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MACMILLAN'S MAGAZINE.
VOL. LIIL
MACMILLAN'S
VOL. LIIL
NOVEMBER 1885, TO APRIL 1886.
MACMILLAN AND CO.,
29 & 30, BEDFORD STREET, CO VENT GARDEN ; AND
gotk.
1886.
W.J. LINTON. S'
The Right of Translation and Reproduction is Reserved.
,53
RICHARD CLAY & SONS,
BREAD STREET HILL,
Bungay, Su/olk.
CONTENTS.
i'AGE
American Notes, Some 43
Arolliad, The; an Epic of the Alps k ..... 311
Austria's Policy in the East , 17
Books, A Century of 377
Borrow, George. By GEORGE SAINTSBURY 1 70
Bradshaw, Henry. By ARTHUR BENSON 475
Burmah, Matters in. By MAJOR-GENERAL McMAHON 314
Champion of her Sex, A. By W. MINTO 264
Church Authority ; its meaning and value. By REV. J. M. WILSON . . . . . . . 116
Classic Ground, On 28
Cossack Poet, A. By W. R. MORFILL 458
Culture and Science. By E. A. SONNENSCHEIN 5
Democracy, The Socialistic Tendencies of Modern. By HON. G. C. BRODRICK . . 390
Dymond, Mrs. By MRS. RITCHIE (Miss THACKERAY) :
Chapters xxxii. xxxv 63
,, xxxvi. xxxiX 141
Egypt, The Situation in. By R. H. Lang 246
" English," The Depression of. By W. BAPTISTE SCOONES 37
Eton College, Ode on a Near Prospect of 213
" Eumenides " at Cambridge, The. By MOWBRAY MORRIS 205
Faroes, A Walk in the 121
February Filldyke. A SONNET 263
Florence and Modern Tuscany, Old. By MRS. Ross 153
Footprints 276
Fyvie Castle, and its Lairds. By MRS. Ross 465
Garrison, William Lloyd. By GOLDWIN SMITH 321
General Readers ; By One of Them . 450
Gladstone Myth, The Great 241
Graham, Victor . k : 364
Grant, General. By L. J. JENNINGS 161
Holiday, A. Sonnet 347
Indian Village, An 75
vi Contents.
PAGE
Irish Shootings 92
King's Daughter in Danger, The 193
Legend of Another World, A. By the Author of " A Strange Temptation ". ... 401
Literature, The Office of 361
Long Odds. By H. RIDER HAGGARD 289
Love's Labours Lost, On. By WALTER PATER 89
Mendelssohn, Moses 298
Morris and the French Revolution, Gouverneur 55
Peacock, Thomas Love. By GEORGE SAINTSBURY 414
Poetic Imagination, The. By ARTHUR TILLEY 184
Poetry and Politics. By ANDREW LANG 81
Poetry and Politics. By ERNEST MYERS 257
Poetry, The Musical and the Picturesque Elements in. By THOMAS WHITTAKER . . 428
Poetry, The Province and Study of. By FRANCIS T. PALGRAVE 332
Present-Day Idealism 445
Reflections, Some Random 278
Robsart, The Death of Amy 131
Sand's Country, In George. By Miss BETHAM EDWARDS 382
School-Book, An Old. By J. H. RAVEN . 437
Shakespeare, A Translator of 104
Strange Temptation, A 215
Van Storck, Sebastian. By WALTER PATER 348
Vastness. By LORD TENNYSON '. 1
Victor Graham 364
Whist, American Leads at. By CAVENDISH 235
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\ MACMILLAN'S MAGAZINE
NOVEMBER, 1885.
VASTNESS.
i.
MANY a hearth upon our dark globe sighs after many a
vanished face,
Many a planet by many a sun may roll with the dust of
a vanish'd race.
II.
Raving politics, never at rest as this poor earth's pale
history runs,
What is it all but a trouble of ants in the gleam of a
million million of suns ?
in.
Lies upon this side, lies upon that side, truthless violence
mourn'd by the Wise,
Thousands of voices drowning his own in a popular torrent
of lies upon lies ;
No. 313. VOL. LIU. B
Vast ness.
IV.
Stately purposes, valour in battle, glorious annals of army
and fleet,
Death for the right cause, death for the wrong cause,
trumpets of victory, groans of defeat;
v.
Innocence seethed in her mother's milk, and Charity setting
the martyr aflame ;
Thraldom who walks with the banner of Freedom, and recks
not to ruin a realm in her name.
VI.
Faith at her zenith, or all but lost in the gloom of doubts
that darken the schools ;
Craft with a bunch of all-heal in her hand, follow' d up by
her vassal legion of fools ;
VII.
Pain, that has crawl' d from the corpse of Pleasure, a worm
which writhes all day, and at night
Stirs up again in the heart of the sleeper, and stings him
back to the curse of the light;
VIII.
Wealth with his wines and { his wedded harlots ; Flattery
gilding the rift of a throne; ,
Opulent Avarice, lean as Poverty; honest Poverty, bare to
the bone ;
IX.
Love for the maiden crown'd with marriage, no regrets for
aught that has been,
Household happiness, gracious children, debtless competence,
golden mean;
x.
National hatreds of whole generations, and pigmy spites of
the village spire ;
Vows that will last to the last death-ruckle, and vows that
are snapt in a moment of fire ;
XI.
He that has lived for the lust of the minute, and died in
the doing it, flesh without mind ;
He that has nail'd all flesh to the Cross, till Self died out
in the love of his kind ;
XII.
Spring and Summer and Autumn and Winter; and all
these old revolutions of earth ;
All new-old revolutions of Empire change of the tide
what is all of it worth ?
XIII.
What the philosophies, all the sciences, poesy, varying voices
of prayer ?
All that is noblest, all that is basest, all that is filthy
with all that is fair?
B 2
"Fastness.
XIV.
What is it all, if we all of us end but in being our own
corpse-coffins at last,
Swallow'd in Vastness, lost in Silence, drown' d in the deeps
of a meaningless Past ?
xv.
What but a murmur of gnats in the gloom, or a moment's
anger of bees in their hive ?
Peace, let it be ! for I loved him, and love him for ever :
the dead are not dead but alive.
TENNYSON.
CULTURE AND SCIENCE. 1
IT is with some diffidence that I have
elected to address you to-day on the
subject of culture and science. I am
aware that I shall have to speak about
matters on which I am imperfectly
instructed in the presence of masters
of the craft ; and even to tread ground
on which the eminent man who opened
this college five years ago Professor
Huxley has unfurled the flag of
occupation. But after all, science and
culture are subjects of perennial in-
terest, upon which a good deal may be
said. And there is perhaps a certain
fitness in reverting, at the close of our
first college lustrum, and on a day
when the memory of our generous
founder and of our late venerable pre-
sident, Dr. Heslop, is fresh, to the
topics in which they were so deeply
interested.
But I must, at the outset, guard
myself against misapprehension. In
comparing culture and science, I have
no intention of contrasting the facul-
ties of arts and science in this or any
other college. I must claim the
original right of a speaker to define
the terms he uses in his own way.
By science I do not mean merely the
science of nature ; by culture I do
not mean merely literary culture. Nor
is it the object of this address to define
the position and relations of classics
and physical science in the school
curriculum. I am about to speak to
students of a " miniature University"
about university studies. And my
object is to indicate the relations of
science in the widest sense and let-
ters to culture. Let us first ask,
" What is science ? "
1 An Address delivered at the Distribution
of Prizes in the Mason College, Birmingham
(October 1st, 1885), by E. A. Sonnenschein,
M.A., Professor of Classics, and Chairman of
the Academic Board.
By science I understand organised
knowledge, working by method, based
on evidence, and issuing in the dis-
covery of law. By culture I mean the
complete spiritual development of the
individual. The object of science is
exact knowledge ; the object of cul-
ture is a complete human being.
Nor can I admit that this view is
arbitrary. Underlying much con-
fusion of thought and polemical per-
versity, I find some such distinction
as I have indicated present to the
consciousness of educated men and
women.
In contending, then, that the dis-
tinction between science and culture
is not coincident with the distinction
between the study of the external
universe on the one hand and the
study of letters on the other, let me
first try to show that science does not
exclude letters that letters admit of
a scientific treatment just as much as
the phenomena of light or the circula-
tion of the blood.
Having given an extended sense to
the word science, I will indicate the
part that it plays in culture; and
finally I will maintain that, though an
essential factor in culture, it is not the
only factor. I will try to show that
science embraces one aspect of letters,
but is itself only one element in a
wider conception of culture.
I do not wish to base my argument
on authority ; but it is the fashion
nowadays to appeal on important
questions to Germany, and I will
remind you that the word Wissenschaft
is by no means so restricted in its use
as our corresponding English word
" science " sometimes is. Wissenschaft
scientific knowledge embraces
philology, philosophy, theology, laws,
no less than mathematics and the
branches included under the name
6
Culture and Science.
Naturwissenschaftj chemistry, physics,
biology, and so on. This is not a mere
question of terminology ; under dis-
tinctions of words there generally lie
distinctions of things, and by this use
of their word Wissenschaft the Ger-
mans the most active body of ex-
plorers in the world declare that
they regard all these subjects as
admitting of scientific treatment ; and
they make it the chief business of
their Universities to treat them in
this way. The word arts I cannot
but regard as unfortunate. It carries
very little meaning in it. There are
fine arts, and arts which are not fine.
There are even black arts. But why
philology, for instance, should be
called an art, and medicine a science,
does not appear, except to the historic
consciousness.
My illustrations shall be derived
chiefly from the subject in which I am
personally most interested the study
of classical philology. Classics is a
wide field, and includes two main divi-
sions interpretation, and textual
criticism. It embraces in its scope
several departments, such as ancient
history, archaeology, mythology, epi-
graphy, palaeography. The latter is
the study of manuscripts, and aims at
determining the method of deciphering
them, and the law of error in them.
The object of the whole of classical
philology is to restore a picture of
human life in the Greek and Roman
world. The object of textual criticism
is the restoration of texts, the dis-
covery of what the classical writers
really said. This it effects by exposing
the traces of detrition in them, the
havoc which time and error have
wrought, and by finding the true
way of repairing their devastations.
George Eliot speaks with light
banter of inventing a few Greek
emendations, as if emendation were
mere guesswork, to be thrown off in
a careless hour for the amusement
of the world of scholars and the
advertisement of one's own ingenuity.
But to emend scientifically is no light
task. The scholar must employ
method and proof if his work is to
claim serious attention. To discover
that a passage is corrupt, he must have
found that this word, or this construc-
tion, or this rhythm, is a barbarism, or
at any rate is never so used by his
author ; that this sentiment or allusion
is an anachronism ; he must, in fact,
discover or rectify the law of the word,
the law of the sentence, the law of the
metre. Here there is plenty of room
for independent observation. These
laws are not to be found ready-made in
grammars ; an emendation really new
must be based on nothing less than a
new examination of the facts. The
proof of corruption of the text lies in
the application of the resulting laws
to a particular passage. To emend is
to form an hypothesis as to the original
constitution of the passage an hypo-
thesis which must pass through the
ordeal of verification by all the known
laws palseographical, linguistic, his-
toric, and other.
Let us not be dominated by the
phrase "inductive science." Each
science has its own peculiar methods,
in which induction and deduction,
observation and experiment, play
parts more or less prominent. The
methods of physics are not identically
the methods of the so-called natural
sciences. Mathematics is not usually
reckoned as an inductive science at
all. But the methods and results of
one and all may be equally scientific
may be alike calculated to carry an
authoritative power of conviction.
No doubt the processes of textual
criticism have been often conducted in
such a way as to lead to results which
were tentative, or even purely fanciful.
But other sciences too have passed
through an empirical stage. As
practised nowadays, especially in the
philological seminaries of Germany,
textual criticism may claim to rank
as a science ; its methods are well-
established, its results definite
KrrjfjLara es det, wrung from the wil-
derness of mediaeval barbarism by
the devoted efforts of armies of scho-
lars. If a scholar of the sixteenth
Culture and Science.
century could come to life, he would
be astonished at the magnitude of the
results which have been achieved.
He would find many a familiar in-
terpolation exscinded, many a sorry
gap filled up by probable or certain
conjectures, many a line nay, even a
whole author restored to metrical
form. It is scarcely too much to say
that the face of classical literature has
undergone, and is undergoing, a pro-
cess of renovation.
I might extend my illustrations al-
most infinitely. There is comparative
philology, one of the most brilliant
examples of what can be effected by
scientific research in the field of lan-
guage. It has opened up to us
glimpses into a past far more remote
than the beginnings of history ; it has
given us a far from colourless picture
of early Aryan civilisation, and a still
fuller account of the periods when
the western Aryans separated from
their eastern kinsfolk. I might quote
the marvellous discoveries in the
history of Assyria and Egypt, the
deciphering of the cuneiform cha-
racter and the hieroglyphics. There
is comparative mythology, which has
brought to light the various deposits
of nature worship, hero worship, and
primitive custom embedded in the soil
of language, like the remains of ex-
tinct animals in the crust of the earth.
All these sciences are sisters german
of anthropology and archaeology. To
sketch the early condition of man
many different kinds of evidence must
be pressed into the service ; and the
study of language is not the least of
them.
By a similar argument I might es-
tablish the claims of history, of soci-
ology, of political economy to the name
of sciences. All the great products of
human thought and human life may
form the subject-matter of science, if
examined on scientific principles.
Let us, then, cease to oppose one
subject to another as scientific and
non-scientific. The distinction is not
in subjects, but in methods of treating
them. Let us hold fast to the position
that science is a particular method of
treating subjects, leading to results of
a particular kind.
I am not going to discuss the ques-
tion of the school curriculum. But
even at the risk of seeming to adopt
the platform that there is " nothing
like leather," I will say one word
upon the educational value of these
studies. If scientific in themselves,
they may be so taught as to furnish a
scientific discipline. The highest ideal
of teaching is that which follows the
path of discovery, leading the pupil
along lines which an original dis-
coverer pursued, or might have pur-
sued. And I do not know that there
is any better field for educating the
logical powers than the scientific treat-
ment of language and the products of
literature. Am I confronted with the
statement that these studies depend on
authority ? Not, I reply, if they are
taught and studied rationally. Whose
authority 1 Not the authority of the
classics themselves. The days are
past when men set the classics of
Greece and Home on an icy pinnacle of
excellence by themselves, unapproach-
able by the literary masters of other
countries. All serious students of the
classics know, or ought to know, that
not all the writers of Greece and Rome
are equally worthy of admiration and
imitation. Nor would any classical
teacher, I imagine, claim special con-
sideration for any opinions expressed
by these writers. Is it the authority
of the grammar that is referred to ? I
reply that a grammar is not the arbi-
trary creation of schoolmasters, but
the record of law discovered by the
patient observation of ages, and liable
to revision by any independent in-
quirer into the phenomena of lan-
guage. No, the doctrine of the in-
fallibility of the Eton grammar, like
the doctrine of the plenary inspiration
of manuscripts, has had its day. I
believe that so far from fostering a
blind adherence to authority, there is
no discipline more helpful in liberating
the mind from the thraldom of words.
Hear one, who cannot himself be
8
Culture and Science.
charged with any prejudice in favour
of authority the late John Stuart
Mill : " To question all things, never
to turn away from any difficulty, to ac-
cept no doctrine either from ourselves
or from other people without a rigid
scrutiny by negative criticism ; letting
no fallacy or incoherence or confusion
of thought step by unperceived ; above
all, to insist upon having the meaning
of a word clearly understood before
using it, and the meaning of a propo-
sition before assenting to it these are
the lessons we learn from ancient
dialecticians." And again, " In cul-
tivating the ancient languages. . . .
we are all the while laying an admir-
able foundation for ethical and philo-
sophical culture."
And this is not the expression of an
isolated opinion. The unanimous and
maturely -considered verdict of the
University of Berlin, contained in the
memorial addressed in the year 1880
to the Prussian Minister of Education
on the question of the admission of
Realschiiler pupils of modern schools
to the University, constitutes, per-
haps, the most important modern tes-
timony to the value of a classical edu-
cation. This memorial was signed by
all the members of the philosophical
faculty, including such names as
Hoffmann, the chemist ; Helmholtz,
the physicist ; Peters, the naturalist ;
Zeller, the philosopher; as well as
Mommsen, the classical philologist ;
Zupitza, the English philologist;
Curtius, the historian. I am aware
that the whole of Germany is not
unanimous upon the educational ques-
tions raised in the Berlin memorial ;
but they are nevertheless worthy of
our most earnest attention. The in-
teresting point of the memorial is the
emphasis with which it insists on the
value of classical philology in cultivat-
ing what it calls " the ideality of the
scientific sense, the interest in science
not dependent upon, nor limited by,
practical aims, but ministering to the
liberal education of the mind as such,
the many-sided and broad exercise of
the thinking faculty." By science is
of course here meant not merely the
science of nature. But the science of
nature is included. Germany has built
temples and palaces for the study of
nature, as Professor Hoffmann says.
But she cultivates philology side by
side with nature more assiduously
than ever; and here we have some
of her leading physicists and natural-
ists joining hands with the philologists,
and coming forward to tell the world
that they Consider classics not in the
light of a foe, but rather as a discipline
of peculiar value as a preparation for
other scientific pursuits. And the
German Universities are schools of
universal learning. Here are a few
statistics. In the year 1880 the Ger-
man Universities numbered in all
eighteen hundred and nine teachers,
including extraordinary professors and
Privat-Docenten. Of these, nine hun-
dred and thirty belonged to the philo-
sophical faculty, which includes what
we should call the faculties of science
and arts. Now, how are these nine
hundred and thirty teachers distri-
buted ? About one-third of them re-
present mathematics and the sciences
of nature; the other two-thirds are
engaged upon classical philology, ori-
ental philology, modern philology (the
latter two branches are increasing in
numbers from year to year), arch-
seology, history, political science, and
philosophy. The numbers at Leipsic
were :
Total of ordinary professors (not includ-
ing extraordinary professors and Privat-
Docenten) 34
f Professors of Classical Philology 5
Oriental and Modem
Philology 9
23 1 Archaeology 2
History 2
Philosophy 2
Political Economy 3
Mathematics and As-
tronomy 4
Physical and Natural
Science 7
If we consider the numbers of
students, the proportions are similar.
In 1881-82, the German Universities
numbered about twenty-four thousand
Culture and Science.
students ; of these, nine thousand
five hundred were members of the
philosophical faculty rather more
than five students for each professor.
And the percentages of their distribu-
tion were :
Students of Philology, Philoso-
phy, History, &c 63 per cent.
Students of Mathematics and
the Sciences of Nature 37 ,,
But I must in fairness also mention
the fact that during forty years the
students of mathematics and the
sciences of nature have increased ten-
fold, while those of philology and his-
tory have not yet been tripled ; and also
that of the three-fold increase in stu-
dents of philology, a large part is due
to the students of modern philology.
On the other hand, the ten-fold in-
crease is largely due to the mathema-
ticians. And it is a curious fact that
the study of medicine is not making
such strides in popular favour as the
philological and historical sciences. 1
I cannot give you accurate statistics
about France or America ; but the
recent announcement of the prospectus
of the Johns Hopkins University in
Baltimore, of no less than thirteen
advanced courses of lectures in ori-
ental philology alone, shows that one
university of the United States, at
any rate, does not regard physical
science and philology as inconsistent
ends.
The nineteenth century the "so-
called nineteenth century," as an
indignant and sarcastic lecturer is said
to have called it is marked by a
powerful re-action against the tradi-
tion of an exclusive classical education.
France led the way, at the end of last
century, by abolishing her classical
schools and setting up polytechnics in
their place ; and although she soon
repented and returned to the paths of
Greek and Latin, recent changes, and
especially those made under the minis-
try of M. Jules Ferry in 1880, seem to
point to another oscillation in the
1 See Conrad's German Universities for the
last Fifty Years, translated by J. Hutchison.
direction of the ideas of the Revolution.
Germany is agitated by the question of
modern as against classical education.
In England, one parliamentary com-
mission after another has reported
upon the deficient provision for science
teaching in our public and endowed
schools, apparently without much effect
upon the majority of schools in ques-
tion. Physical science and modern
languages are in revolt, demanding
and demanding justly a fair recogni-
tion in our school curriculum. The
claims of their most accredited cham-
pions are strictly moderate, and the
enlightened educationist must, I think,
pronounce their revolt to be completely
justified, and sympathise with an agi-
tation the object of which is to remove
the educational ban laid by our tradi-
tional system upon the study of nature
and modern languages.
But sometimes physical science,
arrogating the broader name of science,
takes up an aggressive attitude, and
exhibits a special animus against what
it calls "dead languages." "Sweep
away the lumber of the middle ages,"
it cries ; " cease mumbling of the dry
bones^ of "your| classics, and open the
book "of nature." It would appear
that physical science, like Ireland,
cannot get her grievances redressed
without threatening the sister realm.
But this attitude of aggression is
essentially of the nature of temporary
reaction ; its representatives might do
well to bear in mind that a reaction,
pushed too far, may provoke a counter
reaction.
But this r ^is{by way of digression.
Permit me to remind you of the general
drift of my argument. So far I have
been claiming language and literature
as departments of science. But this
was not my main object. My main
object is to define the relations of
science and letters to culture.
Perhaps it is unnecessary for me
to dwell much upon the importance of
science as an element of culture. But
I desire to lay some emphasis upon
what I may call the formative function
of science, because in the first place I
io
Culture and Science.
have extended tbe use of the word,
and in the second place there is one
point of view in which the man of
science, and especially the student of
nature, appears to be often misunder-
stood. " A mere specialist " has be-
come a term of reproach. Now I will
not deny that specialism has its dan-
gers. We all know the scarabseist of
Wendell Holmes, who sunk his life
in beetles, and regarded the man pro-
fessing to be an entomologist as neces-
sarily a humbug. There is the classi-
cal scholar who, as JByron says :
" Of Grecian dramas _ vaunts the deathless
fame,
Of Avon's bard remembering scarce the
name."
There is the German student of
American politics who follows the
minutest ramifications of parties across
the Atlantic, but has neither thought
nor interest for the political problems
of his own country. Science is long,
life short. And we are sometimes
tempted to fear that science may be-
come so split up like the practical
arts that every man will be working
at a branch of the subject which no
one cares for or can understand except
himself.
" Im engen Kreis verengert sich der Sinn," *
says Goethe. " Culture means com-
pensation of bias," says Emerson ; and
in a similar spirit Dr. Martineau, the
venerable ex-principal of Manchester
New College, has recently told us that
he compelled himself when a young
man to devote his best energies to the
subjects for which he had no aptitude,
leaving those for which he had a gift
to take care of themselves. So con-
siderable are the dangers of specialism.
But there is another side to the
picture. I submit that specialism
may be claimed as an essential element
in the life of the mind, and that from
the point of view of culture. This
may sound paradoxical ; but a man's
bias is at least part of himself ; and
there is something in the consecration
1 "In a narrow sphere the mind becomes
narrowed."
of all the faculties to a limited field,
which braces the mind and gives it
intellectual grip. Specialism means
depth of insight, the probing a subject
to the core ; it means discovery, it
means originality. I believe it means
development of character and growth
of the capacity for knowledge. Let
me compare the mind to a house with
many windows. For a vital compre-
hension of truth, I would prefer to
look through one window thoroughly
cleaned, than through all of them only
half purified from the obscuring
medium of error and prejudice. To
the young student especially I would
say : " Clean one of your windows ; be
not content until there is one branch
of your subject if it be only one
branch of a branch which you under-
stand as thoroughly as you are capable
of understanding it, until your sense
of truth is satisfied, and you have
intellectual conviction.' 7 Be assured
that in learning this one thing you
will have added an eye to your mind,
an instrument to your thought, and
potentially have learned many things.
In the life of the mature investigator
specialism plays a similar part ; to
remain healthy, he must continually
drink deep at the fountain head ; he
must go further than others have gone
before him; and to this end he must
devote what may seem to outsiders an
abnormal amount of time and energy
to his special department. It is too
common an experience that the man
of mere general culture loses interest
in what he "studies ; his mind ranges
over wide tracts, through which he is
guided by no central idea or dominant
conviction ; he acquires a habit of
thinking, like the typical Oxford man,
that "there is nothing new, nothing
true, and it does not much matter."
The cure for this intellectual ailment
is concentration. Let the sufferer
make some little plot of ground his
own; let him penetrate through and
beyond the region of literary ortho-
doxy, and he will find that the universe
is not exhausted by even the highest
thoughts of the greatest minds ; that
Culture and Science.
11
truth has ever new lights for the
inquirer, and that the humble efforts
of pigmies like himself may by com-
bination lead to the scaling of heights
which even giants could not take by
storm.
Do not, then, neglect the scientific
attitude in your studies. Whatever
it be that you are engaged upon
whether chemistry or physics, or bio-
logy or geology, whether mathematics
or classics, or some modern language
or literature make it your effort, if
possible, to be a discoverer, on however
small a scale, or at any rate to exer-
cise independent thought.
I have accentuated the importance
of the scientific attitude in the develop-
ment of mind. But a further and
important question remains. Is the
scientific attitude the only and all-
sufficient attitude ? Let us consider
more closely what the method of
science involves. The object of science
is essentially to arrange phenomena
in the most simple way to introduce
order into our conceptions of things.
To effect this, each science adopts a
single point of view, and is compelled
to deal with single aspects of things
employs, in fact, division of labour. For
to treat all aspects at once would be to
introduce cross divisions into science,
and so make it unscientific. Thus
mathematics, for instance, deals with
things from the point of view of
number and space ; physics treats
them as exhibiting energy ; chemistry
as compounded or uncompounded ;
biology as living ; psychology as think-
ing and feeling ; sociology as living in
societies or states. Comte sketched
out a pyramid of the sciences, in which
they were arranged in a sort of hier-
archy of complexity ; at the base the
most general and simple, at the apex
the most special and complex. But,
whether more or less complex, each
science deals with its one aspect of
things, and that only. No single
science can exhaust even the smallest
concrete thing. A piece of chalk
represents for the physicist a certain
group of forces ; for the chemist certain
elements combined in certain propor-
tions ; for the geologist a certain stage
in the history of the earth's crust.
To the political economist man is
wealth-producing, for political eco-
nomy deals mainly with human nature
as concerned in wealth. Each science,
then, consciously limits its view, in
order that it may give a more com-
plete account of one phase of things
directs its energies into one channel
in order to give force to the stream.
In other words, science is abstract.
But man is not content always to
confine his view to aspects of things ;
he needs also to regard them as
wholes. It is true that the several
sciences to a certain extent supple-
ment one another. The man who is
acquainted with physics, chemistry,
geology, and other sciences, has an
insight into several aspects of the
same lump of chalk. But still the
unity, the wholeness, may be missed.
For, though the whole is made up of its
parts, it cannot be conceived by addi-
tion of isolated conceptions of parts.
This has been expressed with fine
sarcasm by Goethe's Mephistopheles :
" Wer will was Lebendig's erkennen und
beschreiben,
Sucht erst den Geist herauszutreiben,
Dann hat er die Theile in seiner Hand,
Fehlt leider nur das geistige Band. " *
How, then, are we to grasp the
" spirit that binds things together 2 "
The answer is, by another than the
scientific method by the method of
poetry. Science analyses and arranges
according to special aspects ; poetry
bodies forth conceptions of wholes,
rejecting all definition by limitation,
sacrificing detail for breadth. The
poet's aim is to build up again in his
own soul the unity of things, which
science is always breaking down ; to
find in the universe an object which
can satisfy the claims of his emotional
as well as his intellectual, nature.
1 "The man who seeks to know and de-
scribe a living thing first drives the spirit out
of it : he then holds the parts in his hand ;
but alas ! the spirit that bound them together
has departed."
12
Cultilre and Science.
Thus, if in one sense it is true that
poetry always lags a little behind
science, turning the laborious results
of one generation into the fairy
tales of the next, in another sense
poetry anticipates science ; the vision
of the poet dimly traces out the lines
along which the science of the future
will march. Shall I seem to be trying
to run with the hare and hunt with
the hounds, if I say that some of the
highest generalisations of science
appear to me to be in large degree
of the nature of poetry anticipations
of nature, conceived and believed long
before anything like adequate evi-
dence was forthcoming 'I I would
name the doctrines of the conserva-
tion of energy and the evolution of
life. The latter may be read, in a
somewhat archaic form, in the philo-
sophic poem of Lucretius, written
nearly two thousand years ago ; and I
can well believe that it was present
to Darwin as a poetic idea before he
conceived of the exact method of its
demonstration.
No doubt poetry must renounce the
severity and caution of which science
is so justly proud. For the objects at
which the poet " throws out "his con-
ception are too great to be compassed
by definition, and his ideas will often
be pronounced faulty by the future
researcher. But he is content in his
own sphere of work that of a maker
or creator knowing that his results,
too, are unapproachable by the scien-
tific man. No amount of psychology
would create a Hamlet.
And, if the results of poetry are
different from those of science, so is
the form into which the poet throws
his ideas. He does not aim at an
iron rigidity of logical proof, but
rather at a lightness of touch which
hints rather than demonstrates, veils
while it unveils. The ideal of science
is exhaustive demonstration; that of
poetry imaginative creation. The poet
does not attempt to give new know-
ledge ; rather he takes the reader into
partnership, and tries, by the power
of sympathy, to awaken his slumber-
ing conceptions. And the products
of literature can be apprehended only
imaginatively. If we seek for demon-
stration, we find emptiness. I know
of a young man, trained in mathe-
matics and Latin grammar, who pa-
tiently almost pathetically read and
re-read his Sartor Resartus in the hope
of finding a syllogism or some sem-
blance of a proposition of Euclid in it,
and who did not understand it. Like
the mathematical reader of Paradise
Lost, he could not make out that it
proved anything. Perhaps it would
not be going too far to say that, in
the interests of science itself, we
ought to cultivate the capacity for a
non-scientific attitude. For the first
attitude in approaching an object,
whether natural or literary, should be
a receptive one. The widening of
one's experience, letting things tell
their own tale, even the attitude of
mere passive enjoyment, will often
carry the beginner further in under-
standing than a relentless search for
law.
Nature, then, is not exhausted by
the most complete inquiry into her
laws taken separately. It still re-
mains to conceive her as a whole to
apprehend her by the imagination ;
and some of her secrets reveal them-
selves less to the microscope than to
the poetic eye. " This most excellent
canopy, the air, look you, this brave
o'erhanging firmament, this majestical
roof fretted with golden fire" how
many a digger and delver in the cause
of science has presented to them a
mind petrified by absorption in a fixed
idea, and insensible to their magic 1
" We live by admiration " is one of
the favourite texts of Wordsworth.
The scientist seeks not to live, but to
reduce things to his categories of
thought. Like Mr. Browning's Para-
celsus :
" He still must hoard and keep and class all
truths
With one ulterior purpose : he must know. "
To him nature is indeed never a mere
" pestilential congregation of vapours."
Culture and Science.
13
For there is the beauty of her law
ever unfolding itself before his eyes ;
" the heavens " it has been said, " de-
clare to him the glory of Kepler and
Newton." But this is not all their
glory. He must have something of
the poetic mind if he would feel the
awe and rapture with which Kant
gazed upon the starry heavens, and
Linnaeus upon the gorse in blossom ; if
he would see nature as she paints
herself upon the canvas of Turner ;
if he would love her as Words-
worth loved her. Otherwise the soul
of nature escapes his ken ; we may
say of Nature what Schiller says of
truth generally :
" Dich zu fangen, ziehen sie aus mit Netzen
und Stangen,
Aber mit Geistestritt schreitest du mitten
hindurch." 1
Let me further illustrate this diffe-
rence of attitude in dealing with the
products of literature. The scientific
observer brings them into the field of
the grammatical microscope or the
historic telescope. But their aroma is
apt to vanish in the process. One may
have ransacked the Iliad and the
Odyssey to discover the development
of a mood or a particle, while remain-
ing wall-eyed to the beauty of these
poems ; one may be an authority on
the Homeric question without having
known Homer. I would not call such
a man a pedant ; but I would say that
he has confined himself to one aspect
of the poet and missed his poetry. A
fair country lies around him, waiting
for illumination from the dawn of
poetic imagination. He gropes in it,
guided only by the uncertain beams of
his grammatical candle. For to enter
into the conceptions of the poet, one
must be something of a poet oneself ;
one needs, at any rate, some literary
experience. A sense of humour is
one thing ; an inquiry into the
humorous the rationale of humour
is quite another.
1 "To catch thee they take the field with
nets and poles ; but thou, like a spirit, passest
through the midst of them. "
I think a protest is needed at
the present day against an exclusive
devotion to the scientific side of
literature, and especially of classical
literature. The laws and history of
the classical languages are the main
objects of work in our classical
schools and universities ; grammar
tends to replace literature, prosody
is substituted for poetry, and little
room is left for the play of con-
templative imagination. This perhaps
cannot be otherwise so long as we live
under the whips and scorpions of an
exigent examination system ; for the
scientific side of literature presents
obvious advantages, in the examination
room, both to examiners and exami-
ned. Literary culture, like astronomy,
does not pay. So our students learn
to translate and compose, but not to
read or appreciate; and the literary
artists are approached through the
medium of what the scientific scholars
have said about them. It is commonly
believed abroad that the English man
of business, or country squire, re-
freshes his soul during the long winter
evenings by reading his Yirgil or
Horace. This is, I am told, an ex-
aggeration, and likely to be less true
since it has ceased to be the fashion
for members of Parliament to quote
Horace in the House or at any rate
to quote him correctly. However, in
the treatment of the classics as litera-
ture, we might perhaps do well to
remember the best traditions of Eng-
lish scholarship, and emulate the wider
and more liberal reading of the age
of Bentley.
Again in history we have the same
two elements the scientific and the
purely literary. I have no wish to
depreciate the great achievements of
scientific history a science which has
resulted in discoveries as instructive
as those of palaeontology or geology.
It is an admirable thing to weigh
evidence, and to correct hasty judg-
ments by fuller research ; but history,
written in this spirit only, loses its
power of inspiration, of kindling the
imagination at the thought of great
Culture and Science.
deeds and great men, and of carrying
the reader on the wings of sympathy
into a remote past. And this its
dramatic or poetic function is surely
one at least of the functions of history.
Here then you have my conception
.of the prime essentials of culture in
the two attitudes of mind the scien-
tific and the poetic. Intellectual man-
hood is not reached till concentration,
exact inquiry, begins ; but the mind
grows poor without the poetical spirit.
There is one truth of science, and an-
other of poetry, and both are indispens-
able. But it is not many subjects that
are needed for culture ; rather it is a
manysidedness of mind by which to
conceive things both scientifically and
imaginatively. To maintain this two-
fold attitude is, I know, not easy.
Men inspired with the ardour of pur-
suit, and conscious of the limitless field
of research right ahead, may say with
Luther, " God help me, I can no
other ; " and he would be a bold man
who ventured to cast a stone at them.
" The ink of science," says a Mo-
hammedan proverb, " is more precious
than the blood of martyrs." But the
victories of science too have been
achieved not without sweat and blood.
Let us not fail to remember the cost
to the intellectual martyrs them-
selves. They have nobly served hu-
manity ; but they have sacrificed their
own development. The Nemesis is in-
evitable ; we cannot, for our own sakes,
afford to be less than cultured. Nay,
we cannot afford to be less than cul-
tured for others' sakes. Culture as
well as science has its altruistic side.
Society is the gainer by every com-
plete unit that is added to it, and
enriched by every ideal human
creature.
I do not mean to say that he who
commands both attitudes of mind
possesses all knowledge. Man's mind
I have compared to a house with
many windows : some of them, let us
say, look out upon the trees and
flowers of the garden ; others are
turned towards the street, crowded
with human life ; its skylights look
upon the heavens. Doubtless it were
a grand thing to have knowledge of
all the great objects of human con-
templation ; but we must recognise the
limitations of our nature, and renounce
the impossible.
On the other hand, we may con-
sole ourselves with the reflection
that one subject deeply studied in-
volves examination of others. No man
can thoroughly probe a difficult ques-
tion of law without coming upon
problems of morals, politics, and
religion ; no one can carry his re-
searches into language far without
solving on the way many a question
of logic and even metaphysics. In this
way one science leads over to another ;
and the specialist is not so incomplete
as he is sometimes supposed to be.
His knowledge stretches itself out in
many directions, like the branches of
a tree, which spring from a single
trunk and are centred in it. Still no
man can be a master of all sciences.
But there is one kind of knowledge
of which we must all take account
all must be students in the school of
life and manners. Some practical ex-
perience of men and affairs is essential
to character and social refinement.
" Es bildet em Talent sich in der Stille ;
Sich. ein Charakter in dem Strom der Welt." 1
For those who have not yet stepped
forth into the arena of public life,
there is the microcosm of school or
college in which they may learn many
of the lessons which the great world
teaches. This social life is a hardly
less important feature of n. college than
the lecture room. And I hope that
while in the latter you will imbibe
something more than you can get from
books, catching the contagion of the
lecture room and laboratory the vis
viva of nascent thought you will, by
contact with one another in the com-
mon rooms and Union, gain that edu-
cation of which Oxford and Cambridge
are so justly proud the experience of
the world, which makes a man.
1 " Genius develops in retirement ; a
character in the stream of life." GOETHE.
Culture and Science.
15
Let me cast a brief glance upon the
general aim and purport of what I
have said. The prime essentials of cul-
ture are science and poetry ; and they
may be cultivated without spreading
ourselves impartially over the whole
field of knowledge, without ascetically
denying our special bent. One branch
of either of the great departments,
nature and literature, may give us
scope for both energies of soul ; but
the student of nature cannot be inde-
pendent of the aid of poetry, unless,
indeed, he is a poet himself. Farther,
in resigning claims to universal know-
ledge, we may remember that to
command one department is to com-
mand many potentially, and even
involves inquiry into, and partial grasp
of, subjects lying outside it. Finally,
life is long enough to admit of our
making practical experience of our
fellow men, without which we our-
selves are scarcely human.
I do not know whether my concep-
tion of the distinction between science
and poetry will be accepted. I am
aware that some philosophers even
Plato give a very different account of
poetry, reducing it to mere imitation
and subjective fancy. The position of
co-ordinator which I have given to
poetry is assigned by Plato to
dialectic, that is, philosophy, which
he calls the " coping stone of the
sciences." But I think you will agree
with me that there is a difference
between poetry and science, and that
both are essential elements of culture.
And perhaps what Plato means by
" philosophy " is not. after all, so very
different from what I mean by poetry
from the highest kind of poetry.
Philosophy might be called poetry
in undress. The late Mark Patti-
son spoke of philosophy as a dis-
position, a method oL conceiving
things not a series of demonstra-
ble propositions. In this sense it
means the power of escaping from
one's own limitations, and of rising to
higher conceptions ; the capacity of
reverence for the wider universe of
which one's positive knowledge touches
merely the fringe ; the saving know-
ledge by which man corrects the
tendencies to intellectual arrogance :
and this is what I mean by poetry.
Plato prophesied, half seriously, that
the State would never cease from ill
till philosophers became kings, or
kings philosophers. For the academic
workers of the future I do not
demand royal prerogatives. But if
the University is worthy of its calling
the people will look to it for intellec-
tual light and leading. England is
waking up to the paramount import-
ance of education ; to this question
the new Democracy is sure to turn
with increasing earnestness. Is it
too much to hope that the University
will hold its position at the helm of
the educational system? From the
University the nation will expect
guidance in developing the education
of the people ; and if it is not to be
false to its trust, it must take up the
problem of education in a serious, in a
scientific spirit. Teaching may be
called a science or an art ; but the
enlightened know that it admits of
definite principles and of progress ;
and progress, even in details, involves
far-reaching consequences to millions.
In the science of education England is
far behind the foremost nations of
Europe perhaps behind America.
This deficiency is nothing less than a
"national calamity." To faulty and
antiquated methods of teaching we
may safely attribute much of that ill-
success in the race of life of which we
have recently heard such just com-
plaints. The future of England hangs
not only on the recognition of physical
science, but far more upon the creation
of a high ideal of teaching, and the
total abolition of that senseless ingur-
gitation of compendious statements,
which has usurped its place in the
national consciousness.
I am drawing near the conclusion
of my task. I fear I have already
taxed your patience too far. One
word in conclusion.
A genial bishop was in the habit of
inquiring from his candidates for
16
Culture and Science.
ordination whether they were married.
" Happy man !" cried the prelate if the
answer was given in the affirmative ;
if in the negative, his formula of
benediction was, " Lucky dog." In a
similar spirit I would address the
younger members of this college who
have elected to be members of the
faculties of science or the faculties of
arts respectively. Those of you who
pursue physical science have before
you a sphere worthy of all the highest
energies of the mind. You will come
into direct contact with Nature get
to know her, not at second-hand from
her blurred reflection in books, but
face to face. The field on which the
victories of physical science have been
won is teeming with problems of the
widest bearing on many questions of
the day social, religious, and philo-
sophical, as well as natural. To the
scientific man belongs the " spirit of
the great world brooding upon things
to come." In a very true sense, his
is the future.
To the students of what I must still
call arts, I would say : You are about
to make personal acquaintance with
the great minds of the past. Before
you there will unfold itself a rich and
manifold life, to which you may be
brought very near. The inheritance
of the past is yours, and in the litera-
ture of your own and other countries
you may study the great generalisa-
tions of science, clarified by their pas-
sage through great minds, turned to
shape and incorporated in the con-
sciousness of the race by the pen of
poet and philosopher.
" Happy the man," sang Virgil,
" who has gained a knowledge of the
causes of things, and trampled all fear
under foot, and risen above relentless
Fate and the hungry clamour of death.
Yet not less blest is he who knows
the rustic gods even Pan, and old
Silvanus, and the sister nymphs."
Thrice happy he who has strength
" to do these things, and not to leave
the others undone." Firmly centred
in the present, he reaches a hand both
to the past and to the future. He is,
the true " heir of all the ages,"
17
AUSTRIA'S POLICY IN THE EAST.
BEFORE proceeding to examine the
position which Austria has assumed
in the East, it will be profitable to
consider the course she has pursued
since the Six Weeks' War thrust her
forth from the German Confederation.
In doing so, more regard must be had
for material facts than for the diplo-
matic bye-play and false lights which
have been employed to conceal the true
intent of her designs and course of
policy. The exclusion of Austria from
the German Bund having left her states-
men without a field for their diplomatic
activity in the west, impelled them
to seek new openings in the south-
east for the exercise of the propensity
to meddle in their neighbours' affairs
which has been a dominating vice in
the policy of the House of Hapsburg.
The early intentions of Count Beust,
on succeeding to the direction of
Austro-Hungarian affairs in 1866,
though calculated to disturb the poli-
tical status quo in the East so far as
the unprogressive Turkish rule in
Europe was concerned, appear to have
been founded on a statesmanlike and
true perception of the necessities of
the time. The Christian populations
of the Ottoman Empire were for the
first time awakening to the need of
higher political organisation, in which
freer scope than the Turk permitted
should be found for their intellectual
and material development. The Ser-
vian, Bulgarian, and Hellenic races,
groaning through centuries of despot-
ism under a power alien alike in blood
and religion, were becoming restless,
and striving, feebly though it may
have been, to throw off the hateful
yoke. It was in sympathy with their
aspirations and needs that the inten-
tions of Count Beust were conceived,
and they were such as must have met
with the approval of liberal-minded
No. 313. VOL. LIII.
men both in England and Europe at
large. But in lending a helping hand
to the Christians of the Turkish
dominions in Europe, Count Beust
contemplated no violent attack on
that shadowy fetish of British poli-
ticians for so many years after the
substance had ceased to exist the
integrity and independence of the
Ottoman Empire. A semi-political
independence under the sovereignty of
the Sultan was all that was aimed at.
It is not necessary here to specu-
late on what might have been the
issue of this change ; suffice it to
say that it was a solution at once
legitimate and eminently pacific. But
it did not meet the views of the court
party at. Vienna, which had not yet
recovered from the wound to its pride
and obstinacy inflicted by the forced
concession of Hungarian legislative
independence; nor did it enjoy the
approval of the moving spirit which
controls from Berlin the destinies of
Austria. Foreign and internal in-
fluences, both hostile to his policy in
the East, helped to bring about Count
Beust's downfall, and paved the way
for the advent to power of Count
Andrassy and the tortuou's courses
which have led to the position in
which Austria now finds herself,
whence to retrograde or to advance
is equally difficult and dangerous.
The first steps of the Andrassy policy
in the East were not, however, of too
pronounced a character, nor did they
by any means indicate the full inten-
tions of the new Chancellor ; though
had the Turks, who were more imme-
diately concerned, been possessed of
greater political foresight, they must
have discerned the dangers ahead.
The methods adopted were peaceful,
though it can hardly be supposed that
they were misunderstood by Russia.
c
18
Austria's Policy in the East
Steamers directed from Triest, took pos-
session of both the coasting and foreign
trade of Turkey. The Danube traffic
was monopolised by a company subsi-
dised from Vienna. The foreign and
internal postal system, except at Con-
stantinople, was almost completely in
the hands of the Austrian Lloyd's, and
controlled by Austrian officials. But
the Turks remained blind to the
dangers of the situation, and made
no effort to extricate themselves from
the meshes of the net Austria was in-
sensibly weaving round them. It is
true that under English auspices
attempts were made to develop the
postal system for the benefit of the
Ottoman Government ; but such was
the obstruction offered by Turkish
officials, in many cases prompted
from outside, that no practical re-
sult was possible. The power which
the apathy and indifference of
the Turkish Administration in this
way placed in the hands of the
Austrian Government was unlimited.
The markets of Turkey were inundated
with Vienna wares and Austrian
manufactures of the cheapest and
most inferior descriptions ; their cheap-
ness enabling them to completely oust
British and other goods from markets
in which the latter had once enjoyed
the monopoly. The Danube commerce
became almost exclusively Austrian ;
and the traveller in the East found no
other means of voyaging from port to
port but in vessels flying the nag of
the empire-kingdom. The Turkish
banner was nowhere seen. The in-
fluence conferred by the control of the
postal system of the Ottoman Empire
was less obvious and legitimate, but
infinitely greater. How many who
have resided in the East or travelled
there can tell of correspondence de-
layed or missing ! No government of
Europe knew more of the secrets of
the East than that of the Kaiser
Franz Josef, with its control of the
mail bags and the telegraph wires
carrying the news of the East to the
West. The exceptional means of in-
formation which it thus possessed
enabled the Austrian Cabinet, or, more
properly speaking, the Austrian Chan-
cellor, to follow at ease every phase in
the development of affairs in the Sul-
tan's dominions, and to strike in with
the effect possible only for those
familiar with each spring of action.
The first active steps of Austria in
bringing on the disintegration of the
Turkish Empire, which was solemnly
registered at Berlin in 1878, were
taken in Bosnia and Herzegovina.
The movements of the Panslavists in
Bulgaria through their committees at
Bucharest and in Russia were well
known, and their aims thoroughly
understood, at Vienna. Accordingly,
in 1875, measures leading to a rising
in Herzegovina were planned. Agents
provocateurs were sent to prepare the
way. The visit of the Emperor of
Austria to Dalmatia in April of that
year, and his reception of deputa-
tions from Herzegovina, were details
diligently and elaborately carried
out. Their meaning, however, was not
hidden entirely from the Turks, whose
suspicions appear to have been now
effectually roused. -In May, just after
the Austrian Emperor had returned
from Dalmatia, the Turks began send-
ing ammunition, arms, accoutrements,
and clothing for troops in large quanti-
ties by rail from Salonica to Mitrovitza,
whence they were despatched to depots
in Bosnia and Herzegovina. This unex-
pected action caused much speculation
among the Austrian agents who were
scattered over the country; and the
reinforcement of the garrisons in those
provinces caused the 'Austrian Govern-
ment to send a special diplomatic
agent to report on the actual state of
affairs. The personage selected for
this duty was the celebrated Baron
Hiibner, on whom the Emperor Napo-
leon inflicted the slight at that memor-
able New Year's reception of 1859
which heralded the War of Italian In-
dependence. At Serajevo, Baron Hiib-
ner found the now well-known Dervish
Pasha in command, and was received
by him with all the honours, and invited
to a review of the troops composing
Policy in the East.
19
the garrison. The incident which
occurred after the review, as described
by an eyewitness, was striking, and
must have suggested some suspicion
of the Turkish commander to the
mind of the Austrian envoy. In
replying to the compliments of the
Baron on the appearance of his troops,
the wily little Pasha said, " Yes,
Excellency ! You see here men devoted
to the defence of their country against
every foe, and who can go for twenty-
four hours on a drink of water ! "
From Serajevo the Baron continued
his journey to Mitrovitza by Novi
Bazar, stopping at various places on
the route where he was enabled to
communicate with the numerous
agents of his Government. From
Mitrovitza he travelled by special
train to Salonica. Here he remained
but three days ; but during this brief
period he was subjected to a slight from
the Turkish Yali or Governor-General
of the Province. On his making an
official call on the Yali, who had been
duly notified beforehand, accompanied
by the personnel of the Consulate, the
Turkish functionary did not accord
him the honour due to his position by
meeting him at the door of the recep-
tion room. An altercation ensued,
which was terminated by the offended
Ba-ron abruptly leaving the Konak
with his suite. Explanations which
were accepted as satisfactory were
made by the Yali, and the difficulty
was smoothed over. Returning from
Salonica t.he Austrian envoy travelled
only as far as Uskub by rail. From
there he took post horses to Belgrade
by way of Nisch. On the day follow-
ing his arrival at the Servian capital
the insurrection in Bosnia and Herze-
govina broke out.
Skilfully manipulated, the telegraph
wires under Austrian control conveyed
to the western capitals facts and state-
ments calculated to impress the idea
that the rising against the authority
of the Sultan was entirely due to
Russian emissaries and Panslav com-
mittees. But close observers saw be-
hind Ljubobratich and many others,
whose names the events of the day
made familiar to the English public,
the hands of the Austrian. The
thousands of refugees who found tem-
porary shelter during the troublous
times on Austrian soil were, in most
cases, refugees by instigation. Their
hospitable reception, and the few
thousands of pounds expended in their
maintenance, were among the claims
for which Austria was afterwards
indemnified at Berlin in 1878. At
the same time, with an impartiality
for which sufficient credit can hardly
be awarded her, the way was made
smooth for the suppression of the
insurrection by the Turks ; and the
Salonica-Mitrovitza railway, a line
owned in Austria and managed by
Austrian officials, was entirely at the
disposition of the Turkish Government,
whose troops, supplies, and stores were
carried over it on credit. With evi-
dence, ample and convincing, of the
aims of Austria before them, it was
but a question of time how soon the
Panslav party in Russia, and later on
the Russian Government itself, should
throw themselves into the struggle
which was manifestly impending. The
Montenegrin and Servian wars in
1876 ; the abortive rising in Bulgaria,
and the massacres south of the Balkans
in the same year ; the conference at
Constantinople, where the peculiar line
of policy which characterised thfl deal-
ings of Lord Beaconsh'eld's Cabinet
with the Porte up to its overthrow in
1880 first disclosed itself were all
strands in the thread of policy directed
from Yienna and woven at Berlin.
Assuredly, had the Emperor of Russia
and his advisers foreseen the ultimate
issue to which events were tending,
they might even at the last moment
have stayed their hand. But it had
not yet been made clear to them that
the way to Constantinople lay through
Yienna. The Panslav party, which,
in its hatred of the Turk, aimed di-
rectly at the destruction of his detested
rule over their co-religionists and
brothers in race, had swept away by
its enthusiasm what power of resist-
c 2
20
Austria's Policy in the East.
ance there was in the autocracy. The
heart of the Turk was hardened by
his pride, and the conflicting official
and non-official advice of England pre-
disposed him to stiffen his neck. The
struggle which such conditions rendered
inevitable could not be long averted,
and the war, which was officially de-
clared on the twenty-third of April,
1877, was in the natural course of
events.
No one who saw the Ernperor Alex-
ander the Second at the conclusion
of the review of his troops on that
memorable day, on the Bessarabian
plain of Ungheni, when he gave
the final orders for the passage of
the Pruth, could fail to perceive
how deeply he seemed to feel the re-
sponsibility and importance of the
event. The shadow of the future
appeared already to have been cast
across his path as he quitted the
group of his generals, and, passing
quickly between the lines of people
who had collected at the railway
station, entered the train which was
to carry him back to his capital.
Compared with previous wars, the
military circumstances in which
Russia entered on the last conflict
with Turkey were immeasurably
greater in her favour. There were
then no tedious marches over desert
wastes, but railways, fairly organised,
brought the invading army to the
very banks of the Danube ; while the
alliance with Roumania seemed to
guarantee every facility which the
situation demanded for a successful
and speedy issue. Why, then, did
something akin to paralysis appear
to enfeeble the arm of Russia? The
answer is simple. The equivocal atti-
tude of Austria weighed like a night-
mare on the counsellors of the Emperor.
It is true Prince Bismarck had declared
that the Eastern Question did not call
for the active intervention of Ger-
many ; and that Austria had virtually
thrown over Turkey in refusing to
carry out, in conjunction with Eng-
land and France (who also repudiated
her engagement), the tripartite treaty
of 1856, which guaranteed the in-
tegrity and independence of the Otto-
man Empire. Nevertheless, the hand
of Austria pressed heavily on the arm
of the Czar. Very soon after the
declaration of war, Austria had made
it clear to the Russian Government
that their operations were to be
strictly confined to Turkish territory.
Any attempt of Servia to take up
arms in aid of Russia was frus-
trated by the threat of an occupation
of Belgrade by Austrian troops, and
Roumanian soil was to be respected
on condition that the Roumanian ter-
ritory west of the Aluta was not made
the base of active operations against
the Turks in Bulgaria. The effect of
this was doubly favourable to the
Turks, who, relieved from menace to
their left flank, were enabled, leaving
but twelve thousand men to hold
Widdin, to concentrate the whole of
their strength on the centre and right
of their line of defence. Indecision
was perceptible in the Russian con-
duct and counsels throughout the
whole campaign. Doubts of Germany,
and absolute distrust of Austria, hin-
dered vigorous action on the part of
the Russian generals ; while the Turk,
stimulated to resistance by false assur-
ances of English support, and buoyed
up by deceitful promises, was bleeding
at every pore. When, finally, with
Russia well-nigh exhausted and Turkey
prostrate, Servia was released from
the leash, it was because Austria's end
was served, and neither combatant
could be much benefited or more
gravely injured by withholding the
feeble principality. The aim of Austria
was but to prevent Servia from being
employed as a base for the operation of
Russian influence on the Slavs of
Bosnia, Herzegovina, Montenegro, and
Macedonia those provinces on which
her covetous eye had been so long fixed.
The fall of Plevna, the subsequent
passage of the Balkans, the complete
and irretrievable collapse of the Turk-
ish defence, and the appearance of
Skobeleff's division, reduced and fever-
stricken as it was, before Constant!-
Austria's Policy in the East.
21
nople, were but details in the hastening
of the crisis which brought into play
the combinations resulting in the Con-
gress of Berlin. In these combinations
we now know the predominating force
was exercised by the Austro-German
and English plenipotentiaries. Con-
stantinople lay within reach of the
hand of Russia, but that hand was
powerless. Englishmen have been
pleased to believe that the British
fleet at Constantinople and Gallipoli
was what deterred the Russians from
entering the capital of the Sultan ;
but the belief was a fond and nat-
tering delusion. The invisible cord
which withheld the hand of Russia
was drawn in Berlin through Vienna.
The certainty of the entry of an
Austrian army into Moldavia and
Bessarabia was the real obstacle to
the Russian advance, which the
British fleet alone was impotent to
prevent. The Russian army was ever
compelled to look behind it, always
seeing the shadow of the concealed
hand it had cause to dread. The writer
vividly calls to mind an incident which
occurred at Constantinople while the
Russian troops were bivouacked in
sight of its minarets. He paid a visit
one evening, in the company of a
friend, to Skobeleff, who was confined
to his bed by an attack of fever.
Despite his malady, the general was
deep in the study of some military
work, but on the names of his visi-
tors being announced he sprang up in
his couch to receive them, and almost
the first question he put to the writer
was " What is Austria doing 1 " a
sufficient indication of the apprehen-
sions disturbing the counsels and
paralysing the action of Russia. In-
formation of a trustworthy character
had just then been received at Con-
stantinople, and it was known both
at the Russian headquarters and at the
Sublime Porte that a partial mobili-
sation of the Austrian army was
imminent, and that the occupation of
Bosnia and Servia on one hand, and of
Jassy and various points in Moldavia
on the other, were contemplated. So
serious a menace was one the Russian
army, crippled though victorious, was
unable to despise ; and so it came
to pass that, under the pressure of
Austria and Germany, Russia submit-
ted to enter the congress chamber at
Berlin, to sacrifice all that nigh a
century of intrigue and war had gained.
With the details and results of the
Berlin settlement all who followed
the reports of the proceedings of the
Congress are familiar. Of the fact
that what was believed to be a settle-
ment is proving but a truce, most, if
they had not already foreseen it, are
now becoming convinced. Races and
communities delivered from an inert
barbaric despotism were partitioned
and carved out to suit the -selfish
ambitions of certain governments,
and the political exigences of the
moment. A condition of things fore-
doomed to perish was created from
the Danube to the ^Egean and from
the Black Sea to the Adriatic. The
opportunity of settling the Eastern
difficulty on a just and stable basis
was thrown away with a recklessness
inconceivable except by those who
understood that a sense of right and
political morality were absent from
the council board over which Prince
Bismarck presided. The opportunity
of re-integrating each race within its
rights vanished. The Bulgarians were
divided into three sections. The Greeks
were betrayed, while false hopes were
dangled before their eyes* Albania,
distracted by intrigue of every kind,
was left a prey to anarchy and mis-
rule. Bosnia and Herzegovina, against
the will and in spite of the heroic
resistance of their peoples, were given
over to Austria, who virtuously pre-
tended bashful compliance with the
"will of Europe," conscious that it
was her own action which had pro-
duced the "disorder" which she was
called in by accomplices to put down.
Montenegro, which had maintained
for centuries its independence against
the Turk, was virtually handed over to
Austria by the twenty-ninth Article
of the Berlin Treaty. Macedonia was
22
Austria's Policy in the
left, with its conglomerate population
of Serb, Albanian, Bulgarian, Greek,
Wallach, and Moslem, to ferment to a
degree of anarchy sufficient to require
the orderly hand of the Austrian
bureaucracy to restore tranquillity
and cover it with their "civilising
influences."
The creation of the autonomous pro
vince of East Roumelia was the fruit
of the Treaty of San Stefano, trimmed
and reduced at Berlin. The elabora-
tion of its organic statutes and form
of government was entrusted to a
mixed international body called the
East Roumelia Commission, the guid-
ing spirit of which was Herr von
Kallay, the Austro- Hungarian dele-
gate. A zealous partisan of the
Andrassy policy in the East, Herr von
Kallay had passed many years at
Belgrade, working industriously for
the advancement of Austrian influ-
ence in Servia by means of the press
and the diplomatic service. He
brought, then, to the work of his
mission at Philippopolis, where the
commission sat, an accurate concep-
tion of the end to be attained,
and a complete knowledge of the
means necessary to further the de-
signs of his Government. Consis-
tently supported by his German and
English colleagues, he was enabled to
override all opposition raised by the
Russian or Turkish delegates. It
was during the sitting of the East
Roumelia Commission, towards the
end of 1878, that Austria openly
showed her hand somewhat prema-
turely it seems to have been, for
even Lord Beaconsfield's Cabinet,
with all its anti-Russian proclivities,
was not prepared to follow unre-
servedly the lead of its allies. In
brief, Count Andrassy proposed to
the English Government that while
the civil and financial administration
of East Roumelia and Macedonia
should be undertaken by England,
Austrian troops were to occupy the
two provinces. This was so bold a
stroke in the forward policy that it
is hardly to be wondered at that good
and substantial reasons were found
for not at once acceding to the
Austrian request. Perhaps, too, the
compensations had not been so well
defined as they were later on ; the
proceeding savoured, besides, too much
of the iron and the earthen pot float-
ing together on the ruffled surface of
the water. The earthen pot of English
civil and financial administration must
soon have disappeared before the iron
pot of Austrian military exigences.
A British Parliament could hardly
have sanctioned such proceedings, even
if the Government had entertained the
proposal. The rejection of this caused
anger and heart-burning at Vienna,
augmented later on by Lord Salis-
bury's reluctance to support the
Austrian Government in their effort
to compel the Russian evacuation of
East Roumelia by the thirteenth of
April, 1879, which Count Andrassy
declared, in addressing the delega-
tions, was a point of honour with
Austria. The Treaty of Berlin, in
the twenty-second Article, had fixed
nine months from the date of signa-
ture of the Treaty,' which was the
thirteenth of July, 1878, as the term
of the Russian occupation of the
conquered territory ; and accordingly
Count Andrassy had held the view
that the last Russian should retire
from its soil by the thirteenth of
April; whereas the Russian Govern-
ment maintained, and maintained suc-
cessfully, that the complete occupation
only should cease on that date, and
accordingly did not commence the
evacuation before the day called for
by Count Andrassy for its termination.
Great annoyance was both felt and
expressed at Vienna on this subject,
and Lord Salisbury was openly accused
of having come to an understanding
with Russia over the head of the
"old and faithful" ally of England.
Those who followed the news of the
day will call to mind the pertinacity
with which, by means of the press,
the Vienna Government endeavoured
to predispose the public mind in
Europe in favour of a mixed occupa-
Austria's Policy in the East.
tion of East Rournelia by foreign
troops, from which Russians were to
be rigorously excluded. The failure
was a sore trial to the political temper
of the Austrian Cabinet. Without the
intervention of foreign arms the East
Roumelia Commission at Philipoppolis
concluded its labours ; and at the
banquet given by the Commission be-
fore its members separated, Herr von
Kallay astonished his hearers by an-
nouncing that " We [that is, Austria]
do not care now how soon East
Roumelia and Bulgaria are united."
During the sitting of the Bulgarian
Assembly at Tirnova, the part played
by Austria was rather that of an ob-
servant spectator. The representatives
of East Roumelia who went to Tirnova
to claim the right to sit in the Con-
stituante assembled to organise the
government of the principality, were
refused admission. Meeting with no
encouragement from the Russian Im-
perial Commissioner, a small number
of the East Roumelian delegates
addressed themselves to Yienna, and
implored the Austrian Emperor to
save them from being restored to
Turkish dominion. But the moment
for action was not yet ripe, and the
question was left in abeyance to a
more convenient season. The resist-
ance in Bosnia to the execution of
the European mandate with which
Austria had entered that province and
Herzegovina, had been of so much
more serious and forcible a character
than anticipated, that Austria-Hun-
gary was for the time arrested in the
career of adventure on which she had
launched. Anything more, therefore,
than a formal expression of interest in
their welfare could not be given to the
East Roumelians. The attention of
Austria was absorbed in consolidating
her position in the new provinces, and
securing the means of preventing
any possible future joint action of
Servia and Montenegro. The reluc-
tance of the Hungarians to further
the aims of the forward party in
Austria, and to diminish their own
forces by the addition of Slavs to
the already powerful Slav element
in the empire -kingdom, was a tem-
porary check to further advance.
The impolitic speech of M. Tisza, in
which he described the Austrian occu-
pation of the Turkish provinces as
destined to crush the head of the
Slavonic serpent, was rather calcu-
lated to act in the nature of a
challenge to the whole Slavonic race
than to produce a reassuring or tran-
quillising effect on minds still heaving
from their late struggles. The over-
haste also with which the Roman
Catholic propaganda followed in the
wake of the military occupation
could not but be regarded with sus-
picion by a people of whom but a fifth
are Roman Catholics by religion, the
rest being either adherents of the
Eastern Church or Mussulmans. The
whole Austrian action, indeed, in
the provinces snatched from Turkey,
has, since the day her troops crossed
their borders on their mission of
civilisation, been marked by all the
errors of a military bureaucracy ham-
pered by Parliamentary opposition and
want of funds, and a certain subjection
to outside opinion, more particularly
to that expressed in the foreign press.
But the many important stipula-
tions of the Treaty of Berlin which
yet remained to be carried out at
the end of 1879, and which there
is much reason to believe were not
intended to be carried out in their
integrity, called for settlement. The
Montenegrin and the Greek questions ;
the execution of reforms in the Euro-
pean provinces of Turkey, called for by
the twenty-third Article of the Berlin
Treaty, and the condition of Armenia,
demanded attention. The settlement
of these questions on the basis of the
Treaty to which all the Powers re-
presented at Berlin had affixed their
signatures, did not, however, meet with
the ulterior views of all their govern-
ments. The union of interests so
ostentatiously proclaimed between
Germany and Austria, and the adhe-
sion of the English Cabinet to their
views of the settlement of the Eastern
Austria's Policy in the East.
Question as since developed, together
with M. Tisza's ''crushing of the head
of the Slavonic serpent," were the
first overt indications of the Drang
nach Osten (pressing eastward) policy of
the Austro-German combination. It
was the comprehension of this policy
in its full scope and meaning which
furnished the theme and motive of the
speeches of Skobeleff at Paris and
elsewhere, and brought into renewed
activity the leaders and partisans of
the Panslav cause in Russia and
among the Slavonic races. The dis-
solution of Parliament in 1880, and
the result of the appeal of Lord Bea-
consfield to the people of England on
that occasion, determined the fate of
the combination which had been
formed to inaugurate a new departure
in Eastern affairs, entirely and radi-
cally at variance with the spirit and
letter of the Berlin settlement. Who
is there that cannot call to mind the
almost frantic efforts made from
Berlin and Vienna, during the excit-
ing period immediately preceding that
general election, to influence, by alter-
nate cajolery and menace, the public
sentiment of England in favour of
Lord Beacon sfield's Administration ?
And who does not remember the wail of
anger that went up when the accession
to power of the Liberal party was an-
nounced 1 Under the determined lead
of that party, England, acting on the
Powers whose recalcitrancy to the
Berlin Treaty menaced a complete
disruption of the European concert,
has obtained settlements of the Monte-
negrin and Greek questions, unsatis-
factory indeed, and not without great
difficulty, and in spite of a want of
loyalty where the opposite might have
been expected. But such harmony as
it was possible to create among the
discordant elements of which the Euro-
pean concert is composed, could not be
obtained for the settlement of the con-
ditions of the twenty-third Article
of the Berlin Treaty. It is true
delegates were despatched in 1880 to
Constantinople to elaborate a series
of statutes for the government of the
provinces remaining under the mis-
rule of the Pashas. But the whole
performance was a hollow mockery of
the crying wants of the oppressed
people of Thrace, Macedonia, and
Epirus. Propositions tending to pro-
mote uniformity of method in the
government of each province were
strenuously opposed by the Austrian
delegates, on the plea that the cha
racter and local peculiarities of each
district must be first considered, but
with the real design of preventing
any solid bond of union among
the diverse peoples. The statutes,
however, have remained a dead letter,
for their execution is supported
neither by Germany, Austria, Italy,
France, nor Russia. Alone England
could do, and the immovable Turk
would do, nothing. The observation
of Herr von Kallay, then Under
Secretary for Foreign Affairs at
Vienna, when his opinion of the or-
ganic statutes was asked by one of the
foreign delegates on the revived East
Roumelia Commission, was on a parallel
with the Austrian action all through
the recent phases "of the Eastern
difficulty. " We have a more serious
solution than that," said Herr von
Kallay a clear implication that re-
formed government, by the aid of
Austria and her supporter Germany,
was not to be established in the un-
emancipated provinces of European
Turkey, nor even contemplated. The
efforts of Austria to obtain the con-
sent and recognition of Europe to
her formal annexation of Bosnia and
the Herzegovina showed the em-
barrassing nature of the position in
which her Government found itself.
At the same time they indicated
to both the Turkish and Russian
Governments that the time was not
far off when a decisive move must be
made on the part of Austria. To
abandon the provinces again to Turk-
ish misrule was impossible ; to grant
them anything in the shape of an
autonomous government equally so,
seeing the encouragement this would
give the Czech autonomous party, and
Austria's Policy in the East.
25
the opposition which the idea met from
the Hungarians.-] The alternative was
the complete subjugation of the
country ; subjugation in a military
sense, for there was no probability of
the Mussulman inhabitants willingly
accepting the rule of Austria, after
so many thousands had lost their
lives in opposing the transfer of an
allegiance which had brought them
nothing but the rigid exaction of
augmented taxes, and would impose
military service to an alien sove-
reign. To the Christians, the taxa-
tion to which they were subjected by
Austrian officials was as onerous as to
the Mussulmans ; while the agrarian
grievances, which were the ostensible
cause of their rising against the
Turkish rule, remained without
redress.
The difficulty the Austrian Govern-
ment had to face was extreme. The
expenses of the occupation and ad-
ministration of the provinces were in
excess of the revenues, and the com-
pact by which the Austrian and Hun-
garian Governments were not to be
called on to contribute could not be
broken without sufficient and weighty
reason. Indecision was not less peril-
ous than action ; it was necessary to
hasten a crisis; and accordingly the
law of military service was ordered to
be put in force, not only in the occu-
pied provinces, but, to give it the air
of impartiality, as well in those parts
of Dalmatia which had hitherto suc-
cessfully resisted the conscription, and
with the inhabitants of which, as in
the case of the Crivoscians, a special
compact of exemption existed. The in-
surrection of the Crivoscians and Her-
zegovinians was the answer. Whether
the conscription was the direct cause of
the insurrection, or whether the Aus-
trian authorities profited by their
knowledge of what was in prepara-
tion to bring on the crisis, cannot
be confidently determined. The locali-
ties in which the bands made their
appearance in most force seem to
indicate a pre-arranged line of
action. Those whose knowledge of
the country and people entitled their
opinions to consideration had for
some time held the view that a
rising against Austrian rule was
imminent, and that Christians and
Mussulmans would be found fighting
side by side in the struggle. The end
in Eastern politics has generally been
held to justify the means, and there is
no reason to believe that a higher
political moral tone is prevalent in the
East to-day than at any other time.
The co-operation of Austria and Ger-
many with Italy in the settlement of
the Greek frontier question forms an
interesting chapter in the history of
the Eastern difficulty, which has yet
to be written. But it is so linked
with all Austrian policy in the East,
that it is but an additional indication
of what is contemplated by Austria
and Germany, with the tacit adher-
ence of Italy. Skilfully as Prince
Bismarck masked, German views of
predominance in the East behind his
Pomeranian grenadier, it is clear that,
whatever interests in the settlement
of the oriental difficulty it may once
have pleased him to express, his
pretensions are- now of a solid and
substantial gravity which must be
the cause of uneasiness to more than
one of the Western Powers and to
Russia. It requires but a glance at
the map of Europe to perceive what
the accomplishment of the Austro-
German programme in the east of
Europe signifies. Skilfully and per-
severingly has the telegraph and print-
ing press been worked until the idea
of the Russian at Constantinople has
been made a nightmare which has
cost England millions of money and
thousands of precious lives. It has
been used to pervert the moral sense
of her people and her rulers till she has
come now to be almost invariably found
on the side of the oppressor against
the oppressed. And the same agencies
are still busily at work to persuade
this country that there is no other
alternative to the blessings of Austro-
German rule for the nationalities
of the East than subjugation to
26
Aiistria's Policy in the East.
a barbarous Russian despotism. The
great question, and one worth con-
sidering before it may be too late,
is, Is this true ? In the first place has
it been shown that any of the libe-
rated nationalities of the East have
expressed, diplomatically or otherwise,
a desire to be placed under the rule of
either Austria or Russia, or of one of
them rather than of the other 1 Have
the Greeks, the Bulgarians, or the
Servians, at any time before or since
their emancipation exhibited a desire
to be annexed or protected by either
Russia or Austria? Has it not rather
been the contrary? Have not these
peoples, so far as their feeble voices
have been able to make themselves
heard above the gong-beating of di-
plomacy, invariably and consistently
pleaded for national independence,
and for scope and time to work out
their own career in peace and security 1
But, say some, they are not yet fit
for self-government, and, if left to
themselves, they will only fly at each
other's throats. Let it be granted
that these two reasons (if true) are
serious enough to militate against
giving unlimited liberty to the Greek,
the Bulgarian, and the Servian. Would
it not be the duty of the Powers, sup-
posing always their policy to be disin-
terested, to prevent conflicts, and so, in
a word, to train up these smaller na-
tionalities until they could recognise
that their true interests and chances
of prosperity lay in pursuing a course
of mutual conciliation and goodwill ?
There hardly seems ground for dispute
here. What, then, is the inevitable
conclusion ? Surely this, that some of
the governments are preparing, owing
to their unwillingness or inability to
effectually oppose others, to seize or
bring into subjection portions of Turkey
to which they are under a solemn pledge
to give good government and security
for life, honour, and property, not only
without, but against the consent, of
their inhabitants. The prospect is
not reassuring, nor is the spectacle
edifying. Yet all that has been
here said or indicated is a near and
possible contingency. Whatever those
who endeavour to quiet or mislead the
public mind may assert, the Eastern
Question is fast quitting the lines for
its settlement which were traced out
at Berlin in 1878, as well as those
contemplated by the British Austro-
German understanding before the
general election of 1880. The sup-
pression of the insurrection in
Herzegovina and Bosnia has en-
tirely altered the status of Austria,
both towards those provinces and
towards Europe. In the nature
of things, the absurd position in
which Austria was placed with her
own consent cannot be re-estab-
lished. Backed by Germany, Austria
will very reasonably, as it seems, de-
mand to be allowed to incorporate
those provinces into the empire-king-
dom ; but whatever their relationship
is to be, they cannot but prove the
apple of discord between the two sec-
tions of the dual empire. The pre-
dominance, however, which Germany
holds in the combination with Aus-
tria, constitutes the danger of this
method of solving' the difficulty,
rouses the sensibility of the Slavonic
world, and menaces the peace of
Europe. Russia and the Slavonic
races at large might contemplate with
equanimity the formation of a Slavonic
empire in the south-east of Europe,
which, from the affinity of race and
religion of its populations, could be no
menace to herself ; but the prospect of
Slavonic races subjected to the in-
fluence and rule of the Teuton, and in-
vaded by the Papal propagandists, and
serving to aggrandise and enrich a
great rival, can only but precipitate the
struggle between Teuton and Slav
which both believe to be impending.
Looking at the question dispassion-
ately, the solution most favourable
to the interest of England is that
which seems to have been the least
considered the independence of the
nationalities of the Balkan peninsula.
The subjection of the races inhabiting
the valley of the Danube and the
Balkan country to either Russia or
Austria's Policy in the East.
Austro-Germany cannot be regarded
with indifference by the Western
Powers, least of all by England.
Austria on the ^Egean, with Germany
behind her, means the creation of a
great naval power in the Eastern
Mediterranean, disposing of the mari-
time resources of the Greeks. The
Power, or combination of Powers,
which aims at the subjugation of
what was once Turkey in Europe,
cannot be relied on to respect the
independence of Greece after that it
shall have brought the other races
under its sway. The harbours of the
^Egean, the countless islands which
cover its expanse, will afford shelter
to fleets which at any moment may de-
scend on the flank of our road to India
through the Mediterranean, and forbid
us the right of way through the Suez
Canal. Behind such fleets are the magni-
ficent port of Yolo and the Dardanelles,
affording refuges against attack and
for refit. It may be that it is now
too late to repair the errors in policy
of which successive administrations in
this country have been guilty, and
that events are themselves shaping a
course to which England, either of
design or from indifference, will have
largely contributed. A vigorous policy,
which would have given to the op-
pressed nationalities of the East their
independence of all foreign control,
would have saved us from our present
disquietude. On the Danube we see
Roumania, Servia, and Bulgaria threat-
ened by Austria. In Macedonia, Al-
bania, and Epirus, the negative policy of
Germany and Austria has left these
countries a prey to anarchy and mis-
rule, while Montenegro has, in fact,
become an Austrian vassal. The set-
tlement of the Greek frontier dispute,
though adding to Greece a valuable
and not inconsiderable tract of terri-
tory, has left the principle for which
she and her friends contended prac-
tically as far from settlement as ever.
Even across the new Greek frontier
the baleful apprehensions of Austrian
influence are felt. The nomination of
Herr von Kallay to the position of
chief administrator of Bosnia and
Herzegovina was more suggestive of
danger to the independence of the
Balkan nationalities than the mere
jack - boot government which had
hitherto mismanaged those provinces.
It was the first step in the "more
serious solution " to which reference
has already been made, the first to a
radical departure from the lines of
the Treaty of Berlin.
An attentive observer will readily
perceive, by the light of the events of
the past six years, the goal to which
things are tending an Austrian pre-
dominance, backed by Germany,
throughout the whole of South-east-
ern Europe, alike^on the .ZEgean and
the Bosphorus as on the Danube.
What may be the import of this pre-
dominance of a powerful politico-
military combination, animated by
no sentimental regard for the sus-
ceptibilities or interests of other
States, cannot remain long hidden.
28
ON CLASSIC GROUND.
THEY say you may get a shrewd notion
of a man's character by a glance at
his book-shelves ; but for my part I
would sooner ask what books a man
read in certain conditions of time and
place, in certain accidents, certain
changes and chances of his affairs ;
when sick, or sorry, or glad ; harassed,
or at leisure ; fresh in the morning
light, or tired in the gray hours of the
evening ; in the first surprise of new
scenes, or renewing the memory of old
ones.
Consider, for example, a man, who
had worn the gown there in his youth,
revisiting Oxford after a long lapse of
years ; not in the time of term, when
all the place would be gay with a life
he had no share in, and like some
forlorn ghost he would wander silent
and puzzled, and perchance something
sad
"Among new men, strange faces, other
minds."
But let his visit be in the time
of vacation in the long vacation, say.
when it is some three weeks or so
old, and when "the high midsummer
pomps are on," as he probably has
never seen them there. Then Oxford
is his own ; the Oxford he knew in the
days before the flood, when gowns
were only worn by men, when no
blatant tramway desecrated the High
Street, and no chattering nursemaids
broke the sacred stillness of Magdalen
groves. Then the old gray quadrangles
are alive once more with the forms
he knew, with voices long silent to
. his ears, but unforgotten still. Every
step awakes some echo of the past ;
every echo stirs some fresh remem-
brance. Even the old scouts who come
grinning up to him mines of incon-
venient memories, old, battered, but-
tery-worn bodies have a grace about
them more than nature mostly gives
their kind.
' ' Comrades of his past were they,
Of that unreturning day."
Above all, as Lamb says, he can fetch
up past opportunities. Ah, those past
opportunities ! Oxford is a soil which
grows that sort of grain in rich pro-
fusion, and our friend would be a Tom
of ten thousand indeed if he had not
a liberal crop of them.
Surely the books a man in such a
place and time would turn to would
illustrate the bent of his mind more
vividly than the everyday aspect of
his shelves. If he had a friend with
him, a comrade of those old years, he
would read no books. Then they would
talk : ye gods, how they would talk !
But if he were alone and, unless he
had provided himself with company,
he would probably be very much alone
he would almost inevitably seek
some moments of companionship in
books, and in books redolent of this
or that of the many perfumes of the
place. And from his choice a curious
assayer of the great human riddle
might amuse himself much in framing a
scheme of that man's life, its past and
its present, its dreams and its realities.
" In the shadow of the mighty Bodley "
he might be found solacing himself
with the old folios of Anthony "Wood,
or still more venerable relics. "Were
he one who in his day had walked
delicately and along well-ordered paths,
he might now " fetch up past opportu-
nities " by a study of the adventures
of Mr. Verdant Green, or Mr. Drys-
dale, or of that still more audacious
volume (as I have heard) which retails
the experiences of one Peter Priggins,
a scout. Had he, on the other hand,
been one wont to lean his ear too
closely to the chimes of midnight, or
On Classic Ground.
29
too profuse in his consumption of
ginger, it is probable that having
been long forced to forswear both
those and all kindred delights he
would be something of an ascetic, at
least in theory ; musing over the great
vanished era of plain living and high
thinking, as we imagine it to have
been. Then would the Apologia be
in his hands ; then would he relieve
with the livelier chatter of the brothers
Mozley the sour egotism of Mark
Pattison. Then would he walk into
Trinity to see if the snap-dragon still
grew on its walls, as it grew in the
Fre.shmanhood of John Henry New-
man ; then, pacing the gravelled
quadrangle of Oriel, would he strive
to catch in the echoes of his solitary
steps some memories of that mighty
band of reformers, who pulled down
so much, and built up so little ; or,
peering still further into the abysm of
time, would he linger round that
glorious old library of Merton the
oldest, probably, and most perfect
book-retreat in the world if haply
on the ear of imagination might fall
the ghostly footsteps of Duns Scotus
still restlessly pacing the bricked
floor as he meditated some shrewd
retort on the Dominican. And surely,
Nominalist or Realist, Stoic or Epicu-
rean, whatever he has been or be, if he
be a true son of Oxford some part of
his time at least will . be spared to
his old friends, the Scholar Gipsy and
Thyrsis.
It happened that in the course of
this summer I found myself at Oxford,
in much the same circumstances as
the visitor thus foreshadowed. I had
not set foot in the place for very many
years, and I was alone. As this is no
autobiography, nor designed as a
posthumous bombshell for my friends,
there is no need to specify the nature
of my reflections, nor the books I
found most congenial to them. But
as the weather during all my visit
was superlatively fine, day succeeding
day of blue sky and sunshine and
breeze, a great deal of my time was natu-
rally passed in the open air ; and after
the first rapture of memory among the
gray old buildings had been satisfied,
it was no less natural that I should
turn to that " loved hill-side " whereon
Thyrsis and his friend had first assayed
their shepherd pipes. It had long
been a wish of mine to stand under
the shade of the elm- tree
' ' The signal-elm, that looks on Ilsley downs,
The Vale, the three lone weirs, the youthful
Thames : "
the tree whose life was fondly fancied
by the two friends to be co-existent
with that of
" The Oxford scholar poor,
Of pregnant parts and quick inventive brain,
Who, tired of knocking at preferment's door,
One summer-morn forsook
His friends, and went to learn the gipsy-lore,
And roam'd the world with that wild
brotherhood,
And came, as most men deem'd, to little
good,
But came to Oxford and his friends no more."
From hunting with the Berkshire
hounds that " rude Cumnor ground "
had once been tolerably familiar to me ;
but really to know a country you must
traverse it on your own legs, and we
were no great pedestrians in my
Oxford days ; at least those whom I
saw most of were not. We preferred
horse-exercise ; and though the statutes
of the college, within whose venerable
walls we pursued, with moderation,
the study of polite learning, had much
to say against that pastime, we man-
aged to gratify our preference not
illiberally. My main dependence was
the small pocket volume, one of the
Golden Treasury Series, containing
the two poems
" Runs it not here, the track by Childsworth
farm,
Past the high wood, to where the elm-tree
crowns
The hill behind whose ridge the sunset
flames ? "
That was all the compass I had to
steer by ; and where this farm lay I
knew no more than readers of the
morning papers knew till the other
day where Yap might be. Somewhere
between the two Hinkseys the path
30
On Classic Ground.
must lie ; so much was clear, but
nothing more.
One burning July day my quest
began. I went out of the town, under
the railway bridge, past Oseney, and
up through the water meadows to
Ferry Hinksey, which had been selected
as the base of my first operations. In
which of the two Hinkseys swung the
sign that bore Sibylla's name I do not
know, nor which of their little streets
boasted the haunted mansion. But
I do know that the name of George
Scott is on the signboard of " The
Fishes," at Ferry Hinksey, and that
he sells only that sort of bastard
ginger-beer which is compact of some
vile powder, or so-called essence, and
stored in glass-bottles. And so it was
in nearly all the ale-houses throughout
the country side. The good old brew
that sprang after the bursting cork out
of the squat brown stone bottles has
gone ; gone with Sibylla and her sign,
and with the girl by the boatman's
door, and with the mowers \vho stayed
their scythes among the river-grass to
watch the friends steering their course
through the Wytham flats
".They all are gone, and thou art gone as
well ! "
This " Fishes " inn is well-named,
though the " Fishers " had, perhaps,
been better. Never were there such
Ushers as these Oxford folk. Man,
woman, and child, the fields are full
of them ; each sedged brook is alive
with their floats, and round every pond
they crowd, solemn, silent, earnest,
like adjutant birds beside some In-
dian tank. In all my walks I never
saw a fish landed, nor so much even as
a bobbing float. But the fishers fished
on for ever. I verily believe the old vil-
lage patriarchs, when too weak to hobble
to the brooksides, woo the imported
minnow from the tubs outside their
doors. As I crossed the ferry that
day, the little boy who worked the
rope entertained me with legends of a
vast jack, believed to have its home
under a tree close by the punt's moor-
ngs. Each time I crossed that ferry,
and I crossed it many times, that jack
grew, till the sturgeon Nahma, king
of fishes, can have been but a
stickleback to him. And there he
lies (the jack), for aught I know, to
this day.
Across the ferry, then, past the new
inn and the old church, up the grassy
hill-side, and through a bean-field,
sweeter than all the perfumes of
Araby, I went, till I came out where
a wide plain of yellowing corn sloped
upward to the sky, and from out the
further hedgerow rose a likely tree.
Might this be the elm 1
No ; for it was an oak, and the view
from it was not the view prescribed.
No downs of Ilsley were in sight, and
only half the vale. Yet it was a noble
view. It was not August : the corn
was not yet ready for the reapers ; the
lindens were missing. Yet it was not
hard to fancy it the very spot where
he who strove
*' To flute his friend, like Orpheus, from the
dead,"
waited for the shepherd that summer
day long ago.
" Screeu'd is this nook o'er the high, half-
reap'd field,
And here till sundown, shepherd ! will I
be.
Through the thick corn the scarlet
poppies peep,
And round green roots and yellowing
stalks 1 see
Pale pink convolvulus in tendrils creep ;
And air-swept lindens yield
Their scent, and rustle down their per-
fumed showers
Of bloom on the bent grass where I am
laid,
And bower me from the August sun
with shade ;
And the eye travels down to Oxford's
towers."
On through the gate into the farther
field, and then, on the fronting ridge
rose Cumnor Hurst, with its little
wind-swept clump of firs guarded by
the solitary elm not my elm, for the
Hurst has its own place in the elegy.
As is the case with most Englishmen,
my knowledge of England is curiously
limited, and my praise is therefore
little worth ; but I cannot remember
On Classic Ground.
31
any English scene to be compared with
that you get from Cumnor Hurst.
Two noble views come before me as
I write ; the well-known one from
Leith Hill, and one from the garden-
terrace of Duncombe Park in York-
shire ; but neither of these in my eyes
ranks with the wide Oxfordshire pros-
pect. In the two former the scene
lies flat and straight before you; in
the last, it lies all round you. There,
on that little knoll, with the breeze
singing through the pines overhead
for how still soever it be elsewhere,
there is always a breeze on the
Hurst while "the bleating of the
folded flocks " conies faintly from
the distant uplands, mixed with yet
fainter sounds of human labour in
the hay-fields below ; there you stand,
like the eagle, " ringed with the azure
world." The open air is all round
you ; turn where you will, the ever-
lasting hills make your horizon. To
the north-east rise the Chilterns, and
below them, in more distinguishable
tints, the wooded range which over-
looks Oxford, the range of Headington
and Shotover. Oxford herself lies full
and fair before you \ her staring new red
suburbs reaching away like unlovely
wings on either side the immortal
group of " dreaming spires," along Port
Meadow almost to Godstow on the
one side, and nearly touching Iffley on
the other. There is the tower of Iffley
church, and the immemorial poplars.
Northwards rise the woods of Wytham,
their dark green masses glorified into
orange by the vivid sunlight. Below
them Ensham, and all " the grassy
harvest of the river fields," threaded
by the shy silver of the youthful
Thames, from whose farther bank the
slender spire of Cassington soars into
the golden air. Westward, beneath
your feet, lies Cumnor, half hidden in
its leafy nest ; and above Cumnor, and
all away to the west and south-west,
the Berkshire moors go rolling on,
down after down, to the far blue line
of the Cotswolds. Many a time in my
month's holiday did I look over that,
scene, and in many a change of light
and shade, beneath blue skies and
gray, and once even through the driving
rain, but its infinite variety never grew
stale to my eyes.
Still, there was the amari aliquid,
of course. On the Cumnor side of the
slope, marring all the western view, a
tall red chimney, vomiting smoke from
its black mouth, marks a brick kiln of
the lords of Abingdon. Gratifying,
no doubt, as another sign of the tire-
less industry of the Anglo-Saxon race ;
but not beautiful. And there must be
so many ugly spots which a wilderness
of chimneys could make no uglier i
It was a hot day, and the spirit of
Giles Gosling called to me from out
the trees of Cumnor. So down the
slope I went, and through the kilns,
and after a dusty tramp along the
white high road came into the village
by its rare old church.
Immediately behind the church is
a grass field, surrounded by a rough
stone wall, and in that wall lies all
that the neighbourhood now holds of
Cumnor Hall. Many an oak still
grows thereby, but the Hall itself
has vanished, as the hall of Balclutha,
or that " where Jamshyd gloried and
drank deep." In 1811 the skeleton of
the house, which can have been no
great thing, was still standing ; but
in that year the Lord Abingdon of the
day carried off the windows and door-
ways to adorn his new church at
Wytham. For some while longer three
bare stone arches still marked the spot ;
but now they too are gone, and nothing
remains but the close, some fine old
trees relics, let us believe, of the
avenue beneath which Amy and the
faithful Janet hurried on that midnight
flight and the stone wall.
And yet there was no midnight
flight to Kenilworth ; no Kenil-
worth for Amy to fly to, for it was not
Leicester's till after her death ; and
while she lived Robert Dudley was not
Leicester, and poor Amy was no
countess. Tony Fire-the-Faggot was
Anthony Forster, gent., a worthy mem-
ber of a good old Shropshire family,
a cultivator of the fine arts, and
32
On Classic Ground.
possessed of as many virtues as Bishop
Berkeley. " Villain " Yarney was Sir
Richard Yerney, of Compton Yerney
in Warwickshire, high-sheriff for the
county, and heaven and the antiquaries
only know what else of great and good.
There was no flight from the old
Devonshire home, no clandestine mar-
riage, no broken-hearted father. Mis-
tress Amy Robsart and her lord were
married in open day, at Sheen in
Surrey, in the presence of little King
Edward and a goodly company, with
marriage settlements and festivities,
and everything handsome about them.
There was no murder. Lady Dudley
died, it is true; and here, it is also
true, the champions of the fact are a
little at loss ; for how the lady died,
by her own hand or sheer accident
murder we are forbidden to call it
no one rightly knows. She was found
one September evening, when all the
servants had at her own bidding been
packed off to Abingdon Fair, and Dud-
ley (who, for all his affection, seems to
have given her very little of his com-
pany) was with the court at Windsor-
she was found in the lonely house
lyiDg dead at the foot of "a pair of
stairs." That was all that was ever
known, or ever will be, till the grave
in St. Mary's gives up its dead. 1
Yes, it is all a myth ; and Sir Wal-
ter was a heedless traducer of most
honourable men, palming off a paltry
novel as history on the idle public.
Truly, a most reprehensible deed. And
yet I think not all the antiquarians in
the world will be able to pull down
what Sir Walter has builded. Shrewdly
does the east wind of fact nip these old
flowers of romance. But somehow they
survive ; renewed, like the Bed Rose
of Lancaster, " for everlasting blossom-
ing," when once the sun of genius has
touched them with its liberal warmth.
Mr. Ruskin has proved the Yenice of
1 Lady Dudley was buried with great cere-
mony, in the presence of her husband, many
of his court friends, a large company of
ladies, and several of the University dignitaries,
in the chancel of St. Mary's Church, Oxford,
September, 1560.
Childe Harold to be "a mere efflores-
cence of decay," nothing but "a stage-
dream, which the first ray of daylight
must dissipate into dust " ; yet it is a
dream which will outlast the histori-
cal Yenice of Mr. Ruskin. Not all the
pamphleteers in either hemisphere will
silence villain Yarney's fatal whistle,
or give Tony Fire -the- Faggot decent
burial in Cumnor church. He has yet
to be born who shall be man enough to
" burke Sir Walter ! "
The Black Bear still rears itself
against the ragged staff in Cumnor,
and the sign still bears the name
Giles Gosling. But it is a beast of
modern breed, and the Gosling is but
a pretty piece of sentiment. Mine
host of to-day rejoices in the name of
Bunsby a noticeable name, too !
Still, whatever its age, the place
has a fine old air about it, and for
the sentiment of the signboard, I
called for a cup of Master Bunsby's
ale, and drank it to the health of Sir
Walter. I drank it in a quaint half-
moon-shaped room, with narrow, high-
backed, oaken settles ranged round
the walls, rare to l6ok at, but a very
Siege Perilous for the weary traveller.
Miss Bunsby if Miss Bunsby it was
who served my ale fills pretty
Cicely's part not unworthily. But the
grace granted Tressilian was not mine.
My Hebe had told me of a conveni-
ent way on to the range again, through
the village of Wootton ; but it in-
cluded a mile or so of the high road,
and I had not come out to tramp the
high road. So, when Cumnor was
fairly left behind, T essayed to make a
way for myself. It was not well
made. After some very rough walk-
ing, unrelieved by hedges of amazing
consistency, I got into a wood ; in that
wood was a bog, and I got into that
bog; and as I floundered in its Ser-
boniaii depths some confounded dog
kept baying through the wood, and
awful memories of bloodhounds and
dismal swamps came thronging into
my hot, midge-tormented head. Those
midges, by the way, or whatsoever
else be the winged buzzing beasts that
On Classic Ground.
33
encircle one's head on a summer day's
walk, are those which attach them-
selves to you on your first start, the
same which go with you to the end ?
From the moment I got fairly into the
fields that day till I re-entered Oxford,
"a host of insects," as with Words-
worth's traveller, went " ever with me
as I paced along." Save for the few
minutes passed in the inn parlour they
never left me. There was no appreci-
able moment of relieving guard ; and
yet it seems hard to suppose a gnat
would travel so far for the sheer
pleasure of tormenting one wretched
head.
A very hot, dishevelled creature at
last, after a wasted hour, stumbled
into Wootton. The history of this
parish dates from the middle of the
thirteenth century, but to me it is, or
was, chiefly remarkable for possessing
not a single ale-house ! In those strug-
gles in the wood the virtue of John
Bunsby's cheer had gone from me, and
needed renewing. It could not be
done in Wootton. Five hundred souls,
or thereabouts, are there in the village,
but not one ale-house I There was the
"Fox," indeed, but the "Fox" was
"over the hills and far away." Still
it was truly a case of Fox, et prceterea
nihil, and, after all, the blessed animal
lay in my homeward track. The tongue
of the Berkshire peasant is not easily
understanded of the stranger, and my
inquiries as to the whereabouts of this
house of call resulted in no certain
knowledge. Like the Mulligan's Lon-
don home, it was tJiere there repre-
senting an indefinite portion of the
Cumnor range. It was clear, however,
that my way was up the hill, and to
that hill a pretty path stretched out
through a mile or so of grass fields
and over sundry primeval stone stiles.
Along that path accordingly, and over
those stiles, I went, till half way up
the hill there rose a little cluster of
cottages, which betokened some form
of civilisation ; but signs of entertain-
ment for man or beast there were
none. Again I sought to fathom the
mysteries of the native dialect, and
No. 313. VOL. LIII.
this time there came with them a
gesture clearly pointing, or so it
seemed, to some chimneys rising from
a small clump of trees a few hundred
yards distant. They were soon reached.
The house was perched on a little ledge
overlooking a glorious landscape a
most picturesque position, but not too
convenient for a house of call ambitious
of much custom. A mere track led up
to it, nor was there any signboard,
nor customary inscription detailing
the privileges of him who is licensed
to inspirit the weary traveller. But
over the doorway grinned, in stuffed
similitude of life, a noble fox an un-
conventional form of signboard in har
mony with the romance of the situation.
I entered ; all was still ; no welcome
bar greeted my longing eyes. I
coughed, scraped with my feet, and
beat with my stick upon the floor,
till, having in vain exhausted the
signs by which a modest man notifies
his presence, I was fain to lift up my
voice. Thereat, from a parlour on my
left, bounced out a matronly but not
merciful-seeming dame, who somewhat
tartly demanded my wants. I an-
swered, with perfect truth, that I
only wanted something to drink, and
my tone also had perhaps a touch of
petulance in it. " Then," was the
startling reply, "I don't think you
can have it." What a hostess ! But,
of course, the place was no inn; it
was a private house, the house of ,
some name I could not catch, and was
not interested in, for, as I could not
drink there, it might have been a
lunatic asylum for all I cared. Pro-
fuse were my apologies, but the good
dame still, like Nell Cook, "looked
askew." Perhaps she took me for
the scholar - gipsy, and feared for
her spoons : my coat was of grey, and
my hat of undeniably antique shape,
and she, of course, could not tell I
was no scholar. Well, she would do
nothing for me but direct me to the
real Fox, which was still some half
mile further on ; and thither, like a
Young Marlow who had missed his
cue, I departed. I thought she might
On Classic Ground.
have been more liberal, and I think
so still.
However, the goal was reached at
last, and the Fox proved more cordial
than the Vixen. The sun was slop-
ing fast now to the western hills,
and as, my refreshing over, I came out
on the high level of the range before
the road begins its downward sweep
into Oxford, there was little of him
left but his light in the sky. It was
here, at this place and time, that I
saw the " dreaming spires " in their
most perfect loveliness. I stood at
the meeting of four roads. Before
me sloped away to the north-east a
vast amphitheatre of corn, burnished
by the liberal sun before its time.
Dark belts of wood encircled it, but
at the summit of the arc the woods
dipped, and in the space thus left,
from out a little sea of silver mist,
rose Oxford. From out that silver sea
she rose over the golden corn. Spire
and tower and dome, each rose up
clear and white against the purple
hills to take the last kiss of the dying
day. The woods on either side shut
out the staring horrors of the new
town ; all was pure Oxford.
" By the skirts of that grey cloud,
Many-domed Padua proud,
Stands, a peopled solitude,
'Mid the harvest shining plain."
On such a picture I, who am an un-
travelled man, had never looked
before ; and far indeed must I travel
ere I shall see one to better it.
And I had never found the tree !
Had never even stumbled on the right
track, for I had seen no Childsworth
Farm. Truth to tell, I was so filled
with delight at my ramble and all its
memories, so rejoiced in the sheer
possession of the open air, the fresh
sunlight, and the breeze, after so
many months of our accursed Babylon,
that the particular purpose of my
quest had rather passed out of my
mind. But what mattered it ? There
were many days still to run ; and there
was the "loved hill-side" all before
me, with Providence and that "good
survivor " for my guide.
Many a time was the quest renewed,
and many a glorious day passed on
those " warm, green-muffled Cumnor
hills." One particular day there was
when they were warm with a ven-
geance. South Hinksey was the base
of operations that time, and as I crossed
the high wooden bridge that spans both
railway and reservoir, and went along
the causeway (then anything but
"chill" !), my eye had marked on a ridge
immediately over the village a " lone
sky-pointing tree " which looked much
like that I sought. The path led up
through the Happy Valley though
why this particular valley, by no
means the happiest in the range for
natural beauty, should monopolise that
title I know not and over the hill
beyond lay Childsworth Farm. Chils-
well they call it now, and a very
sufficient, comfortable homestead it is,
with a spacious stone barn, queerly
loop-holed as though for musketry.
The road to Cumnor runs past its
gate and over the hills to the right :
but the possible tree lay to the left,
up a steep grass-field liberally studded
with thistles. A ragged hedge crowned
the top, and at its western end was
the tree.
An elm, no doubt of that : a tall,
slender elm, with some exotic growth
clustering round the lower trunk.
There, too, was the " high wood,"
with a persistent ringdove calling
from its cool depths. But no Ilsley
downs were in sight. The view over
the Thames valley was as it should
be, though some envious intervening
trees rather robbed Oxford of her fair
proportions. The towers of Merton
and Magdalen stood up in conspicuous
beauty, and the pomps of Christ Church ;
but the spire of St. Mary's was want-
ing, and the dome of the Radcliffe.
On the other side view there was
none, save of the intervening valley,
in which nestled one lone little home-
stead, and the next ridge, the high
table-land of the range. However,
this was the most satisfactory issue
my search vouchsafed me. It was
an elm ; it stood " bare on its lonely
On Classic Ground.
35
ridge ; " and behind that ridge the
sunset would, in proper time and due
atmospheric conditions, most assuredly
iflame. More than that, without the
jftat of its first discoverer, I could not
say.
Pho3bus, what a day that was !
There was a certain August day last
year, the day when the English and
Australian cricketers met at Kenning-
ton Oval, one the former are little
likely to forget. That perhaps was
hotter, but only that of all the days
have passed over my head in England.
Yet it was a generous heat, born of the
sun only, unmixed with any stifling
tropical steam. The air was fresh and
pure, and though breeze there was
none, to breathe it was a liberal
pleasure. Past the Fox again,
and down the hill-side through
abstemious Wootton, out on to the
high road I went by the path the lass
of the Bear had designed for my steps
that other time. But then, instead of
turning up the road to Cumnor, or
down it to Abingdon, I held on across
some grass lands, where the panting
cows had barely strength to chew the
customary cud, and through a noble
field of quick-yellowing corn, out again
on to the public way the way which
led to Besilsleigh and Fyfield. In
July, and such a July, there was small
likelihood of finding any maidens
dancing round the Fyfield-tree ; more-
over, my purpose was to cross " the
stripling Thames at Bablock-hythe."
So turning to the right, I set my face
for Eaton, and a fiery stretch of blind-
ing white road. No traveller was on
that road save my perspiring self : the
fields on either side were silent and
empty : even in the village itself no
sign of humanijty was visible save here
and there some listless mother lulling
her uneasy brat in the shade of a
doorway. It was as though all human
life had shrunk away in the presence
of that imperious sun. But, indeed,
my walks were not rich in social
charm : it was rare (and the rarity was
borne with patience) to meet with any
of my kind outside the villages, and in
them life seemed neither large nor
brisk. Queer old sleepy hollows. are
those villages : unchanged through
all the change at work in the
great intellectual centre so near
them. Curious it is from the stir
of the quick spreading city to pass
at one step into this old-world region,
there at her very gates. And yet,
perhaps to some minds it might seem
more typical of Oxford than Oxford
herself ! After a lapse of twenty years
the friend of Thyrsis found that
" nothing keeps the same." Another
term of twenty years has flown since
a feebler foot first trod these hills, and
yet to me everything seems to have
kept strangely the same. There are
the old sign-posts, fossils of the coaching
age, still in dumb reproach enjoining
man to go to Bath by this road, or by
that to Cheltenham. There are still
the huge ungainly stiles, and the
rough broken paths surely, as Buck-
stone used to say in the Overland
Route, the "nubbliest spots in the
whole of the island." The bare, hard-
benched little ale-houses, whence the
clattering boors drove out the shy
gipsy-scholar, are standing still. The
thatched rough-plastered cottages are
all unchanged, with their tiny stone-
walled garden plots, ablaze with
old-time blossoms, heavy crimson roses,
homely sweet-william and gaudy
marigold, stocks and the musk
carnation, "gold -dusted" snapdragon
and tall white nodding lilies. The
recluse of Walden Pond might have
made even his fastidious soul in the
simple quiet of these Oxford villages.
A little way outside Eaton, toiling
up the slope from the river meadows, I
met an old man, the oldest man I ever
saw still following the fortunes of
labouring humanity. So old was he
that he seemed bent not double but
treble with age. Over his shoulders
fell thin silver festoons of hair, and
the skin of his face was as the rind of
a water-melon. A rude staff, taller
than himself no great height
propped his slow steps, and at his back
hung a wallet that might have been
r. 2
36
On Classic Ground.
the wallet of Time. Old enough he
looked to have been born in those far
off days
" When wits were fresh and clear,
And life ran gaily as the sparkling Thames ;"
Though life had run, one fears, with
little gaiety for him ! He piped out
a feeble answer to my greeting,
and added the welcome news that the
ferry was barely a mile before me.
Heaven help that old man if, on the
very threshold of the grave, he had
paused to deceive the stranger ! It was
the longest mile I ever walked.
At last, the stripling Thames ; not
running gaily what could run in
that fierce heat, save this too solid
flesh ! but basking in the burning
light, a still sheet of molten gold,
shrinking from its thirsty banks
as though in very shame to see the
drooping grasses it had not strength to
save. The huge punt stretched half
across the stream; a little knot of
should-be workmen were resting at the
farther end, lazily contemplating
through the smoke of their short black
pipes the young walls of a hideous brick
tenement they might finish at some
more convenient time. In the next
meadow was the inevitable fisherman
poor fool, he might as well have
whipped the turnpike road ! My de-
mands for a passage were grudgingly
granted, and hardly a piece of silver,
instead of the customary copper toll,
reconciled the grumbling Charon when
he found I had made the passage in
sheer wantonness. What were my
memories to him ? Twenty years ago
I had crossed that stream, an eager
Freshman, bound for my first college
steeplechase, in the company of one
who has since too early crossed
that other " unpermitted ferry's flow."
Clearly the scene came back to me.
The moist, fresh-smelling fields smiling
under the dappled February sky ; the
gray brimming current ; the slow punt
packed full with thronging lads and
shy horses ; the laugh, the jest, and
all the high anticipation of the fun ;
and he, my friend, the earliest and the
best
" But while I mused came Memory with sad
eyes,
Holding the folded annals of my youth. "
Here it is fit to drop these poor
"coronals of that unforgotten time."
Perhaps I never found the tree : per-
haps it is gone, and the gipsy-scholar
dead. But the recollection of those
pleasant summer days will never go
of that so sweet renewal of youth.
Next year may I take up the search
again,
" Still nursing the unconquerable hope,
Still clutching the inviolable shade " !
37
THE DEPRESSION OF "ENGLISH."
IF to the Royal Commission on the
Depression of Trade could be added
one to consider the causes of the de-
pression of the literature and history
of our own country, some interesting
and suggestive evidence might be forth-
coming. And if only impartial wit-
nesses were selected, the labours of
such a commission would be finished
within a week. To such impartial
witnesses might be recommended the
scrutiny of the various changes intro-
duced of late years in the regulations
for the examination of aspirants to
various of the higher branches of the
services.
Rather more than a quarter of a
century ago an edict went forth in the
ordinary course of public business, the
full effect of which could not have
been anticipated at the time. It em-
bodied a tentative scheme, matured
after much patient thought and deli-
beration by a syndicate of represen-
tative men, prominent amongst whom
were the late Lords Macaulay and
Derby.
Matter-of-fact and simple, carefully
considered in point of light and shade,
and weighed with scrupulous care,
this scheme, though not absolutely
perfect, was fraught with the best
intentions. The chief promoters did
not live to witness the salutary revo-
lution it occasioned ; and they are
not here to protest against the cruel
mutilation of their work. The pur-
port of this new project was ap-
parently fourfold : to legislate for the
benefit of India ; to claim proper
recognition in the future for all the
leading branches of learning, and
notably of those then absolutely ne-
glectedEnglish literature and his-
tory; to appeal to all sorts and
conditions of youths not to youths
of an uniform mental pattern turned
out like bullets from a mould, but to
every shade of capacity and intelli-
gence ; and lastly, to give an impetus
to the dormant energies of the non-
classical masses by pointing out that
English and science and modern lan-
guages were also high roads to em-
ployment in the public service.
This tempting bait was not thrown
out in vain, and very gradually a
change for the better set in. The
process was necessarily sluggish, for
the reason that the new class of com-
batants had no weapon sufficiently
keen to wield in the field of open com-
petition. Still there are records tell-
ing that at first hundreds fought in
many a forlorn hope, and it was just
this spirit of pugnacity that heralded
a complete revolution in our educa-
tional system.
" Modern sides" and classes for
English study in our great public
schools were not even dreamt of then ;
University undergraduates were left
in comfortable ignorance as to the
development of the prose, the poetry,
and the history of their own land, for
in those days there was no Early-
English Text Society for the en-
couragement of philological work
adapted to the wants of young stu-
dents ; Professor Child had not written
a line of his Observations on the Lan-
guage of Chaucer, which settled for all
time, and for all subsequent com-
mentators, the principles upon which
an accurate text of this poet could be
constructed ; the Clarendon Press
Series, and other kindred literary
ventures, had not been planned , while
such pioneers as Green, Freeman,
Stubbs, Lecky, Gardiner, and Pearson
were not much beyond their teens ;
and the large proportion of the com-
The Depression of "English"
pany of scholars responsible for the
Handbooks, Primers, Glossaries, Synop-
ses, Epochs, Studies, Outlines, Digests,
Elements, and Specimens, designed to
soften the tasks of their younger
brethren at school these men were
in their cradles.
Books of this class have come " not
single spies but in battalions." Com-
mencing with English subjects, they
have rapidly extended to the other
accepted branches of learning. Even
the old classical texts have disappeared,
and the annotated Primer is supreme.
It will indeed be difficult to con-
jecture what is likely to come next,
for there can be scarcely any author,
ancient or modern, left for the editor's
handiwork. Nearly every reign in our
history hasjbeen exhaustively treated by
a master hand ; the biography of every
great historical character has been
written ; and the abridgments (some
few exceedingly good) of the general
history of England, of European his-
tory, and of the history of English
literature, are innumerable. Such an
extraordinary upheaval is unparal-
leled, not to say appalling. II y en a
pour tons les go'dts^ and from pence to
guineas.
Every known man has been pressed
into the service according to his lights,
and with the result that a consider-
able number of these volumes has
been launched from the Universities
and the Public Schools. In some cases
it may be objected that editions
have contained twice as many pages
of notes as of text, and that youths
who should be made to think for them-
selves are spoon-fed with the most
trivial explanations and interpreta-
tions of ' the original ; a scoffing public
has even gone so far as to assert that
people who read these volumes other
than for personal delectation are
" cramming."
Viewing, however, the work of the
three last decades as a whole, more
has been accomplished in aid of a
scholarly and critical appreciation of
" English " than was done in the three
centuries preceding. It is not too
much to assert that Lord Macaulay
and his colleagues could no more have
anticipated that so gigantic an edifice
would rise from their foundation stone,
than our Cromwellian ancestors could
have discerned in the haphazard Navi-
gation Act the astounding develop-
ment of our mercantile marine. Ii>
behoves us to keep a watchful eye on
this monument of industry and cul-
ture, to encourage the admiration of
it, and to check all dangerous reaction.
It has been tampered with already.
It is important to bear in mind
that a new department of state, known
as the Civil Service Commission, was
instituted at this time to act as an
examining body for the public service,
and the Order in Council in question
formed part of the general scheme.
The history of this body may be de-
scribed as a Thirty Years' skirmish
between tradition and progress, and
is commensurate with every stage of
the literary movement. Each step in
advance taken by the commission in-
creased the vitality of the intellectual
labour-market, and struck at the weak
point in the education of [the rising
generation.
In course of time a few powerful
schools agreed to accept the situation,
and their example was followed, with
more or less enthusiasm, by others.
The reaction extended to the Universi-
ties, and, by means of many " extension
schemes," has permeated every nook
and corner of our educational system.
Any movement, therefore, which
directly or indirectly tends to depress
what is termed the " modern side " in
our great schools any retrograde
movement, in fact must inevitably
lead to injustice and trouble.
Two illustrations will be given indi-
cative of nothing less than the delibe-
rate depreciation of English literature
and history in quarters where they
were formerly allowed to rank at their
proper value.
First, in regard to candidates for
the Royal Military College, Sand-
hurst. New regulations have been
issued abolishing the study of English
The Depression of " English."
39
literature, and degrading history to
the standard of a second-class optional
subject. History, therefore, will be
shirked by any candidates who can
improve their chances of success by
means of better "paying" branches;
so that Sandhurst will be recruited by
many a cadet absolutely without know-
ledge of any branch even of military
history.
The specific complaint of past years,
in regard to this examination, has al-
ways been that encouragement was
given to the bookworm at the expense
of the more desirable athlete ; and
that it was ridiculous to put the
English officer of the future through
his facings in Chaucer or Spenser, or
indeed in any purely literary study.
In their condemnation of " English "
these malcontents were helping to
undermine the very work that was
the mainstay of youths who during
their school career had scarcely at-
tained mediocrity in classics or mathe-
matics. It was the very branch by
means of which they could hope to
scramble over the last stileJ
A reference to the analyses of these
competitions will show that no subject
was so popular as " English ; " and, if
marks go to prove anything, in none
was the general level of proficiency so
well maintained. Let it be remem-
bered that the great mass of Sand-
hurst candidates is composed of those
whose peculiar tastes and abilities
have been more in the direction
of the playing-field than the study,
and that public opinion persists
in pointing to such youths as the
most desirable for our officers. Un-
fortunately for them they have be-
longed to the less industrious of
schoolboys, and when they come to
see the necessity of serious study, it
is only natural they should lean 'to-
wards subjects in which they have not
already been proved to be wretchedly
deficient. There can be no just princi-
ple in any competition which does not
recognise unreservedly the existence
of various degrees of ability, and many
distinctions of special aptitude. It is
monstrous to assume that because a
lad is not a scholar he is fit for
nothing; and monstrous to condemn
him for studying the very books which
have been written or edited by some
of the most capable men of his
generation.
Easy enough is it to follow the
train of reasoning that has led to the
abandonment of a course of literature
for army students; but it is quite
impossible to understand why at least
some portion of history, embracing a
Military Campaign, has not been made
obligatory. This was to be looked for,
not only in the interests of the ser-
vice, but as a preparation for future
studies at Sandhurst. Instead of this,
history is classed as one of the four
optional subjects ; and quality is to be
sacrificed to quantity by the vexatious
introduction of a paper involving a
knowledge of facts from the time of
the early Britons to the present reign.
Many will therefore avoid this part
of the programme if they possibly
can, and will enter Sandhurst igno-
rant of the names of the great adver-
saries of Marlborough and Wellington;
never having seen or discussed the
plan of a battle, and totally untrained
to follow the lectures of their military
instructors. Shade of the Napiers !
We know, at least, how not to do it.
The second illustration is a more
serious one, and deals, not with a
larger body of men, but with men of
a different stamp, whose intellectual
aims are higher and whose ambition
it is to serve their country in the
Civil Service of India.
There is no doubt whatever that the
literary movement aforesaid is the
direct outcome of the different stages
of improvement in the education of
candidates for this service who were
examined under Lord Macaulay's
scheme of 1855. This is proved beyond
all question in each successive annual
report of the Civil Service Commis-
sioners up to the year 1878. There
are the volumes, duly signed and de-
livered to the public ; each one marking
a stage of progress as regularly as the
40
The Depression of " English!'
milestone on the Queen's highway.
There is nothing theoretical or specu-
lative about them ; nothing but facts
overwhelmingly convincing Study
them side by side with the Publishers'
Circulars, and we find the relation of
cause and effect unmistakably marked.
To be brief, the standard was gradu-
ally raised along the entire range of
public education ; books were published
with amazing rapidity to meet the
standard ; and candidates in abund-
ance met and conquered the standard.
English literature and history were
encouraged by means of rewards in
marks suitable to their importance,
and with complete success. The clas-
sical examination included papers in
Greek and Roman history, litera-
ture, and antiquities ; and a fair know-
ledge of the literature and history of
France, Germany, and Italy was ex-
pected of those who asked to be
examined in the languages of one or
other of these countries. The stand-
ard, in fact, was well adjusted to the
important prizes to be won; and,
except perhaps for the classification of
modern languages, the field was a fair
one for all comers. Certainly the Eng-
lish branches came to be the most popu-
lar. But just as this literary and scho-
larly movement had reached its zenith,
it was discovered we were all wrong.
An order from the Secretary of State
for India in Council decreed that every-
thiDg must be changed, and down came
the precious fabric. As to the politi-
cal expediency of Lord Salisbury's
Minute there are certainly more "noes "
than "ayes," both in England and in
India ; but in regard to its harmfulness
from an educational point of view, the
following facts must speak for them-
selves.
By the stratagem of lowering the
age an excuse was provided for falliog
back into the old grooves, and of
practically reducing the standard of
prize winners to one of grammar and
figures. The literary and historical
portions of the examination in French,
German and Italian, and even in Latin
and Greek, have been lopped off, and
the test in each restricted to fragments
of translation and composition; and
by way of dealing a death-blow to the
study of English literature and history
so few marks are assigned to each that
already half the candidates have
arrived at the conclusion that the
game is no longer worth the candle.
Indeed, they can no more now afford
to give serious thought to history and
literature, and neglect for a single
week the orthodox and only remunera-
tive subjects, than a parliamentary
candidate can at the present moment
abandon electioneering for ballooning.
Boys are quite as self-seeking and
alive to the main chance as their
rulers who frame these strange laws.
It is inconceivable that so ripe an
English scholar as Lord Salisbury can
have signed this decree for the depres-
sion of English with a full know-
ledge of what was likely, nay sure,
to happen. There must, indeed, have
been some most plausible and alluring
arguments at work to have induced
him to do in 1878 what he himself
denounced with so much force only
eighteen months ago.
During a discussion in the House of
Lords early last year on the question,
proposed by the War Office, for changes
in the scheme of examination for milit-
ary students (the scheme already men-
tioned), his lordship appeared as the
champion of English studies, and elo-
quently condemned the proposal as
impolitic and shortsighted. Curiously
enough, there was no Liberal peer
present able to play a trump card
in the game of party-politics by re-
minding the former Secretary for
India of a measure identical in purport
with that before the House, for
which, though not responsible for its
inspiration, he was there to answer.
But let that pass. The full effect of
the mischief that has set in will be
imperfectly understood without a few
statistics : they shall be as few as
possible.
We will take the four conventional
subjects : Latin, Greek, French trans-
lation and composition, and Mathe-
The Depression of " English!'
matics, and see how they answered
the purposes of the forty-one selected
candidates for India last June :
Maximum
Marks.
lit
Gross total of
the Successful
Candidates.
i
Greek
600
32
8 494
265
Latin
800
39
16 941
434
French i
500
1 000
41
41
8,849
16 236
216
396
Some other branches will give the
following :
8,3 .
^~
&
3 02
HII
3 S3
-U <U
03
%
o3p
i i
N,
OS's
o|
1
500
15
3 540
236
Italian
400
22
2 807
128
English History
,, Literature ....
300
300
21
21
1,637
1,711
H
Chemistry
500
10
1 358
136
Electricity and Mag-)
netisin /
300
7
282
40
Heat and Light
300
2
39
19
Mechanical Philoso-)
phy and Astronomy/
300
2
61
30
Logic
300
3
240
80
Political Economy ....
300
22
1,631
74
Sanskrit
500
o
Science, it will be observed, is in a
deplorably bad way ; but I am con-
cerned here only with the English
side.
Everybody, of course, takes his
chance with the English essay; but,
as regards history and literature, we
find that already fifty per cent, of the
candidates are avoiding them ; whereas,
in the old day, before the marks were
reduced, all were glad to be examined
in them. The statistics show not only
deliberate depression in the estimate
of the relative value of history and
literature to other subjects, but posi-
tive injustice in applying this estimate.
How comes it that Latin, which is set
tat nearly three times the value of Eng-
lish history or literature, is made to pro-
duce six times the value of each, and
mathematics five times the value ?
Who shall say that lads are not
actually invited to stand aloof from
self -culture in their mother-tongue,
when such facts as these are printed
for their guidance 1
If any reader be disposed to repeat
the old old cry that history is but a
" cram " subject, easily " got up," I
would bid him know this that not
only is there a paper on the entire
range of history, but a paper on the
following special periods as well, in
any one of which candidates are
examined ; and that by way of " indi-
cating the character and amount of
reading that would be regarded as
satisfactory," this leaflet is distributed.
1. A.i). 1066 1307. Stubbs's Select Charters ;
Stubbs's Constitutional History ; Free-
man's Norman Conquest, vol. v.
2. A.D. 1461 1588. Hallam's Constitutional
History of England ; Fronde's History of
England ; Brewer's Henry the Eighth.
3. A.D. 1603 1715. Hallam's Constitutional
History of England ; Macaulay's History
of England ; Gardiner's History of Eng-
land ; Wyon's Reign of Queen Anne.
4. A.D. 17151805. Lord Stanhope's His-
tory ; Sir T. E. May's Constitutional His-
tory ; Seeley's Expansion of England ; and
Massey's Reign of George the Third.
And all this for what may be got
out of three hundred marks, from
which one hundred are docked for
" superficial knowledge ! " If students
cannot steer clear of superficiality
on such works as these, where can
they turn for safety ? Could any-
thing be more likely to depress the
study of history among boys between
the ages of seventeen and nineteen
than a challenge of this forbidding
nature ? Of course they will prefer to
turn to anything, even to a few books
of Euclid, than face a task weighted
with so heavy a premium ; especially
when they ascertain that Mr. Freeman's
volume consists of nine hundred large
and closely-printed pages of learned
comments on the Norman and Angevin
kings ; that Professor Stubbs's great
works must be hard reading even to
University schoolmen ; that the handi-
est edition of Mr. Froude's History is in
twelve volumes covering six thousand
pages, though, to be sure, Mr. Froude's
The Depression of "English''
six thousand pages are easier reading
than half that number from most
other hands ; that Brewer means two
ponderous tomes in one thousand pages
of equally ponderous records of the life
of Henry the Eighth to the death of
Wolsey; and that Mr. Gardiner's
monumental work on the Personal
Government of Charles the First and
the fall of the monarchy is not a mere
handy text-book ; when, in short, they
cast about for selecting a " special
period " to supplement the general
paper for which Mr. Green's or Mr.
Bright's History must be read, and yet
find that black-mail is levied in all
directions, they naturally will not
imperil their chances by undertaking
so much unremunerative labour.
But let it be assumed that a candi-
date shall know his history of Period
I. as completely as Professors Stubbs
and Freeman, or of Period II. as com-
pletely as Mr. Froude or Dr. Brewer ;
he can obtain no more than full marks.
Then let it be likewise assumed
that the same candidate shall have
reached the level of a Warton or a
Craik in the history of English litera-
ture, how would he fare in contrast
with a rival who in the mathematical
papers, beginning with arithmetic and
ending with the differential and in-
tegral calculus (not a very high
standard), shall also make full marks'?
This would be the result :
Deduct for
Maxi- Marks superficial
mum. gained, knowledge. Total.
. /History 300 ... 300 ... 100 = 200
A '\Literature ... 300 ... 300 ... 100 = 200
400
B. Mathematics 1,000 ... 1,000
If, again, this same mark-test be
applied, and Latin and Greek be
substituted for mathematics, we shall
find
/Greek .........
(Latin ..........
total 400 ' as before -
Maxi- Marks
mum gained. Deduct.
600
800
600
800
Total.
100 = 500
100 = 700
1,200
This table presupposes the pos-
sibility of a perfectly accurate adjust-
ment of the relative standard that
is considered equitable ; but the
previous tables show that in the actual
process of distributing marks " Eng-
lish " is made to fall yet another fifty
per cent. Need more be said 1
The old argument that classics and
mathematics should take precedence,
owing to the length of time that is
spent on them, is only an argument in
favour of the comparatively few who
are blessed with classical or mathemati-
cal ability. Almost the same amount
of school-time has to be given to
them, will he nil he, by lads of no real
aptitude for them, whose abilities, in-
deed, lean in a diametrically opposite
direction. Ought they to pay a double
penalty for their misfortune by being
practically excluded from all chance
of preferment in the public service?
By all means welcome loyally and
liberally the best classical and mathe-
matical students, for they are the
representatives of the best teaching in
all our chief seats of learning ; but do
not let us any longer wilfully shelve
well-disposed workers in other useful
directions.
Yery tardily we are recognising
responsibilities that are unspeakably
important by giving increased en-
couragement to the study of modern
languages. With our country swarm-
ing with German clerks (they are here
in their tens of thousands), bringing
with them a competent knowledge of
French and English, doing excellent
work at a low rate of wage, claiming
and readily obtaining priority of
choice over less useful Englishmen in
our own houses of business, we are
sadly in need of this crumb of comfort.
Why are we, then, taking away with
one hand what we are giving with the
other? Surely our resources are not
so scanty that, in order to provide for
the necessities of embryonic modern
linguists, we must contrive, after all
that has been done for them, to thrust
the history and literature of England
into the background !
W. BAPTISTE SCOONES.
SOME AMERICAN NOTES.
THE following pages record some first
impressions of the United States
during a short visit in the autumn
of last year. It is with not a little
misgiving that they are offered to
the public. So many eminent men
have been to that country lately, so
much has been said and written of
their experiences, by themselves and
others, that the question must almost
inevitably arise, What can be left for
one, who boasts none of their eminence,
to say? Indeed, I fear, very little.
Yet I try to console myself with the
reflection that no object looks quite
the same to different eyes, and that
there are many, very many, objects in
America.
In the company of two friends I
sailed from Liverpool one Saturday
evening in the windy month of Sep-
tember, and early on the ninth morn-
ing of our voyage we made the
harbour of New York. The sun was
rising in the orange-coloured east ; on
the western horizon grey level banks
of mist brooded over the still sleeping
city. Its towers and pinnacles, indis-
tinctly seen through the dim vapour,
looked full of majesty ; the city itself
on the bosom of the still waters might
have been a home of beauty and poetry.
Soon some fishing craft came out of
the harbour trimming their white sails
to the breeze ; then a tender followed,
on board of which we steamed to the
custom-house quay.
About two hours after landing the
examination of our luggage was com-
pleted, and we found ourselves in a
commodious two-horsed cab in which
we were jolted slowly along what must,
I suppose, in courtesy be called the
paved streets of New York. In the
matter of street paving in America
the resources of civilisation are by no
means exhausted. Nothing worse than
the state of the roadway in New York
is easily conceivable \ nothing more
hideous than the general aspect of the
city on close inspection is humanly
possible. Great square, clean, ugly
blocks of buildings present themselves
in uniform and tasteless repetition
throughout the wearisome monotony of
the " long, unlovely streets." The
side-walks are disfigured with tele-
graph-posts; the sky is almost dark-
ened with the dense net-work of the
wires interlacing overhead. New York
is nothing but half-a-dozen streets
running north and south for twelve or
fifteen miles, and no streets in the
civilised world are less attractive or so
ill adapted for the purpose of swift
and easy transit. A few hours in New
York is sufficient to enable you to
do adequate justice to its deformi-
ties ; a little longer time is required
if you wish to examine the most
characteristic product of America, the
humanity which is found in its streets.
No type of national life is more
distinct than that of the American.
You cannot mistake a genuine
Yankee for the representative of
any other nationality under the sun.
In spite of the immense influx of
emigrants from Europe this remains
true. The country has an omni-
vorous appetite for fresh colonists,
and a digestion which absorbs and
assimilates them all. It takes an
Irishman or a German landed in the
States perhaps a shorter time, an
Englishman or Scotchman perhaps a
longer time, to become an American ;
but they are all transformed at last.
It is not so easy to tell in what the
change consists, as it is to remark the
difference. Physically there is dete-
rioration. The climate withers all ;
the face becomes dry and pinched,
the movements slow and languid ; the
44
Some American Notes.
speech drawls. There is no greater
mistake than to imagine that the
typical American is an energetic
being, vivid and versatile in mind,
restlessly eager in the active reali-
sation of his ideas ; for in truth he
is the slowest, most lethargic of men.
I remember an American friend telling
me a story of a fellow-student in their
college days. One of the professors
found this youth one day seated in an
attitude, familiar enough to us through
pictorial representations, which is un-
deniably comfortable but scarcely con-
ducive to study. " I'll tell you what
it is, professor," said the student, " I
was cut out for a loafer." The pro-
fessor regarded him for a moment
with half compassionate contempt :
" Well," he said, " I guess the man
who cut you out knew his business."
I do not mean to say that the Ameri-
can is naturally cut out for a loafer,
but I do say that he has a languid
and faded look. The enterprise of the
States is largely in the hands of new
settlers. It is they who people the
distant west where new territories are
born in a day. The native American
looks as if he would stop altogether.
When he does exert himself it is for
the discovery of some new means of
avoiding trouble. He is a great me-
chanical inventor, but he perfects
nothing. He is not without literary
and artistic sensibility, but he has
produced no great work of genius.
The sustained effort such work de-
mands is beyond the compass of his
powers. That "artistic anaemia," of
which Dr. Holmes half deprecatingly,
half deploringly, speaks as a recog-
nised characteristic of the American
man of genius, is but an illustration
in one department of life of a na-
tional apathy and bloodlessness.
Morally there is a great deal to
admire in the American. I like his
tolerance, his frankness, his friendli-
ness, his familiarity, his independence.
He is uniformly polite. He will go
out of his way to put you into yours.
I am afraid, however, he is just a
little I hardly dare to say it snob-
bish. It is a notorious fact, observed
since society was first divided into
classes, that those who claim most
eagerly to be ladies and gentlemen
are precisely those to whom Prudence,
if she were allowed to speak, would
suggest silence. Everybody in America
is a lady or a gentleman, and must
be styled accordingly. " Are you the
gentleman to whom I gave my order ? "
you ask the waiter in the hotel. The
position of a nation which repudiated
all social distinctions in defence of the
simple and wholesome truth of our
common manhood and womanhood is
intelligible ; but not so intelligible is
this national advocacy of a common
gentlemanhood and ladyhood. No
doubt, however, the practice is designed
to raise the standard of manners.
The freedom with which you can speak
to strangers, and are spoken to by
them, is delightful ; and if you go to
the country for information, and as a
student of its life, it is of priceless
advantage. One word more what is
best in the American character, the
real sensibility and 'tenderness which
vibrate beneath the surface, and stir
now and then a naturally languid
and self-indulgent race till it thrills
with a generous enthusiasm, this the
American does his best to conceal.
From New York our first move was
in the direction of Niagara, which we
approached by way of the Hudson
River. We sailed up this fine river
as far as Albany. The colours of the
fall glowed along the wooded banks
and down the shoulders of the Catskill
Mountains. In our moist atmosphere
the foliage of summer withers from the
trees in smouldering hues of dusky
brown and copper ; in the dry air of
the States it flames with scarlet and
crimson. No lovelier gradation of
variegated tints in a scale of warm
colour was well conceivable. A breeze
as soft as the balmiest of midsummer
breathed gently in our faces. We
passed West Point, with its military
Academy perched airily on the rock
overlooking the river ; we passed the
spot where Henry Hudson anchored
Some American Notes.
45
on its stream; we passed Jay Gould's
house. Each spot was brought to our
notice by our guide-book with equal
and undiscriminating emphasis.
We arrived at Albany, the capital
of New York State, about six o'clock.
Strolling down the principal street we
saw a door, as of a shop, open. There
appeared to be nothing on the premises
save a number of curious uniforms
hung round upon the wall. " Come
in, come right in," said a man at the
door, as he saw us look in and hesitate
to enter. " We're all Republicans here.
I guess we won't hurt anybody."
"But what is all this?" we asked.
"This is the head-quarters of the
Republican Unconditionals," replied
the man. And then he went on to
explain, that two or three months
before a presidential election each of
the rival parties organises clubs all
over the country for electioneering
purposes, and that this was the head-
quarters of one of the clubs of the
Republican party. The uniform of
this particular organisation of politi-
cians consisted of a white pasteboard
helmet and a white oilskin tunic with
red facings, and each member of it
owned and carried a torch on parade.
A demonstration or march-out took
place two or three times a week. The
clubs do nothing but demonstrate
this activity exhausts their political
functions. We saw enough of these
strange, boyish, good-humoured, and
rather vulgar displays throughout our
journey. Wherever we went, north,
south, east, and west, merchants,
lawyers, doctors, artizans, were career-
ing through the streets beneath a
flutter of flags and flicker of torches in
costumes such as might clothe the
" supers " for an imposing procession
on the provincial stage. " Backwards,"
says the song,
"roll .backwards, Time, in your
flight,
Make me a child again just for to-night."
During the autumn of every fourth
year this wish is more than fulfilled
for the American, who is made, and
continues to be, a child until he gets
a new president.
The Republican "Unconditionals"
did not parade the evening we were at
Albany, but fit was a great occasion
with the Democrats. About nine
o'clock we strolled through the town
and up to the capitol an immense
building, erected regardless of expense,
and not yet completed or paid for.
All the American State-houses have
an open passage running through
them, with offices on either side.
Entering at one approach we saunt-
ered through the long corridor and
found that the door at the other side
opened out on a wide flight of steps
which descended to the street. This
street was crowded by an immense
concourse of people, which lined the
pavement and surged up to the steps of
the capitol on which we stood. Rockets
hissed in the air, and coloured lights
flared from the windows of the houses.
A minute or two afterwards a gentle-
man came out and stood bare-headed
on the steps beside us. We quickly
recognised him, by his portraits, to be
Grover Cleveland. Then drums sounded
and the martial tread of American
politicians, and all the Democratic
clubs in Albany demonstrated before
their chosen candidate for the presi-
dential chair. The procession was com-
posed of such fantastic creatures as I
have already described. One club,
however, disdaining the meretricious
ornament of oil-skins and coloured
cloth, rested their claim to public
sympathy exclusively upon the posses-
sion of white hats. They all wore
white hats, and the advancing column
was followed by a cart in which was
placed an apparatus which threw a
strong beam of limelight along the
line of the moving heads. Grover
Cleveland stood impassive and silent
till the whole display was at an end.
A large strong-built and, for an
American, close-jointed man, with high
forehead and dull heavy look, his face
would be quite uninteresting save for
a certain firmness of purpose which is
conveyed by the lines of its lower half.
Some American Notes.
Clever or brilliant he cannot possibly
be. Strong and capable as an admin-
istrator he well may be. One thing
is noteworthy, he is an American
politician who doesn't talk. He never
opened his lips that evening he never
does if he can help it and he can
generally help it. Mr. Froude and
Mr. Carlyle tell us that democratic
electors will always choose for their
leader the eloquent man who can
flatter them, and that as eloquence is
incompatible with statesmanship de-
mocracies must founder. This rule
has been broken for once. Last
November, America had to choose be-
tween the most brilliant talker, the
greatest flatterer and most restless
in intellectual vitality of all her poli-
ticians, and this grave, phlegmatic,
silent man who stood beside us on the
steps of the capitol at Albany; and
she chose the latter. As Cleveland
retired, which he did rapidly, a great
crowd swarmed up the steps and
pressed into the building. Children
anxious to shake hands with him
followed in great numbers. "Which
way did Cleveland go 1 " said an ex-
cited little maiden to me, and added
without waiting for an answer, " I
say, hurrah for Cleveland ! " Perhaps,
on the whole, we may say so too.
From Albany a night's journey by
rail brought us to Niagara ; of its
famous falls I do not propose to speak.
To me they were disappointing. I
am told that if you* stay a week at
Niagara you grow to think them sub-
lime ; I stayed only two days, so the
fitting emotions may not have had
time to develop. These, it should be
remembered, are only first impressions.
Boston came next on the pro-
gramme. I liked Boston. The newer
portion of the town is handsome and
orderly, and the quaint red - brick
houses, sheltered and beautified by
neighbouring trees, which clamber up
the rising ground of the Tremont quar-
ter, are truly picturesque. In the
centre of the town is a well-kept space
devoted to horticulture, and adjoining
.this is the " common" a hilly enclo-
sure of shady walks and open grass.
It was the longest of the former,
stretching from Joy Street to Boylston
Street, which was, you may remember,
the scene of one of the daintiest pieces
of love-making recorded in American
fiction the inimitable sequel to the
story of the Autocrat of the Breakfast
Table.
When we arrived in Boston we
hired a cab, and told the driver to
show us the principal sights. He
jumped up on his box with alacrity.
" I'll take you first," he said, " to see
J. L. Sullivan's house." "Who is
he ? " we inquired. " Never heard of
J. L. ? " responded cabby. "Why,
where do you hail from?" "From
England," was the reply. "Never
heard of him there? why, he's our
great fighting man." " Rubbish ! "
said my friend, impatiently ; " we come
to see Boston, a great intellectual centre,
and the first thing you propose to show
us is the house of a brutal prize-fighter."
Cabby muttered that the house in
question was a fine ojie, and then sug-
gested driving us to the market. After
this second proposal we had to take the
matter into our own hands and make
our own selection. We had a long
and pleasant drive first, to the busy
centre of the town, to the Old South
Church, to the old State House, to
Faneuil Hall, with their historic
memories ; then round the suburbs
through the cluster of red buildings
which forms the University of Har-
vard, past the tree beneath whose
shadow Washington assumed com-
mand of the Republican forces, to
the house which was for so long the
quiet home of Longfellow to the dock-
yards and arsenal, to Bunker's Hill.
At Boston, for the first time on
American soil, you forget that you are
in a new country with a short history,
for the dust of heroes has mingled with
the earth on which we tread. Moses at
the Red Sea, Leonidas at Thermopylse,
to these landmarks in the history of
freedom age can add nothing, from them
it can take nothing away ; and Pres-
cott, with his "embattled" townsmen
Some American Notes.
at Bunker's Hill, inaugurated a new
social experiment among men as well
as a new epoch in the annals of their
liberties. The great experiment,
made for the first time on an ade-
quate scale, whether a people can
govern itself has been so far suc-
cessful. And yet I think the success
might have been steadier, and would
certainly have had a wider influence
abroad, if America had escaped from
that metaphysical stage of national
existence in which she still remains.
It will be a great day for that country
when her popular orators and Cali-
fornian economists have learned that
it is a mistake to mix metaphysic with
politics and economics, and that, whe-
ther the question at issue be one of
land nationalisation or electoral privi-
lege, all vapouring about " human
rights," " natural rights of man,"
and so forth, is as much beside the
question as if nowadays one were to
introduce the doctrine of the divine
right of kings into an inquiry concern-
ing the relative advantages of mo-
narchy and republicanism. We also,
it may be, are not without need to learn
the same lesson. The questions be-
tween rival forms of government, as
indeed all others of high political im-
portance, can be safely discussed only
on the broad humane ground of social
expediency.
From Boston we returned to New
York, where I parted temporarily from
my friends and proceeded to Phila-
delphia and Baltimore. I must pass
briefly over my visits to these cities
not because they were less interesting
than those I have already described,
but because both these places have the
characteristics of other northern towns,
and there is still much I wish to say
about the south and west. You all
know what is to be seen in Phila-
delphia ; you all know that the Decla-
ration of Independence was first read
from the steps of Independence Hall,
and that its noble words are inscribed
in the vestibule of that building. In
spite of the grandeur and imposing
magnificence of portions of the town,
it is still in some degree rustic. The
" pleasant woodland names " of the
streets, Chestnut Street, &c., remind us
of the country breezes which rocked its
cradle. It is perhaps to the influence
of these breezes that the women of
Baltimore and Philadelphia look so
much healthier, as certainly they
seemed to me to look, than their
sisters of New York and Boston.
From Baltimore I went to Washing-
ton. Washington is laid out on an
extensive scale, but it is no more
than a skeleton city. The buildings
are what the Americans call "elegant."
It is a well-ordered and well-kept city,
artifically endowed with objects of in-
terest, only Providence has not fallen
in with the designs of its founders.
There is little trade, and a small,
purposeless population. I went of
course to the Capitol, where it seems
to me internal comfort and convenience
are rather sacrificed to general effect.
The rooms in actual use are small.
But it is something for an insignificant
mortal to have stood in such a large
building. Size counts for something.
Even Mr. Ruskin admits that it is
impossible to be quite indifferent to
St. Peter's when you know that the
acanthus leaves on the capitals are
measured by feet.
I rejoined my two companions at a
place than which none is more inter-
esting in later American history,
Harper's Ferry. The busy activities
of that little town are silent now, its
streets are dirty and deserted, and the
appearance of their squalor and neglect
disfigures one of the fairest scenes of
nature. The government arsenal, so
famous once, has been long disused,
and the ground on which it stood
was advertised for sale. John Brown's
fort is an unsightly ruin. And yet I
should not have liked to omit a visit
to a place so closely associated with
famous names and inspiring deeds. I
crossed the river and climbed the steep
sides of the Maryland heights. From
that eminence a panorama is spread
before the eye, unrivalled in interest
and beauty. To the north and north-
48
Some American Notes.
west stretches a wide billowy cham-
paign to the confines of Pennsylvania,
rich, fruitful, and beneficent. Beneath
our feet the Potomac makes music
among the rough stones which served
so often the passage of armies, whilst
southwards, far as the eye could reach,
overlooked by the strong guardianship
of the Blue Ridge to the left and the
Great North Mountains to the right,
gleamed like a braid of silver the
waters of the Shenandoah. as they
flow through the fair Virginian valley
to which they lend their name. No
mountain guardianship could preserve
that quiet valley from the " red rain "
which fell not to make its harvests
grow. From 1860 to 1864 the tide of
war ebbed and flowed through it inces-
santly. In the great struggle between
the Northern and Southern forces, the
strategical importance of the Shenan-
doah valley was immense. It runs for
nearly two hundred miles in a south-
westerly direction, with scarcely a gap
in the protecting bulwark of its moun-
tain barriers. But the egress from the
valley to the north would bring an in-
vading army sixty miles in the rear of
Washington, and would therefore out-
flank the capital of the Union ; the
passage of a northern army, on the
other hand, through the valley would
be a march away from Richmond. It
was necessary for the troops of the
Union to command the Shenandoah ;
it was the object of the Confederates to
prevent this. So rich was the valley
in its " well-filled barns, its cattle, and
its busy mills," that southern armies
lived on it for years, till at last the
decree went forth that it must be
cleared not of rebels alone but of
the means it furnished for their sub-
sistence ; and Grant sent out the me-
morable word to "eat out Virginia
clear and clean, so that the crows
flying over it for the balance of this
season will have to carry their pro-
vender with them."
We had intended to drive through
this valley, but the road was so dusty
we preferred the train. We stopped
at Charleston, the little town where
John Brown met his death. We went
into the State House where the trial
took place, and heard the details of it
re-told by a Southerner with passionate
antagonism against the outlaw. A
little distance off had been raised the
gallows where the brave spirit of the
"grizzly fighter" left its body, but
only to animate and inspire the friends
of freedom, and to march with their
armies to victory.
Through the whole of the Southern
States, but notably through Virginia,
everything dates from the war. The
change which it effected was not so
much a change as a revolution. The
old Virginia has disappeared, never to
return. We can hardly now recover by
imagination a picture of the Southern
planter in the days of his ascendency.
Proud, careless, and at ease, born not
to produce but to consume, he lived
upon his broad domains as a king over
his dusky troops of slaves. In a land
where free labour was degraded, too
haughty or too indolent to work, he
trained his sons, as he was trained
himself, to despise the exertion of-
honourable toil. Rich, and firmly
rooted in his position, his influence
determined for generations the policy
of his country, till the election of the
first Republican president, a quarter
of a century ago, startled him in his
thoughtless security. When the waves
of the war which followed had ebbed
away, he raised his head a ruined and
discredited man. His fortune was all
but annihilated. Perhaps he might
have recovered something -of his old
position had he remained on his an-
cestral soil. But, too proud to suffer
the humiliation of being seen to work
where he had long lived at ease, he
parted with what remained of his pos-
sessions, and, seeking a new fortune
in other lands, bade an indignant
farewell to the rich valleys and proud
heights of his beautiful state. The
descendants of the few planters who
remained soon broke through the old
lines of social cleavage by inter-
marriage with the mean whites the
po' white trash with whom their
Some American Notes.
49
fathers would not have deigned to
associate, and the mischievous social
ascendency of pre-secession days was
at an end for ever. Last November,
for the first time since before the
great days of Lincoln, a candidate
representing the policy of the South
was elected to the presidential chair.
A fear has been expressed in some
quarters that this (recent) election
may bring back with it the dangerous
rule of the past ; and it was not the
least unworthy of the many pitiful
electioneering devices of the rival
candidate that he sought, as it was
not too euphemistically described, to
"wave the bloody shirt," and excite
the old feelings of antagonism between
North and South. But the fear is
baseless as a dream. The past can
never be restored. In my journey
through the old area of the Southern
Confederacy I saw enough, indeed, of
the attitude and temper of the people
to let me know that those feelings are
by no means dead which awoke into
passionate life during the long war of
the secession. The embers of its
furious fires still burn with a dull
red glow, but the points of concentra-
tion have long since disappeared to
which they might once have been col-
lected to revive by mutual contact
into flame. To restore the ascendency
of the South to-day would be just as
impossible as it was found impossible
in the eighteenth century to reseat the
Stuart princes upon their forfeited
throne. Analyse the outbreak of the
rebellion of the Slave States as you
please, it was, after all, but the con-
tinuance, and the close, of that great
conflict whose commencement for the
last time reddened our English soil
with blood. It was the despairing
struggle of authority against freedom,
of privilege against democracy, when
the lineal descendants of the old Cava-
liers matched bravely their unequal
arms against the full-grown strength
of that gaunt but mighty Titan who
lay two centuries ago in the loins of
Puritanism. The questions first raised
at Edgehill were at last conclusively
No. 313. VOL. LIII.
settled for the whole English-speaking
race when Lee had been routed at
Gettysburg and Sherman had marched
through Georgia to the sea.
Luray, in the Shenandoah valley,
is being made famous by a lime-
stone cave, one of those vast sub-
terranean caverns which seem to
honeycomb the whole region. Not
so large as the Mammoth Caves of
Kentucky, where one may wander
for a whole day without retracing
a single step, the cave at Luray
is excelled by none, so I am
told, in the extent and variety of
its formations. I went to visit it
with a stranger who was staying at
the same hotel. The guide received
us at the entrance, and shook hands
with that amiable frankness which
makes transatlantic life so pleasant.
We wandered through the vast and
beautiful chambers ; some of the lime-
stone deposits delicate almost to tran-
sparency, like the texture of the lightest
shawl ; others solid stalagmites or sta-
lactites, which may have endured for
a millennium.
My stranger companion stopped
suddenly. " So God Almighty made
all this in six days," he said. " Devil
a bit," retorted the guide; " we've
got mixed up somehow about that."
These remarks started a conversation
which was carried on till it embraced
abstruse points of divinity. Both the
guide and the stranger were strong
advocates of free-agency, and repu-
diated the hyper -Calvinism of some
of the American sects. "But what
beats me," said the guide, "is why
God made the devil." " He had no
business to do so," said the stranger
frankly; "I can't excuse my Maker."
I humbly objected that if he credited
the Bible story at all he would find
that God did not create a devil but a
great angel, and that if my friend
held to the doctrine of free-agency, he
could not complain if the issue of that
creation had turned out worse than
was expected. My remark provoked
a loud laugh from the guide, a clap on
the shoulder and a dig in the ribs,
50
Some American Notes.
which I regarded as so many tributes
to my skill in theological dialectic.
" Boys," he said, "it does me good to
have a conversation like this."
This incident occurred on Sunday,
and on the evening of the same day
I attended an African service. The
barber of the hotel, a coloured man,
was a deacon of the little church, to
which he guided me with a lantern on
one of the darkest nights I was ever
abroad in. There is a college for the
training of coloured preachers at
Harper's Ferry where the officiating
minister of this evening had been
trained. He had been a slave in his
youth, and learned to read by stealth
when it was penal for a negro to pos-
sess a book. If his style was a little
rambling, his address was frank and
earnest. " Love your enemies " was
the text j it was not easy, but " the
Saviour done it," he said with quiet
simplicity. An interesting feature of
the service was the method by which
the collection was obtained. After the
sermon was over, two deacons got up
and stood behind a table placed im-
mediately below the pulpit. The men
sat together on the right side of the
church and the women on the left.
One deacon then said, "Now I want
five dollars from the men " ; and the
other added, "And I want the same
from the women." Then they all
began to sing a hymn. Still no one
moved. They sang another hymn, and
at the close of it I rose and started
the collection with a ten- dollar bill.
' We're getting on pretty well this
side," said the deacon of the males,
knowingly. Another hymn was sung
without much effect; but later on a
stirring melody about "seeing de fine
white horses when de bridegroom
comes," broke down the reserve, and
when they came to the verse
"Drive 'em down to Jordan when de bride-
groom comes,"
the dimes and nickels rattled down
uron the collection table with agree-
able music. The sum collected was
large for the resources of the congre-
gation, and reflected credit upon the
dark-skinned worshippers.
I saw a good deal of the negro in
the southern states. Not a white man
south of the Potomac can be found to
say a good word for his coloured
neighbour, who in his eyes is stupidly
lazy and deceitful. I did not find him
so. Wherever I met the negro I found
him obliging, intelligent, and, on the
whole, a steady worker. I attended his
services, I examined his schools, I saw
him at work on the railway, and in
the fields, I followed him to the public
courts, and I can say confidently that
he is not the degraded outcast he is
sometimes pictured. " Go," said one
Southerner in Savannah, "to the police
court on Monday morning, and see
how the niggers spend their Sunday."
"At what time?" I asked. "At
eight o'clock," said my informant. I
went at eight o'clock. There were
eight convictions for the offences of
previous day ; four of the culprits were
white, and four were coloured. I never
saw a brighter lot of children than the
dusky little figures sitting in the school-
room at Asheville, North Carolina, and
slowly spelling out the not inspiriting
words "a hog can run." The negro
is eager to learn, and is steadily im-
proving his position. But the old an-
tagonism of the races is as strong as
ever, if, indeed, not stronger than ever.
Relations, unjustifiable enough, but
equally natural in che old days of
negro bondage, which led often to a
southern planter ^having to number
his sons and daughters among his
slaves, no longer fuse the races into
one. The black man is despised as of
old, and no one hails him as a brother.
His children must go to separate
schools he must travel by separate
cars on the railway. Will it be so'
always with these six millions of free
citizens of the American Republic?
It is a grave and difficult question.
Ductile, plastic, impressionable, the
negro takes the mould of his sur-
roundings. In the north he is a
Yankee, in Florida he is half a Spa-
niard, in Louisiana he is almost wholly
Some American Notes.
51
French. In an alien land, at least,
he has not the independent vitality
which gains respect for its originality
and strength ; at best he is but a weak
imitator of his old enslavers. What
may be the future of the dark conti-
nent and its inhabitants is one of the
great problems of the world. But it
is my own conviction that the tribes
and peoples which have been sold from
it into slavery will never reach the
height of perfect manhood in the
countries of their exile until the race
from which they spring develops a
new endemic civilisation in Africa.
And if ever the curse is to be lifted
which has lain so long upon those
thick-lipped sons of Ham, the new ex-
periment with the African must be
made in his own magnificent home.
From the Shenandoah valley we
crossed the fine highlands of North
Carolina, and reached the sea-board of
the Southern States at Charleston.
Charleston is an attractive place. It
lies so low that seen from the harbour
it appears to float upon the ocean, and
reminds one of Venice. The harbour
is protected by the formidable rock of
Fort Sumter at its mouth, and the
sandy bulwark of Sullivan's Island.
Walking along the shore of the latter
the resemblance to Venice is com-
pleted in our minds as we recall the
delightful stretches of the Lido. We
drove round Charleston and its pretty
surroundings. One point of interest
is the famous magnolia cemetery, about
two miles from the town. All the trees
along the southern sea-board are draped
with long festoons of a dry grey moss,
so that the branches of even the
stiffest appear to droop with a tender
and sorrowful grace. And here we
see what we see in so many towns of
the Union, and on a greater scale in
the national buryiDg places at Wash-
ington, Gettysburg, or Vicksburg, a
spot kept sacred and separate for the
graves of those who lost their lives in
the war. Here at Charleston is a wide
inclosure where rest the remains of
the Confederate dead. A simple
soldiers' monument j and to right and
left of it, with narrow headstones to
mark the name and regiment and
death-date of each, are ranged the long
lines of the slain. Side by side they
lie, as close almost as once they stood
in the serried ranks of battle. It is
a touching and memorable sight. I
know nothing quite like it in any other
country. Long hence, when the tra-
vellers of a later-born generation spell
out the letters on the crumbling stones
which seem still so fresh to-day, they
will know that through all the years
of their civil strife, in south as well
as north, the citizens of the American
Republic never allowed the coarse
brutality of war to weaken the noble
sentiment which guards the sanctity
of human life, but that for them the
memory of each fallen soldier was
precious, and his name not to be
forgotten.
The aspect of the country from
Charleston southwards is interest-
ing, but scarcely noteworthy. Huge
stretches of uncleared forest of live-
oak and pine alternate with the soft
snow of the cotton fields, in which the
dark-skinned gatherers of the wool
stand out in pleasing contrast, and the
marshy savannahs of the rice planta-
tions. All trains in America are slow,
like the movements of the people, but
in the south they wriggle like wounded
snakes along the ill- jointed and uneven
tracks. The dust was intolerable,
and the heat began to be oppressive ;
but in spite of these drawbacks to
locomotion in the Southern States we
pushed still southwards to obtain
at least a glimpse of Florida. After
spending a Sunday in Savannah we
moved on to Jacksonville, crossed
the St. John's River and took the
train to St. Augustine. In Florida a
breath from the tropics warms the
air. The line from Jacksonville to St.
Augustine is a narrow-gauge line cut
through the primeval forest. The
journey is like passing through the
palm-house at Kew Gardens, the
breezes are so heavy with the scent of
sub- tropical vegetation. The cleared
soil is still matted with palmy growths,
E 2
52
Some American Notes.
and palms and palmettos spring up side
by side with live-oak and pine. When
we returned by the same route it was
evening, and the fire-flies sailed through
the silent southern night.
In St. Augustine we stand within
the limits of the oldest European
settlement, with the doubtful exception
of Santa Fe, in the United States. I
had wished to see it. It is unlike
anything else in America. Memories
of Europe linger here. The old world
is face to face with the new, and the
ghosts of its dead passions and
departed glories haunt the streets.
You wander into the old Huguenot
churchyard, and look sadly at the
indecipherable slabs ; you stand upon
the fort raised by the strong hand of
Spain, still bearing the name and arms
of her king. There is a Moorish tower
upon the cathedral, where the Catholic
worship which superseded the Protes-
tantism of the annihilated colony of
France still survives. There is no
other spot upon American soil which
" gathers the ages and nations in its
wide embrace," or reads to us in the
irony of its history so many lessons
upon the fate which awaits alike the
faiths and the fame of men. Dis-
covered by the devout Catholic on the
festival of St. Augustine, first settled
under the inspiration, if not by the
advice, of the austere autocrat of
Geneva himself, it became a centre
of Castilian chivalry in the greatest
days of Spain. And now what re-
mains? Of the proud might of
Catholic Spain, a few stones remaining
one upon another ; of the passionate
faith of the Huguenot, a few nameless
graves ; whilst above these desolate
memorials of so much that once was
great and strong tower the luxurious
hotels in which the pleasure-loving
descendants of the Puritans fritter
away their idle hours, or seek vainly a
renewal of the health they have ruined
in excess.
We returned to Jacksonville, and
thence along the coast line of Florida,
stopping at Pensacola, to New Orleans.
Here I parted from my friends, and
started alone for Chicago. It took me
from Monday afternoon until Wednes-
day morning by uninterrupted travel-
ling to get there. As the distance
is only nine hundred and fifteen
miles, you can judge of our rate
of progression. The first night of
our journey was hot with southern
closeness, and throughout the sleeping
car the mosquitos hummed fiercely
round the berths; the last morning
the frost lay crisp and hoar upon the
ground, as the train swept past the
trim suburb Mr. Pullman has honoured
with his own name, and glided into the
station at Chicago. Nothing I saw in
America impressed me more than this
city. I had not conceived of anything
so fine, so really inspiriting in its
greatness and enterprise. Beautiful it
is not, for nothing that the craft or
enterprise of man has reared upon
American soil is truly beautiful ; but
there is dignity in the long lines of the
tree- bordered avenues, and the vistas
of the stately streets. And to think
of the activity displayed in the great
reconstruction ! Fourteen years ago,
when fire laid the city in ruins, a
population of three hundred thousand
souls was rendered homeless ; to-day
the population of Chicago, with
its suburbs, must approach three-
quarters of a million. There is
no one no American who does not
take pride in Chicago, and regard
with as much awe as an Ameri-
can is capable of feeling, the spectacle
of its prodigious and unexampled
development. And yet it is not
America alone which should be proud ;
for it was not America alone, it was
the whole civilised world, which raised
this phoenix city from the ashes of the
old. To-day the population of Chicago
is not yet American: it is German,
Scandinavian, Irish, English. You
hear all Teutonic tongues in the streets.
The first person who spoke to me after
my arrival was a woman, who asked
for a direction, and addressed me in
Norwegian. The names above the
stores are two-thirds German. The
women have still the round freshness
Some American Notes.
53
and bloom of the Teutonic type ; the
sap of the Old World is not yet dried
out of the faces of the men. The in-
evitable change no doubt will come.
The men will soon wither into Ameri-
cans, and the beautiful women of
Chicago will learn to eat five meat
meals a day.
But at the present hour nothing is
more amazing than this queen of the
West, and her immense and unwearied
activities. Thirty trunk lines, with
their countless affluents and tribu-
taries, empty and refill their cars in
her depots. As in the days of her im-
perial dominion all roads in the civil-
ised world led to Rome, so do all the
new highways of American civilisation
lead to Chicago. Along these iron
arteries of commerce the Wealth of a
whole nation is poured into her lap.
The forests of the north pile high her
quays with timber ; the prairies of the
west fill her store-houses with grain ;
the cattle from a thousand plains are
gathered in her yards. Her wide
arms are ever open ; she receives and
distributes all. Upon the sands of
her storm-swept mere she sits a queen,
waiting only the crown of sovereignty.
From Chicago I went back direct
to New York, arriving just in time to
witness a final Republican effort on
behalf of Mr. Elaine. Through a
dense crowd a procession such as I
have already described commenced to
march past my hotel about half past
nine o'clock in the evening ; I heard
dreamily the shouts of the last files of
the processionists from my bed-room at
two o'clock in the morning. It seems
to me that the old political divisions in
America are rapidly giving place to
new, and a popular appeal on the
question of free-trade, if not imminent,
cannot long be delayed. " What we
want in America," said a manufac-
turer, " is farmers. We have enough
manufacturers." " Yes, my friend, "
I replied ; " and when the immense
west is peopled and your farmers
control the elections, they will not, to
enrich you, consent to pay six hundred
per cent, duty for every blanket on
their bed, or three hundred per cent,
for every button on their coat." There
will then be only two alternatives
free-trade, or rupture of the Union.
Before the next evening had closed
in I was on my way home. I first
saw New York beneath an orange
glow of dawn, I saw it last against
a crimson blaze of sunset. As far as
the sun which kindled those skies
had travelled since he bade good-night
to England, so far would he again
travel ere he said good- morning to
San Francisco. No thought brings
with it a keener sense of the extent of
the American continent, of its im-
mense, its almost limitless, resources.
What will be the future of the
United States ? Who can tell The
veil of Isis is drawn across the destiny
of that vast and busy commonwealth
in heavy and impenetrable folds. The
history of the American people ex-
hibits such strong and baffling con-
trasts as must surely disturb the most
reckless adventurer in the field of
amateur prophecy. No nation
ever presented to the world a less
united front, or seemed to inclose
elements more diverse and irreconcil-
able, yet none has defended its
national unity with more stubborn
and indomitable resolution. No
nation has produced for its highest
posts men more pure, or greater in
the prime elements of simple manhood
none has been disgraced by states-
men more corrupt. No nation ever
lavished upon those who have min-
istered to its progress in the arts of
war and peace more abundant honour
none has dismissed and degraded its
public servants with more ungenerous
and petulant impatience. No nation
ever fought for a great cause with
loftier or more unselfish courage it
is the same nation which has developed
from its own experience a word which
has enlarged our Anglo-Saxon vocabu-
lary with a new name for craven and
white-livered panic. No nation ever
taught the world a deeper lesson in
what constitutes the true dignity and
greatness of a state none has allowed
Some American Notes.
its own politics to degenerate into
such a mixture of vulgarity and child-
ishness. No nation has produced
jurists who have done more to animate
the form of law with the spirit of hu-
manity and truth in none have the
guardians of justice bartered it for
gold in more shameless or cynical be-
trayal. No nation has a shorter his-
tory none is more mature. It is the
same with the individual and the
race. The young American has no
childhood, the race has had no youth;
new without freshness, old without
antiquity. Who would care to forecast
the future of a country and a people
of which such things must be said ?
And yet when criticism has done
its worst, and the faults of the
American Republic have been most
unsparingly exposed, of one thing its
history assures us well that the same
patient and unwearied Spirit, who has
guided the toilsome march of mankind
from its eastern birth-place, and
touched with heroic fire the souls of
men when there was work for heroes
to accomplish, has not forsaken
our race in the confused and novel life
of its western home. In the great
crises of its destiny America has not
yet failed. When brave hearts have
been called for to resist and tender
hearts to suffer, the courage and the
sacrifice have not been called for in
vain. The history of America for
another hundred years no one would
venture to anticipate. It may be that
the West will struggle with the East
as the North has struggled with the
South, not in the like sanguinary con-
flict, but with equal and more suc-
cessful determination to be separate.
Or it may be that the manifest des-
tiny of the Great Republic will con-
solidate its rule, and enlarge its do-
minion, until one law prevails from
Panama to Labrador. Yet whatever
be the changes of the future, if its
citizens are but true to the splendid
principles on which their state was
founded, and choose, like their
" symbol-bird," the clear, upper air
of purity and freedom which na-
tions neither rise to without struggle,
nor fall from without death then the
political and social evolution of the
new world may still guide the old
towards finer issues of beneficence
and peace.
55
GOUVERNEUR MORRIS AND THE FRENCH REVOLUTION.
RIVAROL, Malouet, Gouverneur Morris,
and Mallet du Pan, these are the four
men whom M. Taine has distinguished
as the most competent observers of
the French Revolution. Of these four,
who are alike in having been led from
the liberal point of view to condemna-
tion of the Revolution, the last two,
from the independence of their posi-
tion and the range of their political
experience, are perhaps the most re-
markable. The one an American, the
other a Genevese, both were foreigners
and republicans, both had had practi-
cal experience of domestic revolution,
and both had learnt the lesson of free-
dom in self-governing communities. If
Mallet du Pan, the fellow citizen of
Rousseau and protege of Voltaire, had
enjoyed the advantage of passing his
life in contact with the great world
of European thought; Morris, one of
the founders of the American Repub-
lic, had played a highly honourable
and responsible part in the greatest
event of the eighteenth century. And
if Mallet du Pan, with his intimate
knowledge of the social and political
condition of European states, realised
more profoundly and with ever deepen-
ing dejection the significance of the
Revolution, which appears rather as
an episode in the pages of Morris, it is
possible that, in view of the mighty
predominance of the Western Repub-
lic, history may justify the American
statesman's unconscious estimate of
the relative importance of that event.
Born at the family estate of Mor-
risiana, in the State of New York, of
ancestors not undistinguished as citi-
zens, he arrived at manhood at the
moment when the struggle of Inde-
pendence began ; he was elected at the
age of twenty-three to the legislature
pf his own state, when he powerfully
advocated independence and took a
prominent part in the debates on the
Constitution of New York. Delegated
in 1778 to the Continental Congress
he became one of the most active
agents of the system of government
by committees, and distinguished him-
self especially in the departments of
the organisation of the army, in the
foreign negotiations, and in finance.
The reputation he early gained in the
last branch of administration designat-
ed him for the post of Assistant Super-
intendent of the Finances. His public
career was crowned by his participa-
tion in the work of the convention for
the formation of the constitution of
the United States, which, according to
his friend Madison, owed its shape
and finish to his hand. He then de-
voted himself, in conjunction with the
great financier Robert Morris, to com-
mercial operations, in which he realised
a large fortune and acquired the kind
of experience most useful to an econo-
mist. It was in connection with
private and semi-official matters of
this nature, and not at first as minister
of his country, that he arrived in
France in February 1789.
Morris had fully profited by the best
training for statesmanship, for he was
thoroughly competent in law, finance
and politics. His personal and social
qualities were no less remarkable. His
features are described as having been
regular and expressive, his demeanour
frank and dignified, and his figure tall
and commanding, in spite of a wooden
leg which an accident in early life
obliged him to use. Of a sanguine
and ambitious temperament, his chief
characteristic in society was a daring
self-possession, and he was often heard
to declare that in his intercourse with
men he never knew the sensation of
56
Gouverneur Morris and the French Revolution.
inferiority or embarrassment. His
liveliness, tact, and common sense made
him a most agreeable companion, but
in conversation upon politics, zeal, he
says, always got the better of prudence.
His keenest interest was in the study
of men, and like George the Third,
who once remarked that the most
beautiful sight he ever beheld was
the colliery country near Stroud, his
attention in travelling was always
directed less to the beauties of nature
than to the details and economy
of the various manufactures, to the
agriculture of the country, and to all
that concerned the comfort and con-
dition of the people. With such a
disposition he soon became a favourite
in the salons of Paris, where to be an
American was at that time almost a
sufficient introduction. He speaks
with but little enthusiasm of the
society of that vaunted epoch. At
one house he observed that each
person " being occupied either in say-
ing a good thing or in studying one
to say, it is no wonder if he cannot
find time to applaud that of his neigh-
bour." He availed himself, however,
of his opportunities of making the
acquaintance of men of many shades
of opinion, and his judgments upon
them are full of acuteness and sense.
His connection with Lafayette intro-
duced him at once to the revolutionary
leaders. Lafayette himself received
him with an hospitality which in this
case was amply repaid by the efforts
made in later years by Morris to
obtain his release from the Austrian
Government. He very soon indeed
found himself in opposition to La-
fayette's ideas. At their first interview
Morris saw him to be " too republican
for the genius of his country." When
the latter showed him the draft
of the Declaration of Rights, he
suggested amendments " tending to
soften the high-coloured expressions
of freedom." He did not spare his
warnings or his criticism either in
conversation or in writing, but when
he told him in plain words that the
"thing called a constitution" which
the Assembly had passed was good
for nothing, it is not surprising
that a certain coldness grew up be-
tween them. " He lasted longer than
I expected," was Morris's remark,
when his friend was crushed by the
wheel which he put in motion. Talley-
rand impressed him at first sight as
a " sly, cool, cunning, ambitious man ; "
and he put his finger upon the pre-
vailing characteristic of the mind of
Sieyes when he observed of him that
he despised all that had been said or
sung on the subject of government be-
fore him.
His criticism of Mirabeau, if not
profound, is instructive as illus-
trating the side of his character
which most impressed contemporaries.
The greatest figure of the Revolu-
tion except Bonaparte Mirabeau
united genius and patriotism with de-
grading faults of character. His own
cry of regret, perhaps the most
pathetic ever uttered by a public man,
is the explanation of the contradiction
of his life : " Combien V immoralite de
ma jeunesse fait de tort a la chose pub-
lique." The invincible repugnance
of the world was shown by the fact,
noted by Morris, that he was received
with hisses at the opening of the
States -General. His past made him
enter on the great struggle not as a
philosopher or a statesman, but as a
malcontent and a declasse. His pecu-
niary embarrassments destroyed his
personal independence, and sold him,
in the words of his enemies, to the
court. His personal ambition, his
want of temper, his necessity for self-
assertion, his " insatiate thirst for ap-
plause," led the great orator to en-
deavour to maintain his ascendency
by thundering against the enemies of
the Revolution and inflaming popular
passion; while he was secretly working
for the cause of the monarchy. And
not in secret only. He clearly saw
that the annihilation of the executive
power, the paralysis of administration,
would deliver over his country to the
Grouverneur Morris and the French Revolution.
57
violence of foreign enemies, and the
worse misfortune of anarchy at home.
He turned to the monarchy as the
only anchor of safety. He considered
that to restore to the king power, at
least equal to that nominally exercised
by the King of England, was the only
way to avert disaster. His opposition
to the declaration of rights, his absten-
tion from the work of the abolition
of feudalism on the day of the fourth
of August, his contention for investing
the king with the right of peace and
war and with an absolute veto, with-
out which he would " rather live in
Constantinople than in Paris "; above
all, his effort to induce the Assembly to
give a seat in their body to the minis-
ters of the crown, the constitutional
pivot on which the fortunes of the
Revolution may be said to have turned,
were all public actions which might
have won for him the confidence of
moderate men of all parties. In such
a union under such leadership lay the
only hope, and with the presumption
of genius he felt and proclaimed that
he was the only man who could recon-
cile the monarchy with freedom. Yet
Morris only echoed the sentiment of
the best men of his time when he said
11 that there were in the world men
who were to be employed but not
trusted," "that virtue must ever be
sullied by an alliance with vice," "that
Mirabeau was the most unprincipled
scoundrel that ever lived."
The man to whose lot it fell to initi-
ate the Revolution, whose duty it was
to guide it, the man for whom Mira-
beau could find no words strong enough
to express his contempt, met with the
following judgment from Gouverneur
Morris. " M. Necker has obtained a
much greater reputation than he had
any right to. An unspotted integrity
as minister, and serving at his own
expense in an office which others seek
for the purpose of enriching them-
selves, have acquired for him, very
deservedly, much confidence. Add to
this that his writings on finance teem
with that sort of sensibility which
makes the fortune of modern romances,
and which is exactly suited to this
lively nation, who love to read but
hate to think. Hence his reputation.
He is without the talents of a great
minister ; and though he understands
man as a covetous creature, he does
not understand mankind ; he is utterly
ignorant of politics, by which I mean
politics in the great sense. . . From
the moment of convening the States-
General he has been afloat upon the
wide ocean of incidents."
Necker was, in fact, without the
highest qualities of statesmanship.
And when this is said, all is said. It
was unjust, as a friend and contempo-
rary writer truly observed, to reproach
a minister for not leading an assembly
which refused to be led, which at every
turn insisted on giving lessons to its
instructor. The finances could not be
re-established when anarchy was uni-
versal, and authority non-existent,
without credit, taxes, or public con-
fidence. But although it was " as
unjust to accuse him of the ruin of
the finances as to accuse him of
the loss of the battle of Ramillies,"
Morris was on no uncertain ground
when he condemned Necker as a very
poor financier, and nothing can be more
luminous than his exposition of the
fallacy of the system of borrowing
from the caisse d'escompte, or the farce
of the patriotic contribution, than his
prediction of the ruin which must
ensue from the issue of assignats.
Morris had early realised the fact that
the study of economic questions is the
foundation of statesmanship. His
writings had instructed his country-
men in liberal theories of commerce,
and enlightened them on the abstruser
questions of the nature of money and
the sources and foundation of credit.
In an official position he had done much
to restore public and private credit,
and introduce order into the financial
administration, upon which, as he said,
" the preservation of our federal union
greatly depends." It is interesting to
note in how many points he had criti-
58
Grouvemeur Morris and the French Revolution.
cised by anticipation the economic
fallacies which distinguished the re-
volutionary epoch. He had, for in-
stance, combated the regulation of
prices by law, an expedient which
became famous during the Terror
under the name of the maximum
laws, on the ground of the injustice
of taxing a community by depre-
ciation : he had condemned taxes on
money, which merely drew it from
circulation and rendered the collection
of taxes more difficult. The outcry
against monopolists and forestallers
which had arisen in the American
colonies during the war, found its
counterpart in the popular resentment
during the whole course of the Revolu-
tion against the sangsues publiques,
who saved the community from starva-
tion by buying up and storing provi-
sions and money. Morris had justified
the operations of the capitalists by the
economy which was thus introduced
into consumption, the activity imparted
to commerce, and the steadiness esta-
blished in price. The well-to-do classes
shared with the monopolists the exe-
cration of the mob ; Morris had pointed
out the impossibility of an economic
distinction between luxuries and neces-
sities, and ventured the remark that
" there was a less proportion of rogues
in coaches than out of them." The
spirit in which he watched the great
socialistic experiment of the Reign of
Terror the complete and even scien-
tific character of which M. Taine has
pointed out in the ablest chapters of
his latest volume may be gathered
from a question he put to Hamilton,
"How long a supposed society can
exist, after property shall have been
done away," and the answer which he
gave, " that government being esta-
blished to protect property is respected
only in proportion to the fulfilment of
that duty, and durable only as it is
respectable."
If his previous experience had given
Morris competence in finance, it had
given him also in a high degree a mas-
tery of constitutional questions. His
criticism of the constitution of 1791
was worthy of the man to whose hand
much of the American constitution
was due, of the man whom Hamilton
and Madison had invited to join in the
writing of the Federalist. In his own
country he had been unjustly accused of
a leaning towards monarchy, so strong
had been his dread of the " anarchy
which would lead to monarchy."
Among a people without the educa-
tion or instincts of free government
characteristic of English communities,
he early saw his worst fear realised.
"Despotic states perish for want of des-
potism, as cunning people for want of
cunning." The suddenness of the col-
lapse of the monarchy shows how true
was the insight which led Mallet du
Pan to say, in speaking of the various
causes assigned for the French Revolu-
tion, the quarrels of the parlements,
the assembling of the notables, the
deficit, the ministry of Necker, the as-
saults of philosophy "None of these
things would have happened under a
monarchy which was not rotten at the
core." By the end of July Morris ob-
served that " France was as near anar-
chy as a society could be without disso-
lution." The government of the country
fell suddenly into the hands of an As-
sembly ignorant and inexperienced in
public affairs, and Morris deplored
that they had "all that romantic
spirit, and those romantic ideas of
government which, happily for Ame-
rica, we were cured of before it was
too late." In a passage which has a
reminiscence of the Reflections, he cha-
racterised the situation as it existed
in November 1790 :
" This unhappy country, bewildered
in the pursuit of metaphysical whim-
sies, presents to our moral view a
mighty ruin. Like the remnants of
ancient magnificence, we admire the
architecture of the temple, while we
detest the false god to whom it was
dedicated. Daws and ravens, and the
birds of night, now build their nests in
its niches. The sovereign, humbled
to the level of a beggar's pity, without
Gfouverneur Morris and the French Revolution.
59
resources, without authority, without
a friend. The Assembly, at once a
master and a slave, new in power, wild
in theory, raw in practice. It engrosses
all functions, though incapable of exer-
cising any, and has taken from this
fierce ferocious people every restraint
of religion and of respect. Sole execu-
tors of the law, and therefore supreme
judges of its propriety, each district
measures out its obedience by its
wishes, and the great interests of the
whole, split up into fractional morsels,
depend on momentary impulse and
ignorant caprice. Such a state of
things cannot last."
It was in no spirit of unfriendly
criticism, either towards the French
people or their aspirations, that Morris
wrote these words. " I wish very
much," he had said, "the happiness
of this inconstant people. I love
them. I feel grateful to them for
their efforts in our cause, and I con-
sider the establishment of a good
constitution here as the principal
means, under Divine Providence, of
extending the blessings of freedom to
many millions of my fellow country-
men." But he saw very clearly that
the so-called work of reconstruction
was but the first step in a course of
constitutional experiments during
which France was to pass from one
extreme to the other from the omni-
potence of a legislative assembly to
the absolutism of a despotic executive.
The speech which Morris put into the
mouth of the king on the occasion of
his acceptance of the constitution of
1791 is a state paper of the highest
importance. The opening words, " It
is no longer a king who addresses you,
Louis the Sixteenth is only a private
individual," strike the key-note of a
criticism which condemns point by
point the concentration of power in
the hands of an unwieldy assembly,
the destruction of the principle of
authority in government, the exagge-
rated decentralisation which created
forty-four thousand sovereign bodies,
and made it possible, as M. Taine has
shown, for one of them to "besiege,
mutilate, and govern the National
Convention, and through it the whole
of France."
His warnings, like so many others,
fell upon deaf ears. The moment,
inevitable in every despotism, had
arrived when an incapable ruler was
called upon to grapple with a de-
moralised administration. " An able
man would not have fallen into his
situation." The retrospect in which
Morris pointed out the occasions on
which a " small-beer character " threw
away one by one his chances of avert-
ing revolution proves, with irresistible
force, that a strong sovereign might
even at the last moment have saved
his country from anarchy and his own
house from the fate which Mirabeau
prophesied for them at the hands of
the populace in the terrible words,
" Ilsbattront le pave de leurs cadavres."
It was not as Minister of the United
States that Governeur Morris had so
freely taken his part in passing events,
had criticised and advised the king
and his ministers. He did not receive
his appointment until Jefferson's re-
call in the beginning of the year 1792.
At that time his intervention, even
had his position allowed of it, would
have been useless, and it was limited
to an attempt to enable the royal
family to escape just before the cata-
strophe of the tenth of August. After
that event, unlike other foreign re-
presentatives, he remained an eye-
witness of the Revolution until the
end of the Reign of Terror. The diffi-
culty and even danger of the times
for he was subjected to arrest and
search, followed, of course, by minis-
terial apologies made it necessary
for him to remove to a country house
twenty miles from the capital. His
official duties were confined to re-
monstrances against decrees affecting
American commerce, to the protec-
tion of American shipping, and of
American citizens. His correspond-
ence, in spite of the fact that every
letter "bore marks of patriotic
60
Gouverneur Morris and the French Revolution,
osity," remained full and interesting.
The situation of the finances and
the impending bankruptcy formed
the subject of exhaustive comment ;
and he noticed the expenditure of
blood and money, the rarity of artisans
and labourers of every description,
without blinding himself to the im-
mense resources possessed by an ad-
ministration to whom war was a
necessity and bankruptcy but a start-
ing point for fresh efforts. He truly
observed that, once the debt of France
had been liquidated by depreciation,
she would present a rich surface
covered with above twenty millions of
people who loved war better than
labour ; and that the Administration
would continue "to find war abroad
necessary to preserve peace at home."
Anticipating, as he did, the inevitable
close in a military despotism, he won-
dered that *' four years of convulsion
among four -and -twenty millions of
people had brought forth no one, either
in civil or military life, whose head
would fit the cap which fortune had
woven."
His recall from a post in which, as
he said, he felt himself degraded by
the communication he was forced into
with the worst of mankind, was partly
owing to the disfavour with which
his anti-revolutionary sentiments were
viewed by some of his countrymen.
It inspired a remark which is full of
meaning. " Oliver Cromwell well
understood the value of mob senti-
ment when he replied to his chaplain,
vain of the applauding crowds which
thronged round his master's coach,
' There would be as many and as glad
to attend me at the gallows.' I do
not believe that a good man in America
can feel all the force of that expres-
sion, and therefore I believe it is very
difficult to form on certain subjects a
just opinion." Had Morris lived until
1830 he might have added that the
full force of that expression could
only be felt by those who witnessed
the results of the identification of the
principles of Jacobinism with those of
political freedom ; for the temporary
triumph of reaction in Europe, and
the equally illogical apotheosis by
liberal writers of the revolutionary
. party, both sprang from this confusion
of thought.
A " high-toned " Monarchy, an As-
sembly less numerous and elected for
a longer period than was provided in
the constitution of 1791, and an here-
ditary Second Chamber such was the
constitution which Gouverneur Morris
considered as the only government
which would consist with the physical
and moral state of France. These
were the opinions of Malouet, of
Mounier, of Mallet du Pan, and, with
the exception that he would have dis-
pensed with a Second Chamber and
given even greater power to the Mo-
narchy, of Mirabeau. Of these men
Morris was, perhaps, the most distin-
guished for his freedom from doctri-
naire views. Surrounded on his
arrival in France by politicians cla-
mouring for the immediate application
of English constitutional forms to their
own country, he was one of the fore-
most to insist on the differences of
national character which made such
ideas chimerical. " A republican," he
said, " and just as it were emerged
from that assembly which has formed
one of the most republican of all
republican constitutions, I preach in-
cessantly respect for the prince, atten-
tion to the rights of the nobility, and
moderation not only in the object, but
also in the pursuit of it." " They
want an American Constitution, with
the exception of a king instead of a
president, without reflecting that they
have not American citizens to support
that constitution." " Every country
must have a constitution suited to its
circumstances, and the state of France
requires a higher-toned government
than that of England." These seem-
ingly obvious statements were sup-
ported by the irresistible argument
drawn from the political ignorance,
incapacity, and immorality of the new
citizens of France. " The materials
Gouverneur Morris and the French Revolution.
61
for a revolution," he wrote, " are very
indifferent. Everybody agrees that
there is an utter prostration of morals,
but this general position can never
convey to an American mind the
degree of depravity. It is not by any
figure of rhetoric or force of language
that the idea can be communicated.
A hundred anecdotes and a hundred
thousand examples are required to
show the extreme rottenness of every
member. It is, however, from such
crumbling matter that the great edifice
of freedom is to be erected here."
Morris, in short, did not believe that
a nation demoralised by despotism
could be prepared for the full exercise
of the privileges of freedom. He told
Lafayette that it was from regard to
liberty that he was opposed to the
democracy, and in this opinion he was
in accord with the most advanced
English statesmen of that time, for
Fox himself had expressly disclaimed
any leaning to democracy. The
Liberals of the Revolution whom
Morris, with his clear good sense,
his knowledge of affairs, and his
devotion to the principles of con-
stitutional freedom, so admirably re-
presents, have met until recent times
with little respect from philosophic
historians, but their aims were at least
plausible, and the realisation of them
could not have proved less conducive
to free government than the actual
course of events. They possessed,
moreover, the virtue of consistency ;
they were never brought, like the
Jacobin leaders, to acquiesce in the
destruction of their hopes, and they
had never been partisans of the old
monarchical system of government. A
passage, which is worth quoting, shows
that Morris, at any rate, candidly re-
cognised the advantages secured by
what in his opinion was the worst
kind of change. He thus summarises
the consequences of the Revolution in
1790 :
" (1). The abolition of those different
rights and privileges which kept the
provinces asunder, occasioning thereby
a variety of taxation, increasing the
expenses of collection, impeding the
useful communication of commerce,
and destroying that unity in the sys-
tem of distributive justice which is
one requisite to social happiness.
(2). The abolition of feudal tyranny,
by which the tenure of real property
is simplified, the value reduced to
money, rent is more clearly ascertained,
and the estimation which depended
upon idle vanity, or capricious taste,
or sullen pride, is destroyed. (3). The
extension of the circle of commerce to
those vast possessions held by the
clergy in mortmain, which, conferring
great wealth as the wages of idleness,
damped the ardour of enterprise, and'
impaired that ready industry which
increases the stock of national riches.
(4). The destruction of a system of
venal jurisprudence, which, arrogating
a kind of legislative veto, had estab-
lished the pride and privileges of the
few on the misery and- degradation of
the general mass. (5). Above all, the
promulgation and extension of those
principles of liberty, which will, I
hope, remain to cheer the heart and
cherish a nobleness of soul when the
metaphysical froth and vapour shall
have been blown away. The awe of
that spirit which has been thus raised
will, I trust, excite in those who may
hereafter possess authority a proper
moderation in its exercise, and induce
them to give to this people a real
constitution of government fitted to
the natural, moral, social, and political
state of their country."
But although he might cherish the
hope that from the " chaos of opinion
and the conflict of its jarring elements
a new order might at length arise,"
he might well despair of the immediate
future. That opinion was shared by
others conspicuous in the cause of
freedom. Washington, who, as ap-
pears from his correspondence with
the American Minister, early mis-
trusted the course of events, and
Romilly, who hoped against hope
until the September massacres drew
62
Grouverneur Morris and the French Revolution.
from him the exclamation, "One
might as well think of establishing
a republic of tigers in some forest of
Africa as of maintaining a free go-
vernment among such monsters," were
among those who were one by one
brought to Morris's conclusion " The
glorious opportunity is lost, and for
this time at least the Revolution has
failed."
The conclusion of the life of Gou-
verneur Morris was no less useful and
prosperous than his previous career.
After his recall from his post he
remained four years in Europe, during
which time he visited the various
capitals and formed connections with
the prominent men of every country.
In 1799, ten years after his arrival in
France, he returned to the United
States where, as he said, he was
received "as if he were not an un-
welcome guest in his native country."
He was almost immediately elected to
the Senate, where he served his term
with vigour and effect; and gave his
support to the party of the Federalists.
In possession of an ample fortune
and numerous friends, he delighted in
the exercise of hospitality, and occu-
pied himself for lie rest of his life in
agriculture and the management of
his property, while retaining an
active interest in public affairs. He
married late in life, and died seven
years afterwards, in 1816, at his own
estate at Morrisiana.
63
MRS. DYMOND.
CHAPTER XXXII.
BED COMES INTO FASHION.
"With your hands and your feet and your
raiment all red." MACAULAY.
Du PARC was still at his. work late
that evening when he heard a knock
at the door, and he cried " Come in,"
without looking up.
He was bending over his plate with
the gas jet flaring above his head, his
black curly hair was in the light, his
brown face in shadow. He had taken
off his worn uniform, and was dressed
in an old velvet coat, shabby enough
for any Communist. His dog was
lying at his feet.
"What is it?" he said, looking up
half blinded. " Is it you, mother ? "
" It is I, Susanna Dymond," said
Susy, standing in the doorway and
hesitating to come in ; "I want you to
help me, Mr. Max. I am in great per-
plexity, and I want you to advise me,"
and as she spoke she came forward
into the light. " I have been expect-
ing Mr. Marney, but he has not come
yet," continued Susy, with a faltering
voice. " I fear it will kill mamma
outright to be moved to England ; I
think it will be best to take her
somewhere into Paris, where she can
be safer than here ; and meanwhile
your mother must not be delayed
by us."
"My mother had better go," said
Maxwell, after a moment's thought ;
"I will see to that. I would not
urge Mrs. Marney's departure ; but if
the Federals make a stand at Neuilly,
this place may be in flames at any
moment. You know I am in their coun-
sels," he said with a shrug. " You see
I am working all night to finish up
my plates. I have already tried to talk
to Madame Marney," he continued,
putting down his point and rising from
his seat. "You must act for her,
pack everything in readiness, and I
will make arrangements and have a
carriage here to-morrow. I know of
a house in Paris where she will be
safe for the present. And we must
get hold of Marney," he added.
l( Thank you," said Susy. It seemed
to ease her heart to say the words
which are so meaningless, but which
sometimes mean so much almost
everything, at some moments.
Susy lingered still. She had said
what she meant to say ; but there was
something more she longed to say, as
she stood with her true eyes fixed
uponkMax, while the words failed her.
" Why do you look at me like that,
Madame 1 " he asked, smiling gravely,
and yet not without some feeling per-
haps of what was in her mind.
" Ah ! Max ! " she answered in a
low voice, " I am trying to find cour-
age to ask you to come away. You
tell us to go, and we are going ; why
do you yourself remain? What can
you do ? These Communists are no fit
associates for you. I have here learnt
enough in the last few days to know
something of the truth. What part
can an honest man take in this ter-
rible confusion except that of his own
simplest duty? Oh, leave these mad
people ! Your mother is your first
duty now. For her sake, for my sake,
if my wishes still touch you, come
away."
" Your wishes must always touch
me," he said, simply and gravely ;
"but you do not understand: my
mother can get on without me. I
mean I am not necessary to her," he
said, looking steadily at Susy as he
spoke; "but my poor mother-country
wants me. It is true I am only one
man in a stupid crowd \ but if I go
with that crowd I may hope perhaps
64
Mrs. Dymond.
to lead it in some measure, or to
help at least to lead it. For I ask
you, Madame," and his eyes began to
flash as he went on, " if all the honest
men continue to desert their posts, to
take their tickets by every train, as
they have done for the last few days,
leaving Paris at the mercy of the un-
disciplined mob, who will be to blame
for whatever desperate encounter may
arise ? I should like you, at least, to
think of me as an honest man, and
not as a coward, even though I tell
you I am afraid to go, afraid to aban-
don a party where I imagine my pre-
sence may be of use, for another
faction whose acts and deeds I repro-
bate with all my heart. Caron has
elected to stay, and my convictions will
not let me abandon him, alone, to face
the storm which is ready to break.
Our place is here at our posts, even if
we cannot keep back the horrible burst-
ings of the flood-gates, the hopeless
reprisals, which must follow." He had
almost forgotten Susy's presence ; he
was growing more excited every
moment, while she turned paler and
paler, and at last sank down trembling
on one of the overturned cases.
"I have frightened you," he said,
stopping short, melting. " Ah, forgive
me. There is nothing for people to
fear who are doing their duty as best
they can. You are in the same danger
as I am. You are not afraid for
yourself," and as he spoke he took her
cold hand in his. She could not
answer ; her reluctant sympathy, her
utter goodwill, her generous love were
his ; but never, never again should
she speak of her feeling to him. She
could only faintly press his hand ; and
then she got up from the wooden
case, and, walking slowly across the
room, opened the door upon the
garden, dim with the night and star-
lit ; then she stopped " Ah ! what is
that," said she starting. The muffled
sound of a distant gun came bursting
through the darkness with a dull
vibration. It was followed by a
second and a third.
" It is the cannon from the batteries
of Chaumont," said Max, following her
to the door and looking out ; " the
fight has begun." As he spoke two
or three figures came up crossing the
dark garden. " Good night, Madame ;
be without fear ; all will arrange
itself," said Max, speaking very loud
and distinct. He pushed Susy away
with a gentle violence as he spoke, so
anxious did he seem that she should
be gone.
She went back agitated but calmed
by her talk. It was not what he
had said which comforted her, but
his voice, his bright dominant looks
breaking through the occasional
glooms and moods she knew so well,
the sense of capability and restrained
power he threw into the most trivial
details, all seemed to her full of help
and life. He was no visionary, no
utterer of professions ; of such men she
had an instinctive horror. But he
had told her his meaning, his aims, his
thoughts, about which he was generally
silent, and his looks spoke the truth
from his honest heart.
"We are all suspect, we upper
classes," says Mademoiselle Fayard
next morning, as she sat there in her
skimp gown and limp gloves, clasping
her old split parasol, the victim of the
German Empire. She had come up to
take leave of Madame du Pare, to
talk over the horrible news of the out-
break, of the dreadful report of the
murder of the generals. " So Susy and
her mother were also going ? Had
they secured their passports ? It was
as well to have passports in such
times," said Mademoiselle Fayard.
" Mr. Jo must go and ask for them,"
says Madame, pouring out the coffee,
and shaking her head continually.
But where was Jo? No one had
seen him since the early morning. He
had been up betimes and had started
for the station to look for his bag, so
Denise reported.
" I would offer to go for your passe-
port, madame," said Mademoiselle
Fayard, " but they will see at a glance
that I am not a British subject."
Mrs Dymcnd.
"I am a British subject," cries
Madame with dignity. " I will ac-
company Susy."
" Your complexion alone, madame,
is enough to convince them of your
nationality," says Mademoiselle polite-
ly. Max came in while they were all
discussing their complexions over their
breakfast; he looked fagged and
anxious, and seemed more and more
preoccupied; he also came in to ask
for the missing Jo.
" Ah ! those yong men ! " cries
Madame du Pare, " they are always
onpunctual ; he leave me and his
inamma to get the passeports. Why
do you notj come with us, Max? I
am going onto see Caron afterwards."
Max looked doubtful ; "he could
only accompany them as far as the
Barriere," he said, " if they would
start at once ; " and they accordingly
set out walking along the broad avenue
that leads to the Arc. Madame du
Pare and Mademoiselle Fayard were
ahead. Once more Susy found her-
self walking beside her friend, but he
seemed busy, hurried, scarcely con-
scious of her presence. A double supply
of soldiers were mounting guard at the
gates of Paris, and an officer followed
by an orderly came forward to interro-
gate them. To this officer Madame
immediately addressed herself with
dignity.
" We come to demand passes, mon-
sieur," said Madame ; "I am the pro-
prietress of the Villa du Pare, where I
have dwelt respected for nearly thirty
years, and now that I am driven from
my home by those who . . . . "
But here her son hastily interposed,
fearing lest one of his mother's out-
bursts of eloquence might bring them
all into difficulty : " This officer is busy,
mamma," he said, interrupting and
laughing at the same time ; " he has
not time to listen to all your reasons for
leaving home. Madame is residing in
Paris," Max goes on, pointing to Made-
moiselle Fayard, " and is returning
to her domicile, and Madame," says
he, pointing to Susy, " is English ;
she is going to the English Embassy to
No. 313. VOL. LIII.
demand a passeporl for herself and her
mother who is ill. I will answer for
these ladies. You know me, my
lieutenant."
" Pass, mesdames," says the officer,
politely saluting, and he turns away
and goes into his little wooden hut.
As he was turning away, Maxwell
came close to his mother, and said in
a low voice, not laughing any more,
"Mother, I conjure you to re-
member that if you say things to
people in the street you will not only
bring trouble upon yourself, but en-
danger every one of us. Be silent, I
beseech you."
" This is a pretty country, indeed,"
says Madame, with a grunt, " where
sons can impose silence on the mothers
who brought them into the world.
So much for your liberty."
" Come, along, dear madame," said
Susy, slipping her arm into the old
lady's.
Max looked after them for an in-
stant as the three walked away, the
sturdy old mother still protesting ; the
limp one-sided member of the upper
classes fluttering vaguely after her ;
and Susy, straight, majestic, walking
steadily on with her long black folds
flowing round her upright figure. They
turned a corner and were gone.
The streets of Paris seemed strangely
changed to Susanna from that chill
morning only a few days ago when
she first arrived. The city seemed
suddenly awakened to an angry mood,
noisy, excited. The sad women in
their mourning were still coming and
going about the streets, but there were
also others whom she had not seen
before strange - looking figures, like
old-fashioned pictures of Jerome or
Horace Vernet.
" How the red has come into
fashion ; how much it is worn," said
Mademoiselle Fayard, stopping breath-
less to look about. Indeed, it was
remarkable that so many people should
have suddenly changed their looks and
their mourning clothes.
Men and women too wore bards of
crimson round their waists and across
Mrs. Dymond.
their shoulders ; one or two people
passed in red pointed caps of liberty,
and presently coming up the street ap-
peared a figure like one of Gilray's
caricatures. A huge man, with a long
tufted beard, with an enormous neck-
tie tied in a huge bow, swaggering
along as if all Paris belonged to him,
with wide coat flaps, a tricolor rosette
in his peaked hat. Into his sash he
had stuck two pistols and a dirk, in
his hand he carried a cane with a long
tassel. As he advanced puffing and
strutting up the road, Susy pressed
Madame' s arm in terror lest she
should address herself to this im-
posing apparition.
" Oh the abominable monkey," mut-
ters the old lady between her teeth.
The man scowled at her as she passed,
but fortunately did not heed what she
said.
They parted from poor Mademoiselle
at a street corner; she had various
commissions of her own on her mind,
and Susy and her companion went
on to the embassy in the Rue St.
Honore. A friendly Union Jack was
hanging over the British lion upon the
gate. The tall English porter, with
his brooms and pails was washing out
the court-yard. There was a peaceful
and reassuring aspect about the place,
which restored their somewhat trou-
bled spirits. The porter pointed up a
narrow staircase leading to the
" bureau," in a side lodge.
" The clerk would be back imme-
diately," he said, and he left them in
a little inner room with a stove and a
pen and a half dried-up inkstand.
It was an entresol ; the low window
opened to the yard, so that they could
see nothing of the streets outside.
When the clerk came in at last, the
two ladies had told him their business.
He said he must consult a superior.
Mrs. Dymond, of course could have a
passport for herself. He thought
there would be no difficulty about her
mother. As for Madame du Pare he
did not know how far she was still
entitled to be considered a British sub-
ject. He would inquire.
" Is M. Bagginal still here?" Susy
asked. " He knows my name."
" M. Bagginal is away on leave for
a few days ; he left immediately after
the siege. We expect him back
daily."
Then the young man signed to them
to come into the second room, of which
the windows looked upon the street.
How quickly events arise when the
time is ripe for them !
In those few minutes while they
waited in the back room, the whole
place had been transformed ; the dull
street was now crowded and alive with
people ; every casement was open and
full of heads, women peeped from the
garret windows, men crowded to the
shop doors. Where was the gloom of
yesterday, the mourning sadness of a
conquered nation?
Mr. Bagginal' s representative entered
the room at this minute with Susanna's
card in his hand. He was another
young man of the Bagginal type, well
dressed, well bred. He knew Mrs.
Dymond's name, he said, while
Madame, as usual, began her state-
ment ; she gave a retrospect of her past
life, her marriage, her early difficul-
ties, she was proceeding to give her
views upon the politics of the day
when a sudden cry from the street
distracted the polite attache.
Madame exclaimed, and left off in
the midst of her harangue and ran to
the window, and Susy turned pale as
she followed her.
Up the centre of the street came a
mad-looking dancing procession. A
great red flag was borne ahead by a
man in a blouse and a scarlet Phrygian
cap. Then followed a wild bacchanalian
crew, headed by a dishevelled woman
also crowned with the cap of liberty,
and dressed entirely in red from head to
foot, followed by some others dancing,
clapping their hands, and beating time
to a drum and a tambourine ; half-a-
dozen men with pistols in their belts,
with huge boots, and a scarlet figure,
carrying a second flag, wound up the
procession. The whole band swept on
like some grim vision; it was there, it
Mrs. Dymond.
67
was gone, the window closed up ? the
street was empty again. The sight
seemed so ominous of past terror, of
new disaster, that even Madame was
silent for once.
" Oh, come, my child," she said to
Susy, who was now standing with her
passeports in her hand. " We have
much to do ; we must not delay. This
city is no place for quiet people."
CHAPTER XXXIII.
ONE OLD FRIEND TO ANOTHER.
MADAME had very much at heart her
desire to say good-bye to Monsieur
Caron. " He and I are old people ; we
may not meet again in this world,"
she said. "He has tilled my son's
head with many mad ideas, but he has
shown himself a good, true friend.
Are you afraid to come, Susy ? "
She looked pleased when Susy said
she should be glad to go with her, she
was not afraid.
Monsieur Caron lived some way off
in the Rue du Bac, and Mrs. Dymond,
seeing a chance carriage in the road,
signed to it, and got in with her friend.
As they rolled along, they passed the
head of a second procession coming
up some side street, and preceded by
a blue flag carried by a man like
a beadle.
This procession, unlike the other,
was not on tip-toe ; it came steadily
and quietly along, and consisted al-
most entirely of well-dressed and re-
spectable - looking people, civilians,
National Guards, and others, walking
five or six abreast, with folded arms
and serious faces, talking as they went.
"That is a deputation going to
parley with the Federals," shouted
the coachman, turning round upon
his seat. " Everybody has a proces-
sion ; you will see the Federals with
their barricade in the Place Yendome ;
these gentlemen are going to mediate ;
that is why they are not armed."
The carriage jogged on, and pre-
sently they passed two stacks of guns,
piled at the entrance of the Place
Yend6me, where the column still rose
supreme above the heads of the en-
camped Federals.
" Do you see the cannons ? " said the
coachman, a little old man, who seemed
of a military turn of mind. " Oh, they
are strong, ceux-lct ! "
"It is all nonsense," cries Madame,
very angrily, " all childish nonsense."
One of the sentries looked up at her
as she spoke.
It was a glorious spring morning,
and the sweetness and the sunshine
seemed to be on the side of peace and
happier promise. The stacked guns
gleamed, the mediators and the sol-
diers alike seemed enjoying the beauty
of the morning.
A few minutes afterwards they were
crossing the Pont Neuf, from whence
they could see all Paris and its glories
shining along the river banks, and
soon they reached Monsieur Caron' s
house on the far side of the Seine,
where he lived in a high-perched
lodging.
The coachman would not wait for
them ; they paid him and let him go,
and walked in to the stone-paved
court, where a porter, as usual, was
collecting the broken fragments scat-
tered by the Prussian bomb-shells.
The house in which Caron lived was
well-known to the world. Many mes-
sengers of good and evil tidings had
passed up its old stone nights. Cha-
teaubriand had once lived there,
faithful to his poor blind, beautiful
friend of earlier days. Madame Re-
camier had lived there, and her friend
and disciple. Wise men had climbed
those flights, and mighty men belong-
ing to the world of action ; there had
come the Amperes and Mathieu de
Montmorency that loyal gentleman
all the shifting splendours of those
early days and ministers, and kings
and queens deposed, and courtiers in
the ascendant : the place still seems
haunted by those familiar ghosts of
the first half of the century.
Madame, who knew the way, panted
up, followed up by Mrs. Dymond. They
rang the bell of a door, which was
F 2
63
Mrs. Dymond.
presently opened by an old woman-
servant in a country dress, who nodded
recognition, and showed them through
the dining-room to Caron's study.
How peaceful it all seemed, after
the tumult of the streets full of the
signs of war, of party strife, and con-
fusion. The old man sat reading the
paper in his dressing-gown and velvet
toque. He sat with his back to the
warm flood of light that came from
the open window. He rose to meet them,
looking surprised but pleased at their
visit : his bright blue eyes shone like
a young man's beneath his grey hair.
" How good of you, mesdames, to take
the trouble," said he, courteously, in
his pretty slow English, " and to find
me out in my nest. It is a long way
up, as I fear you have discovered.
Will you have some refreshment
coffee or sirop? Madeline will be
proud to serve you."
" Oh no, nothing of the sort," says
Madame, putting up her hand. " We
come to take leave, Monsieur Caron.
I did not ' wish to go without seeing
you once more. You and I are too
old friends to part without a good
hand-shake, although our opinions
differ, and you know that I shall
always detest yours."
Caron smiled. "And so you are
driven out 1 ?" he said. " It is hard on
you, my poor lady. It would take a
great deal to tear me from my quiet
corner here. You see the Prussians
have had some grace ; they sent an
enormous canon-ball into our court-
yard, but it has done no great harm.
Those are Chateaubriand's trees," he
said to Susy, who was looking about
with some interest and surprise. " He
used to walk there in that avenue,
and compose his sentimental poetry,
his impossible idylls. Will you like
to come out on the balcony?" and as
he spoke he stepped out into the sun-
shine. A sweet, peaceful sight met
their eyes ; the old gardens were
shining green among walls and gables
and peeps of distant places far away.
As Susy leant over the rails the
twitter of the birds was in the air,
and with it all the sweet spring
fragrance of the hour. " That is the
priests' garden next door," Caron said,
pointing to a beautiful old garden,
with lilacs, beyond a wall. "They
have just come back with their semi-
narists ; there is one of them reading
his breviary. He is dreaming away
his time, poor fellow ! I fear he does
not know what an awakening is before
him."
Alas ! the old man spoke prophetic-
ally, not knowing what he said. Only
a few weeks more and the silent young
priest was heroically giving up his life
for his breviary.
" One can hardly realise that this is
also Paris," said Susy, " as one comes in
straight from the streets, and from
hearing the clamour and cries of those
horrible people."
" Ah ! my dear young lady, do not
call them horrible people," said the
old man with a sigh. "They want
good things, which pleasant and well-
mannered people withhold from them
and their children. They are only
asking for justice, for happiness. They
ask rudely, in loud voices, because
when they ask politely they are not
listened to."
" Excuse me, Monsieur Caron," cries
Madame, stoutly, " I cannot help con-
tradic. They imposes on you; they
asks, they takes, they gets rations,
they runs away, but they will not
work, they cannot learn, they will
not fight ; you will never teach
them anything except to drink and
shout. . . . But I forgot; I did
not come to argue, I came to shake
your hand," said the old lady, with a
touch of real feeling. " I go to-morrow ;
Max will follow as soon as he has de-
spatched his work. He will come
after me if you do not detain him.
Caron, my old friend, I am here to
ask this of you do not keep him
from me, do not lead him into dan-
gers." Two tears stood in her little
gray eyes, winking with emotion.
" Would that you, too, were coming
into safety," she said ; that you were
coming with me or even with
Mrs. Dymond.
69
Susanna she go back to England,
and there you would be safe.
" Will you come ? " Susanna cried,
blushing up eagerly. " Dear Monsieur
Caron ! Jo and I would, oh so gladly !
bring you home with us. Indeed our
house is always open to you any
time, any day."
The old man looked touched and
pleased by her eagerness. "I thank
you warmly," he said, " but my work
is here. Dear lady, what would you
think of me if I abandoned it my
ateliers, my employes, my half-finished
schemes ? " Then he turned to Madame
du Pare, and took her old brown hand
in his with the same gentle, courtly
respect that he might have shown to
a primate, to a beautiful lady. " You
must trust me as you have always
done hitherto," he said. " Max shall
run no danger if I can help it none
that I do not share myself," and as he
spoke a bright and almost paternal
look was in his face. " Only you
must remember," he added gravely,
" there are some chances which an
honest man must face in times like
these, and Max is an honest man."
His words struck Susy ; they re-
minded her of her own talk with Du
Pare.
Madame turned red, snorted, jerked,
tried to speak, failed, choked. " Where
is Madeleine ?" she said at last. "I
will ask Madeleine for some sugar and
water," and she left the room very
quickly.
Caron shook his head gently as he
looked after her ; then he turned his
blue eyes on Susanna, who stood silent
with her pale face. Still without
speaking Caron went to a table,
opened a drawer, and came slowly back
to her, holding a packet in his hand.
"I have something to ask of you,"
he said. " It has just occurred to me,
that I have some papers here which I
should be glad to know of in a place
of safety. Will you take them back
to England with you 1 and if anything
should happen to me send for Max,
and he will know what to do with them.
They are papers relating to my works,"
he added, and some private memoranda
for my friend Max. I left another
parcel in my old lodging in the Broinp-
ton Road with Mrs. Barry," he added,
smiling. " It is only an unfinished
article about my society, but Max may
like to finish it some day."
Susy knew that for some time past
Caron had been try in g to apply his social-
ism to his paper-mills, and that he had
turned the whole concern into a com-
pany, of which the shareholders were the
workmen themselves. It was a society
conducted on the same plan as that of
Leclair, which had proved so successful.
The workmen gave zeal, care, thrift, as
their share of the capital ; Caron ad-
ministered the whole, and re-invested
the profits in graduated shares at the
end of the year.
"You have heard of my factories,"
he said to Susy. " Do you know the
story of the slave who fell with the
bowl of grain, and of the swallows
who flew to fetch each other to share
and share alike ? My work-people are
my swallows, and if anything were to
happen to me, Max must be able to
supply them with grain. Do not look
distressed, my dear lady," said the old
man, shrugging his shoulders, " death
must come to us all. I care not by
what name it comes; but I want to
know that my children are provided
for. I know that I can trust you,
and for the present will you keep my
little confidence ? "
" You know you can trust me," Susy
said with a sigh, and as she spoke
Madame came back with hurried steps
and with red eyes. " Well then, good-
bye, Monsieur Caron. Madeleine gave
me all I wanted," cried the old lady.
" Come, Susy, come."
Caron followed them in silence to
the door. " Good-bye, good-bye ; take
care of yourself, Monsieur Caroo,"
Madame kept repeating, as she
stumped down stairs.
CHAPTER XXXIV.
PAST THE CHURCH OP ST. ROCH.
THEY came away into the street
again, and walked in silence for a
time. Madame went ahead, inco-
70
Mrs. Dymond.
herently grunting and grumbling to
herself, quieting down by degrees, and
finding some comfort in checking off
her many plans upon her fingers.
" Luncheon, necessaries for the journey,
a carriage to be commanded, then the
omnibus, and so home." They crossed
the bridge and went into the Tuileries
Gardens. The first thing that struck
them was that the sentries had been
changed since they passed before. Two
hideous little men, with straw in their
boots, were keeping guard, and as
they crossed each other in their zig-
zaging lines they occasionally stopped
and whispered together. A dirty-
looking officer, with a calico sash tied
round his waist, came strutting up,
and rebuked the sentries in a loud,
familiar voice. Many people were about,
staring at the strange-looking soldiers
established in the customary places.
Most of the shops seemed to have put
up their shutters again. Madame's
purchases pre-occupied her, and she
crossed the street to one of the few
shops which still remained open. Just
as she came up to the counter, the
shopwoman suddenly put down the
handful of things she was folding
away and looked at the door. There
was a crowd of voices outside, a mur-
mur rather than a cry ; one or two
people came rushing by the swinging
glass door ; a man burst in, whispered
something across the counter, and the
woman, with a pale scared face, turned
to Madame.
" They are shooting down the people
in the Place Vendome," she said
quietly ; "we must put up our shutters.
Will you remain?"
" Oh, no, no ! Let us go home to
mamma," cried Susy, running to the
door with a first terrified impulse of
flight, and in an instant she and
Madame found themselves one of a
tide of human beings running along
the street. A minute brought them
to the turning up the Rue St. Roch,
that narrow defile where, near a cen-
tury before, the young Napoleon, Dic-
tator, had ordered his troops to fire on
the mob ; along which the young com-
municants had crowded that day last
year Susy thought of it, even at that
moment, flying with the flying stream
children, women in their mourning
dresses, couples arm-in-arm. An omni-
bus, turning out of its way in the Rue
de Rivoli, began madly galloping up
the steep ascent, along which every
door, every shop, seemed closed al-
ready, whereas the great church gates
flew ppen wide, and something like a
black wave of people came sweeping
down the great flight of steps into the
street below, flowing and mingling
with the crowd. One or two people
were standing outside their doors,
watching this flight.
" Let us get out of the crowd," said
Madame, coolly, as she hurried along.
" Once across out of the Rue St.
Honor 6 we shall be safe enough."
Susanna in those few moments of
time seemed to see more of life than
in as many years of an ordinary exist-
ence. The people running, the groups
rallying, the terrified women dragging
their children into shelter. She saw
a group of hateful young dandies lean-
ing over a balcony with opera-glasses
in their gloved hands, and laughing
at the diverting sight of fellow-
citizens flying for their lives. She
saw a man in plain clothes suddenly
attack a little man in a National
Guard's uniform, clutch at him by the
collar, with an oath : " Ah, you hide
away in your shops and corners, and
this is why we are abandoned to
these wretches ! " cries the assailant.
Then a few steps further on, a
door burst open, a middle-aged man,
dressed in the uniform of the National
Guard and evidently prepared for
action, sallies forth, to be as suddenly
dragged back by one of those huge
and powerful megeres for which Paris
is famous. "Do you think that I
shall let you go 1 " she shrieks, as she
hurls her husband back, and the door
bangs upon the struggling pair. As
they were crossing the Rue St. Honore
Madame said " Ah ! " in a peculiar
voice, and a couple of bullets whistled
by. The insurgents were still firing
from their barricade at the unarmed
masses, at the formidable children, the
Mrs. Dymond.
71
dangerous nursemaids and servant
girls. Once across the Rue St.
Honore, as Madame said, they were
in comparative safety ; but one more
alarm was reserved for them. In the
street leading to the Boulevard they
suddenly found themselves surrounded
by soldiers. In a moment they saw
that these were not insurgents, but
National Guards belonging to the
party of order, with broad blue sashes
round their waists. One of them, a
big, fair young man, stopped short,
and stamped his foot in furious help-
less rage and indignation as he looked
up at the lounging young men in the
balcony overhead. " The country in
ruin, and not one of you cowards to
answer her call/' he cried, shaking his
list at them with impotent fury. An
older officer said something, pointed
somewhere, and the little band hurried
on, glittering, clanking, helpless against
the great catastrophe.
On the Boulevards everything was
quiet and silent. The place seemed
almost deserted ; a few people were
resting on the benches, the sun shone,
the surly women were selling their
newspapers in the little kiosks, upon
which the various placards and appeals
of the day were fluttering. Susy saw
one despairing cry from a friend of
order, headed
" LIBERTY, FRATERNITY, EQUALITY.
" I appeal to the manhood, to the
patriotism of the population, to those
desiring tranquillity and respect for
law. Time presses ; a barrier is ab-
solutely needed to stem the tide of
revolution ; let all good citizens give
me their support.
" (Signed) A. BONNE,
" Captain Comm., 1st Company, 253 Batt"
Alongside of this, and indefinitely
multiplied, were the Federal mani-
festos in their official type and paper
"Citizens! the day of the 18th of
March will be known to posterity as
the day of the justice of the people !
The government has fallen, the entire
army, rejecting the crime of fratricide,
has joined in one cry of 'Long live
the Republic, long live the National
Garde ! ' No more divisions ; perfect
unity, absolute liberty are before us."
" Come, come ; do not waste your
time upon that barbouillage," cries
Madame ; " here is our omnibus." And
as she spoke she hailed a yellow omni-
bus that was quietly jogging in the
direction of Neuilly.
Everything was as usual when they
got back to the Yilla, but Susy found
to her dismay that Jo was still away.
Max came in almost immediately after
them ; he seemed to have been chiefly
concerned for their safety.
" Jo could take care of himself," he
said. " He must follow them later in
the day if he did not get home before
they left." The carriage was ordered
at five o'clock, and the porter of the
house they were going to had been
forewarned.
CHAPTER XXXV.
FUNERALIA.
" Seul avec sa torche/' V. HUGO.
THERE was a great deal to be done
before the time which Susanna had
agreed upon with Max, when her
mother was to be removed into Paris.
Everything had to be quietly prepared ;
but the boxes were packed, and all was
in readiness at the time appointed.
Adolphe was outside waiting to help
to carry Mrs. Marney in his strong
maimed arms, Susy anxiously came
and went, looking out for the carriage.
She gathered a last bunch of lilac and
brought it up to her mother's room.
She felt her heart sink as she thought
of the pain she must give.
" Let me tie the flowers up for you,"
cried Denise, meeting her in the door-
way, and anxious to show her good-
will.
" Susy," said Mrs. Marney, as her
daughter came into the room, fol-
lowed by Denise carrying the lilac,
" come and sit down here beside me,
dear. Michael has been here. He is
coming again." She spoke gently; a
72
Mrs. Dymoni
very sweet expression was in her
:ace.
" When was he here, mamma ? " said
Susy, surprised. "I have only been
away a few minutes." And then in
a moment she knew that it was all a
sick woman's hallucination.
"He left as you came i~ito the
room. He wanted to see me. He
came and stood by my bedside," said
Mrs. Marney. " He comes when I am
alone. I tell him he must not neglect
his work for me ; but he knows I like
him to come."
Her expression was so sweet, so
strange, that Susy was still more
frightened she took her mother's
hand ; it was very cold.
" How sweet those lilacs are," Mrs.
Marney went on. " The hot weather
is here ; I have been thinking the boys
will be wanting their summer clothes.
Susy, will you see to them when you
go back? You must not stop away
any longer with me, dear. It is a
rest to my heart to know my boys
are in your care."
Susanna could not speak. She heard
the wheels stop at the gate outside,
and the thought of tearing her dying
mother away seemed to her so cruel,
so unnatural, that suddenly she felt,
whatever happened, Mrs. Marney must
be left in peace. It was at this moment
that the door opened, and Du Pare
came in quietly, followed by Adolphe,
prepared to carry the poor lady away.
Susy put up a warning hand as they
approached.
Mrs. Marney smiled, seeing Max.
"Ah, Max," she said, "have you
come for us? Take her away; take
care of her. I have no strength to go
with you, my dears. I shall stay
quiet now, Susy," she said, putting
out her hand. As Susy caught her in
her arms she gave a deep sigh, and
her head fell upon Susy's shoulder
Max sprang to the bedside.
"She is gone!" said Adolphe, in a
whisper. "Poor lady ! poor lady ! "
She was quiet at last, lying with
closed eyes, with her hands crossed
above the heart which ached no more.
Susanna had sat all night long by her
mother's bed. She had ceased to weep
when morning came. She sat almost
as quiet as her dead mother. Only
yesterday, as it seemed to her, she
had watched by another death -bed.
Here again the awful hand had come
across her path, dividing those living
still from those who had lived. Susy
was a child to no one any more all
her past, all her childhood, was gone.
The room was in order. Madame and
Denise had helped to put it straight ;
there were more flowers out of the gar-
den, a mass of spring blossom, which
Max had brought to the door in his
arms and given to his mother. Every-
thing was put straight for ever. There
would be no more work done, though
the work-basket was still heaped ; no
more travelling, though Mary's boxes
were packed ; no more talks, no more
troubles. Marney 's strange trade of
pen and ink, had travelled elsewhere ;
so had the cheerful noises and shouts
of the little boys that she had
so loved to hear. Mary wanted no-
thing any more. She had longed for
her husband, and she had seen him,
though he had not come to her ; her
daughter was by her side and held her
hand, and death cannot seem anything
but peaceful to a mother with her
child to tend her to the end.
A sort of altercation on the landing
outside seemed strangely at variance
with the stillness of the room. Ma-
dame's indignant " Oh ! no, no, you
cannot pass like that," aroused Mrs.
"Dymond. She went to the door and
opened it quietly. "What is it?"
she said as she did so, and, not for t he
first time in her life, she came face to
face with Marney, heated, excited
strangely excited.
" I have travelled all night, and
this old devil would keep me away
from my poor Polly," he cried. " She
wants me, alive or dead, my poor, poor
Polly ! and that is why I am here,"
he went on. "D'ye hear, Mrs. Dy-
mond ? For all your money and
grandeur, ye didn't love your husband
Mrs. Dymond.
73
as your mother loved me. Don't
bear malice ! " he cried, more and more
wildly. " You can give me a kiss,
though you always hated me," and he
caught Susy in his arms, and then
pushed her roughly away, and went
up to the coffin with a reeling step.
" Polly!" he said, "why didn't you
wait for me? you knew I should
come if I could ! Ah ! it's the first
time you ever failed me, my poor
girl ! I travelled all night. I could
not have got through the night but
for a dram," he cried, excitedly.
While he was still speaking thus
incoherently, standing by the coffin,
the sound of music outside came into
the room through the open windows.
It was the funeral march of a military
band following some famous patriot
to his grave. To Susy, in her highly-
strung condition, the sound seemed
almost supernatural. She laid her
hand on Marney's arm, then, with one
look at her mother's face, she burst
into tears, and went out of the room.
She met Max on the stairs hurrying
up with a pale face ; the thought of
her trouble quite unnerved him.
" My mother sent me for you," he
said. "Is Marney there? Has he
frightened you ? "
She put her hand to her head.
"No," she said, "but I cannot stay
with him alone."
They could hear him walking up
and down excitedly, talking and call-
ing piteously for some one to come to
him. Then the steps ceased, the music
went dying up the street, other steps
came sounding on the wooden stairs.
Madame' s friend, the young under-
taker and his man, came tramping up
the wooden stairs, and all the dreary
preparations for the funeral went on.
The patriot's procession, meanwhile,
travelled on its way, the car, covered
with flags, slowly winding through
the streets of Paris; people looked
on, or fell into its train. For two
hours it paraded thus, amid cries
and shouts, and in time to the beat
of the muffled drums and to the
crashing music of a band which was
conducted, so it was said, by the great
Bergeret himself. It was late in the
afternoon before it reached the gates
of Montmartre, where the women
were selling their wreaths and immor-
telles. The great funeral had hardly
passed on its way when a second
humble procession appeared a bier,
drawn by a single horse, and driven
by Madame's friend, the young under-
taker, followed by a carriage with
some travelling cases on the top.
Marney was sitting on the box by the
driver of the carriage ; Madame du
Pare, her son, and her servant and
Susanna were inside. The carriage
drew up by the roadway; Adolphe,
who had come upon the bier, now
joined them, and they all passed in
together along an avenue of graves
and lilacs. The place was looking
beautiful in the setting sunlight for
miles around they could see the country
lighted by its rays. They came to the
quiet corner where poor Mary's grave
had been dug under the golden
branches of an acacia tree. As they
all stood by the open grave, united
together for the last time by their
common feeling for the woman who
was gone, the muffled drums and
funeral strains from the patriot's grave
still reached them from a distance.
When Mary Marney was laid to her
last rest, and the prayers were over,
the officiating clergyman turned aside,
pulling off his surplice and carrying it
on his arm, and went and mingled with
the crowd round about the hero's grave.
The end of his funeral eulogium was
being pronounced his last words had
been "Vive la Commune!" said a man
in a black tail coat and a red sash,
and suddenly all the people round
about took up the cry. Susy heard
them cheering as she stood by her
mother's grave, she was still very
calm, awe- stricken, and silent ; she
had stayed alone after the others had
all gone on. When she reached the
iron gates by which they had come
in, she found her stepfather waiting
for her. His hat was over his eyes;
Mrs. Dymond.
it may have been the light of the
setting sun which dazzled him. He
did not look round, but he spoke as
she came up to him.
" You will go and see the boys and
tell them," he said. " I know that for
her sake you will be a good friend to
them. As for me, do not fear that I
shall trouble you. You can write to
the office if you have anything to say.
I will send remittances from time to
time."
" Do you wish me to take care of
the boys altogether? " Susy asked.
"Just as you like," said he, turn-
ing away with a sigh. " Your mother
would have wished it so. You are
more fit than I am." A. minute more
and he was gone. It was the last time
they ever met. Susy parted from him
with something more like charity in
her heart than she could have be-
lieved possible. He had made no pro-
fessions, he had left his boys in her
charge ; and while Susy had Dermy
and Mikey to care for she still seemed
able to do something for her mother.
Madame du Pare, who had stood wait-
ing a little way off, now also came up
to take leave.
" I, too, must say farewell, my
child," said the old lady with some
solemnity ; " I can delay no longer,
and you are returning to your home.
My son will see you off. Ah ! Susy,
we shall miss you sorely."
Susy could not speak ; she bowed her
head, took her old friend's hand in
hers, and suddenly flinging her arms
round her neck she burst into tears
** God bless you, my dear child.
Write very soon and tell me of your-
self, of your safe return," said the old
lady. Then looking about for the
coachman, " Ah ! it is insupportable !
That man is not there. I shall miss my
train ; " and madame, with renewed
animation, trotted off towards the
crowd. She came back a minute after-
wards, followed by the coachman and
her friend the undertaker. Max and
Adolphe arrived at the same minute
with a second carriage for Susanna,
which they had been in search of. As
the ^undertaker helped madame into
the carriage, there came a parting
cheer from the friends of the fallen
patriot.
" Listen to them," said the man,
shutting the door with a bang, "as if
it were not better to die ore's proper
natural death (sa belle mort naturelle)
than to be shot and shouted over like
this ! " Max had delayed a moment to
say a word to Susanna,
" I must see my mother off," he
said. "It is more than likely you
may find the Neuilly road blocked up ;
if you cannot get home, drive to this
address, and wait till I come," and he
wrote something on a card and gave
her a key. " It is the house to which
I hoped you might have taken her for
safety, it is that of a friend ; you will
find no one there," he added.
Susy was anxiously hoping to get
back and to find Jo at the villa, but
when they reached the Avenue de
Neuilly, she found that Max's warning
was well advised. The way was im-
passable, a barrier had been erected;
the Federals had established them-
selves; it was hopeless to try to re-
turn to the villa.
" Don't fear, madame. I will get
through the line," said Adolphe, see-
ing her look of disappointment. " I
will find Mr. Jo and bring you news
of him later." And when Susy faintly
exclaimed, "I show them my hands,
and they always let me pass," said the
poor fellow laughing ruefully, and
before she could say another word he
was gone.
To be continued.
75
AN INDIAN VILLAGE.
A STEEP incline leads down the side
of a hill to the village of K .
The road is ankle-deep in loose
sand, ruddy as the flesh tints of
the inhabitants of the country. The
fronds of the palms and the leaves of
the tamarind trees, yellow and sear
with the first heats of summer, fall
fast to the earth. Every now and
again a gust of scorching hot wind
stirs thick clouds of blinding dust, as
thick almost and as suffocating as
those of the simoon. Bank and
dyke are gay with verdant cactus,
flowering thorn, festoons of air-roots
hanging in garlands, gigantic feather
grasses with flossy plumes, and field
flowers bright with all gorgeous hues.
Crows caw querulously from the boughs
of banyan and peepul tree, preening
their wings in solemn convocation.
There is a rustle of insect life in the
scrubby underwood. Ruby - tailed
dragon-flies float lazily by. Bright
green parrots with scarlet beaks circle
in the hot, quivering air. The tan-
gled gossamer skeins of the spider still
sparkle with the heavy dews of the
tropical night. The bee drones out
his unending tune, and swarms of
gnats circle ceaselessly under the cas-
sei'ina trees.
The rocky bluffs of the surrounding
amphitheatre of hills glitter in the
blinding glare of the sun, but the
deep gullies and ravines, where the
torrents of the rainy seasons have
worked their furious will, are filled
with cool blue shadows. As their
jagged, tormented slopes spread up-
wards into flat table-lands, each peak
and crag and swelling buttress tells
its tale of the wars and convulsions in
Nature's history. At their feet a
trembling mist slowly creeping sky-
wards heralds the fierce heat of the
full day.
A few herds of goats and cows
have already clambered up the rocky
spurs to browse on grass white as flax,
or earn a scanty and precarious subsis-
tence from the sun-lit jungle, or the
famished verdure of the last monsoon.
In charge of these poor brutes are wild
country folk, slightly made, with thick
lips, coarse hair, and skins that almost
rival the negro's in blackness. They
wear no other garment than a coloured
rag round the loins. The unkempt
locks of the girls fall on to their
shoulders in a glorious tangle ; neck-
laces of coarse blue beads and armlets
are their ornaments, and huge nose-
rings bob over their gaping mouths.
The village lies at the foot of the hills,
by the side of a tank, partly lined
with walls of rude masonry, and
fringed with cocoa-nut palms, planted
in quincuncial fashion and growing
marvellously straight. Over its
shallow waters, glittering in the
morning light like a huge emerald,
float reeds and sedges and shiny pond
weeds. The shore a zone of deep
mud is pitted with the hoofs of
goats, cows, and buffaloes ; two or
three of the latter are even now at
their bath, their square nostrils and
black humps just peeping above the
water. Women are scrubbing their
brass pots and pans with dirt and
sand, or washing their own gay
clothes, whilst the men are engaged
in more personal ablutions, removing
the oil from their bodies or the
dust from their feet. A Brahmin is
putting up his prayers and muttering
Sanscrit mantras, which he does not
understand, before a small temple
with conical roof. Through the dirty
green surface a water snake is wrig-
gling his way ; some rats are out
foraging ; a bald - headed adjutant-
bird, balancing on one leg, mounts
76
An Indian Village.
guard over the lizards basking on the
shelving bank ; the heron and the
kingfisher add their share of life to
the strange scene. Women and girls,
with noiseless steps but loud chatter-
ing tongues, pass to and fro from the
tank to the village, bearing on their
heads water-pots of all sizes and
shapes. When one remembers that
the village water supply is entirely
dependent on this general bathing-
place, where mud and water mix in about
equal proportions, the frequent pre-
sence of the cholera is not surprising.
The huts of the village, amounting to
perhaps two hundred little homesteads,
stretch in irregular lines on either
side of the high road without any
topographical justification, and are
separated from each other by ill-
defined muddy tracks, or hedges
of prickly pear, which are but feeble
defences against the wild beasts of
the jungle. Very rough structures
are these huts. The peaked roof is
wrought of interlaced logs and
branches, thatched either with straw
or palm leaves, or covered with ruddy
clay tiles. The walls are mostly of
caked mud or matting, but here and
there one sees a stronger support of
stone or brick. They rarely stand
more than eight feet high, and the
eaves of the projecting roofs form a
verandah on all sides. The floor is
either of the bare earth, or concrete
called chunam ; a wooden floor would
be more expensive, less durable, and be,
moreover, a too convenient harbourage
for insects. One hut is in process of
building. Bamboos, full of knots, and
brambles are being reared to form an
unsubstantial roof a frail defence
against the deluges of rain, the tor-
nadoes of wind, and other formidable
operations of tropical nature. Women
in a circle, with light wooden rammers,
are laying down the concrete floor,
and lightening their labours with the
nasal strains of some country song.
A white bullock stalks gravely round
and round, crushing mortar in a
primitive press with a pre-adamite
cylindrical roller.
All the huts are one storied, and
they are as squalid and untenantable
as the shanties and cabins of the Irish
poor. The roofs are strewn about
with baskets, damaged hen-coops, and
cotton cloths fifteen to twenty feet
long. Tufts of weed and coarse grass
and spiky brambles grow out of every
available cranny in the thatch or in
the tiles, but there are no lovely
lichens or mosses as in the Emerald
Isle. Here and there a rude attempt
to decorate these dirty, ragged tene-
ments appears to have been made, for
grotesque figures in chalk and ver-
milion are daubed on either side of
the doors, and in several walls
are whitewashed, with empty niches
for idols and gods. A few have open
holes, which do double duty as win-
dows and chimneys. These apertures
are barred and closed in the cold or
rainy season with boards or shutters
of country manufacture. Glass is ap-
parently unknown in the village, and
if it were known would probably be a
luxury above the pockets of the vil-
lagers ; nor are windows necessary in
a tropical country, except during the
monsoon. Bolstered up with sticks
and stakes, the walls, of matting, mud,
or stone, are so cracked and torn that
one can see into the lives of the people
within, and it is a marvel how the
buildings continue to hold together.
The inmates of each homestead herd
in patriarchal fashion, and in a fashion,
it may also be said, sadly irreconcilable
with health. Each dismal, dirty abode
contains, for furniture, a few stools, a
native bed or two, a few brass vessels,
and articles of dress worth perhaps
ten to fifteen shillings, which do occa-
sional duty as carpets. It will be
centuries yet before the family ex-
penses of the Hindu ryot come up to
those of the English landed proprietor I
The sacred little shrub dedicated to
Yishnu, sprouts from a blue and white
pot in front of some of these family
hives.
About fifty of these huts constitute
the village bazaar, or market. One
general dealer's store succeeds that of
An Indian Village.
77
another. The shopkeeper squats amid
his miscellaneous wares, cross-legged,
like a big grasshopper, on the raised
floor. Baskets of cane or bamboo, con-
taining onions, millet, peas, seeds of
all sorts, and the simple vegetable
food of an Eastern people, are piled
up in rows behind him. Strings of
plantains hang in front of the stall,
and of glutinous sweetmeats, in the
form of wheels, elephants, elephant-
headed gods, and a thousand more
devices, which, with other lollipops,
are consumed in large quantities by
every man, woman, and child in the
village. The display of fruit is limited
to water-melons, jack-fruit, pummeloes,
and plantains, and in front seeds are
spread out to dry on gunny-bags.
Unlike the town dealer, the rural
shopkeeper does not decorate his store
with gold and silver tissue paper, nor
does he, even on holidays, hang yellow
flowers on his dirty, treacherous, little
scales. In a wooden bowl, or in his
loin cloth, he keeps his stores of copper
money ill- shaped pice, and cowries
or shell money and in some secret
cranny in the walls or floor of his hut
he buries an occasional silver bit.
Paper money rarely, if ever, finds its
way to his till.
From the huts a stream of animal
life finds its way into the road. Skinny
fowls peck here and there in the refuse
heaps, greedily gobbling up an un-
savoury variety of quaintly-flavoured
food, which renders them uneatable to
Europeans. Cattle saunter out from
the unventilated cowsheds of matting.
Long-haired mangey curs, black and
white and spotted, yelp around the
miserable buffaloes on their way to
the arid deserts which represent their
pastures. Not a cat is to be seen in
the village, but goats innumerable.
A seedy-looking parrot, moulting in a
tumble-down wooden cage, and a
monkey, represent the village pets.
Hogs and pigs are as conspicuous by
their absence as butchers' shops. Little
naked urchins, their heads shaved ac-
cording to the rules of caste, and their
eyes blackened with kohl, wearing
charms round neck and loins, scamper
after their mothers, or hug them as
they straddle across their hips like
little black apes. Cakes of cowdung,
used for fuel, are drying in the sun-
light by the roadside, or against the
walls. It is one of the chief occupa-
tions of the Indian villager's wife to
make the cowdung into cakes, and she
may be seen at every hour of the day
gathering the precious ordure for the
family hearth into wicker-work
baskets.
The male population are but scantily
clothed. Round the loins they wear a
cloth, which leaves their thin legs bare.
Each man wears the turban, a dirty
sheet coiled negligently round the head.
The prevalent taste appears to incline
to white, but red and blue turbans are
also seen. Rough sandals, or shoes
studded with brass-headed nails, and
turned up at the toes, protect the black
feet from the baking heat of the earth.
Few foreheads are marked with the
caste-mark, but some of the cultivators
wear dirty little Brahminical threads,
and charms are tied round most necks.
When on a journey they carry rough
country blankets, or cumblies, striped
in black and white, which, when worn
over the head and body, protect them
from the chill dews of night. For self-
defence some of them use stout sticks,
which they are very expert in wielding
like quarter staves; but one never
sees here the queer old swords and
cutlasses that the peasantry carry in
some parts of Hindoostan.
The females drape themselves in a
very graceful manner in one long
cotton cloth, with decorated borders,
which, after being wound round the
loins, so as to leave the legs uncovered
half way up to the thigh, is thrown
over the back and head, and brought
down over the face as a sort of veil.
A short-sleeved bodice falling to the
waist is worn under this cloth. Ban-
gles of glass and shell glitter on the
bare arms, and a few girls wear rings
in their noses and on their toes. These
ornaments are of the commonest mate-
rial glass, brass, or tinsel paper and
78
An Indian Village.
their clothes are purchased from the
itinerant Mohammedan hawkers, who
carry their whole stock-in-trade, of
cotton prints and gaudy chintzes and
handkerchiefs, under their arms. The
hair of both women and girls is worn
in the same fashion, parted in the
centre and tied at the nape of the neck
in a neat little plait. Cocoa-nut oil is
plentifully applied to keep the dark
tresses glossy and smooth, and on holi-
days a wreath of yellow flowers, or a
brass ornament, is added. The village
tank is the great gossiping place ; but
their hours for unrestrained gossip are
not many. To their lot fall all
the domestic duties, and throughout
the day they are to be seen winnowing
corn, grinding grain, husking rice with
pestle and mortar, or turning the
handmill. They appear to be exces-
sively fond of their children, and are
certainly models of industry. Do-
mestic drudges, beasts of burden,
agricultural labourers, exposed to all
the inclemency of the seasons, none of
them have any pretensions to beauty.
They are an ugly, but gentle race.
Their carriage, however, is perfect, and
they stride along straight as arrows
a habit no doubt due to the constant
balancing of burdens on the head.
The amusements of the village are
simple. The favourite game of the
boys is a kind of prisoner's base.
Birds' nesting enters not into their
pastimes, nor have the mysteries of
cricket yet penetrated into this dis-
trict. The men lounge on their veran-
dahs, smoking the family hubble-
bubble filled with bhang prepared
from the stalks and leaves of the
hemp plant, or indulging in desultory
conversation as soporific as the social
atmosphere of the Neapolitan lazza-
rone. The village public-house a
squalid structure with a corrugated
iron roof, a table laden with country
liquors, and a dirty little flag by way
of signboard offers its solace to a few
convivial spirits. In the main road,
perhaps, a juggler is showing off the
tricks of his monkeys and cobras to a
crowd squatting before him in the
shape of a half moon. He beats on a
small drum with his fingers, or blows
through a little pipe of reeds, till he
has got his audience together, and
then proceeds to make mango trees
grow, to spit fire, or having hidden a
boy in a basket, rams his old anti-
quated scimitar through the wicker-
work, to the intense delight of the
overgrown children jabbering round
him. Naked urchins make mud pat-
ties in the thoroughfares ; boys try to
float their tiny paper kites in the hot
motionless air; girls swing little
babies to sleep; wives fan their
slumbering lords. The noise of tom-
toms and cattle bells never ceases.
All, young and old, male and female,
chew pan as a sailor chews his quid ;
the said pan having the reputation
of an astringent and a great strength-
ener of the gums, but most certainly
discolouring the teeth very sadly.
A dreary sing-song proclaims the
whereabouts of the village school.
Outside, in the elevated courtyard,
the scholars are learning their les-
sons, scrawling on the dust, on palm-
leaves, or on broken pieces of slate,
or in line repeating their tasks. The
dominie, a Brahmin, naked to the
waist, a little black tuft of hair bob-
bing on his shaven crown, walks up
and down inspecting his pupils as they
whine out arithmetical puzzles. The
primers are all in the vernacular, for
English is not taught here ; and as
female education is still an unf elt want
in the village, women grow, live, and
die here in Cimmerian ignorance. The
master is paid by small gratuities of
coarse grain, oil, or cloth.
The village boasts of only one small
temple. Peeping in at the dusky door
one sees behind an iron grating a tiny
clay god, with the head of an elephant
and two pairs of arms. This is the
god Ganesh. His tiara is of tinsel
paper, and a little doll's frock of crim-
son silk hangs over his protuberant
belly an even more contemptible
little image than the waxen bambino
of poor Italian hamlets. Chaplets of
yellow jasmine and other flowers, and
An Indian Village.
79
small offerings of rice, are decaying in
front of the shrine. Outside, a kind
of obelisk, studded with rows of nails,
serves to support coloured glasses,
which are filled with cocoa-nut oil
on holidays, and over this spread the
branches of a mango tree, planted by
some superstitious villager with a
view to a comfortable berth in the
next world.
On the outskirts of the village tiny
shrines of mortar and brick, in shape
not unlike a dog's kennel, line either
side of the way, each containing a
rude stone, carved with the image of
a god or goddess, and painted a bright
red. At the lower end, numerous
little white figures of elephants
are ranged on an earthen platform.
These are objects of worship to the
rural population ; but what is not an
object of worship to them ? Evidently
the trees are, for several of the ban-
yans are gay with streamers of coloured
rag. Jungle spirits, river spirits, can-
nibal spirits, ghosts, and goblins all
have a place in their creed. They
believe in witchcraft, magic, astrology,
and the exorcism of devils from the
bodies of possessed persons. A blight
is brought about by the killing of
cows, or the eating of beef ; and the
irremediable sterility of the soil is
still ascribed to the operations of the
officers of the survey some three-score
years ago !
The lean, slouching, ungainly village
bullocks must be first cousins to
Pharaoh's lean kine. Dull-eyed, feeble,
compact only of skin and bone, brutally
treated, they look, and surely must
be, the very embodiment of animal
misery. Superstition, which forbids
their slaughter, makes no provision
for kind treatment, and the peasantry
maintain that it is cheaper to work
them to death than to 'buy new bullocks
in order to tend the old more carefully.
Their beef is naturally quite tasteless.
From the jungles these poor brutes
procure just enough food to keep
themselves alive. What a contrast
they form to the fine lazy Brahminical
bull with its large meek eyes, soft
dove-coloured skin, and lusty hump on
the back; or to the^ prize cattle now
and again paraded at local exhibitions.
Buffaloes are kept for milk, and for
ploughing the marshy lands. The
sheep are as hairy as the goats. The
ponies are hardy, active, and vicious ;
and as often as not ridden bare-
backed. The community also possess a
small breed of little donkeys animals
which a London costermonger would
spurn, and gifted with a dislocat-
ing roughness of action which no lan-
guage can describe to such as have
never felt it.
No railway comes near the place,
but there is a constant stream of road-
traffic. Bullock-cart after bullock-
cart goes by both day and night, each
lumbering shapeless vehicle drawn by
two oxen, for cart horses may be said
to have no existence in India. These
carts are sometimes covered in with a
sort of hood of matting, and under
this improvised shelter reposes the
carter's wife and his children, a little
knot of black faces and black arms.
For the sake of society, and by way
of mutual protection, the carters
travel in bands averaging from a
dozen to twenty, halting at nightfall
and forming a regular encampment by
the roadside. The draught-bullocks are
white or dun in colour, with large
dewlaps and big humps. Sometimes
they are made gay with rude necklaces
and tassels of scarlet wool, and nearly
all are decorated with brass bobs and
bells. If they happen to be docile
Jehu speaks to them in the most
endearing terms ; but should they
prove intractable he indulges in a
flood of vituperation in which his
native tongue is peculiarly rich. Every
ungreased wheel seems to have its own
peculiar squeak, and the poor beasts
sway from side to side as they strive
to make the hard yoke easier to their
necks.
The agricultural implements might
throw light on the primitive agricul-
ture of the Aryans. The small native
plough is carried afield by the peasant
on his shoulders, and he uses the trees
80
An Indian Village.
to store up hay in untidy ricks. Irri-
gation by watercourse or well is
unknown, and the villagers depend
solely on the rainfall for the fertility
of their fields. The lever and bucket
so familiar to travellers in Egypt, the
revolving water-wheel in shape like
the paddles of a steamboat or the
treadmill, are never seen, nor bullocks
lifting water in leathern skins. The
fields, irregular and capricious in shape,
of black or deep brown earth, are
sown with barley, jowaree, millet, and
ragi. The cocoa-nut trees yield oil,
their husks make serviceable ropes,
their leaves are used as thatch, the
wood serves for rafters of a small
span, and the juice yields toddy. Bulks
or raised ridges, irregular and hard as
iron, divide field from field, and paths
seldom traversable by wheels lead to
and from the village to the irreclaim-
able jungle. The high road is the
only metalled road in the district, and
no where could one find a market or
ornamental garden. Platforms raised
in the centre of the fields are used as
observatories, from whence cultivators
armed with slings scare off the birds
from the ripening grains.
The chief village functionary is pro-
bably the schoolmaster, who to his
pedagogic duties adds those of priest
and physician. After him comes the
patel or headman, the mouthpiece and
representative of the hereditary culti-
vators, of the tenants at will, and of
the tenants by occupancy. To his
kulkarni or clerk is committed the
drawing up of the village deeds
documents written on execrable paper,
commencing with the name of the
goddess of wealth, and terminating
with the bangle marks, or other
pictorial attestations of the illiterate
villagers. He keeps the rural rent roll,
the accounts of every estate, a classi-
fication of the different soils, and of
the rights and interest in them of the
peasants a record which effectually
checks promiscuous squatting. The
village smith, seated before his shanty,
his primitive bellows by his side,
hammers away at bands of iron im-
ported with piece goods. Justice is
administered by the village pancfiayat
or counsel, and its decrees are enforced
by expulsion from caste. The mar-
warree, or native money-lender, officiates
as the village capitalist. This worthy
crouches on the floor of his hut like a
beast of prey with the face of a
hawk ; and once in his debt, lucky is
the cultivator who can ever call him-
self again a free man. To them he
makes advances on grain which are
often repaid in kind on the threshing
floor of the village. He has his wife
here, a buxom dame, who struts about
in her petticoats of amber and crimson
like a peacock the only woman in the
village who veils her face whenever
she goes abroad, and gifted with a
tongue shrill enough to make itself
heard from one end of the village to
the other. The barber is the wag of
the community, his wife its midwife ;
and the schoolmaster casts horoscopes
and tells fortunes.
At noon the village enjoys a siesta,
and at night during the sultry season
the majority of the villagers sleep
outside their huts on each side of the
road, on the native bed, or charpoy, a
web of netting stretched on four short
legs. Dogs mount guard over the
cattle, and here and there figures
clothed in white glide noiselessly by
like sheeted ghosts. Through the in-
terstices of each hut glimmers a
tiny light. The cricket chants in the
grass, and maybe a panther, or even
a tiger, slinks down to drink at the
tank, and carry off, if luck favour
him, some unfortunate cow. Jackals
are prowling up and down for stray
fowls, and overhead the owls and flying
foxes hooting in the trees. Mean-
while the rising moon is touching
rock and valley with inexpressible
tenderness, and the mystic voice of
nature begins to whisper of things
unseen.
MACMILLAN'S MAGAZINE
DECEMBER, 1885.
POETRY AND POLITICS.
THE separation of literary criticism
from politics appears to have been a
gain both to politics and to literature.
If Mr. Swinburne, for example, speaks
unkindly about kings and priests in
one volume, that offence is not re-
membered against him, even by the
most Conservative critic, when he
gives us a book like 'Atalanta/ or
' Erechtheus. 7 If Victor Hugo applauds
the Commune, the Conservative M.
Paul de Saint Victor freely forgives
him. In the earlier part of the cen-
tury, on the other hand, poems which
had no tinge of politics were furiously
assailed, for party reasons, by Tory
critics, if the author was a Whig, or
had friends in the ranks of Whiggery. 1
Perhaps the Whiggish critics were not
less one-sided,but their exploits (except
a few of Jeffrey's) are forgotten.
Either there were no Conservative
poets to be attacked, or the Whig at-
tack was so weak, and so unlike the
fine fury of the Tory reviewers, that it
has lapsed into oblivion. Assuredly
no Tory Keats died of an article, no
Tory Shelley revenged him in a Con-
servative ' Adonais/ and, if Lord
Byron struck back at his Scotch
reviewers, Lord Byron was no Tory.
In the happy Truce of the Muses,
which now enables us to judge a poet
1 Compare Maginn's brutal and silly attack
on Shelley's ' Adonais,' recently reprinted in
Maginn's ' Miscellanies.' Sampson Low and
Company.
No. 314. VOL. LIII.
on his literary merits, Mr. Courthope
has raised a war-cry which will not,
I hope, be widely echoed. He has
called his reprinted essays 'The
Liberal Movement in English Litera-
ture/ 2 and has thus brought back
the howls of partisans into a region
where they had been long silent.
One cannot but regret this intru-
sion of the factions which have " no
language but a Cry" into the tran-
quil regions of verse. Mr. Courthope
knows that the title of his essays will
be objected to, and he tries to de-
fend it. Cardinal Newman, he says,
employs the term " Liberalism " to
denote a movement in the region of
thought. Would it not be as true
to say that Cardinal Newman uses
" Liberalism " as " short " for most
things that he dislikes ? In any case
the word " Liberal " is one of those
question-begging, popular, political
terms which had been expelled from
the criticism of poetry. It seems an
error to bring back the word with
its passionate associations. Mr. Court-
hope will, perhaps, think that the
reviewer who thus objects is himself
a Liberal. It is not so ; and though
I would fain escape from even the
thought of party bickerings, I pro-
bably agree with Mr. Courthope in
not wishing to disestablish anything
or anybody, not even the House of
Lords. None the less it is distract-
3 John Murray, London, 1885.
G
82
Poetry and Politics.
ing, when we are occupied for once
with thoughts about poetry, to meet
sentences like this : " Life, in the
Radical view, is simply change ; and
a Radical is ready to promote every
caprice or whim of the numerical
majority of the moment in the belief
that the change which it effects in the
constitution of society will bring him
nearer to some ideal state existing in
his own imagination." Or again :
"How many leagues away do they"
(certain remarks of Mr. Burke's)
" carry us from the Liberal Radical-
ism now crying out for the aboli-
tion of the hereditary branch of the
Legislature?" and so on. One ex-
pects, in every page, to encounter the
deceased wife's sister, or " a cow and
three acres." It is not in the mood
provoked by our enthusiasm for the
hereditary branch of the Legislature,
it is not when the heart stands up in
defence of the game laws, that we
are fit to reason about poetry. Con-
sequently, as it appears to me, Mr.
Courthope, in his excitement against
Radicalism, does not always reason
correctly, nor, perhaps, feel correctly,
about poetry.
As far as I understand the main
thesis of Mr. Courthope's book, it is
something like this. From a very
early date, from the date certainly of
Chaucer, there have been flowing two
main streams in English literature.
One stream is the Poetry of Romance,
the other is the Poetry of Manners.
The former had its source (I am in-
clined to go a great way further back
for its source) " in the institutions of
chivalry, and in mediaeval theology."
The other poetical river, again, the
poetry of manners, " has been fed by
the life, actions, and manners of the
nation." One might add to this that
the "life and actions" of our people
have often, between the days of the
Black Prince and of General Gordon,
been in the highest degree " romantic."
This mixture, however, would confuse
ML. Courthope's system. Dray ton's
' Agincourt,' Lord Tennyson's * Revenge'
may be regarded at will, perhaps, as
belonging to the poetry of romance,
or the poetry of national action.
Mr. Courthope does not touch on this
fact, but the reader will do well to
keep it in mind, for reasons which
will appear later.
The fortunes of the two streams
of poetry have been different. The
romantic stream was lost in the sands
of Donne, Crashaw, Cowley, and the
rest, but welled up again in the begin-
ning of our own century, in Scott,
Coleridge, and others. The poetry of
manners, on the other hand, had its
great time when men, revolting from
the conceits of degenerate romanticism,
took, with Pope, Dryden, Thomson,
and Johnson, to " correctness," to
working under the " ethical impulse."
Now the " correctness " and the choice
of moral topics which prevailed in the
eighteenth century were " Conserva-
tive, "and the new burst of romantic poe-
try was " Liberal," and was connected
with the general revolutionary and
Liberal movement in politics, specu-
lation, and religion. Finally, Mr.
Courthope thinks that " the Liberal
movement in our literature, as well as
in our politics, is beginning to lan-
guish." Perhaps Mr. Chamberlain
and his friends are not aware that
they are languishing. In the interests
of our languishing poetry, at all
events, Mr. Courthope briefly pre-
scribes more " healthy objectivity "
(the words are mine, and are slang,
but they put the idea briefly), and a
"revival of the simple iambic move-
ments of English in metres historically
established in our literature."
In this sketch of Mr. Courthope's
thesis, his main ideas show forth as,
if not new, yet, perfectly true. There
is, there has been, a poetry of romance
of which the corruption is found in the
wanton conceits of Donne and Cra-
shaw. There is, there has been, a
poetry of manners and morals, of
which the corruption is didactic prosi-
ness. In the secular action and re-
action, each of these tendencies has,
at various times, been weak or strong.
At the beginning of this century, too,
Poetry and Politics.
a party tinge was certainly given,
chiefly by Conservative critics, to the
reborn romantic poetry. Keats cared
as little as any man for what Marcus
Aurelius calls "the drivelling of
politicians," but even Keats, as a
friend of " kind Hunt's," was a sort
of Liberal. But admitting this party
colouring, one must add that it was of
very slight moment indeed, and very
casually distributed. Therefore, one
must still regret, for reasons which
will instantly appear, Mr. Courthope's
introduction of party names and party
prejudices into his interesting essays.
It is probably the author's preoccu-
pation with politics which causes fre-
quent contradictions, as they seem, and
a general sense of confusion which
often make it very hard to follow his
argument, and to see what he is really
driving at. For example, Scott, the
Conservative Scott, whom Mr. Court-
hope so justly admires, has to appear
as a Liberal, almost a revolutionary,
in verse. Mr. Courthope quotes Cole-
ridge's account of the origin of
Lyrical Ballads as " the first note
of the ' new departure/ which I have
called the ' Liberal Movement in
English Literature.' " Well, but the
Tory Scott was an eager follower of
Coleridge's ; he played (if we are to be
political) Mr. Jesse Collings to Cole-
ridge's Mr. Chamberlain. This, by it-
self, proves how very little the Liberal
movement in literature was a party
movement, how little it had to do with
Liberalism in politics.
Again, when Mr. Courthope is cen-
suring, and most justly censuring, Mr.
Carlyle's grudging and Pharisaical
article on Scott, he speaks of Carlyle
as a "Radical," and finds that "our
Radical Diogenes " blamed Scott " be-
cause he was a Conservative, and
amused the people." Now Carlyle,
of all men, was no Radical ; and Scott,
as a Conservative, is a queer figure
in a Liberal movement. Another odd
fact is that the leaders of the Liberal
movement " steeped themselves " in
the atmosphere of feudal romance.
Whatever else feudal romance may
have been, it was eminently anti-
Radical, and, to poetic Radicals,
should have been eminently uncon-
genial. Odder still (if the Liberal
movement in literature was a party
movement to any important extent) is
Mr. Courthope's discovery that Macau-
lay was a Conservative critic. Yet a
Conservative critic Macaulay must
have been, because he was in the
camp opposed to that of Coleridge and
Keats. Macaulay was a very strong
party man, and, had he been aware
that his critical tastes were Tory, he
would perhaps have changed his tastes.
Yet again, Mr. Courthope finds that
optimism is the note of Liberalism,
while " the Conservative takes a far
less sanguine view of the prospects of
the art of poetry," and of things in
general. But Byron and Shelley, in
Mr. Courthope's argument, were Libe-
ral poets. Yet Mr. Courthope says,
speaking of Shelley, " like Byron, he
shows himself a complete pessimist."
For my own part (and Mr. Court-
hope elsewhere expresses the same
opinion), Shelley seems to me
an optimist, in his queer political
dreams of a future where Prometheus
and Asia shall twine beams and buds
in a cave, unvexed by priests and
kings a future in which all men shall
be peaceful, brotherly, affectionate
sentimentalists. But Mr. Courthope
must decide whether Byron and Shelley
are to be Conservatives and pessimists,
or Liberals and optimists. At present
their position as Liberal pessimists
seems, on his own showing, difficult
and precarious. Macaulay, too, the
Liberal Macaulay, is a pessimist, ac-
cording to Mr. Courthope. All this
confusion, as I venture to think it,
appears to arise, then, from Mr. Court-
hope's political preoccupations. He
shows us a Radical Carlyle, a Conser-
vative Macaulay ; a Scott who is, per-
haps, a kind of Whig ; a Byron, who,
being pessimistic, should be Conserva-
tive, but is Liberal ; a Shelley, who is
Liberal, though, being pessimistic, he
ought to be Conservative. It is all
very perplexing, and, like most mis-
G 2
84
Poetry and Politics.
chief, all comes out of party politics.
It is less easy to demonstrate, what
I cannot help suspecting, that Mr.
Courthope's great admiration of the
typical poetry of the eighteenth cen-
tury comes from his persuasion that
that poetry, like Providence, " is Tory."
This may seem an audacious guess. I
am led to make it partly by observing
that Mr. Courthope's own poems, espe-
cially the charming lyrics in * The Para-
dise of Birds/ have a freedom and a
varied music, extremely Liberal, ex-
tremely unlike Johnson and Thom-
son, and not all dissimilar to what we
admire in the Red Republican verse
of Mr. Swinburne. Now, if Mr.
Courthope writes verse like that (and
I wish he would write more), surely his
inmost self must, on the whole, tend
rather to the poetry he calls Liberal,
than to that which (being a politician)
he admires as Conservative, but does
not imitate. All this, however, is an
attempt to plumb " the abysmal depths
of personality." We are on firmer
ground when we try to show that Mr.
Courthope expresses too high an
opinion of the typical poetry of the
eighteenth century. Now this really
brings us face to face with the great
question, Was Pope a poet ? and that,
again, leads us to the brink of a dis-
cussion as to What is poetry? On
these matters no one will ever per-
suade his neighbours by argument.
We all follow our tastes, incapable of
conversion. I must admit that I am,
on this point, a Romanticist of the
most "dishevelled" character; that
Pope's verse does not affect me as
what I call poetry affects me ; that
I only style Pope, in Mr. Swinburne's
words, " a poet with a difference."
This is one of the remarks which in-
spire Mr. Courthope to do battle for
Pope, and for Thomson, and Johnson,
and the rest. Mr. Matthew Arnold,
too, vexes Mr. Courthope by calling
Pope and Dry den " classics of our
prose." Why are they not poets? he
asks \ and " Who is a poet if not
Pope?" Who? Why from Homer
onwards there are many poets : there
are " many mansions," but if Pope
dwells in one of them I think it is
by courtesy, and because there are
a few diamonds of poetry in the fine
gold of his verse. But it is time to
say why one would (in spite of the
very highest of all living authori-
ties) incline to qualify the title of
" poet " as given to Pope. It is for a
reason which Mr. Courthope finds it
hard to understand. He says that
Mr. Matthew Arnold and Mr. Swin-
burne deny Pope the laurel without
assigning reasons. They merely cry,
in a despotic fashion, stet pro rations
voluntas. They do not offer argu-
ment, or, if they argue, their ar-
guments will not " hold water."
But Mr. Courthope himself justifies
the lack of argument by his own reply
to certain reasonings of Words-
worth's. " Your reasoning, no doubt,"
says Mr. Courthope to the Bard of
Rydal, "is very fine and ingenious,
but the matter is one not for argu-
ment, but for perception."
Precisely : and so Mr. Arnold and
Mr. Swinburne might answer Mr.
Courthope's complaints of their lack
of argument, " The matter is one not
for argument, but for perception."
One feels, or perceives, in reading
Pope, the lack of what one cannot
well argue about, the lack of the in-
definable glory of poetry, the bloom
on it, as happiness is, according to
Aristotle, the bloom on a life of good-
ness. Mr. Swinburne, avoiding
"argument," writes, "the test of the
highest poetry is that it eludes all tests.
Poetry in which there is no element at
once perceptible and indefinable by
any reader or hearer of any poetic
instinct may have every other good
quality . . . but if all its properties
can easily or can ever be gauged and
named by its admirers, it is not poetry,
above all it is not lyric poetry, of the
first water." In fact, to employ the
terms of Mr. Courthope's own reply to
Wordsworth, " the matter is one not
for argument, but for perception."
Now this "perceptible and indefin-
able" element in poetry, is rarely
Poetry and Politics.
85
present in Pope's verse, if it is ever
present at all. We can " gauge and
name " the properties of Pope's verse,
and little or nothing is left unnamed
and ungauged. For this reason Pope
always appears to me, if a poet at all,
a poet " with a difference." The test,
of course, is subjective, even mystical,
if you will. Mr. Courthope might
answer that Pope is full of passages
in which he detects an indefinable
quality that can never be gauged or
named. In that case I should be
silenced, but Mr. Courthope does not
say anything of the sort. Far from
that, he says (and here he does as-
tonish me) that " the-most sublime pas-
sages of Homer, Milton, and Yirgil,
can readily be analysed into their
elements." Why, if it were so, they
would indeed be on the level of Pope.
But surely it is not so. We can parse
Homer, Milton, and Yirgil ; we can
make a precis of what they state ; but
who can analyse their incommunicable
charm ? If any man thinks he can
analyse it, to that man, I am inclined
to cry, the charm must be definable
indeed, but also imperceptible. Take
Homer's words, so simply uttered,
when Helen has said that her brothers
shun the war, for her shame's sake
Qs <j)aro' TOVS ft ^77 Kare^ei/ (/>ucri'boy ata,
'Ej/ Aa/Ke&ai'/zoi/i au$t, (piXr; Iv Trarpidiyair).-
Who can analyse the subtle melan-
choly of the lines, the incommunicable
charm and sweetness, full of all
thoughts of death, and life, and the
dearness of our native land ?
In Yirgil and Milton it is even
easier to find examples of this price-
less quality, lines like
" Fluminaque antiques subterlabentia
muros," 2
or
"Te, Lari maxime, teque
Fluctibus et fremitu assurgens, Benace,
Tnarinn 1 " 3
"So spake she, but them already the
mother earth possessed, there in Lacedsemon,
their own dear native land. "
" And rivers gliding under ancient walls. "
"Thee, mightiest Laris, and thee Bena-
cus, rising with waves and surge as of the sea."
Mr. Courthope himself quotes lines
of Milton's that sufficiently illustrate
my -meaning
" And ladies of the Hesperides that seemed
Fairer than feigned of old or fabled since
Of faery damsels met in forest wide
By Knight of Logris or of Lyones,
Lancelot, or Pelleas, or Pellenore."
There is something in the very pro-
cession and rhythmical fitness of the
words, there is a certain bloom and
charm, which defies analysis. This
bloom is of the essence of poetry, and
it is not characteristic of the typical
verse of Mr. Courthope' s Conservative
eighteenth century. He enters into
argument with Mr. Swinburne, who
quotes, as an example of the inde-
finable quality
" Will no one tell me what she sings ?
Perhaps the plaintive numbers flow
For old, unhappy, far-off things,
And battles long ago."
Mr. Swinburne says that "if not
another word was left of the poem
in which those two last lines occur,
those two lines would suffice to show
the hand of a poet differing, not in
degree, but in kind, from the tribe
of Byron or of Southey " the Con-
servative singer of Wat Tyler. As to
Byron I do not speak ; but certainly
the two lines, like two lines of
Sappho's, if they alone survived,
would give assurance of a poet of
the true gift, of the unimpeachable
inspiration. Such a line as
'Hpos ayyeXos Ififpofjywvos dr)da>v } *
cos de Trals TreSa juarepa
or
is not a more infallible proof of the
existence of a true poet.
Mr. Courthope does not see this in
the case of Wordsworth. He says
the beauty of the fragment depends
on the context. I quote his remark,
which proves how vain it is to argue
about poetry, how truly it is "a
4 "The dear glad angel of spring, the
Nightingale." BEN JONSON.
5 "Even as a child to its mother I flutter
to thee. " Both these passages are fragments
of Sappho.
86
Poetry and Politics.
matter of perception." Mr. Court-
hope says, "The high quality of the
verses depends upon their associations
with the image of the solitary High-
land reaper singing unconsciously her
'melancholy strain' in the midst of
the autumn sheaves; detached from
this image the lines would scarcely
have been more affecting than our
old friend, 'Barbara, celarent, &c.' "
By an odd coincidence, and personal
experience, I can disprove (in my own
case) this dictum of Mr. Courthope's.
When I was a freshman, with a great
aversion to Wordsworth, and an almost
exhaustive ignorance of his poetry, I
chanced to ask a friend to suggest a
piece of verse for Latin elegiacs. He
answered, "Why don't you try
* Will no one tell me what she sings ?
Perhaps the plaintive numbers flow
For old, unhappy, far-off things,
And battles long ago.' "
I did not attempt to convert the lines
into blundering elegiacs. I did not
even ask for the context, but the
beauty and enchantment of the sounds
remained with me, singing to me, as
it were, in lonely places beside the
streams and below the hills. This is,
perhaps, evidence that, for some hear-
ers, the high quality of Wordsworth's
touch, " when Nature took the pen
from him," does not depend on the
context, though from the context
even that verse gains new charms.
For what is all Celtic poetry but a
memory
" Of old, unhappy, far-off things,
And battles long ago " ?
In the long run, perhaps, as Mr.
Courthope says, Mr. Swinburne " only
proves by his argument that the
poetry of Byron is of a different
kind from the poetry of Wordsworth
and Shelley, and that he himself
infinitely prefers the poetry of the
two latter." Unluckily argument
can prove no more than that the
poetry which we "infinitely prefer"
is of a different kind from the poetry
of Pope and Johnson, and even from
most of Thomson's. One cannot de-
monstrate that it is not only of a
different kind but of an infinitely
higher kind. That is matter for per-
ception. But this one may say, and
it may even appear of the nature of
an argument, that the poetry of " a dif-
ferent kind," which I agree with so
much more competent a judge as Mr.
Swinburne in preferring, is not pecu-
liar to any one people, or time, or
movement. It is quod semper, quod
ubique, quod ab omnibus. I find this
flower on the long wild, frozen plains
and steppes, the tundras, of the Finnish
epic, the ' Kalevala ' : " The cold has
spoken to me, and the rain has told
me her runes ; the winds of heaven,
the waves of the sea, have spoken and
sung to me, the wild birds have
taught me, the music of many waters
has been my master." So says the
Runoia, and he speaks truly, but wind
and rain, and fen and forest, cloud
and sky and sea, never taught their
lesson to the typical versifiers of the
Conservative eighteenth century. I
find their voices, and their enchant-
ment, and their passion in Homer and
Yirgil, in Theocritus, and Sophocles,
and Aristophanes, in the volkslieder
of modern Greece, as in the ballads of
the Scottish border, in Shakespeare
and Marlowe, in Ronsard and Joachim
du Bellay, in Cowper and Gray, as in
Shelley and Scott and Coleridge, in
Edgar Poe, in Heine, and in the Edda.
Where I do not find this natural
magic, and "element at once per-
ceptible and indefinable," is in the
' Rape of the Lock,' ' The Essay on Man,'
' Eloisa to Abelard,' The Campaign,'-
is in the typical verse of the classical
and Conservative eighteenth century.
Now, if I am right in what, after all,
is a matter of perception, if all great
poetry of all time has this one mark,
this one element, and is of this one
kind, while only the typical poetry of
a certain three generations lacks the
element, and is of another kind, can
I be wrong in preferring quod semper,
quod ubique, quod ab omnibus ?
The late Rector of Lincoln College
(a Liberal, to be sure, alas !) has defined
Poetry and Politics.
87
that which we consciously miss in
Pope and Johnson as " the element of
inspired feeling." Perhaps we can-
not define it, and perhaps it is going
too far to say, with the Rector, that
" it is by courtesy that the versifiers
of the century from Dryden to
Churchill are styled poets." Let us
call them " poets with a difference,"
for even Mr. Courthope will probably
admit (what he says Mr. Swinburne
has "proved " about Byron) that they
are poets " of a different kind." Then
let us prefer which kind we please,
and be at rest. We, who prefer the
kind that Homer began, and that
Lord Tennyson continues, might add,
as a reason for our choice, that our
side is strong in the knowledge
and rendering of Nature. Words-
worth, in a letter to Scott, 1 remarked
that Dryden' s was " not a poeti-
cal genius," although he possessed
(what Chapelain, according to Theo-
phile Gautier, especially lacked), " a
certain ardour and impetuosity of
mind, with an excellent ear." But, said
Wordsworth. " there is not a single
image from nature in the whole body
of his works," and, " in his translation
from Yirgil, wherever Yirgil can be
fairly said to have had his eye upon
his object, Dryden always spoils the
passage." So, it is generally confessed,
does Pope spoil Homer, Homer who
always has his eye on the object. I
doubt if Chapman, when he says
" And with the tops lie bottoms all the deeps,
And all the bottoms in the tops lie steeps,"
gives the spirit of a storm of Homer's
worse than Pope does, when he
remarks
" The waves behind roll on the waves before."
Or where does Homer say that the
stars
" O'er the dark trees a yellower verdure shed,
And tip with silver every mountain head ? "
says Homer, and it is enough. The
" yellower verdure," and the silver,
1 Lockhart's ' Memoirs of the Life of Sir
Walter Scott,' ii. 89.
2 " And all the stars show plain."
and the rest of this precious stuff come
from Pope, that minute observer of
external nature. Mr. Courthope num-
bers Dryden, with Shakespeare,
Chaucer, and Scott, among poets with
" the power of reproducing the idea
of external nature." It may be my
unconscious Liberalism, but I prefer
the view of that eminent Radical,
William Wordsworth. Mr. Courthope
elsewhere asserts that the writers of
the best poetry of the eighteenth
century (meaning Pope, I presume,
and the rest), " faced nature boldly,
and wrote about it in metre directly
as they felt it." Probably, by
" nature," Mr. Courthope means
"human nature," for I cannot believe
that Pope, boldly facing Nature on a
starlit night, really saw a " yellower
verdure " produced by " that obscure
light which droppeth from the stars."
Before leaving the question of the
value of typical eighteenth century
poetry, one would recall Mr. Court-
hope's distinctions between the poetry
of manners and national action, and the
poetry of romance. I said that there
was much romance in our national
actions. Now, outside the sacred
grove of Conservative and classical
poetry, that romance of national
action has been felt, has been fittingly
sung. From the Fight of Brunan-
burh, to Dray ton's ' Agincourt,' from
Agincourt to Lord Tennyson's ' Re-
venge,' and Sir Francis Doyle's ' Red
Thread of Honour,' we have certain
worthy and romantic lyrics of national
action. The Cavalier poets gave us
many songs of England under arms,
even Macaulay's ' Armada ' stirs us like
' Chevy Chase,' or ' Kinmont Willie.'
The Conservative and classical age of
our poetry was an age of great actions.
What, then, did the Conservative
poets add to the lyrics of the romance
of national action? Where is their
* Battle of the Baltic/or their 'Mariners
of England ' ? Why, till we come to
Cowper (an early member of " the
Liberal movement,") to Cowper and the
' Loss of the Royal George,' I declare
I know not where to find a poet who
88
Poetry and Politics.
has discovered in national action any
romance or any inspiration at all !
What do we get, in place of the
romance of national adventure, in
place of ' Lucknow' and ' The Charge of
the Light Brigade/ from the classical
period T Why, we get, at most, and
at best,
" Though fens and floods possessed the middle
space
That unprovoked they would have feared to
pass,
Nor fens nor floods can stop Britannia's
bands,
When her proud foe ranged on their border
stands." *
I recommend the historical and topo-
graphical accuracy of the second line,
and the musical correctness of the
fourth. Not thus did Scott sing how
" The stubborn spearsmen still made good
Their dark impenetrable wood,"
and I doubt if Achilles found any
such numbers, when Patroclus entered
his tent, aeiSe S'apa K/Vea oh/Span/. 2 The
Conservative age, somehow, was less
patriotic than the poets of *' the
Liberal movement."
Space fails me, and I cannot join
battle with Mr. Courthope as to the
effect of science on poetry, and as to
the poetry of savage times and peoples,
though I am longing to criticise the
verses of Dieyries and Narrinyeries,
and the karakias of the Maoris, and
the great Maori epic, so wonderfully
Homeric, and the songs of the
Ojibbeways and Malagasies. When
Macaulay said, "as civilisation ad-
vances, poetry almost necessarily de-
clines," I doubt if much Dieyri or
Narrinyeri verse was present to his
consciousness. But this belongs to a
separate discussion.
I have tried to show that, by intro-
1 Of course there are better things than this
in the 'Campaign' of the inspired Mr. Addison.
2 " And he was singing of the glorious deeds
of men."
ducing political terms into poetical
criticism, and by having his eye on
politics when discoursing of poetry,
Mr. Courthope has not made obscure
matters clearer, and has, perhaps,
been betrayed into a strained affec-
tion for the Conservative and classical
school. His definition of what gives
a poet his rank, "his capacity for
producing lasting pleasure by the
metrical expression of thought, of
whatever kind it may be," certainly
admits Pope and some of his fol-
lowers. But, as a mere matter of
perception, I must continue to think
them " poets with a difference," dif-
ferent from Homer, Sappho, Theocritus,
Virgil, Shelley, 'Keats, Coleridge, and
Heine. This is the conclusion of a
romanticist, who maintains that the
best things in Racine, the best things
in Aristophanes, the best things in
the Book of Job, are romantic. But I
willingly acknowledge that the classi-
cal movement, the Conservative move-
ment, the movement which Waller
began and Pope completed, was in-
evitable, necessary, salutary.
I am not ungrateful to Pope and
Waller ; but they hold of Apollo in
his quality of leech, rather than of
minstrel, and they " rather seem his
healing son," Asclepius, than they
resemble the God of the Silver Bow.
As to the future of our poetry, whether
poets should return to "the simple
iambic movements " or not, who can
predict ? It all depends on the poets,
probably unborn, who are to succeed
Mr. Matthew Arnold and Lord Tenny-
son. But I hope that, if our innumer-
able lyric measures .are to be deserted,
it may be after my time. I see
nothing opposed to a moderate Conser-
vatism in anapaests, but I fear Mr.
Courthope suspects the lyric Muse
herself of a dangerous Radicalism.
ANDREW LANG.
89
ON LOVE'S LABOUES LOST.
LOVE'S LABOURS LOST is one of the
earliest of Shakspere's dramas, and
has many of the peculiarities of his
poems, which are also the work of his
earlier life. The opening speech of
the King on the immortality of fame
on the triumph of fame over death
and the nobler parts of Biron, have
something of the monumental style
of Shakspere's Sonnets, and are not
without their conceits of thought
and expression. This connection of
the play with his poems is further
enforced by the insertion in it of three
sonnets and a faultless song ; which,
in accordance with Shakspere's prac-
tice in other plays, are inwoven into
the action of the piece and, like the
golden ornaments of a fair woman, give
it a peculiar air of distinction. There
is merriment in it also, with choice
illustrations of both wit and humour ;
a laughter often exquisite, ringing,
if faintly, yet as genuine laughter
still, though sometimes sinking into
mere burlesque, which has not lasted
quite so well. And Shakspere brings
a serious effect out of the trifling of
his characters. A dainty love-making
is interchanged with the more cumbrous
play ; below the many artifices of
Biron's amorous speeches we may
trace sometimes the " unutterable
longing ; " and the lines in which
Katherine describes the blighting
through love of her younger sister are
one of the most touching things in older
'literature. 1 Again, how many echoes
seem awakened by those strange words,
actually said in jest! "The sweet
war-man (Hector of Troy) is dead and
rotten ; sweet chucks, beat not the
bones of the buried : when he breathed,
he was a man " words which may
remind us of Shakspere's own epitaph.
In the last scene, an ingenious turn is
given to the action, so that the piece
1 Act v., scene ii.
does not conclude after the manner
of other comedies
" Our wooing doth not end like an old play ;
Jack hath not Jill : "
and Shakspere strikes a passionate
note across it at last, in the entrance
of the messenger, who announces to
the Princess that the King her father
is suddenly dead.
The merely dramatic interest of the
piece is slight enough only just suf-
ficient, indeed, to be the vehicle of its
wit and poetry. The scene a park
of the King of Navarre is unaltered
throughout ; and the unity of the play
is not so much the unity of a drama
as that of a series of pictorial groups,
in which the same figures reappear, in
different combinations, but on the
same background. It is as if Shak-
spere had intended to bind together,
by some inventive conceit, the devices
of an ancient tapestry, and give voices
to its figures. On one side, a fair
palace ; on the other, the tents of the
Princess of France, who has come on
an embassy from her father to the
King of Navarre ; in the midst, a
wide space of smooth grass. The same
personages are combined over and
over again into a series of gallant
scenes the Princess, the three masked
ladies, the quaint, pedantic King one
of those amiable kings men have never
loved enough, whose serious occupa-
tion with the things of the mind seems,
by contrast with the more usual forms
of kingship, like frivolity or play.
Some of the figures are grotesque
merely, and, all the male ones at least,
a little fantastic. Certain objects re-
appearing from scene to scene love-
letters crammed with verses to the
margin, and lovers' toys hint ob-
scurely at some story of intrigue.
Between these groups, on a smaller
scale, come the slighter and more
90
On Love's Labours Lost.
homely episodes, with Sir Nathaniel
the curate, the country-maid Jaque-
netta, Moth or Mote the elfin-page,
with Hiems and Ver, who recite " the
dialogue that the two learned men
have compiled in praise of the owl
and the cuckoo." The ladies are
lodged in tents, because the King,
like the princess of the modern poet's
fancy, has taken a vow
"To make his court a little Academe,"
and for three years' space no woman
may come within a mile of it ; and the
play shows how this artificial attempt
was broken through. For the King and
his three fellow-scholars are of course
soon forsworn, and turn to writing
sonnets, each to his chosen lady.
These fellow- scholars of the King
"quaint votaries of science." at first,
afterwards, " affection's men-at-arms "
three youthful knights, gallant,
amorous, chivalrous, but also a little
affected, sporting always a curious
foppery of language are throughout
the leading figures in the foreground ;
one of them, in particular, being more
carefully depicted than the others, and
in himself very noticeable a portrait
with somewhat puzzling manner and
expression, which at once catches the
eye irresistibly and keeps it fixed.
Play is often that about which
people are most serious ; and the
humorist may observe how, under
all love of playthings, there is almost
always hidden an appreciation of some-
thing really engaging and delightful.
This is true always of the toys of
children ; it is often true of the play-
things of grown-up people, their vani-
ties, their fopperies even the cynic
would add their pursuit of fame and
their lighter loves. Certainly, this is
true without exception of the play-
things of a past age, which to those
who succeed it are always full of
pensive interest old manners, old
dresses, old houses. For what is
called fashion in these matters occu-
pies, in each age, much of the care of
many of the most discerning people,
furnishing them with a kind of mirror
of their real inward refinements, and
their capacity for selection. Such
modes or fashions are, at their best,
an example of the artistic predomin-
ance of form over matter; of the
manner of the doing of it over the
thing done ; and have a beauty of
their own. It is so with that old
euphuism of the Elizabethan age
that pride of dainty language and
curious expression, which it is very
easy to ridicule, which often made
itself ridiculous, but which had below
it a real sense of fitness and nicety ;
and which, as we see in this very play,
and still more clearly in the Sonnets,
had some fascination for the young
Shakspere himself. It is this foppery
of delicate language, this fashionable
plaything of his time, with which Shak-
spere is occupied in ' Love's Labours
Lost.' He shows us the manner in all
its stages ; passing from the grotesque
and vulgar pedantry of Holofernes,
through the extravagant but polished
caricature of Armado, to become the
peculiar characteristic of a real though
still quaint poetry in Biron himself
still chargeable, even at his best, with
just a little affectation. As Shak-
spere laughs broadly at it in Holo-
fernes or Armado, he is the analyst of
its curious charm in Biron ; and this
analysis involves a delicate raillery
by Shakspere himself at his own
chosen manner.
This " foppery " of Shakspere's day
had, then, its really delightful side, a
quality in no sense " affected," by
which it satisfies a real instinct in our
minds the fancy so many of us have
for an exquisite and curious skill in
the use of words. Biron is the per-
fect flower of this manner
"A man of fire-new words, fashion's own
knight "
as he describes Armado, in terms
which are really applicable to him-
self. In him this manner blends with
a true gallantry of nature, and an
affectionate complaisance and grace.
He has at times some of its extra-
vagance or caricature also, but the
shades of expression by which he
On Love's Labours Lost.
91
passes from this to the "golden
cadence" of Shakspere' s own chosen
verse, are so fine, that it is sometimes
difficult to trace them. What is a
vulgarity in Holofernes, and a carica-
ture in Armado, refines itself in him
into the expression of a nature truly
and inwardly bent upon a form of deli-
cate perfection, and is accompanied by
a real insight into the laws which deter-
mine what is exquisite in language,
and their root in the nature of things.
He can appreciate quite the opposite
style
" In russet yeas, and honest kersey noes ; "
he knows the first law of pathos,
that
" Honest plain words best suit the ear of
grief."
He delights in his own rapidity of
intuition; and, in harmony with the
half-sensuous philosophy of the Son-
nets, exalts, a little scornfully, in
many memorable expressions, the
judgment of the senses, above all
slower, more toilsome means of know-
ledge, scorning some who fail to see
things only because they are so clear
" So ere you find where light in darkness lies,
Your light grows dark by losing of your
eyes "
as with some German commentators
on Shakspere. Appealing always to
actual sensation from men's affected
theories, he might seem to despise
learning ; as, indeed, he has taken up
his deep studies partly in play, and
demands always the profit of learning
in renewed enjoyment; yet he sur-
prises us from time to time by intui-
tions which can come only from a
deep experience and power of obser-
vation; and men listen to him, old
and young, in spite of themselves.
He is quickly impressible to the
slightest clouding of the spirits in
social intercourse, and has his mo-
ments of extreme seriousness ; his
trial-task may well be, as Rosaline
puts it
" To enforce the pained impotent to smile."
But still, through all, he is true to his
chosen manner; that gloss of dainty
language is a second nature with him ;
even at his best he is not without a
certain artifice ; the trick of playing
on words never deserts him ; and Shak-
spere, in whose own genius there is an
element of this very quality, shows
us in this graceful, and, as it seems,
studied, portrait, his enjoyment of it.
As happens with every true drama-
tist, Shakspere is for the most part
hidden behind the persons of his crea-
tion. Yet there are certain of his
characters in which we feel that there
is something of self-portraiture. And
it is not so much in his grander,
more subtle and ingenious creations
that we feel this in Hamlet and
King Lear as in those slighter and
more spontaneously developed figures,
who, while far from playing principal
parts, are yet distinguished by a cer-
tain peculiar happiness and delicate
ease in the drawing of them figures
which possess, above all, that winning
attractiveness which there is no man
but would willingly exercise, and
which resemble those works of art
which, though not meant to be very
great or imposing, are yet wrought of
the choicest material. Mercutio, in
'Romeo and Juliet,' belongs to this
group of Shakspere's characters ver-
satile, mercurial people, such as make
good actors, and in whom the
"Nimble spirits of the arteries,"
the finer but still merely animal
elements of great wit, predominate.
A careful delineation of little, charac-
teristic traits seems to mark them
out as the characters of his predilec-
tion ; and it is hard not to identify
him with these more than with others.
Biron, in 'Love's Labours Lost,' is
perhaps the most striking member
of this group. In this character,
which is never quite in touch with,
never quite on a perfect level of under-
standing with the other persons of the
play, we see, perhaps, a reflex of Shak
spere himself, when he has just be-
come able to stand aside from and
estimate the first period of his poetry.
WALTER PATER.
92
IRISH SHOOTINGS.
IN the month of November, 1883, I
was on a visit to a relative who lived
in a remote district in the south-west
of Ireland; and as my host was an
invalid and his two sons were at
school I was thrown pretty much on
my own resources for amusement.
One morning I started after break-
fast with a couple of dogs to explore
a distant coom, or mountain valley,
where I was promised the chance of
five or six brace of woodcock, and the
certainty of a fine view of the sur-
rounding hills and distant sea.
The morning was dark and lower-
ing, but the barometer stood high, and
there did not seem to be any danger
of rain. I found the coom more
distant than I had expected, and
also lost a good deal of time in
looking for snipe in a promising bog
which lay a little off my road. The
birds were wild, and the bogs so
full of water after recent rains that
I could not get near them ; as a
countryman whom I met informed me,
" Ye won't get widin the screech of a
jackass of them, for ye makes as much
nize as a steamer paddlin' through all
that wather;" so I abandoned the
chase after securing three or four
couple. The man was friendly, and
seemed inclined for a talk.
" Where are ye goin' now, yer
honour ? if I might make so bould,"
he asked as I turned away.
"I'm going up to Coomeana," I
replied.
"Why thin? What to do there,
yer honour, might I ax, if it's plazin'
to ye?"
" To look for a cock. Are there
any about ? "
"Cocks is it, why wouldn't they?
Begor, it do be crawlin' wid them
sometimes. Ye wouldn't have the
laste taste of tibbacky about ye, yer
honour ? I hadn't a shough (pull) of
the pipe wid three days, and I'm just
starved for the want of it."
"All right," said I. "Here you
are," and I pulled out my tobacco
pouch and gave him a couple of
ounces of cavendish. He bit it with
the air of a connoisseur, and his not .
very attractive countenance bright-
ened.
" Oh, glory ! " said he, " why thin
long life to you ! " and he " let," as he
would have expressed it, "a lep out
himself," and sitting down on a stone,
proceeded to charge an almost stem-
less dkudheen without loss of time.
I wished him good morning, whistled
to the dogs and went my way.
Presently I heard the steps of one
running behind me, and turning back
was aware of my friend pursuing.
When he overtook me, he civilly
removed his pipe, which was now all
aglow, and after eying it lovingly,
said,
" Whisper, yer honour. Ye'll be
the sthrange gintleman that's stoppin'
wid Misther Bourke over yondher ? "
"Yes," I replied. " What of that ? "
" Oh, nothin' at all, sir. I thought
so meself. The byes (boys) were
tellin' me that ye was the civil gintle-
man to the poor people, and that ye
has great nature, and so 1 finds ye,
be Job. And " after a pause, " ye're
goin' up Coomeana afther the cocks?
Well, good sport to yer honour
another pause. " Don't ye be out too
late. Them mountains is lonesome
about nightfall," he added musingly.
" Oh, I'm not afraid of the fairies,"
I replied.
"Whisht, sir," said he, this time
with real concern. " 'Tisn't looky
(lucky) to be talkin' of the good
people," touching his hat, "out in
these bogs. 'Tisn't thim I manes at
Irish Shootings.
93
all, only ye know," said he insinuat-
ingly, -"the little mountain paths is
crass (cross, difficult) to a sth ranger,
and ye might lose yer way or fall into
a bog-hole. That's a purty gun ye
has," said he admiringly ; " does she
scatter well now ? "
" No, I should hope not," said I.
" Och, that's a pity," he replied ;
for an Irish peasant not being gene-
rally a good shot, except at landlords,
policemen and such big game, his
ideal of a shot-gun is a weapon which
will scatter well, and give him most
chances.
" Well, good evenin' to yer honour,
and good look anyways," and as I was
turning away he added carelessly,
" don't ye be out too late."
1 thought his manner strange, but
did not attach any significance to his
warning. Mr. Bourke was on fair
terms with his tenants, and though the
times were troublous he had never even
received a threatening letter ; besides
I was known to be a stranger, with
no stake in the country, and was also,
as my friend said, a favourite with the
boys.
It was a weary way up the moun-
tain side and the afternoon was well
advanced before I reached my desti-
nation. The view down the mountain
gorge was very fine, and under a fair
sky, with the hill sides in alternate light
and shadow, must have been magnifi-
cent. But as I saw it then, range after
range stretched away in gloomy loneli-
ness to the ocean, which lay dull and
leaden some miles away, with a hooker
or coasting craft, dark and solitary,
lying becalmed or at anchor close in
shore. I did not, however, waste time
in studying the view, for I soon came
upon the birds, though this was cer-
tainly not one of the days quoted by
my friend below, when the place was
" crawlin' with them." They lay close
too ; and as Irish dogs are generally
better at snipe than cock, and there
was no wind, they often got up behind
me, making me lose much time in
following them ; so that the evening
was closing in before I had shot more
than four couple, and as my host had
told me not to show my face with less
than six, I determined to bestir myself,
and calling the dogs I started for a
little valley about half a mile away
into which I had marked several
birds, and which I had been told
before starting was the surest find on
the mountain.
This valley was not more than half
a mile away as the crow flies ; but then
I am not a crow, and I had to go up
one little hill and down another, and
to make a long circuit round a shaking
bog, so that by the time I had got to
my hunting ground, and had shot one
bird, the night was coming on apace ;
and to make matters worse, a mist
came sweeping up from the sea, which
grew thicker every instant, so that
when I at last made up my mind to
turn my face homewards, I was at a
loss which way to turn it.
The hill-tops were by this time
hidden in mist, so that in the fading
light I could make out no landmarks.
I knew that the wind had sprung
up from seaward, but it was very
light, and seemed shifty and uncer-
tain. I hit at last upon a path, which
seemed like that by which I had
come up ; but after following it for
more than a mile, it led me to a
brawling stream, which I had not met
before, and I began to suspect that
I had been following it away from
home instead of homewards.
I then tried back for a mile and a
half or more, by which time it was
nearly dark, and then I lost the path
altogether. I took a pull at my flask,
and ate the remains of a piece of oat-
cake which I had brought with me in
the morning. I called the dogs and
spoke to them, and encouraged them
to make a show of their wonderful
instinct and lead me home ; but they
only sat on their tails, and whimpered
and shivered, looking at me sadly, as
though to ask why I had got them into
such a mess.
I shouted and shouted, but no an-
swer came back upon the wind. I
was tired and wet and wretched ; so I
Irish Shootings.
lit my pipe, which gave me some little
comfort, and made up my mind to
walk on till I came somewhere, or till
I found a convenient heap of stones,
which would give me some shelter
from the wind and now thickly falling
rain, till morning.
The moon would not rise for some
hours, so there was no use in waiting
for her. I therefore plodded on slowly,
taking comfort from the thought that
things could not be worse, as I
brought to mind the great poet's
words, " the worst is not, as long as
we can say, This is the worst." But
soon I found my mistake ; for after
walking about another mile I put
my foot into a hole and fell and
wrenched my ankle, so that walking,
which was before ;only tiring, now be-
came painful, and having come to a
good high cairn of those great ice-
borne boulders so common in the
south and west, I crept into a hollow
between two of them and, with the
dogs lying close beside me for warmth
and company, soon dozed oft' to sleep,
being very weary.
I may have slept for an hour or
more, when I was awakened by the
barking of one of the dogs. He was
seated on a hillock outside, bark-
ing, and looking into the distance,
where I could see nothing, though the
rain had ceased and the stars were
now shining. But I soon discovered
that he was answering another dog, for
after listening intently I heard in the
distance, far below me, that measured
yap, yap, yap, followed by intervals of
silence, which is so hard to bear when
one wants to sleep, and the watch-
dog's dishonest bark either " bays the
whispering wind," or holds distant
converse with a neighbour. So I got
up, and though my ankle was swollen
and painful, I girded myself and
went my way, guided by the sound.
After stumbling wearily along, and
falling many times, I at last arrived
at what seemed to be a farm-house of
the better sort, through the window of
which I saw with great joy a cheerful
fire blazing.
The dog who had led me thither
was seated on a dunghill outside the
door, and was soon waging fierce
battle with both my dogs, and the
noise which they made, and my cries
whilst striving to part them, soon
roused the inmates. The door was
opened, and a girl's voice was heard
calling, " Taypob, Taypot, ye blaggard,
come in out of that ! " whilst a deeper
voice in the background asked
"Who's there? Come in whoever
ye are, in the name of God."
The girl who was standing at the
door started back on seeing the gun,
but being aware of " the smell-dogs,"
as our American cousins call them,
and noting my sporting gear, she said
in a pleasant voice, " Come in out of
the could, sir, sure it's late ye're out.
Och ! 'Tis desthroyed with the wet ye
are. He's lame too, the crayture,"
she added kindly. '" Is it the way ye
hurted yerself, sir % "
" Put a chair for the gintleman,
Mary. Have ye no manners ? " said
an old man who was crouching on a
settle in the ingle nook. "I can't
stir meself, sir," he added ; " I'm
fairly bate wid the rheumatism. May-
be 'tis the way ye got lost on the
mountain, sir ? I seen the fog comin*
up and 'tisn't the first time I seen
that same to happen to a gintleman
in that very shpot. That mountain is
very vinimous to them that isn't well
acquainted wid it."
So I told him my tale and asked
him if I could stop for the night, for
he let me know that Mr. Bourke's
house was " a matther of seven Irish
mile away," and he replied,
" Why then to be sure ! and wel-
come, only it's a poor place for the
likes of yer honour, but if ye're any
relation of Misther Bourke ye can't
help bein' a rale gintleman, and ye
won't mind it. 'Tis only them half
sirs and the likes that's conthrary in
themselves, and that the divil himself
couldn't plaze ; and Mary, sure his
honour will be hungry, small blame
to him ! We'll have the praties biled
in a brace of shakes, and a rasher of
Irish Shootings.
95
bacon, and a basin of milk; sure that's
betther than the hunger anyways,
though 'tisn't what ye're used to."
Here I may remark that the Irish
peasant is essentially a well-bred
person, and might set an example of
good manners to many who look upon
themselves as his social superiors. An
Irishman, even of the poorest, will
give you the shelter of his roof and
all that his poor house contains with
perfect hospitality, and with a true
welcome, and having once and for all
apologised for the shortcomings of his
menage, will not (as he considers it)
insult your good feeling by further
excuses \ but will take it for granted
that you will accept the best which he
can give you, be it good or bad, in
the same kindly spirit in which he
offers it.
It was not very long before I was
sitting down to a smoking dish of
excellent potatoes, and an appetising
rasher, which Mary deftly cooked,
having learned (as she informed me)
cooking and other accomplishments at
the convent school. Now that I had
time to look at her, I discovered that
she was an uncommonly handsome and
attractive girl, about nineteen years
of age, dark-haired, with large merry
blue eyes, "put in with a dirty
finger" a distinctly Spanish type of
face and figure, such as you meet
now and then in the west and south,
in remarkable contrast to the abori-
ginal type, which it must be con-
fessed, is the reverse of attractive.
It is strange how traces of the old
Spanish connection crop up, and how
the young people sometimes " throw
back " to the southern ancestor. One
also lights upon other links of the
broken chain now and then, in out-of-
the-way places. Thus to my great
surprise I happened on a little boy
not long ago in a southern county
whose Christian name was Alfonso,
though his surname was only Egan.
His parents told me that he was called
after his great-grandfather, but they
had no tradition of any Spanish con-
nection, and of a truth they bore no
outward token of any such strain of
foreign blood.
Mary's father, too, was to all ap>
pearance a Celt. He was a big, black-
bearded man, well past middle age.
He must have been a strong able
man in his day, but he now seemed
bowed down with pain and sickness.
The family consisted, in addition to
these two, of an active, bright-eyed
boy about thirteen years of age, two
younger children, and a stout, red-
legged servant maid.
After I had finished a hearty meal,
seasoned with the best of sauce, I
produced my flask, into which I had
dipped but modestly, and Mary having
brought glasses and the " matarials,"
I proceeded to mix a couple of stiff
tumblers for her father and myself ;
and having persuaded him after due
apology to join me in a pipe, we drew
round the blazing fire of turf and
bog-deal into the cosy ingle nook, and
laid ourselves out for a chat.
The old man seemed delighted to
break the monotony of his life by
conversation with a stranger, and I
interested them all by giving them an
account of the United States, where
I had been travelling a short time
before, and to which many of their
relations and friends had emigrated.
Then we began to talk about the state
of the country, concerning which they
were much more reticent.
" It was purty quiet in these parts,
glory be to God ! " said the old man,
u though I'm tould there's bad work
elsewhere."
He said his own farm was a good
one, with " the grass of fifteen cows,"
for the extent of farms in the wild
west is measured by their grazing
capabilities, not by the acreage. His
rent was fair, and the times he ad-
mitted were pretty good.
"Were there any bad characters
about I" I asked.
" Well, no, not many ; barrin' wan,
and he was on the run (flying from
justice), and a good job too."
" Who was he, and what had he
done'4"
96
Irish Shootings.
"He was wan Murty O'Hea, a
broken farmer, and a bad mimber
everyways, and there was a warrant
out agin him, along of a dacent boy
of the O'Connors that he kilt, and
that swore informations agin him
accordingly."
" Yes, and there's no fear he'd bate
him no, nor two like him only he
got a vacancy on him (got inside his
guard) by chance, and gave him a
conthrary (foul) sthroke, wan dark
night," said Mary.
" Oho ! " said I, " you seem to know
all about it, Mary. It wasn't about
you that they were fighting, was
iU"
At which Mary blushed and hung
her head and showed her long eye-
lashes, and looked quite pretty enough
to have been the cause of one of those
dreadful wars which we are told did
not begin with Helen.
" But was that the only reason he
had for running away ? " I asked.
" Och, no," replied the father. " He
owed five years' rent to the masther,
and his credit was bate wid all the
shopkeepers, and what he owed for
whiskey is unknownst ; and the
masther ejected him a year ago, and
nobody would take the farm for fear
of him and of his faction, that's sthrong
in these parts, till meself tuk the
grazin' of half of it for six months,
for I has more cattle than I can feed ;
but nobody will go to live there."
" Yes, and sorry I am ye ever had
anything to say to it, and 'twould be
betther for ye a dale if ye tuk my
advice and left it alone. 'Tisn't looky,"
said Mary.
" Why thin, maybe ye're right, and
I'm thinkin' I'll be said by ye, Mary,
and give it up next week, for ye has
a dale of sinse sometimes for a
shlip of a girl. Come hether to me.
Whisper," said he ; and after a short
colloquy Mary lighted a candle and
went out.
" I sees ye're sleepy, sir," said the
old man. " Ye had a long day. Is
the fut bad wid ye now, yer honour?"
"Oh, no," said I. "It's a little
swollen, but I can walk all right, at
any rate with my boot off."
"Well, Mary will have the bed
ready in the room for ye prisintly,
and though it's a poor place for the
likes of ye, ye're young, God bless ye,
and ye're tired ; ye'll get a good sleep.
Och hone ! 'tis many's the night since
I had the good sleep, wid me joints,
and a toothache in every knuckle of
them ! "
Here we were interrupted by the
loud barking of the house-dog, to
which my two pointers responded with
growlings. The latch was raised, and
a countryman burst in. He had
neither coat nor hat, and he looked
wild and distraught, his clothes drip-
ping with water as though he had
fallen into some dyke or bog-hole.
"Oh, Paddy," he cried, "ye un-
fortunate crayture ! Run ! Hun for
yer life ! They're comin' to ye to-
night, and if they ketches ye, ye're a
dead man. Didn't I tell ye how
'twould be, when ye was so covatious
and couldn't let that farm alone ? "
Poor Paddy trembled visibly, whilst
Mary, who had joined us, turned very
white, and the children clustered round
us, crying.
" Run is it ! " answered Paddy.
" That's a quare story ! How would
the likes of me run, when I can only
crawl across the flure, about as quick
as a dhrucktheen? (a slug). Run?
Moryah ! (forsooth). 'Tis aisy to
say run, and where would I run to?
Ye knows as well as me that none of
the neighbours would lave me in if
them is comin' that you knows of.
Och ullagone ! If they'll kill me out
of hand 'tis little I cares, only for
Mary and the childher. Well, 'tis the
will of God, I suppose. Glory be to
his name : Amin ! " a response in
which all the others, even the little
children, joined.
"Who's coming?" asked I, "and
what's it all about ? 7>
" Who's this ? " asked the new
comer, in whom I recognised my
friend of the morning. " Och ! 'tis
the gintleman from Misther Bourke's.
Irish Shootings.
97
Come away, yer honour, this is no
place for the likes of you. What did
I tell you this mornin' 1 "
" Yes, but what's the row 1 " said I.
"I don't understand."
" 'Tis the Land Layguers," he replied
in a low voice, and pointing to my
host. " He's broke the rules, and 'tis
the ordher, I'm tould. They'll kill
him to-night. There's no fear of
the childher, they won't touch them.
Do you come away wid me, yer
honour; I'll see ye safe."
Indeed I won't," said I. " They
took me in when I was wet and
hungry, and gave me food and shelter,
and I won't desert them now at a
pinch. Besides, look at my foot. I
couldn't walk if I would, and I
wouldn't if I could. Will you stay
yourself and help to fight ? "
" Is it me ? " he said, turning pale.
" Och, no, I darn't ; and what could
the likes of me do ? "
" Will you go and warn the polis,
then?" asked Mary, who seemed to
be recovering her courage and her
colour.
" No, I'd be afeard," he replied.
''Sure, all the count hry would know
'twas me that sould the pass. Them
polis wouldn't keep it saycret ; there's
no thrusting thim."
" Dinny," cried Mary, turning to
one of the boys, " you go."
" I will," said Dinny, jumping up
and snatching his cap.
" How far is the police station ? " I
asked.
" 'Tis a matther of four Irish mile,
and meself is afeard the polis is sent
away wid false news to the wesht."
" Dinny," said Mary, whilst her
cheeks were dyed with a bright blush,
''call down first to Darby O'Connor's.
Tell him that we're set, and to carry
the car and the mare, and to dhrive
like the divil afther the polis, and to
bring them back wid him."
" Good ! " said I ; " you're a brave
girl, and we're not dead yet ; " and I
tore a leaf out of my note-book and
wrote on it an urgent message.
" Give this to the sergeant, Dinny,"
No. 314. VOL. LIII.
said I, " and tell him, when he comes
within hearing of the house, to fire a
shot, and to let a screech out of him-
self, and we'll hold out as long as
we can."
" How soon will they be here,
James 1 " asked Paddy.
"They won't be here before an
hour, anyways, and maybe not till
the latther ind of the night. They're
comin' from the say. Murty O'Hea
is the head of them, and there's seven
or eight black (surly, determined)
boys wid him, sthrangers from the
islands I'm tould ; but they're waitin'
for some sinther (centre) from the
County Limerick. Well, God help ye
all this night ! Come away, Dinny. I'll
see ye safe as far as Darby's. God
bless yer honour ! Ye' re a brave
gintleman. I said to meself this
mornin' that ye was the right sort."
And they went out and shut the
door.
" Now, Mary," said I, " come
along ; you and the girl. We must
make the house as secure as we can.
We have plenty of time, and we're
not going to be killed like sheep."
First I turned out my game bag, and
found, to my horror, that I had only
seven cartridges left, and three of
them were snipe shot, whilst the re-
mainder were only No. 6. I had
taken fewer than usual with me, not
expecting much sport, and of these I
had wasted too many in wild shooting.
" Never mind," said I ; " the greater
reason for shooting straight now."
First I inspected the fortress. The
dwelling-house consisted, as is usual
in the houses of the peasantry, of
two living-rooms only, separated by
a partition, with the chimney at
one side and a high gable at the
other. The kitchen had two doors
directly facing each other, and was
lighted by a single window in the
front. The bedroom was also lighted
by one window, which looked to the
rear ; and communicating with the
bedroom by a small door, and running
at right angles to the rear of the
dwelling-house, was a third room or
98
Irish Shootings.
store-house, with a second door open-
ing on the back yard. This room was
now half full of potatoes and turnips.
The front door was as strong as I
could desire, being made of solid oak
(the spoil of some wreck), firmly
bolted and bound with iron. The
back door, however, was weak ; both
were fastened by ricketty locks and
good stout wooden bars. I found that
there was good store of suitable
timber for barricading both doors and
windows ; the loft, which extended as
usual from the fire-place to half-way
across the living - room, being alto-
gether floored with "treble deals,"
also from some wreck. These deals
were not nailed, but were laid loose
across the joists, each deal being
about fifteen feet long by eighteen
inches wide, and three inches thick.
I also found some shorter pieces,
which, placed against the door panels,
served as backing ; and having but-
tressed them firmly with rows of
deals secured by wedges to others,
which I laid flat upon the floor from
wall to wall, and fastened with stout
nails, or rather spikes, of which I
found a goodly bag, I felt pretty sure
that my doors could stand a siege,
if the enemy were unprovided with
a battering train. The windows I
secured in a similar fashion with
mattresses, leaving a loop-hole in
each.
I then, with the assistance of the
women and the eldest boy, made the
store-room's outer door safe by piling
up all the turnips and potatoes against
it, thus making a most effectual bar-
ricade. By the time this was done I
found that it was a quarter past
eleven, and the boy had been gone
just three-quarters of an hour. " He
ought to be nearly at the police station
now, Mary," said I.
" He ought so," said she, "if he tuk
the horse. She can go, niver fear, and
Darby won't spare her. Only if the
polis was sent away afther a red
herring, 'twill be a bad job."
" Well, maybe they've found out
their mistake by this time. We can
hold out for an hour at any rate,
unless they burn us."
" I don't think there's much fear of
that," said the father. " The thatch
is ould and rotten, and 'tis soaked wid
the wather for the last week. I'm
goin' to have it renewed wid two
years. 'Tis looky now I didn't ; "
and he evidently hugged himself
upon his foresight, and became a
little more cheerful.
"Now," said I, "put out the fire,
and put the candle behind the
door in the room, so that 'twill just
give us light to move about by, and
no more. By the way, you haven't
got a crow-bar, have you ? "
" Why wouldn't we 1 " said Mary.
"Here it is, and a bill-hook too, a
good sthrong one."
"Oh, it's not to fight with that I
want the crow-bar, but that bill-hook
is a good weapon at a pinch. Put
it behind the door, Mary. Is it
sharp 1 "
" 'Tis, sir. I put a great edge on it
nieself yestherday, in the way I'd cut
down some furze wid it."
"Good," said I; "now bring the
light," and going into the store-room,
after a good deal of labour (for all the
walls were over two feet thick) I
knocked out two loop-holes, whereby
I could command the back door. I
only wished that I had a similar coign
of vantage from which to enfilade the
front ; in which case, if we were fire-
proof, as the old man thought, I might
set the gang at defiance, or at any rate
as long as my cartridges should last.
Unfortunately the relative positions
of the front door and window were
such that any one standing close to the
former could not be touched from the
latter.
I left the maid-servant and the
eldest child, a sharp boy of eleven,
on guard at the loop-holes, and re-
turned to the kitchen. The old man
was crooning over the scattered
embers ; Mary was standing by his
side, pale and quiet. We waited long.
No sound broke the stillness, save
the occasional smothered whine of one
Irish Shootings.
of the dogs who was hunting in his
dreams, and the old man's laboured
breathing, broken sometimes by a
stifled cough. Mary had sunk down
upon the settle, and covered her face
with her hands.
The servant girl stirred uneasily,
and knocked down a heap of potatoes
which rolled along the earthen floor.
The shrill whistle of a red-shank, flying
overhead, startled us for an instant.
I looked through the loop-holed win-
dow ] the sea lay calm and still in
the moonlight, darkened towards the
horizon by a light breeze, which was
creeping in. The light was dim, for
the air was full of vapour, but there
was enough to shoot by.
"Mary," I heard the old man whim-
per, " ye'll bury me, agragal, in Kil-
colman churchyard by the mother, and
ye'll give me a decent funeral ; and
maybe when I'm dead thim that
looked black on me of late will for-
get it and come to me wake. Yer
mother had a great wake, and there
was a power of people at her funeral,
though maybe ye doesn't remember
it ; and me father aiqually so. God
rest their souls this night ! "
"Whisht, father, whisht!" replied
Mary. " The tibbacky isn't sowed
yet that will be smoked at yer
wake."
" It's ten minutes past twelve now,"
said I ; " surely the police at any rate
ought to be showing up."
Just then the dog, which we had
turned out of doors, began to growl.
Then came a few short barks, as he
jumped behind a hedge some thirty
yards to the front, after which he was
suddenly silent, and I heard some one
saying, in a low and insinuating voice,
"Taypot, poor Taypot 1 doesn't you
know me 1" followed by the sound of
a dull stroke and a sharp yelp, which
instantly ceased.
" Tell Judy to keep a sharp look-out,
Mary," said I, "and don't you stop in
front of the door."
" All right, sir," said she.
Then there was an interval of
silence, lasting for at least ten
minutes ; nothing stirred in front,
and the tension of our nerves was
becoming painful.
" What can they be waiting for ? "
said I.
" Maybe the whole of them isn't
come yet," replied Mary.
" Well, the longer they wait the
better. 'Twill give the police more
time to come up. When they come,
Mary, do you answer them ; but don't
speak for some minutes, just as if you
were getting out of bed, and stand
close to the wall."
" They'll thry the back dure first,
sir ; 'tis the wakest."
" So much the better. If they do,
I'll mark one of them, at any rate,
and maybe two. Oh, if I only had a
bullet!"
Just then Judy rushed in. " They're
coming to the back dure, sir ! "
" How many ? " I asked.
" Oh, a power of them. How can
I tell how many ? Isn't their faces
black ] Murty O'Hea is there for wan.
I'd know the voice of him if his head
was off his shoulders."
I lost no time in getting to my loop-
hole in the store-room. The boy was
squatted eager- eyed at the other. They
were eight in all. Four were armed
with guns, the others had only Cle-
alpines (or black-thorn sticks). Brave
fellows, they were not afraid even
with such slight weapons to face a
rheumatic old man ! All their faces
were blackened. As I got into posi-
tion, a powerful, undersized, red-
bearded savage, whom I recognised
by the description given me as Mary's
quondam lover, was in the act of
knocking at the door. He knocked
three times before there was any
answer. All the others remained
drawn up in line, with their backs
to the wall, at the side farthest from
the window.
At last I heard Mary ask, in a
sleepy tone, " Who's there? "
" A friend," was the reply, evidently
in a disguised voice.
" Well, friend, what does ye want
at this hour ? "
H 2
100
Irish Shootings.
" I wants to see the man of the
house. I has a message for him."
11 Well, keep it till the mornin'. I'm
not goin' to open the dure at this hour
of the night, and bad mimbres about
too, as maybe ye knows. To the divil
wid yerself and yer message ! "
But though poor Mary spoke so
bravely, I noted that her voice trem-
bled. Then came a low curse in
Irish.
" Come on, boys," cried the ruffian,
" ye knows what we has to do. There's
no use in waitin'."
Just then the moon shone out from
behind a veil of mist. I levelled my
gun, took a steady and careful aim
at the fellow's eye, and pulled the
trigger ; but, as bad luck would have
it, just at that instant he stooped to
put his eye to the key-hole, and the
shot glanced over him, but caught his
next neighbour (who was a tall man)
in the shoulder. He staggered and
yelled but did not fall ; and as the
whole mob turned to fly, I let drive
at the lot of them, peppering more
than one, as the chorus of yells which
followed the shot bore witness; but
I apparently left their leader un-
touched, and before I could reload, they
had all taken refuge behind a hedge
some distance to the rear.
" Well done, yer honour ! " cried the
little boy in wild delight. " Begor, ye
warmed them anyways. Did ye see
that last fellow scratchin' himself as if
bees was swarmin' about him 1 "
" Go back to your hole, you young
scamp, and don't take your eye off it,
or I'll warm you, where I warmed him.
And you, Judy, come back too."
" Did ye kill him ? " cried Mary,
excitedly. " Oh, if ye only kilt kirn, I
don't care what would happen to us."
" No. Mary, I'm afraid not. Better
luck next time."
" Och ! 'tis a pity," said she.
" They'll try the front door next,"
said I. " We must keep a sharp look-
out." But we waited long. At last
I said to my companion, " I think
they've had enough."
"No fear," she replied. "If that
one is alive they'll be back." But
we waited and waited, and though I
thought I heard a confused murmur,
still no one appeared. At last Judy
came stealing in.
" I'm thinkin'," said she, " there's
wan on the roof."
"Where?" asked I.
"The room."
I stole in gently, and after listening
for a moment, I could distinctly hear
some one above, fumbling as it seemed
with the thatch.
" He's thryin' to set it a-fire," said
Judy. " I think 'twill bate him. Ye
might as well thry to light a wather-
fall wid two matches."
"Well," said I, "'tis a pity to
waste No. 6 at such close quarters," so
I slipped in a cartridge of snipe shot,
and putting the muzzle of the gun
close to the sound, I fired. There was
the noise of a body slipping down the
steep roof, a heavy thud followed by a
deep groan, and all was still.
"That's three cartridges gone, and
two fellows disabled at any rate.
Stand back ! " I cried, as I saw a flash
from the hedge in front, followed by a
volley, which struck the front door,
apparently without penetrating.
"That's good," said Mary, "bark
away ! Maybe ye'll wake the polis
in time."
After this we had another and a
longer respite, but we could hear a
confused murmur of voices, apparently
in altercation, from the direction of
the haggard (hay-yard or hay-guard).
" I think they must have got more
help," said the old man, who had
regained his courage and was now to
all appearances enjoying the fight.
" Keep a good look-out, Judy," I
cried to our sentry.
" Never fear, yer honour. They're
buzzin' like bees behind there."
" I think," said I, " they must have
some one with them who has smelt
powder before, or they would have
had enough by this time."
" Most like," replied Mary. "Tim
Healy, a Yankee Irishman that was
in the war, wid two more sthrangers,
Irish Shootings.
101
was seen at the crass-roads on Sun-
day."
" Here they come," said I. " What
devilment are they up to now 1 "
I might well ask. They had got a
cart and piled it with sheaves of
oats, and lashed bundles of straw to
the axle so as to protect their legs ;
and as the haggard was unfortunately
on a higher level than the house, they
had no difficulty in running this
testudo down the road which led to
the latter.
" Tis the way they're goin' to burn
us ! " cried Mary.
" I don't think so," said I, as I saw
them directing the engine straight
for the window at which I was posted.
"They want to block our loop-hole
and then force the door. Oh, why
didn't I make one in the door ? "
" Ah ! you've got that ! " I added,
as the cart-wheel swerved over a stone,
exposing a fellow's legs, which I
promptly dosed with shot, though at
too long a range to do him much
harm, although I made him yell.
" Ye hit him ! "' cried Mary. " Well
done ! Ye're a fine man at a pinch.
God bless ye ! What would we do
widout ye this night?"
Here the cart came bang against
our only loop-hole. " What will be
their next move now?" I wondered ;
"this is becoming serious ;" and like
Wellington I prayed for morning, or
the police. We were not kept long in
doubt. Judy cried out from behind,
"They're takin' round the laddher,
a lot of them," and at the same time a
voice was heard from behind the front
door.
"Open the dure. Ye'd betther.
If ye forces us to dhrive it in, we'll
kill every wan of ye, man, woman, and
child."
" We will not," cried Mary gallant-
ly. "I know ye, Murty O'Hea,
and I'll live to see ye swing for this
yet."
" Ah ! ye knows me, does ye, Mary 1
So does Darby O'Connor too. I left
me mark on him, and I'll lave it on
you to-night. He may marry ye to-
morrow mornin' if he likes. I'll not
hindher him, never fear."
At this horrid threat poor Mary
fairly broke down. She threw herself
on the ground and flung her arms
round my knees. " Promise me, sir,
promise me, that ye' 11 kill me before
ye lets him touch me. You're a
gintleman and you'll keep yer word."
"Nonsense, Mary," said I. "Never
mind the ruffian. He'll never get in
here while I'm alive."
" He will, he will. Well I knows
him. Promise me quick that yell
keep wan shot for me 1 Oh, man ! "
she cried, as I still hesitated, " had ye
niver a mother ? ' '
"All right, Mary, I promise."
" God bless ye," said she, getting
up. " I don't care now, and maybe I'll
lave me mark on some of them yet ; "
and she seized the bill-hook, and stood
ready behind the door. The bill-hook
was a handy and most efficient weapon,
somewhat like the old Saxon bill, with
a curved steel blade about eighteen
inches long, rivetted to an ashen
handle some three feet in length.
"Begor," said the old man, upon
whose face the light of battle was
stealing, and who now looked quite
cheerful, " I'll have a sthroke for me
life too. We're not bate yet. 'Tis
the heaviest showers that clears away
the quickest," and seizing an old
scythe blade, he hobbled over and
planted himself against the wall.
" Well done, Paddy," said I. "Never
say die."
Here we were interrupted by a
tremendous blow on the front door,
which shivered the lock and shook the
fastenings, but failed to start the
struts or backing with which I had
braced it. They were using the ladder
as a battering ram.
" At it again, boys ! " cried the
voice of the arch-ruffian, and the
blows were repeated once and again
with increased force, but still the
backing stood fast. After a fourth
blow however, a panel gave way be-
tween the props, leaving a hole of
about one foot by ten inches ; but the
102
Irish Shootings.
supports above and below were as
strong as ever. A shot was promptly
fired through this hole which smashed
some crockery on the dresser, but the
assailants, no doubt recollecting that
one shot could go out where another
could come in, drew back for consulta-
tion, and did not care apparently
to renew the attack. After a few
minutes Judy rushed in, " Come quick,
sir," cried she; "they're stalin' round
wid the laddher, while you're watchin'
the front. They knows the back dure
is wake."
I was just in time. They were
coming up with a rush, seven of them,
bearing the ladder, and as soon as I
got them nearly end on I fired, and
evidently peppered more than one,
judging from the chorus of yells which
they set up as they dropped the ladder.
I could have got a beautiful flying
shot at the last man, but I had now
only two cartridges left, and as one of
them was promised to Mary, I desired
to keep the other in reserve. Startled
by a cry from her I rushed back into
the kitchen, and saw her by the dim
light, with her white teeth set, bring-
ing down the bill-hook with the full
swing of her nervous young arms
upon a hand which had stolen in
through the hole and was trying to
undo the bar. The blow was followed
by a fearful howl, and something
dropped upon the floor.
" More power to ye, Mary ! " cried
the old man. " You done it well. Put
in the other hand, ye spalpeen, till
she'll thrim it for ye to match that
wan. Here's the polis at last. 'Tis
a'inost time for thim," as a shot was
heard a long way down the road, fol-
lowed by a faint shout, and in about
five minutes the rattling of car-wheels
was heard up the stony ascent, whilst
outside the house we could hear the
rapid flight of hurrying feet as our
assailants at last withdrew.
In a few minutes the police were at
the door, led by a stalwart young
peasant, who, as soon as we undid the
fastenings, rushed in and threw his
arms around Mary. " Ye're not hurt,
acushla?" said he. "The Lord be
praised ! I niver thought I'd see
ye alive agin."
"Small thanks to you," said she,
pushing him away. " Ye may thank
this gintleman here that stood to us.
I suppose 'tis the way ye was polishin'
yer boots or ilin' yer hair, beforye'd
come to help us."
" No," replied he, " but the polis
was sint away wandherin' as far as
Ballinhassig Bridge, a matther of six
mile, and we tuk the wrong road.
We'd never be here only for the mare.
She's kilt outside, the crayture. She
haven't a shake left in any hair of
her tail : if she went on another
mile she'd dhrop before she got half
way."
" 'Tis true for him, sir," said the
sergeant. "We went on what we
thought was sure information, and we
wouldn't have come back only for
your note. But we mustn't waste
time. Which way did they go ? "
" They came from the say," said
Mary.
" Oh, thin they've gone back the
same way. I saw a hooker standing
in before dusk. Who warned you, sir?"
"Don't tell," whispered Mary
eagerly. " The people would kill
him."
" I don't know," said I. " He was
a stranger to me."
"It's no use askin' any of ye, I sup-
pose," said the sergeant, looking round
at the stolid faces of his hearers.
" Come on, boys, we're only wasting
time. Will you come with us, sir ? "
"No, I can't," said I. "I've hurt
my foot."
"I'll come wid ye," said Darby.
" I'd like to have a sthroke at the
villain. What's this ? " added he, pick-
ing up three bloody fingers and a
portion of a hand off the floor.
"That's Mary's work," said I.
" Only a gentleman's hand which he
offered her and which she accepted-"
" 'Tis Murty O'Hea's finger," said
Darby, dancing with delight. " I'd
know that crook in it if it was biled,
and the red hair."
Irish Shootings.
103
" Aye, he left the mark of it on ye
more than once," said Mary, spite-
fully.
"Oh, Mary, ye' re a grand girl!
There isn't the likes of ye undher the
canopy. Ye gave him a resate for me,
anyways."
"Come along, men," said the ser-
geant, "we have no tiine to lose.
They have the start of us. Hallo!
Here's a pool of blood, where some-
body fell. Did ye warm many of
them, sir ? "
"About half a dozen, I think,"
said I ; " but I had only small shot."
" This fellow got a good dose at any
rate. We're bound to ketch him,"
So away they went, but came back
about day-break tired and crest-fallen.
Whilst they were searching the bay
in front, the gang escaped over the
shoulder of the hill to another creek
half a mile to the southward ; and the
police were only in time to see the
hooker rounding the further point and
running fast before a north-easterly
breeze which had sprung up towards
morning. The gang was apparently
strong-handed, for they took away
their wounded with them.
About three weeks after the night
of the siege I was packing up my
traps on the eve of my departure from
Ireland, when a servant came in and
told me that a person wanted to see
me.
"Who is it?" Tasked.
" Oh, she didn't tell me her name,
but sure, what matter? She's the
purtiest girl ever ye see. She's purty
enough to frighten ye."
I went down stairs, and in the hall
I found my friend Mary, blushing
like a rose in June.
"I hear tell that ye were goin'
away to-morrow, sir," she said, " and
I was in a terrible fright I wouldn't
have thim done in time, but I finished
them to-day, glory be to God ! "
"Finished what, Mary? If you
only did it as well as the last piece of
work you had a hand in you made a
good job of it, whatever it is."
" Och, no," said she smiling, " 'tis
the fut this time ] " and she pulled out
from under her cloak six pairs of
beautiful black lamb's-wool stockings
which she had made for me.
" Oh, thank you, Mary," said I.
"It was really very kind of you to
take so much trouble for me. I shall
value them very much, and you may
be sure that I'll never put them on
without thinking of you."
"Throuble?" said she. "What's
throuble? Where would I be to-day,
only for you that night? I hear
you're goin' a long journey, and I'll
think of you when the nights is dark
and the says is high. And oh, I pray
to God Almighty," she added, falling
on her knees, "that he'll carry ye
safe, wheriver ye goes ; and that the
holy Jasus may put his shoulder to ye
when ye are in danger, as ye did to
us that night ; and that he may open
a gap for ye, and shlip ye inside the
walls of heaven someways, when ye
die. Amin."
"Thank you very much, Mary,"
said I. " I hope to hear good news of
you and Darby, and if ever I come
back you may be sure I won't be long
in paying you a visit. Did you ever
hear what became of that scoundrel
Murty?"
" Yes, yer honour," said she lower-
ing her voice. " I hear that he died
of the lock-jaw a week aft her, but
sure I couldn't help it, and the priest
himself said I sarved him right.
Ye kilt that other one dead yerself ;
and I hear another of 'em is run away
to America ; and a dale of 'em has the
small-pox wid the small shot that ye
scatthered about 'em. Divil mend
'em ! Well, good-bye to yer honour,"
holding out her hand whilst her bright
eyes were dimmed with tears, " be
sure we'll remimber ye and pray for
ye always."
104
A TRANSLATOR OF SHAKESPEARE.
MORE than half a century has passed
away since Carlyle first reflected in
England Goethe's vision of a world-
literature a literature not of this or
that people, nation, and language, but
of all peoples, nations, and languages ;
and on this, as on many other occa-
sions, took the opportunity to com-
mend the work of German over Eng-
lish translators. There can be no
doubt but that the idea took far
stronger hold of German than of Eng-
lish men of letters, and that the Ger-
mans have far outstripped us in the
advance to its fulfilment. It is ac-
knowledged that the German love for
Shakespeare falls little short of our
own. while Dickens and Scott are
familiar names in German households,
and Moliere, Gozzi, and Goldoni, no
less than Shakespeare, find constant
welcome on the German stage. In
England, however, the case is very
different. It may of course be urged
that if Germany can show such names
as Goethe, Schiller, Schlegel, and Tieck
among the ranks of her translators, we
too can adduce Dryden, Pope, Cowper,
Shelley, and Coleridge ; and some may
feel disposed, at the mention of Pope's
name, to ask whether no less a person
than Swift did not write and congratu-
late Pope, at the conclusion of his ver-
sion of Homer, on having done with
translations, and secured his freedom
from the necessity of misemploying
his genius, under which a " rascally
world " had laid him. To this it can
but be answered that Swift, himself
the prime instigator of the rascally
world to the exactions which he repro-
bates, did so write ; and it must also
be admitted that translations of Homer
continue almost annually to be pro-
duced, and that the Odes of Horace
and Goethe's ' Faust ' are almost equal
favourites with English translators. But
conceding this much, and also the fact
that English versions of many foreign
works, from the ' Agamemnon ' of JE>s-
chylus to the latest novel of M. Zola,
appear and disappear in the course of
each year, it still seems that perma-
nently valuable reproductions of the
masterpieces of foreign literature are
remarkably scarce. Englishmen of
ordinary education can generally
name three or four translations of
Homer, but not one of Moliere.
The reasons for this difference be-
tween ourselves and the Germans are
for others to show. Many English-
men will doubtless plead that the
existence of a national theatre gives
a stimulus to German translators,
which in England is unknown ; many
more will be led by insular prejudice
to affirm that the Germans have more
to gain than ourselves from foreign
literature. But it is not proposed to
discuss such questions here. It is,
however, possible that a short account
of the life of a German translator may
not be without interest as throwing
some light on the process whereby
Germany contrives to make the
world's literature her own. The
name of this man is, we believe,
quite unknown in England ; and per-
haps even in Germany, for reasons
that will presently appear, hardly
honoured according to his deserts.
None the less, however, did he find
at the hands of one whose name has
reached England, Herr Gustav Frey-
tag, 1 a brief but affectionate biogra-
phy, from which the story here told has
been, by permission, derived.
Wolf, Count Baudissin, then, was
born on the 30th of January, 1789.
1 Im Neuen Reich,' 8th and 15th January,
1880.
A Translator of Shakespeare.
105
He came of one of the many families
which had fought their way to distinc-
tion in the Thirty Years' War ; the
founder thereof having served in the
Swedish, Danish and Saxon armies,
and received as reward the estate of
Rantzau, close to Kiel in Holstein.
The grandfather of Count Wolf also
was a major in the Saxon army, but
being compelled, through no fault of
his own, to quit that service for the
Danish, abandoned the profession of
war for diplomacy, and became Danish
ambassador at the Court of Berlin,
finally dying as governor of Copen-
hagen in 1815.
Wolf's father likewise entered the
Danish diplomatic service, and being
from this cause continually absent
from home, his children, four sons
and a daughter, of whom Wolf was
the eldest, were left almost entirely
to the care of their mother. Wolf
was a lively, affectionate boy, with,
from the first, an insatiable thirst
for knowledge ; indeed, when but six
years old he wrote a piteous letter to
his father, begging him to come home
soon, as his mother knew so " dread-
fully little." For all this, however,
the boy was neither forward nor super-
ficial ; he was naturally shy, and this
shyness was increased to a painful de-
gree by physical weakness and defect-
ive eyesight. Hence, driven in some
measure to isolation, he found his
dearest companions in his books, and
his unwearied industry enabled him
to turn that isolation to good account.
Further, his mother, even if she knew
11 dreadfully little," took care that her
deficiencies should be supplemented by
others ; an enthusiastic scholar had
charge of Wolf's classical education,
and inspired him with a love of Greek
and Latin which never perished. Then
again, though German systems were
followed and German sympathies care-
fully fostered in the training of the
children, yet, according to the fashion
of the time, French was the language
alike of conversation and correspond-
ence in the family circle a fashion
which, as will be seen, was many
years later not without advantage
even to Germany.
Up to the year 1802 the family
spent its life between Kantzau and
Copenhagen, the former being the
summer, the latter the winter resi-
dence. For Copenhagen was now
substituted the embassy at Berlin a
change of the highest importance to
Wolf. True, Berlin had as yet no
university, but A. W. Schlegel was
delivering his lectures on literature ;
Inland had charge of the theatres,
and the plays represented were those
of Goethe and Schiller; further, in
1803, Fichte began his philosophical
lectures, which, as well as those of
Schlegel, Wolf constantly attended.
He now devoted himself to the study
of English, and completed, at the age
of fifteen, a translation of ' King Lear,'
which was read and approved by
Schlegel himself, and even used by
Both in his new version of the same
play, wherein Wolf's share of the work
was not the least successful. Mean-
while he was working, to his father's
great satisfaction, at the office of the
embassy, copying and even drafting
despatches ; and for his reward was
taken by him from time to time among
the great men then assembled at
Berlin Fichte, Schlegel, and even
Schiller. Here also he made the ac-
quaintance of Zelter, of no small value
and delight to Wolf, who was passion-
ately fond of music.
In 1805 Wolf went with his classi-
cal tutor to the University of Kiel,
there to study jurisprudence prepara-
tory to a diplomatic career; and in 1806
left Kiel for the University of Gottin-
gen. The journey was a remarkable
one. On the road the travellers first
met the news of Jena, soon confirmed
by the appearance of a herd of fugi-
tives from the field, unarmed and de-
moralised. To the fugitives succeeded
quickly a regiment of French cuiras-
siers, and the carriage was stopped till
the column had passed. Still the tra-
vellers pushed on ; the sympathies of
the Baudissins were with Prussia, but
Wolf cared little yet for politics, and
106
A Translator of Shakespeare.
his only fear was lest the course of
study at Gottingen should be inter-
rupted by the invasion. This fear, how-
ever, was not realised, for Gottingen
had a champion in Christian Gotlob
Heyne, who, by skilful management and
good fortune, contrived not only to save
the University and the surrounding
district, but even to reap active benefit
for it from the war. So Gottingen
shook her head gravely at the tumult
without, and took no further notice.
The lectures went on as usual ; the
students made long excursions on foot
as usual ; Wolf Baudissin worked with
book and pen, if possible, harder than
usual. Why not 1 Are not dons dons
all the world over ? and is not an uni-
versity, be it Gottingen or Oxford, the
very centre and omphalos of the uni-
verse ?
" Si fractus illabatur orbis
Impavidam ferient ruinse."
But very soon, Gottingen' s placidity
notwithstanding, Wolf Baudissin be-
came uncomfortable and restless.
What business had he studying
quietly there with Europe seething
round him, and what profit was he
to his country or to any one ? The
thought preyed upon him, and he had
at one time serious thoughts of enlist-
ing as a private in a hussar regiment.
The news of the bombardment of
Copenhagen in 1807 rallied these
scattered notions of discontent, and
concentrated them into ardent pa-
triotism and intense hatred of Eng-
land. He found vent for his restless-
ness in political excitement ; concerned
as yet only for the plight of his native
Denmark, and feeling only as a Dane ;
but soon to feel as, in the widest sense,
a German.
In 1808 he went to the University
of Heidelberg for the summer, and re-
turned, after a tour in Switzerland, to
Gottingen, in the autumn of the same
year. His attention was now given
mainly to the study of jurisprudence,
but he found time for his beloved
music, and for a thorough mastery of
Spanish, the fruit whereof was a trans-
lation of Don Quixote, made solely for
his own improvement. In the spring
of 1809 he paid a visit to Jena, where
he had the good fortune to become
personally acquainted with Goethe.
The latter appears to have treated
Baudissin very kindly, and to have
inspired him with an admiration
even more than Teutonic. One re-
mark Goethe made in speaking of
the German nation, which his young
visitor had good cause to remember
many years later. " We have a noble
pile of fuel," said he, " but we want a
good grate to hold it all together."
Eor sixty-two long years was this
" grate " making, till its completion
was proclaimed from the palace at
Versailles.
In the autumn of 1809 Baudissin
finally left Gottingen and entered the
Danish diplomatic service. He was
able to begin his new career among
friends and relations ; all the
higher posts, both of the court and
of the government, being then in
the hands of the Schleswig-Holstein
nobility. Indeed, it was something
quite out of the common that the
ministry of foreign affairs should be,
as it was just at this time, in the
hands of a Dane Rosenkrantz. Bau-
dissin was nominated secretary of
legation at Stockholm, where a Count
Dernath, his uncle, was ambassador,
and arrived in that city in January,
1810. Those were troublous times for
Sweden. Little more than a year had
passed since Finland had been ceded
to Russia; less than a year since a
bloodless revolution had deposed King
Gustavus and placed King Christian the
Thirteenth on the throne ; and now,
only a few months after Baudissin' s
arrival, the Duke of Augustenburg,
appointed heir to the childless King
Christian, was seized with apoplexy
while reviewing his regiment, and died
in a few hours. Report spread among
the people ^that their favourite had
been poisoned ; and Baudissin was one
of those who saw a leading minister
of state, suspected, as one of the
obnoxious party of the nobles, to be
the murderer, dragged from his coach
A Translator of Shakespeare.
107
in the funeral procession, and torn to
pieces by the mob. Intrigue after
intrigue followed the death of the
heir. The right of electing a new one
was vested in the States of Sweden,
but with France and Russia both
deeply interested in the matter, it was
clear that the Swedes would have little
chance of exercising a free choice.
The majority of the people favoured
the election of the deceased prince's
brother ; the Danish ambassador
worked with might and main to
bring the crown of Sweden to Den-
mark ; but a subtle French agent was
also busy with misrepresentation and
other tools of his trade. In a word,
Marshal Bernadotte was elected ; the
French took the oyster, Swede and
Dane took each a shell, and the Prince
of Ponte Corvo became crown prince
and practically regent.
Meanwhile, poor Baudissin was not
happy. The frivolous society of Stock-
holm suited him but ill, his uncle's
methods of proceeding little better ;
he was lonely and miserable, and but
for his beloved books would soon have
resigned his appointment. In time, in-
deed, he found congenial friends ; but
also, which was not so welcome, great
luse for anxiety in the political pro-
jects of his government and the
personal status of his uncle. This
itter was not ill disposed to his
3phew, and a man of more than
iverage ability ; but gifted with a fatal
>ve of intrigue, and a still more fatal
ibit of undervaluing realities, and
learing and seeing those things only
which tended to the furtherance of his
own projects. He still schemed, notwith-
standing Bernadotte's election, to win
Sweden for Denmark, basing all his
hopes of success on Napoleon, and feel-
ing confident of the support of his own
)vernment. The result was an elo-
luent warning to young Baudissin
tinst excessive diplomatic subtlety.
sy the autumn of 1811, Count Der-
ith's longer stay at Stockholm
ime impossible, and Baudissin was
nominated charge d'affaires in his place,
remaining, as such, the diplomatic
representative of Denmark at Stock-
holm, until March, 1813. His position
was not an easy one. On the one
hand his own government, still in
possession of Norway and the Duchies,
had not relinquished the hope of
becoming the great Scandinavian
power, and, encouraged by Count
Dernath, was strongly inclined to trust
to Napoleon's invincibility. On the
other, Sweden, equally with Russia
and England, earnestly sought the
alliance of Denmark, Bernadotte's
ambition being the leadership of a
Swedo-Danish army ; while Russia
went so far as to offer a bribe of
German territory as Denmark's share
in the spoil. It so happened also
that Stockholm became the channel
through which the powers of the Great
Eastern Alliance sought the adher-
ence of Denmark. The Russian am-
bassador chose to make his offers
to Baudissin rather than through his
emissary at Copenhagen ; and Berna-
dotte said plainly that he distrusted
his own agent at Copenhagen, and pre-
ferred to treat with the Danish
government through the young charge
d'affaires at Stockholm. Thus, from
the autumn of 1812, Swede and
Russian bid against each other to gain
the Danish Alliance ; every offer being
made in strictest confidence to Baudis-
sin. A curious position this for a
diplomat of but two years' standing
and no more than twenty-three years
of age, rendered perhaps more easy by
the fact that in the main he agreed
with those who were pressing him
most closely. Already becoming more
German than Danish he shrank from
the project of Danish opposition to a
real German rising, and, in direct con-
tradiction to his uncle, expressed to his
government his firm conviction that
Denmark's real salvation lay in alli-
ance with the powers of the East. It
was possibly from a knowledge of his
opinions that the Swedish and Russian
agents alike determined to address
themselves mainly to him ; possibly also
from a hope that one so young and in-
experienced would be more easily man-
108
A Translator of Shakespeare.
ageable. In this last hope, at any rate,
they were deceived, for Baudissin, young
as he was, possessed all the best quali-
ties of a diplomatist. To unswerving
probity he joined a simple straight-
forwardness which won him a confi-
dence denied to more tortuous spirits ;
while a silent attention, innate percep-
tion of character, and an extraordinary
memory enabled him to appraise that
confidence at its true value. And it
is sufficiently evident that his worth
was duly appreciated even by those
who held views diametrically opposed
to his own; for the Danish government,
heedless though it was of his recom-
mendations, did not fail to compliment
him on the manner in which he
performed his duties. It was this
infatuation at Copenhagen, however,
which made his position so difficult
and so anxious ; and it was a day of
relief and rejoicing to him when the
news of the retreat from Moscow
reached Stockholm. Moreover, as if
to complete his satisfaction, there
arrived about this time August Wil-
helm Schlegel and Madame de Stael,
both of whom admitted him to inti-
macy. Of the latter, indeed, he wrote
home with hardly less enthusiasm
than he had written of Goethe.
But this was not to last long. In
March, 1813, the Danish ministry
decided finally to rest the. destiny of
Denmark on Napoleon ; and Baudissin
at once destroyed the archives of the
embassy and returned to Copenhagen.
Here he was well received by his
employers ; the foreign minister com-
mended him highly, and the king him-
self, after admitting that every one
had the right to his own opinions,
expressed great satisfaction with his
despatches. This done, Baudissin re-
tired to his relations in the country,
not knowing how soon the correctness
of his judgment was to be vindicated.
No later than in May of the same
year he received suddenly a secret
message from the foreign minister to
repair at once to Copenhagen. Arriv-
ing wearied by a long journey at
express speed, he learnt from Rosen-
krantz that he was to start at once
with Minister Kaas on an extra-
ordinary mission to Dresden, there to
conclude an alliance with the Emperor
Napoleon. This order came upon him
like a thunderclap. In vain he
adduced every argument against his
employment in the matter, and earn-
estly begged that the duty might be
intrusted to another. The minister
answered that it was the king's order ;
the matter was already settled, and
the appointment made by his majesty
for particular reasons. In despair
Baudissin sought the king himself,
and said straight out that his convic-
tions unfitted him for so important a
mission. The king's reply was short :
" You must go, sir, and I wish you a
pleasant journey." Not yet convinced,
Baudissin turned to his father, who, as
he knew, shared his own opinion as to
the policy that should be pursued.
But the old diplomatist had been
trained in a school of strict discipline :
" You have made your protest and
can do no more. You must go."
So in another hour he started,
crushed and tortured by the feeling
that he was little else than a traitor
to his country. A dull silent journey
must that have been to Minister Kaas,
with his young colleague fretting his
heart out by his side at every stage
more rebellious against the duty
thrust upon him, and more conscious
that such rebellion, after yielding so
far, had forfeited all claim to be
deemed honourable. Nevertheless,
the determination that go to Dresden
he would not grew stronger on him, so
strong at last that even stratagem
seemed justifiable to give it effect,
and insincerity a virtue when
used to uphold a righteous cause.
Arrived at Holstein, Baudissin ob-
tained leave to go for one night to
the house of his friend, Count Fritz
Keventlow, promising to rejoin his
chief the next morning. Count Fritz
received him with open arms, and
full compassion for his misery; and
thus encouraged, Baudissin finally
made up his mind to let Minister
A Translator of Shakespeart
109
Kaas perform his mission alone. But
how was it to be done? for the
Reventlows must not be implicated.
All night long he pondered, and early
in the morning sought a young doctor,
one Franz Hegewisch, who, like him-
self, was on a visit to the Heventlows.
" "Would Herr Doctor," he asked, " be
good enough to lay my arm on a
couple of chairs and break it
with a hammer 1 " Herr Doctor
was, both politically and profession-
ally, an enthusiast; he would break
Herr Graf's arm for him in so good
a cause with the greatest pleasure.
"But stay," added the doctor, "before
breaking an arm in a friend's house,
should we not first ask his permis-
sion?" Certainly we should; so first
to Count Fritz and then to busi-
ness. But Count Fritz had very
different advice for his friend. " Re-
sign your appointment on this mis-
sion by all means, but do an honour-
able duty like an honourable man, not
like a refractory conscript. Your
duty is to write from here to
the king that you cannot obey his
orders against your own convictions ;
that therefore you repeat once more in
writing the request you made by word
of mouth, and are ready to take the
consequences. Await the result here,
and do not be afraid of getting me
into trouble, for I shall be proud to
suffer in such a cause." Such brave
honest words fell gratefully on Baudis-
sin's ears. He wrote forthwith to
Minister Kaas and the king, and,
with arm unbroken and mind un-
burdened, cheerfully awaited the
answer. In due time it came, offering
a choice of two alternatives : one
year's confinement in the fortress of
Friedrichsort as second class state
prisoner, or a judicial inquiry into the
matter. A confidential note from
Rosenkrantz recommended the first,
and the first was accordingly chosen.
So now to Friedrichsort, having first
obtained privilege of books, a piano,
and two hours' daily exercise under
custody of a sentry on the ramparts.
So Baudissin passed the summer of
the great year, his imprisonment
lightened by work at a translation of
Dante, by his beloved music, and by
occasional visits not only of relations
but even of sympathisers from among
the people. Not for a moment was
he shaken in the opinion for which
he suffered, and he determined that,
unless things at Copenhagen were
altered at the expiration of his
year of imprisonment, he would sever
himself from Denmark and enter
the German army. His whole
heart was with the German rising,
and conflict against Napoleon with
sword or pen he held to be a
sacred duty. He now stood on high
ground ; he had, it is true, sunk
almost to the ridiculous, but he had
risen again to the sublime : the oppo-
sition of king, official, chief, and father
had almost made him a malingerer ;
the sympathy (in its most literal sense)
of a friend raised him from that to a
prisoner for conscience' sake.
By October, 1813, however, Copen-
hagen did change its opinions. Ten
days after the battle of Leipsic arrived
most opportunely the birthday of the
queen, under cover of which redress
of injustice was made to seein a favour,
and Baudissin was set at liberty.
Being pressed by his father he re-
entered the diplomatic service, and
was appointed secretary of legation
at the head-quarters of the allies,
with whom he entered Paris. Thence
he went with his chief, Count Christian
Bernsdorff, to the Congress of Vienna ;
but even the excitement of operations
in the field, and the preparations for
the Congress could not reconcile his
dislike for the Danish service. His
former misdeeds were apparently not
forgotten in Copenhagen, and he
longed not unnaturally for quiet life
at home. He left the service for the
second and last time, now completely
in disgrace with Danish royalty.
In the autumn of 1814 he married
his cousin, Countess Julia Bernsdorff,
and shortly after he had brought his
wife home his father died, leaving
him the property of Rantzau. But
no
A Translator of Shakespeare.
even in retirement his quarrel with
the court was destined to be embit-
tered, for now came the first rising of
German opposition to Denmark. Poli-
tical feeling was strong among the
landed proprietors of Schleswig Hoi-
stein, and Baudissin took a leading
part in their protests against the
invasion of the laws of the Duchies,
and the illegal exactions imposed by
Denmark. But the time was not yet
ripe: Danish reaction came, and the
movement was suppressed and died
away. So Baudissin, who had given
up much of his time to political
meetings and contributions to a new
journal started by his party, now re-
turned to his favourite work. He
took Shakespeare in hand and trans-
lated < Henry the Eighth/ the last of
the historical plays that had been left
untranslated by Schlegel. This, his
first book, appeared in 1818.
About this time he carried out a
project which had been a favourite
with him, as with most Germans,
since his university days, namely, a
visit to Italy. His immediate object
was the restoration of his wife's
health, but other circumstances pro-
longed his stay beyond the time
that he had intended. With his
love for all that was beautiful in
nature and art he could not be
otherwise than happy there ; and
especially in Rome where a circle of
distinguished men, Thorwaldsen among
them, gladly received him. But the
resentment of the court at Copen-
hagen was still alive, and in 1821 he
received an anonymous warning that
he had better not return home for
the present. Certain letters, which
he had written in the course of a
friendly correspondence from Stock-
holm, had been seized, and for
some reason, probably on account of
their German proclivities, had given
offence in high quarters. Again, two
years later, on his leaving Rome, he
received a letter from Rosenkrantz,
whom he had sounded on the subject,
that he had still better keep out of
the way; the seized letters, though
free, as Baudissin knew, from indis-
cretion, were not yet forgotten. Nor
was it until ten years later, on the ac-
cession of King Christian the Eighth,
that his reconciliation with the court
was effected. He was then invited to
Copenhagen and asked to re-enter the
Danish service indeed, there was
some talk of making him director of
the museums ; but it was then too
late, for he had already fixed his home
elsewhere.
Finding on his departure from Italy
that, though not hindered from paying
a short visit to Rantzau, permanent re-
sidence in Denmark was denied to him,
he finally, after some wandering, de-
cided to migrate to Dresden, whither
he accordingly went with his wife in
1827. The old connection of his
family with the Saxon service no
doubt influenced his choice, and he
had the satisfaction of finding that
the royal family, true to its here-
ditary principles, was not unmindful
of services rendered to its house in
former generations. Nevertheless, it
was no part of his plan to seek office
anew, and he never appeared, except
on formal occasions, at court, though
in later years honoured by the friend-
ship of two of the kings of Saxony.
Ear more important to himself, and
not to himself only, was the friendship
he contracted with the poet, Ludwig
Tieck, which was destined to turn his
talents to the task best suited for
them to the task of translation.
Tieck was at this time burdened
with the weight of an unfulfilled
obligation. August Wilhelm Schlegel
had, between the years 1797 and 1801,
translated sixteen of Shakespeare's
plays, including the historical plays
(with the exception of t. ' Richard the
Third ' and Henry the Eighth),'
' Romeo and Juliet,' ' Midsummer
Night's Dream,' ' Julius Caesar/
< Twelfth Night/ ' The Tempest/ < The
Merchant of Venice/ ' Hamlet/ and
' As You Like It.' To these he added
'Richard the Third ' in 1810, and then
declined to proceed with the work any
further. The publishers had accordingly
A Translator of Shakespeare.
Ill
to turn to Tieck, who had frequently
been consulted by Schlegel, and was
otherwise best qualified for the duty.
But on taking over the task in 1824,
Tieck was no longer in a position
to carry out his engagement ; not
one single play did he translate ; and
his daughter, Dorothea, a woman of
remarkable character, prepared, by
earnest study of English, to help him
through it. During the years 1825
and 1826, the plays translated by
Schlegel were duly published, with
occasional corrections by Tieck ; but
throughout the four succeeding years
no further volume appeared, for the
very sufficient reason that Tieck fur-
nished no manuscript. So matters
stood when Baudissin arrived in
Dresden ; and the advantage of willing
help from one who had already proved
his capacity by a translation of ' Henry
the Eighth ' was too great to be over-
looked. Accordingly, in the summer
of 1829, Baudissin took the work
upon himself. First giving his atten-
tion to revising his former version of
' Henry the Eighth,' he was able, in
1830, to incorporate it with the last
plays translated by Schlegel, and fur-
nish another long-delayed volume.
Then throwing all his strength into
the work he succeeded in less than
three years in completing the transla-
tion of twelve more plays : * The
Comedy of Errors,' 'Troilus and Cres-
sida,' ' The Merry Wives of Windsor,'
' Othello,' King Lear,' ' Taming of the
Shrew,' ' Much Ado About Nothing,'
' Love's Labours Lost,' * Titus An-
dronicus,' 'Antony and Cleopatra,'
' Measure for Measure,' and ' All's
Well that Ends Well ' ; whereof the
first five were finished in the course
of the single year 1831. Dorothea
worked with him industriously, and
to her are ascribed the remaining
six plays : ' Two Gentlemen of Yerona,'
' Coriolanus,' Winter's Tale,' ' Timon,'
' Cymbeline,' and ' Macbeth.' How, far
she was aided by the others is a
doubtful question, which nothing but
an examination of her manuscript
can solve. There are in Baudissin' s
manuscript some different renderings
of passages translated by her, and
some pages where the lines are
marked alternately with D and /, as
though the two had amused them-
selves by such alternate work. One
thing, however, is certain that Doro-
thea relied in the course of her trans-
lation more on her fellow-labourer
than on her father. She, like Bau-
dissin, worked with extraordinary
diligence, and zeal in the common
cause knit a strong bond of friendship
between them. Nevertheless, while
honouring her energy and undoubted
talent, Baudissin was sometimes not
wholly satisfied either with the lan-
guage or the rhythm of her transla-
tions.
So the great work was finally ac-
complished and published in a com-
plete form, whereof Tieck, after a
few words of thanks to his coad-
jutors, announced himself to be sole
editor and finisher. The claim to
this honour, so casually made, was
never questioned by Baudissin, but
has, nevertheless, not been allowed
latterly to pass unchallenged. The
copies made for the press were
taken from Baudissin' s manuscript,
which include a mass of corrections
in his hand. Further, it appears from
his diary that he first finished his own
translation, and then read it aloud to
Tieck, who added notes to certain in-
dividual lines which, when intended to
clear up the sense of obscure passages,
were not always looked upon by the
translator as improvements. Tieck' s
share in the business therefore, as
Herr Freytag points out, can hardly
be accounted more important than
that of any literary friend to whose
judgment such work might be sub-
mitted; and it would seem that the
notes supplied by him were inserted
mainly as proofs of his own industry.
The same method of proceeding was
adopted when a revision became neces-
sary in 1839 : Tieck gave an hour
every day to the task, but Baudissin
had prepared everything beforehand,
and it was he who had the alterations
112
A Translator of Shakespeare.
and improvements ready for Tieck's
" yea " or " nay."
Nevertheless, Baudissin left all
honour and fame arising from this
great undertaking to Tieck, and made
over his share of the profits to Doro-
thea. Tieck, observes Herr Freytag,
was an amiable man, but not over scru-
pulous in literary matters, and his
casual appropriation of another's labour
was thoroughly characteristic. But
Tieck's obligations to Baudissin were
not ended yet. Over and above the
plays usually ascribed to Shakespeare,
he held that some ten more were
from his hand. Of these he had al-
ready translated, and published in his
' Altenglisches Theater,' the following
six : the older ' King John,' 'The Pinner
of Wakefield,' the older ' King Lear,'
' Pericles ' (now generally included),
* Locrine,' and ' The Merry Devil of
Edmonton.' He now left the transla-
tion of the remaining four, namely,
'Ed ward the Third,' 'Oldcastle,' 'Crom-
well,' and 'The London Prodigal,' to
Baudissin ; and in 1836 they appeared
in a separate volume under the title
'Four Plays of Shakespeare, trans-
lated by Ludwig Tieck.'
In later years Baudissin suffered
not a little from new translators and
cribics. Schlegel's literary fame for-
bade any depreciation of his share of
the work, but it became the fashion to
criticise Baudissin' s pretty severely.
No doubt both translations were sus-
ceptible of improvement, the more so as
in the course of years a closer study of
Shakespeare by experts, both English
and German, has cleared away many
of the difficulties which beset the earlier
translators. But Baudissin laboured
under exceptional difficulties. He
worked against time to save the
honour of Tieck, whose engagements
he had undertaken to make good.
Hence not only was the labour ex-
cessive, but the translations were
swept into the press as fast as they
were completed. Nevertheless, ob-
serves Herr Freytag, if Schlegel shows
in certain respects greater command of
language and vigour of expression,
his rival need not shrink from com-
parison with him in the happy re-
production of humour and epigram.
Moreover, Baudissin frequently heard,
with a quiet smile, laudatory com-
ments on passages ascribed to others,
but in reality his own work. Yet
another trial awaited him concern-
ing this translation. In 1867 a
new and complete revision of the
old version was made, and exe-
cuted, it would seem, like our own
revised version of the New Testament,
in a somewhat narrow and pedantic
spirit. Once again Baudissin' s name
as the coadjutor of Tieck was omitted,
and some young translators had the
hardihood calmly to publish his text,
with alterations that were not always
improvements, as their own. This
Baudissin bore, as usual, in silence.
Schlegel had protested against Tieck's
alterations in his text, and insisted on
the restoration of the original; but
Baudissin, though he knew that this
translation was the pride of his life,
was content to leave the credit thereof,
as from the first, to others ; yet, while
rejoicing in any real improvements, he
could not but regret variations which
altered without amending his own text.
Tieck at least had the excuse that his
friend from the first connived at the
misappropriation of his labour; but
others can plead no such defence.
It may be asked whether Baudissin's
behaviour to Tieck was not generous
to a fault. To this Herr Freytag is
able to reply, that Baudissin actually
felt himself greatly beholden to the
man who thus, without acknowledg-
ment, used his talents for his own
advantage. It must be remembered
that being no longer in the diplomatic
service, and forbidden moreover by
royal displeasure to attend to his duties
as a landowner,he had now no employ-
ment for his indefatigable industry.
We have seen how, even at Gottingen,
the sense of unprofitableness weighed
heavily on him ; and that sense
would naturally be much increased
after the taste of activity and re-
sponsibility at Stockholm. He had
A Translator of Shakespeare.
113
already occupied his leisure with trans-
lation for his own enjoyment, but till
chance threw him with Tieck he had
no idea that his genius could be turned,
not only to the assistance of a friend,
but also to the enjoyment of a nation ;
and, without a thought for his own
aggrandisement, he hailed the pros-
pect with delight. Even now, notwith-
standing Herr Frey tag's endeavour to
secure justice for his friend, it would
seem as if comparatively few, even in
Germany, know or appreciate the
share that Baudissin took in the trans-
lation of Shakespeare. Dr. Kluge, in
his ' History of German National Lite-
rature/ does indeed set forth the fact
that the nineteen plays which pass
under Tieck' s name were but revised
by him, and really translated by
Baudissin and Dorothea. But in
truth, where lesser names are mingled
with greater in a work of this kind,
they must surely be absorbed and
forgotten in them. Pope's Homer is
a familiar word enough; but the names
of Fenton and Broome, who translated
twelve books of the ' Odyssey ' for Pope,
are forgotten. For this they have,
perhaps, only themselves to thank, for,
as Johnson remarks, readers of poetry
have never been able to distinguish
their work from Pope's ; and the same
perhaps holds good of Baudissin in
relation to Tieck. But it is to be
noticed that, whereas Tieck made no
word of acknowledgment to his part-
ner, Pope, on the other hand, took
particular care to immortalise Broome
in the ' Dunciad ' (marking " very dis-
tinctly " in a note the payment
made to him for his help), and Broome
and Fenton alike in the oft-quoted
letter on Fenton's death.
Shakespeare completed for others,
Baudissin now began to work for him-
self. He had determined to translate
for his own use all that were to be
found of the works of Shakespeare's
dramatic contemporaries ; and a pub-
lisher having expressed his readiness
to make the translation public, there
appeared, this time in his own name,
two volumes entitled * Ben Jonson and
No. 314. VOL. LIII.
his School' (1836), containing the fol-
lowing plays : ' The Alchemist ' and
* The Devil is an Ass ' of Ben Jonson j
'The Spanish Curate' and 'The Elder
Brother ' of Fletcher ; ' The Fatal
Dowry ' of Massinger and Field ' and
' The Duke of Milan/ ' A New Way
to Pay Old Debts/ and 'The City
Madam/ of Massinger. For this
work he received for the first time
money earned by his pen, which
greatly delighted him. His skill is
fully displayed therein, not only by
the masterly way in which he has over-
come the many difficulties of language
and of obscure references to contem-
porary events, but also by the distinc-
tion which he has maintained between
the style and language of the different
poets. And his triumph was the
greater, inasmuch as Schlegel had de-
clared a translation of Ben Jonson
and the dramatists of his school to
be impracticable. But very shortly
after, the death of his wife destroyed
all pride and pleasure in his work,
and for the next few years prevented
any new undertaking. He sought re-
lief in a long journey through Greece,
and in 1840, having married again,
he began his literary labours anew.
He had at various times made care-
ful study of the language of the Ger-
man poetry of the Middle Ages (mittel
hoch deutsch), and in 1845 and 1848 he
published translations into modern
German of two old chivalric poems, the
' Iwein' of Hartmann von Aue, and the
'Wigalois ' of Wirnt von Gravenberg.
The peculiar difficulty of such a trans-
lation lies in the different signification
attached to the same word in the two
dialects, and this he was able success-
fully to conquer. Then the work was
again interrupted by the tumults of
the year 1848. Holstein rose against
the Danish headship, and Baudissin,
whom an anticipation of this struggle
had severed from Denmark thirty
years before, took up the cause with
warmth. His brother Otto was one
of the leaders of the armed revolt, and
he himself could spare no time from
political correspondence and journalism
114
A Translator of Shakespeare.
for his beloved music and the more im-
portant work which was his chiefest
delight. The times were full of anxiety
for him, and called for great sacri-
fices ; but none the less were they of
true gain and advantage. Hitherto
inclined to view every democratic
movement with distrust, he read the
lesson aright, and became henceforth
a staunch and enlightened Liberal.
It was not until the year 1857 that
he betook himself again to his transla-
tions, when he published his first and
only work in prose, * The Biographical
Essays of Don Manuel Josef Quintana,
rendered from the Spanish.' This
done, after first translating Ponsard's
' L'Honneur et 1' Argent/ in order to
test his powers, he began in 1865 the
translation of Moliere. It was at first
his intention to publish one volume
only of selected plays, but even in his
seventy-fifth year delight in the work
carried him away, and by 1867 he was
ready with his second great gift to the
German theatre a complete transla-
tion of Moliere. Of this it is
sufficient to say that it is the standard
text of the German stage ; but it is
curious to note that some German
critics have found fault with it
on the ground that the iambic of
the German drama is employed
throughout instead of the alexan-
drines of the original. The result that
would follow from the admission of
the principle implied in this criticism
may easily be seen ; but the criticism
is especially remarkable as coming
from a people which has but compara-
tively recently freed itself from the
bondage of French literary canons, and
has not yet ceased to rejoice in its free-
dom. In any case there can be little
doubt that the German actors are
thankful for being spared the necessity
of declaiming in a metre utterly unsuit-
able to the genius of the German
language.
Moliere thus happily completed,
Baudissin went on next to the ' Pro-
verbes Dramatiques ' of Leclerq, pub-
lishing in 1875 two volumes ' Dra-
matische Sprichworter ' von Carmontel
und Th. Leclerq. From this he
passed on with enthusiasm to the
translation of three plays by Francois
Coppee an enthusiasm increased by
personal knowledge of the French
poet who had spent some time
with him as his guest at Rantzau.
Baudissin' s last printed work was a
single volume, ' Italienisches Theater/
containing translations of plays' by
Gozzi, Goldoni, Giraud, and del Testa.
These had been his delight in youth,
and now at the age of eighty-eight
he was able not only still to enjoy
them himself, but to give others a
share in his enjoyment.
Thus the years passed away in quiet
earnest work ; the summers spent at
Rantzau, the winters at Dresden. Nor
did literary labours make him forgetful
of his duties to his tenants in Holstein.
Towards them and his other depen-
dents his relation was almost patri-
archal ; and though in times of trouble
and excitement (whereof so long a life
could not but have its share) he did
not escape experience of ingratitude,
yet in the main his friendliness met
with its due reward of thankfulness
and love. Once, in a bad season, he
refused to take from a farmer his full
rent, but the latter would not hear of
such a thing. " A bargain is a bar-
gain," he said, and paid in full.
Another farmer lost by fire a large
barn, well stored, and, the fire being
no fault of his, the loss (over one
thousand pounds), which was only
partially covered by insurance, fell
on the landlord. One day this
farmer came to Baudissin, and said,
" This won't do, Herr Graf ; perhaps
the hay was a bit damp. I must
pay my half of the loss, for I can-
not rest till I do." Yet another
tenant, on the renewal of his lease,
made the suggestion (usually left to
landlords) that, as times were improved,
his rent should be raised ; and one old
peasant wrote to Dresden and begged
the Herr Graf to come a little earlier
than usual to Rantzau, as he was
going to celebrate his golden wedding.
Whereupon, needless to say, Baudissin
A Translator of Shakespeare.
115
altered his plans on purpose to be
present.
Such being the terms on which he
lived with those inferior to him in
station, it is not difficult to conceive
the respect and affection which
his friends in Dresden had for him.
It was natural that a younger
generation should be attracted to
one who had lived among the giants
of old time ; who had listened to
Schiller and Goethe, and been the
friend of August Schlegel and Madame
de Stael ; who had met the fugitives
from Jena, and lived to see the
triumph of Sedan; who had entered
Paris with the allies in 1814, and
hailed the news of the German entry
in 1871 ; who when first he set out for
Dresden, knew it as the head-quarters
of the first Napoleon, and saw it at
last, after Koniggratz and Sedan, the
capital of a province in a united
German Empire. Yet there was
greater attraction than this in the
extraordinary amiability and modesty
of the man. Highly cultivated, gifted
with keen perception of artistic and
scientific excellence, he could be appre-
ciative without being patronising ; and
though he shrank from all that was
base and wrong, he had the widest
sympathy for human failing and
human misfortune. He was not one
of those who thought that each
generation was inferior to that which
preceded it ; but at the age of seventy
or eighty years, his mind unfettered
and unexhausted by the thought and
action of an earlier time, he watched
the creation and development of new
things with as lively an interest as
at twenty. His conversion to Lib-
eralism in politics has already been
noticed, and in respect of art and
literature his feelings were the same.
No one more readily recognised the
merit of rising young poets or painters,
with whom he sympathised, as one of
their own age, in the struggle for suc-
cess ; and this without losing one jot
of his love for the masterpieces of the
past. He could wander through the
Dresden Gallery for the hundredth
time with ever-increasing delight, and
in the very last year of his life a
quartette of Mozart's exercised the
same entrancing influence as of old.
So this gentle life, so stormily
begun, drew peacefully to its close.
Almost to the last his health, his
faculties, his capacity for enjoyment,
his power of work, nay, his very hand-
writing, remained unshaken and un-
changed. Even at the last, the
growing infirmities of age could not
impair his cheerfulness and amenity.
Only a few weeks before his death, his
eyesight beginning to fail, he sought
for one well acquainted with French
and English through whose help he
might continue the work in which he
delighted ; but a choice was hardly
made when his work was closed for
ever by death.
He died on the fourth of April,
1878, leaving a name which will ever
hold an honourable place among the
greatest of those who have laboured
to bring home the poetry of foreign
nations to the great German people.
116
CHURCH AUTHORITY: ITS MEANING AND VALUE. 1
LET us try and clear the ground a
little. We will therefore first ask :
" The authority of the Church on what
subjects?"
Setting aside exploded ideas, such
as the authority of the Church to
enforce discipline or moral laws on
the world, these subjects may be
divided, as a first approximation, into
three classes.
There may (or may not) be an
authority which deals with (1) dis-
puted questions relating to the history
of the Bible and of Christianity : for
instance, the criticism and historical
veracity of the Bible \ the history of
the canon; the study of the remains
of Christian antiquity ; in a word, the
nature of the materials for the history
of our religion.
(2) Disputed questions relating to
what we may call the more or less
formulated doctrines of Christianity,
inferred from, rather than explicitly
stated in, the Bible.
(3) All that relates to Church go-
vernment and discipline, and ritual
and finance.
We will briefly refer to these divi-
sions as criticism, theology, business.
It is plain that these subjects are so
different that it is mere confusion of
thought to class them together.
Next, "What do we mean by
authority ? " Here there is an obvious
ambiguity.
There is (1) the preponderant weight
we assign to the learning and judg-
ment of men whose veracity and
impartiality we trust. We speak of
the authority of a scholar like Light-
foot. It is not, however, an authority
in the sense that it demands obedi-
1 A paper read at a clerical meeting in
Bristol, July 6, 1885, as a basis for discussion.
ence ; it only demands respect and
consideration.
There is (2) another sort of autho-
rity. There are men with an un-
rivalled genius for holiness ; men
refined by prayer and unflinching
devotion to duty, and therefore gifted
with a singular delicacy of touch and
insight, with a true inspiration of
God's Holy Spirit. We feel in them
our best selves : we feel that they are
nearer to God than we are : their
words have an authority. Still, this
is not an authority which commands
obedience : it silently appeals for
respect and love. It is compatible
with error.
There is (3) yet another authority
which does command obedience, which
has the power of enforcing itself. The
Church, acting through its defined
powers, has authority. The Bishop
may suspend for defined offences in
virtue of his " authority."
Once more, these kinds of authority
are so different that they can only
be taken together by confusion of
thought.
Let us call them the authority of
learning, of holiness, and of law.
Happily, it is not necessary to define
what we mean by the Church for the
purposes of the present essay. One
meaning we can point out in passing.
The Church of England, " as by law
established," has unquestioned autho-
rity in certain matters of discipline
and ritual. The disciplinary functions
of Church Courts and Bishops are not
wholly suspended. The Church has the
authority of law in matters of disci-
pline.
So far is easy. The more difficult
question is, " Has the Church, what-
ever the Church is, an authority of
Church Authority : its Meaning and Value.
117
learning to decide matters of criticism ;
or of holiness and inspiration to pro-
nounce authoritatively in matters of
doctrine or of conduct ? "
Do not let us confuse these two
the authorities of learning in criticism,
and of holiness or insjnration in theo-
logy or conduct.
There are many questions before
the world which are purely matters
of learning. When was the Book of
Deuteronomy written 1 By what route
did Israel come out of Egypt ? What
is the origin of the Gospels'? What
was the relation of the agape and the
Eucharist? What is the value of
Codex B 1 These, and an infinite
number of such questions, are ques-
tions of learning and criticism ; they
are questions as to matters of fact ;
they are not questions of religion or
conduct.
Now, the question is an intelligible
one, and admits of a positive answer :
" Has the Church, in any sense of the
word, authority to decide these ques-
tions ? Is it possible that matters of
fact can be decided by authority?"
Now, it is a matter of fact, one way
or the other, whether, for example, the
Masoretic text of Samuel is as old as
the LXX. ; whether an axehead ever
floated on water ; and whether St.
Paul wrote the Epistle to the Hebrews.
Could any past consensus of opinion
on these points decide them ? Might
it not have been wrong? These are
as much matters of fact as whether
the earth is round or flat. Let us
never forget that there was a time
when it was pronounced to be " a
shame in a Christian man even so
much as to mention the antipodes."
St. Ambrose and St. Basil were, I
believe, exceptions among the fathers
in the liberality of their views on this
point. They were brave enough to
defy public opinion, and to declare
that a correct belief in the antipodes
was not necessary to salvation. Men
made the mistake then, which con-
fused thinkers make now, of asserting
on authority about matters of fact.
The Copernican theory, the Darwinian
theory, the Straussian theory, most of
our disputed questions, are questions
as to matters of fact. Now, the result
of the last four hundred years of growth
of the human mind is that we now at
last know that matters of fact are not
decided by authority. They are settled
by evidence, and by reason. Can this
be seriously disputed ? The scientific
mind is unable to conceive how a
question as to a matter of fact can be
settled by authority.
The Church, therefore, has no autho-
rity to decide questions of learning
and criticism, or matters of fact.
Now remains the other less explored
region into which we must penetrate.
What do we mean by saying that " the
Church hath authority in controversies
of faith " ? Here we seem to be on
solid ground, for this is one of the
Thirty-nine Articles.
No doubt most of my hearers know
the history of these famous words, as
given by Bishop Browne. I suppose
we owe them to no less profound a
theologian than Queen Elizabeth
herself. She is said to have refused
to sign the articles as drafted and
signed by the two Houses of Convo-
cation until these words were added.
Convocation seems to have submitted
to her will, and accepted the authority
for the Church. Some may think it
is a slightly Erastian origin for the
power claimed ; others may think it
defines those powers. But we will not
look a gift-horse in the mouth.
The words, however, are not free
from ambiguities. There is not only
the plain difference between the fides
quce creditur and the fides qua creditur ;
but even when we agree that it is the
first of these that is intended, an
ambiguity remains.
The words may mean, " There is a
perennial association of men, in legiti-
mate possession of the property be-
queathed to the Church, charged with
the duty of teaching and preaching
God's Word, and of administering the
Sacraments and other Christian rites.
118
Church Authority : its Meaning and Value.
This association has, under certain
limitations, the power of deciding from
time to time on the qualifications for
membership. These qualifications con-
sist in the profession of certain beliefs,
and the conformity to certain customs.
This association or Church can define
those beliefs and prescribe those
customs subject to the limitation that
nothing shall be contrary to God's
Word written."
This is one meaning. The Church
can declare, not that this or that is
true, but that to believe this or that,
to act thus or thus, is the condition of
membership, and of enjoying the
emoluments and immunities it brings,
or professes to bring.
We will call this authority declara-
tory of t/ie terms of membership. The
Church has this authority.
Now this is probably what Elizabeth
meant, and what Convocation accepted,
if they did accept this clause ; but it
is not the sense in which we ordinarily
now quote the words. We think of a
Church older than the Thirty-nine
Articles ; and we mean by its authority
a power resident somewhere, not to
declare conditions of membership, but
to ascertain and declare theological
truth. This is a totally different
thing.
The real question then at last is
this. We believe I suppose we all
believe that there is disseminated
among all individuals, and all branches
of the Church of Christ, some illumi-
nation in spiritual truth, as the result
of the influence on us of the Holy
Spirit. At any rate, this is my firm
conviction. I have no belief more
fundamental than that God guides the
reason and spirit of His faithful ser-
vants.
Does there, then, exist did there
ever exist any means for so focussing
this illumination as to produce a per-
fect light ? If any method existed for
collecting, if I may use the expression,
the sparks of the Holy Spirit in the
hearts of all Christians, till they com-
bined into a perfect and heavenly
flame ; any celestial chemistry which
should separate the fragments of the
divine in us from the masses of the
earthly, the result would be an
" authority " for ascertaining and de-
claring spiritual truth.
The ages have made several answers
to this question. They have frequently
said that (Ecumenical Councils were
such a focussing, such a chemistry.
They have said that it was possible
once before the great schism, but is
impossible now.
If any one thinks that it was pos-
sible once, and is impossible now, let
him read Church History in some
detail ; let him read the Acts of the
Council of Chalcedon.
The truth is, that such a process is
impossible. There exists no such
method of focussing, no such celestial
chemistry. We cannot separate the
human from the divine in man.
It is the old fallacy. On a priori
grounds, men think that God must
govern the world and the Church as
they themselves would govern it, by
giving them an infallible Pope, a
verbally inspired Bible, an unerring
voice of the Church. We had better
study what is, instead of deciding
what must and ought to be. There
are spots on the sun, though it was
declared to be impossible there should
be : the earth is round : the earth does
move. When a man argues that so
and so must be the case that it stands
to reason it must be the case it
always means that he averts his eyes
from facts. He prefers to tell us
what he thinks God ought to do. I
prefer patiently to try and find out
what God has done and is doing. This
is the method of science, and is adopted
by those who desire, above all things,
to see things as they are. I think it
is the reverent method.
But perhaps some one will say, there
is an authority ; but it resides not in
Pope, nor Councils, nor letter of the
Bible : it resides in the consensus of
Catholic antiquity ; and he will quote
the Yincentian rule. This is equally
Church Authority: its Meaning and Value.
119
illusory, and specially so if applied
only to the past. I do not deny, as
will be seen presently, the enormous
moral weight of widespread and long-
lasting agreement, but that such moral
weight is ejusdem generis with a final
authority from which there is no ap-
peal, this I deny. Not only did no
such consensus ever exist ; not only, if
it did exist, would it fail to indicate
more than the opinion that prevailed
at the time ; not only would all sorts
of errors and crimes find in the Yin-
centian rule a strong support ; but it
is fundamentally opposed to the charter
of the Church. That charter is, that
the Church is alive, a living body
with Christ as its head, and subject
to the laws of life and growth. The
Yincentian rule, if limited to the past,
unintentionally strangles that life. It
says, You shall not be led into all
truth ; you shall not advance beyond
such and such a century. Now, to
one who, like myself, believes that the
Holy Spirit is training and guiding
and shining on the whole Church of
Christ, that the whole world of man is
growing and shall grow to the stature
of the fulness of Christ, that the very
best of us has but imperfectly grasped
the meaning of Christ's words and
life, and that the Spirit of God will
make that life and those words better
understood to one who holds this
faith, any such notions as that growth
is to be strangled by an imaginary
consensus of the past, the living heart
stopped by the dead hand, are mon-
strous, and a falsehood to be repudiated
with all his might.
But a belief widely held always has
some truth in it. What is the truth
in this]
The truth is that there exists a dif-
fused and daily growing illumination
in a Christian society ; on the whole,
the verdict of a Christian community
is not far wrong what they bind or
loose on earth, is bound or loosed in
heaven.
These verdicts are not only on ques-
tions of right and wrong. On these
the Christian conscience, give it time
enough, will pronounce right. It has
pronounced against impurity, against
slavery, against religious persecution ;
it is slowly making up its mind on
other subjects. There is a slowly
working divine chemistry which finally
crystallises out the truth.
But even on questions of criticism
and doctrine, within certain limits,
securus judicat orbis. The formation
of the Canon that is, the selection
from the fragments of early Christian
writings of such as should be deemed
Canonical was such a popular judg-
ment. The vox populi sifted the
literature; the vox concilii did but
confirm the verdict of the people. The
real authority was the diffused voice
of Christian men. Our Prayer Book
is similarly the result of the verdict of
a later Christendom : it is the concen-
trated essence of the devotion and the
inspiration of fifteen Christian cen-
turies.
The moral authority of an approxi-
mate consensus in the past is a real and
great thing : it resides in the fact of
some opinion having prevailed in the
struggle. It was the fittest for the
human mind then ; it does not follow
that it is the fittest now. The hetero-
doxy of one age sometimes becomes the
orthodoxy of another. It may have been
but the schoolmaster to bring men to
Christ. But the proved fitness of any
opinion in the past, or in another level
of thought in the present, will make us
hesitate long before we abandon it,
still longer before we denounce it. We
can only abandon it for a wider appli-
cation of the Yincentian rule, when,
as in the phrase sine dubio in ceternum
peribunt, it conflicts with the moral
sense of Christendom. We can only
denounce it when it poisons as well as
weakens spiritual life.
I can now briefly sum up :
Authority, in the sense of power to
transact business, is possessed by every
Church.
Authority, in the sense of declar-
ing the tenets and other conditions of
120
Church Authority : its Meaning and Value.
is possessed by every
Church.
Autliority to decide questions of learn-
ing or of fact in the past, there is none
anywhere ; and further it may be
added that such matters of fact and
of learning are not and cannot be
religion, though for a time men may
think they are.
Authority to ascertain dogma that
is, to give a divinely inspired and final
decision on a speculative question, not
as a condition of membership, but as an
absolute truth there is none, and has
been none. The diffused illumination
of the Christian world canDot be so
focussed. The growth of pious thought
cannot be anticipated. But there is a
power resident in the Christian world
as a whole to decide right at last.
Misconceptions of God do not last for
ever.
Authority on questions of right and
wrong absolute there is none, ap-
proximate there is, in the growing
consensus of the total Christian society,
and especially of those who have the
gift of holiness and the graces of the
Spirit. Tnis absolutely adds to the
known ethical and spiritual truths of
the world.
Such seem to me to be the facts.
Thus God sees fit to educate His
Church. It is vain to wish it were
otherwise, to dream that it is other-
wise. We must look at the facts.
J. M. WILSON.
121
A WALK IN THE FAROES.
" ME not much Engelsk. Money this,
and grub this. Other thing, so ! "
I had engaged a man to guide me
over the hills to the old seat of eccle-
siastical rule in the Faroe Islands,
and the above speech was in answer
to my inquiry about his linguistic
capacity. He was a little man with
much eyebrow, a short beard that
curled in the front as decidedly as a
fish-hook, and a nose somewhat sus-
piciously rubicund. On the strength
of his engagement by "the English-
man " as walking companion for a
certain number of hours, he had
assumed a dignity of manner that
made him look ridiculously con-
ceited, and had, moreover, put on
his best clothes, and washed himself
at an unusual hour of the day.
They had told me that his English
was quite phenomenally good, and that
I should be as much at home with him
as with my own brother. But, for
the former, I found he had little more
vocabulary than the words above-men-
tioned, which he pronounced diaboli-
cally : while, for the rest, I felt not
very fraternally towards him at first
sight. He illustrated his utterance by
producing a five-pre copper coin ; by
opening his mouth and pointing down
his throat with one of his thumbs ; and
by jerking his head like one habituated
to dram-drinking. Still, I had no
right to think evil of my friend,
Olaus Jackson, merely because he
seemed to have bibulous propensities ;
and, without more delay than was ex-
acted by the need to take a ceremo-
nious farewell of some Thorshavn ac-
quaintance who thought my projected
walk only another proof that all Eng-
lishmen were conundrums, Olaus and
I set forth, he leading, with his head
very high, and holding his alpenstock
as gracefully as if he had been born a
beadle instead of a Faroe man.
A word about my man's dress,
which was the characteristic Faroe
costume. On his head (to begin at
the top) he wore a red and black
striped turban, about a foot in height,
which fell to his left ear. His body
was swathed in a copious brown wool-
len tunic, too large for him, yet padded
with underclothing so as to make him
look almost formidably robust. Faroe
pantaloons of blue cloth covered his
legs to the knees, where they were at-
tached by four or five gay gilt buttons.
His calves were shown in all their
symmetry by the brown hose which
ended in his moccasins of untanned
cowskin tied round the ankles by
strings of white wool. Lastly, to
protect his precious throat, Olaus wore
a woollen scarf of red, green and
blue, which, having circumvented that
part- of him an indefinite number of
times, stuffed the rest of its long
length within his tunic, where it
helped to swell the magnitude of his
chest.
Truly, he was a majestic object com-
pared with those others of his com-
patriots who, not being so fortunate as
to know English, had no chance of such
an engagement as his, and were there-
fore compelled to crawl along the rugged
track out of the town, in their dirtiest
rags, bent double by the loads of peat
upon their backs. But Olaus was
too wise in his generation to risk
conversation with me in the presence
of his neighbours ; he strutted ahead,
and quickened his pace whenever I
came within six feet of him.
Thus we proceeded through Thors-
havn, an attraction for all eyes. As
we climbed the rude rock stairs,
stained black with the ooze of much
drainage matter, little children with
bronzed cheeks, flaxen hair and
Saxon blue eyes clasped each other's
hands, and stood aside on the tips of
122
A Walk in the Faroes.
their wooden sabots, while they whis-
pered among themselves " Engdsk-
mandf" Housewives threw their
brooms into a corner, or left the rolls
of fygbrtid to grill by themselves, and
flew to the window or door to see
us pass ; the word had gone along the
street that we were coming half a mi-
nute ago. One old crone, whose ninety
years were opposed to hurry, but not
to the curious instincts of her nature,
had herself supported to the glass, be-
hind which her yellow face, with its
sunken black eyes, gleamed at me like
something spectral, not human. Arti-
sans, straddled across the skeleton
beams of a house half built, stopped
their hammering and stared, until I
was near enough for a display of cour-
tesy ; then off came their caps, and a
civil " God dag " whispered from the
roof. Ladies, clattering down to the
stream, laden to their noses with
clothes for the wash, dropped their
burdens to the ground and sat upon
them, that they might see us at their
ease, and, with the freedom of their
sex, commented glibly on my pecu-
liarities, and audibly. School-boys
conning their lessons as they trotted
to the royal school, shut their books
and gaped, until we had passed,
when they shouted. In brief, we had
the honour of causing a five-minutes'
ferment of excitement in those parts of
Thorshavn which we traversed. No
English gentleman had visited the
place for a couple of years, and I
was a recent arrival. Conspicuousness
is odious to a man of sensibility and
sense ; I was therefore delighted when
the last " God dag " was exchanged,
the last house of the town was left
behind, and there was nothing more
animate in front than Olaus and the
brown mountain tops, their sides
strewn chaotically with countless
white boulders, among which the
white sheep browsed almost unper-
ceived. As for Olaus, no sooner were
we out of the town than he seemed to
shrink ; and in a little while he had
sobered his pace until he was abreast
with me. Then, with a squint of hu-
mility, as if in apology for his late
exhibition of pride, he informed me, in
an irregular mosaic of three languages,
that he was not very well, but that he
hoped to get something to eat at the
conclusion of our walk. .
The weather at the outset was not
bad for Faroe. There was cloud on
the hills, but the blue spaces aloft, and
their blue counterparts on the sea to
our left, were augury of good. Naalsoe
Island, four miles away, lying straight
some seven or eight miles, and rising
to a peak of twelve or thirteen hundred
feet, was clearly defined, and the white
church of its one town shone like a
snowball in the distance. The sea
too was quiet, though breathed over
by a north-easterly wind just strong
enough to admonish the clouds on the
hills that they had better go up higher.
But, ere we had walked a mile along
the road, which runs out from the town
perhaps twice as far, a sudden change
came about. The wind shifted to the
rainy quarter, to the south-west. In
ten minutes Naalsoe disappeared from
sight. The fog on the hills descended
and surrounded us. And Olaus and I
were soon treading dismally over wet
bogs, through the soaked and soaking
heather, and rained on by the clouds
into whose very hearts we were
methodically attempting to climb.
Nowhere is weather more fickle than
in the Faroes. And it is not every one
who can console himself, in the midst
of a Faroe fog, with the reflection that
it is a salubrious if unwelcome visita-
tion.
Not a soul lives between Thorshavn
and Kirkeboe, though the distance is
some six English miles. In the first
place it is an inland route, and there
is no inland habitation throughout the
Faroes. All the people are born, as it
were, face to face with the sea. And
the nature of the country, sown as it
is almost everywhere with innumer-
able boulders, offers little inducement
to farmers. If the sheep and small
horses, which are turned loose here-
abouts to take care of themselves, can
find herbage enough to sustain them,
A Walk in the Faroes.
123
this is as much as can be expected from
the interior. While, secondly, our
track was mountainous from begin-
ning to end. From one terrace of
shingle and hard rock the uniformity
of which was broken by occasional
tufts of vivid green, whence clear
spring water gushed towards the
valleys we passed to another similar
terrace, and thence across miniature
desert plateaux of inexpressible bleak-
ness and aridity; until we had gone
from the east of the island to the west,
and could see, far down, when the fog
lifted, the dull, lead-coloured sea be-
tween Stromo and the islets of Hestoe
and Kolter. A little later, and the
black rocks of these isles were visible ;
their bases rose straight from the
water, but their summits, hidden in
the clouds, were as high as the imagi-
nation pleased to make them.
It was an all but soundless walk.
True, Olaus, thanks to his cold, was
frequently obliged to clear his throat,
and he made plenty of noise in the
exertion. But the echoes of his efforts,
exaggerated and bandied from rock to
rock, soon died away, and left the still-
ness yet more still. Now and again an
oyster-catcher would rise with a scream,
and his scarlet and white plumage
flash brightly through the dim atmo-
sphere about us. But no other birds
were about that day. The fog seemed to
have sent all living things to sleep, save
only Olaus and myself. Yet, though the
air was about half as thick as that of
London in November, there was a
subtle element of exhilaration about
it which made the walk quite enjoy-
able and enlivening. 1 chanced to
have my small five-chambered revolver
with me a most useless weapon in Faroe
by the by, where murder is an unknown
term. This I was tempted suddenly to
fire, after a rather long spell of complete
silence. The next moment Olaus was
by my side, clutching at the thing, and
peering open-mouthed down its barrel,
careless of the fact that one of his
fingers in his excitement was pressing
the trigger of the yet loaded pistol ;
and it was only after much trouble
that I persuaded him to let me put him
out of reach of danger.
"Had I brought it to shoot him
with?" Olaus inquired, in heated
Danish, his red nose fiery with per-
turbation and anxiety. And I could
only soothe him into complete tran-
quillity by surrendering the revolver
to him and bidding him use it himself
at anything he pleased, except myself.
But henceforward, until we were close
to the green patch of cultivated ground
between the perpendicular rocks of the
mainland and the sea itself, which
represented the old church town of
Kirkeboe, I was questioned about
"the little gun," whose fellow he had
never yet seen; its cost, its maker,
the number of men I had killed with
it, the degree of its fatality, my object
in bringing it to Faroe, &c. The re-
port seemed to have a most stimulating
effect upon the man's intellect, for, in
quaint enough Danish, he began to tell
a tale about the only man of his ac-
quaintance who had ever meditated a
deed of violence.
"There was one man, and he was
one very angry man, and he get in a
passion one day and swear he kill
somebody. He go to his home, and
first thing he see is his woman at
the quern she a meek thing with no
spirit ; and he run at her, and without
one word he knock her down flat, and
she lie without moving, her nose up-
standing to the roof. Then this one
man shocked with himself, to think
how near he was to being a slayer of
his wife. No man has yet killed his
wife in Faroe, and he so near being
the first ! And all his anger go out of
him like the wind from a bladder when
you untie the string. And he bethink
himself how to keep himself from being
so wicked. He run to the cupboard
and pour brandy down his woman's
throat. And then when, after a time,
she breathe freely and open an eye,
this one man run off, and down to the
rocks, and throw himself, all in one
instant, into the sea, where he drown.
He not kill his woman after that."
Master Olaus' tale may stand on the
124
A Walk in the Faroes.
merits of its moral ; for its truth I do
not vouch.
From the higher rocks, still wrapped
in dark fog, we could see Kirkeboe
below in the bright sunshine. It was
like looking at a pretty face from
under the photographer's cloth.
Soon we reached the first parallelo-
gram of rye within the parish. Then
a dog began to bark from a neigh-
bouring strip of grass meadow. A
second dog, nearer the knot of build-
ings, took up the cry. One man, cut-
ting grass with a short-bladed scythe,
looked up from his work, saw us,
whistled to another man similarly
engaged, who, taking the signal, waved
his hand towards the farm, and having
secured attention and done his work,
crossed his legs and scrutinised us.
The first man, in the meantime,
striding like a giant, had come along-
side Olaus and me, and opened a rapid
conversation with the former, of which
I was the object and illustration, judg-
ing from his stare and Olaus' gestures.
"What is it all about?" I asked
Olaus, at length. They had been
talking Faroese, which is a spoken,
not a written, language, and therefore
a sad stumbling-block for foreigners.
" He have never seen an English-
man before ; he is an ignorant
fellow," said Olaus, at first begin-
ning in a tone quite loud enough
for the other to hear, but ending in
a whisper. Not that the Kirkeboe
man seemed likely to resent depre-
ciatory reference to him. He was
in the throes of an excited desire
to understand the composition of an
Englishman, now that Providence had
put such a creature in his way. Having
examined the texture of my clothes,
and shaken his head over the quality
of my Scotch tweeds, he fell on his
knees in a fervour, and, ejaculat-
ing tremulously, " Me shoemaker I "
seized one of my feet, and began
pinching and thumbing the leather
of my boot. Here, at any rate, was
something that he approved; for,
having done with my foot, and set
it tenderly upon the ground again, he
raised towards me a face full of
depression, and shook his head
mournfully, while he murmured,
" Brilliant ! "
It was the homage of an artist to-
wards his ideal. What were untanned
cowskin moccasins, tied round the ankle
with common strings, in comparison
with the elegant thick-soled production
of a scientific bootmaker? And we
left this man still gazing at my feet
as they receded from him.
The cultivated part of Kirkeboe is
like all the other cultivated parts in
the Faroe Isles. From the sea it
would be a green patch, or patch of
patches, on the hem of the grey or
purple swelling mass of land green
in summer that is ; for later, when
the hay is stacked and the grain
carried, the tiny fields take a golden
colour which almost dazzles the eyes
in the bright sunshine. The land is
cut up into numerous sections by the
shallow ditches necessary to carry off
the heavy rains which pour down
from the high overshadowing rocks.
A Norfolk farmer would laugh a
Faroe man's husbandry to scorn.
So poor is the soil, so rude the im-
plements, so uncertain the weather !
And so trifling the results ! He
would ask wherein lay the use of
cutting a field of rye some fifteen
yards by five, the heads of irregular
height and separated from each other
by inches. And, indeed, if time were
as valuable in Faroe as in England,
there would be reason in his inquiry.
But when Olaus and I traversed the
parish, its grass, full of flowers and
knee deep, was uncut ; and thanks to
the mountain mist and the warm sun
which now seemed to shine from under
the mist, as strong and sweet of per-
fume as any English meadow in June.
Kine were tethered here and there,
and peered at us with mild questioning
eyes. A milk girl, with one pail of
milk slung on her back, one on each
of her arms, and knitting withal as
she went swinging and singing down
to the farm, gave us cheerful greeting.
The sea, placid silver to the horizon,
A Walk in the Faroes.
125
or until obscured by the frowning
rocks of Sandoe and Hestoe, just broke
into white foam against the gnarled
and iron strand of the village.
Close to the white church and the
beach is the one ecclesiastical ruin in
Faroe. It stands picturesquely with its
four chief walls uncovered to the sky,
grass within them and grass without,
and its large pointed east window
filled with a near panorama of black
perpendicular cliffs with grassy edges
of velvety green inaccessible even for
the nimble Faroe sheep. Centuries
ago, before Protestantism trod the life
out of architecture, here at Kirkeboe
was a bishop's residence and a school
for priests. But with the Reforma-
tion the importance of the place ended.
A Protestant bishop was appointed to
Kirkeboe, it is true ; but certain of the
sea robbers, who from the earliest
times had ravaged these thinly-
peopled islands, soon frightened this
gentleman out of the country. Since
then no bishop has held sway in Faroe ;
and the ruins at Kirkeboe are the
only remaining witness of the early
power of the Church in the isles.
Once in six or seven weeks the pro-
vost or dean of the clergy holds ser-
vice nowadays in the place where,
five hundred years ago, prayers were
said daily by a bishop.
The hospitality of Northmen is pro-
verbial. Though, save for one or two
government officials, there are no rich
men in Faroe, a stranger is every-
where received with open hands and,
better still, with open hearts. Olaus
was for taking advantage of this
immediately. He would introduce me
to the farmer there and then, and I
could begin eating and drinking within
the minute. But I saw through his
pretext, and bid him go and fill his
own stomach while I examined the
cathedral walls. I had no excuse for
pressing myself upon strangers, it
seemed to me ; if he as a native had
less conscience, so much the better for
him. This he refused to do, however ;
and he sulkily followed me into the
cathedral precincts. But here there
was really nothing of interest to see.
The walls are of hard trapstone, the
irregular blocks connected with a
mortar of extraordinary adhesive-
ness. By the eastern window are
some stone decorations, and outside
the same window is a sculpture of the
crucifixion, not more artistic than the
bulk of other similar work three cen-
turies ago. In fact, the most curious
object in the cathedral was something
secular a plough. The Kirkeboe
bonder had introduced this novelty
into his district only the other day ;
and, though by no means remarkable
in its make or size, it was to a Faroe
man transcendent in interest over the
cathedral and all its history. It was to
this that Olaus pointed triumphantly
when we walked into the long grass
of the aisle. And it was to explain
this to me that another man in a blue
nightcap came headlong after us and
plunged straightway into an incompre-
hensible discourse, one word in ten of
which was English. But it was deli-
cious to mark instant enmity towards
this interloper printed upon Olaus'
face. He tried to out-talk him, and,
failing in this, assured me that the
plough was not good for much after
all, let that other man say what he
might about it ; and, as if he were my
sworn bodyguard, he constantly inter-
posed himself between the man and
me, his face red with indignation, and
his eyes flashing. The stranger man
drew me aside towards a bit of de-
corated work of which he seemed to
know the history, and as the ground
in the vicinity was swampy he exerted
himself to put stepping-stones for me
in the kindest and most self-sacrificial
manner. At this Olaus seemed beside
himself with anger ; he stood apart and
writhed, working his lips like a luna-
tic, and he took it hardly when I
laughed at him. Eventually, he stole
towards me, and getting on the side
farthest from the obnoxious interloper
whispered, with dramatic tremulous-
ness, upturning an anguished eye of
assurance at the same time
" Sir, this man lille (little) drunk ; I
swear he lille drunk."
But I am afraid Olaus derived no
126
A Walk in the Faroes.
comfort from the accusation, for I felt
impelled to tell him that the new arri-
val " a little drunk " was more enter-
taining than himself, perfectly sober.
At this conjuncture the farmer him-
self opportunely appeared at the
west end of the aisle, smiling
and extending his hand in greeting.
And behind him came his sons, two
broad-shouldered brown young men,
as honestly genial of expression as
their father. They all shook my hand
with a vigour that made me wince,
and I was invited into the house with-
out delay.
It was an ordinary-looking .Faroe
farm building, with the usual number
of smaller houses attached, for the
bedding of the labourers, the drying
of the mutton and beef for winter use,
the storing of grain and wool, both
raw and manufactured ; black in the
body, with a roofing of bright turf,
amid which pink achillea and yellow
buttercups bloomed profusely. But
at one time its foundations had sup-
ported an episcopal residence. Where
now farm-refuse littered the yard and
cods' heads stared ugly in death,
shaven monks had walked to and fro,
with the swirl of the sea on the rocks
hard by dinning their ears. No
whitewashed Lutheran church, sur-
mounted by its lozenge-shaped belfry
tower, had then stood between them
and the sea horizon.
Not that I was allowed time for
any such old-world reflections as
these. Divorced from. Olaus, who,
though a consequential man. was
not fit for a drawing-room, I surren-
dered myself wholly to my new friends,
exchanged bows and hand-shakings
with the lady of the house, and seated
myself by the table, with a vase of
blue and crimson flowers under my
nose. Then came in the farmer's
daughter, a young lady of eighteen,
who had just finished her education,
as the phrase goes, in Copenhagen,
and, after greetings, was commis-
sioned to bring wine and cake and
cigars. She was a beautiful girl, with
dark eyes unusual in this land of
Northmen, brilliant complexion, and
an elegant figure ; but, much as one
could not help admiring her, it went
against the grain to be waited upon
by her with a deference that was yet
more humiliating. In Faroe the cus-
tom of toasting is general. He were
but an ill-mannered fellow who would
drink anything stronger than water in
company with another without wish-
ing him health and prosperity. Accord-
ingly, glasses were filled with sherry
(a great luxury in Faroe), and, one
after the other, standing with solemn
eyes, the household of the bonder
clinked my glass, uttering the mono-
syllable " Skald." The wine was then
drunk at a gulp, smiles were ex-
changed, and cigars were lit by the
gentlemen. Photographic albums were
brought forward, and, with kindly
simplicity, I was informed of the
names and standing of people whom I
had never seen and was never likely
to know. In Faroe, as elsewhere, pho-
tography has proved a social blessing.
No house is without its collection of
portraits, and these almost invariably
serve to break the ice of early acquaint-
anceship. In Thorshavn I was soon
at home with the photographs of
scores of people who were strangers
to me when I left the place.
I asked the bonder if his farm was
prosperous. It was a foolish question,
for when, since Adam became a
labourer, was a tiller of the ground
contented with its' fruits ? Here, in-
deed, there was much amiss. The
summer had been far too wet. The
hay would be late, and the crops re-
fused to ripen. The cows were not
too loyal in their tribute. The lambs
had met with many accidents; and
numbers of the sheep had, at wooling
time, shed their fleeces against the
rocky edges of the mountains, and
presented themselves to their owner
naked and profitless. Even the eider
ducks, in his rock-island a hundred
yards away, had not yielded him more
than two pounds of down this season,
at twenty shillings the pound. And
the cod fishing also had been poor.
But, having voided himself of these
legitimate grievances, the farmer ac-
A Walk in the Faroes.
127
knowledged that he had much to be
thankful for. His family were well,
his men did their work, and they all
had enough to eat and drink. Nor
were they troubled with anxieties about
war and such matters, as in England.
One of the boys here pricked up his
ears and asked if General Gordon was
really dead, and when I told him the
common opinion, he looked quite sorry.
They had heard of Gordon from the
Copenhagen papers, and in Faroe,
no less than in Denmark, he had
been exalted on a pedestal of heroic
fame. Moreover they knew some-
thing of his features from the alma-
nacs supplied to the local merchants
by the traders from Orkney and
Shetland. To the farmer, Gordon
suggested the royal family of Den-
mark, and the different members of
King Christian's house were enumer-
ated affectionately for me, and their
portraits, including those of the
Prince and Princess of Wales, ar-
ranged symmetrically on one wall of
the room, indicated to me. It is a
trifle strange, considering how little
actual advantage they derive from the
Danish rule, that the Faroese should
be so warm in their devotion to the
Danish Government ; and may, per-
haps, be explained by the surmise that
in the less complex stages of civilisa-
tion man can and will venerate and
love a master, if he be not positively
hateful. I never entered a house in
Faroe without seeing a portrait of the
Danish king a steel engraving or a
common woodcut daubed with rainbow
colours. Loyalty is surely spontaneous
in these happy isles.
King Christian's picture recalled to
my kindly host another monarch
whose memory is held in esteem at
Kirkeboe. Centuries ago the people of
Norway rose against their sovereign
and put him to death ; and would
also have killed his Queen Gunhild
and her little boy-baby had she not
fled from the country with him.
Kirkeboe in Faroe was the refuge
sought by this poor lady with her
orphaned child. A relative of hers
was bishop here, and gave her shelter.
She assumed a menial character, hid
her boy for a whole summer in a cave
among the black-beetling rocks over
the village, visiting him daily to
suckle and tend him, and trusted in
the future to atone for the past and
present. In due time the boy grew
up to manhood. Then, donning his
rights as a panoply, he returned to
Norway, carried all before him, and
secured his father's throne. This tale
of King Sverre, Bishop Ho, and Gun-
hild the Queen, was told me by the
elder of the farmer's sons ; and
he would have shown the site of the
cave itself if the fog had not lain too
low on the hill sides. Avalanches of
stones and snow have in the course of
time made the hole harder to attain
than once it was, but at the best it
must have been a panting climb for
the hapless queen, in addition to her
other misfortunes of exile and apparent
servitude.
Another curiosity of Kirkeboe is a
famous old house of Norwegian tim-
ber, with as wonderful a history as
the Santa Casa of Loretto. It is said
to be eight hundred years old, and to
have floated deliberately from Norway
upon the beach of Kirkeboe, not
exactly furnished, but ready for fur-
niture and occupation. Nor is it of
flimsy material. Trunks a foot
in diameter are dovetailed into
similar trunks ; and the massy planks
of the partitions and flooring suggest
the enormous weight of the entire
structure. There is rude carving on
some of the beams, and the panels also
are decorated here and there. Nowa-
days the chief room of this house serves
as the rtfgstue, or kitchen ; literally,
the smoke-room, as the common
kitchen of a Faroe house being
unprovided with a chimney, the
hearth stands in the middle of the
chamber, and over it, in the roof, is
a hole for the smoke to go through
wlien it chooses. When I entered it a
man on his knees was eating fish from a
wooden trough, much as a pig feeds in
his stye. He had the backbone of an
entire cod in his two hands, and was
sucking the flesh from it with enthu-
128
A Walk in the, Faroes.
siasm. A woman at the other end of
the room was turning the spinning-
. wheel, keeping an eye upon certain
rolls of rye-bread laid upon a gridiron
over the lurid sods of turf on the
hearth. These cakes were of two
dimensions, the greater, representing
one man's portion, being perhaps a
quarter as large again as the other or
woman's portion. It is an old Faroe
custom thus to distinguish between
the appetite or deserts of the sexes
probably the latter. And yet, apart
from the claim of more exacting phy-
sique, considering the work done by
men and women, one is disposed to
think that the men are rewarded over-
liberally. A specialist, for instance,
thus enumerates the chief duties of a
Faroe housewife. She has "to crush
corn in the quern, to clean the entrails
of slaughtered animals, to cleanse the
cow-houses and milk the cows, to dry
the corn, to knit, weave, and sew, to
knead and bake the bread, to pluck
the sea-birds, taken by the thousand
in the season, wash the skins and
wool, and do all other washing, to
spin, dye, cook, &c., &c." Whereas, if
we exclude fishing and field work,
both of which are much curtailed in
winter, when the nights are four times
as long as the days, the men are
mainly engaged in woolwork, and chat-
tering like the women themselves.
But it will be long before the women
of Faroe take up the cry of " equality
of consideration and a bigger loaf ! "
Dutiful submission to their lords and
masters is inborn with Jb hem like the
marrow of their bones.
Out of this r^gstue, the beams of
which were grimed with the smoke of
centuries, we went into a sleeping
chamber. The beds were of hay, new
cut, ravishingly sweet, and set in the
wood of the wall like the bunks of a
ship. Under the floor of this room
was a cavity, ten feet, perhaps, in
depth, which, if tradition may be cre-
dited, was used as a dungeon by the old
Northmen who owned the house before
it got adrift from the mainland. It
were curious to know the exact history
of this imported domicile. One thing
is sure that it is unique in Faroe.
As for its trip of two hundred miles
across the North Atlantic, one is
loth to rebuff the imagination by dis-
crediting such a delicious spectacle.
The good farmer was for returning
and drinking more wine after viewing
the rpgstue. But one of the boys
suggested that the white church ought
to be seen ; his father had the reading
of the service upon him five Sundays
out of six, he said. And so the key
was fetched, and, passing through a
tangled bit of paddock, notable only
for some edible shrub which grew in
it, we assailed and opened the door.
A less remarkable place of worship
cannot be conceived. It was of wood,
varnished inside and whitewashed
outside; plain to nakedness, with a
streak or two of bright colour about
its wooden pulpit. A spittoon stood
at the foot of the altar, which bore
a crucifix and some dirt. But, though
so unattractive, familiarity had en-
deared the edifice to the boys. They
prattled about; it, and sat on the tops
of the pews, lounged against the altar,
and paddled their fingers in the font ;
told how in winter the sea thunders
its waves against the sides and drowns
the sound of the pastor's voice ; the
number of the congregation, a bare
half dozen at times ; the cost of the
candles, and so forth. The Lutherans
of Faroe are not excited religionists ;
they take their quota of inspired
moral teaching once a week, or once
every six weeks, as the case may be,
and it suffices them. In truth, how-
ever, there can be no more moral
community under the sun than this
isolated population of eleven thousand
human beings.
When we were about to leave the
church and re-lock it, my friend and
guide Olaus made his appearance in
the doorway, with a shining face and
an eager expression.
" Dreadful bad weather coming
on ! " he said to me in an aside, which
happily was audible to the elder of
the farmer's sons.
"Bad ! why, the sun is all over the
sea," exclaimed the boy, " and Sandoe
A Walk in the Faroes.
129
yonder is out of the clouds. It will
be soft to-morrow, but all to-day
fine."
"Well, /think " murmured Olaus,
with a vanquished look of discomfi-
ture at his belly, which was patently
swelled, " I am ready to go home ! "
he continued, in elucidation of his
weather wisdom.
But this the good bonder protested
against. I had taken only the pre-
liminary refreshment ; a substantial
repast would be ready by and by ; his
wife was preparing it.
And so, to pass the time, it was
proposed that we should visit the eider-
duck island, a good stone's throw
from the shore. Accordingly, some
men were summoned, and, with a
whoop of self-encouragement, these
launched one of the bonder's boats.
A Faroe boat is as old fashioned a
concern as a poke bonnet. It has a
curved prow and a curved stern ; and
both ends are furnished with handles
for the seizure of the boat. The oars,
moreover, are tied to the sides with
thongs of cowskin. But there can be
no ground for cavil against boats and
men who, like these, can jointly get over
twenty-four miles of water-way, and
not by any means still water, in four
hours or so. Faroe men row astonish-
ingly quick, but for style they care
nothing ; and though they would soon
beat an Oxford crew in a long race,
they would not fail also to excite its
derision.
During the passage the boys pulled
up a quantity of seaweed, and offered
me three varieties to taste and deter-
mine as to the best. Olaus, who was
with us, would have saved me the
ordeal of decision ; for he filled his
mouth by handfuls. But the boys
scorned Olaus, esteeming him by
another standard than his own, and
I had to arbitrate. Two of the kinds
were ribbon-leaved and palatable
enough; the third, like a rope of
amber, was better still. Henceforward
I shall consider it no hardship for a
community to be forced upon this kind
of food as a supplement to better.
Though what consequences would
No. 314. VOL. LIIT.
ensue upon an exclusive diet of sea-
weed I cannot pretend to say. Olaus,
who seemed to be a receptacle for any-
thing eatable, having disposed of many
yards of seaweed, began upon the
mussels and other shell-fish which
incrusted the rocks of the bird-island,
and we left him at his dessert, in
search of nests.
The Holm, as they called it, was
hard to walk upon, being composed of
irregular heaps of rock overgrown
with long rank grass, in which the
common sea - birds laid their eggs.
Though it was very late in the season,
these eggs were under our feet wher-
ever we trod, and many a promising
brood was perforce destroyed. As for
the more valuable eider broods, these
were provided with thatched houses,
into which we crept carefully, blocking
the aperture so as to leave the female
bird no chance of escape. And thus we
saw several interesting families in the
straw side by side. The female is a
rich glossy slate and bronze colour,
somewhat larger than our common
duck. Ordinarily there were four eggs
in each nest. Some, however, were
hatched, and the delicate young birds
fluttered hither and thither in their
excitement. Not one of the more
resplendent male birds was at home ;
they were doubtless whirling about
over the seaward end of the islet,
screaming their best in company
with thousands of other birds. It is
from the lower part of the neck and
the breast of these precious birds that
the down is plucked. And it was
from this rock that the bonder derived
his revenue of a couple of pounds
sterling, as the value of the two
pounds weight of down which he had
been able to accumulate in the year.
I asked if the common tern's eggs
were good to eat, when, to my dis-
tress, I had crushed three at one step :
and Olaus Jackson, who had rejoined
us after his surfeit of shell-fish,
for answer bade me watch him. The
monster hereupon broke egg after egg
upon his teeth, and tipped the hapless
contents down his red throat, seem-
ingly quite callous whether the eggs
1:30
A Walk in the Faroes.
were good or bad, in an early or a late
stage of incubation. But he was
summarily stopped by the younger boy,
who looked disgusted, and wrathfully
told him in Faroese that he was com-
mitting an illegal as well as a hide-
ously greedy action ; the eggs were
protected by Faroe law unless they
were bad. I do not quite know what
Olaus said in reply but I gathered
from the boy that he pleaded in ex-
tenuation the peculiar flavour of most
of those he had eaten. Personally,
from what I had seen of him, I could
believe the man capable of eating a
bad egg rather than nothing at all.
But it was time for me to be eating
on my own account ; not that the day
was darkening, for in Faroe latitudes
the sun in summer hardly goes below
the horizon at the end of the day.
Rain was to be feared, however, and
a thickening of the clouds on the hills.
The bonder would not join me at my
meal ; the laws of hospitality forbade
such presumption. And, much as I
should have liked his company, I did
not press it. All the members of the
family were present while I ate. They
took a quiet unobtrusive interest in
my movements, and talked only when
addressed. Again I was waited on by
the ladies with cheerful zeal ; and this
was the only embarrassing part of the
meal to myself. The spoons here, as
in most Faroe farmhouses, were of
silver, heavy and old. Lastly, coffee
and cigars were brought forward, and
a reluctant permission to start was
accorded me. Had I been willing to
stay, they would have welcomed me.
The guest room, opening from the
drawing-room, was shown to tempt
me ; but it was as nothing compared
with their own honest hospitable dis-
positions. To crown his kindness, the
bonder offered me a horse for the
return journey. It was a little animal
of the Faroe breed, such as the dealers
buy in the isles for three to four sove-
reigns apiece ; but it was surefooted
and strong. Then, one after the other,
these friends of a day said " Farvel"
almost tremulously, and squeezed my
hand not even excepting the young
lady, who, in spite of her Copenhagen
piano and finished education, was as
simple of speech and manner as a
peasant's daughter dependent for her
education upon nature alone. Her fair
face was crimson when she said
" Good-bye," and her eyes looked down
modestly ; but she gripped my hand as
tightly as a boy. Verily, I could not
help feeling sad when I rejoined the
lumpish Olaus, and thought that in all
human probability I should never see
these true gentlefolk again.
We made the first mile or so of our
return climb in silence. Olaus seemed
sulky, and panted as if troubled by
his digestion ; while the sharp rock
of Kolter Island, five miles across the
now glittering sea, enchained my eyes,
though not my thought. A little
higher, and we were plunged to the
neck into the inevitable fog. But,
before taking the step, I looked back
at Kirkeboe, now a green space no
larger than a handkerchief on the
level between the mountains and the
sea, with its white church no bigger
than a common nut ; and the sight
warmed my heart. Then, for two
weary hours, we waded through a mist
' that hung our beards with dewdrops,
and made us limp to the bones.
No sooner were we in the chief street
of Thorshavn than my man straight-
ened himself up, and tried to renew
the deportment of the morning. But
something made him abruptly throw
aside all his assumption of importance.
" Farvel" he said, with sudden
energy, holding out his hand, and his
eye was bright.
"Why! what is the matter?" I
asked. "You may as well come on!
Why not?"
"Because," said Olaus, with deci-
sion, though his lip quivered, " it is
supper- time. Farvel."
And away he sprang towards his
own house, soon breaking into a
gentle trot, which, ere I lost him, had
developed into a tearing gallop of
impatience.
131
THE DEATH OF AMY ROBSART.
IT has always been a vexed question
how far poets and romance-writers
should be permitted to work the
course of history to their own will ;
and it is inevitable that it should be
so. It is impossible to deliver the
law on any point which must, after
all, depend mainly on personal notions
of reason and propriety, even in those
rare cases where two persons are found
to agree on the truth of history itself.
Yet the question, like so many much-
debated questions, has its simple side
or what at least may seem so to minds
not too stubbornly set on finding diffi-
culties. It has one particularly simple
side, which indeed seems to offer the
very last word to those comfortable
souls who are averse to considering too
curiously on any matter. When 'Old
Mortality' was first published there
arose much discussion on the author's
treatment of the two parties, the Cava-
liers and the Puritans : especially in
Scotland it was thought altogether
intolerable that the " bloody Claver'se"
of a legend still so firmly believed
should be presented as a mirror of
chivalry. All this seemed to Jeffrey
very much of a storm in a tea-cup. " It
is," he wrote, 1 " a singular honour, no
doubt, to a work of fiction and amuse-
ment to be thus made the theme of
serious attack and defence upon points
of historical and theological discussion;
and to have grave dissertations written
by learned contemporaries upon the
accuracy of its representations of pub-
lic events and characters. It is diffi-
cult for us, we confess, to view the
matter in so serious a light." We
must for our part own to being very
much on the side of Jeffrey, holding
that in a professed work of fiction the
license of the author should be in pro-
portion to his .capacity of using it for
1 'Edinburgh Review,' March, 1817.
our amusement. However, we do not
propose to intrude our own views, still
less to attempt to make converts to
them ; being very well aware how
extremely unpopular and altogether
absurd they must seem to so eager,
curious, and, above all, so exact an
age as this. There is, however,
another view which we shall offer
with less diffidence ; a simple view,
too, and, as it seems to us, based
upon good sense. It is, at any rate,
the view of a man entitled to be
heard on any question of literature
some will say especially on any
question of romantic literature. It
is the view of Macaulay, and may
be seen in a passage of his journal
quoted by Mr. Trevelyan. 2 He
had been reading Schiller's 'Joan of
Arc/ and had closed the book in a
characteristic tempest of indigna-
tion with the last act. " Absurd be-
yond description," he calls it ; and
then he goes on : " The monstrous
violation of history which everybody
knows is not to be defended. Schiller
might just as well have made Wallen-
stein dethrone the Emperor, and reign
himself over Germany or Mary be-
come Queen of England, and cut off
Elizabeth's head, as make Joan fall
in the moment of victory." The pre-
sent is not perhaps the most con-
venient time for putting Macaulay
in the witness-box. He is not in
fashion ; but fashions do not last. An
epoch of change such as, we hear pro-
claimed, triumphantly or otherwise,
on every side, we are now passing
through, "is often followed by an epoch
of restoration ; and as the frequent
attempts which, despite Mr. Bagehot's
warning, 3 have in recent times been
2 'Life and Letters of Lord Macanlay,'
ch. xii.
3 Ibid. ch. xi.
K 2
132
The Death of Amy Robsart.
made to re-write Macaulay have not
been uniformly successful, it is quite
within the bounds of possibility that
another generation may see fit to re-
verse the decision of this. At any rate
in this particular instance Macaulay's
verdict is perhaps as satisfactory, cer-
tainly as clear as any we are likely to
get. It may be said to represent the
common-sense of the question ; and
though common-sense is itself perhaps
in no very great favour to-day, it
affords at least a good point to start
from.
Let us assume then, that the poet
or romance- writer, when working with
historic materials, times, characters,
or scenes, unfamiliar, doubtful, or
unimportant, may put them to such
uses as his fancy or convenience may
dictate. "Where his materials are such
as everybody, even historians them-
selves, are agreed upon, he must range
himself with " everybody." Starting
with this assumption, we propose to
inquire what really is the sum of
the grave offences against history Sir
Walter Scott has been accused of
committing in his novel of ' Kenil-
worth.' There is, probably, by this
time a pretty general impression that
all is not as it should be in that
enchanting tale. But the impres-
sion does not seem to be a very
clear one, even among those who
have been most strenuous to put
Sir Walter wrong. Our inquiry is
not inspired by any great motives.
We are influenced by no abstract love
of truth or justice. We have no super-
stitious reverence for the awful muse
of history. Our motive is in truth
no higher one than curiosity, the idle
motive of an empty day ; and espe-
cially a curiosity to see how these
antiquarians work. Your thorough-
going antiquarian is in the very nature
of things a terrible iconoclast. Now
iconoclasm is an intoxicating pastime ;
when once the spirit of battle is up,
few of its professors are cool enough
to see or care on whose head the
swashing blow falls, or what it breaks,
or to keep in mind the particular
purpose of the fray. Backwards and
forwards it rocks, like that famous
fight over the dead consul
" Till none could see Valerius,
And none wist where lie lay."
" Captain or colonel, or knight in
arms," down they all go : every-
thing that stands in the way of
these furious searchers after truth
must go, animate or inanimate, prince
or peasant, cathedral or cottage. And
the present age is one particularly
favourable to this free fighting. It is
not only an epoch of change, but also
an epoch of dissolution. The old
shrines must not only be dismantled,
they must be pulled down ; the old
idols not only discrowned, they must
be broken up. If we cannot create,
we can at least destroy. A Mahomet
is not born every day, but we can all
of us be Omars ; we can all help to
burn the libraries. Perhaps not all
of this great work of destruction is of
such importance as its votaries assume.
However, it is, of course, a serious
affair to fasten a charge of murder on
an innocent man, even in fiction.
So we have been minded to see for
ourselves how far Sir Walter is really
guilty of this grave offence ; what
it is the antiquarians have really
discovered in short, after a second-
hand fashion to play the antiquarian
ourselves. We do not, indeed, for a
moment profess to have made any
discoveries of our own ; our present
business is merely to sift the discoveries
of others.
But before setting to work let us,
as briefly as may be, review the rank
of Sir Walter's accusers, and the sum
of their charges against him. In the
year of the publication of the novel,
that is in 1821, the errors in Lady
Dudley's biography were duly set forth
in the ' Quarterly Review,' and pos-
sibly in other places unknown to us.
But it is clear that at the time, and for
many years afterwards, there was no
suspicion that any offence against the
good fame of Leicester, Yarney, or
Forster had been committed. The
Tke Death of Amy Robsart.
133
tradition that the Earl of Leicester's
first wife had been done to death at
Cumnor Hall by foul means to which
he was privy, if he had not literally
ordered them, had been common pro-
perty ever since the Earl's own day.
It seems to have been in 1848 that the
truth of this tradition was first seriously
questioned. In that year Lord Bray-
brook e published the third edition of
Pepys's ' Diary,'and the late Mr. George
Lillie Craik, the first volume of his ' Ro-
mance of the Peerage.' Both these
books contained a correspondence then
lately discovered in the Pepysian
Library at Cambridge, between Lei-
cester, or Lord Robert Dudley as he
then was, and his cousin Sir Thomas
Blount. The letters are not originals,
but copies made, it has been assumed
from the handwriting, some twenty
years or so after the events they
report. Lord Braybrooke contented
himself with merely printing the cor-
respondence ; but Mr. Craik went
farther, as was indeed his business.
He pointed out how much, or, as it
would be more true to say, how little,
these letters really proved. He also
pointed out, and, so far as we know,
was the first to do so, that Ashmole's
version of the affair, on which Sir
Walter had based his tale, was really
no more than a copy of a notorious
contemporary publication known as
'Leycester's Commonwealth.'
In 1850 Mr. Bartlett, of Abingdon,
published his ' Historical and Descrip-
tive Account of Cumnor Place.' In it,
together with much curious archaeo-
logical matter, he amplified Mr. Craik' s
statements; and added some particulars
of Anthony Forster, whom he showed
to have been, at any rate intellectual-
ly and socially, a different man from
the boorish ruffian of ' Kenil worth.'
Neither he nor Mr. Craik can be
called accusers of Sir Walter. They
did their spiriting gently and reve-
rently ; above all, they confined them-
selves solely to facts. By their fol-
lowers, who have practically been able
to add little to the sum of their actual
knowledge, they are barely mentioned.
Perhaps, because they were not
" thorough " enough to satisfy those
Fifth-Monarchy men ; because, unlike
Butcher Harrison, they " did the work
negligently." But, in truth, your
red-hot antiquarian is never very
prompt to acknowledge his debts.
In 1859 the late Mr. Pettigrew, vice-
president of the British Archaeological
Association, published a pamphlet,
called * An Inquiry into the Particu-
lars connected with the Death of Amy
Robsart (Lady Dudley),' l which he had
previously read at the meeting of the
Society at New bury in the same year.
A more voluminous work, ' Amye Rob-
sart and the Earl of Leycester,' followed
in 1870 from Mr. Adlard, an American
gentleman. Six years later, that is
in 1876, Canon Jackson read a paper
on the same subject at the meeting of
the Wiltshire Archaeological Society at
Salisbury. This paper was privately
printed in the following year, and sub-
sequently incorporated in an article
published in the 'Nineteenth Century '
Magazine, for March, 1882.
Only one voice, has been heard on
the other side, but that is no feeble
one. A short while ago Mr. Walter
Rye, known for his researches in the
history of Norfolk, published a pamph-
let, 'The Murder of Amy Robsart,'
which he defiantly styles, "A Brief
for the Prosecution." He has intro-
duced too much unsavoury and irrele-
vant scandal about Queen Elizabeth ;
but he has also recapitulated with great
clearness and precision the charge
against Leicester; he has broken
down much of the evidence on the
other side ; and if his new points for the
prosecution are not always of paramount
importance, he has at least reminded
the jury of much which his opponents
have naturally done their best to put
by or to ignore. If Sir Walter wanted
a counsel, he need wish for no better
one than Mr. Rye.
Let us now take the points in the
story on which Sir Walter has been
1 Lady, or Dame, Dudley, in the style of
the day, not Lady Robert Dudley as we should
say now.
134
The Death of Amy Rolsart.
proved wrong. Amy's father was not
Sir Hugh Robsart, of Devonshire, but
Sir John Robsart, of Norfolk. She did
not steal from her home to marry
Dudley privately ; she was married to
him publicly at Sheen, in Surrey, on
the fourth of June, 1550. It is known
from the Privy Council Records that
she visited him when he was a prisoner
in the Tower, for his share in the at-
tempt to put his brother's wife, Lady
Jane Grey, on the throne. A letter, pre-
served in the Harleian manuscripts,
written by her to Mr. Flowerdew, the
agent of a Norfolk sheep-farm that
she had brought her husband, shows
her to have been living some time be-
tween 1557 and 1559, at the house of
one Mr. Hyde, at Denchworth, about
four miles from Cumnor. Therefore,
her married life was not the involun-
tary seclusion of the novel, though
she certainly seems to have had but
little of her husband's company. She
was never Countess of Leicester, and
she never was at Kenilworth. The
Queen gave Kenilworth to Lord Robert
Dudley, in June 1563 ; and in Sep-
tember of the same year created him
Earl of Leicester. Lady Dudley was
not found dead in a cellar, but lying
at the foot of a staircase leading down
into the hall. Her father had died
some years previously, shortly after her
marriage. Neither was the skeleton
of Anthony Forster found lying across
his money-bags in a secret chamber. It
is not known precisely where he died,
but he was buried on the tenth of
November, 1572, in Cumnor church, in
a sumptuous marble tomb, which stands
to this day. On that tomb are in-
scribed the names of his five children,
but among them the name of Janet
does not appear. It is also known that
he stood much higher in the social
scale than he stands in the novel.
This is the sum total of Sir Walter's
proved blenches from the straight path
of history. We will now turn to
those other and more serious offences
he is alleged to have committed. They
may be very briefly stated : firstly,
there is absolutely no proof that Lady
Dudley was murdered ; secondly, if
she was murdered, there is absolutely
no proof that Dudley, Forster, or
Varney were in any way accessories,
either before or after the fact ; thirdly,
there is every possible reason for dis-
believing them to have been so. As
Canon Jackson is the latest accuser,
and as his plaint embraces the whole
story begun by Mr. Craik and con-
tinued by Messieurs Bartlett, Petti-
grew, and Adlard, we will confine our
examination in chief to him.
But we must first spare a word or
two on a mistake of his we will not
call it but a slight confusion of ideas.
It is not only against the novel that he
takes up his parable, but against the
" several kinds of public spectacles "
emanating from the novel. "There
was," he says, "the melodrama of
'Amy Robsart ' performed for a whole
season before thousands upon thou-
sands." This melodrama the good Canon
cannot away with, and particularly
the part it assigned to Varney, who
seems indeed to have been modelled
on the good old pattern of theatrical
villainy. " It must," he says, " be ex-
quisitely ridiculous to any person
knowing the truth to sit and see such
nonsense. An archaeologist, looking
round upon the spectators, would sigh
with pity for the hundreds of simple
folk who watch the proceedings with
the deepest interest, not having the
slightest idea that they are gulled and
misled by the whole representation."
Well, the archaeologist has his revenge
now. It is he who " gulls " and " mis-
leads " the " simple folk " to-day by
the anachronisms and other absur-
dities he persuades ignorant managers
to perpetrate in their so-called Shake-
spearean revivals, and other historical
spectacles. This, however, is beside
the present question. What we desire
with submission to point out to Canon
Jackson is, that Sir Walter cannot in
reason be held to blame for the catch-
penny theatrical imitations of his work.
Would any sane person venture
maintain that Shakespeare was respoi
ible for the monstrous travesties
The Death of Amy Robsart.
135
his work that strut across the stage
to-day 9
" It must be exquisitely ridiculous,"
says Canon Jackson, " to any person
knowing the truth to sit and see such
nonsense." Let us see then what is
the truth ; not the conjecture or the
inference, the possibility or proba-
bility, but the truth, the literal
matter-of-fact. And first of Forster
and Yarney.
We may presume the story of
' Kenilworth ' to be generally familiar
to our readers ; and as the preface to
all editions of the novel likely to have
come into their hands contains the
passage from Ashmole's 'Antiquities
of Berkshire ' l which Sir Walter took
for his authority, we need not quote
it here. It must, however, be remem-
bered, that all the rest of Ashmole's
narrative, the hasty burial, the ex-
humation and inquest at the father's
insistance, and the subsequent re-burial
in Oxford ; has no place in ' Kenil-
worth.' All we are concerned with is
Sir Walter's alleged offence in giving
countenance to a shameless libel im-
plicating three honourable men in a
murder that never was committed.
That Ashmole though it would
be more strictly archaeological to say
Ashmole's editor, it will be more con-
venient to say Ashmole, and we must
trust that the shade of that learned
herald will pardon us that Ashmole
took this story from ' Leycester's Com-
monwealth,' was, as we have said, first
shown by Mr. Craik, and in Mr.
Pettigrew's pamphlet the passages
he borrowed are printed. The re-
semblance is certainly very close,
being in parts indeed no other than
a literal transcript. ' Leycester's Com-
monwealth' was a famous book in
its day. It was printed abroad, and
1 According to Lysons' ' History of Berk-
shire, '(Ellas Ashmole, "that industrious herald
and antiquary," is not really responsible for
this work. It was published after his death,
and all of his own hand contained in it is the
church notes copied from those deposited by
him in the Herald's College. All else was
contributed by the Editor. Mr. Adlard has
called attention to this.
the copies sent bound into England
with the outside of the leaves coloured
green, whence it was popularly known
as "Father Parson's Green Coat."
The first edition bears the date 1584.
The notorious Jesuit, Robert Parsons,
has always been credited with the
work, but there was a strong sus-
picion at the time that Cecil had a
hand in it. In this suspicion Mr. Rye
is much inclined to agree. It is
certain, as he says, that Cecil was
no friend to Leicester ; and it is
at least a curious coincidence that
in the ' Commonwealth ' reference is
made to Sir Nicholas Throckmor-
ton's report of a rumour current
in Paris that " the Queen of England
had a meaning to marry her Horse-
keeper." This report was made
in a private letter to Cecil ! The
authorship of the book is, however,
of no very great moment. There is the
book itself, plain enough: and it can
be no less plain to any one who reads
the history of the time that it does no
more than repeat the current scandal
about Leicester. A gross and shame-
less libel it may be ; written it may be
by an unscrupulous man who had every
motive to injure and discredit the
professed champion of the Protestant
cause ; but it is more certain than
anything else in this wretched business
that * Leycester's Commonwealth ' only
put into shape the floating stories
against Leicester's good fame. AD
answer was sent out by Sir Philip
Sydney, framed in hot haste at the
moment, but never printed till the
publication of the ' Sydney Papers '
in 1746. Mr. Adlard calls it " a very
able answer to the 'Commonwealth,'
and refutation of the statements
made therein." It is neither one
nor the other. Sydney was Dudley's
nephew, and the paper is precisely
such as a chivalrous man, who
hated to hear ill of any one,
would write of a defamed kinsman.
It is vague, confused, warm-hearted,
and somewhat hot-headed; a gene-
ral disclaimer of all reports against
Dudley's good name, partly, indeed,
136
The Death of Amy Robsart.
based on the excellent qualities of his
lineage ; a particular refutation of
none. It proves nothing ; it dis-
proves nothing ; and it never even
mentions the Cumnor scandal by name.
Of Forster and Varney there is no
other mention in the book, and Petti-
grew, writing in 1859, is obliged to
own that of the latter he " can ascer-
tain no particulars." But Canon
Jackson, as we have seen, "knows
the truth." What then is the truth
he knows? Mr. Adlard had already
published two letters ^which he had
discovered in the Lansdowne manu-
scripts at the British Museum, from
Leicester to Cecil, about the lands of
a certain " young Varney," grandson
of a Sir Richard Yarney (or Verney), 1
who was sheriff of Warwickshire in
1562, and died in 1567. To these
Canon Jackson has added a letter,
found among the papers at Longleat,
dated from Warwick, the twentieth
of April, 1560, addressed "To the
Bt. honourable and my verry good
lorde, the lorde Bobert Dudley, Mr. of
the horses to the Quene's Majestie at
Court," and signed " Bichard Yerney."
The letter itself is of no matter, re-
ferring merely to the loss of some
hawks of Dudley's by the carelessness
of one of the writer's servants. But
the seal is the thing : like Constantino,
the Canon cries, In hoc signo vincam.
The device of this seal is an antelope,
and at the end of the animal's tail is
what the Canon calls "a tripartite
finish, something like a fleur-de-lis."
Antelopes thus adorned support,
he says, the coat of arms borne
by the Yerneys of Compton Yerney
in Warwickshire, whereof the present
Lord Willoughby de Broke is the
head. Consequently this Bichard
Yerney must have been a member
of that family. As a matter of fact,
the Willoughbys and Yerneys, of
Compton Murdac, not Compton Yer-
ney, did not intermarry till the next
century. This is, of course, neither
here nor there ; only, an antiquarian
1 The name, as was the fashion of the day,
was spelt in all manner of different ways.
is clearly nothing if not accurate.
However, we will allow that the
Bichard Yerney who wrote to Dudley
about some hawks was a perfectly
reputable and blameless gentleman.
And indeed, as the Canon quotes,
though without specifying his autho-
rity, a letter from Sir Ambrose Cave,
member of Parliament for Warwick-
shire, recommending Sir Bichard
Yarney to Dudley as a commissioner
for that county, we may fairly assume
him to have been a personage of some
note. But contemporary with this im-
maculate knight was another Bichard
Yarney. There was a well-known
Buckinghamshire family of that name 2
connected with the Dudleys by mar-
riage and also by misfortunes. Sir
Balph Yarney had, with other chil-
dren, three sons, Edmund, Francis, and
Bichard. Edmund and Francis had
both been concerned in Sir Henry
Dudley's conspiracy of 1556. Francis
had been Elizabeth's servant when
she was in confinement at Wood-
stock, had been accused of tampering
with a letter, and, according to Mr.
Bye, had about as bad a name as any
young gentleman of that day. Of
Bichard nothing is certainly known;
but in 1572, five years after the death
of Canon Jackson's good knight, a
Bichard Yarney was appointed to the
marshal ship of the Bench for life.
He died in November, 1575 ; on the
fifteenth of the month Leicester wrote
to beg Shrewsbury not to fill up the
place "void by the death of Mr.
Yarney."
Let us now see what is the sum of
this truth Canon Jackson claims to
know. He knows that in 1559 Sir
Ambrose Cave wrote a letter to
Dudley recommending a Sir Bichard
Yerney as a commissioner for the
county of Warwick, and that in 1560
a Bichard Yerney wrote a letter to
Dudley about some hawks, which
letter was sealed with the device now
2 Sir Harry Verney, of Clay don, is the
present head of this family, but not by direct
descent. See the ' Verney Papers ' in the Cam-
den Society, and Mr. Eye's pamphlet.
The Death of Amy Robsart.
137
borne by the Yerneys of Compton Ver-
riey in Warwickshire. That is what he
knows. What he does not know, or
did not when he composed his pamph-
let, is, that there was at the same
time another Richard Yerney, one of
a family of brothers of notoriously
bad character, connected with Dudley
by marriage, and in some way or an-
other concerned in his affairs. Canon
Jackson says the first Richard, of
Warwickshire, is the man whose me-
mory Sir Walter has defamed. Mr.
Rye thinks the other Richard, of
Buckinghamshire, is the man impli-
cated by the author of * Leycester's
Commonwealth ' in Lady Dudley's
death. There is not a tittle of proof
either way.
When we come to Anthony Forster
we get on firmer ground. We really
know something about him. Possibly
it is this comparative fulness of know-
ledge that has so confused Canon
Jackson as to cause him on the same
page to place Forster's death in 1569
and his election as member of parlia-
ment for Abingdon in 1572. 1 Anthony
came of a respectable Shropshire
family. His wife was Anne, daughter
of Reginald Williams, of Burghfield in
Berkshire, the eldest brother of Lord
Williams of Thame, Mary's Lord
Chamberlain. He held Cumnor Place
as tenant of Doctor Owen, one of
Elizabeth's physicians, whose wife
was present in the house at the time
of Lady Dudley's death. In the
following year, 1561, he bought the
place from his landlord. In 1570 he
was returned to parliament as member
for Abingdon. In 1572 he died, and
was, as has been already said, buried
in Cumnor church. His tomb, an
elaborate structure, is adorned with
a long Latin epitaph, in which he is
described as wise, eloquent, just, and
charitable, learned in classic literature,
in music, architecture, and botany ; in
short, as a man possessed of every
virtue and every accomplishment. 2
1 See Mr. Rye's pamphlet, and the ' Nine-
teenth Century' Magazine for March, 1882.
2 See Mr. Pettigrew's 'Inquiry.'
Moreover, he was, according to Canon
Jackson, "highly esteemed as a most
honest gentleman by his neighbours
at Abingdon," and " was sometimes
sent for by the University of Oxford
to assist in settling matters of contro-
versy." But it happens that in the
correspondence between Blount and
Dudley, which is the witness for
"the most honest gentleman," there
is also, though the Canon seems
to have forgotten it, a particular
allusion to Forster's unpopularity
with his neighbours. Some of the
jury, Blount says, are " verie
enemies to Anthony Fforster " ; and
again he assures Dudley they are
certain to be careful in their inquiry,
but, " whether equitie is the cause or
mallice to Fforster do forbyd it, I
knowe not." As for his great repute
at the University, the sole instance of
his connection with it is that his
name appears as a companion of
Henry Norris of Wytham, when the
latter went, in 1562, to demand
admission for Doctor Man, when the
Catholic members of Merton College
had shut the gates against their new
Warden ; 3 which proves, if it prove
nothing else, that he had abjured
the faith of his fathers, and become,
in all outward seeming at any rate,
a zealous Protestant. That Forster
was in some way a dependent of Dud-
ley's is clear from a letter, found
at Longleat, in which the latter gives
the former orders concerning the pre-
parations at Kenilworth for a visit
from Sir Nicholas Bacon, Lord Keeper
of the Great Seal, signing himself,
" Your loving master," and addressing
the letter to "my loving servant."
3 This is the Man who was sent as ambas-
sador to Madrid, in return for Don Guzman da
Silva's appointment to London. "Of which
ambassadors," Anthony "Wood tells us, "Queen
Elizabeth used merrily to say, that as her
brother the King of Spain had sent to her a
Goos-man, so she had sent to him a Man-
goose." Man's subsequent conduct seems rather
to have justified the royal jest. See Wood's
'AthenseOxonienses,' i. 367 (ed. 1813), and his
' History and Antiquities of the University of
Oxford,' i. 285 a ; also Mr. Froude's ' History,'
ix. 327.
138
The Death of Amy Robsart.
Also in a sarcastic paper on Leices-
ter's qualifications to be the Queen's
husband, Cecil notes, as a point in his
favour, that he would enhance his
particular friends to wealth and office,
naming Forster and Appleyard as
instances. 1
Thus, separating the literal facts
which history furnishes concerning Var-
ney and Forster from the conjectures
which, probable or otherwise, the an-
tiquaries after their fashion would
insist on our taking with equal serious-
ness, how little appears our real know-
ledge ! How certain also is it that our
knowledge does not include a single
proved fact which precludes the possi-
bility of Yarney's and Forster's com-
plicity in the death of their patron's
wife. With the balance of conjecture
we are not concerned. It has, we
say again, no place in our present
inquiry.
Let us now turn to the circumstances
of Lady Dudley's death, so far as they
are really known.
The date when the lady took up her
residence at Cumnor cannot be fixed,
but it cannot well have been before
1560. Canon Jackson has made a
great point of a paper found at
Longleat from her to her tailor. It
shows, he says, that she was " liberally
supplied with the finery of the day,"
that there is at least " no sign of
parsimony in her apparel," this last
piece of evidence being considered by
him so important as to deserve the
distinction of italics. But who has
said anything to the contrary 1 Cer-
tainly not Sir Walter, as his novel
stands most strenuously to testify.
This, however, is beside the question.
The whole business is, indeed, overlaid
with so very much that is beside the
question, that it is extremely difficult,
even with the best intentions, to keep
always clear of the pitfalls that beset
our laborious steps.
Elizabeth came to the throne in
November, 1558. Early in the next
1 See Mr. Fronde's ' History,' vii. 283 note,
and Mr. Rye's pamphlet, both referring to the
Hatfield Manuscripts.
year rumours were abroad that she
was likely to marry Robert Dudley,
whenever his wife's death should leave
him free for a second marriage.
In May, 1559, De Feria, the Spanish
minister in England, wrote to Philip,
that he hears the Queen " is enamoured
of my Lord Robert Dudley, and will
never let him leave her side. ... It
is even reported that his wife has a
cancer on the breast, and that the
Queen waits only till she die to marry
him." Dudley had then been married
to Amy Robsart nearly nine years,
but no children had been born of the
marriage. It is vain work trying to
guess Elizabeth's real feelings, nor are
we concerned with them. All that is
certain, and all that is necessary for
us to bear in mind, is, that from the
time of the Queen's accession to the
time of Lady Dudley's death, it was
common talk, both in England and
on the continent, that Lord Robert
Dudley was one day to be the husband
of the Queen of England. On the
eleventh of September, 1560, De
Quadra, then Spanish ambassador in
London, sent off to the Duchess of
Parma at Brussels a long account of a
conversation he had held on the third
of the month with Cecil. The secre-
tary, who was then disgraced, owing,
it was supposed, to Dudley's influence,
after lamenting the Queen's folly and
the injury she was doing to herself
and the realm, said that " they were
thinking of destroying Lord Robert's
wife. They had given out that she
was ill ; but she was not ill at all ; she
was very well, and taking care not to
be poisoned." The next day, that is
on the fourth of September, four
days before Lady Dudley's death, the
Queen told the ambassador " that
Lord Robert's wife was dead or nearly
so, and begged me to say nothing about
it. Assuredly it is a matter full of
shame and infamy." And the letter
concludes with a paragraph evidently
penned in haste at the last moment :
" Since this was written the death of
Lord Robert's wife has been given out
publicly. The Queen said in Italian,
The Death of Amy Robsart.
139
' Que si ha rotto il collo.' It seems
that she fell down a staircase." x
Dudley was then with the court at
Windsor. The news of his wife's
death was not generally known till
the eleventh of September; but it is
clear from his first letter to Blount,
that on the ninth he was aware that
something had happened at Cumnor.
He at once sent off Blount to inquire ;
but while Biount was still on the road,
the news arrived at Windsor by a mes-
senger named Bowes. Dudley remained
quietly at Windsor, contenting himself
with sending a letter after Blount, to
the effect that he had learnt of his
wife's death " by a fall from a pair
of stayres," and praying his cousin
earnestly to do all that he can to sift
the matter to the bottom, and to. see
that the coroner and the jury did their
part likewise, " honorablie and duelie
by all manner of examynacions." He
said also that he had sent " for my
brother Appleyarde, because he is her
brother." Then Blount tells his tale.
He had stayed his journey at Abing-
don, to hear what the folk said. The
landlord of his inn was discreet. He
allowed that some people were dis-
posed to say evil of the matter, but for
his own part he would say no more
than that it was a misfortune, because
it had happened in Forster's house,
and he had a good opinion of Forster.
Next he reports a conversation with
Pinto, Lady Dudley's maid. Pinto was
vague, as is the wont of her class. She
said she thought it " verie chance,
and neither done by man nor by her-
self ; " then owned that she had often
heard her lady pray to God to deliver
her from desperation ; and finally said
that she meant to imply nothing. The
most important, however, of Blount's
news is that the servants had all been
sent off to Abingdon fair early on the
fatal day Sunday, the eighth of Sep-
tember by Lady Dudley's own orders,
leaving her alone with Mrs. Odingsell,
a daughter of the Hyde whose seat in
parliament Forster succeeded to, and
1 See Mr. Froude's 'History,' vii. 277-81,
also a note, p. 290 on the Simancas Manuscripts.
Mrs. Owen, wife of Forster's landlord.
Of Forster and his wife there is no word.
The servants returned in the evening,
to find their mistress lying dead in the
hall. Nothing more is known. Of Mrs.
Odingsell's evidence, or Mrs. Owen's,
we have no record. There is no re-
port of the proceedings at the inquest,
nor of the verdict. The only autho-
rity for the former is the correspond-
ence between Dudley and Blount;
we know, from various sources, that
the latter, after a long and uneasy
inquiry, was one of accidental death ;
and that the public were not at all
satisfied with the result. One or
two other things have, however, to
be noted. Mention has been made
of one Appleyard, sent by Dudley to
attend the inquest. John Appleyard
was Amy's half brother. He was
concerned in some way with the Dud-
leys in the affair of Lady Jane Grey,
after which he disappears till he turns
up again at Cumnor. Seven years
after the inquest, when the old rumour
of the Queen's marriage with Dudley
blazed out again, people began to
revive the Cumnor scandal. Blount
and Appleyard were both summoned
before the Council, and notes of the
latter's examination exist among the
Hatfield manuscripts in Cecil's own
handwriting. From these it appears
that one of the witnesses swore that,
" bringing answer from the Earl of
Leicester to Appleyard that he could
not help him in his requests as he
desired, Appleyard used words of
anger, and said amongst other things
that he had for the Earl's sake
covered the murder of his sister."
Appleyard himself swore that he did
not believe the Earl to be guilty, but
" thought it an easy matter to find out
the offender " ; he further swore that
he had often pressed Dudley to let
him take the matter up, but had been
always refused on the ground that
the jury thought otherwise, although
at the time he made his request the
verdict had not been given. Subse-
quently Appleyard, lying in the Fleet
prison, withdrew his words, and pro-
140
The Death of Amy Robsart.
fessed himself satisfied with the ver-
dict, a copy of which had at his own
request been sent to him. Also,
there exists in the same volume of
manuscripts from which the famous
correspondence was extracted, the
fragment of an original letter from
Blount to Dudley referring to this
very examination. In this he much
regrets that they could not have
spoken together first. This letter ap-
pears to be in Blount's own hand-
writing ; it is at any rate in an
earlier handwriting than the other
letters. Mr. Froude thinks it pos-
sible that the latter may be copies
garbled for Blount to take before
the Council. It is certainly pos-
sible, but we are not just now deal-
ing with possibilities. He also says
that if Appleyard spoke truth there is
no more to be said. Canon Jackson
says very triumphantly that Apple-
yard did not speak truth, because of
his recantation, and because of a
letter found at Longleat from Sir
Henry Nevill to Sir John Thynne, in
which Appleyard is said to have con-
fessed before the Star-Chamber that
he had spoken falsely and maliciously.
But Canon Jackson must have read
history somewhat dimly if he does
not know that a man brought before
the Council for speaking ill of a
monarch's favourite was very apt to
change his tone. But again there is
no proof either way. Mr. Froude has
really put the case in a nutshell : "If
Appleyard spoke the truth, there is no
more to be said." For close upon
three hundred years the general
opinion has been that Appleyard did
speak the truth. 1
Here, then, all our real knowledge of
the case ends. That the shadow of his
wife's death, as of so many other evil
deeds, never passed away from Robert
Dudley during his life, every one with
the merest smattering of history knows ;
that it has hung over his memory
since, every one knows. That Messieurs
Pettigrew, Adlard, and Jackson have
1 Mr. Fronde's ' History of England,' vii.
283-9.
removed one jot or tittle of it, every
one capable of distinguishing between
proof and conjecture may, if he choose
to read their evidence, know equally
well. The suspicion may be cruelly
unjust, but that is not the question.
Lady Dudley may have taken her own
life in a fit of despair, or have died by
sheer accident ; but again, that is not
the question. The charge of these
gentlemen all as honourable as Brutus
was, or as they wish to make Leicester
and Forster and Yarney to have been
is that Sir Walter has grossly falsi-
fied history to the prejudice of honest
men. Have they proved their charge ?
That is the question. They have not
proved it in a single instance. They
have not proved that Lady Dudley
was not put out of the way to further
her husband's ambition ; nor that he
was not at least a consenting party ;
nor that Forster and Varney were
not in some way or another partners
in their patron's guilt, Where Sir
Walter went wrong was known long
before any one of them put pen
to paper. Of all their more serious
charges not one has been verified.
They may conjecture, but so might
Sir Walter. Like Lucetta, they may
think it so, because they think it so ;
but so might Sir Walter. He may be
. altogether wrong, but so may they be.
It is a sheer question of fact against
theory. They have piled up tons of
theories to mount up to Sir Walter's
throne, but the little ounce of fact
wanting to shake him down they have
not found. The truth has never come
to light, and in all human probability
now it never will come. Mr. Petti-
grew, it may be, has by this time
learned it. But Mr. Adlard and
Canon Jackson are with us still. Let
us pray them, in all good meaning, to
turn, not to ' Kenil worth ' again, but to
another novel of Sir Walter's ; to turn
to ' The Antiquary,' and from that de-
lightful book to learn once more the
lesson taught on the Kaim of Kin-
prunes to all antiquaries, not to pub-
lish their tracts till they have examined
the thing to the bottom.
141
MRS. DYMOND.
CHAPTER XXXVI.
IN AN EMPTY APARTMENT.
THE house was at the corner of the
boulevard and the Rue Lavoisier, near
the mortuary chapel which Madame
du Pare had once promised to visit
with Susy.
In this strange house, with the
occasional roar and rush in the boule-
vard close at hand, the hours passed
like some strange nightmare ; so slowly,
so long, so stifling in their silent
oppression, that Susy could scarcely
believe that another hour was gone
when the gilt clock struck. The
apartment belonged to unknown people
who had fled hastily, leaving their
clothes and their possessions in confu-
sion ; shoes and papers, packing cases
half packed, a parcel of silver spoons
lying on the table. The linen cup-
boards were open, with the neat
piles disordered and over-turned ; the
clocks were going, but the beds were
not made. At first Susy set to work
straightening, making order in the
confusion, preparing a room for herself,
and another for Jo in caso ho should
arrive. She swept and folded and
put away, and made the rooms ready
for the night. She put by a lady's
smart bonnet, a child's pair of little
boots. Had she been in any mood
to do so, she might have pieced to-
gether the story of those to whom
the home belonged ; but she was
dull, wearied out, only wanting news
of Jo. As Mrs. Dymond worked 011
the time passed ; then, when the work
was done, when she had established
herself in one of the two bedrooms,
when all was straight, and the linen
piled afresh and the doors of the
cupboard closed, though the clocks
still ticked on, time itself seemed to
stop. She was quite alone now, neither
Jo nor Adolphe rejoined her, nor did
Max come as he had promised.
The rest of the house was also
empty ; the concierge was down below
in his lodge, but except for him
no one remained in the sunny tall
building lately so alive, so closely
packed.
" There was one lady still remaining
of all the inhabitants," the concierge
said, " an English lady a dame de
charite, who would not leave her
poor ; but she was gone away for a
day to visit a sick friend."
Susy went down stairs towards
evening to ask if no letter had come
for her. She even went out, at the
porter's suggestion, bareheaded, as
people do in France, and bought some
milk and some food from an adjoining
shop, and then came back to the silent
place.
It was a most terrible experience;
one which seemed so extraordinary
that Mrs. Dymond could hardly believe
that it was not all some dream from
which she would presently awake.
She waited till long past midnight on
her bed, and fell asleep at last ; but
towards four o'clock the sound of the
cannon at Montmartre awoke her, and
she sat up on the bed listening with a
beating heart. There was a crucifix
at the foot of the bed ; in her natural
terror and alarm it seemed to her that
the figure on the crucifix looked up in
the early dawn. There was a picture
beneath the crucifix of a Madonna
with a burning heart. A longing, an
unutterable longing came to poor
Susanna for her own mother Mary's
tender, comforting, loving arms round
her own aching heart surely it was on
fire too. How lonely she felt, how
deserted. Max might have come
142
Mrs. Dymond.
last night, as he promised. It seemed
to Susy that she understood now for
the first time what the secret of Mary
Marney's life had been ; a secret that
Susy herself had learnt so unwillingly,
so passionately, so late in life's experi-
ence. If she had had any one to speak
to, everything might have seemed less
vaguely terrible. As she was listen-
ing with a beating heart came a
sound from without, that of a drum
beating with a measured yet hur-
ried roll ; the rattle came closer and
closer, and finally stopped under her
very window. She started from the
bed and ran and looked out. The
dawn had just touched the opposite
houses, another shutter opened, then
a door creaked, and a man ran out
hastily buttoning his clothes ; then a
second stood in the door-way in shirt-
sleeves, but he did not move. Then
the drum rolled away again, and with
two men only following, passed down
the street to the boulevard. The
sound came fainter and more hopeless.
Then the distant cannon began to boom
again, and some carts with soldiers
galloped by.
Susy stood helplessly looking from
her window. Already the inhabitants
of Paris were awake, and receiving
the sun, as it at last dispelled the
heavy morning fogs, with loud cries of
" Vive la Republique" Drink was
being distributed among the National
Guards assembled in the Place de
I'Hotel de Yille. Many of the bewildered
soldiers, who had been poured into the
town all the preceding days, were look-
ing on and sharing in these festivities.
Others, who had been out all night,
were still wandering about the streets
asking the passers-by where they were
to go for shelter. A band of armed
patriots, crossing the Place de la Con-
corde, were shouting out "A Versailles /"
with the same enthusiasm with which
their predecessors had cried " A Ber-
lin/" a few months before. Others,
whom they met along the road, take
up the cry ; the women assembling in
the streets and doorways were utter-
ing fiercer, vaguer threats of vengeance
against tyrants, against Versailles, and
the police, and, indeed, before many
hours had passed the first of their un-
happy victims was being hunted to his
death along the Rue des Martyrs.
Alas ! he was but the first of the
many who were to follow, and whose
nobler blood was destined to flow upon
those cruel stones.
Reading the papers of those days we
see that an imposing deputation was
preparing to visit the Place de la Bas-
tille, carrying a red Phrygian flag
before it; that the new self-elected
government was gloriously proclaiming
the " Perfect Unity, and Liberty entire
and complete," of which we have al-
ready heard so much ; that the people
of Paris had shaken off the despotism
which had sought to crush it to the
ground. " Calm and impassive in its
force, it was standing (so say Bill-
coray, Varlin, Jourde, Ch. Lullier,
Blanchet, Pougeret, &c., &c.) and in-
contestably proving a patriotism equal
to the height of present circum-
stances."
What were all these echoes to Susy
at her window, looking out with her
heavy anxious heart ? Jo ! Max ! where
were they 1 ? what were they about?
Ah ! would these terrible hours never
She dressed very early, lit a fire,
and prepared a meal with the tin of
milk which she had bought the day
before. It was an unutterable relief
to hear the door-bell ring about eight
o'clock in the morning. She found
the concierge outside bringing up
water from the pump below, and a
note which had been left very early in
the morning before he was up. Susy
tore it open. The note was in Max's
writing ; it had no beginning nor
date, but its news was fresh life to
poor Susy. It was in English. "I
have tidings of Jo. Marney, by good
fortune, heard of him, and sent me
word. He is in custody, and I have
gone after him, and hope to bring
him back safe to you. Meet us to-
day at one o'clock at the Station, by
which you came. Adolphe will come
Mrs. Dymond.
143
and conduct you safely there. M. DU
P."
Susy burst into tears of relief, and
sank into a chair. The concierge
looked on compassionately at la
petite dame as he called her, car-
ried his pails into the kitchen, and
returned on tiptoe, so as to show his
friendly sympathy. How the morning
passed Mrs. Dymond could scarcely
have told ; at twelve o'clock Adolphe
appeared with a porter's knot upon
his strong shoulders to carry her bag
and her parcel of shawls. He had
been vexed to fail her the night before ;
he was coming off when a messenger
from du Pare had met him with a
parcel of letters, which he had been
obliged to deliver. He had been about
till one o'clock at night. " It was a
real corvee" said Adolphe.
" But it was apparently in your
service, madame," said he, politely.
" It is necessary in these days to make
one's plans beforehand, and if people
won't agree to reason, you must use
a little compulsion."
Susy did not understand very well
what he was saying. She walked by
his side, questioning him about Max
and Jo. He could tell her very little,
except that du Pare had sent him
on these errands. As they were walk-
ing along, side by side, suddenly a
quiet-looking woman in a white cap
and black dress crossed the street, and
came up and caught Susy by the hand.
" Oh ! " she said, " why do you stay
here? You are English. What do
you do here? It is not your home.
Go home, go home ; you don't know
what dangers are about you here."
Then she pushed Susy, and hurried on
wildly.
" Curious woman," says Adolphe,
imperturbably. " She is not so far
wrong. Come, madame, we must not
be too late. There don't seem to be
many people left anywhere," he said,
looking about him.
" How strangely empty the streets
are," said Mrs. Dymond. "The rail-
way place is quite deserted, and the
station, too, looks shut."
CHAPTER XXXVII.
AT THE TERMINUS.
THE station was shut, the doors and
windows seemed closely barred, but
as they looked they saw a side-door
which was held cautiously ajar.
Adolphe kicked with his foot, and in
a minute they were let in. . . Within
was a strange scene of crowded con-
fusion and excitement baggage in
piles, people in groups clinging toge-
ther, women wringing their hands and
weeping, men gesticulating. In one
of the waiting-rooms there was a
crowd round a wounded man, in
another a woman in hysterics.
" Did you see nothing ? " cried half
a dozen voices as Susy entered, follow-
ing Adolphe.
" We saw nothing at all ; we met
nobody anywhere," said he. "What is
the matter with you all? "
Then they were told by a dozen voices
of a fight which had taken place only
a few minutes before in the open
place outside the station. Some of the
Federal prisoners were being brought
up to the station to be taken to
Versailles to be judged. It was a
grave affair. They were accused of
participation in the murder of the
generals. The Federals had made a
desperate attempt to deliver their
men from the hands of the escort.
The escort had driven off the attack,
and fought its way into the station.
The prisoners were all now safely
shut up in the railway carriages and
doubly guarded ; the Federals had re-
treated whether for good, or whether
they had only gone for reinforcements,
it was impossible to say. Adolphe's
face fell, though he tried to look
pleased.
" They are all on a wrong scent,"
cries a man in his shirt- sleeves. "They
have got hold of Papa Caron among
others who never touched a Hy. I saw
the man who struck down Clement
Thomas. I should know him again.
He is not one of these. The old man
was lying on the ground ; they struck.
144
Mrs. Dymond.
him down with the butt-end of their
guns."
There was a murmur of horror all
round, as the narrator, a natural dra-
matist, as most Frenchmen are, threw
up his arms and re-acted the dreadful
scene. Susy turned sick with horror.
"Your train will be starting in
about ten minutes/' Adolphe was
beginning to say, when suddenly his
tone changes. " Take care ! take
care ! this way, madame," cries
Adolphe, suddenly thrusting himself
before her. " Up! up! on the seat ! "
With a sudden cry the crowd began
to sway, to fly in every direction ;
the great centre door of the station
trembled under the blows which were
being struck from without. There
was a brief parley from a window, a
man standing on a truck began to
shout
"Let them in ! They want to deliver
the prisoners ! They will hurt nobody."
A woman close by screamed and
fainted. As Susy was stooping and
helping to pull her up upon the bench
the two great folding doors suddenly
burst open, letting in the light, and a
file of Federal soldiers marching in
step and military order. Adolphe,
who had thrust Susy into a corner of
the salle, now helped to raise the faint-
ing woman, with Susy's assistance, as
she stood on the bench out of the rush
of the crowd, while Adolphe and his
hotte made a sort of rampart before
them.
" Don't be frightened," he said, " no
one will fight ; the prisoners' escort
will see it is no use making a stand
against such numbers. Parclie, they
are off ! " he cried excitedly, for as he
spoke the engine outside gave a shrill
whistle and started off upon the lines.
Susy, from her place by the window,
could see the train slowly steaming out
of the station. There was a wild shout
from the spectators. What was it that
Susy also saw through the barred
window by which she stood (half a
dozen other heads below were crowd-
ing against the panes which looked to
the platform) 1 She saw a figure, surely
it was familiar to her, it could be none
other than Max who was flying down
the lines to the signal posts, and in
another minute the train, still snorting
and puffing, began to slacken speed,
then finally stopped, then backed, then
stopped again.
" The danger signals are all up.
They don't dare advance ! " cried some
of the men at the window.
" That is it, bien trouve. Look out,
madame. What do you see ? " cried
Adolphe eagerly from below.
Meanwhile the detachment of Fede-
rals, still in good order, still advancing,
came on, lining the centre of the hall,
spreading out through the door on to
the side of the platform along which the
Versailles train had started. There was
a second platform on the other side of
the station from which Susy's own
train to Rouen and Havre was also
making ready to start. It was curious
to note how methodically common life
went on in the midst of these scares
and convulsions. Suddenly Susy, with
a sinking, sickening heart, realised that
the moment for her own time of de-
parture had almost come ; again she
thought of Max's note and of its
promise. Alas ! alas ! it was not
carried out no Jo was there. If
she went, she must go alone ! It
was all too rapid for her to formulate
either her fear or her hope. Pre-
sently there was a fresh stir among
the crowd, and a functionary's voice
was heard shouting "Passengers for
Rouen and Havre en voiture I "
" You see it is all right ! ". said
Adolphe, cheerfully. " You had better
go, madame ; I will wait here in case
your son should come, to send him
after you. He is big enough to
travel alone," said the young man,
nodding to reassure her, though he
looked very pale, and his face belied
his words.
She was in utter perplexity ; she
knew not what to do what to deter-
mine ; of one thing and one only was
she sure, Max had promised to find Jo,
to save him, and he would keep his word.
Yes ! it would be better to go on ; her
Mrs. Dymond.
145
presence was but an incumbrance ;
Max could help Jo; that much she
knew ; what could she do but add to
their perplexities. The fainting woman"
was already revived as Susy sprang
down from the bench with Adolphe's
help, and as she did so she heard
another shout, a loud cheer. The crowd
swayed. Between the ranks of the
soldiers came the triumphant proces-
sion of Federals with their red scarves,
returning from the platform, and at
the head of it Caron borne in triumph
on some of his own workmen's
shoulders. Half-a-dozen liberated pri-
soners were marching after him,
shouting wildly and tossing hats and
handkerchiefs.
Caron, who had been a prisoner
among the rest, was smiling, undis-
turbed and quiet as ever, and bowing
and softly waving his hat. To be safe
mattered little to him, but his heart
was overflowing with grateful pride
and pleasure at the manner of his
release ; the rally of his friends, the
determination with which his work-
men had united to defend him against
his enemies filled his heart with
peaceful content.
Mrs. Dymond, speechless, open-eyed,
was still looking after him with
breathless interest and surprise, when
her own turn came, her own release
from cruel suspense. A hand was laid
on her shoulder, she was hugged in
two strong arms and fairly lifted off
the ground, and Jo, grinning, delighted,
excited and free, was by her side once
more.
" I am going back with you, Mrs.
Dymond," said he; "it's all right.
I've got my return ticket."
" He has given us trouble enough ! "
cries Max, coming up behind him
breathless and excited too. "For
heaven's sake carry him off at once
now you have got him. It is time you
were in the train. The troops may be
upon us again."
" I was safe all through," said Jo,
" but we know, Mrs. Dymond, Caron
has enemies. Lucky for us, Max
remembered the danger signals."
No. 314. VOL. LIU.
All the time Jo spoke du Pare was
hurrying Susanna along towards the
platform from which the Rouen train
was starting. It was approached by a
turnstile, where they were met by an
excited functionary who let Jo and
his return ticket through the turnstile,
but angrily opposed the passage of
Adolphe and the parcels. It was no
use waiting to discuss the matter ;
the man was terribly excited, and
time was pressing.
" Take the bag and find some places,"
Max cried, handing the things over the
barrier to Jo.
Susy paused for one minute. " Good-
bye, Adolphe," she said ; " I shall never
forget your kindness never, never."
Then she raised her eyes, looking
steadily into du Fare's face. All the
passing flush of success was gone from
it. He was drawing his breath
heavily ; he looked anxious, harassed.
Susy, too, was very pale, and she held
by the wooden barrier.
" I I can't leave you in this hor-
rible place," she said passionately.
" How can I say good-bye ? " and as
she spoke she burst into uncontrol-
lable tears.
He took her in his arms, then and
there, before them all who cared ?
who had time to speculate upon their
relations ?
" I shall come to you ; don't say
good-bye," he said ; " we are not part-
ing," and he held her close and
breathless to his beating heart, and
then in a moment more he had put
her away with gentle strength, and
pushed her through the gate. The
wooden turnstile was between them,
his pale face was immediately lost in
the sway of the crowd ; she found
herself roughly hurried along ; thrust
into the first open carriage. Jo leapt
in after her; the door was banged.
There were other people in the car-
riage some sobbing, some talking
incoherently, all excited, exasperated,
incoherent. "C'est trop ! c'est trop !
c'est trop ! " one man was shrieking
over and over again. "I can bear
no more. I am going yes, I am
L
146
Mrs. Dymond.
going ! " Another young fellow "sat
with his face in his hands, sobbing.
Jo was very silent, and sat for a long
time staring at his fellow travellers.
It was not till they reached Rouen,
and the reassuring German helmets
came round about the carriage win-
dows asking what had happened in
Paris, that he began to talk to Susy
that he gave her any details of his
escape and his captivity. He had
met Caron that morning after he
left them at the villa, and was
walking with him from the station,
when they were both suddenly ar-
rested, with a young man who had
only joined them a few minutes before.
They were not allowed a word. They
were hurried off, and all three locked
up in a guard-house, where they were
kept during the two days. Late on the
afternoon of the second day they were
moved to a second corps de garde. On
their way from one place to another
they fortunately passed Marney in
the street. "I shouted to him," said
Jo, " for I knew he would let you
know, and I knew he had been at
work, when Caron received a message
through one of the soldiers they were
most of them half Federals that we
.were to be rescued. I don't think
he or I were in very much danger," Jo
added, " but the third man had been a
soldier, and would have been shot, so
Caron told me afterwards. He was a
fine fellow half an Englishman ; they
called him Russell, or some such name."
" Oh ! Jo, I have got you safe," said
Susy, beginning to cry again. " I can't
think I can't speak I can't feel
any more."
"Why should you? " said Jo, prac-
tically. " Give me your ticket, for
fear you should lose it," and then he
settled himself comfortably to sleep in
his corner, smiled at her, and pulled
down the blind. Susy could not rest ;
she sat mechanically watching the
green plains and poplar trees flying
past the window. She was nervously
unhinged by the events of the last two
days ; the strain had been very great.
She longed to get back to silence, to
home, to the realisation of that one
moment of absolute relief. She felt
as if she could only rest again with
'Phraisie in her arms, only thus bear
the renewed suspense, the renewed
anxiety. But she knew at the same
time, with grateful, indescribable relief,
that her worst trouble was even over
now, though prison bars, distance, a
nation's angry revenge, lay between
her and that which seemed so great
a portion of her future life.
They reached home on the evening
of the second day. The carriage was
waiting at the station with Phraisie
in it. The drive did Susy good after
all these tragic, distorted days, during
which she had been living this double
life. Little Phraisie in her arms was
her best comforter, her best peace-
maker. A gentle wind blew in her
face, a gentle evening burnt away in
quiet gleams, the sky was so grey, so
broken ; the soft golden gates of the
west were opening wide, and seemed
to call to weary spirits to enter into
the realms of golden peace. The
hedges on either side were white with
the garlands of spring. The dogs, who
had been set loose, came barking to
meet them, as the wheels turned in at
the familiar home gates. The servants
appeared eager to welcome. Jo
silently gave the reins into the coach-
man's hand, and sprang down and
handed out his stepmother with some-
thing of his father's careful courtesy.
Little Phraisie woke up bright,
delighted to be in her mother's arms
once more and at home ; she went run-
ning from room to room. It was home,
Susy felt, and not only home but a
kind tender home, full of a living past,
with a sense of the kindness that was
not dead.
Phraisie was put to bed ; dinner
was laid in the library for the
young man and his stepmother. Jo
sat still silent, revolving many things
in his mind. From a stripling he had
grown to be a man in the last few
weeks. His expedition, his new ex-
perience, Tempy's marriage, his own
responsibility all these things had
Mrs. Dymond.
147
sobered him, and made him realise the
importance of the present, of conduct,
of other people's opinion.
"Here we are beginning our life
together again, Mrs. Dymond," said he
at last. " We get on very well, don't
we?"
"Yery well, dear Jo," Susy said,
smiling, " until some one who has more
right to be here than I have comes to
live at the Place."
" What are you talking about !" says
Jo, blushing up. "I don't mean to
marry for years to come, if that is what
you mean."
"Ah, my dear," said Susy, with
some emotion, "make no promises;
you do not know; you cannot foretell.
One can never foretell."
He looked hard at her. He guessed
that Susy had not come back to them
as she went away. She turned a little
pale when she saw his eyes fixed upon
her. It seemed to her as if her story
must be written in her face. She
might have told him she need not
have been ashamed but she felt as df
his father's son was no proper con-
fidant.
Long after Jo had gone to bed she
sat by the dying fire, living over and
over those terrible days, those strange
momentous hours.
CHAPTER XXXVIII.
CAEON.
WE must refer those of our readers
who take any interest in the subse-
quent adventures of Max and his
contemporaries to the pages of the
Daily Velocipede for some account of
those days which followed Susy's de-
parture from Paris. Marny's eloquent
pen, dipped in dynamite and gun-
powder, flashing with flame and sen-
sation, became remarked beyond the
rest, and brought readers by hundreds
to his paper. He was everywhere,
saw everything, so graphic were his
descriptions, so minute, so full of
enthusiasm, that it was impossible for
more experienced newspaper readers
than Susy to say how much he wrote
from his own observation, or what
hearsay legends he translated into his
own language, which, whatever its
merits or demerits, did not lack in
vividness. Susy scanned the columns
day by day with anxious eyes for more
and more news. She found so much
that she was almost bewildered by it,
and scarcely knew what to believe ; as
for direct intelligence of Max, scarcely
any came to her, though Madame sent
letters from time to time from her
farm at Avignon. But Madame' s
letters chiefly described her olive
trees, her cow, her pig, her eggs,
and her tomatoes. Max delayed ; he
did not rejoin her as she had hoped he
might have done ; he left her to do it
all, to engage the man, to contract
with the hotels for her eggs and butter.
Susy wrote to Madame from time to
time, telling her about little Phraisie
and the two boys, who were doing well
at their school. In one letter Susy
also described a domestic event, of
which the news had reached Tarndale
soon after her return from Paris.
Uncle Peregrine Bolsover had died
suddenly from the effects of a snake
bite. He had left no will, but Charlie
became undisputed heir to the Bolsover
estates, and Uncle Bob now transferred
to him the allowance which Peregrine
had hitherto enjoyed ; but this news
did not interest Madame du Pare in
the least. *The price of butter had
fallen, and her mind was preoccupied
by more present contingencies.
As the events multiplied in France,
as the storms raged more and more
fiercely, those who had remained, hop-
ing to stem the waves, felt every day
more helpless ; the sea was too rough,
the evil blasts too high what voice
could be heard ? What orders could
prevail? Captains and leaders were
powerless now. For the first time
Caron lost courage and confidence. The
murder of the hostages seemed like a
death blow to the dear old man who
could not believe in the wickedness of
men whom he had trusted and lived
with all his threescore years, during
L 2
148
Mrs. Dymond.
which he himself, though he did not
know it, had been as a hostage for
good and for truth among the angry
and the ignorant people. He moped,
his blue eyes were dim, his steps were
slow. Max hardly recognised him one
day when he met him coming out of
his own doorway in the Rue de Bac.
He was carrying some letters to a
post-office hard by ; he seemed glad to
take du Fare's strong arm.
" I am tired ; I feel ill," he said.
" I feel disgraced and utterly ashamed ;
this is no liberty, no republic any
more. This is tyranny, monstrous
wickedness ; these crimes of the
brutal ignorant have only the excuse
of ignorance. If I, if others before
me, had done our simplest duty in
life, such blank ignorance would not
now exist."
Max felt his heart sore for his old
friend. He himself had hoped less of
his fellow-creatures ; he was more
angry and less crushed than Caron.
"If these brutes had listened to
your teaching," he said, trying to
cheer him, " and to that of sensible
men, it might have all turned differ-
ently. They will still have to learn
before they can cease to be brutes."
" I have no more strength to teach."
said Caron. " Max, do you know that
I have left you all all my theories,
my failures, my ineptitudes, my reali-
ties, mes cheres verites," he said. " You
must make the best use you can of
it all. You can ask for the memoranda
and papers. I gave them to your
friend, la douce Susanne. They will
be for you and your children, my dear
son. If you escape from this terrible
catastrophe, go to her. I think that
with her you will find happiness."
Max, greatly touched, pressed his
old friend's arm. " One can scarcely
look forward," he said, "from one
hour to another, but you have guessed
rightly ; if happier times ever come for
me, they could only be with her."
Car on' s eyes lighted up.
" That is well," he said, with a
bright smile. Then, giving him the
letters, "I had been about to post
them," he said. " Will you leave
them for me ? They will be safer if
they go by hand. You have done me
good," he added. " I shall return home-
quietly."
Max left him at the turn of the
street.
Is it chance, is it solemn fatality
by what name is one to call that flash
of fate suddenly falling upon men as
they journey on their way, which falls,
without warning, irrevocable, undreamt
of, rending the veil of life for ever ?
While Caron turned slowly home-
wards to his quiet study, where old
Madelaine was at work against his
return, a mad crowd had gathered in
an adjoining street, and was pursuing
with cruel rage a wretched victim who
flew along a narrow alley, and came
rushing across the pavement upon
which Caron was walking.
The victim, a gendarme, torn,
wounded, bleeding in the temples,
ran straight against Caron, and fell
helpless at his knees, pursued by the
yelling mob.
The old man seemed suddenly roused
to a young man's strength of indigna-
tion, and flung himself before the
victim.
" Stop I " he cried to the mob.
"What are you doing] I am Caron.
You know me. Let this man pass ! "
For a moment, startled by his voice,
his fearless, commanding look, they
hung back ; but out of the crowd a
huge, half drunk communist came
striding up, and putting out his hand
with a tipsy chuckle tried to pull for-
ward the poor fainting wretch.
Caron pulled an official scarf from
his pocket, and holding it up in his
left hand, struck the man in the face
with it.
" That man is drunk," Caron cried,
appealing to the crowd ; " and you,
people you let yourselves be led by
such as he?"
The people looked at the scarf, hesi-
tated, began to murmur and make
way, but the drunken leader, still
chuckling and stupid, seized the
miserable victim again.
Mrs. Dymond.
149
"Let him go, I tell you," said
Caron. "It is the will of the
people."
" Silence ! or I shoot you too ! " cried
the brute, pulling out a pistol, and
aiming it at the fainting heap upon
the pavement.
With the natural impulse of one so
generous, the old man sprang forward
to turn the arm, but he was too late.
The pistol went off, and Caron fell
back, silent, indeed, and for ever.
The murderer, half -sobered, stood
with his pistol confronting them all, as
Caron had done a moment before, and
then began to back slowly. The crowd
wavered, and suddenly dispersed.
" Silence ! " cry the blasphemers to
those who from generation to genera-
tion, by love, by work, by their very
being, testify to the truth. And the
good man dies in his turn, but the
truth he loved lives on. "There is
neither speech nor language : but their
voices are heard among them, their
sound is gone out into all lands : and
their words into the ends of the
world."
Susanna was spared the shock of
reading this cruel story in the paper.
Marney wrote to her, telling her of
the event as he had heard it, simply,
and without the comments he after-
wards added in print.
To the papers this was but an
incident in those awful times ; the
readers of M. Maxime du Camp's ter-
rible volumes will find many and many
such noted there ; they will also find
an episode curiously like one in which
Max du Pare was (according to the
Daily Velocipede) concerned, and which
happened during the last of those
terrible nights in which the flames
raged and fought on the tide of madness
in furious might and irresponsibility.
" Was this the end of it of the visions
of that gentle old teacher of a gospel
which was for him, and not for
frenzied demons and desperate mad-
men 1 " thought Max, as he tried a
short cut across the Carrousel, round
which the flames were leaping madly.
The gate into the Tuileries, by which
he had come with Susanna once, was
closed : he had to turn back and fight
his way along the crowds and the
ramparts of the Rue de Rivoli again,
to the Ministere de la Marine, whither
he was bound. Some weeks before,
Caron's influence had appointed Max
to some subordinate place under the
Commune in the Ministere de la
Marine. In his first natural fury
and grief at his old friend's death,
du Fare's first impulse had been to
wash his hands of the whole thing,
the guilt and the wicked confusion,
and to come away with the rest ; then
came the remembrance of that life-
long lesson of forbearance and tena-
city ; that strange sense which some
men call honour only awoke; that will
which keeps men at their guns,
fighting for an unworthy cause in
the front of an overwhelming force.
Was it also some feeling of honest
trust in himself which impelled Caron's
disciple to stand to his post? He
remained ; protesting, shrewdly
using every chance for right. He had
been to the Central Committee now to
protest in vain against the destruction
of the building; it was full of sick
people. He represented the lower
rooms were used as hospital wards.
" The sick people must be moved,"
yelled the chiefs ; the fiat had gone
forth. The Yersaillais had reached
the Rondpoint of the Champs Elysees ;
they should find Paris a heap of
charred remains before they entered
her streets.
Max got back through the wild
Saturnalia of the streets, where dis-
hevelled women were dancing round
the flames, and men, yelling and drunk-
en, were howling out that the last day
had come ; he reached the Ministere
at last, to find that a band of men
were smearing the walls and stair-
cases with petroleum, in readiness for
the firing ; while down below, with
infinite pains and delays, the sick were
being slowly moved from their shelter
into the street. In vain the com-
munists swore and raged at the
150
Mrs. Dymond.
delay ; slowly, and more slowly, did
the doctor and his nurses get through
their arduous work. Max saw at a
glance what was in their minds to
delay long enough was to save the
place, for the Yersaillais were within
a quarter of an hour's march, and
once they were there all danger would
be over. " Good God ! " said the poor
doctor in an undertone, wiping his
perspiring brow ; " why don't they
come on I Will they wait till Dooms-
day i"
Max shrugged his shoulders as he
went on, looking in for a moment at
the band of incendiaries sitting
gloomily drinking in a small room or
office, where they were awaiting their
summons, and the news that the hos-
pital wards were evacuated.
Du Pare climbed on, and went and
stood upon a flat terrace on the roof,
from which he could see the heavens
alight with the lurid glare of the
flames now bursting from every side.
To the right the Rue Royale was
burning ; to the left, on the other side
of the waters, which repeated the
flames, the whole of the Rue de Lille
was in a blaze. Close at hand the
offices of the Finance were burning \
the Tuileries were an ocean of flame.
At his feet was the Place de la Con-
corde, silent, deserted, covered with
wrecks, with broken statues and
monuments ; beyond the Place de la
Concorde lay the sombre green of the
Champs Ely sees, showing here and
there some faintly twinkling bivouac
fire.
Suddenly, as he looked, his brain
reeled, then he put his hands to his
head, and tears came into his eyes and
seemed to save him. The clock below
struck the hour ; for a moment he
hesitated, then his resolution was
taken. He made certain observations,
and down the stairs by which he had
come hurried back. When he reached
the door of the room where the Com-
munists were still sitting, he passed
his fingers through his hair ; he tore
open his shirt ; he had deliberately
smeared his hands in some black
cinders lying in a heap on the roof,
and with his fingers he now blackened
his face, and flinging violently open
the door, hurried in, crying out the
terrible pass-word of those sad times,
" We are betrayed ! We are betrayed !
The Yersaillais are upon us; they
have surrounded us. Stop not ; that
way I will lead you," he cried, as the
men rose half scared, half drunk, look-
ing for an exit. "Follow me," he
cried, flying up the stairs once more,
and turning by the upper passages to
the lofts and back garrets, he left
them, promising to return. Shutting
a heavy door upon them, he double-
locked them in. When he hurried
down to the ground floor, he found
that three wounded men only were
lying on the ground, ready to be car-
ried out.
" You can take your time," he said
to the doctor ; " the incendiaries are
up stairs, under lock and key."
The doctor immediately gave the
word to his assistants, and the
wounded, who had been carried out
with infinite pain and patience, were
now brought back again, and were
there in their places when the Yer-
saillais marched in an hour later.
CHAPTER XXXIX.
IN A TOY SHOP.
WHEN the flames were extinguished,
when the great panic was subsiding,
then came the day of reprisals, and
the unhappy Parisians, who, after en-
during so much with patience, had
broken out in their madness, now fell
under the scourge once more. Perhaps
nothing during the war, not even the
crazed monstrosities of the desperate
commune, has ever been more heart-
breaking to hear of than the accounts
of the cold-blooded revenge of the
Yersaillais.
Again we must refer our readers to
the Daily Velocipede, in the columns
of which Max was reported to be
among the condemned prisoners, but
Susy was surprised and reassured
by an ambiguous letter, which reached
Mrs. Dymond.
151
her at Crowbeck Place, from no less
well-informed a person than Mr. Bag-
ginal of the English embassy.
" I have executed your commission,"
so it began. (Susy had not given Mr.
Bagginal any commission, and she
turned the letter over in some sur-
prise.) " I am sending you the photo-
graphs of the ruins and of Paris, that
you wished for in its present changed
aspect. I hope also to have some pen-
and-ink etchings to forward at the same
time. They are by our companion of
last year, who has been doing some
very good work lately, though he
complains of the light of his present
studio ; he hopes, however, to be able
to remove before long to some more
commodious quarters. If you should
like any more of the drawings, you can
always order them from a toy-shop in
the Brompton Road, which I believe
you and Miss Phraisie are sometimes
in the habit of patronising. Pray pre-
sent my compliments to that young
lady, and tell her I shall bring over
some bonbons when I next come. They
are making them now of chocolate, in
the shape of cannon balls and of shells,
filled with vanille creams, which I as-
you are excellent. Believe me,
Mrs. Dymond, always most
Faithfully yours,
" C. E. BAGGINAL."
The photographs arrived by the
lext post, and with them a sketch of
the well-remembered studio in the
lla,. and another very elaborately-
ished drawing of a dark box-room
Mr. Bagginal's lodgings, where the
artist must have spent a good many
hours ; the third drawing was a slight
sketch of the little shop front in the
Brompton Road, with Mrs Barry's
name over the doorway. Susy recog-
nised it at once, for she had been there
and had often heard of the place from
himself.
Two days afterwards Susy, with
m's packet in her hand, was
riving along Knightsbridge towards
the little shop in a strangely anxious
" excited frame of mind.
It seemed to her as if all the toys
were feeling for her as she stood
there the dolls with their goggle blue
eyes, the little donkeys and horses,
the sheep with their pink and blue
ribbons. They all seemed compassionate
and to be making mute signs ; she saw
the little trumpets in their places and
the sugar-candy stores ; she could have
bought up the whole shopful, but the
little assemblage would not have seemed
the same to her in any other place.
Here in the suburban street, with the
carts passing and repassing, hospitals,
buildings, the quiet little shop haunted
by the children's smiling faces seemed
to shrink away from the busy stream
outside-; all the dolls seemed to put
up their leather arms in deprecation,
crying, " Don't come in here, we belong
to peaceful toy-land, we have to do
with children only, not with men."
The woman who kept the shop had
left the parlour door open, and Susy
could see the window and the old Lon-
don garden beyond, the square panes
with autumn creepers peeping through.
The woman of the shop came out
from her parlour, and Susy with fal-
tering lips asked her if she could give
her any news of M. du Pare. " I have
some papers which I want to send
him," said Mrs. Dymond.
" I will call him, ma'am," said the
woman very quietly ; " he came last
night ; " and almost as she was speak-
ing the door opened and Max was
there.
Clap your pink arms, oh goggle eyes ;
play, musical boxes ; ring, penny trum-
pets; turn, cart wheels, and let the
happy lovers meet !
Two more people are made happy
in this care-worn world; they are
together, and what more do they
want !
Du Pare had escaped, although his
name was on the list of those attainted.
Mr. Bagginal could, perhaps, if he
chose, give the precise details of the
young man's evasion from the box
room where he had spent so many dull
days. Mr. Bagginal sent him with a
letter to Mr. Vivian, that good friend
152
Mrs. Dymond.
of art and liberty. I know not if it
was Sir Frederick, or Sir George, or
Sir John to whom he, Mr. Vivian, in
turn introduced du Pare on his
arrival, with cordial deeds and words
of help and recommendation. He
was bidden to leave his toy shop and
take up his abode with the Vivians
for a time, and work and make his
way in the London world. His ad-
mirable etchings of Mrs. Vivian
and her two daughters first brought
him into notice and repute : they were
followed by the publication of that
etching already mentioned of a beau-
tiful young woman gazing at a statue.
Du Pare was able, fortunately, to earn
from the very first; later he had more
money than he knew what to do with.
Mr. White more than once had occa-
sion to acknowledge with thanks com-
munications which passed between
Max and Susy and his own particular
branch of the society for the organisa-
tion of the relief of distress.
The papers, of which he had not at
first realised the importance, and
which Susanna brought him, con-
tained, besides many theories and
verses half finished, a duly signed
will which very materially affected
Max's future prospects. Caron had
left him his heir and executor, his
trustee for his works and his men.
It is true the old man's for-
tune had been greatly reduced by late
events and by the expenses of his
establishment, but his houses were
standing still, his machinery and his
workshops were still there most of
the workmen had clung to the enter-
prise in which they had a personal
stake and though it was not possible
for Max, an unwilling exile, to return
to France, yet Adolphe was found
capable and able to replace him for the
time on the spot. Mickey and Dermey,
it was hoped, would be in time able to
take their share in the management
of the works.
When the general amnesty was
proclaimed about four years ago
Max was once more free to return
to France. Susy, most certainly
would not like to leave England
altogether, but she is glad to go
from time to time to the White
House among the poplar trees in the
little village near the paper mills.
" Les Saules " is a happy meeting house
for her English friends, and there upon
the iron bench by the shining glass
ball in the garden sits old Madame du
Pare from Avignon admiring her
northern grandchildren.
They come up in a little file headed
by Phraisie, who is perhaps also dragg-
ing a little Bolsover by the hand. They
are laughing and singing as they come
along
" Promenons-nous dans les bois,
Pendant que le loup n'y est pas ; "
sing the children's voices taking up
that song of childhood and innocent
joy which reaches from generation to
generation, which no sorrow, no dis-
aster, will ever silence while this world
rolls on.
OLD FLORENCE AND MODERN TUSCANY.
' Florence within her ancient limit-mark,
Which calls her still to matin prayers and
noon,
Was chaste and sober, and abode in peace.
She had no amulet, no head-tires then,
No purfled dames ; no zone, that caught
the eye
More than the person did. Time was not
yet,
When at his daughters' births the sire
grew pale,
For fear the age and dowry should exceed,
On each side, just proportion. House was
none,
Void of its family ; nor yet had come
Sardanapalus to exhibit feats
Of chamber prowess. Montemalo yet
O'er our suburban turret rose ; as much
To be surpast in fall, as in its rising.
I saw Bellincion Berti walk abroad
In leathern girdle, and a clasp of bone ;
And, with no artificial colouring on her
cheeks,
His lady leave the glass. The sons I saw
Of Nerli, and of Vecchio, well content
With unrobed jerkin ; and their good
dames handling
The spindle and the flax. Oh, happy,
they ! "
[us writes Dante, in the ' Paradise '
>ut the sobriety and simplicity of
jss and manners in Florence of his
ty ; and nearly a century later
r. Villani writes :
The citizens of Florence lived soberly, on
viands and at small cost ; they were
rude and unpolished in many customs and
courtesies of life, and dressed themselves and
their women in coarse cloth ; many wore plain
leather, without cloth over it ; bonnets on
their heads ; and all, boots on their feet. The
Florentine women were without ornament ;
the better sort being content with a close
gown of scarlet cloth of Ypres or of camlet,
tied with a girdle in the ancient mode, and a
mantle lined with fur, with a hood attached
to be worn on the head. The common sort of
women were clad in a coarse gown of cambrai
in like fashion."
Things appear to have changed soon
after this, as the sage old Florentines
drew up a series of sumptuary laws in
1415, directed against the luxury and
splendour of women's dress and of
marriage festivals. They declared
that such magnificence was opposed
to all republican laws and usages, and
only served to enervate and corrupt
the people. If a citizen of Florence
wished to give an entertainment in
honour of a guest, he was obliged to
obtain a permit from the Priors of
Liberty, for which he paid ten golden
florins, and had also to swear that such
splendour was only exhibited for the
honour and glory of the city. Who-
ever transgressed this law was fined
twenty-five golden florins. It was
considered shameful to have much
plate ; nearly all household implements
were of brass, now and then beautified
by having the arms of the family in
enamel upon them. These sumptuary
laws were not confined to Florence.
The town of Pistoja enacted similar
ones in 1322: Perugia in 1333.
Phillipe le Bel promulgated sumptuary
laws in France in 1310; Charles the
Ninth in 1575; and Louis the Thir-
teenth in 1614; but with no greater
success than the worthy old repub-
licans.
Pandolfini, in his curious book,
' Del Governo della Famiglia,' inveighs
against the Florentine custom of paint-
ing the face. In his counsels to his
young wife, Giovanna degli Strozzi,
he says :
" Avoid all those false appearances by
which dishonest and bad women try to allure
men, thinking with ointments, white lead and
paint, with lascivious and immoral dress, to
please men better than when adorned with
simplicity and true honesty. Not only is this
reprehensible, but it is most unwholesome to
corrupt the face with lime, poisons, and so-
called washes. See, oh, my wife, how fresh
and well-looking are all the women of this
house ! This is because they use only water
from the well as an ointment ; do thou like-
wise, and do not plaster and whiten thy face,
thinking to appear more beautiful in my eyes.
Thou art fresh and of a fine colour ; think not
to please me by cheatery and showing thyself
to me as thou art not, because I am not to be
deceived ; I see thee at all hours, and well I
know how thou art without paint. "
154
Old Florence and Modern Tuscany.
The Florentine ladies appear to have
held their own against all these at-
tempts to convert them to a simpler
mode of life. Sachetti gives an amus-
ing instance of their ready wit, while
he was Prior of the Republic. A new
judge, Amerigo degli Amerighi, came
from Pesaro, and was specially ordered
to see that the sumptuary laws were
obeyed ; he fell into disgrace for doing
too little, and his defence is as
follows :
' ' My masters, I have worked all my life at
the study of law, and now that I thought
I knew something I find I know nothing ; for
trying to discover the forbidden ornaments
worn by your women, according to the orders
you gave me, I have not found in any law-
book arguments such as they give. I will
cite you some. I met a woman with a border,
all curiously ornamented and slashed, turned
over her hood ; the notary said to her, ' Give
me your name, for you have an embroidered
border.' The good woman takes off the
border, which was attached to her hood with
a pin, and holding it in her hand, replies that
it is a garland. There are others who wear
many buttons down the front of their dresses ;
I say to one, ' You may not wear those
buttons,' and she answers, * Yes, sir, I can,
for these are not buttons, but coppelle, and if
you do not believe me, see, they have no haft,
and there are no buttonholes. ' The notary
goes up to a third, who was wearing ermine, and
says, ' How can you excuse yourself, you are
wearing ermine,' and begins to write the ac-
cusation. The woman replies, ' No, do not
write, for this is not ermine but lattizzo (fur
of any young sucking animal).' The notary
asked, 'And what is this lattizzo?' And
the woman's answer was, 'The man is a
fool ! ' '
The widows seem to have given less
trouble ; but they always took care that
their dresses should be well cut and fit
perfectly.
Philosophers, of course, wrote treat-
ises on political economy, and poets
satirised the different fashions of their
times. Thus, in Lodovico Adimari,
we read :
" The high- bom dame now plasters all her
cheeks
With paint by shovelfuls, and in curled
rings
Or tortuous tresses twines her hair, and
To shave with splintered glass the down
that springs
On her smooth face and soft skin, till they
seem
The fairest, tenderest of all tender things :
Rouge and vermilion make her red lips
beam
Like rubies burning on the brow divine
Of heaven-descended Iris : jewels gleam
About her breasts, embroidered on the
shrine
Of satins, silks, and velvets : like the
snails,
A house in one dress on her back she
trails." 1
Cennino Cennini, a painter and
pupil of Agnolo Gaddi, the godson of
Giotto, says, in his Treatise on
Painting :
' ' It might be for the service of young
ladies, more especially those of Tuscany, to
mention some colours which they think highly
of, and use for beautifying themselves ; and
also certain washes. But as those of Padua
do not use such things, and I do not wish to
make myself obnoxious to them, or to incur
the displeasure of God and of Our Lady, so I
shall say no more on this subject. But," he
continues, ' ' if thou desirest to preserve thy
complexion for a long time, I advise thee to
wash thyself with water from fountains, rivers,
or wells. I warn thee that if thou .usest cos-
metics thy face will become hideous and thy
teeth black ; thou wilt be old before thy time,
and the ugliest object possible. This is quite
enough to say on this subject. "
Cennini seems, notwithstanding, to
have been employed to paint peoples
faces, if we may judge from the
following passage in the same work :
" Sometimes you may be obliged to paint or
dye flesh, faces of men and women in particu-
lar. You can mix your colours with yolk of
egg ; or should you wish to make them more
brilliant, with oil, or liquid varnish, the
strongest of all temperas. Do you want to
remove the colours or tempera from the face ?
Take yolk of egg and rub it, a little at a time,
with your hand on the face. Then take clean
water, in which bran has been boiled, and
wash the face ; then more of the yolk of egg,
and again rub the face with it ; and again
wash with warm water. Repeat this many
times until the face returns to its original
. colour."
The sumptuary laws cited by the
Osservatore Florentine are as fol-
low :
"1st. It is forbidden for any unmarried
woman to wear pearls or precious stones,
and the married dames may only wear orna-
ments of the value of forty golden florins at
any one time.
"2nd. In the week preceding a wedding
1 Translated by Mr. J. A. Symonds.
Old Florence and Modern Tuscany.
155
neither bride nor bridegroom may ask to
dinner or supper more than four persons, not
appertaining to the house.
" 3rd. The brides who desire to go to
church on horseback may do so, but are not
to be accompanied by more than six women
attendants.
" 4th. On the marriage day only sixteen
women may dine in the bridegroom's house,
six of the bride's family and ten of the bride-
groom's, besides his mother, his sisters, and
his aunts.
"5th. There may only be ten men of the
family, and eight friends ; boys under four-
teen do not count.
"6th. During the repast only three musi-
cians and singers are to be allowed.
"7th. The dinner or supper may not con-
sist of more than three solid dishes, but con-
fectionary and fruit ad libitum.
"8th. The bride and bridegroom are
allowed to invite two hundred people to
witness the signing of the contract before
the celebration of the marriage."
These laws, however, appear to have
been of little use, to judge by the re-
presentation of the marriage proces-
sion of Boccaccio degli Adimari on
the cassone, or marriage-chest, the
painted front of which is now in the
Academia delle Belle Arte, at Florence.
Men and women magnificently clad are
walking hand in hand, under a canopy
of red and white damask, supported
by poles, and stretched from the lovely
little Loggia del Bigallo, past Lorenzo
Ghiberti's famous doors of the bap-
tistry of San Giovanni, to the corner
of Via de' Martelli. The trumpeters
of the Republic sit on the steps of the
Loggia, blowing their golden trumpets
ornamented with square flags, on which
is emblazoned the lily of the city
of Florence. Pages in gorgeous
clothes, and carrying gold and silver
vases on their heads, are passing in
and out of one of the Adimari palaces.
A man behind the musicians holds a
flask of wine in his hand, just the
same flask as one sees now in daily use
in Tuscany. The ladies have head-
dresses like large turbans ; one is
made of peacock feathers, and all are
sparkling with jewels.
Funerals were also a great source of
show and splendour in those days, and
their cost increased rapidly. In 1340
the funeral of Gherardo Baroncelli cost
only two hundred golden florins, and
about the same time that of Giotto
Peruzzi five hundred ; whereas, in
1377, the expenses for the burial of
Monaldo Alberti di Messer Niccolaio
d'Jacopo degli Alberti amounted to
three thousand golden florins, nearly
five thousand pounds.
The following details of this magni-
ficent affair, from the manuscript of
Monaldi, may interest the curious
reader :
" Monaldo Alberti di Messer Niccolaio
d'Jacopo degli Alberti, died on the 7th August,
1377 ; he passed for the richest man, as re-
gards money, in the country. He was buried
on the 8th August, in Santa Croce, with great
honour of torches and wax candles. The
funeral car was of red damask, and he was
dressed in the same red damask, in cloth and
in cloth of gold. There were eight horses,
one decked with the arms of the people, be-
cause he was a cavalier of the people ; one
with the arms of the Guelphs, because he was
one of their captains ; two horses were covered
with big banners, on which were emblazoned
the Alberti arms ; one horse had a pennant,
and a casque and sword and spurs of gold, and
on the casque was a damsel with two wings ;
another horse was covered with scarlet, and
his rider had a thick mantle of fur, lined ;
another horse was undraped, and his rider
wore a violet cloak lined with dark fur.
"When the body was removed from the
arcade of the house, there was a sermon.;
seventy-two torches surrounded the car, that
is to say, sixty belonging to the house, and
twelve to the Guelph party. A large cata-
falque was all furnished with torches of a
pound weight ; and the whole church, and
the chief chapels towards the centre of the
church, were full of small torches of half a
pound weight, often interspersed with those of
one pound. All the relations, and those of
close parentage with the house of Alberti,
were dressed in blood-red ; and all the women
who belonged 'to them, or had entered the
family by marriage, wore the same colour.
Many other families were in black. A great
quantity of money was there to give away for
God, &c. Never had been seen such honours.
This funeral cost something like three thousand
golden florins."
The Medici made no attempt to con-
trol this splendour ; indeed, one of
Lorenzo the Magnificent' s favourite
sayings was, Pane e feste tengon il
popol quieto (Bread and shows keep
the people quiet). Cosmo the First had
a passion for jousts and games of all
sorts ; ballets on horseback and mas-
156
Old Florence and Modern Tuscany.
querades ; these were generally held in
the Piazza Sta. Croce. The masquerade,
in 1615, to celebrate the arrival of
Ubaldo della Rovere, Prince of Urbino,
has been engraved by Jacques Callot,
and was called the War of Love.
First came the chariot of Love,
surrounded with clouds, which opened
showing Love and his court. Then
came the car of Mount Parnassus with
the Muses, Paladins, and famous men
of letters. The third was the chariot
of the Sun, with the twelve signs of
the zodiac, the serpent of Egypt, the
months and seasons ; this chariot was
surrounded by eight Ethiopian giants.
The car of Thetis closed the proces-
sion, with Sirens, Nereids, and Tritons,
and eight giant Neptunes, to represent
the principal seas of the world.
Eerdinand the Second also delighted
in these shows, and several held during
his reign have been engraved by Stefano
della Bella and Jacques Callot.
Princess Yiolante of Bavaria, who
came, in 168 9, to marry Ferdinand, son
of Cosmo the Third, was received with
great splendour. She entered Florence
by the Porta San Gallo, where a chapel
had been erected on purpose to crown
her as she crossed the threshold of the
city. The princess then seated herself
on a jewelled throne, and was carried
into the town under a canopy borne
by a number of youths, splendidly
dressed, and chosen for their beauty
and high birth. After a solemn thanks-
giving in the cathedral she was es-
corted to the Pitti Palace by the
senate and the chief people of the
city. The carnival feasts that year
were more magnificent than usual in
her honour.
T. Kinnucini, writing to a friend
in the beginning of the seventeenth
century, gives the following quaint
account of a wedding in his own
1 family :
"When the alliance was arranged, we went
in person to all our near relatives, and sent
servants to those of remoter kin, to give notice
of the day on which the bride would leave our
house in her bridal attire ; so that all relations
down to the third degree might accompany
her to mass. At the house door we found a
company of youths, the seraglio, as we
say, who complimented my niece, and made
as though they would not allow her to quit
the house until she bestowed on them rings or
clasps, or some such trinkets. "When she had,
with infinite grace, given the usual presents,
the spokesman of the party, who was the :
youngest, and of high family, w T aited on the
bride, and served her as far as the church
door, giving her his arm. After the marriage
we had a grand banquet, with all the relations
on both sides, and the youths of the seraglio,
who, in truth, have a right to be present at
the feast."
In other descriptions of marriages
about the same time, we read that
during the banquet a messenger sought
audience of the bride and presented
her with a basket of flowers, or a pair
of scented gloves sent by the ser-
aglio, together with the rings, clasps,
or other ornaments she had given
them on leaving her father's house.
The bridegroom, according to his
means, gave the messenger thirty,
forty, fifty, or even, if very rich, a
hundred scudi, which the youths spent
in a great feast to their companions
and friends, in a masquerade, or some
such entertainment.
The marriage ring was given on
another day, when there was a feast
of white confectionary, followed by
dancing, if the size of the house per-
mitted it. Otherwise the company
played at giule, a game of cards
no longer known ; the name being
derived, says Salvini, from the coin
called yiulio, worth fifty-six centimes,
which was placed in a plate in the
middle of the table as the stake.
At the beginning of the feast the
names of the guests were read out
according to their different degrees of
parentage, so that all might find their
places without confusion.
The bride's dower was carried in
procession to the bridegroom's house,
in the cassoni, or marriage-chests, which
varied in splendour according to the
riches of the family. Some were of i
carved wood, some inlaid, others j
covered with velvet ornamented with ]
richly gilt ironwork, and the finest of '
all were painted, often by famous ,
artists, with the deeds of the ances-
Old Florence and Modern Tuscany.
157
tors of the family. The great luxury
consisted in fine linen ; " twenty dozen
of everything," was the rule in those
days, which is still adhered to among
old-fashioned people in Tuscany.
It was in such a marriage-chest that
the beautiful Ginevra dei Benci, whose
portrait exists in the fresco by Ghir-
landajo in Sta. Maria Novella, hid
while playing hide and seek the even-
ing before her marriage. The cassone
was of carved wood, and the heavy
lid closed upon her, snapping the lock
fast. All search for her was vain, and
the old tale says that her fair fame
suffered at the hands of malicious
women, jealous of her exceeding
beauty. Years afterwards, when the
chest was forced open, the remains of
the lovely Ginevra were found, still,
it is said, preserving traces of beauty,
and with the peculiar scent she used
still lingering about her long, fair
hair; in her right hand she grasped
the jewel her bridegroom had given
her to fasten the front of her gown.
In Florence the betta Ginevra is still
talked about among the common people,
as the ideal type of woman's beauty.
All these old usages have vanished
now among the gentlefolk of Florence,
but some yet linger among the conta-
dini, or peasantry, who are essentially
conservative, and opposed to change.
Sir Henry Maine has described 1 a state
of things among the South Slavonians
and Rajpoots which is curiously like
the life of the Tuscan contadino of
the present day.
The house community of the South
Slavonians despotically ruled by the
paterfamilias; and the house-mother,
who governs the women of the family,
though always subordinate to the house-
chief, is almost a counterpart of the
primitive custom still prevailing in
Tuscany, and doubtless existing in the
days of the gallant youths and fair
ladies we have mentioned above.
In all dealings of the contadini
with strangers the capoccio, or head-
man, represents the family, and
his word or signature binds them
1 In the ' Nineteenth Century ' Magazine,
December, 1877.
all collectively. He administers the
family affairs, and arranges what
work is to be done during the day,
and who is to do it. No member of
the family can marry without his
consent, ratified by that of the padrone,
or landlord, and he keeps the common
purse. On Saturday night the men
state their wants to him, and he de-
cides whether they are reasonable, and
above all whether the family finances
permit their realisation. The rule of
the capoccio is extremely despotic, for
I have known the case of an old man,
the uncle of the head-man, being kept
for some time without his weekly
pittance for buying snuff as a punish-
ment for disobeying an order.
The dignity of capoccio is here-
ditary and generally goes to the eldest
son, although it happens that he may
be passed over, and an uncle or a
younger brother chosen to fill the
position, by the padrone, to whom the
capoccio is responsible for the beha-
viour of the rest of the family.
Should he fall hopelessly ill, the family
inform the padrone in an indirect way,
who suggests to the head-man that
he should abdicate ; but in this case,
and indeed whenever it is practicable,
the choice of the successor is left to
the capoccio himself, in order to main-
tain the dignity of the position.
The massaia, or house-mother, is
generally one of the oldest women in
the house ; often the mother or the
wife of the head-man, but occasionally
of more distant kin. She retains the
post until her death, and rules over
the women, keeping the purse for
the smaller house expenses, such as
linen, clothes for the women, pepper,
salt, and white rolls for the small
children. All these are bought with
the proceeds of the work of the women
themselves, which includes the care of
the silkworms, of the poultry, if they
are permitted by the landlord to keep
fowls, and the straw-plaiting, which
is universal in the lower Yal d'Arno.
The girls, from the age of fourteen,
are allowed a certain time every day
to work for their dowry, generally in
the evening.
158
Old Florence and Modern Tuscany.
A bride brings into her husband's
house a bed, some linen, a cassone, her
personal clothes, and a vezzo, a necklace
of several strings of irregular pearls,
costing from five to a hundred pounds,
according to the wealth of her father,
or the amount she has been able to
earn. The vezzo always represents half
the dowry, and those who are too poor
to buy pearls get a necklace of dark
red coral.
After a due course of courtship
during which the young man visits
his innamorata every Saturday evening
and on holidays, bringing her a flower,
generally a carnation, or a rose in the
summer months, and improvising (if
he can) terze or ottave rhymes in her
honour, which he sings as he nears
the house the capoccio dons his best
clothes, and goes in state to ask the
hand of the girl for his son, brother,
nephew, or cousin, as it may be. When
the affair is settled, after much talk-
ing and gesticulation, like everything
else in Tuscany, a stimatore or savio,
an appraiser or wise-man, is called in,
who draws up an account of all the
bride's possessions. This paper, duly
signed and sealed, is consigned to the
capoccio of the bridegroom's house,
who keeps it carefully, as should the
young man die without leaving child-
ren, the wife has a right to the value
of all she brought into her husband's
house. If there are children the
capoccio is the sole guardian, and he
administers their property for them,
unless the mother has reason to think
him harsh or unfaithful, when she
may call for a consiglio di famiglia,
or family council, who name two or
more administrators.
A widow may elect to remain in
her adopted family and look after her
children, who by law belong to the
representative of their father ; or she
can leave her children and return to
her own people if they are able and
willing to receive her, which is not
often the case, as in Tuscany the
contadini marry their children by
rotation, so that often the younger
sons or daughters have to wait for
years, until the elder are settled in
life. It would be an unheard of thing
for a younger daughter to marry
before her elder sister.
Second marriages of widows with
children are rare, as the woman would
seldom be allowed to bring her chil-
dren by the first husband into the
house, and the folk-songs and pro-
verbs are condemnatory of the
practice :
Quando la capra ha passato il poggiolo non
si ricorda piu del figliuolo. (When the she-
goat has crossed the hillock she forgets her
young.)
Dio ti guardi da donna due volte maritate.
(God preserve thee from a twice married
woman. )
Quando si maritan vedove, il benedetto va
tutto il giorno per casa. ("When widows
marry, the dear departed is all day long about
the house. )
La vedovella quando sta'n del letto,
Colle lagrime bagna le lenzuola ;
E si rivolta da quel altro verso :
Accanto ci si trova la figlwla.
figlia mia, se tu nonfossi nata,
Al mondo mi sarei rimaritata.
(The widow lying in her bed,
With tears bedews the sheets ;
And turns round to the other side,
Where her daughter is.
Oh, my daughter, dear, if thou hadst not been
born,
I should have found another husband in this
world. )
After seven years of age the chil-
dren are by law allowed to choose with
whom they will live, and I have known
some cases of children leaving their
mother and coming of their own
accord to their uncle or grandfather,
begging to be taken into the paternal
house.
When a marriage is settled, the
family of the bride invites the capoccio
and the bridegroom to dinner, to meet
all her relations. This is called the
impalmamento, and many toasts are
drunk to the health of the young
couple. It is considered highly im-
proper for the bride to visit her future
home, and even in her walks she takes
care to avoid it. The other members
of her family may visit it, but she
would be dishonoured for ever if she
went near her bridegroom's house.
The peasantry now almost univer-
Old Florence and Modern Tuzczny.
159
sally observe the new law of civil
marriage, but they still regard it as
a mere form and look on the religious
ceremony as the important thing. The
civil marriage is often celebrated three
or four days before the religious ser-
vice, and the girl goes quietly home
to her father's house until the day
fixed for the latter.
In some parts of the Val d'Arno
the custom of being married after sun-
down prevails, and the bride wears a
black dress, with a white bonnet
or cap and white gloves, while,
even in winter, a fan is an indispen-
sable adjunct to her costume. Brides-
maids are unknown, as no unmarried
girl is ever present at a marriage.
The bride is attended to church by
her father and mother, and her male
and married female relations. The
bridegroom's mother, or the massaia
of his house, stays at home to welcome
her new daughter, whom she meets on
the threshold of the house with il
bacio di benvenuto (the kiss of wel-
come). At the dinner or supper, as
the case may be, everybody in turn
makes a brindisi to the young couple.
The female relations of the bride do
not go to this dinner, and she makes
up a basket of eatables to send home
by one of the men.
During the first week of her mar-
riage the bride is expected to be up
before any one else, to light the fire
and prepare coffee for the men before
* ne 7 g into the fields, and to cook
the hot meal either at noon or in the
evening, to show that she is a good
housewife.
On the first Sunday or holiday fol-
lowing the wedding the mother and
sisters of the bride come to see her,
and the following week some of the
family of the bridegroom accompany
him and his young wife to her old
home, where they dine ; and this
closes the festivities.
It occasionally happens that a family
of peasants, living in the same house
and originally nearly related, in the
lapse of years lose relationship so com-
pletely that they might intermarry,
but such a thing very rarely happens.
I know a family of twenty- seven who
are three distinct branches of the
same family, but whose relationship
dates back more than a hundred
years. They, however, regard each
other as of one family, and implicitly
obey the capoccio, who is a com-
paratively young man.
The mezzeria or metayer system
generally prevailing in Tuscany induces
a patriarchal feeling between landlord
and peasant, which is very pleasant tc
see, but is not conducive to agricul-
tural progress, or a good thing for the
landlord. He pays all the taxes to
government, which are enormous; he
provides the house rent free, and
keeps it in repair ; he buys the oxen,
cows, and horses, bearing half the loss
if they die, and of course getting half
the profit when they are sold. The
peasant gives his labour, the land-
owner gives the land and the capital,
and the proceeds are divided between
them. In bad years the landlord
advances corn to his peasants, which
they repay when they can, in wine, oil,
beans, &c. Where there is a large
family of young children the peasant
sometimes accumulates a load of debt
that cripples him for years ; in rare
instances the landlord turns him out
at six months' notice, and puts another
family on the farm ; but as a rule the
peasants remain for generations on the
same property, and always talk of
themselves as the gente (people) of
their landlord.
The English farmer does not exist in
Tuscany; none of the peasants have
enough capital to lease land, and if
they had they would not do it, being
so much better off under the
mezzeria. If a peasant leased a
farm he would probably starve in a
bad season, instead of tiding it over as
he now does by the padrone's help.
The small proprietors are gradually
disappearing in Tuscany ; they cannot
pay the enormous taxes and live. One
never takes up a newspaper without
seeing a list of small proprietors whose
poderi are for sale, by order of the
esattore or tax-gatherer. The Tus-
cans are a gentle and long-suffering
160
Old Florence and Modern Tuscany.
people, but such a condition of things
produces a vast amount of discontent
and hatred of the government, and
destroys a valuable class of trust-
worthy, orderly citizens.
When a contadino is sent away,
he occasionally finds a new poderi,
but most commonly sinks in the social
scale and becomes a bracciante or
day labourer, when his lot is miser-
able enough. The usual wage in Tus-
cany is one franc, twelve centimes,
about elevenpence a day. The day's
work begins at sunrise and lasts till
sunset, with half-an hour's rest for
breakfast at eight in the morning and
one hour for lunch at midday. In the
great heat of summer the midday
rest is prolonged, and the men come
earlier and go away later from their
work. When the weather is bad they
are days without employment ; and
where there are many small children,
the family is often at starvation point.
The women in the lower Yal d'Arno
are universally occupied in straw
plaiting, and if very expert can, in
exceptional years, and for a short time,
gain as much as tenpence a day. But
fashion is always changing, and new
plaits have to be learned, so that the
average gain rarely exceeds twenty cen-
times, or twopence a day. When the
Japanese rush hats came into fashion,
there was very great misery among all
the poor plaiters, as Leghorn straw
hats were almost unsaleable.
Going out to service is looked upon
as a degradation among the Tuscan
peasantry, and when you find a woman
of that class in service she is certain
to be either a childless widow, a bur-
den on her own family and unkindly
treated by the relatives of her late
husband, or a girl who has not been
allowed to marry as she wished. The
contadino almost invariably chooses
a wife in his own class, generally
from a neighbouring family. Fa-
vourite proverbs among the peasants
are
Donne e Inioi de' paesi tuoi. (Women and
oxen from thine own country. )
or
Chi di contano si va a maritare, sara
ingannato o vuol ingannare. (He who seeks
a wife from a distance will be deceived, or
attempts deception. )
You will seldom find a peasant
above thirty who can write and read,
though some have learnt to sign their
names in a sort of hieroglyph. The
rising generation are being instructed
in a desultory manner, and are won-
derfully quick at learning. Every
man in the army is forced to learn
under penalty of being kept in the
ranks until he can read, write, and
cipher decently well ; so that one may
say that the army is one vast school.
The conscription is, however, a very
heavy tax, particularly on the agri-
cultural population, and entails great
misery. The loss, for three years, of
the son, who in many cases is the chief
bread-winner for his younger brothers
and sisters, or for an invalid father,
often reduces the family to beggary. I
need not add that the loss to the
country is enormous.
On the other hand, there is no doubt
that the army is the great, and
probably the only, method of gradually
fusing the different Italian races I
had almost said nationalities. Since
the Middle Ages the hatred between
not only the different provinces, but
between the towns and even the
smallest villages, has always existed,
and is still extremely strong. An
Italian seldom, if ever, in Italy at
least, talks of himself as an Italian.
He is a Neapolitan, a Tuscan, a
Piedmontese, a Roman, or a Lombard ;
and each province thinks that it has
the monopoly of honesty, truth, and
exemption from crime. All this will,
no doubt, pass when education has had
time to influence the lower classes ;
and then also the quaint manners and
customs I have attempted to describe
will disappear, like the costume of the
peasants, which now lingers on only in
the meridional provinces.
JANET Ross.
MACMILLAN'S MAGAZINE
JANUARY, 1886.
GENERAL GRANT.
THE first volume of General Grant's
1 Memoirs' 1 brings the story of his
life down to the siege and capture of
Yicksburg the achievement which
has always been held to give him his
best claim to rank as a great strategist
and commander. It was one of the
most perilous operations ever carried
out, and from first to last it was con-
ducted in defiance of all the recognised
rules of warfare. Grant himself tells
us that General Sherman remonstrated
most earnestly with him when the pro-
ject was first discussed, or rather men-
tioned ; for Grant rarely submitted
any of his plans for discussion, either
in a council of war or elsewhere.
Some of the generals on the northern
side took particular pains not to com-
mit themselves to an important step
without consultation with the authori-
ties at Washington. The President
was commander -in-chief, and the secre-
tary of war, Mr. Stanton, was a man
who very easily took offence, and who
never forgave. The necessity of
" standing well " at Washington, was
one cause of the failure of so many of
the generals who took the field at the
outset of the rebellion. They were
afraid of the Government, and still
more .afraid of the newspapers.
Grant alone had the courage to set
them all at defiance. When he had
formed his plans he kept them as
secret from everybody as circumstances
1 ' Personal Memoirs of U. S. Grant.' Vol. i.
Sampson Low and Company, London, 1885.
No. 315. VOL. LIII.
permitted until the moment for action
arrived. It does not appear that he
sent any message whatever to Wash-
ington concerning Yicksburg until the
place was actually in. his possession.
Sherman, who was with him, showed
him all the dangers of the enterprise.
He pointed out that to go into a hos-
tile country, with a large river behind
the advancing force, and the enemy
holding strongly - fortified positions
above and below, was to incur a
frightful risk, and consequently he
recommended a backward move upon
Memphis. Grant coolly answered that
Memphis was the very place to which
he did not want to go. He knew that
a feeling of great discouragement ex-
isted in the North, that the elections of
1862 had proved the growth of a sen-
timent adverse to the continuance of
the war, and that it had become neces-
sary to substitute a compulsory draft
for voluntary enlistment. He felt that
unless a striking success could be ob-
tained, the South would probably
triumph, and he decided that it was
better to run any hazard than not
to try for that success. Hence he
resolved to cross the Mississippi, and
almost literally to burn his boats be-
hind him. His scheme was to cut
loose from his base of supplies, and to
push forward into the Confederate ter-
ritory without supports of any kind.
An officer of his staff told me that an-
other officer ventured one morning to
say to his chief, " General, if we are
162
General Grant.
beaten, we shall not have sufficient
transport back for ten thousand
troops." " If we are beaten," replied
Grant, in his usual impassive manner,
" transport back for ten thousand
troops is more than I shall want."
His army knew as well as he did that
nothing was left for it but to conquer
or die ; and it also knew that no mis-
giving or hesitation on the part of its
leader would be allowed to interfere
with his design. This was the great
peculiarity of Grant's character his
unshakable determination. When he
was in the right men praised it, as it
was very natural they should do ;
when he turned out to be wrong as
he did often enough in civil life they
denounced his senseless and incurable
obstinacy. It was by obstinacy that
he beat down secession. Scientific tac-
tics had been employed, and had led
only to failure and disappointment.
Wisely or unwisely, Grant disregarded
science, especially in his movement
against Yicksburg. He won the vic-
tory by a series of rapid movements,
which bewildered the Southern gene-
rals ; before they fairly realised their
danger they had lost the control of
the Mississippi, and, as Grant truly
says, the " fate of the Confederacy was
sealed." Thousands and tens of thou-
sands of men were still to fall, but the
loss of Yicksburg was the death-blow
of the Southern cause.
This event, therefore, forms an
appropriate dividing line in a fragment
of autobiography for this work, even
in its complete state, will evidently be
no more than a fragment which must
always be invested with a strange and
mournful interest. It was begun and
carried on with the shadow of death
ever upon the page death by one of
the most agonising of diseases, and
accompanied with mental distress
scarcely less poignant than the direst
form of physical torture. When I
first met General Grant, soon after
the close of the war, he was still a
young man, full of life and energy,
with a constitution of iron, proof
against all the hardships, fatigues, and
anxieties he had passed through. He
was then at the zenith of his fame, the
idol of the people, followed everywhere
by the acclamations which are reserved
in all countries for the successful
soldier. Greater glo'ry was never
heaped upon Washington himself.
Men and women would travel hun-
dreds of miles in the hope of looking
upon his face, or of being permitted
to boast that they had touched his
hand. He received all this homage
with phlegmatic indifference, seldom
saying a word, shaking hands until
his arm was sore, and hurrying off as
fast as he could to his eternal cigar.
Presents of all kinds poured in upon
him. A nation which has no titles to
confer, and which will not give away
estates and pensions, could not reward
Grant as Marlborough or Wellington
was rewarded in this country ; but
private gratitude did all that was
thought right and becoming. One
house was given to him in Washing-
ton, another in Philadelphia, a third
in Galena. A considerable sum of
money was raised for his benefit, and
held in trust. By an unfortunate
accident this trust fund was not
available to him at the crisis of his
misfortunes. For the time, however,
there seemed to be everything that
was enviable in his circumstances.
His reputation was without a stain of
any kind; malice itself was for the
moment reduced to silence. It had
frequently been alleged that he was
by nature cruel and relentless ; but
the magnanimity which he displayed
towards Lee and the other Confederate
generals, in opposition to many power-
ful influences, swept away this re-
proach. He had never interfered in
the strife of politics ; partisans on
either side could make no complaint
respecting him ; not a single impru-
dent word had ever escaped his lips.
It is not given to any of us to know
the critical moment in our lives when j
it would be well if we could rise up i
and depart ; but surely, amid the grief |
and anguish of his last days, a feeling !
of regret must have sometimes pre- j
sented itself to the mind of General !
Grant that the summons to go did not
General Grant.
163
reach him in 1865. But for what we
are accustomed to call an accident, it
would have reached him. He had
been engaged to accompany President
Lincoln to Ford's theatre, in Washing-
ton, on the night of the assassination
plot, and it is now known that he
was marked to die. Some domestic
arrangements prevented him keeping
this appointment, and the bullet which
was intended for him was never fired.
It seems a hard sayiDg, but it is true,
that Lincoln was more fortunate that
night than Grant.
For President Lincoln died in the
full sunshine of success if, indeed, it
<?an be said that sunshine ever fell upon
that melancholy spirit. Between him
and the people, whom he had served so
faithfully, there was no cloud. He
had outlived all misunderstandings and
injustice. There was a time, no doubt,
when his rough, uncouth ways, and
the absence of all conventional dignity
in his life and conversation, led many
of his countrymen to form a false
estimate of his nature ; but the lofti-
ness of his views, and the sincerity of
his patriotism, were never questioned.
In his second inaugural address, and
in his short but memorable speech at
Gettysburg, he struck a note in har-
mony with the solemnity of the time ;
and long before the war came to an
end it was universally acknowledged
that the homely rail-splitter of Illinois
was the man of all others fitted to deal
with the great crisis which had fallen
upon the nation. Everybody saw how
invaluable had been his patience, his
good-humour, his quiet belief in the
cause which was at stake, his sagacity
in bringing to light a capable man,
and of remaining faithful to him.
Many attempts were made to set him
against General Grant, but none of
them succeeded. " He drinks too much
whisky," said one of Grant's maligners
to the President. " Try and find out
the brand," whispered Lincoln ; " I
should like to send a barrel or two to
some of the other generals." In com-
mon with General Sherman and others,
the President anticipated the daring
inarch upon Yicksburg with great
misgiving, and looked upon it as a
mistake ; but after the fort had fallen
he wrote a note of hearty congratula-
tion to the general whom he had
never seen. " I now wish," he said,
" to make a personal acknowledgment
that you were right and I was wrong."
This letter is not published by General
Grant in his ' Memoirs ' ; in fact, he
publishes not a word of any kind in his
own praise. His narrative is a plain
almost bald record of the simplest
facts, recounted with a modesty which
is rare, if not absolutely unique, in
works of this kind, but which is in
itself vividly characteristic of the
man. I spent many long evenings
with him at various times, and I never
once heard him make the slightest
allusion to the part which he had
played in the war. If any one else
touched upon the subject in his pre-
sence, his hard, firm mouth would
close "like a steel trap," as the
American saying goes, and the chances
were that not another word would
escape from him until the indiscreet
visitor had gone.
This reluctance to talk of his own
deeds is visible even in the ' Memoirs,'
which he only consented to write in
the hope of leaving behind him some
provision for his family. He went
unwillingly to the task, and although
his interest in it increased as he made
progress, it is clear that it gave him
no pleasure to recount his personal ex-
ploits. He had resolved never to
write anything for publication, but
troubles fell thickly upon him one
after another, and at last he yielded
to the solicitations of the publishers.
" I consented," he says in his preface,
" for the money it gave me ; for at
that moment I was living upon bor-
rowed money." His houses had pro-
bably been sold long before, and after
the failure of the firm of rogues with
which he became entangled, he was
left absolutely penniless. Then he
began his autobiography upon the
novel plan of saying as little about
himself as he could possibly help.
His account of his early life occupies
more space than the description of
M 2
164
General Grant.
any great siege or battle in which he
\vas engaged. Everybody knows that
he was brought up in humble circum-
stances, though not in poverty. His
father had a tannery, and young
Grant often worked in it, though he
detested the occupation. When the
siege of Yicksburg made him famous,
the " politicians " flocked around him
from all quarters, and endeavoured to
turn him to account in their several
ways. Grant met all their approaches
with the same imperturbability. " I
am unable to talk politics," he used
to say, " but if you want to know
anything about the best method of
tanning leather, I believe I can tell
you." Through the interest of a Con-
gressman, he was admitted to the
great military training school of West
Point, where Lee, and " Stonewall "
Jackson, and others who afterwards
became celebrated in the Confederacy,
were students at the same time.
Grant's sole ambition after he left
West Point was to obtain a profes-
sorship in some college ; but the out-
break of the Mexican war, provoked
by the annexation of Texas, soon pro-
vided him with active employment.
In that war he received some valuable
training as a soldier, but when peace
came he found that his position had not
in any way improved. By this time
he had a wife and two children, with-
out any adequate means of earning
money for their support. The family
went to a little farm belonging to his
wife near St. Louis, and there Grant
tried to get a living in any way that
presented itself. "If nothing else
could be done," he says, " I would
load a cord of wood on a waggon, and
take it to the city for sale." Then he
went into a " real estate " business, or,
as we say, a land-agency ; found that
this brought no grist to the mill, and
was driven to become a clerk in his
father's store. So he went on, living
in a hand-to-mouth manner, until the
war broke out in 1861, and he was
called upon to take command of a com-
pany of volunteers raised in Galena.
This, too, seemed likely to be but
a short-lived occupation. No one then
believed that the war would last long.
Mr. Jefferson Davis told a meeting at
La Grange, Mississippi, that he would
be willing to " drink all the blood
spilled south of Mason and Dixon's
line." Mr. Seward, the secretary of
state, continually declared that the
war would be over in ninety days.
Grant's belief to the last was that
if the capture of Fort Donelson, in
February, 1862, had been followed
up by the Federals with a determined
advance over the south-west, the re-
bellion would have collapsed. But
the Federal generals were slow to
perceive any advantage they had
gained ; many of them were utterly
incapable of perceiving it. General
Halleck, who was Grant's superior
officer, gave him no encouragement
even to attack Fort Donelson ; and
bestowed but slight and grudging
thanks upon him after the victory.
For venturing to push on to Nashville
Grant was superseded, and virtually
placed under arrest. But he was
very soon restored to his command,
and not long afterwards won the
bloody battle of Shiloh, where the
Confederates fought until they were
literally cut to pieces. " I saw an
open field," he writes, "over which
the Confederates had made repeated
charges the day before, so covered
with dead that it would have been
possible to walk across the clearing,
in any direction, stepping on dead
bodies, without a foot touching the
ground." "The Confederate troops
fought well," is Grant's laconic remark
on all this heroism, repeated on so
many fields, and always in vain.
Donelson, Shiloh, and Vicksburg
have generally been recognised as
affording conclusive proofs of Grant's
military capacity ; but his campaigns
in Virginia are more open to question.
The slaughter in the "Wilderness,"
where thousands of the northern
troops were sacrificed, might have
been avoided if Grant had clung less
tenaciously to his resolve to "fight
it out on that line if it took all
summer." He had to deviate from
that line after all, but one object
General Grant.
165
which he constantly kept in view was
accomplished by " hammering away"
at the enemy, he had reduced Lee's
power of resistance. The Confederate
leader was obliged to break up
his small force into detachments to
meet the assaults which were delivered
in all directions, and with a few thou-
sand half-starved and ragged troops
he had to face at least a hundred and
eighty thousand men in the army of
the Potomac. His supports were un-
certain ; some of his subordinates
like General Early were worse than
useless. The commissariat arrange-
ments had completely broken down.
The Confederates were left almost
without ammunition or food. Yet in
the desperate engagements at Spott-
sylvania, Cold Harbour, and before
Petersburg, upwards of seventy thou-
sand men of Grant's army were killed
or wounded. The carnage and the
suffering inflicted in that last cam-
paign have never been exceeded in
any war of modern times.
Grant's losses were heavy, but Lee's
slender resources were wrecked in a
much more serious proportion, and
there was no recruiting possible for
the Confederates. Their dead who lay
so thickly beneath the fields were
children of the soil, and there were
none to replace them. Sometimes
whole families had been destroyed \ but
the survivors still fought on, though
it must have been without hope. In
the Confederate lines round Peters-
burg there was often absolute desti-
tution as an officer who was there
told me, in the Shenandoah valley,
shortly after the end of the struggle,
every cat and dog for miles around had
been caught and eaten. Grant was
pressing onwards ; Sherman's march
had proved that the Confederacy was
an egg-shell ; Sheridan's splendid
cavalry was ever hovering round the
last defenders of the bars and stripes ;
Grant saw that all was over, and he
invited Lee to surrender. But for a
day or two longer Lee held out ; and
then Grant sent him another message,
couched in terms as gentle and cour-
teous as he could find. All that
further resistance could do would be
to bring about more useless butchery,
with inevitable defeat at the end. Yet
the Confederates were unwilling to
relinquish everything, and when they
saw their general riding out sadly to
meet the conqueror, they gave way to
the bitterest grief. 1 There remained
but a broken and scattered remnant of
the proud forces of the Confederacy
to surrender with their beloved com-
mander.
It was General Grant's duty to van-
quish his foe, but he would not
humiliate him. He declined to be
present at the formal disbandment of
the Southern troops, and when Lee
handed him his sword, Grant returned
it with a few words of manly sympa-
thy. This act of kindness touched
Lee deeply, for no one in the whole
South felt more keenly the wreck of
all the hopes which had been bound up
in the " lost cause." The Northern
people had made great sacrifices to
carry on the war, but the conditions
of the contest were necessarily more
severe in the South. The church
bells, the leaden roofing from the
houses, everything that could be
melted down, had been used for bullets.
After Sherman's march the country
was like a desert. Bridges, fences,
railroads, all had disappeared. Yet
the people still hoped that their
favourite general, Lee, would some-
how or other be able to turn back the
multitudes which were arrayed against
him. They regarded him with an
affection which the vast reverses that
overwhelmed him and them could not
weaken. I saw him in one of the towns
of the Shenandoah valley some months
after the surrender at Appomattox.
He was quite white, bent, and broken,
but the welcome which met him could
not have been more ardent if he had
returned victorious. The women
crowded round him, with streaming
eyes, kissing his hand ; even the men
were deeply moved. At that time
there was a foolish cry among the peo-
ple of the South. ''Let us all emigrate, it
1 The scene was vividly described some
years ago in an article by Mr. Francis Lawley.
166
General Grant.
matters not where. Let us leave a
land which can never be our home
again." Lee did all he could to dis-
courage it. There soon arose a fierce
demand in some parts of the North,
led by Secretary Stanton, for the
" punishment of traitors," and but for
Grant's interposition Lee would un-
doubtedly have been sent to join
Jefferson Davis in Fortress Monroe.
Grant risked his popularity by insist-
ing that Lee was a prisoner of war on
parole, and that until he broke his
parole it would be an outrage to ar-
rest him. The controversy was active,
and sometimes angry ; but Grant was
immovable, and Stanton had to give
way. The two generals never met
afterwards. Lee continued to the last
to set a good example to his followers
by returning as a quiet citizen to the
work which he found ready to his
hands, as the president of a college.
There he did his duty, but it is no
mere figure of speech to say that his
heart was broken. There are blows
from which no man can recover from
which, indeed, he has no wish to re-
cover and death, when it came, was
welcomed as a friend by General
Lee.
It is at the close of the rebellion, as
I have said, that one could almost de-
sire that General Grant's career had
likewise closed. There were further
triumphs in store for him, but scarcely
any great happiness, and no real ad-
dition to his honours. He had no am-
bition to launch out upon the stormy
and dangerous sea of politics, and his
fellow commander, Sherman, wrote to
him a most sensible and manly letter,
earnestly advising him to keep away
from Washington. But the Repub-
lican party had no candidate to put
before the country who was half so
likely to win his way to the Presidency
as General Grant, and in a rash mo-
ment, as I venture to think, he con-
sented to serve. The same considera-
tions obliged him to become a candi-
date for a second term of office, and
he was elected only to find that new
disappointments and mortifications
awaited him. He had always been ac-
customed to place great dependence in
men who had once served under him, or
for whom he had taken a liking. This
would have been an altogether ad-
mirable quality had his judgment of
other men been infallible. But,
in truth, it was far from that ; he
made great and ruinous mistakes, and
he rarely could be brought to see his
mistakes, even when irreparable mis-
chief had been done. Hence arose all
those scandals about " whisky rings "
and " Indian rings " which threw so
much reproach on his second adminis-
tration. That the President himself
was perfectly free from corruption most
men believed at the time, and every-
body admits now. He was not cap-
able of wilfully committing a dishon-
ourable act. Some of his followers
were not so scrupulous, and the diffi-
culty was that Grant could not be
brought to see that his confidence had
been betrayed. He had been bitterly
attacked, and he thought that his
subordinates were assailed merely
because they were faithful to him. I
remember him saying to me, in the
midst of one of the worst of all the
outcries against a member of his estab-
lishment, to whom he was much at-
tached, but who was not worthy of
that attachment, " Z. is only at-
tacked because he is known to be my
true friend. He has done nothing
wrong. I do not care whom you put
into his place, they would calumniate
him in the same way to-morrow.
They strike at me over his shoulder ;
I can stand it, but it shall do him
harm." He could not be brought
think that any one in whom he
trusted might possibly deceive him.
All his sad experience seems, in
this respect, to have been thrown
away upon him. The firm of frau-
dulent brokers who plundered him
so mercilessly, and tried to strip him
of his reputation after they had taken
all his money, ought not to have de-
ceived any man with even elementary
ideas of business. Grant's credulity,
when his confidence had once been
secured, knew no bounds. This was
the sole secret of all the mistakes in
G-eneral Grant.
167
his career as President of the United
States. At Washington he was no
longer in a position where taciturnity
and self-reliance could carry him
through all emergencies. He had to
depend upon others ; he was obliged
to ask for advice, and even to act
upon it. He liked to have men about
him who could make themselves agree-
able, for, in spite of his grim bearing
and unsympathetic aspect, he was a
warmhearted man, and enjoyed a
little gaiety after office hours. He
contributed not a little to this gaiety
himself, by drawing upon a store of
curious anecdotes of men whom he
had known, or by remarks of a dry,
sarcastic turn on the politicians or
events of the day. No man could talk
better when he was in the humour.
He had a pleasant voice, and a simple,
retiring manner, and was always
ready to listen to any suggestions
that were made to him by persons
whom he respected. He had read a
good deal, and thought even more,
and he delighted in picking up infor-
mation in the easiest of all modes
by converse with people who had made
a special study of the subject he
wished to understand. When he
talked, no words were wasted, and
the listener could never fail to be
impressed with his profound common-
sense. And yet, in spite of his com-
mon-sense, he fell so easy a prey to
rascality. The truth is, he was not
fit to cope with rascals. He had no
distrust in his nature ; he was not on
the look-out for knavery. A New
York clerk of eighteen would have
seen through the glaring impostures
of the firm which dragged him down
to ruin. Yet Grant reposed so much
faith in that wretched firm that he
could go and ask for a loan of a
large sum of money to help it, as
he supposed, through difficulties which
were practically insurmountable. No
great man was ever before so miser-
ably duped.
An ex-President of the United
States does not occupy a very en-
viable position. One day the head of
the Government, the next he is no-
body. Unless he has some lucrative
calling to which he can return, or
private means upon which he can
retire, he is a source of embarrassment
to himself and to others. The poli-
ticians have had out of him all that
they want, and he cannot very well
" run " for an inferior office. In Eng-
land we pension off old servants of the
state perhaps a little too freely. The
ample salary which a man receives for
doing his appointed work is not
thought enough to enable him to
spend his last days in comfort, and
therefore, whether the holders of high
offices are in or out of harness, they
are well taken care of. The American
people are not so generous. Their
Presidents are dismissed without re-
cognition of any kind. General Arthur,
a man of the very highest character,
has fortunately a good profession, and
an excellent position in that profes-
sion, and he has gone back to his
office from the White House as if
nothing had happened. But when
General Grant retired he could not
return to the army, and he had no
other occupation open to him. It was
impossible that he should again set up
in business as a tanner. He spent
many months in making a tour of a
large part of the world, and during
his visit to England he saw nearly all
our most distinguished public men, and
formed his own opinions concerning
them. I asked him one evening which
of these men had struck him most.
After a moment's consideration, he
replied, "Mr. Disraeli. Your Mr.
Gladstone talks the best I never
heard a man talk so well before but
Mr. Disraeli is more original. And
then, you see, he does not say much.
' I never can make out why you did
not keep Mexico when you had got it,
General,' he said to me the first time
I saw him. No more can I." But in
his ' Memoirs,' I see that Grant con-
demns the Mexican war as unjust, and
therefore he might have found a
reason to give Mr. Disraeli for not
treating Mexico after the fashion of
Texas.
The " third term " project was not
168
General Grant.
dead when General Grant returned to
the United States, but the American
people looked upon it with great dis-
like. The Republican party, or a large
section of it, desired to nominate Grant
again ; but the Convention at Chicago
was much divided, and after even more
than the usual doublings and turnings
of the delegates, the choice fell upon
General Garfield. Grant must now
have known that political life was
closed to him, and he undertook
various commercial undertakings which
turned out to be profitable. They were
put into his way by friends who de-
sired to serve him. A great deal of
money doubtless passed through his
hands at various times, although I
never heard that his habits were ex-
travagant. At any rate, he was better
off, pecuniarily, at the close of 1883
than he had ever been before. General
Badeau, who knew his chief's affairs
better than any one outside his own
family, states that Grant himself
estimated his fortune at this time at
a million of dollars. This, however,
was chiefly in the air. He was only
sixty-one, to all appearance in perfect
health, happy in his surroundings, and
engaged in " business which brought
him in an ample income." Prosperity
and contentment seemed to be assured
to him. But everybody who has
studied human history, whether in
books or on the world's great stage,
must have observed that it is precisely
at these periods, when all is appa-
rently going well, that the dark fates
so frequently descend with their in-
exorable decrees, and darken all the
sun of a man's life, and condemn him
to struggle for the rest of his days
amid the bitter waters of affliction.
It was so with General Grant. An
occurrence of evil omen befell him on
Christmas Eve. He had reached his
own door, when, in turning to pay a
cabman, he fell upon the frozen pave-
ment, and sustained an injury which
was followed by an attack of pleurisy.
From that time he was called upon to
bid farewell to health and peace of
mind. Already he had, at the solici-
tation of his son, joined the firm of
Ward and Fish, and put all his
savings into it about twenty thou-
sand pounds. The affair seemed to
go on prosperously so prosperously
that Grant, as his friend has said,
thought he was worth a million
of dollars. Everybody remembers
the exposure that followed in May,
1884. One morning Grant went down
to the office in Wall Street, and found
that Ward had absconded, and that he
and his children were utterly ruined.
Only a few days before, Ward had
induced him to borrow one hundred
and fifty thousand dollars under the
pretence that this sum would enable
him to discharge some pressing claims
upon a bank in which the firm had
large deposits. Grant went to Mr.
W. H. Yanderbilt, of the New York
Central Railway, who died so recently,
and asked for the money as a loan.
Thirty thousand pounds is a large sum,
but Vanderbilt sat down and drew a
cheque for it, and handed it to his
visitor. The railroad king knew a
few hours afterwards that Grant had
been duped, and that his own money
was lost, but he behaved throughout
with the utmost generosity. He took
possession of Grant's house and pro-
perty, merely to protect them from
other creditors. He nobly offered to
make the whole over to Mrs. Grant,
but the general refused. Grant had
no idea at first that the firm with
which his name had been identified ex-
isted upon sheer roguery. But all the
papers were soon full of the shameful
story. The famous soldier saw but too
clearly that he had been used as a
decoy by an abominable swindler.
House, money, books, furniture, his
swords, and other presents the money
of his children and many of his friends
everything was gone, including, as
he thought, his honour. It was after-
wards clearly seen that he had no
complicity whatever in the frauds
committed by his partners that he
was the chief of the sufferers, not in
any way a culprit. The sympathy of
the people went out to him ; once
more he rallied from enfeebled health
and a wounded spirit, and he began
General Grant.
169
to believe that in time he might
recover from this unmerited and
disastrous blow.
But another great calamity was
hanging over him. A few months
after the failure of the firm, he began
to complain of a pain in his throat.
Gradually it grew worse ; he could
swallow nothing but liquid food ; doc-
tors were consulted, various opinions
were given, and at last the dread fact
could no longer be concealed that his
disease was cancer. He had already
begun to write his ' Memoirs,' urged on
by the one hope which now remained
to him the hope of making some pro-
vision for his family in place of that
which they had lost. But the torment
which now visited him, day and night,
obliged him to stop. He could not
lie down without bringing on fits of
choking; he would sit for hours, as
General Badeau has said, " propped
up in his chair, with his hands clasped,
looking at the blank wall before him,
silent, contemplating the future ; not
alarmed, but solemn, at the prospect
of pain and disease, and only death at
the end." Of all the soldiers who
perished slowly of lingering wounds
on battle-fields during the war, none
suffered such protracted and cruel
tortures as General Grant.
Then there came a change for the
better. The kindly messages which
were sent to him from all classes of
his own countrymen, north and south,
and which flowed in upon him from
England from the Queen herself
greatly cheered and consoled . him.
Again he set to work upon his book,
determined to finish it before he died.
He was further encouraged by the
news that Congress had at last passed
a bill placing him on the retired list
of the army. His good name, he felt,
was once more established. In June,
1884, he seemed to be a little better,
but the great heat of the city
distressed him, and a villa near
Saratoga was offered to him by a
friend. Thither he went, still bent
upon finishing his book. He knew
that he could not live. Several times
he had actually been at the point of
death once at least he had taken
leave of those who were so dear to
him. His unconquerable nature alone
kept him alive. Three families, as we
learn from his old aide-de-camp, were
dependent upon him. If he could
complete his 'Memoirs' over half a
million dollars would be earned for
his kindred. Again and again he
took up his pencil and paper for he
could no longer dictate and wrote,
slowly and laboriously, as much as he
could. No murmur escaped him.
Great physical prostration, accom-
panied by inevitable mental depres-
sion, often assailed him, but he sum-
moned all his energies, and came back
from the very portals of the grave.
That his children and grandchildren
should not be left to the tender
mercies of the world this was the
solitary boon he craved. And it was
granted. He had time to write the
last words of the last page, and then,
on the twenty-third of July, the end
came gently to him. With his wife
and family still around him, he passed
away as an over-wearied child might
fall asleep.
Few men had known more of the
vicissitudes of life. He had tasted all
the sweets, such as they are, of wild
and unbounded popularity ; he had
sunk into neglect ; he had seen his re-
putation undergo total eclipse. In his
declining years, and smitten with a fatal
malady, he found himself reduced to
penury, and obliged to begin the fight
against want all over again. His-
tory may possibly decide that he is
not to be ranked among the greatest
of generals or the wisest of statesmen ;
but it will be obliged to acknowledge
that he was the only man who proved
himself able to bring a long and
desperate civil war to an end ; and it
will do justice to the ardent patriotism
which always animated him, and to
the intrepid soul which refused to be
crushed even when all his little world
stood around him in ruins.
L. J. JENNINGS.
170
GEORGE BORROW.
IN this paper I do not undertake to
throw any new light on the little-
known life of the author of ' Lavengro.'
I believe that there is ground for
hoping that, among the few people who
knew Borrow intimately, some one
will soon be found who will give to the
world an account of his curious life,
and perhaps some specimens of those
" mountains of manuscript " which, as
he regretfully declares, never could
find a publisher an impossibility
which, if I may be permitted to offer
an opinion, does not reflect any great
credit on publishers. For our present
purpose it is sufficient to sum up the
generally-known facts that Borrow
was born in 1803 at East Dereham in
Norfolk, his father being a captain in
the army, who came of Cornish blood,
his mother a lady of Norfolk birth and
Huguenot extraction. His youth he
has himself described in a fashion
which nobody is likely to care to
paraphrase. After the years of travel
chronicled in ' Lavengro,' he seems to
have found scope for his philological
and adventurous tendencies in the
rather unlikely service of the Bible
Society ; and he sojourned in Russia and
Spain to the great advantage of Eng-
lish literature. This occupied him dur-
ing the greater part of the years from
1830 to 1840. Then he came back to
his native county or, at any rate, his
native district married a widow of
some property at Lowestof t, and spent
the last forty years of his life at
Oulton Hall, near the piece of water
which is thronged in summer by all
manner of sportsmen and others. He
died but the other day ; and even since
his death he seems to have lacked the
due meed of praise which the Lord
Chief Justice of the equal foot usually
brings even to persons far less deserving
than Borrow.
There is this difficulty in writing
about him, that the audience must
necessarily consist of fervent devotees
on the one hand, and of complete
infidels, or at least complete know-
nothings, on the other. To any one
who, having the faculty to understand
either, has read ' Lavengro ' or ' The
Bible in Spain,' or even ' Wild Wales,'
praise bestowed on Borrow is apt to
seem impertinence. To anybody else
(and unfortunately the anybody else is
in a large majority) praise bestowed
on Borrow is apt to look like that very
dubious kind of praise which is be-
stowed on somebody of whom no one
but the praiser has ever heard. I can-
not think of any single writer (Peacock
himself is not an exception) who is in
quite parallel case. And, as usual,
there is a certain excuse for the
general public. Borrow kept himself
during not the least exciting period of
English history quite aloof from Eng-
lish politics, and from the life of great
English cities. But he did more than
this. He is the only really consider-
able writer of his time in any modern
European nation who seems to have
taken absolutely no interest in current
events, literary and other. Putting a
very few allusions aside, he might have
belonged to almost any period. His
political idiosyncrasy will be noticed
presently ; but he who lived through
the whole period from Waterloo to
Mai wand has not, as far as I remember,
mentioned a single English writer later
than Scott and Byron. He saw the
rise, and, in some instances, the death,
of Tennyson, Thackeray, Macaulay,
Carlyle, Dickens. There is not a
reference to any one of them in his
works. He saw political changes such
as no man for two centuries had seen,
and (except the Corn Laws, to which
he has some half-ironical allusions, and
George Borrow.
in
the Ecclesiastical Titles Bill, which
stirred his one active sentiment), he
has referred to never a one. He seems
in some singular fashion to have stood
outside of all these things. His
Spanish travels are dated for us by
references to Dona Isabel, and Don
Carlos,to Mr. Yilliers, and Lord Palmer-
ston. But cut these dates out, and
they might be travels of the last cen-
tury. His Welsh book proclaims
itself as written in the full course of
the Crimean War ; but excise a few
passages which bear directly on that
event, and the most ingenious critic
would be puzzled to " place " the com-
position. Shakespeare, we know, was
for all time, not of one age only ; but I
think we may say of Borrow, without
too severely or conceitedly marking
the difference, that he was not of or
for any particular age or time at all.
If the celebrated query in Long-
fellow's ' Hyperion/ " What is time 1 "
had been addressed to him, his most
appropriate answer, and one which he
was quite capable of giving, would
have been, " I really don't know."
To this singular historical vagueness
has to be added a critical vagueness
even greater. I am sorry that I am
unable to confirm or to gainsay at
first hand Borrow's wonderfully high
estimate of certain Welsh poets. But
if the originals are anything like his
translations of them, I do not think
that Ab Gwilym and Lewis Glyn
Cothi, Gronwy Owen and Huw Morris
can have been quite such mighty bards
as he makes out. Fortunately, how-
ever, a bettor test presents itself. In
one book of his, ' Wild Wales/ there
are two estimates of Scott's works.
Borrow finds in an inn a copy of
'Woodstock' (which he calls by its
less known title of 'The Cavalier'),
and decides that it is " trashy ; "
chiefly, it would appear, because
the portrait therein contained of
Harrison, for whom Borrow seems on
one of his inscrutable principles of
prejudice to have had a liking, is not
wholly favourable. He afterwards
informs us that Scott's 'Norman
Horseshoe ' (no very exquisite song at
the best, and among Scott's somewhat
less than exquisite) is "one of the
most stirring lyrics of modern times,"
and that he sang it for a whole even-
ing; evidently because it recounts a
defeat of the Normans, whom Borrow,
as he elsewhere tells us in sundry
places, disliked for reasons more or less
similar to those which made him like
Harrison, the butcher. In other
words, he could not judge a work of
literature as literature at all. If it
expressed sentiments with which he
agreed, or called up associations which
were pleasant to him, good luck to it ;
if it expressed sentiments with which
he did not agree, and called up no
pleasant associations, bad luck.
In politics and religion this curious
and very John Bullish unreason is
still more apparent. I suppose Borrow
may be called, though he does not call
himself, a Tory. He certainly was an
unfriend to Whiggery, and a hater of
Radicalism. He seems to have given
up even the Corn Laws with a certain
amount of regret, and his general
attitude is quite Eldonian. But he
combined with his general Toryism
very curious Radicalisms of detail,
such as are to be found in Cobbett
(who, as appeared at last, and as all
reasonable men should have always
known, was really a Tory of a peculiar
type), and in several other English
persons. The Church, the Monarchy,
and the Constitution generally were
dear to Borrow, but he hated all the
aristocracy (except those whom he
knew personally), and most of the
gentry. Also, he had the odd Radical
sympathy for anybody who, as the
vernacular has it, was " kept out of
his rights." I do not know, but I
should think, that Borrow was a strong
Tichbornite. In that curious book,
' Wild Wales/ where almost more of
his real character appears than in any
other, he has to do with the Crimean
War. It was going on during the
whole time of his tour, and he once or
twice reports conversations in which,
from his knowledge of Russia, he
172
George Borrow.
demonstrated beforehand to Welsh in-
quirers how improbable, not to say
impossible, it was that the Russian
should be beaten. But the thing that
seems really to have interested him
most was the case of Lieutenant
P or Lieutenant Parry, whom
he sometimes alludes to in the fuller
and sometimes in the less explicit
manner. My own memories of 1854
are rather indistinct, and I confess
that I have not taken the trouble to
look up this celebrated case. As far
as I can remember, and as far as
Borrow's references here and elsewhere
go, it was the doubtless lamentable but
not uncommon case of a man who is
difficult to live with, and who has to
live with others. Such cases occur at
intervals in every mess, college, and
other similar aggregation of humanity.
The person difficult to live with gets,
as they say at Oxford, " drawn." If
he is reformable he takes the lesson,
and very likely becomes excellent
friends with those who " drew " him.
If he is not, he loses his temper, and
evil results of one kind or another
follow. Borrow's Lieutenant P
seems unluckily to have been of the
latter kind, and was, if I mistake not,
recommended by the authorities to
withdraw from a situation which to
him was evidently a false and unsuit-
able one. With this Borrow could
not away. He gravely chronicles the
fact of his reading an "excellent
article in a local paper on the case
of Lieutenant P ; " and with no
less gravity (though he was, in a cer-
tain way, one of the first humorists of
our day) he suggests that the com-
plaints of the martyred P to the
Almighty were probably not uncon-
nected with our Crimean disasters.
This curious parochialism pursues him
into more purely religious matters. I
do not know any other really great
man of letters of the last three-
quarters of a century of whose attitude
Carlyle's famous words, "regarding
God's universe as a larger patrimony of
Saint Peter, from which it were well
and pleasant to hunt the Pope," are so
literally true. It was not in Borrow's
case a case of sancta simplicitas. He
has at times flashes of by no means
orthodox sentiment, and seems to have
fought, and perhaps hardly won, many
a battle against the army of the
doubters. But when it comes to the
Pope, he is as single-minded an enthu-
siast as John Bunyan himself, whom,
by the way, he resembles in more
than one point. The attitude was,
of course, common enough among his
contemporaries ; indeed any man who
has come to forty years must remem-
ber numerous examples among his own
friends and kindred. But in literature,
and such literature as Borrow's, it is
rare.
Yet again, the curiously piecemeal,
and the curiously arbitrary character
of Borrow's literary studies in lan-
guages other than his own, is note-
worthy in so great a linguist. The
entire range of French literature, old
as well as new, he seems to have
ignored altogether I should imagine
out of pure John Bullishness. He has
very few references to German, though
he was a good German scholar a fact
which I account for by the other fact,
that in his earlier literary period Ger-
man was fashionable, and that he
never would have anything to do
with anything that fashion favoured.
Italian, though he certainly knew it
well, is equally slighted. His educa-
tion, if not his taste for languages,
must have made him a tolerable
(he never could have been an exact)
classical scholar. But it is clear that
insolent Greece and haughty Home
exerted no attraction upon him. I
question whether even Spanish would
not have been too common a toy to
attract him much if it had not been
for the accidental circumstances which
connected him with Spain.
Lastly (for I love to get my devil's
advocate work over), in Borrow's
varied and strangely attractive gallery
of portraits and characters, most ob-
servers must perceive the absence of
the note of passion. I have sometimes
tried to think that miraculous episode
George Borrow.
173
of Isopel Berners and the Armenian
verbs, with the whole sojourn of
Lavengro in the dingle, a mere way-
ward piece of irony a kind of con-
scious ascetic myth. But I am afraid
the interpretation will not do. The
subsequent conversation with Ursula
Petulengro under the hedge might be
only a companion piece ; even the
more wonderful, though much less in-
teresting, dialogue with the Irish girl
in the last chapters of ' Wild Wales '
might be so rendered by a hardy
exegete. But the negative evidence
in all the books is too strong. It may
be taken as positively certain that
Borrow never was "in love," as the
phrase is, and that he had hardly the
remotest conception of what being in
love means. It is possible that he
was a most cleanly liver it is possible
that he was quite the reverse : I have
not the slightest information either
way. But that he never in all his life
heard with understanding the refrain
of the ' Pervigilium '
Cras amet qui nunquam amavit, quique
amavit eras amet,
I take as certain.
The foregoing remarks have, I
think, summed up all Bor row's de-
fects, and it will be observed that even
these defects have the attraction for
the most part of a certain strangeness
and oddity. If they had not been
accompanied by great and peculiar
merits he would not have emerged
from the category of the merely
bizarre, where he might have been
left without further attention. But,
as a matter of fact, all, or almost all,
of his defects are not only counter-
balanced by merits, but are them-
selves for the most part exaggerations
or perversions of what is in itself
meritorious. With less wilfulness,
with more attention to the literature,
the events, the personages o c his own
time, with a more critical and com-
mon-sense attitude towards his own
crochets, Borrow could hardly have
wrought out for himself (as he has to
an extent hardly paralleled by any
other prose writer who has not de-
liberately chosen supernatural or fan-
tastic themes) the region of fantasy,
neither too real nor too historical,
which Joubert thought proper to the
poet. Strong and vivid as Borrow' s
drawing of places and persons is, he
always contrives to throw in touches
which somehow give the whole the air
of being rather a vision than a fact.
Never was such a John-a-Dreams as
this solid, pugilistic John Bull Part
of this literary effect of his is due to
his quaint habit of avoiding, where
he can, the mention of proper names.
The description, for instance, of Old
Sarum and Salisbury itself in * Laven-
gro ' is sufficient to identify them to
the most careless reader, even if the
name of Stonehenge had not occurred
on the page before ; but they are not
named. The description of Bettws-y-
Coed in 'Wild Wales/ though less
poetical, is equally vivid. Yet here it
would be quite possible for a reader,
who did not know the place and its
relation to other named places, to pass
without any idea of the actual spot.
It is the same with his frequent refer-
ences to his beloved city of Norwich,
and his less frequent references to his
later home at Oulton. A paraphrase,
an innuendo, a word to the wise he
delights in, but anything perfectly
clear and precise he abhors. And by
this means and others, which it might
be tedious to trace out too closely, he
succeeds in throwing the same cloudy
vagueness over times as well as places
and persons. A famous passage
perhaps the best known, and not far
from the best he ever wrote about
Byron's funeral, fixes, of course, the
date of the wondrous facts or fictions
recorded in 'Lavengro ' to a nicety. Yet
who, as he reads it and its sequel (for
the separation of '.Lavengro' and 'The
Romany Rye ' is merely arbitrary,
though the second book is, as a
whole, less interesting than the for-
mer), ever thinks of what was actually
going on in the very positive and
prosaic England of 1824-51 The
later chapters of 'Lavengro' are the
174
George Borrow.
only modern * Romance of Adventure '
that I know. The hero goes " over-
thwart and endlong," just like the
figures whom all readers know in
Malory, and some in his originals. I
do not know that it would be more
surprising if Borrow had found Sir
Ozana dying at the chapel in Lyonesse,
or had seen the full function of the
Grail, though fear he would have pro-
tested against that as popish. Without
any apparent art, certainly without
the elaborate apparatus which most
prose tellers of fantastic tales use, and
generally fail in using, Borrow spirits
his readers at once away from mere
reality. If his events are frequently
as odd as a dream, they are always
as perfectly commonplace and real for
the moment as the events of a dream
are a little fact which the above-
mentioned tellers of the above-men-
tioned fantastic stories are too apt
to forget. It is in this natural roman-
tic gift that Borrow' s greatest charm
lies. But it is accompanied and nearly
equalled both in quality and degree
by a faculty for dialogue. Except
Defoe and Dumas, I cannot think
of any novelists who contrive to tell
a story in dialogue and to keep up
the ball of conversation so well as
Borrow ; while he is considerably the
superior of both in pure style and in
the literary quality of his talk. Bor-
row' s humour, though it is of the
general class of the older English
that is to say, the pre-Addisonian
humorists is a species quite by itself.
It is rather narrow in range, a little
garrulous, busied very often about curi-
ously small matters, but wonderfully
observant and true, and possessing a
quaint dry savour as individual as
that of some wines. A characteristic
of this kind probably accompanies the
romantic Ethos more commonly than
superficial judges both of life and
literature are apt to suppose ; but
the conjunction is nowhere seen better
than in Borrow. Whether humour
can or cannot exist without a dispo-
sition to satire co-existing, is one of
those abstract points of criticism for
which the public of the present day
has little appetite. It is certain (and
that is what chiefly concerns us for
the present) that the two were not
dissociated in Borrow. His purely
satirical faculty was very strong in-
deed, and probably if he had lived a
less retired life it would have found
fuller exercise. At present the most
remarkable instance of it which exists
is the inimitable portrait-caricature of
the learned Unitarian, generally known
as "Taylor of Norwich." I have
somewhere (I think it was in MissMar-
tineau's * Autobiography ') seen this
reflected on as a flagrant instance of
ingratitude and ill-nature. The good
Harriet, among whose numerous gifts
nature had not included any great
sense of humour, naturally did not
perceive the artistic justification of
the sketch, which I do not hesitate to
call one of the most masterly things
of the kind in literature.
Another Taylor, the well-known
French baron of that name, is much
more mildly treated, though with little
less skill of portraiture. As for " the
publisher " of ' Lavengro,' the portrait
there, though very clever, is spoilt by
rather too much evidence of personal
animus, and by the absence of re-
deeming strokes; but it shows the
same satiric power as the sketch of
the worthy student of German who
has had the singular ill-fortune to
have his books quizzed by Carlyle,
and himself quizzed by Borrow. It
is a strong evidence of Borrow's ab-
straction from general society that
with this satiric gift, and evidently
with a total freedom from scruple as
to its application, he should have left
hardly anything else of the kind. It
is indeed impossible to ascertain
how much of the abundant character-
drawing in his four chief books (all
of which, be it remembered, are auto-
biographic and professedly historical)
is fact and how much fancy. It is
almost impossible to open them any-
where without coming upon personal
sketches, more or less elaborate, in
which the satiric touch is rarely
George Borrow.
175
wanting. The official admirer of
" the grand Baintham " at remote
Corcubion, the end of all the Euro-
pean world ; the treasure-seeker, Bene-
dict Mol ; the priest at Cordova, with
his revelations about the Holy Office ;
the Gibraltar Jew, are only a few
figures out of the abundant gallery of
'The Bible in Spain.' 'Lavengro,'
besides the capital and full-length por-
traits above referred to, is crowded
with others hardly inferior, among
which only one failure, the disguised
priest with the mysterious name, is
to be found. Not that even he has not
good strokes and plenty of them, but
that Borrow's prejudices prevented
his hand from being free. But Jasper
Petulengro, and Mrs. Hearne, and the
girl Leonora, and Isopel, that vigorous
and slighted maid, and dozens of
minor figures, of whom more presently,
atone for him. * The Romany Rye '
adds only minor figures to the gallery,
because the major figures have ap-
peared before ; while the plan and
subject of ' Wild Wales ' also exclude
anything more than vignettes. But
what admirable vignettes they are,
and how constantly bitten in with
satiric spirit all lovers of Borrow
know.
It is, however, perhaps time to give
some more exact account of the books
thus familiarly and curiously referred
to ; for Borrow most assuredly is not
"a popular writer." I do not know
whether his death, as often happens,
sent readers to his books. But I
know for a fact that not long before
it * Lavengro, 5 ' The Romany Rye/ and
* Wild Wales ' were only in their third
edition, though the first was nearly
thirty, and the last nearly twenty,
years old. ' The Bible in Spain ' had,
at any rate in its earlier days, a wider
sale, but I do not think that even
it is very generally known. I should
doubt whether the total number
sold during more than forty years
of volumes surpassed for interest
of incident, style, character and de-
scription by few books of the cen-
tury, has equalled the sale within
any one of the last few years of a fairly
popular book by any fairly popular
novelist of to-day. It probably would
not approach a tenth or a twentieth
of the sale of such a thing as ' Called
Back.' And there is not the obstacle
to Borrow's popularity that there is
to that of some other writers, not-
ably the already-mentioned author of
'Crotchet Castle.' No extensive literary
cultivation is necessary to read him.
A good deal even of his peculiar
charm may be missed by a prosaic or
inattentive reader, and yet enough
will remain. But he has probably
paid the penalty of all originality,
which allows itself to be mastered by
quaintness, and which refuses to meet
public taste at least half way. It
is certainly difficult at times to know
what to make of Borrow. And the
general public, perhaps excusably, is
apt not to like things or persons when
it does not know what to make of
them.
Borrow's literary work, even putting
aside the "mountains of manuscript"
which he speaks of as unpublished,
was not inconsiderable. There were,
in the first place, his translations,
which, though no doubt not without
value, do not much concern us here.
There is, secondly, his early hack
work, his ' Chaines de 1'Esclavage,'
which also may be neglected. Thirdly,
there are his philological speculations
or compilations, the chief of which is,
I believe, his ' Romano-Lavo-Lil,' the
latest published of his works. But
Borrow, though an extraordinary lin-
guist, was a somewhat unchastened
philologer, and the results of his life-
long philological studies appear to
much better advantage from the
literary than from the scientific point
of view. Then there is The Gypsies in
Spain,' a very interesting book of its
kind, marked throughout with Bor-
row's characteristics, but for literary
purposes merged to a great extent
in The Bible in Spain.' And, lastly,
there are the four original books, as
they may be called, which, at great
leisure, and writing simply because he
176
George Borrow.
chose to write, Borrow produced during
the twenty years of his middle age.
He was in his fortieth year when, in
1842, he published 'The Bible in
Spain.' * La.vengro ' came nearly ten
years later, and coincided with (no
doubt it was partially stimulated by)
the ferment over the Ecclesiastical
Titles Bill. Its second part, * The
Romany Rye,' did not appear for six
years, that is to say, in 1857, and its
resuscitation of quarrels, which the
country had quite forgotten (and when
it remembered them was rather
ashamed of), must be pronouncd un-
fortunate. Last came ' Wild Wales,'
in 1862, the characteristically belated
record of a tour in the principality
during the year of the Crimean War.
On these four books Sorrow's literary
fame rests. His other works are in-
teresting because they were written
by the author of these, or because of
their subjects, or because of the effect
they had on other men of letters,
notably Longfellow and Merimee, on
the latter of whom Borrow had an
especially remarkable influence. These
four are interesting of themselves.
The earliest has, I believe been, and
for reasons quite apart from its bibli-
cal subject perhaps deserves to be, the
greatest general favourite, though its
literary value is a good deal below that
of 'Lavengro.' 'The Bible in Spain'
records the journeys, which, as an
agent of the Bible Society,-; Borrow
took through the Peninsula at a sin-
gularly interesting time, the disturbed
years of the early reign of Isabel
Segunda. Navarre and Aragon, with
Catalonia, Valencia and Murcia, he
seems to have left entirely unvisited ;
I suppose because of the Carlists.
Nor did he attempt the southern part
of Portugal; but Castile and Leon,
with the north of Portugal and the
south of Spain, he quartered in the
most interesting manner, riding every-
where with his servant and his saddle-
bag of Testaments at, I should suppose,
a considerable cost to the subscribers
of the Society and it may be hoped, at
some gain to the propagation of evan-
gelical principles in the Peninsula,
but certainly with the results of ex-
treme satisfaction to himself and of a
very delightful addition to English
literature. He was actually im-
prisoned at Madrid, and was fre-
quently in danger from Carlists and
brigands, and severely orthodox eccle-
siastics. It is possible to imagine a
more ideally perfect missionary ; but
it is hardly possible to imagine a more
ideally perfect traveller. His early
habits of roughing it, his gipsy initia-
tion, his faculties as a linguist, and
his other faculties as a born vagrant,
certain to fall on his feet anywhere,
were all called into operation. But
he might have had all these advant-
ages and yet lacked the extraordinary
literary talent which the book reveals.
In the first chapter there is a certain
stiffness ; but the passage of the
Tagus in the second must have told
every competent reader in 1842 that
he had somebody to read quite differ-
ent from the run of common writers,
and thenceforward the book never
flags till the end. How far the story
is rigidly historical I should be very
sorry to have to decide. The author
makes a kind of apology in his preface
for the amount of fact which has been
supplied from memory. I dare say the
memory was quite trustworthy, and
certainly adventures are to the adven-
turous. We have had daring travel-
lers enough during the last half cen-
tury, but I do not know that any one
has ever had quite such a romantic
experience as Sorrow's ride across the
Hispano-Portuguese frontier with a
gipsy contrabandista, who was at the
time a very particular object of police
inquiry. I dare say the interests of
the Bible Society required the adven-
turous journey to the wilds of Finis-
terra. But I feel that if that associa-
tion had been a mere mundane com-
pany and Borrow its agent, trouble-
some shareholders might have asked
awkward questions at the annual
meeting. Still, this sceptical attitude
is only part of the ofncial duty of the
critic, just as, of course, Sorrow's
George Borrow.
177
adventurous journeys into the most
remote and interesting parts of Spain
were part of the duty of the colpor-
teur. The book is so delightful that,
except when duty calls, no one would
willingly take any exception to any
part or feature of it. The constant
change of scene, the romantic episodes
of adventure, the kaleidoscope of
characters, the crisp dialogue, the
quaint reflection and comment relieve
each other without a break. I do not
know whether it is really true to
Spain and Spanish life, and, to tell the
exact truth, I do not in the least care.
If it is not Spanish it is remarkably
human and remarkably literary, and
those are the chief and principal
things.
' Lavengro,' which followed, has all
the merits of its predecessor and
more. It is a little spoilt in its later
chapters by the purpose, the anti-
papal purpose, which appears still
more fully in ' The Romany Rye.' But
the strong and singular individuality
of its flavour as a whole would have
been more than sufficient to carry off
a greater fault. There are, I should
suppose, few books the successive
pictures of which leave such an im-
pression on the reader who is prepared
to receive that impression. The word
picture is here rightly used, for in
all Borrow' s books -more or less, and
in this particularly, thie narrative is
anything but continuous. It is a suc-
cession of dissolving views which grow
clear and distinct for a time and then
fade off into a vagueness before once
more appearing distinctly ; nor has
this mode of dealing with a subject
ever been more successfully applied
than in 'Lavengro.' At the same
time the mode is one singularly diffi-
cult of treatment by any reviewer. To
describe * Lavengro ' with any chance
of distinctness to those who have not
read it, it would be necessary to give
a series of sketches in words, like
those famous ones of the pictures in
' Jane Eyre.' East Dereham, the Yiper
Collector, the French Prisoners at
Norman Cross, the Gipsy Encampment,
No. 315. VOL. LIII.
the Sojourn in Edinburgh (with a
passing view of Scotch schoolboys
only inferior, as everything is, to Sir
Walter's history of Green-breeks), the
Irish Sojourn, with the horse whisper-
ing and the " dog of peace," the
settlement in Norwich with Borrow' s
compulsory legal studies and his
very uncompulsory excursions into
Italian, Hebrew, Welsh, Scandinavian,
anything that obviously would not
pay, the new meeting with the gipsies
in the castle field, the fight only the
first of many excellent fights these
are but a few of the memories which
rise to every reader of even the early
chapters of this extraordinary book,
and they do not cover its first hundred
pages in the common edition. Then
his father dies and the born vagrant
is set loose for vagrancy. He goes to
London, with a stock of translations
which is to make him famous, and a
recommendation from Taylor of Nor-
wich to "the publisher." The pub-
lisher exacted something more than
his pound of flesh in the form of
Newgate Lives and review articles, and
paid, when he did pay, in bills of un-
certain date which were very likely to
be protested. But Borrow won through
it all, making odd acquaintances with
a young man of fashion (his least life-
like sketch) ; with an apple-seller on
London Bridge, who was something
of a " fence " and had erected Moll
Flanders (surely the oddest patroness
ever so selected) into a kind of patron
saint ; with a mysterious Armenian
merchant of vast wealth, whom the
young man, according to his own
account, finally put on a kind of fili-
bustering expedition against both the
Sublime Porte and the White Czar, for
the restoration of Armenian indepen-
dence. I do not know whether there
is any record of the result : perhaps
Mr. Hagopian will tell us when he
next writes to the ' Times.' At last,
out of health with perpetual work and
low living, out of employ, his friends
beyond call, he sees destruction before
him, writes * The Life and Adventures
of Joseph Sell' (name of fortunate
178
George Borrow.
omen !) almost at a heat and on a
capital, fixed and floating, of eighteen-
pence, and disposes of it for twenty
pounds by the special providence of
the Muses. With this twenty pounds
his journey into the blue distance
begins. He travels partly by coach
to (I suppose Amesbury, at any
rate) somewhere near Salisbury, and
gives the first of the curiously un-
favourable portraits of stage coach-
men, which remain to check Dickens's
rose-coloured representations (no pun
is intended) of Mr. Weller and his
brethren. I incline to think that
Borrow's was likely to be the truest
picture. According to him, the aver-
age stage coachman was anything but
an amiable character, greedy, insolent
to all but persons of wealth and rank,
a hanger-on of those who might claim
either ; bruiser enough to be a bully
but not enough to be anything more ;
in short, one of the worst products of
civilisation. From civilisation itself,
however, Borrow soon disappears, at
least as any traceable signs go. He
journeys not farther west, but north-
wards into the West Midlands and the
marshes of Wales. He buys a tinker's
beat and fit-out from a feeble vessel
of the craft, who has been expelled by
"the Flaming Tinman," a half -gipsy
of robustious behaviour. He is met by
old Mrs. Hearne, the mother-in-law of
his gipsy friend Jasper Petulengro,
who resents a Gorgio's initiation in
gipsy ways, and very nearly poisons
him by the wily aid of her grand-
daughter Leonora. He recovers, thanks
to a Welsh travelling preacher and to
castor oil. And then when the Welsh-
man hag left him comes the climax
and turning point of the whole story,
the great fight with Jem Bosvile, " the
Flaming Tinman." The much abused
adjective Homeric belongs in sober
strictness to this immortal battle,
which has the additional interest not
thought of by Homer (for goddesses
do not count) that Borrow's second
and guardian angel is a young woman of
great attractions and severe morality,
Miss Isopel (or Belle) Berners, whose
extraction, allowing for the bar sin-
ister, is honourable, and who, her
hands being fully able to keep her
head, has sojourned without ill for-
tune in " the Flaming Tinman's "
very disreputable company. Bosvile,
vanquished by pluck and good fortune
rather than strength, flees the place
with his wife. Isopel remains behind
and the couple take up their joint
residence, a residence of perfect pro-
priety, in this dingle, the exact locality
of which I have always longed to
know, that I might make an autumnal
pilgrimage to it. Isopel, Brynhild as
she is, would apparently have had no
objection to be honourably wooed. But
her eccentric companion confines him-
self to teaching her " I love," in Arme-
nian, which she finds unsatisfactory;
and she at last departs, leaving a letter
which tells Mr. Borrow some home
truths. But before this catastrophe
has been reached, ' Lavengro ' itself
ends with a more startling abruptness
than perhaps any nominally complete
book before or since.
It would be a little interesting to
know whether the continuation, * The
Romany Bye/ which opens as if there
had been no break whatever, was
written continuously or with a break.
At any rate its opening chapters con-
tain the finish of the lamentable
history of Belle Berners, which must
induce every reader of sensibility to
trust that Borrow, in writing it, was
only indulging in his very considerable
faculty of perverse romancing. The
chief argument to the contrary is, that
surely no man, however imbued with
romantic perversity, would have made
himself cut so poor a figure as Borrow
here does without cause. The gipsies
re -appear to save the situation, and a
kind of minor Belle Berners drama is
played out with Ursula, Jasper's sister.
Then the story takes another of its
abrupt turns. Jasper, half in gener-
osity it would appear, half in way-
wardness, insists on Borrow purchasing
a thorough-bred horse which is for
sale, advances the money, and de-
spatches him across England to Horn-
George Borrow.
179
castle Fair to sell it. The usual Le
Sage-like adventures occur, the oddest
of which is the hero's residence for
some considerable time as clerk and
storekeeper at a great roadside inn.
At last he reaches Horncastle, sells
the horse to advantage, and the story
closes as abruptly and mysteriously
almost as that of Lavengro, by a long
and in parts, it must be confessed,
rather dull conversation between the
hero, the Hungarian who has bought
the horse, and the dealer who has
acted as go-between. This dealer in
honour of Borrow, of whom he has
heard through the gipsies, executes
the wasteful and very meaningless
ceremony of throwing two bottles of
old rose champagne, at a guinea a-
piece, through the window. Even this
is too dramatic a finale for Borrow' s
unconquerable singularity, and he adds
a short dialogue between himself and
a recruiting sergeant. And after this
again there comes an appendix con-
taining an apologia for ' Lavengro,' a
great deal more polemic against Ro-
manism, some historical views of more
originality than exactness, and a dia-
tribe against gentility, Scotchmen,
Scott, and other black beasts of Bor-
row' s. This appendix has received
from some professed admirers of the
author a great deal more attention
than it deserves. In the first place,
it was evidently written in a fit of
personal pique ; in the second, it is
chiefly argumentative, and Borrow had
absolutely no argumentative faculty.
That it contains a great deal of quaint
and piquant writing is only to say
that its writer wrote it, and though
the description of " Charlie-over-the-
waterism " probably does not apply
to any being who ever lived, except
to a few schoolgirls of both sexes, it
has a strong infusion of Borrow's
satiric gift. As for the diatribes
against gentility, Borrow has only
done very clumsily what Thackeray
had done long before without clumsi-
ness. It can escape nobody who has
read his books with a seeing eye that
he was himself exceedingly proud, not
merely of being a gentleman in the
ethical sense, but of being one in the
sense of station and extraction which,
by the way, the decriers of British
snobbishness usually are, so that no
special blame attaches to Borrow for
the inconsistency. Only let it be under-
stood, once for all, that to describe
him as " the apostle of the ungenteel "
is either to speak in riddles or quite
to misunderstand his real merits and
abilities.
I believe that some of the small but
fierce tribe of Borrovians are inclined
to resent the putting of the last of
this remarkable series, ' Wild Wales,'
on a level with the other three. With
such I can by no means agree. ' Wild
Wales ' has not, of course, the charm of
unfamiliar scenery and the freshness
of youthful impression which distin-
guish ' The Bible in Spain ' ; it does
not attempt anything like the novel-
interest of ' Lavengro ' and ' The
Romany Rye ' ; and though, as has
been pointed out above, something of
Borrow's secret and mysterious way of
indicating places survives, it is a pretty
distinct itinerary over great part of
the actual principality. I have fol-
lowed most of its tracks on foot my-
self, and nobody who wants a Welsh
guide-book can take a pleasanter one,
though he might easily find one much
less erratic. It may thus have, to
superficial observers, a positive and
prosaic flavour as compared with
the romantic character of the other
three. But this distinction is not real.
The tones are a little subdued, as
was likely to be the case with an
elderly gentleman of fifty, travelling
with his wife and step-daughter, and
not publishing the record of his travels
till he was nearly ten years older.
The localities are traceable on the
map and in Murray, instead of being
the enchanted dingles and the half-
mythical woods of 'Lavengro.' The
personages of the former books return
no more, though with one of his most
excellent touches of art, the author
has suggested the contrast of youth
and age by a single gipsy interview
N 2
180
George Borrow.
in one of the later chapters. Borrow,
like all sensible men, was at no time
indifferent to good food and drink,
especially good ale ; but the trencher
plays in ' Wild Wales ' a part, the im-
portance of which may perhaps have
shocked some of our latter-day deli-
cates, to whom strong beer is a
word of loathing, and who wonder
how on earth our grandfathers and
fathers used to dispose of " black
strap." A very different set of readers
may be repelled by the strong literary
colour of the book, which is almost a
Welsh anthology in parts. But those
few who can boast themselves to find
the whole of a book, not merely its
parts, and to judge it when found,
will, I think, be not least fond of
* Wild Wales.' If they have, as every
reader of Borrow should have, the
spirit of the roads upon them, and are
never more happy than when jour-
neying on " Shanks his mare," they
will, of course, have in addition a
private and personal love for it. It
is, despite the interludes of literary
history, as full of Borrow' s peculiar
conversational gift as any of its pre-
decessors. Its thumbnail sketches,
if somewhat more subdued and less
elaborate, are not less full of charac-
ter. John Jones, the Dissenting
weaver, who served Borrow at once
as a guide and a whetstone of
Welsh in the neighbourhood of Llan-
gollen ; the " kenfigenous " Welsh-
woman who first, but by no means
last, exhibited the curious local jea-
lousy of a Welsh-speaking English-
man ; the doctor and the Italian
barometer-seller at Cerrig-y-Drudion ;
the " best Pridydd of the world " in
Anglesey, with his unlucky addiction
to beer and flattery; the waiter at
Bala ; the " ecclesiastical cat" (a cat
worthy to rank with those of Southey
and Gautier) ; the characters of the
walk across the hills from Machynlleth
to the Devil's Bridge ; the scene at
the public-house on the Glamorgan
border, where the above mentioned
jealousy comes out so strongly; the
mad Irishwoman, Johanna Colgan (a
masterpiece by herself) ; and the Irish
girl, with her hardly inferior history
of the faction-fights of Scotland Road
(which Borrow, by a mistake, has put
in Manchester instead of in Liverpool) ;
these make a list which I have written
down merely as they occurred to me,
without opening the book, and with-
out prejudice to another list nearly as
long which might be added. Wild
Wales,' too, because of its easy and
direct opportunity of comparing its
description with the originals, is par-
ticularly valuable as showing how
sober, and yet how forcible Borrow' s
descriptions are. As to incident, one
often, as before, suspects him of ro-
. mancing, and it stands to reason that
his dialogue, written long after the
event, must be full of the "cocked-
hat-and- sword " style of narrative.
But his description, while it has
all the vividness, has also all the
faithfulness and sobriety of the best
landscape-painting. See a place which
Kingsley or Mr. Huskin, or some other
master of our decorative school, have
described much more one which has
fallen into the hands of the small fry
of their imitators and you are almost
sure to find that it has been overdone.
This is never, or hardly ever, the case
with Borrow, and it is so rare a merit,
when it is found in a man who does
not shirk description where necessary,
that it deserves to be counted to him
at no grudging rate.
But there is no doubt that the
distinguished feature of the book is
its survey of Welsh poetical literature.
I have already confessed that I am not
qualified to judge the accuracy of
Sorrow's translations, and by no
means disposed to overvalue them.
But any one who takes an interest in
literature at all, must, I think, feel
that interest not a little excited by the
curious Old Mortality-like peregrina-
tions which the author of 'Wild Walts'
made to the birth-place, or the burial-
place as it might be, of bard after bard,
and by the short but masterly accounts
which he gives of the objects of his
search. Of none of the numerous
George Borrow.
181
subjects of his linguistic rovings does
Borrow seem to have been fonder,
putting Romany aside, than of Welsh.
He learnt it in a peculiarly contraband
manner originally, which, no doubt,
endeared it to him ; it was little known
to and often ridiculed by most English-
men, which was another attraction ;
and it was extremely unlikely to
" pay " in any way, which was a third.
Perhaps he was not such an adept in
it, as he would have us believe the
respected Cymmrodorion Society or Pro-
fessor Rhys must settle that. But it
needs no knowledge of Welsh what-
ever to perceive the genuine enthusiasm,
and the genuine range of his acquaint-
ance with the language from the purely
literary side. When he tells us that
Ab Gwilym was a greater poet than
Ovid or Chaucer I feel considerable
doubts whether he was quite competent
to understand Ovid and little or no
doubt that he has done wrong to
Chaucer. But when, leaving these idle
comparisons, he luxuriates in details
about AbG wilym himself , and his poems,
and his lady loves, and so forth, I have
no doubt about Sorrow's appreciation
(casual prejudices always excepted) of
literature. Nor is the charm which
he has added to Welsh scenery by this
constant identification of it with the
men, and the deeds, and the words of
the past to be easily exaggerated.
Little has been said hitherto of
Borrow's more purely, or if anybody
prefers the word formally, literary
characteristics. They are sufficiently
interesting. He unites with a general
plainness of speech and writing, not
unworthy of Defoe or Cobbett, a very
odd and complicated mannerism, which,
as he had the wisdom to make it the
seasoning and not the main substance
of his literary fare, is never disgusting.
The secret of this may be, no doubt,
in part sought in his early familiarity
with a great many foreign languages,
some of whose idioms he transplanted
into English, but this is by no means
the whole of the receipt. Perhaps it
is useless to examine analytically that
receipt's details, or rather (for the
analysis may be said to be compulsory
on any one who calls himself a critic),
useless to offer its results to the
reader. One point which can escape
no one who reads with his eyes open
is the frequent, yet not too abun-
dant repetition of the same or very
similar words a point wherein much
of the style of persons so dissimilar as
Carlyle, Borrow, and Thackeray con-
sists. This is a well-known fact so
well-known indeed that when a person
who desires to acquire style hears of
it, he often goes and does likewise,
with what result all reviewers know.
The peculiarity of Borrow as far as I
can mark it, is that, despite his strong
mannerism, he never relies on it as too
many others, great and small, are wont
to do. His character sketches, of
which, as I have said, he is so abund-
ant a master, are always put in the
plainest and simplest English. So are
his flashes of ethical reflection, which,
though like all ethical reflections often
one-sided, are of the first order of
insight. I really do not know that, in
the mint and anise and cummin order
of criticism, I have more than one
charge to make against Borrow. That
is that he, like other persons of his
own and the immediately preceding
time, is wont to make a most absurd
misuse of the word individual. With
Borrow " individual " means simply
" person " : a piece of literary gentility
of which he of all others ought to
have been ashamed.
But such criticism would be pecu-
liarly out of place in the case of Bor-
row whose attraction is one neither
mainly nor in any very great degree
one of pure form. His early critics
compared him, and the comparison is
natural, to Le Sage. It was natural I
say, but it was not extraordinarily
critical. Both men wrote of vagabonds,
and to some extent of picaroons ; both
neglected the conventionalities of their
own language and literature ; both had
a singular knowledge of human nature.
But Le Sage is one of the most imper-
sonal of all great writers, and Borrow
is one of the most personal. And it
182
George Borrow.
is undoubtedly in the revelation of his
personality that great part of his
charm lies. It is, as has been fully
acknowledged, a one-sided wrong-
headed not always quite right-hearted
personality. But it is intensely English,
possessing at the same time a certain
strain of romance which the other
John Bulls of literature mostly lack,
and which John Bunyan, the king of
them all, only reached within the
limits, still more limited than Borrow's,
of purely religious, if not purely eccle-
siastical, interests. A born grumbler ;
a person with an intense appetite for
the good things of this life ; profoundly
impressed with and at the same time
sceptically critical of the bad or good
things of another life ; apt, as he some-
where says himself, "to hit people
when he is not pleased " ; illogical ;
constantly right in general despite his
extremely roundabout ways of reach-
ing his conclusion ; sometimes absurd,
and yet full of humour ; alternately pro-
saic and capable of the highest poetry ;
George Borrow, Cornishman on the
father's side and Huguenot on the
mother's, managed to display in per-
fection most of the characteristics of
what once was, and let us hope has
not quite ceased to be, the English
type. If he had a slight overdose of
Celtic blood and Celtic peculiarity, it
was more than made up by the readi-
ness of literary expression which it
gave him. He, if any one, bore an
English heart, though, as there often
has been, there was something perhaps
more than English as well as less than
it in his fashion of expression.
To conclude, Borrow has what
after all is the chief mark of a
great writer distinction. "Try to
be like somebody," said the unlucky
critic-bookseller to Lamartine; and he
has been gibbeted for it very justly
for the best part of a century. It
must be admitted that " try not to
be like other people," though a much
more fashionable is likely to be quite
as disastrous a recommendation. But
the great writers, whether they try to
be like other people or try not to be
like them (and sometimes in the first
case most of all), succeed only in
being themselves, and that is what
Borrow does. His attraction is rather
complex, and different parts of it may,
and no doubt do, appeal with differ-
ing force to this and that reader. One
may be fascinated by his pictures of
an unconventional and open air life,
the very possibilities of which are to
a great extent lost in our days, though
patches of ground here and there in
England (notably the tracts of open
ground between Cromer and Wells in
Borrow's own county) still recall
them. To others he may be attractive
for his sturdy patriotism, or his ad-
venturous and wayward spirit, or his
glimpses of superstition and romance.
The racy downrightnes of his talk ;
the axioms, such as that to the Welsh
alewife, " The goodness of ale depends
less upon who brews it than upon
what it is brewed of " ; or the sarcas-
tic touches as that of the dapper shop-
keeper, who, regarding the funeral
of Byron, observed, " I too, am fre-
quently unhappy," each and all may
have their votaries. His literary de-
votion to literature would, perhaps, of
itself attract few; for, as has been
hinted, it partook very much of the
character of will-worship, and there
are few people who like any will-
worship in letters except their own ;
but it adds to the general attraction
no doubt in the case of many. That
neither it, nor any of his other claims,
has yet forced itself as it should on the
general public is an undoubted fact ;
not very difficult, perhaps, to under-
stand, though rather difficult fully to
explain, at least without some air of
superior knowingness and taste. Yet
he has, as has been said, his devotees,
and I think they are likely rather to
increase than to decrease. He wants
editing, for his allusive fashion of
writing probably makes a great part of
him nearly unintelligible to those who
have not from their youth up devoted
themselves to the acquisition of useless
knowledge. There ought to be a
good life of him, of which, I believe,
George Borrow.
183
there is at last some chance. The
great mass of his translations, pub-
lished and unpublished, and the
smaller mass of his early hackwork,
no doubt deserves judicious excerption.
If professed philologers were not even
more ready than most other special-
ists each to excommunicate all the
others except himself and his own
particular Johnny Dods of Farthing's
Acre, it would be rather interesting to
hear what some modern men of many
languages have to say to Sorrow's
linguistic achievements. But all these
things are only desirable embellish-
ments and assistances. His real
claims and his real attractions are
comprised in four small volumes,
the purchase of which, under modern
arrangements of booksellers, leaves
some change out of a sovereign, and
which will about half fill the ordinary
bag used for briefs and dynamite.
It is not a large literary baggage,
and it does not attempt any very
varied literary kinds. If not exactly
a novelist in any one of his books,
Borrow is a romancer in the true and
not the ironic sense of the word in all
of them. He has not been approached
in merit by any romancer who has pub-
lished books in our days, except Charles
Kingsley ; and his work, if less varied
in range and charm than Kingsley's, has
a much stronger and more concentrated
flavour. Moreover, he is the one Eng-
lish writer of our time, and perhaps
of times still farther back, who never
seems to have tried to be anything
but himself; who went his own way
all his life long with complete in-
difference to what the public or the
publishers liked, as well as to what
canons of literary form and standards
of literary perfection seemed to in-
dicate as best worth aiming at. A
most self -sufficient person was Bor-
row, in the good and ancient sense,
as well as to some extent in the bad
and modern sense. And what is more,
he was not only a self-sufficient per-
son, but very sufficient also to the
tastes of all those who love good
English and good literature.
GEORGE SAINTSBURY
184
THE POETIC IMAGINATION.
" Forms more real than living man,
Nurslings of immortality."
SHELLEY.
PHYSIOLOGISTS would, I suppose, tell
us that imagination is a reflex action
of the brain, a definition more concise
than helpful. It is to the psycho-
logists that we shall more naturally
look for assistance on this subject.
According to the most recent English
work on the subject, Mr. Sully 's
1 Outlines of Psychology/ imagination
is the picturing of objects and events
in what are called images. If, he says,
the images are exact copies of past im-
pressions, the process is called repro-
ductive imagination, or memory. If,
on the other hand, the images are
modifications or transformations of
past impressions, the process is marked
off as productive or constructive im-
agination. This latter process, Mr.
Sully points out, answers roughly to
the popular term imagination. But,
as he says, this kind of imagination
not only transforms or idealises past
impressions, it also works them up
into new imaginative products.
Further, he might have added, ima-
gination is interpretative ; it interprets
the facts of the world of sense, or, in
Wordsworth's phrase, it explains "the
moral property and scope of things."
If, then, we take into account these
three functions of the imagination,
shall we not pronounce that there is
after all more similarity than dis-
similarity between the memory and
the imagination ? Shall we not say
that memory is concerned with what
is old, imagination with what is new ;
that memory is reproductive, imagina-
tion productive ; that memory is imi-
tative, imagination original ? Allow-
ing then for the obvious metaphor in
the use of the word seeing, may we
not accept James Hinton's definition
of imagination as "the power of see-
ing the unseen " ?
It should here be noticed that for-
merly the word fancy was used to de-
note what we now term imagination.
Thus Milton speaks of Shakespeare as
"fancy's child." It was Coleridge
who first distinguished between fancy
and imagination, and, though the dis-
tinction is not considered of any ac-
count by modern psychologists, it is, I
believe, a real one. Coleridge defined
fancy as "a mode of memory emanci-
pated from the order of time and
space ; and blended with and modi-
fied by that empirical phenomenon of
the will, which we express by the word
choice;" and he pointed out that
" equally with the ordinary memory it
must receive all its materials ready-
made from the law of association." The
term imagination he reserved for the
creative faculty, but unfortunately the
full and complete account of its powers
which he intended one day to write,
remained one of the many projects
which he never put into execution. In
the few but pregnant hints, however,
which he has left us on the subject, he
especially insists on the unity of the
imagination, coining for it the epithet
esemplastic (ets ev TrXarretv, i.e. to
shape into one) and saying that it sees
il piu in uno. The same idea is care-
fully worked out by Mr. Kuskin in his
account of the imagination in * Modern
Painters,' where he points out with
great appositeness of illustration the
difference between mere composition,
or patchwork, and true imaginative
production. Indeed, one of the strongest
arguments in favour of what may be
The Poetic Imagination.
185
called the transcendental theory of the
imagination is the immeasurable dis-
tance that separates the patchwork of
an inferior artist from the seamless
garment woven by a master's hand.
So immeasurable is it that it is im-
possible to accept the explanation that
the secret of true imaginative work
consists merely in modifying and
piecing together past impressions
so rapidly and so deftly that we can-
not detect the join.
"All imaginative activity," truly
says Mr. Sully, " involves an element of
feeling." Love, pity, horror, joy, indig-
nation, all serve to kindle the imagina-
tion. But the emotions which beat in
closest unison with it are the aesthetic
emotions, that group of nameless
and mysterious feelings which are
generated by the presence of beauty.
Seeing, then, that the true character-
istic of the imagination is its creative
and life-giving power, and that it has
an intimate relation with the aesthetic
emotions, it is not surprising that it
should be especially the art-faculty,
the faculty which comes into play in
the production of all works of art.
The sculptor must be able to model,
| the painter to draw and to colour, the
| architect to build, the musician must
[ be a master of melody and harmony,
the poet of language and rhythm ; but
j all alike must have imagination.
Take, for instance, one of those
! Dutch pictures, for which Mr. Ruskin
i has such contempt and George Eliot
| such sympathy. The exclusive wor-
shipper of high art condemns it at
! once as wholly devoid of imagination.
But let us try the picture by a simple
: test. Let us set ten painters down to
paint a study from the life of an old
woman scraping carrots. What will
be the result ? For certain, no two of
their pictures will be exactly alike.
' Each painter will have added some-
I thing new, something which to the
eye of the ordinary observer did not
appear in the actual scene ; and this
i addition, this idealisation, as we should
\ call it, will have come from the
painter's imagination.
We speak of imagination as the
idealising faculty ; but it is a mistake
to suppose that to idealise necessarily
means to make beautiful. Idealisation
consists rather in throwing into relief
the characteristic parts of an object,
and discarding unimportant details ;
in short, in presenting an idea of the
object to the mind which, by virtue of
this rearrangement makes a deeper
and more lasting impression ; and for
this reason, that artistic truth has
been substituted for scientific truth,
life for death.
Not only is imagination necessary
for the production of a work of art,
but it is also necessary for the under-
standing of it. The conception which
is born of imagination can only be
apprehended by imagination. Hegel
indeed makes a distinction between
the active or productive imagination
of the artist, and the passive or re-
ceptive imagination of the beholder
of a work of art, and calls them by
different names; but in reality the
difference between them is one of
degree and not one of kind. The
impression which is made upon the
beholder of a work of art, though
doubtless far less intense, is no doubt
similar in kind to that which the
artist himself had when he conceived
it.
It must be admitted that the law
that imagination is necessary to the
production of a work of art does not
apply so strictly to poetry as to the
other fine arts, and for this reason,
that poetry stands on a somewhat
different footing from other arts. It is,
so to speak, less strictly an art. In
the first place, not only, as is the case
with other time arts, such as music,
is the impression which it makes upon
the imagination spread over a period
of time instead of being almost
instantaneous, as it is in a space
art like painting, but it is not al-
ways even continuous. When Edgar
Poe declared that a poem which could
not be read through at a single sitting
was an anomaly, thus excluding the
' Iliad ' and other epics from the cate-
186
The Poetic Imagination.
gory of poetry, he was only following
out to its logical conclusion, his
theory that poetry, like music, is a
pure art. But the common-sense of
many generations, which is a higher
court than any theory, has ruled him
to be wrong. The explanation is that
poetry is not a pure art.
Secondly, there is this vital distinc-
tion between poetry and the other fine
arts. They are addressed immedi-
ately to the senses, and through the
senses to the emotions and the imagi-
nation; but poetry, though it is in
some measure addressed to the ear
and so far partakes of the nature of
music, is chiefly and primarily ad-
dressed to the intellect for language
implies intellect to understand it
and through the intellect to the
emotions and the imagination.
There follow from these special
characteristics of poetry two notable
results. First, the impression made
upon the imagination by a poem being
often spread over a considerable space
of time, which may not even be con-
tinuous, we can dispense with imagi-
native treatment in some parts of a
poem, and we do not necessarily
condemn a whole poem because it con-
tains some unimaginative passages.
Secondly, poetry not being addressed
primarily to the senses, there is a
marked difference between the func-
tion of the imagination in poetry and
its function in a sensuous art like
painting. In both arts alike it is the
function of the imagination to repre-
sent both the visible and the invisible
world, both the sensuous object and
the inward spiritual meaning of that
object; but in painting the sensuous
object is directly presented, while the
spiritual idea can only be suggested ;
in poetry, on the other hand, it is the
object itself which can only be sug-
gested, it is the spiritual idea which
receives direct presentment.
It is most important that poets and
painters should bear in mind this
distinction. To paint pictures vague
in outline and blurred in colour under
the impression that they thus become
spiritual, is as foolish as to write
poems full of detailed and matter-of-
fact descriptions of material objects in
order to make them sensuous. It is
quite true that painting should be
spiritual, it is equally true that
poetry should be sensuous; but this
must be effected by the method proper
to each art, not by confusing their
two methods.
It will be remembered that in those
noble chapters of ' Modern Painters '
in which Mr. Ruskin treats of the
imagination he classifies its powers
under three heads, Associative, Pene-
trative, and Contemplative. By As-
sociative imagination he means the
power of constructing images, or, as
Coleridge calls it, the shaping power
of the imagination. Contemplative
imagination is, as I shall try to show
presently, merely a form of this, which
I prefer to call by the more ordinary
term Constructive. On the other hand,
a faculty of the imagination which
Mr. Ruskin has omitted in this classi-
fication is the idealising faculty. I
would therefore propose to substitute
for Mr. Ruskin's-* terminology the
terms Constructive, Idealising, and
Penetrative, as expressing the various
powers of the imagination.
Let us consider now what is the
part played by the imagination in the
genesis of a poem. First, it is to the
imagination that the first conception
of every true poem is due. Some ex-
ternal object, either animate or in-
animate, either a face or a landscape,
sends a rush of emotion to the poet's
soul and kindles his imagination.
What Turgenieff says of himself is
probably true of most great poets and
novelists, that they never start from
the idea but always from the object.
The imagination being thus called into
life exercises its powers by an instan-
taneous and involuntary process. It
transports the poet from the world of
sense to the spiritual world beyond ;
it reveals to him as in a vision the
inward meaning of the sensuous fact
which has aroused his emotions, while
in one and the same moment the
I
The Poetic Imagination.
187
vision is embodied in the form of a
poem, the general idea of which,
along with the rhythmical move-
ment, flashes upon the poet instan-
taneously. Then follows the " accom-
plishment of verse," the filling up the
details of the poet's design, in order to
communicate his vision to those denser
intelligences which lack the " divine
faculty." With the true poet, to borrow
the words used by Monro of Catullus,
" there is no putting together of pieces
of mosaic ; with him the completed
thought follows at once upon the
emotion, and the consummate form
and expression rush to embody this
thought for ever."
Of course it is only short poems that
require, as it were, but a single
draught of inspiration from the
imagination for their production. In
longer poems the poet must be con-
stantly calling upon his imagina-
tion for fresh efforts. But he must
call upon it as a master, and he must
never lose sight of the original im-
pulse which gave birth to his work, of
the guiding idea which ought to be
the central point of his poem. The
reason why so many poets who excel
in short poems fail when they try a
longer flight is that they have not suffi-
cient power of mental concentration to
keep their imagination steadily fixed on
one point. They follow it instead of
guiding it, and it sometimes leads them
into grievous quagmires. The imagina-
tion is partly an active and partly a
passive faculty. Visions often come
to us without any effort of our own ;
it is only the supreme artist, the
really great man, who can control his
visions.
The intensity and the quality of
the imagination in a poem will vary
accoi'ding to the nature of the poet's
genius and the special mood en-
gendered in him by the motive of the
poem the character of the imagina-
tion will determine that of the poem.
Thus, if the imagination be directed
chiefly towards the human passions
and the infinite variations of them
which make up individual human
character, the result will be a drama,
or at least a dramatic poem. If on
the other hand it is rather on the
actions than on the passions of men,
rather on human nature in its broad
outlines than on the characteristics
which mark off one human being from
another, that the imagination loves to
dwell, we shall have a narrative, pos-
sibly an epic, poem. If the imagina-
tion is strongly emotional the result
will be a lyric ; if it suggest a train of
thought rather than of images it will
produce an elegy.
Even from the two kinds of poetry
which are rightly accounted the lowest,
inasmuch as their aims are only in a
small measure artistic, namely satire
and didactic poetry, imagination is by
no means absent. There is imagina-
tion in the descriptions of persons, and
in the pictures of social life which
satire, not wholly unmindful of her
early Italian home, sets up as a mark
for her arrows ; there is imagination
in the images and metaphors, and in
the concentrated and pregnant lan-
guage by which a didactic poem like
* The Essay on Man ' seeks to render
its reasoning more pointed and im-
pressive.
The images evoked by the Construc-
tive imagination are of two kinds.
They are either complex images re-
presenting some new combination of
actually existing objects, or they are
simple images of wholly new objects,
of objects which have no existence in
the world of sense. The former class
of images only require a somewhat
low degree of imagination for their
production, and ordinary persons, who
are neither novelists nor poets, have
frequent experiences of them. They
supply what are called the scenes or
situations of fiction, in which some
new and ideal combination either of
man or nature, or of both together, is
presented, and which form the frame-
work for all narrative and dramatic
poetry, as well as for all novels.
The most obvious instance of the
second class of images are what are
called imaginary creatures, such as
188
The Poetic Imagination.
Milton's Satan, Ariosto's Hippogriff,
Dante's Nimrod, Shakespeare's Ariel.
But what are we to say of those far
higher creations, the human beings
who live only in the world of fiction ?
Are they due to the Constructive
power of the imagination, or to its
Idealising power, or to its Penetrative
power 1
It may at once be granted that all
fictitious characters which are drawn
from existing persons must be ascribed
to the Idealising imagination. But 1
believe that the majority of characters
in fiction, and certainly all the
greatest characters, are purely ideal
representations and not portraits.
Although some living person may have
first suggested them, they are evolved
by the imagination without any further
reference to that person. A great
many characters for instance in Al-
phonse Daudet's novels are said to be
portraits : but they have been claimed
as such by reason, not of any essential
property of likeness, but of certain
details of position and circumstances.
Whether Numa Roumestan stands for
Gambetta, or the Due de Mora for the
Due de Moray or not, there can be no
doubt that both Numa and Mora are
absolutely new creations.
If then the characters of fiction are
creations and not representations, they
must, as far as regards the first con-
ception of them, be ascribed to the
constructive power of the imagination.
But their evolution is surely due to its
penetrative power. To evolve a great
character of fiction requires a deep
knowledge of the human heart, and
so much of that knowledge as proceeds
from intuition and not from actual
experience can only come from the
imagination as a penetrative faculty.
It is Penetrative imagination that
inspires the dramatist with those
touches that reveal a whole world of
passion at a flash ; such touches as
those cited by Mr. Ruskin, the " He
has no children " of Macduff ; the " My
gracious silence hail ! " of Coriolanus ;
the " Quel giorno piu non vi leggemeno
avanti " of Francesca, or that wonder-
ful passage in * Lear,' wonderful in
its simplicity
" Pray, do not mock me :
I am a very foolish fond old man,
Fourscore and upward ; and, to deal
plainly,
I fear I am not in my perfect mind."
This intensity and energy of concen-
tration are unfailing signs of Penetra-
tive imagination, the imagination which
pierces right to the heart of things,
seizes hold of their most characteristic
and life-giving quality, and reveals it in
language as simple as it is pregnant.
What a picture of perfect beauty
we have in these lines from * Chris-
tabel '
" Her gentle limbs she did undress
And lay down in her loveliness."
What intense imagination in the
following from Keats
"Or like stout Cortez, when with eagle eyes
He stared at the Pacific and all his men
Looked at each other with a wild surmise
Silent, upon a peak in Darien."
Or in this from Wordsworth's ' Yei
trees ' :
" Nor uninformed with Phantasy, and looks
That threaten the profane. "
Or as an instance of a somewl
more elaborate, but still intensely
imaginative, description we have
Shelley's
" And in its depth there is a mighty rock,
Which has, from unimaginable years,
Sustained itself with terror and with toil
Over a gulf, and with the agony
With which it clings seems slowly coming
down ;
Even as a wretched soul, hour after hour,
Clings to the ways of life ; yet clinging leans,
And, leaning, makes more dark the dread
abyss
In which it fears to fall. Beneath this crag,
Huge as despair, &c."
Or Milton's description of Satan, the
sublimest portrait ever painted in
words
" He, above the rest
In shape and gesture proudly eminent,
Stood like a tower ; his form had yet not
lost
The Poetic Imagination.
189
All her original brightness ; nor appeared
Less than archangel ruined, and the excess
Of glory obscured : as when the sun, new
risen,
Looks through the horizontal misty air
Shorn of his beams.
Darkened so, yet shone
Above them all the archangel ; but his face
Deep scars of thunder had intrenched ; and
care
Sat on his faded cheek ; but under brows
Of dauntless courage, and considerable pride,
Waiting revenge."
There are some lyrics which exhibit
in the highest degree this penetrative
faculty of the imagination, concen-
trating themselves on some object
of nature, and revealing in one lumi-
nous flash of song the secret of its
spiritual life. Such are Wordsworth's
' Daffodils ', To the Cuckoo ', and ' To
a Skylark ' ; Herrick's ' To Blossoms ' ;
Goethe's ' Auf alien Gipfeln'. But
on the whole this intensity of imagi-
nation is to be found more often in
sonnets than in those poems to which
the name of lyric is generally re-
stricted. The very form of the
sonnet, its forced concentration, its
division into two parts, its sober but
stately rhythm, makes it an admirable
instrument for the purpose of calling
up before the mind the twin image of
a sensuous object and a spiritual idea.
Wordsworth's sonnets especially are
characterised by this high imaginative
power, and of his sonnets there is no
finer example than the well-known one
' Upon Westminster Bridge.'
" Earth has not anything to show more fair :
Dull would he be of soul who could pass by
A sight so touching in its majesty :
This city now doth like a garment wear
The beauty of the morning ; silent, bare,
Ships, towers, domes, theatres, and temples
lie
Open unto the fields and to the sky,
All bright and glittering in the smokeless
air.
Never did sun more beautifully steep
In his gilt splendour valley, rock, or hill ;
Ne'er saw I, never felt, a calm so deep !
The river glideth at his own sweet will :
Dear God ! the very houses seem asleep ;
And all that mighty heart is lying still ! "
In the great majority of lyrical
poems which deal with some external
object, and not with the poet's own
passion, the poet plays round his
subject rather than penetrates it, con-
templates it rather than interprets it.
Thus, sometimes his imagination, in-
stead of remaining concentrated on
the object which has inspired the
poem, flies off to fresh images, and so
becomes creative instead of penetra-
tive. This is what Mr. Ruskin means
when he speaks of the imagination in
its contemplative mood. We have a
good instance of it in those beautiful
lines from Keats's 'The Eve of St.
Agnes,' where the soul of the sleeping
maiden is said to be
" Clasped like a missal, where swart Paynims
pray ;
Blinded alike from sunshine and from rain,
As though a rose should shut, and be a bud
again."
Here the
soul as
poet, after describing the
" Blissfully havened both from joy and pain,"
a touch of really penetrative imagi-
nation is, as it were, distracted by
fresh images ; first, that of a missal
clasped tight for safety in a land of
pagans, and then that of a rose-bud.
Sometimes the imagination gives
place for a time to fancy, and then,
instead of images which have an es-
sential likeness to the object which is
being described, we get images which
have only some external and acci-
dental likeness. There is no better
example of the difference between
fancy and imagination than that in-
stanced by Mr. Ruskin, Wordsworth's
poem, * To the Daisy ' the one begin-
ning, " With little here to do or see."
Here the flower is compared succes-
sively to a " nun demure," a " sprightly
maiden," a " queen in crown of rubies
drest," a " starveling in a scanty vest,"
a " little cyclops," a " silver shield
with boss of gold," and a " star " ; and
the poet himself notes the ephemeral
character of these images, which start
up one after the other at the bidding
of fancy
" That thought comes next and instantly
The freak is over."
190
The Poetic Imagination.
At last his mind ceases from wan-
dering, cleaves to the flower itself with
intensity of gaze, and illumines it with
true penetrative imagination.
" Sweet flower ! for by that name at last
When all my reveries are past
I call thee, and to that cleave fast,
Sweet silent creature !
That breath'st with me in sun and air,
Do thou, as thou art wont, repair
My heart with gladness, and a share
Of thy meek nature ! "
Defective imagination in lyrical
poems is also due to the poet's vision
being dimmed by the shadow of his
own personal joys and sorrows. In-
stead of projecting himself by the
force of sympathy into the external
world, whether of man or nature, he
makes it sympathise with him. Con-
sequently, though he gives us a faithful
representation of his own feelings, the
image that he presents of the external
world is blurred and misty. It is the
great weakness of Byron, as an imagi-
native poet, that his personal aspi-
rations and regrets are continually
passing across the field of his vision,
and, as it were, distorting his imagi-
nation. Thus, even in the splendid
description of the Lake of Geneva in
the third canto of ' Child e Harold/
passages of a really high order of
imagination are interrupted by egoistic
and commonplace outbursts, which go
far to spoil that illusion which it is
the business of all poetry to create.
The same kind of defective imagination
is shown in Byron's often-noticed inca-
pacity to create real human beings,
his attempts at creation being for the
most part merely copies of himself.
Shelley, who with a love even greater
than that of Byron for the elemental
forces of nature had an ear for her
more hidden harmonies which was
wholly wanting to the other poet,
shows a finer quality of imagination
in his treatment of nature. But in-
tensely penetrative though his imagi-
nation sometimes is, it is on the whole
less remarkable for intensity than for
sensibility and productiveness. No
poet's emotions were more easily
aroused, and no poet's imagination
was in such intimate sympathy with
his emotions. In the presence of
nature to see with him was to feel,
and to feel was to imagine. But his
poetry for the most'part rather charms
us by the marvellous delicacy and
variety of its images than seizes hold
of us by the force of its imaginative
truth. It is not often that he attains to
that luminous and concentrated depth
of imagination which distinguishes
1 The Cenci ', and 'Adonais '. His poem
' To a Skylark ' is probably far better
known than Wordsworth's poem on
the same subject ; l in splendour of
colour and movement it far surpasses
its modest grey-toned companion ; but
I question whether out of all its wealth
of beautiful and subtle images there
is one that shows such high imagina-
tive power, such intense penetration,
as the line which forms the climax of
Wordsworth's poem
" True to the kindred points of Heaven and
Home."
It is, of course, not enough for a
poet to have a powerful imagination ;
he must be able to embody his visions.
" Poetry is not imagination, but imagi-
nation shaped." 2 The instruments at
his command are two, language and
rhythm, and it is his business to use
these in such a way as to assist as
much as possible the imagination of
his readers in realising his conceptions.
In the first place then, his vocabulary
should be as large as possible ; the
better the instrument, the easier it is
to play on. But he must also know
how to play on it : he must know how
to vary his method with his theme :
he must remember that when he is
portraying great passion his language
cannot be too simple the death of
Desdemona, the closing lines of ' The
1 I mean the one beginning
" Ethereal minstrel ! pilgrim of the sky !
2 F. W. Robertson, in his lecture on the
' Influence of Poetry on the Working Classes,'
which, with his lecture on Wordsworth, I
warmly commend to all those who are not
already acquainted with them.
The Poetic Imagination.
191
Cenci,' Heine's and Catullus' lyrics,
are models in their bare simplicity of
language. He must also remember
that when he wishes to call up before
the mind of his readers some sensuous
object, he must do this not by an
accurate and detailed description of
that object, but by using some word
or expression which, by the force of
association, immediately suggests an
imaginative impression of that object.
It has been truly said that the poet is
a namer ; that all language was in its
origin poetry, and that prose is fos-
silised poetry. By which it is meant
that, in the early stages of human
society, things were named after their
chief characteristic were called by
some symbolical name which not only
served to mark them off from other
things, but interpreted their proper-
ties and meaning. Thus, man is the
thinker, the moon is the measurer, the
sun is the begetter, the serpent is the
creeper. 1 But in the process of time
the meaning of these names has been
forgotten ; they no longer appeal to
the imagination, they are fossil
names. It is therefore the business
of the poet to invent new names
names which do appeal to the imagi-
nation, which do reveal to us some
new quality in the object named. The
difference between false poets and
true poets is that the false poet goes
for his names to the poetical dictionary,
the true poet finds them in his own
breast. The names of the one, though
they were living in the hands of their
makers, are cold and dead ; the names
of the other breathe with a vital
energy. It is only the real poet, the
real maker of names, who can touch
our imagination.
The second instrument which the
poet has at his disposal is rhythm.
Its effects are far more subtle than
those of language, and consequently
far more difficult to analyse. But the
intimate connection between rhythm
and emotion has been pointed out by
several writers, notably^by Mr. Herbert
1 Professor Max Muller, ' Lectures on the
Science of Language,' i. p. 434.
Spencer. Not only does strong emo-
tion find a natural expression in the
rhythmical movement or language,
but conversely the effect of rhythm is
to excite emotion. It may therefore
be reasonably inferred that the func-
tion of rhythm in poetry is to pre-
dispose the mind of the reader to
emotional impulses, and thus make
it more sensible to the influence of
imagination. Rhyme, of course, is
merely a method of measuring rhythm,
but it also serves to keep the reader's
mind concentrated, to produce that
feeling of expectancy which is so
effective in stimulating the imagina-
tion. The same purpose is served by
the various forms of repetition used in
poetry, from alliteration or the repeti-
tion of consonantal and vowel sounds,
to the refrain or the repetition of a
whole sentence.
The art of using all these rhythmical
effects so as to heighten the imagina-
tive impression of a poem, to vary
them "in correspondence with some
transition in the nature of the imagery
or passion, "as Coleridge says, is one of
the poet's most incommunicable secrets,
and I for one shall not try to surprise
it. I will only point to that supreme
example of rhythmical effort in our
language, Coleridge's ' Christabel.'
How weird is the rhythm of these
two lines !
"Is the night chilly and dark ?
The night is chilly, but not dark."
And how the effect of weirdness is
sustained by the repetition at inter-
vals of " The night is chill " ! and how
the rhythm dances in the following !
"The one red leaf, the last of its clan,
That dances as often as dance it can."
Such are the methods which the
poet uses to bewitch our imagination,
to draw us with him into that region
of truth and beauty and love that lies
beyond the senses' ken. But we must
meet him half-way. Our imagination
must not be utterly dead, or his most
potent efforts will fail to elicit a
response. People are gifted with
192
The Poetic Imagination.
imagination in a very various degree,
but every one can cultivate his imagi-
nation, can make it more sensible to
the calls of beauty and sympathy.
People whose lives are shut in by
sordid and commonplace surroundings
have very little imagination. But the
spark is there, it only wants fanning.
By seeing great pictures, by reading
good literature, whether it be poems
or novels, above all by intercourse
with nature, the imagination may
certainly be stimulated. What is the
aim of art for the people, and parks
for the people, but that they may
become more sensible to the influences
of the spiritual world, that their lives
may be made brighter by contact with
the ideal 1 But it is in the power of
all of us, the educated and the un-
educated alike, either to quicken or to
deaden our imagination. Sympathy
with our fellow- men, high aspirations,
purity, unworldliness, these are the
helps to the imagination. Selfishness,
unbelief, sensuality, worldliness, these
are the hindrances ; these are the
chains which bind us to the earth,
these are the clouds which hide from
us the light of heaven.
ARTHUR TILLEY.
11)3
THE KING'S DAUGHTER IN DANGER.
"THE king's daughter is all glorious
within : her clothing is of wrought
gold." Ah! but there are many
new men-milliners at work, tricking
out a new and a rival princess,
whose clothing is stitched by Radical
hands, and whose virgin charms are
heightened by the cosmetics of the
Political Dissenter and the Atheist
names, let us here say, used as acknow-
ledged parts of our daily speech, and
not in any term of reproach. This
figure is plain for all folk to see
across the Channel. Oar vivacious
neighbours, with their facile fingers
and more subtle appreciation of effect,
have brought their gold earrings and
precious things, and besought their
high priests, "Make us a god to go
before us." Perhaps a few of the
more hesitating may tremble slightly
at the prospect of the expression on
the face of Moses when he descends j
but, after all, the expression will soon
wear off, and since Caesar's day the
Gauls have ever delighted in new
things. We ourselves have this in-
estimable advantage, that we can
largely study the picture whence our
future model is to be drawn. Of
course, with our insular belief in our-
selves and our sagacity, we shall im-
prove on the original, and allowance
must be made for differences of touch
in certain particulars ; but we can
judge pretty accurately the general
effect, atmosphere, and surroundings
of our future Paradise.
It might have seemed, even to a
fairly observant eye, that twenty years
ago the possibility of liberty and
| equality in religion fraternity we
I may leave out of the question was a
I very slight one in this future Paradise.
j Then, it was but the little cloud no
! bigger than a man's hand ; and lo, now,
I there is sound of abundance of rain,
No. 315 VOL. LIU.
even hail which will run along the
ground very vehemently. Party fac-
tion is a decimal that recurs despe-
rately ; and there never was a mustard
seed that was half so prolific as the
letting out of the (so-called) religious
waters.
It might be interesting, though per-
haps not very remunerative, to know
how many of those, especially in
Parliament, who are prepared to say
at once, " I vote for Disestablishment,"
have taken the trouble to study the
whole question, and to ascertain from
men, statistics, and books, the manifold
intricacies of the case from all its
aspects. Nowadays, professions of
faith are required from candidates
who, in haste that is almost indecent,
pledge themselves to lines of action
concerning matters of which they
know absolutely nothing. Nothing is
easier than to assent this evening and
to dissent to-morrow, at greater leisure
and in a cooler moment ; but it takes
courage and honesty of purpose, not
always found in political life, to
publish a more sober retractation of
statements and assents made on the
spur of the moment. No man likes to
appear to have been ignorant, and to
have committed himself in ignorance.
Yet numbers do so. The desire to
write M.P. after their names is with
some men an ample, though inexplica-
ble, reason for swallowing all and
not least, ecclesiastical camels and
gnats wholesale.
It is undoubtedly an argument, and
no mean one, in favour of the Estab-
lished Church, that it already exists.
The plaintiff, to prove his case satis-
factorily, must show conclusively that
the fact of an Established Church is a
real tangible evil ; a thing monstrous
and contrary to true liberty ; an
anomaly which is no longer tolerable ;
194
The King's Daughter in Danger.
and further, that it is of absolute
necessity to the weal of this country
that all the interests and associations
linked intimately with the cause of
such a Church be plucked up, being all
nothing as compared with the glorious
sunshine which will then be let into
the now decaying roots. And; he
must go a step further. He must
be prepared to offer in lieu of that
which he has uprooted a substitute
more abiding, more useful, more
thoroughly and truly national. And
yet one more point should be clearly
recognised in this, as in all such ques-
tions, whether religious, political or
social ; that, while men may absolutely
decline to found an institution on such
lines as those which are inherent in
the institution in question, they may
be satisfied that to remodel and repair
is sufficient. It may be utterly un-
desirable to set up such an Established
Church as ours in another country
putting aside the question of its prac-
ticability ; but it would be fallacious
to argue therefore that the Established
Church in England should cease to
exist. So far, it is no desire of the
writer to do more than point out that
fair play should be extended on both
sides ; only let it be distinctly remem-
bered that it is chimerical and danger-
ous, in orators especially, to hold up
ideal states where liberty of religion
is dispensed with free hand and an
Established Church does not exist,
unless they have carefully weighed
the practical issues of such a position,
and are perfectly convinced that in
England, after a due and long con-
sideration of her history, such a sphere
is necessary, and demanded by the
majority of the nation.
For this leads us to the one real
question of all questions, round which
all else, however momentous, centres
Is the Church national ? Is the
Church fulfilling her functions as the
national Church? Is she justifying
her position? Is her work conspicu-
ously to the front for the nation's
welfare and true benefit from one end
of this country to the other 1
Now, whether or no the Church in
this large sense is national it is for
the decriers of such an establishment
to prove. They impeach, they raise
axes and hammers, they cry "Down
with it to the ground." Let us, then,
examine the nature of the combined
forces who press forward to the work
of destruction, and see for ourselves
how far they, on their side, have a
just and legitimate claim to be con-
sidered the national party. This is
not to shirk in the very least the
main question at issue Is the Church
truly national? but only an endea-
vour to see why forces, at first sight a
little heterogeneous, push on so vehe-
mently under one banner and with one
war cry.
First, let us clear the ground, so that
we may see with what common cause
we are contending ; let us understand
distinctly what is meant by Establish-
ment and Disestablishment with En-
dowment and Disendowment we are
not at present concerned. It may,
however, be remarked in passing (a
fact too often disregarded), that the \
popular notion that at some vague j
period in our history the State did j
make a general national endowment ij
of religion, is quite erroneous. The \
conversion of England was not, as n
some will tell you can take place in the i)
individual soul, a " sudden conversion." j
By no means. As every student of {
history knows, there was at that time j
no one national kingdom. Nor was,)
there any system nor could such '
system have existed whereby a na- j
tional Church could be endowed. If! 1
such endowment of the Church existed]
in any form whatsoever, it was an]
action which concerned one or other
small kingdom, but in no way affected
the whole of England. That one
Church became more favoured by
richer endowment than another was
due to the fact that one king, or one
earl, favoured one Church more than
another, and gave his wealth to his
own particular favourite.
There never was a time when b),
some deliberate act on the part 01
The King's Daughter in Danger.
195
king or people the Church was " estab-
lished." It is a general notion that
the Church and State are two distinct
bodies, existing as such from some
ideal point of time, and that a com-
pact or bargain can be struck between
these two. The clergy, such people
hold, or would hold if they thought
over the matter seriously, form the
Church ; the State is the Govern-
ment, or, as Mr. Green first taught
the general world, as distinguished
from those who knew better before,
the Euglish people. But the Church
is not composed solely of clergy,
nor in any proper sense can the
Church be anything else than the
nation viewed religiously; a religious
body, being either of one mind or
of many minds, yet religious minds.
The State is emphatically not the
Government, but the nation at large.
" The whole thing," says Mr. Freeman,
" like everything else in this country,
came of itself. The Church Establish-
ment has just the same history as the
House of Commons, or as trial by jury.
It is the creation of the law ; but it is
not the creation of any particular law,
but of the general course of our law,
written and unwritten." It is vain
to argue that in our day the Estab-
lished Church is one and the same
with the English nation; but it was
so co -extensive once. There were three
heads to the one body of the English
nation the head civil, the head eccle-
siastical, the head military ; but they
all had one and the same body. Re-
garding the nation from a military
view, the nation was military ; re-
garded from a religious point of view,
it was ecclesiastical.
And once more, on this head, we
are not by any means at one with
those who say that the Church is a
sacred corporation, and, like the
person of the Roman tribune, in
violable. We have no sympathy
with those who sneer at the Church
as an " Act-of -Parliament " Church ; at
the same time we hold that the power
of Parliament is supreme, and that so
long as the Church is to call itself
national, so long it must bow to the
powers that be in this country. " An
Act of Parliament may be unjust, but
it cannot be unlawful." All things are
"lawful," though not necessarily "ex
pedient," for such a power. If the
State, after careful deliberation, de-
cides that the community at large has
a prior claim to any special corpora-
tion, then the corporation must give
way. Unless so much is admitted, so
long as the Church is established, we
can hardly argue together further.
With the belief, natural to the Church,
that their whole body is linked in an
immutable chain of apostles, fathers,
confessors, orders, and so forth up to
the Founder of Christianity, we have
here nothing to do. Arguments for
such a perpetual process and for re-
cognition of, and obedience to, the
voice of the Church over the voice of
Caesar, are wide of the question con-
sidered in these pages. They do not
deal with the Church as established ;
they do not affect the national Church.
"The authority of the Church," says
Dr. Pusey, 1 " was given to her by her
Divine Lord within certain limits :
' Teach them whatever I command
you.' " This authority of the Church
is for a law to herself as a Church,
but not as an established and national
Church. " The Church 2 is in matter
of fact our great divinely-appointed
guide unto saving truth, under divine
grace. The Church is practically the
pillar and ground of the truth, an
informant given to all people, high
and low, that they might not have to
wander up and down and grope in
darkness, as they do in a state of
nature." The State in no way denies
this. It would be impossible for any
Church to exist which had less con-
fidence in itself and its origin. But
the State says that, while the Church
may believe all this, like Gallio, it
cares, as a State, " for none of these
1 'An Eirenicon,' by E. B. Pusey, D.D.,
p, 40.
2 'British Critic' for October, 1838, quoted
by Eev. W. G. Ward, ' The Ideal of a Chris-
tian Church,' p. 9.
o 2
The King's Daughter in Danger.
things." So long as the Established
Church is the national Church, it is
liable to be touched and handled by
the State, if the State judges it ex-
pedient to do so.
If this matter be granted, let us
proceed to look at the peculiar features
of the various assailants of a national
Church.
Broadly divided, they amount to
three classes (1) the Radical ; (2) the
Atheist ; (3) the Political Dissenter.
The Radical must always be care-
fully distinguished from the Atheist,
with whom naturally and necessarily
he has nothing in common. It is a
stupid, if not an atrocious, blunder to
mix up men who have only so much
of unity that they desire to pull down
the Established Church. People of
widely discordant views may get into
the same lobbies ; as we know ; but it
is only a very undiscriminating mind
which would therefore associate Mr.
Gladstone and Mr. Bradlaugh. It is
injudicious to do so, for such conduct is
apt to force the Radical into a still more
bitter antagonism, and may drive him
to unite with those outside his camp
on other grave matters, if he is so
constantly misrepresented. At the
same time, the Radical may well
seriously ask himself how it is that
he is associated with such strange
bedfellows, and whether he is not
being hurried forward into actions and
into decisions without a careful sound-
ing of the deeps beyond. Liberty is
his god : liberty is the phylactery
which is writ large on every article
of his political and religious attire ;
in Liberty's cause, and to woo her
smile, he, a zealous votary, ofttimes
cuts himself with knives and lancets
and yet, who is the gainer ? His argu-
ment, putting aside the many minor
ones, which are again divided and sub-
divided, is extremely intelligible. The
Church no longer coincides with the
nation the malicious might add, no
more does the army and is only
one of a number of religious bodies.
Other religious bodies enjoy few or no
privileges ; why should the Church,
then, enjoy so many ? But further, the
Radical will assert that the Church
blocks true liberty, that it has always
done so in the past, and that it is the
flunkey of wealth and titles.
" The Church of England," says the
most able leader of the -Radical party,
" is the ally of tyranny, the organ of
social oppression, the champion of in-
tellectual bondage." And Mr. Goldwin
Smith writes in a similar vein : " For
ages, Christianity has been accepted by
the clergy of the Established Church
as the ally of political and social
injustice."
How much happier it might have
been for this world, if not for the
next, if the word " liberty " had never
been written. And yet perhaps, for
this is not so certain as some think
to paraphrase Voltaire, " If there had
been no liberty, it would have been
necessary to invent one." We shall
have plenty of employment, more than
plenty, if we stare "liberty" in the
face for a few moments. There are
certain men of great talents, im-
mense beneficence, and a large method
of looking round about systems and
institutions, who yet appear either
to grow colour-blind, or to require
blue spectacles, when they look at
certain positions ! Take Mr. John
Bright, for instance. A man of
extraordinary oratorical talents, and
hitherto of wonderful touch with the
English character, he drops his
" liberal " principles in a moment
when he casts his eye on the English
Church. Mr. Chamberlain has more
excuse. But Mr. Chamberlain, when
he poses as a champion of liberty, and
wins cheap applause by denouncing an
Established Church as an anomaly
and an ogre who eats up the crusts of
the poor, is really talking quite off
the purpose. He wins cheers and
he wins votes, but what can he really
know of the working of, and the work
of, the English Church ? It is ex-
tremely easy to glance superficially
at such an institution, and to bring
out in bold relief the mistakes and
errors of particular men, or to ridicule
The King's Daughter in Danger.
197
the system of a Church, the position,
bearings, and condition of which
neither speaker nor audience know
save in a most cursory manner. Any
third-rate actor can win the applause
of "the gods;" but "Cato" together
with "the judicious" must grieve, or
grow hot with indignation, that such
fustian should be like to gain the
day.
But the Radical of course we mean
the perfectly sincere Radical, who does
not play to the " gallery," but has
large aims, and sincerely great aims
has the ulterior intention of diverting
the wealth of the Church when dis-
endowed to uses more beneficial in his
eyes. This is, however, to enter upon
the topic of Disendowment, which we
have agreed not to discuss. The
Radical cordially dislikes the Church
as a powerful engine, the one most
powerful engine, in the Conservative
hands. The great mass of the clergy,
and a very considerable share of the
Church, belong to the " great stupid
party; " and an attempt to attack the
status and funds of the Church would
unite together those within the pale
who at present have considerable
differences of opinion. Love of mother
Church would in almost all cases
precede love of political sentiment.
With regard to the Atheist, little
need be said as to his attacks. They
have always been, and must neces-
sarily be, against all religion ; but he
has the skill to perceive when to be
silent, and when to swell the shout
against a cause which is in some
quarters unpopular. He would argue
that in a free country religious bodies
must all be treated alike, and that he
cares for none of them, no, nor how
many there may be of them, provided
each man is permitted to go his own
way. Religion in the abstract is
a most unprofitable study ; national
religion is an absolute torment, which
ought to be applied to no man. And
if a number of men holding such a
view, unable or unwilling to believe
that God exists, were to possess seats
in Parliament and be called upon to
legislate on matters relating to the
national Church then indeed we
should witness a monstrous paradox.
The Political Dissenter is not let
the present writer frankly confess for
himself a very nice person. He never
says "I am for peace" so much is
true ; it is likewise certain that when
he speaks, "they are for war." He
is always dwelling in the tents of
Kedar, and he really rather likes his
quarters. Take away his red rag of a
national Church, and where is this bull
of Birmingham Bashan 1 The Reverend
Mr. Crosskey, and the like of him, are
the most inveterate and active skir-
mishers in the ranks of the Church.
Their skill is positively marvellous ;
they surprise clerical stragglers now
and again, and make much of such
surprises in print and on platform.
Their attack perhaps lacks refinement ;
but they hit hard. The air of Bir-
mingham is good for pugilism it
runs in the blood. Mr. Dale is a finer
hitter, and a far superior man of war.
He is, as Mr. Matthew Arnold ob-
serves, 1 " really a brilliant pugilist."
The Wesleyan body, the oldest of
the Methodist denominations claim-
ing upwards of a million adherents in
Great Britain, over and above some
eight hundred thousand younger mem-
bers in the Sunday schools by no
means exercise themselves in a similar
tone. The closer historical relation
of Methodism with the Established
Church may in some degree account
for this ; yet it would be foolish to
suppose that by them also Disestablish-
ment will not be hailed. But in the
pulpit they are temperate ; to denounce
the Church is not one and the same
thing as to attack the devil, the world,
and the flesh. It is worthy of notice,
that this year, in the annual Wesleyan
Conference at Newcastle - on - Tyne,
Dr. Osborn emphatically declared
and his words were received with great
applause that it would prove totally
destructive to the body if Wesleyan
ministers were to take sides in political
1 'Last Essays on Church and Religion,'
p. 185.
198
The Kings Daughter in Danger.
warfare. And in his address to the
newly-ordained young ministers, the
ex-president expressed the popular
conviction when he said that the
minister most faithfully fulfilled his
ordination vows who passed through a
circuit without letting his people know
to what political party he belonged.
But it would be wrong to conclude
that therefore this body will vote
unanimously for the Establishment
to continue. To them, as to all Non-
conformist bodies, the tithe is an
injustice. To them, as to all Non-
conformist bodies, the fact of a
church in every parish, and a priest
in every parish, representatives of
nationality, and necessarily regarded
as such formally or informally, is
a thing difficult to stomach. And it
may further be conceded that the tone
and language of many Church people,
and of not a few clergymen, is of such
an arrogant nature as to widen es-
trangement, and to prevent that sym-
pathy which does so much, if it says
so little. The superior tone, as of a
chosen priesthood, a peculiar people,
which some smooth-faced curate will
often assume towards individuals, or
bodies of men of piety and ability,
whose convictions are deep and
sincere, has done incalculable harm.
Many clergymen, especially country
clergymen, whose vision is at times
limited, speak of a Dissenter as to
be classed with publicans and sin-
ners ; and it is to be noticed with
what far greater fairness and kindli-
ness the mass of clergy refer to the
Roman Catholics in their parish.
There are many exceptions the ex-
ceptions are probably far more fre-
quent than before but the mischief
that is done by such slighting and un-
charitableness, though, doubtless, not
known to those who so speak, is
never forgotten. It is no n^w thing.
As long ago as the year 1867 we find
Dean Alford drawing public attention
to the unfortunate exchange of feel-
ing : " Nothing," he writes, "is more
strongly impressed on my mind, when
I look over the religious state of Eng-
land, than that we, who are members
of her Established Church, have need
to face the whole important question
of our relations to Nonconformists,
with a view to a readjustment in the
light of the Christian conscience of our
words and our acts respecting them.
... It seems to me that there is no
justification for the present alienation
of affection, the present virtual sus-
pension of intercourse, the present
depreciating tone and manner which
prevail on the part of English Church-
men towards Dissenters and towards
Churches which differ from ourselves
in organisation." Dr. Stoughton, in
his work on religion in England (1800-
1850), mentions with strong feeling
how Nonconformists appreciated the
courtesy and fellowship of the late
Dean of Westminster : " No one did
so much as he to bring together
persons of different communions ; and
under the touch of his warm and com-
prehensive sympathy, prejudice and
bigotry, at least for a time, melted
entirely away. Congregations who
only saw him as with bent head, down-
cast eyes, and slow and reverent step,
he walked up the pulpit stair, could
not picture what he was as he came
forward at home with rapid move-
ment, and with smiles irradiating
his finely-chiselled features, to grasp
the hands of Nonconformist guests,
bidding them a welcome which glowed
with genuine heartiness." And the
late Archbishop of Canterbury, a
man wise in his generation and
full of discreet understanding, in
a Charge delivered at Maidstone on
"Union Without," tells his hearers
not to judge of the Nonconformists by
the "violent expressions of platform
orators." " I thought it wise," so he
says in his Charge, "and gladly wel-
comed the opportunity to receive in
my house, which might be considered
as the very home of the Church of
England, a large and powerful deputa-
tion of the chief Nonconformist minis-
ters in London. . . . Such meetings
can, I think, be fraught with nothing j
but real good."
The King's Daughter in Danger.
199
In judging of the grounds of com-
plaint against the national Church
made by Radicals and Nonconformists,
it is of special importance that English
Churchmen should endeavour to look
fairly at existing facts, to consider how
they themselves would feel were con-
ditions reversed, whether their own
motives in the desire to maintain the
Established Church are pure and free
from alloy. That men of rare abilities,
genuine sincerity, and strong love of
liberty and freedom, should be coupled
with baser tools and instruments, and
should be thrown into the same ranks
with men of violently socialistic and
atheistic views, may be cause for
regret ; but it is not therefore the
slightest evidence that the cause advo-
cated has not right and justice on its
side. The better may bewail the fact
that they have as allies the baser, and
may have respect for their enemies ;
but none the less will they contend
ardently for that wherein they believe,
and believe to be for the greatest
benefit to the country at large. People
occupied by strong religious convic-
tions may wince at unity for the
moment with people detesting re-
ligion ; but it is possible that both
may fight under the same banner
with the best of conscientious motives.
Let us now turn from this neces-
sarily all too brief survey of the chief
opponents of the national Church, and
look down the lists of those within the
beleaguered city to see how they fare.
It is not always the attack from with-
out which is the most to be dreaded ;
a man's foes may be, and often are,
" those of his own household."
The camp within the national
Church may be for greater convenience
divided into the three well-known
parties of High, Low, and Broad
Church.
The High Church man in doctrine
may not in all cases correspond to
what is called the Ritualist, but in
several he does. They at least have
given back to the Church the " beauty
of holiness." They, like the Radicals,
have a keen appreciation of liberty,
but shall we say also like the Radi-
cals ? they have not a vivid sense of
humour. Recently, at the adminis-
tration of the Holy Communion at a
church in Cornwall, the non-celebrant
priest was to be seen during the
greater part of the Communion ser-
vice grovelling on the floor, so
that, to the congregation he ap-
peared like unto a four-footed beast,
" clothed in white samite, mystic, won-
derful." It may be said that at such
a time the attitude of the body matters
little, that the devout have no thought
for such things as the posture of this
or that person. Yet nature will
return, however so much expelled by
a proper and becoming fork; and
surely a congregation following such a
lead would present a truly appalling
spectacle. This party the Ritualists
pay little attention to the injunc-
tions of such bishops as may run
counter to their own desires; they
attach absolutely none to the admoni-
tions and menaces of civil jurisdic-
tion. In their congregations you will
find, taken all through, a very large
percentage of young people : this is
natural, because the movement has
not been of very long growth. You
will find also < a considerable mass
of women ; and this also is natural.
Ever since women gathered round
the Cross, their sex has strongly
supported religious causes ; and their
far greater leisure, and hitherto more
untutored reasoning powers, have con-
tributed to make them fill the seats
of churches. It will be curious to
see if, under this new and so-called
higher education of theirs, they will
continue equally loyal to the call of
religion. Without expressing a strong
opinion on any side, it may be safely
affirmed that if once the mothers of
England become careless of religion,
it will be the worst blow for English
character that could possibly be struck.
It is a particular misfortune of this
body, that its members, and especi-
ally its younger members, in their
devotional books, in their gestures
and demeanour in church, in their
200
The King's Daughter in Danger.
whole religious attitude, sail as near
the Romish tenets and method of
service as they can. The weaker
ones, who possess less common sense
and temperateness, are apt to get
on to an inclined plane, and hardly
know where to stop. Their vows of
ordination are understood with much
mental reservation and elasticity of
meaning ; the authority of " The Or-
dinary " is an excellent expression in
its way, but not one to be too strongly
dwelt upon, or kept in inconvenient
memory. It would be, however,
extremely unfair to this large and
important branch of the Church not
to recognise to the full the im-
mense vitality of the whole section,
and the never-tiring work which is
done by great numbers of Ritualist
clergy in the dark places of great towns.
It is always an easy matter for an
outsider, who has taken no trouble to
ascertain the meaning of certain for-
mulas, postures, or demeanours, to
raise a cheap laugh. It is natural
that people who live outside a religion,
and especially if their inclination
has nothing of sympathy with it,
should fail wholly to appreciate its
symbols. The mind which struggles
to be calmly philosophical insensibly
imbibes prejudices, itself blind to its
own partiality. " Philosophers," says
M. Renouf truly, " who may pride
themselves on their freedom from
prejudice, may yet fail to understand
whole classes of psychological pheno-
mena which are the result of religious
practice, and are familiar to those
alone to whom such practice is
habitual." To the outside world the
Egyptian worship of a dog, an ibis,
or a goat, seemed ludicrous, and even
monstrous. " The god of the Egyp-
tians," says Clement of Alexandria,
" is revealed ; a beast, rolling on a
purple couch." And yet it may be
worth while to remember that once
Christianity itself was held to be
a "damnable superstition (exitiabilis
super stitio) ; " and men believed popu-
larly that its followers worshipped
the ass, a form of religion derived
from the Jew. To the outer work
the worship of the Lamb with seven
horns and seven eyes, adored by four
beasts, can hardly have appeared other
than a " damnable superstition."
A portion of this branch would
desire Disestablishment. Rejecting all
outer authority they would naturally
wish the Church to be a law to itself. If
the Church were disestablished accord-
ing to their wish, it is difficult to say to
what excesses they might run, or how
far they could coquet with the blan-
dishments of Rome without fear of
breach of promise. It is dangerous
to play on the verge of precipices ; it
is especially dangerous when the
player is young, inexperienced, backed
up by an excited crowd of fervid
worshippers, and a little intoxicated
by the odours of incense and feminine
flattery. What Pusey could hold and
do, with apparent impunity, may not
therefore be carried out and on with
equal impunity by those who have not
also imitated Pusey in a careful
scrutiny of cause and effect.
Nothing more beautiful can be ima-
gined than the frame of religious
spirit which permeates the saintly
Pusey in all his writing a spirit of
love, of the deepest and most pure
religion. But this spirit is temperate
if firm, understanding if dogmatic.
This is the innocence of a child
combined with an unswerving faith.
" I believe explicitly all which I
know God to have revealed in His
Church ; and implicitly (implicite) any
thing, if He has revealed it, which I
know not. In simple words, I be-
lieve all which the Church believes."
This spirit can hardly be reached; it
must be born, possibly in some cases
born again. A spirit so bathed, so
totally immersed, in thorough com-
munion with the Church as the sole
representative of God Himself, is one
which no outsider can fathom, no
system of philosophy explain, no
argument reach. It may be incon-
sistent with a degree of liberty ; it
may lack the fresh play of the keen
outer air so wholesome, so bracing;
Tke King's Daughter in Danger.
201
yet it possesses the supreme peace
which passes understanding. No ; the
name of Pusey is revered among the
Ritualistic branch of the Church, but
his spirit is too often absent from it.
The Low Church party have not
gained ground. They have been
obliged in many instances to yield to
the prevailing tendency of the age,
and to allow greater ornateness of
service, and more colour in the con-
duct of their forms of religion. The
particular views of such men as Dean
McNeile, Dean Close, and Canon
Stowell, are not the views put for-
ward popularly by the modern Low
Church party, though the older men,
such as Canon Hoare, would probably
adhere to them. At the present day
it can hardly be said that any of the
great preachers or writers of the Eng-
lish Church belong to this school. Such
names as Liddon pre-eminently the
first teac/ier of the day Magee, Light-
foot, Church, Woodford, Yaughan, are
not enrolled in what are called Evan-
gelical annals. There is, it appears, a
certain strait-waistcoat of thought
to be worn by the disciples of this
school, which cribs and confines over-
much the men of wider sympathies
and bigger hearts. Their predeces-
sors in the country parts were men of
a different stamp. George Eliot's Mr.
Irwine is not a Low Church clergy-
man ; his service was the usual ser-
vice of his day unadorned, simple,
homely. He was not what would be
called " advanced ;" but he was not the
man who would call the Pope " Anti-
christ" every Sunday morning from his
cushioned pulpit. He " dwelt among
his own people," and was equally
interested in their baptisms, their
fields of potatoes, their dairies, and
their first communions. The modern
type not rarely lacks this geniality,
if he has more salvational virtue in
him. As he is seen at times out for
a holiday on the sea-shore he does not
always show to much advantage. But
we all have our weak points, and out-
ward appearances have always been
deceitful.
The Broad Church party has ad-
vanced while the Low Church has
decreased. This is natural. The Low
Church party has done great good in
Missions and in putting the Bible into
people's hands. The savage has more
often had a Bible put into his hand
by an Evangelical than by all the
rest of the Church put together. The
Broad Church party must swell with
the increase of free thought. It has
no exact horizon; a convenient haze
ever floats over the valleys beyond.
Maurice, Hare, Kingsley, Robertson,
Stanley, Pearson where are now the
shoulders whereon their mantles may
fitly rest !
The movement has enlarged its
mouth : it now aspires to unite reve-
lation and science. The error of this
school is subtle, but yet manifest. People
who have no especial "views" on reli-
gion, who pride themselves on being
"large-minded" and "broad-minded,"
who like to hear some new thing ; men
who are scientific, and not appreciative
of dogmatic religion ; people who like to
appear to go to church but " can't
stand orthodoxy;" ladies who have
read a little a very little Strauss,
and are inclined to think " there is a
great deal in what he says ; " together
with the sincere believers in the
elasticity of religious faith form a
congregation which requires to be in-
terested. With some of these pastors
and spiritual instructors " sacerdotal-
ism " is the red rag. They exhaust the
epithets of the English language, they
bring up all their artillery of sesqui-
pedalian words, their big guns of sar-
castic, scornful, denunciatory speech,
against the exaltation of the man into
a priest. And when not engaged with
" sacerdotalism " they are at the throat
of dogma. Dogma, they assert, is the
root of all the evil which retards the
Church of England from being truly
and really national. Dogma interferes
with and maims liberty. " Religentem
esse oportet, religiosum nefas." 1 The
sentiment of M. Ernest Renan is
theirs, enlarged and writ plain : " Le
1 " Piety is a duty, Superstition a crime.'
202
The King's Daughter in Danger.
devoir du savant est d'exprimer avec
franchise le resultat de ses etudes, sans
chercher a troubler la conscience des
personnes qui ne sont pas appelees a
la meme vie que lui, mais aussi sans
tenir compte des motifs d'interet et
des pretendues convenances qui fans-
sent si souvent 1'expression de la
verite." l
It is the cry of reason struggling
up to the higher air, while faith
stands staring below. It is so they
of this school will tell you but the
repetition of Prometheus bound, im-
potent, yet potent to hurl defiance at
the presiding Zeus. The old bottles
are worn out, the new wine of our
vintage will be spilt : let us have
those of new make. Forgetful are
they that ofttimes when men have
well drunk they turn with a sigh and
say, "The old is better."
Yet this positive abhorrence of dogma
is to be found in the manifesto of the
politician, the literature of science,
and not least in works of fiction. The
clergyman who abides by dogma is
nearly always contrasted in ridicule
with his brother clergyman who pre-
fers liberty of thought to catechism
and creed. Says Canon Liddon in his
university sermons of about twenty
years ago : " Dogma is assumed,
rather than stated in terms, to be
untrue. This assumption is partly
traceable to a weakened belief in the
reality of an objective revelation com-
mitted to the Church of God. . . . The
hands that direct the onslaught are
the hands of Esau ; but the voice gives
utterance to no native type of English
thought : it is the voice of the philo-
sophy of Hegel." Whether this phi-
losophy has done more than tinge the
religious feelings of a few more
thoughtful souls is a question foreign
to our purpose. It is certain that the
1 " The duty of the man who knows is to
express with freedom the result of his studies,
without seeking to trouble the conscience of
those who are not called to the same life as
himself ; but also without considering inter-
ested motives and feigned conveniences which
so frequently assume the guise of truth."
anti-dogmatic schools need a strong
reminder, and an understanding re-
minder, of the text on which the
eloquent Canon's sermon is based,
Where, the spirit of the Lord is, there
is liberty.
A lawless liberty, falsely so called,
which declines to submit except to
what can be felt, tasted, handled, can
of course have no sympathy with a
decided and definite dogma, elastic
indeed, yet with clearly distinguish-
able boundaries, submissive to the
will of God " whose service is perfect
freedom." Without necessarily going
so far as to affirm with St. Cyril,
Meyicrrov TOtVW KTrjfJLa ecrri TO rcov
Soy//,aT<oi/ fjidOrjjj,a, z or putting the
" science of dogmas " in the foremost
place, surely it may be granted that
dogma is absolutely fundamental to
any Church which is to have consis-
tency. Those who falsely try to win
the popular sentiment to their side by
stripping teaching of every shred of
dogma, are anxious enough to set up
shibboleths of their own, which are to
the full as definite, only tinged with
that excess of arrogance which belongs
to all sects and parties which deviate
from the main path by .reason of
supposed superiority. An excellent
definition of dogma to sum up this
question is given by the preacher
above alluded to, and one which the
extreme latitudinarians might well
read and digest " Dogma is essential
Christian truth thrown by authority
into a form which admits of its per-
manently passing into the understand-
ing, and being treasured by the heart
of the people."
The attitude of the English people,
generally considered, is one in the
main of respect. They pass by, and
many touch their hats, simply because
they recognise the " king's daughter."
We shall not be surprised to find that
the upper classes aft'ect Church views.
Royalty sets the fashion : it is the
Court religion. But with brilliant
exceptions the upper classes are not
2 "The study of dogma is in truth the
most important of all."
The Kings Daughter in Danger.
203
religious. Bazaars, and suchlike
eccentric charities, do not form the
basis of religion. There is an enor-
mous amount of indifference to reli-
gion in this class, which as a rule eats
too much if Lady John Manners has
not belied her kind and drinks quite
enough, though less than its grand-
fathers ; nor do the clergy devote so
much of their energy to changing the
lives of this class as they do to others.
There are always brilliant exceptions ;
so there will be always men like the
present Bishops of Truro and Lich-
field, who, as parish priests in fashion-
able London produced big results.
No ! Religious feeling is not strong
in the extremes of society the upper
and the lower classes. Religion and
true piety are to be found in the ranks
of the great middle section. Here
is to be seen the back-bone of the
religious feelings and sympathies of
England.
But England is becoming more and
more democratic ; and among the
democracy Dissent has undoubted
sway. The Church of England recog-
nises this fact. The Church of Eng-
land must go out into the highways
and hedges and compel them to come
in. What the Tory Democrat aims at
doing in the political world, must be
done by the Church of England in the
religious world, if it is to be the
national Church. True, it is an under-
taking fraught with stupendous diffi-
culty. The teaching of the Board
Schools is simply neutral and colour-
less, if it exists, in matters religious ;
the Church must in its own way colour
education. What the boy is, the man
frequently grows to be. If the upper
classes are to be a pillar of defence to
the Church in perilous times, the
Church must educate, must instruct,
must be foster-father and foster-
mother, else the apathy of the upper
classes, who regard Dissent as not
very respectable nor very much the
religion for a gentleman, will be but a
broken reed when the hurricane falls
on the Church's devoted head. And
this applies more strongly in the case
of the poor. The clergyman, who is
first gentleman, or first scholar, must
first be an imitation of his Master,
" the tribune of the people : " he must
be above, yet always of, them ; he
must win their affections, be their
right hand. The example of Lowder
is not uncommon : it must be pretty
universal if the Church is to be the
Church of the people. The Dissenting
minister, socially often the inferior of
the clergy of the Established Church,
speaks with a popular voice in popular
tones understood of the people. They
sit near each other in the chapel, as
they live near each other in the street.
They like impassioned language and
fervid eloquence ; even the Salva-
tionists' drum does not jar on their
senses. They understand that Charles
Wesley effected as much, or more, by
sweet melody and the hymn, as his
brother by his oratorical gifts. " Me-
thodism could never have become what
it did without its unparalleled hymn-
book."
Well, the English clergy, mostly
of the High Church party, are compre-
hending this. High Church in form
and belief, these men are evangelical
in method. Canons Body, Knox-
Little, and others, have learnt the
secret of that enthusiastic chameleon,
Father Ignatius. Short, stirring mis-
sionary addresses, frequent hymns, a
service which appeals to the heart
first and indirectly to the head these
are the weapons which will cause the
Church to be the great power among
the people. Its freedom, its liberal
sentiments, its teaching based on the
Christ of the poor, the carpenter's
Son, its beautiful language, its very
essence, must charm the English
people. The Gospel must knock at
their doors ; they will not come to hear
it, sitting side by side with the richer
folk. This working class has no
strong prejudices in favour of one
religious form over another ; but they
will very soon believe that the Church
of England is entirely Tory and anti-
popular. Dissent they will equally
soon believe to be their champion.
204
The Kings Daughter in Danger.
The Church must display itself as
the great national organ for the pro-
motion of goodness. If Dissenters fcilt
at the Church, let it be understood
that they are inconsistent, attacking
that very quality which they ought
most energetically to defend. Let it
be seen and no point is more impor-
tant than this that, while those
outside the Church are willing to
combine for party purposes entirely to
harass, vex, and pull down the bul-
warks of the Established Church, yet
inside, with large divergence of
opinion on lesser matters, there is
unity ; unity aiming at this one end
the dissemination of goodness. If
there is within the Church only a zeal
for party as would certainly be the
case were the Church disestablished
one man crying, " I am of King,"
another " I am of Ryle," then this
great aim must suffer ; discredit must
be brought on the Church ; and the
Church must cease to be national.
Then there will be great rejoicing,
even if the moderate Liberals sigh and
shrug their shoulders those elastic
shoulders capable of bearing so much !
Then also there will be wailing among
not a few thinking men, who will see
at last that party has ascended the
throne in all things supreme ; supreme
at last in matters religious, as it has
long been in matters political.
Then will Mr. Joseph Chamberlain,
still true to that touch of " senti-
ment" which adorned his namesake in
Sheridan's immortal comedy, turn to
his trusty henchmen and command,
" Go, bury now this cursed woman ; "
adding with a pious afterthought, " for
she is a king's daughter."
205
THE 'EUMENIDES' AT CAMBRIDGE.
AMONG the many innovations which
the disturbing years have lately brought
to our Universities, these present-
ments of the Greek drama are among
the few one suffers gladly. Innova-
tions, indeed, they wholly are not,
but rather a revival of an old and
honourable custom. Whether the
halls of Oxford and Cambridge have
before our day rung to the mea-
sures of the Attic tragedians I can-
not say, but am inclined to think
not. In those times when the drama
was most liberally cultivated at the
Universities, that is, in the sixteenth
and seventeenth centuries, the general
knowledge of the Greek literature and
language seems by all accounts to have
been no great thing. Mr. Bass Mul-
linger and the Oxford Historical Society
will no doubt tell us all about that
some day. But Latin, and at a later
time English, plays were frequent. The
performances were strictly confined to
members of the Universities. Against
the general stage-play the face of au-
thority was sternly set; "ludus in-
honestus" it was contemptuously styled,
and its professional exponent was by
no means regarded then as the fine
flower of intellectual growth. In 1575,
for instance, the Vice-Chancellor of
Cambridge was warned by the Privy
Council " of some attempts of light and
decayed persons who for filthy lucre
there are minded and do seek nowadays
to devise and to set up in open places
shows of unlawful, hurtful, pernicious,
and unhonest games near to Cam-
bridge," whereby the youth of that
University were like to be " enticed
from their ordinary places of learning."
A few years later, in 1587, the Earl
of Leicester's players were bribed with
a present of twenty shillings (a sum
signifying, of course, considerably more
than it would now) not to act in
Oxford.
But among the students themselves
the drama was liberally encouraged.
Indeed, the first statutes of Trinity
College, Cambridge, expressly ordained
the performance of Latin tragedies and
comedies in the hall at Christmas ; and
at King's also they were a regular
feature of the academical year, as they
had been long before with the parent of
all colleges,with Merton College, Oxford.
In 1564 Elizabeth saw the ' Aulularia '
of Plautus presented on a stage in the
chapel at King's, and also an English
play, ' Ezechias,' by the famous
Nicholas Udall of Eton, who bears the
honour of being the father of English
Comedy. Till late years this honour had
been always given to one Still, after-
wards Bishop of Bath and Wells, and
Vice-Chancellor of his University ; his
' Gammer Gurton's Needle,' first played
at Christ's College in 1566, was al-
ways named as the first of the
race, till Collier deposed it and placed
the ' Ralph Roister Doister,' of Udall,
written about 1540, in its stead.
The good bishop seems in his old age
to have repented him of his early de-
viation from the classic path ; at least
when Vice-Chancellor he remonstrated
with Elizabeth's ministers for permit-
ting the entertainment of an English
play to be offered to her. These
performances for many years made an
inevitable part of the honours paid to
royalty ; and the dramatic tastes of
the Cambridge students seem more
than once to have caused some un-
pleasantness. In Henry the Eighth's
reign they played a piece called * Pam-
machus,' which greatly vexed the
loyal soul of Gardiner, Bishop of
Winchester, and their Chancellor.
He remonstrated with the Vice-
Chancellor, Matthew Parker, and the
audience were put under a rigorous
examination. Their memories were,
however, of that convenient order
206
The ' SJumenides' at Cambridge.
displayed by an important witness at
the great trial of Queen Caroline : no
one could remember anything which
really made against the king's
righteousness, and so the matter had
perforce to be dropped. Mr. Froude,
also, tells a terrible tale of a mis-
adventure with Henry's great daughter.
She had been staying at Cambridge
during one of her "progresses"
in the summer of 1564, and been
mightily pleased with all she saw and
heard. The students prayed her to
stay yet one more evening to see a
play they had got up for her ; but she
could not, having to travel far the next
day, and intending to sleep some ten
miles or so out of the town to break
the journey. Then, says Mr. Froude
(cruelly, as one who in his day had
suffered from the " amateur "), " the
students, too enamoured of their per-
formance to lose a chance of exhibit-
ing it, pursued the queen to her rest-
ing-place." With royal clemency she
suffered the performance ; but it seems
unfortunately to have been some sort
of skit on the Catholic bishops, Bon-
ner, Heath, Thirlby, and the rest who
were then waiting judgment in prison,
and with royal anger she resented it.
"With indignant words she rose from
her seat, and swept from the room ;
the lights were turned out, and the
discomfited players left to make the
best of their way back to Cambridge.
But in the reign of her successor a yet
greater humiliation fell to the lot of
the Oxford players ; Elizabeth had
been angry, but James was bored, and
said so ! In 1605 the king was at
Oxford, and among the entertainments
provided for him were three plays in
Christ Church hall, memorable among
other things for being, as it is said,
the first at which movable scenes
arranged by Inigo Jones) were used.
One of these plays was called the
'Ajax Flagellifer/ The players,
wrote Leland, "had all the goodly-
antique apparel, but for all that, it
was not acted so well by many degrees
as I have seen it at Cambridge. The
king was very weary before he came
thither, but much more wearied by it,
and spoke many words of dislike." Nor
was Charles much more fortunate in
1636, when a piece, written by William
Strode, the public orator, full of hits
against earless Prynne and the Puri-
tans, was performed in the same hall ;
the worst play, Lord Carnarvon vowed,
"that ever he saw, but one that he
saw at Cambridge." However, at the
same visit Cartwright's ' Royal Slave '
was given in the hall of Saint John's
College, and at this the queen was so
pleased that she had it repeated after-
wards at Hampton Court, with the
same dresses that had been worn by the
Oxford players. 1 On another occasion
at the same University, a pastoral, but
what or by whom is not specified, was
presented before James and his queen,
in which the players, according to
Winwood, were very sparely draped
indeed; whether this entertainment
also provoked words of dislike from
the king, or whether it so pleased the
queen as to command a royal encore,
I cannot say. No doubt, when a
French pastoral was played at Hamp-
ton Court before Charles, the per-
formers, including the queen and
several of her maids of honour, were
more decently clad. Between 1605
and 1607 Ben Jonson's 'Yolpone'
was presented very triumphantly at
both Universities ; but the plays seem
to have been mostly of native pro-
duction, and, of course, to have been
rather flouted by the regular play-
wrights. In ' The Return from
Parnassus ' (acted, by the way, at
Saint John's College, Cambridge,
though possibly with this heretical
passage excised), one of the char-
acters observes : " Few of the Uni-
versity pen plays well ; they smell too
much of that writer Ovid and that
writer Metamorphosis, and talk too
much of Proserpine and Jupiter "-
much as certain of our modern play-
wrights take objection to the style
of Shakespeare.
The drama was much in vogue at
1 See Mr. Gardiner's 'History of England,'
VIII. 150-2.
The ' Eumenides' at Cambridge.
207
Cambridge when Milton was an under-
graduate at Christ's College, but
whether he bore any part in it I
am not sure ; he has written, peevishly
says Johnson, against the custom, but
that was in his later peevish years ; in
his youth he seems to have had no ob-
jection to theatrical amusements, and
from his good looks and his learning
one imagines him likely to have been
useful to any cast. Then the clouds
of Puritanism darkened the face
of the land, and the theatre lapsed
into disgrace. We read of Cowley's
' Guardian ' being played privately
at Cambridge in those times, and ap-
parently by a professional company ;
but till the Restoration the students
of either University were probably
allowed few, if any, such relaxations
from their graver studies. In 1669,
however, Cosmo de Medicis, prince of
Tuscany, was present at a Latin
comedy in Trinity College, Cambridge ;
and two years later the king himself
was entertained with an English play
in the same collegers he had been when
Prince of Wales j ust thirty years before.
So far as my fragmentary researches
have led me this was the last occasion
of such honours being paid to royal
guests. Neither James, nor William,
nor Anne received them, though the
latter was entertained at Oxford with
a concert in the Theatre. Then the
royal visits altogether ceased, till that
memorable one whose painful tale is
told in Madame D'Arblay's journal.
When the author of 'Cecilia,' half
fainting from hunger and fatigue,
was dragged through Oxford in the
train of her royal mistress it is
not recorded that any theatrical
performance enabled the poor lady-in-
waiting to snatch a few minutes
of rest. But, indeed, through the
greater part of the last century the
atmosphere of Oxford at least seems
to have been little favourable to such
erudite amusements. The evidence of
Swift, Chesterfield, Gibbon, to mention
but a few notable witnesses, shows but
too clearly how sadly Oxford had in
those days fallen from her high estate.
But to get to our Greek play ; and
indeed, it is well that the Eumenides
should be gracious goddesses, for they
have been kept a long time waiting.
Every one knows the genesis of these
antique reproductions : how Oxford
(that " mother of great movements," as
one of the most gifted of her later-
born sons has called her) led off with
the ' Agamemnon ' of ^Eschylus, and
how Cambridge followed with the
' Ajax ' of Sophocles and the ' Birds '
of Aristophanes. In intrinsic interest
the 'Eumenides '^of ^Eschylus is hardly
in the first rank. It has not the hu-
manity, nor the majesty, nor the pity
of such plays, for instance, as ' Aga-
memnon ' or ' Prometheus,' ' CEdipus,
the King ' or ' (Edipus at Colonos,'
the 'Medea' or the 'Alcestis.' It
has what to a modern critic would be
a radical fault, it deals with a past
event ; it is disputatious rather than
active. On the other hand, certain
extrinsic circumstances give it an im-
portance above its purely dramatic
qualities ; an importance to us, and
gave it one, we may suppose, to its
first audience. It is, in the first place,
a part of the only trilogy extant ; it
is the final act of one great drama,
the story of Orestes, of which the
' Agamemnon ' and the ' Choephori,'
or ' Libation-bearers,' form the first
two. To the Athenian, then, who had
seen the whole tale evolved, from the
primal curse of blood wrought on the
house of Atreus through the murder
of the husband by the wife, on through
the revenge of the son upon the
mother, down to the final expiation,
there was naturally no such sense of
inaction as we feel who see only now
the last act. During something over
n ^y years it was the common, though
probably not indispensable, custom for
each competing tragedian to produce
four plays ; three serious ones (not
necessarily connected with each other)
and a shorter piece, called a crarv/ao?, or
satyric drama, from the Chorus being
composed of satyrs; of which the
' Cyclops ' of Euripides, familiar, let
us hope, even to those who are not
208
The ' Eumenides' at Cambridge.
Grecians, through Shelley's admirable
translation, is the sole example. This
combination was known as a rerpoAoyta,
or tetralogy ; sometimes the fourth
piece was omitted, and then the
three tragedies were styled a rpiXoyia,
or trilogy. The earliest of such tri-
logies is that one of ^Eschylus which
contained the 'Persse,' exhibited B.C.
472 ; the last recorded tetralogy was
one exhibited by Euripides B.C. 415, of
which the ' Troades ' alone remains.
The three plays by .^Eschylus, which
form the ( Oresteia ' or story of Orestes,
is the only perfect trilogy which has
survived. This fact (which is, of course,
common knowledge to all students of
the Greek drama, but for such I do
not presume to write), it is well to
bear in mind when considering the
' Eumenides ' as a play.
But to the Athenians it had
another importance ; one, indeed, not
altogether proper " to the purpose
of playing/' yet one which even those
fine critics could not have wholly put
by. At the time of the play, about
458 B.C., the time of the rupture with
Sparta and the alliance with Argos,
the feeling between the Aristocratic
party, or Conservatives as we should
now say, led by Cimon, and the Demo-
cratic party led by Pericles, was at
its height. Progress was the order of
the day, and one of the most popular
movements on that dim uncertain
road was the abolition of the Areo-
pagus, which one fond, like Mr.
Courthope, of political parallels,
might explain as the disestablishment
of the House of Lords. At any rate
that old aristocratic assembly was to
go, or at least to be reformed away
into practical nothingness. It was,
said the Democrats, old-fashioned, un-
wieldy, superfluous, the stronghold of
a selfish nobility : it must go. One
of its especial privileges was that of
supreme jurisdiction in all cases of
homicide. Ephialtes, the most popular
champion of the Democratical party
next to Pericles, is believed by some
to have brought forward a motion
to abolish this special privilege. He
had certainly caused the laws of
Solon to be brought down from the
Acropolis and deposited in the market-
place, so as to signify the transfer
of their guardianship from the senate
to the people, a piece of impiety,
as many of course called it, for which
he not long after paid with his
life. Others, however, and among
them both Thirlwall and Grote, hold
that the jurisdiction in cases of
murder was still to be left, and in
fact to be the sole power left, to
the Areopagus. It is certain that
some such power, nominally at any
rate, belonged to that assembly very
nearly down to the Christian era ; but
that any real attempt had ever been
made to annul it is not so certain. This
uncertainty throws a curious doubt on
the exact tendency of the political al-
lusions in the last scene of the play.
^Eschylus, as became "a man of Mara-
thon," might certainly be supposed to
have been on the side of the Tories, and
the charge of Athena to the twelve
citizens whom she had summoned to
decide between the Furies and Orestes,
seems surely to point that way.
" men of Athens, ye who first do judge
The law of bloodshed, hear me now ordain
Here to all time, for ^Egeus' Attic host,
. Shall stand this council-court of judges
sworn ;
Here the tribunal, set on Ares' Hill
Where camped of old the tented Amazons,
What time in hate of Theseus they assailed
Athens, and set against her citadel
A counterwork of new sky-pointing towers,
And there to Ares held their sacrifice,
Where now the rock hath name, even Ares'
Hill.
And hence shall Eeverence and her kinsmar
Fear
Pass to each free man's heart, by day and
night,
Enjoining, ' Thou shalt do no unjust thing,'
So long as Law stands as it stood of old
Unmarred by civic change. Look you, the
spring
Is pure ; but foul it once with influx vile
And muddy clay, and none can drink
thereof.
Therefore, citizens, I bid ye bow
In awe to this command, ' Let no man live
Uncurbed by Law or curbed by tyranny,
Nor banish ye the monarchy of Awe
Beyond the walls ; untouched by fear
divine
No man doth justice, in the world of men
The ' Eumenides ' at Cambridge.
209
Therefore in purity and holy awe
Stand and revere ; so shall ye have and hold
A saving bulwark of the state and land,
Such as no man hath ever elsewhere known,
Nor in far Scythia, nor in Pelops' realm.
Thus I ordain it now,
A court unsullied by the lust of gain,
Sacred and swift to vengeance, wakeful ever
To champion men who sleep, the country's
guard.
Thus have I spoken, thus to mine own clan
Commended it for ever. " J
It certainly seems hard to under-
stand this in any other light than that
of an emphatic appeal against meddling
with an august and precious institu-
tion. But others have thought that
the poet's real design was to urge the
Athenians to be content with the juris-
diction over murderers still to be left
by the reformers in the hands of the
old tribunal ; and they argue from this
and from a later passage praising the
alliance with Argos, that JEschylus
was really on the side of Pericles. It
is impossible for any man to say pre-
cisely how this may have been. It
may be that the poetic voice had after
all some influence, and that Ephialtes
thought it prudent to moderate his
first proposal. This, however, could
only be settled by a knowledge of the
precise dates of the passing of the
measure and the production of the
play; and perhaps it is the safest
way to believe that the poet, like
a wise man, so framed his words that
his hearers might take them each
according to his disposition. But the
political turn is there, clear enough,
whichever way it tended ; and one
can well understand how keen a zest
it must have given to the closing scene
among that curious, eager, restless
people, at a time when the current of
party-feeling ran so high.
Other causes than these had, no
doubt, too, their share in the selection
of the play by those responsible for
its choice at Cambridge. The feel-
ings which stirred the Greek audience
of old, and the feelings which stir
'The House of Atreus,' by E. D. A.
Morshead, M.A., late Fellow of New College,
Assistant Master of Winchester College ; from
which the translations of the play here used
are taken.
No. 315 VOL. LIIT.
the Greek student of to-day, could
hardly with reason be allowed an
Areopagitic supremacy of jurisdiction.
The spectacular quality of the drama
now, as then, must come into the ac-
count, and in this quality the 'Eu-
menides ' is particularly rich ; especially
in that side of the quality which turns
most strongly to modern melodrama.
The Chorus of Furies obviously was
full of possibilities : the three scenes,
the temple of Apollo at Delphi, the
temple of Athena on the Acropolis,
the Areopagus, all so closely bound up
with the national history and religion
of the Athenians, these, too, would
naturally play their part in determin-
ing the choice of a play designed to
reproduce to modern eyes so essential
a feature of old Greek life. And from
one point of view no possibility had
been missed. Allowing for the small-
ness of the stage and when one con-
siders how large a share in the pomp
and majesty of the performance the
spacious Athenian theatre must have
played, the allowance is no slight one
allowing for this, the furnishing of
the scene, the grouping of the charac-
ters, and all what we call generally
stage - management, was admirably
picturesque and effective. Especially
so was the last scene of all, when
the fair words of Athena had pre-
vailed upon the baffled Furies to put
by their anger and become gracious
goddesses indeed ; and when the white-
robed attendants filed past the judg-
ment-seat, with solemn chant escorting
'Night's childless children" to their
new home beneath the Sacred Hill :
" With loyalty we lead you : proudly cr O ,
Night's childless children, to your home
below !
(0 countrymen, a while from words for-
bear ! )
To Darkness' deep primeval lair,
Far in Earth's bosom, downward fare,
Adored with prayer and sacrifice !
(0 citizens, forbear your cries !)
Pass hitherward, ye powers of Dread,
With all your wrath, that was, allayed
Into the heart of this loved land ;
With joy unto your temple wend,
The while upon your steps attend
The flames that feed upon the brand
(Now, now ring out your chant, your ioy's
acclaim!)
P
210
The ' JSumenides ' at Cambridge.
Behind them, downward as they fare,
Let holy hands libations bear,
And torches' sacred flame.
All -seeing Zeus and Fate come down
To battle fair for Pallas' town !
Ring out your chant, ring out your joy's
acclaim ! "
Even there, cabined and confined
within the narrow compass of the little
Cambridge theatre, the pomp and cir-
cumstance of the scene were singularly
fine and stirring. What must it not
have been in Athens itself, in Athens
of the prime ! in the great theatre of
Dionysus on the very slope of the
Sacred Hill, as the stately pageant
paced along in the delicate air and
gracious sunlight of the Attic spring,
and the rhythmic chant of the Chorus
swelled to its final notes of triumph !
" Then what golden hours were for us,
As we sat together there,
When the white vests of the Chorus
Seemed to wave up a live air !
When the cothurns trod majestic
Down the deep iambic lines,
And the rolling anapaestic
Curled like vapour over shrines ! "
How were these plays acted 1 What
the plays were themselves we know,
and with tolerable certainty we know
what the theatrical arrangements were,
the building and furnishing of the
stage, the number of the actors and
the chorus, the scenes, the dresses.
But the acting ? Of that we really
know nothing ; each man is free to
form his own conclusions from his own
consciousness, or the learning of others.
For my part I must frankly own that,
save for that last scene, and a moment-
ary picture or two, the performance in
no way tallied with my notions of a
Greek play ; clever it indisputably was,
picturesque, animated, striking ; but,
even allowing for the inevitable and
impassable gulf which divides the old
world from the new, root and branch
opposed to all my poor intellect had
ever conceived of the original. Of
acting, as we take the word, I can-
not imagine the Greeks to have
had any idea, at least before the
day of the New Comedy. We know
that the actors wore huge masks,
constructed in some forgotten fashion
to swell the volume of the voice, which
must otherwise in that vast unroofed
theatre have been but a feeble pipe ;
we know that they increased their
stature by various means. Surely thus
accoutred and encumbered their move-
ments must necessarily have been more
deliberate and measured than those
the brisk vivacious style of the modern
stage affects. Would the shade of
Clytemnestra, for example (and how
admirable it was in its first inception ! )
would that " dim sheeted ghost," with
the red gash still marring the white
throat, have rushed like a mere angry
mortal down among the sleeping
Furies ? Nothing could have been.
more impressive than its entrance,
and the way it spoke its first re-
proaches, from the inmost recesses of*
the shrine, half shrouded in the altar-
smoke
"Sleep on! Awake! what skills your sleep*
to me ! "
seemed very much to me the right way.
Should it not have been so to the
end 1 Should not the voice alone have
been suffered to rouse the sleepers?
Something one fancies this ghost to
have been like that shape Saul saw at
Endor, and so to have spoken :
" From lips that moved not and unbreathing
frame,
Like cavern'd winds the hollow accents
came. "
Or, if the phantom must have em-
ployed some more human action,
might it not have been something
more deliberate and dignified ?
* Awake and hear for mine own soul I cry
Awake, ye powers of hell ! the wandering
soul
That once was Clytemnestra calls arise ! "
Surely in these words one finds no
indication of mere human hurry and
bustle, of rousing the sleepers as one
might rouse a lazy 'Jboy from his bed
for morning school ! Again, when the '
Pythian priestess rushes out from the j
inner shrine where she has seen the j
slumbering monsters, and falls in her !
terror supine upon the stage, how i
does the text support this action ?
The ' Eumenides ' at Cambridge.
211
" Things fell to speak of, fell for eyes to see,
Have sped me forth again from Loxias'
shrine,
"With strength unstrung, moving erect no
more,
But aiding with my hands my failing feet,
Unnerved by fear."
True, there was a time when an
ingenious Scholiast, foreshadowing
the age of realism, supposed this to
signify that the priestess came crawl -
ing in on her hands and knees ; but
then a Scholiast is capable of anything.
And, indeed, I am not sure that even
so very literal an interpretation would
not match the text better than this
" back fall " !
But there is another reason, which,
to me at least, carries yet greater
weight ; there is the quality of the
verse. I cannot think that those ma-
jestic Greek iambics were spoken in
the conversational style of modern
dialogue, just as I cannot conceive
~ k the style of the modern stage to suit
the scarce less majestic iambic of
Shakespeare. Let me be permitted
for once to quote the native Greek :
yap of/id /col papaivcrai
iro-raiviov yap ov irpbs ec-rio 0eot)
Ka.6apij.dis
Place beside it such a passage as this
" Five hundred poor I have in yearly pay,
Who twice a day their withered hands -hold
up
Toward Heaven, to pardon blood ; and I
have built
Two chantries, where the sad and solemn
priests
Sing still for Eichard's soul. "
Surely it is not considering too curi-
ously to consider that verse of this
great quality demands a style and tone
of speech altogether different from that
modern custom, and perhaps I may add
modern language, prescribes. Surely
' ' Look, how the stain of blood
Is dull upon my hand, and wastes away,
And laved and lost therewith is the deep
curse
Of matricide. For while the guilt was
new,
'Twas banished from me at Apollo's
hearth,
Atoned and purified by death of swine. "
a grand manner of speech is needful
here, if ever needful anywhere ; some
larger utterance than our frail modern
tongues are taught to frame, to do
fit service to these imperial cadences.
" They stand generally still in solemn
dignified attitudes, so as to look very
much like coloured statues or figures
in a bas-relief; and they utter the sonor-
ous verse in a kind of recitative, yet
so distinctly that the words may be
accurately heard by all the audience." 2
In this passage seems to me to lie the
very purpose of the old Greek playing.
About the Chorus there must be even
more uncertainty ; about all Greek
music there is uncertainty. It seems,
however, to be generally agreed that
the accompaniment to the choric odes
of tragedy and to the movements of
the singers was of some very solemn
and simple kind. One fancies, at
least, that it could never have been
loud enough to drown, or even to in-
terfere with, the voices of the singers ;
that it must have been essentially
an accompaniment. If one most
ignorant of the musical art may be
permitted to guess, I should be in-
clined to think it might possibly have
been something like that we call
the Gregorian chant. However, it is
but impertinence in me to speak of
such things, and I certainly should
not presume to criticise Mr. Stanford's
music. It was said to be very good,
and I can well believe it was so. Cer-
tainly, even to an unskilled ear, there
were many passages in it most pleas-
ing and it seemed most congenial to
the words and motive ; the closing
chant, for example, and the song be-
ginning
" aye 5$j Kal
arvyepav
"Weave the weird dance, behold, the hour
To utter forth the chant.of hell"
2 'JSschylus/ by Eeginald S. Copleston,
Fellow and Lecturer of St. John's College,
Oxford (the present Bishop of Colombo) ; in
Blackwood's 'Ancient Classics for English
Eeaders' one of the best volumes in an
admirable series.
p 2
212
The ' JZumenid-es' at Cambridge.
and probably only to an unskilled ear
could it at any time have sounded too
loud, too overpowering, too noisy.
But, after all, these things can only
be to us as the judicious may deter-
mine. And probably the most judi-
cious will determine only that he
knows nothing. It must all be mere
guesswork; and the cleverest guess will
be leagues, it may be, away from the
reality. How far probably from the
reality are all our efforts to bring back
the form and colour of the vanished
past ! And, to take another view, who
shall say that the responsible authori-
ties were not wise in their kind to mo-
dernise on every side this old-world
scene 'J To a generation which can
find in Shakespeare only an excuse
for carpentering and upholstery, what
yawning abysses of despair would not
a Greek play reveal, if it were any
thing such as I have here feebly
essayed to conceive. And from the
modern view how good it was ! How
thoroughly done, how smooth and well
ordered ! In how few English-speak-
ing theatres would one find anything
like the precision, intelligence, and ac-
curacy with which these players had
mastered assuredly no holiday task !
How refreshing even to think of
the long hours these buoyant young
spirits
" There in the joy of their life and glory of
shooting-jackets, "
must have passed without a murmur
in the mere acquisition of the text
and the dull routine of rehearsal !
How incomparably superior an occupa-
tion to agitating for the franchise, or
riding on bicycles, or any other of those
debasing enjoyments which a younger
generation has adopted for the en-
chantments that once were ours of
the middle age ! What a succession of
bright engaging pictures, of radiant
figures ! What ideal gods of Hellas
were Apollo and Hermes ! Like the
lonians glorified in the old Homeric
hymn, one might have thought them
immortal and unaging; or as that
conqueriDg son of Archestratos whom
Pindar saw in his spring-tide bloom
beside the altar at Olympia. The pro-
priety of assigning Athena's part to a
woman is not so certain. The fact that
all the personages of the Attic theatre
were presented by males we may pass
by ; that is a sentiment, and those
who after due thought determined to
"do it after the high modern fashion "
were surely wise to discard all senti-
ment. But the voice ! The female
voice, that excellent thing in woman,
is, as a woman has herself said,
" Somewhat low for ats and ots."
It is hardly competent to give the
necessary volume and emphasis to
those grand Greek syllables, to say
nothing of the inevitable contrast with
the deeper voices around it. But,
when this has been said, it must be also
said that hard indeed it would have
been to find either man or woman
to deliver the words with more clear-
ness and perception ; or to present a
more charming figure in the white robe,
glancing helmet, and long-shadowing
spear even if charm be not the
capital idea we should get from the
vision of her whose eyes could " shine
terribly."
The Furies must have been difficult
creatures to deal with, even as Orestes
found them. As a Chorus certainly
they were most exactly trained, and
marshalled by a most earnest and
skilful leader. Their guise is said to
have been copied as literally as might
be from some old vase-paintings, and
so one must not dispute it. Certainly
they made a grim and ghastly band
enough, if possibly a shade more gro-
tesque than necessary.
And, for the last word, may one say,
without being impertinent or captious,
that it was all indeed a very pretty
poem, if one must not call it !
^Eschylus 1
MOWBRAY MORRIS.
213
ODE ON A NEAR PROSPECT OF ETON COLLEGE.
THE SHADE OF DR. HAWTREY SPEAKS.
WAKED from my sleep on thy dear breast,
Etona, by some strange unrest
Thy hallowed stones I tread ;
Beholding startled, sad, dismayed,
The spot wherein my boyhood played,
My manhood ruled as Head.
A narrower, less pellucid air
Pervades thy courts and cloisters, where,
Scholars and gentlemen,
Of ampler thought, serener brow,
\afJL7rpOTOLTOv
Here, in those generations gone,
Fairer than their own Helicon
The Muses found a home ;
Here taught our lisping tongues to raise
Some echoes of those deathless lays,
The glory of the golden days
Of Athens and of Rome.
Vanished is now that heavenly Choir;
The thoughts that burn, the poet's fire
A colder age disdains;
The mighty roll of Homer's verse
Gives way to German, French, or worse,
And Prose triumphant reigns.
Strange studies whose outlandish name
My shuddering lips refuse to frame
The place of Classics fill ;
Long Chamber is improved away,
King's Scholars gownless now may stray ;
The Brewery is still.
To "Absence" oft, to chapels more,
To schools far longer than of yore
Thy sad Alumni flock ;
More frequent " Pcenas " to be done,
More stern commands to " Come at one,"
And shade of Keate, forgive them ! none
To worship at the block !
214 Ode on a Near Prospect of Eton College.
These changes, to an Eton mind
So rude, so needless and unkind,
I might perchance condone,
If but the Vandal's ruthless hand
Would let thine ancient buildings stand,
Would leave thy walls alone.
But no ! the whirlwind of reform
E'en Upper School must wreathe in storm,
And desolation spread
O'er those old panels that enshrine,
Column on column, line on line,
The memories of thy dead.
What stories could those panels tell
Of sons of thine, who, through the spell
And magic of thy name,
Tn England's victories have bled,
Her fortunes ruled, her senates led,
O'er Letters, Art, Keligion, shed
The lustre of thy fame !
The Library whose precincts yield
Some quiet hours from stream and field,
Whose wealth of lettered lore
'Twas mine to cherish and adorn,
From old associations torn,
Must know its place no more !
That home which Savile, Keate, and I,
Found good enough in days gone by,
Is this too doomed to fall,
And in one common ruin blend
Each old familiar gabled friend
Whose roofs in dear disorder trend
Down to the Sacred Wall !
If gentle Henry's holy shade
But dreamed the havoc to be made,
Not e'en the crack of doom
Would in more consternation call
His statue from its pedestal,
His spirit from its tomb !
Sons of our Gracious Mother, wake !
Ere yet the billows o'er her break,
Roll back the rising tide;
That unborn ages may behold
On her high banner's blazoned fold
" Esto perpetua," still? enrolled
The motto of her pride !
B. M. T.
215
A STRANGE TEMPTATION.
I WENT to Alderthwaite for rest and
change of scene. Perhaps the place
was ill chosen, for I knew it to have
been a favourite haunt of Wilfrid
Gale's. This very knowledge attracted
me to the spot, when it ought to
have driven me away ; for if I wanted
a real mental change I should have
gone to some retreat wholly uncon-
nected with the memory of my friend.
Wilfrid Gale had died young;
weary, heart-sick, and disappointed.
His ambition had brought to him only
humiliation, his talent had led him on
to despair. He was a literary genius,
undeveloped, but full of promise, and
his hopes of early success had been
withered by neglect, or nipped by cruel
criticism. If he had been a strong
man he might have faced the world's
indifference until it had changed to
applause ; but his health was delicate
and his organisation sensitive ; and he
may be said to have died of his last
failure, a failure which a little waiting
might have turned to success.
The story of his life was a sad one,
and it seemed to his sister Alison a
real tragedy. In her eyes his genius
seemed immense, his difficulties unpre-
cedented. He had been her hero, his
talents had been her glory, and his
defeat brought to her the keenest
disappointment. He was one of the
immortals, and she the favoured being
destined to minister at his side, and
shine in the reflected brightness of his
success. So she had dreamed in happier
days, before she knew that her lot
would be darker than this ; that she
was fated only to soothe his sorrows
and to watch by him in the weary days
of his passing away.
I had always believed in Wilfrid's
talent and ultimate success, and I
admired his sister a great deal. When
he died I readily undertook the task
of editing his works ; this was proposed
to me by his publishers, and I carried
it out with zeal and enjoyment. His
writing was good, though somewhat
immature, and the last of his books
was full of an irregular but highly
original power. He had accepted
its defeat too soon. The literary world
was still hesitating whether to forget
it and let it pass by, to be stranded on
a lonely shore for ever ; or to take it
up with enthusiasm and to waft
it down the tide of the generations
in a whirlwind of applause. The
death of the author turned the
scale ; the work received immediate
and general attention; my little in-
troductory Life of Wilfrid Gale
was read with interest ; there was a
demand for a complete edition of his
writings. He was declared to be
among the immortals who had died
young, leaving the world only a faint
indication of their undoubted powers.
His neglected productions were neatly
bound in volumes suitable for a library
of classical literature; some of his
characters were declared to be crea-
tions of such power that they could
never be forgotten ; they must secure
to their author a permanent niche in
the great temple of fame.
Nothing else could have consoled
Alison Gale so much for the death of
her brother. His most earnest desire
had been realised though he might
not know it and his life had not been
thrown away. She chose to believe
that it was mainly through my
instrumentality that " justice" had at
last been done to him.
" They would not listen," she said.
"I knew if he could only get their
attention once, all difficulty would be
over. You have made them hear
216
A Strange Temptation.
against their will, and now they can
never forget, never be indifferent
again."
Her gratitude was very pleasant to
nie, though I thought it overstrained.
I had certainly spoken from a vantage
ground which her brother had never
reached. I was nob a clever man
myself, but I had the reputation of
one, which was a more profitable
thing. I belonged to a literary family.
I had run in the grooves of publica-
tion all my life. I wrote for critical
papers, my name carried weight, and
I was credited with more judgment
than I possessed. Perhaps I had given
my poor friend's little bark the final
shove that was wanted to get it off
the shallows into the current of popu-
larity ; I stood at a good spot for
making such pushes, and 1 was some-
times inclined to regret that I had no
large venture of my own to embark.
On this occasion I had put more
strength than usual into the effort of
launching ; I had been moved by my
friend's death, interested in his works,
and excited by his sister's appeal to
me to do my best. My nerves were
overstrained, my identity seemed lost
in that of Wilfrid Gale ; I lived in
the world of his creations and could
not get back into a wholesome at-
mosphere of cynical selfishness ; his
enthusiasm possessed me ; I was in
one of those moods in which if
the exponents of fashionable modern
Buddhism are right the wander-
ing earthly shell, the discarded
mortal will of my dead friend, might
easily have taken hold of me, and bent
me to its service. My poor friend's
will had never been a very strong one,
however, never so strong as his genius,
and something happened to me wholly
different from this.
I went down to Alderthwaite to
have a quiet time, boating on the lake
and wandering on the moors. Alison
Gale bade me good-bye with tears in
her eyes ; and I felt, as I pressed her
hand and looked into her sad face,
that she who had been the inspiration
of my recent task might t be willing
soon to become its reward. The devo-
tion she had lavished on her brother
might be transferred at last to his
best friend, as she persisted in calling
me.
This thought was a pleasant one,
and I hoped to fill up idle moments at
Alderthwaite with happy day-dreams
of my own. I intended to think of
Alison and of my own future, and to
have done for the present with
Wilfrid and his melancholy fate.
When I got down to the place I
found that the inn at which my friend
had usually stayed was closed for re-
pairs. I was obliged to take lodgings
at a farmhouse on the shore of the
lake. It was a tumble-down, pic-
turesque place, which had once been
the manor-house, and still held the
proud name of Alderthwaite Hall.
Two half ruined towers rose at its
corners, smothered in ivy, and one
window only looked out on the lonely
waters of the lake, with the unpeopled
fells rising from its further shore.
The farm people occupied some build-
ings at the back, with a cheerful view
into their own stable-yards and pig-
styes. The east side of the house was
reserved for lodgers, artists, fishermen,
and such eccentric creatures, who pre-
ferred scenery to comfort. It had a
separate entrance, and was tolerably
furnished. The great attractions of the
place were the vicinity of the water
and the use of the shabby boat.
I fancied that I could be very com-
fortable there for a couple of weeks ;
so I engaged rooms, sent for my traps,
and established myself in the place.
Before proceeding further I must
explain that I did not believe in
ghosts, and had no connection with
any psychical society. I was not on
the look-out for spiritual experiences,
and I believed that a healthy mind
in a healthy body would enable any
man to laugh at suggestions of the
supernatural.
Perhaps at this time my mind was
not in a healthy condition, and I be-
came subject to delusions, like some
other unfortunate persons. In that
I
A Strange Temptation.
217
case I have done a grievous wrong to
a friend whom I loved, and wrecked
my own life without any reason
whatever. I am impelled to tell my
story in the hope that, if it does not
justify my conduct, it will at least
explain the terrible temptation in
which I was unexpectedly placed. It
may be also that some persons will take
my own view of the case, and believe
that I was impelled to put an end to
much unmerited and useless suffering,
at the cost of trouble to myself and
disappointment to the woman I loved.
My first evening at Alderthwaite
Hall was a pleasant one ; the weather
was fine, and I strolled out along the
shore of the lake. Afterwards I re-
turned to my room, and wrote a few
letters. The room was comfortable
and cheerful in the lamp-light ; the
only thing that troubled me about it
was a perplexing sense of familiarity,
as if I had been in the place before,
and had some sad association with it.
This, of course, was impossible.
The quietness of the place was
agreeable to me in the irritated state
of my nerves. The farmyard sounds
had ceased ; the farm people were out
of hearing at the other side of the
building. There was a glimmer of
moonlight on the lake, and I had not
drawn down the blind of my window,
so that I could see the still shining
water whenever I lifted my head from
my paper.
It was strange that this deep silence
did not produce an impression of soli-
tude. On the contrary I continually
felt as if some one were sitting in the
room watching me. More than once
I looked over my shoulder with a start
to see who it was. Then I smiled at
my own imagination, which peopled
this solitude with personages.
Nevertheless, the impression re-
turned as soon as I had become
absorbed in my work: I felt that a
woman a woman whom I knew quite
well sat in a chair behind me, watch-
ing with folded hands. The impres-
sion always grew upon me in an
I indirect sort of manner as my attention
became more and more diverted to my
work ; when it had become sufficiently
intense to be disturbing, and so to
rouse me to think of it seriously, it
vanished.
There was nothing in the nature of
terror in this unusual sensation of a
familiar presence when nobody was
there. I had something of the same
feeling in the passages of the house,
and when I went up to my bedroom,
just as if the place were occupied by
persons whom I knew quite well, and
might expect to meet without any sur-
prise on the landings or the stairs.
The closed doors which I passed on my
way did not seem to me to be shut on
empty rooms persons who were not
strangers lived behind them, and might
come out and speak to me at any
moment.
This impression was not unpleasant,
though I smiled at its unreality. I
supposed that living in a crowd had
made it impossible for me to realise
all at once the fact of solitude, and the
complete stillness of deserted rooms.
My imagination peopled them with
beings full of life and business, going
about in a silent manner something
like my own. Once I had a fancy
that I met a young girl on the stairs,
who smiled at me as she passed. I
found myself smiling in return before
I had time to consider the folly of it.
Another time I thought a child's
laugh disturbed the air outside, but
no child was near when I went to the
door to look round.
On the second evening I went for a
row on the lake by moonlight. I kept
near the shore, and I was coasting a
promontory, where a great tree hid
from me the tiny bay on the other
side, when I was startled by a faint
cry beyond the darkness of the foliage.
There seemed to be a shiver of the
water, a shining of ripples in the
moonlight, and then all was still again.
When I rowed round the point, the
little bay was quiet enough; there
was no sign of any movement or any
presence there.
Nevertheless, as I made my way
218
A Strange Temptation.
home again I was oppressed by the
consciousness of something^ in the
atmosphere more tragic and intense
than usual ; my mental feelings were
analogous to those physical ones de-
scribed by many when there is " thun-
der in the air." Something remarkable
was going to happen, nay, was happen-
ing, just outside the range of my
perceptions ; I groped in the darkness,
and had not the sense necessary to
discover what was going on around
me. To all outward appearance the
world was quiet, and at rest ; to my
uneasy consciousness it was full of a
painful life which depressed without
revealing itself to me.
When my landlady brought my
supper that night I took occasion to
ask if the place had ever been haunted,
but she repelled the idea with indig-
nation. Nothing had ever happened
there to make it haunted, she said.
It had always been a well-to-do place,
with well-to-do and well-behaved folks
living there. I came to the conclusion
that my own nerves were at fault, and
that a period of rest and quiet would
dissipate all unpleasant fancies.
But the next night as I sat at the
table writing a hand seemed to be
laid on my shoulder. I turned quickly,
and seemed to see a woman's eyes fixed
on me in the dimness behind. There
was something commanding in the
look^ and the hand held me as if to
compel attention. I roused myself to
an attitude of repellent observation,
and as I looked defiantly into the
shadow the sensations faded away ;
there was no hand on my shoulder,
there were no eyes in the dimness :
yet, before they went, their look had
seemed to change from passionate
insisting to entreaty, reproach, despair.
I got up and walked about the room
impatiently, determined to shake off
my nervous weakness ; something
stopped me once, like a sob of dis-
appointment, but when I listened,
again there was silence.
I moved the furniture ; I looked
into the cupboards ; finally, I took my
hat and went out. But from that
time forward I was haunted not only
by the consciousness of a life which
moved unseen around me, but also
by that of a reproachful personality,
which followed me sadly from hour to
hour, and vainly strove to open some
communication with me.
I did not want the communication,
for my part. I avoided it, and re-
pelled it. It seemed to me the
beginning of madness, or of some
knowledge too sad to be borne. When
in my idler moments the conscious-
ness grew upon me, and the look and
the touch took more definite form,
until it seemed as if they would blend
at last into a voice which I must hear,
then I roused myself defiantly, and
said to the unknown presence, " You
are not there; I do not believe in
you ; I will not see you," and stared
hard into the daylight or the darkness.
With the sound of a little sigh, the
breath of a hope gone out, the pre-
sence would cease to be, and I stood
free for a time.
In all these strange visitations,
which grew more frequent and more
defined, I could not say that I ever
heard, or saw, or felt any distinct
thing; I was only conscious through
my brain, through my intelligence, as
distinguished from my senses at the
moment, that they were there to be
heard, or felt, or seen.
I knew that some one spoke, I felt
certain that some one looked at me,
but it was with the consciousness with
which we realise things told in clever
books that I knew it. My senses had
little to do with this experience ; as
soon as I roused myself to have full
command over them, I became con-
vinced that my impressions had no
foundation in fact ; they were woven
out of my own vivid imagination and
seemed real because my nerves were
weak.
This feeling of being continually
followed by a presence which was
sometimes reproachful and sometimes
beseeching was, however, very un-
pleasant. The vague curiosity which
I occasionally felt concerning the other
A Strange Temptation.
219
visionary personalities which appeared
to live round me was quelled by my
instinctive resistance to the one who
seemed to have some claim or to make
some demand upon me. I felt at
times as if an effort was being made
to reach me in some way and to com-
pel my conscious attention. There
was something I was to be made to
know, something I was to under-
stand.
I had no desire to understand it.
The only world with which I had, so
far, had any personal acquaintance,
contained a great deal of unpleasant-
ness, and a large number of respon-
sibilities. I did not wish to be
introduced to another one, and to be
entangled in its troubles. I felt sure,
already, that it was full of troubles.
If it was a real world I wished to
have nothing to do with it ; if, on the
other hand, it was the creation of my
ill-controlled fancy, this fancy must
be resisted in the interest of my own
sanity.
As my health improved and I began
to eat and to sleep well, and yet the
strange impressions did not pass away,
I resolved to leave Alderthwaite, and
so to get rid of them. I announced
my resolution to my landlady, without
telling her my reason, and I began to
pack up my things. But from the
moment when I determined to go the
struggle, if I may call it so, became
more intense. I never felt alone ;
beseeching hands followed me, entreat-
ing voices spoke to me, angry eyes
looked at me. What they asked I
did not know ; I only knew that I
could not be rid of them however
much I absorbed myself in activity.
At last I was tired, and sat down to
rest in my sitting-room. It was late
in the evening ; I had only a couple
of letters to write, giving my change
of address. The farm people had gone
to bed early as usual, and most of the
haunting images of the daytime had
faded away with it. I was alone, yet
not alone ; for one was with me, per-
sistent, demanding, unwearied.
I sat at the table and felt that, as
before, eyes watched me and waited,
eyes that I could not see, but which
strove to make me feel their presence.
Another will besides mine penetrated
the gloom of the place, and a resolve,
strong with the strength of despair,
seemed to struggle with my resolution
to go away ignorant. The strength
of this resolve, and the painfulness of
it, impressed itself upon me ever more
and more. It seemed to myself that,
at last, with a certain outbreak of
impatience, I yielded to the demand
made upon me, and turned round from
the window with a look of inquiry in
my eyes.
At first I saw nothing unusual in
the shadow of that corner where
rested an apparently empty chair.
But I knew that some one was there,
and I felt that my momentary surren-
der had been accepted. A certain
power from the darkness seemed to
reach me and hold my attention fixed ;
and then without any feeling of sur-
prise I began to see that some one
sat in the chair, and to meet the gleam
of eager eyes fixed on me with intent-
ness. I knew then that whether
madness or knowledge lay before me
it was too late to escape. My
former experiences had been vague
impressions ; my present was one of
deliberate, though unwilling, obser-
vation.
The eyes grew clearer and more
luminous, and the outlines of the face
became more distinct. It was a dark
and angry countenance, the face of a
woman of thirty, handsome, but very
unhappy. Her look was fixed upon
me with something like a command,
yet it was not a command, it was
rather a conscious and determined
force ; she did not order me to sur-
render to her all my thoughts, she
made me do it ; she held me with
the strength of a desperate resolve, as
if aware of a reluctance on my part, of
a desire to escape.
As the features took distinctness
the pale lips quivered, a flash of
sombre triumph lightened the gloomy
eyes.
220
A Strange Temptation.
"At last!" she said, "at last!
How long you have resisted."
Her voice came to me like a new
consciousness, with which my hearing
had little to do ; it was a human voice,
but with a tone and quality which I
had never heard before. I did not at-
tempt to speak in return ; I waited to
hear more.
" You knew, yet you would not
know," she went on ; " you saw, but
you would not believe. You have
fought against my will and persisted
in a blindness which would not be en-
lightened. But I could not give way.
You were my only hope."
I was tormented by a sense of recog-
nition, which overcame my reluctance
to acknowledge by any words this
strange presence. To speak would add
to the power of this mysterious being,
woman or spirit, who had taken form
in the gloom, and according to her
own declaration forced herself upon
my consciousness ; but my wonder was
stronger than my fear, and so I
answered her.
" Who are you ? I seem to know
you. Have I ever seen you before? "
She smiled a sombre smile.
" You know me. "Who better ?
Have you not worked me up to fuller
life, given to me a more vivid person-
ality, a distincter consciousness ? Your
friend, who made me, hardly knew me
so well."
This was a strange answer ; my head
was throbbing with a heated confu-
sion of ideas and images. The clue to
the woman's identity seemed only just
out of my reach ; she was familiar to
me as an old friend ; but when,
where, and how could I have seen her
before 1
" But for you," she went on, "I
might have died an easy death, an
early death. He had little vital force
to put into me. I should hardly have
known or understood before the end
came and I faded out of life, how I
came to be, and what I was. I could
not have resented the cruelty of him
and you."
" Of me ! " I answered, in deeper
wonder. " How can I have injured
you and when I "
" Do you not understand yet ? " she
said. "And there are the others,
too."
" What others V I demanded, with
a feeling of growing chilliness and dis-
comfort. Could I be in a world of
ghosts, of ghosts gone mad with
trouble, who mistook me for their
injurer? I seemed to have wandered
into a strange corner of spirit-land,
and to have at last learnt to see the
sights there, and hear the sounds ; but
the land was a dismal one indeed.
" Come with me and see," she an-
swered ; and rising from the chair in
which she had seemed to sit, she walked
towards the door.
I had no choice of action ; the possi-
bility of resistance did not even occur
to me. Her will was stronger than
mine, and, when once she had over-
come the preliminary difficulty of my
stupidity (a stupidity which had proved
serviceable for once in delaying this
unpleasant experience), when she had
forced upon me the consciousness of
her presence, I was compelled to follow
her and to receive the end of the
revelation.
She led me up the dark staircase to
a little unused bedroom. It had, at
least since my residence in the house,
been always empty before of any
human presence. As the door opened
before her now, I was conscious that
some one was within. The woman
with the dark eyes turned and
watched the effect upon me of the
scene she revealed.
At first I was hardly aware what I
saw ; my hold on the spirit- world
seemed slight, its sights and sounds
reached me with difficulty ; but as my
guide kept her eyes fixed upon me,
frowning with displeasure at my per-
plexity, the whole scene grew into dis-
tinctness as she had done.
A candle burnt on the little table ;
beside it, on a low chair, sat a lovely
firl with a little baby in her arms,
he could hardly be twenty years old,
but her face was wan, her large eyes
A Strange Temptation.
221
bright with suffering. She was watch-
ing with anxiety a young man who
paced up and down the room with an
angry countenance.
" I am sick of it all," he said, " sick
of you and the child, and the whole lot
of it. I shall be off to the colonies and
begin a new life. To-morrow will see
the end of this one. You may go
back to your friends."
" George ! " She rose to her feet
with a cry of dismay. " They will not
have me. I quarrelled with them all
for your sake."
" More fool you ! "
" George ! " she repeated, as she
put the baby in the cradle and went
forward to catch at his hand ; "if you
go, take me with you. I will go
anywhere."
" Didn't I tell you I was sick of the
sight of you?" he growled.
" But, George, it is for the child,"
she answered, with a catch of the
breath. " I am sick, I am ill ; I
cannot work for him ; if you leave us
I shall die, and then my little baby ! "
She held his hand passionately,
and, partly through weariness, partly
in terrified entreaty, she sank on her
knees beside him, arresting his im-
patient walk.
" You ought to be precious glad to
get rid of me," he answered roughly ;
"you can't pretend to be fond of me
yet."
" No," she said, with passionate im-
prudence, " I can't ; I know you too
well. It is because of the child ! "
He snatched his hand from her in
his sudden rage, and struck her a fierce
blow on the forehead. With a low
cry she fell to the ground, and lay
there sobbing painfully.
I stood in my place dumb with
horror and indignation ; but my guide
aroused me with an impatient word,
drove me with the force of her look (I
can describe it in no other way) back
into the passage, and shut the door
of the room again.
" Now," she said, " do you know us
at last ? "
" It is," I answered in a low voice
of wonder and dismay, " it is a scene
out of Wilfrid Gale's novel."
It was with a smile almost of
triumph that my companion led me
back to the sitting-room. She pressed
her wasted hands on the table there,
and leaned over it towards me as she
said, " Is it satisfactory to you 1 Would
you like it to go on for ever ? "
" I ?" was my perplexed and troubled
answer.
" Yes, you," she repeated, with
gentle insisting, as if she could now
afford to be forbearing with me. " Do
you realise it all, and the weary length
of it? Would you like us never to
reach the end ? "
"You?" I repeated again, help-
Yes, I ; I and the others. It is
no better for me, knowing what we
are and all the thin uselessness of
our existence, than for the others,
who do not guess, who go through it
all again and again as if it were for
the first time and the last. Does it
help me, do you suppose it can help
me, in the misery of my life here, to
know that I am but the shadow of a
man's thought a shadow that would
have faded away if it had not been
strengthened by the force of another
man's will, and stamped by the recog-
nition of so many others with the
seal of a miserable continuance? "
" I do not think I understand you,"
I replied, although I began to fear
that I did.
She smiled incredulously.
" It adds to the bitterness of my
sufferings from which I cannot es-
cape, because they are myself and I
am them to know that they are
nothing, the reflection of a man's dis-
appointment, of his sadness, which he
put into form and made alive in this
way ; to know that I can never escape,
never feel or think for myself, but
must live over and over again the
wretchedness which he mapped out for
me, in order to buy for himself fame
and a fame of which he knows
nothing ! "
"This, at least," I said., "is not in
222
A Strange Temptation.
Wilfrid Gale's story ; this scene he
did not plan."
" No," she said, her brow darkening,
' ' but it is not much ; it is the effort
of despair. You can help us, and no
one else. I knew that, and the know-
ledge gave me strength for once to
break through the fetters of his mind,
and to act for myself. I am not like
the others," she went on gloomily,
"who guess nothing, but feel on the
lines that he laid down and have no
thought of escape. I suppose," she said,
a faint smile showing through the
bitterness of her speech, "that the
evolution which explains all things to
you may work also in the world of
fancy, where we, like the creations of
other artists, are doomed to live ; and
he had made me so self-conscious and
analytical, and you had thrown so
much reality into his sketch of me,
that it is not wonderful for the self-
consciousness to have deepened into a
knowledge of what I am, and how I
came to be. I fought and struggled
towards the knowledge as soon as I
dimly guessed it, in the hope that it
might set me free ; for if I knew myself
to be only the dream of a novelist,
would not the dream vanish at the
touch of the daylight truth ? But it
was not so; my knowledge helped
me no more than yours does. Do not
the Buddhists teach that consciousness
is ignorance, and that knowledge will
destroy it and absorb all life into the
eternally Unconscious ? But who among
you has reached this height, except by
those gates of death which are closed
to us ? Some of your poets have said
that creation is only a breath of God,
which He will inhale again and so
destroy. But the man who gave life
to us by his fancy is dead himself, and
has left us to survive him. Some of
you have said again that you are only
a thought of your Creator ; but do you
suffer less because it is only in His
thought that you suffer ! If you know
that you are nothing, does it help you
when you feel cold or hunger 1 It
helps me no more than that, when I
go through those pangs which your
friend appointed for me to suffer.
And there is no more any hope of
appeal to him ; he has gone away and
left us to take our chance. Nay, he
wanted our sufferings to have the
immortality which he had not \ and,
because his will was too weak to
enforce his desire, you came forward
to help with the strength of yours."
" Do you mean," I said, " that it is
at all my fault that you suffer so
much?"
"Whose fault besides?" she
answered indignantly. " Your friend's
fancy created us, but it was not
strong enough to give us lasting life.
We should have passed away and
been forgotten, as lie would have been ;
but you have given us a place in the
thoughts of men from which we cannot
escape ; you have breathed new vitality
into what was dying before. As long
as we are real in the minds of many
we must be real to ourselves too ; we
must work out over and over again
the problems of our existence, and
love, and hate, and suffer, even
though we may come to have the
bitterness of knowing as I know
that our passion is foolishness, our
pain a shadow, and ourselves the
mere playthings of a vain man's
ambition."
" But," I said, slowly and wonder-
ingly, " if you exist, there must be so
many of you."
"And why not?" she asked, with
a bitter laugh. " Are there not so
many of all created things, all things
that suffer ? And to each one the
problem is as terrible as if no others
felt it. The fact of the consciousness
of a creature does not stay the forces
that create it. They go on turning
the machine just as much as ever,
even when the grain begins to feel
and to suffer for the grinding of the
wheels. Consciousness does not count
in the laws of nature ; it does a little
in the morality of man, but not
much not outside the region of his
own interests. Did not your friend,
who gave me so much knowledge and
so many thoughts, did he not reveal
A Strange Temptation.
223
to me also what your clever men, your
most cultivated men, the advanced
men of your age, think about con-
sciousness! How they tell us that
when there is an end to be achieved
any end, whether of knowledge or of
benevolence it cannot be counted that
the instruments may suffer ? Do they
not say that in the hands of science
the throbbing nerves of an inferior
creature are but as the lifeless quartz
lines in the unvitalised rock, that
the mere fact of consciousness can
make no difference in the treatment of
them ? When you read these things,
can you help knowing that the increase
of suffering is regarded as no check on
the multiplication of energy ? Men
must do things and make things,
even if the things are only made to
suffer."
" Some men, if they knew, would
cease to make," I answered abruptly.
Her dark sad eyes fixed themselves
more intently upon me with the
eagerness of a great anxiety.
" Are you," she said, " one of those
men 1 "
I felt myself flush under her search-
ing gaze. The oppression of finding
myself closed in by an unpleasant yet
just demand was beginning to weigh
upon me ; but I answered briefly, " I
am not one of the men who make."
" You have given life to the dying
creations of another man. Oh," she
said, clasping her hands together, and
stretching them before her in an out-
break of passionate appeal, "I have
fought for the strength to speak to
you, for the power to burst the limits
of my life, and to make an independ-
ent effort ; it was not for myself
only, it was for the others too, all the
others who suffer and do not know.
Perhaps I am the first who ever did
it, but I shall not be the last. For,
ever more and more, the artists, the
creators, strive to give us more reality
and more individual life. They are
not satisfied to make us pictures or
types ; they want us to be real men
and women like themselves. They do
not make us very great, or very good,
only very real and unhappy. And no
man ever tried harder to escape from
the sadness of his life by putting it into
the lives of his characters than Wilfrid
Gale. No one knows this better than
you do. Yet for a long time you
would not see my appeals to you, you
would not hear me when I spoke.
You have looked into my face with
the cruel reality and incredulity of
your eyes until you drove me back
into the shadowy hopelessness of that
existence from which I tried to reach
you. Now, when you can doubt no
longer, you are going away, away
where I cannot follow you. Will you
leave us then to our misery ? "
The intensity of the woman's look,
the reality of her speech impressed me
strangely. I could not refuse to answer
even as if she were all she seemed to
be.
"What can I do to help you?"
I asked her at last.
" Undo what you have done. You
write in many papers without signing
your name, write in all of them the
opposite of what you have said before ;
speak slightingly of us, say that we
are nothing, encourage the world to
pass us by and forget us."
" But /shall never forget you."
She sighed a little. " That is the
danger of it ; and I knew that. You
will forget the others at least. It was
only for your friend's sake that you
thought of them so much. When you
go to other work it will wipe out the
memory of what you really never cared
for. As for me, I must take my chance.
Even if you don't forget, the world's
hold on me will grow less and less. I
shall fade out of other minds, until at
length my thread of suffering will
become very slight indeed ; then, at
last, when you die " she smiled here
faintly, and did not finish.
" I see your troubles will be over,"
I answered somewhat dryly. " But
does it not occur to you capable as
you seem to be of independent thought
that my position has its duties 2 "
"You strained your convictions
for the sake of your friend ; you have
224
A Strange Temptation.
only to do as much in another direc-
tion and the mischief will be coun-
teracted," she answered quickly.
" There is also the memory of my
friend to consider, and his wishes,"
I replied, determined to argue the
question out.
" A dead man, one who does not
know, who has escaped," she said
scornfully, as if indeed the gate of
death was a haven of refuge denied to
her.
" And his sister, whose happiness is
bound up in his success ? "
She looked at me keenly then, press-
ing her thin fingers heavily on the
table again.
" One woman," she said, " only
one. You must love her much to
put her happiness against that of so
many."
" She is living, and my friend."
" And we only dream that we live.
Ah, but the dreaming is bitter ! "
She caught her breath in as if with
the horror of some remembrance.
" And she can go her own way, and
make her own life; help those she
loves, and leave those she hates die
at the end and have done with it.
Would you sacrifice us to her ? "
" It is a terrible thing that you ask
me to do."
" And a terrible thing which I beg
you to undo."
" If I did it, and told why, no one
would understand me, or believe me,"
I said, speaking more to myself than
to her.
"Has that anything to do with the
rightness of it 1 " she asked, quite
gently, and moving a little nearer to
me. When I started at the movement
she stopped and flushed all over her
pale face, as if recognising my instinct
of separation ; but she resumed her
speaking softly " You do not always
act for such reasons," was what she
added.
I looked at her surprised.
" You are a clever woman/' I said,
" and have worked your way to a
very individual life : you have got
quite beyond my friend and me. I
doubt if even I can help you to-
escape."
Her eyes saddened perceptibly.
" That is what I fear. On my way
to this, I have learned many things.
When we begin to help ourselves, we
get, sometimes, beyond the help of
others. We grope our way to death
through fuller life, and if we do not
quite get there it would have been
better perhaps not to start. This I
did not know at the beginning ; but
even if I had known I might have
gone on for the others' sake. You
know how much I mean when I say
that. I have shown you very little
of all the truth, but the rest you
can remember. You have guessed
dimly what has been going on
around you before to-night, all the
sorrow of it, and the pain ; all the
shame that some suffer undeserved,
and the wretched remorse of others
who were created to do the sin, and
make the trouble. You cannot let it
go on as before, and go away, and
forget."
There was a certain dignity in her
address which lifted it above the level
of an entreaty, while its gentleness
kept it away from the harshness of a
demand. The consciousness that the
release she asked for might not include
herself had purified her mood of its
bitterness, and ennobled her whole
attitude.
" I cannot answer you now," I said,
"you must give me time to think it
out and to realise that this is no
dream."
"At least you will not go away
without speaking to me again 1 " she
said.
" No, I will not. If you are here
to be spoken to again you shall
speak : I will certainly not deny you
that chance."
" Thank you," she said, smiling
sweetly, and lifting her hands from
the table. There was a swift look
of farewell in her eyes, and then
she was gone ; and I was alone,
more alone than I had been for many
days.
A Strange Temptation.
225
II.
WHEN the morning came I broke my
promise, and ran away. It was a
cowardly thing to do, but I said to
myself that I had dreamt a dream
which ought not to interfere with my
waking movements ; that I had no
need to keep a promise made to a
vision ; and that, if I wished to pre-
serve my sanity, I must leave at once
the place where I had been subject to
such a strange delusion.
As I walked to the station, a letter
was put into my hand from Alison
Gale
" I am glad to hear where you are
staying," she wrote. "That is the
house in which my brother wrote his
great book his last book. The whole
place must be haunted by his thoughts,
and beautified by the memories of
those creations which had their begin-
ning there."
I crumpled the paper up in my hand
with a feeling of irritation. This fact
I had not known before, for I had
always believed that Wilfrid Gale
stayed-^ at the inn to which I had
meant .to go ; it was a fact which I
did not feel pleased to have put before
me at this moment. I desired to learn
no new circumstance which would add
to the vividness of my recent impres-
sions, or confirm any haunting belief
in their reality. I wanted to forget
' The Yalley of Utter Darkness,' and
all the other books which my friend
had written, and all the characters in
them. I decided that fiction was a
nuisance, and ambition a vulgar mis-
take. I bought a morning paper to
divert my mind to politics.
The first person I went to see when
I reached London was Alison Gale. I
did not ask myself why I did it, nor
try to decide whether I desired to
strengthen my resolution to escape, or
only to receive the reward of it.
The reward was given to me un-
grudgingly. I still looked ill and worn ;
my residence at Alderthwaite had
failed to restore me to my ordinary
condition of cynical cheerfulness ; the
No, 315 VOL. xxxin.
memory of what I had left behind
stood between me and my personal
hopes ; I could get little enjoyment
out of them ; they were at best but a
necessary consolation.
Alison perceived my melancholy
mood, and was full of compassion and
sympathy. These feelings gave the
touch of tenderness to her gratitude
which had been wanting before ; and
her surrender to me was very easy and
simple. She promised to be my wife
with a gentle humility, as if she would
not refuse anythiDg I wished, yet
doubted the sufficiency of herself to
be all that I deserved to have.
But then, so she was pleased to say,
no one could be sufficiently paid for
being good and noble and great.
When people did very good things,
their own generosity had to be their
reward. As for herself and here she
looked down, blushing very prettily,
and playing with the flowers in her
belt it would be a great happiness to
her to spend her life with one who had
come forward with so much perception
and generosity to make the world
understand what Wilfrid was, and to
save his genius from being wasted.
She had always thought that she
would never marry, because marriage
would take her from Wilfrid, and she
would rather care for him most of all j
but to become my wife now seemed
only like going on with her life with
him, and she felt sure that her
brother in heaven, if he could know
about it, would be happy to think of
our spending the rest of our lives
together.
I saw that she over-estimated my
opinion of her brother's genius, and
placed me in a false position as a
fellow-worshipper with herself at his
shrine. I could also have wished that
she had shown more personal regard for
me, instead of putting me forward as a
substitute for the brother she had lost.
But the personal feeling would come
with time, and she would also learn to
understand that I had a career of my
own, and talents worth considering.
In the meantime, her excess of sub-
226
A Strange Temptation.
missive gratitude was somewhat em-
barrassing, and it made it all the
more painful for me to oppose any
wish of hers when she brought it
forward. Almost the first suggestion
she made on her own behalf was a
painful one.
" I should like," she said, blushing
brightly, " when we are married, in-
stead of going to the places that so
many go to, to stay at Alderthwaite
Hall for a little while. He liked it so
much, and you know it already, and
could show it to me."
I answered quite abruptly that this
was out of the question ; the place was
altogether unsuitable. Then I re-
covered myself, and said I was sorry
not to agree to anything she would
like ; but the situation was melancholy,
the house old-fashioned and uncom-
fortable. It would not do at all.
She was a little hurt and surprised
at first, having evidently felt confident
of my sympathy with this desire. She
had a great deal of sentiment, and was
sure that I had it too, in a cleverer
way ; but, being satisfied with the
main thing, my devotion to her
brother's memory, she was willing to
be guided and corrected in smaller
things. After a time she began to
seem somewhat abashed at herself
for having meddled in an arrangement
which she ought to have left altogether
in my hands.
Her shyness and submission troubled
me, and I was sorry to have driven her
back into the mood of grateful devo-
tion. However, it could not be helped,
and I did not doubt that we should
learn to understand one another better
in course of time.
Our marriage was to take place after
an interval of a few months, and Alison
went to pay a series of visits to friends
meanwhile. I was left without the
solace of her society, and felt disin-
clined to go back into my own circle,
or to accept invitations in general.
Alison's suggestion about Alder-
thwaite Hall had come upon me with
a kind of shock ; it brought back all
the memories from which I was trying
to escape ; for I could not help realis-
ing the impossibility of taking to that
trouble-haunted place the young wife
for whose sake I had shut my ears to
the appeal made to me.
I could never tell her all that hap-
pened to me there, how I had nearly
yielded to the strange demand forced
upon me, or how I had fled in a
cowardly manner from the considera-
tion of it. After my marriage that
chapter of my memory must be a
closed book, and Alderthwaite a for-
bidden place. I could never face the
reproaches possibly waiting for me,
nor could I mingle my love for Alison
with my sympathy for that strange
vision of a woman who had appealed to
me so passionately for herself and her
fellow victims.
I tried to think that it had all been
an illusion, a dream ; and that now, in
my happier mood, it could never re-
turn. And yet the perplexity of it
haunted me ; and I asked myself con-
tinually whether I had run away before
the visions of a disordered fancy, or
broken a promise to a creature who was
capable of judgment and consciousness,
I felt a great desire to settle the pro-
blem while my life was my own, before
it was quite bound up with Alison's.
Her absence at this time gave me an
opportunity of testing my recovered
nerve, and proving that Alderthwaite
Hall had been haunted only by my own
dreams. To convince myself of this
fact seemed really necessary to my
peace of mind.
I did not write to Alison to tell her
where I was going, for I knew that her
letters would be forwarded to me ; but
I packed up my portmanteau and went
down again to the old house by the
lake.
I shall not tell all that happened to
me after I went back to Alderthwaite
Hall ; the recital of it would be pain-
ful, and would bring back too vividly
the memory of all that I endured at
the time.
At first indeed there was a false air
of peace and quietness about the place,
as if it held no secret and hid no
A Strange Temptation.
227
trouble ; and yet this calm failed to
satisfy me. I was not convinced that
there was nothing strange to hear or
see ; T only felt that I had perhaps
sacrificed my power of hearing and
seeing, and with it all hope of helping
those who had appealed to me.
The sunny quietness of the fells and
the shining stillness of the lake were
not without their sense of desolation.
Somewhere, pushed out of sight by my
determined action, the miserable lives
might go on, with the power of prayer
or reproach denied to them. I felt
like one of those pitiless experimenters
on living animals who content them-
selves with administering the cruel drug
curari, which binds their victims in a
hopeless stillness and silence, while it
leaves them full powers of perception
and pain. Of all prisons such a one
must be the .most horrible, because it
is the narrowest ; the walls of it are
the tortured flesh of the creature,
within which it can make no Struggle,
beyond which it can cast out no cry.
Had I done something like this in
refusing to hear the appeal so pain-
fully made to me ; in cutting myself
off at once from sympathy and commu-
nion with those I might have helped ?
This was my first sensation when
I found only a commonplace world
awaiting me at Alderthwaite, the
chickens cheerfully scratching in the
yard, the sandpipers crying shrilly
over the water. It was succeeded by
one of relief and triumph. My past
experiences had been delusions born of
weakened nerves and solitude. I had
broken no promise after all, and been
guilty of no unkindness.
This happy assurance was, however,
very soon to be dispelled, and I was to
go through more than my last experi-
ence of horror. Gradually the power
of knowing what was going on around
me returned, at first with a painful
sense of awakening to a lost conscious-
ness and of fighting with intervening
I dreams. I knew that there was trouble
| near me, and strove vainly to under-
i stand what it was ; I was certain that
i voices spoke and people moved around
me, but the thread seemed lost which
would guide my perceptions to a clear
knowledge of what they were.
This time I had to grope my way
alone out of the spiritual darkness ;
my old guide had abandoned me, dis-
couraged by my unfaithfulness. And
when at last I forced my way back
into the shadowy world from which I
seemed shut out, no one recognised my
presence there : I was a stranger even
to her.
My experience was a remarkable
one ; I doubt if any one ever went
through the like before. By the force
of my sympathy, communicated to me
in the first instance by the strange
woman who had spoken to me, I was
admitted into a world which had little
to do with my own, and enabled to see
all that happened there.
I saw many unpleasant things,
nearly everything that one would de-
sire not to see : a grey-haired father
insulted by his worthless son ; a noble
woman cast off and scoffed at by an
inferior lover ; a child murdered by its
mother ; a wife weeping over her dead
husband. Even the pleasanter scenes
brought their own horror; I knew
they were but the flowery ways which
lead without any hope of a turning
straight to a wretched end. I grew
sick of them at last ; sick of watching
the bright beginnings of a young
affection which must turn to hatred
and humiliation ; the budding of hopes
whose fruit would be despair. The
whole thing was a horrid mockery,
with the dreadful sense of reality
behind it. It was I who was a phan-
tom, my presence disregarded and
even ignored, while the tragedy went
on around me.
One of the most painful experiences
was to see the woman who had ap-
pealed to me, who had shown herself
capable of self-sacrifice and noble
thoughts, lavish her fondness on a
vulgar villain who laughed at her.
The sight was revolting to every
instinct I had. She seemed to have
gone back, at least at times, to the
ignorant completeness of her original
Q 2
228
A. Strange Temptation.
life ; at other times she would half
awake, look around her in a kind of
horror and perplexity, and struggle
to understand the second consciousness
which slumbered within her.
At such times I wondered if it could
be the shock of my desertion which
had driven her back from the higher
station, if the violence of the effort
which she had made in vain had re-
sulted in a hopeless relapse into her
old helplessness.
Perhaps it was my sympathy which
helped her at last to re-emerge, for
she began once more to show some con-
secutive consciousness of the shadowi-
ness of her life, and to revolt against
the things it compelled her to be and
to do. Then she recognised my pre-
sence, and though she did not speak
to me looked at me often with
mingled humiliation and reproach ;
as if ashamed that I should see the
things she was forced to do, and
yet indignant that I should have
left her with no choice but to do
them.
It was long' before she attempted to
speak to me again, or to take that
place of leader and advocate which
had been hers before. She was too
proud to appeal for herself, and at
first too miserable to appeal for others.
Meanwhile it was my fate to watch,
from hour to hour, so many creatures
go helplessly on the way marked out
by the caprice of a man's fancy to
inevitable sorrow.
I could not interfere, I could not
influence I was entirely outside ;
but a week's watching made me feel
like Dante in his journey through
the Inferno ; or, worse than that, like
a brute who is beguiling helpless crea-
tures into torture for some purpose of
his own.
I had forgotten my own future ;
I had forgotten Alison ; I struggled
only with the one thought that these
victims were Wilfrid Gale's, and not
mine ; that I had no right to interfere
and put an end to their sorrows. This
was the argument with which I lulled
my conscience, or fought against my
temptation whichever way you like
to put it.
After many days of the struggle I
felt quite broken down ; all power of
resistance seemed to have gone from
me ; I must yield, or once more, like
a coward, find safety in flight.
"It is enough," I felt inclined to
cry ; " the brightness of life is gone
for ever if I must buy it at the price
of this knowledge. I will have no
more of it."
And then I knew that for the first
time since my return my old guide
waited for me, patiently, quietly ; and
that, however much I might desire to
refuse, I must get up and follow her.
She led me out to the lake, and
there, as we stood beside the shining
water, bright with gleaming moon-
light, I became aware of a presence
near us. It was the girl whom I had
first seen the night before I fled from
Alderthwaite.
She had her baby in her arms, and
she bent over it, speaking to it softly.
"Little baby," she said, in her
childlike voice, "he will not come
back to us any more ; and my mother
is dead, and my father will never for-
give. If I left you to grow up as I'
did, would you leave me for some one
who did not care much, as I left my
mother, and should I have to die
alone 1 Little baby, it is better to die
now now before your heart is,"
broken as mine is ; before you break
some one else's as I did. It is not
worth while living ; it is better to
die. The trouble is so long, and the
happiness so short." She spoke plead-
ingly, as if the child could under-
stand and might reproach her for
what she meant to do, rocking it
gently all the while in her arms. " I
am hungry, baby, and very ill. When
you wake you will cry because I have
so little food to give you. It is
better never to wake, never to feel
any more."
She stopped with a shudder, and
looked round as if frightened, and
I saw then how thin she was, and
how wan her cheeks.
A Strange Temptation.
229
"It is dreadful to do it myself,"
she said in a low voice ; " if some one
would only do it for me, and I never
know, as I can do it for baby ! Oh !
if he would not give me the means to
live he might have given me death
instead ; but I must seek that for
myself, even that."
She seemed to be relenting in her
purpose, and looked back along the
path by which she had come ; but the
child stirred in her arms and uttered
a faint moan, more pitiful to hear than
any cry. She bent over it with pas-
sionate kisses, and said, " I will do it,
baby, for your sake; I will not be
afraid."
She laid it down then, very gently
and carefully, in a boat moored to the
beach. With her wasted fingers she
undid the fastening and put the oars
into their places ; then, slowly and
painfully, she began to row into the
deeper water. She paused once among
the water-lilies and looked at her
baby, as if she thought of laying him
down among their roots ; but she re-
membered the uncertainty of her own
resolution and went further away from
the shore. In the still, deep water
near the centre of the lake she stood
up, letting the oars fall away out of
her reach. She took the baby up
and remained for a moment, a dark,
straight figure in the moonlight ; the
boat had drifted a little, the oars were
black lines some feet away. Then she
held out the child suddenly at arm's
length, uttering a strange despairing
cry, which was no appeal for help, but
rather a protest and a last declaration
of pain to the indifferent universe.
The cry rang down the lake, and the
fells cast it back ; it was followed by
a splash. She had opened her arms
and let the child fall into the water.
A strange thing followed. She had
evidently meant to spring in after her
baby, but now her courage failed her,
and she cowered down shuddering in
the boat. Then she leaned over and
tried to reach the oars, but they were
too far away; after that she burst
into a fit of bitter sobbing, and covered
her face with her hands, longing per-
haps for courage to finish what she
had begun.
In another moment she stopped and
looked round her, timidly and cau-
tiously. She seemed afraid of what
she might see, and her fear was not
without foundation, for a dark object
was apparent in the water near her.
At the sight of it she rose as if she
had been struck, and, without a mo-
ment's hesitation, leapt over the side
of the boat towards it.
" My baby, come back to me ! " was
her cry as the ruffled waters closed
over her. In the gleaming moonlight
only the boat was left drifting, and
near it the floating oars.
I turned away with something be-
tween a shudder and a sigh of relief.
"Yes, it is over," said my guide,
speaking for the first time since my
return, and answering my thought.
" Must it begin again and go on,
through all the weary course of it, to
the dreadful end ? "
I looked at her actually with some-
thing of anger and repugnance. She
was like an accusing spirit from which
I could not escape. I uttered no word
in reply, but I went in-doors, took
pen and paper, and wrote through all
that night and into the following
morning.
It was not one thing that I wrote,
but many. There was a serious essay
pointing out the intrinsic weakness of
my friend's writings and the sketchi-
ness of his characters ; there was a
jesting discourse, which laughed at
the public for having taken seriously
what was only worth a passing thought ;
there were other papers in other styles.
The substance of all was the same, but
the forms were different, and each, as
I wrote it, I addressed to the magazine
for which it was most suited, among
those to which I was an accepted
contributor.
I did this work without pause or
hesitation. When it was done I had
my breakfast, packed up my port-
manteau, and departed. I posted my
productions en route, paid a nying
230
A Strange Temptation.
visit to my lodgings, and took the
earliest train to Dover. My next
letter to Alison was dated from Paris.
I told her that I had been suddenly
obliged to go abroad on business, that
I should travel from place to place,
and that I could not at present give
her any address to write to.
My great desire at that time was to
get out of the reach of letters and
magazines. If my papers were printed,
it must be without any proof correc-
tion from me. I was determined to
have nothing more to do with them.
If they came into my hands again, it
could only be to renew the old struggle,
which I hoped to have concluded for
ever.
When I next saw Alison more than
three months had passed away. I
had written to her several times, but
always when on the point of changing
my quarters, and I had taken care to
avoid giving any instructions for the
forwarding of letters. If this thing
had to be done, let it be done irre-
trievably before I had any more
knowledge of it.
I spoke to Alison in my brief
letters of much business and travel
in which I was involved : and I spoke
truthfully, for I had chosen to absorb
myself in an exhaustive study of cer-
tain districts of the Continent, on
which, with their people and their
history, I had been invited to write a
series of papers.
" I cannot create," I wrote to her,
with a ghastly effort to be playful,
" but I can at least amass ; and I am
trying hard to lay the foundation of
some future fame before I come back
to you. This sort of travelling will
be out of the question for you, and
after we are married I shall not like
to do it alone."
When I had actually started on my
return journey, I telegraphed the time
at which I expected to arrive at home,
and on reaching my London lodgings
I found a note from Alison awaiting
me. It was very brief, and only
stated where she was to be found ; but
I guessed from the tone of it that
something was wrong, and that she
had some revelation to make.
When I actually stood before her,
she looked very pale and sad. The
mourning which she wore for her
brother before I went away had not
been changed for anything brighter ;
it had not even been modified. She
listened to my greetings quietly, and
then sat down, clasping her hands in
the intensity of some emotion.
"I want to tell you," she said,. "of
something dreadful that has happened
since you went away," and then I
knew that the thing had been done,
and that my wild shots had not missed
their mark.
A heap of papers and magazines lay
beside her ; she took them up now,
and began to finger them in an
agitated manner.
" Some one," she said, " has done a
wicked thing some one who must
have hated my brother, and been
angry that justice had been done to
him at last. See ! " she went on, hold-
ing the papers towards me, " every one
of them contains something written
against his books."
I took them from her, and was glad
to hold my head down, examining
them. As I turned over the pages
rapidly, I perceived that the writing
in question was all mine. Some of it
had been abbreviated, some a little
altered, the editors having taken the
responsibility of correction in my
absence. One little essay, light and
sarcastic in tone, had evidently fallen
in altogether with the editorial mood ;
it had been polished to a keener in-
tensity of mocking evil, and some very
sharp strokes of severity had been
added to it.
" What is so strange," said Alison,
in her low, troubled voice, " is, that
people believe those wicked things. I
know they do. I can see it by the
way they begin to look at me, as if
they were a little sorry, but it did not
matter much. They are not interested
as they were before, and glad to talk
of my brother ; they just look at me
for a moment in an observing sort of
A Strange Temptation.
231
manner, and then turn away. The
most they will say now is, ' What a
pity your brother died so young,' as
if he did not do enough to make his
fame first!"
" You must be mistaken," I an-
swered, still turning over the leaves,
and wondering how I could have
thought of so much severe criticism
in one night ; " such a change cannot
take place all at once."
" Yet it has } and oh ! how I have
wished for you to come back and do
something. My friends talk to me,
and say that my brother's fame had
not been established long enough to
resist this attack ; that your praise of
him had started it, and that now every
one remembers that you were his par-
ticular friend. Nobody cared for his
writing, really that's what they try
to tell me in other words, to make me
patient, but people were ashamed of
not seeming to care when they heard
that he was so clever, and a real
genius. Now they can please them-
selves, because some one has dared to
write slightingly of him ; and the sale
of his books has stopped quite sud-
denly. It must be a very jealous and
wicked person who has done it ! "
" Why do you think it is one per-
son 1 There are six essays here, in
different papers."
" They are none of them signed ;
and I do not believe there are two
persons in the world so cruel as that,"
she ended conclusively.
I put the papers down and looked
at her at last.
" Alison," I said, " you know that
I love you."
"I believe that you do," she
answered, her face flushing, " that is
why I ask you to help me."
" And that I was your brother's
friend, and liked to be of service to
him?"
" You have been before, and you
will be again now," she said ; but I
went on without heeding her.
" How will you believe me, then,
when I tell you that I wrote these
papers, every one of them 1 "
" You ! " She rose to her feet, con-
fronting me.
" Yes, I ! " I answered, rising too,
and putting the papers down.
" I do not believe you. You are
mad. You are ill. You do not know
what you are saying."
" I know very well. It was to get
away from this trouble that I left you
and went abroad."
She trembled a little, and leaned on
the table to support herself, looking
at me with a white face.
" You could not do it," she said.
" There was no motive. It is some
cruel joke."
"It is the miserable truth ; and I
will tell you the motive."
Then I sat down again, and told
her, as rapidly and yet as fully as I
could, the history of my temptation,
how I had fled from it, returned to it,
yielded to it.
She sank back in her chair as she
listened, a look of perplexity, of incre-
dulity, of pain, on her face. Once I
thought there was a glimpse of fear
there; but my calm manner, my
steady voice, the coherence of my dis-
course, in spite of its strange subject,
reassured her. She could not think
that I was dangerously mad ; it was
easier to believe that I was, for some
unknown reason, deceiving her.
When I had finished she looked at
me quietly, and said, " You have had
a strange delusion ; and now you will
confess all, and undo it."
" No," I said, " much as I love you,
I don't think I shall ever undo it."
"Do you mean," she said, "that
you will let the world go on reading
those papers, not knowing why they
were written? "
" Does the world know why I wrote
the first ; because he was my friend,
and you were his sister 1 "
She paled a little at this, but
answered, " It was true ; you believed
it."
"With modifications. And these
papers are true, and I believe them,
with modifications. No, I will inter-
fere no more. I have but undone
A Strange Temptation.
what I did. If your brother's fame
is a real thing, if his genius is a suffi-
cient thing, his works will survive
this attack. If they cannot survive
it, if they owed their success entirely
to what I wrote before, let them be
forgotten ; it is their proper fate."
"But I," she said, her eyes begin-
ning to flame somewhat, " I can tell
the world what you will not."
" You can please yourself," I
answered; "the world will not, any
more than you do, believe in my true
motive. They will think my explana-
tion a mere excuse to escape your
anger. Will it then benefit your
brother's fame for it to be known that
the critic who praised him so highly
at first repented afterwards and wrote
these things ? "
She became very pale indeed, and
faltered, " You are too clever for me.
I did not think of that."
I was touched with pity and tender-
ness at the sight of her trouble.
" Alison," I said, " forgive me, and
let this go by. You cannot believe or
understand what I have told you, but
you can at least suppose that I have
some good reason, and would not
grieve you without cause. I have
but undone what I did : your brother's
fame stands as it was before I touched
it. If it fades away and he is forgot-
ten, he is spared the trouble of know-
ing it. He is gone, and can suffer no
more from the world's caprices; but
we have years of life before us. Let
this be a closed book in the future.
If you can forgive me I will strive to
make up in other ways for this trou-
ble ; why should we not be happy yet,
since we love one another ' "
"I?" she said, drawing back, and
speaking with scorching emphasis.
" Do you think that / can love you,
the traitor, the wicked injurer of the
dead?"
" I hoped you loved me," I an-
swered, " since you promised to be
my wife."
" I will not break my promise," she
said, " if you will undo this wickedness
that you have done."
"It is impossible, much as I love
you."
" Then let me never have the misery
of looking on your face again," she
answered passionately. And so she
turned and left me.
I have never seen Alison since that
day, but I have heard of her marriage
to a clergyman, a very second-rate sort
of man, who fancies, entirely without
foundation, that he has a talent for
composing hymns.
I cannot say that I have ever re-
pented what I did, though it has made
my life lonely, and brought trouble to
the girl I loved. If I made a mistake,
the error was a cruel one, to me as
well as to others ; but I am to-day as
convinced of the reality of what I saw
and heard as when I sat down and
wrote those papers.
Alison did not exaggerate the con-
sequence of their almost simultaneous
appearance. Wilfrid Gale had not
the qualities necessary to ensure popu-
larity, though he was clever enough
for people to admire him when told
with authority that they ought to
do so. When told, however, with
equal authority, and more numerical
force, that they might please them-
selves, they pleased themselves in
the direction of forgetfulness and
neglect.
After my parting with Alison Gale
I went abroad again, and did not re-
turn to England for some years.
During my absence Alison married,
and many of my friends had time to
forget me.
They had time also to forget the
poor genius who had died too young,
and for whom the mistaken zeal of a
friend as gossip said had achieved a
momentary popularity. When I came
back I found that his name had slipped
from people's memories, and his books
had disappeared from the stalls. There
was no demand for his works in the
libraries, no reference to his produc-
tions in the current literature. Very
few read him^ and nobody quoted him.
He was remembered, as a name, by
one or two literary persons, but his
A Strange Temptation.
233
writings had, even with them, sunk
into the haze of oblivion.
I went down to Alderthwaite Hall
once more, and found a great peace
and silence resting on its ivied chim-
neys and dwelling in its ancient walls.
The ghosts had gone, set free at last
from the sadness of their unreal exist-
ence. None thought of them, none
remembered them ; that mission of
reflecting in a shadowy life the intense
consciousness of men and women who
believed in their identities, was over
and done with. All were gone, except
one, whose sad face still haunted the
place with its patient sweetness.
It was even as she had guessed. The
effort which broke the narrow bonds
of her life, and rendered her capable
of original action, had set her in a
higher circle of existence than those
who were her companions. As their
consciousness grew less intense, their
joy and sorrow less real, her individu-
ality remained the same. Gradually
she became more and more separated
from those for whom she had done so
much, and also from the old chain of
circumstances and feelings which had
bound her before. She stood aloof in
her solitude, and saw the old life fall
away, saw the old companions die out,
till they were only faint echoes, or
dim visions.
Then she was left alone, with no
life to live, her career ended ; her work
successful for others, a failure for her-
| self alone.
" But I do not repent/' ' she said,
speaking to me for the last time, " it
was a good thing to do, and the rest
are free. I would have done it for
that alone. It used to seem a terrible
thing to me, when first I grew to
understand it, to think of all those
lives marked out to live, those loves to
be felt, those sins to be done, without
any choice. But since then I have
wondered in my great loneliness
whether you in the larger world
have any more choice, though you
think you have. Those poor things
thought they had, too, and I thought
it once ; and I have wondered whether
if any of you get far enough to see
what you are, the hopelessness and the
triviality of it will drive you to de-
spair, as it did me. But I cannot tell.
Will any of you be strong enough to
reach a higher knowledge, and will it
also prove to be death and oblivion 1
Will it be the fate of one, as it has
been mine, to find that greater truth
which is the end of life, and, having
opened the door by which the others
go out, to be left alone in all eternity
with no way of passing through ? "
11 1 should never have the courage
to seek such a way," I answered,
shuddering.
"You cannot tell what you would
do if the need proved strong enough.
And now I want to ask one thing for
myself : this is for myself alone. It
is that you will go away from this
place again, and never return to it. I
think of you always with gratitude and
kindness. To have known you is some
compensation for having been com-
pelled, in the existence from which you
delivered me, to love " she stopped
and shuddered. " I will not go back
to that evil thought, which covers me
still with humiliation. Your memory
is pleasant to me, but your presence
fills me with too strong a life. Too
strong because I have nothing to do
with it, and am as purposeless as a
shadow. When you are far away my
thoughts are dim like a dream. I
hardly know that I go on existing:;
one day perhaps I may go out alto-
gether. For you will forget me, per-
haps, and it is only in your mind that
I now live not the old life, a newer
though a lonelier one."
" I fear that I shall never forget
you," I answered in a low voice.
" I must wait longer then," she
answered with a wan sweet smile ;
" when the end comes for you it will
come for me too. There is some plea-
sure in the thought. We have never
lived the same life, I have been only a
vision to you ; but we may at least
die together, and that will be a kind
of meeting. Good-bye."
She smiled with a quivering lip, and
A Strange Temptation.
I put out my hand to touch hers. It
seemed so real to me that I felt as if
I might clasp it, and draw her from
her shadowy world to my real one.
But she drew back, shook her head,
and smiled again.
"Let me go!" she said; "never
call me to this stronger life again. It
can only be an added pain to us both."
My hand dropped. I had no strength
to protest, but watched her as she
faded from my sight, and then put my
hand over my eyes, feeling as if I had
parted from a friend who was very
dear to me.
I never saw her again. If she still
haunts the old Hull at Alderthwaite I
shall not know. Peace be with her
sweet strong spirit if it has not yet
found its rest !
I shall never marry. Alison was
my first love ; after I lost her I never
looked on another woman whom I
desired to make my wife. About
them all, in spite of their fairness,
there was something hard, and cold,
and worldly. That vision that I had
had of a suffering creature, who was
willing to suffer still if her companions
might be set free, came between me
and all the bright beauty of girls who
hardly knew what trouble was. It
comes between me and my old am-
bitions now.
What a strange thing it is to look
forward to my own death, knowing
that it will bring her freedom and
therefore her reward !
235
AMERICAN LEADS AT WHIST.
EVER since whist became a scientific
game authorities have been agreed
on one fundamental point, viz., that
the original lead should be from the
strongest suit.
About the year 1728, so far as is
known, whist was first studied scien-
tifically by a party of gentlemen fre-
quenting the Crown coffee-house in
Bedford Row. It is on record that
these players laid down as their first
rule, " Lead from the strong suit."
Shortly after this (1743) appeared
Hoyle's ' Short Treatise on the Game
of Whist.' Hoyle echoes the Crown
dictum. His first " general rule " is,
" When you lead, begin with the best
suit in your hand." Payne, ' Maxims '
(1773), says, " Begin with the suit of
which you have most in number."
Matthews, 'Advice' (1805), recom-
mends leads from sequences of three
cards or more, and adds, " If you have
none, lead from your most numerous
suit ; " but when weak in trumps, he
does not like leading from a long weak
suit. This, however, is rather a con-
tradiction in terms, as one of the
elements of strength is number.
" Ccelebs," ' Laws and Practice of
Whist' (1851), states that "generally
the primitive lead is from the strong-
est or most numerous suit." Clay,
'Treatise on Short Whist' (1864), re-
marks, " Let your first lead be from
your strongest suit." The above list-
could be extended, but enough has
been quoted to carry the point that
there is a general consensus among
writers on the game, as also among
players, that the original lead should
be from the strongest suit.
By " the " original lead is meant the
very first lead of all. When the ori-
ginal leader loses the lead, and some
one else opens a fresh suit, his lead is
original in one sense, but is not the
original lead. After one or two tricks
have been played, the fall of the cards
may influence the next lead. It is not
proposed to discuss here leads late in
a hand. The following observations
apply in their absolute form to " the "
original lead only.
By the strongest suit is meant the
suit of greatest number. It is not
denied that there are exceptional hands,
from which the suit of greatest number
is not led originally. Thus a player
may hold five, four, three, two, in one
suit, and ace, king, queen, in another,
and in his judgment it may be ad-
visable to open the tierce major in
preference to the suit of four small
cards. But. in a theoretical discussion,
such hands may be ignored, for the
very reason that they are exceptional.
Four cards is the minimum number
of a strong suit. Three is somewhat
below the average of cards of the same
suit in one hand ; four is somewhat
above the average. Hence, for pre-
sent purposes, it may be taken that a
strong suit is a suit of four or more
cards.
The selection of card depends on the
number of the cards in the suit, and
on the number and value of the high
cards.
Thus, a small card is led when the
suit contains no honour ; or, with two
exceptions, when it contains only one
honour. The honours are, of course,
ace, king, queen, knave.
With ace and more than three small
cards in a plain suit, ace is led, as,
owing to the number of cards held in
the suit (five at least), it is not great
odds against the second round being
trumped. Also when the only honour
is the knave, and it is accompanied by
at least the ten and the nine, then the
knave is led.
When the suit contains two honours,
if they are ace and king, it is ob-
viously right, in plain suits, to lead
236
American Leads at Whist.
them in preference to a low card. If
the two honours are king and queen,
the king is led. Further, if the ten
accompanies queen, knave, queen is
led ; and if ten accompanies king,
knave, ten is led. In other cases a
small card is led with two honours in
the suit. With more than two honours
in the suit, a high card is always led.
And observe, in three combinations
from which a high card is led the
second lead is a low card, viz., ace and
four small cards ; king (led from king,
queen), when the king wins the trick ;
and ten (led from king, knave, ten),
when the ten wins the trick.
In all other cases (bar exceptional
conditions owing to the fall of the
cards in the first trick, which can
only be taken into account in a com-
plete treatise), when a high card is
led, the lead is followed by another
high card.
A strong suit, then, may be opened
in one of three ways : 1. A low card
may be led. 2. A high card may be
led, followed by a low card. 3. A nigh
card may be led, followed by a high
card.
Take first the case of a low card
led. Which of the low cards of the
strong suit should the original leader
select ?
A player somewhat advanced in
the game would answer that, having
no pretension to win the trick, the
lowest card of all should be led, so as
to avoid the possibility of any un-
necessary sacrifice. He might add
that, as between such cards as a two
and a three, it is true there can be no
sacrifice in leading the three ; but
that, having a rule of play, it is
advisable to apply it uniformly, and
that consequently he would always
lead his lowest when opening a strong
suit with a small card. And, indeed,
this was the practice from the earliest
period of scientific whist, until the
year 1872.
About that time a number of highly
intelligent players were in the habit
of pursuing their favourite pastime at
the County Club, in Albemarle Street.
They observed that the invariable
lead of the lowest sometimes lost
a trick to a very small card on the
first round, should the third hand
happen to be very weak in the leader's
suit. Thus, leader has king, ten, nine,
eight, two ; second hand has queen,
knave, five, four ; third hand has six,
three ; fourth hand has ace, seven.
The old-fashioned game was to lead
the two. The second and third hands
would play the four and the six respec-
tively, and the fourth hand would
win the trick with the seven. If, with
these cards, the first lead is the eight,
it forces the ace from the fourth hand,
and leaves the leader with the winning
card. From such a combination as the
above there can be no doubt, as was
soon decided, that the eight, and not
the lowest card, is the most favourable
one for the original lead.
Then the question arose How far
is this scheme to be carried ? Holding
an intermediate sequence of knave,
ten, nine (say with the king above
and the two below the sequence)
even the old-fashioned players would
begin with the nine in preference to
the two. The example set out at
length has already shown that if the
intermediate sequence is ten, nine,
eight, it is also right to begin with the
eight. Who shall say that it is not
right to begin with the seven, holding
an intermediate sequence of nine,
eight, seven ? And how about an in-
termediate sequence of eight, seven,
six?
The line could not be drawn, so the
knot was cut by pursuing a uniform
practice with all intermediate sequences
of three cards. That is to say, with
such a suit as queen, seven, six, five,
two (containing an intermediate se-
quence of seven, six, five), the leader
would open the game with the five,
and not with the two.
And " Lo ! a marvel came to light."
Given the original lead from a strong
suit, it was remarked that when the
leader first produced, say, a five, and
afterwards played a two, he must
necessarily have led from great nume-
American Leads at Whist.
237
rical strength, that is from a suit of
at least five cards.
Now it has been a maxim of scien-
tific whist from time immemorial that
it is an advantage to inform partner
of strength in any particular suit, and
especially of great strength. Hence,
it having been discovered that a player
could inform his partner of great
strength by first leading his pen-
ultimate card, when he held an inter-
mediate sequence, it began to be
considered whether he should confine
this advantage to suits containing such
sequences. Why should he not, it was
suggested, extend the rule to all suits
of five or more cards, irrespective of
their containing an intermediate se-
quence ? To give a concrete example.
From queen, six, five, four, two, the
four was led, and the information was
given. But from queen, six, four,
three, two, the two was led, and the
information was withheld. Why 1 Be-
cause the four, three, two sequence was
not " intermediate." It was soon felt
that this was splitting straws, and the
rule to lead the penultimate card from
all suits of five cards opened with a
small card (whether containing an in-
termediate sequence or not), became
established.
It was, however, hotly disputed in
some quarters whether it is advisable
to inform partners of such details of
strength, bearing in mind that the
information is also imparted to the
adversaries. It would require a separ-
ate essay to thresh out the pros and
cons of the Battle of the Penulti-
mate. Suffice it to say that, with the
exception of a small contingent of
Irreconcilables, the penultimate sys-
tem is now approved of by good players.
And it is not to be supposed that pen-
ultimates are led, by gentlemen who
play to win, out of any compliment to
Drayson, Pole, " Cavendish " or other
writers who uphold the system. Far
from it. The plan is followed because
it has been found to answer.
There is yet one step further. What
is to be done with suits of more than
five cards?
For a long time (that is, from 1872
to 1884) the penultimate was led from
suits of five or more cards. The lead
of the ante-penultimate from suits of
six cards had been several times pro-
posed, notably by Drayson in 1879.
But the proposals fell flat until a year
or two back, when Mr. Nicholas
Browse Trist, of New Orleans, U.S.A.,
hit the nail on the head. He laid it
down as a general principle that all long
suits opened with a low card should
be treated as though they contained
the minimum of numerical strength
only (that is, four cards), and that
the fourth-best card should always be
the one chosen for the first lead lower
cards being disregarded. Thus, from
king, ten, nine, six, lead the six. From
king, ten, nine, six, five, lead the six.
From king, ten, nine, six, five, four, lead
the six. And so on, whatever the
procession of small cards lower than
the six. The difference between the
two schemes may be briefly stated
thus : for " lowest " and for " pen-
ultimate " read " fourth-best."
The advantage of this uniformity of
lead is that partner always knows
the leader holds exactly three cards
in his suit higher than the one led.
If the leader afterwards plays lower
cards he still retains the three higher
cards. An example will render the
working of the fourth -best rule
apparent. Put out the cards of one
suit, and give the leader queen, knave,
eight, seven, four, three. Give the
second hand the ten ; the third hand
ace, king, nine ; and the fourth hand
six, five, two. The penultimate leader
starts with the four. Second hand
plays ten ; third hand plays king ; and
fourth hand plays two. To the second
trick the third hand leads ace. The
fourth hand (now second to play) plays
five ; the original leader (now third
hand) plays three ; the other player
renounces.
Now the original leader's partner
knows (owing to the penultimate)
that the lead was from at least
five cards; but he cannot infer the
value of any one of the three or
238
American Leads at Whist.
more cards remaining in the leader's
hand.
Replace the suit as at first, and let
the leader open with his fourth-best
card the American lead. He leads
the seven ; the others play ten, king,
two, as before.
The third hand knows that the leader
holds three cards all higher than the
seven ; ten having been played, and
holding ace, nine, himself, he can mark
queen, knave, eight in the leader's
hand, just as though he saw them
there. And, what is most valuable,
the third hand knows at once that the
leader has the entire command of the
suit. This he did not know, even
after the second round, according to
the penultimate way of leading. The
second trick the cards are played thus
ace ; five ; three ; renounce. The
play of the five shows that the leader
holds the four, in addition to queen,
knave, eight ; and the only card the
leader's partner cannot place is the
six.
The difference, then, as regards
partner's knowledge under the two
methods is, that according to penulti-
mate play the third hand knows almost
nothing about the leader's suit ; ac-
cording to fourth-best, or American,
play the third hand knows nearly
everything. Especial attention is
drawn to the fact that the most use-
ful information, namely, that the leader
commands the suit, is imparted by the
American lead on ihejirst round.
It is amazing that players who have
got as far as penultimates should
hesitate about adopting fourth-bests.
They lead the fourth-best from a suit
of four cards, they lead the fourth-
best from a suit of five cards ; but
many of them will not lead the fourth-
best from a suit of six cards. They
have swallowed the camel and they
strain at the gnat. For the first rule
of American leads is simplicity itself.
All it asks is this
When you open your strong suit with
a low card, lead your FOURTH-BEST.
There are three cases, already enu-
merated, where a high card having
been first led, the second lead is a
low card. If these combinations are
calculated it will be found that, bar
trumping, the original lead of the
low card is more likely to win tricks
than that of the high card. So having
led the high card the leader of the low
card, to the next trick, is in much the
same position as though he were about
to open his suit with a low card, sub-
ject, of course, to contrary indications
from the previous fall of the cards.
It is pretty evident then, if the
fourth -best law is adopted, that the
leader should continue with the low
card he would originally have selected
had he led that first. For instance ;
with ace, eight, seven, five, two. if the
suit were opened (as it is in trumps)
with a low card, the five would be
chosen. In plain suits the ace is led.
Prior to the introduction of fourth-
bests the two was next led. But the
fourth-best law points to the original
fourth- best, viz., the five, as the card
to be proceeded with. Hence the
second rule of American leads (which
is only supplementary to the first)
is
On quitting the head of your suit,
after the first round, lead your ORIGINAL
FOURTH-BEST.
The Battle of the Fourth-Best is
now raging, as did years ago the
battle of the penultimate. The old
stock arguments against penultimates
are urged against fourth-bests. It
will be well to examine these argu-
ments. They are three : 1. That the
lead of the fourth-best complicates the
game. 2. That fourth-bests seldom
affect the result. 3. That the exact
information given by fourth-bests is
more advantageous to the adversaries
than to the leader and his partner.
The complication argument, if sound,
might be met by remarking it is no
objection to the rules of play of an
intellectual game that they should
exercise the brains of the players.
But it is more readily met by denying
its soundness in fact. The leader's
partner is only expected to observe
that the leader holds three cards
American Leads at Whist.
239
higher than the one he first led in the
suit of his own choosing ; or, in the
case of a high card followed by a low
one, that the leader holds two cards
higher than the one led on the second
round. That is all. If the leader's
partner is clever enough also to note
the absence of certain small cards, he
may mentally place them in the
leader's hand. But should he be a
moderate player he is not obliged to
do this. If he can do it he will derive
the fullest possible advantage from
the lead of the fourth- best; if he
cannot (owing to inexperience or to
want of observation), he will only
derive part of the advantage he might
obtain. As Clay wisely puts it, "The
beginner should at first content him-
self by carefully observing the broad
indications of the game. With care,
and his eyes never wandering from
the table, each day will add to the
indications which he will observe and
understand. Memory and observation
will become mechanical to him and
will cost him little effort, when all
that will remain for him to do will be
to calculate at his ease the best way
of playing the remainder of his own
and his partner's hands, in many cases,
as though he saw tlie greater portion of
the cards laid face upwards on the
table." The italics are ours.
The result argument overlooks the
fact that, in their most important
features, American leads have been
anticipated. Whenever a young player
leads his lowest from a suit of four
cards, he, like M. Jourdain, who spoke
prose without knowing it, makes an
American lead without knowing it.
So, whenever he leads the penultimate
from a suit of five cards, he makes the
American lead without knowing it. It
is only when he comes to a six card suit,
or to a suit of more than four cards
from which he first leads a high card
and then a low one, that he is invited
to lead a card which, but for American
leads, he would not have led. Conse-
quently, the American lead only differs
from the ordinary lead in a few cases ;
and it necessarily follows that the
result can only be affected in some of
these few cases.
The advantage-to-adversary argu-
ment is more troublesome to combat.
It is freely admitted that hands can
be so arranged as to give the adver-
saries an advantage, in consequence of
the adoption of the American system.
The question remains On which side
will the balance of advantage lie in
the long run ? This question can only
be answered by experience. So far as
our experience goes no one who has
once practised American leads has
abandoned them because the practice
has resulted in a loss.
And, it being admitted that it is an
advantage to convey information of
strength, it is contrary to all ex-
perience that incomplete information
should be better than precise informa-
tion. It may turn out to be so in this
particular instance; but more than
mere assertion is required to convince
American leaders of the soundness of
the doctrine that the leader ought to
give his partner not too much infor-
mation but just information enough.
When a suit is opened with a high
card, and another high card is next
led, it will in most instances be
because the leader holds a third high
card. Thus, with ace, queen, knave,
&c., ace is first led, and then queen or
knave. It is well established that
with ace, queen, knave, four in suit,
ace should be followed by queen ; with
more than four in suit, that ace should
be followed by knave.
The reason is that, with the four
card combination, the leader is not
strong enough to tempt his partner to
unblock the suit on the second round
by playing the king ; but that, with
the five card combination, if partner
originally holds king and two small
ones, the leader wants the king out of
the way, on the second round, to free
his suit. The same applies to queen,
knave, ten, four in suit or five in suit.
With four lead queen, then knave ;
with more than four, lead queen, then
ten. And, by analogy, from knave,
ten, nine, four in suit, lead knave,
240
American Leads at Whist.
then ten ; from knave, ten, nine, more
than four in suit, lead knave, then
nine.
It will be noticed that, in the ex-
amples, the higher of two indifferent
cards is led when the lead was from a
suit of four cards ; that the lower of
two indifferent cards is led when the
lead was from a suit of more than
four cards. About these leads happily
there is no dispute.
It must be assumed that the reader
knows the usual leads from combina-
tions of high cards. The only point
sought by the American plan is to
procure a uniform system of leading
from high indifferent cards. And
seeing that, in the cases quoted, the
second lead depends on the number of
cards held in the suit, the American
law follows almost as a matter of
course, viz. :
With two high indifferent cards, on
the second round lead THE HIGHER if
you had four in suit originally ; THE
LOWER if you had more than four.
Thus, with king, knave, ten, &c.,
the ten is led. If the queen is not
played to the first trick the remaining
cards are not indifferent, and the rule
does not apply. But if queen, or
queen, ace, come out on the first round
and the leader now obtains the lead
again, his king and knave are indif-
ferent cards. If, then, he proceeds
with the king, the higher of the in-
different cards, he tells his partner he
remains with knave and one small
card ; if he proceeds with the knave,
the lower of the indifferent cards, he
tells his partner that he remains with
king and at least two small cards.
Or, in trumps, if the lead is from
ace, king, queen, the queen is first led.
Now king and ace are indifferent
cards. Ace being the second lead, the
leader still holds king and at most
one small trump ; king being the
second lead the leader still holds
ace and at least two small trumps.
Or, from king, queen, knave, at
least two small cards, knave is
led, both in trumps and in plain
suits ; and king and queen are in-
different cards. If the king is the
second lead, the cards in the leader's
hand are queen and two small ones
exactly } if the queen is the second
lead, the leader has still in hand king
and at least three small ones.
In order to lead properly from high
cards it is essential to be sure that
the high cards are indifferent. In
this consists the only trouble with re-
gard to these leads. Players who
know the ordinary leads can apply the
rule readily. Players who are not
familiar with leads from high cards
will first have to learn, by heart, what
everybody who pretends to play whist
ought to know.
Some few writers have recently
advised the adoption of the American
system when the leader is strong in
trumps, and the retention of the old-
fashioned system when the leader is
weak in trumps. This may be all
very well as a matter of judgment
on obtaining the lead and opening a
suit for the first time towards the
middle of the hand. But as regards
"the" original lead it can hardly be
argued that a mixed system or rather
no system is preferable to a uniform
method. "The" original lead pro-
ceeds on the assumption that the third
player holds his average of good and
bad cards. Hence, if the leader's
partner has a strong, or even an
average hand, his play may be seri-
ously hampered by withholding infor-
mation which must be given by the
first lead of all or not at all.
It may be asked, Why should players
trouble themselves to learn American
leads when in many cases the old-
fashioned lead answers nearly or quite
as well? The answer is simple.
American leads propose a systematic
course when opening the strong suit,
and substitute general principles for
rule of thumb. They thus elevate the
character of the game, and they enable
even beginners to speak the Language
of Whist intelligibly for the benefit of
partners who understand it.
CAVENDISH.
MACMILLAN'S MAGAZINE
FEBRUARY, 1886.
THE GREAT GLADSTONE MYTH. 1
IN the post - Christian myths of
the Teutonic race settled in England
no figure appears more frequently and
more mysteriously than that of Glad-
stone, or Mista Gladstone. To un-
ravel the true germinal conception
of Gladstone, and to assign to all the
later accretions of myth their proven-
ance and epoch, are the problems
attempted in this chapter. It is
almost needless (when we consider
the perversity of men and the lasting
nature of prejudice) to remark that
some still see in Gladstone a
shadowy historical figure. Just as
our glorious mythical Siegfried has
been falsely interpreted as the
shadowy traditional Arminius (the
Arminius of Tacitus, not of Leo
Adolescens,) projected on the mists of
the Brocken, so Gladstone has been
recognised as a human hero of the
Fourth Dynasty. In this capacity he
has been identified with Gordon (pro-
bably the north wind), with Spurgeon, 2
whom I have elsewhere shown to
be a river god, and with Living-
stone. In the last case the identity
of the suffix " stone," and the resem-
blance of the ideas of " joy " and
of " vitality," lend some air of spe-
ciousness to a fundamental error.
Livingstone is ohne zweifel, a form
(like Cox) of the midnight sun, now
fabled to wander in the " Dark Con-
1 A chapter from Prof. Boscher's ' Post-
Christian Mythology. ' Berlin and New York,
A.D. 3886.
2 Both these names are undoubtedly Greek
neuter substantives.
No. 316. VOL. LIU.
tinent," now alluded to as lost in the
cloudland of comparative mythology.
Of all these cobwebs spun by the
spiders of sciolism, the Euhemeristic
or Spencerian view that Gladstone
is an historical personage has
attracted most attention. Unluckily
for its advocates, the whole contem-
porary documents of the Fourth
Dynasty have perished. When an
over-educated and over-rated populace,
headed by two mythical figures, Wat
Tyler and one Jo, 3 rose in fury against
the School Boards and the Department,
they left nothing but tattered frag-
ments of the literature of the time.
Consequently we are forced to recon-
struct the Gladstonian myth by the
comparative method, that is, by com-
paring the relics of old Ritual treatises,
hymns, imprecations, and similar re-
ligious texts, with works of art, altars,
and statues, and with popular tradi-
tions and folk-lore. The results,
again, are examined in the light of
the Yedas, the Egyptian monuments,
and generally of everything that, to
the unscientific eye,seems most turbidly
obscure in itself, and most hopelessly
remote from the subject in hand. The
aid of Philology will not be rejected
because Longus, or Longinus, has 4
meanly argued that her services must
be accepted with cautious diffidence.
On the contrary, Philology is the only
3 Lieblein speaks ('Egyptian Eeligion,'
1884, Leipzig,) of "the mythical name Jo."
Already had Continental savants dismissed the
belief in a historical Jo, a leader of the Demos.
4 There seems to be some mistake here.
242
The Great Gladstone Myth.
real key to the labyrinths of post-
Christian myth.
The philological analysis of the
name of Gladstone is attempted, with
very various results, by Roth, Kuhn,
Schwartz, and other contemporary
descendants of the old scholars. Roth
finds in "Glad" the Scotch word
" gled," a hawk or falcon. He then
adduces the examples of the Hawk-
Indra, from the Rig Yeda, and of the
Hawk-headed Osiris, both of them
indubitably personifications of the
sun. On the other hand, Kuhn, with
Schwartz, fixes his attention on the
suffix " stone," and quotes, from a
fragment attributed to Shakespeare,
"the all-dreaded thunder stone."
Schwartz and Kuhn conclude, in har-
mony with their general system, that
Gladstone is really and primarily the
thunder-bolt, and secondarily the
spirit of the tempest. They quote an
isolated line from an early lay about
the " Pilot who weathered the
storm," which they apply to Gladstone
in his human or political aspect, when
the storm- spirit had been anthropo-
morphised, and was regarded as an
ancestral politician. But such scanty
folklore as we possess assures us that
the storm, on the other hand,
weathered Gladstone ; and that the
poem quoted refers to quite another
person, also named William, and
probably identical with William Tell
that is, with the sun, which of
course brings us back to Roth's view
of the hawk, or solar Gladstone,
though this argument in his own
favour has been neglected by the
learned mythologist. He might also,
if he cared, adduce the solar stone of
Delphi, fabled to have been swallowed
by Cronus. Kuhn, indeed, lends an
involuntary assent to this conclusion
(Ueber Untwick. der Myth.) when he
asserts that the stone swallowed by
Cronus was the setting sun. Thus we
have only to combine our information
to see how correct is the view of Roth,
and how much to be preferred to that
of Schwartz and Kuhn. Gladstone,
philologically considered, is the " hawk-
stone," combining with the attributes
of the Hawk-Indra and Hawk-Osiris
those of the Delphian sun-stone, which
we also find in the Egyptian Ritual
for the Dead. 1 The ludicrous theory
that Gladstone is a territorial surname,
derived from some place, " Gledstane "
(Falkenstein), can only be broached by
men ignorant of even the grammar
of Sanskrit ; dabblers who mark with
a pencil the pages of travellers and
missionaries. We conclude, then, that
Gladstone is, primarily, the hawk-sun,
or sun-hawk.
From philology we turn to the
examination of literary fragments,
which will necessarily establish our
already secured position (that Glad-
stone is the sun), or so much the
worse for the fragments. These have
reached us in the shape of burned and
torn scraps of paper, covered with
printed texts, which resolve them-
selves into hymns, and imprecations
or curses. It appears to have been
the custom of the worshippers of
Gladstone to salute his rising, at each
dawn, with printed outcries of adora-
tion and delight, resembling in
character the Osirian hymns. These
are sometimes couched in rhythmical
language, as when we read
"[Gla] dstone, the pillar of the People's
hopes, " ;
to be compared with a very old text,
referring obscurely to " the People's
William," and "a popular Bill,"
doubtless one and the same thing,
as has often been remarked. Among
the epithets of Gladstone which occur
in the hymns, we find " versatile,"
" accomplished," " philanthropic,"
" patriotic," " statesmanlike," " sub-
tle," "eloquent," "illustrious," "per-
suasive," "brilliant," "clear," "un-
ambiguous," "resolute." All of those
are obviously intelligible only when
applied to the sun. At the same
time we note a fragmentary curse of
the greatest importance, in which
Gladstone is declared to be the be-
loved object of "the Divine Figure
from the North," or "the Great
1 "Lepierre sorti du soleil se retrouve au
Livre des Souffles." Lefebure, 'Osiris,' p.
204. Brugseh, 'Shai-n. sinsin,' i. 9.
The Great Gladstone Myth.
243
White Czar." This puzzled the
learned, till a fragment of a Muel-
lerian disquisition was recently un-
earthed. In this text 1 it was stated,
on the authority of Brinton, that
" the Great White Hare " worshipped
by the Red Indians was really, when
correctly understood, the Dawn. It
is needless to observe (when one is
addressing scholars) that " Great
White Hare" (in Algonkin, Mani-
bozho) becomes Great White Czar in
Victorian English. Thus the Divine
Figure from the North, or White
Czar, with whom Gladstone is mythi-
cally associated, turns out to be the
Great White Hare, or Dawn Hero, of
the Algonkins. The sun (Gladstone)
may naturally and reasonably be
spoken of in mythical language as
the "Friend of the Dawn." This
proverbial expression came to be mis-
understood, and we hear of a Liberal
statesman, Gladstone, and of his
affection for a Russian despot. The
case is analogous to Apollo's fabled
love for Daphne = Dahana, the Dawn.
While fragments of laudatory hymns
are common enough, it must not be
forgotten that dirges or curses (Dirce)
are also discovered in the excavations.
These Dirce were put forth both morn-
ing and evening, and it is interesting
to note that the imprecations vented
at sunset ("evening papers," in the
old mythical language) are even more
severe and unsparing than those
uttered ("morning papers") at dawn.
How are the imprecations to be ex-
plained? The explanation is not
difficult, nothing is difficult to a
comparative mythologist. Gladstone
is the sun, the enemy of Darkness.
But Darkness has her worshippers as
well as Light. Set, no less than
Osiris, was adored in the hymns of
Egypt, perhaps by kings of an invad-
ing Semitic tribe. Now there can be
no doubt that the enemies of Glad-
stone, the Rishis, or hymn-writers
who execrated him, were regarded
by his worshippers as a darkened
class, foes of enlightenment. They
are spoken of as " the stupid party,"
1 'Nineteenth Century,' December, 1885.
as " obscurantists," and so forth, with
the usual amenity of theological con-
troversy. It would be painful, and is
unnecessary, to quote from the curses,
whether matins or vespers, of the
children of night. Their language is
terribly severe, and, doubtless, was
regarded as blasphemy by the sun-
worshippers. Gladstone is said to
have " no conscience," " no sense of
honour," to be so fugitive and evasive
in character, that one might almost
think the moon, rather than the sun,
was the topic under discussion. But,
as Roth points out, this is easily ex-
plained when we remember the vicissi-
tudes of English weather, and the in-
frequent appearances of the sun in
that climate. By the curses, uttered
as they were in the morning, when
night has yielded to the star of day,
and at evening, when day is, in turn,
vanquished by night, our theory of
the sun Gladstone is confirmed beyond
reach of cavil; indeed the solar
theory is no longer a theory, but a
generally recognised fact.
Evidence, which is bound to be con-
firmatory, reaches us from an altar
and from works of art. The one altar
of Gladstone is by some explained as
the pedestal of his statue, while the an-
thropological sciolists regard it simply
as a milestone ! In speaking to scholars
it is hardly necessary even to touch on
this preposterous fallacy, sufficiently
confuted by the monument itself. <
On the road into western England,
between the old sites of Bristol and
London, excavations recently laid bare
the very interesting monument figured
here.
Though some letters or hieroglyphs
are defaced, there can be no doubt that
the inscription is correctly read G. 0. M.
244
The Great Gladstone Myth.
The explanation which I have pro-
posed (Zeitschrift fur Ang. Ant.) is
universally accepted by scholars. I
read Gladstonio Optimo Maximo, " To
Gladstone, Best and Greatest," a form
of adoration, or adulation, which sur-
vived in England (like municipal in-
stitutions, the game laws, and trial by
jury) from the date of the Roman
occupation. It is a plausible conjec-
ture that Gladstone stepped into the
shoes of Jupiter Optimus Maximus.
Hence we may regard him (like
Osiris) as the sum of the monotheistic
conception in England.
This interpretation is so manifest,
that, could science sneer, we might
laugh at the hazardous conjectures of
smatterers ignorant even of the gram-
mar of Sanskrit. They, as usual, are
greatly divided among themselves. The
Spencerian or Euhemeristic school,
if that can be called a school
""Where blind and naked Ignorance
Delivers brawling judgments all day long
On all things, unashamed,"
protests that the monument is a pe-
destal of a lost image of Gladstone.
The inscription (G. 0. M.) is read
" Grand Old Man," and it is actually
hinted that this was the petit nom, or
endearing title, of a real historical
politician. Weak as we may think
such reasonings, we must regard them
as, at least, less unscholarly than the
hypothesis that the inscription should
be read
"90 M."
meaning " ninety miles from London."
It is true that the site whence the
monument was excavated is at a dis-
tance of ninety miles from the ruins of
London, but that is a mere coincidence,
on which it were childish to insist.
Scholars know at what rate such acci-
dents should be estimated, and value
at its proper price one unimpeachable
equation like G. 0. M.rr Gladstonio
Optimo Maximo.
It is, of course, no argument against
this view that the authors of the
Diroa regard Gladstone as a male-
ficent being. How could they do
otherwise ? They were the scribes of
the opposed religion. Diodorus tells
us about an Ethiopian sect which
detested the Sun. A parallel, as
usual, is found in Egypt, where Set,
or Typhon, is commonly regarded as a
maleficent spirit, the enemy of Osiris,
the midnight sun. None the less it is
certain that under some dynasties
Set himself was adored the deity of
one creed is the Satan of its opponents.
A curious coincidence seems to show
(as Bergaigne thinks) that Indra, the
chief Indo-Aryan deity, was occasion-
ally confounded with Yrittra, who is
usually his antagonist. The myths of
Egypt, as reported by Plutarch, say
that Set, or Typhon, forced his way
out of his mother's side, thereby show-
ing his natural malevolence even in
the moment of his birth. The myths
of the extinct Algonkins of the Ameri-
can continent repeat absolutely the
same tale about Malsumis, the brother
and foe of their divine hero, Glooskap.
Now the Rig Veda (iv. 18, 1-3) attri-
butes this act to Indra, and we may
infer that Indra had been the Typhon,
or Set, or Glooskap, of some Aryan
kindred, before he became the chief
and beneficent god of the Kusika
stock of Indo-Aryans. The eyil
myth clung to the good god. By a
similar process we may readily account
for the imprecations, and for the many
profane and blasphemous legends, in
which Gladstone is represented as
oblique, mysterious, and equivocal.
(Compare Apollo Loxias.) The same
class of ideas occurs in the myths
about Gladstone " in Opposition " (as
the old mythical language runs), that
is, about the too ardent sun of summer.
When " in Opposition," he is said to
have found himself in a condition " of
more freedom and less responsibility,"
and to "have made it hot for his
enemies," expressions transparently
mythical. If more evidence were
wanted, it would be found in the
myth which represents Gladstone as
the opponent of Huxley. As every
philologist knows, Huxley, by Grimm's
law, is Huskley, the hero of a
" husk myth " (as Ralston styles it),
a brilliant being enveloped in a husk,
The Great Gladstone Myth.
245
probably the night or the thunder-
cloud. The dispute between Glad-
stone and Huskley as to what occurred
at the Creation is a repetition of the
same dispute between Wainamoinen
and Jonkahainen, in the Kalewala of
the Finns. Released from his husk
the opponent becomes Beaconsfield =
the field of light, or radiant sky.
In works of art Gladstone is repre-
sented as armed with an axe. This,
of course, is probably a survival
from the effigies of Zeus Labran-
deus, den Man auf Miinzen mit der
streitaxt erblickt (Preller, i. 112).
We hear of axes being offered to
Gladstone by his worshippers. Nor
was the old custom of clothing the
image of the god (as in the sixth
book of the 'Iliad') neglected. We
read that the people of a Scotch manu-
facturing town, Galashiels, presented
the Midlothian Gladstone (a local hero)
with " trouserings," which the hero
graciously accepted. Indeed he was
remarkably unlike Death, as described
by^Eschylus, "Of all gods, Death only
recks not of gifts." Gladstone, on the
other hand, was the centre of a lavish
system of sacrifice loaves of bread,
axes, velocipedes, books, in vast and
overwhelming numbers, were all dedi-
cated at his shrine. Hence some have
identified him with Irving, also a deity
propitiated (as we read in Hatton) by
votive offerings. In a later chapter
I show that Irving is really one of
the Asvins of Vedic mythology, "the
Great Twin Brethren," or, in mythic
language, "the Corsican Brothers"
(compare Myriantheus on the Asvins).
His inseparable companion is Wilson-
Barret.
Among animals the cow is sacred
to Gladstone ; and, in works of art,
gems and vases (or " jam-pots "). He
is represented with the cow at his
feet, like the mouse of Horus, of
ApolloSmintheus, and of the Japanese
God of Plenty (see an ivory in the
Henley Collection). How are we to
explain the companionship of the cow ?
At other times the Sun-hero sits be-
tween the horns of the Cow-Goddess
Dilemma, worshipped at Westminster.
(Compare Brugsch. 'Religion und My-
thologie der alten Aegypter,' P. 168,
" Die Darstellungen Zeigen uns den
Sonnengott zwischen den Hornern der
Kuh sitzend.") The idea of Le Page
Renouf, and of Pierret andDe Rouge, is
that the cow is a symbol of some Glad-
stonian attribute, perhaps "squeez-
ability," a quality attributed to the hero
by certain Irish minstrels. I regard it
as more probable that the cow is (as
in the Yeda) the rain-cloud, released
from prison by Gladstone, as by
Indra. At the same time the cow, in
the Veda, stands for Heaven, Earth,
Dawn, Night, Cloud, Rivers, Thunder,
Sacrifice, Prayer, and Soma. We thus
have a wide field to choose from, nor
is our selection of very much import-
ance, as any, or all, of these interpre-
tations will be welcomed by Sanskrit
scholars. The followers of McLennan
have long ago been purged out of the
land by the edict of Oxford against
this sect of mythological heretics.
They would doubtless have maintained
that the cow was Gladstone's totem,
or family crest, and that, like other
totemists, he was forbidden to eat
beef.
It is curious that on some old and
worn coins we detect a half-obliterated
male figure lurking behind the cow.
The inscription may be read " Jo," or
" lo," and appears to indicate lo, the
cow-maiden of Greek myth (see the
' Prometheus ' of JEschylus).
In addressing scholars it is needless
to refute the Euhemeristic hypothesis,
worthy of the Abbe Banier, that the
cow is a real cow, offered by a real
historical Gladstone, or by his com-
panion, Jo, to the ignorant populace of
the rural districts. We have already
shown that Jo is a mythological name.
The tendency to identify Gladstone
with the cow (as the dawn with the
sun) is a natural and edifying ten-
dency, but the position must not be
accepted without further inquiry.
Caution, prudence, a tranquil bal-
ancing of all available evidence, and
an absence of preconceived opinions,
these are the guiding stars of com-
parative mythology.
246
THE SITUATION IN EGYPT.
So much has been written and said
about Egypt during the past few
years that it may be asked, " "What
circumstances can justify a further in- .
fliction upon such a tiresome subject ? "
The question is so reasonable that I
will at once explain the motives which
induce me to give publicity to the
impressions produced upon my mind
by a visit in November last to that
interesting country. The circum-
stances in which I visited it were
in some respects exceptional. Ten
years ago I left Egypt after a resi-
dence of about four years, having in-
terested myself in all its concerns, and
especially in its financial position, and
having mixed freely with its people,
with whom I had the advantage of
conversing in their own language.
Thus, in revisiting the scene of former
labours, I was perhaps enabled to
realise more fully than those who had
followed events from day to day the
importance and significance of the
changes which had taken place since
Egypt was administered by a Govern-
ment under British guidance. Over
those who visited the country for
the first time, I had the decided
advantage of comparing the actual
situation with well-known past condi-
tions. Further, from a varied circle
of acquaintances, both native and
foreign, and in virtue of my absolutely
independent position, I heard the
views of all parties, from the con-
tented foreign functionary to the
rabid anti - British foreigner, and
the simple peasant. I went to
Egypt entirely unbiassed ; indeed,
rather prepared to find the situation
better than many supposed it. I
heard with perfect impartiality what
every one had to say, and I am cer-
tain no one had cause to play a part
before me. My motive, therefore, in
writing my impressions upon some
important questions affecting our
position in Egypt is the belief that
an altogether impartial opinion, in
the exceptional circumstances just
described, may prove interesting and
profitable.
The subject is one of far wider
and more intense interest to our
nation than I find is appreciated by
the mass of the British public. It
is no party question, but essentially
an imperial one, involving our national
honour and affecting the pockets of
the British taxpayers. We have
assumed in Egypt a position of the
gravest responsibility, and it is now
too late to examine whether the
assumption of that responsibility was
wise or necessary. My conviction is
that a series of diplomatic acts, I had
almost said errors, led us into respon-
sibilities which we might have avoided,
and which there was no imperious
necessity to assume j but in the life of
nations, as well as of individuals,
there are often created situations from
which retreat is impossible, and when
the acts of yesterday can neither be
ignored nor annulled to-day.
Rightly or wrongly, we upset the
order of things which existed in
Egypt, and in doing so, perhaps un-
wittingly but no less truly, we excited
foreign jealousies and aroused national
and natural prejudices. We wrought
havoc in our course with individual
interests, and destroyed the fortunes of
many. The ruins of Alexandria and
the extinction of a trade with the
Soudan which represented at the lowest
calculation a value of two millions
sterling per annum are only some of
the more palpable evidences of that
havoc. We undertook the respon-
sibility of guiding the destinies of a
people who did not seek our guidance,
and we promised to create a new order
of administration which would be more j
The Situation in Egypt.
247
beneficial to the people than that
which existed in the past. In our
efforts to accomplish this we have
already squandered some twenty mil-
lions of British money, and, including
indemnities, have burdened Egypt
with some six or seven millions ster-
ling, have sacrificed thousands of
precious lives, and have lost to Egypt
territory of vast extent and of vital
importance to the tranquillity of what
remains. Terrible as all this seems to
be, it is so well known that it requires
no detailed proof to the even cursory
reader of newspapers during the past
three years. But what is still more
sad is that our action, as far as I could
see in Egypt, has been so barren of
results as to fill us with feelings of
despair. Thanks to a military occu-
pation of the country by some fifteen
thousand British soldiers, our road to
India may be considered secure ; but
every one of these soldiers is required
to hold in check enemies which we
should never have heard of had we
not assumed our Egyptian responsi-
bilities, and which probably would
never have existed had we left the
country alone.
In these sentiments no one would
more willingly advocate than I the
oft talked-of policy of scuttling from
Egypt. But it is with infinite regret
that I have been brought to the con-
viction that such a policy is now
impossible, and would involve disaster
to Egypt, and dishonour as well as
disaster to England. It would be to
intensify all the evils we have already
unintentionally caused to Egypt to
kill brutally the patient we had in
moments of heedlessness interfered to
possess and engaged to cure. I desire
distinctly to be at one with my readers
on this point ; for it is the conviction of
the impossibility now to throw off: the
responsibilities we have assumed which
leads me to examine the causes of the
unsatisfactory position in Egypt, to
indicate certain modifications in our
mode of action, and to draw attention
to evils which require to be remedied
even at the cost of some inconvenience
to ourselves. The past as well as the
present Government have invariably
admitted that we cannot quit Egypt
until we can leave behind us a settled
Government ; and this essential con-
tingency places the policy of scuttling
in a future of which there is no
possible vision in the present. The
statement may be proper in diplomatic
correspondence with other powers,
but it is of no practical interest to the
British public, whose purses and blood
have to be drawn upon until that
problematic contingency occurs.
Some, and I found their number
numerous among foreign residents of
all nationalities in Egypt, advocate,
as a remedy for a situation which they
find intolerable, the taking over en-
tirely by Great Britian of the govern-
ment of Egypt ; and another solution,
of which we often hear, is the pro-
claiming of a Protectorate by England.
I will not waste time in examining the
possibility or the opportunity of either
of these propositions. To my mind
the first would be a folly, the second a
useless formality.
The only practical view of the ques-
tion is this. Seeing that we cannot
reverse our action in the past, can we
not, guided by apparent defects in its
execution hitherto, and undertaking
courageously its manifest obligations,
hope to redeem our pledges, and work-
ing upon clearly defined lines gradu-
ally obtain the objects we have in view ?
It is because I think we can that I
undertake the invidious task of criti-
cising what has been done, and the
duty of stimulating the British public
to discard from the consideration of
the Egyptian question all party feel-
ings, and to assist in the improvement
of the material situation of Egypt.
Our first necessity is clearly to define
the position which England has taken
up in regard to Egypt. Our direct
interference in Egypt an interference
supported by a military force had, in
general terms, three objects in view :
first, to establish a settled native
government there ; second, to advance
the material interests of the country \
248
The Situation in Egypt.
and third, to see that its international
engagements were properly respected.
Such, I think, fairly represent the
expressed views of the past and pre-
sent government of England in regard
to Egypt. -.Now, the impression which I
carried away with me from Egypt was,
that the progress we have made and
are making to the first and second of
these objects is very small.
Let us examine the situation in
reference to the first of them.
Tewfik Pasha, the Khedive-elect of
England, seems to have an easy posi-
tion, and looks the very picture of
health and happiness. But ask whe-
ther His Highness is gaining pos-
session of the hearts of his people ;
whether he is becoming such a part of
the national existence as to give us
the near prospect of seeing him the
cherished father of his people the head
of an established order of things which
exists on account of its inherent
vitality? I am sorry to say that I
did not meet any one who would have
answered those questions affirmatively.
On the contrary, the consensus of
opinions which I heard was that
Tewfik Pasha, notwithstanding his
many deserving qualities, exists only
as Khedive in virtue of the presence
of British bayonets in the country.
The Council of Ministers in Egypt
means Nubar Pasha, just as the
Liberal party in England means Mr.
Gladstone. The reputation of Nubar
Pasha is European. He is certainly the
ablest man in Egypt, and a statesman
who would make his mark in any
country. Yet no one could pretend that
the Council of Ministers in Egypt
possesses the sympathy of the nation.
Little need be said of the Legislative
Assembly which forms part of the ad-
ministrative machinery to which Lord
Dufferin's mission gave existence. It
is treated as a kind of enfant terrible,
whose voice is to be heard as little as
possible, for it is sure to utter discord-
ant notes. The fact is the Legislative
Assembly simply expresses the unpo-
pularity of the present administrative
state of things. It is not that Tewfik
Pasha is a bad Khedive, or that Nubar
Pasha is an incompetent Minister.
Quite the contrary. But it is that
the foreign counsel which we impose
upon them is too patent, too fussy, too
arbitrary and too absorbing. They
cannot acquire popular sympathy, for
they are no other in the eyes of the
people than the executive agents of a
foreign power. No effort is made to
conceal this foreign action. It is
flaunted in the face of the public on
every possible occasion, and served out
to it in financial, judicial, and adminis-
trative literature in foreign languages,
which seem to know no end. We do
not leave the initiative to the native
rulers, but we take every means of
demonstrating that all the initiative
comes from foreigners. And as that
initiative is most frequently the in-
vention of Western innovators, incon-
sonant with Eastern ideas, it is not only
popularly distasteful, but renders the
executive agents, through whom it is
dispensed, odious to the country. The
" masterful hand of the resident," to
which Lord Dufferin alluded in his
able report, would have been a hundred
times more beneficial for its essen-
tial characteristic is that it works un-
seen by the people, and does not lessen
the prestige of the ruler. Our counsel
in Egypt is not of the nature of advice
given in a discreet and entirely confi-
dential way, which may influence
while publicly unheard of, but rather
the noisy imposition of new-fangled
schemes. Given that we wish to
create a native government which pos-
sesses the sympathy of the country, we
have hitherto gone a strange way to
work in its creation. We have seemed
to fancy, or proceeded as if we fancied,
that the foreign element we have put
into the administration might become
popular either from its individual cha-
racteristics or from its exploits. No
greater fallacy can be indulged in, and
we shall never succeed in our objects
until we frankly recognise this. The
Egyptian people do not differ in this
respect from any other peoples. It is
in human nature that an element
The Situation in Egypt.
249
foreign in sympathies, essentially dif-
ferent in education and experience,
destitute of the direct touch which
comes from intercourse and knowledge
of the language of the country, should
be antipathetic to the native popula-
tion. And it is in recognition of this
fact that we preferred to select as our
object the strengthening of a native
element rather than the imposition of
a foreign. But in the execution of cm-
plan we have miserably failed. The
task which we set ourselves was not
the reformation of Egypt by substitut-
ing a highly-civilised administration
in place of a semi-civilised, but rather
the gradual strengthening of the ex-
isting semi-civilised organisation. This
latter is a work of patience the
achievement of years of persevering
effort, whose progress must not be
judged by results obtained in a few
months, but by a steady advance to-
wards the desired object during a
series of years. And yet we intro-
duce in feverish haste far-reaching in-
novations before the country is pre-
pared for them ; ignore native opinion
when it is not in harmony with our
Western ideas ; allow our agents to
assume the part of initiators when
their duty ought to be to eclipse them-
selves as much as possible from public
view ; and we impair the authority of
the authorised native agents by the
high-handed action of foreign function-
aries. A few examples will suffice to
justify this statement.
An important foreign functionary
was justly indignant at the number of
persons he found under arrest during
several months without trial ; but his
remedy of opening the prison doors
and letting all go free was an unwise
and high-handed proceeding, which
might be justifiable on the part of a con-
queror desirous of making himself popu-
lar, but subversive of all discipline on
the part of a subordinate functionary.
We have introduced judicial innova-
tions in regard to the forced sale of
land for debt. However reasonable the
measure may appear to Western legis-
lators, it is entirely opposed to the
principles of legislation which have
always existed in all Mussulman
countries, where the doctrine is estab-
lished that " no sale or transfer of
land can take place without the express
consent of the proprietor, except for
the unique purpose of public utility."
Under this system creditors and
debtors had got along for centuries,
and all conventions between the two
had been established in conformity
with these conditions. Justice at
least demanded that in introducing
an innovation which improved the
position of the creditor, the terms of
the bargain to which the debtor had
consented, should have been modified.
Because the produce of the land
was the security of the debt, the
debtor had consented to pay a usuri-
ous rate of interest ; but when, by
a forced innovation, the security of
the debt became supplemented by the
land itself, no more than a legal rate
of interest should have been accorded
to the creditor. To the imprudence,
therefore, of hastily modifying the long-
established principles which had regu-
lated the possession of property, was
added a neglect of the first elements of
justice towards the weakest of the two
parties interested. Instead of content-
ing ourselves with improving the ad-
ministration of justice gradually, we
introduce precipitately new principles
of law ; and it is to such precipitate in-
novations, which were entirely outside
our programme, that we owe the largest
amount of the antipathy and hostility
to foreign intervention which exists in
the great mass of the Egyptian people. 1
1 In connection with the anti-Mussulman
innovation of judicial sale of land for debt a
circumstance often repeated to me shows how
strong are the prejudices of the natives and
how little confidence they have in the perma-
nency of the present order of things. Even
when the natives desire to acquire land exposed
for sale judicially they prefer to pay a much
higher price to a first purchaser who accepts
the risk of what they consider an illegal sale,
and who gives them a title-deed before a
"Kadi." They have the conviction that on
the return of purely Mussulman jurisdiction
in Egypt all the present judicial sales would
be declared illegal and the title-deeds worthless.
250
The Situation in Egypt.
Again, from time immemorial a
common punishment in Egypt was
what is known as the kourbash, a pun-
ishment resembling the "cat o' nine
tails" in common use in our own
country thirty years ago. The kour-
bash was the weapon of order in the
country. From sentimental motives
we forced the native government,
against its better judgment, to throw
away that weapon, not gradually but
precipitately. We might have recom-
mended the suppression of the penalty
in trivial cases, and that its illegal use
should be a misdemeanour of the highest
gravity; but its precipitate abolition
was unwise because we had prepared
nothing to replace it in a country
where imprisonment is only looked
upon as a transfer to more comfortable
quarters than are enjoyed at home.
Thus along with the shout of triumph
upon the abolition of the kourbash,
which is recorded in the Blue Book
No. 15 of 1885, we hear on all
hands of the difficulties created in the
preservation of order, and in the
execution of necessary works of public
utility,
At a railway station in Egypt I
heard a native farmer loudly crying
out that he had been forcibly deprived
of the produce of twenty-five acres of
his best land, and adding a variety of
maledictory expressions towards the
foreign administration represented by
two Englishmen whom he was ad-
dressing. I had occasion to converse
with the latter at the next station, and
was informed of the cause of this
scandal. Complaint had been made
to the irrigation-officers that the land
of a certain peasant was receiving
no water. On repairing to the spot
the officer found that the owner of the
piece of ground between the water-
course and the dry patch of land had
ploughed up and sown the passage
through which the water should have
been led. The matter was reported to
the local Mudir, and he was requested
to remedy the evil Some days passed
during which no action was taken.
Losing patience, the young English-
man proceeded himself to discharge
the functions of the local Mudir, and
cut a channel through the intervening
land. "I admit," he said, "that I
took a deal of the man's land, but he
deserved it. There will be a grand
row about the thing ; at all events the
patch is watered." No doubt there
was a case of injustice, and some days
would have been required to bring
pressure upon the local Mudir to do
his duty ; yet the pressure would
have delivered the Mudir from the
ill-will of the perpetrator of the in-
justice, who was an influential pro-
prietor, and the disagreeable action
would have been taken in a legal
way. The " grand row " which the
officer foresaw as the result of his extra-
judicial procedure would have been
avoided, and possibly a solution less
disastrous to the proprietor of the
intervening land might have been
found. Our young and zealous func-
tionaries boil over at the sight of
injustices which they find existing
around them ; they are impatient of
the slowness which characterises all
action in Oriental countries ; but they
are too apt to forget that a violent
remedy is often more hurtful than a
slow but patient curing. In this case
the land was watered a few days
sooner, but the authority of the local
Mudir was impaired and his adminis-
trative superiors were ignored. This
is only a trivial example of what goes
on in frequent instances and in im-
portant matters.
To create a native government
which can hope for popular sym-
pathy we must be more careful
than in the past to allow it all the
prestige of power ; we must leave it to
work towards its ends in the way
which its local knowledge and ex-
perience dictates, and we must di-
minish to its utmost minimum all
foreign interference and the use of
foreign officials. This course may
imply slower progress and the con-
tinuance of much that is discordant to
the notions of Western civilisation,
but only by it can we hope to work
The Situation in Egypt.
251
out a plan which has no other preten-
sion than to assist Egypt to govern
herself. The plan may not succeed,
but at least it deserves a fair and
favourable trial, which it has not yet
had, and never will have until the
Egyptian ministry is left more free
to administer according to its own
lights and to devise in its own way its
projects for the general good. What-
ever we may individually think of the
corruption of subordinate Egyptian
officials we must remember that
they are the only properly available
administrative element in the country,
and that they must be used and im-
proved, not set aside. We have joined
in imposing upon Egypt international
obligations of a most grievous and
burdensome nature for the benefit of
foreign creditors, and our duty is to
diminish to the utmost in our power,
and even accept certain sacrifices
to alleviate, the load and the vexations
which we too heedlessly assisted in
imposing.
This last observation leads me
naturally to explain the impression
which I formed of the present and
future condition of agriculturists in
Egypt. I had hoped to find a decided
improvement in the position of that
interesting class upon which the welfare
of Egypt depends. Greater regularity
in the collection of the taxes which
weigh upon property, and the improve-
ments in irrigation from the able and
experienced efforts of Colonel Scott-
Moncrieff, led me to anticipate that I
should find the farmers in a materially
better condition than they were before
we upset the government of Ismail
Pasha and undertook to guide the
destinies of Egypt. Both of these
benefits, I was glad to find, existed
in reality. The system pursued in the
collection of the taxes upon land is
admirable. By the tax-paper which is
furnished to the proprietor of land at
the beginning of each financial year
not only does he know the exact
amount which he owes, but also the
date before which each instalment has
to be paid. Thus the farmer is freed
from all vexatious exactions, and is
enabled to provide beforehand for
his engagements to the State. Also
the good work which Colonel Scott -
Moncrieff has already been able to
achieve was demonstrated by the fact
that last year, notwithstanding a most
unfavourable Nile, the irrigation of the
land was accomplished with an almost
perfect regularity, and the employ-
ment of artificial and costly means of
raising water to its requisite height
was greatly diminished. On this last
point I heard an indirect testimony
of the highest value. The most ex-
tensive furnisher of steam-pumps for
irrigation was summoned to the Com-
mission sitting at Alexandria to ex-
amine into the causes of the general
depression in trade. His frank ex-
planation of the depression in the
trade with which he and English engi-
neers were concerned was that Colonel
MoncriefE's administration had dimin-
ished largely the number of farmers
who required to raise the water for
their lands by artificial means. This
testimony confirms in the most em-
phatic way the value of Colonel Mon-
crieiFs services.
But, notwithstanding the reality
of these two important benefits,
I heard a general wail from all agri-
culturists as to their prospects in
consequence of the steady and persis-
tent reduction in the value of cotton
and grain during recent years. *' Prices
have fallen to such a point that agri-
culture leaves no longer a reasonable
profit," was the remark of cultivators,
both small and great. I had heard
in Cairo and Alexandria of the large
number of peasants who were unable
to repay the advances which they had
contracted towards money-lenders, of
the ruinous depreciation in the value
of lands and the impossibility to find
purchasers for it ; but it was only in
the interior that I found the real cause
of these unsatisfactory symptoms.
Government functionaries in Cairo
told me that the peasants were paying
their taxes with fair regularity; but
in the interior I heard that to do so
252
The Situation in Egypt.
many had to resort to loans at the
ruinous rates of four or five per cent,
per month. A Greek capitalist in
Alexandria told me that the peasants
were not paying their debts because
the British administration had trans-
formed these formerly honest debtors
into rogues of the worst class ; but in
the interior I was convinced that after
paying expenses and taxes there was
little left for the peasant to become
rogue upon. As I was conscious that the
opinion which I had formed was at vari-
ance with very largely circulated state-
ments I took especial pains to examine
with care and impartiality the allega-
tions of agriculturists. If true, these
allegations afford an explanation of
the discontent to which all give utter-
ance, with the exception of a few
foreign functionaries.
The productions which chiefly affect
Egypt are cotton and grain. Of the
total exportations from Egypt, amount-
ing to, in round numbers, twelve
millions and a half sterling, cotton
and cotton seed contribute about ten
millions, and grain about half a mil-
lion, so that cotton represents in the
proportion of four-fifths all the im-
ported wealth of the country. It may
therefore be said that upon cotton the
agricultural prosperity of Egypt de-
pends. The steady shrinking in the
value of that article is a fact of which
all are cognisant ; but to show the
full effect of that circumstance upon
Egypt we must define its extent. I
did so in two ways : first, from prices
obtained by growers in Egypt, and
secondly, from independent statistics of
the value of cotton in Liverpool, the
largest market in the world for the
staple.
From accurately kept accounts of a
native proprietor, which I was allowed
to examine, I ascertained that the
average price at which he sold his
cotton in 1878 (in no wise an excep-
tional year) was 350 piastres per
cantar (98 Ibs.), whereas, the highest
price which he could obtain last No-
vember was 200 piastres per cantar.
Thus, the extent of the reduction in
price since 1878 is forty-three per
cent.
By statistics of the price of " fair "
Egyptian cotton in Liverpool, I find
that its average price during the
decade of 1861 to 1870 was seventeen-
pence per pound, and from 1871 to
1880 it was eightpence per pound,
whereas it was quoted on the twenty-
fourth of December last at five and a
half pennies per pound. The shrinking
thus represents fifty-three per cent, in
the second decade as compared with the
first, and thirty per cent, in the present
price as compared with the average
price between 1871 and 1880. It may
therefore be asserted, without exagge-
ration, that the fall in the value of
Egyptian cotton since 1878 is equiva-
lent to thirty-five per cent.
Although grain is not an article of
large export from Egypt it is one of
large local consumption, and its price
consequently affects materially the
producer. From the accounts before-
mentioned, I ascertained that in 1878
the wheat crop realised to the farmer
at the place of production, one hun-
dred and fourteen piastres per ardeb
(9| bushels), whereas last year it only
obtained fifty-six piastres per ardeb.
The fall, therefore, represents close
upon fifty per cent.
To appreciate properly the disast-
rous result of the reductions in the
value of cotton and grain, we must
bear in mind the undeniable fact that
all of these reductions fall upon the
profits of the farmer. His charges
for production have not diminished
since 1878, and his land-tax has re-
mained the same, if it has not
increased. Consequently, if the profit
of farmers in Egypt represented forty
per cent, of the gross income in 1878
it dwindled away to nearly zero in
1885.
It is extremely difficult in all
countries to estimate with accuracy the
profits of farming, and especially so in
a country like Egypt, where compara-
tively few farmers keep accounts.
The majority of native farmers in
Egypt, when asked on the subject of
The Situation in Egypt.
253
their profits, reply in a general way,
that " in former years, when the value
of wheat was above one hundred
piastres per ardeb, their cotton crop
remained as clear profit, the other pro-
duce of the farm sufficing to cover all
expenses. But this is no longer the
case since wheat has fallen to nearly
half that price." As only one acre
out of every three can or ought to be
devoted to cotton, the produce of that
acre of cotton was, in former times,
considered to be the profit of three
acres of land. Taking the average
yield of cotton as three cantars per
acre, the profit of three acres in 1878
might be estimated at 101. 10s. To-
day, however, the value of three
cantars of cotton is only 61., and
from this last sum a deduction has
to be made, seeing that, on account
of the fall in the value of grain, all
expenses of production are not other-
wise covered.
Yague though this system of appre-
ciation may appear, my inquiries led
me to believe that it represents the
most favourable view of the present
situation. It indicates that the pro-
fits of farmers are to-day about forty
per cent, less than they were seven
years ago. I heard it very commonly
remarked in Egypt that now the
farmers are entirely delivered from
the irregular exactions of Ismail
Pasha, and so far this is true. But
it is easy to exaggerate these exac-
tions. They were chiefly in the
nature of advances upon future pay-
ments, and we must not forget that
Ismail Pasha was constantly bringing
new money, borrowed from foreigners,
into the country, and that at least he
paid the interest of debt by these
borrowings. I admit that Ismail
Pasha participated largely in the good
profits which farmers made in his
day ; but the participation which he
extorted did not amount to anything
like the depreciation which has since
taken place in profits.
I cannot pretend to say positively
that the present reduced profits do
not give a fair return in a good year
to a farmer who is not burdened
with debt. But seeing the risks
which are incident to farming
disease of cattle, ravages of worms
and various atmospheric contrarieties
the profit of II. 10s. per acre upon
land worth at a minimum 251. per acre
appears to me a feeble and uninviting
return. Certainly it cannot sup-
port usurious interest upon advances ;
and such interest must necessarily
extinguish the profits of those whose
circumstances have obliged them to
borrow to an extent which nearly
represents the value of their land as
well as the outlay necessary to bring
their crops to maturity. By all com-
petent to express an opinion I was
informed that the majority of the
peasants are heavily burdened with
debt, and consequently the condition
of that majority is now reduced to a
painful struggle for existence.
The results of the Daira and Do-
main administrations might be cited
as proof of the feeble return obtain-
able from farming in Egypt. These
administrations cultivate the best
lands in Egypt, and the land-tax
which they pay is proportionately
much lighter than that imposed upon
other proprietors, yet they do not
yield a net profit of more than two
per cent, upon the value of the estates.
It may be said that these administra-
tions, being managed by an interna-
tional trinity, two members of which
are ignorant of the country and its
language, do not fairly represent the
results of intelligent farming, and in
this opinion I agree. Still I cannot
admit that the most perfect system of
administration possible would succeed
in doing more than double the present
return, and in that case we have a
right to ask whether four per cent, as
net profit is either a reasonable or invit-
ing return upon operations exposed to
considerable risks and in a country
where capital is scarce.
By the courtesy of a most intelligent
native proprietor I was allowed to
examine his farming accounts of the
past eight years. They were ap-
254
The Situation in Egypt.
parently kept with great accuracy,
and treated of the most minute de-
tails. The land which he farms
amounts to twelve hundred acres of
moderately good quality, but far
from being the best land of Egypt.
With the exception of thirty-seven
acres, all the lands pay taxes under
the class of ouchouri, and the re-
sults therefore represent those of the
most lightly-taxed lands in Egypt.
However interesting all the details
might be, it is impossible for me in
such an article as the present to give
a translation of them, but I will
burden my readers with their results
on two points, namely, the net profits
per acre and the annual burden of the
land-tax. These two points furnish
us with facts of great importance in
regard to present profits as compared
with the profits previous to 1880, and
also the present burden of taxation as
compared to what it was before 1880.
The following table represents these
results :
Year.
/~
Egyptian
Era.
Our Era.
Net Profit per Acre.
Burden of Land-Tax
per Acre.
Piastres.
Shillings.
Piastres.
Shillings.
1593
1876-7
138|
284
51
104
1594
18778
107J
22
48
9|
1595
18789
218|
45
48
9|
1596
187980
171|
35
75
16i
1597
188081
97i
20
75
15*
1598
188182
1091
214
75
15*
1599
188283
73f
15
69|
lit
1600
188384
68|
14
694
14*
The accounts were not made up
for last year, as the cotton crop had
not been entirely gathered before I
left Egypt. Its yield was expected to
be twenty per cent, inferior to that of
1884, which was the largest yield ever
known. But without taking into ac-
count a reduced yield in 1885, the
reduction in the price of cotton would
alone diminish the net profit per acre
to sixty piastres, or 12s. 3d., as against
14s. 3d. of land-tax.
The total outlay, for farm buildings,
cattle, and utensils, was about 1,800.,
equal to II. 10s. per acre, and the
value of the land minimum 201. per
acre. Thus we have a capital outlay
of 2,11. 10s. per acre yielding only a
net return of 12s. 3d., equal to a shade
less than three per cent. I may add
that all the information which I ob-
tained from other native proprietors
confirmed, in a general way, these
results. In my notes I find the fol-
lowing clear statement by a most in-
fluential proprietor: "I pay upon my
lands 1,3001. of taxes ouchouri lands
and the profit they left me last year
was SOOL Had they been kharadge
lands I should have paid 480. more
of taxes, which would have reduced
the profit to 3201. If present low
prices continue all this small profit
will disappear."
From the preceding remarks it would
appear therefore evident that the re-
duction in the prices of grain and
cotton has diminished the profits of
farmers to such an extent that, even
upon the exceptionally favoured lands
of the class " ouchouri," l the return is
feebly remunerative. What then must
be the condition of those lands called
" kharadge," l which pay a much greater
burden of taxation 1 By an official
return we learn that in Upper and
Lower Egypt there are three million
four hundred and forty-one thousand
seven hundred and forty-four acres of
1 The word ' ouchour ' means a tenth part
or tithe, and 'kharadge' means a servitude
without indication of quantity.
The Situation in Egypt.
255
" kharadge " lands, and only one mil-
lion three hundred and sixty-two thou-
sand two hundred and twenty acres
of " ouchouri" lands ; and that the ave-
rage taxation upon the former is
piastres one hundred and twenty-eight
(II. 6s. 3d.) as against piastres fifty-one
and a half (10s. 6d.) upon the latter.
The classification does not indicate a
difference of quality in the lands but
simply a difference in tenure. The
" ouchouri " lands were ceded upon ex-
ceptional conditions by the Viceroys,
whereas the "kharadge" lands repre-
sent the most ancient tenure in the
country. We have already found that
on a farm almost entirely composed of
ouchouri lands the profit was only
12s. 3d. per acre, while the land-tax
amounted to 14s. 3d. per acre. But
had these lands been kharadge lands
the results would have been, on the
most favourable conditions, a profit of
only 7s. Qd. as against 19s. of land-
tax!
When we take these facts into ac-
count is it marvellous that we find
throughout the rural population of
Egypt sentiments of general discon-
tent 1 Is it extraordinary creditors
should cry out that their debtors do
not repay them their advances, or that
land should find no serious purchasers 1
Is it to be wondered at that shop-
keepers should complain that trade
with the peasants is bad, and that
credit in the country is at the lowest
ebb ? Superficial observers invoke the
increased value during the past two
years of importations, but they forget
that these increases are the result of the
repairs necessitated after the havocs
of war (of which the four millions of
indemnities represent only a portion)
and of the exceptional expenditure
supported by the British tax-payer,
which our recent military expeditions
and present military occupation give
rise to. Underneath the surface, over
which a certain calm is shed by ex-
ceptional and regrettable causes, there
exists a rottenness which is bringing
the most important interests of the
country to the brink of ruin, and we
are blindly disregarding it. The first
of Egyptian statesmen has been warn-
ing us of the danger for more than a
year, but the optimistic views of our
counsellors have been preferred, and
we have followed those who cry, " Peace,
peace, when there is no peace." To
the credit of Lord Northbrook I must
say that those who had occasion to
know the real impressions which he
carried away from Egypt assured me
he was fully convinced of the dangers
ahead, and foresaw the necessity of a
radical remedy, but obedience to party
induced him to change his original
report. Still in his compromise he
obtained a reduction of 456,000. on
the land-tax, which has, however, not
yet been placed at the disposal of the
Egyptian Government, although nearly
a year has passed since it was sanc-
tioned.
There is evidently a pressing neces-
sity of relieving the burden of tax-
ation upon " kharadge " lands if we
would save their owners from ruin,
and advance the material interests of
the country. In view of the reduced
values of produce this measure is not
only necessary but is also equitable.
In 1868, when one-sixth was added
to the land-tax, cotton was worth
double its present value, and an in-
creased taxation could be supported.
But such is no longer the case. Not
only is it equitable to remit the in-
crease imposed in 1868, but a further
reduction is necessary. In the opinion
of the most moderate and most com-
petent authorities in Egypt, " the
minimum of reduction,which ought to
be made is one million sterling, tem-
porarily accorded for the few years
until the cadastre is terminated and
proportioned upon the most necessitous
lands." Nearly half of that reduction
has already received the sanction of
the Powers, and it should be made at
once without stint or hesitation. It
might be expected that I should
prove that the financial situation
renders the remission of the other
half possible; but besides that my
present space will not admit of such
56
The Situation in Egypt.
an examination, I have no desire to
inflict upon my readers its tiresome
details. Fully a year before Mr. Cave
went to Egypt I published the details
of the Egyptian budget as they were
communicated to me by the then
Minister of Finance, and I have seen
nearly identical figures reappear in the
reports of the various financial missions
since that time. Figures were trans-
posed and the groupings were changed,
but in all the main features the budget
was the same.
The great blot in the financial posi-
tion in Egypt has always been that
too much money is exported out of the
country in payment of interest and
tribute. More than a half of the
revenue leaves the country for these
two purposes, and as long as this is
the case, capital cannot grow in the
hands of the people. Notwithstanding
this, the last financial year left the
large surplus of about three-quarters
of a million sterling, and competent
authorities assured me this surplus
would be largely increased at the end
of the current year. In these circum-
stances it need not be difficult to
sacrifice a sum of half a million to
save the most vital interest in the
country a sacrifice which would do
much to allay the general discontent,
and which would have the immediate
effect of giving a value to land, and of
restoring credit, thus assisting in the
material development of the resources
of the country. The commercial inter-
ests of all the European countries are
deeply concerned in the attainment
of this desirable result, and were it
necessary we might profitably lend, in
a small measure, our credit to make it
certain. The debt of Egypt pays five
and six per cent, to its creditors. To
twenty-five millions of it we might
attach our guarantee, and thus econo-
mise to Egypt a sum of nearly half a
million. The risk run by the guar-
antee is nil, and, doing so, we may
get rid of two of the most unpopular
and costly foreign administrations in
the country. Suffice it to say, that
the financial situation of Egypt pre-
sents no insuperable difficulties, if the
material interests of the country are
husbanded and not killed. The pros-
perity of all classes in Egypt depends
upon her agriculture, and if we can
raise that from its present dejection
we shall inaugurate a new era for the
country, and give a stimulus to her
trade both at home and abroad.
It has often been said to me that
the British Parliament will, shrink
from accepting further pecuniary re-
sponsibilities towards Egypt. This
would be to strain at a gnat after
having swallowed a camel ; to prefer
costly sacrifices to inexpensive facili-
ties. It is vain to expect to secure
the goodwill of the Egyptian people
unless we are ready, on our part,
to confer upon them such benefits
as it is in our power easily
bestow. Without risk and without
cost we can ease her burdens, and ii
is both our duty and our interes
to do so. It is our duty, as some
reparation for the severe losses
have inflicted upon Egypt. It is 01
interest, because whatever we
economise to her of her revenues anc
devote to the improvement of h(
agricultural position will return to
multiplied a hundred-fold, and creal
cargoes for our ships, orders for 01
looms, and food for our poor.
R HAMILTON LANG,
257
POETRY AND POLITICS. 1
WITH almost all that Mr. Lang has
said on this subject 2 I entirely agree.
It appears to me to be manifest that
political party names ought not to be
allowed to beset the mind when it is
engaged to the enjoyment and estima-
tion of poetry. And he would be a
hard-hearted man who would not sym-
pathise with Mr. Lang's distress at this
confusion of boundaries. He feels the
pang of a romantic traveller confronted
lay a London advertisement in a moun-
tain glen. Like some hart in a secret
covert, he starts sadly as he hears, or
thinks he hears, the political horn
wound suddenly in the grove of the
Muses, and the hunter preparing to
" lay his hounds in near
The Caledonian deer."
It appears to me also plain that al-
though such argument and analysis as
are undertaken by Mr. Courthope in his
ingenious, but rather confusing book,
may incidentally, perhaps accidentally,
throw light on poetical qualities, yet
they may more easily lead to fallacies
and strained judgments. Above all
do I most emphatically agree that in
such lines as those quoted by Mr. Lang
from Homer and Virgil, and Milton
and Wordsworth (to which hundreds
more might, happily for the world, be
added), there dwells a peculiar en-
chantment at once indefinable and
1 Since I wrote this paper I have read Mr.
Courthope's reply to Mr. Lang in the ' Na-
tional Review.' With part of it I can agree ;
with part I cannot. But as it belongs to
a special controversy, I think that probably
any value my remarks may possess will be
better retained by leaving them as they are
than by modifying them to follow the course
of Mr. Courthope's argument. I need hardly
say that this is from no want of respect
toward what he has written, but, on the
contrary, because I would avoid the least
semblance of a pretension to play the arbiter
between him and Mr. Lang.
2 'Macmillan's Magazine/ December, 1885.
No. 316. VOL. LIII.
indispensable to the highest poetry;
and that the appreciation of this
quality is matter " not of argument,
but of perception."
Being thus so entirely at one with
Mr. Lang as to his main positions and
his mental attitude toward poetry, I
am disappointed to find, further on in
his paper, what seems to make an excep-
tion to this agreement. The attitude
with which I sympathise is that of dis-
trust and aversion toward the arbitrary
labels which many attempt to affix to
the works of poets, and toward the ex-
aggerated desire to classify and assign
them to definite " schools." But Mr.
Lang himself seems to lend some counte-
nance to the mistaken hankering after
such labels in his use of the cant terms
"classical" and "romantic," as ap-
plied to poetry. The terms, I conceive,
were first used in French or German
literature, and it might be of a certain
interest to trace their origin in those
countries ; but I cannot but think that
they are likely to do at least as much
ill service as good in general discus-
sion of the poetry of any race or
country, and especially of our own.
When Mr. Lang says that he is " a
romanticist," and that "the best things
in Aristophanes, and Racine, and the
Book of Job, are romantic," what does
he mean? Does he mean anything
more than that the best things are what
he likes best 1 What will he say of the
two lines concerning Helen's brothers
which he quotes from the third book
of the ' Iliad,' or of the other lines from
Virgil? Are these "romantic?" If
the epithet " classical " has any mean-
ing applicable to poetic qualities, it
would surely be the appropriate one
in these cases. It should, I imagine,
imply restrained force, chastened
grace, pregnant simplicity of phrase,
as opposed to more fantastic and start-
s
258
Poetry and Politics.
ling methods of appealing to the imagi-
nation; and such force, grace, and
simplicity are eminently present in
these passages. Is Mr. Lang, then,
as a " romanticist " to recant or
qualify his admiration of them 1 And
why is this misused epithet of
" classical " to be bestowed on the
Euglish poets of the eighteenth cen-
tury? What makes poetry classic
unless it be the possession of high
poetic genius ? Even by the admission
of its admirers, the genius of the
eighteenth century poets was prosaic
compared with that of those preceding
and succeeding them. It cannot be
held that there is more to be found in
this period of either the spirit or the
form (if, indeed, these can be rightly
viewed apart in poetry) of the great
poets of antiquity. What influence
from antiquity is to be found here
seems rather to be that of the silver
age of Latin poetry. Shall we not do
more wisely to discard, or at least use
with great wariness, all such cant
terms as these of " classical " and
"romantic," as belonging, or tending
to belong, to a cloud of parasitic pe-
dantries, invented for the benefit of
lecturers and critics, but merely ob-
scuring and obstructing our enjoyment
of poetry? Undoubtedly a poet is
influenced by his age and its action,
and also by his predecessors and con-
temporaries in his own art, as well as
by the more permanent elements of hu-
man life, and by the phenomena of the
visible universe. But who shall foretell
from his multiform "environment"
what part of it is to find expression
in his poetry ? That depends on his
own free genius.
No definitions of the nature of
poetry can ever be entirely satisfac-
tory, but it is generally interesting to
hear what a poet has to say of his art.
Well worthy of attention is Mr.
Swinburne's remark, quoted by Mr.
Couithope, that the two primary and
essential qualities of poetry are
im gination and harmony. There is
no discrepancy, and no less significance,
in the words of an older poet, a fold of
whose lyric mantle has fallen on Mr.
Swinburne. Pindar is somewhere
speaking of the qualities by which
poetry lives. It will live, he says,
" whensoever by favour of the Graces
the tongue hath drawn it forth out of
the depth of the heart." 1 The favour
of the Graces that is, the power of
imagination to conceive, and of har-
monious words to express this is
indispensable ; but so also is a certain
state of the heart, of the feelings. It
is not meant, of course, that a poet
has deeper or stronger feelings than
men who have not the gift of express-
ing them in poetry, still less that his
feelings need exceptionally affect his
moral action. Yery likely they are
too transient or too imaginative, or
have little reference to practical life.
A man of any other kind is as likely
to " make his life a poem." But strong
and pervading feeling, however tran-
sient, however merely imaginative,
there surely must be to produce real
poetry. Whatsoever things are lovely,
or majestic, or piteous, or terrible (if
there be beauty in their pity and terror)
all these can draw poetry from a poet,
and that whether the images come to
him in woods and mountains, or in oral
tradition, or in books, from his own
time, or from times remote. No classi-
fication as " classical " or " romantic "
can debar him from his common rights
on all these pastures of the mind.
Only these things must have possessed
his imagination, and through his
imagination his feeling, before they
will call forth his best poetry. It is
indeed this need of penetrated and
penetrative feeling, and presentation of
beauty and grandeur, combined with
the intellectual formative effort, that
makes the production of poetry of
sustained excellence so hard and rare,
and makes us feel that almost all
poems would have been better if they
had been shorter. Now in this newly-
revived question of the claims of
Pope and kindred writers to be
counted poets, is it not primarily the
continuous absence of deep imaginative
1 'Nemean/iv. 7, 8.
Poetry and Politics.
259
feeling which prevents some of us
from so counting them in any but a
very imperfect sense ? Neglect of
inanimate nature possibly even glar-
ingly false description of it, as in
Pope's Homer need not argue the
absence of poetry, any more than mere
accurate and picturesque description
need argue its presence. Descriptions
of picturesque phenomena are used
with much greater reserve by the great
poets of antiquity than by most Eng-
lish writers since Thomson and Cow-
per ; yet they are by no means used
with less effect, for they are always
strictly relevant to the human interest.
But the most fatal want in Pope and
his fellows is a want of passion. By
passion is not necessarily meant, of
course, any tumult of the mind ; more
often a kind of fervent stillness ; but
at any rate a condition in which the
intellectual perception is, so to speak,
steeped throughout in emotional con-
templation of a possessing idea, with
which it is for the time identified, yet
without losing its intellectual forma-
tive energy. Only by " possession "
of this kind, coinciding with the re-
quisite faculty of words, is the perfect
poetic expression of the idea elicited.
Though it often includes, it yet differs
from, that " ardour and impetuosity of
mind " allowed by Wordsworth to
Dryden. Ardour of this kind is
necessary to the orator also, but then
the orator is always thinking first, or
at least equally, of his audience, and
the effect of his words on them : the
poet is entirely occupied with the
object of his imagination. In this
lies the reason why didactic poems are
in continual danger of degenerating
into mere rhetorical verse a danger
which even the genius of Lucretius
could not altogether surmount, and
which repeatedly compelled Virgil to
choose in the ' Georgics ' between in-
struction and poetry. He seldom fails
to choose the latter alternative. It is
not of students of agriculture that he
is thinking when he loses himself in
imagination among the cool glens of
Hsemus, beneath the umbrage of the
giant boughs. But in Pope and
Addison and Dryden, and the eigh-
teenth-century poets generally, the
rhetorical quality is predominant, and
it is only in this rhetorical quality
that I can see plausible justification of
Mr. Courthope's attributing to that
century a closer connexion between
poetry and public life than is found
during other periods. In the sonnets
alone of the recluse Wordsworth there
would seem to be more memorable
witness to things of national concern.
It is by no means intended here that
a man may not be both a rhetorician
and a poet. Macaulay, for instance,
was both ; and though his vein of
poetic metal is a small thing among
the vast mines of his rhetoric, it runs
pure and unconfused when it appears
in his ' Lays.' Rhetoric must be in-
cluded in the genius of a dramatic, and
even of an epic, poet. Yet there are
few momentous speeches in Homer or
in Shakespeare which do not contain
a poetic element far beyond the rhetoric
with which it blends. Through the
stern brief utterances of Achilles
avenging, pierce such haunting strains
as the lines
ij&s ^ SeiXr) f) /j.fffov
Tts Kal e/teto "Apei e/c 6v/j.bv
076 Sovpl j8aA&>J> $j curb
It is only through the presence of
imaginative passion that the metrical
form of expression justifies its use, at
once as a necessity, and as an inex-
haustible charm. Metre not only pro-
vides, as has not seldom been remarked,
a balance and law which harmonises
the passionate flow of imaginative
emotion ; but it also deepens and in-
tensifies that emotion by bringing it
into accord, so to speak, with the inner
music which is at the heart of things,
and through which alone their exist-
ence can have its fullest meaning, and
be the object of vivid conception. Thus
the art of poetry, instead of removing
us from nature, brings us closer. This
1 " There cometh morn or eve or some noon-
day when my life too some man shall take in
battle, whether with spear he smite or, arrow
from the string."
2
260
Poetry and Politics.
is an effect of metre far beyond the
conciseness and power of impressing
the memory in which Pope seems to
have seen its chief merits.
The things which fertilise one poet's
imagination may be very different
from those which fertilise another's ;
the seed may be Wafted from mediaeval
romance, or from Hellenic mythology,
from the idea of the fall of man, or
of the founding of a state, from clouds
or from flowers, from mountains or
from the sea. It may even be
found, under limitations to which I
will return, in some of the political in-
terests shudderingly repudiated by Mr.
Lang. But whatever it may be, it is
something which the poet must trans-
fer, so to speak, from his imagination
to ours, by means of his art and his
feeling combined, or rather interfused.
Some degree of sympathy, of course, is
needed : the subject which interests
him may seem so remote from hu-
manity in general, or perhaps so
trivial, that such transference is hardly
possible ; but this is only a question of
degree. Now Pope not only generally
chooses things to write about which
are unlikely to inspire poetic feeling ;
but even when his subjects are
moving (as the grief of Eloisa), they
ueem to contend in vain with the anti-
thetical point-making of the expres-
sion. The fact of his writing in metre,
and giving his readers pleasure by his
epigrammatic skill in wielding it, is
surely beside the mark in considering
whether he is to be called a poet. The
mere terseness and compendious con-
venience of metre can give pleasure
when they fix a witty epigram on the
mind, but this is not a poetic pleasure.
Pope's deficiency may be well seen by
comparing him with Gray, of whom
Mr. Courthope speaks ,as " carrying on
the ethical impulse communicated to
poetry by Pope." Many lines of Gray
share largely the mannerism of Pope's
age, and yet by their interpenetrative
glow of imaginative feeling are stamped
as indisputable poetry. And not only
in Gray, but also in Crabbe, there is
at times imaginative passion ; it is
lack of beauty, rather than lack of
passion, that gives Crabbe but a low
place among poets. For in high poetry
this penetrative feeling must have its
cause, however indirectly, in the con-
templation of beauty of some kind ;
this is part of what Pindar means
when he speaks of the favour of the
Graces as indispensable. Yerse of
which the pervasive feeling and im-
agination are mainly excited by mean
or hideous things may attain great
power as satire, but not as pure poetry.
It is as a satirist rather than as a poet
that Byron seems to me to be entitled
to rank high, in spite of the directness
and facility, the rhetorical force which
his prodigious ability gave him on
subjects of many kinds. The ' Vision
of Judgment ' and ' Don Juan ' seem
to me his most successful works. I
do not forget that this postulate of
beauty might seem to deprive most of
Dante's ' Hell ' of its place in pure
poetry. Some parts must be so ex-
cepted, I think, and also such parts
of the ' Purgatory ' and ' Paradise ' as
treat of matters where there is not
enough feeling transmitted to the
reader to prevent his thinking that
they might as well have been in prose.
Such are most of the theological and
philosophical disquisitions. But even
in the ' Inferno,' besides the broken
lights of pathetic beauty, such as the
meetings with Francesca, or with Bru-
netto Latini, the horrors are redeemed
to poetry by the sense both of the
noble and melancholy presence of the
guide Virgil, and of the righteous
judgments of God which overshadow
the whole. Nor can there be a nobler
poetical idea than that of the progress
and purgation of the human spirit,
symbolised through the entire poem by
Dante's upward journey through hell
and purgatory to the spheres of heaven.
The argument has somewhat led us
away from the title of this paper and
of Mr. Lang's, but a few further re-
marks more directly relevant to it may
yet find room. On the principles sug-
gested above, it is plain what kind of
power political theories or interests
Poetry and Politics.
261
may have in affecting poetry. If they
attract a poet's imagination by some-
thing in them which he happens to feel
vividly noble or imposing, they may
contribute an element to his poetry.
But it is also plain that this is not
likely to happen in the case of contem-
porary party politics, because these are
commonly involved in a cloud of pro-
saic and even mean associations, which
render an imaginative presentment
practically impossible. Of course a
poet may be a politician, like any one
else, when not concerned with his art,
and the broad fundamental principles
on which his politics are based may be
capable of poetical expression. But it
can only be when remoteness has caused
the prosaic details to disappear that
the imagination will be sufficiently im-
pressed by some moral or picturesque
beauty discoverable beneath these to
find material for poetry. And English
politics of the eighteenth century would
be among the least likely to afford
such material. Tn the preceding age
there was obviously far more idealism
in the political world. And a know-
ledge of Milton's ardent political aspi-
rations, and of his part in public
affairs, repeatedly add great interest
to his poetry. But from his poetry
itself politics are excluded, unless it
be in a few of his sonnets. Even
these, though they are inspired by
contemporary men and things, deal
only with the generalities and morali-
ties of politics. Scott also, though of
course in a far less degree, was in-
volved in the party politics of his
time. But it is one of the especial
glories of his sane and kindly genius
that this fact could never be discovered
from his works of imagination. When
he presents historical characters and
parties in which analogies to modern
politics might be found, no tinge of
partisanship ever disturbs the serene
and frank impartiality with which he
depicts all the lights and shades of the
" mighty opposites," who have, under
whatever flag, animated the stage of
human life by battling for the fulfil-
ment of some political or religious
ideal, or, it may be, for little but the
satisfaction of a barbaric love of
strife. It is only natural, perhaps,
that, among political ideas, those of a
" Liberal " or progressive kind should
have been more often and more directly
expressed in poetry, for the vague
future lends itself more readily to the
moulding of imagination than the
familiar order of things seen in the
light of common day. Even if the
idealisation be of the past, this is hardly
more corroborative of a practical and
political Conservatism of existing insti-
tutions. But happily the instinct of
poets has pretty nearly banished party
politics and definite political specifics
of all kinds from poetry at any rate
from the best. The one great excep-
tion is an exception that may really be
said to go far to prove the rule. Dante
not only argued systematically for his
cherished political theory in prose, but
also eagerly welcomed all occasions for
vindicating it in his great poem. The
doctrine of the divinely appointed
ordinance of the Holy Roman Empire
may be said to be incorporated in the
fabric of the ' Divina Commedia.' Going
beyond generalities in praise of free-
dom or tradition, progress or order,
Dante urges his specific remedy for the
political ills and difficulties of the
world its repose under the wing of
the imperial "bird of God." But then
this was a remedy at which no practi-
cal politician had at that time any in-
tention of aiming. Doubtless the idea
of the Roman Empire had still some
traditional authority over the minds
of men. But the then emperor was
too fully occupied with affairs on
a much smaller scale to listen to
Dante's cry to him on behalf of
"widowed " Rome. As to the Ghi-
bellines, they only profaned il sacro-
santo segno by usurping it.
" Faccian gli Ghibellin, faccian lor arte
Sott' altro segno ; che mal segue quello
Sempre chi la giustizia e lui diparte." *
1 " Let the Ghibellines practice their arts
under some other banner than this ; for ever
is he an ill follower thereof who dissevers it
from justice."
262
Poetry and Politics.
If the universal empire of Rome had
been before Dante's view as a mili-
tant or a triumphant reality, instead
of as a visionary ideal of the reign of
justice and peace, it would probably
soon have lost its power of inspiration.
When we speak of the failure of
politics to inspire poetry, it need hardly
be said that such politics do not in-
clude the sentiment of patriotism, of
resistance to oppressors or invaders,
or to national enemies generally. This
is happily a sentiment which has
known no distinction of parties in our
country, and has found expression
alike in the Conservative Wordsworth,
the Liberal Tennyson, and the Radical
Burns ; and I am glad to see that Mr.
Lang reminds his readers that in the
falsely-named " classical period " of the
eighteenth century English patriotism
found no poetic expression comparable
to that achieved in the age when it
has been alleged that the Revolution
had corrupted our literature with
cosmopolitan indifference. To the
eighteenth century in England belong
great and solid achievements, but not
the imaginative aspirations of the
Reformation, or of the Revolution, or
of the age of the Crusades and the
foundation of the great monastic orders
of Dominic and Francis. Out of all
the nineteen centuries since the Chris-
tian era, only in the three periods con-
taining those three great movements
can Europe claim to have felt the full
influence of those "golden stars"
beneath which poets are said to be
born.
But such wide fields of disquisition
are not to be entered now. In con-
clusion I would merely say a word to
deprecate any imputation of dogmatism
in these matters. In the first place, I
am well aware that if several people
write about a subject of this kind they
are very likely to misunderstand each
other, and also to use the same words
in senses that differ with the user.
They may be repeating when they
mean to controvert, and possibly con-
troverting when they mean to repeat.
Further, with regard to the view here
supported the view that the estimate
of poetry is ultimately a matter of
perception rather than argument, that
the highest poetic qualities are ap-
prehensible but indefinable those
who think thus are by virtue of their
faith especially bound (however hard
it seem) to be most careful to hold
frankly to the principle, and not
merely to "respect the right of pri-
vate judgment," but to try to believe
that when a judgment differs from
theirs it may be based on some real
perception of qualities not apparent
to themselves, perhaps overlaid with
defects which their idiosyncrasy makes
exceptionally disfiguring in their eyes,
perhaps appealing to associations
which to them are insignificant. Per-
sonally, for instance, I would most
willingly sacrifice the whole of ' Childe
Harold,' if need were, to preserve
Coleridge's ' Kubla Khan,' or Words-
worth's l Solitary Reaper,' or one of
Macaulay's 'Lays.' Yet it is un-
deniable that a great body of opinion
would be opposed, that a great number
of persons who derive genuine pleasure
from poetry think as highly of Byron
as a poet as I think of him as a
satirist. Others, again, may hold
Wordsworth's ' Reaper ' a simple and
graceful piece without any especial
rare and penetrative charm. Others
(including a greater number of respect-
able judges) will allow little to Macau-
lay's poetry except "a certain ardour
and impetuosity." Dr. Mommsen
classes the '^Eneid' with the 'Hen-
riade ' ; and we know Voltaire's
opinions on Dante and Shakespeare.
All this only shows how subtle is the
appeal of poetry, and on what complex
associations it depends in each indi-
vidual case. Probably, therefore, not
very much is to be gained by discus-
sion of whether this or that is true
poetry, still less by too elaborate
attempts at artificial classification of
poets. Let us by all means know all
we can of what there was in the con-
cerns of a poet's age, political, religi-
ous, social, literary, artistic which
was likely to influence his mind and
Poetry and Politics.
263
his work, so that we may hereby
apprehend more fully the significance
of what he wrote. There will be
natural and legitimate occasions when
such knowledge will contribute an
element in our appreciation of him.
But let his poetry be judged as poetry,
on the ground of its own merits, its
own appeal to the perception of the
reader, and without reference to
theories as to its supposed connexion
with something else, to find which the
mind must leave its due enjoyment,
and travel forth on a barren quest
among academic formulae and illusive
classifications and definitions of the
indefinable.
ERNEST MYERS.
FEBRUARY FILLDYKE.
February Filldyke ! darkly pour
Rivers of rain from out your cloudy sky,
And heed not slanderous men. Right glad am I
To see thee soften earth so hard and frore.
Thine aconites do make a golden floor;
And snowdrops, winter's kindest legacy,
Droop dainty heads, and are, like maidens, shy,
Knowing that boisterous March rs at the door.
Thy scented breath, thy blackbird's broken stave,
Do charm delight; and thrice more welcome thou,
"With hazel catkins twined about thy brow,
Than that last gleam that old October gave.
The Indian summer let my rivals sing,
But I will praise the Spring before the Spring.
264
A CHAMPION OF HER SEX.
CLARISSA HAELOWE has recently been
spoken of in a flippant and mocking
spirit as "the aboriginal woman's
rights person." The same claim has
been advanced for more than one of
the three daughters of King Lear, and
one might make out a case for abori-
ginals of much earlier date, our choice
ranging from Medea to Hypatia,
according to our fancy of what con-
stitutes the type. But there is a real
aboriginal of considerably greater
antiquity than is commonly supposed,
a " woman's rights person " of the
fifteenth century, whose claims to this
high honour rest on the substantial
foundation that she not merely ac-
quired fame as a writer in man's most
peculiar fields, composing the best
mediaeval manual of military tactics
and international law, but also wrote
a formal treatise on the disabilities
of women, in which she defended her
sex against the aspersions of monks
and men of the world, and antici-
pated most of the arguments familiar
to the present generation.
This mediaeval paragon, who has to
her credit more than fifteen thousand
verses besides her prose works, was
Christine de Pisan. She is mostly
known to historians as the author of
the ' Livre des Fais et Bonnes Meurs du
sage Roy Charles V.,' a vivid picture
of the court and the policy of that
monarch ; but this was only a small
part of her literary work. There
was no kind of composition known in
her day which she did not attempt,
from ballades and virelays to moral
and scientific treatises. Of course
she was obliged to take part in politics.
She had no other means of attracting
the notice and conciliating the support
of noble patrons ; and six persons,
besides herself, were dependent on^her
pen. It is to Christine's honour that,
living in the troubled reign of Charles
the Sixth, she used what influence and
eloquence she had on the side of peace.
The woman's influence was used as
women's influence ought to be, but
according to the satirists, with whom
Christine exchanged many words,
so seldom is. She was driven at last
to take shelter in an abbey, and from
this seclusion, in 1429, she issued her
last writing, a song of triumph over
the victory of Joan of Arc.
Thus Christine vindicated the dignity
of her sex by example as well as by
precept. Her reputation was de-
servedly great among her contempor-
aries, and it stood high throughout the
fifteenth century. At that time it
was already an object of ambition
with princes to attach learned persons
to their courts, and Christine seems
to have received tempting offers from
more than one to leave her adopted
country. Gian Galeazzo Visconti,
whose honours in this kind were
not conferred without good reason,
invited her to Milan. Henry the
Fourth was so pressing in his in-
vitation to England that she could
evade him only by stratagem. One of
her sons was in the service of the Earl
of Salisbury, who had made Christine's
acquaintance and conceived a great
admiration for her when he visited the
French court to negotiate the marriage
of the child Isabella with Richard
the Second. After the execution
of Salisbury, Henry took possession
of the boy, and would not allow
him to return to France, but in-
vited his mother to join him in
England. Thereupon Christine prac-
tised what she would have called
a " cautel ; " she professed herself
highly honoured by the king's invita-
tion, and requested that her son
should be sent to fetch her; then.
A Champion of her Sex.
265
when she had him safe and sound, she
excused herself and remained in
France. Christine herself records
these evidences of her high reputa-
tion, and modestly suggests that the
wide fame of her writings, which
spread rapidly into many lands, was
less owing to their worth than to the
strange fact that they were written by
a woman.
All through the century her repu-
tation stood firm. A translation
of the * Moral Proverbs ' of Christine
was one of the earliest productions of
Caxton's press ; and he published also
a translation of her 'Livre de Faits
d'Armes et de Chevalerie,' the manual
already mentioned of military tactics
and international law. Even in the
reign of Henry the Eighth this manual
continued to be quoted, although
written by a woman, as authoritative.
In this reign also, in 1521, was printed
and published 'The Boke of the Cyte
of Ladies/ a translation of Christine's
'La Cite des Dames.' The printer was
Henry Pep well, and he set forth in
his prologue that the book came into
his custody from the hands of Bryan
Anslay, one of the king's yeomen
of the cellar. This would seem to
be the only form in which Christine's
defence of her sex against monastic
scurrility and depreciation ever ap-
peared in print. Strange to say it
was never printed in France, although
the king's library contains many
manuscripts of it, and it was appar-
ently one of the most popular of her
works for several generations.
That ' La Cite" des Dames ' has been
printed only once, and then in a
translation, and is now entirely for-
gotten, is a sad instance of the dis-
proportion between fact and expecta-
tion. The authoress intended it to be,
and her contemporaries had good
reason for expecting it to be, a per-
petual city of refuge for ladies; a
storehouse of arguments good for all
time against men who should say that
" women are fit for nothing but to
bear children and spin." It is a sur-
prisingly modern book in spite of its
antiquated allegorical dress, and its
quaint pre-Renaissance notions of
history, in accordance with which
Minerva, Medea, and Sappho figure,
as shining examples of female capacity
and virtue, side by side with Christian
martyrs and noble ladies of the Middle
Ages. Mediaeval allegories are often
condemned as tedious ; but they are
not really so except to students who
are anxious to get at the pith of a
treatise, and have no time to enjoy the
lively play of fancy, and the realistic
settings with which the mediaeval
artist tried to beguile readers into
the perusal of solid morality and in-
struction. We find the preliminary
flourishes and collateral graces tedious
when we are eager to get at the sub-
stance, and do not give them a fair
trial. These allegories were the novels
of the Middle Ages ; most of them
novels with a very obvious purpose,
yet often brilliantly written, and as
full of action and lively circumstance
as if the leading characters had borne
the names of a common humanity in-
stead of those of abstract qualities.
Riches and Magnificence, Avarice and
Jollity, even Reason and Justice, are
often in the pages of the mediaeval
allegorist as strongly defined and
vitalised personages as the heroes and
heroines of modern novels. Apart
from the dramatic skill of individual
writers, the difference between the
mediaeval Abstraction and the modern
Person is mainly a difference of naming.
Christine's ' City of Ladies ' is not a
conspicuously brilliant example of the
allegory. Its allegorical setting is, in
fact, slight and conventional, and
affords hardly any artistic protection
to the mass of facts arranged in sup-
port of her argument. Yet the book
opens with a brightness and animation
that must surprise those who expect
to find dullness or inartistic clumsiness
in pre-Renaissance literature. This is
how the opening is rendered by the
English translator, modernised only in
spelling and punctuation :
" One day as I was sitting in my little cell,
divers books of divers matters about me, mine
266
A Champion of her Sex.
intent was at that time to travail, and to
gather into my conceit the weighing of divers
sentences of divers authors by me long time
before studied. I dressed my visage towards
those foresaid books, thinking as for the time
to leave in peace subtle things and to disport
me for to look upon some pleasant book of the
writing of some poets, and as 1 was in this
intent I searched about me after some pretty
book, and of adventure there came a strange
book into my hands that was taken to me to
keep. I opened this book and I saw by the
intitulation that it called him Matheolus.
Then in laughing because I had not seen him,
and often times I had heard speak of him
that he should not speak well of the reverence
of women, I thought that in manner of solace
I would visit him. And yet I had not looked
long on him but that my good mother that
bare me called me to the refection of supper,
whereof the hour was come. Purposing to
see him in the morning, I left him at that
time, and in the morrow following I set me
again to my study as I did of custom. I
forgot not to put my will in effect that came
to me the night before to visit the foresaid
book of Matheolus."
It was " in manner of solace " that
Christine proposed to visit the ribald
Matheolus, but she had not read far
when she concluded that the matter
was "not right pleasant to people
that delighted them not in evil say-
ing," that it was of no profit to any
edifying of virtue, and that both in
word and in matter the book was
ungentlemanly. This curiosity in the
scurrilous humour of the middle ages
has been reprinted in the present
century, and we can see for ourselves
that Christine's taste was not at fault.
She soon put the book aside, she tells
us, and gave her attention to higher and
more profitable matters. Still, worth-
less as the book was, it set her thinking
why it was that so many clerks, not
merely persons like Matheolus of no
reputation, but philosophers, poets, and
rhetoricians, had agreed with one
accord to speak evil of woman as a
being predisposed to all vices. She
began to examine herself as " a woman
natural," then all her acquaintances,
princesses, great ladies, and middle-class
gentlewomen. She could not see that
the judgment of the philosophers was
right. Yet she argued strongly within
herself against these women, saying
that it would be too much that so
many famous men and solemn clerks
of high and great understanding should
be mistaken. Every moral work con-
tained some chapters or clauses blaming
women. Her understanding must be
at fault. She recalled all the hard
things that she had heard of women,
and applied them to herself. " Right
great foison of ditties and proverbs of
divers authors" came before her.
She remembered in herself one after
another, as it had been a well springing.
Overwhelmed by the weight of this
authority, Christine could only con-
clude that " God had made a foul
thing when he made woman," and she
" marvelled that so worshipful a
workman deigned ever to make so
abominable a work." Great sorrow
took possession of her, and she ad-
dressed God reproachfully, asking why
she had not been born in the mascu-
line kind, so as to have been able to
serve him the better. Then came a
vision that comforted her.
" As I was in this sorrowful thought, the
head downcast as a shameful person, the eyes
full of tears, holding my hand under my
cheek, leaning on the pommell of my chair,
suddenly I saw come down upon my lap a
streaming of light as it were of flame. And
I that was in a dark place in which the sun
might not shine at that hour, started then as
though I had been waked of a dream ; and
dressing the head to behold this light from
whence it might come, I saw before me stand-
ing three ladies, crowned, of right sovereign
reverence. Of the which the shining of their
clear faces gave light unto me and to all the
place. There as I was marvelling, neither
man nor woman with me, considering, the door
close upon me and they thither come, doubting
lest it had been some fantasy, for to have
tempted me, I made the sign of the cross in
my forehead full of dread. And then she
which was the first of the three, in laughing
began thus to reason with me : ' Dear
daughter, dread ye nought, for we be not
come hither for nothing that is contrary with
thee, nor to do thee to be encumbered, but
for to comfort thee as those that have pity
of thy trouble, and to put thee out of the
ignorance that so much blindeth thine under-
standing. Thou puttest from thee that thou
knowest of very certain science, to give faith
to the contrary, to that which thou feelest
not, ne seest not, ne knowest otherwise than
by plurality of strange opinions. Thou
resemblest the fool of the which was made a
jape, which was sleeping in the mill and was
A Champion of her Sex.
267
clothed in the clothing of a woman, and to
make resemblance those that mocked him
witnessed that he was a woman, and so he
believed more their false sayings than the
certainty of his being. How is it, fair
daughter, and where is thy wit become ?
Hast thou forgotten how the fine gold proveth
him in the furnace that he changeth not his
virtue, but it is more pliant to be wrought
into divers fashions. ... It seemeth that
thou trowest that all the words of philosophers
be articles of the faith of Jesu Christ, and
that they may not err. And as to these
poets of which thou speakest, knowest thou
not well that they have spoken in many things
in manner of fables. And do intend so much
to the contrary of that that their sayings
showeth. And it may be taken after the
rule of grammar the which is named Anti-
phrasis, the which intendeth thus as thou
knowest well as one should say, "Such an
one is a shrew," that is to say that he is good,
and so by the contrary. I counsel thee that
thou do thy profit of their sayings and thou
understand it so whatsoever be their intent
in such places whereas they blame women.' "
Christine's three visitors proceed to
tell her that they have come to consti-
tute her the champion of her sex, and
to help her to build a city in which
women, hitherto scattered and defence-
less, might for ever find refuge against
all their slanderers. In Pepwell's
edition of the ' City of Ladies ' there is
a woodcut representing the scene, a
rough reproduction of a drawing in
the manuscript, Christine seated at
her desk, and the three visitors in a
row each with an appropriate symbol,
Reason with a mirror, Righteousness
with a rule, Justice with a measure.
"We shall deliver to thee/' these per-
sonages say, " matter enough stronger
and more durable than any marble,
and as for cement there shall be no
better than thou shalt have. So shall
thy city be right fair, without fear,
and of perpetual during to the world."
Reason is to help her to lay the foun-
dations, Righteousness to build the
walls and the cloisters, and Justice the
battlements and high towers. Against
all but ladies of good fame and women
worthy of praisings, the gates of the
city are to be strongly shut. "I
prophecy to thee," says Reason, " as
very sibyl, that this city shall never
be brought to nought,"
Then Christine is told to set to work
at once and dig deep in the earth for
a foundation, which, being interpreted,
means that she is to ask questions of
Reason and record the answers. To
read these questions and answers
brings into mind the saying of La
Bruyere Les anciens ont tout dit. A
specimen or two will show at least
that the question of woman's business
and other capacities was very fairly
raised in the fifteenth century. For
example, Christine asks why women
sit not in the seats of Pleading and
Justice. The answer is in effect that
there are sufficient men, and that men
are stronger of body to enforce the
laws. But if any say that it is be-
cause women have not sufiicient under-
standing to learn the laws, the contrary
is made manifest by many examples.
A long array is quoted, partly mythi-
cal, partly historical, of empresses,
queens, duchesses, and countesses cele-
brated for their administrative suc-
cesses and martial exploits Menalippe,
Hypolyta, Semiramis, Tamaris, Xeno-
bia, Fredegund, Blanche, the mother of
St. Louis, and many more recent
widows "who maintained right in
their dominions as well as their hus-
bands had. done."
" Of women of worship and knight-
hood," Reason says, " I might tell thee
enough ; " and the knight liness of
woman being thus established, Christ-
ine proceeds to ask "if ever God list
to make a woman, so noble to have
any understanding of the highness of
science." In answer to this, Reason
is most explicit :
"I say to thee again, and doubt never the
contrary, that if it were the custom to put the
little maidens to the school, and they were
made to learn the sciences as they do to the
men-children, that they should learn as per-
fectly, and they should be as well entered into
the subtleties of all the arts and sciences as
men be. And, peradventure, there should be
more of them, for I have teached heretofore
that by how much women have the body more
soft than the men have, and less able to do .
divers things, by so much they have the
understanding more sharp there as they
apply it."
Reason does not think that women
268
A Champion of her Sex.
should meddle with that which is
committed to men to do, but doubts
not but that if they had equal ex-
perience they would be equally full of
knowledge. And she quotes many
examples of women " illumined of
great sciences," from Sappho down to
Christine's countrywoman Novella
d'Andrea, daughter of a Professor of
Civil Law at Bologna, who lectured to
her father's students with a curtain
before her, that her beauty might not
distract the attention of the young
men. But Christine, resolved to meet
boldly the worst things said of the
female intellect, demands next "if
there was ever woman that found
anything of herself that was not
known before." To this Reason
promptly answers that the Roman
letters were invented by Nicostrata,
otherwise called Carmentis ; that
Minerva invented iron and steel
armour, Ceres the tilling of the earth,
Isis gardening, Arene the shearing of
sheep, Pamphila the weaving of silk ;
that Thamar was a mistress of the art
of painting, and that Sempronia knew
Greek and Latin and was a most ac-
complished musician. After enlarging
on the wealth that has come to the
world through the inventions of these
noble ladies, Reason has a fling at the
" evil-saying clerks " " they should
be ashamed and cast down their eyes,
seeing that the very Latin letters,
upon the knowledge of which they
pride themselves, were invented by a
woman."
Such were the foundations of
Christine's city of refuge for ladies.
When Reason has laid the foundations
the walls are raised and crowned with
most prosperous speed. Her sisters
Righteousness and Justice dispose
easily of the arguments of those who
deny the moral qualities and the
piety of women. All the gibes of
monastic cynicism are triumphantly
refuted by examples. The work runs
to considerable length, as Christine
has gathered into it all the materials
she used in her numerous battles on.
behalf of her sex. We dare say it will
be news to many of the modern advo-
cates of the cause that it found so
eager and thorough a champion nearly
five hundred years ago. Christine's
city is a large and rambling range of
building, with many quaint towers and
turrets, but though time has under-
mined some of its argumentative
defences, one is astonished to find how
much of it is still suited for modern
habitation.
Another of Christine's works enjoyed
a still greater reputation in its day.
The manual of military tactics and
international law is perhaps the most
surprising of her achievements. It
is the book known to antiquaries
in Caxton's translation as * The Boke
of Fayttes of Armes and Chyvalrye.'
The importance and authority at-
tached to the work may be judged
from the fact that it was at the de-
sire of Henry the Seventh that Caxton
undertook the translation. To de-
scribe it as a manual of military tac-
tics and international law is strictly
correct. The productions of Caxton's
press are oftener referred to than read,
and the common impression about the
Boke of Fayttes, derived from a fanci-
ful construction of the title, is that it
is a collection of stories of chivalrous
exploits. It is a grave, solid,
systematic treatise, handling many
topics of the highest policy, from the
manners of a good general and the
minutiae of siege operations to the
wager of battle, safe-conducts, and
letters of marque.
For a woman to attempt the com-
pilation of a soldier's manual was such
an extraordinary undertaking that
Christine felt bound to make an apo-
logy before she went beyond her pro-
logue. She appealed again for her
main justification to Minerva, the
goddess of war, " the inventor of iron
and of all manner of harness." A
woman might fairly write about the
laws of war when it was a woman
that invented its chief implements.
But Christine did not profess to be
original. She trusted partly to recog-
nised authorities and partly to the
A Champion of her Sex.
269
kind offices of knightly friends. In-
deed, when she was half through her
work, it seems to have occurred to her
that she might be accused of pla-
giarism, and she prepared an ingenious
defence, in which the vexed question
how far an author may help himself
from the works of others is solved with
great plausibility. One evening after
she had completed the second . of the
four parts of the book she fell asleep,
and a venerable figure appeared to
her in her dreams which she recognised
as the impersonation of her master
Study. " Dear love, Christine," he
said to her, " I am hither come to be
thy help in the performing of this
present book. It is good that thou
take and gather of the Tree of
Batailles that is in my garden, some
fruits of which thou shalt use." This
was the master's figurative way of
saying that Christine was now to have
recourse, for that part of her work
which dealt with political questions
arising out of war, to Honore Bonnet's
'Arbre des Batailles.' Hitherto she
had been chiefly indebted to Yegetius
and Frontin. " But, my master," she
objected, " I beg you to say whether
any rebuke will be cast at me for
using the said fruit." " By no means,"
Study replied. "It is a common use
among my disciples to give and impart
one to other of the flowers that they
take diversely out of my gardens.
And all those that help themselves
were not the first that have gathered
them. Did not Maister Jean de Meun
help himself in his Book of the Rose of
the sayings of Lorris, and semblably
of others ? It is, then, no rebuke, but
it is laud and praising, when well and
properly they be applucked and set by
order. And there lieth the maistrie
thereof. And it is better to have seen
and visited many books."
To the statement of this theory of
literary communism it ought to be
added that Christine not only shows
her " maistrie " in " applucking "
skilfully, but is most explicit in
the acknowledgment of her obliga-
tions. The knights who assisted her
in her elaborate directions for siege
operations certain knights wise in
these feats of arms did not desire
their names to be known, but every-
body else from whom she borrows
receives due credit.
The life of this remarkable woman
has attracted very little notice from
English writers. Horace Walpole
touches lightly on her career in his
Royal and Noble Authors, commenting
with polite levity on the attachment
entertained for her by the Earl of
Salisbury. This is the only notable
reference to her in English literature,
and it might have been more respect-
ful. But in France Christine has
naturally received more attention.
Her biography rests upon autobio-
graphical passages in her own writings,
most of which are accessible only in
manuscripts in the Bibliotheque du Hoi.
The antiquary Boivin the younger led
the way in exploring these at the be-
ginning of last century. His paper on
Christine and her father, Thomas de
Pisan, printed in the Transactions of
the Academic des Inscriptions et Belles
Lettres, restored the once famous
authoress from her obscurity. Un-
fortunately, though the Abbe Boivin
produced a curious scrap of biography,
he did not perform his task with suf-
ficient care. Doubtless with the best
of intentions, he killed Christine's
husband thirteen years before, accord-
ing to Christine herself, his death
actually took place. Nobody has dis-
covered on what authority Boivin fixed
the date. It may have been that he
considered it necessary to account for
Christine's resort to authorship as a
livelihood. It may have been that he
considered it necessary to account for
the warmth of the language used by
the Earl of Salisbury in his love songs
to Christine. At any rate it was un-
fortunate, for it gave Horace Walpole
an opportunity for sneering both at
Christine and at her lover. The ami-
able cynic of Strawberry Hill was
under the impression that Christine
was a widow when the earl addressed
her, and expressed some little con-
270
A Champion of Tier Sex.
tempt for him because he could not
persuade the mother to leave Paris,
and consoled himself by taking her
young son under his protection. The
truth is that Christine's husband,
Etienne du Castel, was alive at the
time. This fact was brought to light
by the writers of the notice of Chris-
tine in the Petitot collection of me-
moirs. But Boivin's paper, being first
in the field, has continued to be the
basis of notices of Christine de Pisan
in dictionaries of biography, although
an excellent monograph has since
then been written by Mme. Raimond
Thomassy.
It is indeed a very interesting life.
By birth Christine belongs to the il-
lustrious company of Italian women
who adorned the early years of the
Renaissance. She was a native of
Italy, and, though she wrote in French,
her place is with the female poets,
jurists, and scholars whose learning
and talents excited the admiration
of the Italian courts and universities
in the middle ages. Her father,
Thomas de Pisan, was a renowned
astrologer. To the modern ear this
is as much as to say that he was a
disreputable quack. The whirligig of
Time and the researches of the Psychi-
cal Society may bring round its re-
venges to astrology, but it is difficult
nowadays to attach even the idea of
respectability to this occult art. It
was otherwise in the reign of Charles
the Fifth of France. The latter half
of the fourteenth century was the
palmy period of astrology. Its posi-
tion then was an adumbration of the
position now occupied by science. All
the honours now paid to men of science
were then absorbed by the astrologers.
The catalogue of famous astrologers
drawn up by Simon de Phares, and
the recital of their achievements in
predicting great events and detecting
great criminals, commanded as much
respect as would now be given to a
catalogue of European men of science
and their most notable discoveries.
The feats of Nicolas de Paganica and
Mark de Genes in foretelling births
and deaths in royal families passed
from gossip to gossip, and from writer
to writer, like the fame of Helmholtz
or Pasteur. For a time all the affairs
of life, public and private, were regu-
lated by the advice of the stars.
Charles the Fifth, who had an especial
respect for the science, kept many astro-
logers on handsome pensions. Such
patron as he, with men always about
him to make the requisite calculations,
would not have undertaken a journey,
or made a present of a jewel, or put
on a new robe, would not even have
gone outside the gates of his palace,
without first ascertaining whether the
aspect of the heavens was favourable.
And every great baron, every digni-
tary of the Church had at least one
astrologer in his pay, and would not
have dreamt of making an addition to
castle or chapel until this authority
had selected the propitious moment.
Chaucer may or may not have meant
to be ironical when he said of his
doctor
" Well coude he fortunen the ascendant
Of his ymages for Ms patient."
But fashionable patients undoubtedly
expected as much of their doctors in
Chaucer's time. Wars were under-
taken and battles begun only with the
same high sanction.
In these palmy days of astrology,
Thomas de Pisan, according to his
daughter, was at the very top of his
profession. She says that in the
opinion of experts entitled to judge
there was not in his own generation,
and there had not been for a hundred
years before, a man of such profound
knowledge in mathematical science and
astrological calculation. She mentions
one great proof of his skill that could
not easily be surpassed. He predicted
the hour of his own death, and he died
punctually at the appointed time. Re^
spect for his art could not have been
carried farther. Christine is suspected
of having been guilty of a little ex-
aggeration in her description of her
father. Other contemporary chro-
niclers do not assign him the same
A Champion of her Sex.
271
prominent place. It is remarked that
she speaks in terms of very high praise
of all her relations an amiable feature
in her character. Concerning Thomas
de Pisan she even goes so far as to
say that the great prosperity of the
reign of Charles the Fifth was chiefly
due to his counsels. If that monarch
undertook affairs of moment only when
his favourite astrologer told him that
the conjunctions were propitious, this
is at least an evidence of the good
judgment of Thomas de Pisan. Putting
aside the question whether Christine
was misled by filial affection, her ac-
count of her father is to the following
effect. He was a native of Bologna,
where he had considerable property.
He married the daughter of a Venetian
doctor, a councillor of the republic,
and, fixing his residence in Venice, was
himself soon promoted to the same
dignity. In a few years his reputa-
tion as an astrologer and an adept versed
in all the sciences spread beyond Italy.
Having occasion to visit his native
city of Bologna, he there received at
the same time pressing invitations
from the King of Hungary and the
King of France to pay them a visit.
i He decided in favour of the King of
I France, being influenced to this deci-
sion partly by Charles the Fifth's
great repute as a patron of science,
and partly by the high character of
the university of Paris, which he
wished to see. He did not propose to
i stay more than a year in France, and
I left his wife and children behind him
j in Bologna, but Charles was so
| charmed with his conversation that
! he resolved to attach Thomas de Pisan
! permanently to his court. The astro-
i loger received, besides his courteous
entertainment, the substantial temp-
tation of a most munificent salary \ so
he sent for his family and settled in
France.
Christine was five years old when,
in 1368, she was presented along with
her mother at the court of Charles.
She does not forget to say that they
were magnificently apparalled & la
Lombarde. Although a somewhat
ostentatious man, with a turn for
magnificence, and careless of the
money liberally bestowed upon him by
the king, Thomas de Pisan was a good
father. He took great pains with
Christine's education, taught her
French and Latin as well as Italian,
and made her study science as well as
belles lettres. She acknowledges also
that he acted wisely in the choice of a
husband for her. She had many
offers, knights, nobles, and rich
officials being among her suitors.
" Let it not be supposed that I boast
of this," she writes in recording the
circumstance, " for the authority of
the honour and great love that the
King showed to my father was the
cause, not any worth of mine." This
was Christine's modesty, for in ad-
dition to her brilliant talents and
vivacity, she thanks God elsewhere
that she had a person free from de-
formity and pleasing enough, and a
complexion that was not in the least
sickly. The extant portraits repre-
sent her as a comely woman, with
regular features and a tendency
to embonpoint. Whatever her personal
attractions, she, or her father for her,
with her subsequent approval, de-
clined all the " chevaliers " and riches
clercs in favour of a young Picard
gentleman, a man of good family,
greater in virtues than in wealth, by
name Etienne du Castel. Through
the astrologer's influence he was ap-
pointed one of the financial secretaries
of the king. Christine was only
fifteen years old at the time of her
marriage.
It was well for Christine that her
father had taken pains with her educa-
tion. Two years after her marriage,
in 1380, Charles the Fifth died, and
with him departed the good fortune of
the family of Thomas de Pisan. The
astrologer, with his turn for magni-
ficence, had always lived up to his
income, and his son-in-law as well as
himself found much less lucrative em-
ployment after the King's death.
Thomas de Pisan soon followed his
patron to the grave. Christine's
272
A Champion of her Sex.
husband was disabled by ill health, and
it fell upon her to support the family.
Her mother and two poor relations,
beside three children of her own, were
dependent on her. She undertook
the duty with heroic energy. She had
acquired a reputation as a writer of
ballades, virelays, and other poetry,
but she resolved to qualify herself for
what seems to have been more profit-
able work, and, counting all that she
had learned in her youth as insufficient,
she set herself, as she tells us, anew
to the a b c of learning. " I betook
myself to ancient histories from the
commencement of the world, the
histories of the Hebrews, the Assyri-
ans, and the principal empires, pro-
ceeding from the one to the other,
descending to the Romans, the French,
the Britons, and other subjects of
chronicle ; then to the problems of
the sciences, as far as the space of
time that I studied could comprehend
them ; finally to the books of the
poets." The number of authors that
Christine refers to furnishes an index
to the extent of her studies. M.
Petitot has compiled a list of them :
" Among Greek authors one remarks
the names of Homer, Sappho, Plato,
Aristotle, Hippocrates, Galen, Chry-
sostem, &c. She mentions even several
sayings and maxims attributed to
Socrates, to Democritus, to Diogenes,
to Pythagoras, and several other phi-
losophers. Among the Latins, Yirgil,
Horace, Ovid, Tibullus, Catullus,
Juvenal, Lucan, Cicero, Valerius
Maximus, Suetonius, Seneca, Boethius,
Apuleius, Yegetius, Pompeius Trogus.
The works of St. Augustine, St.
Jerome, and St. Ambrose were familiar
to her. Her writings prove that she
had not only read these various
authors, and many others that we
cannot add to the list, but that she
had made a profound study of them,
and one cannot but feel a certain
astonishment when one finds in a
woman of the fourteenth century an
erudition such as is hardly possessed
by the most laborious men."
That Christine had read in the
original every passage from every
author that she quotes it would be too
much to believe. There were compen-
diums in those days by the aid of
which it was possible to make a great
display of learning at small expense ;
and students were necessarily very
much dependent upon these compen-
diums, copies of the originals not being
accessible to everybody. But with
every allowance for this, it is obvious
that Christine was a great reader, and
for her age a very accomplished
scholar. There is an air of scholarly
substantiality, an amount of literary
flesh on the bones of her works, very
rare in the middle ages. All the
writers that were known in France in
her time were known to her. Charles
the Fifth had a collection of nine
hundred volumes in the Library Tower
of the Louvre. She had access to
this, and through her friend Gerson,
the chancellor, to all the literary
treasures of the University of Paris.
Christine shows not only great
skill in the handling of her mate-
rials, but unmistakable evidence
of businesslike industry in the accu-
mulation of them. When she had
bravely made up her mind to subsist
by her pen, Anthony Trollope himself
did not go to work with steadier
energy and purpose than Christine de
Pisan. She reminds us frequently of
Trollope in her precise enumerations of
the quantity of work accomplished in a
given time. Her first six years of author-
ship, begun after the above elaborate
preparation, were especially prolific.
"Between the year 1399," she says,
" and the year 1405, during all which
time I never ceased, I compiled fifteen
principal works, without counting
other occasional little writings,
amounting altogether to about seventy
quires of large size." This period of
vigorous industry was distracted by
the death of her husband in 1402, by
lawsuits following thereupon, and by
the death of her most munificent patron,
Philip of Burgundy, in 1404 : but mis-
fortunes only stimulated the courage-
ous woman to increased exertions.
A Champion of Tier Sex.
273
Christine did not escape calumny.
The warmth of her amatory verses,
which excited the suspicions of Horace
Walpole, exposed her also to disgrace-
ful insinuations from her contempor-
aries. She complained bitterly of
these slanders, and solemnly protested
her innocence. She had no time for
intrigues. She did not speak in her
own person; the warmth of senti-
ment in her lays and ballads was
purely dramatic, and an imaginative
assumption. "When people speak
evil of me," she says, " sometimes I am
vexed, and sometimes I only smile and
say to myself, ' The gods, and he and
I, know that there is no truth in it.' "
Apart from the impassioned tone of
her love songs, which was simply that
of the period, there is not a tittle
of evidence against the lady's re-
putation. Her detractors found sup-
port for their slanders in the brave
show that, womanlike, she kept up
when her fortunes were at their lowest
ebb. Even when reduced to the neces-
sity of borrowing money, she never
relaxed in her determination to keep
up appearances, and carefully con-
cealed her poverty from the world.
Her repast was often sober, she says, as
became a widow, and under her mantle
of grey fur and her gown of scarlet,
not often renewed but well preserved,
she was often sick at heart ; and she
had bad nights on her bed, though it was
handsome and stately ; but there was
nothing in her face or her habit to
show the world the burden of her
troubles.
A hard struggle Christine seems to
have had. The income of authorship
was very precarious in those days. A
copyist had a more certain livelihood.
Once an author had parted with his
manuscript, copies might be multiplied
to any degree without his consent.
He was not consulted, and he was not
paid ; the copyright belonged to the
owner of the manuscript. There was
no great demand for original works.
An author's only chance of obtaining
remuneration for his labours was to
present his work to a powerful patron
No. 316 VOL. LIII.
with a nattering dedication, leaving it
to the patron to make such a return
as his generosity dictated. The ful-
someness of dedications, highly pep-
pered to please a patron and enlist
vanity on the side of generosity, is
often denounced by modern writers,
who are perhaps not much more scru-
pulous in their appeals to the great
modern patron, the public. The
author of the fifteenth century was
probably as conscientiously persuaded
of the virtues of his patron as the
author of the nineteenth century is of
the virtues of his. When Christine
de Pisan resolved to support herself
and her family by authorship, she had
peculiar difficulties in her search for a
patron. The patronage of literature
was indeed already established as a
thing becoming the high station of a
prince. Charles the Fifth had done
much to encourage a healthy rivalry
in this matter among the princes of
Europe. But the distracted reign of
his successor was a bad time for the
literary aspirant in France. Why
Christine persisted in clinging to her
adopted country at such a time, and
steadily refused the tempting offers
of the Duke of Milan and the
King of England, is not clear. The
secret of her attachment to Paris
must remain one of the mysteries of
her life. It may simply have been
that all her friends were there ; and
that as a sensible womaa she doubted
the permanence of the favour of
patrons in every country, even if she
could depend upon the permanence of
their power. Anyhow, she remained
in France, and addressed herself to
one after another of the factious
chiefs, by whose struggles for pro-
minence the unhappy kingdom was
torn.
She nattered them all in her dedica-
tions the Duke of Orleans, the Duke
of Burgundy, the Duke of Berry,
Isabella of Bavaria, the queen but
she did not attach herself to any
party, and she maintained a lofty tone
both in morality and in politics.
There was nothing base in her
274
A Champion of her Sex.
flattery. She credited the objects of
it with virtues that they did not pos-
sess, but the virtues were such as they
would have been much the better for
possessing. Praise for any quality
that was really virtuous, even though
the recipient of the praise did not
deserve it, was a wholesome influence
in a generation when the corruption
of the chivalrous ideal had reached
its worst, when courtly magnificence
of living was disgraced by shameless
orgies, and public honours were sought
by the vilest intrigues and the most
treacherous assassinations.
One of Christine's first works was
a collection of chivalrous precepts
thrown into the form of a letter sent
by the goddess Othea to Hector of
Troy at the age of fifteen. Othea is
a personification of Wisdom, and she
tells the boy, in a succession of
maxims in verse, each followed by
explanations and exemplifications in
prose, after the manner of the Cato
Major, what he must do, and what he
must avoid, in order to become a per-
fect knight. It was dedicated to the
Duke of Orleans, whose faction was in
the ascendant at the close of the four-
teenth century. The Duchess of Or-
leans, Valentine Yisconti, was a coun-
trywoman of Christine's, and this
may possibly have influenced her first
choice of a patron. There is, unfor-
tunately, no reason to believe that
the excellent precepts of this trea-
tise had any effect on the Duke him-
self. The paramour of Isabella wa 
