have been his struggles, so wild and fantastic the 
 character of his fears, that once or twice, I (his destroyer) 
 
 I, who was watching him with an ever-deadly purpose, 
 became absolutely daunted and oppressed. I resumed my 
 strength, however, speedily, as you will suppose ; for what 
 his fear was to him, hate or revenge was to me, the sole 
 stirring principle of life. Oh ! this accursed wretch ! does 
 he ever dream that I relax ? that toil, and destitution, and 
 danger have any effect upon me ? He shall live to find him- 
 self in error. I am the fate, the bloodhound that will fol- 
 low, and must find him at last. Let me give up the contest 
 at once, and all will be quiet ; no more fear for him, no 
 more sad labors for me ! Of what value is life to either :f 
 us ? But yes, to me, it is of value ; for I have a deed to 
 do, an act of justice to perform on the most reckless and 
 heartless villain that ever disgraced the human name." 
 
 " And his name, what is that ? " asked Denbigh. 
 
 " Warne, Warne, the brand of hell be on him ! " 
 
THE MAN-HUNTER. 103 
 
 * Hush ! do not speak so loud ! Look ! there is some 
 one in yonder box who has heard you," said Denbigh again, 
 in a suppressed tone. 
 
 " I care not," replied the other. " This devil who walks 
 in human shape, and under the name of Warne, is now in 
 this city. He has eluded me for a short a very short 
 time by shifting his course and changing his disguises. 
 But I am here, and shall find him, wherever he lurks. Be 
 sure of it." 
 
 At this moment a stranger was seen stealing from a box, 
 where he had been taking refreshment. He appeared by 
 his walk (for the two speakers saw only his back) to be 
 an old man. ""He said nothing ; but, walking up towards the 
 end of the room, where a person attached to the inn was 
 standing, put a piece of money in his hand, (evidently more 
 than sufficient to discharge his bill.) and left the house. 
 
 From the first movement of the stranger, the attention of 
 Gordon was upon him: his neck was stretched out, his 
 eyes strained and wide open ; he even seemed to listen to 
 his tread. 
 
 " What is the matter ? " said Denbigh. " There is noth- 
 ing but an old man there, who is tottering home to bed." 
 
 Gordoi. made no reply, but followed the person alluded 
 to stealthily from the house. After a minute's space, Den- 
 bigh saw liim again hiding behind the buttress of a building 
 on the opposite side of the street. He was evidently watch- 
 ing the stranger He did not continue long, however, in 
 this situation, but stole forwards cautiously. After pro- 
 ceeding a short distance, he turned, and followed the wind- 
 ings of a street or road that intersected the principal street 
 of the town, and finally disappeared. 
 
 Denbigh never saw him again. Three or four days 
 afterwards, the body of an unknown man was found in a 
 copse near the city of Dessau. It was pierced with wounds, 
 and disfigured, and the clothes were much torn, as in a 
 
104 BARRY CORNWALL. 
 
 Struggle. From one hand (which remained clasped) some 
 fragments of dress, coarser than what belonged to the body, 
 were forced with dilliculty ; but they did not lead to drier- 
 tioii. The stranger w:is buried, and as much inquiry mad* 1 , 
 respecting him as is usual i'or persons for whom no one feel* 
 an interest. His murderer never was discovered. Denbigh 
 left the place immediately that the inquisition was over. 
 Ik 1 did not volunteer his evidence upon the occasion. His 
 natural love of justice, and perceptions of right, were pel 
 haps obscured by his affection for his friend ; besides which, 
 nothing that he could have said upon the occasion would 
 have exceeded a vague suspicion of the fact. At all events, 
 he kept (.onion's secret, until he deemed that it was not 
 dangerous to disclose it 
 
 In regard to Gordon himself he was never more heard 
 of. A man, indeed, bearing somewhat of his appearance, 
 was afterwards seen in the newly-cleared country near the 
 Ohio; but, excepting the resemblance that he bore to Den- 
 bigh's friend, and a certain intelligence beyond his situation 
 (which was that of a common laborer), there was nothing 
 to induce a belief that it was the same person. Whoever 
 he might be, however, even he too now has disappeared. 
 He was killed accidentally, while felling one of those enor- 
 mous hemlock-trees, with which some parts of the great 
 continent abound. A shallow grave was scooped for him ; 
 a fellow-laborer's prayer was his only requiem ; and, what- 
 ever may have been his intellect, whatever his passions 01 
 strength of purpose, the frail body which once contained 
 them now merely fertilizes the glade of an American forest, 
 or else has become food for the' bear or the jackal. 
 
 [The story of Aguirra, referred to in the foregoing nar- 
 rative, occurs in one of our early periodical works, and is to 
 the following effect : Aguirra was a Spanish soldier, under 
 the vommand of Esquivel, governor of Lima or Potosi. 
 
THK MAN-III-NIKR. 105 
 
 For some small cause, or for no cause, (to make an ex- 
 ample, or to wro;ik his spite,) this governor caused Aguirra 
 to be stripped and flogged. He received some hundred 
 stripes ; his remonstrances (that he was a gentleman, and as 
 such exempt by law from such disgrace, and that what he 
 had done was unimportant, and justified by common usage) 
 being treated with contempt. lie endured the punishment 
 in the presence of a crowd of comrades and strangers, and 
 swore (with a Spaniard's spirit) never to be satisfied but 
 with his tyrant's blood. lie waited patiently, until Esquhel 
 was no longer governor ; refusing consolation, and declin- 
 ing, from fancied unworthiness, all honorable employment. 
 But, when thje governor put off his authority, then Aguirra 
 commenced his revenge. He followed his victim from 
 place to place, haunted him like a ghost, and filled 
 him (though surrounded by friends and servants) with per- 
 petual dread. No place, no distance, could stop him. He 
 has been known to track his enemy for three, four, five 
 hundred leagues at a time ! He continued pursuing him for 
 three years and four months ; and at last, after a journey 
 of five hundred leagues, came upon him suddenly at Cuzco ; 
 found him, for the first time, without his guards, and in- 
 stantly stabbed him to the heart ! 
 
 Such is the story of Aguirra. It is believed to be a fact ; 
 and so is the story which I have recounted above. The 
 circumstances are not only curious as showing a strange 
 coincidence, but they show also what a powerful effect a 
 narrative of this kind may produce. For there is little 
 doubt but that the South American tale, although it may 
 not absolutely have generated the spirit of vengeance in 
 Gordon's mind, so shaped and modified it as to stimulate 
 his flagging animosity ; carried him through all impedi- 
 ments and reverses to the catastrophe ; and enabled him 
 to exhibit a perseverance that is to be paralleled nowhere, 
 except perhaps in the history of fanatics or martyrs.] 
 
THE NORSEMAN. 
 
 BY GERALD MASSEY. 
 
 A SWARTHY strength with face of light, 
 As dark sword-iron is beaten bright ; 
 A brave, frank look, with health aglow, 
 Bonny blue eyes and open brow ; 
 His friend he welcomes, heart-in-hand, 
 But foot to foot his foe must stand : 
 A Man who will face, to his last breath, 
 The sternest facts of life and death : 
 
 This is the brave old Norseman. 
 
 The wild wave-motion weird and strange 
 Rocks in him ! seaward he must range ; 
 His life is just a mighty lust 
 To wear away with use, not rust ! 
 Though bitter wintry cold the storm, 
 The fire within him keeps him warm : 
 Kings quiver at his flag unfurled, 
 The Sea-King 's master of the world ! 
 
 And conquering rides the Norseman. 
 
 He hides at heart of his rough life 
 A world of sweetness for the Wife : 
 From his rude breast a Babe may press 
 Soft milk of human tenderness, 
 Make his eyes water, his heart dance, 
 And sunrise in his countenance : 
 
THE NORSEMAN. 107 
 
 In merry mood his ale lie quaffs 
 
 By firelight, and his jolly heart laughs : 
 
 The blithe, great-hearted Norseman. 
 
 But when the Battle Trumpet rings, 
 His soul 's a war-horse clad with wings ! 
 He drinks delight in with the breath 
 Of Battle and the dust of death : 
 The Axes redden ; spring the sparks 
 Blood-radiant grow the gray mail-sarks ; 
 Such blows might batter, as they fell, 
 Heaven's gates, or burst the booms of hell ! 
 So fights the fearless Norseman. 
 
 The Norseman's king must stand up tall, 
 If he would be head over all ; 
 Mainmast of Battle ! when the plain 
 Is miry red with bloody rain ! 
 And grip his weapon for the fight, 
 Until his knuckles all grow white ; 
 Their banner-staff he bears is best 
 If double handful for the rest : 
 
 When " Follow me ! " cries the Norseiii-n. 
 
 Valiant and true, as Sagas tell, 
 The Norseman hated lies like hell ; 
 Hardy from cradle to the grave, 
 'T was their religion to be brave : 
 Great, silent fighting-men, whose words 
 Were few, soon said, and out with Swords ! 
 One saw his heart cut from his side 
 Living, and smiled ; and smiling, died : 
 
 The unconquerable Norseman. 
 
 They swam the flood ; they strode in flame ; 
 Nor quailed when the Valkyrie came 
 
108 GERALD MASSEY. 
 
 To kiss the chosen, for her charms, 
 "With " Rest my Hero, in mine arms." 
 Their spirits through a grim wide wound, 
 The Norse door-way to heaven found ; 
 And borne upon the battle blast, 
 Into the hall of Heroes passed : 
 
 And there was crowned the Norseman. 
 
 The Norseman wrestled with old Rome, 
 For Freedom in our Island home ; 
 He taught us how to ride the sea 
 With hempen bridle, horse of tree : 
 The Norseman stood with Robin Hood 
 By Freedom in the merry green wood, 
 When William ruled the English land 
 With cruel heart and bloody hand. 
 
 For Freedom fights the Norseman. 
 
 Still in our race the Norse king reigns ; 
 His best blood beats along our veins ; 
 With his old glory we can glow, 
 And surely sail where he could row : 
 Is danger stirring ? from its sleep 
 Our War-dog wakes his watch to keep, 
 Stands with our Banner over him, 
 True as of old, and stern and grim ! 
 
 Come on, you '11 find the Norseman 
 
 When Swords are gleaming you shall see 
 The Norseman's face flash gloriously, 
 With look that makes the foeman reel ; 
 His mirror from of old was steel ! 
 And still he wields, in Battle's hour, 
 The old Thor's hammer of Norse power, 
 Strikes with a desperate arm of might, 
 And at the last tug turns the fight : 
 
 For never yields the Norseman 
 
THE DRUIDS. 
 
 BY EDMUND BURKE. 
 
 BRITAIN was in the time of Julius Caesar what it is at 
 this daj in climate and natural advantages, temperate 
 and reasonably fertile. But, destitute of all those improve- 
 ments which in a succession of ages it has received from in- 
 genuity, from commerce, from riches and luxury, it then 
 wore a very rough and savage appearance. The country, 
 forest or marsh ; the habitations, cottages ; the cities, hiding- 
 places in woods ; the people naked, or only covered with 
 skins ; their sole employment, pasturage and hunting. They 
 painted their bodies for ornament or terror, by a custom 
 general amongst all savage nations, who, being passion- 
 ately fond of show and finery, and having no object but 
 their naked bodies on which to exercise this disposition, 
 have in all times painted or cut their skins, according to 
 their ideas of ornament. They shaved the beard on the 
 chin ; that on the upper lip was suffered to remain, and 
 grow to an extraordinary length, to favor the martial ap- 
 pearance, in which they placed their glory. They were in 
 their natural temper not unlike the Gauls ; impatient, fiery, 
 inconstant, ostentatious, boastful, fond of novelty, and, like 
 all barbarians, fierce, treacherous, and cruel. Their arms 
 were short javelins, small shields of a slight texture, and 
 great cutting swords with a blunt point, after the Gaulish 
 fashion. 
 
110 EDMUND BURKE. 
 
 Their chiefs went to battle in chariots, not unartfully 
 contrived, nor unskilfully managed. I cannot help tliink- 
 ing it something extraordinary, and not easily to be ac- 
 counted for, that the Britons should have been so expert 
 in the fabric of those chariots, when they seem utterly 
 ignorant in all other mechanic arts ; but thus it is deliv- 
 ered to us. They had also horse, though of no great repu- 
 tation, in their armies. Their foot was without hea\y 
 armor ; it was no firm body ; nor instructed to preserve 
 their ranks, to make their evolutions, or to obey their com 
 manders ; but in tolerating hardships, in dexterity of form- 
 ing ambuscades (the art military of savages), they are said 
 to have excelled. A natural ferocity and an impetuous 
 onset stood them in the place of discipline. 
 
 It is very difficult, at this distance of time, and with so 
 little information, to discern clearly what sort of civil gov- 
 ernment prevailed among the ancient Britons. In all very 
 uncultivated countries, as society is not close or intricate, 
 nor property very valuable, liberty subsists with few re- 
 straints. The natural equality of mankind appears, and is 
 asserted ; and therefore there are but obscure lines of any 
 form of government. In every society of this sort the 
 natural connections are the same as in others, though the 
 political ties are weak. Among such barbarians, therefore, 
 though there is little authority in the magistrate, there is 
 often great power lodged, or rather left, in the father ; for, 
 as among the Gauls, so among the Britons, he had the 
 power of life and death in his own family, over his chil- 
 dren and Ins servants. 
 
 But among freemen and heads of families causes of all 
 sorts seem to have been decided by the Druids : they sum- 
 moned and dissolved all the public assemblies ; they alone 
 had the power of capital punishments, and indeed seem to 
 have had the sole execution and interpretation of whatever 
 laws subsisted among this people. In this respect the 
 
THE DRUIDS. Ill 
 
 Celtic nations did not greatly differ from others, except that 
 we view them in an earlier stage of society. Justice was 
 in all countries originally administered by the priesthood ; 
 nor indeed could laws in their first feeble state have either 
 authority or sanction, so as to compel men to relinquish 
 their natural independence, had they not appeared to come 
 down to them enforced by beings of more than human 
 power. The first openings of civility have been every- 
 where made by religion. Amongst the Romans, the cus- 
 tody and interpretation of the laws continued solely in the 
 college of the pontiffs for above a century. 
 
 The time in which the Druid priesthood was instituted 
 is unknown. It probably rose, like other institutions of 
 that kind, from low and obscure beginnings ; and acquired 
 from time, and the labors of able men, a form, by which 
 it extended itself so far, and attained at length so mighty 
 an influence over the minds of a fierce, and otherwise un- 
 governable, people. Of the place where it arose there is 
 somewhat less doubt. Caesar mentions it as the common 
 opinion that this institution began in Britain ; that there it 
 always remained in the highest perfection, and that from 
 thence it diffused itself into Gaul. I own I find it not easy 
 to assign any tolerable cause why an order of so much 
 authority, and a discipline so exact, should have passed 
 from the more barbarous people to the more civilized ; 
 from the younger to the older ; from the colony to the 
 mother country ; but it is not wonderful that the early 
 extinction of this order, and that general contempt in which 
 the Romans held all the barbarous nations, should have left 
 these matters obscure and full of difficulty. 
 
 The Druids were kept entirely distinct from the body of 
 the people ; and they were exempted from all the inferior 
 and burdensome offices of society, that they might be at 
 leisure to attend the important duties of their own charge. 
 They were chosen out of the best families, and from the 
 
112 EDMUND BURKE. 
 
 young men of the most promising talents ; a regulation 
 which placed and preserved them in a respectable light 
 with the world. None were admitted into this order but 
 after a long and laborious novitiate, which made the char- 
 acter venerable in their own eyes by the time and difficulty 
 of attaining it. They were much devoted to solitude, and 
 thereby acquired that abstracted and thoughtful air wliich 
 is so imposing upon the vulgar. And when they appeared 
 in public it was seldom, and only on some great occasion ; 
 in the sacrifices of the gods, or on the seat of judgment 
 They prescribed medicine ; they formed the youth ; they 
 paid the last honors to the dead ; they foretold events ; they 
 exercised themselves in magic. They were at once the 
 priests, lawgivers, and physicians of their nation, and con- 
 sequently concentred in themselves all that respect that 
 men have diffusively for those who heal their diseases, pro- 
 tect their property, or reconcile them to the Divinity. 
 What contributed not a little to the stability and power of 
 this order was the extent of its foundation, and the regu- 
 larity and proportion of its structure. It took in both 
 sexes ; and the female Druids were in no less esteem for 
 their knowledge and sanctity than the males. It was divid- 
 ed into several subordinate ranks and classes ; and they all 
 depended upon a chief, or Arch-Druid, who was elected 
 to his place with great authority and pre-eminence for life. 
 They were further armed with a power of interdicting from 
 their sacrifices, or excommunicating, any obnoxious persons. 
 This interdiction, so similar to that used by the ancient 
 Athenians, and to that since practised among Christians, 
 was followed by an exclusion from all the benefits of civil 
 community ; and it was accordingly the most dreaded of all 
 punishments. This ample authority was in general use- 
 fully exerted ; by the interposition of the Druids, differ- 
 ences were composed and wars ended ; and the minds of the 
 fierce Northern people, being reconciled to each other, under 
 
THE DRUIDS. 113 
 
 the influence of religion, united with signal effect against 
 their common enemies. 
 
 There was a class of the Druids, whom they called 
 Bards, who delivered in songs (their only history) the ex- 
 ploits of their heroes; and who composed those verses 
 which contained the secrets of Druidical discipline, their 
 principles of natural and moral philosophy, their astronomy, 
 and the mystical rites of their religion. These verses in all 
 probability bore a near resemblance to the golden verses 
 of Pythagoras ; to those of Phocylides, Orpheus, and other 
 remnants of the most ancient Greek poets. The Druids, 
 even in Gaul, where they were not altogether ignorant of 
 the use of letters, in order to preserve their knowledge in 
 greater respect, committed none of their precepts to writ- 
 ing. The proficiency of their pupils was estimated princi- 
 pally by the number of technical verses which they retained 
 in their memory : a circumstance that shows this discipline 
 rather calculated to preserve with accuracy a few plain 
 maxims of traditionary science, than to improve and extend 
 it. And this is not the sole circumstance which leads us 
 to believe that among them learning had advanced no 
 further than its infancy. 
 
 The scholars of the Druids, like those of Pythagoras, 
 were carefully enjoined a long and religious silence ; for if 
 barbarians come to acquire any knowledge, it is rather by 
 instruction than examination : they must therefore be silent. 
 Pythagoras, in the rude times of Greece, required silence 
 in his disciples ; but Socrates, in the meridian of the Athe- 
 nian refinement, spoke less than his scholars: everything 
 was disputed in the Academy. 
 
 The Druids are said to be very expert in astronomy, in 
 geography, and in all parts of mathematical knowledge. 
 And authors speak, in a very exaggerated strain, of their 
 excellence in these, and in many other sciences. Some 
 elemental knowledge I suppose they had ; but I can 
 
114 EDMUND BURKE. 
 
 scarcely be persuaded that their learning was either deep 
 or extensive. In all countries where Druidism was pro- 
 fessed, the youth were generally instructed by that order; 
 and yet was there little, either in the manners of the peo- 
 ple, in their way of life, or their works of art, that demon- 
 strates profound science, or particularly mathematical skill. 
 Britain, where their discipline was in its highest perfection, 
 and which was therefore resorted to by the people of Gaul, 
 as an oracle in Druidical questions, was more barbarous in 
 all other respects than Gaul itself, or than any other coun- 
 try then known in Europe. These piles of rude magnifi- 
 cence, Stonehenge and Abury, are in vain produced in 
 proof of their mathematical abilities. These vast structures 
 have nothing which can be admired, but the greatness of 
 the work ; and they are not the only instances of the great 
 things which the mere labor of many hands united, and 
 persevering in their purpose, may accomplish with very 
 little help from mechanics. Th^ may be evinced by the 
 immense buildings, and the low state of the sciences, among 
 the original Peruvians. 
 
 The Druids were eminent, above all the philosophic 
 lawgivers of antiquity, for their care in impressing the 
 doctrine of the soul's immortality on the minds of their 
 people, as an operative and leading principle. This doc- 
 trine was inculcated on the scheme of transmigration, which 
 some imagine them to have derived from Pythagoras. But 
 it is by no means necessary to resort to any particular 
 teacher for an opinion which owes its birth to the weak 
 struggles of unenlightened reason, and to mistakes natural 
 to the human mind. The idea of the soul's immortality is 
 indeed ancient, universal, and in a manner inherent in our 
 nature : but it is not easy for a rude people to conceive any 
 other mode of existence than one similar to what they had 
 experienced in life; nor any other world as the scene of 
 such an existence but this we inhabit, beyond the bounds of 
 
THE DRUIDS. 115 
 
 which the mind extends itself with great difficulty. Admi- 
 ration, indeed, was able to exalt to heaven a few selected 
 heroes: it did not seem absurd that those, who in their 
 mortal state had distinguished themselves as superior and 
 overruling spirits, should after death ascend to that sphere 
 which influences and governs everything below; or that 
 the proper abode of beings, at once so illustrious and per- 
 manent, should be in that part of nature in which they had 
 always observed the greatest splendor and the least muta- 
 tion. But on ordinary occasions it was natural some should 
 imagine that the dead retired into a remote country, sepa- 
 rated from the living by seas or mountains. It was natural 
 that some should follow their imagination with a simplicity 
 still purer, and pursue the souls of men no further than 
 the sepulchres in which their bodies had been deposited; 
 whilst others of deeper penetration, observing that bodies 
 worn out by age, or destroyed by accidents, still afforded 
 the materials for generating new ones, concluded likewise 
 that a soul being dislodged did not wholly perish, but was 
 destined, by a similar revolution in nature, to act again, and 
 to animate some other body. This last principle gave rise 
 to the doctrine of transmigration ; but we must not presume, 
 of course, that where it prevailed it necessarily excluded the 
 other opinions ; for it is not remote from the usual proced- 
 ure of the human mind, blending, in obscure matters, imag- 
 ination and reasoning together, to unite ideas the most 
 inconsistent. When Homer represents the ghosts of his 
 heroes appealing at the sacrifices of Ulysses, he supposes 
 them endued with life, sensation, and a capacity of moving, 
 but he has joined to these powers of living existence un- 
 comeliness, want of strength, want of distinction, the char- 
 acteristics of a dead carcass. This is what the mind is apt 
 to do : it is very apt to confound the ideas of the surviving 
 soul and the dead body. The vulgar have always, and still 
 do, confound these very irreconcilable ideas. They lay the 
 
116 EDMUND BURKE 
 
 scene of apparitions in churchyards ; they habit the ghosl 
 in a shroud, and it appears in all the ghastly paleness of a 
 corpse. A contradiction of this kind has given rise to a 
 doubt whether the Druids did in reality hold the doctrine 
 of transmigration. There is positive testimony that they 
 did hold it. There is also testimony as positive that they 
 buried or burned with the dead utensils, arms, slaves, and 
 whatever might be judged useful to them, as if they were tci 
 tx5 removed into a separate state. They might have held 
 both these opinions; and we ought not to be surprised to 
 find error inconsistent. 
 
 The objects of the Druid worship were many. In this 
 respect they did not differ from other heathens ; but it must 
 be owned, that in general their ideas of divine matters were 
 more exalted than those of the Greeks and Romans, and 
 that they did not fall into an idolatry so coarse and vulgar. 
 That their gods should be represented under a human form, 
 they thought derogatory to beings uncreated and imperisha- 
 ble. To confine what can endure no limits within walls 
 and roofs, they judged absurd and impious. In these par- 
 ticulars there was something refined, and suitable enough 
 to a just idea of the Divinity. But the rest was not equal. 
 Some notions they had, like the greatest part of mankind, of 
 a Being eternal and infinite ; but they also, like the greatest 
 pait of mankind, paid their worship to inferior objects, from 
 the nature of ignorance and superstition always tending 
 downwards. 
 
 The first and chief objects of their worship were the ele- 
 ments ; and, of the elements, fire, as the most pure, active, 
 penetrating, and what gives life and energy to all the rest. 
 Among fires, the preference was given to the sun, as the 
 most glorious visible being, and the fountain of all life. 
 Next they venerated the moon and the planets. After fire, 
 water was held in reverence. This, when pure, and ritualty 
 prepared, was supposed to wash away all sins, and to qual 
 
THE DRUIDS. 117 
 
 ify the priest to approach the altar of the gods with more 
 acceptable prayers ; washing with water being a type natu- 
 ral enough of inward cleansing and purity of mind. They 
 also worshipped fountains, and lakes, and rivers. 
 
 Oaks were regarded by this sect with a particular ven- 
 eration, as by their greatness, their shade, their stability 
 and duration, not ill representing the perfections of the 
 Deity. From the great reverence in which they held this 
 tree, it is thought their name of Druids is derived, the 
 word Deru in the Celtic language signifying an oak. But 
 their reverence was not wholly confined to this tree. All 
 forests were held sacred ; and many particular plants were 
 respected, as'^endued with a particular holiness. No plant 
 was more revered than the mistletoe, especially if it grew 
 on the oak ; not only because it is rarely found upon that 
 tree, but because the oak was among the Druids peculiarly 
 sacred. Towards the end of the year they searched for this 
 plant, and when it was found great rejoicing ensued : it was 
 approached with reverence ; it was cut with a golden hook ; 
 it was not suffered to fall to the ground, but received with 
 great care and solemnity upon a white garment. 
 
 In ancient times, and in all countries, the profession of 
 physic was annexed to the priesthood. Men imagined that 
 all their diseases were inflicted by the immediate displeas- 
 ure of the Deity, and therefore concluded that the remedy 
 would most probably proceed from those who were particu- 
 larly employed in his service. Whatever, for the same 
 reason, was found of efficacy to avert or cure distempers 
 was considered as partaking somewhat of the Divinity. 
 Medicine was always joined with magic ; no remedy was 
 administered without mysterious ceremony and incantation. 
 The use of plants and herbs, both in medicinal and magical 
 practices, was early and general. The mistletoe, pointed 
 out by its very peculiar appearance and manner of growth, 
 must have struck powerfully on the imaginations of a su- 
 
118 EDMUND BUKKE. 
 
 perstitious people. Its virtues may have been soon discov- 
 ered. It has been fully proved, against the opinion of 
 Celsus, that internal remedies were of very early use. 
 Yet if it had not, the practice of the present savage nations 
 supports the probability of that opinion. By some modern 
 authors the mistletoe is said to be of signal service in the 
 cure of certain convulsive distempers, which, by their sud- 
 denness, their violence, and their unaccountable symptoms, 
 have been ever considered as supernatural. The epilepsy 
 was by the Romans for that reason called Morbus Sacer ; 
 and all other nations have regarded it in the same light. 
 The Druids also looked upon vervain, and some other 
 plants, as holy, and p . >bably for a similar reason. 
 
 The other objects of the Druid worship were chiefly 
 serpents in the animal world, and rude heaps of stone, or 
 great pillars without polish or sculpture, in the inanimate. 
 The serpent, by his dangerous qualities, is not ill adapted to 
 inspire terror ; by his annual renewals, to raise admiration ; 
 by his make, easily susceptible of many figures, to serve for 
 a variety of symbols ; and by all, to be an object of religious 
 observance : accordingly no object of idolatry has been more 
 universal. And this is so natural, that serpent-veneration 
 seems to be rising again even in the bosom of Mahome- 
 tanism. 
 
 The great stones, it has been supposed, were originally 
 monuments of illustrious men, or the memorials of consid- 
 erable actions, or they were landmarks for deciding the 
 bounds of fixed property. In time, the memory of the 
 persons or facts which these stones were erected to perpetu- 
 ate wore away ; but the reverence which custom, and proba- 
 bly certain periodical ceremonies, had preserved for those 
 places was not so soon obliterated. The monuments them- 
 selves then came to be venerated ; and not the less because 
 the reason for venerating them was no longer known. The 
 landmark was in those times held sacred on account of its 
 
THE DRUIDS. 119 
 
 great uses, and easily passed into an object of worship. 
 Hence the god Terminus amongst the Romans. This relig- 
 ious observance towards rude stones is one of the most 
 ancient and universal of all customs. Traces of it are to 
 be found in almost all, and especially in these Northern 
 nations ; and to this day in Lapland, where heathenism is 
 not yet entirely extirpated, their chief divinity, which they 
 call Stor Junkare, is nothing more than a rude stone. 
 
 Some writers, among the moderns, because the Druids 
 ordinarily made no use of images in their worship, have 
 given in to an opinion, that their religion was founded on 
 the unity of the Godhead. Buf this is no just consequence. 
 The spirituality of the idea, admitting their idea to have 
 been spiritual, does not infer the unity of the object All 
 the ancient authors who speak of this order agree, that, 
 besides those great and more distinguishing objects of their 
 worsliip already mentioned, they had gods answerable to 
 those adored by the Romans. And we know that the 
 Northern nations who overran the Roman Empire had in 
 fact a great plurality of gods, whose attributes, though not 
 their names, bore a close analogy to the idols of the South- 
 ern world. 
 
 The Druids performed the highest act of religion by 
 sacrifice, agreeably to the custom of all other nations. 
 They not only offered up beasts, but even human victims ; 
 a barbarity almost universal in the heathen world, but exer- 
 cised more uniformly, and with circumstances of peculiar 
 craelty, amongst those nations where the religion of the 
 Druids prevailed. They held that the life of a man was 
 the only atonement for the life of a man. They frequently 
 enclosed a number of wretches, some captives, some crimi- 
 nals, and, when these were wanting, even innocent victims, 
 in a gigantic statue of wicker-work, to which they set fire, 
 and invoked their deities amidst the horrid cries and shrieks 
 of the sufferers, and the shouts of those who assisted at 
 tins tremendous rite. 
 
120 EDMUND BURKE. 
 
 There were none among the ancients more emiuent foi 
 all the arts of divination than the Druids. Many of the 
 superstitious practices in use to this day among the country 
 people for discovering their future fortune seem to be 
 remains of Druidism. Futurity is the great concern of 
 mankind. Whilst the wise and learned look back upon ex- 
 perience and history, and reason from things past about 
 events to come, it is natural for the rude and ignorant, who 
 have the same desires without the same reasonable means 
 of satisfaction, to inquire into the secrets of futurity, and 
 to govern their conduct by omens, dreams, and prodigies. 
 The Druids, as well as th% Etruscan and Roman priest- 
 hood, attended with diligence the flight of birds, the pecking 
 of chickens, and the entrails of their animal sacrifices. It 
 was obvious that no contemptible prognostics of the weather 
 were to be taken from certain motions and appearances in 
 birds and beasts. A people who lived mostly in the open 
 air must have been well skilled in these observations. And 
 as changes in the weather influenced much the fortune of 
 their huntings, or their harvests, which were all their for- 
 tunes, it was easy to apply the same prognostics to every 
 event by a transition very natural and common ; and thus 
 probably arose the science of auspices, which formerly 
 guided the deliberations of councils, and the motions of 
 armies, though now they only serve, and scarcely serve, if 
 amuse the vulgar. 
 
 The Druid temple is represented to have been nothing 
 more than a consecrated wood. The ancients speak of no 
 other. But monuments remain which show that the Druids 
 Avere not in this respect wholly confined to groves. They 
 had also a species of building, which in all probability 
 was destined to religious use. This sort of structure 
 was indeed without walls or roof. It was a colonnade, 
 generally circular, of huge rude stones, sometimes single, 
 sometimes double ; sometimes with, often without, an 
 
THE DRUIDS. 121 
 
 architrave These open temples were not in all respects 
 peculiar to the Northern nations. Those of the Greeks 
 which were dedicated to the celestial gods, ought in strict- 
 ness to have had no roof, and were thence called Hy- 
 pcethra. 
 
 Many of these monuments remain in the British islands, 
 curious for their antiquity, or astonishing for the greatness 
 of the work ; enormous masses of rock, so poised as to be 
 set in motion with the slightest touch, yet not to be pushed 
 from their place by a very great power : 7at altars, pecu- 
 liar and mystical in their structure, thrones, basins, heaps 
 or kearns ; and a variety of other works, displaying a wild 
 industry, and, a strange mixture of ingenuity and rudeness. 
 But they are all worthy of attention ; not only as such 
 monuments often clear up the darkness, and supply the 
 defects, of history, but as they lay open a noble field of 
 speculation for those who study the changes which have 
 happened in the manners, opinions, and sciences of men, 
 and who think them as worthy of regard as the fortune 
 of wars, and the revolutions of kingdoms. 
 
 The short account which I have here given does not con- 
 tain the whole of what is handed down to us by ancient 
 writers, or discovered by modern research, concerning this 
 remarkable order. But I have selected those which appear 
 to me the most striking features, and such as throw the 
 strongest light on the genius and true character of the Dru- 
 idical institution. In some respects it was undoubtedly 
 very singular ; it stood out more from the body of the 
 people than the priesthood of other nations ; and their 
 knowledge and policy appeared the more striking by being 
 contrasted with the great simplicity and rudeness of the 
 people over whom they presided. But, notwithstanding 
 some peculiar appearances and practices, it is impossible 
 not to perceive a great conformity between this and the 
 ancient orders which have been established for the purposes 
 
122 EDMUND BURKE. 
 
 of religion in almost all countries. For, to say nothing of 
 the resemblance which many have traced between this and 
 the Jewish priesthood, the Persian Magi, and the India 
 Brachmans, it did not so greatly differ from the Roman 
 priesthood either in the original objects, or in the general 
 mode of worship, or in the constitution of their hierarchy. 
 In the original institution, neither of these nations had the 
 use of images ; the rules of the Salian as well as Druid 
 discipline were delivered in verse ; both orders were under 
 an elective head ; and both were for a long time the law- 
 yers of their country. So that when the order of Druids 
 was suppressed by the emperors, it was rather from a dread 
 of an influence incompatible with the Roman government, 
 lhan from any dislike of their religious opinions. 
 
THE WITCH'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 BY JOHN G. WHITTTER. 
 
 IT was the pleasant harvest time, 
 When cellar-bins are closely stowed, 
 And garrets bend beneath their load, 
 
 And the old swallow-haunted barns 
 Brown-gabled, long, and full of seams 
 Through which the moted sunlight streams. 
 
 And winds blow freshly in, to shake 
 The red plumes of the roosted cocks, 
 And the loose haymow's scented locks 
 
 Are filled with summer's ripened stores, 
 Its odorous grass and barley sheaves, 
 From their low scaffolds to their eaves. 
 
 On Esek Harden's oaken floor, 
 
 With many an autumn threshing worn, 
 Lay the heaped ears of unhusked corn. 
 
 And thither came young men and maids, 
 Beneath a moon that, large and low, 
 Lit that sweet eve of long ago. 
 
124 JOHN G. WHITTIER. 
 
 They took then places ; some by chance, 
 And others by a merry voice 
 Or sweet sinile guided to their choice. 
 
 How pleasantly the rising moon, 
 Between the shadow of the mows, 
 Looked on them through the great elm boughs ! 
 
 On sturdy boyhood sun-embrowned, 
 On girlhood with its solid curves 
 Of healthful strength and painless nerves ! 
 
 And jests went round, and laughs that made 
 The house-dog answer with his howl, 
 And kept astir the barn-yard fowl ; 
 
 And quaint old songs their fathers sung, 
 In Derby dales and Yorkshire moors, 
 Ere Norman William trod their shores ; 
 
 And tales, whose merry license shook 
 The fat sides of the Saxon thane, 
 Forgetful of the hovering Dane ! 
 
 But still the sweetest voice was mute 
 That river-valley ever heard, 
 From lip of maid or throat of bird ; 
 
 For Mabel Martin sat apart, 
 
 And let the haymow's shadow fall 
 Upon the loveliest face of all. 
 
 She sat apart, as one forbid, 
 
 Who knew that none would condescend 
 To own the Witch-wife's child a friend. 
 
THE WITCH'S DAUGHTER. 
 
 The seasons scarce had gone their round, 
 Since curious thousands thronged to see 
 Her mother on the gallows-tree ; 
 
 And mocked the palsied limbs of age, 
 That faltered on the fatal stairs, 
 And wan lip trembling with its prayers ! 
 
 Few questioned of the sorrowing child, 
 Or, when they saw the mother die, 
 Dreamed of the daughter's agony. 
 
 They 'went up to their homes that day, 
 As men and Christians justified : 
 God willed it, and the wretch had died I 
 
 Dear God and Father of us all, 
 Forgive our faith in cruel lies, 
 Forgive the blindness that denies ! 
 
 Forgive thy creature when he takes, 
 For the all-perfect love thou art, 
 Some grim creation of his heart. 
 
 Cast down our idols, overturn 
 Our bloody altars ; let us see 
 Thyself in thy humanity ! 
 
 Poor Mabel from her mother's grave 
 Crept to her desolate hearthstone, 
 And wrestled with her fate alone ; 
 
 With love, and anger, and despair, 
 The phantoms of disordered sense, 
 The awful doubts of Providence ! 
 
126 JOHN G. WHITTIER. 
 
 The school-boys jeered her as they passed 
 And, when she sought the house of prayer, 
 Her mother's curse pursued her there. 
 
 And still o'er many a neighboring door 
 She saw the horseshoe's curved charm, 
 To guard against her mother's harm ; 
 
 That mother, poor, and sick, and lame, 
 Who daily, by the old arm-chair, 
 Folded her withered arms in prayer ; 
 
 Who turned, in Salem's dreary jail, 
 Her worn old Bible o'er and o'er, 
 When her dun eyes could read no more ! 
 
 Sore tried and pained, the poor girl kept 
 Her faith, and trusted that her way, 
 So dark, would somewhere meet the day. 
 
 And still her weary wheel went round 
 Day after day, with no relief: 
 Small leisure have the poor for grief. 
 
 So in the shadow Mabel sits ; 
 
 Untouched by mirth she sees and hears ; 
 Her smile is sadder than her tears. 
 
 But cruel eyes have found her out, 
 And cruel lips repeat her name, 
 And taunt her with her mother's shame. 
 
 She answered not with railing words, 
 But drew her apron o'er her face, 
 And, sobbing, glided from the place. 
 
THE WITCH'S DAUGHTER. 127 
 
 And only pausing at the door, 
 
 Her sad eyes met the troubled gaze 
 Of one who, in her better days, 
 
 Had been her warm and steady friend 
 Ere yet her mother's doom had made 
 Even Esek Harden half afraid. 
 
 He felt that mute appeal of tears, 
 And, starting, with an angry frown 
 Hushed all the wicked murmurs down. 
 
 " Good neighbors mine," he sternly said, 
 " This passes harmless mirth or jest ; 
 I brook no insult to my guest. 
 
 " She is indeed her mother's child ; 
 But God's sweet pity ministers 
 Unto no whiter soul than hers. 
 
 ** Let Goody Martin rest in peace ; 
 I never knew her harm a fly, 
 And witch or not, God knows not L 
 
 " I know who swore her life away ; 
 And, as God lives, I 'd not condemn 
 An Indian dog on word of them." 
 
 The broadest lands in all the town, 
 The skill to guide, the power to awe, 
 Were Harden's ; and his word was law. 
 
 None dared withstand him to his face, 
 But one sly maiden spake aside 
 " The little witch is evil eyed ! 
 
128 JOHN G. WHITTIER. 
 
 " Her mother only killed a cow, 
 Or witched a churn or dairy-pan ; 
 But she, forsooth, must charm a man ! " 
 
 Poor Mabel, in her lonely home, 
 Sat by the window's narrow pane, 
 White in the moonlight's silver rain. 
 
 The river, on its pebbled rim, 
 
 Made music such as childhood knew ; 
 The door-yard tree was whispered through 
 
 By voices such as childhood's ear 
 Had heard in moonlights long ago ; 
 And through the willow boughs below 
 
 She saw the rippled water shine ; 
 Beyond, in waves of shade and light, 
 The hills rolled off into the night 
 
 Sweet sounds and pictures mocking so 
 The sadness of her human lot, 
 She saw and heard, but heeded not. 
 
 She strove to drown her sense of wrong, 
 And, in her old and simple way, 
 To teach her bitter heart to pray. 
 
 Poor child ! the prayer, begun in faith, 
 Grew to a low, despairing cry 
 Of utter misery : " Let me die ! 
 
 " 0, take me from the scornful eyes, 
 And hide me where the cruel speech 
 And mocking finger may not reach ! 
 
THE WITCH'S DAUGHTER. 129 
 
 * I dare not breathe my mother's name : 
 A daughter's right I dare not cri^ve 
 To weep above her unblest grave ! 
 
 " Let me not live until my heart, 
 With few to pity, and with none 
 To love me, hardens into stone. 
 
 " O God ! have mercy on thy child, 
 
 Whose faith in thee grows weak and small, 
 And take me ere I lose it all ! " 
 
 A shadow on the moonlight fell, 
 
 And murmuring wind and wave became 
 A voice whose burden was her name. 
 
 Had then God heard her ? Had he sent 
 His angel down ? In flesh and blood, 
 Before her Esek Harden stood ? 
 
 He laid his hand upon her arm : 
 
 " Dear Mabel, this no more shall be ; 
 Who scoffs at you, must scoff at me. 
 
 " You know rough Esek Harden well ; 
 And if he seems no suitor gay, 
 And if his hair is touched with gray, 
 
 " The maiden grown shall never find 
 
 His heart less warm than when she smiled, 
 Upon his knees, a little child ! " 
 
 Her tears of grief were tears of joy, 
 As, folded in his strong embrace, 
 She looked in Esek Harden's face. 
 
130 JOHN G. WHITTIER. 
 
 ' O, truest friend of aU ! " she said, 
 
 " God bless you for your kindly thought, 
 And make me worthy of my lot ! " 
 
 He led her through his dewy fields, 
 
 To where the swinging lanterns glowed, 
 And through the doors the huskers showed 
 
 " Good friends and neighbors ! " Esek said, 
 " I 'm weary of this lonely life ; 
 In Mabel see my chosen wife ! 
 
 " She greets you kindly, one and all ; 
 The past is past, and all offence 
 Falls harmless from her innocence. 
 
 " Henceforth she stands no more alone ; 
 You know what Esek Harden is ; 
 He brooks no wrong to him or his." 
 
 Now let the merriest tales be told, 
 And let the sweetest songs be sung, 
 That ever made the old heart young ! 
 
 For now the lost has found a home ; 
 And a lone hearth shall brighter burn, 
 As all the household joys return ! 
 
 O, pleasantly the harvest moon, 
 Between the shadow of the mows, 
 Looked on them through the great elm boughs ! 
 
 On Mabel's curls of golden hair 
 On Esek's shaggy strength it fell ; 
 And the wind whispered, " It is well ! n 
 
THE OLD LADY, AND THE OLD GENTLEMiN 
 
 BY LEIGH HUNT. 
 
 THE OLD LADY. 
 
 IF the Old Lady is a widow and lives alone, the man- 
 ners of her condition and time of life are so much the 
 more apparent. She generally dresses in plain silks, that 
 make a gentle rustling as she moves about the silence of 
 her room; and she wears a nice cap with a lace border, 
 that comes under the chin. In a placket at her side is an 
 old enamelled watch, unless it is locked up in a drawer 
 of her toilet, for fear of accidents. Her waist is rather 
 tight and trim than otherwise, as she had a fine one when 
 young ; and she is not sorry if you see a pair of her stock- 
 ings on a table, that you may be aware of the neatness of 
 her leg and foot Contented with these and other evident 
 indications of a good shape, and letting her young friends 
 understand that she can afford to obscure it a little, she 
 wears pockets, and uses them well too. In the one is 
 her handkerchief, and any heavier matter that is not likely 
 to come out with it, such as the change of a sixpence ; in 
 the other is a miscellaneous assortment, consisting of a 
 pocket-book, a bunch of keys, a needle-case, a spectacle- 
 case, crumbs of biscuit, a nutmeg and grater, a smelling- 
 bottle, and, according to the season, an orange or apple, 
 which after many days she draws out, warm and glossy, 
 
132 LEIGH HUNT. 
 
 to give to some little child that has well behaved itself. 
 She generally occupies two rooms, in the neatest condition 
 possible. In the chamber is a bed with a white coverlet, 
 built up high and round, to look well, and with curtains 
 of a pastoral pattern, consisting alternately of large plants, 
 and shepherds and shepherdesses. On the mantel-piece 
 are more shepherds and shepherdesses, with dot-eyed sheep 
 at their feet, all in colored ware : the man, perhaps, in a 
 pink jacket and knots of ribbons at his knees and shoes, 
 holding his crook lightly in one hand, and with the other 
 at his breast, turning his toes out and looking tenderly at 
 the shepherdess ; the woman holding a crook also, and 
 modestly returning his look, with a gypsy-hat jerked up 
 behind, a very slender waist, with petticoat and hips to 
 counteract, and the petticoat pulled up through the pocket- 
 holes, in order to show the trimness of her ankles. But 
 these patterns, of course, are various. The toilet is an- 
 cient, carved at the edges, and tied about with a snow- 
 white drapery of muslin. Beside it are various boxes, 
 mostly japan ; and the set of drawers are exquisite things 
 for a little girl to rummage, if ever little girl be so bold, 
 containing ribbons and laces of various kinds ; linen smell- 
 ing of lavender, of the flowers of which there is always 
 dust in the corners; a heap of pocket-books for a series 
 of years ; and pieces of dress long gone by, such as head- 
 fronts, stomachers, and flowered satin shoes, with enormous 
 heels. The stock of letters are under especial -lock and 
 key. So much for the bedroom. In the sitting-room is 
 rather a spare assortment of shining old mahogany furni- 
 ture, or carved arm-chairs equally old, with chintz dra- 
 peries down to the ground ; a folding or other screen, with 
 Chinese figures, their round, little-eyed, meek faces perking 
 sideways ; a stuffed bird, perhaps in a glass case (a living 
 one is too much for her) ; a portrait of her husband over 
 the mantel-piece, in a coat with frog-buttons, and a delicate 
 
THE OLD LADY. 133 
 
 frilled hand lightly inserted in the waistcoat ; and opposite 
 him on the wall is a piece of embroidered literature, 
 framed and glazed, containing some moral distich or maxim, 
 worked in angular capital letters, with two trees or parrots 
 below, in their proper colors ; the whole concluding with an 
 ABC and numerals, and the name of the fair industrious, 
 expressing it to be "her work, Jan. 14, 1762." The rest 
 of the furniture consists of a looking-glass with carved 
 edges, perhaps a settee, a hassock for the feet, a mat for 
 the little dog, and a small set of shelves, in which are 
 the " Spectator " and " Guardian," the " Turkish Spy," a 
 Bible and Prayer-Book, " Young's Night Thoughts," with a 
 piece of laceXn it to flatten, " Mrs. Rowe's Devout Exer- 
 cises of the Heart," "Mrs. Glasse's Cookery," and perhaps 
 " Sir Charles Grandison," and " Clarissa." John Buncle " 
 is in the closet among the pickles and preserves. The 
 clock is on the landing-place between the . two room doors, 
 where it ticks audibly but quietly; and the landing-place, 
 as well as the stairs, is carpeted to a nicety. The house 
 is most in character, and properly coeval, if it is in a 
 retired suburb, and strongly built, with wainscot rather 
 than paper inside, and lockers in the windows. Before 
 the windows should be some quivering poplars. Here the 
 Old Lady receives a few quiet visitors to tea, and per- 
 haps an early game at cards: or you may see her going 
 out on the same kind of visit herself, with a light umbrella 
 running up into a stick and crooked ivory handle, and her 
 little dog, equally famous for his love to her and captious 
 antipathy to strangers. Her grandchildren dislike him on 
 holidays, and the boldest sometimes ventures to give him 
 a sly kick under the table. When she returns at night, 
 she appears, if the weather happens to be doubtful, in a 
 calash ; and her servant in pattens, follows half behind and 
 half at her side, with a lantern. 
 
 Her opinions are not many nor new. She thinks the 
 
Io4 LEIGH HUNT 
 
 clergyman a nice man. The Duke of Wellington, in he- 
 opinion, is a very great man ; bnt she has a secret prefer- 
 ence for the Marquis of Granby. She thinks the young 
 women of the present day too forward, and the men not 
 respectful enough; but hopes her grandchildren will be 
 better; though she differs with her daughter in several 
 points respecting their management. She sets little value 
 on the new accomplishments; is a great though delicate 
 connoisseur in butcher's meat and all sorts of housewifery ; 
 and if you mention waltzes, expatiates on the grace and 
 fine breeding of the minuet She longs to have seen one 
 danced by Sir Charles Grandison, whom she almost con- 
 siders as a real person. She likes a walk of a summer's 
 evening, but avoids the new streets, canals, &c., and some- 
 times goes through the churchyard, where her children 
 and her husband lie buried, serious, but not melancholy. 
 She has had three great epochs in her life: her mar- 
 riage, her having been at court, to see the King and 
 Queen and Royal Family, and a compliment on her fig- 
 ure she once received, in passing, from Mr. "Wilkes, whom 
 she describes as a sad, loose man, but engaging. His 
 plainness she thinks much exaggerated. If anything takes 
 her at a distance from home, it is still the court ; but she 
 seldom stirs, even for that. The last time but one that 
 she went, was to see the Duke of Wttrtemberg ; and most 
 probably for the last time of all, to see the Princess Char- 
 lotte and Prince Leopold. From this beatific vision she 
 returned with the same admiration as ever for the fine, 
 comely appearance of the Duke of York and the rest of 
 the family, and great delight at having had a near view 
 of the Princess, whom she speaks of with smiling pomp 
 and lifted mittens, clasping them as passionately as she 
 can together, and calling her, in a transport of mixed 
 loyalty and self-love, a fine royal young creature, and 
 Daughter of England." 
 
THE OLD GENTLEMAN. 135 
 
 THE OLD GENTLEMAN. 
 
 OUR Old Gentleman, in order to be exclusively him- 
 self, must be either a widower or a bachelor. Suppose 
 the former. We do not mention his precise age, which 
 would be invidious : nor whether he wears his own hair or 
 a wig ; which would be wanting in universality. If a wig, 
 it is a compromise between the more modern scratch and 
 the departed glory of the toupee. If his own hair, it is 
 white, in spite of his favorite grandson, who used to get 
 on the chair behind him, and pull the silver hairs out, ten 
 years ago. If he is bald at top, the hair-dresser, hovering 
 and breathing about him like a second youth, takes care 
 to give the bald place as much powder as the covered , 
 in order that lie may convey to the sensoriuni within a 
 pleasing indistinctness of idea respecting the exact limits 
 of skin and hair. He is very clean and neat ; and, in 
 warm weather, is proud of opening his waistcoat half-way 
 down, and letting so much of his frill be seen, in order to 
 show his hardiness as well as taste. His watch and shirt- 
 buttons are of the best ; and he does not care if he has 
 two rings on a finger. If his watch ever failed him at 
 the club or coffee-house, he would take a walk every day 
 to the nearest clock of good character, purely to keep it 
 right. He has a cane at home, but seldom uses it, on 
 finding it out of fashion with his elderly juniors. He has 
 a small cocked hat for gala days, which he lifts higher 
 from his head than the round one, when bowed to. In 
 his pockets are two handkerchiefs (one for the neck at 
 night-time), his spectacles, and his pocket-book. The 
 pocket-book, among other things, contains a receipt for 
 a cough, and some verses cut out of an odd sheet of an 
 old magazine, on the lovely Duchess of A., beginning, 
 
 " When beauteous Mira walks the plain " 
 
136 LEIGH HUNT. 
 
 He intends this for a commonplace-book which he keeps, 
 consisting of passages in verse and prose, cut out of news- 
 papers and magazines, and pasted in columns ; some of 
 them rather gay. His principal other books are Shake- 
 speare's Plays and Milton's Paradise Lost ; the Spectator, 
 the History of England, the Works of Lady M. ~W. Mon- 
 tague, Pope, and Churchill ; Middleton's Geography ; the 
 Gentleman's Magazine ; Sir John Sinclair on Longevity ; 
 several plays with portraits in character ; Account of Eliz- 
 abeth Canning, Memoirs of George Ann Bellamy, Poetica 
 Amusements at Bath-Easton, Blair's Works, Elegant Ex- 
 tracts ; Junius as originally published ; a few pamplilets 
 on the American War, and Lord George Gordon, &c., 
 and one on the French Revolution. In his sitting-rooms 
 are some engravings from Hogarth and Sir Joshua ; an 
 engraved portrait of the Marquis of Granby ; ditto of M. 
 le Comte de Grasse surrendering to Admiral Rodney ; a 
 humorous piece after Penny ; and a portrait of himself, 
 painted by Sir Joshua. His wife's portrait is in his cham- 
 ber, looking upon his bed. She is a little girl, stepping 
 forward with a smile, and a pointed toe, as if going to 
 dance. He lost her when she was sixty. 
 
 The Old Gentleman is an early riser, because he intends 
 to live at least twenty years longer. He continues to 
 take tea for breakfast, in spite of what is said against its 
 nervous effects; having been satisfied on that point some 
 years ago by Dr. Johnson's criticism on Hanway, and a 
 great liking for tea previously. His china cups and sau- 
 cers have been broken since his wife's death, all but one, 
 which is religiously kept for his use. He passes his morn- 
 ing in - walking or riding, looking in at auctions, looking 
 after his India bonds or some such money securities, fur- 
 thering some subscription set on foot by his excellent 
 friend Sir John, or cheapening a new old print for his 
 portfolio. He also hears of the newspapers ; not caring 
 
THE OLD GENTLEMAN. 137 
 
 to see them till after dinner at the coffee-house. He may 
 also cheapen a fish or so ; the fishmonger soliciting his 
 doubting eye as he passes, with a profound bow of recog- 
 nition. He eats a pear before dinner. 
 
 His dinner at the coffee-house is served up to him at 
 the accustomed hour, in the old accustomed way, and by 
 the accustomed waiter. If William did not bring it, the 
 fish would be sure to be stale, and the flesh new. He 
 eats no tart ; or if he ventures on a little, takes cheese 
 with it. You might as soon attempt to persuade him out 
 of his senses as that cheese is not good for digestion. 
 He takes port ; and if he has drunk more than usual, 
 and in a more private place, may be induced, by some 
 respectful inquiries respecting the old style of music, to 
 sing a song composed by Mr. Oswald or Mr. Lampe, such 
 
 as, 
 
 " Chloe, by that borrowed kiss/' 
 or, 
 
 " Come, gentle god of soft repose," 
 
 or his wife's favorite ballad, beginning, 
 
 " At Upton on the hill, 
 There lived a happy pair." 
 
 Of course, no such exploit can take place in the coffee- 
 room ; but he will canvass the theory of that matter there 
 with you, or discuss the weather, or the markets, or the 
 theatres, or the merits of " my lord North " or " my lord 
 Rockingham " ; for he rarely says simply, lord ; it is gen- 
 erally " my lord," trippingly and genteelly off the tongue. 
 If alone after dinner, his great delight is the newspapfir ; 
 which he prepares to read by wiping his spectacles, care- 
 fully adjusting them on his eyes, and drawing the candle 
 close to him, so as to stand sideways betwixt his ocular 
 aim and the small type. He then holds the paper at 
 arm's length, and dropping his eyelids half down and his 
 
138 LEIGH HUNT. 
 
 mouth half open, takes cognizance of the day's informa- 
 tion. If he leaves off, it is only when the door is opened 
 by a new-comer, or when he suspects somebody is over- 
 anxious to get the paper out of his hand. On these occa- 
 sions he gives an important hem ! or so ; and resumes. 
 
 In the evening, our Old Gentleman is fond of going to 
 the theatre, or of having a game of cards. If he enjoys 
 the latter at his own house or lodgings, he likes to pltiy 
 with some friends whom he has known for many years ; 
 but an elderly stranger may be introduced, if quiet and 
 scientific ; and the privilege is extended to younger men 
 of letters ; who, if ill players, are good losers. Not that 
 he is a miser, but to win money at cards is like proving 
 his victory by getting the baggage ; and to win of a 
 younger man is a substitute for his not being able to beat 
 him at rackets. He breaks up early, whether at home 
 or abroad. 
 
 At the theatre, he likes a front row in the pit. He 
 comes early, if he can do so without getting into a squeeze, 
 and sits patiently waiting for the drawing up of the cur- 
 tain, with his hands placidly lying one over the other on 
 the top of his stick. He generously admires some of 
 the best performers, but thinks them far inferior to Gar- 
 rick, Woodward, and Clive. During splendid scenes, he 
 is anxious that the little boy should see. 
 
 He has been induced to look in at Vauxhall again, but 
 likes it still less than he did years back, and cannot bear 
 it in comparison with Ranelagh. He thinks everything 
 looks poor, flaring, and jaded. " Ah ! " says he, with a 
 sort of triumphant sigh, " Ranelagh was a noble place ! 
 Such taste, such elegance, such beauty ! There was the 
 Duchess of A., the finest woman in England, sir ; and 
 Mrs. L., a mighty fine creature ; and Lady Susan what's 
 her name, that had that unfortunate affair with Sir Charles. 
 Sir, they came swimming by you like the swans." 
 
THE OLD GENTLEMAN. 139 
 
 The Old Gentleman is very particular in having his 
 slippers ready for him at the fire, whin he comes 
 home. He is also extremely choice in his stuff, and de- 
 lights to get a fresh box-full in Tavistock Street, in his 
 way to the theatre. His box is a curiosity from India. 
 He calls favorite young ladies by their Christian names, 
 however slightly acquainted with them ; and has a privi 
 iege of saluting all brides, mothers, and indeed every 
 species of lady, on the least holiday occasion. If the hus- 
 band, for instance, has met with a piece of luck, he 
 instantly moves forward, and gravely kisses the wife on 
 the cheek. The wife then says, " My niece, sir, from 
 the country *Nj and he kisses the niece. The niece, see- 
 ing her cousin biting her lips at the joke, says, " My 
 .cousin Harriet, sir " ; and he kisses the cousin. He 
 tk never recollects such weather," except during the " Great 
 Frost," or when he rode down with " Jack Skrimshire to 
 Xewinarket." He grows young again in liis little grand- 
 children, especially the one which he thinks most like him- 
 self; which is the handsomest. Yet he likes best, perhaps, 
 the one most resembling his wife ; and will sit with him 
 on his lap, holding his hand in silence, for a quarter of 
 an hour together. He plays most tricks with the former, 
 and makes him sneeze. He asks little boys in general 
 who was the father of Zebedee's children. If his grand- 
 sons are at school, he often goes to see them ; and makes 
 them blush by telling the master or the upper scholars, 
 that they are fine boys, and of a precocious genius. He 
 is much struck when an old acquaintance dies, but adds 
 that lie lived too fast; and that poor Bob was a sad dog 
 in his youth ; " a very sad dog, sir ; mightily set upon 
 .1 short life and a merry one." 
 
 When he gets very old indeed, he will sit for whole 
 evenings, and say little or nothing ; but informs you, thai 
 there is Mrs. Jones (the housekeeper) " She '11 talk." 
 
A SABBATH SUMMER NOON 
 
 BY WILLIAM MOTHERWELL. 
 
 THE calmness of this noontide hour, 
 The shadow of this wood, 
 The fragrance of each wilding flower, 
 
 Are marvellously good ; 
 O, here crazed spirits breathe the balm 
 Of Nature's solitude ! 
 
 It is a most delicious calm 
 That resteth everywhere, 
 
 The holiness of soul-sung psalm, 
 Of felt but voiceless prayer ! 
 
 With hearts too full to speak their bliss. 
 God's creatures silent are. 
 
 They silent are ; but not the less 
 
 In this most tranquil hour 
 Of deep, unbroken dreaminess, 
 
 They own that Love and Power 
 Which, like the softest sunshine, rests 
 
 On every leaf and flower. 
 
 How silent are the song-filled nests 
 That crowd this drowsy tree, 
 
A SABBATH SUMMER NOON. 141 
 
 How mute is every feathered breast 
 
 That swelled with melody ! 
 And yet bright bead-like eyes declare 
 
 This hour is ecstasy. 
 
 Heart forth ! as uncaged bird through ail 
 
 And mingle in the tide 
 Of blessed things, that, lacking care, 
 
 Now full of beauty glide 
 Around thee, in their angel hues 
 
 Of joy and sinless pride. 
 
 Here, on this green bank that o'erviews 
 
 The far-retreating glen, 
 Beneath the spreading beech-tree muse, 
 
 Of all within thy ken ; 
 For lovelier scene shall never break 
 
 'On thy dimmed sight again. 
 
 Slow stealing from the tangled brake 
 
 That skirts the distant hill, 
 With noiseless hoof, two bright fawns make 
 
 For yonder lapsing rill ; 
 Meek children of the forest gloom, 
 
 Drink on, and fear no ill ! 
 
 And buried in the yellow broom 
 That crowns the neighboring height, 
 
 Couches a loutish shepherd groom, 
 With all his flocks in sight ; 
 
 Which dot the green braes gloriously 
 With spots of living light. 
 
 It is a sight that filleth me 
 With meditative joy, 
 
142 WILLIAM MOTHER WELL. 
 
 To mark these dumb things curiously 
 Crowd round their guardian boy ; 
 
 As if they felt this Sabbath hour 
 Of bliss lacked all alloy. 
 
 I bend me towards the tiny flower, 
 That underneath this tree 
 
 Opens its little breast of sweets 
 In meekest modesty, 
 
 And breathes the eloquence of love 
 In muteness, Lord ! to thee. 
 
 There is no breath of wind to move 
 The flag-like leaves, that spread 
 
 Their grateful shadow far above 
 This turf-supported head ; 
 
 All sounds are gone, all murmuringe 
 With living nature wed. 
 
 n 
 
 The babbling of the clear well-springs*, 
 The whisperings of the trees, 
 
 And all the cheerful jargonings 
 Of feathered hearts at ease, 
 
 That whilom filled the vocal wood, 
 Have hushed their minstrelsies. 
 
 The silentness of night doth brood 
 O'er this bright summer noon ; 
 
 And Nature, in her holiest mood, 
 Doth all things well attune 
 
 To joy, in the religious dreams 
 Of green and leafy June. 
 
 Far down the glen in distance gleams 
 The hamlet's tapering spire, 
 
A SABBATH SUMMER NOON. 143 
 
 And, glittering in meridial beams, 
 
 Its vane is tongued with fire ; 
 And hark how sweet its silvery bell, 
 
 And hark the rustic choir ! 
 
 The holy sounds float up the dell 
 
 To fill my ravished ear, 
 And now the glorious anthems swell 
 
 Of worshippers sincere, 
 Of hearts bowed in the dust, that shed 
 
 Faith's penitential tear. 
 
 Dear Lord ! thy shadow is forth spread 
 
 On all mine eye can see ; 
 And, filled at the pure fountain-head 
 
 Of deepest piety, 
 My heart loves all created things, 
 
 And travels home to thee. 
 
 Around me while the sunshine flings 
 
 A flood of mocky gold, 
 My chastened spirit once more sings, 
 
 As it was wont of old, 
 That lay of gratitude which burst 
 
 From young heart uncontrolled. 
 
 When in the midst of nature nursed, 
 
 Sweet influences fell 
 On chilly hearts that were athirst, 
 
 Like soft dews in the bell 
 Of tender flowers, that bowed their heads 
 
 And breathed a fresher smell, 
 
 So, even now this hour hath sped 
 In rapturous thought o'er me. 
 
144 WILLIAM MOTHER WELL. 
 
 Feeling myself with nature wed, 
 
 A holy mystery, 
 A part of earth, a part of heaven, 
 
 A part, Great God ! of thee. 
 
 Fast fade the cares of life's dull sweven, 
 
 They perish as the weed, 
 While unto me the power is given, 
 
 A moral deep to read 
 In every silent throe of mind 
 
 External beauties breed. 
 
THE INCENDIARY. 
 
 BY MARY RUSSELL MITFORD. 
 
 NO one that had the misfortune to reside during the last 
 winter in the disturbed districts of the south of Eng- 
 land will ever forget the awful impression of .that terrible 
 time. The stilly gatherings of the misguided peasantry 
 amongst, the wild hills, partly heath and partly woodland, 
 of which so much of the northern part of Hampshire is com- 
 posed, dropping in one by one, and two by two in the 
 gloom of evening, or the dim twilight of a November morn- 
 ing ; or the open and noisy meetings of determined men at 
 noontide in the streets and greens of our Berkshire villages, 
 and even sometimes in the very churchyards, sallying forth 
 in small but resolute numbers to collect money or destroy 
 machinery, and compelling or persuading their fellow-labor- 
 ers to join them at every farm they visited ; or the sudden 
 appearance and disappearance of these large bodies, who 
 sometimes remained together to the amount of several hun- 
 dreds for many days, and sometimes dispersed, one scarcely 
 knew how, in a few hours ; their daylight marches on the 
 high road, regular and orderly as those of an army, or 
 their midnight visits to lonely houses, lawless and terrific as 
 the descent of pirates or the incursions of banditti ; all 
 brought close to us a state of things which we never thought 
 to have witnessed in peaceful and happy England. In the 
 sister island, indeed, we had read of such horrors, but now 
 they were brought home to our very household hearths ; we 
 10 
 
146 MARY RUSSELL MITFORD. 
 
 tasted of fear, the bitterest cup that an imaginative woman 
 can taste, in all its agonizing varieties ; and felt, by sad 
 experience, the tremendous difference between that distant 
 report of danger, with which we had &o often fancied that 
 we sympathized, and the actual presence of danger itself. 
 Such events are salutary, inasmuch as they show to the 
 human heart its own desperate self-deceit. I could not but 
 smile at the many pretty letters of condolence and fellow- 
 feeling which I received from writers who wrote far too well 
 to feel anything, who most evidently felt nothing ; but the 
 smile was a melancholy one, for I recollected how often, 
 not intending to feign, or suspecting that I was feigning, I 
 myself had written such. 
 
 Nor were the preparations for defence, however neces- 
 sary, less shocking than the apprehensions of attack. The 
 hourly visits of bustling parish officers, bristling with impor- 
 tance (for our village, though in the centre of the insur- 
 gents, continued uncontaminated, " faithful amidst the un- 
 faithful found," and was, therefore, quite a rallying-point 
 for loyal men and true) ; the swearing in of whole regi- 
 ments of petty constables ; the stationary watchmen, who 
 every hour, to prove their vigilance, sent in some poor 
 wretch, beggar or match-seller, or rambling child, under the 
 denomination of suspicious persons ; the mounted patrol, 
 whose deep " All 's well ! " which ought to have been consola- 
 tory, was about the most alarming of all alarming sounds ; 
 the soldiers, transported from place to place in carts the bet- 
 ter to catch the rogues, whose local knowledge gave them 
 great advantage in a dispersal ; the grave processions of 
 magistrates and gentlemen on horseback j and above all, 
 the nightly collecting of arms and armed men within our 
 own dwelling, kept up a continual sense of nervous inquie- 
 tude. 
 
 Fearful, however, as were the realities, the rumors were 
 a hundred-fold more alarming. Not an hour passed, but. 
 
THE INCENDIARY. 147 
 
 from some quarter or other, reports came pouring in of mobs 
 gathering, mobs assembled, mobs marching upon us. Now 
 the high roads were blockaded by the rioters, travellers 
 murdered, soldiers defeated, and the magistrates, who had 
 gone out to meet and harangue them, themselves surrounded 
 and taken by the desperate multitude. Now the artisans 
 the commons, so to say, of B. had risen to join the peas- 
 antry, driving out the gentry and tradespeople, while they 
 took possession of their houses and property, and only de- 
 taining the mayor and aldermen as hostages. Now that 
 illustrious town held loyal, but was besieged. Now the mob 
 had carried the place ; and arti.-ans, constables, tradespeople, 
 soldiers, and magistrates, the mayor and corporation included, 
 were murdered to a man, to say nothing of women and chil- 
 dren ; the market-place running with blood, and the town- 
 hall piled with dead bodies. This last rumor, which was 
 much to the taste of our villagers, actually prevailed for 
 several hours ; terrified maid-servants ran shrieking about 
 the house, and every corner of the village street realized 
 Shakespeare's picture of " a smith swallowing a tailor's 
 news." 
 
 So passed the short winter's day. With the approach of 
 night came fresh sorrows ; the red glow of fires gleaming on 
 the horizon, and mounting into the middle sky ; the tolling 
 of bells ; and the rumbling sound of the engines clattering 
 along from place to place, and often, too often, rendered 
 useless by the cutting of the pipes after they had begun to 
 play. a dreadful aggravation of the calamity, since it 
 proved that among those who assembled, professedly to help, 
 were to be found favorers and abettors of the concealed in- 
 cendiaries. O the horrors of those fires, breaking forth 
 night after night, sudden, yet expected, always seeming 
 nearer than they actually were, and always said to have 
 been more mischievous to life and property than they actu- 
 ally had been ! Mischievous enough they were, Heaven 
 
148 MARY RUSSELL MITFORD. 
 
 knows ! A terrible and unholy abuse of the most beau- 
 tiful and comfortable of the elements! a sinful destruc- 
 tion of the bounties of Providence ! an awful crime 
 against God and man ! Shocking it was to behold the 
 peasantry of England becoming familiarized with this 
 tremendous power of evil, this desperate, yet most cow- 
 \rdly sin ! 
 
 The blow seemed to fall, too, just where it might least have 
 een looked for, on the unoffending, the charitable, the 
 \ma ; on those who were known only as the laborer's friends ; 
 *u impoverish whom was to take succor, assistance and pro- 
 ttiCiioii irom the poor. One of the objects of attack in our 
 uvrn immediate neighborhood was a widow lady, between 
 eignty and ninety, the best of the good, the kindest of the 
 kind. Occvarences like this were in every way dreadful. 
 They made us fear (and such fear is a revengeful passion, 
 and comes ne^r to hate) the larger half of our species 
 They weakened our faith in human nature. 
 
 The revulsion was, however, close at hand. A time came 
 which changed the current of our feelings, a time of ret- 
 ribution. The fired weie quenched ; the riots were put- 
 down ; the chief of the rwters were taken. Examination 
 and commitment were the older of the day ; the crowded 
 jails groaned with their overload of wretched prisoners ; sol- 
 diers were posted at every avenue to guard against possible 
 escape; and every door was watched night and day by 
 miserable women, the wives, mothers, or daughters of the 
 culprits, praying for admission to their unfortunate relatives. 
 The danger was fairly over, and pity had succeeded to 
 fear. 
 
 Then, above all, came the special commission : the judges 
 in threefold dignity ; the array of counsel ; the crowded 
 court ; the solemn trial ; the awful sentence ; all the more 
 impressive from the merciful feeling which pervaded the 
 government, the counsel, and the court. My father, a very 
 
THE INCENDIARY. 149 
 
 old magistrate, being chairman of the bench, as well as one 
 of the grand jury, and the then high sheriff, with whom it 
 is every way an honor to claim acquaintance, being his inti- 
 mate friend, I saw and knew more of the proceedings of 
 this stirring time than usually falls to the lot of women, and 
 took a deep interest in proceedings which had in them a 
 thrilling excitement, as far beyond acted tragedy as truth 
 is beyond fiction. 
 
 I shall never forget the hushed silence of the auditors, a 
 dense mass of human bodies, the heads only visible, ranged 
 tier over tier to the very ceiling of the lofty hall ; the rare 
 and striking importance which that silence and the awful- 
 ness of the occasion gave to the mere official forms of a 
 court of justice, generally so hastily slurred over and slightly 
 attended to; the unusual seriousness of the counsel; the 
 watchful gravity of the judges; and, more than all, the 
 appearance of the prisoners themselves, belonging mostly to 
 the younger classes of the peasantry, such men as one is 
 accustomed to see in the fields, on the road, or the cricket- 
 ground, with sunburnt faces, and a total absence of reflection 
 or care, but who now, under the influence of a keen and bit- 
 ter anxiety, had acquired not only the sallow paleness proper 
 to a prison, but the look of suffering and of thought, the 
 brows contracted and brought low over the eyes, the general 
 sharpness of feature and elongation of countenance, which 
 give an expression of intellect, a certain momentary eleva- 
 tion, even to the commonest and most vacant of human faces. 
 Such is the power of an absorbing passion, a great and en- 
 grossing grief. One man only amongst the large number 
 whom I heard arraigned (for they were brought out by tens 
 and by twenties) would, perhaps, under other circumstances, 
 have been accounted handsome ; yet a painter would at that 
 moment have found studies in many. 
 
 I shall never forget, either, the impression made on my 
 mind by one of the witnesses. Several men had been ar- 
 
150 MARY RUSSELL MITFORD. 
 
 raigned together for machine-breaking. All but one of them 
 had employed counsel for their defence, and under their 
 direction had called witnesses to character, the most respect- 
 able whom they could find, the clergy and overseers of 
 their respective parishes, for example, masters with whom 
 they had lived, neighboring farmers or gentry, or even 
 magistrates, all that they could muster to grace or credit 
 their cause. One poor man alone had retained no counsel, 
 offered no defence, called no witness, though the evidence 
 against him was by no means so strong as that against his 
 fellow-prisoners ; and it was clear that his was exactly the 
 case in which testimony to character would be of much 
 avail. The defences had ended, and the judge was begin- 
 ning to sum up, when suddenly a tall, gaunt, upright figure, 
 with a calm, thoughtful brow, and a determined but most 
 respectful demeanor, appeared in the witnesses' box. He 
 was dressed in a smock-frock, and was clean and respect- 
 able in , appearance, but evidently poor. The judge inter- 
 rupted himself in his charge to inquire the man's business ; 
 and hearing that he was a voluntary witness for the unde- 
 fended prisoner, proceeded to question him, when the fol- 
 lowing dialogue took place. The witness's replies, which 
 seemed to me then, and still do so, very striking from their 
 directness and manliness, were delivered with the same 
 humble boldness of tone and manner that characterized the 
 words. 
 
 Judge. " You are a witness for the prisoner, an unsum- 
 moned witness ? " 
 
 " I am, my lord. I heard that he was to be tried to-day, 
 and have walked twenty miles to speak the truth of him, as 
 one poor man may do of another." 
 " What is your situation in life ? " 
 " A laborer, my lord ; nothing but a day-laborer." 
 " How long have you known the prisoner ? " 
 "As long as I have known anything. We were play- 
 
THE INCENDIARY. 151 
 
 mates together, went to the same school, have lived in the 
 same parish. I have known him all my life." 
 
 " And what, character has he borne ? " 
 
 "As good a character, my lord, as a man need work 
 under." 
 
 It is pleasant to add, that this poor man's humble testi- 
 mony was read from the judge's notes, and mentioned in the 
 judge's charge, with full as much respect, perhaps a little 
 more, than the evidence of clergymen and magistrates for 
 the rest of the accused; and that, principally from this 
 direct and simple tribute to his character, the prisoner in 
 question was acquitted. 
 
 To return,* Tiowever, from my evil habit of digressing (if 
 I may use an Irish phrase) before I begin, and making my 
 introduction longer than my story, a simple sin to which in 
 many instances, and especially in this, I am fain to plead 
 guilty; to come back to my title and my subject. I 
 must inform my courteous readers, that the case of arson 
 which attracted most attention and excited most interest in 
 this part of the country, was the conflagration of certain 
 ricks, barns, and farm-buildings, in the occupation of Rich- 
 ard Mayne ; and that, not so much from the value of the 
 property consumed (though that value was considerable), as 
 on account of the character and situation of the prisoner, 
 whom, after a long examination, the magistrates found them- 
 selves compelled to commit for the offence. I did not hear 
 this trial, the affair having occurred in the neighboring coun- 
 ty, and do not, therefore, vouch for " the truth, the whok' 
 truth, and nothing but the truth," as one does when an ear- 
 witness ; but the general outline of the story will suffice for 
 our purpose. 
 
 Richard Mayne was a wealthy yeoman of the old school, 
 sturdy, boisterous, bold, and kind, always generous, and gen- 
 erally good-natured, but cross-grained and obstinate by fits, 
 and sometimes purse-proud, after the fashion of men who 
 
152 MARY RUSSELL MITFORD. 
 
 have made monej by their own industry and shrewdness, 
 He had married late in life, and above him in station, and 
 had now been for two or three years a widower, with one 
 only daughter, a girl of nineteen, of whom he was almost as 
 fond as of his greyhound Mayfly, and for pretty much the 
 same reason, that both were beautiful and gentle, and his 
 own, and both admired and coveted by others, that May 
 ny had won three cups, and that Lucy had refused four 
 offers. 
 
 A sweet and graceful creature was Lucy Mayne. Her 
 mother, a refined and cultivated woman, the daughter of an 
 unbeneficed clergyman, had communicated, perhaps uncon- 
 sciously, much of her own taste to her daughter. It is true, 
 that most young ladies, even of her own station, would have 
 looked with great contempt on Lucy's acquirements, who 
 neither played nor drew, and was wholly, in the phrase of 
 the day, unaccomplished; but then she read Shakespeare 
 and Milton, and the poets and prose-writers of the Jameses' 
 and Charleses' times, with a perception and relish of their 
 beauty very uncommon in a damsel under twenty; and 
 when her father boasted of his Lucy as the cleverest as well 
 as the prettiest lass within ten miles, he was not so far 
 wrong as many of his hearers were apt to think him. 
 
 After all, the person to whom Lucy's education owed 
 most was a relation of her mother's, a poor relation, who, 
 being left a widow with two children almost totally destitute, 
 was permitted by Richard Mayne to occupy one end of a 
 small farm-house, about a mile from the old substantial 
 manorial residence which he himself inhabited, whilst he 
 farmed the land belonging to both. Nothing could ex- 
 ceed his kindness to the widow and her family ; and Mrs. 
 Owen, a delicate and broken-spirited woman, who had known 
 better days, and was now left with a sickly daughter and a 
 promising son dependent on the precarious charity of rela- 
 tives and friends, found in the free-handed and open-heaited 
 
THE INCENDIARY. 153 
 
 farmer and his charming little girl her only comfort. He 
 even restored to her the blessing of her son's society, who 
 had hitherto earned his living by writing for an attorney in 
 the neighboring town, but whom her wealthy kinsman now 
 brought home to her, and established as the present assist- 
 ant and future successor of the master of a well-endowed 
 grammar-school in the parish, Farmer Mayne being one 
 of the trustees, and all-powerful with the other function- 
 aries joined in the trust, and the then schoolmaster in so 
 wretched a state of health as almost to insure a speedy 
 vacancy. 
 
 In most instances, such an exertion of an assumed rather 
 than a legitimate authority, would have occasioned no small 
 prejudice against the party protected ; but Philip Owen was 
 not to be made unpopular, even by the unpopularity of his 
 patron. Gentle, amiable, true, and kind, kind, both in 
 word and deed, it was found absolutely impossible to dis- 
 like him. He was clever, too, very clever, with a remark- 
 able aptitude for teaching, as both parents and boys soon 
 found to their mutual satisfaction ; for the progress of one 
 half-year of his instruction equalled that made hi a twelve- 
 month under the old regime. He must also, one should 
 think, have been fond of teaching, for, after a hard day's 
 fagging at Latin and English, and writing, and accounts, 
 and all the drudgery of a boys' school, he would make a 
 circuit of a mile and a half home in order to give Lucy 
 Mayne a lesson in French or Italian. For a certain- 
 ty, Philip Owen must have had a strong natural turn for 
 playing the pedagogue, or he never would have gone so far 
 out of his way just to read Fenelon and Alfieri with Lucy 
 Mayne. 
 
 So for two happy years matters continued. At the expi- 
 ration of that time, just as the old schoolmaster, who de- 
 clared that nothing but Philip's attention had kept him alive 
 so long, was evidently on his death-bed, Farmer Maj-,e sud- 
 
154 MARY RUSSELL MITFORD. 
 
 denly turned Mrs. Owen, her son, and her sick daughter out 
 of the house, which, by his permission, they had hitherto 
 occupied ; and declared publicly, that whilst he held an 
 acre of land in the parish, Philip Owen should never be 
 elected master of the grammar-school, a threat which 
 there was no doubt of his being able to carry into effect. 
 The young man, however, stood his ground ; and sending 
 off his mother and sister to an uncle in Wales, who had 
 lately written kindly to them, hired a room at a cottage in 
 the village, determined to try the event of an election, which 
 the languishing state of the incumbent rendered inevitable. 
 
 The cause of Farmer Mayne's inveterate dislike to one 
 whom he had so warmly protected, and whose conduct, man- 
 ners, and temper had procured him friends wherever lie was 
 known, nobody could assign with any certainty. Perhaps 
 he had unwittingly trodden on Mayfly's foot, or had opposed 
 some prejudice of her master's, but his general careful- 
 ness not to hurt anything, or offend anybody, rendered either 
 of these conjectures equally improbable ; perhaps he had 
 been found only too amiable by the farmer's other pet, 
 those lessons in languages were dangerous things ! and 
 when Lucy was seen at church with a pale face and red 
 eyes, and when his landlord Squire Hawkins's blood-hunter 
 was seen every day at Farmer Mayne's door, it became cur- 
 rently reported and confidently believed, that the cause oi 
 the quarrel was a love affair between the cousins, which the 
 farmer was determined to break off, in order to bestow his 
 daughter on the young lord of the manor. 
 
 Affairs had been in this posture for about a fortnight, and 
 the old schoolmaster was just dead, when a fire broke out in 
 the rick-yard of Farley Court, and Philip Owen was appre- 
 hended and committed as the incendiary ! The astonish- 
 ment of the neighborhood was excessive ; the rector and 
 half the farmers of the place offered to become bail ; but the 
 offence was not bailable ; and the only consolation left for 
 
THE INCENDIARY. 155 
 
 the friends '>i the unhappy young man, was the knowledge 
 that the trial would speedily come on, and their internal 
 conviction that an acquittal was certain. 
 
 As time wore on, however, their confidence diminished. 
 The evidence against him was terribly strong. He had been 
 observed lurking about the rick-yard with a lantern, in 
 which a light was burning, by a lad in the employ of 
 Farmer Mayne, who had gone thither for hay to fodder his 
 cattle, about an hour before the fire broke out. At eleven 
 o'clock the haystack was on fire, and at ten Robert Doyle 
 had mentioned to James White, another boy in Farmer 
 Mayne's service, that he had seen Mr. Philip Owen behind 
 the great rick. % Farmer Mayne himself had met him at 
 half past ten (as he was returning from B. market) in the 
 lane leading from the rick-yard towards the village, and had 
 observed him throw something he held in his hand into the 
 ditch. Humphry Harris, a constable employed to seek for 
 evidence, had found the next morning a lantern, answering 
 to that described by Robert Doyle, in the part of the ditch 
 indicated by Farmer Mayne, which Thomas Brown, the vil- 
 lage shopkeeper, in whose house Owen slept, identified as 
 having lent to his lodger in the early part of the evening. 
 A silver pencil, given to Owen by the mother of one of his 
 pupils, and bearing his full name on the seal at the end, was 
 found close to where the fire was discovered ; and, to crown 
 all, the curate of the village, with whom the young man's 
 talents and character had rendered him a deserved favorite, 
 had unwillingly deposed that he had said "it might be in his 
 power to take a great revenge on Farmer Mayne," or words 
 to that effect ; whilst a letter was produced from the accused 
 to the farmer himself, intimating that one day he would be 
 sorry for the oppression which he had exercised towards 
 him and his. These two last facts were much relied upon 
 as evincing malice, and implying a purpose of revenge from 
 the accused towards the prosecutor; yet there were many 
 
I5t) MARY RUSSELL MITFORD. 
 
 who thought that the previous circumstances might well 
 account for them without reference to the present occur- 
 rence, and that the conflagration of the ricks and farm- 
 buildings might, under the spirit of the time (for fires were 
 raging every night in the surrounding villages), be merely a 
 remarkable coincidence. The young man himself simply 
 denied the fact of setting fire to any part of the property or 
 premises ; inquired earnestly whether any lives had been 
 lost, and still more earnestly after the health of Miss Lucy ; 
 and on finding that she had been confined to her bed by 
 fever and delirium, occasioned, as was supposed, by the 
 fright, ever since that unhappy occurrence, relapsed into a 
 gloomy silence, and seemed to feel no concern or interest in 
 the issue of the trial. 
 
 His friends, nevertheless, took kind and zealous measures 
 for his defence, engaged counsel, sifted testimony, and 
 used every possible means, in the assurance of his innocence, 
 to trace out the true incendiary. Nothing, however, could 
 be discovered to weaken the strong chain of circumstantial 
 evidence, or to impeach the credit of the witnesses, who, with 
 the exception of the farmer himself, seemed all friendly to 
 the accused, and most distressed at being obliged to bear tes- 
 timony against him. On the eve of the' trial, the most zeal- 
 ous of his friends could find no ground of hope, except in 
 the chances of the day ; Lucy, for whom alone the prisoner 
 asked, being still confined by severe illness. 
 
 The judges arrived, the whole terrible array of the 
 special commission ; the introductory ceremonies were gone 
 through ; the cause was called on, and the case proceeded 
 with little or no deviation from the evidence already cited. 
 When called upon for his defence, the prisoner again asked 
 if Lucy Mayne were in court ? and hearing that she was 
 ill in her father's house, declined entering into any defence 
 whatsoever. Witnesses to character, however, pressed foi 
 ward, his old master, the attorney, the rector and curate 
 
THE INCENDIARY. lf>7 
 
 of (he parish, half the fanners of the village, everybody, in 
 short, who ever had an opportunity of knowing him, even 
 his reputed rival, Mr. Hawkins, who, speaking, he said, on 
 the authority of one \\ ho knew him well, professed himself 
 confident that he could not be guilty of a bad action, a 
 piece of testimony that seemed to strike and affect the pris- 
 oner more than anything that had passed ; evidence to 
 character crowded into court; but all was of no avail 
 against the strong chain of concurrent facts ; and the judge 
 was preparing to sum up, and the jury looking as if they 
 had already condemned, when suddenly a piercing shriek 
 was heard in the hall, and pale, tottering, dishevelled, 
 Lucy Mayne "rushed into her father's arms, and cried 
 out, with a shrill, despairing voice, that " she was the only 
 guilty ; that she had set fire to the rick ; and that if they 
 killed Philip Owen for her crime, they would be guilty of 
 murder." 
 
 The general consternation may be imagined, especially 
 that of the farmer, who had left his daughter almost insen- 
 sible with illness, and still thought her light-headed. Medi- 
 cal assistance, however, was immediately summoned, and it 
 then appeared that what she said was most true ; that the 
 lovers, for such they were, had been accustomed to deposit 
 letters in one corner of that unlucky hay-rick ; that having 
 seen from her chamber-window Philip Owen leaving the 
 yard, she had flown with a taper in her hand to secure the 
 expected letter, and, alarmed at her father's voice, had ran 
 away so hastily, that she had, as she now remembered, left 
 the lighted taper amidst the hay ; that then the fire came, 
 and all was a blank to her, until, recovering that morning 
 from the stupor succeeding to delirium, she had heard that 
 Philip Owen was to be tried for his life from the effect of 
 her carelessness, and had flown to save him she knew not 
 how ! 
 
 The sequel may be guessed ; Philip was, of course, ac- 
 
158 MARY RUSSELL MITFORD. 
 
 quitted ; everybody, even the very judge, pleaded for the 
 lovers ; the young landlord and generous rival added his 
 good word ; and the schoolmaster of Farley and his pretty 
 wife are at this moment one of the best and happiest co j/tea 
 in his Majesty's dominions. 
 
WISHING. 
 
 BY JOHN G. SAXE. 
 
 OF all amusements for the mind, 
 From logic down to fishing, 
 There is n't one that you can find 
 
 So very cheap as " wishing." 
 A very choice diversion too, 
 
 If we but rightly use it, 
 
 And not, as we are apt to do, 
 
 Pervert it, and abuse it. 
 
 I wish a common wish indeed 
 
 My purse were somewhat fatter, 
 That I might cheer the child of need, 
 
 And not my pride to flatter ; 
 That I might make Oppression reel, 
 
 As only gold can make it, 
 And break the Tyrant's rod of steel, 
 
 As only gold can break it 
 
 I wish that Sympathy and Love, 
 
 And every human passion 
 That has its origin above, 
 
 Would come and keep in fashion ; 
 That Scorn, and Jealousy, and Hate, 
 
 And every base emotion, 
 Were buried fifty fathom deep 
 
 Beneath the waves of Ocean 1 
 
160 JOHN G. SAXE. 
 
 I wish that friends were always true, 
 
 And motives always pure ; 
 I wish the good were not so few, 
 
 I wish the bad were fewer ; 
 I wish that parsons ne'er forgot 
 
 To heed their pious teaching ; 
 I wish that practising was not 
 
 So different from preaching ! 
 
 1 wish that modest worth might be 
 
 Appraised with truth and candor ; 
 I wish that innocence were free 
 
 From treachery and slander ; 
 I wish that men their vows would mind ; 
 
 That women ne'er were rovers ; 
 I wish that wives were always kind, 
 
 And husbands always lovers ! 
 
 I wish in fine that Joy and Mirth, 
 
 And every good Ideal, 
 May come erewhile, throughout the earth. 
 
 To be the glorious Real ; 
 Till God shall every creature bless 
 
 With his supremest blessing, 
 And Hope be lost in Happiness, 
 
 And Wishing in Possessing 1 
 
THE GREAT PORTRAIT-PAINTERS 
 
 By CHARLES ROBERT LESLIE. 
 
 THERE has never existed a great painter of History 
 or Poetry who has not been great in portrait. Even 
 Michael Angelo is no exception. There may not remain 
 any painted portraits of known persons by his hand, but 
 there are sculptured portraits by him, and it is impossible 
 to look even at the engravings of the Prophets and Sibyls, 
 without seeing that they are from a hand practised in 
 portrait, a hand, too, that had acquired its power by the 
 practice of literal exactness. " Fuseli distinguishes the 
 styles, epic, dramatic, and historic, beautifully," says Mr. 
 Haydon. But I think, as I do of such distinctions gen- 
 erally, that these are entirely imaginary ; and that the style 
 of Michael Angelo is distinguished, as are all others, by 
 the peculiar mind of the artist only. Haydon adds that, 
 " the same instruments are used in all styles, men and 
 women ; and no two men or women were ever the same 
 in form, feature, or proportion. After Fuseli has said, 
 ' the detail of character is not consistent with the epic,' he 
 goes on to show the great difference of character between 
 each Prophet, as decided as any character chosen by Ra- 
 phael in any of his more essentially dramatic works. ' Nor 
 are the Sibyls,' continues Fuseli, ' those female oracles, less 
 expressive or less individually marked.'" Thus, though 
 Haydon was unwilling to abandon the classifications of 
 U 
 
162 CHARLES ROBERT LESLIE. 
 
 Fuseli, the contradiction involved in them did not escape 
 him. 
 
 There cannot be a doubt that Michael Angelo, had he 
 devoted himself to portrait only, would have been a super- 
 lative portrait-painter ; for in his works we find everything 
 in perfection that portrait requires, dignity, the expres- 
 sion of character, the highest perception of beauty, in man, 
 woman, and child ; and not only in the unfinished marble 
 that adorns our Academy library, but in the smaller com- 
 partments of the Sistine ceiling, the most natural and fa- 
 miliar domestic incidents treated in the most graceful 
 manner. It is right this should be remembered, because 
 painters (as they fancy themselves) of High Art, who 
 really have not the talents portrait requires, must not be 
 allowed to class themselves with Michael Angelo, as long 
 as they cannot do what he, in perfection, could do. 
 
 Conspicuous as he stands among great portrait-painters, 
 Vandyke is not first of the first. The attitudes of his 
 single figures are often formal and unmeaning ; and his 
 groups, however finely connected by composition, are sel- 
 dom connected by sentiment. Fathers, mothers, sons, and 
 daughters, stand or sit beside each other, as they stood or 
 sat in his room, for the mere purpose of being painted ; 
 and it is therefore the nicely discriminated individual char- 
 acter of every head, the freshness and delicacy of his color, 
 and the fine treatment of his masses, that have placed him 
 high among portrait-painters. The Countess of Bedford, 
 at Petworth, his Snyders at Castle Howard, his whole 
 lengths at Warwick and at Windsor, the noble equestrian 
 picture at Blenheim, of Charles L, with its magnificent 
 landscape background, and the whole length of Charles in 
 the Louvre, are among the masterpieces of Vandyke ; but 
 he has nowhere shown such dramatic powers as are dis- 
 played by Velasquez, in his portrait picture of "The Sur- 
 render of Breda." 
 
THE GREAT PORTRAIT-PAINTERS. 163 
 
 The Governor of the town is presenting its keys to the 
 Marquis Spinola, who (hat in hand) neither takes them, 
 nor allows his late antagonist to kneel. But, laying his 
 hand gently on his shoulder, he seems to say, " Fortune has 
 favored me, but our cases might have been reversed." To 
 paint such an act of generous courtesy was worthy of a 
 contemporary of Cervantes. It is not, however, in the 
 choice of the subject, but in the manner in which he has 
 brought the scene before our eyes, that the genius and mind 
 of Velasquez are shown. The cordial, unaffected bearing 
 of the conqueror could only have been represented by as 
 thorough a gentleman as himself. I know this picture but 
 from copies. *Mr. Ford says of the original, " Never were 
 knights, soldiers, or national character better painted, or 
 the heavy Fleming, the intellectual Italian, and the proud 
 Spaniard more nicely marked, even to their boots and 
 breeches ; the lances of the guards actually vibrate. Ob- 
 serve the contrast of the light-blue, delicate page, with the 
 dark, iron-clad General, Spinola, who, the model of a high- 
 bred, generous warrior, is consoling a gallant but vanquished 
 enemy." 
 
 Another great portrait picture, the conception of which 
 is equally dramatic and original, is at Windsor Castle. The 
 Archduke Ferdinand of Austria and the Prince of Spain, 
 mounted on chargers, are directing an assault in the battle 
 of Nortlingen. The conventional manner, sanctioned in- 
 deed by great painters, of representing commanders of 
 armies, whether mounted or on foot, quietly looking out of 
 the picture, while the battle rages behind them, is here set 
 aside. The generals are riding into the scene of action ; 
 and yet their attitudes are so contrived as sufficiently to 
 show their features. Nearer to the spectator are half- 
 length figures, the end of a long line of steel-clad infantry, 
 diminishing in perspective up a hill to the fortress they are 
 storming. All is action ; and though we are only shown 
 
164 CHARLES ROBERT LESLIE. 
 
 the generals and the common soldiers, yet, as the horses 
 of the former are in profile, and have just come into the 
 picture, we may imagine a train of attendant officers about 
 to appear ; and though portrait was the first object of 
 Rubens, the picture is a noble representation of a battle. 
 The conception, as regards the foot-soldiers, has been im- 
 itated, though differently applied, by Opie ; and probably 
 Raphael's composition in the Vatican, representing David 
 gazing at Bathsheba, while the troops of Uriah pass below 
 him, suggested it to Rubens. 
 
 The pendant to this picture is the group of Sir Balthasar 
 Gerbier, his wife, and children ; which Dr. Waagen inclines 
 to attribute to Vandyke. But the arrangement and dra- 
 matic connection of the figures is entirely free from the 
 formality of Vandyke ; and a comparison of this fine com- 
 position with Vandyke's " Children of Charles I." at 
 Windsor, his "Pembroke Family" at Wilton, his "Earl 
 and Countess of Derby" belonging to Lord Clarendon, 
 or " The Nassau Family " at Penshanger, will show that 
 it is by Rubens. 
 
 Perhaps the noblest group of portraits ever painted, for 
 it is considered the greatest work of its class by Titian, is 
 that of the male part of the family of Luigi Cornaro. The 
 fine old man, whose life by an extraordinary system of 
 temperance was protracted to a hundred years, kneels be- 
 fore an altar in the open air, followed by his son-in-law 
 and grandchildren, except the three youngest, who are 
 sitting on the steps of the altar playing with a little dog, 
 an incident like some I have noticed in the works of Ra- 
 phael. The characteristic arrangement of the figures, the 
 noble simplicity of the lines, and the truth and power of 
 the color, unite in placing this picture on the summit of 
 Art. There is no apparent sacrifice of detail, no trick, that 
 we can discover, to give supremacy to the heads, which 
 yet rivet our attention at the first glance, and to which we 
 
THE GREAT PORTRAIT-PAINTERS. 1 63 
 
 return again and again, impressed by the thought and mind 
 in the countenance's of the elder personages, and charmed 
 with the youthful innocence of .the boys. I have seen peo- 
 ple, ignorant of the principles of Art, and caring little about 
 pictures, stand before this one in astonishment, and I have 
 heard them express themselves in a way which proved that 
 little of its excellence was lost on them. Fortunately for Eng- 
 land, it belongs to his Grace the Duke of Northumberland. 
 
 There was a time when kings, warriors, and other em- 
 inent persons were painted, almost as a matter of course, 
 in devotional attitudes. It was, in fact, a fashion, and was 
 continued to a later date than the close of Titian's life. But 
 is not so much what the individual painted may be doing, 
 as its consistency with his whole life, and the look and man- 
 ner given him by the painter, which interests or offends us. 
 The piety of a kneeling hero may be ostentatious ; or we 
 might happen to know that devotion was all the religion he 
 practised, and that he was lifting to Heaven hands that had 
 been steeped, and were again to be steeped, in innocent 
 blood. Sir Thomas More was several times painted by 
 Holbein, yet never, that I recollect, in an attitude of devo- 
 tion, or accompanied by any symbol of that religion which 
 was the rule of his life ; and what would the memory of 
 More, or the genius of Holbein, have gained had he so 
 painted him ? Raphael flattered Leo the Tenth, as he was 
 directed, by introducing him, in the "Attila," as Leo the 
 First. But when he was to paint a more characteristic 
 portrait of the Pope, he represented only the sovereign and 
 the dilettante. Leo is examining with a glass a splendidly- 
 illuminated manuscript. He sits in a chair of state, at- 
 tended, not by saints, but by two princes of the church; 
 and the portrait is, as all portraits should be, biographical. 
 Even in copies (from which only I know it), I fancy I see- 
 faint indications of a love of fun, so characteristic of a 
 Pontiff who delighted in a practical joke. 
 
166 CHARLES ROBERT LESLIE. 
 
 The admirers of devotional portrait object to the more 
 modern custom of indicating the deeds of the person repre- 
 sented, as savoring of vanity ; forgetting that acts of devo- 
 tion are deeds, and, as far as attitude and expression have 
 to do with devotion, the easiest of all deeds ; and when 
 consisting in these alone, the most criminal of all vanities. 
 The only portrait of that admirable woman Margaret Tu- 
 dor, represents her in a religious habit, with her hands 
 joined in prayer, and she could not have been so charac- 
 teristically handed down to us in any other dress or attitude. 
 Neither could Sir Joshua's portrait of General Eliott be 
 more happily conceived than it is. The key of the fortress 
 he is defending is held firmly in his hand. But commanding 
 as are the air and attitude, they have nothing of the vanity 
 of bravado ; indeed, if what is most honorable to the man 
 should not be painted, the world would not have possessed 
 the noble conception of Velasquez that has been described. 
 
 What may be called masquerading or fancy-ball portrait 
 is seldom happy; and though we do not object to Sir 
 Joshua's "Kitty Fisher as Cleopatra," or "Emily Bertie 
 as Thais," yet, as in such cases, let us be sure the assumed 
 character accords with the real one. Sir Thomas Lawrence 
 made a sketch of George the Fourth in the armor of the 
 Black Prince, but had the good sense not to carry the 
 matter further than a sketch. 
 
 Are portrait-painters, it may be asked, to paint the vices 
 of their sitters? Assuredly, if these vices exhibit them- 
 selves in the countenance. And Fuseli praises Titian for 
 expressing some of the most odious individual characteristics, 
 in portraits that he selects as works of the highest order. 
 
 Allan Cunningham accuses Reynolds of flattery, and I 
 apprehend Sir Joshua was just as much of a flatterer as 
 Titian. With a vulgar head before him, he would not, or 
 rather could not, make a vulgar picture. But I do not 
 believe that he would have given to Colonel Charteris " an 
 
THE GREAT PORTRAIT-PAINTERS. 167 
 
 aspect worthy a President of the Society for the Suppression 
 of Vice," unless, which is not impossible, he had such an 
 aspect. In his whole length of the Duke of Orleans, the 
 debauchee was as apparent as the Prince. 
 
 No man can be a good portrait-painter who is not a 
 good physiognomist. I do not mean that he should know 
 Lavater by heart, or that he must believe in all that phre- 
 nology assumes. But he must be, what all of us are, in 
 some degree, a judge of character by the signs exhibited 
 in the face. A few of the broad distinctions of physiognomy 
 depend on the forms of the features, but all its nicer shades 
 have far more to do with expression ; and in this, indeed, 
 the real character is often seen where the conformation of 
 the features seems to contradict it. Socrates had the face 
 and figure of a Silenus, but the great mind of the phi- 
 losopher must have been visible, through the disguise, to 
 all who could read expression. There are some general 
 and well-known rules for the determination of physiognom- 
 ical character, as far as it has to do with the shapes of the 
 features ; the aquiline nose and eye, for instance, belong to 
 the heroic class, thick lips to the sensual, and thin to the 
 selfish; yet all these may be liable to many exceptions; 
 the first certainly are; for Nelson, Wolfe, Turenne, and 
 many other heroes, will occur to our recollection who had 
 nothing of the eagle physiognomy. It is natural to asso- 
 ciate beauty with goodness, and ugliness with wickedness ; 
 and children generally do this. But an acquaintance with 
 the world soon shows us that bad and selfish hearts may 
 be concealed under the handsomest features, and the highest 
 virtues hidden under the homeliest ; and that goodness may 
 even consist with conformations of face absolutely ugly. 
 We then begin to look for the character in the expression 
 rather than in the forms of the features, and to distinguish 
 assumed expressions from natural ones ; and so we go on, 
 and, as we grow older, become better physiognomists, though 
 
168 CHARLES ROBERT LLSLIE. 
 
 we never arrive at that certainty of judgment which seems 
 not to be intended we ever should. 
 
 The best portrait-painters, though they may not have 
 penetrated through the mask to all beneath it, have, by the 
 Melity of their Art, given resemblances that sometimes 
 correct and sometimes confirm the verdicts of historians. 
 \Vho can look at Vandyke's three heads, painted to enable 
 Bernini to make a bust, and believe all that has been said 
 against Charles L? Or who can look at Holbein's por- 
 traits of Henry VIII., and doubt the worst that has been 
 said of his selfish cruelty ? 
 
 Among the many excellences of Holbein, his treatment 
 of the hands is not the least ; and it is evident that in his 
 whole-lengths of Henry, they are portraits, and so are the 
 legs, and that the king stood for the entire figure in that 
 characteristic, but by no means graceful attitude, in which 
 he set the fashion to his courtiers. We feel that we could 
 swear to the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the 
 truth, of such portraits. 
 
 Among the pictures at Hampton Court attributed to 
 Holbein, few can be relied on as genuine. I cannot be- 
 lieve that those historical curiosities, ' ; The Embarkation of 
 Henry VIII. from Dover," "The Field of the Cloth of 
 Gold," " The Meeting of Henry and Maximilian," or " The 
 Battle of the Spurs," are his works; neither do I believe 
 he painted the picture that includes Henry, Jane Seymour, 
 Prince Edward, Mary, and Elizabeth, nor the life-sized 
 whole-length of "The Earl of Surry." According to the 
 general custom of attributing the portraits of every age 
 to the greatest master of that age, Holbein is made answer- 
 able for these, and many others, greatly inferior to the 
 picture, certainly by him, belonging to the Surgeon Barbers' 
 Company ; a work rivalling Titian in its color, and in the 
 finely-marked individual character of the heads. It i. 
 remarkable that, although it has hung in the very heart of 
 
THE GREAT PORTRAIT-PAINTERS. 169 
 
 London for more than three hundred years, it has not in 
 the least suffered from smoke ; and if it has ever been 
 cleaned, it has sustained no injury from the process. Dr., 
 Waagen urges the importance of so fine a picture being 
 removed to the National Gallery, and thinks an arrange- 
 ment might be made to that purpose, between the Govern- 
 ment and the company that possesses it ; "a consummation 
 ' devoutly to be wished." There is not a Holbein in the 
 National Gallery. 
 
 While speaking of this great painter, I must not omit 
 to notice the interest given to his picture of the family of 
 Sir Thomas More, by making the background an exact 
 representation of an apartment in More's house. This 
 example might effect a great improvement hi portrait, and 
 it would often be found easier to the painter (as well as 
 far more agreeable) to copy realities, than to weary him- 
 self with ineffectual attempts to make the eternal pillar 
 and curtain, or the conventional sky and tree, look as well 
 as they do in the backgrounds of Reynolds and Gains- 
 borough. 
 
 The question relating to the degree in which personal 
 defects are to be marked must, in every case, be settled 
 by the taste of the painter. Reynolds has not only shown 
 that Baretti was near-sighted, but he has made that defect 
 as much the subject of the picture as the sitter himself, 
 and Baretti's absorption in his book strongly marks the 
 literary man. But near-sightedness is not a deformity, 
 and there can be no doubt that Reynolds abated whatever 
 of malformation he might not for the sake of individuality 
 think it right to exclude, and that he also invariably softened 
 harshness of feature or expression, and diminished positive 
 ugliness, as far as he could do so without losing character. 
 Chantrey did the same ; but Lawrence softened harshness 
 so much as often to lose character. The portraits of neither 
 of the three could ever be called ridiculously like, an ex- 
 
170 CHARLES ROBERT LESLIE. 
 
 pression sometimes used in the way of compliment, but in 
 reality pointing exactly to what a portrait should not be ; 
 and Wilkie felt this so much that he went to the other 
 extreme, and even deviated into unlikeness in his portraits, 
 from the dread of that un-ideal mode of representation which 
 excites us to laugh. 
 
 We undervalue that which costs us least effort, and "West, 
 while engaged on a small picture of his own family, little 
 thought how much it would surpass in interest many of 
 his more ambitious works. Its subject is the first visit 
 of his father and elder brother to his young wife, after 
 the birth of hor second child. They are Quakers ; and the 
 venerable old man and his eldest son wear their hats, 
 according to the custom of their sect. Nothing can be 
 more beautifully conceived than the mother bending over 
 the babe, sleeping in her lap. She is wrapped in a white 
 dressing-gown, and her other son, a boy of six years old, 
 is leaning on the arm of her chair. "West stands behind 
 his father, with his palette and brushes in his hand, and the 
 silence that reigns over the whole is that of religious medi- 
 tation, which will probably end, according to the Quaker 
 custom, in a prayer from the patriarch of the family. The 
 picture is a very small one, the engraving from it being 
 of the same size. It has no excellence of color, but the 
 masses of light and shadow are impressive and simple, and 
 I know not a more original illustration of the often-painted 
 subject, the ages of man. Infancy, childhood, youth, middle 
 life, and extreme age, are beautifully brought together in 
 the quiet chamber of the painter's wife. Had he been 
 employed to paint these five ages, he would perhaps have 
 given himself a great deal of trouble to produce a work 
 that would have been classical, but, compared with this, 
 commonplace ; while he has here succeeded in making 
 a picture which, being intended only for himself, is for that 
 reason a picture for the whole world ; and if painters could 
 
THE GREAT PORTRAIT-PAINTERS 171 
 
 always thus put their hearts into their work, how much 
 would the general interest of the Art be increased ! 
 
 Among the many great lessons in portrait composition, 
 by Rembrandt, are "The Night Watch," at Amsterdam, 
 " The Group of Surgeons assembled round a Corpse," in 
 the Musee at the Hague, and the picture which Mr. Smith, 
 in his " Catalogue RaisonneY' calls " Ranier Hanslo and his 
 Mother." A sight of the two first is well worth a journey 
 to Holland. The last is sometimes described as " a woman 
 consulting a Baptist minister," and at others, "a woman 
 consulting an eminent lawyer, or an eminent physician." 
 As there are large books on a table and in the background, 
 and the expressions of the heads are earnest and serious, 
 the subject might be either of these. I saw the picture 
 (which belongs to the Earl of Ashburnham) many years 
 ago, and have ever since been haunted with the wish to 
 see it again. Indeed, I was about to make a day's journey 
 for that sole purpose, when it was sent to London for sale. 
 The persons it represents are unknown, the heads of neither 
 are remarkable for beauty, or any other interest than that 
 marked individuality that carries with it a certainty of 
 likeness ; and yet it is a picture that throws down every 
 barrier that would exclude it from the highest class of Art ; 
 nor do I know anything from the hand of Rembrandt in 
 which he appears greater than in this 'simple and unpre- 
 tending work. I remember being surprised to hear Sir 
 Thomas Lawrence object to its treatment, that though the 
 man turns towards the woman, and is speaking earnestly, 
 while she is listening with great attention, yet they do not 
 look in each other's faces. I was surprised that he should 
 not have noticed how frequently this happens, in conversa- 
 tions on the most important subjects, and oftenest, indeed, 
 in such conversations. Rembrandt has repeated these at- 
 titudes and expressions, in the two principal personages in 
 "The Night Watch," with the difference only, that tho 
 
172 CHARLES ROBERT LESLIE. 
 
 figures are walking as they converse. There is an engrav- 
 ing of the " Hanslo and his Mother " by Josiah Boydell, 
 which, however, fails in giving the breadth of light on the 
 female head, the color of which is as near to perfection as 
 Art ever approached. 
 
 The hands in Rembrandt's portraits, as in those of Hol- 
 bein, do everything required of them in the most natural 
 and expressive way. But very different are the hands 
 of Vandyke, which have an affected grace, adopted from 
 Rubens, though carried further from Nature, and which may 
 be traced from Rubens to Coreggio. The hands in Van- 
 dyke's portraits are always of one type, thin and elegant, 
 with long, tapered fingers. He was followed in these par- 
 ticulars by Lely with still more of affectation, who carried 
 a corresponding mannerism into his faces, losing nearly all 
 individuality in that <wie style of beauty that was in fashion. 
 
 A nobleman said to Lely, " How is it that you have so 
 great a reputation, when you know, as well as I do, that 
 you are no painter ? " " True, but I am the best you have," 
 was the answer. And so it is ; the best artist of the age 
 will generally, while living, have a reputation equal to the 
 greatest that have preceded him. Lely, however, was a 
 painter, and of very great merit. His color, always pearly 
 and refined, is often very charming. He understood well 
 the treatment of landscape as background, and there are 
 some of his pictures which I prefer to some pictures by 
 Vandyke. 
 
 Sir Joshua Reynolds remarks that in general the greatest 
 portrait-painters have not copied closely the dresses of their 
 time. Holbein, however, took no liberties with the doublets, 
 hose, or mantles of the gentlemen he painted, nor with the 
 head-gear or kirtles of the ladies ; neither did Velasquez ; 
 and their portraits are, therefore, curious records of fashions, 
 picturesque, and sometimes fantastic in the extreme, yet 
 ulways treated with admirable Art ; and I confess I prefer 
 
THE GREAT PORTRAIT-PAINTERS. 173 
 
 those of Sir Joshua's portraits in which he has faithfully 
 adhered to the dress of the sitter ; which is always char- 
 acteristic,, and often highly so. The manner in which 
 Queen Elizabeth covered herself with jewels, and the 
 splendor with which Raleigh decorated his person, pertain 
 to biography. 
 
 In some of Vandyke's portraits, no change is made in 
 the dress, while in many (I believe the most), that which 
 is stiff and formal is loosened, and alterations are introduced 
 that we are only aware of when we compare his pictures 
 with exact representations, by other artists, of the costume 
 of the time. Such deviations from matter of fact were 
 carried much ^further by Lely and Kneller, particularly in 
 their portraits of ladies ; and the first adopted an elegant, 
 but impossible, undress, that assists the voluptuous expres- 
 sion which he aimed at, either to please a dissolute Court, 
 Dr because it pleased himself ; possibly for both reasons. 
 
 With Kneller, however, the ideal style of the dress does 
 not affect the prevailing character he gave to the beauties 
 he painted, who seem a higher order of beings than the 
 ladies of Lely. Among the attractions of the latter the ex- 
 pression of strict virtue is by no means conspicuous, while it 
 would seem profane to doubt the purity of the high-born 
 dames of Kneller. Though, as a painter, not to be com- 
 pared to Lely, his women seem secured from moral degra- 
 dation by an ever-present consciousness of noble birth, which 
 sits well on them ; and though their demeanor is as studied 
 as the grace of a minuet, it does not offend like vulgar 
 affectation. Fielding, the natural Fielding, greatly ad- 
 mired the stately beauties of Kneller, at Hampton Court, 
 and compared Sophia Western to one of them. Conscious 
 that. '* when unadorned, adorned the most," they reject the 
 fuel of jewellery, and are content with only so much assist- 
 ance from Art as they receive from well-arranged draperies. 
 
 The great fault of Lely is the family likeness, closer than 
 
174 CHARLES ROBERT LESLIE. 
 
 that of sisters, which forbids our relying on his pictures 
 as portraits ; and this unpardonable fault is carried even 
 further by Kneller, whose ladies are all cast in one mould 
 of feature and form, and all alike tall to a degree rare in 
 nature. 
 
 Reynolds adopted something from both which he used 
 to advantage; but he did far more, he recovered por- 
 trait from all the mannerism that had accumulated on it, 
 from the death of Vandyke to his own time, and restored 
 it to truth. 
 
 When we compare his style with that of his master, 
 Hudson, we are struck with its vast superiority, its wide 
 difference, not merely in degree, but in kind ; and in this 
 it would appear to form an exception to what has generally 
 been the case, namely, that the style of every extraordinary 
 genius is but a great improvement on that of the school in 
 which he was reared. But it was not from Hudson, nor 
 from his visit to Italy, that the Art of Reynolds was formed. 
 The seed that was to produce fruit, so excellent and abun- 
 dant, was sown before he quitted Devonshire. He there 
 saw, and probably among the first pictures he ever saw, 
 the works of a painter wholly unknown in the metropolis. 
 " This painter," Northcote tells us, " was William Gandy, of 
 Exeter, whom," he says, " I cannot but consider as an early 
 master of Reynolds. He told me himself that he had seen 
 portraits by Gandy equal to those of Rembrandt ; one in 
 particular of an alderman of Exeter, which is placed in a 
 public building in that city. I have also heard him repeat 
 some observations of Gandy's which had been mentioned 
 to him, and that he approved of; one. in particular was, 
 that a picture ought to have a richness in its texture, as 
 if the colors had been composed of cream or cheese, and the 
 reverse of a hard and husky or dry manner." Now a 
 single precept like tin's, falling into an ear fitted to receive 
 it, is sufficient to create a style ; while, upon the inapt, all 
 the best instruction that can be given is wasted. 
 
THE GREAT PORTRAIT-PAINTERS. 175 
 
 I have seen a portrait by Gaudy, which I should have 
 mistaken for an early work of Reynolds ; and this, with 
 what Xorthcote tells us, is enough to establish, in my mind, 
 Gand/s claim to the honor of being the first instructor of 
 a great genius whom he never saw. Gandy's father was a 
 pupil of Vandyke ; and being patronized by the Duke of 
 Ormond, and retained in his service in Ireland, his -voik? 
 were as little known in London as those of his son, TV : r 
 practised only in Devonshire. Thus, while the style of 
 Vandyke degenerated through the hands of his successors 
 in the Capital, till it was totally lost in the beginning of 
 the eighteenth century, some of its best qualities were pre- 
 served in rentete parts of the kingdom, to lead to a splendid 
 revival of portraiture ; so true it is that, however obscured 
 from sight, at times, some of the links in the chain of Art 
 may be, still it is a chain never wholly broken. 
 
 Nothing can be further from my intention than to lesse* 
 the fame of Reynolds. What I have stated merely show* 
 what indeed we might be certain of without a knowledge of 
 the facts, namely, that the birth of his Art was not miracu- 
 lous. Praise enough is still left for him ; for that which he 
 derived from Gandy was but the medium of his own fasci- 
 nating conceptions of Nature. " There is a charm," says 
 Northcote, " in his portraits, a mingled softness and force, 
 a grasping at the end, with nothing harsh or unpleasant in 
 the means, that you will find nowhere else. He may gc 
 out of fashion for a tune, but you must come back to him 
 again, while a thousand imitators and academic triflers are 
 forgotten." 
 
 In looking over prints from his works, we are astonished 
 at the many attitudes and incidents we find new to Art, 
 and yet often such as from their very familiarity in life 
 have been overloked by other painters. The three Ladies 
 Waldegrave, one winding silk from the hands of another, 
 while the third is bending over a drawing, Mrs. Abington 
 
176 CHARLES ROBERT LESLIE. 
 
 leaning on the back of her chair, and Lady Fenoulhet with 
 her hands in a muff, for instance ; and then the many ex- 
 quisitely natural groupings of mothers and children, and of 
 children with children ; how greatly superior in interest are 
 such conceptions, fresh from Nature, to some of his inven- 
 tions, as of ladies sacrificing to the Graces, or decorating 
 a statue of Hymen, of which indeed he made fine pictures 
 (for that he could not help), but pictures the impression of 
 which is comparatively languid. 
 
 In the collected works of no other portrait-painter do we 
 find so great a diversity of individual character illustrated 
 by so great a variety of natural incident, or aided by such 
 various and well-chosen effects of light and shadow ; many 
 entirely new to Art, as, for instance, the partial shadows 
 thrown by branches of trees over whole-length figures. In- 
 deed, by no other painter, except Gainsborough, has land- 
 scape been so beautifully or effectively brought in aid of 
 portrait. Vandyke generally subdues its brightness to give 
 supremacy to the head, and Lely and Kneller did this still 
 more ; but Reynolds, without lessening its power, always 
 contrived it so as to relieve the face most effectively. 
 
 We may learn nearly everything relating to portrait from 
 Reynolds. Those deviations from the exact correspondence 
 of the sides of the face which are so common in Nature 
 are never corrected by him, as they sometimes are by in- 
 ferior artists under the notion of improving the drawing. 
 He felt that a marked difference in the lines surrounding 
 the eyes often greatly aids the expression of the face. He 
 took advantage of this in painting the fixed despair of 
 Ugolino, no doubt finding it in the model ; and in a very 
 different head, his front face of Garrick, he has, by observing 
 the difference of the eyes, given great archness of expres- 
 sion, and assisted its intelligence without making the face 
 less handsome. 
 
 It has been said, and I believe it, that no painter cai 
 
THE GREAT PORTRAIT-PAINTERS. 177 
 
 put more sense into a head than he possesses himself, and 
 it must have been rare for Reynolds to meet with an in 
 tellect superior to his own. Had we no other evidence, that 
 of Goldsmith, who knew him well, was a close observer, and 
 no flatterer, would be conclusive : 
 
 "Here Reynolds is laid, and to tell you my mind, 
 He has not left a wiser or better behind." 
 
 But his portraits were not always so satisfactory to his 
 sitters as the works of inferior painters. The truth is, 
 sitters are no judges of their own likenesses, and in their 
 immediate family circle the- best judges are not always to 
 be found. I?ord Thurlow said, "There are two factions, 
 the Reynolds faction and the Romney faction. I am of 
 the Romney faction." Now in Romney*s whole-length the 
 Chancellor appeared a more handsome man than in the 
 half-length of Reynolds. Romney avoided all indication 
 of the suppressed temper that was so apt to explode in 
 violent paroxysms, and this rendered his picture more ac- 
 ceptable to the original. But he missed what Reynolds 
 alone could give, that extraordinary sapience which made 
 Charles Fox say, " No man could be so wise as Lord Thur- 
 low looked." 
 
 That the portraits of Reynolds were the best of all like- 
 nesses, I have no manner of doubt. I know several of his 
 pictures of children, the originals of whom I have seen in 
 middle and old age, and hi every instance I could discover 
 much likeness. He painted Lord Melbourne when a boy, 
 and with that genuine laugh that was so characteristic of 
 the future Prime Minister at every period of his life ; and 
 no likeness between a child and a man of sixty (an age at 
 which I remember Lord Melbourne) was ever more strik- 
 ing. Lord Melbourne recollected that Sir Joshua bribed 
 him to sit, by giving him a ride on his foot, and said, " If 
 you behave well, you shall have another ride." 
 12 
 
178 CHARLES ROBERT LESLIE. 
 
 His fondness of children is recorded on all his canvases 
 in which they appear. A matchless picture of Miss Bowls, 
 a beautiful laughing child caressing a dog, was sold a few 
 years ago at auction, and cheaply, at a thousand guineas. 
 The father and mother of the little girl intended she should 
 sit to Romney, who at one time more than divided the 
 town with Reynolds. Sir George Beaumont, however, 
 advised them to employ Sir Joshua. "But his pictures 
 fade." " No matter, take the chance ; even a faded pic- 
 ture by Reynolds will be the finest thing you can have. 
 Ask him to dine with you ; and let him become acquainted 
 with her." The advice was taken ; the little girl was placed 
 beside Sir Joshua at the table, where he amused her so 
 much with tricks and stories that she thought him the 
 most charming man in the world, and the next day was 
 delighted to be taken to his house, where she sat down with 
 a face full of glee, the expression of wliich he caught at 
 once and never lost ; and the affair turned out every way 
 happily, for the picture did not fade, and has till now 
 escaped alike the inflictions of time or of the ignorant 
 among cleaners. 
 
 Doubts have been expressed of the sincerity of Sir 
 Joshua's great admiration of Michael Angelo. Had he, 
 on his return from Italy, undertaken to decorate a church 
 (supposing an opportunity) with imitations of the Sistine 
 ceiling, I should doubt his appreciation of the gi^at works 
 that cover it. But a painter may sincerely admire Art 
 very different from his own; and I rest my belief of his 
 full appreciation of Michael Angelo less on his " Tragic 
 Muse " (Mrs. Siddons) or his " Ugolino," both of which we 
 may in some degree trace among the conceptions in the 
 Sistine Chapel, than to that general greatness and grace 
 of style stamped on all his works. " Reynolds," says 
 Sterne, " great and graceful as he paints " ; nor could his 
 Art be so well characterized by any other two words. 
 
VHE GREAT PORTRAIT-PAINTERS. 179 
 
 It has buen more than once intimated that Reynolds 
 cared for no other artist's success. But if this were the 
 case, why did he take the trouble to write and deliver his 
 discourses? in which he did not fail to give all the in- 
 struction he could convey, by words, in his own branch of 
 the Art, as well as in those which he considered higher. 
 He was daily accessible to all young artists who sought his 
 advice, and readily lent them the finest of his own works ; 
 but in doing this he always said to the portrait-painter, " It 
 will be better for you to study Vandyke." It is clear, that, 
 though he felt his own superiority among his contemporaries, 
 he had a belief that British Art' was advancing, and that 
 he should be 'surpassed by future painters ; like the belief 
 in which Shakespeare supposes an ideal mistress to say of 
 himself, 
 
 "But since he died, and poets better prove/' 
 
 for Reynolds, like all men of the loftiest minds, was modest. 
 Mrs. Bray, in her " Life of Stothard," says, with great truth, 
 of the modesty of such men, that it " is not at all inconsistent 
 with that strong internal conviction, which every man of real 
 merit possesses, respecting his own order of capacity. He 
 feels that Nature has given him a stand on higher ground 
 than most of his contemporaries ; but he does not look down 
 on them, but above himself. What he does is great, but he 
 still feels that greatness has a spirit which is ever mount- 
 ing, that rests on no summit within mortal view, but 
 soars again and again in search of an ideal height on which 
 to pause and fold its wings." 
 
 Gainsborough was the most formidable rival of Reynolds. 
 Whether he felt it hopeless to make use of Sir Joshua's 
 weapons, or whether his peculiar taste led him to the 
 choice of other means; he adopted a system of chiaro- 
 scuro, of more frequent occurrence in Nature than those 
 extremes of light and dark which Reynolds managed with 
 
180 CHARLES ROBERT LESLIE. 
 
 such consummate judgment. His range in portrait was 
 more limited, but within that range he is at times so de- 
 lightful that we should not feel inclined to exchange a head 
 by him for a head of the same person by Sir Joshua. His 
 men are as thoroughly gentlemen, and his women as en- 
 tirely ladies, nor had Reynolds a truer feeling of the charms 
 of infancy. Indeed his cottage children are more interest- 
 ing because more natural than the " Robinettas " and " Mus- 
 cipulas" of his illustrious rival, the only class of pictures 
 by ReyieHa in which mannerism in expression and attitude 
 obtrudes itself in the place of what is natural. Gains- 
 borough's barefoot child on her way to the well, with her 
 little dog under her arm, is unequalled by anything of the 
 kind in the world. I recollect it at the British Gallery, 
 forming part of a very noble assemblage of pictures, and 
 I could scarcely look at or think of anything else in the 
 rooms. This inimitable work is a portrait, and not of a 
 peasant child, but of a young lady, who appears also in his 
 picture of the girl and pigs, which Sir Joshua purchased. 
 
 That Reynolds and Gainsborough were not on terms of 
 friendship seems to have been the fault of the latter, who, 
 with all his excellent qualities, had not so equable a temper 
 as Sir Joshua. Reynolds did not, as Allan Cunningham 
 intimates, wait till the death of Gainsborough to do justice 
 to his genius. The brief allusion to their last interview in 
 his fourteenth discourse, which is as modest as it is touching, 
 proves that he had not done so ; and it seems clear that Sir 
 Joshua would have told much more, had it not been to his 
 own honor, and that he has only said what he felt necessary 
 for the removal of any charge of injustice on his part. 
 
 The powers of Gainsborough, in portrait, may be well 
 estimated by that charming picture in the Dulwich Gallery, 
 of "Mrs. Sheridan and Mrs. Tickell"; and the whole- 
 lengths at Hampton Court, of " Colonel St. Leger," and 
 "Fisher the Composer." 
 
THK GREAT PORTRAIT -PAINTERS. 181 
 
 A painter may have great ability, and yet be inferior to 
 those of whom I have spoken. Sir Thomas Lawrence was 
 perhaps hindered from rising to the highest rank as a 
 colorist by his early and first practice of making portraits 
 in colorless chalk only. His wish to please the sitter made 
 him yield more than his English predecessors had done to 
 the foolish desire of most people to be painted with a smile : 
 though he was far from extending this indulgence to that 
 extreme of a self-satisfied simper that the French painters 
 of the age preceding his had introduced to portrait. Of 
 indefatigable industry, Lawrence's habit of undertaking too 
 many pictures at the same time was a serious drawback, 
 in many cases*, to their excellence. He began the portraits 
 of children which he did not finish till they were grown up, 
 and of gentlemen and ladies while their hair was of its first 
 color, but which remained incomplete in his rooms till the 
 originals were gray. The most beautiful of his female 
 heads, and beautiful it is, is the one he painted of Lady 
 Elizabeth Leveson Gower (afterwards Marchioness of West- 
 minster). This was begun and finished off-hand; and so 
 was the best male head he ever painted, his first portrait of 
 Mr. West, not the whole-length in the National Gallery, in 
 which he has much exaggerated the stature of the original. 
 He took especial delight in painting the venerable and ami- 
 able President, who offered a remarkable instance of what 
 I have described elsewhere, the increase of beauty in old 
 age, and of whom this portrait is a work of great excel- 
 lence. 
 
 Without any of those peculiar blandishments of manner, 
 either as a painter or a man, that contributed to make 
 Lawrence the most popular portrait-painter of his time, 
 Jackson was more of an artist, much truer in color, and, 
 indeed, in this respect approaching to Reynolds, whose 
 pictures he sometimes copied so closely as to deceive even 
 Northcote. When his sitters were ordinary people, his 
 
182 CHARLES ROBERT LESLIE. 
 
 portraits were often ordinary works ; but when they were 
 notable persons, he exerted all his powers. The portrait he 
 painted of Canova, for Chantrey, is in all respects superior 
 to that which Lawrence painted of the great sculptor; 
 more natural, more manly, and much finer in effect. His 
 heads of Sir John Franklin (painted for Mr. Murray), of 
 Flaxman, of Stothard, and of Listen, are all admirably 
 characteristic, and among the finest portraits of the British 
 school ; and I remember seeing at Castle Howard his half- 
 length of Northcote, hanging in company with Vandyke's 
 half-length of Snyders, and a magnificent head of a Jew 
 Rabbi by Rembrandt, and well sustaining so trying a 
 position. Perfectly amiable in his nature, nothing pleased 
 Jackson more than opportunities of recommending young 
 painters of merit to patronage ; and he introduced Wilkie 
 and Haydon to Lord Mulgrave and Sir George Beau- 
 mont. With strong natural sense, playful in his manner, 
 and with a true relish of humor, Jackson was a great 
 favorite with all who had the happiness to know him, and 
 his loss, by an early death, was irreparable to his friends, 
 and a very great one to Art. 
 
 The many advantages in many ways resulting from 
 Photography are yet but imperfectly appreciated; for its 
 improvements have followed each other so rapidly, that AVC 
 cannot but expect many more, and are quite in the dark 
 as to what may be its next wonder. In its present state it 
 confirms what has always been felt by the best artists and the 
 best critics, that fac-simile is not that species of resemblance 
 to Nature, even in a portrait, that is most agreeable: for 
 while the best calotypes remind us of mezzotint engravings 
 from Velasquez, Rembrandt, or Reynolds, they are still 
 inferior in general effect to such engravings : and they thus 
 help to show that the ideal is equally a principle of por- 
 trait-painting as of all other Art: and that not only does 
 this consist in the best view of the face, the best light and 
 
THE GREAT PORTRAIT-PAINTERS. 183 
 
 shadow, and the most characteristic attitude of the figure, 
 for all these may be selected for a photographic picture, 
 but that the ideal of a portrait, like the ideal of all Art, 
 depends on something which can only be communicated by 
 the mind, through the hand and eye, and without any other 
 mechanical intervention than that of the pencil. Photog- 
 raphy may tend to relax the industry of inferior painters, 
 but it may be hoped and reasonably expected that it will 
 stimulate the exertions of the best ; for much may be learnt 
 from it if used as a means of becoming better acquainted 
 with the beauties of Nature, but nothing if resorted to only 
 as a substitute for labor. 
 t 
 
TO AGE. 
 
 BY WALTER SAVAGE LANDOR 
 
 WELCOME, old friend ! These many years 
 Have we lived door by door ; 
 The Fates have laid aside their shears 
 Perhaps for some few more. 
 
 I was indocile at an age 
 
 When better boys were taught, 
 But thou at length hast made me sage, 
 
 If I am sage in aught. 
 
 Little I know from other men, 
 
 Too little they from me, 
 But thou hast pointed well the pen 
 
 That writes these lines to thee. 
 
 Thanks for expelling Fear and Hope, 
 
 One vile, the other vain ; 
 One's scourge, the other's telescope, 
 
 I shall not see again ; 
 
 Rather what lies before my feet 
 
 My notice shall engage : 
 He who hath braved Youth's dizzy heat 
 
 Dreads not the frost of Age. 
 
/ 
 
 ( UNIVERSITY ) 
 
 THE YOUTH OF MAN. 
 
 BY MATTHEW ARNOLD. 
 
 WE, O Nature, depart : 
 Thou survivest us : this, 
 This, I know, is the law. 
 Yes, but more than this, 
 Thou who seest us die 
 ^eest us change while we live ; 
 Seest our dreams one by one, 
 Seest our errors depart : 
 
 Watchest us, Nature, throughout, 
 Mild and inscrutably calm. 
 
 Well for us that we change ! 
 Well for us that the Power 
 Which in our morning prime 
 Saw the mistakes of our youth, 
 Sweet and forgiving and good, 
 Sees the contrition of age ! 
 
 Behold, O Nature, this pair ! 
 See them to-night where they stand, 
 Not with the halo of youth 
 Crowning their brows with its light, 
 Not with the sunshine of hope, 
 Not with the rapture of spring, 
 
186 MATTHEW ARNOLD. 
 
 Which they had of old, when they stood 
 
 Years ago at my side 
 
 In this selfsame garden, and said : 
 
 " We are young, and the world is ours, 
 
 For man is the king of the world. 
 
 Fools that these mystics are 
 
 Who prate of Nature ! but she 
 
 Has neither beauty, nor warmth, 
 
 Nor life, nor emotion, nor power. 
 
 But Man has a thousand gifts, 
 
 And the generous dreamer invests 
 
 The senseless world with them all. 
 
 Nature is nothing ! her charm 
 Lives in our eyes which can paint, 
 Lives in our hearts which can feel ! " 
 
 Thou, O Nature, wert mute, 
 Mute as of old : days flew, 
 Days and years ; and Time 
 With the ceaseless stroke of his wings 
 Brushed off the bloom from their soul. 
 Clouded and dim grew their eye ; 
 Languid their heart ; for Youth 
 Quickened its pulses no more. 
 Slowly within the walls 
 Of an ever-narrowing world 
 They drooped, they grew blind, they grew old. 
 Thee and their Youth in thee, 
 Nature, they saw no more. 
 
 Murmur of living ! 
 Stir of existence ! 
 Soul of the worlo ' 
 Make, O make yourselves felt 
 To the dying spirit of Youth. 
 
THE YOUTH OF MAN. 187 
 
 Come, like the breath of spring. 
 
 Leave not a human soul 
 
 To grow old in darkness and pain. 
 
 Only the living can feel you : 
 But leave us not while we live. 
 
 Here they stand to-night, 
 Here, where this gray balustrade 
 Crowns the still valley : behind 
 Is the castled house with its woods 
 Which sheltered their childhood, the sun 
 On its ivied windows : a scent 
 From 'the gray-walled garden?, a breath 
 Of the fragrant stock and the pink, 
 Perfumes the evening air. 
 Their children play on the lawns. 
 They stand and listen : they hear 
 The children's shouts, and, at times, 
 Faintly, the bark of a dog 
 From a distant farm in the hills : 
 Nothing besides : in front 
 The wide, wide valley outspreads 
 To the dun horizon, reposed 
 In the twilight, and bathed in dew, 
 
 Cornfield and hamlet and copse 
 Darkening fast ; but a light, 
 Far off, a glory of day, 
 Still plays on the city spires : 
 And there in the dusk by the walls, 
 With the gray mist marking its course 
 Through the silent flowery land, 
 
 On, to the plains, to the sea, 
 Floats the Imperial Stream. 
 
 Well I know what they feel. 
 They gaze, and the evening wind 
 
188 MATTHEW ARNOLD. 
 
 Plays on their faces : they gaze ; 
 
 Airs from the Eden of Youth 
 
 Awake and stir in their soul : 
 
 The Past returns ; they feel 
 
 What they are, alas ! what they were. 
 
 They, not Nature, are changed. 
 Well I know what they feel. 
 
 Hush ! for tears 
 Begin to steal to their eyes. 
 Hush ! for fruit 
 Grows from such sorrow as theirs. 
 
 And they remember 
 With piercing, untold anguish 
 The proud boasting of their youth. 
 
 And they feel how Nature was fair. 
 And the mists of delusion, 
 And the scales of habit, 
 Fall away from their eyes. 
 And they see, for a moment, 
 Stretching out, like the Desert 
 In its weary, unprofitable length, 
 Their faded, ignoble lives 
 
 While the locks are yet brown on thy uead, 
 While the soul still looks through thine eyes, 
 While the heart still pours 
 The mantling blood to thy cheek, 
 
 Sink, O Youth, in thy soul ! 
 Yearn to the greatness of Nature ! 
 Rally the good in the depths of thyself! 
 
HANNIBAL'S MARCH INTO ITALY 
 
 BY DR. ARNOLD. 
 
 f B^WlCE in history has there been witnessed the strug- 
 i gle of tbe highest individual genius against the re- 
 sources and institutions of a great nation ; and in both 
 cases the nation has been victorious. For seventeen years 
 Hannibal strove against Rome ; for sixteen years Napo- 
 leon Bonaparte strove against England : the efforts of the 
 first ended in Zama, those of the second in Waterloo. 
 
 True it is, as Polybius has said, that Hannibal was sup- 
 ported by the zealous exertions of Carthage ; and the 
 strength of the opposition to his policy has been very pos- 
 sibly exaggerated by the Roman writers. But the zeal of 
 his country in the contest, as Polybius himself remarks in 
 another place, was itself the work of his family. Never 
 did great men more show themselves the living spirit of 
 a nation than Hamilcar, and Hasdrubal, and Hannibal, 
 during a period of nearly fifty years, approved themselves 
 to be to Carthage. It is not, then, merely through our 
 ignorance of the internal state of Carthage that Hannibal 
 stands so prominent in all our conceptions of the second 
 Punic war ; he was really its moving and directing power, 
 and the energy of his country was but a light reflected from 
 his own. History therefore gathers itself into his single 
 pereon : in that vast tempest which, from north and south, 
 from the west and the east, broke upon Italy, we see noth- 
 ing but Hannibal. 
 
190 DR. ARNOLD. 
 
 But if Hannibal's genius may be likened to the Homeric 
 god, who in his hatred of the Trojans rises from the deep 
 to rally the fainting Greeks, and to lead them against the 
 enemy, so the calm courage with which Hector met his 
 more than human adversary in his country's cause is no 
 unworthy image of the unyielding magnanimity displayed 
 by the aristocracy of Rome. As Hannibal utterly eclipses 
 Carthage, so on the contrary Fabius, Marcellus, Claudius, 
 Nero, even Scipio himself, are as nothing when compared 
 to the spirit and wisdom and power of Rome. The senate 
 which voted its thanks to its political enemy, Varro, after 
 his disastrous defeat, " because he had not despaired of the 
 Commonwealth," and which disdained either to solicit or to 
 reprove, or to threaten, or in any way to notice the twelve 
 colonies which had refused their accustomed supplies of 
 men for the army, is far more to be honored than the con- 
 queror of Zama. This we should the more carefully bear 
 in mind, because our tendency is to admire individual great- 
 ness far more than national ; and as no single Roman will 
 bear comparison with Hannibal, we are apt to murmur at 
 the event of the contest, and to think that the victory was 
 awarded to the least worthy of the combatants. On the 
 contrary, never was the wisdom of God's providence more 
 manifest than in the issue of the struggle between Rome 
 and Carthage. It was clearly for the good of mankind that 
 Hannibal should be conquered ; his triumph would have 
 stopped the progress of the world. For great men can 
 only ant permanently by forming great nations ; and no one 
 man, even though it were Hannibal himself, can in one gen- 
 eration effect such a work. But where the nation has been 
 merely enkindled for a while by a great man's spirit, the 
 light passes away with him who communicated it ; and the 
 nation, when he is gone, is like a dead body, to which magic 
 pow^r had for a moment given an unnatural life : when the 
 charm has ceased, the body is cold and stiff as before. He 
 
HANNIBAL'S MARCH INTO ITALY. 191 
 
 who grieves over the battle of Zama should carry on his 
 thoughts to a period thirty years later, when Hannibal must, 
 in the course of nature, have been dead, and consider how 
 the isolated Phoenician city of Carthage was fitted to re- 
 ceive and to consolidate the civilization of Greece, or by its 
 laws and institutions to bind together baibarians of every 
 race and language into an organized empire, and prepare 
 them for becoming, when that empire Avas dissolved, the 
 free members of the commonwealth of Christian Europe. 
 
 Hannibal was twenty-six years of age when he was ap- 
 pointed commander-in-chief of the Carthaginian armies in 
 Spain, upon the sudden death of Hasdrubal. Two years, 
 we have seen, Had been employed in expeditions against the 
 native Spaniards ; the third year was devoted to the siege 
 of Saguntum. Hannibal's 'pretext for attacking it was, that 
 the Saguntines had oppressed one of the Spanish tribes in 
 alliance with Carthage ; but no caution in the Saguntine 
 government could have avoided a quarrel, which their en- 
 emy was determined to provoke. Saguntum, although not a 
 city of native Spaniards, resisted as obstinately as if the 
 very air of Spain had breathed into foreign settlers on its 
 soil the spirit so often, in many different ages, displayed by 
 the Spanish people. Saguntum was defended like Numan- 
 tia and Gerona : the siege lasted eight months; and \\hen 
 all hope was gone, several of the chiefs kindled a fire in the 
 market-place, and after having thrown in their most pre- 
 cious effects, leapt into it themselves, and perished. Stil] 
 the spoil found in the place was very considerable ; there 
 was a large treasure of money, which Hannibal kept for his 
 war expenses ; there were numerous captives, whom he dis 
 tributed amongst his soldiers as their share of the plunder ; 
 and there was much costly furniture from the pubh'c and 
 private buildings, which he sent home to decorate the tem- 
 ples and palaces of Carthage. 
 
 It must have been towards the close of the year, but 
 
192 DR. ARNOLD. 
 
 apparently before the consuls were returned from Elyria, 
 that the news of the fall of Saguntum reached Rome. Im- 
 mediately ambassadors were sent to Carthage ; M. Fabius 
 Buteo, who had been consul seven-and-twenty years before, 
 C. Licinius Varus, and Q. Baebius Tamphilus. Their or- 
 ders were simply to demand that Hannibal and his principal 
 officers should be given up for their attack upon the allies 
 of Rome, in breach of the treaty, and, if this were refused, 
 to declare war. The Carthaginians tried to discuss the pre- 
 vious question, whether the attack on Saguntum was a 
 breach of the treaty ; but to this the Romans would not 
 listen. At length M. Fabius gathered up his toga, as if he 
 was wrapping up something in it, and holding it out thus 
 folded together, he said, " Behold, here are peace and war ; 
 take which you choose ! " The Carthaginian suffete, or 
 judge, answered, " Give whichever tliou wilt." Hereupon 
 Fabius shook out the folds of his toga, saying, " Then here 
 we give you war " ; to which several members of the coun- 
 cil shouted in answer, " With all our hearts we welcome 
 it." Thus the Roman ambassadors left Carthage, and re- 
 turned straight to Rome. 
 
 But before the result of this embassy could be known in 
 Spain, Hannibal had been making preparations for his 
 intended expedition, in a manner which showed, not only 
 that he was sure of the support of his government, but thai 
 he was able to dispose at his pleasure of all the military 
 resources of Carthage. At his suggestion fresh troops from 
 Africa were sent over to Spain to secure it during his 
 absence, and to be commanded by his own brother, Has- 
 drubal ; and their place was to be supplied by other troops 
 raised in Spain ; so that Africa was to be defended by 
 Spaniards, and Spain by Africans, the soldiers of each 
 nation, when quartered amongst foreigners, being cut off 
 from all temptation or opportunity to revolt. So com- 
 pletely was he allowed to direct every military measure, 
 
HANNIBAL'S MARCH INTO ITALY. 193 
 
 that he is said to have sent Spanish and Numidian troops 
 to garrison Carthage itself; in other words, this was a part 
 of his general plan, and was adopted accordingly by the 
 government. Meanwhile he had sent ambassadors into 
 Gaul, and even across the Alps, to the Gauls who had 
 so lately been at war with the Romans, both to obtain 
 information as to the country through which his march 
 lay, and to secure the assistance and guidance of the Gauls 
 in his passage of the Alps, and their co-operation in arms 
 when he should arrive in Italy. His Spanish troops he had 
 dismissed to their several homes at the end of the last cam- 
 paign, that they might carry their spoils with them, and tell 
 of their exploits to their countrymen, and enjoy, during the 
 winter, that almost listless ease which is the barbarian's 
 relief from war and plunder. At length he received the 
 news of the Roman embassy to Carthage, and the actual 
 declaration of war ; his officers also had returned from Cis- 
 alpine Gaul. "The natural difficulties of the passage of 
 the Alps were great," they said, " but by no means insuper- 
 able ; while the disposition of the Gauls was most friendly, 
 and they were eagerly expecting his arrival." Then Han- 
 nibal called his soldiers together, and told them openly that 
 he was going to lead them into Italy. " The Romans," he 
 said, have demanded that I and my principal officers 
 should be delivered up to them as malefactors. Soldiers, 
 will you suffer such an indignity ? The Gauls are holding 
 out their arms to us, inviting us to come to them, and to 
 assist them in revenging their manifold injuries. And the 
 country which we shall invade, so rich in corn and wine 
 and oil, so full of flocks and herds, so covered with flourish- 
 ing cities, will be the richest prize that could be offered by 
 the gods to reward your valor." One common shout from 
 the soldiers assured him of their readiness to follow him. 
 He thanked them, fixed the day on which they were to b 
 ready to march, and then dismissed them. 
 13 
 
T.H DR. ARNOLD. 
 
 In this interval, and now on the very eve of commencing 
 his appointed work, to which for eighteen years he had 
 been solemnly devoted^ and to which he had so long been 
 looking forward with almost sickening hope, he left the 
 head-quarters of his army to visit Gades, and there, in the 
 temple of the supreme god of Tyre, and all the colonies of 
 Tyre, to olfer his prayers and vows for the success of hi 3 
 enterprise. He was attended only by those immediately 
 attached to his person; and amongst these was a Sicilian 
 Greek, Silenus, who followed him throughout his Italian 
 expedition, and lived at his table. When the sacrifice was 
 over, Hannibal returned to his army at New Carthage ; 
 and, everything being ready, and the season sufficiently 
 advanced, for it was now late in May, he set out on his 
 march for the Iberus. 
 
 And here the fulness of his mind, and his strong sense of 
 being the devoted instrument of his country's gods to de- 
 stroy their enemies, haunted him by night as they possessed 
 him by day. In his sleep, so he told Silenus, he fancied 
 that the supreme god of his fathers had called him into the 
 presence of all the gods of Carthage, who were sitting on 
 their thrones in council. There he received a solemn 
 charge to invade Italy; and one of the heavenly council 
 went with him and with his army, to guide him on his way. 
 He went on, and his divine guide commanded him, " See 
 that thou look not behind thee." But after a while, im- 
 patient of the restraint, he turned to look back ; and there 
 he beheld a huge and monstrous form, thick-set all over 
 with serpents ; wherever it moved orchards and woods and 
 houses fell crushing before it. He asked his guide in won- 
 der what that monster form was? The god answered, 
 " Thou seest the desolation of Italy ; go on thy way, 
 straight forward, and cast no look behind." Thus, with 
 no divided heart, and with an entire resignation of all 
 personal and domestic enjoyments forever, Hannibal went 
 
HANNIBAL'S MARCH INTO ITALY. 195 
 
 forth, at the age of twenty-seven, to do the work of his 
 country's god, and to redeem his early vow. 
 
 The consuls at Rome came into office at this period on 
 the fifteenth of March; it was possible, therefore, for a con- 
 sular army to arrive on the scene of action in time to 
 dispute with Hannibal, not only the passage of the Rhone, 
 but that of the Pyrenees. But the Romans exaggerated 
 the difficulties of his march, and seem to have expected that 
 the resistance of the Spanish tribes between the Ibems and 
 the Pyrenees, and of the Gauls between the Pyrenees and 
 the Rhone, would so delay him that he would not reach the 
 Rhone till the end of the season. They therefore made 
 their preparations leisurely. 
 
 Of the consuls for this year, the year of Rome 536, 
 and 218 before the Christian era, one was P. Cornelius 
 Scipio, the son of L. Scipio, who had been consul in the 
 sixth 3 ear of the first Punic war, and the grandson of L. 
 Scipio Barbatus, whose services in the third Samnite war 
 are recorded in his famous epitaph. The other was Ti. 
 Sempronius Longus, probably, but not certainly, the son 
 of that C. Sempronius Blaesus who had been consul in* 
 the year 501. The consul's provinces were to be Spain 
 and Sicily; Scipio, with two Roman legions, and 15,600 
 of the Italian allies, and with a fleet of sixty quinqueremes, 
 was to command in Spain ; Sempronius, with a somewhat 
 larger army, and a fleet of 160 quinqueremes, was to cross 
 over to LilybaBum, and from thence, if circumstances fa- 
 vored, to make a descent on Africa, A third army, con- 
 sisting also of two Roman legions, and 11,000 of the allies, 
 was stationed in Cisalpine Gaul, under the praetor, L. Man- 
 lius Vulso. The Romans suspected that the Gauls would 
 rise in arms erelong; and they hastened to send out the 
 colonists of two colonies, which had been resolved on before, 
 but not actually founded, to occupy the important stations of 
 Placcntia and Cremona on the opposite bank* of the Po. 
 
,196 DR. ARNOLD. 
 
 The colonists sent to each of these places were no fewer 
 than six thousand ; and they received notice to be at their 
 colonies in thirty days. Three commissioners, one of them 
 C. Lutatius Catulus, being of consular rank, were sent out 
 as usual, to superintend the allotment of lands to the set- 
 tlers; and these 12,000 men, together with the praetor's 
 army, were supposed to be capable of keeping the Gauls 
 quiet. 
 
 It is a curious fact, that the danger on the side of Spain 
 was considered to be so much the less urgent, that Scipio's 
 army was raised the last, after those of his colleague and of 
 the praetor, L. Manlius. Indeed, Scipio was still at Rome, 
 when tidings came that the Boians and Insubrians had 
 revolted, had dispersed the new settlers at Placentia and 
 Cremona, and driven them to take refuge at Mutina, had 
 treacherously seized the three commissioners at a confer- 
 ence, and had defeated the praetor, L. Manlius, and obliged 
 him also to take shelter in one of the towns of Cisalpine 
 Gaul, where they were blockading him. One of Scipio's 
 legions, with five thousand of the allies, was immediately 
 sent off into Gaul under another prastor, C. Atilius Ser- 
 ranus ; and Scipio waited till his own army should again be 
 completed by new levies. Thus, he cannot have left Rome 
 till late in the summer ; and when he arrived with his fleet 
 and army at the mouth of the eastern branch of the Rhone, 
 he found that Hannibal had crossed the Pyrenees ; but he 
 still hoped to impede his passage of the river. 
 
 Hannibal, meanwhile, having set out from New Carthage 
 with an army of 90,000 foot and 12,000 horse, crossed the 
 Iberus ; and from thenceforward the hostile operations of 
 Ids march began. He might, probably, have marched 
 through the country between the Iberus and the Pyrenees, 
 had that been his sole object, as easily as he made his way 
 from the Pyrenees to the Rhone ; a few presents and civili- 
 ties would easily have induced the Spanish chiefs to allow 
 
HANNIBAL'S MARCH INTO ITALY. 197 
 
 him a free passage. But some of the tribes northward of 
 the Iberus were friendly to Rome : on the coast were the 
 Greek cities of Rhoda and Emporiae, Massalif* colonies, 
 and thus attached to the Romans as the old allies of their 
 mother city : if this part of Spain were left unconquered, 
 the Romans would immediately make use of it as the base 
 of their operations, and proceed from thence to attack the 
 whole Carthaginian dominion. Accordingly, Hannibal em- 
 ployed his army in subduing the whole country, which ho 
 effected with no great loss of time, but at a heavy expense 
 of men, as he was obliged to carry the enemy's strongholds 
 by assault, ralher than incur the delay of besieging them. 
 He left Hanno with eleven thousand men to retain posses- 
 sion of the newly-conquered country ; and he further dimin- 
 ished his army by sending home as many more of his 
 Spanish soldiers, probably those who had most distinguished 
 themselves, as an earnest to the rest, that they too, if they 
 did their duty well, might expect a similar release, and 
 might look forward to return erelong to their homes full of 
 spoil and of glory. These detachments, together with the 
 heavy loss sustained in the field, reduced the force with 
 which Hannibal entered Gaul to no more than 50,000 foot 
 and 9,000 horse. 
 
 From the Pyrenees to the Rhone his progress was easy. 
 Here he had no wish to make regular conquests ; and pres- 
 ents to the chiefs mostly succeeded in conciliating their 
 friendship, so that he was allowed to pass freely. But on 
 the left bank of the Rhone the influence of the Massaliots 
 with the Gaulish tribes had disposed them to resist the in- 
 vader ; and 'the passage of the Rhone was not to be effected 
 without a contest. 
 
 Scipio, by this time, had landed his army near the east- 
 ern mouth of the Rhone ; and his information of Hannibal's 
 movements was vague and imperfect. His men had suf- 
 fered from sea-sickness on their voyage from Pisa to the 
 
108 DR. ARNOLD. 
 
 Rhone ; and he wished to give them a short time to recover 
 their strength and spirits, before he led them against the 
 enemy. He still felt confident that Hannibal's advance 
 from the Pyrenees must be slow, supposing that he would 
 be obliged to fight his way ; so that he never doubted that 
 he should have ample time to oppose his passage of the 
 Rhone. Meanwhile he sent out 300 horse, with some 
 Gauls, who were in the service of the Massaliots, ordering 
 them to ascend the left bank of the Rhone, and discover, if 
 possible, the situation of the enemy. Pie seems to have 
 been unwilling to place the river on his rear, and therefore 
 never to have thought of conducting his opA-ations on the 
 right bank, or even of sending out reconnoitring parties 
 in this direction. 
 
 The resolution which Scipio formed a few days after- 
 wards, of sending his army to Spain, when he himself re- 
 turned to Italy, was deserving of such high praise, that we 
 must hesitate to accuse him of over caution or needless 
 delay at this critical moment. Yet he was sitting idle at 
 the mouth of the Rhone, while the Gauls were vainly 
 endeavoring to oppose Hannibal's passage of the river 
 We must understand that Hannibal kept his army as far 
 away from the sea as possible, in order to conceal his move- 
 ments from the Romans ; therefore he came upon the 
 Rhone, not on the line of the later Roman road from Spain 
 to Italy, which crossed the river at Tarasco, between Avig- 
 non and Aries, but at a point much higher up, above its 
 confluence with the Durance, and nearly half-way, if we 
 can trust Polybius's reckoning, from the sea to its confluence 
 with the Isere. Here he obtained from the natives on the 
 right bank, by paying a fixed price, all their boats and ves- 
 sels of every description with which they were accustomed 
 to traffic down the river : they allowed him also to cut tim- 
 ber for the construction of others ; and thus in two days he 
 was provided with the means of transporting his army. 
 
HANNIBAL'S MARCH INTO ITALY. 199 
 
 But finding that the Gauls were assembled on the eastern 
 bank to oppose his passage, he sent off a detachment of his 
 army by night with native guides, to ascend the right bank, 
 for about two-and-twenty miles, and there to cross as they 
 could, where there was no enemy to stop them. The woods. 
 which then lined the river, supplied this detachment with 
 the means of constructing barks and rafts enough for the 
 passage ; they took advantage of one of the many islands in 
 this part of the Rhone, to cross where the stream was 
 divided ; and thus they all reached the left bank in safety. 
 There they took up a strong position, probably one of those 
 strange masses of rock which rise here and there with steep 
 cliffy sides like islands out of the vast plain, and rested for 
 four-and-twenty hours after their exertions in the march 
 and the passage of the river. 
 
 Hannibal allowed eight-and-forty hours to pass from the 
 time when the detachment left his camp ; and then, on the 
 morning of the fifth day after his arrival on the Rhone, he 
 made his preparations for the passage of his main army. 
 The mighty stream of the river, fed by the snows of the 
 high Alps, is swelled rather than diminished by the heats of 
 summer ; so that, although the season was that when the 
 southern rivers are generally at their lowest, it was rolling 
 the vast mass of its waters along with a startling fulness and 
 rapidity. The heaviest vessels were therefore placed on the 
 left highest up the stream, to form something of a break- 
 water for the smaller craft crossing below ; the small boats 
 held the flower of the light-armed foot, while the cavalry 
 were in the larger vessels ; most of the horses being towed 
 astern swimming, and a single soldier holding three or four 
 together by their bridles. Everything was ready, and the 
 Gauls on the opposite side had poured out of their camp, 
 and lined the bank in scattered groups at the most accessible 
 points, thinking that their task of stopping the enemy's land- 
 ing would be easily accomplished. At length Hannibal's 
 
200 DR. ARNOLD. 
 
 eye observed a column of smoke rising on the farther shore, 
 above or on the right of the barbarians. This was the con- 
 certed signal which assured him of the arrival of his detach- 
 ment ; and he instantly ordered his men to embark, and 
 to push across with all possible speed. They pulled vigor- 
 ously against the rapid stream, cheering each other to the 
 work ; while behind them were their friends, cheering them 
 also from the bank ; and before them were the Gauls sing- 
 ing their war-songs, and calling them to come on with tones 
 and gestures of defiance. But on a sudden a mass of fire 
 was seen on the rear* of the barbarians; the Gauls on the 
 bank looked behind, and began to turn away from the river ; 
 and presently the bright arms and white linen coats of the 
 African and Spanish soldiers appeared above the bank, 
 breaking in upon the disorderly line of the Gauls. Hanni- 
 lal himself, who was with the party crossing the river, 
 leaped on shore amongst the first, and forming his men as 
 fast as they landed, led them instantly to the charge. But 
 the Gauls, confused and bewildered, made little resistance ; 
 they fled in utter rout ; whilst Hannibal, not losing a mo- 
 ment, sent back his vessels and boats for a fresh detachment 
 of his army ; and before night his whole force, with the 
 exception of his elephants, was safely established on the 
 eastern side of the Rhone. 
 
 As the river was no longer between him and the enemy, 
 Hannibal early on the next morning sent out a party of 
 Numidian cavalry to discover the position and number of 
 Scipio's forces, and then called his army together, to see and 
 hear the communications of some chiefs of the Cisalpine 
 Gauls, who were just arrived from the other side of the 
 Alps. Their words were explained to the Africans and 
 Spaniards in the army by interpreters ; but the very sight 
 of the chiefs was itself an encouragement ; for it told the 
 soldiers that the communication with Cisalpine Gaul was 
 not impracticable, and that the Gauk had undertaken so 
 
HANNIBAL'S MARCH INTO ITALY. 201 
 
 long a journey for the purpose of obtaining the aid of the 
 Carthaginian army, against their old enemies, the Romans. 
 Besides, the interpreters explained to the soldiers that the 
 chiefs undertook to guide them into Italy by a short and 
 safe route, on which they would be able to find provisions ; 
 and spoke strongly of the great extent and richness of Italy, 
 when they did arrive there, and how zealously the Gauls 
 would aid them. Hannibal then came forward himself and 
 addressed his army : their work, he said, was more than half 
 accomplished by the passage of the Rhone ; their own eyes 
 and ears had witnessed the zeal of their Gaulish allies in 
 their cause ; for the rest, their business was to do their duty, 
 and obey his "orders implicitly, leaving everything else to 
 him. The cheers and shouts of the soldiers again satisfied 
 him how fully he might depend upon them; and he then 
 addressed his prayers and vows to the gods of Carthage, 
 imploring them to watch over the army, and to prosper its 
 work to the end, as they had prospered its beginning. The 
 soldiers were now dismissed, with orders to prepare for 
 their march on tlie morrow. 
 
 Scarcely was the assembly broken up, when some of the 
 Numidians who had been sent out in the morning were 
 seen riding for their lives to the camp, manifestly in flight 
 from a victorious enemy. Not half of the original party 
 returned ; for they had fallen in with Scipio's detachment of 
 Roman and Gaulish horse, and, after an obstinate conflict, 
 had been completely beaten. Presently after, the Roman 
 horsemen appeared in pursuit ; but when they observed the 
 Carthaginian camp, they wheeled about and rode off, to 
 carry back word to their general. Then at last Scipio put 
 his army in motion, and ascended the left bank of the river 
 to find and engage the enemy. But when he arrived at the 
 spot where his cavalry had seen the Carthaginian camp, he 
 found it deserted, and was told that Hannibal had been gone 
 three days, having marched northwards, ascending the left 
 
202 DR. ARNOLD. 
 
 bank of the river. To follow him seemed desperate : it was 
 plunging into a country wholly unknown to the Romans, 
 where they had neither allies nor guides, nor resources of 
 any kind ; and where the natives, over and above the com- 
 mon jealousy felt by all barbarians towards a foreign army, 
 were likely, as Gauls, to regard the Romans with peculiar 
 hostility. But if Hannibal could not be followed now, he 
 might easily be met on his first arrival in Italy; from the 
 mouth of the Rhone to Pisa was the chord of a circle, while 
 Hannibal was going to make a long circuit; and the Ro- 
 mans had an army already in Cisalpine Gaul; while the 
 enemy would reach the scene of action exhausted with the 
 fatigues and privations of his march across the Alps. Ac- 
 cordingly, Scipio descended the Rhone again, embarked his 
 army and sent it on to Spain under the command of his 
 brother, Cnseus Scipio, as his lieutenant ; while he himself 
 in his own ship, sailed for Pisa, and immediately crossed 
 the Apennines to take the command of the forces of the two 
 praetors, Manlius and Atilius, who, as we have seen, had an 
 army of about 25,000 men, over and above the colonists of 
 Placentia and Cremona, still disposable in Cisalpine Gaul. 
 
 This resolution of Scipio to send his own army on to 
 Spain, and to meet Hannibal with the army of the two prae- 
 tors, appears to show that he possessed the highest qualities 
 of a general, which involve the wisdom of a statesman no 
 less than of a soldier. As a mere military question, his 
 calculation, though baffled by the event, was sound ; but if 
 we view it in a higher light, the importance to the Romans 
 of retaining their hold on Spain would have justified a far 
 greater hazard ; for if the Carthaginians were suffered to 
 consolidate their dominion in Spain, and to avail themselves 
 of its immense resources, not in money only, but in men, the 
 hardiest and steadiest of barbarians, and, under the training 
 of such generals as Hannibal and his brother, equal to the 
 best soldiers in the world, the Romans would hardly have. 
 
HANNIBAL'S MARCH INTO ITALY. 203 
 
 been able to maintain the contest. Had not P. Scipio then 
 despatched his army to Spain at this critical moment, instead 
 of carrying it home to Italy, his son in all probability would 
 never have won the battle of Zama. 
 
 Meanwhile Hannibal, on the day after the skirmish with 
 Scipio's horse, had sent forward his infantry, keeping the 
 cavalry to cover his operations, as he still expected the Ro- 
 mans to pursue him; while he himself waited to super- 
 intend the passage of the elephants. These were thirty- 
 seven in number ; and their dread of the water made their 
 transport a very difficult operation. It was effected by 
 fastening to the bank large rafts of 200 feet in length, cov- 
 ered carefully % with earth : to the end of these smaller rafts 
 were attached, covered with earth in the same manner, and 
 with towing lines extended to a numbeuof the largest barks, 
 which were to tow them over the stream. The elephants, 
 two females leading the way, were brought upon the rafts 
 by their drivers without difficulty; and as soon as they 
 came upon the smaller rafts, these were cut loose at once 
 from the larger, and towed out into the middle of the river. 
 Some of the elephants, in their terror, leaped overboard, 
 and drowned their drivers ; but they themselves, it is said, 
 held their huge trunks above water, and struggled to the 
 shore ; so that the whole thirty-seven were landed in safety. 
 Then Hannibal called in his cavalry, and covering his 
 march with them and with the elephants, set forward up 
 the left bank of the Rhone to overtake the infantry. 
 
 In four days they reached the spot where the Isere, com- 
 ing down from the main Alps, brings to the Rhone a stream 
 hardly less full or mighty than his own. In the plains 
 above the confluence two Gaulish brothers were contending 
 which should be chief of their tribe ; and the elder called 
 in the stranger general to support his cause. Hannibal 
 readily complied, established him firmly on the throne, and 
 received important aid from him in return. He supplied 
 
204 DR. ARNOLD. 
 
 the Carthaginian army plentifully with provisions, furnished 
 them with new arms, gave them new clothing, especially 
 shoes, which were found very useful in the subsequent 
 march, and accompanied them to the first entrance on the 
 mountain country, to secure them from attacks on the part 
 of his countrymen. 
 
 The attentive reader, who is acquainted with the geogra- 
 phy of the Alps and their neighborhood, will perceive that 
 this account of Hannibal's march is vague. It does not 
 appear whether the Carthaginians ascended the left bank of 
 the Isere or the right bank ; or whether they continued to 
 ascend the Rhone for a time, and, leaving it only so far as to 
 avoid the great angle which it makes at Lyons, rejoined it 
 again just before they entered the mountain country, a little 
 to the left of the present road from Lyons to Chamberri. 
 But these uncertainties cannot now be removed, because 
 .Polybius neither possessed a sufficient knowledge of the 
 bearings of the country, nor sufficient liveliness as a painter, 
 to describe the line of the march so as to be clearly recog- 
 nized. I believe, however, that Hannibal crossed the Isere, 
 and continued to ascend the Rhone; and that afterwards, 
 striking off to the right across the plains of Dauphine, he 
 reached what Polybius calls the first ascent of the Alps, at 
 the northern extremity of that ridge of limestone moun- 
 tains, which, rising abruptly from the plain to the height of 
 4,000 or 5,000 feet, and filling up the whole space between 
 the Rhone at Belley and the Isere below Grenoble, first 
 introduces the traveller coming from Lyons to the remark- 
 able features of Alpine scenery. 
 
 At the end of the lowland country, the Gaulish chief, who 
 had accompanied Hannibal thus far, took leave of him : his 
 influence probably did not extend to the Alpine valleys; 
 and the mountaineers, far from respecting his safe-conduct, 
 might be in the habit of making plundering inroads on his 
 own territory. Here then Hannibal was left to himself; 
 
HANNIBAL'S MARCH INTO ITALY. 205 
 
 and he found that the natives were prepared to beset hia 
 passage. They occupied all such points as commanded the 
 road ; which, as usual, was a sort of terrace cut in the 
 mountain-side, overhanging the valley whereby it pene- 
 trated to the central ridge. But as the mountain line is of 
 no great breadth here, the natives guarded the defile only 
 by day, and withdrew when night came on to their own 
 homes, in a town or village among the mountains, and lying 
 in 'the valley behind them. .Hannibal, having learnt 'this 
 from some of his Gaulish guides whom he sent among them, 
 encamped in their sight just below the entrance of the de- 
 file ; and as soon as it was dusk, he set out with a detach- 
 ment of light *troops, made his way through the pass, and 
 occupied the positions which the barbarians, after their usual 
 practice, had abandoned at the approach of night. 
 
 Day dawned ; the main army broke up from its camp, 
 and began to enter the defile ; while the natives, finding 
 their positions occupied by the enemy, at first looked on qui- 
 etly, and offered no disturbance to the march. But when 
 they saw the long narrow line of the Carthaginian army 
 winding along the steep mountain-side, and the cavalry and 
 baggage-cattle struggling at every step with the difficulties 
 of the road, the temptation to plunder was too strong to be 
 resisted ; and from many points of the mountain above the 
 road they rushed down upon the Carthaginians. The con- 
 fusion was terrible : for the road or track was so narrow, 
 that the least crowd or disorder pushed the heavily loaded 
 baggage-cattle down the steep below ; and the horses, 
 wounded by the barbarians' missiles, and plunging about 
 wildly in their pain and terror, increased the mischief. At 
 last Hannibal was obliged to charge down from his position, 
 which commanded the whole scene of confusion, and to 
 drive the barbarians off. This he effected ; yet the conflict 
 )f so many men on the narrow road made the disorder 
 worse for a time ; and he unavoidably occasioned the de- 
 
206 DR. ARNOLD. 
 
 struct ion of many of his own men. At last, the barbarians 
 being quite beaten off, the army wound its way out of the 
 defile in safety, and rested in the wide and rich valley which 
 extends from the lake of Bourget, with scarcely a percep- 
 tible change of level, to the Isere at Montmeillan. Hanni 
 bal meanwhile attacked and stormed the town, which was 
 the barbarians' principal stronghold; and here he not only 
 recovered a great many of his own men, horses, and bag- 
 gage-cattle, but also found a large supply of corn and cattle 
 belonging to the barbarians, which he immediately made 
 use of for the consumption of his soldiers. 
 
 In the plain which he had now reached, he halted for a 
 whole day, and then, resuming his march, proceeded for 
 three days up the valley of the Isere on the right bank, 
 without encountering any difficulty. Then the natives met 
 him with branches of trees in their hands, and wreaths on 
 their heads, in token of peace : they spoke fairly, offered 
 hostages, and wished, they said, neither to do the Cartha- 
 ginians any injury, nor to receive any from them. Hanni- 
 bal mistrusted them, yet did not wish to offend them ; he 
 accepted their terms, received their hostages, and obtained 
 large supplies of cattle ; and their whole behavior seemed 
 so trustworthy, that at last he accepted their guidance, it is 
 said, through a difficult part of the country, which he was 
 now approaching. For all the Alpine valleys become nar- 
 rower, as they draw nearer to the central chain ; and the 
 mountains often come so close to the stream, that the roads 
 in old times were often obliged to leave the valley and 
 ascend the hills by any accessible point, to descend again 
 when the gorge became wider, and follow the stream as 
 before. If this is not done, and the track is carried nearer 
 the river, it passes often through defiles of the most formi- 
 dable character, being no more than a narrow ledge above a 
 furious torrent, with cliffs rising above it absolutely precip- 
 itous, and coming down on the other sidt of the torrent 
 
HANNIBAL'S MAKCH INTO ITALY. 207 
 
 abruptly to the water, leaving no passage by which man or 
 even goat could make its way. 
 
 It appears that the barbarians persuaded Hannibal to 
 pass through one of these defiles, instead of going round it ; 
 and while his army was involved in it, they suddenly, and 
 without provocation, as we are told, attacked him. Making 
 their way along the mountain-sides above the defile, they 
 rolled down masses of rock on the Carthaginians below, or 
 even threw stones upon them from their hands, stones and 
 rocks being equally fatal against an enemy so entangled. 
 It was well for Hannibal, that, still doubting the barbarians' 
 faith, he had, sent forward his cavalry and baggage, and cov- 
 ered the march with his infantry, who thus had to sustain 
 the brunt of the attack. Foot-soldiers on such ground were 
 able to move where horses would be quite helpless ; and 
 thus at last Hannibal, with his infantry, forced his way to 
 the summit of one of the bare cliffs overhanging the defile, 
 and remained there during the night, whilst the cavalry and 
 baggage slowly struggled out of the defile. Thus again 
 baffled, the barbarians made no more general attacks on the ' 
 army ; some partial annoyance was occasioned at intervals, 
 and some baggage was carried off ; but it was observed that 
 wherever the elephants were the line of march was secure ; 
 for the barbarians beheld those huge creatures with terror, 
 having never had the slightest knowledge of them, and not 
 daring to approach when they saw them. 
 
 Without any further recorded difficulty, the army on the 
 ninth day after they had left the plains of Dauphine arrived 
 at the summit of the central ridge of the Alps. Here there 
 is always a plain of some extent, immediately overhung by 
 the snowy summits of the high mountains, but itself in 
 summer presenting in many parts a carpet of the freshest 
 grass, with the chalets of the shepherds scattered over it, 
 and gay with a thousand flowers. But far different is its 
 aspect through the greatest part of the year : then it is one 
 
208 DR. ARNOLD. 
 
 unvaried waste of snow ; and the little lakes, which on 
 many of the passes enliven the summer landscape, are now 
 frozen over and covered with snow, so as to be no longer 
 distinguishable. Hannibal was on the summit of the Alps 
 about the end of October : the first winter snows had 
 already fallen ; but two hundred years before the Cliristian 
 era, when all Germany was one vast forest, the climate of 
 the Alps was far colder than at present, and the snow lay 
 on the passes all through the year. Thus the soldiers were 
 in dreary quarters ; they remained two days on the summit, 
 resting from their fatigues, and giving opportunity to many 
 of the stragglers, and of the horses and cattle, to rejoin 
 them by following their track; but they were cold, and 
 worn, and disheartened ; and mountains still rose before 
 them, through wKich, as they knew too well, even their 
 descent might be perilous and painful. 
 
 But their great general, who felt that he now stood victo- 
 rious on the ramparts of Italy, and that the torrent which 
 rolled before him was carrying its waters to the rich plains 
 of Cisalpine Gaul, endeavored to kindle his soldiers with 
 his own spirit of hope. He called them together ; he 
 pointed out the valley beneath, to which the descent seemed 
 the work of a moment. " That valley," he said, " is Italy ; it 
 leads us to the country of our friends the Gauls ; and yon- 
 der is our way to Rome." His eyes were eagerly fixed on 
 that point of the horizon ; and as he gazed, the distance 
 between seemed to vanish, till he could almost fancy that 
 lie was crossing the Tiber, and assailing the capitol. 
 
 After the two days' rest the descent began. Hannibal 
 experienced no more open hostility from, the barbarians, 
 only some petty attempts here and there to plunder ; a fart 
 strange in itself, but doubly so, if he was really descending 
 the valley of the Doria Baltea, through the country of the 
 Salassians, the most untamable robbers of all the Alpine 
 barbarians. It is possible that the influence of the Insu- 
 
HANNIBAL'S MARCH INTO ITALY. 209 
 
 briand may partly have restrained the mountaineers ; and 
 partly also may they have been deterred by the ill success 
 of all former attacks, and may by this time have regarded 
 the strange army and its monstrous beasts with something 
 of superstitious terror. But the natural difficulties of the 
 ground on the descent were greater than ever. The snow- 
 covered the track so that the men often lost it, and fell down 
 the steep below: at last they came to a place where au 
 avalanche had carried it away altogether for about three 
 hundred yards, leaving the mountain-side a mere wreck of 
 scattered rocks and snow. To go round was impossible ; for 
 the depth of the snow on the heights above rendered it 
 hopeless to scale them; nothing therefore was left but to 
 repair the road. A summit of some extent was found, and 
 cleared of the snow; and here the army was obliged to 
 encamp, whilst the work went on. There was no want of 
 hands ; and every man was laboring for his life ; the road 
 therefore was restored, and supported with solid substruc- 
 tions below ; and in a single day it was made practicable for 
 the cavalry and baggage-cattle, which were immediately 
 sent forward, and reached the lower valley in safety, where 
 they were turned out to pasture. A harder labo** was 
 required to make a passage for the elephants : the way for 
 them must be wide and solid ; and the work could not be 
 accomplished in less than three days. The poor animals 
 suffered severely in the interval from hunger ; for no forage 
 was to be found in that wilderness of snow, nor any trees 
 whose leaves might supply the place of other herbage. At 
 last they too were able to proceed with safety; Hannibal 
 overtook his cavalry and baggage ; and in three days more 
 the whole army had got clear of the Alpine valleys, and 
 entered the country of their friends, the Insubrians, on the 
 wide plain of Northern Italy. 
 
 Hannibal was arrived in Italy, but with a force so weak- 
 ened by its losses in men and horses, and by the exhausted 
 14 
 
210 DR. ARNOLD. 
 
 state of the survivors, that he might seem to Lave accom- 
 plished his great march in vain. According to his own 
 statement, which there is no reason to doubt, he brought out 
 of the Alpine valleys no more than 12,000 African and 
 8,000 Spanish infantry, with 6,000 cavalry ; so that his 
 march from the Pyrenees to the plains of Northern Italy 
 must have cost him 33,000 men ; an enormous loss, which 
 proves how severely the army must have suffered from the 
 privations of the march and the severity of the Alpine cli- 
 mate ; for not half of these 33,000 men can have fallen in 
 battle. With his army in this condition, some period of 
 repose was absolutely necessary; accordingly, Hannibal 
 remained in the country of the Insubrians till rest, and a 
 more temperate climate, and wholesome food, with which 
 the Gauls plentifully supplied him, restored the bodies and 
 spirits of his soldiers, and made them again ready for action. 
 His first movement was against the Taurinians, a Ligurian 
 people, who were constant enemies of the Insubrians, and 
 therefore would not listen to Hannibal, when he invited 
 them to join his cause. He therefore attacked and stormed 
 their principal town, put the garrison to the sword, and 
 struck such terror into the neighboring tribes, that they sub- 
 mitted immediately, and became his allies. This was his 
 first accession of strength in Italy, the first-fruits, as he 
 hoped, of a long succession of defections among the allies 
 of Rome, so that the swords of the Italians might effect for 
 him the conquest of Italy. 
 
THE MONK FELIX. 
 
 BY HENRY W. LONGFELLOW. 
 
 morning, all alone, 
 Out of his convent of gray stone, 
 Into the forest, older, darker, grayer, 
 His lips moving as if in prayer, 
 His head sunken upon his breast 
 As in a dream of rest, 
 Walked the Monk Felix. All about 
 The broad, sweet sunshine lay without, 
 Filling the summer air ; 
 And within the woodlands as he trod 
 The twilight was like the Truce of God 
 With worldly woe and care ; 
 Under him lay the golden moss ; 
 And above him the boughs of hemlock-trees 
 Waved, and made the sign of the cross, 
 And whispered their Benedicites ; 
 And from the ground 
 Rose an odor sweet and fragrant 
 Of the wild-flowers and the vagrant 
 Vines that wandered, 
 Seeking the sunshine, round and round. 
 
 These he heeded not, but pondered 
 On the volume in his hand, 
 
212 HENRY W. LONGFELLOW. 
 
 A volume of Saint Augustine, 
 
 Wherein he read of the unseen 
 
 Splendors of God's great town 
 
 In the unknown land, 
 
 And, with his eyes cast down 
 
 In humility, he said : 
 
 " I believe, O God ; 
 
 What herein I have read, 
 
 But alas ! I do not understand ! * 
 
 And lo ! he heard 
 The sudden singing of a bird, 
 A snow-white bird, that from a cloud 
 1 Dropped down, 
 And among the branches brown 
 Sat singing 
 
 So sweet, and clear, and loud, 
 It seemed a thousand harp-strings ringing. 
 And the Monk Felix closed his book, 
 And long, long, 
 With rapturous look, 
 He listened to the song, 
 And hardly breathed or stirred, 
 Until he saw, as in a vision, 
 The land Elysian, 
 And in the heavenly city heard 
 Angelic feet 
 
 Fall on the golden flagging of the street. 
 And he would fain 
 Have caught the wondrous bird, 
 But strove in vain ; 
 For it flew away, away, 
 Far over hill and dell, 
 And instead of its sweet singing 
 He heard the convent bell 
 Suddenly in the silence ringing 
 
THE MONK FELIX. 213 
 
 For the service of noonday. 
 
 And he retraced 
 
 His pathway homeward sadly and in haste. 
 
 In the convent was a change ! 
 
 He looked for each well-known face, 
 
 But the faces were new and strange ; 
 
 New figures sat in the oaken stalls, 
 
 New voices chanted in the choir ; 
 
 Yet the place was the same place, 
 
 The same dusky walls 
 
 Of cold, gray stone, 
 
 The some cloisters and belfry and spire. 
 
 A stranger and alone 
 
 Among that brotherhood 
 
 The Monk Felix stood. 
 
 " Forty years," said a Friar, 
 
 " Have I been Prior 
 
 Of this convent in the wood, 
 
 But for that space 
 
 Never have I beheld thy face ! " 
 
 The heart of the Monk Felix fell : 
 
 And he answered, with submissive tone, 
 
 " This morning, after the hour of Prime 
 
 I left my cell, 
 
 And wandered forth alone, 
 
 Listening all the time 
 
 To the melodious singing 
 
 Of a beautiful white bird, 
 
 Until I heard 
 
 The bells of the convent ringing 
 
 Noon from their noisy towers. 
 
 It was as if I dreamed ; 
 
214 HENRY W. LONGFELLOW. 
 
 For what to me had seemed 
 Moments only, had been hours ! " 
 
 " Years ! " said a voice close by. 
 
 It was an aged monk who spoke, 
 
 From a bench of oak 
 
 Fastened against the wall ; 
 
 He was the oldest monk of all. 
 
 For a whole century 
 
 Had he been there, 
 
 Serving God in prayer, 
 
 The meekest and humblest of his creatures. 
 
 He remembered well the features 
 
 Of Felix, and he said, 
 
 Speaking distinct and slow : 
 
 " One hundred years ago, 
 
 When I was a novice in this place, 
 
 There was here a monk, full of God's grace, 
 
 Who bore the name 
 
 Of Felix, and this man must be the same." 
 
 And straightway 
 
 They brought forth to the light of day 
 
 A volume old and brown, 
 
 A huge tome, bound 
 
 In brass and wild-boar's hide, 
 
 Wherein were written down 
 
 The names of all who had died 
 
 In the convent, since it was edified. 
 
 And there they found, 
 
 Just as the old monk said, 
 
 That on a certain day and date, 
 
 One hundred years before, 
 
 Had gone forth from the convent gate 
 
 The Monk Felix, and never more 
 
 Had entered that sacred door. 
 
THE MONK FL.JX. 215 
 
 He had been counted among the dead ! 
 
 And they knew, at last, 
 
 That, such had been the power 
 
 Of that celestial and immortal song, 
 
 A hundred years had passed, 
 
 And had not seemed so long 
 
 As a single hour ! 
 
A MOUNTAIN CATASTROPHE. 
 
 BY THOMAS DE QUINCEY. 
 
 THE little valley of Easedale is one of the most impres- 
 sive solitudes among the mountains of the lake district ; 
 and I must pause to describe it. Easedale is impressive, 
 first, as a solitude ; for the depth of the seclusion is brought 
 out and forced more pointedly upon the feelings by the thin 
 scattering of houses over its sides, and the surface of what 
 may be called its floor. These are not above five or six 
 at the most ; and one, the remotest of the whole, was un- 
 tenanted for all the thirty years of my acquaintance with 
 the place. Secondly, it is impressive from the excessive love- 
 liness which adorns its little area. This is broken up into 
 small fields and miniature meadows, separated not as too 
 often happens, with sad injury to the beauty of the lake 
 country by stone-walls, but sometimes by little hedge-rows, 
 sometimes by little sparkling, pebbly " beck," lustrous to the 
 very bottom, and not too broad for a child's flying leap ; 
 and sometimes by wild self-sown woodlands of birch, alder, 
 holly, mountain-ash, and hazel, that meander through the 
 valley, intervening the different estates with natural sylvan 
 marches, and giving cheerfulness in winter, by the bright 
 scarlet of their barrier. It is the character of all the north- 
 ern English valleys, as I have already remarked, and it 
 is a character first noticed by Wordsworth, that they 
 assume, in their bottom areas, the level, floor like shape. 
 
A MOUNTAIN CATASTROPHE. 217 
 
 making everywhere a direct angle with the surrounding 
 hills, and definitely marking out the margin of their out- 
 lines ; whereas the Welsh valleys have too often the glar- 
 ing imperfection of the basin shape, which allows no sense 
 of any absolute valley surface ; the hills are already com- 
 mencing at the very centre of what is called the level area. 
 The. little valley of Easedale is, in this respect, as highly 
 finished as in every other ; and in the Westmoreland spring, 
 which may be considered May and the earlier half of June, 
 whilst the grass in the meadows is yet short from the 
 habit of keeping the sheep on it until a much later period 
 than elsewhere, (viz. until the mountains are so far cleared 
 of snow and the probability of storms as to make it safe 
 to send them out on their summer migration,) the little 
 fields of Easedale have the most lawny appearance, and, 
 from the humidity of the Westmoreland climate, the most 
 verdant that it is possible to imagine; and on a gentle 
 vernal day when vegetation has been far enough ad- 
 vanced to bring out the leaves, an April sun gleaming 
 coyly through the clouds, and genial April rain gently 
 penciling the light spray of the wood with tiny pearl- 
 drops I have often thought, whilst looking with silent 
 admiration upon this exquisite composition of landscape, 
 \\ith its miniature fields running up like forest glades into 
 miniature woods ; its little columns of smoke, breathing up 
 like incense to the household gods, from the hearths of two 
 or three picturesque cottages, abodes of simple, primi- 
 tive manners, and what, from personal knowledge, I will 
 call humble virtue, whilst my eyes rested on this charm- 
 ing combination of lawns and shrubberies, I have thought 
 that if a scene on this earth could deserve to be sealed up, 
 lik'e the valley of Rasselas, against the intrusion of the 
 world, if there were one to which a man would willingly 
 surrender himself a prisoner for the years of a long life, 
 that it is this Easedale, which would justify the 
 
218 THOMAS DE QUINCE Y. 
 
 choice, and recompense the sacrifice. But there is a third 
 advantage possessed by this Easedale, above other rival 
 valleys, in the sublimity of its mountain barriers. In one 
 of its many rocky recesses is seen a " force " (such is the 
 local name for a cataract), white with foam, descending at 
 all seasons with respectable strength, and after the melting 
 of snows with an Alpine violence. Follow the leading of 
 this " force " for three quarters of a mile, and you come to 
 a little mountain lake, locally termed a "tarn," the very 
 finest and most gloomy sublime of its class. From this 
 tarn it was, I doubt not, though applying it to another, 
 that Wordsworth drew the circumstances of his general 
 description : 
 
 " Thither the rainbow comes, the cloud, 
 
 And mists that spread the flying shroud ; 
 And winds 
 
 That, if they could, would hurry past : 
 
 But that enormous barrier binds them fast. 
 &c. &c. &c. 
 
 The rocks repeat the raven's croak, 
 
 In symphony austere/' 
 
 And far beyond this " enormous barrier," that thus impris- 
 ons the very winds, tower upwards the aspiring heads 
 (usually enveloped in cloud and mist) of Glaramara, Bow 
 Fell, and the other fells of Langdale Head and Borrow- 
 dale. Finally, superadded to the other circumstances of 
 solitude, arising out of the rarity of human life, and of the 
 signs which mark the goings on of human life, two other 
 accidents there are of Easedale which sequester it from 
 the world, and intensify its depth of solitude beyond what 
 could well be looked for or thought possible in any vale 
 within a district so beaten by modern tourists. One is, 
 that it is a chamber within a chamber, or rather a closet 
 within a chamber, a chapel within a cathedral, a little 
 private oratory within a chapel. For Easedale is, in fact, 
 a dependency of Grasmere, a little recess lying within 
 
A MOUNTAIN CATASTROPHE. 219 
 
 the same general basin of mountains, but partitioned off 
 by a screen of rock and swelling uplands, so inconsiderable 
 in height, that, when surveyed from the commanding sum- 
 mits of Fairfield or Seat Sandal, they seem to subside into 
 the level area, and melt into the general surface. But, 
 viewed from below, these petty heights form a sufficient 
 partition ; which is pierced, however, in two points, 
 once by the little murmuring brook threading its silvery 
 line onwards to the -lake of Grasmere, and again by a little 
 rough lane, barely capable (and I think not capable in all 
 points) of receiving a postchaise. This little lane keeps 
 ascending amongst wooded steeps for a quarter of a mile ; 
 and then, by a downward course of a hundred yards or 
 so, brings you to a point at which the little valley suddenly 
 bursts upon you with as full a revelation of its tiny pro- 
 portions as the traversing of the wooded backgrounds 
 will permit The lane carries you at last to a little wooden 
 bridge, practicable for pedestrians ; but for carriages, even 
 the doubtful road already mentioned ceases altogether: 
 and this fact, coupled with the difficulty of suspecting such 
 a lurking paradise from the high road through Grasmere, 
 at every point of which the little hilly partition crowds 
 up into one mass with the capital barriers in the rear, 
 seeming, in fact, not so much to blend with them as to be 
 a part of them, may account for the fortunate neglect of 
 Easedale in the tourist's route; and also because there 
 is no one separate object, such as a lake or a splendid 
 cataract, to bribe the interest of those who are hunting 
 after sights; for the "force" is comparatively small, and 
 the tarn is beyond the limits of the vale, as well as difficult 
 of approach- 
 One other circumstance there is about Easedale, which 
 completes its demarcation, and makes it as entirely a land- 
 locked little park, within a ring-fence of mountains, as 
 ever human art, if rendered capable of dealing with moun 
 
220 THOMAS DE QUINCEY. 
 
 tains and their arrangement, could have contrived. The 
 sole approach, as I have mentioned, is from Grasmere; 
 and some one outlet there must inevitably be in every vale 
 that can be interesting to a human occupant, since without 
 water it would not be habitable ; and running water must 
 force an exit for itself, and, consequently, an inlet for the 
 world; but, properly speaking, there is no other. For, 
 when you explore the remoter end of the vale, at which 
 you suspect some communication with the world outside, 
 you find before you a most formidable amount of climbing, 
 the extent of which can hardly be measured where there 
 is no solitary object of human workmansliip or vestige of 
 animal life, not a sheep-track even, not a shepherd's hovel, 
 but rock and heath, heath and rock, tossed about in monoto- 
 nous confusion. And, after the ascent is mastered, you 
 descend into a second vale, long, narrow, sterile, known 
 by the name of "Far Easedale," from which point, if 
 you could drive a tunnel below the everlasting hills, per- 
 haps six or seven miles might bring you to the nearest 
 habitation of man, in Borrowdale ; but, crossing the moun 
 tains, the road cannot be less than twelve or fourteen, and, 
 in point of fatigue, at the least twenty. This long valley, 
 which is really terrific at noonday, from its utter loneli- 
 ness and desolation, completes the defences of little sylvan 
 Easedale. There is one door into it from the Grasmere 
 side ; but that door is hidden ; and on every other quarter 
 there is no door at all, nor any, the roughest, access, but 
 what would demand a day's walking. 
 
 Such is the solitude so deep, so seventimes guarded, 
 and so rich in miniature beauty of Easedale; and in 
 this solitude it was that George and Sarah Green, two 
 poor and hard-working peasants, dwelt, with a numerous 
 family of small children. Poor as they were, they had 
 won the general respect of the neighborhood, from the 
 uncomplaining firmness with which they bore the hard- 
 
A MOUNTAIN CATASTROPHE. 221 
 
 of their lot, and from the decent attire in which the 
 good mother of the family contrived to send out her chil- 
 dren to the Grasmere school. It is a custom, and a very 
 ancient one, in Westmoreland, and I have seen the same 
 usage prevailing in Southern Scotland, that any sale 
 by auction, whether of cattle, of farming-produce, farming- 
 stock, wood, or household furniture, and seldom a fort- 
 night passes without something of the sort, forms an ex- 
 cuse for the good women, throughout the whole circumfer- 
 ence of perhaps a dozen valleys, to assemble at the place 
 of sale, with the nominal purpose of aiding the sale, or of 
 buying something they may happen to want. No doubt 
 the real business of the sale attracts numbers ; although of 
 late years, that is, for the last twenty-five years, through 
 which so many sales of furniture the most expensive (has- 
 tily made by casual settlers, on the wing for some fresher 
 novelty), have made this particular article almost a 
 drug in the country; and the interest in such sales has 
 greatly declined. But, in 1807, this fever of founding vil- 
 las or cottages ornees was yet only beginning ; and a sale, 
 except it were of the sort exclusively interesting to farming- 
 men, was a kind of general intimation to the country, from 
 the owner of the property, that he would, on that afternoon, 
 be "at home" for all comers, and hoped to see as large 
 an attendance as possible. Accordingly, it was the almost 
 invariable custom and often, too, when the parties were 
 far too poor for such an effort of hospitality to make 
 ample provision, not of eatables, but of liquor, for all who 
 came. Even a gentleman, who should happen to present 
 himself on such a festal occasion, by way of seeing the 
 "humors" of the scene, was certain of meeting the most 
 cordial welcome. The good woman of the house more 
 particularly testified her sense of the honor done to her 
 house, and was sure to seek out some cherished and soli- 
 tary article of china, a wreck from a century back, 
 
222 THOMAS DE QUINCEY 
 
 in order that he, being a porcelain man amongst so many 
 delf men and women, might have a porcelain cup to drink 
 from. 
 
 The main secret of attraction at these sales many a 
 score of which I have attended was the social rendez- 
 vous thus effected between parties so remote from each 
 other (either by real distance, or by the virtual distance 
 which results from a separation by difficult tracts of hilly 
 country), that, in fact, without some such common object 
 and oftentimes something like a bisection of the interval 
 between them, they would not be likely to hear of each 
 other for months, or actually to meet for years. This 
 principal charm of the " gathering," seasoned, doubtless, to 
 many by the certain anticipation that the whole budget of 
 rural scandal would then and there be opened, was not 
 assuredly diminished to the men by the anticipation of 
 excellent ale (usually brewed six or seven weeks before, 
 in preparation for the event), and possibly of still more 
 excellent pow-sowdy (a combination of ale, spirits, and 
 spices) ; nor to the women by some prospect, not so inev- 
 itably fulfilled, but pretty certain in a liberal house, of 
 communicating their news over excellent tea. Even the 
 auctioneer was always "part and parcel" of the mirth: 
 he was always a rustic old humorist, a " character," and a 
 jovial drunkard, privileged in certain good-humored liber- 
 ties and jokes with all bidders, gentle or simple, and fur- 
 nished with an ancient inheritance of jests appropriate to 
 the articles offered for sale, jests that had, doubtless, done 
 their office from Elizabeth's golden days ; but no more, on 
 that account, failed of their expected effect, with either 
 man or woman of this nineteenth century, than the sun 
 fails to gladden the heart because it is that same old obso- 
 lete sun that has gladdened it for thousands of years. 
 
 One thing, however, in mere justice to the poor indige- 
 nous Dalesmen of Westmoreland and Cumberland, I am 
 
A MOUNTAIN CATASTROPHE. 223 
 
 bound, in this place, to record, that, often as I have been at 
 these sales, and through many a year before even a scat- 
 tering of gentry began to attend, yet so true to the natural 
 standard of politeness was the decorum uniformly main- 
 tained, even the old buffoon (as sometimes he was) of an 
 auctioneer never forgot himself so far as to found upon any 
 article of furniture a jest that could have called up a pain- 
 ful blush in any woman's face. He might, perhaps, go so 
 far as to awaken a little rosy confusion upon some young 
 bride's countenance, when pressing a cradle upon her at- 
 tention : but never did I hear him utter, nor would he have 
 been tolerated in uttering, a scurrilous or disgusting jest, 
 such as might easily have been suggested by something 
 offered at a household sale. Such jests as these I heard 
 for the first time at a sale in Grasmere in 1814, and, I am 
 ashamed to say it, from some " gentlemen " of a great city. 
 And it grieved me to see the effect, as it expressed it- 
 self upon the manly faces of the grave Dalesmen, a 
 sense of insult offered to their women, who met in confid- 
 ing reliance upon the forbearance of the men, and upon 
 their regard for the dignity of the female sex, this feeling 
 struggling with the habitual respect they are inclined to 
 show towards what they suppose gentle blood and supe- 
 rior education. Taken generally, however, these were the 
 most picturesque and festal meetings which the manners 
 of the country produced. There you saw all ages and 
 both sexes assembled ; there you saw old men whose heads 
 would have been studies for Guido; there you saw the 
 most colossal and stately figures amongst the young men 
 that England has to show ; there the most beautiful young 
 women. There it was that sometimes I saw a lovelier face 
 than ever I shall see again : there it was that local pecu- 
 liarities of usage or of language were best to be studied ; 
 there at least in the earlier years of my residence in 
 that district that the social benevolence, the grave wis- 
 
224 THOMAS DE QtHNCEY. 
 
 dom, the innocent mirth, and the neighborly kindness of 
 the people, most delightfully expanded, and expressed them- 
 selves with the least reserve. 
 
 To such a scene it was, to a sale of domestic furniture 
 at the house of some proprietor on the point of giving up 
 housekeeping, perhaps in order to live with a married son 
 or daughter, that George and Sarah Green set forward in 
 the forenoon of a day fated to be their last on earth. The 
 sale was to take place in Langdale Head ; to which, from 
 their own cottage in Easedale, it was possible in daylight, 
 and supposing no mist upon the hills, to find out a short cut 
 of not more than eight miles. By this route they went ; and 
 notwithstanding the snow lay on the ground, they reached 
 their destination in safety. The attendance at the sale must 
 have been diminished by the rigorous state of the weather ; 
 but still the scene was a gay one as usual. Sarah Green, 
 though a good and worthy woman in her maturer years, had 
 been imprudent, and, as the tender consideration of the 
 country is apt to express it, " unfortunate " in her youth. 
 She had an elder daughter, and I believe the father of this 
 girl was dead. The girl herself was grown up ; and the 
 peculiar solicitude of poor Sarah's maternal heart was at 
 this time called forth on her behalf: she wished to see her 
 placed in a very respectable house, where the mistress was 
 distinguished for her notable qualities and her success in 
 forming good servants. This object so important to Sarah 
 Green in the narrow range of her cares, as in a more ex- 
 alted family ft might be to obtain a ship for a lieutenant 
 that had passed as master and commander, or to get him 
 "posted" occupied her almost throughout the sale. A 
 doubtful answer had been given to her application; and 
 Sarah was going about the crowd, and weaving her person 
 in and out in order to lay hold of this or that intercessor 
 who might have, or might seem tc have, some weight with 
 the principal person concerned. 
 
A MOUNTAIN CATASTROPHE. 225 
 
 This was the last occupation which is known to have 
 stirred the pulses of her heart. An illegitimate child is 
 everywhere, even in the indulgent society of Westmore- 
 land Dalesmen, under some shade of discountenance ; so 
 that Sarah Green might consider her duty to be the stronger 
 toward the child of her " misfortune." And she probably 
 had another reason for her anxiety as some words dropped 
 by her on this evening led people to presume in her con- 
 scientious desire to introduce her daughter into a situation 
 less perilous than that which had compassed her own youth- 
 fill steps with snares. If so, it is painful to know that the 
 virtuous wish, whose 
 
 " vital warmth 
 Gave the last human motion to the heart," 
 
 should not have been fulfilled. She was a woman of ardent 
 and affectionate spirit, of which Miss Wordsworth's memoir, 
 or else her subsequent memorials in conversation, (I forget 
 which,) gave some circumstantial and affecting instances, 
 which I cannot now recall with accuracy. This ardor it was, 
 and her impassioned manner, that drew attention to what 
 she did ; for, otherwise, she was too poor a person to be 
 important in the estimation of strangers, and, of all possible 
 situations, to be important at a sale, where the public atten- 
 tion was naturally fixed upon the chief purchasers, and the 
 attention of the purchasers upon the chief competitors. Hence 
 it happened that, after she ceased to challenge notice by the 
 emphasis of her solicitations for her daughter, she ceased 
 to be noticed at all ; and nothing was recollected of her sub- 
 sequent behavior until the time arrived for general separa- 
 tion. This time was considerably after sunset; and the 
 final recollections of the crowd with respect to George and 
 Sarah Green were, that, upon their intention being under- 
 stood to retrace their morning path, and to attempt the 
 perilous task of dropping down into Easedale from the 
 mountains above Langdale Head, a sound of remonstrance 
 15 
 
226 THOMAS DE QUINCE Y. 
 
 arose from many quarters. However, at a moment when 
 everybody was in the hurry of departure, and, to persons 
 of their mature age, the opposition could not be very ob- 
 stinate, party after party rode off; the meeting melted 
 away, or, as the Northern phrase is, scaled ; and at length 
 nobody was left of any weight that could pretend to influ- 
 ence the decision of elderly people. They quitted the scene, 
 professing to obey some advice or other upon the choice of 
 roads ; but, at as early a point as they could do so unob- 
 served, began to ascend the hills, everywhere open from the 
 rude carriage-way. After this, they were seen no more. 
 They had disappeared into the cloud of death. Voices were 
 heard, some hours afterwards, from the mountains, voices, 
 as some thought, of alarm ; others said, no, that it was 
 only the voices of jovial people, carried by the wind into un- 
 certain regions. The result was, that no attention was paid 
 to the sounds. 
 
 That night, in little peaceful Easedale, six children sat 
 by a peat fire, expecting the return of their parents, upon 
 whom they depended for their daily bread. Let a day 
 pass, and they were starved. Every sound was heard with 
 anxiety; for all this was reported many a hundred times 
 to Miss Wordsworth, and those who, like myself, were 
 never wearied of hearing the details. Every sound, every 
 echo amongst the hills was listened to for five hours, from 
 seven to twelve. At length, the eldest girl of the family 
 about nine years old told her little brothers and sisters to 
 go to bed. They had been taught obedience ; and all of them, 
 at the voice of their eldest sister, went off fearfully to their 
 beds. What could be their fears, it is difficult to say ! they 
 had no knowledge to instruct them in the dangers of the 
 hills ; but the eldest sister always averred that they had a 
 deep solicitude, as she herself had, about their parents. 
 Doubtless she had communicated her fears to them. Some 
 time in the course of the evening, but it was late and 
 
A MOUNTAIN CATASTKOPHE. 227 
 
 after midnight, the moon arose, and shed a torrent of light 
 upon the Langdale fells, which had already, long hours be- 
 fore, witnessed in darkness the death of their parents. It 
 may be well here to cite Mr. Wordsworth's stanzas : 
 
 " Who weeps for strangers ? Many wept 
 
 For George and Sarah Green ; 
 Wept for that pair's unhappy fate, 
 Whose graves may here be seen. 
 
 " By night, upon these stormy fells, 
 
 Did wife and husband roam ; 
 Six little ones at home had left, 
 And could not find that home. 
 
 " For any dwelling-place of man 
 
 As vainly did they seek. 
 He perished ; and a voice was heard 
 The widow's lonely shriek. 
 
 "Not many steps, and 'she was left 
 
 A body without life, 
 A few short steps were the chain that bound 
 The husband to the wife. 
 
 " Now do these sternly-featured hills, 
 
 Look gently on this grave ; 
 And quiet now are the depths of air, 
 As a sea without a wave. 
 
 " But deeper lies the heart of peace 
 
 In quiet more profound ; 
 The heart of quietness is here 
 Within this churchyard bound, 
 
 "And from all agony of mind 
 It keeps them safe, and far 
 From fear and grief, and from all need 
 Of sun or guiding star. 
 
 " O darkness of the grave ! how deep, 
 
 After that living night, 
 That last and dreary living one 
 Of sorrow and affright ! 
 
228 THOMAS DE QUINCEY. 
 
 " sacred marriage-bed of death, 
 That keeps them side by side 
 In bond of peace, in bond of love, 
 That may not be untied ! " 
 
 That night, and the following morning, came a further 
 and a heavier fall of snow ; in consequence of which the 
 poor children were completely imprisoned, and cut off from 
 all possibility of communicating with their next neighbors. 
 The brook was too much for them to leap ; and the' little 
 crazy wooden bridge could not be crossed, or even ap- 
 proached with safety, from the drifting of the snow having 
 made it impossible to ascertain the exact situation of some 
 treacherous hole in its timbers, which, if trod upon, would 
 have let a small child drop through into the rapid waters. 
 Their parents did not return. For some hours of the morn- 
 ing the children clung to the hope that the extreme severity 
 of the night had tempted them to sleep in Langdale ; but 
 this hope forsook them as the day wore away. Their father, 
 George Green, had served as a soldier, and was an active 
 man, of ready resources, who would not, under any cir- 
 cumstances, have failed to force a road back to his family, 
 had he been still living ; and this reflection, or rather semi- 
 conscious feeling, which the awfulness of their situation 
 forced upon the minds of all but the mere infants, taught 
 them to feel the extremity of their danger. Wonderful it is 
 to see the effect qf sudden misery, sudden grief, or sudden 
 fear, (where they do not utterly upset the faculties,) in 
 sharpening the intellectual perceptions. Instances must 
 have fallen in the way of most of us. And I have noticed 
 frequently that even sudden and intense bodily pain is part 
 of the machinery employed by nature for quickening the 
 development of the mind. The perceptions of infants aie 
 not, in fact, excited gradatim and continuously, but per 
 saltum, and by unequal starts. At least, in the case of my 
 own children, one and all, I have remarked, that, after any 
 
A MOUNTAIN CATASTROPHE. 229 
 
 very severe fit of those peculiar pains to which the delicate 
 digestive organs of most infants are liable, there always 
 become apparent on the following day a very considerable 
 increase of vital energy and of vivacious attention to the ob- 
 jects around them. The poor desolate children of Blentarn 
 Ghyll, hourly becoming more ruefully convinced that they 
 were orphans, gave many evidences of this awaking power, 
 as lodgtxl by a providential arrangement, in situations of 
 trial that most require it. They huddled together, in the 
 evening, round their hearth-fire of peats, and held their little 
 councils upon what was to be done towards any chance 
 if chance remained of yet giving aid to their parents; 
 for a slender hope had sprung up that some hovel or sheep- 
 fold might have furnished them a screen (or, in Westmore- 
 land phrase, a bield) against the weather-quarter of the 
 storm, in 'which hovel they might be lying disabled or 
 snowed up ; and secondly, as regarded themselves, in what 
 way they were to make known their situation, in case the 
 snow should continue or increase ; for starvation stared them 
 in the face, if they should be confined for many days to their 
 house. 
 
 Meantime, the eldest sister, little Agnes, though sadly 
 alarmed, and feeling the sensation of eariness as twilight 
 came on, and she looked out from the cottage door to the 
 dreadful fells, on which, too probably, her parents were 
 lying corpses, (and possibly not many hundred yards from 
 their own threshold,) yet exerted herself to take all the 
 measures which their own prospects made prudent. And 
 she told Miss Wordsworth, that, in the midst of the oppres- 
 sion on her little spirit, from vague ghostly terrors, she did 
 not fail, however, to draw some comfort from the considera- 
 tion, that the very same causes which produced their danger 
 in one direction, sheltered them from danger of another 
 kind, such dangers as she knew, from books that she had 
 read, would have threatened a little desolate flock of children 
 
230 THOMAS DE QUINCEY. 
 
 in other parts of England ; that, if they could not get out 
 into Grasmere, on the other hand, bad men, and wild seafar- 
 ing foreigners, who sometimes passed along the high road 
 in that vale, could not get to them ; and that, as to their 
 neighbors, so far from having anything to fear in that 
 quarter, their greatest apprehension was lest they might not 
 be able to acquaint them with their situation ; but that, if 
 that could be accomplished, the very sternest amongst them 
 were kind-hearted people, that would contend with each 
 other for the privilege of assisting them. Somewhat cheered 
 with these thoughts, and having caused all her brothers and 
 sisters except the two little things, not ye"t of a fit age 
 to kneel down and say the prayers which they had been 
 taught, this admirable little maiden turned herself to every 
 household task that could have proved useful to them in a 
 long captivity. First of all, upon some recollection that the 
 clock was nearly going down, she wound it up. Next, she 
 took all the milk which remained from what her mother had 
 provided for the children's consumption during her absence, 
 and for the breakfast of the following morning, this luck- 
 ily was still in sufficient plenty for two days' consumption, 
 (skimmed or " blue " milk being only one half-penny a quart, 
 and the quart a most redundant one, in Grasmere,) this 
 she took and scalded, so as to save it from turning sour. 
 That done, she next examined the meal-chest ; made the 
 common oatmeal porridge of the country (the burgoo of the 
 royal navy) ; but put all of the children, except the two 
 youngest, on short allowance ; and, by way of reconciling 
 them in some measure to this stinted meal, she found out a 
 little hoard of flour, part of which she baked for them upon 
 the hearth into little cakes ; and this unusual delicacy per- 
 suaded them to think that they had been celebrating a feast. 
 Next, before night coming on should make it too trying to 
 her own feelings, or before fresh snow coming on might make 
 it impossible, she issued out of doors. There her first task 
 
A MOUNTAIN CATASTKOPHE. 231 
 
 was, vdth the assistance of two younger brothers, to cawy 
 in from the peat-stack as many peats as might serve them for 
 a week's consumption. That done, in the second place, she 
 examined the potatoes, buried in " brackens " (that is, with- 
 ered fern) : these were not many ; and she thought it better 
 to leave them where they were, excepting as many as would 
 make a single meal, under a fear that the heat of their cot- 
 tage would spoil them, if removed. 
 
 Having thus made all the provision in her power for 
 supporting their own lives, she turned her attention to the 
 cow. Her she milked ; but, unfortunately the milk she 
 gave, either from being badly fed, or from some other cause, 
 was too trifling to be of much consideration towards the 
 wants of a large family. Here, however, her chief anxiety 
 was to get down the hay for the cow's food from a loft above 
 the outhouse; and in this she succeeded but imperfectly, 
 from want of strength and size to cope with the difficulties 
 of the case ; besides that the increasing darkness by this 
 time, together with the gloom of the place, made it a matter 
 of great self-conquest for her to work at all; and, as re- 
 spected one night at any rate, she placed the cow in a situa- 
 tion of luxurious warmth and comfort. Then retreating 
 into the warm house, and " barring " the door, she sat down 
 to undress the two youngest of the children ; them she laid 
 carefully and cosily in their little nests up-stairs, and sang 
 them to sleep. The rest she kept up to bear her company 
 until the clock should tell them it was midnight; up to 
 which time she had still a lingering hope that some welcome 
 shout from the hills above, which they were all to strain 
 their ears to catch, might yet assure them that they were 
 not wholly orphans, even though one parent should have 
 perished. No shout, it may be supposed, was ever heard ; 
 nor could a shout, in any case, have been heard, for the 
 night was one of tumultuous wind. And though, amidst its 
 ravings, sometimes they fancied a sound of voices, still, in 
 
232 THOMAS DE QUINCEY. 
 
 the de.id lulls that now and then succeeded, they heard 
 nothing to confirm their hopes. As last services to what she 
 might now have called her own little family, Agnes took 
 precautions against the drifting of the snow within the door 
 and the imperfect window which had caused them some dis- 
 comfort on the preceding day ; and, finally, she adopted the 
 most systematic and elaborate plans for preventing the pos- 
 sibility of their fire being extinguished, which, in the event 
 of their being thrown upon the ultimate resource of their 
 potatoes, would be absolutely (and in any event nearly) in- 
 dispensable to their existence. 
 
 The night slipped away, and another morning came, 
 bringing with it no better hopes of any kind. Change there 
 had been none but for the worse. The snow had greatly 
 increased in quantity ; and the drifts seemed far more for- 
 midable. A second day passed like the first ; little Agnes 
 still keeping her little flock quiet, and tolerably comfortable ; 
 and still calling on all the elders in succession to say their 
 prayers, morning and night. 
 
 A third* day came ; and whether it was on that or on 
 the fourth, I do not now recollect ; but on one or other there 
 came a welcome gleam of hope. The arrangement of the 
 snow-drifts had shifted during the night ; and though the 
 wooden bridge was still impracticable, a low wall had been 
 exposed, over which, by a very considerable circuit, and 
 crossing the low shoulder of a hill, it seemed possible that a 
 road might be found into Grasmere. In some walls it was 
 necessary to force gaps ; but this was effected without much 
 difficulty, even by children, for the Westmoreland walls are 
 always "open," that is, uncemented with mortar, and the 
 push of a stick will readily detach so much from the upper 
 part of an old crazy field wall, as to lower it sufficiently for 
 female or for childish steps to pass. The little boys accom- 
 panied their sister until she came to the other side of the 
 hill, which, lying more sheltered from the weather, and to 
 
A MOUNTAIN CATASTROPHE. 233 
 
 windward, offered a path onwards comparatively easy. Here 
 they parted ; and little Agnes pursued her solitary mission 
 to the nearest house she could find accessible in Grasmere. 
 
 No house could have proved a wrong one in such a case. 
 Miss Wordsworth and I often heard the description renewed 
 of the horror which, in an instant, displaced the smile of 
 hospitable greeting, when little weeping Agnes told her sad 
 tale. No tongue can express the fervid sympathy which 
 travelled through the vale, like the fire in an American 
 forest, when it was learned that neither George nor Sarah 
 Green had been seen by their children since the day of the 
 Langdale sale. "Within half an hour, or little more, from 
 the remotest parts of the valley, some of them distant 
 nearly two miles from the point of rendezvous, all the 
 men of Grasmere had assembled at the little cluster of cot- 
 tages called " Kirktown," from their adjacency to the vener- 
 able parish church of St. Oswald. There were at the time 
 I settled in Grasmere (viz. in the spring of 1809, and, 
 therefore, I suppose at this time, fifteen months previously) 
 about sixty-three households in the vale, and the total num- 
 ber of souls was about two hundred and sixty-five ; so that 
 the number of fighting men would be about sixty or sixty- 
 six, according to the common way of computing the proper* 
 tion ; and the majority were so athletic and powerfully built, 
 that, at the village games of wrestling and leaping, Pro- 
 fessor Wilson, and some visitors of his and mine, scarcely 
 one cf whom was under five feet eleven in height, with pro- 
 portionable breadth, seem but middle-sized men amongst the 
 towering forms of the Dalesmen. Sixty at least, after a 
 short consultation as to the plan of operations, and for 
 arranging the kind of signals by which they were to com- 
 municate from great distances, and in the perilous events of 
 mists or snow-storms, set off, with the speed of Alpine hun- 
 ters, to the hills. The dangers of the undertaking were 
 considerable, under the uneasy and agitated state of the 
 
234 THOMAS DE QUINCE Y. 
 
 weather ; and all the women of the vale were in the greatest 
 anxiety, until night brought them back, in a body, unsuc- 
 cessful. Three days at the least, and I rather think five, 
 the search was ineffectual ; which arose partly from the 
 great extent of the ground to be examined, and partly from 
 the natural mistake made of ranging almost exclusively on 
 the earlier days on that part of the hills over which the path 
 of Easedale might be presumed to have been selected under 
 any reasonable latitude of circuitousness. But the fact is, 
 when the fatal accident (for such it has often proved) of a 
 permanent mist surprises a man on the hills, if he turns and 
 loses his direction, he is a lost man ; and without doing this 
 so as to lose the power of s'orienter in one instant, it is well 
 known how difficult it is to avoid losing it insensibly and by 
 degrees. Baffling snow-showers are the worst kind of mists. 
 And the poor Greens had, under that kind of confusion, 
 wandered many a mile out of their proper track. 
 
 The zeal of the people, meantime, was not in the least 
 abated, but rather quickened, by the wearisome disappoints 
 ments ; every hour of daylight was turned to account ; no 
 man of the valley ever came home to dinner ; and the reply 
 of a young shoemaker, on the fourth night's return, speaks 
 sufficiently for the unabated spirit of the vale. Miss Words- 
 worth asked what he would do on the next morning. " Go 
 up again, of course," was his answer. But what if to-mor- 
 row also should turn out like all the rest ? " Why, go up in 
 stronger force on the next day." Yet this man was sacri- 
 ficing his own daily earnings without a chance of recom- 
 pense. At length sagacious dogs were taken up ; and, 
 about noonday, a shout from an aerial height, amongst thick 
 volumes of cloudy vapor, propagated through repeating bands 
 of men from a distance of many miles, conveyed as by tele- 
 graph the news that the bodies were found. George Green 
 was found lying at the bottom of a precipice, from which he 
 had fallen. Sarah Green was found on the summit of the 
 
A MOUNTAIN CATASTROPHE. 235 
 
 precipice ; and, by laying together all the indications of 
 what had passed, the sad hieroglyphics of their last agonies, 
 it was conjectured that the husband had desired his wife to 
 pause for a few minutes, wrapping her, meantime, in his own 
 great-coat, whilst he should go forward and reconnoitre the 
 ground, in order to catch a sight of some object (rocky peak, 
 or tarn, or peat-field) which might ascertain their real situa- 
 tion. Either the snow above, already lying in drifts, or the 
 blinding snow-storms driving into his eyes, must have misled 
 him as to the nature of the circumjacent ground ; for the 
 precipice over which he had fallen was but a few yards from 
 the spot in which he had quitted his wife. The depth of 
 the descent, and the fury of the wind (almost always violent 
 on these % cloudy altitudes), would prevent any distinct com- 
 munication between the dying husband below and his de- 
 spairing wife above ; but it was believed by the shepherds 
 best acquainted with the ground and the range of sound as 
 regarded the capacities of the human ear, under the proba- 
 ble circumstances of the storm, that Sarah might have 
 caught, at intervals, the groans of her unhappy partner, sup- 
 posing that his death were at all a lingering one. Others, 
 on the contrary, supposed her to have gathered this catas- 
 trophe rather from the want of any sounds, and from his 
 continued absence, than from any one distinct or positive 
 expression of it; both because the smooth and unruffled 
 surface of the snow where he lay seemed to argue that he 
 had died without a struggle, perhaps without a groan, and 
 because that tremendous sound of " hurtling " in the upper 
 chambers of the air, which often accompanies a snow-storm, 
 when combined with heavy gales of wind, would utterly 
 oppress and stifle (as they conceived) any sounds so feeble 
 as those from a dying man. In any case, and by whatever 
 sad language of sounds or signs, positive or negative, ,he 
 might have learned or guessed her loss, it was generally 
 aep-eed that the wild shrieks heard towards midnight in 
 
236 THOMAS DE QUINCKY. 
 
 Langdale Head announced the agonizing moment which 
 brought to her now widowed heart the conviction of utter 
 desolation and of final abandonment to her own fast-fleeting 
 energies. It seemed probable that the sudden disappear- 
 ance of her husband from her pursuing eyes would teach her 
 to understand his fate, and that the consequent indefinite 
 apprehension of instant death lying all around the point on 
 which she sat had kept her stationary to the very attitude 
 in which her husband left her, until her failing powers and 
 the increasing bitterness of the cold, to one no longer in 
 motion, would soon make those changes of place impossible, 
 which, at any rate, had appeared too dangerous. The foot- 
 steps in some places, wherever drifting had not obliterated 
 them, yet traceable as to the outline, though partially filled 
 up with later falls of snow, satisfactorily showed that, how- 
 ever much they might have rambled, after crossing and 
 doubling upon their own paths, and many a mile astray 
 from their right track, still they must have kept together to 
 the very plateau or shelf of rock at which their wanderings 
 had terminated ; for there were evidently no steps from this 
 plateau in the retrograde order. 
 
 By the time they had reached this final stage of their 
 erroneous course, all possibility of escape must have been 
 long over for both alike ; because their exhaustion must 
 have been excessive before they could have reached a point 
 so remote and high ; and, unfortunately, the direct result of 
 all this exhaustion had been to throw them farther off their 
 home, or from " any dwelling-place of man," than they were 
 at starting. Here, therefore, at this rocky pinnacle, hope 
 was extinct for either party. But it was the impression of 
 the vale, that, perhaps within half an hour before reaching 
 this fatal point, George Green might, had his conscience or 
 his heart allowed him in so base a desertion, have saved 
 himself singly, without any very great difficulty. It is to be 
 hoped, however, and, for my part, I think too well of 
 
A MOUNTAIN CATASTROPHE. 237 
 
 human nature to hesitate in believing, that not many, 
 even amongst the meaner-minded and the least generous of 
 men, could have reconciled themselves to the abandonment 
 of a poor fainting female companion in such circumstances. 
 Still, though not more than a most imperative duty, it was 
 one (I repeat) which most of his associates believed to have 
 cost him (perhaps consciously) his life. For his wife not 
 only must have disabled him greatly by clinging to his arm 
 for support ; but it was known, from her peculiar charactei 
 and manner, that she would be likely to rob him of his 
 coolness and presence of mind by too painfully fixing his 
 thoughts, where her own would be busiest, upon their help- 
 less little family. " Stung with the thoughts of home," to 
 borrow, the fine expression of Thomson in describing a sim- 
 ilar case, alternately thinking of the blessedness of that 
 warm fireside at Blentarn Ghyll, which was not again to 
 spread its genial glow through her freezing limbs, and of 
 those darling little faces which, in this world, she was to see 
 no more ; unintentionally, and without being aware even of 
 that result, she would rob the brave man (for such he was) 
 of his fortitude, and the strong man of his animal resources. 
 And yet, (such in the very opposite direction, was equally 
 the impression universally through Grasmere,) had Sarah 
 Green foreseen, could her affectionate heart have guessed 
 even the tenth part of that love and neighborly respect for 
 herself which soon afterwards expressed themselves in show- 
 ers of bounty to her children ; could she have looked behind 
 the curtain of destiny sufficiently to learn that the very des- 
 olation of these poor children which wrung her maternal 
 heart, and doubtless constituted to her the sting of death, 
 would prove the signal and the pledge of such anxious 
 guardianship as not many rich men's children receive, and 
 that this overflowing offering to her own memory would not 
 be a hasty or decaying tribute of the first sorrowing sensi- 
 bilities, but would pursue her children steadily until their 
 
238 THOMAS DE QUINCEY. 
 
 hopeful settlement in life, or anything approaching this, 
 to have known or have guessed, would have caused her (as 
 all said who knew her) to welcome the bitter end by which 
 such privileges were to be purchased. 
 
 The funeral of the ill-fated Greens was, it may be sup- 
 posed, attended by all the vale ; it took place about eight 
 days after they were found ; and the day happened to be in 
 the most perfect contrast to the sort of weather which pre- 
 vailed at the time of their misfortune : some snow still 
 remained here and there upon the ground ; but the azure of 
 the sky was unstained by a cloud, and a golden sunlight 
 seemed to sleep, so balmy and tranquil was the season, upon 
 the very hills where they had wandered, then a howling 
 wilderness, but now a green pastoral lawn, in its lower 
 ranges, and a glittering expanse, smooth, apparently, and 
 riot difficult to the footing, of virgin snow, hi its higher. 
 George Green had, I believe, an elder family by a former 
 wife ; and it was for some of these children, who lived at a 
 distance, and who wished to give their attendance at the 
 grave, that the funeral was delayed. After this solemn 
 ceremony was over, at which, by the way, I then heard 
 Miss Wordsworth say that the grief of Sarah's illegitimate 
 daughter was the most overwhelming she had ever wit- 
 nessed, a regular distribution of the children was made 
 amongst the wealthier families of the vale. There had 
 already, and before the funeral, been a perfect struggle to 
 obtain one of the children, amongst all who had any facili- 
 ties for discharging the duties of such a trust ; and even the 
 poorest had put in their claim to bear some part in the 
 expenses of the case. But it was judiciously decided that 
 none of the children should be intrusted to any persons who 
 seemed likely, either from old age or from slender means, or 
 from nearer and more personal responsibilities, to be under 
 the necessity of devolving the trust, sooner or later, upon 
 strangers, who might have none of that interest in the chil- 
 
A MOUNTAIN CATASTROPHE. 239 
 
 dren which attached, in their minds, the Grasmere people to 
 the circumstances that made them orphans. Two twins, 
 who had naturally played together and slept together from 
 their birth, passed into the same family : the others were 
 dispersed ; but into such kind-hearted and intelligent fami- 
 lies, with continued opportunities of meeting each other on 
 errands, or at church, or at sales, that it was hard to say 
 which had the happier fate. And thus in so brief a period 
 as one fortnight, a household that, by health and strength, 
 by the humility of poverty, and by innocence of life, seemed 
 sheltered from all attacks but those of time, came to be 
 utterly broken up. George and Sarah Green slept in Gras- 
 mere churchyard, never more to know the want of " sun or 
 guiding star." Their children were scattered over wealthier 
 houses than those of their poor parents, through the vales of 
 Grasmere or Rydal ; and Blentarn Ghyll, after being shut 
 up for a season, and ceasing for months to send up its little 
 slender column of smoke at morning and evening, finally 
 passed into the hands of a stranger. 
 
THRENODY. 
 
 BY RALPH WALDO EMERSON. 
 
 THE South-wind brings 
 Life, sunshine, and desire, 
 And on every mount and meadow 
 Breathes aromatic fire ; 
 But over the dead he has no power, 
 The lost, the lost, he cannot restore ; 
 And, looking over the hills, I mourn 
 The darling who shall not return. 
 
 I see my empty house, 
 
 I see my trees repair their boughs ; 
 
 And he, the wondrous child, 
 
 Whose silver warble wild 
 
 Outvalued every pulsing sound 
 
 Within the air's cerulean round, 
 
 The hyacinthine boy, for whom 
 
 Morn well might break and April bloom, 
 
 The gracious boy, who did adorn 
 
 The world whereinto he was born, 
 
 And by his countenance repay 
 
 The favor of the loving Day, 
 
 Has disappeared from the Day's eye ; 
 
 Far and wide she cannot find him ; 
 
 My hopes pursue, they cannot bind him. 
 
THRENODY. 241 
 
 Returned this day, the South-wind searches, 
 And finds young pines and budding birches ; 
 But finds not the budding man ; 
 Nature, who lost, cannot remake him ; 
 Fate let him fall, Fate can't retake him ; 
 Nature, Fate, men, him seek in vain. 
 
 And whither now, my truant wise and sweet, 
 
 0, whither tend thy feet ? 
 
 I had the right, few days ago, 
 
 Thy steps to watch, thy place to know ; 
 
 How have I forfeited the right ? 
 
 Hast thou forgot me in a new delight ? 
 
 I hearken for thy household cheer, 
 
 O eloquent child ! 
 
 Whose voice, an equal messenger, 
 
 Conveyed thy meaning mild. 
 
 What though the pains and joys 
 
 Whereof it spoke were toys 
 
 Fitting his age and ken, 
 
 Yet fairest dames and bearded men, 
 
 Who heard the sweet request, 
 
 So gentle, wise, and grave, 
 
 Bended with joy to his behest, 
 
 And let the world's affairs go by, 
 
 Awhile to share his cordial game, 
 
 Or mend his wicker wagon-frame, 
 
 Still plotting how their hungry ear 
 
 That winsome voice again might hear ; 
 
 For his lips could well pronounce 
 
 Words that were persuasions. 
 
 Gentlest guardians marked serene 
 His early hope, his liberal mien ; 
 16 
 
M2 KALPH WALDO EMERSON. 
 
 Took counsel from his guiding eyes 
 To make this wisdom earthly wise. 
 Ah, vainly do these eyes recall 
 The school-march, each day's festival, 
 When every morn my bosom glowed 
 To watch the convoy on the road ; 
 The babe in willow wagon closed, 
 With rolling eyes and face composed ; 
 With children forward and behind, 
 Like Cupids studiously inclined ; 
 And he the chieftain paced beside, 
 The centre of the troop allied, 
 With sunny face of sweet repose, 
 To guard the babe from fancied foes. 
 The little captain innocent 
 Took the eye with him as he went ; 
 Each village senior paused to scan 
 And speak the lovely caravan. 
 From the window I look out 
 To mark thy beautiful parade, 
 Stately marching in cap and coat 
 To some tune by fairies played ; 
 A music heard by thee alone 
 To works as noble led thee on. 
 
 Now Love and Pride, alas ! in vain, 
 Up and down their glances strain. 
 The painted sled stands where it stood ; 
 The kennel by the corded wood ; 
 The gathered sticks to stanch the wall 
 Of the snow-tower, when snow should fall ; 
 The ominous hole he dug in the sand, 
 And childhood's castles built or planned ; 
 His daily haunts I well discern, 
 The poultry-yard, the shed, the barn, 
 
THRENODY. 243 
 
 And every inch of garden ground 
 
 Paced by the blessed feet around, 
 
 From the roadside to the brook 
 
 Whereinto lie loved to look. 
 
 Step the meek birds where erst they ranged ; 
 
 The wintry garden lies unchanged ; 
 
 The brook into the stream runs on ; 
 
 But the deep-eyed boy is gone. 
 
 On that shaded day, 
 
 Dark with more clouds than tempests are, 
 
 When thou didst yield thy innocent breatli 
 
 In bird-like heavings unto death, 
 
 Night came, and Nature had not thee ; 
 
 I said, " We are mates in misery." 
 
 The morrow dawned with needless glow ; 
 
 Each snow-bird chirped, each fowl must crow ; 
 
 Each tramper started ; but the feet 
 
 Of the most beautiful and sweet 
 
 Of human youth had left the hill 
 
 And garden, they were bound and stilL 
 
 There 's not a sparrow or a wren, 
 
 There 's not a blade of autumn grain, 
 
 Which the four seasons do not tend, 
 
 And tides of life and increase lend ; 
 
 And every chick of every bird, 
 
 And weed and rock-moss is preferred. 
 
 O ostrich-like forgetfulness ! 
 
 O loss of larger in the less ! 
 
 Was there no star that could be sent, 
 
 No watcher in the firmament, 
 
 No angel from the countless host 
 
 That loiters round the crystal coast, 
 
 Could stoop to heal that only child, 
 
 Nature's sweet marvel undefiled, 
 
 And keep the blossom of the earth, 
 
 Which all her harvests were not worth ? 
 
244 RALPH WALDO EMERSON. 
 
 Not mine, I never call thee mine. 
 
 But Nature's heir, if I repine, 
 
 And seeing rashly torn and moved 
 
 Not what I made, but what I loved, 
 
 Grow early old with grief that thou 
 
 Must to the wastes of Nature go, 
 
 'T is because a general hope 
 
 Was quenched, and all must doubt and grope. 
 
 For flattering planets seemed to say 
 
 This child should ills of ages stay, 
 
 By wondrous tongue, and guided pen, 
 
 Bring the flown Muses back to men. 
 
 Perchance not he but Nature ailed, 
 
 The world and not the infant failed. 
 
 It was not ripe yet to sustain 
 
 A genius of so fine a strain, 
 
 Who gazed upon the sun and moon 
 
 As if he came unto his own, 
 
 And, pregnant with his grander thought, 
 
 Brought the old order into doubt. 
 
 His beauty once their beauty tried ; 
 
 They could not feed him, and he died, 
 
 And wandered backward as in scorn, 
 
 To wait an aeon to be born. 
 
 HI day which made this beauty waste, 
 
 Plight broken, this high face defaced ! 
 
 Some went and came about the dead ; 
 
 And some in books of solace read ; 
 
 Some to their friends the tidings say ; 
 
 Some went to write, some went to pray 
 
 One tarried here, there hurried one ; 
 
 But their heart abode with none. 
 
 Covetous death bereaved us all, 
 
 To aggrandize one funeral. 
 
 The eager fate which carried thee 
 
 Took the largest part of me : 
 
THRENODY. 245 
 
 For this losing is true dying ; 
 This is lordly man's down-lying, 
 This his slow but sure reclining, 
 Star by star his world resigning. 
 
 child of paradise, 
 
 Boy who made dear his father's home, 
 
 In whose deep eyes 
 
 Men read the welfare of the times to come, 
 
 1 am too much bereft. 
 
 The world dishonored thou hast left. 
 O truth's and nature's costly lie I 
 O trusted broken prophecy ! 
 richest fortune sourly crossed ! 
 Born for the future, to the future lost ! 
 
 THE deep Heart answered, " Weepest thou ? 
 
 Worthier cause for passion wild 
 
 If I had not taken the child. 
 
 And deemest thou as those who pore, 
 
 With aged eyes, short way before, 
 
 Think'st Beauty vanished from the coast 
 
 Of matter, and thy darling lost ? 
 
 Taught he not thee the man of eld, 
 
 Whose eyes within his eyes beheld 
 
 Heaven's numerous hierarchy span 
 
 The mystic gulf from God to man ? 
 
 To be alone wilt thou begin 
 
 When worlds of lovers hem thee in ? 
 
 To-morrow, when the masks shall fall 
 
 That dizen Nature's carnival, 
 
 The pure shall see by their own will, 
 
 Which overflowing Love shall fill, 
 
 T is not within the force of fate 
 
 The fate-conjoined to separate. 
 
246 RALPH WALDO EMERSON. 
 
 But thou, my votary, weepest thou ? 
 
 I gave thee sight where is it now ? 
 
 I taught thy heart beyond the reach 
 
 Of ritual, bible, or of speech ; 
 
 Wrote in thy mind's transparent table, 
 
 As far as the incommunicable ; 
 
 Taught thee each private sign to raise, 
 
 Lit by the supersolar blaze. 
 
 Past utterance, and past belief, 
 
 And past the blasphemy of grief, 
 
 The mysteries of Nature's heart ; 
 
 And though no Muse can these impart, 
 
 Throb thine with Nature's throbbing breast, 
 
 And all is clear from east to west. 
 
 u I came to thee as to a friend ; 
 Dearest, to thee I did not send 
 Tutors, but a joyful eye, 
 Innocence that matched the sky, 
 Lovely locks, a form of wonder, 
 Laughter rich as woodland thunder, 
 That thou might'st entertain apart 
 The richest flowering of all art : 
 And as the great all-loving Day 
 Through smallest chambers takes its way, 
 That thou might'st break thy daily bread 
 With prophet, saviour, and head ; 
 That thou might'st cherish for thine own 
 The riches of sweet Mary's Son, 
 Boy-Rabbi, Israel's paragon. 
 And thoughtest thou such guest 
 Would in thy hall take up his rest ? 
 Would rushing life forget her laws, 
 Fate's glowing revolution pause ? 
 High omens ask diviner guess ; 
 Not to be conned to tediousness. 
 
THRENODY. 247 
 
 And know my higher gifts unbind 
 The zone that girds the incarnate mind. 
 When the scanty shores are full 
 With Thought's perilous, whirling pool ; 
 When frail Nature, can no more, 
 Then the Spirit strikes the hour : 
 My servant Death, with solving rite, 
 Pours finite into infinite. 
 
 " Wilt thou freeze love's tidal flow, 
 
 Whose streams through nature circling go ? 
 
 Nail the wild star to its track 
 
 On the half-climbed zodiac ? 
 
 Light is light which radiates, 
 
 Blood is blood which circulates, 
 
 Life is life which generates, 
 
 And many-seeming life is one, 
 
 Wilt thou transfix and make it none ? 
 
 Its onward force too starkly pent 
 
 In figure, bone, and lineament ? 
 
 Wilt thou, uncalled, interrogate, 
 
 Talker ! the unreplying Fate ? 
 
 Nor see the genius of the whole 
 
 Ascendant in the private soul, 
 
 Beckon it when to go and come, 
 
 Self-announced its hour of doom? 
 
 Fair the soul's recess and shrine, 
 
 Magic-built to last a season ; 
 
 Masterpiece of love benign ; 
 
 Fairer than expansive reason 
 
 Whose omen 't is, and sign. 
 
 Wilt thou not ope thy heart to know 
 
 What rainbows teach, and sunsets show ? 
 
 Verdict which accumulates 
 
 From lengthening scroll of human fates, 
 
248 RALPH WALDO EMERSON. 
 
 Voice of earth to earth returned, 
 Prayers of saints that inly burned, 
 Saying, What is excellent. 
 As God lives, is permanent ; 
 Hearts are dust, hearts' loves remain ; 
 Hearts love will meet thee again. 
 Revere the Maker ; fetch thine eye 
 Up to his style, and manners of the sky. 
 Not of adamant and gold 
 Built he heaven stark and cold ; 
 No, but a nest of bending reeds, 
 Flowering grass, and scented weeds ; 
 Or like a traveller's fleeing tent, 
 Or bow above the tempest bent ; 
 Built of tears and sacred flames, 
 And virtue reaching to its aims ; 
 Built of furtherance and pursuing, 
 Not of spent deeds, but of doing. 
 Silent rushes the swift Lord 
 Through ruined systems still restored, 
 Broadsowing, bleak and void to bless, 
 Plants with worlds the wilderness ; 
 Waters with tears of ancient sorrow 
 Apples of Eden ripe to-morrow. 
 House and tenant go to ground, 
 Lost in God, in Godhead found." 
 
LAST DAYS OF SIR WAITER SCOTT. 
 
 BY JOHN G. LOCKHART. 
 
 THE last jotting of Sir Walter's Diary perhaps the 
 last specimen of his handwriting records his starting 
 from Naples on the 16th of April, 1832. After the llth 
 of May the story can hardly be told too briefly. 
 
 The irritation of impatience, which had for a moment 
 been suspended by the aspect and society of Rome, re- 
 turned the moment he found himself on the road, and 
 seemed to increase hourly. His companions could with 
 difficulty prevail on him to see even the Falls of Terni, or 
 the Church of Santa Croce, at Florence. On the 17th, a 
 cold and dreary day, they passed the Apennines, and dined 
 on the top of the mountains. The snow and the pines re- 
 called Scotland, and he expressed pleasure at the sight of 
 them. That night they reached Bologna, and he would 
 see none of the interesting objects there, and next day, 
 hurrying in like manner through Ferrara, he proceeded 
 as far as Monselice. On the 19th he arrived at Venice; 
 and he remained there till the 23d; but showed no curi- 
 osity about anything except the Bridge of Sighs and the 
 adjoining dungeons, down into which he would scramble, 
 though the exertion was exceeding painful to him. On 
 the other historical features of that place one so sure in 
 other days to have inexhaustible attractions for him lie 
 would not even look ; and it was the same with all that he 
 
 ( 
 
250 JOHN G. LOCKHART. 
 
 came within reach of even with the fondly anticipated 
 chapel at Inspruck as they proceeded through the Tyrol, 
 and so onwards, by Munich, Ulm, and Heidelberg, to 
 Frankfort. Here (June 5) he entered a bookseller's shop ; 
 and the people seeing an English party, brought out 
 among the first things a lithographed print of Abbotsford. 
 He said, " I know that already, sir," and hastened back to 
 the inn without being recognized. Though in some parts 
 of the journey they had very severe weather, he repeat- 
 edly wished to travel all the night as well as all the day ; 
 and the symptoms of an approaching fit were so obvious, 
 that he was more than once bled, ere they reached May- 
 ence, by the hand of his affectionate domestic. 
 
 At this town they embarked on the 8th June in the 
 Rhine steamboat; and while they descended the famous 
 river through its most picturesque region, he seemed to 
 enjoy, though he said nothing, the perhaps unrivalled 
 scenery it presented to him. His eye was fixed on the 
 successive crags and castles, and ruined monasteries, each 
 of which had been celebrated hi some German ballad fa- 
 miliar to his ear, and all of them blended in the immortal 
 panorama of Childe Harold. But so soon as he resumed 
 his carriage at Cologne, and nothing but flat shores, and 
 here and there a grove of poplars and a village spire were 
 offered to the vision, the weight of misery sunk down again 
 upon him. It was near Nimeguen, on the evening of the 
 9th, that he sustained another serious attack of apoplexy, 
 combined with paralysis. Nicolson's lancet restored, after 
 the lapse of some minutes, the signs of animation ; but this 
 was the crowning blow. Next day he insisted on resuming 
 his journey, and on the llth was lifted from the carriage 
 into a steamboat at Rotterdam. 
 
 He reached London about six o'clock on the evening of 
 Wednesday the 13th of June. Owing to the unexpected 
 rapidity of the journey his eldest daughter had had no 
 
LAST DAYS OF SIR WALTER SCOTT. 251 
 
 notice when to expect him; and fearful of finding her 
 either out of town, or unprepared to receive him and his 
 attendants under her roof, Charles Scott drove to the St. 
 James's hotel, in Jennyn Street, and established his quar- 
 ters there before he set out in quest of his sister and myself. 
 When we reached the hotel, he recognized us with every 
 mark of tenderness, but signified that he was totally ex- 
 hausted; so no attempt was made to remove him further, 
 and he was put to bed immediately. Dr. Ferguson saw 
 him the same night, and next day Sir Henry Halford and 
 Dr. Holland saw him also; and during the next three 
 weeks the two former visited him daily, while Ferguson 
 was scarcely absent from his pillow. The Major was soon 
 on the spot To his children, all assembled once more 
 about him, he repeatedly gave his blessing in a very solemn 
 manner, as if expecting immediate death, but he was never 
 in a condition for conversation, and sunk either into sleep 
 or delirious stupor upon the slightest effort. 
 
 Mrs. Thomas Scott came to town as soon as she heard 
 of his arrival, and remained to help us. She was more 
 than once recognized and thanked. Mr. Cadell, too, ar- 
 rived from Edinburgh, to render any assistance in his 
 power. I think Sir Walter saw no other of his friends ex- 
 cept Mr. John Richardson, and him only once. As usual, 
 he woke up at the sound of a familiar voice, and made an 
 attempt to put forth his hand, but it dropped powerless, and 
 he said, with a smile, "Excuse my hand." Richardson 
 made a struggle to suppress his emotion, and after a mo- 
 ment, got out something about Abbotsford and the woods 
 which he had happened to see shortly before. The eye 
 brightened, and he said, "How does Kirklands get on?" 
 Mr. Richardson had lately purchased the estate so called 
 on the Teviot, and Sir Walter had left him busied with 
 plans of building. His friend told him that his new house 
 was begun, and that the Marquis of Lothian had very 
 
252 JOHN G. LOCKHART. 
 
 kindly lent him one of his own, meantime, in its vicinity, 
 " Ay, Lord Lothian is a good man," said Sir Walter ; " he 
 is a man from whom one may receive a favor, and that 's 
 saying a good deal for any man in these days." The stu- 
 por then sank back upon him, and Richardson never heard 
 his voice again. This state of things continued till the 
 beginning of July. 
 
 During those melancholy weeks great interest and sym- 
 pathy were manifested. Allan Cunningham mentions that, 
 walking home late one night, he found several working- 
 men standing together at the corner of Jermyn Street, and 
 one of them asked him, as if there was but one death-bed 
 in London, " Do you know, sir, if this is the street where 
 he is lying ? " The inquiries both at the hotel and at my 
 house were incessant ; and I think there was hardly a mem- 
 ber of the Royal family who did not send every day. The 
 newspapers teemed with paragraphs about Sir Walter ; and 
 one of these, it appears, threw out a suggestion that his 
 travels had exhausted his pecuniary resources, and that if 
 he were capable of reflection at all, cares of that sort might 
 probably harass his pillow. This paragraph came from a 
 very ill-informed, but, I dare say, a well-meaning quarter. 
 It caught the attention of some members of the then gov- 
 ernment; and, in consequence, I received a private com- 
 munication to the effect that, if the case were as stated, Sir 
 Walter's family had only to say what sum would relieve 
 him from embarrassment, and it would be immediately 
 advanced by the Treasury. The then Paymaster of the 
 Forces, Lord John Russell, had the delicacy to convey this 
 message through a lady with whose friendship he knew us 
 to be honored. We expressed our grateful sense of his 
 politeness, and of the liberality of the government, and I 
 now beg leave to do so once more ; but his Lordship was 
 of course informed that Sir Walter Scott was not situated 
 as the journalist had represented. 
 
LAST DAYS OF SIR WALTER SCOTT. 253 
 
 Dr. Ferguson's memorandum on Jennyn Street will be 
 acceptable to the reader. He says: 
 
 "When I saw Sir Walter he was lying in the second 
 floor back-room of the St. James's Hotel, in Jermyn Street, 
 in a state of stupor, from which, however, he could be 
 roused for a moment by being addressed, and then he rec- 
 ognized those about him, but immediately relapsed. I 
 think I never saw anything more magnificent than the 
 symmetry of his colossal bust, as he lay on the pillow with 
 his chest and neck exposed. During the time he was in 
 Jermyn Street he was calm, but never collected, and in 
 general either in absolute stupor or in a waking dream. 
 He never seemed to know where he was, but imagined 
 himself to be still in the steamboat. The rattling of car- 
 riages, and the noises of the street sometimes disturbed this 
 illusion, and then he fancied himself at the polling-booth 
 of Jedburgh, where he had been insulted and stoned. 
 
 " During the whole of this period of apparent helpless- 
 ness, the great features of his character could not be mis- 
 taken. He always exhibited great self-possession, and 
 acted his part with wonderful power whenever visited, 
 though he relapsed the next moment into the stupor from 
 which strange voices had roused him. A gentleman stum- 
 bled over a chair in his dark room; he immediately 
 started up, and though unconscious that it was a friend, 
 expressed as much concern and feeling as if he had never 
 been laboring under the irritability of disease. It was im- 
 possible even for those who most constantly saw and waited 
 on him in his then deplorable condition to relax from the 
 habitual deference which he had always inspired. He 
 expressed his will as determinedly as ever, and enforced it 
 with the same apt and good-natured irony as he was wont 
 to use. 
 
 " At length his constant yearning to return to Abbotsford 
 induced his physicians to consent to his removal, and the 
 
254 JOHN G. LOCKHART. 
 
 moment this was notified to him, it seemed to infuse ne\ 
 vigor into his frame. It was on a calm, clear afternoon of 
 the 7th July, that every preparation was made for his 
 embarkation on board the steamboat. He was placed on a 
 chair by his faithful servant, Nicolson, half dressed, and 
 loosely wrapped in a quilted dressing-gown. He requested 
 Lockhart and myself to wheel him towards the light of the 
 open window, and we both remarked the vigorous lustre of 
 his eye. He sat there silently gazing on space for more 
 than half an hour, apparently wholly occupied with his own 
 thoughts, and having no distinct perception of where he 
 was or how he came there. He suffered himself to be 
 lifted into his carriage, which was surrounded by a crowd 
 among whom were many gentlemen on horseback, who had 
 loitered about to gaze on the scene. 
 
 " His children were deeply affected, and Mrs. Lockhart 
 trembled from head to foot and wept bitterly. Thus sur- 
 rounded by those nearest to him, he alone was unconscious 
 of the cause or the depth of their grief, and while yet alive 
 seemed to be carried to his grave." 
 
 On this his last journey, Sir Walter was attended by his 
 two daughters, Mr. Cadell, and myself, and also by Dr. 
 James Watson, who (it being impossible for Dr. Ferguson 
 to leave town at that moment) kindly undertook to see him 
 safe at Abbotsford. We embarked 'in the James Watt 
 steamboat, the master of which (Captain John Jamieson), as 
 well as the agent of the proprietors, made every arrange- 
 ment in their power for the convenience of the invalid. 
 The Captain gave up for Sir Walter's use his own private 
 cabin, which was a separate erection, a sort of cottage, on 
 the deck; and he seemed unconscious, after laid in bed 
 there, that any new removal had occurred. On arriving at 
 Newhaven, late on the 9th, we found careful preparations 
 made for his landing by the manager of the Shipping Com- 
 pany (Mr. Hamilton) ; and Sir Walter, prostrate in his 
 
LAST DAYS OF SIR WALTER SCOTT. 255 
 
 carriage, was slung on shore, and conveyed from thence to 
 Douglas's hotel, in St. Andrew's Square, in the same com- 
 plete apparent unconsciousness. Mrs. Douglas had in 
 former days been the Duke of Buccleuch's housekeeper 
 at Bowhill, and she and her husband had also made the 
 most suitable provision. At a very early hour on the 
 morning of Wednesday, the llth, we again placed him in 
 his carriage, and he lay in the same torpid state during the 
 first two stages on the road to Tweedside. But as we de- 
 scended the vale of the Gala he began to gaze about him, 
 and by degrees it was obvious that he was recognizing the 
 features of that familiar landscape. Presently he mur- 
 mured a name or two, Gala Water, surely, Buck- 
 holm, f orwoodlee." As we rounded the hill at Ladhope, 
 and the outline of the Eildons burst on him, he became 
 greatly excited, and when turning himself on the couch his 
 eye caught at length his own towers, at the distance of a 
 mile, he sprang up with a cry of delight. The river being 
 in flood, we had to go round a few miles by Melrose bridge, 
 and during the time this occupied, his woods and house 
 being within prospect, it required occasionally both Dr. 
 Watson's strength and mine, in addition to Nicolson's, to 
 keep him in the carriage. After passing the bridge, the 
 road for a couple of miles loses sight of Abbotsford, and he 
 relapsed into his stupor; but on gaining the bank imme- 
 diately above it, his excitement became again ungovern- 
 able. 
 
 Mr. Laidlaw was waiting at the porch, and assisted ns 
 in lifting him into the dining-room, where his bed had been 
 prepared. He sat bewildered for a few moments, and then 
 resting his eye on Laidlaw, said, "Ha! Willie Laidlaw! 
 O man, how often have I thought of you ! " By this time 
 his dogs had assembled about his chair, they began to 
 fawn upon him and lick his hands, and he alternately 
 sobbed and smiled over them, until sleep oppressed him. 
 
256 JOHN G. LOCKHART. 
 
 Dr. Watson having consulted on all tilings with Mr 
 Clarkson and his father, resigned the patient to them, and 
 returned to London. None of them could have any hope, 
 but that of soothing irritation. Recovery was no longer t 
 be thought of; but there might be Euthanasia. 
 
 And yet something like a ray of hope did break ir 
 upon us next morning. Sir Walter awoke perfectly con 
 scious where he was, and expressed an ardent wish to b* 
 carried out into his garden. We procured a Bath-chair from 
 Huntly-Burn, and Laidlaw and I wheeled him out before 
 his door, and up and down for" some time on the turf, and 
 among the rose-beds, then in full bloom. The grandchfr 
 dren admired the new vehicle, and would be helping w 
 their way to push it about. He sat in silence, smiling pla- 
 cidly on them, and the dogs their companions, and now and 
 then admiring the house, the screen of the garden, and the 
 flowers and trees. By and by he conversed a little, very 
 composedly, with us, said he was happy to be at home 
 that he felt better than he had ever done since he lefl 
 it, and would perhaps disappoint the doctors after all. 
 
 He then desired to be wheeled through his rooms, and 
 we moved him leisurely for an hour or more up and down 
 the hall and the great library. "I have seen much," he 
 kept saying, "but nothing like my ain house, give me 
 one turn more ! " He was gentle as an infant, and allowed 
 himself to be put to bed again, the moment we told him 
 that we thought he had had enough for one day. 
 
 Next morning he was still better; after again enjoying 
 the Bath-chair for perhaps a couple of hours out of doors, 
 he desired to be drawn into the library, and placed by the 
 central window, that he might look down upon the Tweed. 
 
 Here he expressed a wish that I should read to him, and 
 when I asked from what book, he said, "Need you ask? 
 There is but one." I chose the 14th chapter of St. John's 
 Gospel; he listened with mild devotion, and said when I 
 
LAST DAYS OF SIR WALTER SCOTT 257 
 
 had done, " Well, this is a great comfort, I have followed 
 you distinctly, and I feel as if I were yet to be myself 
 again." In this placid frame he was again put to bed, and 
 had many hours of soft slumber. 
 
 On the third day Mr. Laidlaw and I again wheeled him 
 about the small piece of lawn and shrubbery in front of the 
 house for some time, and the weather being delightful, and 
 all the richness of summer around him, he seemed to taste 
 fully the balmy influences of nature. The sun getting very 
 strong, we halted the chair in a shady corner, just within 
 the verge of his verdant arcade around the court-wall ; and 
 breathing the coolness of the spot, he said, " Read me some 
 amusing thing, read me a bit of Crabbe." I brought out 
 the first volume of his old favorite that I could lay hand on, 
 and turned to what I remembered as one of his most favorite 
 passages in it, the description of the arrival of the play- 
 ers in the Borough. Ke listened with great interest, and 
 also, as I soon perceived, with great curiosity. Every 
 now and then he exclaimed, "Capital excellent very 
 good Crabbe has lost nothing," and we were too well 
 satisfied that he considered himself as hearing a new pro- 
 duction, when, chuckling over one couplet, he said, " Better 
 and better but how will poor Terry endure these cuts ? " 
 I went on with the poet's terrible sarcasms upon the theat- 
 rical life, and he listened eagerly, muttering, "Honest 
 Dan!" "Dan won't like this." At length I reached 
 those lines, 
 
 " Sad happy race ! soon raised and soon depressed, 
 Your days all passed in jeopardy and jest : 
 Poor without prudence, with afflictions vain, 
 Not warned by misery, nor enriched by gain." 
 
 "Shut the book," said Sir Walter, " I can't stand more of 
 this, it will touch Terry to the very quick." 
 
 On the morning of Sunday, the 15th, he was again taken 
 out into the little pleasaunce, and got as far as his favorite 
 17 
 
258 JOHN G. LOCKHART. 
 
 terrace-walk between the garden and the river, from which 
 he seemed to survey the valley and the hills with much 
 satisfaction. On re-entering the house, he desired me to 
 read to him from the New Testament, and after that, he 
 again called for a little of Crabbe ; but whatever I select- 
 ed from that poet seemed to be listened to as if it made 
 part of some new volume published while he was in Italy. 
 He attended with this sense of novelty, even to the tale of 
 Phoebe Dawson, which, not many months before, he could 
 have repeated every line of, and which I chose for one of 
 these readings, because, as is known to every one, it had 
 formed the last solace of Mr. Fox's death-bed. On the con- 
 trary, his recollection of whatever I read from the Bible 
 appeared to be lively ; and in the afternoon, when we made 
 his grandson, a child of six years, repeat some of Dr. 
 Watts's hymns by his chair, he seemed also to remember 
 them perfectly. That evening he heard the Church ser- 
 vice, and when I was about to close the book, said, " Why 
 do you omit the visitation for the sick ? " which I added 
 accordingly. 
 
 On Monday he remained in bed and seemed extremely 
 feeble; but after breakfast on Tuesday, the 17th, he ap- 
 peared revived somewhat, and was again wheeled about 
 on the turf. Presently he fell asleep in his chair, and after 
 dozing for perhaps half an hour, started awake, and shak- 
 ing the plaids we had put about him from off his shoul- 
 ders, said : " This is sad idleness. I shall forget what I have 
 been thinking of, if I don't set it down now. Take me into 
 my own room, and fetch the keys of my desk." He re- 
 peated this so earnestly that we could not refuse; his 
 daughters went into his study, opened his writing-desk, and 
 laid paper and pens in the usual order, and I then moved 
 him through the hall and into the spot where he had al 
 ways been accustomed to work. When the chair was 
 placed at the desk, and he found himself in the old posi- 
 
LAST DATS OF SIB WALTER SCOTT. 259 
 
 tion, he Brniled and thanked us, and said, " Now give me 
 my pen, and leave me for a little to myself." Sophia put 
 the pen into his hand, and he endeavored to close his fin- 
 gers upon it, but they refused their office, it dropped on 
 the paper. He sank back among his pillows, silent tears 
 rolling down his cheeks ; but composing himself by and by, 
 motioned to me to wheel him out of doors again. Laidlaw 
 met us at the porch, and took his turn of the chair. Sir 
 Walter, after a little while, again dropped into slumber. 
 When he awakened, Laidlaw said to me, " Sir Walter 
 has had a little repose." "No, Willie," said he, "no 
 repose for Sir Walter but in the grave." The tears again 
 rushed from his eyes. " Friends," said he, " don't let me 
 expose myself get me to bed, that 's the only place." 
 
 With this scene ended our glimpse of daylight Sir 
 Walter never, I think, left his room afterwards, and hardly 
 his bed, except for an hour or two in the middle of the 
 day ; and after another week he was unable even for this. 
 During a few days he was in a state of painful irritation, 
 and I saw realized all that he had himself prefigured in 
 his description of the meeting between Crystal Croftangry 
 and his paralytic friend. Dr. Ross came out from Edin- 
 burgh, bringing with him his wife, one of the dearest nieces 
 of the Clerk's Table. Sir Walter with some difficulty rec- 
 ognized the Doctor, but, on hearing Mrs. Ross's voice, 
 exclaimed at once, " Is n't that Kate Hume ? " These kind 
 friends remained for two or three days with us. Clarkson's 
 lancet was pronounced necessary, and the relief it afforded 
 was, I am happy to say, very effectual. 
 
 After this he declined daily, but still there was great 
 strength to be wasted, and the process was long. He 
 seemed, however, to suffer no bodily pain, and his mind, 
 though hopelessly obscured, appeared, when there was any 
 symptom of consciousness, to be dwelling, with rare excep- 
 tions, on serious and solemn things ; the accent of the voice 
 
260 JOHN G. LOCKHART. 
 
 grave, sometimes awful, but never querulous, an! very 
 seldom indicative of any angry or resentful thoughts. Now 
 and then he imagined himself to be administering justice 
 as Sheriff; and once or twice he seemed to be ordering 
 Tom Purdie about trees. A few times also, I am sorry to 
 say, we could perceive that his fancy was at Jedburgh, 
 and Burk Sir Walter escaped him in a melancholy tone. 
 But commonly whatever we could follow him in was a 
 fragment of the Bible (especially the Prophecies of Isaiah 
 and the Book of Job) of some petition in the litany 
 or a verse of some psalm (in the old Scotch metrical ver- 
 sion) or of some of the magnificent hymns of the Rom- 
 ish ritual in which he had always delighted, but which 
 probably hung on his memory now in connection with the 
 church services he had attended while in Italy. We very 
 often heard distinctly the cadence of the Dies Irce ; and I 
 think that the very last stanza that we could make out was 
 the first of a still greater favorite : 
 " Stabat Mater dolorosa, 
 
 Juxta crucem lachrymosa, 
 
 Dam pendebat Filius." 
 
 All this time he continued to recognize his daughters, 
 Laidlaw, and myself, whenever we spoke to him, and 
 received every attention with a most touching thankfulness. 
 Mr. Clarkson, too, was always saluted with the old cour- 
 tesy, though the cloud opened but a moment for him to 
 do so. Most truly might it be said that the gentleman sur- 
 vived the genius. 
 
 After two or three weeks had passed in this way, I was 
 obliged to leave Sir Walter for a single day, and go into 
 Edinburgh, to transact business on his account, with Mr. 
 Henry Cockburn (now Lord Cockburn), then Solicitor- 
 General for Scotland. The Scotch Reform Bill threw a 
 great burden of new duties and responsibilities upon the 
 Sheriffs; and Scott's Sheriff-substitute, the Laird of .Rae- 
 
LAST 1>ATS OF SIB WALTER SCOTT. 261 
 
 burn, not having been regularly educated for the law, found 
 himself incompetent to encounter these novelties, especially 
 as regarded the registration of voters, and other details 
 connected with the recent enlargement of .the electoral 
 franchise. Under such circumstances, as no one but the 
 Sheriff could appoint another Substitute, it became neces- 
 sary for Sir Walter's family to communicate the state he 
 was in in a formal manner to the Law Officers of the 
 Crown ; and the Lord Advocate (Mr. Jeffrey), in conse- 
 quence, introduced and carried through Parliament a short 
 bill (2 and 3 William IV. cap. 101), authorizing the gov- 
 ernment to appoint a new Sheriff of Selkirkshire, " during 
 the incapacity or non-resignation of Sir Walter Scott." It 
 was on t^iis bill that the Solicitor- General had expressed a 
 wish to converse with me ; but there was little to be said, 
 as the temporary nature of the new appointment gave no 
 occasion for any pecuniary question ; and, if that had been 
 otherwise, the circumstances of the case would have ren- 
 dered Sir Walter's family entirely indifferent upon such a 
 subject There can be no doubt that, if he had recovered 
 in so far as to be capable of executing a resignation, the 
 government would have considered it just to reward thirty- 
 two years' faithful services by a retired allowance equiva- 
 lent to his salary, and as little that the government 
 would have had sincere satisfaction in settling that matter 
 in the shape most acceptable to himself. And perhaps 
 (though I feel that it is scarcely worth while) I may as 
 well here express my regret that a statement highly unjust 
 and injurious should have found its way into the pages of 
 some of Sir Walter's preceding biographers. These writ- 
 ers have thought fit to insinuate that there was a want of 
 courtesy and respect on the part of the Lord Advocate, 
 and the other official persons connected with this arrange- 
 ment. On the contrary, nothing could be more handsome 
 and delicate than the whole of their conduct in it; Mr 
 
262 JOHN G. LOCKHART. 
 
 Cockburn could not have entered into the case with greater 
 feeling and tenderness, had it concerned a brother of his 
 own ; and when Mr. Jeffrey introduced his bill in the House 
 of Commons, he used language so graceful and touching, 
 that both Sir Robert Peel and Mr. Croker went across the 
 House to thank him cordially for it. 
 
 Perceiving, towards the close of August, that the end was 
 near, and thinking it very likely that Abbotsford might soon 
 undergo many changes, and myself, at all events, never see 
 it again, I felt a desire to have some image preserved of 
 the interior apartments as occupied by their founder, and 
 invited from Edinburgh for that purpose Sir Walter's dear 
 friend, William Allan, whose presence, I well knew, 
 would, even under the circumstances of that time, be nowise 
 troublesome to any of the family, but the contrary in all 
 respects. Mr. Allan willingly complied, and executed a 
 series of beautiful drawings, which may probably be en- 
 graved hereafter. He also shared our watchings, and wit- 
 nessed all but the last moments. Sir Walter's cousins, the 
 ladies of Ashestiel, came down frequently, for a day or 
 two at a time, and did whatever sisterly affection could 
 prompt, both for the sufferer and his daughters. Miss 
 Barbara Scott (daughter of his Uncle Thomas) and Mrs. 
 Scott of Harden did the like. 
 
 As I was dressing on the morning of Monday the 17th 
 of September, Nicolson came into my room, and told me 
 that his master had awoke in a state of composure and con- 
 sciousness, and wished to see me immediately. I found 
 him entirely himself, though in the last extreme of feeble- 
 ness. His eye was clear and calm every trace of the 
 wild fire of delirium extinguished. " Lockhart," he said, 
 " I may have but a minute to speak to you. My dear, be 
 a good man be virtuous be religious be a good 
 man. Nothing else will give you any comfort when you 
 come to lie here." He paused, and I said, " Shall I send 
 
LAST DAYS OF SIR WALTER SCOTT. 263 
 
 for Sophia and Anne?" "No," said he, "dont disturb 
 them. Poor souls ! I know they were up all night God 
 bless you all." With this he sunk into a very tranquil 
 sleep, and, indeed, he scarcely afterwards gave any sign 
 of consciousness, except for an instant on the arrival of his 
 sons. They, on learning that the scene was about to close, 
 obtained a new leave of absence from their posts, and both 
 reached Abbotsford on the 19th. About half past one 
 1*. M., on the 21st of September, Sir Walter breathed his 
 last, in the presence of all his children. It was a beautiful 
 day, so warm that every window was wide open, and 
 so perfectly still that the sound of all others most delicious 
 to his ear, the gentle ripple of the Tweed over its pebbles, 
 was distinctly audible as we knelt around the bed, and his 
 eldest son kissed and closed his eyes. 
 
 No sculptor ever modelled a more majestic image of 
 repose. 
 
 His funeral was conducted in an unostentatious manner, 
 but the attendance was very great. Few of his old friends 
 then in Scotland were absent, and many, both friends and 
 strangers, came . from a great distance. His old domestics 
 and foresters made it their petition that no hireling hand 
 might assist in carrying his remains. They themselves 
 bore the coffin to the hearse, and from the hearse to the 
 grave. The pall-bearers were his sons, his son-in-law, and 
 his little grandson ; his cousins, Charles Scott of Nesbitt, 
 James Scott of Jedburgh, (sons to his Uncle Thomas,) Wil- 
 liam Scott of Raeburn, Robert Rutherford, Gerk to the 
 Signet, Colonel (now Sir James) Russell of Ashestiel, Wil- 
 liam Keith (brother to Sir Alexander Keith of Ravelstone), 
 and the chief of his family, Hugh Scott of Harden, now 
 Lord Polwarth. 
 
 When the company were assembled, according to the 
 usual Scotch fashion, prayers were offered up by the very 
 Reverend Dr. Baird, Principal of the University of Edin 
 
264 JOHN G. LOCKHAKT. 
 
 burgh, and by the Rev. Dr. David Dickson, minister of St 
 Cuthbert's, who both expatiated in a very striking manner 
 on the virtuous example of the deceased. 
 
 The court-yard and all the precincts of Abbotsford were 
 crowded with uncovered spectators as the procession was 
 arranged ; and as it advanced through Darnick and Mel- 
 rose, and the adjacent villages, the whole population ap- 
 peared at their doors in like manner, almost all in black. 
 The train of carriages extended, I understand, over more 
 than a mile, the Yeomanry followed in great numbers 
 on horseback and it was late in the day ere we reached 
 Dryburgh. Some accident, it was observed, had caused 
 the hearse to halt for several minutes on the summit of the 
 hill at Bemerside exactly where a prospect of remarka- 
 ble richness opens, and where Sir Walter always had been 
 accustomed to rein up his horse. The day was dark and 
 lowering, and the wind high. 
 
 The wide enclosure at the abbey of Dryburgh was 
 thronged with old and young ; and when the coffin was 
 taken from the hearse, and again laid on the shoulders of 
 the afflicted serving-men, one deep sob burst from a thousand 
 lips. Mr. Archdeacon Williams read the Burial Service of 
 the Church of England ; and thus, about half past five 
 o'clock, in the evening of Wednesday, the 26th September, 
 1832, the remains of Sir Walter Scott were laid by the 
 side of his wife, in the sepulchre of his ancestors, "in 
 sure and certain hope of the resurrection to eternal life, 
 through our Lord Jesus Christ ; who shall change our vile 
 body that it may be like unto his glorious body, according to 
 the mighty working, whereby he is able to subdue all things 
 to himself" ' 
 
THE NEW EDEN. 
 
 (WRITTEN FOB A HORTICULTURAL FESTIVAL.) 
 
 BY OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES. 
 
 SCARCE could the parting ocean close, 
 * Seamed by the Mayflower's cleaving bow, 
 When o'er the rugged desert rose 
 
 The waves that tracked the Pilgrim's plough 
 
 Then sprang from many a rock-strewn field 
 The rippling grass, the nodding grain, 
 
 Such growths as English meadows yield 
 To scanty sun and frequent rain. 
 
 But when the fiery days were done, 
 And Autumn brought his purple haze, 
 
 Then, kindling in the slanted sun, 
 
 The hillsides gleamed with golden maize. 
 
 Nor treat his homely gift with scorn 
 Whose fading memory scarce can save 
 
 The hillocks where he sowed his corn, 
 
 The mounds that mark his nameless grave. 
 
 The food was scant, the fruits were few : 
 A red-streak glistened here and there ; 
 
 Perchance in statelier precincts grew 
 Some stern old Puritanic pear. 
 
266 OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES. 
 
 Austere in taste, and tough at core 
 Its unrelenting bulk was shed, 
 
 To ripen in the Pilgrim's store 
 
 When all the summer sweets were fled. 
 
 Such was his lot, to front the storm 
 With iron heart and marble brow, 
 
 Nor ripen till his earthly form 
 
 Was cast from life's autumnal bough. 
 
 But ever on the bleakest rock 
 
 We bid the brightest beacon glow, 
 
 And still upon the thorniest stock 
 The sweetest roses love to blow. 
 
 So on our rude and wintry soil 
 We feed the kindling flame of art, 
 
 And steal the tropic's blushing spoil 
 To bloom on Nature's icy heart. 
 
 See how the softening Mother's breast 
 Warms to her children's patient wiles, 
 
 Her lips by loving Labor pressed 
 Break in a thousand dimpling smiles, 
 
 From when the flushing bud of June 
 Dawns with its first auroral hue, 
 
 Till shines the rounded harvest-moon, 
 And velvet dahlias drink the dew. 
 
 Nor these the only gifts she brings ; 
 
 Look where the laboring orchard groans, 
 And yields its beryl-threaded strings 
 
 For chestnut burs and hemlock cones. 
 
THE NEW EDEN. 267 
 
 Dear though the shadowy maple be, 
 
 And dearer still the whispering pine, 
 Dearest yon russet-laden tree 
 
 Browned by the heavy rubbing kine ! 
 
 There childhood flung its venturous stone, 
 
 And boyhood tried its daring climb, 
 And though our summer birds have flown 
 
 It blooms as in the olden time. 
 
 Nor be the Fleming's pride forgot, 
 
 With swinging drops and drooping bells, 
 
 Freckled and splashed with streak and spot, 
 On the warm-breasted, sloping swells ; 
 
 Nor Persia's painted garden-queen, 
 
 Frail Houri of the trellised wall, 
 Her deep-cleft bosom scarfed with green, 
 
 Fairest to see, and first to fall. 
 
 When man provoked his mortal doom, 
 
 And Eden trembled as he fell, 
 When blossoms sighed their last perfume, 
 
 And branches waved their long farewell. 
 
 One sucker crept beneath the gate, 
 
 One seed was wafted o'er the wall, 
 One bough sustained his trembling weight ; 
 
 These left the garden, these were all. 
 
 And far o'er many a distant zone 
 
 These wrecks of Eden still are flung ; 
 
 The fruits that Paradise hath known 
 Are still in earthly gardens hung. 
 
263 OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES. 
 
 Yes, by our own unstoried stream 
 The pink-white apple-blossoms burst 
 
 That saw the young Euphrates gleam, 
 That Gihon's circling waters nursed. 
 
 For us the ambrosial pear displays 
 The wealth its arching branches hold, 
 
 Bathed by a hundred summery days 
 In floods of mingling fire and gold. 
 
 And here, where beauty's cheek of flame 
 With morning's earliest beam is fed, 
 
 The sunset-painted peach may claim 
 To rival its celestial red. 
 
 What though in some unmoistened vale 
 The summer leaf grow brown and sere, 
 
 Say, shall our star of promise fail 
 That circles half the rolling sphere, 
 
 From beaches salt with bitter spray, 
 O'er prairies green with softest rain, 
 
 And ridges bright with evening's ray, 
 To rocks that shade the stormless main ? 
 
 If by our slender-threaded streams 
 The blade and leaf and blossom die, 
 
 If, drained by noontide's parching beams, 
 The milky veins of Nature dry, 
 
 See, with her swelling bosom bare, 
 Yon wild-eyed Sister in the West, 
 
 The ring of Empire round her hair, 
 The Indian's wampum on her breast ! 
 
THE NEW EDEN. 269 
 
 We saw the August sun descend, 
 
 Day after day, with blood-red stain, 
 And the blue mountains dimly blend 
 
 With smoke-wreaths from the burning plain ; 
 
 Beneath the hot Sirocco's wings 
 
 We sat and told the withering hours, 
 Till Heaven unsealed its azure springs, 
 
 And bade them leap in flashing showers. 
 
 Yet in our Ishmael's thirst we knew 
 
 The mercy of the Sovereign hand 
 Would pour the fountain's quickening dew 
 
 3\> feed some harvest of the land. 
 
 No flaming swords of wrath surround 
 
 Our second Garden of the Blest j 
 It spreads beyond its rocky bound, 
 
 It climbs Nevada's glittering crest. 
 
 God keep the tempter from its gate ! 
 
 God shield the children, lest they fall 
 From their stern fathers' free estate, 
 
 Till Ocean is its only wall I 
 
CAMBRIDGE WORTHIES -THIRTY 1EARS AGO. 
 
 BY JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL. 
 
 AMBRIDGE has long had its port, but the greater 
 part of its maritime trade was, thirty years ago, in- 
 trusted to a single Argo, the sloop Harvard, which belonged 
 to the College, and made annual voyages to that vague 
 Orient, known as Down East, bringing back the wood that 
 in those days gave to winter life at Harvard a crackle and 
 a cheerfulness, for the loss of which the greater warmth 
 of anthracite hardly compensates. New England life, to 
 be genuine, must have in it some sentiment of the sea, 
 it was this instinct that printed the device of the pine-tree 
 on the old money and the old flag, and these periodic ven- 
 tures of the sloop Harvard made the old Viking fibre 
 vibrate in the hearts of all the village boys. What a vista 
 of mystery and adventure did her sailing open to us ! 
 With what pride did we hail her return ! She was our 
 scholiast upon Robinson Crusoe and the Mutiny of the 
 Bounty. Her captain still lords it over our memories, 
 the greatest sailor that ever sailed the seas, and we should 
 not look at Sir John Franklin himself with such admiring 
 interest as that with which we enhaloed some larger boy 
 who had made a voyage in her, and had come back with- 
 out braces to his trousers (gallowses we called them) and 
 squirting ostentatiously the juice of that weed which still 
 gave him little private returns of something very like sea 
 
CAMBRIDGE WORTHIES THIRTY YEARS AGO. 271 
 
 sickness. All our -shingle vessels were shaped and rigged 
 by her, who was our glass of naval fashion and our mould 
 of aquatic form. We had a secret and wild delight in 
 believing that she carried a gun, and imagined her sending 
 grape and canister among the treacherous savages of Old- 
 town. Inspired by her were those first essays at navigation 
 on the Winthrop duck-pond of the plucky boy who was 
 afterward to serve two famous years before the ma<?t 
 
 The greater part of what is now Cambridgeport was then 
 (in the native dialect) a hucUeberry pastur. Woods were 
 not wanting on its outskirts, of pine, and oak, and maple, 
 and the rarer tupelo with downward limbs. Its veins did 
 not draw their blood from the quiet old heart of the village, 
 but it h^d a distinct being of its own, and was rather a 
 great caravansary than a suburb. The chief feature of 
 the place was its inns, of which there were five, with vast 
 barns and court-yards, which the railroad was to make as 
 silent and deserted as the palaces of Nimroud. Great 
 white-topped wagons, each drawn by double files of six 
 or eight horses, with its dusty bucket swinging from the 
 hinder axle, and its grim bull-dog trotting silent underneath, 
 or in midsummer panting on the lofty perch beside the 
 driver (how elevated thither baffled conjecture), brought 
 all the wares and products of the country to their mart 
 and seaport in Boston. Those filled the inn-yards, or 
 were ranged side by side under broad-roofed sheds, and far 
 into the night the mirth of their lusty drivers clamored 
 from the red-curtained bar-room, while the single lantern 
 swaying to and fro in the black cavern of the stables made 
 a Rembrandt of the group of hostlers and horses below. 
 There were, beside the taverns, some huge square stores 
 where groceries were sold, some houses, by whom or why 
 inhabited was to us boys a problem, and, on the edge of the 
 marsh, a currier's shop, where, at high tide, on a floating 
 platform, men were always beating skins in a way to remind 
 
272 JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL. 
 
 one of Don Quixote's fulling-mills. ISTor did thes*s make 
 all the Port. As there is always a Coming Man who never 
 comes, so there is a man who always comes (it may be 
 only a quarter of an hour) too early. This man, as far as 
 the Port is concerned, was Rufus Davenport. Looking at 
 the marshy flats of Cambridge, and considering their near- 
 ness to Boston, he resolved that there should grow up a 
 suburban Venice. Accordingly, the marshes were bought, 
 canals were dug, ample for the commerce of both Indies, 
 and four or five rows of brick houses were built to meet 
 the first wants of the wading settlers who were expected 
 to rush in WHENCE ? This singular question had never 
 occurred to the enthusiastic projector. There are laws 
 which govern human migrations quite beyond the control 
 of the speculator, as many a man with desirable building- 
 lots has discovered to his cost. Why mortal men will pay 
 more for a chess-board square in that swamp than for an 
 acre on the breezy upland close by, who shall say ? And 
 again, why, having shown such a passion for your swamp, 
 they are so coy of mine, who shall say ? Not certainly any 
 one who, like Davenport, had got up too early for his gen- 
 eration. If we could only carry that slow, imperturbable 
 old clock of Opportunity, that never strikes a second too 
 soon or too late, in our fobs, and push the hands forward 
 as we can those of our watches ! With a foreseeing econ- 
 omy of space which now seems ludicrous, the roofs of this 
 forlorn hope of houses were made flat that the swarming 
 population might have where to dry their clothes. But 
 A. U. C. 30 showed the same view as A. U. C. 1, only 
 that the brick blocks looked as if they had been struck by a 
 malaria. The dull weed upholstered the decaying wharves, 
 and the only freight that heaped them was the kelp and 
 eelgrass left by higher floods. Instead of a Venice, behold 
 a Torzelo! The unfortunate projector took to the last 
 refuge of the unhappy, bookmaking, and bored the 
 
CAMBRIDGE WORTHIES THIRTY YEARS AGO. 273 
 
 reluctant public with what he called a Rightaim Testament, 
 prefaced by a recommendation from General Jackson, who 
 perhaps, from its title, took it for some treatise on ball- 
 practice. 
 
 But even Cambridgeport, my dear Storg, did not want 
 associations poetic and venerable. The stranger who took 
 the " Hourly " at Old Cambridge, if he were a physiog- 
 nomist and student of character might perhaps have had 
 his curiosity excited by a person who mounted the coach 
 at the Port. So refined was his whole appearance, so 
 fastidiously neat his apparel, but with a neatness that 
 seemed less the result of care and plan than a something 
 as proper to the man as whiteness to the lily, that you 
 would have at once classed him with those individuals, 
 rarer than great captains and almost as rare as great poets, 
 whom nature sends into the world to fill the arduous office 
 of Gentleman. Were you ever emperor of that Barataria 
 which under your peaceful sceptre would present, of course, 
 a model of government, this remarkable person should be 
 Duke of Bienseance and Master of Ceremonies. There 
 are some men whom destiny has endowed with the faculty 
 of external neatness, whose clothes are repellant of dust 
 and mud, whose unwithering white neckcloths persevere 
 to the day's end, unappeasably seeing the sun go down 
 upon their starch, and whose linen makes you fancy them 
 heirs in the maternal line to the instincts of all the wash- 
 erwomen from Eve downward. There are others whose 
 inward natures possess this fatal cleanness, incapable of 
 moral dirt-spot. You are not long in discovering that the 
 stranger combines in himself both these properties. A 
 nimbus of hair, fine as an infant's, and early white, show- 
 ing refinement of organization and the predominance of 
 the spiritual over the physical, undulated and floated around 
 a face that seemed like pale flame, and over which the flit- 
 ting shades of expression chased each other, fugitive and 
 18 
 
274 JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL. 
 
 gleaming as waves upon a field of rye. It was a counts 
 nance that, without any beauty of feature, was very beau 
 tiful. I have said that it looked like pale flame, aid can 
 find no other words for the impression it gave. Here was 
 a man all soul, whose body seemed only a lamp of finest 
 clay, whose service was to feed with magic oils, rare and 
 fragrant, that wavering fire which hovered over it. You, 
 who ore an adept in such matters, would have detected 
 in the eyes that artist-look which seems to see pictures evei 
 in the air, and which, if it fall on you, makes you feel as 
 if all the world were a gallery, and yourself the rather, 
 indifferent Portrait of a Gentleman hung therein. As the 
 stranger brushes by you in alighting, you detect a single 
 incongruity, a smell of dead tobacco-smoke. You ask 
 his name, and the answer is, Mr. Allston. 
 
 " Mr. Allston ! " and you resolve to note down at once 
 in your diary every look, every gesture, every word of the 
 great painter ? Not in the least. You have the true An- 
 glo-Norman indifference, and most likely never think of 
 him again till you hear that one of his pictures has sold 
 for a great price, and then contrive to let your grand- 
 children know twice a week that you met him once in a 
 coach, and that he snid, " Excuse me, sir," in a very Titian- 
 esque manner when he stumbled over your toes in getting 
 out. Hitherto Boswell is quite as unique as Shakespeare. 
 The country-gentleman, journeying up to London, inquires 
 of Mistress Davenant at the Oxford inn the name of his 
 pleasant companion of the night before. " Master Shake- 
 speare, an 't please your worship," and the Justice, not with- 
 out a sense of unbending, says, " Truly, a merry and 
 conceited gentleman ! " It is lucky for the peace of great 
 men that the world seldom finds out contemporaneously 
 who its great men are, or, perhaps, that each man esteems 
 himself the fortunate he who shall draw the lot of mem- 
 ory from the helmet of the future. Had the eyes of some 
 
CAMBRIDGE WORTHIES THIRTY YEARS AGO. 275 
 
 Stratford burgess been achromatic telescopes capable of a 
 perspective of two hundred years ! But, even then, would 
 not his record have been fuller of says-Is than of says-hes ? 
 Nevertheless, it is curious to consider from what infinitely 
 varied points of view we might form our estimate of a great 
 man's character, when we remember that he had his points 
 of contact with the butcher, the baker, and the candle-stick- 
 maker, as well as with the ingenious A, the sublime B, 
 and the Right Honorable C. If it be true that no man 
 ever clean forgets everything, and that the act of drowning 
 (as is asserted) forthwith brightens up all those o'er-rusted 
 impressions, would it not be a curious experiment, if, after 
 a remarkable person's death, the public, eager for minutest 
 particulars, should gather together all who had ever been 
 brought into relations with him, and, submerging them to 
 the hair's-breadth hitherward of the drowning-point, subject 
 them to strict cross-examination by the Humane Society, 
 as soon as they became conscious between the resuscitating 
 blankets? All of us probably have brushed against des- 
 tiny in the street, have shaken hands with it, fallen asleep 
 with it in railway carriages, and knocked heads with it in 
 some one or other of its yet unrecognized incarnations. 
 
 Will it seem like presenting a tract to a colporteur, my 
 dear Storg, if I say a word or two about an artist to you 
 over there in Italy ? Be patient, and leave your button in 
 my grasp yet a little longer. A person whose opinion is 
 worth having once said to me, that, however one's opinions 
 might be modified by going to Europe, one always came 
 back with a higher esteem for Allston. Certainly he is 
 thus far the greatest English painter of historical subjects. 
 And only consider how strong must have been the artistic 
 bias in him to have made him a painter at all under the cir- 
 cumstances. There were no traditions of art, so necessary 
 for guidance and inspiration. Blackburn, Smibert, Copley, 
 Trumbull, Stuart, it was, after all, but a Brentford seep- 
 
276 JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL. 
 
 tre which their heirs could aspire to, and theirs were not 
 names to conjure with, like those through which Fame, as 
 through a silver trumpet, had blown for three centuries. 
 Copley and Stuart were both remarkable men, but the one 
 painted like an inspired silk-mercer, and the other seems to 
 have mixed his colors with the claret of which he and his 
 generation were so fond. And what could a successful 
 artist hope for at that time beyond the mere wages of his 
 work? His pictures would hang in cramped back-parlors, 
 between deadly cross-fires of lights, sure of the garret or 
 the auction-room erelong, in a country where the nomad 
 population carry no household gods with them but their five 
 wits and their ten fingers. As a race, we care nothing 
 about Art, but the Puritan and the Quaker are the only 
 Anglo-Saxons who have had pluck enough to confess it. If 
 it were surprising that Allston should have become a painter 
 at all, how almost miraculous that he should have been a 
 great and original one. We call him original deliberately, 
 because, though his school is essentially Italian, it is of less 
 consequence where a man buys his tools, than what use he 
 makes of them. Enough English artists went to Italy and 
 came back painting history in a very Anglo-Saxon manner, 
 and creating a school as melodramatic as the French, with- 
 out its perfection in technicalities. But Allston carried 
 thither a nature open on the Southern side, and brought 
 it back so steeped in rich Italian sunshine that the east 
 winds (whether physical or intellectual) of Boston and the 
 dusts of Cambridgeport assailed it in vain. To that bare 
 wooden studio one might go to breathe Venetian air, and 
 better yet, the very spirit wherein the elder brothers of Art 
 labored, etherealized by metaphysical speculation, and sub- 
 limed by religious fervor. The beautiful old man ! Here 
 was genius with no volcanic explosions (the mechanic result 
 of vulgar gunpowder often), but lovely as a Lapland night , 
 here was fame, not sought after nor worn in any cheap 
 
CAMBRIDGE WORTHIES THIRTY YEARS AGO. 277 
 
 French fashion as a ribbon at the button-hole, but so gentle, 
 so retiring, that it seemed no more than an assured and em- 
 boldened modesty ; here was ambition, undet>ased by rivalry 
 and incapable of the downward look ; and all these massed 
 and harmonized together into a purity and depth of charac- 
 ter, into a tone, which made the daily life of the man the 
 greatest masterpiece of the artist. 
 
 But let us go to the Old Town. Thirty years since, the 
 Muster and the Cornwallis allowed some vent to those natu- 
 ral instincts which Puritanism scotched, but not killed. The 
 Cornwallis had entered upon the estates of the old Guy 
 Fawkes procession, confiscated by the Revolution. It was 
 a masquerade, in which that grave and suppressed humor 
 of whiclj the Yankees are fuller than other people, burst 
 through all restraints, and disported itself in all the wildest 
 vagaries of fun. It is a curious commentary on the artifi- 
 ciality of our lives, that men must be disguised and masked 
 before they will venture into the obscurer corners of their 
 individuality, and display the true features of their nature. 
 One remarked it in the Carnival, and one especially noted 
 it here among a race naturally self-restrained; for Silas, 
 and Ezra, and Jonas were not only disguised as Redcoats, 
 Continentals, and Indians, but not unfrequently disguised in 
 drink also. It is a question whether the Lyceum, where 
 the public is obliged to comprehend all vagrom men, sup- 
 plies the place of the old popular amusements. A hundred 
 and fifty years ago, Cotton Mather bewails the carnal attrac- 
 tions of the tavern and the training-field, and tells of an old 
 Indian, who imperfectly understood the English tongue, but 
 desperately mastered enough of it (when under sentence of 
 death) to express a desire for instant hemp rather than 
 listen to any more ghostly consolations. Puritanism I 
 am perfectly aware how great a debt we owe it tried over 
 again the old experiment of driving out nature with a pitch- 
 fork, and had the usual success. It was like a ship inwardly 
 
278 JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL. 
 
 on fire, whose hatches must be kept hermetically battened 
 down, for the admittance of an ounce of heaven's own natu- 
 ral air would explode it utterly. Morals can never be 
 safely embodied in the constable. Polished, cultivated, fas- 
 cinating Mephistophiles ! it is for the ungovernable break- 
 ings-away of the soul from unnatural compressions that thou 
 waitest with a patient smile. Then it is that thou offerest 
 thy gentlemanly arm to unguarded youth for a pleasant 
 stroll through the City of Destruction, and, as a special 
 favor, introducest him to the bewitching Miss Circe, and to 
 that model of the hospitable old English gentleman, Mr. 
 Comus ! 
 
 But the Muster and the Cornwallis were not peculiar to 
 Cambridge. Commencement Day was. Saint Pedagogus 
 was a worthy whose feast could be celebrated by men 
 who quarrelled with minced-pies and blasphemed custard 
 through the nose. The holiday preserved all the features 
 of an English fair. Stations were marked out beforehand 
 by the town constables, and distinguished by numbered 
 stakes. These were assigned to the different vendors of 
 small wares, and exhibitors of rarities, whose canvas booths, 
 beginning at the market-place, sometimes half encircled the 
 common with their jovial embrace. Now, all the Jehoiada- 
 boxes in town were foroal to give up all their rattling 
 deposits of specie, if not through the legitimate orifice, then 
 to the brute force of the hammer. For hither were come 
 all the wonders of the world, making the Arabian Nights 
 seem possible, and which we beheld for half price, not with- 
 out mingled emotions, pleasure at the economy, and shame 
 at not paying the more manly fee. Here the mummy un- 
 veiled her withered charms, a more marvellous Ninon, still 
 attractive in her three thousandth year. Here were the 
 Siamese Twins ah, if all such enforced and unnatural 
 unions were made a show of! Here were the flying-horses 
 (their supernatural effect injured like that of some po- 
 
CAMBRIDGE WORTHIES THIRTY YEARS AGO. 279 
 
 cms by the visibility of the man who turned the crank), 
 on which, as we tilted at the ring, we felt our shoulders tin- 
 gle with the accolade, and heard the clink of golden spurs 
 at our heels. Are the realities of life ever worth half so 
 much as its cheats ? and are there any feasts half so filling 
 at the price as those Barmecide ones spread for us by Im- 
 agination ? Hither came the Canadian giant, surrepti- 
 tiously seen, without price, as he alighted, in broad day 
 (giants were always foolish), at the tavern. Hither came 
 the great horse Columbus, with shoes two inches thick, and 
 more wisely introduced by night. In the trough of the 
 town-pump might be seen the mermaid, its poor monkey's 
 head carefully sustained above water for fear of drowning. 
 There were dwarfs, also, who danced and sang, and many a 
 proprietor regretted the transaudient properties of canvas, 
 which allowed the frugal public to share in the melody 
 without entering the booth. Is it a slander of J. H., who 
 reports that he once saw a deacon, eminent for psalmody, 
 lingering near one of these vocal tents, and, with an assumed 
 air of abstraction, furtively drinking in, with unhabitual ears, 
 a song, not secular merely, but with a dash of libertinism ! 
 The New England proverb says, " All deacons are good, 
 but there's a difference in deacons." On these days 
 Snow became super-terranean, and had a stand in the 
 square, and Lewis temperately contended with the stronger 
 fascinations of egg-pop. But space would fail me to make 
 a catalogue of everything. No doubt, Wisdom also, as 
 usual, had her quiet booth at the corner of some street, 
 without entrance-fee, and, even at that rate, got never a 
 customer the whole day long. For the bankrupt afternoon 
 there were peep-shows, at a cent each. 
 
 But all these shows and their showers are as clean gone 
 now as those of Caesar and Timour and Napoleon, for which 
 the world paid dearer. They are utterly gone out, not 
 leaving so much as a snuff behind, as little thought of 
 
280 JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL. 
 
 now as that John Robins, who was once so considerable 
 a phenomenon as to be esteemed the last great Antichrist 
 and son of perdition by the entire sect of Muggletonians. 
 Were Commencement what it used to be, I should be 
 tempted to take a booth myself, and try an experiment 
 recommended by a satirist of some merit, whose works 
 were long ago dead and (I fear) deedeed to boot: 
 
 Menenius, thou who fain wouldst know how calmly men can pass 
 
 Those biting portraits of themselves, disguised as fox or ass, 
 
 Go, borrow coin enough to buy a full-length psyche-glass, 
 
 Engage a rather darkish room in some well-sought position, 
 
 And let the town break out with bills, so much per head admission, 
 
 GREAT NATURAL CURIOSITY ! ! THE BIGGEST LIVING POOL ! ! ! 
 
 Arrange your mirror cleverly, before it set a stool, 
 
 Admit the public one by one, place each upon the seat, 
 
 Draw up the curtain, let him look his fill, and then retreat : 
 
 Smith mounts and takes a thorough view, then comes serenely down, 
 
 Goes home and tells his wife the thing is curiously like Brown ; 
 
 Brown goes and stares, and tells his wife the wonder's core and pith 
 
 Is that 't is just the counterpart of that conceited Smith : 
 
 Life calls us all to such a show ; Menenius, trust in me, 
 
 While thou to see thy neighbor smil'st, he does the same for thee ! " 
 
 My dear Storg, would you come to my show, and, instead 
 of looking in my glass, insist on taking your money's worth 
 in staring at the exhibitor? 
 
 Not least among the curiosities which the day brought 
 together, were some of the graduates, posthumous men, as 
 it were disentombed from country parishes and district 
 schools, but perennial also, in whom freshly survived all 
 the college jokes, and who had no intelligence later than 
 their Senior year. These had gathered to eat the college 
 dinner, and to get the Triennial Catalogue (their Libro d'oro) 
 referred to oftener than any volume but the Concordance. 
 Aspiring men they were, certainly, but in a right, unworldly 
 way ; this scholastic festival opening a peaceful path to the 
 ambition which might else have devasted mankind with 
 Prolusions on the Pentateuch, or Genealogies of the Dor- 
 
CAMBRIDGE WORTHIES THIRTY YEARS AGO. 281 
 
 mouse Family. For, since in the Academic processions 
 the classes are ranked in the order of their graduation, and 
 he has the best chance at the dinner who has the fewest 
 teeth to eat it with, so by degrees there springs up a 
 competition in longevity, the prize contended for being the 
 oldest surviving graduateship. This is an office, it is true, 
 without emolument, but having certain advantages, never- 
 theless. The incumbent, if he come to Commencement, 
 is a prodigious lion, and commonly gets a paragraph in the 
 newspapers once a year with the (fiftieth) last survivor of 
 Washington's Life Guard. If a clergyman, he is expected 
 to ask a blessing and return thanks at the dinner, a function 
 which he performs with centenarian longanimity, as if he 
 reckoned the ordinary life of man to be fivescore years, 
 and that a grace must be long to reach so very far away 
 as heaven. Accordingly, this silent race is watched, on 
 the course of the catalogue, with an interest worthy of 
 Newmarket ; and, as star after star rises in that galaxy of 
 death,* till one name is left alone, an oasis of life in the 
 Stellar desert, it grows solemn. The natural feeling is 
 reversed, and it is the solitary life that becomes sad and 
 monitory, the Stylites, there, on the lonely top of his cen- 
 tury-pillar, who has heard the passing-bell of youth, love, 
 friendship, hope, of everything but immitigable eld. 
 
 Dr. K. was President of the University then, a man of 
 genius, but of genius that evaded utilization, a great water- 
 power, but without rapids, and flowing with too smooth and 
 gentle a current to be set turning wheels and whirling 
 spindles. His was not that restless genius, of which the 
 man seems to be merely the representative, and which 
 wreaks itself in literature or politics, but of that milder 
 sort, quite as genuine, and perhaps of more contempora- 
 neous value, which is the, man, permeating a whole life 
 with placid force, and giving to word, look, and gesture a 
 meaning only justifiable by our belief in a reserved power 
 
$82 JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL. 
 
 of latent reinforcement. The man of talents possesses 
 them like so many tools, does his job with them, and there 
 an end ; but the man of genius is possessed by it, and it 
 makes him into a book or a life according to its whim. 
 Talent takes the existing moulds and makes its castings, 
 better or worse, of richer or baser metal, according to knack 
 and opportunity; but genius is always shaping new ones 
 and runs the man in them, so that there is always that 
 human feel in its results which gives us a kindred thrilL 
 What it will make we can only conjecture, contented always 
 with knowing the infinite balance of possibility against 
 which it can draw at pleasure. Have you ever seen a 
 man whose check would be honored for a million pay his 
 toll of one cent, and has not that bit of copper, no bigger 
 than your own and piled with it by the careless tollman, 
 given you a tingling vision of what golden bridges he could 
 pass, into what Elysian regions of taste and enjoyment and 
 culture, barred to the rest of us ? Something like it is the 
 impression made by such characters as K.'s on those who 
 come in contact with them. 
 
 There was that in the soft and rounded (I had almost 
 said melting) outlines of his face which reminded one of 
 Chaucer. The head had a placid yet dignified droop like 
 his. He was an anachronism, fitter to have been Abbot of 
 Fountains or Bishop Golias, courtier and priest, humorist 
 and lord spiritual, all in one, than for the mastership of a 
 provincial college which combined with its purely scholastic 
 functions those of accountant and chief of police. For 
 keeping books he was incompetent, (unless it were those he 
 borrowed,) and the only discipline he exercised was by the 
 unobtrusive pressure of a gentlemanliness which rendered 
 insubordination to him impossible. But the world always 
 judges a man (and rightly enough, too) by his little faults 
 which he shows a hundred times a day, rather than by his 
 great virtues which he discloses perhaps but once in a life- 
 
CAMBRIDGE WORTHIES THIRTY YEARS AGO. 285 
 
 time and to a single person, nay, in proportion as they are 
 rarer, and as lie is nobler, is shier of letting their existence 
 be known at all. He was one of those misplaced persons 
 whose misfortune it is that their lives overlap two distinct 
 eras, and are already so impregnated with one, that they can 
 never be in healthy sympathy with the other. Born when 
 the New England clergy were still an establishment and an 
 aristocracy, and when office was almost always for life and 
 often hereditary, he lived to be thrown upon a time when 
 avocations of all colors might be shuffled together in the life 
 of one man like a pack of cards, so that you could not 
 prophesy that he who was ordained to-day might not ac- 
 cept a colonelcy of * filibusters to-morrow. Such tempera- 
 ments as his attach themselves like barnacles to what seems 
 permanent, but presently the good ship Progress weighs 
 anchor and whirls them away fHm drowsy tropic inlets to 
 arctic waters of unnatural ice. To such crustaceous na- 
 tures, created to cling upon the immemorial rock amid 
 softest mosses, comes the bustling Nineteenth Century, and 
 says, " Come, come, bestir yourself to be practical : get out 
 of that old shell of yours forthwith ! " Alas, to get out of 
 the shell is to die ! 
 
 One of the old travellers in South America tells of fishes 
 that built their nests in trees (piscium et summa haesit genus 
 M//WO), and gives a print of the mother fish upon her nest, 
 while her mate mounts perpendicularly to her without aid 
 of legs or wings. Life shows plenty of such incongruities 
 between a man's place and his nature, (not so easily got 
 over as by the traveller's undoubting engraver,) and one 
 cannot help fancying that K. was an instance in point. He 
 never encountered, one would say, the attraction proper 
 to draw out his native force. Certainly few men who 
 impressed others so strongly, and of whom so many good 
 things are remembered, left less behind them to justify 
 contemporary estimates. He printed nothing, and was. 
 
284 JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL. 
 
 perhaps, one of those the electric sparkles of whose brains, 
 discharged naturally and healthily in conversation, refuse 
 to pass through the non-conducting medium of the inkstand. 
 His ana would make a delightful collection. One or two 
 of his official ones will be in place here. Hearing that 
 Porter's flip (which was exemplary) had too great an at- 
 traction for the collegians, he resolved to investigate the 
 matter himself. Accordingly, entering the old inn one day, 
 he called for a mug of it, and, having drunk it, said, " And 
 so, Mr. Porter, the young gentlemen come to drink your 
 flip, do they?" 
 
 " Yes sir sometimes." ^ 
 
 " All, well, I should think they would. Good day, Mr. 
 Porter," and departed, saying nothing more, for he always 
 wisely allowed for the existence of a certain amount of 
 human nature in ingenuous youth. At another time the 
 " Harvard Washington " asked leave to go into Boston to 
 a collation which had been offered them. " Certainly, 
 young gentlemen," said the President, " but have you en- 
 gaged any one to bring out your muskets ? " the College 
 being responsible for these weapons, which belonged to the 
 State. Again, when a student came with a physician's 
 certificate, and asked leave of absence, K. granted it at 
 once, and then added, " By the way, Mr. , persons in- 
 terested in the relation which exists between states of the 
 atmosphere and health, have noticed a curious fact in regard 
 to the climate of Cambridge, especially within the College 
 limits, the very small number of deaths in proportion to 
 the cases of dangerous illness." This is told of Judge W., 
 himself a wit, and capable of enjoying the humorous deli- 
 cacy of the reproof. 
 
 Shall I take Brahmin Alcott's favorite word, and call him 
 a daemonic man? No, the Latin genius is quite old-fash- 
 ioned enough for me, means the same thing, and its deriva- 
 tive geniality expresses, moreover, the base of K.'s being. 
 
CAMBRIDGE WORTHIES THIRTY YEARS AGO. 285 
 
 How he suggested cloistered repose and quadrangles mossy 
 with centurial associations! How easy he was, and how 
 without creak was every movement of his mind ! This life 
 was good enough for him, and the next not too good. The 
 gentlemanlike pervaded even his prayers. His were not 
 the manners of a man of the world, nor of a man of the 
 other world either, but both met in him to balance each 
 other in a beautiful equilibrium. Praying, he leaned for- 
 ward upon the pulpit-cushion as for conversation, and seemed 
 to feel himself (without irreverence) on terms of friendly but 
 courteous familiarity with Heaven. The expression of his 
 face was that of tranquil contentment, and he appeared less 
 to be supplicating expected mercies than thankful for those 
 already found, as if he were saying the gratias in the refec- 
 tory of the Abbey of Theleme. Under him flourished the 
 Harvard Washington Corps, whose gyrating banner, in- 
 scribed Tarn Marti quam Mercurio (atqui magis IAJCBO 
 should have been added), on the evening of training-days, 
 was an accurate dynamometer of Willard's punch or Por- 
 ter's flip. It was they who, after being royally entertained 
 by a maiden lady of the town, entered in their orderly book 
 a vote that Miss Blank was a gentleman. I see them now, 
 returning from the imminent deadly breach of the law of 
 Rechab, unable to form other than the serpentine line of 
 beauty, while their officers, brotherly rather than imperious, 
 instead of reprimanding, tearfully embraced the more eccen- 
 tric wanderers from military precision. Under him the 
 Med. Facs. took their equal place among the learned socie- 
 ties of Europe, numbering among their grateful honorary 
 members Alexander, Emperor of all the Russias, who (if 
 College legends may be trusted) sent them, in return for 
 their diploma, a gift of medals, confiscated by the authori- 
 ties. Under him the College fire-engine was vigilant and 
 active in suppressing any tendency to spontaneous combus- 
 tion among the Freshmen, or rushed wildly to imaginary 
 
286 JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL. 
 
 conflagrations, generally in a direction whore punch was 
 to be had. All these useful conductors for the natural 
 electricity of youth, dispersing it or turning it harmlessly 
 into the earth, are taker away now, wisely or not, is ques- 
 tionable. 
 
 An academic town, in whose atmosphere there is always 
 something antiseptic, seems naturally to draw to itself cer- 
 tain varieties and to preserve certain humors (in the Ben 
 Jonsonian sense) of character, men who come not to study 
 so much as to be studied. At the head-quarters of Wash- 
 ington once, and now of the Muses, lived C , but before 
 
 the date of these recollections. Here for seven years (as 
 the law was then) he made his house his castle, sunning 
 himself in his elbow-chair at the front-door, on that seventh 
 day, secure from every arrest but that of Death. Here 
 long survived him his turbaned widow, studious only of Spi- 
 noza, and refusing to molest the canker-worms that annually 
 disleaved her elms, because we were all vermicular alike. 
 She had been a famous beauty once, but the canker years 
 had left her leafless too, and I used to wonder, as I saw her 
 sitting always alone at her accustomed window, whether she 
 were ever visited by the reproachful shade of him who (in 
 spite of Rosalind) died broken-hearted for her in her radi- 
 ant youth. 
 
 And this reminds me of J. F., who, also crossed in love, 
 allowed no mortal eye to behold his face for many years. 
 The eremitic instinct is not peculiar to the Thebais, as many 
 a New England village can testify, and it is worthy of con- 
 sideration that the Romish Church has not forgotten this 
 among her other points of intimate contact with human 
 nature. F. became purely vespertinal, never stirring abroad 
 till after dark. He occupied two rooms, migrating from one 
 to the other as the necessities of housewifery demanded, 
 and when it was requisite that he should put his signature 
 to any legal instrument, (for he was an anchorite of ample 
 
CAMBRIDGE WORTHIES THIRTY YEARS AGO. 287 
 
 means,) he wrapped himself in a blanket, allowing nothing 
 to be seen but the hand which acted as scribe. What im- 
 pressed us boys more than anything was the rumor that he 
 had suffered his beard to grow, such an anti-Sheffieldism 
 being almost unheard of in those days, and the peculiar 
 ornament of man being associated in our minds with noth- 
 ing more recent than the patriarchs and apostles, whose 
 effigies we were obliged to solace ourselves with weekly in 
 the Family Bible. He came out of his oysterhood at last, 
 and I knew him well, a kind-hearted man, who gave annual 
 sleigh-rides to the town paupers, and supplied the poorer 
 children with school-books. His favorite topic of conversa- 
 tion was Eternity, and, like many other worthy persons, he 
 used to faricy that meaning was an affair of aggregation, and 
 that he doubled the intensity of what he said by the sole aid 
 of the multiplication-table. "Eternity!" he used to say, 
 " it is not a day ; it is not a year ; it is not a hundred years ; 
 it is not a thousand years ; it is not a million years ; no, sir " 
 (the sir being thrown in to recall wandering attention), " it 
 is not ten million years ! " and so on, his enthusiasm becom- 
 ing a mere frenzy when he got among his sextillions, till I 
 sometimes wished he had continued in retirement. He used 
 to sit at the open window during thunder-storms, and had a 
 Grecian feeling about death by lightning. In a certair 
 sense he had his desire, for he died suddenly, not by fire 
 from heaven, but by the red flash of apoplexy, leaving his 
 whole estate to charitable uses. 
 
 If K. were out of place as president, that was not P. as 
 Greek professor. Who that ever saw him can forget him, 
 in his old age, like a lusty winter, frosty but kindly, with 
 great silver spectacles of the heroic period, such as scarce 
 twelve noses of these degenerate days could bear ? He was 
 a natural celibate, not dwelling " like the fly in the heart of 
 the apple," but like a lonely bee, rather, absconding himself 
 in Hymettian flowers, incapable of matrimony as a solitary 
 
288 JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL. 
 
 palm-tree. There was not even a tradition of youthful dis- 
 appointment. I fancy him arranging his scrupulous toilet, 
 not for Amaryllis or Neaera, but, like Machiavelli, for the 
 society of his beloved classics. His ears had needed no 
 prophylactic wax to pass the Sirens' isle, nay, he would 
 have kept them the wider open, studious of the dialect in 
 which they sang, and perhaps triumphantly detecting the 
 JEolic digamma in their lay. A thoroughly single man, 
 single-minded, single-hearted, buttoning over his single heart 
 a single-breasted surtout, and wearing always a hat of a 
 single fashion, did he in secret regard the dual number of 
 his favorite language as a weakness ? The son of an officer 
 of distinction in the Revolutionary War, he mounted the 
 pulpit with the erect port of a soldier, and carried his cane 
 more in the fashion of a weapon than a staff, but with the 
 point lowered in token of surrender to the peaceful proprie- 
 ties of his calling. Yet sometimes the martial instincts 
 would burst the cerements of black coat and clerical neck- 
 cloth, as once when the students had got into a fight upon 
 the training-field, and the licentious soldiery, furious with 
 rum, had driven them at point of bayonet to the College 
 gates, and even threatened to lift their arms against the 
 Muses' bower. Then, like Major Goffe at Deerfield, sud- 
 denly appeared the gray-haired P., all his father resurgent 
 in him, and shouted, " Now, my lads, stand your ground ; 
 you 're in the right now ! don't let one of them get inside 
 the College grounds!" Thus he allowed arms to get the 
 better of the toga, but raised it, like the Prophet's breeches, 
 into a banner, and carefully ushered resistance with a pre- 
 amble of infringed right. Fidelity was his strong charac- 
 teristic, and burned equably in him through a life of eighty- 
 three years. He drilled himself till inflexible habit stood 
 sentinel before all those postern-weaknesses which tempera- 
 ment leaves unbolted to temptation. A lover of the schol- 
 ar's herb, yet loving freedom more, and knowing that the 
 
CAMBRIDGE WORTHIES THIRTY YEARS AGO. 289 
 
 animal appetites ever hold one hand behind them for Satan 
 to drop a bribe in, he would never have two cigars in his 
 house at once, but walked every day to the shop to fetch his 
 single diurnal solace. Nor would he trust liimself with two 
 on Saturdays, preferring (since he could not violate the Sab- 
 bath even by that infinitesimal traffic) to depend on Provi- 
 dential ravens, which were seldom wanting in the shape of 
 some black-coated friend who knew his need and honored 
 the scruple that occasioned it. He was faithful also to his 
 old hats, in which appeared the constant service of the an- 
 tique world, and which he preserved forever, piled like a 
 black pagoda under his dressing-table. No scarecrow was 
 ever the residuary legatee of his beavers, though one of 
 them in aify of the neighboring peach-orchards would have 
 been sovran against an attack of Freshmen. He wore them 
 all in turn, getting through all in the course of the year, like 
 the sun through the signs of the Zodiac, modulating them 
 according to seasons and celestial phenomena, so that ne\r 
 was spider-web or chickweed so sensitive a weather-gauge 
 as they. Nor did his political party find him less loyal. 
 Taking all the tickets, he would seat himself apart, and care- 
 fully compare them with the list of regular nominations as 
 printed in his Daily Advertiser before he dropped his ballot 
 in the box. In less ambitious moments, it almost seems to 
 me that I would rather have had that slow, conscientious 
 vote of P.'s alone, than have been chosen alderman of the 
 ward! 
 
 If you had walked to what was then Sweet Auburn, by 
 the pleasant Old Road, on some June morning thirty years 
 ago, you would, very likely, have met two other character- 
 istic persons, both phantasmagoric now and belonging to the 
 Past. Fifty years earlier, the scarlet-coated, rapiered fig- 
 ures of Vassall, Oliver, and Brattle creaked up and down 
 there on red-heeled shoes, lifting the ceremonious three- 
 cornered hat and offering the fugacious hospitalities of the 
 19 
 
290 JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL. 
 
 snuff-box. They are all shadowy alike now, not one of 
 your Etruscan Lucumos or Roman consuls more so, my 
 dear Storg. First is W., his queue slender and tapering 
 like the tail of a violet crab, held out horizontally, by the 
 high collar of his shepherd's-gray overcoat, whose style was 
 of the latest when he studied at Leyden in his hot youth. 
 The age of cheap clothes sees no more of those faithful old 
 garments, as proper to their wearers, and as distinctive as 
 the barks of trees, and by long use interpenetrated with 
 their very nature. Nor do we see so many humors (still 
 in the old sense) now that every man's soul belongs to the 
 Public, as when social distinctions were more marked, and 
 men felt that their personalities were their castles, in which 
 they could entrench themselves against the world. Now-a- 
 days men are shy of letting their true selves be seen, as if 
 in some former life they had committed a crime, and were 
 all the time afraid of discovery and arrest in this. For- 
 merly they used to insist on your giving the wall to their 
 peculiarities, and you may still find examples of it in the 
 parson or the doctor of retired villages. One of W.'s oddi- 
 ties was touching. A little brook used to run across the 
 street, and the sidewalk was carried over it by a broad stone. 
 Of course, there is no brook now. What use did tliat little 
 glimpse of ripple serve, where the children used to launch 
 their chip fleets ? W., in going over this stone, which gave 
 a hollow resonance to the tread, used to strike upon it three 
 times with his cane, and mutter Tom ! Tom ! Tom ! I used 
 to think he was only mimicking with his voice the sound of 
 the blows, and possibly it was that sound which suggested 
 his thought, for he was remembering a favorite nephew 
 prematurely dead. Perhaps Tom had sailed his boats 
 there ; perhaps the reverberation under the old man's foot 
 hinted at the hollowness of life ; perhaps the fleeting eddies 
 of the water brought to mind the fugaces annos. W., like 
 P., wore amazing spectacles, fit to transmit no smaller image 
 
CAMBRIDGE WORTHIES THIRTY YEARS AGO. 291 
 
 than the page of mightiest folios of Dioscorides or Hercules 
 de Saxonia, and rising full-disked upon the beholder like 
 those. prodigies of two moons at once, portending change to 
 monarchs. The great collar disallowing any independent 
 rotation of the head, I remember he used to turn his whole 
 person in order to bring their foci to bear upon an object. 
 One can fancy that terrified nature would have yielded up 
 her secrets at once, without cross-examination, at their first 
 glare. Through them he had gazed fondly into the great 
 mare's-nest of Junius, publishing his observations upon the 
 eggs found therein in a tall octavo. It was he who intro- 
 duced vaccination to this Western World. He used to stop 
 and say good morning kindly, and pat the shoulder of the 
 blushing school-boy who now, with the fierce snow-storm 
 wildering without, sits and remembers sadly those old meet- 
 ings and partings in the June sunshine. 
 
 Then there was S., whose resounding " Haw ! haw ! haw ! 
 by George ! " positively enlarged the income of every dwell- 
 er in Cambridge. In downright, honest good cheer and 
 good neighborhood, it was worth five hundred a year to 
 every one of us. Its jovial thunders cleared the mental air 
 of every sulky cloud. Perpetual childhood dwelt in him, 
 the childhood of his native Southern France, and its fixed 
 air was all the time bubbling up and sparkling and winking 
 in his eyes. It seemed as if his placid old face were only a 
 mask behind which a merry Cupid had ambushed himself, 
 peeping out all the while, and ready to drop it when the 
 play grew tiresome. Every word he uttered seemed to be 
 hilarious, no matter what the occasion. If he were sick and 
 you visited him, if he had met with a misfortune (and there 
 are few men so wise that they can look even at the back of 
 a retiring sorrow with composure), it was all one ; his great 
 laugh went off as if it were set like an alarum-clock, to run 
 down, whether he would or no, at a certain nick. Even 
 after an ordinary good-morning! (especially if to an old 
 
292 JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL. 
 
 pupil, arid in French,) the wonderful Haw ! haw ! haw ! by 
 George ! would burst upon you unexpectedly, like a salute 
 of artillery on some holiday which you had forgotten. Ev- 
 erything was a joke to him, that the oath of allegiance 
 had been administered to him by your grandfather, that 
 he had taught Prescott his first Spanish (of which he was 
 proud), no matter what. Everything came to him marked 
 by nature right side up, with care, and he kept it so. 
 The world to him, as to all of us, was like a medal, on the 
 obverse of which is stamped the image of Joy, and on the 
 reverse that of Care. S. never took the foolish pains to 
 look at that other side, even if he knew its existence ; much 
 less would it have occurred to him to turn it into view and 
 insist that his friends should look at it with him. Nor was 
 this a mere outside good-humor ; its source was deeper in a 
 true Christian kindliness and amenity. Once when he had 
 been knocked down by a tipsily-driven sleigh, and was urged 
 to prosecute the offenders, " No, no," he said, his wounds 
 still fresh, "young blood! young blood! it must have its 
 way ; I was young myself." Was I few men come into life 
 so young as S. went out. He landed in Boston (then the 
 front-door of America) in '93, and, in honor of the cere- 
 mony, had his head powdered afresh and put on a suit of 
 court-mourning before he set foot on the wharf. My fancy 
 always dressed him in that violet silk, and his soul certainly 
 wore a full court-suit What was there ever like his bow ? 
 It was as if you had received a decoration, and could write 
 yourself gentleman from that day forth. His hat rose, re- 
 greeting your own, and having sailed through the stately 
 curve of the old regime, sank gently back over that placid 
 brain which harbored no thought less white than the powder 
 which covered it. I have sometimes imagined that there 
 was a graduated arc over his head, invisible to other eyes* 
 than his, by which he meted out to each his rightful share 
 of castorial consideration. I carry in my memory three 
 
CAMBRIDGE WORTHIES THIRTY YEARS AGO. 293 
 
 exemplary bows. The first is that of an old beggar, who 
 already carrying in his hand a white hat, the gift of benevo- 
 lence, took off the black one from his head also, and pro- 
 foundly saluted me with both at once, giving me, in return 
 for my alms, a dual benediction, puzzling as a nod from 
 Janus Bifrons. The second I received from an old Cardinal 
 who was taking his walk just outside the Porta San Gio- 
 vanni at Rome. I paid him the courtesy due to his age and 
 rank. Forthwith rose first the Hat ; second, the hat of 
 his confessor; third, that of another priest who attended 
 him ; fourth, the fringed cocked-hat of his coachman ; fifth 
 and sixth, the ditto, ditto, of his two footmen. Here was an 
 investment, indeed ; six hundred per cent interest on a sin- 
 gle bow ! The third bow, worthy to be noted in one's alma- 
 nac among the other mirabilia, was that of S. in which 
 courtesy had mounted to the last round of her ladder, and 
 tried to draw it up after her. 
 
 But the genial veteran is gone even while I am writing 
 this, and I will play Old Mortality no longer. Wandering 
 among these recent graves, my dear friend, we may chance 
 
 to but no, I will not end my sentence.' I bid you 
 
 heartily farewell ! 
 
B E E T H OVE H. 
 
 A LETTER TO GOETHE. 
 
 BY BETTINA VON ARMM 
 
 IT is Beethoven of whom I will now speak to you, and 
 with whom I have forgotten the world and you : true, 
 I am not ripe for speaking, but I am nevertheless not mis- 
 taken when I say (what no one understands and believes) 
 that he far surpasses all in mind, and whether we shall 
 ever overtake him? I doubt it! may he only live till 
 that mighty and sublime enigma which lies within his 
 spirit be matured to its highest perfection ! Yes, may he 
 reach his highest aim, then will he surely leave a key to 
 heavenly knowledge in our hands which will bring us one 
 step nearer to true happiness. 
 
 To you I may confess, that I believe in a divine magic, 
 which is the element of mental nature; this magic does 
 Beethoven exercise in his art ; all relating to it which he 
 can teach you is pure magic; each combination is the 
 organization of a higher existence: and thus, too, does 
 Beethoven feel himself to be the founder of a new sensual 
 basis in spiritual life. You will understand what I mean 
 to say by this, and what is true. Who could replace this 
 spirit? from whom could we expect an equivalent? The 
 whole business of mankind passes to and fro before him 
 like clock-work ; he alone produces freely from out himself 
 the unforeseen, the uncreated. What is intercourse with 
 
BEETHOVEN. 295 
 
 the world to him who ere the sunrise is already at his 
 sacred work, and who after sunset scarcely looks around 
 him, who forgets to nourish his body, and is borne in 
 his flight on the stream of inspiration far beyond the shores 
 of that e very-day life ? He says himself: " When I open 
 my eyes, I cannot but sigh, for what I see is against my 
 religion, and I am compelled to despise the world, which 
 has no presentrment that music is a higher revelation than 
 all their wisdom and philosophy. Music is the wine which 
 inspires new creations ; and I am the Bacchus who presses 
 out this noble wine for mankind, and makes them spirit- 
 drunk; and then, when they are sober again, what have 
 they not fished up to bring with them to dry land ? I have 
 no friend ; I must live with myself alone ; but I well know I 
 that God is nearer to me in my art than to others. I com- \ 
 mune with him without dread ; I have ever acknowledged 
 and understood him ; neither have I any fear for my mu- 
 sic ; it can meet no evil fate. He to whom it makes itself 
 intelligible must become freed from all the wretchedness 
 which others drag about with them/' All this did Beetho- 
 ven say to me the first time I saw him. A feeling of rev- 
 ence penetrated me, as, with such friendly openness, he 
 uttered his mind to me, who could have been only very 
 unimportant to him. I was surprised, too, because I had 
 been told he was very shy, and conversed with no one. 
 
 They were afraid to introduce me to him, and I was 
 forced to find him out alone. He has three dwellings, in 
 which he alternately secretes himself; one in the country, 
 one in the town, and the third upon the bulwarks. Here 
 I found him upon the third floor ; unannounced, I entered, 
 he was seated at the piano ; I mentioned my name : he 
 was very friendly, and asked if I would hear a song that he 
 had just composed; then he sung, shrill and piercing, so 
 that the plaintiveness reacted upon the hearer, "Kno**'s1 
 thou the land." "It 's beautiful, is it not?" said he ; 
 
296 BETTINA VON ARNIM. 
 
 spired, "most beautiful! I will sing it again." He was 
 delighted at my cheerful praise. " Most men," said he, are 
 touched by something good, but they are no artist-natures ; 
 artists are ardent, they do not weep." Then he sung an- 
 other of your songs, to which he had a few days ago com- 
 posed music, "Dry not the tears of eternal love." He 
 accompanied me home, and it was upon the way that he 
 said so many beautiful things upon art ; withal he spoke so 
 loud, stood still so often upon the street, that some courage 
 was necessary to listen; he spoke passionately and much 
 too startlingly for me not also to forget that we were in the 
 street. They were much surprised to see me enter, with 
 him, in a large company assembled to dine with us. After 
 dinner, he placed himself, unasked, at the instrument, and 
 played long and wonderfully: his pride and genius were 
 both in ferment; under such excitement his spirit creates 
 the inconceivable, and his fingers perform the impossible. 
 Since this he comes every day, or I go to him. For this 
 I neglect parties, picture-galleries, theatres, and even St. 
 Stephen's tower itself. Beethoven says, " Ah ! what should 
 you see there ? I will fetch you, and towards evening we 
 will go through the Schonbrunn alley." Yesterday, I 
 walked with him in a splendid garden, in full blossom, all 
 the hot-houses open ; the scent was overpowering. Beetho- 
 ven stood still in the burning sun, and said, " Goethe's 
 poems maintain a powerful sway over me, not only by their 
 matter, but also their rhythm ; I am disposed and excited 
 to compose by this language, which ever forms itself, as 
 through spirits, to more exalted order, already carrying 
 within itself the mystery of harmonies. Then, from the 
 focus of inspiration, I feel myself compelled to let the mel- 
 ody stream forth on all sides. I follow it, passionately 
 overtake it again; I see it escape me, vanish amidst the 
 crowd of varied excitements, soon I seize upon it again 
 with renewed passion ; I cannot part from it, with quick 
 
BEETHOVEN. 297 
 
 rapture I multiply it, in every form of modulation, and 
 at the last moment, I triumph over the first musical thought, 
 
 see now, that 's a symphony ; yes, music is indeed 
 the mediator between the spiritual and sensual life. I 
 should like to speak with Goethe upon this, if he would 
 understand me. Melody is the sensual life of poetry. Do 
 not the spiritual contents of a poem become sensual feeling 
 through melody? Do we not in Mignon's song perceive 
 its entire sensual frame of mind through melody ? and does 
 not this perception excite again to new productions ? There, 
 the spirit extends itself to unbounded universality, where 
 all in all forms itself into a bed for the stream of feelings 
 which take their rise in the simple musical thought, and 
 which else would die unperceived away ; this is harmony, 
 this is expressed in my symphonies ; the blending of various 
 forms rolls on as in a bed to its goal. Then one feels that 
 an Eternal, an Infinite, never quite to be embraced, lies in 
 all that is spiritual; and although in my works I have 
 always a feeling of success, yet I have an eternal hunger, 
 
 that what seemed exhausted with the last stroke of the 
 drum with which I drive my enjoyment, my musical con- 
 victions, into the hearers, to begin again like a child. 
 Speak to Goethe of me, tell him he should hear my sym- 
 phonies ; he would then allow me to be right in saying that 
 music is the only unembodied entrance into a higher sphere 
 of knowledge which possesses man, but he will never be 
 able to possess it. One must have rhythm in the mind to 
 comprehend music in its essential being; music gives pre- 
 sentiment, inspiration of heavenly knowledge; and that 
 which the spirit feels sensual in it is the embodying of spir- 
 itual knowledge. Although the spirits live upon music, as 
 one lives upon air, yet it is something else spiritually to 
 understand it ; but the more the soul draws out of it its sen- 
 sual nourishment, the more ripe does the spirit become foi 
 a happy intelligence with it But few attain to this ; for, 
 
298 BETTINA VON ARNIM. 
 
 as thousands engage themselves for love's sake, and among 
 these thousands love does not once reveal itself, although 
 they all occupy themselves of love, in like manner do 
 thousands hold communion with music, and do not possess 
 its revelation : signs of an elevated moral sense form, too, 
 the groundwork of music, as of every art. All genuine 
 invention is a moral progress. To subject one's self to 
 music's unsearchable laws ; by virtue of these laws to curb 
 and guide the spirit, so that it pours forth these revelations, 
 this is the isolating principle of art ; to be dissolved in its 
 revelations, this is abandonment to genius, which tranquilly 
 exercises its authority over the delirium of unbridled pow- 
 ers; and thus grants to fancy the highest efficacy. Thus 
 does art ever represent divinity, and that which stands in 
 human relation to it is religion; what we acquire through 
 art is from God, a divine suggestion, which sets up a goal 
 for human capacities, which the spirit attains. 
 
 " We do not know what grants us knowledge ; the firmly 
 enclosed seed needs the moist, warm, electric soil to grow, 
 think, express itself. Music is the electric soil in which the 
 spirit lives, thinks, invents. Philosophy is the precipitation 
 of its electric spirit; and its necessity, which will ground 
 everything upon a first principle, is supplied by music; 
 and although the spirit be not master of that which it 
 creates through music, yet is it blessed in this creation; 
 in this manner, too, is every creation of art independent ; 
 mightier than the artist himself, and returns by its appear- 
 ance back to the divine ; and is only connected with men, 
 in so much as it bears witness to the divine mediation 
 in him. 
 
 "Music gives to the spirit relation to harmony. A 
 thought abstracted has still the feeling of communion, of 
 affinity, in the spirit ; thus each thought in music is in the 
 most intimate, inseparable affinity with the communion of 
 harmony, which is unity. 
 
BEETHOVEN. 299 
 
 " The electric excites the spirit to musical, fluent, stream- 
 ing production. 
 
 " I am of electric nature. I must break off with my 
 unwitnessed wisdom, else I shall miss the rehearsal ; write 
 to Goethe about me, if you understand me; but I can 
 answer nothing, and I will willingly let myself be instructed 
 by him." I promised him to write to you all, as well as I 
 could understand it. He took me to a grand rehearsal, 
 with full orchestra, there T sat in the wide, unlighted 
 space, in a box quite alone ; single gleams stole through 
 the crevices and knot-holes, in which a stream of bright 
 sparks were dancing, like so many streets of light, peopled 
 by happy spirits. 
 
 There, then, I saw this mighty spirit exercise his rule. 
 O GoetlTe ! no emperor and no king feels such entire con- 
 sciousness of his power, and that all pWer proceeds from 
 him, as this Beethoven, who just now, in the garden, in vain 
 sought out the source from which he receives it all ; did I 
 understand him as I feel him, then I should know every- 
 thing. There he stood so firmly resolved, his gestures, 
 his countenance, expressed the completion of his creation ; 
 he prevented each error, each misconception ; not a breath 
 was voluntary ; all, by the genial presence of his spirit, set 
 in the most regulated activity. One could prophesy that 
 such a spirit, in its later perfection, would step forth again 
 as ruler of the earth. 
 
A SONG FROM THE ARCADIA. 
 
 BY SIR PHILIP SIDNEY. 
 
 SINCE Nature's works be good, and death doth serve 
 As Nature's work : why should we fear to die ? 
 Since fear is vain but when it may preserve : 
 Why should we fear that which we cannot fly ? 
 
 Fear is more pain* than is the pain it fears, 
 Disarming human minds of native might : 
 While each conceit an ugly figure bears, 
 Which were not ill, well viewed in reason's light. 
 
 Our only eyes, which dimmed with passions be, 
 And scarce discern the dawn of coming day, 
 Let them be cleared, and now begin to see, 
 Our life is but a step in dusty way. 
 
 Then let us hold the bliss of peaceful mind, 
 Since this we feel, great loss we cannot find. 
 
HOUSEHOLD FRIENDS 
 
 FOR EVERY SEASON 
 
 'The pleasant books, that silently among 
 
 Our household treasures take familiar places, 
 And are to us as if a living tongue 
 
 Spake from the printed leaves or pictured faces ! " 
 
 LONGFELLOW. 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 ALFRED TENNYSON : The Hesperides .... 1 
 
 THOMAS HUGHES : The Ashen Fagot . . 6 
 
 
 
 OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES: Contentment ... 47 
 
 ANNA THACKERAY : Little Scholars ... 50 
 
 A. WEST : Andante 68 
 
 SIR THOMAS BROWNE : On Dreams .... 69 
 
 CHRISTINA ROSSETTI : Goblin Market .... 74 
 
 THEODORE WINTHROP : Love and Skates ... 92 
 
 D. G. ROSSETTI : The Blessed Damozel .... 162 
 
 JEAN PAUL: The Happy Life of a Parish Priest . 167 
 THOMAS HOOD : The Song of the Shirt . . . .173 
 
 SAMUEL SMILES : John Flaxman 176 
 
 JOHN G. WHITTIER: Raphael 185 
 
 W. M. THACKERAY: Tunbridge Toys .... 188 
 
 WILLIAM WORDSWORTH: To the Moon .... 196 
 
 LORD JEFFREY : Character of Watt .... 198 
 
 CHARLES LAMB : An Essay on Roast Pig . . . 203 
 
iv CONTENTS. 
 
 D. A. WASSON : All '* Well 212 
 
 CHARLES DICKENS : Carlavero's Bottle .... 215 
 
 MRS. H. B. STOWE : When I awake, I am still with thee 227 
 JOHN KEATS: The Eve of St. Agnes . . . .228 
 
 ADELAIDE A. PROCTER: Links with Heaven . . 241 
 
 HENRY D. THOREAU : Winter Animals in the Woods . 243 
 
 SYDNEY DOBELL : Home, Wounded .... 253 
 
 SIR PHILIP SIDNEY : Thoughts from the Arcadia . . 263 
 
 LORD BYRON : The Rhine 265 
 
 ROSE TERRY : A Woman . 267 
 
 J. G. HOLLAND : Daniel Gray 295 
 
 ALEXANDER CARLYLE : My Friends 298 
 
 SHELLEY: Beatrice's Song 317 
 
 WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT: Thanatopsis .... 318 
 
THE HESPERIDES 
 
 BY ALFRED TENNYSON. 
 
 "Hesperus and his daughters three, 
 That sing about the golden tree." COMCS. 
 
 THE North-wind fallen, in the new-starred night 
 ZMonian Hanno, voyaging beyond 
 The hoary promontory of Soloe 
 Past Thymiaterion, in calmed bays, 
 Between the southern and the western Horn, 
 Heard neither warbling of the nightingale, 
 Nor melody o' the Lybian lotus-flute 
 Blown seaward from the shore ; but from a slope 
 That ran bloom-bright into the Atlantic blue, 
 Beneath a highland leaning down a weight 
 Of cliffs, and zoned below with cedar-shade, 
 Came voices, like the voices in a dream, 
 Continuous, till he reached the outer sea. 
 
 SONG. 
 I. 
 
 The golden apple, the golden apple, the hallowed fruit, 
 Guard it well, guard it warily, 
 
 * The Laureate of England (whose latest portrait fronts our title-page) 
 has seen fit to ignore many of his earlier productions, some of which he 
 thought well enough of once. The one entitled " Hesperides " is too gen- 
 
 1 
 
2 ALFRED TENNYSON. 
 
 Singing airily, 
 
 Standing about the charmed root. 
 
 Round about all is mute, 
 
 As the snow-field on the mountain-peaks, 
 
 As the sand-field at the mountain-foot. 
 
 Crocodiles in briny creeks 
 
 Sleep and stir not : all is mute. 
 
 If ye sing not, if ye make false measure, 
 
 We shall lose eternal pleasure, 
 
 Worth eternal want of rest. 
 
 Laugh not loudly : watch the treasure 
 
 Of the wisdom of the west. 
 
 In a corner wisdom whispers. Five and three 
 
 (Let it not be preached abroad) make an awful mystery. 
 
 For the blossom unto threefold music bloweth ; 
 
 Evermore it is born anew ; 
 
 And the sap to threefold music floweth, 
 
 From the root 
 
 Drawn in the dark, 
 
 Up tq the fruit, 
 
 Creeping under the fragrant bark, 
 
 Liquid gold, honey-sweet, through and through. 
 
 Keen-eyed sisters, singing airily, 
 
 Looking warily 
 
 Every way, 
 
 Guard the apple night and day, 
 
 Lest one from the east come and take it away. 
 
 ii. 
 
 Father Hesper, Father Hesper, watch, watch, ever and aye, 
 Looking under silver hair with a silver eye. 
 
 uine a poem to be left out of his *' complete edition," and we print it here 
 because we think it worthy of the bard of " Locksley Hull" and " The 
 Ladv of Shalott." 
 
THE HESPERIDES. 3 
 
 Father, twinkle not thy steadfast sight ; 
 
 Kingdoms lapse, and climates change, and races die ; 
 
 Honor comes with mystery ; 
 
 Hoarded wisdom brings delight. 
 
 Number, tell them over and number 
 
 How many the mystic fruit-tree holds, 
 
 Lest the red-combed dragon slumber 
 
 Rolled together in purple folds. 
 
 Look to him, father, lest he wink, and the golden apple be 
 
 stolen away, 
 For his ancient heart is drunk with overwatchings night 
 
 and day, 
 
 Round about the hallowed fruit-tree curled : 
 Sing awa%y, sing aloud evermore in the wind, without stop, 
 Lest his scaled eyelid drop, 
 
 For he is older than the world. 
 
 
 
 If he waken, we waken, 
 
 Rapidly levelling eager eyes. 
 
 If he sleep, we sleep, 
 
 Dropping the eyelid over the eyes. 
 
 If the golden apple be taken, 
 
 The world will be overwise. 
 
 Five links, a golden chain, are we, 
 
 Hesper, the dragon, and sisters three, 
 
 Bound about the golden tree. 
 
 m. 
 
 Father Hesper, Father Hesper, watch, watch, night and day, 
 
 Lest the old wound of the world be healed, 
 
 The glory unsealed, 
 
 The golden apple stolen away, 
 
 And the ancient secret revealed. 
 
 Look from west to east along : 
 
 Father, old Hirnala weakens, Caucasus is bold aiid strong. 
 
4 ALFRED TENNYSON. 
 
 Wandering waters unto wandering waters call ; 
 
 Let them clash together, foam and fall. 
 
 Out of watchings, out of wiles, 
 
 Comes the bliss of secret smiles. 
 
 All things are not told to all. 
 
 Half-round the mantling night is drawn, 
 
 Purple-fringed with even and dawn. 
 
 Hesper hateth Phosphor, evening hateth morn. 
 
 IV. 
 
 Every flower and every fruit the redolent breath 
 
 Of this warm sea-wind ripeneth, 
 
 Arching the billow in his sleep ; 
 
 But the land-wind wandereth, 
 
 Broken by the highland-steep, 
 
 Two streams upon the violet deep : 
 
 For the western sun and the western star, 
 
 And the low west-wind, breathing afar, 
 
 The end of day and beginning of night, 
 
 Make the apple holy and bright ; 
 
 Holy and bright, round and full, bright and blest, 
 
 Mellowed in a land of rest ; 
 
 Watch it warily day and night ; 
 
 All good things are in the west. 
 
 Till midnoon the cool east light 
 
 Is shut out by the round of the tall hill-brow ; 
 
 But when the full-faced sunset yellowly 
 
 Stays on the flowering arch of the bough, 
 
 The luscious fruitage clustereth mellowly, 
 
 Golden-kernelled, golden-cored, 
 
 Sunset-ripened above on the tree. 
 
 The world is wasted with fire and sword, 
 
 But the apple of gold hangs over the sea. 
 
 Five links, a golden chain, are we, 
 
THE HESPERIDES. 
 
 Hesper, the dragon, and sisters three, 
 
 Daughters three, 
 
 Bound about 
 
 All round about 
 
 The gnarled bole of the charmed tree. 
 
 The golden apple, the golden apple, the hallowed fruit, 
 
 Guard it well, guard it warily, 
 
 Watch it warily, 
 
 Singing airily,' 
 
 Standing about the charmed root 
 
THE ASHEN FAGOT. 
 
 BY THOMAS HUGHES, 
 
 AUTHOR OF "TOM BBOWH AT OXFORD," ETC. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 AT about four o'clock on Christmas Eve, a year or two 
 back, two men trudged briskly up the little village 
 street of Lilburne, in the county of Wilts. They were both 
 dressed in rough shooting-suits, and one carried a common 
 game-bag, and the other a knapsack. Each of them had a 
 stout stick in his hand. The elder, who might be six or 
 seven and twenty, wore a strong reddish-brown beard. The 
 rest of his rather broad face was well tanned by exposure to 
 weather ; he had a clear, merry gray eye, and an air of very 
 British self-reliance about him. The younger, in his twen- 
 tieth year, or thereabouts, wore also as much beard as na- 
 ture had yet bestowed on him, and was tanned a ruddy 
 brown. He was darker than his companion, and his com- 
 plexion would have been sallow, but for the work of sun 
 and air on* it. There was the possibility of great ner- 
 vous irritability and excitableness in the look of him ; but 
 this natural tendency of his constitution and temperament 
 seemed, at least for the present, to be counteracted by 
 robust health. 
 
 The two stopped at the door of " The Wagoner's Rest," 
 the only public house of Lilburne village. 
 
 " Well, here we are then, at the last stage. How much 
 farther do you say it is?" 
 
THE ASHEN FAGOT. 7 
 
 "Just six miles." 
 
 " I 'ra never quite at ease about your arithmetic, Johnny. 
 Hullo here. House ! landlord ! who 's at home here ? " and 
 he gave a thump or two on the door-post, which brought 
 mine host out with a run. 
 
 " How far do you call it to Avenly, landlord ? " 
 
 "A matter o' seven miles, sir." 
 
 " There, you see, Herbert, I was n't far wrong," said the 
 younger. 
 
 " A mile out, Johnny, never mind. Now what do yoi 
 say ? shall we push on at once, or stop and feed ? " 
 
 " What should you. like ? " 
 
 " That has nothing to say to it. You 're in command, you 
 know, sinc# this morning." 
 
 " Well, I should n't like to be there very early. I 'm 
 sure you would feel yourself " 
 
 " Then we call a halt," interrupted the elder, leading the 
 way into the house ; " this cold air of yours has given me a 
 deuce of an appetite. Now, landlord, what can we have to 
 eat, directly ? Some cold meat, or whatever you can give 
 us at once. Mind, sharp 's the word ! Or, never mind, no, 
 you go and draw us some of your best tap. You 11 help us, 
 ma'am, I can see, about the eatables, and I'm sure we 
 couldn't be in better hands." 
 
 This speech, begun in the street, ended in the tiny bar of 
 " The Wagoner's Rest," in which the hostess stood, a tidy, 
 well-looking woman, in Sunday cap and ribbons, donned in 
 honor of the season, and of the rush of guests whom she 
 was expecting as the day wore on. 
 
 She was flattered by the compliment of her off-hand 
 guest, who clearly was not in the habit of letting the 
 grass grow on his own heels, or on those of any one else 
 with whom he had to do. He had sent her bustling off in 
 a minute or two to cook rashers of bacon on toast, and to 
 run round to the yard in the forlorn hope that one of the 
 
8 THOMAS HUGHES. 
 
 hens might have so forgotten herself as to lay IL such 
 weather, in that cold, dark little stable of " The Wag mer's 
 Rest." Meanwhile, he had taken possession of the bar, 
 heaped up the fire, seated his companion opposite to him, 
 and, by the time the landlord arrived with a jug of his best 
 ale, was as much at home as if he had been in the habit of 
 taking his meals there once a week for the last ten years. 
 
 " I 'm afraid you '11 find it a leetel chilly, gentlemen," said 
 the landlord, as he placed the jug and glasses on the table ; 
 "the cellar ain't altogether as warm as it should be." 
 
 " O, never fear ! We shall warm your ale fast enough, 
 I've no doubt. Home-brewed, eh?" 
 
 " Ees, whoam-brewed, sir ; I does the maltin' for all the 
 farmers round. 'Tis raal malt and hops, I assure 'ee." 
 
 " That 's all right then. Yes, that has the right smack," 
 he went on, pouring out a glass and taking it off, " fine and 
 bright and wholesome tackle. We have n't tasted such ale 
 this many a day, have we, Johnny ? But, as you say, a 
 little chilled ; so we '11 put it on the hob till the rashers 
 come. Real old Christmas weather this, eh, landlord ? " 
 
 "Ah, 'tis, sir." 
 
 a And when does your mail-cart come by ? " 
 
 "At eight o'clock, sir." 
 
 "Well, the driver will bring our traps, and there is a 
 carrier from this to Avenly, is n't there ? " 
 
 "Ees, sir." 
 
 "Does he live here?" 
 
 "Just athert the street, sir." 
 
 " Then I should like to see him. You can send over for 
 him presently. Ah, here come the rashers. They look 
 splendid, ma'am. But no eggs ! " 
 
 " Well, sir, you see as our hens gets no het about the 
 place. My master don't kep no beastesses. There 's no 
 'commodation for 'em here, and I tells 'un th' hens wunt 
 lay without het." 
 
THE ASHEN FAGOT. 9 
 
 "Never mind, ma'am; the hens are quite right. We 
 shall do famously with that splendid loaf and the cheese. 
 Here, Johnny, hold your plate. We 're not turning you out, 
 ma'am ? Pray, don't go, don't mind us." 
 
 The landlady protested that they were quite welcome to 
 the bar, and soon followed her husband, leaving them alone 
 to their meal, to which they proceeded to do ample justice. 
 The worthy pair were soon discussing their guests with one 
 or two village gossips, who had already arrived in the 
 kitchen, amongst them the village carrier. 
 
 The travellers lost no time over their food. The land- 
 lady was summoned, complimented, and paid, and came out 
 of her bar again very favorably impressed with the stran- 
 gers. In another minute they were in the kitchen amongst 
 the circle of the Lilburne quidnuncs, ready for the road. 
 The elder made the necessary arrangement with the carrier 
 to bring on their luggage, and then, after shaking hands 
 with the courtesying landlady, they sallied out into the 
 street, accompanied to the door by the landlord and several 
 of the men. The daylight was fast slipping away. The 
 air was perfectly still and hushed, but a dull heavy curtain 
 of cloud had settled on the village, from which every now 
 and then a crisp flake or two of snow came floating gently 
 down. . 
 
 " We sha'n't have much light for our walk, Johnny ; are 
 you sure about the road?" 
 
 "I should think so. Besides, there is no turn in it 
 except the one at the end of the village, on to the downs." 
 
 "Very good. You are pilot. It's a straight road to 
 Avenly, eh ? " he added, turning to the carrier. 
 
 " Ees ; but 't is a unked road to kep to in a vail, is the 
 downs road," replied the carrier, " by reason as there ain't 
 no hedges, and sech like, to go by." 
 
 " You think we 're going to have a fall, then ? " 
 
 " It hev looked like nothin' else aal day." 
 
10 THOMAS HUGHES. 
 
 " Then we must make the most of the daylight. The 
 moon will be up in an hour." 
 
 " Ees ; but her '11 kep t' other side o' th' fall, zur." 
 
 " Small blame to her. Well, good night." 
 
 A chorus of " Good nights " from the conclave at the 
 door of "The Wagoner's Rest" followed the two travel- 
 lers, as they strode away down the village street. Before 
 they were out of sight, the snow began to fall in earnest 
 The villagers stood gaping after them. Such an event was 
 to them as good as a war telegram to their kindred circles 
 in the neighborhood of St. James's. 
 
 "Be 'em genTvolk, now, zhould 'ee zay?" asked the 
 blacksmith, taking his pipe from his mouth. 
 
 "GenTvolk! Wut bist thenkin' ov?" replied the 
 carrier. 
 
 " Wut, dost n't thenk so ? I 'ze warn'd 'em for genT- 
 volk, that I 'ool," put in the landlord. " Wut dost take 'em 
 for, then?" 
 
 " Zummat in th' engineerin' line, or contractor chaps, 
 med be." 
 
 " Noa, noa ! Thaay be too pleasant-spoken, and don't 
 give no trouble." 
 
 " But wut dost zaay to them ther 5 girt beards ? And th' 
 clothes on 'em like zacks, and mwoast as coarse ? " 
 
 The beard movement, and modern habits of dress, had 
 not yet penetrated to Lilburne. The carrier's last remark 
 seemed to puzzle the landlord, more or less. 
 
 " Wut dost zaay, Muster Gabbet ? " he said, turning to 
 one of the circle, who had not yet spoken ; " be 'em genT- 
 volk, or bean't 'em?" 
 
 The person appealed to had been a groom in his youth, 
 who had seen " Lunnon," and other distant countries. He 
 kept a pony, too, on which he frequented all neighboring 
 meets of hounds, and other sporting gatherings, and was 
 considered a great authority by the Lilburne coterie on any 
 
THE ASHEN FAGOT. 11 
 
 matter involving knowledge of life. From his contact with 
 the outer world the edges of his accent had been rubbed off. 
 He was a man of few and weighty words. 
 
 " Gentlemen, to be sure," replied Mr. Gabbet. 
 
 " I told 'ee zo," said the landlord, triumphantly, turning to 
 the carrier. 
 
 " Wi' beards like bottle-brushes ! haw, haw ! " rejoined 
 that worthy, by no means discomfited. 
 
 "That's no odds," replied Mr. Gabbet " Last coursin' 
 meetin' ther' was half th' young squires wi' beards." 
 
 " And wi' duds on 'em, like galley-crows, I s'poses ! haw, 
 haw ! " said the incredulous carrier. 
 
 " What dost go on laaffin' for, thee girt gawney ? " said the 
 landlord ^ " that 's how th' genTvolk do dress now-a-days, 
 bean't it, Mr. Gabbet ? Ther 5 wur young Squire Mundell 
 passed here only last week, dressed noways different from 
 thaay ; only he 'd a got zhart wide breeches, and red striped 
 stockin's, he had, and mortal queer a did look." 
 
 "They calls them dresses nick-and-nockers," said Mr. 
 Gabbet, gravely. 
 
 " Nockers or no, / dwont call 'em genTvolk," persisted 
 the incorrigible carrier. 
 
 " Thee 'st as cam as a peg. 'T ain't a mossel o' use to talk 
 sense to th'." 
 
 At this point of the dialogue the objects of the conversa- 
 tion took the turn towards the downs, and disappeared, and 
 Mr. Gabbet retired suddenly into the house. He was lol- 
 lowed at once by the rest, and the knotty question was 
 adjourned to the chimney-corner, where it furnished talk 
 for the rest of the evening, and caused the consumption of 
 several extra mugs of beer. 
 
12 THOMAS HUGHES. 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 THE little hamlet of Avenly is dropped, as it were, in a 
 dip of the downs, many miles from anything approaching to 
 a town. It consists of a miniature church, and neat parson- 
 age-house and garden ; the manor-house and curtilage, 
 which we must look at more closely presently ; one public 
 house ; two or three general shops in a very small way, one 
 of which is the post-office ; and a dozen or two thatched 
 cottages. These are scattered prettily enough by the side 
 of the road from Lilburne to Devizes, or of the little clear 
 brook, which runs parallel to the road through the hamlet, 
 between the church and the manor-house. 
 
 There are three or four clumps of fine ashes and elms in 
 or near the hamlet, of which the biggest is the rookery at 
 the end of the manor-garden. There is also timber in the 
 fences of the few enclosures, one of which enclosures is a 
 fine orchard, and there are fruit-trees in most of the cottage- 
 gardens. Where the hamlet stands, the dip is not half a 
 mile across; it is narrower yet above, and widens below. 
 The downs encircle the place on all sides. Except within 
 the enclosures, not a tree is to be seen ; and the contrast is 
 what gives its peculiar charm to the little out-of-the-way 
 place, as it lies there in the lap of the great brown bare 
 downs, rejoicing in its own shade and verdure. The first 
 glance from the brow above, as you come upon it either 
 from the Lilburne or Devizes side, shows you at once the 
 character of the place. It has the special characteristics of 
 the old manor, the big house in the middle, the little copy- 
 hold tenements clustering about it, and around a sea of com- 
 mon lands ; not that the lands are copyhold, but the manor- 
 house is so completely the centre of the little community, 
 that one could easily fancy the little people about holding 
 their allotments still by suit and service, as indeed they 
 
THE ASHEN FAGOT. 13 
 
 do j for almost all of them are employed by the owner of 
 the manor-house. 
 
 The manor-house itself is one in which the first impres- 
 sion you get on entering, and the last which remains with 
 you after you leave, will most likely be that here, if any- 
 where in the world, there is no lack of anything. 
 
 There is no lack of room. The house is a great, old- 
 fashioned, rambling brick and flint building, with more 
 rooms than anybody can possibly want who is ever likely 
 to live there, and not the sort of little useless rooms which 
 one often sees in country houses, but good, large twenty- 
 foot-by-fifteen places, where a dozen children might romp 
 on a wet day. The outhouses, wlu'ch have been built up by 
 successive generations of wealthy tillers of the soil, each of 
 whom has had some special fancy in the matter of stables, 
 brew-houses, granaries, or barns, are various, solid, and 
 quaint. They surround a yard which covers half an acre 
 of ground, paved with flint round two of the sides to a 
 breadth of some twelve feet, but otherwise soft-bottomed and 
 full of straw, in which fat heifers stand over their hocks, 
 and munch out of the racks which are set up at several 
 points and constantly replenished, and saucy calves disport 
 themselves, and bully the younger generations of small- 
 limbed, fat-sided black pigs, their fellow-occupants. There 
 is animal life of all kinds, representatives of every species 
 of domestic beast or fowl which can be used either for profit 
 or pleasure. There is no lack of dead stock, dozens of 
 hay-ricks and corn-stacks thatched mounds full of mangold- 
 wurzel and turnips and potatoes, besides well-stored barns 
 and granaries ; a dozen ploughs, eight or ten wagons, carts, 
 a light carriage or two, and a steam-engine. 
 
 And, lastly, there is no lack of human stock to crown the 
 whole ; jolter-headed plough-boys and carter-boys, and farm- 
 servants and house-servants, and ". the family," with whom 
 we are chiefly concerned. The head of these, and feudal 
 
14 THOMAS HUGHES. 
 
 king and lord paramount of , the little hamlet of Avenly, is 
 Farmer John Kendrick, as he would call himself, Squire 
 Kendrick, as the peasantry all around call liirn. He is the 
 fourth or fifth in descent of his family, who have owned a 
 considerable tract of land in the dip of the downs in which 
 Avenly lies ; and, besides his own land, he farms a great 
 tract of the downs on lease. In fact, he pays more than 
 four fifths of the tithes and rates of the parish himself, and 
 employs all but some dozen or so of the whole male popu- 
 lation. He is, at the time of our story, a hale man of about 
 forty- three, a good sportsman, and an energetic and success- 
 ful fanner, reasonably well educated, and open-minded, of 
 good plain manners, without mucli polish. He has no near 
 neighbors, except his parson, and no spare time to go far 
 a-field for society ; so that he sees little of it. A just and a 
 kind man, but hot-tempered and somewhat arbitrary, from 
 having had his own way since he was a boy of nineteen, 
 when his father died. He married early the daughter of a 
 clergyman's widow, a lady of education and refinement, 
 whom, nevertheless, he had managed to make very happy, 
 and who had borne him a large family. 
 
 On the morning of the Christmas Eve with which we are 
 concerned, Mrs. Kendrick is making tea in the south parlor 
 of the manor, at a long table, w r hile her eldest daughter 
 Mabel, a girl of eighteen, is cutting large plates of bread- 
 and-butter, and filling mugs with new milk for the younger 
 branches. Presently the bell rings for prayers, and the gov- 
 erness with her convoy arrive at one door, while two school- 
 boys of fifteen and fourteen, and a small boy of nine 
 proud of having been out with his big brothers come in 
 with rosy cheeks from the hall. 
 
 " You can call the servants in, Willie," said Mrs. Ken- 
 drick to the eldest boy, as soon as she had returned all their 
 salutes ; " we are not to wait for papa." 
 
 After prayers, the serious business of breakfast began, 
 amidst a Babel of talk from the boys. 
 
THE ASHEN FAGOT. lo 
 
 " Have n't we had a jolly morning, mamma ? Parker's 
 pond is frozen over splendidly, and we Ve been sliding ever 
 since it was light." 
 
 " And I can do butter-and-eggs all down the long slide, 
 which the carter-boys have made, can't I, Willie ? " (The 
 feat of butter-and-eggs, be it known to those readers who 
 are not up to the higher mysteries of sliding, consists in 
 going down the slide on one foot, and beating with the heel 
 and toe of the other at short intervals.) 
 
 " Yes, and Bobby is getting on famously, and goes at the 
 elide like a little dragon," said Willie. Bobby, the small 
 boy of nine, looked up proudly at his mother, with his 
 mouth too full of bread-and-butter to be able to take his own 
 part \xy speech at the moment. 
 
 " Bobby has n't learnt a word of his lessons though," said 
 a staid little girl of twelve, looking up from her milk ; " and 
 Miss Smith says he '11 have to stay in after breakfast to do 
 them." 
 
 "That's just like you now, Clara," retorted Dick, the 
 butter-and-eggg boy; "why can't you mind your own les- 
 sons, and let Bobby alone ? " 
 
 " But, Bobby, how did you get out so early ? " asked Mrs. 
 Kendrick. 
 
 "O, Willie came in and told me I might get up and 
 come with them." 
 
 " Yes, mamma, and I 'm sure it will do him good to be 
 out with us, instead of being with the girls. He need n't do 
 lessons, need he, just at Christmas time ? " 
 
 " Well, dear, Bobby shall have a holiday, and may go 
 with you. But you must take care of him, for he 's only a 
 little fellow, remember." 
 
 " O, yes, that we will." 
 
 " May n't I have some cold beef, mamma ? " broke in Dick, 
 and, permission being given, he and Willie helped them- 
 selves at the sideboard, and kept the conversation alive 
 
16 THOMAS HUGHES. 
 
 with accounts of the game of hockey they were going to 
 have with the carter-boys, who were to break off work at 
 twelve, and the rat-catching which was to come off in the 
 big barn in the afternoon. 
 
 " And to-ni<rht is Ashen Fagot night, is n't it, mamma ? 
 and you '11 let us all go, and you and papa will come ? You 
 did n't go in last year ; and I heard Joe, the head carter, say 
 it was n't like Ashen Fagot if master and mistress did n't 
 come in." 
 
 A shade passed over Mrs. Kendrick's face, but she said 
 quietly, " Perhaps your papa will look in, dear ; and, at any 
 rate, you can all go for an hour or two." 
 
 "And O, mamma, shall we see the mummers ?" asked a 
 little bright-eyed girl of eight. 
 
 " Most likely, Maggy. They are sure to come, I think." 
 
 " But where 's papa ? Why does n't he come to break- 
 fast?" 
 
 " He has ridden out. He will come down and see you 
 sliding after breakfast, I 'm sure." 
 
 " Do you think I might take his skates? Dick wants to 
 begin, and I could lend him mine if I may have papa's." 
 
 " Yes, certainly, dear. I 'm sure papa would wish you to 
 have them." 
 
 " But, Willie," interrupted Dick, " there 's that pair of 
 smaller ones, hanging up by papa's ; they would fit you 
 better, you know. What's the matter? Why do you 
 kick me under the table ? " 
 
 Willie answered by a frown at his brother, and then 
 glanced up hastily at his mother, who had bent down over 
 her teacup. Mabel, who had been watching her mother 
 since the mention of the Ashen Fagot, got up quickly, 
 saying, 
 
 " O, there 's papa ; I 'm sure I heard his horse. Let us 
 go and bring him in." 
 
 The breakfast circle broke up at once. Willie lingered, 
 
THE ASHEN FAGOT. 17 
 
 looking at his mother, who looked up presently, and 
 said, 
 
 " You can take papa's skates, dear ; but you must n't have 
 the other pair." 
 
 " Of course, dear mother, I know," he said, going up to 
 her fondly. And she kissed him, and he pressed her hand, 
 and then went off after his brothers. Mabel came back 
 with her father, and took out some embroidery-work, and 
 sat by him. while Mrs. Kendrick poured out his tea. Each 
 of them made some efforts to talk, but they were failures, 
 and John Kendrick finished his breakfast in silence. When 
 he had done, he got up and walked to one of the windows 
 and looked out, and his wife came and put her hand on his 
 shouldes. He took her other hand in his, and said, 
 
 " It was selfish of me to leave you this morning, dear, but 
 I could n't have borne the children's merry prattle so early. 
 I shall be better before dinner-time. What are the boys 
 doing?" 
 
 " They have gone down to the pond, dear, full of all their 
 plans. They are very happy. Shall we dine alone, just 
 you, I, and Mabel?" 
 
 " No, no ! I niust face it. It 's only just to-day. One 
 must make home cheerful to them in their holidays." 
 
 " Indeed, dear John, they are very happy ; are not they, 
 Mabel?" 
 
 " Yes, really, papa ; and Willie is so thoughtful and nice." 
 
 " He 's a fine character, thank God," said Mr. Kendrick ; 
 and then, after a minute's pause, he went on : " Only to 
 have written those three lines all this time. For myself, I 
 should n't wonder, but the cruelty of such silence to you, 
 to Mabel" 
 
 "But, dearest John, remember they were written on 
 board ship. He may never have had a chance of writing 
 again." 
 
 " God knows, dearest A cold heart, I fear." 
 2 
 
18 THOMAS HUGHES. 
 
 "O, no, papa. Indeed you wrong him. He -was wild 
 and headstrong, but never cold or cruel." 
 
 " I would give all I an worth to be sure of it, Mabel. 
 Come, come, we must bear it as we may. Shall we walk 
 out presently, dear? I want to go to the bailiff's cottage, 
 and to call at old Jacob Eagleton's. His wife 's ill again ; 
 we can carry her some wine, and take the pond on the way 
 home, and see the boys slide." 
 
 " In half an hour, dear ? " 
 
 " Yes. You and Mabe will call for me, then, in my 
 room." 
 
 John Kendrick went to his study, and sat down before 
 his library table, and looked for five minutes absently across 
 the room and out of the window ; a most unwonted thing 
 for him. Then he roused himself with a start and a sigh, 
 and took a small bundle of letters and papers, chiefly bills, 
 out of the drawer of his library table. The letters were in 
 a school-boy hand. He read them through, tied up the 
 packet, and put them back, and then went and unlocked a 
 cupboard, and was looking at a cap, a riding-whip, and 
 cricket-bat, and other articles of dress and sport which it 
 contained, when he heard his wife's step. He shut and 
 locked the door of the cupboard, and turned to meet her 
 and Mabel. 
 
 " Here we are, dear, ready for our walk, and here 's the 
 post-bag." 
 
 John Kendrick took it and unlocked it, turning the con- 
 tents on to his table. A couple of papers and a half a 
 dozen letters fell out. He took up the first and was reading 
 it, when his wife broke out, 
 
 "O John, look here! what is this?" 
 
 She held out to him a soiled letter, with a strange stamp 
 on it. He took it, looked at it for a moment, tore it open 
 with a trembling hand, and glanced through it, and then, 
 handing it to his wife, leant forward on the table, burying 
 his face in his hands. 
 
THE ASHEN FAGOT. 19 
 
 Mabel read eagerly over her mother's shoulder, glancing 
 rapidly from the page to the loved face, out of which the 
 look of repressed sorrow which had haunted it for more 
 than a year was passing, while tears ran down her cheeks, 
 and hindered her from reading. But, as she finished, she 
 stooped, and threw her arm round her husband's neck and 
 said, 
 
 " John, God has been very good to us to-day. This day, 
 too, of all others." 
 
 Mr. Kendrick squeezed his wife's hand, and then got up 
 and took two or three turns about the room, while his wife 
 and daughter still pored over the letter. 
 
 " He is alive, at any rate, and well, and earning his bread 
 honestly. * But why could n't he have written before ? Why 
 does n't he write himself now ? " 
 
 " O John, I can quite understand. It was so natural that 
 he should get this friend to write for him." 
 
 " What 's the name ? " 
 
 " The signature is H. Upton. What can we do to thank 
 him?" 
 
 " What is the date of the letter ? Let me see the en- 
 velope. Why, how can it have been so long ? The post- 
 mark is July 22d." 
 
 " Is it longer than it should have been ? " 
 
 " Yes, the regular mail comes in less than three months." 
 
 " Three months, papa ! what a dreadful distance ! " said 
 Mabel ; " we may write to him at once, now that we know 
 where he is, to tell him to come home, may n't we ? " 
 
 " We'll, we will think it over, Mabe. Perhaps he is bet- 
 ter where he is." 
 
 " Poor boy ! I wonder how he will spend this Christmas." 
 
 Jacob Eagleton's wife got a double allowance of wine- 
 that morning when Mr. and Mrs. Kendrick and their 
 daughter visited her. 
 
 " Wutever can be cum to the squire and missis ? " the old 
 
20 THOMAS HUGHES. 
 
 woman muttered, as they left her ; " thaay hen't looked so 
 cheerful, not scarce since 'em wur married. " 
 
 Every one who met them in their walk made some re- 
 mark of the same kind. 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 " WHAT did that old fellow call this road of yours, John- 
 ny T" asked the elder of our two travellers, giving his 
 shoulders a shake, which sent an accumulation of an inch 
 or so of snow off them. 
 
 " A unked road to kep in a vail," answered Johnny, imi- 
 tating the carrier's accent. 
 
 "By Jove, he's right! How it does come down! I 
 had almost forgotten what snow was like, though I rather 
 enjoy it." 
 
 "It must have been snowing up here for hours. Look 
 how deep it is. Four or five inches at least, already." 
 
 " Whereabouts are we ? We should be half-way, at any 
 rate, by this time." 
 
 " That we must be, for we 're on level ground. It is n't 
 quite two miles now to the dip just above." 
 
 They walked on for a minute or two in silence. " What 's 
 the matter, Johnny ? what are you sighing at ? " 
 
 " I 've half a mind to turn back. I almost wish I had 
 stayed out on your run, instead of coming home." 
 
 "Nonsense, man. Cheer up. Why, in an hour's time 
 you '11 be warming yourself by the Ashen Fagot, you 've 
 told me so much about. We couldn't have hit a more 
 lucky day." 
 
 "But don't you remember? Ashen Fagot Night was 
 the very time that it all began." 
 
 " And the properest night, then, for it all to end." 
 
 " They never answered your letter ! " 
 
 "There was no time, man. The answer couldn't have 
 come out before we had started." 
 
THE ASHEN FAGOT. 21 
 
 And you think it will be all right, then ? If they only 
 knew how bitterly I have grieved over it all, and how I 
 have longed to see home again ! And now I 'm here, I 
 don't know how to face them. I almost wish I was back 
 again." 
 
 " Cheer up, Johnny. Why, nothing would serve you but 
 coming right off, the moment we landed, without giving me 
 an hour hi London, and now you want to be back again. 
 Why, man, it will be the happiest minute of their lives, 
 when they see you again." 
 
 " Do you think so ? " 
 
 " I 'm sure of it. But I '11 be hanged if I know when it 's 
 likely to be, though. I can't see five yards ahead. All the 
 snow in the heavens seems coming straight down on us. 
 Do you think we 're in the road ? " 
 
 " Well, I hope so ; but let 's see." And Johnny stooped 
 down and scratched a hole in the snow with his hand ; the 
 result of which was " Hullo ! " and a long whistle. 
 
 "Eh, what is it?" 
 
 " Grass, by Jove ! We 're on the downs." 
 
 " Well, that 's jolly. Let 's try again." So the two tried 
 several more places on each side of their track, with no 
 better success. 
 
 " Here 's a pretty go. Confound your linked road ! we 
 shall have to camp out, or walk all night." 
 
 " I hope not. If we go on, we must hit the Avenly dip 
 somewhere." 
 
 " Come along, then. It 's no good standing here." 
 
 They pushed on again, and soon began to be amused by 
 their adventure, and laughed and chatted, in defiance of 
 snow and downs. Their talk turned on home, and the elder 
 was describing his feelings on coming back. 
 
 " By the way, Herbert, you 've never told me why you 
 left the old country." 
 
 u Because I could n't live in it, Johnny. At my father's 
 
22 THOMAS HUGHES. 
 
 death I was left with a magnificent patrimony of 400 and 
 a clerk's place of 40 a year. That did n't suit me. Be- 
 sides, to tell the truth, I was in a bad way, ready to hang 
 myself about a young woman. There was nothing for it but 
 to bolt, and seek my fortune." 
 
 " And you Ve found it, too." 
 
 " Yes, in one way. But it does n't seem worth much 
 after all." 
 
 " Is she married then ? " 
 
 " Heaven knows. I had a letter from her father, an old 
 family friend, five years back. I think he suspected how 
 matters stood. I never spoke, of course, as she was quite a 
 girl, and it would n't have been fair. I wrote to him several 
 times, but letters miscarry from our parts. Then I wrote 
 to some people I knew, and got an answer that he had left 
 our old neighborhood. Hullo! we Ve run against something 
 at last. What 's this ? " 
 
 " All right. It 's one of the down barns," said Johnny, 
 when they had groped their way round the building, which 
 they had nearly run against; "we shall most likely be ahle 
 to get in." 
 
 But they tried both the great side-doors and found them 
 locked. " Hark ! did n't I hear a sheep bleat ? " 
 
 "Very likety. There's often a fold and a shepherd's 
 cottage close by ; which way was it ? " 
 
 " Just down here." 
 
 They followed the sound for a short distance, and came 
 upon haulm walls and hurdles, within which were a large 
 flock of sheep, and the next moment heard furious barking. 
 Then through the down-pour of snow they made out a small 
 cottage, the door of which opened, and a tall figure in smock- 
 frock and long leather gaiters appeared, thrown out into 
 relief by the light in the room behind him. 
 
 "Quiet w'oot! Dal th' noise! Cas'n't let'm harken?" 
 As the dog ceased barking, the shepherd's ear caught the 
 
THE ASHEN FAGOT. 23 
 
 crunching of the snow under their feet as they approached 
 Hullo, ther' ! Wut be at wi' the vauld ? " 
 
 " AVe 've lost our way on the downs to-night, that 's all. 
 We came upon your fold by good luck ; may we sit down 
 till the storm 's over ? " 
 
 The shepherd looked somewhat suspiciously at them at 
 Crst, but then moved aside. 
 
 " Ees, ee med cum in. But 'twunt last long this starm." 
 So they entered the cottage, a low two-roomed place, the 
 living-room opening to the outer air, in which they found 
 the shepherd's wife, and tailless dog, a small, carefully-nursed 
 fire, and the tea-things laid. 
 
 The occasion was just the one for the elder traveller, and 
 he proved <mite equal to it Under his influence the shep- 
 herd's wife bustled about, and the fire was piled up with as 
 much fuel of old fagots, coke, and cinders as would have 
 lasted the worthy couple a fortnight ; the kettle sung and 
 puffed away at the unwonted stimulant administered to him ; 
 the three mugs of the establishment were produced, and 
 Johnny brought out a flask from his knapsack, full of good 
 brandy. The coats were shaken by the shepherd, and hung 
 up on pegs to dry, and in five minutes' time the whole party 
 was settled down, the hosts to their tea, and the guests to 
 a mug of grog each. 
 
 " Well, Johnny, this is n't a bad change from the Downs, 
 eh ? Look here, ma'am ; let me put a drop of brandy in 
 your tea ; you can't think what a good thing it is. Eh, 
 shepherd, you '11 try my prescription, too, won't you ? " 
 
 " Ef you plaase, zur. Ah, it do 'mazingly flavor th' tea ; 
 d'wont it, Betty ? Wun't you tek' nothin' to yeat, zur ? 
 You be raal welcum to 't" 
 
 " No, thankee ; we fed at Lilburne. But if your wife 
 does n't mind smoking " 
 
 "Blessee, noa, zur. Do'ee light up. Hur be terrible 
 vond o' th' smell o' baccur, tho' hur dwon't zmoke." 
 
24 THOMAS HUGHES. 
 
 But you do, shepherd?" 
 
 " Lord, ees, zur." 
 
 " Then you must take some of my stock " ; and, suiting 
 the action to the word, he emptied his big pouch on the 
 table, and, separating the contents, pushed about two thirds 
 over towards the shepherd, whose eyes glistened at the 
 sight. 
 
 " 'T is very kind o' you, zur ; but, can 'ee spare 't ? " 
 
 " Yes, yes, there 's plenty more where that came from. 
 And, now you Ve done your tea, draw round, and brew a 
 good mug of that stuff. Don't be afraid of it; it won't 
 hurt you, nor you, ma'am, either, such a night as this. Your 
 health, ma'am ; your health, shepherd ; and yours, Johnny, 
 and a merry Christmas to you all." 
 
 " The zaam to you, gen'l'men, and many ov 'em." 
 
 The shepherd drinks, and passes the mug to his wife, and 
 then produces a short black pipe, which he fills, and sucks 
 at with evident delight, Herbert watching him. " There 's 
 nothing so comforting, when one 's out with the sheep at 
 nights, as a pinch of good tobacco, eh, shepherd ? " 
 
 " Ther' beant, zur. But how do 'ee cum to know 't ? " 
 
 " Oh ! I 'm a shepherd myself." 
 
 " Noa, be 'ee though ? Thee dost n't look like one, zur. 
 Wut zart o' vlock 's yourn, zrar ? " 
 
 u I Ve three or four, of a thousand each." 
 
 " Vour thousand zhep ! I hopes you 've got volks wi' 
 some gumption in 'em, zur, to look arter 'em these cowld 
 nights." 
 
 " O, it 's lambing time with us, and we never have any 
 nights like this." 
 
 Shepherd chuckles, and looks incredulous. 
 
 " You don't believe me, I see, shepherd." 
 
 " I never heer'd tell o' lambin' much afore Easter." 
 
 " But you don't understand. It 's summer now where 1 
 live." 
 
THE ASHEN FAGOT. 25 
 
 " Zummer at Christmas time ! a martal queer time o' year 
 for zummer, zur." 
 
 " Yes, real hot summer." 
 
 " Wher do 'ee live, then, zur ? " 
 
 "On the other side of the world. In Xew South 
 Wales." 
 
 " Dear heart ! and zo 't is zummer in them parts at 
 Christmas time? "Well, 'tis mighty curous to think on, 
 now." 
 
 " Do'st mind, Jonas, as Mrs. Gibbins said, as her sen as 
 wur transported wrote from Botany Bay as the seasons wur 
 all got wrong ther ? Zo a zend to zay." 
 
 " You dwon't cum from Botany Bay, zur, do 'ee ? " 
 
 " Well, k 's in the same part of the world. But we 're 
 not returned convicts, if that 's what you mean." 
 
 Shepherd glances at his wife, and seems much relieved. 
 
 " But you may depend upon it, that 's the place for us 
 shepherds. What would you say now to fifty pounds a 
 year, and your keep, with as much beef and mutton as you 
 could eat? You don't get anything like that in the old 
 country." 
 
 Shepherd stops smoking and opens his eyes, " Vifty 
 pound a year!" 
 
 "Ay, every penny of it, and not a bit too much. I 
 should like to know who ought to be well paid if the shep- 
 herd is n't 
 
 * If 't was n't for the sheep and the poor shepherd, 
 The world would be starved and naked,' 
 
 you know." 
 
 " So you knows th' owld zhearing zong ? " 
 
 ' No, I only know a line or two that I 've picked up from 
 my friend here. I should like to hear it of all things. Can't 
 you give it us ? " 
 
 The shepherd looks shy, but, after a little persuasion from 
 his wife, who declares that he is noted for singing, he clears 
 his throat and croons out : 
 
26 THOMAS HUGHES. 
 
 " Zeng, bwoys, zeng, a zhepherd 's as happy as a. lord, 
 And a /.hep 's the vinest creetur owld England can afford, 
 And, if you listens vor a while, the truth I zoon will tell 'ee, 
 'T is clothin' to the back, my bwoys, and linin' to the belly. 
 The zhepherd stands beneath the bush, a-shiverin' and shakin' 
 If 't was n't vor th' zhep and th' poor zhepherd th' world 'd go stan ed 
 
 and nuked. 
 
 All along the winter time we gives our zhep some hay, 
 Keps fodderin' and fodderin' o'n until the month of May. 
 And, when the month of May cums in, if the weather should prove fine, 
 The little lambs will skip and play, and plaase the zhepherd's mind. 
 And, when the month of June cums in, if the weather should prove hct, 
 We teks the clothin' off their backs, while the pudding 's in the pot. 
 And then agen at night, my bwoys, together we will zeng, 
 For a zhepherd lives as happy as ever a prince or king." 
 
 " Thank you. I shall carry the old song back to the other 
 side of the world. Now, shepherd, come, take another glass. 
 The brandy is n't out, you see." 
 
 The shepherd, after some coquetting, makes another mix- 
 ture in his cup, and hands it to his wife, who puts down her 
 knitting, and gets up to make a little courtesy, and say, " Your 
 health, gentl'men." The shepherd takes a drink. 
 
 " Ah ! it zims to do a body good, that do, now, to put 
 the heart into 'un, zur." 
 
 " I 'm glad you like it, You must have a hard life of it 
 up here on the downs at times." 
 
 "Ah, 't is, zur, I assure 'ee, and I had ought to know. 
 Nigh varty year, man and bwoy, I 've ben a zheperdin', and 
 afore that I wur bird-kepin', when I wur quite a leetel 'un. 
 I allus liked bird-kepin^ and I 've zhot a zite on 'em wi' th' 
 owld king's-arm as maester kep vor 't." 
 
 " What was the best shot you ever made, now ? " 
 
 " Well, zur, I '11 tell 'ee. It wur at th' rooks, and, ef you 
 knows about bird-kepin', you minds how keen the rooks be 
 at seedin' time, to light and snicker about wher' thaay can 
 see arra bit ov a scratch, specially in the niornin's. So I 
 casts about in my yead I haint got much book-larnin', but 
 I Ve got a yead on m' zhoulders as answers to 't how to 
 
THE ASHEX FAGOT. 27 
 
 cotch 'em, cos' 'em be aggravatin' birds, plague} cunnin' let 
 'em be never zo lear. One mornin' afore light I hucks up a 
 bit o' ground right afore the barn ther', and drows a handful 
 o* zeed corn auver the scratch, and gets inside zo as um 
 med n't zee m', and then puts two pipes-full o' powder, and 
 a'mwoost all the shot as I M got, into the gun, and waits. 
 Arter a bit I hears one on 'em a cawin' up above, and then 
 down a cums, plump. Th' owld wosbird teks a look at th' 
 barn, but both doors was wide open, zo as a' could zee right 
 droo. Zo a gevs a caw as tho' 'twur all right (a could n't 
 zee I, for a bit o' straw as I 'd got round m') and falls to 
 hisself, and, a'most afore you could look, the scratch wur all 
 black wi' 'em, scrouging and cawin' together. Then I zets 
 up zoftly and teks a long breath, and zhuts m' eyes, and pulls. 
 A went off wi' th' mwost all-fired noise, and kicked I fit to 
 bust. Wen I cum to, and zet up in the straw, and could 
 look out, ' Lord,' sez I, ' wut ! haint I killed not one on 'em ? ' 
 Then I hears a floppeting behind m', and turns round. You 
 zee, zur, th' owld king's-arm had took and kicked I right 
 round, zo as I wur looking out o' t'other door o' the barn wen 
 I cum *o." 
 
 " O yes, shepherd, I dare say." 
 
 " Well, but when you got faced round again to the right 
 door what had you done ? " 
 
 " Lord, zur, the ground wur all black wi' 'em, mostly 
 dead, but zum on 'em hobblin' about, more nor dree-score 
 on 'em " 
 
 The shepherd is interrupted by the laughter of the younger 
 of his guests. 
 
 " You med b'leeve m' or not, as you plazes, zur." 
 
 " Threescore rooks at a shot. What do you say to that, 
 ma'am ? " 
 
 " 'T wur afore my time, zur, but I never heerd Jonas tell 
 it no other waay." 
 
 " Well, it would take a big whale to swallow you, Jonas." 
 
28 THOMAS HUGHES. 
 
 " Poor owld mother tuk and put zum on 'em into a pie 
 But 'em did yeat terrible runk, I wun't deny but 'em wur 
 terrible runk." 
 
 " So I should think. Let 's see, what 's the time ? Not 
 half past seven. How 's the night, shepherd ? " 
 
 The shepherd gets up and goes to the door. 
 
 Johnny, in a low voice to Herbert, "I know all about 
 where we are now, only about a mile and a half from 
 home. It 's the great barn we used to call the haunted 
 barn." 
 
 " What was it haunted with ? " 
 
 " Cats ; I '11 tell you the story presently. I don't want to 
 talk, or Jonas might recognize me." 
 
 " Not he. Well, what do you make of the night, shep- 
 herd ? " 
 
 'T is clearin' off, zur. 'T will be vine enuff d'rectly." 
 
 " Did you ever see any ghosts in the barn ? " 
 
 " Haw ! haw ! Noa, zur. Ther' beant no bogles up here ; 
 thaay keps down below, thaay does." 
 
 " Well, we may as well be getting ready for a start." So 
 they got up, put on their coats, shouldered their knapsacks, 
 and, having astonished Jonas's wife by a present of five shil- 
 lings to buy fuel with, stepped out, accompanied by Jonas. 
 
 The last flakes of the snow-storm were falling, and the 
 moon shone out keen and white, and the air felt deliciously 
 keen and fresh after Jonas's little close hole of a kitchen. 
 
 " How splendid ! " said Herbert, as they paused before the 
 cottage door. " Hark ! don't I hear bells ? " 
 
 " Zartin zhure. Thaay be Avenly Christmas bells, zur, a 
 ringin' for Squire Kendrick's Ashen Fagot. Thaay '11 be 
 lightin' he up zmartish, I '11 war'nd." 
 
 " We can go straight across to Avenly, I suppose." 
 
 " Ees, zur, straight as you plaazes. Zo you be gwine to 
 Avsnly?" 
 
 << Yes, I hope so." 
 
THE ASHEN FAGOT. 29 
 
 " Did 'ce ever heer o' th' Squire's zon as runnecl a~w aay 
 vrom whoam out in thaay forrin parts, zur ? " 
 
 " I never met any one who went by that name. So the 
 Squire's son ran away from home ? " 
 
 " Ees a did, mwoar' nor a year ago." 
 
 How was that ? " 
 
 " Well, I d' wont kneow th' rights on 't, zur. I Ve heerd 
 as a wur zo nat'rally grounded wi' pride and obs'tncy a 
 would n't tek a word vrom 's own vather. Then a' spent a 
 zite o' money, I heerd, at college. Hows'mever, won daay, 
 th' Squire spoke zharper n' usual to 'n, and a went aff then 
 and ther. A wa' n't a bad haart neither ; that I 'ool zaay 
 var 'n. I 've a zeed un about wi' Tummus scoors o' times ; 
 TummuSmbe the Squire's zhepherd, and wur main vond 
 ov 'n. But a 'd got a zart o' prodigalish Avaay wi' un as 
 did n't bode no good." 
 
 " Well, shepherd, I hope he '11 come to his senses and get 
 back home soon." 
 
 " I wishes a med, zur. For th' Squire hev never rightly 
 held up s' yead sence he bin gone ; nor madam neither. And 
 there a'n't a better maester nor missus in th' whole country 
 zide. I kneows I wishes I 'd been barn on he's lands." 
 
 " Well, good by, shepherd. I hope we may meet again 
 before long." 
 
 " I dwon't care how zoon, zur. But shall I gwo 'lang with 
 'ee a bit, to show 'ee th' waay ? " 
 
 " No, thanks, we shall do famously ; good night." 
 
 So they shook the horny hand of their host, and went olF 
 across the glittering snow in the still moonlight towards 
 Avenly dip, with the Christmas chime coming up from the 
 little hamlet, and speaking to open hearts, of the child that 
 was born, and the shepherds that kept their flocks, in a far 
 land, near twenty centuries ago. 
 
30 THOMAS HUGHES. 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 " LET tV adze 'bide, Maester Dick ; let th' adze 'bide, I 
 tell 'ee. Dal'd if I dwon't gev thee the stick, ef thee gwoes 
 an spwilin' the tools, aal as I can zaay." 
 
 Dick Kendrick, to whom this objurgation was addressed 
 in the outhouse next the stable of Avenly Manor-House, 
 which was used for a carpenter's shop, dropped the forbidden 
 adze for the moment. Moses Ockle, the carpenter, his in- 
 terlocutor, went on with his work for some time with one 
 eye on the adze, but presently relaxed his vigilance, and 
 Dick had hold of the adze again, and was chipping away at 
 a tough log of timber, " before a body could wink a'mwoast," 
 as his victim described it. The second or third chink of the 
 adze, however, recalled Moses to the state of affairs, and, 
 dropping the saw he was using, he caught up the nearest 
 switch he could lay hands on, and made at Dick, who bolted 
 behind the big bench which stood in the middle of the shop, 
 meaning to parley. This afforded him protection for the 
 moment, but, seeing that Moses was in earnest, and would 
 infallibly reach him over the bench, he broke cover, and 
 made for the open door, upsetting, on his way, the cross- 
 trees at which the pursuer had been working, and just escap- 
 ing a swingeing blow, which the enraged carpenter, his shins 
 smarting from contact with the over-set cross-trees, aimed at 
 him, and which fell on the door-post. 
 
 " Od, drattle th' young carcass," growled Moses, as he 
 gathered up his work and went on with it ; " thee bist he 
 very moral o' thy brother. He wur transpAvorted, or zum- 
 mat equal to 't, and thou 'It cum to the gallus, zhure as my 
 neam 's Moses." 
 
 " Well, Moses," said William Kendrick, entering a few 
 minutes afterwards, " you 're making the Ashen Fagot for 
 to- night, arn't you ? " 
 
THE ASHEN FAGOT. 31 
 
 Ees, Maester Willum." 
 
 " "Will you please make a smaller one, too ? You '11 be 
 glad, I know, to hear that we have had news of my brother. 
 So papa and mamma say the children may have a fagot 
 before the supper begins." 
 
 " That I 'ool, Maester Willum. And how many hoops '11 
 'ee hev to un ? " 
 
 " 0, four or five, Moses." 
 
 " Zaay arf a dozen, zur. But I be mazin' glad to heai 
 about th' young squire. And wher be un, then, Maester 
 Willum, make zo bowld, and wut be un doin' ov ? " 
 
 " He is in Australia, right on the other side of the world, 
 Moses. And he is very well, and doing capitally. He is a 
 sort of head man to a great sheep farmer there." 
 
 " Th' young squire a zhepperdin ! Maester William ? " 
 
 " Yes, Moses, and w^- not ? The sheep farmers are the 
 great people. I shouiu. like nothing better than to go out 
 myself, and make my own way there. But can't you let me 
 help you ? I should so like to help make the Ashen Fagots 
 for to-night." 
 
 Moses was nothing loath. Willie was a very different style 
 of boy from Dick, and so the two worked on together, Moses 
 cutting ash-poles for the two fagots, and Willie under his 
 direction preparing the hazel-rods for the hoops. 
 
 " Why don't you make the hoops of ash, too, Moses ? " 
 
 " 'Cause hazel burns slawer, and zo howlds th' vagot to- 
 gether langer." 
 
 By the time it was dusk they had finished binding the two 
 fagots ; one a monster, some six feet long, with about a 
 dozen hazel hoops round him, the other a miniature one 
 of half the size. Willie marched off in triumph with the 
 smaller, leaving the carpenter to follow with the other when 
 lie had tidied up the place a bit, which he did, muttering to 
 himself: "And zo th' young squire be zhepperdin, be un? 
 Ef a' had 's desarvins, a 'd be kepin' pegs, like he in Scrip- 
 
32 THOMAS HUGHES. 
 
 tur, and a fillin' ov 's belly wi' th* husks as th' zwine did 
 yet." 
 
 Willie and the carpenter deposited their burdens in a huge 
 lofty room at one end of the house, away from the sitting- 
 rooms. It was called the kitchen, but seldom used for that 
 purpose, a smaller and more central room having succeeded 
 it. It had now become more a servants' hall, but its special 
 vocation, and one for which it was eminently qualified, was 
 that of receiving the periodical gatherings at harvest homes, 
 Ashen Fagot nights, and such occasions, when the Ken- 
 dricks made entertainment for their vassals. 
 
 The chief feature in the room was the fireplace, which 
 cannot be better described than in the homely words of a 
 rhymer of the country : 
 
 " My veather's vires wur mead o' logs 
 0' cleft 'ood down upon the dogs, 
 In our girt vire-pleace, zo wide 
 As you med draw a cart inzide, 
 An big an little med zet down 
 On boath zides, an avore, an all rown; 
 An up in corner thaay did hitch 
 The zaalt box on the bacon vlitch; 
 An, when I wur a zettin, I 
 Could zee aal up into the sky 
 An watch the zmoke gwo vrom the vire 
 Aal up an out at un, an higher; 
 An ther' wur beacon upon rack, 
 An plates to yet it upon tack ; 
 An rown the walls were yarbs, stowd 
 In peapern brigs, an blathers bio wed; 
 An jest above the clavey boord 
 Were vather's gun, an zpurs, an zoord ; 
 An ther' were ther' our gertest pride, 
 The zettle by the vire zide." 
 
 This room was now, under the hands of two maids, being 
 prepared for the evening's festivities, while the children ran 
 in and out, helping, as they delighted to think. A bright fire 
 crackled already on the dogs, which were in due time to 
 receive the Ashen Fagots ; all the furniture was moved 
 
THE ASHEN FAGOT. 33 
 
 except the great table which ran along one side. There 
 was plenty of Christmas, in the shape of holly and ivy, over 
 the fireplace and on the walls, and a bunch of mistletoe hang- 
 ing from a rack in the middle of the ceiling. The Ashen 
 Fagots were duly deposited in a corner of the great fire- 
 place, and by five o'clock, when the maids and children went 
 off to tea, all was ready. The kitchen was left, winking 
 away in the cosey firelight, for the fairies, if they pleased, to 
 come in and take their pastime on the clean sanded floor. 
 Meantime, the sole occupants were two robins, who seemed 
 to be thoroughly satisfied with the asylum which they had 
 hit upon for their Christmas Eve, and chirped to one an- 
 other, as they flitted about, and peered with their small bright 
 eyes into % every corner, discoursing, no doubt, of how un- 
 pleasant the snow was becoming outside, and what fools their 
 neighbors, the wrens and sparrows, were, not to avail them- 
 selves of such comfortable quarters, before they went up to 
 perch for the night on the bacon rack. 
 
 The robins, no doubt, soon began to see reasons for recon- 
 sidering their opinions, when, at about six o'clock, the door 
 which led from the house opened, and Clara, Bobby, and 
 Maggie, and the party of children they had been allowed to 
 ask to tea, rushed into the room, followed by Mabel and her 
 friend the clergyman's daughter, who brought her little 
 nephews, and Miss Smith. 
 
 After the first rush round the great room, all so nicely 
 cleared for a good romp, had been duly executed by the 
 children, and candles had been lighted, there was a call at 
 once for the Ashen Fagot. In fact, Bobby and the vicar's 
 eldest grandson had seized on it, and were in the act of 
 putting it on the dogs, when* Mabel suggested that it would 
 be burnt out too soon if they lighted it at once. 
 
 " O yes, let us have a play first," said Clara ; " and then 
 we will sit down and make forfeits, or Mabel will tell us a 
 story, and then we can have the fagot" 
 
34 THOMAS HUGHES. 
 
 " And Aunt Nellie will sing us a song, won't you ? one 
 we can all join in ? " said the vicar's grandson. 
 
 "O yes, Walter, presently, when you are all tired of 
 play." And so to play they went vigorously. Blind-man's- 
 buff, hunt-the-slipper, and the post-office, in which latter 
 game Clara distinguished herself, succeeded one another 
 rapidly ; and the circle was constantly increased by the 
 arrival of one after another of the servants, dairy-maid, 
 laundry-maid, house-maid, nurse-maid, &c. The Ashen Fag- 
 ot was put on in triumph, and blazed and crackled to the 
 complete satisfaction of the young ones. Then a great dish 
 came in for snap-dragon, and Bobby and his friend were 
 soon distinguishing themselves by dashing their hands 
 bravely into the burning brandy, and bringing out the 
 raisins for their favorites amongst the group of girls. 
 When all the raisins had been extracted and eaten, and 
 the salt had been duly thrown into the burning spirit, and 
 everybody had looked sufficiently green and cadaverous, a 
 cry for forfeits arose. So the party sat down round Mabel 
 on benches brought out from under the table, and Mabel 
 began, 
 
 " The first day of Christmas my true love sent to me a partridge and a 
 pear-tree; 
 
 The second day of Christmas my true love sent to me two turtle-doves, 
 a partridge, and a peai*-tree; 
 
 The third day of Christmas my true love sent to me three fat hens, two 
 turtle-doves, a partridge, and a pear-tree ; 
 
 The fourth day of Christinas my true love sent to me four ducks quack- 
 ing, three fat hens, two turtle-doves, a partridge, and a pear-tree; 
 
 The fifth day of Christinas my true love sent to me five hares running, 
 four ducks quacking, three fat hens, two turtle-doves, a par- 
 tridge, and a pear-tree." 
 
 And so on. Each day was taken up and repeated all round ; 
 and for every breakdown (except by little Maggie, who 
 struggled with desperately earnest round eyes to follow the 
 rest correctly, but with very comical results), the player 
 who made the slip was duly noted down by Mabel for a 
 forfeit. 
 
THE ASHEN FAGOT. 35 
 
 In tlie middle of the game, the door which opened to the 
 garden flew open, and Willie and Dick arrived on the scene 
 of action, with 
 
 " Now then, make room, here are the mummers ! " 
 " O, the mummers, the mummers ! hurrah ! " chorused 
 the infantiy, as they withdrew, under Mabel and Nelly's 
 wing, to the side and end of the kitchen. St. George and 
 his adversary were then called by the two boys, who stood 
 by the door, as masters of the ceremonies. They came in, 
 shaking the snow from their queer attempts at costume, 
 consisting of helmets, in shape very like fool's-caps, of dif- 
 ferent-colored paper, and scraps of ribbon and colored cloth 
 or cotton sewn on to their smock-frocks. They marched 
 round after one another, repeating their introductory verses 
 in a queer nasal singsong, and then fell to single combat 
 witli their wooden swords, which soon resulted in the dis- 
 comfiture of St. George. His adversary, being of a noble 
 temper, now calls for the doctor. 
 
 " Doctor, doctor, plaay thy part ; 
 St. Gaarge be wounded to the heart : 
 Doctor, doctor, come and see ; 
 St. Gaarge be wounded in the knee." 
 
 The ridiculous figure called the doctor answers the ap- 
 peal, entering with 
 
 " Here euros I, a ten pound doctor; 
 
 Ten pound is my fee ; 
 But, sence thee bist a vriend o' mine, 
 I '11 tek but vive vrom thee." 
 
 And so it goes on, with much more ridiculous doggerel, but 
 of absorbing interest to little Maggie, and all the younger 
 portion of the audience. 
 
 ' Well, what were you playing at when we came in ? " 
 said Willie, as the mummers went off, after getting the ac- 
 customed gratuity. 
 
 " Forfeits," said Mabel. " Will you play ? Our fagot is 
 nearly out, so you won't have much of it." 
 
36 THOMAS HUGHES. 
 
 " Hullo ? look, here 's a robin ; what fun ! " said Dick 
 shying his cap at one of the robins, who, from his perch on 
 the rack, was contemplating the doings of mankind, with his 
 head on one side, and thinking probably what fools they 
 must be, to be carrying on their unmeaning games, instead 
 of sleeping and letting him sleep. 
 
 Dick had three or four shots with his cap at the birds, 
 before Mabel, backed by Willie, to whom she appealed, 
 could make him leave them alone. Then they took to for- 
 feits again ; and Dick, who was absolute lord of misrule in 
 the place, soon made it too uproarious. Whenever it came 
 to his turn to declare a forfeit (and he constantly managed 
 that it should do so, by making horrible faces, and otherwise 
 interrupting the one whose turn it was to repeat), he played 
 some half-malicious prank. At last, having caught up the 
 dairy-maid, he declared her forfeit " clenching hands." 
 This operation is performed by the caller and payer of the 
 forfeit standing up, and joining their hands with the fingers 
 laced, when the gentleman, by extending his arms, brings 
 the lady's face close up to his own, and kisses her. In the 
 present case, the dairy-maid, being full as strong as Master 
 Dick, kept him nearly at arms' length; but the attempt 
 annoyed Mabel, who put a stop to the game. Whereupon 
 Dick took himself off till supper-time, declaring them slow. 
 
 They were getting rather tired, and the embers of the 
 fagot were all red-hot and nearly consumed ; so they made 
 a circle round, and the maids brought some logs and put 
 them on. 
 
 " Now, Aunt Nelly, you must sing us a song." 
 
 " O yes, the one about the sisters, and the cherry with- 
 out a stone, please," said Bobby. 
 
 " Very well. Mabel, you will take the questions. And, 
 mind, you must all sing the chorus." 
 
 ** I had four sisters lived over the sea, 
 Parra marra dictum domine; 
 
THE ASHEN FAGOT. 37 
 
 They each sent a Christmas present to me, 
 Partum qnartum paradise templum, 
 
 Parra marra dictum doraine. 
 The first sent a cherry without a stone, 
 
 Parra marra dictum domine; 
 The second sent a bird without a bone, 
 
 Partum quartum paradise templum, &c. 
 The third sent a blanket without a thread, 
 
 Parra marra dictum domine: 
 The fourth sent a book no man could read, 
 Partum quartum paradise templum, &c. 
 How could it be a cherry without a stone? 
 
 Parra marra dictum domine; 
 How could it be a bird without a bone? 
 
 Partum quartum paradise templum, &c. 
 How could it be a blanket without a thread? 
 
 Parra marra dictum domine ; 
 How could it be a book no man could read ? 
 
 Partum quartum paradise templum, &c. 
 When the cherry 's in the bud it has no stone, 
 
 Parra marra dictum domiue ; 
 When the bird 's in the egg it has no bone, 
 Partum quartum paradise templum, &c. 
 When the blanket 's in the fleece it has no thread, 
 
 Parra marra dictum domine ; 
 When the book 's in the press no man can read, 
 Partum quartum paradise templum, 
 Parra marra dictum domine." 
 
 The song and chorus delighted the children; and then 
 Mabel was called on for her story, which would, no doubt, 
 fascinate readers as much as it did her audience round the 
 remains of the ashen fagot, were there space to give it. 
 And now it was getting near eight o'clock, the chimes were 
 ringing out, and it was time to prepare the kitchen for the 
 supper of the grown-up folk. Nelly and her charge with- 
 drew through the house, and the other children dispersed. 
 Mabel remained to give an eye to the supper arrangements. 
 Presently Bobby and Maggie, who had not yet been carried 
 off, ran up and pulled her gown. 
 
 " O Mabel, come and look, do come and look ! " 
 
 What is it, Bobby ? " 
 
**8 THOMAS HUGHES. 
 
 " O, two great hairy faces, like the giants in our picture 
 book ! " 
 
 Where ? What do you mean, Bobby ? " 
 
 " Here, at the window. They frightened Maggie so." 
 
 " O yes, that they did," said Maggie, holding on to her 
 sister's gown. " You ain't afraid, Mabel ?" 
 
 " No, dear ; come along." So s,he went to the window, 
 which looked out on the garden, and which she had opened 
 a few minutes before to freshen the room. 
 
 " Why, Bobby, you must have fancied it all." 
 
 " No, no ; did n't we see two great hairy faces, such big 
 ones, looking in ? " 
 
 "O yes, Mabel." 
 
 Mabel looked out carefully amongst the shrubs. The 
 moon and snow made it almost as light as day, except just 
 in the shadow of the house ; but she could see nothing. 
 
 "Well, Bobby, you see they've run away. They 
 could n't get through these bars at any rate ; so we 're quite 
 safe. Hark ! there are the school-children, singing a carol 
 at papa's window. Come along ; you can go and hear them, 
 and say good-night to papa." And so Mabel and the chil- 
 dren left the kitchen. 
 
 ***** 
 
 "Nearly caught, eh, Johnny?" whispered the elder of 
 our travellers, as the two drew themselves up in the shadow 
 of the house, behind a laurel. " Who was the pretty little 
 bright-eyed girl?" 
 
 "My little sister, Maggie." 
 
 " And the boy ? " 
 
 " My youngest brother, Bob." 
 
 " And the tall girl they ran up to ? " 
 
 "My eldest sister, Mabel." 
 
 " You 're a lucky dog. Hark ! what 's that ? " 
 
 " The school-children, singing a carol before the house." 
 
 They listened while the young voices sang the grand old 
 caroL 
 
THE ASHEN FAGOT. 39 
 
 " While shepherds kept their flocks by night." 
 
 Neither spoke for some seconds after the voices ceased. 
 
 * What are you going to do, Johnny," Herbert said, gen- 
 tly, at last. 
 
 " O, I don't quite know yet; I am so confused still. Ton 
 don't mind waiting a little ? " 
 
 " Not a bit. As long as you please, so that we get 
 housed by bedtime." 
 
 " Here come the people to * Ashen Fagot,' stand back." 
 ***** 
 
 " Now, papa. They have done supper, and Dick and I 
 have put the Ashen Fagot on, and it 's just blazing up. 
 You '11 come in and wish them a merry Christmas, won't 
 you?" * 
 
 Mr. Kendrick rose from his chair in the parlor, where 
 he was sitting with his wife and Mabel, and prepared to go 
 with Willie. 
 
 " But the vicar is n't come," he said ; " he would like to 
 go in with me and say a few words to them." 
 
 " O John, I '11 wait for the vicar and Nelly, and bring 
 them in for a few minutes when they come." 
 
 So Mr. Kendrick and Mabel went with "Willie back to 
 the kitchen, where the Ashen Fagot was already crackling 
 and roaring away merrily on the dogs. The women, who 
 had supped with their husbands and brothers, were seated 
 in the chimney-corner, and round one side of the fire on 
 benches, leaving the space clear between the fire and the 
 long table. At the upper end of the table, the bailiff, the 
 carpenter, the parish clerk, and the wheelwright were 
 seated, and the farm-laborers, men and boys, below. Ma- 
 bel joined the women, while her father took the top of the 
 table; the men all rising till he had taken his seat, with 
 Willie by his side. Dick was seated at his ease next to .ho 
 bailiff, on the opposite side from Moses, the carpenter. 
 
 There were several large copper jugs on the table, out of 
 one of which Mr. Kendrick filled a horn of beer. 
 
40 THOMAS HUGHES. 
 
 " Here 's a merry Christmas to you all," he said, drinking, 
 " and I hope you 've enjoyed yourselves to-night ? " 
 
 " Ees, ees, that us hev'," chorused the men, and, at a sign 
 from the bailiff, Moses, the carpenter, cleared his throat and 
 sang: 
 
 " Here 's a health unto our maester, 
 Th' vounder ov this veasfc; 
 I haups to God wi 1 aal my heart, 
 His sowl in heav'n may rest, 
 And ael his works med prawsper, 
 Wutever he teks in hand, 
 Vor we are ael his zarvents, 
 And ael at his command. 
 
 " Then drenk, bwoys, drenk, 
 And mind you do not spill ; 
 Vor, ef you do, you must drenk two, 
 Vor 't is our maester's will." 
 
 " Your health, zur, and missus's, and ael th' fam'ly, and a 
 merry Christmas to ee ael, and many ov 'em ! " followed 
 this poetical greeting, which was sung vociferously, the 
 words being those of an old harvest-home song, well known 
 for generations to all the inhabitants of Avenly. 
 
 " Now you can light your pipes, and make the most of 
 your time ; the Ashen Fagot waits for nobody." 
 
 The lighting up of pipes soon followed this permission ; 
 and Mr. Kendrick, after chatting for a minute or two to the 
 men nearest him, was just getting up to speak, when the 
 lowest of the hazel bonds of the Ashen Fagot burst. 
 
 " A bond ! a bond ! drenk to th' bond ! " said several voices. 
 The bailiff looked at his master, who seated himself at once. 
 
 " No, no, I can wait," he said ; " keep to your custom. A 
 sip and a song for every bond." 
 
 This saying was received with enthusiasm, and a call on 
 Muster Hockle followed. The carpenter seemed the favor- 
 ite performer. " Gie 's th' howl's disaster, Maester Hockle," 
 suggested the bailiff. 
 
THE ASHEN FAGOT. 41 
 
 " I 've often heard my gram 'mer tell 
 
 Of a peart young owl, as ael the day 
 In a nook ov the paason's barn did dwell, 
 In hidlock blinkin' the time away. 
 
 " But, zo zoon as ever the zun were zet, 
 A poachin' away like mad went he, 
 And once his desarvings he did get, 
 As aal o' you shall presently zee. 
 
 " A vlod vor miles auver hill and dale, 
 
 And a caddled the mice in many a vield; 
 For ael o' you as heers this tale 
 
 Do know as the weakest must allus yield. 
 
 " At last a hunted zo vur away 
 
 That the zun cum peeping auver the hills, 
 And the birds waked up and did un espy, 
 ^V.nd wur ael in a churm az um whetted then* bills. 
 
 " ' Gwo at un, my bwoys,' the missel-dresh cries; 
 
 ' A vrightened my mate, and her eggs be ael addled' j 
 
 And the yuckle did scraam, ' Let us peck out his eyes; 
 
 Zich a girt mouchin' wosbird deserves to be caddled.' 
 
 " Thany dreshed un long, and thaay dreshed un zore ; 
 
 Thaay dreshed un and tar ael the dowl vrom his yead, 
 And thaay vollured un whoam unto the barn dwoor, 
 And ther' thaay left un purty nigh dead. 
 
 MORAL. 
 
 " Now, ael you young men as loves ramblin' o' night, 
 Be plazed from this story to take timely warnin', 
 Vor ther' med be them as ud not thenk it right 
 If you chances to get auvertuk by the marnin'." 
 
 Any one who had thought of looking at the garden win- 
 dow during Moses's song would have been able to confirm 
 the story of little Maggie on all points, except as to the 
 size of the two faces which peered through the window- 
 bars. They might easily have fancied that the fleshy em- 
 bodiments of some two < antagonist Christmas principles 
 were watching the Ashen Fagot supper from without ; 30 
 marked was the contrast between the merry, curious look of 
 
42 THOMAS HUGHES. 
 
 the lighter, and the painful tension of muscles and hunger* 
 ing anxiety of the darker face. 
 
 " Lawk ! do 'ee look, Miss Mabel. Zhure as vate I zeed 
 zummat at th' winder,** whispered Goody Ockle, the car- 
 penter's wife, to Miss Kendrick. 
 
 Mabel glanced at the window a little nervously, and 
 thought she detected figures disappearing ; but her father 
 had now risen to speak to his men, and she turned to listen. 
 
 "You all know," he said, with his homely Wiltshire 
 manner, which gave him such a hold over the people who 
 lived round him, " you know well, after all these years 
 we have lived side by side as good neighbors, how much I 
 enjoy meeting you here at such times as this. For five and 
 twenty years now we have met here, and had our merry- 
 makings, our harvest-homes, and Ashen Fagot nights, 
 through bad times and good times. Well, we Ve had good 
 times lately in field and fold, and I hope we 're all thankful 
 for them, and laying by something against hard times, which 
 will be sure to come back again, sooner or later, remem- 
 ber that. When they come, I hope we shall all pull togeth- 
 er as we have done before ; but there 's nothing like being a 
 little before the world. The only one of all those twenty- 
 five Ashen Fagots which I have n't seen burnt with you 
 was the last one. You all know why I was n't with you. 
 It had pleased God to send me a very fearful trial last year, 
 and I had n't the heart to come among you as usual. I 
 know how. pleased you will all be to hear that I have had 
 good news to-day from the other side of the world, good 
 news of Master John." Here his voice faltered ; and when 
 the rough murmurs of sympathy had subsided a little, he 
 changed the subject abruptly, and went on : " It has always 
 been a source of great pride to me, and to our good vicar, 
 whom we all love as an old friendf though he lias only been 
 with us four years or so," (the vicar, who had just entered, 
 with Mrs. Kendrick on his arm, followed by his daughter, 
 
THE ASHEN FAGOT. 43 
 
 was hailed by a burst of applause, and stood benevolently 
 wondering through his spectacles what It could be all about,) 
 a we are very proud to think how little drunkenness we 
 have in this parish. I 'm sure you '11 all take a pride, and 
 you particularly, boys," (the boys at the end of the table be- 
 came specially attentive,) "in keeping up our, good name. 
 * Merry and wise,' is our Avenly motto. You will be sure 
 to go right if you will only mind your mothers and wives, 
 whom I am always delighted to welcome here with you, and 
 who, mind, ought always to be with you at such times. 
 Mind, boys, and men too, there's no honest mirth where 
 wives and daughters can't come. There 's one more word, 
 which, perhaps, would come better from the vicar than from 
 me ; but as he '11 have his turn to-morrow in the pulpit, I 
 may just touch upon his ground now. This ' Ashen Fagot ' 
 night, you know, is the night of peace and good-will of all 
 the year. So, if any of you have had fallings-out with 
 your neighbors, or in your families, now 's the time to set 
 them all right. Don't let the last bond of the fagot burst 
 before we have made all our hearts clean and whole with 
 all men this Christmas eve. I see there 's another bond 
 just going to burst; so I shall only wish you all again a 
 very merry Christmas." 
 
 The bond burst almost before Mr. Kendrick sat down, but 
 not a soul in the room noticed it. Every eye was turned to 
 the opposite side of the room. Her father's look as he spoke, 
 and some of his words, had touched Mabel very deeply. She 
 could scarcely keep from bursting into tears. The warmth 
 of the great fagot and the smell of the smoke gave her a 
 choking feeling, which she found it every moment more diffi- 
 cult to struggle against So she had glided across to the 
 opposite door, and, opening it a little, stood by it listening. 
 Just as Mr. Kendrick finished, she stepped out for a breath 
 of fresh air, to look at the pure moonlight, and recover her- 
 self, when she heard her name whispered close by. She 
 
44 THOMAS HUGHES. 
 
 turned with a start, and the next moment found herself in 
 the arms of a man. Altogether, the excitement of the day 
 and the evening, with this last shock at the end of all, proved 
 too much for her, and she fairly fainted away. 
 
 " Good God, Herbert ! what am I to do ? Here 's Mabel 
 fainting ! " 
 
 " Why the deuce did you frighten her, then ? Come, 
 bring her in," and, so saying, Herbert pushed the door open. 
 The astonishment of the company vented itself first in a sort 
 of gasp ; Mr. Kendrick turned sharply round, following the 
 universal stare, and beheld one bearded stranger in front, 
 standing on his kitchen floor, with a big stick in his hand, 
 and his daughter in the arms of another just behind him. 
 He sprang to his feet, as did all the other men, but not 
 before Mrs. Kendrick had rushed across the kitchen, cry- 
 ing, 
 
 " Mabel, dearest, what is it ? What have you done to my 
 child ? " 
 
 " Mother, dear mother ! don't you know me ? " 
 
 " Johnny ! O God, is it Johnny ? " and now the mother 
 was on his neck, sobbing hysterically ; and the whole of the 
 women thronged round them, and murmurs of " Master 
 John ! " " 'T is the young squire, zhure enough ! " " Massy, 
 how a be grawed," and such like, passed round the men. 
 
 " Had n't you better stand back, and give the young lady 
 room to come round ? " said Herbert. 
 
 Mr. Kendrick now pressed forward with blanched face 
 through the crowd. The son could only stretch out his 
 hand, with, " Dear father, you have forgiven me ? " 
 
 John Kendrick the elder seized and grasped it twice, but 
 could not speak. He was not the man to give way in public, 
 but his bowels yearned to his son, and he fled away to his 
 chamber to weep there. 
 
 Herbert was looking on, much moved, weighing within 
 himself whether he could be of any use, when his eye caught 
 
THE ASHEN FAGOT. 45 
 
 sight of the vicar, making horrible gulping faces, and wiping 
 his spectacles. He looked anxiously at him for a moment, 
 and then, springing across, seized his hand and began shak- 
 ing it furiously. 
 
 " Why, Mr. Ward, Mr. Ward, don't you know me ? " 
 
 u Eh, oh ! what ? no ! Who are you ? " replied the vicar, 
 shaking away, however, with great good-will, and glad to find 
 an outlet for his feelings. 
 
 " Why, Herbert Upton of course. Who should I be ? " 
 
 " What, Herbert ! God bless me ! No, it can't be. Yes, 
 I see. My dear boy, what brings you here ? Where have 
 you been ? Why have n't you written ? " 
 
 " So I have, often, some years back." 
 
 " What, written ? I Ve never had the letters." 
 
 " And Neliy ? " 
 
 " O, here she is, somewhere. Nelly, where are you ? We 
 often talk of you and old times." 
 
 And now there was like to be another catastrophe calling 
 for salts and cold water, as Herbert and Nelly met again 
 after six years' parting. He had left her a slip of a girl, 
 and found her a fine young woman. She had last seen 
 him a stripling of twenty, and he stood there now a great- 
 bearded man. 
 
 Readers must picture to themselves the rest of the scene, 
 how the troubled groups divided themselves again ; how 
 the Ashen Fagot revelry went on in the kitchen, every bond 
 that had burst during the interruption receiving due posthu- 
 mous honors ; how the reputation of Avenly for strict sobri- 
 ety was somewhat shaken that night, though nothing was said 
 about it by squire or vicar ; how, at the supper in the parlor, 
 to which no one but Herbert and Dick did any justice, the 
 story of Herbert's meeting with Johnny half-starved in the 
 streets of Sydney, and taking him into his employment, of 
 their defence of their wagon and beasts against bushrangers, 
 of the lucky accident which enabled Herbert to come home, 
 
46 THOMAS HUGHES. 
 
 was told by fits and starts in answer to a thousand ques- 
 tions. 
 
 It was almost midnight before they broke up, and then 
 Mr. Kendrick asked the vicar to read to them, and took 
 down his big Bible. And the old vicar, peering through his 
 spectacles, turned to the 15th chapter of St. Luke, and read 
 it ; and as the well-known words were heard again, there 
 was no dry eye in the parlor, except the incorrigible Dick's. 
 
 Herbert Upton escorted the vicar and Nelly home ; and 
 on the next Sunday the banns of Herbert Upton, of New 
 South Wales, and Eleanor Ward, of Avenly, were duly 
 published for the first time in the parish church. Herbert 
 established himself for the winter at the vicarage, with three 
 good hunters, which stood in Mr. Kendrick's capacious sta- 
 bles. The worthy villagers of Avenly will long remember 
 and talk over the Ashen Fagot night when the young 
 squire came home again. 
 
CONTENTMENT. 
 
 BY OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES. 
 
 " Man wants but little here belmr. w 
 
 LITTLE I ask ; my wants are few ; 
 I only wish a hut of stone, 
 (A very plain brown stone will do,) 
 That I may call my own ; 
 And close at hand is such a one, 
 In yonder street that fronts the sun. 
 
 Plain food is quite enough for me ; 
 
 Three courses are as good as ten ; 
 If Nature can subsist on three, 
 
 Thank Heaven for three. Amen I 
 I always thought cold victual nice ; 
 My choice would be vanilla-ice. 
 
 I care not much for gold or land ; 
 
 Give me a mortgage here and there, 
 Some good bank-stock, some note of hand, 
 
 Or trifling railroad share, 
 I only ask that Fortune send 
 A little more than I shall spend. 
 
 Honors are silly toys, I know, 
 And titles are but empty names ; 
 
48 OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES. 
 
 I would, perhaps, be Plenipo, 
 But only near St. James ; 
 I 'm very sure I should not care 
 To fill our Gubernator's chair. 
 
 Jewels are bawbles ; 't is a sin 
 
 To care for such unfruitful things ; 
 One good-sized diamond in a pin, 
 
 Some, not so large, in rings, 
 A ruby, and a pearl, or so, 
 Will do for me ; I laugh at show. 
 
 My dames should dress in cheap attire ; 
 
 (Good, heavy silks are never dear ;) 
 I own perhaps I might desire 
 
 Some shawls of true Cashmere, 
 Some marrowy crapes of China silk, 
 Like wrinkled skins on scalded milk. 
 
 I would not have the horse I drive 
 
 So fast that folks must stop and stare ; 
 An easy gait two, forty-five 
 
 Suits me ; I do not care ; 
 Perhaps, for just a single spurt, 
 Some seconds less would do no hurt. 
 
 Of pictures, I should like to own 
 
 Titians and Raphaels three or four, - 
 I love so much their style and tone, 
 
 One Turner, and no more, 
 (A landscape, foreground golden dirt, 
 The sunshine painted with a squirt.) 
 
 Of books but few, some fifty score 
 For daily use, and bound for wear ; 
 
CONTENTMENT. 49 
 
 The rest upon an upper floor ; 
 
 Some little luxury there 
 Of red morocco's gilded gleam, 
 And vellum rich as country cream. 
 
 
 Busts, cameos, gems, such tilings as these, 
 
 Which others often show fci prUt, 
 /value for their power to please, 
 
 And selfish churls deride ; 
 One Stradivarius, I confess, 
 Two Meerschaums, I would fain possess. 
 
 Wealth's wasteful tricks I will not learn, 
 *Nor ape the glittering upstart fool ; 
 Shall not carved tables serve my turn, 
 
 But all must be of buhl ? 
 Give grasping pomp its double share, 
 I ask but one recumbent chair. 
 
 Thus humble let me live and die, 
 
 Nor long for Midas' golden touch ; 
 If Heaven more generous gifts deny, 
 I shall not miss them much, 
 Too grateful for the blessing lent 
 Of simple tastes and mind content ! 
 
LITTLE SCHOLARS 
 
 BY ANNA THACKERAY. 
 
 morning, as I was walking up a street 
 1 in Pimlico, I came upon a crowd of little persons issu- 
 ing from a narrow alley. Ever so many little people there 
 were streaming through a wicket ; running children, shouting 
 children, loitering children, chattering children, and children 
 spinning tops by the way, so that the whole street was 
 awakened by the pleasant childish clatter. As I stand for 
 an instant to see the procession go by, one little girl pops 
 me an impromptu courtesy, at which another from a distant 
 quarter, not behindhand in politeness, pops me another ; and 
 presently quite an irregular little volley of courtesyings goes 
 off in every direction. Then I blandly inquire if school is 
 over ? and if there is anybody left in the house ? A little 
 brown-eyes nods her head, and says, " There 's a great many 
 people left in the house." And so there are, sure enough, 
 as I find when I get in. 
 
 Down a narrow yard, with the workshops on one side and 
 the schools on .the other, in at a little door which leads into 
 a big room where there are rafters, maps hanging on the 
 walls, and remarks in immense letters, such as, " COFFEE 
 is GOOD FOR MY BREAKFAST," and pictures of useful 
 things, with the well-thumbed .story underneath ; a stove in 
 the middle of the room ; a paper hangh fe up on the door 
 with the names of the teachers ; and everywhere wooden 
 
LITTLE SCHOLARS. 51 
 
 oenches and tables, made low and small for little legs and 
 arms. 
 
 Well, the school-room is quite empty and silent now, and 
 the little turmoil has poured eagerly out at the door. It is 
 twelve o'clock, the sun is shining in the court, and some- 
 thing better than schooling is going on in the kitchen yon- 
 der. Who cares now where coffee comes from ? or which 
 are the chief cities in Europe ? or in what -year Stephen 
 came to the throne ? For is not twelve o'clock dinner-time 
 with all sensible people ? and what periods of history, what 
 future aspirations, what distant events are as important to 
 us grown-up folks, and children, too as this pleasant 
 daily recurring one ? 
 
 The kiod, motherly schoolmistress who brought me in, 
 tells me that for a shilling half a dozen little boys and girls 
 can be treated to a wholesome meal. I wonder if it smells 
 as good to them as it does to me, when I pull my shilling 
 out of my pocket. The food costs more than twopence 
 but there is a fund to which people subscribe, and with ifc. 
 help the kitchen cooks all through the winter months. 
 
 All the children seem very fond of the good Mrs. K . 
 
 As we leave the school-room, one little tiling comes up cry- 
 ing, and clinging to her, " A boy has been and 'it me ! " 
 But when the mistress says, " Well, never mind, you shall 
 have your dinner," the child is instantly consoled ; " and 
 you, and you, and you," she continues ; but this selection is 
 too heart-rending; and with the help of another lucky 
 shilling, nobody present is left out. I remember particularly 
 a lank child, with great black eyes and fuzzy hair, and a 
 pinched gray face, who stood leaning against a wall ii^the 
 sun : once, in the Pontine Marshes, years ago, I remember 
 seeing such another figure. "That poor thing is seven- 
 teen," says Mrs. K . " She sometimes loiters here all 
 
 day long ; she has no mother : and she often comes and tells 
 me her father is so drunk she dare not go home. I always 
 give her a dinner when I can. This is the kitchen." 
 
52 ANNA THACKERAY. 
 
 The kitchen is a delightful little clean-scrubbed place, with 
 rice pudding baking in the oven, and a young mistress, and 
 a big girl, busy bringing in great caldrons full of the mutton- 
 broth I have been scenting all this time. It is a fresh, 
 honest, hungry smell, quite different from that unwholesome 
 compound of fiy and sauce, and hot, pungent spice, and stew 
 and mess, which comes steaming up, some seven hours later, 
 into our dining-rooms, from the reeking kitchens below. 
 Here a poor woman is waiting, with a jug and a round- 
 eyed baby. The mistress tells me the people in the neigh- 
 borhood are too glad to buy what is left of the children's 
 
 dinner. " Look what good stuff it is," says Mrs. K , 
 
 and she shows me a bowl full of the jelly to which it turns 
 when cold. As the two girls come stepping through the 
 sunny doorway, with the smoking jar between them, I 
 think Mr. Millais might make a pretty picture of the little 
 scene ; but my attention is suddenly distracted by the round- 
 eyed baby, who is peering down into the great soup-jug with 
 such wide, wide-open eyes, and little hands outstretched, 
 such an eager, happy face, that it almost made one laugh, 
 and cry too, to see. The baby must be a favorite, for he is 
 served, and goes off in his mother's arms, keeping vigilant 
 watch over the jug, while four or five other jugs and women 
 are waiting still in the next room. Then into rows of little 
 yellow basins our mistress pours the broth, and we now go 
 in to see the company in the dining-hall, waiting for its 
 banquet. Ah me ! but it is a pleasanter sight to see than 
 any company in all the land. Somehow, as the children 
 say grace, I feel as if there was indeed a blessing on the 
 foo<!^ a blessing which brings color into these wan cheeks, 
 and strength and warmth into these wasted little limbs. 
 Meanwhile the expectant company is growing rather im- 
 patient, and is battering the benches with its spoons, and 
 tapping neighboring heads as well. There goes a little 
 guest, scrambling from his place across the room and back 
 
LITTLE SCHOLARS. 53 
 
 again. So many are here to-day, that they have not all got 
 seats. I see the wan girl still standing against the wall, and 
 there is her brother, a sociable little fellow, all dressed 
 in corduroys, who is making funny faces at me across the 
 room, at which some other little boys burst out laughing. 
 But the infants on the dolls'-benches. at the other end, are 
 the best fun. There they are three, four, five years old 
 whispering and ohattering, and tumbling over one another. 
 Sometimes one infant falls suddenly forward, with its nose 
 upon the table, and stops there quite contentedly; some- 
 times another disappears entirely under the legs, and is 
 tugged up by its neighbors. A certain number of the in- 
 fants have their dinner every day, the mistress tells me. 
 
 Mrs. * has said so, and hers is the kind hand which has 
 
 provided for all these young ones ; while a same kind heart 
 has schemed how to shelter, to feed, to clothe, to teach the 
 greatest number of these hungry and cold and neglected 
 little children. 
 
 As I am replying to the advances of my young friend in 
 the corduroys, I suddenly hear a cry of " Ooo ! ooo ! ooo ! 
 noo spoons, noo spoons, ooo ! ooo ! ooo ! " and all the 
 little hands stretch out eagerly as one of the big girls goes 
 by with a paper of shining metal spoons. By this time the 
 basins of soup are travelling round, with hunches of home- 
 made bread. " The infants are to have pudding first," says 
 the mistress, coming forward ; and in a few minutes more 
 all the little birds are busy pecking at their bread and pud- 
 ding, of which they take up very small mouthfuls, in very 
 big spoons, and let a good deal slobber down over their 
 pinafores. 
 
 One little curly-haired boy, with a very grave face, was 
 eating pudding very slowly and solemnly; so I said to 
 him, 
 
 " Do you like pudding best ? " 
 
 Little Boy. Isss." 
 
54 ANNA THACKERAY. 
 
 " And can you read ? " 
 
 Little Boy. " Isss." 
 
 " And write ? " 
 
 Little Boy. " Isss." 
 
 " And have you got a sister ? " 
 
 Little Boy. " Isss." 
 
 u And does she wash your face so nicely ? " 
 
 Little Boy, extra solemn. " No, see is wite a little girl 
 see is on'y four year old." 
 
 " And how old are you ? " 
 
 Little Boy, with great dignity. " / am fi' year old." 
 
 Then he told me Mrs. Willis " wassed" his face, and 'he 
 brought his sister to school. 
 
 " Where is your sister ? " says the mistress, going by. 
 
 But four-years was not forthcoming. 
 
 " I s'pose see has wait home," says the child, and goes on 
 with his pudding. 
 
 This little pair are orphans out of the workhouse, Mrs. 
 
 K told me. But somebody pays Mrs. Willis for their 
 
 keep. 
 
 There was another funny little thing, very, small, sitting 
 between two bigger boys, to whom I said, 
 
 " Are you a little boy or a little girl ? " 
 
 " Little dirl," says this baby, quite confidently. 
 
 " No, you ain't," cries the left-hand neighbor, very much 
 excited. 
 
 " Yes, she is," says right-hand neighbor. 
 
 And then three or four more join in, each taking a differ- 
 ent view of the question. All this time corduroys is still 
 grinning and making faces in his corner. I admire his brass 
 buttons, upon which three or four more children instantly 
 crowd round to look at them. One is a poor little deformed 
 fellow, to whom buttons would be of very little use. He is 
 in quite worn and ragged clothes : he looks as pale and thin 
 almost as that poor girl I first noticed He has no mother 
 
LITTLE SCHOLARS. 55 
 
 he and his brother live alone with their father, who is out all 
 day, and the children have to do everything for themselves. 
 The young ones here who have no mothers seem by far the 
 worst off. This little deformed boy, poor as he is, finds 
 something to give away. Presently I see him scrambling 
 over the backs of the others, and feeding them with small 
 shreds of meat, which he takes out of his soup with his 
 grubby little fingers, and which one little boy, called Thomp- 
 son, is eating with immense relish. Mrs. K here comes 
 
 up, and says that those who are hungry are to have some 
 more. Thompson has some more, and so does another rosy 
 little fellow ; but the others have hardly finished what was 
 first given them, and the veiy little ones send off their pud- 
 ding half e^aten, and ask for soup. The mistresses here are 
 quite touchingly kind and thoughtful. I did not hear a sharp 
 tone. All the children seemed at home, and happy, and 
 gently dealt with. However cruelly want and care and 
 harshness haunt their own homes, here at least there are 
 only kind words and comfort for these poor little pilgrims 
 
 whose toil has begun so early. Mrs. told me once, 
 
 that often in winter time these children come barefooted 
 through the snow, and so cold and hungry that they have 
 fallen off their seats half fainting. We may be sure that 
 such little sufferers thanks to these Good Samaritans ! 
 will be tenderly picked up and cared for. But, I wonder, 
 must there always be children in the world hungry and de- 
 serted ? and will there never, out of all the abundance of the 
 earth, be enough to spare to content those who want so little 
 to make them happy ? 
 
 Mrs. came in while I was still at the school, and 
 
 took me over the workshops where the elder boys learn to 
 carpenter and carve. Scores of drawing-rooms in Belgravia 
 are bristling with the pretty little tables and ornaments these 
 young artificers design. A young man with a scrip turaJ ' 
 name superintends the work ; the boys are paid for their 
 
56 ANNA THACKERAY. 
 
 labor, and send out red velvet and twisted legs, and wood 
 ornamented in a hundred devices. There is an industrial 
 class for girls, too. The best and oldest are taken in, and 
 taught housework, and kitchen-work, and sewing. Even the 
 fathers and mothers come in for a share of the good things, 
 and are invited to tea sometimes, and amused in the evening 
 with magic-lanterns, and conjurers, and lecturings. I do not 
 dwell at greater length upon the industrial part of these 
 schools, because I want to speak of another very similar 
 institution I went to see another day. 
 
 On my way thither I had occasion to go through an old 
 churchyard, full of graves and sunshine ; a quaint old sub- 
 urban place, with tree-tops and old brick houses all round 
 about, and ancient windows looking down upon the quiet 
 tombstones. Some children were playing among the graves, 
 and two rosy little girls in big bonnets were sitting demurely 
 on a stone, and grasping two babies that were placidly bask- 
 ing in the sun. The little girls look up and grin as I go by. 
 I would ask them the way, only I know they won't answer, 
 and so I go on, out at an old iron gate, with a swinging 
 lamp, up " Church Walk " (so it is written), and along a 
 trim little terrace, to where a maid-of-all-work is scrubbing 
 
 at her steps. When I ask the damsel my way to B 
 
 Street, she says she " do-ant know B Street, but there 's 
 
 Little Davis Street round the corner " ; and when I say I 'm 
 afraid Little Davis Street is no good to me, she says, " 'T ain't 
 Gunter's Row, is it ? " So I go off in despair, and after some 
 minutes of brisk walking find myself turning up the trim 
 little terrace again, where the maid-of-all-work is still busy 
 at her steps. This time, as we have a sort of acquaint- 
 ance, I tell her that I am looking for a house where girls 
 are taken in, and educated, and taught to be housemaids. 
 At which confidence she brightens up, and says, " There 's a 
 'ouse round the-ar with somethink wrote on the door, jest 
 where the little boy's a-trundlin' of his 'oop." 
 
LITTLE SCHOLARS. 57 
 
 And so, sure enough, following the hoop, I come to an 
 old-fashioned house in a court-yard, and ring at a wooden 
 door, on which " Girls' Industrial Schools " is painted up in 
 white letters. 
 
 A little industrious girl, in a lilac pinafore, let me in, with 
 a courtesy. 
 
 " May I come in and see the place ? " say I. 
 
 " Please, yes," says she (another courtesy). " Please, what 
 name? please walk this way." 
 
 " This way " leads through the court, where clothes are 
 hanging on lines, into a little office-room, where my guide 
 leaves me, with yet another little courtesy. In a minute the 
 mistress comes out from the inner room. She is a kind, 
 smiling young woman, with a fresh face and a pleasant man- 
 ner. She takes me in, and I see a dozen more girls in lilac 
 pinafores reading round a deal table. They look mostly 
 about thirteen or fourteen years old. I ask if this is all the 
 school. 
 
 " Xo, not all," the mistress says, counting ; " some are in 
 the laundry, and some are not at home. When they are 
 old enough, they go out into the neighborhood to help to 
 wash, or cook, or what not. Go on, girls ! " and the girls 
 instantly begin to read again, and the mistress, opening a 
 door, brings us out into the passage. " We have room for 
 twenty-two," says the little mistress ; " and we dress them, 
 and feed them, and teach them as well as we can. On 
 wctk-clays they wear anything we can find for them, but 
 they have very nice frocks on Sundays. I never leave 
 them; I sit with them, and sleep among them, and walk 
 with them ; they are always friendly and affectionate to me 
 and among themselves, and are very good companions." 
 
 In answer to my questions, she said that most of the 
 children were put in by friends who paid half a crown a 
 week for them, sometimes the parents themselves, but they 
 could rarely afford it That besides this, and what the girla 
 
58 ANNA THACKERAY. 
 
 could earn, 200 a year is required for the rent of the 
 house and expenses. " It has always been made up," says 
 the mistress, " but we can't help being very anxious at times, 
 as we have nothing certain, nor any regular subscriptions. 
 Won't you see the laundry ? " she adds, opening a door. 
 
 In the laundry is a steam, and a clatter, and irons, and 
 linen, and a little mangle, turned by two little girls, while 
 two or three more are busy ironing under the superintend- 
 ence of a- washerwoman with tucked-up sleeves ; piles of 
 shirt-collars and handkerchiefs and linen are lying on the 
 shelves, shirts and clothes are hanging on lines across the 
 room. The little girls don't stop, but go on busily. 
 
 " Where is Mary Anne ? " says the mistress, with a little 
 conscious pride. 
 
 " There she is, mum," says the washerwoman, and Mary 
 Anne steps out, blushing, from behind the mangle, with a 
 hot iron in her hand and a hanging head. 
 
 "Mary Anne is our chief laundry-maid," says the mis- 
 tress, as we came out into the hall again. " For the first 
 year I could make nothing of her ; she was miserable in the 
 kitchen, she couldn't bear housework, she wouldn't learn 
 her lessons. In fact, I was quite unhappy about her, till 
 one day I set her to ironing ; she took to it instantly, and 
 has been quite cheerful and busy ever since." 
 
 So leaving Maiy Anne to her vocation in life, we went 
 jp-stairs to the dormitories. The first floor is let to a lady, 
 and one of the girls is chosen to wait upon her ; the second 
 floor is where they sleep, in fresh light rooms with open 
 windows and sweet spring breezes blowing in across gar- 
 dens and court-yards. The place was delightfully trim and 
 fresh and peaceful; the little gray-coated beds stood in 
 rows, with a basket at the foot of each, and texts were 
 hanging up on the wall. In the next room stood a ward- 
 robe full of the girls' Sunday clothes, of which one of them 
 keeps the key ; after this came the mistress's own room, as 
 fresh and light and well kept as the rest. 
 
LITTLE SCHOLARS. 59 
 
 These little maidens scrub and cook and wash and sew. 
 I?hey make broth for the poor, and puddings. They are 
 taught to read and write and count, and they learn geogra- 
 phy and history as well. Many of them come from dark, 
 unwholesome alleys in the neighborhood, from a dreary 
 country of dirt and crime and foul talk. In this little con- 
 vent all is fresh and pure, and the sunshine pours in at 
 every window. I don't know that the life is very exciting 
 there, or that the days spent at the mangle, or round the 
 deal table, can be very stirring ones. But surely they are 
 well spent, learning useful arts, and order and modesty and 
 cleanliness. Think of the cellars and slums from which 
 these children come, and of the quiet little haven where 
 they are fitted for the struggle of life, and are taught to be 
 good and industrious and sober and honest. It is only for 
 a year or two, and then they will go out into the world 
 again, into a world, indeed, of which we know but little, 
 a world of cooks and kitchen-maids and general servants. 
 I daresay these little industrious girls, sitting round that 
 table and spelling out the Gospel of St. John this sunny 
 afternoon, are longing and wistfully thinking about that 
 wondrous coming time. Meanwhile the quiet hour goes by. 
 I say farewell to the kind, smiling mistress ; Mary Anne is 
 still busy among her irons; I hear the mangle click as I 
 pass, and the wooden door opens to let me out. 
 
 In another old house, standing in a deserted old square 
 near the city, there is a school which interested me as 
 much as any of those I have come across, a school :or 
 little Jewish boys and girls. We find a tranquil, roomy eld 
 house, with light windows looking out into the quiet square 
 with its ancient garden ; a carved staircase ; a little hall 
 paved with black and white mosaic, whence two doors lead 
 respectively to the Boys' and Girls' schools. Presently a 
 little girl unlocks one of these doors, and runs up before us 
 into the school-room, a long, well-lighted room full of other 
 
60 ANNA THACKERAY. 
 
 little girls busy at their desks : little Hebrew maidens with 
 Oriental faces, who look up at us as we come in. This is 
 
 always rather an alarming moment ; but Dr. , who knows 
 
 the children, comes kindly to our help, and begins to tell us 
 about the school. " It is an experiment," he says, " and 
 one which has answered admirably well. Any children are 
 admitted, Christians as well as Jews ; and none come with- 
 out paying something every Aveek, twopence or threepence, 
 as they can afford, for many of them belong to the very 
 poorest of the Jewish community. They receive a very 
 high class of education." (When I presently see what they 
 are doing, and hear the questions they can answer, I begin 
 to feel a very great respect for these little bits of girls in 
 pinafores, and for the people who are experimenting on 
 them.) " But the chief aim of the school is to teach 
 them to help themselves, and to inculcate an honest self- 
 dependence and independence." And, indeed, as I look at 
 them, I cannot but be struck with a certain air of re- 
 spectability and uprightness among these little creatures, 
 as they sit there, so self-possessed, keen-eyed, well-mannered. 
 " Could you give them a parsing lesson ? " the doctor asks 
 the schoolmistress, who shakes her head, and says it is their 
 day for arithmetic, and she may not interrupt the order of 
 their studies ; but that they may answer any questions the 
 doctor likes to put to them. 
 
 Quite little tlu'ngs, with their hair in curls, can tell you 
 about tons and hundredweights, and how many horses it 
 would take to draw a ton, and how many little girls to draw 
 two thirds of a ton, if so many little girls went to a horse ; 
 and if a horse were added, or a horse taken away, or two 
 eighths of the little girls, or three fourths of the horse, or 
 one sixth of the ton, until the room begins to spin 
 breathlessly round and round, and I am left ever so far 
 behindhand. 
 
 "Is avoirdupois an English word?" Up goes a little 
 
LITTLE SCHOLARS. 61 
 
 hand, with fingers working eagerly, and a pretty little 
 creature, wLh long black hair and a necklace, cries out that 
 it is French, and means, have weight. 
 
 Then the doctor asks about early English history, and the 
 hands still go up, and they know all about it ; and so they 
 do about civilization, and despotism, and charters, and Picts 
 and Scots, and dynasties, and early lawgivers, and coloniza- 
 tion, and reformation. 
 
 "Who was Martin Luther? Why did he leave the 
 Catholic Church ? What were indulgences ? " 
 
 " You gave the Pope lots of money, sir, and he gave you 
 dispensations." This was from our little portress. 
 
 There was another little shrimp of a thing, with wonder- 
 ful, long-sJit, flashing eyes, who could answer anything 
 almost, and whom the other little girls accordingly brought 
 forward in triumph from a back row. 
 
 " Give me an instance of a free country ? " asks the tired 
 questioner. 
 
 " England, sir ! " cry the little girls in a shout. 
 
 " And now of a country which is not free." 
 
 "America," cry two little voices; and then one adds, 
 " Because there are slaves, sir." " And France," says a 
 third ; " and we have seen the emperor in the picture- 
 shops." 
 
 As I listen to them, I cannot help wishing that many of 
 our little Christians were taught to be as independent and 
 self-respecting in their dealings with the grown-up people 
 who come to look at them. One would fancy that servility 
 was a sacred institution, we cling to it so fondly. We seem 
 to expect an absurd amount of respect from our inferiors ; 
 we are ready to pay back just as much to those above us in 
 station : and hence I think, notwithstanding all the kindness 
 of heart, all the well-meant and well-spent exertion we see 
 in the world, there is often too great an inequality between 
 those who teach and those who would learn, those who give 
 and those whose harder part it is to receive. 
 
62 ANNA THACKERAY. 
 
 We were quite sorry at last when the doctor made a little 
 bow, and said, " Good morning, young ladies," quite politely, 
 to his pupils. It was too late to stop and talk to the little 
 boys down below, but we went for a minute into an inner 
 room out of the large boys' school-room, and there we found 
 half a dozen little men, with their hats on their heads, sitting 
 on their benches, reading the Psalms in Hebrew ; and so we 
 stood, for this minute before we came away, listening to 
 David's words spoken in David's tongue, and ringing rather 
 sadly in the boys' touching childish voice. 
 
 But this is not by any means the principal school which 
 the Jews have established in London. Deep in the heart 
 of the city, beyond St. Paul's, beyond the Cattle 
 Market, with its countless pens, beyond Finsbury Square, 
 and the narrow Barbican, travelling on through a dirty, 
 close, thickly peopled region, you come to Bell Lane, in 
 Spitalfields. And here you may step in at a door and sud- 
 denly find yourself in a wonderful country, in the midst of 
 an unknown people, in a great hall sounding with the voices 
 of hundreds of Jewish children. I know not if it is always 
 so, or if this great assemblage is only temporary, during the 
 preparation for the Passover, but all along the sides of this 
 great room were curtained divisions, and classes sitting 
 divided, busy at their tasks, and children upon children as 
 far as you could see ; and somehow as you look you almost 
 see, not these children only, but their forefathers, the Chil- 
 dren of Israel, camping in their tents, as they camped at 
 Succoth, when they fled out of the land of Egypt and the 
 house of bondage. Some of these here present to-day are 
 still flying from the house of bondage ; many of them are 
 the children of Poles and Russians and Hungarians, who 
 have escaped over here to avoid conscription, and who arrive 
 destitute and in great misery. But to be friendless, and in 
 want, and poverty-stricken is the best recommendation for 
 admission to this noble charity. And here, as elsewhere, 
 
LITTLE SCHOLARS. 63 
 
 any one who comes to the door is taken in, Christian as 
 well as Jew. 
 
 I have before me now the Report for the year 5619 
 (1858), during which 1,800 children have come to these 
 schools daily. 10,000 in all have been admitted since the 
 foundation of the school. The working alone of the estab- 
 lishment salaries, repairs, books, laundresses, &c. 
 amounts to more than 2,000 a year. Of this a very con- 
 siderable portion goes in salaries to its officers, of whom I 
 count more than fifty in the first page of the pamphlet. 
 " 12 to a man for washing boys," is surely well-spent 
 money; "3 to a beadle, 14 for brooms and brushes, 
 1 19*. Qd. for repair of clocks," are among the items. 
 The anntial subscriptions are under 500, and the very 
 existence of the place (so says the Report) depends on 
 voluntary offerings at the anniversary. That some of these 
 gifts come in with splendid generosity I need scarcely say. 
 Clothing for the whole school arrives at Easter, once a year, 
 and I saw great bales of boots for the boys waiting to be 
 unpacked in their school-room. Tailors and shoemakers 
 come and take measurings beforehand, so that everybody 
 gets his own. To-day, these artists having retired, car- 
 penters and bricklayers are at work all about the place, and 
 the great boys' school, which is larger still than the girls', is 
 necessarily empty, except that a group of teachers and 
 monitors are standing in one corner talking and whisper- 
 ing together. The head-master, with a black beard, comes 
 down from a high desk in an inner room, and tells us about 
 the place, about the cleverness of the children, and the 
 scholarship lately founded ; how well many of the boys turn 
 out in after life, and for what good positions they are fitted 
 by the education they are able to receive here ; " though 
 Jews," he said, "are debarred by their religious require- 
 ments from two thirds of the employments which Christians 
 are able to fill. Masters cannot afford to employ workmen 
 
64 ANNA THACKERAY. 
 
 who can only give their time from Monday to Friday after- 
 noon. There are, therefore, only a very limited number of 
 occupations open to us. Some of our boys rise to be min- 
 isters, and many become teachers here, in which case gov- 
 ernment allows them a certain portion of their salary." 
 
 The head-mistress in the girls' school was not less kind 
 and ready to answer our questions. During the winter 
 mornings, hot bread-and-milk are given out to any girl who 
 chooses to ask for it, but only about a hundred come for- 
 ward, of the very hungriest and poorest. When we came 
 
 away from Square a day before, we had begun to 
 
 think that all poor Jews were well and warmly clad, and 
 had time to curl their hair and to look clean and prosperous 
 and respectable, but here, alas ! comes the old story of want 
 and sorrow and neglect. What are these brown, lean, wan 
 little figures, in loose gowns falling from their shoulders, 
 black eyes, fuzzy, unkempt hair, strange bead necklaces round 
 their throats and ear-rings in their ears ? I fancied these 
 must be the Poles and Russians ; but when I spoke to one 
 of them, she smiled, and answered very nicely, in perfectly 
 good English, and told me she liked writing best of all, and 
 showed me a copy very neat, even, and legible. 
 
 Whole classes seemed busy sewing at lilac pinafores, 
 which are, I suppose, a great national institution; others 
 were ciphering and calling out the figures as the mistress 
 chalked the sum upon a slate. Hebrew alphabets and sen- 
 tences were hanging up upon the walls. All these little 
 Hebrew maidens learn the language of their nation. 
 
 In the infant-school, a very fat little pouting baby, with 
 dark eyes, and a little hook-nose and curly locks, and a blue 
 necklace, and funny ear-rings in her little rosy ears, came 
 forward, grasping one of the mistresses' fingers. 
 
 " This is a good little girl," said that lady, " who knows 
 her alphabet in Hebrew and in English." 
 
 And the little girl looks up very solemn, as children 
 
LITTLE SCHOLARS. 65 
 
 do, to whom everything is of vast importance, and each 
 little incident a great new fact. The infant-schools do 
 not make part of the Bell Lane Establishment, though 
 they are connected with it, and the children, as they grow 
 up, and are infants no longer, draft off into the great free- 
 school. 
 
 The infant-school is a light, new building close by, with 
 arcaded play-grounds, and plenty of light and air and 
 freshness, though it stands in this dreary, grimy region. As 
 we come into the school-rooms we find, piled up on steps at 
 either end, great living heaps of little infants, swaying, kick- 
 ing, shouting for their dinner, beating aimlessly about with 
 little legs and arms. Little Jew babies are uncommonly 
 like little* Christians ; just as funny, as hungry, as helpless, 
 and happy now that the bowls of food come steaming in. 
 One, two, three, four, five little cook-boys, in white jackets 
 and caps and aprons, appear in a Hue, with trays upon 
 their heads, like the processions out of the Arabian Nights ; 
 and as each cook-boy appears, the children cheer, and the 
 potatoes steam hotter and hotter, and the mistresses begin 
 to ladle them out. 
 
 Rice and brown potatoes is the manna given twice a 
 week to these hungry little Israelites. I rather wish for 
 the soup and pudding certain small Christians are gobbling 
 up just about this time in another corner of London ; but 
 this is but a halfpenny-worth, while the other meal costs a 
 penny. You may count by hundreds here, instead of by 
 tens ; and I don't think there would be so much shouting at 
 the little cook-boys if these hungry little beaks were not 
 eager for their food. I was introduced to one little boy 
 here, who seemed to be very much looked up to by his 
 companions because he had one long curl right along the 
 top of his head. As we were busy talking to him, a 
 number of little things sitting on the floor were busy strok- 
 ing and feeling with little gentle fingers the soft edges of a 
 5 
 
66 ANNA THACKERAY. 
 
 coat one of us had on, and the silk dress of a lady who was 
 present. 
 
 The lady who takes chief charge of these 400 babies 
 told us how the mothers as well as the children got assist- 
 ance here in many ways, sometimes coming for advice, 
 sometimes for small loans of money, which they always 
 faithfully repay. She also showed us letters from some of 
 the boys who have left and prospered in life. One from a 
 youth who has lately been elected alderman in some distant 
 colony. She took us into a class-room and gave a lesson to 
 some twenty little creatures, while, as it seemed to me, all 
 the 380 others were tapping at the door, and begging to be 
 let in. It was an object-, and then a scripture-lesson, and 
 given with the help of old familiar pictures. There was 
 Abraham with his beard, and Isaac and the ram, hanging 
 up against the wall ; there was Moses, and the Egyptians, 
 and Joseph, and the sack and the brethren, somewhat out 
 of drawing. All these old friends gave one quite a homely 
 feeling, and seemed to hold out friendly hands to us 
 strangers and Philistines, standing within the gates of the 
 chosen people. 
 
 Before we came away the mistress opened a door and 
 showed us one of the prettiest and most touching sights I 
 have ever seen. It was the arcaded play-ground full of 
 happy, shouting, tumbling, scrambling little creatures : little 
 turnbled-down ones kicking and shouting on the ground, 
 absurd toddling races going on, whole files of little things 
 wandering up and down with their arms round one another's 
 necks: a happy, friendly little multitude indeed: a sight 
 good for sore eyes. 
 
 And so I suppose people of all nations and religions love 
 and tend their little ones, and watch and yearn over them. 
 I have seen little Catholics cared for by kind nuns with 
 wistful tenderness, as the young ones came clinging to their 
 black vails and playing with their chaplets ; little High- 
 
LITTLE SCHOLARS. 07 
 
 Church maidens growing up rosy and happy amid crosses 
 and mediaeval texts, and chants, and dinners of fish, and 
 kind and melancholy ladies in close caps and loose-cut 
 dresses ; little Low-Church children smiling and dropping 
 courtesies as they see the Rev. Mr. Faith-in-grace coming 
 up the lane with tracts in his big pockets about pious ne- 
 groes, and broken vessels, and devouring worms, and I 
 dare say pennies and sugar-plums as well. 
 
 Who has not seen and noted these tilings, and blessed, 
 with a thankful, humble heart, that fatherly Providence 
 which has sent this pure and tender religion of little chil- 
 dren to all creeds and to all the world? 
 
ANDANTE. 
 
 BEETHOVEN'S SIXTH SYMPHONY. 
 BY A. WEST. 
 
 SOUNDING above the warring of the years, 
 Over their stretch of toils, and pains, and fears, 
 Comes the well-loved refrain, 
 That ancient voice again. 
 
 Sweeter than when beside the river's marge 
 We lay and watched, like Innocence at large, 
 
 The changeful waters flow, 
 
 Speaks this brave music now. 
 
 Tender as sunlight upon childhood's head, 
 Serene as moonlight upon childhood's bed, 
 
 Comes the remembered power 
 
 Of that forgotten hour. 
 
 The little brook with merry voice and low, 
 The gentle ripples rippling far below, 
 Talked with no idle voice, 
 
 Though idling were their choice. 
 
 Now through the tumult and the pride of life, 
 Gentler, yet firmly soothing all its strife, 
 
 Nature draws near once more, 
 
 And knocks at the world's door. 
 
 She walks within her wild, harmonious maze, 
 Evolving melodies from doubt and haze, 
 
 And leaves us freed from care, 
 
 Like children standing there. 
 
ON DREAMS. 
 
 BY SIR THOMAS BROWNE. 
 
 HALF our days we pass in the shadow of the earth ; 
 and the brother of death exacteth a third part of our 
 lives. A good part of our sleep is peered out with visions 
 and fantastical objects, wherein we are confessedly deceived. 
 The day upplieth us with truths ; the night, with fictions 
 and falsehoods, which uncomfortably divide the natural ac- 
 count of our beings. And, therefore, having passed the day 
 in sober labors and rational inquiries of truth, we are fain 
 to betake ourselves unto such a state of being, wherein the 
 soberest heads have acted all the monstrosities of melancholy, 
 and which unto open eyes are no better than folly and mad- 
 ness. 
 
 Happy are they that go to bed with grand music, like 
 Pythagoras, or have ways to compose the fantastical spirit, 
 whose unruly wanderings take off inward sleep, filling our 
 heads with St. Anthony's visions, and the dreams of Lipara 
 in the sober chambers of rest. 
 
 Virtuous thoughts of the day lay up good treasures for 
 the night; whereby the impressions of imaginary forms 
 arise into sober similitudes, acceptable unto our slumbering 
 selves and preparatory unto divine impressions. Hereby 
 Solomon's sleep was happy. Thus prepared, Jacob might 
 well dream of angels upon a pillow of stone. And the best 
 sleep of Adam might be the best of any after.* 
 
 * the best sleep of Adam, <fc.] The only sleep of Adam recorded is that 
 which God caused to fall upon him, and which resulted in the creation 
 
70 SIR THOMAS BROWNE. 
 
 That there should be divine dreams seems unreasonably 
 doubted by Aristotle. That there are demoniacal dreams 
 we have little reason to doubt. Why may there not be 
 angelical ? If there be guardian spirits, they may not be 
 inactively about us in sleep ; but may sometimes order our 
 dreams : and many strange hints, instigations, or discourses, 
 which are so amazing unto us, may arise from such founda- 
 tions. 
 
 But the phantasms of sleep do commonly walk in the 
 great road of natural and animal dreams, wherein the 
 thoughts or actions of the day are acted over and echoed 
 in the night. Who can therefore wonder that Chrysostom 
 should dream of St. Paul, who daily read his epistles ; or 
 that Cardan, whose head was so taken up about the stars, 
 should dream that his soul was in the moon ! Pious per- 
 sons, whose thoughts are daily busied about heaven, and the 
 blessed state thereof, can hardly escape the nightly phan- 
 tasms of it, which though sometimes taken for illuminations, 
 or divine dreams, yet rightly perpended may prove but 
 animal visions, and natural night-scenes of their awaking 
 contemplations. 
 
 Many dreams are made out by sagacious exposition, and 
 from the signature of their subjects ; carrying their interpre- 
 tation in their fundamental sense and mystery of similitude, 
 whereby he that understands upon what natural fundamental 
 every notion dependeth may, by symbolical adaptation, hold 
 a ready way to read the characters of Morpheus. In dreams 
 of such a nature, Artemidorus, Achmet, and Astrampsichus, 
 from Greek, Egyptian, and Arabian oneiro-criticism, may 
 hint some interpretation ; who, while we read of a ladder in 
 Jacob's dream, will tell us that ladders and scalary ascents 
 signify preferment; and while we consider the dream of 
 Pharaoh, do teach us that rivers overflowing speak plenty, 
 
 of woman. It does not veiy clearly appear whether Sir Thomas calls it 
 the best sleep of Adam in allusion to its origin or its result. 
 
ON DREAMS. 71 
 
 lean oxen, famine and scarcity ; and therefore it was but 
 reasonable in Pharaoh to demand the interpretation from 
 his magicians, who, being Egyptians, should have been well 
 versed in symbols and the hieroglyphical notions of tilings. 
 The greatest tyrant in such divinations was Xabuchodonosor, 
 while, besides the interpretation, he demanded the dream 
 itself; which being probably determined by divine immission, 
 might escape the common road of phantasms, that might have 
 been traced by Satan. 
 
 When Alexander, going to besiege Tyre, dreamt of a 
 Satyr, it was no hard exposition for a Grecian to say, " Tyre 
 will be thine." He that dreamed that he saw his father 
 washed by Jupiter and anointed by the sun, had cause to 
 fear that fye might be crucified, whereby his body would be 
 washed by the rain, and drop by the heat of the sun. The 
 dream of Vespasian was of harder exposition ; as also that 
 of the Emperor Mauritius, concerning his successor Phocas. 
 And a man might have been hard put to it to interpret the 
 language of JEsculapius, when to a consumptive person he 
 held forth his fingers ; implying thereby that his cure lay in 
 dates, from the homonomy of the Greek, which signifies 
 dates and fingers. 
 
 We owe unto dreams that Galen was a physician, Dion 
 an historian, and that the world hath seen some notable 
 pieces of Cardan ; yet, he that should order his affairs by 
 dreams, or make the night a rule unto the day, might be 
 ridiculously deluded ; wherein Cicero is much to be pitied, 
 who having excellently discoursed of the vanity of dreams, 
 was yet undone by the flattery of his own, which urged him 
 to apply himself unto Augustus. 
 
 However dreams may be fallacious concerning outward 
 events, yet may they be truly significant at home ; and 
 whereby we may more sensibly understand ourselves. Men 
 act in sleep with some conformity unto their awaked senses ; 
 and consolations or discouragements may be drawn from 
 
72 SIR THOMAS BROWNE. 
 
 dreams which intimately tell us ourselves. Luther was not 
 like to fear a spirit in the night, when such an apparition 
 would not terrify him in the day. Alexander would hardly 
 have run away in the sharpest combats of sleep, nor Demos- 
 thenes have stood stoutly to it, who was scarce able to do it 
 in his prepared senses. 
 
 Persons of radical integrity will not easily be perverted 
 in their dreams, nor noble minds do pitiful things in sleep. 
 Crassus would have hardly been bountiful in a dream, whose 
 fist was so close awake. But a man might have lived all his 
 life upon the sleeping hand of Antonius.* 
 
 There is an art to make dreams, as well as their interpre- 
 tations ; and physicians will tell us that some food makes 
 turbulent, some gives quiet dreams. Cato, who doated upon 
 cabbage, might find the crude effects thereof in his sleep ; 
 wherein the Egyptians might find some advantage by their 
 superstitious abstinence from onions. Pythagoras might 
 have [had] calmer sleeps, if he [had] totally abstained 
 from beans. Even Daniel, the great interpreter of dreams, 
 in his leguminous diet seems to have chosen no advanta- 
 geous food for quiet sleeps, according to Grecian physic. 
 
 To add unto the delusion of dreams, the fantastical ob- 
 jects seem greater than they are ; and being beheld in the 
 vaporous state of sleep, enlarge their diameters unto us ; 
 whereby it may prove more easy to dream of giants than 
 pygmies. Democritus might seldom dream of atoms, who 
 so often thought of them. He almost might dream himself 
 a bubble extending unto the eighth sphere. A little water 
 makes a sea ; a small puff of wind a tempest. A grain of 
 sulphur kindled in the blood may make a flame like ^Etua ; 
 and a small spark in the bowels of Olympias a lightning 
 over all the chamber. 
 
 * sleeping hand of Antonius."] Who awake was open-handed and liberal, 
 in contrast with the close-fsledness of Crassus, and therefore would have 
 been munificent in his dreams. 
 
ON DREAMS. 73 
 
 
 
 But, beside these innocent delusions, there is a sinful state 
 of dreams. Death alone, not sleep, is able to put an end unto 
 sin ; and there may be a night-book of our iniquities ; for 
 beside the transgressions of the day, casuists will tell us of 
 mortal sins in dreams, arising from evil precogitations ; moau- 
 while human law regards not noctambulos ; and if a night- 
 walker should break his neck, or kill a man, takes no notice 
 of it. 
 
 Dionysius was absurdly tyrannical to kill a man for dream- 
 ing that he had killed him ; and really to take away his life, 
 who had but fantastically taken away his. Lamia was ridicu- 
 lously unjust to sue a young man for a reward, who had 
 confessed that pleasure from her in a dream which she had 
 denied unto his awaking senses : conceiving that she had 
 merited somewhat from his fantastical fruition and shadow 
 of herself. If there be such debts, we owe deeply unto 
 sympathies ; but the common spirit of the world must be 
 ready in such arrearages. 
 
 If some have swooned, they may have also died in dreams, 
 since death is but a confirmed swooning. Whether Plato 
 died in a dream, as some deliver, he must rise again to 
 inform us. That some have never dreamed is as improbable 
 as that some have never laughed. That children dream not 
 the first half-year ; that men dream not in some countries, 
 with many more, are unto me sick men's dreams ; dreams 
 out of the ivory gate,* and visions before midnight. 
 
 * the ivory gate.] The poets suppose two gates of sleep, the one of 
 horn, from which true dreams proceed; the other of ivory, which sends 
 forth false dreams. 
 
GOBLIN MARKET 
 
 BY CHRISTINA ROSSETTL 
 
 MORNING and evening 
 Maids heard the goblins cry 
 " Come buy our orchard fruits, 
 Come buy, come buy : 
 Apples and quinces, 
 Lemons and oranges, 
 Plump unpecked cherries, 
 Melons and raspberries, 
 Bloom-down-cheeked peaches, 
 Swart-headed mulberries, 
 Wild free-born cranberries, 
 Crab-apples, dewberries, 
 Pine-apples, blackberries, 
 Apricots, strawberries ; 
 All ripe together 
 In summer weather, 
 Morns that pass by, 
 Fair eves that fly j 
 Come buy, come buy : 
 Our grapes fresh from the vine, 
 Pomegranates full and fine, 
 Dates and sharp bullaces, 
 Rare pears and greengages, 
 Damsons and bilberries, 
 
GOBLIN MARKET. 75 
 
 Taste them and try : 
 
 Currants and gooseberries, 
 
 Bright-fire-like barberries, 
 
 Figs to fill your mouth, 
 
 Citrons from the South, 
 
 Sweet to tongue and sound to eye ; 
 
 Come buy, come buy." 
 
 Evening by evening 
 Among the brookside rushes, 
 Laura bowed her head to hear, 
 Lizzie veiled her blushes : 
 Crouching close together 
 In* the cooling weather, 
 With clasping arms and cautioning lips, 
 With tingling cheeks and finger tips. 
 u Lie close," Laura said, 
 Pricking up her golden head : 
 " We must not look at goblin men, 
 We must not buy their fruits : 
 Who knows upon what soil they fed 
 Their hungry, thirsty roots ? " 
 " Come buy," call the goblins, 
 Hobbh'ng down the glen. 
 " Oh," cried Lizzie, " Laura, Laura, 
 You should not peep at goblin men." 
 Lizzie covered up her eyes, 
 Covered close, lest they should look ; 
 Laura reared her glossy head, 
 And whispered like the restless brook : 
 " Look, Lizzie, look, Lizzie, 
 Down the glen tramp little men. 
 One hauls a basket, 
 One bears a plate, 
 One lugs a golden dish 
 
76 CHRISTINA ROSSETTL 
 
 Of many pounds weight. 
 
 How fair the vine must grow 
 
 Whose grapes are so luscious ; 
 
 How warm the wind must blow 
 
 Through those fruit bushes." 
 
 " No," said Lizzie : " No, no, no ; 
 
 Their offers should not charm us, 
 
 Their evil gifts would harm us." 
 
 She thrust a dimpled finger 
 
 In each ear, shut eyes and ran : 
 
 Curious Laura chose to linger, 
 
 Wondering at each merchant man. 
 
 One had a cat's face, 
 
 One whisked a tail, 
 
 One tramped at a rat's pace, 
 
 One crawled like a snail, 
 
 One like a wombat prowled obtuse and fiirry, 
 
 One like a ratel tumbled hurry skurry. 
 
 She heard a voice like voice of doves 
 
 Cooing all together : 
 
 They sounded kind and full of loves 
 
 In the pleasant weather. 
 
 Laura stretched her gleaming neck 
 Like a rush-imbedded swan, 
 Like a lily from the beck, 
 Like a moonlit poplar branch, 
 Like a vessel at the launch, 
 When its last restraint is gone. 
 
 Backwards up the mossy glen 
 Turned and trooped the goblin men, 
 With their shrill, repeated cry, 
 u Come buy, come buy." 
 When they reached where Laura was 
 
GOBLIN MARKET. 77 
 
 They stood stock still upon the moss, 
 Leering at each other, 
 Brother with queer brother ; 
 Signalling each other, 
 Brother with sly brother. 
 One set his basket down, 
 One reared his plate ; 
 One began to weave a crown 
 Of tendrils, leaves, and rough nuts brown 
 (Men sell not such in any town) ; 
 One heaved the golden weight 
 Of dish and fruit to offer her : 
 " Come buy, come buy," was still their cry. 
 Laura Stared, but did not stir, 
 Longed, but had no money : 
 The whisk-tailed merchant bade her taste 
 In tones as smooth as honey, 
 The cat-faced purred, 
 The rat-paced spoke a word 
 Of welcome, and the snail-paced even was heard ; 
 One parrot- voiced and jolly 
 
 Cried " Pretty Goblin " still for " Pretty Polly " ; 
 One whistled like a bird. 
 
 But sweet-tooth Laura spoke in haste 
 " Good folk, I have no coin ; 
 To take were to purloin : 
 I have no copper in my purse, 
 I have no silver either, 
 And all my gold is on the furze 
 That shakes in windy weather 
 Above the rusty heather." 
 " You have much gold upon your head," 
 They answered all together : 
 a Buy from us with a golden curl." 
 
78 CHRISTINA ROSSETTI. 
 
 She clipped a precious golden lock, 
 She dropped a tear more rare than pearl, 
 Then sucked their fruit globes fair or red : 
 Sweeter than honey from the rock, 
 Stronger than man-rejoicing wine, 
 Clearer than water flowed that juice ; 
 She never tasted such before, 
 How should it cloy with length of use ? 
 She sucked and sucked and sucked the more 
 Fruits which that unknown orchard bore ; 
 . She sucked until her lips were sore ; 
 Then flung the emptied rinds away, 
 But gathered up one kernel-stone, 
 And knew not was it night or day 
 As she turned home alone. 
 
 Lizzie met her at the gate, 
 Full of wise upbraidings : 
 " Dear, you should not stay so late, 
 Twilight is not good for maidens ; 
 Should not loiter in the glen, 
 In the haunts of goblin men. 
 Do you not remember Jeanie, 
 How she met them in the moonlight, 
 Took their gifts both choice and many, 
 Ate their fruits and wore their flowers, 
 Plucked from bowers 
 Where summer ripens at all hours ? 
 But ever in the moonlight 
 She pined and pined away ; 
 Sought them by night and day, 
 Found them no more, but dwindled and grew gray ; 
 Then fell with the first snow, 
 While to this day no grass will grow 
 Where she lies low : 
 
GOBLIN MARKET. 73 
 
 I planted daisies there a year ago 
 
 That never blow. 
 
 You should not loiter so." 
 
 " Nay, hush," said Laura : 
 
 u Nay, hush, my sister : 
 
 I ate and ate my fill, 
 
 Yet my mouth waters still ; . 
 
 To-morrow night I will 
 
 Buy more " : and kissed her: 
 
 " Have done with sorrow ; 
 
 I '11 bring you plums to-morrow 
 
 Fresh on their mother twigs, 
 
 Cherries worth getting ; 
 
 You cannot think what figs 
 
 My teeth have met in, 
 
 What melons icy-cold 
 
 Piled on a dish of gold 
 
 Too huge for me to hold, 
 
 What peaches with a velvet nap, 
 
 Pellucid grapes without one seed : 
 
 Odorous indeed must be the mead 
 
 Whereon they grow, and pure the wave they drink 
 
 With lilies at the brink, 
 
 And sugar-sweet their sap." 
 
 Golden head by golden head, 
 Like two pigeons in one nest 
 Folded in each other's wings, 
 They lay down in their curtained bed : 
 Like two blossoms on one stem, 
 Like two flakes of new-fall'n snow, 
 Like two wands of ivory 
 Tipped with gold for awful kings. 
 Moon and stars gazed in at them, 
 Wind sang to them lullaby, 
 
80 CHRISTINA ROSSETTL 
 
 Lumbering owls forbore to fly, 
 Not a bat flapped to and fro 
 Round their rest : 
 
 Cheek to cheek and breast to breast 
 Locked together in one nest 
 
 Early in the morning, 
 When the first cock crowed his warning, 
 Neat like bees, as sweet and busy, 
 Laura rose with Lizzie : 
 Fetched in honey, milked the cows, 
 Aired and set to rights the house, 
 Kneaded cakes of whitest wheat, 
 Cakes for dainty mouths to eat, 
 Next churned butter, whipped up cream, 
 Fed their poultry, sat and sewed ; 
 Talked as modest maidens should : 
 Lizzie with an open heart, 
 Laura in an absent dream, 
 One content, one sick in part ; 
 One warbling for the mere bright day's delight, 
 One longing for the night. 
 
 At length slow evening came : 
 They went with pitchers to the reedy brook ; 
 Lizzie most placid in her look, 
 Laura most like a leaping flame. 
 They drew the gurgling water from its deep ; 
 "Lizzie plucked purple and rich golden flags, 
 Then turning homewards said : " The sunset flushes 
 Those farthest loftiest crags ; 
 Come, Laura, not another maiden lags, 
 No wilful squirrel wags, 
 The beasts and birds are fast asleep." 
 But Laura loitered still among the rushes, 
 And said the bank was steep. 
 
GOBLIN MARKET. 81 
 
 And said the hour was early still, 
 The dew not fall'n, the wind not chill: 
 Listening ever, but not catching 
 The customary cry, 
 " Come buy, come buy," 
 With its iterated jingle 
 Of sugar-baited words : 
 Not for all her watching 
 Once discerning even one goblin 
 Racing, whisking, tumbling, hobbling ; 
 Let alone the herds 
 That used to tramp along the glen, 
 In groups or single, 
 Of Jbrisk fruit-merchant men. 
 
 Till Lizzie urged, " O Laura, come ; 
 I hear the fruit-call, but I dare not look ; 
 You should not loiter longer at this brook : 
 Come with me home. 
 The stars rise, the moon bends her arc, 
 Each glow-worm winks her spark, 
 Let us get home before the night grows dark : 
 For clouds may gather, 
 Though this is summer weather, 
 Put out the lights and drench us through ; 
 Then if we lost our way, what should we do ?" 
 
 Laura turned cold as stone 
 To find her sister heard that cry alone, 
 That goblin cry, 
 
 " Come buy our fruits, come buy." 
 Must she, then, buy no more such dainty fruits ? 
 Must she no more that succous pasture find, 
 Gone deaf and blind ? 
 Her tree of life drooped from the root : 
 6 
 
82 CHRISTINA KOSSETTL 
 
 She said not one word in her heart's sore ache , 
 
 But peering through the dimness, naught discerning, 
 
 Trudged home, her pitcher dripping all the way : 
 
 So crept to bed and lay 
 
 Silent till Lizzie slept ; 
 
 Then sat up in a passionate yearning, 
 
 And gnashed her teeth for balked desire, and wept 
 
 As if her heart would break. 
 
 Day after day, night after night, 
 Laura kept watch in vain 
 In sullen silence of exceeding pain. 
 She never caught again the goblin cry : 
 " Come buy, come buy " ; 
 She never spied the goblin men 
 Hawking their fruits along the glen ; 
 But when the noon waxed bright, 
 Her hair grew thin and gray ; 
 She dwindled, as the fair full moon doth turn 
 To swift decay and burn 
 Her fire away. 
 
 One day, remembering her kernel-stone, 
 She set it by a wall that faced the south ; 
 Dewed it with tears, hoped for a root, 
 Watched for a waxing shoot, 
 But there came none ; 
 It never saw the sun, 
 It never felt the trickling moisture run : 
 While with sunk eyes and faded mouth 
 She dreamed of melons, as a traveller sees 
 False waves in desert drouth 
 With shade of leaf-crowned trees, 
 And burns the thirstier in the sandful breeze. 
 
GOBLIN MARKET. 83 
 
 She no more swept the house, 
 Tended the fowls or cows, 
 Fetched honey, kneaded cakes of wheat, 
 Brought water from the brook : 
 But sat down listless in the chimney-nook, 
 And would not eat. 
 
 Tender Lizzie could not bear 
 To watch her sister's cankerous care, 
 Yet not to share. 
 She night and morning 
 Caught the goblins' cry : 
 " Come buy our orchard fruits, 
 Come^ buy, come buy " : 
 Beside the brook, along the glen, 
 She heard the tramp of goblin men, 
 The voice and stir 
 Poor Laura could not hear ; 
 Longed to buy fruit to comfort her, 
 But feared to pay too dear. 
 She thought of Jeanie in her grave, 
 Who should have been a bride ; 
 But who for joys brides hope to have 
 Fell sick and died 
 In her gay prime, 
 In earliest Winter time, 
 With the first glazing rime, 
 With the first snow-fall of crisp Winter time. 
 
 Till Laura dwindling 
 Seemed knocking at Death's door : 
 Then Lizzie weighed no more 
 Better and worse ; 
 
 But put a silver penny in her purse, 
 Kissed Laura, crossed the heath with clumps of furze 
 
84 CHRISTINA BOSSETTL 
 
 At twilight, halted by the brook 
 And for the first time in her life 
 Began to listen and look. 
 
 Laughed every goblin 
 When they spied her peeping 
 Came towards her hobbling, 
 Flying, running, leaping, 
 Puffing and blowing, 
 Chuckling, clapping, crowing. 
 Clucking and gobbling, 
 Mopping and mowing, 
 Full of airs and graces, 
 Pulling wry faces, 
 Demure grimaces, 
 Cat-like and rat-like, 
 Ratel- and wombat-like, 
 Snail-paced in a hurry, 
 Parrot-voiced and whistler, 
 Helter skelter, hurry skurry, 
 Chattering like magpies, 
 Fluttering like pigeons, 
 Gliding like fishes, 
 Hugged her and kissed her, 
 Squeezed and caressed her : 
 Stretched up their dishes, 
 Panniers, and plates : 
 " Look at our apples 
 Russet and dun, 
 Bob at our cherries, 
 Bite at our peaches, 
 Citrons and dates, 
 Grapes for the asking, 
 Pears red with basking 
 Out in the sun, 
 
GOBLIN MARKET. 85 
 
 Plums on their twigs ; 
 Pluck them and suck them, 
 Pomegranates, figs." 
 
 " Good folk," said Lizzie, 
 Mindful of Jeanie : 
 " Give me much and many n : 
 Held out her apron, 
 Tossed them her penny. 
 " Nay, take a seat with us, 
 Honor and eat with us," 
 They answered, grinning : 
 " Our feast is but beginning. 
 Night yet is early, 
 Warm and dew-pearly, 
 Wakeful and starry : 
 Such fruits as these 
 No man can carry ; 
 Half their bloom would fly, 
 Half their dew would dry, 
 Half their flavor would pass by. 
 Sit down and feast with us, 
 Be welcome guest with us, 
 Cheer you and rest with us." 
 " Thank you," said Lizzie. " But one waits 
 At home alone for me : 
 So without further parleying, 
 If you will not sell me any 
 Of your fruits, though much and many, 
 Give me back my silver penny 
 I tossed you for a fee." 
 They began to scratch their pates, 
 No longer wagging, purring, 
 But visibly demurring, 
 Grunting and snarling. 
 
86 CHRISTINA ROSSETTI. 
 
 One called her proud, 
 
 Cross-grained, uncivil ; 
 
 Their tones waxed loud, 
 
 Their looks were evil. 
 
 Lashing their tails 
 
 They trod and hustled her, 
 
 Elbowed and jostled her, 
 
 Clawed with their nails, 
 
 Barking, mewing, hissing, mocking, 
 
 Tore her gown and soiled her stocking, 
 
 Twitched her hair out by the roots, 
 
 Stamped upon her tender feet, 
 
 Held her hands and squeezed their fruits 
 
 Against her mouth to make her eat. 
 
 White and golden Lizzie stood, 
 Like a lily in a flood, 
 Like a rock of blue-veined stone 
 Lashed by tides obstreperously, 
 Like a beacon left alone 
 In a hoary roaring sea, 
 Sending up a golden fire, 
 Like a fruit-crowned orange-tree 
 White with blossoms honey-sweet 
 Sore beset by wasp and bee, 
 Like a royal virgin town 
 Topped with gilded dome and spire 
 Close beleaguered by a fleet 
 Mad to tug her standard down. 
 
 One may lead a horse to water, 
 Twenty cannot make him drink. 
 Though the goblins cuffed and caught her, 
 Coaxed and fought her, 
 Bullied and besought her, 
 
GOBLIN MARKET. 87 
 
 Scratched her, pinched her black as ink, 
 
 Kicked and knocked her, 
 
 Mauled and mocked her, 
 
 Lizzie uttered not a word ; 
 
 Would not open lip from lip 
 
 Lest they should cram a mouthful in : 
 
 But laughed in heart to feel the drip 
 
 Of juice that syrupped all her face, 
 
 And lodged in dimples of her chin, 
 
 And streaked her neck which quaked like curd. 
 
 At last the evil people 
 
 Worn out by her resistance 
 
 Flung back her penny, kicked their fruit 
 
 Along whichever road they took, 
 
 Not leaving root or stone or shoot ; 
 
 Some writhed into the ground, 
 
 Some dived into the brook 
 
 With ring and ripple, 
 
 Some scudded on the gale without a sound, 
 
 Some vanished in the distance. 
 
 In a smart, ache, tingle, 
 Lizzie went her way ; 
 Knew not was it night or day ; 
 .Sprang up the bank, tore through the furze, 
 Threaded copse and dingle, 
 And heard her penny jingle 
 Bouncing in her purse, 
 Its bounce was music to her ear. 
 She ran and ran 
 
 As if she feared some goblin man 
 Dogged her with gibe or curse 
 Or something worse : 
 But not one goblin skurried after, 
 Nor was she pricked by fear ; 
 
88 CHRISTINA KOSSETTI. 
 
 The kind heart made her windy-paced 
 
 That urged her home quite out of breath with haste 
 
 And inward laughter. 
 
 She cried " Laura," up the garden, 
 " Did you miss me ? 
 Come and kiss me. 
 Never mind my bruises, 
 Hug me, kiss me, suck my juices 
 Squeezed from goblin fruits for you, 
 Goblin pulp and goblin dew. 
 Eat me, drink me, love me ; 
 Laura make much of me : 
 For your sake I have braved the glen 
 And had to do with goblin merchant men.* 
 
 Laura started from her chair, 
 Flung her arms up in the air, 
 Clutched her hair : 
 " Lizzie, Lizzie, have you tasted 
 For my sake the fruit forbidden ? 
 Must your light like mine be hidden, 
 Your young life like mine be wasted, 
 Undone in mine undoing 
 And ruined in my ruin, 
 Thirsty, cankered, goblin-ridden ? " 
 She clung about her sister, 
 Kissed and kissed and kissed her : 
 Tears once again 
 Refreshed her shrunken eyes, 
 Dropping like rain 
 After long sultry drouth ; 
 Shaking with aguish fear, and pain, 
 She kissed and kissed her with a hungry mouth. 
 
GOBLIN MARKET. 89 
 
 Her lips began to scorch, 
 That juice was wormwood to her tongue, 
 She loathed the feast : 
 
 Writhing as one possessed she leaped and sung, 
 Rent all her robe, and wrung 
 Her hands in lamentable haste, 
 And beat her breast. 
 Her locks streamed like the torch 
 Borne by a racer at full speed, 
 Or like the mane of horses in their flight, 
 Or like an eagle when she stems the light 
 Straight toward the sun, 
 Or like a caged thing freed, 
 Or like a flying flag when armies run. 
 
 Swift fire spread through her veins, knocked at her heart, 
 Met the fire smouldering there 
 And overbore its lesser flame ; 
 She gorged on bitterness without a name : 
 Ah ! fool, to choose such part 
 Of soul-consuming care ! 
 Sense failed in the mortal strife : 
 Like the watch-tower of a town 
 Which an earthquake shatters down, 
 Like a lightning-stricken mast, 
 Like a wind-uprooted tree 
 Spun about, 
 
 Like a foam-topped waterspout 
 Cast down headlong in the sea, 
 She fell at last ; 
 Pleasure past and anguish past, 
 Is it death or is it life ? 
 
 Life out of death. 
 That night long Lizzie watched by her, 
 
90 CHRISTINA ROSSETTI. 
 
 Counted her pulse's flagging stir, 
 
 Felt for her breath, 
 
 Held water to her lips, and cooled her face 
 
 With tears and fanning leaves : 
 
 But when the first birds chirped about their eaves, 
 
 And early reapers plodded to the place 
 
 Of golden sheaves, 
 
 And dew-wet grass 
 
 Bowed in the morning winds so brisk to pass, 
 
 And new buds with new day 
 
 Opened of cup-like lilies on the stream, 
 
 Laura awoke as from a dream, 
 
 Laughed in the innocent old way, 
 
 Hugged Lizzie, but not twice or thrice ; 
 
 Her gleaming locks showed not one thread of gray 
 
 Her breath was sweet as May, 
 
 And light danced in her eyes. 
 
 Days, weeks, months, years, 
 Afterwards, when both were wives 
 With children of their own ; 
 Their mother-hearts beset with fears, 
 Their lives bound up in tender lives ; 
 Laura would call the little ones 
 And tell them of her early prime, 
 Those pleasant days long gone 
 Of not-returning time : 
 Would talk about the haunted glen, 
 The wicked, quaint fruit-merchant men, 
 Their fruits like honey to the throat, 
 But poison in the blood ; 
 (Men sell not such in any town : ) 
 Would tell them how her sister stood, 
 In deadly peril to do her good, 
 And win the fiery antidote : 
 
GOBLIN MARKET. 91 
 
 Then joining hands to little hands 
 "Would bid them cling together, 
 u For there is no friend like a sister 
 In calm or stormy weather ; 
 To cheer one on the tedious wa/, 
 To .fetch one if one goes astray, 
 To lift one if one totters down 
 To strengthen whilst one stands." 
 
LOVE AND SKATES. 
 
 BY THEODORE WLNTHROP. 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 A KNOT AND A MAN TO CUT IT. 
 
 ONSTERNATION ! Consternation in the back office 
 of Benjamin Brummage, Esq., banker in Wall 
 Street. 
 
 Yesterday down came Mr. Superintendent Whiffler, from 
 Dunderbunk, up the North River, to say, that, "unless 
 something be done, at once, the Dunderbunk Foundry and 
 Iron- Works must wind up." President Brummage forth- 
 with convoked his Directors. And here they sat around 
 the green table, forlorn as the guests at a Barmecide 
 feast. 
 
 Well they might be forlorn! It was the rosy summer 
 solstice, the longest and fairest day of all the year. But 
 rose-color and sunshine had fled from Wall Street. Noisy 
 Crisis towing black Panic, as a puffing steam-tug drags a 
 three-decker cocked and primed for destruction, had sud- 
 denly sailed in upon Credit. 
 
 As all the green inch-worms vanish on the tenth of every 
 June, so on the tenth of that June all the money in America 
 had buried itself and was as if it were not. Everybody and 
 everything was ready to fail. If the hindmost brick went, 
 down would go the whole file. 
 
 There were ten Directors of the Dunderbunk Foundry. 
 
 Now, not seldom, of a Board of ten Directors, five a-e 
 
LOVE AND SKATES. 93 
 
 wise and five are foolish : five wise, who bag all the Com- 
 pany's funds in salaries and commissions for indorsing its 
 paper ; five foolish, who get no salaries, no commissions, no 
 dividends, nothing, indeed, but abuse from the stock- 
 holders, and the reputation of thieves. That is to say, 
 five of the ten are pickpockets ; the other five, pockets to 
 be picked. 
 
 It happened that the Dunderbunk Directors were all 
 honest and foolish but one. He, John Churm, honest and 
 wise, was off at the "West, with his Herculean shoulders at 
 the wheels of a dead-locked railroad. These honest fellows 
 did not wish Dunderbunk to fail for several reasons. First, 
 it was not pleasant to lose their investment. Second, one 
 important failure might betray Credit to Crisis with Panic 
 at its heels, whereupon every investment would be in 
 danger. Third, what would become of their Directorial 
 reputations? From President Brummage down, each of 
 these gentlemen was one of the pockets to be picked in a 
 great many companies. Each was of the first Wall-Street 
 fashion, invited to lend his name and take stock in every 
 new enterprise. Any one of them might have walked down 
 town in a long patchwork toga made of the newspaper 
 advertisements of boards in which his name proudly figured. 
 If Dunderbunk failed, the toga was torn, and might presently 
 go to rags beyond repair. The first rent would inaugurate 
 universal rupture. How to avoid this disaster ? that was 
 the question. 
 
 " State the case, Mr. Superintendent WhifSer," said Presi- 
 dent Brummage, in his pompous manner, with its pomp a 
 h'ttle collapsed, pro tempore. 
 
 Inefficient TVliiffler whimpered out his story. 
 
 The confessions of an impotent executive are sorry stuff 
 to read. Whiffler's long, dismal complaint shall not be re- 
 peated. He had taken a prosperous concern, had carried 
 on things in his own way, and now failure was inevita- 
 
94 THEODORE WINTHROP. 
 
 ble. He had bought raw material lavishly, and worked 
 it badly into half-ripe material, which nobody wanted to 
 buy. He was in arrears to his hands. He had tried to 
 bully them when they asked for their money. They 
 had insulted him, and threatened to knock off work, unless 
 they were paid at once. " A set of horrid ruffians," Whif- 
 fler said, " and his life would n't be safe many days among 
 them." 
 
 " Withdraw, if you please, Mr. Superintendent," President 
 Brummage requested. " The Board will discuss measures 
 of relief." 
 
 The more they discussed, the more consternation. No- 
 body said anything to the purpose, except Mr. Sam Gwelp, 
 his late father's lubberly son and successor. 
 
 " Blast ! " said he ; " we shall have to let it slide ! " 
 
 Into this assembly of imbeciles unexpectedly entered Mr. 
 John Churm. He had set his Western railroad trains 
 rolling, and was just returned to town. Now he w r as ready 
 to put those Herculean shoulders at any other bemired and 
 rickety no-gocart. 
 
 Mr. Churm was not accustomed to be a Director in 
 feeble companies. He came into Dunderbunk recently as 
 executor of his friend Darner, a year ago bored to death by 
 a silly wife. 
 
 Churm's bristly aspect and incisive manner made him a 
 sharp contrast to Brummage. The latter personage was 
 flabby in flesh, and the oppressively civil counter-jumper 
 style of his youth had grown naturally into a deportment of 
 most imposing pomposity. 
 
 The Tenth Director listened to the President's recitative 
 of their difficulties, chorused by the Board. 
 
 " Gentlemen," said Director Churm, " you want two 
 things.. The first is Money ! " 
 
 He pronounced this cabalistic word with such magic 
 power, that all the air seemed instantly filled with a cheer- 
 
LOVE AND SKATES. 95 
 
 fill flight of gold American eagles, each carrying a double 
 eagle on its back and a silver dollar in its claws ; and all 
 the soil of America seemed to sprout with com, as after a 
 shower a meadow sprouts, with the yellow buds of the dan- 
 delion. 
 
 " Money ! yes, Money ! " murmured the Directors. 
 
 It seemed a word of good omen, now. 
 
 " The second thing," resumed the new-comer, " is a 
 Alan ! " 
 
 The Directors looked at each other and did not see such 
 a being. 
 
 " The actual Superintendent of Dunderbunk is a dunder- 
 head," said Churm. 
 
 " Pun ! *\ cried Sam Gwelp, waking up from a snooze. 
 
 Several of the Directors, thus instructed, started a com- 
 plimentary laugh. 
 
 " Order, gentlemen ! Orrderr ! " said the President, severe- 
 ly, rapping with a paper-cutter. 
 
 "We must have a Man, not a Whiffler!" Churm con- 
 tinued. "And I have one in my eye." 
 
 Everybody examined his eye. 
 
 " Would you be so good as to name him ? " said Old 
 Brummage, timidly. 
 
 He wanted to see a Man, but feared the strange creature 
 might be dangerous. 
 
 Richard Wade," says Churm. 
 
 They did not know him. The name sounded forcible. 
 
 " He has been in California," the nominator said. 
 
 A shudder ran around the green table. They seemed to 
 see a frowzy desperado, shaggy as 'a bison, in a red shirt 
 and jackboots, hung about the waist with an assortment of 
 six-shooters and bowie-knives, and standing against a back- 
 ground of mustangs, monte-banks, and lynch-law. 
 
 "We must get Wade," Churm says, with authority 
 u He knows Iron by heart. He can handle Men. I will 
 
96 THEODORE WIXTHROP. 
 
 back him with my blank check, to any amount, to his 
 order." 
 
 Here a murmur of applause, swelling to a cheer, burst 
 from the Directors. 
 
 Everybody knew that the Geological Bank deemed 
 Churm's deposits the fundamental stratum of its wealth. 
 They lay there in the vaults, like underlying granite. 
 When hot times came, they boiled up in a mountain to 
 buttress the world. 
 
 Churm's blank check seemed to wave in the air like an 
 oriflamme of victory. Its payee might come from Botany 
 Bay; he might wear his beard to his knees, and his belt 
 stuck full of howitzers and boomerangs; he might have 
 been repeatedly hung by Vigilance Committees, and as 
 often cut down and revived by galvanism ; but brandishing 
 that check, good for anything less than a million, every 
 Director in Wall Street was his slave, his friend, and his 
 brother. 
 
 " Let us vote Mr. Wade in by acclamation," cried the 
 Directors. 
 
 " But, gentlemen," Churm interposed, " if I give him my 
 blank check, he must have carte blanche, and no one to 
 interfere in his management." 
 
 Every Director, from President Brummage down, drew 
 a long face at this condition. 
 
 It was one of their great privileges to potter in the Dun- 
 derbunk affairs and propose ludicrous impossibilities. 
 
 " Just as you please," Churm continued. " I name a 
 competent man, a gentleman and fine fellow. I back him 
 with all the cash he wants. But he must have his own 
 way. Now take him, or leave him ! " 
 
 Such despotic talk had never been heard before in that 
 Directors' Room. They relucted a moment. But they 
 thought of their togas of advertisements in danger. The 
 blank check shook its blandishments before their eyes. 
 
t 
 LOVE AND SKATES. 97 
 
 " We take him," they said, and Richard Wade was the 
 new Superintendent unanimously. 
 
 " He shall be at Dunderbunk to take hold to-morrow 
 morning," said Churm, and went off to notify him. 
 
 Upon this, Consternation sailed out of the hearts of 
 Brummage and associates. 
 
 They lunched with good appetites over the green table, 
 and the President confidently remarked, 
 
 " I don't believe there is going to be much of a crisis, 
 after all." 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 BARRACKS FOR THE HERO. 
 
 WADE packed his kit, and took the Hudson River train 
 for Dunderbunk the same afternoon. 
 
 He swallowed his dust, he gasped for his fresh air, he 
 wept over his cinders, he refused his " lozengers," he was 
 admired by all the pretty girls and detested by all the puny 
 men in the train, and in good time got down at his station. 
 
 He stopped on the platform to survey the land and water 
 privileges of his new abode. 
 
 " The June sunshine is unequalled," he soliloquized, " the 
 river is splendid, the hills are pretty, and the Highlands, 
 north, respectable ; but the village has gone to seed. Place 
 and people look lazy, vicious, and ashamed. I suppose 
 those chimneys are my Foundry. The smoke rises as if 
 the furnaces were ill-fed and weak in the lungs. Nothing 
 I can see looks alive, except that queer little steamboat 
 coming in, the * I. Ambuster,' jolly name for a boat ! " 
 
 Wade left his traps at the station, and walked through 
 the village. All the gilding of a golden sunset of June 
 could not made it anything but commonplace. It would be 
 forlorn on a gray day, and utterly dismal in a storm. 
 
 " I must look up a civilized house to lodge in," thought 
 7 
 
96 TiiEODOKK wixntuor. 
 
 the stranger. " I cannot possibly camp at the tavern. Its 
 otVeiu-o is rum, and smells to heaven." 
 
 Presently our explorer found a neat, white, two-story, 
 home-like abode on the upper street, overlooking the river 
 
 "This promises," he thought. "Here are rosrs on the 
 porch, a piano, or at least a melodeon, by the parlor-window, 
 and they are insured in the Mutual, as the Mutual's plate 
 announces. Now, it' that nice-looking person in Mack I >ee 
 setting a table in the back-room is a widow, 1 will camp 
 here." 
 
 Perry Purtett was the name on the door, and opposite 
 the sign of an omnhun-gatkfrum country-store hinted that 
 Perry was deceased. The hint was a broad one. Wade 
 read, " Ringdove. Successor to late P. Purktt." 
 
 " It 's worth a try to get in here out of the pagan barba- 
 rism around. I '11 propose as a lodger to the widow." 
 
 So said Wade, and rang the bell under the roses. A 
 pretty, slim, delicate, fair-haired maiden answered. 
 
 " This explains the roses and the melodeon," thought 
 Wade, and asked, Can 1 see your mother ? " 
 
 Mamma came. - Mild, timid, accustomed to depend on 
 the late Perry, and wants a friend." Wade analyzed, while 
 he bowed. He proposed himself as a lodger. 
 
 " 1 did n't know it was talked of generally," replied the 
 widow, plaintively ; " but I /tare said that we felt lonesome, 
 Mr. Purtett bein' gone, and if the new minister " 
 
 Here she paused. The cut of Wade's jib was nnelerical. 
 He did not stoop, like a new minister, lie was not pallid, 
 meagre, and clad in unwholesome black, like the same. 
 His bronzed face was frank and bold and unfamiliar with 
 speculations on Original Sin or Total Depravity. 
 
 " I am not the new minister," said Wade, smiling slightly 
 over his moustache ; u but a new Superintendent for the 
 Foundry." 
 
 Mr. Wliiffler is goin' ? " exclaimed Mrs. Purtett, She 
 
LOVE AND SKATES. 99 
 
 looked at her daughter, who gave a little sob and ran out of 
 the room. 
 
 "What makes my daughter Belle feel bad," says the 
 widow, " is, that she had a friend, well, it is n't too much 
 to say that they was as good as engaged, and he was 
 foreman of the Foundry finishin'-shop. But somehow 
 Whiffler spoilt him, just as he spoils everything he touches ; 
 and last winter, when Belle was away, William Tarbox 
 that 's his name, and his head is runnin' over with inven- 
 tions took to spreein' and liquor, and got ashamed of 
 himself, and let down from a foreman to a hand, and is all 
 the while lettin' down lower." 
 
 The widow's heart thus opened, Wade walked in as con- 
 soler. This also opened the lodgings to him. He was 
 presently installed in the large and small front-rooms up- 
 stairs, unpacking his traps, and making himself permanently 
 at home. 
 
 Superintendent Whiffler came over, by and by, to see his 
 successor. He did not like his looks. The new man 
 should have looked mean or weak or rascally, to suit the 
 outgoer. 
 
 " How long do you expect to stay ? " asks Whiffler, with 
 a half-sneer, watching Wade hanging a map and a print 
 vis-a-vis. 
 
 " Until the men and I, or the Company and I, cannot 
 pull together." 
 
 " I '11 give you a week to quarrel with both, and another 
 to see the whole concern go to everlasting smash. And 
 now, if you 're ready, I '11 go over the accounts with you 
 and prove it." 
 
 Whiffler himself, insolent, cowardly, and a humbug, if not 
 a swindler, was enough, Wade thought, to account for any 
 failure. But he did not mention this conviction. 
 
100 THEODORE WINTHROP. 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 HOW TO BEHEAD A HYDRA! 
 
 AT ten next morning, Whiffler handed over the safe-key 
 to Wade, and departed to ruin some other property, if he 
 could get one to ruin. Wade walked with him to the 
 e^ite. 
 
 " I'm glad to be out of a sinking ship," said the ex -boss. 
 " The works will go down, sure as shooting. And I think 
 myself well out of the clutches of these men. They 're a 
 bullying, swearing, drinking set of infernal ruffians. Fore- 
 men are just as bad as hands. I never felt safe of my life 
 with 'em." 
 
 " A bad lot, are they ? " mused Wade, as he returned to 
 the office. " I must give them a little sharp talk by way of 
 Inaugural." 
 
 He had the bell tapped and the men called together hi 
 the main building. 
 
 Much work was still going on in an inefficient, unsyste- 
 matic way. 
 
 While hot fires were roaring in the great furnaces, smoke 
 rose from the dusty beds where Titanic castings were cool- 
 ing. Great cranes, manacled with heavy chains, stood over 
 the furnace-doors, ready to lift steaming jorums of melted 
 metal, and pour out, hot and hot, for the moulds to swallow. 
 
 Raw material in big heaps lay about, waiting for the fire 
 to ripen it. Here was a stack of long, rough, rusty pigs, 
 clumsy as the shillelahs of the Anakim. There was a pile 
 of short, thick masses, lying higgledy-piggledy, stuff from 
 the neighboring mines, which needed to be crossed with 
 foreign stock before it could be of much use in civiliza- 
 tion. 
 
 Here, too, was raw material organized : a fly-wheel, large 
 enough to keep the knobbiest of asteroids revolving without 
 
LOVE AND SKATES. 101 
 
 a wabble ; a cross-head, cross-tail, and piston-rod, to help a 
 great sea-going steamer breast the waves ; a light walking- 
 beam, to whirl the paddles of a fast boat on the river ; and 
 other members of machines, only asking to be put together 
 and vivified by steam and they would go at their work with 
 a will. 
 
 From the black rafters overhead hung the heavy folds of 
 a dim atmosphere, half dust, hah smoke. A dozen sun- 
 beams, forcing their way through the grimy panes of the 
 grimy upper windows, found this compound quite palpable 
 and solid, and they moulded out of it a series of golden bars 
 set side by side aloft, like the pipes of an organ out of ifo 
 perpendicular. 
 
 "Wade grew indignant, as he looked about him and saw so 
 much good stuff and good force wasting for want of a little 
 will and skill to train the force and manage the stuff. He 
 abhorred bankruptcy and chaos. 
 
 "All they want here is a head," he thought. 
 
 He shook his own. The brain within was well developed 
 with healthy exercise. It filled its case, and did not rattle 
 like a withered kernel, or sound soft like a rotten one. It 
 was a vigorous, muscular brain. The owner felt that he 
 could trust it for an effort, as he could his lungs for a shout, 
 his legs for a leap, or his fist for a knock-down argument. 
 
 At the tap of the bell, the " bad lot " of men came *o 
 gether. They numbered more than two hundred, though 
 the Foundry was working short. They had been notified 
 that that gonoph of a Whiffler was kicked out, and a new- 
 feller was in, who looked cranky enough, and wanted to see 
 'em and tell 'em whether he was a damn' fool or not." 
 
 So all hands collected from the different parts of the 
 Foundry to see the head. 
 
 They came up with easy and somewhat swaggering bear- 
 ing, a good many roughs, with here and there a ruffian. 
 Several, as they approached, swung and tossed, for mere 
 
102 THEODORE WINTHROP. 
 
 overplus of strength, the sledges with which they had been 
 tapping at the bald shiny pates of their anvils. Several 
 wielded their long pokers like lances. 
 
 Grimy chaps, all with their faces streaked, like Blackfeet 
 in their war-paint. Their hairy chests showed, where some 
 men parade elaborate shirt-bosoms. Some had their sleeves 
 pushed up to the elbow to exhibit their compact flexors and 
 extensors. Some had rolled their flannel up to the shoul- 
 der, above the bulging muscles of tfie upper arm. They 
 wore aprons tied about the neck, like the bibs of our child- 
 hood, or about the waist, like the coquettish articles which 
 young housewives affect. But there was no coquetry in 
 these great flaps of leather or canvas, and they were be- 
 smeared and rust-stained quite beyond any bib that ever 
 suffered under bread-and-molasses or mud-pie treatment. 
 
 They lounged and swaggered up, and stood at ease, not 
 without rough grace, in a sinuous line, coiled and knotted 
 like a snake. 
 
 Ten feet back stood the new Hercules who was to take 
 down that Hydra's two hundred crests of insubordination. 
 
 They inspected him, and he them as coolly. He read 
 and ticketed each man, as he came up, good, bad, or on 
 the fence, and marked each so that he would know him 
 among a myriad. 
 
 The Hands faced the Head. It was a question whether 
 the two hundred or the one would be master in Dunderbunk. 
 
 Which was boss ? An old question. It has to be settled 
 whenever a new man claims power, and there is always a 
 struggle until it is fought out by main force of brain or 
 muscle. 
 
 Wade had made up his mind on this subject. He waited 
 a moment until the men were still. He was a Saxon six- 
 footer of thirty. He stood easily on his pins, as if he had 
 eyed men and facts before. His mouth looked firm, his 
 brow freighted, his nose clipper, that the hands could see. 
 
LOVE AND SKATES. 103 
 
 But clipper noses are not always backed by a stout hull. 
 Seemingly freighted brows sometimes carry nothing but bal- 
 last and dunnage. The firmness may be all in the mous- 
 tache, while the mouth hides beneath, a mere silly slit. All 
 which the hands knew. 
 
 Wade began, short and sharp as a trip-hammer, when it 
 has a bar to shape. 
 
 "I'm the new Superintendent. Richard Wade is my 
 name. I rang the bell because I wanted to see you and 
 have you see me. You know as well as I do that these 
 Works are in a bad way. They can't stay so. They must 
 come up and pay you regular wages and the Company 
 profits. Every man of you has got to be here on the spot 
 when the bell strikes, and up to the mark in his work. You 
 have n't been, and you know it. You Ve turned out rot- 
 ten iron, stuff that any honest shop would be ashamed o 
 Now there 's to be a new leaf turned over here. You 're to 
 be paid on the nail ; but you 've got to earn your money. 
 I won't have any idlers or shirkers or rebels about me. I 
 shall work hard myself, and every man of you will, or he 
 leaves the shop. Now, if anybody has a complaint to make, 
 I'll hear him before you all." 
 
 The men were evidently impressed with Wade's Inaugu- 
 ral. It meant something. But they were not to be put 
 down so easily, after long misrule. There began to be a 
 whisper, 
 
 "B'il in, Bill Tarbox! and talk up to him!" 
 
 Presently Bill shouldered forward and faced the new 
 ruler. 
 
 Since Bill took to drink and degradation, he had been the 
 but-end of riot and revolt at the Foundry. He had had his 
 own way with Whiffler. He did not like to abdicate and 
 give in to this new chap without testing him. 
 
 In a better mood, Bill would have liked Wade's looks 
 and words ; but to-day he liad a sore head, a sour face, and 
 
104 THEODORE WINTHROP. 
 
 a bitter heart, from last night's spree. And then he had 
 heard, it was as well known already in Dunderbunk as if 
 the town-crier had cried it, that Wade was lodging at 
 Mrs. Purtett's, where poor Bill was excluded. So Bill 
 stepped forward as spokesman of the ruffianly element, and 
 the immoral force gathered behind and backed him heavily. 
 
 Tarbox, too, was a Saxon six-footer of thirty. But he 
 had sagged one inch for want of self-respect. He had 
 spoilt his color and dyed his moustache. He wore foxy- 
 black pantaloons tucked into red-topped boots, with the 
 name of the maker on a gilt shield. His red-flannel shirt 
 was open at the neck and caught with a black handkerchief. 
 His damaged tile was in permanent crape for the late la- 
 mented Poole. 
 
 " We allow," says Bill, in a tone half-way between La- 
 b'lache's De profundis and a burglar's bull-dog's snarl, 
 " that we Ve did our work as good as need to be did. We 
 'xpect we know our rights. We ha'n't ben treated fair, and 
 I 'm damned if we 're go'n' to stan' it." 
 
 " Stop ! " says Wade. " No swearing in this shop ! " 
 
 u Who the Devil is go'n' to stop it ? " growled Tarbox. 
 
 " I am. Do you step back now, and let some one come 
 out who can talk like a gentleman ! " 
 
 " I 'm damned if I stir till I Ve had my say out," says 
 Bill, shaking himself up and looking dangerous. 
 
 " Go back ! " 
 
 Wade moved close to him, also looking dangerous. 
 
 " Don't tech me ! " Bill threatened, squaring off. 
 
 He was not quick enough. Wade knocked him down flat 
 on a heap of moulding-sand. The hat in mourning for 
 Poole found its place in a puddle. 
 
 Bill did not like the new Emperor's method of compel- 
 ling kotou. Round One of the mill had not given him 
 enough. 
 
 He jumped up from his soft bed and made a vicious rush 
 
LOVE AND SKATES, 105 
 
 at Wade. But he was damaged by evil courses. He was 
 fighting against law and order, on the side of wrong and 
 bad manners. 
 
 The same fist met him again, and heavier. 
 
 Up went his heels ! Down went his head ! It struck 
 the ragged edge of a fresh casting, and there he lay stunned 
 and bleeding on his hard black pillow. 
 
 " Ring the bell to go to work ! " said Wade, in a tone that 
 made the ringer jump. 4< Now, men, teike hold and do your 
 duty and everything will go smooth ! " 
 
 The bell clanged in. The line looked at its prostrate 
 champion, then at the new boss standing there, cool and 
 brave, and not afraid of a regiment of sledge-hammers. 
 
 They wanted an Executive. They wanted to be well 
 governed, as all men do. They wanted disorder out and 
 order in. The new man looked like a man, talked fair, hit 
 hard. Why not all hands give in with a good grace and go 
 to work like honest fellows ? 
 
 The line broke up. The hands went off to their duty. 
 And there was never any more insubordination at Dunder- 
 bunk. 
 
 This was June. 
 
 Skates in the next chapter. 
 
 Love in good time afterward shall glide upon the scene. 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 A CHRISTMAS GIFT. 
 
 THE pioneer sunbeam of next Christmas morning rattled 
 over the Dunderbunk hills, flashed into Richard Wade's 
 eyes, waked him, and was off, ricochetting across the black 
 ice of the river. 
 
 Wade jumped up, electrified and jubilant. He |jad gone 
 to bed feeling quite too despondent for so healthy a fellcw. 
 
106 THEODORE WINTHROP. 
 
 Christmas eve, the time of family meetings, reminded him 
 how lonely he was. He had not a relative in the we rid, 
 except two little nieces, one as tall as his knee, the other 
 almost up to his waist ; and them he had safely bestowed in 
 a nook of New England, to gain wit and virtues, as they 
 gained inches. 
 
 " I have had a stern and lonely life," thought "Wade, as 
 he blew out his candle last night, " and what has it profited 
 me?" 
 
 Perhaps the pioneer sunbeam answered this question with 
 a truism, not always as applicable as in this case, "A 
 brave, able, self-respecting manhood is fair profit for any 
 man's first thirty years of life." 
 
 But, answered or not, the question troubled Wade no 
 more. He shot out of bed in tip-top spirits; shouted 
 " Merry Christmas ! " at the rising disk of the sun ; looked 
 over the black ice ; thrilled with the thought of a long holi- 
 day for skating ; and proceeded to dress in a knowing suit 
 of rough clothes, singing, "Ah, non giunge ! " as he slid into 
 them. 
 
 Presently, glancing from his south window, he observed 
 several matinal smokes rising from the chimneys of a 
 country-house a mile away, on a slope fronting the river. 
 
 " Peter Skerrett must be back from Europe at last," he 
 thought. " I hope he is as fine a fellow as he was ten years 
 ago. I hope marriage has not made him a muff, and wealth 
 a weakling." 
 
 Wade went down to breakfast with an heroic appetite. 
 His " Merry Christmas " to Mrs. Purtett was followed up 
 by a ravished kiss and the gift of a silver butter-knife. 
 The good widow did not know which to be most charmed 
 with. The butter-knife was genuine, shining, solid silver, 
 with her initials, M. B. P., Martha Bilsby Purtett, given in 
 luxuriant flourishes ; but then the kiss had such a fine 
 twang, such an exhilarating titillation ! The late Perry's 
 
LOVE AND SKATES. 107 
 
 . from fiist to last, had wanted point. They were, as 
 the Spanish proverb would put it, unsavory as unsalted 
 eggs, for want of a moustache. The widow now perceived, 
 with mild regret, how much she had missed when she mar- 
 ried " a man nil shaven and shorn." Her cheek, still fair, 
 though forty, flushed with novel delight, and she appreciated 
 her lodger more than ever. 
 
 Wade's salutation to Belle Purtett was more distant 
 There must be a little friendly reserve between a hand- 
 some young man and a pretty young woman several grades 
 lower in the social scale, living in the same house. They 
 were on the most cordial terms, however ; and her gift of 
 course embroidered slippers and his to her of course 
 "The Illustrated Poets," in Turkey morocco were ex- 
 changed with tender good-will on both sides. 
 
 " We shall meet on the ice, Miss Belle," said Wade. " It 
 is a day of a thousand for skating." 
 
 " Mr. Ringdove says you are a famous skater," Belle 
 rejoined. " He saw you on the river yesterday evening." 
 
 ki Yes ; Tarbox and I were practising to exhibit to-day ; 
 but I could not do much with my dull old skates." 
 
 Wade breakfasted deliberately, as a holiday morning 
 allowed, and then walked down to the Foundry. There 
 would be no work done to-day, except by a small gang 
 keeping up the fires. The Superintendent wished only to 
 give his First Semi-Annual Report an hour's polishing, 
 before he joined all Dunderbunk on the ice. 
 
 It was a halcyon day, worthy of its motto, " Peace on 
 earth, good-will to men." The air was electric, the sun 
 overflowing with jolly shine, the river smooth and sheeny 
 from the hither bank to the snowy mountains opposite. 
 
 " I wish I were Rembrandt, to paint this grand shadowy 
 interior," thought Wade, as he entered the silent, deserted 
 Foundry. " With the gleam of the snow in my eyes, it 
 looks deliciously warm and chiaroscuro. When the men 
 
108 THEODORE WIXT1IROP. 
 
 are here and l fervet opus, the pot boils, I cannot stop 
 to see the picturesque." 
 
 He opened his office, took his Report and began to com- 
 plete it with ,s, ;s, and .s in the right places. 
 
 All at once the bell of the Works rang out loud and 
 clear. Presently the Superintendent became aware of a 
 tramp and a bustle in the building. By and by came a tap 
 at the office-door. 
 
 " Come in," said Wade, and enter young Perry Purtett. 
 
 Perry was a boy of fifteen, with hair the color of fresh 
 sawdust, white eyebrows, and an uncommonly wide-awake 
 look. Ringdove, his father's successor, could never teach 
 Perry the smirk, the grace, and the seductiveness of the 
 counter, so the boy had found his place in the finishing-shop 
 of the Foundry. 
 
 " Some of the hands would like to see you for half a 
 jiff, Mr. Wade," said he. " Will you come along, if you 
 please?" 
 
 There was a good deal of easy swagger about Perry, as 
 there is always in boys and men whose business is to watch 
 the lunging of steam-engines. Wade followed him. Perry 
 led the way with a jaunty air that said, 
 
 " Room here ! Out of the way, you lubberly bits of cast- 
 iron ! Be careful, now, you big derricks, or I '11 walk right 
 over you ! Room now for Me and My suite ! " 
 
 This pompous usher conducted the Superintendent to the 
 very spot in the main room of the Works where, six months 
 before, the Inaugural had been pronounced and the first 
 Veto spoken and enacted. 
 
 And there, as six months before, stood the Hands await- 
 ing their Head. But the aprons, the red shirts, and the 
 grime of working-days were off, and the whole were in holi- 
 day rig, as black and smooth and shiny from top to toe as 
 the members of a Congress of Undertakers. 
 
 Wade, following in the wake of Perry, took his stand 
 
LOVE AND SKATES. 109 
 
 feeing the rank, and waited to see what he was summoned 
 for. He had not long to wait. 
 
 To the front stepped Mr. William Tarbox, foreman of the 
 finishing-shop, no longer a bhoy, but an erect, fine-looking 
 fellow, with no nitrate in his moustache, and his hat perma- 
 nently out of mourning for the late Mr. Poole. 
 
 " Gentlemen," said Bill, " I move that this meeting organ- 
 ize by appointing Mr. Smith Wheelright Chairman. As 
 many as are in favor of this motion, please to say, ' Ay.' " 
 
 " Ay ! " said the crowd, very loud and big. And then 
 every man looked at his neighbor a little abashed, as if he 
 himself had made all the noise. 
 
 " This is a free country," continues Bill. u Every woter 
 has a right to a fair shake. Contrary minds, * No.' " 
 
 No contrary minds. The crowd uttered a great silence. 
 Every man looked at his neighbor, surprised to find how 
 well they agreed. 
 
 " Unanimous I " Tarbox pronounced. " No fractious mi- 
 norities here, to block the wheels of legislation ! " 
 
 The crowd burst into a roar at this significant remark, and, 
 again abashed, dropped portcullis on its laughter, cutting off 
 the flanks and tail of the sound. 
 
 k - Mr. Purtett, will you please conduct the Chairman to 
 the Chair," says Bill, very stately. 
 
 " Make way here ! " cried Perry, with the manner of a 
 man seven feet high. " Step out now, Mr. Chairman ! " 
 
 He took a big, grizzled, docile-looking fellow patro- 
 nizingly by the arm, led him forward, and chaired him on 
 a large cylinder-head, in the rough, just hatched out of its 
 mould. 
 
 " Bang away with that, and sing out ' Silence ! ' " says the 
 knowing boy, handing Wheelright an iron bolt, and taking 
 his place beside him as prompter. 
 
 The docile Chairman obeyed. At his breaking silence by 
 hooting " Silence ! " the audience had another mighty bob- 
 tailed laugh. 
 
110 THEODORE WINTHROP. 
 
 " Say, ' Will some honorable member state the object of 
 this meeting?'" whispered the prompter. 
 
 " Will some honorable mumbler state the subject of this 
 'ere meetin' ? " says Chair, a little bashful and confused. 
 
 Bill Tarbox advanced, and, with a formal bow, began, 
 
 "Mr. Chan-man " 
 
 " Say, * Mr. Tarbox has the floor,' " piped Perry. 
 
 " Mr. Tarbox has the floor," diapasoned the Chair. 
 
 " Mr. Chairman and Gentlemen " Bill began, and 
 stopped. 
 
 u Say, ' Proceed, Sir ! ' " suggested Perry, which the 
 senior did, magnifying the boy's whisper a dozen times. 
 
 Again Bill began and stopped. 
 
 " Boys," said he, dropping grandiloquence, " when I 
 accepted the office of Orator of the Day at our primary, 
 and promised to bring forward our Resolutions in honor of 
 Mr. Wade with my best speech, I did n't think I was 
 going to have such a head of steam on that the waives 
 would get stuck and the piston jammed and I could n't 
 say a word. 
 
 " But," he continued, warming up, " when I think of the 
 Indian powwow we had in this very spot six months ago, 
 and what a mean bloat I was, going to the stub-tail dogs 
 with my hat over my eyes, and what a hard lot we were 
 all round, livin' on nothin' but argee whiskey, and rampin' 
 off on benders, instead of makin' good iron, and how the 
 Works was flat broke, and how Dunderbunk was full of 
 women crying over their husbands and mothers ashamed of 
 their sons, boys, when I think how things was, and see 
 how they are, and look at Mr. Wade standing there like 
 a " 
 
 Bill hesitated for a comparison. 
 
 " Like a thousand of brick," Perry Purtett suggested, 
 sotto voce. 
 
 The Chairman took this as a hint to himself 
 
LOVE AND SKATES. Ill 
 
 u Like a thousand of brick," he said, with the voice of a 
 Stentor. 
 
 Here the audience roared and cheered, and the Orator 
 got a fresh start. 
 
 " When you came, Mr. Wade," he resumed, " we was 
 about sick of putty-heads and sneaks that did n't know 
 enough or did n't dare to make us stand round and bone 
 IL. You walked in, b'ilin' over with grit. You took hold 
 as if you belonged here. You made things jump like a 
 two-headed tarrier. All we wanted was a live man, to say, 
 * Here, boys, all together now ! You Ve got your stint, and 
 I 've got mine. I 'm boss in this shop, but I can't do the 
 first thing, unless every man pulls his pound. Now, then, 
 my hand ism the throttle, grease the wheels, oil the waives, 
 poke the fires, hook on, and let 's yank her through with a 
 will!'" 
 
 At this figure the meeting showed a tendency to cheer. 
 u Silence ! " Perry sternly suggested. " Silence ! " repeated 
 the Chair. 
 
 " Then," continued the Orator, " you was n't one of the 
 uneasy kind, always fussin' and cussin' round. You was n't 
 always spyin' to see we did n't take home a cross-tail or a 
 hundred-weight of cast-iron in our pants' pockets, or go to 
 swiggin' hot metal out of the ladles on the sly." 
 
 Here an enormous laugh requited Bill's joke. Perry 
 prompted, the Chair banged with his bolt and cried, 
 "Order!" 
 
 " Well, now, boys," Tarbox went on, " what has come ol 
 having one of the right sort to be boss ? Why, this. The 
 Works go ahead, stiddy as the North River. We work full 
 time and full-handed. We turn out stuff that no shop 
 needs to be ashamed of. Wages is on the nail. We have 
 a good time generally. How is that, boys, Mr. Chair- 
 man and Gentlemen?" 
 
 " That 's so ! " from everybody. 
 
112 THEODORE WINTHROP. 
 
 "And there's something better yet," Bill resumed. 
 " Dunderbunk used to be full of crying women. They 've 
 stopped crying now." 
 
 Here the whole assemblage, Chairman and all, burst into 
 an irrepressible cheer. 
 
 " But I 'm making my speech as long as a lightning-rod/' 
 said the speaker. " I '11 put on the brakes, short. I guess 
 Mr. Wade understands pretty well, now, how we feel ; and 
 if he don't, here it all is in shape, in this document, with 
 ' Whereas ' at the top and ' Resolved ' entered along down 
 in five places. Mr. Purtett, will you hand the Resolutions 
 to the Superintendent?" 
 
 Perry advanced and did his office loftily, much to the 
 amusement of Wade and the workmen. 
 
 " Now," Bill resumed, " we wanted, besides, to make you 
 a little gift, Mr. Wade, to remember the day by. So we got 
 up a subscription, and every man put in his dime. Here 's 
 the present, hand 'em over, Perry ! 
 
 " There, Sir, is THE BEST PAIR OF SKATES to be had in 
 York City, made for work, and no nonsense about 'em. 
 We Dunderbunk boys give 'em to you, one for all, and hope 
 you '11 like 'em and beat the world skating, as you do in all 
 the things we 've knowed you try. 
 
 " Now, boys," Bill perorated, " before I retire to the 
 shades of private life, I motion we give Three Cheers, 
 regular Toplifters, for Richard Wade ! " 
 
 " Hurrah ! Wade and Good Government ! " " Hurrah ! 
 Wade and Prosperity ! " " Hurrah ! Wade and the Women's 
 Tears Dry ! " 
 
 Cheers like the shout of Achilles ! Wielding sledges is 
 good for the bellows, it appears. Toplifters! Why, the 
 moky black rafters overhead had to tug hard to hold the 
 roof on. Hurrah ! From eveiy corner of the vast build- 
 ing came back rattling echoes. The Works, the machinery, 
 the furnaces, the stuff, all had their voice to add to the 
 verdict. 
 
LOVE AND SKATES. 113 
 
 Magnificent music ! and our Anglo-Saxon is the on A y race 
 in the world civilized enough to join in singing it. We are 
 the only hurrahing people, the only brood hatched in a 
 " Hurrah's nest." 
 
 Silence restored, the Chairman, prompted by Perry, said, 
 " Gentlemen, ]NIr. Wade has the floor for a few remarks." 
 
 Of course Wade had to speak, and did. He would not 
 have been an American in America else. But his heart 
 was too full to say more than a few hearty and earnest 
 words of good feeling. 
 
 " Now, men," he closed, " I want to get away on the rivei 
 and see if my skates will go as they look ; so I '11 end bj 
 proposing three cheers for Smith Wheelwright, our Chair- 
 man, three for our Orator, Tarbox, three for Old Dunder- 
 bunk, Works, Men, Women, and Children ; and one big 
 cheer for Old Father Iron, as rousing a cheer as ever was 
 roared." 
 
 So they gave their three times three with enormous en- 
 thusiasm. The roof shook, the furnaces rattled, Perry 
 Purtett banged with, the Chairman's hammer, the great 
 echoes thundered through the Foundry. 
 
 And when they ended with one gigantic cheer for IRON, 
 tough and true, the weapon, the tool, and the engine of all 
 civilization, it seemed as if the uproar would never cease 
 until Father Iron himself heard the call in his smithy away 
 under the magnetic pole, and came clanking up to return 
 thanks in person. 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 SKATING AS A FIXE ART. 
 
 OF all the plays that are played by this playful world on 
 its play-days, there is no play like Skating. 
 
 To prepare a board for the moves of this game of games, 
 a panel for the drawings of this Fine Art, a stage for the 
 8 
 
114 THEODOKE WINTHROP. 
 
 entrechats and pirouettes of its graceful adepts, Zero, magi- 
 cal artificer, had been, for the last two nights, sliding at full 
 speed up and down the North River. 
 
 We have heard of Midas, whose touch made gold, and of 
 the virgin under whose feet sprang roses ; but Zero's heels 
 and toes were armed with more precious influences. They 
 left a diamond way, where they slid, a hundred and fifty 
 miles of diamond, half a mile wide and six inches thick. 
 
 Diamond can only reflect sunlight ; ice can contain it. 
 Zero's product, finer even than diamond, was filled, at the 
 rate of a million to the square foot, with bubbles im- 
 measurably little, and yet every one big enough to comprise 
 the entire sun in small, but without alteration or abridg- 
 ment. When the sun rose, each of these wonderful cells 
 was ready to catch the tip of a sunbeam and house it in a 
 shining abode. 
 
 Besides this, Zero had inlaid his work, all along shore, 
 vith exquisite marquetry of leaves, brown and evergreen, 
 of sprays and twigs, reeds and grasses. No parquet in any 
 palace from Fontainebleau to St. Petersburg could show 
 such delicate patterns, or could gleam so brightly, though 
 polished with all the wax in Christendom. 
 
 On this fine pavement, all the way from Cohoes to Spuy- 
 ten Duyvil, Jubilee was sliding without friction, the Christ- 
 mas morning of these adventures. 
 
 Navigation was closed. Navigators had leisure. The 
 sloops and schooners were frozen in along shore, the tugs 
 and barges were laid up in basins, the floating palaces were 
 down at New York, deodorizing their bar-rooms, regilding 
 their bridal chambers, and enlarging their spittoon accom- 
 modations alow and aloft, for next summer. All the pop- 
 ulation was out on the ice, skating, sliding, sledding, slipping, 
 tumbling, to its heart's content. 
 
 One person out of every Dunderbunk family was of 
 course at home, roasting Christmas turkey. The rest were 
 
LOVE AND SKATES. 115 
 
 already at high jinks on Zero's Christmas present, when 
 Wade and the men came down from the meeting. 
 
 Wade buckled on his new skates in a jiffy. He stamped 
 to settle himself, and then flung off half a dozen circles on 
 the right leg, half a dozen with the left, and the same with 
 either leg backwards. 
 
 The ice, traced with these white peripheries, showed like 
 a blackboard where a school has been chalking diagrams of 
 Euclid, to point at with the "slow unyielding finger" of 
 demonstration. 
 
 " Hurrah ! " cries Wade, halting in front of the men, who, 
 some on the Foundry wharf, some on the deck of our first 
 acquaintance at Dunderbunk, the tug " I. Anibuster," were 
 putting on their skates or watching him. "Hurrah! the 
 skates are perfection ! Are you ready, Bill ? " 
 
 "Yes," says Tarbox, whizzing off rings, as exact as 
 Giotto's autograph. 
 
 " Xow, then," Wade said, " we '11 give Dunderbunk a 
 laugh, as we practised last night." 
 
 They got under full headway, Wade backwards, Bill for- 
 wards, holding hands. When they were near enough to the 
 merry throng out in the stream, both dropped into a sitting 
 posture, with the left knee bent, and each with his right leg 
 stretched out parallel to the ice and fitting compactly by the 
 other man's lep;. In this queer figure they rushed through 
 the laughing crowd. 
 
 Then all Dunderbunk formed a ring, agog for a grand 
 show of 
 
 SKATING AS A FINE ART. 
 
 The world loves to see Great Artists, and expects them 
 to do their duty. 
 
 It is hard to treat of this Fine Art by the Art of Fu>e 
 Writing. Its eloquent motions must be seen. 
 
 To skate Fine Art, you must have . Body J"id s, Soul. 
 
116 THEODORE WINTLROP, 
 
 each of the First Order ; otherwise you will never get out 
 of coarse art and skating in one syllable. So much for 
 yourself, the motive power. And your machinery, your 
 smooth-bottomed rockers, the same shape stem and stern, 
 this must be as perfect as the man it moves, and who 
 moves it. 
 
 Now suppose you wish to skate so that critics will say, 
 " See ! this athlete does his work as Church paints, as Dar- 
 ley draws, as Palmer chisels, as Whittier strikes the lyre, 
 and Longfellow the dulcimer ; he is as terse as Emerson, as 
 clever as Holmes, as graceful as Curtis ; he is as calm as 
 Seward, as keen as Phillips, as stalwart as Beecher ; he is 
 Garabaldi, he is Kit Carson, he is Blondin ; he is as com- 
 plete as the steamboat Metropolis, as Steers's yacht, as 
 Singer's sewing-machine, as Colt's revolver, as the steam- 
 plough, as Civilization." You wish to be so ranked among 
 the people and tilings that lead the age ; consider the 
 qualities you must have, and while you consider, keep your 
 eye on Richard Wade, for he has them all in perfection. 
 
 First, of your physical qualities. You must have lungs, 
 not bellows ; and an active heart, not an assortment of slug- 
 gish auricles and ventricles. You must have legs, not shanks 
 Their shape is unimportant, except that they must not inter- 
 fere at the knee. You must have muscles, not flabbiness ; 
 sinews like wire ; nerves like sunbeams ; and a thin layer 
 of flesh to cushion the gable-ends, where you will strike, if 
 you tumble, which, once for all be it said, you must never 
 do. You must be all momentum, and no inertia. You must 
 be one part grace, one force, one agility, and the rest caout- 
 chouc, Manilla hemp, and watch-spring. Your machine, 
 your body, must be thoroughly obedient. It must go just sc 
 far and no farther. You have got to be as unerring as a 
 planet holding its own, emphatically, between forces centrip- 
 etal and centrifugal. Your aplomb must be as absolute as 
 the pounce of a falcon. 
 
LOVE AND SKATES. 117 
 
 So much for a few of the physical qualities necessary to 
 be a Great Artist in Skating. See Wade, how he shows 
 them! 
 
 Now for the moral and intellectual. Pluck is the first ; 
 it always is the first quality. Then enthusiasm. Then pa- 
 tience. Then pertinacity. Then a fine aesthetic faculty, 
 in short, good taste. Then an orderly and submissive mind, 
 that can consent to act in accordance with the laws of Art. 
 Circumstances, too, must have been reasonably favorable. 
 That well-known sceptic, the King of tropical Bantam, 
 could not skate, because he had never seen ice and doubted 
 even the existence of solid water. Widdrington, after the 
 Battle of Chevy Chace, could not have skated, because 
 he had no l^gs, poor fellow ! 
 
 But granted the ice and the legs, then if you begin in the 
 elastic days of youth, when cold does not sting, tumbles do 
 not bruise, and duckings do not wet ; if you have pluck and 
 ardor enough to try everything ; if you work slowly ahead 
 and stick to it ; if you -have good taste and a lively inven- 
 tion ; if you are a man, and not a lubber ; then, in fine, 
 you may become a Great Skater, just as with equal power 
 and equal pains you may put your grip on any kind of 
 Greatness. 
 
 The technology of skating is imperfect. Few of the great 
 feats, the Big Things, have admitted names. If I attempted 
 to catalogue Wade's achievements, this chapter might be- 
 come an unintelligible rhapsody. A sheet of paper and a 
 pen-point cannot supply the place of a sheet of ice and a 
 skate-edge. Geometry must have its diagrams, Anatomy 
 its corpus to carve. Skating also refuses to be spiritualized 
 into a Science ; it remains an Art, and cannot be expressed 
 in a formula. 
 
 Skating has its Little Go, its Great Go, its Baccalau 
 reate, its M. A., its F. S. D. (Doctor of Frantic Skipping), 
 its A. G. D. (Doctor of Airy Gliding), its N. T. D. (Doctor 
 
118 THEODORE WINTHROP. 
 
 of No Tumbles), and finally its highest degree, U. P. (Un- 
 approachable Podographer). 
 
 Wade was U. P. 
 
 There were a hundred of Dunderbunkers who had passed 
 their Little Go and could skate forward and backward easily. 
 A half-hundred, perhaps, were through the Great Go ; these 
 could do outer edge freely. A dozen had taken the Bacca- 
 laureate, and were proudly repeating the pirouettes and 
 spread-eagles of that degree. A few could cross their feet, 
 on the edge, forward and backward, and shift edge on the 
 same foot, and so were Magistri Arlis. 
 
 Wade, U. P., added to these an indefinite list of combina- 
 tions and fresh contrivances. He spun spirals slow, and 
 spirals neck or nothing. He pivoted on one toe, with the 
 other foot cutting rings, inner and outer edge, forward and 
 back. He skated on one foot better than the M. A.s could 
 on both. He ran on his toes ; he slid on his heels ; he cut 
 up shines like a sunbeam on a bender ; he swung, light as 
 if he could fly, if he pleased, like a wing-footed Mercury ; 
 he glided, as if will, not muscle, moved him ; he tore about 
 in frenzies ; his pivotal leg stoou firm, his balance leg flapped 
 like a graceful pinion ; he turned somersets ; he jumped, 
 whirling backward as he went, over a platoon of boys laid 
 flat on the ice; the last boy winced, and thought he was 
 amputated; but Wade flew over, and the boy still holds 
 together as well as most boys. Besides this, he could write 
 his name, with a flourish at the end, like the rubrica of a 
 Spanish hidalgo. He could podograph any letter, and mul- 
 titudes of ingenious curlicues which might pass for the 
 alphabets of the unknown tongues. He could not tumble. 
 
 It was Fine Art. 
 
 Bill Tarbox sometimes pressed the champion hard. But 
 Bill stopped just short of Fine Art, in High Artisanship. 
 
 How Dunderbunk cheered this wondrous display ! How 
 delighted the whole population was to believe they possessed 
 
LOVE AND SKATED 119 
 
 the best skater on the North River ! How they struggled 
 to imitate ! How they tumbled, some on their backs, some 
 on their faces, some with dignity like the dying Caesar, some 
 rebelliously like a cat thrown out of a garret, some limp as 
 an ancient acrobate ! How they laughed at themselves and 
 at each other ! 
 
 " It 's all in the new skates," says Wade, apologizing for 
 his unapproachable power and finish. 
 
 " It 's suthin' in the man," says Smith Wheelwright. 
 
 " Now chase me, everybody," said Wade. 
 
 And, for a quarter of an hour, he dodged the merry crowd, 
 until, at last, breathless, he let himself be touched by pretty 
 Belle Purtett, rosiest of all the Dunderbunk bevy of rosy 
 maidens onthe ice. 
 
 " He rayther beats Bosting," says Captain Isaac Ambus- 
 ter to Smith Wheelwright. " It 's so cold there that they 
 can skate all the year round ; but he beats them, all the 
 same." 
 
 The Captain was sitting in a queer little bowl of a skiff 
 on the deck of his tug, and rocking it like a cradle, as he 
 talked. 
 
 " Bosting 's always hard to beat in anything," rejoined the 
 ex-Chairman. But if Bosting is to be beat, here 's the 
 man to do it." 
 
 And now, perhaps, gentle reader, you think I have said 
 enough in behalf of a limited fraternity, the Skaters. 
 
 The next chapter, then, shall take up the cause of the 
 Lovers, a more numerous body, and we will see whether 
 True Love, which never makes " smooth running," can help 
 its ^regress by a skate-blade. 
 
120 THEODORE WINTHROP. 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 " GO NOT, HAPPY DAT, TILL THE MAIDEN YIELDS " 
 
 CHRISTMAS noon at Dunderbunk, every skater was in 
 galloping glee, as the electric air and the sparkling 
 sun and the glinting ice had a right to expect they all 
 should be. 
 
 Belle Purtett, skating simply and well, had never looked 
 so pretty and graceful. So thought Bill Tarbox. 
 
 He had not spoken to her, nor she to him, for more than 
 six months. The poor fellow was ashamed of himself and 
 penitent for his past bad courses. And so, though he longed 
 to have his old flame recognize him again, and though he 
 was bitterly jealous and miserably afraid he should lose 
 her, he had kept away and consumed his heart like a true 
 despairing lover. 
 
 But to-day Bill was a lion, only second to Wade, the 
 unapproachable lion-in-chief. Bill was reinstated in public 
 esteem, and had won back his standing in the Foundry. He 
 had to-day made a speech which Perry Purtett gave every- 
 body to understand "none of Senator Bill Seward's could 
 hold the tallow to." Getting up the meeting and present- 
 ing Wade with the skates was Bill's own scheme, and it 
 had turned out an eminent success. Everything began to 
 look bright to him. His past life drifted out of his mind 
 like the rowdy tales he used to read in the Sunday news- 
 papers. 
 
 He had watched Belle Purtett all the morning, and saw 
 that she distinguished nobody with her smiles, not even that 
 coq du village, Ringdove. He also observed that she was 
 furtively watching him. 
 
 By and by she sailed out of the crowd, and went off a 
 little way to practise. 
 
 " Now," said he to himself, "sail in, Bill Tarbox ! " 
 
LOVE AND SKATES. 121 
 
 Belle heard the sharp strokes of a powerful skater coming 
 after her. Her heart divined who this might be. She sped 
 away like the swift Camilla, and her modest drapery showed 
 just enough and " ne quid nimis " of her ankles. 
 
 Bill admired the grace and the ankles immensely. But 
 his hopes sank a little at the flight, for he thought she 
 perceived his chase and meant to drop him. Bill had not 
 had a classical education, and knew nothing of Galatea in 
 the Eclogue, how she did not hide until she saw her 
 swain was looking fondly after. 
 
 " She. wants to get away," he thought. " But she sha'n't, 
 no, not if I have to follow her to Albany." 
 
 He struck out mightily. Presently the swift Camilla let 
 herself be overtaken. 
 
 " Good morning, Miss Purtett." (Dogged air.) 
 
 " Good morning, Mr. Tarbox." (Taken-by-surprise air.) 
 
 " I 've been admiring your skating," says Bill, trying to 
 be cool. 
 
 " Have you ? " rejoins Belle, very cool and distant 
 
 " Have you been long on the ice ? " he inquired, hypo- 
 critically. 
 
 " I came on two hours ago with Mr. Ringdove and the 
 girls," returned she, with a twinkle which said, " Take that, 
 sir, for pretending you did not see me." 
 
 " You 've seen Mr. Wade skate, then," Bill said, ignoring 
 Ringdove. 
 
 " Yes ; is n't it splendid ? " Belle replied, kindling. 
 
 " Tip-top ! " 
 
 " But then he does everything better than anybody." 
 
 " So he does ! " Bill said, true to his friend, and yet 
 beginning to be jealous of this enthusiasm. It was not the 
 first time he had been jealous of Wade ; but he had quelled 
 his fears, like a good fellow. 
 
 Belle perceived Bill's jealousy, aud could have cried for 
 joy. She had known as little of her once lover's heart as 
 
122 THEODORE WINTHROP. 
 
 he of hers. She only knew that he stopped coming to see 
 her when he fell, and had not renewed his visits now that 
 he was risen again. If she had not been charmingly ruddy 
 with the brisk air and exercise, she would have betrayed 
 her pleasure at Bill's jealousy with a fine blush. 
 
 The sense of recovered power made her wish to use it 
 again. She must tease him a little. So she continued, as 
 they skated on in good rhythm, 
 
 " Mother and I would n't know what to do without Mr. 
 "Wade. We like him so much," said ardently. 
 
 What Bill feared was true, then, he thought. Wade, 
 noble fellow, worthy to win any woman's heart, had fasci- 
 nated his landlady's daughter. 
 
 " I don't wonder you like him," said he. " He deserves 
 it." 
 
 Belle was touched by her old lover's forlorn tone. 
 
 " He does indeed," she said. " He has helped and 
 taught us all so much. He has taken such good care of 
 Perry. And then" here she gave her companion a 
 little look and a little smile " he speak's so kindly of you, 
 Mr. Tarbox." 
 
 Smile, look, and words electrified Bill. He gave such a 
 spring on his skates that he shot far ahead of the lady. He 
 brought himself back with a sharp turn. 
 
 " He has done kinder than he can speak," says Bill. 
 " He has made a man of me again, Miss Belle." 
 
 " I know it. It makes me very happy to hear you able 
 to say so of yourself." She spoke gravely. 
 
 " Very happy " about anything that concerned him ? 
 Bill had to work off his over-joy at this by an exuberant 
 flourish. He whisked about Belle, outer edge backward. 
 She stopped to admire. He finished by describing on the 
 virgin ice, before her, the letters B. P., in his neatest style 
 of podography, easy letters to make, luckily. 
 
 Beautiful ! " exclaimed Belle. " What are those let- 
 ters ? Oh ! B. P. ! What do they stand for ? " 
 
LOVE AMD SKATES. 12 J 
 
 "Guess!" 
 
 "I'm so dull,'' said she, looking bright as a diamond. 
 Let me think ! B. P. ? British Poets, perhaps." 
 
 " Try nearer home ! " 
 
 " What are you likely to be thinking of that begins with 
 B. P. ? O, I know ! Boiler Plates ! " 
 
 She looked at him, innocent as a lamb. Bill looked 
 at her, delighted with her little coquetry. A woman 
 without coquetry is insipid as a rose without scent, as 
 Champagne without bubbles, or as corned beef without 
 mustard. 
 
 " It 's something I 'm thinking of most of the time," says 
 he; "but I hope it's softer than Boiler Plates. B. P 
 stands for ^liss Isabella Purtett." 
 
 " Oh ! " says Belle, and she skated on in silence. 
 
 " You came down with Alonzo Ringdove ? " BiH 
 asked, suddenly, aware of another pang after a moment 
 of peace. 
 
 " He came with me and his sisters," she replied. 
 
 Yes ; poor Ringdove had dressed himself in his shiniest 
 black, put on his brightest patent-leather boots, with his 
 new swan-necked skates newly strapped over them, and 
 wore his new dove-colored overcoat with the long skirts, on 
 purpose to be lovely hi the eyes of Belle on this occasion. 
 Alas, in vain ! 
 
 " Mr. Ringdove is a great friend of yours, is n't he ? " 
 
 " If you ever came 'to see me now, you would know who 
 my friends are, Mr. Tarbox." 
 
 " Would you be my friend again, if I came, Miss 
 Belle ? " 
 
 "Again? I have always been so, always, Bill." 
 
 " Well, then, something more than my friend, now that 
 I am trying to be worthy of more, Belle ? " 
 
 " What more can I be ? " she said, softly. 
 
 M wife." 
 
124 THEODORE WINTHROP. 
 
 She curved to the right. He followed. To the left. He 
 was not to be shaken off. 
 
 " Will you promise me not to say waives instead of valves, 
 Bill ? " she said, looking pretty and saucy as could be. " I 
 know, to say W for V is fashionable in the iron business ; 
 but I don't like it." 
 
 " What a thing a woman is to dodge ? " says Bill. " Sup- 
 pose I told you that men brought up inside of boilers, 
 hammering on the inside against twenty hammering like 
 Wulcans on the outside, get their ears so dumfounded that 
 they can't tell whether they are saying valves or waives, 
 wice or virtue, suppose I told you that, what would 
 you say, Belle ? " 
 
 " Perhaps I 'd say that you pronounce virtue so well, and 
 act it so sincerely, that I can't make any objection to your 
 other words. If you 'd asked me to be your vife, Bill, I 
 might have said I did n't understand ; but wife I do under- 
 stand, and I say " 
 
 She nodded, and tried to skate off. Bill stuck close to 
 her side. 
 
 "Is this true, Belle?" he said, almost doubtfully. 
 
 "True as truth!" 
 
 She put out her hand. He took it, and they skated on 
 together, hearts beating to the rhythm of their move- 
 ments. The uproar and merriment of the village came only 
 faintly to them. It seemed as if all Nature was hushed to 
 listen to their plighted troth, their words of love renewed, 
 more earnest for long suppression. The beautiful ice spread 
 before them, like their life to come, a pathway untouched 
 by any sorrowful or weary footstep. The blue sky was 
 cloudless. The keen air stirred the pulses like the vapor 
 of frozen wine. The benignant mountains westward kindly 
 surveyed the happy pair, and the sun seemed created to 
 warm and cheer them. 
 
 And you forgive me, Belle ? " said the lover. " I feel 
 
LOVE AND SKATES. 125 
 
 as if I had only gone bad to make me know bow much 
 better going right is." 
 
 " I always knew you would find it out. I never stopped 
 hoping and praying for it." 
 
 " That must have been what brough't Mr. Wade here." 
 
 " Oh, I did hate him so, Bill, when I heard of something 
 that happened between you and him! I thought him a 
 brute and a tyrant. I never could get over it, until he told 
 mother that you were the best machinist he ever knew, and 
 would some time grow to be a great inventor." 
 
 " I 'm glad you hated him. I suffered rattlesnakes and 
 collapsed flues for fear you M go and love him." 
 
 " My affections were engaged," she said with simple 
 seriousness.* 
 
 " Oh, if I 'd only thought so long ago ! How lovely you 
 are ! " exclaims Bill, in an ecstasy. " And how refined I 
 And how good ! God bless you ! " 
 
 He made up such a wishful mouth, so wishful for one 
 of the pleasurable duties of mouths, that Belle blushed, 
 laughed, and looked down, and as she did so saw that one 
 of her straps was trailing. 
 
 " Please fix it, Bill," she said, stopping and kneeling. 
 
 Bill also knelt, and his wishful mouth immediately took 
 its chance. 
 
 A manly smack and sweet little feminine chirp sounded 
 as their lips met. 
 
 Boom ! twanging gay as the first tap of a marriage-bell, 
 a loud crack in the ice rang musically for leagues up and 
 down the river. " Bravo ! " it seemed to say. " Well done, 
 Bill Tarbox ! Try again ! " Which the happy fellow did, 
 and the happy maiden permitted. 
 
 " Now," said Bill, " let us go and hug Mr. Wade ! " 
 
 " What ! Both of us ? " Belle protested. " Mr. Tarbox, 
 I am ashamed of you ! " 
 
126 THEODORE WINTHROP. 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 WADE DOWN. 
 
 THE hugging of Wade by the happy pair had to be done 
 metaphorically, since it was done in the sight of all Dunder- 
 bunk. 
 
 He had divined a happy result when he missed Bill Tar- 
 box from the arena, and saw him a furlong away, hand in 
 hand with his reconciled sweetheart. 
 
 " I envy you, Bill," said he, " almost too much to put 
 proper fervor into my congratulations." 
 
 " Your time will come," the foreman rejoined. 
 
 And says Belle, " I am sure there is a lady skating some- 
 where, and only waiting for you to follow her." 
 
 " I don't see her," Wade replied, looking with a mock- 
 grave face up and down and athwart the river. " When 
 you 've all gone to dinner, I '11 prospect ten miles up and 
 down, and try to find a good matrimonial claim that 's not 
 taken." 
 
 " You will not come up to dinner ? " Belle asked. 
 
 " I can hardly afford to make two bites of a holiday," 
 said Wade. " I Ve sent Perry up for a luncheon. Here 
 he comes with it. So I cede my quarter of your pie, Miss 
 Belle, to a better fellow." 
 
 " Oh ! " cries Perry, coming up and bowing elaborately. 
 " Mr. and Mrs. Tarbox, I believe. Ah, yes ! Well, I 
 will mention it up at Albany. I am going to take my 
 Guards up to call on the Governor." 
 
 Perry dashed off, followed by a score of Dunderbunk 
 boys, organized by him as the Purtett Guards, and taught 
 to salute him as Generalissimo with military honors. 
 
 So many hundreds of turkeys, done to a turn, now began 
 to have an effect upon the atmosphere. Few odors are 
 more subtile and pervading than this, and few more appetiz- 
 
LOVE AND SKATES. 127 
 
 ing. Indeed, there is said to be an odd fellow, a strictly 
 American gourmand, in New York, who sits from noon to 
 dusk on Christmas day up in a tall steeple, merely to catch 
 the aroma of roast-turkey floating over the city, and 
 much good, it is said, it doesihhn. 
 
 Hard skating is nearly as effective to whet Lunger as his 
 gentleman's expedient When the spicy breezes began to 
 blow soft as those of Ceylon's isle over the river and every 
 whiff talked Turkey, the population of Dunderbunk listened 
 to the wooing and began to follow its several noses snubs, 
 beaks, blunts, sharps, piquants, dominants, fines, bulgies, and 
 bifids on the way to the several households which those 
 noses adorned or defaced. Prosperous Dunderbunk had a 
 Dinner, yes, a DINNER, that day, and Richard Wade was 
 gratefully remembered by many over-fed foundry-men and 
 their over-fed families. 
 
 Wade had not had half skating enough. 
 
 " I '11 time myself down to Skerrett's Point," he thought, 
 " and take my luncheon there among the hemlocks." 
 
 The Point was on the property of Peter Skerrett, Wade's 
 friend and college comrade of ten years gone. Peter had 
 been an absentee in Europe, and smokes from his chimneys 
 this morning had confirmed to Wade's eyes the rumor of his 
 return. 
 
 Skerrett's Point was a mile below the Foundry. Our 
 hero did his mile under three minutes. How many seconds 
 under, I will not say. I do not wish to make other fellows 
 unhappy. 
 
 The Point was a favorite spot of Wade's. Many a twi- 
 light of last summer, tired with his fagging at the Works to 
 make good the evil of Whiffler's rule, he had lain there on 
 the rocks under the hemlocks, breathing the spicy methyl 
 they poured into the air. After his day's hard fight, in the 
 dust and heat of the Foundry, with anarchy and unthrift, he 
 used to take the quiet restoratives of Nature, until the mur- 
 
128 THEODORE WINTHROP. 
 
 inur and fragrance of the woods, the cool wind, and the 
 soothing loiter of the shining stream had purged him from 
 the fevers of his task. 
 
 To this old haunt he skated, and kindling a little fire, as 
 an old campaigner loves to* do, he sat down and lunched 
 heartily on Mrs. Purtett's cold leg, cannibal thought ! 
 on the cold leg of Mrs. Purtett's yesterday's turkey. Then 
 lighting his weed, dear ally of the lonely, the Superin- 
 tendent began to think of his foreman's bliss, and to long for 
 some thing similar on his own plane. 
 
 " I hope the wish is lather to its fulfilment," he said. 
 " But I must not stop here and be spooney. Such a halcyon 
 day I may not have again in all my life, and I ought to make 
 the best of it with my New Skates." 
 
 So he dashed off, and filled the little cove above the Point 
 with a labyrinth of curves and flourishes. 
 
 When that bit of crystal tablet was well covered, the 
 podographer sighed for a new sheet to inscribe his intricate 
 rubricas upon. Why not write more stanzas of the poetry 
 of motion on the ice below the Point ? Why not ? 
 
 Braced by his lunch on the brown fibre of good Mrs. 
 Purtett's cold drumstick and thigh, Wade was now in fine 
 trim. The air was more glittering and electric than ever. 
 It was triumph and victory and paean in action to go flashing 
 along over this footing, smoother than polished marble and 
 sheenier than first-water gems. 
 
 Wade felt the high exhilaration of pure blood galloping 
 through a body alive from top to toe. The rhythm of liis 
 movement was like music to him. 
 
 The Point ended in a sharp promontory. Just before he 
 came abreast of it, Wade under mighty headway flung into 
 his favorite corkscrew spiral on one foot, and went whirling 
 dizzily along, round and round, in a straight line. 
 
 At the dizziest moment, he was suddenly aware of a figure 
 also turning the Point at full speed, and rushing to a col- 
 lision. 
 
LOVE AND SKATES. 129 
 
 He jerked aside to avoid it. He could not look to his 
 footing. His skate struck a broken oar, imbedded in the 
 ice. He fell violently, and lay like a dead man. 
 
 His New Skates, Testimonial of Merit, seem to have 
 served liim a shabby trick. 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 SEEING Wade lie there motionless, the lady 
 
 Took off her spectacles, blew her great red nose, and 
 stiffly drew near. 
 
 Spectacles ! Nose ! No, the latter feature of hers had 
 never become acquainted with the former ; and there was as 
 little stiffness as nasal redness about her. 
 
 A fresh start, then, and this time accuracy ! 
 
 Appalled by the loud thump of the stranger's skull upon 
 the chief river of the State of New York, the lady it was 
 a young lady whom Wade had tumbled to avoid turned, 
 saw a human being lying motionless, and swept gracefully 
 toward him, like a Good Samaritan, on the outer edge. It 
 was not her fault, but her destiny, that she had to be grace- 
 ful even under these tragic circumstances. 
 
 " Dead ! " she thought. " Is he dead ? " 
 
 The appalling thump had cracked the ice, and she could 
 not know how well the skull was cushioned inside with 
 brains to resist a blow. 
 
 She shuddered as she swooped about toward this possible 
 corpse. It might be that he was killed, and half the fault 
 hers. No wonder her fine color, shining in the right parts 
 of an admirably drawn face, all disappeared instantly. 
 
 But she evidently was not frightened. She halted, kneeled, 
 looked curiously at the stranger, and then proceeded, in a 
 perfectly cool and self-possessed way, to pick him up. 
 9 
 
130 THEODORE WINTHROP. 
 
 A solid fellow, heavy to lift in his present lumpish condi- 
 tion of dead- weight ! She had to tug mightily to get him up 
 into a sitting position. When he was raised, all the back- 
 bone seemed gone from his spine, and it took the whole force 
 of her vigorous arms to sustain him. 
 
 The effort was enough to account for the return of her 
 color. It came rushing back splendidly. Cheeks, forehead, 
 everything but nose, blushed. The hard work of lifting so 
 much avoirdupois, and possibly, also, the novelty of support- 
 ing so much handsome fellow, intensified all her hues. Her 
 eyes blue, or that shade even more faithful than blue 
 deepened ; and her pale golden hair grew several carats 
 not carrots brighter. 
 
 She was repaid for her active sympathy at once by discov- 
 ering that this big, awkward thing was not a dead, but only 
 a stunned body. It had an ugly bump and a bleeding cut 
 on its manly skull, but otherwise was quite an agreeable 
 object to contemplate, and plainly on its " unembarrassed 
 brow Nature had written k Gentleman.' " 
 
 As this young lady had never had a fair, steady stare at a 
 stunned hero before, she seized her advantage. She had 
 hitherto been distant with the other sex. She had no 
 brother. Not one of her male cousins had ever ventured 
 near enough to get those cousinly privileges that timid 
 cousins sigh for and plucky cousins take, if they are worth 
 taking. 
 
 Wade's impressive face, though for the moment blind as a 
 statue's, also seized its advantage and stared "at her in- 
 tently, with a pained and pleading look, new to those reso- 
 lute features. 
 
 Wade was entirely unconscious of the great hit he had 
 made by his tumble : plump into the arms of this heroine ! 
 There were fellows extant who would have suffered anj 
 imaginable amputation, any conceivable mauling, any fling 
 from the apex of anything into the lowest deeps of any- 
 where, for the honor he was now enjoying. 
 
LOVE AND SKATES. 131 
 
 But all he knew was that his skull was a beehive in an 
 uproar, and that one lobe of his brain was struggling to 
 swarm off. His legs and arms felt as if they belonged to 
 another man, and a very limp one at that. A ton of cast-iron 
 seemed to be pressing his eyelids down, and a trickle of red- 
 hot metal flowed from his cut forehead. 
 
 " I shall have to scream," thought the lady, after an instant 
 of anxious waiting, " if he does not revive. I cannct leave 
 him to go for help." 
 
 Not a prude, you see. A prude would have had cheap 
 scruples about compromising herself by taking a man in 
 her arms. Not a vulgar person, who would have required 
 the stranger to be properly recommended by somebody who 
 came over 'in the Mayflower, before she helped him. Not a 
 feeble-minded damsel, who, if she had not fainted, would 
 have fled away, gasping and in tears. No timidity or 
 prudery or underbred doubts about this thorough creature. 
 She knew she was in her right womanly place, and she 
 meant to stay there. 
 
 But she began to need help, possibly a lancet, possibly a 
 pocket-pistol, possibly hot blankets, possibly somebody to 
 knead these lifeless lungs and pommel this flaccid body, 
 until circulation was restored. 
 
 Just as she was making up her mind to scream, Wade 
 stirred. He began to tingle as if a familiar of the Inquisi- 
 tion were slapping him all over with fine-toothed currycombs. 
 He became half conscious of a woman supporting him. Jo 
 a stammering and intoxicated voice he murmured, 
 
 " Who ran to catch me when I fell, 
 And kissed the place to make it well ? 
 My-" 
 
 He opened his eyes. It was not his mother ; for she was 
 long since deceased. Nor was this non-mother kissing the 
 place. 
 
 In fact, abashed at the blind eyes suddenly unclosing s<? 
 
132 THEODORE WINTHROP. 
 
 near her, she was on the point of letting her burden drop. 
 When dead men come to life in such a position, and begin to 
 talk about " kissing the place," young ladies, however inde- 
 pendent of conventions, may well grow uneasy. 
 
 But the stranger, though alive, was evidently in a mollus- 
 cous, invertebrate condition. He could not sustain himself. 
 She still held lum up, a little more at arm's-length, and all 
 at once the reaction from extreme anxiety brought a gush 
 of tears to her eyes. 
 
 " Don't cry," says Wade, vaguely, and still only half con- 
 scious. " I promise never to do so again." 
 
 At this, said with a childlike earnestness, the lady smiled. 
 
 " Don't scalp me," Wade continued, in the same tone. 
 " Squaws never scalp." 
 
 He raised his hand to his bleeding forehead. 
 
 She laughed outright at his queer plaintive tone and the 
 new class he had placed her in. 
 
 Her laugh and his own movement brought Wade fully to 
 himself. She perceived that his look was transferring her 
 from the order of scalping squaws to her proper place as a 
 beautiful young woman of the highest civilization, not smeared, 
 with vermilion, but blushing celestial rosy. 
 
 " Thank you," said Wade. " I can sit up now without 
 assistance." And he regretted profoundly that good breed 
 ing obliged him to say so. 
 
 She withdrew her arms. He rested on the ice, posture 
 of the Dying Gladiator. She made an effort to be cool and 
 distant as usual ; but it would not do. Tin's weak mighty 
 man still interested her. It was still her business to be 
 strength tc him. 
 
 He made a feeble attempt to wipe away the drops of 
 blood from his forehead with his handkerchief. 
 
 " Let me be your surgeon ! " said she. 
 
 She produced her own folded handkerchief, M. D. were 
 the initials in the corner, and neatly and tenderly tur- 
 bancd him. 
 
LOVE AND SKATES. Io3 
 
 Wade submitted with delight to this treatment. A tum- 
 ble with such trimmings was luxury indeed. 
 
 " Who would not break his head," he thought, " to have 
 these delicate fingers plying about him, and this pure, noble 
 face so close to his ? What a queenly indifferent manner 
 she has ! What a calm brow ! What honest eyes ! What 
 a firm nose ! What equable cheeks ! What a grand indig- 
 nant mouth ! Not a bit afraid of me ! She feels that I f on 
 a gentleman and will not presume." 
 
 " There ! " said she, drawing back. " Is that comforta- 
 ble ? " 
 
 " Luxury ! " he ejaculated with fervor. 
 
 " I am afraid I am to blame for your terrible fall." 
 
 " No, \my own clumsiness and that oar-blade are in 
 fault." 
 
 " If you feel well enough to be left alone, I will skate off 
 and call my friends." 
 
 " Please do not leave me quite yet ! " says Wade, entirely 
 satisfied with the tete-a-tete. 
 
 "Ah! here comes Mr. Skerrett round the Point!" she 
 said, and sprang up, looking a little guilty. 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 LOVE IN THE FIRST DEGREE. 
 
 PETER SKERRETT came sailing round the purple rocks 
 of his Point, skating like a man who has been in the South 
 of Europe for two winters. 
 
 He was decidedly Anglicized in his whiskers, coat, and 
 shoes. Otherwise he in all respects repeated his well-known 
 ancestor, Skerrett of the Revolution; whose two portraits 
 1. A ruddy hero in regimentals, in Gilbert Stuart's early 
 brandy -arid-water manner ; 2. A rosy sage in senatorial, in 
 Stuart's later claret-and- water manner hang in his de- 
 scendant's dining-room. 
 
134 THEODORE WINTHROP. 
 
 Peter's first look was a provokingly significant one at the 
 confused and blushing young lady. Secondly, he inspected 
 the Dying Gladiator on the ice. 
 
 " Have you been tilting at this gentleman, Mary ? " he 
 asked, in the voice of a cheerful, friendly fellow. " Why ! 
 Hullo. Hooray ! It 's Wade, Richard Wade, Dick Wade ! 
 Don't look, Miss Mary, while I give him the grips .of all the 
 secret societies we belonged to in college." 
 
 Mary, however, did look on, pleased and amused, while 
 Peter plumped down on the ice, shook his friend's hand, 
 and examined him as if he were fine crockery, spilt and 
 perhaps shattered. 
 
 " It 's not a case of trepanning, Dick, my boy ? " said he. 
 
 " No," said the other. " I tumbled in trying to dodge 
 this lady. The ice thought my face ought to be scratched, 
 because I had been scratching its face without mercy. My 
 wits were knocked out of me ; but they are tired of secession, 
 and pleading to be let in again." 
 
 " Keep some of them out for our sake ! We must have 
 you at our commonplace level. Well, Miss Mary, I suppose 
 this is the first time you have had the sensation of breaking 
 a man's head. You generally hit lower." Peter tapped 
 his heart. 
 
 " I 'm all right now, thanks to my surgeon," says Wade. 
 " Give me a lift, Peter." He pulled up and clung to his 
 friend. 
 
 " You 're the vine and I 'm the lamp-post," Skerrett said. 
 * Mary, do you know what a pocket-pistol is ? " 
 
 " I have seen such weapons concealed about the persons 
 of modern warriors." 
 
 " There 's one in my overcoat-pocket, with a cup at the 
 but and a cork at the muzzle. Skate off, now, like an angel, 
 and get it. Bring Fanny, too. She is restorative." 
 
 " Are you alive enough to admire that, Dick ? " he con- 
 tinued, as she skimmed away. 
 
LOVE AND SKATES. 135 
 
 * It would put a soul under the ribs of Death." 
 
 " I venerate that young woman," says Peter. " You see 
 what a beauty she is, and just as unspoiled as this ice. Un- 
 spoiled beauties are rarer than rocs' eggs." 
 
 " She has a singularly true face," "Wade replied, " and that 
 is the main thing, the most excellent thing in man or 
 woman." 
 
 " Yes, truth makes that nuisance, beauty, tolerable." 
 
 " You did not do me the honor to present me." 
 
 " I saw you had gone a great way beyond that, my boy. 
 Have you not her initials in cambric on your brow ? Not 
 M. T., which would n't apply ; but M. D." 
 
 "Mary ?" 
 
 Darner." 
 
 " I like the name," says Wade, repeating it. " It sounds 
 simple and thorough-bred." 
 
 " Just what she is. One of the nine simple-hearted and 
 thorough-bred girls on this continent." 
 
 Nine ? " 
 
 " Is that too many ? Three, then. That 's one in ten 
 millions. The exact proportion of Poets, Painters, Orators, 
 Statesmen, and all other Great Artists. Well, three or 
 nine, Mary Darner is one of them. She never saw fear 
 or jealousy, or knowingly allowed an ignoble thought or an 
 ungentle word or an ungraceful act in herself. Her atmos- 
 phere does not tolerate flirtation. You must find out for 
 yourself how much genius she has and has not. But I will 
 say this, that I think of puns two a minute faster when 
 I 'm with her. Therefore she must be magnetic, and that 
 is the first charm in a woman." 
 
 Wade laughed. "You have not lost your powers of 
 analysis, Peter. But talking of this heroine, you have not 
 told me anything about yourself, except apropos of pun- 
 ning." 
 
 " Come up and dine, and we '11 fire away personal his- 
 
136 THEODORE WTNTHROP. 
 
 tories, broadside for broadside ! I 've been looking in vain 
 for a worthy hero to set vis-a-vis to my fair kinswoman. 
 But stop ! perhaps you have a Christmas turkey at home, 
 with a wife opposite, and a brace of boys waiting for drum- 
 sticks." 
 
 " No, my boys, like cherubs, await their own drum- 
 sticks. They 're not born, and I 'm not married." 
 
 " I thought you looked incomplete and abnormal. Well, 
 I will show you a model wife, and here she comes ! " 
 
 Here they came, the two ladies, gliding round the Point, 
 with draperies floating as artlessly artful as the robes of 
 Raphael's Hours, or a Pompeian Bacchante. For want of 
 classic vase or patera, Miss Darner brandished Peter Sker- 
 rett's pocket-pistol. 
 
 Fanny Skerrett gave her' hand cordially to Wade, and 
 looked a little anxiously at his pale face. 
 
 " Now, M. D." says Peter, " you have been surgeon, you 
 shall be doctor and dose our patient. Now, then, 
 
 ' Hebe, pour free ! 
 
 Quicken his eyes with mountain-dew, 
 That Styx, the detested, 
 No more he may view.' " 
 
 " Thanks, Hebe ! " 
 Wade said, continuing the quotation, 
 
 "I quaff it! 
 lo Paean, I cry! 
 The whiskey of the Immortals 
 Forbids me to die." 
 
 "We effeminate women of the nineteenth century are 
 afraid of broken heads," said Fanny. " But Mary Darner 
 seems quite to enjoy your accident, Mr. Wade, as an adven- 
 ture." 
 
 Miss Darner certainly did seem gay and exhilarated. 
 
 " I enjoy it," said Wade. " I perceive that I fell on my 
 feet, when I fell on my crown. I tumbled among old friends, 
 and I hope among new ones." 
 
LOVE AND SKATES. 137 
 
 " I have been waiting to claim my place among your old 
 friends," Mrs. Skerrett said, " ever since Peter told me you 
 were one of his models." 
 
 She delivered this little speech with a caressing manner 
 which totally fascinated Wade. 
 
 Nothing was ever so absolutely pretty as Mrs. Peter 
 Skerrett. Her complete prettiness left nothing to be de- 
 sired. 
 
 " Never," thought Wade, " did I see such a compact little 
 casket of perfections. Every feature is thoroughly well 
 done and none intrusively superior. Her little nose is a 
 combination of all the amiabilities. Her black eyes sparkle 
 with fun and mischief and wit, all playing over deep ten- 
 derness befyw. Her hair ripples itself full of gleams and 
 shadows. The same coquetiy of Nature that rippled her 
 hair has dinted her cheeks with shifting dimples. Every 
 time she smiles and she smiles as if sixty an hour were 
 not half-allowance a dimple slides into- view and vanishes 
 like a dot in a flow of sunny water. And, O Peter Skerrett ! 
 if you were not the best fellow in the world, I should envy 
 you that latent kiss of a mouth." 
 
 "You need not say it, Wade, your broken head ex- 
 empts you from the business of compliments," said Peter ; 
 " but I see you think my wife perfection. You '11 think so 
 the more, the more you know her." 
 
 " Stop, Peter," said she, " or I shall have to hide behind 
 the superior charms of Mary Darner." 
 
 Miss Darner certainly was a woman of a grander order. 
 You might pull at the bells or knock at the knockers and be 
 introduced into the boudoirs of all the houses, villas, seats, 
 chateaus, and palaces in Christendom without seeing such 
 another. She belonged distinctly to the Northern races, 
 the " brave and true and tender " women. There was, 
 indeed, a trace of hauteur and imperiousness in her look 
 and manner; but it did not ill become her distinguished 
 
138 THEODORE WINTHROP. 
 
 figure and face. Wade, however, remembered her sweet 
 earnestness when she was playing leech to his wound, and 
 chose to take that mood as her dominant one. 
 
 " She must have been desperately annoyed with borea 
 and boobies," he thought. " I do not wonder she protects 
 herself by distance. I am afraid I shall never get within 
 her lines again, not even if I should try slow and regular 
 approaches, and bombard her with bouquets for a twelve- 
 month." 
 
 " But, Wade," says Peter, " all this time you have not 
 told us what good luck sends you here to be wrecked on the 
 hospitable shores of my Point." 
 
 " I live here. I am chief cook and confectioner where 
 you see the smoking top of that tall chimney up-stream." 
 
 " Why, of course ! What a dolt I was, not to think of 
 you, when Churm told us an Athlete, a .Brave, a Sage, and 
 a Gentleman was the Superintendent of Dunderbunk ; but 
 said we must find his name out for ourselves. You remem- 
 ber, Mary. Miss Darner is Mr. Churm's ward." 
 
 She acknowledged with a cool bow that she did remem- 
 ber her guardian's character of Wade. 
 
 " You do not say, Peter," says Mrs. Skerrett, with a 
 bright little look at the other lady, " why Mr. Churm was 
 so mysterious about Mr. Wade." 
 
 " Miss Darner shall tell us," Peter rejoined, repeating his 
 wife's look of merry significance. 
 
 She looked somewhat teased. Wade could divine easily 
 the meaning of this little mischievous talk. His friend 
 Churm had no doubt puffed him furiously. 
 
 " All this time," said Miss Darner, evading a reply, " we 
 are neglecting our skating privileges." 
 
 " Peter and I have a few grains of humanity in our 
 souls," Fanny said. " We should blush to sail away from 
 Mr. Wade, while he carries the quarantine flag at his pale 
 cheeks." 
 
LOVE AND SKATES. 139 
 
 " I am almost ruddy again," says Wade. " YoLr potion, 
 Miss Darner, has completed the work of your surgery. I 
 can afford to dismiss my lamp-post." 
 
 " Whereupon the post changes to a teetotum," Peter said, 
 and spun off in an eccentric, ending in a tumble. 
 
 " I must have a share in your restoration, Mr. Wade," 
 Fanny claimed. " I see you need a second dose of medi- 
 cine. Hand me the flask, Mary. What shall I pour from 
 this magic bottle ? juice of Rhine, blood of Burgundy, fire 
 of Spain, bubble of Rheims, beeswing of Oporto, honey of 
 Cyprus, nectar, or Whiskey ? Whiskey is vulgar, but the 
 proper thing, on the whole, for these occasions. I prescribe 
 it." And she gave him another little draught to imbibe. 
 
 He took it kindly, for her sake, and not alone for that, 
 but for its own respectable sake. His recovery was com- 
 plete. His head, to be sure, sang a little still, and ached 
 not a little. Some fellows would have gone on the sick 
 list with such a wound. Perhaps he would, if he had had 
 a trouble to dodge. But here instead was a pleasure to 
 follow. So he began to move about slowly, watching the 
 ladies. 
 
 Fanny was a novice in the Art, and this was her first 
 lay this winter. She skated timidly, holding Peter very 
 tightly. She went into the dearest little panics for fear of 
 tumbles, and uttered the most musical screams and laughs. 
 And if she succeeded in taking a few brave strokes and 
 finished witk a neat slide, she pleaded for a verdict of 
 " Well done ! " with such an appealing smile and such a fine 
 show of dimples that every one was fascinated and applauded 
 heartily. 
 
 Miss Darner skated as became her free and vigorous 
 character. She had passed her Little Go as a scholar, 
 and was now steadily winning her way through the list of 
 achievements, before given, toward the Great Go. To-day 
 she was at work at small circles backward. Presently she 
 
140 THEODORE WINTHROP. 
 
 wound off a series of perfectly neat ones, and, looking up, 
 pleased with her prowess, caught Wade's admiring eye. At 
 this she smiled and gave an arch little womanly nod of self- 
 approval, which also demanded masculine sympathy before 
 it was Vjuite a perfect emotion. 
 
 "With this charming gesture, the alert feather in her 
 Amazonian hat nodded, too, as if it admired its lovely 
 mistress. 
 
 Wade was thrilled. " Brava ! " he cried, in answer to 
 the part of her look which asked sympathy , and then, in 
 reply to the implied challenge, he forgot his hurt and his 
 shock, and struck into the same figure. 
 
 He tried not to surpass his fair exemplar too cruelly. 
 But he did his peripheries well enough to get a repetition 
 of the captivating nod and a Bravo ! from the lady. 
 
 " Bravo ! " said she. " But do not tax your strength too 
 soon." 
 
 She began to feel that she was expressing too much 
 interest in the stranger. It was a new sensation for her to 
 care whether men fell or got up. A new sensation. She 
 rather liked it. She was a trifle ashamed of it. In 
 either case, she did not wish to show that it was in her 
 heart.. The consciousness of concealment flushed her 
 damask cheek. 
 
 It was a damask cheek. All her hues were cool and 
 pearly ; while Wade, Saxon too, had hot golden tints in his 
 hair and moustache, and his color, now returning, was good 
 strong red with plenty of bronze in it. 
 
 " Thank you," he replied. " My force has all come back. 
 You have electrified me." 
 
 A civil nothing; but meaning managed to get into his 
 tone and look, whether he would or not. 
 
 Winch he perceiving, on his part began to feel guilty. 
 
 Of what crime ? 
 
 Of the very same crime as hers, the most ancient and 
 
LOVE AND SKATES. 141 
 
 most pardonable crime of youth and maiden, that sweet 
 and guiltless crime of love in the first degree. 
 
 So, without troubling themselves to analyze their feelings, 
 they found a piquant pleasure in skating together, she in 
 admiring his tours de force, and he instructing her. 
 
 " Look, Peter ! " said Mrs. Skerrett, pointing to the other 
 pair skating, he on the backward roll, she on the forward, 
 with hands crossed and locked; such contacts are per- 
 mitted in skating, as in dancing. " Your hero and my 
 heroine have dropped into an intimacy." 
 
 " None but the Plucky deserve the Pretty," says Peter. 
 
 " But he seems to be such a fine fellow, suppose she 
 should n't " 
 
 The pretty face looked anxious. 
 
 " Suppose he should n't," Peter on the masculine behalf 
 returned. , 
 
 " He cannot help it : Mary is so noble, and so charm- 
 ing, when she does not disdain to be." 
 
 " I do not believe she can help it. She cannot disdain 
 Wade. He carries too many guns for that. He is just as 
 fine as she is. He was a hero when I first knew him. His 
 face does not show an atom of change ; and you know what 
 Air. Churm told us of his chivalric deeds elsewhere, and 
 how he tamed and reformed Dunderbunk. He is crystal 
 grit, as crystalline and gritty as he can be." 
 
 " Grit seems to be your symbol of the highest qualities. 
 It certainly is a better thing in man than in ice-cream. 
 But, Peter, suppose this should be a true love and should 
 not run smooth?" 
 
 " "What consequence is the smooth running, so long as 
 there is strong running and a final getting in neck and neck 
 at the winning-post ? " 
 
 " But," still pleaded the anxious soul, having no anxie- 
 ties of her t wn, she was always suffering for others, " he 
 eeems to be such a fine fellow ! and she is so hard to win 1 * 
 
142 THEODORE WINTER OP. 
 
 Am I a fine fellow?" 
 
 No, horrid ! " 
 
 " The truth, or I let you tumble." 
 
 " Well, upon compulsion, I admit that you are." 
 
 " Then being a fine fellow does not diminish the said fel- 
 low's chances of being blessed with a wife quite superfine." 
 
 " If I thought you were personal, Peter, I should object 
 to the mercantile adjective. ' Superfine,' indeed ! " 
 
 " I am personal. I withdraw the obnoxious phrase, and 
 substitute transcendent. No, Fanny dear, I read Wade's 
 experience in my own. I do not feel very much concerned 
 about him. He is big enough to take care of himself. A 
 man who is sincere, self-possessed, and steady, does not get 
 into miseries with beautiful Amazons like our friend. He 
 knows too much to try to make his love run up hill ; but let 
 it once get started, rough running gives it vim. Wade will 
 love like a deluge, when he sees that he may, and I 'd 
 advise obstacles to stand off." 
 
 " It was pretty, Peter, to see cold Mary Darner so gentle 
 and almost tender." 
 
 " I always have loved to see the first beginnings of what 
 looks like love, since I saw ours." 
 
 " Ours," she said, " it seems like yesterday." 
 
 And then together they recalled that fair picture against 
 its dark ground of sorrow, and so went on refreshing the 
 emotions of that time, until Fanny smiling said, 
 
 " There must be something magical in skates, for here we 
 are talking sentimentally like a pair of young lovers." 
 
 " Health and love are cause and effect," says Peter, sen- 
 tentiously. 
 
 Meanwhile Wade had been fast skating into the good 
 graces of his companion. Perhaps the rap on his head had 
 deranged him. He certainly tossed himself about in a 
 reckless and insane way. Still, he justified his conduct by 
 never tumbling again, and by inventing new devices with 
 bewildering rapidity. 
 
LOVE AND SKATES. 143 
 
 This pair were not at all sentimental. Indeed, their talk 
 was quite technical : all about rings and edges, and heel and 
 toe, what skates are best, and who best use them. There 
 is an immense amount of sympathy to be exchanged on such 
 topics, and it was somewhat significant that they avoided 
 other themes where they might not sympathize so thor- 
 oughly. The negative part of a conversation is often as 
 important as its positive. 
 
 So the four entertained themselves finely, sometimes as a 
 quartette, sometimes as two duos with proper change. of 
 partners, until the clear west began to grow golden and the 
 clear east pink with sunset. 
 
 " It is a pity to go," said Peter Skerrett. " Everything 
 here is perfection and Fine Art; but we must not be 
 unfaithful to dinner. Dinner would have a right to pun- 
 ish us, if we did not encourage its efforts to be Fine Art 
 also." 
 
 " Now, Mr. Wade," Fanny commanded, " your most 
 heroic series of exploits, to close this heroic day." 
 
 He nimbly dashed through his list. The ice was traced 
 with a labyrinth of involuted convolutions. 
 
 Wade's last turn brought him to the very spot of his 
 tumble. 
 
 " All ! " said he. " Here is the oar that tripped me, with 
 ' Wade, his mark,' gashed into it. If I had not this," he 
 touched Miss Darner's handkerchief, "for a souvenir, I 
 think I would dig up the oar and carry it home." 
 
 " Let it melt out and float away in the spring," Mary 
 said. "It may be a perch for a sea-gull or a buoy for a 
 drowning man." 
 
 Here, if this were a long story instead of a short OE3, 
 might be given a description of Peter Skerrett's house and 
 the menu of Mrs. Skerrett's dinner. Peter and his wife 
 had both been to great pillory dinners, ad nauseam, and 
 learnt what to avoid. How not to be bored is the object 
 
144 THEODORE WINTHROP. 
 
 of all civilization, and the Skerretts had discovered the 
 methods. 
 
 I must dismiss the dinner and the evening, stamped with 
 the general epithet, Perfection. 
 
 " You will join us again to-morrow on the river," said 
 Mrs. Skerrett, as Wade rose to go. 
 
 " To-morrow I go to town to report to my Directors." 
 
 "Then next day." 
 
 "Next day, with pleasure." 
 
 Wade departed and marked this halcyon day with white 
 chalk, as the whitest, brightest, sweetest of his life. 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 FOREBODINGS. 
 
 JUBILATION! Jubilation now, instead of Consternation, 
 in the office of Mr. Benjamin Brummage in Wall Street. 
 
 President Brummage had convoked his Directors to hear 
 the First Semi- Annual Report of the new Superintendent 
 and Dictator of Dunderbunk. 
 
 And there they sat around the green table, no longer 
 forlorn and dreading a failure, but all chuckling with satis- 
 faction over their prosperity. 
 
 They were a happy and hilarious family now, so 
 hilarious that the President was obliged to be always rap- 
 ping to Orderr with his paper-knife. 
 
 Every one of these gentlemen was proud of himself as a 
 Director of so successful a Company. The Dunderbunk 
 advertisement might now consider itself as permanent in 
 the newspapers, and the Treasurer had very unnecessarily 
 inserted the notice of a dividend, which everybody knew of 
 already. 
 
 When Mr. Churm was not by, they all claimed the honor 
 of having discovered Wade, or at least of having been the 
 first to appreciate him. 
 
LOVE AND SKATES. 145 
 
 They all invited him to dinner, the others at their 
 houses, Sam Gwelp at his club. 
 
 They had not yet begun to wax fat and kick. They still 
 remembered the panic of last summer. They passed a 
 unanimous vote of the most complimentary confidence in 
 Wade, approved of his system, forced upon him an increase 
 of salary, and began to talk of " launching out " and doub- 
 ling their capital. In short, they behaved as Directors do 
 when all is serene. 
 
 Churm and Wade had a hearty laugh over the ab- 
 surdities of the Board and all their vague propositions. 
 
 " Dunderbunk," said Churm, " was a company started on 
 a sentimental basis, as many others are." 
 
 " Mr. Brummage fell in love with pig-iron ? " 
 
 " Precisely. He had been a dry-goods jobber, risen from 
 a retailer somewhere in the country. He felt a certain lack 
 of dignity in his work. He wanted to deal in something 
 more masculine than lace and ribbons. He read a sen- 
 timental article on Iron in the ' Journal of Commerce ' : how 
 Iron held the world together ; how it was nerve and sinew ; 
 how it was ductile and malleable and other things that 
 sounded big ; how without Iron civilization would stop, and 
 New-Zealanders hunt rats among the ruins of London ; 
 how anybody who would make two tons of Iron grow where 
 one grew before was a benefactor to the human race greater 
 than Alexander,' Caesar, or Napoleon; and so on, you 
 know the eloquent style. Brummage's soul was fired. He 
 determined to be greater than the three heroes named. He 
 was oozing Avith unoccupied capital. He went about among 
 the other rich jobbers, with the newspaper article in his 
 hand, and fired their souls. They determined to be great 
 Iron-Kings, magnificent thought ! They wanted to read 
 in the newspapers, * If all the iron rails made at the Dun- 
 derbunk Works in the last six months were put together in 
 a straight line, they would reach twice round our terraque 
 
 10 
 
146 THEODORE WINTHROP. 
 
 ous globe and seventy-three miles two rails over.' So on 
 that poetic foundation they started the concern." 
 
 Wade laughed. " But how did you happen to be with 
 them?" 
 
 " Oh ! my friend Darner sold them the land for the shop 
 and took stock in payment. I came into the Board as his 
 executor. Did I never tell you so before ? " 
 
 " No." 
 
 " Well, then, be informed that it was in Miss Darner's 
 behalf that you knocked down Friend Tarbox, and so got 
 your skates for saving her property. It 's quite a romance 
 already, Richard, my boy ! and I suppose you feel im- 
 mensely bored that you had to come down and meet us old 
 chaps, instead of tumbling at her feet on the ice again to- 
 day." 
 
 " A tumble in this wet day would be a cold bath to 
 romance." 
 
 The Gulf Stream had sent up a warm spoil-sport rain 
 that morning. It did not stop, but poured furiously the 
 whole day. 
 
 From Cohoes to Spuyten Duyvil, on both sides of the 
 river, all the skaters swore at the weather, as profane per- 
 sons no doubt did when the windows of heaven were opened 
 in Noah's time. The skateresses did not swear, but sav- 
 agely said, " It is too bad," and so it was. 
 
 Wade, loaded with the blessings of his Directors, took the 
 train next morning for Dunderbunk. 
 
 The weather was still mild and drizzly, but promised to 
 clear. As the train rattled along by the river, Wade could 
 see that the thin ice was breaking up everywhere. In mid- 
 stream a procession of blocks was steadily drifting along. 
 Unless Zero came sliding down again pretty soon from 
 Boreal regions, the sheets that filled the coves and clung 
 to the shores would also sail away southward, and the whole 
 Hudson he left clear as in midsummer. 
 
LOVE AND SKATES. 147 
 
 At Yonkers a down train ranged by the side of Wade's 
 tram, and, looking out he saw Mr. and Mrs. Skerrett 
 alighting. 
 
 He jumped down, rather surprised, to speak to them. 
 
 " We have just been telegraphed here," said Peter, grave- 
 ly. " The son of a widow, a friend of ours, was drowned 
 this morning in the soft ice of the river. He was a pet of 
 mine, poor fellow! and the mother depends upon me for 
 advice. We have come down to say a kind word. Why 
 won't you report us to the ladies at my house, and say 
 we shall not be at home until the evening train ? They 
 do not know the cause of our journey except that it is 
 a sad one." 
 
 " Perhaps Mr. Wade will carve their turkey for them at 
 dinner, Peter," Fanny suggested. 
 
 " Do, Wade ! and keep their spirits up. Dinner 's at 
 six." 
 
 Here the engine whistled. Wade promised to "shine 
 substitute " at his friend's board, and took his place again. 
 The train galloped away. 
 
 Peter and his wife exchanged a bright look over the 
 fortunate incident of this meeting, and went on their kind 
 way to carry sympathy and such consolation as might be 
 to the widow. 
 
 The train galloped northward. Until now, the beat of 
 its wheels, like the click of an enormous metronome, had 
 kept time to jubilant measures singing in Wade's brain. 
 He was hurrying back, exhilarated with success, to the 
 presence of a woman whose smile was finer exhilaration 
 than any number of votes of confidence, passed unanimously 
 by any number of conclaves of overjoyed Directors, and 
 signed by Brummage after Brummage, with the signature 
 of a capitalist in a flurry of delight at a ten per cent divi- 
 dend. 
 
 But into this joyous mood of Wade's the thought of death 
 
148 THEODORE WINTHROP. 
 
 suddenly intruded. He could not keep a picture of death 
 and drowning out of his mind. As the train sprang along 
 and opened gloomy breadth after breadth of the leaden 
 river, clogged with slow-drifting files of ice-blocks, he found 
 himself staring across the dreary waste and forever fancy- 
 ing some one sinking there, helpless and alone. 
 
 He seemed to see a brave, bright-eyed, ruddy boy ven- 
 turing out carelessly along the edges of the weakened ice. 
 Suddenly the ice gives way, the little figure sinks, rises, 
 clutches deperately at a fragment, struggles a moment, is 
 borne along in the relentless flow of the chilly water, stares 
 in vain shoreward, and so sinks again with a look of agony, 
 and is gone. 
 
 But whenever this inevitable picture grew before Wade's 
 eyes, as the drowning figure of his fancy vanished, it sud- 
 denly changed features, and presented the face of Mary 
 Darner, perishing beyond succor. 
 
 Of course he knew that this was but a morbid vision. 
 Yet that it came at all, and that it so agonized him, 
 proved the force of his new feeling. 
 
 He had not analyzed it before. This thought of death 
 became its touchstone. 
 
 Men like Wade, strong, healthy, earnest, concentrated, 
 straightforward, isolated, judge men and women as friends or 
 foes at once and once for all. He had recognized in Mary 
 Darner from the first a heart as true, whole, noble, and 
 healthy as his own. A fine instinct had told him that she 
 was waiting for her hero, as he was for his heroine. 
 
 So he suddenly loved her. And yet not suddenly ; for 
 all his life, and all his lesser forgotten or discarded passions, 
 had been training him for this master one. 
 
 He suddenly and strongly loved her ; and yet it had only 
 been a beautiful bewilderment of uncomprehended delight, 
 until this haunting vision of her fair face sinking amid the 
 hungry ice beset him. Then he perceived what would be 
 lost to him, if she were lost 
 
LOVE AND SKATES. 149 
 
 The thought of Death placed itself between him and 
 Love. If the love had been merely a pretty remembrance 
 of a charming woman, he might have dismissed his fancied 
 drowning scene with a little emotion of regret Now, the 
 fancy was an agony. 
 
 He had too much power over himself to entertain it long. 
 But the grisly thought came uninvited, returned undesired, 
 and no resolute Avaunt, even backed by that magic wand, a 
 cigar, availed to banish it wholly. 
 
 The sky cleared cold at eleven o'clock. A sharp wind 
 drew through the Highlands. As the train rattled round 
 the curve below the tunnel through Skerrett's Point, Wade 
 could see his skating course of Christmas day with the 
 ladies. Finn ice, glazed smooth by the sudden chill after 
 the rain, filled the Cove and stretched beyond the Point 
 into the river. 
 
 It was treacherous stuff, beautiful to the eyes of a skater, 
 but sure to be weak, and likely to break up any moment 
 and join the deliberate headlong drift of the masses in mid- 
 current. 
 
 Wade almost dreaded lest his vision should suddenly 
 realize itself, and he should see his enthusiastic companion 
 of the other day sailing gracefully along to certain death. 
 
 Nothing living, however, was in sight, except here and 
 there a crow, skipping about in the floating ice. 
 
 The lover was greatly relieved. He could now forewarn 
 the lady against the peril he had imagined. The train in a 
 moment dropped him at Dunderbunk. He hurried to the 
 Foundry and wrote a note to Mrs. Darner. 
 
 " Mr. Wade presents his compliments to Mrs. Darner, and 
 has the honor to inform her that Mr. Skerrett has nomi- 
 nated him carver to the ladies to-day in their host's place. 
 
 " Mr. Wade hopes that Miss Darner will excuse him from 
 his engagement to skate with her tin's afternoon. The ice is 
 dangerous, and Miss Darner should on no account venture 
 upon it." 
 
150 THEODORE WTNTHROP. 
 
 Perry Purtett was the bearer of this billet. He swag- 
 gered into Peter Skerrett's hall, and dreadfully alarmed the 
 fresh-imported Englishman who answered the bell, by order- 
 ing him in a severe tone, 
 
 " Hurry up, now, White Cravat, with that answer ! I 'm 
 wanted down at the Works. Steam don't bile when I'm 
 off; and the fly-wheel will never buzz another turn, unless 
 I 'm there to motion it to move on." 
 
 Mrs. Darner's gracious reply informed Wade "that she 
 should be charmed to see him at dinner, etc., and would not 
 fail to transmit his kind warning to Miss Darner, when she 
 returned from her drive to make calls." 
 
 But when Miss Darner returned in the afternoon, her 
 mother was taking a gentle nap over the violet, indigo, blue, 
 green, yellow, orange, red stripes of a gorgeous Afghan she 
 was knitting. The daughter heard nothing of the billet. 
 The house was lonely without Fanny Skerrett. Mr. Wade 
 did not come at the appointed hour. Mary was not willing 
 to say to herself how much she regretted his absence. 
 
 Had he forgotten the appointment ? 
 
 No, that was a thought not to be tolerated. 
 
 " A gentleman does not forget," she thought, and she haa 
 a thorough confidence, besides, that this gentleman was very 
 willing to remember. 
 
 She read a little, fitfully, sang fitfully, moved about the 
 house uneasily ; and at last, when it grew late, and she was 
 bored and Wade did not arrive, she pronounced to herself 
 that he had been detained in town. 
 
 This point settled, she took her skates, put on her pretty 
 Amazonian hat with its alert feather, and went down to 
 waste her beauty and grace on the ice, unattended and 
 aloue> 
 
LOVE AND SKATES. 151 
 
 CHAPTER XI. 
 
 CAP'N AMBDSTEB'S SKIFF. 
 
 IT was a busy afternoon at the Dunderbunk Foundry. 
 
 The Superintendent had come back with his pocket fid] 
 rf orders. Everybody, from the Czar of Russia to the 
 Piesident of the Guano Republic, was in the market for 
 machinery. Crisis was gone by. Prosperity was come. 
 The world was all ready to move, and only waited for a 
 fresh supply of wheels, cranks, side-levers, walking-beams, 
 and other such muscular creatures of iron, to push and tug 
 and swing and revolve and set Progress a-going. 
 
 Dunderfcunk was to have its full share in supplying the 
 demand. It was well understood by this time that the iron 
 Wade made was as stanch as the man who made it. Dun- 
 derbunk, therefore, Head and Hands, must despatch. 
 
 So it was a busy afternoon at the industrious Foundry. 
 The men bestirred themselves. The furnaces rumbled. 
 The engine thumped. The drums in the finishing-shop 
 hummed merrily their lively song of labor. The four trip- 
 hammers two bull-headed, two calf-headed champed, 
 like carnivorous maws, upon red bars of iron, and over 
 their banquet they roared the big-toned music of the trip- 
 hammer chorus. 
 
 "Now then! hit hard! 
 Strike while Iron 's hot. Life 's short Art 's long." 
 
 By this massive refrain, ringing in at intervals above the 
 ceaseless buzz, murmur, and clang throughout the buildings, 
 every man's work was mightily nerved and inspired. Every- 
 body liked to hear the sturdy song of these grim vocalists ; 
 and whenever they struck in, each solo or duo or quatuor 
 of men, playing Anvil Chorus, quickened time, and all the 
 action and rumor of the busy opera went on more cheerilj 
 and lustily. So work kept astir like play. 
 
152 THEODORE WINTHROP. 
 
 An hour before sunset, Bill Tarbox stepped into Wade's 
 office. Even oily and begrimed, Bill could be recognized as 
 a favored lover. He looked more a man than ever before. 
 
 " I forgot to mention," says the foreman, " that Cap'n 
 Ambuster was in, this morning, to see you. He says, that, 
 if the river 's clear enough for him to get away from our 
 dock, he '11 go down to the City to-morrow, and offers to 
 take freight cheap. We might put that new walking-beam, 
 we 've just rough-finished for the ' Union,' aboard of him." 
 
 " Yes, if he is sure to go to-morrow. It will not do to 
 delay. The owners complained to me yesterday that the 
 4 Union ' was in a bad way for want of its new machinery. 
 Tell your brother-in-law to come here, Bill." 
 
 Tarbox looked sheepishly pleased, and summoned Perry 
 Purtett. 
 
 " Run down, Perry," said Wade, " to the ' Ambuster,' and 
 ask Captain Isaac to step up here a moment. Tell him I 
 have some freight to send by him." 
 
 Perry moved through the Foundry with his usual jaunty 
 step, left his dignity at the door, and ran off to the dock. 
 
 The weather had grown fitful. Heavy clouds whirled 
 over, trailing snow-flurries. Rarely the sun found a cleft in 
 the black canopy to shoot a ray through and remind the 
 world that he was still in his place and ready to shine when 
 he was wanted. 
 
 Master Perry had a furlong to go before he reached the 
 dock. He crossed the stream, kept unfrozen by the warm 
 influences of the Foundry. He ran through a little dell 
 hedged on each side by dull green cedars. It was severely 
 cold now, and our young friend condescended to prance and 
 jump over the ice-skimmed puddles to keep his blood in 
 motion. 
 
 The little rusty, pudgy steamboat lay at the down-stream 
 side of the Foundry Wharf. Her name was so long and 
 her paddle-box so short, that the painter, beginning with 
 
LOVE AND SKATES. 153 
 
 ambitious large letters, had been compelled to abbreviate 
 the last syllable. Her title read thus : 
 
 I. AMBUSTer. 
 
 Certainly a formidable inscription for a steamboat ! 
 
 When she hove in sight, Perry halted, resumed his 
 stately demeanor, and embarked as if he were a Doge 
 entering a Bucentaur to wed a Sea. 
 
 There was nobody on deck to witness the arrival and 
 salute the magnijico. 
 
 Perry looked in at the CapVs office. He beheld a three- 
 legged stool, a hacked desk, an inky steel-pen, an inkless 
 inkstand ; but no Cap'n Ambuster. 
 
 Perry inspected the Cap'n's state-room. There was a 
 cracked looking-glass, into which he looked ; a hair-brush 
 suspended by the glass, which he used ; a lair of blankets in 
 a berth, which he had no present use for ; and a smell of 
 musty boots, which nobody with a nose could help smelling. 
 Still no Captain Ambuster, nor any of his crew. 
 
 Search in the unsavory kitchen revealed no cook, coiled 
 up in a corner, suffering nightmares for the last greasy 
 dinner he had brewed hi his frying-pan. There were no 
 deck hands bundled into their bunks. Perry rapped on the 
 chain-box and inquired if anybody was within, and nobody 
 answering, he had to ventriloquize a negative. 
 
 The engine-room, too, was vacant, and quite as unsavory 
 as the other dens on board. Perry patronized the engine 
 by a pull or two at the valves, and continued his tour of 
 inspection. 
 
 The Ambuster's skiff, lying on her forward deck, seemed 
 to entertain him vastly. 
 
 " Jolly ! " says Perry. And so it was a jolly boat in the 
 literal, not the technical sense. 
 
 " The three wise men of Gotham went to sea in a bowl ; 
 and here 's the identical craft," says Perry. 
 
154 THEODORE WINTHROP. 
 
 He gave the chubby little machine a push with his foot 
 It rolled and wallowed about grotesquely. When it was 
 still again, it looked so comic, lying contentedly on its fat 
 side like a pudgy baby, that Perry had a roar of laughter, 
 which, like other laughter to one's self, did not sound very 
 merry, particularly as the north-wind was howling omi- 
 nously, and the broken ice, on its downward way, was 
 whispering and moaning and talking on in a most mysteri- 
 ous and inarticulate manner. 
 
 " Those sheets of ice would crunch up this skiff, as pigs 
 do a punkin," thinks Perry. 
 
 And with this ^thought in his head he looked out on the 
 river, and fancied the foolish little vessel cast loose and 
 buffeting helplessly about in the ice. 
 
 He had been so busy until now, in prying about the 
 steamboat and making up his mind that Captain and men 
 had all gone off for a comfortable supper on shore, that his 
 eyes had not wandered toward the stream. 
 
 Now his glance began to follow the course of the icy cur- 
 rent. He wondered where all this supply of cakes came 
 from, and how many of them would escape the stems of 
 ferry-boats below and get safe to sea. 
 
 All at once, as he looked lazily along the lazy files of ice, 
 his eyes caught a black object drifting on a fragment in a 
 wide way of open water opposite Skerrett's Point, a mile 
 distant. 
 
 Perry's heart stopped beating. He uttered a little gasp- 
 ing cry. He sprang ashore, not at all like a Doge quitting 
 a Bucentaur. He tore back to the Foundry, dashing 
 through the puddles, and, never stopping to pick up his cap, 
 burst in upon Wade and Bill Tarbox in the office. 
 
 The boy was splashed from head to foot with red mud. 
 His light hair, blown wildly about, made his ashy face seem 
 paler. He stood panting. 
 
 His dumb terror brought back to Wade's mind all the bad 
 omens of the morning. 
 
LOVE AND SKATES. 155 
 
 * Speak 1 " said he, seizing Peny fiercely by the shoulder. 
 
 The uproar of the Works seemed to hush for an instant, 
 while the lad stammered faintly, 
 
 " There 's somebody carried off in the ice by Skerrett's 
 Point. It looks like a woman. And there 's nobody to 
 help." 
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 
 IN THE ICE. 
 
 " HELP ! help ! " shouted the four trip-hammers, bursting 
 ji like a magnified echo of the boy's last word. " Help ! 
 help ! " all the humming wheels and drums repeated more 
 plaintively. 
 
 Wade made for the river. 
 
 This was the moment all his manhood had been training 
 and saving for. For this he had kept sound and brave from 
 his youth up. 
 
 As he ran, he felt that the only chance of instant help 
 was in that queer little bowl-shaped skiff of the " Am- 
 buster." 
 
 He had never been conscious that he had observed it ; 
 but the image had lain latent in his mind, biding its time. 
 It might be ten, twenty precious moments before another 
 boat could be found. This one was on the spot to do its 
 duty at once. 
 
 " Somebody carried off, perhaps a woman," Wade 
 thought. " Not No, she would not neglect my warn- 
 ing ! Whoever it is, we must save her from this dreadful 
 death!" 
 
 He sprang on board the little steamboat. She was sway- 
 ing uneasily at her moorings, as the ice crowded along and 
 hammered against her stem. Wade stared from her deck 
 down the river, with all his life at his eyes. 
 
156 THEODORE WINTHROP. 
 
 More than a mile away, below the hemlock-crested point, 
 was the dark object Perry had seen, still stirring along the 
 edges of the floating ice. A broad avenue of leaden-green 
 water wrinkled by the cold wind separated the field where 
 this figure was moving from the shore. Dark object and its 
 footing of gray ice were drifting deliberately farther and 
 farther away. 
 
 For one instant Wade thought that the terrible dread in 
 his heart would paralyze him. But in that one moment, 
 while his blood stopped flowing and his nerves failed, Bill 
 Tarbox overtook him and was there by his side. 
 
 " I brought your cap," says Bill, " and our two coats." 
 
 "Wade put on his cap mechanically. This little action 
 calmed him. 
 
 " Bill," said he, " I 'm afraid it is a woman, a dear 
 friend of mine, a very dear friend." 
 
 Bill, a lover, understood the tone. 
 
 " We '11 take care of her between us," he said. 
 
 The two turned at once to the little tub of a boat. 
 
 Oars ? Yes, slung under the thwarts, a pair of 
 short sculls, worn and split, but with work in them still. 
 There they hung ready, and a rusty boat-hook, besides. 
 
 " Find the thole-pins, Bill, while I cut a plug for her bot- 
 tom out of this broomstick," Wade said. 
 
 This was done in a moment. "Bill threw in the coats. 
 
 " Now, together ! " 
 
 They lifted the skiff to the gangway. Wade jumped 
 down on the ice and received her carefully. They ran 
 her along, as far as they could go, and launched her in the 
 sludge. 
 
 " Take the sculls, Bill. 1 11 work the boat-hook in the 
 bow." 
 
 Nothing more was said. They thrust out with their crazy 
 little craft into the thick of the ice-flood. Bill, amidships, 
 dug with his sculls in among the huddled cakes. It was 
 
LOVE AND SKATES. 157 
 
 clumsy pulling. Now this oar and now that would be 
 thrown out He could never get a full stroke. 
 
 Wade in the bow could do better. He jammed the 
 blocks aside with his boat-hook. He dragged the skiff 
 forward. He steered through the little open ways of 
 water. 
 
 Sometimes they came to a broad sheet of solid ice. 
 Then it was " Out with her, Bill ! " and they were both 
 out and sliding their bowl so quick over, that they had 
 not time to go through the rotten surface. This was 
 drowning business ; but neither could be spared to drown 
 yet. 
 
 In the leads of clear water, the oarsman got brave pulls, 
 and sent the boat on mightily. Then again in the thick 
 porridge of brash ice they lost headway, or were baffled and 
 stopped among the cakes. Slow work, slow and painful ; 
 and for many minutes they seemed to gain nothing upon 
 the steady flow of the merciless current. 
 
 A frail craft for such a voyage, this queer little half- 
 pumpkin ! A frail and leaky shell. She bent and cracked 
 from stem to stern among the nipping masses. Water 
 oozed in through her dry seams. Any moment a rougher 
 touch or a sharper edge might cut her through. But that 
 was a risk they had accepted. They did not take time to 
 think of it, nor to listen to the crunching and crackling of 
 the hungry ice around. They urged straight on, steadily, 
 eagerly, coolly, spending and saving strength. 
 
 Not one moment to lose ! The shattering of broad sheets 
 of ice around them was a warning of what might happen to 
 the frail support of their chase. One thrust of the boat- 
 hook sometimes cleft a cake that to the eye seemed stout 
 enough to bear a heavier weight than a woman's. 
 
 Not one moment to spare ! The dark figure, now drifted 
 far below the hemlocks of the Point, no longer stirred. It 
 seemed to have sunk upon the ice and to be resting there 
 
158 THEODORE WINTHROP. 
 
 weary and helpless, on one side a wide way of lurid water 
 on the other half a mile of moving desolation. 
 
 Far to go, and nc time to waste ! 
 
 Give way, Bill ! Give way ! " 
 
 "Ay, ay!" 
 
 Both spoke in low tones, hardly louder than the whisper 
 of the ice around them. 
 
 By this time hundreds from the Foundry and the village 
 were swarming upon the wharf and the steamboat. 
 
 " A hundred tar-barrels would n't git up my steam in time 
 to do any good," says Cap'n Ambuster. " If them two in 
 my skiff don't overhaul the man, he 's gon e." 
 
 " You 're sure it 's a man ? " says Smith Wheelwright. 
 
 " Take a squint through my glass. I 'm dreffully afeard 
 it 's a gal ; but suthin' 's got into my eye, so I can't see." 
 
 Suthin' had got into the old fellow's eye, suthin' saline 
 and acrid, namely, a tear. 
 
 " It 's a woman," says Wheelwright, and suthin' of the 
 same kind blinded him also. 
 
 Almost sunset now. But the air was suddenly filled with 
 perplexing snow-dust from a heavy squall. A white cur- 
 tain dropped between the anxious watchers on the wharf 
 and the boatmen. 
 
 The same white curtain hid the dark floating object from 
 its pursuers. There was nothing in sight to steer by now. 
 
 Wade steered by his last glimpse, by the current, 
 by the rush of the roaring wind, by instinct. 
 
 How merciful that in such a moment a man is spared the 
 agony of thought ! His agony goes into action, intense as 
 life. 
 
 It was bitterly cold. A swash of ice-water filled the 
 bottom of the skiff. She was low enough down without 
 that. They could not stop to bail, and the miniatuie ice- 
 bergs they passed began to look significantly over the gun- 
 wale. Which would come to the point of foundering first, 
 the boat or the little floe it aimed for ? 
 
LOVE AND SKATES. 159 
 
 Bitterly cold! The snow hardly melted upon Tarbox's 
 bare hands. His fingers stiffened to the oars; but there 
 was life in them still, and still he did his work, and never 
 turned to see how the steersman was doing his. 
 
 A flight of crows came sailing with the snow-squall. 
 They alighted all about on the hummocks, and curiously 
 watched the two men battling to save life. One block 
 impish bird, more malignant or more sympathetic tlian Jj 
 fellows, ventured to poise on the skiffs stern. 
 
 Bill hissed off his third passenger. The crow rose on its 
 toes, let the boat slide away from under him, and followed 
 croaking dismal good wishes. 
 
 The last sunbeams were now cutting in everywhere. 
 The thick* snow-flurry was like a luminous cloud. Sud- 
 denly it drew aside. 
 
 The industrious skiff had steered so well and made such 
 headway, that there, a hundred yards away, safe still, not 
 gone, thank God ! was the woman they sought. 
 
 A dusky mass flung together on a waning rood of ice, 
 Wade could see nothing more. 
 
 Weary or benumbed, or sick with pure forlornness and 
 despair, she had drooped down and showed no sign of life. 
 
 The great wind shook the river. Her waning rood of 
 ice narrowed, foot by foot, like an unthrifty man's heritage. 
 Inch by inch its edges wore away, until the little space that 
 half sustained the dark heap was no bigger than a coffin-lid. 
 
 Help, now ! now, men, if you are to save ! Thrust, 
 Richard Wade, with your boat-hook ! Pull, Bill, till your 
 oars snap ! Out with your last frenzies of vigor ! For the 
 little raft of ice, even that has crumbled beneath its burden, 
 and she sinks, sinks, with succor close at hand ! 
 
 Sinks ! No, she rises and floats again. 
 
 She clasps something that holds her head just above 
 water. But the unmannerly ice has buffeted her hat ofH 
 The fragments toss it about, that pretty Amazonian hat, 
 
160 THEODORE WINTHROP. 
 
 witii its alert feather, all drooping and draggled. Her fair 
 hair and pure forehead are uncovered for an astonished sun- 
 beam to alight upon. 
 
 " It is my love, my life, Bill ! Give way, once more ! " 
 
 " Way enough ! Steady ! Sit where you are, Bill, and 
 trim boat, while I lift her out. We cannot risk capsizing." 
 
 He raised her carefully, tenderly, with his strong arms. 
 
 A bit of wood had buoyed her up for that last moment. 
 ft was a broken oar with a deep fresh gash in it. Wade 
 knew his mark, the cut of his own skate-iron. This 
 busy oar was still resolved to play its part in the drama. 
 
 The round little skiff just bore the third person without 
 sinking. 
 
 Wade laid Mary Darner against the thwart. ' She would 
 not let go her buoy. He unclasped her stiffened hands. 
 This friendly touch found its way to her heart. She opened 
 her eyes and knew him. 
 
 " The ice shall not carry off her hat to frighten some 
 mother, down stream," says Bill Tarbox, catching it. 
 
 All these proceedings Cap'n Ambuster's spy-glass an 
 nounced to Dunderbunk. 
 
 " They 're h'istin' her up. They 've slumped her into the 
 skiff. They 're puttin' for shore. Hooray ! " 
 
 Pity a spy-glass cannot shoot cheers a mile and a half! 
 
 Perry Purtett instantly led a stampede of half Dunder- 
 bunk along the railroad-track to learn who it was and all 
 about it. 
 
 All about it was that Miss Darner was safe, and not 
 dangerously frozen, and that Wade and Tarbox had 
 carried her up the hill to her mother at Peter Skerrett's. 
 
 Missing the heroes in chief, Dunderbunk made a hero ot 
 Cap'n Ambuster's skiff. It was transported back on the 
 shoulders of the crowd in triumphal procession. Perry 
 Purtett carried round the hat for a contribution to new 
 paint it, new rib it, new gunwale it, give it new sculls and a 
 
LOVE AND SKATES. 161 
 
 new boat-hook, indeed to make a new vessel of the brave 
 little bowl. 
 
 I 'm afeard," says Cap'n Ambuster, " that, when I git a 
 harnsome new skiff, I shall want a harasome new steam- 
 boat, and then the boat will go to cruisin' round for a 
 harnsome new Cap'n." 
 
 And now for the end of this story. 
 
 Healthy love-stories always end in happy marriages. 
 
 So ends this story, begun as to its love portion by the 
 little romance of a tumble, and continued by the bigger 
 romance of a rescue. 
 
 Of course there were incidents enough to fill a volume, 
 obstacles enough to fill a volume, and development of char- 
 acter enough to fill a tome thick as " Webster's Unabridged," 
 before the happy end of the beginning of the Wade-Darner 
 joint history. 
 
 But we can safely take for granted that, the lover being 
 true and manly, and the lady true and womanly, and both 
 possessed of the high moral qualities necessary to artistic 
 skating, they will go on understanding each other better, 
 until they are as one as two can be. 
 
 Masculine reader, attend to the moral of this tale : 
 
 Skate well, be a hero, bravely deserve the fair, prove 
 your deserts by your deeds, find your " perfect woman nobly 
 planned to warm, to comfort, and command," catch her 
 when found, and you are Blest. 
 
 Reader of the gentler sex, likewise attend: 
 
 All the essential blessings of life accompany a true heart 
 and a good complexion. Skate vigorously ; then your heart 
 will beat true, your cheeks will bloom, your appointed lover 
 will see your beautiful soul shining through your beautiful 
 face, he will tell you so, and after sufficient circumlocution 
 he will Pop, you will accept, and your lives will glide 
 sweetly as skating on virgin ice to silver music. 
 11 
 
THE BLESSED DAMOZEL. 
 
 BY D. G. ROSSETTI. 
 
 FTHHE blessed Damozel leaned out 
 I From the gold bar of Heaven ; 
 
 Her eyes knew more of rest and shade 
 Than waters stilled at even ; 
 
 She had three lilies in her hand, 
 And the stars in her hair were seven. 
 
 Her robe, ungirt from clasp to hem. 
 
 No wrought flowers did adorn, 
 But a white rose of Mary's gift, 
 
 For service meetly worn ; 
 And her hair lying down her back 
 
 Was yellow like ripe corn. 
 
 Her seemed she scarce had been ft day 
 
 One of God's choristers ; 
 The wonder was not yet quite gone 
 
 From that still look of hers ; 
 Albeit, to them she left, her day 
 
 Had counted as ten years. 
 
 (To one, it is ten years of years, 
 
 Yet now, and in this place, 
 
 Surely she leaned o'er me her hair 
 Fell all about my face 
 
 Nothing: the autumn fall of leaves. 
 The whole year sets apace.) 
 
THE BLESSED DAMOZEL. 163 
 
 It was the rampart of God's house 
 
 That she was standing on ; 
 By God built over the sheer depth 
 
 The which is Space begun ; 
 So high, that looking downward thence 
 
 She scarce could see the sun. 
 
 It lies in Heaven, across the flood 
 
 Of ether, as a bridge. 
 Beneath, the tides of day and night 
 
 With flame and blackness ridge 
 The void, as low as where this earth 
 
 Spins like a fretful midge. 
 
 
 
 She scarcely heard her sweet new friends : 
 
 Playing at holy games, 
 Softly they spake among themselves 
 
 Their virginal chaste names ; 
 And the souls, mounting up to God, 
 
 Went by her like thin flames. 
 
 And still she bowed above the vast 
 
 Waste sea of worlds that swarm ; 
 Until her bosom must have made 
 
 The bar she leaned on warm, 
 And the lilies lay as if asleep 
 
 Along her bended arm. 
 
 From the fixed place of Heaven, she saw 
 
 Time like a pulse shake fierce 
 Through all the worlds. Her gaze still strove 
 
 Within the gulf to pierce 
 Its path ; and now she spoke, as when 
 
 The stars sung in their spheres. 
 
164 D. G. ROSSETTI. 
 
 The sun was gone now. The curled ir oon 
 
 Was like a little feather 
 Fluttering far down the gulf. And now 
 
 She spoke through the still weather. 
 Her voice was like the voice the stars 
 
 Had when they sung together. 
 
 " I wish that he were come to me, 
 
 For he will come," she said. 
 " Have I not prayed in Heaven ? on earth, 
 
 Lord, Lord, has he not prayed ? 
 Are not two prayers a perfect strength? 
 
 And shall I feel afraid ? 
 
 
 " When round his head the aureole clings, 
 
 And he is clothed in white, 
 I '11 take his hand and go with him 
 
 To the deep wells of light, 
 And we will step down as to a stream, 
 
 And bathe there in God's sight. 
 
 " We two will stand beside that shrine, 
 
 Occult, withheld, untrod, 
 Whose lamps are stirred continually 
 
 With prayers sent up to God ; 
 And see our old prayers, granted, melt 
 
 Each like a little cloud. 
 
 " We two will lie i' the shadow of 
 
 That living mystic tree, 
 Within whose secret growth the Dove 
 
 Is sometimes felt to be, 
 While every leaf that His plumes touch 
 
 Saith His Name audibly. 
 
THE BLESSED DAMOZEL. 165 
 
 u And I myself will teach to him, 
 
 I myself, lying so, 
 The songs I sing here ; which his voice 
 
 Shall pause in, hushed and slow, 
 And find some knowledge at each pause, 
 
 Or some new thing to know." 
 
 (Ah sweet ! Just now, in that bird's song, 
 
 Strove not her accents there 
 Fain to be hearkened ? When those bell* 
 
 Possessed the midday air, 
 "Was she not stepping to my side 
 
 Down all the trembling stair ? ) 
 
 
 
 ** We two," she said, " will seek the groves 
 
 Where the Lady Mary is, 
 With her five handmaidens, whose names 
 
 Are five sweet symphonies, 
 Cecily, Gertrude, Magdalen, 
 
 Margaret, and Rosalys. 
 
 " Circlewise sit they, with bound locks 
 
 And foreheads garlanded ; 
 Into the fine cloth white like flame 
 
 Weaving the golden thread, 
 To fashion the birth-robes for them 
 
 Who are just born, being dead. 
 
 " He shall tear, haply, and be dumb ; 
 
 Then I will lay my cheek 
 To his, and tell about our love, 
 
 Not once abashed or weak ; 
 And the dear Mother will approve 
 
 My pride, and let me speak. 
 
166 D. G. ROSSETTI. 
 
 " Herself shall bring us, hand in hand, 
 To Him round whom all souls 
 
 Kneel, the unnumbered ransomed heada 
 Bowed with their aureoles : 
 
 And angels meeting us shall sing 
 To their citherns and citoles. 
 
 "There will I ask of Christ the Lord 
 Thus much for him and me : 
 
 Only to live as once on earth 
 At peace, only to be, 
 
 As then awhile, forever now 
 Together, I and he." 
 
 She gazed, and listened, and then said, 
 Less sad of speech than mild, 
 
 " All this is when he comes." She ceased. 
 The light thrilled past her, 
 
 Filled with angels in strong level lapse. 
 Her eyes prayed, and she smiled. 
 
 (I saw her smile.) But soon their flight 
 Was vague in distant spheres ; 
 
 And then she laid her arms along 
 The golden barriers, 
 
 And laid her face between her hands, 
 And wept. (I heard her tears.) 
 
THE HAPPY LIFE OF A PARISH PRIEST IN 
 SWEDEN. 
 
 BY JEAN PAUL. 
 
 JTVILL begin with winter, and I will suppose it to be 
 Christmas. The priest, whom we shall imagine to be a 
 German, and summoned from the southern climate of Ger- 
 many upon presentation to the church of a Swedish hamlet 
 lying in a high polar latitude, rises in cheerfulness about 
 seven o'clock in the morning; and till half past nine he 
 burns his lamp. At nine o'clock the stars are still shining, 
 and the unclouded moon even yet longer. This prolonga- 
 tion of starlight into the forenoon is to him delightful ; for 
 he is a German, and has a sense of something marvellous in 
 a starry forenoon. Methinks I behold the priest and his 
 flock moving towards the church with lanterns : the lights 
 dispersed amongst the crowd connect the congregation into 
 the appearance of some domestic group or larger household, 
 and carry the priest back to his childish years during the 
 winter season and Christmas matins, when every hand bore 
 its candle. Arrived at the pulpit, he declares to his audi- 
 ence the plain truth, word for word, as it stands in the 
 Gospel : in the presence of God, all intellectual pretension? 
 are called upon to be silent ; the very reason ceases to be 
 reasonable ; nor is anything reasonable in the sight of God 
 
 but a sincere and upright heart. 
 
 
 
 Just as he and his flock are issuing from the church, the 
 
168 JEAN PAUL. 
 
 bright Christmas sun ascends above the horizon, and shoots 
 his beams upon their faces. The old men, who are numer- 
 ous in Sweden, are all tinged with the colors of youth by 
 the rosy morning-lustre ; and the priest, as he looks away 
 from them to mother earth lying in the sleep of winter, and 
 to the churchyard, where the flowers and the men are all 
 in their graves together, might secretly exclaim with the 
 poet : " Upon the dead mother, in peace and utter gloom, 
 are reposing the dead children. After a time, uprises the 
 everlasting sun ; and the mother starts up at the summons 
 of the heavenly dawn with a resurrection of her ancient 
 gloom : And her children ? Yes : but they must wait 
 awhile." 
 
 At home he is awaited by a warm study, and a " long- 
 levelled rule " of sunlight upon the book-clad wall. 
 
 The afternoon he spends delightfully ; for, having before 
 him such a perfect flower-stand of pleasures, he scarcely 
 knows where he should settle. Supposing it to be Christ- 
 mas day, he preaches again : he preaches on a subject which 
 calls up images of the beauteous Eastern land, or of eter- 
 nity. By this time, twilight and gloom prevail through the 
 church : only a couple of wax lights upon the altar throw 
 wondrous and mighty shadows through the aisles : the angel 
 that hangs down from the roof above the baptismal font is 
 awoke into a solemn life by the shadows and the rays 
 and seems almost in the act of ascension : through the 
 windows, the stars or the moon are beginning to peer: 
 aloft, in the pulpit, which is now hid in gloom, the priest is 
 inflamed and possessed by the sacred burden of glad tidings 
 which he is announcing: he is lost and insensible to all 
 besides; and from amidst the darkness which surrounds 
 him he pours down his thunders, with tears and agitation, 
 reasoning of future worlds, and of the heaven of heavens, 
 and 'whatsoever else can most powerfully shake the heart 
 and the affections. 
 
HAPPY LIFE OF A PARISH PRIEST IN SWEDEN. 169 
 
 Descending from his pulpit in these holy fervors, he now, 
 perhaps, takes a walk : it is about four o'clock : and he walks 
 beneath a sky lit up by the shifting northern lights, that to 
 his eye appear but an Aurora striking upwards from the 
 eternal morning of the south, or as a forest composed of 
 saintly thickets, like the fiery bushes of Moses, that are 
 round the throne of God. 
 
 Thus, if it be the afternoon of Christmas day : but if it 
 be any other afternoon, visitors, perhaps, come and bring 
 their well-bred grown-up daughters; like the fashionable 
 world in London, he dines at sunset ; that is to say, like the 
 Mw-fashionable world of London, he dines at two o'clock ; 
 and he drinks coffee by moonlight ; and the parsonage-house 
 becomes an % en chanted palace of pleasure, gleaming with 
 twilight, starlight, and moonlight. Or, perhaps, he goes 
 over to the schoolmaster, who is teaching his afternoon 
 school : there, by the candlelight, he gathers round his knees 
 all the scholars, as if being the children of his spiritual 
 children they must therefore be his own grandchildren ; 
 and with delightful words he wins their attention, and pours 
 knowledge into their docile hearts. 
 
 All these pleasures failing, he may pace up and down in 
 his library, already, by three o'clock, gloomy with twilight, 
 but fitfully onlivened by a glowing fire, and steadily by the 
 bright moonlight ; and he needs do no more than taste at 
 every turn of his walk a little orange marmalade, to call 
 up images of beautiful Italy, and its gardens and orange 
 groves, before all his five senses, and, as it were, to the very 
 tip of his tongue. Looking at the moon, he will not fail to 
 recollect that the very same silver disk hangs at the very 
 eame moment between the branches of the laurels in Italy. 
 It will delight him to consider that the JEolian harp and 
 the lark, and indeed music of all kinds, and the stars and 
 children, are just the same in hot climates and in cold. 
 And when the post-boy, that rides in with news from Italy, 
 
170 JEAN PAUL. 
 
 winds Ms horn through the hamlet, and with a few simple 
 notes raises up on the frozen window of his study a vision 
 of flowery realms ; and when he plays with treasured leaves 
 of roses and of lilies from some departed summer, or with 
 plumes of a bird of Paradise, the memorial of some distant 
 friend ; when further, his heart is moved by the magnificent 
 sounds of Lady-day, Salad-season, Cherry-time, Trinity- 
 Sundays, the rose of June, &c., how can he fail to forget 
 that he is in Sweden by the time that his lamp is brought 
 in ? and then, indeed, he will be somewhat disconcerted to 
 recognize his study in what had now shaped itself to his 
 fancy as a room in some foreign land. However, if he 
 would pursue this airy creation, he need but light at his 
 lamp a wax-candle-end, to gain a glimpse through the 
 whole evening into that world of fashion and splendor from 
 which he purchased the said wax-candle-end. For I 
 should suppose, that at the court of Stockholm, as else- 
 where, there must be candle-ends to be bought of the 
 state-footmen. 
 
 But now, after the lapse of half a year, all at once there 
 strikes upon his heart something more beautiful than Italy, 
 where the sun sets so much earlier in summer-time than it 
 does at our Swedish hamlet : and what is that ? It is the 
 longest day, with the rich freight that it carries in its bosom, 
 and leading by the hand the early dawn, blushing with rosy 
 light and melodious with the carolling of larks at one 
 o'clock in the morning. Before two, that is, at sunrise, 
 the elegant party that we mentioned last winter arrive in 
 gay clothing at the parsonage; for they are bound on a 
 little excursion of pleasure in company with the priest. At 
 two o'clock they are in motion ; at which time all the flowers 
 are glittering, and the forests are gleaming with the mighty 
 light. The warm sun threatens them with no storm nor 
 thunder-showers ; for both are rare in Sweden. The priest, 
 in common with the rest of the company, is attired in the 
 
HAPPY LIFE OF A PARISH PRIEST IN SWEDEN. 171 
 
 costume of Sweden ; he wears his short jacket with a broad 
 scarf, his short cloak above that, his round hat with floating 
 plumes, and shoes tied with bright ribbons : like the rest 
 of the men, he resembles a Spanish knight, or a prove^al, 
 or other man of the South ; more especially when he and 
 his gay company are seen flying through the lofty foliage 
 luxuriant with blossom, that within so short a period of 
 weeks has shot forth from the garden-plots and the naked 
 boughs. 
 
 That a longest day like this, bearing such a cornucopia 
 of sunshine, of cloudless ether, of buds and bells, of blossoms 
 and of leisure, should pass away more rapidly than the 
 shortest, is not difficult to suppose. As early as eight 
 o'clock in the,evening the party breaks up ; the sun is now 
 burning more gently over the half-closed, sleepy flowers : 
 about nine he lias mitigated his rays, and is beheld bathing, 
 as it were, naked in the blue depths of heaven : about ten, 
 at which hour the company reassemble at the parsonage, 
 the priest is deeply moved, for throughout the hamlet, 
 though the tepid sun, now sunk to the horizon, is still shed- 
 ding a sullen glow upon the cottages and the window-panes, 
 everything reposes in profoundest silence and sleep : the 
 birds even are all slumbering in the golden summits of the 
 woods : and at last, the solitary sun himself sets, like a moon, 
 amidst the universal quiet of nature. To our priest, walk- 
 ing in his romantic dress, it seems as though rosy-colored 
 realms were laid open, in which fairies and spirits range ; 
 and he would scarcely feel an emotion of wonder, if, in this 
 hour of golden vision, his brother, who ran away in child- 
 hood, should suddenly present himself as one alighting from 
 some blooming heaven of enchantment. 
 
 The priest will not allow his company to depart: he 
 detains them in the parsonage garden, where, says he, 
 every one that chooses may slumber away in beautiful 
 bowers the brief, warm hours until the reappearance of 
 
172 JEAN PAUL. 
 
 the sun. This proposal is generally adopted ; and the gar- 
 den is occupied : many a lovely pair are making believe to 
 sleep, but, in fact, are holding each other by the hand. 
 The happy priest walks up and down through the parterres. 
 Coolness comes, and a few stars. His nigl it- violets and 
 gillyflowers open and breathe out their powerful odors. To 
 the north, from the eternal morning of the pole, exhales as 
 it were a golden dawn. The priest thinks of the village of 
 his childhood far away in Germany ; he thinks of the life of 
 man, his hopes, and his aspirations : and he is calm and at 
 peace with himself. Then all at once starts up the morning 
 sun in his freshness. Some there are in the garden who 
 would fain confound it with the evening sun, and close their 
 eyes again: but the larks betray all, and awaken every 
 sleeper from bower to bower. 
 
 Then again begin pleasure and morning in their pomp of 
 radiance ; and almost I could persuade myself to delineate 
 the course of this day also, though it differs from its pre- 
 decessor hard]y by so much as the leaf of a rose-bud. 
 
THE SONG OF THE SHIRT. 
 
 BY THOMAS HOOD. 
 
 WITH fingers weary and worn, 
 With eyelids heavy and red, 
 A woman sat, in unwomanly rags, 
 Plying her needle and thread, 
 
 Stitch! stitch! stitch! 
 In poverty, hunger, and dirt ; 
 
 And still with a voice of dolorous pitch 
 She sang the " Song of the Shirt ! " 
 
 "Work! work! work! 
 
 While the cock is crowing aloof ! 
 And work work work 
 
 Till the stars shine through the roof ! 
 It 's, O, to be a slave 
 
 Along with the barbarous Turk, 
 Where woman has never a soul to save, 
 
 If this is Christian work ! 
 
 " Work work work ! 
 
 . Till the brain begins to swim ! 
 Work work work 
 
 Till the eyes are heavy and dim ! 
 Seam, and gusset, and band, 
 
 Band, and gusset, and seam, 
 Till over the buttons I fall asleep, 
 
 And sew them on in a dream ! 
 
174 THOMAS HOOD. 
 
 " O men with sisters dear ! 
 
 O men with mothers and wives ! 
 It is not linen you 're wearing out, 
 
 But human creatures' lives ! 
 Stitch stitch stitch, 
 
 Tn poverty, hunger, and dirt, 
 Sewing at once, with a double thread, 
 
 A shroud as well as a shirt ! 
 
 " But why do I talk of death, 
 
 That phantom of grisly bone ? 
 I hardly fear his terrible shape, 
 
 It seems so like my own, 
 
 It seems so like my own 
 
 Because of the fasts I keep ; 
 God ! that bread should be so dear, 
 
 And flesh and blood so cheap ! 
 
 " "Work work work ! 
 
 My labor never flags ; 
 And what are its wages ? A bed of straw, 
 
 A crust of bread and rags, 
 That shattered roof ^and this naked floor 
 
 A table a broken chair 
 And a wall so blank my shadow I thank 
 
 For sometimes falling there ! 
 
 " Work work work ! 
 
 From weary chime to chime ! 
 Work work work 
 
 As prisoners work for crime ! 
 Band, and gusset, and seam, 
 
 Seam, and gusset, and band, 
 Till the heart is sick and the brain benumbed, 
 
 As well as the weary hand. 
 
THE SONG OF THE SHIRT. 175 
 
 " "Work work work ! 
 
 In the dull December light ! 
 And work work work 
 
 When the weather is warm and bright ! 
 While underneath the eaves 
 
 The brooding swallows cling, 
 As if to show me their sunny backs, 
 
 And twit me with the Spring. 
 
 " O but to breathe the breath 
 
 Of the cowslip and primrose sweet, 
 With the sky above my head, 
 
 And the grass beneath my feet ! 
 Foronly one short hour 
 
 To feel as I used to feel, 
 Before I knew the woes of want 
 
 And the walk that costs a meal ! 
 
 " O but for one short hour, 
 
 A respite, however brief ! 
 No blessed leisure for love or hope, 
 
 But only time for grief ! - 
 A little weeping would ease my heart ; 
 
 But in their briny bed 
 My tears must stop, for every drop 
 
 Hinders needle and thread ! " 
 
 With fingers weary and worn, 
 
 With eyelids heavy and red, 
 A woman sat, in unwomanly rags, 
 
 Plying her needle and thread, 
 Stitch! stitch! stitch! 
 
 In poverty, hunger, and dirt ; 
 And still with a voice of dolorous pitch 
 Would that its tone could reach the rich ! 
 
 She sang this " Song of the Shirt ! " 
 
JOHN FLAX MAN 
 
 BY SAMUEL SMILES. 
 
 JOHN FLAXMAN was a true genius, one of the 
 greatest artists England has yet produced. He was be- 
 sides a person of beautiful character, his life furnishing many 
 salutary lessons for men of all ranks. Flaxman was the son 
 of a humble seller of plaster-casts in New Street, Covent 
 Garden; and when a child, he was so constant an inva- 
 lid that it was his custom to sit behind the shop counter 
 propped by pillows, amusing himself with drawing and read- 
 ing. A benevolent clergyman, named Matthews, one day 
 calling at the shop, found the boy trying to read a book, 
 and on inquiring what it was, found it was a Cornelius Nepos, 
 which his father had picked up for a few pence at a bookstall. 
 The gentleman, after some conversation with the boy, said 
 that was not the proper book for him to read, but that he 
 would bring him a right one on the morrow ; and the kind 
 man was as good as his word. The Rev. Mr. Matthews 
 used afterwards to say, that from that casual interview with 
 the cripple little invalid behind the plaster-cast seller's shop- 
 counter, began an acquaintance which ripened into one of 
 the best friendships of his life. He brought several books 
 to the boy, amongst which were Homer and " Don Quix- 
 ote," in both of which Flaxman then and ever after took 
 immense delight. His mind was soon full of the heroism 
 which breathed through the pages of the former work, and, 
 
JOHN FLAXMAN. 177 
 
 with the stucco Ajaxes and Achilleses about him, looming 
 along the shop shelves, the ambition thus early took posses- 
 sion of him, that lie too would design and embody in poetic 
 forms those majestic heroes.. His black chalk was at once 
 in his hand, and the enthusiastic boy labored in a divine 
 despair to body forth in visible shapes the actions of the 
 Greeks and Trojans. 
 
 Like all youthful efforts, his first designs were crude. 
 The proud father one day showed them to Roubilliac, the 
 sculptor, who turned from them with a contemptuous 
 " Pshaw ! " But the boy had the right stuff in him ; he had 
 industry and patience ; and he continued to labor incessantly 
 at his books and drawings. He then tried his young powers 
 in modelling figures in plaster of Paris, wax, and clay; 
 some of these early works are still preserved, not because 
 of their merit, but because they are curious as the first 
 healthy efforts of patient genius. The boy was long before 
 he could walk, and he only learned to do so by hobbling 
 along upon crutches. Hence he could not accompany his 
 father to see the procession at the coronation of George HI., 
 but he entreated his father to bring him back one of the 
 coronation medals which were to be distributed amongst the 
 crowd. The pressure was too great to enable the father to 
 obtain one in the scramble, but, not to disappoint the little 
 invalid, he obtained a plated button bearing the stamp of a 
 horse and jockey, which he presented to his son as the 
 coronation medal. His practice at this time was to make 
 impressions of all seals and medals that pleased him ; and it 
 was for this that he so much coveted the medal. 
 
 His physical health improving, the little Flaxman then 
 threw away his crutches. The kind Mr. Matthews invited 
 him to his house, where his wife explained Homer and 
 Milton to him. They helped him also in his self-culture, 
 giving him lessons in Greek and Latin, the study of which 
 he prosecuted at home. When under Mrs. Matthews, he 
 12 
 
178 SAMUEL SMILES. 
 
 also attempted with his bit of charcoal to embody in outline 
 on paper such passages as struck his fancy. His drawings 
 could not, however, have been very extraordinary, for when 
 he showed a drawing of an eye which he had made to Mor- 
 timer, the artist, that gentleman, with affected surprise, 
 exclaimed, " Is it an oyster ? " The sensitive boy was 
 much hurt, and for a time took care to avoid showing his 
 drawings to artists, who, though a thin-skinned race, are 
 sometimes disposed to be very savage in their criticisms on 
 others. At length, by dint of perseverance and study, Ins 
 drawing improved so much that Mrs. Matthews obtained a 
 commission for him from a lady, to draw six original draw- 
 ings in black chalk of subjects in Homer. His first commis- 
 sion ! A great event that in the boy's life. A surgeon's 
 first fee, a lawyer's first retainer, a legislator's first speech, 
 a singer's first appearance behind the footlights, an author's 
 first book, are not any of them mpre full of interest to the 
 individual than the artist's first commission. The boy duly 
 executed the order, and was both well praised and well paid 
 for his work. 
 
 At fifteen Flaxman entered a student at the Royal 
 Academy. He might then be seen principally in the com- 
 pany of Blake and Stothard, young men of kindred tastes 
 and genius, gentle and amiable, yet ardent in their love 
 of art. Notwithstanding his retiring disposition, Flaxman 
 soon became known among the students, and great things 
 were expected of him. Nor were their expectations dis- 
 appointed : in his fifteenth year he gained the silver prize, 
 and next year he became a candidate for the gold one. 
 Everybody prophesied that he would carry off the medal, 
 for there was none who surpassed him in ability and in- 
 dustry. The youth did his best, and in his after-life 
 honestly affirmed that he deserved the prize, but he lost it, 
 and the gold medal was adjudged to Engleheart, who was not 
 afterwards heard of. This failure on the part of the youth 
 
JOHN FLAXMAN. 179 
 
 was really of service to him ; for defeats do not long cast 
 down the resolute-hearted, but only serve to call forth their 
 real powers. " Give me time," said he to his father, " and 
 I will yet produce works that the Academy will be proud 
 to recognize." He redoubled his efforts, spared no pains, 
 designed and modelled incessantly, and consequently made 
 steady if not rapid progress. But meanwhile poverty 
 threatened his father's household: the plaster-cast trade 
 yielded a verj bare living; and young Flaxman, with 
 resolute self-denial ? curtailed his hours of study, and devoted 
 himself to helping his father in the humble details of his 
 business. He laid aside his Homer to take up the plaster- 
 trowel. He was willing to work in the humblest depart- 
 ment of tire trade so that his father's family might be 
 supported, and the wolf kept from the door. To this 
 drudgery of his art he served a long apprenticeship ; but it 
 did him good. It familiarized him with steady work, and 
 cultivated in Mm the spirit of patience. The discipline may 
 have been rough, but it was wholesome. 
 
 Happily young Flaxman's skill in design had reached the 
 knowledge of Mr. Wedgwood, who sought him out for the 
 purpose of employing him in designing improved patterns 
 of china and earthenware to be produced at his manufactory. 
 It may seem a humble department of art for Flaxman to 
 have labored in ; but it really was not so. An artist may 
 be laboring truly in his vocation while designing even so 
 common an article as a teapot or a water-jug; articles 
 which are in daily i's-3 amongst the people, and are befcre 
 their eyes .at every meal, may be made the vehicles of 
 art-education to all. and minister to their highest culture^ 
 The most ambitious artist nmy thus confer a greater prac- 
 tical benefit on his countrymen than by executing an elab- 
 orate work which he may seU frr thousands of pounds, to 
 be placed in some weHhv map's galle^r, where it is hid- 
 den away from public sight. Before "Wedgwood's time the 
 
180 SAMUEL SMILES. 
 
 designs which figured upon our china and stoneware were 
 hideous both in drawing and execution, and he determined 
 to improve both. Finding out Flaxman, he said to him 
 " Well, my lad, I have heard that you are a good draughts- 
 man and clever designer. I 'm a manufacturer of pots, 
 name Wedgwood. Now, I want you to design some models 
 for me, nothing fantastic, but simple, tasteful, and correct 
 in drawing. I '11 pay you well. You don't think the work 
 beneath you ? " " By no means, sir," replied Flaxman, 
 " indeed, the work is quite to my taste. Give me a few 
 days, call again, and you will see what I can do." 
 " That 's right, work away. Mind, I am in want of them 
 now. They are for pots of all kinds, teapots, jugs, tea- 
 cups and saucers. But especially I want designs for a 
 table-service. Begin with that. I mean to supply one for 
 the royal table. Now, think of that, young man. What 
 you design is meant for the eyes of royalty ! " "I will do 
 my best, sir, I assure you." And the kind gentleman 
 bustled out of the shop as he had come in. 
 
 Flaxman did his best. By the time that Mr. Wedgwood 
 next called upon him, he had a numerous series of models 
 prepared for various pieces of earthenware. They con- 
 sisted chiefly of small groups in very low relief, the 
 subjects taken from ancient verse and history. Many of 
 them are still in existence, and some are equal in beauty 
 and simplicity to his after-designs for marble. The cele- 
 brated Etruscan vases, many of which were to be found in 
 public museums and in the cabinets of the curious, furnished 
 him with the best examples of form, and these he embel- 
 lished with liis own elegant devices. " Stuart's Athens," 
 then recently published, also furnished him with specimens 
 of the purest-shaped Greek utensils, and he was not slow to 
 adopt the best of them, and work them up into new and 
 wondrous shapes of elegance and beauty. Flaxman then 
 saw that he was laboring in a great work, no less than 
 
JOHN FLAXMAN. 181 
 
 the promotion of popular education ; and he was proud in 
 after-life to allude to these his early labors, by which he 
 was enabled at the same time to cultivate his love of the 
 beautiful, to diffuse a taste for art among the people, and to 
 replenish his own purse, while he promoted the prosperity 
 of his friend and benefactor. 
 
 Engaged in such labors as these, for several years Flax- 
 man executed but few works of art, and then at rare 
 intervals. He lived a quiet, secluded, and simple life, 
 working during the day, and sketching and reading in the 
 evenings. He was so poor that he had as yet been only 
 able to find plaster of Paris for his works, marble was 
 too dear a material for him. He had hitherto executed 
 only one statue in the latter material, and that was a com- 
 mission. 
 
 At length, in the year 1782, when twenty-seven years of 
 age, he quitted his father's roof and rented a small house 
 and studio in TVardour Street, Soho ; and what was more, 
 he married, Ann Denman was the name of his wife, 
 and a cheery, bright-souled, noble woman she was. He 
 believed that in marrying her he should be able to work 
 with an intenser spirit ; for, like him, she had a taste for 
 poetry and art, and besides was an enthusiastic admirer of 
 her husband's genius. Yet when Sir Joshua Reynolds 
 himself a bachelor met Flaxman shortly after his mar- 
 riage, he said to him, " So, Flaxman, I am told you are 
 married ; if so, sir, I tell you you are ruined for an artist." 
 Flaxman went straight home, sat down beside his wife, took 
 her hand in his, and said, " Ann, I am ruined for an artist" 
 " How so, John ? How has it happened ? and who has 
 done it ? " " It happened," he replied, " in the church, and 
 Ann Denman has done it" He then told her of Sit 
 Joshua's remark, whose opinion was well known, and had 
 often been expressed, that if students would excel they must 
 bring the whole powers of their mind to bear upon their art, 
 
182 SAMUEL SMILES. 
 
 from the moment they rise until they go to bed ; and u'so, 
 that no man could be a great artist unless he studied the 
 grand works of Raffaelle, Michael Angelo, and others, at 
 Rome and Florence. " And I/' said Flaxman, drawing up 
 his little figure to its full height, "/would be a great artist." 
 " And a great artist you shall be," said his wife, " and visit 
 Rome too, if that be really necessary to make you great." 
 " But how ? " asked Flaxman, " Work and economize" 
 rejoined the brave wife ; " I will never have it said that 
 Ann Denman ruined John Flaxman for an artist." And 
 so it was determined by the pair that the journey to Rome 
 was to be made when their means would admit. " I will go 
 to Rome," said Flaxman, " and show the President that 
 wedlock is for a man's good rather than his harm ; and you, 
 Ann, shall accompany me." 
 
 Patiently and happily this affectionate couple plodded on 
 during five years in that humble little home in Wardour 
 Street ; always with the long journey to Rome before them. 
 It was never lost sight of for a moment, and not a penny 
 was uselessly spent that could be saved towards the neces- 
 sary expenses. They said no word to any one about their 
 project, solicited no aid from the Academy, but trusted 
 only to their own patient labor and love to pursue and 
 achieve their object. During this time Flaxman exhibited 
 very few works. He could not afford marble to experiment 
 in original designs ; but he obtained frequent commissions for 
 monuments, by the profits of which he maintained himself. 
 He still worked for the Messrs. Wedgwood, who proved 
 good paymasters; and, on the whole, lie was thriving, 
 happy, and hopeful. He was not a little respected by his 
 neighbors, and those who knew him greatly estimated his 
 sincerity, his honesty, and his unostentatious piety. His 
 local respectability was even such as to bring local honors 
 and local work upon him ; so much so that he was on one 
 occasion selected by the rate-payers to collect the watch- 
 
JOHN FLAXMAN. 183 
 
 rate for the parish of St. Anne, when he might be seen 
 going about with an ink-bottle suspended from his button- 
 hole, collecting the money. 
 
 At length Flaxman and his wife, having thriftily accumu- 
 lated a sufficient store of savings, set out for Rome. Arrived 
 there, he applied himself diligently to study, maintaining 
 himself, like other poor artists, by making copies from the 
 antique. English visitors sought his studio and gave him 
 commissions ; and it was then that he composed his beautiful 
 designs, illustrative of Homer, JEschyluS, and Dante. The 
 price paid, for them was moderate, only fifteen shillings 
 apiece ; but Flaxman worked for art as well as money, and 
 the beauty of the designs brought him new friends and 
 patrons. IJe executed Cupid and Aurora for the munificent 
 Thomas Hope, and the Fury of Athamas for the Earl of 
 Bristol. He then prepared to return to England, his taste 
 improved and cultivated by careful study; but before he 
 left Italy, the Academies of Florence and Carrara recog- 
 nized his merit by electing him a member. 
 
 His fame had preceded him to England, and he soon 
 found abundant lucrative employment. While at Rome, he 
 had been commissioned to execute his famous monument 
 in memory of Lord Mansfield, and it was erected in the 
 north transept of Westminster Abbey shortly after his re- 
 turn. It stands there in majestic grandeur, a monument to 
 the genius of Flaxman himself, calm, simple, and severe. 
 No wonder that Banks, the sculptor, then in the heyday of 
 his fame, exclaimed when he saw it, " This little man cuts 
 us all out!" 
 
 When the bigwigs of the Royal Academy heard of Flax- 
 man's return, and especially when they had an opportunity 
 of seeing and admiring his noble portrait-statue of Mans- 
 field, they were eager to have him enrolled among their 
 number. The Royal Academy has always had the art of 
 running to the help of the strong ; and when an artist has 
 
184 SAMUEL SMILES. 
 
 proved that he can achieve a reputation without the Acade- 
 my, then is the Academy most willing to " patronize " him. 
 He allowed his name to be proposed in the candidates' list 
 of associates, and was immediately elected. His progress 
 was now rapid, and he was constantly employed. Perse- 
 verance and study, which had matured his genius, had made 
 him great, and he went on from triumph to triumph. But 
 he appeared in yet a new character. The little boy who 
 had begun his studies behind the poor plaster-cast seller's 
 shop-counter in New Street, Covent Garden, was now a 
 man of high intellect and recognized supremacy in art, to 
 instruct aspiring students, in the character of Professor of 
 Sculpture to the Royal Academy! And no man better 
 deserved to fill that distinguished office ; for none is so able 
 to instruct others as he who, for himself and by his own 
 almost unaided efforts, has learned to grapple with, and 
 overcome difficulties. The caustic Fuseli used to talk of 
 the lectures as " sermons by the Reverend John Flaxmau " ; 
 for the sculptor was a religious man, which Fuseli was not. 
 But Flaxman acquitted himself well in the professorial 
 chair, as any one who reads his instructive " Lectures on 
 Sculpture," now published, may ascertain for himself. 
 
 Flaxman's monuments are known nearly all over Eng- 
 land. Their mute poetry beautifies most of the cathedrals, 
 and many of the rural churches. Whatever work of this 
 kind he executed, he threw a soul and meaning into it, 
 embodying some high Christian idea of charity, of love, of 
 resignation, of affection, or of kindness. 
 
RAPHAEL. 
 
 BY JOHN G. WfflTTIER. 
 
 I SHALL not soon forget that sight : 
 The glow of Autumn's westering day, 
 A hazy warmth, a dreamy light, 
 On Raphael's picture lay. 
 
 It was a simple print I saw, 
 The fair face of a musing boy ; 
 
 Yet while I gazed a sense of awe 
 Seemed blending with my joy. 
 
 A simple print: the graceful flow 
 Of boyhood's soft and wavy hair, 
 
 And fresh young lip and cheek, and brow 
 Unmarked and clear, were there. 
 
 Yet through its sweet and calm repose 
 
 I saw the inward spirit shine ; 
 It was as if before me rose 
 
 The white veil of a shrine. 
 
 As if, as Gothland's sage has told, 
 The hidden life, the man within, 
 
 Dissevered from its frame and mould, 
 By mortal eye were seen. 
 
186 JOHN G. WHITTIER. 
 
 Was it the lifting of that eye, 
 
 The waving of that pictured hand ? 
 
 Loose as a cloud-wreath on the sky, 
 I saw the walls expand. 
 
 The narrow room had vanished, space 
 Broad, luminous, remained alone, 
 
 Through which all hues and shapes of grace 
 And beauty looked or shone. 
 
 Around the mighty master came 
 
 The marvels which his pencil wrought, 
 
 Those miracles of power whose fame 
 Is wide as human thought. 
 
 There drooped thy more than mortal face, 
 Mother, beautiful and mild ! 
 
 Enfolding in one dear embrace 
 Thy Saviour and thy Child ! 
 
 The rapt brow of the Desert John ; 
 
 The awful glory of that day, 
 When all the Father's brightness shone 
 
 Through manhood's veil of clay. 
 
 And, midst gray prophet forms, and wild 
 Dark visions of the days of old, 
 
 How sweetly woman's beauty smiled 
 Through locks of brown and gold ! 
 
 There Fornarina's fair young face 
 Once more upon her lover shone, 
 
 Whose model of an angel's grace 
 He borrowed from her own. 
 
RAPHAEL. 187 
 
 Slow passed that vision from my view, 
 
 But not the lesson which it taught ; 
 The soft, calm shadows which it threw 
 
 Still rested on my thought : 
 
 The truth, that painter, bard, and sage, 
 Even in Earth's cold and changeful clime, 
 
 Plant for their deathless heritage 
 The fruits and flowers of time. 
 
 We shape ourselves the joy or fear 
 
 Of which the coming life is made, 
 And fill our Future's atmosphere 
 
 With sunshine or with shade. 
 
 The tissue of the Life to be 
 
 We weave with colors all our own, 
 And in the field of Destiny 
 
 We reap as we have sown. 
 
 Still shall the soul around it call 
 
 The shadows which it gathered here, 
 And, painted on the eternal wall, 
 
 The Past shall reappear. 
 
 Think ye the notes of holy song 
 
 On Milton's tuneful ear have died ? 
 Think ye that Raphael's angel throng 
 
 Has vanished from his side ? 
 
 O no ! We live our life again : 
 
 Or warmly touched or coldly dim 
 The pictures of the Past remain, - 
 
 Man's works shall follow him ! 
 
TUNBRIDGE TOYS. 
 
 BY W. M. THACKERAY. 
 
 1 WONDER whether those little silver pencil-cases with 
 a movable almanac at the but-end are still favorite 
 implements with boys, and whether pedlers still hawk them 
 about the country ? Are there pedlers and hawkers still, or 
 are rustics and children grown too sharp to deal with them ? 
 Those pencil-cases, as far as my memory serves me, were 
 hot of much use. The screw upon which the movable 
 almanac turned was constantly getting loose. The 1 of the 
 table would work from its moorings, under Tuesday or 
 Wednesday, as the case might be, and you would find, on 
 examination, that Th. or W. was the 23 of the month 
 (which was absurd on the face of the thing), and in a word, 
 your cherished pencil-case an utterly unreliable timekeeper. 
 Nor was this a matter of wonder. Consider the position of a 
 pencil-case in a boy's pocket. You had hard-bake in it; 
 marbles, kept in your purse, when the money was all gone ; 
 your mother's purse knitted so fondly and supplied with a 
 little bit of gold, long since, prodigal little son ! scat- 
 tered amongst the swine, I mean amongst brandy-balls, 
 open tarts, three-cornered puffs, and similar abominations. 
 You had a top and string ; a knife ; a piece of cobbler's 
 wax ; two or three bullets ; a Little Warbler ; and I, for my 
 part, remember, for a considerable period, a brass-barrelled 
 pocket-pistol (which would fire beautifully, for with it I shot 
 
TUNBRIDGE TOYS. 181) 
 
 off a button from Butt Major's jacket) ; with all these 
 things, and ever so many more, clinking and rattling in 
 your pockets, and your hands, of course, keeping them in 
 perpetual movement, how could you expect your movable 
 almanac not to be twisted out of its place now and again, 
 your pencil-case to be bent, your liquorice-water not 
 to leak out of your bottle over the cobbler's wax, your 
 bull's-eyes not to ram up the lock and barrel of your pistol, 
 and so forth? 
 
 In the month of June, thirty-seven years ago, I bought 
 one of those pencil-cases from a boy whom I shall call 
 Hawker, and who was in my form. Is he dead ? Is he a 
 millionnaire ? Is he a bankrupt now ? He was an immense 
 screw at school, and I believe to this day that the value of 
 the thing for which I owed and eventually paid three-and- 
 sixpence was in reality not one-and-nine. 
 
 I certainly enjoyed the case at first a good deal, and 
 amused myself with twiddling round the movable calendar. 
 But this pleasure wore off. The jewel, as I said, was not 
 paid for, and Hawker, a large and violent boy, was exceed- 
 ingly unpleasant as a creditor. His constant remark was, 
 " When are you going to pay me that three-and-sixpence ? 
 What sneaks your relations must be ! They come to see 
 you. You go out to them on Saturdays and Sundays, and 
 they never give you anything! Don't tell me, you little hum- 
 bug ! " and so forth. The truth is, that my relations were 
 respectable ; but my parents were making a tour in Scot- 
 land ; and my friends in London, whom I used to go and see, 
 were most kind to me, certainly, but somehow never tipped 
 me. That term, of May to August, 1823, passed in agonies 
 then, in consequence of my debt to Hawker. What was 
 the pleasure of a calendar pencil-case in comparison with 
 the doubt and torture of mind occasioned by the sense of 
 the debt, and the constant reproach in that fellow's scowling 
 eyes and gloomy, coarse reminders ? How was I to pay off 
 
190 W. M. THACKERAY. 
 
 such a debt out of sixpence a week ? ludicrous ! "TCTiy did 
 not some one come to see me, and tip me ? Ah ! my dear 
 sir, if you have any little friends at school, go and see them, 
 and do the natural thing by them. You won't miss the 
 sovereign. You don't know what a blessing it will be tc 
 them. Don't fancy they are too old, try 'em. And thej 
 will remember you, and bless you in future days ; and theii 
 gratitude shall accompany your dreary after life and they 
 shall meet you kindly when thanks for kindness are scant. 
 O mercy ! shall I ever forget that sovereign you gave me, 
 Captain Bob ? or the agonies of being in debt to Hawker ? 
 In that very term, a relation of mine was going to India. I 
 actually was fetched from school in order to take leave of 
 him. I am afraid I told Hawker of this circumstance. I 
 own I speculated upon my friend's giving me a pound. A 
 pound? Pooh! A relation going to India, and deeply 
 affected at parting from his darling kinsman, might give 
 five pounds to the dear fellow ! . . . . There was Hawker 
 when I came back, of course, there he was. As he 
 looked in my scared face, his turned livid with rage. He 
 muttered curses, terrible from the lips of so young a boy. 
 My relation, about to cross the ocean to fill a lucrative 
 appointment, asked me with much interest about my pro- 
 gress at school, heard me construe a passage of Eutropius, 
 the pleasing Latin work on which I was then engaged, 
 gave me a God bless you, and sent me back to school ; upon 
 my word of honor, without so much as a half-crown ! It is 
 all very well, my dear sir, to say that boys contract habits 
 of expecting tips from their parents' friends, that they be- 
 come avaricious, and so forth. Avaricious ! fudge ! Boys 
 contract habits of tart and toffee eating, which they do not 
 carry into after life. On the contrary, I wish I did like 
 'em. What raptures of pleasure one could have now for 
 five shillings, if one could but pick it off the pastry-cook's 
 tray ! No. If you have any little friends at school, out 
 
TUNBRIDGE TOYS. 191 
 
 with your half-crowns, my friend, and impart to those little 
 ones the little fleeting joys of their age. 
 
 Well, then. At the beginning of August, 1823, Bartle- 
 my-tide holidays came, and I was to go to my parents, 
 who were at Tunbridge Wells. My place in the coach was 
 taken by my tutor's servants, Bolt-in-Tun, Fleet Street, 
 seven o'clock in the morning, was the word. My tutor, the 
 
 Rev. Edward P , to whom I hereby present my best 
 
 compliments, had a parting interview with me: gave me 
 my little account for my governor : the remaining part of the 
 coach-hire ; five shillings for my own expenses ; and some 
 five-and-twenty shillings on an old account which had been 
 overpaid, and was to be restored to my family. 
 
 Away I ran and paid Hawker his three-and-six. Ouf ! 
 what a weight it was off my mind ! (He was a Norfolk 
 boy, and used to go home from Mrs. Nelson's Bell Inn, 
 Aldgate, but that is not to the point) The next morn- 
 ing, of course, we were an hour before the time. I and 
 another boy shared a hackney-coach; two-and-six: porter 
 for putting luggage on coach, threepence. I had no more 
 money of my own left. Rasher well, my companion, went 
 into the Bolt-in-Tun coffee-room, and had a good breakfast. 
 I could n't ; because, though I had five-and-twenty shillings 
 of my parents' money, I had none of my own, you see. 
 
 I certainly intended to go without breakfast, and still 
 remember how strongly I had that resolution in my mind. 
 But there was that hour to wait A beautiful August 
 morning, I am very hungry. There is Rasherwell 
 " tucking " away in the coffee-room. I pace the street, as 
 sadly almost as if I had been coming to school, not going 
 thence. I turn into a court by mere chance, I vow it 
 was by mere chance, and there I see a coffee-shop with 
 a placard in the window, Coffee Twopence. Round of but- 
 tered toast, Twopence. And here am I hungry, penniless, 
 with five-and-twenty shillings of my parents' money in my 
 pocket. 
 
192 W. M. THACKERAY. 
 
 What would you have done ? You see I had had my 
 money, and spent it in that pencil-case affair. The five- 
 and-twenty shillings were a trust, by me to be handed 
 over. 
 
 But then would my parents wish their only child to be 
 actually without breakfast ? Having this money, and being 
 so hungry, so very hungry, might n't I take ever so little. 
 Might n't I at home eat as much as I chose ? 
 
 Well, I went into the coffee-shop, and spent fourpence. 
 1 remember the taste of the coffee and toast to this day, 
 a peculiar, muddy, not-sweet-enough, most fragrant coffee, 
 a rich, rancid, yet not-buttered-enough, delicious toast. 
 The waiter had nothing. At any rate, fourpence I know 
 was the sum I spent. And, the hunger appeased, I got on 
 the coach a guilty being. 
 
 At the last stage what is its name ? I have forgotten 
 in seven-and-thirty years there is an inn with a little 
 green and trees before it ; and by the trees there is an open 
 carriage. It is our carriage. Yes, there are Prince and 
 Blucher, the horses ; and my parents in the carriage. Oh ! 
 how I had been counting the days until this one came. 
 Oh ! how happy had I been to see them yesterday ! But 
 there was that fourpence. All the journey down, the toast 
 had choked me, and the coffee poisoned me. 
 
 I was in such a state of remorse about the fourpence, that 
 I forgot the maternal joy and caresses, the tender paternal 
 voice. I pull out the twenty-four shillings and eightpence 
 with a trembling hand. 
 
 " Here 's your money," I gasp out, " which Mr. P 
 
 owes you, all but fourpence. I owed three-and-sixpence to 
 Hawker out of my money for a pencil-case, and I had none 
 left, and I took fourpence of yours, and had some coffee at a 
 shop." 
 
 I suppose I must have been choking whilst uttering this 
 confession. 
 
TUNBRIDGE TOYS. 193 
 
 " My dear boy," says the governor, " why did n't you go 
 and breakfast at the hotel ? " 
 
 " He must be starved," says my mother. 
 
 I had confessed ; I had been a prodigal ; I had been taken 
 back to my parents' arms again. It was not a very great 
 crime as yet, or a very long career of prodigality ; but don't 
 we know that a boy who takes a pin which is not his own, 
 will take a thousand pounds when occasion serves, bring his 
 parents' gray heads with sorrow to the grave, and carry his 
 own to the gallows? Witness the career of Dick Idle, 
 upon whom our friend Mr. Sala has been discoursing. 
 Dick only began by playing pitch-and-toss on a tombstone : 
 playing fair, for what we know ; and even for that sin he 
 was promptly caned by the beadle. The bamboo was in- 
 effectual to cane that reprobate's bad courses out of him. 
 From pitch-and-toss he proceeded to manslaughter if neces- 
 sary : to highway robbery ; to Tyburn and the rope there 
 Ah ! Heaven be thanked, my parents' heads are still above 
 the grass, and mine still out of the noose. 
 
 As I look up from my desk, I see Tunbridge "Wells Com- 
 mon and the rocks, the strange familiar place which I 
 remember forty years ago. Boys saunter over the green 
 with stumps and cricket-bats. Other boys gallop by on the 
 riding-master's hacks. I protest it is Cramp, Riding-Mas- 
 ter, as it used to be in the reign of George IV., and that 
 Centaur Cramp must be at least a hundred years old. 
 Yonder comes a footman with a bundle of novels from the 
 library. Are they as good as our novels ? Oh ! how de- 
 lightful they were ! Shades of Valancour, awful ghost of 
 Manfroni, how I shudder at your appearance ! Sweet 
 image of Thaddeus of Warsaw, how often has this almost 
 infantile hand tried to depict you in a Polish cap and richly 
 embroidered tights ! And as for Corinthian Tom in light 
 blue pantaloons and Hessians, and Jerry Hawthorn from 
 the country, can all the fashion, can all the splendor of real 
 13 
 
194 W. M. THACKERAY. 
 
 life which these eyes have subsequently beheld, can all the 
 wit I have heard or read in later times, compare with your 
 fashion, with your brilliancy, with your delightful grace, and 
 sparkling vivacious rattle ? 
 
 Who knows ? They may have kept those very books at 
 the library still, at the well-remembered library on the 
 Pantiles, where they sell that delightful, useful Tunbridge 
 ware. I will go and see. I went my way to the Pantiles, 
 the queer little old-world Pantiles, where a hundred years 
 since so much good company came to take its pleasure. Is 
 it possible, that in the past century, gentlefolks of the first 
 rank (as I read lately in a Lecture on George II. in this 
 Magazine) assembled here and entertained each other with 
 gaming, dancing, fiddling, and tea? There are fiddlers, 
 harpers, and trumpeters performing at this moment in a 
 weak little old balcony, but where is the fine company? 
 Where are the earls, duchesses, bishops, and magnificent 
 embroidered gamesters ? A half-dozen of children and their 
 nurses are listening to the musicians ; an old lady or two in 
 a poke bonnet passes, and for the rest, I see but an unin- 
 teresting population of native tradesmen. As for the li- 
 brary, its window is full of pictures of burly theologians, and 
 their works, sermons, apologues, and so forth. Can I go in 
 and ask the young ladies at the counter for Manfroni, or the 
 One-Handed Monk, and Life in London, or the Adventures 
 of Corinthian Tom, Jeremiah Hawthorn, Esq., and their 
 friend Bob Logic ? absurd. I turn away abashed from 
 the casement, from the Pantiles, no longer Pantiles, 
 but Parade. I stroll over the Common and survey the 
 beautiful purple hills around, twinkling with a thousand 
 bright villas, which have sprung up over this charming 
 ground since first I saw it. What an admirable scene of 
 peace and plenty ! What a delicious air breathes over the 
 heath, blows the cloud shadows across it, and murmurs 
 through the full-clad trees ! Can the world show a land 
 
TUNBRIDGE TOYS. 195 
 
 fairer, richer, more cheerful ? I see a portion of it when I 
 look up from the window at which I write. But fair scene, 
 green woods, bright terraces gleaming in sunshine, and pur- 
 ple clouds swollen with summer rain nay, the very pages 
 over which my head bends disappear from before my 
 eyes. They are looking backwards, back into forty years 
 off, into a dark room, into a little house hard by on the 
 Common here, in the Bartlemy-tide holidays. The parents 
 have gone to town for two days : the house is all his own, 
 his own and a grim old maid-servant's, and a little boy is 
 seated at night in the lonely drawing-room, poring over 
 Manfrani, or the One- Handed Monk, so frightened that he 
 scarcely dares to turn round. 
 
TO THE MOON. 
 
 BY WILLIAM WORDSWORTH. 
 
 QUEEN of the stars ! so gentle, so benign, 
 That ancient Fable did to thee assign, 
 When darkness creeping o'er thy silver brow 
 Warned thee these upper regions to forego, 
 Alternate empire in the shades below, 
 A Bard, who, lately near the wide-spread sea 
 Traversed by gleaming ships, looked up to thee 
 With grateful thoughts, doth now thy rising hail 
 From the close confines of a shadowy vale. 
 Glory of night, conspicuous yet serene, 
 Nor less attractive when by glimpses seen 
 Through cloudy umbrage, well might that fair face, 
 And all those attributes of modest grace, 
 In days when Fancy wrought unchecked by fear, 
 Down to the green earth fetch thee from thy sphere, 
 To sit in leafy woods by fountains clear ! 
 
 still beloved (for thine, meek Power, are charms 
 That fascinate the very Babe in arms, 
 While he, uplifted towards thee, laughs outright, 
 Spreading his little palms in his glad Mother's sight) 
 O still beloved, once worshipped ! Time, that frowns 
 In his destructive flight on earthly crowns, 
 Spares thy mild splendor ; still those far-shot beams 
 Tremble on dancing waves and rippling streams 
 
TO THE MOON. 197 
 
 With stainless touch, as chaste as when thy praise 
 
 Was sung by Virgin-choirs in festal lays ; 
 
 And through dark trials still dost thou explore 
 
 Thy way for increase punctual as of yore, 
 
 When teeming Matrons yielding to rude faith 
 
 In mysteries of birth and life and death 
 
 And painfiil struggle and deliverance prayed 
 
 Of thee to visit them with lenient aid. 
 
 What though the rites be swept away, the fanes 
 
 Extinct that echoed to the votive strains ; 
 
 Yet thy mild aspect does not, cannot, cease 
 
 Love to promote and purity and peace ; 
 
 And Fancy, unreproved, even yet may trace 
 
 Faint types of suffering in thy beamless face. 
 
 Then, silent Monitress ! let us not blind 
 To worlds unthought of till the searching mind 
 Of Science laid them open to mankind 
 Told, also, how the voiceless heavens declare 
 God's glory ; and acknowledging thy share 
 In that blest charge ; let us without offence 
 To aught of highest, holiest influence 
 Receive whatever good 5 t is given thee to dispense. 
 May sage and simple, catching with one eye 
 The moral intimations of the sky, 
 Learn from thy course, where'er their own be taken, 
 " To look on tempests, and be never shaken " ; 
 To keep with faithful step the appointed way 
 Eclipsing or eclipsed, by night or day, 
 And from example of thy monthly range 
 Gently to brook decline and fatal change ; 
 Meek, patient, steadfast, and with loftier scope, 
 Than thy revival yields, for gladsome hope I 
 
CHARACTER OF WATT. 
 
 BY LORD JEFFREY. 
 
 INDEPENDENTLY of his great attainments in mechan- 
 ics, Mr. Watt was an extraordinary, and in many respects 
 a wonderful man. Perhaps no individual in his age possessed 
 so much and such varied and exact information, had read 
 so much, or remembered what he had read so accurately 
 and well. He had infinite quickness of apprehension, a pro- 
 digious memory, and a certain rectifying and methodizing 
 power of understanding, which extracted something precious 
 out of all that was presented to it. His stores of miscella- 
 neous knowledge were immense, and yet less astonishing 
 than the command he had at all times over them. It 
 seemed as if every subject that was casually started in con 
 versation with him had been that which he had been last 
 occupied in studying and exhausting, such was the copi- 
 ousness, the precision, and the admirable clearness of the 
 information which he poured out upon it without effort or 
 hesitation. Nor was this promptitude and compass of knowl- 
 edge confined in any degree to the studies connected with 
 his ordinary pursuits. That he should have been minutely 
 and extensively skilled in chemistry and the arts, and in 
 most of the branches of physical science, might perhaps have 
 been conjectured ; but it could not have been inferred from 
 his usual occupations, and probably is not generally known, 
 that he was c iriously learned in many branches of antiouity. 
 
CHARACTER OF WATT. 199 
 
 metaphysics, medicine, and etymology, and perfectly at home 
 in all the details of architecture, music, and law. He was 
 well acquainted, too, with most of the modern languages, 
 and familiar with their most recent literature. Nor was it 
 at all extraordinary to hear the great mechanician and 
 engineer detailing and expounding, for hours together, the 
 metaphysical theories of the German logicians, or criticising 
 the measures or the matter of the German poetry. 
 
 His astonishing memory was aided, no doubt, in a great 
 measure, by a still higher and rarer faculty, by his power 
 of digesting and arranging in its proper place all the infor- 
 mation he received, and of casting aside and rejecting, as it 
 were instinctively, whatever was worthless or immaterial. 
 Every conception that was suggested to his mind seemed 
 instantly to take its place among its other rich furniture, and 
 to be condensed into the smallest and most convenient form. 
 He never appeared, therefore, to be at all encumbered or 
 perplexed with the verbiage of the dull books he perused, or 
 the idle talk to which he listened ; but to have at once ex- 
 tracted, by a kind of intellectual alchemy, all that was wor- 
 thy of attention, and to have reduced it, for his own use, to 
 its true value and to its simplest form. And thus it often 
 happened that a great deal more was learned from his brief 
 and vigorous account of the theories and arguments of 
 tedious writers, than an ordinary student could ever have 
 derived from the most painful study of the originals, and 
 that errors and absurdities became manifest, from the mere 
 clearness and plainness of his statement of them, which might 
 have deluded and perplexed most of his hearers without that 
 invaluable assistance. 
 
 It is needless to say that, with those vast resources, his 
 conversation was at all times rich and instructive in no ordi- 
 nary degree : but it was, if possible, still more pleasing than 
 wise, and had all the charms of familiarity, with all the sub- 
 stantial treasures of knowledge. No man could be more 
 
200 LORD JEFFREY. 
 
 social in his spirit, less assuming or fastidious in his man- 
 ners, or more kind and indulgent towards all who ap- 
 proached him. He rather liked to talk, at least in his 
 latter years ; but though he took a considerable share of the 
 conversation, he rarely suggested the topics on which it was 
 to turn, but readily and quietly took up whatever was pre- 
 sented by those around him, and astonished the idle and 
 barren propounders of an ordinary theme by the treasures 
 which he drew from the mine they had unconsciously opened. 
 He generally seemed, indeed, to have no choice or predilec- 
 tion for one subject of discourse rather than another ; but 
 allowed his mind, like a great cyclopaedia, to be opened at 
 any letter his associates might choose to turn up, and only 
 endeavor to select from his inexhaustible stores what might 
 be best adapted to the taste of his present hearers. As to 
 their capacity he gave himself no trouble ; and, indeed, such 
 was his singular talent for making all tilings plain, clear, 
 and intelligible, that scarcely any one could be aware of such 
 a deficiency in his presence. His talk, too, though overflow- 
 ing with information, had no resemblance to lecturing or 
 solemn discoursing, but, on the contrary, was full of collo- 
 quial spirit and pleasantry. He had a certain quiet and 
 grave humor, which ran through most of his conversation, 
 and a vein of temperate jocularity, which gave infinite zest 
 and effect to the condensed and inexhaustible information 
 which formed its main staple and characteristic. There was 
 a little air of affected testiness, and a tone of pretended 
 rebuke and contradiction, with which he used to address 
 his younger friends, that was always felt by them as an en- 
 dearing mark of his kindness and familiarity, and prized 
 accordingly, far beyond all the solemn compliments that ever 
 proceeded from the lips of authority. His voice was deep 
 and powerful, though he commonly spoke in a low and 
 somewhat monotonous tone, which harmonized admirably 
 with the weight and brevity of his observations, and set off 
 
CHARACTER OF WATT. 201 
 
 to the greatest advantage the pleasant anecdotes, which he 
 delivered with the same grave brow, and the same calm 
 smile playing soberly on his lips. There was nothing of 
 effort, indeed, or impatience, any more than of pride or lev- 
 ity, m his demeanor ; and there was a finer expression of 
 reposing strength and mild self-possession in his manner 
 than we ever recollect to have met with in any other person. 
 He had in his character the utmost abhorrence for all sorts 
 of forwardness, parade, and pretensions ; and, indeed, never 
 failed to put all such impostures out of countenance, by the 
 manly plainness and honest intrepidity of his language aud 
 deportment. 
 
 In his temper and dispositions he was not only kind and 
 affectionate* but generous, and considerate of the feelings of 
 all around him, and gave the most liberal assistance and 
 encouragement to all young persons who showed any indi- 
 cations of talent, or applied to him for patronage or advice 
 His health, which was delicate from his youth upwards, 
 seemed to become firmer as he advanced in years ; and he 
 preserved, up almost to the last moment of his existence, 
 not only the full command of his extraordinary intellect, but 
 all the alacrity of spirit and the social gayety which had 
 illumined his happiest days. His friends in this part of the 
 country never saw him more full of intellectual vigor and 
 colloquial animation never more delightful or more in- 
 structive than in his last visit to Scotland in autumn, 
 1817. Indeed, it was after that time that he applied him- 
 self, with all the ardor of early life, to the invention of a 
 machine for mechanically copying all sorts of sculpture and 
 statuary, and distributed among hi a friends some of its 
 earliest performances, as the productions of a young artist 
 just entering on his eighty-third year. 
 
 This happy and useful life came at last to a gentle 
 close. He had suffered some inconvenience through the 
 Bummer, but was not seriously indisposed till within a few 
 
202 LORD JEFFREY. 
 
 weeks from his death. He then became perfectly aware of 
 the event which was approaching ; and, with his usual tran- 
 quillity and benevolence of nature, seemed only anxious to 
 point out to the friends around him the many sources of 
 consolation which were afforded by the circumstances under 
 which it was about to take place. He expressed his sincere 
 gratitude to Providence for the length of days with which 
 he had been blessed, and his exemption from most of the 
 infirmities of age, as well as for the calm and cheerful even- 
 ing of life that he had been permitted to enjoy, after the 
 honorable labors of the day had been concluded. And thus, 
 full of years and honors, in all calmness and tranquillity, he 
 yielded up his soul, without pang or struggle, and passed 
 from the bosom of his family to that of his GOD.' 
 
A DISSERTATION UPON EOAST PIG, 
 
 BY CHARLES LAMB. 
 
 MANKIND, says a Chinese manuscript, which my 
 friend M. was obliging enough to read and explain 
 to me, for the first seventy thousand ages ate their meat 
 raw, clawing or biting it from the living animal, just as 
 they do in Abyssinia to this day. This period is not 
 obscurely hinted at by their great Confucius in the second 
 chapter of his Mundane Mutations, where he designates a 
 kind of golden age by the term Cho-fang, literally the 
 Cooks' Holiday. The manuscript goes on to say, that the 
 art of roasting, or rather broiling (which I take to be 
 the elder brother) was accidentally discovered in the 
 manner following: The swineherd, Ho-ti, having gone 
 out into the woods one morning, as his manner was, to 
 collect mast for his hogs, left his cottage in the care of 
 his eldest son, Bo-bo, a great lubberly boy, who being 
 fond of playing with fire, as yonkers of his age commonly 
 are, let some sparks escape into a bundle of straw, which 
 kindling quickly, spread the conflagration over every part 
 of their poor mansion, till it was reduced to ashes. To- 
 gether with the cottage, (a sorry antedeluvian makeshift 
 of a building, you may think it,) what was of much more 
 importance, a fine litter of new-farrowed pigs, no less 
 than nine in number, perished. China pigs have been 
 esteemed a luxury all over the East, from the remotest 
 
204 CHARLES LAMB. 
 
 
 
 periods that we read of. Bo-bo was in the utmost conster- 
 nation, as you may think, not so much for the sake of the 
 tenement, which his father and he could easily build up 
 again with a few dry branches, and the labor of an hour 
 or two. at any time, as for the loss of the pigs. While he 
 was thinking what he should say to his father, and wring- 
 ing his hands over the smoking remnants of one of th 
 untimely sufferers, an odor assailed his nostrils, unlike I 
 scent which he had before experienced. AVhat could it pro- 
 1 from? not from the burnt cottage, he had smelt 
 that smell before, indeed this was by no means the tirst 
 
 Ment of the kind which had occurred through the D 
 licence of this unlucky young firebrand. Much less did it 
 mble that of any known herb, weed, or flower. A pre- 
 monitory moistening at the same time overflowed his nether 
 lip. He knew not what to think. He next stooped down 
 to feel the pig, if there were any signs of life in it. He 
 burnt his lingers, and to cool them he applied them in his 
 booby fashion to his mouth. Some of the crumbs of the 
 scorched skin had come away with his lingers, and for the 
 first time in his life (in the world's life indeed, for before 
 him no man had known it) he tasted crackling.' Again 
 he felt and fumbled at the pig. It did not burn him so much 
 now, still he licked his lingers from a sort of habit. The 
 truth at length broke into his slow understanding, that it 
 was the pig that smelt so. and the pig that tasted so deli- 
 cious : and surrendering himself up to the new-born plea- 
 sure, he fell to tearing up whole handful s of the scorched 
 skin with the flesh next it. and was cramming it down his 
 throat in his beastly lashion. when his sire entered amid 
 the smoking rafters, armed with retributory cudgel, and 
 finding how affairs stood, began to rain blows upon the 
 young rogue's shoulders, as thick as hailstones, which 
 Bo-bo heeded not any more than if they had been flies. 
 The tickling pleasure, which he experienced in his lower 
 
A DISSERTATION UPON ROAST PIG. 205 
 
 regions, had rendered him quite callous to any inconve- 
 r.i.-iices he might feel in those remote quarters. His 
 father ini^lit lay on, hut he could not beat him from his 
 '11 he ha<l fairly made an end of it, when, becoming 
 a little more sensible of his situation, something like the 
 following dialogue ciiMi<-d. 
 
 4 - You graceless whelp, what have you got there de- 
 vouring? Is it not enough that you hav- burnt rue down 
 ili re.- houses with your dogs tricks, and be lunged to 
 you! but you must be eating fire, and I know not what; 
 what have you got there, I say ? " 
 
 "O father, the pig, the pig! do come and taste how 
 nice the burnt pig eats." 
 
 Tin- cars of Ho-ti tingled with horror. He cursed his 
 son, and he cursed himself that ever he should beget a 
 son that should eat burnt pig. 
 
 Bo-bo, whose scent was wonderfully sharpened since 
 morning, soon raked out another pig, and fairly rending 
 it asunder, thrust the lesser half by main force into the 
 fists of Ho-ti, still shouting out, " Eat, eat, eat the burnt 
 pig, father, only taste ; O Lord ! " with such-like barba- 
 rous ejaculations, cramming all the while as if he would 
 choke. 
 
 Ho-ti trembled every joint while he grasped the abom- 
 inable thing, wavering whether he should not put his son 
 to death for an unnatural young monster, when the crack- 
 ling scorching hi- fingers, as it had done his son's, and 
 applying the same remedy to them, he in his turn tasted 
 some of its flavor, which, make what sour mouths he 
 would for a pretence, proved not altogether displeasing to 
 him. In conclusion (for the manuscript here is a little 
 tedious) both father arid son fairly set down to the mess, 
 and never left off till they had despatched all that remained 
 of the litter. 
 
 Bo-bo was strictly enjoined not to let the secret escape, 
 
206 CHARLES LAMB. 
 
 for the neighbors would certainly have stoned them for a 
 couple of abominable wretches, who could think of im- 
 proving upon the good meat which God had sent them. 
 Nevertheless, strange stories got about. It was observed 
 that Ho-ti's cottage was burnt down now more frequently 
 than ever. Nothing but fires from this time forwa.d. 
 Some would break out in broad day, others in the night 
 time. As often as the sow farrowed, so sure was the 
 house of Ho-ti to be in a blaze ; and Ho-ti himself, which 
 was the more remarkable, instead of chastising his son, 
 seemed to grow more indulgent to him than ever. At 
 length they were watched, the terrible mystery discovered, 
 and father and son summoned to take their trial at Pekin, 
 then an inconsiderable assize town. Evidence was given, 
 the obnoxious food itself produced in court, and verdict 
 about to be pronounced, when the foreman of the jury 
 begged that some of the burnt pig, of which the culprits 
 stood accused, might be handed into the box. He han- 
 dled it, and they all handled it ; and burning their fingers, 
 as Bo-bo and his father had done before them, and nature 
 prompting to each of them the same remedy, against 
 the face of all the* facts, and the clearest charge which 
 judge had ever given, to the surprise of the whole court, 
 townsfolks, strangers, reporters, and all present, without 
 leaving the box, or any manner of consultation whatever, 
 they brought in a simultaneous verdict of Not Guilty. 
 
 The judge, who was a shrewd fellow, winked at the 
 manifest iniquity of the decision ; and when the court was 
 dismissed, went privily, and bought up all the pigs that 
 could be had for love or money. In a few days his Lord- 
 ship's town-house was observed to be on fire. The thing 
 took wing, and now there was nothing to be seen but fire 
 in every direction. Fuel and pigs grew enormously dear 
 all over the district. The insurance offices one and all 
 shut up shop. People built slighter and slighter every 
 
A DISSERTATION UPON ROAST PIG. 207 
 
 day, until it was feared that the very science of architec- 
 ture would iii no long time be lost to the world. Thus 
 this custom of firing houses continued, till in process of 
 time, says my manuscript, a sage arose, like our Locke, 
 who made a discovery, that the flesh of swine, or indeed 
 of any other animal, might be cooked (burnt, as they 
 called it) without the necessity of consuming a whole 
 house to dress it. Then first began the rude form of a 
 gridiron. Roasting by the string or spit came in a cen- 
 tury or two later ; I forget in whose dynasty. By such 
 slow degrees, concludes the manuscript, do the most use- 
 ful, and seemingly the most obvious arts make their way 
 among mankind. 
 
 Without placing too implicit faith in the account above 
 given, it must be agreed, that if a worthy pretext for so 
 dangerous an experiment as setting houses on fire (especially 
 in these days) could be assigned in favor of any culinary 
 object, that pretext and excuse might be found in ROAST 
 PIG. 
 
 Of all the delicacies in the whole mundus edibilis, I will 
 maintain it to be the most delicate princeps obsoniorum. 
 
 I speak not of your grown porkers things between pig 
 and pork those hobbydehoys but a young and tender 
 suckling under a moon old guiltless as yet of the 
 sty with no original speck of the amor immunditice, the 
 hereditary failing of the first parent, yet manifest his 
 voice as yet not broken, but something between a childish 
 treble and a grumble the mild forerunner, or prcdudium 
 of a grunt. 
 
 He must be roasted. I am not ignorant that our ances- 
 tors ate them seethed, or boiled, but what a sacrifice of 
 the exterior tegument ! 
 
 There is no flavor comparable, I will contend, to that of 
 the crisp, tawny, well-watched, not over-roasted, crackling, 
 as it is well called, the very teeth are invited to their 
 
208 CHARLES LAMB. 
 
 share of the pleasure at this banquet in overcoming the 
 coy, brittle resistance, with the adhesive oleaginous 
 O call it not fat ! but an indefinable sweetness growing 
 up to it, the tender blossoming of fat fat cropped in 
 the bud taken in the shoot in the first innocence 
 the cream and quintessence of the child-pig's yet pure 
 
 food, the lean, no lean, but a kind of animal manna, 
 
 or, rather, fat and lean (if it must be so) so blended and 
 running into each other, that both together make but one 
 ambrosian result, or common substance. 
 
 Behold him, while he is " doing " it seemeth rather a 
 refreshing warmth, than a scorching heat, that he is so 
 passive to. How equably he twirleth round the string ! 
 Now he is just done. To see the extreme sensibility of 
 that tender age ! he hath wept out his pretty eyes radi- 
 ant jellies shooting stars. 
 
 See him m the dish, his second cradle, how meek he 
 lieth ! wouldst thou have had this innocent grow up to 
 the grossness and indocility which too often accompany 
 maturer swinehood ? Ten to one he would have proved a 
 glutton, a sloven, an obstinate, disagreeable animal 
 wallowing in all manner of filthy conversation, from 
 these sins he is happily snatched away, 
 
 Ere sin could blight or sorrow fade, 
 Death came with timely care 
 
 his memory is odoriferous, no clown curseth, while his 
 stomach half rejecteth, the rank bacon, no coal-heaver 
 bolteth him in reeking sausages, he hath a fair sepulchre 
 in the grateful stomach of the judicious epicure, and for 
 such a tomb might be content to die. 
 
 He is the best of sapors. Pineapple is great. She is 
 indeed almost too transcendent a delight, if not sinful, 
 yet so like to sinning that really a tender conscienced per- 
 son would do well to pause too ravishing for mortal taste, 
 
A DISSERTATION UPON ROAST PIG. 209 
 
 she woundeth and excoriateth the lips that approach her 
 like lovers' kisses, she biteth she is a pleasure bordering 
 on pain from the fierceness and insanity of her relish 
 but she stoppeth at the palate she meddleth not with the 
 appetite and the coarsest hunger might barter her con- 
 sistently for a mutton chop. 
 
 Pig let me speak his praise is no less provocative 
 of the appetite, than he is satisfactory to the criticalness of 
 the censorious palate. The strong man may batten on him, 
 and the weakling refuseth not his mild juices. 
 
 Unlike to mankind's mixed characters, a bundle of virtues 
 and vices, inexplicably intertwisted, and not to be un- 
 ravelled without hazard, he is good throughout. No 
 part of him is better or worse than another. He helpeth, 
 as far as his little means extend, all around. He is the 
 least envious of banquets. He is all neighbor's fare. 
 
 I am one of those, who freely and ungrudgingly impart 
 a share of the good things of this life which fall to their 
 lot, (few as mine are in this kind) to a friend. I protest 
 I take as great an interest in my friend's pleasures, his 
 relishes, and proper satisfactions, as in mine own. ** Pres- 
 sents," I often say, " endear Absents." Hares, pheasants, 
 partridges, snipes, barn-door chickens, (those " tame vil- 
 latic fowl,") capons, plovers, brawn, barrels of oysters, I 
 dispense as freely as I receive them. I love to taste them, 
 as it were, upon the tongue of my friend. But a stop 
 must be put somewhere. One wouid not, like Lear, "give 
 everything." I make my stand upon pig Methinks it is 
 an ingratitude to the Giver of all good flavors, to extra- 
 domiciliate, or send out of the house, slightingly, (under 
 pretext of friendship, or I know not what.) a blessing so 
 particularly adapted, predestined, I may say, to my indi- 
 vidual palate It argues an insensibility. 
 
 I remember a touch of conscience in this kind at school. 
 My good old aunt, who never parted from me at the end 
 14 
 
210 CHARLES LAMB. 
 
 of a holiday without stuffing a sweetmeat, or some nice 
 thing, into my pocket, had dismissed me one evening with 
 a smoking plum-cake fresh from the oven. In my way to 
 school (it was over London bridge) a grayheaded old beg- 
 gar saluted me (I have no doubt, at this time of day. that 
 he was a counterfeit.) i had no pence to console him with, 
 and in the vanity of self-denial, and the very coxcombry of 
 charity, schoolboy-like, I made him a present of the 
 whole cake ! I walked on a little, buoyed up, as one is on 
 such occasions, with a sweet soothing of self-satisfaction; 
 but before I had got to the end of the bridge, my better 
 feelings returned, and I burst into tears, thinking how 
 ungrateful I had been to my good aunt, to go and give her 
 good gift away to a stranger that I had never seen before, 
 and who might be a bad man for aught I knew ; and then 
 I thought of the pleasure my aunt would be taking in 
 thinking that I I myself, and not another would eat 
 her nice cake, and what should I say to her the next 
 time I saw her, how naughty I was to part with her 
 pretty present! and the odor of that spicy cake came 
 back upon my recollection, and the pleasure and the curi- 
 osity I had taken in seeing her make it, and her joy when 
 she sent it to the oven, and how disappointed she would 
 feel that I had never had a bit of it in my mouth at last, 
 and I blamed my impertinent spirit of alms-giving, and out- 
 of-place hypocrisy of goodness ; and above all I wished 
 never to see the face again of that insidious, good-for- 
 nothing, old gray impostor. 
 
 Our ancestors were nice in their method of sacrificing 
 these tender victims. We read of pigs whipt to death with 
 something of a shock, as we hear of any other obsolete 
 custom. The age of cli.-cipline is gone by, or it would be 
 curious to inquire (in a philosophical light merely) what 
 effect this process might have towards intenerating and 
 dulcifying a substance, naturally so mild and dulcet as the 
 
A DISSERTATION UPON ROAST PIG. 211 
 
 flesh of young pigs. It looks like refining a violet. Yet 
 we should be cautious, while we condemn the inhumanity, 
 how we censure the wisdom of the practice. It might 
 impart a gusto. 
 
 I remember an hypothesis, argued upon by the youiig 
 students, when I was at St. Omer's, and maintained with 
 much learning and pleasantry on both sides, " Whether, 
 supposing that the flavor of a pig who obtained his death 
 by whipping (per flagellationem extremam), superadded a 
 pleasure upon the palate of a man more intense than any 
 possible suffering we can conceive in the animal, is man 
 justified in using that method of putting the animal to 
 death ? " I forget the decision. 
 
 His sauce should be considered. Decidedly, a few 
 bread-crumbs, done up with his liver and brains, and a dash 
 of mild sage. But banish, dear Mrs. Cook, I beseech 
 you, the whole onion tribe. Barbecue your whole hogs to 
 your palate, steep them in shalots, stuff them out with 
 plantations of the rank and guilty garlic; you cannot 
 poison them, or make them stronger than they are, but 
 consider, he is a weakling a flower. 
 
ALL'S WELL. 
 
 BY D. A. WASSON. 
 
 SWEET- VOICED Hope, thy fine discourse 
 Foretold not half life's good to me ; 
 Thy painter, Fancy, hath not force 
 To show how sweet it is to be ! 
 Thy witching dream 
 And pictured scheme 
 To match the fact still want the power ; 
 Thy promise brave 
 From birth to grave 
 Life's bloom may beggar in an hour. 
 
 Ask and receive, 't is sweetly said ; 
 Yet what to plead for know I not ; 
 For Wish is worsted, Hope o'ersped, 
 And aye to thanks returns my thought 
 
 If I would pray, 
 
 I 've naught to say 
 But this, that God may be God still, 
 
 For Him to live 
 
 Is still to give, 
 And sweeter than my wish his will. 
 
 O wealth of life beyond all bound ! 
 Eternity each moment given ! 
 
ALL 'S WELL. 213 
 
 What plummet may the Present sound? 
 Who promises & future heaven? 
 
 Or glad, or grieved, 
 
 Oppressed, relieved, 
 In blackest night, or brightest day, 
 
 Still pours the flood 
 
 Of golden good, 
 And more than heartfull fills me aye. 
 
 My wealth is common ; I possess 
 
 No petty province, but the whole ; 
 What 's mine alone is mine far less 
 Than treasure shared by every souL 
 
 Talk not of store, 
 
 Millions or more, 
 Of values which the purse may hold, 
 
 But this divine ! 
 
 I own the mine 
 Whose grains outweigh a planet's gold. 
 
 I have a stake in every star, 
 
 In every beam that fills the day ; 
 AH hearts of men my coffers are, 
 My ores arterial tides convey ; 
 
 The fields, the skies, 
 
 And sweet replies 
 Of thought to thought are my gold-dust, 
 
 The oaks, the brooks, 
 
 And speaking looks 
 Of lovers' faith and friendship's trust. 
 
 Life's youngest tides joy-brimming flow 
 
 For him who lives above all years, 
 Who all-immortal makes the Now, 
 
 And is not ta'en in Time's arrears, 
 
214 D. A. WASSON. 
 
 His life's a hymn 
 
 The seraphim 
 Might hark to hear or help to sing, 
 
 And to his soul 
 
 The boundless whole 
 Its bounty all doth daily bring. 
 
 u All mine is thine," the sky-soul saith ; 
 " The wealth I am, must thou become 
 Richer and richer, breath by breath, 
 Immortal gain, immortal room ! " 
 
 And since all his 
 
 Mine also is, 
 Life's gift outruns my fancies far, 
 
 And drowns the dream 
 
 In larger stream, 
 As morning drinks the morning-star. 
 
CARLAVERO'S BOTTLE 
 
 t 
 
 BY CHAKLES DICKENS. 
 
 THE rising of the Italian people from under their unut- 
 terable wrongs, and the tardy burst of day upon them 
 after the long, long night of oppression that has darkened 
 their beautiful country, has naturally caused my mind to 
 dwell often of late on my own small wanderings in Italy. 
 Connected with them is a curious little drama, in which the 
 character I myself sustained was so very subordinate, that I 
 may relate its story without any fear of being suspected of 
 self-display. It is strictly a true story. 
 
 I am newly arrived one summer evening, in a certain 
 small town on the Mediterranean. I have had my dinner 
 at the inn, and I and the mosquitoes are coming out into the 
 streets together. It is far from Naples ; but a bright brown 
 plump little woman-servant at the inn is a Neapolitan, and 
 is so vivaciously expert in pantomimic action, that in the 
 single moment of answering my request to have a pair 
 of shoes cleaned which I left up-stairs, she plies imaginary 
 brushes, and goes completely through the motions of polish- 
 ing the shoes up, and laying them at my feet. I smile at the 
 brisk little woman in perfect satisfaction with her briskness ; 
 and the brisk little woman, amiably pleased with me be- 
 cause I am pleased with her, claps her hands and laughs 
 delightfully. We are in the inn yard. As the little 
 woman's bright eyes sparkle on the cigarette I am smoking 
 
210 CHARLES DICKENS. 
 
 I make bold to offer her one ; she accepts it none the less 
 merrily because I touch a most charming little dimple in 
 her fat cheek with its light paper end. Glancing up at the 
 many green lattices, to assure herself that the mistress is not 
 looking on, the little woman then puts her two little dimpled 
 arms akimbo, and stands on tiptoe to light her cigarette at 
 mine. "And now, dear little sir," says she, puffing out 
 smoke in a most innocent and cherubic manner,^' keep quite 
 straight on, take the first to the right, and probably you will 
 see him standing at his door." 
 
 I have a commission to " him." and I have been inquiring 
 about him. I have carried the commission about Italy sev- 
 eral months. Before I left England, there came to me one 
 night a certain generous and gentle English nobleman, he 
 is dead in these days when I relate the story, and exiles 
 have lost their best British friend, with this request : 
 " Whenever you come to such a town, will you seek out one 
 Giovanni Carlavero, who keeps a little wine-shop there. 
 Mention my name to him suddenly, and observe how it 
 affects him ? " I accepted the trust, and am on my way to 
 discharge it. 
 
 The sirocco has been blowing all day, and it is a hot, un- 
 wholesome evening, with no cool sea-breeze. Mosquitoes 
 and fireflies are lively enough, but most other creatures are 
 faint. The coquettish airs of pretty young women in the 
 tiniest and wickedest of dolls' straw hats, who lean out at 
 open lattice blinds, are almost the only airs stirring. Very 
 ugly and haggard old women with distaffs, and with a gray 
 tow upon them that looks as if they were spinning out their 
 own hair, (I suppose they were once pretty, too, but it is 
 very difficult to believe so,) sit on the footway leaning 
 against house-walls. Everybody who has come for water 
 to the fountain stays there, and seems incapable of any such 
 energetic idea as going home. Vespers are over, though 
 not so long but that I can smell the heavy resinous incense 
 
CARLAVEEO'S BOTTLE. 217 
 
 as I pass the church. Xo man seems to be af work, save 
 the coppersmith. In an Italian town he is always at work, 
 and always thumping in the deadliest manner. 
 
 I keep straight on, and come in due time to the first on 
 the right : a narrow, dull street, where I see a well-favored 
 man of good stature and military bearing, in a great cloak, 
 standing at a door. Drawing nearer to this threshold, I see 
 it is the threshold of a small wine-shop ; and I can just make 
 out, in the dim light, the inscription that it is kept by Gio- 
 s-anni Carlavero. 
 
 I touch my hat to the figure in the cloak, and pass in, and 
 draw a stool to a little table. The lamp (just such another 
 as they dig out of Pompeii) is lighted, but the place is emp- 
 ty. The figure in the cloak has followed me in, and stands 
 before me. 
 
 " The master ? " 
 
 " At your service, sir." 
 
 " PJease to give me a glass of the wine of the country." 
 
 He turns to a little counter, to get it. As his striking 
 face is pale, and his action is evidently that of an enfeebled 
 man, I remark that I fear he has been ill. It is not much, 
 he courteously and gravely answers, though bad while it 
 lasts : the fever. 
 
 As he sets the wine on the little table, to his manifest 
 surprise I lay my hand on the back of his, look him in the 
 face, and say in a low voice : " I am an Englishman, and 
 you are acquainted with a friend .of mine. Do you recol- 
 lect ? " and I mention the name of my generous coun- 
 tryman. 
 
 Instantly he utters a loud cry, bursts into tears, and falls 
 on his knees at my feet, clasping my legs in both his arms 
 and bowing his head to the ground. 
 
 Some years ago, this man at my feet, whose overfraught 
 heart is heaving as if it would burst from his breast, and 
 whose tears are wet upon the dress I wear, was a galley- 
 
218 CHARLES DICKENS. 
 
 slave in the North of Italy. He was a political offender, 
 having been concerned in the then last rising, and was sen- 
 tenced to imprisonment for life. That he would have died 
 in his chains is certain, but for the circumstance that the 
 Englishman happened to visit his prison. 
 
 It was one of the vile old prisons of Italy, and a part of 
 it was below the .waters of the harbor. The place of his 
 confinement was an arched underground and under-water 
 gallery, with a grill-gate at the entrance, through which it 
 received such light and air as it got. Its condition was 
 insufferably foul, and a stranger could hardly breathe in it, 
 or see in it with the aid of a torch. At the upper end of 
 this dungeon, and consequently in the worst position, as 
 being the farthest removed from h'ght and air, the English- 
 man first beheld him, sitting on an iron bedstead, to which 
 he was chained by a heavy chain. His countenance im- 
 pressed the Englishman as having nothing in common with 
 the faces of the malefactors with whom he was associated, 
 and he talked with him, and learned how he came to be 
 there. 
 
 When the Englishman emerged from the dreadful den 
 into the light of day, he asked his conductor, the governor 
 of the jail, why Giovanni Carlavero was put into the worst 
 place. 
 
 " Because he is particularly recommended," was the strin- 
 gent answer. 
 
 " Recommended, that is to say, for death ? " 
 
 " Excuse me ; particularly recommended," was again the 
 answer. 
 
 " He has a bad tumor in his neck, no doubt occasioned by 
 the hardship of his miserable life. If it continues to be neg- 
 lected, and he remains where he is, it will kill him." 
 
 " Excuse me, I can do nothing. He is particularly rec- 
 ommended." 
 
 The Englishman was staying in that town, and he went 
 
CARLAVERO'S BOTTLE 219 
 
 to his home there ; but the figure of this man chained to the 
 bedstead made it no home, and destroyed his rest and peace. 
 He was an Englishman of an extraordinarily tender heart, 
 and he could not bear the picture. He went back to the 
 prison gate : went back again and again, and talked to the 
 man and cheered him. He used his utmost influence to get 
 the man unchained from the bedstead, were it only for ever 
 &o short a time in the day, and permitted to come to the 
 grate. It took a long time, but the Englishman's station, 
 personal character, and steadiness of purpose wore out oppo- 
 sition so far, and that grace was at last accorded. Through 
 the bars, when he could thus get light upon the tumor, the 
 Englishman lanced it, and it did well, and healed. His 
 strong interest in the prisoner had greatly increased by this 
 time, and he formed the desperate resolution that he would 
 exert his utmost self-devotion and use his utmost efforts to 
 get Carlavero pardoned. 
 
 If the prisoner had been a brigand and a murderer, if he 
 had committed every non-political crime in the Newgate 
 Calendar and out of it, nothing would have been easier than 
 for a man of any court or priestly influence to obtain his re- 
 lease. As it was, nothing could have been more difficult. 
 Italian authorities, and English authorities who had interest 
 with them, alike assured the Englishman that his object was 
 hopeless. He met with nothing but evasion, refusal, and 
 ridicule. His political prisoner became a joke in the place. 
 It was especially observable that English Circumlocution, 
 and English Society on its travels, were as humorous on the 
 subject as Circumlocution and Society may be on any subject 
 without loss of caste. But the Englishman possessed (and 
 proved it well in his life) a courage very uncommon among 
 us ; he had not the least fear of being considered a bore, in 
 .a good, humane cause. So he went on persistently trying, 
 and trying, and trying to get Giovanni Carlavero out. 
 That prisoner had been rigorously rechained, after the tumor 
 
220 CHARLES DICKENS. 
 
 operation, and it was not likely that his miserable life could 
 last very long. 
 
 One day, when all the town knew about the Englishman 
 and his political prisoner, there came to the Englishman a 
 certain sprightly Italian advocate of whom he had some 
 knowledge ; and he made this strange proposal : " Give me 
 a hundred pounds to obtain Carlavero's release. I think I 
 can get him a pardon with that money. But I cannot tell 
 you what I am going to do with the money, nor must you 
 ever ask me the question if I succeed, nor must you ever 
 ask me for an account of the money if I fail." The English- 
 man decided to hazard the hundred pounds. He did so, and 
 heard not another word of the matter. For half a year and 
 more the advocate made no sign, and never once "took 
 on" in any way to have the subject on his mind. The 
 Englishman was then obliged to change his residence to 
 another and more famous town in the North of Italy. He 
 parted from the poor prisoner with a sorrowful heart, as 
 from a doomed man for whom there was no release but 
 Death. 
 
 The Englishman lived in his new place of abode another 
 half-year or more, and had no tidings of the wretched pris- 
 oner. At length, one day, he received from the advocate a 
 cool, concise, mysterious note, to this effect. " If you still 
 wish to bestow that benefit upon the man in whom you were 
 once interested, send me fifty pounds more, and I think it 
 can be insured." Now, the Englishman had long settled in 
 his mind that the advocate was a heartless sharper, who 
 had preyed upon his credulity and his interest hi an unfor- 
 tunate sufferer. So he sat down and wrote a dry answer, 
 giving the advocate to understand that he was wiser now 
 than he had been formerly, and that no more money was 
 extractable from his pocket. 
 
 He lived outside the city gates, some mile or two from the 
 post-office, and was accustomed to walk into the city with 
 
CARLAVERO'S BOTTLE. 221 
 
 hit> letters and post them himself. On a lovely spring day, 
 when the sky was exquisitely blue, and the sea divinely 
 beautiful, he took his usual walk, carrying this letter to the 
 advocate in his pocket. As he went along, his gentle heart 
 was much moved by the loveliness of the prospect, and by 
 the thought of the slowly-dying prisoner chained to the bed- 
 stead, for whom the universe had no delights. As he drew 
 nearer and nearer to the city where he was to post the let- 
 ter, he became veiy uneasy in his mind. He debated witli 
 himself, was it remotely possible, after all, that this sum of 
 fifty pounds could restore the fellow-creature whom he pitied 
 so much, and for whom he had striven so hard, to liberty ? 
 He was not a conventionally rich Englishman, very far 
 from that, but he had a spare fifty pounds at the banker's. 
 
 He resolved to risk it. Without doubt, GOD has recom- 
 pensed him for the resolution. 
 
 He went to the banker's, and got a bill for the amount, 
 and enclosed it in a letter to the advocate that I wish I 
 could have seen. He simply told the advocate that he was 
 quite a poor man, and that he was sensible it might be a 
 great weakness in him to part with so much money on the 
 faith of so vague a communication ; but that there it was, 
 and that he prayed the advocate to make a good use of it. 
 If he did otherwise, no good could ever come of it, and it 
 would lie heavy on his soul one day. 
 
 "Within a week, the Englishman was sitting at his break- 
 fast, when he heard some suppressed sounds of agitation on 
 the staircase, and Giovanni Carlavero leaped into his room 
 and fell upon his breast, a free man ! 
 
 Conscious of having wronged the advocate in his own 
 thoughts, the Englishman wrote him an earnest and grateful 
 letter, avowing the fact, and entreating him to confide by 
 what means and through what agency he had succeeded so 
 well. The advocate returned for answer through the post : 
 "There are many things, as you know, in this Italv of 
 
222 CHARLES DICKENS. 
 
 ours thai are safest and best not even spoken of, far less 
 written of. We may meet some day, and then I may tell 
 you what you want to know ; not here, and now." But the 
 two never did meet again. The advocate was dead wheu 
 the Englishman gave me my trust ; and how the man had 
 been set free remained as great a mystery to the English- 
 man, and to the man himself, as it was to me. 
 
 But I knew this : here was the man, this sultry night, 
 on his knees at my feet, because I was the Englishman's 
 friend ; here were his tears upon my dress ; here were his 
 sobs, choking his utterance ; here were his kisses on my 
 hands, because they had touched the hands that had worked 
 out his release. He had no need to tell me it would be hap- 
 piness to him to die for his benefactor : I doubt if I ever saw 
 real, sterling, fervent gratitude of soul before or since. 
 
 He was much watched and suspected, he said, and had 
 had enough to do to keep himself out of trouble. This, and 
 his not having prospered in his worldly affairs, had led to 
 his having failed in his usual communications to the English- 
 man for as I now remember the period some two or 
 three years. But his prospects were brighter, and his wife, 
 who had been very ill, had recovered, and his fever had left 
 him, and he had bought a little vineyard, and would I carry 
 to his benefactor the first of its wine ? Ay, that I would (I 
 told him with enthusiasm), and not a drop of it should be 
 spilled or lost ! 
 
 He had cautiously closed the door before speaking of him- 
 self, and had talked with such excess of emotion, and in a 
 provincial Italian so difficult to understand, that I had more 
 than once been obliged to stop him, and beg him to have 
 compassion on me and be slower and calmer. By degrees 
 he became so, and tranquilly walked back with me to the 
 hotel. There I sat down before I went to bed and wrote a 
 faithful account of him to the Englishman : which I con- 
 cluded by saying that I would bring the wine home, against 
 any difficulties, every drop. 
 
CARLAVERO'S BOTTLE. 223 
 
 Early next morning, when I came out at the hotel door to 
 pursue my journey, I found my friend waiting with one of 
 those immense bottles in which the Italian peasants store 
 their wine, a bottle holding some half-dozen gallons, 
 bound round with basket-work for greater safety on the jour- 
 ney. I see him now, in the bright sunlight, tears of grati- 
 tude in his eyes, proudly inviting my attention to this 
 corpulent bottle. (At the street corner hard by, two high- 
 flavored, able-bodied monks, pretending to talk together, 
 but keeping their four evil, eyes upon us.) 
 
 How the bottle had been got there did not appear ; but 
 the difficulty of getting it into the ramshackle vetturino car- 
 riage in which I was departing was so great, and it took up 
 so much room when it was got in, that I elected to sit out- 
 side. The last I saw of Giovanni Carlavero was his running 
 through the town by the side of the jingling wheels, clasping 
 my hand as I stretched it down from the box, charging me 
 with a thousand last loving and dutiful messages to his dear 
 patron, and finally looking in at the bottle as it reposed 
 inside, with an admiration of its honorable way of travelling 
 that was beyond measure delightful. 
 
 And now, what disquiet of mind this dearly-beloved and 
 highly-treasured Bottle began to cost me no man knows. 
 It was my precious charge through a long tour, and for hun- 
 dreds of miles I never had it off my mind by day or by 
 night. Over bad roads, and they were many, I clung 
 to it with affectionate desperation. Up mountains, I looked 
 in at it and saw it helplessly tilting over on its back, with 
 terror. At innumerable inn doors, when the weather was 
 bad, I was obliged to be put into my vehicle before the Bot- 
 tle could be got in, and was obliged to have the Bottle lifted 
 out before human aid could come near me. The Imp of the 
 same name, except that his associations were all. evil and 
 these associations were all good, would have been a les 
 troublesome travel] ing-companion. I might have served 
 
224 CHARLES DICKENS. 
 
 Mr. Cruikshank as a subject for a new illustration of tho 
 miseries of the Bottle. The National Temperance Society 
 might have made a powerful Tract of me. 
 
 The suspicions that attached to this innocent Bottle great- 
 ly aggravated my difficulties. It was like the apple-pie in 
 the child's book. Parma pouted at it, Modena mocked it, 
 Tuscany tackled it, Naples nibbled it, Rome refused it, Aus- 
 tria accused it, Soldiers suspected it, Jesuits jobbed it. I 
 composed a neat oration, developing my inoffensive inten- 
 tions in connection with this Bottle, and delivered it in an 
 infinity of guard-houses, at a multitude of town-gates, and 
 on every drawbridge, angle, and rampart of a complete sys- 
 tem of fortifications. Fifty times a day I got down to ha- 
 rangue an infuriated soldiery about the Bottle. Through the 
 filthy degradation of the abject and vile Roman states I had 
 as much difficulty in working my way with the Bottle, as if 
 it had bottled up a complete system of heretical theology. In 
 the Neapolitan country, where everybody was a spy, a sol- 
 dier, a priest, or a lazzarone, the shameless beggars of all 
 four denominations incessantly pounced on the Bottle, and 
 made it a pretext for extorting money from me. Quires 
 quires do I say ? reams of forms illegibly printed on whity- 
 brown paper were filled up about the Bottle, and it was the 
 subject of more stamping and sanding than I had ever seen 
 before. In consequence of which haze of sand, perhaps, it 
 was always irregular, and always latent with dismal penal- 
 ties of going back, or not going forward, which were only to 
 be abated by the silver crossing of a base hand, poked shirt- 
 less out of a ragged uniform sleeve. Under all discourage- 
 ments, however, I stuck to my Bottle, and held firm to my 
 resolution that every drop of its contents should reach the 
 Bottle's destination. 
 
 The latter refinement cost me a separate heap of troubles 
 on its own separate account. What corkscrews did I see 
 the mih'tary power bring out against that Bottle : what gini- 
 
CABLAVERO'S BOTTLE. 225 
 
 lets, spikes, divining-rods, gauges, and unknown tests and 
 instruments ! At some places they persisted in declaring 
 that the wine must not be passed, without being opened and 
 tasted ; I, pleading to the contrary, used then to argue the 
 question seated on the Bottle, lest they should open it in 
 spite of me. In the southern parts of Italy, more violent 
 shrieking, face-making, and gesticulating, greater vehemence 
 of speech and countenance and action, went on about that 
 Bottle than would attend fifty murders in a northern lati- 
 tude. It raised important functionaries out of their beds in 
 the dead of night. I have known half a dozen military lan- 
 terns to disperse themselves at all points of a great sleeping 
 piazza, each lantern summoning some official creature to get 
 up, put on his cocked hat instantly, and come and stop the 
 Bottle. It was characteristic, that, while this innocent Bottle 
 had such immense difficulty in getting from little town to 
 town, Signor Mazzini and the fiery cross were traversing 
 Italy from end to end. 
 
 Still I stuck to my Bottle, like any fine old English gen- 
 tleman all of the olden time. The more the Bottle was in- 
 terfered with, the stancher I became (if possible) in my 
 first determination that my countryman should have it deliv- 
 ered to him intact, as the man whom he had so nobly restored 
 to life and liberty had delivered it to me. If ever I have 
 been obstinate in my days, and I may have been, say, 
 once or twice, I was obstinate about the Bottle. But I 
 made it a rule always to keep a pocketful of small coin at 
 its service, and never to be out of temper in its cause. 
 Thus I and the Bottle made our way. Once we had a 
 break-down ; rather a bad break-down, on a steep high place 
 with the sea below us, on a tempestuous evening when it 
 blew great guns. We were driving four wild horses abreast, 
 Southern fashion, and there was some little difficulty in stop- 
 ping them. I was outside, and not thrown off; but no words 
 can describe my feelings when I saw the Bottle travelling 
 15 
 
226 CHARLES DICKENS. 
 
 inside, as usual burst the door open, and roll obesely out 
 into the road. A blessed Bottle with a charmed existence, 
 he took no hurt, and we repaired damage, and went on 
 triumphant. 
 
 A thousand representations were made to me that the 
 Bottle must be left at this place, or that, and allied for 
 again. I never yielded to one of them, and never parted 
 from the Bottle, on any pretence, consideration, threat, or 
 entreaty. I had no faith in any official receipt for the Bot- 
 tle, and nothing would induce me to accept one. These 
 unmanageable politics at last brought me and the Bottle, 
 still triumphant, to Genoa. There I took a tender and 
 reluctant leave of him for a few weeks, and consigned him 
 to a trusty English captain, to be conveyed to the port of 
 London by sea. 
 
 While the Bottle was on his voyage to England, I read 
 the Shipping Intelligence, as anxiously as if I had been an 
 underwriter. There was some stormy weather after I my- 
 self had got to England by way of Switzerland and France, 
 and my mind greatly misgave me that the Bottle might be 
 wrecked. At last, to my great joy, I received notice of his 
 safe arrival, and immediately went down to Saint Kath- 
 arine's Docks, and found him in a state of honorable captiv- 
 ity in the custom-house. 
 
 The wine was mere vinegar when I set it down before the 
 gen3rous Englishman, probably it had been something 
 like vinegar when I took it up from Giovanni Carlavero, 
 but not a drop of it was spilled or gone. And the English- 
 man told me, with much emotion in his face and voice, that 
 he had never tasted wine that seemed to him so sweet and 
 sound. And long afterward, the Bottle graced his table. 
 And the last time I saw him in this world that misses 'him, 
 he took me aside in a crowd, to say, with his amiable smile : 
 " We were talking of you only to-day at dinner, and I 
 wished you had been there, for I had some claret up in Car- 
 lavero's Bottle." 
 
WHEN I AWAKE, I AM STILL WITH THEE. 
 
 BY MRS. H. B. STOWE. 
 
 S" TILL, still with thee, when purple morning breaketh. 
 When the bird waketh and the shadows flee ; 
 Fairer than morning, lovelier than the daylight, 
 Dawns the sweet consciousness, lam with thee! 
 
 Alone with thee, amid the mystic shadows, 
 
 The solemn hush of nature newly bora ; 
 Alone with thee in breathless adoration, 
 
 In the calm dew and freshness of the morn. 
 
 As in the dawning o'er the waveless ocean 
 The image of the morning star doth rest, 
 
 So in this stillness thou beholdest only 
 Thine image in the waters of my breast. 
 
 Still, still with thee ! as to each new-born morning 
 A fresh and solemn splendor still is given, 
 
 So doth this blessed consciousness, awaking, 
 
 Breathe, each day, nearness unto thee and heaven. 
 
 When sinks the soul, subdued by toil, to slumber, 
 Its closing eye looks up to thee in prayer, 
 
 Sweet the repose beneath thy wings o'ershading, 
 But sweeter still to wake and find thee there. 
 
 So shall it be at last, in that bright morning 
 When the soul waketh and life's shadows flee ; 
 
 O, in that hour, fairer than daylight dawning, 
 Shall rise the glorious thought, / am with thee r 
 
THE EVE OP ST. AGNES, 
 
 BY JOHN KEATS. 
 
 ST. AGNES' EVE, ah, bitter chill it was ! 
 The owl, for all his feathers, was a-cold ; 
 The hare limped trembling through the frozen grass, 
 And silent was the flock in woolly fold : 
 Nuinb were the beadsman's fingers while he told 
 His rosary, and while his frosted breath, 
 Like pious incense from a censer old, 
 Seemed taking flight for heaven without a death, 
 Past the sweet virgin's picture, while his prayer he saith, 
 
 His prayer he saith, this patient, holy man ; 
 
 Then takes his lamp, and riseth from his knees, 
 
 And back returneth, meagre, barefoot, wan, 
 
 Along the chapel aisle by slow degrees ; 
 
 The sculptured dead on each side seem to freeze, 
 
 Einprisoned in black, purgatorial rails ; 
 
 Knights, ladies, praying in dumb orat'ries, 
 
 He passeth by ; and his weak spirit fails 
 
 To think how they may ache in icy hoods and mails. 
 
 Northward he turneth through a little door, 
 And scarce three steps, ere music's golden tongue 
 Flattered to tears this aged man and poor ; 
 But no, already had his death-bell rung ; 
 
THE EVE OF ST. AGNES. 229 
 
 The joys of all his life were said and sung : 
 
 His was harsh penance on St. Agues' Eve : 
 
 Another way he went, and soon among 
 
 Rough ashes sat he for his soul's reprieve, 
 
 And all night kept awake, for sinners' sake to grieve. 
 
 That ancient beadsman heard the prelude soft : 
 And so it chanced, for many a door was wide, 
 From hurry to and fro. Soon, up aloft, 
 The silver, snarling trumpets 'gan to chide ; 
 The level chambers, ready with their pride, 
 Were glowing to receive a thousand guests : 
 The carved angels, ever eager-eyed, 
 Stared, where upon their heads the cornice rests, 
 With hair blown back, and wings put crosswise on their 
 breasts. 
 
 At length burst in the argent revelry, 
 
 With plume, tiara, and all rich array, 
 
 Numerous as shadows haunting fairily 
 
 The brain, new-stuffed, in youth, with triumphs gay 
 
 Of old romance. These let us wish away ; 
 
 And turn, sole-thoughted, to one lady there, 
 
 Whose heart had brooded, all that wintry day, 
 
 On love, and winged St. Agnes' saiotly care, 
 
 As she had heard old dames full many times declare. 
 
 They told her how, upon St. Agnes' Eve, 
 
 Young virgins might have visions of delight, 
 
 And soft adorings from their loves receive 
 
 Upon the honeyed middle of the night, 
 
 If ceremonies due they did aright ; 
 
 As, supperless to bed they must retire, 
 
 And couch supine their beauties, lily white ; 
 
 Nor look behind, nor sideways, but require 
 
 Of heaven with upward eyes for all that they desire. 
 
230 JOHN KEATS. 
 
 Full of this whim was thoughtful Madeline ; 
 
 The music, yearning like a god in pain, 
 
 She scarcely heard ; her maiden eyes divine, 
 
 Fixed on the floor, saw many a sweeping train 
 
 Pass by, she heeded not at all ; in vain 
 
 Came many a tiptoe, amorous cavalier, 
 
 And back retired, not cooled by high disdain. 
 
 But she saw not ; her heart was otherwhere ; 
 
 She sighed for Agnes' dreams, the sweetest of the year. 
 
 She danced along with vague, regardless eyes, 
 Anxious her lips, her breathing quick and short ; 
 The hallowed hour was near at hand ; she sighs 
 Amid the timbrels, and the thronged resort 
 Of whisperers in anger, or in sport ; 
 Mid looks of love, defiance, hate, and scorn, 
 Hoodwinked with fairy fancy ; all amort 
 Save to St. Agnes and her lambs unshorn, 
 And all the bliss to be before to-morrow morn. 
 
 So, purposing each moment to retire, 
 She lingered still. Meantime, across the moors, 
 Had come young Porphyro, with heart on fire 
 For Madeline. Beside the portal doors, 
 Buttressed from moonlight, stands he, and implores 
 All saints to give him sight of Madeline ; 
 But for one moment in the tedious hours, 
 That he might gaze and worship all unseen ; 
 Perchance speak, kneel, touch, kiss, in sooth such thing:- 
 have been. 
 
 He ventures in : let no buzzed whisper tell : 
 All eyes be muffled, or a hundred swords 
 Will storm his heart, love's feverous citadel ; 
 For him, those chambers held barbarian hordes, 
 
THE EVE OF ST. AGNES. 231 
 
 Hyena foemen, and hot-blooded lords, 
 Whose very dogs would execrations howl 
 Against his lineage ; not one breast affords 
 Him any mercy, in that mansion foul, 
 Save one old beldame, weak in body and in soul. 
 
 Ah, happy chance ! the aged creature came, 
 
 Shuffling along with ivory-headed wand, 
 
 To where he stood, hid from the torch's flame, 
 
 Behind a broad hall-pillar, far beyond 
 
 The sound of merriment and chorus bland. 
 
 He startled her ; but soon she knew his face, 
 
 And grasped his fingers in her palsied hand, 
 
 Saying, " Mercy, Porphyro ! hie thee from this place ; 
 
 They are all here to-night, the whole blood-thirsty race ! 
 
 " Get hence ! get hence ! there 's dwarfish Hildebraud ; 
 
 He had a fever late, and in the fit 
 
 He cursed thee and thine, both house and land ; 
 
 Then there 's that old Lord Maurice, not a whit 
 
 More tame for his gray hairs Alas me ! flit ! 
 
 Flit like a ghost away ! " " Ah, gossip dear, 
 
 We 're safe enough ; here in this arm-chair sit, 
 
 And tell me how " ". Good saints ! not here, not here ; 
 
 Follow me, child, or else these stones will be thy bier." 
 
 He followed through a lowly arched way, 
 Brushing the cobwebs with his lofty plume ; 
 And as she muttered, " Well-a well-a-day ! " 
 He found him in a little moonlight room, 
 Pale, latticed, chill, and silent as a tomb. 
 " Now tell me where is Madeline," said he, 
 " O, tell me, Angela, by the holy loom 
 Which none but secret sisterhood may see, 
 When they St. Agnes' wool are weaving piously." 
 
232 JOHN KEATS. 
 
 " St. Agnes ! Ah ! it is St. Agnes' Eve, 
 
 Yet men will murder upon holy days ; 
 
 Thou must hold water in a witch's sieve, 
 
 And be liege-lord of all the elves and fays, 
 
 To venture so. It fills me wi'h amaze 
 
 To see thee, Porphyro ! St. Agnes' Eve ! 
 
 God's help ! my lady fair the conjurer plays 
 
 This very night ; good angels her deceive ! 
 
 But let me laugh awhile, I 've mickle time to grieve." 
 
 Feebly she laugheth in the languid moon, 
 
 While Porphyro upon her face doth look, 
 
 Like puzzled urchin on an aged crone 
 
 Who keepeth closed a wondrous riddle-book, 
 
 As spectacled she sits in chimney nook. 
 
 But soon his eyes grew brilliant, when she told 
 
 His lady's purpose ; and he scarce could brook 
 
 Tears, at the thought of those enchantments cold, 
 
 And Madeline asleep in lap of legends old. 
 
 Sudden a thought came like a full-blown rose, 
 
 Flushing his brow* and in his pained heart 
 
 Made purple riot ; then doth he propose 
 
 A stratagem, that makes the beldame start : 
 
 " A cruel man and impious thou art ! 
 
 Sweet lady, let her pray, and sleep and dream 
 
 Alone with her good angels, far apart 
 
 From wicked men like thee. Go, go ! I deem 
 
 Thou canst not surely be the same that thou didst seem." 
 
 " I will not harm her, by all saints 1 swear ! " 
 Quoth Porphyro ; " O, may I ne'er find grace 
 When my weak voice shall whisper its last prayer, 
 If one of her soft ringlets I displace, 
 
THE EVE OF ST. AGNES. 233 
 
 Or look with ruffian passion in her face : 
 Good Angela, believe me by these tears ; 
 Or I will, even in a moment's space, 
 Awake, with horrid shout, my foemen's ears, 
 And beard them, though they be more fanged than wolves 
 and bears." 
 
 " Ah ! why wilt thou affright a feeble soul ? 
 A poor, weak, palsy-stricken, churchyard thing, 
 Whose passing-bell may ere the midnight toll ; 
 Whose prayers for thee, each morn and evening, 
 Were never missed." Thus plaining, doth she bring 
 A gentler speech from burning Porphyro ; 
 So woful, and of such deep sorrowing, 
 That Angela gives promise she will do 
 Whatever he shall wish, betide her weal or woe. 
 
 Which was, to lead him, in close secrecy, 
 
 Even to Madeline's chamber, and there hide 
 
 Him in a closet, of such privacy 
 
 That he might see her beauty unespied, 
 
 And win perhaps that night a peerless bride, 
 
 While legioned fairies paced the coverlet, 
 
 And pale enchantment held her sleepy-eyed. 
 
 Never on such a night have lovers met, 
 
 Since Merlin paid his demon all the monstrous debt. 
 
 " It shall be as thou wishest," said the dame ; 
 " All cates and dainties shall be stored there 
 Quickly on this feast-night ; by the tambour frame 
 Her own lute thou wilt see ; no time to spare, 
 For I am slow and feeble, and scarce dare 
 On such a catering trust my dizzy head. 
 Wait here, my child, with patience kneel in prayer 
 The while. Ah ! thou must needs the lady wed, 
 Or may I never leave my grave among the dead." 
 
234 JOHN KEATS. 
 
 So saying, she hobbled off with busy fear. 
 
 The lover's endless minutes slowly passed : 
 
 The dame returned, and whispered in his ear 
 
 To follow her ; with aged eyes aghast 
 
 From fright of dim espial. Safe at last, 
 
 Through many a dusky gallery, they gain 
 
 The maiden's chamber, silken, hushed and chaste ; 
 
 Where Porphyro took covert, pleased amain. 
 
 His poor guide hurried back with agues in her brain. 
 
 Her faltering hand upon the balustrade, 
 Old Angela was feeling for the stair, 
 When Madeline, St. Agnes' charmed maid, 
 Rose, like a missioned spirit, unaware ; 
 With silver taper's light, and pious care, 
 She turned, and down the aged gossip led 
 To a safe level matting. Now prepare, 
 Young Porphyro, for gazing on that bed ! 
 She comes, she comes again, like ring-dove frayed and 
 fled. 
 
 Out went the taper as she hurried in ; 
 
 Its little smoke, in pallid moonshine, died ; 
 
 She closed the door, she panted, all akin 
 
 To spirits of the air, and visions wide ; 
 
 No uttered syllable, or, woe betide ! 
 
 But to her heart, her heart was voluble, 
 
 Paining with eloquence her balmy side ; 
 
 As though a tongueless nightingale should swell 
 
 Her throat in vain, and die, heart-stifled in her dell. 
 
 A casement high and triple-arched there was, 
 All garlanded with carven imageries 
 Of fruits, and flowers, and bunches of knot-grass, 
 And diamonded with panes of quaint device, 
 
THE EVE OF ST. AGNES. 235 
 
 Innumerable of stains and splendid dyes, 
 As are the tiger-moth's deep-damasked wings; 
 And in the midst, 'mong thousand heraldries, 
 And twilight saints, and dim emblazonings, 
 A shielded scutcheon blushed with blood of queens and 
 kings. 
 
 Full on this casement shone the wintry moon, 
 And threw warm gules on Madeline's fair breast, 
 As down she knelt for heaven's grace and boon ; 
 Rose-bloom fell on her hands, together prest, 
 And on IILT silver cross soft amethyst, 
 And on her hair a glory, like a saint ; 
 She seemed a splendid angel, newly drest, 
 Save wings, for heaven. Porphyro grew faint: 
 She knelt, so pure a thing, so free from mortal taint. 
 
 Anon his heart revives ; her vespers done, 
 
 Of all its wreathed pearls her hair she frees ; , 
 
 Unclasps her warmed jewels one by one ; 
 
 Loosens her fragrant bodice ; by degrees 
 
 Her rich attire creeps rustling to her knees ; 
 
 Half hidden, like a mermaid in sea- weed, 
 
 Pensive awhile she dreams awake, and sees, 
 
 In fancy, fair St. Agnes in her bed, 
 
 But dares not look behind, or all the charm is fled. 
 
 Soon, trembling in her soft and chilly nest, 
 In sort of wakeful swoon, perplexed she lay, 
 Until the poppied warmth of sleep oppressed 
 Her soothed limbs, and soul fatigued away ; 
 Flown like a thought, until the morrow-day; 
 Blissfully havened both from joy and pain ; 
 Clasped like a inissal where swart Payiiims pray ; 
 
236 JOHN KEATS. 
 
 Blinded alike from sunshine and from rain, 
 
 As though a rose should shut, and be a bud again. 
 
 Stolen to this paradise, and so entranced, 
 Porphyro gazed upon her empty dress, 
 And listened to her breathing, if it chanced 
 To wake into a slumbrous tenderness ; 
 Which when he heard, that minute did he bless, 
 And breathed himself ; then from the closet crept, 
 Noiseless as fear in a wide wilderness, 
 And over the hushed carpet, silent, stept, 
 And 'tween the curtains peeped, where, lo ! how fast 
 she slept. 
 
 Then by the bedside, where the faded moon 
 Made a dim, silver twilight, soft he set 
 A table, and, half anguished, threw thereon 
 A cloth of woven crimson, gold, and jet : 
 *O for some drowsy Morphean amulet ! 
 The boisterous, midnight, festive clarion, 
 The kettle-drum, and far-heard clarionet, 
 Affray his ears, though but in dying tone : 
 The hall-door shuts again, and all the noise is gone. 
 
 And still she slept an azure-lidded sleep, 
 In blanched linen, smooth, and laveudered ; 
 While he from forth the closet brought a heap 
 Of candied apple, quince, and plum, and gourd ; 
 With jellies soother than the creamy curd, 
 And lucent syrops, tinct with cinnamon ; 
 Manna and dates, in argosy transferred 
 From Fez ; and spiced dainties, every one, 
 From silken Samarcaud to cedared Lebanon. 
 
THE EVE OF ST. AGNES. 237 
 
 These delicates he heaped with glowing hand 
 
 On golden dishes and in baskets bright 
 
 Of wreathed silver. Sumptuous they stand 
 
 In the retired quiet of the night, 
 
 Filling the chilly room with perfume light. 
 
 " And now, my love, my seraph fair, awake ! 
 
 Thou art my heaven, and I thine eremite ; 
 
 Open thine eyes, for meek St. Agnes' sake, 
 
 Or I shall drowse beside thee, so my soul doth ache." 
 
 Thus whispering, his warm, unnerved arm 
 Sank in her pillow. Shaded was her dream 
 By the dusk curtains ; 't was a midnight charm 
 Impossible to melt as iced stream : 
 The lustrous salvers in the moonlight gleam ; 
 Broad golden fringe upon the carpet lies ; 
 It seemed he never, never could redeem 
 From such a steadfast spell his lady's eyes ; 
 So mused awhile, entoiled in woofed phantasies- 
 Awakening up, he took her hollow lute, 
 Tumultuous, and, in chords that tenderest be, 
 He played an ancient ditty, long since mute, 
 In Provence called " La belle dame sans merci ; " 
 Close to her ear touching the melody ; 
 Wherewith disturbed, she uttered a soft moan : 
 He ceased ; she panted quick, and suddenly 
 Her blue affrayed eyes wide open shone : 
 Upon his knees he sank, pale as smooth-sculptured stone. 
 
 Her eyes were open, but she still beheld, 
 Now wide awake, the vision of her sleep. 
 There was a painful change, that nigh expelled 
 The blisses of her dream so pure and deep ; 
 
238 JOHN KEATS. 
 
 At which fair Madeline began to weep, 
 And moan forth witless words with many a sigh ; 
 While still her gaze on Porphyro would keep; 
 Who knelt, with joined hands and piteous eye, 
 Fearing to move or speak, she looked so dreamingly. 
 
 " Ah, Porphyro ! " said she, " hut even now 
 
 Thy voice was at sweet tremble in mine ear, 
 
 Made tunable with every sweetest, vow: 
 
 And those sad eyes were spiritual and clear ; 
 
 How changed thou art ! how pallid, chill, and drear! 
 
 Give me that voice again, my Porphyro, 
 
 Those looks immortal, those complainings dear ! 
 
 O, leave me not in this eternal woe, 
 
 For if thou diest, my love, I know not where to go." 
 
 Beyond a mortal man impassioned far 
 
 At these voluptuous accents, he arose, 
 
 Ethereal, flushed, and like a throbbing star 
 
 Seen mid the sapphire heaven's deep repose ; 
 
 Into her dream he melted, as the rose 
 
 Blendeth its odor with the violet, 
 
 Solution sweet; meantime the frost-wind blows 
 
 Like love's alarum pattering the sharp sleet 
 
 Against the window-panes ; St. Agnes' moon hath set. 
 
 'Tis dark; quick pattereth the flaw-blown sleet: 
 " This is no dream, my bride, my Madeline ! " 
 'Tis dark; the iced gusts still rave and beat : 
 " No dream ? alas ! alas ! and woe is mine ! 
 Porphyro will leave me here to fade and pine. 
 Cruel ! what traitor could thee hither bring? 
 I curse not, for my heart is lost in thine, 
 Though thou forsakest a deceived thing; 
 A dove forlorn and lost, with sick, unpruncd wing." 
 
THE EVE OF ST. AGNES. 239 
 
 " My Madeline ! sweet dreamer ! lovely bride ! 
 
 Say, may I be for aye tliy vassal blest ? 
 
 Thy beauty's shield, heart-shaped and vermeil dyed ? 
 
 Ah, silver shrine, here will I take my rest 
 
 After so many hours of toil and quest, 
 
 A famished pilgrim, saved by miracle. 
 
 Though I have found, I will not rob thy nest, 
 
 Saving of thy sweet self; it' thou thiuk'st well 
 
 To trust, fair Madeline, to no rude infidel. 
 
 " Hark ! 't is an elfin storm from faery land, 
 
 Of haggard seeming, but a boon indeed: 
 
 Arise, arise! the morning is at hand ; 
 
 The bloated wassailers will never heed : 
 
 Let us away, my love, with happy speed ; 
 
 There are no ears to hear, or eyes to see, 
 
 Drowned all in Rhenish and the sleepy mead : 
 
 Awake, arise, my love, and fearless be, 
 
 For o'er the southern moors I have a home for thee." 
 
 She hurried at his words, beset with fears, 
 
 For there were sleeping dragons all around, 
 
 At glaring watch, perhaps, with ready spears; 
 
 Down the wide stairs a darkling way they found, 
 
 In all the house was heard no human sound. 
 
 A chain-drooped lamp was flickering by each door ; 
 
 The arras, rich with horseman, hawk, and hound, 
 
 Fluttered in the besieging wind's uproar; 
 
 And the long carpets rose along the gusty floor. 
 
 They glide, like phantoms, into the wide hall ! 
 Like phantoms to the iron porch they glide, 
 Where lay the porter, in uneasy sprawl, 
 With a huge empty flagon by his side : 
 
240 JOHN KEATS. 
 
 The wakeful bloodhound rose, and shook his hide, 
 
 But his sagacious eye an inmate owns ; 
 
 By one, and one, the bolts full easy slide ; 
 
 The chains lie silent on the footworn stones ; 
 
 The key turns, and the door upon its hinges groans. 
 
 And they are gone ! ay, ages long ago 
 These lovers fled away into the storm. 
 That night the baron dreamt of many a woe, 
 And all his warrior-guests, with shade and form 
 Of witch, and demon, and large coffin-worm, 
 Were long be-nightmared. Angela the old 
 Died palsy- twitched, with meagre face deform ; 
 The beadsman, after thousand aves told, 
 For aye unsought-for slept among his ashes cold. 
 
LINKS ITH HEAVEN 
 
 BY ADELAIDE A. PROCTER. 
 
 OUR God in Heaven, from that holy place, 
 To each of us an Angel guide has given ; 
 But Mothers of dead children have more grace, 
 For they give Angels to their God and Heaven. 
 
 How can a Mother's heart feel cold or weary, 
 Knowing her dearer self safe, happy, warm ? 
 
 How can she feel her road too dark or dreary, 
 
 Who knows her treasure sheltered from the storm' 
 
 How can she sin ? Our hearts may be unheeding, 
 Our God forgot, our holy Saints defied; 
 
 But can a mother hear her dead child pleading, 
 And thrust those little angel hands aside ? 
 
 Those little hands stretched down to draw her ever 
 Nearer to God by mother love : we all 
 
 Are blind and weak, yet surely she can never, 
 With such a stake in Heaven, fail or fall. 
 
 She knows that when the mighty Angels raise 
 Chorus in Heaven, one little silver tone 
 
 Is hers forever, that one little praise, 
 One little happy voice, is all her own. 
 16 
 
242 ADELAIDE A. PROCTER. 
 
 We may not sec her sacred crown of honor, 
 But all the Angels flitting to and fro 
 
 Pause smiling as they pass, they look upon her 
 As mother of an angel whom they know, 
 
 One whom they left nestled at Mary's feet, 
 
 The children's place in Heaven, who softly singa 
 
 A little chant to please them, slow and sweet, 
 Or smiling strokes their little folded wings ; 
 
 Or gives them Her white lilies or Her beads 
 To play with : yet, in spite of flower or song, 
 
 They often lift a wistful look that pleads 
 
 And asks Her why their mother stays so long. 
 
 Then our dear Queen makes answer she will call 
 Her very soon : .meanwhile they are beguiled 
 
 To wait and listen while She tells them all 
 A story of Her Jesus as a child. 
 
 All, Saints in Heaven may pray with earnest will 
 And pity for their weak and erring brothers : 
 
 Yet there is prayer in Heaven more tender still, 
 The little Children pleading for their Mothers. 
 
WINTER ANIMAIS IN THE WOODS. 
 
 BY HENRY D. THOREAU. 
 
 FOR sounds in winter nights, and often in winter days, 
 I heard the forlorn but melodious note of a hooting 
 owl indefinitely far ; such a sound as the frozen earth would 
 yield if struck with a suitable plectrum, the very lingua 
 vernacida of "Waldcn "Wood, and quite familiar to me at 
 last, though I never saw the bird while it was making it 
 I seldom opened my door in a winter evening without hear- 
 ing it : Hoo hoo hoo, hoorer hoo, sounded sonorously, and 
 the first three syllables accented somewhat like how der do ; 
 or sometimes hoo hoo only. One night in the beginning of 
 winter, before the pond froze over, about nine o'clock, I was 
 startled by the loud honking of a goose, and, stepping to 
 the door, heard the sound of their wings like a tempest in 
 the woods as they flew low over my house. They passed 
 over the pond toward Fair Haven, seemingly deterred from 
 settling by my light, their commodore honking all the 
 wliile with a regular beat. Suddenly an unmistakable cat- 
 owl from very near me, with the most harsh and tremendous 
 voice I ever heard from any inhabitant of the woods, re- 
 sponded at regular intervals to the goose, as if determined 
 to expose and disgrace this intruder from Hudson's Bay by 
 exhibiting a greater compass and volume of voice in a 
 native, and boo-hoo him out of Concord horizon. What do 
 you mean by alarming the citadel at this time of night con- 
 
244 HENRY D. THOREAU. 
 
 secrated to me ? Do you think I am ever caught napping 
 at such an hour, and that I have not got lungs and a larynx 
 as well as yourself? Boo-hoo, boo-hoo, boo-hoo! It was 
 one of the most thrilling discords I ever heard. And yet, 
 if you had a discriminating ear, there were in it the ele- 
 ments of a concord such as these plains never saw nor 
 heard. 
 
 I also heard the whooping of the ice in the pond, my 
 great bedfellow in that part of Concord, as if it were rest- 
 less in its bed and would fain turn over, were troubled with 
 flatulency and bad dreams ; or I was waked by the cracking 
 of the ground by the frost, as if some one had driven a 
 team against my door, and in the morning would find a 
 crack in the earth a quarter of a mile long and a third of 
 an inch wide. 
 
 Sometimes I heard the foxes as they ranged over the 
 snow-crust, in moonlight nights, in search of a partridge or 
 other game, barking raggedly and demoniacally, like forest 
 dogs, as if laboring with some anxiety, or seeking expres- 
 sion, struggling for light and to be dogs outright and run 
 freely in the streets ; for if we take the ages into our 
 account, may there not be a civilization going on among 
 brutes as well as men ? They seemed to me to be rudi- 
 mental, burrowing men, still standing on their defence, 
 awaiting their transformation. Sometimes one came near 
 to my window, attracted by my light, barked a vulpine 
 curse at me, and then retreated. 
 
 Usually the red squirrel (Sciurus Hudsonius) waked me 
 in the dawn, coursing over the roof and up and down the 
 sides of the house, as if sent out of the woods for this pur- 
 pose. In the course of the winter I threw out half a 
 bushel of ears of sweet-corn, which had not got ripe, on to 
 the snow-crust by my door, and was amused by watching 
 the motions of the various animals which were baited by it. 
 In the twilight and the night the rabbits came regularly and 
 
WINTER ANIMALS IN THE WOODS. 245 
 
 made a hearty meal. All day long the red squirrels came 
 and went, and afforded me much entertainment by their 
 manoeuvres. One would approach at first warily through 
 the shrub-oaks, running over the snow-crust by fits and 
 starts, like a leaf blown by the wind, now a few paces this 
 way, with wonderful speed and waste of energy, making 
 inconceivable haste with his " trotters," as if it were for a 
 wager, and now as many paces that way, but never getting 
 on more than half a rod at a time ; and then suddenly 
 pausing with a ludicrous expression and a gratuitous somer- 
 set, as if all the eyes in the universe were fixed on him, 
 for all the motions of a squirrel, even in the most solitary 
 recesses of the forest, imply spectators as much as those of 
 a dancing-girl, wasting more time in delay and circum- 
 spection than would have sufficed to walk the whole dis- 
 tance, I never saw one walk, and then suddenly, 
 before you could say Jack Robinson, he would be in the top 
 of a young pitch-pine, winding up his clock and chiding all 
 imaginary spectators, soliloquizing and talking to all the 
 universe at the same time, for no reason that I could ever 
 detect, or he himself was aware of, I suspect. At length 
 he would reach the corn, and selecting a suitable ear, brisk 
 about in the same uncertain trigonometrical way to the top- 
 most stick of my wood-pile, before my window, where he 
 looked me in the face, and there sit for hours, supplying 
 himself with a new ear from time to time, nibbling at first 
 voraciously and throwing the half-naked cobs about ; till at 
 length he grew more dainty still, and played with his food, 
 tasting only the inside of the kernel, and the ear, which 
 was held balanced over the stick by one paw, slipped from 
 his careless grasp and fell to the ground, when he would look 
 over at it with a ludicrous expression of uncertainty, as if 
 suspecting that it had life, with a mind not made up whether 
 to get it again, or a new one, or be off; now thinking of 
 corn, then listening to hear what was in the wind. So the 
 
24 (? HENRY D. THOREAU. 
 
 little impudent fellow would waste many an ear in a fore- 
 noon ; till at last, seizing some longer and plumper one, 
 considerably bigger than himself, and skilfully balancing it, 
 he would set out with it to the woods, like a tiger with 
 a buffalo, by the samo zigzag course and frequent pauses, 
 scratching along with it as if it were too heavy for him and 
 falling all the while, making its fall a diagonal between a 
 perpendicular and horizontal, being determined to put it 
 through at any rate ; a singularly frivolous and whimsical 
 fellow ; and so he would get off with it to where he lived, 
 perhaps carry it to the top of a pine-tree forty or fifty rods 
 distant, and I would afterwards find the cobs strewn about 
 the woods in various directions. 
 
 At length the jays arrive, whose discordant screams were 
 heard long before, as they were warily making their 
 approach an eighth of a mile off, and in a stealthy and 
 sneaking manner they flit from tree to tree, nearer and 
 nearer, and pick up the kernels which the squirrels have 
 dropped. Then, sitting on a pitch-pine bough, they attempt 
 to swallow in their haste a kernel which is too big for their 
 throats and chokes them; and after great labor they dis- 
 gorge it, and spend an hour in the endeavor to crack it by 
 repeated blows with their bills. They were manifestly 
 thieves, and I had not much respect for them; but the 
 squirrels, though at first shy, went to work as if they were 
 taking what was their own. 
 
 Meanwhile, also, came the chickadees in flocks, which, 
 picking up the crumbs the squirrels had dropped, flew to the 
 nearest twig, and, placing them under their claws, hammered 
 away at them with their little bills, as if it were an insect 
 in the bark, till they were sufficiently reduced for their 
 slender throats. A little flock of these titmice came daily 
 to pick a dinner out of my wood-pile, or the crumbs at my 
 door, with faint, flitting, lisping notes, like the tinkling of 
 icicles in the grass, or else with sprightly day day day, or 
 
WINTER ANIMALS IN THE WOODS. 247 
 
 more rarely, in spring-like days, a wiry summery phe-fo 
 from the wood-side. They were so familiar that at length 
 one alighted on an armful of wood which I was carrying in, 
 and pecked at the sticks without fear. I once had a spar- 
 row alight upon my shoulder for a moment while I was 
 hoeing in a village garden, and I felt that I was more dis- 
 tinguished by that circumstance than I should have been by 
 any epaulet I could have worn. The squirrels also grew at 
 last to be quite familiar, and occasionally stepped upon niy 
 shoe, when that was the nearest way. 
 
 When the ground was not yet quite covered, and again 
 near the end of winter, when the snow was melted on my 
 south hillside and about my wood-pile, the partridges came 
 out of the woods morning and evening to feed there. 
 Whichever side you walk in the woods the partridge bursts 
 away on whirring wings, jarring the snow from the dry 
 leaves and twigs on high, which comes sifting down in the 
 sunbeams like golden dust ; for this brave bird is not to be 
 scared by winter. It is frequently covered up by drifts, 
 and, it is said, " sometimes plunges from on wing into the 
 soft snow, where it remains concealed for a day or two." I 
 used to start them in the open land also, where they had 
 come out of the woods at sunset to " bud " the wild apple- 
 trees. They will come regularly every evening to particu- 
 lar trees, where the cunning sportsman lies in wait for them, 
 and the distant orchards next the woods suffer thus not a 
 little. I am glad that the partridge gets fed, at any rate. 
 It is Nature's own bird which lives on buds and diet-drink. 
 
 In dark winter mornings, or in short winter afternoons, 
 I sometimes heard a pack of hounds threading all the woods 
 with hounding cry and yelp, unable to resist the instinct of 
 the chase, and the note of the hunting-horn at intervals, 
 proving that man was in the rear. The woods ring again, 
 and yet no fox bursts forth on to the open level of the pond, 
 nor following pack pursuing their Actaion. And perhaps at 
 
248 HENRY D. THOREAU. 
 
 evening I see the hunters returning with a single brush 
 trailing from their sleigh for a trophy, seeking their inn. 
 They tell me that if the fox would remain in the bosom of 
 the frozen earth he would be safe, or if he would run in a 
 straight line away no fox-hound could overtake him ; but, 
 having left his pursuers far behind, he stops to rest and 
 listen till they come up, and when he runs he circles round 
 to his old haunts, where the hunters await him. Sometimes, 
 however, he will run upon a wall many rods, and then leap 
 off far to one side, and he appears to know that water will 
 not retain his scent. A hunter told me that he once saw a 
 fox pursued by hounds burst out on to Walden when the 
 ice was covered with shallow puddles, run part way across, 
 and then return to the same shore. Erelong the hounds 
 arrived, but here they lost the scent. Sometimes a pack 
 hunting by themselves would pass my door, and circle round 
 my house, and yelp and hound without regarding me, as if 
 afflicted by a species of madness, so that nothing could 
 divert them from the pursuit. Thus they circle until they 
 fall upon the recent trail of a fox, for a wise hound will for- 
 sake everything else for this. One day a man came to my 
 hut from Lexington to inquire after his hound, that made a 
 large track, and had been hunting for a week by himself. 
 But I fear that he was not the wiser for all I told him, for 
 every time I attempted to answer his questions he inter- 
 rupted me by asking, " What do you do here ? " He had 
 lost a dog, but found a man. 
 
 One old hunter who has a dry tongue, who used to come 
 to bathe in Walden once every year when the water was 
 warmest, and at such times looked in upon me, told me, 
 that many years ago he took his gun one afternoon and 
 went out for a cruise in Walden Wood ; and as he walked 
 the Wayland road he heard the cry of hounds approaching, 
 and erelong a fox leaped the wall into the road, and as quick 
 as thought leaped the other wall out of the road, and his 
 
WINTER ANIMALS IN THE WOODS. 249 
 
 swift bullet had not touched him. Some way behind came 
 an old hound and her three pups in full pursuit, hunting 
 on their own account, and disappeared again in the woods. 
 Late in the afternoon, as he was resting in the thick woods 
 south of Walden, he heard the voice of the hounds far over 
 toward Fair Haven still pursuing the fox; and on they 
 came, their hounding cry which made all the woods ring 
 sounding nearer and nearer, now from Well-Meadow, now 
 from the Baker Farm. For a long time he stood still and 
 listened to their music, so sweet to a hunter's ear, when 
 suddenly the fox appeared, threading the solemn aisles with 
 an easy coursing pace, whose sound was concealed by & 
 sympathetic rustle of the leaves, swift and still, keeping the 
 ground, leaving his pursuers far behind ; and, leaping upon 
 a rock amid the woods, he sat erect and listening, with his 
 back to the hunter. For a moment compassion restrained 
 the latter's arm; but that was a short-lived mood, and as 
 quick as thought can follow thought his piece was levelled, 
 and whang ! the fox, rolling over the rock, lay dead on 
 the ground. The hunter still kept his place and listened to 
 the hounds. Still on they came, and now the near woods 
 resounded through all their aisles with their demoniac cry. 
 At length the old hound burst into view, with muzzle to the 
 ground, and snapping the air as if possessed, and ran di- 
 rectly to the rock ; but spying the dead fox, she suddenly 
 ceased her hounding, as if struck dumb with amazement, 
 and walked round and round him in silence; and one by 
 one her pups arrived, and, like their mother, were sobered 
 into silence by the mystery. Then the hunter came for- 
 ward and stood in their midst, and the mystery was solved. 
 They waited in silence while he skinned the fox, then 
 followed the brush awhile, and at length turned off into the 
 woods again. That evening a Weston Squire came to the 
 Concord hunter's cottage to inquire for his hounds, and told 
 how for a week they had been hunting on their own account 
 
250 HENRY D. THOREAU. 
 
 from Western woods. The Concord hunter told him what 
 he knew, and offered him the skin ; but the other declined it, 
 and departed. He did not find his hounds that night, but 
 the next day learned that they had crossed the river and 
 put up at a farm-house for the night, whence, having been 
 well fed, they took their departure early in the morning. 
 
 The hunter who told me this could remember one Sam 
 Nutting, who used to hunt bears on Fair Haven Ledges, 
 and exchange their skins for rum in Concord village ; who 
 told him, even, that he had seen a moose there. Nutting 
 had a famous fox-hound named Burgoyne, he pronounced 
 it Engine, which my informant used to borrow. In the 
 " Wast Book " of an old trader of this town, who was also 
 a captain, town-clerk, and representative, I find the following 
 entry. Jan. 18th, 1742-3, "John Mclven Cr. by 1 Grey 
 Fox 2 3 " ; they are not now found here ; and in 
 his ledger, Feb. 7th, 1743, Hezekiah Stratton has credit 
 " by > 2 a Catt skin 1 4 " ; of course, a wild-cat, for 
 Stratton was a sergeant in the old French war, and would 
 not have got credit for hunting less noble game. Credit is 
 given for deer-skins also, and they were daily sold. One 
 man still preserves the horns of the last deer that was killed 
 in this vicinity, and another has told me the particular! of 
 the hunt, in which his uncle was engaged. The hunters 
 were formerly a numerous and merry crew here. I remem- 
 ber well one gaunt Nimrod who would catch up a loaf by 
 the roadside and play a strain on it wilder and more 
 melodious, if my memory serves me, than any hunting- 
 horn. 
 
 At midnight, when there was a moon, I sometimes met 
 with hounds in my path prowling about the woods, which 
 would skulk out of my way, as if afraid, and stand silent 
 amid the bushes till I had passed. 
 
 Squirrels and wild mice disputed for my store of nut?.. 
 There were scores of pitch-pines around my house, froo> 
 
WINTER ANIMALS IN THE WOODS 251 
 
 one to four inches in diameter, which had been gnawed by 
 mice the previous winter, a Norwegian winter for them, 
 for the snow lay long and deep, and they were obliged to 
 mix a large proportion of pine bark with their other diet. 
 These trees were alive and apparently flourishing at mid 
 summer, and many of them had grown a foot, though com- 
 pletely girdled ; but after another winter such were without 
 exception dead. It is remarkable that a single mouse should 
 thus be allowed a whole pine-tree for its dinner, gnawing 
 round instead of up and down it ; but perhaps it is neces- 
 sary in order to thin these trees, which are wont to grow 
 up densely. 
 
 The hares (Lepus Americanus) were very familiar. 
 One had her form under my house all winter, separated 
 from me only by the flooring, and she startled me each 
 morning by her hasty departure when I began to stir, 
 thump, thump, thump, striking her head against the floor- 
 timbers in her hurry. They used to come round my door 
 at dusk to nibble the potato-parings which I had thrown out, 
 and were so nearly the color of the ground that they could 
 hardly be distinguished when still. Sometimes in the twi- 
 light I alternately lost and recovered sight of one sitting 
 motionless under my window. When I opened my door in 
 the evening, off they would go with a squeak and a bounce. 
 Near at hand they only excited my pity. One evening one 
 sat by my door, two paces from me, at first trembling with 
 fear, yet unwilling to move; a poor wee thing, lean and 
 bony, with ragged ears and sharp nose, scant tail and slen- 
 der paws. It looked as if Nature no longer contained the 
 breed of nobler bloods, but stood on her last toes. Its 
 large eyes appeared young and unhealthy, almost dropsical. 
 I took a step, and lo ! away it scud with an elastic spring 
 over the snow-crust, straightening its body and its limbs 
 into graceful length, and soon put the forest between me and 
 itself, the wild, free venison asserting its vigor and the 
 
252 HENRY D. THOREAU. 
 
 dignity of Nature. Not without reason was its slenderness. 
 Such, then, was its nature. (Lepus, levipes, light-foot, some 
 think.) 
 
 What is a country without rabbits and partridges ? They 
 are among the most simple and indigenous animal products ; 
 ancient and venerable families known to antiquity as to 
 modern times ; of the very hue and substance of Nature, 
 nearest allied to leaves and to the ground, and to one 
 another ; it is either winged or it is legged. It is hardly as 
 if you had seen a wild creature when a rabbit or a partridge 
 bursts away, only a natural one, as much to be expected as 
 rustling leaves. The partridge and the rabbit are still sure 
 to thrive, like true natives of the soil, whatever revolutions 
 occur. If the forest is cut off, the sprouts and bushes 
 which spring up afford them concealment, and they become 
 more numerous than ever. That must be a poor country 
 indeed that does not support a hare. Our woods teem with 
 them both, and around every swamp may be seen the 
 partridge or rabbit walk, beset with twiggy fences and 
 horse-hair snares, which some cow-boy tends. 
 
HOME, WOUNDED 
 
 BY SYDNEY DOBELL. 
 
 WHEEL me into the sunshine, 
 Wheel me into the shadow, 
 There must be leaves on the woodbine, 
 Is the king-cup crowned in the meadow? 
 
 Wheel me down to the meadow, 
 
 Down to the little river, 
 
 In sun or in shadow 
 
 I shall not dazzle or shiver, 
 
 I shall be happy anywhere, 
 
 Every breath of the morning air 
 
 Makes me throb and quiver. 
 
 Stay wherever you will, 
 
 By the mount or under the hill, 
 
 Or down by the little river : 
 
 Stay as long as you please, 
 
 Give me only a bud from the trees, 
 
 Or a blade of grass in morning dew, 
 
 Or a cloudy violet clearing to blue, 
 
 I could look on it forever. 
 
 Wheel, wheel through the sunshine, 
 Wheel, wheel through the shadow ; 
 
254 SYDNEY DOBELL. 
 
 There must be odors round the pine, 
 There must be balm of breathing kine, 
 Somewhere down in the meadow. 
 Must I choose ? Then anchor me there 
 Beyond the beckoning poplars, where 
 The larch is snooding her flowery hair 
 With wreaths of morning shadow. 
 
 Among the thicket hazels of the brake 
 
 Perchance some nightingale doth shake 
 
 His feathers, and the air is full of song ; 
 
 In those old days when I was young and strong, 
 
 He used to sing on yonder garden tree, 
 
 Beside the nursery. 
 
 Ah, I remember how I loved to wake, 
 
 And find him singing on the self-same bough 
 
 (I know it even now) 
 
 Where, since the flit of bat, 
 
 In ceaseless voice he sat, 
 
 Trying the spring night over, like a tune. 
 
 Beneath the vernal moon ; 
 
 And while I listed long, 
 
 Day rose, and still he sang, 
 
 And ah 1 his stanchless song, 
 
 As something falling unaware, 
 
 Fell out of the tall trees he sang among, 
 
 Fell ringing down the ringing morn, and rang, 
 
 Rang like a golden jewel down a golden stair. 
 
 Is it too early ? I hope not 
 But wheel me to the ancient oak, 
 On this side of the meadow ; 
 Let me hear the raven's croak 
 Loosened to an amorous note 
 In the hollow shadow. 
 
HOME, WOUNDED. 25o 
 
 Let me see the winter 'snake 
 Thawing all his frozen rings 
 On the bank where the wren sings. 
 Let me hear the little bell, 
 Where the red-wing, topmast high, 
 Looks toward the northern sky, 
 And jangles his farewell. 
 Let us rest by the ancient oak, 
 And see his net of shadow, 
 His net of barren shadow, 
 Like those wrestlers* nets of old, 
 Hold the winter dead and cold, 
 Hoary winter, white and cold, 
 While all is green in the meadow. 
 
 And when you 've rested, brother mine, 
 
 Take me over the meadow ; 
 
 Take me along the level crown 
 
 Of the bare and silent down, 
 
 And stop by the ruined tower. 
 
 On its green scarp, by and by, 
 
 I shall smell the flowering thyme, 
 
 On its wall the wall-flower. 
 
 In the tower there used to be 
 
 A solitary tree. 
 
 Take me there, for the dear sake 
 
 Of those old days wherein I loved to lie 
 
 And pull the melilote, 
 
 And look across the valley to the sky, 
 
 And hear the joy that filled the warm wide hoar 
 
 Bubble from the thrush's throat, 
 
 As into a shining mere 
 
 Rills some rillet trebling clear, 
 
 And speaks the silent silver of the lake. 
 
 There 'mid cloistering tree-roots, year by year, 
 
256 SYDNEY DOBELL. 
 
 The hen-thrash sat, and he, her lief and dear, 
 Among the boughs did make 
 A ceaseless music of her married time, 
 And all the ancient stones grew sweet to hear, 
 And answered him in the unspoken rhyme 
 Of gracious forms most musical 
 That tremble on the wall 
 And trim its age with airy fantasies 
 That flicker in the sun, and hardly seem 
 As if to be beheld were all, 
 And only to our eyes 
 They rise and fall, 
 And fall and rise, 
 
 Sink down like silence, or a-sudden stream 
 As wind-blown on the wind as streams a wedding-chime. 
 
 But you are wheeling me while I dream, 
 And we 've almost reached the meadow I 
 You may wheel me fast through the sunshine, 
 You may wheel me fast through the shadow, 
 But wheel me slowly, brother mine, 
 Through the green of the sappy meadow ; 
 For the sun, these days have been so fine, 
 Must have touched it over with celandine, 
 And the southern hawthorn, I divine, 
 Sheds a muffled shadow. 
 
 There blows 
 
 The first primrose, 
 
 Under the bare bank roses : 
 
 There is but one, 
 
 And the bank is brown, 
 
 But soon the children will come down, 
 
 The ringing children come singing down, 
 
 To pick their Easter posies, 
 
HOME, WOUNDED. 257 
 
 And they '11 spy it out, my beautiful, 
 Among the bare brier-roses ; 
 And when I sit here again alone, 
 The bare brown bank will be blind and dull, 
 Alas for Easter posies ! 
 But when the din is over and gone, 
 Like an eye that opens after pain, 
 I shall see my pale flower shining again ; 
 Like a fair star after a gust of rain 
 I shall see my pale flower shining again ; 
 Like a glow-worm after the rolling wain 
 Hath shaken darkness down the lane 
 I shall see my pale flower shining again ; 
 And it will blow here for two months more, 
 And it will blow here again next year, 
 And the year past that, and the year beyond ; 
 And through all the years till my years are o'er 
 I shall always find it here. 
 Shining across from the bank above, 
 Shining up from the pond below, 
 Ere a water-fly wimple the silent pond, 
 Or the first green weed appear. 
 And I shall sit here under the tree, 
 And as each slow bud uncloses, 
 I shall see it brighten and brighten to me, 
 From among the leafing brier-roses, 
 The leaning leafing roses, 
 As at eve the leafing shadows grow, 
 And the star of light and love 
 Draweth near o'er her airy glades, 
 Draweth near through her heavenly shades, 
 As a maid through a myrtle grove. 
 And the flowers will multiply, 
 As the stars come blossoming over the sky, 
 The bank will blossom, the waters blow, 
 17 
 
258 SYDNEY DOBELL. 
 
 Till the singing children hitherward hie 
 
 To gather May-day posies ; 
 
 And the bank will be bare wherever they go, 
 
 As dawn, the primrose-girl, goes by, 
 
 And alas for heaven's primroses ! 
 
 Blare the trumpet, and boom the gun, 
 But, oh ! to sit here thus in the sun, 
 To sit here feeling my work is done, 
 While the sands of life so golden run, 
 And I watch the children's posies, 
 And my idle heart is whispering, 
 " Bring whatever the years may bring, 
 The flowers will blossom, the birds will sing, 
 And there '11 always be primroses." 
 
 Looking before me here in the sun, 
 I see the Aprils one after one, 
 Primrosed Aprils one by one, 
 Primrosed Aprils on and on, 
 Till the floating prospect closes 
 In golden glimmers that rise and rise, 
 And perhaps are gleams of Paradise, 
 And perhaps too far for mortal eyes 
 New years of fresh primroses, 
 Years of earth's primroses, 
 Springs to be, and springs for me 
 Of distant, dim primroses. 
 
 My soul lies out like a basking hound, 
 
 A hound that dreams and dozes ; 
 
 Along my life my length I lay, 
 
 I fill to-morrow and yesterday, 
 
 I am warm with the suns that have long since set, 
 
 I am warm with the summers that are not yet, 
 
HOME, WOUNDED. 259 
 
 And like one who dreams and dozes 
 
 Softly afloat on a sunny sea, 
 
 Two worlds are whispering over me, 
 
 And there blows a wind of roses 
 
 From the backward shore to the shore before, 
 
 From the shore before to the backward shore, 
 
 And like two clouds that meet and pour, 
 
 Each through each, till core in core 
 
 A single self reposes, 
 
 The nevermore with the evermore 
 
 Above me mingles and closes ; 
 
 As my soul lies out like the basking hound, 
 
 And wherever it lies seems happy ground, 
 
 And when, awakened by some sweet sound, 
 
 A dreamy eye uncloses, 
 
 I see a blooming world around 
 
 And I lie amid primroses, 
 
 Years of sweet primroses, 
 
 Springs of fresh primroses, 
 
 Springs to be, and springs for me 
 
 Of distant, dim primroses. 
 
 O to lie a-dream, a-dream, 
 
 To feel I may dream and to know you deem 
 
 My work is done forever, 
 
 And the palpitating fever 
 
 That gains and loses, loses and gains, 
 And beats the huriying blood on the brunt of a thousand pains 
 
 Cooled at once by that blood-let 
 
 Upon the paparet ; 
 And all the tedious tasked toil of the difficult long endeavar 
 
 Solved and quit by no more fine 
 
 Than these limbs of mine, 
 
 Spanned and measured once for all 
 
 By that right hand I lost, 
 
260 SYDNEY DOBELL. 
 
 Bought up at so light a cost 
 
 As one bloody fall 
 
 On a soldier's bed, 
 
 And three days on the ruined wall 
 
 Among the thirstless dead. 
 
 o 
 
 O to think my name is crost 
 
 From duty's muster-roll ; 
 
 That I may slumber though the clarion call, 
 
 And live the joy of an embodied soul 
 
 Free as a liberated ghost. 
 
 O to feel a life of deed 
 
 Was emptied out to feed 
 
 That fire of pain that burned so brief a while, 
 
 That fire from which I come, as the dead come 
 
 Forth from the irreparable tomb, 
 
 Or as a martyr on his funeral pile 
 
 Heaps up the burdens other men do bear 
 
 Through years of segregated care, 
 
 And takes the total load 
 
 Upon his shoulders broad, 
 
 And steps from earth to God. 
 
 O to think, through good or ill, 
 
 Whatever I am you '11 love me still ; 
 
 O to think, though dull I be, 
 
 You that are so grand and free, 
 
 You that are so bright and gay, 
 
 Will pause to hear me when I will, 
 
 As though my head were gray ; . 
 
 And though there 's little I can say, 
 
 Each will look kind with honor while he hears. 
 
 And to your loving ears 
 
 My thoughts will halt with honorable scars, 
 
 And when my dark voice stumbles with the weight 
 
HOME, WOUNDED. 261 
 
 Of what it doth relate 
 
 (Like tha . blind comrade blinded in the wars * 
 
 Who bore the one-eyed brother that was lame), 
 
 You '11 remember 't is the same 
 
 That cried, " Follow me," 
 
 Upon a summer's day ; 
 
 And I shall understand with unshed tears 
 
 This great reverence that I see, 
 
 And bless the day and Thee, 
 
 Lord God of victory ! 
 
 And she, 
 
 Perhaps O even she 
 
 May look as she looked when I knew her 
 
 In those old days of childish sooth, 
 
 Ere my boyhood dared to woo her. 
 
 I will not seek to sue her, 
 
 For I 'm neither fonder nor truer 
 
 Than when she slighted my lovelorn youth, 
 
 My giftless, graceless, guinealess truth, 
 
 And I only lived to rue her. 
 
 But I '11 never love another, 
 
 And, in spite of her lovers and lands, 
 
 She shall love me yet, my brother ! 
 
 As a child that holds by his mother, 
 While his mother speaks his praises, 
 Holds with eager hands, 
 And ruddy and silent stands 
 In the ruddy and silent daisies, 
 And hears her bless her boy, 
 And lifts a wondering joy, 
 So I '11 not seek nor sue her, 
 But I '11 leave my glory to woo her, 
 And I '11 stand like a child beside, 
 And from behind the purple pride 
 
262 SYDNEY DOBELL. 
 
 I '11 lift my eyes unto her, 
 
 And I shall not be denied. 
 
 And you will love her, brother dear, 
 
 And perhaps next year you '11 bring me here 
 
 All through the balmy April-tide, 
 
 And she will trip like spring by my side, 
 
 And be all the birds to my ear. 
 
 And here all three we '11 sit in the sun, 
 
 And see the Aprils one by one, 
 
 Primrosed Aprils on and on, 
 
 Till the floating prospect closes 
 
 In golden glimmers that rise and rise, 
 
 And perhaps, are gleams of Paradise, 
 
 And perhaps, too far for mortal eyes, 
 
 New springs of fresh primroses, 
 
 Springs of earth's primroses, 
 
 Springs to be and springs for me, 
 
 Of distant dim primroses. 
 
THOUGHTS FROM THE ARCADIA. 
 
 BY SIR PHILIP SIDNEY. 
 
 /""^ IVE tribute, but not oblation, to human wisdom/' 
 
 \Jf " Longer I would not wish to draw breath, than 1 
 may keep myself unspotted of any heinous crime." 
 
 " In the clear mind of virtue treason can find no hiding- 
 place." 
 
 " The only disadvantage of an honest heart is credulity." 
 
 "The hero's soul may be separated from his body, but 
 never alienated from the remembrance of virtue." 
 
 " Doing good is the only certainly happy action of a 
 man's life." 
 
 " The journey of high honor lies not in smooth ways." 
 
 "Who shoots at the midday sun, though he is sure he 
 sfcall never hit the mark, yet as sure he is that he shall 
 shoot higher than he who aims but at a bush." 
 
 " Remember that in all miseries, lamenting becomes fools, 
 and action, the wise." 
 
 "The great, in affliction, bear a countenance more prince- 
 ly than they were wont; for it is the temper of highest 
 hearts, like the palm-tree, to strive most upward when it is 
 most burdened." 
 
 "The perfect hero passeth through the multitude as a 
 man that neither disdains a people", nor yet is anything 
 tickled with their flattery." 
 
 "In a brave bosom, honor cannot be rocked asleep by 
 affection." 
 
264 SIR PHILIP SIDNEY. 
 
 " Contention for trifles can get but a trifling victory." 
 " Prefer truth, before the maintaining of an opinion." 
 "A man of true honor thinks himself greater in being 
 subject to his word given, than in being lord of a princi- 
 pality." 
 
 " Joyful is woe for a noble cause, and welcome all its mis- 
 eries." 
 
 " There is nothing evil but what is within us ; the rest is 
 either natural or accidental." 
 
 " While there is hope left, let not the weakness of sorrow 
 make the strength of resolution languish." 
 
 " Who frowns at others' feasts, had better bide away." 
 " Friendship is so rare, as it is to be doubted whether it 
 be a thing indeed, or but a word." 
 
 " Prefer your friend's profit before your own desire." 
 " A just man hateth the evil, but not the evil-doer." 
 " One look (in a clear judgment) from a fair and virtuous 
 woman is more acceptable than all the kindnesses so prodi- 
 gally bestowed by a wanton beauty." 
 
 "It is folly to believe that he can faithfully love who 
 does not love faithfulness." 
 
 " Who doth desire that his wife should be chaste, first be 
 he true; for truth doth deserve truth." 
 
 " It is no less vain to wish death than it i? cowardly to 
 fear it." 
 
 " Everything that is mine, even to my life, i* Ws I love, 
 but the secret of my friend is not mine" 
 
THE KHINE, 
 
 BY LORD BYRON. 
 
 THE castled crag of Drachenfels 
 Frowns o'er the wide and winding Rhine, 
 Whose breast of waters broadly swells 
 
 Between the banks which bear the vine, 
 And hills all rich with blossomed trees, 
 
 And fields which promise corn and wine, 
 And scattered cities crowning these, 
 
 Whose far white walls along them shine, 
 Have strewed a scene, which I should see 
 With double joy wert thou with me. 
 
 And peasant girls with deep-blue eyes, 
 
 And hands which offer early flowers, 
 Walk smiling o'er this paradise ; 
 
 Above, the frequent feudal towers 
 Through green leaves lift their walls of gray, 
 
 And many a rock which steeply lowers, 
 And noble arch in proud decay, 
 
 Look o'er this vale of vintage- bowers ; 
 But one thing wants these banks of Rhine, 
 Thy gentle hand to clasp in mine ! 
 
 I send the lilies given to me : 
 
 Though long before thy hand they touch 
 I know that they must withered be, 
 
 But yet reject them not as such ; 
 
266 LORD BYRON. 
 
 For I have cherished them as dear, 
 Because they yet may meet thine eye, 
 
 And guide thy soul to mine even here, 
 When thou behold'st them drooping nigh, 
 
 And know'st them gathered by the Rhine, 
 
 And offered from my heart to thine ! 
 
 The river nobly foams and flows, 
 
 The charm of this enchanted ground, 
 And all its thousand turns disclose f 
 
 Some fresher beauty varying round : 
 The haughtiest breast its wish might bound 
 
 Through life to dwell delighted here ; 
 Nor could on earth a spot be found 
 
 To nature and to me so dear, 
 Could thy dear eyes in following mine 
 Still sweet more these banks of Rhine ! 
 
A WOMAN. 
 
 BY ROSE TERRY. 
 
 " Not perfect, nay ! but fall of tender wants." Tne Pnnceu. 
 
 I SAT by my window sewing, one bright autumn day, 
 thinking much of twenty other tilings, and very lit- 
 tle of the long seam that slipped away from under my 
 fingers slowly, but steadily, when I heard the front door 
 open with a quick push, and directly into my open door 
 entered Laura Lane, with a degree of impetus that ex- 
 plained the previous sound in the hall. She threw herself 
 into a chair before me, flung her hat on the floor, threw 
 her shawl across the window-sill, and looked at me with- 
 out speaking : hi fact, she was quite too much out of breath 
 to speak. 
 
 I was used to Laura's impetuousness ; so I only smiled, 
 and said, " Good morning." 
 
 " Oh ! " said Laura, with a long breath, " I have got some- 
 thing to tell you, Sue." 
 
 " That 's nice," said I ; " news is worth double here in the 
 country ; tell me slowly, to prolong the pleasure." 
 
 "You must guess first. I want to have you try your 
 powers for once ; guess, do ! " 
 
 "Mr. Lincoln defeated?" 
 
 "0 no, at least not that I know of; all the returns 
 from this State are not in yet, of course not from the 
 others ; besides, do you think I 'd make such a fuss about 
 politics?" 
 
268 ROSE TERRY. 
 
 "You might," said I, thinking of all the beautiful and 
 brilliant women that in other countries and other tunes had 
 made " fuss " more potent than Laura's about politics. 
 
 "But I should n't," retorted she. 
 
 " Then there is a new novel out ? " 
 
 "No!" (with great indignation). 
 
 " Or the parish have resolved to settle Mr. Hermann ? " 
 
 " How stupid you are, Sue ! Everybody knew that yes- 
 terday." 
 
 "But I am not everybody." 
 
 " I shall have tc help you, I see," sighed Laura, half pro- 
 voked. " Somebody is going to be married." 
 
 " Mademoiselle, the great. Mademoiselle ! " 
 
 Laura stared at me. I ought to have remembered she 
 was eighteen, and not likely to have read Sevigne*. I began 
 more seriously, laying down my seam. 
 
 " Is it anybody I know, Laura ? " 
 
 " Of course, or you would n't care about it, and it would 
 be no fun to tell you." 
 
 "Is it you?" 
 
 Laura grew indignant. 
 
 " Do you think I should bounce in, in this way, to tell 
 you 7 was engaged ? " 
 
 " Why not ? should n't you be happy about it ? " 
 
 "Well, if I were, I should " 
 
 Laura dropped her beautiful eyes and colored. 
 
 " The thoughts of youth are long, long thoughts." 
 
 I am sure she felt as much strange, sweet shyness sealing 
 her girlish lips at that moment as when she came, very 
 slowly and silently, a year after, to tell me she was engaged 
 to Mr. Hermann. I had to smile and sigh both. 
 " Tell me, then, Laura ; for I cannot guess." 
 " I '11 tell you the gentleman's name, and perhaps you can 
 guess the lady's then : it is Frank Addison." 
 
A WOMAN. 269 
 
 " Frank Addison ! " echoed I, in surprise ; for this young 
 man was one I knew and loved well, and I could not think 
 who in our quiet village had sufficient attraction for his fas- 
 tidious taste. 
 
 He was certainly worth marrying, though he had some 
 fault?, being as proud as was endurable, as shy as a child, 
 and altogether endowed with a full appreciation, to say the 
 least, of his own charms and merits : but he was sincere 
 and loyal and tender ; well cultivated, yet not priggish or 
 pedantic; brave, well-bred, and high-principled; handsome 
 besides. I knew him thoroughly ; I had held him on my 
 lap, fed him with sugar-plums, soothed his child-sorrows, 
 and scolded his naughtiness, many a time ; I had stood with 
 him by his mother's dying-bed and consoled him by my own 
 tears, for his mother I loved dearly ; so, ever since, Frank 
 had been both near and dear to me, for a mutual sorrow is 
 a tie that may bind together even a young man and an old 
 maid in close and kindly friendship. I was the more sur- 
 prised at his engagement because I thought he would have 
 been the first to tell me of it ; but I reflected that Laura 
 was his cousin, and relationship has an etiquette of prece- 
 dence above any other social link. 
 
 " Yes, Frank Addison ! Now guess, Miss Sue ! for he 
 is not here to tell you, he is in New York ; and here in 
 my pocket I have got a letter for you, but you sha'n't have 
 it till you have well guessed." 
 
 I was, I am ashamed to confess it, but I was not a 
 little comforted at hearing of that letter. One may shake 
 up a woman's heart with every alloy of life, grind, break, 
 scatter it, till scarce a throb of its youth beats there, but to 
 its last bit it is feminine still ; and I felt a sudden sweetness 
 of relief to know that my boy had not forgotten me. 
 
 " I don't know whom to guess, Laura ; who ever marries 
 after other people's fancy ? If I were to guess Sally Hetb 
 eridge, I might come as near as I shall to the truth." 
 
270 ROSE TERRY. 
 
 Laura laughed. 
 
 " You know better," said she. " Frank Addison is the 
 last man to marry a dried-up old tailoress." 
 
 " I don't know that he is ; according to his theories of 
 women and marriage, Sally would make him happy. She 
 is true-hearted, I am sure, generous, kind, affectionate, 
 sensible, and poor. Frank has always raved about the 
 beauty of the soul, and the degradation of marrying money, 
 therefore, Laura, I believe he is going to marry a beauty 
 and an heiress. I guess Josephine Bowen." 
 
 " Susan ! " exclaimed Laura, with a look of intense aston- 
 ishment, " how could you guess it ? " 
 
 "Then it is she?" 
 
 " Yes, it is, and I am so sorry ! such a childish, gig- 
 gling, silly little creature ! I can't think how Frank could 
 fancy her ; she is just like Dora in ' David Copperfield,' 
 a perfect gosling ! I am as vexed " 
 
 "But she is exquisitely pretty." 
 
 " Pretty ! well, that is all ; he might as well have bought 
 a nice picture, or a dolly ! I am out of all patience with 
 Frank. I have n't the heart to congratulate him." 
 
 " Don't be unreasonable, Laura ; when you get as old as 
 I am, you will discover how much better and greater facts 
 are than theories. It 's all very well for men to say, 
 
 1 Beauty is unripe childhood's cheat, 
 
 the soul is all they love, the fair, sweet character, the 
 lofty mind, the tender woman's heart, and gentle loveliness ; 
 but when you come down to the statistics of love and mat- 
 rimony, you find Sally Hetheridge at sixty an old maid, and 
 Miss Bowen at nineteen adored by a dozen men and en- 
 gaged to one. No, Laura, if I had ten sisters, and a fairy 
 godmother for each, I should request that ancient dame to 
 endow them all with beauty and silliness, sure that theL 
 they would achieve a woman's best destiny, a home." 
 
A WOMAN. 271 
 
 Laura's lace burned indignantly ; she hardly let me finish 
 before she exclaimed, 
 
 " Susan Lee ! I am ashamed of you ! Here are you, an 
 old maid, as happy as anybody, decrying all good gifts to a 
 woman, except beauty, because, indeed, they stand in the 
 way of her marriage ! as if a woman was only made to be 
 a housekeeper ! " 
 
 Laura's indignation amused me. I went on, 
 
 " Yes, I am happy enough ; but I should have been much 
 happier had I married. Don't waste your indignation, 
 dear ; you are pretty enough to excuse your being sensible, 
 and you ought to agree with my ideas, because they excuse 
 Frank, and yours do not." 
 
 " I don't want to excuse him ; I am really angry about it. 
 I can't bear to have Frank throw himself away ; she is 
 pretty now, but what will she be in ten years ? " 
 
 " People in love do not usually enter into such remote 
 calculations ; love is to-day's delirium ; it has an element of 
 divine faith in it, in not caring for the morrow. But Laura, 
 we can't help this matter, and we have neither of us any 
 conscience involved in it. Miss Bowen may be better than 
 we know. At any rate, Frank is happy, and that ought to 
 satisfy both you and me just now." 
 
 Laura's eyes filled with tears. I could see them glisten 
 on the dark lashes, as she affected to tie her hat, all the 
 time untying it as fast as ever the knot slid. She was a 
 sympathetic little creature, and loved Frank very sincerely, 
 having known him as long as she could remember. She 
 gave me a silent kiss, and went away, leaving the letter, 
 yet unopened, lying in my lap. I did not open it just then. 
 I was thinking of Josephine Bowcn. 
 
 Every summer, for three years, Mr. and Mrs. Bowen had 
 come to Ridgefield for country air, bringing with them their 
 adopted daughter, whose baptismal name had resigned in 
 favor of the pet appellation " Kitten," a name better 
 
272 ROSE TERRY. 
 
 adapted to her nature and aspect than the Imperatrice ap- 
 pellation that belonged to her. She was certainly aa 
 charming a little creature as ever one saw in flesh and 
 blood. Her sweet child's-face, her dimpled, fair cheeks, her 
 rose-bud of a mouth, and great, wistful, blue eyes, that 
 ' laughed like flax-flowers in a south wind, her tiny, round 
 chin, and low, white forehead, were all adorned by profuse 
 rings and coils and curls of true gold-yellow, that never 
 would grow long, or be braided, or stay smooth, or do any- 
 thing but ripple and twine and push their shining tendrils 
 out of every bonnet or hat or hood the little creature wore, 
 like a stray parcel of sunbeams that would shine. Her del- 
 icate, tiny figure was as round as a child's, her funny 
 hands as quaint as some fat baby's, with short fingers and 
 dimpled knuckles. She was a creature as much made to be 
 petted as a King Charles spaniel, and petted she was, 
 far beyond any possibility of a crumpled rose-leaf. Mrs. 
 Bowen was fat, loving, rather foolish, but the best of friends 
 and the poorest of enemies ; she wanted everybody to be 
 happy and fat and well as she was, and would urge the 
 necessity of wine, and entire idleness, and horse-exercise, 
 upon a poor minister, just as honestly and energetically as 
 if he could have afforded them : an idea to the contrary 
 never crossed her mind spontaneously, but, if introduced 
 there, brought forth direct results of bottles, bank-bills, and 
 loans of ancient horses, only to be checked by friendly re 
 monstrance, or the suggestion that a poor man might be also 
 proud. Mr. Bowen was tall and spare, a man of much 
 sense and shrewd kindliness, but altogether subject and sub- 
 missive to " Kitten's " slightest wish. She never wanted 
 anything; no princess in a story-book had less to desire; 
 and this entire spoiling and indulgence seemed to her only 
 the natural course of things. She took it as an open rose 
 takes sunshine, with so much simplicity, and heartiness, and 
 beaming content, and perfume of sweet, careless affection, 
 
A WOMAN. 273 
 
 that she was not given over to any little vanities or affecta- 
 tions, but was always a dear, good little child, as happy as 
 the day was long, and quite without a fear or apprehension. 
 I had seen very little of her in those three summers, for I 
 had been away at the sea-side, trying to fan the flickering 
 life that alone was left to me with pungent salt breezes and 
 stinging baptisms of spray, but I had liked that little pretty 
 well. I did not think her so silly as Laura did ; she seemed 
 to me so purely simple, that I sometimes wondered if her 
 honest directness and want of guile were folly or not. But 
 I liked to see her, as she cantered past my door on her pony, 
 the gold tendrils thick clustered about her throat and under 
 the brim of her black hat, and her bright blue eyes sparkling 
 with the keen air, and a real wild-rose bloom on her smiling 
 face. She was a prettier sight even than my profuse chrys- 
 anthemums, whose masses of garnet and yellow and white 
 nodded languidly to the autumn winds to-day. 
 
 I recalled myself from this dream of recollection, better 
 satisfied with Miss Bowen than I had been before. I could 
 see just how her beauty had bewitched Frank, so bright, 
 so tiny, so loving : one always wants to gather a little, gay, 
 odor-breathing rose-bud for one's own, and such she was to 
 him. 
 
 So then I opened his letter. It was dry and stiff: men's 
 letters almost always are ; they cannot say what they feel ; 
 they will be fluent of statistics, or description, or philosophy, 
 or politics, but as to feeling, there they are dumb, except 
 in real love-letters, and, of course, Frank's was unsatisfac- 
 tory accordingly. Once, toward the end, came out a natural 
 sentence : " O Sue ! if you knew her, you would n't won- 
 der ! " So he had, after all, felt the apology he would not 
 speak; he had some little deference left for his deserted 
 theories. 
 
 "Well I knew what touched his pride, and struck that 
 little, revealing spark from his deliberate pen: Josephine 
 18 
 
274 ROSE TERR*. 
 
 Bowen was rich, and he only a poor lawyer in a country 
 town : he felt it even in this first flush of love, and to that 
 feeling I must answer when I wrote him, not merely to 
 the announcement, and the delight, and the man's pride. 
 So I answered his letter at once, and he answered mine in 
 person. I had nothing to say to him, when I saw him ; it 
 was enough to see how perfectly happy and contented he 
 was, how the proud, restless eyes that had always looked 
 a challenge to all the world were now tranquil to their 
 depths. Nothing had interfered with his passion. Mrs. 
 Bowen liked him always, Mr. Bowen liked him now ; no- 
 body had objected, it had not occurred to anybody to object ; 
 money had not been mentioned any more than it would 
 have been, in Arcadia. Strange to say, the good, simple 
 woman, and the good, shrewd man had both divined Frank's 
 peculiar sensitiveness, and respected it. 
 
 There was no period fixed for the engagement, it was in- 
 definite as yet, and the winter, with all its excitements of 
 South and North, passed by at length, and the first of April 
 the Bowens moved out to Eidgefield. It was earlier than 
 usual; but the city was crazed with excitement, and Mr. 
 Bowen was tried and worn ; he wanted quiet. Then I saw 
 a great deal of Josephine, and in spite of Laura, and her 
 still restless objections to the child's childish, laughing, incon- 
 sequent manner, I grew into liking her: not that there 
 seemed any great depth to her ; she was not specially intel- 
 lectual, or witty, or studious, or practical ; she did not try 
 to be anything : perhaps that was her charm to me. I had 
 seen so many women laboring at themselves to be some- 
 thing, that one who was content to live without thinking 
 about it was a real phenomenon to me. Nothing bores me 
 (though I be stoned for the confession, I must make it ! ) 
 more than a woman who is bent on improving her mind, or 
 forming her manners, or moulding her character, or watch- 
 ing her motives, with that deadly-lively conscientiousness 
 
A WOMAN. 275 
 
 that makes so many good people disagreeable. Why can't 
 they consider the lilies, which grow by receiving sun and 
 air and dew from God, and not hopping about over the lots 
 to find the warmest comer or the wettest hollow, to see 
 how much bigger and brighter they can grow ? It was real 
 rest to me to have this tiny, bright creature come in to me 
 every day during Frank's office-hours as unintentionally as 
 a yellow butterfly would come in at the window. Some- 
 times she strayed to the kitchen-porch, and, resting her 
 elbows on the window-sill and her chin on both palms, looked 
 at me with wondering eyes while I made bread or cake ; 
 sometimes she came by the long parlor-window, and sat 
 down on a bi-ioche at my feet while I sewed, talking in her 
 direct, unconsidered way, so fresh, and withal so good and 
 pure, I came to thinking the day very dull that did not 
 bring "Kitten" to see me. 
 
 The nineteenth of April, in the evening, my door opened 
 again with an impetuous bang ; but this tune it was Frank 
 Addison, his eyes blazing, his dark cheek flushed, his whole 
 aspect fired and furious. 
 
 " Good God, Sue ! do you know what they Ve done in 
 Baltimore ? " 
 
 " What ? " said I, in vague terror, for I had been an 
 alarmist from the first : I had once lived at the South. 
 
 " Fired on a Massachusetts regiment, and killed nobody 
 knows how many yet-; but killed, and wounded." 
 
 I could not speak : it was the lighted train of a powder- 
 magazine burning before my eyes. Frank began to walk 
 up and down the room. 
 
 " I must go ! I must ! I must ! " came involuntarily from 
 his working lips. 
 
 " Frank ! Frank ! remember Josephine." 
 
 It was a cowardly thing to do, but I did it. Frank turned 
 ghastly white, and sat down in a chair opposite me. I 
 had for the moment quenched his ardor ; he looked at me 
 with anxious eyes and drew a long sigh, almost a groan. 
 
276 ROSE TERKY. 
 
 " Josephine ! " he ^aid, as if the name were new to him, 
 so vitally did the idea seize all his faculties. 
 
 " Well, dear ! " said a sweet little voice at the door. 
 
 Frank turned, and seemed to see a ghost ; for there in 
 the doorway stood " Kitten," her face perhaps a shade 
 calmer than ordinary, swinging in one hand the tasselled 
 hood she wore of an evening, and holding her shawl togeth 
 er with the other. Over her head we discerned the spare, 
 upright shape of Mr. Bowen, looking grim and penetrative, 
 but not unkindly. 
 
 " What is the matter ? " went on the little lady. 
 
 Nobody answered, but Frank and- 1 looked at each other. 
 She came in now and went toward him, Mr. Bowen follow- 
 ing at a respectful distance, as if he were her footman. 
 
 " I 've been looking for you everywhere," said she, with 
 the slightest possible suggestion of reserve, or perhaps ti- 
 midity, in her voice. " Father went first for me, and when 
 you were not at Laura's or the office, or the post-office, or 
 Mrs. Sledge's, then I knew you were here ; so I came with 
 him, because because " she hesitated the least bit here 
 we love Sue." 
 
 Frank still looked at her with his soul in his eyes, as if 
 he wanted to absorb her utterly into himself and then die 
 I never saw such a look before ; I hope I never may again , 
 it haunts me to this day. 
 
 I can pause now to recall and reason about the curious, 
 exalted atmosphere that seemed suddenly to have surround- 
 ed us, as if bare spirits communed there, not flesh and 
 blood. Frank did not move ; he sat and looked at her 
 standing near him, so near that her shawl trailed against 
 his chair ; but presently when she wanted to grasp some- 
 thing, she moved aside and took Ijold of another chair, 
 not his : it was a little thing, but it interpreted her. 
 
 " Well ? v said he in a hoarse tone. 
 
 Just then she moved, as I said, and laid one hand on 
 
A WOMAN. 277 
 
 the back of a chair : it was the only symptom of emotion 
 she show ed ; her voice was as childish-clear and steady 
 as before. 
 
 " You want to go, Frank, and I thought you would rather 
 be married to me first ; so I came to find you and tell you 
 I would." 
 
 Frank sprang to his feet like a shot man ; I cried ; Jose- 
 phine stood looking at us quite steadily, her head a little 
 bent toward me, her eyes calm, but very wide open ; and 
 Mr. Bowen gave an audible grunt. I suppose the right 
 thing for Frank to have done in any well-regulated novel 
 would have been to fall on his knees and call her all sorts 
 of names ; but people never do that is, any people that I 
 know just what the gentlemen in novels do ; so he walked 
 off and looked out of the window. To my aid caine the 
 goddess of slang. I stopped snuffling directly. 
 
 " Josephine," said I, solemnly, " you are a brick ! " 
 
 "Well, I should think so!" said Mr. Bowen, slightly 
 sarcastic. 
 
 Josey laughed very softly. Frank came back from the 
 window, and then the three went off together, she holding 
 by her father's arm, Frank on his other side. I could not 
 but look after them as I stood in the hall-door, and then I 
 came back and sat down to read the paper Frank had flung 
 on the floor when he came in. It diverted my mind enough 
 from myself to enable me to sleep ; for I was burning with 
 self-disgust to think of my cowardice, I, a grown woman, 
 supposed to be more than ordinarily strong-minded by some 
 people, fairly shamed and routed by a girl Laura Lane 
 called "Dora"! 
 
 In the morning, Frank came directly after breakfast. 
 He had found his tongue now, certainly, for words 
 seemed noway to satisfy him, talking of Josephine ; and 
 presently she came, too, as brave and bright as ever, sewing 
 busily on a long housewife for Frank ; and after her, Mrs. 
 
278 ROSE TERRY. 
 
 Bo wen, making a huge pin-ball in red white, and blue, and 
 full of the trunk she was packing for Frank to carry, to 
 be filled with raspberry-jam, hard gingerbread, old brandy, 
 clove-cordial, guava jelly, strong peppermints, quinine, black 
 cake, cod-liver oil, horehound-candy, Brandreth's pills, dam- 
 son-leather, and cherry-pectoral, packed in with flannel and 
 cotton bandages, lint, lancets, old linen, and cambric hand- 
 kerchiefs. 
 
 I could not help laughing, and was about to remonstrate, 
 when Frank shook his head at me from behind her. He 
 said afterward he let her go on that way, because it kept 
 her from crying over Josephine. As for the trunk, he 
 should give it to Miss Dix as soon as ever he reached 
 Washington. 
 
 In a week, Frank bad got his commission as captain of a 
 company in a volunteer regiment; he went into camp at 
 Dartford, our chief town, and set to work in earnest at tac- 
 tics and drill. The Bowens also went to Dartford, and the 
 last week in May came back for Josey's wedding. I am a 
 superstitious creature, most women are, and it went to 
 my heart to have them married in May ; but I did not say 
 so, for it seemed imperative, as the regiment were to leave 
 for Washington in June, early. 
 
 The day but one before the wedding was one of those 
 warm, soft days that so rarely come in May. My windows 
 were open, and the faint scent of springing grass and open- 
 ing blossoms came in on every southern breath of wind. 
 Josey had brought her work over to sit beside me. She 
 was hemming her wedding-veil, a long cloud of tulle ; 
 and as she sat there, pinching the frail stuff in her fingers, 
 and handling her needle with such deft little ways, as if 
 they were old friends and understood each other, there was 
 something so youthful, so unconscious, so wistfully sweet in 
 her aspect, I could not believe her the same resolute, brave 
 creature I had seen that night in April. 
 
A WOMAN. 279 
 
 * Josey," said I, " I don't know how you can be willing to 
 let Frank go." 
 
 It was a hard thing for me to say, and I said it without 
 thinking. 
 
 She leaned back in her chair, and pinched her hem faster 
 than ever. 
 
 " I don't know, either," said she. " I suppose it was be- 
 cause I ought. I don't think I am so willing now, Sue : it 
 was easy at first, for I was so angry and grieved about those 
 Massachusetts men ; but now, when I get time to think, I 
 do ache over it ! I never let him know ; for it is just the 
 same right now, and he thinks so. Besides, I never let my- 
 self grieve much, even to myself, lest he might find it out. 
 I must keep bright till he goes. It would be so very hard 
 on him, Susy, to think I was crying at home." 
 
 I said no more, I could not ; and happily for me, 
 Frank came in with a bunch of wild-flowers that Josey took 
 with a smile as gay as the columbines, and a blush that out- 
 shone the " pinkster-bloomjes," as our old Dutch " chore- 
 man " called the wild honeysuckle. A perfect shower of 
 dew fell from them all over her wedding-veil. 
 
 The day of her marriage was showery as April, but a 
 gleam of soft, fitful sunshine streamed into the little church- 
 windows, and fell across the tiny figure that stood by Frank 
 Addison's side, like a ray of glory, till the golden curls glit- 
 tered through her veil, and the fresh lilies-of-the-valley that 
 crowned her hair and ornamented her simple dress seemed 
 to send out a fresher fragrance, and glow with more pearly 
 whiteness. Mrs. Bowen, in a square pew, sobbed and snuf- 
 fled, and sopped her eyes with a lace pocket-handkerchief, 
 and spilt cologne all over her dress, and mashed the flowers 
 on her French hat against the dusty pew-rail, and behaved 
 generally like a hen that has lost her sole chicken. Mr. 
 Bowen sat upright in the pew-corner, uttering sonorous 
 hems, whenever his wife sobbed audibly ; he looked as dry 
 
230 ROSE TERRY. 
 
 as a stick, and as grim as Bunyan's giant, and chewed car- 
 damom-seeds, as if he were a ruminating animal. 
 
 After the wedding came lunch : it was less formal than 
 dinner, and nobody wanted to sit down before hot dishes 
 and go through with the accompanying ceremonies. For 
 my part, I always did hate gregarious eating : it is well 
 enough for animals, in pasture or pen ; but a thing that has 
 so little that is graceful or dignified about it as this taking 
 food, especially as the thing is done here in America, 
 ought, in my opinion, to be a solitary act. I never bring 
 my quinine and iron to my friends and invite them to share 
 it ; why should I ask them to partake of my beef, mutton, 
 and pork, with the accompanying mastication, the distortion 
 of face, and the suppings and gulpings of fluid dishes that 
 many respectable people indulge in ? No, let me, at 
 least, eat alone. But I did not do so to-day; for Josey, 
 with the most unsentimental air of hunger, sat down at the 
 table and ate two sandwiches, three pickled mushrooms, a 
 piece of pie, and a glass of jelly, with a tumbler of ale be- 
 sides. Laura Lane sat on the other side of the table, her 
 great dark eyes intently fixed on Josephine, and a look in 
 which wonder was delicately shaded with disgust quivering 
 about her mouth. She was a feeling soul, and thought a 
 girl in love ought to live on strawberries, honey, and spring- 
 water. I believe she really doubted Josey's affection for 
 Frank, when she saw her eat a real mortal meal on her 
 wedding-day. As for me, I am a poor, miserable, unhealthy 
 creature, not amenable to ordinary dietetic rules, and much 
 given to taking any excitement, above a certain amount in 
 lieu of rational food ; so I sustained myself on a cup of 
 coffee, and saw Frank also make tolerable play of knife and 
 fork, though he did take some blanc-mange with his cold 
 chicken, and profusely peppered his Charlotte-Russe ! 
 
 Mrs. Bowen alternately wept and ate pie. Mr. Bowen 
 said the jelly tasted of turpentine, and the chickens must 
 
A WOMAN. . 281 
 
 have gone on Noah's voyage, they were so tough ; he 
 growled at the ale, and asked nine questions about the 
 coffee, all of a derogatory sort, and never once looked at 
 Josephine, who looked at him every tune he was particularly 
 cross, with a rosy little smile as if she knew why ! The 
 few other people present behaved after the ordinary fashion ; 
 and when we had finished, Frank and Josephine, Mr. and 
 Mrs. Bowen, Laura Lane and I, all took the train for Dart- 
 ford. Laura was to stay two weeks, and I till the regiment 
 left 
 
 An odd time I had, after we were fairly settled in our 
 quiet hotel, with those two girls. Laura was sentimental, 
 sensitive, rather high-flown, very shy, and self-conscious ; it 
 was not in her to understand Josey at all. "We had a great 
 deal of shopping to do, as our little bride had put off buying 
 most of her finery till this time, on account of the few 
 weeks between the fixing of her marriage-day and its arri- 
 val. It was pretty enough to see the naive vanity with 
 which she selected her dresses and shawls and laces, the 
 quite inconsiderate way in which she spent her money on 
 whatever she wanted. One day we were in a dry-goods' 
 shop, looking at silks ; among them lay one of Marie-Louise 
 blue, a plain silk, rich from its heavy texture only, soft, 
 thick, and perfect in color. 
 
 " I will have that one," said Josephine, after she had eyed 
 it a moment, with her head on one side, like a canary-bird. 
 "How much is it?" 
 
 " Two fifty a yard, Miss," said the spruce clerk, with an 
 inaccessible air. 
 
 " I shall look so nice in it ! " Josey murmured. " Sue, 
 will seventeen yards do ? it must be very full and long ; I 
 can't wear flounces." 
 
 " Yes, that 's plenty," said I, scarce able to keep down a 
 smile at Laura's face. 
 
 She would as soon have smoked a cigar on the steps of 
 
282 ROSE TERRY. 
 
 the hotel as have mentioned before anybody, much less a 
 supercilious clerk, that she should " look so nice " in any- 
 thing. Josey never thought of anything beyond the fact, 
 which was only a fact. So, after getting another dress of a 
 lavender tint, still self-colored, but corded and rich, because 
 it went well with her complexion, and a black one, that 
 " father liked to see against her yellow wig, as he called it," 
 Mrs. Josephine proceeded to a milliner's, 'vhere, to Laura's 
 further astonishment, she bought bonnets for herself, as if 
 she had been her own doll, with an utter disregard of prop- 
 er self-depreciation, trying one after another, and discarding 
 them for various personal reasons, till at last she fixed on a 
 little gray straw, trimmed with gray ribbon and white dai- 
 sies, " for camp," she said, and another of white lace, a 
 fabric calculated to wear twice, perhaps, if its floating 
 sprays of clematis did not catch in any parasol on its first 
 appearance. She called me to see how becoming both the 
 bonnets were, viewed herself in various ways in the glass, 
 and at last announced that she looked prettiest in the straw, 
 but the lace was most elegant. To this succeeded purchases 
 of lace and shawls, that still further opened Laura's eyes, and 
 made her face grave. She confided to me privately, that, 
 after all, I must allow Josephine was silly and extravagant. 
 I had just come from that little lady's room, where she sat 
 surrounded by the opened parcels, saying, with the gravity 
 of a child, 
 
 " I do like pretty things, Sue ! I like them more now 
 than I used to, because Frank likes me. I am so glad 
 I 'm pretty ! " 
 
 I don't know how it was, but I could not quite coincide 
 with Laura's strictures. Josey was extravagant, to be sure ; 
 she was vain ; but something so tender and feminine fla- 
 vored her very faults that they charmed me. I was not 
 an impartial judge ; and I remembered, through all, that 
 A.pril night, and the calm, resolute, self-poised character 
 
A WOMAN. 283 
 
 that invented the lovely, girlish face with such dignity, 
 strength, and simplicity. No, she was not silly ; I could not 
 grant that to Laura. 
 
 Every day we drove to the camp, and brought Frank 
 home to dinner. Now and then he stayed with us till the 
 next day, and even Laura could not wonder at his " infatua- 
 tion," as she had once called it, when she saw how thor- 
 oughly Josephine forgot herself in her utter devotion to 
 him ; over this, Laura's eyes filled with sad forebodings. 
 
 " If anything should happen to him, Sue, it will kill her," 
 she said. " She never can lose him and live. Poor little 
 thing ! how could Mr. Bowen let her marry him ? " 
 
 " Mr. Bowen lets her do much as she likes, Laura, and 
 always has, I imagine." 
 
 " Yes, she has been a spoiled child, I know, but it is such 
 a pity!" 
 
 " Has she been spoiled ? I believe, as a general thing, 
 more children are spoiled by what the Scotch graphically 
 call 'nagging* than by indulgence. What do you think 
 Josey would have been, if Mrs. Brooks had been her 
 mother ? " 
 
 " I don't know quite ; unhappy I am sure ; for Mrs. 
 Brooks's own children look as if they had been fed on 
 chopped catechism, and whipped early every morning, ever 
 since they were born. I never went there without hearing 
 one or another of them told to sit up, or sit down, or keep 
 still, or let their aprons alone, or read their Bibles ; and Joe 
 Brooks confided to me in Sunday school that he called Dea- 
 con Smith i old bald-head,' one day, in the street, to see if 
 a bear would n't come and eat him up, he was so tired of 
 being a good boy ! " 
 
 " That 's a case in point, I think, Laura ; but what a jolly 
 little boy ! he ought to have a week to be naughty in, di- 
 rectly." 
 
 " He never will, while his mother owns a rod ! " said she, 
 emphatically. 
 
284 ROSE TERRY. 
 
 I had beguiled Laura from her subject ; for, to tell the 
 truth, it was one I did not dare to contemplate ; it op- 
 pressed and distressed me too much. 
 
 After Laura went home, we stayed in Dartford only a 
 week, and then followed the regiment to Washington. We 
 had been there but a few days, before it was ordered into 
 service. Frank came into my room one night to tell me. 
 
 " We must be off to-morrow, Sue, and you must take 
 her back to Ridgefield at once. I can't have her here. 1 
 have told Mr. Bowen. If we should be beaten, and we 
 may, raw troops may take a panic, or may fight like vet- 
 erans, but if we should run, they will make a bee-line for 
 Washington. I should go mad to have her here with a pos- 
 sibility of Rebel invasion. She must go ; there is no ques- 
 tion." 
 
 He walked up and down the room, then came back and 
 looked me straight in the face. 
 
 " Susan, if I never come back, you will be her godd 
 friend, too ? " 
 
 " Yes," said I, meeting his eye as coolly as it met mine : 
 I had learned a lesson of Josey. " I shall see you in the 
 morning ? " 
 
 " Yes " ; and so he went back to her. 
 
 Morning came. Josephine was as bright, as calm, as nat- 
 ural, as the June day itself. She insisted on fastening " her 
 Captain's " straps on his shoulders, purloined his cumbrous 
 pin-ball and put it out of sight, and kept even Mrs. Bowen's 
 sobs in subjection by the intense serenity of her manner. 
 The minutes seemed to go like beats of a fever-pulse ; ten 
 o'clock smote on a distant bell ; Josephine had retreated, as 
 if accidentally, to a little parlor of her own, opening from 
 our common sitting-room. Frank shook hands with Mr. 
 Bowen ; kissed Mrs. Bowen dutifully, and cordially too ; 
 gave me one strong clasp in his arms, and one kiss ; then 
 went after Josephine. I closed the door softly behind him. 
 
A WOMAN. 285 
 
 In five minutes by the ticking clock he came out, and strode 
 through the room without a glance at either of us. I had 
 heard her say " Good by " in her sweet, clear tone, just as 
 he opened the door ; but some instinct impelled me to go in 
 to her at once : she lay in a dead faint on the floor. 
 
 We left Washington that afternoon, and went straight 
 back to Ridgefield. Josey was in and out of my small house 
 continually : but for her father and mother, I think she 
 would have stayed with me from choice. Rare letters came 
 from Frank, and were always reported to me, but, of course, 
 never shown. If there was any change in her manner, it 
 was more steadily affectionate to her father and mother than 
 ever ; the fitful, playful ways of her girlhood were subdued, 
 but, except to me, she showed no symptom of pain, no shad- 
 ow of apprehension : with me alone she sometimes drooped 
 and sighed. Once she laid her little head on my neck, and, 
 holding me to her tightly, half sobbed, 
 
 " Oh, I wish I wish I could see him just for once ! " 
 
 I could not speak to answer her. 
 
 As rumors of a march toward Manassas increased, Mr. 
 and Mrs. Bowen took her to Dartford : there was no tele- 
 graph line to Ridgefield, and but one daily mail, and now a 
 day's delay of news might be a vital loss. I could not go 
 with them ; I was too ill. At last came that dreadful day 
 of Bull Run. Its story of shame and blood, trebly exagger- 
 ated, ran like fire through the land. For twenty-four long 
 hours every heart in Ridgefield seemed to stand still ; then 
 there was the better news of fewer dead than the first re- 
 port, and we knew that the enemy had retreated, but no 
 particulars. Another long, long day, and the papers said 
 
 Colonel 's regiment was cut to pieces ; the fourth mail 
 
 told another story: the regiment was safe, but Captains 
 Addison, Black, and Jones, I think, were missing. The 
 fifth day brought me a letter from Mr. Bowen. Frank was 
 dead, shot through the heart, before the panic began, cheer- 
 
286 ROSE TERRY. 
 
 ing on his men ; he had fallen in the very front rank, and 
 his gallant company, at the risk of their lives, after losing 
 half their number as wounded or killed, had brought off his 
 body, and carried it with them in retreat, to find at last that 
 they had ventured all this for a lifeless corpse ! 
 
 He did not mention Josephine, but asked me to come to 
 them at once, as he was obliged to go to Washington. I 
 could not, for I was too ill to travel without a certainty of 
 being quite useless at my journey's end. I could but just 
 sit up. Five days after, I had an incoherent sobbing sort 
 of letter from Mrs. Bowen, to say that they had arranged to 
 have the funeral at Ridgefield the next day but one, that 
 Josephine would come out, with her, the night before, and 
 directly to my house, if I was able to receive them. I sent 
 word by the morning's mail that I was able, and went my- 
 self to the station to meet them. 
 
 They had come alone, and Josey preceded her mother 
 into the little room, as if she were impatient to have any 
 meeting with a fresh face over. She was pale as any pale 
 blossom of spring, and as calm. Her curls, tucked away 
 under the widow's-cap she wore, and clouded by the mass 
 of crape that shrouded her, left only a narrow line of gold 
 above the dead quiet of her brow. Her eyes were like the 
 eyes of a sleep-walker : they seemed to see, but not to feel 
 sight. She smiled mechanically and put a cold hand into 
 mine. For any outward expression of emotion, one might 
 have thought Mrs. Bowen the widow : her eyes were blood- 
 shot and swollen, her nose was red, her lips tremulous, 
 her whole face stained and washed with tears, and the 
 skin seemed wrinkled by their salt floods. She had cried 
 herself sick, more over Josephine than Frank, as was 
 natural. 
 
 It was but a short drive over to my house, but an utterly 
 silent one. Josephine made no sort of demonstration, ex- 
 cept that she stooped to pat my great dog as we went in. I 
 
A WOMAN. | 287 
 
 gave her a room that opened out of mine, and put Mrs. 
 Bowen by herself. Twice in the night I stole in to look at 
 her : both times I found her waking, her eyes fixed on the 
 open window, her face set in its unnatural quiet ; she smiled, 
 but did not speak. Mrs. Bowen told me in the morning 
 that she had neithei shed a tear nor slept since the news 
 came : it seemed to strike her at once into this cold silence, 
 and so she had remained. About ten, a carriage was sent 
 over from the village to take them to the funeral. Tliis 
 miserable custom of ours, that demands the presence of 
 women at such ceremonies, Mrs. Bowen was the last person 
 to evade ; and when I suggested to Josey that she should 
 stay at home with me, she looked surprised, and said, qui- 
 etly, but emphatically, " O no ! " 
 
 After they were gone, I took my shawl and went out on 
 the lawn. There was a young pine dense enough to shield 
 me from the sun, sitting under which I could see the funeral 
 procession as it wound along the river's edge up toward the 
 burying-ground, a mile beyond the station. But there was 
 no sun to trouble me ; cool gray clouds brooded ominously 
 over all the sky : a strong south wind cried, and wailed, and 
 swept in wild gusts through the woods, while in its intervals 
 a dreadful quiet brooded over earth and heaven, over the 
 broad weltering river, that, swollen by recent rain, washed 
 the green grass shores with sullen flood, over the heavy 
 masses of oak and hickory trees that hung on the farther 
 hillside, over the silent village and its gathering people. 
 The engine-shriek was borne on the coming wind from far 
 down the valley. There was an air of hushed expectation 
 and regret in Nature itself that seemed to fit the hour to 
 its event. 
 
 Soon I saw the crowd about the station begin to move, 
 and presently the funeral-bell swung out its solemn tones of 
 lamentation; its measured, lingering strokes, mingled with 
 the woful shrieking of the wind and the sighing of the 
 
288 ROSE TERRr. 
 
 pine-tree overhead, made a dirge of inexpressible force and 
 melancholy. A weight of grief seemed to settle on my 
 very breath : it was not real sorrow ; for, though I knew it 
 well, I had not felt yet that Frank was dead, it was not 
 real to me, I could not take to my stunned perceptions 
 the fact that he was gone. It is the protest of Xature. dim- 
 ly conscious of her original eternity, against this interruption 
 of death, that it should always be such an interruption, so 
 incredible, so surprising, so new. No, the anguish that 
 oppressed me now was -not the true anguish of loss, but 
 merely the effect of these adjuncts ; the pain of want, of 
 aration, of reaching in vain after that which is gone, of 
 %-ivid dreams and tearful waking, all this lay in "wait for 
 the future, to be still renewed, still suffered and endured, 
 till time should be no more. Let all these pangs of recol- 
 lection attest it, these involuntary bursts of longing for 
 
 the eyes that are gone and the voice that is still, these 
 
 recoils of baffled feeling seeking for the one perfect sympa- 
 thy forever fled, these pleasures dimmed in their first 
 resplendence for want of one whose joy would have been 
 keener and sweeter to us than our own, these hitter sor- 
 rows crying like children in pain for the heart that should 
 have soothed and shared them! No, there is no such 
 dreary He as that which prates of consoling Time ! You 
 who are gone, if in heaven you know how we mortals fare, 
 
 you kndw that life took from you no love, no faith, that 
 
 bitterer tears fall for you to-day than ever wet your new 
 graves, that the gayer words and the recalled smiles are 
 only, like the flowers that grow above you, symbols of the 
 deeper roots we" strike in your past existence, that to the 
 true soul there is no such thing as forgetfulness, no such 
 mercy as diminishing regret ! 
 
 Slowly the long procession wound up the river, here, 
 
 black with plumed hearse and sable mourners, there, gay 
 
 with regimental band and bright uniforms, no stately, 
 
A WOMAN. 289 
 
 proper funeral, ordered by custom and marsl ailed by pro- 
 priety, but a straggling array of vehicles ; here, the doctor's 
 old chaise. there, an open wagon, a dusty buggy, a long, 
 open omnibus, such as the village-stable kept for pleasure- 
 parties or for parties of mourning who wanted to go en 
 masse. 
 
 All that knew Frank, in or about Ridgefield, and all who 
 hatl sons or brothers in the army, swarmed to do him honor ; 
 and the quaint, homely array crept slowly through the val- 
 ley, to the sound of tolling bell and moaning wind and the 
 low rush of the swollen river, the first taste of war's des- 
 olation that had fallen upon us, the first dark wave of a 
 whelming tide ! 
 
 As it passed out of sight, I heard the wheels cease, one 
 by one, their crunch and grind on the gravelled road up the 
 slope of the graveyard. I knew they had reached that 
 hillside where the dead of Ridgefield lie calmer than its 
 living ; and presently the long-drawn notes of that hymn- 
 tune consecrated to such occasions old China rose and 
 fell in despairing cadences on my ear. If ever any music 
 was invented for the express purpose of making mourners 
 as distracted as any external thing can make them, it is the 
 bitter, hopeless, unrestrained wail of this tune. There is 
 neither peace nor resignation in it, but the very exhaustion 
 of raving sorrow that heeds neither God nor man, but cries 
 out, with the soulless agony of a wind-harp, its refusal to be 
 comforted. 
 
 At length it was over, and still in that same dead calm 
 Josephine came home to me. Mrs. Bowen was frightened, 
 Mr. Bowen distressed. I could not think what to do at 
 first; but remembering how sometimes a little thing had 
 utterly broken me down from a regained calmness after loss, 
 some homely association, some recall of the past, I begged 
 of Mr. Bowen to bring up from the village Frank's knap- 
 sack, which he had found in one of his men's hands, the 
 19 
 
290 ROSE TERRY. 
 
 poor fellow having taken care of that, while he lost his 
 own : " For the captain's wife," he said. As soon as it 
 came, I took from it Frank's coat, and his cap and sword. 
 My heart was in my mouth as I entered Josephine's room, 
 and saw the fixed quiet on her face where she sat. I 
 walked in, however, witli no delay, and laid the things down 
 on her bed, close to where she sat. . She gave one startled 
 look at them and then at me ; her face relaxed from all its 
 quiet lines ; she sank on her knees by the bedside, and, 
 burying her head in her arms, cried, and cried, and cried, so 
 helplessly, so utterly without restraint, that I cried too. It 
 was impossible for me to help it. At last the tears exhaust- 
 ed themselv^. ; the dreadful sobs ceased to convulse her; 
 all drenched and tired, she lifted her face from its rest, and 
 held out her arms to me. I took her up, and put her to bed 
 like a child. I hung the coat and cap and sword where she 
 could see them. I made her take a cup of broth, and be- 
 fore long, with her eyes fixed on the things I had hung up, 
 she fell asleep, and slept heavily, without waking, till the 
 next morning. 
 
 I feared almost to enter her room when I heard her stir ; 
 I had dreaded her waking, that terrible hour that all 
 know who have suffered, the dim awakening shadow that 
 darkens so swiftly to black reality ; but I need not 1m -e 
 dreaded it for her. She told me afterward that in all that 
 sleep she never lost the knowledge of her grief; she did 
 not come into it as a surprise. Frank had seemed to be 
 with her, distant, sad, yet consoling ; she felt that he was 
 gone, but not utterly, that there was a drear separation 
 and loneliness, but not forever. 
 
 When I went in, she lay there awake, looking at her tro 
 phy, as she came to call it, her eyes with all their light 
 quenched and sodden out with crying, her face pale and 
 unalterably sad, but natural in its sweetness and mobility 
 She drew me down to her and kissed me. 
 
A WOMAN. 291 
 
 * May 1 get up ? " she asked ; and then, without waiting 
 for an answer, went on, "I have been selfish, Sue ; I will 
 try to be better now; I won't run away from my battle. 
 O how glad I am he did n't run away ! It is dreadful 
 now, dreadful ! Perhaps, if I had to choose if he should 
 have run away or or this, I should have wanted him to 
 run, I 'm afraid I should. But I am glad now. If God 
 wanted him, I 'm glad he went from the front ranks. 
 those poor women whose husbands ran away, and were 
 killed, too ! " 
 
 She seemed to be so comforted by that one thought ! It 
 was a strange trait in the little creature ; I could not quite 
 fathom it. 
 
 After this she came down-stairs and went about among 
 us, busying herself in various little ways. She never went 
 to the graveyard; but whenever she was a little tired, I 
 was sure to find her sitting in her room with her eyes on 
 that cap and coat and sword. Letters of condolence poured 
 in, but she would not read them or answer them, and they 
 all fell into my hands. I could not wonder ; for of all cruel 
 conventionalities, visits and letters of condolence seem to 
 me the most cruel. If friends can be useful in lifting off 
 the little painful cares that throng in the house of death till 
 its presence is banished, let them go and do their work qui- 
 etly and cheerfully ; but to make a call or write a note, to 
 measure your sorrow and express theirs, seems to me on a 
 par with pulling a wounded man's bandages off and probing 
 his hurt to hear him cry out and hear yourself say how bad 
 it must be ! 
 
 Laura Lane was admitted, for Frank's sake, as she had 
 been his closest and dearest relative. The day she came, 
 Josey had a severe headache, and looked wretchedly. Lau- 
 ra was shocked, and showed it so obviously, that, had there 
 been any real cause for her alarm, I should have turned her 
 out of the room without ceremony, almost before she was 
 
292 ROSE TERRY. 
 
 fairly in it. As soon as she left, Josey looked at me and 
 smiled. 
 
 " Laura thinks I am going to die," said she ; " but I 'm 
 not. If I could, I would n't, Sue ; for poor father and 
 mother want me, and so will the soldiers by and by." A 
 weary, heart-breaking look quivered in her face as she went 
 on, half whispering, " But I should I should like to see 
 him ! " 
 
 In September she went away. I had expected it ever 
 since she spoke of the soldiers needing her. Mrs. Bowen 
 went to the sea-side for her annual astjima. Mr. Bowen 
 went with Josephine to Washington. There, by some talis- 
 manic influence, she got admission to the hospitals, though 
 she was very pretty, and under thirty. I think perhaps her 
 pale face and widow's-dress, and her sad, quiet manner, 
 were her secret of success. She worked here like a sprite ; 
 nothing daunted or disgusted her. She followed the army 
 to Yorktown, and nursed on the transport-ships. One man 
 said, I was told, that it was " jes' like havin' an apple-tree 
 blow raound, to see that Mis' Addison ; she was so kinder 
 cheery an' pooty, an' knew sech a sight abaout nussin', it did 
 a feller lots of good only to look at her chirpin' abaout." 
 
 Now and then she wrote to me, and almost always ended 
 by declaring she was " quite well, and almost happy." If 
 ever she met with one of Frank's men, and all who were 
 left re-enlisted for the war, he was sure to be nursed like 
 a prince, and petted witR all sorts of luxuries, and told 
 it was for his old captain's sake. Mr. and Mrs. Bowen fol- 
 lowed her everywhere, as near as they could get to her, and 
 afforded unfailing supplies of such extra hospital stores as 
 she wanted ; they lavished on her time and money and love 
 enough to have satisfied three women, but Josey found use 
 for it all for her work. Two months ago, they all came 
 back to Dartford. A hospital had been set up there, and 
 some one was needed to put it in operation ; her experience 
 
A WOMAN. 293 
 
 would be doubly useful there, and it was pleasant for 
 her to be so near Frank's home, to be among his friends 
 and hers. 
 
 I went in, to do what I could, being stronger than usnal. 
 and found her hard at work. Her face retained its rounded 
 outline, her lips had recovered their bloom, her curls now 
 and then strayed from the net under which she carefully 
 tucked them, and made her look as girlish as ever, but the 
 girl's expression was gone ; that tender, patient, resolute 
 look was born of a woman's stern experience ; and though 
 she had laid aside her widow's-cap, because it was incon- 
 venient, her face was so sad in its repose, so lonely and 
 inexpectant, she scarce needed any outward symbol to pro- 
 claim her widowhood. Yet under all this new character lay 
 still some of those childish tastes that made, as it were, the 
 " fresh perfume " of her nature : everything that came in 
 her way was petted ; a little white kitten followed her about 
 the wards, and ran to meet her whenever she came in, with 
 joyful demonstrations ; a great dog waited for her at home, 
 and escorted her to and from the hospital ; and three cana- 
 ries hung in her chamber ; and I confess here, what I 
 would not to Laura, that she retains yet a strong taste for 
 sugar-plums, gingerbread, and the "Lady's Book." She 
 kept only so much of what Laura called her vanity as to be 
 exquisitely neat and particular in every detail of dress ; and 
 though a black gown, and a white linen apron, collar, and 
 cuffs do not afford much room for display, yet these were 
 always so speckless and spotless that her whole aspect was 
 refreshing. 
 
 Last week there was a severe operation performed hi the 
 hospital, and Josephine had to be present. She held the 
 poor fellow's hand till he was insensible from the kindly 
 chloroform they gave him, and, after the surgeons were 
 through, sat by him till night, with such a calm, cheerful 
 face, giving him wine and broth, and watching every indica- 
 
294 ROSE TERRY. 
 
 tion of pulse or skin, till he really rallied, and is now doing 
 well. 
 
 As I came over, the next day, I met Doctor Rivers at the 
 door of her ward. 
 
 " Really," said he, " that little Mrs. Addison is a true 
 heroine ! " 
 
 The kitten purred about my feet, and as I smiled assent 
 to him, I said inwardly to myself, 
 
 " Really, she is a true woman 1 " 
 
DANIEL GRAY 
 
 BY J. G. HOLLAND. 
 
 IF I shall ever win the home in heaven 
 For whose sweet rest I humbly hope and pray, 
 In the great company of the forgiven 
 I shall be sure to find old Daniel Gray. 
 
 1 knew him Avell ; in fact, few knew him better ; 
 
 For my young eyes oft read for him the Word, 
 And saw how meekly from the crystal letter 
 
 He drank the life of his beloved Lord. 
 
 Old Daniel Gray was not a man who lifted 
 On ready words his freight of gratitude, 
 
 And was not called upon among the gifted, 
 In the prayer-meetings of his neighborhood. 
 
 He had a few old-fashioned words and phrases, 
 Linked in with sacred texts and Sunday rhymes ; 
 
 And I suppose that, in his prayers and graces, 
 I Ve heard them all at least a thousand times. 
 
 I see him now, his form, and face, and motions, 
 His homespun habit, and his silver hair, 
 
 And hear the language of his trite devotions 
 Rising behind the straight-backed kitchen-chair. 
 
296 J. G. HOLLAND. 
 
 I can remember how the sentence sounded, 
 
 " Help us, Lord, to pray, and not to faint ! " 
 And how the " conquering-and-to-conquer " rounded 
 
 The loftier aspirations of the saint. 
 
 * 
 
 He had some notions that did not improve him : 
 He never kissed his children, so they say ; 
 
 And finest scenes and fairest flowers would move him 
 Less than a horseshoe picked up in the way. 
 
 He could see naught but vanity in beauty, 
 And naught but weakness in a fond caress, 
 
 And pitied men whose views of Christian duty 
 Allowed indulgence in such foolishness. 
 
 Yet there were love and tenderness within him ; 
 
 And I am told, that, when his Charley died, 
 Nor Nature's need nor gentle words could win him 
 
 From his fond vigils at the sleeper's side. 
 
 And when they came to bury little Charley, 
 
 They found fresh dew-drops sprinkled in his hair, 
 
 And on his breast a rose-bud, gathered early, 
 And guessed, but did not know, who placed it thera 
 
 My good old friend was very hard on fashion, 
 
 And held its votaries in lofty scorn, 
 And often burst into a holy passion 
 
 While the gay crowds went by on Sunday morn. 
 
 Yet he was vain, old Gray, and did not know it ! 
 
 He wore his hair unparted, long, and plain, 
 To hide the handsome brow that slept below it, 
 
 For fear the world would think that he was vain I 
 
DANIEL GRAY. 297 
 
 He had a hearty hatred of oppression, 
 
 And righteous words for sin of every kind ; 
 
 Alas, that the transgressor and transgression 
 Were linked so closely in his honest mind ! 
 
 Yet that sweet tale of gift without repentance, 
 Told of the Master, touched him to the core, 
 
 And tearless he could never read the sentence : 
 " Neither do I condemn thee : sin no more." 
 
 Honest and faithful, constant in his calling, 
 Strictly attendant on the means of grace, 
 
 Instant in prayer, and fearful most of falling, 
 Old Daniel Gray was always in his place. 
 
 A practical old man, and yet a dreamer, 
 
 He thought that in some strange, unlooked-for way, 
 His mighty Friend in heaven, the great Redeemer, 
 
 Would honor him with wealth some golden day. 
 
 This dream he carried in a hopeful spirit 
 Until in death his patient eye grew dim, 
 
 And his Redeemer called him to inherit 
 
 The heaven of wealth long garnered up for him. 
 
 So, if I ever win the home in heaven 
 
 For whose sweet rest I humbly hope and pray, 
 
 In the great company of the forgiven 
 I shall be sure to find old Daniel Gray. 
 
MI FRIENDS. 
 
 BY ALEXANDER CARLYLE. 
 
 IN the year 1753 David Hume was living in Edinburgh 
 and composing his History of Great Britain. He was 
 a man of great knowledge, and of a social and benevolent 
 temper, and truly the best-natured man in the world. He 
 was branded with the title of Atheist, on account of the 
 many attacks on revealed religion that are to be found in 
 his philosophical works, and in many places of his History, 
 the last of which are still more objectionable than the 
 first, which a friendly critic might call only sceptical 
 Apropos of this, when Mr. Robert Adam, the celebrated 
 architect, and his brother, lived in Edinburgh with their 
 mother, an aunt of Dr. Robertson's, and a very respectable 
 woman, she said to her son, " I shall be glad to see any of 
 your companions to dinner, but I hope you will never bring 
 the Atheist here to disturb my peace." But Robert soon 
 fell on a method to reconcile her to him, for he introduced 
 him under another name, or concealed it carefully from her. 
 When the company parted, she said to her son, " I must 
 confess that you bring very agreeable companions about 
 you, but the large, jolly man who sat next me is the most 
 agreeable of them all." " This was the very Atheist," said 
 he, " mother, that you was so much afraid of." " Well, says 
 she, " you may bring him here as much as you please, for 
 he 's the most innocent, agreeable, facetious man I ever met 
 
MY FRIENDS. 299 
 
 with." This was truly the case with him ; for though he 
 had much learning and a fine taste, and was professedly a 
 sceptic, though by no means an atheist, he had the greatest 
 simplicity of mind and manners with the utmost facility and 
 benevolence of temper of any man I ever knew. His con- 
 versation was truly irresistible, for while it was enlightened, 
 it was naive almost to puerility. 
 
 I was one of those who never believed that David Hume's 
 sceptical principles had laid fast hold on his mind, but 
 thought that his books proceeded rather from affectation of 
 superiority and pride of understanding and love of vainglory. 
 I was confirmed in this opinion, after his death, by what the 
 Honorable Patrick Boyle, one of his most intimate friends, 
 told me many years ago at my house in Musselburgh, where 
 he used to come and dine the first Sunday of every General 
 Assembly, after his brother, Lord Glasgow, ceased to be 
 Lord High Commissioner. "When we were talking of 
 David, Mrs. Carlyle asked Mr. Boyle if he thought David 
 Hume was as great an unbeliever as the world took him to 
 be ? He answered, that the world judged from his books, 
 as they had a right to do ; ' but he thought otherwise, who 
 had known him all his life, and mentioned the following 
 incident : When David and he were both in London, at the 
 period when David's mother died, Mr. Boyle, hearing of it, 
 soon after went into his apartment, for they lodged in the 
 same house, when he found him in the deepest affliction 
 and in a flood of tears. After the usual topics of condolence, 
 Mr. Boyle said to him, " My friend, you owe this uncom- 
 mon grief to your having thrown off the principles of re- 
 ligion ; for if you had not, you would have been consoled by 
 the firm belief that the good lady, who was not only the 
 best of mothers, but the most pious of Christians, was now 
 completely happy in the realms of the just." To which 
 David replied. " Though I threw out my speculations to 
 entertain and employ the learned and metaphysical world, 
 
300 ALEXANDER CARLYLE. 
 
 yet in other things I do not think so differently from the resi 
 of mankind as you may imagine." To this my wife was a 
 witness. This conversation took place the year after David 
 died, when Dr. Hill, who was to preach, had gone to a room 
 to look over his notes. 
 
 At this period, when he first lived in Edinburgh, and was 
 writing his History of England, his circumstances were nar- 
 row, and he accepted the office of Librarian to the Faculty 
 of Advocates, worth 40 per annum. But it was not for 
 the salary that he accepted this employment, but that he 
 might have easy access to the books in that celebrated li- 
 brary ; for, to my certain knowledge, he gave every farthing 
 of the salary to families in distress. Of a piece with this 
 temper was his curiosity and credulity, which were without 
 bounds, a specimen of which shall be afterwards given when 
 I come down to Militia and the Poker. His economy was 
 strict, as he loved independency ; and yet he was able at 
 that time to give suppers to his friends in his small lodging 
 in the Canongate. He took much to the company of the 
 younger clergy, not from a wish to bring them over to his 
 opinions, for he never attempted to overturn any man's 
 principles, but they best understood his notions, and could 
 furnish him with literary conversation. Robertson and 
 John Home and Baimatine and I lived all in the country, 
 and came only periodically to the town. Blair and Jardine 
 both lived in it, and suppers being the only fashionable meal 
 at that time, we dined where we best could, and by cadies 
 assembled our friends to meet us in a tavern by nine 
 o'clock ; and a fine time it was when we could collect David 
 Hume, Adam Smith, Adam Ferguson, Lord Elibank, and 
 Drs. Blair and Jardine, on an hour's warning. I remember 
 one night that David Hume, who, having dined abroad, 
 came rather late to us, and directly pulled a large key from 
 his pocket, which he laid on the table. This he said was 
 given him by his maid Peggy (much more like a man than 
 
MY FRIENDS. 301 
 
 a woman) that she might not sit up for him, for she said 
 when the honest fellows came in from the country, he 
 never returned home till after one o'clock. This intimacy 
 of the young clergy with David Hume enraged the zealots 
 on the opposite side, who little knew how impossible it 
 was for him, had he been willing, to shake their prin- 
 ciples. 
 
 As Mr. Hume's circumstances improved he enlarged his 
 mode of living, and instead of the roasted hen and minced 
 collops, and a bottle of punch, he gave both elegant dinners 
 and suppers, and the best claret, and, which was best of 
 all, he furnished the entertainment with the most instruc- 
 tive and pleasing conversation, for he assembled whosoever 
 were most knowing and agreeable among either the laity 
 or clergy. This he always did, but still more unsparingly 
 when he became what he called rich. For innocent mirth 
 and agreeable raillery I never knew his match. Jardine, 
 who sometimes bore hard upon him, for he had much 
 drollery and wit, though but little learning, never could 
 overturn his temper. Lord Elibank resembled David in 
 his talent for collecting agreeable companions together, and 
 had a house in town for several winters chiefly for that 
 purpose. 
 
 David, who delighted in what the French call plaisan- 
 terie, with the aid of Miss Nancy Ord, one of the Chief 
 Baron's daughters, contrived and executed one that gave, 
 him very great delight. As the New Town was making 
 its progress westward, he built a house in the southwest 
 corner of St. Andrew Square. The street leading south to 
 Princess Street had not yet got its name affixed, but they 
 got a workman early one morning to paint on the corner- 
 stone of David's house " St. David's Street,'* where it re 
 mains to this day. 
 
 He was at first quite delighted with Ossian'e poems, and 
 gloried in them ; but on going to London he went over to 
 
302 ALEXANDER CARLYLE. 
 
 the other side, and loudly affirmed them to be inventions 
 of Macpherson. I happened to say one day, when he was 
 declaiming against Macpherson, that I had met with nobody 
 of his opinion but William Caddel of Cockenzie, and Presi- 
 dent Dundas, which he took ill, and was some time of 
 forgetting. This is one instance of what Smellie says of 
 him, that though of the best temper in the world, yet he 
 could be touched by opposition or rudeness. This was the 
 only time I had ever observed David's temper change. I 
 can call to mind an instance or two of his good-natured 
 pleasantry. Being at Gilmerton, where David Hume was 
 on a visit, Sir David Kinloch made him go to Athlestane- 
 ford Church, where I preached for John Home. When we 
 met before dinner, " What did you mean," says he to me, 
 " by treating John's congregation to-day with one of Cicero's 
 academics? I did not think that such heathen morality 
 would have passed in East Lothian." On Monday, when 
 we were assembling to breakfast, David retired to the enc 
 of the dining-room, when Sir David entered : " What are 
 you doing there, Davy ? come to your breakfast." " Take 
 away the enemy first," says David. The baronet, thinking 
 it was the warm fire that kept David in the lower end of 
 the room, rung the bell for a servant to carry some of it off. 
 It was not .the fire that scared David, but a large Bible that 
 was left on a stand at the upper end of the room, a chapter 
 of which had been read at the family prayers the night 
 before, that good custom not being then out of use when 
 clergymen were in the house. Add to this John Home 
 saying to him at the Poker Club, when everybody wondered 
 what could have made a clerk of Sir William Forbes run 
 away with 900, "I know that very well," says John 
 Home to David ; " for when he was taken, there was found 
 in his pocket your Philosophical Works and Boston's Four- 
 fold State of Man? 
 
 David Hume, during all his life, had written the most 
 
MY FRIENDS. 303 
 
 pleasing and agreeable letters to his friends. I have pre- 
 served two of these. But I lately saw two of more early 
 dale in the hands of Mr. Sandiland Dysart, Esq., W. S., to 
 his mother, who was a friend of David's, and a very accom- 
 plished woman, one of them dated in 1751, on occasion of 
 his brother Hume of NinewelTs marriage ; and the other in 
 1754, with a present of the first volume of his History, both 
 of which are written in a vein of pleasantry and playfulness 
 which nothing can exceed, and which makes me think that 
 a collection of his letters would be a valuable present to the 
 world, and present throughout a very pleasing picture of his 
 mind. 
 
 I have heard him say that Baron Montesquieu, when he 
 asked him if he did not think that there would soon be a 
 revolution in France favorable to liberty, answered, " No, 
 for their noblesse had all become poltroons." He said that 
 the club in Paris (Baron Holbach's) to which he belonged 
 were of opinion that Christianity would be abolished in 
 Europe by the end of the eighteenth century ; and that they 
 laughed at Andrew Stuart for making a battle in favor of a 
 future state, and called him " L'ame Immortelle." 
 
 David Hume, like Smith, had no discernment at all of 
 characters. The only two clergymen whose interests he 
 espoused, and for one of whom he provided, were the two 
 silliest fellows in the Church. With every opportunity, he 
 was ridiculously shy of asking favors, on account of preserv- 
 ing his independence, which always appeared to me to be a 
 very foolish kind of pride. His friend John Home, with 
 not more benevolence, but with no scruples from a wish of 
 independence, for which he was not born, availed himself of 
 his influence and provided for hundreds, and yet he never 
 asked anything for himself. 
 
 Adam Smith, though perhaps only second to David in 
 learning and ingenuity, was far inferior to him in conversa- 
 tional talents. In that of public speaking they were equal 
 
304 ALEXANDER CARLYLE. 
 
 David never tried it, and I never heard Adam but once, 
 which was at the first meeting of the Select Society, when 
 he opened up the design of the meeting. His voice was 
 harsh and enunciation thick, approaching to stammering. 
 His conversation was not colloquial, but like lecturing, in 
 which I have been told he was not deficient, especially when 
 he grew warm. He was the most absent man in company 
 that I ever saw, moving his lips, and talking to himself, and 
 smiling, in the midst of large companies. If you awaked 
 him from his reverie and made him attend to the subject of 
 conversation, he immediately began a harangue, and never 
 stopped till he told you all he knew about it, with the 
 utmost philosophical ingenuity. He knew nothing of 
 characters, and yet was ready to draw them on the slight- 
 est invitation. But when you checked him or doubted, he 
 retracted with the utmost ease, and contradicted all he had 
 been saying. His journey abroad with the Duke of Buc- 
 cleuch cured him in part of those foibles; but still he 
 appeared very unfit for the intercourse of the world as a 
 travelling tutor. But the Duke was a character, both in 
 point of heart and understanding, to surmount all disadvan- 
 tages, he could learn nothing ill from a philosopher of 
 the utmost probity and benevolence. If he [Smith] had 
 been more a man of address and of the world, he might 
 perhaps have given a ply to the Duke's fine mind, which 
 was much better when left to its own energy. Charles 
 Townshend had chosen Smith, not for his fitness for the 
 purpose, but for his own glory in having sent an eminent 
 Scottish philosopher to travel with the Duke. 
 
 Smith had from the Duke a bond for a life annuity of 
 300, till an office of equal value was obtained for him in 
 Britain. When the Duke got him appointed a Commis- 
 sioner of the Customs in Scotland, he went out to Dalkeith 
 with the bond in his pocket, and, offering it to the Duke, 
 told him that he thought himself bound in honor to sur- 
 
MY FRIENDS. 305 
 
 render the bond, as his Grace had now got him a place of 
 500. The Duke answered that Mr. Smith seemed more 
 careful of his own honor than of his, which he found 
 wounded by the proposal. Thus acted that good Duke, 
 who, being entirely void of vanity, did not value himself 
 on splendid generosities. He had acted in much the same 
 manner to Dr. Hallam, who had been his tutor at Eton ; 
 for when Mr. Townshend proposed giving Hallam an an- 
 nuity of 100 when the Duke was taken from him, " No," 
 says he, " it is my desire that Hallam may have as much as 
 Smith, it being a great mortification to him that he is not to 
 travel with me." 
 
 Though Smith had some little jealousy in his temper, he 
 had the most unbounded benevolence. His smile of appro- 
 bation was truly captivating. His affectionate temper was 
 proved by his dutiful attendance on his mother. One in- 
 stance I remember which marked his character. John 
 Home and he, travelling down from London together [in 
 1776], met David Hume going to Bath for the recovery of 
 his health. He anxiously wished them both to return with 
 him ; John agreed, but Smith excused himself on account of 
 the state of his mother's health, whom he needs must see. 
 Smith's fine writing is chiefly displayed in his book on 
 Moral Sentiment, which is the pleasantest and most elo- 
 quent book on the subject. His Wealth of Nations, from 
 which he was judged to be an inventive genius of the first 
 order, is tedious and full of repetition. His separate essays 
 in the second volume have the air of being occasional pam- 
 phlets, without much force or determination. On political 
 subjects his opinions were not very sound. 
 
 Dr. Adam Ferguson was a very different kind of man. 
 He was the son of a Highland clergyman, who was much 
 respected, and had good connections. He had the pride 
 and high spirit of his countrymen. He was bred at St. 
 Andrews University, and had gone early into the world 
 
 20 
 
306 ALEXANDER CARLYLE. 
 
 for being a favorite of a Duchess Dowager of Athole, and 
 bred to the Church, she had him appointed chaplain to the 
 42d regiment, then commanded by Lord John Murray, her 
 son, when he was not more than twenty-two. The Duchess 
 had imposed a very difficult task upon him, which was to be 
 a kind of tutor or guardian to Lord John ; that is to say, to 
 gain his confidence and keep him in peace with his officers, 
 which it was difficult to do. This, however, he actually 
 accomplished, by adding all the decorum belonging to the 
 clerical character to the manners of a gentleman ; the effect 
 of which was, that he was highly respected by all the 
 officers, and adored by his countrymen, the common sol- 
 diers. He remained chaplain to this regiment, and went 
 about with them, till 1755, when they went to America, on 
 which occasion he resigned, as it did not suit his views to 
 attend them there. He was a year or two with them in 
 Ireland, and likewise attended them on the expedition to 
 Brittany under General Sinclair, where his friends David 
 Hume and Colonel Edmonstone also were. This turned 
 his mind to the study of war, which appears in his Roman 
 History, where many of the battles are better described than 
 by any historian but Polybius, who was an eyewitness to so 
 many. 
 
 He had the manners of a man of the world, and the de- 
 meanor of -a high-bred gentleman, insomuch that his com- 
 pany was much sought after ; for though he conversed with 
 ease, it was with a dignified reserve. If he had any fault 
 in conversation, it was of a piece with what I have said of 
 his temper, for the elevation of his mind prompted him to 
 such sudden transitions and dark allusions that it was not 
 always easy to follow him, though he was a very good 
 speaker. He had another talent, unknown to any but his 
 intimates, which was a boundless vein of humor, which he 
 indulged when there were none others present, and which 
 flowed from his pen in every familiar letter he wrote. He 
 
MY FRIENDS. 307 
 
 had the faults, however, that belonged to that character, for 
 he was apt to be jealous of his rivals, and indignant against 
 assumed superiority. His wife used to say that it was very 
 fortunate that I was so much in Edinburgh, as I was a great 
 peacemaker among them. She did not perceive that her 
 own husband was the most difficult of them all. But as 
 they were all honorable men in the highest degree, John 
 Home and I together kept them on very good terms: I 
 mean by them, Smith and Ferguson and David Hume ; for 
 Robertson was very good-natured, and soon disarmed the 
 failing of Ferguson, of whom he was afraid. With respect 
 to taste, we held David Hume and Adam Smith inferior to 
 the rest, for they were both prejudiced in favor of the 
 French tragedies, and did not sufficiently appreciate Shake- 
 speare and Milton. Their taste was a rational act, rather 
 than the instantaneous effect of fine feeling. David Hume 
 said Ferguson had more genius than any of them, as he 
 had made himself so much master of a difficult science 
 viz. Natural Philosophy, which he had never studied but 
 when at college in three months, as to be able to 
 teach it. 
 
 The time came when those who were overawed by Fer- 
 guson repaid him for his haughtiness ; for when his Roman 
 History was published, at a period when he had lost his 
 health, and had not been able to correct it diligently, by a 
 certain propensity they had, unknown to themselves, ac- 
 quired, to disparage everything that came from Ferguson, 
 they did his book more hurt than they could have done by 
 open criticism. It was provoking to hear those who were 
 so ready to give loud praises to very shallow and imperfect 
 English productions to curry favor, as we supposed, with 
 the booksellers and authors concerned taking every 
 opportunity to undermine the reputation of Ferguson's 
 book. " It was not a Roman History," said they (which 
 it did not say it was). " This delineation of the constitution 
 
308 ALEXANDER CARLYLE. 
 
 of the Republic is well sketched ; but for the rest, it is any- 
 thing but history, and then it is so incorrect that is a perfect 
 shame." All his other books met with the same treatment^ 
 while, at the same time, there were a few of us who could 
 not refrain from saying that Ferguson's was the best history 
 of Rome ; that what he had omitted was fabulous or insig- 
 nificant, and what he had wrote was more profound in 
 research into characters, and gave a more just delineation 
 of them than any book now extant. The same thing we 
 said of his book on Moral Philosophy, which we held to be 
 the book that did the most honor of any to the Scotch phi- 
 losophers, because it gave the most perfect picture of moral 
 virtues, with all their irresistible attractions. His book on 
 Civil Society ought only to be considered as a college ex- 
 ercise, and yet there is in it a turn of thought and a species 
 of eloquence peculiar to Ferguson. Smith had been weak 
 enough to accuse him of having borrowed some of his inven- 
 tions without owning them. This Ferguson denied, but 
 owned he derived many notions from a French author, and 
 that Smith had been there before him. David Hume did 
 not live to see Ferguson's History, otherwise his candid 
 praise would have prevented all the subtle remarks of the 
 jealous or resentful. 
 
 With respect to Robertson and Blair, their lives and 
 characters have been fully laid before the public, by 
 Professor Dugald Stewart in a long life of Robertson, 
 where, though the picture is rather in disjointed members, 
 yet there is hardly anything omitted that tends to make a 
 judicious reader master of the character. Dr. Blair's char- 
 acter is more obvious in a short but very elegant and true 
 account of him, drawn up by Dr. Finlayson. John Hill is 
 writing a more diffuse account of the latter, which may not 
 be so like. To the character of Robertson I have only to 
 add here, that, though he was truly a very great master of 
 conversation, and in general perfectly agreeable, yet he 
 
MY FRIENDS. 309 
 
 appeared sometimes so very foiid of talking, even when 
 showing-off was out of the question, and so much addicted 
 to the translation of other people's thoughts, that he some- 
 times appeared tedious to his best friends. Being on one 
 occasion invited to dine with Patrick Robertson, his brother, 
 I missed my friend, whom I had met there on all former 
 occasions ; " I have not invited him to-day," says Peter, 
 " for I have a very good company, and he '11 let nobody 
 speak but himself. Once he was staying with me for a 
 week, and I earned him to dine with our parish club, who 
 were fully assembled to see and hear Dr. Robertson, but 
 Dr. Finlay of Drunimore took it in his head to come that 
 day, where he had not been for a year before, who took the 
 lead, being then rich and self-sufficient, though a great 
 babbler, and entirely disappointed the company, and gave 
 us all the headache. He [Robertson] was very much a 
 master of conversation, and very desirous to lead it, and to 
 make dissertations and raise theories that sometimes pro- 
 voked the laugh against him. One instance of this was 
 when he had gone a jaunt into England with some of 
 Henry Duudas's (Lord Melville's) family. He [Dundas] 
 and Mr. Baron Cockburn and Robert Sinclair were on 
 horseback, and seeing a gallows on a neighboring hillock, 
 they rode round to have a nearer view of the felon on the 
 gallows. When they met in the inn, Robertson immedi- 
 ately began a dissertation on the character of nations, and 
 how much the English, like the Romans, were hardened by 
 their cruel diversions of cock-fighting, bull-baiting, bruising, 
 &c. : for had they not observed three Englishmen on horse- 
 back do what no Scotchman or Here Dundas, having 
 
 compassion, interrupted him, and said, " What ! did you not 
 know, Principal, that it was Cockburn and Sinclair and 
 me ? " This put an end to theories, &c., for that day. 
 Robertson's translations and paraphrases on other people's 
 thoughts were so beautiful and so harmless that I never 
 
310 ALEXANDER CARLYLE. 
 
 saw anybody lay claim to their own ; but it was not so when 
 he forgot himself so far as to think he had been present 
 where he had not been, and done what he had not the least 
 hand in, one very singular instance of which I remember. 
 Hugh Bannatine and some clergyman of Haddington Presby 
 tery came to town in great haste, on their being threatened 
 with having their goods distrained for payment of the win- 
 dow tax. One of them called on me as he passed ; but as 
 I was abroad, he left a note (or told Mrs. C.), to come to 
 them directly. I rode instantly to town and met them, and 
 it was agreed on to send immediately to the solicitor, James 
 Montgomery. A cady was despatched, but he could not be 
 found, till I at last heard his voice as I passed the door of a 
 neighboring room. He came to us on being sent for, and 
 he immediately granted the alarmed brethren a sist. Not a 
 week after, three or four of the same clergymen, dining at 
 the Doctor's house, where I was, the business was talked of, 
 when he said, " Was not I very fortunate in ferreting out 
 the solicitor at Walker's, when no cady could find him ? " 
 " No, no," says I, " Principal ; I had that good-luck, and 
 you were not so much as at the meeting." We had sent to 
 him, and he could not come. " Well, well," replied he, " I 
 have heard so much about it that I thought I had been 
 there." He was the best- tempered man in the world, and 
 the young gentlemen who had lived for many years in his 
 house declared they never saw him once ruffled. His table, 
 which had always been hospitable, even when his income 
 was small, became full and elegant when his situation was 
 improved. As he loved a long repast, as he called it, he 
 was as ready to give it at home as to receive it abroad. 
 The softness of his temper, and his habits at the head of a 
 party, led him to seem to promise what he was not able to 
 perform, which weakness raised up to him some very invet- 
 erate enemies, while at the same time his true friends saw 
 that those weaknesses were rather amiable than provoking. 
 
MY FRIENDS. 311 
 
 He was not so much beloved by women as by men, which 
 we laughingly used to say was owing to their rivalship as 
 talkers, but was much more owing to his having been very 
 little in company with ladies in his youth. He was early 
 married, though his wife (a very good one) was not his first 
 choice, as Stewart in his Life would make us believe. 
 Though not very complaisant to women, he was not beyond 
 their regimen any more than Dr. George Wishart, for in- 
 stances of both their frailties on that side could be quoted. 
 'T is as well to mention them here. In the year '78, when 
 Drs. Robertson and Drysdale had with much pains prepared 
 an assembly to elect young Mr. Robertson into the Procura- 
 tor's chair, and to get Dr. Drysdale chosen Principal Clerk 
 to the Assembly, as colleague and successor to Dr. George 
 Wishart, it was necessary that Dr. Wishart should resign, 
 in order to his being re-elected with Drysdale; but this, 
 when first applied to, he positively refused to do, because he 
 had given his word to Dr. Dick that he would give him a 
 year's warning before he resigned. In spite of this declara- 
 tion a siege was laid to the honest man by amazons. After 
 several hearings, in which female eloquence was displayed 
 in all its forms, and after many days, he yielded, as he said 
 himself, to the earnest and violent solicitations of Dr. Drys- 
 dale's family. He never after had any intercourse with that 
 family, nor saw them more. Mr. James Lindsay told me 
 this anecdote. 
 
 Dr. Robertson's weakness was as follows : He had en- 
 gaged heartily with me, when in 1788 I stood candidate for 
 the clerkship, Dr. Drysdale having shown evident marks of 
 decline. In the year 1787, I had a long evening's walk 
 with the Procurator, when, after mentioning every candidate 
 for that office we could think of, the Procurator at last said 
 that nobody had such a good chance as myself. After a 
 long discussion I yielded, and we in due form communicated 
 this resolution to his father, who consented with all hia 
 
312 ALEXANDER CARLYLE. 
 
 heart, and gave us much advice and some aid. When the 
 vacancy happened, in 1789, Robert Adam assisted his 
 brother-in-law with all his interest, which was considerable. 
 In the mean time the same influence was used with Dr. 
 Robertson as had been with Dr. Wishart, in a still more 
 formidable shape ; for Mrs. Drysdale was his cousin-german, 
 and threatened him with the eternal hate of all the family. 
 He also yielded ; and Robert Adam, when seriously pressed 
 with a view to drop his canvass if Robertson advised to 
 " No," Robertson said, " go on " ; as he thought he had the 
 best chance. Robert Adam told this to Professor Ferguson 
 when he solicited his vote. 
 
 Robertson's conversation was not always so prudent as 
 his conduct, one instance of which was his always asserting 
 that any minister of state who did not take care of himself 
 when he had an opportunity was no very wise man. This 
 maxim shocked most young people, who thought the Doc- 
 tor's standard of public virtue was not very high. This 
 manner of talking likewise seconded a notion that prevailed 
 that he was a very selfish man. With all those defects, his 
 domestic society was pleasing beyond measure ; for his wife, 
 though not a woman of parts, was well suited to him, who 
 was more fitted to lead than to be led ; and his sons and 
 daughters led so happy a life that his guests, which we were 
 often for a week together, met with nothing but welcome, and 
 peace, and joy. This intercourse was not much diminished 
 by his having not put any confidence in me when he left the 
 business of the Church, further than saying that he intended 
 to do it. Though he knew that I was much resorted to for 
 advice when he retired, he never talked to me on the sub- 
 ject, at which I was somewhat indignant. His deviations in 
 politics lessened the freedom of our conversation, though we 
 Btill continued in good habits; but ever after he left the 
 leading in Church affairs, he appeared to me to have lost his 
 spirits : and still more, when the magistrates resorted to Dr 
 
MY FRIENDS. 313 
 
 Blair, insvead of him, for advice about their choice of pro- 
 fessors and ministers. I had discovered his having sacri- 
 ficed me to Mrs. Drysdale, in 1789, but was long acquainted 
 with his weaknesses, and forgave him; nor did I ever 
 upbraid him with it but in general terms, such as that I 
 had lost the clerkship by the keenness of my oppo'nents and 
 the coldness of my friends. I had such a conscious superi- 
 ority over him in that affair that I did not choose to put an 
 old friend to the trial of making his fault greater by a lame 
 excuse. 
 
 Dr. Blair was a different kind of man from Robertson, 
 and his character is very justly delineated by Dr. Finlayson, 
 so far as he goes. Robertson was most sagacious, Blair was 
 most naif. Neither of them could be said to have either wit 
 or humor. Of the latter Robertson had a small tincture, 
 Blair had hardly a relish for it. Robertson had a bold and 
 ambitious mind, and a strong desire to make himself con- 
 siderable ; Blair was timid and unambitious, and withheld 
 himself from public business of every kind, and seemed to 
 have no wish but to be admired as a preacher, parficularly 
 by the ladies. His conversation was so infantine that many 
 people thought it impossible, at first sight, that he could be 
 a man of sense or genius. He was as eager about a new 
 paper to his wife's drawing-room, or his own new wig, as 
 about a new tragedy or a new epic poem. Not long before 
 his death I called upon him, when I found him restless and 
 fidgety. "What is the matter with you to-day," says I, 
 " my good friend, are you well ? " " O yes," says he, 
 " but I must dress myself, for the Duchess of Leinster has 
 ordered her granddaughters not to leave Scotland without 
 seeing me." " Go and dress yourself, Doctor, and I shall 
 read this novel ; for I am resolved to see the Duchess of 
 Leinster's granddaughters, for I knew their father and 
 grandfather." This being settled, the young ladies, with 
 their governess, arrived at one, and turned out poor little 
 
314 ALEXANDER CARLYLE. 
 
 girls of twelve and thirteen, who could hardly be supposed 
 to carry a well-turned compliment which the Doctor gave 
 them in charge to their grandmother. 
 
 Robertson had so great a desire to shine himself, that I 
 hardly ever saw him patiently bear anybody else's sho wing- 
 off but E>r. Johnson and Garrick. Blair, on the contrary, 
 though capable of the most profound conversation, when cir- 
 cumstances led to it, had not the least desire to shine, but 
 was delighted beyond measure to show other people in their 
 best guise to his friends. " Did not I show you the lion 
 well to-day ? " used he to say after the exhibition of a re- 
 markable stranger. For a vain man, he was the least 
 envious I ever knew. He had truly a pure mind, in which 
 there was not the least malignity ; for though he was of a 
 quick and lively temper, and apt to be warm and impatient 
 about trifles, his wife, who was a superior woman, only 
 laughed, and his friends joined her. Though Robertson 
 was never ruffled, he had more animosity in his nature than 
 Blair. They were both reckoned selfish by those who 
 envied their prosperity, but on very unequal grounds ; for 
 though Blair talked selfishly enough sometimes, yet he 
 never failed in generous actions. In one respect they were 
 quite alike. Having been bred at a time when the common 
 people thought to play with cards or dice was a sin, and 
 everybody thought it an indecorum in clergymen, they could 
 neither of them play at golf or bowls, and far less at cards 
 or backgammon, and on that account were very unhappy 
 when from home in friends' houses in the country in rainy 
 weather. As I had set the first example of playing at cards 
 at home with unlocked doors, and so relieved the clergy 
 from ridicule on that side, they both learned to play at 
 whist after they were sixty. Robertson did very well, 
 Blair never shone. He had his country quarters for two 
 summers in my parish, where he and his wife were quite 
 happy. We were much together. Mrs. C., who had wit 
 
MY FRIENDS. 315 
 
 and humor in a high degree, and an acuteness and extent of 
 mind that made her fit to converse with philosophers, and 
 indeed a great favorite with them all, gained much upon 
 Blair; and, as Mrs. B. alleged, could make him believe 
 whatever she pleased. They took delight in raising the 
 wonder of the sage Doctor. " Who told you that story, my 
 dear Doctor ? " " No," says he, " don't you doubt it, for it 
 was Ulrs. C. who told me." On my laughing, " and so, 
 so," said he, " I must hereafter make allowance for her imag- 
 ination." 
 
 Blair had lain under obligation to Lord Leven's family 
 for his first church, which he left within the year; but 
 though that connection was so soon dissolved, and though 
 Blair took a side in Church politics wholly opposite to 
 Lord Leven's, the Doctor always behaved to the family 
 with great respect, and kept up a visiting correspondence 
 with them all his life. Not so Robertson with the Arniston 
 family, who had got him the church of Gladsmuir. The 
 first President failed and died not, hoAvever, till he had 
 marked his approbation of Robertson in 1751. His 
 manner had not been pleasing to him, so that he was alien- 
 ated till Harry grew up ; but him he deserted also, on the 
 change in 1782, being dazzled with the prospect of his son's 
 having charge of ecclesiastical affairs, as his cousin John 
 Adam was to have of political, during Rockingham's new 
 ministry. This threw a cloud on Robertson which was 
 never dispelled. Blah* had for a year been tutor to Simon 
 Fraser, Lord Lovat's eldest son, whose steady friendship he 
 preserved to the last, though the General was not remark- 
 able for that amiable weakness ; witness the saying of a 
 common soldier whom he had often promised to make a 
 sergeant, but never performed, " O Simon, Simon, as long 
 as you continue to live, Lord Lovat is not dead." 
 
 Five or six days before he [Blair] died, finding him well 
 and in good spirits, I said to him, " Since you don't choose to 
 
316 ALEXANDER CARLYLE. 
 
 dine abroad in this season (December), you may at least let 
 a friend or two dine with you." " Well, well, come you and 
 dine with me to-morrow," looking earnestly at Miss Hunter, 
 his niece. " I am engaged to-morrow, but I can return at 
 four to-day." He looked more earnestly at his niece. 
 " What 's to hinder him ? " said she, meaning to answer his 
 look, which said, " Have you any dinner to-day, Betty ? " 
 I returned, accordingly, at four, and never passed four 
 hours more agreeably with him, nor had more enlightened 
 conversation. Nay more, three days before his death he 
 sent to John Home a part of his History, with two or three 
 pages of criticism on that part of it that relates to Provost 
 Drummond, in which he and I thought John egregiously 
 wrong. 
 
 It was long before Blair's circumstances were full, yet he 
 lived handsomely, and had literary strangers at his house, as 
 well as many friends. A task imposed on both Robertson 
 and Blair was reading manuscript prepared for the press, of 
 which Blair had the greatest share of the poetry, and Rob- 
 ertson of the other writings, and they were both kind 
 encouragers of young men of merit. 
 
BEATRICE'S SONG. 
 
 BY PERCY BYSSHE SHELLEY. 
 
 COME, I will sing you some low, sleepy tune, 
 Not cheerful, nor yet sad ; some dull old thing 
 Some outworn and unused monotony, 
 Such as our country gossips sing and spin, 
 Till they almost forget they live : lie down ! 
 So ; that will do. Have I forgot the words ? 
 Faith ! they are sadder than I thought they wer 
 
 SONG. 
 
 False friend, wilt thou smile or weep 
 When my life is laid asleep ? 
 Little cares for a smile or a tear 
 The clay-cold corpse upon the bier ; 
 
 Farewell! Heigh-ho! 
 
 What is this whispers low ? 
 There is a snake in thy smile, my dear 
 And bitter poison within thy tear. 
 
 Sweet sleep ! were death like to thee, 
 Or if thou couldst mortal be, 
 I would close these eyes of pain ; 
 When to wake ? Never again. 
 
 O World ! farewell ! 
 
 Listen to the passing bell ! 
 It says, thou and I must part, 
 With a light and a heavy heart 
 
THANATOPSIS, 
 
 BY WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT. 
 
 TO him who, in the love of Nature, holds 
 Communion with her visible forms, she speaks 
 A various language : for his gayer hours 
 She has a voice of gladness, and a smile 
 And eloquence of beauty ; and she glides 
 Into his darker musings with a mild 
 And gentle sympathy, that steals away 
 Their sharpness, ere he is aware. When thoughts 
 Of the last bitter hour come like a blight 
 Over thy spirit, and sad images 
 Of the stern agony, and shroud, and pall, 
 And breathless darkness, and the narrow house. 
 Make thee 'to shudder, and grow sick at heart, 
 Go forth under the open sky, and list 
 To Nature's teachings, while from all around 
 Earth and her waters, and the depths of air 
 Comes a still voice, Yet a few days, and thee 
 The all-beholding sun shall see no more 
 In all his course ; nor yet in the cold ground, 
 Where thy pale form was laid, with many tears, 
 Nor in the embrace of ocean, shall exist 
 Thy image. Earth, that nourished thee, shall claim 
 Thy growth, to be resolved to earth again ; 
 And, lost each human trace, surrendering up 
 
THANATOPSrS. 319 
 
 Thine individual being, shalt thou go 
 
 To mix forever with the elements ; 
 
 To be a brother to the insensible rock, 
 
 And to the sluggish clod, which the rude swain 
 
 Turns with his share, and treads upon. The oak 
 
 Shall send his roots abroad, and pierce thy mould. 
 
 Yet not to thine eternal resting-place 
 Shalt thou retire alone, nor couldst thou wish 
 Couch more magnificent. Thou shalt lie down 
 With patriarchs of the infant world, with kings, 
 The powerful of the earth, the wise, the good. 
 Fair forms, and hoary seers of ages past, 
 All in one mighty sepulchre. The hills, 
 Rock-ribbed, and ancient as the sun ; the vales 
 Stretching in pensive quietness between ; 
 The venerable woods; rivers that move 
 In majesty, and the complaining brooks, 
 That make the meadows green ; and, poured round all, 
 Old ocean's gray and melancholy waste, 
 Are but the solemn decorations all 
 Of the great tomb of man ! The golden sun, 
 The planets, all the infinite host of heaven, 
 Are shining on the sad abodes of death, 
 Through the still lapse of ages. All that tread 
 The globe are but a handful to the tribes 
 That slumber in its bosom. Take the wings 
 Of morning, traverse Barca's desert sands, 
 Or lose thyself in the continuous woods 
 Where rolls the Oregon, and hears no sound 
 Save his own dashings, yet the dead are there ! 
 And millions in those solitudes, since first 
 The flight of years began, have laid them down 
 In their last sleep, the dead reign there alone ! 
 So shalt thou rest ; and what if thou withdraw 
 
320 WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT. 
 
 In silence from the living, and no friend 
 Take note of thy departure ? All that breathe 
 Will share thy destiny. The gay will laugh 
 When thou art gone, the solemn brood of care 
 Plod on, and each one, as before, will chase 
 His favorite phantom ; yet all these shall leave 
 Their mirth and their employments, and shall come 
 And make their bed with thee. As the long train 
 Of ages glide away, the sons of men 
 The youth in life's green spring, and he who goes 
 In the full strength of years, matron and maid, 
 And the sweet babe, and the gray-headed man 
 Shall, one by one, be gathered to thy -side 
 By those who in their turn shall follow them. 
 
 So live, that when thy summons comes to join 
 The innumerable caravan that moves 
 To the pale realms of shade, where each shall take 
 His chamber in the silent halls of death, 
 Thou go not, like the quarry-slave at night, 
 Scourged to his dungeon, but, sustained ami 1 auulhud 
 Span 'unfaltering trust, approach thy grave 
 Like one who wraps the drapery of his couch 
 About him, and lies down to pleasant dreams. 
 
 : : UC -(T^ S*r*~*- 
 
 
GOOD COMPANY 
 
 FOR EVERY DAY IN THE YEAR 
 
 'Good Company .... well approved in all." 
 
 SHAKESPEARE. 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 Pag 
 JOHN G. WHITTIER: Yankee Gypsies ... 1 
 
 JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL : Dara 16 
 
 THOMAS CARLYLE : Cromwell 19 
 
 T. WESTWOOD: Little Bell 86 
 
 ROSE TERRY : The Mormon's Wife .... 89 
 
 JOHN GIBSON LOCKHART : Beyond .... 109 
 
 JOHN MILTON : Autobiographical Passages . . . 110 
 WILLIAM ALLINGHAM : Wakening . . . .117 
 
 EDMUND LODGE : John Graham . . . . 118 
 
 W. EDMONDSTOUNE AYTOUN: The Burial-March of 
 
 Dundee 128 
 
 GOETHE : Mignon as an Angel . . . . . 134 
 
 MRS. GASKELL: The Cage at Cranford. . . .136 
 
 EDMUND SPENSER : Verses on Sir Philip Sidney . 150 
 
 GEORGE TICKNOR : Prescott's Infirmity of Sight . .152 
 
 DANTE: Beatrice 168 
 
 . 
 
17 CONTENTS. 
 
 
 
 ROBERT SOUTHEY: A Love Story . . . .170 
 
 BAYARD TAYLOR : The Mystic Summer ... 236 
 
 MRS. JAMESON : Two of the Old Masters . . .239 
 
 FREDERICK TENNYSON: The Poet's Heart . . 261 
 
 GIORGIO VASARI : Character of Fra Angelico . .265 
 
 WILLIAM BLAKE: Songs 267 
 
 J. HAIN FRISWELL: Upon Growing Old . . .277 
 
 R. W. EMERSON: The Titmouse . . . . 284 
 
 NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE : Little Pansie . . . 288 
 
 H. W. LONGFELLOW: Palingenesis .... 305 
 
 WASHINGTON IRVING : Rip Van Winkle . . . 308 
 
YANKEE GYPSIES. 
 
 BY JOHN G. WHITTIER. 
 
 " Here 's to budgets, packs, and wallets , 
 Here's to all the wandering train." BURNS. 
 
 I CONFESS it, I am keenly sensitive to " skyey influ- 
 ences." I profess no indifference to the movements of 
 that capricious old gentleman known as the clerk of the 
 weather. I cannot conceal my interest in the behavior of 
 that patriarchal bird whose wooden similitude gyrates on 
 the church spire. Winter proper is well enough. Let the 
 thermometer go to zero if it will ; so much the better, if 
 thereby the very winds are frozen and unable to flap their 
 stiff wings. Sounds of bells in the keen air, clear, musical, 
 heart-inspiring; quick tripping of fair moccasoned feet on 
 glittering ice-pavements ; bright eyes glancing above the 
 uplifted muff like a sultana's behind the folds of her yash- 
 mack\ school-boys coasting down street like mad Green- 
 landers; the cold brilliance of oblique sunbeams flashing 
 back from wide surfaces of glittering snow or blazing upon 
 ice-jewelry of tree and roof. There is nothing in all this to 
 complain of. A storm of summer has its redeeming sublim- 
 ities, its slow, upheaving mountains of cloud glooming in 
 the western horizon like new-created volcanoes, veined with 
 fire, shattered by exploding thunders. Even the wild gales 
 of the equinox have their varieties, sounds of wind-shaken 
 woods, and waters, creak and clatter of sign and casement, 
 
 1 A 
 
2 JOHN G. WHITTIER. 
 
 hurricane puffs and down-rushing rain-spouts. But this 
 dull, dark autumn day of thaw and rain, when the very 
 clouds. seom too spiritless and languid to storm outright or 
 take themselves out of the way of fair weather; wet beneath 
 and above, reminding one of that ray less atmosphere of 
 Dante's Thiid Circle, where the infernal Priessnitz admin- 
 isters his hydropathic torment, 
 
 " A heavy, cursed, and relentless drench, 
 The land it soaks is putrid " ; 
 
 or rather, as everything, animate and inanimate, is seething 
 in warm mist, suggesting the idea that Nature, grown old 
 and rheumatic, is trying the efficacy of a Thompsonian 
 sieam-box on a grand scale ; no sounds save the heavy plash 
 of muddy feet on the pavements ; the monotonous, melan- 
 choly drip from trees and roofs ; the distressful gurgling of 
 water-ducts, swallowing the dirty amalgam of the gutters ; a 
 dim, leaden-colored horizon of only a few yards in diameter, 
 shutting down about one, beyond which nothing is visible 
 save in faint line or dark projection ; the ghost of a church 
 spire or the eidolon of a chimney-pot. He who can extract 
 pleasurable emotions from the alembic of such a day has a 
 trick of alchemy with which I am wholly unacquainted. 
 
 Hark ! a rap at my door. Welcome anybody just now. 
 One gains nothing by attempting to shut out the sprites of 
 the weather. They come in at the keyhole ; they peer 
 through the dripping panes ; they insinuate themselves 
 through the crevices of the casement, or plump down chim- 
 ney astride of the rain-drops. 
 
 I rise and throw open the door. A tall, shambling, loose- 
 jointed figure ; a pinched, shrewd face, sunbrown and wind- 
 dried ; small, quick-winking black eyes. There he stands, 
 the water dripping from his pulpy hat and ragged elbows. 
 
 I speak to him ; but he returns no answer. With a 
 dumb show of misery quite touching he hands me a soiled 
 
YANKEE GYPSIES. S 
 
 piece of parchment, whereon I read what purports to be a 
 melancholy account of shipwreck and disaster, to the par- 
 ticular detriment, loss, and damnification of one Pietro 
 Frugoni, who is, in consequence, sorely in want of the alms 
 of all charitable Christian persons, and who is, in short, the 
 bearer of this veracious document, duly certified and in- 
 dorsed by an Italian consul in one of our Atlantic cities, of a 
 high-sounding, but to Yankee organs unpronounceable, name. 
 
 Here commences a struggle. Every man, the Mahome- 
 tans tell us, has two attendant angels, the good one on his 
 right shoulder, the bad on his left. " Give," says Benevo- 
 lence, as with some difficulty I fish up a small coin from the 
 depths of my pocket. " Not a cent," says selfish Prudence ; 
 and I drop it from my fingers. " Think," says the good an- 
 gel, "of the poor stranger in a strange land, just escaped 
 from the terrors of the sea storm, in which his little prop- 
 erty has perished, thrown half naked and helpless on our 
 shores, ignorant of our language, and unable to find employ- 
 ment suited to his capacity." " A vile impostor ! " replies 
 the left-hand sentinel. " His paper, purchased from one of 
 those ready writers in New York who manufacture beggar 
 credentials at the low price of one dollar per copy, with 
 earthquakes, fires, or shipwrecks, to suit customers." 
 
 Amidst this confusion of tongues I take another survey 
 of my visitant. Ha ! a light dawns upon me. That 
 shrewd, old face, with its sharp, winking eyes, is no stran- 
 ger to me. Pietro Frugoni, I have seen thee before. Si, 
 signor, that face of thine has looked at me over a dirty white 
 neckcloth, with the corners of that cunning mouth drawn 
 downwards, and those small eyes turned up in sanctimonious 
 gravity, while thou wast offering to a crowd of half-grown 
 boys an extemporaneous exhortation in the capacity of a 
 travelling preacher. Have I not seen it peering out from 
 under a blanket, as that of a poor Penobscot Indian who had 
 lost the use of his hands while trapping on the Madawaska ? 
 
4 JOHN G. WHITTIER. 
 
 Is it not the face of the forlorn father of six small childrer, 
 whom the " marcury doctors " had " pisened " and crippled ? 
 Did it not belong to that down-east unfortunate who had 
 been out to the " Genesee country " and got the " fevern- 
 nager," and whose hand shook so pitifully when held out to 
 receive my poor gift ? The same, under all disguises 
 Stephen Leathers, of Barrington him, and none other! 
 Let me conjure him into his own likeness: 
 
 " Well, Stephen, what news from old Barrington ? " 
 
 " O, well I thought I knew ye," he answers, not the least 
 disconcerted. " How do you do ? and how 's your folks ? 
 All well, I hope. I took this 'ere paper you see, to help a 
 poor furriner, who could n't make himself understood any 
 more than a wild goose. I thought I 'd just start him for- 
 'ard a little. It seemed a marcy to do it." 
 
 Well and shiftily answered, thou ragged Proteus. One 
 cannot be angry with such a fellow. I will just inquire into 
 the present state of his Gospel mission and about the condi- 
 tion of his tribe on the Penobscot ; and it may be not amiss 
 to congratulate him on the success of the steam doctors in 
 sweating the "pisen" of the regular faculty out of him. 
 But he evidently has no wish to enter into idle conversation. 
 Intent upon his benevolent errand, he is already clattering 
 down stairs. Involuntarily I glance out of the window just 
 in season to catch a single glimpse of him ere he is swal- 
 lowed up in the mist. 
 
 He has gone ; and, knave as he is, I can hardly help ex- 
 claiming, "Luck go with him!" He has broken in upon 
 the sombre train of my thoughts and called up before me 
 pleasant and grateful recollections. The old farm-house 
 nestling in its valley ; hills stretching off to the south and 
 green meadows to the east ; the small stream which came 
 noisily down its ravine, washing the old garden wall and 
 softly lapping on fallen stones and mossy roots of beeches 
 and hemlocks ; the tall sentinel poplars at the gateway ; the 
 
YANKEE GYPSIES. 5 
 
 oak forest, sleeping unbroken to the northern horizon ; the 
 grass-grown carriage-path, with its rude and crazy bridge, 
 the dear old landscape of my boyhood lies outstretched be- 
 fore me like a daguerrotype from that picture within which 
 I have borne with me in all my wanderings. I am a boy 
 again, once more conscious of the feeling, half terror, half 
 exultation, with which I used to announce the approach of 
 this very vagabond and his " kindred after the flesh." 
 
 The advent of wandering beggars, or, " old stragglers," as 
 we were wont to call them, was an event of no ordinary in- 
 terest in the generally monotonous quietude of our farm life. 
 Many of them were well known ; they had their periodical 
 revolutions and transits ; we could calculate them like eclipses 
 or new moons. Some were sturdy knaves, fat and saucy ; 
 and, whenever they ascertained that the " men folks " were 
 absent, would order provisions and cider like men who 
 expected to pay for it, seating themselves at the hearth or 
 table with the air of Falstaff, " Shall I not take mine ease 
 in mine own inn ? " Others, poor, pale, patient, like Sterne's 
 monk, came creeping up to the door, hat in hand, standing 
 there in their gray wretchedness with a look of heartbreak 
 and forlornness which was never without its effect on our 
 juvenile sensibilities. At times, however, we experienced a 
 slight revulsion of feeling when even these humblest chil- 
 dren of sorrow somewhat petulantly rejected our proffered 
 bread and cheese, and demanded instead a glass of cider. 
 "Whatever the temperance society might in such cases have 
 done, it was not in our hearts to refuse the poor creatures a 
 draught of their favorite beverage ; and was n't it a satisfac- 
 tion to see their sad, melancholy faces light up as we handed 
 them the full pitcher, and, on receiving it back empty from 
 their brown, wrinkled hands, to hear them, half breathless 
 from their long, delicious draught, thanking us for the favor, 
 as " dear, good children " 1 Not unfrequently these wander- 
 ing tests of our benevolence made their appearance in inter- 
 
6 JOHN G. WHITTIER. 
 
 esting groups of man, woman, and child, picturesque in their 
 squalidness, and manifesting a maudlin affection which would 
 have done honor to the revellers at Poosie-Nansie's, immor- 
 tal in the cantata of Burns. I remember some who were 
 evidently the victims of monomania haunted and hunted 
 by some dark thought possessed by a fixed idea. One, a 
 black-eyed, wild-haired woman, with a whole tragedy of sin, 
 shame, and suffering written in her countenance, used often 
 to visit us, warm herself by our winter fire, and supply her- 
 self with a stock of cakes and cold meat ; but was never 
 known to answer a question or to ask one. She never 
 smiled ; the cold, stony look of her eye never changed ; a si- 
 lent, impassive face, frozen rigid by some great wrong or sin. 
 We used to look with awe upon the "still woman," and 
 think of the demoniac of Scripture who had a " dumb spirit." 
 One I think I see him now, grim, gaunt, and ghastly, 
 working his slow way up to our door used to gather herbs 
 by the wayside and call himself doctor. He was bearded 
 like a he-goat and used to counterfeit lameness, yet, when he 
 supposed himself alone, would travel on lustily as if walking 
 for a wager. At length, as if in punishment of his deceit, 
 he met with an accident in his rambles and became lame in 
 earnest, hobbling ever after with difficulty on his gnarled 
 crutches. Another used to go stooping, like Bunyan's pil- 
 grim, under a pack made of an old bed sacking, stuffed out 
 into most plethoric dimensions, tottering on a pair of email, 
 meagre legs, and peering out with his wild, hairy face from 
 under his burden like a big-bodied spider. That " man with 
 the pack" always inspired me with awe and reverence. 
 Huge, almost .suUime, in its tense rotundity, the father of 
 all packs, never laid aside and never opened, what might 
 there not be within it ? With what flesh-creeping curiosity 
 I used to walk round about it at a safe distance, half expect- 
 ing to see its striped covering stirred by the motions of a 
 mysterious life, or that some evil monster would leap out of 
 
YANKEE GYPSIES. 7 
 
 it, like robbers from All Baba's jars or armed men from the 
 Trojan horse ! 
 
 There was another class of peripatetic philosophers 
 half peddler, half mendicant who were in the habit of 
 visiting us. One we recollect, a lame, unshaven, sinister- 
 eyed, unwholesome fellow, with his basket of old news- 
 papers and pamphlets, and his tattered blue umbrella, serv- 
 ing rather as a walking-staff than as a protection from the 
 rain. He told us on one occasion, in answer to our inquir- 
 ing into the cause of his lameness, that when a young man 
 he was employed on the farm of the chief magistrate of a 
 neighboring State ; where, as his ill luck would have it, the 
 governor's handsome daughter fell in love with him. He 
 was caught one day in the young lady's room by her father ; 
 whereupon the irascible old gentleman pitched him uncere- 
 moniously out of the window, laming him for life, on the 
 brick pavement below, like Vulcan on the rocks of Lemnos. 
 As for the lady, he assured us " she took on dreadfully about 
 it." "Did she die?" we inquired anxiously. There was a 
 cunning twinkle in the old rogue's eye as he responded, 
 " Well, no, she did n't. She got married." 
 
 Twice a year, usually hi the spring and autumn, we were 
 honored with a call from Jonathan Plummer, maker of 
 verses, pecller and poet, physician and parson, a Yankee 
 troubadour, first and last minstrel of the valley of the 
 Merrimac, encircled, to my wondering young eyes, with the 
 very nimbus of immortality. He brought with him phis, 
 needles, tape, and cotton thread for my mother; jackknives, 
 razors, and soap for my father ; and verses of his own com- 
 posing, coarsely printed and illustrated with rude woodcuts, 
 for the delectation of the younger branches of the family. 
 No lovesick youth could drown himself, no deserted maiden 
 bewail the moon, no rogue mount the gallows without fitting 
 memorial in Pluinmer's verses. Earthquakes, fires, fevers, 
 and shipwrecks he regarded as personal favors from Provi- 
 
8 JOHN G. WHITTIEB. 
 
 dence, furnishing the raw material of song and ballad. 
 Welcome to us in our country seclusion as Autolycus to the 
 clown in Winter's Tale, we listened with infinite satisfaction 
 to his readings of his own verses, or to his ready improvisa- 
 tion upon some domestic incident or topic suggested by his 
 auditors. When once fairly over the difficulties at the out- 
 set of a new subject his rhymes flowed freely, " as if he had 
 eaten ballads and all men's ears grew to his tunes." His 
 productions answered, as nearly as I can remember, to 
 Shakespeare's description of a proper ballad "doleful 
 matter merrily set down, or a very pleasant theme sung 
 lamentably." He was scrupulously conscientious, devout, 
 inclined to theological disquisitions, and withal mighty in 
 Scripture. He was thoroughly independent ; flattered no- 
 body, cared for nobody, trusted nobody. When invited to 
 sit down at our dinner-table, he invariably took the precau- 
 tion to place his basket of valuables between his legs for 
 safe keeping. "Never mind thy basket, Jonathan," said 
 my father ; " we sha' n't steal thy verses." " I 'm not sure 
 of that," returned the suspicious guest. " It is written, 
 4 Trust ye not in any brother.' " 
 
 Thou too, O Parson B., with thy pale student's brow 
 and rubicund nose, with thy rusty and tattered black coat 
 overswept by white, flowing locks, with thy professional 
 white neckcloth scrupulously preserved when even a shirt 
 to thy back was problematical, art by no means to be 
 ove rlooked in the muster-roll of vagrant gentlemen possess- 
 ing the entree of our farm-house. Well do we remember 
 with what grave and dignified courtesy he used to step over 
 its threshold, saluting its inmates with the same air of gra- 
 cious condescension and patronage with which in better 
 days he had delighted the hearts of his parishioners. Poor 
 old man ! He had once been the admired and almost wor- 
 shipped minister of the largest church in the town where 
 he afterwards found support in the winter season as a pau- 
 
YANKEE GYPSIES. 9 
 
 per He had early fallen into intemperate habits ; and at 
 the age of threescore and ten, when I remember him, he 
 was only sober when he lacked the means of being other- 
 wise. Drunk or sober, however, he never altogether forgot 
 the proprieties of his profession ; he was always grave, 
 decorous, and gentlemanly ; he held fast the form of sound 
 words, and the weakness of the flesh abated nothing of the 
 rigor of his stringent theology. He had been a favorite 
 pupil of the learned and astute Emmons, and was to the 
 last a sturdy defender of the peculiar dogmas of his school. 
 The last time we saw him he was holding a meeting in our 
 district school-house, with a vagabond pedler for deacon 
 and travelling companion. The tie which united the ill- 
 assorted couple was doubtless the same which endeared 
 Tarn O'Shanter to the souter : 
 
 " They had been fou for weeks thegither." 
 
 He took for his text the first seven verses of the concluding 
 chapter of Ecclesiastes, furnishing in himself its fitting 
 illustration. The evil days had come ; the keepers of the 
 house trembled; the windows of life were darkened. A 
 few months later the silver cord was loosened, the golden 
 bowl was broken, and between the poor old man and the 
 temptations which beset him fell the thick curtains of the 
 grave. 
 
 One day we had a call from a " pawky auld carle " of a 
 wandering Scotchman. To him I owe my first introduction 
 to the songs of Burns. After eating his bread and cheese 
 and drinking his mug of cider he gave us Bonnie Doou, 
 Highland Mary, and Auld Lang Syne. He had a ri sh, full 
 voice, and entered heartily into the spirit of his lyrics. I 
 have since listened to the same melodies from the lips of 
 Dempster (than whom the Scottish bard has had no 
 sweeter or truer interpreter) ; but the skilful performance 
 of the artist lacked the novel charm of the gaberlunzie's 
 1* 
 
10 JOHN G. WHITTIER. 
 
 singing in the old farm-house kitchen. Another wanderer 
 made us acquainted with the humorous old ballad of " Our 
 gude man cam hame at e'en." He applied for supper and 
 lodging, and the next morning was set at work splitting 
 stones in the pasture. While thus engaged the village 
 doctor came riding along the highway on his fine, spirited 
 horse, and stopped to talk with my father. The fellow 
 eyed the animal attentively, as if familiar with all his good 
 points, and hummed over a stanza of the old poem : 
 
 " Our gude man cam hame at e'en, 
 
 And hame cam he ; 
 And there he saw a saddle horse 
 
 Where nae horse should be. 
 How cam this horse here * 
 
 How can it be ? 
 How cam this horse here 
 
 Without the leave of me * ' 
 ' A horse ? ' quo she. 
 ' Ay, a horse/ quo he. 
 1 Ye auld fool, ye blind fool, 
 
 And blinder might ye be, 
 'T is naething but a milking cow 
 
 My mamma sent to me.' 
 A milch cow ? ' quo he. 
 Ay, a milch cow/ quo she. 
 Weel, far hae I ridden, 
 
 And muckle hae I seen ; 
 But milking cows wi' saddles on 
 
 Saw I never nane.' " 
 
 That very night the rascal decamped, taking with him 
 the doctor's horse, and was never after heard of. 
 
 Often, in the gray of the morning, we used to see one or 
 more " gaberluuzie men," pack on shoulder and staff in 
 hand, emerging from the barn or other out-building where 
 they had passed the night. I was once sent to the bam to 
 fodder the cattle late in the evening, and, climbing into the 
 
YANKEE GYPSIES. 11 
 
 mow to pitch down hay for that purpose, I was startled by 
 the sudden apparition of a man rising up before me, just 
 discernible in the dim moonlight streaming through the 
 seams of the boards. I made a rapid retreat down the lad- 
 der ; and was only reassured by hearing the object of my 
 terror calling after me, and recognizing his voice as that of 
 a harmless old pilgrim whom I had known before. Our 
 farm-house was situated in a lonely valley, half surrounded 
 with woods, with no neighbors in sight. One dark, cloudy 
 night, when our parents chanced to be absent, we were sit- 
 ting with our aged grandmother in the fading light of the 
 kitchen fire, working ourselves into a very satisfactory state 
 of excitement and terror by recounting to each other all the 
 dismal stories we could remember of ghosts, witches, 
 haunted houses, and robbers, when we were suddenly start- 
 led by a loud rap at the door. A stripling of fourteen, I 
 was very naturally regarded as the head of the household ; 
 so, with many misgivings, I advanced to the door, which I 
 slowly opened, holding the candle tremulously above my 
 head and peering out into the darkness. The feeble glim- 
 mer played upon the apparition of a gigantic horseman, 
 mounted on a steed of a size worthy of such a rider 
 colossal, motionless, like images cut out of the solid night. 
 The strange visitant gruffly saluted me ; and, after making 
 several ineffectual efforts to urge his horse in at the door, 
 dismounted and followed me into the room, evidently enjoy- 
 ing the terror which his huge presence excited. Announc- 
 ing himself a~ the great Indian doctor, he drew himself up 
 before the fire, stretched his arms, clinched his fists, struck 
 his broad chest, and invited our attention to what he called 
 his " mortal frame." He demanded in succession all kinds 
 of intoxicating liquors ; and, on being assured that we had 
 none to give him, he grew angry, threatened to swallow my 
 younger brother alive, and, seizing me by the hair of my 
 head as the angel did the prophet at Babylon, led me about 
 
12 JOHN G. WHITTIER. 
 
 from room to room. After an ineffectual search, in the 
 course of which he mistook a jug of oil for one of brandy, 
 and, contrary to my explanations and remonstrances, insisted 
 upon swallowing a portion of its contents, he released me, 
 fell to crying and sobbing, and confessed that he was so drunk 
 already that his horse was ashamed of him. After bemoan- 
 ing and pitying himself to his satisfaction he wiped his ejes, 
 and sat down by the side of my grandmother, giving her to 
 understand that he was very much pleased with her appear- 
 ance ; adding, that, if agreeable to her, he should like the 
 privilege of paying his addresses to her. While vainly 
 endeavoring to make the excellent old lady comprehend his 
 very flattering proposition he was interrupted by the return 
 of my father, who, at once understanding the matter, turned 
 him out of doors without ceremony. 
 
 On one occasion, a few years ago, on my return from the 
 field at evening, I was told that a foreigner had asked for 
 lodgings during the night, but that, influenced by his dark, 
 repulsive appearance, my mother had very reluctantly re- 
 fused his request. I found her by no means satisfied with 
 her decision. " What if a son of mine was in a strange 
 land ? " she inquired, self-reproachfully. Greatly to her re- 
 lief, I volunteered to go in pursuit of the wanderer, and, 
 taking a crosspath over the fields, soon overtook him. He 
 had just been rejected at the house of our nearest neighbor, 
 and was standing in a state of dubious perplexity in the 
 street. His looks quite justified my mother's suspicions. 
 He was an olive-complexioned, black-bearded Italian, with 
 an eye like a live coal, such a face as perchance looks out 
 on the traveller in the passes of the Abruzzi, one of those 
 bandit visages which Salvator has painted. With some dif- 
 ficulty I gave him to understand my errand, when he over- 
 whelmed me with thanks and joyfully followed me back. 
 He took his seat with us at the supper-table ; and, when we 
 were all gathered around the hearth that cold autumnal 
 
YANKEE GYPSIES. 13 
 
 evening, he told us, partly by words and partly by gestures, 
 the story of his life and misfortunes, amused us with descrip- 
 tions of the grape-gatherings and festivals of his sunny clime, 
 edified my mother with a recipe for making bread of chest- 
 nuts ; and in the morning, when, after breakfast, his dark, 
 sullen face lighted up and his fierce eye moistened with 
 grateful emotion as in his own silvery Tuscan accent he 
 poured out his thanks, we marvelled at the fears which had 
 so nearly closed our door against him ; and, as he departed, 
 we all felt that he had left with us the blessing of the poor. 
 
 It was not often that, as in the above instance, my moth- 
 er's prudence got the better of her charity. The regular 
 " old stragglers " regarded her as an unfailing friend ; and 
 the sight of her plain cap was to them an assurance of forth- 
 coming creature comforts. There was indeed a tribe of lazy 
 strollers, having their place of rendezvous in the town of 
 Barringtou, New Hampshire, whose low vices had placed 
 them beyond even the pale of her benevolence. They were 
 not unconscious of their evil reputation ; and experience had 
 taught them the necessity of concealing, under well-contrived 
 disguises, their true character. They came to us in all 
 shapes and with all appearances save the true one, with 
 most miserable stories of mishap and sickness and all "the 
 ills which flesh is heir to." It was particularly vexatious 
 to discover, when too late, that our sympathies and chari- 
 ties had been expended upon such graceless vagabonds as 
 the " Barrington beggars." An old withered hag, known by 
 the appellation of Hopping Pat, the wise woman of her 
 tribe, was in the habit of visiting us, with her hopeful 
 grandson, who had "a gift for preaching" as well as for 
 many other things not exactly compatible with holy orders. 
 He sometimes brought with him a tame crow, a shrewd, 
 knavish-looking bird, who, when in the humor for it, could 
 talk like Barnaby Rudge's raven. He used to say he could 
 "do nothin' at exhortin' without a white handkercher on hig 
 
14 JOHN G. WHITTIER. 
 
 neck and money in his pocket " a fact going far to confirm 
 the opinions of the Bishop of Exeter and the Puseyites gen- 
 erally, that there can be no priest without tithes and surplice. 
 
 These people have for several generations lived distinct 
 from the great mass of the community, like the gypsies of 
 Europe, whom in many respects they closely resemble. 
 They have the same settled aversion to labor and the same 
 disposition to avail themselves of the fruits of the industry 
 of others. They love a wild, out-of-door life, sing songs, 
 tell fortunes, and have an instinctive hatred of " missionaries 
 and cold water." It has been said I know not upon what 
 grounds that their ancestors were indeed a veritable im- 
 portation of English gypsyhood ; but if so, they have un- 
 doubtedly lost a good deal of the picturesque charm of its 
 unhoused and free condition. I very much fear that my 
 friend Mary Russell Mitford, sweetest of England's rural 
 painters, who has a poet's eye for the fine points in 
 gypsy character, would scarcely allow their claims to frater- 
 nity with her own vagrant friends, whose camp-fires wel- 
 comed her to her new home at Swallowfield. 
 
 " The proper study of mankind is man " ; and, according 
 to my view, no phase of our common humanity is altogether 
 unworthy of investigation. Acting upon this belief two or 
 three summers ago, when making, in company with my sis- 
 ter, a little excursion into the hill country of New Hamp- 
 shire, I turned my horse's head towards Barrington for the 
 purpose of seeing these semi-civilized strollers in their own 
 home, and returning, once for all, their numerous visits. 
 Taking leave of our hospitable cousins in old Lee with 
 about as much solemnity as we may suppose Major Laing 
 parted with his friends when he set out in search of desert- 
 girdled Timbuctoo, we drove several miles over a rough 
 road, passed the Devil's Den unmolested, crossed a fretful 
 little streamlet noisily working its way into a valley where 
 it turned a lonely, half-ruinous mill, and climbing a steep 
 
YANKEE GYPSIES. 15 
 
 hill beyond, saw before us a wide sandy level, skirted on the 
 west and north by low, scraggy hills, and dotted here and 
 there with dwarf pitch pines. In the centre of this desolate 
 region were some twenty or thirty small dwellings, grouped 
 together as irregularly as a Hottentot kraal. Unfenced, 
 unguarded, open to all comers and goers, stood that city of 
 the beggars no wall or paling between the ragged cabins 
 to remind one of the jealous distinctions of property. The 
 great idea of its founders seemed visible in its unappropri- 
 ated freedom. Was not the whole round world their own ? 
 and should they haggle about boundaries and title deeds ? 
 For them, on distant plains, ripened golden harvests; for 
 them, in far-off workshops, busy hands were toiling ; for 
 them, if they had but the grace to note it, the broad earth 
 put on her garniture of beauty, and over them hung the 
 silent mystery of heaven and its stars. That comfortable 
 philosophy which modern transcendentalism has but dimly 
 shadowed forth that poetic agrarianism, which gives all 
 to each and each to all is the real life of this city of un- 
 work. To each of its dingy dwellers might be not unaptly 
 applied the language of one who, I trust, will pardon me for 
 quoting her beautiful poem in this connection : 
 
 " Other hands may grasp the field or forest, 
 Proud proprietors in pomp may shine ; 
 Thou art wealthier all the world is thine.'' 
 
 But look ! the clouds are breaking. " Fair weather com- 
 eth out of the north." The wind has blown away the mists ; 
 on the gilded spire of John Street glimmers a beam of sun- 
 shine ; and there is the sky again, hard, blue, and cold in its 
 eternal purity, not a whit the worse for the storm. In the 
 beautiful present the past is no longer needed. Reverently 
 and gratefully let its volume be laid aside ; and when again 
 the shadows of the outward world fall upon the spirit, may 
 I not lack a good angel to remind me of its solace, even if 
 he comes in the shape of a Barrington beggar. 
 
D A R A. 
 
 BY JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL 
 
 WHEN Persia's sceptre trembled in a hand 
 Wilted with harem-heats, and all the land 
 Was hovered over by those vulture ills 
 That snuff decaying empire from afar, 
 Then, with a nature balanced as a star, 
 Dara arose, a shepherd of the hills. 
 
 He who had governed fleecy subjects well, 
 
 Made his own village by the self-same spell 
 
 Secure and quiet as a guarded fold ; 
 
 Then, gathering strength by slow and wise degrees, 
 
 Under his sway, to neighbor villages 
 
 Order returned, and faith, and justice old. 
 
 Now when it fortuned that a king more wise 
 Endued the realm with brain, and hands, and eyes, 
 He sought on every side men brave and just ; 
 And having heard our mountain shepherd's praise, 
 How he refilled the mould of elder days, 
 To Dara gave a satrapy in trust. 
 
 So Dara shepherded a province wide, 
 
 Nor in his viceroy's sceptre took more pride 
 
 Than in his crook before ; but envy finds 
 
DARA. 17 
 
 More food in cities than on mountains bare ; 
 And the frank sun of spirits clear and rare 
 Breeds poisonous fogs in low and marish minds. 
 
 Soon it was whispered at the royal ear 
 That, though wise Dara's province, year by year, 
 Like a great sponge, sucked wealth and plenty up, 
 Yet, when he squeezed it at the king's behest, 
 Some yellow drops more rich than all the rest 
 Went to the filling of his private cup. 
 
 For proof, they said that, wheresoe'er he went, 
 A chest, beneath whose weight the camel bent, 
 Went with him ; and no mortal eye had seen 
 What was therein, save only Dara's own. 
 But, when 't was opened, all his tent was known 
 To glow and lighten with heaped jewels' sheen. 
 
 The king set forth for Dara's province straight, 
 Where, as was fit, outside the city's gate, 
 The viceroy met him with a stately train, 
 And there, with archers circled, close at hand, 
 A camel with the chest was seen to stand. 
 The king's brow reddened, for the guilt was plain. 
 
 " Open me here," he cried, " this treasure chest." 
 
 'T was done, and only a worn shepherd's vest 
 
 Was found within. Some blushed and hung the head ; 
 
 Not Dara ; open as the sky's blue roof 
 
 He stood, and " O my lord, behold the proof 
 
 That I was faithful to my trust," he said. 
 
 " To govern men, lo, all the spell I had ! 
 My soul in these rude vestments ever clad 
 Still to the unstained past kept true and leal, 
 
18 JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL. 
 
 Still on these plains could breathe her mountain air, 
 
 And fortune's heaviest gifts serenely bear, 
 
 Which bend men from their truth and make them reel. 
 
 " For ruling wisely I should have small skill, 
 Were I not lord of simple Dara still : 
 That sceptre kept, I could not lose my way." 
 Strange dew in royal eyes grew round and bright, 
 And strained the throbbing lids ; before 't was night, 
 Two added provinces blest Dara's sway. 
 
CROMWELL. 
 
 BY THOMAS CARLYLE. 
 
 CROMWELL'S BIRTHPLACE. 
 
 HUNTINGDON itself lies pleasantly along the left 
 bank of the Ouse, sloping pleasantly upwards from 
 Ouse Bridge, which connects it with the old village of God- 
 manchester ; the Town itself consisting mainly of one fair 
 street, which towards the north end of it opens into a kind 
 of irregular market-place, and then contracting again soon 
 terminates. The two churches of All-Saints' and St. John's, 
 as you walk up northward from the Bridge, appear success- 
 ively on your left ; the church-yards flanked with shops or 
 other houses. The Ouse, which is of very circular course 
 in this quarter, winding as if reluctant to enter the Fen- 
 country, says one topographer, has still a respectable 
 drab-color gathered from the clays of Bedfordshire, has 
 not yet the Stygian black which in a few miles further it 
 assumes for good. Huntingdon, as it were, looks over into 
 the Fens; Godmanchester, just across the river, already 
 stands on black bog. The country to the East is all Fen 
 (mostly unreclaimed in Oliver's time, and still of a very 
 dropsical character) ; to the West it is hard green ground, 
 agreeably broken into little heights, duly fringed with wood, 
 and bearing marks of comfortable long-continued cultivation. 
 Here, on the edge of the firm green land, and looking ovei 
 into the black marshes with their alder-trees and willow 
 trees, did Oliver Cromwell pass his young years. 
 
20 THOMAS CARLYLE. 
 
 COINCIDENCES. 
 
 WHILE Oliver Cromwell was entering himself of Sidney- 
 Sussex College, William Shakespeare was taking his fare- 
 well of this world. Oliver's Father had, most likely, cr.me 
 with him ; it is but some fifteen miles from Huntingdon ; 
 you can go and come in a day. Oliver's Father saw Oliver 
 write in the Album at Cambridge : at Stratford, Shake- 
 speare's Ann Hathaway was weeping over his bed. The 
 first world-great thing that remains of English History, the 
 Literature of Shakespeare, was ending; the second world- 
 great thing that remains of English History, the armed 
 Appeal of Puritanism to the Invisible God of Heaven 
 against many very visible Devils, on Earth and Elsewhere, 
 was, so to speak, beginning. They have their exits and their 
 entrances. And one People, in its time, plays many parts. 
 
 Chevalier Florian, in his " Life of Cervantes," has re- 
 marked that Shakespeare's death-day, 23d April, 1616, 
 was likewise that of Cervantes at Madrid. " Twenty-third 
 of April " is, sure enough, the authentic Spanish date : but 
 Chevalier Florian has omitted to notice that the English 
 twenty-third is of Old Style. The brave Miguel died ten 
 days before Shakespeare ; and already lay buried, smoothed 
 right nobly into his long rest. The Historical Student can 
 meditate on these things. 
 
 HIS CONVERSION. 
 
 IN those years it must be that Dr. Simcott, Physician in 
 Huntingdon, had to do with Oliver's hypochondriac mala- 
 dies. He told Sir Philip Warwick, unluckily specifying no 
 date, or none that has survived, " he had often been sent for 
 
CROMWELL. 21 
 
 at midnight:" Mr. Cromwell for many years was very 
 " splenetic " (spleen-struck), often thought he was just about 
 to die, and also " had fancies about the Town Cross." 
 Brief intimation, of which the reflecting reader may make a 
 great deal. Samuel Johnson, too, had hypochondrias; all 
 great souls are apt to have, and to be in thick darkness 
 generally, till the eternal ways and the celestial guiding- 
 stars disclose themselves, and the vague Abyss of Life knit 
 itself up into Firmaments for them. Temptations in the 
 wilderness, Choices of Hercules, and the like, in succinct or 
 loose form, are appointed for every man that will assert a 
 soul in himself and be a man. Let Oliver take comfort in 
 his dark sorrows and melancholies. The quantity of sor- 
 row he has, does it not mean withal the quantity of sym- 
 pathy he has, the quantity of faculty and victory he shall 
 yet have ? Our sorrow is the inverted image of our noble- 
 ness. The depth of our despair measures what capability 
 and height of claim we have to hope. Black smoke as of 
 Tophet filling all your universe, it can yet by true heart- 
 energy become flame, and brilliancy of Heaven. Courage ! 
 It is therefore in these years, undated by History, that we 
 must place Oliver's clear recognition of Calvinistic Chris- 
 tianity ; what he, with unspeakable joy, would name his Con- 
 version, his deliverance from the jaws of Eternal Death. 
 Certainly a grand epoch for a man : properly the one 
 epoch ; the turning-point which guides upwards, or guides 
 downwards, him and his activity for evermore. Wilt thou 
 join with the dragons ; wilt thou join with the Gods ? Of 
 thee, too, the question is asked ; whether by a man in 
 Geneva gown, by a man in " Four surplices at Allhallow- 
 tide," with words very imperfect ; or by no man and no 
 words, but only by the Silences, by the Eternities, by the 
 Life everlasting and the Death everlasting. That the 
 " Sense of difference between Right and Wrong " had filled 
 all Time and all Space for man, and bodied itself forth into 
 
22 THOMAS CARLYLE. 
 
 a Heaven and Hell for him ; this constitutes the grand fea- 
 ture of those Puritan, Old-Christian Ages ; this is the 
 element which stamps them as Heroic, and has rendered 
 their works great, manlike, fruitful to all generations. It is 
 by far the memorablest achievement of our Species ; with- 
 out that element in some form or other, nothing of Heroic 
 ha/1 ever been among us. 
 
 For many centuries Catholic Christianity a fit embodi- 
 ment of that divine Sense had been current more or less, 
 making the generations noble : and here in England, in the 
 Century called the Seventeenth, we see the last aspect of it 
 hitherto, not the last of all, it is to be hoped. Oliver 
 was henceforth a Christian man ; believed in God, not on 
 Sundays only, but on all days, in all places, and in all case: 
 
 CHARLES AND THE PARLIAMENT. 
 
 SIR OLIVER CROMWELL has faded from the Parliament 
 ary scene into the deep Fen-country, but Oliver Cromwell 
 Esq. appears there as Member for Huntingdon, at West- 
 minster "on Monday, the 17th of March," 1627-8. This 
 was the Third Parliament of Charles ; by much the most 
 notable of all Parliaments till Charles's Long Parliament 
 met, which proved his last. 
 
 Having sharply, with swift impetuosity and indignation, 
 dismissed two Parliaments because they would not " supply " 
 him without taking " grievances " along with them ; and, 
 meanwhile and afterwards, having failed in every operation 
 foreign and domestic, at Cadiz, at Rhe, at Rochelle ; and 
 having failed, too, in getting supplies by unparliamentary 
 methods, Charles " consulted with Sir Robert Cotton what 
 was to be done ; " who answered, Summon a Parliament 
 again. So this celebrated Parliament was siimmoned. It 
 
CROMWELL. 23 
 
 met, as we said, in March, 1628, and continued with one 
 prorogation till March, 1629. The two former Parliaments 
 had sat but a few weeks each, till they were indignantly 
 hurled asunder again ; this one continued nearly a year. 
 Wentworth (Strafford) was of this Parliament ; Hampden, 
 too, Selden, Pym, Holies, and others known to us ; all these 
 had been of former Parliaments as well ; Oliver Cromwell, 
 Member for Huntingdon, sat there for the first time. 
 
 It is very evident, King Charles, baffled in all his enter- 
 prises, and reduced really to a kind of crisis, wished much 
 this Parliament should succeed ; and took what he must have 
 thought incredible pains for that end. The poor King 
 strives visibly throughout to control himself, to be soft and 
 patient; inwardly writhing and rustling with royal rage. 
 Unfortunate King, we see him chafing, stamping, a very 
 fiery steed, but bridled, check-bitted, by innumerable straps 
 and considerations ; struggling much to be composed. 
 Alas ! it would not do. This Parliament was more Puri- 
 tanic, more intent on rigorous Law and divine Gospel, 
 than any other had ever been. As indeed all these Parlia- 
 ments grow strangely in Puritianism ; more and ever more 
 earnest rises from the hearts of them all, " Sacred Majes- 
 ty, lead us not to Antichrist, to Illegality, to temporal and 
 eternal Perdition ! " The Nobility land Gentry of England 
 were then a very strange body of men. The English 
 Squire of the Seventeenth Century clearly appears to have 
 believed in God, not as a figure of speech, but as a very 
 fact, very awful to the heart of the English Squire. " He 
 wore his Bible doctrine round him," says one, "as our 
 Squire wears his shotbelt ; went abroad with it, nothing 
 doubting." King Charles was going on his father's course, 
 only with frightful acceleration: he and his respectable 
 Traditions and Notions, clothed in old sheepskin and 
 respectable Church-tippets, were all pulling one way; 
 England and the Eternal Laws pulling another; the rent 
 fast widening till no man could heal it. 
 
24 THOMAS CARLYLE. 
 
 This was the celebrated Parliament which framed the Peti- 
 tion of Right, and set London all astir with " bells and bon- 
 fires " at the passing thereof ; and did other feats not to be 
 particularized here. Across the murkiest element in which 
 any great Entity was ever shown to human creatures, it still 
 rises, after much consideration, to the modern man, in a dim 
 but undeniable manner, as a most brave and noble Parlia- 
 ment. The like of which were worth its weight in dia- 
 monds even now ; but has grown very unattainable now 
 next door to incredible now. We have to say that this Par- 
 liament chastised sycophant Priests, Mainwaring, Sibthorp, 
 and other Arminian sycophants, a disgrace to God's 
 Church; that it had an eye to other still more elevated 
 Church-sycophants, as the mainspring of all ; but was cau- 
 tious to give offence by naming them. That it carefully 
 " abstained from naming the Duke of Buckingham." That 
 it decided on giving ample subsidies, but not till there were 
 reasonable discussion of grievances. That in manner it was 
 most gentle, soft-spoken, cautious, reverential ; and in sub- 
 stance most resolute and valiant. Truly with valiant, pa- 
 tient energy, in a slow, steadfast English manner, it car- 
 ried, across infinite confused opposition and discouragement, 
 its Petition of Right, and what else it had to carry. Four 
 hundred brave men, brave men and true, after their sort ! 
 One laments to find such a Parliament smothered under 
 Dryasdust's shot-rubbish. The memory of it, could any 
 real .memory of it rise upon honorable gentlemen and us, 
 might be admonitory, would be astonishing at least. 
 
 A GENTLEMAN FARMER. 
 
 IN or soon after 1631, as we laboriously infer from the 
 imbroglio records of poor Noble, Oliver decided on an 
 
25 
 
 enlarged sphere of action as a Farmer ; sold his properties 
 in Huntingdon, all or some of them ; rented certain grazing- 
 lands at St. Ives, five miles down the River, eastward of his 
 native place, and removed thither. The Deed of Sale is 
 dated 7th May, 1631 ; the properties are specified as in the 
 possession of himself or his Mother ; the sum they yielded 
 was 1800. With this sum Oliver stocked his Grazing- 
 Farm at St. Ives. The Mother, we infer, continued to 
 reside at Huntingdon, but withdrawn now from active occu- 
 pation, in the retirement befitting a widow up in years. 
 There is even some gleam of evidence to that effect : her 
 properties are sold ; but Oliver's children born to him at St. 
 Ives are still christened at Huntingdon, in the Church he 
 was used to ; which may mean also that their good Grand- 
 mother was still there. 
 
 Properly this was no change in Oliver's old activities ; it 
 was an enlargement of the sphere of them. His Mother 
 still at Huntingdon, within few miles of him, he could still 
 superintend and protect her existence there, while managing 
 his new operations at St. Ives. He continued here till the 
 summer or spring of 1636. A studious imagination may 
 sufficiently construct the figure of his equable life in those 
 years. Diligent grass-farming ; mowing, milking, cattle- 
 marketing : add u hypocondria," fits of the blackness of 
 darkness, with glances of the brightness of very Heaven ; 
 prayer, religious reading and meditation ; household epochs, 
 joys, and cares : we have a solid, substantial, inoffensive 
 Farmer of St. Ives, hoping to walk with integrity and hum- 
 ble devout diligence through this world ; and, by his Mak- 
 er's infinite mercy, to escape destruction, and find eternal 
 salvation in wider Divine Worlds. This latter, this is the 
 grand clause in his Life, which dwarfs all other clauses. 
 Much wider destinies than he anticipated were appointed 
 him on Earth ; but that, in comparison to the alternative of 
 Heaven or Hell to all Eternity, was a mighty small matter. 
 2 
 
26 THOMAS CARLYLE. 
 
 VESTIGES. 
 
 OLIVER, as we observed, has left hardly any memorial of 
 himself at St. Ives. The ground he farmed is still partly 
 capable of being specified, certain records or leases being 
 still in existence. It lies at the lower or South-east end of 
 the Town ; a stagnant flat tract of land, extending between 
 the houses or rather kitchen-gardens of St. Ives in that 
 quarter, and the banks of the River, which, very tortuous 
 always, has made a .new bend here. If well drained, this 
 land looks as if it would produce abundant grass, but natur- 
 ally it must be little other than a bog. Tall bushy ranges 
 of willow-trees and the like, at present, divide it into fields ; 
 the River, not visible till you are close on it, bounding 
 them all to the South. At the top of the fields next to the 
 Town is an ancient massive Barn, still used as such ; the 
 people call it " Cromwell's Barn ; " and nobody can prove 
 that it was not his ! It was evidently some ancient man's 
 or series of ancient men's. 
 
 Quitting St. Ives Fen-ward or Eastward, the last house 
 of all, which stands on your right hand among gardens, 
 seemingly the best house in the place, and called Slepe 
 Hall, is confidently pointed out as " Oliver's House." It is 
 indisputably Slepe-Hall House, and Oliver's Farm was 
 rented from the estate of Slepe Hall. It is at present used 
 for a Boarding-school : the worthy inhabitants believe it to 
 be Oliver's ; and even point out his " Chapel " or secret Pu- 
 ritan Sermon-room in the lower story of the house : no Ser- 
 mon-room, as you may well discern, but to appearance some 
 sort of scullery or wash-house or bake-house. " It was here 
 he used to preach," say they. Courtesy forbids you to 
 answer, " Never ! " But in fact there is no likelihood that 
 this was Oliver's House at all : in its present state it does 
 not seem to be a century old ; and originally, as is like, it 
 
CROMWELL. 27 
 
 must have served as residence to the Proprietors of Slepe- 
 Hall estate, not to the Farmer of a part thereof. Tradition 
 makes a sad blur of Oliver's memory in his native country ! 
 We know, and shall know, only this, for certain here, that 
 Oliver farmed part or whole of these Slepe-Hall Lands, 
 over which the human feet can still walk with assurance ; 
 past which the River Ouse still slumberously rolls towards 
 Earith Bulwark and the Fen-country. Here of a certainty 
 Oliver did walk and look about him habitually during those 
 five years from 1631 to 1636; a man studious of many 
 temporal and many eternal things. His cattle grazed here, 
 his ploughs tilled here, the heavenly skies and infernal 
 
 abysses overarched and underarched him here 
 
 How he lived at St. Ives : how he saluted men on the 
 streets ; read Bibles ; sold cattle ; and walked, with heavy 
 footfall and many thoughts, through the Market Green or 
 old narrow lanes in St. Ives, by the shore of the black 
 Ouse River, shall be left to the reader's imagination. 
 There is in this man talent for farming ; there are thoughts 
 enough, thoughts bounded by the Ouse River, thoughts that 
 go beyond Eternity, and a great black sea of things that 
 he has never yet been able to think. 
 
 SHIPMONEY. 
 
 ON the very day while Oliver Cromwell was writing this 
 Letter at St. Ives, two obscure individuals, " Peter Aldridge 
 and Thomas Lane, Assessors of Shipmoney," over in Buck- 
 inghamshire, had assembled a Parish Meeting in the Church 
 of Great Kimble, to assess, and rate the Shipmoney of the 
 said Parish : there, in the cold weather, at the foot of the 
 Chiltern Hills, " 11 January, 1635," the Parish did attend, 
 44 John Hampden, Esquire," at the head of them, and by a 
 
28 THOMAS CARLYLE. 
 
 Return still extant, refused to pay the same or any portion 
 thereof, witness the above " Assessors," witness aiso two 
 " Parish Constables " whom we remit from such unexpected 
 celebrity. John Hampden's share for this Parish is thirty- 
 one shillings and sixpence : for another Parish it is twenty 
 shillings ; on which latter sum, not on the former, John 
 Hampden was tried. 
 
 THE SHIPMONEY TRIAL. 
 
 IN the end of that same year [1637] there had risen all 
 over England huge rumors concerning the Shipmoney Trial 
 at London. On the 6th of November, 1637, this important 
 Process of Mr. Hampden's began. Learned Mr. St. John, 
 a dark tough man, of the toughness of leather, spake with 
 irrefragable law-eloquence, law-logic, for three days run- 
 ning, on Mr. Hampden's side ; and learned Mr. Holborn 
 for three other days ; preserved yet by Rushworth in 
 acres of typography, unreadable now to all mortals. For 
 other learned gentlemen, tough as leather, spoke on the 
 opposite side ; and learned judges animadverted, at endless 
 length, amid the expectancy of men. With brief pauses, 
 the Trial lasted for three weeks and three days. Mr. 
 Hampden became the most famous man in England, by 
 aciident partly. The sentence was not delivered till April, 
 1638 ; and then it went against Mr. Hampden: judgment 
 in Exchequer ran to this effect, " Gonsideratum est per eos- 
 dem Barones quod prcedictus Johannes Hampden de iisdem 
 viginti solidis oneretur" He must pay the Twenty shil 
 Hugs, " et inde satisfaciat." No hope in Law-Courts, 
 then ; Petition of Right and Tallagio non concedendo 
 have become an old song. 
 
CROMWELL. 
 
 BATTLE OF NASEBY. 
 
 THE old Hamlet of Naseby stands yet, on its old hill-top, 
 very much as it did in Saxon days, on the Northwestern 
 border of Northamptonshire, some seven or eight miles 
 from Market-Harborough in Leicestershire, nearly on a 
 line, and nearly nrdway, between that Town and Daventry. 
 A peaceable old Hamlet, of some eight hundred souls ; clay 
 cottages for laborers, but neatly thatched and swept ; 
 smith's shop, saddler's shop, beer shop, all in order ; form- 
 ing a kind of square, which leads off Southwards into two 
 long streets : the old Church, with its graves, stands in the 
 centre, the truncated spire finishing itself with a strange old 
 Ball, held up by rods ; a " hollow copper Ball, which came 
 from Boulogne in Henry the Eighth's time," which has, 
 like Hudibras's breeches, " been at the Siege of Bullen." 
 The ground is upland, moorland, though now growing corn ; 
 was not enclosed till the last generation, and is still some- 
 what bare of wood. It stands nearly in the heart of Eng- 
 land: gentle Dulness, taking a turn at etymology, some- 
 times derives it from Navel ; " Navesby, quasi Navelsby, 
 from being," &c. : Avon Well, the distinct source of 
 Shakespeare's Avon, is on the Western slope of the high 
 grounds ; Nen and Welland, streams leading towards Crom- 
 well's Fen-country, begin to gather themselves from boggy 
 places on the Eastern side. The grounds, as we say,, lie 
 high ; and are still, in their new subdivisions, known by 
 the name of " Hills," " Rutput Hill," " Mill Hill," " Dust 
 Hill," and the like, precisely as in Rushworth's time : but 
 they are not properly hills at all ; they are broad blunt 
 clayey masses, swelling towards and from each other, like 
 indolent waves of a sea, sometimes of miles in extent. 
 
 It was on this high moor-ground, in the centre of Eng- 
 land, that King Charles, on the 14th of June, 1645, fought 
 
30 THOMAS CARLYLE. 
 
 his last Battle ; dashed fiercely against the New-Model 
 Army, ^ hich he had despised till then ; and saw himself 
 ghivered utterly to ruin thereby. " Prince Rupert, on the 
 King's right wing, charged up the hill, and carried all be 
 fore him ; " but Lieutenant-General Cromwell charged down 
 hill on the other wing, likewise carrying all before him, 
 and did not gallop off the field to plunder. He, Cromwell, 
 ordered thither by the Parliament, had arrived from the 
 Association two days before, " amid shouts from the whole 
 Army : " he had the ordering of the Horse this morning. 
 Prince Rupert, on returning from his plunder, finds the 
 King's Infantry a ruin ; prepares to charge again with the 
 rallied Cavalry ; but the Cavalry, too, when it came to the 
 point, " broke all asunder," never to reassemble more. The 
 chase went through Harborough, where the King had al- 
 ready been that morning, when in an evil hour he turned 
 back, to revenge some " surprise of an outpost at Naseby 
 the night before," and give the Roundheads battle. 
 
 Ample details of this Battle, and of the movements prior 
 and posterior to it, are to be found in Sprigge, or copied 
 with some abridgment into Rushworth ; who has also copied 
 a strange old Plan of the Battle ; half-plan, half-picture, 
 which the Sale-Catalogues are very chary of, in the case of 
 Sprigge. By assiduous attention, aided by this Plan, as the 
 old names yet stick to their localities, the narrative can still 
 be, and has lately been, pretty accurately verified, and the 
 Figure of the old Battle dimly brought back again. The 
 reader shall imagine it, for the present. On the crown of 
 Naseby Height stands a modern Battle-monument ; but, by 
 an unlucky oversight, it is above a mile to the east of where 
 the Battle really was. There are, likewise, two modern 
 Books about Naseby and its Battle, both of them without 
 value. 
 
 The Parliamentary Army stood ranged on the height 
 still partly called " Mill Hill," as, in Rushworth's time, a 
 
CROMWELL. 31 
 
 mile and half from Naseby ; the King's Army, on a parallel 
 Hill," its back to Harborough, with the wide table of up- 
 land now named Broad Moor between them, where indeed 
 the main brunt of the action still clearly enough shows it- 
 self to have been. There are hollow spots, of a rank vegeta- 
 tion, scattered over that Broad Moor, which are understood 
 to have once been burial mounds, some of which, one to my 
 knowledge, have been, with more or less of sacrilege, veri- 
 fied as such. A friend of mine has in his cabinet two an- 
 cient grinder-teeth, dug lately from that ground, and waits 
 for an opportunity to rebury them there. Sound, effectual 
 grinders, one of them very large ; which ate their breakfast 
 on the fourteenth morning of June, two hundred years ago, 
 and, except to be clinched once in grim battle, had never 
 work to do more in this world ! " A stack of dead bodies, 
 perhaps about a hundred, had been buried in this Trench, 
 piled, as in a wall, a man's length thick ; the skeletons lay 
 in courses, the heads of one course to the heels of the next ; 
 one figure, by the strange position of the bones, gave us the 
 hideous notion of its having been thrown in before death. 
 We did not proceed far ; perhaps some half-dozen skele- 
 tons. The bones were treated with all piety, watched rig- 
 orously over Sunday, till they could be covered in again." 
 Sweet friends, for Jesus' sake forbear ! 
 
 At this Battle, Mr. John Rush worth, our Historical Rush- 
 worth, had, unexpectedly, for some instants, sight of a very 
 famous person. Mr. John is Secretary to Fairfax, and they 
 have placed him to-day among the Baggage-wagons, near 
 Naseby Hamlet, above a mile from the fighting, where he 
 waits in an anxious manner. It is known how Prince Ru- 
 pert broke our left wing while Cromwell was breaking their 
 left " A gentleman of public employment, in the late ser- 
 vice near Xaseby," writes next day, "Harborough, 15th 
 June, 2 in the morning," a rough graphic Letter in the 
 Newspapers, wherein is this sentence : 
 
32 THOMAS CARLYLE. 
 
 * * * "A party of theirs that broke through the left 
 wing of horse, came quite behind the rear to our Train, the 
 Leader of them being a person somewhat in habit like the 
 General, in a red montero. as the General had. He came 
 as a friend ; our commander of the guard of the Train went 
 with his hat in his -hand, and asked him, How the day 
 went? thinking it had been the General : the Cavalier, who 
 we since heard was Rupert, asked him and the rest, If they 
 would have quarter ? They cried No ; gave fire, and in- 
 stantly beat them off. It was a happy deliverance,"! 
 without doubt. 
 
 There were taken here a good few " ladies of quality i* 
 carriages," and above a hundred Irish ladies not of quali 
 ty, tattery camp-followers, " with long skean-knives about a 
 foot in length," which they well knew how to use, upon 
 whom, I fear, the Ordinance against Papists pressed hard 
 this day. The King's Carriage was also taken, with a Cab- 
 inet and many Royal Autographs in it, which, when printed, 
 made a sad impression against his Majesty, gave, in fact, 
 a most melancholy view of the veracity of his Majesty. 
 " On the word of a King," all was lost ! 
 
 BRIDGET CROMWELL'S WEDDING. 
 
 AND now, dated on the Monday before, at Holton, a 
 country Parish in those parts,<there is this still legible in 
 the old Church Register, intimately interesting to some 
 friends of ours ! " HENRY IRETON, Commissary- Gen- 
 eral to Sir Thomas Fairfax, and BRIDGET, Daughter to 
 Oliver Cromwell, Lieutenant- General of the Horse, to the 
 said Sir Thomas Fairfax, were married, by Mr. Dell, in the 
 Lady Whorwood 'her house in Holton, June 15th, 1646. 
 ALBAN BALES, Rector." 
 
CROMWELL. 33 
 
 Ireton, we are to remark, was one of Fairfax's Com- 
 missioners on the Treaty for surrendering Oxford, and 
 busy undor the walls there at present, llolton is some five 
 miles east of the City ; Holton House, we guess, by various 
 indications, to have been Fairfax's own quarter. Dell, al- 
 ready and afterwards well known, was the General's Chap- 
 lain at this date. Of " the Lady Whorwood " I have traces, 
 rather in the Royalist direction ; her strong moated House, 
 very useful to Fairfax in those weeks, still stands conspicu- 
 ous in that region, though now under new figure and owner- 
 ship ; drawbridge become faced, deep ditch now dry, moated 
 ; sland changed into a flower-garden; "rebuilt in 1807." 
 Fairfax's lines, we observe, extended " from Headingtor 
 Hill to Marston," several miles in advance of Holton 
 House, then " from Marston," across the Cherwell, " and 
 over from that to the Isis on the North side of the City " ; 
 southward, and elsewhere, the besieged, "by a dam at St. 
 Clement's Bridge, had laid the country all under water " : 
 in such scenes, with the treaty just ending, and general 
 peace like to follow, did Ireton welcome his bride, a 
 brave young damsel of twenty-one, escorted, doubtless, by 
 her Father, among others, to the Lord General's house, 
 and there, by Rev. Mr. Dell, solemnly handed over to 
 new destinies ! 
 
 DEATH WARRANT. 
 
 THE Trial of Charles Stuart falls not to be described in 
 this place : the deep meanings that lie in it cannot be so 
 much as glanced at here. Oliver Cromwell attends in the 
 High Court of Justice at every session except one ; Fairfax 
 sits only in the first. Ludlow, Whalley, Walton, names 
 known to us, are also constant attendants in that High 
 Court, during that long -memorable Month of January, 1649. 
 
34 THOMAS CARLYLE. 
 
 The King is thrice brought to the Bar ; refuses to plead, 
 comports himself with royal dignity, with royal haughti- 
 ness, strong in his divine right ; " smiles " contemptuously, 
 " looks with an austere countenance ; " does not seem, till 
 the very last, to have fairly believed that they would dare 
 to sentence him. But they were men sufficiently provided 
 with daring ; men, we are bound to see, who sat there as in 
 the Presence of the Maker of all men, as executing the judg- 
 ments of Heaven above, and had not the fear of any man or 
 thing on the Earth below. Bradshaw said to the King, 
 " Sir, you are not permitted to issue out in these discours- 
 ings. This Court is satisfied of its authority. No Court will 
 bear to hear its authority questioned in that manner." 
 " Clerk, read the Sentence ! " 
 
 And so, under date, Monday 29th January, 1648-9, there 
 is this stern Document to be introduced ; not specifically of 
 Oliver's composition ; but expressing in every letter of it 
 the conviction of Oliver's heart, in this, one of his most im- 
 portant appearances on the stage of earthly life. 
 
 To Colonel Francis flacker, Colonel flunch, and Lieuten- 
 ant-Colonel Phayr, and to every one of them. 
 
 At the High Court of Justice for the Trying and Judging of 
 Charles Stuart, King of England, 29th January, 1648. 
 
 WHEREAS Charles Stuart, King of England, is and 
 standeth convicted, attainted and condemned of High Trea- 
 son and other high Crimes ; and Sentence upon Saturday 
 last was pronounced against him by this Court, To be put to 
 death by the severing of his head from his body ; of which 
 Sentence execution yet remaineth to be done : 
 
 These are therefore to will and require you to see the 
 said Sentence executed, in the open street before Whitehall, 
 upon the morrow, being the Thirtieth day of this instant 
 month of January, between the hours of Ten in the morn- 
 
CROMWELL. 35 
 
 iiig and Five in the afternoon, with full effect. And for so 
 doing, this shall be jour warrant. 
 
 And these are to require all Officers and Soldiers, and 
 others the good People of this Nation of England, to be 
 assisting unto you in this service. 
 
 Given under our hands and seals. 
 JOHN BRADSHAW, 
 THOMAS GREY, "Lord Groby," 
 OLIVER CROMWELL. 
 
 ("And Fifty-six others.") 
 
 " Tetrce lettuce, ac molossis suis ferociores. Hideous mon- 
 sters, more ferocious than their own mastiffs ! " shrieks Sau- 
 maise ; shrieks all the world, in unmelodious soul-confusing 
 diapason of distraction, happily at length grown very 
 faint in our day. The truth is, no modern reader can con- 
 ceive the then atrocity, ferocity, unspeakability of this fact. 
 First, after long reading in the old dead Pamphlets does 
 one see the magnitude of it. To be equalled, nay to be pre- 
 ferred think some, in point of horror, to * the Crucifixion of 
 Christ." Alas, in these irreverent times of ours, if all the 
 Kings of Europe were cut in pieces at one swoop, and flung 
 in heaps in St. Margaret's Churchyard on the same day, the 
 emotion would, in strict arithmetical truth, be small in com- 
 parison! We know it not, this atrocity of the English 
 Regicides ; shall never know it. I reckon it perhaps the 
 most daring action any Body of Men to be met with in His- 
 tory ever, with clear consciousness, deliberately set them- 
 selves to do. Dread Phantoms, glaring supernal on you, 
 when once they are quelled and their light snuffed out, 
 none knows the terror of the Phantom ! The Phantom is a 
 poor paper-lantern with a candle-end in it, which any whip- 
 ster dare now beard. 
 
 A certain Queen in some South-Sea Island, I have read 
 in Missionary Books, had been converted to Christianity; 
 
36 THOMAS CARLYLE. 
 
 did not any longer believe in the old gods. She assembled 
 her people ; said to them, " My faithful People, the gods do 
 not dwell in that burning mountain in the centre of our Isle. 
 That is not God ; no, that is a common burning-moun- 
 tain, mere culinary fire burning under peculiar circum- 
 stances. See, I will walk before you to that burning- 
 mountain ; will empty my wash-bowl into it, cast my slipper 
 over it, defy it to the uttermost; and stand the conse- 
 quences!" She walked accordingly, this South- Sea Hero- 
 ine, nerved to the sticking-place ; her people following in 
 pale horror and expectancy : she did her experiment ; 
 and, I am told, they have truer notions of the gods in that 
 Island ever since ! Experiment which it is now very easy 
 to repeat, and very needless. Honor to the Brave who de- 
 liver us from Phantom-dynasties, in South-Sea Islands and 
 in North ! 
 
 This action of the English Regicides did in effect strike a 
 damp like death through the heart of Flunkeyism univer- 
 sally in this world. Whereof Flunkeyism, Cant, Cloth-wor- 
 ship, or whatever ugly name it have, has gone about incura- 
 bly sick ever since ; and is now at length, in these genera- 
 tions, very rapidly dying. The like of which action will not 
 be needed for a thousand years again. Needed, alas not 
 till a new genuine Hero-worship has arisen, has perfected 
 itself; and had time to generate into a Flunkeyism and 
 Cloth-worship again ! Which I take to be a very long date 
 indeed. 
 
 MR. MILTON 
 
 ON which same evening, [March 13, 1468,] furthermore, 
 one discerns in a faint but an authentic manner, certain dim 
 gentlemen of the highest authority, young Sir Harry Vane 
 to appearance one of them, repairing to the lodging of one 
 
CROMWELL. 37 
 
 Mr. Milton, " a small house in Holborn, which opens back- 
 wards into Lincoln's Inn Fields ; to put an official question 
 to him there." Not a doubt of it they saw Mr. John this 
 evening. In the official Book this yet stands legible : 
 
 " Die Martis, 13 Martii, 1648." " That it is referred to 
 the same Committee," Whitlocke, Vane, Lord Lisle, Earl 
 of Denbigh, Harry Marten, Mr. Lisle, " or any two of them, 
 to speak with Mr. Milton, to know, Whether he will be em- 
 ployed as Secretary for the Foreign Languages ? and to re- 
 port to the Council." I have authority to say that Mr. 
 Milton, thus unexpectedly applied to, consents ; is formally 
 appointed on Thursday next ; makes his proof-shot, " to the 
 Senate of Hamburgh," about a week hence ; and gives, 
 and continues to give, great satisfaction to that Council, to 
 me, and to the whole Nation now, and to all Nations! 
 Such romance lies in the State-Paper Office. 
 
 THE LEVELLERS ENGLISH SANSCULOTTISM. 
 
 WHILE Miss Dorothy Mayor is choosing her wedding- 
 dresses, and Richard Cromwell is looking forward to a life 
 of Arcadian felicity now near at hand, there has turned up 
 for Richard's Father and other parties interested, on the 
 public side of things, a matter of very different complexion, 
 requiring to be instantly dealt with in the interim. The 
 matter of the class called Levellers ; concerning which we 
 must now say a few words. 
 
 In 1647 there were Army Adjutators ; and among some 
 of them wild notions afloat, as to the swift attainability of 
 Perfect Freedom, civil and religious, and a practical Mil- 
 lennium on this Earth ; notions which required', in the Ren- 
 dezvous at Corkbushfield, " Rendezvous of Ware," as they 
 oftenest call it, to be very resolutely trodden out. Eleven 
 
38 THOMAS CARLYLE. 
 
 chief mutineers were ordered from the ranks in that Ren- 
 dezvous ; were condemned by swift Court-Martial to die ; 
 and Trooper Arnald, one of them, was accordingly shot 
 there and then; which extinguished the mutiny for that 
 time. War since, and Justice on Delinquents, England 
 made a Free Commonwealth, and such like, have kept the 
 Army busy; but a deep republican leaven, working all 
 along among these men, breaks now again into very for- 
 midable development. As the following brief glimpses and 
 excerpts may satisfy an attentive reader who will spread 
 them out, to the due expansion, in his mind. Take first 
 this glimpse into the civil province ; and discern with 
 amazement, a whole submarine world of Calvinistic Sanscu- 
 lottism, Five-point Charter, and the Rights of Man, threat- 
 ening to emerge almost two centuries before its time. 
 
 "The Council of State," says Whitlocke, just while 
 Mr. Barton is boggling about the Hursley Marriage-settle- 
 ments, "has intelligence of certain Levellers appearing at St. 
 Margaret's Hill, near Cobham in Surrey, and at St. George's 
 Hill," in the same quarter: "that they were digging the 
 ground, and sowing it with roots and beans. One Everard, 
 once of the Army, who terms himself a Prophet, is the 
 chief of them : " one Winstanley is another chief. They 
 were Thirty men, and said that they should be shortly Four- 
 thousand. They invited all to come in and help them ; and 
 promised them meat, drink, and clothes. They threatened 
 to pull down Park-pales, and to lay all open ; and threaten 
 the neighbors that they will shortly make them all come up 
 to the hills and work." These infatuated persons, begin- 
 ning a new era in this headlong manner on the chalk hills 
 of Surrey, are laid hold of by certain Justices, " by the coun- 
 try people," and also by " two troops of horse ; " and com- 
 plain loudly of such treatment ; appealing to all men 
 whether it be fair. This is the account they give of them- 
 selves when brought before the General some days after- 
 wards: 
 
CROMWELL. 39 
 
 * Apr it 20th, 1649. Everard and Winstanley, the chief 
 of those that digged at St. George's Hill in Surrey, came to 
 the General and made a large declaration, to justify their 
 proceedings. Everard said, He was of the race of the 
 Jews," as most men called Saxon, and other, prop erly are ; 
 " That all the Liberties of the People were lost by the com- 
 ing in of William the Conquerer ; and that, ever since, the 
 People of God had lived under tyranny and oppression 
 worse than that of our Forefathers under the Egyptians. 
 But now the time of deliverance was at hand; and God 
 would bring His People out of this slavery, and restore 
 them to their freedom in enjoying the fruits and benefits of 
 the Earth. And that there had lately appeared to him, 
 Everard, a vision ; which bade him, Arise and dig and 
 plough the Earth, and receive the fruits thereof. That 
 their intent is to restore the Creation to its former condi- 
 tion. That as God had promised to make the barren land 
 fruitful, so now what they did, was to restore the ancient 
 Community of enjoying the Fruits of the Earth, and to dis- 
 tribute the benefit thereof to the poor and needy, and to feed 
 the hungry and clothe the naked. That they intend not 
 to meddle with any man's property, nor to break down any 
 pales or enclosures," in spite of reports to the contrary; 
 " but only to meddle with what is common and untilled, and 
 to make it fruitful for the use of man. That the time will 
 suddenly be, when all men shall willingly come in and give 
 up their lands and estates, and submit to this Community of 
 Gpods." 
 
 These are the principles of Everard, Winstanley, and the 
 poor Brotherhood, seemingly Saxon, but properly of the 
 race of the Jews, who were found dibbling beans on St. 
 George's Hill, under the clear April skies in 1649, and 
 hastily bringing in a new era in that manner. " And for 
 all such as will come in and work with them, they shal] 
 have meat, drink, and clothes, which is all that is necessary 
 
40 THOMAS CARLYLE. 
 
 to the life of man : and as for money, there is not any need 
 of it ; nor of clothes more than to cover nakedness." For 
 the rest, "That they will not defend themselves by arms, 
 but will submit unto authority, and wait till the promised 
 opportunity be offered, which they conceive to be at hand. 
 And that as their forefathers lived in tents, so it would be 
 suitable to their condition, now to live in the same. 
 
 " While they were before the General, they stood with 
 their hats on ; and being demanded the reason thereof, they 
 said, Because he was but their fellow-creature. Being 
 asked the meaning of that phrase, Give honor to whom hon- 
 or is due, they said, Your mouths shall be stopped that 
 ask such a question." 
 
 Dull Bulstrode hath " set down this the more largely be- 
 cause it was the beginning of the appearance " of an exten- 
 sive levelling doctrine, much to be " avoided " by judicious 
 persons, seeing it is "a weak persuasion." The germ of 
 Quakerism, and much else, is curiously visible here. But 
 let us look now at the military phasis of the matter ; where 
 "a weak persuasion," mounted on cavalry horses, with 
 sabres and fire-arms in its hand, may become a very peril 
 ous one. 
 
 Friday, 20th April, 1649. The Lieutenant-General has 
 consented to go to Ireland ; the City also will lend money ; 
 and now this Friday the Council of the Army meets al 
 Whitehall to decide what regiments shall go on that ser- 
 vice. "After a solemn seeking of God by prayer," they 
 agree that it shall be by lot: tickets are put into a hat, a 
 child draws them : the regiments, fourteen of foot and four- 
 teen of horse, are decided on in this manner. " The offi- 
 cers on whom the lot fell, in all the twenty-eight regiments, 
 expressed much cheerfulness at the decision." The officers 
 did : but the common men are by no means all of that 
 humor. The common men, blown upon by Lilburn, and 
 his five small Beagles, have notions about Engand's new 
 
CROMWELL. 41 
 
 Chains, about the Hunting of Foxes from Triploe Heath, 
 and in fact ideas concerning the capability that lies in man, 
 and in a free Commonwealth, which are of the most alarm- 
 ing description. 
 
 Thursday, 26th April This night at the Bull in Bish- 
 opsgate there has an alarming mutiny broken out in a 
 troop of Whalley's regiment there. Wha] ley's men are not 
 allotted for Ireland : but they refuse to quit London, as they 
 are ordered ; they want this and that first ; they seize their 
 colors from the Cornet, who is lodged at the Bull there : 
 the General and the Lieu tenant- General have to hasten 
 thither ; quell them, pack them forth on their march ; seiz- 
 ing fifteen of them first, to be tried by Court-Martial. 
 Tried by instant Court-Martial, five of them are found 
 guilty, doomed to die, but pardoned ; and one of them, 
 Trooper Lockyer, is doomed and not pardoned. Trooper 
 Lockyer is shot, in Paul's Churchyard, on the morrow. A 
 very brave young man, they say ; though but three-and- 
 twenty, " he has served seven years in these Wars," ever 
 since the Wars began. " Religious," too, " of excellent 
 parts and much beloved;" but with hot notions as to 
 human Freedom, and the rate at which the milleianiums 
 are attainable, poor Lockyer! He falls shot in Paul's 
 Churchyard on Friday, amid the tears of men and women. 
 Paul's Cathedral, we remark, is now a Horseguard ; horses 
 stamp in the Canons' stalls there : and Paul's Cross itself, 
 as smacking of Popery, where in fact Alablaster cn.e 
 preached flat Popery, is swept altogether away, and its 
 leaden roof melted into bullets, or mixed with tin for 
 culinary pewter. Lockyer's corpse is watched and wept 
 over, not without prayer, in the eastern regions of the City, 
 till a new week come ; and on Monday, this is what we see 
 ad\ ancing westward by way of funeral to him. 
 
 " About one hundred went before the Corpse, five or six 
 in a file; the Corpse was then brought, with six trumpets 
 
42 THOMAS CARLYLE. 
 
 sounding a soldier's knell ; then the Trooper's Horse came, 
 clothed all over in mourning, and led by a footman. The 
 Corpse was adorned with bundles of Rosemary, one half 
 stained in blood; and the Sword of the deceased along with 
 them. Some thousands followed in rank and file : all had 
 sea-green-and-black ribbons tied on their hats, and to their 
 breasts : and the women brought up the rear. At the new 
 Churchyard in Westminster, some thousands more of the 
 better sort met them, who thought not fit to march thrcugh 
 the City. Many looked upon this funeral as an affront to 
 the Parliament and Army ; others called these people ' Lev- 
 ellers ; ' but they took no notice of any one's sayings." 
 
 That was the end of Trooper Lockyer : six trumpets wail- 
 ing stern music through London streets ; Rosemaries and 
 Sword half-dipped in blood ; funeral of many thousands in 
 seagreen Ribbons and black : testimony of a weak per- 
 suasion, now looking somewhat perilous. Lieutenant-Colo- 
 nel Lilburn, and his five small Beagles, now in a kind of 
 loose arrest under the Lieutenant of the Tower, make haste 
 to profit by the general emotion ; publish on the 1st of May 
 their " Agreement of the People," their Bentham-Sieyes 
 Constitution : Annual very exquisite Parliament, and other 
 Lilburn apparatus ; whereby the Perfection of Human Na- 
 ture will with a maximum of rapidity be secured, and a 
 millennium straightway arrive, sings the Lilburn Oracle. 
 
 May 9/A. Richard Cromwell is safe wedded ; Richard's 
 Father is reviewing troops in Hyde Park, " seagreen colors 
 in some of their hats." The Lieutenant-General speaks ear- 
 nestly to them. Has not the Parliament been diligent, do- 
 ing its best ? It has punished Delinquents ; it has voted, in 
 these very days, resolutions for dissolving itself and assem- 
 bling future Parliaments. It has protected trade; got a 
 good Navy afloat. You soldiers, there is exact payment 
 provided for you. Martial Law ? Death, or other punish- 
 ment of mutineers ? Well ! Whoever cannot stand Mar- 
 
CROMWELL. 43 
 
 tial Law is not fit to be a soldier : his best plan will be to 
 lay down his arms ; lie shall have his ticket, and get his ar- 
 rears as we others do, we that still mean to fight against 
 the enemies of England and this Cause. One trooper 
 showed signs of insolence ; the Lieutenant-General sup- 
 pressed him by rigor and by clemency : the seagreen rib- 
 bons were torn from such hats as had them. The humor 
 of the men is not the most perfect. This Review was on 
 Wednesday : Lilburn and his five small Beagles are, on 
 Saturday, committed close Prisoners to the Tower, each 
 rigorously to a cell of his own. 
 
 It is high time. For now the flame has caught the 
 ranks of the Army itself, in Oxfordshire, in Gloucester- 
 shire, at Salisbury, where head-quarters are ; and rapidly 
 there is, on all hands, a dangerous conflagration blazing out. 
 In Oxfordshire, one Captain Thompson, not known to us 
 before, has burst from his quarters at Banbury, with a 
 Party of Two-Hundred, in these same days ; has sent forth 
 his England's Standard Advanced; insisting passionately on 
 the New Chains we are fettered with ; indjgnantly demand- 
 ing swift perfection of Human Freedom, justice on the 
 murderers of Lockyer and Arnald ; threatening that if a 
 hair of Lilburn and the five small Beagles be hurt, he will 
 avenge it " seventy-and-seven fold." This Thompson's Par- 
 ty, swiftly attacked by his Colonel, is broken within the 
 week ; he himself escapes with a few. and still roves up and 
 down. To join whom, or to communicate with Gloucester- 
 shire where help lies, there has, in the interim, open mu- 
 tiny, " above a Thousand strong," with subalterns, with a 
 Cornet Thompson brother of the Captain, but without any 
 leader of mark, broken out at Salisbury: the General and 
 Lieutenant-General, with what force can be raised, are 
 hastening thitherward in all speed. Now were the time for 
 Lieutenant-Colonel Lilburn; now or never might noisy 
 John do some considerable injury to the Cause he has at 
 
44 THOMAS CARLYLE. 
 
 heart : but he sits, in these critical hours, fast within stone 
 walls ! 
 
 Monday, \Uh May. All Sunday the General and Lieu- 
 tenant-General marched in full speed, by Alton, by Ando- 
 ver, towards Salisbury ; the mutineers, hearing of them, 
 start northward for Buckinghamshire, then for Berkshire ; 
 the General and Lieutenant-General turning also north- 
 ward after them in hot chase. The mutineers arrive at 
 Wantage; make for Oxfordshire by Newbridge; find the 
 Bridge already seized ; cross higher up by swimming ; get 
 to Burford, very weary, and "turn out their horses to 
 grass ; Fairfax and Cromwell still following in hot speed, 
 a march of near fifty miles that Monday. What boots 
 it, there is no leader, noisy John is sitting fast within stone 
 walls ! The mutineers lie asleep in Burford, their horses 
 out at grass ; the Lieutenant-General, having rested at a 
 safe distance since dark, bursts into Burford as the clocks 
 are striking midnight. He has beset some hundreds of the 
 mutineers, " who could only fire some shots out of win- 
 dows;" has dissipated the mutiny, trodden down the Lev- 
 elling Principle out of English affairs once more. Here 
 is the last scene of the business ; the rigorous Court-Martial 
 having now sat ; the decimated doomed Mutineers being 
 placed on the leads of the Church to see. 
 
 Thursday, 11 th May. "This day in Burford Church- 
 yard, Cornet Thompson, brother to Thompson the chief 
 leader, was brought to the place of execution; and ex- 
 pressed himself to this purpose, That it was just what did 
 befall him ; that God did not own the ways he went ; that 
 he had offended the General : he desired the prayers of the 
 people ; and told the soldiers who were appointed to shoot 
 him, that when he held out his hands, they should do their 
 duty. And accordingly he was immediately, after the si<rn 
 given, shot to death. Next after him was a corporal, 
 brought to the same place of execution ; where, looking 
 
CROMWELL. 45 
 
 upon his fellow-mutineers, he set his back against the wall ; 
 and bade them who were appointed to shoot, ' Shoot ! ' and 
 died desperately. The third, being also a corporal, was 
 brought to the same place ; and without the least acknow- 
 ledgment of error, or show of fear, he pulled off his doub- 
 let, standing a pretty di.-tance from the wall ; and bade the 
 soldiers do their duty ; looking them in the face till they 
 gave fire, not showing the least kind of terror or fearful- 
 ness of spirit." So die the Leveller Corporals ; strong they, 
 after their sort, for the Liberties of England ; resolute to 
 the very death. Misguided Corporals ! But History, which 
 has wept for a misguided Charles Stuart, and blubbered, in 
 the most copious helpless manner, near two centuries now, 
 whole floods of brine, enough to salt the Herring fishery, 
 will not refuse these poor Corporals also her tributary sigh. 
 With Arnald of the Rendezvous at Ware, with Lockyer of 
 the Bull in Bishopsgate, and other misguided martyrs to 
 the Liberties of England then and since, may they sleep 
 well! 
 
 Cornet Dean who now came forward, as the next to be 
 shot, expressed penitence ; got pardon from the General : 
 and there was no more shooting. Lieutenant-General Crom- 
 well went into the Church, called down the Decimated of 
 the Mutineers ; rebuked, admonished ; said, the General in 
 his mercy had forgiven them. Misguided men, would you 
 ruin this Cause, which marvellous Providences have so con- 
 firmed to us to be the Cause of God ? Go, repent, and re- 
 bel no more lest a worse thing befall you ! " They wept," 
 says the old Newspaper ; they retired to the Devizes for a 
 time ; were then restored to their regiments, and marched 
 cheerfully for Ireland. Captain Thompson, the Cornet's 
 brother, the first of all the Mutineers, he too, a few days 
 afterwards, was fallen in with in Northamptonshire, still 
 mutinous ; his men took quarter ; he liimself * fled to a 
 wood," fired and fenced there, and again desperately fired, 
 
46 THOMAS CARLYLE. 
 
 declared he would never yield alive ; whereupon " a 
 Corporal with seven bullets in his carbine " ended Captain 
 Thompson too ; and this formidable conflagration, to the 
 last glimmer of it, was extinct. 
 
 Sansculottism, as we said above, has to lie submerged for 
 almost two centuries yet. Levelling, in the practical civil 
 or military provinces of English things, is forbidden to be. 
 IK the spiritual provinces it cannot be forbidden ; for there 
 it everywhere already is. It ceases dibbling beans on St. 
 George's Hill near Cobham ; ceases galloping in mutiny 
 across the Isis to Burford ; takes into Quakerisms, and king- 
 doms which are not of this world. My poor friend Dryas- 
 dust lamentably tears his hair over the intolerance of that 
 old Time to Quakerism and such like ; if Dryasdust had seen 
 the dibbling on St. George's Hill, the threatened fall of 
 " Park-pales," and the gallop to Burford, he would reflect 
 that conviction in an earnest age means, not lengthy Spout- 
 ing in Exeter-hall, but rapid silent Practice on the face of 
 the Earth ; and would perhaps leave his poor hair alone. 
 
 SCOTCH PURITANISM. 
 
 THE faults or misfortunes of the Scotch People, in their 
 Puritan business, are many ; but, properly their grand fault 
 is this, That they have produced for it no sufficiently heroic 
 man among them. No man that has an eye to see beyond 
 ihe letter and the rubric ; to discern, across many consecra- 
 ted rubrics of the Past, the inarticulate divineness too of the 
 Present and the Future, and dare all perils in the faith of 
 that ! With Oliver Cromwell born a Scotchman, with a 
 Hero King and a unanimous Hero Nation at his back, it 
 might have been far otherwise. With Oliver born Scotch, 
 one sees not but the whole world might have become Pun 
 
CROMWELL. 47 
 
 tan; might have struggled, yet a long while, to fashion 
 itself according to that divine Hebrew Gospel, to the ex- 
 clusion of other Gospels not Hebrew, which also are divine, 
 and will have their share of fulfilment here ! But of such 
 issue there is no danger. Instead of inspired Olivers, glow- 
 ing with direct insight and noble daring, we have Argyles, 
 Loudons, and narrow, more or less opaque persons of the 
 Pedant species. Committees of Estates, Committees of 
 Kirks, much tied-up in formulas, both of them : a bigoted 
 Theocracy without the Inspiration ; which is a very hopeless 
 phenomenon indeed. The Scotch People are all willing, 
 eager of heart; asking, Whitherward? But the Leaders 
 stand aghast at the new forms of danger, and in a vehement 
 discrepant manner some calling, Halt ! others calling, Back- 
 ward ! others, Forward ! huge confusion ensues. Con- 
 fusion which will need an Oliver to repress it ; to bind it up 
 in tight manacles, if not otherwise ; and say, " There, sit 
 there and consider thyself a little ! " 
 
 The meaning of the Scotch Covenant was, That God's 
 divine Law of the Bible should be put in practice in these 
 Nations ; verily it, and not the Four Surplices at Allhallow- 
 tide, or any Formula of cloth or sheepskin here or else- 
 where which merely pretended to be it : but then the Cov- 
 enant says expressly, there is to be a Stuart King in the 
 business : we cannot do without our Stuart King ! Given 
 a divine Law of the Bible on one hand, and a Stuart King, 
 Charles First or Charles Second, on the other: alas, did 
 History ever present a more irreducible case of equations in 
 this world ? I pity the poor Scotch Pedant Governors, still 
 m>re the poor Scotch People, who had no other to follow! 
 Nay, as for that, the People did get through in the end, 
 such was their indomitable pious constancy, and other worth 
 and fortune : and Presbytery became a Fact among them, 
 to the whole length possible for it ; not without endless re 
 Fults. But for the poor Governors this irreducible case 
 
48 THOMAS CARLYLE. 
 
 proved, as it were, fatal ! They have never since, if we 
 will look narrowly at it, governed Scotland, or even well 
 known that they were there to attempt governing it. Once 
 they lay on Dunse Hill, " each Earl with his Regiment of 
 Tenants round him," For Christ's Crown and Covenant; 
 and never since had they any noble National act, which it 
 was given them to do. Growing desperate of Christ's 
 Crown and Covenant, they, in the next generation, when 
 our Annus Mirabilis arrived, hurried up to Court, looking 
 out for other Crowns and Covenants ; deserted Scotland 
 and her Cause, somewhat basely ; took to booing and booing 
 for Causes of their own, unhappy mortals ; and Scotland 
 and all Causes that were Scotland's have had to go on very 
 much without them ever since ! 
 
 THE BATTLE OF DUNBAR. 
 
 THE small Town of Dunbar stands, high and windy, look- 
 ing down over its herring-boats, over its grim old Castle 
 now much honeycombed, on one of those projecting rock 
 promontories with which that shore of the Frith of Forth is 
 niched and vandyked, as far as the eye can reach. A beau- 
 tiful sea ; good land too, now that the plougher understands 
 his trade ; a grim niched barrier of whinstone sheltering it 
 from the chafings and tumblings of the big blue German 
 Ocean. Seaward, St. Abb's Head, of whinstone, bounds 
 your horizon to the east, not very far off; west, close by, is 
 the deep bay, and fishy little village of Belhaven: the 
 gloomy Bass and other rock-islets, and farther the Hills of 
 Fife, and foreshadows of the Highlands, are visible as you 
 look seaward. From the bottom of Belhaven Bay to that 
 of the next sea-bight, St. Abb's ward, the Town and its 
 environs form a peninsula. Along the base of which penin- 
 
CROMWELL. 49 
 
 gala, " not much above a mile and a half from sea to sea," 
 Oliver Cromwell's Army, on Monday, the 2d of Septem- 
 ber, 1650, stands ranked, with its tents and Town behind 
 it, in very forlorn circumstances. This now is all the 
 ground that Oliver is lord of in Scotland. His Ships lie in 
 the offing, with biscuit and transport for him ; but visible 
 elsewhere in the Earth no help. 
 
 Landward, as you look from the Town of Dunbar there 
 rises, some short mile off, a dusky continent of barren heath 
 Hills ; the Lammermoor, where only mountain-sheep can 
 be at home. The crossing of which, by any of its boggy 
 passes, and brawling stream-courses, no Army, hardly a 
 solitary Scotch Packman could attempt, in such weather. 
 To the edge of these Lammermoor Heights, David Lesley 
 has betaken himself; lies now along the outmost spur of 
 them, a long Hill of considerable height, which the Dun- 
 bar people call the Dun, Doon, or sometimes for fashion's 
 sake the Down, adding to it the Teutonic hill likewise, 
 though Dun itself in old Celtic signifies Hill. On this 
 Doon Hill lies David Lesley, with the victorious Scotch 
 Army, upwards of Twenty thousand strong ; with the Com- 
 mittees of Kirk and Estates, the chief Dignitaries of the 
 Country, and in fact the flower of what the pure Covenant 
 in this the Twelfth year of its existence can still bring 
 forth. There lies he, since Sunday night, on the top and 
 slope of this Doon Hill, with the impassable heath conti- 
 nents behind him : embraces, as within outspread tiger- 
 claws, the base-line of Oliver's Dunbar Peninsula ; waiting 
 what Oliver will do. Cockburnspath with its ravines has 
 been seized on Oliver's left, and made impassable ; behind 
 Oliver is the sea ; in front of him Lesley, Doon Hill, and 
 the heath-continent of Lammermoor. Lesley's force is of 
 Three-and-twenty thousand, in spirits as of men chasing: 
 Oliver's about half as many, in spirits as of men chased. 
 What is to become of Oliver ? . . . . 
 
 3 D 
 
50 THOMAS CARLYLE. 
 
 The base of Oliver's Dunbar Peninsula, as we have 
 called it (or Dunbar- Pinfold, where ho is now hemmed in, 
 upon "an entanglement very difficult"), extends from Bel- 
 haven Bay on his right, to Brocksmouth House on his left; 
 " about a mile and a half from sea to sea : " Brocksmouth 
 House, the Earl (now Duke) of Roxburgh's mansion, 
 which still stands there, his soldiers now occupy as their 
 extreme post on the left. As its name indicates, it is the 
 mouth or issue of a small Rivulet, or Burn called Brock, 
 BrocJcsburn ; which, springing from the Lammermoor, and 
 skirting David Lesley's Doon Hill, finds its egress here, 
 into the sea. The reader who would form an image' to 
 himself of the great Tuesday, 3d of September, 1650, at 
 Dunbar, must note well this little Burn. It runs in a deep 
 grassy glen, which the South-country Officers in those old 
 Pamphlets describe as a "deep ditch, forty feet in depth, 
 and about as many in width," ditch dug out by the little 
 Brook itself, and carpeted with greensward, in the course of 
 long thousands of years. It runs pretty close by the foot of 
 Doon Hill ; forms, from this point to the sea, the boundar^ 
 of Oliver's position: his force is arranged in battle-order 
 along the left bank of this Brocksburn, and its grassy glen ; 
 he is busied all Monday, he and his Officers, in ranking 
 them there. " Before sunrise on Monday " Lesley sent 
 down his horse from the Hill-top, to occupy the other side 
 of this Brook; "about four in the afternoon," his train 
 came down, his whole Army gradually came down ; and 
 they now are ranking themselves on the opposite side of 
 Brocksburn, on rather narrow ground; cornfields, but 
 swiftly sloping upwards to the steep of Doon Hill. This 
 goes on, in the wild showers and winds of Monday, 2nd 
 September, 1650, on both sides of the Rivulet of Brock. 
 Whoever will begin the attack, must get across this Brook 
 nnd its glen first ; a thing of much disadvantage. 
 
 Behind Oliver's ranks, between him and Dunbar, stand 
 
CROMWELL. 51 
 
 his tents; sprinkled up and down, by battalions, over the 
 face of this " Peninsula " ; which is a low though very un- 
 even tract of ground ; now in our time all yellow with 
 wheat and barley in the autumn season, but at that date 
 only partially tilled, describable by Yorkshire Hodgson 
 as a place of plashes and rough bent-grass ; terribly beaten 
 by showery winds that day, so that your tent will hardly 
 stand. There was then but one Farm-house on this tract, 
 where now are not a few : thither were Oliver's Cannon 
 sent this morning; they had at first been lodged "in the 
 Church," an edifice standing then as now somewhat apart, 
 
 at the south end of Dunbar 
 
 And now farther, on the great scale, we are to remark 
 very specially that there is just one other " pass " across the 
 Brocksburn ; and this is precisely where the London road 
 now crosses it; about a mile east from the former pass, 
 and perhaps two gunshots west from Brocksmouth House. 
 There the great road then as now crosses the Burn of 
 Brock; the steep grassy glen, or "broad ditch forty feet 
 deep," flattening itself out here once more into a passable 
 slope : passable, but still steep on the southern or Lesley 
 side, still mounting up there, with considerable acclivity, into 
 a high table- ground, out of which the Boon Hill, as outskirt 
 of the Larnmermoor, a short mile to your right, gradually 
 gathers itself. There, at this "pass," on and above the 
 present London road, as you discover after long dreary dim 
 examining, took place the brunt or essential agony of the 
 Battle of Dunbar long ago. Read in the extinct old Pam- 
 phlets, and ever again obstinately read, till some light arise 
 in them, look even with unmilitary eyes at the ground as it 
 now is, you do at least obtain small glimmerings of distinct 
 features here and there, which gradually coalesce into a 
 kind of image for you ; and some spectrum of the Fact be- 
 comes visible ; rises veritable, face to face on you, grim and 
 sad in the depths of the old dead Time. Yes, my travelling 
 
52 THOMAS CARLYLE. 
 
 friends, vehiculating in gigs or otherwise over that piece of 
 London road, you may say to yourselves, Here without 
 monument is the grave of a valiant thing which was done 
 under the Sun ; the footprint of a Hero, not yet quite un- 
 distinguishable, is here ! 
 
 " The Lord General about four o'clock," say the old Pam- 
 phlets, " went into the Town to take some refreshment," a 
 hasty late dinner, or early supper, whichever we may call 
 it; "and very soon returned back," having written Sir 
 Arthur's Letter, I think, in the interim. Coursing about 
 the field, with enough of things to order; walking at last 
 with Lambert in the Park or Garden of Brocksmouth 
 House, he discerns that Lesley is astir on the Hillside; 
 altering his position somewhat. That Lesley in fact is 
 coming wholly down to the basis of the Hill, where his 
 horse had been since sunrise : coming wholly down to the 
 edge of. the Brook and glen, among the sloping harvest- 
 fields there ; and also is bringing up his left wing of horse, 
 most part of it, towards his right ; edging himself, " shog- 
 ging," as Oliver calls it, his whole line more and more to 
 the right! His meaning is, to get hold of Brocksmouth 
 House and the pass of the Brook there ; after which it will 
 be free to him to attack us when he will ! Lesley in feet 
 considered, or at least the Committee of Estates and Kirk 
 consider, that Oliver is lost; that, on the whole, he must 
 not be left to retreat, but must be attacked and annihilated 
 here. A vague story, due to Bishop Burnet, the watery 
 source of many such, still circulates about the world, That 
 it was the Kirk Committee who forced Lesley down against 
 his will ; that Oliver, at sight of it, exclaimed, " The Lord 
 hath delivered," &c. : which nobody is in the least bound to 
 believe. It appears, from other quarters, that Lesley ivas 
 advised or sanctioned in this attempt by the Committee of 
 Estates and Kirk, but also that he was by no means hard to 
 advise ; that, in fact, lying on the top of Doon Hill, shelter- 
 
CROMWELL. 53 
 
 less in such weather, was no operation to spin out beyond 
 necessity ; and that if anybody pressed too much upon him 
 with advice to come down and fight, it was likeliest to be 
 Royalist Civil Dignitaries, who had plagued him with their 
 cavillings at his cunctations, at his " secret fellow-feeling for 
 the Sectarians and Regicides," ever since this "War began. 
 The poor Scotch Clergy have enough of their own to an- 
 swer for in this business; let every back bear the burden 
 that belongs to it In a word, Lesley descends, has been de- 
 scending all day, and " shogs " himself to the right, urged I 
 believe, by manifold counsel, and by the nature of the case ; 
 and, what is equally important for us, Oliver sees him, and 
 sees through him, in this movement of his. 
 
 At sight of this movement, Oliver suggests to Lambert 
 standing by him, Does it not give us an advantage, if we, 
 instead of him, like to begin the attack ? Here is the 
 Enemy's right wing coming out to the open space, free to 
 be attacked on any side ; and the main-battle hampered in 
 narrow sloping ground, between Doon Hill and the Brook, 
 has no room to manoeuvre or assist : beat this right wing 
 where it now stands ; taker it in flank and front with an 
 overpowering force, it is driven upon its own main-battle, 
 the whole Army is beaten ? Lambert eagerly assents " had 
 meant to say the same thing. " Monk, who comes up at 
 the moment, likewise assents; as the other Officers do, 
 when the case is set before them. It is the plan resolved 
 upon for battle. The attack shall begin to-morrow before 
 dawn. 
 
 And so the soldiers stand to their arms, or lie within in- 
 stant reach of their arms, all night ; being upon an engage- 
 ment very difficult indeed. The night is wild and wet; 
 2d of September means 12th by our calendar: the Harvest 
 Moon wades deep among clouds of sleet and hail. Who- 
 ever has a heart for prayer, let him pray now, for the 
 wrestle of death is at hand. Pray, and withal keep hia 
 
54 THOMAS CARLYLF 
 
 powder dry ! And be ready for extremities, and quit him 
 self like a man ! Thus they pass the night ; making that 
 Duubar Peninsula and Brock Rivulet long memorable to 
 me. We English have some tents; the Scots have none. 
 The hoarse sea moans bodeful, swinging low and heavy 
 against these whinstone bays ; the sea and the tempests are 
 abroad, all else asleep but we, and there is One that rides 
 on the wings of the wind. 
 
 Towards three in the morning, the Scotch foot, by order 
 of a Major- General, say some, extinguish their matches, all 
 but two in a company ; cower under the corn-shocks, seek- 
 ing some imperfect shelter and sleep. Be wakeful, ye Eng- 
 lish ; watch, and pray, and keep your powder dry. About 
 four o'clock comes order to my pudding-headed Yorkshire 
 friend, that his regiment must mount and march straight- 
 way ; his and various other regiments march, pouring swift- 
 ly to the left to Brocksmouth House, to the Pass over the 
 Brock. With overpowering force let us storm the Scots 
 right wing there; beat that, and all is beaten. Major 
 Hodgson, riding along, heard, he says, " a Cornet praying 
 in the night"; a company of poor men, I think, making 
 worship there, under the void Heaven, before battle joined : 
 Major Hodgson, giving his charge to a brother Officer, 
 turned aside to listen for a minute, and worship and pray 
 along with them ; haply his last prayer on this Earth, as it 
 might prove to be. But no ; this Cornet prayed with such 
 effusion as was wonderful ; and imparted strength to my 
 Yorkshire friend, who strengthened his men by telling them 
 of it. And the Heavens, in their mercy, I think, have 
 opened us a way of deliverance ! The Moon gleams out, 
 hard and blue, riding among hail-clouds ; and over St. Abb's 
 Head a streak of dawn is rising. 
 
 And now is the hour when the attack should be, and no 
 Lambert is yet here, he is ordering the line far to the right 
 yet ; and Oliver occasionally, in Hodgson's hearing, is impa 
 
CROMWELL. 55 
 
 taent for him. The Scots too, on this wing, are awake ; 
 thinking to surprise us ; there is their trumpet sounding, we 
 heard it once ; and Lambert, who was to lead the attack, is 
 not here. The Lord General is impatient ; behold Lam- 
 bert at last! The trumpets pea 1 , shattering with fierce 
 clangor Night's silence ; the cannons awaken along all the 
 line : " The Lord of Hosts ! The Lord of Hosts ! " On, 
 my brave ones, on ! 
 
 The dispute " on this right wing, was hot and stiff for 
 three quarters of an hour. " Plenty of fire, from field- 
 pieces, snaphances, matchlocks, entertained the Scotch main- 
 battle across the Brock ; poo" stiffened men, roused from 
 the corn-shocks with their matches all out! But here on 
 the right, their horse " with lancers in the front rank," 
 charge desperately ; drive us hick across the hollow of the 
 Rivulet ; back a little ; but the Lord gives us courage, and 
 we storm home again, horse and foot, upon them, with a 
 shock like tornado tempests ; break them, beat them, drive 
 them all adrift. " Sorae fled towards Copperspath, but most 
 across their own foot. " Their own poor foot, whose 
 matches were hard'y well alight yet ! Poor men, it was a 
 terrible awakeniij? for them : field-pieces and charge of foot 
 across the Brocksburn : and now here is their own horse in 
 mad panic, trampling them to death. Above Three-thou- 
 sand killed upon the place : ' I never saw such a charge of 
 foot and horse," says one ; nor did I. Oliver was still near 
 to Yorkshire Hodgson, when the shock succeeded. Hodg- 
 son heard him say : " They run ! I profess they run ! " 
 And over St. Abb's Head, and the German Ocean, just 
 then, burst the first gleam of the level sun upon us, " and I 
 heard Nol say, in the words of the Psalmist, ' Let God arise, 
 let His enemies be scattered,' " or in Rous's metre, 
 
 Let God arise, and scattered 
 
 Let all his enemies be ; 
 And let all those that do him hate 
 
 Before his presence flee 1 
 
56 THOMAS CARLYLE. 
 
 Even so. The Scotch Army is shivered to utter ruin ; 
 rushes in tumultuous wreck, hither, thither; to Belhaven, 
 or, in their distraction, even to Dunbar ; the chase goes as 
 far as Haddington ; led by Hacker. " The Lord General 
 made a halt," says Hodgson, " and sang the Hundred-and- 
 seventeenth Psalm," till our horse could gather for the 
 chase. Hundred-and-seventeenth Psalm, at the foot of the 
 Doon Hill ; there we uplift it, to the tune of Bangor, or 
 some still higher score, and roll it strong and great against 
 the sky : 
 
 O give ye praise unto the Lord, 
 
 All nati-ons that be ; 
 Likewise ye people all accord 
 His name to magnify ! 
 
 For great to-us-ward ever are 
 
 His loving kindnesses ; 
 His truth endures for evermore : 
 
 The Lord, do ye bless ! 
 
 And now to the chase again. 
 
 The prisoners are Ten-thousand, all the foot in a mass. 
 * * * Such is Dunbar Battle ; which might almost be 
 called Dunbar Drove, for it was a frightful rout. Brought 
 on by miscalculation; misunderstanding of the difference 
 between substances and semblances; by mismanagement 
 and the chance of war. 
 
 DISMISSAL OF THE RUMP. 
 
 Wednesday, 20th April, 1 653. My Lord General is in 
 his reception-room this morning, in plain black clothes and 
 gray worsted stockings; he, with many Officers: but few 
 Members have yet come, though punctual Bulstrode and 
 certain others are there. Some waiting there is ; some im- 
 
CROMWELL. 57 
 
 piitience that the Members would come. The Members do 
 not come : instead of Members, comes a notice that they 
 are busy getting on with their Bill [for Parliamentary Re- 
 form] in the House, hurrying it double quick through all 
 the stages. Possible, New message that it will be Law in 
 a little while, if no interposition take place ! Bulstrode 
 hastens off to the House : my Lord General, at first incred- 
 ulous, does now also hasten off, nay orders that a com- 
 pany of Musketeers of his own regiment attend him. Hast- 
 ens off, with a very high expression of countenance, I think ; 
 saying or feeling : Who would have believed it of them ? 
 " It is not honest ; yea it is contrary to common honesty ! " 
 My Lord General, the big hour is come ! 
 
 Young Colonel Sidney, the celebrated Algernon, sat in 
 the House this morning: a House of some Fifty-three. Al- 
 gernon has left distinct note of the affair ; less distinct we 
 have from Bulstrode, who was also there, who seems in 
 some points to be even wilfully wrong. Solid Ludlow was 
 far off in Ireland, but gathered many details in after-years; 
 and faithfully wrote them down, in the unappeasable indig- 
 nation of his heart. Combining these three originals, we 
 have, after various perusals and collations and consider- 
 ations, obtained the following authentic, moderately con- 
 ceivable account. 
 
 "The Parliament sitting as usual, and being in debate 
 upon the Bill, with the amendments, which it was thought 
 would have been passed that day, the Lord General Crom- 
 well came into the House, clad in plain black clothes and 
 gray worsted-stockings, and sat down, as he used to do, in 
 an ordinary place." For some time he listens to this in- 
 teresting debate on the Bill ; beckoning once to Harrison, 
 who came over to him, and answered dubitatingly. Where- 
 upon the Lord General sat still, for about a quarter of an 
 hour longer. But now the question being to be put, That 
 this Bill do now pass, he beckons again to Harrison, says, 
 3* 
 
58 THOMAS CARLYLE. 
 
 " This is the time I must do it ! " and so " rose up, put off 
 his hat, and spake. At the first, and for a good while, he 
 spake to the commendation of the Parliament for their pains 
 and care of the public good ; but afterwards he changed his 
 style, toui them of their injustice, delays of justice, self- 
 interest, and other faults," rising higher and higher, into 
 a very aggravated style indeed. An honorable Member, 
 Sir Peter Wentworth by name, not known to my readers, 
 and by me better known than trusted, rises to order, as we 
 phrase it; says, "It is a strange language this; unusual 
 within the walls of Parliament this ! And from a trusted 
 servant too ; and one whom we have so highly honored ; 
 and one " " Come, come ! " exclaims my Lord General, 
 in a very high key. " We have had enough of this," 
 and in fact my Lord General, now blazing all up into clear 
 conflagration, exclaims, * I will put an end to your prating," 
 and steps forth into the floor of the House, and "clapping 
 on his hat," and occasionally "stamping the floor with his 
 feet," begins a discourse which no man can report! He 
 Ba y S Heavens ! he is heard saying : " It is not fit that you 
 should sit here any longer ! You have sat too long here for 
 any good you have been doing lately. You shall now give 
 place to better men ! Call them in ! " adds he briefly, to 
 Harrison, in word of command : " and some twenty or 
 thirty " grim musketeers enter, with bullets in their snap- 
 hances ; grimly prompt for orders ; and stand in some atti- 
 tude of Carry-arms there. Veteran men : men of might 
 and men of war, their faces are as the faces of lions, and 
 their feet are swift as the roes upon the mountains : not 
 beautiful to honorable gentlemen at this moment. 
 
 " You call yourselves a Parliament," continues my Lord 
 General, in clear blaze of conflagration : " you are no Par- 
 liament ; I say, you are no Parliament ! some of you are 
 drunkards," and his eye flashes on poor Mr Chaloner, aa 
 official man of some value, addicted to the bottle ; " some of 
 
CROMWELL. 59 
 
 you ar c ," and he glares into Harry Marten, and the 
 
 poor Sir Peter, who rose to order, lewd livers both ; "living 
 in open contempt of God's Commandments. Following 
 your own greedy appetites, and the Devil's Command- 
 ments. 4 Corrupt, unjust persons.' " " And here, I think, 
 he glanced at Sir Bulstrode Whitlocke, one of the Com- 
 missioners of the Great Seal, giving him and others very 
 sharp language, though he named them not " : " Corrupt, 
 unjust persons ; scandalous to the profession of the Gospel : 
 how can you be a Parliament for God's People ? Depart, 
 I say ; and let us have done with you. In the name of 
 God, go!" 
 
 The House is of course all on its feet, uncertain almost 
 whether not on its head : such a scene as was never seen 
 before in any House of Commons. History reports with a 
 shudder that my Lord General, lifting the sacred Mace 
 itself, said, " What shall we do with this bawble ? Take it 
 away ! '' and gave it to a musketeer. And now, " Fetch 
 him do\vn J " says he to Harrison, flashing on the Speaker. 
 Speaker Lenthall, more an ancient Roman than anything 
 else, declares, He will not come till forced. "Sir," said 
 Harrison, ' I will lend you a hand " ; on which Speaker 
 Lenthall came down, and gloomily vanished. They all 
 vanished ; flooding gloomily, clamorously out, to their ulte- 
 rior business, and respective places of abode : the Long 
 Parliament is dissolved ! " ' It 's you, that have forced me to 
 this,' exclaims my Lord General : i I have sought the Lord 
 night and day, that He would rather slay me than put me 
 upon the doing of this work.' At their going out, some say, 
 the Lord General said to young Sir Harry Vane, calling 
 him by his name, that he might have prevented this ; but 
 that he was a juggler, and had not common honesty. 'O, 
 Sir Harry Vane, thou with thy subtle casuistries, and ab- 
 struse hair-splittings, thou art other than a good one, I 
 think ! The Lord deliver thee from me, Sir Harry Vane !' 
 
60 THOMAS CARLYLE. 
 
 All being gone out, the door of the House was locked, and 
 the Key with the Mace, as I heard, was carried away by 
 Colonel Otley " ; and it is all over, and the unspeakable 
 Catastrophe has come, and remains. 
 
 THE BAREBONES PARLIAMENT. 
 
 CONCERNING this Puritan Convention of the Notables, 
 which in English History is called the Little Parliament, 
 and derisively Barebones's Parliament, we have not much 
 more to say. They are, if by no means the remarkablest 
 Assembly, yet the Assembly for the remarkablest purpose 
 who have ever met in the Modern World. The business is, 
 No less than introducing of the Christian Religion into real 
 practice in the Social Affairs of this Nation. Christiad Re- 
 ligion, Scriptures of the Old and New Testaments : such, 
 for many hundred years, has been the universal solemnly 
 recognized Theory of all men's Affairs ; Theory sent down 
 out of Heaven itself; but the question is now that of reduc- 
 ing it to Practice in said Affairs ; a most noble, surely, 
 and most necessary attempt; which should not have been 
 put off so long in this Nation ! We have conquered the En- 
 emies of Christ; let us now, in real practical earnest, set 
 about doing the Commandments of Christ, now that there is 
 free room for us ! Such was the purpose of this Puritan As- 
 sembly of the Notables, which History calls the Little Par- 
 liament, or derisively Harebones's Parliament. 
 
 It is well known they failed : to us, alas ! it is too evident 
 they could not but fail. Fearful impediments lay against 
 that effort of theirs ; the sluggishness, the slavish half-and- 
 halfness, the greediness, the cowardice, and general opacity 
 and falsity of some ten million men against it; alas, the 
 whole world, and what we call the Devil and all his angels, 
 
CROMWELL. 61 
 
 against it ! Considerable angels, human and other ; most ex- 
 tensive arrangements, investments to be sold off at a tre- 
 mendous sacrifice ; in general the entire set of luggage- traps 
 and very extensive stock of merchant-goods and real and 
 floating property, amassed by that assiduous Entity above- 
 mentioned, for a thousand years or more ! For these, and 
 also for other obstructions, it could not take effect at that 
 time ; and the Little Parliament became a Barebones's Par- 
 liament, and had to go its ways again. 
 
 CONSPIRACIES. 
 
 To see a little what kind of England it was, and what 
 kind of incipient Protectorate it was, take, as usual, the fol- 
 lowing small and few fractions of Authenticity of various 
 complexion, fished from the doubtful slumber-lakes, and 
 dust vortexes, and hang them out at their places in the void 
 night of things. They are not very luminous ; but if they 
 were well let alone, and the positively tenebrific were well 
 forgotten, they might assist our imaginations in some slight 
 measure. 
 
 Sunday, 18th December, 1653. A certain loud-tongued, 
 loud-minded Mr. Feak, of Anabaptist-Leveller persuasion, 
 with a Colleague seemingly Welsh, named Povvel, have a 
 Preaching-Establishment, this good while past in Black- 
 Mars ; a Preaching-Establishment every Sunday, which on 
 Monday evening becomes a National-Charter Convention 
 as we should now call it ; there Feak, Powel, and Company 
 are in the habit of vomiting forth from their own inner-man, 
 into other inner-men greedy of such pabulum, a very flamy 
 fuliginous set of doctrines, such as the human mind, 
 superadding Anabaptistry to Sansculottism, can make some 
 attempt to conceive. Sunday, the 18th, which is two days 
 
62 THOMAS CARLYLE. 
 
 after the Lord Protector's Installation, this Feak-Powel 
 Meeting was unusually large ; the Feak-Powel inner-man 
 unusually charged. Elements of soot and fire really copi- 
 ous : fuliginous flamy in a very high degree ! At a time, 
 too, when all Doctrine does not satisfy itself with spouting, 
 but longs to become instant Action. " Go and tell your 
 Protector," said the Anabaptist Prophet, " that he has de- 
 ceived the Lord's People ; that he is a perjured villain," 
 " will not reign long," or I am deceived : " will end worse 
 than the last Protector did," Protector Somerset who died 
 on the scaffold, or the tyrant Crooked Richard himself! 
 Say I said it ! A very foul chimney indeed, here got on 
 fire. And "Major General Harrison, the most eminent 
 man of the Anabaptist Party, being consulted whether 
 he would own the new Protectoral Government, answered 
 frankly, No"; was thereupon ordered to retire home to 
 Staffordshire, and keep quiet. 
 
 Does the reader bethink him of those old Leveller Cor- 
 porals at Burford, and Diggers at St. George's Hill five 
 years ago; of Quakerisms, Calvinistic Sansculottisms, and 
 one of the strangest Spiritual Developments ever seen in 
 any country ? The reader sees here one foul chimney on 
 fire, the Feak-Powel chimney in Blackfriars ; and must con- 
 sider for himself what masses of combustible materials, no- 
 ble fuel and base soot and smoky explosive fire-damp, in 
 the general English Household it communicates with ! Re- 
 publicans Proper, of the Long Parliament; Republican 
 Fifth -Monarchists of the Little Parliament; the solid Lud- 
 lows, the fervent Harrisons: from Harry Vane down to 
 Christopher Feak, all manner of Republicans find Cromwell 
 unforgivable. To the Harrison-and-Feak species Kingship 
 in every sort, and government of man by man, is carnal, 
 expressly contrary to various Gospel Scriptures. Very hor- 
 rible for a man to think of governing men ; whether he 
 ought even to govern cattle, and drive them to field and to 
 
CROMWELL. 63 
 
 needful penfold, " except in the way of love and persua- 
 sion," seems doubtful to me ! But fancy a reign of Christ 
 and his Saints ; Christ and his Saints just about to come, 
 had not Oliver Cromwell stept in and prevented it! 
 The reader discerns combustabilities enough ; conflagrations, 
 plots, stubborn disaffectious and confusions, on the Republi- 
 can and Republican-Anabaptist side of things. It is the 
 first Plot-department which my Lord Protector will have to 
 deal with all his life long. This he must wisely damp down, 
 as he may. Wisely: for he knows what is noble in the 
 matter, and what is base in it ; and would not sweep the 
 fuel and the soot both out of doors at once. 
 
 Tuesday, lth February, 1653-4. "At the Ship-Tavern 
 in the Old Bailey, kept by Mr. Thomas Amps," we come 
 upon the second life-long Plot-department: Eleven trucu- 
 lent, rather threadbare persons, sitting over small drink 
 there, on the Tuesday night, considering how the Protector 
 might be assassinated. Poor broken Royalist men ; payless 
 old Captains, most of them, or such like ; with their steeple- 
 hats worn very brown, and jack-boots slit, and projects 
 that cannot be executed, Mr. Amps knows nothing of 
 them, except that they came to him to drink ; nor do we. 
 Probe them -with questions ; clap them in the Tower for a 
 while ; Guilty, poor knaves : but not worth hanging : dis- 
 appear again into the general mass of Royalist Plotting, 
 and ferment there. 
 
 The Royalists have lain quiet ever since Worcester, wait- 
 ing what issue matters would take. Dangerous to meddle 
 with a Rump Parliament ; or other steadily regimented 
 thing ; safer if you can find it fallen out of rank ; hope- 
 fullest of all when it collects itself into a Single Head. 
 The Royalists judge, with some reason, that if they could 
 kill Oliver Protector, this Commonwealth were much en- 
 dangered. In these Easter weeks, too, or Whitsuii weeks, 
 there comes "from our Court," (Charles Stuart's Court,) 
 
64 THOMAS CARLYLE. 
 
 " at Paris," great encouragement to all men of spirit in 
 straitened circumstances, A Royal Proclamation " By the 
 King," drawn up, say some, by Secretary Clarendon ; set- 
 ting forth that " Whereas a certain base, mechanic fellow, 
 by name Oliver Cromwell, has usurped our throne," much 
 to our and other people's inconvenience, whosoever will kill 
 the said mechanic fellow " by sword, pistol, or poison," shall 
 have 500 a year settled upon him, with colonelcies in our 
 Army, and other rewards suitable, and be a made man, 
 " on the word and faith of a Christian King." A Procla- 
 mation which cannot be circulated except hi secret; but is 
 well worth reading by all loyal men. And so Royalist 
 Plots also succeed one another, thick and threefold through 
 Oliver's whole life; but cannot take effect. Vain for a 
 Christian King and his cuimingest Chancellors to summon 
 all the sinners of the Earth, and whatever of necessitous 
 Truculent-Flunkeyism there may be, and to bid, in the 
 name of Heaven and of another place, for the Head of 
 Oliver Cromwell; once for all, they cannot have it, that 
 Head of Cromwell ; not till he has entirely done with it, 
 and can make them welcome to their benefit from it. 
 
 JAMES NAYLER AND COMPANY. 
 
 "!N the month of October, 1655," there was seen a 
 strange sight at Bristol in the West. A Procession of 
 Eight Persons ; one, a man on horseback, riding single ; the 
 others, men and women, partly riding double, partly on foot, 
 in the muddiest highway, in the wettest weather ; singing, 
 all but the single rider, at whose bridle splash and walk two 
 women : " Hosannah ! Holy, holy ! Lord God of Sabaoth ! " 
 and other things, " in a buzzing tone," which the impartial 
 hearer could not make out. The single-rider is a rawboned 
 
CROMWKLL 65 
 
 male figure, " with lank hair reaching below his cheeks ; " 
 hat drawn close over his brows ; " nose rising slightly in the 
 middle ; " of abstruse " down look," and large dangerous 
 jaws strictly closed : he sings not ; sits there covered ; and 
 is sung to by the others bare. Amid pouring deluges, and 
 mud knee-deep : " so that the rain ran in at their necks, and 
 they vented it at their hose and breeches " : a spectacle to 
 the West of England and Posterity ! Singing as above ; 
 answering no question except in song. From Bedminster 
 to Ratcliffe Gate, along the streets to the High Cross of 
 Bristol: at the High Cross they are laid hold of by the 
 Authorities ; turn out to be James Nayler and Company. 
 James Nayler, " from Andersloe " or Ardsley " in York- 
 shire," heretofore a Trooper under Lambert ; now a Qua- 
 ker and something more. Infatuated Nayler and Com- 
 pany; given up to Enthusiasm, to Animal-Magnetism, to 
 Chaos and Bedlam in one shape or other ! Who will need 
 to be coerced by the Major-Generals, I think ; to be for- 
 warded to London, and there sifted and cross-questioned. 
 Is not the Spiritualism of England developing itself in 
 strange forms ? The Hydra, royalist and sansculottic, has 
 many heads. 
 
 THE WEST INDIAN INTEREST. 
 
 THE Grand Sea- Armament which sailed from Portsmouth 
 at Christmas, 1654, proved unsuccessful. It went west- 
 ward ; opened its sealed Instructions at a certain latitude ; 
 found that they were instructions to attack Hispaniola, to 
 attack the Spanish Power in the West Indies ; it did attack 
 Hispaniola, and lamentably failed; attacked the Spanish 
 Power in the West Indies, and has hitherto realized almost 
 nothing, a mere waste Island of Jamaica, to all* appear- 
 ance little worth the keeping at such cost. It is hitherto 
 
66 THOMAS CARLYLF, 
 
 the unsuccessfulest enterprise Oliver Cromwell ever had 
 concern with. Desborow fitted it out at Portsmouth, while 
 the Lord Protector was busy with his First refractory Ped- 
 ant Parliament ; there are faults imputed to Desborow : but 
 the grand fault the Lord Protector imputes to himself, That 
 he chose, or sanctioned the choice of Generals, improper to 
 command it. Sea-General Penn, Land-General Venables, 
 they were unfortunate, they were incompetent ; fell into 
 disagreements, into distempers of the bowels ; had crit- 
 ical Civil Commissioners with them, too, who did not mend 
 the matter. Venables lay " six weeks in bed," very ill of 
 sad West-India maladies ; for the rest, a covetous lazy dog, 
 who cared nothing for the business, but wanted to be home 
 at his Irish Government again. Penn is Father of Penn 
 the Pennsylvanian Quaker ; a man somewhat quick of tem- 
 per " like to break his heart," when affairs went wrong ; 
 unfit to right them again. The two Generals came volun- 
 tarily home in the end of last August [1655], leaving the 
 wreck of their forces in Jamaica; and were straightway 
 lodged in the Tower for quitting their post. 
 
 A great Armament of Thirty, nay of Sixty ships ; of 
 Four-thousand soldiers, two regiments of whom were vet- 
 erans, the rest a somewhat sad miscellany of broken Royal- 
 ists, unruly Levellers, and the like, who would volunteer, 
 whom Venables augmented at Barbadoes, with a still more 
 unruly set to Nine-thousand : this great Armament the 
 Lord Protector has strenuously hurled, as a sudden fiery 
 bolt, into the dark Domdaniel of Spanish Iniquity in the far 
 West ; and it has exploded there, almost without effect 
 The Armament saw Hispaniola, and Hispaniola with fear 
 and wonder saw it, on the 14th of April, 1055: but the 
 Armament, a sad miscellany of distempered unruly persons, 
 durst not land " where Drake had landed," and at once take 
 the Town and Island : the Armament hovered hither and 
 thither; and at last agreed to land some sixty miles off: 
 
CROMWELL. 67 
 
 marched therefrom through thick-tangled woods, under trop- 
 ical heats, till it was nearly dead with mere marching; 
 was then set upon by ambuscadoes ; fought miserably ill, 
 the unruly persons of it, or would not fight at all; fled 
 back" to its ships a mass of miserable disorganic ruin ; and 
 " dying there at the rate of two-hundred a day," made for 
 Jamaica. 
 
 Jamaica, a poor unpopulous Island, was quickly taken, as 
 rioh Hispaniola might have been, and the Spaniards were 
 driven away : but to men in biliary humor it seemed hardly 
 worth the taking or the keeping. " Immense Proves of 
 wild cattle: cows and horses, run about Jamaica"; dusky 
 Spaniards dwell in hatos, in unswept shealings : " 80,000 
 hogs are killed every year for the sake of their lard, which 
 is sold under the name of hog's-butter at Carthagena " : but 
 what can we do with all that ! The poor Armament con- 
 tinuing to die as if by murrain, and all things looking worse 
 and worse to poor biliary Generals. Sea- General Penn set 
 sail for home, whom Land- General Venables swiftly fol- 
 lowed: leaving Vice-Admiral Goodson, " Major- General 
 Fortescue," or almost whosoever liked, to manage in their 
 absence, and their ruined moribund forces to die as they 
 could ; and are now lodged in the Tower, as they de- 
 served to be. The Lord Protector, and virtually England 
 with him, had hoped to see the dark empire of bloody 
 Antichristian Spain a little shaken in the West; some 
 reparation got for its inhuman massacrings, and long con- 
 tinued tyrannies, massacrings, exterminations of us, " at 
 St. Kitts in 1629, at Tortuga in 1637, at Santa Cruz 
 in 1650 " : so, in the name of England, had this Lord Pro- 
 tector hoped ; and he has now to take his disappointment. 
 
 The ulterior history of these "Western Affairs, of this new 
 Jamaica under Cromwell, lies far dislocated, drowned deep, 
 in the Slumber-Lakes of Thurloe and Company ; in a most 
 dark, stupefied, and altogether dismal condition. A history 
 
68 THOMAS CAKLVLE. 
 
 indeed, which, as you painfully fish it up and by d< 
 
 Aen it to life, is in itself sufficiently dismal. Not 
 much to be intermeddled with here. The English loft in 
 Jamaica, the English sue .hither, prospe 
 
 as lu-ed be: still die. soldiers and settlers of them, 
 frightful rate per day : languish, for most part, astonished in 
 their sultry strange new element : and cannot be brought to 
 front with right manhood the deadly inextricable jungle of 
 tropical confusions, oim-r and inner, in which they find them- 
 
 l>rave Governors, For;<sene, Sedg-.vick. r.rayne. 
 
 * :ber, die rapidly, of the climate and of broken 
 heart ; their life-tire all > B, in that dark chaos, and 
 
 no result visible. It is painful to read what misbe- 
 havior there is. what difficulties there are. 
 
 Almost the one strady light-point in the business is the 
 Protector's own spirit of determination. If England have 
 now a West-India Im< 1 Jamaica be an Island 
 worth something, it is to this Protector mainly that we owe 
 it. Here too. as in former dark Hope shines in 
 him, like a pillar if fire, when it has gone out in all the 
 others." Having put his hand to this work, he will r 
 any discouragement turn back. Jamaica shall yet be a col- 
 ony ; Spain and its dark Domdaniel shall yet be smitten to 
 the heart, the enemies of God and His Gospel, by the 
 soldiers and servants of God. It must, and it shall. We 
 have failed in the West, but not wholly ; in the West and in 
 the East, by sea and by land, as occasion shall be min- 
 istered, we will try it again and again Reinforce- 
 ment went on the back of reinforcement, during this Pro- 
 tector's lifetime; "a Thousand Irish Girls" went; not to 
 speak of the rogue-aud-vagabond species from Scotland. 
 "we can help you" at any time "to two or three hundred 
 of these," And so at length a West-India Interest did take 
 root; and bears spices and poisous, and other produce, to 
 this day. 
 
CROMWELL. <,<j 
 
 QUARTERMASTER SINDERCOMB THE ASSASSIN. 
 
 Mu.i:s Si.MH.KroMi;, now a cashiered muster hV 
 
 is once a zealous Deptford in. I, v. : 
 li-ied to fi'jiii lor j,ib-r inning of these wars. 
 
 !!<, Ion -hi -trolley on the side of Liberty, bcin^ 
 
 lowj then gradually got astray into !, \ 
 c|lin;_' COUr <"-, and wandered ever d< -eper there, till day- 
 I it became quite dark. He waH one 
 
 i-d Corporals, or Quartermasters, 
 doomed to ,t I 'nirf>rd, M;vcri years ago: but he es- 
 
 ni;_'lit. ;ui'l w;i* nol -hot llu;rc; took Mi\ 
 Scotland; got again to be Quartermaster ; was in tlj<; Over- 
 ton J'lot, lor Beising Monk and marching into I-^ngland, 
 lately; \\ h<Tcuj;on Monk ea^hiered hini : and he carne to 
 ; lo<l^<-<! himself here, in a sulky threadbare man- 
 ner, in Ak-itia or elsewhere. A gloomy man and Ex- 
 Qii.-iri'-i master; has become one of Sexby' people, " on the; 
 faith of A Tin! linn Kin^"; nolliing now left of him but the 
 fierceness, groping some path for itself, in the utter dark. 
 Henry Toope, one of his Highnesses Lifeguard: gives us, 
 or will give us, an inkling of Sindercomb ; and we know 
 hin# of his courses and inventions, whieh are many. 
 He rode in Hyde 1'ark among his Iligbness's escort, with 
 ; but the deed could not then be done. Leave me 
 the 1600, said he ; and I will find a way to do it. Sexby 
 left it him ami went abroad. 
 
 Inventive Sindercomb then took a House in Hammer- 
 smith; Garden-House, I think, "whieh had a banqueting- 
 room looking into the road"; road very narrow at that 
 part; road from Whitehall to Hampton Court on Satur- 
 day-afternoons. Inventive Sindercomb here set about pro- 
 viding blunderbusses of the due explosive force, ancient 
 ''infernal machines," in fact, with these he will blow hi* 
 
70 THOMAS CARLYLE. 
 
 Highness's Coach and his Highness's self into small pieces, 
 if it please Heaven. It did not please Heaven, prob- 
 ably not Henry Toope of his Highuess's Lifeguard. This 
 first scheme proved a failure. 
 
 Inventive Sindercomb, to justify his 1600, had to try 
 something. He decided to fire Whitehall by night, and ha\ e 
 a stroke at his Highness in the tumult. He has " a hun- 
 dred swift horses, two in a stable, up and down " : set a 
 hundred stout ruffians on the back of these, in the nocturnal 
 fire ; and try Thursday, 8th January, 1656-7 ; that is to be 
 the Night. On the dusk of Thursday, January 8th, he with 
 old-trooper Cecil, his second in the business, attends Public 
 Worship in Whitehall Chapel ; is seen loitering there after- 
 wards, " near the Lord Lambert's seat." Nothing more is 
 seen of him : but about half-past eleven at night, the senti- 
 nel on guard catches a smell of fire ; finds holed wain- 
 scots, picked locks ; a basket of the most virulent wildfire, 
 " fit almost to burn through stones," with lit match slowly 
 creeping towards it, computed to reach it in some half-hour 
 hence, about the stroke of midnight! His Highness is 
 summoned, the Council is summoned ; alas, Toope of the 
 Lifeguard is examined and Sindercomb's lodging is known. 
 Just when the wildfire should have blazed, two Guardsmen 
 wait upon Sindercomb ; seize him, not without hard defence 
 on his part, "wherein his nose was nearly cut off" ; bring 
 him to his Highness. Toope testifies ; Cecil peaches : 
 inventive Sindercomb has failed for the last time. To the 
 Tower with him, to a jury of his country with him ! The 
 emotion in the Parliament and in the Public, next morning, 
 was great. It had been proposed to ring an alarm at the 
 moment of discovery, and summon the Trainbands ; but his 
 Highness would not hear of it. 
 
 This Parliament, really intent on settling the Nation, 
 could not want for emotions, in regard to such a matter! 
 Parliament adjourns for a week, till the roots of the Pic t are 
 
CROMWELL. 71 
 
 investigated somewhat. Parliament, on reassembling, ap- 
 points a day of Thanksgiving for the Nation ; Friday, come 
 four weeks, which is February 20th, that shall be the gen- 
 eral Thanksgiving Day : and in the mean time we decide to 
 go over in a body, and congratulate his Highness. A mark 
 
 of great respect to him 
 
 On Monday, 9th February, Sindercomb was tried by a 
 jury in the Upper Bench ; and doomed to suffer as a traitor 
 and assassin, on the Saturday following. The night before 
 Saturday his poor Sister, though narrowly watched, smug- 
 gled him some poison : he went to bed, saying, " Well, this 
 is the last time I shall go to bed " ; the attendants heard him 
 snore heavily, and then cease ; they looked, and he lay dead. 
 " He was of that wretched sect called Soul- Sleepers, who be- 
 lieve that the soul falls asleep at death " ; a gloomy, far-mis- 
 guided man. They buried him on Tower-hill, with due igno- 
 miny, and there he rests ; with none but frantic Anabaptist 
 Sexby, or Deceptive Presbyterian Titus, to sing his praise. 
 
 INSTALLED AS PROTECTOR. 
 
 LAND- GENERAL REYNOLDS has gone to the French Neth- 
 erlands, with Six-thousand men, to join Turenne in fighting 
 the Spaniards there ; and Sea-General Montague, is about 
 hoisting his flag to co-operate with him from the other ele- 
 ment. By sea and land are many things passing ; and 
 here in London is the loudest thing of all : not yet to be 
 entirely omitted by us, though now it has fallen very silent 
 in comparison. Inauguration of the Lord Protector ; second 
 and more solemn Installation of him, now that he is fully 
 recognized by Parliament itself. He cannot yet, as it 
 proves, be crowned King ; but he shall be installed in his 
 Protectorship with all solemnity befitting such an occasion. 
 
 Friday, 2Qth June, 1657. The Parliament and all the 
 
72 THOMAS CARLYLE. 
 
 world are busy with this grand affair; the labors of the 
 Session being now complete, the last finish being now given 
 to our new Instrument of Government, to our elaborate 
 Petition and Advice, we will add this topstone to the work, 
 and so amid the shoutings of mankind, disperse for the: 
 recess. Friday at two o'clock, " in a place prepared," duly 
 prepared, with all manner of " platforms," " cloths of state," 
 and " seats raised one above the other," " at the upper end of 
 Westminster Hall." Palace Yard, and London generally, 
 is all a-tiptoe, out of doors. Within doors, Speaker Wid- 
 drington and the Master of the Ceremonies have done their 
 best : the Judges, the Aldermen, the Parliament, the Coun- 
 cil, the foreign Ambassadors, and domestic Dignitaries with- 
 out end ; chairs of state, cloths of state, trumpet-peals, and 
 acclamations of the people " Let the reader conceive it ; or 
 read in old pamphlets the " exact relation " of it with all the 
 speeches and phenomena, worthier than such things usually 
 are of being read. 
 
 " His Highness standing under the Cloth of State," says 
 Bulstrode, whose fine feelings are evidently touched by it, 
 " the Speaker, in the name of the Parliament, presented to 
 him : First, a Robe of purple velvet ; which the Speaker, 
 assisted by Whitlocke and others, put upon his Highness. 
 Then he," the Speaker, " delivered to him the Bible richly 
 gilt and bossed," an affecting symbolic Gift : " After that, 
 the Speaker girt the Sword about his Highness ; and deliv- 
 ered into his hand the Sceptre of massy gold. And then, 
 this done, he made a Speech to him on these several things 
 presented " ; eloquent mellifluous Speech, setting forth the 
 high and true significance of these several Symbols, Speech 
 still worth reading ; to which his Highness answered in 
 silence by dignified gesture only. " Then Mr. Speaker 
 gave him the Oath"; and so 'ended really in a solemn man- 
 ner. "And Mr. Manton, by prayer, recommended his 
 Highness, the Parliament, the Council, the Forces by land 
 
CROMWELL. 73 
 
 and sea, and the whole Government and People of the 
 Three Nations, to the blessing and protection of God." 
 And then "the people gave several great shouts"; and 
 " the trumpets sounded ; and the Protector sat in his chair 
 of state, holding the Sceptre in his hand " ; a remarkat le 
 sight to see. "On his right sat the Ambassador of 
 France," on his left some other Ambassador ; and all round, 
 standing or sitting, were Dignitaries of the highest quality ; 
 "and near the Earl of Warwick, stood the Lord Viscount 
 Lisle, stood General Montague and Whitlocke, each of 
 them having a drawn sword in his hand," a sublime sight 
 to some of us ! 
 
 And so this Solemnity transacts itself; which, at the 
 moment, was solemn enough ; and is not yet, at this or any 
 hollowest moment of Human History, intrinsically alto- 
 gether other. A really dignified and veritable piece of Sym- 
 bolism; perhaps the last we hitherto, in these quack-ridden 
 histrionic ages, have been privileged to see on such an occa- 
 sion. 
 
 ROYALIST INSURRECTION FAILURE. 
 
 His Highness, before this Monday's sun sets [Feb. 4, 
 1658], has begun to lodge the Anarchic Ringleaders, Roy- 
 alist, Fifth-Monarchist, in the Tower ; his Highness is bent 
 once more with all his faculty, the Talking- Apparatus being 
 gone, to front this Hydra, and trample it down once again. 
 On Saturday he summons his Officers, his Acting- Appara- 
 tus, to Whitehall round him ; explains to them " in a Speech 
 two hours long" what kind of Hydra it is; asks, Shall it con- 
 quer us, involve us in blood and confusion ? They answer 
 from their hearts, No, it shall not ! " We will stand and 
 fall with your Highness, we will live and die with you ! " 
 It is the last duel this Oliver has with any Hydra foment- 
 
 4 
 
74 THOMAS CARLYLE. 
 
 ed into life by a Talking- Apparatus ; and he again conquers 
 it, invincibly compresses it, as he has heretofore done. 
 
 One day, in the early days of March next, his Highness 
 said to Lord Broghil : An old friend of yours is in Town, 
 the Duke of Ormond, now lodged in Drury Lane, at the 
 Papist Surgeon's there ; you had better tell him to be gone ! 
 Whereat his Lordship stared; found it a fact however ; and 
 his Grace of Ormond did go with exemplary speed, and got 
 again to Bruges and the Sacred Majesty, with report That 
 Cromwell had many enemies, but that the rise of the Roy- 
 alists was moonshine. Arid on the 12th of the month his 
 Highness had the Mayor and Common Council with him in 
 a body at Whitehall ; and " in a Speech at large " explained 
 to them that his Grace of Ormond was gone only " on Tues- 
 day last " ; that there were Spanish Invasions, Royalist In- 
 surrections, and Frantic-Anabaptist Insurrections rapidly 
 ripening ; that it would well beseem the City of London 
 to have its Militia in good order. To which the Mayor and 
 Common Council " being very sensible thereof," made zeal- 
 DUS response by speech and by act. In a word, the Talk- 
 ing-Apparatus being gone, and an Oliver Protector no\v at 
 the head of the Acting- Apparatus, no Insurrection, in the 
 eyes of reasonable persons, had any chance. The leading 
 Royalists shrank close into their privacies again, consid- 
 erable numbers of them had to shrink into durance in the 
 Tower. Among which latter class his Highness, justly in- 
 censed, and " considering," as Thurloe says, " that it was not 
 lit there should be a Plot of this kind every winter," had 
 determined that a High Court of Justice should take cogni- 
 zance of some. High Court of Justice is accordingly nomi- 
 nated as the Act of Parliament prescribes : among the par- 
 ties marked for Trial by it are Sir Henry Slingsby, long 
 since prisoner for Penruddock's business, and the Rev. Dr. 
 Hewit, a man of much forwardness in Royalism. Sir Henry, 
 prisoner in Hull and acquainted with the Chief Officers 
 
CROMWELL. 75 
 
 there, has been treating with them for betrayal of the place 
 to his Majesty ; has even, to that end, given one of them a 
 Majesty's Commission ; for whose Spanish Invasion such a 
 Haven and Fortress would have been extremely convenient. 
 Reverond Dr. Hewit, preaching by sufferance, according to 
 the old ritual, " in St. Gregory's Church near Paul's, " to a 
 select disaffected audience, has farther seen good to distin- 
 guish himself very much by secular zeal in this business of 
 the Royalist Insurrection and Spanish Charles-Stuart Inva- 
 sion ; which has now come to nothing, and left poor Dr. 
 Hewit in a most questionable position. Of these two, and 
 of others, a High Court of Justice shall take cognizance. 
 
 The Insurrection having no chance in the eyes of reason- 
 able Royalists, and they in consequence refusing to lead it, 
 the large body of tmreasouable Royalists now in London 
 City, or gathering thither, decide, with indignation, That they 
 will try it on their own score and lead it themselves. Hands 
 to work, then, ye unreasonable Royalists ; pipe, All hands ! 
 Saturday the 1 oth of May, that is the night appointed : To 
 rise that Saturday Night ; beat drums for u Royalist Ap- 
 prentices," ' k fire houses at the Tower," slay this man, slay 
 that, and bring matters to a good issue. Alas, on the very 
 edge of the appointed hour, as usual, we are all seized ; the 
 ringleaders of us are all seized, " at the Mermaid in Cheap- 
 side," for Thurloe and his Highness have long known 
 what we were upon ! Barkstead, Governor of the Tower, 
 " marches into the City with five drakes," at the rattle of 
 which every Royalist Apprentice, and party implicated, 
 shakes in his shoes: and this also has gone to vapor, 
 leaving only for result certain new individuals of the Civic 
 class to give account of it to the High Court of Justice. 
 
 Tuesday, 25th May, 1658, the High Court of Justice sat ; 
 a formidable Sanhedrim of above a Hundred-and-thirty 
 heads ; consisting of " all the Judges," chief Law Officials, 
 and others named in the Writ, according to Act of Parlia- 
 
76 THOMAS CARLYLE. 
 
 ment ; sat " in Westminster Hall, at nine in the morning, 
 for the Trial of Sir Henry Slingsby, Knight, John Hewit, 
 Doctor of Divinity," and three others whom we may forget. 
 Sat day after day till all were judged. Poor Sir Henry, on 
 the first day, was condemned ; he pleaded what he could, 
 poor gentleman, a very constant Royalist all along ; but the 
 Hull business was too palpable ; he was condemned to die. 
 Reverend Dr. Hewit, whose proceedings also had become 
 very palpable, refused to plead at all ; refused even " to take 
 off his hat," says Carrion Heath, " till the officer was coming 
 to do it for him " ; had a <k Paper of Demurrers prepared by 
 the learned Mr. Prynne," who is now again doing business 
 this way ; " conducted himself not very wisely," says Bui- 
 strode. He likewise received sentence of death. The oth- 
 ers, by narrow missing, escaped ; by good luck, or the Pro- 
 tector's mercy, suffered nothing. 
 
 As to Slingsby and Hewit, the Protector was inexorable. 
 Hewit has already taken a very high line : let him perse- 
 vere in it! Slingsby was the Lord Fauconberg's uncle, 
 married to his Aunt Bellasis ; but that could not stead him, 
 perhaps that was but a new monition to be strict with 
 him. The Commonwealth of England and its Peace are not 
 nothing! These Royalist Plots every winter, deliveries 
 of garrisons to Charles Stuart, and reckless " usherings of us 
 into blood," shall end! Hewit and Slingsby suffered on 
 Tower Hill, on Monday, 8th June; amid the manifold 
 rumor and emotion of men. Of the City insurrectionists 
 six were condemned ; three of whom were executed, three 
 pardoned. And so the High Court of Justice dissolved 
 itself; and at this and not at more expense of blood, the 
 huge Insurrectionary movement ended, and lay silent within 
 its caves again. 
 
 Whether in any future year it would have tried another 
 rising against such a Lord Protector, one does not know, 
 one guesses rather in the negative. The Royalist Cause. 
 
CROMWELL. 77 
 
 after so many failures, after such a sort of enterprises u on 
 the word of a Christian King," had naturally sunk very low. 
 Some twelvemonth hence, with a Commonwealth not now 
 under Cromwell, but only under the impulse of Cromwell, 
 a Christian King hastening down to the Treaty of the Pyr- 
 enees, where France and Spain were making Peace, found 
 one of the coldest receptions. Cardinal Mazarin " sent his 
 coaches and guards a day's journey to meet Lockhart, the 
 Commonwealth Ambassador."; but refused to meet the 
 Christian King at all ; would not even meet Ormond except 
 as if by accident, " on the public road," to say that there was 
 no hope. The Spanish Minister, Don Louis de Haro, was 
 civiller in manner ; but as to Spanish Charles-Stuart Inva- 
 sions or the like, he also decisively shook his head. The 
 Royalist cause was as good as desperate in England ; a mel- 
 ancholy Reminiscence, fast fading away into the realm of 
 shadows. Not till Puritanism sank of its own accord, could 
 Royalism rise again. But Puritanism, the King of it once 
 away, fell loose very naturally in every fibre, fell into 
 Kinglessness, what we call Anarchy ; crumbled down, ever 
 faster, for Sixteen Months, in mad suicide, and universal 
 clashing and collision ; proved, by trial after trial, that there 
 lay not in it either Government or so much as Self- Govern- 
 ment any more ; that a Government of England by it was 
 henceforth an impossibility. Amid the general wreck of 
 things, all Government threatening now to be impossible, 
 the Reminiscence of Royalty rose again, u Let us take 
 refuge in the Past, the Future is not possible ! " and Major- 
 General Monk crossed the Tweed at Coldstream, with 
 results which are well known. 
 
 Results which we will not quarrel with, very mournful as 
 they have been ! If it please Heaven, these Two Hundred 
 Years of universal Cant in Speech, with so much of Cotton- 
 spimiing, Coal-boring, Commercing, and other valuable Sin- 
 cerity of Work going on the while, shall not be quite lost to 
 
78 THOMAS CARLYLE. 
 
 us! Our Cant will vanish, our whole baleful cunningly 
 compacted Universe of Cant, as does a heavy Nightmare 
 Dream. We shall awaken ; and find ourselves in a world 
 greatly widened. Why Puritanism could not continue ? 
 My friend, Puritanism was not the Complete Theory of this 
 immense Universe ; no, only a part thereof! To me it 
 seems, in my hours of hope, as if the Destinies meant some- 
 thing grander with England than even Oliver Protector did ! 
 We will not quarrel with the Destinies ; we will work as 
 we can towards fulfilment of them. 
 
 DEATH OF THE PROTECTOR. 
 
 OLIVER'S look was yet strong ; and young for his years, 
 which were Fifty-nine last April [1658]. The "Three- 
 score and ten years," the Psalmist's limit, which probably 
 was often in Oliver's thoughts and in those of others there, 
 might have been anticipated for him : Ten years more of 
 Life ; which, we may compute, would have given another 
 History to all the Centuries of England. But it was not to 
 be so, it was to be otherwise. Oliver's health, as we might 
 observe, was but uncertain in late times ; often " indisposed " 
 the spring before last. His course of life had not been 
 favorable to health ! " A burden too heavy for man ! " as 
 he himself, with a sigh, would sometimes say. Incessant 
 toil ; inconceivable labor, of head and heart and hand ; toil, 
 peril, and sorrow manifold, continued for near Twenty years 
 now, had done their part : those robust life-energies, it after- 
 ward appeared, had been gradually eaten out. Like a Tow- 
 er strong to the eye, but with its foundations undermined ; 
 which has not lofi g to stand ; the fall of which, on any shock, 
 may be sudden. 
 
 The Manzinis and Dues de Crequi, with their splendors, 
 
CROMWELL. 79 
 
 and congratulations about Dunkirk, interesting to the street 
 populations and general public, had not yet withdrawn, when 
 at Hampton Court there had begun a private scene, of 
 much deeper and quite opposite interest there. The Lady 
 Claypole, Oliver's favorite Daughter, a favorite of all the 
 world, had fallen sick we know not when ; lay sick now, 
 to death, as it proved. Her disease was of internal female 
 nature; the painfullest and most harassing to mind and 
 sense, it is understood, that falls to the lot of a human crea- 
 ture. Hampton Court we can fancy once more, in those 
 July days, a house of sorrow ; pale Death knocking there, 
 as at the door of the meanest hut. " She had great suffer- 
 ings, great exercises of spirit ! " Yes : and in the depths 
 of the old Centuries, we see a pale anxious Mother, anxious 
 Husband, anxious weeping Sisters, a poor young Frances 
 weeping anew in her weeds. " For the last fourteen days " 
 his Highness has been by her bedside at Hampton Court, 
 unable to attend to any public business whatever. Be still, 
 my Child ; trust thou yet in God : in the waves of the Dark 
 River, there too is He a God of help ! On the 6th day of 
 August she lay dead ; at rest forever. My young, my beau- 
 tiful, my brave ! She is taken from me ; I am left bereaved 
 of her. The Lord giveth, and the Lord taketh away, 
 blessed be the Name of the Lord ! . . . . 
 
 In the same dark days occurred George Fox's third 
 and last interview with Oliver George dates noth- 
 ing; and his facts everywhere lie round him like the leather- 
 parings of his old shop : but we judge it may have been 
 about the time when the Manzinis and Dues de Craaii 
 were parading in their gilt coaches, That George and two 
 Friends " going out of Town," on a summer day, " two of 
 Hacker's men " had met them, taken them, brought them 
 to the Mews. " Prisoners there a while " : but the Lord's 
 power was over Hacker's men; they had to let us go. 
 "Whereupon : 
 
80 THOMAS CARLYLE. 
 
 " The same day, taking boat I went down " (up) " to 
 Kingston, and from 'thence to Hampton Court, to speak 
 with the Protector about the Sufferings of Friends. I met 
 him riding into Hampton-Court Park ; and before I came to 
 him as he rode at the head of his Lifeguard, I saw and felt 
 
 a waft " (whiff) " of death go forth against him." Or 
 
 in favor of him, George ? His life, if thou knew it, has not 
 been a merry thing for this man, now or heretofore ! I fancy 
 he has been looking, this long while, to give it up, when- 
 ever the Commander-in-chief required. To quit his labori- 
 ous sentry -post ; honorably lay up his arms, and be gone to 
 his rest: all Eternity to rest in, O George! Was thy 
 own life merry, for example, in the hollow of the tree ; clad 
 permanently in leather ? And does kingly purple, and gov- 
 erning refractory worlds instead of stitching coarse shoes, 
 make it merrier ? The waft of death is not against him I 
 think, perhaps against thee, and me, and others, 
 George, when the Nell-Gwyn Defender and Two Centuries 
 of all-victorious Cant have come in upon us ! My unfortu- 
 nate George, "a waft of death go forth against him; 
 
 and when I came to him, he looked like a dead man. 
 After I had laid the Sufferings of Friends before him, and 
 had warned him accordingly as I was moved to speak to 
 him, he bade me come to his house. So I returned to 
 Kingston ; and, the next day, went up to Hampton Court 
 to speak farther with him. But when I came, Harvey, who 
 was one that waited on him, told me the Doctors were not 
 willing that I should speak with him. So I passed away, 
 and never saw him more." 
 
 Friday, the 20th of August, 1658, this was probably the 
 day on which George Fox saw Oliver riding into Hampton 
 Park with his Guards for the last time. That Friday, as 
 we find, his Highness seemed much better : but on the mor- 
 row a sad change had taken place ; feverish symptoms, for 
 which the Doctors vigorously prescribed quiet. Saturday 
 
CROMWELL. 81 
 
 to Tuesday the symptoms continued ever worsening : a kind 
 of tertian ague, " bastard tertian " as the old Doctors name 
 it ; for which it was ordered that his Highness should return 
 to Whitehall, as to a more favorable air in that complaint. 
 On Tuesday, accordingly, he quitted Hampton Court; 
 never to see it more. 
 
 " His time was come," says Harvey, " and neither prayers 
 nor tears could prevail with God to lengthen out his life, 
 and continue him longer to us. Prayers abundantly and 
 incessantly poured out on his behalf, both publicly and pri- 
 vately, as was observed, in a more than ordinary way. Be- 
 sides many a secret sigh, secret and unheard by men, yel 
 like the cry of Moses, more loud, and strongly laying hold 
 on God, than many spoken supplications. All which, the 
 hearts of God's People being thus mightily stirred up, 
 did seem to beget confidence in some, and hopes in all ; ye*> 
 some thoughts in himself, that God would restore him." 
 
 ** Prayers public and private " : they are worth imagining 
 to ourselves. Meetings of Preachers, Chaplains, and Godly 
 Persons; "Owen, Goodwin, Sterry, with a company of 
 others in an adjoining room " ; in Whitehall, and elsewhere 
 over religious London and England, fervent outpourings of 
 many a loyal heart. For there were hearts to whom the 
 nobleness of this man was known ; and his worth to the 
 Puritan Cause was evident. Prayers, strange enough to 
 us ; in a dialect fallen obsolete, forgotten now. Authentic 
 wrestlings of ancient Human Souls, who were alive then, 
 with their affections, awe-struck pieties ; with their Human 
 Wishes, risen to be transcendent, hoping to prevail with the 
 Inexorable. All swallowed now in the depths of dark 
 Time ; which is full of such, since the beginning ! Truly it 
 is a great scene of World-History, this in old Whitehall: 
 Oliver Cromwell drawing nigh to his end. The exit of 
 Oliver Cromwell, and of English Puritanism; a great 
 Light, one of our few authentic Solar Luminaries, going 
 4* v 
 
82 THOMAS CARLYLE. 
 
 down now amid the clouds of Death. Like the setting of a 
 great victorious summer Sun its course now finished. 
 " So stirbt ein Held," says Schiller ; " So dies a Hero ! Sight 
 worthy to be worshipped ! " He died, this Hero Oliver, in 
 Resignation to God, as the Brave have all done. " We could 
 not be more desirous he should abide," says the pious 
 Harvey, "than he was content and willing to be gone." The 
 struggle lasted, amid hope and fear, for ten days 
 
 On Monday, August 30th, there roared and howled all 
 day a mighty storm of wind. Ludlow, coming up to Town 
 from Essex, could not start in the morning for wind ; tried 
 it in the afternoon ; still could not get along, in his coach, 
 for head- wind; had to stop at Epping. On the morrow, 
 Fleetwood came to him in the Protector's name, to ask, 
 What he wanted here? Nothing of public concernment, 
 only to see my mother-in-law ! answered the solid man. For 
 indeed he did not know that Oliver was dying ; that the glo- 
 rious hour of Disenthralment, and immortal " Liberty " to 
 plunge over precipices with one's self and one's Cause, was 
 so nigh! It came; and he took the precipices, like a 
 strongboned resolute blind ginhorse, rejoicing in the break- 
 age of its halter, in a very gallant constitutional manner. 
 Adieu, my solid friend ; if I go to Vevay, I will read thy 
 Monument there, perhaps not without emotion, after all ! 
 
 It was on this stormy Monday, while rocking-winds, heard 
 in the sick-room and everywhere, were piping aloud, that 
 Thurloe and an Official person entered to inquire, Who, in 
 case of the worst, was to be his Highness's Successor ? The 
 Successor is named in a sealed Paper already drawn up, 
 above a year ago, at Hampton Court; now lying in such 
 and such a place. The Paper was sent for, searched for; 
 it could never be found. Richard's is the name understood 
 to have been written in that Paper : not a good name ; but 
 in fact one does not know. In ten years' time, had ten 
 years more been granted, Richard might have become a 
 
CROMWELL. 83 
 
 fitter man; might have been cancelled, if palpably unfit. 
 Or perhaps it was Fleetwood's name, and the Paper by 
 certain parties was stolen ? None knows. On the Thurs- 
 day night following, " and not till then," his Highness is 
 understood to have formally named " Richard ! " or per- 
 haps it might only be some heavy-laden " Yes, yes ! " spoken 
 out of the thick death-slumbers, in answer to Thurloe's ques- 
 tion " Richard ? " The thing is a little uncertain. It was, 
 once more, a matter of much moment ; giving color prob- 
 ably to all the subsequent Centuries of England, this an- 
 swer! .... 
 
 Thursday night the writer of our old Pamphlet was him- 
 self in attendance on his Highness ; and has preserved a 
 trait or two ; with which let us hasten to conclude. To-mor- 
 row is September Third, always kept as a Thanksgiving- 
 day, since the Victories of Dunbar and Worcester. The 
 wearied one, " that very night before the Lord took him to 
 his everlasting rest," was heard thus, with oppressed voice, 
 speaking : 
 
 " * Truly God is good ; indeed, He is ; He will not ' 
 then his speech failed him, but, as I apprehended, it was, 
 4 He will not leave me.' This saying, ' God is good,' he fre- 
 quently used all along; and would speak it with much 
 cheerfulness, and fervor of spirit, in the midst of his pains. 
 Again he said: 'I would be willing to live to be farther 
 serviceable to God and His People : but my work is done. 
 Yet God will be with His People.' 
 
 " He was very restless most part of the night, speaking 
 often to himself. And there being something to drkk 
 offered him, he was desired to take the same, and endeavor 
 to sleep. Unto which he answered : ' It is not my desire 
 to drink or sleep ; but my design is, to make what haste I 
 can to be gone.' 
 
 " Afterwards, towards morning, he used divers holy ex- 
 pressions, implying much inward consolation and peace; 
 
84 THOMAS CARLYLE. 
 
 among the rest he spake some exceeding self-debasing 
 words, annihilating and judging himself. And truly it was 
 observed, that a public spirit to God's Cause did breathe in 
 him, as in his lifetime so now to his very last." 
 
 When the morrow's sun rose, Oliver was speechlf -ss ; be- 
 tween three and four in the afternoon, he lay dead. Friday, 
 3d September, 1658. "The consternation and astonishment 
 3f all people," writes Fauconberg, " are inexpressible ; their 
 hearts seem as if sunk within them. My poor Wife, I 
 know not what on earth to do with her. When seemingly 
 quieted, she bursts out again into a passion that tears her 
 very heart to pieces." Husht, poor weeping Mary ! Here 
 is a Life-battle right nobly done. Seest thou not, 
 
 The storm is changed into a calm, 
 
 At His command and will ; 
 So that the waves which raged before, 
 
 Now quiet are and still ! 
 
 Then are they glad, because at rest 
 
 And quiet now they be : 
 So to the haven He them brings 
 
 Which they desired to see. 
 
 " Blessed are the dead that die in the Lord " ; blessed are 
 the valiant that have lived in the Lord. " Amen, saith the 
 Spirit," Amen. " They do rest from their labors, and their 
 works follow them." 
 
 " Their works follow them." As, I think, this Oliver 
 Cromwell's works have done, and are still doing ? We have 
 had our " Revolutions of Eighty-eight," officially called " glo- 
 rious " ; and other Revolutions not yet called glorious, and 
 somewhat has been gained for poor Mankind. Men's ears 
 are not now slit off by rash Officially ; Officiality will, for 
 long henceforth, be more cautious about men's ears. The 
 tyrannous Star-chambers, branding-irons, chimerical Kings 
 and Surplices at All-hallowtide, they are gone, or with im- 
 
CROMWELL. 85 
 
 mense velocity going, Oliver's works do follow him ! The 
 works of a man, bury them under what guano-mountains and 
 obscene owl-droppings you will, do not perish, cannot perish. 
 What of Heroism, what of Eternal Light was in a Man 
 and his Life, is with very great exactness added to the Eter- 
 nities, remains forever a new divine portion of the Sum of 
 Things ; and no owl's voice, this way or that, in the least, 
 avails in the matter. But we have to end here. 
 
 Oliver is gone ; and with him England's Puritanism, 
 laboriously built together by this man, and made a thing 
 far-shining miraculous to its own Century, and memorable 
 to all the Centuries, soon goes. Puritanism, without its 
 King, is h'ngless, anarchic; falls into dislocation, self-col- 
 lision ; staggers, plunges into ever deeper anarchy ; King, 
 Defender of the Puritan Faith there can none now be 
 found ; and nothing is left but to recall the old disowned 
 Defender with the remnants of his Four Surplices, and 
 Two Centuries of ffypocrisis (or Play-acting not so called), 
 and put up with all that, the best we may. The Genius of 
 England no longer soars Sunward, world-defiant like an 
 Eagle through the storms, " mewing her mighty youth," as 
 John Milton saw her do: the Genius of England, much 
 more like a greedy Ostrich intent on provender and a 
 whole skin mainly, stands with its other extremity Sunward 
 with its Ostrich-head stuck into the readiest bush of old 
 Church-tippets, King-cloaks, or what other ** sheltering Fal- 
 lacy " there may be, and so awaits the issue. The issue has 
 been slow ; but it is now seen to have been inevitable. 
 No Ostrich, intent on gross terrene provender, and sticking 
 its head into Fallacies, but will be awakened one day, 
 
 in a terrible a posteriori manner, if not otherwise ! 
 
 Awake before it come to that ! God and man bid us awake ! 
 The Voices of our Fathers, with thousand-fold stern moni- 
 tion to one and all, bid us awake. 
 
LITTLE BELL. 
 
 BY T. WESTWOOD. 
 
 " He prayeth well, who loveth well 
 Both man and bird and beast." 
 
 THE ANCIENT MARINER. 
 
 PIPED the Blackbird, on the beech wood spray, 
 " Pretty inaid, slow wandering this way, 
 
 What 's your name ? " quoth he. 
 " What's your name ? Oh ! stop and straight unfold, 
 Pretty inaid, with showery curls of gold." 
 " Little Bell," said she. 
 
 Little Bell sat down beneath the rocks, 
 Tossed aside her gleaming, golden locks, 
 
 " Bonny bird ! " quoth she, 
 " Sing me your best song, before I go." 
 " Here 's the very finest song, I know, 
 Little Bell," said he. 
 
 And the Blackbird piped you never heard 
 Half so gay a song from any bird ; 
 
 Full of quips and wiles, 
 Now so round and rich, now soft and slow, 
 All for love of that sweet face below, 
 
 Dimpled o'er with smiles. 
 
 And the while that bonny bird did pour 
 
 His full heart out, freely, o'er and o'er, 
 
 'Neath the morning skies, 
 
LITTLE BELL. 87 
 
 In the little childish heart below, 
 
 All the sweetness seemed to grow and grow, 
 
 And shine forth in happy overflow 
 
 From the brown, bright eyes. 
 
 Down the dell she tripped, and through the glade 
 Peeped the squirrel from the hazel shade, 
 
 And, from out the tree, 
 
 Swung and leaped and frolicked, void of fear, 
 While bold Blackbird piped, that all might hear, 
 
 " Little Bell ! " piped he. 
 
 Little Bell sat down amid the fern : 
 
 " Squirrel, Squirrel ! to your task return ; 
 
 Bring me nuts ! " quoth she. 
 Up, away ! the frisky Squirrel hies, 
 Golden wood-lights glancing in his eyes, 
 
 And adown the tree, 
 
 Great ripe nuts, kissed brown by July sun, 
 In the little lap drop, one by one 
 Hark ! how Blackbird pipes, to see the fun ! 
 
 " Happy Bell ! " pipes he. 
 
 Little Bell looked up and down the glade : 
 " Squirrel, Squirrel, from the nut-tree shade, 
 Bonny Blackbird, if you 're not afraid, 
 
 Come and share with me ! " 
 Down came Squirrel, eager for his fare, 
 Down came bonny Blackbird, I declare ; 
 Little Bell gave each his honest share 
 
 Ah ! the merry three ! 
 
 And the while those frolic playmates twain 
 Piped and frisked from bough to bough again, 
 'Neath the morning skies, 
 
88 T. WESTWOOD. 
 
 In the little childish heart below, 
 
 All the sweetness seemed to grow and grow, 
 
 And shine out in happy overflow, 
 
 From her brown, bright eyes. 
 
 By her snow-white cot, at close of day, 
 Knelt sweet Bell, with folded palms, to pray. 
 
 Very calm and clear 
 
 Rose the praying voice, to where, unseen, 
 In blue heaven, an angel shape serene 
 
 Paused awhile to hear. 
 
 44 What good child is this," the angel said, 
 " That, with happy heart, beside her bed, 
 
 Prays so lovingly ? " 
 Low and soft, oh ! very low and soft, 
 Crooned the Blackbird in the orchard croft, 
 
 " Bell, dear Bell ! " crooned he. 
 
 " Whom God's creatures love," the angel fair 
 Murmured, " God doth bless with angels' care ; 
 
 Child, thy bed shall be 
 
 Folded safe from harm ; love, deep and kind, 
 Shall watch round and leave good gifts behind, 
 
 Little Bell, for thee." 
 
THE MORMON'S WIFE. 
 
 BY ROSE TEERY. 
 
 " ' Woe to that man/ his warning voice replied 
 To all who questioned, or in silence sighed 
 Woe to that man who ventures truth to win, 
 And seeks his object by the path of sin ! ' " 
 
 SCHILLER. 
 
 DON'T think much, my young friend, of those Mor* 
 mons ! I have had some reasons of my own for dislik- 
 ing them ! " said Parson Field to me, as we sat together, one 
 August noon, in the porch of his red house at Plainfield. 
 
 " Do tell me, sir," said I, settling myself in an easy atti- 
 tude to hear his story for a story from Parson Field was 
 not to be despised his quaint simplicity bringing out, in 
 old-time and expressive phrases, whatever he describes with 
 the clear fidelity of an interior by Aliens. " Do tell me," 
 said I again, with a deeper emphasis ; whereat the old gen- 
 tleman looked at me over his spectacles, and, smiling benig- 
 nantly into my eager face, began. 
 
 " When I first came to Plainfield," said he, " more than 
 thirty years ago, I had been a minister of the Lord only tec 
 years, and I had been settled for that period of time in a 
 large city, where I served acceptably to a worthy congre- 
 gation ; but certain reasons of my own induced me ..o leave 
 that situation, and come here to live, where also I found 
 acceptance, and not many months after I came there was a 
 considerable reviving of the work in this place, and many 
 believed. Of these was a certain Joseph Frazer, a young 
 
90 ROSE TERRY. 
 
 Scotchman, concerning whom I felt much misgiving, lest he 
 should take the wrong path ; but he, in due season, joined 
 himself to the church, and edified the brethren in walk and 
 conversation ; so that, when he left Plainfield and settled in 
 the West Indies, we were loth to have him go. 
 
 " Some years afterwards we heard he was married there 
 to a lady of Spanish extraction, and a Catholic ; and, after 
 ten years elapsed, she died, leaving him one child, a daugh- 
 ter, eight years of age, and with her he came to Plainfield, 
 desiring that the child, whom he had named Adeline, after 
 his own mother, should have a New England training. 
 
 " But, wonderful are the ways of Providence ! On his re- 
 turn to Cuba, he perished in the vessel, which went down 
 in a heavy gale off Cape Hatteras ; and when the news 
 came to his mother, old Mrs. Frazer, she sent for me that I 
 should tell the child Adeline, for she had given proofs of a 
 singular nature, ardent and self-confident in the extreme. 
 I took my hat, and went over to Mrs. Frazer's, with a very 
 heavy heart, for the grief of a child is a fearful thing to me, 
 and to be the bringer of evil tidings, that shall stain the 
 pureness and calm of a child's thoughts with the irreparable 
 shadow of death, is no light thing, nor easily to be done. I 
 entered into the house one day in June : it was a very sweet 
 day, and, as I walked quietly into the low kitchen, I saw 
 Adeline, with her head resting on her hands, and her large 
 eyes eagerly gazing out of the window at the gambols of a 
 scarlet-throated humming-bird. I went close to her, and 
 thought to myself that I would speak, but I did not, for I 
 saw that, in her little pale face, which made me more sad 
 than before ; and I had it on my lips to say, ' Adeline, are 
 you homesick?' (which was the thing of all others I should 
 not say) when suddenly she turned about, and answered the 
 question before I spoke it. 
 
 " ' Sir,' said she, ' I wish I was in Cuba. I had just such 
 a humming-bird at home ; and I fed it with orange boughs 
 
THE MORMON'S WIFE. 91 
 
 full of white flowers, every day ; but you have no orange 
 trees here, and I have no papa ! ' 
 
 " It seemed to me that the child's angel had thus opened 
 the way for me to speak, and I began to say some things 
 about the love of our universal Father, when she laid her 
 little hand on my arm with a fearfully strong pressure. 
 * Mr. Field,' said she, l is my papa dead ! ' I never shall 
 forget the eyes that looked that question into mine. I felt 
 like an unveiled spirit before their eager, piercing stare. I 
 did not answer except by a strong quiver of feeling that 
 would run over my features, for I loved her father even as 
 a kinsman, and I needed to say nothing more, for the child 
 fell at my feet quite rigid, and I called Mrs. Frazer, who 
 tried all her nurse-arts to restore little Adeline; but was 
 forced, at last, to send for a physician, who bled the child, 
 and brought her round. 
 
 " In the mean time I had gone home to prepare my ser- 
 mon, for it was not yet finished, and the day was Friday ; 
 but I kept seeing that little lifeless face, all orphaned as it 
 .was, and the Scripture, ' As one whom his mother comfort- 
 eth,' was so borne in upon my mind, that, although I had 
 previously fixed upon one adapted to a setting forth of the 
 doctrine of election, I was wrought upon to make the other 
 the subject of my discourse: and truly the people wept; 
 almost all but Adeline, who sat in the square pew with her 
 great eyes fixed upon me, and her small lips apart, like one 
 who drinks from the stream of a rock. 
 
 " The next day I was resting, as my custom is, after the 
 Sabbath ; and in a warm, fair day, I find no better rest than 
 to sit by the open window, and breathe the summer air, and 
 fill my eyes and heart with the innumerable love-tokens that 
 God hath set thickly in Nature. I was, therefore, at my 
 usual place, wrapt in thought, and beholding the labors of a 
 small bird which taught her young to fly, when I felt a 
 light, cold touch, and, turning, saw little Adeline beside me, 
 
92 ROSE TERRY. 
 
 * Sir,' said she, without any preface, < when my papa went 
 away, he left with me a letter, which he said I was to give 
 you if he died.' So far she spoke steadily, but there the 
 small voice quivered, and broke down. I took the letter 
 she proffered me, and, breaking the seal, found it a short 
 but touching appeal to me, as the spiritual father of Joseph 
 Frazer, to take his own child under my care, and be as a 
 father to her, inasmuch as his mother was old and feeble, 
 and also to be executor of his will, of which a copy was en- 
 closed. I said this much to the child as shortly as I could, 
 and with her grave voice she replied, ' Sir, I should like to 
 be your little girl, if you will preach me some more ser- 
 mons.' Now I was affected at this answer ; not the less 
 that the leaven of pride, which worketh in every man, was 
 fed by even a baby's praise ; and, putting on my hat, I 
 walked over to Mrs. Frazer's house and laid the matter be- 
 fore her. She was not, at first, willing to give Adeline up, 
 but at length, after much converse to and fro, she came to 
 my conclusion, that the child would be better in my hands, 
 inasmuch as she herself could not hope for a long continu- 
 ance : and as it was ordered, she died the next summer. I 
 sent for my sister Martha, who was somewhat past mar- 
 riageable years, but kind and good, to come and keep house 
 for me, and from that time Adeline was as my own child. 
 But I must hasten over a time, for I am too long in telling 
 this. 
 
 " In course of years the child grew up, tall and slender, 
 of a very stately carriage, and having that Scriptural glory 
 of a woman, long and abundant hair. 
 
 " She was still very fervid in her feelings, but reserved 
 and proud, and I fear I had been too tender with her for 
 her good, inasmuch as she thought her own will and pleasure 
 must always be fulfilled ; and we all know that is not one of 
 the ordinations of Providence. 
 
 " As Adeline came to be a woman, divers youths of my 
 
THE MORMON'S WIFE. 93 
 
 congregation were given to call of a Sabbath night, with 
 red apples for me, and redder cheeks for Adeline, who was 
 scarcely civil to them, and often left them to my conversa- 
 tion, which they seemed not to relish so much as would 
 have been pleasing to human nature. 
 
 " But my sainted mother, who was not wanting in the 
 wisdom of this world, was used to say that every man and 
 woman had their time of crying for the moon, and while 
 some knew it to be a burning fire, and others scornfully 
 called it cheese, and if they got it, either burned their fin- 
 gers, or despised their desire, still all generations must have 
 their turn, and truly I believed it, when I found that Ade- 
 line herself began to have a pining for something which I 
 could not persuade her to specify. The child grew thin and 
 pale, and ceased the singing of psalms at her daily task, and 
 I could not devise what should be done for her; though 
 Martha strongly recommended certain herb teas, which Ade- 
 line somewhat unreasonably rebelled against. However, 
 about this time, my attention was a little turned from her, 
 as there was much religious awakening in the place, and 
 among others, whom the deacons singled out as special ob- 
 jects of attention, was one John Henderson, a frequent vis- 
 itor at our house, and a young man of good parts and kindly 
 feeling, as it seemed, but of a peculiar nature, being easily 
 led into either right or wrong, yet still given to fits of stub- 
 bornness, when he could not be drawn, so to speak, with a 
 cart-rope. 
 
 " Now Adeline had been a professor of religion for some 
 years, but it did not seem to me that she took a right view 
 of this particular season, for many times she refused to go 
 to the prayer-meetings, even to those which were held with 
 special intentions towards the unconverted ; and many times, 
 on my return, I found her with pale cheeks and red eyes, 
 evidently from tears. About this time, also, she began to 
 take long, solitary walks, from which she returned with hei 
 
94 ROSE TERRY. 
 
 hands full of wild flowers, for it was now early spring ; but 
 she cared nothing for the flowers, and would scatter them 
 about the house to fade, without a thought. In the mean 
 time, the revival progressed, but, I lament to say, with no 
 visible change in John Henderson. He had gotten into one 
 of his stubborn moods of mind, and neither heaven nor hell 
 seemed to affect him. The only softening I could perceive 
 in the young man was during the singing of hymns, which 
 was well done in our meeting-house, for Adeline led the 
 choir, and I noticed that, whenever that part of the exercises 
 began, John Henderson would lift up his head, and a strange 
 color and tender expression seemed to melt the hard lines 
 of his face. 
 
 " Somewhere about the latter end of April, as I was re- 
 turning from a visit to a sick man, I met John coming from 
 a piece of woods, that lay behind my house about a mile, 
 with his hands full of liverwort blossoms. I do not know 
 why this little circumstance gave me comfort, yet, I have 
 ever observed, that a man who loves the manifestations of 
 God in his works is more likely to be led into religion than 
 a brutal or a mere business man : so 1 was desirous of 
 speaking to the youth, but when he saw me he turned from 
 the straight path, and, like an evil-doer, fled across the 
 fields another way. I did not call after him, for some ex- 
 perience has constrained me to think that there is no little 
 wisdom in sometimes letting people alone, but I took my 
 own way home, and having put on my cloth shoes to ease 
 my feet, and being in somewhat of a maze of thought, I 
 went up to my study, as it seemed, very quietly, for I en- 
 tered at the open door and found Adeline sitting in my arm- 
 chair by the window, quite unaware of my nearness. I 
 well remember how like a spirit* she looked that day, with 
 her great eyes raised to a cloud that rested in the bright 
 sky, her soft black hair twisted into a crown about her 
 head, and her light dress falling all over the chair, while in 
 
THE MORMON'S WIFE. .95 
 
 her hands, lying between the slight fingers, and by the bluer 
 veins, was clasped a bunch of liverwort blossoms. Then I 
 perceived, for the first time, why my child was crying for the 
 moon, and that John Henderson cared for the singing and 
 not for the hymns, at which I sorrowed. But I sat down 
 by Ada, and taking the flowers out of her cold hands, began 
 to say that I had met John Henderson on the road with 
 some such blossoms, at which she looked at me even as she 
 did when I told her about her father, and, seeing that I 
 smiled, and yet was not dry-eyed, nor quite at rest, the tears 
 began, slowly, to run over her eyelashes, and in a few very 
 resolute words, she told me that Mr. Henderson had asked 
 her that morning to marry him. 
 
 "Xow I knew not well what to say, but I set myself 
 aside, as far as I could, and tried not to remember how sore 
 a trial it would be to part with Ada, and I reasoned with 
 her calmly about the youth, setting forth, first, that he was 
 not a professing Christian, and that the Scripture seemed 
 plain to me on that matter, though I would not constrain 
 her conscience if she found it clear in this thing ; and, sec- 
 ond, that he was a man who held fast to this world's goods, 
 and was like to be a follower of Mammon if he learned not 
 to love better things in his youth ; and, third, that he was a 
 man who had, as one might say, a streak of granite in his 
 nature, against which a feeling person would continually fall 
 and be hurt, and which no person could work upon, if once 
 it came in the way even of right action. To all this Ade- 
 line answered with more reason than I supposed a woman 
 could, only that I noticed, at the end of each answer, she 
 said in a low voice, as if it were the end of all contention, 
 'and I love him.' Whereby, seeing that the thing was well 
 past my interference, I gave my consent with many doubts 
 and fears in my heart, and, having blessed the child, I sent 
 her away that I might meditate over this matter. 
 
 "When John came in the evening for his answer, I was 
 
% ROSE TERRY. 
 
 enabled to exhort him faithfully, and, in his softened state of 
 feeling, he chose to tell me that he had been seeking relig- 
 ion because he feared I would not give him Adeline unless 
 he were joined to the church, and hecould not make a hyp- 
 ocrite of himself, even for that, but he had hoped that in the 
 use of means he might be awakened and converted. At 
 this I was pleased, inasmuch as it showed a spirit of truth 
 in the young man, but I could not avoid setting before him 
 that self-seeking had never led any soul to God, and how 
 cogent a reason he had himself given for his want of success 
 in things pertaining to his salvation ; but as I spoke Ada 
 came in by the other door, and John's eyes began to wander 
 so visibly, that I thought it best to conclude, and I must say 
 he appeared grateful. So I went out of the door, leaving 
 Ada stately and blushing as a fair rose-tree, notwithstanding 
 that John Henderson seemed to fancy she needed his sup- 
 port. 
 
 " As the year went on, and I could not in conscience let 
 Adeline leave me until her lover had some fixed mainte- 
 nance, I had many conversations with him, (for he also was 
 an orphan,) and it was at length decided that he should buy, 
 with Ada's portion, a goodly farm in Western New York ; 
 and in the ensuing summer, after a year's engagement, they 
 were to marry. So the summer came ; I know not exactly 
 what month was fixed for their marriage, though I have the 
 date somewhere, but one thing I recollect, that the hop-vine 
 over this porch was in full bloom, and after I had joined my 
 child and the youth in the bands of wedlock, I went out into 
 the porch to see them safe into the carriage that was to take 
 them to the boat, and there Ada put her arms about my 
 neck, and kissed me for good-by, leaving a hot tear upon my 
 cheek ; and a south wind at that moment smote the hop- 
 vine so that its odor of honey and bitterness mingled swept 
 across my face, and always afterward this scent made me 
 think of Adeline. After two years had passed away, during 
 
THE MORMON'S WIFE. 97 
 
 which we heard from her often, we heard that she had . a 
 little daughter born, and her letters were full of joy and 
 pride, so that I trembled for the child's spiritual state ; but 
 after some three years the little girl with her mother came 
 to Phinfield, and I did not know but Adeline was excusa- 
 ble in her joy, for such a fair and bright child was scarcely 
 ever seen ; but the next summer came sad news : little 
 Nelly was dead, and Ada's grief seemed inexhaustible, 
 while her husband fell into one of his sullen states of mind, 
 and the affliction passed over them to no good end, as it 
 seemed. 
 
 " Soon after this, the Mormon delusion began to spread 
 rapidly about John Henderson's dwelling-place, and in less 
 than a year after Nelly's death I had a letter from Ada, 
 dated at St. Louis, which I will read to you, for I have it 
 in my pocket-book, having retained it there since yesterday, 
 when I took it out from the desk to consult a date. 
 
 " It begins : * Dear Uncle,' (I had always instructed 
 the child so to call me, rather than father, seeing we can 
 have but one father, while we may be blessed with nume- 
 rous uncles) ' I suppose you will wonder how I came to be 
 at St. Louis, and it is just my being here that I write to 
 explain. You know how my husband felt about Nelly's 
 death, but you cannot know how I felt ; for, even in my 
 very great sorrow, I hoped all the time, that by her death, 
 John might be led to a love of religion. He was very un- 
 happy, but he would not show it, only that he took even 
 more tender care of me than before. I have always been 
 his darling and pride; he never let me work, because he 
 said ifc spoiled my hands ; but after Nelly died, he was 
 hardly willing I should breathe ; and though he never spoke 
 of her, or seemed to feel her loss, yet I have heard him. 
 whisper her name in his sleep, and every morning his hair 
 and pillow were damp with crying ; but he never knew I 
 saw it. After a few months, there came a Mormon preacher 
 
 5 G 
 
98 ROSE TERRY. 
 
 into cur neighborhood, a man of a great deal of lalent 
 and earnestness, and a firm believer in the revelation to 
 Joseph Smith. At first my husband did not take any 
 notice of him, and then he laughed at him for being a be- 
 liever in what seemed like nonsense ; but one night he was 
 persuaded to go and hear Brother Marvin preach in the 
 school-house, and he came home with a very sober face. I 
 said nothing, but when I found there was to be a meeting 
 the next night, I asked to go with him, and, to my surprise, 
 I heard a most powerful and exciting discourse, not wanting 
 in either sense or feeling, though rather poor as to argu- 
 ment; but I was not surprised that John wanted to hear 
 more, nor that, in the course of a few weeks, he avowed 
 himself a Mormon, and was received publicly into the sect. 
 Dear Uncle, you will be shocked, I know, and you will won- 
 der why I did not use my influence over my husband, to 
 keep him from this delusion ; but you do not know how 
 much I have longed and prayed for his conversion to a re- 
 ligious life; until any religion, even one full of errors, 
 seemed to me better than the hardened and listless state of 
 his mind. 
 
 " * I could not but feel, that if he were awakened to a 
 sense of the life to come, in any way, his own good sense 
 would lead him right in the end ; and there is so much ar- 
 dor and faith about this strange belief, that I do not regret 
 his having fallen in with it, for I think the true burning of 
 Gospel faith will yet be kindled by means of this strange fire. 
 In the mean time he is very eager and full of zeal for the 
 cause, so much so, that thinking it to be his duty, he resolved 
 to sell our farm at Oakwood, and remove to Utah. If any- 
 thing could make me grieve over a change, I believe to be 
 for John's spiritual good, it would be this idea : but no re- 
 gret or sorrow of mine shall ever stand in the way of his 
 soul ; so I gave as cheerful a consent as I could to the sale, 
 and I only cried a few tears, over little Nelly's bed, under 
 
THE MORMON'S WIFE. 99 
 
 the great tulip-tree. There my husband has put an iron 
 railing, and I have planted a great many sweet-brier vines 
 over the rock ; and Mr. Keeney, who bought the farm, has 
 promised that the spot shall be kept free from weeds, so I 
 leave her in peace. Do write to me, Uncle Field. I feel 
 sure I have done right, because it has not been in my own 
 way, yet sometimes I am almost afraid. I shall be very 
 far away from you, and from home, and my child ; but I 
 am so glad now she is in heaven, nothing can trouble her, 
 and I shall not much care about myself, if John goes right. 
 " ' Give my love to Aunt Martha, and please write to 
 your dear child. 
 
 * ADA HENDERSON. " 
 
 "I need not say, my young friend," resumed Parson 
 Field, wiping his spectacles, and clearing his voice with a 
 vigorous ahem ! ! " that I could not, in conscience, approve 
 of Adeline's course. * Thou shalt not do evil that good may 
 come,' is a Gospel truth, and cannot be transgressed with 
 good consequences. I did write to Ada ; but, inasmuch as 
 the act was done, I said not much concerning it, but bade 
 her take courage, seeing that she had meant to do right, 
 although in the deed she had considered John Henderson 
 before anything else, which was, as you may perceive, her 
 besetting sin, and therefore it seemed good to me to put, at 
 the end of my epistle, (as I was wont always to offer a suit- 
 able text of Scripture for her meditation,) these words, 
 ' Little^ children, keep yourselves from idols ! ' I did not 
 hear again from Adeline, till she had been two months in 
 the Mormon city, and though she tried her best to seem 
 contented and peaceful, in view of John's new zeal, and his 
 tender care of her, still I could not but think of the hop- 
 blossoms, for I perceived, underneath this present sweet- 
 ness, a little drop of life and pain working to some unseen 
 end. That year passed away and we heard no more, and 
 
100 ROSE TERRY. 
 
 the next also, at which I wondered much; but, reflecting 
 on the chances of travel across those deserts, and having a 
 surety of Ada's affection for me, I did not repine, though I 
 felt some regret that there was such uncertainty of carriage ; 
 nevertheless, I wrote as usual, that no chance might be lost. 
 " The third summer was unusually warm in our parts, and 
 its heats following upon a long, wet spring, caused much and 
 grievous sickness, and I was obliged to be out at all hours 
 with the dying, and at funerals, so that my bodily strength 
 was wellnigh exhausted, and at haying-time, just as I was 
 cutting the last swarth on my river meadow, which is low- 
 lying land, and steamed with hot vapor as I laid it bare to 
 the sun, I fell forward across my scythe-snath and fainted. 
 This was the beginning of a long course of fever, of a ty- 
 phoid character, during which I was either stupid or deliri- 
 ous most of the time, and, while I lay sick, there came a 
 letter to me, from Salt Lake city, written chiefly by John 
 Henderson, who begged me to come on if it was a possible 
 thing and see his wife, who was wasting with a slow con- 
 sumption, and much bent upon seeing me. I could discern 
 that the letter was not willingly written ; it was stiff in 
 speech, though writ with a trembling hand. At the end of 
 it were a few lines from Ada herself; a very impatient and 
 absolute cry for me, as if she could not die till I came. 
 Now Martha had opened this letter, as she was forced to by 
 my great illness, and, having read it, asked the doctor if it 
 was well to propound the contents to me, and he said decid- 
 edly that he could not answer for my life if she did : so 
 Martha, like a considerate woman, wrote an answer herself 
 to John Henderson (of which she kept a copy for me to 
 see), setting forth that I was in no state to be moved with 
 such tidings ; that, however, I should have the letter as 
 soon as the doctor saw fit, and sending her love and sym- 
 pathy to Ada, and a recommend that she should try balm 
 tea. 
 
THE MORMON'S WIFE. 101 
 
 u After a long season of suspense, I was graciously up- 
 lifted from fever, and enabled to leave my bed for a few 
 hours daily ; and, when I could ride out, which was only 
 by the latter end of October, I was given the child's letter, 
 and my heart sank within me, for I knew how bitterly she 
 had needed my strength to help her. It was a warm au- 
 tumn day, near to noon, when I read that letter, and, as I 
 leaned back in my chair, the red sunshine came in upon me, 
 and the smell of dead leaves, while upon the hop-vine one 
 late blossom, spared by the white frosts, and dropping across 
 the window, also put forth its scent, bringing Adeline, as it 
 were, right back into my arms, and the faintness passed 
 away from me with some tears, for I was weak, and a man 
 may not always be stronger than his nature. Now, when 
 Martha sounded the horn for dinner, and our hired man 
 came in from the hill-lot, where he was sowing wheat, I saw 
 that he had a letter in his hand of great size and thickne.-s ; 
 and, coming into the keeping-room where I sat, he said that 
 Squire White had brought it over from the Post-office as he 
 came along, thinking I would like to have it directly. I 
 was rather loth to open the great packet at first, for I be- 
 thought myself it was likely to be some Consociation pro- 
 ceedings, which were never otherwise than irksome to me, 
 and were now weary to think of, seeing the grasshopper 
 had become a burden. I reached my spectacles down from 
 the nail, and found the post-mark to be that of the Mormon 
 city ; and-with unsteady hand I opened the seal, and found 
 within several sheets of written letter-paper, directed to me 
 in Ada's writing, and a short letter from Johr Henderson, 
 which ran thus : 
 
 U< DEAR SIR, 
 
 "'My first wife, Adeline Frazer Henderson, departed 
 this life on the sixth of July, at my house in the city of 
 Great Salt Lake. Shortly before dying she called upon 
 
102 ROSE TERRY 
 
 me, in the presence of two sisters, and one of the Saints, to 
 deliver into your hands the enclosed packet, and tell you of 
 her death. According to her wish, I send the papers by 
 mail ; and, hoping you may yet be called to be a partaker 
 in the faith of the saints below, I remain your afflicted, yet 
 rejoicing friend, 
 
 " * JOHN HENDERSON. ' 
 
 " I was really stunned for a moment, my young friend, 
 not only with grief at my own loss, but with pity and sur- 
 prise at the entire deadening, as it appeared, of natural af- 
 fection in the man to whom I had given my daughter ; and 
 also my conscience was not free from offence, for I could 
 not but think that a more fervent and wrestling expostula- 
 tion, on the sin of marrying an unbeliever, might have saved 
 Adeline from sorrow in the flesh. However, I said as 
 much as seemed best at the time, and upon that reflection I 
 rested myself ; for he who adheres to a pure intention, need 
 not repent of his deeds afterward ; and the next day, when 
 my present anguish and weakness had somewhat abated, I 
 read the manuscript Ada had sent me. 
 
 " It was, doubtless, penned with much reluctance, for the 
 child's natural pride was great, and no less weighty subject 
 than her husband's salvation could have forced her to speak 
 of what she wrote for me : and, indeed, I should feel no 
 right to put the confidence into your hands, 'were not my 
 child beyond the reach of man's judgment, and did I not feel 
 it a sacred duty to protest, so long as life lasts, against this 
 abominable Mormon delusion, and the no less delusive pre- 
 text of doing evil that good may come. I cannot read 
 Ada's letter aloud to you, for there is to be a funeral at two 
 o'clock, which I must attend ; but I will give you the pa- 
 pers, and you may sit in my chair and read ; only, be 
 patient with my bees, if they come too near you, for they 
 like the hop-blossoms, and never sting unless you strike. " 
 
THE MORMON'S WIFE. 108 
 
 So saying, Parson Field gave me his leathern chair and 
 the papers, and I sat down in the hop-crowned porch, to 
 read Adeline Henderson's story, with a sort of reverence for 
 her that prompted me to turn the rustling pages carefully, 
 and feel startled if a door swung to in the quiet house, as if 
 I were eavesdropping ; but soon I ceased to hear, absorbed 
 in her letter, which began as the first did. 
 
 " DEAR UNCLE, 
 
 " To-day I begged John to write, and ask you to come 
 here. I could not write you since I came here but that 
 once, though your letters have been my great comfort, and 
 I added a few words of entreaty to his, because I am dying, 
 and it seems as if I must see you before I die ; yet I fear 
 the letter may not reach you, or you may be sick : and for 
 that reason I write now, to tell you how terrible a necessity 
 urged me to persuade you to such a journey. I can write 
 but little at a time, my side is so painful ; they call it slow- 
 consumption here, but I know better ; the heart within me 
 
 is turned to stone, I felt it then Ah ! you see my mind 
 
 wandered in that last line ; it still will return to the old 
 theme, like a fugue tune, such as we had in the Plainfield 
 singing-school. I remember one that went, ' The Lord is 
 just, is just, is just.' Is He? Dear Uncle, I must begin 
 at the beginning, or you never will know. I wrote you from 
 St. Louis, did I not ? I meant to. From there, we had a 
 dreary journey, not so bad to Fort Leaven worth, but after 
 that inexpressibly dreary, and set with tokens of the dead, 
 who perished before us. A long reach of prairie, day after 
 day, and night after night ; grass, and sky, and graves ; 
 grass, and sky, and graves ; till I hardly knew whether the 
 life I dragged along was life or death, as the thirsty, fever- 
 ish days wore on into the awful and breathless nights, when 
 every creature was dead asleep, and the very stars in heaven 
 grew dim in the hot, sleepy air dreadful days I I was 
 
104 ROSE TERRY. 
 
 too glad to see that bitter inland sea, blue as the fresh lakes, 
 with its gray islands of bare rock, and sparkling sand shores, 
 still more rejoiced to come upon the City itself, the rows of 
 quaint, bare houses, and such cool water-courses, and, over 
 all, near enough to rest both eyes and heart, the sunlit 
 mountains, 'the shadow of a great rock in a weary land.' 
 
 " I liked my new house well. It was too large for our 
 need, but pleasanter for its airiness, and the first thing I did 
 was to plant a little hop-vine, that I had brought all the way 
 with such great care, by the east porch. I wanted some- 
 thing like Plainfield in my home. I don't know why I lin- 
 ger so, I must write faster, for I grow weak all the time. 
 
 " I liked the City very well for awhile ; the neighbors 
 were kind, and John more than that; I could not be un- 
 happy with him 1 thought. We had a pretty garden, 
 
 for another man had owned the house before us, and we 
 had not to begin everything. Our next door neighbor, Mrs. 
 Colton, was good and kind to me, so was her daughter 
 Lizzy, a pretty girl, with fair hair, very fair. I wonder 
 John liked it after mine. The first great shock I had was 
 at a Mormon meeting. I cannot very well remember the 
 ceremony, because I grew so faint ; but I would not faint 
 away lest some one should see me. I only remember that it 
 was Mrs. Colton's husband with another wife being "sealed" 
 to him, as they say here. You don't know what that means, 
 Uncle Field ; it is one part of this religion of Satan, that 
 any man may have, if he will, three or four wives, perhaps 
 more. I only know that shameless man, with grown daugh- 
 ters, and the hair on his head snow-white, has taken two, 
 and his own wife, a firm believer in this faith ! looks on 
 calmly, and lives with them in peace. I know that, and my 
 soul sickened with disgust, but I did not fear ; not a thought, 
 not a dream, not a shadow of fear crossed me. I should 
 have despised myself forever if the idea had stained my 
 soul; my husband was my husband mine before God 
 
THE MORMON'S WIFE 105 
 
 and man ! and our child was in heaven ; how glad I was 
 she could never be a Mormon ! 
 
 " I was sorry for Mrs. Colton, though she did not need it, 
 and when I saw John leaning over their gate, or smoking in 
 the porch with the old man, I thought he felt so, too, and I 
 was glad to see him more sociable than ever he was in the 
 States.- After awhile he did not smoke, but talked with 
 Elder Colton, and then would come home and expound out 
 of the book of Mormon to me. I was very glad to have 
 frim earnest in his religion, but I could not be. Then he 
 grew very thoughtful, and had a silent fit, but I took no 
 notice of it, though I think now he meant to leave me, but 
 I began to pine a little for home, and when I worked in the 
 garden, and trained the vines about our veranda, I used to 
 wish he would help me as he did Lizzy Colton, but I still 
 remembered how good he was to pity and help them. 
 
 " O fool ! yet, I had rather be a fool over again than 
 have imagined that I am glad of, even now I did not 
 once suspect. 
 
 " But one day I remember every little thing in that 
 day even the slow ticking of the clock, as I tied up my 
 hop-vine; and after that I went into the garden, and sat 
 down 'on a little bench under the grape-trellis, and looked at 
 the mountains. How beautiful they were ! all purple in the 
 shadow of sunset, and the sky golden green above them, 
 with one scarlet cloud floating slowly upward: I hope I 
 shall never see a red cloud again. Presently, John came 
 and sat by me, and I laid my head on his shoulder ; I was 
 so glad to have him there it cured my homesickness ; 
 once or twice he began to say something, and stopped, but I 
 did not mind it. I wanted him to see a low line of mist 
 creeping down a canon in the mountains, and I stood up to 
 point it out ; so he rose, too, and in a strange, hurried way, 
 began to say something about the Mormon faith, and the 
 duties of a believer, which I did not notice either very 
 5 
 
106 ROSE TERRY. 
 
 much I was so full of admiring the scarlet cloud when, 
 like a sudden thunder-clap at my ear, I heard this quick, 
 resolute sentence : ' And so, according to the advice and best 
 judgment of the Saints, Elizabeth Colton will be sealed to 
 me, after two days, as my spiritual wife.' 
 
 "Then my soul fled out of my lips, in one cry I wv- 
 dead my heart turned to a stone, and nothing can melt it ! 
 I did not speak, or sigh, but sat down on the bench, and 
 John talked a great deal ; I think he rubbed my hands and 
 kissed me, but I did not feel it. I went away, by and by, 
 when it was dark, into the house and into my room. I 
 locked the door and looked at the wall till morning, then I 
 went down and sat in a chair till night ; and I drank, drank, 
 drank, like a fever. All the time cold water, but it never 
 reached my thirst. John came home, but he did not dare 
 touch me ; I was a dead corpse, with another spirit in it 
 not his wife she was dead, and gone to heaven on a bright 
 cloud. I remember being glad of that. 
 
 " In two days more he had a wife, and I was not his any 
 longer. I staid up stairs when he was in the house, and 
 locked my door, till, after a great many days, I began to feel 
 sorry for him. Oh ! how sorry ! for I knew I know he 
 will see himself some day with my eyes, but not till I die. 
 Then I found my lips full of blood one morning, and that 
 pleased me, for I knew it was a promise of the life to come ; 
 now I should go to heaven, where there are n't any Mor- 
 mons. 
 
 " I believe, though, people were kind to me all the time ; 
 for I remember they came and said things to me, and one 
 shook me a little to see if I felt ; and one woman cried. I 
 was glad of that, for I could n't cry. However, after three 
 months, I was better: worse, John said one day, and he 
 brought a doctor, but the man knew as well as I did so he 
 said nothing at all, and gave me some herb tea ; tell Aunt 
 Martha that. 
 
THE MORMON'S WIFE. 107 
 
 * Then I could walk out of doors, but I did not care to ; 
 only once I smelt the hop-blossoms, and that I could not 
 bear, so I went out and pulled up my hop-vine by the roots, 
 and laid it out, all straight, in the fierce sunshine : it died 
 directly. In the winter, John had another wife sealed to 
 him; I heard somebody say so; he did not tell me, and if 
 he had I could not help it. I found he had taken a little 
 adobe house for 'hose two, and I knew it was out of tender- 
 ness for my feelings he did so. Oh ! Uncle Field ! perhaps 
 he has loved me all this time ? I know better, though, than 
 that? Spring came, and I was very weak, and I grew not. 
 to care about anything; so I told John he could bring 
 those two women to this house if he wished ; I did not care, 
 only nobody must ever come into my room. He looked 
 ashamed, and pleased, too; but he brought them, and no- 
 body ever did come into my room. By and by Elizabeth 
 Colton brought a little baby down stairs, and its name was 
 Clara. Poor child ! poor little Mormon child ! I hope it 
 will die some time before it grows up ; only I should not 
 like it to come my side of heaven, for it had blue eyes like 
 John's. 
 
 " Then I grew more and more ill, and now I am really 
 dying, and no letter has come from you ! It takes so long 
 three whole months, and I have been more than a year in 
 the house with John Henderson and the two women. I 
 know I shall never see you, but I must speak, I must, even 
 out of the grave ; and I keep hearing that old fugue. ' The 
 Lord is just, is just, is just ; the Lord is just and good ! ' 
 Is he ? I know He is ; but I forget sometimes. Uncle 
 Field ! you must pray for John ! you must ! I cannot die 
 and leave him in his sins, his delusion ; he does not think it 
 is sin, but I know it. Pray ! pray ! dear Uncle : don't be 
 discouraged do not fear he will be undeceived some 
 time ; he will repent, I know ! The Lord is just, and I will 
 pray in heaven, and I will tell Nelly to, but you must. It 
 
108 ROSE TERRY. 
 
 says in the Bible, ' tne prayer of a righteous man ' ; and oh ! 
 I am not righteous ! I should not have married him ; it 
 was an unequal yoke, and I have borne the burden ; but I 
 loved him so much ! Uncle Field, I did not keep myself 
 from idols. Pray ! I shall be dead, but he lives. Pray 
 for him, and, if you will, for the little child because I 
 am dying. Dear Nelly ! " 
 
 "Are you blotting my letter, young man?" said Parson 
 Field, at my elbow, as I deciphered the last broken, tremb- 
 ling line of Ada's story. " Here I have been five minutes, 
 and you did not hear me ! " I really had blotted the letter ! 
 
BEYOND. 
 
 BY JOHN GIBSON LOCKHABT. 
 
 WHEN youthful faith hath fled, 
 Of loving take thy leave ; 
 Be constant to the dead, 
 The dead cannot deceive 
 
 Sweet modest flowers of spring, 
 How fleet your balmy day ! 
 
 And man's brief year can bring 
 No secondary May, 
 
 No earthly burst again 
 Of gladness out of gloom ; 
 
 Fond hope and vision vain, 
 Ungrateful to the tomb. 
 
 But 'tis an old belief 
 
 That on some solemn shore 
 
 Beyond the sphere of grief, 
 
 Dear friends shall meet once more,- 
 
 Beyond the sphere of time, 
 And sin and fate's control, 
 
 Serene in endless prime 
 Of body and of soul. 
 
 That creed I fain would keep, 
 That hope I'll not forego; 
 
 Eternal be the sleep, 
 Unless to waken so. 
 
AUTOBIOGRAPHICAL PASSAGES. 
 
 BY JOHN MILT)N. 
 
 T710R although a poet, soaring in the high region of his 
 Jj fancies, with his garland and singing-robes about him, 
 might, without apology, speak more of himself than I mean 
 to do ; yet for me sitting here below in the cool element of 
 prose, a mortal thing among many readers, of no empyreal 
 conceit, to venture and divulge unusual things of myself, I 
 shall petition to the gentler sort, it may not be envy to me. 
 I must say, therefore, that after I had, for my first years, by 
 the ceaseless diligence and care of my father, whom God rec- 
 ompense, been exercised to the tongues, and some sciences, as 
 my age would suffer, by sundry masters and teachers, both 
 at home and at the schools, it was found that whether aught 
 was imposed on me by them that had the overlooking, or be- 
 taken to of mine own choice in English, or other tongue, 
 prosing or versing, but chiefly this latter, the style, by certain 
 vital signs it had, was likely to live. But much latelier, in 
 the private academies of Italy, whither I was favored to re- 
 sort, perceiving that some trifles which I had in memory, 
 composed at under twenty or thereabout (for the manner is 
 that every one must give some proof of his wit and reading 
 there), met with acceptance above what was looked for ; 
 and other things which I had shifted in scarcity of books 
 and conveniences, to patch up amongst them, were received 
 with written encomiums, which the Italian is not forward to 
 bestow on men of this side the Alps, I began thus far to 
 
AUTOBIOGRAPHICAL PASSAGES. Ill 
 
 assent both to them and divers of my friends here at home, 
 and not less to an inward prompting, which now grew daily 
 upon me, that by labor and intent study, (which I take to be 
 my portion in this life,) joined with the strong propensity 
 of nature, I might perhaps leave something so written, to 
 after-times, as they should not willingly let it die. These 
 thoughts at once possessed me, and these other ; that if I 
 were certain to write as men buy leases, for three lives and 
 downward, there ought no regard be sooner had than to 
 God's glory, by the honor and instruction of my country. 
 For which cause, and not only for that I knew it would be 
 hard to arrive at the second rank among the Latins, I ap- 
 plied myself to that resolution which Ariosto followed against 
 the persuasions of Bembo, to fix all the industry and art I 
 could unite to the adorning of my native tongue; not to 
 make verbal curiosities the end, (that were a toilsome van- 
 ity,) but to be an interpreter and relater of the best and 
 sagest things among mine own citizens throughout this 
 island, in the mother dialect. That what the greatest and 
 choicest wits of Athens, Rome, or modern Italy, and those 
 Hebrews of old did for their country, I, in my proportion, 
 with this over and above, of being a Christian, might do for 
 mine ; not caring to be once named abroad, though perhaps I 
 could attain to that, but content with these British islands 
 as my world ; whose fortune hath hitherto been, that if the 
 Athenians, as some say, made their small deeds great and 
 renowned by their eloquent writers, England hath had her 
 noble achievements made small by the unskilful handling of 
 monks and mechanics. 
 
 Time serves not now, and perhaps I might seem too pro- 
 fuse, to give any certain account of what the mind at home, 
 in the spacious circuits of her musing, hath liberty to pro- 
 pose to herself, though of highest hope and hardest attempt- 
 ing. Whether that epic form, whereof the two poems of 
 Homer, and those other two of Virgil and Tasso are a diffuse, 
 
112 JOHN MILTON. 
 
 and the book of Job a brief model ; or whether the rules of 
 Aristotle herein are strictly to be kept, or nature to be fol- 
 lowed, which in them that know art, and use judgment, is 
 no transgression, but an enriching of art. And lastly, what 
 king or knight before the conquest, might be chosen, in 
 whom to lay the pattern of a Christian hero. And as Tasso 
 gave to a prince of Italy his choice, whether he would com- 
 mand him to write of Godfrey's expedition against the infi- 
 dels, or Belisarius against the Goths, or Charlemagne against 
 the Lombards ; if to the instinct of nature and the embold- 
 ening of art aught may be trusted, and that there be noth- 
 ing adverse in our climate, or the fate of this age, it haply 
 would be no rashness, from an equal diligence and inclina- 
 tion, to present the like offer in our own ancient stories. Or 
 whether those dramatic constitutions, wherein Sophocles 
 and Euripides reign, shall be found more doctrinal and ex- 
 emplary to a nation. The Scripture also affords us a divine 
 pastoral drama in the Song of Solomon, consisting of two 
 persons, and a double chorus, as Origen rightly judges ; and 
 the Apocalypse of St. John is the majestic image of a high 
 and stately tragedy, shutting up and intermingling her sol- 
 emn scenes and acts with a seven-fold chorus of hallelujahs 
 and harping symphonies. And this my opinion, the grave 
 authority of Pareus, commenting that book, is sufficient 
 to confirm. Or if occasion should lead, to imitate those 
 magnific odes and hymns, wherein Pindarus and Callima- 
 chus are in most things worthy, some others in their frame 
 judicious, in their matter most an end faulty. But those 
 frequent songs throughout the laws and prophets, beyond all 
 these, not in their divine argument alone, but in the very 
 critical art of composition, may be easily made appear over 
 all the kinds of lyric poesy to be incomparable. These 
 abilities, wheresoever they be found, are the inspired gift of 
 God, rarely bestowed, but yet to some (though most abuse) 
 in every nation : and are of power, beside the office of a 
 
AUTOBIOGRAPHICAL PASSAGES. 113 
 
 pulpit, to inbreed and cherish in a great people the seeds 
 of virtue and public civility ; to allay the perturbations of 
 the mind, and set the affections in right tune ; to celebrate 
 in glorious and lofty hymns the throne and equipage of 
 God's almightiness, and what he suffers to be wrought with 
 high providence in his church ; to sing victorious agonies of 
 martyrs and saints, the deeds and triumphs of just and pious 
 nations, doing valiantly through faith against the enemios of 
 Christ; to deplore the general relapses of kingdoms and 
 states from justice and God's true worship. Lastly, whatso- 
 ever in religion is holy and sublime, in virtue amiable or 
 grave, whatsoever hath passion or admiration in all the 
 changes of that which is called fortune from without, or the 
 wily subtleties and refluxes of man's thoughts from within ; 
 all these things, with a solid and treatable smoothness, to 
 point out and describe. Teaching over the whole book of 
 sanctity and virtue, through all the instances of example, 
 with such delight to those especially of soft and delicious 
 temper, who will not so much as look upon truth her- 
 self, unless they see her elegantly dressed ; that whereas the 
 paths of honesty and good life appear now rugged and diffi- 
 cult, though they be indeed easy and pleasant, they will then 
 appear to all men both easy and pleasant, though they were 
 rugged and difficult indeed. And what a benefit this would 
 be to our youth and gentry, may be soon guessed by what 
 we know of the corruption and bane which they suck in 
 daily from the writings and interludes of libidinous and 
 ignorant poetasters, who having scarce ever heard of that 
 which is the main consistence of a true poem, the choice of 
 such persons as they ought to introduce, and what is moral 
 and decent to each one, do for the most part lay up vicious 
 principles in sweet pills, to be swallowed down, and make 
 the taste of virtuous documents harsh and sour. But be- 
 cause the spirit of man cannot demean itself lively in this 
 body, without some recreating intermission of labor and 
 
114 JOHN 'MILTON. 
 
 serious things, it were happy for the commonwealth, if oui 
 magistrates, as in those famous governments of old, would 
 take into their care, not only the deciding of our conten- 
 tious law cases and brawls, but the managing of our public 
 sports and festival pastimes, that they might be, not s-uch as 
 were authorized awhile since, the provocations of drunken- 
 ness and lust, but such as may inure and harden our bodies, 
 by martial exercises, to all warlike skill and performance ; 
 and may civilize, adorn, and make discreet our minds, by 
 the learned and affable meeting of frequent academies, and 
 the procurement of wise and artful recitations, sweetened 
 with eloquent and graceful enticements to the love and 
 practice of justice, temperance, and fortitude, instructing 
 and bettering the nation at all opportunities, that the call of 
 wisdom and virtue may be heard everywhere, as Solomon 
 saith : " She crieth without, she uttereth her voice in the 
 streets, in the top of high places, in the chief con- 
 course, and in the openings of the gates." Whether this 
 may not be only in pulpits, but after another persuasive 
 method, at set and solemn paneguries, in theatres, porches, 
 or what other place or way may win most upon the people, 
 to receive at once both recreation and instruction ; let them 
 in authority consult. The thing which I had to say, and 
 those intentions which have lived within me, ever since I 
 could conceive myself anything worth to my country, I re- 
 turn to crave excuse, that urgent reason hath plucked from 
 me, by an abortive and foredated discovery. And the accom- 
 plishment of them lies not but in a power above man's to 
 promise ; but that none hath by more studious ways endeav- 
 ored, and with more unwearied spirit that none shall, that I 
 dare almost aver of myself, as far as life and free leisure will 
 extend ; and that the land had once enfranchised herself 
 from this impertinent yoke of prelacy, under whose inquisito- 
 rious and tyrannical duncery no free and splendid wit can 
 flourish. Neither do I think it shame to covenant with any 
 
AUTOBIOGRAPHICAL PASSAGES. 115 
 
 knowing leader, that for some few years yet I may go on 
 trust with him toward the payment of what I am now in- 
 debted, as being a work not to be raised from the heat of 
 youth, or the vapors of wine; like that which flows at 
 waste from the pen of some vulgar amorist, or the trencher- 
 fury of a rhyming parasite ; nor to be obtained by the invo- 
 cation of dame Memory and her syren daughters ; but by 
 devout prayer to that eternal Spirit, who can enrich with 
 all utterance and knowledge, and sends out his seraphim 
 with the hallowed fire of his altar, to touch and purify 
 the lips of whom he pleases. To this must be added indus- 
 trious and select reading, steady observation, insight into all 
 seemly and generous arts and affairs ; till which in some 
 measure be compassed, at mine own peril and cost, I refuse 
 not to sustain this expectation from as many as are not loth 
 to hazard so much credulity upon the best pledges that I 
 can give them. Although it nothing content me to have 
 disclosed thus much beforehand, but that I trust hereby to 
 make it manifest with what small willingness I endure to 
 interrupt the pursuit of no less hopes than these, and leave a 
 calm and pleasing solitariness, fed with cheerful and confi- 
 dent thoughts, to embark in a troubled sea of noises and 
 hoarse disputes ; from beholding the bright countenance of 
 truth in the quiet and still air of delightful studies, to come 
 into the dim reflection of hollow antiquities sold by the 
 seeming bulk, and there be fain to club quotations with men 
 whose learning and belief lies in marginal stuffings; who 
 when they have, like good sumpters, laid you down their 
 horse-load of citations and fathers at your door, with a rhap- 
 sody of who and who were bishops here or there, you may 
 take off their pack-saddles, their day's work is done, and 
 episcopacy, as they think, stoutly vindicated. Let any gen- 
 tle apprehension that can distinguish learned pains from 
 unlearned drudgery, imagine what pleasure or profoundness 
 can be in this, or what honor to deal against such adversa- 
 
116 JOHN MILTON. 
 
 ries. But were it the meanest under-service, if God, by his 
 secretary, conscience, enjoin it, it were sad for me if I should 
 draw back ; for me especially, now when all men offer their 
 aid to help, ease, and lighten the difficult labors of the 
 Church to whose service, by the intentions of my parents and 
 friends, I was destined of a child, and in mine own resolu- 
 tions, till coming to some maturity of years, and perceiving 
 what tyranny had invaded the Church, that he who would 
 take orders, must subscribe slave, and take an oath withal ; 
 which unless he took with a conscience that would retch, he 
 must either strait perjure, or split his faith ; I thought it 
 better to prefer a blameless silence, before the sacred office 
 of speaking, bought and begun with servitude and forswear- 
 ing. 
 
WAKENING. 
 
 BY WILLIAM ALLINGHAM. 
 
 A GOLDEN pen I mean to take, 
 A book of ivory white, 
 And in the mornings when I wake 
 
 The kind dream-thoughts to write, 
 Which come from heaven for love's support, 
 
 Like dews that fall at night. 
 For soon the delicate gifts decay, 
 As stirs the mired and smoky day. 
 
 
 
 u Sleep is like death," and after sleep 
 
 The world seems new begun ; 
 Its earnestness all clear and deep, 
 
 Its true solution won ; 
 White thoughts stand luminous and firm, 
 
 Like statues in the sun ; 
 Refreshed from super-sensuous founts, 
 The soul to purer vision mounts. - 
 
JOHN GRAHAM, 
 
 FIRST VISCOUNT OF DUNDEE. 
 BY EDMUND LODGE. 
 
 THIS remarkable man, whose name can never be for- 
 gotten while military skill and prowess, and the most 
 loyal and active fidelity to an almost hopeless cause, shall 
 challenge recollection, was the eldest son of Sir William 
 Graham, of Claverhouse, in the County of Forfar, by Jane, 
 fourth daughter of John Carnegy, first Earl of Northesk. 
 His family was a scion which branched off from the ancient 
 stock of the great House of Montrose, early in the fifteenth 
 century, by the second marriage of William Lord Graham, 
 of Kincardine, to Mary, second daughter of Robert the 
 Third, King of Scotland, and had gradually acquired consid- 
 erable estates, chiefly by the bounty of the Crown. He re- 
 ceived his education in the University of St. Andrews, which 
 he left to seek on the Continent the more polished qualifica- 
 tions of a private gentleman of large fortune, the sphere to 
 which he seemed to have been destined. In France, how- 
 over, the latent fire of his character broke forth ; he entered 
 as a volunteer into the army of Louis the Fourteenth ; and 
 having presently determined to adopt the military profes- 
 sion, accepted in 1672 a commission of Cornet in the Horse 
 Guards of William the Third, Prince of Orange, by whom, 
 in the summer of 1 674, he was promoted to be Captain of a 
 troop, for his signal gallantry at the battle of Serieffe, in 
 which indeed he saved the life of that Prince by a personal 
 
JOHN GRAHAM. 119 
 
 effort. lie asked soon after for the command of one of the 
 Scottish regiments in the Dutch service, and, strange to tell, 
 was refused, on which he threw up his commission, making 
 the cutting remark, that " the soldier who has not gratitude 
 cannot he brave," and returned to England, bringing with 
 him, however, the warmest recommendation* from William 
 to Charles the Second ; and Charles, who had been just then 
 misadvised to subdue the obstinacy of the Scottish Cove- 
 nanters by force of arms, appointed him to lead a body of 
 horse which had been raised in Scotland for that purpose, 
 and gave him full powers to act as he might think fit against 
 them, although under the nominal command of the Duke of 
 Monmouth. His conduct in the performance of this im- 
 politic and cruel commission has left a stain on his memory 
 scarcely to be glossed over by the brilliancy of his subse- 
 quent merits. Bred from his infancy in an enthusiastic ven- 
 eration to monarchy, and to the Established Church, his 
 hatred to the Whigs, as they were then called in Scotland, 
 was almost a part of his nature ; and, under the inf lence of 
 a temper which never allowed him to be lukewarm in any 
 pursuit, his zeal degenerated on this occasion with a fright- 
 ful facility into a spirit of persecution. He watched and 
 dispersed, with the most severe vigilance, the devotional 
 meetings of those perverse and miserable sectaries, and 
 forced thousands of them to subscribe, at the point of the 
 sword, to an oath utterly subversive of the doctrines which 
 they most cherished. But this was not the worst. On the 
 1st of July, 1679, having attacked a conventicle on Loudoun 
 Hill, in Ayrshire, the neighboring peasants rose suddenly on 
 a detachment of his troops, and, with that almost supernatu- 
 ral power which a pure thirst of vengeance alone will some- 
 times confer on mere physical force, defeated them with 
 considerable loss. The fancied disgrace annexed to this 
 check raised Graham's fury to the highest pitch, and he per- 
 mitted himself to retaliate on the unarmed Whigs by cruelties 
 
120 EDMUND LODGE. 
 
 inconsistent with the character of a brave man. The track 
 of his march was now uniformly marked by carnage ; the 
 refusal of his test was punished with instant death ; and Ihe 
 practice of these horrible excesses, which was continued for 
 some months, procured for him the appellation of " Bloody 
 Claverhouse " ; by which he is still occasionally mentioned 
 in that part of Scotland. He apologized for these horrors 
 by coldly remarking, that " if terror ended or prevented war, 
 it was true mercy." 
 
 It may be concluded that this intemperance had the full 
 approbation of the Crown, for we find that he was appointed 
 in 1082 Sheriff of the Shire of Wigton; received soon after 
 a commission of Captain in what was called the Royal Regi- 
 ment of Horse ; was sworn a Privy-Councillor in Scotland ; 
 and had a grant from the .King of the Castle of Dudhope, and 
 the office of Constable of Dundee. Nor was it less acceptable 
 such is the rage of party, especially when excited by re- 
 ligious discord to the Scottish Episcopalians, who from that 
 time seemed to have reposed in him the highest confidence. 
 James, however, in forming on his accession a new Privy 
 Council for that country, was prevailed on to omit his name, 
 on the ground of his having connected himself in marriage 
 with the fanatical family of Cochrane, Earl of Dundonald, 
 but that umbrage was soon removed, and in 1686 he was 
 restored to his seat in the Council, and appointed a Brigadier- 
 General; in 1688 promoted to the rank of Major-General ; 
 and, on the 12th of November in that year, created by 
 patent to him, and the heirs male of his body, with remain- 
 der, in default of such issue, to his other heirs male, Viscount 
 of Dundee, and Baron Graham of Claverhouse, in Scotland. 
 The gift of these dignities was, in fact, the concluding act of 
 James's expiring government. Graham, who was then at- 
 tending that unhappy Prince in London, used every effort 
 that good sense and high spirit could suggest, to induce him to 
 remain in his capital, and await there with dignified firmness 
 
JOHN GRAHAM. 121 
 
 the arrival of the Prince of Orange ; undertaking for himself 
 to collect, with that promptitude which was almost peculiar 
 to him, ten thousand of the King's disbanded troops, and at 
 their head to annihilate the Dutch forces which William had 
 brought with him. Perhaps there existed not on the face of 
 the earth another man so likely to redeem such an engage- 
 ment ; but James, depressed and irresolute, refused the offer. 
 Struck, however, with the zeal and bravery, and indeed with 
 the personal affection, which had dictated it, he intrusted to 
 Dundee the direction of all his military affairs in Scotland, 
 whither that nobleman repaired just at the time that James 
 fled from London. 
 
 When he arrived at Edinburgh he found a Convention sit- 
 ting, as in London, of the Estates of the country, in which 
 he took his place. He complained to that assembly that a 
 design had been formed to assassinate him ; required that all 
 strangers should be removed from the town ; and, his request 
 having been denied, he left Edinburgh at the head of a troop 
 of horse, which he had hastily formed there of soldiers who 
 had deserted in England from his own regiment. In the 
 short interval afforded by the discussion of this matter, he 
 formed his plans. After a conference with the Duke of 
 Gordon, who then held the Castle for James, he set out for 
 Stirling, where he called a Parliament of the friends of that 
 Prince, and the revolutionists in Scotland saw their influ- 
 ence, even within a few days, dispelled as it were by magic, in 
 obedience to his powerful energies. He was, in a manner, 
 without troops, depending on the affections of those around 
 him, which he had heated to enthusiasm, when a force sent 
 by the Convention to seize his person seemed to remind him 
 that he must have an army. He retired therefore into Loch- 
 aber; summoned a meeting of the chiefs of clans in the 
 Highlands, and presently found himself at the head of six 
 thousand of the hardy natives, well armed and accoutred, 
 He now wrote to James, who, in compliance with French 
 
122 EDMUND LODGE. 
 
 counsels, was wasting his time and means in Ireland, con- 
 juring him to embark with a part of his army for Scotland, 
 " whore," as he told the king, " there were no regular troops, 
 except four regiments, which William had lately sent down ; 
 where his presence would fix the wavering, and intimidate 
 the timid ; and where hosts of shepherds would start up war- 
 riors at the first wave of his banner upon their mountains." 
 With the candor and plainness of a soldier and a faithful 
 servant, he besought James to be content with the exercise of 
 his own religion, and to leave in Ireland the Earl of Melfort, 
 Secretary of State, between whom and himself some jealousy 
 existed which might be prejudicial to a service in which they 
 were alike devotedly sincere, however they might differ as to 
 the best means of advancing it. James rejected his advice. 
 " Dundee was furnished," says Burnet, " with some small 
 store of arms and ammunition, and had kind promises, en- 
 couraging him, and all that joined with him." 
 
 Left now to his own discretion and his own resources, he 
 displayed, together with the greatest military qualifications, 
 and the most exalted generosity and disinterestedness, all the 
 subtlety of a refined politician. On his arrival at Inverness 
 he found that a discord had long subsisted between the 
 people of the town and some neighboring chiefs, on an al- 
 leged debt from the one to the other, and that the two parties, 
 with their dependants, had assembled in arms to decide the 
 quarrel. He heard the allegations of the principals on each 
 side, with an affectation of the exactness of judicial inquiry, 
 and then, having convened the entire mass of the conflicting 
 parties in public, reproached them with the most cutting 
 severity, that they, " who were all equally friends to King 
 James, should be preparing, at a time when he most needed 
 their friendship, to draw those daggers against each other 
 which ought to be plunged only into the breasts of his ene- 
 mies." He then paid from his own purse the debt in dis- 
 pute ; and the late litigants, charmed by the grandeur of his 
 
JOHN GRAHAM. 128 
 
 conduct, instantly placed themselves in a cordial union under 
 his banner. To certain other chiefs, upon whose estates the 
 Earl of Argyle. who sought to restore his importance by at- 
 taching himself to the revolutionary party, had ancient claims 
 in law, and to others, who had obtained grants from the 
 Crown of some of that nobleman's forfeited lands, he repre- 
 sented the peril in which they would be placed by the suc- 
 cess of William's enterprise on the British throne, and 
 gained them readily to his beloved cause. He addressed 
 himself with signal effect to all the powerful men of the 
 north of Scotland; fomented the angry feelings of .hose 
 who thought themselves neglected by the new government; 
 flattered the vanity of those who, indifferent to the affairs of 
 either party, sought simply for power and importance ; cor- 
 rupted several officers of the regiments which were in 
 preparation to be sent against him ; and even managed to 
 maintain a constant, correspondence with some members 
 of the Privy Council, by whom he was regularly apprised 
 of the plans contrived from time to time to counteract his 
 gigantic efforts. Nay, he contrived to detach, as it were in 
 a moment, from Lord Murray, heir to the Earl of Athol, 
 a body of a thousand men, raised by that nobleman on his 
 father's estates ; a defection of Highland vassals which had 
 never till then occurred. " While Murray," says my author, 
 u was reviewing them, they quitted their ranks ; ran to an 
 adjoining brook ; filled their bonnets with water ; drank to 
 King James's health; and, with pipes playing, marched off 
 to Lord Dundee." 
 
 So acute and experienced a commmJer as William could 
 not be long unconscious of the importance of such an enemy. 
 He despatched into Scotland, at the head of between five and 
 six thousand picked troops, General M'Kay, who had long 
 served him in Holland with the highest military reputation. 
 In the mean time, James, who had been apprised of this dis- 
 position, sent orders to Dundee not to hazard a battle till 
 
124 EDMUND LODGE. 
 
 the arrival of a force from Ireland, which he now promised. 
 Two months, however, elapsed before it appeared, which 
 Dundee, burning with impatience, was necessitated to pass 
 in the mountains, in marches of unexampled rapidity, in 
 furious partial attacks, and masterly retreats. It has been 
 well said of him, that " the first messenger of his approach 
 was generally his own army in fight, and that the first intel- 
 ligence of his retreat, brought accounts that he was already 
 out of his enemy's reach." The long-expected aid at length 
 arrived, in the last week of June, 1689, consisting only of 
 five hundred raw and ill-provided recruits, but he instantly 
 made ready for action. He advanced to meet M'Kay, who 
 was preparing to invest the Castle of Blair, in Athol, a 
 fortress the possession whereof enabled James's army to 
 maintain a free communication between the northern and 
 southern Highlands, and determined to attack William's 
 troops on a small plain at the mouth of the pass of Killi- 
 cranky, after they should have marched through that re- 
 markable defile, on their road to Blair. On the 16th of 
 July, at noon, M'Kay's army arrived on the plain, and dis- 
 covered Dundee in array on the opposite hills. He had 
 resolved, for reasons abounding with military genius, to 
 defer his onset till the evening, and M'Kay, by various ex- 
 pedi^nts vainly tempted him during the day to descend : at 
 length, half an hour before sunset, his Highlanders rushed 
 down with the celerity and the fury of lions, and William's 
 army was in an instant completely routed. Dundee, who 
 had fought on foot, now mounted his horse, and flew towards 
 the pass, to cut off their retreat, when, looking back, he found 
 that he had outstripped his men, and was nearly alone. He 
 halted, and, wavering his arm in the air, pointed to the pass, 
 as a signal to them to hasten their march, and to occupy it. 
 At that moment a ball from a musket aimed at him lodged 
 in his body, immediately under the arm so raised. He fell 
 from his horse, and, fainting, was carried off the field ; but 
 
JOHN GRAHAM. 125 
 
 soon after recovering his senses for a few seconds, he hastily 
 inquired " how things went," and on being answered " all 
 was well," " Then," said he, " I am well," and expired. 
 William, on hearing of his death, said, " The war in Scot- 
 land is now ended." 
 
 The memory of this heroic partisan has been cherished in 
 the hearts, and celebrated by the pens, of numbers of his 
 countrymen. A poet thus pathetically addresses his shade, 
 and bewails the loss sustained by Scotland in his death : 
 
 " Ultime Scotorum, potuit quo sospite solo 
 
 Libertas patriae salva fuisse tuce. 
 Tc moricnte novos accepit Scotia cives, 
 
 Accepitque novos to moriente Deos. 
 Ilia tibi superesse negat, tu non potes illi. 
 
 Ergo Caledonia, nomen inane, vale ! 
 Tuque vale gentis priscae fortissimo ductor, 
 
 Optime Scotorum, atque ultimo, Grame, vale 1 " 
 
 And Sir John Dalrymple has left us some particulars of his 
 military character exquisitely curious and interesting. " In 
 his marches," says that author, " his men frequently wanted 
 bread, salt, and all liquors except water, during several weeks, 
 yet were ashamed to complain, when they observed that their 
 commander lived not more delicately than themselves. If 
 anything good was brought him to eat, he sent it to a faint 
 or sick soldier. If a soldier was weary, he offered to carry 
 his arms. He kept those who were with him from sinking 
 under their fatigues, not so much by exhortation as by pre- 
 venting them from attending to their sufferings ; for this 
 reason Ii3 walked on foot with the men ; now by the side of 
 one clan, and anon by that of another : he amused them with 
 jokes ; he flattered them with his knowledge of their gen- 
 ealogies ; he animated them by a recital of the deeds of their 
 ancestors, and of the verses of their bards. It was one of 
 his maxims that no general should fight with an irregular 
 army unless he was acquainted with every man he com- 
 
126 EDMUND LODGE. 
 
 manded. Yet, with these habits of familiarity, the severity 
 of his discipline was dreadful : the only punishment he in- 
 flicted was death. All other punishments, he said, disgraced 
 a gentleman, and all who were with him were of that rank ; 
 but that death was a relief from the consciousness of crime. 
 It is reported of him that having seen a youth fly in his first 
 action, he pretended he had sent him to the rear on a mes- 
 sage. The youth fled a second time he brought him to 
 the front of the army, and saying that ' a gentleman's son 
 ought not to fall by the hands of a common executioner,' shot 
 him with his own pistol." 
 
 In society he is said to have been as much distinguished 
 by a delicacy and softness of manners and temper, and by 
 the most refined politeness, as he was by his sternness in war. 
 Sir Walter Scott, in his Romance of Old Mortality, in which 
 facts and fiction are blended with an uncommon felicity, 
 gives us the following picture of his person and demeanor, 
 evidently not the work of fancy, and probably in substance 
 the result of respectable and inveterate tradition : 
 
 " Graham of Claverhouse was rather low of stature, and 
 slightly, though elegantly, formed ; his gesture, language, and 
 manners, were those of one whose life had been spent among 
 the noble and the gay. His features exhibited even femi- 
 nine regularity. An oval face, a straight and well-formed 
 nose, dark hazel eyes, a complexion just sufficiently tinged 
 with brown to save it from the charge of effeminacy, a short 
 upper lip, curved upwards like that of a Grecian statue, and 
 slightly shaded by small mustachios of light brown, joined to 
 a profusion of long curled locks of the same color, which fell 
 down on each side of his face, contributed to form such a 
 countenance as limners like to paint, and ladies to look upon. 
 The severity of his character, as well as the higher attributes 
 of undaunted and enterprising valor which even his enemies 
 were compelled to admit, lay concealed under an exterior 
 which seemed adapted to the court or the saloon rather than 
 
JOHN GRAHAM. 127 
 
 to the field. The same gentleness and gayety of expression 
 which reigned in his features seemed to inspire his actions 
 and gestures ; and, on the whole, he was generally esteemed, 
 ai first sight, rather qualified to be the votary of pleasure 
 than of ambition. But under this soft exterior was hidden a 
 spirit unbounded in daring and in aspiring, yet cautious and 
 prudent as that of Machiavel himself. Profound in politics, 
 and imbued, of course, with that disregard for individual 
 rights which its intrigues usually generate, this leader was 
 cool in pursuing success, careless of death himself, and ruth- 
 le3 in inflicting it upon others. Such are the characters 
 formed in times of civil discord, when the highest qualities, 
 perverted by party spirit, and inflamed by habitual opposi- 
 tion, are too often combined with vices and excesses, which 
 C* jprive them at once of their merit and of their lustre." 
 
THE BURIAL-MARCH OF DUNDEE/ 
 
 BY W. EDMONDSTOUNE AYTOUN. 
 
 SOUND the fife, and cry the slogan, 
 Let the pribroch shake the air 
 With its wild triumphal music, 
 
 Worthy of the freight we bear. 
 Let the ancient hills of Scotland 
 
 Hear once more the battle-song 
 Swell within their glens and valleys 
 
 As the clansmen march along ! 
 Never from the field of combat, 
 
 Never from the deadly fray, 
 Was a nobler trophy carried 
 
 Than we bring with us to-day, 
 Never, since the valiant Douglas 
 
 On his dauntless bosom bore 
 Good King Robert's heart the priceless 
 
 To our dear Redeemer's shore ! 
 Lo ! we bring with us the hero, 
 
 Lo ! we bring the conquering Graeme, 
 Crowned as best beseems a victor 
 
 From the altar of his fame ; 
 Fresh and bleeding from the baftle 
 
 Whence his spirit took its flight, 
 
 * John Graham of Claverhouse, Viscount Dundee, was killed at 
 the battle of Kflliecrankie in Scotland. 
 
THE BURIAL-MARCH OF DUNDEE. 
 
 Midst the crashing charge of squadrons, 
 
 And the thunder of the fight ! 
 Strike, I say, the notes of triumph, 
 
 As we march o'er moor and lea 1 
 Is there any here will venture 
 
 To bewail our dead Dundee ? 
 Let the widows of the traitors 
 
 Weep until their eyes are dim ! 
 Wail ye may full well for Scotland, 
 
 Let none dare to mourn for him ! 
 See ! above his glorious body 
 
 Lies the royal banner's fold ; 
 See ! his valiant blood is mingled 
 
 With its crimson and its gold. 
 See how calm he looks, and stately, 
 
 Like a warrior on his shield, 
 Waiting till the flush of morning 
 
 Breaks along the battle-field 1 
 See never more, my comrades, 
 
 Shall we see that falcon eye 
 Redden with its inward lightning, 
 
 As the hour of fight drew nigh ! 
 Never shall we hear the voice that 
 
 Clearer than the trumpet's call, 
 Bade us strike for King and Country, 
 
 Bade us win the field, or fall ! 
 Oa the heights of Killiecrankie 
 
 Yester-morn our army lay : 
 Slowly rose the mist in columns 
 
 From the river's broken way ; 
 Hoarsely roared the swollen torrent, 
 
 And the Pass was wrapt in gloom, 
 When the clansmen rose together 
 
 From their lair amidst the broom. 
 6* 
 
130 W. EDMONDSTOUNE AYTOUN. 
 
 Then we belted on our tartans, 
 
 And our bonnets down we drew, 
 And we felt our broadswords' edges, 
 
 And we proved them to be true ; 
 And we prayed the prayer of soldiers, 
 
 And we cried the gathering-cry, 
 And we clasped the hands of kinsmen, 
 
 And we swore to do or die ! 
 Then our leader rode before us 
 
 On his war-horse black as night, 
 Well the Cameronian rebels 
 
 Know that charger in the fight ! 
 And a cry of exultation 
 
 From the bearded warriors rose ; 
 For we loved the house of Claver'se, 
 
 And we thought of good Montrose. 
 But he raised his hand for silence 
 
 " Soldiers ! I have sworn a vow: 
 Ere the evening star shall glisten 
 
 On Schehallion's lofty brow, 
 Either we shall rest in triumph, 
 
 Or another of the Graemes 
 Shall have died in battle-harness 
 
 For his Country and King James I 
 Think upon the Royal Martyr, 
 
 Think of what his race endure, 
 Think of him whom butchers murdered 
 
 On the field of Magus Muir : 
 By his sacred blood I charge ye, 
 
 By the ruined hearth and shrine, 
 6y the blighted hopes of Scotland, 
 
 By your injuries and mine, 
 Strike this day as if the anvil 
 
 Lay beneath your blows the while, 
 
THE BURIAL-MARCH OF DUNDEE. 131 
 
 Be they covenanting traitors, 
 
 Or the brood of false Argyle ! 
 Strike ! and drive the trembling rebels 
 
 Backwards o'er the stormy Forth ; 
 Let them tell their pale Convention 
 
 How they fared within the North. 
 Let them tell that Highland honor 
 
 Is not to be bought nor sold, 
 That we scorn their prince's anger 
 
 As we loathe his foreign gold. 
 Strike ! and when the fight is over, 
 
 If ye look in vain for me, 
 Where the dead are lying thickest, 
 
 Search for him that was Dundee ! " 
 
 Loudly then the hills re-echoed 
 
 "With our answer to his call, 
 But a deeper echo sounded 
 
 In the bosoms of us all. 
 For the lands of wide Breadalbane, 
 
 Not a man who heard him speak 
 Would that day have left the battle. 
 
 Burning eye and flushing cheek 
 Told the clansmen's fierce emotion, 
 
 And they harder drew their breath ; 
 For their souls were strong within them, 
 
 .Stronger than the grasp of death. 
 Soon we heard a challenge-trumpet 
 
 Sounding in the Pass below, 
 And the distant tramp of horses, 
 
 And the voices of the foe : 
 Down we crouched amid the bracken, 
 
 Till the Lowland ranks drew near, 
 Panting like the hounds in summer, 
 
 When they scent the stately deer 
 
132 W. EDMONDSTOUNE AYTOUN. 
 
 From the dark defile emerging, 
 
 Next we saw the squadrons come, 
 Leslie's foot and Leven's troopers 
 
 Marching to the tuck of drum ; 
 Thropgh the scattered wood of birches, 
 
 O'er the broken ground and heath, 
 Wound the long battalion slowly, 
 
 Till they gained the plain beneath ; 
 Then we bounded from our covert, 
 
 Judge how looked the Saxons then, 
 When they saw the rugged mountains 
 
 Start to life with armed men ! 
 Like a tempest down the ridges 
 
 Swept the hurricane of steel, 
 Rose the slogan of Macdonald, 
 
 Flashed the broadsword of Lochiel ! 
 Vainly sped the withering volley 
 
 'Mongst the foremost of our band, 
 On we poured until we met them, 
 
 Foot to foot, and hand to hand. 
 Horse and man went down like drift-wood 
 
 When the floods are black at Yule, 
 And their carcasses are whirling 
 
 In the Garry's deepest pool. 
 Horse and man went down before us, 
 
 Living foe there tarried none 
 On the field of Killiecrankie, 
 
 When that stubborn fight was done ! 
 
 And the evening star was shining 
 On Schehallion's distant head, 
 
 When we wiped our bloody broadswords, 
 And returned to count the dead. 
 
 There we found him gashed and gory. 
 Stretched upon the cumbered plain, 
 
THE BURIAL-MARCH OF DUNDEE. 133 
 
 As he told us where to seek him, 
 
 In the thickest of the slain. 
 And a smile was on his visage, 
 
 For within his dying ear 
 Pealed the joyful note of triumph, 
 
 And the clansmen's clamorous cheer ? 
 So, amidst the battle's thunder, 
 
 Shot, and steel, and scorching flame, 
 In the glory of his manhood 
 
 Passed the spirit of the Graeme ! 
 
 Open wide the vaults of Atholl, 
 
 Where the bones of heroes rest, 
 Open wide the hallowed portals 
 
 To receive another guest ! 
 Last of Scots, and last of freemen, 
 
 Last of all that dauntless race, 
 Who would rather die unsullied 
 
 Than outlive the land's disgrace ! 
 O thou lion-hearted warrior ! 
 
 Reck not of the after-time ; 
 Honor may be deemed dishonor, 
 
 Loyalty be called a crime. 
 Sleep in peace with kindred ashes 
 
 Of the noble and the true, 
 Hands that never failed their country, 
 
 Hearts that never baseness knew. 
 Sleep ! and till the latest trumpet 
 
 Wakes the dead from earth and sea, 
 Scotland shall not boast a braver 
 
 Chieftain than our own Dundee I 
 
MIGNON AS AN ANGEL 
 
 BY GOETHE. 
 
 IT chanced that the birthday of two twin-sisters, whose be- 
 havior had been always very good, was near; I prom- 
 ised that, on this occasion, the little present they had so 
 well deserved should be delivered to them by an angel. 
 They were on the stretch of curiosity regarding this phenom- 
 enon. I had chosen Mignon for the part ; and accordingly, 
 at the appointed day, I had her suitably equipped in a 
 long light snow-white dress. She was, of course, provided 
 with a golden girdle round her waist, and a golden fillet on 
 her hair. I at first proposed to omit the wings ; but the 
 young ladies who were decking her, insisted on a pair of 
 large golden pinions, in preparing which they meant to 
 show their highest art. Thus did the strange apparition, 
 with a lily in the one hand, and a little basket in the other, 
 glide in among the girls : she surprised even me. " There 
 comes the angel ! " said I. The children all shrank back ; 
 at last they cried : " It is Mignon ! " yet they durst not 
 venture to approach the wondrous figure. 
 
 " Here are your gifts," said she, putting dow,n the basket 
 They gathered around her, they viewed, they felt, they 
 questioned her. 
 
 " Art though an angel ? " asked one of them 
 
 " I wish I were," said Mignon. 
 
 Why dost thou bear a lily ? " 
 
MIGNON AS AN ANGEL. 135 
 
 u So pure and so open should my heart be ; then were 1 
 happy." 
 
 " What wings are these ? Let us see them ! " 
 
 ''They represent far finer ones, which are not yet un- 
 folded." 
 
 And thus significantly did she answer all their other 
 childlike, innocent inquiries. The little party having satis- 
 fied their curiosity, and the impression of the show begin- 
 ning to abate, we were for proceeding to undress the little 
 angel. This, however, she resisted : she took her cithern ; 
 she seated herself here, on this high writing-table, and sang 
 a little song with touching grace : 
 
 Such let me seem, till such I be ; 
 
 Take not my snow-white dress away ; 
 Soon from this dusk of earth I flee 
 
 Up to the glittering lands of day. 
 
 There first a little space I rest, 
 Then wake so glad, to scene so kind ; 
 
 In earthly robes no longer drest, 
 This band, this girdle left behind. 
 
 And those calm shining sons of morn, 
 
 They ask not who is maid or boy ; 
 No robes, no garments there are worn, 
 
 Our body pure from sin's alloy. 
 
 Through little life not much I toiled, 
 Yet anguish long this heart has wrung, 
 
 Untimely woe my blossom spoiled ; 
 Make me again forever young ! 
 
THE CAGE AT CRANFORD. 
 
 BY MKS. GASKELL. 
 
 HAVE I told you anything about my friends at Cran* 
 ford since the year 1856? I think not. 
 
 You remember the Gordons, don't you ? She that was 
 Jessie Brown, who married her old love, Major Gordon : 
 and from being poor became quite a rich lady : but for all 
 that never forgot any of her old friends in Cranford. 
 
 Well ! the Gordons were travelling abroad, for they were 
 very fond of travelling ; people who have had to spend part 
 of their lives in a regiment always are, I think. They were 
 now at Paris, in May, 1856, and were going to stop there, 
 and in the neighborhood all summer, but Mr. Ludovic was 
 coming to England soon ; so Mrs. Gordon wrote me word. 
 I was glad she told me, for just then I was waiting to make 
 a little present to Miss Pole, with whom I was staying ; so 
 I wrote to Mrs. Gordon, and asked her to choose me out 
 something pretty and new and fashionable, that would be 
 acceptable to Miss Pole. Miss Pole had just been talking 
 a great deal about Mrs. Fitz Adam's caps being so unfash- 
 ionable, which I suppose made me put in that word fashion- 
 able ; but afterwards I wished I had sent to say my present 
 was not to be too fashionable ; for there is such a thing, I 
 can assure you ! The price of my present was not to be 
 more than twenty shillings, but that is a very handsome sum 
 if you put it in that way, though it may not sound no much 
 if you only call it a sovereign. 
 
THE CAGE AT CRANI ORD. 137 
 
 Mrs. Gordon wrote back to me, pleased, as she always 
 was, with doing anything for her old friends. She told nie 
 she had been out for a day's shopping before going into the 
 country, and had got a cage for herself of the newest and 
 most elegant description, and had thought that she could not 
 do better than get another like it as my present for Miss 
 Pole, as cages were so much better made in Paris than any- 
 where else. I was rather dismayed when I read this letter, 
 for however pretty a cage might be, it was something for 
 Miss Pole's own self, and not for her parrot, that I had in- 
 tended to get. Here had I been finding ever so many rea- 
 sons against her buying a new cap at Johnson's fashion-show, 
 because I thought that the present which Mrs. Gordon was 
 to choose for me in Paris might turn out to be an elegant 
 and fashionable head-dress ; a kind of cross between a tur- 
 ban and a cap, as I see those from Paris mostly are ; and 
 now I had to veer round, and advise her to go as fast as she 
 could, and secure Mr. Johnson's cap before any other pur- 
 chaser snatched it up. But Miss Pole was too sharp for me. 
 
 " Why, Mary," said she, " it was only yesterday you were 
 running down that cap like anything. You said, you know, 
 that lilac was too old a color for me ; and green too young ; 
 and that the mixture was very unbecoming." 
 
 " Yes, I know," said I ; " but I have thought better of it. 
 I thought about it a great deal last night, and I think I 
 thought they would neutralize each other; and the shad- 
 ows of any color are, you know something I know com- 
 plementary colors." I was not sure of my own meaning, 
 but I had an idea in my head, though I could not express it. 
 She took me up shortly. 
 
 " Child, you don't know what you are saying. And be- 
 sides, I don't want compliments at my time of life. I lay 
 awake, too, thinking of the cap. I only buy one ready-made 
 once a year, and of course it 's a matter for consideration , 
 and I came to the conclusion that you were quite right." 
 
138 MRS. GASKELL. 
 
 "O dear Miss Pole! I was quite wrong; if you only 
 knew I did think it a very pretty cap only " 
 
 " Well ! do just finish what you 've got to say. You 're 
 almost as bad as Miss Matty in your way of talking, without 
 being half as good as she is in other ways ; though I 'ni very 
 fond of you, Mary, I don't mean I am not ; but you mus'. see 
 you 're very off and on, and very muddle-headed. It 's the 
 truth, so you will not mind my saying so." 
 
 It was just because it did seem like the truth at that time 
 that I did mind her saying so ; and, in despair, I thought I 
 would tell her all. 
 
 " I did not mean what I said ; I don't think lilac too old 
 or green too young : and I think the mixture very becoming 
 to you ; and I think you will never get such a pretty cap 
 again, at least in Cranford." It was fully out, so far, at 
 least. 
 
 " Then, Mary Smith, will you tell me what you did mean, 
 by speaking as you did, and convincing me against my will, 
 and giving me a bad night ? " 
 
 " I meant O Miss Pole, I meant to surprise you with 
 a present from Paris ; and I thought it would be a cap. 
 Mrs. Gordon was to choose it, and Mr. Ludovic to bring it. 
 I dare say it is in England now ; only it's not a cap. And 
 I did not want you to buy Johnson's cap, when I thought I 
 was getting another for you." 
 
 Miss Pole found this speech " muddle-headed," I have no 
 doubt, though she did not say so, only making an odd noise 
 of perplexity. I went on : "I wrote to Mrs. Gordon, and 
 asked her to get you a present something new and pretty. 
 I meant it to be a dress, but I suppose I did not say so ; I 
 thought it would be a cap, for Paris is so famous for caps, 
 and it is " 
 
 " You 're a good girl, Mary," (I was past thirty, but did 
 not object to being called a girl ; and, indeed, I generally 
 felt like a girl at Cranford, where everybody was so much 
 
THE CAGE AT CRANFORD. 139 
 
 older than I was,) " but when you want a thing, say what 
 you want ; it is the best way in general. And now I sup- 
 pose Mrs. Gordon has bought something quite different ? 
 a pair of shoes, I dare say, for people talk a deal of Paris 
 shoes. Anyhow, I 'm just as much obliged to you, Mary, 
 my dear. Only you should not go and spend your money 
 on me." 
 
 " It was not much money ; and it was not a pair of shoes. 
 You '11 let me go and get the cap, won't you ? It was so 
 pretty somebody will be sure to snatch it up." 
 
 " I don't like getting a cap that 's sure to be unbecoming." 
 
 " But it is not ; it was not. I never saw you look so well 
 in anything," said I. 
 
 " Mary, Mary, remember who is the father of lies ! " 
 
 " But he 's not my father," exclaimed I, in a hurry, for I 
 saw Mrs. Fitz Adam go down the street in the direction of 
 Johnson's shop. " I '11 eat my words ; they were all false : 
 only just let me run down and buy you that cap that 
 pretty cap." 
 
 " Well ! run off, child. I liked it myself till you put me 
 out of taste with it." 
 
 I brought it back in triumph from under Mrs. FitzAdam's 
 very nose, as she was hanging in meditation over it ; and 
 the more we saw of it, the more we felt pleased with our 
 purchase. We turned it on this side, and we turned it on 
 that ; and though we hurried it away into Miss Pole's bed- 
 room at the sound of a double knock at the door, when we 
 found it was only Miss Matty and Mr. Peter, Miss Pole 
 could not resist the opportunity of displaying it, and said in 
 a solemn way to Miss Matty : " Can I speak to you for a 
 few minutes in private ? " And I knew feminine delicacy 
 too well to explain what this grave prelude was to lead to ; 
 aware how immediately Miss Matty's anxious tremor would 
 be allayed by the sight of the cap. I had to go on talk- 
 ing to Mr. Peter, however, when I would far rather have 
 
140 MRS. GASKELL. 
 
 been in the bedroom, and heard the observations and com- 
 ments. 
 
 We talked of the new cap all day ; what gowns it would 
 suit ; whether a certain bow was not rather too coquettish 
 for a woman of Miss Pole's age. " No longer young," as 
 she called herself, after a little struggle with the words, 
 though at sixty-five she need not have blushed as if she 
 were telling a falsehood. But at last the cap was put away, 
 and with a wrench we turned our thoughts from the subject 
 We had been silent for a little while, each at our work with 
 a candle between us, when Miss Pole began : 
 
 " It was very kind of you, Mary, to think of giving me a 
 present from Paris." 
 
 " Oh, I was only too glad to be able to get you some- 
 thing! I hope you will like it, though it is not what I 
 expected." 
 
 " I am sure I shall like it. And a surprise is always so 
 pleasant." 
 
 " Yes ; but I think Mrs. Gordon has made a very odd 
 choice." 
 
 " I wonder what it is. I don't like to ask, but there 's a 
 great deal in anticipation ; I remember hearing dear Miss 
 Jenkyns say that ' anticipation was the soul of enjoyment/ 
 or something like that. Now there is no anticipation in a 
 surprise ; that 's the worst of it." 
 
 " Shall I tell you what it is ? " 
 
 " Just as you like, my dear. If it is any pleasure to you, 
 I am quite willing to hear." 
 
 "Perhaps I had better not. It is something quite dif- 
 ferent to what I expected, and meant to have got ; and I 'm 
 not sure if I like it as well." 
 
 " Relieve your mind, if you like, Mary. In all dis- 
 appointments sympathy is a great balm." 
 
 " Well, then, it 's something not for you; it's for Polly. 
 It 's a cage. Mrs. Gordon says they make such pretty ones 
 in Paris." 
 
THE CAGE AT CEANFORD. 141 
 
 I could see that Miss Pole's first emotion was disappoint- 
 ment. But she was very fond of her cockatoo, and the 
 thought of his smartness in his new habitation made her bo 
 reconciled in a moment ; besides that she was really grate- 
 ful to me for having planned a present for her. 
 
 " Polly ! Well, yes ; his old cage is very shabby ; he is 
 so continually pecking at it with his sharp bill. I dare say 
 Mrs. Gordon noticed it when she called here last October. 
 I shall always think of you, Mary, when I see him in it. 
 Now we can have him in the drawing-room, for I dare say 
 a French cage will be quite an ornament to the room." 
 
 And so she talked on, till we worked ourselves up into 
 high delight at the idea of Polly in his new abode, present- 
 able in it even to the Honorable Mrs. Jamieson. The next 
 morning Miss Pole said she had been dreaming of Polly 
 with her new cap on his head, while she herself sat on a 
 perch in the new cage and admired him. Then, as if 
 ashamed of having revealed the fact of imagining "such 
 arrant nonsense " in her sleep, she passed on rapidly to the 
 philosophy of dreams, quoting some book she had lately 
 been reading, which was either too deep in itself, or too 
 confused in her repetition for me to understand it. After 
 breakfast, we had the cap out again ; and that in its differ- 
 ent aspects occupied us for an hour or so ; and then, as it 
 was a fine day, we turned into the garden, where Polly was 
 hung on a nail outside the kitchen window. He clamored 
 and screamed at the sight of his mistress, who went to look 
 for an almond for him. I examined his cage meanwhile, 
 old discolored wicker-work, clumsily made by a Cranford 
 basket-maker. I took out Mrs. Gordon's letter ; it was 
 dated the loth, and this was the 20th, for I had kept it 
 secret for two days in my pocket. Mr. Ludovic was on 
 the point of setting out for England when she wrote. 
 
 " Poor Polly ! " said I, as Miss Pole, returning, fed him 
 with the almond. 
 
142 MRS. GASKELL. 
 
 " All ! Polly .does not know what a pretty cage he la 
 going to have," said she, talking to him as she would have 
 done to a child ; and then turning to me, she asked when I 
 thought it would come ? "We reckoned up dates, and made 
 out that it might arrive that very day. So she called to her 
 little stupid servant-maiden Fanny, and bade her go out and 
 buy a great brass-headed nail, very strong, strong enough to 
 bear PcUy and the new cage, and we all three weighed the 
 cage in our hands, and on her return she was to come up 
 into the drawing-room with the nail and a hammer. 
 
 Fanny was a long time, as she always was, over her er- 
 rands ; but as soon as she came back, we knocked the nail, 
 with solemn earnestness, into the house- wall, just outside the 
 drawing-room window ; for, as Miss Pole observed, when I 
 was not there she had no one to talk to, and as in summer- 
 iime she generally sat with the window open, she could com- 
 bine two purposes, the giving air and sun to Polly-Cock- 
 atoo, and the having his agreeable companionship in her 
 solitary hours. 
 
 " When it rains, my dear, or even in a very hot sun, I 
 shall take the cage in. I would not have your pretty pres- 
 ent spoilt for the world. It was very kind of you to think 
 of it ; I am quite come round to liking it better than any 
 present of mere dress ; and dear Mrs. Gordon has shown 
 all her usual pretty observation in remembering my Polly- 
 Cockatoo." 
 
 " Polly-Cockatoo " was his grand name ; I had only once 
 or twice heard him spoken of by Miss Pole in this formal 
 manner, except when she was speaking to the seivants; 
 then she always gave him his full designation, just as most 
 people call their daughters Miss, in speaking of them to 
 strangers or servants. But since Polly was to have a new 
 cage, and all the way from Paris too, Miss Pole evidently 
 thought it necessary to treat him with unusual respect. 
 
 We were obliged to go out to pay some calls ; but we left 
 
THE CAGE AT CRANFORD. 143 
 
 strict orders with Fanny what to do if the cage arrived in 
 our absence, as (we had calculated) it might. Miss Pole 
 stood ready bonneted and shawled at the kitchen door, I 
 behind her, and cook behind Fanny, each of us listening to 
 the conversation of the other two. 
 
 " And Fanny, mind if it comes you coax Polly- Cockatoo 
 nicely into it. He is very particular, and may be attached 
 (o his old cage, though it is so shabby. Remember, birds 
 have their feelings as much as we have ! Don't hurry him 
 in making up his mind." 
 
 "Please, ma'am, I think an almond would help him to 
 get over his feelings," said Fanny, dropping a curtsey at 
 evejy speech, as she had been taught to do at her charity 
 school. 
 
 " A very good idea, very. If I have my keys in my 
 pocket I will give you an almond for him. I think he is 
 sure to like the view up the street from the window; he 
 likes seeing people, I think." 
 
 " It 's but a dull look-out into the garden ; nowt but 
 dumb flowers," said cook, touched by this allusion to the 
 cheerfulness of the street, as contrasted with the view from 
 her own kitchen window. 
 
 " It 's a very good look-out for busy people," said Miss 
 Pole, severely. And then, feeling she was likely to get 
 the worst of it in an encounter with her old servant, she 
 withdrew with meek dignity, being deaf to some sharp re- 
 ply ; and of course I, being bound to keep order, was deaf 
 too. If the truth must be told, we rather hastened oui 
 steps, until we had banged the street door behind us. 
 
 We called on Miss Matty, of course ; and then on Mrs. 
 Hoggins. It seemed as if ill-luck would have it that we 
 went to the only two households of Cranford where there 
 was the encumbrance of a man, and in both places the man 
 was where he ought not to have been namely, in his own 
 house, and in the way. Miss Pole out of civility to me, 
 
144 MRS. GASKELL. 
 
 and because she really was full of the new cage for Polly 
 and because we all in Cranford relied on the sympathy of 
 our neighbors in the veriest trifle that interested us told 
 Miss Matty, and Mr. Peter, and Mr. and Mrs. Hoggins ; he 
 was standing in the drawing-room, booted and spurred, and 
 eating his hunk of bread and cheese in the very presence 
 of his aristocratic wife, my lady that was. As Miss Pole 
 said afterwards, if refinement was not to be found in Cran- 
 ford, blessed as it was with so many scions of county 
 families, she did not know where to meet with it. Bread 
 and cheese in a drawing-room ! Onions next. 
 
 But for all Mr. Hoggins's vulgarity, Miss Pole told him 
 of the present she was about to receive. 
 
 " Only think ! a new cage for Polly Polly Polly- 
 Cockatoo, you know, Mr. Hoggins. You remember him, 
 and the bite he gave me once because he wanted to be put 
 back in his cage, pretty bird ? " 
 
 " I only hope the new cage will be strong as well as 
 
 pretty, for I must say a " He caught a look from his 
 
 wife, I think, for he stopped short. "Well, we're old 
 friends, Polly and I, and he put some practice in my way 
 once. I shall be up the street this afternoon, and perhaps 
 I shall step in and see this smart Parisian cage." 
 
 " Do ! " said Miss Pole, eagerly. " Or, if you are in a 
 hurry, look up at my drawing-room window; if the cage 
 is come, it will be hanging out there, and Polly in it." 
 
 We had passed the omnibus that met the train from 
 London some time ago, so we were not surprised as we re- 
 turned home to see Fanny half out of the window, and 
 cook evidently either helping or hindering her. Then they 
 both took their heads in ; but there was no cage hanging 
 up. We hastened up the steps. 
 
 Both Fanny and the cook met us in the passage. 
 
 " Please, ma'am," said Fanny, " there 's no bottom to the 
 cage, and Polly would fly away." 
 
THE CAGE AT CRANFORD. 145 
 
 " A nd there 's no top," exclaimed cook. " He might get 
 out at the top quite easy." 
 
 ' Let me see," said Miss Pole, brushing past, thinking 
 no doubt that her superior intelligence was all that was 
 needed to set things to rights. On the ground lay a bun^ 
 die, or a circle of hoops, neatly covered over with calico, no 
 more like a cage for Polly-Cockatoo than I am like a cage. 
 Cook took something up between her finger and thumb, and 
 lifted the unsightly present from Paris. How I wish it had 
 stayed there ! but foolish ambition has brought people to 
 ruin before now; and my twenty shillings are gone, sure 
 enough, and there must be some use or some ornament in- 
 tended by the maker of the thing before us. 
 
 "Don't you think it's a mousetrap, ma'am?" asked 
 Fanny, dropping her little curtsey. 
 
 For reply, the cook lifted up the machine, and showed 
 how easily mice might run out ,' and Fanny shrank back 
 abashed. Cook was evidently set against the new inven- 
 tion, and muttered about its being all of a piece with 
 French things French cooks, French plums, (nasty dried- 
 up things,) French rolls (as had no substance in 'em.) 
 
 Miss Pole's good manners, and desire of making the best 
 of things in my presence, induced her to try and drown 
 cook's mutterings. 
 
 " Indeed, I think it will make a very nice cage for Polly- 
 Cockatoo. How pleased he will be to go from one hoop to 
 another, just like a ladder, and with a board or two at the 
 bottom, and nicely tied up at the top " 
 
 Fanny was struck with a new idea. 
 
 " Please, ma'am, my sister-in-law has got an aunt as lives 
 lady's-maid with Sir John's daughter Miss Arley. And 
 they did say as she wore iron petticoats all made of 
 hoops " 
 
 " Nonsense, Fanny ! " we all cried ; for such a thing had 
 not been heard of in all Drumble, let alone Cranford, and I 
 7 j 
 
H6 MRS. GASKELL. 
 
 was rather looked upon in the light of a fast young woman 
 by all the laundresses of Cranford, because I had two corded 
 petticoats. 
 
 " Go mind thy business, wench," said cook, with the ut- 
 most contempt ; " I '11 warrant we '11 manage th' cage without 
 thy help." 
 
 " It is near dinner-time, Fanny, and the cloth not laid," 
 said Miss Pole, hoping the remark might cut two ways ; 
 but cook had no notion of going. She stood on the bottom 
 step of the stairs, holding the Paris perplexity aloft in the 
 air. 
 
 " It might do for a meat-safe," said she. " Cover it o'er 
 wi' canvas, to keep th' flies out. It is a good framework, I 
 reckon, anyhow ! " She held her head on one side, like a 
 connoisseur in meat-safes, as she was. 
 
 Miss Pole said, " Are you sure Mrs. Gordon called it a 
 cage, Mary? Because she is a woman of her word, and 
 would not have called it so if it was not." 
 
 " Look here ; I have the letter in my pocket." 
 
 " ' I have wondered how I could best fulfil your commis- 
 sion for me to purchase something to the value of um, 
 um, never mind 'fashionable and pretty for dear Miss 
 Pole, and at length I have decided upon one of the new 
 kind of " cages " ' (look here, Miss Pole ; here is the word, 
 CAGE),' which are made so much lighter and more ele- 
 gant in Paris than in England. Indeed, I am not sure if 
 they have ever reached you, for it is not a month since I 
 saw the first of the kind in Paris.' " 
 
 "Does she say anything about Polly-Cockatoo?" asked 
 Miss Pole. " That would settle the matter at once, as 
 showing that she had him in her mind." 
 
 " No nothing." 
 
 Just then Fanny came along the passage with the tray 
 full of dinner things in her hands. When she had put 
 them down, she stood at the door of the dining-room taking 
 
THE CAGE AT CRANFORD. 147 
 
 a distant view of the article. " Please, ma'am, it looks like 
 a petticoat without any stuff in it ; indeed it does, if I 'm to 
 be whipped for saying it." 
 
 But she only drew down upon herself a fresh objurgation 
 from the cook ; and sorry and annoyed, I seized the oppor- 
 tunity of taking the thing out of cook's hand, and carrying 
 it up stairs, for it was full time to get ready for dinner. But 
 we had very little appetite for our meal, and kept constantly 
 making suggestions, one to the other, as to the nature and 
 purpose of this Paris " cage," but as constantly snubbing 
 poor little Fanny's reiteration of " Please, ma'am, I do be- 
 lieve it's a kind of petticoat indeed I do." At length 
 Miss Pole turned upon her with almost as much vehemence 
 as cook had done, only in choicer language. 
 
 * Don't be so silly, Fanny. Do you think ladies are like 
 children, and must be put in go-carts ; or need wire-guards 
 like fires to surround them ; or can get warmth out of bits of 
 whalebone and steel; a likely thing indeed! Don't keep 
 talking about what you don't understand." 
 
 So our maiden was mute for the rest of the meal. After 
 dinner we had Polly brought up stairs in her old cage, and I 
 held out the new one, and we turned it about in every way. 
 At length Miss Pole said : 
 
 " Put Polly- Cockatoo back, and shut him up in his cage. 
 You hold this French thing up," (alas ! that my present 
 should be called a " thing,") " and I '11 sew a bottom on to 
 it. I'll lay a good deal, they've forgotten to sew in the 
 bottom before sending it off." So I held and she sewed ; 
 and then she held, and 1 sewed, till it was all done. Just 
 as we had put Polly- Cockatoo in, and were closing up the 
 top with a pretty piece of old yellow ribbon and, indeed, 
 it was not a bad-looking cage after all our trouble Mr. 
 Hoggins came up stairs, having been seen by Fanny before 
 he had time to knock at the door. 
 
 u Hallo ! " :*aid he, almost tumbling over us, as we were 
 sitting on the floor at our work. "What 's this ? " 
 
148 MRS. GASKELL. 
 
 " It 's this pretty present for Polly- Cockatoo," said MLsa 
 Pole, raising herself up with as much dignity as she could, 
 " that Mary has had sent from Paris for me." Miss Pole 
 was in great spirits now we had got Polly in ; I can 't say 
 that I was. 
 
 Mr. Hoggins began to laugh in his boisterous vulgar way. 
 
 " For Polly ha ! ha ! It 's meant for you, Miss Pole 
 ha ! ha ! It 's a new invention to hold your gowns out 
 ha! ha!" 
 
 " Mr. Hoggins ! you may be a surgeon, and a very clever 
 one, but nothing not even your profession gives you a 
 right to be indecent." 
 
 Miss Pole was thoroughly roused, and I trembled in my 
 shoes. But Mr. Hoggins only laughed the more. Polly 
 screamed in concert, but Miss Pole stood in stiff rigid pro- 
 priety, very red in the face. 
 
 " I beg your pardon, Miss Pole, I am sure. But I am 
 pretty certain I am right. It's no indecency that I can 
 see ; my wife and Mrs. Fitz Adam take in a Paris fashion- 
 book between 'em, and I can't help seeing the plates of 
 fashions sometimes ha! ha! ha! Look, Polly has got 
 out of his queer prison ha ! ha ! ha ! " 
 
 Just then Mr. Peter came in ; Miss Matty was so curious 
 to know if the expected present had arrived. Mr. Hoggins 
 took him by the arm, and pointed to the poor thing lying 
 on the ground, but could not explain for laughing. Miss 
 Pole said : 
 
 " Although I am not accustomed to give an explanation 
 of my conduct to gentlemen, yet, being insulted in my own 
 house by by Mr. Hoggins, I must appeal to the brother 
 of my old friend rny very oldest friend. Is this article 
 a lady's petticoat, or a bird's cage ? " 
 
 She held it up as she made this solemn inquiry. Mr. 
 Hoggins seized the moment to leave the room, in shame, as 
 I supposed, but, in reality, to fetch his wife's fashion-book ; 
 
THE CAGE AT CRANFORD. 149 
 
 and, before I Lad completed the narration of the story of 
 my unlucky commission, he returned, and, holding the 
 fashion-plate open by the side of the extended article, 
 demonstrated the identity of the two. 
 
 But Mr. Peter had always a smooth way of turning off 
 anger, by either his fun or a compliment. " It is a cage," 
 said he, bowing to Miss Pole; "but it is a cage for an 
 angel, instead of a bird ! Come along, Hoggins, I want to 
 speak to you ! " 
 
 And, with an apology, he took the offending and victo- 
 rious surgeon out of Miss Pole's presence. For a good 
 while we said nothing ; and we were now rather shy of 
 little Fanny's superior wisdom when she brought up tea. 
 But towards night our spirits revived, and we were quite 
 ourselves again, when Miss Pole proposed that we should 
 cut up the pieces of steel or whalebone which, to do them 
 justice, were very elastic and make ourselves two good 
 comfortable English calashes out of thorn with the aid of a 
 piece of dyed silk which Miss Pole had by her. 
 
VERSES ON SIR PHILIP SIDNEY. 
 
 Br EDMUND SPENSER. 
 
 YOU knew who knew not r AstropheL 
 (That I should live to say I knew, 
 And have not in possession still !) 
 Things known permit me to renew : 
 Of him you know his merit such, 
 I cannot say you hear too much. 
 
 Within these woods of Arcady, 
 
 He chief delight and pleasure took ; 
 And on the mountain Partheny, 
 Upon the crystal liquid brook, 
 The Muses met him every day, 
 That taught him song to write and say. 
 
 When he descended from the mount, 
 
 His personage seemed most divine ; 
 A thousand graces one might count 
 Upon his lovely cheerful eyne. 
 
 To hear him speak and sweetly smile, 
 You were in Paradise the while. 
 
 A sweet attractive kind of grace, 
 
 A full assurance given by looks ; 
 Continual comfort in a face, 
 
 The lineaments of Gospel books : 
 
VERSES ON SIR PHILIP SIDNEY. lol 
 
 I trow that countenance cannot lie, 
 Whose thoughts are legible in th' eye. 
 
 Above all others, this is he, 
 
 Which erst approved in his song 
 That love and honor might agree, 
 
 And that pure love will do no wrong. 
 Sweet saints, it is no sin or blame 
 To love a man of virtuous name. 
 
 Did never love so sweetly breathe 
 
 In any mortal breast before : 
 Did never Mu?e inspire beneath 
 A poet's brain with finer store. 
 
 He wrote of love with high conceit. 
 And beauty rear'd above her height. 
 
PRESCOTFS INFIRMITY OF SIGHT. 
 
 BY GEORGE TICKNOR. 
 
 "VY^HEX the Ferdinand and Isabella" was published, 
 T ? in the winter of 18378, its author was nearly 
 forty-two years old. His character, some of whose traits 
 had been prominent from childhood, while others had been 
 slowly developed, was fully formed. His habits were set- 
 tled for life. He had a perfectly well-defined individuality, 
 as everybody knew who knew anything about his occupa- 
 tions and ways. 
 
 Much of what went to constitute this individuality was 
 the result of his infirmity of sight, and of the unceasing 
 struggle he had made to overcome the difficulties it entailed 
 upon him. For, as we shall see hereafter, the thought of 
 this infirmity, and of the embarrassments it brought with it, 
 was ever before him. It colored, and in many respects it 
 controlled, his whole life. 
 
 The violent inflammation that resulted from the fierce 
 attack of rheumatism in the early months of 1815 first start- 
 led him, I think, with the apprehension that he might pos- 
 sibly be deprived of sight altogether, and that thus his future 
 years would be left in * total eclipse, without all hope of 
 day." But from this dreary apprehension, his recovery, 
 slow, and partial as it was, and the buoyant spirits that en- 
 tered so largely into his constitution, at last relieved him. 
 He even, from time to time, as the disease fluctuated to ind 
 fro, had hopes of an entire restoration of his sight. 
 
PRESCOTT'S INFIRMITY OF SIGHT. 153 
 
 But beftre long, he began to judge things more exactly 
 as they were, and saw plainly that anything like a full re- 
 covery of his sight was improbable, if not impossible. He 
 turned his thoughts, therefore, to the resources that would 
 still remain to him. The prospect was by no means a pleas- 
 ant one, but he looked at it steadily and calmly All 
 thought of the profession which had long been so tempting 
 to him he gave up. He saw that he could never fulfil its 
 duties. But intellectual occupation he could not give up. 
 It was a gratification and resource which his nature de- 
 manded, and would not be refused.. The difficulty was to 
 find out how it could be obtained. During the three months 
 of his confinement in total darkness at St. Michael's, he first 
 began to discipline his thoughts to such orderly composition 
 in his memory as he might have written down on paper, if 
 his sight had permitted it. " I have cheated," he says, in a 
 letter to his family written at the end of that discouraging 
 period, "I have cheated many a moment of tedium by 
 compositions which were soon banished from my mind for 
 want of an amanuensis." 
 
 Among these compositions was a Latin ode to his friend 
 Gardiner, which was prepared wholly without books, but 
 which, though now lost, like the rest of his Latin verses, he 
 repeated years afterwards to his Club, who did not fail to 
 think it good. It is evident, however, that, for a consider- 
 able time, he resorted to such mental occupations and exer- 
 cises rather as an amusement than as anything more serious. 
 Nor did he at first go far with them even as a light and tran- 
 sient relief from idleness ; for, though he never gave them 
 up altogether, and though they at last became a very impor- 
 tant element in his success as an author, he soon found an 
 agreeable substitute for them, at least so far as his imme- 
 diate, every-day wants were concerned. 
 
 The substitute to which I refer, but which itself implied 
 much previous reflection and thought upon what he should 
 7* 
 
154 GEORGE TICKXOR. 
 
 commit to paper, was an apparatus to enable the blind to 
 write. He heard of it in London during his first residence 
 there in the summer of 1816. A lady, at whose house he 
 visited frequently, and who became interested in his misfor- 
 tune, " told him," as he says in a letter to his mother, " of a 
 newly invented machine by which blind people are enabled 
 to write. I have," he adds, " before been indebted to Mrs. 
 Dclafield for an ingenious candle-screen. If this machine 
 can be procured, you will be sure to feel the effects of it." 
 
 He obtained it at once ; but he did not use it until nearly 
 a month afterwards, when, on the 24th of August, at Paris, 
 he wrote home his first letter with it, saying, " It is a very 
 happy invention for me." And such it certainly proved to 
 be, for he never ceased to use it from that day ; nor does it 
 now seem possible that, without the facilities it afforded him, 
 he ever would have ventured to undertake any of the works 
 which have made his name what it is. 
 
 The machine if machine it can properly be called is 
 an apparatus invented by one of the well-known Wedgewood 
 family, and is very simple both in its structure and use. It 
 looks, as it lies folded up on the table, like a clumsy 
 portfolio, bound in morocco, and measures about ten inches 
 by nine when unopened. Sixteen stout parallel brass wires 
 fastened on the right-hand side into a frame of the same size 
 with the cover, much like the frame of a school-boy's slate, 
 and crossing it from side to side, mark the number of lines 
 that can be written on a page, and guide the hand in its 
 blind motions. This framework of wires is folded down upon 
 a sheet of paper thoroughly impregnated with a black sub- 
 stance, especially on its under surface, beneath which lies 
 the sheet of common paper that is to receive the writing. 
 There are thus, when it is in use, three layers on the 
 right-hand side of the opened apparatus ; viz. the wires, the 
 blackened sheet of paper, and the white sheet, all lying 
 successively in contact with each other, the two that are 
 
PRESCOTT'S INFIRMITY OF SIGHT. 155 
 
 underneath being held firmly in their places by the frame- 
 work of wires which is uppermost. The whole apparatus 
 is called a noctograpk. 
 
 When it has been adjusted, as above described, the person 
 using it writes with an ivory style, or with a style made of 
 some harder substance, like agate, on the upper surface of 
 the blackened paper, which, wherever the style presses on 
 it, transfers the coloring matter of its under surface to the 
 white paper beneath it, the writing thus produced looking 
 much like that done with a common black-lead pencil. 
 
 The chief difficulty in the use of such an apparatus 
 is obvious. The person employing it never looks upon 
 his work ; never sees one of the marks he is making. He 
 trusts wholly to the wires for the direction of his hand. He 
 makes his letters and words only from mechanical habit. 
 He must, therefore, write straight forward, without any op- 
 portunity for correction, however gross may be the mistakes 
 he has made, or however sure he may be that he has made 
 them ; for, if he were to go back in order to correct an error, 
 he would only make his page still more confused, and prob- 
 ably render it quite illegible. When, therefore, he has 
 made a mistake, great or small, all he can do is to go for- 
 ward, and rewrite further on the word or phrase he first in- 
 tended to write, rarely attempting to strike out what was 
 wrong, or to insert, in its proper place, anything that may 
 have been omitted. It is plain, therefore, that the person 
 who resorts to this apparatus as a substitute for sight ought 
 previously to prepare and settle in his memory what he 
 wishes to write, so as to make as few mistakes as possible. 
 
 With the best care his manuscript will not be very leg- 
 ible. Without it, he may be sure it can hardly be deci- 
 phered at all. 
 
 That Mr. Prescott, under his disheartening infirmities, 
 I refer not only to his imperfect sight, but to the rheumatism 
 from which he was seldom wholly free, should, at the age 
 
156 GEORGE TICKXOR 
 
 of five-and-twenty or thirty, with no help but this simple ap- 
 paratus, have aspired to the character of a historian dealing 
 with events that happened in times and countries far distant 
 from his own, and that are recorded chiefly in foreign lan- 
 guages and by authors whose conflicting testimony was often 
 to be reconciled by laborious comparison, is a remarkable 
 fact in literary history. It is a problem the solution of 
 which was, I believe, never before undertaken ; certainly 
 never before accomplished. Nor do I conceive that he him- 
 self could have accomplished it, unless to his uncommon in- 
 tellectual gifts had been added great animal spirits, a strong, 
 persistent will, and a moral courage which was to be daunt- 
 ed by no obstacle that he might deem it possible to remove 
 by almost any amount of effort.* 
 
 That he was not insensible to the difficulties of his under- 
 taking, we have partly seen, as we have witnessed how his 
 hopes fluctuated while he was struggling through the ar- 
 rangements for beginning to" write his " Ferdinand and Isa- 
 bella," and, in fact, during the whole period of its compo- 
 sition. But he showed the same character, the same fer- 
 tility of resource, every day of his life, and provided, both 
 by forecast and self-sacrifice, against the embarrassments of 
 his condition as they successively presented themselves. 
 
 The first thing to be done, and the thing always to be re- 
 peated day by day, was to strengthen, as much as possible, 
 what remained of his sight, and at any rate, to do nothing 
 
 * The case of Thierry the nearest known to me was differ- 
 ent. His great work, " Histoire de la Conquete de 1' Angletcrre par 
 les Normands," was written before he became blind. "What he pub- 
 lished afterward was ' dictated, wonderful, indeed, all of it, but 
 especially all that relates to what he did for the commission of the 
 government concerning the Tiers jfctat, to be found in that grand 
 collection of "Documents ine'dits sur 1'Histoire de France," begun 
 under the auspices and influence of M. Guizot, when he was ministei 
 of Louis-Philippe. 
 
PRESCOTT'S INFIRMITY OF SIGHT. 157 
 
 ehat should tend to exhaust its impaired powers. In 1321, 
 when he was still not without some hope of its recovery, he 
 made this memorandum. " I will make it my principal pur- 
 pose to restore my eye to its primitive vigor, and will do 
 nothing habitually that can seriously injure it." To this end 
 he regulated his life with an exactness that I have never 
 known equalled. Especially in whatever related to the 
 daily distribution of his time, whether in regard to his intel- 
 lectual labors, to his social enjoyments, or to the care of his 
 physical powers, including his diet, he was severely exact, 
 managing himself, indeed, in this last respect, under the 
 general directions of his wise medical adviser, Dr. Jackson, 
 but carrying out these directions with an ingenuity and 
 fidelity all his own. 
 
 He was an early riser, although it was a great effort for 
 him to be such. From boyhood it seemed to be contrary 
 to his nature to get up betimes in the morning. He was, 
 therefore, always awaked, and after silently, and sometimes 
 slowly and with reluctance, counting twenty, so a -s fairly to 
 arouse himself, he resolutely sprang out of bed ; or, if he 
 failed, he paid a forfeit, as a memento of his weakness, to 
 the servant who had knocked at his chamber-door.* His 
 failures, however, were rare. When he was called, he was 
 told the state of the weather and of the thermometer. This 
 was important, as he was compelled by his rheumatism 
 almost always present, and, when not so, always appre- 
 hended to regulate his dress with care; and, finding it 
 difficult to do so in any other way, he caused each of its 
 heavier external portions to be marked by his tailor with 
 
 * When he was a bachelor, the servant, after waiting a certain 
 number of minutes at the door without receiving an answer, went in 
 and took away the bed-clothes. This was, at that period, the office 
 of faithful Nathan Webster, who was remembered kindly in Mr. Pres- 
 cott's will, and who was for nearly thirty years in the family, a true 
 and valued friend of all its members. 
 
158 GEORGE TICKNOR. 
 
 the number of ounces it weighed, and then put them on 
 according to the temperature, sure that their weight would 
 indicate the measure of warmth and protection they would 
 afford.* 
 
 As soon as he was dressed, he took his early exercise in 
 the open air. This, for many years, was done on horse- 
 back, and, as he loved a spirited horse and was often think- 
 ing more of his intellectual pursuits than of anything else 
 while he was riding, he sometimes caught a fall. But he 
 was a good rider, and was sorry to give up this form of 
 exercise and resort to walking or driving, as he did, by 
 ord(.T of his physician, in the last dozen years of his life. 
 No weather, except a severe storm, prevented him at any 
 period from thus, as he called it, ." winding himself up." 
 Even in the coldest of our very cold winter morning?, it 
 was his habit, so long as he could ride, to see the sun rise on 
 a particular spot three or four miles from town. In a letter 
 to Mrs. Ticknor, who was then in Germany, dated March, 
 1836, at the end of a winter memorable for its extreme se- 
 verity, he says, " You will give me credit for some spunk 
 when I tell you that I have not been frightened by the 
 zold a single morning from a ride on horseback to Jamaica 
 Plain and back again before breakfast. My mark has been 
 to see the sun rise by Mr. Greene's school, if you remember 
 where that is." When the rides here referred to were 
 taken, the thermometer was often below zero of Fahrenheit. 
 
 On his return home, after adjusting his dress anew, with 
 reference to the temperature within doors, he sat down, 
 almost always in a very gay humor, to a moderate and even 
 spare breakfast, a meal he much liked, because, as he said, 
 
 * As in the case of the use of wine, hereafter to be noticed, he 
 made, from year to year, the most minute memoranda about the use 
 of clothes, finding it necessary to be exact on account of the rheuma- 
 tism which, besides almost constantly infesting his limbs, always af- 
 fected his sight when it became severe. 
 
PRESCOTT'S INFIRMITY OF SIGHT. 159 
 
 he could then have his family with him in a quiet way, and 
 so begin the day happily. From the breakfast-table he 
 went at once to his study. There, while busied with what 
 remained of his toilet, or with the needful arrangements for 
 his regular occupations, Mrs. Prescott read to him, generally 
 from the morning papers, but sometimes from the current 
 literature of the day. At a fixed hour seldom later than 
 ten liis reader, or secretary, came. In this, as in every- 
 thing, he required punctuality ; but he noted tardiness only 
 by looking significantly at his watch ; for it is the testimony 
 of all his surviving secretaries, that he never spoke a severe 
 word to either of them in the many years of their familiar 
 intercourse. 
 
 When they had met in the study, there was no thought 
 but of active work for about three hours.* His infirmities, 
 however, were always present to warn him how cautiously it 
 must be done, and he was extremely ingenious in the means 
 he devised for doing it without increasing them. The 
 shades and shutters for regulating the exact amount of light 
 which should be admitted ; his own position relatively to 
 its direct rays, and to those that were reflected from sur- 
 rounding objects ; the adaptation of his dress and of the 
 temperature of the room to his rheumatic affections ; and 
 the different contrivances for taking notes from the books 
 that were read to him, and for impressing on his memory, 
 with the least possible use of his sight, such portions of 
 
 * I speak here of the time during which he was busy with his 
 Histories. In the intervals between them, as, for instance, between 
 the "Ferdinand and Isabella" and the "Mexico," between the 
 " Mexico " and " Pern," &c., his habits were very different. At 
 these periods he indulged, sometimes for many months, in a great 
 deal of light, miscellaneous reading, which he used to call " literary 
 loafing." This he thought not only agreeable, but refreshing and 
 useful; though sometimes he complained bitterly of himself for car- 
 rying his indulgences of this sort too far. 
 
160 GEORGE TICKXOE. 
 
 each as were needful for his immediate purpose. were all 
 of them the result of painstaking experiments, skilfully and 
 patiently made. But their ingenuity and adaptation were 
 less remarkable than the conscientious consistency with 
 which they were employed from day to day for forty 
 
 In relation to all such arrangements, two circumstances 
 should be noted. 
 
 The first is, that the resources of his eye were always 
 very small and uncertain, except for a few years, beginning 
 in 1840, when, from his long-continued prudence or from 
 some inscrutable cause, there seemed to be either an increa-e 
 of strength in the organ, or else such a diminution of its 
 sensibility as enabled him to use it more, though its strength 
 might really be diminished. 
 
 Thus, for instance, he was able to use his eye very little 
 in the preparation of the " Ferdinand and Isabella," not 
 looking into a book sometimes for weeks and even months 
 together, and yet occasionally he could read several hours 
 in a day if he carefully divided the whole into short portions, 
 so as to avoid fatigue. While engaged in the composition 
 of the " Conquest of Mexico." on the contrary, he was able 
 to read with considerable regularity, and so he was while 
 working on the " Conquest of Peru," though, on the whole, 
 with less.* 
 
 * How uncertain was the state of his eye, even when it was 
 strongest, may be seen from memoranda made at different times, 
 within less than two years of each other. The first is in January, 
 1829, when he was full of grateful feelings for an unexpected increase 
 of his powers of sight. " By the blessing of Heaven," he says, " I 
 have been enabled to have the free use of my eye in the daytime dur- 
 ing the last weeks, without the exception of a single day, although 
 deprived, for nearly a fortnight, of my accustomed exercise. I hope 
 I have not abused this great privilege." But this condition of thing? 
 did not last long. Great fluctuations followed. In August and Sep- 
 tember he was much discouraged by severe inflammations ; and in 
 October, 1830, when he had been slowly writing the "Ferdinand 
 
PRESCOTT'S INFIRMITY OF SIGHT. 161 
 
 Bat he hud, during nearly all this time, another difficulty 
 to encounter. There had come on prematurely that grad- 
 ual alteration of the eye which is the consequence of advanc- 
 ing years, and for which the common remedy is spectacles. 
 Even when he was using what remained to him of sight on 
 the " Conquest of Mexico " with a freedom which not a little 
 animated him in his pursuits, he perceived this discouraging 
 change. In July, 1841, he says: " My eye, for some days, 
 feels dim. * I guess and fear,' as Burns says." And in 
 June, 1842, when our families were spending together at 
 Lebanon Springs a few days which he has recorded as 
 otherwise very happy, he spoke to me more than once in a 
 tone of absolute grief, that he should never again enjoy the 
 magnificent spectacle of the starry heavens. To this sad 
 deprivation he, in fact, alludes himself in his Memoranda of 
 that period, where, in relation to his eyes, he says : " I find 
 a misty veil increasing over them, quite annoying when 
 
 reading. The other evening B said, ' How beautiful 
 
 the heavens are with so many stars ! ' I could hardly see 
 two. It made me sad/' 
 
 Spectacles, however, although they brought their appro- 
 priate relief, brought also an inevitable inconvenience. 
 They fatigued his eye. He could use it, therefore, less 
 and less, or if he used it at all, beyond a nicely adjusted 
 amount, the excess was followed by a sort of irritability, 
 weakness, and pain in the organ which he had not felt for 
 many years. This went on increasing with sad regularity. 
 But he knew that it was inevitable, and submitted to it pa- 
 tiently. In the latter part of his life he was able to use his 
 eye very little indeed for the purpose ot reading, in the 
 last year, hardly at all. Even in several of the years pre- 
 
 and Isabella " for about a year, his sight for a time became so much 
 impaired that he was brought I use his own words " seriously to 
 consider what steps he should take in relation to that work, if his 
 sight should fail him altogether." 
 
162 GEORGE TICKXOR. 
 
 ceding, he used it only thirty-five minutes in each day, 
 divided exactly by the watch into portions of five minutes 
 each, with at least half an hour between, and always stop- 
 ping the moment pain was felt, even if it were felt at the first 
 instant of opening the book. I doubt whether a more per- 
 sistent, conscientious care was ever taken of an impaired 
 physical power. Indeed, I do not see how it could have 
 been made more thorough. But all care was unavailing, 
 and he at last knew that it was so. The decay could not be 
 arrested. He spoke of it rarely, but when he perceived 
 that in the evening twilight he could no longer walk about 
 the streets that were familiar to him with his accustomed 
 assurance, he felt it deeply. Still he persevered, and was 
 as watchful of what remained of his sight as if his hopes of 
 its restoration had continued unchecked. Indeed, I think 
 he always trusted that he was saving something by his anx- 
 ious care ; he always believed that great prudence on one 
 day would enable him to do a little more work on the next 
 than he should be able to do without so much caution. 
 
 The other circumstance that should be noticed in relation 
 to the arrangements for his pursuits is, the continually in- 
 creased amount of light he was obliged to use, and which he 
 could use without apparent injury. 
 
 In Bedford Street, where he first began his experiments, 
 he could, from the extreme sensitiveness of his eye, bear 
 very little light. But, even before he left that quiet old 
 mansion, he cut out a new window in his working-room, 
 arranging it so that the light should fall more strongly and 
 more exclusively upon the book he might be using. This 
 did very well for a time. But when he removed to Beacon 
 Street, the room he built expressly for his own use contained 
 six contiguous windows ; two of which, though large, were 
 glazed each with a single sheet of the finest plate-glass, 
 nicely protected by several curtains of delicate fabric and of 
 a light-blue color, one or more of which could be drawn up 
 
PRESCOTT'S INFIRMITY OF SIGHT. 163 
 
 over each window to temper the light while the whole light 
 that was admitted through any one opening could be ex- 
 cluded by solid wooden shutters. At first, though much 
 light was commonly used, these appliances for diminishing 
 it were all more or less required. But, gradually, one after 
 another of them was given up, and, at last, I observed that 
 none was found important He needed and used all the 
 light he could get. 
 
 The change was a sad one, and he did not like to allude 
 to it. But during the last year of his life, after the first 
 slight access of paralysis, which much disturbed the organ 
 for a time, and rendered its action very irregular, he spoke 
 plainly to me. He said he must soon cease to use his eye 
 for any purpose of study, but fondly trusted that he should 
 always be able to recognize the features of his friends, and 
 should never become a burden to those he loved by needing 
 to be led about. His hopes were, indeed, fulfilled, but not 
 without the sorrow of all. The day before his sudden 
 death he walked the streets as freely as he had done for 
 years. 
 
 Still, whatever may have been the condition of his eye at 
 any period, from the fierce attack of 1815 to the very end 
 of his life, it was always a paramount subject of anxiety 
 with him. He never ceased to think of it, and to regulate 
 the hours, and almost the minutes, of his daily life by it. 
 Even in its best estate he felt that it must be spared ; in its 
 worst, he was anxious to save something by care and absti- 
 nence. He said, " he reckoned time by eyesight, as dis- 
 tances on railroads are reckoned by hours." 
 
 One thing hi this connection may be noted as remarkable. 
 He knew that, if he would give up literary labor altogether, 
 his eye would be better at once, and would last longer. 
 His physicians all told him so, and their opinion was ren- 
 dered certain by his own experience ; for whenever he ceased 
 to work for some time, as during a visit to New York i 
 
164 GEORGE TICKNOR. 
 
 1842 and a visit to Europe in 1850, in short, whenever 
 he took a journey or indulged himself in holidays of such a 
 sort as prevented him from looking into books at all or 
 thinking much about them, his general health immediately 
 became more vigorous than might have been expected from 
 a relief so transient, and his sight was always improved ; 
 sometimes materially improved. But he would not pay the 
 price. He perferred to submit, if it should be inevitable, to 
 the penalty of ultimate blindness, rather than give up his 
 literary pursuits. 
 
 He never liked to work more than three hours consecu- 
 tively. At one o'clock, therefore, he took a walk of about 
 two miles, and attended to any little business abroad that 
 was incumbent on him, coming home generally refreshed 
 and exhilarated, and ready to lounge a little and gossip. 
 Dinner followed, for the greater part of his life about three 
 o'clock, although, during a few years, he dined in winter at 
 five or six, which he preferred, and which he gave up only 
 because his health demanded the change. In the summer 
 he always dined e?rly, so as to have the late afternoon for 
 driving and exercise during our hot season. 
 
 He enjoyed the pleasures of the table, and even its luxu- 
 ries, more than most men. But he restricted himself care- 
 fully in the use of them, adjusting everything with reference 
 to its effect on the power of using his eye immediately after- 
 wards, and especially on his power of using it the next day. 
 Occasional indulgence when dining out or with friends at 
 home he found useful, or at least not injurious, and was en- 
 couraged'in it bj his medical counsel. But he dined abroad, 
 as he did everything of the sort, at regulated intervals, and 
 not only determined beforehand in what he should deviate 
 from his settled habits, but often made a record of the result 
 for his future government. 
 
 The most embarrassing question, however, as to diet, re- 
 garded the use of wine, which, if at first it sometimes seemed 
 
PBESCOTT'S INFIRMITY OF SIGHT. 165 
 
 to be followed by bad consequences, was yet, on the whole, 
 found useful, and was prescribed to him. To make every- 
 thing certain, and settle the precise point to which he should 
 go, he instituted a series of experiments, and between March, 
 1818, and November, 1820, a period of two years and 
 nine months, he recorded the exact quantity of wine that 
 he took every day, except the few days when he entirely 
 abstained. It was Sherry or Madeira. In the great ma- 
 jority of cases four fifths, I should think it ranged from 
 one to two glasses, but went up sometimes to four or five, 
 and even to six. He settled at last, upon two or two and 
 a half as the quantity best suited to his case, and persevered 
 in this as his daily habit, until the last year of his life, dur- 
 ing which a peculiar regimen was imposed upon him from 
 the peculiar circumstances of his health. In all this I wish 
 to be understood that he was rigorous with himself, much 
 more so than persons thought who saw him only when he 
 was dining with friends, and when, but equally upon system 
 and principle, he was much more free. 
 
 He generally smoked a single weak cigar after dinner, 
 and listened at the same time to light reading from Mrs. 
 Prescott. A walk of two miles more or less followed ; 
 but always enough, after the habit of riding was given up, to 
 make the full amount of six miles' walking for the day's 
 exercise, and then, between five and eight, he took a cup of 
 tea, and had his reader with him for work two hours more. 
 
 The labors of the day were now definitively ended. He 
 came down from his study to his library, and either sat 
 there or walked about while Mrs. Prescott read to him 
 from some amusing book, generally a novel, and, above all 
 other novels, those of Scott and Miss Edgeworth. In all 
 this he took great solace. He enjoyed the room as well as 
 the reading, and, as he moved about, would often stop be- 
 fore the books, especially his favorite books, and be 
 sure that they were all in their proper places, drawn up ex- 
 
16l> GEORGE TICKNOR. 
 
 actlj to the front of their respective shelves, like soldiers 
 on a dress-parade, sometimes speaking of them, and 
 almost to them, as if they were personal friends. 
 
 At half past ten, having first taken nearly another glass 
 of wine, he went to bed, fell asleep quickly, and slept soundly 
 and well. Suppers he early gave up, although they were a 
 form of social intercourse much liked in his father's house, 
 and common thirty or forty years ago in the circle to which 
 he belonged. Besides all other reasons against them, he 
 found that the lights commonly on the table shot their hori- 
 zontal rays so as to injure his suffering organ. Larger even- 
 ing parties, which were not so liable to this objection, he 
 liked rather for their social influences than for the pleasure 
 they gave him ; but he was seen in them to the last, though 
 rarely and only for a short time in each. Earlier in life, 
 when he enjoyed them more and stayed later, he would, 
 in the coldest winter nights, after going home, run up and 
 down on a plank walk, so arranged in the garden of the 
 Bedford-Street house that he could do it with his eyes shut, 
 for twenty minutes or more, in order that his system might 
 be refreshed, and his sight invigorated, for the next morn- 
 ing's work.* Later, unhappily, this was not needful. His 
 eye had lost the sensibility that gave its value to such a 
 habit. 
 
 In his exercise, at all its assigned hours, he was faithful 
 and exact. If a violent storm prevented him from going 
 out, or if the bright snow on sunny days in winter rendered 
 it dangerous for him to expose his eye to its brilliant reflec- 
 
 * Some persons may think this to have been a fancy of my 
 friend, or an over-nice estimate of the value of the open air. But 
 others have found the same benefit who needed it less. Sir Charles 
 Bell says, in his journal, that' he used to sit in the open air a great 
 deal, and read or draw, because on the following day he found himself 
 so much better able to work. Some of the best passages in his great 
 treatises were, he says, written under these circumstances. 
 
PRESCOTT'S INFIRMITY OF SIGHT. 167 
 
 tion, he would dress himself as for the street and walk vig- 
 orously about the colder parts of the house, or he would 
 saw and chop fire-wood, under cover, being, in the latter 
 case, read to all the while. 
 
 The result he sought, and generally obtained, by these 
 efforts was not, however, always to be had without suffering. 
 The first mile or two of his walk often cost him pain 
 sometimes sharp pain in consequence of the rheumatism, 
 which seldom deserted his limbs ; but he never on this 
 account gave it up; for regular exercise in the open air 
 was, as he well knew, indispensable to the preservation of 
 whatever remained of his decaying sight. He persevered, 
 therefore, through the last two suffering years of his life, 
 when it was peculiarly irksome and difficult for him to 
 move ; and even in the days immediately preceding his first 
 attack of paralysis, when he was very feeble, he was out 
 at his usual hours. His will, in truth, was always stronger 
 than the bodily ills that beset him, and prevailed over them 
 to the last* 
 
 * On one occasion, when he was employed upon a work that 
 interested him because it related to a friend, he was attacked with 
 pains that made a sitting posture impossible.* But he would not 
 yield. He took his noctograph to a sofa, and lAielt before it so as to 
 be able to continue his work. This resource, however, failed, and 
 then he laid himself down flat upon the floor. This extrarordinary 
 operation went on during portions of nine successive days. 
 
BEATRICE. 
 
 BY DANTE. 
 
 THIS most gentle lady reached such favor among the 
 people, that when she passed along the way persons 
 ran to see her, which gave me wonderful delight. And 
 when she was near any one, such modesty took possession 
 of his heart, that he did not dare to raise his eyes or to re- 
 turn her salutation ; and to this, should any one doubt it, 
 many, as having experienced it, could bear witness for me. 
 She, crowned and clothed with humility, took her way, dis- 
 playing no pride in that which she saw and heard. Many, 
 when she had passed, said, " This is not a woman ; rather is 
 she one of the most beautiful angels of heaven." Others 
 said, " She is a miracle. Blessed be the Lord who can per- 
 form such a marvel ! " I say that she showed herself so 
 gentle and so full of all beauties, that those who looked on 
 her felt within themselves a pure and sweet delight such as 
 they could not tell in words ; nor was there any who could 
 look at her and not feel need at first to sigh. These and 
 more wonderful things proceeded from her, marvellously and 
 with power. Wherefore I, thinking on all this-, proposed 
 to say some words, in which I would exhibit her mar- 
 vellous and excellent influences, to the end that not only 
 those who might actually behold her, but also others, might 
 know of her whatever words could tell. Then I wrote this 
 sonnet : 
 
BEATRICE. 169 
 
 So gentle and so modest doth appear 
 My lady when she giveth her salute, 
 That every tongue becometh trembling mute, 
 Nor do the eyes to look upon her dare 
 
 And though she hears her praises, she doth go 
 Benignly clothed with humility, 
 And like a thing come down she seems to be 
 From heaven to earth, a miracle to show. 
 
 So pleaseth she whoever cometh nigh, 
 
 She gives the heart a sweetness through the eyes, 
 Which none can understand who doth not prove. 
 
 And from her lip there seems indeed to move 
 A spirit sweet and in Love's very guise, 
 Which goeth saying to the soul, "Ah, sigh ! " 
 
A LOVE STORY.* 
 
 BY ROBERT SOUTHEY. 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 RASH MAERIAGES. AN EARLY WIDOWHOOD. AFFLICTION BEN 
 DERED A BLESSING TO THE SUFFERERS J AND TWO ORPHAN* 
 LEFT, THOUGH NOT DESTITUTE, YET FRIENDLESS. 
 
 Love built a stately house; where Fortune came, 
 And spinning fancies, she was heard to say 
 
 That her fine cobwebs did support the frame; 
 
 Whereas they were supported by the same. ' 
 But Wisdom quickly swept them all away. 
 
 HERBERT. 
 
 MRS. DOVE was the only child of a clergyman who 
 held a small vicarage in the West Riding. Leonard 
 Bacon, her father, had been left an orphan in early youth. 
 He had some wealthy relations by whose contributions he 
 was placed at an endowed grammar-school in the country, 
 and having through their influence gained a scholarship, to 
 which his own deserts might have entitled him, they con- 
 tinued to assist . him sparingly enough indeed at the 
 University, till he succeeded to a fellowship. Leonard was 
 made cf Nature's finest clay, and Nature had tempered it 
 with the choicest dews of heaven. 
 
 He had a female cousin about three years younger than 
 himself, and in like manner an orphan, equally destitute, but 
 
 * Southey always intended to complete this story, but he did not live 
 to fulfil his purpose. It is here brought together for the first time in 
 America, from the pages of that admirable work which has now taken 
 its place as an English classic, " The Doctor." 
 
A LOVE STORY. 171 
 
 far more forlorn. Man hath a fleece about him which en- 
 ables him to bear the bufferings of the storm ; but woman 
 when young, and lovely, and poor, is as a shorn lamb for 
 which the wind has not been tempered. 
 
 Leonard's father and Margaret's had been bosom friends. 
 They were subalterns in the same regiment, and, being for a 
 long time stationed at Salisbury, had become intimate at the 
 house of Mr. Trewbody, a gentleman of one of the oldest 
 families in Wiltshire. Mr. Trewbody had three daughters. 
 Melicent, the eldest, was a celebrated beauty, and the knowl- 
 edge of this had not tended to improve a detestable temper. 
 The two youngest, Deborah and Margaret, were lively, good- 
 natured, thoughtless, and attractive. They danced with the 
 two lieutenants, played to them on the spinnet, sung with 
 them and laughed with them, till this mirthful intercourse 
 became serious, and, knowing that it would be impossible to 
 obtain their father's consent, they married the men of their 
 hearts without it. Palmer and Bacon were both without 
 fortune, and without any other means of subsistence than 
 their commissions. For four years they were as happy as 
 love could make them ; at the end of that time Palmer was 
 seized with*an infectious fever. Deborah was then far ad- 
 vanced in pregnancy, and no solicitations could induce Bacon 
 to keep from his friend's bedside. The disease proved fatal ; 
 it communicated to Bacon and his wife; the former only 
 survived his friend ten days, and he and Deborah were then 
 laid in the same grave. They left an only boy of three 
 years old, and in less than a month the widow Palmer was 
 delivered of a daughter. 
 
 In the first impulse of anger at the flight of his daughters, 
 and the degradation of his family, (for Bacon was the son 
 of a tradesman, and Palmer was nobody knew who,) Mr. 
 Trewbody had made his will, and left the whole sum, which 
 he had designed for his three daughters, to the eldest 
 Whether the situation of Margaret and the two orphans 
 
172 ROBERT SOUTHEY. 
 
 might have touched him, is perhaps doubtful, for the fam- 
 ily were either light-hearted or hard-hearted, and his heart 
 was of the hard sort; but he died suddenly a few months 
 before his sons-in-law. The only son, Trewman Trewbody, 
 Esq., a Wiltshire fox-hunter, like his father, succeeded to 
 the estate ; and as he and his eldest sister hated each other 
 cordially, Miss Melicent left the manor-house, and estab- 
 lished herself in the Close at Salisbury, where she lived in 
 that style which a portion of 6,000 enabled her in those 
 days to support. 
 
 The circumstance which might appear so greatly to have 
 aggravated Mrs. Palmer's distress, if such distress be capable 
 of aggravation, prevented her perhaps from eventually sink- 
 ing under it. If the birth of her child was no alleviation 
 of her sorrow, it brought with it new feelings, new duties, 
 new cause for exertion, and new strength for it. She wrote 
 to Melicent and to her brother, simply stating her own 
 destitute situation, and that of the orphan Leonard ; she be- 
 lieved that their pride would not suffer them either to let 
 her starve or go to the parish for support, and in this she 
 was not disappointed. An answer was returned by Miss 
 Trewbody, informing her that she had nobody to thank but 
 herself for her misfortunes ; but that, notwithstanding the 
 disgrace which she had brought upon the family, she might 
 expect an annual allowance of ten pounds from the writer, 
 and a like sum from her brother ; upon this she must retire 
 into some obscure part of the country, and pray God to for- 
 give her for the offence she had committed, in marrying 
 beneath her birth, and against her father's consent. 
 
 Mrs. Palmer had also written to the friends of lieutenant 
 Bacon, her own husband had none who could assist her. 
 She expressed her willingness and her anxiety to have the 
 care of her sister's orphan, but represented her forlorn state. 
 They behaved more liberally than her own kin had done, 
 and promised five pounds a year as long as the boy should 
 
A LOVE STORY. 173 
 
 require it. With this and her pension she took a cottage in 
 a retired village. Grief had acted upon her heart like the 
 rod of Moses upon the rock in the desert ; it had opened 
 it, and the well-spring of piety had gushed forth. Affliction 
 made -her religious, and religion brought with it consolation, 
 and comfort, and joy. Leonard became as dear to her S 
 Margaret. The sense of duty educed a pleasure from every 
 privation to which she subjected herself for the sake of 
 economy; and, in endeavoring to fulfil her duties in that 
 state of life to which it had pleased God to call her, she 
 was happier than she had ever been in her father's house, 
 and not less so than in her marriage state. Her happiness 
 indeed was different in kind, but it was higher in degree. 
 For the sake of these dear children she was contented to 
 live, and eyen prayed for life ; while, if it had respected 
 herself only, death had become to her rather an object of 
 desire than of dread. In this manner she lived seven years 
 after the loss of her husband, .and was then carried off by an 
 acute disease, to the irreparable loss of the orphans, who 
 were thus orphaned indeed. 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 A LADY DESCRIBED WHOSE SINGLE LIFE WAS NO BLESSEDNESS 
 EITHER TO HERSELF OR OTHERS. A VERACIOUS EPITAPH AND 
 AN APPROPRIATE MONUMENT. 
 
 Beauty ! my Lord, 't is the worst part of woman ! 
 A weak, poor thing, assaulted every hour 
 By creeping minutes of defacing time; 
 A superficies which each breath of care 
 Blasts off; and every humorous stream of grief, 
 Which flows from forth these fountains of our eyes, 
 Washeth away, as rain doth winters snow. 
 
 GOFF. 
 
 Miss TREWBODY behaved with perfect propriety upon 
 the new* of her sister's death. She closed her front win- 
 
174 ROBERT SOUTHEY. 
 
 dows for two days ; received no visitors for a week ; was 
 much indisposed, but resigned to the will of Providence, in 
 reply to messages of condolence ; put her servants in mourn- 
 ing, and sent for Margaret, that she might do her duty to 
 her sister's child by breeding her up under her own eye. 
 Poor Margaret was transferred from the stone floor of her 
 mother's cottage to the Turkey carpet of her aunt's parlor. 
 She was too young to comprehend at once the whole evil of 
 the exchange ; but she learned to feel and understand if. 
 during years of bitter dependence, unalleviated by any hope, 
 except that of one day seeing Leonard, the only creature on 
 earth whom she remembered with affection. 
 
 Seven years elapsed, and during all those years Leonard 
 was left to pass his holidays, summer and winter, at the 
 grammar-school where he had been placed at Mrs. Palmer's 
 death : for although the master regularly transmitted with 
 his half-yearly bill the most favorable accounts of his dis- 
 position and general conduct, as well as of his progress in 
 learning, no wish to see the boy had ever arisen in the 
 hearts of his nearest relations ; and no feeling of kindness, 
 or sense of decent humanity, had ever induced either the 
 fox-hunter Trewman, or Melicent his sister, to invite him 
 for Midsummer or Christmas. At length in the seventh 
 year a letter announced that his school-education had been 
 
 completed, and that he was elected to a scholarship at 
 
 College, Oxford, which scholarship would entitle him to a 
 fellowship in due course of time : in the intervening years 
 some little assistance from his liberal benefactors would be 
 required ; and the liberality of those kind friends would be 
 well bestowed upon a youth who bade so fair to do honor 
 to himself, and to reflect no disgrace upon his honorable con- 
 nections. The head of the family promised his part, with 
 an ungracious expression of satisfaction at thinking that, 
 " thank God, there would soon be an end of these demands 
 upon him." Miss Trewbody signified her assent in the 
 
A LOVE STORY. 175 
 
 same amiable and religious spirit. However much her 
 sister had disgraced her family, she replied, " Please God, 
 it should never be said that she refused to do her duty." 
 
 The whole sum which these wealthy relations contributed 
 was not very heavy, an annual ten pounds each ; but 
 they contrived to make their nephew feel the weight of 
 every separate portion. The Squire's half came always 
 with a brief note, desiring that the receipt of the enclosed 
 sum might be acknowledged without delay, not a word j{ 
 kindness or courtesy accompanied it: and Miss Trewbody 
 never failed to administer with her remittance a few edify- 
 ing remarks upon the folly of his mother in marrying 
 beneath herself; and the improper conduct of his father in 
 connecting himself with a woman of family, against the 
 consent of her relations ; the consequence of which was, 
 that he had left a child dependent upon those relations for 
 support. Leonard received these pleasant preparations of 
 charity only at distant intervals, when he regularly expected 
 them, with his half-yearly allowance. But Margaret mean- 
 time was dieted upon the food of bitterness, without one 
 circumstance to relieve the misery of her situation. 
 
 At the time of which I am now speaking, Miss Trewbody 
 was a maiden lady of forty-seven, in the highest state of 
 preservation. The whole business of her life had been to 
 take care of a fine person, and in this she had succeeded 
 admirably. Her library consisted of two books : " Nelson's 
 Festivals and Fasts " was one, the other was " The Queen's 
 Cabinet Unlocked"; and there was not a cosmetic in the 
 latter which she had not faithfully prepared. Thus by 
 means, as she believed, of distilled waters of various kinds, 
 May-dew and buttermilk, hec skin retained its beautiful 
 texture still, and much of its smoothness ; and she knew at 
 times how to give it the appearance of that brilliancy which 
 it had lost. But that was a profound secret. Miss Trew- 
 body, remembering the example of Jezebel, always felt 
 
176 BOBERT SOUTHEY. 
 
 conscious that she was committing a sin when she took the 
 rouge-box in her hand, and generally ejaculated m a low 
 voice, the Lord forgive me ! when she laid it down : but, 
 looking in the glass at the same time, she indulged a hope 
 that the nature of the temptation might be considered as 
 an excuse for the transgression. Her other great business 
 was to observe with the utmost precision all the punctilios 
 of her situation in life ; and the time which was not devoted 
 to one or other of these worthy occupations, was employed 
 in scolding her servants, and tormenting her niece. This 
 employment, for it was so habitual that it deserved that 
 name, agreed excellently with her constitution. She was 
 troubled with no acrid humors, no fits of bile, no diseases 
 of the spleen, no vapors or hysterics. The morbid matter 
 was all collected in her temper, and found a regular vent at 
 her tongue. This kept the lungs in vigorous health ; nay, 
 it even seemed to supply the place of wholesome exercise, 
 and to stimulate the system like a perpetual blister, with 
 this peculiar advantage, that instead of an inconvenience it 
 ttas a pleasure to herself, and all the annoyance was to her 
 dependants. 
 
 Miss Trewbody lies buried in the Cathedral at Salisbury, 
 where a monument was erected to her memory worthy of 
 remembrance itself for its appropriate inscription and ac- 
 companiments. The epitaph recorded her as a woman 
 eminently pious, virtuous, and charitable, who lived univer- 
 sally respected, and died sincerely lamented, by all who had 
 the happiness of knowing her. This inscription was upon 
 a marble shield supported by two Cupids, who bent their 
 heads over the edge, with marble tears larger than gray 
 pease, and something of the .same color, upon their cheeks. 
 These were the only tears which her death occasioned, and 
 the only Cupids with whom she had ever any concern. 
 
A LOVE STORY. 177 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 A SCE^E WHICH WILL PUT SO3IE OF THOSE READERS WHO HAVB 
 BEEN MOST IMPATIENT WITH THE AUTHOR, IN THE BEST HUMOB 
 WITH HIM. 
 
 There is no argument of more antiqnity and elegancy than is the mat- 
 ter of Love ; for it seems to be as old as the world, and to bear date from 
 the first time that man and woman was: therefore in this, as in the finest 
 metal, the freshest wits have in all ages shown their best workmanship. 
 
 EGBERT WILMOT. 
 
 Leonard had resided three years at Oxford, one 
 of his college-friends invited him to pass the long vacation 
 at his father's house, which happened to be within an easy 
 ride of Salisbury. One morning, therefore, he rode to that 
 city, rung at Miss Trewbody's door, and having sent in his 
 name, was admitted into the parlor, where there was no one 
 to receive him. while Miss Trewbody adjusted her head- 
 dress at the toilette, before she made her appearance. Her 
 feelings while she was thus employed were not of the 
 pleasantest kind toward this unexpected guest ; and she was 
 prepared to accost him with a reproof for his extravagance 
 in undertaking so long a journey, and with some mortifying 
 questions concerning the business which brought him there. 
 But this amiable intention was put to flight, when Leonard, 
 as soon as she entered the room, informed her, that having 
 accepted an invitation into that neighborhood, from his friend 
 and fellow-collegian, the son of Sir Lambert Bowles, he'had 
 taken the earliest opportunity of coming to pay his respects 
 to her, and acknowledging his obligations, as bound alike 
 by duty and inclination. The name of Sir Lambert Bowle3 
 acted upon Miss Trewbody like a charm ; and its mollify- 
 ing effect was not a little aided by the tone of her nephew's 
 address, and the sight of a fine youth in the first bloom of 
 manhood, whose appearance and manners were such, that 
 8 L 
 
178 ROBERT SOUTHEY. 
 
 she could not be surprised at the introduction he had ob- 
 tained into one of the first families in the county. The 
 scowl, therefore, which she brought into the room upon her 
 brow, passed instantly away, and was succeeded by so 
 gracious an aspect, that Leonard, if he had not divined the 
 cause, might have mistaken this gleam of sunshine for fair 
 weather. 
 
 A cause which Miss Trewbody could not possibly suspect 
 had rendered her nephew's address thus conciliatory. Had 
 he expected to see no other person in that house, the visit 
 would have been performed as an irksome obligation, and 
 iris manner would have appeared as cold and formal as the 
 reception which he anticipated. But Leonard had not for- 
 gotten the playmate and companion with whom the happy 
 years of his childhood had been passed. Young as he was 
 at their separation, his character had taken its stamp dur- 
 ing those peaceful years, and the impression which it then 
 received was indelible. Hitherto hope had never been to 
 him so delightful as memory. His thoughts wandered back 
 into the past more frequently than they took flight into the 
 future ; and the favorite form which his imagination called 
 up was that of the sweet child, who in winter partook his 
 bench in the chimney-corner, and in summer sat with him 
 in the porch, and strung the fallen blossoms of jessamine 
 upon stalks of grass. The snowdrop and the crocus re- 
 minded him of their little garden, the primrose of their 
 sunny orchard-bank, and the bluebells and the cowslip of 
 the fields, wherein they were allowed to run wild, and 
 gather them in the merry month of May. Such as she 
 then was he saw her frequently in sleep, with her blue 
 eyes, and rosy cheeks, and flaxen curls: and in his day- 
 dreams he sometimes pictured her to himself such as he 
 supposed she now might be, and dressed up the image with 
 all the magic of ideal beauty. His heart, therefore, was at 
 his lips when he inquired for his cousin. It was not with- 
 
A LOVE STORY. 179 
 
 out something like fear, and an apprehension of disappoint- 
 ment, that he awaited her appearance ; and he was secretly 
 condemning himself for the romantic folly which he had 
 encouraged, when the door opened, and a creature came in, 
 less radiant, indeed, but more winning than his fancy 
 had created, for the loveliness of earth and reality waa 
 about her. 
 
 ' Margaret," said Miss Trewbody, " do you remember 
 your cousin Leonard?" 
 
 Before she could answer, Leonard had taken her hand. 
 " 'T is a long while, Margaret, since we parted ! ten 
 years! But I have not forgotten the parting nor the 
 blessed days of our childhood." 
 
 She stood trembling like an aspen leaf, and looked wist- 
 fully in his face for a moment, then hung down her head, 
 without power to utter a word in reply. But he felt her 
 tears fall fast upon his hand, and felt also that she returned 
 its pressure. 
 
 Leonard had some difficulty to command himself, so as to 
 bear a part in conversation with his aunt, and keep his eyes 
 and his thoughts from wandering. He accepted, however, 
 her invitation to stay and dine with her with undissembled 
 satisfaction, and the pleasure was not a little heightened 
 when she left the room to give some necessary orders in 
 consequence. Margaret still sate trembling and in silence. 
 He took her hand, pressed it to his lips, and said in a low 
 earnest voice, " Dear, dear Margaret ! " She raised her 
 eyes, and fixing them upon him with one of those looks, 
 the perfect remembrance of which can never be effaced from 
 the heart to which they have been addressed, replied in a 
 lower but not less earnest tone, " Dear Leonard ! " and from 
 that moment their lot was sealed for time and for eternity. 
 
180 ROBERT SOUTHEY. 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 MORE CONCERNING LOVE AND THE DREAM OP LIFE. 
 
 Happy the bonds that hold ye; 
 Sure they be sweeter far than liberty, 
 There is no blessedness but in such bondage ; 
 Happy that happy chain; such links are heavei ly. 
 
 BEAUMONT ANE FLETCHER. 
 
 I WILL not describe the subsequent interviews between 
 Leonard and his cousin, short and broken, but precious as 
 they were; nor that parting one, in which hands were 
 plighted with the sure and certain knowledge that hearts 
 had been interchanged. Remembrance will enable some of 
 my readers to portray the scene, and then perhaps a sigh 
 may be heaved for the days that are gone : Hope will pic- 
 ture it to others and with them the sigh will be for the 
 days that are to come. 
 
 There was not that indefinite deferment of hope in this 
 case at which the heart sickens. Leonard had been bred 
 up in poverty from his childhood ; a parsimonious allowance, 
 grudgingly bestowed, had contributed to keep him frugal at 
 college, by calling forth a pardonable if not a commendable 
 sense of pride in aid of a worthier principle. He knew 
 that he could rely upon himself for frugality, industry, and 
 a cheerful as well as a contenteti mind. He had seen the 
 miserable state of bondage in which Margaret existed with 
 her aunt, and his resolution was made to deliver her from 
 tha : bondage as soon as he could obtain the smallest bene- 
 fice on which it was possible for them to subsist. They 
 agreed to live rigorously within their means, however poor, 
 and put their trust in Providence. They could not be de- 
 ceived in each other, for they had grown up together ; and 
 they knew that they were not deceived in themselves. 
 Their love had the freshness of youth, but prudence and 
 
A LOVE STORY. 181 
 
 forethought were not wanting; the resolution which they 
 had taken brought with it peace of mind, and no misgiving 
 was felt in either heart when they prayed for a blessing 
 upon their purpose. In reality it had already brought a 
 blessing with it; and this they felt; for love, when it de- 
 serves that n^ime, produces in us what may be called a 
 regeneration of its own a second birth dimly, but yet 
 in some degree, resembling that which is effected by Divine 
 Love when its redeeming work is accomplished in the soul. 
 
 Leonard returned to Oxford happier than all this world's 
 wealth or this world's honors could have made him. He 
 had now a definite and attainable hope an object in life 
 which gave to life . itself a value. For Margaret, the world 
 no longer seemed to her like the same earth which she had 
 till then inhabited. Hitherto she had felt herself a forlorn 
 and solitary creature, without a friend; and the sweet 
 sounds and pleasant objects of nature, had imparted as little 
 cheerfulness to her as to the debtor who sees green fields in 
 sunshine from his prison, and hears the lark singing at lib- 
 erty. Her heart was open now to all the exhilarating and 
 all the softening influences of birds, fields, flowers, vernal 
 suns, and melodious streams. She was subject to the same 
 daily and hourly exercise of meekness, patience, and hu- 
 mility; but the trial was no longer painful; with love in 
 her heart, and hope and sunshine in her prospect, she found 
 even a pleasure in contrasting her present condition with 
 that which was in store for her. 
 
 In these our days every young lady holds the pen of a 
 ready writer, and words flow from it as fast as it can indent 
 its zigzag lines, according to the reformed system of writing, 
 which said system improves handwritings by making 
 them all alike and all illegible. At that time women wrote 
 better and spelt worse ; but letter-writing was not one of 
 their accomplishments. It had not yet become one of the 
 general pleasures and luxuries of life, perhaps the greatest 
 
182 ROBERT SOUTHEY. 
 
 gratification which the progress of civilization has given 
 us. There was then no mail-coach to waft a sigh across the 
 country at the rate of eight miles an hour. Letters came 
 slowly and with long intervals between ; but when they 
 came, the happiness which they imparted to Leonard and 
 Margaret lasted during the interval, however long. To 
 Leonard it was as an exhilarant and a cordial which rejoiced 
 and strengthened him. He trod the earth with a lighter and 
 more elated movement on the day when he received a letter 
 from Margaret, as if he felt himself invested with an impor- 
 tance which he had never possessed till the happiness of an- 
 other human being was inseparably associated with his own. 
 
 So proud a thing it was for him to wear 
 
 Love's golden chain, 
 With which it is best freedom to be bound.* 
 
 Happy, indeed, if there be happiness on earth, as that 
 same sweet poet says, is he 
 
 Who love enjoys, and placed hath his mind 
 Where fairest virtues fairest beauties grace, 
 
 Then in himself such store of worth doth find 
 That he deserves to find so good a place.* 
 
 This was Leonard's case ; and when he kissed the paper 
 which her hand had pressed, it was with a consciousness of 
 the strength and sincerity of his affection, which at once re- 
 joiced and fortified his heart. To Margaret his letters were 
 like summer dew upon the herb that thirsts for such refresh- 
 ment. Whenever they arrived, a headache became the 
 cause or pretext for retiring earlier than usual to her cham- 
 ber, that she might weep and dream over the precious lines. 
 
 True gentle love is like the summer dew, 
 
 Which falls around when all is still and hush ; 
 
 And falls unseen until its bright 'drops strew 
 
 With odors, herb and flower, and bank and bush. 
 
 * Drummond. 
 
A LOVE STORY. 183 
 
 O love ! when womanhood is in the flush, 
 And man's a young and an unspotted thing, 
 
 His first-breathed word, and her half-conscious hlusb, 
 Are fair as light in heaven, or flowers in spring* 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 AS EARLY BEREAVEMENT. TRUE LOVE ITS OWN COMFORTER. A 
 LONELY FATHER AND AN ONLY CHILD. 
 
 Read ye that run the awful truth, 
 
 With which I charge my page; 
 A worm is in the bud of youth, 
 
 And at the root of age. 
 
 COWPER. 
 
 LEONARD was not more than eight-and-twenty when he 
 obtained a living, a few miles from Doncaster. He took 
 his bride with him to the vicarage. The house was as hum- 
 ble as the benefice, which was worth less than 50 a year ; 
 but it was soon made the neatest cottage in the country 
 round, and upon a happier d\*elling the sun never shone. 
 A few acres of good glebe were attached to it ; and the gar- 
 den was large enough to afford healthful and pleasurable 
 employment to its owners. The course of true love never 
 ran more smoothly ; but its course was short. 
 
 O how this spring of love resembleth 
 
 The uncertain glory of an April day, 
 Which now shows all the beauty of the sun, 
 
 And by and by a cloud takes all away ! t 
 
 Little more than five years from the time of their mar- 
 riage had elapsed, before a head-stone in the adjacent 
 churchyard told where the remains of Margaret Bacon had 
 been deposited, in the thirtieth year of her age. 
 
 * Allan Cunningham. t Shakespeare. 
 
184 EGBERT SOUTHEY. 
 
 i 
 When the stupor and the agony of that bereavement had 
 
 passed away, the very intensity of Leonard's affection be- 
 came a source of consolation. Margaret had been to him a 
 purely ideal object during the years of his youth ; death 
 had again rendered her such. Imagination had beautified 
 and idolized her then ; faith sanctified and glorified her now. 
 She had been to him on earth all that he had fancied, all 
 that he had hoped, all that he had desired. She would 
 again be so in heaven. And this second union nothing 
 could impede, nothing could interrupt, nothing could dis- 
 solve. He had only to keep himself worthy of it by cher- 
 ishing her memory, hallowing his heart to it while he per- 
 formed a parent's duty to their child ; and so doing to await 
 his own summons, which must one day come, which every 
 day was brought nearer, and which any day might bring. 
 
 'T is the only discipline we are born for ; 
 All studies else are but as circular lines, 
 And death the centre where they must all meet.* 
 
 The same feeling which from his childhood had refined 
 Leonard's heart, keeping it* pure and undefiled, had also 
 corroborated the natural strength of his chafacter, and made 
 him firm of purpose. It was a saying of Bishop Andrewes, 
 that " good husbandry is good divinity " ; " the truth where- 
 of," says Fuller, " no wise man will deny." Frugality he 
 had always practised as a needful virtue, and found that, in 
 an especial manner, it brings with it its own reward. He 
 now resolved upon scrupulously setting apart a fourth of his 
 small income to make a provision for his child, in case of 
 her surviving him, as in the natural course of things might 
 be expected. If she should be removed before him for 
 this was an event the possibility of which he always bore in 
 mind he had resolved, that whatever should have been 
 accumulated with this intent, should be disposed of to some 
 
 * Massinger. 
 
A LOVE STORY. 185 
 
 other pious purpose, for such, within the limits to which 
 his poor means extended, he properly considered this. 
 And having entered on this prudential course with a calm 
 reliance upon Providence, in case his hour should come be- 
 fore that purpose could be accomplished, he was without 
 any earthly hope or fear, those alone excepted from 
 which no parent can be free. 
 
 The child had been christened Deborah, after her maternal 
 grandmother, for whom Leonard ever gratefully retained a 
 most affectionate and reverential remembrance. She was 
 a healthy, happy creature in body and in mind ; at first 
 
 one of those little prating girls 
 Of whom fond parents tell such tedious stories ; * 
 
 afterwards, as she grew up, a favorite with the village 
 schoolmistress, and with the whole parish ; docile, good- 
 natured, lively and yet considerate, always gay as a lark and 
 busy as a bee. One of the pensive pleasures in which 
 Leonard indulged was to gaze on her unperceived, and 
 trace the likeness to her mother. 
 
 O Christ ! 
 
 How that which was the life's life of our being, 
 Can pass away, and we recall it thus ! t 
 
 That resemblance which was strong in childhood lessened 
 as the child grew up ; for Margaret's countenance had ac- 
 quired a cast of meek melancholy during those years in 
 which the bread of bitterness had been her portion ; and, 
 when hope came to her, it was that " hope deferred,' which 
 takes from the cheek its bloom, even when the heart, instead 
 of being made sick, is sustained by it. But no unhappy 
 circumstances depressed the constitutional buoyancy of her 
 daughter's spirits. Deborah brought into the world the 
 
 * Dryden. t Isaac Comnenus. 
 
1 7 ' F .' F :~ r . . > I ttH - V 
 
 easy temper and a 
 
 :. ' ' "-. - *" -. ~v. 
 
 ... 
 
 in " : -j : : r > .:: -./: -- '"'} 
 
 ce, with the sort of 
 
 - .:.-. 
 
 i WBBC& nan gnun * ^ercoc aMHM-iHre 
 to her mother s, he wished to persuade himseif, that as the 
 cf Ac one seemed to narc hern thus pre- 
 
 km ^^ . - _ m. i * 
 :- ".:-: . .. \ ' . . -. .- 
 
 rf_. -"--"""- 
 
 ocneis mi a goon OKI go, WKIXT m^ta > au> m 
 
 rcomrse should ripen her for^ 
 
 CHAPTER TI 
 
 of Leonard 
 
 . -" - "- - ^. - - - "- 
 
 : . T ? 
 labored with such 
 
 upon the death of CTery 
 
 another far the thing from 
 
 - ^ ^ ""/.*- r ~ ^ * , ^. !\ * 
 change. An abolitioa almost as complete with regard to 
 the pezson had takes place in the present instance. The 
 
 to him by all his dearest 
 He had been known bv it on 
 
A LOVE STORY. 187 
 
 his mother's knees, and in the humble cottage of that aunt 
 who had been to him a second mother ; and by the wife of 
 his bosom, his first, last, and only love. Margaret had 
 never spoken to him, never thought of him, by any other 
 name. From the hour of her death, no human voice ever 
 addressed him by it again. He never heard himself so 
 called, except in dreams. It existed only in the dead let- 
 ter ; he signed it mechanically in the course of business, 
 but it had ceased to be a living name. 
 
 Men willingly prefix a handle to their names, and tack 
 on to them any two or more honorary letters of the alphabe: 
 as a tail ; they drop their surnames for a dignity, and 
 change them for an estate or a title. They are pleased 
 to be Doctor'd and Professor'd ; to be Captain'd, Major'd, 
 Colouel'd, General' d, or Admiral'd; to be Sir John'd, my- 
 Lorded, or your-Grace'd. " You and I," says Cranmer in 
 his Answer to Gardiner's book upon Transubstantiation 
 "you and I were delivered from our surnames when we 
 were consecrated Bishops ; sithence which time we have so 
 commonly been used of all men to be called Bishops, you of 
 Winchester, and I of Canterbury, that the most part of the 
 people know not that your name is Gardiner, and mine 
 Cranmer. And I pray God, that we being called to the 
 name of Lords, have not forgotten our own baser estates, 
 that once we were simple squires ! " But the emotion with 
 which the most successful suitor of Fortune hears himself 
 first addressed by a new and honorable title, conferred upon 
 him for his public deserts, touches his heart less (if that 
 heart be sound at the core), than when after long absence, 
 some one who is privileged so to use it, accosts him by his 
 Christian name, that household name which he has never 
 heard but from his nearest relations, and his old Familiar 
 friends. By this it is that we are known to all around us 
 in childhood ; it is used only by our parents and our nearest 
 kin when that stage is passed ; and, as they drop off, it dies 
 as to its oral uses with them. 
 
188 ROBERT SOUTHEY. 
 
 It is because we are remembered more naturally in our 
 family and paternal circles by our baptismal than our he- 
 reditary names, and remember ourselves more naturally by 
 them, that the Roman Catholic, renouncing, upon a princi- 
 ple of perverted piety, all natural ties when he enters a 
 convent, and voluntarily dies to the world, assumes a new 
 one. This is one manifestation of that intense selfishness 
 which the law of monastic life inculcates, and affects to 
 sanctify. Alas, there need no motives of erroneous relig- 
 ion to wean us from the ties of blood and of affection ! They 
 are weakened and dissolved by fatal circumstances, and the 
 ways of the world, too frequently and too soon. 
 
 " Our men of rank," said my friend one day when he was 
 speaking upon this subject, " are not the only persons who 
 go by different appellations in different parts of their lives. 
 We all moult our names in the natural course of life. I 
 was Dan in my father's house, and should still be so with 
 my uncle William and Mr. Guy, if they were still living. 
 Upon my removal to Doncaster, my master and mistress 
 called me Daniel, and my acquaintance Dove. In Holland 
 I was Mynheer Duif. Now I am the Doctor, and not 
 among my patients only ; friends, acquaintance, and stran- 
 gers, address me by this appellation ; even my wife calls 
 me by no other name; and I shall never be anything but 
 the Doctor again, till I am registered at my burial by the 
 Bame name as at my christening." 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 THE DOCTOB IS INTRODUCED, BY THE SMALL-POX, TO HIS FUTURB 
 WIFE. 
 
 Long-waiting love doth entrance find 
 Into the slow-believing mind. 
 
 SYDNEY GODOLPHIN. 
 
 WHEN Deborah was about nineteen, the small-pox broke 
 out in Doncaster, and soon spread over the surrounding 
 
A LOVE STORY. 189 
 
 country, occasioning everywhere a great mortality. At 
 that time inoculation had very rarely been practised in 
 the provinces ; and the prejudice against it was so strong, 
 that Mr. Bacon, though convinced in his own mind that the 
 practice was not only lawful, but advisable, refrained from 
 having his daughter inoculated till the disease appeared in 
 his own parish. He had been induced to defer it during 
 her childhood, partly because he was unwilling to offend the 
 prejudices of his parishioners, which he hoped to overcome 
 by persuasion and reasoning when time and opportunity 
 might favor ; still more, because he thought it unjustifiable 
 to introduce such a disease into his own house, with immi- 
 nent risk of communicating it to others, which were other- 
 wise in no danger, in which the same preparations would 
 not be made, and where, consequently, the danger would be 
 greater. But when the malady had shown itself in the par- 
 ish, then he felt that his duty as a parent required him to 
 take the best apparent means for the preservation of his 
 child ; and that as a pastor also it became him now in his 
 own family to set an example to his parishioners. 
 
 Deborah, who had the most perfect reliance upon her 
 father's judgment, and lived in entire accordance with his 
 will in all things, readily consented ; and seemed to regard 
 the beneficial consequences of the experiment to others with 
 hope, rather than to look with apprehension to it for herself. 
 Mr Bacon therefore went to Doncaster and called upon 
 Mr. Dove. " I do not," said he, " ask whether you would 
 advise me to have my daughter inoculated ; where so great 
 a risk is to be incurred, in the case of an only child, you 
 might hesitate to advise it. But if you see nothing in her 
 present state of health, or in her constitutional tendencies, 
 which would render it more than ordinarily dangerous, it is 
 her own wish and mine, after due consideration on my part, 
 that she should be committed to your care, putting our 
 trust in Providence." 
 
190 ROBERT SOUTHEY. 
 
 Hitherto there had been no acquaintance between Mr. 
 Bacon and the Doctor, farther than that they knew each 
 other by sight and by good report. This circumstance led 
 to a growing intimacy. During the course of his attend- 
 ance, the Doctor fell in friendship with the father, and the 
 father with him. 
 
 " Did he fall in love with his patient? " 
 
 " No, ladies." 
 
 You have already heard that he once fell in love, and 
 how it happened. And you have also been informed that 
 he caught love once, though I have not told you how, 
 because it would have led me into too melancholy a tale. 
 In this case he neither fell in love, nor caught it, nor ran 
 into it, nor walked into it ; nor was he overtaken in it, as a 
 boon companion in liquor, or a runaway in his flight. Yet 
 there was love between the parties at last, and it was love for 
 love, to the heart's content of both. How this came to pass 
 will be related at the proper time and in the proper place. 
 
 For here let me set before the judicious reader certain 
 pertinent remarks by the pious and well-known author of a 
 popular treatise upon the Right Use of Reason, a trea- 
 tise which has been much read to little purpose. That au- 
 thor observes, that " those writers and speakers whose chief 
 business is to amuse or delight, to allure, terrify, or persuade 
 mankind, do not confine themselves to any natural order, but 
 in a cryptical or hidden method, adapt everything to their 
 designed ends. Sometimes they omit those things which 
 might injure their design, or grow tedious to their hearers, 
 though they seem to have a necessary relation to the point in 
 hand ; sometimes they add those things which have no great 
 reference to the subject, but are suited to allure or refresh 
 the mind and the ear. They dilate sometimes, and flourish 
 long upon little incidents, and they skip over, and but 
 lightly touch the dryer part of the theme. They omit tilings 
 essential which are not beautiful ; they insert little needless 
 
A LOVE STORY. 191 
 
 chcumstances, and beautiful digressions: they invert times 
 and actions, in order to place everything in the most affect- 
 ing light; they place the first things last, and the last 
 things first with wondrous art ; and yet so manage it as tc 
 conceal their artifice, and lead the senses and passions of 
 their hearers into a pleasing and powerful captivity." 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 MB. BACON 8 PARSONAGE. CHRISTIAN RESIGNATION. TIME AND 
 CHANGE. WILKIE AND THE MONK IN THE ESCURIAL. 
 
 The idea of her life shall sweetly creep 
 
 Into his study of imagination; 
 
 And every lovely organ of her life 
 
 Shall come apparelled in more precious habit, 
 
 More moving delicate, and full of life, 
 
 Into the eye and prospect of his soul, 
 
 Than when she lived indeed. 
 
 SHAKESPEARE. 
 
 IN a Scotch village the Manse is sometimes the only good 
 house, and generally it is the best ; almost, indeed, what in 
 old times the Mansion used to be in an English one. In Mr. 
 Bacon's parish, the vicarage, though humble as the benefice 
 itself, was the neatest. The cottage in which he and Marga- 
 ret passed their childhood, had been remarkable for that com- 
 fort which is the result and the reward of order and neatness : 
 and when the reunion which blessed them both rendered the 
 remembrance of those years delightful, they returned in 
 this respect to the way in which they had been trained up, 
 practised the economy which they had learned there, and 
 loved to think how entirely their course of life, in all its cir- 
 cumstances, would be after the heart of that person, if she 
 could behold it, whose memory they both with equal affec- 
 tion cherished. After his bereavement, it was one of the 
 widower's pensive pleasures to keep everything in the 
 
192 ROBERT SOUTHEY. 
 
 state us when Margaret was living. Nothing was neglected 
 that she used to do, or that she would have done. The 
 flowers were tended as carefully as if she were still to enjoy 
 their fragrance and their beauty ; and the birds who came 
 in winter for their crumbs, were fed as duly for her sake, as 
 they had formerly been by her hands. * 
 
 There was no superstition in this, nor weakness. Im- 
 moderate grief, if it does not exhaust itself by indulgence, 
 easily assumes the one character or the other, or takes a 
 type of insanity. But he had looked for consolation, where, 
 when sincerely sought, it is always to be found ; and he had 
 experienced that religion effects in a true believer all that 
 philosophy professes, and more than all that mere philos- 
 ophy can perform. The wounds which stoicism would cau- 
 terize, religion heals. 
 
 There is a resignation with which, it may be feared, 
 most of us deceive ourselves. To bear what must be 
 borne, and submit to what cannot be resisted, is no more 
 than what the unregenerate heart is taught by the instinct 
 of animal nature. But to acquiesce in the afflictive dispen- 
 sations of Providence, to make one's own will conform in 
 all things to that of our Heavenly Father, to say to him 
 in the sincerity of faith, when we drink of the bitter cup, 
 " Thy will be done ! " to bless the name of the Lord as 
 much from the heart when he takes away as when he gives, 
 and with a depth of feeling, of which, perhaps, none but the 
 afflicted heart is capable, this is the resignation which re- 
 ligion teaches, this the sacrifice which it requires.* This 
 sacrifice Leonard had made, and he felt that it was accepted. 
 
 * This passage was written when Southey was bowing his head 
 under the sorest and saddest of his many troubles. He thus alludes 
 to it in a letter to J. W. Warter, dated October 5, 1834. 
 
 " On the next leaf is the passage of which I spoke in my letter from 
 York. It belongs to an early chapter in the third volume ; and very 
 remarkable it is that it should have been written just at that time." 
 
A LOVE STORY. 193 
 
 Severe, therefore, as his loss had been, and lasting as its 
 effects were, it produced in him nothing like a settled sor- 
 row, nor even that melancholy which sorrow leaves behind. 
 Gibbon has said to himself, that as a mere philosopher he 
 could not agree with the Greeks, in thinking that those who 
 die in their youth are favored by the Gods : 
 
 *Ov of Bfoi (j>i\ovcriv diro6vr}(TKei. vcos. 
 
 It was because he was "a mere philosopher," that he 
 failed to perceive a truth which the religious heathen ac- 
 knowledged, and which is so trivial, and of such practical 
 value, that it may now be seen inscribed upon village tomb- 
 stones. The Christian knows that "Blessed are the dead 
 which die in the Lord ; even so saith the Spirit." And the 
 heart of the Christian mourner, in its deepest distress, hath 
 the witness of the Spirit to that consolatory assurance. 
 
 In this faith Leonard regarded his bereavement. His 
 loss, he knew, had been Margaret's gain. What, if she had 
 been summoned in the flower of her years, and from a state 
 of connubial happiness which there had been nothing to dis- 
 turb or to alloy ? How soon might that flower have been 
 blighted, how surely must it have faded, how easily 
 might that happiness have been interrupted, by some of 
 those evils which flesh is heir to ! And as the separation 
 was to take place, how mercifully had it been appointed 
 that he, who was the stronger vessel, should be the survivor ! 
 Even for their child this was the best, greatly as she needed, 
 and would need, a mother's care. His paternal solicitude 
 would supply that care, as far as it was possible to supply 
 it ; but had he been removed, mother and child must have 
 been left to the mercy of Providence, without any earthly 
 protector, or any means of support. 
 
 For her to die was gain ; in him, therefore, it were sinful 
 as well as selfish to repine, and of such selfishness and sin 
 his heart acouitted him. If a wish could have recalled her 
 y M 
 
194 ROBERT SOUTHEY. 
 
 to life, no such wish would ever have by him been uttered, 
 nor ever have by him been felt; certain he was, that he 
 loved her too well to bring her again into this world of in- 
 stability and trial. Upon earth there can be no safe happi- 
 
 Ak! male FORTUNE devota est ara MANENTI. 
 Fallit, et hcec nullas accipit ara pi-eces.* 
 
 All things here are subject to Time and Mutability : 
 
 Quod tibi largo, dedit Horn dextra, 
 Horn furaci rapid sinistrdj 
 
 We must be in eternity before we can be secure against 
 cnange. " The world," says Cowper, " upon which we close 
 our eyes at night, is never the same with that on which we 
 open them in the morning." 
 
 It was to the perfect Order he should find in that state 
 upon which he was about to enter, that the judicious Hooker 
 looked forward at his death with placid and profound con- 
 tentment. Because he had been employed in contending 
 against a spirit of insubordination and schism which soon 
 proved fatal to his country ; and because his life had been 
 passed under the perpetual discomfort of domestic discord, 
 the happiness of Heaven seemed, in his estimation, to consist 
 primarily in Order, as, indeed, in all human societies this is 
 the first thing needful. The discipline which Mr. Bacon had 
 undergone was very different in kind : what he delighted to 
 think was, that the souls of those whom death and redemp- 
 tion have made perfect, are in a world where there is 110 
 change, nor parting, where nothing fades, nothing passes 
 away and is no more seen, but the good and the beautiful 
 are permanent. 
 
 Miser, chi speme in cosa mortal pone ; 
 Ma, chi non ve la pone '! \ 
 
 * Wallius. f Casimir. \ Petrarch. 
 
A LOVE STORY. 19,5 
 
 When Wilkie was in the Escurial looking at Titian's 
 famous picture of the Last Supper, in the refectory there, 
 an old Jeronimite said to him, " I have sat daily in sight of 
 that picture for now nearly threescore years ; during that 
 time my companions have dropped off, one after another, 
 all who were my seniors, all who were my contemporaries, 
 and many, or most of those who were younger than myself; 
 more than one generation has passed away, and there the 
 figures in the picture have remained unchanged ! I look at 
 them till I sometimes think that they are the realities, and 
 we but shadows ! " * 
 
 I wish I could record the name of the monk by whom 
 that natural feeling was so feelingly and strikingly ex- 
 
 " The shows of things are better than themselves," 
 
 says the author of the Tragedy of Nero, whose name also 
 I could wish had been forthcoming; and the classical reader 
 will remember the lines of Sophocles : 
 
 l Op<5 yap Tjpas ovdcv ovras oXXo, TT\T)V 
 
 otronrfp o>/Ltev, TJ KOV<J)T)V (T<idv. t 
 
 These are reflections which should make us think 
 
 Of that same time when no more change shall be, 
 
 But steadfast rest of all things, firmly stayd 
 
 Upon the pillars of Eternity, 
 
 That is contraire to mutability ; 
 
 For all that moveth doth in change delight : 
 
 But thenceforth all shall rest eternally 
 
 With Him that is the God of Sabaoth hight, 
 
 O that great Sabaoth God grant me that sabbath's sight. J 
 
 * See the very beautiful lines of Wordsworth in the " Yarrow 
 Revisited." The affecting incident is introduced in "Lines on a 
 Portrait." 
 
 \ Sophc:les. J Spenser. 
 
196 ROBERT SOUTHEY. 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 A COUNTRY PARISH. SOME WHOLESOME EXTRACTS, SOME TRUH 
 ANECDOTES, AND SOME USEFUL HINTS, WHICH WILL NOT BE 
 TAKEN BY THOSE WHO NEED THEM MOST. 
 
 Ifyr, e inconveniente, che ddle cose delettabili dlcune ne sieno utili, cosi come 
 dell' utili moke ne sono delettabili, et in tutte due alcune si truovono 
 honeste. 
 
 LEONE MEDICO (HEBREO.) 
 
 MR. BACON'S parsonage was as humble a dwelling in all 
 respects as the cottage in which his friend Daniel was born. 
 A best kitchen was its best room, and in its furniture an 
 Observantine Friar would have seen nothing that he could 
 have condemned as superfluous. His college and later 
 school books, with a few volumes which had been presented 
 to him by the more grateful of his pupils, composed his 
 scanty library : they were either books of needful reference, 
 or such as upon every fresh perusal might afford new 
 delight. But he had obtained the use of the Church Li- 
 brary at Doncaster by a payment of twenty shillings, accord- 
 ing to the terms of the foundation. Folios from that 
 collection might be kept three months, smaller volumes, 
 one or two, according to their size; and as there were 
 many works in it of solid contents as well as sterling value, 
 he was in no such want of intellectual food, as too many of 
 his brethren are, even at this time. How much good might 
 have been done, and how much evil might probably have 
 been prevented, if Dr. Bray's design for the foundation 
 of parochial libraries had been everywhere carried into 
 effect ! 
 
 The parish contained between five and six hundred souls. 
 There was no one of higher rank among them than entitled 
 him, according to the custom of those days, to be styled 
 
A LOVE STORY. 197 
 
 gentleman upon his tombstone. They weie plain people, 
 who had neither manufactories to corrupt, alehouses to 
 brutalize, nor newspapers to mislead them. At first com- 
 ing among them he had won their good-will by his affability 
 and benign conduct, and he had afterwards gained their 
 respect and affection in an equal degree. 
 
 There were two services at his church, but only one ser- 
 mon, which never fell short of fifteen minutes in length, and 
 seldom extended to half an hour. It was generally abridged 
 from some good old divine. His own compositions were 
 few, and only upon points on which he wished carefully 
 to examine and digest his own thoughts, or which were 
 peculiarly suited to some or other of his hearers. His whole 
 stock might be deemed scanty in these days ; but there was 
 not one in it which would not well bear repetition, and the 
 more observant of his congregation liked that they should be 
 repeated. 
 
 Young ministers are earnestly advised long to refrain 
 from preaching their own productions, in an excellent little 
 book addressed by a Father to his Son, preparatory to his 
 receiving holy orders. Its title is a "Monitor for Young 
 Ministers," and every parent who has a son so circum- 
 stanced would do well to put it into his hands. " It is not 
 possible," says this judicious writer, " that a young minister 
 can at first be competent to preach his sermons with effect, 
 even if his abilities should qualify him to write well. His 
 very youth and youthful manner, both in his style of writing 
 and in his delivery, will preclude him from being effective. 
 Unquestionably it is very rare indeed for a man of his age 
 to have his mental abilities sufficiently chastened, or his 
 method sufficiently settled, to be equal to the composition 
 of a sermon fit for public use, even if it should receive the 
 advantage of chaste and good delivery. On every account, 
 therefore, it is wise and prudent to be slow and backward in 
 venturing to produce his own efforts, or in thinking that 
 
198 ROBERT SOUTHEY. 
 
 they are fit for the public ear. There is an abundant field 
 of the works of others open to him from the wisest and the 
 best of men, the weight of whose little fingers, in argument 
 or instruction, will be greater than his own loins even at his 
 highest maturity. There is clearly no want of new compo- 
 sitions, excepting on some new or occasional emergencies : 
 for there is not an open subject in the Christian religion, 
 which has not been discussed by men of the greatest learn- 
 ing and piety, who have left behind them numerous works 
 for our assistance and edification. Many of these are so 
 neglected that they are become almost new ground for our 
 generation. To these he may freely resort, till expe- 
 rience and a rational and chastened confidence shall warrant 
 him in believing himself qualified to work upon his own 
 resources." 
 
 'He that learns of young men," says Rabbi Jose Bar 
 Jehudah, " is like a man that eats unripe grape*, or that 
 drinks wine out of the wine-press ; but he that learneth of 
 the ancient, is like a man that eateth ripe grapes, and drink- 
 eth wine that is old." * 
 
 It was not in pursuance of any judicious advice like this 
 that Mr. Bacon followed the course here pointed out, but 
 from his own good sense and natural humility. His only 
 ambition was to be useful; if a desire may be called ambi- 
 tious which orgiuated in the sincere sense of duty. To 
 think of distinguishing himself in any other way, would for 
 him, he well knew, have been worse than an idle dream. 
 The time expended in composing a sermon as a perfunctory 
 official business, would have been worse than wasted for 
 himself, and the time employed in delivering it, no better 
 than wasted upon his congregation. He was especially 
 careful never to weary them, and, therefore, never to preach 
 anything which was not likely to engage their attention, 
 and make at least some present impression. His own ser- 
 
 * Lightfoot. 
 
A LOVE STORY. 199 
 
 raons effected this, because they were always composed with 
 some immediate view, or under the influence of some deep 
 and strong feeling: and in his adopted ones, the different 
 manner of the different authors produced an awakening 
 effect. Good sense is as often to be found among the illit- 
 erate, as among those who have enjoyed the opportunities 
 of education. Many of his hearers who knew but one 
 meaning of the word style, and had never heard it used in 
 any other, perceived a difference in the manner of Bishops 
 Hall and Sanderson and Jeremy Taylor, of Barrow and 
 South and Scott, without troubling themselves about the 
 cause, or being in the slightest degree aware of it. 
 
 Mr. Bacon neither undervalued his parishioners, nor over- 
 valued the good which could be wrought among them by 
 direct instruction of this kind. While he used perspicuous 
 language, he knew that they who listened to it would be 
 able to follow the argument ; and as he drew always from 
 the wells of English unclefiled, he was safe on that point. 
 But that all even of the adults would listen, and that all 
 even of those who did, would do anything more than hear, 
 he was too well acquainted with human nature to expect. 
 
 A woman in humble life was asked one day on the way 
 back from church, whether she had understood the sermon ; 
 a stranger had preached, and his discourse resembled one of 
 Mr. Bacon's neither in length nor depth. " Wud I hae the 
 persumption ? " was her simple and contented ans\ver. The 
 quality of the discourse signified nothing to her ; she had 
 done her duty, as well as she could, in hearing it; and she 
 went to her house justified rather than some of those who 
 had attended to it critically ; or who had turned to the text 
 in their Bibles when it was given out. 
 
 " Well, Master Jackson," said his minister, walking home- 
 ward after service with an industrious laborer, who was a 
 constant attendant ; " well, Master Jackson, Sunday must be 
 a blessed day of rest for you, who work so hard all the 
 
200 EGBERT SOUTHEY. 
 
 week ! And you make a good use of the day, for you are 
 always to be seen at church ! " " Ay, sir," replied Jack- 
 son, " it is indeed a blessed day ; I works hard enough all 
 the week, and then I comes to church o' Sundays, and sets 
 me down, and lays my legs up, and thinks o' nothing." 
 
 " Let my candle go out in a stink, when I refuse to con- 
 fess from whom I have lighted it" * The author to whose 
 little book f I am beholden for this true anecdote, after say- 
 ing, " Such was the religion of this worthy man," justly 
 adds, " and such must be the religion of most men of his sta- 
 tion. Doubtless, it is a wise dispensation that it is so. 
 For so it has been from the beginning of the world, and 
 there is no visible reason to suppose that it can ever be 
 otherwise." 
 
 " In spite," says this judicious writer, " of all the zealous 
 wishes and efforts of the most pious and laborious teachers, 
 the religion of the bulk of the people must and will ever be 
 little more than mere habit, and confidence in others. This 
 must of necessity be the case with all men, who, from defect 
 of nature or education, or from other worldy causes, have 
 not the power or the disposition to think ; and it cannot be 
 disputed that the far greater number of mankind are of this 
 class. These facts give peculiar force to those lessons 
 which teach the importance and efficacy of good example 
 from those who are blessed with higher qualifications ; and 
 they strongly demonstrate the necessity, that the zeal of 
 those who wish to impress the people with the deep and 
 awful mysteries of religion should be tempered by wisdom 
 and discretion, no less than by patience, forbearance, and 
 a gieat latitude of indulgence for uncontrollable circum- 
 stances. They also call upon us most powerfully to do all 
 we can to provide such teachers, and imbue them with such 
 principles as shall not endanger the good cause by over 
 
 * Fuller. t Few Words on many Subjects. 
 
A LOVE STORY. 201 
 
 earnest efforts to effect more than, in the nature of things, 
 can be done ; or disturb the existing good by attempting 
 more than will be borne, or by producing hypocritical pre- 
 tences of more than can be really felt" 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 SHOWING HOW THE VICAR DEALT WITH THE JUVENILE PART OF 
 HIS FLOCK J AND HOW HE WAS OF OPINION THAT THE MORE 
 PLEASANT THE WAT IN WHICH CHILDREN ARE TRAINED UP TO 
 GO CAN BE MADE FOR THEM, THE LESS LIKELY THEY WILL 
 BE TO DEPART FROM IT. 
 
 Sweet were the sauce would please each kind of taste, 
 The life, likewise, were pure that never swerved; 
 
 For spiteful tongues, in cankered stomachs placed, 
 Deem worst of things which best, percase, deserved. 
 
 But what for that ? This medicine may suffice, 
 
 To scorn the rest, and seek to please the wise. 
 
 SIR WALTER RALEIGH. 
 
 THE first thing which Mr. Bacon had done after taking 
 possession of his vicarage, and obtaining such information 
 about his parishioners as the more considerate of them 
 could impart, was to inquire into the state of the children 
 in every household. He knew that to win the mother's 
 good-will was the surest way to win that of the family, and 
 to win the children was a good step toward gaining that 
 of the mother. In those days reading and writing were 
 thought as little necessary for the lower class, as the art 
 of spelling for the class above them, or indeed for any 
 except the learned. Their ignorance in this respect was 
 sometimes found to be inconvenient, but by none, perhaps, 
 except here and there by a conscientious and thoughtful 
 clergyman, was it felt to be an evil, an impediment in 
 the way of that moral and religious instruction, without 
 which men are in danger of becoming as the beasts thai 
 9* 
 
202 ROBERT SOUTHEY. 
 
 perish. Yet the common wish of advancing their children 
 in the world, made most parents in this station desire to 
 obtain the advantage of what they called book-learning for 
 any son, who was supposed to manifest a disposition likely 
 to profit by it. To make him a scholar was to raise him a 
 step above themselves. 
 
 Qui ha les lettres, ha I'adresse 
 
 Au double d'un qui n'en ha point.* 
 
 Partly tor this reason, and still more that industrious moth- 
 ers might be relieved from the care of looking after their 
 children, there were few villages in which, as in Mr. 
 Bacon's parish, some poor woman in the decline of life and 
 of fortune did not obtain day-scholars enough to eke out her 
 scanty means of subsistence. 
 
 The village schoolmistress, such as Shenstone describes 
 in his admirable poem, and such as Kirke White drew from 
 the life, is no longer a living character. The new system 
 of education has taken from this class of women the staff 
 of their declining age, as the spinning-jennies have silenced 
 the domestic music of the spinning-wheel. Both changes 
 have come on unavoidably in the progress of human affairs. 
 It is well when any change brings with it nothing worse 
 than some temporary and incidental evil ; but if the moral 
 machinery can counteract the great and growing evils of 
 the manufacturing system, it will be the greatest moral 
 miracle that has ever been wrought. 
 
 Sunday schools, which make Sunday a day of toil to the 
 teachers, and the most irksome day of the week to the chil- 
 dren, had not at that time been devised as a palliative for 
 the profligacy of large towns, and the worsened and worsen- 
 ing condition of the poor. Mr. Bacon endeavored to make 
 the parents perform their religious duty toward their chil- 
 dren, either by teaching them what they could themselves 
 teach, or by sending them where their own want of knowl- 
 *Baif. 
 
A LOVE STORY. 203 
 
 edge might be supplied. Whether the children went to 
 school or not, it was his wish that they should be taught 
 their prayers, the Creed, and the Commandments, at home. 
 These he thought were better learned at the mother'? knees 
 than from any other teacher ; and he knew also how whole- 
 some for the mother it was, that the child should receive 
 from her its first spiritual food, the milk of sound doctrine. 
 In a purely agricultural parish, there were at that time no 
 parents in a state of such brutal ignorance as to be unable 
 to teach these, though they might never have been taught 
 to read. When the father or mother could read, he ex- 
 pected that they should also teach their children the 
 Catechism ; in other cases this was left to his humble 
 coadjutrix, the schoolmistress. 
 
 During the summer and part of the autumn, he followed 
 the good old usage of catechising the children, after the 
 second lesson in the evening service. His method was to 
 ask a few questions in succession, and only from those who 
 he knew were able to answer them ; and after each answer 
 he entered into a brief exposition suited to their capacity. 
 His manner was so benevolent, and he had made himself 
 so familiar in his visits, which were at once pastoral and 
 friendly, that no child felt alarmed at being singled out; 
 they regarded it as a mark of distinction, and the parents 
 were proud of seeing them thus distinguished. This prac- 
 tice was discontinued in winter ; because he knew that to 
 koep a congregation in the cold is not the way either to 
 quickei or cherish devotional feeling. Once a week during 
 Lent he examined all the children, on a week-day; the last 
 examination was in Easter week, after which each was sent 
 home happy with a homely cake, the gift of a wealthy 
 parishioner, who by this means contributed not a little to 
 the good effect of the pastor's diligence. 
 
 The foundation was thus laid by teaching the rising gen- 
 eration their duty towards God and towards their neighbor, 
 
204 ROBERT SOUTHEY. 
 
 and so far training them in the way that they should go. 
 In the course of a few years every household, from the 
 highest to the lowest, (the degrees were neither great 
 nor many,) had learned to look upon him as their friend. 
 There was only one in the parish whose members were 
 upon a parity with him in manners, none in literary cul- 
 ture ; but in good-will, and in human sympathy, he was 
 upon a level with them all. Never interfering in the con- 
 cerns of any family, unless his interference was solicited, he 
 was consulted upon all occasions of trouble or importance. 
 Incipient disputes, which would otherwise have afforded 
 grist for the lawyer's mill, were adjusted by his mediation ; 
 and anxious parents, when they -had cause to apprehend 
 that their children were going wrong, knew no better 
 course than to communicate their fears to him, and re- 
 quest that he would administer some timely admonition. 
 Whenever he was thus called on, or had of himself per- 
 ceived that reproof or warning was required, it was given 
 in private, or only in presence of the parents, and always 
 with a gentleness which none but an obdurate disposition 
 could resist. His influence over the younger part of his 
 flock was the greater because he was no enemy to any in- 
 nocent sports, but, on the contrary, was pleased to see them 
 dance round the May-pole, encouraged them to dress their 
 doors with oaken boughs on the day of King Charles's 
 happy restoration, and to wear an oaken garland in the 
 hat, or an oak-apple on its sprig in the button-hole; went 
 to see their bonfire on the 5th of November, and enter- 
 tained the morris-dancers when they called upon him in 
 their Christmas rounds. 
 
 Mr. Bacon was in his parish what a moralizing old poet 
 wished himself to be, in these pleasing stanzas : 
 
 I would I were an excellent divine.. 
 
 That had the Bible at my fingers' ends, 
 
A LOVE STORY. 205 
 
 That men might hear out of this mouth of mine 
 
 How God doth make his enemies his friends ; 
 Rather than with a thundering and long prayer 
 Be led into presumption, or despair. 
 
 This would I be, and would none other be 
 
 But a religious servant of my God : 
 And know there is none other God but He 
 
 And willingly to suffer Mercy's rod, 
 Joy in his grace and live but in his love, 
 And seek my bliss but in the world above. 
 
 And I would frame a kind of faithful prayer 
 
 For all estates within the state of grace; 
 That careful love might never know despair, 
 
 Nor servile fear might faithful love deface ; 
 And this would I both day and night devise 
 To make my humble spirits exercise. 
 
 And I would read the rules of sacred life, 
 
 Persuade the troubled soul to patience, 
 The husband care, and comfort to the wife, 
 
 To child and servant due obedience, 
 Faith to the friend and to the neighbor peace, 
 That love might live, and quarrels all might cease ; 
 
 Pray for the health of all that are diseased, 
 
 Confession unto all that are convicted, 
 And patience unto all that are displeased, 
 
 And comfort unto all that are afflicted, 
 And mercy unto all that have offended, 
 And graco to all, that all may be amended.* 
 
 * N. B., supposed to be Nicholas Breton 
 
206 ROBERT SOUTHEY. 
 
 CHAPTER XI. 
 
 SOME ACCOUNT OF A RETIRED TOBACCONIST AND HIS FAMILY. 
 
 Non fumum ex Jidgore, sed ex fumo dare liicem. 
 
 HORACE. 
 
 IN all Mr. Bacon's views he was fortunate enough to 
 have ths hearty concurrence of the wealthiest person in the 
 parish. This was a good man, Allison by name, who, hav- 
 ing realized a respectable fortune in the metropolis as a 
 tobacconist, and put out his sons in life according to their 
 respective inclinations, had retired from business at the age 
 of threescore, and established himself with an unmarried 
 daughter, and a maiden sister some ten years younger than 
 himself, in his native village, that he might there, when his 
 hour should come, be gathered to his fathers. 
 
 u The providence of God," says South, ' has so ordered 
 the course of things, that there is no action, the usefulness 
 of which has made it the matter of duty and of a profession, 
 but a man may bear the continual pursuit of it, without 
 loathing or satiety. The same shop and trade that employs 
 a man in his youth, employs him also in his age. Every 
 morning he rises fresh to his hammer and his anvil : custom 
 has naturalized his labor to him ; his shop is his element, 
 and he cannot, with any enjoyment of himself, live out of 
 it." The great preacher contrasts this with the wearisome- 
 ness of an idle life, and the misery of a continual round of 
 what the world calls pleasure. " But now," says he, " if 
 God has interwoven such a contentment with the works 
 of our ordinary calling, how much superior and more re- 
 fined must that be that arises from the survey of a pious 
 and well-governed life ? " 
 
 This passage bears upon Mr. Allison's case, partly in the 
 consolatory fact which it states, and wholly in the applica- 
 
A LOVE STORY. 207 
 
 | 
 
 tion which South has made of it. At the age of fourteen 
 he had been apprenticed to an uncle in Bishopsgate Street 
 Within ; and twenty years after, on that uncle's death, had 
 succeeded to his old and well-established business. But 
 though he had lived there prosperously and happily six and 
 twenty years longer, he had contracted no such love for it 
 as to overcome the recollections of his childhood. Grateful 
 as the smell of snuff and tobacco had become to him, he 
 still remembered that cowslips and violets were sweeter ; 
 and that the breath of a May morning was more exhila- 
 rating than the air of his own shop, impregnated as it was 
 with the odor of the best Virginia. So having buried his 
 wife, who was a Londoner, and made over the business to 
 his eldest son, he returned to his native place, with the 
 intention of dying there; but he was in sound health of 
 body and mind, and his green old age seemed to promise, 
 as far as anything can promise, length of days. 
 
 Of his two other sons, one had chosen to be a clergyman, 
 and approved his choice both by his parts and diligence; 
 for he had gone off from Merchant-Tailors' School to St. 
 John's, Oxford, and was then a fellow of that college. The 
 other was a mate in the Merchants' service, and would soon 
 have the command of a ship in it. The desire of seeing 
 the world led him to this way of life ; and that desire had 
 been unintentionally implanted by his father, who, in making 
 himself acquainted with everything relating to the herb out 
 of which his own fortune was raised, had become fond of 
 reading voyages* and travels. His conversation induced the 
 lad to read these books, and the books confirmed the incli- 
 nation which had already been excited ; and, as the boy was 
 of an adventurous temper, he thought it best to let him 
 follow the pursuit on which his mind was bent. 
 
 The change to a Yorkshire village was not too great for 
 Mr. Allison, even after residing nearly half a century in 
 Bishopsgate Street Within. The change in his own house- 
 hold, indeed, rendered it expedient for him to begin, in this 
 
208 ROBERT SOUTHEY. 
 
 sense, a new life. He had lost his mate ; the young birds- 
 were full-fledged and had taken flight ; and it was time that 
 he should look out a retreat for himself and the single nest- 
 ling that remained under his wing, now that his son and 
 successor had brought home a wife. The marriage had 
 been altogether with his approbation ; but it altered his 
 position in the house ; and in a still greater degree his 
 sister's ; moreover, the nest would soon be wanted for an- 
 other brood. Circumstances thus compelled him to put in 
 effect what had been the dream of his youth, and the still 
 remote intention of his middle age. 
 
 Miss Allison, like her brother, regarded this removal as a 
 great and serious change, preparatory to the only greater 
 one in this world that now remained for both ; but, like 
 him, she regarded it rather seriously than sadly, or sadly 
 only in the old sober meaning of the word ; and there was 
 a soft, sweet, evening sunshine in their prospect, which both 
 partook, because both had retained a deep affection for the 
 scenes of their childhood. To Betsey, her niece, nothing 
 could be more delightful than the expectation of such a re- 
 moval. She, who was then only entering her teens, had 
 nothing to regret in leaving London ; and the place to 
 which she was going was the very spot which, of all others 
 in this wide world, from the time in which she -was con- 
 scious of forming a wish, she had wished most to see. Her 
 brother, the sailor, was not more taken with the story of 
 Pocahontas and Captain Smith, or Dampier's Voyages, than 
 she was with her aunt's details of the farm and the dairy at 
 Thaxted Grange, the May-games and the Christmas gam- 
 bols, the days that were gone, and the elders who were 
 departed. To one born and bred in the heart of London, 
 who had scarcely ever seen a flock of sheep, except when 
 they were driven through the streets to or from Smithfield, 
 no fairy tale could present more for the imagination than a 
 description of green fields and rural life. The charm of 
 truth heightened it, and the stronger charm of natural 
 
A LOVE STORY. 209 
 
 piety; for the personages of the tale were her near kin, 
 whose names she had learned to love, and whose living 
 memory she revered, but whose countenances she never 
 could behold till she should be welcomed by them in the 
 everlasting mansions of the righteous. 
 
 None of the party were disappointed when they had es- 
 tablished themselves at the Grange. Mr. Allison found full 
 occupation at first in improving the house, and afterwards 
 in his fields and garden. Mr. Bacon was just such a clergy- 
 man as he would have chosen for his parish priest, if it had 
 been in his power to choose, only he would have had him 
 provided with a better benefice. The single thing on which 
 there was a want of agreement between them was, that 
 the Vicar neither smoked nor took snuff; he was not the 
 worst company on this account, for he had no dislike to 
 the fragrance of a pipe ; but his neighbor lost the pleasure 
 which he would have had in supplying him with the best 
 Pig-tail, and with Strasburg or Rappee. Miss Allison fell 
 into the habits of her new station the more easily, because 
 they were those which she had witnessed in her early 
 youth ; she distilled waters, dried herbs, and prepared con- 
 serves, which were at the service of all who needed them 
 in sickness. Betsey attached herself at first sight to Deborah, 
 who was about five years elder, and soon became to her as 
 a sister. The aunt rejoiced in finding so suitable a friend 
 and companion for her niece ; and as this connection was a 
 pleasure and an advantage to the Allisons, so was it of the 
 greatest benefit to Deborah. 
 
 What of her ensues 
 
 I list not prophesy, but let Time's news 
 Be known, when 't is brought forth. Of this allow 
 If ever you have spent time worse ere now ; 
 If never yet, the Author then doth say, 
 He wishes earnestly you never may.* 
 
 * Shakespeare. 
 
210 ROBERT SOUTHEY. 
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 
 MORE CONCERNING THE AFORESAID TOBACCO! 1ST. 
 
 I doubt nothing at all but that you shall like the man every day better 
 than other ; for verily I think he lacketh not of those qualities which 
 should become any honest man to have, over and besides the gift of 
 nature wherewith God hath above the common rate endued him. 
 
 ARCHBISHOP CKANMER. 
 
 MR. ALLISON was as quiet a subject as Peter Hopkins, 
 but he was not like him a political quietist from indiffer- 
 ence, for he had a warm sense of loyalty, and a well-rooted 
 attachment to the constitution of his country in church and 
 state. His ancestors had suffered in the Great Rebellion, 
 and much the greater part of their never large estates had 
 been alienated to raise the fines imposed upon them as de- 
 linquents. The uncle, whom he succeeded in Bishopsgate 
 Street, had, in his early apprenticeship, assisted at burning 
 the Rump, and in maturer years had joined as heartily in 
 the rejoicings when the Seven Bishops were released from 
 the Tower: he subscribed to Walker's "Account of the 
 Sufferings of the Clergy," and had heard sermons preached 
 by the famous Dr. Scott (which were afterwards incorpo- 
 rated in his great work upon the Christian Life) in the 
 church of St. Peter-le-Poor (oddly so called, seeing that 
 there are few districts within the City of London so rich, 
 insomuch that the last historian of the metropolis believed 
 the parish to have scarcely a poor family in it), and in 
 All-hallows, Lombard Street, where, during the reign of 
 the Godly, the puritanical vestry passed a resolution, that 
 if any persons should come to the church " on the day 
 called Christ's birthday," they should be compelled to 
 leave it. 
 
 In these principles Mr. Allison had grown up ; and with- 
 out any profession of extra religion, or ever wearing a 
 
A LOVE STORY. 211 
 
 sanctified face, he had in the evening of his life attained 
 " the end of the commandment, which is charity, proceeding 
 from a pure heart, and a good conscience, and a faith un- 
 feigned." London in his days was a better school for young 
 men in trade than it ever was before, or has been since. 
 The civic power had quietly and imperceptibly put an end 
 to that club-law which once made the apprentices a tur- 
 bulent and formidable body, at any moment armed as well 
 as ready for a riot ; and masters exercised a sort of parental 
 control over the youth intrusted to them, which in later 
 times it may be feared has not been so conscientiously ex- 
 erted, because it is not likely to be so patiently endured. 
 Trade itself had not then been corrupted by that ruinous 
 spirit of competition, which, more than any other of the 
 evils now pressing upon us, deserves to be called the curse 
 of England in the present age. At all times men have 
 been to be found, who engaged in hazardous speculations, 
 gamester like, according to their opportunities, or who, mis- 
 taking the means for the end, devoted themselves with 
 miserable fidelity to the service of Mammon. But " Live 
 and let iive," had not yet become a maxim of obsolete mo- 
 rality. We had our monarchy, or hierarchy, and our aristoc- 
 racy, God be praised for the benefits which have been 
 derived from all three, and God in his mercy continue them 
 to us ! but we had no plutarchy, no millionnaires, no great 
 capitalists to break down the honest and industrious trader 
 with the weight of their overbearing and overwhelming 
 wealth. They who had enriched themselves in the course 
 of regular and honorable commerce withdrew from business, 
 and left the field to others. Feudal tyranny had passed 
 away, and moneyed tyranny had not yet arisen in its stead, 
 a tyranny baser in its origin, not more merciful in its 
 operations, and with less in its appendages to redeem it. 
 
 Trade, in Mr. Allison's days, was a school of thrift and 
 probity, as much as of profit and loss ; such his shop had 
 
212 KOBERT SOUTHEY. 
 
 been when he succeeded to it upon his uncle's decease, and 
 such it continued to be when he transmitted it to his son. 
 Old Mr. Strahan the printer (the founder of his typarchical 
 dynasty) said to Dr. Johnson, that " there are few ways in 
 Avhich a man can be more innocently employed than in get- 
 ting money"; and he added, that "the more one thinks of 
 this the juster it will appear. 1 ' Johnson agreed with him ; 
 and though it was a money-maker's observation, and though 
 the more it is considered now, the more fallacious it will be 
 found, the general system of trade might have justified it 
 at that time. The entrance of an exciseman never occa- 
 sioned any alarm or apprehension at No. 113 Bishopsgate 
 Street Within, nor any uncomfortable feeling, unless the 
 officer happened to be one who, by giving unnecessary 
 trouble, and by gratuitous incivility in the exercise of 
 authority, made an equitable law odious in its execution. 
 They never there mixed weeds with their tobacco, nor 
 adulterated it in any worse way ; and their snuff was never 
 rendered more pungent by stirring into it a certain propor- 
 tion of pounded glass. The duties were honestly paid, with 
 a clear perception that the impost fell lightly upon all whom 
 it affected, and affected those only who chose to indulge 
 themselves in a pleasure which was still cheap, and which, 
 without any injurious privation, they might forego. Nay, 
 when our good man expatiated upon the uses of tobacco, 
 which Mr. Bacon demurred at, and the Doctor sometimes 
 playfully disputed, he ventured an opinion, that among the 
 final causes for which so excellent an herb had been cre- 
 ated, the facilities afforded by it towards raising the revenue 
 in a well-governed country like our own, might be one. 
 
 There was a strong family likeness between him and his 
 sister, both in countenance and disposition. Elizabeth Alli- 
 son was a person for whom the best and wisest man might 
 have thanked Providence if she had been allotted to him for 
 helpmate. But though she had, in Shakespeare's language. 
 
A LOVE STORY. 213 
 
 " withered on the virgin thorn," hers had not been a life of 
 single blessedness : she had been a blessing first to her par- 
 ents; then to her brother and her brother's family, where she 
 relieved an amiable but sickly sister-in-law from those do- 
 mestic offices which require activity and forethought ; lastly, 
 after the di.-persion of his sons, the transfer of the business 
 to the eldest, and the breaking-up of his old establishment, 
 to the widower and his daughter, the only child who cleaved 
 to him, not like Ruth to Naomi, by a meritorious act of 
 duty, for in her case it was in the ordinary course of things, 
 without either sacrifice or choice ; but the effect in endear- 
 ing her to him was the same. 
 
 In advanced stages of society, and nowhere more than in 
 England at this time, the tendency of all things is to weaken 
 the relations between parent and child, and frequently to de- 
 stroy them, reducing human nature in this respect nearer to 
 the level of animal life. Perhaps the greater number of 
 male children who are " born into the world," in our part 
 of it, are put out at as early an age, proportionately, as the 
 young bird is driven from its nest, or the young beast turned 
 off by its dam as being capable of feeding and protecting 
 itself; and in many instances they are as totally lost to the 
 parent, though not in like manner forgotten. Mr. Allison 
 never saw all his children together after his removal from 
 London. The only time when his three sons met at the 
 Grange was when they came there to attend their father's 
 funeral ; nor would they then have been assembled, if the 
 Captain's ship had not happened to have recently arrived in 
 port. 
 
 This is a state of things more favorable to the wealth 
 than to the happiness of nations. It was a natural and pious 
 custom in patriarchal times that the dead should be gath- 
 ered unto their people. " Bury me," said Jacob, when he 
 gave his dying charge to his sons, "bury me with my 
 fathers in the cave that is in the field of Machpelah, which 
 
2H ROBERT SOUTHEY. 
 
 is before Mamre in the land of Canaan, which Abraham 
 bought with the field of Ephron the Hittite, for a posses- 
 sion of a burying-place. There they buried Abraham and 
 Sarah his wife ; there they buried Isaac and Rebecca his 
 wife ; and there I buried Leah." Had such a passage 
 occurred in Homer, or in Dante, all critics would have con- 
 curred in admiring the truth and beauty of the sentiment. 
 He had buried his beloved Rachel by the way where she 
 died ; but, although he remembered this at his death, the 
 orders which he gave were, that his own remains should be 
 laid in the sepulchre of his fathers. The same feeling pre- 
 vails among many, or most of those savage tribes who are 
 not utterly degraded. With them the tree is not left to lie 
 where it falls. The body of one who dies on an expedition 
 is interred on the spot, if distance or other circumstances 
 render it inconvenient to transport the corpse; but, how- 
 ever long the journey, it is considered as a sacred duty that 
 the bones should at some time or other be brought home. 
 In Scotland, where the common rites of sepulture are 
 performed with less decency than in any other Christian 
 country, the care with which family burial-grounds in the 
 remoter parts are preserved, may be referred as much to 
 natural feeling as to hereditary pride. 
 
 But as indigenous flowers are eradicated by the spade and 
 plough, so this feeling is destroyed in the stirring and bust- 
 ling intercourse of commercial life. No room is left for it ; 
 as little of it at this time remains in wide America as in 
 thickly-peopled England. That to which soldiers and sail- 
 ors are reconciled by the spirit of their profession, and the 
 chances of war and of the seas, the love of adventure and 
 the desire of advancement cause others to regard with the 
 same indifference ; and these motives are so prevalent, that 
 the dispersion of families and the consequent disruption of 
 natural ties, if not occasioned by necessity, would now 
 in most instances be the effect of choice. Even those 
 
A LOVE STORY. 215 
 
 to whom it is an inevitable evil, and who feel it deeply as 
 such, look upon it as something in the appointed course of 
 things, as much as infirmity and age and death. 
 
 It is well for us that in early life we never think of the 
 vicissitudes which lie before us ; or look to them only \* ith 
 pleasurable anticipations as they approach. 
 
 Youth 
 
 Knows naught of changes : Age hath traced them oft, 
 Expects and can interpret them.* 
 
 The thought of them, when it comes across us in middle 
 life brings with it only a transient sadness, like the shadow 
 of a passing cloud. We turn our eyes from them while 
 they are in prospect ; but when they are in retrospect 
 many a longing, lingering look is cast behind. So long as 
 Mr. Allison was in business, he looked to Thaxted Grange 
 as the place where he hoped one day to enjoy the blessings 
 of retirement, that otium cum dignitate, which in a certain 
 sense the prudent citizen is more likely to attain than the 
 successful statesman. It was the pleasure of recollection 
 that gave this hope its zest and its strength. But after the 
 object which during so many years he had held in view had 
 been obtained, his day-dreams, if he had allowed them to 
 take their course, would have recurred more frequently to 
 Bishopsgate Street than they had ever wandered from 
 thence to the scenes of his boyhood. They recurred 
 thither oftener than he wished, although few men have 
 been more masters of themselves ; and then the remem- 
 brance of his wife, whom he had lost by a lingering disease 
 in middle age; and of the children, those who had died 
 during their childhood, and those who in reality were almost 
 as much lost to him in the ways of the world, made him 
 alway turn for comfort to the prospect of that better state 
 of existence in which they should once more all be gathered 
 
 * Isaac Comnenus. 
 
216 ROBERT SOUTHEY. 
 
 together, and where there would be neither change nor part- 
 ing. His thoughts often fell into this train, when on sum- 
 mer evenings he was taking a solitary pipe in his arbor, 
 with the church in sight, and the churchyard wherein, at no 
 distant time, he was to be laid in his last abode. Such 
 musings induced a sense of sober piety, of thankfulness 
 for former blessings, contentment with the present, and 
 humble yet sure and certain hope for futurity, which might 
 vainly have been sought at prayer-meetings or evening lec- 
 tures, where indeed little good can ever be obtained with- 
 out some deleterious admixture, or alloy of baser feelings. 
 
 The happiness which he had found in retirement was of 
 a different kind from what he had contemplated; for the 
 shades of evening were gathering when he reached the 
 place of his long wished for rest, and the picture of it which 
 had imprinted itself on his imagination was a morning 
 view. But he had been prepared for this by that slow 
 change, of which we are not aware during its progress till 
 we see it reflected in others, and are thus made conscious 
 of it in ourselves ; and he found a satisfaction in the station 
 which he occupied there, too worthy in its nature to be 
 called pride, and which had not entered into his anticipa- 
 tions. It is said to have been a saying of George the 
 Third, that the happiest condition in which an English- 
 man could be placed, was just below that wherein it would 
 have been necessary for him to act as a Justice of the Peace, 
 and above that which would have rendered him liable to 
 parochial duties. This was just Mr. Allison's position ; 
 there w r as nothing which brought him into rivalry or com- 
 petition with the surrounding Squirarchy, and the yeomen 
 and peasantry respected him for his own character, as well 
 as for his name's sake. He gave employment to more per- 
 sons than when he was engaged in trade, and his indirect 
 influence over them was greater ; that of his sister was still 
 more. The elders of the village remembered her in her 
 
A LOVE STORY. 217 
 
 youth, and 1 )ved her for what she then had been, as well as 
 for what she now was ; the young looked up to her as the 
 Lady Bountiful, to whom no one that needed advice or 
 assistance ever applied in vain. She it was who provided 
 those much approved plum-cakes, not the less savory for 
 being both homely and wholesome, the thought of which 
 induced the children to look on to their Lent examination 
 with hope, and prepare for it with alacrity. Those offices in 
 a parish which are the province of the Clergyman's wife, 
 when he has made choice of one who knows her duty, and 
 has both will and ability to discharge it, Miss Allison per- 
 formed ; and she rendered Mr. Bacon the farther, and to him 
 individually the greater, service of imparting to his daughter 
 those instructions which she had no mother to impart. 
 Deborah could not have had a better teacher ; but as the 
 present chapter has extended to a sufficient length, 
 
 Diremo U resto in qud che vien dipoi, 
 Per non venire a noja a me e voi.* 
 
 CHAPTER XIII. 
 
 A FEW PARTICULARS CONCERNING NO. 113 BISHOPSGATB STREET 
 WITHIN J AND OF THE FAMILY AT THAXTED GRANGE. 
 
 Opinion is the rate of things, 
 
 From hence our peace doth flow 
 I have a better fate than kings, 
 
 Because I think it so. 
 
 KATHARINE PHILIPS. 
 
 THE house wherein Mr. Allison realized by fair dealing 
 and frugality the modest fortune which enabled him to re- 
 purchase the homestead of his fathers, is still a Tobacco- 
 nist's, and has continued to be so from " the palmy days " 
 
 * Orlando Innamorato. 
 
218 ROBERT SOUTHEY. 
 
 of that trade, when King James vainly endeavored, by the 
 expression of his royal dislike, to discountenance the newly- 
 imported practice of smoking ; and Joshua Sylvester thun- 
 dered from Mount Helicon a Volley of Holy Shot, thinking 
 that thereby " Tobacco " should be " battered, and the Pipes 
 shattered, about their ears that idly idolize so base and bar- 
 barous a weed, or at least-wise overlove so loathsome van- 
 ity." * For he said, 
 
 If there be any Herb in any place 
 
 Most opposite to God's good Herb of Grace, 
 
 'T is doubtless this ; and this doth plainly prove it, 
 
 That for the most, most graceless men do love it. 
 
 Yet it was not long before the dead and unsavory odor of 
 that weed, to which a Parisian was made to say that " sea- 
 coal smoke seemed a very Portugal perfume," prevailed as 
 much in the raiment of the more coarsely clad part of the 
 community, as the scent of lavender among those who were 
 clothed in fine linen, and fared sumptuously every day : and 
 it had grown so much in fashion, that it was said children 
 " began to play with broken pipes, instead of corals, to make 
 way for their teeth." 
 
 Louis XIV. endeavored just as ineffectually to discourage 
 the use of snuff-taking. His valets de chambre were obliged 
 to renounce it when they were appointed to their office ; 
 and the Duke of Harcourt was supposed to have died of 
 apoplexy in consequence of having, to please his Majesty, 
 left off at once a habit which he had carried to excess. 
 
 I know not through what intermediate hands the business 
 at No. 113 has passed, since the name of Allison was with- 
 drawn from the firm ; nor whether Mr. Evans, by whom it 
 is now carried on there, is in any way related by descent 
 with that family. Matters of no greater importance to most 
 
 * Old Burton's was a modified opinion. See Anatomic of Melan- 
 choly, Part ii. 2, mem. 2, subs. 2. 
 
A LOVE STORY. 219 
 
 men have been made the subject of much antiquarian in- 
 vestigation ; and they who busy themselves in such inves- 
 tigations must not be said to be ill-employed, for they find 
 harmless amusement in the pursuit, and sometimes put up a 
 chance truth of which others, soon or late, discover the ap- 
 plication. The house has at this time a more antiquated 
 appearance than any other in that part of the street, though 
 it was modernized some forty or fifty years after Mr. Ba- 
 con's friend left it. The first floor then projected several 
 feet farther over the street than at present, and the second 
 several feet farther over the first ; and the windows, which 
 still extend the whole breadth of the front, were then com- 
 posed of small casement panes. But in the progress of 
 those improvements which are now carrying on in the city 
 with as much spirit as at the western end of the metropolis, 
 and which have almost reached Mr. Evans's door, it cannot 
 be long before the house will be either wholly removed, or 
 so altered as no longer to be recognized. 
 
 The present race of Londoners little know what the 
 appearance of the city was a century ago ; their own city, 
 I was about to have said ; but it was the city of their great- 
 grandfathers, not theirs, from which the elder Allisons re- 
 tired in the year 1746. At that time the kennels (as in 
 Paris) were in the middle of the street, and there were 
 no footpaths ; spouts projected the rain-water in streams, 
 against which umbrellas, if umbrellas had been then in use, 
 could have afforded no defence ; and large signs, such as are 
 now only to be seen at country inns, were suspended before 
 every shop,* from posts which impeded the way, or from 
 iron supports strongly fixed into the front of the house. 
 The swinging of one of these broad signs in a high wind, 
 and the weight of the iron on which it acted, sometimes 
 
 * The counting of these signs " from Temple Bar, the furthest 
 Conduit in Cheapside," &c., is quoted as a remarkable instance of 
 Fuller's Memory. Life, &c., p. 76, ed. 1662. 
 
220 ROBERT SOUTHEY. 
 
 brought the wall down ; and it is recorded that one front- 
 fall of this kind in Fleet Street maimed several per.-ons, 
 and killed " two young ladies, a cobbler, and the King's 
 jeweller." 
 
 The sign at No. 113 was an Indian Chief smoking the 
 calumet. Mr. Allison had found it there; and when it 
 became necessary that a new one should be substituted, he 
 retained the same figure, though, if he had been to 
 choose, he would have greatly preferred the head of Sir 
 Walter Raleigh, by whom, according to the common belief, 
 he supposed tobacco had been introduced into this country. 
 The Water-Poet imputed it to the Devil himself, and pub- 
 lished 
 
 A Proclamation, 
 
 Or Approbation, 
 From the King of Execration 
 
 To every Nation, 
 For Tobacco's propagation. 
 
 Mr. Allison used to shake his head at such libellous asper- 
 sions. Raleigh was a great favorite with him, and held, 
 indeed, in especial respect, though not as the Patron of his 
 old trade, as St. Crispin is of the Gentle Craft, yet as the 
 founder of his fortune. He thought it proper, therefore, 
 that he should possess Sir Walter's History of the World, 
 though he had never found inclination, or summoned up 
 resolution, to undertake its perusal. 
 
 Common sense has been defined by Sir Egerton Brydges, 
 " to mean nothing more than an uneducated judgment, aris- 
 ing from a plain and coarse understanding exercised upon 
 common concerns, and rendered effective rather by experi- 
 ence, than by any regular process of the intellectual powers. 
 If this," he adds, " be the proper meaning of that quality, 
 we cannot wonder that books are little fitted for its culti- 
 vation." Except that there was no coarseness in his nature, 
 this would apply to Mr Allison. He had been bred up with 
 
A LOVE STORY. 221 
 
 the notion, that it behoved him to attend to his business, 
 and that reading formed no part of it. Nevertheless he had 
 acquired some liking for books, by looking casually now and 
 then over the leaves of those unfortunate volumes with 
 which the shop was continually supplied for its daily con- 
 sumption. 
 
 Many a load of criticism, 
 Elaborate products of the midnight toil 
 Of Belgian brains,* 
 
 went there ; and many a tome of old law, old physic, and 
 old divinity ; old history as well ; books of which many 
 were at all times rubbish ; some which, though little better, 
 would now sell for more shillings by the page than they 
 then cost pence by the pound ; and others, the real value 
 of which is perhaps as little known now, as it was then. 
 Such of these as in latter years caught his attention, he now 
 and then rescued from the remorseless use to which they 
 had been condemned. They made a curious assortment 
 with his wife's books of devotion or amusement where- 
 with she had sometimes beguiled, and sometimes soothed, 
 the weary hours of long and frequent illness. Among 
 the former were Scott's " Christian Life," Bishop Bayly's 
 " Practice of Piety," Bishop Taylor's " Holy Living and 
 Dying," Drelincourt on Death, with De Foe's lying story 
 of Mrs. Veal's ghost as a puff preliminary, and the Night 
 Thoughts. Among the latter were Cassandra, the Guard- 
 ian and Spectator, Mrs. Howe's Letters, Richardson's Nov- 
 els, and Pomfret's Poems. 
 
 Mrs. Allison had been able to do little for her daughter 
 of that little, which, if her state of health and spirits had 
 permitted, she might .have done ; this, therefore, as well as 
 the more active duties of the household, devolved upon Eliz- 
 abeth, who was of a better constitution in mind as well 
 
 * Akenside. 
 
222 ROBERT SOUTHET. 
 
 as body Elizabeth, before she went to reside with her 
 brother, had acquired all the accomplishments which a 
 domestic education in the country could in those days 
 impart. Her book of receipts, culinary and medical, might 
 
 vied with the " Queen's Cabinet Unlocked." The 
 spelling indeed was such as ladies used in the reign of 
 Queen Anne, and in the old time before her, when every 
 
 elt as she thought fit ; but it was written in a well- 
 proportioned Italian hand, with fine down-strokes and broad 
 up-ones, equally distinct and beautiful. Her speech was 
 good Yorkshire, that is to say, good provincial English, not 
 the worse for being provincial, and a little softened by five- 
 and-twenty years' residence in London. Some sisters, who 
 in those days kept a boarding-school of the first repute, in 
 one of the midland counties, used to say, when they spoke 
 of an old pupil, u her irent to school to we." Miss Allison's 
 language was not of this kind. it savored of rusticity, not 
 of ignorance ; and where it was peculiar, as in the metrop- 
 olis, it gave raciness to the conversation of an agreeable 
 woman. 
 
 She had been well instructed in ornamental work as well 
 as ornamental penmanship. Unlike most fashions, this had 
 continued to be in fashion because it continued to be of use ; 
 though no doubt some of the varieties which Taylor, the 
 "Water-Poet, enumerates in his praise of the Xeedle, might 
 have been then as little understood as now : 
 
 Tent-work, Raised-work, Laid-work, Prest-work, Net-work, 
 Most carious Pearl, or rare Italian Cut-work, 
 Fine Fern-stitch, Finny-stitch, New-stitch and Chain-stitch, 
 Brave Bred-stitch, Fisher-stitch, Irish-stitch and Queen-stitch, 
 The Spanish-stitch, Rosemary-stitch and Maw-stitch, 
 The smarting Whip-stitch. Back-stitch and the Cross-stitch 
 All these are good, and these we must allow ; 
 are everywhere in practice now. 
 
 There was a book published in the Water-Poet's days, 
 
A LOVE STORY. 22? 
 
 with the title of " School House for the Needle " ; it con- 
 sisted of two volumes in oblong quarto, that form being 
 suited to it3 plates " of sundry sorts of patterns and exam- 
 ples " ; and it contained a " Dialogue in Verse between 
 Diligence and Sloth." If Betsey Allison had studied in 
 this " School House,'* she could not have been a greater 
 proficient with the needle than she became under her 
 Aunt's teaching: nor would she have been more 
 
 versed in the arts 
 Of pies, puddings, and tarts,* 
 
 if she had gone through a course of practical lessons in one 
 of the Pastry Schools which are common in Scotland, but 
 were tried without success in London, about the middle of 
 the last century. Deborah partook of these instructions at 
 her father's desire. In all that related to the delicacies of 
 a country table, she was glad to be instructed, because it 
 enabled her to assist her friend ; but it appeared strange to 
 her that Mr. Bacon should wish her to learn ornamental 
 work, for rthich -she neither had, nor could forsee any use. 
 But if the employment had been less agreeable than she 
 found it in such company, she would never have disputed, 
 nor questioned his will. 
 
 For so small a household, a more active or cheerful 
 one could nowhere have been, found than at the Grange. 
 Ben Jonson reckoned among the happinesses of Sir Robert 
 Wroth that of being " with unbought provision blest." This 
 blessing Mr. Allison enjoyed in as great a degree as his 
 position in life permitted ; he neither killed his own meat 
 nor grew bis own corn ; but he had his poultry-yard, his 
 garden and his orchard ; he baked his own bread, brewed 
 his own beer, and was supplied with milk, cream, and butter 
 from his own dairy. It is a fact not unworthy of notice, 
 %hat the most intelligent farmers in the neighboihood of 
 V<ondon are persons who have taken to (arming as a busi- 
 
 T. Warton. 
 
224 ROBERT SOUTHEY. 
 
 ness, because of their strong inclination for rural employ- 
 ments ; one of the very best in Middlesex, when the Survey 
 of that County was published by the Board of Agriculture, 
 had been a tailor. Mr. Allison did not attempt to manage 
 the land which he kept in his own hands ; but he had a 
 trusty bailiff, and soon acquired knowledge enough for 
 superintending what was done. When he retired from 
 trade he gave over all desire for gain, which indeed he had 
 never desired for his own sake ; he sought now only whole- 
 some occupation, and those comforts which may be said to 
 have a moral zest. They might be called luxuries, if that 
 word could be used in a virtuous sense without something 
 so to qualify it. It is a curious instance of the modification 
 which words undergo in different countries, that luxury has 
 always a sinful acceptation in the southern languages of 
 Europe, and lust an innocent one in the northern ; the 
 harmless meaning of the latter word, we have retained in 
 the verb to list. 
 
 Every one who looks back upon the scenes of his youth, 
 has one spot upon which the last light of the evening sun- 
 shine rests. The Grange was that spot in Deborah's ret- 
 rospect. 
 
 CHAPTER XIV. 
 
 A REMARKABLE EXAMPLE, SHOWING THAT A WISE MAN, WHEN HB 
 RISES IN THE MORNING, LITTLE KNOWS WHAT HE MAY DO BE- 
 FORE NIGHT. 
 
 Now I love, 
 
 And so as in so short a time I may, 
 Yet so as time shall never break that so, 
 And therefore so accept of Elinor. 
 
 ROBERT GREENE. 
 
 ONE summer evening the Doctor, on his way back from a 
 visit in that direction, stopped, as on such opportunities he 
 usually did, at Mr. Bacon's wicket, and looked in at the 
 
A LOVE STORY. 225 
 
 open casement to see if his friends were within. Mr. Bacon 
 was sitting there alone, with a book open on the table before 
 him; and looking round when he heard the horse stop, 
 " Come in, Doctor," said he, " if you have a few minutes to 
 spare. You were never more welcome." 
 
 The Doctor replied, " I hope nothing ails either Deborah 
 or yourself? " 
 
 " No," said Mr. Bacon, " God be thanked ! but something 
 has occurred which concerns both." 
 
 "When the Doctor entered the room, he perceived that the 
 wonted serenity of his friend's countenance was overcast by 
 a shade of melancholy thought. "Nothing," said he, "I 
 hope, has happened to distress you?" 
 
 " Only to disturb us," was the reply. " Most people would 
 probably think that we ought to consider it a piece of good 
 fortune. One who would be thought a good match for her, 
 has proposed to marry Deborah." 
 
 " Indeed ! " said the Doctor ; " and who is he ? " feeling, 
 as he asked the question, an unusual warmth in his face. 
 
 "Joseph Hebblethwaite, of the Willows. He broke his 
 mind to me this morning, saying that he thought it best to 
 speak with me before he made any advances himself to the 
 young woman: indeed he had had no opportunity of so 
 doing, for he had seen little of her ; but he had heard enough 
 of her" character to believe that she would make him a good 
 wife ; and this, he said, was all he looked for, for he was 
 well to do in the world." 
 
 "And what answer did you make to this matter-of-fact 
 way of proceeding?" 
 
 " I told him that I commended the very proper course he 
 had taken, and that I was obliged to him for the good opinion 
 of my daughter which he was pleased to entertain : that 
 marriage was an affair in which I should never attempt to 
 direct her inclinations, being confident that she would never 
 give me cause to oppose them ; and that I would talk with 
 10* o 
 
226 ROBERT SOUTHEY. 
 
 her upon the proposal, and let him know the result. Aa 
 soon as I mentioned it to Deborah, she colored up to her 
 eyes ; and with an angry look, of which I did not think those 
 eyes had been capable, she desired me to tell him that he 
 had better lose no time in looking elsewhere, for his thinking 
 of her was of no use. 4 Do you know any ill of him ?' said 
 I. ' No,' she replied, ' but I never heard any good, and 
 tha* 's ill enough. And I do not like his looks.' " 
 
 " Well said, Deborah ! " cried the Doctor : clapping his 
 hands so as to produce a sonorous token of satisfaction. 
 
 " ' Surely, my child,' said I, ' he is not an ill-looking per- 
 son ? ' * Father,' she replied, 4 you know he looks as if he 
 had not one idea in his head to keep company with an- 
 other.' " 
 
 " Well said, Deborah ! " repeated the Doctor. 
 
 " Why, Doctor, do you know any ill of him ? " 
 
 " None. But, as Deborah says, I know no good ; and if 
 there had been any good to be known, it must have come 
 within my knowledge. I cannot help knowing who the per- 
 sons are to whom the peasantry in my rounds look with re- 
 spect and good-will, and whom they consider their friends 
 as well as their betters. And, in like manner, I know who 
 they are from whom they never expect either courtesy or 
 kindness." 
 
 " You are right, my friend ; and Deborah is right. Her 
 answer came from a wise heart; and I was not sorry that 
 her determination was so promptly made, and so resolutely 
 pronounced. But I wish, if it had pleased God, the offer 
 had been one which she could have accepted with her own 
 willing consent, and with my full approbation." 
 
 " Yet," said the Doctor, " I have often thought how sad 
 a thing it -would be for you ever to part with her." 
 
 " Far more sad will it be for me to leave her unprotected 
 as it is but too likely that, in the ordinary course of nature 
 I one day shall; and as any day in that same ordinary 
 
A LOVE STORY. 227 
 
 course, I so possibly may ! Our best intentions, even when 
 they have been most prudentially formed, fail often in their 
 issue. I meant to train up Deborah in the way she should 
 go, by fitting her for that state of life in which it had pleased 
 God to place her ; so that she might have made a good wife 
 for some honest man in the humbler walks of life, and have 
 been happy with him." 
 
 " And how was it possible," replied the Doctor, " that you 
 could have succeeded better ? Is she not qualified to be a 
 good man's wife in any rank ? Her manner would not do 
 discredit to a mansion ; her management would make a farm 
 prosperous, or a cottage comfortable ; and for her principles, 
 and temper and cheerfulness, they would render any home 
 a happy one." 
 
 " You have not spoken too highly in her praise, Doctor. 
 But as she has from her childhood been all in all to me, 
 there is a danger that I may have become too much so to 
 her ; and that, while her habits have properly been made 
 conformable to our poor means and her poor prospects, she 
 has been accustomed to a way of thinking, and a kind of 
 conversation, which have given her a distaste for those 
 whose talk is only of sheep and of oxen, and whose thoughts 
 never get beyond the range of their every day employments. 
 In her present cirde, I do not think there is one man with 
 whom she might otherwise have had a chance of settling in 
 life, to whom she would not have the same intellectual ob- 
 jections as to Joseph Hebblethwaite : though I am glad tl.it 
 the moral objection was that which first instinctively oc- 
 curred to her. 
 
 "I wish it were otherwise, both for her sake and my 
 own : for hers, because the present separation would have 
 more than enough to compensate it, and would in its con- 
 sequences mitigate the evil of the final one, whenever that 
 may be ; for my own, because I should then have no cause 
 whatever to render the prospect of dissolution otherwise 
 
228 ROBERT SOUTHEY. 
 
 than welcome, but be as willing to die as to sleep. It ij 
 not owing to any distrust in Providence, that I am not thus 
 willing now, God forbid ! But if I gave heed to my own 
 feelings, I should think that I am not long for this world ; 
 and surely it were wise to remove, if possible, the only cause 
 that makes me fear to think so." 
 
 " Are you sensible of any symptoms that can lead to such 
 an apprehension ? " said the Doctor. 
 
 " Of nothing that can be called a symptom. I am to all 
 appearance in good health, of sound body and mind ; and 
 you know how unlikely my habits are to occasion any dis- 
 turbance in either. But I have indefinable impressions, 
 sensations they might almost be called, which, as I can- 
 not but feel them, so I cannot but regard them." 
 
 " Can you not describe these sensations ? " 
 
 " No better than by saying, that they hardly amount to 
 sensations, and are indescribable." 
 
 " Do not," said the Doctor, " I entreat you, give way to 
 any feelings of this kind. They may lead to consequences 
 which, without shortening or endangering life, would render 
 it anxious and burdensome, and destroy both your useful- 
 ness and your comfort." 
 
 "I have this feeling, Doctor; and. you shall prescribe for 
 it, if you think it requires either regimen or physic. But at 
 present yon will do me more good by assisting me to pro- 
 cure for Deborah such a situation as she must necessarily 
 look for on the event of my death. What I have laid by, 
 even if it should be most advantageously disposed of, would 
 afford her only a bare subsistence ; it is a resource in case 
 of sickness, but while in health, it would never be her wish 
 to eat the bread of idleness. You may have opportunities 
 of learning whether any lady within the circle of your prac- 
 tice wants a young person in whom she might confide, either 
 as an attendant upon herself, or to assist in the management 
 of her children, or her household. You may be sure this is 
 
A LOVE STORY. 229 
 
 not the first time that I have thought upon the subject ; but 
 the circumstance which has this day occurred, and the feel- 
 ing of which I have spoken, have pressed it upon my con- 
 sideration. And the inquiry may better be made, and the 
 step taken while it is a matter of foresight, than when it has 
 become one of necessity." 
 
 " Let me feel your pulse ! " 
 
 u You will detect no other disorder there," said Mr. Bacon, 
 holding out his arm as he spake, " than what has been caused 
 by this conversation, and the declaration of a purpose, which, 
 though for some time perpended, I had never till now fully 
 acknowledged to myself." 
 
 " You have never then mentioned it to Deborah ? " 
 
 " In no other way than by sometimes incidentally speak 
 ing of the way of life which would be open to her, in case 
 . of her being unmarried at my death." 
 
 " And you have made up your mind to part with 
 her?" 
 
 " Upon a clear conviction that I ought to do so ; that it is 
 best for herself and me." 
 
 "Well, then, you will allow me to converse with her 
 first upon a different subject. You will permit me to see 
 whether I can speak more successfully for myself, than you 
 have done for Joseph Hebblethwaite. Have I your con- 
 Bent ?" 
 
 Mr. Bacon rose in great emotion, and taking his friend's 
 hand, pressed it fervently and tremulously. Presently they 
 heard the wicket open, and Deborah came in. 
 
 " I dare say, Deborah," said her father, composing himself, 
 " you have been telling Betsey Allison of the advantageous 
 offer that you have this day refused." 
 
 " Yes," replied Deborah ; " and what do you think she 
 said? That little as she likes him, rather than that I 
 should be thrown away upon such a man, she could almost 
 make up her mind to marry him herself." 
 
230 ROBERT SOUTHEY. 
 
 " And I," said the Doctor, " rather than such a man should 
 have you, would marry you myself." 
 
 " Was not I right in refusing him, Doctor ? " 
 
 " So right, that you never pleased me so well before ; and 
 never can please me better, unless you will accept of me 
 in his stead." 
 
 She gave a little start, and looked at him half incredu- 
 lously, and half angrily withal ; as if what he had said was 
 too light in its manner to be serious, and yet too serious in 
 its import to be spoken in jest. But when he took her by 
 the hand, and said, " Will you, dear Deborah ? " with a pres- 
 sure, and in a tone that left no doubt of his earnest meaning, 
 she cried, " Father, what am I to say ? speak for me ! " 
 " Take her, my friend ! " said Mr. Bacon. " My blessing be 
 upon you both. And, if it be not presumptuous to use the 
 words, let me say for myself, * Lord, now lettest thou thy 
 servant depart in peace ! ' " 
 
 CHAPTER XV. 
 
 THE WEDDING PEAL AT ST. GEORGE'S, AND THE BRIDE'g 
 APPEARANCE AT CHURCH. 
 
 IN the month of April, 1761, the Doctor brought home 
 his bride to Doncaster. Many eyes were turned upon her 
 when she made her appearance at St. George's Church. 
 The novelty of the place made her less regardful of this 
 than she might otherwise have been. Hollis Pigot, who 
 held the vicarage of Doncaster thirty years, and was then 
 in the last year of his incumbency and his life, performed 
 the service that day. I know not among what description 
 of preachers he was to be classed ; whether with those who 
 obtain attention, and command respect, and win confidence, 
 and strengthen belief, and inspire hope, or with the far more 
 numerous race of Spintexts and of Martexts. But if he 
 
A LOVE STORY. 231 
 
 had preached that morning with the tongue of an angel, 
 the bride would have had no ears for him. Her thoughts 
 were neither upon those who on their way from church 
 would talk over her instead of the sermon, nor of the ser- 
 vice, nor of her husband, nor of herself in her new charac- 
 ter, but of her father, and with a feeling which might 
 almost be called funereal, that she had passed from under 
 his pastoral as well as his paternal care. 
 
 CHAPTER XVI. 
 
 SOMETHING SERIOUS. 
 
 If thou hast read all this book, and art never the better, yet catch thia 
 flower before thou go out of the garden, and peradventure the scent 
 thereof will bring thee back to smell the rest 
 
 HEXKY SMITH. 
 
 DEBORAH found no one in Doncaster to supply the place 
 of Betty Allison in the daily intercourse of familiar and 
 perfect friendship. That indeed was impossible ; no after- 
 math has the fragrance and the sweetness of the first crop. 
 But why do I call her Deborah? She had never been 
 known by that name to her new neighbors ; and to her very 
 father she was now spoken of as Mrs. Dove. Even the 
 Allisons called her so in courteous and customary usage, but 
 not without a melancholy reflection, that when Deborah 
 Bacon became Mrs. Dove, she was in a great measure lost 
 to them. 
 
 friendship, although it ceases not 
 In marriage, is yet at less command 
 Than when a single freedom can dispose it.* 
 
 Doncaster has less of the Rus in Urbe now than it had in 
 those days, and than Bath had when those words were 
 
 Ford. 
 
232 ROBERT SOUTIIEf. 
 
 placed over the door of a lodging-house, on the North 
 Parade. And the house to which the Doctor brought home 
 his bride, had less of it than when Peter Hopkins set up 
 the gilt pestle and mortar there as the cognizance of his 
 vocation. It had no longer that air of quiet respectability 
 which belongs to such a dwelling in the best street of a 
 small country town. The Mansion House, by which it was 
 dwarfed and inconvenienced in many ways, occasioned a 
 stir and bustle about it, unlike the cheerful business of a mar- 
 ket day. The back windows, however, still looked to the 
 fields, and there was still a garden. But neither fields nor 
 garden could prevail over the odor of the shop, in which, like 
 
 Hot, cold, moist and dry, four champions fierce, 
 
 in Milton's Chaos, rhubarb and peppermint, and valerian, and 
 assafoetida, " strove for mastery," and to battle brought their 
 atoms. Happy was the day when peppermint predomi- 
 nated; though it always reminded Mrs. Dove of Thaxted 
 Grange, and the delight with which she used to assist Miss 
 Allison in her distillations. There is an Arabian proverb 
 which says, "The remembrance of youth is a sigh." 
 Southey has taken it for the text of one of those juvenile 
 poems in which he dwells with thoughtful forefeeling upon 
 the condition of declining life. 
 
 Miss Allison had been to her, not indeed as a mother, but 
 as what a stepmother is, who is led by natural benevolence 
 ami a religious sense of duty, to perform as far as possible 
 a mother's part to her husband's children. There are more 
 such stepmothers than the world is willing to believe, and 
 they have their reward here as well as hereafter. It was 
 impossible that any new friend could fill up her place in 
 Mrs. Dove's affections, impossible that she could ever feel 
 for another woman the respect, and reverence, and grati- 
 tude, which blended with her love for this excellent person. 
 Though she was born within four miles of Doncaster, and 
 
A LOVE STORY. 233 
 
 had lived till her marriage in the humble vicarage in which 
 she was born, she had never passed four-and-twenty hours 
 in fhat town before she went to reside there ; nor had she 
 the slightest acquaintance with any of its inhabitants, except 
 the few shopkeepers with whom her little dealings had lain, 
 and the occasional visitants whom she had met at the 
 Grange. 
 
 An Irish officer in the army, happening to be passenger 
 in an armed vessel during the last war, used frequently to 
 wish that they might fall in with an enemy's ship, because 
 he said, he had been in many land battles, and there was 
 nothing in the world which he desired more than to see 
 what sort of a thing a sea-fight was. He had his wish, 
 and when after a smart action, in which he bore his part 
 bravely, an enemy of superior force had been beaten off, 
 he declared with the customary emphasis of an Hibernian 
 adjuration, that a sea-fight was a mighty sairious sort of 
 thing. 
 
 The Doctor and Deborah, as soon as they were be- 
 trothed, had come to just the same conclusion upon a very 
 different subject. Till the day of their engagement, nay, 
 till the hour of proposal on his part, and the very instant 
 of acceptance on hers, each had looked upon marriage, 
 when the thought of it occurred, as a distant possibility, 
 more or less desirable, according to the circumstances which 
 introduced the thought, and the mood in which it was enter- 
 tained. And when it was spoken of sportively, as might 
 happen, in relation to either the one or the other, it was 
 lightly treated as a subject in which they had no concern. 
 But from the time of their engagement, it seemed to both 
 the most serious event of their lives. 
 
 In the Dutch village of Broek, concerning which, singu- 
 lar as the habits of the inhabitants are, travellers have re- 
 lated more peculiarities than ever prevailed there, one 
 remarkable custom shows with how serious a mind some of 
 
234 ROBERT SOUTHEY. 
 
 the Hollanders regard marriage. The great house-door is 
 never opened but when the master of the house brings 
 home his bride from the altar, and when husband "and 
 wife are borne out to the grave. Dr. Dove had seen that 
 village of great baby-houses ; but though much attached 
 to Holland, and to the Dutch as a people, and disposed to 
 think that we might learn many useful lessons from our 
 prudent and thrifty neighbors, he thought this to be as pre- 
 posterous, if not as shocking a custom, as it would be to 
 have the bell toll at a marriage, and to wear a winding- 
 sheet for a wedding garment. 
 
 We look with wonder at the transformations that take 
 place in insects, and yet their physical metamorphoses are 
 not greater than the changes which we ourselves undergo 
 morally and intellectually, both in our relations to others 
 and in our individual nature. Chaqtie individu, considers 
 separement, dijfere encore de lui-meme par Fejfet du terns; 
 il devient un autre, en quelque maniere, aux diverses epoques 
 de sa vie. Uenfant, fhomme rait, le vieillard, sont comme 
 autant detrangers unis dans une seule personne par le lien 
 mysterieux du souvenir.* Of all changes in life, marriage is 
 certainly the greatest, and though less change in every re- 
 spect can very rarely be produced by it in any persons 
 than in the Doctor and his wife, it was very great to 
 both. On his part it was altogether an increase of hap- 
 piness; or rather, from having been contented in his sta- 
 tion he became happy in it, so happy as to be exper- 
 imentally convinced that there can be no "single bless- 
 edness" for man. There were some drawbacks on her 
 part, in the removal from a quiet vicarage to a busy 
 street; in the obstacle which four miles opposed to that 
 daily and intimate intercourse with her friends at the 
 Grange, which had been the chief delight of her maiden 
 life ; and above all, in the separation from her father, for 
 
 * Necker 
 
A LOVE STORY. 235 
 
 even at a distance which may appear so inconsiderable, such 
 it was : but there was the consolatory reflection, that those 
 dear friends and that dear father concurred in approving 
 her marriage, and in rejoicing in it for her sake ; and the 
 experience of every day and every year made her more and 
 more thankful for her lot. In the full liturgic sense of the 
 word, he worshipped her, that is, he loved and cherished and 
 respected and honored her; and she would have obeyed 
 him cheerfully as well as dutifully, if obedience could have 
 been shown where there was ever but one will. 
 
THE MYSTIC SUMMER 
 
 BY BAYARD TAYLOR. 
 
 TIS not the dropping of the flower, 
 The blush of fruit upon the tree, 
 Though Summer ripens, hour by hour. 
 The garden's sweet maternity : 
 
 'T is not that birds have ceased to build, 
 And wait their brood with tender care ; 
 
 That corn is golden in the field, 
 And clover balm is in the air ; 
 
 Not these the season's splendor bring, 
 And crowd with life the happy year, 
 
 Nor yet, where yonder fountains sing, 
 The blaze of sunshine, hot and clear. 
 
 In thy full womb, O Summer ! lies 
 
 A secret hope, a joy unsung, 
 Held in the hush of these calm skies, 
 
 And trembling on the forest's tongue. 
 
 The lands of harvest throb anew 
 
 In shining pulses, far away ; 
 The Night distils a dearer dew, 
 
 And sweeter eyelids has the Day. 
 
THE MYSTIC SUMMER. 237 
 
 And not in vain the peony burns 
 
 In bursting globes, her crimson fire, 
 Her incense-dropping ivory urns 
 
 The lily lifts in many a spire : 
 
 And not in vain the tulips clash 
 
 In revelry the cups they hold 
 Of fiery wine, until they dash 
 
 With ruby streaks the splendid gold ! 
 
 Send down your roots the mystic charm 
 That warms and flushes all your flowers, 
 
 And with the summer's touch disarm 
 The thraldom of the under powers, 
 
 Until, in caverns, buried deep, 
 
 Strange fragrance reach the diamond's home, 
 And murmurs of the garden sweep 
 
 The houses of the frighted gnome ! 
 
 For, piercing through their black repose, 
 
 And shooting up beyond the sun, 
 I see that Tree of Life, which rose 
 
 Before the eyes of Solomon : 
 
 Its boughs, that, in the light of God, 
 
 Their bright, innumerous leaves display, 
 
 Whose hum of life is borne abroad 
 By winds that shake the dead away. 
 
 And, trembling on a branch afar, 
 
 The topmost nursling of the skies, 
 I see my bud, the fairest star 
 
 That ever dawned for watching eyes. 
 
238 BAYARD TAYLOR. 
 
 Unnoticed on the boundless tree, 
 Its fragrant promise fills the air; 
 
 Its little bell expands, for me, 
 A tent of silver, lily-fair. 
 
 All life to that one centre tends ; 
 
 All joy and beauty thence outflow ; 
 Her sweetest gifts the summer spends, 
 
 To teach that sweeter bud to blow. 
 
 So, compassed by the vision's gleam, 
 In trembling hope, from day to day, 
 
 As in some bright, bewildering dream, 
 The mystic summer wanes away* 
 
TWO OP THE OLD MASTERS 
 
 BY MRS. JAMESON. 
 
 WITHIN a short period of about thirty years, that 
 is, between 1490 and 1520, the greatest painters 
 whom the world has yet seen were living and working 
 together. On looking back, we cannot but feel that the 
 excellence they attained was the result of the efforts and 
 aspirations of a preceding age ; and yet these men were so 
 great in their vocation, and so individual in their greatness, 
 that, losing sight of the linked chain of progress, they 
 seemed at first to have had no precursors, as they have 
 since had no peers. Though living at the same time, and 
 most of them in personal relation with each other, the direc- 
 tion of each mind was different was peculiar; though 
 exercising in some sort a reciprocal influence, this influence 
 never interfered with the most decided originality. These 
 wonderful artists, who would have been remarkable men in 
 their time, though they had never touched a pencil, were 
 Lionardo da Vinci, Michael Angelo, Raphael, Correggio, 
 Giorgione, Titian, in Italy ; and in Germany, Albert Durer, 
 Of these men, we might say, as of Homer and Shakespeare, 
 that they belong to no particular age or country, but to all 
 time, and to the universe. That they flourished together 
 within one brief and brilliant period, and that each carried 
 out to the highest degree of perfection his own peculiar 
 aims, was no casualty ; nor are we to seek for the causes of 
 this surpassing excellence merely in the history of the art as 
 
240 MRS. JAMESON. 
 
 such. The causes lay far deeper, and must be referred to the 
 history of human culture. The fermenting activity of the 
 fifteenth century found its results in the extraordinary devel- 
 opment of human intelligence in the commencement of the 
 sixteenth century. We often hear in these days of " the 
 spirit of the age " ; but in that wonderful age three mighty 
 spirits were stirring society to its depths : the spirit oi 
 bold investigation into truths of all kinds, which led to the 
 Reformation ; the spirit of daring adventure, which led men 
 in search of new worlds beyond the eastern and the western 
 oceans ; and the spirit of art, through which men soared even 
 to the " seventh heaven of invention." 
 
 LIONARDO DA VINCI. 
 
 LIONARDO DA VINCI seems to present hi his own person a 
 resume of all the characteristics of the age in which he lived. 
 He was the miracle of that age of miracles. Ardent and 
 versatile as youth ; patient and persevering as age ; a most 
 profound and original thinker ; the greatest mathematician 
 and most ingenious mechanic of his time ; architect, chemist, 
 engineer, musician, poet, painter ! we are not only astound- 
 ed by the variety of his natural gifts and acquired knowl- 
 edge, but by the practical direction of his amazing powers. 
 The extracts which have- been published from MSS. now 
 existing in his own handwriting show him to have antici- 
 pated, by the force of his own intellect, some of the greatest 
 discoveries made since his time. These fragments, says Mr. 
 Hallam, " are, according to our common estimate of the age 
 in which he lived, more like revelations of physical truths 
 vouchsafed to a single mind, than the superstructure of its 
 reasoning upon any established basis. The discoveries which 
 made Galileo, Kepler, Castelli, and other names illustrious 
 the system of Copernicus the very theories of recent 
 geologists, are anticipated by Da Vinci within the compass 
 
TWO OF THE OLD MASTERS. 241 
 
 of a few pages, not perhaps in the most precise language, 
 or on the most conclusive reasoning, but so as to strike us 
 with something like the awe of preternatural knowledge. 
 In an age of so much dogmatism, he first laid down the 
 grand principle of Bacon, that experiment and observation 
 must be the guides to just theory in the investigation of 
 nature. If any doubt could be harbored, not as to the right 
 of Lionardo da Vinci to stand as the first name of the fif- 
 teenth century, which is beyond all doubt, but as to his 
 originality in so many discoveries which probably no one 
 man, especially in such circumstances, has ever made, it 
 must be by an hypothesis not very untenable, that some parts 
 of physical science had already attained a height which 
 mere books do not record." 
 
 It seems at first sight almost incomprehensible that, thus 
 endowed as a philosopher, mechanic, inventor, discoverer, 
 the fame of Lionardo should now rest on the works he has 
 left as a painter. We cannot, within these limits, attempt 
 to explain why and how it is that as the man of science he 
 has been naturally and necessarily left behind by the onward 
 march of intellectual progress, while as the poet-painter he 
 still survives as a presence and a power. "We must proceed 
 at once to give some account of him in the character in 
 which he exists to us and for us, that of the great artist. 
 
 Lionardo was born at Vinci, near Florence, in the Lower 
 Val d'Arno, on the borders of the territory of Pistoia. 
 His father, Piero da Vinci, was an advocate of Florence, 
 not rich, but hi independent circumstances, and possessed of 
 estates in land. The singular talAts of his son induced 
 Piero to give him, from an early age, the advantage of the 
 best instructors. As a child, he distinguished himself by 
 his proficiency in arithmetic and mathematics. Music he 
 studied early, as a science as well as an art He invented 
 a species of lyre for himself, and sung his own poetical com- 
 positions to his own music, both being frequently extempo- 
 11 p 
 
242 MBS. JAMESON. 
 
 raneous. But his favorite pursuit was the art of design in all 
 its branches ; he modelled in clay or wax, or attempted to 
 draw every object which struck his fancy. His father sent 
 him to study under Andrea Verrocchio, famous as a sculp- 
 tor, chaser in metal, and painter. Andrea, wh was ah ex- 
 cellent and correct designer, but a bad and hard colorist, 
 was soon after engaged to paint a picture of the Baptism of 
 our Saviour. He employed Lionardo, then a youth, to exe- 
 cute one of the angels. This he did with so much softness 
 and richness of color that it far surpassed the rest of the pic- 
 ture ; and Verrocchio from that time threw away his palette, 
 and confined himself wholly to his works in sculpture and 
 design ; " enraged," says Vasari, " that a. child should thus 
 excel him." 
 
 The youth of Lionardo thus passed away in the pursuit of 
 science and of art. Sometimes he was deeply engaged in 
 astronomical calculations and investigations ; sometimes ar- 
 dent in the study of natural history, botany, and anatomy ; 
 sometimes intent on new effects of color, light, shadow, or 
 expression, in representing objects animate or inanimate. 
 Versatile, yet persevering, he varied his pursuits, but he 
 never abandoned any. He was quite a young man when he 
 conceived and demonstrated the practicability of two magnifi- 
 cent projects. One was, to lift the whole of the Church of 
 San Lorenzo, by means of immense levers, some feet higher 
 than it now stands, and thus supply the deficient elevation ; 
 the other project was, to form the Arno into a navigable 
 canal, as far as Pisa, which would have added greatly to the 
 commercial advantages %f Florence. 
 
 It happened about this time that a peasant on the estate 
 of Piero da Vinci brought him a circular piece of wood, cut 
 horizontally from the trunk of a very large old fig-tree> 
 which had been lately felled, and begged to have something 
 painted on it as an ornament for his cottage. The man 
 being an especial favorite, Piero desired his son Lionardo 
 
TWO OF THE OLD MASTERS. 243 
 
 to gratify his request ; and Lionardo, inspired by that wild- 
 ness of fancy which was one of his characteristics, took the 
 panel into his own room, and resolved to astonish his fathor 
 by a most unlooked-for proof of his art. He determined to 
 compose something which should have an effect similar to 
 that of the Medusa on the shield of Perseus, and almost 
 petrify beholders. Aided by his recent studies in natural 
 history, he collected together from the neighboring swamps 
 and the river-mud all kinds of hideous reptiles, as adders, 
 lizards, toads, serpents ; insects, as moths, locusts ; and other 
 crawling and flying, obscene and obnoxious things ; and out 
 of these he compounded a sort of monster, or chimera, which 
 he represented as about to issue from the shield, with eyes 
 flashing fire, and of an aspect so fearful and abominable that 
 it seemed to infect the very air around. When finished, he 
 led his father into the room in which it was placed, and the 
 terror and horror of Piero proved the success of his at- 
 tempt. This production, afterwards known as the Rotello 
 del Fico, from the material on which it was painted, was sold 
 by Piero secretly for one hundred ducats, to a merchant, 
 who carried it to Milan, and sold it to the duke for three 
 hundred. To the poor peasant thus cheated of his Rotello, 
 Piero gave a wooden shield, on which was painted a heart 
 transfixed by a dart ; a device better suited to his taste and 
 comprehension. In the subsequent troubles of Milan, Lion- 
 ardo's picture disappeared, and was probably destroyed, as an 
 object of horror, by those who did not understand its value 
 as a work of art. 
 
 The anomalous monster represented on the Rotello was 
 wholly different from the Medusa, afterwards painted by 
 Lionardo, and now existing in the Florence Gallery. It 
 represents the severed head of Medusa, seen foreshortened, 
 lying on a fragment of rock. The features are beautiful 
 and regular ; the hair already metamorphosed into ser- 
 pents, 
 
244 MRS. JAMESON. 
 
 " which curl and flow, 
 And their long tangles in each other lock, 
 And with unending involutions show 
 Their maile'd radiance." 
 
 Those who have once seen this terrible and fascinating pic 
 ture can never forget it. The ghastly head seems to expire, 
 and the serpents to crawl into glittering life, as we look 
 upon it. 
 
 During this first period of his life, which was wholly 
 passed in Florence and its neighborhood, Lionardo painted 
 several other pictures, of a very different character, and de- 
 signed some beautiful cartoons of sacred and mythological 
 subjects, which showed that his sense of the beautiful, the 
 elevated, and the graceful, was not less a part of his mind, 
 than that eccentricity and almost perversion of fancy which 
 made him delight in sketching ugly, exaggerated caricatures, 
 and representing the deformed and the terrible. 
 
 Lionardo da Vinci was now about thirty years old, in the 
 prime of his life and talents. His taste for pleasure and 
 expense was, however, equal to his genius and indefatigable 
 industry ; and, anxious to secure a certain provision for the 
 future, as well as a wider field for the exercise of his various 
 talents, he accepted the invitation of Ludovico Sforza il 
 Moro, then regent, afterwards Duke of Milan, to reside in 
 his court, and to execute a colossal equestrian statue of his 
 ancestor Francesco Sforza. Here begins the second period 
 of his artistic career, which includes his sojourn at Milan, 
 that is, from 1483 to 1499. 
 
 Vasari says that Lionardo was invited to the court of 
 Milan for the Duke Ludo vice's amusement, k ' as a musician 
 and performer on the lyre, and as the greatest singer and 
 improvisators of his time " ; but this is improbable. Lio- 
 nardo, in his long letter to that prince, in which he recites 
 his own qualifications for employment, dwells chiefly on his 
 skill in engineering and fortification, and sums up his pre- 
 
TWO OF THE OLD MASTERS. 245 
 
 tensions as an artist in these few brief words : " I under- 
 stand the different modes of sculpture in marble, bronze, 
 and terra-cotta. In painting, also, I may esteem myself 
 equal to any one, let him be who he may." Of his musical 
 talents he makes no mention whatever, though undoubtedly 
 these, as well as his other social accomplishments, his hand- 
 some person, his winning address, his wit and eloquence, 
 recommended him to the notice of the prince, by whom he 
 was greatly beloved, and in whose service he remained for 
 about seventeen years. It is not necessary, nor would it be 
 possible here, to give a particular account of all the works 
 in which Lionardo was engaged for his patron, nor of the 
 great political events in which he was involved, more by his 
 position than by his inclination ; for instance, the invasion 
 of Italy by Charles VIII. of France, and the subsequent in- 
 vasion of Milan by Louis XII., which ended in the destruc- 
 tion of the Duke Ludovico. We shall only mention a few 
 of the pictures he executed. One of these, the portrait of 
 Lucrezia Crivelli, is now in the Louvre (No. 1091). An- 
 other was the Nativity of our Saviour, in the imperial 
 collection at Vienna ; but the greatest work of all, and by 
 far the grandest picture which, up to that time, had been 
 executed in Italy, was the Last Supper, painted on the wall 
 of the refectory, or dining-room, of the Dominican convent 
 of the Madonna delle Grazie. It occupied the painter about 
 two years. Of this magnificent creation of art only the 
 mouldering remains are now visible. It has been so often 
 repaired, that almost every vestige of the original painting 
 is annihilated ; but, from the multiplicity of descriptions, 
 engravings, and copies that exist, no picture is more uni- 
 versally known and celebrated. 
 
 The moment selected by the painter is described in the 
 twenty-sixth chapter of St. Matthew, twenty-first and 
 twenty-seconl verses: "And as they did eat, he said. 
 Verily, I say unto you, that one of you shall betray me 
 
246 MRS. JAMESON. 
 
 and they were exceedingly sorrowful, and began every one 
 of them to say unto him, Lord, is it I?" The knowledge 
 of character displayed in the heads of the different apostles 
 is even more wonderful than the skilful arrangement of the 
 figures and the amazing beauty of the workmanship. The 
 space occupied by the picture is a wall twenty-eight feet in 
 length, and the figures are larger than life. The best judg- 
 ment we can now form of its merits is from the fine copy 
 executed by one of Leonardo's best pupils, Marco Uggione, 
 for the Certosa at Pa via, and now in London, in the col- 
 lection of the Royal Academy. Eleven other copies, by 
 various pupils of Lionardo, painted either during his life- 
 time or within a few years after his death, while the picture 
 was in perfect preservation, exist in different churches and 
 collections. 
 
 Of the grand equestrian statue of Francesco Sforza, Lio- 
 nardo never finished more than the model in clay, which 
 was considered a masterpiece. Some years afterwards, (in 
 1499,) when Milan was invaded by the French, it was used 
 as a target by the Gascon bowmen, and completely destroyed. 
 The profound anatomical studies which Lionardo made for 
 this work still exist. 
 
 In the year 1500, the French being in possession of 
 Milan, his patron Ludovico in captivity, and the affairs of 
 the state in utter confusion, Lionardo returned to his native 
 Florence, where he honed to re-establish his broken for- 
 tunes, arid to find employment. Here begins the third 
 period of his artistic life, from 1500 to 1513, that is, from 
 his forty-eighth to his sixtieth year. He found the Medici 
 family in exile, but was received by Pietro Soderini (who 
 governed the city as " Gonfaloniere perpetuo ") with great 
 distinction, and a pension was assigned to him as painter in 
 the service of the republic. 
 
 Then began the rivalry between Lionardo and Michael 
 Angelo, which lasted during the remainder of Lionardo's 
 
TWO OF THE OLD MASTERS. 247 
 
 life. The difference of age (for Michael Angelo was twenty- 
 two years younger) ought to have prevented all unseemly 
 jealousy. Bat Michael Angelo was haughty, and impatient 
 of all superiority, or even equality ; Lioriardo, sensitive, 
 capricious, and naturally disinclined to admit the pretensions 
 of a rival, to whom he could sav, and did say, " I was famous 
 before you were born ! " With all their admiration of each 
 other's genius, their mutual frailties prevented any real 
 good-will on either side. The two painters competed for 
 the honor of painting in fresco one side of the great Council- 
 hall in the Palazzo Vecchio at Florence. Each prepared 
 his cartoon ; each, emulous of the fame and conscious of the 
 abilities of his rival, threw all his best powers into his work. 
 Lionardo chose for his subject the Defeat of the Milanese 
 general, ifcccolo Piccinino, by the Florentine army in 1440. 
 One of tna finest groups represented a combat of cavalry 
 disputing the possession of a standard. " It was so wonder- 
 fully executed, that the horses themselves seemed animated 
 by the same fury as their riders ; nor is it possible to de- 
 scribe the variety of attitudes, the splendor of the dresses 
 and armor of the warriors, nor the incredible skill displayed 
 in the forms and actions of the horses." 
 
 Michael Angelo chose for his subject the moment before 
 the same battle, when a party of Florentine soldiers bathing 
 in the Arno are surprised by the sound of the trumpet call- 
 ing them to^arms. Of this cartoon we shall have more to 
 say in treating of his life. The preference was given to 
 Lionardo da Vinci. But, as Vasari relates, he spent so 
 much time in trying experiments, and in preparing the wall 
 to receive oil painting, which he preferred to fresco, that in 
 the interval some changes in the government intervened, 
 and the design was abandoned. The two cartoons remained 
 for several years open to the public, and artists flocked from 
 every part of Italy to study them. Subsequently they were 
 cut up into separate parts, dispersed, and lost. It is curious 
 
248 MRS. JAMESON. 
 
 that of Michael Angelo's composition only one small copy 
 exists ; of Lionardo's, not one. From a fragment which ex- 
 isted in his time, but which has since disappeared, Rubens 
 made a fine drawing, which was engraved by Edelinck, and 
 is known as the Battle of the Standard. 
 
 It was a reproach against Lionardo, in his own time, that 
 he began many things and finished few ; that his magnificent 
 designs and projects, whether it art or mechanics, were sel- 
 dom completed. This may be a subject of regret, but it is 
 unjust to make it a reproach. It was in the nature of the 
 man. The grasp of his mind was so nearly superhuman, 
 that he never, in anything he effected, satisfied himself or 
 realized his own vast conceptions. The most exquisitely 
 finished of his works, those that in the perfection of the exe- 
 cution have excited the wonder and despair of succeeding 
 artists, were put aside by him as unfinished sketches. Most 
 of the pictures now attributed to him were wholly or in 
 part painted by his scholars and imitators from his cartoons. 
 One of the most famous of these was designed for the altar- 
 piece of the church of the convent called the Nunziata. It 
 represented the Virgin Mary seated in the lap of her 
 mother, St. Anna, having in her arms the infant Christ, 
 while St. John is playing with a lamb at their feet; St. 
 Anna, looking on with a tender smile, rejoices in her divine 
 offspring. The figures were drawn with such skill, and the 
 various expressions proper to each conveyed with such inim- 
 itable truth and grace, that, when exhibited in a chamber of 
 the convent, the inhabitants of the city flocked to see it, and 
 for two days the streets were crowded with people, " as if it 
 had been some solemn festival " ; but the picture was never 
 painted, and the monks of the Nunziata, after waiting kng 
 and in vain for their altar-piece, were obliged to employ 
 other artists. The cartoon, or a very fine repetition of it, 
 is now in the possession of the Royal Academy, and it must 
 not be confounded with the St. Anna in the Louvre, a more 
 fantastic and apparently an earlier composition. 
 
TWO OF THE OLD MASTERS. 249 
 
 Lionardo, during his stay at Florence, painted the por- 
 trait of Ginevra Benci, already mentioned, in the memoir of 
 Ghirlandajo. as the reigning beauty of her time ; and also 
 the portrait of Mona Lisa del Giocondo, sometimes called 
 La Joconde. On this last picture he worked at intervals 
 for four years, but was still unsatisfied. It was purchased 
 by Francis I. for four thousand golden crowns, and is now 
 in the Louvre. We find Lionardo also engaged by Crcsar 
 Borgia to visit and report on the fortifications of his territo- 
 ries, and in this office he was employed for two years. In 
 1514 he was invited to Rome by Leo X., but more in his 
 character of philosopher, mechanic, and alchemist, than as a 
 painter. Here he found Raphael at the height of his fame, 
 and then engaged in his greatest works, the frescos of 
 the Vatican. Two pictures which Lionardo painted while 
 at Rome the Madonna of St. Onofrio, and the Holy Fam- 
 ily, painted for Filiberta of Savoy, the Pope's sister-in-law 
 (which is now at St. Petersburg) show that even this 
 veteran in art felt the irresistible influence of the genius of 
 his young rival. They were both Raffaellesque in the sub- 
 ject and treatment. 
 
 It appears that Lionardo was ill-satisfied with his sojourn 
 at Rome. He had long been accustomed to hold the first 
 rank as an artist wherever he resided ; whereas at Rome he 
 found himself only one among many who, if they acknowl- 
 edged his greatness, affected to consider his day as past. 
 Ho was conscious that many of the improvements m the 
 arts which were now brought into use. and which enabled 
 the painters of the day to produce such extraordinary effects, 
 were invented or introduced by himself. If he could no 
 longer assert that measureless superiority over all others 
 which he had done in his younger days, it was because he 
 himself had opened to them new paths to excellence. The 
 arrival of his old competitor Michael Angelo, and some 
 slight on the part of Leo X., who was annoyed by his spec- 
 ll* 
 
250 MBS. JAMESON. 
 
 ulative and dilatory habits in executing the works intrusted 
 to him, all added to his irritation and disgust. He left 
 Rome, and set out for Pavia, where the French king Fran- 
 cis I. then held his court. He was received by the young 
 monarch with every mark of respect, loaded with favors, 
 and a pension of seven hundred gold crowns settled on him 
 for life. At the famous conference between Francis I. and 
 Leo X. at Bologna, Lionardo attended his new patron, and 
 was of essential service to him on that occasion. In the fol- 
 lowing year, 1516, he returned with Francis I. to France, 
 and was attached to the French court as principal painter. 
 It appears, however, that during his residence in France he 
 did not paint a single picture. His health had begun to 
 decline from the time lie left Italy ; and, feeling his end 
 approach, he prepared himself for it by religious meditation, 
 by acts of charity, and by a most conscientious distribution 
 by will of all his worldly possessions to his relatives and 
 friends. At length, after protracted suffering, this great 
 and most extraordinary man died at Cloux, near Amboise, 
 on the 2d of May, 1519, being then in his sixty-seventh 
 year. It is to be regretted that we cannot wholly credit 
 the beautiful story of his dying in the arms of Francis I., 
 who, as it is said, had come to visit him on his death-bed. It 
 would, indeed, have been, as Fuseli expressed it, "an honor 
 to the king, by which Destiny would have atoned to that 
 monarch for his future disaster at Pavia," had the incident 
 really happened, as it has been so often related by biogra- 
 phers, celebrated by poets, represented with a just pride by 
 painters, and willingly believed by all the world ; but the 
 well-authenticated fact that the court was on that day at St. 
 Germain-en-Laye, whence the royal ordinances are dated, 
 renders the story, unhappily, very doubtful. 
 
TWO OF THE OLD MASTERS. 251 
 
 TITIAN. 
 
 TIZIANO VECELLI was born at Cadore in the Friuli, a 
 district to the north of Venice, where the ancient family of 
 the Vecelli had been long settled. There is something very 
 amusing and characteristic in the first indication of his love 
 of art ; tor while it is recorded of other young artists that 
 they took a piece of charcoal or a piece of slate to trace the 
 images in their fancy, we are told that the infant Titian, 
 with an instinctive feeling prophetic of his future excellence 
 as a colorist, used the expressed juice of certain flowers to 
 paint a figure of a Madonna. When he was a boy of nine 
 years old his father, Gregorio, carried him to Venice and 
 placed him under the tuition of Sebastian Zuccato, a 
 painter and worker in mosaic. He left this school for 
 that of the Bellini, where the friendship and fellowship of 
 Giorgione seems early to have awakened his mind to new 
 ideas of art and color. Albert Durer. who was at Venice 
 in 1494, and again in 1507, also influenced him. At this 
 time, when Titian and Giorgione were youths of eighteen 
 and nineteen, they lived and worked together. It has been 
 related that they were employed in painting the frescos of 
 the Fondaco dei Tedeschi. The preference being given to 
 Titian's performance, which represented the story of Judith, 
 caused such a jealousy between the two friends, that they 
 ceased to reside together ; but at this time, and for some 
 years afterwards, the influence of Giorgione on the mind 
 and the style of Titian was such that it became difficult to 
 distinguish their works ; and on the death of Giorgione, 
 Titian was required to complete his unfinished pictures. 
 This great lo?s to Venice and the world left him in the 
 prime of youth without a rival. We find him for a few 
 years chiefly employed in decorating the palaces of the 
 Venetian nobles, both in the city and on the mainland. 
 
252 MRS. JAMESON. 
 
 The first of his historical compositions which is celebrated 
 by his biographers is the Presentation of the Virgin in 
 the Temple, a large picture, now in the Academy of 
 Arts at Venice ; and the first portrait recorded is that of 
 Catherine, Queen of Cyprus, of which numerous repeti- 
 tions and copies were scattered over all Italy. There is 
 a fine original in the Dresden Gallery. This unhappy 
 Catherine Cornaro, the "daughter of St. Mark," having 
 been forced to abdicate her crown in favor of the Venetian 
 state, was at this time living in a sort of honorable captivity 
 at Venice. She had been a widow for forty years, and he 
 has represented her in deep mourning, holding a rosarv in 
 her hand, the face still bearing traces of that beauty for 
 which she was celebrated. 
 
 It appears that Titian was married about 1512, but of his 
 wife we do not hear anything more. It is said that her 
 name was Lucia, and we know that she bore him three chil 
 dren, two sons, and a daughter called Lavinia. It .seems 
 probable, on a comparison of dates, that she died about the 
 year 1530. 
 
 One of the earliest works on which Titian was engaged 
 was the decoration of the convent of St. Antony, at Padua, 
 in which he executed a series of frescos from the life of St. 
 Antony. He was next summoned to Ferrara by the Duke 
 Alphonso I., and was employed in his service for at least 
 two years. He painted for this prince the beautiful picture 
 of Bacchus and Ariadne, which is now in the National Gal- 
 lery, and which represents on a small scale an epitome of 
 all the beauties which characterize Titian, in the rich, pictur- 
 esque, animated composition, in the ardor of Bacchus, who 
 flings himself from his car to pursue Ariadne; the dancing 
 bacchanals, the frantic grace of the bacchante, and the little 
 joyous satyr in front, trailing the head of the sacrifice. He 
 painted for the same prince two other festive subjects: one 
 in which a nymph and two men are dancing, while another 
 
TWO OF THE OLD MASTERS. 253 
 
 nymph lies asleep ; and a third, in which a number of chil- 
 dren and cupids are sporting round a statue of Venus. 
 There are here upwards of sixty figures in every variety 
 of attitude, some fluttering in the air, some climbing the 
 fruit-trees, some shooting arrows, or embracing each other. 
 This picture is known as the Sacrifice to the Goddess of 
 Fertility. While it remained in Italy, it was a study for 
 the first painters, for Poussin, the Carracci, Albano, and 
 Fiamingo the sculptor, so famous for his models of children. 
 At Ferrara, Titian also painted the portrait of the first wife 
 of Alphonso, the famous and infamous Lucrezia Borgia; 
 and here also he formed a friendship with the poet Ariosto, 
 whose portrait he painted. 
 
 At this time he was invited to Rome by Leo X., for 
 whom Raphael, then in the zenith of his powers, was execut- 
 ing some of his finest works. It is curious to speculate 
 what influence these two distinguished men might have 
 exercised on each other had they met ; but it was not so 
 decreed. Titian was strongly attached to his home and his 
 friends at Venice ; and to hi< birthplace, the little town of 
 Cadore, he paid an annual summer visit. His long absence 
 at Ferrara had wearied him of courts and princes; and, 
 instead of going to Rome to swell the luxurious state of Leo 
 X., he returned to Venice and remained there stationary for 
 the next few years, enriching its palaces and churches with 
 his magnificent works. These were so numerous that it 
 would be in vain to attempt to give an account even of those 
 considered as the finest among them. Two, however, must be 
 pointed out as pre-eminent in beauty and celebrity. First, 
 the Assumption of the Virgin, painted for the Church of 
 Santa Maria de' Frari, and now in the Academy of the 
 Fine Arts at Venice, and well known from the magnificent 
 engraving of Schiavone the Virgin is soaring to heaven 
 amid groups of angels, while the apostles gaze upwards; 
 and, se '.ondly, the Death of St. Peter Martyr when attacked 
 
254 MRS. JAMESON. 
 
 by assassins at the entrance of a wood ; the resignation of 
 the prostrate victim and the ferocity of the murderer, the 
 attendant flying ** in the agonies of cowardice," with the trees 
 waving their distracted boughs amid the violence of the tem- 
 pest, have rendered this picture famous as a piece of scenic 
 poetry as well as of dramatic expression. 
 
 The next event of Titian's life was his journey to Bologna 
 in 1530. In that year the Emperor Charles V. and Pope 
 Clement VII. met at Bologna, each surrounded by a bril- 
 liant retinue of the most distinguished soldiers, statesmen, 
 and scholars, of Germany and Italy. Through the influence 
 of his friend Aretino, Titian was recommended to the Car- 
 dinal Ippolito de' Medici, the Pope's nephew, through whose 
 patronage he was introduced to the two potentates who sat 
 to him. One of the portraits of Clement VII., painted at 
 this time, is now in the Bridgewater Gallery. Charles V. 
 was so satisfied with his portrait, that he became the zealous 
 friend and patron of the painter. It is not precisely known 
 which of several portraits of the Emperor painted by Titian 
 was the one executed at Bologna on this memorable occa- 
 sion, but it is supposed to be that which represents him on 
 horseback charging with his lance, now in the Royal Gallery 
 at Madrid, and of which Mr. Rogers possesses the original 
 study. The two portraits of Ippolito de' Medici in the Pitti 
 Palace and the Louvre were also painted at this period. 
 
 After a sojourn of some months at Bologna, Titian re- 
 turned to Venice loaded with honors and rewards. There 
 was no potentate, prince, or poet, or reigning beauty, who 
 did not covet the honor of being immortalized by his pencil. 
 He had, up to this time, managed his worldly affairs with 
 great economy ; but now he purchased for himself a house 
 opposite to Murano, and lived splendidly, combining with 
 the most indefatigable industry the liveliest enjoyment of 
 existence ; his favorite companions were the architect San 
 Bovino and the witty profligate Pietro Aretii o. Titian has 
 
TWO OF THE OLD MASTERS. 255 
 
 often been reproached with his friendship for Aretino, and 
 nothing can be said in his excuse, except that the proudest 
 princes in Europe condescended to flatter and caress this 
 unprincipled literary ruffian, who was pleased to designate 
 himself as the ' ; friend of Titian, and the scourge of princes." 
 One of the finest of Titian's portraits is that of Aretino, in 
 the Munich Gallery. 
 
 Thus in the practice of his art, in the society of his 
 friends, and in the enjoyment of the pleasures of life, did 
 Titian pass several years. The only painter of his time 
 who was deemed worthy of competing with him was Lieinio 
 Regillo, better known as Pordenone, Between Titian and 
 Pordenone there existed not merely rivalry, but a personal 
 hatred, so bitter that Pordenone affected to think his life in 
 danger, and when at Venice painted with his shield and 
 poniard lying beside him. As long as Pordenone lived, 
 Titian had a spur to exertion, to emulation. All the other 
 good painters of the time, Palma, Bonifazio, Tintoretto, 
 were his pupils or his creatures ; Pordenone would never 
 owe anything to him; and the picture called the St. Jus- 
 tina, at Vienna, shows that he could equal Titian on his own 
 ground. 
 
 After the death of Pordenone at Ferrara, in 1539, Titian 
 was left without a rival. Everywhere in Italy art was on 
 the decline : Lionardo, Raphael, Correggio, had all passed 
 away. Titian himself, at the age of sixty, was no longer 
 young, but he still retained all the vigor and the freshness 
 of youth ; neither eye nor hand, nor creative energy of mind 
 had failed him yet. He was again invited to Ferrara, and 
 painted there the portrait of the old Pope Paul III. He 
 then visited Urbino, where he painted for the Duke the fa- 
 mous Venus which hangs in the Tribune of the Florence Gal- 
 lery, and many other pictures. He again, by order of Charles 
 V., repaired to Bologna, and painted the Emperor, standing, 
 and by his side a favorite Irish wolf-dog. This picture was 
 
256 MRS. JAMESON. 
 
 given by Philip IV. to Charles I. of England, but after his 
 death was sold into Spain, and is now at Madrid. 
 
 Pope Paul III. invited him to Rome, whither he repaired 
 in 1548. There he painted that wonderful picture of the 
 old Pope with his two nephews, the Duke Ottavio and Car- 
 dinal Farnese, which is now at Vienna. The head of the 
 Pope is a miracle of character and expression. A keen-vis- 
 aged, thin little man, with meagre fingers like birds' claws, 
 and an eager cunning look, riveting the gazer like the eye of 
 a snake, nature itself! and the Pope had cither so little 
 or so much vanity as to be perfectly satisfied. He rewarded 
 the painter munificently; he even offered to make his son 
 Pomponio Bishop of Ceneda, which Titian had the good 
 sense to refuse. While at Rome he painted several pic- 
 tures for the Farnese family, among them the Venus and 
 Adonis, of which a repetition is in the National Gallery, 
 and a Danae which excited the admiration of Michael An- 
 gelo. At this time Titian was seventy-two. 
 
 He next, by command of Charles V., repaired to Augs- 
 burg, where the Emperor held his court: eighteen years 
 had elapsed since he first sat to Titian, and he was now 
 broken by the cares of government, far older at fifty than 
 the painter at seventy-two. It was at Augsburg that the 
 incident occurred which has been so often related : Titian 
 dropped his pencil, and Charles, taking it up and presenting 
 it, replied to the artist's excuses that " Titian was worthy of 
 being served by Cassar." This pretty anecdote is not with- 
 out its parallel in modern times. When Sir Thomas Law- 
 rence was painting at Aix-la-Chapelle. as he stooped to place 
 a picture on his easel, the Emperor of Russia anticipated him, 
 and, taking it up, adju ted it himself; but we do not hear 
 that he made any speech on the occasion. When at Augs- 
 burg, Titian was ennobled and created a count of the em- 
 pire, with a pension of two hundred gold ducats, and his son 
 Pomponio was appointed canon of the cathedral of Milan. 
 
TWO OF THE OLD MASTERS. 257 
 
 After the abdication and death of Charles V., Titian contin- 
 ued in great favor with his successor Philip II., for whom 
 he painted several pictures. It is not true, however, thai 
 Titian visited Spain. The assertion that lie did so rests on 
 the sole authority of Palomino, a Spanish writer on art, and, 
 though wholly unsupported by evidence, has been copied 
 from one book into another. Later researches have proved 
 that Titian returned from Augsburg to Venice; and an 
 uninterrupted series of letters and documents, with dates of 
 time and place, remain to show that, with the exception of 
 this visit to Augsburg and another to Vienna, he resided 
 constantly in Italy, and principally at Venice, from 1530 to 
 his death. Notwithstanding the compliments and patronage 
 and nominal rewards he received from tlv j Spanish court, 
 Titian was worse off under Philip II. than he had been 
 under Charles V. : his pension was constantly in arrears ; 
 the payments for his pictures evaded by the officials : and 
 we find the great painter constantly presenting petitions 
 and complaints in moving terms, which always obtained gra- 
 cious but illusive answers. Philip II., who commanded the 
 riches of the Indies, was for many years a debtor to Titian 
 for at least two thousand gold crowns ; and his accounts 
 were not settled at the time of his death. For Queen 
 Mary of England, who wished to patronize one favored by 
 her husband, Titian painted several pictures, some of which 
 were in the possession of Charles I. ; others had been car- 
 ried to Spain after the death of Mary, and are now in the 
 Royal Gallery at Madrid. 
 
 Besides the pictures painted by command for royal and 
 noble patrons, Titian, who was unceasingly occupied, had 
 always a great number of pictures in his house which he 
 presented to his friends, or to the officers and attendants of 
 the court, as a means of procuring their favor. There is 
 extant a letter of Aretino, in which he describes the scene 
 which took place when the Emperor summoned his favorite 
 
 Q 
 
258 MRS. JAMESON. 
 
 painter to attend the court at Augsburg. " Tt was," he 
 says, " the most flattering testimony to his excellence to 
 behold, as soon as it was known that the divine painter was 
 sent for, the crowds of people running to obtain, if possible, 
 the productions of his art ; and how they endeavored to 
 purchase the pictures, great and small, and ever} thing that 
 was in the house, at any price ; for everybody seems assured 
 that his august majesty will so treat his Apelles that he 
 will no longer condescend to exercise his pencil except to 
 oblige him." 
 
 Years passed on, and seemed to have no power to quench 
 the ardor of this wonderful old man. He was eighty-one 
 when he painted the Martyrdom of St. Laurence, one of 
 his largest and grandest compositions. The Magdalen, the 
 half-length figure with uplifted streaming eyes, which lie 
 sent to Philip II., was executed even later ; and it was not 
 till he was approaching his ninetieth year that he showed 
 in his works symptoms of enfeebled powers ; and then it 
 seemed as if sorrow rather than time had reached him and 
 conquered him at last. The death of many friends, the 
 companions of his convivial hours, left him "alone in his 
 glory." He found in his beloved art the only refuge from 
 grief. His son Pomponio was still the same worthless 
 profligate in age that he had been in youth. His son Orazio 
 attended upon him with truly filial duty and affection, and 
 under his father's tuition had become an accomplished artist ; 
 but as they always worked together, and on the same can- 
 vas, his works are not to be distinguished from his father's. 
 Titian was likewise surrounded by painters who, without 
 being precisely his scholars, had assembled from every part 
 of Europe to profit by his instructions. The early morning 
 and the evening hour found him at his easel ; or lingering 
 in his little garden (where he had feasted with Aretino and 
 Sansovino, and Bembo and Ariosto, and " the most gracious 
 Virginia," and " the most beautiful Violante "), and gazing 
 
TWO OF THE OLD MASTERS. 259 
 
 on the setting sun, with a thought perhaps of his own long 
 and bright career fast hastening to its close ; not that such 
 anticipations clouded his cheerful spirit, buoyant to the 
 last! In 1574, when he was in his ninety-seventh year, 
 Henry III. of France landed at Venice on his way from 
 Poland, and was magnificently entertained by the Republic. 
 On this occasion the King visited Titian at his own house, 
 attended by a numerous suite of princes and nobles. Titian 
 entertained them with splendid hospitality; and when the 
 King asked the price of some pictures which pleased him, 
 he presented them as a gift to his Majesty, and every one 
 praised his easy and noble manners and his generoua 
 bearing. 
 
 Two years more passed away, and the hand did not yet 
 tremble nor was the eye dim. When the plague broke 
 out in Venice, the nature of the distemper was at first mis- 
 taken, and the most common precautions neglected ; the 
 contagion spread, and Titian and his son were among those 
 who perished. Every one had fled, and before life was 
 extinct some ruffians entered his chamber and carried off, 
 before his eyes, his money, jewels, and some of his pictures. 
 His death took place on the 9th of September, 1575. A 
 law had been made during the plague that none should be 
 buried in the churches, but that all the dead bodies should 
 be carried beyond the precincts of the city ; an exception, 
 however, even in that hour of terror and anguish, was made 
 in favor of Titian. His remains were borne with honor to 
 the tomb, and deposited in the Church of Santa Maria do* 
 Frari, for which he had painted his famous Assumption. 
 There he lies beneath a plain black marble slab, on which 
 is simply inscribed, 
 
 "TIZIANO VECELLIO." 
 
 In the year 1794 the citizens of Venice resolved to erect 
 a noble and befitting monument to his memory. Canova 
 
260 MRS. JAMLSON. 
 
 made the design ; but the troubles which intervened, and 
 the extinction of the Republic, prevented the execution of 
 this project. Canova's magnificent model was appropriated 
 to another purpose, and now forms the cenotaph of the 
 Archduchess Christina, in the Church of the Augustines 
 at Vienna. 
 
 This was the life and death of the famous Titian. He 
 was pre-eminently the painter of nature ; but to him nature 
 was clothed in a perpetual garb of beauty, or rather to him 
 nature and beauty were one. In historical compositions 
 and sacred subjects he has been rivalled and surpassed, 
 but as a portrait painter never ; and his portraits of cele- 
 brated persons have at once the truth and the dignity of 
 history. 
 
THE POET'S HEART 
 
 BY FREDERICK TENNYSON. 
 
 WHEN the Poet's heart is dead, 
 That with fragrance, light, and sound, 
 Like a Summer-day was fed, 
 
 Where, O, where shall it be found, 
 In Sea, or Air, or underground ? 
 
 ii. 
 
 It shall be a sunny place ; 
 An urn of odors ; a still well, 
 
 Upon whose undisturbed face 
 
 The lights of Heaven shall love to dwell, 
 And its far depths make visible. 
 
 m. 
 
 It shall be a crimson flower 
 
 That in Fairyland hath thriven ; 
 
 For dew a gentle Sprite shall pour 
 Tears of Angels down from Heaven, 
 And hush the winds at morn and even. 
 
262 FREDERICK TENNYSON. 
 
 IV. 
 
 It shall be on some fair morn 
 
 A swift and many-voiced wind, 
 Singing down the skies of June, 
 And with its breath and gladsome tune 
 Send joy into the heart and mind. 
 
 v. 
 
 It shall be a fountain springing, 
 Far up into the happy light, 
 With a silver carol ringing, 
 With a magic motion flinging 
 Its jocund waters, starry-bright. 
 
 VI. 
 
 It shall be a tiny thing 
 
 Whose breath is in it for a day, 
 
 To fold at Eve its weary wing, 
 And at the dewfall die away 
 On some pure air, or golden ray, 
 
 VII. 
 
 Falling in a violet-bloom ; 
 
 Tombed in a sphere of pearly rain ; 
 
 Its blissful ghost a wild perfume 
 To come forth with the Morn again, 
 And wander through an infant's brain ; 
 
 VIII. 
 
 And the pictures it should set 
 In that temple of Delight 
 
 Would make the tearless cherub fret 
 With its first longing for a sight 
 Of things beyond the Day and Night. 
 
THE POET'S HEART. 263 
 
 IX. 
 
 But one moment of its span 
 
 Should thicker grow with blissful things 
 Than any days of mortal Man, 
 Or his years of Sorrow can, 
 
 Though beggars should be crowned kings, 
 
 x. 
 
 It shall be a tuneful voice 
 Falling on a Lover's ear, 
 
 Enough to make his heart rejoice 
 For evermore, or far, or near, 
 In dreams that swallow hope and fear. 
 
 XI. 
 
 It shall be a chord divine 
 
 By Mercy out of Heaven hung forth, 
 
 Along whose trembling, airy line 
 A dying Saint shall hear on earth 
 Triumphant songs, and harped mirth ! 
 
 XII. 
 
 It shall be a wave forlorn 
 
 That o 'er the vast and fearful Sea 
 
 In troubled pride and beauty borne 
 From winged storms shall vainly flee 
 And seek for rest where none shall be. 
 
 XIII. 
 
 It shall be a mountain Tree, 
 
 Thro' whose great arms the winds shall blow 
 Louder than the roaring Sea, 
 
 And toss its plumed head to and fro ; 
 
 But a thousand flowers shall live below 
 
264 FREDERICK TENNYSON. 
 
 XIV. 
 It shall be a kingly Star 
 
 That o'er a thousand Suns shall burn 
 Where the high Sabaoth are, 
 And round its glory flung afar 
 
 A mighty host shall swiftly turn. 
 
 xv. 
 
 All things of beauty it shall be 
 
 All things of power of joy of fear ; 
 But out of bliss and agony 
 It shall come forth more pure and free, 
 And sing a song more sweet to hear. 
 
 XVI. 
 
 For methinks, when it hath passed 
 
 Thro' wondrous Nature's world- wide reign, 
 
 Perchance it may come home at last, 
 And the old Earth may hear again 
 Its lofty voice of Joy and Pain. 
 
CHARACTER OF FRA ANGELICO. 
 
 BY GIORGIO VASARL 
 
 FRA ANGELICO was a man of the utmost simplicity 
 of intention, and was most holy in every act of his 
 life. It is related of him, and it is a good evidence of his 
 simple earnestness of purpose, that being one morning invited 
 to breakfeast by Pope Nicholas V., he had scruples of con- 
 science as to eating meat without the permission of his prior, 
 not considering that the authority of the pontiff was super- 
 seding that of the prior. He disregarded all earthly advan- 
 tages ; and, living in pure holiness, was as much the friend 
 of the poor in life as I believe his soul now is in heaven. 
 He labored continually at his paintings, but would do noth- 
 ing that was not connected with things holy. He might 
 have been rich, but for riches he took no care ; on the con- 
 trary he was accustomed to say, that the only true riches 
 was contentment with little. He might have commanded 
 many, but would not do so, declaring that there was less 
 fatigue and less danger of error in obeying others, than in 
 commanding others. It was at his option to hold places of 
 dignity in the brotherhood of his order, and also in the 
 world ; but he regarded them not, affirming that he sought 
 no dignity and took no care but that of escaping hell and 
 drawing near to Paradise. And of a truth what dignity 
 can be compared to that which should be most coveted by 
 all Churchmen, nay, by every man living, that, namely, 
 12 
 
266 GIORGIO VASARI. 
 
 which is found in God alone, and in a life of virtuous 
 labor ? 
 
 Fra Angelico was kindly to all, and moderate in all his 
 habits, living temperately, and holding himself entirely apart 
 from the snares of the world. He used frequently to say, 
 tLat he who practised the art of painting had need of quiet, 
 and should live without cares or anxious thoughts ; adding, 
 that he who would do the work of Christ should perpetually 
 remain with Christ. He was never seen to display anger 
 among the brethren of his order ; a thing which appears to 
 me most extraordinary, nay, almost incredible ; if he admon- 
 ished his friends, it was with gentleness and a quiet smile ; 
 and to those who sought his works, he would reply with the 
 utmost cordiality, that they had but to obtain the assent of 
 the prior, when he would assuredly not fail to do what they 
 desired. In fine, this never sufficiently to be lauded father 
 was most humble, modest, and excellent in all his words 
 , and works ; in his painting he gave evidence of piety and 
 devotion, as well as of ability, and the saints that he painted 
 have more of the air and expression of sanctity than have 
 those of any other master. 
 
 It was the custom of Fra Angelico to abstain from re- 
 touching or improving any painting once finished. He 
 altered nothing, but left all as it was done the first time, 
 believing, as he said, that such was the will of God. It is 
 also affirmed that he would never take the pencil in hand 
 until he had first offered a prayer. He is said never to 
 have painted a Crucifix without tears streaming from hi? 
 eyes, and in the countenances and attitudes of his figures i^ 
 is easy to perceive proof of his sincerity, his goodness, and 
 the depth of his devotion to the religion of Christ. 
 
 He died in 1455, at the age of sixty-eight. 
 
SONGS. 
 
 BY WILLIAM BLAKE. 
 
 I GIVE you the end of a golden string 
 
 Only wind it into a ball, 
 It will lead you in at Heaven's gate, 
 
 Built in Jerusalem wall. 
 
 I. 
 
 MY SILKS AND FINE ARRAY: 
 
 MY silks and fine array, 
 My smiles and languished air, 
 By love are driven away. 
 
 And mournful, lean Despair 
 Brings me yew to deck my grave : 
 Such end true lovers have. 
 
 His face is fair as heaven 
 
 When springing buds unfold ; 
 
 O, why to him was 't given, 
 Whose heart is wintry cold? 
 
 His breast is Love's all-worshipped tomb 
 
 Where all love's pilgrims come. 
 
 Bring me an axe and spade, 
 Bring me a winding-sheet ; 
 
268 WILLIAM BLAKE. 
 
 When I my grave have made, 
 
 Let winds and tempests beat : 
 Then down I '11 lie, as cold as clay. 
 True love doth pass away ! 
 
 n. 
 
 THE FIRST SONG OF INNOCENCE, 
 
 PIPING down the valleys wild, 
 Piping songs of pleasant glee, 
 
 On a cloud I saw a child, 
 
 And he, laughing, said to me : 
 
 " Pipe a song about a Lamb ! " 
 So I piped with merry cheer 
 
 " Piper, pipe that song again " ; 
 So I piped : he wept to hear 
 
 " Drop thy pipe, thy happy pipe : 
 Sing thy songs of happy cheer ! " 
 
 So I sang the same again, 
 
 While he wept with joy to hear. 
 
 " Piper, sit thee down and write 
 In a book, that all may read." 
 
 So he vanished from my sight, 
 And I plucked a hollow reed, 
 
 And I made a rural pen, 
 And I stained the water clear, 
 
 And I wrote my happy songs 
 Every child may joy to hear. 
 
SONGS. 269 
 
 m. 
 
 THE LITTLE BLACK BOY. 
 
 MY mother bore me in the southern wild, 
 And I am black, but O, my soul is white. 
 
 White as an angel is the English child, 
 But I am black, as if bereaved of light 
 
 My mother taught me underneath a tree, 
 And, sitting down before the heat of day, 
 
 She took me on her lap and kissed me, 
 And, pointing to the East, began to say : 
 
 " Look on the rising sun : there God does live, 
 And gives this light, and gives His heat away ; 
 
 And flowers and trees and beasts and men receive 
 Comfort in morning, joy in the noonday. 
 
 " And we are put on earth a little space, 
 
 That we may learn to bear the beams of love ; 
 
 And these black bodies and this sunburnt face 
 Are but a cloud, and like a shady grove. 
 
 " For when our souls have learned the heat to bear, 
 The cloud will vanish, we shall hear His voice, 
 
 Saying, * Come out from the grove, my love and care, 
 And round my golden tent like lambs rejoice.' " 
 
 Thus did my mother say, and kissed me, 
 
 And thus I say to little English boy : 
 When I from black, and he from white cloud free, 
 
 And round the tent of God like lambs we joy ; 
 
270 WILLIAM BLAKE. 
 
 I '11 shade him from the heat till he can bear 
 To lean in joy upon our Father's knee ; 
 
 And then I '11 stand and stroke his silver hair, 
 And be like him, and he will then love me. 
 
 IV. 
 THE CHIMNEY-SWEEPER. 
 
 WHEN my mother died I was very young, 
 And my father sold me while yet my tongue 
 Could scarcely cry, " Weep ! weep ! weep ! weep ! " 
 So your chimneys I sweep and in soot I sleep. 
 
 There 's little Tom Dacre, who cried when his head, 
 That curled like a lamb's back, was shaved ; so I said, 
 " Hush, Tom ! never mind it, for when your head 's bare, 
 You know that the soot cannot spoil your white hair." 
 
 And so he was quiet, and that very night, 
 
 As Tom was a-sleeping, he had such a sight ; 
 
 That thousands of sweepers, Dick, Joe, Ned, and Jack, 
 
 Were all of them locked up in coffins of black. 
 
 And by came an angel, who had a bright key, 
 And he opened the coffins, and set them all free ; 
 Then down a green plain, leaping, laughing they run, 
 And wash in a river, and shine in the sun. 
 
 Then naked and white, all their bags left behind, 
 They rise upon clouds, and sport in the wind ; 
 And the angel told Tom, if he 'd be a good boy, 
 He 'a have God for his father, and never want joy. 
 
SONGS. 271 
 
 ^.nd so Tom awoke, and we rose in the dark, 
 And got with our bags and our brushes to work : 
 Though the morning was cold, Tom was happy and warm : 
 So, if all do their duty, they need not fear harm. 
 
 V. 
 THE DIVINE IMAGE. 
 
 To mercy, pity, peace, and love, 
 All pray in their distress, 
 
 And to these virtues of delight 
 Return their thankfulness. 
 
 For mercy, pity, peace, and love, 
 Is God our Father dear ; 
 
 And mercy, pity, peace, and love, 
 Is man, His child and care. 
 
 For Mercy has a human heart ; 
 
 Pity, a human face ; 
 And Love, the human form divine ; 
 
 And Peace, the human dress. 
 
 Then every man, of every clime, 
 That prays in his distress, 
 
 Prays to the human form divine : 
 Love, Mercy, Pity, Peace. 
 
 And all must love the human form, 
 In heathen, Turk, or Jew ; 
 
 Where mercy, love, and pity dwell, 
 There God is dwelling too. 
 
272 WILLIAM BLAKE. 
 
 VI. 
 
 ON ANOTHER'S SORROW, 
 
 CAN I see another's woe, 
 And not be in sorrow too ? 
 Can I see another's grief, 
 And not seek for kind relief? 
 
 Can I see a falling tear, 
 And not feel my sorrow's share ? 
 Can a father see his child 
 Weep, nor be with sorrow filled ? 
 
 Can a mother sit and hear 
 An infant groan, an infant fear ? 
 No ! no ! never can it be ! 
 Never, never can it be ! 
 
 And can He, who smiles on all, 
 Hear the wren, with sorrows small, 
 Hear the small bird's grief and care, 
 Hear the woes that infants bear ? 
 
 And not sit beside the nest, 
 Pouring Pity in their breast ? 
 And not sit the cradle near, 
 Weeping tear on infant's tear ? 
 
 And not sit both night and day, 
 Wiping all our tears away ? 
 O, no ! never can it be ! 
 Never, never can it be ! 
 
SONGS. 273 
 
 He doth give his joy to all : 
 He becomes an infant small, 
 He becomes a man of woe, 
 He doth feel the sorrow too. 
 
 Think not thou canst sigh a sigh, 
 And thy Maker is not by : 
 Think not thou canst weep a tear, 
 And thy Maker is not near. 
 
 O, He gives to us his joy, 
 That our griefs He may destroy: 
 Till our grief is fled and gone, 
 He doth sit by us and moan. 
 
 vn. 
 
 THE TIGER. 
 
 TIGER, Tiger, burning bright 
 In the forests of the night, 
 What immortal hand or eye 
 Framed thy fearful symmetry ? 
 
 In what distant deeps or skies 
 Burned that fire within thine eyes ? 
 On what wings dared he aspire ? 
 What the hand dared seize the fire ? 
 
 And what shoulder, and what art, 
 Could twist the sinews of thy heart ? 
 When thy heart began to beat, 
 What dread hand formed thy dread feet ? 
 12* u 
 
274 WILLIAM BLAKE. 
 
 What the hammer, what the chain, 
 Knit thy strength and forged thy brain ? 
 What the anvil ? What dread grasp 
 Dared thy deadly terrors clasp ? 
 
 When the stars threw down their spears, 
 And watered heaven with their tears, 
 Did he smile his work to see ? 
 Did He who made the lamb make thee ? 
 
 VIII. 
 A LITTLE BOY LOST. 
 
 " NOUGHT loves another as itself, 
 
 Nor venerates another so, 
 Nor is it possible to thought 
 
 A greater than itself to know. 
 
 " And, Father, how can I love you 
 Or any of my brothers more ? 
 
 I love you like the little bird 
 
 That picks up crumbs around the door." 
 
 The Priest sat by and heard the child ; 
 
 In trembling zeal he seized his hair, 
 He led him by his little coat, 
 
 And all admired the priestly care. 
 
 And standing on the altar high, 
 
 " Lo ! what a fiend is here," said he, 
 
 " One who sets reason up for judge 
 Of our most holy Mystery." 
 
SONGS. 2/0 
 
 The weeping child could not be heard, 
 The weeping parents wept in vain. 
 
 They stripped him to his little shirt, 
 And bound him in an iron chain, 
 
 And burned him in a holy place 
 
 Where many had been burned before ; 
 
 The weeping parents wept in vain. 
 
 Are such things done on Albion's shore ? 
 
 IX 
 SMILE AND FROWN. 
 
 THERE is a smile of Love, 
 
 And there is a smile of Deceit, 
 
 And there is a smile of smiles 
 In which the two smiles meet 
 
 And there is a frown of Hate, 
 And there is a frown of Disdain, 
 
 And there is a frown of frowns 
 
 Which you strive to forget in vain ; 
 
 For it sticks in the heart's deep core, 
 And it sticks in the deep backbone. 
 
 And no smile ever was smiled 
 But only one smile alone. 
 
 (And betwixt the cradle and grave 
 It only once smiled can be,) 
 
 That when it once is smiled 
 There 's an end to all misery. 
 
276 WILLIAM BLAKE 
 
 X. 
 
 OPPORTUNITY. 
 
 HE who bends to himself a joy 
 Does the winged life destroy ; 
 But he who kisses the joy as it flies 
 Lives in eternity's sunrise. 
 
UPON GROWING OLD. 
 
 BY J. HAIN FRISWELL. 
 
 JOHN FOSTER, (he who sprung into celebrity from 
 one essay, Popular Ignorance,) had a diseased feeling 
 against growing old, which seems to us to be very prevalent 
 He was sorry to lose every parting hour. " I have seen a 
 fearful sight to-day," he would say, "I have seen a butter- 
 cup." To others the sight would only/give visions of the 
 coming spring and future summer ; to' 1 him it told of the 
 past year, the last Christmas, the days which would never 
 come again, the so many days nearer the grave. Thack- 
 eray continually expressed the same feeling. He reverts 
 to the merry old time when George the Third was king. 
 He looks back with a regretful mind to his own youth. 
 The black Care constantly rides behind his chariot. " Ah, 
 my friends," he says, " how beautiful was youth ! We are 
 growing old. Spring-time and summer are past. We near 
 the winter of our days. We shall never feel as we have 
 felt. We approach the inevitable grave." Few men, in 
 deed, know how to grow old gracefully as Madame de Stael 
 very truly observed. There is an unmanly sadness at leav- 
 ing off the old follies and the old games. We all hate fo- 
 geyism. Dr. Johnson, great and good as he was, had a touch 
 of this regret, and we may pardon him for the feeling. A 
 youth spent in poverty and neglect, a manhood consumed 
 in unceasing struggle, are not preparatives to growing old in 
 
278 J. HAIN FEISWELL. 
 
 peace. "We fancy that, after a stormy morning and a lower- 
 ing day, the evening should have a sunset glow, and, when 
 the night sets in, look back with regret at the " gusty, bab- 
 bling, and remorseless day " ; but if we do so, we miss the, 
 supporting faith of the Christian and the manly cheerful- 
 ness of the heathen. To grow old is quite natural ; being 
 natural, it is beautiful ; and if we grumble at it, we miss 
 the lesson, and lose all the beauty. 
 
 Half of our life is spent in vain regrets. When we are 
 boys we ardently wish to be men ; when men we wish as 
 ardently to be boys. We sing sad songs of the lapse of 
 time. We talk of " auld lang syne," of the days when we 
 were young, of gathering shells on the sea-shore and throw- 
 ing them carelessly away. We never cease to be senti- 
 mental upon past youth arid lost manhood and beauty. Yet 
 there are no regrets so false, and few half so silly. Per- 
 haps the saddest sight in the world is to see an old lady, 
 wrinkled and withered, dressing, talking, and acting like a 
 very young one, and forgetting all the time, as she clings to 
 the feeble remnant of the past, that there is no sham so 
 transparent as her own, and that people, instead of feeling 
 with her, are laughing at her. Old boys disguise their foi- 
 bles a little better ; but they are equally ridiculous. The 
 feeble protests which they make against the flying chariot 
 of Time are equally futile. The great Mower enters the 
 field, and all must come down. To stay him would be im- 
 possible. We might as well try with a finger to stop 
 Ixion's wheel, or to dam up the current of the Thames with 
 a child's foot. 
 
 Since the matter is inevitable, we may as well sit down 
 and reason it out. Is it so dreadful to grow old ? Does old 
 age need its apologies and its defenders ? Is it a benefit or 
 a calamity ? Why should it be odious and ridiculous ? An 
 old tree is picturesque, an old castle venerable, an old cathe- 
 dral inspires awe, why should man bo worse than his 
 works ? 
 
UPON GROWING OLD. 279 
 
 Let us, in the first place, see what youth is. Is it so 
 blessed and happy and flourishing as it seems to us? 
 Schoolboys do not think so. They always wish to be 
 older. You cannot insult one of them more than by tell- 
 iug him that he is a year or two younger than he is. He 
 fires up at once: "Twelve, did you say, sir? Xo, I'm 
 fourteen." But men and women who have reached twenty- 
 eight do not thus add to their years. Amongst schoolboys, 
 notwithstanding the general tenor of those romancists who 
 see that everything young bears a rose-colored blush, mis- 
 ery is prevalent enough. Emerson, Coleridge, Wordsworth, 
 were each and all unhappy boys. They all had their re- 
 buffs, and bitter, bitter troubles ; all the more bitter because 
 their sensitiveness was so acute. Suicide is not unknown 
 amongst the young ; fears prey upon them and terrify them ; 
 ignorances and follies surround them. Arriving at manhood, 
 we are little better off. If we are poor, we mark the differ- 
 ence between the rich and us ; we see position gains all the 
 day. If we are as clever as Hamlet, we grow just as philo- 
 sophically disappointed. If we love, we can only be sure of 
 a brief pleasure, an April day. Love has its bitterness. 
 " It is," says Ovid, an adept in the matter, " full of anxious 
 fear." We fret and fume at the authority of the wise 
 heads; we have an intense idea of our own talent. We 
 believe calves of our own age to be as big and as valuable 
 as full-grown bulls ; we envy whilst 1 we jest at the old. 
 We cry, with the puffed-up hero of the Patricians Daugh- 
 ter 
 
 " It may be by the calendar of years 
 You are the elder man ; but 't is the sun 
 Of knowledge on the mind's dial shining bright, 
 And chronicling deeds and thoughts, that makes true time." 
 
 And yet life is Avithal very unhappy, whether we live 
 amongst the grumbling captains of the clubs, who are ever 
 seeking and not finding promotion ; amongst the strug- 
 
280 J. HAIN FRISWELL. 
 
 gling authors and rising artists who never rise ; or among 
 the young men who are full of riches, titles, places, and 
 honor, who have every wish fulfilled, and are miserable 
 because they have nothing to wish for. Thus the young 
 Romans killed themselves after the death of their emperor, 
 not for grief, not for affection, not even for the fashion of 
 suicide, which grew afterwards prevalent enough, but from 
 the simple weariness of doing everything over and over 
 again. Old age has passed such stages as these, landed on 
 a safer shore, and matriculated in a higher college, in a 
 purer air. We do not sigh for impossibilities; we cry 
 not 
 
 " Bring these anew, and set me once again 
 
 In the delusion of life's infancy ; 
 I was not happy, but I knew not then 
 
 That happy I was never doomed to be." 
 
 We know that we are not happy. We know that life 
 perhaps was not given us to be continuously comfortable 
 and happy. We have been behind the scenes, and know 
 all the illusions ; but when we are old we are far too wise to 
 throw life away for mere ennui. With Dandolo, refusing a 
 crown at ninety-six, winning battles at ninety -four; with 
 Wellington, planning and superintending fortifications at 
 eighty; with Bacon and Humboldt, students to the last 
 gasp ; with wise old Montaigne, shrewd in his gray-beard 
 wisdom and loving life, even in the midst of his fits of gout 
 and colic, Age knows far too much to act like a sulky 
 child. It knows too well the results and the value of 
 things to care about them ; that the ache will subside, the 
 pain be lulled, the estate we coveted be worth little ; the 
 titles, ribbons, gewgaws, honors, be all more or less worth- 
 less. " Who has honor ? Pie that died o' Wednesday ! ' 
 Such a one passed us in the race, and gained it but to fall. 
 We are still up and doing ; we may be frosty and shrewd, 
 but kindly. We can wish all men well ; like them, too, so 
 
UPON GROWING OLD. 281 
 
 far as they may be liked, and smile at the fuss, bother, hurry, 
 and turmoil, which they make about matters which to us are 
 worthless dross. The greatest prize in the whole market 
 in any and in every market success, is to the old man 
 nothing. He little cares who is up and who is down ; the 
 present he lives in and delights in. Thus, in one of those 
 admirable comedies in which Robson acted, we find the son 
 a wanderer, the mother's heart nearly broken, the father 
 torn and broken by a suspicion of his son's dishonesty, but 
 the grandfather all the while concerned only about his gruel 
 and his handkerchief. Even the pains and troubles incident 
 to his state visit the old man lightly. Because Southey sat 
 for months in his library, unable to read or touch the books 
 he loved, we are not to infer that he was unhappy. If the 
 stage darkens as the curtain falls, certain it also is that the 
 senses grow duller and more blunted. " Don't cry for me, 
 my dear," said an old lady undergoing an operation ; " I do 
 not feel it." 
 
 It seems to us, therefore, that a great deal of unnecessary 
 pity has been thrown away upon old age. We begin at 
 school reading Cicero's treatise, hearing him talk with Scipio 
 and Lcelius ; we hear much about poor old men ; we are 
 taught to admire the vigor, quickness, and capacity of youth 
 and manhood. We lose sight of the wisdom which age 
 brings even to the most foolish. We think that a circum- 
 scribed sphere must necessarily be an unhappy one. It is 
 not always so. What one abandons in growing old is per- 
 haps after all not worth having. The chief part of youth is 
 but excitement; often both unwise and unhealthy. The 
 same pen which has written, with a morbid feeling, that 
 " there is a class of beings who do grow old in their youth 
 and die ere middle age," tells us ako that " the best of life is 
 but intoxication." That passes away. The man who has 
 grown old does not care about it. The author at that period 
 has no feverish excitement about seeing himself in print; 
 
282 J. HAIN FRISWELL. 
 
 he does not hunt newspapers for reviews and notices. He 
 is content to wait; he knows what fame is worth. The 
 ohscure man of science, who has been wishing to make the 
 world better and wiser ; the struggling curate, the poor and 
 hard-tried man of God ; the enthusiastic reformer, who has 
 watched the sadly slow dawning of progress and liberty ; 
 the artist, whose dream of beauty slowly fades before his 
 dim eyes all lay down their feverish wishes as they 
 advance in life, forget the bright ideal which they cannot 
 reach, and embrace the more imperfect real. We speak not 
 here of the assured Christian. He, from the noblest pinna- 
 cle of faith, beholds a promised land, and is eager to reach 
 it ; he prays " to be delivered from the body of this death " ; 
 but we write of those humbler, perhaps more human souls, 
 with whom increasing age each day treads down an illu- 
 sion. All feverish wishes, raw and inconclusive de-ires, 
 have died clown, and a calm beauty and peace survive ; 
 passions are dead, temptations weakened or conquered ; 
 experience has been won ; selfish interests are widened 
 into universal ones ; vain, idle hopes, have merged into a 
 firmer faith or a complete knowledge ; and more light 
 has broken in upon the soul's dark cottage, battered and 
 decayed, " through chinks which Time has made." 
 
 Again, old men are valuable, not only as relics of the 
 past, but as guides and prophets for the future. They know 
 the pattern of every turn of life's kaleidoscope. The colors 
 merely fall into new shapes ; the groundwork is just the 
 same. The good which a calm, kind, and cheerful old man 
 can do is incalculable. And whilst he does good to others, 
 he enjoys himself. He looks not unnaturally to that which 
 should accompany old age honor, love, obedience, troops 
 of friends ; and he plays his part in the comedy or tragedy 
 of life with as much gusto as any one else. Old Montague 
 or Capulet, and old Polonius, that wise maxim-man, enjoy 
 themselves quite as well as the moody Hamlet, the perturbed 
 
UPON GROWING OLD. 283 
 
 Laertes, or even gallant Mercutio or love-sick Romeo. 
 Friar Lawrence, who is a good old man, is perhaps the 
 happiest of all in the dramatis persona, unless we take 
 the gossiping, garrulous old nurse, with her sunny recollec- 
 tions of maturity and youth. The great thing is to have 
 the mind well employed, to work whilst it is yet day. The 
 precise Duke of Wellington, answering every letter with 
 " F. M. presents his compliments "; the wondrous worker 
 Humboldt, with his orders of knighthood, stars, and ribbons, 
 lying dusty in his drawer, still contemplating Cosmos, and 
 answering his thirty letters a day, were both men in ex- 
 ceedingly enviable, happy positions ; they had reached the 
 top of the hill, and could look back quietly over the rough 
 road which they had travelled. We are not all Humboldts 
 or Wellingtons ; but we can all be busy and good. Experi- 
 ence must teach us all a great deal ; and if it only teaches 
 us not to fear the future, not to cast a maundering regret 
 over the past, we can be as happy in old age ay, and far 
 more so than we were in youth. We are no longer the 
 fools of time and error. We are leaving by slow degrees 
 the old world; we stand upon the threshold of the new; 
 not without hope, but without fear, in an exceedingly natu- 
 ral position, with nothing strange or dreadful about it ; with 
 our domain drawn within a narrow circle, but equal to our 
 power. Muscular strength, organic instincts, are all gone ; 
 but what then ? We do not want them ; we are getting 
 ready for the great change, one which is just as necessary 
 as it was to be born ; and to a little child perhaps one is not 
 a whit more painful, perhaps not so painful as the other. 
 The wheels of Time have brought us to the goal ; we are 
 about to rest while others labor, to stay at home while 
 others wander. We touch at last the mysterious door, 
 are we to be pitied or to be envied ? 
 
THE TITMOUSE. 
 
 BY K. W. EMERSON. 
 
 YOU shall not be over-bold 
 When you deal with arctic cold, 
 As late I found ray lukewarm blood 
 Chilled wading in the snow-choked wood. 
 How should I fight ? ray foeman fine 
 Has million arms to one of mine. 
 East, west, for aid I looked in vain ; 
 East, west, north, south, are his domain. 
 Miles off, three dangerous miles, is home ; 
 Must borrow his winds who there would comet 
 Up and away for life ! be fleet ! 
 The frost-king ties my fumbling feet, 
 Sings in my ears, my hands are stones, 
 Curdles the blood to the marble bones, 
 Tugs at the heartstrings, numbs the sense, 
 Hems in the life with narrowing fence. 
 
 Well, in this broad bed lie and sleep, 
 
 The punctual stars will vigil keep, 
 
 pnbalmed by purifying cold, 
 
 The winds shall sing their dead-march old, 
 
 The snow is no ignoble shroud, 
 
 Che moon thy mourner, and the cloud. 
 
 Softly, but this way fate was pointing, 
 'T was coming fast to such anointing, 
 
THE TITMOUSE. 285 
 
 When piped a tiny voice hard by, 
 Gay and polite, a cheerful cry, 
 " Chic-chic-a-dee-dee!" saucy note, 
 Out of sound heart and merry throat, 
 As if it said, " Good day, good sir I 
 Fine afternoon, old passenger ! 
 Happy to meet you in these places, 
 Where January brings few men's faces." 
 
 This poet, though he live apart, 
 
 Moved by a hospitable heart, 
 
 Sped, when I passed his sylvan fort, 
 
 To do the honors of his court, 
 
 As fits a feathered lord of land, 
 
 Flew near, with soft wing grazed my hand, 
 
 Hopped on the bough, then, darting low, 
 
 Prints his small impress on the snow, 
 
 Shows feats of his gymnastic play, 
 
 Head downward, clinging to the spray. 
 
 Here was this atom in full breath 
 
 Hurling defiance at vast death, 
 
 This scrap of valor just for play 
 
 Fronts the north-wind in waistcoat gray, 
 
 As if to shame my weak behavior. 
 
 I greeted loud my little saviour : 
 
 " Thou pet ! what dost here ? and what for? 
 
 In these woods, thy small Labrador 
 
 At this pinch, wee San Salvador ! 
 
 What fire burns in that little chest, 
 
 So frolic, stout, and self-possest ? 
 
 Didst steal the glow that lights the West ? 
 
 Henceforth I wear no stripe but thine : 
 
 Ashes and black all hues outshine. 
 
 Why are not diamonds black and gray, 
 
 To ape thy dare-devil array ? 
 
R. W. EMERSON. 
 
 And I affirm the spacious North 
 Exists to draw thy virtue forth. 
 I think no virtue goes with size : 
 The reason of all cowardice 
 Is, that men are overgrown, 
 And, to be valiant, must come down 
 To the titmouse dimension." 
 
 'T is good-will makes intelligence, 
 
 And I began to catch the sense 
 
 Of my bird's song : " Live out of doors, 
 
 In the great woods, and prairie floors. 
 
 I dine in the sun ; when he sinks in the sea, 
 
 I, too, have a hole in a hollow tree. 
 
 And I like less when summer beats 
 
 With stifling beams on these retreats 
 
 Than noontide twilight which snow makes 
 
 With tempest of the blinding flakes : 
 
 For well the soul, if stout within, 
 
 Can arm irnpregnably the skin ; 
 
 And polar frost my frame defied, 
 
 Made of the air that blows outside." 
 
 With glad remembrance of my debt, 
 I homeward turn. Farewell, my pet ! 
 When here again thy pilgrim comes, 
 He shall bring store of seeds and crumbs. 
 Henceforth I prize thy wiry chant 
 O'er all that mass and minster vaunt : 
 For men mishear thy call in spring, 
 As 't would accost some frivolous wing, 
 Crying out of the hazel copse, " Phe be ! " 
 And in winter " Chic-a-dee-dee ! " 
 I think old Crcsar must have heard 
 In Northern Gaul my dauntless bird, 
 
THE TITMOUSE. 287 
 
 And, echoed in some frosty wold, 
 Borrowed thy battle-numbers bold. 
 And I shall write our annals new, 
 And thank thee for a better clew : 
 I, who dreamed not, when I came here. 
 To find the antidote of fear, 
 Now hear thee say in Roman key, 
 "Paan! Ve-ni, Vi-di, Vi-ci." 
 
LITTLE PANSIE. 
 
 A FRAGMENT. 
 BY NATHANIEL HAWTHOKNE. 
 
 DOCTOR DOLLIVER, a worthy personage of ex- 
 treme antiquity, was aroused rather prematurely, one 
 summer morning, by the shouts of the child Pansie, in an 
 adjoining chamber, summoning Old Martha (who performed 
 the duties of nurse, housekeeper, and kitchen-maid, in the 
 Doctor's establishment) to take up her little ladyship and 
 dress her. The old gentleman woke with more than his cus- 
 tomary alacrity, and, after taking a moment to gather his 
 wits about him, pulled aside the faded moreen curtains of 
 his ancient bed, and thurst his head into a beam of sunshine 
 that caused him to wink and withdraw it again. This tran- 
 sitory glimpse of good Dr. Dolliver showed a flannel night- 
 cap, fringed round with stray locks of silvery white hair, 
 and surmounting a meagre and duskily yellow visage, which 
 was crossed and criss-crossed with a record of his long life 
 in wrinkles, faithfully written, no doubt, but with such 
 cramped chirography of Father Time that the purport was 
 illegible. It seemed hardly worth while for the patriarch 
 to get out of bed any more, and bring his forlorn shadow 
 into the summer day that was made for younger folks. The 
 Doctor, however, was by no means of that opinion, being con- 
 siderably encouraged towards the toil of living twenty-four 
 hours longer by the comparative ease with which he found 
 
LITTLE PAXSIE. 289 
 
 himself going through the usually painful process of bestirring 
 bis rusty joints, (stiffened by the very rest and sleep that 
 should have made them pliable,) and putting them in a 
 condition to bear his weight upon the floor. Nor was he 
 absolutely disheartened by the idea of those tonsorial, ablu- 
 tionary. and personally decorative labors which are apt to 
 become so intolerably irksome to an old gentleman, after 
 performing them daily and daily for fifty, sixty, or seventy 
 years, and finding them still as immitigably recurrent as at 
 first. Dr. Dolliver could nowise account for this happy 
 condition of his spirits and physical energies, until he 
 remembered taking an experimental sip of a certain cordial 
 which was long ago prepared by his grandson and carefully 
 sealed up in a bottle, and had been reposited in a dark closet 
 among a parcel of effete medicines ever since that gifted 
 young man's death. 
 
 " It may have wrought effect upon me," thought the Doc- 
 tor, shaking his head as he lifted it again from the pillow. 
 " It may be so ; for poor Cornelius oftentimes instilled a 
 strange efficacy into his perilous drugs. But I will rather 
 believe it to be the operation of God's mercy, which may 
 have temporarily invigorated my feeble age for little Pan- 
 sie's sake." 
 
 A twinge of his familiar rheumatism, as he put his foot 
 out of. bed, taught him that he must not reckon too confi- 
 dently upon even a day's respite from the intrusive family 
 of aches and infirmities which, with their proverbial fidelity 
 to attachments once formed, had long been the closest ac- 
 quaintances that the poor old gentleman had in the world. 
 Nevertheless, he fancied the twinge a little less poignant 
 than those of yesterday ; and, moreover, after stinging him 
 pretty smartly, it passed gradually off with a thrill, which, 
 in its latter stages, grew to be almost agreeable. Pain is 
 but pleasure too strongly emphasized. With cautious move- 
 ments, aiid only a groan or two, the good Doctor transferred 
 
 13 8 
 
290 NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. 
 
 himself from the bed to the floor, where he stood awhile 
 gazing from one piece of quaint furniture to another, (such 
 as stiff-backed Mayflower chairs, an oaken chest-of-drawers 
 carved cunningly with shapes of animals and wreaths of 
 foliage, a table with multitudinous legs, a family -record in 
 faded embroidery, a shelf of black-bound books, a dirty 
 heap of gallipots and phials in a dim corner,) gazing at 
 these things and steadying himself by the bedpost, while 
 his inert brain, still partially benumbed with sleep, came 
 slowly into accordance with the realities about him. The 
 object which most helped to bring Dr. Dolliver completely 
 to his waking perceptions was one that common observers 
 might suppose to have been snatched bodily out of his 
 dreams. The same sunbeam that had dazzled the Doctor 
 between the bed-curtains gleamed on the weather-beaten 
 gilding which had once adorned this mysterious symbol, and 
 showed it to be an enormous serpent, twining round a wood- 
 en post, and reaching quite from the floor of the chamber to 
 its ceiling. 
 
 It was evidently a thing that could boast of considerable 
 antiquity, the dry-rot having eaten out its eyes and gnawed 
 away the tip of its tail ; and it must have stood long ex- 
 posed to the atmosphere, for a kind of gray moss had par- 
 tially overspread its tarnished gilt surface, and a swallow, or 
 other familiar little bird, in some by-gone summer, seemed 
 to have built its. nest in the yawning and exaggerated 
 mouth. It looked like a kind of Manichean idol, which 
 might have been elevated on a pedestal for a century or so, 
 enjoying the worship of its votaries in the open air. until 
 the impious sect perished from among men, all save old 
 Dr. Dolliver, who had set up the monster in his bedchamber 
 for the convenience of private devotion. But we are un- 
 pardonable in suggesting such a fantasy to the prejudice of 
 our venerable friend, knowing him to have been as pious 
 and upright a Christian, and with as little of the serpent in 
 
LITTLE PAXSIE. 291 
 
 his character, as ever came of Puritan lineage. Not to 
 make a further mystery about a very simple matter, this 
 bedimmcd and rotten reptile was once the medical emhlem 
 or apothecary's sign of the famous Dr. Swinnerton, who 
 practised physic in the earlier days of New England, when a 
 head of ^sculapius or Hippocrates would have vexed the 
 souls of the righteous as .savoring of heathendom. The 
 ancient dispenser of drugs had therefore set up an image of 
 the Brazen Serpent, and followed his business for many 
 years, with great credit under this Scriptural device; and 
 Dr. Dolliver, being the apprentice, pupil, and humble friend 
 of the learned Swinnerton's old age, had inherited the sym- 
 bolic snake, and much other valuable property, by his be- 
 quest. 
 
 While the patriarch was putting on his small-clothes, he 
 took care to stand in the parallelogram of bright sunshine 
 that fell upon the uncarpeted floor. The summer warmth 
 was very genial to his system, and yet made him shiver ; 
 his wintry veins rejoiced at it, though the reviving blood 
 tingled through them with a half painful and only half 
 pleasurable titillation. For the first few moments after 
 creeping out of bed, he kept his back to the sunny window 
 and seemed mysteriously shy of glancing thitherward ; but 
 as the June fervor pervaded him more and more thoroughly, 
 he turned bravely about, and looked forth at a burial-ground 
 on the corner of which he dwelt. There lay many an old 
 acquaintance, who had gone to sleep with the flavor of Dr. 
 Dolliver's tinctures and powders upon his tongue ; it was 
 the patient's final bitter taste of this world, and perhaps 
 doomed to be a recollected nauseousness in the next. Ye.>- 
 terday, in the chill of his forlorn old age, the Doctor expect- 
 ed r-oon to stretch out his weary bones among that quiet 
 community, and might scarcely have shrunk from the pros- 
 pect on his own account, except, indeed, that he dreamily 
 mixed up the infirmities of his present condition with the 
 
292 NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. 
 
 repose of the approaching one, being haunted by a notion 
 that the damp earth, under the grass and dandelions, must 
 needs be pernicious for his cough and his rheumatism. But, 
 this morning, the cheerful sunbeams, or the mere taste of 
 his grandson's cordial that he had taken at bedtime, or the 
 fitful vigor that often sports irreverently with aged people, 
 had caused an unfrozen drop of youthfulness, somewhere 
 within him, to expand. 
 
 " Hem ! ahem ! " quoth the Doctor, hoping with one effort 
 to clear his throat of the dregs of a ten years' cough. 
 "Matters are not so far gone with rne as I thought. I 
 have known mighty sensible men, when only a little age- 
 stricken or otherwise out of sorts, to die of mere faintheart- 
 edness, a great deal sooner than they need." 
 
 He shook his silvery head at his own image in the look- 
 ing-glass, as if to impress the apophthegm on that shadowy 
 representative of himself; and for his part, he determined 
 to pluck up a spirit and live as long as he possibly could, if 
 it were only for the sake of little Pansie, who stood as close 
 to one extremity o f human life as her great-grandfather tc 
 the other. This child of three years old occupied all the 
 unfossilized portion of good Dr. Dolliver's heart. Every 
 other interest that he formerly had, and the entire confra- 
 ternity of persons whom he once loved, had long ago 
 departed, and the poor Doctor could not follow them, be- 
 cause the grasp of Pansie's baby-fingers held him back. 
 
 So he crammed a great silver watch into his fob, and 
 drew on a patchwork morning-gown of an ancient fashion. 
 Its original material was said to have been the embroidered 
 front of his own wedding-waistcoat and the silken skirt of 
 his wife's bridal attire, which his eldest granddaughter had 
 taken from the carved chest-of-drawers, after poor Bessie, 
 the beloved of his youth, had been half a century in the 
 grave. Throughout many of the intervening years, as the 
 garment got ragged, the spinsters of the old man's family 
 
LITTLE PANSIE. 293 
 
 had quilted their duty and affection into it in the shape of 
 patches upon patches, rose-color, crimson, blue, violet; and 
 green, and then (as their hopes faded, and their life kept 
 growing shadier, and their attire took a sombre hue) sober 
 pray and great fragments of funereal black, until the Doctor 
 could revive the memory of most things that had befallen 
 him by looking at his patchwork-gown, as it hung upon a 
 .chair. And now it was ragged again, and all the fingers 
 that should have mended it were cold. It had an Eastern 
 fragrance, too, a smell of drugs, strong-scented herbs, and 
 spicy gums, gathered from the many potent infusions that 
 had from time to time been spilt over it ; so that, snuffing 
 him afar off, you might have taken Dr. Dolliver for a mum- 
 my, and could hardly have been undeceived by his shrunken 
 and torpid aspect, as he crept nearer. 
 
 Wrapt in his odorous and many-colored robe, he took 
 staff in hand and moved pretty vigorously to the head of 
 the staircase. As it was somewhat steep, and but dimly 
 lighted, he began cautiously to descend, putting his left hand 
 on the banister, and poking down his long stick to assist him 
 in making sure of the successive steps ; and thus he became 
 a living illustration of the accuracy of Scripture, where it 
 describes the aged as being " afraid of that which is high," 
 a truth that is often found to have a sadder purport than 
 its external one. Half-way to the bottom, however, the 
 Doctor heard the impatient and authoritative tones of little 
 Pansie, Queen Pansie, as she might fairly have been 
 styled, in reference to her position in the' household, call- 
 ing amain for grandpapa and breakfast. He was startled 
 into such perilous activity by the summons, that his heels 
 slid on the stairs, the slippers were shuffled off his feet, and 
 he saved himself from a tumble only by quickening his 
 pace, and coming down at almost u run. 
 
 " Mercy on my poor old bones ! " mentally exclaimed the 
 Doctor, fancying himself fractured in fifty places. " Some 
 
294 NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. 
 
 of them are broken, surely, and metliinks my heart has 
 leaped out of my mouth ! What ! all right ? Well, well ! 
 but Providence is kinder to me than I deserve, prancing 
 down this steep staircase like a kid of three months old ! " 
 
 He bent stiffly to gather up his slippers and fallen staff; 
 and meanwhile Pansie had heard the tumult of her great- 
 grandfather's descent, and was pounding against the door 
 of the breakfast-room in her haste to come at him. The 
 Doctor opened it, and there she stood, a rather pale and 
 large-eyed little thing, quaint in her aspect, as might well 
 be the case with a motherless child, dwelling in an uncheer- 
 ful house, with no other playmates than a decrepit old man 
 and a kitten, and no better atmosphere within-doors than 
 the odor of decayed apothecary's stuff, nor gayer neighbor- 
 hood than that of the adjacent burial-ground, where all her 
 relatives, from her great-grandmother downward, lay calling 
 to her, " Pansie, Pansie, it is bedtime ! " even in the prime of 
 the summer morning. For those dead women-folk, especi- 
 ally her mother and the whole row of maiden aunts and 
 grand-aunts, could not but be anxious about the child, know- 
 ing that little Pansie would be far safer under a tuft of 
 dandelions than if left alone, as she soon must be, in this 
 difficult and deceitful world. 
 
 Yet, in spite of the lack of damask roses in her cheeks, 
 she seemed a healthy child, and certainly showed great ca- 
 pacity of energetic movement in the impulsive capers with 
 which she welcomed her venerable progenitor. She shouted 
 out her satisfaction, moreover, (as her custom was, having 
 never had any over-sensitive auditors about her to tame 
 down her voice,) till even the Doctor's dull ears were full 
 of the clamor. 
 
 " Pansie, darling," said Dr. Dolliver cheerily, patting her 
 brown hair with his tremulous fingers, " thou hast put some 
 of thine own friskiness into poor old grandfather, this fine 
 morning ! Dost know, child, that he came near breaking his 
 
LITTLE PANSIE. 295 
 
 necK down-stairs at the sound of thy voice? What wouldst 
 thou have done then, little Pansie ? " 
 
 " Kiss poor grandpapa and make him well ! " answered 
 the child, remembering the Doctor's own mode o, cure in 
 similar mishaps to herself. "It shall do poor grandpapa 
 good ! " she added, putting up her mouth to apply the 
 remedy. 
 
 " Ah, little one, thou hast greater faith in thy medicines 
 than ever I had in my drugs," replied the patriarch with a 
 giggle, surprised and delighted at his own readiness of 
 response. " But the kiss is good for my feeble old heart, 
 Pansie, though it might do little to mend a broken neck ; so 
 give grandpapa another dose, and let us to breakfast." 
 
 In this merry humor they sat down to the table, great- 
 grandpapa and Pausie side by side, and the kitten, as soon 
 appeared, making a third in the party. First, she showed 
 her mottled head out of Pansie's lap, delicately sipping milk 
 from the child's basin without rebuke ; then she took post 
 on the old gentleman's shoulder, purring like a spinning- 
 wheel, trying her claws in the wadding of his dressing- 
 gown, and still more impressively reminding him of her 
 presence by putting out a paw to intercept a warmed-over 
 morsel of yesterday's chicken on its way to the Doctor's 
 mouth. After skilfully achieving this feat, she scrambled 
 down upon the breakfast-table and began to wasli her face 
 and hands. Evidently, these companions were all three on 
 intimate terms, as was natural enough, since a great manv 
 childish impulses were softly creeping back on the simple- 
 minded old man ; insomuch that, if no worldly necessities 
 nor painful infirmity had disturbed him, his remnant of life 
 might have been as cheaply and cheerily enjoyed as the 
 early playtime of the kitten and the child. Old Dr. Dol- 
 liver and his great-granddaughter (a ponderous title, which 
 seemed quite to overwhelm the tiny figure of Pansie) had 
 met one another at the two extremities of the life-circle 
 
296 NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE 
 
 her sunrise served him for a sunset, illuminating his locks 
 of silver and hers of golden brown with a homogeneous 
 shimmer of twinkling light. 
 
 Little Pansie was the one earthly creature that inherited 
 a drop of the Dolliver blood. The Doctor's only child, poor 
 Bessie's offspring, had died the better part of a hundred 
 years before, and his grandchildren, a numerous and dimly 
 remembered brood, had vanished along his weary track in 
 their youth, maturity, or incipient age, till, hardly knowing 
 how it had all happened, he found himself tottering onward 
 with an infant's small fingers in his nerveless grasp. So 
 mistily did his dead progeny come and go in the patriarch's 
 decayed recollection, that this solitary child represented for 
 him the successive babyhoods of the many that had gone 
 before. The emotions of his early paternity came back to 
 him. She seemed the baby of a past age oftener than she 
 seemed Pansie. A whole family of grand-aunts, (one of 
 whom had perished in her cradle, never so mature as Pansie 
 now, another in her virgin bloom, another in autumnal maid- 
 enhood, yellow and shrivelled, with vinegar in her blood, 
 and still another, a forlorn widow, whose grief outlasted 
 even its vitality, and grew to be merely a torpid habit, and 
 was saddest then,) all their hitherto forgotten features 
 peeped through the face of the great-grandchild, and their 
 long inaudible voices sobbed, shouted, or laughed, in her 
 familiar tones. But it often happened to Dr. Dolliver, while 
 frolicking amid this throng of ghosts, where the one reality 
 looked no more vivid than its shadowy sisters, it often 
 happened that his eyes filled with tears at a sudden per- 
 ception of what a sad and poverty-stricken old man he was, 
 already remote from his own generation, and bound to 
 stray farther onward as the sole playmate and protector of a 
 child ! 
 
 As Dr. Dolliver, in spite of his advanced epoch of life, is 
 likely to remain a considerable time longer upon our hands. 
 
LITTLE PANSIE. 2 ( ,7 
 
 we deem it expedient to give a brief sketch of his position, 
 in order that the story may get onward with the greater 
 freedom when he rises from the breakfast-table. Deeming 
 it a matter of courtesy, we have allowed him the honorary 
 title of Doctor, as did all his townspeople and contempora- 
 ries, except, perhaps, one or two formal old physicians, 
 stingy of civil phrases and over-jealous of their own pro- 
 fessional dignity. Nevertheless, these crusty graduates were 
 technically right in excluding Dr. Dolliver from their fra- 
 ternity. He had never received the degree of any medical 
 school, nor (save it might be for the cure of a toothache, or 
 a child's rash, or a whitlow on a seamstress's finger, or some 
 such trifling malady) had he ever been even a practitioner 
 of the awful science with which his popular designation con- 
 nected him. Our old friend, in short, even at his highest 
 social elevation, claimed to be nothing more than an apothe- 
 cary, and, in these later and far less prosperous days, scarcely 
 so much. Since the death of his last surviving grandson, 
 (Pansie's father, whom he had instructed in all the mys- 
 teries of his science, and who, being distinguished by an ex- 
 perimental and inventive tendency, was generally believed to 
 have poisoned himself with an infallible panacea of his own 
 distillation,) since that final bereavement, Dr. Dolliver's 
 once pretty flourishing business had lamentably declined. 
 After a few months of unavailing struggle, he found it ex- 
 pedient to take down the Brazen Serpent from the position 
 to which Dr. Swinnerton had originally elevated it, in front 
 of his shop in the main street, and to retire to his private 
 dwelling, situated in a by-lane and on the edge of a burial- 
 ground. 
 
 This house, as well as the Brazen Serpent, some old med- 
 ical books, and a drawer full of manuscripts, had come to 
 him by the legacy of Dr. Swinnerton. The dreariness of the 
 locality had been of small importance to our friend in his 
 young manhood, when he first led his fair wife over the 
 13* 
 
298 NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. 
 
 threshold, and so long as neither of them had any kinship 
 with the human dust that rose into little hillocks, and still 
 kept accumulating beneath their window. But, too soon 
 afterwards, when poor Bessie herself had gone early to rest 
 there, it is probable that an influence from her grave may 
 have prematurely calmed and depressed her widowed hus- 
 band, taking away much of the energy from what should 
 have been the most active portion of his life. Thus he 
 never grew rich. His thrifty townsmen used to tell him, 
 that, in any other man's hands, Dr. Swinnerton's Brazen 
 Serpent (meaning, I presume, the inherited credit and goyd- 
 will of that old worthy's trade) would need but ten years* 
 time to transmute its brass into gold. In Dr. Dolliver's 
 keeping, as we have seen, the inauspicious symbol lost the 
 greater part of what superficial gilding it originally had. 
 Matters had not mended with him in more advanced life, 
 after he had deposited a further and further portion of his 
 heart and its affections in each successive one of a long row 
 of kindred graves ; and as he stood over the last of them, 
 holding Pansie by the hand and looking down upon the 
 coffin of his grandson, it is no wonder that the old man 
 wept, partly for those gone before, but not so bitterly as for 
 the little one that stayed behind. Why had not God taken 
 her with the rest? And then, so hopeless as he was, so 
 destitute of possibilities of good, his weary frame, his de- 
 crepit bones, his dried-up heart, might have crumbled into 
 dust at once, and have been scattered by the next wind over 
 all the heaps of earth that were akin to him. 
 
 This intensity of desolation, however, was of too positive 
 a character to be long sustained by a person of Dr. Dolli- 
 ver's original gentleness and simplicity, and now so com- 
 pletely tamed by age and misfortune. Even before he 
 turned away from the grave, he grew conscious of a slightly 
 cheering and invigorating effect from the tight grasp of the 
 child's warm little hand. Feeble as he was, she seemed to 
 
LITTLE PANS\E. 299 
 
 adopt him willingly for her protector. And the Doctor 
 never afterwards shrank from his duty nor quailed beneath 
 it, but bore himself like a man, striving, amid the sloth of 
 age and the breakiug-up of intellect, to earn the competency 
 which he had failed to accumulate even in his most vigorous 
 days. 
 
 To the extent of securing a present subsistence for Pansie 
 aud himself, he was successful. After his son's death, when 
 the Brazen Serpent fell into popular disrepute, a small share 
 of tenacious patronage followed the old man into his retire- 
 ment. In his prime, he had been allowed to possess more 
 skill than usually fell to the share of a Colonial apothecary, 
 having been regularly apprenticed to Dr. Swinnerton, who, 
 throughout his long practice, was accustomed personally to 
 concoct the medicines which he prescribed and dispensed. 
 It was believed, indeed, that the ancient physician had 
 learned the art at the world-famous drug-manufactory of 
 Apothecary's Hall, in London, and, as some people half- 
 malignly whispered, had perfected himself under masters 
 more subtle than were to be found even there. Unques- 
 tionably, in many critical cases he was known to have em- 
 ployed remedies of mysterious composition and dangerous 
 potency, which in less skilful hands would have been more 
 likely to kill than cure. He would willingly, it is said, have 
 taught his apprentice the secrets of these prescriptions, but 
 the la f ter, being of a timid character and delicate conscience, 
 had shrunk from acquaintance with them. It was probably 
 as the result of the same scrupulosity that Dr. Dolliver had 
 always declined to enter the medical profession, in which 
 his old instructor had set him such heroic examples of 
 adventurous dealing with matters of life and death. Never- 
 theless, the aromatic fragrance, so to speak, of the learned 
 Swinnerton's reputation had clung to our friend through 
 life ; and there were elaborate preparations in the pharma- 
 copoeia of that day, requiring such minute skill and consci- 
 
300 NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. 
 
 entious fidelity in the concocter that the physicians were still 
 glad to confide them to one in whom these qualities were so 
 evident. 
 
 Moreover, the grandmothers of the community were kind 
 to him, and mindful of his perfumes, his rose-water, his 
 cosmetics, tooth-powders, pomanders, and pomades, the scent- 
 ed memory of which lingered about their toilet-tables, or 
 came faintly back from the days when they were beautiful. 
 Among this class of customers there was still a demand for 
 certain comfortable little nostrums, (delicately sweet and 
 pungent to the taste, cheering to the spirits, and fragrant in 
 the breath.) the proper distillation of which was the airiest 
 secret that the mystic Swinnerton had left behind him. 
 And, besides, these old ladies had always liked the manners 
 of Dr. Dolliver, and used to speak of his gentle courtesy be- 
 hind the counter as having positively been something to ad- 
 mire ; though, of later years, an unrefined, an almost rustic 
 simplicity, such as belonged to his humble ancestors, appear- 
 ed to have taken possession of him, as it often does of prettily 
 mannered men in their late decay. 
 
 But it resulted from all these favorable circumstances that 
 the Doctor's marble mortar, though worn with long service 
 and considerably damaged by a crack that pervaded it, con- 
 tinued to keep up an occasional intimacy with the pestle ; 
 and he still weighed drachms and. scruples in his delicate 
 scales, though it seemed impossible, dealing with such mi- 
 nute quantities, that his tremulous fingers should not put in 
 too little or too much, leaving out life with the deficiency or 
 spilling in death with the surplus. To say the truth, his 
 stanchest friends were beginning to think that Dr. Dolliver's 
 fits of absence (when his mind appeared absolutely to depart 
 from him, while his frail old body worked on mechanically) 
 rendered him not quite trustworthy without a close super- 
 vision of his proceedings. It was impossible, however, to 
 convince the aged apothecary of the necessity for such vigi- 
 
LITTLE PANSIE. 301 
 
 lance ; and if anything could stir up his gentle temper to 
 wrath, or, as oftener happened, to tears, it was the attempt 
 (which he was marvellously quick to detect) thus to inter- 
 fere with his long-familiar business. 
 
 The public, meanwhile, ceasing to regard Dr. Dolliver in 
 his professional aspect, had begun to take an interest in him 
 as perhaps their oldest fellow-citizen. It was he that re- 
 membered the Great Fire and the Great Snow, and that had 
 been a grown-up stripling at the terrible epoch of Witch- 
 Times, and a child just breeched at the breaking-out of King 
 Philip's Indian War. He, too, in his school-boy days, had 
 received a benediction from the patriarchal Governor Brad- 
 street, and thus could boast (somewhat as Bishops do of 
 their unbroken succession from the Apostles) of a transmit- 
 ted blessing from the whole company of sainted Pilgrims, 
 among whom the venerable magistrate had been an honored 
 companion. Viewing their townsman in this aspect, the 
 people revoked the courteous Doctorate with which they 
 had heretofore decorated him, and now knew him most 
 familiarly as Grandsir Dolliver. His white head, his Puri- 
 tan band, his threadbare garb, (the fashion of which he had 
 ceased to change, half a century ago,) his gold-headed staff, 
 that had been Dr. Swinnerton's, his shrunken, frosty figure, 
 and its feeble movement, all these characteristics had a 
 wholeness and permanence in the public recognition, like 
 the meeting-house steeple or the town-pump. All the 
 younger portion of the inhabitants unconsciously ascribed 
 a sort of aged immortality to Grandsir Dolliver's infirm and 
 reverend presence. They fancied that he had been born 
 old, (at least, I remember entertaining some such notions 
 about age-stricken people, when I myself was young.) and 
 that he could the better tolerate his aches and incommodities, 
 his dull ears and dim eyes, his remoteness from human inter- 
 course within the crust of indurated years, the cold tempera- 
 ture that kept him always shivering and sad, the heavj 
 
302 NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. 
 
 burden that invisibly bent down his shoulders, that all 
 these intolerable things might bring a kind of enjoyment to 
 Grandsir Dolliver, as the life-long conditions of his peculiar 
 existence. 
 
 But, alas ! it was a terrible mistake. This weight of 
 years had a perennial novelty for the poor sufferer. He 
 never grew accustomed to it, but, long as he had now borne 
 the fretful torpor of his waning life, and patient as he 
 seemed, he still retained an inward consciousness that these 
 stiffened shoulders, these quailing knees, this cloudiness of 
 sight and brain, this confused forgetfulness of men and 
 affairs, were troublesome accidents that did not really belong 
 to him. He possibly cherished a half-recognized idea that 
 they might pass away. Youth, however eclipsed for a 
 season, is undoubtedly the proper, permanent, and genuine 
 condition of man ; and if we look closely into this dreary 
 delusion of growing old, we shall find that it never abso- 
 lutely succeeds in laying hold of our innermost convictions. 
 A sombre garment, woven of life's unrealities, has muffled 
 us from our true self, but within it smiles the young man 
 whom we knew ; the ashes of many perishable things have 
 fallen upon our youthful fire, but beneath them lurk the 
 seeds of inextinguishable flame. So powerful is this in- 
 stinctive faith that men of simple modes of character are 
 prone to antedate its consummation. And thus it happened 
 with poor Grandsir Dolliver, who often awoke from an old 
 man's fitful sleep with a sense that his senile predicament 
 was but a dream of the past night ; and hobbling hastily 
 across the cold floor to the looking-glass, he would be griev- 
 ously disappointed at beholding the white hair, the wrinkles 
 and furrows, the ashen visage and bent form, the melancholy 
 mask of Age, in which, as he now remembered, some strange 
 and sad enchantment had involved him for years gone by ! 
 
 To other eyes than his own, however, the shrivelled olf* 
 gentleman looked as if there were little hope of his throw- 
 
LITTLE PANSIE. 303 
 
 ing off this too artfully wrought disguise, until, at no distant 
 day, his stooping figure should be straightened out, his hoary 
 locks be smoothed over his brows, and his much enduring 
 bones be laid safely away, with a green coverlet spread over 
 them, beside his Bessie, who doubtless would recognize her 
 youthful companion in spite of his ugly garniture of decay. 
 He longed to be gazed at by the loving eyes now closed ; 
 he shrank from the hard stare of them that loved him not, 
 "\Yalking the streets seldom and reluctantly, he felt a dreary 
 impulse to elude the people's observation, as if with a sense 
 that he had gone irrevocably out of fashion, and broken his 
 connecting links with the network of human life ; or else it 
 was that nightmare-feeling which we sometimes have in 
 dreams, when we seem to find ourselves wandering through 
 a crowded avenue, with the noonday sun upon us, in some 
 wild extravagance of dress or nudity. He was conscious of 
 estrangement from, his towns-people, but did not always 
 know how nor wherefore, nor why he should be thus grop- 
 ing through the twilight mist in solitude. It' they spoke 
 loudly to him, with cheery voices, the greeting translated 
 itself faintly and mournfully to his ears ; if they shook him 
 by the hand, it was as if a thick, insensible glove absorbed 
 the kindly pressure and the warmth. When little Pansie 
 was the companion of his walk, her childish gayety and 
 freedom did not avail to bring him into closer relationship 
 with men, but seemed to follow him into that region of in- 
 definable remoteness, that dismal Fairy-Land of aged fancy, 
 into which old Grander Dolliver had so strangely crept 
 away. 
 
 Yet there were moments, as many persons had noticed, 
 when the great-grandpapa would suddenly take stronger 
 hin-s of life. It was as if his faded figure had been col- 
 ored over anew, or at least, as he and Pansie moved along 
 tin; street, as if a sunbeam had fallen across him, instead 
 of the gray gloom of an instant before. His chilled sensi- 
 
304 NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. 
 
 bilities had probably been touched and quickened by the 
 warm contiguity of his little companion through the medium 
 of her hand, as it stirred within his own, or some inflection 
 of her voice that set his memory ringing and chiming with 
 forgotten sounds. While that music lasted, the old man 
 was alive and happy. And there were seasons, it might be, 
 happier than even these, when Pansie had been kissed and put 
 to bed, and Grandsir Dolliver sat by hi* fireside gazing in 
 among the massive coals, and absorbing their glow into those 
 cavernous abysses with which all men communicate. Hence 
 come angels or fiends into our twilight musings, according 
 as we may have peopled them in by-gone years. Over 
 our friend's face, in the rosy flicker of the. fire-gleam, stole 
 an expression of repose and perfect trust that made him as 
 beautiful to look at, in his high-backed chair, as the child 
 Pansie on her pillow ; and sometimes the spirits that were 
 watching him beheld a calm surprise draw slowly over his 
 features and brighten into joy, yet not so vividly as to break 
 his evening quietude. The gate of heaven had been kindly 
 left ajar, that this forlorn old creature might catch a glimpse 
 within. All the night afterwards, he would be semi-con- 
 scious of an intangible bliss diffused through the fitful lapses 
 of an old man's slumber, and would awake, at early dawn, 
 with a faint thrilling of the heartstrings, as if there had 
 been music just now wandering over them. 
 
PALINGENESIS. 
 
 BY H. W. LONGFELLOW. 
 
 I LAY upon the headland-height, and listened 
 To the incessant sobbing of the sea 
 In caverns under me, 
 
 And watched the waves, that tossed and fled and glistened, 
 Until the rolling meadows of amethyst 
 Melted away in mist 
 
 Then suddenly, as one from sleep, I started ; 
 For round about me all the sunny capes 
 
 Seemed peopled with the shapes 
 Of those whom I had known in days departed, 
 Apparelled in the loveliness which gleams 
 
 On faces seen in dreams. 
 
 A moment only, and the light and glory 
 Faded away, and the disconsolate shore 
 
 Stood lonely as before ; 
 And the wild roses of the promontory 
 Around me shuddered in the wind, and shed 
 
 Their petals of pale red. 
 
 There was an old belief that in the embers 
 Of all things their primordial form exists, 
 And cunning alchemists 
 
306 H. W. LONGFELLOW. 
 
 Could recreate the rose with all its members 
 From its own ashes, but without the bloom, 
 Without the lost perfume. 
 
 Ah, me ! what wonder-working, occult science 
 Can from the ashes in our hearts once more 
 
 The rose of youth restore ? 
 What craft of alchemy can bid defiance 
 To time and change, and for a single hour 
 
 Renew this phantom-flower ? 
 
 " Oh, give me back," I cried, " the vanished splendor* 
 The breath of morn, and the exultant strife, 
 
 When the swift stream of life 
 Bounds o'er its rocky channel, and surrenders 
 The pond, with all its lilies, for the leap 
 
 Into the unknown deep ! " 
 
 And the sea answered, with a lamentation, 
 Like some old prophet wailing, and it said, 
 
 " Alas ! thy youth is dead ! 
 It breathes no more, its heart has no pulsation, 
 In the dark places with the dead of old 
 
 It lies forever cold ! " 
 
 Then said I, " From its consecrated cerements 
 I will not drag this sacred dust again, 
 
 Only to give me pain ; 
 
 But, still remembering all the lost endearments, 
 Go on my way, like one who looks before, 
 
 And turns to weep no more." 
 
 Into what land of harvests, what plantations 
 Bright with autumnal foliage and the glow 
 Of sunsets burning low ; 
 
PALINGENESIS. 307 
 
 Beneath what midnight skies, whose constellations 
 Light up the spacious avenues between 
 This world and the unseen ! 
 
 Amid what friendly greetings and caresses, 
 What households, though not alien, yet not mine, 
 
 What bowers of rest divine ; 
 To what temptations in lone wildernesses, 
 Whnt famine of the heart, what pain and loss, 
 
 The bearing of what cross ! 
 
 I do not know ; nor will I vainly question 
 Those pages of the mystic book which hold 
 
 The story still untold, 
 But without rash conjecture or suggestion 
 Turn its last leaves in reverence and good heed, 
 
 Until " The End " I read. 
 
EIP VAN WINKLE 
 
 BY WASHINGTON IRVING. 
 
 [The following Tale was found among the papers of the late Died- 
 rich Knickerbocker, an old gentleman of New York, who was very 
 curious in the Dutch history of the province, and the manners of 
 the descendants from its primitive settlers. His historical re- 
 searches, however, did not lie so much among books as among men ; 
 for the former are lamentably scanty on his favorite topics ; whereas 
 he found the old burghers, and still more their wives, rich in that 
 legendary lore so invaluable to true history. Whenever, therefore, 
 he happened upon a genuine Dutch family, snugly shut up in its 
 low-roofed farmhouse, under a spreading sycamore, he looked upon 
 it as a little clasped volume of black-letter, and studied it with the 
 zeal of a bookworm. 
 
 The result of all these researches was a history of the province 
 during the reign of the Dutch governors, which he published some 
 years since. There have been various opinions as to the literary 
 character of his work, and, to tell the truth, it is not a whit better 
 than it should be. Its chief merit is its scrupulous accuracy, which 
 indeed was a little questioned on its first appearance, but has since 
 been completely established ; and it is now admitted into all his- 
 torical collections, as a book of unquestionable authority. 
 
 The old gentleman died shortly after the publication of his work, 
 and now that he is dead and gone, it cannot do much harm to his 
 memory to say, that his time might have been much better em- 
 ployed in weightier labors. He, however, was apt to ride his hobby 
 his own way ; and though it did now and then kick up the dust a 
 little in the eyes of ^iis neighbors, and grieve the spirit of some 
 friends, for whom he felt the truest deference and affection ; yet his 
 errors and follies are remembered "more in sorrow than in anger," 
 and it begins to be suspected that he never intended to injure or 
 
RIP VAN WINKLE. 309 
 
 offend. But, however his memory may be appreciated by critics, it 
 is still held dear by many folk whose good opinion is well worth 
 having ; particularly by certain biscuit- bakers, who have gone so far 
 as to imprint his likeness on their new-year cakes ; and have thus 
 given him a chance for immortality, almost equal to the being 
 stamped on a Waterloo Medal, or a Queen Anne's farthing.] 
 
 RIP VAN WINKLE. 
 
 A POSTHUMOUS WRITING OF DIEDRICH KNICKERBOCKER. 
 
 " By Woden, God of Saxons, 
 From whence comes Wensday, that is Wodensday, 
 Truth is a thing that ever I will keep 
 Unto thylke day in which I creep into 
 My sepulchre. 7 ' 
 
 CARTWRIGHT. 
 
 WHOEVER has made a voyage up the Hudson, 
 must remember the Kaatskill Mountains. They 
 are a dismembered branch of the great Appalachian family, 
 and are seen away to the west of the river, swelling up to 
 a noble height, and lording it over the surrounding country. 
 Every change of season, every change of weather, indeed 
 every hour of the day. produces some change in the magi- 
 cal hues and shapes of these mountains, and they are re- 
 garded by all the good wives, far and near, as perfect 
 barometers. When the weather is fair and settled, they 
 are clothed in blue and purple, and print their bold out- 
 lines on the clear evening sky ; but sometimes, when the 
 rest of the landscape is cloudless, they will gather a hood 
 of gray vapors about their summits, which, in the last rays 
 of the setting sun, will glow and light up like a crown of 
 glory. 
 
 At the foot of these fairy mountains the voyager may 
 have descried the light smoke curling up from a village, 
 
310 WASHINGTON IRVING. 
 
 whose shingle-roofs gleam among the trees, just where the 
 blue tints of the upland melt away into the fresh green of 
 the nearer landscape. It is a little village of great antiq- 
 uity, having been founded by some of the Dutch colonists 
 in the early times of the province, just about the beginning 
 of the government of the good Peter Stuyvesant, (may he 
 rest in peace !) and there were some of the houses of the 
 original settlers standing within a few years, built of small 
 yellow bricks brought from Holland, having latticed win- 
 dows and gable fronts, surmounted with weathercocks. 
 
 In that same village, and in one of these very houses, 
 (which, to tell the precise truth, was sadly time-worn and 
 weather-beaten,) there lived many years since, while the 
 country was yet a province of Great Britain, a simple 
 good-natured fellow, of the name of Rip Van Winkle. 
 He was a descendant of the Van Winkles who figured so 
 gallantly in the chivalrous days of Peter Stuyvesant, and 
 accompanied him to the siege of Fort Christina. He in- 
 herited, however, but little of the martial character of his 
 ancestors. I have observed that he was a simple good- 
 natured man ; he was, moreover, a kind neighbor, and n 
 obedient hen-pecked husband. Indeed, to the latter cir- 
 cumstance might be owing that meekness of spirit which 
 gained him such universal popularity ; for those men are 
 most apt to be obsequious and conciliating abroad, who are 
 under the discipline of shrews at home. Their tempers, 
 doubtless, are rendered pliant and malleable in the fiery 
 furnace of domestic tribulation, and a curtain lecture is 
 worth all the sermons in the world for teaching the virtues 
 of patience and long-suffering. A termagant wife may, 
 therefore, in some respects, be considered a tolerable bless- 
 ing; and if so, Rip Van Winkle was thrice blessed. 
 
 Certain it is, that he was a great favorite among all the 
 good wives of the village, who, as usual with the amiable 
 sex, -took his part in all family squabbles ; and never 
 
RIP VAX WINKLE. 311 
 
 failed, whenever they talked those matters over in their 
 evening gossipings, to lay all the blame on Dame Van 
 Winkle. The children of the village, too, would shout 
 with joy whenever he approached. He assisted at their 
 sports, made their playthings, taught them to fly kites and 
 shoot marbles, and told them long stories of ghosts, witches, 
 and Indians. Whenever he went dodging about the vil- 
 lage, he was surrounded by a troop of them, hanging on 
 his skirts, clambering on his back, and playing a thousand 
 tricks on him with impunity ; and not a dog would bark 
 at him throughout the neighborhood. 
 
 The great error in Rip's composition was an insuperable 
 aversion to all kinds of profitable labor. It could not be 
 from the want of assiduity or perseverance ; for he would 
 sit on a wet rock, with a rod as long and heavy as a Tar- 
 tar's lance, and fish all day without a murmur, even though 
 he should not be encouraged by a single nibble. He 
 would carry a fowling-piece on his shoulder for hours 
 together, trudging through woods and swamps, and up hill 
 and down dale, to shoot a few squirrels or wild pigeons. 
 He would never refuse to assist a neighbor even in the 
 roughest toil, and was a foremost man at all country frolics 
 for husking Indian corn, or building stone fences : the 
 women of the village, too, used to employ him to run their 
 errands, and to do such little odd jobs as their less obliging 
 husbands would not do for them. In a word, Rip was 
 ready to attend to anybody's business but his own ; but as 
 to doing family duty, and keeping his farm in order, he 
 found it impossible. 
 
 In fact, he declared it was of no use to work on his farm ; 
 it was the most pestilent little piece of ground in the whole 
 country ; everything about it went wrong, and would go 
 wrong, in spite of him. His fences were continually falling 
 to pieces ; his cow would either go astray, or get among the 
 cabbages ; weeds were sure to grow quicker in his fields 
 
312 WASHINGTON IRVING. 
 
 than anywhere else ; the rain always made a point of set- 
 ting in just as he had some out-door work to do ; so that 
 though his patrimonial estate had dwindled away under 
 his management, acre by acre, until there was little more 
 left than a mere patch of Indian corn and potatoes, yet 
 it was the worst conditioned farm in the neighborhood. 
 
 His children, too, were as ragged and wild as if they 
 belonged to nobody. His son Rip, an urchin begotten in 
 his own likeness, promised to inherit the habits, with the 
 old clothes of his father. He was generally seen trooping 
 like a colt at his mother's heels, equipped in a pair of his 
 father's cast-off galligaskins, which he had much ado to 
 hold up with one hand, as a fine lady does her train in bad 
 weather. 
 
 Rip Van Winkle, however, was one of those happy 
 mortals, of foolish, well-oiled dispositions, who take the 
 world easy, eat white bread or brown, whichever can be got 
 with least thought or trouble, and would rather starve on a 
 penny than work for a pound. If left to himself, he would 
 have whistled life away in perfect contentment ; but his 
 wife kept continually dinning in his ears about his idle- 
 ness, his carelessness, and the ruin he was bringing on his 
 family. Morning, noon, and night her tongue was inces- 
 santly going, and everything he said or did was sure to 
 produce a torrent of household eloquence. Rip had but 
 one way of replying to all lectures of the kind, and that, 
 by frequent use, had grown into a habit. He shrugged 
 his shoulders, shook his head, cast up his eyes, but said 
 nothing. This, however, always provoked a fresh volley 
 from his wife, so that he was fain to draw off his forces, 
 and take to the outside of the house, the only side which, 
 in truth, belongs to a hen-pecked husband. 
 
 Rip's sole domestic adherent was his dog Wolf, who was 
 as much hen-pecked as his master ; for Dame Van Winkle 
 regarded them as companions in idleness, and even looked 
 
RIP VAN WINKLE. 313 
 
 upon Wolf with an evil eye, as the cause of his master's 
 going so often astray. True it is, in all points of spirit be- 
 litting an honorable clog, he was as courageous an animal 
 as ever scoured the woods ; but what courage can withstand 
 the ever-during and all-besetting terrors of a woman's 
 tongue ? The moment Wolf entered the house his crest 
 fell, his tail drooped to the ground or curled between his 
 !ie sneaked about with a gallows air, casting many a 
 sidelong glance at Dame Van Winkle, and at the least 
 flourish of a broomstick or ladle, he would fly to the door 
 with yelping precipitation. 
 
 Times grew worse and worse with Rip Van Winkle as 
 years of matrimony rolled on ; a tart temper never mellows 
 with age, and a sharp tongue is the only edged tool that 
 grows keener with constant use. For a long while he used 
 to console himself, when driven from home, by frequenting 
 a kind of perpetual club of the sages, philosophers, and 
 other idle personages of the village, which held its sessions 
 on a bench before a small inn, designated by a rubicund 
 portrait of his Majesty George the Third. Here they 
 used to sit in the shade through a long, lazy summer's day, 
 talking listlessly over village gossip, or telling endless sleepy 
 stories about nothing. But it would have been worth any 
 statesman's money to have heard the profound discussions 
 that sometimes took place, when by chance an old news- 
 paper fell into their hands from some passing traveller. 
 How solemnly they would listen to the contents, as drawled 
 out by Derrick Van Bummel, the schoolmaster, a dapper, 
 learned little man, who was not to be daunted by the 
 most jrigantic word in the dictionary ; and how sagely they 
 would deliberate upon public events some months after 
 they had taken place ! 
 
 The opinions of this junto were completely controlled 
 by Nicholas Vedder, a patriarch of the village, and land- 
 lord of the inn, at the door of which he took his seat from 
 
314 WASHINGTON IRVING. 
 
 morning till night, just moving sufficiently to avoid the 
 sun and keep in the shade of a large tree ; so that the 
 neighbors could tell the hour by his movements as accu- 
 rately as by a sun-dial. It is true he was rarely heard to 
 speak, but smoked his pipe incessantly. His adherents, 
 however, (for every great man has his adherents,) perfectly 
 understood him, and knew how to gather his opinions. 
 When anything that was read or related displeased him, 
 he was observed to smoke his pipe vehemently, and to 
 send forth short, frequent, and angry puffs ; but when 
 pleased, he would inhale the smoke slowly and tranquilly, 
 and emit it in light and placid clouds ; and sometimes, 
 taking the pipe from his mouth, and letting the fragrant 
 vapor curl about his nose, would gravely nod his head in 
 token of perfect approbation. 
 
 From even this stronghold the unlucky Rip was at 
 length routed by his termagant wife, who would suddenly 
 break in upon the tranquillity of the assemblage and call 
 the members all to naught ; nor was that august person- 
 age, Nicholas Vedder himself, sacred from the daring 
 tongue of this terrible virago, who charged him outright 
 with encouraging her husband in habits of idleness. 
 
 Poor Rip was at last reduced almost to despair; and 
 his only alternative, to escape from the labor of the farm 
 and clamor of his wife, was to take gun in hand and stroll 
 away into the woods. Here he would sometimes seat 
 himself at the foot of a tree, and share the contents of his 
 wallet with Wolf, with whom he sympathized as a fellow- 
 sufferer in persecution. " Poor Wolf," he would say, 
 " thy mistress leads thee a dog's life of it ; but never 
 mind, my lad, whilst I live thou shalt never want a friend 
 to stand by thee!" Wolf would wag his tail, look 
 wistfully in his master's face, and if dogs can feel pity, 
 I verily believe he reciprocated the sentiment with all 
 his heart. 
 
RIP VAN WINKLE. 315 
 
 In a long ramble of the kind on a fine autumnal day, 
 Rip had unconsciously scrambled to one of the highest 
 parts of the Kaatskill Mountains. He was after his 
 favorite sport of squirrel shooting, and the still soli- 
 tudes had echoed and re-echoed with the reports of his 
 ^un. Panting and fatigued, he threw himself, late in 
 the afternoon, on a green knoll, covered with mountain 
 herbage, that crowned the brow of a precipice. From 
 an opening between the trees he could overlook all the 
 lower country for many a mile of rich woodland. He 
 saw at a distance the lordly Hudson, far, far below him, 
 moving on its silent but majestic course, with the reflec- 
 tion of a purple cloud, or the sail of a lagging bark, 
 here and there sleeping on its glassy bosom, and at last 
 losing itself in the blue highlands. 
 
 On the other side he looked down into a deep moun- 
 tain glen, wild, lonely, and shagged, the bottom filled with 
 fragments from the impending cliffs, and scarcely lighted 
 by the reflected rays of the setting sun. For some time 
 Rip lay musing on this scene ; evening was gradually 
 advancing ; the mountains began to throw their long 
 blue shadows over the valleys ; he saw that it would be 
 dark long before he could reach the village, and he 
 heaved a heavy sigh when he thought of encountering 
 the terrors of Dame Van Winkle. 
 
 As he was about to descend, he heard a voice from a 
 distance, hallooing, " Rip Van Winkle ! Rip Van Win- 
 kle ! " He looked round, but could see nothing but a 
 crow winging its solitary flight across the mountain. He 
 thought his fancy must have deceived him, and turned 
 again to descend, when he heard the same cry ring 
 through the still evening air: "Rip Van Winkle! Rip 
 Van Winkle!" at the same time Wolf bristled up his 
 back, and. giving a loud growl, skulked to his master's 
 side, looking fearfully down into the glen. Rip now felt a 
 
316 WASHINGTON IRVING. 
 
 vague apprehension stealing over him; he looked anx- 
 iously in the same direction, and perceived a strange 
 figure slowly toiling up the rocks, and bending under the 
 weight of something he carried on his back. He was 
 surprised to see any human being in this lonely and un- 
 frequented place, but supposing it to be some one of the 
 neighborhood in need of his assistance, he hastened down 
 to yield it. 
 
 On near approach he was still more surprised at the 
 singularity of the stranger's appearance, lie was a short, 
 square-built old fellow, with thick bushy hair, and a grizzled 
 beard. His dress was of the antique Dutch fashion, a 
 cloth jerkin strapped round the waist, several pairs of 
 breeches, the outer one of ample volume, decorated with rows 
 of buttons down the sides, and bunches at the knees. He 
 bore on his shoulder a stout keg, that seemed full of liquor, 
 and made signs for Rip to approach and assist him with 
 the load. Though rather shy and distrustful of this new 
 acquaintance, Rip complied with his usual alacrity ; and 
 mutually relieving each other, they clambered up a narrow 
 gully, apparently the dry bed of a mountain torrent. As 
 they ascended, Rip every now and then heard long rolling 
 peals, like distant thunder, that seemed to issue out of a 
 deep ravine, or rather cleft, between lofty rocks, toward 
 which their rugged path conducted. He paused for an in- 
 stant, but supposing it to be the muttering of one of those 
 transient bander-showers which often take place in moun- 
 tain heights, he proceeded. Passing through the ravine, 
 they came to a hollow, like a small amphitheatre, surrounded 
 by perpendicular precipices, over the brinks of which 
 impending trees shot their branches, so that you only 
 caught glimpses of the azure sky and the bright evening 
 cloud. During the whole time Rip and his companion 
 had labored on in silence; for though the former marvelled 
 greatly what could be the object of carrying a keg of 
 
RIP VAN WINKLE. 317 
 
 liquor up this wild mountain, yet there was something 
 strange and incomprehensible about the unknown, that 
 inspired awe and checked familiarity. 
 
 On entering the amphitheatre, new objects of wonder 
 presented themselves. On a level spot in the centre was a 
 company of odd-looking personages playing at ninepins. 
 They were dressed in a quaint outlandish fashion ; some 
 wore short doublets, others jerkins, with long knives in 
 their belts, and most of them had enormous breeches, of 
 similar style with those of the guide. Their visages, too, 
 were peculiar : one had a large head, broad face, and 
 small piggish eyes ; the face of another seemed to consist 
 entirely of nose, and was surmounted by a white sugar- 
 loaf hat, set off with a little red cock's tail. They all had 
 beards, of various shades and colors. There was one who 
 seemed to be the commander. He was a stout old gentle- 
 man, with a weather-beaten countenance ; he wore a 
 laced doublet, broad belt and hanger, high-crowned hat 
 and feather, red stockings, and high-heeled shoes, with 
 roses in them. The whole group reminded Rip of the 
 figures in an old Flemish painting, in the parlor of 
 Dominie Van Shaick, the village parson, and which had 
 been brought over from Holland at the time of the settle- 
 ment. 
 
 What seemed particularly odd to Rip was, that though 
 these folks were evidently amusing themselves, yet they 
 maintained the gravest faces, the most mysterious silence, 
 and were, withal, the most melancholy party of pleasure 
 he had ever witnessed. Nothing interrupted the stillness 
 of the scene but the noise of the balls, which, whenever 
 they were rolled, echoed along the mountains like rum- 
 bling peals of thunder. 
 
 As Rip and his companion approached them, they sud- 
 denly desisted from their play, and stared at him with 
 such fixed statue-like gaze, and such strange, uncouth, 
 
318 WASHINGTON IRVING. 
 
 lack-lustre countenances, that his heart turned within 
 him, and his knees smote together. His companion now 
 emptied the contents of the keg into large flagons, and 
 made signs to him to wait upon the company. He 
 obeyed with fear and trembling ; they quaffed the liquor 
 in profound silence, and then returned to their game. 
 
 By degrees Kip's awe and apprehension subsided. He 
 even ventured, when no eye was fixed upon him, to taste 
 the beverage, which he found had much of the flavor of 
 excellent Hollands. He was naturally a thirsty soul, and 
 was soon tempted to repeat the draught. One taste pro- 
 voked another ; and he reiterated his visits to the flagon 
 so often that at length his senses were overpowered, his 
 eyes swam in his head, his head gradually declined, and 
 he fell into a deep sleep. 
 
 On waking, he found himself on the green knoll 
 whence he had first seen the old man of the glen. He 
 rubbed his eyes, it was a bright sunny morning. The 
 birds were hopping and twittering among the bushes, and 
 the eagle was wheeling aloft, and breasting the pure 
 mountain breeze. "Surely," thought Rip, "I have not 
 slept here all night." He recalled the occurrences before 
 he fell asleep. The strange man with a keg of liquor 
 the mountain ravine the wild retreat among the rocks 
 the woe-begorie party at ninepins the flagon , 
 "Oh! that flagon! that wicked flagon !" thought Rip; 
 " what excuse shall I make to Dame Van Winkle ? " 
 
 He looked round for his gun, but in place of the 
 clean, well-oiled fowling-piece, he found an old firelock 
 lying by him, the barrel incrusted with rust, the lock 
 i'alling off, and the stock worm-eaten. He now suspected 
 that the grave roysters of the mountain had put a trick 
 upon him, and, having dosed him with liquor, had 
 robbed him of his gun. Wolf, too, had disappeared, 
 but he might have strayed away after a squirrel or par- 
 
RIP VAN WINKLE. 319 
 
 tridge. He whistled after him and shouted his Dame, 
 but all in vain ; the echoes repeated his whistle and 
 shout, but no dog was to be seen. 
 
 He determined to revisit the scene of the last even- 
 gambol, and if he met with any of the party, to 
 demand his dog and gun. As he rose to walk, he 
 found himself stiff in the joints, and wanting in his 
 usual activity. "These mountain beds do not agree 
 with me,'' thought Rip, "and if this frolic should lay 
 me up with a fit of the rheumatism, I shall have a 
 I time with Dame Van Winkle." With some dif- 
 ficulty he got down into the glen : he found the gully 
 up which he and his companion had ascended the 
 preceding evening ; but to his astonishment a mountain 
 stream was now foaming down it, leaping from rock to 
 rock, and filling the glen with babbling murmurs. He, 
 however, made shift to scramble up its sides, working 
 his toilsome way through thickets of birch, sassafras, 
 and witch-hazel, and sometimes tripped up or entangled 
 by the wild grape-vines that twisted their coils or ten- 
 drils from tree to tree, and spread a kind of network in 
 his path. 
 
 At length he reached to where the ravine had opened 
 through the cliffs to the amphitheatre ; but no traces of 
 such opening remained. The rocks presented a high 
 impenetrable wall, over which the torrent came tumbling 
 in a sheet of feathery foam, and fell into a broad deep 
 basin, black from the shadows of the surrounding forest. 
 Here, then, poor Rip was brought to a stand. He again 
 called and whistled after his dog ; he was only answered 
 by the cawing of a flock of idle crows, sporting high in 
 air about a dry tree that overhung a sunny precipice ; 
 and who, secure in their elevation, seemed to look down 
 and scoff at the poor man's perplexities. What was to 
 be done ? the morning was passing away, and Rip felt 
 
320 WASHINGTON IRVING. 
 
 famished for want of his breakfast. He grieved to give 
 up his dog and his gun ; he dreaded to meet his wife ; 
 but it would not do to starve among the mountains. lie 
 shook his head, shouldered the rusty firelock, and, with a 
 heart full of trouble and anxiety, turned his steps hunne- 
 wurd. 
 
 As he approached the village he met a number of peo- 
 ple, but none whom he knew, which somewhat surprised 
 him, for he had thought himself acquainted with every one 
 in the country round. Their dress, too, was of a different 
 fashion from that to which he was accustomed. They all 
 stared at him with equal marks of surprise, and whenever 
 they cast their eyes upon him, invariably stroked their 
 chins. The constant recurrence of this gesture induced 
 Rip, involuntarily, to do the same, when, to his astonish- 
 ment, he found his beard had grown a foot long ! 
 
 He had now entered the skirts of the village. A troop 
 of strange children ran at his heels, hooting after him, and 
 pointing at his gray beard. The dogs, too, not one of 
 which he recognized for an old acquaintance, barked at 
 him as he passed. The very village was altered ; it was 
 larger and more populous. There were rows of houses 
 which he had never seen before, and those which had been 
 his familiar haunts had disappeared. Strange names were 
 over the doors strange faces at the windows every- 
 thing was strange. His mind now misgave him; he began 
 to doubt whether both he and the world around him were 
 not bewitched. Surely this was his native village, which 
 he had left but the day before. There stood the Kaat- 
 skill Mountains; there ran the silver Hudson at a dis- 
 tance ; there was every hill and dale precisely as it had 
 always been ; Rip was sorely perplexed. " That flagon 
 last night," thought he, "has addled my poor head sadly !" 
 
 It was with some difficulty that he found the way to his 
 own house, which he approached with silent awe, expect- 
 
RIP VAN WINKLE. 321 
 
 ing every moment to hear the shrill voice of Dame Van 
 Winkle. He found the house gone to decay, the roof 
 fallen in, the windows shattered, and the doors off the 
 ~. A half-starved dog that looked like Wolf was 
 skulking about it. Rip called him by name, but the cur 
 snarled, showed his teeth, and passed on. This was an 
 unkind cut indeed. " My very dog," sighed poor Rip, 
 " has forgotten me ! " 
 
 He entered the house, which, to tell the truth, Dame 
 Van Winkle had always kept in neat order. It was empty, 
 forlorn, and apparently abandoned. The desolateness over- 
 came all his connubial fears, he called loudly for his 
 wife and children ; the lonely chambers rang for a moment 
 with his voice, and then all again was silence. 
 
 He now hurried forth, and hastened to his old resort, 
 the village inn ; but it, too, was gone. A large rickety 
 wooden building stood in its place, with great gaping win- 
 dows, some of them broken, and mended with old hats and 
 petticoats ; and over the door was painted, " The Union 
 Hotel, by Jonathan Doolittle." Instead of the great tree 
 that used to shelter the quiet little Dutch inn of yore, there 
 was now reared a tall naked pole, with something on the 
 top that looked like a red nightcap, and from it was flut- 
 tering a flag, on which was a singular assemblage of stars 
 and stripes ; all this was strange and incomprehensible. 
 He recognized on the sign, however, the ruby face of King 
 George, under which he had smoked so many a peaceful 
 pipe ; but even this was singularly metamorphosed. The 
 red coat was changed for one of blue and bluff, a sword 
 was held in the hand instead of a sceptre, the head was 
 decorated with a cocked hat, and underneath was painted 
 in large characters, GENERAL WASHINGTON. 
 
 There was, as usual, a crowd of folks about the door, 
 but none that Rip recollected. The very character of the 
 people seemed changed. There was a busy, bustling, dis- 
 
322 WASHINGTON IRVING. 
 
 putatious tone about it, instead of the accustomed phlegm 
 and drowsy tranquillity. He looked in vain for the sage 
 Nicholas Vedder, with his broad face, double chin, and fair 
 long pipe, uttering clouds of tobacco-smoke instead of idle 
 speeches ; or Van Bummel, the schoolmaster, doling forth 
 the contents of an ancient newspaper. In place of these, 
 a lean, bilious-looking fellow, with his pockets full of hand- 
 bills, was haranguing vehemently about rights of citizens 
 elections members of congress liberty Bunker's 
 Hill heroes of seventy -six and other words, which 
 were a perfect Babylonish jargon to the bewildered Van 
 Winkle. 
 
 The appearance of Rip, with his long grizzled beard, his 
 rusty fowling-piece, his uncouth dress, and an army of 
 women and children at his heels, soon attracted the atten- 
 tion of the tavern politicians. They crowded round him, 
 eying him from head to foot with great curiosity. The 
 orator bustled up to him, and, drawing him partly aside, 
 inquired u on which side he voted." Rip stared in vacant 
 stupidity. Another short but busy little fellow pulled him 
 by the arm, and, rising on tiptoe, inquired in his ear 
 u whether he was Federal or Democrat." Rip was equally 
 at a loss to comprehend the question ; when a knowing, 
 self-important old gentleman, in a sharp cocked hat, made 
 his way through the crowd, putting them to the rjght and 
 left with his elbows as he passed, and planting himself 
 before Van Winkle, with one arm a-kimbo, the other rest- 
 ing on his cane, his keen eyes and sharp hat penetrating, 
 as it were, into his very soul, demanded in an austere tone, 
 " What brought him to the election with a gun on his 
 shoulder, and a mob at his heels, and whether he meant to 
 breed a riot in the village?" "Alas! gentlemen," cried 
 Rip, somewhat dismayed, " I am a poor quiet man, a native 
 of the place, and a loyal subject to the king, God bless 
 him ! " 
 
RIP VAN WINKLE. 323 
 
 Here a general shout burst from the bystanders : " A tory ! 
 a tory! a spy! a refugee ! hustle him! away with him!" 
 It was with great difficulty that the self-important man in 
 the cocked hat restored order ; and-, having assumed a 
 tenfold austerity of brow, demanded again of the unknown 
 culprit what he came there for, and whom he was seeking. 
 The poor man humbly assured him that he meant no harm, 
 but merely came there in search of some of his neighbors, 
 who used to keep about the tavern. 
 
 " Well who are they ? name them." 
 
 Rip bethought himself a moment, end inquired, 
 < Where 's Nicholas Vedder ? " 
 
 There was a silence for a little while, when an old man 
 replied in a thin piping voice, " Nicholas Vedder ! why, 
 he is dead and gone these eighteen years ! There was a 
 wooden tombstone in the churchyard that used to tell all 
 about him, but that's rotten and gone too." 
 
 " Where's Brom Dutcher?" 
 
 " 0, lie went off to the army in the beginning of the 
 war : some say he was killed at the storming of Stony 
 Point ; others say he was drowned in a squall at the foot 
 of Antony's Nose. I don't know ; he never came back 
 again. r 
 
 " Where's Van Bummel, the schoolmaster?" 
 
 *" He went off to the wars too, was a great militia gen- 
 eral, and is now in congress." 
 
 Rip's heart died away at hearing of these S;K! changes in 
 his home and friends, and finding himself thus alone in the 
 world. Every answer puzzled him too, by treating of 
 such enormous lapses of time, and of matters which he 
 could not understand : war congress Stony Point ; 
 he had no courage to ask after any more friends, but cried 
 out in despair, " Does nobody here know Rip Van 
 Winkle ? " 
 
 " O, Rip Van Winkle ! " exclaimed two or three. O, 
 
324 WASHINGTON IRVING. 
 
 to be sure ! that 's Rip Van Winkle yonder, leaning against 
 the tree." 
 
 Rip looked, and beheld a precise counterpart of himself, 
 as he went up the' mountain : apparently as lazy, and 
 certainly as ragged. The poor fellow was now completely 
 confounded. He doubted his own identity, and whether he 
 was himself or another man. In the midst of his bewilder- 
 ment, the man in the cocked hat demanded who he was, 
 and what was his name. 
 
 " God knows ! " exclaimed he, at his wit's end ; " I 'm 
 not myself I'm somebody else that's me yonder 
 no that's somebody else got into my shoes I was my- 
 self last night, but 1 fell asleep on the mountain, and 
 they've changed my gun, and everything's changed, and 
 I 'm changed, and I can't tell what 's my name, or who I 
 am!" 
 
 The bystanders began now to look at each other, nod, 
 wink significantly, and tap their fingers against their fore- 
 heads. There was a whisper, also, about securing the gun, 
 and keeping the old fellow from doing mischief, at the 
 very suggestion of which the self-important man in the 
 cocked hat retired with some precipitation. At this 
 critical moment a fresh comely woman pressed through 
 the throng to get a peep at the gray -bearded man. She 
 had a chubby child in her arms, which, frightened at his 
 looks, began to cry. " Hush, Rip," cried she, " hush, you 
 little fool ; the old man won't hurt you." The name of 
 the child, the air of the mother, the tone of her voice, all 
 awakened a train of recollections in his mind. " What is 
 your name, my good woman ? " asked he. 
 
 "Judith Gardenier." 
 
 " And your father's name ? " 
 
 " Ah, poor man ! Rip Van Winkle was his name, but 
 it's twenty years since he went away from home with his 
 gun, and never has been heard of since : his dog came home 
 
RIP VAN WINKLE. 325 
 
 without him ; but whether he shot himself, or was carried 
 away by the Indians, nobody can tell. I was then but a 
 little girl." 
 
 Rip had but one question more to ask ; but he put it 
 with a faltering voice : 
 
 * Where 's your mother ? " 
 
 " Oh, she too had died but a short time since ; she 
 broke a blood-vessel in a fit of passion at a New England 
 peddler." 
 
 There was a drop of comfort, at least, in this intelligence. 
 The honest man could contain himself no longer. He caught 
 his daughter and her child in his arms. "I am your 
 lather ! " cried he " Young Rip Van Winkle once old 
 Rip Van Winkle now ! Does nobody know poor Rip Van 
 Winkle?" 
 
 All stood amazed, until an old woman, tottering out from 
 among the crowd, put her hand to her brow, and peering un- 
 der it in his face for a moment, exclaimed, " Sure enough ! 
 it is Rip Van Winkle it is himself! Welcome home again, 
 old neighbor ! Why, where have you been these twenty 
 long years ''. " 
 
 Rip's story was soon told, for the whole twenty years 
 had been to him but as one night. The neighbors stared 
 when they heard it ; some were seen to wink at each 
 other, and put their tongues in their cheeks : and the self- 
 important man in the cocked hat, who when the alarm 
 was over had returned to the field, screwed down the 
 corners of his mouth, and shook his head ; upon which 
 there was a general shaking of the head throughout the 
 assemblage. 
 
 It was determined, however, to take the opinion of old 
 Peter Vanderdonk, who was seen slowly advancing up the 
 road. He was a descendant of the historian of that name, 
 who wrote one of the earliest accounts of the province. 
 Peter was the most ancient inhabitant in the village, and 
 
326 WASHINGTON IRVING. 
 
 well versed in all the wonderful events and traditions of 
 the neighborhood. He recollected Rip at once, and cor- 
 roborated his story in the most satisfactory manner. He 
 assured the company that it was a fact, handed down from 
 his ancestor the historian, that the Kaatskill Mountains 
 had always been haunted by strange beings; that it was 
 affirmed that the great Hendrick Hudson, the first dis- 
 coverer of the river and country, kept a kind of vigil there 
 every twenty years, with his crew of the Half-moon, being 
 permitted in this way to revisit the scenes of his enterprise, 
 and keep a guardian eye upon the river, and the great city 
 called by his name ; that his father had once seen them in 
 their old Dutch dresses playing at ninepins in a hollow of 
 the mountain ; and that he himself had heard, one summer 
 afternoon, the sound of their balls, like distant peals of 
 thunder. 
 
 To make a long story short, the company broke up, and 
 returned to the more important concerns of the election. 
 Rip's daughter took him home to live with her ; she had 
 a snug, well-furnished house, and a stout cheery farmer 
 for her husband, whom Rip recollected for one of the ur- 
 chins that used to climb upon his back. As to Rip's son 
 and heir, who was the ditto of himself, seen leaning against 
 the tree, he was employed to work on the farm, but evinced 
 an hereditary disposition to attend to anything else but his 
 business. 
 
 Rip now resumed his old walks and habits ; he soon 
 found many of his former cronies, though all rather the 
 worse for the wear and tear of time, and preferred making 
 friends among the rising generation, with whom he soon 
 grew into great favor. 
 
 Having nothing to do at home, and being arrived at that 
 happy age when a man can be idle with impunity, he took 
 his place once more on the bench at the inn door, and was 
 reverenced as one of the patriarchs of the village, and a 
 
KIP VAN WINKLE. 327 
 
 chronicle of the old times < l before the war." It was some 
 time before he could get into the regular track of gossip, 
 or could be made to comprehend the strange events that 
 had taken place during his torpor. How that there had 
 been a revolutionary war, that the country had thrown off 
 the yoke of old England, and that, instead of being a subject 
 of his Majesty George the Third, he was now a free citizen 
 of the United States. Rip, in fact, was no politician ; the 
 changes of states and empires made but little impression on 
 him ; but there was one species of despotism under which 
 he had long groaned, and that was petticoat government. 
 Happily that was at an end ; he had got his neck out of 
 the yoke of matrimony, and could go in and out whenever 
 he pleased, without dreading the tyranny of Dame Van 
 Winkle. Whenever her name was mentioned, however, 
 he shook his head, shrugged his shoulders, and cast up his 
 eyes ; which might pass either for an expression of resig- 
 nation to his fate, or joy at his deliverance. 
 
 He used to tell his story to every stranger that arrived 
 at Mr. Doolittle's hotel. He was observed, at first, to 
 vary on some points every time he told it, which was, 
 doubtless, owing to his having so recently awakened. It 
 at last settled down precisely to the tale I have related, 
 and not a man, woman, or child in the neighborhood, but 
 knew it by heart. *Some always pretended to doubt the 
 reality of it, and insisted that Rip had been out of his 
 head, and that this was one point on which he always 
 remained flighty. The old Dutch inhabitants, however, 
 almost universally gave it full credit. Even to this day 
 they never hear a thunder-storm of a summer afternoon 
 about the Kaatskill, but they say Hendrick Hudson and 
 his crew are at their game of ninepins ; and it is a common 
 wish of all hen-pecked husbands in the neighborhood, 
 when life hangs heavy on their hands, that they might have 
 a quieting draught out of Rip Van Winkle's flagon. 
 
328 WASHINGTON IRVING. 
 
 NOTE. 
 
 The foregoing tale, one would suspect, had been suggested to 
 Mr. Knickerbocker by a little German superstition about the 
 Emperor Frederick der Rothbart, and the Kypphaiiser moun- 
 tain : the subjoined note, however, which he had appended to 
 the tale, shows that it is an absolute fact, narrated with his 
 usual fidelity : 
 
 " The story of Rip Van Winkle may seem incredible to many, but 
 nevertheless I give it my full belief, for I know the vicinity of our 
 old Dutch settlements to have been very subject to marvellous 
 events and appearances. Indeed, I have heard many stranger stories 
 than this in the villages along the Hudson ; all of which were too 
 well authenticated to admit of a doubt. I have even talked with 
 Rip Van Winkle myself, who, when I last saw him, was a very 
 venerable old man, and so perfectly rational and consistent on every 
 other point, that I think no conscientious person could refuse to 
 take this into the bargain ; nay, I have seen a certificate on the sub- 
 ject, taken before a country justice, and signed with a cross, in the 
 justice's own handwriting. The story, therefore, is beyond the pos- 
 sibility of doubt. D. K." 
 
 POSTSCRIPT. 
 
 The following are travelling notes from a memorandum-book 
 of Mr. Knickerbocker : f 
 
 The Kaatsberg, or Catskill Mountains, have always been a region 
 full of fable. The Indians considered them the abode of spirits, who 
 influenced the weather, spreading sunshine or clouds over the land- 
 scape, and sending good or bad hunting seasons. They were ruled 
 by an old squaw spirit, said to be their mother. She dwelt on the 
 highest peak of the Catskills, and had charge of the doors of day and 
 night, to open and shut them at the proper hour. She hung up the 
 new moons in the skies, and cut up the old ones into stars. In 
 times of drought, if properly propitiated, she would spin light sum- 
 mer clouds out of cobwebs and morning dew, and send them off 
 from the crest of the mountain, flake after flake, like flakes of carded 
 cotton, to float in the air ; until, dissolved by the heat of the sun, 
 
RIP VAN WINKLE. 329 
 
 they would fall in gentle showers, causing the grass to spring, the 
 fruits to ripen, and .the corn to grow an inch an hour. If displeased, 
 however, she would brew up clouds black as ink, sitting in the midst 
 of them like a bottle-bellied spider in the midst of its web ; and 
 when these clouds broke, woe betide the valleys ! 
 
 In old times, say the Indian traditions, there was a kind of Mani- 
 tou or Spirit, who kept about the wildest recesses of the Catskill 
 Mountains, and took a mischievous pleasure in wreaking all kinds 
 of evils and vexations upon the red men. Sometimes he would 
 assume the form of a bear, a panther, or a deer, lead the bewildered 
 hunter a weary chase through tangled forests and among ragged 
 rocks, and then spring off with a loud ho ! ho ! leaving him aghast 
 on the brink of a beetling precipice or raging torrent. 
 
 The favorite abode of this Manitou is still shown. It is a great 
 rock or cliff on the loneliest part of the mountains, and, from the 
 flowering vines which clamber about it, and the wild flowers which 
 abound in its neighborhood, is known by the name of the Garden 
 Eock. Near the foot of it is a small lake, the haunt of the solitary 
 bittern, with water-snakes basking in the sun on the leaves of the 
 pond-lilies, which lie on the surface. This place was held in great 
 awe by the Indians, insomuch that the boldest hunter would not 
 pursue his game within its precincts. Once upon a time, however, 
 a hunter who had lost his way penetrated to the garden rock, where 
 he beheld a number of gourds placed in the crotches of trees. One 
 of these he seized, and made off with it ; but in the hurry of his 
 retreat he let it fall among the rocks, when a great stream gushed 
 forth, which washed him away and swept him down precipices, 
 where he was dashed to pieces, and the stream made its way to the 
 Hudson, and continues to flow to the present day ; being the iden- 
 tical stream known by the name of the Kaaters-kill. 
 
 University Press : John Wilson & Son, Cambridge. 
 
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