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Title: The Catholic World; Volume I, Issues 1-6
       A Monthly Eclectic Magazine

Author: E. Rameur

Release Date: April 4, 2012 [EBook #39367]

Language: English

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*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK CATHOLIC WORLD, VOLUME I, 1-6 ***




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[Transcriber's notes]
  This text is derived from
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  Several scanned pages are obscured by being too closely glued at the
  spine. I have interpolated the missing text where it seemed obvious
  and left "??" where it was in doubt.

  A few cases of inaccurate typesetting such as misplaced words or
  lines have been corrected.

  Although square brackets [] usually designate footnotes or
  transcriber's notes, they do appear in the original text.

  This text includes Volume I;
    Number 1--April 1865
    Number 2--May 1865
    Number 3--June 1865
    Number 4--July 1865
    Number 5--August 1865
    Number 6--September 1865
[End Transcriber's notes]


_Fine Binding_
THE CARSWELL COMPANY LIMITED



THE CATHOLIC WORLD.


_A Monthly Eclectic Magazine_

of

GENERAL LITERATURE AND SCIENCE.


VOL. I.

APRIL TO SEPTEMBER, 1865.



NEW YORK:

LAWRENCE KEHOE, PUBLISHER,

7 BEEKMAN STREET.

1865.



CONTENTS.


  Ancient Saints of God, The, 19.
  Ars, A Pilgrimage to, 24.
  Alexandria, The Christian Schools of, 33, 721.
  Animal Kingdom, Unity of Type in the, 71.
  Art, 136, 286, 420.
  Art, Christian, 246.
  Authors, Royal and Imperial, 323.
  All-Hallow Eve, or the Test of Futurity, 500, 657, 785.
  Arks, Noah's, 513.

  Babou, Monsieur, 106.
  Blind Deaf Mute, History of a, 826.

  Church in the United States, Progress of the, 1.
  Constance Sherwood, 78, 163, 349, 482, 600, 748.
  Catholicism, The Two Sides of, 96, 669, 741.
  Cardinal Wiseman in Rome, 117
  Catacombs, Recent Discoveries in the, 129.
  Chastellux, The Marquis de, 181.
  Church of England, Workings of the Holy Spirit in the, 289.
  Cochin China, French, 369.
  Consalvi's Memoirs, 377.
  Church History, A Lost Chapter Recovered, 414.
  Canova, Antonio, 598.
  Cathedral Library, The, 679.
  Catholic Philosophy in the Thirteenth Century, 685.

  De Guérin, Eugénie and Maurice, 214.
  Divina Commedia, Dante's, 268.
  Dinner by Mistake, A, 535.
  Dramatic Mysteries of the Fifteenth and Sixteenth Centuries, 577.
  Dublin May Morning, A, 825.

  Extinct Species, 526.
  Experience, Wisdom by, 851.

  Falconry, Modern, 493.
  Fifth Century, Civilization in the, 775.

  Guérin, Eugénie and Maurice de, 214.
  Glacier, A Night in a, 345.
  Grand Chartreuse, A Visit to the, 830.

  Hedwige, Queen of Poland, 145.
  Heart and the Brain, 623.

  Irish Poetry, Recent, 466.

  Jem McGowan's Wish, 56.

  Legends and Fables, The Truth of, 433.
  London, Catholic Progress in, 703.
  London, 836.
  Laborers Gone to their Reward, 855.

  Mont Cenis Tunnel, The, 60.
  Mongols, Monks among the, 158.
  Mourne, The Building of, 225.
  Memoirs, Consalvi's, 377.
  Maintenon, Madame de, 799.
  Miscellany, 134, 280, 420, 567, 712, 858.

  Nick of Time, The, 124.

  Perilous Journey, A, 198.
  Poucette, 260.
  Prayer, What came of a, 697.

  Russian Religious, A, 306.

  Saints of God, The Ancient, 19.
  Science, 134, 280, 712.
  Streams, The Modern Genius of, 233.
  Stolen Sketch, The, 314.
  Swetchine, Madame, and her Salon, 456.
  Shakespeare, William, 548.
  St. Sophia, The Church and Mosque of, 641.
  Species, The Origin and Mutability of, 845.

  Three Wishes, The, 31.
  Terrene Phosphorescence, 770.

  Upfield, Many Years Ago at, 393.

  Vanishing Race, A, 708.

  Wiseman, Cardinal in Rome, 117.
  Winds, The, 207.
  Women, A City of, 514.
  Wisdom by Experience, 851.

  Young's Narcissa, 797.


POETRY

  A Lie, 245.
  Avignon, The Bells of, 783.

  Domine Quo Vadis? 76.
  Dream of Gerontius, The, 517, 630.
  Dorothea, Saint, 666.

  Ex Humo, 33.

  Gerontius, The Dream of, 517, 630.

  Hans Euler, 237.

  Limerick Bells, Legend of, 195.

  Mary, Queen of Scots, Hymn by, 337.
  Martin's Puzzle, 739.

  Saint Dorothea, 666.
  Speech, 829.

  Twilight in the North, 344.

  Unspiritual Civilization, 747.


{iv}

_Contents._


NEW PUBLICATIONS.


  Archbishop Spalding's Pastoral, 144.
  At Anchor, 287.
  American Annual Cyclopaedia, US.
  A Man without a Country, 720.

  Banim's Boyne Water, 286.
  Beatrice, Miss Kavanagh's, 574.

  Cardinal Wiseman's Sermons, 139.
  Cummings' Spiritual Progress, 140.
  Christian Examiner, Reply to the, 144.
  Correlation and Conservation of Forces, The, 288, 425.
  Confessors of Connaught, 574.
  Curé of Ars, Life of the, 575.
  Ceremonial of the Church, 720.

  Darras' History of the Church, 141, 575, 860.

  England, Froude's History of, 715.

  Faith, the Victory, Bishop McGill's, 428.

  Grace Morton, 574.

  Heylen's Progress of the Age, etc., 142.
  Household Poems, Longfellow's, 719.

  Irvington Stories, 143.
  Irish Street Ballads, 720.

  John Mary Decalogne, Life of, 576.

  Lamotte Fouqué's Undine, etc 142.
  La Mère de Dieu, 432.
  Life of Cicero, 573.

  Moral Subjects, Card. Wiseman's Sermons on 287.
  Mystical Rose, The, 288.
  Mater Admirabilis. 429.
  Month of Mary, 720.
  Martyr's Monument, The, 860.

  New Path, The, 288, 576.

  Our Farm of Four Acres, 143.

  Protestant Reformation, Abp. Spalding's History of the, 719.

  Real and Ideal, 427.
  Religious Perfection, Bayma's, 431.
  Russo-Greek Church, The, 576.
  Retreat, Meditations and Considerations for a, 720.

  Songs for all Seasons, Tennyson's, 719.
  Sybil, A Tragedy, 860.

  Translation of the Iliad, Lord Derby's, 570.
  Trübner's American and Oriental Literature, 576.

  William Shakespeare, 860.
  Whittier's Poems; 860.

  Young Catholic's Library, 432.
  Year of Mary, 719.

----

THE CATHOLIC WORLD.

VOL. I., NO. 1.--APRIL, 1865.


From Le Correspondant.

THE PROGRESS OF THE CHURCH IN THE UNITED STATES.

BY E. RAMEUR.


[The following article will no doubt be interesting to our readers,
not only for its intrinsic merit and its store of valuable
information, but also as a record of the impressions made upon an
intelligent foreign Catholic, during a visit to this country. As might
have been expected, the author has not escaped some errors in his
historical and statistical statements--most of which we have noted in
their appropriate places. It will also be observed that while
exaggerating the importance of the early French settlements in the
development of Catholicism in the United States, he has not given the
Irish immigrants as much credit as they deserve. But despite these
faults, which are such as a Frenchman might readily commit, the
article will amply repay reading.--ED. CATHOLIC WORLD.]

After the Spaniards had discovered the New World, and while they were
fighting against the Pagan civilization of the southern portions of
the continent, the French made the first [permanent] European
settlement on the shores of America. They founded Port Royal, in
Acaclia, in 1604, and from that time their missionaries began to go
forth among the savages of the North. It was not until 1620 that the
first colony of English Puritans landed in Massachusetts, and it then
seemed not improbable that Catholicism was destined to be the dominant
religion of the New World; but subsequent Anglo-Saxon immigration and
political vicissitudes so changed matters, that by the end of the last
century one might well have believed that Protestantism was finally
and completely established throughout North America. God, however,
prepares his ways according to his own good pleasure; and he knows how
to bring about secret and unforeseen changes, which set at naught all
the calculations of man. The weakness and internal disorders of the
Catholic nations, in the eighteenth century, retarded only for a
moment the progress of the Catholic Church; and Providence, combining
the despised efforts of those who seemed weak with the faults of those
who seemed strong, confounded the superficial judgments of
philosophers, and prepared the way for a speedy religious
transformation of America.

This transformation is going on in our own times with a vigor which
seems to increase every year. The {2} causes which have led to it
were, at the outset, so trivial that no writer of the last century
would have dreamed of making account of them. Yet, already at that
time, Canada, where Catholicism is now more firmly established than in
any other part of America, possessed that faithful and energetic
population which has increased so wonderfully during the last half
century; and even in the United States might have been found many an
obscure, but a patient and stout-hearted little congregation--a relic
of the old English Church, which after three centuries of oppression
was to arise and spread itself with a new life. But no one set store
by the poor French colonists; England and Protestantism, together, it
was thought, would soon absorb them; and as for the _Papists_ of the
United States, the wise heads did not even suspect their existence.
The writer who should have spoken of their future would only have been
laughed at.

The English Catholics, like the Puritans, early learned to look toward
America as a refuge from persecution, and in 1634, under the direction
of Lord Baltimore, they founded the colony of Maryland. Despite
persecution from Protestants whom they had freely admitted into their
community, they prospered, increased, and became the germ of the
Church of the United States, now so large and flourishing.

In the colonial archives of the Ministry of the Navy we have found a
curious manuscript memoir upon Acadia, by Lamothe Cadillac, in which
it is stated that in 1686 there were Catholic inhabitants in New York,
and especially in Maryland, where they had seven or eight priests.
Another paper preserved in the same archives mentions a Catholic
priest residing in New York; and William Penn, who had established
absolute toleration in the colony adjoining that of Maryland, speaks
of an old Catholic priest who exercised the ministry in Pennsylvania.

The Catholics at this time are said to have composed a thirtieth part
of the whole population of Maryland. This estimate seems to us too
low. At all events, the increase of our unfortunate brethren in the
faith was retarded by persecution and difficulties of all kinds which
surrounded them. In the Puritan colonies of the North, they were
absolutely proscribed. In the Southern colonies, of Virginia, Georgia,
and Carolina, their condition was but little better; in New York they
enjoyed a precarious toleration in the teeth of penal laws. In
Maryland and Pennsylvania alone they were granted freedom of worship,
and a legal status; though even in those colonies they were exposed to
a thousand wrongs and vexations. Maryland persecuted them from time to
time and banished their priests; and William Penn, in his tolerant
conduct toward them, was bitterly opposed by his own people.

Nevertheless, despite difficulties and violence, the Anglo-American
Catholics increased by little and little, wherever they got a
foothold; the descendants of the old settlers multiplied; new ones
came from England and Ireland; and a German immigration set in,
especially in Pennsylvania, where several congregations of German
Catholics were formed at a very early period. In the archives of this
province we have found several valuable indications of the state of
the Church in 1760. There were then two priests, one a Frenchman or an
Englishman, named Robert Harding, the other a German of the name of
Schneider. It seems probable that they were both Jesuits.  [Footnote
1] In a letter to Governor Loudon, in 1757, Father Harding estimates
the number of Catholics in Philadelphia and its immediate neighborhood
at two thousand--English, Irish, and German; but in the absence of
Father Schneider he could not be positive as to these figures. A
letter from Gouverneur Morris in 1756 {3} speaks of the Catholics of
Maryland and Pennsylvania as being very numerous and enjoying freedom
of worship, and adds, that in Philadelphia there is a Jesuit who is a
very able and talented man. The Abbé Robin, a chaplain in Rochambeau's
army in 1781, informs us in his narrative that there were several
Catholic churches at Fredericksburg, Va., and even a Catholic
congregation at Charleston, S.C.


  [Footnote 1: In De Courcy and Shea's "Catholic Church in the United
  States" pp. 211,  212, an account will be found of both these
  missionaries. The first mentioned was an Englishman. Both were--
  Jesuits. ED. C. W.]

The toleration accorded to the Jesuits in the United States was
precarious, but it amounted in time to a pretty complete freedom; and
as they were not disturbed when the order was suppressed in Europe,
some of their brethren from abroad took refuge with them; so that in
1784, we find, according to Mr. C. Moreau, in his excellent work on
the French emigrant priests in America,  [Footnote 2] nineteen priests
in Maryland, and five in Pennsylvania. To these we must add the
priests of Detroit, Mich., Vincennes, Ind., and Kaskaskia and Cahokia,
Ill., all four originally French-Canadian settlements which were ceded
to England along with Canada, and after the American Revolution became
parts of the United States. Counting, moreover, the missionaries
scattered among the Indian tribes, we may safely say that the American
Republic contained at the period of which we are speaking not fewer
than thirty or forty ecclesiastics. The number of the faithful may be
set down as 16,000 in Maryland, 7,000 or 8,000 in Pennsylvania, 3,000
at Detroit and Vincennes, and about 2,500 in southern Illinois; in all
the other states together they hardly amounted to 1,500. In a total
population therefore of 3,000,000 they numbered about 30,000, and of
these 5,500 were of French origin. Such was the condition of the
Church in the United States when it was regularly established in 1789
by the erection of an episcopal see at Baltimore, and the appointment,
as bishop, of Mr. Carroll, an American priest, born of one of the
oldest Catholic families of Maryland. The dispersion of the clergy of
France, in 1790, soon afterward supplied America with numerous
evangelical laborers, who gave a new impulse to the development which
was just becoming apparent in the infant Church.

  [Footnote 2: One vol. 12mo. Paris: Douniol.]

A few years before the French Revolution, Mr. Emery, superior of Saint
Sulpice, guided by what we must term an extraordinary inspiration,
came to the assistance of the American Church, and with the help of
his brother Sulpitians and at the cost of the society, founded a
theological seminary at Baltimore. His plans were already well matured
when Bishop Carroll, soon after his appointment, entering heartily
into the project, promised him a house and all the assistance he could
give. Four Sulpitians accordingly set out from Paris in 1790, taking
with them five Seminarians. They were supplied with 30,000 francs to
defray the cost of their establishment, and to this modest sum the
crisis which soon overtook the parent establishment allowed them to
add but little; but this mite, bestowed by the Church of France in the
last days of her wealth, was destined to become, like the widow's
mite, the price of innumerable blessings.

Between 1791 and 1799 the storm of revolution drove twenty-three
French priests to the United States. As the first apostles, when they
set out from Rome, portioned out Germany and Gaul among themselves, so
they divided this country, and most of them organized new communities
of Christians, or by their zeal awakened communities that slept. Six
of them, Flaget, Cheverus, Dubourg, Maréchal, Dubois, and David,
became bishops.

The base of operations from which these peaceful but victorious
invaders went forth was Baltimore, the episcopal see around which were
gathered the old American clergy and the greater part of the Catholic
population. It was here that the Sulpitians {4} had their seminary,
and this establishment became a centre of attraction for a great many
of these exiled priests who belonged to the Society of Saint Sulpice.
Some (as MM. Ciquard, Matignon, and Cheverus) bent their steps from
Baltimore toward the laborious missions among the intolerant and often
fanatical Puritans of the North, where the Catholics--a mere
handful--were found scattered far and wide; isolated in the midst of a
Protestant population; deprived of priests and religious services, and
in danger of totally forgetting the faith in which they had been
baptized. Nothing discouraged these apostolic men. Aided by divine
grace, they awakened the indifferent, converted heretics, gathered
about them the few Catholics who immigrated from Europe, attracted all
men by their affable and conciliating manners, their intelligence and
education, and the disinterestedness of their lives. Soon on this
apparently sterile soil Catholic parishes grew up and flourished in
the midst of people who had never before seen a priest. Thus were
founded the churches of Massachusetts, Maine, and Connecticut--so
quickly that, in 1810 (that is to say, only eighteen years after the
beginning of the missions), it was deemed advisable to erect for them
another bishopric. Congregations had sprung up on every side as if by
enchantment, and the venerable Abbé Cheverus was appointed their first
bishop.

Others went westward. The Abbés Flaget, Badin, Barriere, Fournier, and
Salmon carried the faith into Kentucky. There they found a few
Catholic families who had emigrated from Maryland. With them they
organized churches, which increased with prodigious rapidity, and were
the origin of the present dioceses of Louisville, Covington,
Nashville, and Alton.

The Abbés Richard, Levadour, Dilhiet, and several others, passed
through the forest and the wilderness, and joined the old French
colonies which still survived around the ruins of the French military
posts in the Northwest and in the valley of the Mississippi. They
found there a few missionaries, whom the Canadian Church still
maintained in those distant countries; but their ranks were thin, and
they were old and feeble. This precious reinforcement enabled them to
give a fresh impetus to the French Catholic congregations over whom
they kept watch in the forest. Detroit, Vincennes, Cahokia, Kaskaskia,
and afterward St. Geneviève and St. Louis in Missouri, ceded to the
United States in 1803, received the visits of these new apostles, and
experienced the benefits of their intelligence and zeal. Nearly all
the places where they fixed themselves have since given their names to
large and flourishing bishoprics.

Several of the emigrant priests remained in Maryland and Virginia, and
enabled the Sulpitians to complete the organization of their seminary,
while at the same time they assisted Bishop Carroll in providing more
perfectly and regularly for the wants of those central provinces which
might be called the first home of American Catholicism. The number of
the faithful everywhere increased remarkably. We can hardly estimate
the extraordinary influence which these French missionaries exercised
by their exemplary lives, their learning, their great qualities as
men, and their virtues as saints; and the Anglo-Saxon inhabitants (who
are thoroughly Protestant if you will, but for all that religious at
bottom) were struck by their character all the more forcibly because
it was so totally different from what their prejudices had led them to
expect of the Catholic clergy.

There is something patriarchal and Homeric in the lives of these men,
which read like the poetic legends in which nations have commemorated
the history of their first establishment. We have seen the journal of
one of these missionaries--the Abbé Bourg, {5} who labored further
North, in New Brunswick and Nova Scotia. His life was one long,
perpetual Odyssey. In the spring he used to start from the Bay of
Chaleur, traverse the northern coasts of New Brunswick, pass down the
Bay of Fundy, make the entire circuit of the peninsula of Nova Scotia,
and after a journey of five hundred leagues, performed in nine or ten
months, visit the islands in the Gulf of St. Lawrence, and so come
back to his point of departure. From place to place, the news of his
approach was sent forward by the settlers, so that whenever he stopped
he found the faithful waiting for him, and whole families came fifteen
or twenty leagues to meet him. Hardly had he arrived before he began
the round of priestly labor, of confession and baptism, of burial and
marriage. He was the arbiter of private quarrels, and often of public
disputes. He found time withal to look after the education of the
children--at least to make sure that they were well taught at home.
Thus he would stay fifteen days perhaps in one place, a month in
another, according to the number of the inhabitants. The first
communion of the children crowned his visit. Then the man of God, with
a last blessing on his weeping flock, disappeared for a whole year;
and when the apparition so long desired, but so transitory, had
passed, it left behind a halo of superhuman glory, which seemed to
these pious people the glory rather of a prophet than of an ordinary
man.

In such ways the marks of a messenger from God seemed more and more
clearly and unmistakably stamped upon the Catholic missionary, and
Protestants themselves began to yield to the subtle influence of so
much real virtue and self-devotion. Conversions were frequent even
among the descendants of the stern Puritans. Many of the most fervent
Catholic families in the United States date from this period. A rich
Presbyterian minister of Boston (Mr. John Thayer) was converted, and
became a priest and an apostle. So God scattered the seed of grace
behind the footsteps of his poor, persecuted children, who, despite
their apparent misery, bore continually with them the wealth of the
soul, the power of the Word, and the marvellous attraction of their
sacrifices and virtues.

Providence, however, had not deployed so strong a force for no purpose
beyond the capture of these converts. A very few missionaries might
have sufficed for that; but it was now time to prepare the land for
the great European immigration which was to cause the astonishing
growth of the United States. Spreading themselves over the vast area
of the Union, the emigrants found everywhere these veteran soldiers
whom the French Revolution had sent forth into the New World as
pioneers, tried both by the pains of persecution and the labors of
apostleship. Before this great human tide the old emigrant priests
were like the primitive rocks which arrest and fix geological
deposits, The Catholic part of the tossing flood invariably settled
around them and their disciples. All over the West the churches
founded by the old French settlers increased, and new ones sprang up
wherever a Catholic priest established himself. From that moment the
grand progressive movement has never ceased. The blood of the martyrs
of France, the spirit of her banished apostles, became fruitful of
blessings, of which the American churches are daily sensible.

The first bishop in the United States had been appointed in 1789. Four
years afterward another see was erected at New Orleans, La., which,
ten years later, became a part of the United States; and in 1808, so
rapid had been the Catholic development, that three new bishops were
consecrated--one for Louisville, Ky., another for New York, and the
third for Boston, Mass. Two of these sees were occupied by the French
missionaries who had founded them--Bishop {6} Flaget at Louisville,
and Bishop Cheverus at Boston. That of New York was entrusted to a
venerable priest of English [Irish] origin--the Rev. Luke Concanen. In
the whole United States there were then sixty-eight priests and about
100,000 Catholics. Lei us now glance at the rapid increase of the
American Church up to our own day.


I.

From the States of Maryland and Pennsylvania the Church was not long
in spreading into Virginia, New York, Kentucky, and Ohio. The
establishment of sees at Louisville and New York was followed by the
erection of others at Philadelphia in 1809, and Richmond and
Cincinnati in 1821. The two Carolinas, in which the Catholics had
hitherto been an obscure and rigorously proscribed class, received a
bishop at Charleston in 1820. New Orleans, a diocese of French
creation, was divided in 1824 by the erection of the bishopric of
Mobile. The old French colonies in the far West were the nucleus
around which were formed other churches. The dioceses of St. Louis,
Mo. (organized in 1826), Detroit, Mich. (1832), and Vincennes, Ind.
(1834), all took their names from ancient French settlements, and were
peopled almost exclusively by descendants of the French Canadians who
were their first inhabitants.

Thus, in the course of twenty-six years, we see eight new sees
erected, making the number of bishops in the United States thirteen.
The number of the clergy amounted in 1830 to 232, and in 1834 probably
exceeded 300. At the date of the next official returns (1840) there
were 482 priests and three more bishoprics--those of Natchez, Miss.,
and Nashville, Tenn., both established in 1837, and that of Monterey
in California, a country of Spanish settlement which had recently been
annexed to the United States.   [Footnote 3]

  [Footnote 3: Monterey was not a part of the United States until
  1848, nor a bishop's see until 1850. In place of it we should
  substitute Dubuque, made a see in 1837.--ED. C. W.]

But this increase was not comparable to that which followed between
1840 and 1850. In ten years the number of bishops was doubled by the
erection of fifteen [seventeen] new sees. In 1840 there were sixteen;
in 1850 thirty-one [thirty-three]. The growth during this period was
most perceptible in the North and West. Among the new sees were
Hartford, Conn., Albany and Buffalo, N. Y., Pittsburg, Penn.,
Cleveland, O., Chicago, Ill., Milwaukee, Wis., St. Paul, Minn., Oregon
City and Nesqualy, Oregon, and Wheeling in Northern Virginia. The
others were Little Rock, Ark., Savannah, Ga., Galveston, Texas, and
Santa Fé, New Mexico.   [Footnote 4] The clergy in 1850 numbered
1,800, having considerably more than doubled [nearly quadrupled] their
number in ten years.

  [Footnote 4: And San Francisco and Monterey--ED C. W.]

Thus we see that the Church was pressing hard and fast upon the old
New England Puritans. They soon began to feel uneasy, and to oppose
sometimes a violent resistance to her progress. In some of the States,
especially Connecticut and New Hampshire, there were laws against the
Catholics yet unrepealed; so that the dominant party had more ways of
showing their hatred of the Church than by mere petty vexations. In
Boston things went so far that a nunnery was pillaged and burned by a
mob. It is from this time that we must date the origin of the
Know-Nothing movement, directed ostensibly against foreigners, but
undoubtedly animated in the main by hatred of Catholicism and alarm at
its progress. The fretting and fuming of this political party was the
last effort of Puritan antipathy. The Church prospered in spite of it;
so the Puritans resigned themselves to witness her gradual aggressions
with the best grace they could assume.

{7}

Ten new sees were established between 1850 and 1860, and eight of
these were in the North or West--viz., Erie, Newark, Burlington,
Portland, Fort Wayne, Sault St. Marie, Alton, and Brooklyn. Two were
in the South--Covington and Natchitoches. There were thus in the
United States, in 1860, forty-three bishoprics, with 2,235 priests.
Let us now see how many Catholics were embraced in these dioceses, and
what proportion they bore to the total population.

The number of the faithful it is not easy to determine accurately; for
a false delicacy prevents the Americans from including the statistics
of religious belief in their census-tables. Estimates are very
variable. A work printed at Philadelphia in 1858 by a Protestant
author sets down the number of Catholics as 3,177,140. Dr. Baird, a
Protestant minister, published at Paris in 1857 an essay on religion
in the United States--an essay, be it remarked, which showed the
Catholics no favor--in which he estimated their number at 3,500,000.
But neither of these estimates rests upon trustworthy data. They were
certainly below the truth when they were made, and are therefore far
from large enough now, for the yearly increase is very great.

Our own calculations are drawn partly from our personal observation,
and partly from official documents published by various ecclesiastical
authorities. The best criterion is undoubtedly the rate of increase of
the clergy.

It must be evident that in America, more than in any other country,
there is a logical relation between the number of the faithful and the
number of the priests. As the clergy depend entirely upon the
voluntary contributions of their people, there must be a fixed ratio
between the growth of the flocks and the multiplication of pastors. If
the clergy increase too fast, they endanger their means of support.
Now, if priests cannot live in America without a certain number of
parishioners to support them, we may take this number as a basis for
calculating the minimum of the Catholic population; and we may safely
say that the population will be in reality much greater than this
minimum; because, as we can testify from experience, the churches
never lack congregations, and in most places the number of the clergy
is insufficient to supply even the most pressing religious wants of
the people. One never sees a priest in the United States seeking for
employment. On the contrary, the cry of spiritual destitution daily
goes up from parishes and communities which have no pastors.

Calculations founded upon the statistics of "church accommodations"
given in the United States census--that is, of the number of persons
the churches are capable of holding--are not applicable to our case;
because the Catholic churches, especially in the large cities, are
thronged two or three times every Sunday by as many distinct
congregations, while the Protestant churches have only one service for
all. The capacity of the churches therefore gives us neither the
actual number of worshippers nor the proportion between our own people
and those of other denominations. We have taken, then, as the basis of
our estimate, the ratio between the number of priests and the number
of the faithful, correcting the result according to the circumstances
of particular places. The first point is to establish this ratio, and
we are led by the concurrent results of careful estimates made in some
of the States, and special or general calculations which we have had
opportunity of making in person, to fix it at the average of one
priest for every 2,000 Catholics. But we have a very trustworthy
method of verifying this estimate, and that is by comparison between
the United States and the contiguous British Provinces, in which the
statistics of religious belief are included in the general census.
Setting aside Lower Canada, where the Catholic population is as
compact as it is in France, we find that in Upper {8} Canada, a
country which resembles the Western United States, the ratio in 1860
was one priest for every 1,850 Catholics, and in New Brunswick, a
territory very like New England, one for every 2,400. Our average
ratio of one for every 2,000 cannot, therefore, be far from the truth.
We have made due account of all data by which this ratio could be
either raised or lowered in particular times and places. We have
ourselves made investigations in certain districts, and persons well
qualified to speak on the subject have given us information about
others. The result of our corrected calculation gives us 4,400,000 as
the Catholic population of the United States in 1860, the date of the
last general census. We shall give presently the distribution of this
total among the several states; but we wish first to call attention to
another fact of great importance which appears from our figures. In
1808 the Catholics were 100,000 in a total population of 6,500,000, or
1/65th of the whole; in 1830 they were 450,000 in 13,000,000, or
1/29th of the whole; in 1840, 960,000 in 17,070,000, or 1/18th; in
1850, 2,150,000 in 23,191,000, or 1/11th; and finally, in 1860 they
were over 4,400,000 in 31,000,000, or 1/7th of the total population.
It thus appears that for fifty years the Catholics have increased much
faster than the rest of the inhabitants, and especially during the
last two decades. Between 1840 and 1850 their ratio of increase was
125 per cent., while that of the whole population was only 36; and
from 1850 to 1860 their ratio of increase was 109 per cent., while
that of the whole people was 35.59. These figures, to be sure, are not
mathematically certain, for they are deduced partly from estimates;
but we are confident that, considering the imperfect materials at our
disposal, we have come as near the exact truth as possible, both in
the ratio of increase and in the total population. Official returns in
the British Provinces confirm our calculations in a most remarkable
manner; and we believe that, estimating the future growth on the most
moderate scale, the Catholics will number in 1870 one-fifth of the
whole population, and in 1900 not far from one-third.


II.

Having traced the progress of the Church step by step in the United
States, it will now be equally interesting and instructive to see how
this progress has been made in different places. The Catholics are by
no means uniformly dispersed over the country, and their increase has
not been equally rapid in all the states. It will be worth our while
to see in which quarters they are settled with the most compactness
and in which they are widely dispersed; and thus we may predict
without great risk which regions are destined to be the Catholic
strongholds in the New World. We have already said that the proportion
of the Catholics to the whole people in 1860 was as one to seven; but
if we divide the country into two parts we shall find that in the
Southern states there are only 1,200,000 Catholics in a population of
12,000,000--that is, they are 1/10th of the whole; while in the North
they number 3,200,000 in 19,000,000, or more than 1/6th. Even these
figures give but a very general idea of the distribution of the
faithful. If we take the whole country, state by state, we shall find
the proportions still more variable. In some places the Catholic
element is already so strong that its ultimate preponderance can
hardly be doubted, while its slow development in other quarters
promises little for the future. The following tables will enable our
readers to comprehend at once the distribution of the Catholics among
the various states:

{9}

NORTHERN STATES.

SOUTHERN STATES.

[Illustration]

{10}

These tables show at a glance the disproportion between the Catholics
of the North and those of the South. In only one Northern state (that
of Maine) is the proportion of Catholics as small as 5.45 per cent, of
the whole population; while there are no fewer than five Southern
states in which it is less than three per cent. If we leave out New
Mexico, Texas, Louisiana, Missouri, and Maryland, where the
preponderance of the faithful is due to special causes, we find that
in the other Southern states the average proportion is not above four
per cent. In other words, in these regions the Church has little
better than a nominal existence. This is partly because the stream of
European immigration has always flowed in other directions, and partly
because the negroes generally adhere to the Baptist or Methodist sects
in preference to the Church.

But when we examine the tables more in detail, we see that in both
sections the ratio of Catholics varies greatly in different states. It
is easy to account for this difference in the South. Six states only
have any considerable number of Catholic inhabitants. Louisiana and
Missouri owe them to the old French colonies around which the Catholic
settlers clustered. In New Mexico, more than three-fourths of the
people are of Spanish-Mexican origin. Texas derives a great number of
her inhabitants from Mexico, and has received a large Catholic
emigration both from Europe and from the United States. Maryland, the
germ of the American Church, owes her religious prosperity to the
first English Catholic settlers; and the Church in Kentucky is an
offshoot of that in Maryland. Such are the special causes of the great
differences between the churches of the various Southern states. In
the North there is less disparity. European immigration has produced a
much more decided effect in this section than in the preceding. From
this source come most of the faithful of New York, Oregon, California,
Ohio, and New Jersey. In Ohio the Germans have done the principal
part, and they have done much also in Pennsylvania and Wisconsin. The
effect of conversions is more perceptible in Connecticut, Rhode
Island, Massachusetts, and New York than elsewhere. In many of the
states, however, and especially in Pennsylvania, we find numerous
descendants of English Catholic settlers, while the old French
colonies of the West have had their influence upon the population of
Michigan, Wisconsin, Minnesota, and Illinois, and also of the northern
part of New York, where the French Canadians are daily spreading their
ramifications across the frontier. If we look now at the localities in
which the proportion of Catholics is greatest, we shall notice several
interesting points touching the laws which have determined the
direction of the principal development of the Church, and which will
probably promote it in the future. In the South there are what we may
call three groups of states in which the Catholic element is notably
stronger than in the others. One belongs exclusively to the Southern
section, and consists of Louisiana, Texas, and New Mexico, having an
aggregate Catholic population of 380,000 in 1,363,800, or 28 per
cent. The other groups (Missouri, that is to say, and Maryland and
Kentucky) form parts of much larger groups belonging to the Northern
states. The first of these latter, and that to which Maryland and
Kentucky are attached, consists of Pennsylvania, New York, New Jersey,
and Ohio. Its aggregate population is 11,647,477, of whom the
Catholics are 2,240,000, or nineteen per cent. This group contains the
ancient establishments of Maryland and Pennsylvania--good old Catholic
communities, in which the zeal and piety of the faithful possess that
firm and decided character which comes of long practice and
time-honored traditions. It contains, too, the magnificent seminary of
Baltimore, founded and still directed by the Sulpitians. This is the
largest and most complete {11} establishment of the kind in the United
States, and derives from its connection with the Sulpitian house in
Paris special advantages for superintending the education of young
ecclesiastics, and training accomplished ministers for the sanctuary.
Kentucky, likewise, has some important and noteworthy institutions,
such as the seminary of St. Thomas and the college of St. Mary, both
of which are in high repute at the West, and the magnificent Abbey of
Our Lady of La Trappe at New Haven, with sixty-four religious,
eighteen of whom are choir-monks. The Kentucky Catholics deserve a few
words of special mention. The descendants, for the most part, of the
first settlers of Maryland, who scattered, about a century ago, in
order to people new countries, they partake in an eminent degree of
the peculiar characteristics which have given to Kentuckians a
reputation as the flower of the American people. They are more
decidedly American than the Catholics of any other district, and they
are remarkable for their homogeneousness, their education, and their
attachment to the faith and traditions of the Church.

The most important and numerous Catholic population is found in the
state of New York, where the faithful amount to no fewer than 800,000.
They have here religious establishments of every kind. This condition
of things is the result, in great measure, of the well-known ability
of Archbishop Hughes, whose death has left a void which the American
clergy will find it hard to fill. His reputation was not confined to
the Empire City. He was as well known all over the Union as at his own
see, and was everywhere regarded as one of the great men of the
country. Although the progress of the faith in New York has been owing
in a very great degree to immigration, it is in this city and in
Boston that conversions have been most numerous; and in effecting
these, Archbishop Hughes had a most important share. It is not
surprising, then, that his death should have caused a profound
sensation in the city, and that all religious denominations should
have united in testifying respect for his memory.

It is difficult to apply a statistical table to the study of the
question of conversions. These are mental operations of infinite
variety, both in their origin and in their ways; for the methods of
Providence are as many and as diverse as the shades of human thought
upon which they act. It may be remarked, however, that the different
Protestant sects furnish very unequal contingents to the little army
of souls daily returning to the true faith; and it is a curious fact
that the two sects which furnish the most are the Episcopalians, who,
in their forms and traditions, approach nearest to the Catholic
Church, and the Unitarians, who go to the very opposite extreme, and
appear to push their philosophical and rationalistic principles almost
beyond the pale of Christianity. These two sects generally comprise
the most enlightened and intellectual people of North America. On the
other hand, the denominations which embrace the more ignorant portions
of the population (such as the Baptists, the Wesleyan Methodists,
etc., etc.) furnish, in proportion to their numbers, but few converts.
The principal Catholic review in the United States (_Brownson's
Review_, published in New York) is edited by a well-known convert,
whose name it bears, and who was formerly a Unitarian minister.

Further North--in New England--there is another Catholic group, of
recent origin, formed of the Puritan states of Connecticut,
Massachusetts, and Rhode Island. The first see here was established by
Bishop Cheverus only sixty years ago. These bishoprics, however, have
already acquired importance; for in the diocese of Hartford the
Catholics are now sixteen per cent, of the whole population, and the
rapidity of their increase and the completeness of their church
organization give us ground for bright hopes of their future progress.
Immigration {12} here does much to promote conversions, and it will
not be extravagant to anticipate that in the course of a few years the
number of the faithful will be doubled. _The Pilot_, the most
important Catholic journal in the country, is published in Boston.

The far West, only a few years ago, was a great wilderness, with only
a few French posts scattered here and there in the Indian forest, like
little islands in the midst of a great ocean. Now it is divided into
several states, and counts millions of inhabitants. In this rapid
transformation, Catholicism has not remained behind. Many dioceses
have been established, and the quickness of their growth has already
placed this group in the second rank so far as regards numerical
importance, while all goes to show that Catholicism is destined here
to preponderate greatly over all other denominations. The states of
Missouri, Illinois, Michigan, Wisconsin, and Minnesota contained, in
1860, 4,575,000 souls, of whom 890,000, or 19 per cent., were
Catholics. This is as large a proportion as we find in the central
group. It is, moreover, rapidly rising, and only one thing is
necessary to make these states before long the principal seats of
Catholicism in the Union--that is, an adequate supply of priests. It
is of the utmost importance that the demand for missionaries in these
diocese be supplied at whatever cost.

The principal causes of this remarkable increase are, first, the
crowds of immigrants attracted by the great extent of fertile land
thrown open to settlers; and, secondly, the fact that the Catholic
immigrants on their arrival clustered, so to speak, around the old
French settlements, where the missionaries still maintained the
discipline and worship of the Church. At first, therefore, it was easy
to direct this great influx of people, since they naturally tended
toward the pre-existing centres of faith. The consequence was that the
Church lost by apostacies fewer members than one might have supposed,
and fewer than were lost in other places. But now the daily augmenting
crowds of immigrants are dispersing themselves through less solitary
regions. They are coming under more direct and various influences; and
hence the necessity for increasing the number of churches and parish
priests becomes daily more and more urgent. At the same time, the
means at the disposal of the bishops become daily less and less
adequate for supplying this want, especially since the people of the
country, new and unsettled as they are, and absorbed in material
cares, furnish but few candidates for the priesthood. Here we see a
glorious field for the far-reaching benevolence of the Society for the
Propagation of the Faith. Nowhere, we believe, will the sending forth
of pious and devoted priests produce fruits comparable to those of
which the past gives promise to the future in this part of the United
States. We spoke just now of the old French colonies, and our readers
will perhaps be surprised that we should have made so much account of
those poor little villages, which numbered hardly more than from 500
to 1,500 souls each when the Yankees began to come into the country.
Nevertheless, we have not exaggerated their importance. It is not only
that they served as centres and rallying-points; but so rapid is the
multiplication of families in America that this French population
which, if brought together in one mass in 1800, would have counted at
most 14,000 souls, now numbers, including both the original
settlements and the swarms of emigrants who have gone from them to the
West, not fewer than 80,000. Their descendants are always easily
recognized. Detroit, and its neighborhood in Michigan, Vincennes
(Ind.), Cahokia and Kaskaskia (Ill.), St. Louis, St. Geneviève,
Carondelet, etc. (Mo.), Green Bay and Prairie du Chien (Wis.), St.
Paul (Minn.)--all these old settlements have preserved the deep imprint
of our race. Even in the new colonies which were afterward drawn from
them, the French population have uniformly kept up the practice of
their religion, {13} the use of their mother tongue, and a lively
recollection of their origin. Of this fact we have obtained proof in
several instances from careful personal observation. Small and poor,
therefore, as these settlements were, they had a powerful moral
influence upon the great immigration of the nineteenth century. The
Catholic immigrants felt drawn toward them by the attraction of a
community of thought and customs; and God, whose Providence rules our
lives, directed the movement by his own inscrutable methods.

III.

While the Catholic element was increasing at the rate of 80, 125, and
109 per cent, every ten years, other religious denominations showed an
increase of only twenty or twenty-five per cent. Some remained
stationary, and a few even lost ground. Whence comes this continued
and increasing disparity in the development of different portions of
the same people? The principal reason assigned for it is the immense
emigration from Ireland to America. As the number of Catholics in the
United States when the emigration began was very small, every swarm of
fresh settlers added much more to their ratio of increase than to that
of other denominations. Ten added to ten gives an increase of 100 per
cent.; but the same number added to 100 gives only ten per cent. At
first sight, this seems a sufficient explanation; but we shall find,
when we come to examine it, that it does not really account for our
increase. If the growth of the American Catholic Church were the
result wholly of immigration, we should find that as the number of
Catholic inhabitants increased, the apparent effect of this
immigration would be diminished. In other words, the _ratio_ of increase
would gradually fall to an equality with that of other denominations.
But, so far from this being the case, the difference between our ratio
of increase and that of the Protestant sects is as great as ever--is
even growing greater. The ratio which was ten per cent. a year between
1830 and 1840, rose to 12.50 per cent, a year between 1840 and 1850,
and was 10.09 per cent, between 1850 and 1860. There are other causes,
therefore, beside European emigration to which we must look for an
explanation of Catholic progress in America. If we study with a little
attention the extent to which immigration has influenced the
development of the whole population of the country, and the exact
proportion of the Catholic part of this immigration, we shall find
confirmation of the conclusions to which we have been led by the
simple testimony of figures. Immigration has never furnished more than
six or seven per cent. of the decennial increase of the population of
the United States, the growth of which has been at the rate of
thirty-five per cent, during the same period. Immigration, therefore,
contributed to it only one-fifth. Again, of these immigrants,
including both Irish and Germans, not more than one-third have been
Catholics. Moreover, we must take account of the considerable number
of members that the Church has lost in the course of their dispersion
all over the country.

Clearly, then, the influence of immigration is not enough to account
for the rapid progress of the faith. A careful analysis of the
Catholic population at different tunes, and in different places,
enables us to specify two other causes.

1. The Catholics are principally distributed at the North among the
free states, where the population increases much faster than it does
at the South; and the Catholic families, it has been observed,
multiply much faster than the others, in consequence, no doubt, of
their more active and regular habits of life, sustained morality,
respect for the marriage tie, and regard for domestic obligations.
This difference in fecundity is quite perceptible wherever the
Catholic element {14} is strong--as in Canada, and the states of New
York, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Michigan, Illinois, Wisconsin, etc., and,
among the Southern states, in Louisiana, Maryland, and Missouri.

2. Another cause of increase is the conversion of Protestants--a cause
which operates slowly, quietly, and, at first, imperceptibly, but with
that constant and uniform power--reminding us of the great operations
of nature--which is almost always the sign of a Providential agency.
Eloquent theorists and brilliant writers on statistics, preferring
salient facts and striking phenomena--what they call the great
principles of science--too often overlook or despise those obscure
movements which act quietly upon the human conscience. Yet how much
more powerful is this mysterious action--like the continual dropping of
water--than the showy effects which captivate so many thinkers, whose
organs of perception seem dazzled by the glow of their imagination!
Such was the nature of the invisible operation which was inaugurated
by the preaching of the martyrs of the faith whom the French
Revolution cast forth like seed all over the world. The rules of
political economy had nothing to do with it. It acted in the secret
chambers of men's hearts and the retirement of their meditative
moments, and it has gone on without interruption to the present
moment, increasing year by year. The Church seizes upon the
convictions of grown men; reaches the young by her admirable systems
of education; impresses all by her living, persuasive propagandism,
made beautiful by the zeal and devotion and holiness of her
missionaries. Simple and dignified, without the affectation of dignity--
austere, without fanaticism--their presence alone roots up old
prejudices, while their preaching and example fill the soul with new
lights and with anxieties which nothing but their instructions can set
at rest. Thus, wherever they go, the thoughts and comparisons which
they suggest multiply conversions all around them. You have only to
question a few Catholic families in the older states about their early
religious history, and you will see how important an element in the
prosperity of the Church is this force of attraction--so important,
that the following statement may almost be taken as a general law:
Wherever a Catholic priest establishes himself, though there be not a
Catholic family in the place, it is almost certain that by the end of
a time which varies from five to ten years, he will be surrounded by a
Catholic community large enough to form a parish and support a
clergyman. This rule seems to us to have no exception except in some
of the southern states. We have no hesitation in stating it broadly of
even those parts of New England in which the anti-Catholic feeling is
now strongest.

We shall presently have occasion to show that the only thing which
prevents the American Church from increasing, perhaps doubling, the
rapidity of its progress, is the scarcity of ecclesiastics and
missionaries, from which all the dioceses are suffering.

We have explained the important part which converts have played in
this progress. The inquiry naturally arises: Whence come so many
conversions? What are the causes which generally lead to them? These
are delicate and difficult questions. We have no wish to speak ill of
the Protestant clergy. Most of them are certainly honorable men,
estimable husbands and good fathers; but we cannot help observing that
they lack the sacerdotal character so conspicuous in the Catholic
priest. Their ministry and their teaching cannot fully satisfy the
soul; and whenever a calm and unprejudiced comparison is drawn between
them and the Catholic clergy, it is strange if the former do not
suffer by the contrast, and behold their flocks, little by little,
passing over to the side of the Church. This comparison is one motive
which often leads Protestants, not precisely into {15} the bosom of
the faith, but to the study of Catholic doctrine; and this is a step
by no means easy to persuade them to take; for, of every ten
Protestants who honestly study the faith, seven or eight end by
becoming Catholics. The Americans are a people of a strong religious
bent. Nothing which concerns the great question of religion is
indifferent to them. They study and reflect upon such matters much
more than we skeptical and critical Frenchmen. The conversions
resulting from such frequent consideration of religious matters ought,
therefore, to be far more numerous in America, and even in England,
than in other countries.

There are doubtless many other causes which contribute to the same
result. Among them are mixed marriages, which generally turn out to
the advantage of the Church, especially in the case of educated people
in the upper ranks in society. Not only are the children of these
marriages brought up Catholics, but almost always, as experience has
shown us, the Protestant parent becomes a Catholic too.

The excellent houses of education directed by religious orders are
another active cause of conversions. If elementary education is almost
universal in the United States, it is nevertheless true that the
higher institutions of learning are exceedingly defective. The
colleges and boarding-schools founded under the direction of the
Catholic clergy, though inferior to those of France in the
thoroughness of the education they impart and the amount of study
required of their pupils, are yet vastly superior to all other
American establishments in their method, their discipline, and the
attainments of their professors. The consequence is that they are
resorted to by numbers of Protestant youth of both sexes. No
compulsion is used to make them Catholics; no undue influence is
exerted; the press, free as it is, rarely finds excuse for complaint
on this score; but facts and doctrines speak for themselves. The good
examples and affectionate solicitude which surround these young
people, and the friendships they contract, leave a deep impression on
their minds, and plant the seed of serious thought, which sooner or
later bears fruit. Various circumstances may lead to the final
development of this seed. Now perhaps a first great sorrow wakens it
into life; now it is quickened by new ideas born of study and
experience; in one case the determining influence may be a marriage;
in another, intercourse with Catholic society; and not a few may be
moved by the falsity of the notions of Catholicism which they find
current among Protestants, and which their own experience enables them
to detect. This motive operates oftener than people suppose, and
generally with those who at school or college seemed most bitterly
hostile to the faith. In tine, those who have been educated at
Catholic institutions are less prejudiced and better prepared for the
action of divine grace, which Providence may send through any one of a
thousand channels.

And lastly, Catholicism acts upon the Americans through the medium of
the habits and customs to which it gradually attaches them, the result
of which is that in the growth of the population the Church makes a
constant, an insensible, and what we might call a spontaneous
increase. It is a well-known fact that the Catholic families of North
America, as a general rule, are distinguished by a character of
stability, good order, and moderation which is often wanting in the
Yankee race. Now this turns to the advantage of the Church; for it is
evident that a people which fixes itself permanently where it has once
settled, which concentrates itself, so to speak, has a better chance
of acquiring a predominance in the long run than one of migratory
habits, always in pursuit of some better state which always eludes it.
This truth is nowhere more apparent than in a county of Upper Canada
where we spent nearly three years. The county of Glengarry was settled
{16} in 1815 by Scotchmen, some of whom were Catholics. The colony
increased partly by the natural multiplication of the settlers, partly
by immigration, until about 1840, when immigration almost totally
ceased, all the lands being occupied. The population was then left to
grow by natural increase alone. The Protestants at that time were
considerably in the majority; but by 1850 the proportions began to
change, and out of 17,576 inhabitants 8,870 were Catholics. In 1860
the majority was completely reversed, and in a population of 21,187
there were 10,919 Catholics; in other words, the latter, by the
regular operation of natural causes, had gained every year from one to
two per cent, upon the whole. It would not be easy to give a detailed
explanation of this fact; we are only conscious that some mysterious
and irresistible agency is gradually augmenting the proportion of the
Catholic element in American society and weakening the Protestant.

American society might be compared to a troubled expanse of water
holding various substances in solution. The solid bottom upon which
the waters rest is formed by the deposit of these substances, and day
after day, during the moments of rest which follow every agitation of
the waves, more and more of the Catholic element is precipitated which
the waters bring with them at each successive influx, but fail to
carry off again. It is by this human alluvium that our religion grows
and extends itself; and if this growth is wonderful, it may be that
the effect of the infusion of so much sound doctrine into American
society will prove equally astonishing and precious.

Great stress has often been laid upon the good qualities of the
American people, but comparatively few have spoken of their faults;
not because they had none, but because their faults were lost sight of
in the brilliancy of their material prosperity. But recent events have
led to more reflection upon this point; so it will not astonish our
readers if we point oat one or two, such as the decay of thoughtful,
systematic, methodical intelligence among them, in comparison with
Europeans; their narrowness of mind; their inaptitude for general
ideas; and their sensibly diminishing delicacy of mind. These defects
show an unsuspected but serious and rapid degeneracy of the
Anglo-American race, and the decline has already perhaps gone further
than one would readily believe. If Catholicism, which tends eminently
to develop a spirit of method and order, broadness of view and
delicacy of sentiment, should combat successfully these failings, it
would render a signal service to the United States in return for the
liberty which they have granted it.

But Catholics, we should add, are indebted to the United States for
something more than simple liberty. They have there learned to
appreciate their real power. They have learned by experience how
little they have to fear from pure universal liberty, how much
strength and influence they can acquire in such a state of society.
There is this good and this evil in liberty--that it always proves to
the advantage of the strong; so that when there is question of the
relations between man and man, it must be a well-regulated liberty, or
it will result in the oppression of the weak. But the case is
different when it comes to a question of discordant doctrines: man has
everything to gain by the triumph of sound, strong principles and the
destruction of false and specious theories. In such a contest, let but
each side appear in its true colors, and we have nothing to fear for
the cause of truth. The United States will at least have had the merit
of affording an opportunity for a powerful demonstration of the truth;
and great as are the advantages which the Catholic Church can confer
upon the country, she herself will reap still greater advantages by
conferring them; for it will turn to her benefit in her action upon
the world at large.

In fact, the experience of the Church {17} in America has doubtless
gone for something in the familiarity which religious minds are
gradually acquiring with the principles of political liberty; and thus
the growth of American Catholicism is allied to the world-wide
reaction which is now taking place after the religious eclipse of the
last century. This transformation of the United States, in truth, is
only one marked incident in the intellectual revolution which is
drawing the whole world toward the Catholic Church--England as well
as America, Germany as well as England, even Bulgaria in the far East.
The foreign press brings us daily the signs of this progress; and
nothing can be easier than to point them out in France under our own
eyes. But unfortunately we have been too much in the habit, for the
last century, of leading a life of continual mortification, too
conscious that we were laughed at by the leaders of public opinion. We
crawled along in fear and trembling, creeping close to the walls,
dreading at every step to give offence, or to cause scandal, or to
lose some of our brethren. Accustomed to see our ranks thinned and
whole files carried off in the flower of their youth, we stood in too
great fear of the deceitful power of doctrines which seemed to promise
everything to man and ask nothing from him in return. And therefore
many of us still find it hard to understand the new state of things in
which we are making progress without external help. This progress,
however, inaugurated by the energy of a few, the perseverance of all,
and the overruling hand of divine Providence, is unquestionably going
on, and may easily be proved. We have only to visit our churches,
attend some of the special retreats for men, or look at the Easter
communions, to see what long steps faith and religious practice have
taken within the last forty years. The change is most perceptible
among the educated classes and in the learned professions. We have
heard old professors express their astonishment in comparing the
schools of the present time with those of their youth. It was then
almost impossible to find a young man at the _École Polytechnique_, at
St. Cyr, or at the _École Centrale_, with enough faith and enough
courage openly to profess his religion; now it may be said that a
fifth or perhaps a fourth part of the students openly and
unhesitatingly perform their Easter duty. We ourselves remember that
no longer ago than 1830 it required a degree of courage of which few
were found capable to manifest any religious sentiment in the public
lyceums. Voltairianism--or to speak better, an intolerant
fanaticism--delighted to cover these faithful few with public
ridicule; while now, if we may believe the best authorized accounts,
it is only a small minority who openly profess infidelity. We can
affirm that in the School of Law the change is quite as great, and it
has begun to operate even in that time-honored stronghold of
materialism, the School of Medicine.

But what must strike us most forcibly in the examination of these
questions is the fact, already pointed out by the Abbé Meignan, that
the progress of religion has kept even pace with the extension of free
institutions. Wherever the liberal _régime_ has been established, the
reaction in favor of religion has become stronger, no doubt because
liberty places man face to face with the consequences of his own acts
and the necessities of his feeble nature. Man is never so powerfully
impelled to draw near to God as when he becomes conscious of his own
weakness; never so deeply impressed with the emptiness of false
doctrines as when he has experienced their nothingness in the
practical affairs of life. The violence of external disorder soon
leads him to, reflect upon the necessity of solid, methodical, moral
education, such as regulates one's life, and such as the Church alone
can impart. And therefore the great change of sentiment of which we
have spoken is perceptible chiefly among the educated and liberal
classes, while with the ignorant and {18} vulgar infidelity holds its
own and is even gaining. The educated classes, more thoughtful,
knowing the world and having experience of men, see further and
calculate more calmly the tendency of events; with the common people
reason and plain sense are often overpowered by the violence of their
temperament and the impetuosity of their passions. Ignorance and
inordinate desires do the rest, and they imagine that man will know
how to conduct without knowing how to govern himself.

Whatever demagogues may say, history proves that the head always rules
the body. The period of discouragement and apprehension is past. We
shall yet, no doubt, have to go through trials, and violent crises,
and perhaps cruel persecutions; but we may hope everything from the
future. And why not? If we study the history of the Jewish people, we
shall see how God chastises his people in order to rouse them from
their moral torpor, and raise them up from apparent ruin by unforeseen
means. Weakness, in his hand, at once becomes strength; he asks of us
nothing but faith and courage. We have traced his Providence in the
methods by which he has stimulated the growth of the American
Church--methods all the more effectual because, unlike our own vain
enterprises, they worked for a long time in silence and obscurity.
These Western bishoprics remained almost unknown up to the day when,
the light bursting forth all at once, the world beheld a Church
already organized, already strong, where it had not suspected even her
existence.

There is a magnificent and instructive scene in _Athalie_, where the
veil of the temple is rent, and discloses to the eyes of the terrified
queen, Joas, whom she had believed dead, standing in his glory
surrounded by an army. Even so, it seems to us, was the American
Church suddenly revealed in all her vigor to the astonished world,
when her bishops came two years ago to take their place in the council
at Rome. And the same progress is making all over the globe. Noiseless
and unobtrusive, it attracts no attention from the world; it is
overlooked by Utopian theorists; it goes on quietly in the domain of
conscience; but the day will come when its light will break forth and
astonish mankind by its brightness. Such are the ways of God!


NOTE.--The greater part of the materials for the preceding article
were written or collected during the course of a journey which we made
in the United States in 1860. Since then the progress of Catholicism
has necessarily been somewhat checked by the events of the lamentable
civil war which is desolating the country; but the check has been far
less serious than might have reasonably been apprehended. Religion has
been kept apart from political dissensions and public disorders; it
has only had to suffer the common evils which war, mortality, and
general impoverishment have inflicted upon the whole people. If all
these things are to have any bad effect upon the progress of the
Church, it will be in future years, not now. In fact, all the
documents which we have been able to collect show that the numbers of
both the faithful and the clergy, instead of falling off, have gone on
increasing. In thirty-eight dioceses there are now 275 more priests
than there were in 1860; from the five other sees, namely, those of
New Orleans, Galveston, Mobile, Natchitoches, and Charleston, we have
no returns. This increase is confined almost entirely to the regions
in which the Church was already strongest; elsewhere matters have
remained about stationary.

Of this number of 275 priests added to the Church in the course of
three years, 251 belong to the following fourteen dioceses, namely:
Baltimore, Pittsburg, Cincinnati, Cleveland, Brooklyn, Albany, Alton,
Chicago, Milwaukee, St. Paul, Detroit, Fort Wayne, Vincennes, and
Hartford. The last-named belongs to the {19} Northeastern or New
England group, all the others to the Central and Western. Thus
fourteen dioceses alone show nine-tenths of the total increase, and
the others divide the remaining tenth among them in very minute
fractions. From some states, it is true, the returns are very meagre,
and from others they are altogether wanting; but the disproportion is
so strong as to leave no doubt that the future conquests of the Church
in the United States will be gained, as we have already said,
principally in the Middle and Western States.

E. R.

----

_From The Month._

THE ANCIENT SAINTS OF GOD.

A FRENCH OFFICER'S STORY.


BY THE LATE CARDINAL WISEMAN.


CHAPTER I.

INTRODUCTION.

We often practically divide the saints into three classes. The ancient
saints, those of the primitive age of Christianity, we consider as the
patrons of the universal Church, watching over its well-being and
progress, but, excepting Rome, having only a general connection with
the interests of particular countries, still less of individuals.

The great saints of the middle age, belonging to different races and
countries, have naturally become their patrons, being more especially
reverenced and invoked in the places of their births, their lives, and
still more their deaths; whence, St. Willibrord, St. Boniface, and St.
Walburga are more honored in Germany, where they died, than in
England, where they were born.

The third class includes the more modern saints, who spoke our yet
living languages, printed their books, followed the same sort of life,
wore the same dress as we do, lived in houses yet standing, founded
institutions still flourishing, rode in carriages, and in another
generation would have traveled by railway. Such are St. Charles, St.
Ignatius, St. Philip, St. Teresa, St. Vincent, B. Benedict Joseph, and
many others. Toward these we feel a personal devotion independent of
country; nearness of time compensating for distance of place. There is
indeed one class of saints who belong to every age and every country;
devotion toward whom, far from diminishing, increases the further we
recede from their time and even their land. For we are convinced that
a Chinese convert has a more sensitive and glowing devotion toward our
Blessed Lady, than a Jewish neophyte had in the first century. When I
hear this growth of piety denounced or reproached by Protestants, I
own I exult in it.

For the only question, and there is none in a Catholic mind, is
whether such a feeling is good in itself; if so, growth in it, age by
age, is an immense blessing and proof of the divine presence. It is as
if one told me that there is more humility now in the Church than
there was in the first century, more zeal than in the third, more
faith than in the eighth, more charity than in the twelfth. And so, if
there is more devotion now than there was 1,800 years ago toward the
Immaculate Mother of God, toward {20} her saintly spouse, toward St.
John, St. Peter, and the other Apostles, I rejoice; knowing that
devotion toward our divine Lord, his infancy, his passion, his sacred
heart, his adorable eucharist, has not suffered loss or diminution,
but has much increased. It need not be, and it is not, as John the
Baptist said, "He must increase, and I diminish." Both here increase
together; the Lord, and those who best loved him.

But this is more than a subject of joy: it is one of admiration and
consolation. For it is the natural course of things that sympathies
and affections should grow less by time. We care and feel much less
about the conquests of William I., or the prowess of the Black Prince,
than we do about the victories of Nelson or Wellington; even Alfred is
a mythical person, and Boadicea fabulous; and so it is with all
nations. A steadily increasing affection and intensifying devotion (as
in this case we call it) for those remote from us, in proportion as we
recede from them, is as marvellous--nay, as miraculous--as would be the
flowing of a stream from its source up a steep hill, deepening and
widening as it rose. And such I consider this growth, through
succeeding ages, of devout feeling toward those who were the root, and
seem to become the crown, or flower, of the Church. It is as if a beam
from the sun, or a ray from a lamp, grew brighter and warmer in
proportion as it darted further from its source.

I cannot but see in this supernatural disposition evidence of a power
ruling from a higher sphere than that of ordinary _providence_, the laws
of which, uniform elsewhere, are modified or even reversed when the
dispensations of the gospel require it; or rather, these have their
own proper and ordinary providence, the laws of which are uniform
within its system. And this is one illustration, that what by every
ordinary and natural course should go on diminishing, goes on
increasing. But I read in this fact an evidence also of the stability
and perpetuity of our faith; for a line that is ever growing thinner
and thinner tends, through its extenuation, to inanition and total
evanescence; whereas one that widens and extends as it advances and
becomes more solid, thereby gives earnest and proof of increasing
duration.

When we are attacked about practices, devotions, or corollaries of
faith--"developments," in other words--do we not sometimes labor
needlessly to prove that we go no further than the Fathers did, and
that what we do may be justified from ancient authorities? Should we
not confine ourselves to showing, even with the help of antiquity,
that what is attacked is good, is sound, and is holy; and then thank
God that we have so much more of it than others formerly possessed? If
it was right to say "Ora pro nobis" once in the day, is it not better
to say it seven times a day; and if so, why not seventy times seven?
The rule of forgiveness may well be the rule of seeking intercession
for it. But whither am I leading you, gentle reader? I promised you a
story, and I am giving you a lecture, and I fear a dry one. I must
retrace my steps. I wished, therefore, merely to say that, while the
saints of the Church are very naturally divided by us into three
classes--holy patrons of the Church, of particular portions of it, and
of its individual members--there is one raised above all others, which
passes through all, composed of protectors, patrons, and nomenclators,
of saints themselves. For how many Marys, how many Josephs, Peters,
Johns, and Pauls, are there not in the calendar of the saints, called
by those names without law of country or age!

But beyond this general recognition of the claims of our greatest
saints, one cannot but sometimes feel that the classification which I
have described is carried by us too far; that a certain human dross
enters into the composition of our devotion; we perhaps nationalize,
or even individualize, {21} the sympathies of those whose love is
universal, like God's own, in which alone they love. We seem to fancy
that St. Edward and St. Frideswida are still English; and some persons
appear to have as strong an objection to one of their children bearing
any but a Saxon saint's name as they have to Italian architecture. We
may be quite sure that the power and interest in the whole Church have
not been curtailed by the admission of others like themselves, first
Christians on earth, then saints in heaven, into their blessed
society; but that the friends of God belong to us all, and can and
will help us, if we invoke them, with loving impartiality. The little
history which I am going to relate serves to illustrate this view of
saintly intercession; it was told me by the learned and distinguished
prelate whom I shall call Monsig. B. He has, I have heard, since
published the narrative; but I will give it as I heard it from his
lips.


CHAPTER II.

THE FRENCH OFFICER'S FIRST APPEARANCE.


On the 30th of last month--I am writing early in August--we all
commemorated the holy martyrs, Sts. Abdon and Sennen. This in itself
is worthy of notice. Why should we in England, why should they in
America, be singing the praises of two Persians who lived more than
fifteen hundred years ago? Plainly because we are Catholics, and as
such in communion with the saints of Persia and the martyrs of Decius.
Yet it may be assumed that the particular devotion to these two
Eastern martyrs is owing to their having suffered in Rome, and so
found a place in the calendar of the catacombs, the basis of later
martyrologies. Probably after having been concealed in the house of
Quirinus the deacon, their bodies were buried in the cemetery or
catacomb of Pontianus, outside the present Porta Portese, on the
northern bank of the Tiber. In that catacomb, remarkable for
containing the primitive baptistery of the Church, there yet remains a
monument of these saints, marking their place of sepulture.  [Footnote
5] Painted on the wall is a "floriated" and jewelled cross; not a
conventional one such as mediaeval art introduced, but a plain cross,
on the surface of which the painter imitated natural jewels, and from
the foot of which grow flowers of natural forms and hues; on each side
stands a figure in Persian dress and Phrygian cap, with the names
respectively running down in letters one below the other:

SANCTVS ABDON: SANCTVS SENNEN.

The bodies are no longer there. They were no doubt removed, as most
were, in the eighth century, to save them from Saracenic profanation,
and translated to the basilica of St. Mark in Rome. There they repose,
with many other martyrs no longer distinguishable; since the ancient
usage was literally to bury the bodies of martyrs in a spacious crypt
or chamber under the altar, so as to verify the apocalyptic
description, "From under the altar of God all the saints cry aloud."
This practice has been admirably illustrated by the prelate to whom I
have referred, in a work on this very crypt, or, in ecclesiastical
language, _Confession_ of St. Mark's.

  [Footnote 5:  See _Fabiola_, pp. 362, 363.]

One 30th of July, soon after the siege of Rome in 1848, the chapter of
St. Mark's were singing the office and mass of these Persian martyrs,
as saints of their church. Most people on week-days content themselves
with hearing early a low mass, so that the longer offices of the
basilica, especially the secondary ones, are not much frequented. On
this occasion, however, a young French officer was noticed by {22} the
canons as assisting alone with great recollection.

At the close of the function, my informant went up to the young man,
and entered into conversation with him.

"What feast are you celebrating today?" asked the officer.

"That of Sts. Abdon and Sennen," answered Monsignor B.

"Indeed! how singular!"

"Why? Have you any particular devotion to those saints?"

"Oh, yes; they are my patron saints. The cathedral of my native town
is dedicated to them, and possesses their bodies."

"You must be mistaken there: their holy relics repose beneath our
altar; and we have to-day kept their feast solemnly on that account."

On this explanation of the prelate the young officer seemed a little
disconcerted, and remarked that at P-- everybody believed that the
saints' relics were in the cathedral.

The canon, as he then was, of St. Mark's, though now promoted to the
"patriarchal" basilica of St. John, explained to him how this might
be, inasmuch as any church possessing considerable portions of larger
relics belonging to a saint was entitled to the privilege of one
holding the entire body, and was familiarly spoken of as actually
having it; and this no doubt was the case at P--.

"But, beside general grounds for devotion to these patrons of my
native city, I have a more particular and personal one; for to their
interposition I believe I owe my life."

The group of listeners who had gathered round the officer was deeply
interested in this statement, and requested him to relate the incident
to which he alluded. He readily complied with their request, and with
the utmost simplicity made the following brief recital.



CHAPTER III.

THE OFFICER'S NARRATIVE.

"During the late siege of Rome I happened to be placed in an advanced
post, with a small body of soldiers, among the hillocks between our
headquarters in the villa Pamphily-Doria and the gate of St.
Pancratius. The post was one of some danger, as it was exposed to the
sudden and unsparing sallies made by the revolutionary garrison on
that side. The broken ground helped to conceal us from the marksmen
and the artillery on the walls. However, that day proved to be one of
particular danger. Without warning, a _sortie_ was made in force, either
merely in defiance or to gain possession of some advantageous post;
for you know how the church and convent of St. Pancratius was assailed
by the enemy, and taken and retaken by us several times in one day.
The same happened to the villas near the walls. There was no time
given us for speculation or reflection. We found ourselves at once in
presence of a very superior force, or rather in the middle of it; for
we were completely surrounded. We fought our best; but escape seemed
impossible. My poor little picket was soon cut to pieces, and I found
myself standing alone in the midst of our assailants, defending myself
as well as I could against such fearful odds. At length I felt I was
come to the last extremity, and that in a few moments I should be
lying with my brave companions. Earnestly desiring to have the
suffrages of my holy patrons in that my last hour, I instinctively
exclaimed, 'Sts. Abdon and Sennen, pray for me!' What then happened I
cannot tell. Whether a sudden panic struck my enemies, or something
more important called off their attention, or what else to me
inexplicable--occurred, I cannot say; all that I know is, that somehow
or other I found myself alone, unwounded {23} and unhurt, with my poor
fellows lying about, and no enemy near.

"Do you not think that I have a right to attribute this most wonderful
and otherwise unaccountable escape to the intercession and protection
of Sts. Abdon and Sennen?"

I need scarcely say that this simple narrative touched and moved
deeply all its hearers. No one was disposed to dissent from the young
Christian officer's conclusion.


CHAPTER IV.

THE EXPLANATION.

It was natural that those good ecclesiastics who composed the chapter
of St. Mark's should feel an interest in their youthful acquaintance.
His having accidentally, as it seemed, but really providentially,
strolled into their church at such a time, with so singular a bond of
sympathy with its sacred offices that day, necessarily drew them in
kindness toward him. His ingenuous piety and vivid faith gained their
hearts.

In the conversation which followed, it was discovered that all his
tastes and feelings led him to love and visit the religious monuments
of Rome; but that he had no guide or companion to make his wanderings
among them as useful and agreeable as they might be made. It was
good-naturedly and kindly suggested to him to come from time to time
to the church, when some one of the canons would take him with him on
his _ventidue ore_ walk after vespers, and act the _cicerone_ to him,
if they should visit some interesting religious object. This offer he
readily accepted, and the intelligent youth and his reverend guides
enjoyed pleasant afternoons together. At last one pleasanter than all
occurred, when in company with Monsignor B.

Their ramble that evening led them out of the Porta Portuensis, among
the hills of Monte Verde, between it and the gate of St. Pancratius--
perhaps for the purpose of visiting that interesting basilica. Be it
as it may, suddenly, while traversing a vineyard, the young man
stopped.

"Here," he exclaimed, "on this very spot, I was standing when my
miraculous deliverance took place."

"Are you sure?"

"Quite. If I lived a hundred years, I could never forget it. It is the
very spot."

"Then stand still a moment," rejoined the prelate; "we are very near
the entrance to the cemetery of Pontianus. I wish to measure the
distance."

He did so by pacing it.

"Now," he said, "come down into the catacomb, and observe the
direction from where you stand to the door." The key was soon
procured.

They accordingly went down, proceeded as near as they could judge
toward the point marked over-head, measured the distance paced above,
and found themselves standing before the memorial of Sts. Abdon and
Sennen.

"There," said the canon to his young friend; "you did not know that,
when you were invoking your holy patrons, you were standing
immediately over their tomb."

The young officer's emotion may be better conceived than described on
discovering this new and unexpected coincidence in the history of his
successful application to the intercession of ancient saints.



SANCTI ABDON ET SENNEN, ORATE PRO NOBIS.

------

{24}

From The Lamp.

A PILGRIMAGE TO ARS.


I went to Lyons for the express purpose of visiting the tomb of the
Curé of Ars; for I knew the village of Ars was not very far from that
city, though I had but a vague idea as to where it was situated or how
it was to be reached. I trusted, however, to obtaining all needful
information from the people at the hotel where I was to pass the
night; and I was not mistaken in my expectations; but I must confess,
to my sorrow, that I felt for a moment a very English sort of
shamefacedness about making the inquiry. Put to the waiter of an
English hotel, such a question would simply have produced a stare of
astonishment or a smile of pity. A visit to the tomb of the Duke of
Wellington at St. Paul's, or a descent into kingly vaults for the wise
purpose of beholding Prince Albert's coffin, with its wreaths of
flowers laid there by royal and loving hands these things he would
have sympathized with and understood. But a pilgrimage to the last
resting-place of a man who, even admitting he were at that moment a
saint in heaven, had been but a simple parish-priest upon earth, would
have been a proceeding utterly beyond his capacity to comprehend, and
he would undoubtedly have pronounced it either an act of insanity or
one of superstition, or something partaking of the nature of the two.
I forgot, for a moment, that I was in a Catholic country, and inquired
my way to Ars with an uncomfortable expectation of a sneering answer
in return. Once, however, that the question was fairly put, there was
nothing left for me but to be ashamed of my own misgivings.

"Madame wished to visit the tomb of the sainted Curé?--_mais oui_. It
was the easiest thing in the world. Only an hour's railway from Lyons
to Villefranche; and an omnibus at the latter station, which had been
established for the express purpose of accommodating the pilgrims, who
still flocked to Ars from every quarter of the Catholic world."

I listened, and my way seemed suddenly to become smooth before me.
Later on in the evening, I found that the housemaid of the hotel had
been there often; and two or three times at least during the lifetime
of the Curé. I asked her for what purpose she had gone there; whether
to be cured of bodily ailments or to consult him on spiritual matters?
"For neither one nor the other," she answered, with great simplicity;
"but she had had a great grief, and her mother had taken her to him to
be comforted." There was something to me singularly lovely in this
answer, and in the insight which it gave me into the nature of that
mission, so human, and yet so divine, which the Curé had accomplished
in his lifetime. God had placed him there, like another John the
Baptist, to announce penance to the world. He preached to thousands--he
converted thousands--he penetrated into the hidden consciences of
thousands, and laid his finger, as if by intuition, upon the hidden
sore that kept the soul from God. Men, great by wealth and station,
came to him and laid their burden of sin and misery at his feet. Men,
greater still by intellect, and prouder and more difficult of
conversion (as sins of the intellect ever make men), left his presence
simple, loving, and believing as little children. For these he had
lightning glances and words of fire; these by turns he reprimanded,
exhorted, and encouraged; but when the weak and sorrowful of God's
flock came to him, he paused in his apostolic task to weep over them
and console them. And so it was with {25} Jesus. The great and wealthy
of the earth came to him for relief, and he never refused their
prayers; but how many instances do we find in the gospel of the gift
of health bestowed, unasked and unexpected, upon some poor wanderer by
the wayside, or the yet greater boon of comfort given to some poor
suffering heart, for no other reason that we know of than that it
suffered and had need of comfort! The cripple by the pool of Bethsaida
received his cure at the very moment when he was heartsick with hope
deferred at finding no man to carry him down to the waters; and the
widow of Nain found her son suddenly restored to life because, as the
gospel expressly tells us, he was "the only son of his mother, and she
was a widow."

The heart of the Curé of Ars seems to have been only less tender than
that of his divine Master; and in the midst of the sublime occupation
of converting souls to God, he never disdained the humble task of
healing the stricken spirit, and leading it to peace and joy.

"My husband died suddenly," the young woman went on to say, in answer
to my further questions; "and from affluence I found myself at once
reduced to poverty. I was stunned by the blow; but my mother took me
to the cure; and almost before he had said a word, I felt not only
consoled, but satisfied with the lot which God had assigned me." And
so indeed she must have been. When I saw her, she was still poor, and
earning her bread by the worst of all servitude, the daily and nightly
servitude of a crowded inn; but gentle, placid, and smiling, as became
one who had seen and been comforted by a saint. She evidently felt
that she had been permitted to approach very near to God in the person
of God's servant, and every word she uttered was so full of love and
confidence in the sainted curé that it increased (if that were
possible) my desire to kneel at his tomb, since the happiness of
approaching his living person had been denied me.

The next morning I set off for Villefranche. It is on the direct line
to Paris, and at about an hour's railroad journey from Lyons. When I
reached it, I found three omnibuses waiting at the station, and I
believe they were all there for the sole purpose of conveying pilgrims
to Ars. One of the conductors tried every mode of persuasion--and there
are not a few in the vocabulary of a Frenchman--to inveigle me into his
omnibus. "I should be at Ars in half an hour, and could return at two,
three, four o'clock--in short, at any hour of the night or day that
might please me best." It was with some difficulty I resisted the
torrent of eloquence he poured out upon me; but, in the first place, I
felt that he was promising what he himself would have called "the
impossible," since a public conveyance must necessarily regulate its
movements by the wishes of the majority of its passengers; and in the
next, I had a very strong desire to be alone in body as well as in
mind during the few hours that I was to spend at Ars.

At last I found an omnibus destined solely for visitors to
Villefranche itself, and the conductor promised that he would provide
me a private carriage to Ars if I would consent to drive first to his
hotel. Cabaret he might have called it with perfect truth, for cabaret
it was, and nothing more--a regular French specimen of the article,
with a great public kitchen, where half the workmen of the town
assembled for their meals, and a small cupboard sort of closet opening
into it for the accommodation of more aristocratic guests. Into this,
_bon gré, mal gré_, they wished to thrust me, but I violently repelled
the threatened honor, and with some difficulty carrying my point,
succeeded in being permitted to remain in the larger and cooler space
of the open kitchen until my promised vehicle should appear. It came
at last, a sort of half-cab, half-gig, without a hood, but with a
curiously contrived harness of loose ropes, and looking altogether
{26} dangerously likely to come to pieces on the road. Luckily, I am
not naturally nervous in such matters, and, consoling myself with the
thought that if we did get into grief the "_bon curé_" was bound to
come to my assistance, seeing I had incurred it solely for the sake of
visiting his tomb, I was soon settled as comfortably as circumstances
would permit, and we set off at a brisk pace.

The country around Villefranche is truly neither pretty nor
picturesque; and though we were not really an hour on the road, the
drive seemed tedious. Our Jehu also, as it turned out, had never been
at Ars before; so that he had not only to stop more than once to
inquire the way, but actually contrived at the very last to miss it.
He soon discovered the mistake, however, and retracing his steps, a
very few minutes brought us to the spot where the saint had lived
forty years, and where he now sleeps in death. His house stands beside
the church, but a little in the rear, so it does not immediately catch
the eye; and the church, where his real life was spent, is separated
from the road by a small enclosure, railed off, and approached by a
few steps. We looked around for some person to conduct us, but there
was no one to be seen; so, after a moment's hesitation, we ascended
the steps and entered the church. If you wish to know what kind of
church it is, I cannot tell you. I do not know, in fact, whether it is
Greek or Gothic, or of no particular architecture at all; I do not
know even if it is in good taste or in bad taste. The soul was so
filled with a sense of the presence of the dead saint that it left no
room for the outer sense to take note of the accidents amid which he
had lived. There are two or three small chapels--a Lady chapel, one
dedicated to the Sacred Heart, and another to St. John the Baptist.
There is also the chapel of St. Philomena, with a large lifelike image
of the "_bonne petite sainte_" to whom he loved to attribute every
miracle charity compelled him to perform; and there is the
confessional, where for forty years he worked far greater wonders on
the soul than any of the more obvious ones he accomplished on the
body. All, or most of all, this I saw in a vague sort of way, as one
who saw not; but the whole church was filled with such an aroma of
holiness, there was such a sense of the actual presence of the man who
had converted it into a very tabernacle in the wilderness--a true Holy
of Holies, where, in the midst of infidel France, God had descended
and conversed almost visibly with his people--that I had neither the
will nor the power to condescend to particulars, and examine it in
detail.

My one thought as I entered the church was, to go and pray upon his
tomb; but in the first moment of doubt and confusion I could not
remember, if indeed I had been told, the exact spot where he was
buried. The chapel of St. Philomena was the first to attract my
notice, and feeling that I could not be far wrong while keeping close
to his dear little patroness, I knelt down there to collect my ideas.

The stillness of the church made itself felt. There were indeed many
persons praying in it, but they prayed in that profound silence which
spoke to the heart, and penetrated it in a way no words could have
ever done.

I was thirsting, however, to approach the tomb of the saint, and at
last ventured to whisper the question to a person near me. She pointed
to a large black slab nearly in the centre of the church, and told me
that he lay beneath it. Yes, he was there, in the very midst of his
people, not far from the chapel of St. Philomena, and opposite to the
altar whence he had so many thousands of times distributed the bread
of life to the famishing souls who, like the multitude of old, had
come into the desert, and needed to be fed ere they departed to their
homes. Yes, he was there; and with a strange mingling of joy and
sorrow in the thought I went and knelt down beside him.

{27}

Had I gone to Ars but a few years before, I might have found him in
his living person; might have thrown myself at his feet, and poured
out my whole soul before him. Now I knelt indeed beside him, but
beside his body only, and the soul that would have addressed itself to
mine was far away in the bosom of its God. Humanly speaking, the
difference seemed against me, and yet, in a more spiritual point of
view, it might perhaps be said to be in my favor.

The graces which he obtained for mortals here he obtained by more than
mortal suffering and endurance--by tears, by fastings, and nightly
and daily impetrations;--now, with his head resting, like another St.
John, on the bosom of his divine Lord, surely he has but to wish in
order to draw down whole fountains of love and tenderness on his
weeping flock below. And certainly it would seem so; for however
numerous the miracles accomplished in his lifetime, they have been
multiplied beyond all power of calculation since his death.

Later on in the day, when the present curé showed me a room nearly
half full of crutches and other mementos of cures wrought--"These are
only the ones left there during his lifetime," he observed, in a tone
which told at once how much more numerous were those which cure had
made useless to their owners since his death.

I had not been many minutes kneeling before his tomb, when the lady
who had pointed it out to me asked if I would like to see the house
which he had inhabited in his lifetime. On my answering gladly in the
affirmative, she made me follow her through a side-door and across a
sort of court to the house inhabited by the present curé. This house
had never been the abode of M. Vianney, but had been allotted to the
priests who assisted him in his missions. The one which he actually
inhabited is now a sort of sanctuary, where every relic and
recollection of him is carefully preserved for the veneration of the
faithful. We were shown into a sort of _salle à manger_, sufficiently
poor to make us feel we were in the habitation of men brought up in
the school of a saint, and almost immediately afterward the present
curé entered. He had been for many years the zealous assistant of the
late curé; and, in trying to give me an idea of the influx of
strangers into Ars, he told me that, while M. Vianney spent habitually
from fifteen to seventeen hours in the confessional, he and his
brother priest were usually occupied at least twelve hours out of the
twenty-four in a similar manner. Even this was probably barely
sufficient for the wants of the mission, for the number of strangers
who came annually to Ars during the latter years of the curé's life
was reckoned at about 80,000, and few, if any, of these went away
without having made a general confession, either to M. Vianney
himself, or, if that were not possible, to one or other of the
assisting clergy.

It was pleasant to talk with one who had been living in constant
communication with a saint; and I felt as if something of the spirit
of M. Vianney himself had taken possession of the good and gentle man
with whom I was conversing. Among other things, he told me that the
devout wish of the saint had of late years been the erection of a new
church to St. Philomena; and he gave me a fac-simile of his
handwriting in which he had promised to pray especially for any one
aiding him in the work. The surest way, therefore, I should imagine,
to interest him in our necessities--now that he is in heaven--would be
to aid in the undertaking which he had in mind and heart while yet
dwelling on earth. Even in his lifetime there had been a lottery got
up for raising funds; and as money is still coming in from all
quarters, his wish will doubtless soon be accomplished. I saw a very
handsome altar which has been already presented, and which has been
put aside in one of the rooms of the curé until the church, for which
it is {28} intended, shall have been completed. M. le curé showed me
one or two small photographs, which had been taken without his
knowledge during the lifetime of the saint; and also a little carved
image, which he said was a wonderful likeness, and far better than any
of the portraits. Afterward he pointed out another photograph, as
large as life, and suspended against the wall, which had been procured
after death. It was calm and holy, as the face of a saint in death
should be, and I liked it still better in its placid peace than the
smile of the living photograph. Even the smile seemed to tell of
tears. You know that he who smiles is still doing battle--cheerfully
and successfully indeed, but still doing battle with the enemies of
his soul; while the grave calmness of the dead face tells you at once
that all is over--the fight is fought, the crown is won; eternity has
set its seal on the good works of time, and all is safe for ever.

I could have looked at that photograph a long time, and said my
prayers before it--it seemed to repose in such an atmosphere of
sanctity and peace--but the hours were passing quickly, and there was
still much to see and hear concerning the dead saint. I took leave,
therefore, of the good priest who had been my cicerone so far, and
sought the old housekeeper, who was in readiness to show me the house
where M. Vianney had lived. We crossed a sort of court, which led us
to a door opposite the church. When this was opened, I found myself in
a sort of half-garden, half-yard, in the centre of which the old house
was standing.

It is hard to put upon paper the feelings with which a spot the
habitation of a saint just dead is visited. The spirit of love and
charity and peace which animated the living man still seems brooding
over the spot where his life was passed, and you feel intensely that
the true beauty of the Lord's house was here, and that this has been
the place where his glory hath delighted to dwell. The first room I
entered was one in which the crutches left there by invalids had been
deposited. It was a sight to see. The crutches were piled as close as
they could be against the wall, and yet the room was almost half full.
The persons who used those crutches must have been carried hither,
lame and suffering, and helpless as young children; and they walked
away strong men and cured. Truly "the lame walk and the blind see;"
and the Lord hath visited his people in the person of his servant.

My next visit was made to the _salle à manger_, where M. Vianney had
always taken the one scanty meal which was his sole support during his
twenty-four hours of almost unbroken labor. It was poverty in very
deed--poverty plain, unvarnished, and unadorned--such poverty as an
Irish cabin might have rivalled, but could scarcely have surpassed.
The walls were bare and whitewashed; the roof was merely raftered; and
the floor, which had once been paved with large round stones, such as
are used for the pavement of a street, was broken here and there into
deep holes by the removal of the stones. During his forty years'
residence at Ars, M. Vianney had probably never spent a single sou
upon any article which could contribute to his own comfort or
convenience; and this room bore witness to the fact. How, indeed,
should he buy anything for himself, who gave even that which was given
to him away, until his best friends grew well-nigh weary of bestowing
presents, which they felt would pass almost at the same instant out of
his own possession into the hands of any one whom he fancied to be in
greater want of them than he was? I stood in that bare and desolate
apartment, and felt as if earth and heaven in their widest extremes,
their most startling contrasts, were there in type and reality before
me. All that earth has of poor and miserable and unsightly was present
to the eyes of the body; all that heaven has of bright {29} and
beautiful and glorious was just as present, just as visible, to the
vision of the soul. It was the very reverse of the fable of the fairy
treasures, which vanish into dust when tested by reality. All that you
saw was dust and ashes, but dust and ashes which, tried by the
touchstone of eternity, would, you knew, prove brighter than the
brightest gold, fairer than the fairest silver that earth ever yielded
to set in the diadem of her kings! My reflections were cut short by
the entrance of one of the priests, who invited us to come up stairs
and inspect the vestments which had belonged to the late curé, and
which were kept, I think, apart from those in ordinary use in the
church. There was a great quantity of them, and they were all in
curious contrast with everything else we had seen belonging to M.
Vianney. Nothing too good for God; nothing too mean and miserable for
himself--that had been the motto of his life; and the worm-eaten
furniture of the dining-room, the gold and velvet of the embroidered
vestments, alike bore witness to the fidelity with which he had acted
on it. The vestments were more than handsome--some of them were
magnificent. One set I remember in particular which was very
beautiful. It had been given, with canopy for the blessed sacrament
and banners for processions, by the present Marquis D'Ars, the chief
of that beloved family, who, after the death of Mdlle. D'Ars, became
M. Vianney's most efficient aid in all his works of charity. The
priest who showed them to us, and who had also been one of the late
curé's missionaries, told us that M. Vianney was absolutely enchanted
with joy when the vestments arrived, and that he instantly organized
an expedition to Lyons in order to express his gratitude at the altar
of Notre Dame de Fourrière. The whole parish attended on this
occasion. They went down the river in boats provided for the purpose,
and with banners flying and music playing, marched in solemn
procession through the streets of Lyons, and up the steep sides of
Fourrière, until they reached the church of Notre Dame. There the
whole multitude fell on their knees, and M. Vianney himself prayed, no
doubt long and earnestly, before the miraculous image of Our Lady,
seeking through her intercession to obtain some especial favor for the
man who, out of his own abundance, had brought gifts of gold and
silver to the altar of his God.

I asked the priest for some information about the granary which was
said to have been miraculously filled with corn. He told me he had
been at Ars at the time, and that there could be no doubt that the
granary had been quite empty the night before. It was, I think, a time
of scarcity, and the grain had been set aside for the use of the poor.
M. Vianney went to bed miserable at the failure of his supplies; but
when he visited the granary again early the next morning, he found it
full. It was at the top of his own house, I believe, and was kept, of
course, carefully locked. Nobody knew how it had been filled, or by
whom. In fact, it seemed absolutely impossible that any one could have
carted the quantity of grain needed for the purpose and carried it up
stairs without being detected in the act. The priest made no comment
on the matter; indeed, he seemed anything but inclined to enlarge upon
it, though he made no secret of his own opinion as to the miraculous
nature of the occurrence. As soon as he had answered my inquiries, he
led us to the room which had been the holy curé's own personal
apartment. It was, as well as I can remember, the one over the
dining-room. No apostle ever lived and died in an abode more entirely
destitute of all human riches. It was kept exactly in the same state
in which it had been during his lifetime--a few poor-looking books
still on the small book-shelf, a wooden table and a chair, and the
little bed in the corner, smoothed and laid down, as if only waiting
his return from the confessional for the {30} few short hours he gave
to slumber--if, indeed, he did give them; for no one ever penetrated
into the mystery of those hours, or knew how much of the time set
apart apparently for his own repose was dedicated to God, or employed
in supplicating God's mercies on his creatures.

The history of that room was the history of the saint. A book-shelf
filled with works of piety and devotion; a stove, left doubtless
because it had been originally built into the room, but left without
use or purpose (for who ever heard of his indulging in a fire?); a
table and a chair--that was all; but it was enough, and more than
enough, to fill the mind with thought, and to crowd all the memories
of that holy life into the few short moments that I knelt there. How
often had he come back to that poor apartment, his body exhausted by
fasting, and cramped by long confinement in the confessional, and his
heart steeped (nay, drowned, as he himself most eloquently expressed
it) in bitterness and sorrow by the long histories of sins to which he
had been compelled to listen--sins committed against that God whom he
loved far more tenderly than he loved himself! How often, in the
silence and darkness of the night, has he poured forth his soul, now
in tender commiseration over Jesus crucified by shiners, now over the
sinners by whom Jesus had been crucified! How often has he (perhaps)
called on God to remove him from a world where God was so offended;
and yet, moved by the charity of his tender human heart, has besought,
almost in the same breath, for the conversion of those sinners whose
deeds he was deploring--the cure of their diseases and the removal or
consolation of their sorrows! Like a mother who, finding her children
at discord, now prays to one to pardon, now to another to submit and
be reconciled, so was that loving, pitying heart ever as it were in
contradiction with itself--weeping still with Jesus, and yet still
pleading for his foes.

The mere action of such thoughts upon the human frame would make
continued life a marvel; but when to this long history of mental woe
we add the hardships of his material life--the fifteen or seventeen
hours passed in the confessional, in heat and cold, in winter as in
summer; the one scanty meal taken at mid-day; the four hours of sleep,
robbed often and often of half their number for the sake of quiet
prayer--when we think of these things, there is surely more of miracle
in this life of forty years' duration than in the mere fact that it
won miracles at last from heaven, and that God, seeing how faithfully
this his servant did his will here on earth, complied in turn with
his, and granted his desires.

No one, I think, can visit that spot, or hear the history of that
life, as it is told by those who knew him as it were but yesterday,
without an increase of love, an accession of faith, a more vivid sense
of the presence of God in the midst of his creatures, and a more real
comprehension of the extent and meaning of those words, "the communion
of saints," which every one repeats in the creed, and yet which few
take sufficiently to their heart of hearts to make it really a portion
of their spiritual being--a means of working out their own salvation
by constant and loving communication with those who have attained to
it already. Thousands will seek the living saint for the eloquence of
his words, the sublimity, of his counsels, the unction of his
consolations; but, once departed out of this life, who visits him in
his tomb? who turns to him for aid? who lift their eyes to heaven, to
ask for his assistance thence, with the same undoubting confidence
with which they would have sought it had he been still in the flesh
beside them? In one sense of the word, many; and yet few indeed
compared to the number of those to whom "the communion of saints" is
an article of faith, or ought at least to be so, in something more
than the mere service of the lip. It was amid some such {31} thoughts
as these that I left the town of Ars, grieved indeed that I had not
seen the holy curé in his lifetime, and yet feeling that, if I had but
faith enough, I was in reality rather a gainer than a loser by his
death. He who would have prayed for me on earth would now pray for me
in heaven. He who would have dived into my conscience and brought its
hidden sins to light, would obtain wisdom and grace for another to put
his finger on the sore spot and give it healing. He who would perhaps
have cured me of my bodily infirmities, could do so (if it were for
the good of my soul) not less efficiently now that he was resting on
the heart of his divine Lord. God had granted his prayers while he was
yet upon earth--a saint indeed, and yet liable at any moment to fall
into sin--would he refuse to hear him now that he had received him
into his kingdom, and so rendered him for ever incapable of offending?
I hoped not, I felt not; and in this certainty I went on my way
rejoicing, feeling that it was well for this sinful world that it had
yet one more advocate at the throne of its future Judge, and well
especially for France that, in this our nineteenth century, she had
given a saint to God who would have been the glory of the first. For
truly the arm of the Lord is not shortened. What he has done before,
he can do again; and, therefore, we need not wonder if the miracles of
the Apostles are still renewed at the tomb of this simple and
unlettered, priest, who taught their doctrines for forty years in the
unknown and far-off village of which Providence had made him pastor.

------

From Once A Week.

THE THREE WISHES.


The Eastern origin of this tale seems evident; had it been originally
composed in a Northern land, it is probable that the king would have
been represented as dethroned by means of bribes obtained from his own
treasury. In an Eastern country the story-teller who invented such a
just termination of his narrative would, most likely, have experienced
the fate intended for his hero, as a warning to others how they
suggested such treasonable ideas. Herr Simrock, however, says it is a
German tale; but it may have had its origin in the East for all that.
Nothing is more difficult, indeed, than to trace a popular tale to its
source. Cinderella, for example, belongs to nearly all nations; even
among the Chinese, a people so different to all European nations,
there is a popular story which reads almost exactly like it. Here is
the tale of the Three Wishes.

There was once a wise emperor who made a law that to every stranger
who came to his court a fried fish should be served. The servants were
directed to take notice if, when the stranger had eaten the fish to
the bone on one side, he turned it over and began on the other side.
If he did, he was to be immediately seized, and on the third day
thereafter he was to be put to death. But, by a great stretch of
imperial clemency, the culprit was permitted to utter one wish each
day, which the emperor pledged himself to grant, provided it was not
to spare his life. Many had already perished in consequence of this
edict, when, one day, a count and his young son presented themselves
at court. The fish was served as usual, and when the {32} count had
removed all the fish from one side, he turned it over, and was about
to commence on the other, when he was suddenly seized and thrown into
prison, and was told of his approaching doom. Sorrow-stricken, the
count's young son besought the emperor to allow him to die in the room
of his father; a favor which the monarch was pleased to accord him.
The count was accordingly released from prison, and his son was thrown
into his cell in his stead. As soon as this had been done, the young
man said to his gaolers--"You know I have the right to make three
demands before I die; go and tell the emperor to send me his daughter,
and a priest to marry us." This first demand was not much to the
emperor's taste, nevertheless he felt bound to keep his word, and he
therefore complied with the request, to which the princess had no kind
of objection. This occurred in the times when kings kept their
treasures in a cave, or in a tower set apart for the purpose, like the
Emperor of Morocco in these days; and on the second day of his
imprisonment the young man demanded the king's treasures. If his first
demand was a bold one, the second was not less so; still, an emperor's
word is sacred, and having made the promise, he was forced to keep it;
and the treasures of gold and silver and jewels were placed at the
prisoner's disposal. On getting possession of them, he distributed
them profusely among the courtiers, and soon he had made a host of
friends by his liberality.

The emperor began now to feel exceedingly uncomfortable. Unable to
sleep, he rose early on the third morning and went, with fear in his
heart, to the prison to hear what the third wish was to be.

"Now," said he to his prisoner, "tell me what your third demand is,
that it may be granted at once, and you may be hung out of hand, for I
am tired of your demands."

"Sire," answered his prisoner, "I have but one more favor to request
of your majesty, which, when you have granted, I shall die content. It
is merely that you will cause the eyes of those who saw my father turn
the fish over to be put out."

"Very good," replied the emperor, "your demand is but natural, and
springs from a good heart. Let the chamberlain be seized," he
continued, turning to his guards.

"I, sire!" cried the chamberlain; "I did not see anything--it was the
steward."

"Let the steward be seized, then," said the king.

But the steward protested with tears in his eyes that he had not
witnessed anything of what had been reported, and said it was the
butler. The butler declared that he had seen nothing of the matter,
and that it must have been one of the valets. But they protested that
they were utterly ignorant of what had been charged against the count;
in short, it turned out that nobody could be found who had seen the
count commit the offence, upon which the princess said:

"I appeal to you, my father, as to another Solomon. If nobody saw the
offence committed, the count cannot be guilty, and my husband is
innocent."

The emperor frowned, and forthwith the courtiers began to murmur; then
he smiled, and immediately their visages became radiant.

"Let it be so," said his majesty; "let him live, though I have put
many a man to death for a lighter offence than his. But if he is not
hung, he is married. Justice has been done."



{33}

------

From The Month.

EX HUMO.

BY BARRY CORNWALL.


  Should you dream ever of the days departed--
  Of youth and morning, no more to return--
  Forget not me, so fond and passionate-hearted;
      Quiet at last, reposing
      Under the moss and fern.

  There, where the fretful lake in stormy weather
  Comes circling round the reddening churchyard pines,
  Rest, and call back the hours we lost together,
      Talking of hope, and soaring
      Beyond poor earth's confines.

  If, for those heavenly dreams too dimly sighted,
  You became false--why, 'tis a story old:
  _I_, overcome by pain, and unrequited,
      Faded at last, and slumber
      Under the autumn mould.

  Farewell, farewell! No longer plighted lovers,
  Doomed for a day to sigh for sweet return:
  One lives, indeed; one heart the green earth covers--
      Quiet at last, reposing
      Under the moss and fern.


------

From The Dublin Review.


THE CHRISTIAN SCHOOLS OF ALEXANDRIA.


_S. Clementis Alexandrini Opera Omnia_. Lutetiae. 1629.

_Geschichte der Christlicher Philosophie, von_ Dr. Heinrich Ritter.
Hamburg: Perthes. 1841.


If any country under the sun bears the spell of fascination in its
very name, that country is Egypt. The land of the Nile and the
pyramids, of the Pharaohs and the Ptolemies--the land where art and
science had mysterious beginnings before the dawn of history, where
powerful dynasties held sway for long generations over the fertile
river-valley, and built for themselves mighty cities--Thebes, the
hundred-gated, Memphis, with its palaces, Heliopolis, with its temples--
and left memorials of themselves that are attracting men at this very
day to Luxor and Carnak, to the avenue of sphynxes and the pyramids--
Egypt, where learning

    Uttered its oracles sublime
    Before the Olympiads, in the dew
    And dusk of early time--

the land where,

{34}

  Northward from its Nubian springs,
    The Nile, for ever new and old,
  Among the living and the dead
    Its mighty, mystic stream has rolled--

Egypt seems destined to be associated with all the signal events of
every age of the world. Israel's going into and going out of Egypt is
one of the epic pages of Holy Scripture; Sesostris, King of Egypt,
left his name written over half of Asia; Alexander, the greatest of
the Greeks, laid in Egypt the foundation of a new empire; Cleopatra,
the captive and the captor of Julius Caesar and Mark Antony, killed
herself as the old land passed away for ever from the race of Ptolemy;
Clement and Origen, Porphyry and Plotinus, have left Egypt the classic
land of the Church's battle against the purest form of heathen
philosophy; St. Louis of France has made Egypt the scene of a glorious
drama of heroism and devotion; the pyramids have lent their name to
swell the list of Napoleon's triumphs; and the Nile is linked for ever
with the deathless fame of Nelson.

In the last decade of the second century, about the time when the
pagan virtues of Marcus Aurelius had left the Roman empire to the
worse than pagan vices of his son Commodus, Egypt, to the learned and
wealthy, meant Alexandria. What Tyre had been in the time of Solomon,
what Sidon was in the days of which Homer wrote, that was Alexandria
from the reign of Ptolemy Soter to the days of Mahomet. In external
aspect it was in every way worthy to bear the name of him who drew its
plans with his own hands. Its magnificent double harbor, of which the
Great Port had a quay-side six miles in length, was the common
rendezvous for merchant ships from every part of Syria, Greece, Italy,
and Spain; and its communications with the Red Sea and the Nile
brought to the warehouses that overlooked its quay the riches of
Arabia and India, and the corn and flax of the country of which it was
the capital. The modern traveller, who finds Alexandria a prosperous
commercial town, with an appearance half European, half Turkish,
learns with wonder that its 60,000 inhabitants find room on what was
little more than the mole that divided the Great Port from the
Eunostos. But it should be borne in mind that old Alexandria numbered
300,000 free citizens. The mosques, the warehouses, and the private
dwellings of the present town are built of the fragments of the grand
city of Alexander. The great conqueror designed to make Alexandria the
capital of the world. He chose a situation the advantages of which a
glance at the map will show; and if any other proof were needed, it
may be found in the fact that, since 1801, the population of the
modern town has increased at the rate of one thousand a year. He
planned his city on such vast proportions as might be looked for from
the conqueror of Darius. Parallel streets crossed other streets, and
divided the city into square blocks. Right through its whole length,
from East to West--that is, parallel with the sea-front--one magnificent
street, two hundred feet wide and four miles in length, ran from the
Canopic gate to the Necropolis. A similar street, shorter, but of
equal breadth, crossed this at right angles, and came out upon the
great quay directly opposite the mole that joined the city with the
island of Pharos. This was the famous Heptastadion, or Street of the
Seven Stadia, and at its South end was the Sun-gate; at its North,
where it opened on the harbor, the gate of the Moon. To the right, as
you passed through the Moon-gate on to the broad quay, was the
exchange, where merchants from all lands met each other, in sight of
the white Pharos and the crowded shipping of the Great Port. A little
back from the gate, in the Heptastadion, was the Caesareum, or temple
of the deified Caesars, afterward a Christian church. Near it was the
Museum, the university of Alexandria. Long marble colonnades connected
the {35} university with the palace and gardens of the Ptolemies. On
the opposite side of the great street was the Serapeion, the
magnificent temple of Serapis, with its four hundred columns, of which
Pompey's Pillar is, perhaps, all that is left. And then there was the
mausoleum of Alexander, there were the courts of justice, the
theatres, the baths, the temples, the lines of shops and houses--all on
a scale of grandeur and completeness which has never been surpassed by
any city of the world. Such a city necessarily attracted men.
Alexandria was fitly called the "many-peopled," whether the epithet
referred to the actual number of citizens or to the varieties of
tongue, complexion, and costume that thronged its streets. The Greeks,
the Egyptians, and the Jews, each had their separate quarter; but
there were constant streams of foreigners from the remote India, from
the lands beyond the black rocks that bound the Nile-valley, and from
the Ethiopic races to which St. Matthew preached, where the Red Sea
becomes the Indian Ocean. At the time we speak of, these discordant
elements were held in subjection by the Roman conquerors, whose
legionaries trod the streets of the voluptuous city with stern and
resolute step, and were not without occasion, oftentimes, for a
display of all the sternness and resolution which their bearing
augured.

Alexandria, however, in addition to the busy life of commerce and
pleasure that went on among Greeks, Egyptians, Jews, and Africans, was
the home of another kind of life, still more interesting to us.
Ptolemy Soter, who carried out Alexander's plans, was a man of no
common foresight and strength of character. He was not content with
building a city. He performed, in addition, two exploits, either of
which, from modern experience, we should be inclined to consider a
title to immortality. He invented a new god, and established a
university. The god was Serapis, whom he imported from Pergamus, and
who soon became popular. The university was the Museum, in which lived
and taught Demetrius of Phalerus, Euclid, Stilpo of Megara, Philetas
of Cos, Apelles the painter, Callimachus, Theocritus, Eratosthenes,
Apollonius Rhodius, and a host of others in philosophy, poetry,
geometry, astronomy, and the arts. Here, under successive Ptolemies,
professors lectured in splendid halls, amid honored affluence. All
that we have of the Greek classics we owe to the learned men of the
Museum. Poetry bloomed sweetly and luxuriantly in the gardens of the
Ptolemies; though, it must be confessed, not vigorously, not as on
Ionic coast-lands, nor as in the earnest life of Athenian freedom--save
when some Theocritus appeared, with his broad Doric, fresh from the
sheep-covered downs of Sicily. The name of Euclid suggests that
geometry was cared for at the Museum; Eratosthenes, with his
voluminous writings, all of which have perished, and his one or two
discoveries, which will never die, may stand for the type of
geography, the science for which he lived; and Hipparchus, astronomer
and inventor of trigonometry, may remind us how they taught at the
Museum that the earth was the centre of the universe, and yet,
notwithstanding, could foretell an eclipse almost as well as the
astronomer royal. In philosophy, the university of Alexandria has
played a peculiar part. As long as the Ptolemies reigned in Egypt, the
Museum could boast of no philosophy save commentaries on Aristotle and
Plato, consisting, in great measure, of subtle obscurities to which
the darkest quiddities of the deepest scholastic would appear to have
been light reading. But when the Roman came in, there sprang up a
school of thought that has done more than any other thing to hand down
the fame of Ptolemy's university to succeeding ages. Alexandria was
the birthplace of Neo-Platonism, and, whatever we may think of the
philosophy itself, we must allow it has bestowed fame on its alma {36}
mater. At the dawn of the Christian era, Philon the Jew was already
ransacking the great library to collect matter that should enable him
to prove a common origin for the books of Plato and of Moses. Two
hundred years afterward--that is, just at the time of which we speak--
Plotinus was listening to Ammonius Saccas in the lecture-hall of the
Museum, and thinking out the system of emanations, abysms, and depths
of which he is the first and most famous expounder. Porphyry, the
biographer and enthusiastic follower of Plotinus, was probably never
at Alexandria in person; but his voluminous writings did much to make
the Neo-Platonist system known to Athens and to the cities of Italy.
In his youth he had listened to the lectures of Origen, and thus was
in possession of the traditions both of the Christian and the heathen
philosophy of Alexandria. But his Christian studies did not prevent
him from being the author of that famous book, "Against the
Christians," which drew upon him the denunciations of thirty-five
Christian apologists, including such champions as St. Jerome and St.
Augustine. The Neo-Platonist school culminated and expired in Proclus,
the young prodigy of Alexandria, the ascetic teacher of Athens, the
"inspired dogmatizer," the "heir of Plato." Proclus died in 485, and
his chair at Athens was filled by his foolish biographer Marinus,
after which Neo-Platonism never lifted up its head.

Between the time when Philon astonished the orthodox money-getting
Hebrews of the Jews' quarter by his daring adoption of Plato's Logos,
and the day when poor old Proclus--his once handsome and strong frame
wasted by fasting and Pythagorean austerities--died, a drivelling old
man, in sight of the groves of the Academe and the tomb of Plato, not
far from whom he himself was to lie, many a busy generation had
trodden the halls of the Museum of Alexandria. All that time the
strife of words had never ceased, in the lecture-hall, in the gardens
of the departed Ptolemies, round the banquet-table where the
professors were feasted at the state's expense. All that time the fame
of Alexandria had gathered to her Museum the young generations that
succeeded each other in the patrician homes and wealthy burghs of
Syria, Greece, and Italy. They came in crowds, with their fathers'
money in their purses, to be made learned by those of whose exploits
report had told so much. Some came with an earnest purpose. To the
young medical student, the Alexandrian school of anatomy and the
Alexandrian diploma (in whatever shape it was given)--not to mention
the opportunity of perusing the works of the immortal Hippocrates in
forty substantial rolls of papyrus--were worth all the expense of a
journey from Rome or Edessa. To the lawyer, the splendid collections
of laws, from those of the Pentateuch to those of Zamolxis the
Scythian, were treasures only to be found in the library where the
zeal of Demetrius Phalerius and the munificence of Ptolemy
Philadelphus had placed them. But the vast majority of the youth who
flocked to the Museum came with no other purpose than the very general
one of finishing their education and fitting themselves for the world.
With these, the agreeable arts of poetry and polite literature were in
far greater request than law, medicine, astronomy, or geography. If
they could get a sight of the popular poet of the hour in his morning
meditation under the plane-trees of the gardens, or could crush into a
place in the theatre when he recited his new "Ode to the Empress's
Hair;" or if they attended the lecture of the most fashionable
exponent of the myths of the Iliad, and clapped him whenever he
introduced an allusion to the divine Plato, it was considered a very
fair morning's work, and might be fitly rewarded by a boating party to
Canopus in the afternoon, or a revel far into the night in any of
those thousand palaces of vice {37} with which luxurious Alexandria
was so well provided. And yet there is no doubt that the young men
carried away from their university a certain education and a certain
refinement--an education which, though it taught them to relish the
pleasures of intellect, in no wise disposed them to forego the
enjoyments of sense; and a refinement which, while imparting a
graceful polish to the mind, was quite compatible with the deepest
moral depravity. Pagans as they were, they were the fairest portion of
the whole world, for intellect, for manliness, for generosity, for
wit, for beauty and strength of mind and body--natural gifts that, like
the sun and the rain, are bestowed upon just and unjust. Their own
intercourse with each other taught them far more than the speculations
of any of the myth-hunting professors of the Museum. They crowded in
to hear them, they cheered them, they would dispute and even fight for
a favorite theory that no one understood, with the doubtful exception
of its inventor. But it was not to be supposed that they really cared
for abysms or mystical mathematics, or that they were not a great deal
more zealous for suppers, and drinking bouts, and boating parties.
These latter employments, indeed, may be said to have formed their
real education. Greek intellect, Greek taste, wit, and beauty, in the
sunniest hour of its bloom, mingled with its like in the grandest city
that, perhaps, the earth has ever seen. The very harbors, and temples,
and palaces were an education. The first rounding of the Pharos--when
the six-mile semicircle of granite quay and marble emporia burst on
the view, with the Egyptian sun flashing from white wall and blue sea,
and glancing and sparkling amidst the dense picturesque multitude that
roared and surged on the esplanade--disclosed a sight to make the soul
grow larger. The wonderful city itself was a teaching: the assemblage
of all that was best and rarest in old Egyptian art, and all that was
freshest and most lovely in the art of Greece, left no corner of a
street without its lesson to the eye. Indoors, there was the Museum,
with its miles of corridors and galleries, filled with paintings and
sculptures; outside, the Serapeion, the Caesareum, the exchange, the
palace, the university itself, each a more effective instructor than a
year's course in the schools. And after all this came the library,
with its 700,000 volumes!

In the year of our Lord 181, ships filled the Great Port, merchants
congregated in the exchange, sailors and porters thronged the quays;
crowds of rich and poor, high and low, flocked through the streets;
youths poured in to listen to Ammonius Saccas, and poured out again to
riot and sin; philosophers talked, Jews made money, fashionable men
took their pleasure, slaves toiled, citizens bought and sold and made
marriages; all the forms of busy life that had their existence within
the circuit of the many-peopled city were noisily working themselves
out. In the same year, Pantaenus became the head of the catechetical
school of the patriarchal Church of Alexandria.

It was the time when those who had lived and walked with the Apostles
had passed away, and when the third generation of the Church's rulers
was already growing old. St. Irenaeus was near his glorious end; St.
Eleutherius, of memory dear to Britain, had just closed his
pontificate by martyrdom, and St. Victor sat in his place. The echoes
of the voice of Peter had hardly died out in Rome and Antioch; the
traditions of Paul's bodily presence were yet living in Asia, in
Greece, and the Islands; and the sweet odor of John's life still hung
about the places where his sojourning had been: many a church of
Greece and Egypt and of the far East had the sepulchre of its founder,
an Apostle or an apostolic man, round which to pray. It was the age of
the persecutions, and the age of the apologies. In every {38} city
that was coming about which from the first had been inevitable. The
Church was laying hold of human learning, and setting it to do her own
work. In fixing upon Alexandria as the spot where, at this period, the
contest between Christian science and Gentile learning, Gentile
ignorance and Gentile brute force, was most interesting and most
developed, we must pass by many other Churches, not in forgetfulness,
though in silence. We must pass by Rome, the capital of the world, not
because there were not learned men there whom Jesus Christ had raised
up to battle with heathen philosophy; for it was but a few years since
Justin Martyr had shed his blood for the faith, and Apollonius from
his place in the senate had spoken his "apology" for his fellow
Christians. But the enemies which the Gospel had to meet at Rome were
not so much the learning and science of the heathen as his evil
passions and vicious life; and the sword of persecution, at Rome
hardly ever sheathed, kept down all attempts at regularity or
organization in public teaching. We must pass by Athens, still the
intellectual capital of the world, not because there were not at
Athens also worthy doctors of the wisdom of the cross--witness, to the
contrary, Athenagoras, the Christian philosopher, who presented his
apology to Marcus Aurelius. But Athens, though at the end of the
second century and long afterward she was the mother of orators,
poets, and philosophers, seems to have been too thoroughly steeped in
the sensuous idolatry of Greece to have harbored a school of
Christianity by the side of the Porch and the Lyceum. If the same was
true of Athens then as a century afterward, her smooth-tongued,
"babbling" sophists, and her pagan charms, must have had to answer for
the soul of many a poor Christian youth that went to seek learning and
found perdition. We pass by Carthage, in spite of Tertullian's great
name; Antioch, notwithstanding Theophilus, whose labors against the
heathen still bore fruit; Sardis, in spite of Melito, then just dead,
but living still in men's mouths by the fame of his learning,
eloquence, and miracles; and Hierapolis, in spite of Apollinaris, who,
like so many others, approached the emperor himself with an apology.
All over the Church there were men raised up by God, and fitted with
learning to confront learning, patience to instruct ignorance, and
unflinching fortitude to endure persecution--men in every way worthy
to be the instruments of that great change which was being wrought out
through the wide world of the Roman empire.

But at Alexandria, the school of Christianity existed under
interesting and peculiar conditions. St. Mark had landed on the
granite quay of the Great Port with Peter's commission; he had been
martyred, and his successors had been martyred after him; and for a
long time Christianity here, as everywhere else, had been
contemptuously ignored. It spread, however, as we know. In time, more
than one student, before he attended his lecture in the splendid halls
of the Museum, had given ear to a far different lesson in a different
school. The Christian catechetical school of Alexandria is said to
have been founded by St. Mark himself. If so, it is only what we might
naturally expect; for wherever heathens were being converted, there a
school of teachers had to be provided for their instruction; and we
read of similar institutions at Jerusalem, at Antioch, and at Rome.
But the catechetical school of Alexandria soon assumed an importance
that no other school of those times ever attained. Whether it was that
the influence of the university gave an impetus to regular and
methodical teaching, or that the converts in Alexandria were in great
measure from a cultivated and intellectual class, it appears to have
been found necessary from the earliest times to have an efficient
school, with a man of vigor and intellect at its head, capable of
maintaining his position even when compared {39} with the professors
of the university. The first of the heads or doctors of the school of
whom history has left any account, is Pantaenus. Pantaenus is not so
well known as his place in Church history and his influence on his age
would seem to warrant. He was appointed to his important post at a
time when Christians all over the world must have been rejoicing. The
fourth persecution was just dying out. For twenty years, with the
exception of the short interval immediately after the miracle of the
Thundering Legion, had Marcus Aurelius, imperial philosopher of the
Stoic sort, continued to command or connive at the butchery of his
Christian subjects. What were the motives that led this paragon of
virtuous pagans to lower himself to the commonplace practices of
racking, scourging, and burning, is a question that depends for its
answer upon who the answerer is. Philosophers of a certain class, from
Gibbon to Mr. Mill, are disposed to take a lenient, if not a
laudatory, estimate of his conduct in this matter, and think that the
emperor could not have acted otherwise consistently with his
principles and convictions, as handed down to us in his "Meditations."
Doubtless he had strong convictions on the subject of Christianity,
though it might be questioned whether he came honestly by them. But
his convictions, whatever they were, would probably have ended in the
harmless shape of philosophic contempt, had it not been for the men by
whom he was surrounded. They were Stoics, of course, like their
master, but their stoicism was far from confining itself to
convictions and meditations. They were practical Stoics, of the
severest type which that old-world Puritanism admitted. As good
Stoics, they were of all philosophers the most conceited, and took it
especially ill that any sect should presume to rival them in their
private virtues of obstinacy and endurance. It is extremely probable
that the fourth persecution, both in its commencement and its revival,
was owing to the good offices of Marcus Aurelius's solemn-faced
favorites. But, whatever be the blame that attaches to him, he has
answered for it at the same dread tribunal at which he has answered
for the deification of Faustina and the education of Commodus.

However, about the year 180, persecution ceased at Alexandria, and the
Christians held up their heads and revived again, after the bitter
winter through which they had just passed. Their first thoughts and
efforts appear to have been directed to their school. The name of
Pantaenus was already celebrated. He was a convert from paganism, born
probably in Sicily, but certainly brought up in Alexandria. Curiously
enough, he had been a zealous Stoic, and remained so, in the Christian
sense, after his conversion. There is no doubt that he was well known
among the Gentile philosophers of Alexandria. Perhaps he had lectured
in the Museum and dined in the Hall. Probably he had spent many a day
buried in the recesses of the great libraries, and could give a good
account of not a few of their thousands of volumes. He must have known
Justin Martyr--perhaps had something to say to the conversion of that
brilliant genius, not as a teacher, but as a friend and
fellow-student. He may have come across Galen, when that lively
medical man was pursuing his researches on the immortal Hippocrates,
or entertaining a select circle, in the calm of the evening, under one
of the porticos of the Heptastadion. No sooner was he placed at the
head of the Christian school than he inaugurated a great change, or
rather a great development. Formerly the instruction had been intended
solely for converts, that is, catechumens, and the matter of the
teaching had corresponded with this object. Pantaenus changed all
this. The cessation of the persecution had, perhaps, encouraged bolder
measures; men would think there was no prospect of another, as men
generally think when a long and difficult trial is over; so the
Christian schools were to be opened {40} to all the world. If
Aristotle and Plato, Epicurus and Zeno, had their lecturers, should
not Jesus Christ have schools and teachers too? And what matter if the
Christian doctrine were somewhat novel and hard--was not Ammonius the
Porter, at that very time, turning the heads of half the students in
the city, and filling his lecture-room to suffocation, by expounding
transcendental theories about Plato's Logos, and actually teaching the
doctrine of a Trinity? Shame upon the Christian name, then, if they
who bear it do not open their doors, now that danger is past, and
break the true bread to the hungry souls that eagerly snatch at the
stones and dry sticks that others give! So thought Pantaenus. Of his
teachings and writings hardly a trace or a record has reached us. We
know that he wrote valued commentaries on Holy Scripture, but no
fragment of them remains. His teaching, however, as might have been
expected, was chiefly oral. He met the philosophers of Alexandria on
their own ground. He showed that the fame of learning, the earnestness
of character, the vivid personal influence that were so powerful in
the cause of heathen philosophy, could be as serviceable to the
philosophy of Christ. The plan was novel in the Christian world--at
least, in its systematic thoroughness. That Pantaenus had great
influence and many worthy disciples is evident from the fact that St.
Clement of Alexandria, his successor, was formed in his school, and
that St. Alexander of Jerusalem, the celebrated founder of the library
which Eusebius consulted at Jerusalem, writing half a century
afterward to Alexandria, speaks with nothing less than enthusiasm of
the "happy memory" of his old master. If we could pierce the secrets
of those long-past times, what a stirring scene of reverend wisdom and
youthful enthusiasm would the forgotten school of the Sicilian convert
unfold to our sight! Doubtless, from amidst the confused jargon of all
manner of philosophies, the voice of the Christian teacher arose with
a clear and distinct utterance; and the fame of Pantaenus was carried
to far countries by many a noble Roman and many an accomplished Greek,
zealous, like all true academic sons, for the glory of their favorite
master.

After ten years of such work as this, Pantaenus vacated his chair, and
went forth as a missionary bishop to convert the Indians. Before
passing on to his successor, a few words on this Indian mission,
apparently so inopportune for such a man at such a time, will be
interesting, and not unconnected with the history of the Christian
schools.

In the "many-peopled" city there were men from all lands and of all
shades of complexion. It was nothing strange, then, that an embassy of
swarthy Indians should have one day waited on the patriarch and begged
for an apostle to take home with them to their countrymen. No wonder,
either, that they specified the celebrated master of the catechisms as
their _dignissimus_. The only wonder is that he was allowed to go. Yet
he went; he set out with them, sailed to Canopus, the Alexandrian
Richmond, where the canal joined the Nile; sailed up the ancient
stream to Koptos, where the overland route began; joined the caravan
that travelled thence, from well to well, to Berenice, Philadelphus's
harbor on the Red Sea; embarked, and, after sailing before the monsoon
for seventy days, arrived at the first Indian port, probably that
which is now Mangalore, in the presidency of Bombay. This, in all
likelihood, was the route and the destination of Pantaenus. Now those
among whom his missionary labors appear to have lain were Brahmins,
and Brahmins of great learning and extraordinary strictness of life.
Moreover, there appears to be no reason to doubt that the Church
founded by St. Thomas still existed, and even flourished, in these
very parts, though its apostolic founder had been martyred a hundred
years before. It was not so unreasonable, then, that {41} a bishop
like Pantaenus should have been selected for such a Church and such a
people. Let the reader turn to the story of Robert de' Nobili, and of
John de Britto, whose field of labor extended to within a hundred
miles of master in human learning when the the very spot where
Pantaenus probably landed. St. Francis Xavier had already found
Christians in that region who bore distinct traces of a former
connection with Alexandria, in the very points in which they deviated
from orthodoxy. De' Nobili's transformation of himself into a Brahmin
of the strictest and most learned caste is well known. He dressed and
lived as a Brahmin, roused the curiosity of his adopted brethren,
opened school, and taught philosophy, inculcating such practical
conclusions as it is unnecessary to specify. De Britto did the very
same things. If any one will compare the Brahmins of De Britto and De'
Nobili with those earlier Brahmins of Pantaenus, as described, for
instance, by Cave from Palladius, he will not fail to be struck with
the similarity of accounts; and if we might be permitted to fill up
the picture upon these conjectural hints, we should say that it seems
to us very likely that Pantaenus, during the years that he was lost to
Alexandria, was expounding and enforcing, in the flowing cotton robes
of a venerable Saniastes, the same deep philosophy to Indian audiences
as he had taught to admiring Greeks in the modest pallium of a Stoic.
Recent missionary experience has uniformly gone to prove that deep
learning and asceticism are, humanly speaking, absolutely necessary in
order to attempt the conversion of Brahmins with any prospect of
success: and the mission of Pantaenus seems at once to furnish an
illustration of this fact, and to afford an interesting glimpse of
"Christian Missions" in the second century. But we must return to
Alexandria.

The name that succeeds Pantaenus on the rolls of the School of the
Catechisms is Titus Flavius Clemens, immortalized in history as
Clement of Alexandria. He had sat under Pantaemus, but he was no
ordinary scholar. Like his instructor, he was a convert from paganism.
He was already master in human learning when the grace came. He had
sought far and wide for the truth, and had found it in the Catholic
Church, and into the lap of his new mother he had poured all the
treasures of Egyptian wisdom which he had gathered in his quest.
Athens, Southern Italy, Assyria, and Palestine had each been visited
by the eager searcher; and, last of all, Egypt, and Alexandria, and
Pantaenus had been the term of his travels, and had given to his lofty
soul the "admirable light" of Jesus Christ. When Pantaenus went out as
a missioner to India, Clement, who had already assisted his beloved
master in the work of the schools, succeeded him as their director and
head. It was to be Clement's task to carry on and to develop the work
that Pantaenus had inaugurated--to make Christianity not only
understood by the catechumens and loved by the faithful, but
recognized and respected by the pagan philosophers. Unless we can
clearly see the necessity, or, at least, the reality of the
philosophical side of his character, and the influences that were at
work to make him hold fast to Aristotle and Plato, even after he had
got far beyond them, we shall infallibly set him down, like his modern
biographers, as a half-converted heathen, with the shell of Platonism
still adhering to him.

It cannot be doubted that in a society like that of Alexandria in its
palmy days there were many earnest seekers of the truth, even as
Clement himself had sought it. One might even lay it down as a normal
fact, that it was the character of an Alexandrian, as distinguished
from an Athenian, to speculate for the sake of practising, and not to
spend his time in "either telling or hearing some new thing." If an
Alexandrian was a Stoic, never was Stoic more demure or more intent on
warring against his body, after Stoic {42} fashion; if a geometrican,
no disciple of Bacon was ever more assiduous in experimentalizing,
measuring, comparing, and deducing laws; if a Platonist, then
geometry, ethics, poetry, and everything else, were enthusiastically
pressed into the one great occupation of life--the realizing the ideal
and the getting face to face with the unseen. That all this
earnestness did not uniformly result in success was only too true.
Much speculation, great earnestness, and no grand objective truth at
the end of it--this was often the lot of the philosophic inquirer of
Alexandria. The consequence was that not unfrequently, disgusted by
failure, he ended by rushing headlong into the most vicious excesses,
or, becoming a victim to despair, perished by his own hand. So
familiar, indeed, had this resource of disappointment become to the
philosophic mind, that Hegesias, a professor in the Museum, a little
before the Christian era, wrote a book counselling self-murder; and so
many people actually followed his advice as to oblige the reigning
Ptolemy to turn Grand Inquisitor even in free-thinking Egypt, and
forbid the circulation of the book. Yet all this, while it revealed a
depth of moral wretchedness which it is frightful to contemplate,
showed also a certain desperate earnestness; and doubtless there were,
even among those who took refuge in one or other of these dreadful
alternatives, men who, in their beginnings, had genuine aspirations
after truth, mingled with the pride of knowledge and a mere
intellectual curiosity. Doubtless, too, there was many a sincere and
guileless soul among the philosophic herd, to whom, humanly speaking,
nothing more was wanting than the preaching of the faith. Their eyes
were open, as far as they could be without the light of revelation:
let the light shine, and, by the help of divine grace, they would
admit its beams into their souls.

There are many such, in every form of error. In Clement's days,
especially, there were many whom Neo-Platonism, the Puseyism of
paganism, cast up from the ocean of unclean error upon the shores of
the Church. Take the case of Justin Martyr: he was a young Oriental of
noble birth and considerable wealth. In the early part of the second
century, we find him trying first one school of philosophers and then
another, and abandoning each in disgust. The Stoics would talk to him
of nothing but virtues and vices, of regulating the diet and curbing
the passions, and keeping the intellect as quiet as possible--a
convenient way, as experience taught them, of avoiding trouble;
whereas Justin wanted to hear something of the Absolute Being, and of
that Being's dealings with his own soul--a kind of inquiry which the
Stoics considered altogether useless and ridiculous, if not
reprehensible. Leaving the Stoics, he devoted himself heart and soul
to a sharp Peripatetic, but quarrelled with him shortly and left him
in disgust; the cause of disagreement being, apparently, a practical
theory entertained by his preceptor on the subject of fees. He next
took to the disciples of Pythagoras. But with these he succeeded no
better than with the others; for the Pythagoreans reminded him that no
one ignorant of mathematics could be admitted into their select
society. Mathematics, in a Pythagorean point of view, included
geometry, astronomy, and music--all those sciences, in fact, in which
there was any scope for those extraordinary freaks of numbers which
delighted the followers of the old vegetarian. Justin, having no
inclination to undergo a novitiate in mathematics, abandoned the
Pythagoreans and went elsewhere. The Platonists were the next who
attracted him. He found no lack of employment for the highest
qualities of his really noble soul in the lofty visions of Plato and
the sublimated theories of his disciples and commentators; though it
appears a little singular that, with his propensities toward the ideal
and abstract, he should have tried so many masters before he {43} sat
down under Plato. However, be that as it may, Plato seems to have
satisfied him for a while, and he began to think he was growing a very
wise man, when these illusions were rudely dispelled. One day he had
walked down to a lonely spot by the sea-shore, meditating, probably,
some deep idea, and perhaps declaiming occasionally some passage of
Plato's Olympian Greek. In his solitary walk he met an old man, and
entered into conversation with him. The event of this conversation was
that Justin went home with a wonderfully reduced estimate of his own
wisdom, and a determination to get to know a few things about which
Plato, on the old man's showing, had been woefully in the dark. Justin
became a convert to Christianity. Now, Justin had been at Alexandria,
and, whether the conversation he relates ever really took place, or is
merely an oratorical fiction, the story is one that represents
substantially what must have happened over and over again to those who
thronged the university of Alexandria, wearing the black cloak of the
philosopher.

Justin lived and was martyred some half a century before Clement sat
in the chair of the catechisms. But it is quite plain that, in such a
state of society, there would not be wanting many of his class and
temperament who, in Clement's time, as well as fifty years before,
were in search of the true philosophy. And we must not forget that in
Alexandria there were actually thousands of well-born, intellectual
young men from every part of the Roman empire. To the earnest among
these Clement was, indeed, no ordinary master. In the first place, he
was their equal by birth and education, with all the intellectual
keenness of his native Athens, and all the ripeness and versatility of
one who had "seen many cities of men and their manners." Next, he had
himself been a Gentile, and had gone through all those phases of the
soul that precede and accompany the process of conversion. If any one
knew their difficulties and their sore places, it was he, the
converted philosopher. If any one was capable of satisfying a generous
mind as to which was the true philosophy, it was he who had travelled
the world over in search of it. He could tell the swarthy Syrian that
it was of no use to seek the classic regions of Ionia, for he had
tried them, and the truth was not there; he could assure him it was
waste of time to go to Athens, for the Porch and the Garden were
babbling of vain questions--he had listened in them all. He could calm
the ardor of the young Athenian, his countryman, eager to try the
banks of the Orontes, and to interrogate the sages of Syria; for he
could tell him beforehand what they would say. He could shake his head
when the young Egyptian, fresh from the provincial luxury of Antinoë,
mentioned Magna Graecia as a mysterious land where the secret of
knowledge was perhaps in the hands of the descendants of the Pelasgi.
_He_ had tried Tarentum, he had tried Neapolis; they were worse than
the Serapeion in unnameable licentiousness--less in earnest than the
votaries that crowded the pleasure-barges of the Nile at a festival of
the Moon. He had asked, he had tried, he had tasted. The truth, he
could tell them, was at their doors. It was elsewhere, too. It was in
Neapolis, in Antioch, in Athens, in Rome; but they would not find it
taught in the chairs of the schools, nor discussed by noble
frequenters of the baths and the theatres. He knew it, and he could
tell it to them. And as he added many a tale of his wanderings and
searchings--many an instance of genius falling short, of good-will
laboring in the dark, of earnestness painfully at fault--many of those
who heard him would yield themselves up to the vigorous thinker whose
brow showed both the capacity and the unwearied activity of the soul
within. He was the very man to be made a hero of. Whatever there was
in the circle of Gentile philosophy he knew. St. Jerome calls {44} him
the "most learned of the writers of the Church," and St. Jerome must
have spoken with the sons of those who had heard him lecture--noble
Christian patricians, perchance, whose fathers had often told them
how, in fervent boyhood, they had been spell-bound by his words in the
Christian school of Alexandria, or learned bishops of Palestine, who
had heard of him from Origen at Caesarea or St. Alexander at
Jerusalem. From the same St. Alexander, who had listened to Pantaenus
by his side, we learn that he was as holy as he was learned; and
Theodoret, whose school did not dispose him to admire what came from
the catechetical doctors of Alexandria, is our authority for saying
that his "eloquence was unsurpassed." In the fourth edition of Cave's
"Apostolici," there is a portrait that we would fain vouch to be
genuine. The massive, earnest face, of the Aristotelian type, the
narrow, perpendicular Grecian brow, with its corrugations of thought
and care, the venerable flowing beard, dignifying, but not concealing,
the homely and fatherly mouth, seem to suggest a man who had made all
science his own, yet who now valued a little one of Jesus Christ above
all human wisdom and learning. But we have no record of those features
that were once the cynosure of many eyes in the "many-peopled" city;
we have no memorial of the figure that spoke the truths of the Gospel
in the words of Plato. We know not how he looked, nor how he sat, when
he began with his favorite master, and showed, with inexhaustible
learning, where he had caught sight of the truth, and, again, where
his mighty but finite intellect had failed for want of a more
"admirable light;" nor how he kindled when he had led his hearers
through the vestibule of the old philosophy, and stood ready to lift
the curtain of that which was at once its consummation and its
annihilation.

But the philosophers of Alexandria, so-called, were by no means,
without exception, earnest, high-minded, and well-meaning. Leaving out
of the question the mob of students who came ostensibly for wisdom,
but got only a very doubtful substitute, and were quite content with
it, we know that the Museum was the headquarters of an anti-Christian
philosophy which, in Clement's time, was in the very spring of its
vigorous development. Exactly contemporary with him was the celebrated
Ammonius the Porter, the teacher of Plotinus, and therefore the parent
of Neo-Platonism. Ammonius had a very great name and a very numerous
school. That he was a Christian by birth, there is no doubt; and he
was probably a Christian still when he landed at the Great Port and
found employment as a ship-porter. History is divided as to his
behavior after his wonderful elevation from the warehouses to the
halls of the Museum. St. Jerome and Eusebius deny that he apostatized,
while the very questionable authority of the unscrupulous Porphyry is
the only testimony that can be adduced on the other side; but, even if
he continued to be a Christian, his orthodoxy is rather damaged when
we find him praised by such men as Plotinus, Longinus, and Hierocles.
Some would cut the knot by asserting the existence of two Ammoniuses,
one a pagan apostate, the other a Christian bishop--a solution equally
contradicted by the witnesses on both sides. But, whatever Saccas was,
there is no doubt as to what was the effect of his teaching on, at
least, half of his hearers. If we might hazard a conjecture, we should
say that he appears to have been a man of great cleverness, and even
genius, but too much in love with his own brilliancy and his own
speculations not to come across the ecclesiastical authority in a more
or less direct way. He supplied many imposing premises which Origen,
representing the sound half of his audience, used for Christian
purposes, whilst Plotinus employed them for revivifying the dead body
of paganism. The brilliant sack-bearer seems to have been, at the very
least, a liberal {45} Christian, who was too gentlemanly to mention so
very vulgar a thing as the Christian "superstition" in the classic
gardens of the palace, or at the serene banquets of sages in the
Symposium.

The question, then, is, How did Christianity, as a philosophy, stand
in relation to the affluent professors of Ptolemy's university? That
they had been forced to see there was such a thing as Christianity,
before the time of which we speak (A.D. 200), it is impossible to
doubt. It must have dawned upon the comprehension of the most
imperturbable grammarian and the most materialist surgeon of the
Museum that a new teaching of some kind was slowly but surely striking
root in the many forms of life that surrounded them. Rumors must long
before have been heard in the common hall that executions had taken
place of several members of a new sect or society, said to be impious
in its tenets and disloyal in its practice. No doubt the assembled
sages had expended at the time much intricate quibble and pun, after
heavy Alexandrian fashion, on the subject of those wretched men; more
especially when it was put beyond doubt that no promises of reward or
threats of punishment had availed to make them compromise their
"opinions" in the slightest tittle. Then the matter would die out, to
be revived several times in the same way; until at last some one would
make inquiries, and would find that the new sect was not only
spreading, but, though composed apparently of the poor and the humble,
was clearly something very different from the fantastic religions or
brutal no-religions of the Alexandrian mob. It would be gradually
found out, moreover, that men of name and of parts were in its ranks;
nay, some day of days, that learned company in the Hall would miss one
of its own number, after the most reverend the curator had asked a
blessing--if ever he did--and it would come out that Professor
So-and-so, learned and austere as he was, had become a Christian! And
some would merely wonder, but, that past, would ask their neighbor, in
the equivalent Attic, if there were to be no more cakes and ale,
because _he_ had proved himself a fool; others would wonder, and feel
disturbed, and think about asking a question or two, though not to the
extent of abandoning their seats at that comfortable board.

The majority, doubtless, at Alexandria as elsewhere, set down
Christianity as some new superstition, freshly imported from the home
of all superstitions, the East. There were some who hated it, and
pursued it with a vehemence of malignant lying that can suggest only
one source of inspiration, that is to say, the father of all lies
himself. Of this class were Crescens the Cynic, the prime favorite of
Marcus Aurelius, and Celsus, called the Epicurean, but who, in his
celebrated book, written at this very time, appears as veritable a
Platonist as Plotinus himself. Then, again, there were others who
found no difficulty in recognizing Christianity as a sister
philosophy--who, in fact, rather welcomed it as affording fresh
material for dialectics--good, easy men of routine, blind enough to
the vital questions which the devil's advocates clearly saw to be at
stake. Galen is pre-eminently a writer who has reflected the current
gossip of the day. He was a hard student in his youth, and a learned
and even high-minded man in his maturity, but he frequently shows
himself in his writings as the "fashionable physician," with one or
two of the weaknesses of that well-known character. He spent a long
time at Alexandria, just before Clement became famous, studying under
Heraclian, consulting the immortal Hippocrates, and profiting by the
celebrated dissecting-rooms of the Museum, in which, unless they are
belied, the interests of science were so paramount that they used to
dissect--not live horses; but living slaves. He could not, therefore,
fail to have known how Christianity was regarded at the Museum.
Speaking of Christians, then, in his works, he of course retails a
good deal of {46} nonsense about them, such as we can imagine him to
have exchanged with the rich gluttons and swollen philosophers whom he
had to attend professionally in Roman society; but when he speaks
seriously, and of what he had himself observed, he says, frankly and
honestly, that the Christians deserved very great praise for sobriety
of life, and for their love of virtue, in which they equalled or
surpassed the greatest philosophers of the age. So thought, in all
probability, many of the learned men of Alexandria.

The Church, on her side, was not averse to appearing before the
Gentiles in the garb of philosophy, and it was very natural that the
Christian teachers should encourage this idea, with the aim and hope
of gaining admittance for themselves and their good tidings into the
very heart of pagan learning. And was not Christianity a philosophy?
In the truest sense of the word--and, what is more to the purpose, in
the sense of the philosophers of Alexandria--it was a philosophy. The
narrowed meaning that in our days is assigned to philosophy, as
distinguished from religion, had no existence in the days of Clement.
Wisdom was the wisdom by excellence, the highest, _the_ ultimate
wisdom. What the Hebrew preacher meant when he said, "Wisdom is better
than all the most precious things," the same was intended by the
Alexandrian lecturer when he offered to show his hearers where wisdom
was to be found. It meant the fruit of the highest speculation, and at
the same time the necessary ground of all-important practice. In our
days the child learns at the altar-rails that its end is to love God,
and serve him, and be happy with him; and after many years have
passed, the child, now a man, studies and speculates on the reasons
and the bearings of that short, momentous sentence. In the old Greek
world the intellectual search came first, and the practical sentence
was the wished-for result. A system of philosophy was, therefore, in
Clement's time, tantamount to a religion. It was the case especially
with the learned. Serapis and Isis were all very well for the "old
women and the sailors," but the laureate and the astronomer royal of
the Ptolemies, and the professors, many and diverse, of arts and
ethics, in the Museum, scarcely took pains to conceal their utter
contempt for the worship of the vulgar. Their idols were something
more spiritual, their incense was of a more ethereal kind. Could they
not dispute about the Absolute Being? and had they not glimpses of
something indefinitely above and yet indefinably related to their own
souls, in the Logos of the divine Plato? So the Stoic mortified his
flesh for the sake of some ulterior perfectibility of which he could
give no clear account to himself; the Epicurean contrived to take his
fill of pleasure, on the maxim that enjoyment was the end of our
being, "and tomorrow we die;" the Platonist speculated and pursued his
"air-travelling and cloud-questioning," like Socrates in the basket,
in a vain but tempting endeavor to see what God was to man and man to
God; the Peripatetic, the Eclectic, and all the rest, disputed,
scoffed, or dogmatized about many things, certainly, but, mainly and
finally, on those questions that will never lie still:--Who are we?
and, Who placed us here? Philosophy included religion, and therefore
Christianity was a philosophy.

When Clement, then, told the philosophers of Alexandria that he could
teach them the true philosophy, he was saying not only what was
perfectly true, but what was perfectly understood by them. The
catechetical school was, and appeared to them, as truly a
philosophical lecture-room as the halls of the Museum. Clement himself
had been an ardent philosopher, and he reverently loved his masters,
Socrates and Plato and Aristotle, whilst he had the feelings of a
brother toward the philosophers of his own day. He became a Christian,
and his dearest object was to win his brethren to a participation in
his own good fortune. {47} He did not burn his philosophical books and
anathematize his masters; like St. Paul, he availed himself of the
good that was in them and commended it, and then proclaimed that he
had the key of the treasure which they had labored to find and had not
found. This explains how it is that, in Clement of Alexandria, the
philosopher's mantle seems almost to hide the simple garb of the
Christian. This also explains why he is called, and indeed calls
himself, an Eclectic in his system; and this marks out the drift and
the aim of the many allusions to philosophy that we find in his extant
works, and in the traditions of his teaching that have come down to
us. If Christianity was truly called a philosophy, what should we
expect in its champion but that he should be a philosopher? Men in
these days read the _Stromata_, and find that it is, on the outside,
more like Plato than like Jesus Christ; and thus they make small
account of it, because they cannot understand its style, or the reason
for its adoption. The grounds of questions and the forms of thought
have shifted since the days of the catechetical school. But Clement's
fellow-citizens understood him. The thrifty young Byzantine, for
instance, understood him, who had been half-inclined to join the
Stoics, but had come, in his threadbare pallium, to hear the Christian
teacher, and who was told that asceticism was very good and
commendable, but that the end of it all was God and the love of God,
and that this end could only be attained by a Christian. The languid
but intellectual man of fashion understood him, who had grown sick of
the jargon of his Platonist professors about the perfect man and the
archetypal humanity, and who now felt his inmost nature stirred to its
depths by the announcement and description of the Word made flesh. The
learned stranger from Antioch or Athens, seeking for the truth,
understood him, when he said that the Christian dogma alone could
create and perfect the true Gnostic or Knower; he understood perfectly
the importance of the object, provided the assertion were true, as it
might turn out to be. Unless Clement had spoken of asceticism, of the
perfect man, and of the true Gnostic, his teaching would not have come
home to the self-denying student, to the thoughtful sage, to the
brilliant youth, to all that was great and generous and amiable in the
huge heathen society of the crowded city. As it was, he gained a
hearing, and, having done so, he said to the Alexandrians, "Your
masters in philosophy are great and noble: I honor them, I admire and
accept them; but they did not go far enough, as you all acknowledge.
Come to us, then, and we will show what is wanting in them. Listen to
these old Hebrew writers whom I will quote to you. You see that they
treated of all your problems, and had solved the deepest of them,
whilst your forefathers were groping in darkness. All their light, and
much more, is our inheritance. The truth, which you seek, we possess.
'What you worship, without knowing it, that I preach to you.' God's
Word has been made flesh--has lived on this earth, the model man, the
absolute man. Come to us, and we will show you how you may know God
through him, and how through him God communicates himself to you." But
here he stopped. The "discipline of the secret" allowed him to go no
further in public. The listening Christians knew well what he meant;
his pagan hearers only surmised that there was more behind. And was it
not much that Christianity should thus measure strength and challenge
a contest with the old Greek civilization on equal terms, and about
those very matters of intellect and high ethics in which it especially
prided itself?

But the contest, never a friendly one, save with the dullest and
easiest of the pagan philosophers, very soon grew to be war to the
knife. We have said that the quiet lovers of literature among the
heathen men of science were perfectly ready to admit the Christian
philosophy to a fair share {48} in the arena of disputation and
discussion, looking upon it as being, at worst, only a foolish system
of obtrusive novelties, which might safely be left to their own
insignificancy. But, quite unexpectedly and startlingly for easy-going
philosophers, Christianity was found, not merely to claim the
possession of truth, but to claim it wholly and solely. And, what was
still more intolerable, its doctors maintained that its adoption or
rejection was no open speculative question, but a tremendous practical
matter, involving nothing less than all morality here and all
happiness hereafter; and that the unfortunate philosopher, who, in his
lofty serenity, approved it as right, and yet followed the wrong,
would have to undergo certain horrors after death, the bare suggestion
of which seemed an outrage on the dignity of the philosophical
character. This was quite enough for hatred; and the philosophers, as
their eyes began to open, saw that Crescens and Celsus were right, and
accorded their hatred most freely and heartily.

But Christianity did not stop here. With the old original schools and
their offshoots it was a recognized principle that philosophy was only
for philosophers; and this was especially true of Clement's most
influential contemporaries, the Neo-Platonists. The vulgar had no part
in it, in fact could not come within the sphere of its influence; how
could they? How could the sailors, who, after a voyage, went to pay
their vows in the temple of Neptune on the quay, or the porters who
dragged the grain sacks and the hemp bundles from the tall warehouses
to the holds of Syrian and Greek merchantmen, or the negro slaves who
fanned the brows of the foreign prince, or the armorers of the Jews'
quarter, or the dark-skinned, bright-eyed Egyptian women of the
Rhacôtis suspected of all evil from thieving to sorcery, or, more than
all, the drunken revellers and poor harlots who made night hideous
when the Egyptian moon looked down on the palaces of the
Brucheion--how could any of these find access to the sublime secrets
of Plato or the profound commentaries of his disciples? Even if they
had come in crowds to the lecture-halls--which no one wanted them to
do, or supposed they would do--they could not have been admitted nor
entertained; for even the honest occupations of life, the daily labors
necessary in a city of 300,000 freemen, were incompatible with
imbibing the divine spirit of philosophy. So the philosophers had
nothing to say to all these. If they had been asked what would become
of such poor workers and sinners, they would probably have avoided an
answer as best they could. There were the temples and Serapis and Isis
and the priests--they might go to them. It was certain that
philosophy was not meant for the vulgar. In fact, philosophy would be
unworthy of a habitation like the Museum--would deserve to have its
pensions stopped, its common hall abolished, and its lecture-rooms
shut up--if ever it should condescend to step into the streets and
speak to the herd. It was, therefore, with a disgust unspeakable, and
a swiftly-ripening hatred, that the philosophers saw Christianity
openly proclaiming and practising the very opposite of all this. True,
it had learned men and respected men in its ranks, but it loudly
declared that its mission was to the lowly, and the mean, and the
degraded, quite as much as to the noble, and the rich, and the
virtuous. It maintained that the true divine philosophy, the source of
joy for the present and hope for the future, was as much in the power
of the despised bondsman, trembling under the lash, as of the
prince-governor, or the Caesar himself, haughtily wielding the
insignia of sovereignty. _We_ know what its pretensions and tenets
were, but it is difficult to realize how they must have clashed with
the notions of intellectual paganism in the city of Plotinus--how the
hands that would have been gladly held out in friendship, had it come
in respectable {49} and conventional guise, were shut and clenched,
when they saw in its train the rough mechanic, the poor maid-servant,
the negro, and the harlot. There could be no compromise between two
systems such as these. For a time it might have seemed as if they
could decide their quarrel in the schools, but the old Serpent and his
chief agents knew better: and so did Clement and the Christian
doctors, at the very time that they were taking advantage of fair
weather to occupy every really strong position which the enemy held.
The struggle soon grew into the deadly hand-to-hand grapple that ended
in leaving the corpse of paganism on the ground, dead but not buried,
to be gradually trodden out of sight by a new order of things.


It must not, however, be supposed that the Christian school of
Alexandria was wholly, or even chiefly, employed in controversy with
the schools of the heathen. The first care of the Church was, as at
all times, the household of the faith: a care, however, in the
fulfilment of which there is less that strikes as novel or interesting
at first sight than in that remarkable aggressive movement of which it
has been our object to give some idea. But even in the Church's
household working there is much that is both instructive and
interesting, as we get a glimpse of it in Clement of Alexandria. The
Church in Alexandria, as elsewhere, was made up of men from every lot
and condition of life. There were officials, civil and military,
merchants, shop-keepers, work-people--plain, hard-striving men,
husbands, and fathers of families. In the wake of the upper thousands
followed a long and wide train--the multitude who compose the middle
classes of a great city; and it was from their ranks that the Church
was mainly recruited. They might not feel much interest in the
university, beyond the fact that its numerous and wealthy students
were a welcome stimulus to trade; but still they had moral and
intellectual natures. They must have craved for some kind of food for
their minds and hearts, and cannot have been satisfied with the dry,
unnourishing scraps that were flung to them by the supercilious
philosophers. They must have felt no small content--those among them
who had the grace to hearken to the teachings of Clement--when he told
them that the philosophy _he_ taught was as much for them as for their
masters and their betters. They listened to him, weighed his words,
and accepted them; and then a great question arose. It was a question
that was being debated and settled at Antioch, at Rome, and at Athens,
no less than at Alexandria; but at Alexandria it was Clement who
answered it. "We believe your good tidings," they said; "but tell us,
must we change our lives wholly and entirely? Is everything that we
have been doing so far, and our fathers have been doing before us,
miserably and radically wrong?" They had bought and sold; they had
married and given in marriage; they had filled their warehouses and
freighted their ships; they had planted and builded, and brought up
their sons and daughters. They had loved money, and the praise of
their fellow-men; they had their fashions and their customs, old and
time-honored, and so interwoven with their very life as to be almost
identified with it. Some of their notions and practices the bare
announcement of the Gospel sufficiently condemned; and these must go
at once. But where was the line to be drawn? Did the Gospel aim at
regenerating the world by forbidding marriage and laying a ban on
human labor; by making life intolerable with asceticism; by emptying
the streets and the market-places, and driving men to Nitria and the
frightful rocks of the Upper Nile? And what made the question doubly
exciting was the two-fold fact, first, that in those very days men and
women were continually fleeing from home and family, and hiding, in
the desert; and secondly, that there were in that very city
congregations of {50} men calling themselves Christians, who
proclaimed that it was wrong to marry, and that flesh-meat and wine
were sinful indulgences.

The answer that Clement gave to these questionings is found mainly in
that work of his which is called _Paedagogus_, or "The Teacher." The
answer needed was a sharp, a short, and a decisive one. It needed to
be like a surgical operation--rapidly performed, completed, with
nothing further to be done but to fasten the bandages, and leave the
patient to the consequences, whatever they might be. Society had to be
_reset_. We need not repeat for the thousandth time the fact of the
unutterable corruptness and rottenness of the whole pagan world. It
was not that there were wanting certain true ideas of duty toward the
state, the family, the fellow-citizen: the evil lay far deeper. It was
not good sense that was wanting; it was the sense of the supernatural.
"Let us eat and drink, for to-morrow we die," was the formula that
expressed the code of popular morality; and because men could not "eat
and drink" comfortably and luxuriously without some sort of law,
order, and mutual compact, it followed as a necessary consequence that
there must be law, order, and compact. It was not, therefore, that
Clement had merely to hold up the Gospel and show them its meaning
here and its application there. He had to shift the very groundwork of
morality, to take up the very foundations of the moral acts that go to
make up life as viewed in the light of right and wrong. He had to
substitute heaven for earth, hereafter for here, God for self. And he
did so--in a fashion not unknown in the Catholic Church since, as
indeed it had been not unknown to St. Paul long before. He simply held
up to them the crucifix. Let any one turn to the commencement of the
_Paedagogus_, and he will find a description of what a teacher ought
to be. At the beginning of the second chapter he will read these
words: "My children, our teacher is like the Father, whose Son he is;
in whom there is no sin, great or small, nor any temptation to sin;
God in the figure of a man, stainless, obedient to his Father's will;
the Word, true God, who is in the Father, who is at the Father's right
hand, true God in the form of a man; to whom we must strive with all
our might _to make ourselves like_." It sounds like the commencement
of a children's retreat in one of our modern cities to hear Clement
proclaim so anxiously that the teacher and model of men is no other
than Jesus, and that we must all become children, and go and listen to
him and study him; yet it is a sentence that must have spoken to the
very inmost hearts of all who had a thought or care for their souls in
Alexandria; and one can perceive, in the terms used in the original
Greek, a conscious adaptation of epithets to meet more than one
Platonic difficulty. It was the reconciliation of the true with the
beautiful. The Alexandrians, Greek and Egyptian, with their Greek
longings for the beautiful, and their Egyptian tendings to the
sensible, were not put off by Clement with a cold abstraction. A
mathematical deity, formed out of lines, relations, and analogies,
such as Neo-Platonism offered, was well enough for the lecture-room,
but had small hold upon the heart. Christianity restored the thrilling
sense of a personal God, which Neo-Platonism destroyed, but for which
men still sighed, though they knew not what they were sighing for; and
Christianity, by Clement's mouth, taught that the living and lovely
life of Jesus was to be the end and the measure of the life of all.
They were to follow him: "My angel shall walk before you," is
Clement's own quotation. And having thus laid down the regenerating
principle--God through Jesus Christ--he descends safely and fearlessly
into details. Minutely and carefully he handles the problems of life,
and sets them straight by the light of the life of Jesus.

These details and these directions, {51} as left to us by Clement in
the _Paedagogus_, are only what we might anticipate from a Christian
teacher to his flock; and yet they are very interesting, and disclose
many facts that are full of suggestion to one who reads by the light
of the Catholic faith. Who would not like to hear what Clement said to
the Church of Alexandria about dress, beauty, feasting, drinking,
furniture, conversation, money, theatres, sleep, labor, and
housekeeping? We know well that there must have been ample scope for
discourse on all these topics. The rich Alexandrians, like the rich
Romans, and the rich Corinthians, and the rich everywhere, were
fearfully addicted to luxury, and their poorer neighbors followed
their example as well as they could. But there were circumstances
peculiar to Alexandria that enabled it to outdo the rest of the world
in this matter; putting Rome, of course, out of the question. It was
the market for India; and seeing that almost everything in the way of
apparel came from India, Alexandria had the pick of the best that the
world could afford, and seems not to have been behindhand in taking
advantage of its privilege. Nobody enjoyed more than the Alexandrian--
whether he were a descendant of the Macedonian who came in with the
Conqueror, or a _parvenu_ of yesterday grown great by his wheat-ships
or his silk-bales--to sweep the Heptastadion, or promenade the Great
Quay, or lounge in the gardens of the Museum, in what ancient tailors
and milliners would call a synthesis of garments, as ample, and stiff,
and brilliant as Indian looms could make them. Then, again, Alexandria
was a university town. Two hundred years of effeminate Ptolemies and
four hundred of wealthy students had been more than enough to create a
tradition of high, luxurious living. The conjunction of all that was
to be got for money, with any amount of money to get it with, had made
Alexandria a model city for carrying out the only maxim which the
greater number even of the philosophers themselves really understood
and practically followed: "Let us eat and drink!" Again, a navigable
river, a rainless sky, and a climate perhaps the finest in the world,
offered both inducements and facilities for parties of pleasure and
conviviality in general. It is true the river was only a canal: one
thing was wanting to the perfection of Alexandria as a site for an
empire city, viz., the Nile; but that the canal was a moderate success
in the eyes of the Alexandrians may be inferred from the fact that
Canopus, where it finished its short course of thirteen or fourteen
miles, and joined the Nile, was a perfect city of river-side hotels,
to which the boats brought every day crowds of pleasure-seekers. Very
gay were the silken and gilded boats, with their pleasant canopies and
soothing music; and very gay and brilliant, but not very reputable,
were the groups that filled them, with their crowns of flowers, their
Grecian attitudinizing, and their ingenious arrangements of
fan-working slaves. This was the population which it was Clement's
work to convert to purity and moderation.

It is very common with Clement's modern critics, when making what our
French allies would call "an appreciation" him, to set him down as a
solemn trifler. They complain that they cannot get any "system of
theology" out of his writings; indeed, they doubt whether he so much
as had one. They find him use the term "faith" first in one sense and
then in another, and they are especially offended by his minute
instructions on certain matters pertaining to meat, drink, and dress.
To any one who considers what Clement intended to do in his writings,
and especially in the _Paedagogus_, there is no difficulty in seeing an
answer to a difficulty like this. He did not _mean_ to construct a
"system of theology," and therefore it is no wonder if his critics
cannot find one. He did not even mean to state the broad, general
principles of the Gospel: his hearers knew these well enough. What he
did mean to do was, {52} to apply these general rules and principles
to a variety of cases occurring in everyday life. And yet, as a matter
of fact, it is to be observed that he always does lay down broad
principles before entering into details. In the matter of eating, for
instance, regarding which he is very severe in his denunciations, and
not without reason, he takes care to state distinctly the great
Catholic canon of mortification: "Though all things were made for man,
yet it is not good to use all, nor at all times." Again, in the midst
of his contemptuous enumeration of ancient wines, he does not forget
to say, "You are not robbed of your drink: it is given to you, and
awaits your hand;" that which is blamed is excess. He sums up what he
has been saying against the voluptuous entertainments then so
universal by the following sentence--a novelty, surely, to both
extremes of pagan society in Alexandria--"In one word, whatever is
natural to man must not be taken from him; but, instead thereof, must
be regulated according to fitting measure and time."

In deciding whether Clement was a "solemn trifler," or not, there is
another consideration which must not be omitted, and that is his sense
of the humorous. It may sound incongruous when speaking of a Father of
the Church, and much more of a reputed mystical Father like Clement,
but we think no one can deny that he often supplements a serious
argument by a little stroke of pleasantry. As many of his sentences
stand, a look or a smile would lighten them up and make them sparkle
into humor. Paper and ink cannot carry the tone of the voice or the
glance of the eye, and Clement's voice has been silent and his eye
dimmed for many a century; but may we not imagine that at times
something of archness in the teacher's manner would impart to his
weighty words a touch of quaintness, and the habitually thoughtful eye
twinkle with a gleam of pleasantry? He would be no true follower of
Plato if it were not so. Who shall say he was not smiling when he gave
out that formal list of wines, of eatables, and of scents most
affected by the fashionables of those days? He concludes an invective
against scandalous feats by condemning the universal crown of roses as
a "nuisance:" it was damp, it was cold; it hindered one from using
either his eyes or his ears properly. He advises his audience to avoid
much curious carving and ornamenting of bed-posts; for creeping
things, he says, have a habit of making themselves at home in the
mouldings. He asks if one's hands cannot be as well washed in a clay
basin as in a silver one. He wonders how one can dare to put a plain
little loaf on a grand "wing-footed" table. He cannot see why a lamp
of earthenware will not give as good a light as one of silver. He
alludes with disgust to "hissing frying-pans," to "spoon and pestle,"
and even to the "packed stomachs" of their proprietors; to Sicilian
lampreys, and Attican eels; shell-fish from Capo di Faro, and Ascrean
beet from the foot of Helicon; mullet from the Gulf of Thermae, and
pheasants from the Crimea. We hear him contemptuously repeat the
phrases of connoisseurs about their wines, the startling variety of
which we know from other sources besides his writings: he speaks of
the "scented Thasian," the aromatic "Lesbian," the "sweet wine of
Crete," the "pleasant Syracusan." The articles of plate which he
enumerates to condemn would be more than sufficient to furnish out a
modern wedding breakfast. To scents he gives no quarter. We have heard
a distinguished professor of chemistry assert, in a lecture, that
wherever there is scent on the surface there is sure to be dirt
beneath; and, from the well-known fact that in Capua there was one
whole street occupied by perfumers, he could draw no other inference
than that Capua must have been "a very dirty city." It would appear
that Clement of Alexandria was much of this opinion. He gives a
picture of a pompous {53} personage in a procession, "going along
marvellously scented, for the purpose of producing a sensation, and
yet underneath as foul as he could be." He enumerates the absurd
varieties of ointments in fashion, and orders them to be thrown away.
He is indignant at the saffron-colored scented robe that the gentlemen
wore. He will have no flowing or trailing vestments; no "Attic
buskins," no "Persian sandals." He complains that the ladies go and
spend the whole day at the perfumer's, the goldsmith's, and the
milliner's, just as if he were speaking of "shopping" in the
nineteenth century, instead of A.D. 200. He blames the men for
frequenting the barbers' shops, the taverns, and the dicing-houses. It
is amusing in these days to read of his denunciations of shaving. He
has no patience with "hair-haters:" a man without the hair that God
gave him is a "base sight." "God attached such importance to hair," he
says, "that he makes a man come to hair and sense at the same time."
But, in reality, this vehement attack on the "smooth men," as he calls
them, points to one of the most flagrant of heathen immoralities, and
reveals in the context a state of things to which we may not do more
than allude. He condemns luxury in furniture, from "beds with silver
feet, made of ivory and adorned with gold and tortoise-shell," down to
"little table-daggers," that ancient ladies and gentlemen used
indifferently to their food and to their slaves. All this is not very
deep, but it is just what Clement wanted to say, and a great deal more
useful in its place and connection than a "system of theology." We may
add that it is a great deal more interesting to us, who know pretty
well what Clement's "system of theology" was, but not so well what
were the faults and failings of his Christian men and women in those
far-off Alexandrian times.

There is another epithet bestowed upon Clement, more widely and with
better authority than that of "trifler." He is called a mystic. He
deals in allegorical interpretations of Holy Scripture, in fanciful
analogies, and whimsical reasonings; he was carried away by the spirit
of Neo-Platonism, and substituted a number of idle myths for the stern
realities of the Gospel. It is not our business at present to show, by
references, that this accusation is untrue; but we may admit at once
that it is not unfounded, and we maintain that it points to an
excellence, rather than a defect, in his teaching. From the remarks
made just now, the reader will be prepared to expect that a teacher in
Alexandria in Clement's days _must_ have been a mystic. It was simply
the fashion; and a fashion, in thought and speech, exacts a certain
amount of compliance from those who think or speak for the good of its
followers. Neo-Platonism was not extant in his time as a definite
system, but ever since the days of Philon its spirit had been the
spirit of the Museum. Nature, in its beauty and variety, was an
allegory of the soul so said the philosophers, and the crowd caught it
up with eagerness. The natural philosopher could not lecture on
Aristotle _De Animalibus_ without deducing morals in the style of
AEsop. The moralist, in his turn, could hardly keep up his class-list
without embodying his Beautiful and his Good in the aesthetical garb
of a myth--the more like Plato, the better. The mathematician
discoursed of numbers, of lines, and of angles, but the interesting
part of his lecture was when he drew the analogy from lines and
numbers to the soul and to God. Alexandria liked allegory, and
believed, or thought she believed, that the Seen was always a type of
the Unseen. Such a belief was not unnatural, and by no means
hopelessly erroneous; nay, was it not highly useful to a Christian
teacher, with the Bible in his hand, in which he would really have to
show them so many things, _per allegoriam dicta?_ Clement took up the
accustomed tone. Had he done otherwise, he would have been strange and
old-fashioned, whereas he {54} wanted to get the ear of his
countrymen, and therefore thought it no harm to fall in with their
humor for the mythical; just as good Father Faber preached and wrote
like a modern Englishman, and not like an antique Douai
controversialist, or a well-meaning translator of "Sermons from the
French." But, say the objectors, Clement's interpretation of Scripture
is so very forced and unnatural. The whole subject of allegorical
interpretation of Sacred Scripture is too wide to be entered upon
here; but that the Bible, especially the Old Testament, _has_ an
allegorical sense, no one denies, and the decision of what is the true
allegorical sense depends more upon the authority of the teacher than
upon the interpretation itself. In the time of Clement, when the
Gnostics were attributing the Old Testament to the Evil Principle,
there was a special necessity for a warm and loving acknowledgment
that it was the voice and the teaching of God to man; and it is no
wonder, therefore, that he allows himself, with the brilliant fancy of
an Athenian, even if sometimes with the fantasticalness of an
Alexandrian, to extract meanings out of the sacred text which our
sober eyes could never have discovered. As it is, we owe to his
mysticism no small portion of the eloquence and beauty of his
writings; we may instance that charming passage in the _Paedagogus_
where he alludes to the incident related in the twenty-sixth chapter
of Genesis--"Abimelech, King of the Palestines, looking out through a
window, saw Isaac playing with Rebecca his wife." Isaac represents,
the little one of Christ, and is interpreted to be joy; Rebecca is
patience; the royal Abimelech signifies heavenly wisdom. The child of
Jesus Christ, joyful with a joy that none but that blessed teacher can
give, lovingly sports with his "helpmate," patience, and the wisdom
that is from above looks on and wonderingly admires. The beauty of
conception and perfection of form that is inseparable from true Greek
art, whether in a statue or a medal, an epic or an epigram, is by no
means wanting to the first of the Greek Fathers. A reader who should
take up the _Paedagogus_ for no other than literary reasons would not
be disappointed; he would receive, from his reading, a very high idea
of the wisdom, the eloquence, and, above all, the saintly unction of
the great Catholic doctor and philosopher who first made human science
the handmaid of Christian theology.

The witnessing to the truth before heathen philosophers and the
teaching the children of the faith might have fully employed both the
zeal and the eloquence of Clement. But there was another and a sadder
use for words, in the task of resisting the heresies that seemed to
grow like foul excrescences from the very growth of the Church
herself. Alexandria, the city of Neo-Platonism, was also with nearly
as good a title the city of Gnosticism. To examine the history of
Gnosticism is not a tempting undertaking. On the one side, it is like
walking into a fog, as dense and unpleasant as ever marked a London
November; on the other, it is to disturb a moral cess-pool,
proverbially better left alone. Of the five groups of the Gnostic
family, which seem to agree in little beside worshipping the devil,
holding to "emanations," and owing their origin to Simon Magus, the
particular group that made Alexandria its headquarters acknowledged as
its leading names Basilides, Valentine, and Mark, each of whom outdid
the other in the absurdity of his ravings about eons, generations, and
the like, and in the abominableness of his practical licentiousness.
Valentine and Mark were contemporaries of Clement, if not personally
(Valentine is said to have died A.D. 150) at least in their immediate
influence. No one can tell satisfactorily what made these precious
followers of Simon Magus spend their days in patching up second-hand
systems out of the rags of cast-off Oriental mysticism. No doubt their
jargon appeared somewhat less {55} unnatural in their own days than it
does in ours. They lived nearer the times when the wrecks of primeval
revelation and history had been wrought into a thousand fantastic
shapes on the banks of the Indus, the Euphrates, and the Nile, and
when, in the absence of the true light, men occupied themselves with
the theatrical illuminations of Bel, Isis, and Vishnu. But these
Gnostics, in the clear dawn of the Gospel, still stuck to the fulsome
properties of the devil's play-house. Unsavory and dishonest, they
deserve neither respect for sincerity nor allowance for originality;
they were mere spinners of "endless genealogies," and, with such a
fig-leaf apron, they tried to conceal for a while the rankness of the
flesh that finally made the very pagans join in hounding them from the
earth. The infamous Mark was holding his conventicles in Alexandria
about the very time that Pantaenus and Clement were teaching. To read
of his high-flown theories about eons and emanations, his sham magic,
his familiarity with demons, his impositions on the weaker sex, and
the frightful licentiousness that was the sure end of it all, is like
reading the history of the doings of the Egyptian priests in the
Serapeion rather than of those who called themselves Christians. And
yet these very men, these deluded Marcosians, gave out to learned and
unlearned Alexandria that they alone were the true followers of
Christ. We may conceive the heart-breaking work it would be for
Clement to repel the taunts that their doings brought upon his name
and profession, and to refute and keep down false brethren, whose
arguments and strength consisted in an appeal to curiosity and brute
passion. And yet how nobly he does it, in that picture of the true
Gnostic, or Knower, to which he so often returns in all his extant
works!

But philosophers, faithful, and heretics do not exhaust the story of
Clement's doings. It lends a solemn light to the memorable history we
are noting, to bear in mind that the Church's intellectual war with
Neo-Platonist and Gnostic was ever and again interrupted by the yells
of the blood-thirsty populace, the dragging of confessors to prison,
and all the hideous apparatus of persecution. Which of us would have
had heart to argue with men who might next day deliver us to the
hangman? Who would have found leisure to write books on abstract
philosophy with such stern concrete realities as the scourge and the
knife waiting for him in the street? Clement's master began to teach
just as one persecution was ceasing; Clement himself had to flee from
his schools before the "burden and heat" of another; these were not
times, one would suppose, for science and orderly teaching. Yet our
own English Catholic annals can, in a manner, furnish parallel cases
in more than one solid book of controversy and deep ascetical tract,
thought out and composed when the pursuivants were almost at the
doors. So true it is that when the Church's work demands scientific
and written teaching, science appears and books are written, though
the Gentiles are raging and the peoples imagining their vain things.

Here, for the present, we draw to a close these desultory notes on the
Christian Schools of Alexandria. They will have served their purpose
if they have but supplied an outline of that busy intellectual life
which is associated with the names of Pantaenus and Clement. There is
another name that ought to follow these two--the name of Origen,
suggesting another chapter on Church history that should yield to none
in interest and usefulness. The mere fact that in old Alexandria, in
the face of hostile science, clogged and put to shame by pestilent
heresies, ruthlessly chased out of sight ever and again by brute force--
in spite of all this, Catholic science won respect from its enemies
without for a moment neglecting the interests of its own children, is
a teaching that will never be out of date, and least of all at a time
like ours, and in a country where learning {56} sneers at revelation,
where a thousand jarring sects invoke the sacred name of Christ, and
where public opinion--the brute force of the modern world, as the
rack and the fagot were of the ancient--never howls so loudly as when
it catches sight of the one true Church of the living and eternal God.



----

From The Lamp.

JEM M'GOWAN'S WISH.



"I wish I were a lord," said Pat M'Gowan, a lazy young fellow, as he
stretched over his grandmother's turf-fire a pair of brawny fists that
were as red as the blaze that warmed them.

"_You_ wish to be a lord!" answered Granny M'Gowan; "oh, then, a
mighty quare lord you would make; but, as long as you live, Pat, never
wish again; for who knows but you might wish in the unlucky minute,
and that it would be granted to you?"

"Faix, then, granny, I just wish I could have my wish this minute."

"You're a fool, Pat, and have no more sense in your head than a
cracked egg has a chance of a chicken inside of it. Maybe you'd never
cease repenting of your wish if you got it."

"Maybe so, granny, but for all that I'd like to be a lord. Tell me,
granny, when does the unlucky minute come that a body may get their
wish?"

"Why, you see, Pat, there is one particular little bit of a minute of
time in every twenty-four hours that, if a mortal creature has the
unlucky chance to wish on that instant, his wish, whether for good or
for bad, for life or death, fortune or misfortune, sickness or health,
for himself or for others, the wish is granted to him; but seldom does
it turn out for good to the wisher, because it shows he is not
satisfied with his lot, and it is contrary to what God in his goodness
has laid down for us all to do and suffer for his sake. But, Pat, you
blackguard, I see you are laughing at your old granny because you
think I am going to preach a sermon to you; but you're mistaken. I'll
tell you what happened to an uncle of my own, Jem M'Gowan, who got his
wish when he asked for it."

"Got his wish--oh, the lucky old fellow!" cried Pat. "Do, granny, tell
me all about him. Got his wish! oh, how I wish I was a lord!"

"Listen to me, Pat, and don't be getting on with any of your foolish
nonsense. My uncle, Jem M'Gowan, was then something like yourself, Pat--
a strapping, able chap, but one that, like you too, would sooner be
scorching his shins over the fire than cutting the turf to make it,
and rather watching the potatoes boiling than digging them out of the
ridge. Instead of working for a new coat, he would be wishing some one
gave it to him. When he got up in the morning, he wished for his
breakfast; and when he had swallowed it, he wished for his dinner; and
when he had bolted down his dinner, he began to wish for his supper;
and when he ate his supper, he wished to be in bed; and when he was in
bed, he wished to be asleep--in fact, he did nothing from morning to
night but wish, and even in his dreams I am quite sure he wished to be
awake. Unlucky for Jem, his cabin was convenient to the great big
house of Squire Kavanagh; and when Jem went out in the morning,
shivering with cold, and wishing for a glass of whisky to put _spirits_
in him, and he saw the bedroom windows of Squire Kavanagh closed, and
knew that the squire was lying warm and snug inside, he always wished
to be Squire Kavanagh. Then, when he saw the {57} squire driving the
horse and the hounds before him, and he all the while working in the
field, he wished it still more; and when he saw him dancing with the
beautiful young ladies and illigant young gentlemen in the moonlight
of a summer's evening, in front of his fine hall-door and under the
shade of the old oak-trees, he wished it more than ever. The squire
was always coming before him; and so happy a man did he seem that Jem
was always saying to himself, 'I wish I was Squire Kavanagh,' from,
cockcrow to sunset, until he at last hit upon the unfortunate minute
in the twenty-four hours when his wish was to be granted. He was just
after eating his dinner of fine, mealy potatoes, fresh-churned
buttermilk, and plenty of salt and salt-butter to relish them, when he
stretched out his two legs, threw up his arms, and yawned out, 'Oh,
dear, I wish I was Squire Kavanagh!'

"The words were scarce uttered when he found himself, still yawning,
in the grand parlor of Kavanagh House, sitting opposite to a table
laid out with china, and a table-cloth, silver forks, and no end of
silver spoons, and a roaring hot beefsteak before him. Jem rubbed his
eyes and then his hands with joy, and thought to himself, 'By dad, my
wish is granted, and I'll lay in plenty of beefsteak first of all.' He
began cutting away; but, before he had finished, he was interrupted by
some people coming in. It was Sir Harry M'Manus, Squire Brien, and two
or three other grand gentlemen; and says they to him, 'Kavanagh, don't
you know this is the day you're to decide your bet for five hundred
pounds, that you will leap your horse over the widest part of the pond
outside?'

"'Is it me? says Jem. 'Why, I never leaped a horse in my life!'

"'Bother!' says one; 'you're joking. You told us yourself that you did
it twenty times, and there's the English colonel that made the bet
with you, and he'll be saying, if you don't do it, that the Irish are
all braggers; so, my dear fellow, it just comes to this--you must
either leap the pond or fight me; for, relying upon your word, I told
the colonel I saw you do it myself.'

"'I must fight you or leap the pond, is it?' answered Jem, trembling
from head to foot.

"'Certainly, my dear fellow,' replied Sir Harry. 'Either I must shoot
you or see you make the leap; so take your choice.'

"'Oh! then, bring out the horse,' whimpered Jem, who was beginning to
wish he wasn't Squire Kavanagh.

"In a minute afterward, Jem found himself out in the lawn, opposite a
pond that appeared to him sixty feet wide at the least. 'Why,' said
he, 'you might as well ask me to jump over the ocean, or give a
hop-step-and-a-leap from Howth to Holyhead, as get any horse to cross
that lake of a pond.'

"'Come, Kavanagh,' said Sir Henry, 'no nonsense with us. We know you
can do it if you like; and now that you're in for it, you must finish
it.'

"'Faix, you'll finish me, I'm afeerd,' said Jem, seeing they were in
earnest with him; 'but what will you do if I'm drowned?'

"'Do?' says Sir Henry.' Oh, make yourself aisy on that account. You
shall have the grandest wake that ever was seen in the country. We'll
bury you dacently, and we'll all say that the bouldest horseman now in
Ireland is the late Squire Kavanagh. If that doesn't satisfy you,
there's no pleasing you; so bring out the horse immediately.'

"'Oh! murder, murder!" says Jem to himself; 'isn't this a purty thing,
that I must be drowned to make a great character for a little spalpeen
like Squire Kavanagh? Oh, then, it's I that wish I was Jem M'Gowan
again! Going to be drowned like a rat, or smothered like a blind
kitten! and all for a vagabond I don't care a straw about. I, that
never was on a horse's back before, to think of leaping over an ocean!
Bad cess to you, Squire Kavanagh, for your boastin' and your
wagerin'!'

{58}

"Well, a fine, dashing, jumping, rearing, great big gray horse was led
up by two grooms to Jem's side. 'Oh, the darling!' said Sir Harry;
'there he goes! there's the boy that will win our bets for us! Clap
him at once upon the horse's back,' says he to the grooms. The sight
left Jem's eyes the very instant he saw the terrible gray horse, well
known as one of the most vicious bastes in the entire country. If he
could, he'd have run away, but fright kept him standing stock-still;
and, before he knew where he was, he was hoisted into the saddle.
'Now, boys,' roared Sir Harry, 'give the horse plenty whip, and my
life for it he is over the pond.'

"Jem heard two desperate slashes made on the flanks of the horse. The
creature rose on his four legs off the ground, and came down with a
soss that sent Jem up straight from the saddle like a ball, and down
again with a crack fit to knock him into a hundred thousand pieces,
not one of them bigger than the buttons of his waistcoat. 'Murder!' he
shrieked; 'I wish I was Jem M'Gowan back again!' But there was no use
in saying this, for he had already got his wish. The horse galloped
away like lightning. He felt rising one instant up as high as the
clouds, and the next he came with a plop into the water, like a stone
that you would make take a 'dead man's dive.' He remembered no more
till he saw his two kind friends, Sir Harry M'Manus and Squire Brien,
holding him by the two legs in the air, and the water pouring from his
mouth, nose, and every stitch of his clothes, as heavy and as constant
as if it was flowing through a sieve, or as if he was turned into a
watering-pot.

"'I'm a dead man,' says he, looking up in the face of his grand
friends as well as he could, and kicking at the same time to get loose
from them. 'I'm a dead man; and, what's worse, I'm a murdered man by
the two of you.'

"'Bedad, you're anything but that,' said Sir Harry. 'You're now the
greatest man in the county, for, though you fell into the pond, the
horse leapt it; and I have won my bet, for which I am extremely
obliged to you.'

"After shaking the water out of him, they laid him down on the grass,
got a bottle of whisky, and gave him as much as he chose of it. Jem's
spirits began to rise a little, and he laughed heartily when they told
him he had won 500 from the English colonel. Jem got on his legs, and
was beginning to walk about, when who should he see coming into the
demesne but two gentlemen--one dressed like an officer, with under
his arm a square mahogany box, the other with a great big horsewhip.
Jem rubbed his hands with delight, for he made sure that the gentleman
who carried the box was going to make Squire Kavanagh--that is,
himself--some mighty fine present.

"'Kavanagh,' said Sir Harry, 'you will want some one to stand by you
as a friend in this business; would you wish me to be your friend?'

"'In troth, I would,' says Jem. 'I would like you to act as a friend
to me upon all occasions.'

"'Oh, that's elegant!' said Sir Harry. 'We'll now have rare sport.'

"'I'm mighty glad to hear it,' Jem replied, 'for I want a little sport
after all the troubles I had.'

"'Oh, you're a brave fellow,' said Sir Harry.

"'To be sure I am,' answered Jem. 'Didn't I leap the gray horse over
the big pond?'

"The gentleman with the box and whip here came up to Jem and his
friends; and the whip-gentleman took off his hat, and says he, 'Might
I be after asking you, is there any one of the present company Squire
Kavanagh?'

"Jem did not like the looks of the gentleman, and Sir Harry M'Manus
stepped before him, and said--'Yes; he is here to the fore. What is
your business with him? I am acting as his _friend_, and I have a right
to ask the question.'

"'Then, I'll tell ye what it is,' said {59} the gentleman. 'He
insulted my sister at the Naas races yesterday.'

"'Faix,' says Jem, 'that's a lie! Sure, I wasn't near Naas races.'

"The word was hardly out of his mouth when he got a crack of a
horsewhip across the face, that cut, he thought, his head in two. He
caught hold of the gentleman, and tried to take the whip out of his
hand; but, instead of the strength of Jem M'Gowan, he had only the
weakness of Squire Kavanagh, and he was in an instant collared; and,
in spite of all his kicking and roaring, lathered with the big whip
from the top of his head to the sole of his foot. The gentleman got at
last a little tired of beating him, and, flinging him away from him,
said 'You and I are now quits about the lie, but you must give me
satisfaction for insulting my sister.'

"'Satisfaction!' roared out Jem, as lie twisted and turned about with
the pain of the beating. 'Bedad, I'll never be satisfied till every
bone in your ugly body is broken.'

"'Very well,' said the gentleman. 'My friend, Captain M'Ginnis, is
come prepared for this.'

"Upon that, Jem saw the square box opened that he thought was filled
with a beautiful present for him; and he saw four ugly-looking pistols
lying beside each other, and in one corner about two dozen of shining
bran-new bullets. Jem's knees knocked together with fright when he saw
Captain M'Ginnis and Sir Harry priming and loading the pistols.

"'Oh! murder, murder! this is worse than the gray horse,' he said.
'Now I am quite sure of being killed entirely.' So he caught hold of
Sir Harry by the coat, and stuttered out, *Oh, then, what in the world
are ye going to do with me?'

"'Do?' replied his friend; 'why, you're going to stand a shot, to be
sure.'

"'The devil a shot I'll stand,' said Jem. 'I'll run away this minute.'

"'Then, by my honor and veracity, if you do,' replied Sir Harry, 'I'll
stop you with a bullet. My honor is concerned in this business. You
asked me to be your friend, and I'll see you go through it
respectably. You must either stand your ground like a gentleman, or be
shot like a dog.'

"Jem heartily wished he was no longer Squire Kavanagh; and as they
dragged him up in front of the gentleman, and placed them about eight
yards asunder, he thought of the quiet, easy life he led before he
became a grand gentleman. He never while a laboring boy was ducked in
a pond, or shot like a wild duck. But now he heard something said
about 'making ready;' he saw the gentleman raise his pistol on a level
with his head; he tried to lift his arm, but it stuck as fast by his
side as if it was glued there. He saw the wide mouth of the wicked
gentleman's pistol opened at his very eye, and looking as if it were
pasted up to his face. He could even see the leaden bullet that was
soon to go skelpin' through his brains! He saw the gentleman's finger
on the trigger! His head turned round and round, and in an agony he
cried out--'Oh, I wish I was Jem M'Gowan back again!'



"'Jem, you'll lose half your day's work,' said Ned Maguire, who was
laboring in the same field with him. 'There you've been sleeping ever
since your dinner, while Squire Kavanagh, that you are always talking
about, was shot a few minutes ago in a duel that he fought with some
strange gentleman in his own demesne.'

"'Oh," said Jem, as soon as he found that he really wasn't shot, 'I
wouldn't for the wealth of the world be a gentleman. Better to labor
all day than spend half an hour in the grandest of company. Faix, I've
had enough and to spare of grand company and being a gentleman since I
have gone to sleep here in the potato-field; and Squire Kavanagh, if
he only knew it, had much more reason, poor man, to wish he was Jem
M'Gowan than I had to wish I was Squire Kavanagh.'

{60}

"And ever after that, Pat," concluded the old lady, "Jem M'Gowan went
about his work like a man, instead of wasting his time in nonsensical
wishings."

"Thankee, granny," yawned Pat M'Gowan, as he shuffled off to bed.
"After that long story, I don't think I'll ever wish to be a lord
again."



------

From Chambers's Journal.

THE MONT CENIS TUNNEL.


The tunnel through the Alps at present being pierced to connect the
railway system of France and Italy, has acquired the title of the
"Mont Cenis Tunnel;" but its real position and direction have very
little in common with that well-known Alpine pass. On examining a
chart of the district which has been selected for this important
undertaking, we shall observe that the main chain of the Cottian Alps
extends in a direction very nearly East and West, and that this
portion of it is bounded on either side by two roughly parallel
valleys. On the North we have the valley of the Arc, and on the South
the valley of the Dora Ripari, or, more strictly speaking, the valley
of Rochemolles, a branch of the Dora. The Arc, flowing from East to
West, descends from Lanslebourg to Modane, and from thence, after
joining the Isere, empties itself into the Rhone above Valence. The
torrent Rochemolles, on the other hand, flowing from West to East,
unites itself with the Dora Ripari at Oulx, descends through a narrow
and winding valley to Susa, and thence along the plain to Turin. The
postal road, leaving St. Michel, mounts the valley of the Arc as far
as Lanslebourg, then turns suddenly to the South, passes the heights
of the Mont Cenis, and reaches Susa by a very steep descent. On
mounting the valley of the Arc, and stopping about eighteen miles West
of Mont Cenis, and a mile and a half below the Alpine village of
Modane, we arrive at a place called Fourneaux. Here, at about three
hundred feet above the level of the main road, is the Northern
entrance of the tunnel; the Southern entrance is at the picturesque
village of Bardonnêche, situated at about twenty miles West of Susa,
in the valley of Rochemolles.

The considerations which decided the Italian engineers upon selecting
this position for the contemplated tunnel, were principally the
following: first, it was the shortest route that could be found;
secondly, the difference of level between the two extremities was not
too great; and, thirdly, the construction of the connecting lines of
railway--on the North, from St. Michel to Fourneaux, and on the South,
from Susa to Bardonnêche were, as mountain railways go, practicable,
if not easy. The idea of a tunnel through the Alps had long occupied
the minds of engineers and of statesmen both in France and Italy; but
it is to the latter country that we must give the credit of having
worked the idea into a practical shape, and of having inaugurated one
of the most stupendous works ever undertaken by any people. To pierce
a tunnel seven and a half English miles long, by ordinary means,
through a hard rock, in a position where vertical shafts were
impossible, would be an exceedingly difficult, if not, _in a practical
point of view, an impossible_ undertaking, not only on account of the
difficulties of ventilation, but also on account of the immense _time_
and consequent expense which it would entail. It was evident, {61}
then, that if the project of a tunnel through the Alps was ever to be
realized, some extraordinary and completely new system of mining must
be adopted, by means of which not only a rapid and perfect system of
ventilation could be insured, enabling the miners to resume, without
danger, their labors immediately after an explosion, but which would
treble, or at least double, the amount of work usually performed in
any given time by the system hitherto adopted in tunnelling through
hard rock. To three Piedmontese engineers, Messrs. Grandis, Grattoni,
and Sommeiller, is due the merit of having solved this most difficult
problem; for whether the opening of the Alpine tunnel take place in
ten or twenty years, its ultimate success is now completely assured.

A short review of the history of this undertaking, and a summary of
the progress made, together with a description of the works as they
are conducted at the present time, derived from personal observation,
cannot fail to be interesting to English readers.

Early in 1857, at St. Pier d'Arena, near Genoa, a series of
experiments was undertaken before a select government commission, to
examine into the practicability of a project for a mechanical
perforating-engine, proposed by Messrs. Grandis, Grattoni, and
Sommeiller, for the more rapid tunnelling through hard rock, and with
a view to its employment in driving the proposed shaft through the
Alps. This machine was to be worked by means of air, highly compressed
by hydraulic or other economical means; which compressed air, after
performing its work in the perforating or boring machines, would be an
available and powerful source of ventilation in the tunnel. These
experiments placed so completely beyond any doubt the practicability
of the proposed system, that, so soon as August of the same year, the
law permitting the construction of the tunnel was promulgated.

At this time, absolutely nothing had been prepared, with the exception
of a very general project presented by the proposers, and the model of
the machinery with which the experiments had been made before the
government commission; we cannot, therefore, be much surprised on
finding that some considerable time elapsed before the new machinery
came into successful operation, the more particularly when we consider
the entire novelty of the system, and the unusual difficulties
naturally attending the first starting of such large works, in
districts so wild and uncongenial as those of Fourneaux and
Bardonnêche. Fourneaux was but a collection of mountain-huts,
containing about four hundred inhabitants, entirely deprived of every
means of supporting the wants of any increase of population, and where
outside-work could not be carried on for more than six months in the
year, owing to its ungenial climate. Nor was the case very different
at Bardonnêche, a small Alpine village, situated at more than thirteen
hundred metres (4,225 feet) above the level of the sea, and populated
by about one thousand inhabitants, who lived upon the produce of their
small patches of earth, and the rearing of sheep and goats, and with
their only road of communication with the outer world in a most
wretched and deplorable condition. Under these circumstances, we can
imagine that the task of bringing together large numbers of workmen,
and their competent directing staff, must have been by no means easy;
and that the first work of the direction, although of a nature really
most arduous and tedious (requiring, above all, time and patience),
was also of a nature that could scarcely render its effects very
apparent to the world at large for some considerable time. Again, it
was necessary in this time to make the detailed studies not only of
the tunnel itself, but of the compressing and perforating machinery on
the large scale proposed to be used. This machinery had to be made and
transported through a country abounding in difficulties. Then, as
might be {62} expected, actual trials showed serious defects in the
new machines for the compression of air; and, in perfecting the
mechanical perforators, unexpected difficulties were encountered,
which often threatened to prove insurmountable. The total inexperience
and unskilfulness of the workmen, and the necessity of giving to them
the most tedious instruction; accidents of most disheartening and
discouraging kinds--all tended to delay the successful application of
the new system.

The first important work to be undertaken was the tracing or setting
out of the centre line of the proposed tunnel. It was necessary first
to fix on the summit of the mountain a number of points, in a direct
line, which should pass through the two points chosen, or rather
necessitated by the conditions of the locality, for the two ends of
the tunnel in the respective valleys of the Arc and of Rochemolles;
secondly, to determine the exact distance between these two ends; and
thirdly, to know the precise difference of level between the same
points. These operations commenced toward the end of August, 1857.
Starting from the Northern entrance at Fourneaux, a line was set out
roughly in the direction of Bardonnêche, which line was found to cut
the valley of Rochemolles at a point considerably above the proposed
Southern entrance of the tunnel. On measuring this distance, however,
a second and corrected line could be traced, which was found to be
very nearly correct. Correcting this second line in the same manner,
always departing from the North end, a third line was found to pass
exactly through the two proposed and given points. The highest point
of this line was found to be very nearly at an equal distance from
each end of the tunnel, and at but a short distance below the true
summit of the mountain-point, called the "Grand Vallon." The line thus
approximately determined, it was necessary to fix definitely and
exactly three principal stations or observatories--one on the highest
or culminating point of the mountain, perpendicularly over the axis of
the tunnel; and the other two in a line with each entrance, in such a
manner that, from the centre observatory, both the others could be
observed. At the Southern end, owing to the convenient conformation of
the mountain, the observatory could be established at a point not very
far from the mouth of the tunnel; but toward the North, several
projecting points or counterforts on the mountain necessitated the
carrying of the Northern observatory to a very considerable distance
beyond the entrance of the gallery--not, however, so far as not to be
discerned clearly and distinctly, and without oscillation, by the very
powerful and excellent instrument employed. These three points
permanently established, remain as a check for those intervening, and
serve as the base of the operations for the periodical testing of the
accuracy of the line of excavation.

The first rough tracing out of the line was completed before the
winter of the year 1857, and it was considered sufficiently correct to
permit the commencement of the tunnel at each end by the ordinary
means--manual labor. In the autumn of 1858, the corrected line was
traced, and the observatories definitely fixed, and all other
necessary geodetic operations completed. Contemporaneously was
undertaken a careful levelling between the two ends, taken along the
narrow path of the Colle di Frejus, and bench-marks were established
at intervals along the whole line. All the data necessary for an exact
profile of the work were now obtained. The exact length of the future
tunnel was found to be twelve thousand two hundred and twenty metres,
or about seven and a half English miles; and the difference of level
between the two mouths was ascertained to be two hundred and forty
metres, or seven hundred and eighty feet, the Southern or Bardonnêche
end being the highest. Under these circumstances, it would have been
easy to have established a {63} single gradient from Bardonnêche down
to Fourneaux of about two centimètres per metrè--that is, of about one
in fifty. But a little reflection will show, that in working both ends
of the gallery at once, in order to effect the proper drainage of the
tunnel, it would be necessary to establish two gradients, each
inclining toward the respective mouths, and meeting in some point in
the middle. This, in fact, has been done, and the two hundred and
forty metres' difference of level has been distributed in the
following manner: From Bardonnêche, the gradient mounts at the rate of
0.50 per one thousand mètres--that is, one in two thousand as far as
the middle of the gallery; here it descends toward Fourneaux with a
gradient of 22.20 mètres per one thousand, or about one in forty-five.
The highest point of the Grand Vallon perpendicularly over the axis of
the tunnel is 1615.8 mètres, or 5251.31 feet.

The difficulties encountered in the carrying out of these various
geodetic operations can scarcely be exaggerated. It is true that
nothing is more easy than to picket out a straight line on the ground,
or to measure an angle correctly with a theodolite; but if we consider
the aspect of the locality in which these operations had to be
conducted, repeated over and over again, and tested in every available
manner with the most minute accuracy, we shall be quite ready to
accord our share of praise and admiration to the perseverance which
successfully carried out the undertaking. In these regions, the sun,
fogs, snow, and terrific winds succeed each other with truly
marvellous rapidity, the distant points become obscured by clouds,
perhaps at the very moment when an important sight is to be taken,
causing most vexatious delays, and often necessitating a
recommencement of the whole operation. These delays may in some cases
extend for days, and even weeks. To these inconveniences add the
necessity of mounting and descending daily with delicate instruments
from three thousand to four thousand feet over rocks and rugged
mountain-paths, the time occupied in sending from one point to
another, and the difficulty of planting pickets on elevated positions
often almost inaccessible. All these inconveniences considered, and we
must admit the unusual difficulties of a series of operations which,
under other circumstances, would have offered nothing peculiarly
remarkable.

As has already been pointed out, the excavation of the gallery at both
ends had already been in operation, by ordinary means, since the
latter part of the year 1857; this work continued without interruption
until the machinery was ready; and the progress made in that time
affords a valuable standard by which to measure the effect of the new
machinery. In the interval between the end of 1857 and that to which
we have now arrived, namely, the end of 1858, many important works had
been pushed forward. At Bardonnêche, the communications had been
opened, and bridges and roads constructed for facilitating the
transport of the heavy machinery. Houses for the accommodation of the
workmen had been rapidly springing up, together with the vast edifices
for the various magazines and offices. The canal, more than a mile and
a half in length, for conveying water to the air-compressing machines,
was constructed, and the little Alpine village had become the centre
of life and activity. At Fourneaux, works of a similar character had
been put in motion; only here the transport of the water for the
compressors was more costly and difficult, the water being at a low
level. At first, a current derived from the Arc was used to raise
water to the required height, but afterward it was found necessary to
establish powerful forcing-pumps, new in their details, which are
worked by huge water-wheels driven by the Arc itself. Early in the
month of June, 1859, the first erection of the compressing machinery
was commenced at Bardonnêche. The badness of the season, however, and
{64} the Italian campaign of this year, delayed the rapid progress,
and even caused a temporary suspension of this work. The results
obtained by the experiments which had previously been made on a small
scale at St. Pier d'Arena, failed completely in supplying the data
necessary to insure a practical success to the first applications of
the new system; numberless modifications, both in the
compressing-engines and in the perforating-machines, were found
necessary; and several months were consumed in experimenting with,
modifying, and improving the huge machinery; so that it was not before
the 10th of November, 1860, that five compressors were successfully
and satisfactorily at work. On the 12th, however, two of the large
conducting-pipes burst, and caused a considerable amount of damage,
without causing, however, any loss of life. This accident revealed one
or two very serious defects in the manner of working the valves of the
engine; and in order to provide against the possibility of future
accidents of the same nature, further most extensive modifications
were undertaken.

By the beginning of January, 1861, the five compressors were again at
work; and on the 12th of this month the boring-engine was introduced
for the first time into the tunnel. Very little useful result was,
however, obtained for a long and anxious period, beyond continually
exposing defects and imperfections in the perforators. The pipes
conducting the compressed air from the compressing-machines to the
gallery gave at first continued trouble and annoyance; soon, however,
a very perfect system of joints was established, and this source of
difficulty was completely removed. After much labor and patience, and
little by little, the perforating-machines became improved and
perfected, as is always the case in any perfectly new mechanical
contrivance having any great assemblage of parts. Actual practice
forced into daylight those numberless little defects which theory only
too easily overlooks; but there was no lack of perseverance and
ingenuity on the part of the directing engineers; one by one the
obstacles were met, encountered, and eventually overcome, and the
machines at last arrived at the state of precision and perfection at
which they may be seen to-day. About the month of May, 1861, the work
was suspended for about a month, in consequence of a derangement in
the canal supplying water to the compressors; and it was considered
necessary to construct a large reservoir on the flank of the mountain,
to act as a deposit for the impurities contained in the water, and
which often caused serious inconvenience in the compressors. In the
whole of the first year 1861, the number of working days was two
hundred and nine, and the advance made was but one hundred and seventy
metres (five hundred and fifty feet), or about eighteen inches per day
of twenty-four hours, an amount less than might have been done by
manual labor in the same time. In the year 1862, however, in the three
hundred and twenty-five days of actual work, the advance made was
raised to three hundred and eighty metres (one thousand two hundred
and thirty-five feet), giving a mean advance of 1.17 metres, or about
three feet nine inches per day. In the year 1863, the length done
(always referring to the South or Bardonnêche side) was raised to
above four hundred metres; and no doubt this year a still greater
progress will have been made.

At the Fourneaux or Northern end of the tunnel--owing to increased
difficulties peculiar to the locality--the perforation of the gallery
was much delayed. A totally different system of mechanism for the
compression of air was necessitated; and it was not before the 25th of
January, 1863, that the boring-machine was in _successful_ operation on
this side, or two years later than at Bardonnêche. The experience,
however, gained at this latter place, and the transfer of a few
skilful workmen, soon raised the advance {65} made per day to an
amount equivalent to that effected at the Southern entrance. Thus, on
the South side (omitting the first year, 1861) since the beginning of
1862, and on the North side since the beginning of 1863, the new
system of mechanical tunnelling may be said to have been in regular
and _successful_ operation.

In the beginning of September of this year were completed in all three
thousand five hundred and seventy metres of gallery. From this we
deduct sixteen hundred metres done by manual labor, leaving, for the
work done by the machines, a length of nineteen hundred and seventy
metres. From this we can make a further deduction of the one hundred
and seventy metres executed in the first year of experiment and trial
at Bardonnêche, so that we have eighteen hundred metres in length
excavated by the machines in a time dating from the beginning of 1862
at the South end, and from the beginning of 1863 at the North end of
the tunnel. Thus, up to the month of September, 1864, we have in all
four years and six months; and eighteen hundred metres divided by 4.5
gives us four hundred metres as the rate of progress per year at each
side, or in total, eight hundred metres per year. Basing our
calculation, then, on this rate, we find that the eight thousand six
hundred and fifty metres yet to be excavated will require about ten
and a half more years; so that we may look forward to the opening of
the Mont Cenis tunnel at about the year 1875. The directing engineers,
who have given good proof of competency and skill, are, however, of
opinion that this period may be considerably reduced, unless some
totally unlooked-for obstacles are met with in the interior of the
mountain. As has been indicated above, sixteen hundred metres in
length of the tunnel was completed by manual labor before the
introduction of the mechanical boring-engines, in a period of five
years at the North and three years at the South side, equal to four
years at each end; and eight hundred metres in four years gives us two
hundred metres per year, or just one-half excavated by the machine in
the same period.

In using the machines, up to the present time, a perfect ventilation
of the tunnel has been secured by the compressed air escaping from the
exhaust of the boring-engines; or by jets of air expressly impinged
into the lower end of the gallery to clear out rapidly the smoke and
vapor formed by the explosion of the mine. It should be remembered,
moreover, that in working a gallery of this kind, where vertical
shafts are impossible, by manual labor, a powerful and costly
air-compressing apparatus would have been necessary for the
ventilation of the tunnel alone, so that the economy of the system, as
applied at the Mont Cenis over the general system of tunnelling in
hard rock, is evident. I propose, in the second portion of this
article, to give a short description of the machinery employed and the
system of working adopted, both at the South and North ends of the
Mont Cenis gallery.



II.

Travellers who are given to pedestrian exercises may easily visit the
works being carried on for the perforation of the tunnel through the
Alps, both at Bardonnêche and at Modane, passing from one mouth of the
tunnel to the other by the Colle di Frejus; and in fine weather, the
tourist would not repent the eight hours spent in walking from
Bardonnêche to Susa--a distance of about twenty-five miles. The road
descends the valley of the Dora Ripari, and abounds in beautiful
scenery. The railway to be constructed along this narrow defile will
be found to tax the skill of the engineer as much as any road yet
attempted. Its total length, from the terminus at Susa to the mouth of
the Mont Cenis tunnel, will be forty kilometres, {66} or about
twenty-four miles; and the difference of level between these two
points is about two thousand five hundred feet, the line having a
maximum gradient of one in forty, and a minimum of one in eighty-four.
There will be three tunnels of importance, having a total length of
about ten thousand feet; three others of lesser dimensions, having a
total length of five thousand five hundred feet; and twelve other
small tunnels, of lengths varying from two hundred and twenty to eight
hundred and fifty feet, their total length being five thousand four
hundred feet. Thus, the total length of tunnel on these twenty-four
miles of railway will be nearly twenty-one thousand feet, or about
four miles--just one-sixth of the whole line. There will also be
several examples of bridges and retaining walls of unusual dimensions.

The works being carried on at Bardonnêche are on a larger scale than
at Modane; so we will, with our readers' permission, suppose ourselves
arrived in company at the former place, and the first point which we
will visit together will be the large house containing the
air-compressing machinery. Before entering, however, we will throw a
glance at the exterior of the building. We find before us, as it were,
_two_ houses, in a direct line one with the other--one situated at the
foot of a steep ascent; and the other at about seventy or eighty feet
above it, on the side of the mountain. These two houses are, however,
but _one_, being joined by ten rows of inclined arch-work. Along the
summit of each row of arches is a large iron pipe, more than a foot in
diameter. These ten pipes, inclined at an angle of about forty-five
degrees, come out of the side of the upper house, and enter the side
of the lower house, and serve to conduct the water from the large
reservoir above to the air-compressing machinery, which is arranged in
the house below, exerting in this machinery the pressure of a column
of water eighty-four feet six inches in height. On entering the
compression-room, we have before us ten compressing-machines,
precisely the same in all their parts--five on the right hand, and five
on the left, forming, as it were, two groups of five each. In the
centre of these two groups are two machines, in every respect like a
couple of small steam-engines, only they are worked by compressed air
instead of steam, and which we will call _aereomotori_. Each of these
aereomotori imparts a rotary motion to a horizontal axis extending
along the whole length of the room, and on which are a series of cams,
which regulate the movements of the valves of the great compressors.
This axis we will call the "main shaft." One group of five compressors
is totally independent of the other, and has its aereomotore with its
main shaft; but still, with one single aereomotore, by means of a
simple connecting apparatus, it is possible to work one or the other
group separately, or both together; also, any number of the ten
compressors can be disconnected for repairs without affecting the
action of the rest, or may be injured without conveying any injury to
the others. In front of each of the ten compressors are placed
cylindrical recipients, in every respect like large steam-boilers,
except that they have no fire-grate or flues, each having a capacity
of seventeen cubic metres, or five hundred and eighty-three cubic
feet. These recipients are put into communication one with the other
by means of a tube similar to a steam-pipe connecting a series of
steam-boilers; and each connection is furnished with a stop-valve, so
that any one recipient can be isolated from the rest.

Let us now examine the end and action of this machinery. As the
aereomotori which work the valves of the machines for forcing air into
the recipients are themselves worked by compressed air coming from the
recipients, it is evident that before we can put the
compressing-machines in motion, we must have already some supply of
compressed air in the {67} cylindrical vessels. This supply of air,
compressed to a pressure of six atmospheres, is obtained in the
following manner: Each group of five recipients, filled with air at
the ordinary atmospheric pressure, is put in communication with a
large pipe which enters into a cistern placed in the side of the
mountain at about one hundred and sixty-two feet above the floor of
the compressing-room. The first operation, then, is to open the
equilibrium valves placed at the bottom of the two pipes (one from
each group of recipients); water then rushes into the vessels,
compressing the ordinary air therein contained to about a pressure of
six atmospheres. A communication is now opened between this compressed
air and the cylinders of the aereomotori, which commence their action
precisely as a steam-engine would do on the admission of steam; a
rotary motion is given to the main shaft; and the equilibrium valves,
placed in chambers at the bottom of each of the ten pipes coming from
the cistern of water placed in the house above, are opened. We will
observe the operation in one of the ten lines of action, as it were,
consisting of the pipe conducting the water from the cistern, the
compressing-machine, and the cylindrical recipient. The equilibrium
valve at the bottom of the pipe being opened in the manner above
explained, the water, with its head of eighty-four feet six inches,
rushes past it, along a short length of horizontal pipe (in which is
an exhaust valve, now closed), and begins to mount a vertical column
or tube of cast-iron about ten feet high and two feet in diameter: the
air in this column undergoes compression until it has reached a
pressure sufficient to force open a valve in a pipe issuing from the
summit of the tube, and connecting it with the recipient. This valve
being already weighted with the pressure of the air compressed to six
atmospheres by the means previously explained, a certain quantity of
air is thus forced into the vessel; at this moment, another revolution
of the main shaft causes the equilibrium valve at the bottom of the
conducting-pipe to be shut, and at the same time opens the exhaust
valve at the foot of the vertical column. The head of water being now
cut off, and the exhaust open, the water in the vertical column begins
to sink by its own gravity, leaving a vacuum behind it, if it were not
for a small clack-valve opening inward in the upper part of the
compressing column, which opens by the external pressure of the air,
so that by the time all the water has passed out of the exhaust valve,
the compressor is again full of atmospheric air; the valve in
connection with the recipient being closed by the compressed air
imprisoned in the vessel. The aereomotori continue their motion,
another revolution of the main shaft shuts the exhaust and opens the
equilibrium or admission valve; the column of water is again permitted
to act, and the same action is repeated, more air being forced into
the recipient at each round or _pulsation_ of the machine. Now,
supposing no consumption of the compressed air to take place beyond
that used for driving the aereomotori, it seems evident that the water
in the vessels would be gradually forced out, owing to the growing
pressure of the air inside, above the pressure of the column of water
coming from the higher cistern; but the communication with this higher
cistern is always kept open, the column of water acting, in fact, as a
sort of moderator or governor to the compressing-machine, rising or
falling according to the consumption of the compressed air, and always
insuring that there shall be a pressure of six atmospheres acting
against the valve at the summit of the vertical column. A water-tube
placed on the outside of each group of recipients, with a graduated
scale marked on it, indicates at a glance the consumption of air. If
the perforating-machines in the tunnel cease working, the pressure
augments in the recipients, and the water in them falls until an
equilibrium is established, {68} between the pressure of the column of
water and the force of the compressors, until, in fact, these work
without being able to lift the valve at the summit of the vertical
compressing column. On the other hand, if more air than usual be used
for ventilating the tunnel, or by an accidental leakage in the
conducting-pipes, the water rises rapidly in the recipients, and
consequently in the water-gauge outside, and in thus creating an
equilibrium, indicates the state of things. By this means a continual
compensation of pressure is kept up, which prevents any shock on the
valves, and causes the machine to work with the regularity and
uniformity of a steam-engine provided with a governor. In every turn
of the main shaft, a complete circle of effects take place in the
compressors; and experience has shown that three turns a minute of the
shaft--that is, three _pulsations_ of the compressing-machine per
minute--are sufficient. It will thus be seen that a column of water,
having the great velocity due to a head of eighty-four feet six
inches, acts upon a column of air contained in a vertical tube; the
effect of this velocity being to inject, as it were, a certain
quantity of air into a recipient at each upward stroke of the column,
and at each downward stroke drawing in after it an equivalent quantity
of atmospheric air as a fresh supply. The ten recipients charged with
air compressed to six atmospheres (ninety pounds on the square inch)
in the manner above explained, serve as a reservoir of the force
required for working the boring-engines in the tunnel, and for
ventilating and purifying the gallery. The air is conducted in pipes
about eight inches in diameter, having a thickness of metal of about
three-eighths of an inch. Much doubt had previously been expressed as
to the possibility of conveying compressed air to great distances
without a very great and serious loss of power. The experience gained,
however, at the Mont Cenis has shown that, conveyed to a distance of
thirteen English miles, the loss would be but one-tenth of the
original force; and that the actual measured loss of power in a
distance of six thousand five hundred feet, a little more than a mile
and a quarter, was less than 1-127th of the original pressure in the
recipients.

The mouth of the tunnel is but a few hundred yards from the
air-compressing house--we will now proceed thither. For nearly a mile
in length the gallery is completed and lined with masonry. At the
first view, we are struck with the bold outline of its section and its
ample dimensions. Excepting, perhaps, the passage of an occasional
railway-truck, laden with pieces of rock and rubbish, we find nothing
to remind us of the numbers of busy workmen and of the powerful
machines which are laboring in the tunnel. All is perfectly quiet and
solitary. Looking around us as we traverse this first and completed
portion, we observe nothing very different from an ordinary
railway-tunnel, with the exception of the great iron pipe which
conveys the compressed air, and is attached to the side of the wall.
At the end of about a quarter of an hour we begin to hear sounds of
activity, and little lights flickering in the distance indicate that
we are approaching the scene of operations. In a few moments we reach
the second division of the tunnel, or that part which is being
enlarged from the comparatively small section made by the
perforating-machine to its full dimensions, previously to being lined
with masonry. In those portions where the workmen are engaged in the
somewhat dangerous operation of detaching large blocks of stone from
the roof, the tunnel is protected by a ceiling of massive beams, under
which the visitor passes--not, however, without hurrying his pace and
experiencing a feeling of satisfaction when the distance is completed.
Gradually leaving behind us the bee-like crowd of busy miners, with
the eternal ring of their boring-bars against the hard rock, we find
the excavated gallery {69} getting smaller and smaller, and the
difficulties of picking our way increasing at every step; the sounds
behind us get fainter and fainter, and in a short time we are again in
the midst of a profound solitude.

The little gallery in which we are now stumbling our way over blocks
of stone and rubbish, only varied by long tracts of thick slush and
pools of water, is the section excavated by the boring-machine--in
dimension about twelve feet broad by eight feet high. The tramway
which has accompanied us all the way is still continued along this
small section. In the middle portion underneath the rails is the
canal, inclined toward the mouth of the tunnel, for carrying off the
water; and in this canal are now collected the pipes for conveying the
compressed air to the machines, and the gas for illuminating the
gallery. At the end of a few minutes, a rattling, jingling sound
indicates that we are near the end of our excursion, and that we are
approaching the perforating-machines. On arriving, we find that nearly
the whole of the little gallery is taken up by the engine, the frame
of which, mounted upon wheels, rests upon the main tramway, so that
the whole can be moved backward or forward as necessary. On examining
the arrangement a little closely, we find that in reality we have
before us nine or ten perforators, completely independent of one
another, all mounted on one frame, and each capable of movement in any
direction. Attached to every one of them are two flexible tubes, one
for conveying the compressed air, and the other the water which is
injected at every blow or stroke of the tool into the hole, for the
purpose of clearing out the debris and for cooling the point of the
"jumper." In front, directed against the rock, are nine or ten tubes
(according to the number of perforators), very similar in appearance
to large gun-barrels, out of which are discharged with great rapidity
an equal number of boring-bars or jumpers. Motion is given to these
jumpers by the direct admission of a blast of compressed air behind
them, the return stroke being effected by a somewhat slighter pressure
of air than was used to drive them forward. We will suppose the
machine brought up for the commencement of an attack. The points most
convenient for the boring of the holes having been selected, the nine
or ten perforators, as the case may be, are carefully adjusted in
front of them. The compressed air is then admitted, and the boring of
the holes commences. On an average, at the end of about three-quarters
of an hour, the nine or ten holes are pierced to a depth of two feet
to two feet six inches. Another ten holes are then commenced, and so
on, until about eighty holes are pierced. The greater number of these
holes are driven toward the centre of the point of attack, and the
rest round the perimeter. The driving of these eighty holes to an
average depth of two feet three inches, is usually completed in about
seven hours, and the second operation is then commenced.

The flexible tubes conveying the compressed air and the water are
detached from the machines, and placed in security in the covered
canal. The perforating-machine, mounted on its frame or truck, is
drawn back on the tramway behind two massive folding-doors of wood.
Miners then advance and charge the holes in the centre with powder,
and adjust the matches; fire is given, and the miners retire behind
the folding-doors, which are closed. The explosion opens a breach in
the centre part of the front of attack. Powerful jets of compressed
air are now injected, to clear off the smoke formed by the powder. As
soon as the gallery is clear, the other holes in the perimeter are
charged and fired, and more air is injected. Then comes the third
operation. Gangs of workmen advance and clear away the debris and
blocks of stone detached by the explosion of the mine, in little
wagons running on a pair of rails placed by the side of the main
tramway. This done, the main line is {70} prolonged to the requisite
distance, and the perforating engine is again brought forward for a
fresh attack. Thus, we have three distinct operations--first, the
mechanical perforation of the holes; secondly, the charging and
explosion of the mine; and thirdly, the clearing away of the debris.
By careful registers kept since the commencement of the work, it is
found that the mean duration of each successive operation is as
follows: for the perforation of the holes, seven hours thirty-nine
minutes; for the charging and explosion of the mine, three hours
twenty-nine minutes; for the clearing away of the debris, two hours
thirty-three minutes; or, in all, nearly fourteen hours. Occasionally,
however, the three operations may be completed in ten hours, all
depending upon the hardness of the rock. It has been found practically
more expeditious to make two series of operations in twenty-four
hours.

Whatever may be the nature of the rock, if it is very hard, the depth
of the holes is reduced; that is, the perforation is only continued
for a certain given time--about six and a half hours--which, for the
eighty holes with ten perforaters, gives us about three-quarters of an
hour for each hole. The rock is generally of calcareous schist,
crystallized, and exceedingly hard, traversed by thick veins of
quartz, which often break the points of the boring-tools after a few
blows. Each jumper gives about three blows per second, and makes
one-eighteenth of a revolution on its axis at each blow, or one
complete revolution every six seconds. Thus, in the three-quarters of
an hour necessary to drive a single hole to the depth of twenty-seven
inches, we have four hundred and fifty revolutions of the bar, and
eighteen hundred violent blows given by the point against the hard
rock, and that under an impulse of about one hundred and eighty
pounds. These figures will give us some idea of the wear and tear of
the perforating-machines. It is calculated that on an average one
perforating-machine is worn out for every six metres of gallery, so
that more than two thousand will be consumed before the completion of
the tunnel. The total length completed at the Bardonnêche side at the
present time is just two thousand three hundred metres, or nearly a
mile and a half.

At the north or Modane end, the mechanical perforators are precisely
the same as at Bardonnêche, as also is the system of working in the
gallery. The machinery for the compression of air, however, is very
different, more simple, and in every way an improvement upon that at
the South end. Not finding any convenient means of obtaining a head of
eighty-four feet of water sufficient in quantity for working a series
of compressors, as at Bardonnêche, there has been established at
Modane a system of direct compression, the necessary force for which
is derived from the current of the Arc. Six large water-wheels moved
by this current give a reciprocating motion to a piston contained in a
large horizontal cylinder of cast iron. This piston, having a column
of water on each side of it, raises and lowers alternately these two
columns, in two vertical tubes about ten feet high, compressing the
air in each tube alternately, and forcing a certain quantity, at each
upward stroke of the water, to enter into a cylindrical recipient.
There is very little loss of water in this machine, which in its
action is very like a large double-barreled common air-pump. It is a
question open to science whether the employment of compressed air for
driving the perforating engines in a work such as is in operation at
the Mont Cenis, could not be advantageously and economically exchanged
for the employment of a direct hydraulic motive force, the ventilation
of the tunnel being provided for by other means. The system, however,
employed at Modane has many advantages, which it is impossible to
overlook, and its complete success has given a marked and decided
impulse to the modern science of tunnelling through hard rock.

------

{71}

Translated from the Civiltà Cattolica.

ON THE UNITY OF TYPE IN THE ANIMAL KINGDOM.


I.

The generation of a human creature takes place neither by the
development of a being which is found in the germ, sketched as it were
like a miniature, nor by a sudden formation or an instantaneous
transition from potential to actual existence. It is effected by the
true production of a new being, which pre-exists only virtually in the
activity of the germ communicated by the conceiver, and the successive
transformation of the potential subject.

This truth, an _a priori_ postulate of philosophy, and demonstrated by
physiology _a posteriori_, was illustrated by us in a preceding
article. Here we must discard an error which has sprung from this
truth. For there have been materialists who maintained that there was
but one type in the whole animal kingdom, that is, _man_, as he unites
in himself in the highest possible degree perfection of organism and
delicacy of feelings; and that all the species of inferior animals
were so many stages in the development of that most perfect type. This
opinion is thus expressed by Milne-Edwards in his highly esteemed
lectures on the Physiology and Comparative Anatomy of Man and Animals:

  "Every organized being undergoes in its development deep and various
modifications. The character of the anatomical structure, no less than
  its vital faculties, changes as it passes from the state of embryo
  to that of a perfect animal in its own species. Now all the animals
  which are derived from the same type move during a certain time in
  the same embryonic road, and resemble each other in that process of
  organization during a certain period of time, the longer as their
  zoological relationship is closer; afterward they deviate from the
  common road and each acquires the properties belonging to it. Those
  that are to have a more perfect structure proceed further than those
  whose organization is completed at less cost. It results from this
  that the transitory or embryonic state of a superior animal
  resembles, in a more or less wonderful manner, the permanent state
  of another animal lower in the same zoological series. Some authors
  have thought right to conclude from this that the diversity of
  species proceeds from a series of stages of this kind taking place
  at different degrees of the embryonic development; and these
  writers, falling into the exaggerations to which imitators are
  especially liable, have held that every superior animal, in order to
  reach its definitive form, must pass through the series of the
  proper forms of animals which are its inferiors in the zoological
  hierarchy; so that man, for instance, before he is born, is at first
  a kind of worm, then a mollusk, then a fish, or something like it,
  before he can assume the characters belonging to his species. An
  eminent professor has recently expressed these views in a concise
  form, saying that the embryology of the most perfect being is a
  comparative transitory anatomy, and that the anatomic table of the
  whole animal kingdom is a fixed and permanent representation of the
  movable aspect of human organogeny."

Thus, according to this opinion, man is the only type of animal life;
and every inferior species is but an imitation, more or less perfect,
of the same; an inchoation stopped in its course at a greater or
shorter distance from the term to which the work of nature tends in
its organization of the human embryo. In short, an {72} _entoma in
difetto_, to use the language of Dante.

The doctrine is not new in the scientific world. It was proclaimed in
the last century by Robinet, who held that all inferior beings are but
so many proofs or sketches upon which nature practises in order to
learn how to form man. In the beginning of the present century
Lamarck, in Germany, following Kielmayer, reproduced the same theory.
According to him all the species of animals inferior to man are but so
many lower steps at which the human embryo stops in its gradual
development. Man, on the contrary, is the last term reached by nature
after she has travelled all through the zoological scale, to fit
herself for that work. About the same time the celebrated naturalist,
Stephen Geoffroy Saint Hilaire, began to disseminate in France
analogous ideas under the name of _stages of development_ (_arrêt de
devéloppement)_; and these ideas, exaggerated by some of his
disciples, amounted in their minds to the same doctrine of Lamarck,
just alluded to. Among them Professor Serres holds the first rank, and
it is to him that Milne-Edwards alludes in the passage just cited. He
expresses himself thus:

  "Human organogeny is a comparative transitory anatomy, as
  comparative anatomy is the fixed and permanent state of the
  organogeny of man; and, on the contrary, if we reverse the
  proposition, or method of investigation, and study animal life from
  the lowest to the highest, instead of considering it from the
  highest to the lowest, we shall see that the organisms of the series
  reproduce incessantly those of the embryos, and fix themselves in
  that state which for animals becomes the term of their development.
  The long series of changes of form presented by the same organism in
  comparative anatomy is but the reproduction of the numerous series
  of transformations to which this organism is subjected in the embryo
  in the course of its development. In the embryo the passage is
  rapid, in virtue of the power of the life which animates it; in the
  animal the life of the organism is exhausted, and it stops there,
  because it is not permitted to follow the course traced for the
  human embryo. Distinct stages on the one hand, progressive advance
  on the other, here is the secret of development, the fundamental
  difference which the human mind can perceive between comparative
  anatomy and organogeny. The animal series thus considered in its
  organisms is but a long chain of embryos which succeed each other
  gradually and at intervals, reaching at last man, who thus finds his
  physical development in comparative organogeny."

Thus speaks Serres. And in another place:

  "The whole animal kingdom appears only like one animal in the course
  of formation in the different organisms. It stops here sooner, there
  later, and thus at the time of each interruption determines, by the
  state in which it then is, the distinctive and organized characters
  of classes, families, genera, and species."


II.


THIS OPINION REFUTED BY PHILOSOPHICAL REASONS.


The futility of the above doctrine is manifest, in the first place,
from the weakness of the foundation on which it rests. That foundation
is no other than a kind of likeness which appears at first sight
between the rudimental forms which, in the first steps of its
development, are assumed by the human embryo, and the forms of some
inferior animals. For the germ, by the very reason that it has not, as
it was once believed, all the organism of the human body in
microscopic proportions, but in order to acquire it must pass from
potential to actual existence--by that very reason, is {73} subjected
to continual metamorphoses, that is, to successive transformations,
which give it different aspects, from that of a little disc to the
perfect human figure. Now, it is clear that, in this gradual
transition from the mere power to the act of perfect organization, a
kind of analogy or likeness to some of the numberless forms of
inferior organizations of the animal kingdom may, and must, be found
in its intermediate and incomplete state.

But, evidently, between analogy and identity there is an immense
difference; and the fact of there being an analogy with some of those
forms, gives us no right to infer that there is one with all. Hence
this theory is justly despised by the most celebrated naturalists as
the whim of an extravagant fancy.

"According to Lamarck," says Frédault, in speaking of this, theory,
"all the animals are but inferior grades at which the human germ
stopped in its development, and man is but the result of the last
efforts of a nature which has passed successively through the grades
of its novitiate, and has arrived at the last term of its perfection.
Presented in this view, the doctrine of epigenesis raised against
itself the most simple and scientific common sense, as being
manifestly erroneous. Numerous works on the development of the germ
have demonstrated that appearances were taken for realities, and that
imagination had created a real romance. It has been proved that if, at
certain epochs of its development, the human germ has a distant
resemblance either to a worm or a reptile, such resemblance is very
remote, and that on this point we must believe as much as we would
believe of the assertion of a man who, looking at the clouds, should
say that he could discover the palaces and gardens of Armida, with
horsemen and armies, and all that a heated imagination might fancy."

However, laying aside all that, the opinion which we are now examining
originates, with those who uphold it, in a total absence of
philosophical conceptions. That strange idea of the unity of type and
of its stages, in order to establish the forms of inferior animals,
would never have risen in the mind of any one who had duly considered
the immutability of essences and the reason of the formation of a
thing. The act of making differs from the thing made only as the means
differs from the end. Both belong to the same order--one implies
movement, the other rest. Their difference lies only in this: that
what in the term is unfolded and complete, in its progress toward the
term is found to be only sketched out, and having a tendency to
formation. Hence it follows that, whatever the point of view from
which we consider the embryo of each animal, it is nothing else but
the total organism of the same in the course of formation; and,
therefore, it differs as substantially from every other organism as
the term itself toward which it proceeds. And what we affirm of the
whole organism must be said of each of its parts, which are
essentially related to the whole and follow the nature of the whole.
The first rudiments, for instance, of the hands of man could not
properly be compared to the wings of a bird. As they are hands after
being made, so they are hands in the process of formation; as their
structure is different, so is their being immutable.

Whatever may be the likeness between the first appearances of the
human embryo and the forms of lower animals, they are not the effect
of a stable existence, but of a transitory and shifting existence,
which does not constitute a species, but is merely and essentially a
movement toward the formation of the species. On the contrary, the
forms presented by animals already constituted in their being belong
to a stable and permanent existence, which diversifies one species
from another. The difference, then, between the former and the latter
is interior and substantial, and cannot be changed into exterior and
accidental, as it would be if it consisted in {74} stopping or in
travelling further on. The movement or tendency which takes place in
the germ to become another thing until the said germ assumes a perfect
organization relative to the being it must produce, is not a quality
which can be discarded, since it is intimately combined with the
subject itself in which it is found. The essence itself must be
changed in it in order to obtain stability and consistency. But if the
essence be changed, we are out of the question, since in that case we
should have, not the human embryo arrested at this or that stage on
its road, but a different being substituted for it; of analogous
exterior appearance, perhaps, but substantially different, which would
constitute an annual of inferior degree.

In short, each animal is circumscribed in its own species, like every
other being in nature. If to reach to the perfection required by its
independent existence it needs development, every step in that journey
is an inchoation of the next, and cannot exist but as such. To change
its nature and to make it a permanent being, is as impossible as to
change one essence into another.

Again: From the opinion we are refuting it would follow that all
animals, man excepted, are so many monsters, since they are nothing
else but deviations, for want of ulterior development, from what
nature really intends to do as a term of its action. Thus anomaly is
converted into law, disorder into order, an accidental case into a
constant fact.

Finally, in that hypothesis we should have to affirm not only that the
inferior and more imperfect species appeared on earth before the
nobler and the more akin to the unique and perfect type, but also that
on the appearance of a more perfect species the preceding one had
disappeared; being inferior in the scale of perfection. For what other
reason could be alleged for nature's stopping at a bird when it
intends to make a man, but that the causes are not properly disposed,
or that circumstances are not quite favorable to the production of
that perfect animal? Then when the causes are ready, and the
circumstances propitious, it is necessary that man be fashioned and
that the bird disappear. Now all that is contrary to experience. For
all the species, together with the type, are of the same date, and we
see them born constantly in the same circumstances which are common to
all, either of temperature or atmosphere or latitude, etc.

The theory, then, of the unity of type in the animal kingdom and of
stages of development falls to the ground, if we only look at it from
a philosophical point of view.



III.

IT IS REFUTED BY PHYSIOLOGICAL REASONS.


However, physiological arguments have more force in this matter than
the philosophical; since they are more closely connected with the
subject, and have in their favor the tangible evidence of fact.

We shall take our arguments from three celebrated naturalists as the
representatives of an immense number, whom want of space forbids us to
quote.

Flourens shows the error of that opinion by referring to the diversity
of the nervous system. The nervous system is the foundation of the
animal organism; it is the general instrument of vital functions, of
sensation, and of motion. If then one archetypal idea presides over
the formation of the different organisms, only one nervous system
ought to appear in each, more or less developed or arrested. But
experience teaches us the contrary. It shows nervous systems differing
in different animals ordained to different functions, each perfect in
its kind. "Is there a unity of type?" asks this celebrated naturalist.
"To say that there is but one type is to say that there is but one
form of {75} nervous system; because the form of the nervous system
determines the type; that is, it determines the general form of the
animal. Now, can we affirm that there is but one form of nervous
system? Can we hold that the nervous system of the zoophyte is the
same as that of the mollusk, and this latter the same as that of the
articulata, or this again the same as that of the vertebrata? And if
we cannot say that there is only one nervous system, can we affirm
that there is only one type?"

He speaks likewise of the unity of plan. Every creature is built
differently, and the difference is especially striking between members
of the several grand divisions of the animal kingdom. The plan then of
each is different, and so is the typical idea which prescribes its
formation. No animal can then be considered as the proof or outline of
another.

"Is there a unity of plan? The plan is the relative location of the
parts. One can conceive very well the unity of plan without the unity
of number; for it is sufficient that all the parts, whatever their
number may be, keep always relatively to each other the same place.
But can one say that the vertebrate animal, whose nervous system is
placed above the digestive canal, is fashioned after the same plan as
the mollusk, whose digestive canal is placed above the nervous system?
Can one say that the crustacean, whose heart is placed above the
spinal marrow, is fashioned after the same pattern as the vertebrate,
whose spinal marrow is placed above the heart? Is the relative
location of the parts maintained? On the contrary, is it not
overthrown? And if there is a change in the location of parts, how is
there a unity of plan?"

Müller draws nearer to the consideration of the development of the
human embryo, and forcibly illustrates the falsehood of the pretended
theory. "It is not long since it was held with great seriousness that
the human foetus, before reaching its perfect state, travels
_successively_ though the different degrees of development which are
permanent during the whole life of animals of inferior classes. That
hypothesis has not the least foundation, as Baer has shown. The human
embryo never resembles a radiate, or an insect, or a mollusk, or a
worm. The plan of formation of those animals is quite different from
that of the vertebrate. Man then might at most resemble these last,
since he himself is a vertebrate, and his organization is fashioned
after the common type of this great division of the animal kingdom.
But he does not even resemble at one time a fish, at another a
reptile, a bird, etc. The analogy is no greater between him and a
reptile or a bird, than it is between all vertebrate animals. During
the first stages of their formation, all the embryos of vertebrate
animals present merely the simplest and most general delineations of
the type of a vertebrate; hence it is that they resemble each other so
much as to render it very difficult to distinguish them. The fish, the
reptile, the bird, the mammal, and man are at first the simplest
expression of a type common to all; but in proportion as they grow,
the general resemblance becomes fainter and fainter, and their
extremities, for instance, after being alike for a certain time,
assume the characters of wings, of hands, of feet, etc."

Mr. Milne-Edwards takes the same view of embryonic generation:

  "I agree with Geoffrey Saint Hilaire, that often a great analogy is
  observed between the final state of certain parts of the bodies of
  some inferior animals, and the embryonic state of the same parts of
  other animals belonging to the same type the organism of which is
  further developed, and with the same philosopher, I call the cause
  of the state of permanent inferiority arrests of development. But I
  am far from thinking with some of his disciples that the embryo of
  man or of mammals exhibits in its different degrees of formation the
  species of the less perfect of animate creation. No! a {76} mollusk
  or an anhelid is not the embryo of a mammal, arrested in its organic
  development, any more than the mammal is a kind of fish perfected.
  Each animal carries within itself, from the very origin, the
  beginning of its specific individuality, and the development of its
  organism, in conformity to the general outline of the plan of
  structure proper to its species, is always a condition of its
  existence. There is never a complete likeness between an adult
  animal and the embryo of another, between one of its organs and the
  transitory state of the same in the course of formation; and the
  multiplicity of the products of creation could never be explained by
  a similar transmutation of species. We shall see hereafter, that in
  every zoological group composed of animals which seem to be derived
  from a common fundamental type, the different species do not exhibit
  at first any marked difference, but soon begin to be marked by
  various particularities of constructure always growing and numerous.
  Thus each species acquires a character of its own, which
  distinguishes it from all others in the way of development, and each
  of its organs becomes different from the analogous part of every
  other embryo. But the changes which the organs and the whole being
  undergo after they have deviated from the common genesiac form, are
  generally speaking the less considerable in proportion as the animal
  is destined to receive a less perfect organism, and consequently
  they retain a kind of resemblance to those transitory forms."

Reason then and experience, theory and fact, philosophy and
physiology, agree in protesting against the arbitrary doctrine of the
unity of type in the animal kingdom; a doctrine which has its origin
in an absence of sound scientific notions and a superficial
observation of the phenomena of nature. Through the former defect men
failed to consider that if the end of each animal species is
different, different also must be its being, and therefore a different
type must preside as a rule and supreme law over the formation of the
being. By the latter, some very slight and partial analogies have been
mistaken for identity and universality, and mere appearances have been
assumed as realities.

----

From Blackwood's Magazine.

DOMINE, QUO VADIS?  [Footnote 6]

BY P. S. WORSLEY.

  [Footnote 6: See Mrs. Jameson's "Sacred and Legendary Art," p. 180.]


  There stands in the old Appian Way,
     Two miles without the Roman wall,
  A little ancient church, and grey:
     Long may it moulder not nor fall!
  There hangs a legend on the name
  One reverential thought may claim.

  'Tis written of that fiery time,
     When all the angered evil powers
  Leagued against Christ for wrath and crime,
     How Peter left the accursed towers,
  Passing from out the guilty street,
  And shook the red dust from his feet.

{77}

  Sole pilgrim else in that lone road,
      Suddenly he was 'ware of one
  Who toiled beneath a weary load,
      Bare-headed, in the heating sun,
  Pale with long watches, and forespent
  With harm and evil accident.

  Under a cross his weak limbs bow,
     Scarcely his sinking strength avails.
  A crown of thorns is on his brow,
     And in his hands the print of nails.
  So friendless and alone in shame,
  One like the Man of Sorrows came.

  Read in her eyes who gave thee birth
     That loving, tender, sad rebuke;
  Then learn no mother on this earth,
     How dear soever, shaped a look
  So sweet, so sad, so pure as now
  Came from beneath that holy brow.

  And deeply Peter's heart it pierced;
     Once had he seen that look before;
  And even now, as at the first,
     It touched, it smote him to the core.
  Bowing his head, no word save three
  He spoke--_"Quo vadis, Domine?"_

  Then, as he looked up from the ground,
     His Saviour made him answer due--
  "My son, to Rome I go, thorn-crowned,
     There to be crucified anew;
  Since he to whom I gave my sheep
  Leaves them for other men to keep."

  Then the saint's eyes grew dim with tears.
     He knelt, his Master's feet to kiss--
  "I vexed my heart with faithless fears;
     Pardon thy servant, Lord, for this."
  Then rising up--but none was there--
  No voice, no sound, in earth or air.

  Straightway his footsteps he retraced,
     As one who hath a work to do.
  Back through the gates he passed with haste,
     Silent, alone and full in view;
  And lay forsaken, save of One,
  In dungeon deep ere set of sun.

{78}

  Then he who once, apart from ill,
     Nor taught the depth of human tears,
  Girded himself and walked at will,
     As one rejoicing in the years,
  Girded of others, scorned and slain,
  Passed heavenward through the gates of pain.

  If any bear a heart within,
     Well may these walls be more than stone,
  And breathe of peace and pardoned sin
     To him who grieveth all alone.
  Return, faint heart, and strive thy strife;
  Fight, conquer, grasp the crown of life.


------


From The Month.

CONSTANCE SHERWOOD.

AN AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.

BY LADY GEORGIANA FULLERTON.


CHAPTER I.

I had not thought to write the story of my life; but the wishes of
those who have at all times more right to command than occasion to
entreat aught at my hands, have in a manner compelled me thereunto.
The divers trials and the unlooked-for comforts which have come to my
lot during the years that I have been tossed to and fro on this uneasy
sea--the world--have wrought in my soul an exceeding sense of the
goodness of God, and an insight into the meaning of the sentence in
Holy Writ which saith, "His ways are not as our ways, nor his thoughts
like unto our thoughts." And this puts me in mind that there are
sayings which are in every one's mouth, and therefore not to be
lightly gainsayed, which nevertheless do not approve themselves to my
conscience as wholly just and true. Of these is the common adage,
"That misfortunes come not alone." For my own part, I have found that
when a cross has been laid on me, it has mostly been a single one, and
that other sorrows were oftentimes removed, as if to make room for it.
And it has been my wont, when one trial has been passing away, to look
out for the next, even as on a stormy day, when the clouds have rolled
away in one direction and sunshine is breaking overhead, we see others
rising in the distance. There has been no portion of my life free from
some measure of grief or fear sufficient to recall the words that "Man
is born to trouble as the sparks fly upward;" and none so reft of
consolation that, in the midst of suffering, I did not yet cry out,
"The Lord is my shepherd; his rod and his staff comfort me."

I was born in the year 1557, in a very fair part of England, at
Sherwood Hall, in the county of Stafford. For its comely aspect,
commodious chambers, sunny gardens, and the sweet walks in its
vicinity, it was as commendable a residence for persons of moderate
fortune and contented minds as can well be thought of. Within and
without this my paternal home nothing was wanting which might please
the eye, or minister to {79} tranquillity of mind and healthful
recreation. I reckon it amongst the many favors I have received from a
gracious Providence, that the earlier years of my life were spent
amidst such fair scenes, and in the society of parents who ever took
occasion from earthly things to lead my thoughts to such as are
imperishable, and so to stir up in me a love of the Creator, who has
stamped his image on this visible world in characters of so great
beauty; whilst in the tenderness of those dear parents unto myself I
saw, as it were, a type and representation of his paternal love and
goodness.

My father was of an ancient family, and allied to such as were of
greater note and more wealthy than his own. He had not, as is the
manner with many squires of our days, left off residing on his own
estate in order to seek after the shows and diversions of London; but
had united to a great humility of mind and a singular affection for
learning a contentedness of spirit which inclined him to dwell in the
place assigned to him by Providence. He had married at an early age,
and had ever conformed to the habits of his neighbors in all lawful
and kindly ways, and sought no other labors but such as were
incidental to the care of his estates, and no recreations but those of
study, joined to a moderate pursuit of field-sports and such social
diversions as the neighborhood afforded. His outward appearance was
rather simple than showy, and his manners grave and composed. When I
call to mind the singular modesty of his disposition, and the
retiredness of his manners, I often marvel how the force of
circumstances and the urging of conscience should have forced one so
little by nature inclined to an unsettled mode of life into one which,
albeit peaceful in its aims, proved so full of danger and disquiet.

My mother's love I enjoyed but for a brief season. Not that it waxed
cold toward me, as happens with some parents, who look with fondness
on the child and less tenderly on the maiden; but it pleased Almighty
God to take her unto himself when I was but ten years of age. Her face
is as present to me now as any time of my life. No limner's hand ever
drew a more faithful picture than the one I have of her even now
engraved on the tablet of my heart. She had so fair and delicate a
complexion that I can only liken it to the leaf of a white rose with
the lightest tinge of pink in it. Her hair was streaked with gray too
early for her years; but this matched well with the sweet melancholy
of her eyes, which were of a deep violet color. Her eyelids were a
trifle thick, and so were her lips; but there was a pleasantness in
her smile and the dimples about her mouth such as I have not noticed
in any one else. She had a sweet womanly and loving heart, and the
noblest spirit imaginable; a great zeal in the service of God,
tempered with so much sweetness and cordiality that she gave not
easily offence to any one, of howsoever different a way of thinking
from herself; and either won them over to her faith through the
suavity of her temper and the wisdom of her discourse, or else worked
in them a personal liking which made them patient with her, albeit
fierce with others. When I was about seven years of age I noticed that
she waxed thin and pale, and that we seldom went abroad, and walked
only in our own garden and orchard. She seemed glad to sit on a bench
on the sunny side of the house even in summer, and on days when by
reason of the heat I liked to lie down in the shade. My parents
forbade me from going into the village; and, through the perverseness
common to too many young people, on account of that very prohibition I
longed for liberty to do so, and wearied oftentimes of the solitude we
lived in. At a later period I learnt how kind had been their intent in
keeping me during the early years of childhood from a knowledge of the
woeful divisions which the late changes in religion had wrought in our
country; which I might easily have heard from {80} young companions,
and maybe in such sort as to awaken angry feelings, and shed a drop of
bitter in the crystal cup of childhood's pure faith. If we did walk
abroad, it was to visit some sick persons, and carry them food or
clothing or medicines, which my mother prepared with her own hands.
But as she grew weaker, we went less often outside the gates, and the
poor came themselves to fetch away what in her bounty she stored up
for them. I did not notice that our neighbors looked unkindly on us
when we were seen in the village. Children would cry out sometimes,
but half in play, "Down with the Papists!" but I witnessed that their
elders checked them, especially those of the poorer sort; and "God
bless you, Mrs. Sherwood!" and "God save you, madam!" was often in
their mouths, as she whom I loved with so great and reverent an
affection passed alongside of them, or stopped to take breath, leaning
against their cottage-palings.

Many childish heartaches I can even now remember when I was not
suffered to join in the merry sports of the 1st of May; for then, as
the poet Chaucer sings, the youths and maidens go

  "To fetch the flowers fresh and branch and bloom,
  And these, rejoicing in their great delight,
  Eke each at other throw the blossoms bright."

I watched the merry wights as they passed our door on their way to the
groves and meadows, singing mirthful carols, and bent on pleasant
pastimes; and tears stood in my eyes as the sound of their voices died
away in the distance. My father found me thus weeping one May-day, and
carried me with him to a sweet spot in a wood, where wild-flowers grew
like living jewels out of the green carpet of moss on which we sat;
and there, as the birds sang from every bough, and the insects hovered
and hummed over every blossom, he entertained me with such quaint and
pleasant tales, and moved me to merry laughter by his witty devices;
so that I set down that day in my book of memory as one of the
joyfullest in all my childhood. At Easter, when the village children
rolled pasch eggs down the smooth sides of the green hills, my mother
would paint me some herself, and adorned them with such bright colors
and rare sentences that I feared to break them with rude handling, and
kept them by me throughout the year, rather as pictures to be gazed on
than toys to be played with in a wanton fashion.

On the morning of the Resurrection, when others went to the top of
Cannock Chase to hail the rising sun, as is the custom of those parts,
she would sing so sweetly the psalm which speaketh of the heavens
rejoicing and of the earth being glad, that it grieved me not to stay
at home; albeit I sometimes marvelled that we saw so little company,
and mixed not more freely with our neighbors.

When I had reached my ninth birthday, whether it was that I took
better heed of words spoken in my hearing, or else that my parents
thought it was time that I should learn somewhat of the conditions of
the times, and so talked more freely in my presence, it so happened
that I heard of the jeopardy in which many who held the Catholic faith
were, and of the laws which were being made to prohibit in our country
the practice of the ancient religion. When Protestants came to our
house--and it was sometimes hard in those days to tell who were such at
heart, or only in outward semblance out of conformity to the queen's
pleasure--I was strictly charged not to speak in their hearing of aught
that had to do with Catholic faith and worship; and I could see at
such times on my mother's face an uneasy expression, as if she was
ever fearing the next words that any one might utter.

In the autumn of that year we had visitors whose company was so great
an honor to my parents, and the occasion of so much delight to myself,
that I can call to mind every little circumstance of their brief
sojourn under our roof, even as if it had taken place but {81}
yesterday. This visit proved the first step toward an intimacy which
greatly affected the tenor of my life, and prepared the way for the
direction it was hereafter to take.

These truly honorable and well-beloved guests were my Lady Mounteagle
and her son Mr. James Labourn, who were journeying at that time from
London, where she had been residing at her son-in-law the Duke of
Norfolk's house, to her seat in the country; whither she was carrying
the three children of her daughter, the Duchess of Norfolk, and of
that lady's first husband, the Lord Dacre of the North. The eldest of
these young ladies was of about my own age, and the others younger.

The day on which her ladyship was expected, I could not sit with
patience at my tambour-frame, or con my lessons, or play on the
virginals; but watched the hours and the minutes in my great desire to
see these noble wenches. I had not hitherto consorted with young
companions, save with Edmund and John Genings, of whom I shall have
occasion to speak hereafter, who were then my playmates, as at a riper
age friends. I thought, in the quaint way in which children couple one
idea with another in their fantastic imaginations, that my Lady
Mounteagle's three daughters would be like the three angels, in my
mother's missal, who visited Abraham in his tent.

I had craved from my mother a holiday, which she granted on the score
that I should help her that forenoon in the making of the pasties and
jellies, which, as far as her strength allowed, she failed not to lend
a hand to; and also she charged me to set the bed-chambers in fair
order, and to gather fresh flowers wherewith to adorn the parlor.
These tasks had in them a pleasantness which whiled away the time, and
I alternated from the parlor to the store-room, and the kitchen to the
orchard, and the poultry-yard to the pleasure-ground, running as
swiftly from one to the other, and as merrily, as if my feet were
keeping time with the glad beatings of my heart. As I passed along the
avenue, which was bordered on each side by tall trees, ever and anon,
as the wind shook their branches, there fell on my head showers of red
and gold-colored leaves, which made me laugh; so easy is it for the
young to find occasion of mirth in the least trifle when their spirits
are lightsome, as mine were that day. I sat down on a stone bench on
which the western sun was shining, to bind together the posies I had
made; the robins twittered around me; and the air felt soft and fresh.
It was the eve of Martinmas-day--Hallowtide Summer, as our country
folk call it. As the sun was sinking behind the hills, the tread of
horses' feet was heard in the distance, and I sprang up on the bench,
shading my eyes with my hand to see the approach of that goodly
travelling-party, which was soon to reach our gates. My parents came
out of the front door, and beckoned me to their side. I held my posies
in my apron, and forgot to set them down; for the first sight of my
Lady Mounteagle, as she rode up the avenue with her son at her side,
and her three grand-daughters with their attendants, and many
richly-attired serving-men beside, filled me with awe. I wondered if
her majesty had looked more grand on the day that she rode into London
to be proclaimed queen. The good lady sat on her palfry in so erect
and stately a manner, as if age had no dominion over her limbs and her
spirits; and there was something so piercing and commanding in her
eye, that it at once compelled reverence and submission. Her son had
somewhat of the same nobility of mien, and was tall and graceful in
his movements; but behind her, on her pillion, sat a small counterpart
of herself, inasmuch as childhood can resemble old age, and youthful
loveliness matronly dignity. This was the eldest of her ladyship's
grand-daughters, my sweet Mistress Ann Dacre. This was my first sight
of her who was hereafter to hold so great a place in my heart and {82}
in my life. As she was lifted from the saddle, and stood in her
riding-habit and plumed hat at our door, making a graceful and modest
obeisance to my parents, one step retired behind her grandam, with a
lovely color tinging her cheeks, and her long lashes veiling her sweet
eyes, I thought I had never seen so fair a creature as this high-born
maiden of my own age; and even now that time, as it has gone by, has
shown me all that a court can display to charm the eyes and enrapture
the fancy, I do not gainsay that same childish thought of mine. Her
sisters, pretty prattlers then, four and six years of age, were led
into the house by their governess. But ere our guests were seated, my
mother bade me kiss my Lady Mounteagle's hand and commend myself to
her goodness, praying her to be a good lady to me, and overlook, out
of her great indulgence, my many defects. At which she patted me on
the cheek, and said, she doubted not but that I was as good a child as
such good parents deserved to have; and indeed, if I was as like my
mother in temper as in face, I must needs be such as her hopes and
wishes would have me. And then she commanded Mistress Ann to salute
me; and I felt my cheeks flush and my heart beat with joy as the sweet
little lady put her arms round my neck, and pressed her lips on my
cheek.

Presently we all withdrew to our chambers until such time as supper
was served, at which meal the young ladies were present; and I
marvelled to see how becomingly even the youngest of them, who was but
a chit, knew how to behave herself, never asking for anything, or
forgetting to give thanks in a pretty manner when she was helped. For
the which my mother greatly commended their good manners; and her
ladyship said, "In truth, good Mistress Sherwood, I carry a strict
hand over them, never suffering their faults to go unchastised, nor
permitting such liberties as many do to the ruin of their children." I
was straightway seized with a great confusion and fear that this was
meant as a rebuke to me, who, not being much used to company, and
something overindulged by my father, by whose side I was seated, had
spoken to him more than once that day at table, and had also left on
my plate some victuals not to my liking; which, as I learnt at another
time from Mistress Ann, was an offence for which her grandmother would
have sharply reprehended her. I ventured not again to speak in her
presence, and scarcely to raise my eyes toward her.

The young ladies withdrew early to bed that night, and I had but
little speech with them. Before they left the parlor, Mistress Ann
took her sisters by the hand, and all of them, kneeling at their
grandmother's feet, craved her blessing. I could see a tear in her eye
as she blessed them; and when she laid her hand on the head of the
eldest of her grand-daughters, it lingered there as if to call down
upon her a special benison. The next day my Lady Mounteagle gave
permission for Mistress Ann to go with me into the garden, where I
showed her my flowers and the young rabbits that Edmund Genings and
his brother, my only two playmates, were so fond of; and she told me
how well pleased she was to remove from London unto her grandmother's
seat, where she would have a garden and such pleasant pastimes as are
enjoyed in the country.

"Prithee, Mistress Ann," I said, with the unmannerly boldness with
which children are wont to question one another, "have you not a
mother, that you live with your grandam?"

"I thank God that I have," she answered; "and a good mother she is to
me; but by reason of her having lately married the Duke of Norfolk, my
grandmother has at the present time the charge of us."

"And do you greatly love my Lady Mounteagle?" I asked, misdoubting in
my folly that a lady of so grave aspect and stately carriage should be
loved by children.

{83}

"As greatly as heart can love," was her pretty answer.

"And do you likewise love the Duke of Norfolk, Mistress Ann?" I asked
again.

"He is my very good lord and father," she answered; "but my knowledge
of his grace has been so short, I have scarce had time to love him
yet."

"But I have loved you in no time," I cried, and threw my arms round
her neck. "Directly I saw you, I loved you, Mistress Ann."

"Mayhap, Mistress Constance," she said, "it is easier to love a little
girl than a great duke."

"And who do you affection beside her grace your mother, and my lady
your grandam, Mistress Ann?" I said, again returning to the charge; to
which she quickly replied:

"My brother Francis, my sweet Lord Dacre."

"Is he a child?" I asked.

"In truth, Mistress Constance," she answered, "he would not be well
pleased to be called so; and yet methinks he is but a child, being not
older, but rather one year younger than myself, and my dear playmate
and gossip."

"I wish I had a brother or a sister to play with me," I said; at which
Mistress Ann kissed me and said she was sorry I should lack so great a
comfort, but that I must consider I had a good father of my own,
whereas her own was dead; and that a father was more than a brother.

In this manner we held discourse all the morning, and, like a rude
imp, I questioned the gracious young lady as to her pastimes and her
studies and the tasks she was set to; and from her innocent
conversation I discovered, as children do, without at the time taking
much heed, but yet so as to remember it afterward, what especial care
had been taken by her grandmother--that religious and discreet
lady--to instill into her virtue and piety, and in using her, beside
saying her prayers, to bestow alms with her own hands on prisoners and
poor people; and in particular to apply herself to the cure of
diseases and wounds, wherein she herself had ever excelled. Mistress
Ann, in her childish but withal thoughtful way, chide me that in my
own garden were only seen flowers which pleased the senses by their
bright colors and perfume, and none of the herbs which tend to the
assuagement of pain and healing of wounds; and she made me promise to
grow some against the time of her next visit. As we went through the
kitchen-garden, she plucked some rosemary and lavender and rue, and
many other odoriferous herbs; and sitting down on a bench, she invited
me to her side, and discoursed on their several virtues and properties
with a pretty sort of learning which was marvellous in one of her
years. She showed me which were good for promoting sleep, and which
for cuts and bruises, and of a third she said it eased the heart.

"Nay, Mistress Ann," I cried, "but that must be a heartsease;" at
which she smiled, and answered:

"My grandam says the best medicines for uneasy hearts are the bitter
herb confession and the sweet flower absolution."

"Have you yet made your first communion, Mistress Ann?" I asked in a
low voice, at which question a bright color came into her cheek, and
she replied:

"Not yet; but soon I may. I was confirmed not long ago by the good
Bishop of Durham; and at my grandmother's seat I am to be instructed
by a Catholic priest who lives there."

"Then you do not go to Protestant service?" I said.

"We did," she answered, "for a short time, whilst we stayed at the
Charterhouse; but my grandam has understood that it is not lawful for
Catholics, and she will not be present at it herself, or suffer us any
more to attend it, neither in her own house nor at his grace's."

While we were thus talking, the two little ladies, her sisters, came
from the house, having craved leave from the governess to run out into
the {84} garden. Mistress Mary was a pale delicate child, with soft
loving blue eyes; and Mistress Bess, the youngest, a merry imp, whose
rosy cheeks and dimpling smiles were full of glee and merriment.

"What ugly sober flowers are these, Nan, that thou art playing with?"
she cried, and snatched at the herbs in her sister's lap. "When I
marry my Lord William Howard, I'll wear a posy of roses and
carnations."

"When I am married," said little Mistress Mary, "I will wear nothing
but lilies."

"And what shall be thy posy, Nan?" said the little saucy one again,
"when thou dost wed my Lord Surrey?"

"Hush, hush, madcaps!" cried Mistress Ann. "If your grandam was to
hear you, I doubt not but the rod would be called for."

Mistress Mary looked round affrighted, but little Mistress Bess said
in a funny manner, "Prithee, Nan, do rods then travel?"

"Ay; by that same token, Bess, that I heard my lady bid thy nurse take
care to carry one with her."

"It was nurse told me I was to marry my Lord William, and Madge my
Lord Thomas, and thee, Nan, my Lord Surrey, and brother pretty Meg
Howard," said the little lady, pouting; "but I won't tell grandam of
it an it would be like to make her angry."

"I would be a nun!" Mistress Mary cried.

"Hush!" her elder sister said; "that is foolish talking, Madge; my
grandmother told me so when I said the same thing to her a year ago.
Children do not know what Almighty God intends them to do. And now
methinks I see Uncle Labourn making as if he would call us to the
house, and there are the horses coming to the door. We must needs obey
the summons. Prithee, Mistress Constance, do not forget me."

Forget her! No. From that day to this years have passed over our heads
and left deep scars on our hearts. Divers periods of our lives have
been signalized by many a strange passage; we have rejoiced, and,
oftener still, wept together; we have met in trembling, and parted in
anguish; but through sorrow and through joy, through evil report and
good report, in riches and in poverty, in youth and in age, I have
blessed the day when first I met thee, sweet Ann Dacre, the fairest,
purest flower which ever grew on a noble stem.



CHAPTER II.

A year elapsed betwixt the period of the so brief, but to me so
memorable, visit of the welcomest guests our house ever received--to
wit, my Lady Mounteagle and her grand-daughters--and that in which I
met with an accident, which compelled my parents to carry me to
Lichfield for chirurgical advice. Four times in the course of that
year I was honored with letters writ by the hand of Mistress Ann
Dacre; partly, as the gracious young lady said, by reason of her
grandmother's desire that the bud acquaintanceship which had sprouted
in the short-lived season of the aforesaid visit should, by such
intercourse as may be carried on by means of letters, blossom into a
flower of true friendship; and also that that worthy lady and my good
mother willed such a correspondence betwixt us as would serve to the
sharpening of our wits, and the using our pens to be good servants to
our thoughts. In the course of this history I will set down at
intervals some of the letters I received at divers times from this
noble lady; so that those who read these innocent pictures of herself,
portrayed by her own hand, may trace the beginnings of those virtuous
inclinations which at an early age were already working in her soul,
and ever after appeared in her.

On the 15th day of January of the next year to that in which my eyes
had feasted on this creature so embellished with rare endowments and
{85} accomplished gracefulness, the first letter I had from her came
to my hand; the first link of a chain which knit together her heart
and mine through long seasons of absence and sore troubles, to the
great comforting, as she was often pleased to say, of herself, who was
so far above me in rank, whom she chose to call her friend, and of the
poor friend and servant whom she thus honored beyond her deserts. In
as pretty a handwriting as can well be thought of, she thus wrote:

  "MY SWEET MISTRESS CONSTANCE,
  --Though I enjoyed your company but for the too brief time during
  which we rested under your honored parents' roof, I retain so great
  a sense of the contentment I received therefrom, and so lively a
  remembrance of the converse we held in the grounds adjacent to
  Sherwood Hall, that I am better pleased than I can well express that
  my grandmother bids me sit down and write to one whom to see and to
  converse with once more would be to me one of the chiefest pleasures
  in life. And the more welcome is this command by reason of the hope
  it raises in me to receive in return a letter from my well-beloved
  Mistress Constance, which will do my heart more good than anything
  else that can happen to me. 'Tis said that marriages are made in
  heaven. When I asked my grandam if it were so, she said, 'I am of
  opinion, Nan, they are made in many more places than one; and I
  would to God none were made but such as are agreed upon in so good a
  place.' But methinks some friendships are likewise made in heaven;
  and if it be so, I doubt not but that when we met, and out of that
  brief meeting there arose so great and sudden a liking in my heart
  for you, Mistress Constance,--which, I thank God, you were not slow
  to reciprocate,--that our angels had met where we hope one day to be,
  and agreed together touching that matter.

  "It suits ill a bad pen like mine to describe the fair seat we
  reside in at this present time--the house of Mr. James Labourn,
  which he has lent unto my grandmother. 'Tis most commodious and
  pleasant, and after long sojourn in London, even in winter, a
  terrestrial paradise. But, like the garden of Eden, not without
  dangers; for the too much delight I took in out-of-doors pastimes--
  and most of all on the lake when it was frozen, and we had merry
  sports upon it, to the neglect of my lessons, not heeding the lapse
  of time in the pursuit of pleasure--brought me into trouble and sore
  disgrace. My grandmother ordered me into confinement for three days
  in my own chamber, and I saw her not nor received her blessing all
  that time; at the end of which she sharply reproved me for my fault,
  and bade me hold in mind that 'twas when loitering in a garden Eve
  met the tempter, and threatened further and severe punishment if I
  applied not diligently to my studies. When I had knelt down and
  begged pardon, promising amendment, she drew me to her and kissed
  me, which it was not her wont often to do. 'Nan,' she said, 'I would
  have thee use thy natural parts, and improve thyself in virtue and
  learning; for such is the extremity of the times, that ere long it
  may be that many first shall be last and many last shall be first in
  this realm of England. But virtue and learning are properties which
  no man can steal from another; and I would fain see thee endowed
  with a goodly store of both. That great man and true confessor, Sir
  Thomas More, had nothing so much at heart as his daughter's
  instruction; and Mistress Margaret Roper, once my sweet friend,
  though some years older than my poor self, who still laments her
  loss, had such fine things said of her by the greatest men of this
  age, as would astonish thee to hear; but they were what she had a
  right to and very well deserved. And the strengthening of her mind
  through study and religious discipline served {86} her well at the
  time of her great trouble; for where other women would have lacked
  sense and courage how to act, she kept her wits about her, and
  ministered such comfort to her father, remaining near him at the
  last, and taking note of his wishes, and finding means to bury him
  in a Christian manner, which none other durst attempt, that she had
  occasion to thank God who gave her a head as well as a heart. And
  who knows, Nan, what may befal thee, and what need thou mayst have
  of the like advantages?'

  "My grandmother looked so kindly on me then, that, albeit abashed at
  the remembrance of my fault, I sought to move her to further
  discourse; and knowing what great pleasure she had in speaking of
  Sir Thomas More, at whose house in Chelsea she had oftentimes been a
  visitor in her youth, I enticed her to it by cunning questions
  touching the customs he observed in his family.

  "'Ah, Nan!' she said, that house was a school and exercise of the
  Christian religion. There was neither man nor woman in it who was
  not employed in liberal discipline and fruitful reading, although
  the principal study was religion. There was no quarrelling, not so
  much as a peevish word to be heard; nor was any one seen idle; all
  were in their several employs: nor was there wanting sober mirth.
  And so well-managed a government Sir Thomas did not maintain by
  severity and chiding, but by gentleness and kindness.'

  "Methought as she said this, that my dear grandam in that matter of
  chiding had not taken a leaf out of Sir Thomas's book; and there was
  no doubt a transparency in my face which revealed to her this
  thought of mine; for she straightly looked at me and said, 'Nan, a
  penny for thy thoughts!' at the which I felt myself blushing, but
  knew nothing would serve her but the truth; so I said, in as humble
  a manner as I could think of, 'An if you will excuse me, grandam, I
  thought if Sir Thomas managed so well without chiding, that you
  manage well with it.' At the which she gave me a light nip on the
  forehead, and said, 'Go to, child; dost think that any but saints
  can rule a household without chiding, or train children without
  whipping? Go thy ways, and mend them too, if thou wouldst escape
  chastisement; and take with thee, Nan, the words of one whom we
  shall never again see the like of in this poor country, which he
  used to his wife or any of his children if they were diseased or
  troubled, "We must not look at our pleasures to go to heaven in
  feather-beds, or to be carried up thither even by the chins."' And
  so she dismissed me; and I have here set down my fault, and the
  singular goodness showed me by my grandmother when it was pardoned,
  not thinking I can write anything better worth notice than the
  virtuous talk with which she then favored me.

  "There is in this house a chapel very neat and rich, and an ancient
  Catholic priest is here, who says mass most days; at the which we,
  with my grandmother, assist, and such of her servants as have not
  conformed to the times; and this good father instructs us in the
  principles of Catholic religion. On the eve of the feast of the
  Nativity of Christ, my lady stayed in the chapel from eight at night
  till two in the morning; but sent us to bed at nine, after the
  litanies were said, until eleven, when there was a sermon, and at
  twelve o'clock three masses said, which being ended we broke our
  fast with a mince-pie, and went again to bed. And all the
  Christmas-time we were allowed two hours after each meal for
  recreation, instead of one. At other times, we play not at any game
  for money; but then we had a shilling a-piece to make us merry;
  which my grandmother says is fitting in this time of mirth and joy
  for his birth who is the sole origin and spring of true comfort. And
  now, sweet Mistress Constance, I must bid you farewell; for the
  greatest of {87} joys has befallen me, and a whole holiday to enjoy
  it. My sweet Lord Dacre is come to pay his duty to my lady and tarry
  some days here, on his way to Thetford, the Duke of Norfolk's seat,
  where his grace and the duchess my good mother have removed. He is a
  beauty, Mistress Constance; and nature has so profusely conferred on
  him privileges, that when her majesty the queen saw him a short time
  back on horseback, in the park at Richmond, she called him to her
  carriage-door and honored him with a kiss, and the motto of the
  finest boy she ever beheld. But I may not run on in this fashion,
  letting my pen outstrip modesty, like a foolish creature, making my
  brother a looking-glass and continual object for my eyes; but learn
  to love him, as my grandam says, in God, of whom he is only
  borrowed, and not so as to set my heart wholly on him. So beseeching
  God bless you and yours, good Mistress Constance, I ever remain,
  your loving friend and humble servant,

  "ANN DACRE."

Oh, how soon were my Lady Mounteagle's words exalted in the event! and
what a sad brief note was penned by that affectionate sister not one
month after she writ those lines, so full of hope and pleasure in the
prospect of her brother's sweet company! For the fair boy that was the
continual object of her eyes and the dear comfort of her heart was
accidentally slain by the fall of a vaulting horse upon him at the
duke's house at Thetford.

  "MY GOOD MISTRESS CONSTANCE"
  (she wrote, a few days after his lamentable death),--"The lovingest
  brother a sister ever had, and the most gracious creature ever born,
  is dead; and if it pleased God I wish I were dead too, for my heart
  is well-nigh broken. But I hope in God his soul is now in heaven,
  for that he was so young and innocent; and when here, a short time
  ago, my grandmother procured that he should for the first, and as it
  has pleased God also for the only and the last, time, confess and be
  absolved by a Catholic priest, in the which the hand of Providence
  is visible to our great comfort, and reasonable hope of his
  salvation. Commending him and your poor friend, who has great need
  of them, to your good prayers, I remain your affectionate and humble
  servant,

  "ANN DACRE."


In that year died also, in childbirth, her grace the Duchess of
Norfolk, Mistress Ann's mother; and she then wrote in a less
passionate, but withal less comfortable, grief than at her brother's
loss, and, as I have heard since, my Lady Mounteagle had her
death-blow at that time, and never lifted up her head again as
heretofore. It was noticed that ever after she spent more time in
prayer and gave greater alms. Her daughter, the duchess, who at the
instance of her husband had conformed to the times, desired to have
been reconciled on her deathbed by a priest, who for that end was
conducted into the garden, yet could not have access unto her by
reason of the duke's vigilance to hinder it, or at least of his
continual presence in her chamber at the time. And soon after, his
grace, whose wards they were, sent for his three step-daughters to the
Charterhouse; the parting with which, and the fears she entertained
that he would have them carried to services and sermons in the public
churches, and hinder them in the exercise of Catholic faith and
worship, drove the sword yet deeper through my Lady Mounteagle's
heart, and brought down her gray hairs with sorrow to the grave,
notwithstanding that the duke greatly esteemed and respected her, and
was a very moral nobleman, of exceeding good temper and moderate
disposition. But of this more anon, as 'tis my own history I am
writing, and it is meet I should relate in the order of time what
events came under my notice whilst in {88} Lichfield, whither my
mother carried me, as has been aforesaid, to be treated by a famous
physician for a severe hurt I had received. It was deemed convenient
that I should tarry some time under his care; and Mr. Genings, a
kinsman of her own, who with his wife and children resided in that
town, one of the chiefest in the county, offered to keep me in their
house as long as was convenient thereunto a kindness which my parents
the more readily accepted at his hands from their having often shown
the like unto his children when the air of the country was desired for
them.

Mr. and Mrs. Genings were of the religion by law established. He was
thought to be Catholic at heart; albeit he was often heard to speak
very bitterly against all who obeyed not the queen in conforming to
the new mode of worship, with the exception, indeed, of my mother, for
whom he had always a truly great affection. This gentleman's house was
in the close of the cathedral, and had a garden to it well stored with
fair shrubs and flowers of various sorts. As I lay on a low settle
near the window, being forbid to walk for the space of three weeks, my
eyes were ever straying from my sampler to the shade and sunshine out
of doors. Instead of plying at my needle, I watched the bees at their
sweet labor midst the honeysuckles of the porch, or the swallows
darting in and out of the eaves of the cathedral, or the butterflies
at their idle sports over the beds of mignonette and heliotrope under
the low wall, covered with ivy, betwixt the garden and the close. Mr.
Genings had two sons, the eldest of which was some years older and the
other younger than myself. The first, whose name was Edmund, had been
weakly when a child, and by reason of this a frequent sojourner at
Sherwood Hall, where he was carried for change of air after the many
illnesses incident to early age. My mother, who was some years married
before she had a child of her own, conceived a truly maternal
affection for this young kinsman, and took much pains with him both as
to the care of his body and the training of his mind. He was an apt
pupil, and she had so happy a manner of imparting knowledge, that he
learnt more, as he has since said, in those brief sojourns in her
house than at school from more austere masters. After I came into the
world, he took delight to rock me in my cradle, or play with me as I
sat on my mother's knee; and when I first began to walk, he would lead
me by the hand into the garden, and laugh to see me clutch marigolds
or cry for a sunflower.

"I warrant thou hast an eye to gold, Con," he would say; "for 'tis the
yellow flowers that please thee best."

There is an old hollow tree on the lawn at Sherwood Hall where I often
hid from him in sport, and he would make pretence to seek me
elsewhere, till a laugh revealed me to him, and a chase ensued down
the approach or round the maze. He never tired of my petulance, or
spoke rude words, as boys are wont to do; and had a more serious and
contemplative spirit than is often seen in young people, and likewise
a singular fancy for gazing at the sky when glowing with sunset hues
or darkened by storms, and most of all when studded at night with
stars. On a calm clear night I have noticed him for a length of time,
forgetting all things else, fix his eyes on the heavens, as if reading
the glory of the Lord therein revealed.

My parents did not speak to him of Catholic faith and worship, because
Mr. Genings, before he suffered his sons to stay in their house, had
made them promise that no talk of religion should be ministered to
them in their childhood. It was a sore trial to my mother to refrain,
as the Psalmist saith, from good words, which were ever rising from
her heart to her lips, as pure water from a deep spring. But she
instructed him in many things which belong to gentle learning, and in
French, which she knew well; and {89} taught him music, in which he
made great progress. And this wrought with his father to the
furtherance of these his visits to us. I doubt not but that, when she
told him the names of the heavenly luminaries, she inwardly prayed he
might one day shine as a star in the kingdom of God; or when she
discoursed of flowers and their properties, that he should blossom as
a rose in the wilderness of this faithless world; or whilst guiding
his hands to play on the clavichord, that he might one day join in the
glorious harmony of the celestial choirs. Her face itself was a
preachment, and the tones of her voice, and the tremulous sighs she
breathed when she kissed him or gave him her blessing, had, I ween, a
privilege to reach his heart, the goodness of which was readable in
his countenance. Dear Edmund Genings, thou wert indeed a brother to me
in kind care and companionship whilst I stayed in Lichfield that
never-to-be-forgotten year! How gently didst thou minister to the sick
child, for the first time tasting the cup of suffering; now easing her
head with a soft pillow, now strewing her couch with fresh-gathered
flowers, or feeding her with fruit which had the bloom on it, or
taking her hand and holding it in thine own to cheer her to endurance!
Thou wert so patient and so loving, both with her who was a great
trouble to thee and oftentimes fretful with pain, and likewise with
thine own little brother, an angel in beauty and wit, but withal of so
petulant and froward a disposition that none in the house durst
contradict him, child as he was; for his parents were indeed weak in
their fondness for him. In no place and at no time have I seen a boy
so indulged and so caressed as this John Genings. He had a pretty
wilfulness and such playful ways that his very faults found favor with
those who should have corrected them, and he got praise where others
would have met with chastisement. Edmund's love for this fair urchin
was such as is seldom seen in any save in a parent for a child. It was
laughable to see the lovely imp governing one who should have been his
master, but through much love was his slave, and in a thousand cunning
ways, and by fanciful tricks, constraining him to do his bidding.
Never was a more wayward spirit enclosed in a more winsome form than
in John Genings. Never did childish gracefulness rule more absolutely
over superior age, or love reverse the conditions of ordinary
supremacy, than in the persons of these two brothers.

A strange thing occurred at that time, which I witnessed not myself,
and on which I can give no opinion, but as a fact will here set it
down, and let such as read this story deem of it as they please. One
night that, by reason of the unwonted chilliness of the evening, such
as sometimes occurs in our climate even in summer, a fire had been lit
in the parlor, and the family were gathered round it, Edmund came of a
sudden into the room, and every one took notice that his face was very
pale. He seemed in a great fear, and whispered to his mother, who said
--"Thou must have been asleep, and art still dreaming, child."
Upon which he was very urgent for her to go into the garden, and used
many entreaties thereunto. Upon which, at last, she rose and followed
him. In another moment she called for her husband, who went out, and
with him three or four other persons that were in the room, and I
remained alone for the space of ten or fifteen minutes. When they
returned, I heard them speaking with great fear and amazement of what
they had seen; and Edmund Genings has often since described to me what
he first, and afterward all the others, had beheld in the sky. He was
gazing at the heavens, as was his wont, when a strange spectacle
appeared to him in the air. As it were, a number of armed men with
weapons, killing and murdering others that were disarmed, and great
store of blood running everywhere about them. His parents and those
with them witnessed the same thing, and a great {90} fear fell upon
them all. I noticed that all that evening they seemed scared, and
could not speak of this appearance in the sky without shuddering. But
one that was more bold than the rest took heart, and cried, "God send
it does not forbode that the Papists will murder us all in our beds!"
And Mistress Genings, whose mother was a French Huguenot, said,
"Amen!" I marked that her husband and one or two more of the company
groaned, and one made, as if unwittingly, the sign of the cross. There
were some I know in that town, nay and in that house, that were at
heart of the old religion, albeit, by reason of the times, they did
not give over attending Protestants' worship.

A few days later I was sitting alone, and had a long fit of musing
over the many new thoughts that were crowding into my mind, as yet too
childish to master them, when Edmund came in, and I saw he had been
weeping. He said nothing at first, and made believe he was reading;
but I could see tears trickling down through his fingers as he covered
his face with his hands. Presently he looked up and cried out,

"Cousin Constance, Jack is going away from us."

"And if it please God, not for a long time," I answered; for it
grieved me to see him sad.

"Nay, but he is going for many years, I fear," Edmund said. "My uncle,
Jean de Luc, has asked for him to be brought up in his house at La
Rochelle. He is his godfather, and has a great store of money, which
he says he will leave to Jack. Alack! cousin Constance, I would that
there was no such thing in the world as money, and no such country as
France. I wish we were all dead." And then he fell to weeping again
very bitterly.

I told him in a childish manner what my mother was wont to say to me
when any little trouble fell to my lot--that we should be patient, and
offer up our sufferings to God.

"But I can do nothing now for Jack," he cried. "It was my first
thought at waking and my last at night, how to please the dear urchin;
but now 'tis all over."

"Oh, but Edmund," I cried, "an if you were to be as good as the
blessed saints in heaven, you could do a great deal for Jack."

"How so, cousin Constance?" he asked, not comprehending my meaning;
and thereupon I answered:

"When once I said to my sweet mother, 'It grieves me, dear heart, that
I can give thee nothing, who gives me so much,' she bade me take heed
that every prayer we say, every good work we do, howsoever imperfect,
and every pain we suffer, may be offered up for those we love; and so
out of poverty, and weakness, and sorrow, we have wherewith to make
precious and costly and cheerful gifts."

I spoke as a child, repeating what I had heard; but he listened not as
a child. A sudden light came into his eyes, and methinks his good
angel showed him in that hour more than my poor lips could utter.

"If it be as your sweet mother says," he joyfully cried, "we are rich
indeed; and, even though we be sinners and not saints, we have
somewhat to give, I ween, if it be only our heartaches, cousin
Constance, so they be seasoned with prayers."

The thought which in my simplicity I had set before him took root, as
it were, in his mind. His love for a little child had prepared the way
for it; and the great brotherly affection which had so long dwelt in
his heart proved a harbinger of the more perfect gift of charity; so
that a heavenly message was perchance conveyed to him that day by one
who likewise was a child, even as the word of the Lord came to the
prophet through the lips of the infant Samuel. From that time forward
he bore up bravely against his grief; which was the sharper inasmuch
that he who was the cause of it showed none in return, but rather joy
in the expectancy of the change which was to part them. He {91} would
still be a-prattling on it, and telling all who came in his way that
he was going to France to a good uncle; nor ever intended to return,
for his mother was to carry him to La Rochelle, and she should stay
there with him, he said, and not come back to ugly Lichfield.

"And art thou not sorry, Jack," I asked him one day, "to leave poor
Edmund, who loves thee so well?"

The little madcap was coursing round the room, and cried, as he ran
past me, for he had more wit and spirit than sense or manners:

"Edmund must seek after me, and take pains to find me, if so be he
would have me."

These words, which the boy said in his play, have often come back to
my mind since the two brothers have attained unto a happy though
dissimilar end.

When the time had arrived for Mistress Genings and her youngest son to
go beyond seas, as I was now improved in health and able to walk, my
father fetched me home, and prevailed on Mr. Genings to let Edmund go
back with us, with the intent to divert his mind from his grief at his
brother's departure.

I found my parents greatly disturbed at the news they had had touching
the imprisonment of thirteen priests on account of religion, and of
Mr. Orton being likewise arrested, who was a gentleman very dear to
them for his great virtues and the steadfast friendship he had ever
shown to them.

My mother questioned Edmund as to the sign he had seen in the heavens
a short time back, of which the report had reached them; and he
confirming the truth thereof, she clasped her hands and cried:

"Then I fear me much this forebodes the death of these blessed
confessors, Father Weston and the rest."

Upon which Edmund said, in a humble manner:

"Good Mistress Sherwood, my dear mother thought it signified that
those of your religion would murder in their beds such as are of the
queen's religion; so maybe in both cases there is naught to
apprehend."

"My good child," my mother answered, "in regard of those now in
durance for their faith, the danger is so manifest, that if it please
not the Almighty to work a miracle for their deliverance, I see not
how they may escape."

After that we sat awhile in silence; my father reading, my mother and
I working, and Edmund at the window intent as usual upon the stars,
which were shining one by one in the deep azure of the darkening sky.
As one of greater brightness than the rest shone through the branches
of the old tree, where I used to hide some years before, he pointed to
it, and said to me, who was sitting nearest to him at the window:

"Cousin Constance, think you the Star of Bethlehem showed fairer in
the skies than yon bright star that has just risen behind your
favorite oak? What and if that star had a message for us!"

My father heard him, and smiled. "I was even then," he said, "reading
the words of one who was led to the true religion by the contemplation
of the starry skies. In a Southern clime, where those fair luminaries
shine with more splendor than in our Northern heavens, St. Augustine
wrote thus;" and then he read a few sentences in Latin from the book
in his hand,--"Raising ourselves up, we passed by degrees through all
things bodily, even the very heavens, whence sun and moon and stars
shine upon the earth. Yea, we soared yet higher by inward musing and
discourse and admiring of God's works, and we came to our own minds
and went beyond them, so as to arrive at that region of never-failing
plenty where thou feedest Israel for ever with the food of truth."
These words had a sweet and solemn force in them which struck on the
ear like a strain of unearthly music, such as the wind-harp wakes in
the silence of the {92} night. In a low voice, so low that it was like
the breathing of a sigh, I heard Edmund say, "What is truth?" But when
he had uttered those words, straightway turning toward me as if to
divert his thoughts from that too pithy question, he cried: "Prithee,
cousin Constance, hast thou ended reading, I warrant for the hundredth
time, that letter in thine hand? and hast thou not a mind to impart to
thy poor kinsman the sweet conceits I doubt not are therein
contained?" I could not choose but smile at his speech; for I had
indeed feasted my eyes on the handwriting of my dear friend, now no
longer Mistress Dacre, and learnt off, as it were by heart, its
contents. And albeit I refused at first to comply with his request,
which I had secretly a mind to; no sooner did he give over the urging
of it than I stole to his side, and, though I would by no means let it
out of my hand, and folded down one side of the sheet to hide what was
private in it, I offered to read such parts aloud as treated of
matters which might be spoken of without hindrance.

With a smiling countenance, then, he set himself to listen, and I to
be the mouthpiece of the dear writer, whose wit was so far in advance
of her years, as I have since had reason to observe, never having met
at any time with one in whom wisdom put forth such early shoots.

  "DEAR MISTRESS CONSTANCE"
  (thus the sweet lady wrote),--"Wherefore this long silence and
  neglect of your poor friend? An if it be true, which pains me much
  to hear, that the good limb which, together with its fellow, like
  two trusty footmen, carried you so well and nimbly along the alleys
  of your garden this time last year, has, like an arrant knave,
  played fast and loose, and failed in its good service,--wherein, I am
  told, you have suffered much inconvenience,--is it just that that
  other servant, your hand, should prove rebellious too, refuse to
  perform its office, and write no more letters at your bidding? For
  I'll warrant 'tis the hand is the culprit, not the will; which
  nevertheless should be master, and compel it to obedience. So, an
  you love me, chide roundly that contumacious hand, which fails in
  its duty, which should not be troublesome, if you but had for me
  one-half of the affection I have for you. And indeed, Mistress
  Constance, a letter from you would be to me, at this time, the
  welcomest thing I can think of; for since we left my grandmother's
  seat, and came to the Charterhouse, I have new friends, and many
  more and greater than I deserve or ever thought to have; but, by
  reason of difference of age or of religion, they are not such as I
  can well open my mind to, as I might to you, if it pleased God we
  should meet again. The Duke of Norfolk is a very good lord and
  father to me; but when there are more ways of thinking than one in a
  house, 'tis no easy matter to please all which have a right to be
  considered; and, in the matter of religion, 'tis very hard to avoid
  giving offence. But no more of this at present; only I would to God
  Mr. Fox were beyond seas, and my lady of Westmoreland at her home in
  the North; and that we had no worse company in this house than Mr.
  Martin, my Lord Surrey's tutor, who is a gentleman of great learning
  and knowledge, as every one says, and of extraordinary modesty in
  his behavior. My Lord Surrey has a truly great regard for him, and
  profits much in his learning by his means. I notice he is Catholic
  in his judgment and affections; and my lord says he will not stay
  with him, if his grace his father procures ministers to preach to
  his household and family, and obliges all therein to frequent
  Protestant service. I wish my grandmother was in London; for I am
  sometimes sore troubled in my mind touching Catholic religion and
  conforming to the times, of which an abundance of talk is ministered
  unto us, to my exceeding great discomfort, by my Lady Westmoreland,
  his grace's {93} sister, and others also. An if I say aught thereon
  to Mistress Fawcett (a grave and ancient gentlewoman, who had the
  care of my Lord Surrey during his infancy, and is now set over us
  his grace's wards), and of misliking the duke's ministers and that
  pestilent Mr. Fox--(I fear me, Mistress Constance, I should not have
  writ that unbeseeming word, and I will e'en draw a line across it,
  but still as you may read it for indeed 'tis what he is; but 'tis
  from himself I learnt it, who in his sermons calls Catholic religion
  a pestilent idolatry, and Catholic priests pestilent teachers and
  servants of Antichrist, and the holy Pope at Rome the man of sin)
  she grows uneasy, and bids me be a good child to her, and not to
  bring her into trouble with his grace, who is indeed a very good
  lord to us in all matters but that one of compelling us to hear
  sermons and the like. My Lord Surrey mislikes all kinds of sermons,
  and loves Mr. Martin so well, that he stops his ears when Mr. Fox
  preaches on the dark midnight of papacy and the dawn of the gospel's
  restored light. And it angers him, as well it should, to hear him
  call his majesty King Philip of Spain, who is his own godfather,
  from whom he received his name, a wicked popish tyrant and a son of
  Antichrist. My Lady Margaret, his sister, who is a year younger than
  himself, and has a most admirable beauty and excellent good nature,
  is vastly taken with what she hears from me of Catholic religion;
  but methinks this is partly by reason of her misliking Mr. Fulk and
  Mr. Clarke's long preachments, which we are compelled to hearken to;
  and their fashion of spending Sunday, which they do call the
  Sabbath-day, wherein we must needs keep silence, and when not in
  church sit still at home, which to one of her lively disposition is
  heavy penance. Methinks when Sunday comes we be all in disgrace;
  'tis so like a day of correction. My Lord Surrey has more liberty;
  for Mr. Martin carries him and his brothers after service into the
  pleasant fields about Westminster Abbey and the village of Charing
  Cross, and suffers them to play at ball under the trees, so they do
  not quarrel amongst themselves. My Lord Henry Howard, his grace's
  brother, always maintains and defends the Catholic religion against
  his sister of Westmoreland; and he spoke to my uncles Leonard,
  Edward, and Francis, and likewise to my aunt Lady Montague, that
  they should write unto my grandmother touching his grace bringing us
  up as Protestants. But the Duke of Norfolk, Mrs. Fawcett says, is
  our guardian, and she apprehends he is resolved that we shall
  conform to the times, and that no liberty be allowed us for the
  exercise of Catholic religion."

At this part of the letter I stopped reading; and Edmund, turning to
my father, who, though he before had perused it, was also listening,
said: "And if this be liberty of conscience, which Protestants speak
of, I see no great liberty and no great conscience in the matter."

His cheek flushed as he spoke, and there was a hoarseness in his voice
which betokened the working of strong feelings within him. My father
smiled with a sort of pitiful sadness, and answered:

"My good boy, when thou art somewhat further advanced in years, thou
wilt learn that the two words thou art speaking of are such as men
have abused the meaning of more than any others that can be thought
of; and I pray to God they do not continue to do so as long as the
world lasts. It seems to me that they mostly mean by 'liberty' a
freedom to compel others to think and to act as they have themselves a
mind to; and by 'conscience' the promptings of their own judgments
moved by their own passions."

"But 'tis hard," Edmund said, "'tis at times very hard, Mr. Sherwood,
to know whereunto conscience points, in the midst of so many inward
clamors as are raised in the soul by conflicting passions of dutiful
affection {94} and filial reverence struggling for the mastery. Ay,
and no visible token of God's will to make that darkness light. Tis
that," he cried, more moved as he went on, "that makes me so often
gaze upward. Would to God I might see a sign in the skies! for there
are no sign-posts on life's path to guide us on our way to the
heavenly Jerusalem, which our ministers speak of."

"If thou diligently seekest for sign-posts, my good boy," my father
answered, "fear not but that he who said, 'Seek, and you shall find,'
will furnish thee with them. He has not left himself without
witnesses, or his religion to be groped after in hopeless darkness, so
that men may not discern, even in these troublous times, where the
truth lies, so they be in earnest in their search after it. But I will
not urge thee by the cogency of arguments, or be drawn out of the
reserve I have hitherto observed in these matters, which be
nevertheless the mightiest that can be thought of as regards the
soul's health."

And so, breaking off this discourse, he walked out upon the terrace;
and I withdrew to the table, where my mother was sitting, and once
more conned over the last pages of _my lady's_ letter, which, when the
reader hath read, he will perceive the writer's rank and her right to
be thus titled.

  "And now, Mistress Constance, I must needs inform you of a matter I
  would not leave you ignorant of, so that you should learn from
  strangers what so nearly concerns one whom you have a friendship to--
  and that is my betrothal with my Lord Surrey. The ceremony was
  public, inasmuch as was needful for the solemnising of a contract
  which is binding for life--'until death us do part,' as the marriage
  service hath it. How great a change this has wrought in my thoughts,
  none knows but myself; for though I be but twelve years of age (for
  his grace would have the ceremony to take place on my birthday), one
  year older than yourself, and so lately a child that not a very long
  time ago my grandmother would chastise me with her own hands for my
  faults, I now am wedded to my young lord, and by his grace and all
  the household titled Countess of Surrey! And I thank God to be no
  worse mated; for my lord, who is a few months younger than me, and a
  very child for frolicksome spirits and wild mirth, has,
  notwithstanding, so great a pleasantness of manners and so forward a
  wit, that one must needs have pleasure in his company; and I only
  wish I had more of it. Whilst we were only friends and playmates, I
  used to chide and withstand him, as one older and one more staid and
  discreet than himself; but, ah me! since we have been wedded, 'tis
  grand to hear him discourse on the duty of wives, and quote the
  Bible to show they must obey their husbands. He carries it in a very
  lordly fashion; and if I comply not at once with his commands, he
  cries out what he has heard at the play-house:

    'Such duty as the subject owes the prince
    Even such a woman oweth to her husband;
    And when she's froward, peevish sullen, sour,
    And not obedient to his honest will,
    What is she but a foul contending rebel
    And graceless traitor to her loving lord?
    I am ashamed that women are so simple
    To offer war where they should kneel for peace;
    Or seek for rule, supremacy, or sway,
    Where they are bound to serve, love, and obey.'


  He has a most excellent memory. If he has but once heard out of any
  English or Latin book so much read as is contained in a leaf, he
  will forthwith perfectly repeat it. My Lord Henry, his uncle, for a
  trial, invented twenty long and difficult words a few days back,
  which he had never seen or heard before; yet did he recite them
  readily, every one in the same order as they were written, having
  only once read them over. But, touching that matter of obedience,
  which I care not to gainsay, 'tis not easy at present to obey my
  lord my husband, and his grace his father, and Mistress Fawcett,
  too, who holds as strict a hand over the Countess of Surrey as over
  Mistress Ann Dacre; for the commands of these my rulers do not at
  all times accord: but I pray to God I may do my duty, and be a good
  wife to my lord; and I {95} wish, as I said before, my grandmother
  had been here, and that I had been favored with her good counsel,
  and had had the benefit of shrift and spiritual advice ere I entered
  on this stage of my life, which is so new to me, who was but a child
  a few weeks ago, and am yet treated as such in more respects than
  one.

  "My lord has told me a secret which Higford, his father's servant,
  let out to him; and 'tis something so weighty and of so great
  import, that since he left me my thoughts have been truants from my
  books, and Monsieur Sebastian, who comes to practice us on the lute,
  stopped his ears, and cried out that the Signora Contessa had no
  mercy on him, so to murther his compositions. Tis not the part of a
  true wife to reveal her husband's secrets, or else I would tell you,
  Mistress Constance, this great news, which I can with trouble keep
  to myself; and I shall not be easy till I have seen my lord again,
  which should be when we walk in the garden this evening; but I pray
  to God he may not be off instead to the Mall, to play at kittlepins;
  for then I have small chance to get speech with him to-day. Mr.
  Martin is my very good friend, and reminds the earl of his duty to
  his lady; but if my lord comes at his bidding, when he would be
  elsewhere than in my company, 'tis little contentment I have in his
  visits.

  "'Tis yesterday I writ thus much, and now 'tis the day to send this
  letter; and I saw not my lord last night by reason of his
  grandfather my Lord Arundel sending to fetch me unto his house in
  the Strand. His goodness to me is so great, that nothing more can be
  desired; and his daughter my Lady Lumley is the greatest comfort I
  have in the world. She showed me a fair picture of my lord's mother,
  who died the day he was born, not then full seventeen years of age.
  She was of so amiable a disposition, so prudent, virtuous, and
  religious, that all who knew her could not but love and esteem her.
  And I read a letter which this sweet lady had written in Latin to
  her father on his birthday, to his great contentment, who had
  procured her to be well instructed in that language, as well as in
  her own and in all commendable learning. Then I played at primero
  with my Lord Arundel and my Lady Lumley and my uncle Francis. The
  knave of hearts was fixed upon for the quinola, and I won the flush.
  My uncle Francis cried the winning card should be titled Dudley.
  'Not so,' quoth the earl; 'the knave that would match with the queen
  in the suit of hearts should never win the game.' And further talk
  ensued; from which I learnt that my Lord Arundel and the Duke of
  Norfolk mislike my Lord Leicester, and would not he should marry the
  queen; and my uncle laughed, and said, 'My lord, no good Englishman
  is there but must be of your lordship's mind, though none have so
  good reason as yourself to hinder so base a contract; for if my Lord
  of Leicester should climb unto her majesty's throne, beshrew me if
  he will not remember the box on the ear your lordship ministered to
  him some time since;' at which the earl laughed, too; but my Lady
  Lumley cried, 'I would to God my brother of Norfolk were rid of my
  Lord Leicester's friendship, which has, I much fear me, more danger
  in it than his enmity. God send he does not lead his grace into
  troubles greater than can well be thought of!' Alack, Mistress
  Constance, what uneasy times are these which we have fallen on! for
  methinks 'troubles' is the word in every one's mouth. As I was about
  to step into the chair at the hall-door at Arundel House, I heard
  one of my lord's guard say to another, 'I trust the white horse will
  be in quiet, and so we shall be out of trouble.' I have asked Mr.
  Martin what these words should mean; whereupon he told me the white
  horse, which indeed I might have known, was the Earl of Arundel's
  cognisance; and that the times were very troublesome, and plots were
  spoken of in the North anent the Queen of Scots, her majesty the
  {96} queen's cousin, who is at Chatesworth; and when he said that,
  all of a sudden I grew red, and my cheeks burned like two hot coals;
  but he took no heed, and said, 'A true servant might well wish his
  master out of trouble, when troubles were so rife.' And now shame
  take me for taking up so much of your time, which should be spent in
  more profitable ways than the reading of my poor letters; and I must
  needs beg you to write soon, and hold me as long as I have held you,
  and love me, sweet one, as I love you. My Lady Margaret, who is in a
  sense twice my sister, says she is jealous of Mistress Constance
  Sherwood, and would steal away my heart from her; but, though she is
  a winsome and cunning thief in such matters, I warrant you she shall
  fail therein. And so, commending myself to your good prayers, I
  remain

  "Your true friend and loving servant,
  "ANN SURREY."


As I finished and was folding up my letter the clock struck nine. It
was waning darker without by reason of a cloud which had obscured the
moon. I heard my father still pacing up and down the gravel-walk, and
ever and anon staying his footsteps awhile, as if watching. After a
short space the moon shone out again, and I saw the shadows of two
persons against the wall of the kitchen garden. Presently the
hall-door was fastened and bolted, as I knew by the rattling of the
chain which hung across it. Then my father looked in at the door and
said, "'Tis time, goodwife, for young folks to be abed." Upon which my
mother rose and made as if she was about to withdraw to her
bed-chamber. Edmund followed us up stairs, and, wishing us both
good-night, went into the closet where he slept. Then my mother,
taking me by the hand, led me into my father's study.



[TO BE CONTINUED.]

------

Translated from Der Katholik.

THE TWO SIDES OF CATHOLICISM.

I.

The Church is, in a twofold respect, universal or catholic. While, on
the one hand, she extends herself over the whole earth, and encircles
the entire human race with the bond of the same faith and an equal
love, on the other she makes known, by this very act, the most special
inward character of her own being. Thus the Church is the Catholic
Church, both in her interior being and in her exterior manifestation.

The ground of the well-known saying of St. Ambrose, "Where Peter is,
there is the Church,"  [Footnote 7] lies in the thought, that the
nature of the Church admits of only one form of historical
manifestation. The idea of the true Church can only be realized where
Peter is, in the communion of the legitimate Pope as the successor of
Peter.

  [Footnote 7: Ubi Petrus ibi ecclesia. In Ps. xl. No. 30.]

This proposition has its proximate justification in that clear
expression of the will of Jesus Christ, the founder of the Church, in
which he designates the Apostle Peter as the rock on which he will
build his Church. Moreover, it is precisely this rock-foundation which
is to make the Church indestructible. [Footnote 8] From this it
follows that, in virtue of the ordinance of Jesus, the office of
Peter, or the primacy given him in the Church, was not to expire with
the death of the apostle. For, if the {97} Church is indestructible
precisely on account of her foundation upon the rock-man Peter, he
must remain for all time the support of the Church, and historical
connection with him is the indispensable condition on which the Church
can be firmly established in any part of the earth. This constant
connection with the Apostle Peter is maintained through the bishop of
Rome for the time being. For these two offices, the episcopate of Rome
and the primacy, were connected with each other in the person of the
Apostle Peter. Consequently the same superior rank in the Church which
Peter possessed is transmitted to the legitimate bishop of Rome at the
same time with the Roman episcopal see. Thus the Prince of the
Apostles remains in very deed the rock-foundation of the Church,
continually, in each one of his successors for the time being.

  [Footnote 8: Matt. xvi. 18.]

In the view of Christian antiquity, the unity of the Church was the
particular object for which the papacy was established.  [Footnote 9]
This unity, apprehended in its historical development, gives us the
conception of catholicity.   [Footnote 10]

  [Footnote 9: St. Cyprian, _De Unit Eccl. Primatus Petro dafur, ut
  una Christi ecclesia et cathedra una monstretur_. The primacy is
  given to Peter, that the Church of Christ may be shown to be one,
  and the chair one.]

  [Footnote 10: Ibid. _Ecclesia quoque una est, quae in multitudinem.
  latius incremento faeccunditatis extenditur.... ecclesia Domini luce
  perfusa per obem totam radios suos porrigit. Unum tamen lumen est,
  quod ubique diffunditur, nec unitas corporis separatur._

  The Church also is one, which is extended to a very great multitude
  by the increase of fruitfulness . . . the Church of the Lord
  pervaded with light extends its rays over the whole world.
  Nevertheless the light which is everywhere diffused is one, and the
  unity of the body is never separated.]


Both these marks of the Church must embody themselves in the form of
an outwardly perceptible historical reality. The Church being indebted
for her unity, and by necessary consequence for her catholicity,
precisely to her historical connection with Peter, catholicity is thus
rooted in the idea of the papacy. But does its ultimate and most
profound principle lie therein?

The argument, briefly sketched above, obliges us to rest the
catholicity of the Church on the actual institution of Christ. We can,
however, inquire into the essential reason of this institution. Does
this reason lie simply in a free, voluntary determination of Christ,
or in the interior essence of the Church herself? In the latter case,
the Church would appear as Catholic, because the end of her
establishment could be fulfilled under no other condition. There would
be in her innermost being a secret determination, by force of which
the idea of the Church is completely incapable of realization under
any other form than that of catholicity. A Christian Church without
the papacy were, therefore, entirely inconceivable. If this is
actually the case, there lies hidden under the rind of the Church's
visible form of catholicity, a still deeper catholicity, in which we
are bound to recognize the most profound principle of the outward,
historical side of catholicity.

But that inward principle, the marrow of the Church, where are we to
look for it? Our theologians, following St. Augustine, teach that the
Church, like man, consists of soul and body. The theological virtues
form the soul of the Church, and her body is constituted by the
outward profession of the faith, the participation of the sacraments,
and exterior connection with the visible head of the Church.
[Footnote 11] St. Augustine, indeed, also designates the Holy Ghost as
the soul or the inner principle of the Church. This is the same
thought with the one which will be presently evolved, in which the
inner principle of catholicity will be reduced to the conception of
the _supernatural_. This, however, considered in itself, is withdrawn
from the region of historical manifestation. In order that it may pass
from the region of the invisible into that of apprehensible reality,
it needs a medium that may connect together both orders, the invisible
order of the supernatural and the order of historical manifestation.
It is only in this {98} way that catholicity can acquire for itself a
historical shape, and assume flesh and blood.

  [Footnote 11: Bellarm., _De Eccl. milit._, cap. ii.]

We might be disposed to regard the sacraments as this medium, because
they are the instruments by which grace is conferred, in a manner
apprehensible through the senses. Nevertheless, we cannot find the
constitutive principle of the Church in the sacraments alone. It is
well known that Protestantism has set forth the legitimate
administration of the sacraments as a mark of the true Church. A
searching glance at the Protestant conception of the Church will
hereafter give us a proof that a bare communication in sacraments, at
least from the Protestant stand-point, cannot possibly verify itself
as making a visible Church. According to the Protestant doctrine of
justification, a sacrament is indebted for its grace-giving efficacy
solely to the faith of the receiver. In this view, therefore, the
connection of the invisible element of the supernatural with the
historically manifested reality, and consequently the making visible
of the true Church, is dependent on conditions where historical
fulfilment is not provable. Who can prove whether the recipient of a
sacrament has faith? It is true that, according to the Catholic view,
an objective efficacy is ascribed to the sacrament, i.e., the
outwardly perceptible completion of the sacramental action of itself
permits the invisible element of the supernatural to penetrate into
the sphere of the visible.

Notwithstanding this, the Catholic sacrament is, by itself alone, no
sufficient medium through which the being of the true Church can be
brought into visibility. Did she embody herself historically only in
so far as a sensible matter and an outward action are endued with a
supernatural efficacy, the element of the supernatural would come to a
historical manifestation only as the purely objective. A profound view
of the essence of the Church would not find this satisfactory. The
Church, even on her visible side, is not a purely objective, or merely
outward, institution. The ultimate principle of catholicity--and this
statement will make our conception intelligible--although implanted in
the world as a supernatural leaven from above, has nevertheless its
seat in the deepest interior of the human spirit. Thence it penetrates
upward into the sphere of historical manifestation, and thus proves
itself a church-constitutive principle. Such a connection of the
region of the interior and subjective with that of historical and
visible reality is caused by the objective efficacy of a sacrament,
only in the case where the same is productive of its proper effect.
This, however, according to Catholic doctrine, presupposes an inward
disposition on the part of the recipient, the presence of which cannot
be manifested to outward apprehension. A Church, whose essence
consisted merely in the bond established through the sacraments, could
either not be verified with certitude, or would have an exclusively
exterior character. Accordingly, we have not yet found, in the
Catholic sacramental conception, the middle term we are seeking, by
which the essence of catholicity can be brought into visible
manifestation. Rather, this process has to be already completed and
the conception of the Church to be actualized, before the sacrament
can manifest its efficacy. Through this last, the element of the
supernatural, i.e., the invisible germ of the Church, must be
originally planted or gradually strengthened in individual souls. But
this is effected by the sacrament as the organ and in the name of the
Church, though in particular cases outside of her communion.

The continuous existence of Catholicity is essentially the
self-building of the body of Christ. It produces its own increase
through the instrumentality of the sacraments.  [Footnote 12] The
union between the supernatural and the historical actuality, or the
bond of {99} catholicity, is not then first established in the
sacraments. These only mediate for individual souls the reception into
the union, or confirm them in their organic relation to it, and are
signs of fellowship. In addition to what has been already said, there
is another reason, and one of wider application, to be considered, as
bearing on this point. The principle of a new life which has to be
infused into individual souls through the sacraments is sanctifying
grace. In this, therefore, by logical consequence, we should be
obliged to recognize the interior constitutive principle of the
Church, if it were true that the connection between the inner being of
the Church and her historical manifestation were brought to pass
through the efficacy of the sacraments. According to this apprehension
of the subject, only the saints would belong to the true Church.

  [Footnote 12: Eph. iv. 16.]

One might seek to evade this last conclusion by averring that in the
instance of baptism, the sacrament produces in the soul of the
recipient, beside sanctifying grace, still another effect,
independently of the disposition, namely, the baptismal character.
This character is an indelible mark impressed on the soul. Here, then,
is given us a supernatural principle which penetrates the deepest
interior of the human spirit, and which is, at the same time, capable
of verifying itself as a historical fact; inasmuch as it is infallibly
infused into the soul through an outward, sensible action, and
thereby, through the medium of the latter, becomes visible. Beside
this, one might be still more inclined to regard the baptismal
character as the Church's formative principle, because the same is
stamped upon the soul through a sacrament, whose special end is to
incorporate with the body of Christ its individual members; for which
reason, also, baptism is designated in the language of the Church as
the gate of the spiritual life, _vitae spiritualis janua_.   [Footnote
13]

  [Footnote 13: _Decret. pro Armenia_.]

We must, however, in this immediate connection, put in a reminder,
that it is a disputed point in theology, whether baptism is really, in
all cases, the indispensably necessary condition of becoming a member
of the Church. In the opinion of prominent theologians, a mere
catechumen can, under certain circumstances, be a member of the
Church.   [Footnote 14] Be that as it may, no one will certainly
dispute the fact that a catechumen, whose soul is glowing with divine
love, belongs at least to the soul of the Church. In him, therefore,
the inner germ of the Church's life really exists before the reception
of the baptismal character. Beside this, it appears to us that the
sacramental character, precisely in view of its determinate end, is
not so qualified that we can put it forward as the interior principle
of catholicity. The baptismal character is intended for a distinctive
mark; by it the seal of Church membership is stamped on the soul. It
is true that the same action by which the character is impressed on
the soul also makes the baptized person a member of the Church, or,
that in the same act which plants the inner germ of the Church's being
in the heart, the soul receives also the characteristic outward
impress of that being. But in so far as it is the immediate and proper
faculty of the baptismal character to impress the stamp of the Church
in indelible features upon the soul, the very conception of this
character presupposes necessarily the conception of the Church, as
prior to itself; which shows that we cannot find the principle of the
interior being of the Church in the baptismal character. This is
confirmed by the additional consideration that the baptismal character
is not effaced from those souls which have broken off every kind of
connection with the Church, and have absolutely nothing remaining in
them by which they communicate in her being. Finally, the existence of
the Church, at least so far as her inner being or soul is concerned,
{100} does not date its origin from the institution of baptism. We
must, therefore, go one step further, in order to discover the
interior source of catholicity. As has been heretofore pointed out,
this source lies in that region which we are usually wont to designate
as the Supernatural Order. Let us, therefore, make a succinct
exposition of the interior law of development in this order.

  [Footnote 14: Suarez, _De Fide. Disp._ ix., § i., No. 18.]

According to the Catholic doctrine, _faith_ is the beginning of human
salvation, the ground and root of justification, [Footnote 15] _i.e._,
of the supernatural life of the soul. St. Paul designates faith "the
substance of things hoped for."   [Footnote 16] That is to say, the
beatific vision of God, and with it the point toward which the whole
supernatural order tends and in which it rests, has its foundation
laid in faith, and is already in germ contained in it. Christ, and
with him the fountain of our supernatural life, dwells in us through
faith.   [Footnote 17] Is Christ, therefore, called the foundation,
beside which no other can be laid,   [Footnote 18 ]then is faith
recognized in the basis of the supernatural order, because by faith we
are immediately brought into union with Christ. Wherefore the apostle
makes our participation in the fruits of the work of redemption
precisely dependent on the condition, "If so ye continue in the faith,
grounded and settled."  [Footnote 19] The same portion as foundation,
which faith has in the inner life of grace in the soul, is also
accorded to it in relation to the exterior structure of the Church.
The visibility of the true Church is only the historical embodiment of
the element of the supernatural. The divine building of the Church has
for its foundation the apostles,  [Footnote 20] that is, as the sense
of the passage evidently is, through the faith which they preached.
Very remarkable is the form of expression in the well-known saying of
the apostle: "One Lord, one faith, one baptism."   [Footnote 21] Here
the unity of faith is given the precedence of the unity produced
through baptism, as being its necessary pre-requisite. The one baptism
is the bond of unity of the Church only in the second line. Through
it, namely, the fruitful germ of the one faith in which exclusively
the unity of the Church has its root, is continually planted in
individual souls, an actual confession of that faith being also
included in the ceremony of baptism itself.

  [Footnote 15: _Trid. Sess._ vi.,  cap. 8.]

  [Footnote 16: Heb. xi. i.]

  [Footnote 17: Eph iii. 17.]

  [Footnote 18: I Cor. iii. 11.]

  [Footnote 19: Coloss. i. 23.]

  [Footnote 20: Eph. ii. 20.]

  [Footnote 21: Eph. iv. 5.]


The Church herself makes use of language which clearly shows that she
regards faith as the deepest principle of her being.  [Footnote 22]
The Catechism of the Council of Trent defines the Church as "the
faithful dispersed throughout the world."  [Footnote 23]

  [Footnote 22: _Concil. Lateran., iv. cap. Firmiter: Una fidelium
  universalis ecclesia_. ]

  [Footnote 23: _Catech. Rom._,  pars 1,  cap. x. . qu. 2. ]

According to St. Thomas, also, the unity, and consequently the
catholicity of the Church, is radically grounded in faith. The angelic
doctor means here living faith, or _fides formata_. According to this
view, the principle of catholicity pervades the innermost depth of
subjectivity. At the same time it is clear how the same comes to an
historical manifestation. This takes place in the symbol of the
Church. The faith which finds its historical expression in the
ecclesiastical symbol is to be regarded as _fides formata_,  [Footnote
24] for this reason, because it is a confession of faith made in the
name and by the personality of the collective Church, which possesses
its inward principle of unity in the _fides formata_, or living faith.
Moreover, the symbol of the Church is a constant warning for those of
her members who have not the grace of sanctification to make their
faith living through charity.   [Footnote 25]

  [Footnote 24: That is, faith made perfect by charity as it exists in
  a person who is in the state of grace, in contradistinction from the
  faith of a sinner.--TRANSLATOR ]

    [Footnote 25: _Secunda Secundae_, qu. 1. a. q. ad 3. ]

In the foregoing doctrinal exposition St. Thomas has marked out for us
the path to be followed in seeking {101} for the medium of union
between the exterior and ulterior catholicity of the Church. Our
argument must start, therefore, from the position that the unity of
the Church in the first line is a unity in faith. In this notion we
have the speculative middle term between the inner being of the Church
and her historical form of manifestation. From the blending of both
these elements is formed the full, adequate idea of catholicity. This
last exhibits itself as a force acting in two distinct spheres, that
of the inward subjectivity and that of historical objectivity.
Consequently, the exterior and interior catholicity of the Church, or
the two sides of Catholicism, must be reduced to the same principle. A
further evolution of this thought will make it clear, why the being of
the true Church can only find its true actualization in the historical
form of Catholicism.

The catholic visible form of the Church, as pointed out above, is
indicated in the papacy. But in what relation does the latter stand to
the interior catholicity of the Church? In order to find the right
answer to this decisive question, we must first more exactly define in
what sense the papacy must be regarded as the bond of the historical
unity of the Church. It must be so regarded, precisely in so far as
the primacy has been instituted for the special end of preserving the
faith incorrupt. According to the teaching of the Fathers of the
Church, Peter is the Church's foundation of rock, in virtue of his
faith.  [Footnote 26] By this, of course, is not meant the personal
confession of the Apostle Peter, but the object-matter of the same,
the contents of the faith to be preached by Peter and his successors.
Peter, says Leo the Great, is called by Christ the Rock, on account of
the solidity of the faith which he was to preach, _pro soliditate
fidei quam erat praedicaturus_.  [Footnote 27 ] This is not the place
to develop further in what way the papacy proves itself in act the
cement of the unity of faith. We shall speak of that later. It is
enough for our purpose, in the meanwhile, to take note of the judgment
of the ancient Church. According to the doctrine of the Fathers of the
Church, the fundamental significance which the papacy has for the
Church, rests upon a relation of dependence between her faith and the
faith of Peter, including by consequence that of his successors. In
this sense St. Hilarius distinctly calls the faith of the Apostle
Peter the foundation of the Church.  [Footnote 28] The same view is
found in St. Ambrose,  [Footnote 29] expressed in nearly the same
words. But if Peter is the Church's foundation of rock precisely
through his faith, that mutual relation between the inner catholicity
of the Church and the papacy is no longer doubtful. For that the
Church, according to her inward essence, verifies herself as the
Catholic Church, she owes precisely to her faith, as likewise, on the
other side, her catholic visible form is conditioned by the outward
profession of the same faith. Consequently, the papacy as guardian of
the unity of faith, stands also in a necessary connection with the
inner being of the Church. Here then we have the uniting member we
have been seeking between inward and outward catholicity, the essence
and the manifestation of the Church. _In so far as the historical
connection with Peter must be conceived as a bond of faith, in this
same connection or in the form of Catholicism, the true Church, even
as to her inner being, comes historically into visible manifestation._



  [Footnote 26: See the relevant passages from the fathers in
  Ballerini, _De vi ac rations primatus Rom. Pont._, cap. xii., § 1,
  No. 1. ]

  [Footnote 27: Serm. 62.]

  [Footnote 28: _De Trin_., vi. 37. ]

  [Footnote 29: _De Incarn_., cap. 5. ]


Faith, which we affirm to be the essential kernel of Catholicism, has
two sides, one which is interior and subjective, and another which
comes to outward manifestation. With the heart we believe unto
justification, but with the mouth confession is made unto salvation.
[Footnote 30] A revealed truth {102} corresponds to supernatural faith
as its necessary object. Therefore, it may be remarked in passing, the
subjective act of faith is equally infallible with the divine
testimony itself, upon which it is essentially based.   [Footnote 31]
This revealed object of faith, without which a supernatural faith is
entirely inconceivable, is mediated or set forth through an organ
directly instituted by God for this purpose. An individual, who thinks
that he has discovered, through private investigation or in any other
way, a particular point of doctrine, which hitherto has not been
universally received as such, to be a revealed truth, can only make it
an object of supernatural faith, when he is able to judge with
certainty that this supposed new doctrine of faith would be approved
by the infallible, divinely appointed organ of revealed truth.
[Footnote 32]

  [Footnote 30:  Rom. x. 10.]

  [Footnote 31: St. Thomas, _Secunda Secunda_, q. 1 a. 3.]

  [Footnote 32: Suarez, _De Fide. Disp._ iii., Sect, xiii., No. 9.]



This mediating organ is, however, as we shall fully show in the course
of our further exposition, no other than the Apostle Peter, and
through the relation which he bears to him, his legitimate successor
in office. Peter is the support and the strength of his brethren,
inasmuch as _his_ faith, to which the dogmatic utterance of his
successors gives a new expression according to the needs of the
Church, forms a criterion for the faith of the Church. Peter,
preaching of the faith, continually apprehensible through the papal
definitions of faith, gives to the faith of the Church the specific
form under which the same incorporates itself historically in an
ecclesiastical confession. But in the Church-confession of faith, as
we have before shown, its inner being comes into visible
manifestation. As medium of Peter's preaching of the faith, the papacy
is consequently also a Church-constitutive principle, inasmuch as
through the actualization of the supreme power delegated to him by
Christ, the being of the Church is made visible, and obtains an
historical form. This is the sense of the words, "On this Rock I will
build my Church."

As we have, in the foregoing remarks, conceived of the papacy as the
angle at which the two sides of Catholicism meet, the uniting bond of
the outward and inward catholicity of the Church, we are further bound
to show why precisely the papacy is the appropriate organ to establish
that union between the essence and the manifestation of Catholicism,
and thereby to mediate the actualization of the true idea of the
Church. For this purpose we must endeavor to penetrate somewhat deeper
into the inner being or soul of the Church. We shall there find a
tendency which makes the Catholic form of manifestation of the Church
a postulate of her being. This tendency lies in the character of the
_supernatural_. In the conception of the supernatural we shall
endeavor to point out the radical conception of Catholicism. The
papacy, and the Catholic visible form of the Church mediated by it,
is, in our opinion, the necessary consequence of the supernaturality
of her being.

Thus far we have sketched in brief outlines the mutual relation of the
two sides of Catholicism. We must reserve for a subsequent article the
detailed theological proof of that which we have for the present
suggested as a new theory. Meanwhile we would like to exhibit, in a
few words, the interest which an investigation of this subject claims
for itself at this particular period of time.



II.

The distinction between an exterior and interior catholicity of the
Church is but slightly touched upon in our books of dogmatic
instruction. No one need wonder at this circumstance. It is well known
that the controversy with Protestantism gave occasion to the usual
modern method of treating of the marks of the Church. The {103} method
of the great controversialists of the age of the Reformation has, at
least in regard to the present question, remained, to a considerable
extent, the model for the dogmatic writers of the present time. The
theologians of a former time, however, found no necessity for
expressly distinguishing between the catholicity of the being of the
Church and that of her manifestation. It was enough for their purpose
to prove that the Church, in her historical manifestation, is the
Catholic Church.

The Protestantism of the epoch of the Reformation claimed for its
congregations the honor of having actualized the true idea of the
Church. The churches of Wittenberg, Zurich, and Geneva each pretended
to be the true copy of the evangelical primitive Church. It was easy
for Catholic polemics to destroy this pretension. It was only
necessary to inspect the particular Protestant churches a little
closely. Such a reconnoissance conducted necessarily to the
indubitable conclusion that none of those communions had the marks of
the true Church upon it, and that these were realized only in the
Church in communion with the Pope.

Modern Protestantism is much more modest in its pretensions. The
present champions of the Protestant cause characterize, without
disguise, the attempt of the Reformers to bring the essence of the
true Church historically into manifestation in their communions as a
gross error and a backsliding into Catholicism. They will have it,
that the characteristic principle of Protestantism lies precisely in
the acknowledgment that the true essence of the Church can find its
correlative expression in none of the existing churches. The true
Church, according to this notion, remains an unattainable ideal as
long as the world stands. Not to actualize the idea of the Church,
only to strive after its actualization, is the task of a religious
communion. The Protestantism of the day accordingly recognizes it as
its vocation "to give Christianity precisely the expression and form
which best corresponds to the necessities of the time, the demands of
an advanced science and culture, the grade of intellectual and moral
development of the Christian nations."  [Footnote 33]

  [Footnote 33: Schenkel, "Essence of Prot.," p. 4.]

Protestant polemic theology makes the following use of this view. Over
against the magnificent historical manifestation of the Catholic
Church, the torn and rent condition of the Protestant religious
community presents a striking contrast. The proximate conclusion that
the true Church can only be found within the circle of Catholicism,
they seek now to anticipate on the Protestant side by the observation
that already from the outset one makes a false start who would wish to
recognize the true Church by her form of historical manifestation.
According to the Protestant view, the mark of catholicity verifies
itself exclusively in the inner being of the Church, and not in her
outward manifestation. For, owing to the constant progress of human
development, and the extremely diversified individuality of single
nations, the historical manifestation of the Church must be multiform
to the same extent as the intellectual and moral wants of the
different peoples are various. Nevertheless, in spite of the manifold
differences which distinguish the particular churches in their
historical manifestation, the members of the same blend themselves
together into a great invisible spiritual kingdom. This is the _ideal_
Church.

This is the response which modern Protestantism makes when Catholic
criticism places before its eyes the melancholy picture of its inward
divisions and the history of its variations. From the historical
manifestation of a church to its inner being they say the conclusion
is invalid. In order, therefore, to make Catholic polemics effective,
the relation between the essence and the manifestation of the Church
must be first of all theologically {104} established. It is only after
this has been done that the comparison between "the Church and the
churches" can be exhibited in its entire argumentative force.

The theory of the ideal church is not yet effectively refuted, when we
on the Catholic side content ourselves with proving that the true
Church must become visible. This general proposition does not exclude
the proposition of our opponents. For, according to the Protestant
doctrine, also, the creative power of the spirit of Christianity
exhibits itself in the construction of visible congregations, and the
gradual actualization of the ideal Church is conditioned by a sensibly
apprehensible mediation. The final decision of this question must
therefore be sought in the demonstration of the proposition that the
inmost being of the Church can only realize itself historically in the
one specific form; that a catholicity of the essence of the Church
without a catholicity in her manifestation is entirely inconceivable.
Only by this demonstration will the retreat of Protestant polemics
into the ideal Church be for ever cut off.

Some have argued against the Protestant view, that as Christian truth
is one so the visible Church can also be but one.  [Footnote 34] The
argument is valid only in the prior supposition that there can be but
a single form of historical manifestation for the inner being of the
Church. This, however, Protestantism denies in the sense, that from
its stand-point every particular church represents the idea of the
Church,  [Footnote 35] even though it may be on one side only.
According to the diversified stages of cultivation in the Christian
people, so they say, now one, now another side of Christian truth
attains to its expression in the particular confessions, but in none
the full and entire truth. The contradiction existing between these,
therefore, in nowise falls back upon the Christian verity itself. This
Protestant evasion can also be alone met in the way above designated,
by establishing the relation between the essence and the manifestation
of Catholicism.

  [Footnote 34: Moehler, "Symbolism."]

  [Footnote 35: This is also the theory of High-Church
  Episcopalianism. Mr. Sewall has defined it more logically than any
  other writer of that school. According to him, the unity of the
  Church consists in this, that all churches are formed after one
  ideal model, or on one principle, and the separate churches of
  individual bishops are each a perfect organic whole. That is,
  Catholic unity is an _abstract_ unity, concreted in each particular
  bishop and diocese. Hence there can be no organized unity of the
  universal Church, but only _union_ or friendly communion of
  independent churches. This notion was highly approved by Bishop
  Whittingham, who expressed it in this way, that the true communion
  of churches with each other is in _speculo Trinitatis_. It is pure
  Congregationalism, bating the difference between a diocese governed
  by a chief and inferior pastors, and a single congregation under one
  pastor or several of the same order. But it is the only logical
  conception of a visible church possible, when the papacy, or
  principle of universal organic unity, is denied. It is the logical
  result of the schismatical position of the Greeks, who have no unity
  among themselves except that which is national, but are divided into
  several independent bodies. Hence, the so-called "union movement,"
  as clearly shown by Cardinal Patrizi in the Decree sent to the
  English bishops, is one which proceeds from a denial of Catholic
  unity, and therefore can never lead to unity, but only aim at union,
  or voluntary co-operation of distinct churches with each other. The
  High-Church theory differs from that of the German Protestants in
  this that the former requires that all churches should be alike, and
  each one represent completely the ideal Church; but both are based
  on the same principle, that of an abstract, invisible unity and
  catholicity, concreted in an individual and not a generic and
  universal mode.--TRANSLATOR.]


It has been further argued that a Church of the Nations, which the
Christian Church must be, according to its idea, is entirely
inconceivable without the papacy at its summit.  [Footnote 36] Here,
also, it is presupposed, as already proved, that the conception of
universality which is essentially connected with the idea of the true
Church must also necessarily impress itself upon her actual
explication of herself in time. But it is precisely against this
notion that modern Protestantism contends. Therefore, if our polemic
arms are to bring down their man, the affair must begin with a sharper
delineation of the mutual relation between the essence and the visible
form of the Church.

  [Footnote 36: Döllinger, "The Church and the Churches."]

Beside the polemic advantages to be gained in the course which has
been suggested, there is another in the interest of pacification.
Under the rubbish of the Protestant Church-idea there still lies
buried a remnant of {105} Catholic truth. We ought not to shun the
trouble of bringing this to light. It is the Christian truth contained
in his confession which binds the believing Protestant to it. Catholic
theology has to reclaim this as its own property. It has the mission
intrusted to it to show how the religious satisfaction, which the
deeper Protestant mind thinks it finds in the doctrinal conception of
its confession, is imparted to it in richer abundance and morally
purified through the dogma of the Church. Through this conciliatory
method, an understanding of the Catholic truth can be much more easily
and effectually imparted to the unprejudiced Protestant mind than by a
rough polemical method. This end is most essentially served by the
distinction between the essence and the manifestation of Catholicism.

Protestant piety makes a great boast of its deep spirituality. The
modern ideal theory of the Church owes a great share of its popularity
to its aptitude of application in this direction. By means of this
conception, the Protestant Church is expected to exhibit itself in a
new light as the church of the interior and spiritual life. Does one
attain the same depth of view from the Catholic stand-point? All doubt
on this point must disappear on thorough consideration of what we have
above named, the inner side of Catholicism.

There is another ground for the favor with which this ideal theory of
the Church is at present received. Protestant theology regards it as a
means of its own resuscitation. The old doctrine of justification by
faith alone has in great part lost the charm it once exercised over
the hearts of the German people. The once mighty battle-cry of inward,
subjective faith is no longer to the taste of our age. Therefore, in
our time, instead of the antiquated idea of immediate union with
Christ, the world-moving power of the mind, the creative power of the
idea, is set up as the distinguishing principle of Protestantism. The
latter is thus made to appear as the most powerful protector of the
liberal aspirations of the age.

Catholic controversy must take some cognizance of this, if it would
make its own proper principle prevail. While Protestantism seeks to
gain the favor of the contemporary world by obsequiously yielding to
the caprices of the spirit of the age, the inner principle of
Catholicism raises it above the vacillations which sway particular
periods. Only a Church which, thanks to its native principle, is not
borne along by intellectual and social periodical currents, can
effectually correct their movement. In order, therefore, to measure
accurately the influence which the Church, by virtue of her
institution, is called to exercise upon human society, we must
penetrate into her innermost essence, to the very point where
Catholicism has its deepest principle. First from this point can we
correctly understand in how far the Church is a social power. From
this point of view alone can we comprehend her aptitude to be the
teacher of the nations. And precisely of this social and instructive
vocation have our contemporaries lost the right understanding to a
great extent. It is one of the mightiest tasks of our modern theology
to make the minds of men once more capable of apprehending this truth.
[Footnote 37]

  [Footnote 37: A few sentences rather digressive from the main topic
  of the article are hero omitted.--TRANSLATOR.]

The high importance of authority in the system of Catholicism is well
known. This fundamental principle runs a danger of being placed in a
false light, when it is depressed to the level of the historical and
exterior side of the Church. Ecclesiastical authority, separated from
the ground which lies back of it and which is above the temporal
order, may appear even to the well-disposed as a mere brake for the
stoppage of all intellectual progress. This suggests a temptation to
desire a compromise between the Church and the spirit of the age. When
one takes a merely exterior and {106} historical view of church
authority, the proper spirit of joyousness which ought to belong to
faith is wanting in the submission which is rendered to its decrees.
It is very easy, then, to fall into a sort of diplomatic way of acting
toward the Church as teacher of doctrine. One seeks to accommodate
one's self to her doctrine through subtile distinctions. On the
contrary, the boldest scientific mind frankly and cheerfully bows
itself under the yoke of the obedience of faith, when it sees that the
Church, in her doctrinal decision, is acting from her own interior
principle.

Our doctrinal exposition requires now that we should go into a more
thorough argument respecting the immanent principle of Catholicism,
which we shall first of all undertake to do on Scriptural grounds.
This part of the subject will be treated in an ensuing article.

------

From The Cornhill Magazine.

MONSIEUR BABOU.


I.

In the immediate vicinity of the capital of the kingdom of Lilliput
there is a charming village called "Les Grenouillettes." This rural
resort of the citizens of Mildendo consists, mainly, of three hotels,
thirty public-houses, and five ponds. The population I should reckon
at about ten millions, inclusive of frogs, who are the principal
inhabitants, and who make a great noise in the world there.

Hither flock the jocund burgesses, and dance to the sound of harp and
viol. . . .

It occurs to me that, sprightly as I may think it to call Belgium
Lilliput, the mystification might possibly become tiresome and
inconvenient if persisted in throughout this narrative, beside
becoming absolutely unnecessary. As for the village in question, I
have a reason or two for not calling it by its right name.

About half-a-dozen years ago, my brother (Captain John Freshe, R.N.),
his wife, and I had been wearily jogging all a summer's day in search
of country lodgings for a few weeks in the immediate neighborhood of
Brussels. Now nothing can be more difficult to find in that locality,
except under certain conditions.

You can live at a village hotel, and pay a maximum price for minimum
comfort.

You can, possibly, lodge in a public-house, where it will cost you
dear, however little you pay.

Or you can, in some villages, hire empty rooms in an entirely empty
house, and hire furniture from Brussels, and servants, if you have
none, by the month.

This last alternative has the advantage of ennobling your position
into a quasi-martyrdom, by, in a measure, compelling you to stay where
you are, whether you like it or not.

Toward the end of that longest of the long days, we began to regard
life and circumstance with the apathy of despair, and to cease to hope
for anything further from them except dinner.

The capital of the kingdom of Lilliput appeared to be partially
surrounded by a vast and melancholy campagna of turnips. These wilds,
immeasurably spread, seemed lengthening as we went. Village after
{107} village had we reached, and explored in vain. Judging by our
feelings, I should say we had ransacked at least half-a-hundred of
those rural colonies. Almost all these villages possessed at least six
public-houses and two ponds. Some few had no ponds, but all had six
public-houses. Rural, dusty, cracked public-houses; with frowzy
gardens, with rotten, sloppy tables and benches; with beery gorillas
playing at quoits and ninepins.

The names of none of these settlements seemed to us pronounceable by
human beings, with the exception of two, which sounded like Diggum and
Hittumontheback. But our city driver appeared to be acquainted with
the Simian tongue, and was directed from village to village by the
good-natured apes whom he interrogated.

About sunset we came to a larger and quite civilized place, with a
French name, signifying "The Tadpoles"--the place I have described at
the commencement of this narrative. Our dusty fly and dejected horse
turned into the carriage entrance of the first little hotel we saw. It
stood sideways to a picturesque little lake, with green shores. The
carriage entrance went through the house. Beyond, we had caught sight
of a paved yard or court, and of a vista of green leafiness that
looked cool and inviting. We heard the noisy jangling of a
barrel-organ playing a polka, and we found a performance going on in
the court that absorbed the attention of the whole household. No one
seemed to hear, or at least to heed, the sound of our wheels, but,
when our vehicle fairly stopped in the paved yard, a fishy-eyed waiter
came toward us, jauntily flipping time with his napkin. We begged him
to get us dinner instantly.

"Way, Mosou," replied that official, in the sweet Belgian-French
language, and let us out of the fly. We had been so long cramped up in
it that we were glad to walk, and stand, and look about the court
while our food was got ready.

The organ-grinder had not ceased grinding out his polka for a moment.
The wiry screams of his infernal machine seemed to charm him as much
as they did the rest of the company assembled. He was the usual
Savoyard, with a face like a burnt crust; all fire-brown eyes, sable
ringlets, and insane grimace. He leaned against a low stone post, and
ground out that horrible bray, like a grinning maniac. We walked to a
short distance, and took in the scene.

A little sallow young man, having a bushy mustache, stood near a door
into the house, with a dish in his hand, as if he had been transfixed
in the act of carrying it somewhere. Beside him, on the step of the
door, sat a blonde young woman, with large blue eyes and a little
mouth--as pretty and as _fade_ as a Carlo-Dolcian Madonna. Evidently
these were the landlord and his lady.

On a garden-bench, by the low wall that divided the court from the
garden beyond, sat, a little apart, a young person of a decidedly
French aspect, dressed quite plainly, but with Parisian precision, in
black silk. In her hand and on her lap lay some white embroidery. She
was not pretty, but had neat, small features, that wore a pleasant
though rather sad smile, as she suspended her work to watch what was
going on. An old woman in a dark-blue gown and a clean cap, with a
pile of freshly-ironed linen in her arms, stood at the top of some
steps leading into a little building which was probably the laundry.
She was wagging her old head merrily to the dance tune. Other
lookers-on lounged about, but some of them had vanished since our
arrival--for instance, the fishy-eyed waiter and a burly individual in
a white nightcap.

The centre of attraction remains to be described. Within a few paces
of the organ-grinder, a little girl and boy danced indefatigably on
the stones, to the unmusical music of his box. The little boy was a
small, fair, sickly child, in a linen blouse, and about four years
old. He jumped, and stamped, and {108} laughed excitedly. The little
girl looked about a year older. She was plump and rosy, dressed in a
full pink frock and black silk apron. She had light brown hair, cut
short and straight, like a boy's. She danced very energetically, but
solemnly, without a smile on her wee round mouth. She poussetted, she
twirled--her pink frock spread itself out like a parasol. Her fat
little bare arms akimbo, she danced in a gravely coquettish,
thoroughly business-like way; now crossing, changing places with her
partner; now setting to him, with little pattering feet; now suddenly
whisking and whirling off. The little boy watched her, and followed
her lead: she was the governing spirit of the dance. Both children
kept admirable time. They were dancing the tarantella, though they had
never heard of it; but of all the poetry of motion, the tarantella is
the most natural measure to fall into.

The organ-grinder ground, and grinned, and nodded; the landlord and
his wife exchanged looks of admiration and complacency whenever they
could take their eyes off the little dancing nymph: it was easy to see
they were her proud parents. The quiet young lady on the bench looked
tenderly at the tiny, sickly boy, as he frisked. We felt sure she was
his mother. His eyes were light blue, not hazel; but he had the same
neat little features.

All of a sudden, down from an open window looking into the court,
there came an enormous voice--

"Ah, ah! Bravo! Ah, ah, Monsieur Babébibo-BOU!"

The little boy stopped dancing; so did the little girl, and every one
looked up at the window. The little boy, clapping his hands and
screaming with glee, ran under it. No one could be seen at that
aperture, but we had caught a momentary glimpse of a big blond man in
a blue blouse, who had instantly dropped out of sight, and who was
crouching on the floor, for we saw, though the child below could not,
the top of his straw hat just above the window-edge. The little boy
screamed, "Papa, papa!" The great voice, making itself preternaturally
gruff, roared out--

"Qui est là? Est-ce par chance Monsieur Babébibo-BOU?" (The first
syllables very fast, the final one explosive.)

"Way, way! C'est Mosou Babi--_bou_!" cried the child, trying to
imitate the gruff voice, and jumping and laughing ecstatically.

Out of the window came flying a huge soft ball of many colors, and
then another roar: "Avec les compliments du Roi de tous les joujoux, à
Monsieur Babébibo-BOU!"

More rapture. Then a large white packet, palpably sugar-plums, "Avec
les compliments de la Reine de tous les bonbons, a Mademoiselle Marie,
et à Monsieur Babébibo-BOU!"

Rapture inexpressible, except by shrill shrieks and capers. The plump
little girl gravely advances and assists at the examination of the
packet, popping comfits into her tiny mouth with a placid melancholy,
which I have often observed in fat and rosy faces.

Meanwhile, the organ-grinder has at last stopped grinding, has lowered
his box, and is eating a plateful of cold meat and bread which the old
woman has brought out to him. The landlord and his wife have
disappeared. The young Frenchwoman on the garden-bench has risen, and
come toward the children; and now, from a doorway leading into the
house, issues the big blond man we caught a momentary glimpse of at
the window.

The little boy abandons the sugar-plums to his playfellow, and crying
"Papa! papa!" darts to the new comer, who stoops and gathers him up to
his broad breast, in his large arms and hands, kissing him fondly and
repeatedly. The child responds with like effusion. The father's great
red face, with its peaked yellow beard, contrasts touchingly, somehow,
with the wee pale phiz of his little son. {109} The child's tiny white
pads pat the jolly cheeks and pull the yellow beard. Then the man in
the blouse sets his son carefully on the ground, and kisses the young
Frenchwoman who stands by.

The big man has evidently been absent awhile from his family. "How
goes it, my sister?" says he.

"Well, my brother," she answers quietly. "Thou hast seen Auguste
dance. Thou hast seen how well, and strong, and happy he is--the good
God be thanked."

"And after him, thee, my good sister," says the big man,
affectionately.

We had been called in to dinner by this time, but the open window of
our eating-room looked into the court close to where the group stood.
We observed that Mademoiselle Marie had remained sole possessor of the
packet of sweets; and that the little boy, content to have got his
papa, made no effort to assert his rights in them. The big papa
interfered, saying, "Mais, mais, la petite.... Give at least of the
bonbons to thy comrade. It is only fair."

"Let her eat them, Jean," put in his sister, with naive feminine
generosity and justice. "They are so unwholesome for Auguste, seest
thou?"

The big man laughed, lit his pipe, and the three went away into the
little garden, where they strolled, talking in the summer twilight.

We came happily to an anchor here, in this foggy little haven, and
finding we could secure, at tolerably moderate charges, the
accommodation we required, made up our minds to stay at this little
hotel for the few weeks of our absence from Brussels.



II.

Next morning we were breakfasting in the garden under a trellis of
hop-leaves, when the big man in the blouse came up the gravel-walk,
with his small son on his shoulder.

They were making a tremendous noise. The little boy was pulling his
father's great red ear; he affected to bellow with anguish, his
roaring voice topped by the child's shrill, gleeful treble. We saluted
the new comers in a neighborly manner.

"A beautiful day, Madame," said the big man, in French, taking off his
hat and bowing politely to John's wife, at the same time surrounding
his son safely with his left arm.

"Madame and these Messieurs are English, is it not?"

"A pretty place," we went on to say, after owning our nationality,
"and very pleasant in this hot weather after the glare of Brussels."

"It is that; and I am here as often as possible," returned our new
acquaintance. "My sister is staying here for the advantage of this
little man. . . . Monsieur Auguste, at your service. Salute then the
society, Auguste. You must know he has the pretension to be a little
delicate, this young man. An invalid, if you please; consequently his
aunt spoils him! It is a ruse on his part, you perceive. Ah, bah! An
invalid! My word, he fatigues my poor arm. Ah--h! I cannot longer
sustain him. I faint--I drop him down he goes. . . la--a--à!"

Here, lowering him carefully, as if he were crystal, he pretended to
let his son suddenly tumble on a bit of grass-plot.

"At present" (grumbling) "here he is, broken to pieces probably; we
shall have the trouble of mending him. His aunt must bring her needle
and thread."

Monsieur Auguste was so enchanted with this performance that he
encored it ecstatically. His father obeyed, and then sent him off
running to call out his aunt to breakfast, which was laid under a
neighboring trellis.

"He is strong on his legs, is it not, Madame?" said the father,
looking after him; his jolly face and light blue eyes a little grave,
and wistful. "His spirits are so high, see you? He is {110} too
intelligent, too intellectual--he has a little exhausted his strength;
that says all. He is well enough; he has no malady; and every day he
is getting stouter, plainly to the eye."

Here the aunt and nephew joined us. Our new acquaintance introduced
her.

"Ma belle-soeur. Ma chère,--Madame and these Messieurs are English.
They are good enough to take an interest in this infant Hercules of
ours."

He tossed the child on his shoulder again; established on which throne
his little monarch amused himself by ornamenting the parental
straw-hat with a huge flaring poppy and some green leaves, beneath
which the jovial face bloomed Bacchic.

Meanwhile the quiet young French-woman, smiling affectionately at
those playfellows as they went off together, sat down on a chair we
offered her, and frankly entered into conversation.

In a few minutes we knew a great deal about this little family. The
man in the blouse was a Belgian painter, Jean Baudin, and "well seen
in the expositions of Paris and Brussels." "His wife was my sister: we
were of Paris. When our little Auguste was born, my poor sister died.
She was always delicate. The little one is very delicate. Ah, so
delicate, also. It is impossible to be over-careful of him. And his
father, who is so strong--so strong! But the little one resembles in
every manner his mother. His poor father adores him, as you see. Poor
Jean! he so tenderly loved his wife, who died in her first youth. . . .
She had but eighteen years--she had six years less than I. In dying
she begged me to be to her infant a mother, and to her poor Jean a
sister. Jean is a good brother, bon et brave homme. And for the little
one, he is truly a child to be adored--judiciously, it is understood,
madame: I spoil him not, believe me. But he is clever to astonish you,
that child. So spiritual, and then such a tender little good heart--a
disposition so amiable. Hardly he requires correction. . . . Auguste!
how naughty thou art! Auguste! dost thou hear? Jean! take him then off
the dusty wall, and wipe him a little. Mon ami, thou spoilest the
child; one must be judicious."

We presently left the garden, and, in passing, beheld Monsieur Auguste
at breakfast. He was seated between his papa and aunt, and was being
adored by both (judiciously and injudiciously) to the heart's content
of all three.

We stayed a month at this little hotel at The Tadpoles. The English
family soon fraternized with that of Jean Baudin, the Flemish painter,
also sojourning there, and the only other resident guests.

John's wife and Mademoiselle became good friends and gossips, and sat
at work and chat many a summer hour under the hop trellises.
Mademoiselle Rose Leclerc was the Frenchwoman's name, but her name of
ceremony was simply "Mademoiselle." John and I used to walked about
the country, among the lanes, and woods, and hamlets which diversify
the flats on that side of Brussels, accompanying Jean Baudin and his
paint-box. We sat under a tree, or on a stone fence, smoking pipes of
patience, while Jean made studies for those wonderful, elaborate tiny
pictures, the work of his big hands, by which he and his little son
lived. I remember, in particular, a mossy old cottage, rough and grey;
the front clothed with vines, the quaint long gable running down
behind to within a yard of the ground. Baudin sketched that cottage
very often; and often used its many picturesque features.

Sometimes it was the rickety, black-timbered porch, garlanded with
vine; a sonsy, blond-haired young Flemish maiden sat there, and
twirled the bobbins on a lace-cushion, in a warm yellow flicker of
sunshine. Sometimes Jean went right into the porch and into the
cottage itself, and presently brought us out an old blue-gowned,
black-coifed creature, knitting as she kicked the grand-babe's clumsy
cradle {111} with her clumsy sabot;--a ray through the leafy little
window-hole found the crone's white hair, and the infant cheek. Honest
Jean only painted what he saw with his eyes. He could copy such simple
poetry as this, and feel it too, though he could indite no original
poems on his canvas pages. He was a hearty good fellow, and we soon
got to like him, and his kindly, unpretentious, but not unshrewd,
talk--that is, when it could be got off the paternal grooves--which,
to say the truth, was seldomer than we (who were not ourselves at that
period the parents of prodigies) may have secretly desired.

In the summer evenings we used to sit in the garden all together, the
ladies graciously permitting us to smoke. We liked to set the children
a-dancing again on the grass-plot before us; and I must here confess
that they saltated to a mandolin touched by this hand. I had studied
the instrument under a ragged maestro of Naples, and flattered myself.
I performed on it with credit to both, and to the general delight.

Sometimes Jean Baudin would tie to his cane a little
pocket-handkerchief of Monsieur Auguste, and putting this ensign into
his hand, cause him to go through a certain vocal performance of a
martial and defiant character. The pale little man did it with much
spirit, and a truculent aspect, stamping fiercely at particular
moments of the strain. I can only remember the effective opening of
this entertainment. Thus it began--"_Les Belges_" (at this point the
small performer threw up the staff and flag of his country, and
shouted _ff_) "_SONT BRAVES!!"_ Papa and aunt regarded with pride that
ferocious champion of his valiant compatriots, looking round to read
our astonishment and rapture in our faces.

We all got on excellently with the hotel folk, ingratiating ourselves
chiefly by paying a respectful court to the solid and rosy little
princess of the house. Jean Baudin painted her, sitting placid, a
little open-mouthed, heavy-lidded, over-fed, with a lapful of
cherries. We all made much of her and submitted to her. John's wife
presented her with a frock of English print, of a charming
apple-green; out of which the fat pink face bloomed like a
carnation-bud out of its calyx.

The young landlord would bring us out a dish to our garden
dinner-table, on purpose that he might linger and chat about England.
That country, and some of its model institutions, appeared to excite
in his mind a mixture of awe and curiosity, wonder and horror. For
instance, he had heard--he did not altogether believe it
(deprecatingly)--that not only were the shops of London closed, with
shutters, on the Sunday, but also the theatres; and not only the
theatres, but also the expositions, the gardens and salons of dance,
of music, of play. How! it was actually the truth?

"Certainly, what Madame was good enough to affirm one must believe.
But then what do they? No business, no amusement what then do they,
mon Dieu!--"

"They go to church, read the Bible, and keep the Sabbath day holy,"
asserts Mrs. Freshe, in perfect good faith, and severely and proudly,
as becomes a Protestant Britishwoman.

"Tiens, tiens! But it is triste, that--. Is it not that it is triste,
Madame? Tiens, tiens! And this is that which is the Protestantism.
Since Madame herself affirms it, one can doubt no longer."

And he goes pondering away, to tell his wife; with no increased
tendency to the reformed faith.

Even Joseph, the stolid and fishy-eyed waiter, patronized us, and
gravely did us a hundred obliging services beyond his official duty.

On a certain evening, Mademoiselle, John, John's wife, and I, sat as
usual at book or work under the trellises; while the two children, at
healthful play, prattled under the shade of the laurel-bushes hard by.
As usual, the solid little Flemish maiden was {112} tyrannizing calmly
over her playfellow. We constantly heard her small voice, quiet, slow,
and dominating: "_Je le veux_." "_Je ne le veux pas_." They had for
playthings a little handbell and a toy-wagon, and were playing at
railways. Auguste was the porter, trundling up, with shrill cries,
heavy luggage-trucks piled with gravel, gooseberry-skins, tin
soldiers, and bits of cork. Marie was a rich and haughty lady about to
proceed by the next convoi, and paying an immense sum, in daisies, for
her ticket, to Auguste, become a clerk. A disputed point in these
transactions appeared to be the possession of the bell; the frequent
ringing of which was indeed a principal feature of the performance.
Auguste contended hotly, but with considerable show of reason, to this
effect:--That the instrument belonged to him, in his official
capacities of porter and clerk, rather than to the rich and haughty
lady, who as a passenger was not, and could not be, entitled to
monopolize the bell of the company. Indeed, he declared himself nearly
certain that, as far as his experience went, passengers never did ring
it at all. But Marie's "Je le veux" settled the dispute, and carried
her in triumph, after the crushing manner of her sex, over all
frivolous masculine logic.

Mademoiselle sat placid beside us, doing her interminable and
elaborate satin-stitch. She was working at a broad white slip,
intended, I understood, to form the ornamental base of a petticoat. It
was at least a foot wide, of a florid and labyrinthine pattern, full
of oval and round holes, which appeared to have been cut out of the
stuff in order that Mademoiselle might be at the pains of filling them
up again with thready cobwebs. She would often with demure and
innocent complacency display this fabric, in its progress, to John's
wife (who does not herself, I fancy, excel in satin-stitch), and
relate how short a time (four months, I think) she had taken to bring
it so near completion. Mrs. Freshe regarded this work of art with
feminine eyes of admiration, and slyly remarked that it was really
beautiful enough "même pour un trousseau." At the same time she with
difficulty concealed her disapproval of the waste of precious time
incurred by the authoress of the petticoat-border. Not that
Mademoiselle could be accused of neglecting the severer forms of her
science; such as the construction of frocks and blouses for Monsieur
Auguste--adorned, it must be admitted, with frivolous and intricate
convolutions of braid. And the exquisite neatness of the visible
portions of Monsieur Jean's linen also bore honorable testimony to
Mademoiselle's more solid labors.

Into the midst of this peaceful garden-scene entered a new personage.
A man of middle height, with a knapsack at his back, came up the
gravel-walk: a handsome brown-faced fellow of five-and-thirty, with a
big black beard, and a neat holland blouse, and a grey felt hat.

Mademoiselle and he caught sight of each other at the same instant.

Both gave a cry. Her rather sallow little face flushed like a rose.
She started up; down dropped her petticoat-work; she ran forward,
throwing out her hands; she stopped short--shy, and bright, and
pretty as eighteen! The man made a stride and took her in his arms.

"Ma Rose! ma Rose! Enfin!" cried he in a strangled voice.

She said nothing, but hung at his neck, her two little hands on his
shoulders, her face on his breast.

But that was only for a moment. Then Mademoiselle disengaged herself,
and glanced shamefacedly at us. Then she came quickly up--came to
John's wife, slid an arm round her neck, and said rapidly,
tremulously, with sparkling, tearful eyes:

"C'est Jules, Madame. C'est mon fiancé depuis quatre ans. Ah, Madame,
j'ai honte--mais,"--and ran back to him. She was transformed. In place
of that staid, almost old-maidish {113} little person we knew, lo! a
bashful, rosy, smiling girl, tripping, skipping, beside herself with
happy love! And her little collar was all rumpled, and so were her
smooth brown braids. Monsieur Jules took off his felt hat, and bowed
politely when she came to us, guessing that he was being introduced.
His brown face blushed a little, too: it was a happy and honest one,
very pleasant to see.

The children had left off playing, and stared wide-eyed at these
extraordinary proceedings. Mademoiselle ran to her little nephew, and
brought him to Jules.

"I recognize well the son of our poor Lolotte," said he, softly,
lifting and kissing him. "And that dear Jean, where is he?"

Even as he spoke there came a familiar roar from that window
overlooking the court-yard, by which the painter sat at his easel
almost all day. "Ohé! Monsieur Ba-Bou!" The little boy nearly jumped
out of his new friend's arms.

"Papa! papa! Laissez-moi, done, Mosou!--Papa!"

"Is it that thou art by chance this monsieur whom they call?" laughed
Jules, as he put him down.

"Way, way!" cried the little man as he pattered off, with that gleeful
shriek of his. "C'est moi, Mosou Ba-Bou! Ba-Bou!"

"Thou knowest that great voice of our Jean," said Mademoiselle; "when
he has finished his day's labor he always calls his child like that.
Having worked all day for the little one, he goes now to make himself
a child to play with him. He calls that to rest himself. And truly the
little one idolizes his father, and for him will leave all other
playfellows--even me. Come, then, Jules, let us seek Jean."

And with a smiling salute to us the happy couple went arm-in-arm out
of the garden.



III.

We did not see much of our friends the next day. After their early
dinner, Jean came up the garden all alone, to smoke a pipe, and
stretch his legs before he returned to his work. We thought his
good-natured face was a little sad, in spite of his cheerful _abord_,
as he came to our garden parlor and spoke to us.

"It is a pleasure to see them, is it not?" said he, looking after the
lovers, just vanishing under the archway of the court-yard, into the
sunny village road. Mademoiselle had left off her sober black silk,
and floated in the airiest of chintz muslins.

"My good little Rose merits well her happiness. She sent that brave
Jules marching four years ago, because she had promised my poor wife
not to abandon her helpless infant. Truly she has been the best of
little mothers to my Auguste. Jules went away angry enough; but
without doubt he must have loved her all the better when he came to
reflect. He has been to Italy, to Switzerland, to England--know I
where? He is artist-painter, like me--of France always understood. Me,
I am Flemish, and very content to be the compatriot of Rubens, of
Vandyke. But Jules has very much talent: he paints also the portraits,
and has made successes. He is a brave boy, and deserves his Rose."

"Will the marriage take place now, at last?" we ventured to ask.

"As I suppose," answered Jean, his face clouding perceptibly.

"But you will not separate; you will live together, perhaps,"
suggested John's wife.

"Ah, Madame, how can that be? Jules is of France and I of Belgium.
When I married I brought my wife to Brussels; naturally he will carry
his to Paris. C'est juste."

"Poor little Auguste will miss his aunt," said John's wife,
involuntarily, "and she will hardly bear to leave him, I think."

"Ah, Madame," said Jean, with ever so little bitterness in his tone,
"what would you? The little one must come second now; the husband will
{114} be first. Yes, yes, and it is but fair! Auguste is strong now,
and I must find him a good bonne. I complain not. I am not so
ungrateful. My poor Rose must not be always the sacrifice. She has
been an angel to us. See you, she has saved the life of us both. The
little one must have died without her, and apparently I must have died
without the little one. C'est simple, n'est ce pas?" smiling. Then he
gave a sigh, truly as if he could not repress it, and walked away
hastily. "We looked after him, compassion in our hearts.

"That sickly little boy will hardly live if his aunt leaves him," said
Mrs. Freshe, "_and his father knows it_."

"But what a cruel sacrifice if she stayed!" said John.

"And can her lover be expected to wait till Auguste has grown up into
a strong man?" I put in.

The day after was Sunday. Coming from an early walk, I heard a
tremendous clamor, of woe or merriment, proceeding from a small
sitting-room that opened into the entrance passage. The door was wide,
and I looked in. Jean Baudin was jammed up in a corner, behind a
barricade of chairs, and was howling miserably, entreating to be let
out. His big sun-browned face was crowned by a white coif made of
paper, and a white apron was tied round his great waist over his blue
blouse. Auguste and Marie danced about the barricade with shrill
screams, frantic with joy.

When Baudin saw me he gave a dismal yell, and piteously begged me to
come to his assistance. "See, then, my dear young gentleman, how these
bandits, these rebels, these demons, maltreat their poor bonne! Help,
help!" and suddenly, with a roar like a small Niagara, he burst out of
his prison and took to his heels, round and round the court and up the
garden, the children screaming after him--the noise really terrific.
Presently it died away, and he came back to the doorstep where I
stood, Auguste on his shoulder and the little maiden demurely trotting
after. "At present, I am the bonne," said he. "Rose and her Jules are
gone to church; so is our hostess. In the meanwhile, I undertake to
look after the children. Have you ever seen a little bonne more
pretty? with my coquette cap and my neat apron--hein?"

That evening the lovers went out in a boat on the great pond, or
little lake, at the back of the hotel. They carried Auguste with them.
We all went to the water's edge; the rest remained a while, leaning
over the rails that partly skirted the parapet wall except Jean, who
strolled off with his tiny sketch-book. A very peaceful summer picture
was before us, which I can see now if I shut my eyes--I often see it.
A calm and lovely August evening near sunset; a few golden feathers
afloat in the blue sky. Below, the glassy pond that repeats blue sky,
red-roofed cottages, green banks, and woody slopes--repeats, also, the
solitary boat rowed by Jules, the three light-colored figures it
contains, and a pair of swans that glide stately after. The little boy
is throwing bits of bread or cake to them.

As we stood there and admired this pretty little bright panorama,
John's wife observed that the child was flinging himself dangerously
forward, in his usual eager, excited way, at every cast he made.

"I wonder," said she, "that his aunt takes no notice. She is so
absorbed in talk with Jules she never turns her head. Look! look!
A--h!"

A dreadful shriek went up from lake and shore. The poor little fellow,
had overbalanced himself, and had gone headlong into the lake. Some
one had flashed over the parapet wall at the same moment, and struck
the water with a splash and a thud. Some one was tearing through it
like a steam-engine, toward the boat. It was my brother John. We saw
and heard Jules, frantic, and evidently impotent to save; we saw him
make a vain clutch at something that rose to the surface. At the same
time we {115} perceived that he had scarce power to keep Rose with his
left hand from throwing herself into the water.

Hardly three minutes had yet passed, yet half the population seemed
thronging to the lake-side, here, where the village skirted it.

And suddenly we beheld a terrible--a piteous sight. A big, bareheaded
man, that burst through the people, pale, furious, awful; his teeth
set, his light blue eyes flaring. He seemed to crash through the
crowd, splintering it right and left, like a bombshell through a wall,
and was going crazy and headlong over the parapet into the water. He
could swim no more than Jules.

"Sauvé! sauvé!" cried John's wife, gripping his hand and hanging to it
as he went rushing past. "My husband has found him. See! see there,
Jean Baudin! He holds up the dear child."

She could not have kept him back a moment--probably he did not feel her
touch; he was only dragging her with him. But his wild eyes, fixed and
staring forward, had seen for themselves what he never heard her say.

Fast, fast as one arm could oar him, my brother was bringing Jean his
little one, held above water by the other hand. Then that poor huge
body swayed and shivered; the trembling hands went out, the face
unlocked a little, there came a hoarse sob, and like a thin, strangled
cry in a dream--

"Mon petit! mon petit!"

But strong again, and savage with love, how he snatched the pale
little burden from John, and tore up the bank to the hotel. There were
wooden back-gates that opened into the court on the lake-side, but
which were unused and locked. At one mighty kick they yawned open
before Jean, and he rushed on into the house. Here all had been
prudently prepared, and the little dripping body was quickly stripped
and wrapped in hot blankets. The village doctor was already there, and
two or three women. Jean Baudin helped the doctor and the women with a
touching docility. All his noisy roughness was smoothed. He tamed his
big voice to a delicate whisper. He spoke and moved with an affecting
submissive gentleness, watching what there was he could do, and doing
it exactly as he was bid. Now and then he spoke a word or two under
his breath--"One must be patient, I know, Monsieur le Médecin; yes,
yes." And now and then he muttered piteously "Mon petit! mon petit!"
But he was as gentle as a lamb, and touchingly eager to be helpful.

In half an hour his pain got the better of him a little.

"Mais, mon Dieu, mon Dieu!" he moaned, "how I suffer! Ah, Monsieur, is
it not that he breathes a little, my dear little one? Ah, my God, save
me him! Mon petit! mon petit!"

He went into a corner of the room, and stood with his forehead against
the wall, his shoulders heaving with silent sobs. Then he came back
quiet and patient again.

"Priez, priez pour moi, Madame," said he, once, to John's wife.

"I am praying without ceasing, my poor friend," said she. And once she
hastily laid a handkerchief soaked in essence on his forehead, for she
thought he was surely going to faint, when the hope, long, long
deferred, began to turn his heart sick.

All this time John and I lingered in the dusky passage, in which that
door ajar made a cleft of yellow light. Every now and then a dim
figure stole up to us with an eager sad whisper, asking, "How goes it?
how goes it?" and slipped away down-stairs with the comfortless
answer.

It was poor Jules, who could do nothing for his Rose but this. She had
thrown herself on the floor in a darkening room, and lay there
moaning. Her dire anguish, sharp as a mother's for the little one, was
cruelly and unduly aggravated by self-reproach, and by the
self-inflicted agony of her exile from that room up-stairs. She dared
not enter Jean's presence. She felt that he must for ever abhor the
sight of her; she was afraid he {116} might curse her! She rejected
all kindness, all sympathy, especially from Jules, whom she quite
fiercely ordered to quit her. But when it got quite dark, the poor
fellow took in a candle, and set it on a table; and he spent the time
in going up and down-stairs to fetch her that whisper of news, which,
perhaps, he sweetened with a little false hope before he offered it to
her.

At last we outside heard a movement--a stifled exclamation; and then
one of the women ran out.

"The child has opened his eyes!" said she, as she hurried down-stairs
for some article required.

Presently we heard a man sobbing softly; and then--yes, a faint tiny
voice. And after that--nothing, for a long while. But at last at last!
a miserable, awful cry, and a heavy, heavy fall. And then came out
John's wife, at sight of whose face we turned sick at heart, and
followed her silently down-stairs. We knew what had happened: the
little one was dead.

He had opened his eyes, and had probably known his father; for the
light that his presence always kindled there had come into the little
white face. Jean, too ready to clutch the delusive hope, fell
a-sobbing with rapture, and kissing the little fair head. The child
tried to speak, and did speak, though but once.

"He said, 'Ba-Bou' quite distinctly," said John's wife, "and then such
a pretty smile came; and it's--it's there still, on his little dear
_dead_ face, John."

Here she broke down, and went into a passion of tears, sobbing for
"poor Jean! poor Jean!"

He had fainted for the first time in his strong life, and so that
blessed unconsciousness was deadening the first insupportable agony of
his dreadful wound. They carried him out, and laid him on his bed, and
I believe the doctor bled him. They hoped he would sleep afterward
from sheer exhaustion.

Presently poor Jules came to us, crying like a child, and begging us
to go to his Rose to try to rouse her, if only to make her weep. She
had fallen into a dry depth and abyss of despair--an icy crevasse,
where even his love could not reach her.

Since she had known the child was dead, she had not stirred, except to
resist, moaning, every attempt to lift her from the floor, where she
had cast herself, and except that she shuddered and repulsed Jules,
especially, whenever he went near her.

We went into the room where she lay. My good brother stooped, and
spoke to her in his tender, manly fashion, and lifted her, with a
resolution to which she yielded, and seated her on a sofa beside his
wife, whose kind arms closed round her suffering sister.

And suddenly some one had come in whom Rose could not see, for her
eyes were pressed to that womanly bosom. John's wife made a little
warning gesture that kept us others silent.

It was poor Jean himself; he came in as if in search of somewhat; he
was deadly pale, and perhaps half unconscious what he did. He was
without shoes, and his clothes and blond hair and beard were tumbled
and disordered--just as when they had laid him on his bed. When he saw
Rose, he came straight up to her, and sat down on her other side.

"Ma pauvre Rose," said he piteously--

She gave a cry and start of terror, and turned and saw him. The poor
fellow's broken heart was in his face; she could not mistake the
sweet-natured anguish there. Half bewildered by his inconceivable
grief, he had gone to her, instinctively, like a child, for sympathy
and comfort.

"Ma pauvre Rose," said he, brokenly; "notre petit--"

Passionately she took his great head between her hands, and drew it
down on her bosom, and kissed it passionately weeping at last.

And we all came out softly, and left them--left them to that Pity
which sends us the wholesome agony of such tears.

------

{117}


CARDINAL WISEMAN IN ROME.


"It was in the year 1863," says Monsignore Manning, in his funeral
oration on the great prince of the Church whose loss the whole
Catholic world is now deploring, "that the sovereign pontiff, speaking
of the cardinal, described him as 'the man of divine Providence for
England.'" And truly it seems to us that the direct inspiration of the
Holy Ghost has seldom been so clearly apparent in the choice of a
bishop as it was in the case of him who has filled the cathedral chair
of Westminster for the last fifteen years. When we remember the
peculiar circumstances under which he began his pastorship--the
reaction which was steadily, though as yet almost imperceptibly, going
on in favor of the Church; the doubt and perplexity and wavering with
which a crowd of wandering souls were groping in darkness for the
portals of divine truth; and then the outburst of anger with which the
nation at large read the bulls of the Holy Father, raising up the
English Church from the humiliation in which she had lain for three
hundred years, we shall readily understand that a rare union of
qualities was required in the man who should understand and direct
those honest seekers after truth, and breast successfully that storm
of popular fury. That Nicholas Wiseman, who had left England at the
age of sixteen, and passed twenty years of his youth and early manhood
at Rome--absorbed, just at the time when the character is most liable
to be moulded by external associations, in the theological studies and
ceremonies and sacred traditions of the ecclesiastical capital--that
he, we say, should have displayed such a remarkable fitness for both
these works, is not only an indication of the great qualities of the
man, but an instructive commentary on the school in which he had been
formed. It shows us that a Roman education, while it enlarges the view
and sweeps away local prejudices, yet leaves untouched the salient
points of national character. For his success in dealing with the
Catholic movement which followed the emancipation act of 1829,
Cardinal Wiseman was largely indebted to the quickness and accuracy of
perception in theological matters which he had acquired during his
long residence at the centre of the Christian Church; what helped him
most in his victory over the burst of Protestant fury which followed
the restoration of the English hierarchy, and found official
expression in the ecclesiastical titles bill, was his thorough English
boldness and honesty of speech and manly bearing. He appealed to his
countrymen's traditional love of fair-play; they heard him; and before
long all classes learned to love and respect him.

Of the twenty years' schooling by which he prepared himself for his
work in England, the cardinal has left us some admirable sketches,
scattered through his books. Dr. Manning alluded briefly to the
influence of his Roman education. We propose to gather up what the
cardinal himself has said about it; to paint with his own pencil a
picture of his life of preparation; leaving other hands, if they will,
to paint his subsequent life of labor.

Nicholas Wiseman was born at Seville, in Spain, on the second of
August, 1802. His father was an English merchant, his mother an Irish
lady. He lost his father in infancy, and at the age of six, in
consequence of those wars of invasion which for a time made Spain no
longer habitable, was taken to Ireland to be educated. After spending
one or two years at a boarding-school near Waterford, his mother went
with him to England, and {118} placed him at St. Cuthbert's college,
Ushaw, near Durham. Dr. Lingard was then vice-president of the
college, "and I have retained upon my memory," wrote the cardinal,
nearly fifty years afterward, "the vivid recollection of specific acts
of thoughtful and delicate kindness, which showed a tender heart,
mindful of its duties amidst the many harassing occupations just
devolved on him through the death of the president and his own
literary engagements; for he was reconducting his first great work
through the press. But though he went from college soon after, and I
later left the country, and saw him not again for fifteen years, yet
there grew up an indirect understanding first, and by degrees a
correspondence and an intimacy which continued to the close of his
life."    [Footnote 38]

  [Footnote 38: _Recollections of the Last Four Popes_. Leo XII. Chap.
  vii.]

It was in the course of the eight years which he passed at this
reverend seat of learning--lineal descendant of the old English
college of Douay--that he determined to become a priest. Here he first
began to manifest that deep affection for the city of St. Peter which
distinguished him down to the end of his life. "Its history," he says,
"its topography, its antiquities, had formed the bond of a little
college society devoted to this queen of cities, while the dream of
its longings had been the hope of one day seeing what could then only
be known through hearsay tourists and fabulous plans." But the hope
was fulfilled soon and unexpectedly. In 1818, Pope Pius VII. restored
the English college at Rome, "after it had been desolate and
uninhabited during almost the period of a generation." Nicholas
Wiseman was one of a band of young men sent out to colonize it. He
gives a charming description of the arrival of the little party at
their Roman home, and the delight and surprise with which they roamed,
alone and undirected, through the solemn building, with its wide
corridors; its neat and cheerful rooms; its wainscotted refectory,
from whose groined ceiling looked down St. George and the dragon; its
library heaped with tumultuous piles of unorganized volumes; its
garden, glowing with the lemon and orange, and presenting to one's
first approach a perspective in fresco by Pozzi; and, above all, its
chapel, illuminated from floor to roof with saints of England and
celestial glories;--or, better still, adjoining the college, the old
roofless church of the Holy Trinity, where in generations long past
many a pilgrim from the British Isles had knelt to pray when the good
priests of his nation fed and lodged him on his visit to the tomb of
the apostles. Pleasant must have been the meeting, on that December
afternoon in the year 1818, between these six young men and their
appointed rector Dr. Gradwell, who, being absent when they arrived,
came home that evening and found himself at the head of a college, and
his frugal meal appropriated by the hungry students.

The happiness of that day casts a glow over the page on which, when he
was an old man, the cardinal recorded the incidents. On Christmas eve
he was presented, with some of his companions, to the venerable Pius
VII. We can imagine the feelings of awe with which he approached this
saintly man, released only a few years before from the French
captivity. "There was the halo of a confessor round the tiara of Pius
that eclipsed all gold and jewels.... Instead of receiving us, as was
customary, seated, the mild and amiable pontiff rose to welcome us,
and meet us as we approached. He did not allow it to be a mere
presentation, or a visit of ceremony. It was a fatherly reception, and
in the truest sense our inauguration into the duties that awaited us.
.... The friendly and almost national grasp of the hand, after due
homage had been willingly paid, between the head of the Catholic
Church, venerable by his very age, and a youth who had nothing even to
promise; {119} the first exhortation on entering a course of
ecclesiastical study--its very inaugural discourse from him whom he
believed to be the fountain of spiritual wisdom on earth;--these
surely formed a double tie, not to be broken, but rather strengthened,
by every subsequent experience."

Doubtless his early dreams of Rome were now surpassed by the reality
of his daily life. It was unalloyed spiritual and intellectual
enjoyment. Study was no task; it was only a sort of pleasure; and the
hours of relaxation became a source of mental schooling, even while he
was pursuing the most delightful recreations. It is not difficult to
imagine how he must have spent his holidays--roaming through the field
of art, or resting at some seat of the Muses, or wandering along the
stream of time, bordered by monuments of past greatness--every
footstep awakening the echoes of classic antiquity, or calling up the
most sacred memories of the early suffering Church. Even the solitude
of buried cemeteries, "where the tombs themselves are buried, where
the sepulchres are themselves things decayed and mouldering in
rottenness," is no solitude to him; for he peoples it with the shadowy
forms of the Scipios and Nasones whose ashes are there deposited. How
often, in after years, did he not recur with fond delight to the
"images of long delicious strolls, in musing loneliness, through the
deserted ways of the ancient city; of climbings among its hills, over
ruins, to reach some vantage-ground for mapping the subjacent
territory, and looking beyond on the glorious chains of greater and
lesser mountains, clad in their imperial hues of gold and purple; and
then perhaps of solemn entrance into the cool solitude of an open
basilica, where the thought now rests, as the body then did, after the
silent evening prayer, and brings forward from many well-remembered
nooks every local inscription, every lovely monument of art, the
characteristic feature of each, or the great names with which it is
associated....  Thus does Rome sink deep and deeper into the soul,
like the dew, of which every separate drop is soft and weightless, but
which still finds its way to the root of everything beneath the soil,
imparting there to every future plant its own warm tint, its own balmy
fragrance, and its own ever rejuvenescent vigor."

Such were his hours of recreation: still more delightful were his
hours of study, especially in "the great public libraries, where
noiseless monks brought him and piled round him the folios which he
required, and he sat as still amidst a hundred readers as if he had
been alone." Every day his love, his enthusiasm, for his work seemed
to increase. So he passed six or seven years, "lingering and lagging
behind others," and revelling in spiritual and intellectual luxury.
"Every school-fellow had passed on, and was hard at his noble work at
home, was gaining a crown in heaven to which many have passed." Our
young student had kissed the feet of the dead Pius VII., as he lay in
state in one of the chapels of St. Peter's; had mourned over the
departure of the great minister Consalvi; had presented himself to Leo
XII., and told him, "I am a foreigner who came here at the call of
Pius VII., six years ago; my first patrons, Pius VII., Cardinals
Litta, De Pietro, Fontana, and now Consalvi, are dead. I therefore
recommend myself to your Holiness's protection, and hope you will be a
father to me at this distance from my country." He had obtained the
Holy Father's promise. Already he was known for a youth of marvellous
talents and learning. He had maintained a public disputation in
theology, and been rewarded for his success by the title of D.D. At
last came the jubilee-year of 1825. "The aim of years, the goal of
long preparation, the longed-for crown of unwavering desires, the only
prize thought worthy of being aspired to, was attained in the bright
jubilee spring of Rome. It marks a blessed epoch in a {120} life to
have had the grace of the priesthood superadded to the exuberant
benedictions of that year."

Fortunately for the English college,--and fortunately, perhaps we
should add, for England,--he was not yet to depart for the field of
his great labor. To use his own modest words, he was found to be at
hand in 1826, when some one was wanted for the office of vice-rector
of the English college, and so was named to it; and when, in 1828, the
worthy rector, Dr. Gradwell, was appointed bishop, Dr. Wiseman was, by
almost natural sequence, named to succeed him.

Thus he continued to drink in the spirit of catholicity, and devotion,
and steadiness in faith, of which Rome is the fountain on earth. With
reverent affection he traced out the mementos of primitive
Christianity, the tombs of the martyrs and saints, the altars and
hiding-places and sacred inscriptions of the catacombs. These holy
retreats had for him a fascination such as no other spot even in Rome
possessed. Again and again he recurs to them in his writings,
lingering fondly around the hallowed precincts, and inspiring his
readers with the love for them that burned so ardently in his own
breast. One of the last pieces that came from his pen was the little
story of a martyr's tomb, which we have placed in this number of our
magazine.

Other studies were not neglected. While his companions were indulging
in the mid-day sleep, which almost everybody takes in Rome, he was at
his books. Often he passed whole nights in study, or walking to and
fro, in meditation, through the corridors of the English college. The
seasons of vacation he would often spend collating ancient manuscripts
in the Vatican library, and one of the fruits of that labor was his
_Horae Syriacae_, published when he was only twenty-five years old. In
the same year (1827), he was appointed--though without severing his
connection with the English college--professor of oriental languages
in the Roman university. It is no doubt to these two events that he
alludes in the following extract from his "Recollections" of Leo XII.,
though he tells the story as if he had been only a witness of the
circumstances: "It so happened," he says, "that a person connected
with the English college was an aspirant to a chair in the Roman
university. He had been encouraged to compete for it, on its
approaching vacancy, by his professors. Having no claims of any sort,
by interest or connection, he stood simply on the provision of the
papal bull, which threw open all professorships to competition. It was
but a secondary and obscure lectureship at best; one concerning which,
it was supposed, few would busy themselves or come forward as
candidates. It was, therefore, announced that this rule would be
overlooked, and a person every way qualified, and of considerable
reputation, would be named. The more youthful aspirant unhesitatingly
solicited an audience, at which I was present. He told the Pope
frankly of his intentions and of his earnest wish to have carried out,
in his favor, the recent enactments of his Holiness. Nothing could be
more affable, more encouraging, than Leo's reply. He expressed his
delight at seeing that his regulation was not a dead letter, and that
it had animated his petitioner to exertion. He assured him that he
should have a fair chance, 'a clear stage and no favor,' desiring him
to leave the matter in his hands.

"Time wore on; and as the only alternative given in the bull was
proof, by publication of a work, of proficiency in the art or science
that was to be taught, he quietly got a volume through the
press--probably very heavy; but sprightliness or brilliancy was not a
condition of the bull. When a vacancy arrived, it was made known,
together with the announcement that it had been filled up. All seemed
lost, except the honor of the pontiff, to which alone lay any appeal.
Another audience was asked, and {121} instantly granted, its motive
being, of course, stated. I was again present, and shall not easily
forget it. It was not necessary to re-state the case. 'I remember it
all,' the Pope said most kindly; 'I have been surprised. I have sent
for C----,  through whom this has been done; I have ordered the
appointment to be cancelled, and I have reproved him so sharply that I
believe it is the reason why he is laid up to-day with fever. You have
acted fairly and boldly, and you shall not lose the fruits of your
industry. I will keep my word with you and the provisions of my
constitution.' With the utmost graciousness he accepted the
volume--now treasured by its author, into whose hands the copy has
returned--acknowledged the right to preference which it had
established, and assured its author of fair play.

"The Pope had, in fact, taken up earnestly the cause of his youthful
appellant; instead of annoyance, he showed earnestness and kindness;
and those who had passed over his pretensions with contempt were
obliged to treat with him and compromise with him on terms that
satisfied all his desires. Another audience for thanksgiving was
kindly accorded, and I witnessed the same gentle and fatherly temper,
quietly cheerful, and the same earnest sympathy with the feelings of
him whose cause had been so graciously carried through. If this young
client gained no new energies, gathered no strength from such repeated
proofs of interest and condescension; if these did not both direct and
impel, steer and fill, the sails of his little bark through many
troubled waters; nay, if they did not tinge and savor his entire
mental life, we may write that man soulless and incapable of any noble
emotions."

We must not suppose, however, that all this while he was so lost among
his books as to have forgotten that land for whose conversion he was
destined to labor through the best part of his life. He told a dear
friend how, having to wait one day at the Sapienza for the Hebrew
lecture, he went into the Church of St. Eustachio to pray; and there,
before the altar of the Blessed Sacrament and the altar of the Holy
Virgin Mother, the thought came into his mind that, as his native
country, in the oath which she imposes upon the chief personages of
the state, solemnly abjures these sacred mysteries, it was his duty to
devote himself to the defense and honor of those very doctrines in
England. And no one who has read his sermons and lectures and
pastorals can have failed to notice the burning love for the Eucharist
and the Blessed Virgin which inspired him.

The time was not yet for his mission to England; and it is so hard,
when the mind has been long running in one groove, to break out of it
and take a totally different course, that perhaps he might have come
in time to look upon the Roman theological schools as the ultimate
sphere of usefulness for which God had destined him, had he not been
suddenly called forth from his studious retirement by the voice of the
supreme pontiff. It was in 1827 that Leo XII. determined to institute
in the church of Gesù e Maria a course of English sermons, to be
attended by all colleges and religious communities that spoke the
language, and by as many other persons as chose to listen. It was
intended, of course, principally for the benefit of strangers. His
Holiness appointed Dr. Wiseman preacher. "The burden was laid there
and then," says the cardinal, describing the audience at which he
received this commission, "with peremptory kindness, by an authority
that might not be gainsaid. And crushingly it pressed upon the
shoulders. It would be impossible to describe the anxiety, pain, and
trouble which this command cost for many years after. Nor would this
be alluded to were it not to illustrate what has been kept in view
through this volume--how the most insignificant life, temper, and mind
may be moulded by the action of a {122} great and almost unconscious
power. Leo could not see what has been the influence of his
commission, in merely dragging from the commerce with the dead to that
of the living one who would gladly have confined his time to the
former,--from books to men, from reading to speaking. Nothing but this
would have done it. Yet supposing that the providence of one's life
was to be active, and in contact with the world, and one's future
duties were to be in a country and in times where the most bashful may
be driven to plead for his religion or his flock, surely a command
overriding all inclination and forcing the will to undertake the best
and only preparation for those tasks, may well be contemplated as a
sacred impulse and a timely direction to a mind that wanted both. Had
it not come then, it never more could have come; other bents would
have soon become stiffened and unpliant; and no second opportunity
could have been opened after others had satisfied the first demand."

From this time it would seem as if England had a stronger hold upon
his heart than ever. The noble purpose--which worldly men have since
laughed at as a wild dream--of devoting himself to the conversion of
England, became the ruling idea of his life. And often alone at night
in the college chapel he would "pour out his heart in prayer and
tears, full of aspirations and of a firm trust; of promptings to go,
but fear to outrun the bidding of our divine Master." He offered
himself to the Pope for this great work; but still the time was not
come; and he was told to wait.

But if he was not to go yet himself, he had his part to perform in
making others ready. He well knew that to fit his pupils for their
work, he must teach them something beside theology. Englishmen were a
sort of Brahmins; the missionary who went among them must go as one
versed in all learning, or he would not be listened to. He saw how the
natural sciences were growing to be the favorite pursuit--we may
almost say the hobby--of modern scholars, and in a preface to a thesis
by a student of the English college he insisted on the necessity of
uniting general and scientific knowledge to theological pursuits. As
another instance of the personal influence which several successive
pontiffs exercised over his studies, and the many kind marks of
interest which contributed to attach him so strongly to their persons,
we may repeat an anecdote which he tells in reference to this little
essay. He went to present it to Pius VIII., but the Holy Father had it
already before him, and said, "You have robbed Egypt of its spoil, and
shown that it belongs to the people of God." The same idea which he
briefly exposed in this essay, he developed more fully and with great
wealth of illustration in a course of lectures on the Connection
between Science and Revealed Religion, delivered first to his pupils
and afterward to a distinguished audience at the apartments of
Cardinal Weld. It was partly with a view to the revision and
publication of these lectures that he visited England in 1835.

During his stay in London, he preached a series of controversial
discourses in the Sardinian chapel during the Advent of 1835, and
another in St. Mary's, Moorfields, in Lent, 1836. The latter were
published under the title of _Lectures on the Principal Doctrines and
Practices of the Catholic Church_. They exhibit in a remarkable degree
the qualities, so rare in polemical literature, of kindness,
moderation, and charity for all men. The _odium theologicum_, indeed,
has less place at Rome than anywhere else in the Christian world. It
was at the very centre and chief school of the science of divinity
that he learned to fight against error without temper, and expose
falsehood without hard language. "I will certainly bear willing
testimony," he says, "to the absence of all harsh words and
uncharitable insinuations against others in public lectures or private
teaching, or even {123} in conversation at Rome. One grows up there in
a kinder spirit, and learns to speak of errors in a gentler tone than
elsewhere, though in the very centre of highest orthodox feeling." Dr.
Wiseman went back to the English college, leaving among his countrymen
at home an enviable reputation for honesty, learning, and good sense.

A few years more passed in frequent contact with the Holy Father, and
under the continuous influence of the sacred associations with which
eighteen centuries have peopled the Christian capital, and Nicholas
Wiseman was then ready to go forth to his work. The recollection of
numberless favors and kind words from the supreme pontiff went with
him, and strengthened him, and colored his thoughts. He has told of
the cordial and paternal treatment with which he was honored by
Gregory XVI. in particular. "An embrace would supply the place of
ceremonious forms on entrance. At one time a long, familiar
conversation, seated side by side; at another a visit to the
penetralia of the pontifical apartment (a small suite of entresols,
communicating by an internal staircase) occupied the time.
.....
What it has been my happiness to hear from him in such visits, it
would be betraying a sacred trust to reveal; but many and many words
there spoken rise to the mind in times of trouble, like stars, not
only bright in themselves, but all the brighter in their reflection
from the brightness of their mirror. They have been words of mastery
and spell over after events, promises, and prognostics which have not
failed, assurances and supports that have never come to naught."
[Footnote 39]

  [Footnote 39: He gives an amusing account of a perplexing situation
  from which this same Pope once unwittingly delivered him, while he
  was engaged in his course of lectures on Science and Revealed
  Religion at the apartments of Cardinal Weld. "On one of the days of
  delivery," says he, "I had been prevented from writing the lecture
  in time, and was laboring to make up for my delay, but in vain.
  Quarter after quarter of each hour flew rapidly on, and my advance
  bore no proportion to the matter before me. The fatal hour of twelve
  was fast approaching, and I knew not what excuse I could make, nor
  how to supply, except by a lame recital, the important portion yet
  unwritten of my task--for an index to the lectures had been printed
  and circulated. Just as the last moment arrived, a carriage from the
  palace drove to the door, with a message that I would step into it
  at once, as His Holiness wished to speak to me. This was, indeed, a
  _deus ex machina_--the only and least thought of expedient that
  could have saved me from my embarrassment. A messenger was
  despatched to inform the gathering audience of the unexpected cause
  of necessary adjournment of our sitting till the next day. The
  object of my summons was one of very trifling importance, and
  Gregory little knew what a service he had unintentionally rendered
  me."]


In 1840 it was determined to increase the number of vicars apostolic
in England from four to eight, and Dr. Wiseman, at the same time, was
appointed coadjutor to Bishop Walsh at Wolverhampton. "It was a
sorrowful evening," he says, "at the beginning of autumn, when, after
a residence in Rome prolonged through twenty-two years, till affection
clung to every old stone there, like the moss that grew into it, this
strong but tender tie was cut, and much of future happiness had to be
invested in the mournful recollections of the past."

Here we leave him. It was not until ten years later that he became
cardinal, but though from 1840 to 1850 he filled only a subordinate
position, he was working hard and well during this period, and fast
rising to be the foremost man of all the Catholics of England. And his
work never ceased. He lived to see the hierarchy established, and the
conversion of his countrymen making steady if not rapid progress; but
his energy never flagged when a part of his task was done; he passed
on from one labor to another, until that last day, when "he entered
into the sanctuary of God's presence, from which he never again came
forth."

------

{124}

From All The Year Bound.


THE NICK OF TIME.


Let us suppose a case that might occur if it has not occurred.

John Mullet, immersed (say) in the button trade at Birmingham, has
made money in business. He bequeaths his property by will, and is in
due time gathered to his fathers. His two sons, Jasper and Josiah,
take certain portions; and other portions are to go either to the
family of Jasper or to that of Josiah, according as either one of
those brothers survives the other. Jasper remains in England; but
Josiah goes out to Australia, to establish something that may make his
children great people over there. Both brothers, twelve thousand miles
apart, die on the same day, May 1st, one at noon (Greenwich time), the
other at noon (Sydney time). Jasper's children have been on pleasant
cousinly terms with Josiah's; but they are aware of the fact that it
would be better for them that Josiah should die before their own
father, Jasper. Josiah's children, on the other hand, be they few or
many, although they always liked uncle Jasper, cannot and do not
ignore the fact that their interests would be better served by the
survivorship of Josiah than that of Jasper. The two sets of cousins,
therefore, plunge into a contest, to decide the question of
survivorship between the two sons of old John Mullet.

This is one variety of a problem which the courts of law and equity
are often called upon to settle. Occasionally the question refers to
two persons who die at the same time, and in each other's company. For
instance: Toward the close of the last century, George Netherwood, his
children by his first wife, his second wife, and her son, were all
wrecked during a voyage from Jamaica to England. Eight thousand pounds
were left by will, in such a way that the relations of the two wives
were greatly interested in knowing whether the second Mrs. Netherwood
did or did not survive her husband, even by one single minute--a
matter which, of course, could not be absolutely proved. Again, in
1806, Mr. Mason and one son were drowned at sea; his remaining eight
children went to law, some of them against the others; because, if the
father died before the son, £5,000 would be divided equally among the
other eight children; whereas, if the son died before the father, the
brothers only would get it, the sisters being shut out. A few years
afterward Job Taylor and his wife were lost in a ship wrecked at sea;
they had not much to leave behind them; but what little there was was
made less by the struggles of two sets of relatives, each striving to
show that one or other of the two hapless persons _might_ possibly
have survived the other by a few minutes. In 1819 Major Colclough, his
wife, and four children, were drowned during a voyage from Bristol to
Cork; the husband and wife had both made wills; and there arose a
pretty picking for the lawyers in relation to survivorships and next
of kin, and trying to prove whether the husband died first, the wife
first, or both together. Two brothers, James and Charles Corbet, left
Demerara on a certain day in 1828, in a vessel of which one was master
and the other mate; the vessel was seen five days afterward, but from
that time no news of her fate was ever received. Their father died
about a month after the vessel was last seen. The ultimate disposal of
his property depended very much on the question whether he survived
his two sons or they survived him. Many curious arguments were used in
court. Two or three captains stated that from August to January are
hurricane {125} months in the West Indian seas, and that the ship was
very likely to have been wrecked quite early in her voyage. There
were, in addition, certain relations interested in James's dying
before Charles; and they urged that, if the ship was wrecked, Charles
was likely to have outlived by a little space his brother James,
because he was a stronger and more experienced man. Alas for the
"glorious uncertainty!" One big-wig decided that the sons survived the
father, and another that the father survived the sons. About the
beginning of the present reign, three persons, father, mother, and
child, were drowned on a voyage from Dublin to Quebec; the husband had
made a will, leaving all his property to his wife; hence arose a
contest between the next of kin and the wife's relations, each
catching at any small fact that would (theoretically) keep one poor
soul alive a few minutes longer than the other. About ten years ago, a
gentleman embarked with his wife and three children for Australia: the
ship was lost soon after leaving England; the mate, the only person
who was saved among the whole of the crew and passengers, deposed that
he saw the hapless husband and wife locked in each other's arms at the
moment when the waves closed over them. There would seem to be no
question of survivorship here; yet a question really arose; for there
were two wills to be proved, the terms of which would render the
relatives much interested in knowing whether husband or wife did
really survive the other by ever so small a portion of time.

These entangled contests may rest in peace, so far as the actual
decisions are concerned. And so may others of a somewhat analogous
nature. Such, for instance, as the case of an old lady and her
housekeeper at Portsmouth. They were both murdered one night. The lady
had willed all her property to the housekeeper, and then, the lawyers
fought over the question as to which of the women died first. Or, the
case of a husband who promised, on his marriage-day, to settle £1,200
on his wife "in three or four years." They were both drowned about
three years after the marriage; and it was not until after a tough
struggle in chancery that the husband's relatives conquered those of
the wife--albeit, the money had nearly vanished in law expenses by
that time. Or, the case of a man who gave a power of attorney to sell
some property. The property was sold on the 8th of June, but the man
was never seen after the 8th of the preceding March, and was supposed
to have been wrecked at sea; hence arose a question whether the man
was or was not dead on the day when the property was sold--a question
in which the buyer was directly interested. The decisions in these
particular cases we pass over; but it is curious to see how the law
sometimes tries to _guess_ at the nick of time in which either one of
two persons dies. Sometimes the onus of proof rests on one of the two
sets of relations. If they cannot prove a survivorship, the judgment
is that the deaths were simultaneous. Sometimes the law philosophizes
on vitality and decay. The Code Napoleon lays down the principle that
of two persons who perish by the same calamity, if they were both
children, the elder probably survived the younger by a brief space, on
account of having superior vital energy; whereas, if they were elderly
people, the younger probably survived the elder. The code also takes
anatomy and physiology into account, and discourses on the probability
whether a man would or would not float longer alive than a woman, in
the event of shipwreck. The English law is less precise in this
matter. It is more prone to infer simultaneous death, unless proof of
survivorship be actually brought forward. Counsel, of course, do not
fail to make the best of any straw to catch at. According to the
circumstances of the case, they argue that a man, being usually
stronger than a woman, probably survives her a little in a case of
{126} simultaneous drowning; that, irrespective of comparative
strength, her greater terror and timidity would incapacitate her from
making exertions which would be possible to him; that a seafaring man
has a chance of surviving a landsman, on account of his experience in
salt-water matters; that where there is no evidence to the contrary, a
child may be presumed to have outlived his father; that a man in good
health would survive one in ill health; and so forth.

The nick of time is not less an important matter in reference to
single deaths, under various circumstances. People are often very much
interested in knowing whether a certain person is dead or not. Unless
under specified circumstances, the law refuses to kill a man--that is,
a man known to have been alive at a certain date is presumed to
continue to live, unless and until proof to the contrary is adduced.
But there are certain cases in which the application of this rule
would involve hardship. Many leases are dependent on lives; and both
lessor and lessee are concerned in knowing whether a particular life
has terminated or not. Therefore, special statutes have been passed,
in relation to a limited number of circumstances, enacting that if a
man were seen alive more than seven years ago, and has not since been
seen or heard of, he may be treated as dead.

The nick of time occasionally affects the distribution or amount of
property in relation to particular seasons. Some years ago the
newspapers remarked on the fact that a lord of broad acres, whose
rent-roll reached something like £40,000 a year, died "about midnight"
between the 10th and 11th of October; and the possible consequences of
this were thus set forth: "His rents are payable at 'old time,' that
is, old Lady-day and old Michaelmas-day. Old Michaelmas-day fell this
year on Sunday, the 11th instant. The day begins at midnight. Now, the
rent is due upon the first moment of the day it becomes due; so that
at one second beyond twelve o'clock of the 10th instant, rent payable
at old Michaelmas-day is in law due. If the lord died before twelve,
the rents belong to the parties taking the estates; but if after
twelve, then they belong to and form part of his personal estate. The
difference of one minute might thus involve a question on the title to
about £20,000." We do not know that a legal difficulty did arise; the
facts only indicate the mode in which one might have arisen. Sometimes
that ancient British institution, the house clock, has been at war
with another British institution, the parish church clock. A baby was
born, or an old person died, just before the house clock struck twelve
on a particular night, but after the church clock struck. On which day
did the birth or death take place--yesterday or to-day? And how would
this fact be ascertained, to settle the inheritance of an estate? We
know an instance (not involving, however, the inheritance to property)
of a lady whose relations never have definitely known on which day she
was born; the pocket watch of the accoucheur who attended her mother
pointed to a little before twelve at midnight, whereas the church
clock had just struck twelve. Of course a particular day had to be
named in the register; and as the doctor maintained that his watch was
right, there were the materials for a very pretty quarrel if the
parties concerned had been so disposed. It might be that the nick of
time was midnight exactly, as measured by solar or sun-dial time: that
is, the sun may have been precisely in the nadir at that moment; but
this difficulty would not arise in practice, as the law knows only
mean time, not sun-dial time. If Greenwich time were made legal
everywhere, and if electric clocks everywhere established
communication with the master clock at the observatory, there might be
another test supplied; but under the conditions stated, it would be a
nice matter of _Tweedledum_ and _Tweedledee_ {127} to determine
whether the house clock, the church clock, or a pocket watch, should
be relied upon. All the pocket watches in the town might be brought
into the witness-box, but without avail; for if some accorded with the
house clock, others would surely be found to agree better with the
church clock.

This question of clocks, as compared with time measured by the sun,
presents some very curious aspects in relation to longitude. What's
o'clock in London will not tell you what's o'clock in Falmouth, unless
you know the difference of longitude between the two places. The sun
takes about twenty minutes to go from the zenith of the one to the
zenith of the other. Local time, the time at any particular town, is
measured from the moment of noon at that town; and noon itself is when
the sun comes to the meridian of that place. Hence Falmouth noon is
twenty minutes after London noon, Falmouth midnight twenty minutes
after London midnight; and so on. When it is ten minutes after
midnight, on the morning of Sunday, the 1st of January, in London, it
is ten minutes before midnight, on Saturday, the 31st of December, at
Falmouth. It is a Sabbath at the one place, a working-day at the
other. That particular moment of absolute time is in the year 1865 at
the one, and 1864 at the other. Therefore, we see, it might become a
ticklish point in what year a man died, solely on account of this
question of longitude, irrespective of any wrong-going or wrong-doing
of clocks, or of any other doubtful points whatever. Sooner or later
this question will have to be attended to. In all our chief towns,
nearly all our towns indeed, the railway-station clocks mark Greenwich
time, or, as it is called, "railway time;" the church clocks generally
mark local time; and some commercial clocks, to serve all parties,
mark both kinds of time on the same dial-face, by the aid of an
additional index hand. Railway time is gradually beating local time;
and the law will by-and-by have to settle which shall be used as the
standard in determining the moment of important events. Some of the
steamers plying between England and Ireland use Greenwich time in
notifying the departures from the English port, and Dublin time in
notifying those from the Irish port; a method singularly embarrassing
to a traveller who is in the habit of relying on his own watch. Does a
sailor get more prog, more grog, more pay, within a given space of
absolute time when coming from America to England, or when going from
England to America? The difference is far too slight to attract either
his attention or that of his employers; yet it really is the case that
he obtains more good things in the former of these cases than in the
latter. His days are shorter on the homeward than on the outward
voyage; and if he receive so much provisions and pay per day, he
interprets day as it is to him on shipboard. When in harbor, say at
Liverpool, a day is, to him as to every one else who is stationary
like himself, a period of definite length; but when he travels
Eastward or Westward, his days are variable in length. When he travels
West, he and the sun run a race; the sun of course beats; but the
sailor accomplishes a little, and the sun has to fetch up that little
before he can complete what foot-racers call a lap. In other words,
there is a longer absolute time between noon and noon to the sailor
going West, than to the sailor ashore. When he travels East, on the
contrary, he and the sun run toward each other; insomuch that there is
less absolute time in the period between his Monday's noon and
Tuesday's noon than when he was ashore. The ship's noon is usually
dinner-time for the sailors; and the interval between that and the
next noon (measured by the sun, not by the chronometer) varies in
length through the causes just noticed. Once now and then there are
facts recorded in the newspapers which bring this {128} truth into
prominence--a truth demonstrable enough in science, but not very
familiar to the general public. When the _Great Eastern_ made her first
veritable voyage across the Atlantic in June, 1860, she left
Southampton on the 17th, and reached New York on the 28th. As the ship
was going West, more or less, all the while, she was going with or
rather after the sun; the interval was greater between noon and noon
than when the ship was anchored off Southampton; and the so-called
eleven days of the voyage were eleven long days. As it was important,
in reference to a problem in steam navigation, to know how many
revolutions the paddles made in a given time, to test the power of the
mighty ship, it was necessary to bear in mind that the ship's day was
longer than a shore day; and it was found that, taking latitude and
longitude into account, the day on which the greatest run was made was
nearly twenty-four and a half hours long; the ship's day was equal to
half an hour more than a landsman's day. The other days varied from
twenty-four to twenty-four and a half. On the return voyage all this
was reversed; the ship met the sun, the days were less than
twenty-four ordinary hours long, and the calculations had to be
modified in consequence. The sailors, too, got more food in a homeward
week than an outward week, owing to the intervals between the meals
being shorter albeit, their appetites may not have been cognizant of
the difference.

And this brings us back to our hypothetical Mullets. Josiah died at
noon (Sydney time), and Jasper died on the same day at noon (Greenwich
time). Which died first? Sydney, although not quite at the other side
of the world, is nearly so; it is ten hours of longitude Eastward of
Greenwich; the sun rises there ten hours earlier than with us. It is
nearly bed-time with Sydney folks when our artisans strike work for
dinner. There would, therefore, be a reasonable ground for saying that
Josiah died first. But had it been New Zealand, a curious question
might arise. Otago, and some other of the settlements in those
islands, are so near the antipodes of Greenwich, that they may either
be called eleven and three-quarter hours East, or twelve and a quarter
hours West, of Greenwich, according as we suppose the navigator to go
round the Cape of Good Hope or round Cape Horn. At six in the morning
in London, it is about six in the evening at New Zealand. But of which
day? When it is Monday morning in London, is it Sunday evening or
Monday evening in New Zealand? This question is not so easy to solve
as might be supposed. When a ship called at Pitcairn Island several
years ago, to visit the singular little community that had descended
from the mutineers of the Bounty, the captain was surprised to find
exactly one day difference between his ship's reckoning and that of
the islanders; what was Monday, the 26th, to the one, was Tuesday, the
27th, to the other. A voyage East had been the origin of one
reckoning, a voyage West that of the other. Not unlikely we should
have to go back to the voyage of the Bounty itself, seventy-seven
years ago, to get to the real origin of the Pitcairners' reckoning.
How it may be with the English settlers in New Zealand, we feel by no
means certain. If the present reckoning began with some voyage made
round Cape Horn, then our Monday morning is New Zealand Sunday
evening; but if with some voyage made round the Cape of Good Hope,
then our Monday morning is New Zealand Monday evening. Probabilities
are perhaps in favor of the latter supposition. We need not ask,
"What's o'clock at New Zealand?" for that can be ascertained to a
minute by counting the difference of longitude; but to ask, "What day
of the week and of the month is it at New Zealand?" is a question that
might, for aught we can see, involve very important legal
consequences.

------

{129}

From the Dublin Review.

RECENT DISCOVERIES IN THE CATACOMBS.


The chromo-lithographic press, established at Rome by the munificence
of Pius IX., has issued its first publication, four sheets in large
folio, _Imagines Selectae Deiparae Virginis in Caemeteriis Suburbanis
Udo depictae_, with about twenty pages of text from the pen of the
Cavaliere G. B. de Rossi. The subject and the author are amply
sufficient to recommend them to the Christian archaeologist, and the
work of the artists employed is in every way worthy of both. It is by
no means an uncommon idea, even among Catholics who have visited Rome
and _done_ the catacombs, that our Blessed Lady does not hold any
prominent place in the decorations of those subterranean cemeteries.
Protestant tourists often boldly publish that she is nowhere to be
found there. The present publication will suffice to show, even to
those who never leave their own homes, the falsehood of this statement
and impression. De Rossi has here set before us a selection of four
different representations of Holy Mary, as she appears in that
earliest monument of the Christian Church; and, in illustrating these,
he has taken occasion to mention a score or two of others. Moreover,
he has vindicated for them an antiquity and an importance far beyond
what we were prepared to expect; and those who have ever either made
personal acquaintance with him, or have studied his former writings,
well know how far removed he is from anything like uncritical and
enthusiastic exaggerations. Even such writers as Mr. Burgon ("Letters
from Rome") cannot refrain from bearing testimony to his learning,
moderation, and candor; they praise him, often by way of contrast with
some Jesuit or other clerical exponent of the mysteries of the
catacombs, for all those qualities which are calculated to inspire us
with confidence in his interpretations of any nice points of Christian
archaeology. But we fear his Protestant admirers will be led to lower
their tone of admiration for him, and henceforward to discover some
flaw in his powers of criticism, when they find him, as in these
pages, gravely maintaining, concerning a particular representation of
the Madonna in the catacombs, that it is of Apostolic, or
quasi-Apostolic antiquity. It is a painting on the vaulted roof of an
_arcosolium_ in the cemetery of St. Priscilla, and it is reproduced in
the work before us in its original size. The Blessed Virgin sits, her
head partially covered by a short slight veil, holding the Divine
Infant in her arms; opposite to her stands a man, holding in one hand
a volume, and with the other pointing to a star which appears between
the two figures. This star almost always accompanies our Blessed Lady
in ancient paintings or sculptures, wherever she is represented either
with the Magi offering their gifts, or by the manger's side with the
ox and the ass; but with a single figure, as in the present instance,
it is unusual. Archaeologists will probably differ in their
interpretation of this figure; the most obvious conjecture would, of
course, fix on St. Joseph; there seem to be solid reasons, however,
for preferring (with De Rossi) the prophet Isaias, whose predictions
concerning the Messias abound with imagery borrowed from light, and
who may be identified on an old Christian glass by the superscription
of his name. But this question, interesting as it is, is not so
important as the probable date of the painting itself; and here no
abridgment or analysis of' De Rossi's arguments can do justice to the
moderation, yet irresistible force, with which he accumulates proofs
of {130} the conclusion we have already stated, viz., that the
painting was executed, if not in Apostolic times and as it were under
the very eyes of the Apostles themselves, yet certainly within the
first 150 years of the Christian era. He first bids us carefully to
study the art displayed in the design and execution of the painting;
he compares it with the decorations of the famous Pagan tombs
discovered on the Via Latina in 1858, and which are referred to the
times of the Antoninuses; with the paintings in the pontifical
_cubiculum_ in the cemetery of St. Callixtus, and with others more
recently discovered in the cemetery of Pretextatus, to both of which a
very high antiquity is conceded by all competent judges; and he justly
argues that the more classical style of the painting now under
examination _obliges_ us to assign to it a still earlier date. Next, he
shows that the catacomb in which it appears was one of the oldest,--St.
Priscilla, from whom it receives its name, having been the mother of
Pudens and a contemporary of the Apostles (the impress of a seal, with
the name _Pudens Felix_, is repeated several times on the mortar round
the edge of a grave in this cemetery); nay, further still, it can be
shown that the tombs of Sts. Pudentiana and Praxedes, and therefore,
probably, of their father St. Pudens himself, were in the immediate
neighborhood of the very chapel in which this Madonna is to be seen;
moreover, the inscriptions which are found there bear manifest tokens
of a higher antiquity than can be claimed by any others from the
catacombs: there is the complete triple nomenclature of pagan times,
e.g., Titus Flavius Felicissimus; the epitaphs are not even in the
usual form, _in pace_, but simply the Apostolic salutation, _Pax
tecum, Pax tibi_; and finally, the greater number of them are not cut
on stone or marble slabs, but written with red paint on the tiles
which close the graves--a mode of inscription of which not a single
example, we believe, has hitherto been found in any other part the
catacombs. This is a mere outline of the arguments by which De Rossi
establishes his conclusion respecting the age of this painting, and
they are not even exhibited in their full force in the present
publication at all. For a more copious induction of facts, and a more
complete elucidation both of the history and topography of the
catacombs, we must be content to wait till the author's larger work on
_Roma Sotterranea_ shall appear.

The most recent painting of the Madonna which De Rossi has here
published is that with which our readers will be the most familiar. It
is the one to which the late Father Marchi, S.J., never failed to
introduce every visitor to the catacomb of St. Agnes, and has been
reproduced in various works; the Holy Mother with her hands
outstretched in prayer, the Divine Infant on her bosom, and the
Christian monogram on either side of her and turned toward her. This
last particular naturally directs our thoughts to the fourth century
as the date of this work; and the absence of the _nimbus_ and some other
indications lead our author to fix the earlier half of the century in
preference to the later. Between these two limits, then, of the first
or second, and the fourth century, he would place the two others which
are now published; he distinguishes them more doubtfully, as belonging
respectively to the first and second half of the third century. In
one, from the cemetery of Domitilla, the Blessed Virgin sits holding
the Holy Child on her lap, whilst four Magi offer their gifts; the
other, from the catacomb of Sts. Peter and Marcellinus, represents the
same scene, but with two Magi only. In both there is the same
departure from the ancient tradition of the number of the wise men,
and from the same cause, viz., the desire to give a proper balance and
proportion to the two sides of the picture, the Virgin occupying the
middle place. Indeed, in one of them, it is still possible to trace
{131} the original sketch of the artist, designing another arrangement
with the three figures only; but the result did not promise to be
satisfactory, and he did what thousands of his craft have continued to
do ever since, sacrificed historic truth to the exigencies of his art.

We trust our readers will be induced to get this valuable work and to
study it for themselves; the text may be procured either in French or
in Italian, so that it is readily accessible to all. At the same time
we would take the opportunity of introducing to them another work by
the same indefatigable author, which is also published both in French
and in Italian. At least, such is the announcement of a prospectus now
lying before us, which states that the French translation is published
by Vives, in Paris. We have ourselves only seen the original Italian.
It is a short monthly periodical, illustrations, _Bollettino di
Archeologia Cristiana_, and is addressed not merely to _savans_,
Fellows of Royal Societies, and the like, but rather to all educated
men who care for the history of their religion and are capable of
appreciating its evidences. De Rossi claims for the recent discoveries
in the Roman catacombs the very highest place among the scientific
events of the day which have an important religious bearing, and we
think that the justice of his plea must be admitted. Unfortunately,
however, the vastness of the subject, the multiplied engagements of
the author, and (not least) the political vicissitudes of the times,
have hitherto prevented the publication of these discoveries in a
complete and extended form. We are happy to know that the work is
satisfactorily progressing; but meanwhile he has been persuaded by the
suggestions of many friends, and by the convenience of the thing
itself, to publish this monthly periodical, which will keep us _au
courant_ with the most important additions that are being made from
time to time to our knowledge of those precious memorials of primitive
Christianity, and also supply much interesting information on other
archaeological matters. In these pages the reader is allowed to
accompany, as it were, the author himself in his subterranean
researches, to assist at his discoveries, to trace the happy but
doubtful conjecture of a moment through all its gradual stages, until
it reaches the moral certainty of a conclusion which can no longer be
called in question; _e.g._, the author gives us a portion of a lecture
which he delivered on July 3, 1852, to the Roman Pontifical Academy of
Archaeology. In this lecture he maintained, in opposition to the usual
nomenclature of the catacombs, and entirely on the strength of certain
topographical observations, that a particular cemetery, into which a
very partial opening had been made in 1848, was that anciently called
by the name of Pretextatus, and in which were buried St. Januarius,
the eldest of the seven sons of St. Felicitas, Felicissimus and
Agapitus, deacons of St. Sixtus, Pope Urban, Quirinus, and other
famous martyrs. Five years passed away, and this opinion had been
neither confirmed nor refuted; but in 1857, excavations undertaken for
another purpose introduced our author into a crypt of this cemetery,
of unusual size and richness of ornament, where one of the _loculi_
bore an inscription on the mortar which had secured the grave-stone,
invoking the assistance of "Januarius, Agatopus (for Agapitus), and
Felicissimus, martyrs!" This, of course, was a strong confirmation of
the conjecture which had been published so long before; but this was
all which he could produce in the first number of his _Bollettino_ in
January, 1863. In the second number he could add that, as he was going
to press (February 21), small fragments of an inscription on marble
had been disinterred from the same place, of which only single letters
had yet been found, but which, he did not hesitate to say, had been
written by Pope Damasus and contained his name, as well as the name of
{132} St. Januarius. In March he published the twelve or fourteen
letters which had been discovered, arranging them in the place he
supposed them to have occupied in the inscription, which he
conjecturally restored, and which consisted altogether of more than
forty letters. In April he was able still further to add, that they
had now recovered other portions; amongst the rest, a whole word, or
rather the contraction of a word (_episcop._ for _episcopus_), exactly in
accordance with his conjecture, though, at the time he made the
conjecture, only half of one of the letters had yet come to light.

We need not pursue the subject further. Enough has been said to
satisfy those of our readers who have any acquaintance with the
catacombs, both as to the kind and the degree of interest and
importance which belong to this publication. Its intelligence,
however, is by no means confined to the catacombs. The basilica of San
Clemente; the recent excavations at San Lorenzo, _fuori le mura_; the
postscript of St. Pamphilus the Martyr at the end of one of his
manuscript copies of the Bible, reproduced in the Codex Sinaiticus
lately published by Tischendorf; the arch of Constantine; ancient
scribblings on the wall (_graffiti_) of the palace of the Caesars on
the Palatine, etc., etc., are subjects of able and learned articles in
the several numbers we have received. With reference to the
_graffiti_, one singular circumstance mentioned by De Rossi is worth
repeating here. Most of our readers are probably acquainted with the
_graffiti_ from this place, published by P. Garrucci, in which one
Alessamenus is ridiculed for worshipping as his God the figure of a
man, but with the head of an ass, nailed to a cross. P. Garrucci had
very reasonably conjectured that this was intended as a blasphemous
caricature of the Christian worship; and recently other _graffiti_ in
the very same place have been discovered with the title _Episcopus_,
apparently given in ridicule to some Christian youth; for that the
room on whose walls these scribblings appear was used for educational
purposes is abundantly proved by the numerous inscriptions announcing
that such or such a one _exit de paedagogio_. We seem, therefore, in
deciphering these rude scrawls, to assist, as it were, at one of the
minor scenes of that great struggle between paganism and Christianity,
whereof the sufferings of the early martyrs, the apologies of Justin
Martyr, etc., were only another but more public and historical phase.
History tells us that Caracalla, when a boy, saw one of his companions
beaten because he professed the Christian faith. These _graffiti_ seem
to teach us that there were many others of the same tender age, _de
domo Caesaris_, who suffered more or less of persecution for the same
cause. Other interesting details of the same struggle have been
brought together by De Rossi, carefully gleaned from the patrician
names which appear on some of the ancient grave-stones, sometimes as
belonging to young virgins or widows who had dedicated themselves to
the service of Christ under the discipline of a religious community.
That such a community was to be found early in the fifth century, in
the immediate neighborhood of _S. Lorenzo fuori le mura_, or, at
least, that the members of such a community were always buried about
that time in that cemetery, is one of the circumstances which may be
said to be clearly proved by the recent discoveries. The proofs are
too numerous and minute for abridgment, but the student will be
interested in examining them as they appear in the _Bollettino_.

Another feature in this archaeological publication is its convenience
as a supplement to the volume of Christian Inscriptions published by
the same author. That volume, as our readers are already aware,
contains only such inscriptions of the first six centuries as bear a
distinct chronological note by the names of the chief magistrates, or
in some other way. Additional specimens of these are not unfrequently
discovered in the excavations still {133} in progress on various sides
of the city; and these De Rossi is careful to chronicle, and generally
also to illustrate by notes, in the pages of his _Bollettino_. The
chief value of these additions, perhaps, is to be found in the
corroboration they _uniformly_ give to the conclusions which De Rossi
had already deduced, the canons of chronological distinction and
distribution which he had established, from the larger collection of
inscriptions in the work referred to--whether as to the style of
writing or of diction and sentiments, etc.--canons, the full
importance of which will only be recognized when he shall have
published the second volume of the collection of epitaphs bearing upon
questions of Christian doctrine and practice.

In the earlier numbers of the _Bollettino_ for the present year there
is a very interesting account of the recent discoveries in the
Ambrosian basilica of Milan, where there seems no room to doubt but
that they have brought to light the very sarcophagus in which the
relics of the great St. Ambrose, as well as those of the martyrs Sts.
Gervasius and Protasius, have rested for more than ten centuries. The
history of the discovery is too long to be inserted here, and too
interesting to be abridged. One circumstance, however, connected with
it is too important to be omitted. The sarcophagus itself has not yet,
we believe, been opened; but, from the two sepulchres below and on
either side of it, where the bishop and the martyrs were originally
deposited, and where they remained until their translation in the
ninth century, many valuable relics have been gleaned. We will only
mention one of them--viz., portions of an _ampulla_ such as are found
in the catacombs, and concerning which Dr. Biraghi, the librarian of
the Bibliotheca Ambrosiana (to whose zeal we are indebted for the
whole discovery, and for the account of it to his learning), assures
us that it has been subjected to a chemical examination, and is shown
to have contained blood. This, as De Rossi truly remarks, is the most
notable instance which has yet come before us of this _ampulla_ having
been placed in the sepulchre of famous and historical martyrs, and it
is of very special importance as throwing a flood of light on those
words of St. Ambrose about these relics so often quoted in the
controversy on this subject--_Sanguine, tumulus madet; apparent
cruoris triumphales notae; inviolatae reliquiae loco suo et ordine
repertae_. And it is certainly singular that this discovery should
have been made at a moment when the validity of these _ampullae_, as
sure signs of martyrdom, has been so much called in question. The
Sacred Congregation of Rites had only recently reaffirmed their former
sentence on this matter; and this fact now comes most opportunely from
Milan to add further weight to their decision, by giving a historical
basis to an opinion which before had been thought by some rather to
rest upon theory and conjecture. It will go far, we should think,
toward _rehabilitating_ in the minds of Christian archaeologists the
pious belief of former ages upon this subject, wherever it may have
been shaken.

------

{134}

MISCELLANY.


SCIENCE.

_The Mason-Spider of Corfu_.--A correspondent of a London journal gives
an interesting account of certain habits of this insect, which belongs
to the _mygalidae_ family. The mygales are chiefly found in hot
climates, and include the largest specimens of spiders known. They are
called mason-spiders, from the curious manner in which they build
their houses. "The mygale nest," says the correspondent, "varies much
in size, from one inch in length to three or four, and even six or
seven inches. In the West Indies, where the spiders are crab-like, the
insects measure six inches over. One nest, especially mentioned and
minutely described by Mr. Oudouin, was three inches and a quarter long
and eight-tenths of an inch wide. The nest, of cylindrical form, is
made by boring into the earth; making his excavation, the next thing,
having decided upon the dimensions of his habitation, is to furnish
it, and most beautiful are his paper-hangings. The whole of the
interior is lined with the softest possible silk, a tissue which the
'major domo' spins all over the apartment until it is padded to a
sufficient thickness and made soft enough. Silk lining like this gives
the idea of the mygale having a luxurious turn. This done, and the
interior finished, the mygale shows his peculiarity by taking steps to
keep out the [Greek text] of intruders by making not only a door, and
that self-closing, but a door with swinging hinge, and sometimes one
at each end of his nest, which shows that he has a very good opinion
of his own work within, and knows how to take care of it. Not having
met with any case where any one had seen the positive operation of
making the door of these nests, I thought the details would be
interesting, the more so as they corroborated preconceived ideas of
their construction, and were noticed by a friend quartered at Corfu,
who brought home the nest with him. The following is the description
he gave me:

  "Lying out in one of the sandy plateaux covered with olive groves
  with which Corfu abounds, enjoying his cigar and lounging about in
  the sandy soil, he came to a spider's nest. Examining it, he found
  the lid or door would not open, and seemed held firmly within by the
  proprietor--as if Jack were at home--so he applied forthwith the
  leverage of a knife-blade, upon which the inmate retired to his
  inner chamber. The aggressor decided not to disturb him any more
  that day, but marking the place--most necessary thing to do--thought
  he would explore further the next day, if fine.

  "Accordingly, the next day my friend called early, intending to take
  off the door and to watch the progress of restoration, and how it
  would be accomplished. After waiting a long time, out came Monsieur
  Mygale, and looking carefully round, and finding all quiet,
  commenced operations by running his web backward and forward across
  the orifice of his nest, till there was a layer of silken web; upon
  this he ejected a gluten, over which he scratched the fine sand in
  the immediate neighborhood of his nest; this done, he again set to
  work--webbing, then gluten, sand; then again web, gluten, sand, about
  six times; this occupied in all about eight hours. But the puzzling
  part was that this time he was cementing and building himself out
  from his own mansion, when, to the astonishment and delight of his
  anxious looker-on, he began the finishing stroke by cutting and
  forming the door by fixing his hind legs in the centre of the new
  covering, and from these as a centre he began cutting with his jaws
  right through the door he had made, striking a clear circle round,
  and leaving about one-eighth of the circumference as a hinge. This
  done, he lifted the door up and walked in. My friend then tried to
  open the door with a knife, but the insect pulled it tight from the
  inside. He therefore dug round him and took him off bodily--mygale
  and nest complete. The hinge is most carefully and beautifully
  formed; and there appears to be an important object in view when the
  spider covers over the whole of the orifice, for immediately the
  door is raised it springs back as soon as released; and this is
  caused by the elasticity of the web on the hinge and the peculiar
  formation of the lid or door, which is made thicker on the lower
  side, so that its {135} own weight helps it to be self-closing, and
  the rabbeting of the door is wonderfully surfaced. Bolts and Chub
  locks with a latch-key the mygale family do not possess, but as a
  substitute the lower part of the door has clawholding holes, so that
  a bird's beak or other lever being used, Mons. Mygale holds on to
  the door by these, and with his legs against the sides of his house,
  offers immense resistance against all comers."


_Instinct of Insects_.--One of the regular course of free scientific
lectures delivered at the Paris Sorbonne this last winter, under the
auspices of the Minister of Public Instruction, was by the
distinguished naturalist M. Milne-Edwards, on the instinct and
intelligence of animals. Taking for his text the saying of Linnaeus,
_Natura maxime miranda in minimis,_ he spoke principally of the
instinct of insects, and especially of solitary bees. These
hymenoptera, in fact, afford one of the most striking examples known
of that faculty which impels an animal, either for its own
preservation or for the preservation and development of its offspring,
to perform the most complicated and intelligent actions, readily and
skilfully, yet without having learned how to do them. One species, the
carpenter-bee (_xylocopa_), bores in the trunks of trees galleries
running first horizontally and then vertically to a considerable
depth. She then collects a quantity of wax and honey. The honey she
kneads into a little ball of alimentary matter, in the midst of which
she deposits her first egg. With the wax she constructs a horizontal
partition, formed of concentric annular layers; this encloses the
cell. On this partition she deposits a second egg, enclosed like the
first in the provision destined for the support of the future larva;
and over it builds another partition of wax; and so on, to the top of
the vertical cavity. Then she dies; she never sees her offspring. The
latter, so long as they remain larvae, feed upon the honey which the
maternal foresight provided for them; and so soon as they have passed
through their second metamorphosis and become winged insects, issue
forth from their retreat, to perform in their turn a similar labor.

Another species of solitary bee, whose larva is carnivorous, resorts
to a still more wonderful, but, it must be confessed, very cruel,
expedient to supply the worm-like progeny with food. She constructs a
gallery or tunnel in the earth, and crowns it with a chimney curved
somewhat like a crosier, so as to keep out the rain. Then she goes
a-hunting, and brings back to her den a number of caterpillars. If she
kills them at once, they will spoil before her eggs are hatched; if
she lets them alone, they will run away. What shall she do? She
pierces the caterpillars with her venomous little dart, and injects
into them a drop of poison, which Mr. Claude Bernard no doubt will
analyze some day. It does not kill, it only paralyzes them; and there
they lie, torpid and immovable, till the larvae come into the world
and feast off the sweet and succulent flesh at their leisure.

Everybody is familiar with the habits and wonderful industry of
hive-bees, wasps, and ants. These insects seem to be governed by
something more than blind instinct: it is hardly too much to say that
they give indubitable signs of intelligence. They know how to modify
their course according to circumstances, to provide against unexpected
wants, to avert dangers, and to notify to each other whatever is of
consequence to be known by their whole community. Huber, the
celebrated bee-keeper of Geneva, relates the following anecdote: One
of his hives having been devastated one night by a large sphinx-moth,
the bees set to work the next morning and plastered up the door,
leaving only a small opening which would just admit them, one at a
time, but which the sphinx, with its big body and long wings, could
not pass. As soon as the season arrived when the moths terminate their
short lives, the bees, no longer fearing an invasion, pulled down
their rampart. The next season, as no sphinx appeared to trouble them,
they left their door wide open.



_Ostrich-keeping_.--By late news from the Cape of Good Hope we learn
that the farmers of that colony are beginning to find it profitable to
keep flocks of ostriches, for the feathers of those birds are worth
£25 sterling the pound. For thirty-five ostriches, there must be three
hundred acres of grazing-ground. The plucking takes place once in six
months; the yield of feathers from each bird being worth from £10 to
£12, 10s. The original cost of the young ostriches is said to be £5
each. Some of the {136} farmers who have tried the experiment are of
opinion that ostrich-feathers will pay better than any other produce
of the colony.


_Extraordinary Inland Navigation_.--We hear from South America that a
steamer built in England for the Peruvian government, for the
exploration of rivers, has penetrated the great continent from the
Atlantic side to a distance of ninety-five leagues only from the
Pacific, or nearly all across. The vessel, which draws seven feet
water, steamed seven hundred leagues up the Amazon, two hundred up the
Ucayati, and thence into the Pachitea, which had never before been
navigated except by native canoes. What a magnificent extent of inland
navigation is here opened to commercial enterprise! The mind becomes
somewhat bewildered in imagining the future of those vast
river-valleys when hundreds of steamers shall navigate the streams,
trading among millions of population dwelling on their banks.



_Is the Sun getting Bigger?_--It is known that various speculations
have been put forward as to the cause or source of the sun's heat.
Among those who consider that it consists in the falling of asteroids
or meteorites into the sun, is Mr. J. R. Mayer, of Heilbronn, who
states that the surface of the sun measures 115,000 million square
miles, and that the asteroids falling thereon form a mass every minute
equal in weight to from 94,000 to 188,000 billion kilogrammes. It
might be supposed that this enormous shower would increase the mass
and weight of the sun, and by consequence produce an appreciable
effect on the motion of the planets which compose our system. For
instance, it would shorten our year by a second or something less. But
the calculations of astronomers show that this effect does not take
place; and Mr. Mayer states that to increase the apparent diameter of
the sun a single second by the shower of asteroids would require from
33,000 to 66,000 years.



_Teaching the Deaf and Dumb to Speak_.--Dr. Houdin, director of an
institution for the deaf and dumb at Passy, lately announced to the
French Academy, that after twenty-five years' experience he had proved
the possibility of communicating the faculty of speech, in a certain
degree, to deaf mutes. A commission appointed by the Academy and the
Faculty to investigate the subject, reports that the learned doctor
has really succeeded in several instances in teaching these
unfortunate beings to speak and even comprehend spoken language so
well that it is difficult to believe that they are not guided by the
ear. The patients conversed with the members of the commission, and
answered the different questions put to them. They were found to be
perfectly familiar with the use and mechanism of speech, though
destitute of the sense of hearing, and they comprehended what was said
to them, reading the words upon the lips of the speaker with a
marvellous facility. Thus they become fit to enter into society and
capable of receiving all manner of instruction.

But here is another case still more wonderful. What would you do if
you had to instruct and prepare for first communion a child who was at
the same time deaf, dumb, and _blind_? The case is not an imaginary
one; it has occurred in an asylum for deaf-mutes at Notre Dame de
Larnay, in the diocese of Poitiers. A nun was there charged with the
instruction of a child in this unfortunate state, to whom she could
appeal only by the sense of touch. Yet the child, who astonishes
everybody by her sensibility and intelligence, has come by that means
to a knowledge of the spiritual life, of God and his divine Son, of
religion and its mysteries and precepts--has been prepared, in fine,
for a worthy reception of the Eucharist.


ART.

The past winter in New York has scarcely kept pace with its immediate
predecessor in the number and merit of the collections of pictures
opened to public inspection or disposed of at auction. The
unprecedented prices obtained for the really excellent collection of
Mr. Wolfe, in Christmas week of 1863, seemed to have inoculated art
collectors and dealers with what may be called a _cacoethes vendendi_,
and until far into the succeeding summer the picture auctioneers were
called upon to knock down dozens of galleries of "private gentlemen
about to leave the country," varying in merit from respectable to
positively bad. In these sales the moderns had decidedly the best of
it, the few {137} "old masters" who ventured to appeal to the
sympathies and pockets of our collectors being at last treated with
proper contempt. But the prices realized by the Wolfe gallery, even
when reduced to a specie basis, were too high to become a recognized
standard of value, and gradually the interest in such sales, as well
as the bids, declined, until the sellers became aware (the purchasers
had become aware some time previous) that the market was overstocked
and the demand for pictures had ceased. The contributions of the
foreign artists to the New York Sanitary Fair brought probably less
than a third of the money that would have been obtained for them had
they been sold in January instead of June, and such collections as
have been scraped together for sale during the present season have met
with but moderate pecuniary success. It is gratifying to know,
however, that our resident artists, both native and foreign-born, have
for the most part been busily and profitably employed, and that in
landscape, and in some departments of _genre_, their works have not
suffered in competition with similar ones by reputable European
painters. Without wishing in any respect to recommend or suggest a
protective system for fostering native art, we cannot but rejoice that
the overthrow of the late exaggerated prices for foreign works will
tend to encourage and develop American artists.

The principal art event in anticipation is the opening of next
exhibition of the National Academy of Design in the building now
hastening to completion at the corner of Fourth avenue and
Twenty-third streets. It is to be hoped that the contributions will be
worthy of the place and the occasion. Recent exhibitions have not been
altogether creditable to the Academy.

Durand, the late president of the Academy, and one of our oldest and
most careful landscape painters, has a characteristic work on
exhibition at Avery's Art Agency, corner of Fourth street and
Broadway. It is called "A Summer Afternoon," and is pervaded by a
soft, pensive sentiment of rural repose. In the elaboration of the
trees and in the soft, mellow distances the artist shows his early
skill, albeit in some of his later pieces the timid handling
inseparable from age is discernible.

A collection of several hundred sketches and studies of no special
merit, by Hicks, has recently been disposed of at auction. The essays
of this gentleman in landscape are not happy, and the specimens in
this collection had better, perhaps, have been excluded.

Rossiter's pictures representing Adam and Eve in Paradise, now on
exhibition in New York, have excited more remark than commendation. It
may be said briefly, that they fail to do justice to the subject.

Curnmings's "Historic Annals of the Academy of Design" have been
published, and constitute an interesting addition to the somewhat
meagre collection of works illustrating American art history.

Mr. Thomas Ball, the well-known sculptor of Boston, is about to depart
for Italy, with the intention of remaining several years in Florence,
and executing there in marble a number of plaster models. Among these
are a life-size statue of Edwin Forrest in the part of "Coriolanus,"
and busts of the late Rev. Thomas Starr King and Edward Everett. The
latter is said to be an admirable likeness.

M. J. Heade, an American artist, formerly of Boston and Providence, is
publishing in London a work upon the humming-birds of Brazil,
illustrated from designs by himself.

The United States Senate was recently the scene of a somewhat animated
debate on art matters, arising out of a proposition to authorize the
artist Powell to "paint a picture for the Capitol at a cost not to
exceed $25,000." The scheme was defeated, chiefly through the
opposition of Senator Sumner, who thought the present an improper time
to devote so large a sum to such a purpose.

A very remarkable picture by Gérôme, the most original, and realistic
of living French painters, is now on exhibition at Goupil's, in this
city. It is entitled "The Prayer of the Arab in the Desert," and in a
small space presents a complete epitome of Oriental life.



In London the General Exhibition of water-color drawings, and
collections of works of Holman Hunt, Madox Brown, and the late David
Roberts, have recently been opened. The last named contains 900
pictures, drawings, and sketches, showing the amazing industry of the
artist, and his skill as a draughtsman.

{138}

A monument to Shakespeare, from penny subscriptions, is to be erected
on Primrose Hill, near London.



The sale of the celebrated Pourtalès collection at Paris has been the
all-absorbing art topic abroad. The gallery, at last accounts, was
daily crowded with representatives from all parts of Europe, and the
prices surpassed the estimates of the experts. The value set upon the
whole collection was upward of 3,000,000 francs, but that sum will
probably fall far short of the real total. The bronzes and terra-cotta
occupied four days, and produced over 150,000 francs. The following
are among the most remarkable items: A very small statuette of
Jupiter, found at Besançon in 1820, 8,000 francs; another small
statuette of the same, seated, formerly in the Denon collection,
12,000 francs; the celebrated statuette of Apollo, supposed to date
from the sixth century B.C., from the Neri collection, 5,000 francs;
small statuette of Minerva, arms missing, found at Besançon, 19,200
francs; armor found at Herculaneum, and presented by the Queen of
Naples to Josephine, purchased by the Emperor for 13,000 francs; a
small Roman bust, supposed by Visconti to be a Balbus, bought for the
Louvre for 4,550 francs; a tripod, found in the ruins of the town of
Metapont, and described by Panofka, purchased for the Berlin gallery,
10,000 francs; fine old Roman seat, in bronze, bought for the Louvre,
5,300 francs; vase from Locres, 7,000 francs; another vase, found in
one of the tombs of the Vulci, 9,000 francs.

At the sale of the collection of the Marquis de Lambertye, in Paris, a
charming work by Meissonier, "Reynard in his Study, reading a
Manuscript," was purchased for 12,600 francs; had it not been for the
effect of the Pourtalès sale on the art market, the work would have
fetched considerably more money. It was purchased of the artist
himself, for 16,000 francs, by the late marquis. Another and smaller
picture, not six inches by four, also by Meissonier, was sold on the
same occasion--subject, "Van de Velde in his Atelier"--for 7,020
francs. In the same collection were four works by Decamps, whose
pictures are in great request. One of these, an Eastern landscape,
sold for 15,500 francs; another, a small work, a peasant girl in the
forest, for 4,240 francs; and two still smaller and less important
works, "Tide Out, with Sunset," and "Gorges d'Ollioule," for 1,500
francs each. Three small works by Eugene Delacroix, a "Tiger attacking
a Serpent," "Combat between Moors and Arabs," and "The Scotch Ballad,"
sold, respectively, for 1,820 francs, 1,300 francs, and 2,300 francs.
A minute picture by Paul Delaroche, "Jesus on the Mount of Olives,"
sold for 2,200 francs; Diogenes sitting on the edge of an immense jar,
holding his lantern, by Gèrôme, 1,950 francs; and "Arnauts at Prayer,"
by the same, 3,900 francs. "The Beach at Trouville," by the lately
deceased painter, Troyon, 4,000 francs, and "Feeding the Poultry," by
the same, 4,850 francs.

At the sale of a collection of the works of M. Cordier, the sculptor,
who has earned considerable popularity by his variegated works,
composed of marbles, onyx and bronze, and variously tinted and
decorated, a marble statue, called "La Belle Gallinara," sold for
4,100 francs; a young Kabyle child carrying a branch loaded with
oranges, in Algerian onyx and bronze, and partly colored, 3,000
francs; an Arab woman, a statue of the same materials as the
preceding, intended to support a lamp or candelabrum, purchased by the
Due de Morny for 6,825 francs.

There is a report that the collections of pictures and curiosities
belonging to the Comte de Chambord will shortly be dispersed by the
hammer in Paris.

The scaffolding before the north front of the cathedral of Notre Dame,
in Paris, has been removed, and the façade, with the magnificent
Gothic window, forty feet in diameter, can now be seen to great
perfection, all the rich sculptures having been admirably restored.

A Paris letter says: "The celebrated painting of the 'Assassination of
the Bishop of Liege,' by Eugene Delacroix, was recently sold at
auction at 35,000 francs. The 'Death of Ophelia,' in pencil, by the
same painter, was knocked down for 2,020 francs, which was considered
a large sum for a sketch. 'St. Louis at the Bridge of Taillebourg,' in
water-colors, fetched 3,100 francs. Some copper-plates engraved by
Eugene Delacroix himself were likewise sold."



At the sale of the collection of the Chevalier de Knyff, at Brussels,
the Virgin with the host and surrounded by angels, by Ingres, was
withdrawn at 28,500 francs.

{139}

Among the works of art destroyed in the recent conflagration of the
ducal palace at Brunswick was the colossal bronze figure of Brunonia,
the patron goddess of the town, standing in a car of victory, drawn by
four horses. It was executed by Professor Howaldt and his sons, after
a design by Rietschel.


The colossal bronze statue of Hercules, lately exhumed at Rome, has
been safely deposited in the Vatican.

------

BOOK NOTICES.


SERMONS ON OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST, AND ON HIS BLESSED MOTHER.
By his Eminence Cardinal Wiseman. 8vo., pp. 421. New York: D. & J.
Sadlier & Co.


Coming to us almost in the same moment in which we hear of Cardinal
Wiseman's death, these sermons will be read with a deep and peculiar
interest, now that the eloquent lips which uttered them are closed for
ever. Most of them were preached in Rome, some so long ago as 1827.
These were addressed to congregations composed partly of
ecclesiastics, partly of Catholic sojourners in the Eternal City, and
partly of Protestants. At least one was delivered in Ireland in 1858.
But although some of the discourses belong to the period of the
author's noviceship in the pulpit, and between some there is an
interval of more than thirty years, we are struck by no incongruity of
either thought or style. The earliest have the finish and elegance of
maturity; the latest all the vigor and enthusiasm of youth.

They are not controversial, and hardly any of them can even be called
dogmatic sermons. They are addressed more to the heart than directly
to the understanding, although reasoning and exhortation are often so
skilfully blended that it is hard to say where one begins and the
other ends. They are the outpourings, in fact, of a warm and loving
heart and a full brain. The argument is all the more effective because
the cardinal covers his frame-work of logic with the rich drapery of
his brilliant rhetoric. And yet, with all their gorgeous phraseology,
they are characterized by a simplicity of thought which brings them
down to the level of the commonest intellect.

The greater part of them were preached during the seasons of Lent and
Advent, and the subjects will therefore be found especially
appropriate to the present period. Here is a beautiful passage in
reference to our Lord's agony in the garden:

  "There are plants in the luxurious East, my dearly beloved brethren,
  which men gash and cut, that from them may distil the precious
  balsams they contain; but that is ever the most sought and valued
  which, issuing forth of its own accord, pure and unmixed, trickles
  down like tears upon the parent tree. And so it seems to me, we may
  without disparagement speak of the precious streams of our dear
  Redeemer's blood. When forced from his side, in abundant flow, it
  came mixed with another mysterious fluid; when shed by the cruel
  inflictions of his enemies, by their nails, their thorns, and
  scourges, there is a painful association with the brutal instruments
  that drew it, as though in some way their defilement could attaint
  it. But here we have the first yield of that saving and life-giving
  heart, gushing forth spontaneously, pure and untouched by the
  unclean hand of man, dropping as dew upon the ground. It is the
  first juice of the precious vine; before the wine-press hath bruised
  its grapes, richer and sweeter to the loving and sympathizing soul,
  than what is afterward pressed out. It is every drop of it ours; and
  alas, how painfully so! For here no lash, no impious palm, no
  pricking thorn hath called it forth; but our sins, yes, our sins,
  the executioners not of the flesh, but of the heart of Jesus, have
  driven it all out, thence to water that garden of sorrows! Oh, is it
  not dear to us; is it not gathered up by our affections, with far
  more reverence and love than by virgins of old was the blood of
  martyrs, to be placed for ever in the very sanctuary, yea, within
  the very altar of our hearts?"

From the discourse on the "Triumphs of the Cross," we select the
closing paragraph:

{140}

  "O blessed Jesus, may the image of these sacred wounds, as expressed
  by the cross, never depart from my thoughts. As it is a badge and
  privilege of the exalted office, to which, most unworthy, I have
  been raised, to wear ever upon my breast the figure of that cross,
  and in it, as in a holy shrine, a fragment of that blessed tree
  whereon thou didst hang on Golgotha, so much more let the lively
  image of thee crucified dwell within my bosom, and be the source
  from which shall proceed every thought, and word, and action of my
  ministry! Let me preach thee, and thee crucified, not the plausible
  doctrines of worldly virtue and human philosophy. In prayer and
  meditation let me ever have before me thy likeness, as thou
  stretchest forth thine arms to invite us to seek mercy and to draw
  us into thine embrace. Let my Thabor be on Calvary; there it is best
  for me to dwell. There thou hast prepared three tabernacles; one for
  such as, like Magdalen, have offended much, but love to weep at thy
  blessed feet; one for those who, like John, have wavered in
  steadfastness for a moment, but long again to rest their head upon
  thy bosom; and one whereinto only she may enter whose love burns
  without a reproach, whose heart, always one with thine, finds its
  home in the centre of thine, fibre intertwined with fibre, till both
  are melted into one in that furnace of sympathetic love. With these
  favorites of the cross, let me ever, blessed Saviour, remain in
  meditation and prayer, and loving affection for thy holy rood. I
  will venerate its very substance, whenever presented to me, with
  deep and solemn reverence. I will honor its image, wherever offered
  to me, with lowly and respectful homage. But still more I will
  hallow and love its spirit and inward form, impressed on the heart,
  and shown forth in the holiness of life. And oh! divine Redeemer,
  from thy cross, thy true mercy-seat, look down in compassion upon
  this thy people. Pour forth thence abundantly the streams of
  blessing, which flow from thy sacred wounds. Accomplish within them,
  during this week of forgiveness, the work which holy men have so
  well begun,  [Footnote 40] that all may worthily partake of thy
  Paschal feast. Plant thy cross in every heart; may each one embrace
  it in life, may it embrace him in death; and may it be a beacon of
  salvation to his departing soul, a crown of glory to his immortal
  spirit! Amen."

  [Footnote 40: Alluding to the mission just closed by the Fathers of
  the Institute of Charity.]

What follows is from the sermon on the "Veneration of the Blessed
Virgin:"

  "If, then, any one shall accuse me of wasting upon the mother of my
  Saviour feelings and affections which he hath jealously reserved for
  himself. I will appeal from the charge to his judgment, and lay the
  cause before him, at any stage of his blessed life. I will go unto
  him at the crib of Bethlehem, and acknowledge that, while, with the
  kings of the East, I have presented to him all my gold and
  frankincense and myrrh, I have ventured, with the shepherds, to
  present an humbler oblation of respect to her who was enduring the
  winter's frost in an unsheltered stable, entirely for his sake. Or I
  will meet him, as the holy fugitives repose on their desert-path to
  Egypt, and confess that, knowing from the example of Agar, how a
  mother cast forth from her house into the wilderness, for her
  infant's sake, only loves it the more, and needs an angel to comfort
  her in her anguish (Gen. xxi. 17), I have not restrained my eyes
  from her whose fatigues and pain were a hundred-fold increased by
  his, when I have sympathized with him in this his early flight,
  endured for my sins. Or I will approach a more awful tribunal, and
  step to the foot of his cross, and own to him, that while I have
  adored his wounds, and stirred up in my breast my deepest feelings
  of grief and commiseration for what I have made him suffer, my
  thoughts could not refrain from sometimes glancing toward her whom I
  saw resignedly standing at his feet, and sharing his sorrows; and
  that, knowing how much Respha endured while sitting opposite to her
  children justly crucified by command of God (2 Kings xxi. 10), I had
  felt far greater compassion for her, and had not withheld the
  emotions, which nature itself dictated, of love, and veneration, and
  devout affection toward her. And to the judgment of such a son I
  will gladly bow, and his meek mouth shall speak my sentence, and I
  will not fear it. For I have already heard it from the cross,
  addressed to me, to you, to all, as he said: 'Woman, behold thy
  son;' and again: 'Behold thy mother.' (John xix. 26, 27.)"

An appendix to the volume contains six beautiful pastorals, on
devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus, in connection with education.


SPIRITUAL PROGRESS. By J. W. Cummings, D.D., LL.D., of St. Stephen's
Church, New York City. 12mo., pp. 330. New York: P. O'Shea.

We cannot better state the purpose of this excellent little book than
in the words of the author's preface: "_Spiritual Progress_ is a
familiar exposition of Catholic morality, which has for its object to
tell people of common intelligence what they are expected to do in
{141} order to be good Christians, and how they shall do it, and the
results that will follow." It is written not for those strong, heroic
souls, whose faith is firm, whose devotion is ardent, and who crave
strong spiritual food; but for that numerous class of weak Christians,
recent converts, honest inquirers, and fervent but uninstructed
Catholics, who are not yet prepared to accept the more difficult
counsels of perfection; who are ready perhaps to do what God says they
must do; but need a little training before they can be brought to do
any more. To put an ascetic work into the hands of such persons would
often be like giving beef to a young baby: it would hurt, not help
them. Dr. Cummings's book, in fact, is a sort of spiritual primer for
the use of those who are just beginning their spiritual education. It
is simple, straightforward, and practical. There is a charm in the
style--so clear, so terse, often almost epigrammatic, and sometimes
rising to the poetical--which carries the reader along in spite of
himself. The tone is not conversational; yet when you read, it seems
as if you were not so much reading as listening. And that argues great
literary merit.

Here is an extract from the chapter on "Faults of Conversation:"

  "Gossip is the bane of conversation, for it is the name under which
  injustice makes her entrance into society. There is an element in
  the breast of the most civilized communities, even in times of great
  refinement, that explains how man may, under certain circumstances,
  become a cannibal. It is exhibited in the turns our humor takes in
  conversation. We are not ill-natured, nor disposed to lay a straw in
  the way of any one who has not injured us, and yet, when spurred on
  by the stimulus of talking and being talked to, we can bring
  ourselves to mimic, revile, and misrepresent others, traduce and
  destroy their good name, reveal their secrets, and proclaim their
  faults; and all this merely to follow the lead of others, or for the
  sake of appearing facetious and amusing, or for the purpose of
  building up ourselves by running down those whom in our hearts we
  know and believe to be better than we are.... But as the gossip
  attacks the absent because the absent cannot defend himself or
  herself, shall not we, dear readers, form a society to assist the
  weak and the persecuted? Shall we not enter into a compact to defend
  those who cannot defend themselves? Let us answer as a love of fair
  play suggests. If we are at all influenced by regard for Christian
  charity, let us remember that it takes two to carry on a
  conversation against our neighbor, and that if our visitor is guilty
  of being a gossip, a false witness, or a detractor, we are also
  guilty by consenting to officiate as listeners."

In a chapter on the "Schooling of the
Imagination," Dr. Cummings shows how
the imaginative faculty may be made to
serve the cause of religion, especially in
the practice of meditation, and how
dangerous it becomes when it is not held
in check:

  "We hear songs and the flutters of many wings at Bethlehem, and see
  the light streaming from heaven upon the face of the new-born
  Saviour. We look out over the blue waters of the Lake of Genesareth,
  and see the quaint little bark of Peter as it lay near the shore
  when Jesus preached to the people from its side, or as it flew
  before the wind when the sea waxed wroth, and a great storm arose,
  he meanwhile sleeping and they fearing they would perish. With the
  aid of this wonderful faculty we see him before us in the hour of
  his triumph, surrounded by the multitudes singing, 'Hosanna to the
  son of David,' and in that sad day of his final sorrow, when the
  same voices swelled the fearful cry, 'Crucify him, crucify him.'"


A GENERAL HISTORY OF THE CATHOLIC CHURCH, FROM THE COMMENCEMENT OF THE
CHRISTIAN ERA UNTIL THE PRESENT TIME. By M. L'Abbé J. E. Darras. First
American from the last French edition. With an Introduction and Notes,
by the Most Rev. M. J. Spalding, D.D., Archbishop of Baltimore. Parts
1, 2, and 3. 8vo. New York: P. O'Shea.

This valuable work, which Mr. O'Shea, with a laudable spirit of
enterprise, is giving us by instalments, is intended for just that
class of readers who stand most in need of a readable and pretty full
Church history. When completed it will fill four portly volumes,
imperial octavo; yet it is a work adapted more especially to family
reading than to the use of the scholar in his closet. The Abbé Darras
has judiciously refrained from obstructing the flow of his narrative
by minute references and quotations, nor has he suffered his pen to
run away into long discussions of controverted questions. What he says
of the chronology which he has followed, he might have said, if we
have read him {142} aright, of his whole work: "We have adopted a
system already completed, not that it may perhaps be the most exact in
all its details, but because it is the one most generally followed."
This seems to be the principle which he has kept before his eyes
throughout; and considering the purpose for which he wrote, we think
it a good one. With all the simplicity and modesty of his style,
however, he shows a thorough knowledge of the intricacies of his
subject, and an acquaintance with what the best scholars have written
before him. His history, therefore, fills a void which has long been
aching.

The translation, made by a lady well known and respected by the
Catholics of the United States, reads smoothly, and we doubt not is
accurate. It has been revised by competent theologians, and has the
special sanction of the Archbishop of Baltimore, beside the
approbation of the Archbishops of New York and Cincinnati. The work in
the original French received the warmest encomiums from the European
clergy, and the author was honored, at the conclusion of his labors,
by a kind letter from the Pope.

The mechanical execution of the book is beautiful. The paper is good,
and the type large and clear. We thank Mr. O'Shea for giving us so
important a work in such a rich and appropriate dress.


THE PROGRESS OF THE AGE, AND THE DANGER OF THE AGE. Two lectures
delivered before the St. Xavier Conference of the St. Vincent de Paul
Brotherhood in the Hall of St. Louis University. By the Rev. Louis
Heylen, S. J. 12mo., pp. 107. Cincinnati: John P. Walsh.

These two lectures formed parts of a course delivered during the
winter of 1862-63, by some of the professors of the St. Louis
University. They are admirable compositions, redolent of good sense,
learning, and ripe thought, and deeply interesting. The style has a
true oratorical ring. In the first lecture Father Heylen, after
adverting to the fact that every age since the days of Adam has been
marked by some special characteristic, examines the claim set forth by
our own century to be emphatically the age of progress. In part he
admits and in part he denies it. In material progress, and in the
natural sciences, especially as applied to the purposes of industry
and commerce, it stands at the head of ages. But moral progress is not
one of its characteristics. "Here I feel," says he, "that I am
entering upon a difficult question. Has there been, in the last fifty
years, any marked increase of crime? Is our age, all things
considered, really worse than preceding ages? This question I shall
not undertake to decide; but there are some forms of crime which
appear to me decidedly peculiar to our age." A brief review of these
sins of the day leads naturally to the subject of the second lecture.
Father Heylen sees our greatest danger in that practical materialism
which places material interests and materialistic passions above the
interests of the soul and the claims of virtue. He considers
successively its extent, its effects, and the means to avert it--the
last being, of course, the ennobling and spiritualizing influence of
Catholicism.

We advise those who wish to see how a scholar and an orator can throw
a fresh charm into a stale subject, to read Father Heylen's review of
the startling discoveries of modern science in the first lecture, and
his brilliant description in the second of the ruins with which
materialism has spread the pages of history and the new life which
Catholicism has infused into effete civilizations.

Prefixed to the little volume before us is a short biographical sketch
of Father Heylen, who died in 1863.



UNDINE, OR THE WATER-SPIRIT. Also SINTRAM AND HIS COMPANIONS.
From the German of Friedrich de la Motte Fouqué. I vol. 12mo., pp.
238. New York: James Miller.

THIODOLF, THE ICELANDER. A Romance. From the German of the Baron de la
Motte Fouqué. 12mo., pp. 308. New York: James Miller.

For a man of refined and cultivated taste we know of hardly any more
delightful literary recreation than to turn from the novels of our own
day to one of the exquisite romances of La Motte Fouqué. There is a
nobleness of sentiment in his wild and beautiful fancies which seems
to lift us out of this world into a higher sphere. All his writings
are pervaded by an ideal Christian chivalry, {143} spiritualizing and
refining the supernatural machinery which he is so fond of borrowing
from the old Norse legends. No other author has ever treated the
Northern mythology so well; because no other has attempted to give us
its beauties without its grossness. The gods and heroes of the
Norsemen have been very much in fashion of late years; but take almost
any of the Scandinavian tales recently translated--tales which, if
they have any moral, seem to inculcate the morality of lying and
cheating, and the virtue of strong muscles and how immeasurably finer
and more beautiful by the side of them appear the fairy legends which
Fouqué interweaves with his romances, mingling old superstitions with
Christian faith and virtues, in so delicate a manner that we see no
incongruity in the association. This mutual adaptation, if we may call
it so, he effects partly by transporting us back to those early times
when the faith was as yet only half-rooted in the Northern soil, and
when even many Christian converts clung almost unconsciously to some
of their old pagan beliefs; partly by the genuine religious spirit
which inspires every page of his books, no matter what their subject;
and partly by the allegorical significance which his romances
generally convey. So from tales of water-sprites and evil spirits,
devils, dwarfs, and all manner of supernatural appearances, we rise
with the feeling that we have been reading a lesson of piety, truth,
integrity, and honor. Carlyle calls the chivalry of Fouqué more
extravagant than that which we supposed Cervantes had abolished; but
we are far from agreeing in such a judgment. A chivalry which rests
upon "wise and pious thoughts, treasured in a pure heart," deserves
something better to be said of it.

The three tales whose titles are given above are specimens of three
somewhat different styles in which Fouqué treats his darling subject
of Christian knighthood. The story of "Undine" has always been a pet
in every language of Europe. Sir Walter Scott called it "ravishing;"
Coleridge expressed unbounded admiration of it; the author himself
termed it his darling child. For the tale of "Sintram" we have a
particular affection. As a work of art, it is not to be compared with
the former: it has but little of that tender aerial fancy which makes
the story of the {144} water-sprite so inexpressibly graceful; but
there is a sombre beauty in it which is not less captivating. It is a
story of temptation and trial, of battle with self and triumph over
sin. Its allegorical meaning is more distinct than that of Undine; it
speaks more unmistakably of faith and heroic virtue. "Thiodolf, the
Icelander," is a picture of Norse and Byzantine manners in the tenth
century, and presents an interesting contrast between the rough
manliness of the former and the luxury of the court of Constantinople.
To the merits of wealth of imagination, skilful delineation of
character, and dramatic power of narration, it is said to add
historical accuracy.



OUR FARM OF FOUR ACRES, AND THE MONEY WE MADE BY IT. 12mo., pp. 128.
New York: James Miller.

It is no slight proof of the merit of this little book that it has
gone through at least twelve editions in England, and had so many
imitators that it may almost be called the founder of a school of
literature. Its popularity is still undiminished, and promises long to
continue so. Hardly any one can fail of being interested in this
simple narrative of the blunders, mishaps, and final triumphs of two
city-bred sisters, in their effort to keep a little farm and make it
pay; but to those who, either for health's sake or economy, are about
entering on a similar enterprise, we cannot too strongly recommend it.
It is so practical that we cannot doubt it is all true--indeed its
directness and air of truth and good sense are the secrets of its
remarkable success. We commend it to our readers as an interesting
exemplification of a truth which ought to be more widely known than it
is--that with proper management a small family on a small place in the
country can raise all their own vegetables, not only to their great
comfort, but with considerable pecuniary profit. Men who spend
half-a-year's income in the rent of a city house would do well to take
to heart the lessons of this little book.



THE IRVINGTON STORIES. By M. E. Dodge. Illustrated by F. O. C. Darley.
16mo., pp. 256. New York: James O'Kane.

This is a collection of tales for young people, manufactured with
considerable {145} taste and neatness. Some of the stories bear a good
moral, distinctly brought out.



REPLY TO THE CHRISTIAN EXAMINER ON CATHOLICITY AND NATURALISM.
8vo., pp. 24. Boston: Patrick Donahoe.

The _Christian Examiner_ for January, 1865, contained an article on
"The Order of St. Paul the Apostle, and the New Catholic Church," in
which the writer, after describing a visit to the Paulist
establishment in Fifty-ninth street, and representing Father Hecker
and his companions as being engaged in the attempt to found a new
Catholic Church, passed on to the consideration of the question what
form of religion is best adapted to the wants of the American people.
It was a remarkable article--remarkable not only for its graceful
diction, but for its curious admissions of the failure of
Protestantism as a religious system. "The process of disintegration,"
says the _Examiner_, "is going forward with immense rapidity
throughout Protestant Christendom. Organizations are splitting
asunder, institutions are falling into decay, customs are becoming
uncustomary, usages are perishing from neglect, sacraments are
deserted by the multitude, creeds are decomposing under the action of
liberal studies and independent thought." But from these falling ruins
mankind will seek refuge not in the bosom of the Catholic Church, says
the Christian Examiner, but in Naturalism. The object of the pamphlet
before us is to show, after correcting certain misstatements
concerning the congregation of Paulists, that Naturalism is utterly
unable to satisfy those longings of the heart which, as the _Examiner_
confesses, no Protestant sect can appease.



PASTORAL LETTER OF THE MOST REV. MARTIN JOHN SPALDING, D. D.,
ARCHBISHOP OF BALTIMORE, ETC., TOGETHER WITH THE LATE ENCYCLICAL OF
THE HOLY FATHER, AND THE SYLLABUS OF ERRORS CONDEMNED. 8vo., pp. 43.
Baltimore: Kelly & Piet.

In promulgating the jubilee lately proclaimed by the sovereign
pontiff, the Most Rev. Archbishop Spalding takes occasion to make a
few timely remarks on the Encyclical, the character of Pius IX., the
temporal power of the Popes, and the errors recently condemned. He
explains the true purport of the much-abused Encyclical, shows against
whom it is directed--namely, the European radicals and infidels--and
proves that it never was the intention of the Pope, as has been
alleged, to assail the institutions of this country. In view of the
absurd mistranslations of the Encyclical which have been published by
the Protestant press, Catholics will be glad to have the correct
English version of that important document, which is given by way of
appendix to the pastoral.



We have received the _First Supplement to the Catalogue of the Library
of the Young Men's Association of the City of Milwaukee_, with the
annual report of the Board of Directors for 1863.

------------------

THE CATHOLIC WORLD.


VOL. I., NO. 2. MAY, 1865.



From the Dublin Review.


HEDWIGE, QUEEN OF POLAND.


Hedwige was the youngest daughter of Lewis, nephew and successor to
Casimir the Great, who, on account of the preference he evinced for
his Hungarian subjects, drew upon himself the continued ill-will of
the nation he was called upon to govern. Finding he was unable to cope
with the numerous factions everywhere ready to oppose him, he, not
without many humiliating concessions to the nobles of Poland, induced
them to elect as his successor his daughter Maria, wife of Sigismund,
Marquis of Brandenburg (afterward emperor), and having appointed the
Duke of Oppelen regent of the kingdom, retired to his native Hungary,
unwilling to relinquish the shadow of the sceptre which continually
evaded his grasp.

On his death, which happened in 1382, Poland became the theatre of
intestine disorders fomented by the turbulent nobles, who,
notwithstanding the allegiance they had sworn to the Princess Maria,
refused to allow her even to enter the kingdom. Sigismund was not,
however, inclined thus easily to forego his wife's claims; and as the
Lord of Mazovia at the same time aspired to the vacant throne, many of
the provinces became so desolated by civil war that the leaders of the
adverse factions threw down their arms, and simultaneously agreed to
offer the crown to the Princess Hedwige, then residing in Hungary
under the care of her mother Elizabeth. By no means approving of a
plan which thus unceremoniously excluded her eldest daughter from the
throne, the queen dowager endeavored to oppose injustice by policy.
Hedwige was at the time only fourteen years of age, and the deputies
were informed that, as the princess was too young to undertake the
heavy responsibilities of sovereignty, her brother-in-law Sigismund
must act in her stead until such time as she herself should be
considered capable of assuming the reins of government. This stratagem
did not succeed; the duke was not allowed to cross the frontiers of
Poland, and Elizabeth found herself compelled to part with her
daughter, if she would not see the crown placed on the brow of
whomever the diet might elect.

Now commenced the trials of the young Hedwige, who was thus early
called upon to exercise those virtues of heroic fortitude, patient
endurance, and self-denial which rendered her life a sort of continual
martyrdom, a sacrifice daily offered up at the shrines of religion and
patriotism. At the early age of four years she had been affianced to
William, Duke of Austria, {146} who, in accordance with the custom of
the times, had been educated in Hungary; his affection for his
betrothed growing with his growth, and increasing with his years.
Ambition had no charms for Hedwige; her fervent piety, shrinking
modesty, and feminine timidity sought to conceal, not only her
extraordinary beauty, but those rare mental endowments of which she
was possessed. Bitter were the tears shed by this gentle girl, when
her mother, alarmed at the menaces of the Polish nobles, informed her
she must immediately depart for Cracow, under the protection of
Cardinal Demetrius, Bishop of Strigonia, who was pledged to deliver
her into the hands of those whom she was disposed to regard rather as
her masters than as her subjects. There had been one stipulation made,
which, had she been aware of its existence, would have added a sharper
pang to the already poignant anguish of Hedwige: the Poles required
that their young sovereign should marry only with the consent of the
diet, and that her husband should not only reside constantly in
Poland, but pledge himself never to attempt to render that country
dependent on any other power. Although aware of the difficulties thus
thrown in the way of her union with Duke William, her mother had
subscribed to these conditions; and Hedwige, having been joyfully
received by the prelates and nobles of her adopted country, was
solemnly crowned in the cathedral at Cracow, October 15, 1385, being
the festival of her patron, St. Hedwige. Her youth, loveliness, grace,
and intellectual endowments won from the fierce chieftains an
enthusiastic affection which had been denied to the too yielding
Lewis; their national pride was flattered, their loyalty awakened, by
the innocent fascinations of their young sovereign, and they almost
sought to defer the time which, in her husband, would necessarily give
them a ruler of sterner mould. Nor was Hedwige undeserving of the
exalted station she had been compelled to fill: a worthy descendant of
the sainted Lewis, her every word and action waa marked by a gravity
and maturity which bore witness to the supernatural motives and
heavenly wisdom by which it was inspired; and yet, in the silence of
her chamber, many were the tears she shed over the memory of ties
severed, she feared, for ever. Amongst the earliest candidates for her
hand was Ziemovit, Duke of Mazovia, already mentioned as one of the
competitors for the crown after the death of her father; but the
Poles, still smarting from the effects of his unbridled ambition,
dismissed his messengers with a refusal couched in terms of
undisguised contempt. The question of her marriage once agitated, the
mind of Hedwige naturally turned to him on whom her heart was
unalterably fixed, and whom from her childhood she had been taught to
consider as her future husband; but an alliance with the house of
Austria formed no part of Polish policy, and neither the wishes nor
the entreaties of their queen could induce the diet to entertain the
idea for a moment; in short, their whole energy was employed in
bringing about a union which, however disagreeable to the young
sovereign, was likely to be in every way advantageous to the country
and favorable to the interests of religion.

Jagello, the pagan Duke of Lithuania, was from his proximity and the
extent of his possessions (comprising Samogitia and a large portion of
Russia [Footnote 41]) a formidable enemy to Poland. Fame was not slow
in wafting to his ears rumors of the beauty and accomplishments of
Hedwige, which being more than corroborated by ambassadors employed to
ascertain the truth, the impetuous Jagello determined to secure the
prize, even at the cost of national independence. The idolatry of the
Lithuanians and the early betrothal of Hedwige to Duke William were
the chief obstacles with which he had to contend; but, after a brief
{147} deliberation, an embassy was despatched, headed by Skirgello,
brother to the grand-duke, and bearing the most costly presents;
Jagello himself being with difficulty dissuaded from accompanying them
in person. The envoys were admitted into the presence of the council,
at which the queen herself presided, and the prince proceeded to lay
before the astonished nobles the offers of the barbarian suitor,
offers too tempting to be weighed in the balance against such a trifle
as a girl's happiness, or the violation of what these overbearing
politicians were pleased to term a mere childish engagement,
contracted before the parties were able to judge for themselves. After
a long harangue, in which Skirgello represented how vainly the most
illustrious potentates and the most powerful rulers had hitherto
endeavored to effect the conversion of Lithuania, he offered as "a
tribute to the charms of the queen" that Jagello and his brothers,
together with the princes, lords, and people of Lithuania and
Samogitia, should at once embrace the Catholic faith; that all the
Christian captives should be restored unransomed; and the _whole of
their extensive dominions be incorporated with Poland_; the grand-duke
also pledging himself to reconquer for that country Pomerania,
Silesia, and whatever other territories had been torn from Poland by
neighboring states; and, finally, promising to make good to the Poles
the sum of two hundred thousand florins, which had been sent to
William of Austria as the dowry forfeited by the non-fulfilment of the
engagement entered into by their late king Lewis. A murmur of applause
at this unprecedented generosity ran through the assembly; the nobles
hailed the prospect of so unlooked-for an augmentation of national
power and security; and the bishops could not but rejoice at the
prospect of rescuing so many souls from the darkness of heathenism,
and securing at one and the same time the propagation of the Catholic
faith and the peace of Poland. But the queen herself shared not these
feelings of satisfaction: no sooner had Skirgello ceased than she
started from her seat, cast a hasty glance round the assembly, and, as
if reading her fate in the countenances of the nobles, buried her face
in her hands and burst into a flood of tears. All attempts to soothe
and pacify her were in vain: in a strain of passionate eloquence,
which was not without its effect, she pleaded her affection for Duke
William, the sacred nature of the engagement by which she was pledged
to become his wife, pointed to the ring on her finger, and reminded an
aged prelate who had accompanied her from Hungary that he had himself
witnessed their being laid in the same cradle at the ceremony of their
betrothal. It was impossible to behold unmoved the anguish of so
gentle a creature; not a few of the younger chieftains espoused the
cause of their sovereign; and, at the urgent solicitation of Hedwige,
it was finally determined that the Lithuanian ambassadors, accompanied
by three Polish nobles, should repair to Buda for the purpose of
consulting her mother, the Queen of Hungary.

  [Footnote  41: The territories of many of the Russian or Ruthenian
  dukes which were conquered by the Lithuanian pagans.]


But Elizabeth, though inaccessible to the temptations of worldly
ambition, was too pious, too self-denying, to allow maternal affection
to preponderate over the interests of religion. Aware that the
betrothal of her daughter to the Duke of Austria had never been
renewed from the time of their infancy, she, without a moment's
hesitation, replied that, for her own part, she desired nothing, but
that the queen ought to sacrifice every human feeling for the glory of
Christianity and the welfare of Poland. To Hedwige herself she wrote
affectionately, though firmly, bidding her lay every natural
inclination at the foot of the cross, and desiring her to praise that
God who had chosen so unworthy an instrument as the means by which the
pure splendor of Catholicity should penetrate the darkness of
Lithuania and the other pagan nations. Elizabeth was aware {148} of
the real power of religion over the mind of her child, and doubted not
but that, after the first paroxysm of grief had subsided, she should
be able to overcome by its means the violence of her daughter's
repugnance to the proposed measure. In order to give a color of
impartiality to their proceedings, a diet was convoked at Cracow,
immediately on the return of the embassy, to deliberate on the
relative claims of Jagello, William of Austria, and the Dukes of
Mazovia and Oppelen, all of whom aspired to the hand of Hedwige and
the crown of Poland. The discussion was long and stormy, for amongst
those nobles more immediately around the queen's person there were
many, including a large body of ecclesiastics, who, although convinced
that no lawful impediment existed to the marriage, yet shrank from the
cruelty of uniting the gentle princess to a barbarian; and these
failed not to insist upon the insult which would be implied by such a
choice to the native Catholic princes. The majority, however, were of
a different opinion, and at the close of the diet it was decided that
an ambassador should be despatched to Jagello, inviting him to Cracow
for the purpose of continuing the negotiations in his own person. But
William of Austria was too secure in the justice of his cause and the
affection of his betrothed to resign his pretensions without an
effort; and his ardor being by no means diminished by a letter which
he received from the queen herself, imploring him to hasten to her
assistance, he placed himself at the head of a numerous retinue, and,
with a treasure by which he hoped to purchase the good-will of the
adverse faction, appeared so suddenly at Cracow as to deprive his
opponents of their self-possession. The determination of Hedwige to
unite herself to the object of her early and deep affection was loudly
expressed, and, as there were many powerful leaders--among others,
Gniewosz, Vice-chamberlain of Cracow--who espoused her cause, and
rallied round Duke William, the Polish nobles, not daring openly to
oppose their sovereign, were on the point of abandoning the cause of
Jagello, when Dobeslas, Castellain of Cracow, one of the staunchest
supporters of the Lithuanian alliance, resolved at any risk to prevent
the meeting of the lovers, and actually went so far as to refuse the
young prince admission into the castle, where the queen at the time
was residing, not only drawing his sword, but dragging the duke with
him over the drawbridge, which he commanded to be immediately lowered.
William, thus repulsed, fixed his quarters at the Franciscan
monastery; and Hedwige, fired by the insult, rode forth accompanied by
a chosen body of knights and her female attendants, determined by the
completion of her marriage to place an insuperable bar between her and
Jagello.

In the refectory of the monastery, the queen and the prince at length
met; and, after several hours spent in considering how best to avert
the separation with which they were threatened, it was arranged that
William should introduce himself privately into the castle of Cracow,
where they were to be united by the queen's confessor. Some time
elapsed before this plan could be carried into execution; for although
even Dobeslas hesitated to confine his sovereign within her own
palace, the castle gates were kept shut against the entrance of the
Duke of Austria. Exasperated at this continued opposition, and her
affection augmented by the presence of its object, from whom the
arrival, daily expected, of Jagello would divide her for ever, Hedwige
determined to admit the prince disguised as one of her household, and
a day was accordingly fixed for the execution of this romantic
project. By some means or other the whole plan came to the knowledge
of the vigilant castellain; the adventurous prince was seized in a
passage leading to the royal apartments, loaded with insult, and
driven from the palace, within the walls of which the queen now found
herself a prisoner. {149} It was in vain she wept, and implored to be
allowed to see her betrothed once more, if only to bid him farewell;
her letters were intercepted, her attendants became spies on her
movements, and, on the young prince presenting himself before the
gates, his life was threatened by the barons who remained within the
fortress. This was too much; alarmed for her lover's safety, indignant
at the restraint to which she was subjected, the passion of the girl
triumphed over the dignity of the sovereign. Quitting her apartment,
she hurried to the great gate, which, as she apprehended, was secured
in such a manner as to baffle all her efforts; trembling with fear,
and eager only to effect her escape, she called for a hatchet, and,
raising it with both hands, repeatedly struck the locks and bolts that
prevented her egress. The childish simplicity of the attempt, the
agony depicted in the beautiful and innocent countenance of their
mistress, so touched the hearts of the rude soldiery, that, but for
their dread of the nobles, Hedwige would through their means have
effected her purpose. As it was, they offered no opposition, but stood
in mournful and respectful silence; when the venerable Demetrius,
grand-treasurer of the kingdom, approached, and falling on his knees,
implored her to be calm, and to sacrifice her own happiness, if not to
the wishes of her subjects and the welfare of her country, at least to
the interests of religion. At the sight of that aged man, whose thin
white hairs and sorrowful countenance inspired both reverence and
affection, the queen paused, and, giving him her hand, burst into an
agony of tears; then, hurrying to her oratory, she threw herself on
the ground before an image of the Blessed Virgin, where, after a sharp
interior conflict, she succeeded in resigning herself to what she now
believed to be the will of God--embracing for his sake the heavy cross
which she was to bear for the remainder of her life.

Meanwhile Duke William, to escape the vengeance of the wrathful
barons, was compelled to quit Poland, leaving his now useless wealth
in the charge of the vice-chamberlain, who still apparently continued
his friend. Not long after his departure, Jagello, at the head of a
numerous army, and attended by his two brothers, crossed the
frontiers, determined, as it seemed, to prosecute his suit. At the
first rumor of his approach, the most powerful and influential among
the nobles repaired to Cracow, where prayers, remonstrances, and even
menaces were employed to induce the queen to accept the hand of the
barbarian prince. But to all their eloquence Hedwige turned a deaf
ear: in vain did agents, despatched for the purpose, represent the
duke as handsome in person, princely and dignified in manner; her
conscience was troubled, duty had enlisted on the same side as
feeling, and the contest again commenced. Setting inclination aside,
how dared she break the solemn compact she had made with the Duke of
Austria? She persisted in regarding her proposed marriage with Jagello
as nothing short of an act of criminal infidelity; and, independently
of the affliction of her heart, her soul became a prey to the most
violent remorse. To obtain the consent of Duke William to their
separation was of course out of the question; and before the puzzled
council could arrive at any decision, Jagello entered Cracow, more in
the style of a conqueror than a suitor, and repaired at once to the
castle, where he found the queen surrounded by a court surpassing in
beauty and magnificence all that his imagination had pictured. Pale as
she was from the intensity of her sufferings, he was dazzled, almost
bewildered, by the childlike innocence and winning loveliness of
Hedwige; and his admiration was expressed the following day by the
revenues of a province being laid at her feet in the shape of jewels
and robes of the most costly description. But the queen was more
obdurate than ever. With her knowledge and consent Duke William had
returned to Cracow, though compelled {150} to resort to a variety of
disguises to escape the fury of the barons, now determined to put an
end to his pretensions and his existence together; and it is said
that, in order to avoid his indefatigable enemy, Dobeslas, he was once
compelled to seek refuge in a large chimney. Forced eventually to quit
the capital without seeing Hedwige, he still loitered in the environs;
nor did he return to Austria until her marriage with Jagello
terminated those hopes which he had cherished from his earliest
infancy. In order to quiet the queen's religious scruples, a letter is
said to have arrived from Rome, in which, after pronouncing that the
early betrothal involved no impediment to the marriage, the Holy
Father placed before her the merits of the offering she was called
upon to make, reminding her of the torments so cheerfully suffered by
the early martyrs for the honor of God, and calling upon her to
imitate their example. This statement, however, is not sufficiently
authenticated.

After the severest interior trials, days spent in tears, fasting, and
the most earnest petitions to the throne of Divine grace, the queen
received strength to consummate the sacrifice demanded from her.
Naturally ardent and impulsive, and at an age when every sentiment is
freshest and most keen, she was called upon to extirpate from her
heart an affection not only deep but legitimate, to inflict a wound on
the object of her tenderest love, and, finally, to transfer her
devotion to one whom she had hitherto regarded with feelings of
unqualified aversion. The path of highest, because self-sacrificing
duty, once clear before her, she determined to act with generosity
toward a God from whom she had received so much: her beauty, talents,
the virtues with which she was adorned, were so many precious gifts to
be placed at the disposal of him by whom they had been bestowed.
Covering herself with a thick black veil, she proceeded on foot to the
cathedral of Cracow, and, repairing to one of the side chapels, threw
herself on her knees, where for three hours, with clasped hands and
streaming eyes, she wrestled with the violent feeling that struggled
in her bosom. At length she rose with a detached heart, having laid at
the foot of the cross her affections, her will, her hopes of earthly
happiness; offering herself, and all that belonged to her, as a
perpetual holocaust to her crucified Redeemer, and esteeming herself
happy so that by this sacrifice she might purchase the salvation of
those precious souls for whom he had shed his blood. Before leaving
the chapel she cast her veil over the crucifix, hoping under that pall
to bury all of human infirmity that might still linger round her
heart, and then hastened to establish a foundation for the perpetual
renewal of this type of her "soul's sorrow." This foundation yet
exists: within the same chapel the crucifix still stands, covered by
its sable drapery, being commonly known as _the Crucifix of Hedwige_.

The queen's consent to the Lithuanian alliance endeared her still more
to the hearts of her subjects, who regarded her as a martyr to the
peace of Poland. On the 14th of February, 1386, her marriage was
celebrated with becoming solemnity, Jagello having previously received
the sacrament of baptism; shortly afterward he was crowned, in the
presence of Hedwige, under his Christian name of Wladislas, which he
had taken in deference to the wishes of the Poles. The unassuming
piety, gentle disposition, and great learning of the young queen
commanded at once the respect and admiration of her husband. So great,
indeed, was his opinion of her prudence, that, being obliged to march
into Upper Poland to crush the rebellion of the Palatine of Posnia, he
took her with him in the capacity of mediatrix between himself and the
disaffected leaders who had for months desolated that province. This
mission of mercy was most acceptable to Hedwige; after the example of
the sainted {151} Elizabeth of Hungary, her generosity toward the
widows, orphans, and those who had lost their substance in this
devastating war, was boundless; whilst ministering to their wants, she
failed not, at the same time, to sympathize with their distress; and,
like an angel of peace, she would stand between her husband and the
objects of his indignation. On one occasion, to supply the necessities
of the court, so heavy a contribution had been laid upon the peasants
that their cattle did not escape; watching their opportunity, they,
with their wives and children, threw themselves in the queen's path,
filling the air with their cries, and conjuring her to prevent their
utter ruin. Hedwige, deeply affected, dismounted from her palfrey,
and, kneeling by their side, besought her husband not to sanction so
flagrant an act of oppression; and when the satisfied peasants retired
fully indemnified for their loss, she is said to have exclaimed,
"Their cattle are restored, but who will recompense them for their
tears?" Having reduced the country to obedience, it was time for
Wladislas to turn his attention to his Lithuanian territories, more
especially Russia Nigra, which, although governed by its own princes,
was compelled to do homage to the house of Jagello. Pomerania, which
by his marriage articles he was pledged to recover for Poland, had
been usurped by the Teutonic Knights, who, sensible with how
formidable an opponent they had to contend, endeavored to frustrate
his intentions, first by carrying fire and sword into Lithuania, and
then by exciting a revolution in favor of Duke Andrew, to whom, as
well as to the heathen nobles, the alliance (by which their country
was rendered dependent on Poland) was displeasing. Olgerd, the father
of Wladislas, was a fierce pagan, and his thirteen sons, if we except
the elder, inherited his cruelty, treachery, and rapacity. The
promised revolution in religion was offensive to the majority of the
people; and, to their shame be it spoken, the Teutonic Knights (whose
order was first established to defend the Christian faith against the
assaults of infidels) scrupled not to adopt a crooked policy, and, by
inciting the Lithuanians against their sovereign, threw every
impediment in the way of their conversion. Before the king had any
suspicion of his intentions, the grand-master had crossed the
frontiers, the duchy was laid waste, and many important fortresses
were already in the hands of the order.

Wladislas, then absent in Upper Poland, despatched Skirgello into
Lithuania, who, though haughty, licentious, and revengeful, was a
brave and skilful general. Duke Andrew fled before the forces of his
brother, and the latter attacked the Knights with an impetuosity that
compelled them speedily to evacuate their conquests. The arrival of
the king, with a number of learned prelates, and a large body of
clergy, proved he was quite in earnest regarding the conversion of his
subjects, hitherto immersed in the grossest and most degrading
idolatry. Trees, serpents, vipers, were the inferior objects of their
adoration; gloomy forests and damp caverns their temples; and the most
disgusting and venomous reptiles were cherished in every family as
household gods. But, as with the eastern Magi, fire was the principal
object of the Lithuanian worship; priests were appointed whose office
it was to tend the sacred flame, their lives paying the penalty if it
were allowed to expire. At Wilna, the capital of the duchy, was a
temple of the sun; and should that luminary chance to be eclipsed, or
even clouded, the people fled thither in the utmost terror, eager to
appease the deity by rivers of human blood, which poured forth at the
command of the Ziutz, or high priest, the victims vying with each
other in the severity of their self-inflicted torments.

As the most effectual method of at once removing the errors of this
infatuated people, Wladislas ordered the forests to be cut down, the
serpents to {152} be crushed under the feet of his soldiers, and,
after extinguishing with his own hand the sacred fires, he caused the
temples to be demolished; thus demonstrating to the Lithuanians the
impotency of their gods. With the cowardice ever attendant on
ignorance and superstition, the pagans cast themselves with their
faces to the earth, expecting to see the sacrilegious strangers
blasted by the power of the profaned element; but, no such results
following, they gradually lost confidence in their deities, and of
their own free will desired to be instructed in the doctrines of
Christ. Their theological knowledge was necessarily confined to the
Lord's Prayer and the Creed, and a day was fixed for the commencement
of the ceremony of baptism. As, on account of the number of
catechumens, it was impossible to administer the sacrament to each
individual separately, the nobles and their families, after leaving
the sacred font, prepared to act as sponsors to the people, who, being
divided into groups of either sex, were sprinkled by the bishops and
priests, every division receiving the same name.

Hedwige had accompanied her husband to Lithuania, and was gratified by
witnessing the zeal with which he assisted the priests in their
arduous undertaking; whilst Wladislas, aware of the value of his young
auxiliary, was not disappointed by the degree of enthusiastic
veneration with which the new Christians regarded the sovereign who,
at the age of sixteen, had conferred upon them peace and the light of
the true faith. Hedwige was admirably adapted for this task: in her
character there was no alloy of passion, pride, or frivolity; an enemy
to the luxury and pomp which her sex and rank might have seemed to
warrant, her fasts were rigid and her bodily mortifications severe.
Neither did her fervor abate during her sojourn in the duchy. By her
profuse liberality the cathedral of St. Stanislas of Wilna was
completed. Nor did she neglect the other churches and religious
foundations which, by her advice, her husband commenced in the
principal cities of his kingdom. Before quitting Lithuania, the
queen's heart was wrung by the intelligence she received of a domestic
tragedy of the deepest dye. Her mother, the holy and virtuous
Elizabeth of Hungary, had during a popular insurrection been put to a
cruel death; whilst her sister Maria, who had fallen into the power of
the rebel nobles, having narrowly escaped the same fate, was confined
in an isolated fortress, subject to the most rigorous and ignominious
treatment.

Paganism being at length thoroughly rooted out of Lithuania, a
bishopric firmly established at Wilna, and the seven parishes in its
vicinity amply supplied with ecclesiastics, Wladislas, preparatory to
his return to Poland, appointed his brother Skirgello viceroy of the
duchy. This was a fatal error. The proud barbarians, little disposed
to dependence on a country they had been accustomed to despoil at
pleasure, writhed under the yoke of the fierce tyrant, whose rule soon
became odious, and whose vices were rendered more apparent by the
contrast which his character presented to that of his cousin Vitowda,
whom, as a check upon his well-known ferocity, Wladislas had
designated as his colleague. Scarcely had the court returned to
Poland, when the young prince, amiable, brave, and generous, by
opposing his cousin's unjust and cruel actions, drew upon himself the
vengeance of the latter, and, in order to save his life, was obliged
to seek refuge in Pomerania, from whence, as his honor and patriotism
alike forbade his assisting the Teutonic Knights in their designs upon
his country, he applied to the king for protection.

Wladislas, of a weak and jealous disposition, was, however, at the
time too much occupied in attending to foul calumnies uttered against
the spotless virtue of his queen to give heed to the application.
Notwithstanding the prudence of her general conduct, and {153} the
tender devotion evinced by Hedwige toward her husband, the admiration
which her beauty and sweetness of disposition commanded from all who
approached her was a continual thorn in his side. Her former love for
the Duke of Austria and repugnance to himself haunted him night and
day, until he actually conceived suspicions injurious to her fidelity.
In the polluted atmosphere of a court there were not wanting those
who, for their own aggrandizement, were base enough to resort to
falsehood in order to destroy an influence at which the wicked alone
had cause to tremble. It was whispered in the ear of the unfortunate
monarch that his queen had held frequent, and of course clandestine,
interviews with Duke William, until, half frantic, he one day publicly
reproached her, and, turning to the assembled bishops, wildly demanded
a divorce. The proud nobles indignantly interposed, many a blade
rattled in its sheath, eager to vindicate the innocence of one who, in
their eyes, was purity itself; but Hedwige calmly arose, and with
matronly dignity demanded the name of her accuser, and a solemn trial,
according to the custom of her country. There was a dead silence, a
pause; and then, trembling and abashed before the virtue he had
maligned, the Vice-chamberlain Gniewosz, before mentioned as the
friend of Duke William (whose wealth he had not failed to
appropriate), stepped reluctantly forward. A murmur of surprise and
wrath resounded through the council-chamber: many a sword was drawn,
as though eager for the blood of the offender; but the ecclesiastics
having at length calmed the tumult, the case was appointed to be
judged at the diet of Wislica.

The queen's innocence was affirmed on oath by herself and her whole
household, after which the castellain, John Tenczynski, with twelve
knights of noble blood and unsullied honor, solemnly swore to the
falsehood of the accusation, and, throwing down their gauntlets,
defied to mortal combat all who should gainsay their assertion. None,
however, appeared to do battle in so bad a cause; and the convicted
traitor, silenced and confounded, sank on his knees, confessed his
guilt, and implored the mercy of her he had so foully aspersed. The
senate, in deference to the wishes of Hedwige, spared his life; but he
was compelled to crouch under a bench, imitate the barking of a dog,
and declare that, like that animal, he had dared to snarl against his
chaste and virtuous sovereign.  [Footnote 42] This done, he was
deprived of his office, and banished the court; and Wladislas hastened
to beg the forgiveness of his injured wife.

  [Footnote 42: This was a portion of the punishment specially awarded
  by the penal code of Poland to the crime of calumny. Like many other
  punishments of those ages, it was symbolical in its character. (See
  the valuable work of Albert du Boys, _Histoire du Droit Criminel des
  Peuples Modernes_, liv. ii.; chap. vii.) Similar penalties had been
  common in Poland from early times. Thus we find Boloslas the Great
  inviting to a banquet and vapor bath nobles who had been guilty of
  some transgression; after the bath he administered a paternal
  reproof and castigation. Hence the Polish proverb, "to give a person
  a bath."]

Meanwhile Prince Vitowda, despairing of assistance and pressed on all
sides, after much hesitation joined the Teutonic Knights in an
incursion against Lithuania. The country was invaded by a numerous
army, the capital taken by storm, abandoned to pillage, and finally
destroyed by fire; no less than fourteen thousand of the inhabitants
perishing in the flames, beside numbers who were massacred without
distinction of sex or age. Fortunately the upper city was garrisoned
by Poles, who determined to hold out to the last. The slight
fortifications were speedily destroyed; but, being immediately
repaired, the siege continued so long that Skirgello had time to
assemble an army before which the besiegers were eventually obliged to
retreat. Vitowda, now too deeply compromised to draw back, though
thwarted in his designs on Upper Wilna, gained possession of many of
the frontier towns, and, encouraged by success, aimed at nothing less
than the independent sovereignty of Lithuania. He was, however,
opposed during {154} two or three campaigns by Wladislas person,
until, wearied of the war, the king had the weakness not only to sue
for peace, but to invest Vitowda with the government of the duchy.
This, as might be expected, gave great umbrage to Skirgello, and to
another brother, Swidrigal, so that Lithuania, owing to the ambition
of the rival princes, became for some time the theatre of civil
discord.

Among her other titles to admiration, we must not omit to mention that
Hedwige was a munificent patroness of learning. She hastened to
re-establish the college built by Casimir II., founded and endowed a
magnificent university at Prague for the education of the Lithuanian
youth, and superintended the translation of the Holy Scriptures into
Polish, writing with her own hands the greater part of the New
Testament. Her work was interrupted during her husband's absence by
the attack of the Hungarians on the frontiers of Poland; and it was
then that, laying aside the weakness of her sex, she felt herself
called upon to supply his place. A powerful army was levied, of which
this youthful heroine assumed the command, directing the councils of
the generals, and sharing the privations of the meanest soldier. When
she appeared on horseback in the midst of the troops, nothing could
exceed the enthusiasm of these hardy warriors; and the simplicity with
which they obeyed the slightest order of their queen was touching in
the extreme. Hedwige led her forces into Russia Nigra, and, partly by
force of arms, partly by skilful negotiations, succeeded in
reconquering the whole of that vast province, which her father Lewis
had detached from the Polish crown in order to unite it to that of his
beloved Hungary. This act of injustice was repaired by his daughter,
who thus endeared her name to the memory of succeeding generations.
The conquering army proceeded to Silesia, then usurped by the Duke of
Oppelen, where they were equally successful; so that Wladislas was
indebted for the brightest trophies of his reign to the heroism of his
wife.

Encouraged by her past success, he determined to reconduct her into
Lithuania, in hopes by her means to settle the dissensions of the
rival princes. Accordingly, in the spring of 1393, they proceeded
thither, when the disputants, subdued by the irresistible charm of her
manners, agreed to refer their claims to her arbitration. Of a solid
and mature judgment, Hedwige succeeded in pacifying them; and then, by
mutual consent, they entered into a solemn compact that in their
future differences, instead of resorting to arms, they would submit
their cause unreservedly to the arbitration of the young Queen of
Poland.

Notwithstanding its restoration to internal tranquillity, this
unfortunate duchy was continually laid waste by the Teutonic Knights;
and Wladislas, determined to hazard all on one decisive battle,
commanded forces to be levied not only in Lithuania, but in Poland.
Before the preparations were completed, an interview was arranged to
take place between the king and the grand-master, Conrad de Jungen;
but the nobility, fearing lest the irritable temper of Wladislas would
prove an insurmountable obstacle to all accommodation, implored him to
allow the queen to supply his place. On his consent, Hedwige,
accompanied by the ecclesiastics, the barons, and a magnificent
retinue, proceeded to the place of rendezvous, where she was met by
Conrad and the principal knight-commanders of the order. The terms she
proposed were equitable, and more lenient than the Teutonic Knights
had any reason to expect; but, under one trifling pretext or another,
they refused the restitution of the usurped territories on which the
king naturally insisted, and the queen was at length obliged to
return, prophesying, says the chronicler, that, after her death, their
perversity would receive its deserved punishment at the hands of her
husband. Her prediction was fulfilled. Some years afterward, on the
plains {155} between Grunnervaldt and Tannenberg, the grand-master,
with fifty thousand knights, was slain, and by this decisive victory
the order was placed at the mercy of Poland, though, from the usual
indecision of its king, the fruits of this splendid action were less
than might have been expected.

Until her early death, Hedwige continued the guardian angel of that
beloved country for which she had made her first and greatest
sacrifice; and it is likely that but for her watchfulness, its
interests would have been frequently compromised by the Lithuanian
union. Acting on this principle, she refused to recognize the
investiture of her husband's favorite, the Palatine of Cracow, with
the perpetual fief of Podolia; and, undazzled by the apparent
advantages offered by an expedition against the Tartars headed by the
great Tamerlane, she forbade the Polish generals to take part in a
campaign which, owing to the rashness of Vitowda, terminated so
fatally.

It was shortly after her unsuccessful interview with the Teutonic
Knights that, by the death of her sister Maria, the crown of Hungary
(which ought to have devolved on her husband Sigismund) became again
an object of contention. The Hungarians, attracted by the report of
her moderation, wisdom, and even military skill--not an uncommon
accomplishment in females of those times--determined to offer it to
Hedwige; but her brother-in-law, trusting to her sense of justice,
hastened to Cracow, praying her not to accept the proposal, and
earnestly soliciting her alliance. The queen, whom ambition had no
power to dazzle, consented, and a treaty advantageous to Poland was at
once concluded.

Hedwige was a good theologian, and well read in the fathers and
doctors of the Church; the works of St. Bernard and St. Ambrose, the
revelations of St. Bridget, and the sermons of holy men, being the
works in which she most delighted. In Church music she was an
enthusiast; and not long after the completion of the convent of the
Visitation, which she had caused to be erected near the gates of
Cracow, she founded the Benedictine abbey of the Holy Cross, where
office was daily recited in the Selavonian language, after the custom
of the order at Prague. She also instituted a college in honor of the
Blessed Virgin, where the Psalms were daily chanted, after an improved
method, by sixteen canons.

It was toward the close of the year 1398 that, to the great delight of
her subjects, it became evident that the union of Wladislas and
Hedwige would at length be blessed with offspring. To see the throne
filled by a descendant of their beloved sovereign had been the dearest
wish of the Polish people, and fervent had been the prayers offered
for this inestimable blessing. The enraptured Wladislas hastened to
impart his expected happiness to most of the Christian kings and
princes, not forgetting the Supreme Pontiff, Boniface IX., by whom the
merits of the young queen were so well appreciated that, six years
after her accession, he had addressed to her a letter, written with
his own hand, in which he thanked her for her affectionate devotion to
the Catholic Church, and informed her that, although it was impossible
he could accede to all the applications which might be transmitted to
the Holy See on behalf of her subjects, yet, by her adopting a
confidential sign-manual, those requests to which she individually
attached importance should be immediately granted. The Holy Father
hastened to reply in the warmest terms to the king's communication,
promising to act as sponsor to the child, who, if a boy, he desired
might be named after himself.

Unfortunately, some time before the queen's delivery, it became
necessary for her husband to quit Cracow, in order to direct an
expedition against his old enemies the Teutonic Knights. During his
absence, he wrote a long letter, in which, after desiring that the
happy event might be attended with all possible magnificence, he
entered {156} into a minute detail of the devices and embroidery to be
used in the adornment of the bed and chamber, particularly requesting
that the draperies and hangings might not lack gold, pearls, or
precious stones. This ostentatious display, though excusable in a fond
husband and a powerful monarch about to behold the completion of his
dearest wishes, was by no means in consonance with Hedwige's intense
love of Christian simplicity and poverty. We find her addressing to
her husband these few touching words, expressing, as the result
proved, that presentiment of her approaching end which has often been
accorded to saintly souls: "Seeing that I have so long renounced the
pomps of this world, it is not on that treacherous couch--to so many
the bed of death--that I would willingly be surrounded by their
glitter. It is not by the help of gold or gems that I hope to render
myself acceptable to that Almighty Father who has mercifully removed
from me the reproach of barrenness, but rather by resignation to his
will, and a sense of my own nothingness." It was remarked after this
that the queen became more recollected than ever, spending whole hours
in meditation, bestowing large alms, not only on the distressed of her
own country, but on such pilgrims as presented themselves, and
increasing her exterior mortifications; wearing a hair shirt during
Lent, and using the discipline in a manner which, considering her
condition, might have been deemed injudicious. She had ever made a
point of spending the vigil of the anniversary of her early sacrifice
at the foot of the veiled crucifix, but on this occasion, not
returning at her usual hour, one of her Hungarian attendants sought
her in the cathedral, then but dimly lighted by the massy silver lamp
suspended before the tabernacle. It was bitterly cold, the wind was
moaning through the long aisles, but there, on the marble pavement, in
an ecstacy which rendered her insensible to bodily sufferings, lay
Hedwige, she having continued in this state of abstraction from the
termination of complin, at which she invariably assisted.

At length, on the 12th of June, 1399, this holy queen gave birth to a
daughter, who was immediately baptized in the cathedral of Cracow,
receiving from the Pope's legate, at the sacred font, the name of
Elizabeth Bonifacia. The babe was weak and sickly, and the condition
of the mother so precarious that a messenger was despatched to the
army urging the immediate return of Wladislas. He arrived in time to
witness the last sigh of his so ardently desired child, though his
disappointment was completely merged in his anxiety for his wife. By
the advice of the physicians it had been determined to conceal the
death of the infant, but their precautions were vain. At the very
moment it occurred, Hedwige herself announced it to her astonished
attendants, and then humbly asked for the last sacraments of the
Church, which she received with the greatest fervor. She, however,
lingered until the 17th of July, when, the measure of her merits and
good works being full, she went to appear before the tribunal of that
God whom she had sought to glorify on earth. She died before
completing her twenty-ninth year.

A few days previously she had taken a tender leave of her distracted
husband; and, mindful to the last of the interests of Poland, she
begged him to espouse her cousin Anne, by whose claim to the throne of
the Piasts his own would be strengthened. She then drew off her
nuptial ring, as if to detach herself from all human ties, and placed
it upon his finger, and although, from motives of policy, Wladislas
successively espoused three wives, he religiously preserved this
memorial of her he had valued the most; bequeathing it as a precious
relic (and a memento to be faithful to the land which Hedwige had so
truly loved) to the Bishop of Cracow, who had saved his life in
battle. Immediately after her funeral, he retired to his Russian {157}
province, nor could he for some time be prevailed upon to return and
assume the duties of sovereignty.

There was another mourner for her loss, William of Austria, who,
notwithstanding the entreaties of his subjects, had remained single
for her sake. He was at length prevailed upon to espouse the Princess
Jane of Naples, but did not long survive the union.

The obsequies of Hedwige were celebrated by the Pope's legate with
becoming magnificence. All that honor and respect from which she had
sensitively shrunk during life was lavished on her remains; she was
interred in the cathedral of Cracow on the left of the high altar; her
memory was embalmed by her people's love, and was sanctified in their
eyes. Numerous miracles are said to have been performed at her tomb:
thither the afflicted in mind and body flocked to obtain through her
intercession that consolation which during her life she had so
cheerfully bestowed. Contrary to the general expectation, she was
never canonized;   [Footnote 43] her name, however, continued to be
fondly cherished by the Poles, and by the people who under God were
indebted to her for their first knowledge of Christianity, and of whom
she might justly be styled the apostle. On her monument was graven a
Latin inscription styling her the "Star of Poland," enumerating her
virtues, lamenting her loss, and imploring the King of Glory to
receive her into his heavenly kingdom.

  [Footnote 43: Polish writers give her the title of saint, though her
  name is not inserted in the Martyrologies.--_Butler's Lives of the
  Saints_, October 17th.]

The life of Hedwige is her best eulogium. As it has been seen, she
combined all the qualities not only of her own, but of a more advanced
age. The leisure which she could snatch from the affairs of government
she employed in study, devotion, and works of charity. True to her
principles, she at her death bequeathed her jewels and other personal
property in trust to the bishop and castellain of Cracow, for the
foundation of a college in that city. Two years afterward her wishes
were carried into effect, and the first stone was laid of the since
celebrated university.

Wladislas survived his wife thirty-five years. In his old age he was
troubled by a return of his former jealousy, thereby continually
embittering the life of his queen, a Lithuanian princess, who,
although exculpated by oath, as Hedwige had formerly been, was less
fortunate, inasmuch as she was the continual victim of fresh
suspicions. The latter years of his reign were much disturbed by the
hostilities of the Emperor Sigismund, and by the troubles occasioned
in Lithuania by the rebels, who had again combined with the Teutonic
Knights.

Wladislas died in 1434, at the age of eighty years. It is said that he
contracted his mortal sickness by being tempted to remain exposed too
long to the night air, captivated by the sweet notes of a nightingale.
Notwithstanding his faults, this monarch had many virtues; his piety
was great, and he practised severe abstinences; and although he at
times gave way to a suspicious temper, his general character was
trusting, frank, and generous even to imprudence. His suspicions, in
fact, did not originate with himself. They sprang, in the case of both
his wives, from the tongues of calumniators, to whom he listened with
a hasty credulity. He raised the glory and extended and consolidated
the dominion of Poland. He was succeeded by his son, a child of eleven
years, who had previously been, elected to the throne, but not until
Jagello had confirmed and even enlarged the privileges of the nobles.
His tardy consent, at the diet of Jedlin, roused their pride, so that
it was not until four years later that they solemnly gave their
adhesion.

It has not been our purpose to give more than a page out of the Polish
annals illustrative of the patriotic and Christian spirit of sacrifice
for which Poland's daughters have, down to the {158} present day, been
no less noted than her sons. The mind naturally reverts to the late
cruel struggle in which this generous people has once more succumbed
to the overwhelming power of Russia, and her unscrupulous employment
of the gigantic forces at her command. Europe has looked on
apathetically, and, after a few feeble diplomatic remonstrances, has
allowed the sacrifice to be completed. But the cause of Poland is
essentially the cause of Catholicism and of the Church; and this,
perhaps, may account for the small degree of sympathy it has awakened
in European governments. Russia's repression of her insurgent subjects
became from the first a religious persecution. Her aim is not to
Russify, but to decatholicize Poland. The insurrection, quenched in
blood, has been followed by a wholesale deportation of Poles into the
eastern Russian provinces, where, with their country, it is hoped they
will, ere long, lose also their faith. These are replaced by Russian
colonists transplanted into Poland. To crush, extirpate, and deport
the nobility--to leave the lower class alone upon the soil, who,
deprived of their clergy--martyred, exiled, or in bonds--may become
an easy conquest to the dominant schism--such is the plan of the
autocrat, as we have beheld it actively carried out with all its
accompanying horrors of sacrilege and ruthless barbarity. One voice
alone--that of the Father of Christendom--has been raised to
stigmatize these revolting excesses, and to reprove the iniquity of
"persecuting Catholicism in order to put down rebellion."  [Footnote
44] The same voice has exhorted us to pray for our Polish brethren,
and has encouraged that suffering people to seek their deliverance
from the just and compassionate Lord of all.

  [Footnote 44: The terms of the Holy Father's address have been
  strangely exaggerated in many continental journals, where he is made
  to refer to the subject politically, and loudly to proclaim the
  justice of the Polish insurrection in that regard. The Pope entirely
  restricted his animadversions on the Czar to his persecution of the
  faith of his subjects.]


------

From The Lamp.

MONKS AMONG THE MONGOLS.


In tracing the progress of the various branches of science during the
Middle Ages, there is nothing more striking than the slow stages by
which a knowledge of the truth was reached on the subject of the
earth's form, and the relative positions of the various countries
which compose it. Though from the very earliest period the subject
necessarily occupied a considerable amount of attention, and though
facts began to be observed bearing upon it in the first ages after the
diffusion of mankind, and were largely multiplied in proportion as the
formation of colonies and intercommunication for purposes of commerce
or war became more frequent, yet we find very little advance made in
geographical knowledge from the days of Ptolemy, when the observations
of the ancients were most systematically collected and arranged, till
some centuries after, when the maritime enterprise of the Portuguese
impelled them to the series of discoveries which led to the doubling
of the Cape of Good Hope, and incited the genius of Columbus to the
discovery of a new world.

The cause of this slow advance of geographical, in comparison with
other branches of knowledge, was owing in some measure to the absence
of any exact records of the discoveries made, by which they might have
been communicated to others, and become the {159} starting-point for
further investigations; but still more to the imperfect means of
navigation in existence, and to those barbarian uprisings and
migrations which for centuries, at least, were perpetually changing
the state of Europe and Asia, and, by removing the landmarks of
nations, obliging geography to begin as it were anew. During the whole
of this period, however, we find evidences of the patient cultivation
of this, as of all other branches of human knowledge, within the walls
of those monastic institutions which ignorant prejudice still regards
as the haunts of idleness, but to which the learned of all creeds and
countries acknowledge their deep debt of obligation. Formal accounts
of some distant land, either written by the traveller himself or
recorded from the oral information he communicated; historical
chronicles, in which not alone the events, but all that was known of
the country is recorded, and maps in which the position of various
places is attempted to be laid down, were to be found in every
monastery both on the continent and in our own island. The holy men,
too, who preached the gospel to pagan nations were usually careful
also to enlarge their contemporaries' knowledge concerning the places
and the people among whom they labored. Thus the great St. Boniface
not only converted the Sclavonic nations to Catholic truth, but, at
the special injunction of the Pope, wrote an account of them and of
their country. St. Otho, bishop of Bamberg, did the same for the
countries upon the shores of the Baltic; the holy monk Anscaire for
Scandinavia, where he carried on his apostolic labors; and many others
might be mentioned.

Among the most valuable of the contributions to the geography of the
Middle Ages were those furnished by some monks of the order of St.
Francis, who in the middle of the thirteenth century penetrated into
the remote east, on special missions to the barbarian hordes that then
threatened the very existence of religion and civilization, and whose
enterprises, embarked in at the call of duty, are in many respects
interesting.

History, whether ancient or modern, has few chapters so remarkable as
that which records the rise of the Mongol power. A great chief, who
had ruled over an immense horde of this hitherto pastoral people,
died, leaving his eldest son an infant, and unable to command the
adhesion of his rude subjects. The young chief, as he grew to man's
estate, found his horde dispersed, and only a few families willing to
acknowledge his sway. Determined, however, to regain his power and
carry out the ambitious design which he had formed of conquering the
world, he caused an assembly of the whole people to be summoned on the
banks of the Selinga. At this assembly one of the wise men of the
tribes announced that he had had a vision, in which he saw the great
God, the disposer of kingdoms, sitting upon his throne in council, and
heard him decree that the young chief should be "Zingis Khan," or
"Greatest Chief" of the earth. The shouts of the Mongols testified
their readiness to accept the decree; Zingis Khan was raised to
supreme power over the whole Mongol race. He soon subdued the petty
opposition of his neighbors, and, establishing the seat of his empire
at Karakorum, spread his conquests in every direction with
extraordinary rapidity, and died the ruler of many nations,
bequeathing his power to sons and grandsons as warlike and ambitious
as himself. One of these, Batoo Khan, invaded Europe with an immense
army. He overran Russia, taking Moscow and its other principal places;
subdued Poland and burnt Cracow; defeated the king of Hungary in a
great battle; penetrated to Breslau, which he burned; and defeated,
near Liegnitz, an army composed of Christian volunteers from all
lands;--one of the bloodiest battles ever fought against the eastern
hordes.

It was four years after this great battle, namely, in 1246, and when
all {160} Europe was trembling at the expectation of another invasion
of the Mongols (who, having devastated the country with fire and
sword, had retired loaded with spoils), that two embassies were
despatched by the Pope, Innocent IV., to endeavor to induce them to
stop their progress into Europe, and to embrace Christianity. These
important missions were intrusted to monks of the Franciscan order;
Jean du Plan Carpini being despatched toward the north-east, where the
camp of Batoo was fixed, and Nicholas Ascelin, the year after, sent
into Syria and Persia.

Ascelin's mission, which comprised three other monks of the same order
beside himself, was the most rapidly terminated. Following the south
of the Caspian Sea, the party traversed Syria, Mesopotamia, and
Persia, and at length reached the Mongol or Tatar encampment of
Baiothnoy Khan. Being asked their object as they approached, the holy
men boldly but undiplomatically declared that they were ambassadors
from the head of the Christian world, and that their mission was to
exhort the Tatars to repent of their wicked and barbarous attacks upon
God's people. Being asked what presents they brought to the khan,
according to eastern custom, they further replied that the Pope, as
the vicar of God, was not accustomed to purchase a hearing or favor by
such means, especially from infidels. The Mongols were astonished at
this bold language used toward a race accustomed to strike terror into
all who came into contact with them. They were still more astonished
when the holy men refused, as a reprehensible act of idolatry, to make
the usual genuflexions on being admitted to the presence of the khan,
unless he first became a Catholic and acknowledged the Pope's
supremacy, when they offered to do so for the honor of God and the
Church. Hitherto the barbarians had borne patiently the display of
what they doubtless regarded as the idiosyncrasies of the good friars,
but this last refusal incited their rage; the ambassadors and their
master the Pope were insulted and threatened, and it was debated in
council whether they should not be flayed alive, their skins stuffed
with hay, and sent back to the Pope. The interposition of the khan's
mother saved their lives, however; but the Mongols could never
understand how the Holy Father, who they found from Ascelin kept no
army and had gained no battles, could have dared to send such a
message to their victorious master, whom they styled the Son of
Heaven. Ascelin and his companions were treated during their stay with
scant courtesy, and were dismissed with a letter to the Pope from
Baiothnoy Khan, commanding him, if he wished to remain in possession
of his land and heritage, to come in his own person and do homage to
him who held just sway over the whole earth. They reached as speedily
as possible the nearest Syrian port, and embarked for France. They
brought back to Europe some valuable information respecting the
country of the Mongols, though small compared with that of the other
ambassadors whom we have to mention.

Carpini was a man better fitted the office of ambassador, and able,
without sacrificing his principles or his dignity, to become "all
things to all men." He travelled with a numerous suite through Bohemia
and Poland to Kiow, then the Russian capital. A quantity of skins and
furs was given him in the northern capitals, as presents to the Tatar
chiefs, and all Europe watched with interest the result of the
embassy. On the banks of the Dnieper they first encountered the
barbarians. The purpose of their journey being demanded, they replied
that they were messengers from the Pope to the chief of the Tatar
people, to desire peace and friendship between them, and request that
they would embrace the faith of Christ, and desist from the slaughter
of the Pope's subjects, who had never injured or attempted to injure
them. Their {161} bearing made a very favorable impression. They were
conducted to the tent of the chief, where they did not hesitate to
make the usual salutations; and by his command post-horses and a
Mongol escort were given them to conduct them to Batoo Khan. They
found him at a place on the borders of the Black Sea; and, before
being admitted to an audience, had to pass between two fires, as a
charm to nullify any witchcraft or evil intention on their parts. They
found Batoo seated on a raised throne with one of his wives, and
surrounded by his court. They again made the usual genuflexions, and
then delivered their letters, which Batoo Khan read attentively, but
without giving them any reply. For some months they were "trotted
about," with a view to show them the wealth, power, and magnificence
of the people they were among; and in order that they might
communicate at home what they saw. The holy men passed Lent among the
Mongols; and, notwithstanding the fatigues they had passed through,
observed a strict fast, taking, as their only food for the forty days,
millet boiled in water, and drinking only melted snow. They witnessed
the imposing ceremony of the investiture of a Tatar chief, at which a
large number of feudatory princes were present, with no less than four
thousand messengers bearing tribute or presents from subdued or
submitted states. After the investiture, they also were ushered into
the presence; but, alas, the gifts intrusted to them and their whole
substance were already consumed. The Tatars, however, considerately
dispensed with this usual part of the proceedings; for the coarse garb
of the monks, contrasting as it did with the rich silks and garments
of gold and silver which they describe as being worn generally during
the ceremonies, must have marked them as men who possessed little of
this world's goods.

The ceremonials of investiture over, Carpini was at length called upon
to deliver his message to the newly-appointed khan; and a reply was
given, which he was desired to translate into Latin, and convey to the
Pope. It contained only meaningless expressions of good-will; but the
fact was, that the khan intended to carry the war into Europe, though
he did not desire to give notice of his intent. He offered to send
with them an ambassador to the Pope; but Carpini seems to have
surmised his purpose, and that this ambassador would really be only a
spy; and he therefore found means to evade the offer. They returned
homeward through the rigors of a Siberian winter, accompanied by
several Genoese, Pisan, and Venetian traders, who, following the papal
envoys, had found their way, in pursuit of commerce, to the Tatar
encampment. The hardships the good men endured on the return journey
were of the most fearful kind. Often, in crossing the extensive
steppes of that country, they were forced to sleep all night upon the
snow, and found themselves almost buried in snow-drifts in the
morning. Kiow was at length reached; and its people, who had given up
the adventurous travellers as lost, turned out to welcome them, as men
returned from the grave. The rest of Carpini's life was spent in
similar hardships, while preaching the gospel to the savage peoples of
Bohemia, Hungary, Denmark, and Norway; and death came to him with his
reward, at an advanced age, in the midst of his apostolic labors.

A few years after the missions of Ascelin and Carpini, another
Franciscan, named William Van Ruysbroeck, better known as Rubriquis, a
native of Brabant, was sent by Saint Louis of France on a similar
errand to the Mongols, one of whose khans, it was reported, had
embraced Christianity. He found the rumor void of foundation; and,
though received courteously, as Carpini had been, could perceive not
the slightest disposition among the barbarians to receive or even hear
the truth. At the camp of Sartach Khan, Rubriquis was commanded to
appear before the chief in his priestly vestments, and did so,
carrying a missal {162} and crucifix in his hands, an attendant
preceding him with a censer, and singing the _Salve Regina_. Everything
he had with him was examined very attentively by the khan and his
wives, especially the crucifix; but nothing came of this curiosity.
Like Carpini, the party were frequently exposed to great privations,
both at the encampments and on their journeys; and on one occasion
Rubriquis piously records: "If it had not been for the grace of God,
and the biscuit which we had brought with us, we had surely perished."
On one journey from camp to camp, they travelled for five weeks along
the banks of the Volga, nearly always on foot, and often without food.
Rubriquis' companion Barthelemi broke down under the fatigues of the
return journey; but Rubriquis persevered alone, and traversed an
immense extent of country, passing through the Caucasus, Armenia, and
Syria, before he took ship for France, to report the failure of his
mission to the pious king.

Bootless as these journeys proved, so far as their main object was
concerned, there is no doubt that in many ways they effected a large
amount of good. The religious creed of the Mongols appears to have
been confined to a belief in one God, and in a place of future rewards
and punishments. For other doctrines, or for ceremonies of religion,
they appear to have cared little. They trampled the Caliph of Bagdad,
the "successor of the Prophet," beneath their horses' hoofs at the
capture of that city; and they tolerated at their camps our Christian
monks, as well as a number of professors of the Nestorian heresy. It
was only on becoming Mohammedans that they, and the kindred but rival
race of Ottomans, became intolerant. But it is to be observed that
Islamism, which allowed polygamy, and avoided interference with their
other national habits and customs, would be likely to attract them, in
consequence of their religious indifference, as naturally as
Christianity, which sought to impose restraints upon their ferocity
and sensualism, would repel them. It is no wonder, therefore, that the
efforts of the zealous Franciscans were unsuccessful. But their zeal
and disinterestedness, their irreproachable lives and simple manners,
were not without producing an effect upon the savage men with whom
their embassies brought them into contact; and by their intercourse,
and that mercantile communication for which their travels pioneered
the way, the conduct of the Mongols toward the Christian races was
sensibly affected beneficially, while on the other side they taught
Europe to regard the Mongols as a people to be feared indeed, and
guarded against, but not as the demons incarnate they had been
pictured by the popular imagination. The benefit these devoted monks
conferred upon the progress of science and civilization is scarcely to
be over-estimated; as not only did they acquaint Europe with a number
of minute, and in the main accurate, details respecting a vast tract
of country previously unknown, and the peoples by whom it was
inhabited, but they opened up new realms to commerce, in the exploring
of which Marco Polo, Clavijo, and subsequent travellers, pushed onward
to China, Japan, and India, and prepared the way for the great
maritime discoveries of the succeeding century.

------

{163}

From The Month.

CONSTANCE SHERWOOD.



AN AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.


BY LADY GEORGIANA FULLERTON.


CHAPTER III.

As I entered the library, which my father used for purposes of
business as well as of study, I saw a gentleman who had often been at
our house before, and whom I knew to be a priest, though he was
dressed as a working-man of the better sort and had on a riding coat
of coarse materials. He beckoned me to him, and I, kneeling, received
his blessing.

"What, up yet, little one?" he said; "and yet thou must bestir thyself
betimes to-morrow for prayers. These are not days in which priests may
play the sluggard and be found abed when the sun rises."

"At what hour must you be on foot, reverend father?" my mother asked,
as sitting down at a table by his side she filled his plate with
whatever might tempt him to eat, the which he seemed little inclined
to.

"Before dawn, good Mrs. Sherwood," he answered; "and across the fields
into the forest before ever the laboring men are astir; and you know
best when that is."

"An if it be so, which I fear it must," my father said, "we must e'en
have the chapel ready by two o'clock. And, goodwife, you should
presently get that wench to bed."

"Nay, good mother," I cried, and threw my arms round her waist,
"prithee let me sit up to-night; I can lie abed all to-morrow." So
wistfully and urgently did I plead, that she, who had grown of late
somewhat loth to deny any request of mine, yielded to my entreaties,
and only willed that I should lie down on a settle betwixt her chair
and the chimney, in which a fagot was blazing, though it was
summer-time, but the weather was chilly. I gazed by turns on my
mother's pale face and my father's, which was thoughtful, and on the
good priest's, who was in an easy-chair, wherein they had compelled
him to sit, opposite to me on the other side of the chimney. He
looked, as I remember him then, as if in body and in mind he had
suffered more than he could almost bear.

After some discourse had been ministered betwixt him and my father of
the journey he had been taking, and the friends he had seen since last
he had visited our house, my mother said, in a tremulous voice, "And
now, good Mr. Mush, an if it would not pain you too sorely, tell us if
it be true that your dear daughter in Christ, Mrs. Clitherow, as
indeed won the martyr's crown, as some letters from York reported to
us a short time back?"

Upon this Mr. Mush raised his head, which had sunk on his breast, and
said, "She that was my spiritual daughter in times past, and now, as I
humbly hope, my glorious mother in heaven, the gracious martyr Mrs.
Clitherow, has overcome all her enemies, and passed from this mortal
life with rare and marvellous triumph into the peaceable city of God,
there to receive a worthy crown of endless immortality and joy." His
eye, that had been before heavy and dim, now shone with sudden light,
and it seemed as if the cord about his heart was loosed, and his
spirit found vent at last in words after a long and painful silence.
More eloquent still was his countenance than his words as he
exclaimed, "Torments overcame her not, nor the sweetness of life, nor
her vehement affection for {164} husband and children, nor the
flattering allurements and deceitful promises of the persecutors.
Finally, the world, the flesh, and the devil overcame her not. She, a
woman, with invincible courage entered combat against them all, to
defend the ancient faith, wherein both she and her enemies were
baptized and gave their promise to God to keep the same until death. O
sacred martyr!" and, with clasped hands and streaming eyes, the good
father went on, "remember me, I beseech thee humbly, in thy perfect
charity, whom thou hast left miserable behind thee, in time past thy
unworthy father and now most unworthy servant, made ever joyful by thy
virtuous life, and now lamenting thy death and thy absence, and yet
rejoicing in thy glory."

A sob burst from my mother's breast, and she hid her face against my
father's shoulder. There was a brief silence, during which many
quickly-rising thoughts passed through my mind. Of Daniel in the
lions' den, and the Machabees and the early Christians; and of the
great store of blood which had been shed of late in this our country,
and of which amongst the slain were truly martyrs, and which were not;
of the vision in the sky which had been seen at Lichfield; and chiefly
of that blessed woman Mrs. Clitherow, whose virtue and good works I
had often before heard of, such as serving the poor and harboring
priests, and loving God's Church with a wonderful affection greater
than can be thought of. Then I heard my father say, "How was it at the
last, good Mr. Mush?" I oped my eyes, and hung on the lips of the good
priest even as if to devour his words as he gave utterance to them.

"She refused to be tried by the country," he answered, in a tremulous
voice; "and so they murthered her."

"How so?" my mother asked, shading her eyes with her hand, as if to
exclude the mental sight of that which she yet sought to know.

"They pressed her to death," he slowly uttered; "and the last words
she was heard to say were 'Jesu, Jesu, Jesu! have mercy on me!' She
was in dying about a quarter of an hour, and then her blessed spirit
was released and took its flight to heaven. May we die the death of
the righteous, and may our last end be like hers!"

Again my mother hid her face in my father's bosom, and methought she
said not "Amen" to that prayer; but turning to Mr. Mush with a flushed
cheek and troubled eye, she asked, "And why did the blessed Mrs.
Clitherow refuse to be tried by the country, reverend father, and
thereby subject herself to that lingering death?"

"These were her words when questioned and urged on that point," he
answered, "which sufficiently clear her from all accusation of
obstinacy or desperation, and combine the rare discretion and charity
which were in her at all times: 'Alas!' quoth she, 'if I should have
put myself on the country, evidence must needs have come against me
touching my harboring of priests and the holy sacrifice of the mass in
my house, which I know none could give but only my children and
servants; and it would have been to me more grievous than a thousand
deaths if I should have seen any of them brought forth before me, to
give evidence against me in so good a cause and be guilty of my blood;
and, secondly,' quoth she, 'I know well the country must needs have
found me guilty to please the council, who so earnestly seek my blood,
and then all they had been accessory to my death and damnably offended
God. I therefore think, in the way of charity, for my part to hinder
the country from such a sin; and seeing it must needs be done, to
cause as few to do it as might be; and that was the judge himself.' So
she thought, and thereupon she acted, with that single view to God's
glory and the good of men's souls that was ever the passion of her
fervent spirit."

"Her children?" my mother murmured in a faint voice, still hiding her
face from him. "That little Agnes {165} you used to tell us of, that
was so dear to her poor mother, how has it fared with her?"

Mr. Mush answered, "Her _happy_ mother sent her hose and shoes to her
daughter at the last, signifying that she should serve God and follow
her steps of virtue. She was committed to ward because she would not
betray her mother, and there whipped and extremely used for that she
would not go to the church and hear a sermon. When her mother was
murthered, the heretics came to her and said that unless she would go
to the church, her mother should be put to death. The child, thinking
to save the life of her who had given her birth, went to a sermon, and
thus they deceived her."

"God forgive them!" my father ejaculated; and I, creeping to my
mother's side, threw my arms about her neck, upon which she, caressing
me, said:

"Now thou wilt be up to their deceits, Conny, if they should practice
the same arts on thee."

"Mother," I cried, clinging to her, "I will go with thee to prison and
to death; but to their church I will not go who love not our Blessed
Lady."

"So help thee God!" my father cried, and laid his hand on my head.

"Take heart, good Mrs. Sherwood," Mr. Mush said to my mother, who was
weeping; "God may spare you such trials as those which that sweet
saint rejoiced in, or he can give you a like strength to hers. We have
need in these times to bear in mind that comfortable saying of holy
writ, 'As your day shall your strength be.'"

"'Tis strange," my father observed, "how these present troubles seem
to awake the readiness, nay the wish, to suffer for truth's sake. It
is like a new sense in a soul heretofore but too prone to eschew
suffering of any sort: 'tis even as the keen breezes of our own
Cannock Chase stimulate the frame to exertions which it would shrink
from in the duller air of the Trent Valley."

"Ah! and is it even so with you, my friend?" exclaimed Mr. Mush. "From
my heart I rejoice at it: such thoughts are oftentimes forerunners of
God's call to a soul marked out for his special service."

My mother, against whom I was leaning since mention had been made of
Mrs. Clitherow's daughter, began to tremble; and rising said she would
go to the chapel to prepare for confession. Taking me by the hand, she
mounted the stairs to the room which was used as such since the
ancient faith had been proscribed. One by one that night we knelt at
the feet of the good shepherd, who, like his Lord, was ready to lay
down his life for his sheep, and were shriven. Then, at two of the
clock, mass was said, and my parents and most of our servants
received, and likewise some neighbors to whom notice had been sent in
secret of Mr. Mush's coming. When my mother returned from the altar to
her seat, I marvelled at the change in her countenance. She who had
been so troubled before the coming of the Heavenly Guest into her
breast, wore now so serene and joyful an aspect, that the looking upon
her at that time wrought in me a new and comfortable sense of the
greatness of that divine sacrament. I found not the thought of death
frighten me then; for albeit on that night I for the first time fully
arrived at the knowledge of the peril and jeopardy in which the
Catholics of this land do live; nevertheless this knowledge awoke in
me more exultation than fear. I had seen precautions used, and
reserves maintained, of which I now perceived the cause. For some time
past my parents had prepared the way for this no-longer-to-be-deferred
enlightenment. The small account they had taught me to make of the
wealth and comforts of this perishable world, and the histories they
had recounted to me of the sufferings of Christians in the early times
of the Church, had been directed unto this end. They had, as it were,
laid the wood on the altar of my heart, which they prayed might one
day burn into {166} a flame. And now when, by reason of the discourse
I had heard touching Mrs. Clitherow's blessed but painful end for
harboring of priests in her house, and the presence of one under our
roof, I took heed that the danger had come nigh unto our own doors, my
heart seemed to beat with a singular joy. Childhood sets no great
store on life: the passage from this world to the next is not terrible
to such as have had no shadows cast on their paths by their own or
others' sins. Heaven is not a far-off region to the pure in heart; but
rather a home, where God, as St. Thomas sings,

    "Vitam sine termino
  Nobis donet in patria."

But, ah me! how transient are the lights and shades which flit across
the childish mind! and how mutable the temper of youth, never long
impressed by any event, however grave! Not many days after Mr. Mush's
visit to our house, another letter from the Countess of Surrey came
into my hand, and drove from my thoughts for the time all but the
matters therein disclosed.

  "SWEET MISTRESS CONSTANCE"
  (my lady wrote),--"In my last letter I made mention, in an obscure
  fashion, of a secret which my lord had told me touching a matter of
  great weight which Higford, his grace's steward, had let out to him;
  and now that the whole world is speaking of what was then in hand,
  and that troubles have come of it, I must needs relieve my mind by
  writing thereof to her who is the best friend I have in the world,
  if I may judge by the virtuous counsel and loving words her letters
  do contain. 'Tis like you have heard somewhat of that same matter,
  Mistress Constance; for much talk has been ministered anent it since
  I wrote, amongst people of all sorts, and with various intents to
  the hindering or the promoting thereof. I mean touching the marriage
  of his grace the Duke of Norfolk with the Queen of Scots, which is
  much desired by some, and very little wished for by others. My lord,
  as is reasonable in one of his years and of so noble a spirit, and
  his sister, who is in all things the counterpart of her brother,
  have set their hearts thereon since the first inkling they had of
  it; for this queen had so noted a fame for her excellent beauty and
  sweet disposition that it has wrought in them an extraordinary
  passionate desire to title her mother, and to see their father so
  nobly mated, though not more than he deserves; for, as my lord says,
  his grace's estate in England is worth little less than the whole
  realm of Scotland, in the ill state to which the wars have reduced
  it; and when he is in his own tennis-court at Norwich, he thinks
  himself as great as a king.

  "As a good wife, I should wish as my lord does; and indeed this
  marriage, Mistress Constance, would please me well; for the Queen of
  Scots is Catholic, and methinks if his grace were to wed her, there
  might arise some good out of it to such as are dependent on his
  grace touching matters of religion; and since Mr. Martin has gone
  beyond seas, 'tis very little I hear in this house but what is
  contrary to the teaching I had at my grandmother's. My lord saith
  this queen's troubles will be ended if she doth marry his grace, for
  so Higford has told him; but when I spoke thereof to my Lady Lumley,
  she prayed God his grace's might not then begin, but charged me to
  be silent thereon before my Lord Arundel, who has greatly set his
  heart on this match. She said words were in every one's mouth
  concerning this marriage which should never have been spoken of but
  amongst a few. 'Nan,' quoth she, 'if Phil and thou do let your
  children's tongues wag anent a matter which may well be one of life
  and death, more harm may come of it than can well be thought of.' So
  prithee, Mistress Constance, do you be silent as the grave on what I
  have herein written, if so be you have not heard {167} of it but
  from me. My lord had a quarrel with my Lord Essex, who is about his
  own age, anent the Queen of Scots, a few days since, when he came to
  spend his birthday with him; for my lord was twelve years old last
  week, and I gave him a fair jewel to set in his cap, for a
  love-token and for remembrance. My lord said that the Queen of Scots
  was a lady of so great virtue and beauty that none else could be
  compared with her; upon which my lord of Essex cried it was high
  treason to the queen's majesty to say so, and that if her grace held
  so long a time in prison one who was her near kinswoman, it was by
  reason of her having murthered her husband and fomented rebellion in
  this kingdom of England, for the which she did deserve to be
  extremely used. My lord was very wroth at this, and swore he was no
  traitor, and that the Queen of Scots was no murtheress, and he would
  lay down his head on the block rather than suffer any should style
  her such; upon which my lord of Essex asked, 'Prithee, my Lord
  Surrey, were you at Thornham last week when the queen's majesty was
  on a visit to your grandfather, my Lord Arundel?' 'No,' cried my
  lord, 'your lordship being there yourself in my Lord Leicester's
  suite, must needs have noticed I was absent; for if I had been
  present, methinks 'tis I and not your lordship would have waited
  behind her majesty's chair at table and held a napkin to her.' 'And
  if you had, my lord,' quoth my Lord Essex, waxing hot in his speech,
  'you would have noticed how her grace's majesty gave a nip to his
  grace your father, who was sitting by her side, and said she would
  have him take heed on what pillow he rested his head.' 'And I would
  have you take heed,' cries my lord, 'how you suffer your tongue to
  wag in an unseemly manner anent her grace's majesty and his grace my
  father and the Queen of Scots, who is kinswoman to both, and even
  now a prisoner, which should make men careful how they speak of her
  who cannot speak in her own cause; for it is a very inhuman part, my
  lord, to tread on such as misfortune has cast down.' There was a
  nobleness in these words such as I have often taken note of in my
  lord, though so young, and which his playmate yielded to; so that
  nothing more was said at that time anent those matters, which indeed
  do seem too weighty to be discoursed upon by young folks. But I have
  thought since on the lines which 'tis said the queen's majesty wrote
  when she was herself a prisoner, which begin,

    'O Fortune! how thy restless, wavering state
    Hath fraught with cares my troubled wit;
    Witness this present prison, whither fate
    Could bear me, and the joys I quit'--

  and wondered she should have no greater pity on those in the same
  plight, as so many be at this time. Ah me! I would not keep a bird
  in a cage an I could help it, and 'tis sad men are not more tender
  of such as are of a like nature with themselves!

  "My lord was away some days after this at Oxford, whither he had
  been carried to be present at the queen's visit, and at the play of
  _Palamon and Arcite_, which her majesty heard in the common hall of
  Christ's Church. One evening, as my lady Margaret and I (like two
  twin cherries on one stalk, my lord would say, for he is mightily
  taken with the stage-plays he doth hear, and hath a trick of framing
  his speech from them) were sitting at the window near unto the
  garden practising our lutes and singing madrigals, he surprised us
  with his sweet company, in which I find an ever increasing content,
  and cried out as he approached, 'Ladies, I hold this sentence of the
  poet as a canon of my creed, that whom God loveth not, they love not
  music.' And then he said that albeit Italian was a very harmonious
  and sweet language which pleasantly tickleth the ear, he for his
  part loved English best, even in singing. Upon which, finding him in
  the humor for discreet {168} and sensible conversation, which,
  albeit he hath good parts and a ready wit, is not always the case,
  by reason of his being, as boys mostly are, prone to wagging, I took
  occasion to relate what I had heard my Lord of Arundel say touching
  his visit to the court of Brussels, when the Duchess of Parma
  invited him to a banquet to meet the Prince of Orange and most of
  the chief courtiers. The discourse was carried on in French; but my
  lord, albeit he could speak well in that language, nevertheless made
  use of an interpreter. At the which the Prince of Orange expressed
  his surprise to Sir John Wilson, who was present, that an English
  nobleman of so great birth and breeding should be ignorant of the
  French tongue, which the earl presently hearing, said, 'Tell the
  prince that I like to speak in that language in which I can best
  utter my mind and not mistake.' And I perceive, my lord,' I said,
  'that you are of a like mind with his lordship, and no lover of
  new-fangled and curious terms.'

  "Upon which my dear earl laughed, and related unto us how the queen
  had been pleased to take notice of him at Oxford, and spoke merrily
  to him of his marriage. 'And prithee, Phil, what were her highness's
  words?' quoth his prying sister, like a true daughter of Eve. At
  which my lord stroked his chin, as if to smooth his beard which is
  still to come, and said her majesty had cried, 'God's pity, child,
  thou wilt tire of thy wife afore you have both left the nursery.'
  'Alack,' cried Meg, 'if any but her highness had said it, thy hand
  would have been on thy sword, brother, and I'll warrant thou didst
  turn as red as a turkey-cock, when her majesty thus titled thee a
  baby. Nay, do not frown, but be a good lord to us, and tell Nan and
  me if the queen said aught else.' Then my lord cleared his brow, and
  related how in the hunting scene in the play, when the cry of the
  hounds was heard outside the stage, which was excellently well
  imitated, some scholars who were seated near him, and he must
  confess himself also, did shout, 'There, there--he's caught, he's
  caught!' upon which her grace's majesty laughed, and merrily cried
  out from her box, 'Those boys in very troth are ready to leap out of
  the windows!' 'And had you such pleasant sports each day, brother?'
  quoth our Meg. 'No, by my troth,' my lord answered; 'the more's the
  pity; for the next day there was a disputation held in physic and
  divinity from two to seven; and Dr. Westphaling held forth at so
  great length that her majesty sent word to him to end his discourse
  without delay, to the great relief and comfort of all present. But
  he would not give over, lest, having committed all to memory, he
  should forget the rest if he omitted any part of it, and be brought
  to shame before the university and the court.' 'What said her
  highness when she saw he heeded not her commands?' Meg asked. 'She
  was angered at first,' quoth my lord, 'that he durst go on with his
  discourse when she had sent him word presently to stop, whereby she
  had herself been prevented from speaking, which the Spanish
  Ambassador had asked her to do; but when she heard the reason it
  moved her to laughter, and she titled him a parrot.'

  "'And spoke not her majesty at all?' I asked; and my lord said, 'She
  would not have been a woman, Nan, an she had held her tongue after
  being once resolved to use it. She made the next day an oration in
  Latin, and stopped in the midst to bid my Lord Burleigh be seated,
  and not to stand painfully on his gouty feet. Beshrew me, but I
  think she did it to show the poor dean how much better her memory
  served her than his had done, for she looked round to where he was
  standing ere she resumed her discourse. And now, Meg, clear thy
  throat and tune thy pipe, for not another word will I speak till
  thou hast sung that ditty good Mr. Martin set to music for thee.' I
  have set it down here, Mistress Constance, with the notes as {169}
  she sung it, that you may sing it also; and not like it the less that
  my quaint fancy pictures the maiden the poet sings of, in her 'frock
  of frolic green,' like unto my sweet friend who dwells not far from
  one of the fair rivers therein named.

    A knight, as antique stories tell,
    A daughter had named Dawsabel,
        A maiden fair and free;
    She wore a frock of frolic green,
    Might well become a maiden queen,
        Which seemly was to see.

    The silk well could she twist and twine,
    And make the fine March pine,
    And with the needle work;
    And she could help the priest to say
    His matins on a holy day,
    And sing a psalm in kirk.

    Her features all as fresh above
    As is the grass that grows by Dove,
    And lythe as lass of Kent;
    Her skin as soft as Leinster wool,
    And white as snow on Penhisk Hull,
    Or swan that swims on Trent.

    This maiden on a morn betime
    Goes forth when May is in its prime,
    To get sweet setywall,
    The honeysuckle, the hurlock,
    The lily and the lady-smock,
    To deck her father's hall.

  "'Ah,' cried my lord, when Meg had ended her song, beshrew me, if
  Monsieur Sebastian's madrigals are one-half so dainty as this
  English piece of harmony.' And then,--for his lordship's head is at
  present running on pageants such as he witnessed at Nonsuch and at
  Oxford,--he would have me call into the garden Madge and Bess,
  whilst he fetched his brothers to take part in a May game, not
  indeed in season now, but which, he says, is too good sport not to
  be followed all the year round. So he must needs dress himself as
  Robin Hood, with a wreath on his head and a sheaf of arrows in his
  girdle, and me as Maid Marian; and Meg, for that she is taller by an
  inch than any of us, though younger than him and me, he said should
  play Little John, and Bess Friar Tuck, for that she looks so
  gleesome and has a face so red and round. 'And Tom,' he cried, 'thou
  needst not be at pains to change thy name, for we will dub thee Tom
  the piper.' 'And what is Will to be?' asked my Lady Bess, who, since
  I be titled Countess of Surrey, must needs be styled My Lady William
  Howard.' 'Why, there's only the fool left,' quoth my lord, 'for thy
  sweetheart to play, Bess.' At the which her ladyship and his
  lordship too began to stamp and cry, and would have sobbed outright,
  but sweet Madge, whose face waxes so white and her eyes so large and
  blue that methinks she is more like to an angel than a child, put
  out her little thin hands with a pretty gesture, and said, 'I'll be
  the fool, brother Surrey, and Will shall be the dragon, and Bess
  ride the hobby-horse, an it will please her.' 'Nay, but she is Friar
  Tuck,' quoth my lord, 'and should not ride.' 'And prithee wherefore
  no?' cried the forward imp, who, now she no more fears her grandam's
  rod, has grown very saucy and bold; 'why should not the good friar
  ride, an it doth pleasure him?'

  "At the which we laughed and fell to acting our parts with no little
  merriment and noise, and sundry reprehensions from my lord when we
  mistook our postures or the lines he would have us to recite. And at
  the end he set up a pole on the grass-plat for the Maying, and we
  danced and sung around it to a merry tune, which set our feet flying
  in time with the music:

    Now in the month of maying,
    When the merry lads are playing,
        Fa, la, la.

    Each with his bonny lasse,
    Upon the greeny grasse,
        Fa, la, la.

  Madge was not strong enough to dance, but she stole away to gather
  white and blue violets, and made a fair garland to set on my head,
  to my lord's great content, and would have me unloose my hair on my
  shoulders, which fell nearly to my feet, and waved in the wind in a
  wild fashion; which he said was beseeming for a bold outlaw's bride,
  and what he had seen in the Maid Marian, who had played in the
  pageant at Nonsuch. Mrs. Fawcett misdoubted that this sport of ours
  should be approved by Mr. Charke, who calls all {170} stage-playing
  Satan's recreations, and a sure road unto hell; and that we shall
  hear on it in his next preachment; for he has held forth to her at
  length on that same point, and upbraided her for that she did suffer
  such foolish and profane pastimes to be carried on in his grace's
  house. Ah me! I see no harm in it; and if, when my lord visits me, I
  play not with him as he chooses, 'tis not a thing to be expected
  that he will come only to sing psalms or play chess, which Mr.
  Charke holds to be the only game it befits Christians to entertain
  themselves with. 'Tis hard to know what is right and wrong when
  persons be of such different minds, and no ghostly adviser to be
  had, such as I was used to at my grandmother's house.

  "All, Mistress Constance! when I last wrote unto you I said troubles
  was the word in every one's mouth, and ere I had finished this
  letter--which I was then writing, and have kept by me ever
  since--what, think you, has befallen us? 'Tis anent the marriage of
  his grace with the Queen of Scots; which I now do wish it had
  pleased God none had ever thought of. Some weeks since my lord had
  told me, with great glee, that the Spanish ambassador was about to
  petition her majesty the queen for the release of her highness's
  cousin; and Higford and Bannister, and the rest of his grace's
  household--whom, since Mr. Martin went beyond seas, my lord spends
  much of his time with, and more of it methinks than is beseeming or
  to the profit of his manners and advancement of his behavior--have
  told him that this would prepare the way for the
  greatly-to-be-desired end of his grace's marriage with that queen;
  and my lord was reckoning up all the fine sports and pageants and
  noble entertainments would be enacted at Kenninghall and Thetford
  when that right princely wedding should take place; and how he
  should himself carry the train of the queen-duchess when she went
  into church; who was the fairest woman, he said, in the whole world,
  and none ever seen to be compared with her since the days of Grecian
  Helen. But when, some days ago, I questioned my lord touching the
  success of the ambassador's suits, and the queen's answer thereto,
  he said: 'By my troth, Nan, I understand that her highness sent away
  the gooseman, for so she entitled Senor Guzman, with a flea in his
  ear; for she said he had come on a fool's errand, and gave him for
  her answer that she would advise the Queen of Scots to bear her
  condition with less impatience, or she might chance to find some of
  those on whom she relied shorter by a head.' Oh, my lord,' I cried;
  'my dear Phil! God send she was not speaking of his grace your
  father!' 'Nan,' quoth he, 'she looked at his grace the next day with
  looks of so great anger and disdain, that my lord of Leicester--that
  false and villainous knave--gave signs of so great triumph as if his
  grace was even on his way to the Tower. Beshrew me, if I would not
  run my rapier through his body if I could!' 'And where is his grace
  at present?' I asked. 'He came to town night,' quoth my lord, 'with
  my Arundel, and this morning went Kenninghall.' After this for some
  days I heard no more, for a new tutor came to my lord, who suffers
  him not to stay in the waiting-room with his grace's gentlemen, and
  keeps so strict a hand over him touching his studies, that in his
  brief hours of recreation he would rather play at quoits, and other
  active pastimes, than converse with his lady. Alack! I wish he were
  a few years older, and I should have more comfort of him than now,
  when I must needs put up with his humors, which be as changeful, by
  reason of his great youth, as the lights and shades on the grass
  'neath an aspen-tree. I must be throwing a ball for hours, or
  learning a stage-part, when I would fain speak of the weighty
  matters which be on hand, such as I have told you of. Howsoever, as
  good luck would have it, my Lady Lumley sent for me to spend {171}
  the day with her; and from her ladyship I learnt that his grace had
  written to the queen that he had withdrawn from the court because of
  the pain he felt at her displeasure, and his mortification at the
  treatment he had been subjected to by the insolence of his foes, by
  whom he has been made a common table talk; and that her majesty had
  laid upon him her commands straightway to return to court. That was
  all was known that day; but at the very time that I was writing the
  first of these woeful tidings to you, Mistress Constance, his grace--
  whom I now know that I do love dearly, and with a true daughter's
  heart, by the dreadful fear and pain I am in--was arrested at
  Burnham, where he had stopped on his road to Windsor, and committed
  to the Tower. Alack! alack! what will follow? I will leave this my
  letter open until I have further news to send.

  "His grace was examined this day before my Lord-keeper Bacon, and my
  Lords Northampton, Sadler, Bedford, and Cecil; and they have
  reported to her majesty that the duke had not put himself under
  penalty of the law by any overt act of treason, and that it would be
  difficult to convict him without this. My Lord of Arundel, at whose
  house I was when these tidings came, said her majesty was so angered
  at this judgment, that she cried out in a passion, 'Away! what the
  law fails to do my authority shall effect;' and straightway fell
  into a fit, her passion was so great; and they were forced to apply
  vinegar to restore her. I had a wicked thought come into my mind,
  Mistress Constance, that I should not have been concerned if the
  queen's majesty had died in that fit, which I befear me was high
  treason, and a mortal sin, to wish for one to die in a state of sin.
  But, alack! since I have left going to shrift I find it hard to
  fight against bad thoughts and naughty tempers; and when I say my
  prayers, and the old words come to my lips, which the preachments I
  hear do contradict, I am sometimes well-nigh tempted to give over
  praying at all. But I pray to God I may never be so wicked; and
  though I may not have my beads (which were taken from me), that the
  good Bishop of Durham gave me when I was confirmed, I use my fingers
  in their stead; and whilst his grace was at the Tower I did say as
  many 'Hail Maries' in one day as I ever did in my life before; and
  promised him, who is God's own dear Son and hers, if his grace came
  out of prison, never to be a day of my life without saying a prayer,
  or giving an alms, or doing a good turn to those which be in the
  same case, near at hand or throughout the world; and I ween there
  are many such of all sorts at this time.

  "Your loving servant to command, whose heart is at present heavier
  than her pen,
            "ANN SURREY."

  "P. S. My Lord of Westmoreland has left London, and his lady is in a
  sad plight. I hear such things said on all sides touching Papists as
  I can scarce credit, and I pray to God they be not true. But an if
  they be so bad as some do say, why does his grace run his head into
  danger for the sake of the Popish queen, as men do style her? They
  have arrested Higford and Bannister last night, and they are to
  taste of the rack to-day, to satisfy the queen, who is so urgent on
  it. My lord is greatly concerned thereat, and cried when he spoke of
  it, albeit he tried to hide his tears. I asked him to show me what
  sort of pain it was; whereupon he twisted my arm till I cried out
  and bade him desist. God help me! I could not have endured the pain
  an instant longer; and if they have naught to tell anent these plots
  and against his grace, they needs must speak what is false when
  under the rack. Oh, 'tis terrible to think what men do suffer and
  cause others to suffer!"

This letter came into my hand on a day when my father had gone into
Lichfield touching some business; and {172} he brought with it the
news of a rising in the north, and that his Grace of Northumberland
and my Lord of Westmoreland had taken arms on hearing of the Duke of
Norfolk's arrest; and the Catholics, under Mr. Richard Norton and Lord
Latimer, had joined their standard, and were bearing the cross before
the insurgents. My father was sore cast down at these tidings; for he
looked for no good from what was rebellion against a lawful sovereign,
and a consorting with troublesome spirits, swayed by no love of our
holy religion but rather contrary to it, as my Lord of Westmoreland
and some others of those leading lords. And he hence foreboded fresh
trials to all such as were of the ancient faith all over England;
which was not long in accruing even in our own case; for a short time
after, we were for the first time visited by pursuivants, on a day and
in such a manner as I will now briefly relate.


CHAPTER IV.

On the Sunday morning which followed the day on which the news had
reached us of the rising in Northumberland, I went, as was my wont,
into my mother's dressing-room, to crave her blessing, and I asked of
her if the priest who came to say mass for us most Sundays had
arrived. She said he had been, and had gone away again, and that she
greatly feared we should have no prayers that day, saving such as we
might offer up for ourselves; "together," she added after a pause,
"with a bitter sacrifice of tears and of such sufferings as we have
heard of, but as yet not known the taste of ourselves."

Again I felt in my heart a throbbing feeling, which had in it an
admixture of pain and joy--made up, I ween, of conflicting
passions--such as curiosity feeding on the presentment of an
approaching change; of the motions of grace in a soul which faintly
discerns the happiness of suffering for conscience sake; and the fear
of suffering natural to the human heart.

"Why are we to have no mass, sweet mother?" I asked, encircling her
waist in my arms; "and wherefore has good Mr. Bryan gone away?"

"We received advice late last evening," she answered, "that the
queen's pursuivants have orders to search this day the houses of the
most noted recusants in this neighborhood; and 'tis likely they may
begin with us, who have never made a secret of our faith, and never
will."

"And will they kill us if they come?" I asked, with that same
trembling eagerness I have so often known since when danger was at
hand.

"Not now, not to-day, Conny," she answered; "but I pray to God they do
not carry us away to prison; for since this rising in the north, to be
a Catholic and a traitor is one and the same in their eyes who have to
judge us. We must needs hide our books and church furniture; so give
me thy beads, sweet one, and the cross from thy neck."

I waxed red when my mother bade me unloose the string, and tightly
clasped the cross in both my hands "Let them kill me, mother," I
cried; "but take not off my cross."

"Maybe," she said, "the queen's officers would trample on it, and
injure their own souls in dishonoring a holy symbol." And as she spoke
she took it from me, and hid it in a recess behind the chimney; which
no sooner was done, than we heard a sound of horses' feet in the
approach; and going to the window, I cried out, "Here is a store of
armed men on horseback!" Ere I had uttered the words, one of them had
dismounted and loudly knocked at the door with his truncheon; upon
which my mother, taking me by the hand, went down stairs into the
parlor where my father was. It seemed as if those knocks had struck on
her heart, so great a trembling came over her. My father bade the
servants throw {173} open the door; and the sheriff came in, with two
pursuivants and some more men with him, and produced a warrant to
search the house; which my father having read, he bowed his head, and
gave orders not to hinder them in their duty. He stood himself the
while in the hall, his face as white as a smock, and his teeth almost
running through his lips.

One of the men came into the library,  and pulling down the books,
scattered them on the floor, and cried:

"Look ye here, sirs, what Popish stuff is this, fit for the hangman's
burning!" At the which another answered:

"By my troth, Sam, I misdoubt that thou canst read. Methinks thou dost
hunt Popery as dogs do game, by the scent. Prithee spell me the title
of this volume."

"I will have none of thy gibing, Master Sevenoaks," returned the
other. "Whether I be a scholar or not, I'll warrant no honest
gospeller wrote on those yellow musty leaves, which be two hundred
years old, if they be a day."

"And I'll warrant thee in that credence, Master Samuel, by the same
token that the volume in thy hand is a treatise on field-sports, writ
in the days of Master Caxton; a code of the laws to be observed in the
hunting and killing of deer, which I take to be no Popish sport, for
our most gracious queen--God save her majesty!--slew a fat buck not
long ago in Windsor Forest with her own hand, and remembered his grace
of Canterbury with half her prey;" and so saying, he drew his comrade
from the room; I ween with the intent to save the books from his rough
handling, for he seemed of a more gentle nature than the rest and of a
more moderate disposition.

When they had ransacked all the rooms below, they went upstairs, and
my father followed. Breaking from my mother's side, who sat pale and
still as a statute, unable to move from her seat, I ran after him, and
on the landing-place I heard the sheriff say somewhat touching the
harboring of priests; to the which he made answer that he was ready to
swear there was no priest in the house. "Nor has been?" quoth the
sheriff; upon which my father said:

"Good sir, this house was built in the days of Her majesty's
grandfather, King Henry VII.; and on one occasion his majesty was
pleased to rest under my grandfather's roof, and to hear mass in that
room," he said, pointing to what was now the chapel, "the church being
too distant for his majesty's convenience: so priests have been within
these walls many times ere I was born."

The sheriff said no more at that time, but went into the room, where
there were only a few chairs, for that in the night the altar and all
that appertained to it had been removed. He and his men were going out
again, when a loud knocking was heard against the wall on one side of
the chamber; at the sound of which my father's face, which was white
before, became of an ashy paleness.

"Ah!" cried one of the pursuivants, "the lying Papist! The egregious
Roman! an oath is in his mouth that he has no priest in his house, and
here is one hidden in his cupboard."

"Mr. Sherwood!" the sheriff shouted, greatly moved, "lead the way to
the hiding-place wherein a traitor is concealed, or I order the house
to be pulled down about your ears."

My father was standing like one stunned by a sudden blow, and I heard
him murmur, "'Tis the devil's own doing, or else I am stark, staring
mad."

The men ran to the wall, and knocked against it with their sticks,
crying out in an outrageous manner to the priest to come out of his
hole. "We'll unearth the Jesuit fox," cried one; "we'll give him a
better lodging in Lichfield gaol," shouted another; and the sheriff
kept threatening to set fire to the house. Still the knocking from
within went on, as if {174} answering that outside, and then a voice
cried out, "I cannot open: I am shut in."

"'Tis Edmund!" I exclaimed; "'tis Edmund is in the hiding-place." And
then the words were distinctly heard, "'Tis I; 'tis Edmund Genings.
For God's sake, open; I am shut in." Upon which my father drew a deep
breath, and hastening forward, pressed his finger on a place in the
wall, the panel slipped, and Edmund came out of the recess, looking
scared and confused. The pursuivants seized him; but the sheriff cried
out, surprised, "God's death, sirs! but 'tis the son of the worshipful
Mr. Genings, whose lady is a mother in Israel, and M. Jean de Luc's
first cousin! And how came ye, Mr. Edmund, to be concealed in this
Popish den? Have these recusants imprisoned you with some foul intent,
or perverted you by their vile cunning?" Edmund was addressing my
father in an agitated voice.

"I fear me, sir," he cried, clasping his hands, "I befear me much I
have affrighted you, and I have been myself sorely affrighted. I was
passing through this room, which I have never before seen, and the
door of which was open this morn. By chance I drew my hand along the
wall, where there was no apparent mark, when the panel slipped and
disclosed this recess, into which I stepped, and straightway the
opening closed and I remained in darkness. I was afraid no one might
hear me, and I should die of hunger."

My father tried to smile, but could not. "Thank God," he said, "'tis
no worse;" and sinking down on a chair he remained silent, whilst the
sheriff and the pursuivants examined the recess, which was deep and
narrow, and in which they brandished their swords in all directions.
Then they went round the room, feeling the walls; but though there was
another recess with a similar mode of aperture, they hit not on it,
doubtless through God's mercy; for in it were concealed the altar
furniture and our books, with many other things besides, which they
would have seized on.

Before going away, the sheriff questioned Edmund concerning his faith,
and for what reason he abode in a Popish house and consorted with
recusants. Edmund answered he was no Papist, but a kinsman of Mrs.
Sherwood, unto whose house his father had oftentimes sent him. Upon
which he was counselled to take heed unto himself and to eschew evil
company, which leads to horrible defections, and into the straight
road to perdition. Whereupon they departed; and the officer who had
enticed his companion from the library smiled as he passed me, and
said:

"And wherefore not at prayers, little mistress, on the Lord's day, as
all Christian folks should be?"

I ween he was curious to see how I should answer, albeit not moved
thereunto by any malicious intent. But at the time I did not bethink
myself that he spoke of Protestant service; and being angered at what
passed, I said:

"Because we be kept from prayers by the least welcome visit ever made
to Christian folks on a Lord's morning." He laughed and cried:

"Thou hast a ready tongue, young mistress; and when tried for
recusancy I warrant thou'lt give the judge a piece of thy mind."

"And if I ever be in such a presence, and for such a cause," I
answered, "I pray to God I may say to my lord on the bench what the
blessed apostle St. Peter spoke to his judges: 'If it be just in the
sight of God to hear you rather than God, judge ye.'" At which he
cried:

"Why, here is a marvel indeed--a Papist to quote Scripture!" And
laughing again, he went his way; and the house was for that time rid
of these troublesome guests.

Then Edmund again sued for pardon to my father, that through his rash
conduct he had been the occasion of so great fear and trouble to him.

{175}

"I warrant thee, my good boy," quoth my father, "thou didst cause me
the most keen anguish, and the most sudden relief from it, which can
well be thought of; and so no more need be said thereon. And as thou
must needs be going to the public church, 'tis time that thou bestir
thyself; for 'tis a long walk there and back, and the sun waxing hot."

When Edmund was gone, and I alone with him, my father clasped me in
his arms, and cried:

"God send, my wench, thou mayest justify thy sponsors who gave thee
thy name in baptism; for 'tis a rare constancy these times do call
for, and such as is not often seen, saving in such as be of a noble
and religious spirit; which I pray to God may be the case with thee."

My mother did not speak, but went away with her hand pressed against
her heart; which was what of late I had often seen her to do, as if
the pain was more than she could bear.

One hour later, as I was crossing the court, a man met me suited as a
farmer; who, when I passed him, laid his hand on my shoulder; at the
which I started, and turning round saw it was Father Bryan; who,
smiling as I caught his hand, cried out:

"Dost know the shepherd in his wolf's clothing, little mistress?" and
hastening on to the chapel he said mass, at the which only a few
assisted, as my parents durst not send to the Catholics so late in the
day. As soon as mass was over, Mr. Bryan said he must leave, for there
was a warrant issued for his apprehension; and our house famed for
recusancy, so as he might not stay in it but with great peril to
himself and to its owners. We stood at the door as he was mounting his
horse, and my father said, patting its neck:

"Tis a faithful servant this, reverend father; many a mile he has
carried thee to the homes of the sick and dying since our troubles
began."

"Ah! good Mr. Sherwood," Mr. Bryan replied, as he gathered up the
bridle, "thou hast indeed warrant to style the poor beast faithful. If
I were to shut my eyes and let him go, no doubt but he would find his
way to the doors of such as cleave to the ancient faith, in city or in
hamlet, across moor or through thick wood. If a pursuivant bestrode
him, he might discover through his means who be recusants a hundred
miles around. But I bethink me he would not budge with such a burthen
on his back; and that he who made the prophet's ass to speak, would,
give the good beast more sense than to turn informer, and to carry the
wolf to the folds of the lambs. And prithee, Mistress Constance," said
the good priest, turning to me, "canst keep a secret and be silent,
when men's lives are in jeopardy?"

"Aye," cried my father quickly, "'tis as much as worthy Mr. Bryan's
life is worth that none should know he was here to-day."

"More than my poor life is worth," he rejoined; "that were little to
think of, my good friends. For five years I have made it my prayer
that the day may soon come--and I care not how soon--when I may lay it
down for his sake who gave it. But we must e'en have a care for those
who are so rash as to harbor priests in these evil times. So Mistress
Constance must e'en study the virtue of silence, and con the meaning
of the proverb which teacheth discretion to be the best part of
valor."

"If Edmund Genings asketh me, reverend father, if I have heard mass
to-day, what must I answer?"

"Say the queen's majesty has forbidden mass to be said in this her
kingdom; and if he presseth thee more closely thereon, why then tell
him the last news from the poultry-yard, and that the hares have eat
thy mignonette; which they be doing even now, if my eyes deceive me
not," said the good father, pointing with his whip to the
flower-garden.

So, smiling, he gave us a last blessing, and rode on toward the Chase,
and I went to drive the hares away {176} from the flower-beds, and
then to set the chapel in fair order. And ever and anon, that day and
the next, I took out of my pocket my sweet Lady Surrey's last letter,
and pictured to myself all the scenes therein related; so that I
seemed to live one-half of my life with her in thought, so greatly was
my fancy set upon her, and my heart concerned in her troubles.


CHAPTER V.

Not many days after the sheriff and the pursuivants had been at our
house, and Mr. Bryan, by reason of the bloody laws which had been
enacted against Papists and such as harbor priests, had left us,--
though intending to return at such times as might serve our commodity,
and yet not affect our safety,--I was one morning assisting my mother
in the store-room, wherein she was setting aside such provisions as
were to be distributed to the poor that week, together with salves,
medicines, and the like, which she also gave out of charity, when a
spasm came over her, so vehement and painful, that for the moment she
lost the use of speech, and made signs to me to call for help. I ran
affrighted into the library for my father, and brought him to her,
upon which, in a little time, she did somewhat recover, but desired he
would assist her to her own chamber, whither she went leaning on his
arm. When laid on her bed she seemed easier; and smiling, bade me
leave them for awhile, for that she desired to have speech with my
father alone.

For the space of an hour I walked in the garden, with so oppressive a
grief at my heart as I had never before experienced. Methinks the
great stillness in the air added thereunto some sort of physical
disorder; for the weather was very close and heavy; and if a leaf did
but stir, I started as if danger was at hand; and the noise of the
chattering pies over my head worked in me an apprehensive melancholy,
foreboding, I doubt not, what was to follow. At about eleven o'clock,
hearing the sound of a horse's feet in the avenue, I turned round, and
saw Edmund riding from the house; upon which I ran across the grass to
a turning of the road where he would pass, and called to him to stop,
which he did; and told me he was going to Lichfield for his father,
whom my mother desired presently to see. "Then thou shouldst not
tarry," I said; and he pushed on and left me standing where I was; but
the bell then ringing for dinner, I went back to the house, and, in so
doing, took notice of a bay-tree on the lawn which was withered and
dried-up, though the gardener had been at pains to preserve it by
sundry appliances and frequent watering of it. Then it came to my
remembrance what my nurse used to say, that the dying of that sort of
tree is a sure omen of a death in a family; which thought sorely
disturbed me at that time. I sat down with my father to a brief and
silent meal; and soon after the physician he had sent for came, whom
he conducted to my mother's chamber, whereunto I did follow, and
slipped in unperceived. Sitting on one side of the bed, behind the
curtains, I heard her say, in a voice which sounded hollow and weak,
"Good Master Lawrenson, my dear husband was fain to send for you, and
I cared not to withstand him, albeit persuaded that I am hastening to
my journey's end, and that naught that you or any other man may
prescribe may stay what is God's will. And if this be visible to you
as it is to me, I pray you keep it not from me, for it will be to my
much comfort to be assured of it."

When she had done speaking, he did feel her pulse; and the while my
heart beat so quick and, as it seemed to me, so loud as if it must
needs impede my hearing; but in a moment I heard him say: "God defend,
good madam, I should deceive you. While there is life, there is hope.
Greater {177} comfort I dare not urge. If there be any temporal matter
on your mind, 'twere better settled now, and likewise of your soul's
health, by such pious exercises as are used by those of your way of
thinking."

At the hearing of these his words, my father fetched a deep sigh; but
she, as one greatly relieved, clasped her hands together, and cried,
"My God, I thank thee!"

Then, stealing from behind the curtain, I laid my head on the pillow
nigh unto hers, and whispered, "Sweet mother, prithee do not die, or
else take me with thee."

But she, as one not heeding, exclaimed, with her hands uplifted, "O
faithless heart! O selfish heart! to be so glad of death!"

The physician was directing the maids what they should do for her
relief when the pain came on, and he himself stood compounding some
medicine for her to take. My father asked of him when he next would
come; and he answered, "On the morrow;" but methinks 'twas even then
his belief that there would be no morrow for her who was dying before
her time, like the bay-tree in our garden. She bade him farewell in a
kindly fashion; and when we were alone, I lying on the bed by her
side, and my father sitting at its head, she said, in a low voice,
"How wonderful be God's dealings with us, and how fatherly his care;
in that he takes the weak unto himself, and leaves behind the strong
to fight the battle now at hand! My dear master, I had a dream
yesternight which had somewhat of horror in it, but more methinks of
comfort." My father breaking out then in sighs and tears as if his
heart would break, she said, "Oh, but thou must hear and acknowledge,
my loved master, how gracious is God's providence to thy poor wife.
When thou knowest what I have suffered--not in body, though that has
been sharp too, but in my soul--it will reconcile thine own to a
parting which has in it so much of mercy. Thou dost remember the night
when Mr. Mush was here, and what his discourse did run on?"

"Surely do I, sweet wife," he answered; "for it was such as the mind
doth not easily lose the memory of; the sufferings and glorious end of
the blessed martyr Mrs. Clitherow. I perceived what sorrowful heed
thou didst lend to his recital; but has it painfully dwelt in thy mind
since?"

"By day and by night it hath not left me; ever recurring to my
thoughts, ever haunting my dreams, and working in me a fearful
apprehension lest in a like trial I should be found wanting, and prove
a traitor to God and his Church, and a disgrace and heartbreak to thee
who hast so truly loved me far beyond my deserts. I have bragged of
the dangers of the times, even as cowards are wont to speak loud in
the dark to still by the sound of their own voices the terrors they do
feel. I have had before my eyes the picture of that cruel death, and
of the children extremely used for answering as their mother had
taught them, till cold drops of sweat have stood on my brow, and I
have knelt in my chamber wringing my hands and praying to be spared a
like trial. And then, maybe an hour later, sitting at the table, I
spake merrily of the gallows, mocking my own fears, as when Mr. Bryan
was last here; and I said that priests should be more welcome to me
than ever they were, now that virtue and the Catholic cause were made
felony; and the same would be in God's sight more meritorious than
ever before: upon which, 'Then you must prepare your neck for the
rope,' quoth he, in a pleasant but withal serious manner; at the which
a cold chill overcame me, and I very well-nigh faulted, though
constraining my tongue to say, 'God's will be done; but I am far
unworthy of so great an honor.' The cowardly heart belied the
confident tongue, and fear of my own weakness affrighted me, by the
which I must needs have offended God, who helps such as trust {178} in
him. But I hope to be forgiven, inasmuch as it has ever been the wont
of my poor thoughts to picture evils beforehand in such a form as to
scare the soul, which, when it came to meet with them, was not shaken
from its constancy. When Conny was an infant I have stood nigh unto a
window with her in my arms, and of a sudden a terror would seize me
lest I should let her fall out of my hands, which yet clasped her; and
methinks 'twas somewhat of alike feeling which worked in me touching
the denying of my faith, which, God is my witness, is dearer to me
than aught upon earth."

"'Tis even so, sweet wife," quoth my father; "the edge of a too keen
conscience and a sensitive apprehension of defects visible to thine
own eyes and God's--never to mine, who was ever made happy by thy love
and virtue--have worn out the frame which enclosed them, and will rob
me of the dearest comfort of my life, if I must lose thee."

She looked upon him with so much sweetness, as if the approach of
death had brought her greater peace and joy than life had ever done,
and she replied: "Death comes to me as a compassionate angel, and I
fain would have thee welcome with me the kindly messenger who brings
so great relief to the poor heart thou hast so long cherished. Now,
thou art called to another task; and when the bruised, broken reed is
removed from thy side, thou wilt follow the summons which even now
sounds in thine ears."

"Ah," cried my father, clasping her hand, "art thou then already a
saint, sweet wife, that thou hast read the vow slowly registered as
yet in the depths of a riven heart?" Then his eyes turned on me; and
she, who seemed to know his thoughts, that sweet soul who had been so
silent in life, but was now spending her last breath in
never-to-be-forgotten words, answered the question contained in that
glance as if it had been framed in a set speech.

"Fear not for her," she said, laying her cheek close unto mine. "As
her days, so shall her strength be. Methinks Almighty God has given
her a spirit meet for the age in which her lot is cast. The early
training thou hast had, my wench; the lack of such memories as make
the present twofold bitter; the familiar mention round thy cradle of
such trials as do beset Catholics in these days, have nurtured thee a
stoutness of heart which will stand thee in good stead amidst the
rough waves of this troublesome world. The iron will not enter into
thy soul as it hath done into mine." Upon which she fell back
exhausted and for a while no sound was heard in or about the house
save the barking of our great dog.

My father had sent a messenger to a house where we had had notice days
before Father Ford was staying but with no certain knowledge he still
there, or any other priest in neighborhood, which occasioned him no
small disquietude, for my mother's strength seemed to be visibly
sinking which was what the doctor's words had led him to expect. The
man he sent returned not till the evening; in the afternoon Mr.
Genings and son came from Lichfield, which, when my mother heard, she
said God was gracious to permit her once more to see John, which was
Mr. Genings' name. They had been reared in the same house; and a
kindness had always continued betwixt them. For some time past he had
conformed to the times; and since his marriage with the daughter of a
French Huguenot who lived in London, and who was a lady of very
commendable character and manners, and strenuous in her own way of
thinking, he had left off practising his own religion in secret, which
for a while he used to do. When he came in, and saw death plainly writ
in his cousin's face, he was greatly moved, and knelt down by her side
with a very sorrowful countenance; upon which she straightly looked at
him, and said: "Cousin John, my {179} breath is very short, as my time
is also like to be. But one word I would fain say to thee before I
die. I was always well pleased with my religion, which was once thine
and that of all Christian people one hundred years ago; but I have
never been so well pleased with it as now, when I be about to meet my
Judge."

Mr. Genings' features worked with a strange passion, in which was more
of grief than displeasure, and grasping his son's shoulder, who was
likewise kneeling and weeping, he said: "You have wrought with this
boy, cousin, to make him a Catholic."

"As heaven is my witness," she answered, "not otherwise but by my
prayers."

"Hast thou seen a priest, cousin Constance?" he then asked: upon which
my mother not answering, the poor man burst into tears, and cried:
"Oh, cousin--cousin Constance, dost count me a spy, and at thy
death-bed?"

He seemed cut to the heart; whereupon she gave him her hand, and said
she hoped God would send her such ghostly assistance as she stood in
need of; and praying God to bless him and his wife and children, and
make them his faithful servants, so she might meet them all in
perpetual happiness, she spoke with such good cheer, and then bade him
and Edmund farewell with so pleasant a smile, as deceived them into
thinking her end not so near. And so, after a while, they took their
leave; upon which she composed herself for a while in silence,
occupying her thoughts in prayer; and toward evening, through God's
mercy, albeit the messenger had returned with the heavy news that
Father Ford had left the county some days back, it happened that Mr.
Watson, a secular priest who had lately arrived in England, and was on
his way to Chester, stopped at our house, whereunto Mr. Orton, whom he
had seen in prison at London, had directed him for his own convenience
on the road, and likewise our commodity, albeit little thinking how
great our need would be at that time of so opportune a guest, through
whose means that dear departing soul had the benefit of the last
sacraments with none to trouble or molest her, and such ghostly aid as
served to smooth her passage to what has proved, I doubt not, the
beginning of a happy eternity, if we may judge by such tokens as the
fervent acts of contrition she made both before and after shrift, such
as might have served to wash away ten thousand sins through his blood
who cleansed her, and her great and peaceable joy at receiving him
into her heart whom she soon trusted to behold. Her last words were
expressions of wonder and gratitude at God's singular mercy shown unto
her in the quiet manner of her death in the midst of such troublesome
times. And methinks, when the silver cord was loosed, and naught was
left of her on earth save the fair corpse which retained in death the
semblance it had had in life, that together with the natural grief
which found vent in tears, there remained in the hearts of such as
loved her a comfortable sense of the Divine goodness manifested in
this her peaceable removal.

How great the change which that day wrought in me may be judged of by
such who, at the age I had then reached to, have met with a like
affliction, coupled with a sense of duties to be fulfilled, such as
then fell to my lot, both as touching household cares, and in respect
to the cheering of my father in his solitary hours during the time we
did yet continue at Sherwood Hall, which was about a year. It waxed
very hard then for priests to make their way to the houses of
Catholics, as many now found it to their interest to inform against
them and such as harbored them; and mostly in our neighborhood,
wherein there were at that time no recusants of so great rank and note
that the sheriff would not be lief to meddle with them. We had
oftentimes had secret advices to beware of such and such of our
servants who might betray our hidden conveyances of safety; and my
father scarcely durst {180} be sharp with them when they offended by
slacking their duties, lest they might bring us into danger if they
revealed, upon any displeasure, priests having abided with us. Edmund
we saw no more since my mother's death; and after a while the news did
reach us that Mr. Genings had died of the small-pox, and left his wife
in so distressed a condition, against all expectation, owing to debts
he had incurred, that she had been constrained to sell her house and
furniture, and was living in a small lodging near unto the school
where Edmund continued his studies.

I noticed, as time went by, how heavily it weighed on my father's
heart to see so many Catholics die without the sacraments, or fall
away from their faith, for lack of priests to instruct them, like so
many sheep without a shepherd; and I guessed by words he let fall on
divers occasions, that the intent obscurely shadowed forth in his
discourse to my mother on her deathbed was ripening to a settled
purpose, and tending to a change in his state of life, which only his
love and care for me caused him to defer. What I did apprehend must
one day needs occur, was hastened about this time by a warning he did
receive that on an approaching day he would be apprehended and carried
by the sheriff before the council at Lichfield, to be examined
touching recusancy and harboring of priests; which was what he had
long expected. This message was, as it were, the signal he had been
waiting for, and an indication of God's will in his regard. He made
instant provision for the placing of his estate in the hands of a
friend of such singular honesty and so faithful a friendship toward
himself, though a Protestant, that he could wholly trust him. And next
he set himself to dispose of her whom he did term his most dear
earthly treasure, and his sole tie to this perishable world, which he
resolved to do by straightway sending her to London, unto his sister
Mistress Congleton, who had oftentimes offered, since his wife's
death, to take charge of this daughter, and to whom he now despatched
a messenger with a letter, wherein he wrote that the times were now so
troublesome, he must needs leave his home, and take advantage of the
sisterly favor she had willed to show him in the care of his sole
child, whom he now would forthwith send to London, commending her to
her good keeping, touching her safety and religious and virtuous
training, and that he should be more beholden to her than ever brother
was to sister, and, as long as he lived, as he was bound to do, pray
for her and her good husband. When this letter was gone, and order had
been taken for my journey, which was to be on horseback, and in the
charge of a maiden gentlewoman who had been staying some months in our
neighborhood, and was now about in two days to travel to London, it
seemed to me as if that which I had long expected and pictured unto
myself had now come upon me of a sudden, and in such wise as for the
first time to taste its bitterness. For I saw, without a doubt, that
this parting was but the forerunner of a change in my father's
condition as great and weighty as could well be thought of. But of
this howbeit our thoughts were full of it, no talk was ministered
between us. He said I should hear from him in London; and that he
should now travel into Lancashire and Cheshire, changing his name, and
often shifting his quarters whilst the present danger lasted. The day
which was to be the last to see us in the house wherein himself and
his fathers for many centuries back, and I his unworthy child, had
been born, was spent in such fashion as becometh those who suffer for
conscience sake, and that is with so much sorrow as must needs be felt
by a loving father and a dutiful child in a first and doubtful
parting, with so much regret as is natural in the abandonment of a
peaceful earthly home, wherein God had been served in a Catholic
manner for many generations and up to that time without
discontinuance, only of late years as it were by {181} night and
stealth, which was linked in their memories with sundry innocent joys
and pleasures, and such griefs as do hallow and endear the visible
scenes wherewith they be connected, but withal with a stoutness of
heart in him, and a youthful steadiness in her whom he had infected
with a like courage unto his own, which wrought in them so as to be of
good cheer and shed no more tears on so moving an occasion than the
debility of her nature and the tenderness of his paternal care
extorted from their eyes when he placed her on her horse, and the
bridle in the hand of the servant who was to accompany her to London.
Their last parting was a brief one, and such as I care not to be
minute in describing; for thinking upon it even now 'tis like to make
me weep; which I would not do whilst writing this history, in the
recital of which there should be more of constancy and thankful
rejoicing in God's great mercies, than of womanish softness in looking
back to past trials. So I will even break off at this point; and in
the next chapter relate the course of the journey which was begun on
that day.



[TO BE CONTINUED.]

------

Abridged from Le Correspondant.

THE MARQUIS DE CHASTELLUX.


In the bleak region of Upper Burgundy, not far from the domain of
Vauban, stands the old manor of Chastellux, famous since the fifteenth
century as the birth-place of two brothers, one of whom became an
admiral, the other a marshal of France. From this feudal stronghold
came forth one of the most amiable of the courtiers of Louis XVI.--a
disciple of Voltaire and Hume, a rival of Turgot and Adam Smith, a
friend of Washington and Jefferson, a forerunner of the revolutionists
of 1789, a philosopher, an historian, a political economist, something
of a poet, something of a naturalist, something of an artist, a man of
taste, an enthusiastic student, a brilliant talker, and an elegant
writer. The rude Sieurs de Chastellux would have been not a little
astonished could they have foreseen what character of man was destined
to inherit their title.

François Jean de Beauvoir, first known as Chevalier and afterward
Marquis de Chastellux, was born at Paris in 1734. He was a son of the
Count de Chastellux, lieutenant-general of the armies of the king, by
Mlle. d'Aguesseau, daughter of the chancellor. His mother, being left
a widow at an early period, withdrew thereupon into the privacy of
domestic life, and the young marquis had the good fortune to be
brought up under the eyes of the Chancellor d'Aguesseau himself. He
entered the army at sixteen, and was hardly twenty-one before he had
risen to be colonel. He distinguished himself highly during the
campaigns of the Seven Years' War, and it was as a reward of his
gallantry no less than out of compliment to his hereditary rank that
he was selected on one occasion to present to the king the flags of a
conquered city. It is hard to understand how, in the midst of such an
active life, he could find time for study; but for all that he knew
Greek, Latin, English, and Italian, and had some acquaintance with
every branch of science cultivated in his time. From boyhood he showed
a zealous interest in every sort of invention or discovery which
promised to be of practical use {182} to mankind. When the principle
of inoculation for small-pox was first broached in Europe, everybody
shrank in alarm from the experiment. The young marquis had himself
inoculated without his mother's knowledge, and then, running to
Buffon, who knew his family, exclaimed joyfully, "I am saved, and my
example will be the means of saving many others."

When peace was declared in 1763, he was not yet thirty. With his
eminent gifts of mind and person, a brilliant career in society lay
open to him, but he aimed to be something more than a mere man of
fashion. His first literary productions were biographical sketches of
two of his brother officers, MM. de Closen and de. Belsunce, which
appeared in the _Mercure_, in 1765. He wrote a lively and graceful
little essay on the "Union of Poetry and Music,"--the same subject
which Marmontel afterward treated in his poem of _Polymnie_. The great
quarrel between the schools of Gluck and Piccini did not break out
until ten years later; but mutterings of the coming tempest were heard
already. Italian music had its enthusiastic admirers and its
implacable foes, and in the midst of their disputes Monsigny and
Grétry had just given to France a lyric school of her own by creating
the comic opera. M. de Chastellux, like everybody else in those days,
was passionately fond of the theatre, and he espoused the cause of
Italian music with the ardor that characterized everything he did.
About the same time he fell into the society of the Encyclopoedists,
and allied himself with Helvétius, d'Alembert, Turgot, and the rest of
the philosophical party, who received the illustrious recruit with
open arms.



About the same time that M. de Chastellux left the army, and made his
debut in civil life, the Scottish historian and philosopher, David
Hume, arrived in Paris, with the British ambassador, Lord Hertford. He
became the lion of the day. Courtiers and philosophers fell down and
worshipped him; his skeptical opinions were eagerly imbibed, and the
three years that he spent in the French capital became, owing to his
extraordinary influence, one of the most important epochs in the
literary history of the eighteenth century. M. de Chastellux shared in
the general enthusiasm; and the "Essays" and "Political Discourses" of
Hume, together with the _Essai sur les moeurs et l'esprit des nations_
of Voltaire, which had appeared a few years before, wrought upon his
mind a deep and lasting impression. The united influence of these two
authors led him to a course of study which resulted in a work upon
which his reputation was finally established. This was his celebrated
treatise, "On Public Felicity; or, Considerations on the Condition of
Man at different Periods of his History," in two volumes. It bears a
resemblance to both its parents. It is historical, like the _Essai sur
les moeurs_, and dogmatic, like the "Essays" and "Discourses." And
that is one of its defects. The "Considerations" on the condition of
man at various periods serve by way of introduction to the author's
theory of public felicity; but the second part is inferior to the
first. The body of the book is sacrificed to the introduction.

This was four years before the appearance of Adam Smith's "Wealth of
Nations." The Marquis de Mirabeau and others of his school had begun
to write; but their notions of political economy were still unfamiliar
to the public. M. de Chastellux may therefore be regarded as one of
the first supporters of that doctrine of human perfectibility which
lies at the bottom of all the prevailing opinions of the eighteenth
century. To this he added another theory, that the only end of
government ought to be "the greatest happiness of the greatest
possible number." Nearly one hundred years ago, therefore, he
discovered and developed the principle which is now one of the most
popular epitomes of social science. His style is good, {183} but
neither very concise nor very brilliant. It is now and then obscure,
sometimes digressive, sometimes declamatory; but for the most part
clear, lively, and abounding in those happy touches which show the
writer to be a man of the world as well as an author.

It is said that the immediate occasion of his writing the book was a
conversation with Mably, the author of "Observations on the History of
France," who maintained that the world was constantly degenerating,
and that the men of to-day were not half so good as their
grandfathers. The young philosopher, his head full of the new ideas,
resolved to demonstrate the superiority of the present over the past.
The first edition of his work appeared in 1772, two years before the
death of Louis XV. It was printed anonymously in Holland. Everywhere
it was read with avidity, abroad as well as in France. It was
translated into English, German, and Italian. Voltaire read it at
Ferney, and was so much struck by it that he covered his copy with
marginal notes--not always of approbation--which were reproduced in a
new edition of the work by the author's son, in 1822.

Despite great merits, which cannot be denied it, the essay "On Public
Felicity" is now almost forgotten. In the historical portion, M. de
Chastellux passes in review all the nations of ancient and modern
times, for the purpose of showing that the general condition of man
has never before been so good as it is now. The fundamental principle
of his work is disclosed in the following profession of faith: "To say
that man is born to be free, that his first care is to preserve his
liberty when he enjoys it, and to recover it when he has lost it, is
to attribute to him a sentiment which he shares with the whole animal
kingdom, and which cannot be called in question. And if we add that
this liberty is by its very nature indefinite, and that the liberty of
one individual can only be limited by that of another, we do but
express a truth which few in this enlightened age will be found to
contradict. Look at society from this point of view, and you will see
nothing but a series of encroachments and resistances; and if you want
to form a just idea of government, you must consider it as the
equilibrium which ought to result from these opposing struggles....
Government and legislation are only secondary and subordinate objects.
They ought to be regarded merely as means through which men may
preserve in the social state the greatest possible portion of natural
liberty."

It is melancholy to see how, in a work that has so much to recommend
it, the chapter which treats of the establishment of Christianity is
disfigured by the skeptical philosophy of the age. Our regret at this
is perhaps the more keen because the fault was altogether without
excuse. Turgot had argued before the Sorbonne, only a few years
previously, that a belief in the progress of the human race, so far
from being incompatible with the doctrine of redemption, is its
necessary consequence. De Chastellux might have shown that, if the
coming of our Lord did not immediately effect a sensible reformation
throughout the civilized world, it was because the vices and bad
passions of the old pagan society long survived the overthrow of the
old pagan gods. But there is this to be said for him: if he does not
evince an adequate appreciation of the great moral revolution effected
by Christianity, he at least does not speak of it in the same insolent
tone that was fashionable in his day. When he comes down to modern
times, and treats of density of population in its relation to national
prosperity, he repeats the popular fallacy that the multiplication of
religious orders exerts a pernicious influence upon the progress of
population. But when from general views he descends to statistics, he
refutes his own arguments. "The number of monks in France," he says,
"according to a careful enumeration {184} made by order of government,
a few years ago, was 26,674, and it certainly is not less now." In
point of fact, the real number when the property of the clergy was
confiscated in 1790 was only 17,000; and what is that in a population
of 24,000,000 or 26,000,000? The army withdraws from the marriage
state twenty times that number of men, in the vigor of their age;
whereas the greater part of the monks are men in the decline of life.

It is a matter of astonishment that a work which professes to treat of
"public felicity" should devote itself entirely to the material
well-being of society, and have nothing to say of the moral condition
of mankind, which is the more important element of the two in making
up the sum of human happiness. Every author, of course, has a right to
fix the limits of his subject; but then he must not promise on the
title-page more than he means to perform.

The authorship of the essay on "Public Felicity" was not long a
secret; but de Chastellux received perhaps as much annoyance as glory
from the discovery. His ideas did not please everybody, and among
those who fell foul of him for his philosophical errors were some of
his own family. He made little account of their opposition, and in
1774 came out boldly with an eulogy on Helvétius, with whom he had
lived for a long time on the most intimate terms. Two years later, he
published a second edition of his previous treatise, with the addition
of a chapter of "Ulterior Views," in which he points out the danger of
some of the revolutionary opinions which were then coming more and
more into vogue, and the futility of trying to realize in actual life
that form of government which might be theoretically the best. If he
had been alive in 1789, he would have belonged to the monarchical
party in the Constituent Assembly; and, after having done his part in
paving the way for the revolution, he would have perished as one of
its victims. Among political and social reformers, he must be classed
with the school of Montesquieu rather than with that of Rousseau.



The attention of France, however, was now fixed more and more firmly
upon the contest going on in America between Great Britain and her
rebellious colonies. Louis XVI., after some resistance, yielded to the
demand of public opinion, and, in 1778, not only recognized the
independence of the United States, but sent a fleet under Count
d'Estaing to help them. A second expedition was despatched under Count
de Rochambeau. M. de Chastellux, who then held the grade of maréchal
de camp [equivalent to something between brigadier and major-general
in the present United States army--ED.], obtained permission to join
it, and was appointed major-general. The expeditionary corps arrived
at Newport, capital of the state of Rhode Island, July 10, 1780. It
consisted of eight ships of the line, two frigates, two gunboats, and
over 5,000 troops. The next year came a reenforcement of 3,000 men.
Lord Cornwallis, who commanded the English force was shut up in
Yorktown, Va., and, being closely besieged by the allies and invested
by land and sea, was compelled to surrender in October, 1781. This
forced England to conclude a peace, and the auxiliary corps
re-embarked at Boston on their return to France at the close of 1782.
It had been two years and a half in America, and during this time the
republic had achieved its independence.

During his visit to America, M. de Chastellux employed the brief
periods of leisure left him from military occupations in making three
tours through the interior. He wrote down as he travelled a journal of
his observations, and printed at a little press on board the fleet
some twenty copies of it, ten or twelve of which found their way to
Europe. So great was the eagerness {185} with which people there
seized upon every book relating to America, that a number of copies
were surreptitiously printed, and a publisher at Cassel brought out an
imperfect edition. The author then published the book himself in 1786
(2 vols., 12mo, Paris), under the title, _Voyages de M. le Marquis de
Chastellux dans l'Amérique septentrionale en_ 1780, 1781, _et_ 1782.
Though written originally only for his friends, it has a general
interest, and presents a curious picture of the condition of North
America at the period of which it treats.

The author set out from Newport, where the troops had landed and gone
into winter-quarters, in order to visit Pennsylvania. Accompanied by
two aides-de-camp, one of whom was the Baron de Montesquieu, grandson
of the author of the _Esprit des lois_, and by five mounted servants,
he started, November 11, 1780, on horseback, for that was the only
means of travelling that the country afforded. The ground was frozen
hard, and already covered with snow. The little party directed their
steps first toward Windham, where Lauzun's hussars, forming the
advance-guard of the army, were encamped. They found the Duke de
Lauzun at the head of his troops, and this meeting between the
grandsons of d'Aguesseau and Montesquieu, and a descendant of the
Lauzuns and Birons, all three fighting for the cause of liberty in the
wilds of America, was a curious beginning of their adventures. It was
this same Duke de Lauzun, a friend of Mirabeau and Talleyrand, who
became Duke de Biron after the death of his uncle, was chosen a member
of the States General in 1789, commanded the republican army of La
Vendée, and finished his career on the scaffold.

The travellers crossed the mountains which separated them from the
Hudson, and, after passing through a wild and almost desert country,
arrived at West Point, a place celebrated at that time for the most
dramatic incidents of the war of independence (the treason of General
Arnold and the execution of Major André), and now famous as the seat
of the great military school of the United States. The American army
occupying the forts of West Point, which Arnold's treachery had so
nearly given over to the enemy, saluted the French major-general with
thirteen guns--one for each state in the confederation. "Never," says
he, "was honor more imposing or majestic. Every gun was, after a long
interval, echoed back from the opposite bank with a noise nearly equal
to that of the discharge itself. Two years ago, West Point was an
almost inaccessible desert. This desert has been covered with
fortresses and artillery by a people who, six years before, had never
seen a cannon. The well-filled magazines, and the great number of guns
in the different forts, the prodigious labor which must have been
expended in transporting and piling up on the steep rocks such huge
trunks of trees and blocks of hewn stone, give one a very different
idea of the Americans from that which the English ministry have
labored to convey to Parliament. A Frenchman might well be surprised
that a nation hardly born should have spent in two years more than
12,000,000 francs in this wilderness; but how much greater must be his
surprise when he learns that these fortifications have cost the state
nothing, having been constructed by the soldiers, who not only
received no extra allowance for the labor, but have not even touched
their regular pay! It will be gratifying for him to know that these
magnificent works were planned by two French engineers, M. du Portail
and M. Gouvion,  [Footnote 45] who have been no better paid than their
workmen."

  [Footnote 45: MM. du Portail and Gouvion went to America with
  Lafayette, and returned with him. Each rose afterward to the rank of
  lieutenant-general in the French army. The former, through the
  influence of Lafayette, was appointed minister-of-war in 1790; he
  fled to the United States during the Reign of Terror. The other was
  created major-general of the National Guard of Paris in 1769; he
  fell in battle in 1792.]

West Point stands on the bank of {186} the Hudson, in a situation
which may well be compared with the most beautiful scenery of the
Rhine. M. de Chastellux describes it with the liveliest admiration;
but he remained there only a short time, because he was in haste to
reach the head-quarters of Washington.

"After passing thick woods, I found myself in a small plain, where I
saw a handsome farm. A small camp which seemed to cover it, a large
tent pitched in the yard, and several wagons around it, convinced me
that I was at the head-quarters of _His Excellency_, for so Mr.
Washington is called, in the army and throughout America. M. de
Lafayette was conversing in the yard with a tall man about five feet
nine inches high, of a noble and mild aspect: it was the general
himself. I was soon off my horse and in his presence. The compliments
were short; the sentiments which animated me and the good-will which
he testified for me were not equivocal. He led me into his house,
where I found the company still at table, although dinner had long
been over. He presented me to the generals and the aides-de-camp,
adjutants, and other officers attached to his person, who form what is
called in England and America the _family_ of the general. A few glasses
of claret and madeira accelerated the acquaintances I had to make, and
I soon felt at my ease in the presence of the greatest and best of
men. The goodness and benevolence which characterize him are evident
from everything about him; but the confidence he inspires never gives
occasion to familiarity, for it originates in a profound esteem for
his virtues and a high opinion of his talents."

The next day Washington offered to conduct his guest to the camp of
_the marquis:_ this was the appellation universally bestowed in
America upon Lafayette, who commanded the advance of the army.

"We found his troops in order of battle, and himself at their head,
expressing by his air and countenance that he was better pleased to
receive me there than he would be at his estate in Auvergne.
[Footnote 46] The confidence and attachment of his troops are
invaluable possessions for him, well-earned riches of which nobody can
deprive him; but what, in my opinion, is still more flattering for a
young man of his age (he was not more than twenty-three) is the
influence and consideration he has acquired in political as well as
military matters. I do not exaggerate when I say that private letters
from him have often produced more effect upon some of the states than
the most urgent recommendations of the Congress. On seeing him, one is
at a loss to decide which is the stranger circumstance--that a man so
young should have given such extraordinary proofs of ability, or that
one who has been so much tried should still give promise of such a
long career of glory. Happy his country, should she know how to make
use of his talents! happier still, should she never stand in need of
them!"

  [Footnote 46: M. de Chastellux was cousin-german by the mother's
  side to the Duchess of Ayen, the mother of Madame de Lafayette.]

This last remark shows that M. de Chastellux, with all his enthusiasm
for the present, was not without anxiety for the future. He spent
three days at head-quarters, nearly all the while at table, after the
American fashion. At the end of each meal nuts were served, and
General Washington sat for several hours, eating them, "toasting," and
conversing. These long conversations only increased his companion's
admiration.

"The most striking characteristic of this respected man is the perfect
accord which exists between his physical and moral qualities. This
idea of a perfect whole cannot be produced by enthusiasm, which would
rather reject it, since the effect of proportion is to diminish the
idea of greatness. Brave without rashness, laborious without ambition,
generous without prodigality, noble without pride, virtuous without
severity, he seems always to have {187} confined himself within those
limits where the virtues, by clothing themselves in more lively but
more changeable and doubtful colors, may be mistaken for faults."

The city of Philadelphia was the capital of the confederation and the
seat of the Congress. M. de Chastellux did not fail to visit it. He
enjoyed there the hospitality of the Chevalier de la Luzerne, French
minister to the United States, and had the pleasure of meeting several
young French officers, some in the service of the United States,
others belonging to the expeditionary corps, whom the interruption of
military operations had left at liberty, like himself. Among them were
M. de Lafayette, the Viscount de Noailles, the Count de Damas, the
Count de Custine, the Chevalier de Mauduit, and the Marquis de la
Rouérie. Let us give a few particulars about these "Gallo-Americans,"
as our author calls them. The Viscount de Noailles, brother-in-law of
Lafayette, and colonel of the chasseurs of Alsace, was afterward a
member of the States General, and principal author of the famous
deliberations of the 4th of August. The Count Charles de Damas, an
aide-de-camp of Rochambeau, in after years took part, on the contrary,
against the revolutionists, and, attempting to rescue Louis XVI. at
Varennes, was arrested with him. The Count de Custine, colonel of the
regiment of Saintonge infantry, is the same who was general-in-chief
of the republican armies in 1792, and who died by the guillotine the
next year, like Lauzun. The Chevalier de Mauduit commanded the
American artillery. At the age of fifteen, with his head full of
dreams of classical antiquity, he ran away from college, walked to
Marseilles, and shipped as cabin-boy on board a vessel bound for
Greece, in order to visit the battle-fields of Plataea and
Thermopylae. The same spirit of enthusiasm carried him, at the age of
twenty, to America. Appointed, after the war, commandant at Port au
Prince, he was assassinated there by his own soldiers in 1791. The
history of the Marquis de la Rouérie, or Rouarie, is still more
romantic. In his youth he fell violently in love with an actress, and
wanted to marry her. Compelled by his family to break off this
attachment, he determined to become a Trappist; but he soon threw
aside the monastic habit and went to America, where he commanded a
legion armed and equipped at his own cost. He abandoned his surname
and title, and would only be known as Colonel Armand. After his return
to France, he was concerned, with others of the nobility of Brittany,
in the troubles which preceded the revolution. He was one of the
twelve deputies sent in 1787 to demand of the king the restoration of
the privileges of that province, and as such was committed to the
Bastile. The next year he had occasion to claim the same privileges,
not from the king, but from the Third Estate. In 1791 he placed
himself at the head of the disaffected, and organized the royalist
insurrection in the west. Denounced and pursued, he saved himself by
taking to the forest, lay hid in one chateau after another, fell sick
in the middle of winter, and died in a fit of despair on hearing of
the execution of Louis XVI.

The Chevalier de la Luzerne, brother of the Bishop of Langres,
afterward cardinal, so distinguished for his noble conduct in 1789,
was a man of more coolness and deliberation, but not less devoted to
the cause of the United States. He had given abundant proof of his
friendship by contracting a loan on his own responsibility for the
payment of the American troops.

"M. de la Luzerne," says de Chastellux, "is so formed for the station
he occupies, that one would be tempted to imagine no other could fill
it but himself. Noble in his expenditure, like the minister of a great
monarchy, but plain in his manners, like a republican, he is equally
fit to represent the king with the Congress, or the Congress with the
king. He loves the {188} Americans, and his own inclination attaches
him to the duties of his administration. He has accordingly obtained
their confidence, both as a private and a public man; but in both
these respects he is inaccessible to the spirit of party which reigns
but too much around him. He is anxiously courted by all parties, and,
espousing none, he manages all." In acknowledgment of his services in
America, the Chevalier was appointed, after the peace, minister at
London;--rather an audacious action on the part of the government of
Louis XVI. to choose as their representative in England the very man
who had contributed most of all to the independence of the United
States. The state of Pennsylvania, in gratitude for his acts of
good-will, gave the name of Luzerne to one of her counties.

The principal occupation of these officers, during their stay at
Philadelphia, was to visit, notwithstanding the inclemency of the
weather, the scenes of the recent conflicts near that city, or to
discuss the causes which had turned the fortune of war, now in favor
of the Americans, and now against them. Our author here shows himself
in a new light, as a tactician who, with a thorough knowledge of the
art of war, points out the circumstances which have led to the success
or failure of this or that manoeuvre. Those affairs in which the
French figured especially attracted his attention. Bravery,
generosity, disinterestedness, all the national virtues were
conspicuous in these volunteers who had crossed the ocean to make war
at their own expense, and who softened the asperity of military
operations by the charm of their elegant manners and chivalric
bearing.

Among the battle-fields which these young enthusiasts, while a waiting
something better to do, loved to trace out was that of Brandywine,
where M. de Lafayette, almost immediately after his landing in
America, received the wound in the leg of which he speaks so gaily in
a letter to his wife. Lafayette himself acted as their guide, and
recounted to his friends, on the very scene of action, the incidents
of this day, which was not a fortunate one for the Americans. He did
the honors of another expedition to the heights of Barren Hill, where
he had gained an advantage under rather curious circumstances. He had
with him there about two thousand infantry with fifty dragoons and an
equal number of Indians, when the English, who occupied Philadelphia,
endeavored to surround and capture him.

"General Howe [Sir Henry Clinton--ED.] thought he had now fairly
caught the marquis, and even carried his gasconade so far as to invite
ladies to meet Lafayette at supper the next day; and, whilst the
principal part of the officers were at the play, he put in motion the
main body of his forces, which he marched in three columns. The first
was not long in reaching the advanced posts of M. de Lafayette, which
gave rise to a laughable adventure. The fifty savages he had with him
were placed in ambuscade in the woods, after their own manner; that is
to say, lying as close as rabbits. Fifty English dragoons, who had
never seen any Indians, entered the wood where they were hid. The
Indians on their part, had never seen dragoon. Up they start, raising
a horrible cry, throw down their arms, and escape by swimming across
the Schuylkill. The dragoons, on the other hand, as much terrified as
they were, turned tail, and fled in such a panic that they did not
stop until they reached Philadelphia. M. de Lafayette, finding himself
in danger of being surrounded, made such skilful dispositions that he
effected his retreat, as if by enchantment, and crossed the river
without losing a man. The English army, finding the bird flown,
returned to Philadelphia, spent with fatigue, and ashamed of having
done nothing. The ladies did not see M. de Lafayette, and General Howe
[Clinton] himself arrived too late for supper." By the side of these
admirable military sketches, we have an account of a ball at the
Chevalier de la Luzerne's. "There were near twenty women, {189} twelve
or fifteen of whom danced, each having her 'partner,' as the custom is
in America. Dancing is said to be at once the emblem of gaiety and of
love; here it seems to be the emblem of legislation and of marriage:
of legislation, inasmuch as places are marked out, the country-dances
named, and every proceeding provided for, calculated, and submitted to
regulation; of marriage, as it furnishes each lady with a partner,
with whom she must dance the whole evening, without being permitted to
take another. Strangers have generally the privilege of being
complimented with the handsomest women; that is to say, out of
politeness, the prettiest partners are given to them. The Count de
Damas led forth Mrs. Bingham, and the Viscount de Noailles, Miss
Shippen. Both of them, like true philosophers, testified a great
respect for the custom of the country by not quitting their partners
the whole evening; in other respects they were the admiration of the
whole assembly from the grace and dignity with which they danced. To
the honor of my country, I can affirm that they surpassed that evening
a chief justice of Carolina, and two members of Congress, one of whom
(Mr. Duane) passed for being by ten per cent. more lively than all the
other dancers."

At Philadelphia, as in camp, a great part of the day was passed at
table. The Congress having met, M. de Chastellux was invited to dinner
successively by the representatives from the North and the
representatives from the South; for the political body was even then
divided by a geographical line, each side having separate reunions at
a certain tavern which they used to frequent: so we see the
differences between North and South are as old as the confederation
itself. He made the acquaintance of all the leading members, and
especially of Samuel Adams, one of the framers of the Declaration of
Independence.  [Footnote 47] He saw also the celebrated pamphleteer,
Thomas Paine, who ten years afterward came to France, and was chosen a
member of the National Convention. Together with Lafayette, our author
was elected a member of the Academy of Philadelphia. Despite so many
circumstances to prepossess him in favor of the Americans, he appears
not a very ardent admirer of what he witnesses about him. He shows but
little sympathy with the Quakers, whose "smooth and wheedling tone"
disgusts him, and whom he represents as wholly given up to making
money. Philadelphia he calls "the great sink in which all the
speculations of the United States meet and mingle." The city then had
40,000 inhabitants; it now contains 600,000.

  [Footnote 47: A mistake of the reviewer's. Samuel Adams had no hand
  in writing the Declaration, nor does de Chastellux say that he
  had.--ED. C. W. ]

We can easily conceive that, in contrasting the appearance of this
republican government with the great French monarchy, he should have
found abundant food for study and reflection. He speaks with great
reserve, but what little he says is enough to show that he was not so
much enamored of republican ideas as Lafayette and most of his
friends. The disciple of Montesquieu loses much of his admiration for
the American constitutions when he sees them in operation, and seems
especially loath to introduce them into his own country. The
constitution of Pennsylvania strikes him as particularly defective.

"The state of Pennsylvania is far from being one of the best governed
of the members of the confederation. The government is without force;
nor can it be otherwise. A popular government can never have any
whilst the people are uncertain and vacillating in their opinions; for
then the leaders seek rather to please than to serve them, and end by
becoming the slaves of the multitude whom they pretended to govern."

This constitution had one capital defect: it provided only for a
single legislative chamber. After a disastrous trial, Pennsylvania was
{190} compelled to change her laws, and adopt the system of two
chambers, like the other states of the Union.

Our author betrays his misgivings most clearly in his narrative of an
interview with Samuel Adams. His report of the conversation is
especially curious, as it shows how entirely the two speakers were
preoccupied by different ideas. Samuel Adams, who has been called "the
American Cato," bent himself to prove the revolution justifiable, by
arguments drawn not only from natural right but from historical
precedent. The thoroughly English character of mind of these
innovators led them to make it a sort of point of honor to find a
sanction for their conduct in tradition. M. de Chastellux, like a true
Frenchman, made no account of such reasonings.

"I am clearly of opinion that the parliament of England had no right
to tax America without her consent; but I am still more clearly
convinced that, when a whole people say, 'We will be free!' it is
difficult to demonstrate that they are in the wrong. Be that as it
may, Mr. Adams very satisfactorily proved to me that New England was
peopled with no view to commerce and aggrandizement, but wholly by
individuals who fled from persecution, and sought an asylum at the
extremity of the world, where they might be free to live and follow
their own opinions; that it was of their own accord that these
colonists placed themselves under the protection of England; that the
mutual relationship springing from this connection was expressed in
their charters, and that the right of imposing or exacting a revenue
of any kind was not comprised in them." There was no question between
the two speakers of the Federal Constitution, for it did not yet
exist. The states at that time formed merely a confederation of
sovereign states, with a general congress, like the German
confederation. They had no president or central administration. The
constitutions spoken of in this conversation were simply the separate
constitutions of the individual states, and Samuel Adams, being from
Massachusetts, referred particularly to that state. M. de Chastellux,
accustomed to the complex social systems of Europe, was surprised that
no property qualification should be required of voters; the Americans,
on the contrary, who had always lived in a democratic community, both
before and since the declaration of independence, could not comprehend
the necessity of such a restriction. Both were doubtless right; for it
is equally difficult to establish political inequality where it does
not already exist, and to suddenly abolish it where it does exist. The
constitution of Massachusetts, superior in this respect to that of
Pennsylvania, provided for a moderating power by creation of a
governor's council, elected by property-holders.

Our author's first journey terminates in the north, near the Canada
frontier. He crosses the frozen rivers in a sleigh, in order to visit
the battle-field of Saratoga, the scene, three years before, the
capitulation of General Burgoyne, the most important success which the
Americans had achieved previous to the arrival of the French.
Returning to Newport in the early part of 1781, after having
travelled, in the course of two months, more than three hundred
leagues, on horseback or in sleighs, he passed the rest of the year
solely occupied in the duties of the glorious campaign which put an
end to the war. He wrote a journal of this campaign, but it has not
been published. He speaks of it in the narrative of his travels. From
the _Memoires_ of Rochambeau, however, we learn something of his
gallant behavior at the siege of Yorktown, where, at the head of the
reserve, he repulsed a sortie of the enemy.

His second journey was made immediately after the surrender of
Cornwallis, and was directed toward Virginia, the most important of
the southern, as Pennsylvania was of the northern, states. It was the
birth-place of Washington, of Jefferson, of Madison, and {191} of
Monroe; the state which shared most actively in the war of
independence, and which is now the principal battle-field of the
bloody struggle between North and South. This second journey did not
partake of the military and political character of the first. Now that
the destiny of America seemed settled, the author gave his attention,
principally, to natural history. In every phrase we recognize the
pupil and admirer of Buffon. His chief purpose was to visit a natural
bridge of rock across one of the affluents of the James river, in the
Appalachian mountains. He describes this stupendous arch with great
care, and illustrates his narrative with several drawings which he
caused to be made by an officer of engineers.

_À propos_ of this subject, he indulges in speculations upon the
geological formation of the New World, quite after the manner of the
author of _Époques de la nature_. On the road he amused himself by
hunting. He describes the animals that he kills, and gives an account
of the mocking-bird, which almost equals Buffon's in vivacity, and
excels it in accuracy. He gives several details respecting the
opossum, that singular animal which almost seems to belong to a
different creation. All natural objects interest him, and he studies
them with the zeal of a first discoverer. His description of the
mocking-bird is well worth reproducing:

"I rose with the sun, and, while breakfast was preparing, took a walk
around the house. The birds were heard on every side, but my attention
was chiefly attracted by a very agreeable song, which appeared to
proceed from a neighboring tree. I approached softly, and perceived it
to be a mocking-bird, saluting the rising sun. At first I was afraid
of frightening it, but my presence, on the contrary, gave it pleasure;
for, apparently delighted at having an auditor, it sang better than
before, and its emulation seemed to increase when it saw a couple of
dogs, which followed me, draw near to the tree on which it was
perched. It kept hopping incessantly from branch to branch, still
continuing its song; for this extraordinary bird is not less
remarkable for its agility than its charming notes. It keeps
perpetually rising and sinking, so as to appear not less the favorite
of Terpsichore than Polyhymnia. This bird cannot certainly be
reproached with fatiguing its auditors, for nothing can be more varied
than its song, of which it is impossible to give an imitation, or even
to furnish any adequate idea. As it had every reason to be satisfied
with my attention, it concealed from me none of its talents; and one
would have thought that, after having delighted me with a concert, it
was desirous of entertaining me with a comedy. It began to counterfeit
different birds; those which it imitated the most naturally, at least
to a stranger, were the jay, the raven, the cardinal, and the lapwing.
It appeared desirous of detaining me near it; for, after I had
listened for a quarter of an hour, it followed me on my return to the
house, flying from tree to tree, always singing, sometimes its natural
song, at others those which it had learned in Virginia and in its
travels; for this bird is one of those which change climate, although
it sometimes appears here during the winter."

Continuing his journey, the traveller visited Jefferson at his
country-home, situated deep in the wilderness, on the skirts of the
Blue Ridge. This visit gives him opportunity for a new historical
portrait:

"It was Jefferson himself who built his house and chose the situation.
He calls it Monticello ['little mountain'], a modest title, for it is
built upon a very high mountain; but the name indicates the owner's
attachment to the language of Italy, and above all to the fine arts,
of which that country was the cradle. He is a man not yet forty, of
tall stature and a mild and pleasant countenance; but his mind and
understanding are ample substitutes for every external grace. {192} An
American who, without having ever quitted his own country, is skilled
in music and drawing; a geometrician, an astronomer, a natural
philosopher, a jurist and a statesman; a senator who sat for two years
in the congress which brought about the revolution, and which is never
mentioned without respect, though unhappily not without regret;
[Footnote 48] a governor of Virginia, who filled this difficult
station during the invasions of Arnold, of Phillips, and of
Cornwallis; in fine, a philosopher in voluntary retirement from the
world and public affairs, because he only loves the world so long as
he can flatter himself with the conviction that he is of some use to
mankind. A mild and amiable wife, charming children, of whose
education he himself takes charge, a house to embellish, great
possessions to improve, and the arts and sciences to cultivate--these
are what remain to Mr. Jefferson after having played a distinguished
part on the theatre of the New World. Before I had been two hours in
his company, we were as ultimate as if we had passed our whole lives
together. Walking, books, but above all a conversation always varied
and interesting, sustained by that sweet satisfaction experienced by
two persons whose sentiments are always in unison, and who understand
each other at the first hint, made four days seem to me only so many
minutes. No object had escaped Mr. Jefferson's attention; and it
seemed as if from his youth he had placed his mind, as he has done his
house, on an elevation from which he might contemplate the universe."

  [Footnote 48: The United States were then passing through a crisis
  of anarchy, which lasted until the adoption of the Federal
  Constitution in 1788, and the elevation of Washington to the
  presidency.]

At the period of this visit, Mr. Jefferson thought only of retirement;
but when M. de Chastellux's _Voyages en Amérique_ appeared, three
years afterward, he was minister-plenipotentiary of the United States
in Paris. The death of his wife had determined him to return to public
life. He formed a solid friendship for M. de Chastellux, of which his
correspondence contains abundant proof. The brilliant French soldier
introduced the solitary of Monticello, the "American wild-man of the
mountains," to the _salons_ of Paris; and the republican statesman, with
the manners of an aristocrat, entered, nothing loath, into the society
of the gay and polished capital, where he received the same welcome
and honors that were accorded to Franklin.

This portion of the _Journal_ closes with some general remarks upon
Virginia, which possess a new interest now that the people of that
state reappear upon the scene in the same bellicose and indomitable
character which they bore of old.

"The Virginians differ essentially from the people of the North, not
only in the nature of their climate, soil, and agriculture, but in
that indelible character which is imprinted on every nation at the
moment of its origin, and which, by perpetuating itself from
generation to generation, justifies the great principle that
'everything which is partakes of that which has been.' The settlement
of Virginia took place at the commencement of the seventeenth century.
The republican and democratic spirit was not then common in England;
that of commerce and navigation was scarcely in its infancy. The long
wars with France and Spain had perpetuated the military spirit, and
the first colonists of Virginia were composed in great part of
gentlemen who had no other profession than that of arms. It was
natural, therefore, for these colonists, who were filled with military
principles and the prejudices of nobility, to carry them even into the
midst of the savages whose lands they came to occupy. Another cause
which operated in forming their character was the institution of
slavery. It may be asked how these prejudices have been brought to
coincide with a revolution founded on such different principles? I
answer {193} that they have perhaps contributed to produce it. While
the insurrection in New England was the result of reason and
calculation, Virginia revolted through pride."



The third and last journey of M. de Chastellux led him through New
Hampshire, Massachusetts, and northern Pennsylvania. This was during
the months of November and December, 1782, on the eve of his return to
France. He started from Hartford, the capital of Connecticut, and,
after visiting several other places, went to Boston, for he could not
leave America without seeing this city, the cradle of the revolution.
He found at this port the French fleet, under command of M. de
Vaudreuil, which was to carry back the expeditionary corps to France.
He closes his _Journal_ with an interesting account of the university
at Cambridge, which Ampère, who was, like him, a member of the French
Academy, visited and described seventy years afterward. In the
appendix to his book he gives a letter written by himself on board the
frigate _l'Émeraude_, just before sailing, to Mr. Madison, professor
of philosophy in William and Mary College. It is upon a subject which
has not yet lost its appropriateness--the future of the arts and
sciences in America. A democratic and commercial society, always in a
ferment, seemed to him hardly compatible with scientific, and still
less with artistic, progress. But, in his solicitude for the welfare
of the country he had been defending, he would not allow that the
difficulty was insuperable. Some of his remarks upon this subject are
extremely delicate and ingenious.

The question which troubled him is not yet fully answered, but it is
in a fair way of being settled. The United States have really made but
little progress in the arts, though they have produced a few pictures
and statues which have elicited admiration even in Europe at recent
industrial exhibitions. They are beginning, however, to have a
literature. Even in the days of the revolution they could boast of the
writings of Franklin, which combined the-most charming originality
with refinement and solid good sense. Now they can show, among
novelists, Fenimore Cooper and the celebrated Mrs. Beecher Stowe,
whose book gave the signal for another revolution; among
story-tellers, Washington Irving and Hawthorne; among critics,
Ticknor; among historians, Prescott and Bancroft; among economists,
Carey; among political writers, Everett; among moralists, Emerson and
Channing; among poets, Bryant and Longfellow. In science they have
done still more. They have adopted and naturalized one of the first of
modern geologists, Agassiz; and the hydrographical labors of Maury,
[late] director of the Washington Observatory, are the admiration of
the whole world. Their immense development in industrial pursuits
implies a corresponding progress in practical science. It was Fulton,
an American, who invented the steamboat, and carried out in his own
country the idea which he could not persuade Europe to listen to; and
only lately the reaping-machine has come to us from the shores of the
great lakes and the vast prairies of the Far West.

When the _Voyages en Amérique_ appeared, the revolutionary party in
France were still more dissatisfied with the book than they had been
with the _Félicité publique_. They were angry at the wise and
unprejudiced judgments which the author passed upon men and things in
the New World; they were angry that he found some things not quite
perfect in republican society, that his praises of democracy were not
louder, his denunciations of the past not more sweeping. Brissot de
Warville, whose caustic pen was already in full exercise, published a
bitter review of the book. Some of the hostile criticisms found their
way to the United States, and M. de Chastellux, in sending a copy of
his work to General Washington, took occasion to {194} defend himself.
He received from the general a long and affectionate reply, written at
Mount Vernon, in April, 1786.



M. de Chastellux also wrote a "Discourse on the Advantages and
Disadvantages which have resulted to Europe from the Discovery of
America," and edited the comedies of the Marchioness de Gléon. This
lady, celebrated for her wit and beauty, was the daughter of a rich
financier. At her house, La Chevrette, near Montmorency, she
entertained all the literary world, and gave representations of her
own plays. Her friend, M. de Chastellux, was himself the author of a
few dramatic pieces, performed either at La Chevrette or at the Prince
de Condé's, at Chantilly; but they have never been published. We shall
respect his reserve, and refrain from giving our readers a taste
either of these compositions or of his "Plan for a general Reform of
the French Infantry," and other unpublished writings.


After his return from America, de Chastellux was appointed governor of
Longwy. He had reached the age of nearly fifty and was still
unmarried, when he met at the baths of Spa, which were still the
resort of all the good company in Europe, a young, beautiful, and
accomplished Irish girl, named Miss Plunkett, with whom he fell over
head and ears in love. He married her in 1787, but did not long enjoy
his happiness, for he died the next year. Like most men who devote
themselves to the public welfare, he had sadly neglected his private
affairs. Being the youngest of five children, his fortune was not
large, and it gave him little trouble to run through it. General
officers in those days took a pride in their profuse expenditures in
the field: he ruined himself by his American campaign. His widow was
attached in the capacity of maid of honor to the person of the
estimable daughter of the Duke de Penthièvre, the Duchess of Orléans,
mother of King Louis Philippe. This princess adopted, after a certain
fashion, his posthumous son, who became one of the _chevaliers
d'honneur_ of Madame Adelaide, the daughter of his patroness. He was
successively a deputy and peer of France after the revolution 1830. He
published a short memoir of his father, prefixed to an edition of the
_Félicité publique_.

------

{195}

From The Month.

THE LEGEND OF LIMERICK BELLS.

BY BESSIE RAYNER PARKES.


  There is a convent on the Alban hill,
      Round whose stone roots the gnarlèd olives grow;
  Above are murmurs of the mountain rill,
      And all the broad Campagna lies below;
  Where faint gray buildings and a shadowy dome
  Suggest the splendor of eternal Rome.

  Hundreds of years ago, these convent-walls
      Were reared by masons of the Gothic age:
  The date is carved upon the lofty halls,
      The story written on the illumined page.
  What pains they took to make it strong and fair
  The tall bell-tower and sculptured porch declare.

  When all the stones were placed, the windows stained,
      And the tall bell-tower finished to the crown,
  Only one want in this fair pile remained,
      Whereat a cunning workman of the town
  (The little town upon the Alban hill)
  Toiled day and night his purpose to fulfil.

  Seven bells he made, of very rare devise,
      With graven lilies twisted up and down;
  Seven bells proportionate in differing size,
      And full of melody from rim to crown;
  So that, when shaken by the wind alone,
  They murmured with a soft AEolian tone.

  These being placed within the great bell-tower,
      And duly rung by pious skilful hand,
  Marked the due prayers of each recurring hour,
      And sweetly mixed persuasion with command.
  Through the gnarled olive-trees the music wound,
  And miles of broad Campagna heard the sound.

  And then the cunning workman put aside
      His forge, his hammer, and the tools he used
  To chase those lilies; his keen furnace died;
      And all who asked for bells were hence refused.
  With these his best, his last were also wrought,
  And refuge in the convent-walls he sought.

  There did he live, and there he hoped to die,
      Hearing the wind among the cypress-trees
  Hint unimagined music, and the sky
      Throb full of chimes borne downward by the breeze;
  Whose undulations, sweeping through the air,
  His art might claim as an embodied prayer.

{196}

----

  But those were stormy days in Italy:
      Down came the spoiler from the uneasy North,
  Swept the Campagna to the bounding sea,
      Sacked pious homes, and drove the inmates forth;
  Whether a Norman or a German foe,
  History is silent, and we do not know.

  Brothers in faith were they; yet did not deem
      The sacred precincts barred destroying hand.
  Through those rich windows poured the whitened beam,
      Forlorn the church and ruined altar stand.
  As the sad monks went forth, that self-same hour
  Saw empty silence in the great bell-tower.

  The outcast brethren scattered far and wide;
      Some by the Danube rested, some in Spain:
  On the green Loire the aged abbot died,
      By whose loved feet one brother did remain
  Faithful in all his wanderings: it was he
  Who cast and chased those bells in Italy.

  He, dwelling at Marmontier, by the tomb
      Of his dear father, where the shining Loire
  Flows down from Tours amidst the purple bloom
      Of meadow-flowers, some years of patience saw.
  Those fringèd isles (where poplars tremble still)
  Swayed like the olives of the Alban hill.

  The man was old, and reverend in his age;
      And the "Great Monastery" held him dear.
  Stalwart and stern, as some old Roman sage
      Subdued to Christ, he lived from year to year,
  Till his beard silvered, and the fiery glow
  Of his dark eye was overhung with snow.

  And being trusted, as of prudent way,
      They chose him for a message of import,
  Which the "Great Monastery" would convey
      To a good patron in an Irish court;
  Who, by the Shannon, sought the means to found
  St. Martin's off-shoot on that distant ground.

  The old Italian took his staff in hand,
      And journeyed slowly from the green Touraine
  Over the heather and salt-shining sand,
      Until he saw the leaping crested main,
  Which, dashing round the Cape of Brittany,
  Sweeps to the confines of the Irish Sea.

{197}

  There he took ship, and thence with laboring sail
      He crossed the waters, till a faint gray line
  Rose in the northern sky; so faint, so pale,
      Only the heart that loves her would divine,
  In her dim welcome, all that fancy paints
  Of the green glory of the Isle of Saints.

  Through the low banks, where Shannon meets the sea,
      Up the broad waters of the River King
  (Then populous with a nation), journeyed he,
      Through that old Ireland which her poets sing;
  And the white vessel, breasting up the stream,
  Moved slowly, like a ship within a dream.

  When Limerick towers uprose before his gaze,
      A sound of music floated in the air--
  Music which held him in a fixed amaze,
      Whose silver tenderness was alien there;
  Notes full of murmurs of the southern seas,
  And dusky olives swaying in the breeze.

  His chimes! the children of the great bell-tower,
      Empty and silent now for many a year,
  He hears them ringing out the vesper hour,
      Owned in an instant by his loving ear.
  Kind angels stayed the spoiler's hasty hand,
  And watched their journeying over sea and land.

  The white-sailed boat moved slowly up the stream;
      The old man lay with folded hands at rest;
  The Shannon glistened in the sunset beam;
      The bells rang gently o'er its shining breast,
  Shaking out music from each lilied rim:
  It was a requiem which they rang for him.

  For when the boat was moored beside the quay,
      He lay as children lie when lulled by song;
  But never more to waken. Tenderly
      They buried him wild-flowers and grass among,
  Where on the cross alights the wandering bird,
  And hour by hour the bells he loved are heard.

------

{198}


From London Society.

A PERILOUS JOURNEY.


A TALE.


  There is a tide in the affairs of men,
  Which, taken at the flood, leads on to fortune--


So says the sage, and it is not to be gainsayed by any man whom forty
winters have chilled into wisdom. Ability and opportunity are fortune.
Opportunity is not fortune; otherwise all were fortunate. Ability is
not fortune, else why does genius slave? Why? But because it missed
_the_ opportunity that fitted it?

What I have--wife, position, independence--I owe to an opportunity for
exercising the very simple and unpretending combination of qualities
that goes by the name of ability. But to my story.

My father was a wealthy country gentleman, of somewhat more than the
average of intelligence, and somewhat more than the average of
generosity and extravagance. His younger brother, a solicitor in large
practice in London, would in vain remonstrate as to the imprudence of
his course. Giving freely, spending freely, must come to an end. It
did; and at twenty I was a well educated, gentlemanly pauper. The
investigation of my father's affairs showed that there was one
shilling and sixpence in the pound for the whole of his creditors, and
of course nothing for me.

The position was painful. I was half engaged--to that is, I had
gloves, flowers, a ringlet, a carte de visite of Alice Morton. That,
of course, must be stopped.

Mr. Silas Morton was not ill-pleased at the prospect of an alliance
with his neighbor Westwood's son while there was an expectation of a
provision for the young couple in the union of estates as well as
persons; but now, when the estate was gone, when I, Guy Westwood, was
shillingless in the world, it would be folly indeed. Nevertheless I
must take my leave.

"Well, Guy, my lad, bad job this; very bad job; thought he was as safe
as the Bank. Would not have believed it from any one--not from any
one. Of course all that nonsense about you and Alice must be stopped
now; I'm not a hard man, but I can't allow Alice to throw away her
life in the poverty she would have to bear as your wife; can't do it;
wouldn't be the part of a father if I did."

I suggested I might in time.

"Time, sir! time! How much? She's nineteen now. You're brought up to
nothing; know nothing that will earn you a sixpence for the next six
months; and you talk about time. Time, indeed! Keep her waiting till
she's thirty, and then break her heart by finding it a folly to marry
at all.'

"Ah! Alice, my dear, Guy's come to say 'Good by:' he sees, with me,
that his altered position compels him, as an honorable man, to give up
any hopes he may have formed as to the future."

He left us alone to say 'Farewell!'--a word too hard to say at our
ages. Of course we consulted what should be done. To give each other
up, to bury the delicious past, that was not to be thought of. We
would be constant, spite of all. I must gain a position, and papa
would then help us.

Two ways were open; a commission in India, a place in my uncle's
office. Which? I was for the commission, Alice for the office. A
respectable influential solicitor; a position not to be despised;
nothing but cleverness wanted; and my uncle's name, and no one to wait
for; no liver {199} complaints; no sepoys; no sea voyages; and no long
separation.

"Oh, I'm sure it is the best thing."

I agreed, not unnaturally then, that it was the best.

"Now, you young people, you've had time enough to say 'Good by,' so be
off, Guy. Here, my lad, you'll need something to start with," and the
old gentleman put into my hands a note for fifty pounds.

"I must beg, sir, that you will not insult--"

"God bless the boy! 'Insult!' Why I've danced you on my knee hundreds
of times. Look you, Guy,"--and the old fellow came and put his hand on
my shoulder,--"it gives me pain to do what I am doing. I believe, for
both your sakes, it is best you should part. Let us part friends. Come
now, Guy, you'll need this; and if you need a little more, let me
know."

"But, sir, you cut me off from all hope; you render my life a burden
to me. Give me some definite task; say how much you think we ought to
have; I mean how much I ought to have to keep Alice--I mean Miss
Morton--in such a position as you would wish."

Alice added her entreaties, and the result of the conference was an
understanding that if, within five years from that date, I could show
I was worth £500 a year, the old gentleman would add another £500; and
on that he thought we might live for a few years comfortably.

There was to be no correspondence whatever; no meetings, no messages.
We protested and pleaded, and finally he said--

"Well, well, Guy; I always liked you, and liked your father before
you. Come to us on Christmas day, and you shall find a vacant chair
beside Alice. There, now; say 'Good by,' and be off."

I went off. I came to London to one of the little lanes leading out of
Cannon street. Five hundred a year in five years! I must work hard.

My uncle took little notice of me; I fancied worked me harder than the
rest, and paid me the same. Seventy-five pounds a year is not a large
sum. I had spent it in a month before now, after the fashion of my
father: now, I hoarded; made clothes last; ate in musty, cheap, little
cook-shops; and kept my enjoying faculties from absolute rust by a
weekly half-price to the theatres--the pit.

The year passed. I went down on Christmas, and for twenty-four hours
was alive; came back, and had a rise of twenty pounds in salary for
the next year. I waited for opportunity, and it came not.

This jog-trot routine of office-work continued for two years more, and
at the end of that time I was worth but my salary of £135 per
year--£135! a long way from £500. Oh, for opportunity? I must quit the
desk, and become a merchant; all successful men have been merchants;
money begets money. But, to oppose all these thoughts of change, came
the memory of Alice's last words at Christmas, "Wait and hope, Guy,
dear; wait and hope." Certainly; it's so easy to.

"Governor wants you, Westwood. He's sharp this morning; very sharp; so
look out, my dear nephy."

"You understand a little Italian, I think?" said my uncle.

"A little, sir."

"You will start to-night for Florence, in the mail train. Get there as
rapidly as possible, and find whether a Colonel Wilson is residing
there, and what lady he is residing with. Learn all you can as to his
position and means, and the terms on which he lives with that lady.
Write to me, and wait there for further instructions. Mr. Williams
will give you a cheque for £100; you can get circular notes for £50,
and the rest cash. If you have anything to say, come in here at five
o'clock; if not, good morning. By-the-by, say nothing in the office."

I need not say that hope made me believe my opportunity was come.

I hurried to Florence and discharged my mission; sent home a {200}
careful letter, full of facts without comment or opinion, and in three
weeks' time was summoned to return. I had done little or nothing that
could help me, and in a disappointed state of mind I packed up and
went to the railway station at St. Dominico. A little row with a
peasant as to his demand for carrying my baggage caused me to lose the
last train that night, and so the steamer at Leghorn. The
station-master, seeing my vexation, endeavored to console me:

"There will be a special through train to Leghorn at nine o'clock,
ordered for Count Spezzato: he is good-natured, and will possibly let
you go in that."

It was worth the chance, and I hung about the station till I was
tired, and then walked back toward the village. Passing a small
wine-shop, I entered, and asked for wine in English. I don't know what
whim possessed me when I did it, for they were unable to understand me
without dumb motions. I at length got wine by these means, and sat
down to while away the time over a railway volume.

I had been seated about half an hour, when a courier entered,
accompanied by a railway guard. Two more different examples of the
human race it would be difficult to describe.

The guard was a dark, savage-looking Italian, with 'rascal' and
'bully' written all over him; big, black, burly, with bloodshot eyes,
and thick, heavy, sensual lips, the man was utterly repulsive.

The courier was a little, neatly-dressed man, of no age in particular;
pale, blue-eyed, straight-lipped, his face was a compound of fox and
rabbit that only a fool or a patriot would have trusted out of arm's
length.

This ill-matched pair called for brandy, and the hostess set it before
them. I then heard them ask who and what I was. She replied, I must be
an Englishman, and did not understand the Italian for wine. She then
left.

They evidently wanted to be alone, and my presence was decidedly
disagreeable to them; and muttering that I was an Englishman, they
proceeded to try my powers as a linguist. The courier commenced in
Italian, with a remark on the weather. I immediately handed him the
Newspaper. I didn't speak Italian, that was clear to them.

The guard now struck in with a remark in French as to the fineness of
the neighboring country. I shrugged my shoulders, and produced my
cigar case. French was not very familiar to me, evidently.

"Those beasts of English think their own tongue so fine they are too
proud to learn another," said the guard.

I sat quietly, sipping my wine, and reading.

"Well, my dear Michael Pultuski," began the guard.

"For the love of God, call me by that name. My name is Alexis Alexis
Dzentzol, now."

"Oh! oh!" laughed the guard; "you've changed your name, you fox; it's
like you. Now I am the same that you knew fifteen years ago, Conrad
Ferrate--to-day, yesterday, and for life, Conrad Ferrate. Come, lad,
tell us your story. How did you get out of that little affair at
Warsaw? How they could have trusted you, with your face, with their
secrets, I can't for the life of me tell; you look so like a sly
knave, don't you, lad?"

The courier, so far from resenting this familiarity, smiled, as if he
had been praised.

"My story is soon said. I found, after my betrayal to the police of
the secrets of that little conspiracy which you and I joined, that
Poland was too hot for me, and my name too well known. I went to
France, who values her police, and for a few years was useful to them.
But it was dull work; very dull; native talent was more esteemed. I
was to be sent on a secret service to Warsaw; I declined for obvious
reasons."

"Good! Michael--Alexis; good, {201} Alexis. This fox is not to be
trapped." And he slapped the courier on the shoulder heartily.

"And," resumed the other, "I resigned. Since then I have travelled as
courier with noble families, and I trust I give satisfaction."

"Good! Alexis; good Mich--good Alexis! To yourself you give
satisfaction. You are a fine rascal!--the prince of rascals! So decent;
so quiet; so like the curé of a convent. Who would believe that you
had sold the lives of thirty men for a few hundred roubles?"

"And who," interrupted the courier, "would believe that you, bluff,
honest Conrad Ferrate, had run away with all the money those thirty
men had collected during ten years of labor, for rescuing their
country from the Russian?"

"That was good, Alexis, was it not? I never was so rich in my life as
then; I loved--I gamed--I drank on the patriots' money."

"For how long? Three years?"

"More--and now have none left. Ah! Times change, Alexis; behold me."
And the guard touched his buttons and belt, the badges of his office.
"Never mind--here's my good friend, the bottle--let us embrace--the
only friend that is always true--if he does not gladden, he makes us
to forget."

"Tell me, my good Alexis, whom do you rob now? Who pays for the best,
and gets the second best? Whose money do you invest, eh! my little
fox? Why are you here? Come, tell me, while I drink to your success."

"I have the honor to serve his Excellency the Count Spezzato."

"Ten thousand devils! My accursed cousin!" broke in the guard. "He who
has robbed me from his birth; whose birth itself was a vile robbery of
me--me, his cousin, child of his father's brother. May he be accursed
for ever!"

I took most particular pains to appear only amused at this genuine
outburst of passion, for I saw the watchful eye of the courier was on
me all the time they were talking.

The guard drank off a tumbler of brandy.

"That master of yours is the man of whom I spoke to you years ago, as
the one who had ruined me; and you serve him! May he be strangled on
his wedding night, and cursed for ever."

"Be calm, my dearest Conrad, calm yourself; that beast of an
Englishman will think you are drunk, like one of his own swinish
people, if you talk so loud as this."

"How can I help it? I must talk. What _he_ is, that _I_ ought to be: I
was brought up to it till I was eighteen; was the heir to all his vast
estate; there was but one life between me and power--my uncle's--and
he, at fifty, married a girl, and had this son, this son of perdition,
my cousin. And after that, I, who had been the pride of my family,
became of no account; it was 'Julian' sweet Julian!'"

"I heard," said the courier, "that some one attempted to strangle the
sweet child, that was----?"

"Me--you fox--me. I wish I had done it; but for that wretched dog that
worried me, I should have been Count Spezzato now. I killed that dog,
killed him, no not suddenly; may his master die like him!"

"And you left after that little affair?"

"Oh yes! I left and became what you know me."

"A clever man, my dear Conrad. I know no man who is more clever with
the ace than yourself, and, as to bullying to cover a mistake, you are
an emperor at that. Is it not so, Conrad? Come, drink good health to
my master, your cousin."

"You miserable viper, I'll crush you if you ask me to do that again.
I'll drink--here, give me the glass--Here's to Count Spezzato: May he
die like a dog! May his carcase bring the birds and the wolves
together! May his name be cursed and hated while the sun lasts! And
may purgatory keep him till I pray for his release!"

{202}

The man's passion was something frightful to see, and I was more than
half inclined to leave the place; but something, perhaps a distant
murmur of the rising tide, compelled me to stay. I pretended sleep,
allowing my head to sink, down upon the table.

He sat still for a few moments, and then commenced walking about the
room, and abruptly asked:

"What brought you here, Alexis?"

"My master's horse, Signor Conrad."

"Good, my little fox; but why did you come on your master's horse?"

"Because my master wishes to reach Leghorn to-night, to meet his
bride, Conrad."

"Then his is the special train ordered at nine, that I am to go with?"
exclaimed the guard eagerly.

"That is so, gentle Conrad; and now, having told you all, let me pay
our hostess and go."

"Pay! No one pays for me, little fox; no, no, go; I will pay."

The courier took his departure, and the guard kept walking up and down
the room, muttering to himself:

"To-night, it might be to-night. If he goes to Leghorn, he meets his
future wife; another life, and perhaps a dozen. No, it must be
to-night or never. Does his mother go? Fool that I am not to ask! Yes;
it shall be to-night;" and he left the room.

What should be "to-night?" Some foul play of which the count would be
the victim, no doubt. But how? when? That must be solved. To follow
him, or to wait--which? To wait. It is always best to wait; I had
learned this lesson already.

I waited. It was now rather more than half-past eight, and I had risen
to go to the door when I saw the guard returning to the wine-shop with
a man whose dress indicated the stoker.

"Come in, Guido; come in," said the guard; "and drink with me."

The man came in, and I was again absorbed in my book.

They seated themselves at the same table as before, and drank silently
for a while; presently the guard began a conversation in some patois I
could not understand; but I could see the stoker grow more and more
interested as the name of Beatrix occurred more frequently.

As the talk went on, the stoker seemed pressing the guard on some part
of the story with a most vindictive eagerness, repeatedly asking, "His
name? The accursed! His name?"

At last the guard answered, "The Count Spezzato."

"The Count Spezzato!" said the stoker, now leaving the table, and
speaking in Italian.

"Yes, good Guido; the man who will travel in the train we take
to-night to Leghorn."

"He shall die! The accursed! He shall die to-night!" said the stoker.
"If I lose my life, the betrayer of my sister shall die!"

The guard, returning to the unknown tongue, seemed to be endeavoring
to calm him; and I could only catch a repetition of the word "Empoli"
at intervals. Presently the stoker took from the seats beside him two
tin bottles, such as you may see in the hands of mechanics who dine
out; and I could see that one of them had rudely scratched on it the
name "William Atkinson." I fancied the guard produced from his pocket
a phial, and poured the contents into that bottle; but the action was
so rapid, and the corner so dark, that I could not be positive; then
rising, they stopped at the counter, had both bottles filled with
brandy, and went out.

It was now time to get to the station; and, having paid my modest
score, I went out.

A little in front of me, by the light from a small window, I saw these
two cross themselves, grip each other's hands across right to right,
left to left, and part.

The stoker had set down the bottles, and now taking them up followed
the guard at a slower pace.

{203}

Arrived at the station, I found the count, his mother, a female
servant, and the courier.

The count came up to me, and said, in broken English, "You are the
English to go to Leghorn with me? Very well, there is room. I like the
English. You shall pay nothing, because I do not sell tickets; you
shall go free. Is that so?"

I thanked him in the best Italian I could muster.

"Do not speak your Italian to me; I speak the English as a native; I
can know all you shall say to me in your own tongue. See, here is the
train special, as you call it. Enter, as it shall please you."

The train drew up to the platform; and I saw that the stoker was at
his post, and that the engine-driver was an Englishman.

I endeavored in vain to draw his attention to warn him, and was
compelled to take my seat, which I did in the compartment next the
guard's break--the train consisting of only that carriage and another,
in which were the count, his mother, and the servant.

The guard passed along the train, locked the doors, and entered his
box.

"The Florence goods is behind you, and the Sienna goods is due at
Empoli Junction four minutes before you; mind you don't run into it,"
said the station-master, with a laugh.

"No fear; _we_ shall not run into _it_," said the guard, with a marked
emphasis on the "we" and "it" that I recalled afterward.

The whistle sounded, and we were off. It was a drizzling dark night;
and I lay down full length on the seat to sleep.

As I lay down a gleam of light shot across the carriage from a small
chink in the wood-work of the partition between the compartment I was
in and the guard's box.

I was terribly anxious for the manner of the guard; and this seemed to
be a means of hearing something more. I lay down and listened
attentively.

"How much will you give for your life, my little fox?" said the guard.

"To-day, very little; when I am sixty, all I have, Conrad."

"But you might give something for it, to-night, sweet Alexis, if you
knew it was in danger?"

"I have no fear; Conrad Ferrate has too often conducted a train for me
to fear to-night."

"True, my good Alexis; but this is the last train he will ride with as
guard, for to-morrow he will be the Count Spezzato."

"How? To-morrow? You joke, Conrad. The brandy was strong; but you who
have drunk so much could hardly feel that."

"I neither joke, nor am I drunk; yet I shall be Count Spezzato
to-morrow, good Alexis. Look you, my gentle fox, my sweet fox; if you
do not buy your life of me, you shall die tonight. That is simple,
sweet fox."

"Ay; but, Conrad, I am not in danger."

"Nay, Alexis; see, here is the door" (I heard him turn the handle).
"If you lean against the door, you will fall out and be killed. Is it
not simple?"

"But, good Conrad, I shall not lean against the door."

"Oh, my sweet fox, my cunning fox, my timid fox, but not my strong
fox; you will lean against the door. I know you will, unless I prevent
you; and I will not prevent you, unless you give me all you have in
that bag."

The mocking tone of the guard seemed well understood, for I heard the
click of gold.

"Good, my Alexis; it is good; but it is very little for a life. Come,
what is your life worth, that you buy it with only your master's
money? it has cost you nothing. I see you will lean against that door,
which is so foolish."

"What, in the name of all the devils in hell, will you have?" said the
trembling voice of the courier. "Only a little more; just that belt
{204} that is under your shirt, under everything, next to your skin,
and dearer to you; only a little soft leather belt with pouches in. Is
not life worth a leather belt?"

"Wretch! All the earnings of my life are in that belt, and you know
it."

"Is it possible, sweet fox, that I have found your nest? I shall give
Marie a necklace of diamonds, then. Why do you wait? Why should you
fall from a train, and make a piece of news for the papers? Why?"

"Take it; and be accursed in your life and death!" and I heard the
belt flung on the floor of the carriage.

"Now, good Alexis, I am in funds; there are three pieces of gold for
you; you will need them at Leghorn. Will you drink? No? Then I will
tell you why, without drink. Do you know where we are?"

"Yes; between St. Dominico and Signa."

"And do you know where we are going?"

"Yes; to Leghorn."

"No, sweet Alexis, we are not; we are going to Empoli: the train will
go no further. Look you, little fox; we shall arrive at the junction
one minute before the Sienna goods train, and there the engine will
break down just where the rails cross; for two blows of a hammer will
convert an engine into a log; I shall get out to examine it; that will
take a little time; I shall explain to the count the nature of the
injury; that will take a little time; and then the goods train will
have arrived; and as it does not stop there, this train will go no
further than Empoli, and I shall be Count Spezzato to-morrow. How do
you like my scheme, little fox? Is it not worthy of your pupil? Oh, it
will be a beautiful accident; it will fill the papers. That beast of
an English who begged his place in the train will be fortunate; he
will cease, for goods trains are heavy. Eh! but it's a grand scheme--
the son, the mother, the servant, the stranger, the engine-driver, all
shall tell no tales."

"And the stoker?" said the courier.

"Oh, you and he and I shall escape. We shall be pointed at in the
street as the fortunate. It is good, is it not, Alexis, my fox? I have
told him that the count is the man who betrayed his sister. He
believes it, and is my creature. But, little fox, it was not my
cousin, it was myself, that took his Beatrix from her home. Is it not
good, Alexis? Is it not genius? And Atkinson--he, the driver--is now
stupid: he has drunk from his can the poppy juice that will make him
sleep for ever. I will be a politician. I am worthy of office. I will
become the Minister of a Bourbon when I am count, my dear fox, and you
shall be my comrade again, as of old."

I was, for a time, lost to every sensation save that of hearing. The
fiendish garrulity of the man had all the fascination of the serpent's
rattle. I felt helplessly resigned to a certain fate.

I was aroused by something white slowly passing the closed window of
the carriage. I waited a little, then gently opened it and looked out.
The stoker was crawling along the foot-board of the next carriage,
holding on by its handles, so as not to be seen by the occupants, and
holding the signal lantern that I had noticed at the back of the last
carriage in his hand. The meaning of it struck me in a moment: if by
any chance we missed the goods train from Sienna, we should be run
into from behind by the train from Florence.

The cold air that blew in at the open window refreshed me, and I could
think what was to be done. The train was increasing its pace rapidly.
Evidently the stoker, in sole charge, was striving to reach Empoli
before the other train, which we should follow, was due: he had to
make five minutes in a journey of forty-five, and, at the rate we were
going, we should do it. We stopped nowhere, and the journey was more
than half over. We were now between Segua and {205} Montelupo; another
twenty minutes and I should be a bruised corpse. Something must be
done.

I decided soon. Unfastening my bag, I took out my revolver, without
which I never travel, and looking carefully to the loading and
capping, fastened it to my waist with a handkerchief. I then cut with
my knife the bar across the middle of the window, and carefully looked
out. I could see nothing; the rain was falling fast, and the night as
dark as ever. I cautiously put out first one leg and then the other,
keeping my knees and toes close to the door, and lowered myself till I
felt the step. I walked carefully along the foot-board by side steps,
holding on to the handles of the doors, till I came to the end of the
carriages, and was next the tender. Here was a gulf that seemed
impassable. The stoker must have passed over it; why not I? Mounting
from the foot-board on to the buffer, and holding on to the iron hook
on which the lamps are hung, I stretched my legs to reach the flat
part of the buffer on the tender. My legs swung about with the
vibration, and touched nothing. I must spring. I had to hold with both
hands behind my back, and stood on the case of the buffer-spring, and,
suddenly leaving go, leaped forward, struck violently against the edge
of the tender, and grasped some of the loose lumps of coal on the top.
Another struggle brought me on my knees, bruised and bleeding, on the
top. I stood up, and at that moment the stoker opened the door of the
furnace, and turned toward me, shovel in hand, to put in the coals.
The bright red light from the fire enabled him to see me, while it
blinded me. He rushed at me, and then began a struggle that I shall
remember to my dying day.

He grasped me round the throat with one arm, dragging me close to his
breast, and with the other kept shortening the shovel for an effective
blow. My hands, numbed and bruised, were almost useless to me, and for
some seconds we reeled to and fro on the foot-plate in the blinding
glare. At last he got me against the front of the engine, and, with
horrible ingenuity, pressed me against it till the lower part of my
clothes were burnt to a cinder. The heat, however, restored my hands,
and at last I managed to push him far enough from my body to loosen my
pistol. I did not want to kill him, but I could not be very careful,
and I fired at his shoulder from the back. He dropped the shovel, the
arm that had nearly throttled me relaxed, and he fell. I pushed him
into a corner of the tender, and sat down to recover myself.

My object was to get to Empoli before the Sienna goods train, for I
knew nothing of what might be behind me. It was too late to stop, but
I might, by shortening the journey seven minutes instead of five, get
to Empoli three minutes before the goods train was due.

I had never been on an engine before in my life, but I knew that there
must be a valve somewhere that let the steam from the boiler into the
cylinders, and that, being important, it would be in a conspicuous
position. I therefore turned the large handle in front of me, and had
the satisfaction of finding the speed rapidly increased, and at the
same time felt the guard putting on the break to retard the train.
Spite of this, in ten minutes I could see some dim lights; I could not
tell where, and I still pressed on faster and faster.

In vain, between the intervals of putting on coals, did I try to
arouse the sleeping driver. There I was, with two apparently dead
bodies, on the foot-plate of an engine, going at the rate of forty
miles an hour, or more, amidst a thundering noise and vibration that
nearly maddened me.

At last we reached the lights, and I saw, as I dashed by, that we had
passed the dread point.

As I turned back, I could see the rapidly-dropping cinders from the
train which, had the guard's break been sufficiently powerful to have
made me {206} thirty seconds later, would have utterly destroyed me.

I was still in a difficult position. There was the train half a minute
behind us, which, had we kept our time, would have been four minutes
in front of us. It came on to the same rails, and I could hear its
dull rumble rushing on toward us fast. If I stopped there was no light
to warn them. I must go on, for the Sienna train did not stop at
Empoli.

I put on more fuel, and after some slight scalding, from turning on
the wrong taps, had the pleasure of seeing the water-gauge filling up.
Still I could not go on long; the risk was awful. I tried in vain to
write on a leaf of my note-book, and after searching in the tool-box,
wrote on the iron lid of the tank with a piece of chalk, "Stop
everything behind me. The train will not be stopped till three red
lights are ranged in a line on the ground. Telegraph forward." And
then, as we flew through the Empoli station, I threw it on the
platform. On we went; the same dull thunder behind warning me that I
dare not stop.

We passed through another station at full speed, and at length I saw
the white lights of another station in the distance. The sound behind
had almost ceased, and in a few moments more I saw the line of three
red lamps low down on the ground. I pulled back the handle, and after
an ineffectual effort to pull up at the station, brought up the train
about a hundred yards beyond Pontedera.

The porters and police of the station came up and put the train back,
and then came the explanation.

The guard had been found dead on the rails, just beyond Empoli, and
the telegraph set to work to stop the train. He must have found out
the failure of his scheme, and in trying to reach the engine, have
fallen on the rails.

The driver was only stupefied, and the stoker fortunately only
dangerously, not fatally, wounded.

Another driver was found, and the train was to go on.

The count had listened most attentively to my statements, and then,
taking my grimed hand in his, led me to his mother.

"Madam, my mother, you have from this day one other son: this, my
mother, is my brother."

The countess literally fell on my neck, and kissed me in the sight of
them all; and speaking in Italian said--

"Julian, he is my son; he has saved my life; and more, he has saved
your life. My son, I will not say much; what is your name?"

"Guy Westwood."

"Guy, my child, my son, I am your mother; you shall love me."

"Yes, my mother; he is my brother, I am his. He is English too; I like
English. He has done well. Blanche shall be his sister."

During the whole of this time both mother and son were embracing me
and kissing my cheeks, after the impulsive manner of their passionate
natures, the indulgence of which appears so strange to our cold blood.

The train was delayed, for my wounds and bruises to be dressed, and I
then entered their carriage and went to Leghorn with them.

Arrived there, I was about to say "Farewell."

"What is farewell, now? No; you must see Blanche, your sister. You
will sleep to my hotel: I shall not let you go. Who is she that in
your great book says, 'Where you go, I will go?' That is my spirit.
You must not leave me till--till you are as happy as I am."

He kept me, introduced me to Blanche, and persuaded me to write for
leave to stay another two months, when he would return to England with
me. Little by little he made me talk about Alice, till he knew all my
story.

"Ah! that is it; you shall be unhappy because you want £500 every
year, and I have so much as that. I am a patriot to get rid of my
money. So it is that you will not take money. You have saved my life,
and you will {207} not take money; but I shall make you take money, my
friend, English Guy; you shall have as thus." And he handed me my
appointment as secretary to one of the largest railways in Italy. "Now
you shall take money; now you will not go to your fogland to work like
a slave; you shall take the money. That is not all. I am one of the
practice patriots--no, the practical patriots--of Italy. They come to
me with their conspiracies to join, their secret societies to adhere
to, but I do not. I am director of ever so many railways; I make fresh
directions every day. I say to those who talk to me of politics, 'How
many shares will you take in this or in that?' I am printer of books;
I am builder of museums; I have great share in docks, and I say to
these, 'It is this that I am doing that is wanted.' This is not
conspiracy; it is not plot; it is not society with ribbons; but it is
what Italy, my country, wants. I grow poor; Italy grows rich. I am not
wise in these things; they cheat me, because I am an enthusiast. Now,
Guy, my brother, you are wise; you are deep; long in the head; in
short, you are English! You shall be my guardian in these things--you
shall save me from the cheat, and you shall work hard as you like for
all the money you shall take of me. Come, my Guy, is it so?"

Need I say that it was so? The count and his Blanche made their
honeymoon tour in England. They spent Christmas day with Alice and
myself at Mr. Morton's, and when they left, Alice and I left with
them, for our new home in Florence.

------

From The Cornhill Magazine.

THE WINDS.


  O wild raving west winds....
  Oh! where do ye rise from, and where do ye die?


The question which is put in these lines is one which has posed the
ingenuity of all who have ever thought on it; and though theories have
repeatedly been propounded to answer it, yet one and all fail, and we
again recur to the words of him who knew all things and said, "The
wind bloweth where it listeth, and thou hearest the sound thereof, but
canst not tell whence it cometh or whither it goeth."

However, though we cannot assign exactly the source whence the winds
rise or the goal to which they tend, the labors of meteorologists have
been so far successful as to enable us to understand the causes of the
great currents of air, and even to map out the winds which prevail at
different seasons in the various quarters of the globe. The problem
which has thus been solved is one vastly more simple than that of
saying why the wind changes on any particular day, or at what spot on
the earth's surface a particular current begins or ends. Were these
questions solved, there would be an end to all uncertainty about
weather. There need be no fear that the farmer would lose his crops
owing to the change of weather, if the advent of every shower had been
foretold by an unerring guide, and the precise day of the break in the
weather predicted weeks and months before. This is the point on which
weather-prophets--'astro-meteorologists' they call themselves
now-a-days--still venture their predictions, undismayed by their
reported and glaring failures. {208} It has been well remarked that
not one of these prophets foretold the dry weather which lasted for so
many weeks during the last summer; yet, even at the present day, there
are people who look to the almanacs to see what weather is to be
expected at a given date; and even the prophecies of "Old Moore" find,
or used to find within a very few years, an ample credence. In fact,
if we are to believe the opinions propounded by the positive
philosophers of the present day, we must admit that it is absurd to
place any limits on the possibility of predicting natural phenomena,
inasmuch as all operations of nature obey fixed and unalterable laws,
which are all discoverable by the unaided mind of man.

True science, we may venture to say, is more modest than these
gentlemen would have us to think it; and though in the particular
branch of knowledge of which we are now treating daily prophecies (or
'forecasts,' as Admiral Fitzroy is careful to call them) of weather
appear in the newspapers, yet these are not announced dogmatically,
and no attempt is made in them to foretell weather for more than
forty-eight hours in advance. We are not going to discuss the question
of storms and storm-signals at present, so we shall proceed to the
subject in hand--the ordinary wind-currents of the earth; and in
speaking of these shall confine ourselves as far as possible to
well-known and recorded facts, bringing in each case the best evidence
which we can adduce to support the theories which may be broached.

What, then, our readers will ask, is the cause of the winds? The
simple answer is--the sun. Let us see, now, how this indefatigable
agent, who appears to do almost everything on the surface of the
earth, from painting pictures to driving steam-engines, as George
Stephenson used to maintain that he did, is able to raise the wind.

If you light a fire in a room, and afterward stop up every chink by
which air can gain access to the fire, except the chimney, the fire
will go out in a short time. Again, if a lamp is burning on the table,
and you stop up the chimney at the top, the lamp will go out at once.
The reason of this is that the flame, in each case, attracts the air,
and if either the supply of air is cut off below, or its escape above
is checked, the flame cannot go on burning. This explanation, however,
does not bear to be pushed too far. The reason that the fire goes out
if the supply of air is cut off is, that the flame, so to speak, feeds
on air; while the sun cannot be said, in any sense, to be dependent on
the earth's atmosphere for the fuel for his fire. We have chosen the
illustration of the flame, because the facts are so well known. If,
instead of a lamp in the middle of a room, we were to hang up a large
mass of iron, heated, we should find that currents of air set in from
all sides, rose up above it, and spread out when they reached the
ceiling, descending again along the walls. The existence of these
currents may be easily proved by sprinkling a handful of fine chaff
about in the room. What is the reason of the circulation thus
produced? The iron, unless it be extremely hot, as it is when melted
by Mr. Bessemer's process, does not require the air in order to keep
up its heat; and, in fact, the constant supply of fresh air cools it,
as the metal gives away its own heat to the air as fast as the
particles of the latter come in contact with it. Why, then, do the
currents arise? Because the air, when heated, expands or gets lighter,
and rises, leaving an empty space, or vacuum, where it was before.
Then the surrounding cold air, being elastic, forces itself into the
open space, and gets heated in its turn.

From this we can see that there will be a constant tendency in the air
to flow toward that point on the earth's surface where the temperature
is highest--or, all other things being equal, to that point where the
sun may be at that moment in the zenith. Accordingly, if the earth's
surface were either {209} entirely dry land, or entirely water, and
the sun were continually in the plane of the equator, we should expect
to find the direction of the great wind-currents permanent and
unchanged throughout the year. The true state of the case is, however,
that these conditions are very far from being fulfilled. Every one
knows that the sun is not always immediately over the equator, but
that he is at the tropic of Cancer in June, and at the tropic of
Capricorn in December, passing the equator twice every year at the
equinoxes. Here, then, we have one cause which disturbs the regular
flow of the wind-currents. The effect of this is materially increased
by the extremely arbitrary way in which the dry land has been
distributed over the globe. The northern hemisphere contains the whole
of Europe, Asia, and North America, the greater part of Africa, and a
portion of South America; while in the southern hemisphere we only
find the remaining portions of the two last-named continents, with
Australia and some of the large islands in its vicinity. Accordingly,
during our summer there is a much greater area of dry land exposed to
the nearly vertical rays of the sun than is the case during our
winter.

Let us see for a moment how this cause acts in modifying the direction
of the wind-currents. We shall find it easier to make this
intelligible if we take an illustration from observed facts. It takes
about five times as much heat to raise a ton weight of water through a
certain range of temperature, as it does to produce the same effect in
the case of a ton of rock. Again, the tendency of a surface of dry
land to give out heat, and consequently to warm the air above it, and
cause it to rise, is very much greater than that of a surface of water
of equal area. Hence we can at once see the cause of the local winds
which are felt every day in calm weather in islands situated in hot
climates. During the day the island becomes very hot, and thus what
the French call a _courant ascendant_ is set in operation. The air
above the land gets hot and rises, while the colder air which is on
the sea all round it flows in to fill its place, and is felt as a cool
sea-breeze. During the night these conditions are exactly reversed:
the land can no longer get any heat from the sun, as he has set, while
it is still nearly as liberal in parting with its acquired heat as it
was before. Accordingly, it soon becomes cooler than the sea in its
neighborhood; and the air, instead of rising up over it, sinks down
upon it, and flows out to sea, producing a land-wind.

These conditions are, apparently, nearly exactly fulfilled in the
region of the monsoons, with the exception that the change of wind
takes place at intervals of six months, and not every twelve hours. In
this district--which extends over the southern portion of Asia and the
Indian ocean--the wind for half the year blows from one point, and for
the other half from that which is directly opposite. The winds are
north-east and south-west in Hindostan; and in Java, at the other side
of the equator, they are south-east and north-west. The cause of the
winds--monsoons they are called, from an Arabic word, _mausim_,
meaning season--is not quite so easily explained as that of the
ordinary land and sea breezes to which we have just referred. Their
origin is to be sought for in the temperate zone, and not between the
tropics. The reason of this is that the districts toward which the air
is sucked in are not those which are absolutely hottest, but those
where the rarefaction of the air is greatest. When the air becomes
lighter, it is said to be rarefied, and this rarefaction ought
apparently to be greatest where the temperature is highest. This would
be the case if the air were the only constituent of our atmosphere.
There is, however, a very important disturbing agent to be taken into
consideration, viz., aqueous vapor. There is always, when it is not
actually raining, a quantity of water rising from the surface of {210}
the sea and from every exposed water-surface, and mingling with the
air. This water is perfectly invisible: as it is in the form of vapor,
it is true steam, and its presence only becomes visible when it is
condensed so as to form a cloud. The hotter the air is, the more of
this aqueous vapor is it able to hold in the invisible condition.

We shall naturally expect to find a greater amount of this steam in
the air at places situated near the coast, than at those in the
interior of continents, and this is actually the case. The amount of
rarefaction which the dry air on the sea-coast of Hindostan undergoes
in summer, is partially compensated for by the increased tension of
the aqueous vapor, whose presence in the air is due to the action of
the sun's heat on the surface of the Indian ocean. In the interior of
Asia there is no great body of water to be found, and the winds from
the south lose most of the moisture which they contain in passing over
the Himalayas. Accordingly the air is extremely dry, and a
compensation, similar to that which is observed in Hindostan, cannot
take place. It is toward this district that the wind is sucked in, and
the attraction is sufficient to draw a portion of the south-east
trade-wind across the line into the northern hemisphere. In our winter
the region where the rarefaction is greatest is the continent of
Australia; and accordingly, in its turn, it sucks the north-east
trade-wind of the northern hemisphere across the equator. Thus we see
that in the region which extends from the coast of Australia to the
centre of Asia we have monsoons, or winds which change regularly every
six months. As to the directions of the different monsoons, we shall
discuss them when we have disposed of the trade-winds--which ought by
rights, as Professor Dove observes, rather to be considered as an
imperfectly developed monsoon, than the latter to be held as a
modification of the former.

The origin of the trade-winds is to be sought for, as before, in the
heating power of the sun, and their direction is a result of the
figure of the earth, and of its motion on its axis. When the air at
the equator rises, that in higher latitudes on either side flows in,
and would be felt as a north wind or as a south wind respectively, if
the earth's motion on its axis did not affect it. The figure of the
earth is pretty nearly that of a sphere, and, as it revolves round its
axis, it is evident that those points on its surface which are
situated at the greatest distance from the axis, will have to travel
over a greater distance in the same time than those which are near it.
Thus, for instance, London, which is nearly under the parallel of 50,
has only to travel about three-fifths of the distance which a place
like Quito, situated under the equator, has to travel in the same
time. A person situated in London is carried, imperceptibly to
himself, by the motion of the earth, through 15,000 miles toward the
eastward in the twenty-four hours; while another at Quito is carried
through 25,000 miles in the same time. Accordingly, if the Londoner,
preserving his own rate of motion, were suddenly transferred to Quito,
he would be left 10,000 miles behind the other in the course of the
twenty-four hours, or would appear to be moving in the opposite
direction, from east to west, at the rate of about 400 miles an hour.
The case would be just as if a person were to be thrown into a railway
carriage which was moving at full speed; he would appear to his
fellow-passengers to be moving in the opposite direction to them,
while in reality the motion of progression was in the train, not in
the person who was thrown into it. The air is transferred from high to
low latitudes, but this change is gradual, and the earth, accordingly,
by means of the force of friction, is able to retard its relative
velocity before it reaches the tropics so that its actual velocity,
though still considerable, is far below 400 miles an hour.

This wind comes from high latitudes and becomes more and more easterly
{211} reaching us as a nearly true north-east wind; and as it gets
into lower latitudes becoming more and more nearly east, and forming a
belt of north-east wind all round the earth on the northern side of
the equator. In the southern hemisphere, there is a similar belt of
permanent winds, which are, of course, south-easterly instead of
north-easterly. These belts are not always at equal distances at each
side of the equator, as their position is dependent on the situation
of the zone of maximum temperature for the time being. When we reach
the actual district where the air rises, we find the easterly
direction of the wind no longer so remarkable, as has been noticed by
Basil Hall and others. The reason is, that by the time that the air
reaches the district where it rises, it has obtained by means of its
friction with the earth's surface a rate of motion round the earth's
axis nearly equal to that of the earth's surface itself.

The trade-wind zones, called, by the Spaniards, the "Ladies' Sea"--_El
Golfo de las Damas_--because navigation on a sea where the wind never
changed was so easy, shift their position according to the apparent
motion of the sun in the ecliptic. In the Atlantic the north-east
trade begins in summer in the latitude of the Azores; in winter it
commences to the south of the Canaries.

In the actual trade-wind zones rain very seldom falls, any more than
it does in these countries when the east wind has well set in. The
reason of this is, that the air on its passage from high to low
latitudes is continually becoming warmer and warmer. According as its
temperature rises, its power of dissolving (so to speak) water
increases also, and so it is constantly increasing its burden of water
until it reaches the end of its journey, where it rises into the
higher regions of the atmosphere, and there is suddenly cooled. The
chilling process condenses, to a great extent, the aqueous vapor
contained in the trade-wind air, and causes it to fall in constant
discharges of heavy rain. Throughout the tropics the rainy season
coincides with that period at which the sun is in the zenith, and in
this region the heaviest rain-fall on the globe is observed. The
wettest place in the world, Cherrapoonjee, is situated in the Cossya
hills, about 250 miles northeast of Calcutta, just outside the torrid
zone. There the ram-fall is upward of 600 inches in the year, or
twenty times as much as it is on the west coasts of Scotland and
Ireland. However, in such extreme cases as this, there are other
circumstances to be taken into consideration, such as the position of
the locality as regards mountain chains, which may cause the clouds to
drift over one particular spot.

To return to the wind: When the air rises at the equatorial edge of
the trade-wind zone, it flows away above the lower trade-wind current.
The existence of an upper current in the tropics is well known.
Volcanic ashes, which have fallen in several of the West Indian
islands on several occasions, have been traced to volcanoes which lay
to the westward of the locality where the ashes fell, at a time when
there was no west wind blowing at the sea-level. To take a recent
instance: ashes fell at Kingston, Jamaica, in the year 1835, and it is
satisfactorily proved that they had been ejected from the volcano of
Coseguina, on the Pacific shore of Central America, and must
consequently have been borne to the eastward by an upward current
counter to the direction of the easterly winds which were blowing at
the time at the sea-level.

Captain Maury supposes that when the air rises, at either side of the
equator, it crosses over into the opposite hemisphere, so that there
is a constant interchange of air going on between the northern and
southern hemispheres. This he has hardly sufficiently proved, and his
views are not generally accepted. One of the arguments on which he
lays great stress in support of his theory is that on certain
occasions dust has fallen in {212} various parts of western Europe,
and that in it there have been discovered microscopical animals
similar to those which are found in South America. This appears to be
scarcely an incontrovertible proof; as Admiral Fitzroy observes:
"Certainly, such insects may be found in Brazil; but does it follow
that they are not also in Africa, under nearly the same parallel?"

This counter-current, or "anti-trade," as Sir J. Herschel has called
it, is at a high level in the atmosphere between the tropics, far
above the top of the highest mountains; but at the exterior edge of
the trade-wind zone, it descends to the surface of the ground. The
Canary islands are situated close to this edge, and accordingly we
find that there is always a westerly wind at the summit of the Peak of
Teneriffe, while the wind at the sea-level, in the same island, is
easterly throughout the summer months. Professor Piazzi Smyth, who
lived for some time on the top of that mountain, making astronomical
observations, has recorded some very interesting details of the
conflicts between the two currents, which he was able to observe
accurately from his elevated position. In winter the trade-wind zone
is situated to the south of its summer position in latitude, and at
this season the southwest wind is felt at the sea-level in the Canary
islands. Similar facts to these have been observed in other localities
where there are high mountains situated on the edge of the trade-wind
zone, as, for instance, Mouna Loa, in the Sandwich islands. There can,
therefore, be no doubt that the warm, moist west wind, which is felt
so generally in the temperate zones, is really the air returning to
the poles from the equator, which has now assumed a south-west
direction on its return journey, owing to conditions the reverse of
those which imparted to it a north-east motion on its way toward the
equator. This, then, is our south-west wind, which is so prevalent in
the North Atlantic ocean that the voyage from Europe to America is not
unfrequently called the up-hill trip, in contradistinction to the
down-hill passage home. These are the "brave west winds" of Maury,
whose refreshing action on the soil he never tires of recapitulating.

The south-west monsoons of Hindostan, which blow from May to October,
and the north-west monsoons of the Java seas, which are felt between
November and April, owe their westerly motion to a cause similar to
that of the anti-trades which we have just described. To take the case
of the monsoons of Hindostan: we have seen above how the rarefaction
of the air in Central Asia attracts the southeast trade-wind of the
southern hemisphere across the equator. This air, when it moves from
the equator into higher latitudes, brings with it the rate of motion,
to the eastward, of the equatorial regions which it has lately left,
and is felt as a south-west wind. Accordingly, the directions of the
monsoons are thus accounted for. In the winter months the true
north-east trade-wind is felt in Hindostan; while in the summer months
its place is taken by the south-east trade of the southern hemisphere,
making its appearance as the south-west monsoon. In Java, conditions
exactly converse to these are in operation, and the winds are
south-east from April to November, and north-west during the rest of
the year.

The change of one monsoon to the other is always accompanied by rough
weather, called in some places the "breaking out" of the monsoon; just
as with us the equinox, or change of the season from summer to winter,
and _vice versa_, is marked by "windy weather," or "equinoctial
gales."

The question may, however, well be asked, why there are no monsoons in
the Atlantic Ocean?

In the first place, the amount of rarefaction which the air in Africa
and in Brazil undergoes, in the respective hot seasons of those
regions, is far less considerable than that which is {213} observed in
Asia and Australia at the corresponding seasons.

Secondly, in the case of the Atlantic ocean, the two districts toward
which the air is attracted are situated within the torrid zone, while
in the Indian ocean they are quite outside the tropics, and in the
temperate zones. Accordingly, even if the suction of the air across
the equator did take place to the same extent in the former case as in
the latter, the extreme contrast in direction between the two monsoons
would not be perceptible to the same extent, owing to the fact that
the same amount of westing could not be imparted to the wind, because
it had not to travel into such high latitudes on either side of the
equator. A tendency to the production of the phenomena of the monsoons
is observable along the coast of Guinea, where winds from the south
and south-west are very generally felt. These winds are not really the
south-east trade-wind, which has been attracted across the line to the
northern hemisphere, They ought rather to be considered as of the same
nature as the land and sea breezes before referred to, since we find
it to be very generally the case, that in warm climates the ordinary
wind-currents undergo a deflection to a greater or less extent along a
coast-line such as that of Guinea, Brazil, or north of Australia.

Our readers may perhaps ask why it is, that when we allege that the
whole of the winds of the globe owe their origin to a regular
circulation of the air from the Polar regions to the equator, and back
again, we do not find more definite traces of such a circulation in
the winds of our own latitudes? The answer to this is, that the traces
of this circulation are easily discoverable if we only know how to
look for them, In the Mediterranean sea, situated near the northern
edge of the trade-wind zone, the contrast between the equatorial and
polar currents of air is very decidedly marked. The two conflicting
winds are known under various names in different parts of the
district. The polar current, on its way to join the trade-wind, is
termed the "tramontane," in other parts the "bora," the "maestral,"
etc.; while the return trade-wind, bringing rain, is well known under
the name of the "sirocco." In Switzerland the same wind is called the
"Fohn," and is a warm wind, which causes the ice and snow to melt
rapidly, and constantly brings with it heavy rain.

In these latitudes the contrast is not so very striking, but even here
every one knows that the only winds which last for more than a day or
two at a time are the north-east and the south-west winds, the former
of which is dry and cold, the latter moist and warm. The difference
between these winds is much more noticeable in winter than in summer,
inasmuch as in the latter season Russia and the northern part of Asia
enjoy, relatively to the British Islands, a much higher temperature
than is the case in winter; so that the air which moves from those
regions during the summer months does not come to us from a climate
which is colder than our own, but from one which is warmer.

So far, then, we have attempted to trace the ordinary wind-currents,
but as yet there are very many questions connected therewith which are
not quite sufficiently explained. To mention one of these, we hear
from many observers on the late Arctic expeditions, that the most
marked characteristic of the winds in the neighborhood of Baffin's
Bay, is the great predominance of north-westerly winds. It is not as
yet, nor can it ever be satisfactorily, decided how far to the
northward and westward this phenomenon is noticeable. The question
then is, Whence does this north-west wind come?

As to the causes of the sudden changes of wind, and of storms, they
are as yet shrouded in mystery, and we cannot have much expectation
that in our lifetime, at least, much will be done to unravel the web.
Meteorology is a very young science--if it deserves {214} the title of
science at all--and until observations for a long series of years
shall have been made at many stations, we shall not be in the
possession of trustworthy facts on which to ground our reasoning. It
is merely shoving the difficulty a step further off to assign these
irregular variations to atmospheric waves. It will be time enough to
reason accurately about the weather and its changes when we ascertain
what these atmospheric waves are, and what causes them. Until the
"astro-meteorologists" will tell us the principles on which their
calculations are based, we must decline to receive their predictions
as worthy of any credence whatever.

------

From The Month.

EUGÉNIE AND MAURICE DE GUÉRIN.


The life of Eugénie de Guérin forms a great contrast with those which
are generally brought before the notice of the world. Not only did she
not seek for fame, but the circumstances of her life were the very
ones which generally tend to keep a woman in obscurity. Her life was
passed in the deepest retirement of a country home. The society even
of a provincial town was not within her reach. Poverty placed a bar
between her and the means for study in congenial society. The routine
of her life shut her out from great deeds or unusual achievements. In
fact, her life, so far from being a deviation from the ordinary track
which women have to tread, was a very type of the existence which
seems to be marked out for the majority of women, and at which they
are so often wont to murmur. The want of an aim in life, the necessity
of some fixed, engrossing occupation, and the _ennui_ which follows on
the deprivation of these, forms the staple trial of thousands of
women, especially in England, where there is much intellectual vigor
with so little power for its exercise. That the reaction from this
deprivation is shown by "fastness," or an excessive love of dress and
amusement, is acknowledged by the most keen observers of human nature.
But to the large class of women who, disdaining such means of
distraction, bear their burden patiently, Eugénie de Guérin's _Journal
et Lettres_ possess an intense interest. Her life was so uneventful
that it absolutely affords no materials for a biography, but her
character is so full of interest that her name is now a familiar one
in England and France.

Far away in the heart of sunny Languedoc stands the chateau of Le
Cayla, the home of the de Guérins. They were of noble blood. The old
chateau was full of reminiscences of the deeds of their ancestors. De
Guérin, Bishop of Senlis and Chancellor of France, had gone forth,
with a valor scarcely befitting his episcopal character, to animate
the troops at the battle of Bouvines; and from the walls of Le Cayla
looked down from his portrait de Guérin, Grand Master of the Knights
of Malta in 1206. A cardinal, a troubadour, and countless gallant and
noble soldiers filled up the family rolls--the best blood in France
had mingled with theirs; but now the family were obscure, forgotten,
and poor. But these circumstances were no hindrances to the happiness
of Eugénie's early life.

"My childhood passed away like one long summer-day," said she {215}
afterward. Thirteen happy years fled by. There was the father,
cherished with tender, self-forgetting love; the brother Eranbert; the
sister Marie, the youngest pet of the household; the beautiful and
precocious Maurice; and the mother, the centre of all, loving and
beloved. But a shadow suddenly fell on the sunny landscape, and Madame
de Guérin lay on her death-bed, when, calling to her Eugénie, her
eldest child, she gave to her especial charge Maurice, then aged
seven, and his mother's darling. The dying lips bade Eugénie fill a
mother's place to him, and the sensitive and enthusiastic girl
received the words into her heart, and never forgot them.

From that day her childhood, almost her youth, ended; and it is
without exaggeration we may say that the depth of maternal love passed
into her heart. Henceforth Maurice was the one object and the
absorbing thought of her heart, second only to one other, and that no
love of earth. Sometimes, indeed, that passionate devotion to Maurice
disputed the sway of the true Master, as we shall hereafter see, but
it was never ultimately victorious. It was not likely that their lives
should for long run side by side. The extraordinary brilliancy of
Maurice's gifts made his father determine upon cultivating his mind.
As soon as possible, he was sent first to the _petit séminaire_ at
Toulouse, and then to the college Stanislaus at Paris.

Maurice de Guérin was a singularly endowed being. He possessed that
kind of personal beauty so very rare among men, and which is so hard
to describe--a spiritual beauty, which insensibly draws the hearts of
others to its possessor. Added to this, he had that sweetness of tone
and manner, that instinctive power of sympathy, that sparkling
brilliance which made him idolized by those who knew him, which
rendered him literally the darling of his friends. "_Il était leur
vie_," said those who spoke of him after he was gone from earth.

The early and ardent aspirations of this gifted being were turned
heavenward. His youthful head was devoutly bowed in prayer. The
country people called him "_le jeune saint_;" and his conduct at the
_petit séminaire_ gave such satisfaction that the Archbishop of
Toulouse, and also the Archbishop of Rouen, offered to take the whole
charge of his future education on themselves; but his father refused
both. The temptations of a college life had left him scathless, and
the longing of his soul was for the consecration of the priesthood.
What he might have been, had he fallen into other hands, cannot now be
known. Whether there was an inherent weakness and effeminacy in the
character which would have unfitted him for the awful responsibilities
of the priestly office, we know not. At all events, he was attracted,
as many minds of undoubted superiority were at that time, by the
extraordinary brilliancy and commanding genius of de Lamennais; and
Maurice de Guérin found himself in the solitude of La Chesnaie, a
fellow-student with Hippolyte Lacordaire, Montalembert, Saint-Beuve,
and a group of others. Here some years of his life were spent, divided
between prayer, study, and brilliant conversation, led and sustained
by M. de Lamennais. Maurice, of a shy and diffident disposition, does
not seem to have attached himself to Lamennais, although he admired
and looked up to him, and although the insidious portion of his
teaching was making havoc with his faith.

And now, it may be asked, what of Eugénie? Dwelling in an obscure
province, with no other living guide than a simple parish curé, with a
natural enthusiastic reverence for genius, and a predilection for all
Maurice's friends, was she not dazzled from afar off by this great
teacher of men's minds, this earnest reformer of abuses? The instinct
of the single in heart was hers. Long ere others had discerned the
canker eating away the fruit so fair to look on, Eugénie, with
prophetic voice, was warning Maurice. {216} Lacordaire's noble soul
was yet ensnared. Madam Swetchine's remonstrances had not yet
prevailed; while this young girl in the country, whose name no one
knew, was watching and praying for the issue of the deliberations at
La Chesnaie.

At length the break-up came--the memorable journey to Rome was over.
Submission had been required, and Lacordaire had given it. "Silence is
the second power in the world," he had said to Lamennais; and he had
withdrawn with him to La Chesnaie for a time of retreat, where he was
soon undeceived as to Lamennais' intentions. And these two great men
parted--one to reap the fruits of patient obedience in the success of
one of the greatest works wrought in his century, to gain a mastery
over the men of his age, and to die at last worn out by labors before
his time, the beloved child of the Church, whose borders he had
enlarged, whose honor he had defended; the other, to follow the course
of self-will, and to quench his light in utter darkness.

The students of La Chesnaie went away, and Maurice was thrown on the
world with no definite employment. An unsuccessful attachment deepened
the natural melancholy of his sensitive nature. He went to Paris, and
was soon in the midst of the literary world. He wrote, and obtained
fame; he was admired and sought after; but the beautiful faith of his
youth faded away like a flower, and the innocent pleasures of his
childhood, and the passionate love of his sister, had no attractions
for him compared to the brilliant circles of Parisian society.

And thus was Eugénie's fate marked out. From afar off her heart
followed him; and, partly for his amusement, partly to relieve the
outpourings of her intensely-loving heart, she kept a journal,
intended for Maurice's eye only. A few letters to Maurice and one or
two intimate friends make up the rest of the volume, which was, after
her death, most fortunately given to the world. In these pages her
character stands revealed, and no long description of her mode of life
could have made us more thoroughly acquainted with her than these
words, written sometimes in joy, sometimes in sorrow, in weariness and
depression, in all weathers, and at all times; for, believing that she
pleased her brother, nothing would prevent her from keeping her
promise of a daily record of her life and thoughts. Its chief beauty
lies in that she made so much out of so little. "I have just come away
very happy from the kitchen, where I stood a long time this evening,
to persuade Paul, one of our servants, to go to confession at
Christmas. He has promised me, and he is a good boy and will keep his
word. Thank God, my evening is not lost! What a happiness it would be
if I could thus every day gain a soul for God! Walter Scott has been
neglected this evening; but what book could have been worth to me what
Paul's promise is? . . . _The 20th_.--I am so fond of the snow! Its
perfect whiteness has something celestial about it. To-day I see
nothing but road-tracks, and the marks of the feet of little birds.
Lightly as they rest, they leave their little traces in a thousand
forms upon the snow. It is so pretty to see their little red feet, as
if they were all drawn with pencils of coral. Winter has its beauties
and its enjoyments, and we find them every-where when we know how to
see them. God spreads grace and beauty everywhere. ... I must have
another dish to-day for S.R., who is come to see us. He does not often
taste good things--that is why I wish to treat him well; for it is to
the desolate that, it seems to me, we should pay attentions. No
reading to-day. I have made a cap for a little child, which has taken
up all my time. But, provided one works, be it with the head or the
fingers, it is all the same in the eyes of God, who takes account of
every work done in his name. I hope, then, that my cap has been a
charity--I have given my time, a little material, and a thousand
interesting lines that I could {217} have read. Papa brought me
yesterday _Ivanhoe_, and the _Siècle de Louis XIV_. Here are
provisions for some of our long winter evenings."

Then she had a keen sense of enjoyment, and a wonderful faculty of
making the best of things. Thus a simple pleasure to her was a source
of delight. Here is her description of Christmas night in Languedoc:

"_Dec. 31_. I have written nothing for a fortnight. Do not ask me why.
There are times when we cannot speak, things of which we can say
nothing. Christmas is come--that beautiful fête which I love the most,
which brings me as much joy as the shepherds of Bethlehem. Truly our
whole soul sings at the coming of the Lord, which is announced to us
on all sides by hymns and by the pretty _nadalet_.  [Footnote 49]
Nothing in Paris can give an idea of what Christmas is. You have not
even midnight mass.  [Footnote 50] We all went to it, papa at our
head, on a most charming night. There is no sky more beautiful than
that of midnight: it was such that papa kept putting his head out of
his cloak to look at it. The earth was white with frost, but we were
not cold, and, beside, the air around us was warmed by the lighted
fagots that our servants carried to light us. It was charming, I
assure you, and I wish I could have seen you sliding along with us
toward the church on the road, bordered with little white shrubs, as
if they were flowering. The frost makes such pretty flowers! We saw
one wreath so pretty that we wanted to make it a bouquet for the
Blessed Sacrament, but it melted in our hands; all flowers last so
short a time. I very much regretted my bouquet; it was so sad to see
it melt drop by drop. I slept at the presbytery. The curé's good
sister kept me, and gave me an excellent _réveillon_ of hot milk."
Then, again, the grave part of her nature prevails, and she continues:

  [Footnote 49: A particular way of ringing the bells during the
  fifteen days which precede the feast of Christmas, called in _patois
  nodal_.]

  [Footnote 50: Since the period at which Mdlle. de Guérin wrote,
  midnight mass has been resumed in Paris.]


"These are, then, my last thoughts; for I shall write nothing more
this year; in a few hours it will be over, and we shall have begun a
new year. Oh, how quickly time passes! Alas, alas, can I say that I
regret it? No, my God, I do not regret time, or anything that it
brings; it is not worth while to throw our affections into its stream.
But empty, useless days, lost for heaven, this causes me regret as I
look back on life. Dearest, where shall I be at this day, at this
hour, at this minute, next year? Will it be here, elsewhere; here
below, or above? God only knows; I am before the door of the future,
resigned to all that can come forth from it. To-morrow I will pray for
your happiness, for papa, Mimi, Eran [her other brother and sister],
and all those whom I love. It is the day for presents; I will take
mine from heaven. I draw all from thence, for truly there are few
things which please me on earth. The longer I live, the less it
pleases me, and I see the years pass by without sorrow, because they
are but steps to the other world. Do not think it is any sorrow or
trouble which makes me think this. I assure you it is not, but a
home-sickness comes over my soul when I think of heaven. The clock
strikes; it is the last I shall hear when writing to you."

The following is an account of what she called "a happy day:" "God be
blessed for a day without sorrow. They are rare in this life, and my
soul, more than others, is soon troubled. A word, a memory, the sound
of a voice, a sad face, nothing, I know not what, often troubles the
serenity of my soul--a little sky, darkened by the smallest cloud.
This day I received a letter from Gabrielle, the cousin whom I love so
for her sweetness and beautiful mind. I was uneasy about her health,
which is so delicate, having heard nothing of her for more than a
month. I was so pleased to see a letter from her, that I read it
before my prayers. I was so eager to read it. To see a letter, and not
to open it, is {218} an impossible thing. Another letter was given to
me at Cahuzac. It was from Lili, another sweet friend, but quite
withdrawn from the world; a pure soul--a soul like snow, from its
purity so white that I am confounded when I look at it--a soul made
for the eyes of God. I was coming from Cahuzac, very pleased with my
letter, when I saw a little boy, weeping as if his heart were broken.
He had broken his jug, and thought his father would beat him. I saw
that with half a franc I could make him happy, so I took him to a
shop, where we got another jug. Charles X. could not be happier if he
regained his crown. Has it not been a beautiful day?"

Here is another instance of the way she had of beautifying the most
simple incidents: "I must notice, in passing, an excellent supper that
we have had--papa, Mimi, and I--at the corner of the kitchen-fire,
with the servants: soup, some boiled potatoes, and a cake that I made
yesterday with the dough from the bread. Our only servants were the
dogs Lion, Wolf, and Tritly, who licked up the fragments. All our
people were in church for the instruction which is given for
confirmation;" and, she adds, "it was a charming meal."

The daily devotions of the month of Mary were very recently
established when Eugénie wrote; she speaks thus of them: on one first
of May when absent from home, she writes: "On this day, at this
moment, my holy Mimi (a pet name for her sister) is on her knees
before the little altar for the month of Mary in my room. Dear sister,
I join myself to her, and find a chapel here also. They have given me
for this purpose a room filled with flowers; in it I have made a
church, and Marie, with her little girls, servants, shepherds, and all
the household, assemble together every evening before the Blessed
Virgin. They came at first only to look on, for they had never kept
the month of Mary before. Some good will result to them of this new
devotion, if it is only one idea, a single idea, of their Christian
duties, which these people know so little of, and which we can teach
them while amusing them. These popular devotions please me so, because
they are so attractive in their form, and thereby offer such an easy
method of instruction. By their means, salutary truths appear most
pleasing, and all hearts are gained in the name of our Lady and of her
sweet virtues. I love the month of Mary, and the other little
devotions which the Church permits; which she blesses; which are born
at the feet of the Faith like flowers at the mountain-foot."

Speaking of St. Teresa, to whom she had a great devotion, she says: "I
am pleased to remember that, when I lost my mother, I went, like St.
Teresa, to throw myself at the feet of the Blessed Virgin, and begged
her to take me for her daughter." At another time she says: "To-day,
very early, I went to Vieux, to visit the relics of the saints, and,
in particular, those of St. Eugénie, my patron. I love pilgrimages,
remnants of the ancient faith; but these are not the days for them; in
the greater number of people the spirit for them is dead. However, if
M. le Curé does not have this procession to Vieux, there will be
discontent. Credulity abounds where faith disappears. We have,
however, many good souls, worthy to please the saints, like Rose
Drouille, who knows how to meditate, who has learnt so much from the
rosary; then Françon de Gaillard and her daughter Jacquette, so
recollected in church. This holy escort did not accompany me; I was
alone with my good angel and Mimi. Mass heard, my prayers finished, I
left with one hope more. I had come to ask something from St. Eugène?
The saints are our brothers. If you were all-powerful, would you not
give me all that I desired? This is what I was thinking of while
invoking St. Eugène, who is also my patron. We have so little in this
world, at least let us hope in the other."

Those who are not of the same faith as Eugénie de Guérin have not
failed {219} to be attracted by the depth and ardor of her faith and
piety. A writer in the _Cornhill Magazine_ observes, "The relation to
the priest, the practice of confession assume, when she speaks of
them, an aspect which is not that under which Exeter Hall knows them."

"In my leisure time I read a work of Leitniz, which delighted me by
its catholicity and the pious things which I found in it--like this on
confession:

"'I regard a pious, grave, and prudent confessor as a great instrument
of God for the salvation of souls; for his counsels serve to direct
our affections, to enlighten us about our faults, to make us avoid the
occasions of sin, to dissipate our doubts, to raise up our broken
spirit; finally, to cure or to mitigate all the maladies of the soul;
and, if we can never find on earth anything more excellent than a
faithful friend, what happiness is it not to find one who is obliged,
by the inviolable law of a divine sacrament, to keep faith with us and
to succor souls?'

"This celestial friend I have in M. Bories, and therefore the news of
his departure has deeply affected me. I am sad with a sadness which
makes the soul weep. I should not say this to any one else; they would
not, perhaps, understand me, and would take it ill. In the world they
know not what a confessor is--a man who is a friend of our soul, our
most intimate confidant, our physician, our light, our teacher--a
friend who binds us to him, and is bound to us; who gives us peace,
who opens heaven to us, who speaks to us while we, kneeling, call him,
like God, our father; and faith truly makes him God and father. When I
am at his feet, I see nothing else in him than Jesus listening to
Magdalen, and pardoning much because she has loved much. Confession is
but an expansion of repentance in love."

Again she writes: "I have learnt that M. Bories is about to leave us--
this good and excellent father of my soul. Oh, how I regret him! What
a loss it will be to me to lose this good guide of my conscience, of
my heart, my mind, of my whole self, which God had confided to him,
and which I had trusted to him with such perfect freedom! I am sad
with the sadness which makes the soul weep. My God, in my desert to
whom shall I have recourse? Who will sustain me in my spiritual
weakness? who will lead me on to great sacrifices? It is in this last,
above all, that I regret M. Bories. He knew what God had put into my
heart. I needed his strength to follow it. The new curé cannot replace
him; he is so young; then he appears so inexperienced, so undecided.
It is necessary to be firm to draw a soul from the midst of the world,
and to sustain it against the assaults of flesh and blood.

"It is Saturday--the day of pilgrimage to Cahuzac. I will go there;
perhaps I shall come back more tranquil. God has always given me some
blessing in that chapel, where I have left so many miseries... I was
not mistaken in thinking that I should come back more tranquil. M.
Bories is not going! How happy I am, and how thankful to God for this
favor. It is such a great blessing to me to keep this good father,
this good guide, this choice of God for my soul, as St. Francis de
Sales expresses it.

"Confession is such a blessed thing, such a happiness for the
Christian soul; a great good, and always greater in measure when we
feel it to be so; and when the heart of the priest, into which we pour
our sorrow, resembles that Divine Heart _which has loved us so much_.
This is what attaches me to M. Bories; you will understand it."

Nevertheless, when the trial of parting with this beloved friend did
come, at length, it was borne with gentle submission.

"Our pastor is come to see us. I have not said much to you about him.
He is a simple and good man, knowing his duties well, and speaking
better of God than of the world, which he knows little of. Therefore,
he does not shine in conversation. {220} His conversation is ordinary,
and those who do not know what the true spirit of a priest is would
think little of him. He does good in the parish, for his gentleness
wins souls. He is our father now. I find him young after M. Bories. I
miss that strong and powerful teaching which strengthened me; but it
is God who has taken it from me. Let us submit and walk like children,
without looking at the hand which leads us."

Eugénie's life revolved round that of Maurice. No length of separation
could weaken her affection, nor make her interest in his pursuits less
engrossing. His letters, so few and so scanty, were treasured up and
dwelt upon in many a lonely hour. She suffered with him, wept over his
disappointments, and prayed for his return to the faith of his youth
with all the earnestness of her soul. With exquisite tact she avoided
preaching to him. It was rather by showing him what religion was to
her that she strove to lead him back to its practice.

"_Holy Thursday_.--I have come back all fragrant from the chapel of
moss, in the church where the Blessed Sacrament is reposing. It is a
beautiful day when God wills to rest among the flowers and perfumes of
the springtime. Mimi, Rose, and I made this _reposoir_, aided by M. le
Curé. I thought, as we were doing it, of the supper-room, of that
chamber well furnished, where Jesus willed to keep the pasch with his
disciples, giving himself for the Lamb. Oh, what a gift! What can one
say of the Eucharist? I know nothing to say. We adore; we possess; we
live; we love. The soul is without words, and loses itself in an abyss
of happiness. I thought of you among these ecstasies, and ardently
desired to have you at my side, at the holy table, as I had three
years ago."

Mademoiselle de Guérin occasionally composed; her brother was very
anxious she should publish her productions, but she shrank from the
responsibility. "St. Jean de Damas," she remarks, "was forbidden to
write to any one, and for having composed some verses for a friend he
was expelled from the convent. That seemed to me very severe; but one
sees the wisdom of it, when, after supplication and much humility, the
saint had been forgiven, he was ordered to write and to employ his
talents in conquering the enemies of Jesus Christ. He was found strong
enough to enter the lists when he had been stripped of pride. He wrote
against the iconoclasts. Oh, if many illustrious writers had begun by
a lesson of humility, they would not have made so many errors nor so
many books. Pride has blinded them, and thus see the fruits which they
produce, into how many errors they lead the erring. But this chapter
on the science of evil is too wide for me. I should prefer saying that
I have sewn a sheet. A sheet leads me to reflect, it will cover so
many people, so many different slumbers--perhaps that of the tomb. Who
knows if it will not be my shroud, and if these stitches which I make
will not be unpicked by the worms? While I was sewing, papa told me
that he had sent, without my knowledge, some of my verses to Bayssac,
and I have seen the letter where M. de Bagne speaks of them and says
they are very good. A little vanity came to me and fell into my
sewing. Now I tell myself the thought of death is good to keep us from
sin. It moderates joy, tempers sadness, makes us see that all which
passes by us is transitory."

Again she writes: "Dear one, I would that I could see you pray like a
good child of God. What would it cost you? Your soul is naturally
loving, and prayer is nothing else but love; a love which spreads
itself out into the soul as the water flows from the fountain."

******

"_Ash-Wednesday_.--Here I am, with ashes on my forehead and serious
thoughts in my mind. This 'Remember thou art dust!' is terrible to me.
I hear it all day long. I cannot banish {221} the thought of death,
particularly in your room, where I no longer find you, where I saw you
so ill, where I have sad memories both of your presence and your
absence. One thing only is bright--the little medal of Our Lady,
suspended over the head of your bed. It is still untarnished and in
the same place where I put it to be your safeguard. I wish you knew,
dearest, the pleasure I have in seeing it--the remembrances, the
hopes, the secret thoughts that are connected with that holy image. I
shall guard it as a relic; and, if ever you return to sleep in that
little bed, you shall sleep again near the medal of the Blessed
Virgin. Take from, me this confidence and love, not to a bit of metal,
but to the image of the Mother of God. I should like to know, if in
your new room I should see St. Teresa, who used to hang in your other
room near the _bénitier:_

      'Où toi, nécessiteux
  Défaillant, tu prenais l'aumône dans ce creux.'

You will no longer, I fear, seek alms there. Where will you seek them?
Who can tell? Is the world in which you live rich enough for all your
necessities? Maurice, if I could but make you understand one of these
thoughts, breathe into you what I believe, and what I learn in pious
books--those beautiful reflections of the Gospel--if I could see you a
Christian, I would give life and all for that."

******

Maurice's absence was the great trial of Eugénie's life; but there
were minor trials also, concerning the little things that make up the
sum of our happiness. She suffered intensely and constantly from
_ennui_. Her active, enterprising mind had not sufficient food to
sustain it, and bravely did she fight against this constant depression
and weariness.

A duller life than hers could hardly be found; she had literally
"nothing to do." She had no society, for she lived at a distance from
her friends. Sometimes the curé called, sometimes a priest from a
neighboring parish, and then the monotonous days went on without a
single incident. There was no outward sign of the struggle going on.
Speaking of her father, she says: "A grave look makes him think there
is some trouble, so I conceal the passing clouds from him; it is but
right that he should only see and know my calm and serene side. A
daughter should be gentle to her father. We ought to be to them
something like the angels are to God."

Nor would she distract her thoughts by any means which might injure
her soul. "I have scarcely read the author whose work you sent, though
I admired him as I do M. Hugo; but these geniuses have blemishes which
wound a woman's eye. I detest to meet with what I do not wish to see;
and this makes me close so many books. I have had _Notre Dame de
Paris_ under my hands a hundred times to-day; and the style,
_Esméralda_, and so many pretty things in it, tempt me, and say to me,
'Read--look.' I looked; I turned it over; but the stains here and
there stopped me. I read no more, and contented myself with looking at
the pictures." At another time, when she is staying at a "deserted
house," rather duller than her own, she writes: "The devil tempted me
just now in a little room, where I found a number of romances. 'Read a
word,' he said to me; 'let us see that; look at this;' but the titles
of the books displeased me. I am no longer tempted now, and will go
only to change the books in this room, or rather to throw them into
the fire."

There was one sovereign remedy for her ills, and she sought for it
with fidelity, and reaped her reward.

"This morning I was suffering. Well, at present, I am calm; and this I
owe to faith, simply to faith, to an act of faith. I can think of
death and eternity without trouble, without alarm. Over a deep of
sorrow there floats a divine calm, a serenity, which is the work of
God only. In vain have I tried other things at a time like this; {222}
nothing human comforts the soul, nothing human upholds it.

  'A l'enfant il faut sa mère,
  A mon âme il faut mon Dieu.'"

At another time of suffering she writes: "God only can console us when
the heart is sorrowful: human helps are not enough; they sink beneath
it, it is so weighed down by sorrow. The reed must have more than
other reeds to lean on."

******

"To distract my thoughts, I have been turning over Lamartine, the dear
poet. I love his hymn to the nightingale, and many other of his
'Harmonies' but they are far from having the effect on me that his
'Meditations' used to have. I was ravished and in ecstacy with them. I
was but sixteen, and time changes many things. The great poet no
longer makes my heart vibrate; to-day he has not even power to
distract my thoughts. I must try something else, for I must not
cherish _ennui_, which injures the soul. What can I do? It is not good
for me to write, to communicate trouble to others. I will leave pen
and ink. I know something better, for I have tried it a hundred times;
it is prayer--prayer which calms me when I say to my soul before God,
'Why art thou sad, and wherefore art thou troubled?' I know not what
he does in answering me, but it quiets me just like a weeping child
when it sees its mother. The Divine compassion and tenderness is truly
maternal toward us."

******

And, further on: "Now I have something better to do than write: I will
go and pray. Oh, how I love prayer! I would that all the world knew
how to pray. I would that children, and the old, and the poor, the
afflicted, the sick in soul and body--all who live and suffer--could
know the balm that prayer is. But I know not how to speak of these
things. We cannot tell what is ineffable."

She had said once, as we have seen, that she would give life and all
to see Maurice once more serving God. She had written to him thus, not
carelessly indeed, but as we are too wont to write--not counting the
cost, because we know not what the cost is. She wrote thus, and God
took her at her word, and he asked from her not life, as she then
meant it, but her life's life. First came the trial of a temporary
estrangement. Her journal suddenly stops; she believed it wearied him,
and, without a word of reproach, she silenced her eager pen. Maurice,
however, declared she was mistaken, and she joyfully resumed her task
with words which would evidence, if nothing else were left, us, the
intense depth of her love for her brother. "I was in the wrong. So
much the better; for I had feared it had been your fault." Then
Maurice's health, which had always been delicate, began to fail, and
her heart was tortured at the thought of him suffering, away from her
loving care, unable to send her news of him.

"I have, been reading the epistle about the child raised to life by
Elias. Oh, if I knew some prophet, some one who would give back life
and health, I would go, like the Shunamite, and throw myself at his
feet."

And again, most touchingly, she says: "A letter from Felicité, which
tells me nothing better about you. When will those who know more
write? If they knew how a woman's heart beats, they would have more
pity."

Maurice recovered from these attacks, and in the autumn of 1836
married a young and pretty Creole lady. He had not the violent
attachment as to the "Louise" of his early youth; but the union seemed
a suitable one on both sides. One of Eugénie's brief visits to Paris
was made for the purpose of being present at her brother's marriage.
It was a romantic scene. It took place in the chapel of the old and
quaint Abbaye aux Bois. The church was filled with brilliant and
admiring friends. The bride and bridegroom, both so beautiful, knelt
before the altar; the Père Bugnet, who had {223} known Maurice as a
boy, blessed the union. The gay procession passed from the church, and
met a funeral cortège! It fell like an omen on Eugénie's heart. Six
short months went by, and Eugénie was again summoned to Paris, to
Maurice's sick-bed--his dying-bed it indeed was, but his sister's
passionate love would not relinquish hope. The physicians, catching at
a straw, prescribed native air, and the invalid caught at the proposal
with feverish impatience. That eager longing sustained him through the
long and terrible journey of twenty days; for, the moment he revived,
he would be laid in the salon, and see the home-faces gathered round
him. Then he was carried to his room, and soon the end came. At last
Eugénie knew that he must go, and all the powers of her soul were
gathered into that one prayer, that he might die at peace with God.
Calmly she bent over him, and kissed the forehead, damp with the dews
of death.

"Dearest, M. le Curé is coming, and you will confess. You have no
difficulty in speaking to M. le Curé?" "Not at all," he answered. "You
will prepare for confession, then?" He asked for his prayer-book, and
had the prayers read to him.

When the priest came, he asked for more time to prepare. At last the
curé was summoned.

"Never have I heard a confession better made," said the priest
afterward. As he was leaving the room, Maurice called him back, and
made a solemn retraction of the doctrines of M. de Lamennais. Then
came the Viaticum and the last anointing. Life ebbed away; he pressed
the hand of the curé, who was by him to the last, he kissed his
crucifix, and died. Eugénie's prayer was heard. He died, but at home;
a wanderer come back; an erring child, once more forgiven, resting on
his Father's breast.

And he was gone!--"king of my heart! my other self!" as she had called
him--and Eugénie was left behind. She had loved him too well for her
eternal peace, and it was necessary that she should be purified in the
crucible of suffering. Very gradually she parted from him; the gates
of the tomb closed not on her love; slowly she uprooted the fibres of
her nature which had been entwined in his. Her journal did not end,
and she wrote still to him--to Maurice in heaven: "Oh, my beloved
Maurice! Maurice, art thou far from me? hearest thou me? Sometimes I
shed torrents of tears; then the soul is dried up. All my life will be
a mourning one; my heart is desolate." Then, reproaching herself, she
turns to her only consolation: "Do I not love thee, my God? only true
and Eternal Love! It seems to me that I love thee as the fearful
Peter, but not like John, who rested on thy heart--divine repose which
I so need. What do I seek in creatures? To make a pillow of a human
breast? Alas! I have seen how death can take that from us. Better to
lean, Jesus, on thy crown of thorns.

******

"This day year, we went together to St. Sulpice, to the one o'clock
mass. To-day I have been to Lentin in the rain, with bitter memories,
in solitude. But, my soul, calm thyself with thy God, whom thou hast
received to-day, in that little church. He is thy brother, thy friend,
the well-beloved above all; whom thou canst never see die; who can
never fail thee, in this world or the next. Let us console ourselves
with this thought, that in God we shall find again all we have lost."

One great desire was, however, left to her; that of publishing the
letters and writings of Maurice, and of winning for her beloved one
the fame which she so despised for herself. A tribute to his memory
appeared the year after his death, in the _Revue des deux Mondes_,
from the brilliant pen of Madame Sand; but it was the source of more
pain than pleasure to Eugénie. With the want of candor which is so
often a characteristic of the class of writers to whom Madame Sand
{224} belongs, she represented Maurice as a man totally without faith.
Eugénie believed that he had never actually lost it, although it had
been darkened and obscured; and she was certainly far more in his
confidence than any of his friends.

For some time before his death he had gradually been returning to
religious exercises; and, as we have seen, on his death-bed, he had
most fully retracted and repented of whatever errors there had been in
his life. But Madame Sand was not very likely to trouble herself about
the dying moments of her friend, while it was another triumph to
infidelity to let the world think this brilliant young man lived and
died in its ranks.

"Madame Sand makes Maurice a skeptic, a great poet, like Byron, and it
afflicts me to see the name of my brother--a name which was free from
these lamentable errors--thus falsely represented to the world." And
again: "Oh, Madame Sand is right when she says that his words are like
the diamonds linked together, which make a diadem; or, rather, my
Maurice was all one diamond. Blessed be those who estimated his price;
blessed be the voice which praises him, which places him so high, with
so much respect and enthusiasm! But on one point this voice is
mistaken--when she says he had no faith. No; faith was not wanting in
him. I proclaim it, and attest it by what I have seen and heard; by
his prayers, his pious reading; by the sacraments he received; by all
his Christian actions; by the death which opened life unto him--a
death with his crucifix."

This article of Madame Sand only increased Eugénie's desire to
vindicate her brother, by letting the world judge from his own
writings and letters what Maurice really was. Many projects were set
on foot for publishing this work. Rather than leave it undone, Eugénie
would have undertaken it herself, though her broken spirit shrank more
than ever from any sort of notoriety, or communication with the busy
world outside her quiet home. But she would greatly have preferred the
task should be accomplished by one of his friends; and much of her
correspondence was devoted to the purpose. Time passed, and plan after
plan fell to the ground. This last satisfaction was not to be hers.
She was to see, as she thought, the name of her beloved one gradually
fading away, and forgotten as years went on. To the very last drop she
was to drain the cup of disappointment and loss. Her journal ceased,
and its last sentence was, "Truly did the saint speak who said, 'Let
us throw our hearts into eternity.'"

There are a few fragments and letters, which carry us on some years
later; and in one of the last of these letters, dated 15th of June,
1845, we find these consoling words: "I have suffered; but God teaches
us thus, and leads us to willingly place our hearts above. You are
again in mourning, and I have felt your loss deeply. I mean the death
of your poor brother. Alas! what is life but a continual separation?
But you will meet in heaven, and there will be no more mourning nor
tears; and there the society of saints will reward us for what we have
suffered in the society of men. And, while waiting, there is nothing
else to do than to humble one's self, as the Apostle says, 'under the
mighty hand of God, that he may exalt you in the time of visitation;
casting all your care upon him, for he hath care of you.'"

These are almost her closing words; and thus we see God comforted her.
Three years more passed, of which we have no record; and we cannot but
deeply regret the determination of M. Trebutien not to give any
account of her beyond her own words. As long as they lasted, they are
indeed sufficient; but we would have fain followed her into the
silence of those last years, and have seen the soul gradually passing
to its rest. We would have liked to know if the friends she loved
soothed her dying hours--whether M. Bories, with his "strong {225} and
powerful words," was by her side in her last earthly struggle. But a
veil falls over it all. We feel assured, as we close the volume, that
whatever human means were wanting, the God she had faithfully served
consoled his child to the last, and sustained her mortal weakness till
she reposed in him. After her death, her heart's wish was fulfilled,
and abundant honor has been rendered to Maurice de Guérin. Nay, more;
for homage is ever given to the majesty of unselfish love; and from
henceforth, if Maurice the poet shall be forgotten, Maurice the
brother of Eugénie will never be. She has embalmed his memory with her
deep and fond devotion; and she has left a living record of how, in
the midst of a wearisome, an objectless, a monotonous life, a woman
may find work to do, and doing it, like Eugénie, with all her might,
leave behind her a track of light by which others may follow after
her, encouraged and consoled.
           F.

------

THE BUILDING OF MOURNE.


A LEGEND OF THE BLACKWATER.


BY ROBERT D. JOYCE.


Rome, according to the old aphorism, was not built in a day. Neither
was the old town of Mourne, although it was destroyed in a day, and
made fit almost for the sowing of salt upon its foundations, by the
great Lord of Thomond, Murrough of the Ferns, when he gathered around
it his rakehelly kerns, as Spenser in his spleen called them, and his
fierce galloglasses and roving hobbelers. But the present story has
naught to do with the spoliation and burning of towns. Far different,
indeed, was the founding of Mourne, to the story of the disastrous
termination of its prosperity. You will look in vain to the histories
for a succinct or circumstantial account of the building of this
ancient town; but many a more famous city has its early annals
involved in equal obscurity--Rome, for instance. What tangible fact
can be laid hold of with regard to its early history, save the
will-o'-the-wisp light emanating from the traditions of a more modern
day? A cimmerian cloud of darkness overhangs its founding and youthful
progress, through which the double-distilled microscopic eyes of the
historian are unable to penetrate with any degree of certainty.
Mourne, however, though it cannot boast of a long-written history,
possesses an oral one of remarkable perspicuity and certainty. The men
are on the spot who, with a mathematical precision worthy of
Archimedes or Newton, will relate everything about it, from its
foundation to its fall. The only darkness cast upon their most
circumstantial history is the elysian cloud from their luxuriant
dudheens, as they whiff away occasionally, and relate--

That there was long ago a certain Dhonal, a nobleman of the warlike
race of Mac Caurha, who ruled over Duhallow, and the wild mountainous
territories extending downward along the banks of the Blackwater. This
nobleman, after a long rule of prosperity and peace, at length grew
weary of inaction, and manufactured in his pugnacious brain some cause
of mortal affront and complaint against a neighboring potentate, whose
territory extended in a westerly direction on the opposite shore of
the river. So he mustered his vassals with all imaginable speed, and
prepared to set out for the domains of his foe on a foray of unusual
ferocity and magnitude. Before departing from his castle, which stood
some miles above Mallow, on the banks of the river, he held a long and
confidential parley with his wife, in which he told her, if he were
defeated or slain, and if the foe should cross the Blackwater to make
reprisals, that she should hold out the fortress while one stone would
stand upon another, and especially that she should guard their three
young sons well, whom, he doubted not, whatever might happen, would
one day gain prosperity and renown. After this, he set out on his
expedition, at the head of a formidable array of turbulent kerns and
marauding horsemen. But his neighbor was not a man to be caught
sleeping; for, at the crossing of a ford near Kanturk, he attacked
Dhonal, slew him in single combat, and put his followers to the sword,
almost to a man. After this he crossed the Blackwater, laid waste the
territories of the invader, and at length besieged the castle, where
the widowed lady and her three sons had taken refuge. For a long time
she held her own bravely against her enemy; but in the end the castle
was taken by assault, and she and her three young sons narrowly
escaped with their lives out into the wild recesses of the forest.

After wandering about for some time, the poor lady built a little hut
of brambles on the shore of the Clydagh, near the spot where stand the
ruins of the preceptory of Mourne, or Ballinamona, as it is sometimes
called. Here she dwelt with her children for a long time, in want and
misery. Her sons grew up without receiving any of those
accomplishments befitting their birth, and gained their subsistence,
like the children of the common people around, by tilling a little
plot of land before their hut, and by the products of the chase in the
surrounding forest. One day, as Diarmid, the eldest, with his bow and
arrows ready for the chase, was crossing a narrow valley, he met a
kern, one of the followers of the great lord who had slain his father.
Now, neither Diarmid nor his brothers recollected who had killed their
father, nor the high estate from which they had fallen, for their
mother kept them carefully in ignorance of all, fearing that they
might become known, and that their enemies would kill them also. So
the kern and himself wended their way for some time together along the
side of the valley. At length they started a deer from its bed in the
green ferns. Each shot his arrow at the same moment, and each struck
the deer, which ran downward for a short space, and at last fell dead
beside the little stream in the bottom of the valley.

"The deer is mine!" said the strange kern, as they stood over its
body.

"No!" answered Diarmid, "it is not. See! your arrow is only stickin'
in the skin of his neck, an' mine is afther rattlin' into his heart,
through an' through!"

"No matther," exclaimed the kern, with a menacing look. "I don't care
how he kem by his death, but the deer I must have, body an' bones,
whatever comes of it! Do you think sich a _sprissawn_ as you could
keep me from it, an' I wantin' its darlin' carkiss for the table o' my
lord, the Mac Donogh?"

Now Diarmid recollected that his mother and brothers were at the same
time almost dying in their little hut for want of food. So without
further parley he drew his long skian from its sheath.

"Very well," said he, "take it, if you're a man; but before it goes,
my carkiss must lie stiff an' bloody in its place!"

The kern drew his skian at the word, and there, over the body of the
fallen deer, ensued a combat stern and fierce, which at last resulted
in Diarmid's plunging his skian through and through the body of his
foe into the gritty sand beneath them.

{227}

Diarmid then took the spear and other weapons of the dead kern, put
the deer upon his broad shoulders, and marching off in triumph, soon
gained his mother's little hut. There, after eating a comfortable
meal, and telling his adventure, Diarmid began to lay down his future
plans.

"Mother," he said, "the time is come at last when this little cabin is
too small for me. I'm a man now, an' able to meet a man, body to body,
as I met him to-day; so I'll brighten up my weapons, an' set off on my
adventures, that I may gain renown in the wars. Donogh here, too, has
the four bones of a man," continued he, turning to his second brother;
"so let him prepare, an' we'll thramp off together as soon as we can,
an' perhaps afther all we'd have a castle of our own, where you could
reign in glory, as big an' grand as Queen Cleena o' the Crag!"

"Well, then," answered his mother, "if you must go, before you leave
me, you and your brothers must hunt in the forest for a month, and
bring in as much food as will do me and Rory here for a year and a
day."

"But," said Rory, the youngest, or Roreen Shouragh, or the Lively, as
he was called, in consequence of the 'cute and merry temperament of
his mind--"but, Diarmid, you know I am now beyant fifteen years of
age, an' so, if you go, I'll folly you to the worldt's end!"

"You presumptious little atomy of a barebones," answered his eldest
brother, "if I only see the size of a thrush's ankle of you follyin'
us on the road, I'll turn back an' bate that wiry an' freckled little
carkiss o' yours into frog's jelly! So stay at home in pace an'
quietness, an' perhaps when I come back I might give you a good purse
o' goold to begin your forthin with."

"That for your mane an' ludiacrous purse o' goold!" exclaimed Roreen
Shouragh, at the same time snapping his fingers in the face of his
brother. "Arrah! do you hear him, mother? But never mind. Let us be
off into the forest to-morrow, an' we'll see who'll bring home the
most food before night!"

"Well," said his mother, "whether he stays at home or goes away, I
fear he'll come to some bad end with that sharp tongue of his, and his
wild capers."

"With all jonteel respect, mother," answered Shouragh again, "I mane
to do no such thing. I think myself as good a hairo this
minnit--because I have the sowl an' heart o' one as King Dathi, who
was killed in some furrin place that I don't recklect the jography of,
or as Con o' the Hundhert Battles, or as the best man amongst them,
Fion himself--an' I'll do as great actions as any o' them yet!"

This grandiloquent boast of Roreen Shouragh's set his mother and
brothers into a fit of laughter, from which they only recovered when
it was time to retire to rest. In the morning the three brothers
betook themselves to the forest, and at the fall of night returned
with a great spoil of game. From morning till night they hunted thus
every day for a month, at the end of which time Diarmid said that they
had as much food stored in as would last his mother and Rory for a
year and a day.

On a hot summer noon the two brothers left the little hut, with their
mother's blessing on their heads, and set off on their adventures.
After crossing a few valleys, they came at length to the shore of the
Blackwater, and sat down in the shade of a huge oak-tree on the bank
to rest themselves. Beneath them, in a clear, shady pool, a huge pike,
with his voracious jaws ready for a plunge, was watching a merry
little speckled trout, which in its turn was regarding with most
affectionate eyes a bright blue fly, that was disporting overhead on
the surface of the water. Suddenly the trout darted upward into the
air, catching the ill-starred fly, but, in its return to the element
beneath, unfortunately plumped itself into the Charybdis-like jaws of
the villanous {228} pike, and was from that in one moment quietly
deposited in his stomach.

"Look at that!" said Diarmid to his brother. "That's the way with a
man that works an' watches everything with a keen eye. He'll have all
in the end, just as the pike has both fly and throut--an' just as I
have both fly, an' throut, an' pike!" continued he, giving his spear a
quick dart into the deep pool, and then landing the luckless pike,
transfixed through and through, upon the green bank. "That's the way
to manage, and the divvle a betther sign o' good luck we could have in
the beginning of our journey, than to get a good male so aisy!"

"Hooray!" exclaimed a voice behind them. "That's the way to manage
most galliantly. What a nate dinner the thurminjous monsther will make
for the three of us!" and on turning round, the two brothers beheld
Roreen Shouragh, accoutred like themselves, and dancing with most
exuberant delight at the feat beside them on the grass.

"An' so you have follied us afther all my warnin', you outragious
little vagabone!" exclaimed Diarmid, making a wrathful dart at Roreen,
who, however, eluding the grasp, ran and doubled hither and thither
with the swiftness of a hare, around the trunks of the huge oak-trees
on the shore. In vain Diarmid tried every ruse of the chase to catch
him. Roreen Shouragh could not be captured. At length the elder
brother, wearied out, returned to Donogh, who, during the chase, was
tumbling about on the grass in convulsions of laughter.

"'Tis no use, Donogh," he said, "we must only let him come with us.
He'll never go back. Come here, you aggravatin' young robber,"
continued he, calling out to Roreen, who was still dancing in defiance
beneath a tree, some distance off--"come here, an' you'll get your
dinner, an' may folly us if you wish."

Roreen knew that he might depend on the word of his brother. "I towld
ye both," said he, coming up to the spot, "that I'd folly ye to the
worldt's end; so let us have pace, an' I may do ye some service yet.
But may I supplicate to know where ye're preamblin' to at present; for
if ye sit down that way in every umberagious coolin' spot, as the song
says, the divvle a much ye'll have for yeer pains in the ind?"

"I'll tell you then," answered Donogh, now recovered from his fit of
laughing. "We're goin' off to Corrig Cleena, to see the Queen o' the
Fairies, an' to ask her advice what to do so as to win wealth an'
renown."

"'Tis aisier said than done," said Roreen, "to see Queen Cleena. But
howsomdever, when we're afther devourin' this vouracious thief of a
pike here, we'll peg off to the Corrig as swift as our
gambadin'-sticks will carry us!"

After the meal the three brothers swam across the river, and proceeded
on their way through the forest toward Corrig Cleena. On gaining the
summit of a little height, a long, straight road extended before them.

On and on the straight road they went, till, turning up a narrow path
in the forest, they beheld the great grey boulders of Corrig Cleena
towering before them. They searched round its base several times for
an entrance, but could find none. At length, as they were turning away
in despair, they saw an extremely small, withered old atomy of a
woman, clad all in sky blue, and sitting beside a clump of fairy
thimbles, or foxgloves, that grew on a little knoll in front of the
rock. They went up and accosted her:

"Could you tell us, ould woman," asked Diarmid, "how we can enter the
Corrig? We want to speak to the queen."

"Ould woman, inagh!" answered the little atomy in a towering passion.
"How daar you call me an ould woman, you vagabone? Off wid
you--thramp, I say, for if you sted there till your legs would root in
the ground, you'd get no information from me!"

{229}

"Be aisy, mother," said Donogh, in a soothing voice; "sure, if you can
tell us, you may as well serve us so far, an' we'll throuble you no
more."

"Ould woman an' mother, both!" screamed the little hag, starting up
and shaking her crutch at the brothers; "this is worse than all. You
dirty an' insultin' spalpeens, how daar ye again, I say call me sich
names? What for should I be decoratin' my fingers wid the red blossoms
o' the Lusmore, if I was as ould as you say? Be off out o' this, or be
this an' be that, I ruinate ye both wid a whack o' this wand o' mine!"

"Young leedy," said Roreen Shouragh, stepping up cap in hand at this
juncture, and making the old hag an elaborately polite bow--"young,
an' innocent, an' delightful creethur, p'r'aps you'd have the kindness
to exercise that lily-white hand o' yours in pointin' out the way for
us into Queen Cleena's palace!"

"Yes, young man," answered the crone, greatly mollified at the
handsome address of Roreen. "For your sake, I'll point out the way.
You at laste know the respect that should be paid to youth an'
beauty!"

"Allow me, my sweet young darlint," said Roreen at this, as he stepped
up and offered her his arm--"allow me to have the shuprame pleasure of
conductin' you. I'm sure I must have the honor an' glory of ladin' on
my arm one of the queen's maids of honor. May those enticin' cheeks o'
yours for ever keep the bloomin' an' ravishin' blush they have at the
present minnit, an' may those riglar ivory teeth o' yours, that are as
white as the dhriven snow, never make their conjay from your purty an'
delightful mouth!"

The "delightful young creethur" allowed herself, with many a gratified
smirk, to be conducted downward by the gallant Roreen toward the rock,
where, striking the naked wall with her crutch, or wand as she was
pleased to call it, a door appeared before them, and the three
brothers were immediately conducted into the presence of the fairy
queen.

It would be long, but pleasant, to tell the gallant compliments paid
by Roreen to the queen, and the queen's polite and gracious acceptance
of them; merry to relate the covert laughter of the lovely maids of
honor, as Roreen occasionally showered down praises on the head of the
"young leedy" who so readily gained him admittance to the palace, and
who was no other than the vain old nurse of the queen; but, despite
all such frivolities, this history must have its course. At length the
queen gave them a gentle hint that their audience had lasted the
proper time, and as they were departing she cast her bright but
love-lorn eyes upon them with a kindly look.

"Young man," she said, "you ask my advice how to act so as to gain
wealth and renown. I could give you wealth, but will not, for wealth
thus acquired rarely benefits the possessor. But I will give you the
advice you seek. Always keep your senses sharp and bright, and your
bodies strong by manly exercise. Look sharply round you, and avail
yourselves honorably of every opportunity that presents itself. Be
brave, and defend your rights justly; but, above all, let your hearts
be full of honor and kindness, and show that kindness ever in aiding
the poor, the needy, and the defenceless. Do all this, and I doubt not
but you will yet come to wealth, happiness, and renown. Farewell!"

And in a moment, they knew not how, they found themselves sitting in
the front of the Rock of Cleena, upon the little knoll where Roreen
had so flatteringly accosted the "young leedy." Away they went again
down to the shore, swam back across the river, and wandered away over
hill and dale, till they ascended Sliabh Luchra, and lost themselves
in the depths of the great forest that clothed its broad back. Here
they sat down in a green glade, and began to consider what they should
further do with themselves. At length {230} they agreed to build a
little hut, and remain there for a few days, in order to look about
the country. No sooner said than done.

To work they went, finished their hut beneath a spreading tree, and
were soon regaling themselves on a young fawn they had killed as they
descended the mountain. Next day they went out into the forest, killed
a deer, brought him back to the hut, in order to prepare part of him
for their dinner. Diarmid undertook the cooking for the first day,
while his two younger brothers went out along the back of the mountain
to kill more game. With the aid of a small pot, which they had
borrowed from a forester at the northern part of the mountain, and a
ladle that accompanied it, Diarmid began to cook the dinner, stirring
the pieces of venison round and round over the fire, in order to have
some broth ready at the return of his brothers. As he was stirring and
tasting alternately with great industry, he heard a light footstep
behind him, and on looking round, beheld sitting on one of the large
mossy stones they used for a seat a little crabbed-looking boy, with a
red head almost the color of scarlet, a red jacket, and tight-fitting
trowsers of the same hue, which, reaching a little below the knee,
left the fire-bedizened and equally rubicund legs and feet exposed in
free luxury to the air. His face was handsomely formed, but brown and
freckled, and he had a pair of dark, keen eyes, which seemed to pierce
into the very soul of Diarmid as he sat gazing at him. There was a
wild, elfish look about him altogether, as, with a vivacious twinkle
of his acute eye, he saluted Diarmid politely, and asked him for a
ladleful of the broth. Diarmid, however, in turning round from the
pot, had spilt the contents of the ladle on his hand, burning it
sorely, and was in consequence not in the most amiable humor.

"Give you a ladle of broth, indeed, you little weasel o' perdition!"
exclaimed he. "Peg off out o' my house this minute, or I'll catch you
by one o' them murtherin' legs o' yours, an' bate your brains out
against one o' the stones!"

"I'm well acquainted with the cozy an' indestructible fact, that a
man's house is his castle," said the little fellow, at the same time
thrusting both his hands into his pockets, inclining his head slightly
to one side, and looking up coolly at Diarmid; "but some o' that broth
I must have, for three raisons. First, that all the wild-game o' the
forest are mine as well as yours; second, that I'm a sthranger, an'
you know that hospitality is a virthue in ould Ireland; an', third an'
best, because you darn't refuse me! So, sit down there an' cool me a
good rich ladleful, or, be the hole o' my coat! there'll be wigs on
the green bethune you an' me afore you're much ouldher!"

"Ther's for your impidence, you gabblin' little riffin!" said Diarmid,
making a furious kick at the imperturbable little intruder, who,
however, evaded it by a nimble jump to one side; and then leaping up
suddenly, before his assailant was aware, hit him right and left two
stunning blows with his hard and diminutive fists in the eyes. Round
and round hopped redhead, at each hop striking the luckless Diarmid
right in the face, till at length, with one finishing blow, he brought
him to the ground, stunned and senseless.

"There," he said, as he took a ladleful o' broth and began to cool it
deliberately, "that's the most scientific facer I ever planted on a
man's forehead in my life. I think he'll not refuse me the next time I
ask him."

With that he drank off the broth at a draught, laid the ladle
carefully in the pot, stuck his hands in his pockets, and jovially
whistling up, "The cricket's rambles through the hob," he left the
hut, and strutted with a light and cheerful heart into the forest.

When Diarmid's brothers returned, they found him just recovering from
his swoon, with two delightful black eyes, and a nose of unusual
dimensions. {231} He told them the cause of his mishap, at which they
only laughed heartily, saying that he deserved it for allowing himself
to be beaten by such an insignificant youngster. Next day, Diarmid and
Roreen went out to hunt, leaving Donogh within to cook the dinner.
When they returned, they found the ill-starred Donogh lying almost
dead on the floor, with two black eyes far surpassing in beauty and
magnitude those received on the preceding evening by his brother.

"Let me stay within to-morrow," said Roreen, "for 'tis my turn; an' if
he has the perliteness o' payin' me a visit, I'll reward him for his
condescension."

"Arrah!" said both his brothers, "is it a little traneen like you to
be able for him, when he bate the two of us?"

"No matther," answered Roreen; "tis my turn, an' stay I will, if my
eyes were to be oblitherated in my purricranium!"

And so, when the morrow came, Diarmid and Donogh went out to hunt, and
Roreen Shouragh stayed within to cook the dinner. As the pot commenced
boiling, Roreen kept a sharp eye around him for the expected visitor,
whom he at length descried coming up the glade toward the door of the
hut, whistling cheerfully as he came.

"Good-morrow, youngster!" said the chap as he entered, and made a most
hilarious bow; "you seem to have the odor o' charity from your
handsome face here, at laste it comes most aromatically from the pot,
anyhow."

"Ah, then! good-morrow kindly, my blushin' little moss-rose!" said
Roreen, answering the salutation with an equally ornamental
inclination of his head--"welcome to the hall o' my fathers. P'r'aps
you'd do me the thurminjous honor o' satin' that blazin' little
carkiss o' yours on the stone fornent me there."

"With all the pleasure in the univarse," answered the other, seating
himself; "but as the clay is most obsthreporously hot an' disthressin'
to the dissolute traveller, p'r'aps you'd have the exthrame kindness
o' givin' me a ladleful o' broth to refresh myself."

"Well," said Roreen, "I was always counted a livin' respectacle o' the
hospitality of ould Ireland. Yet, although the first law is not to ask
the name of a guest, in regard to the unmerciful way you thrated my
brothers, I must make bowld, before I grant your request, to have the
honor an' glory of hearin' your cognomen."

"With shuprame pleasure," answered the visitor. "My name, accordin' to
the orthography o' Ogham characters, is Shaneen cus na Thinné, which,
larnedly expounded, manes John with his Feet to the Fire. But the
ferlosophers an' rantiquarians of ould Ireland, thracin' effect from
cause, call me Fieryfoot, an' by that name I shall be proud to be
addhressed by you at present."

"Well," rejoined Roreen, "it only shows their perfound knowlidge an'
love for truth, to be able to make out such a knotty ploberm in
derivations; an' so, out o' compliment to their oceans o' larnin',
you'll get the broth; but," continued he, as he took up a ladleful and
held it to cool, "as there are a few questions now and then thrublin'
my ruminashins, p'r'aps you may be so perlite as to throw a flash o'
lightnin' on them, while we're watin'. One is in nathral history. I've
heerd that of late the hares sleep with one eye shut an' th' other
open. What on earth is the raison of it?"

"That," answered Fieryfoot, "is aisily solvoluted. Tis on account o'
the increase o' weasels, and their love for suckin' the blood o' hares
in their sleep. So the hares, in ordher to be on their guard an'
prevent it, sleep with only one eye at a time, an' when that's rested
an' has slept enough, they open it an' shut the other!"

"The other," said Roreen, "is in asthronomy, an' thrubbles me most of
all, sleepin' an' noddin', aitin' an' dhrinkin'. Why is it that the
man in the moon always keeps a rapin'-hook in his hand, and never uses
it?"

{232}

"Because," answered Fieryfoot, getting somewhat impatient, "because,
you poor benighted crathure, he's not a man at all, but the image of a
man painted over the door of Brian Airach's shebeen there, where those
that set off on a lunarian ramble go in to refresh themselves, as I
want to refresh myself with that ladle o' broth you're delayin' in
your hand!"

"Oh! you'll get it fresh an' fastin'!" exclaimed Roreen, and with that
he dashed the ladleful of scalding broth right into the face of
Fieryfoot, who started up with a wild cry, and rushed half-blinded
from the hut. Away went Roreen in hot pursuit after him, with the
ladle in his hand, and calling out to him, with the most endearing
names imaginable, to come back for another supply of broth--away down
the glades, till at length, on the summit of a smooth, green little
knoll, Fieryfoot suddenly disappeared. Roreen went to the spot, and
found there a square aperture, just large enough to admit his body. He
immediately went and cut a sapling with his knife, stuck it by the
side of the aperture, and placed his cap on it for a mark, and then
returned to the hut, and found his brothers just after coming in. He
related all that happened, and they agreed to go together to the knoll
after finishing their dinner. When the dinner was over, the three
brothers went down to the knoll, and easily found out the aperture
through which Fieryfoot had disappeared.

"An' now, what's to be done?" asked Diarmid.

"What's to be done, is it?" said Roreen; "why just to have me go down,
as I'm the smallest--smallest in body I mane--for, to spake
shupernathrally, my soul is larger than both of yurs put together;
an', in the manetime, to have ye build another hut over the spot an'
live there till I return with a power o' gold an' dimons, and oceans
o' renown an' glory!"

With that he crept into the aperture, while his brothers busied
themselves in drawing brambles and sticks to the spot in order to
build a hut as he had directed. As Roreen descended, the passage began
to grow more broad and lightsome, and at length he found himself on
the verge of a delightful country, far more calm and beautiful than
the one he had left. Here he took the first way that presented itself,
and travelled on till he came to the crossing of three roads. He saw a
large, dark-looking house, part of which he knew to be a smith's
forge, from the smoke, and from the constant hammering that resounded
from the inside. Roreen entered, and the first object that presented
itself was Fieryfoot, as fresh and blooming as a trout, and roasting
his red shins with the utmost luxuriance and happiness of heart before
the blazing fire on the hob.

"Wisha, Roreen Shouragh," exclaimed Fieryfoot, starting from his seat,
spitting on his hand for good luck, and then offering it with great
cordiality, "you're as welcome as the flowers o' May! Allow me to
offer you my congratulations, _ad infinitum_, for your superior
cuteness in the art of circumwentin' your visitors. I prizhume you'll
have no objection to be presented to the three workmen I keep in the
house--the smith there, the carpenter, an' the mason. Roreen Shouragh,
gentlemin, the only man in the world above that was able to circumwint
your masther!"

"A céad mille fáilté, young gintleman!" said the three workmen in a
breath.

Roreen bowed politely in acknowledgment.

"Any news from the worldt above?" asked the smith, as he rested his
ponderous hammer on the anvil.

"Things are morthially dull," answered Roreen, giving a sly wink at
Fieryfoot. "I've heard that the Danes are making a divarshin in
Ireland; that a shower o' dimons fell in Dublin; that the moon is
gettin' mowldy for want o' shinin'; and that there's a say in the west
that is gradually becoming transmogrified into whiskey. I humbly hope
that the latther intelligence {233} is unthrue, for if not, I'm afraid
the whole worldt will become drunk in the twinklin' of a gooldfrinch's
eye!"

"Milé, milé gloiré!" exclaimed the three workmen, "but that's grate
an' wondherful intirely! P'r'aps masther," continued they, addressing
Fieryfoot, and smacking their lips at the thought of whiskey, "p'r'aps
you'd have the goodness o' givin' us a few days' lave of absence!"

"Not at present," answered Fieryfoot; "industry is the soul o'
pleasure, as the hawk said to the sparrow before he transported him to
his stomach, so ye must now set to work an' make a sword, for I want
to make my frind here a present as a compliment for his superior
wisdom."

To work they went. The smith hammered out, tempered, and polished the
blade, the carpenter fashioned the hilt, which the mason set with a
brilliant row of diamonds; and the sword was finished instantly.

"An' now," said Fieryfoot, presenting the sword to Roreen, "let me
have the immorthial pleasure o' presenting you with this. Take it and
set off on your thravels. Let valior and magnanimity be your guide,
and you'll come to glory without a horizintal bounds. In the manetime
I'll wait here till you return."

"I accept it with the hottest gratitudinity an' gladness," said
Roreen, taking the sword and running his eye critically along hilt and
blade. "'Tis a darlin', handy sword; 'tis sharp, shinin', an' killin',
as the sighin' lover said to his sweetheart's eyes, an' altogether
'tis the one that matches my experienced taste, for 'tis tough, an'
light, and lumeniferous, as Nero said to his cimitar, whin he was
preparin' to daycapitate the univarsal worldt wid one blow!"

Saying this, Roreen buckled the sword to his side, bade a ceremonious
farewell to the polite Fieryfoot and his workmen, left the house, and
proceeded on his adventures. He took the west and broader road that
led by the forge, and travelled on gaily till night. For seven days he
travelled thus, meeting various small adventures by the way, and
getting through them with his usual light-heartedness, till at length
he saw a huge dark castle before him, standing on a rock over a
solitary lake. He accosted an old man by the way-side, who told him
that a huge giant of unusual size, strength, and ferocity dwelt there,
and that he had kept there in thrall, for the past year and a day, a
beautiful princess, expecting that in the end she'd give her consent
to marry him. The old peasant told him also that the giant had two
brothers, who dwelt far away in their castles, and that they were the
strangest objects ever seen by mortal eyes; one being a valiant dwarf
as broad as he was long, and the other longer than he was broad, for
he was tall as the giant, but so slightly formed that he was
designated by the inhabitants of the country round Snohad na Dhial, or
the Devil's Needle. Roreen thanked the old man with great urbanity,
and proceeded on his way toward the castle. When he came to the gate,
he knocked as bold as brass, and demanded admittance. He was quickly
answered by a tremendous voice from the inside, which demanded what he
wanted.

"Let me in, ould steeple," said Roreen; "I'm a poor disthressed boy
that's grown wary o' the worldt on account o' my fatness, an' I'm come
to offer myself as a volunthary male for your voracious stomach!"

At this the gate flew open with a loud clang, and Roreen found himself
in the great court-yard of the castle, confronting the giant. The
giant was licking his lips expectantly while opening the gate, but
seemed now not a little disappointed as he looked upon the spare, wiry
form standing before him.

"If you're engaged, ould cannibal," said Roreen again, "in calkalatin'
a gasthernomical ploberm, as I'm aweer you are, by the way you're
lookin' at me, allow me perlitely to help you in hallucidatin' it. In
the first place, if {234} you intend to put me in a pie, I must tell
you that you'll not get much gravy from my carkiss, an' in the next,
if you intend to ate me on the spot, raw, I must inform you that
you'll find me as hard as a Kerry dimon, an' stickin' in your throat,
before you're half acquainted with the politics of your abdominal
kingdom!"

As an answer to this the giant did precisely what Roreen Shouragh
expected he would do. He stooped down, caught him up with his
monstrous hand, intending to chop off his head with the first bite;
but Roreen, the moment he approached his broad, hairy chest, pulled
suddenly out the sword presented to him by Fiery foot, and drew it
across the giant's windpipe, with as scientific a cut as ever was
given by any champion at the battle of Gaura, Clontarf, or of any
other place on the face of the earth. The giant did not give the usual
roar given by a giant in the act of being killed. How could he, when
his windpipe was cut? He only fell down simply by the gate of his own
castle, and died without a groan. Roreen, by way of triumph, leaped
upon his carcass, and with a light heart cut a few nimble capers
thereon, and then proceeded on his explorations into the castle. There
he found the beautiful princess sad and forlorn, whom he soon relieved
from her apprehensions of further thraldom. She told him that she was
not the only lady whose wrongs were unredressed in that strange
country, for that the two remaining brothers of the giant, to wit, the
dwarf and the Devil's Needle, had kept, during her time of thrall, her
two younger sisters in an equally cruel bondage.

"An' now, my onrivalled daisy," said Roreen, after some conversation
had passed between them, "allow me, while I'm in the humor for
performin' deeds o' valior, to thramp off an' set them free!"

"But," said the princess, "am I to be left behind pining in this
forlorn dungeon of a castle?"

"Refulgint leedy," answered Roreen, "a pair of eyes like yours, when
purferrin' a request, are arrisistible, but this Kerry-dimon' heart o'
mine is at present onmovable; and in ferlosophy, when an arrisistible
affeer conglomerates against an onmovable one, nothin' occurs, an' so
I must have the exthrame bowldness of asking you to stay where you are
till I come back, for 'tis always the maxim of an exparienced an'
renowned gineral not to oncumber himself with too much baggage when
settin' out on his advinthures!"

And so the young princess consented to stay, and Roreen, with many
bows and compliments, took his leave. For three days he travelled,
till at length he espied the castle of the dwarf towering on the
summit of a great hill. He climbed the hill as fast as his nimble legs
could carry him, blew the horn at the gate, and defied the dwarf to
single combat. To work they went. The skin of the dwarf was as hard
and tough as that of a rhinoceros, but at length Roreen's sword found
a passage through it, and the dwarf fell dead by his own gate. Roreen
went in, brought the good news of her sister's liberation to the lady,
and after directing her to remain where she was till his return, set
forward again. For three days more he travelled, till he came to the
shore of a sea, where he saw the castle of Snohad na Dhial towering
high above the waves. He climbed up the rock on which the castle
stood, found the gate open, and whistling the romantic pastoral of
"The piper in the meadow straying," he jovially entered the first door
he met. On he went, through room after room, and saw no one, till at
last he came before an exceedingly lofty door, with a narrow and
perpendicular slit in it, extending almost from threshold to lintel.
He peeped in through the open slit, and beheld inside the most
beautiful young lady his eyes ever rested upon. She was weeping, and
seemed sorely troubled. Roreen opened the door, presented himself
before her, and told her how he had liberated her {235} sisters. In
return she told him how that very day she was to be married to Snohad
na Dhial, and wept, as she further related that it was out of the
question to think of vanquishing him, for that he was as tall as the
giant, yet so slight that the slit in the door served him always for
an entrance, but then he was beyond all heroes strong, and usually
killed his antagonist by knotting his long limbs around him and
squeezing him to death.

"No matther," said Roreen. "I'll sing a song afther my victory, as the
gamecock said to the piper. An' now, most delightful an' bloomin'
darlint o' the worldt, this purriliginious heart o' mine is melted at
last with the conshumin' flame o' love. Say, then, the
heart-sootherin' an' merlifluous word that you'll have me, an' your
thrubbles are over in the twinklin'--"

"Not over so soon!" interrupted a loud, shrill voice behind them, and
Roreen, turning round, beheld Snohad na Dhial entering at the slit,
with deadly rage and jealousy in his fiery eyes. Snohad, however, in
his haste to get in and fall upon Roreen, got his middle in some way
or other entangled in the slit, and in his struggles to free himself,
his feet lilted upward, and there he hung for a few moments, inward
and outward, like the swaying beam of a balance. For a few moments
only; for Roreen, running over, with one blow of his faithful sword on
the waist cut him in two, and down fell both halves of Snohad na Dhial
as dead as a door-nail. After this Roreen got the heart-sootherin'
answer he so gallantly implored. He then bethought himself of
returning. After a few weeks he found himself with the three sisters,
and with a cavalcade of horses laden with the most precious diamonds,
pearls, and other treasures belonging to the three castles, in front
of the forge where he had met Fieryfoot, and talking merrily to that
worthy.

"An' now," said Fieryfoot, after he had complimented the ladies on
their beauty, and Roreen on his success and bravery, "I am about to
give my three workmen lave of absence. But they must work seven days
for you first. Then they may go on their peregrinations about ould
Ireland. Farewell. Give my ondeniable love to the ladle, and remember
me to your brothers balligerently!"

With that the two friends embraced, on which Fieryfoot drew out a
small whistle and blew a tune, which set Roreen Shouragh and the three
princesses into a pleasant sleep; on awakening from which they found
themselves by the side of the little hut on the knoll, with the three
workmen beneath them, holding the horses and guarding their loads of
treasure. Roreen's two brothers had just returned from the chase, and
were standing near them in mute wonderment at the spectacle. After
some brief explanations, the whole cavalcade set out on their journey
home, and travelled on till they came to the hut of the lonely widow
on the banks of the Clydagh. It was nightfall when they reached the
place. Roreen told the three workmen that he wanted to have a castle
built on the meadow beside the hut, and then went in and embraced his
mother. The workmen went to the meadow, and when the next morning
dawned, had a castle of unexampled strength and beauty built for
Roreen and his intended bride. The two succeeding mornings saw two
equally splendid castles built for the two brothers and their brides
elect, for they were about to be married to the two elder princesses.
By the next morning after that they had a castle finished for Roreen's
mother. On the second morning afterward they had a town built, and at
length, on the seventh morning, when Roreen went out, he found both
castles and town' enclosed by a strong wall, with ramparts, gateways,
and every other necessary appliance of defence. The three workmen
then took their leave, and by the loud smacking of their lips as they
departed, Roreen knew that they were going off to the west in search
of the "say" of whiskey. After this the three {236} brothers were
married to the three lovely princesses, mercenary soldiers flocked in
from every quarter, and took service under their banners; the
inhabitants of the surrounding country removed into the town, and
matters went on gaily and prosperously. The name of Roreen's wife was
Mourne Blanaid, or the Blooming, and on a great festival day got up
for the purpose, he called the town Mourne, in honor of her. In a
pitched battle they defeated and killed the slayer of their father,
and drove his followers out of their patrimony, and after that they
lived in glory and renown till their death.

For centuries after the town of Mourne flourished, still remaining in
possession of the race of the Mac Carthys. At length the Normans came
and laid their mail-clad hands upon it. In the reign of King John,
Alexander de St. Helena founded a preceptory for Knights Templars near
it, the ruins of which stand yet in forlorn and solitary grandeur
beside the little river. Still the town flourished and throve, though
many a battle was fought within it, and around its gray walls, till at
length, according to Spenser, Murrogh na Ranagh, prince of Thomond,
burst out like a fiery flame from his fastnesses in Clare, overran all
Munster, burnt almost every town in it that had fallen into the
possession of the English, and among the rest Mourne, whose woeful
burning did not content him, for he destroyed it altogether, scarcely
leaving one stone standing there upon another. And now only a few
mounds remain to show the spot where Roreen Shouragh got his town
built, and where he ruled so jovially.

And so, gentle reader, if you look with me to the history of Troy,
Rome, the battle of Ventry Harbor, the Pyramids, or Tadmor in the
Desert, I think you will say that there is none of them so clear, so
circumstantial, and so trustworthy as the early history of the old
town of Mourne.



----

{237}

HANS EULER.

FROM THE GERMAN OF J. G. SEIDL.

  "Hark, child--again that knocking!  Go, fling wide the door, I pray;
  Perchance 'tis some poor pilgrim who has wandered from his way.
  Now save thee, gallant stranger! Sit thou down and share our cheer:
  Our bread is white and wholesome see! our drink is fresh and clear."

  "I come not here your bread to share, nor of your drink to speak.
  Your name?"--"Hans Euler."--"So! 'tis well: it is your blood I seek.
  Know that through many a weary year I've sought you for a foe:
  I had a goodly brother once: 'twas you who laid him low.

  "And as he bit the dust, I vowed that soon or late on you
  His death should be avenged; and mark! that oath I will keep true."
  "I slew him; but in quarrel just. I fought him hand to hand:
  Yet, since you would avenge his fall,--I'm ready; take your stand.

  "But I war not in my homestead, by this hearth whereon I tread;
  Not in sight of these--my dear ones--for whose safety I have bled.
  My daughter, reach me down yon sword,--the same that laid him low;
  And if I ne'er come back again, Tyrol has sons enow."

  So forth they fared together, up the glorious Alpine way,
  Where newly now the kindling east led on the golden day.
  The sun that mounted with them, as he rose in all his pride,
  Still saw the stranger toiling on, Hans Euler for his guide.

  They climbed the mountain summit; and behold! the Alpine world
  Showed clear and bright before them, 'neath the mists that upward curled.
  Below them, calm and happy, lay the valley in her rest,
  With the châlets in her arms, and with their dwellers on her breast.

  Amidst were sparkling waters; giant chasms, scarred and riven;
  Vast, crowning woods; and over all, the pure, blest air of heaven:
  And, sacred in the sight of God, where peace her treasures spread,
  On every hearth, on every home, the soul of freedom shed!

  Both gazed in solemn silence down. The stranger stayed his hand.
  Hans Euler gently pointed to his own beloved land:
  "'Twas this thy brother threatened; such a wrong might move me well.
  'Twas in such a cause I struggled:--'twas for such a fault he fell."

  The stranger paused: then, turning, looked Hans Euler in the face;
  The arm that would have raised the sword fell powerless in its place.
  "You slew him. Was it, then, for this--for home and fatherland?
  Forgive me! 'Twas a righteous cause. Hans Euler, there's my hand!"

    ELEANORA L. HERVEY.


{238}


From All the Year Round.

THE MODERN GENIUS OF THE STREAMS.


Water to raise corn from the seed, to clothe the meadow with its
grass, and to fill the land with fruit and flowers; water to lie
heaped in fantastic clouds, to make the fairy-land of sunset, and to
spread the arch of mercy in the rainbow; water that kindles our
imagination to a sense of beauty; water that gives us our meat, and is
our drink, and cleans us of dirt and disease, and is our servant in a
thousand great and little ways--it is the very juice and essence of
man's civilization. And so, whether we shall drag over cold water, or
let hot water drag us, is one way of putting the question between
canal and steam communication for conveyance of our heavy traffic. The
canal-boat uses its water cold without, the steam-engine requires it
hot within. Before hot water appeared in its industrial character to
hiss off the cold, canals had all the glory to themselves. They are
not yet hissed off their old stages and cat-called into contempt by
the whistle of the steam-engine, for canal communication still has
advantages of its own, and canal shares are powers in the money
market.

Little more than a century ago, not only were there neither canals nor
railroads in this country, but the common high-roads were about the
worst in Europe. Corn and wool were sent to market over those bad
roads on horses' or bullocks' backs, and the only coal used in the
inland southern counties was carried on horseback in sacks for the
supply of the blacksmiths' forges. Water gave us our over-sea
commerce, that came in and went out by way of our tidal rivers; and
the step proposed toward the fostering of our home industries was a
great one when it occurred to somebody to imitate nature, by erecting
artificial rivers that should flow whereever we wished them to flow,
and should be navigable along their whole course for capacious,
flat-bottomed carrying-boats.

The first English canal, indeed, was constructed as long as three
hundred years ago, at Exeter, by John Trew, a native of
Glamorganshire, who enabled the traders of Exeter to cancel the legacy
of the spite of an angry Countess of Devon, who had, nearly three
hundred years before that time, stopped the ascent of sea-going
vessels to Exeter by forming a weir across the Exe at Topham. Trew
contrived, to avoid the obstruction, a canal from Exeter to Topham,
three miles long, with a lock to it. John Trew ruined himself in the
service of an ungrateful corporation.

After this time, improvements went no further than the clearing out of
some channels of natural water-communication, until the time of James
Brindley, the father of the English canal system.

James Brindley was born in the year 1716, the third of the reign of
George the First, in a cottage in the parish of Wormhill, midway
between the remote hamlets of the High Peak of Derby. There his
father, more devoted to shooting, hunting, and bull-running, than to
his work as a cottier, cultivated the little croft he rented, got into
bad company and poverty, and left his children neglected and untaught.
The idle man had an industrious wife, who taught the children, of whom
James was the eldest, what little she knew; but they must all help to
earn as soon as they were able, and James Brindley earned wages at any
ordinary laborer's work that he could get until he was seventeen years
old. {239} He was a lad clever with his knife, who made little models
of mills, and set them to work in mill-streams of his own contrivance.
The machinery of a neighboring grist-mill was his especial delight,
and had given the first impulse to his modellings. He and his mother
agreed that he should bind himself, whenever he could, to a
millwright; and at the age of seventeen he did, after a few weeks'
trial, become apprentice for seven years to Abraham Bennett,
wheelwright and millwright, at the village of Sutton, near
Macclesfield, which was the market-town of Brindley's district.

The millwrights were then the only engineers; they worked by turns at
the foot-lathe, the carpenter's bench, and the anvil; and, in country
places where there was little support for division of labor, they had
to find skill or invention to meet any demand on mechanical skill.
Bennett was not a sober man, his journeymen were a rough set, and much
of the young apprentice's time was at first occupied in running for
beer. He was taught little, and had to find out everything for
himself, which he did but slowly; so that, during some time, he passed
with his master for a stupid bungler, only fit for the farm-work from
which he had been taken. But, after two years of this sort of
pupilage, a fire having injured some machinery in a small silk-mill at
Macclesfield, Brindley was sent to bring away the damaged pieces; and,
by his suggestions on that occasion, he showed to Mr. Milner, the mill
superintendent, an intelligence that caused his master to be applied
to for Brindley's aid in a certain part of the repairs. He was
unwillingly sent, worked under the encouragement of the friendly
superintendent with remarkable ability, and was surprised that his
master and the other workmen seemed to be dissatisfied with his
success. When they chaffed him, at the supper celebrating the
completion of the work, his friend Milner offered to wager a gallon of
the best ale that, before the lad's apprenticeship was out, he would
be a cleverer workman than any of them there present, master or man.
This was a joke against Brindley among his fellow-workmen; but in
another year they found "the young man Brindley" specially asked for
when the neighboring millers needed repairs of machinery, and
sometimes he was chosen in preference to the master himself. Bennett
asked "the young man Briudley" where he had learnt his skill in
mill-work, but he could tell no more than that it "came natural like."
He even suggested and carried out improvements, especially in the
application of the water-power, and worked so substantially well, that
his master said to him one day, "Jem, if thou goes on i' this foolish
way o' workin', there will be very little trade left to be done when
thou comes oot o' thy time: thou knaws firmness o' wark's h' ruin o'
trade."

But presently Jem's "firmness o' wark" was the saving of his master.
Bennett got a contract to set up a paper-mill on the river Dane, upon
the model of a mill near Manchester. Bennett went to examine the
Manchester mill, brought back a confused and beery notion of it, and,
proceeding with the job, got into the most hopeless bewilderment. An
old hand, who had looked in on the work, reported, over his drink at
the nearest public-house, that the job was a farce, and that Abraham
Bennett was only throwing away his employer's money. Next Saturday,
after his work, young Jem Brindley disappeared. He was just of age,
and it was supposed he had taken it into his head to leave his master
and begin life on his own account. But on Monday morning, there he was
at his work, with his coat off, and the whole duty to be done clear in
his head. He had taken on Saturday night a twenty-five mile walk to
the pattern mill, near Manchester. On Sunday morning he had asked
leave of its proprietor to go in and examine it. He had spent {240}
some hours on Sunday in the study of its machinery, and then had
walked the twenty-five miles back, to resume his work and save his
master from a failure that would have been disastrous to his credit.
The conduct of the work was left to him; he undid what was amiss, and
proceeded with the rest so accurately, that the contract was completed
within the appointed time, to the complete satisfaction of all persons
concerned. After that piece of good service, Bennett left to James
Brindley the chief care over his business. When Bennett died, Brindley
carried on to completion all work then in hand, and wound up the
accounts for the benefit of his old master's family. That done, he set
up in business on his own account at the town of Leek, in
Staffordshire; he was then twenty-six years old, having served seven
years as an apprentice and two years as journeyman.

Leek was then but a small market-town, with a few grist-mills, and
Brindley had no capital; but he made himself known beyond Leek as a
reliable man, whose work was good and durable, who had invention at
the service of his employers, and who always finished a job within the
stipulated time. He did not confine himself to mill-work, but was
ready to undertake all sorts of machinery connected with the draining
of mines, the pumping of water, the smelting of iron and copper, for
which a demand was then rising, and became honorably known to his
neighbors as "the Schemer." At first he had no journeyman or
apprentice, and he cut the tree for his own timber. While working as
an apprentice, he had taught himself to write in a clumsy,
half-illegible way--he never learnt to spell--and when he had been
thirteen years in business, he would still charge an employer his
day's work at two shillings for cutting a big tree, for a mill-shaft
or for other use. When he was called to exercise his skill at a
distance upon some machinery, he added a charge of sixpence a day for
extra expenses.

When the brothers John and Thomas Wedgwood, potters in a small way at
the outset of their famous career, desired to increase the supply of
flint-powder, they called "the Schemer" to their aid, and the success
of the flint-mill Brindley then erected brought him business in the
potteries from that time forward.

About this time, also, a Manchester man was being married to a young
lady of mark in the potteries, and, during the wedding festivities,
conversation once turned on the cleverness of the young millwright of
Leek. The Manchester man wondered whether he was clever enough to get
the water out of some hopelessly drowned coal mines of his, and
thought he should like to see him. Brindley was sent for, told the
case and its hitherto insuperable difficulties, went into a brown
study, then suddenly brightened up, and told in what way he thought
that, without great expense, the difficulty might be conquered. The
gist of his plan was to use the fall of the river Irwell, that formed
one boundary of the estate, and pump the water from the pits by means
of the greater power of the water in the river. His suggestion was
thought good, and, being set to work upon this job, he drove a tunnel
through six hundred yards of solid rock, and by the tunnel brought the
river down upon the breast of an immense water-wheel, fixed in a
chamber thirty feet below the surface of the ground; the water, when
it had turned the wheel, was carried on into the lower level of the
Irwell. That wheel, with its pumps, working night and day, soon
cleared the drowned outworkings of the mine; and for the invention and
direction of this valuable engineering work, he seems only to have
charged his workman's wages of two shillings a day.

An engineer from London had been brought down to superintend the
building of a new silk-mill at {241} Congleton, and Brindley was
employed under him to make the water-wheel and do the common work of
his trade. The engineer from London got his work into a mess, and at
last was obliged to confess his inability to carry out his plan. "The
Schemer" Brindley was applied to by the perplexed proprietor. Could he
put the confusion straight? James Brindley asked to see the plans; but
the great engineer refused to show them to a common millwright. "Well,
then," said Brindley to the proprietor of the mill, "tell me exactly
what you want the machinery to do, and I will try to contrive what
will do it. But you must leave me free to work in my own way." He was
told the results desired, and not only achieved them, but achieved
much more, adding new contrivances, which afterward proved of the
greatest value.

After this achievement, Brindley was employed by the now prospering
potters to build flint-mills of more power upon a new plan of his own.
One of the largest was that built for Mr. Baddely, of which work there
is record in such trade entries of his as "March 15, 1757. With Mr.
Baddely to Matherso about a now" (new) "flint-mill upon a windey day 1
day 3s. 6d. March 19 draing a plann 1 day 2s. 6d. March 23 draing a
plann and to sat out the wheelrace 1 day 4s."

At this time Brindley is also exercising his wit on an attempt at an
improved steam-engine; but though his ideas are good, it is hard to
bring them into continuously good working order, and after the close
of entries about it in his memorandum-book, when it seems to have
broken down for a second time, he underlines the item "to Run about a
Drinking Is. 6d." But he confined his despair to the loss of a day and
the expenditure of eighteen pence. Not long afterward he had developed
a patent of his own, and erected, in 1763, for the Walker Colliery at
Newcastle, a steam-engine wholly of iron, which was pronounced the
most "complete and noble piece of iron-work" that had up to that time
been produced. But the perfecting of the steam-engine was then safe in
the hands of Watt, and Brindley had already turned into his own path
as the author of our English canal system.

The young Duke of Bridgewater, vexed in love by the frailty of fair
woman, had abjured interest in their sex, had gone down to his estate
of Worsley, on the borders of Chat Moss, and, to give himself
something more wholesome to think about than the sisters Gunning and
their fortunes, conferred with John Gilbert, his land steward, as to
the possibility of cutting a canal by which the coals found upon his
Worsley estate might be readily taken to market at Manchester.
Manchester then was a rising town, of which the manufacturers were yet
unaided by the steam-engine, and there was no coal smoke but that
which arose from household fires. The roads out of Manchester were so
bad as to be actually closed in winter, and in summer the coal, sold
at the pit mouth by the horse-load, was conveyed on horses' backs at
an addition to its cost of nine or ten shillings a ton.

When the duke discussed with Gilbert old abandoned and new possible
schemes of water conveyance for his Worsley coal, Gilbert advised the
calling in of the ingenious James Brindley of Leek, "the Schemer."
When the duke came into contact with Brindley, he at once put trust in
him, and gave him the direction of the proposed work; whereupon he was
requested to base his advice upon what he enters in his
memorandum-book of jobs done, as an "ochilor," (ocular) "servey or a
ricconitering."

Brindley examined the ground, and formed his own plan. He was against
carrying the canal down into Irwell by a flight of locks, and so up
again on the other side to the proposed level, but counselled carrying
the canal by solid embankments and a stone aqueduct right over the
river upon one {242} level throughout. The duke accepted his opinion,
and had plans prepared for a new application to parliament, Brindley
often staying with him at work and in consultation for weeks together,
while still travelling to and fro in full employment upon mills,
water-wheels, cranes, fire-engines, and other mechanical work. Small
as his pay was, he lived frugally. He had by this time even saved a
little money, and gained credit enough to be able, by borrowing from a
friend at Leek, to pay between five and six hundred pounds for a
fourth share of an estate at Turnhurst, in Staffordshire, supposed by
him to be full of minerals.

The Duke of Bridgewater obtained his act in the year 1760, but the
bold and original part of Brindley's scheme, which many ridiculed as
madness, caused the duke much anxiety. In England there had never been
so great an aqueduct, but the scheme was not only for the carrying of
water in a water-tight trunk of earth over an embankment, but also for
the carrying of ships on a bridge of water over water. Brindley had no
misgivings. To allay the duke's fears, he suggested calling in and
questioning another engineer, who surprised the man of genius by
ending an adverse report thus: "I have often heard of castles an the
air; but never before saw where any of them were to be erected."

The duke, however, with all his hesitation, had most faith in the head
of James Brindley, bade him go on in his own way, and resolved to run
the risk of failure. And so, on a bridge of three arches, the canal
was carried over the Irwell by the Barton aqueduct, thirty-nine feet
above the river. The water was confined within a puddled channel, to
prevent leakage, and the work is at this day as sound as it was when
first constructed. For the safe carrying of water along the top of an
earthen embankment, Brindley had relied upon the retaining powers of
clay puddle. It was by help also of clay puddle that he carried the
weight of the embankment safe over the ooze of Trafford Moss.

With great ingenuity, also, Brindley provided for the crossing of his
canal by streams intercepting its course, without breach of his rule
that it is unsafe to let such waters freely mix with the canal stream.
Thus, to provide for the free passage of the Medlock without causing a
rush into the canal, an ingenious form of weir was contrived, over
which its waters flowed into a lower level, and thence down a well
several yards deep, leading to a subterranean passage by which the
stream was passed into the Irwell, near at hand. Arthur Young, who saw
Brindley's canal soon after it was opened, said that "the whole plan
of these works shows a capacity and extent of mind which foresees
difficulties, and invents remedies in anticipation of possible evils.
The connection and dependence of the parts upon each other are happily
imagined; and all are exerted in concert, to command by every means
the wished-for success." At the Worsley end Brindley constructed a
basin, into which coal was brought from different workings of the mine
by a subterranean water channel. Brindley also invented cranes for the
more ready loading of the boats, laid down within the mines a system
of underground railways leading from the face of the coal where the
miners worked, to the wells that he had made at different points in
the tunnels for shooting the coal down into the boats waiting below.
He drained and ventilated with a water-bellows the lower parts of the
mine. He improved the barges, invented water-weights, raising dams,
riddles to wash the coal for the forges. At the Manchester end
Brindley made equally ingenious arrangements for the easy delivery of
the coal at the top of Castle Hill. At every turn in the work his
inventive genius was felt. When the want of lime for the masonry was a
serious impediment, Brindley discovered how to make, of a useless,
unadhesive lime-marl, by tempering it and casting it in {243} moulds
before burning, an excellent lime, a contrivance that alone saved the
duke several thousands of pounds cost. When the water was let in, and
the works everywhere stood firm, people of fashion flocked to see
Brindley's canal, as "perhaps the greatest artificial curiosity in the
world:" and writers spoke in glowing terms of the surprise with which
they saw several barges of great burden drawn by a single mule or
horse along a "river hung in the air," over another river flowing
beneath.

As for Manchester, with the price of coal reduced one half, it was
ready to make the best use of the steam-engine when it was established
as the motive-power in our factories.

Within two months of the day, seventeenth of July, 1761, when the
first boat-load of coals travelled over the Barton viaduct, Brindley's
notes testify that he was at Liverpool "recconitoring" and by the end
of September he was levelling for a proposed extension of his canal
from Manchester to Liverpool, by joining it with the Mersey, eight
miles below Warrington Bridge, whence there is a natural tideway to
Liverpool, about fifteen miles distant. At that time there was not
even a coach communication over the bad roads between Manchester and
Liverpool, the first stage-coach having been started six years later,
when it required six, and sometimes eight horses to pull it the thirty
miles along the ruts and through the sloughs. The coach started from
Liverpool early in the morning, breakfasted at Prescot, dined at
Warrington, and reached Manchester by supper-time. From Manchester to
Liverpool it made the return journey next day. The Duke of
Bridgewater's proposed canal was strongly opposed as an antagonist
interest by the Mersey and Irwell Navigation Company. The canal
promised to take freights at half the price charged by the Navigation
Company. A son of the Earl of Derby took the part of the "Old
Navigators," and as the Duke of Bridgewater was a Whig, Brindley had
to enter in his note-book that "the Toores" (Tories) had "mad had"
(made head) "agane ye Duk." But at last his entry was: "ad a grate
Division of 127 fort Duk 98 nos for t e Duke 29 Me Jorete," and the
Duke's cause prospered during the rest of the contest.

Brindley bought a new suit of clothes to grace his part as principal
engineering witness for the canal, and having upset his mind for some
days by going to see Garrick play Richard the Third, (wherefore he
declared against all further indulgence in that sort of excitement),
he went to the committee-room duly provided with a bit of chalk in his
pocket, and made good the saying that originated from his clear way of
showing what he meant, upon the floor of the committee-room, that
"Brindley and chalk would go through the world." When asked to produce
a drawing of a proposed bridge, he said he had none, but could
immediately get a model. Whereupon he went out and bought a large
cheese, which he brought into the committee-room and cut into two
equal parts, saying, "Here is my model." The two halves of the cheese
represented the two arches of his bridge, the rest of the work
connected with them he built with paper, with books, or with whatever
he found ready to hand. Once when he had repeatedly talked about
"puddling," some of the members wished to know what puddling was.
Brindley sent out for a lump of clay, hollowed it into a trough,
poured water in, and showed that it leaked out. Then he worked up the
clay with water, going through the process of puddling in miniature,
again made a trough of the puddled clay, filled it with water, and
showed that it was water-tight. "Thus it is," he said, "that I form a
water-tight trunk to carry water over rivers and valleys, wherever
they cross the path of the canal."

And so the battle was fought, and the canal works completed at a total
{244} cost of two hundred and twenty thousand pounds, of which
Brindley was content to take as his share a rate of pay below that of
an ordinary mechanic at the present day. The canal yielded an income
which eventually reached eighty thousand pounds a year; but three and
sixpence a day, and for a greater part of the time half a crown a day,
was the salary of the man of genius by whom it was planned and
executed. Yet Brindley was then able to get a guinea a day for
services to others, though from the Duke of Bridgewater he never took
more than a guinea a week, and had not always that. The duke was
investing all the money he could raise, and sometimes at his wit's end
for means to go on with the work. Brindley gave his soul to the work
for its own sake, and if he had a few pence to buy himself his dinner
with--one day he enters only "ating and drinking 6d."--he could live,
content with having added not a straw's weight of impediment to the
great enterprise he was bent with all the force of his great genius
upon achieving. It gave him the advantage, also, of being able, as was
most convenient, to treat with the duke on equal terms. He was invited
as a canal maker to Hesse by offers of any payment he chose to demand,
but stuck to the duke, who is said even to have been in debt to him
for travelling and other expenses, which he had left unpaid with the
answer, "I am much more distressed for money than you; however, as
soon as I can recover myself, your services shall not go unrewarded."
After Brindley's sudden death his widow applied in vain for sums which
she said were due to her late husband.

The Staffordshire Grand Trunk Canal, Brindley's other great work,
started from the duke's canal, near Runcorn, passed through the
salt-making districts of Cheshire and the Pottery district, to unite
the Severn with the Mersey by one hundred and forty miles of
water-way. This canal went through five tunnels, one of them, that at
Harecastle, being nearly three thousand yards long, a feature in the
scheme accounted by many to be as preposterous as they had called his
former "castle in the air." The work was done; bringing with it
traffic, population, and prosperity into many half-savage midland
districts. It gave comfort and ample employment in the Pottery
district, while trebling the numbers of those whom it converted, from
a half-employed and ill-paid set of savages, into a thriving
community.

Once, when Brindley was demonstrating to a committee of the House of
Commons the superior reliableness and convenience of equable canals as
compared with rivers, liable to every mischance of flood and drought,
he was asked by a member, "What, then, he took to be the use of
navigable rivers?" and replied, "To make canal navigations, to be
sure!" From the Grand Trunk, other canals branched, and yet others
were laid out by Brindley before he died. He found time when at the
age of fifty to marry a girl of nineteen, and the house then falling
vacant on the estate of Turnhurst, of which he had, for the sake of
its minerals, bought a fourth share, and by that time had a colliery
at work, he took his wife home as the mistress of that old, roomy
dwelling. He was receiving better pay then as the engineer of the
Grand Trunk Canal, and his new home was conveniently near to the
workings of its great Harecastle Tunnel, into which he and his
partners sent a short branch canal--of a mile and a half long--from
their coal mine, which was only a few fields distant from his house.

Water, that made his greatness, was at last the death of Brindley. He
got drenched one day while surveying a canal, went about in his wet
clothes, and when he went to bed at the inn was put between damp
sheets. This produced the illness of which he died, at the age of
fifty-six. It was not the first time that he had taken to his bed.
Scarcely able to read, and if he could have read, engaged on work so
new that no book precedents could have {245} helped him, whenever
Brindley had some difficulty to overcome that seemed for a time
insuperable, he went to bed upon it, and is known to have stopped in
bed two or three days, till he had quietly thought it all over, and
worked his way to the solution. It is said that when he lay on his
death-bed some eager canal undertakers urged to see him and seek from
him the solution of a problem. They had met with a serious difficulty
in the course of their canal, and must see Mr. Brindley and get his
advice. They were admitted, and told him how at a certain place they
had labored in vain to prevent their canal from leaking. "Then puddle
it," murmured Brindley. "Sir, but we have puddled it." "Then"--and
they were almost his last words in life--"puddle it again--and
again." As he had wisely invested his savings in Grand Trunk shares,
they and his share in the colliery enabled him to leave ample
provision for his widow and two daughters.

As for the canal system that he established, it has not been made
obsolete by its strong younger brother, the railway system. The duke's
canal is as busy as ever. Not less than twenty million tons of traffic
are at this date carried yearly upon the canals of England alone, and
this quantity is steadily increasing.

We have taken the facts in this account of Brindley, from a delightful
popular edition of that part of Mr. Smiles's Lives of the Engineers
which tells of him and of the earlier water engineers. Of Mr. Smiles's
Lives of George and Robert Stephenson there is a popular edition as a
companion volume, and therein all may read, worthily told, the tale of
the foundation and of the chief triumphs of that new form of
engineering which dealt with water, not by the riverful, but by the
bucketful, and made a few buckets of water strong as a river to sweep
men and their goods and their cattle in a mighty torrent from one
corner of the country to another.

----

From Chambers's Journal.

A LIE.


  A thistle grew in a sluggard's croft,
  Rough and rank with a thorny growth,
  With its spotted leaves, and its purple flowers
  (Blossoms of Sin, and bloom of Sloth);
  Slowly it ripened its baneful seeds,
  And away they went in swift gray showers.

  But every seed was cobweb winged,
  And they spread o'er a hundred miles of land.
  'Tis centuries now since they first took flight,
  In that careless, gay, and mischievous band,
  Yet still they are blooming and ripening fast,
  And spreading their evil by day and night.


{246}

From The Dublin Review.

CHRISTIAN ART.


_The History of our Lord as exemplified in Works of Art;_ with that of
the Types, St. John the Baptist and other persons of the Old and New
Testament. Commenced by the late Mrs. JAMESON; continued and completed
by Lady EASTLAKE. 2 vols. London: Longman. 1864.


The series of works on Christian Art brought out by the late Mrs.
Jameson, and which earned for her so high a reputation as an art
critic, was conceived upon a plan of progressive interest and
importance. From "Sacred and Legendary Art," published in 1848, she
passed to the special legends connected with Monastic Orders, and in
1852 gave to the public her most charming volume, entitled "Legends of
the Madonna." The series was to have closed with the subject of the
volume now before us, and some progress had been made by Mrs. Jameson
in collecting notes on various pictures, when, in the spring of 1860,
death cut her labors short. The work, however, has passed into hands
well able to complete it worthily. We may miss some of the freshness
and genuine simplicity with which Mrs. Jameson was wont to transfer to
paper rare impression made on her mind and heart; but Lady Eastlake,
while bringing to her task the essential qualification of earnestness
and exhibiting considerable grace and force of style, is possessed of
a far wider and more critical acquaintance with the history of art
than her amiable predecessor either had or pretended to have. It is
pleasant to find in these pages, as in those which preceded them, the
evidence of a desire to avoid controversial matter; and that, without
compromise of personal conviction, care has been generally taken not
to wound the feelings of those who differ from the writer in religious
belief. The primary object of the work is aesthetic and artistic, not
religious; and it is seldom that the laws of good taste are
transgressed in its pages by gratuitous attacks upon the tenets of the
great body of artists who are the immediate subject of criticism.
Indeed, considering that these volumes are the production of a
Protestant, we think that less of Protestant animus could hardly be
shown, at all consistently with honesty of purpose and frankness of
speech. That no traces of the Protestant spirit should appear, would
be next to an impossibility; and the affectation of Catholic feeling,
where it did not exist, would be offensive from its very unreality. So
much self-control in traversing a vast extent of delicate and
dangerous ground deserves all the more hearty acknowledgment, as it
must have been peculiarly difficult to a person of Lady Eastlake's
ardent temperament and evident strength of conviction. If, therefore,
in the course of our remarks, we feel bound to point out the evil
influence which Lady Eastlake's religious views seem to us to have
exercised on her critical appreciations, it will be understood that
theories, not persons, are the object of our animadversions. It is at
all times an ungrateful task to expose the weak points of an author;
it would be especially ungenerous to be hard upon the shortcomings of
one who has done such good service to the cause of truth, in proving,
however unconsciously, by the mere exercise of persistent candor, the
identity of Christian and Catholic art. Catholics, indeed, do not
ordinarily stand in need of such proof. If they know anything of art,
the fact of this identity must be with them an early discovery; but it
is gratifying, especially in a time and country in which scant justice
on such matters is too often dealt out to us, to be able to adduce a
{247} testimony the more valuable because given in despite of an
adverse bias. It is quite possible, indeed, that the writer has not
perceived the full import of her work; but no one, we think, can study
her examples or weigh the force of her criticism with out coming to
the true conclusion upon this subject.

But, before establishing the correctness of this assertion, we must
draw attention to one point upon which we are at issue with Lady
Eastlake: a point, moreover, of no small importance, as it vitally
affects the value of a large part of her criticisms. A question arises
at the outset, what standard or test of Christian art is to be set up;
and Lady Eastlake makes an excellent start in the investigation. There
is, perhaps, no principle so steadily kept in view throughout the
work, or so often and earnestly insisted on, as this: that genuine
Christian art and true Christian doctrine are intimately and
essentially connected. Art is bound to depict only the truth in fact
or doctrine (vol. ii., p. 266, note). Departure from sound theology
involves heresy in art. Now, no principle can be more true than this,
or of greater importance toward forming a correct judgment upon works
professing to belong to Christian art. Beauty and truth are
objectively identical, for beauty is only truth lighted up and
harmonized by the reason; and to supernatural beauty, which Christian
art essentially aims at expressing, supernatural truth must
necessarily correspond. For here we have nothing to do with mere
material beauty, "the glories of color, the feats of anatomical skill,
the charms of chiaroscuro, the revels of free handling." Admirable as
these are in themselves, and by no means, theoretically at least,
injurious to Christian art, they belong properly to art as art, and
are more or less separable from art as Christian. Christian art is
never perfect as art, unless material beauty enters into the
composition; but as Christianity is above art, and the soul superior
to the body, so material beauty must never forget its place, never
strive to obtain the mastery, or constitute itself the chief aim of
the artist, upon pain of total destruction of the Christian element.
The soul of Christian art is in the idea--the shadowing out by symbol
or representation, under material forms and conditions, of immaterial,
supernatural, even uncreated beauty, the beauty of heavenly virtue, or
heavenly mystery or divinity itself. But how are these objects, in all
their harmony, proportion, and splendor, to be realized--how is
supernatural beauty to be conceived--except by a soul gifted with
supernatural perceptions? Faith, at least, is indispensably requisite
to the truthfulness of any artistic work intended to represent the
supernatural. Without faith, distortion and caricature are inevitable.
With faith--the foundation of all knowledge of the supernatural in
this life--much, very much, may be accomplished. But it is when faith,
enlivened and perfected by supernatural love, exercises itself in
contemplation, that the spiritual sight becomes keen, and the soul,
from having simply a just appreciation, passes to a vision of
exquisite beauty, sublimity, and tenderness, which a higher perception
of divine mysteries has laid open to its gaze. The hand may falter,
and be faithless to the mental conception, so as to produce imperfect
execution and inadequate artistic result. Faith and love do not make a
man an artist. But, amidst deformity or poverty of art in the material
element, if there is any, however slight, artistic power employed, the
outward defects will be qualified, and almost transformed, to the eye
of an appreciating spectator, through the inner power which speaks
from the painter's soul to his own: just as we learn to overlook, or
even to admire, plain features, and anything short of positive
ugliness of outline, in those whose mental greatness and moral beauty
we have learned to venerate and to love. On the other hand, any amount
of material perfection in contour and color is insipid as a doll,
{248} a mere mask of nothingness, incapable of arresting attention or
captivating the heart, unless within there be a soul of beauty--that
inward excellence which subordinates to itself, while it gives life
and meaning to, the outward form. On the side of the object, truth; on
the part of the spectator, faith and love--these are the palmary
conditions of Christian art and its appreciation. For it must ever be
remembered that supernatural truth lies beyond the ken of any but
souls elevated by faith; and, what is of equal importance, that faith
can have no other object than the truth. Its object is infallible
truth, or it is not faith. No wonder, then, that, when we see a
prodigality of manual skill and grace of form, and even moral beauty
of the natural order, devoid of the inspiration of supernatural faith
and love, we are forced to exclaim with St. Gregory, as he gazed on
the fair Saxon youths, _Heit proh dolor! quod tam lucidi vultus
homines tenebrarum auctor possideret, tantaque gratia frontis
conspicui mentem ab aeterna gratia vacuam gestarent._   [Footnote 51]
Alas! that so much physical beauty should embody nothing but a pagan
idea! It were as unreasonable to look for Christian art as the product
of an heretical imagination, as to demand Christian eloquence or
Christian poetry from an heretical preacher or a free-thinking poet.
The vision is wanting, the appreciation is not there--how, then, is
the expression possible?

  [Footnote 51: "Alas! what pain it is to think that men of such
  bright countenance should be the possession of the Prince of
  Darkness; and that though conspicuous for surprising grace of
  feature, they should bear a soul within untenanted by everlasting
  grace."]

Nor is this a mere abstract theory, erected on  _a priori_
principles. It would be easy to verify our position by a large
induction from the history of art. Is there a picture whose mute
eloquence fills the soul with reverential awe, or holy joy, or
supernatural calm, or deep, deep sympathy with the sufferings of our
Lord, or the sorrows of his Immaculate Mother, we may be sure the
painter was some humble soul, ascetical and pious, who, like Juan de
Joanes, or Zurbaran, spent his days in lifelong seclusion, given up to
the grave and holy thoughts which their pictures utter to us; or that
other Spaniard, Luis de Vargas, famed alike for his austerity and
amiable Christian gaiety; or a Sassoferrato, or a Van Eyck, seeking
in, holy communion the peace of soul which can alone reflect the
calmness of sanctity, or the bliss of celestial scenes; or the holy
friar, John of Fiesoli, known to all as the Angelic whose heroic
humility and Christian simplicity, learned in a life of prayer and
contemplation, invest his pictures with an unearthly charm. These, and
many another pious painter, known or unknown by name to men, looked on
their vocation as a holy trust, and sought to keep themselves
unspotted from the world. Theirs was the practical maxim so dear to
the blessed Angelico, that "those who work for Christ must dwell in
Christ." On the other hand, does a picture, albeit Christian in
subject and in name, offend us by false sentiment, or cold
conventionalism, or sensuality, or affectation, or strain after
theatrical effect, or any of the hundred forms which degraded art
exhibits when it has wandered from the Christian type--we know that we
are looking on the handiwork of some schismatic Greek, or modern
Protestant; or that, if the painter be a Catholic, he lived in the
days or wrought under the influence of the Renaissance, when paganism
made its deadly inroads upon art, substituting the spirit of
voluptuousness for the sweet and austere graces that spring of divine
charity; or under the blighting influence of Jansenism, which killed
alike that queenly virtue and her sister humility by false asceticism
and pharisaic rigor. We might even trust the decision as to the
truthfulness of our view to an inspection of the examples with which
Lady Eastlake has so abundantly illustrated her volumes. Indeed,
hitherto her principle and ours are one.

{249}

But unfortunately, though the _major_ premise of the art-syllogism is
granted on both sides, Lady Eastlake adopts a _minor_, from which we
utterly dissent. It is implied in one and all of the following
statements, and is more or less interwoven with the whole staple of
her work. She tells us that "the materials for this history in art are
only properly derivable from Scripture, and therefore referable back
to the same source for verification" (vol. i., p. 3). And again: "It
may be at once laid down as a principle, that the interests of art and
the integrity of Scripture [by integrity is meant literal adherence to
the text of Scripture] are indissolubly united. Where superstition
mingles, the quality of Christian art suffers; where doubt enters,
Christian art has nothing to do. It may even be averred that, if a
person could be imagined, deeply imbued with aesthetic instincts and
knowledge, and utterly ignorant of Scripture, he would yet intuitively
prefer, as art, all those conceptions of our Lord's history which
adhere to the simple text. . . . All preference for the simple
narrative of Scripture he would arrive at through art--all
condemnation of the embroideries of legend through the same channel"
(vol. i., p. 6). And again: "The simplicity of art and of the Gospel
stand or fall together. The literal narrative of the agony in the
garden lost sight of, all became confusion and error" (vol. ii., p.
30).

Now, whatever obscurity and confusion these passages contain--and they
do contain a great deal--one thing is unmistakably clear, that the
orthodoxy of the ultra-Protestant maxim, "The Bible and the Bible
only," is a fixed principle with Lady Eastlake. And the consequence
is, that, whenever she looks at a religious picture, she refers to the
Gospel narrative for its verification. If it does not stand this test,
it is nowhere in her esteem. What is not in Scripture is legendary and
unartistic, because necessarily at variance with scriptural truth.
Thus whole provinces of art in connection with our Lord are banished
from her pages. Surely such a canon of taste is not only narrow, but
arbitrary: narrow, as excluding whatever comes down to us hallowed by
tradition, considered apart from or beyond the limits of scriptural
statement; arbitrary, because it leaves art at the mercy of the sects,
with their manifold dissensions as to the extent of Scripture, or its
true interpretation. Thus, Lady Eastlake, being herself no believer in
the doctrine of the real presence, does not recognize its enunciation
in the sacred pages, and loses, apparently, all interest in the great
pictures which symbolize or relate to the most holy sacrament of the
altar. So, too, most of the special devotions to the person of our
Lord, which have sprung out of the living faith of the church, and
have furnished subjects for pictures incontestably of a high order,
are totally omitted from her classification of devotional
compositions. We can hardly imagine it possible for her to adhere
consistently to her rule in other departments of Christian art. The
Immaculate Conception, for instance, the Assumption, the Coronation of
our Lady, the marriage of St. Catherine, the stigmata of St. Francis,
the vision of St. Dominic, the miracles of the saints--subjects, many
of which have inspired some of the noblest productions of her favorite
Fra Angelico, or of Raphael, or Murillo, or Velasquez--undoubtedly do
violence to her criteria of artistic merit, though we cannot believe
that she would contest their universally acknowledged claim to the
highest honors in Christian art. Indeed, fidelity to this narrow
Protestant maxim would have rendered these two volumes an
impossibility. Strange, then, that it should not have occurred to the
mind of the authoress that by far the larger part, and, on her own
showing, the most glorious part, of the fraternity of Christian
artists have been men full to overflowing of the spirit of a church
which has never adopted her standard of orthodoxy.

{250}

The Catholic Church is at once the parent, historically, of all
Christian art and the upholder of that grand principle of tradition
which gives to art, no less than to doctrine, a range far wider and
more ample than the mere letter of the biblical records. Of course,
contradiction of Scripture, or "alterations of the text, which,
however slight, affect the revealed character of our Lord," must give
offence to every judicious critic; but it is tradition and the voice
of the living Church--together with that instinctive sense of the
faithful which, so long as they live in submission to their
divinely-appointed teachers, is so marvellously true and
unerring--that must be the criteria of orthodoxy, and determine when
the artist's conceptions or mode of treatment are contrary to, or in
accordance with, the spirit of the sacred text.

Lady Eastlake does not like the notion of our Lord's falling under the
cross. It is not in the Bible, and she pronounces it to be counter to
the spirit and purport of the Gospel narrative. She grows positively
angry with some painters for having represented an angel holding the
chalice, surmounted by a cross or host, before the eyes of our blessed
Redeemer in his agony. She has her own standard of feeling, abstract
and arbitrary, to which she refers the decision of such points. But
where is the guarantee for the correctness of that standard, or the
security for its general acceptance? The Bible does not tell us what
its own spirit and purport are, and outside the Bible Lady Eastlake,
at least, cannot point to any infallible authority. She is, therefore,
imposing her own judgment, unsupported by any assigned reason, upon
the world, as a rule to be followed. So, too, St. Veronica to her is
always _de trop_, morally and pictorially, in the Way of the Cross;
and scholastic interpretations, seemingly because they are scholastic,
of the types of the Old Testament, are invariably pronounced by her to
be strained, unreal, and superstitious. So effectually does
Protestantism interfere with the capacity of a critic to appreciate
the higher developments and fuller expression of Christian art.

Not that a Protestant or a free-thinker can have no sense at all of
the supernaturally beautiful. If they are trained to a high degree of
moral and intellectual cultivation in the natural order, and in
proportion to the height of their attainments in that order, they will
not fail to be affected by beauty of a superior order. For there is no
contradiction between the truth of nature and the truth which is above
nature. The Protestant, indeed, as sincerely holding large fragments
of Christian truth, will necessarily have much sympathy with many
exhibitions of supernatural beauty. But he lacks the clue to it as a
whole; and if he can often admire, rarely, if ever, can he create.
Both Protestant and unbeliever must therefore labor under much
vagueness and uncertainty of judgment, inasmuch as they can have no
fixity of principle. Often they will not know what they want; they
will praise in one page what they condemn in the next; or, when moved,
will be at a loss to account for their emotion. They will exhibit
phenomena not unlike those so often presented in this country by
unbelievers, who, entering our churches, are one while overawed by a
presence they cannot define, and which bewilders their intellect,
whilst it captivates their imagination; and another while, as
unaccountably, are moved to disgust and derision by what to them is an
insoluble riddle, a perplexity, and an annoyance. To such critics some
phases of the supernatural will never be welcome. The tortures of the
martyrs, the self-inflicted macerations of ascetics, the sublime
self-abandonment of heroic charity--whatever, in a word, embodies and
brings home the grand, sacred, but, to the natural man, repugnant idea
of the cross, will always be offensive, and produce a sense of
irritation, such as even Lady Eastlake, with all her {251}
self-mastery and good taste, cannot wholly suppress or conceal. So
true is it in the sphere of Christian art, as in that of Christian
doctrine and devotion, _Nisi credideritis, non intelligetis_. Casual
excitement, transient enthusiasm, unmeaning admiration, are at best
the pitiful substitutes for an intelligent and abiding appreciation of
excellence, in those who are not possessed of supernatural ideas in
common with the subjects and authors of the works of genuine Christian
art.

It would be unfair, however, not to mention that Lady Eastlake admits
many important modifications of this rigid principle of adherence to
the letter of Scripture. The following secondary canons go far to
soften down the asperity of her Protestantism. They shall be stated in
her own words:

"On the other hand, additions to Scripture given in positive images,
if neither prejudicial to art nor inconsistent with our Lord's
character, are not in themselves necessarily objectionable; but will,
according to their merits, be looked upon with indulgence or
admiration. The pictures, for instance, representing the disrobing of
our Lord--a fact not told in Scripture, yet which must have
happened--will be regarded with pathetic interest. The same will be
felt of Paul Delaroche's exquisite little picture, where St. John is
leading the Virgin home; for such works legitimately refresh and carry
on the narrative in a scriptural spirit. Nay, episodes which are more
purely invention--such as the ancient tradition of the Mother of Christ
wrapping the cloth round her son, previous to his crucifixion; or,
again, the picture by Paul Delaroche, of the agony of her and of the
disciples, represented as gathered together in a room while Christ
passes with his cross--even such imaginary episodes will silence the
most arrant Protestant criticism, by their overpowering appeal to the
feelings; since in neither case is the great duty of art to itself or
to its divine object tampered with.

"The same holds good where symbolical forms, as in Christian art of
classic descent, are given, which embody the idea rather than the
fact. For instance, where the Jordan is represented as a river god,
with his urn under his arm, at the baptism of our Lord; or when,
later, the same event is accompanied by the presence of angels, who
hold the Saviour's garments. Such paraphrases and poetical imaginings
in no way affect the truth of the facts they set forth, but rather, to
mortal fancy, swell their pomp and dignity.

"Still less need the lover of art and adorer of Christ care about
inconsistencies in minor matters. As, for example, that the entombment
takes place in a renaissance monument, in the centre of a beautiful
Italian landscape, and not in a cave in a rock in the arid scenery of
Judea. On the contrary, it is right that art should exercise the
utmost possible freedom in such circumstances, which are the signs and
handwriting of different schools and times, and enrich a picture with
sources of interest to the historian and the archaeologist. It is the
moral expression which touches the heart and adorns the tale, not the
architecture or costume; and whether our Lord be in the garb of a
Roman citizen or of a German burgher (though his dress is usually
conventional in color and form), it matters not, if he be but God in
all."

The arbitrariness of the principles set forth in the earlier portion
of this passage, and the quiet assumption that all ancient traditions
are pure inventions, may well be excused by the reader for the sake of
the inconsistency which saves from condemnation not a few glorious
pictures, which could never otherwise have been made to square with
the rule of literal adherence to the Gospel narrative.

Another principle essential to the right appreciation of art is
admirably stated by Lady Eastlake:

"All will agree that the duty of the Christian artist is to give not
only the {252} temporary fact, but the permanent truth. Yet this
entails a discrepancy to which something must be sacrificed. For, in
the scenes from our Lord's life, fact and truth are frequently at
variance. That the Magdalen took our Lord for a gardener, was the
fact; that he was Christ, is the truth. That the Roman soldiers
believed him to be a criminal, and therefore mocked and buffeted him
without scruple, is the fact; that we know him through all these
scenes to be the Christ, is the truth. Nay, the very cruciform nimbus
that encircles Christ's head is an assertion of this principle. As
visible to us, it is true; as visible even to his disciples, it is
false. There are, however, educated people so little versed in the
conditions of art, as to object even to the nimbus, as a departure
from fact, and, therefore, an offence to truth; preferring, they say,
to see our Lord represented as he walked upon earth. But this is a
fallacy in more than one sense. Our Lord, as he walked upon earth, was
not known to be the Messiah. To give him as he was seen by men who
knew him not, would be to give him not as the Christ. It may be urged
that the cruciform nimbus is a mere arbitrary sign, nothing in itself
more than a combination of lines. This is true; but there _must_ be
something arbitrary in all human imaginings (we should prefer to say
symbolizings) of the supernatural. Art, for ages, assumed this sign as
that of the Godhead of Christ, and the world for ages granted it. It
served various purposes; it hedged the rudest representations of
Christ round with a divinity, which kept them distinct from all
others. It pointed him out to the most ignorant spectator, and it
identified the sacred head, even at a distance."

This principle may, indeed, be legitimately extended much further. The
purpose of Christian art is instruction, either in morals or in dogma,
or in both. It is not, therefore, a sin in art to sacrifice upon
occasion some portion of historical truth, in subservience to this
end. Nor in fact, in Catholic ages, was there danger of the people
being led into error on the fundamental facts of religion. The Gospel
narrative was too familiar to them for that. They seem, as is well
remarked by Father Cahier, to have had hearts more elevated than ours,
and more attuned by meditation and habitual catholicity of spirit to
mystery, and its sublimer lessons; and therefore, whenever we find in
early paintings what seems to us anomalous in an historic point of
view, we may conclude with safety that there was a dogmatic intention.

There are, however, limits to liberties of this kind, which may not be
transgressed without incurring censure. Overbold speculation has ere
now betrayed even orthodox theologians into accidental error. And a
Catholic artist may depict, as a Catholic schoolman may enunciate,
views which deserve to be stigmatized as rash, offensive, erroneous,
scandalous, or even, in themselves, heretical. There have been
occasions in which the Church has felt herself bound to interfere with
wanderings of the artistic imagination, as injurious, morally or
doctrinally, to the faithful committed to her charge. Nor have
theologians failed to protest from time to time against similar
abuses. Bellarmine frowned upon the muse in Christian art. Savonarola,
in his best days, made open war upon the pagan corruptions which in
his time had begun to abound in Florentine paintings. Father Canisius
denounces those painters as inexcusable who, in the face of Scripture,
represent our Lady as swooning at the foot of the cross; and Father de
Ligny reprobates, on the same grounds, the introduction of St. Joseph
into pictures of the meeting between the Blessed Virgin and St.
Elizabeth. For--whatever we may think as to his having accompanied our
Lady on the journey--had he been present at the interview, he would
have been enlightened upon the mystery, his ignorance of which
afterward threw him into such perplexity.

{253}

As to the order of the work, Lady Eastlake gives ample explanation in
the preface:

"In the short programme left by Mrs. Jameson, the ideal and devotional
subjects, such as the Good Shepherd, the Lamb, the Second Person of
the Trinity, were placed first; the scriptural history of our Lord's
life on earth next; and, lastly, the types from the Old Testament.
There is reason, however, to believe, from the evidence of what she
had already written, that she would have departed from this
arrangement. After much deliberation, I have ventured to do so, and to
place the subjects chronologically. The work commences, therefore,
with that which heads most systems of Christian art--The Fall of
Lucifer and Creation of the World--followed by the types and prophets
of the Old Testament. Next comes the history of the Innocents and of
John the Baptist, written by her own hand, and leading to the Life and
Passion of our Lord. The abstract and devotional subjects, as growing
out of these materials, then follow, and the work terminates with the
Last Judgment."

Mrs. Jameson's own share in the work is confined mainly to some of the
types, the histories specified above, and familiar scenes in the
earlier portions of the Gospel narrative, including a few of the
miracles and parables of our Lord. The notes are fragmentary, but
written in her usual interesting and lively style. How refreshing, for
instance, and characteristic are the following comments upon some
pictures representing the dismissal of Hagar and Ishmael at the
imperious request of Sarah:

"I believe the most celebrated example is the picture by Guercino, in
the Brera; but I do not think it deserves its celebrity--the pathetic
is there alloyed with vulgarity of character. I remember that, when I
first saw this picture, I could only think of the praises lavished on
it by Byron and others, as the finest expression of deep, natural
pathos to be found in the whole range of art. I fancied, as many do,
that I could see in it the beauties so poetically described. Some
years later, when I saw it again, with a more cultivated eye and
taste, my disappointment was great. In fact, Abraham is much more like
an unfeeling old beggar than a majestic patriarch, resigned to the
divine will, yet struck to the heart by the cruel necessity under
which he was acting. Hagar cries like a housemaid turned off without
wages or warning, and Ishmael is merely a blubbering boy. For
expression, the picture by Govaert Hiricke (Berlin Gallery, 815) seems
to me much superior; the look of appealing anguish in the face of
Hagar as she turns to Abraham, and points to her weeping boy, reaches
to the tragic in point of conception, but Ishmael, if very natural,
with his fist in his eye, is also rather vulgar. Rembrandt's
composition is quite dramatic, and, in his manner, as fine as
possible. Hagar, lingering on the step of the dwelling whence she is
rejected, weeps reproachfully; Ishmael, in a rich Oriental costume,
steps on before, with the boyish courage of one destined to become an
archer and a hunter in the wilderness, and the father of a great and
even yet unconquered nation; in the background Sarah is seen looking
out of the window at her departing rival, with exultation in her
face."

Those who are acquainted with Italian paintings of the 15th century
must have remarked the frequency with which the great masters of the
Tuscan school in that era treat the subject of "The Massacre of the
Innocents." Though our Lord is not an actor in the scene, it is
intimately connected with his history. The Innocents were the first
martyrs in his cause, and from the earliest times attracted the
veneration and tender affection of Christians. Painful as the subject
is, it affords scope for the exercise of the highest tragic power. The
mere fact that Herod's sword swept the nurseries of Bethlehem, though
necessarily entering into the picture, becomes subordinate to the
{254} sorrow which then started into life in so many mothers' hearts.
That is the point made most prominent in the Gospel by the citation of
the pathetic words of Jeremias in the prophecy: "In Rama was there a
voice heard, lamentations, and weeping, and great mourning. Rachel
weeping for her children, and would not be comforted, because they are
not." The mind is carried back to the time when the very sound of
those tottering feet sufficed to waken the pulses of love in the
mother's bosom; when those confiding hands were ever locked in hers.
How dear had been the pretty prattle of those little ones, the first
stammerings of the tongue, the silvery laughter, even the cries of
passion or of pain! Hitherto all had bsen sunshine, or once and again
the shadow of some light cloud had drifted across the face of heaven;
but now agony comes on the wings of the whirlwind--a pitiless storm
that leaves nothing but blank, broken hearts behind. Here we see a
bereaved mother, wildly passionate, tossing her frantic arms
heavenward; we almost fancy we hear her rave and moan. There we mark
the wandering footsteps, no longer obedient to the helm of reason.
Another, with clasped hands, kneels, gazing on the purple stains which
dye the ivory limbs of her slaughtered darling. Or the eye rests with
awful compassion on a standing figure, another speechless Niobe, pale
and unconscious as a statue, still pressing her dead infant to her
breast. Upon one or two upturned faces a light has broken; the grand
thought seems just to have flashed upon their souls--that the purple
stains are the dye of martyrdom, destined by a loving Providence to
adorn a robe of unfading glory. And so sorrow passes almost into joy,
and the imagination reaches forward to another sorrowful Mother
--Mother of sorrows--who is to sit in desolation, yet mastering her
deep woe, and, with a sacrificing love that transcends resignation,
entering into and uniting herself with the mysterious designs of God.
In spite, however, of the interest of the subject, for ages it was
rarely depicted. Mrs. Jameson gives the following account of its
sudden rise into general favor:

"All at once, however, in the latter half of the 15th century--that
is, after 1450--we find the subject of the Holy Innocents assuming an
extraordinary degree of popularity and importance. Then, for the first
time, we find chapels dedicated to them, and groups of martyred
children in altar-pieces round the throne of Christ or the Virgin.
From this period we have innumerable examples of the terrible scene of
the massacre at Bethlehem, treated as a separate subject in pictures
and prints, while the best artists vied with each other in varying and
elaborating the details of circumstantial cruelty and frantic despair.

"For a long time, I could not comprehend how this came about, nor how
it happened that through all Italy, especially in the Tuscan schools,
a subject so ghastly and so painful should have assumed this sort of
prominence. The cause, as it gradually revealed itself, rendered every
picture more and more interesting; connecting them with each other,
and showing how intimately the history of art is mixed up with the
life of a people.

"There had existed at Florence, from the 13th century, a hospital for
foundlings, the first institution of the kind in Europe. It was
attached to the Benedictine monastery of San Gallo, near one of the
gates of the city still bearing the name. In the 15th century, when
the population and extent of the city had greatly increased, it was
found that this hospital was too small, and the funds of the monastery
quite inadequate to the purpose. Then Lionardo Buruni, of Arezzo, who
was twice chancellor of Florence--the same Lionardo who gave to
Ghiberti the subjects of his famous gates--filled with compassion for
the orphans and neglected children, addressed the senate on the
subject, and made such an affecting appeal in their behalf, that not
the senate only, but the whole people of {255} Florence, responded
with enthusiasm, frequently interrupting him with cries of 'Viva
Messer Lionardo d'Arezzo!' 'And,' adds the historian, 'never was a
question of importance carried with such [more] quickness and
unanimity' (_mai con maggior celerità e pienezza de' voti fu vinto
partito di cosa grave come questa_). Large sums were voted, offerings
flowed in, a superb hospital was founded, and Brunelleschi was
appointed architect. When finished, which was not till 1444, it was
solemnly dedicated to the '_Holy Innocents_.' The first child
consigned to the new institution was a poor little female infant, on
whose breast was pinned the name 'Agata,' in remembrance of which an
altar in the chapel was dedicated to St. Agatha. We have proof that
the foundation, progress, and consecration of this refuge for
destitute children excited the greatest interest and sympathy, not
only in Florence, but in the neighboring states, and that it was
imitated in Pisa, Arezzo, and Siena. The union of the two hospitals of
San Gallo and the 'Innocenti' took place in 1463. Churches and chapels
were appended to the hospitals, and, as a matter of course, the
painters and sculptors were called upon to decorate them. Such are the
circumstances which explain, as I think, the popularity of the story
of the Innocents in the 15th century, and the manner in which it
occupied the minds of the great cotemporary artists of the Tuscan
school, and others after them."

We cannot pretend to decide upon the truth of this supposed connection
between the establishment of an institution to minister to the wants
of the forsaken and the development of a special branch of Christian
art. Whether true or not, this much is certain, that it is in keeping
with a multitude of instances which go to prove how favorable the
practice of Catholic charity is to the progress of the arts. Love ever
pours itself around in streams of radiance, lighting up whole regions
which lie beyond its immediate object. It copies the creative
liberality of God, who, in providing us with what is necessary for
subsistence, surrounds us at the same time with a thousand superfluous
manifestations of beauty.

But it is time to pass on to the second volume of this history, which
we owe almost entirely to the pen of Lady Eastlake. It is mainly
occupied with the Passion of our Lord; and certainly the diligent
attention paid by the authoress to this subject, and the judgment
displayed in the arrangement of the narrative and the selection of
examples, cannot be too highly commended. The style is generally
clear, simple, and earnest. Always dignified, it sometimes rises to
eloquence, as in the description of Rembrandt's etching of the "Ecce
Homo," and in the following criticism of Leonardo da Vinci's
celebrated "Last Supper." After a clever disquisition on the
difficulties of the subject, and the conditions essential to its
effective treatment, she thus proceeds:

"We need not say who did fulfil these conditions, nor whose Last
Supper it is--all ruined and defaced as it may be--which alone arouses
the heart of the spectator as effectually as that incomparable shadow
in the centre has roused the feelings of the dim forms on each side of
him. Leonardo da Vinci's _Cena_, to all who consider this grand
subject through the medium of art, is _the_ Last Supper--there is no
other. Various representations exist, and by the highest names in art,
but they do not touch the subtle spring. Compared with this _chef
d'oeuvre_, their Last Suppers are mere exhibitions of well-drawn,
draped, or colored figures, in studiously varied attitudes, which
excite no emotion beyond the admiration due to these qualities. It is
no wonder that Leonardo should have done little or nothing more after
the execution, in his forty-sixth year, of that stupendous picture. It
was not in man not to be fastidious, who had such an unapproachable
standard of his own {256} powers perpetually standing in his path.

"Let us now consider this figure of Christ more closely.

"It is not sufficient to say that our Lord has just uttered this
sentence, viz., 'Verily, verily, I say unto you, one of you shall
betray me;' we must endeavor to define in what, in his own person, the
visible proof of his having spoken consists. The painter has cast the
eyes down--an action which generally detracts from the expression of a
face. Here, however, no such loss is felt. The outward sight, it is
true, is in abeyance, but the intensest sense of inward vision has
taken its place. Our Lord is looking into himself--that self which
knew 'all things,' and therefore needed not to lift his mortal lids to
ascertain what effect his words had produced. The honest indignation
of the apostles, the visible perturbation of the traitor, are each
right in their place, and for the looker-on, but they are nothing to
him. Thus here at once the highest power and refinement of art is
shown, by the conversion of what in most hands would have been an
insipidity into the means of expression best suited to the moment. The
inclination of the head, and the expression of every feature, all
contribute to the same intention. This is not the heaviness or even
the repose of previous silence. On the contrary, the head has not yet
risen, nor the muscles of the face subsided from the act of mournful
speech. It is just that evanescent moment which all true painters
yearn to catch, and which few but painters are wont to observe--when
the tones have ceased, but the lips are not sealed--when, for an
instant, the face repeats to the eye what the voice has said to the
ear. No one who has studied that head can doubt that our Lord has just
spoken: the sounds are not there, but they have not travelled far into
space.

"Much, too, in the general speech of this head is owing to the skill
with which, while conveying one particular idea, the painter has
suggested no other. Beautiful as the face is, there is no other beauty
but that which ministers to this end. We know not whether the head be
handsome or picturesque, masculine or feminine in type--whether the
eye be liquid, the cheek ruddy, the hair smooth, or the beard
curling--as we know with such painful certainty in other
representations. All we feel is, that the wave of one intense meaning
has passed over the whole countenance, and left its impress alike on
every part. Sorrow is the predominant expression--that sorrow which,
as we have said in our Introduction, distinguishes the Christian's
God, and which binds him, by a sympathy no fabled deity ever claimed,
with the fallen and suffering race of Adam. His very words have given
himself more pain than they have to his hearers, and a pain he cannot
expend in protestations as they do, for this, as for every other act
of his life, came he into the world.

"But we must not linger with the face alone; no hands ever did such
intellectual service as those which lie spread on that table. They,
too, have just fallen into that position--one so full of meaning to
us, and so unconsciously assumed by him--and they will retain it no
longer than the eye which is down and the head which is sunk. A
special intention on the painter's part may be surmised in the
opposite action of each hand: the palm of the one so graciously and
bountifully open to all who are weary and heavy-laden; the other
averted, yet not closed, as if deprecating its own symbolic office. Or
we may consider their position as applicable to this particular scene
only; the one hand saying, 'Of those that thou hast given me none is
lost,' and the other, which lies near Judas, 'except the son of
perdition.' Or, again, we may give a still narrower definition, and
interpret this averted hand as directing the eye, in some sort, to the
hand of Judas, which lies nearest it, 'Behold, the hand of him that
{257} betrayeth me is with me on the table.' Not that the science of
Christian iconography has been adopted here, for the welcoming and
condemning functions of the respective hands have been reversed--in
reference, probably, to Judas, who sits on our Lord's right. Or we may
give up attributing symbolic intentions of any kind to the painter--a
source of pleasure to the spectator more often justifiable than
justified--and simply give him credit for having, by his own exquisite
feeling alone, so placed the hands as to make them thus minister to a
variety of suggestions. Either way, these grand and pathetic members
stand as preeminent as the head in the pictorial history of our Lord,
having seldom been equalled in beauty of form, and never in power of
speech.

"Thus much has been said upon this figure of our Lord, because no
other representation approaches so near the ideal of his person. Time,
ignorance, and violence have done their worst upon it; but it may be
doubted whether it ever suggested more overpowering feelings than in
its present battered and defaced condition, scarcely now to be called
a picture, but a fitter emblem of him who was 'despised and rejected
of men.'"

Perhaps there is no other passage in the work so lovingly elaborated
as this. Rivalling in energy, it surpasses in delicate discrimination
even such brilliant criticisms as that of the eloquent Count de
Montalembert on Fra Angelico's "Last Judgment"--a criticism which must
have struck all readers of "Vandalism and Catholicism in Art" as
worthy of the painting it describes. But the mention of the blessed
friar of Fiesoli reminds us that he is a special favorite with Lady
Eastlake also. The spell of his tender and reverent contemplations has
told upon her with considerable power, to an extent, indeed, which
makes her scarcely just toward Raphael himself. Several graphic pages
are devoted to a description of Fra Angelico's "Last Judgment." His
"Adoration of the Cross" also is dwelt upon with much affection, and
in great detail. But our readers will be enabled, we hope, to form
some idea of the feelings with which Lady Eastlake regards this most
Christian of all artists, from the shorter extracts which we subjoin.
After criticizing a fine fresco by Giotto of "Christ washing the
Disciples' feet," she thus comments upon Fra Angelico's treatment of
the same subject:

"Of all painters who expressed the condescension of the Lord by the
impression it produced upon those to whom it was sent, Fra Angelico
stands foremost in beauty of feeling. Not only the hands, but the feet
of poor shocked Peter protest against his Master's condescension. It
is a contest for humility between the two; but our Lord is more than
humble, he is lovely and mighty too. He is on his knees; but his two
outstretched hands, so lovingly offered, begging to be accepted, go
beyond the mere incident, as art and poetry of this class always do,
and link themselves typically with the whole gracious scheme of
redemption. True Christian art, even if theology were silent, would,
like the very stones, cry out and proclaim how every act of our Lord's
course refers to one supreme idea."

And, once more, speaking of the same artist's picture of the "Descent
from the Cross," she thus contrasts his conception with those of Luca
Signorelli, Michael Angelo, Raphael, Razzi, Da Volterra, and other
Italian versions of the 15th and 16th centuries:

"After contemplating these conceptions of the deposition in which a
certain parade of idle sorrow, vehement action, and pendent
impossibilities are conspicuous, it is a relief to turn to one who
here, as ever, stands alone in his mild glory. Fra Angelico's Descent,
painted for the Sta. Trinita at Florence, now in the Accademia there,
is the perfect realization of the most pious idea. No more Christian
conception of the subject, and no more probable {258} setting forth,
of the scene, can perhaps be attained. All is holy sorrow, calm and
still; the figures move gently, and speak in whispers. No one is too
excited to help, or not to hinder. Joseph and Nicodemus, known by
their glories, are highest in the scale of reverential beings who
people the ladder, and make it almost look as if it lost itself, like
Jacob's, in heaven. They each hold an arm close to the shoulder.
Another disciple sustains the body as he sits on the ladder, a fourth
receives it under the knees; and St. John, a figure of the highest
beauty of expression, lifts his hands and offers his shoulder to the
precious burden, where in another moment it will safely and tenderly
repose. The figure itself is ineffably graceful with pathetic
helplessness, but _Corona gloriae_, victory over the old enemy,
surrounds a head of divine peace. He is restored to his own, and rests
among them with a security as if he knew the loving hands so quietly
and mournfully busied about him. And his peace is with them already:
'Peace I leave with you, my peace I give unto you.' In this picture it
is as if the pious artist had sought first the kingdom of God, and all
things, even in art, had been added unto him. . . . We have taken only
the centre group (the size forbidding more), leaving out the sorrowing
women on the right, with the Mother piously kneeling with folded
hands, as if so alone she could worthily take back that sacred form."

Such a picture might have been supposed to be the source of Father
Faber's most pathetic description of the same scene in his "Foot of
the Cross," did we not know that there is sure to be a strong family
likeness between the conceptions of two gentle, humble souls, deriving
their inspiration from the same exercise of prayerful and
compassionate contemplation.

It would be a pity to mar the impression made upon our readers by
passages such as we have quoted, and of which there are many kindred
examples scattered throughout Lady Eastlake's volume, by the painful
contrast of a sad passage upon the Agony in the Garden (vol. ii., p.
30). Though not the sole, it is the most serious, blot upon her work.
Misconceiving altogether the symbolic intention of Catholic artists in
placing the chalice and host in the hand of the ministering angel,
Lady Eastlake for once allows the Protestant spirit within to break
through all bounds of decorum. In what sense the eucharistic chalice,
introduce it where you will, can be a _profane_ representation, it is
impossible to conceive. Good taste, not to say reverence, should have
proscribed the employment of such an epithet. A little patient
reflection, or the still easier and surer method of inquiry at some
Catholic source, would, we venture to think, have overcome her
repugnance, and have saved her Catholic readers some unnecessary pain.
But we are willing to let this offence pass, and to leave the logic of
the accompanying strictures, bad as it is, unchallenged, in
consideration of the eminent service rendered by the work, as a whole,
to the cause of Christian art. Few could have brought together a
larger amount of instructive and interesting matter. Few, perhaps no
one, at least among Protestants, could have undertaken the task with
so much to qualify, so little to disqualify, them for the office of
historian and critic of the glorious series of monuments which
Christian artists have bequeathed to us.

One lesson, above all, every unprejudiced reader ought to derive from
these volumes--that Christian art and Catholic art are identical. Not
to every Catholic artist is it given to produce true Christian art;
but he, _caeteris paribus_, is most certain of attaining the true
standard who is most deeply imbued with true Catholic principles, most
highly gifted with the Catholic virtues of supernatural faith and
love. Looking at the whole range of Christian art, it may be safely
averred that whatever shortcomings there have been within the Church
have been owing to {259} the influence of principles foreign to her
spirit; and that, outside the Church (we say it in spite of Lady
Eastlake's admiration of Rembrandt), there has simply never existed
any Christian art at all. In our own days the rule is not reversed.
Whom have Protestants to set against Overbeck, Cornelius, Deger,
Molitor, and we are proud to add our own illustrious countryman,
Herbert? Not surely the Pre-Raphaelite school in England, though it is
the only one that has the least pretensions to the cultivation of
Christian art. No, it is the Catholic Church alone that can stamp upon
the painter's productions the supernatural impress of those notes by
which she herself is recognizable as true.

There is a unity of intention, scope, and spirit in Catholic art of
every age and clime. Like the doctrines and devotions of the Church,
Catholic art, in all its various forms--symbolical, historical,
devotional, ideal--ever revolves round one centre, and is referable to
one exemplar. Divine beauty "manifest in the flesh"--the image of the
Father clothed in human form and living in the Church--he is the
inspirer of Christian art. _Deum nemo vidit unquam: unigenitus Filius,
qui est in sinu Patris, ipse narravit_.  [Footnote 52] The God-man is
the primary object of artistic contemplation. As in doctrine, so in
aestheticism, every truly Catholic artist may exclaim, _Verbum caro
factum est, et habitavit in nobis; et vidimus gloriam ejus, gloriam
quasi unigeniti a Patre, plenum gratia et veritatis_.  [Footnote 53]

  [Footnote 52: "No man hath seen God at any time: the only-begotten
  Son who is in the bosom of the Father, he hath declared him."--John
  i. 18.]

  [Footnote 53: "The Word was made flesh and dwelt among us; and we
  saw his glory, the glory as it were of the only-begotten of the
  father, full of grace and truth."--John i. 14.]

But this unity, how exuberant in its fertility! The unity of the
Church is the source of her catholicity. The two stand or fall
together. And, so, too, the oneness of Catholic art is the secret of
its universality. It admits of no partial view, excludes no variety or
difference. Unity of spirit binds all together in perfect harmony,
just as diversity of race and multiplicity of individual gifts, in her
members, are fitted together, organized, and held in balance by the
unity of the Church. Unity is the basis and safeguard of catholicity;
catholicity the glory and crown of unity.

Nor is the note of apostolicity wanting. For the Bible, and the Bible
only, as the rule and standard of art, substitute Catholic tradition
handed down from the apostles, inclusive of all that is in Scripture,
but reaching beyond the limits of the written word, and ever
interpreted to the artist, no less than to the rest of the faithful,
by the living voice of the teaching Church, and then the principle
which identifies orthodoxy with Christian art may safely be applied as
a test to religious painting.

Lastly--we had almost said above all--the beauty of holiness is
stamped exclusively upon all art created after the mind of the Church.
For Catholic art is nothing else than the product of contemplation in
souls gifted with artistic capacities; and contemplation is only
another word for the gaze of supernatural faith, quickened and
perfected by supernatural love, upon one or other of those mysteries
which the Church sets before the minds of her children. So at least we
have learned from the Angelic Doctor; who tells us  [Footnote 54] that
beauty is found primarily and essentially in the contemplative life.
For, although St. Gregory teaches that contemplation consists in the
love of God, we are to understand this rather of the motive than of
the precise act. The will inflamed with love desires to behold the
beauty of the beloved object, either for its own sake--the heart
always being where the treasure is--or for the sake of the knowledge
itself which results from the act of vision. Sometimes it is the
senses which are thus compelled to act, sometimes the intellect which
is prompted to this gaze, according as the object is material or
spiritual. But how is the beauty of the object {260} perceived? What
is the faculty whose office it is to light up and reduce to order and
due proportion what is seen? Evidently, the reason. For reason is
light, and where there is reason there is harmony and proportion. And
so beauty, whose essence is brightness and due proportion, is, as we
have said, primarily and necessarily found in the contemplative life;
or, which is the same thing, in the exercise of the reason--its
natural exercise, if the beauty contemplated be in the natural order;
its supernatural exercise, if revealed mystery be that which attracts
and occupies the soul.

  [Footnote 54: 2. 2. Q. clxxx. a. 1, and a. 2. ad 3.]

----

From Chambers's Journal.

POUCETTE.


Nearly seven years ago, I was walking hurriedly along the boulevards
of Paris one winter's evening; it was Christmas-eve, and had been
ushered in by thick fog and miserable drizzling rain, which provoked
the inhabitants of the gay capital to complain loudly of the change
which they fancied had taken place in the seasons of late years,
whereby the detested _brouillards de Londres_ had been introduced into
their once clear, pure atmosphere. The weather was certainly most
unseasonable, and took away almost entirely the small remnant of
Christmas-like feeling, which an Englishman, with all his efforts, can
manage to keep up in a foreign land. I had sat chatting with a friend
over a cosey fire until dusk; and, on leaving his house, neither a
_remise_ nor a _fiacre_ was to be met with empty; so I made up my mind
to a wet walk, and amused myself, as I went on, by observing the
various groups of passengers, some of them suddenly benighted like
myself, as they sped on their way along the crowded thoroughfare. The
brilliant lamps hung from the shops threw a glare over each face as it
flitted past, or paused to look in at the windows; and the noise of
hammers resounded incessantly from the edge of the pavement, where
workmen were busy erecting small wooden booths for the annual
New-Year's fair. Some were already completed, and their owners hovered
about, ever and anon darting forth from behind their small counters,
to pounce upon a likely customer, to whom they extolled the beauty and
cheapness of their wares in tempting terms.

"Tenez, monsieur!" cries an old woman, whose entire stock-in-trade
consists of a few pairs of doll's shoes of chocolate, displayed upon a
tin tray, over which she carefully holds a weather-beaten umbrella.
"Two sous the pair, two sous!" "Voilà, mesdames," bawls a youth of
ten, who, in London, would probably execute an unlimited number of
Catherine-wheels under the feet of paterfamilias, as he crosses a
crowded street; here he is carefully watching a basinful of water, in
which float a number of glass ducks of the most brilliant and
unnatural colors. "Pour un sou!" and he holds up one tiny image
between his finger and thumb, with a business-like air. "Fi done!"
answers a sharp-visaged elderly woman, as she withdraws six of the
ducks from their watery bed, and places them gently in a corner of her
capacious basket, offering the owner at the same time four sous, {261}
which he accepts with the invariable "Merci, madame," and the polite
Parisian bow; and depositing the coins in some deep recess of his huge
trouser-pockets, he resumes his cry of "Un sou, mesdames, pour un
sou," with unblushing mendacity. Just at the corner of the boulevard,
where the Rue de la Paix joins it, stood a lively, wiry-looking little
man, whose bows and cries were incessant, holding something in his
outstretched hands carefully wrapped in wet grass, which he entreats
the bystanders to purchase. As I approach him, he uncovers it, and
discloses a small tortoise, who waves his thin neck from side to side
deprecatingly, and looks appealingly out of his dark eyes. "Buy him,
monsieur," cries the little owner: "he is my last; he will be your
best friend for many years, and afterward he will make an excellent
soup!" A laugh from some of the passers-by rewarded this very naive
definition of a pet; and leaving the lively bustle of the boulevard, I
turned down the Rue de la Paix, and into the dark-looking Rue Neuve
St. Augustin; a little way down which, I perceived a small knot of
people gathered under the arched entrance to a _hôtel_.

There were not many--a few bloused workmen returning from their daily
toil, two or three women, and the usual amount of active _gamins_
darting about the outskirts; within, I could perceive the cocked-hat
of the ever-watchful _sergent de ville_. Prompted by that gregarious
instinct which leads most men toward crowds, I went up to it; and, by
the help of a tolerably tall figure, I looked over the heads of the
people into the centre, at a group, the first sight of whom I shall
not soon forget. There, before me, on the cold pavement, now wet with
wintry rain, lay a little, a very little girl, fainting. Her face,
which was deadly pale, looked worn and pinched by want into that aged,
hard look so touching to see in the very young, because it tells of a
premature exposure to trial and care, if not of a struggle literally
for life. Her jet-black hair, of which she had a profusion, lay
unbound over her shoulders like a mantle. Her dress was an old black
velvet frock, covered with spangles, with a piece of something red
sewn on the skirt, and a scarlet bodice. Her neck and arms were bare;
and the gay dress, where it had been opened in front, showed nothing
underneath it but the poor thin body. Her legs were blue and mottled
with cold; and the tiny feet were thrust into wooden _sabots_, one of
which had dropped off, a world too wide for the little foot it was
meant to protect. A kind-looking elderly woman knelt on the pavement,
and supported the child's head in her arms, chafing her cold hands,
and trying, by every means in her power, to restore animation; and
wandering uneasily up and down beside them, was a curious-looking
non-descript figure, such as one can rarely meet with out of Paris. It
was a poodle--at least so its restless, bead-like, black eyes and
muzzle betokened, and also a suspicious-looking tuft of hair, now
visible, waving above its garments--but the animal presented a most
ludicrous appearance, from being dressed up in a very exact imitation
of the costume of a fine lady during the century of Louis le Grand.
The brilliant eyes were surmounted by a cleverly contrived wig,
frizzed, powdered, and sparkling with mock jewels; the body decked out
in a cherry-colored satin bodice, with a long peaked stomacher,
trimmed with lace, and a stiff hoop, bell-like in shape, but, in
proportion, far within the dimensions of a modern crinoline; even the
high-heeled shoes of scarlet leather were not forgotten; and the
strange anomaly between the animal and its disguise was irresistibly
ludicrous. The dog was perfectly aware that something was going
on--something strange, pitiful, and, what was more to the purpose,
nearly concerning himself; and clever as he was, he could not yet see
a way through his difficulties.

His misery was extreme; he pattered piteously up and down the space
{262} round the fainting child, and raised himself up anxiously on his
hind-legs to peer into her little wan face, presenting thus a still
more ludicrous aspect than before. With his wise doggish face peeping
out curiously from the ridiculous human head-dress, he sniffed all
over the various feet which encircled his precious mistress,
suspiciously; and finally placing himself, still on his hind-legs,
close by her side, he laid his head lovingly to her cheek, and uttered
a low dismal howl, followed, after an instant's pause, by an impatient
bark. The child stirred--roused apparently by the familiar
sound--gasped for breath once or twice; and presently opening her
eyes, she cried feebly, "Mouton, où es tu done?" He leaped up in an
ecstacy, trying, in the height of his joy, to lick her face; but this
was not to be: she pushed him away as roughly as the little feeble
hand had strength to do.

"Ah, wicked dog, go away; you do mischief," she said, fixing a pair of
eyes as round and almost as black as his own upon the unfortunate
animal. He dropped instantly, and with a subdued, sorrowful air, lay
down, licking diligently, in his humility, the little foot from which
the sabot had fallen: he had evidently proved that submission was the
only plan to pursue with his imperious mistress. The girl was stronger
now, and able to sit up with the help of the good woman's knee, and
she drank off a cup of milk which the compassionate wife of the
_concierge_ handed to her. "Thanks, madame," said the child, with native
politeness; "I am better now. You are a good Christian," she added,
turning her head so as to look in the face of the woman who supported
her.

"What are you called, my child?" asked her friend. "Where do you
live?"

"Antoinette Elizabeth is my baptismal name," answered the child, with
odd gravity; "but I am generally called _Poucette_, because, you see,
I am small;" and a faint tinge of color came into her pale cheeks.

No wonder the name was bestowed upon her, for we could see that she
was small, very small; and, from the diminutive size of her limbs, she
seemed likely to remain so till the end of her days.

"Will you go home now?" asked the woman, after a moment's pause.

"No, not just yet," said the tiny being. "I have had no supper. I
shall go to Emile, but Mouton may go home. Go!" she cried,
imperiously, to the dog, as she swiftly slid off the marvellous dress
and wig, out of which casing Mouton came forth an ordinary looking and
decidedly dirty poodle. He hesitated for an instant, when she raised
her little clenched fist, and shook it fiercely at him, repeating
"Go!" in louder tones. He wagged his tail deprecatingly, licked his
black lips, looked imploringly at her out of his loving eyes, and
seemed to beg permission to remain with her; but in vain; then, seeing
her endeavor to rise, he turned, fled up the street with the swiftness
of a bird, and disappeared round the corner. His mistress, in the
meantime, folded up the dog's finery carefully, and deposited it
inside her own poor garments; then, after an instant's pause, she rose
to her feet, and looked round at us. She was well named Poucette: in
stature she did not exceed a child of four years old; but she was
perfectly made, and the limbs were in excellent proportion with the
stature, only her face showed age. There was a keen, worldly look
about the mouth, with its thin scarlet lips; and a vindictive
expression shining in the bold, black eyes--altogether a hard-looking
face, not at all attractive in its character; and yet I felt myself
drawn to the poor child.

She was evidently half-starved, fighting her own hard battle with the
world, and keeping her struggle as much to herself as she could; and
when, scanning curiously over the faces surrounding her, her eyes
rested on mine, I stepped forward, and offered her a five-franc piece.
To my surprise, she threw the money on the pavement {263} with the
bitterest scorn. "I don't want money," she shrieked, passionately--"I
want my supper. Go away, _canaille!_" I stooped down toward her, and
took her hand. "Come with me," I said to her, "and you shall have some
supper. I live close by." She stood on tiptoe even then, and peered
into my face with her sharp eyes. Apparently, however, a short
inspection satisfied her, for she said softly, "Thank you," and tried
to hold my hand. Finding it too much for her small grasp, she clung to
my trousers with one hand, and with the other she waved off the
wondering bystanders with a most majestic air. I offered payment for
the milk, which the good woman civilly refused; and then I sent for a
_fiacre_ in which to get to my lodgings in the Rue Rivoli, shrinking,
I must confess, from the idea of the ridiculous figure I should cut
walking along the streets with this absurd though unfortunate
creature. Presently the concierge arrived with one, and we stepped in,
Poucette entering majestically first. I gave the word, and we started.
Hardly had we turned out of the street, when the impulsive child
beside me seized me with both hands, and in an ecstacy of gratitude
thanked me with streaming eyes for what I was doing for her. "I am
starving," she sobbed--"I fainted from hunger. I have been dancing on
the boulevards all day with Mouton, who is hungry, too, poor fellow,
for he only ate a small bit of bread which a good little gentleman
gave him this morning."

"Why did you not take the money, then?" I asked. "You might have
bought food for yourself and Mouton."

"I did not want money," said the girl proudly--"I don't beg."

"But you say you are hungry."

"That is nothing. I never beg; I dance; and tonight, when I have had
some supper, I shall dance for you, and you shall see," drawing
herself up.

At this speech I hesitated. What in the world had I to do with a
dancing-girl in my quiet bachelor rooms? Did she intend taking them by
storm, and quartering herself upon me, whether I liked it or not? The
question was a difficult one; but yet, when I looked down at the tiny
figure, with its poor, woe-begone face, so thin and weary-looking, its
utter weakness and dependence, I felt that, come what might, I could
not act otherwise than I was doing. "There, go up stairs, _au
troisième_" said I to my charge, as the fiacre stopped, and we got
out; when lo! from behind a large stone close by the entrance to the
_porte-co-chère_, the black round eyes of Mouton glanced furtively out
upon us. His behavior was exceedingly reserved; he durst not even wag
his tail for fear of giving offence, but he glanced at me in the
meekest, humblest entreaty ever dog did. "Don't send him away," I said
to Poucette: "take him up stairs with you; I wish him to remain."

She made no reply, but snapped her fingers encouragingly at him, and
he followed her closely, as she walked up stairs. I paused a moment
with the concierge, to ask her to provide some dinner for my
unexpected guests; and then mounted the stairs after them. I found
Antoinette Elizabeth and her faithful follower seated at my door,
gravely awaiting my arrival. Mouton recognized me as a friend, and
faintly wagged his tail; evidently he was careful, in the presence of
his mistress, upon whom he bestowed his favors. We entered my room,
all three of us; and presently the dinner arrived, and was done ample
justice to. Poucette ate heartily, but not ravenously; and after the
meal was over, we drew our chairs round the fire, and sat eating
walnuts. She asked then, with more timidity than she had yet shown:
"When shall we have the honor of dancing for monsieur?" raising her
large black eyes, which had lost their fierce look, to my face.

"Not just yet, Poucette," I replied. "Tell me something about yourself
first, and eat more walnuts."

{264}

She looked up sharply at this, as if to say, What business is that of
yours? then away into the fire, which was evidently a novel luxury to
her; and finally her glance rested on Mouton, who, having devoured
every superfluous piece of meat, and gnawed the only bone at table,
had now stretched himself on the hearth-rug, and slumbered peacefully
at her feet. "Monsieur is very good," she said presently, with a sigh,
still with her eyes fixed on Mouton. "My history is nothing very
great. I am not a Parisian; my father was a Norman."

"Is he alive now?" I asked, as she paused here.

"I don't know about that," she answered haughtily. "He was a wicked
man. Monsieur understands me?" she said questioningly, with a piercing
look.

"Yes, poor child. And your mother, what of her?"

"She is an angel," faltered the girl. "She went up to heaven last
Christmas;" and the tears filled her eyes as she said it.

"How have you lived since?'

"Oh, that was at Marseilles; and I came on here with Mouton. We
dance," she continued in a firmer voice; "we go out with a man called
Emile, who plays the organ very well, and he has another dog like
Mouton,' only not at all clever: the stupid creature can only hold a
basket in his mouth, and beg for sous; he has no talent." She shrugged
her shoulders, and continued, "We live with Emile and his wife; they
are not always kind to me; but I love Jean."

"Who is this Jean?" I asked.

"Ah! he is a poor boy," she replied; the whole expression of her
countenance softening at his name, and her sallow cheeks crimsoning
with a tender flush. "He is lame; he cannot walk, and is pulled about
in a little carriage; but he does not like to beg, so Emile will not
take him out with us."

"Is Emile his father?" I asked.

"No, monsieur; his father is dead but his mother is Emile's wife. I
take care of Jean myself."

"Are they good to you?"

"Yes, pretty well. You see I dance for them, and people give more
money because I am there; and then Mouton is so clever; one does not
easily meet with a dog like that, who will stand on his hind-legs for
an hour together, and dance as he does. Look at his dress too;" and
she pulled out of the bosom of her frock Mouton's paraphernalia, and
displayed it with evident pride. "In my opinion now, there is no such
dress as that for a dog in all Paris," she said, as she held it up
admiringly to the lamp. "Jean made those shoes; ar'n't they droll? And
the wig; look, that is superb!"

"Who made the wig?" I asked.

"Ah! it was a little boy who is apprenticed to a wigmaker," she
answered. "Monsieur, it was a bargain between us; he wanted something
from me, and--and I said I would give it him if he made a wig for
Mouton; and this is the wig. He is not bad himself, that little boy;
but he is not at all so good as Jean."

"How old is Jean?" I asked.

"He is twelve years old, monsieur."

"And you?"

"I am ten," she replied, with a little sigh and a blush. "But I may
grow still, may I not?" she asked timidly, looking up into my face so
pathetically, that I had hardly sufficient gravity to answer, "Yes, of
course; you will doubtless grow for a long time yet."

"Ah! that is exactly what Jean says," she exclaimed gaily; then added
in a lower voice, "Jean says he likes little people best; but, you
see, he may say that because he likes me."

I answered nothing to this; and presently she roused herself from a
little reverie, and said, "Now we shall dance for you, because it gets
late, and I must go home."

"If you like to remain here all night," I said, "the wife of the
concierge will let you sleep in a little {265} room off theirs, down
stairs; and when you have had some breakfast, you can then return."

"No, no," she repeated sharply; "I will not sleep here; I go home to
Jean."

"Will Emile be glad to see you?"

"That depends; if he is cross, he will beat me for staying so long;
but it does not matter; I wished to stay, and I liked my dinner, and
this warm fire" (she looked wistfully at it). "Monsieur is very good.
Come, Mouton, my friend; wake yourself up."

The dog rose, shook himself, and patiently allowed himself to be
dressed once more. He took an unfair advantage of his mistress,
however, when she knelt down to put on his shoes, and licked her face.
"Ah, _cochon_, how often must I box your ears for that trick!" she
said, as she gave him a tap on the side of his head, for the liberty.
"Come now, walk along." The dog paced soberly toward the door on his
hind-legs.--"That is the _ancien régime_," she explained to me.--"Now,
Mouton, show us how people walk at the present day." The dog stopped,
and at once imitated the short, mincing step of a Parisian belle,
shaking his hoop from side to side in most ludicrous fashion; and as
he reached his mistress, he dropped a little awkward courtesy.

"That is well," she said. "Now sing for us like Madame G----," naming
a famous opera-singer, whose fame was then at its height, and she laid
a light piece of music-paper across his paws. The dog looked closely
down on the paper for an instant, licked his lips, looked round at an
imaginary audience, and then throwing back his head, and fixing his
black eyes on the ceiling, he uttered a howl so shrill and piercing
that I stopped my ears; he then ceased for an instant, looked at his
music attentively, then at his audience, and again uttered that
ear-piercing howl. "That is enough," said Poucette; "bow to the
company." The dog rose and sank with the grace almost of the prima
donna herself.

"Now, Mouton, we are going to dance;" and taking the animal by its
paw, she put the other arm round it, and the two whirled round in a
waltz, keeping admirable time to a tune which Poucette whistled. "Now
read a book, and rest yourself whilst I dance;" and again the piece of
music was laid on Mouton's paws, and he bent his eyes on it,
apparently with the most devoted attention, whilst Poucette slipped
off her heavy sabots, and with naked feet thrust into a pair of old
satin slippers, which she produced from some pocket in her dress, she
executed a sort of fancy dance, half Cachuca, half Bolero, throwing
herself into pretty, graceful attitudes, with a step as light as a
fairy's; then, as she approached Mouton in the figure, she lifted the
music, and taking him by one paw, she led him forward to the front of
my chair on the points of her toes, the two courtesying nearly to the
ground, when Mouton affectionately kissed his mistress on the cheek.

"There, it is over now," said Poucette; "that is all. He does not know
the minuet perfectly yet: next week, perhaps, we shall try it for the
_Jour de l'An_."

"Well done!" I exclaimed, and clapped my hands. "He is a famous dog;
and you--you dance beautifully."

Mouton came to be patted and made much of; and his mistress now
announced her intention of going home at once. Finding it useless to
try and induce her to stay, I offered to go with her myself, and see
her safely through the still crowded streets; but this she firmly
declined.

"No, not to-night," she said. "You may come to-morrow, if you will be
so kind, but not to-night. You have been very good, monsieur; I am not
ungrateful. You may come to-morrow; Rue----,  No.----,  quite close to
Notre Dame." She took my hand, raised it to her lips, courtesied, and
was gone.

{266}

I followed her down stairs, and watched the little figure hurrying
along with a firm step, upright as a dart, the light from the
gas-lamps falling now and then on the spangles of her dress, and
making them twinkle for an instant; and the dark outline of Mouton
following closely behind her, under the shadow of the houses.
Presently they crossed the street, and disappeared in the distance;
and I turned and walked up stairs to my cosey well-lighted room, to
think over the strange life of a street dancing-girl.

After this, I made inquiries about Poucette in the part of the town
where she lived, and visited the man Emile and his wife often. Here I
found the cripple boy Jean, to whom Poucette clung with a tenacity of
affection that was touching to witness. He had had a fall as an
infant, so his mother said, and never had walked; but his fingers were
skilful in making toys, baskets, and small rush-mats, which Poucette
sold during her daily rounds. To him she devoted her affections, her
life, with a steady ardor not often met with at her age. Toward
others, she was always grave, distant, often haughty and bitter in her
expressions of anger, but to him never. However tired she might return
home after dancing or selling his wares on the boulevard, she never
showed him that she was so; if he wished to go out, she drew him in a
rude wooden sledge to the gardens of the Luxembourg; and the two would
sit there by the hour together on Sundays, criticising the passers-by
as they walked about in their gay dresses. At night, if the invalid
was restless or in pain, Poucette sat beside him, sometimes till day
dawned, with a sympathizing cheerful face, ready to attend upon every
want. There she shone; but take away Jean out of her world, and
Poucette stood forth a vixen. Madame Emile, who was herself somewhat
of a shrew, vowed that if it were not that she and Jean were so bound
up together, and nothing could separate them, she must have sent away
Poucette long ago. "No one could endure her temper, monsieur," she
would declare to me; and when she began upon this subject, madame
waxed eloquent. "She is a girl such as there is not besides in Paris.
For Jean, she will give up dress, company, the theatre, everything;
but except for him, she would not go one step out of her way to be
made an empress. It is not natural that. After she first came here, we
had a great deal of trouble with her, and Emile beat her well; but
then she would run away in a rage, and come back again during the
night, for fear Jean should want something. Now we are more used to
her, and we let her have her own way pretty much."

Jean I could get nothing out of except a "Bonjour, monsieur" at
entering and on leaving his house. He sat silently plaiting his mats
or carving toys with his long fingers, looking as if he neither heard
nor understood what we were talking about; but he carefully repeated
all the conversation afterward to his friend Poucette, for she told me
so often when we were together. She used to come and see me at my
rooms, when it was wet, or business was slack; and I succeeded in
finding a customer for her wares in a toy-merchant, who promised to
take all Jean's work at a reasonable price, and was liberal toward the
two children. Poucette was thus able to give up her public dancing,
and stay more at home; and the toyman's daughter taught her dainty
embroidery, in which her skilful fingers soon excelled. She tamed down
wonderfully that winter, and even made some efforts to learn reading,
as I suggested to her what a source of pleasure it would be to Jean,
whose thirst for hearing stories related was intense, if he could read
them for himself. But she was very slow at this; the letters proved a
heavy task to learn, and when we came to spelling, I often despaired;
still she toiled on, and when I left Paris in May, she could read a
very little.

{267}

Six months passed, and again I turned my steps to my old
winter-quarters. The summer and autumn had been spent by me partly in
England, partly in Switzerland. My protege was unable to write, and I
had heard nothing of her since I left Paris. I had not returned there
longer than a week, when I set off into the _cité_, to discover again
my little pupil. It was much the same sort of a day as that on which
we had first met; cold, dank, misty rain kept falling, and streets
were wet and sloppy. The part of the town where Poucette lived was
wretchedly poor, dingy, and dirty-looking, especially in such weather
as I now visited it, and the reputed haunt of thieves and evil-doers
of various kinds. I picked my way along narrow ill-paved streets, with
the gutters in the middle, and at last I reached her old abode. There
was no one stirring about; but the door was ajar. I pushed it open,
and walked in. The dwelling had once been some nobleman's hotel in
bygone days, and its rooms were large and lofty, and at present each
inhabited by different poor families. Emile's was on the ground
floor--a long room, formerly used either as a guard-room or for
playing billiards in. It had one large window, opening in the center,
and crossed outside with thick iron bars, which partially excluded the
light. I was confused on entering from the outer air, and at first
could only perceive that the room was filled with a crowd of people,
of various ages and sexes, but all of the lowest order, some sitting,
some standing. A woman came forth to meet me, whom I recognized as
Madame Emile, sobbing and holding her apron to her eyes. "Ah, mon
Dieu, mon Dieu!" she whispered, as she looked at me and clasped her
hands piteously; "the poor Poucette, how hard it is! Monsieur, you are
welcome; but this is a sorrowful time; she is much hurt." She led me
gently through the various groups, all sorrowfully silent, toward a
low pallet, at the head of the room, where, crushed, bleeding, and now
insensible from pain, lay the form of poor Poucette. "What is this?" I
asked in a whisper. "How did it happen?"

"Ah, it was a vile remise," eagerly answered a dozen voices. "She was
returning home yesterday from selling the mats, and the driver was
drunk. She fell in crossing, and he did not see her. The wheel crushed
her poor chest. Ah, she will die, the unhappy child!"

"Where is Jean?" I asked.

His mother silently pointed out what looked like a bundle of clothes
huddled up in the bed beside the dying child. She was dying, my poor
Poucette. One of the kind-hearted surgeons from the _hôpital_ had been
to see her early that morning, and pronounced that beside the blow on
her chest, which was of itself a dangerous one, severe internal
injuries had taken place, which must end her life in a few hours. Poor
Poucette! I seated myself by the little couch in the dark room, which
was so soon to be filled by the presence of death, and presently the
surgeon came again. All eyes turned anxiously toward him as he walked
to the bed, and kneeling down beside it, carefully examined the poor
little sufferer, whose only sign of consciousness was a groan of
anguish now and then.

"Can nothing be done for her?" I asked, as he rose to his feet and
stood by the bed, looking pityingly down at the two children.

"Nothing whatever," he said, with a mournful shake of his head. "She
will not last through the night."

"Does she suffer?" I asked.

"Acutely, but it will not be for long. Mortification is setting in
rapidly." He paused, then added: "She will probably regain
consciousness at the last;" and left the room.

Slowly the weary hours glided on; gradually the moans became weaker,
and the pulse quick and fitful. Suddenly she opened her eyes, and
looked at me inquiringly; then her eyes fell {268} on Jean, who lay at
her side, and uttered an exclamation of joy. "I am not in pain now,"
she said faintly; "that is over.--Ah, my good monsieur, you said you
would return. I am glad."

"I am grieved to find you thus, Poucette," I whispered. "Can I do
anything for you?"

"Perhaps you would like to have Mouton," she said calmly, as if
thinking aloud.

"I will keep him, if you like it," I replied. "Is there anything else
you would like?"

"Only Jean, dear Jean," and her soft dark eyes were fixed timidly yet
imploringly on my face.

"I will take care of Jean."

"The good God reward you, my kind monsieur! That is all that I want.--
Adieu, madame. Adieu, my good friends. It is over." Just then Mouton
raised himself on his hind-legs by the bed, and peered anxiously into
her face. She put out her little right hand, and gently patted his
head; then, with a last effort, she turned round from us, and flung
one tiny arm round the crippled boy at her side. "Je t'aime toujours,"
she whispered, as she bent over and kissed him. It was a last effort.
A slight shiver passed over the little figure; one long-drawn sigh
escaped the white lips. Poucette was gone to her mother; the wanderer
had been taken home; the desolate one was comforted!

My tale is ended, except to say that, from that evening, Mouton has
been my inseparable companion. He is by no means, however, as
complaisant to me as he was to his mistress; on the contrary, Mouton,
like many other _nouveaux riches_, is rather a spoiled dog, and the
tyrant of my small household. Jean became a basket-maker, and it is
not improbable that my fair readers may have in their possession some
of the productions of his skilful fingers. Such was the fruit of my
Christmas-eve in Paris six years ago. I have never spent one there
since.

----

Translated from Der Katholik.

DANTE'S DIVINA COMMEDIA.


There is none of the Christian poets who has exercised so great an
influence in the intellectual world as Dante Alighieri. His "Vision of
Hell, Purgatory, and Paradise" has been, ever since its appearance, a
mine in which artists, poets, philosophers, theologians, historians,
and statesmen have found treasures. In Italy, immediately after his
death, professors were appointed in the universities to explain his
work, and numbers of both lay and clerical savants, among them even
princes, bishops, and archbishops, took delight in its study and
exposition. With the spread of the Italian language, on which Dante
has stamped for ever the impress of his genius, and with the progress
of Italian culture, all Europe became acquainted with the Commedia,
and learned to admire its beauty and its grandeur. It was translated
into other tongues; learned foreigners undertook to fathom its depths;
and even the spirit of religious unity in the sixteenth century did
not check its influence over the Roman-Germanic nations. Protestant
translators and expositors contended with the Catholic writers who
made of the work of Dante a special study. The Germans especially have
{269} not been backward in this respect, and to prove it we need only
name Kannegieser, Strecksufs, Kofisch, Witte, Wegele, and Philalethes
(the present king of Saxony).

When we wish to assign Dante his proper place in Christian art and
poetry, by comparison with antiquity, we are reminded at once of Homer
and the veneration in which he was held by the Greeks. But how has the
Florentine poet merited such high consideration? Is it by the might of
his genius and the peculiarity of his chosen theme? By the perfection
and the poetic charm of his expression and language? By his deep
knowledge of life and of human nature? By the philosophic and moral
truths which he has woven into his poem? By his religious and
political views? Or by his judgment of historical personages and
facts?

No doubt all these have been helping causes to establish Dante's fame
and give him the position which he holds. But the true reason of all
the singular prerogatives of the poet and of the poem, the reason
which gives us the key to the right understanding of the "Divine
Comedy," and of the various and discrepant explanations of it, must be
sought deeper. There is a principal cause of Dante's greatness, from
which the secondary causes, just named, diverge, as rays of light from
a common centre, and to the knowledge of which only a philosophical
comprehension of history, and especially of poetry, can lead us. We
shall endeavor in this essay to discover this cause, after having
given a brief sketch of the contents and the scope of the great poem.


I.

The _Commedia_, which, in the form of a vision, paints the condition
of the soul after death, is divided into three parts, Hell, Purgatory,
and Paradise. Each part consists of thirty-three cantos, which, with
the introductory canto, make the round number one hundred. Surrounded
by trials and troubles of various kinds, Dante is guided into the
regions of the invisible by his favorite poet Virgil, who comes to his
assistance. Virgil here represents poetry and the idea of the poem. It
was through him that Dante was first led to the serious study of
truth, and to direct his mind to the philosophical consideration of
the condition of mankind.

Our poet now proceeds into the realm of the damned souls, into the
regions of night and hell, which he represents in the form of a funnel
having nine gradually narrowing eddies, in which the souls of the
damned are revolving to the throne of Satan, who sits at the top of
the cone. The narrower grow the circles, the more intense become the
punishments inflicted, in proportion to the increasing guilt of the
culprits. The lowest place among the lost souls is occupied by the
traitors, Brutus, Cassius, and Judas.

The power of the devil over men, and the inexorable character of the
Christian idea of retributive justice, is grandly portrayed in this
part of the work, by interweaving the most moving and striking
episodes, in which well-known characters are described as receiving
punishment equal to their crimes. Even paganism is made to lend its
graces to increase the sublimity of the picture, and clothe the
thoughts of the writer in poetic garments.

Both poets then leave the darkness and horror of hell behind them, and
approach the regions of purification or purgatory, over which
perpetual twilight reigns. This realm of temporary suffering is
supposed by the poet to be on the opposite side of the earth, where
the antipodes dwell. This abode of those souls who are being purified
and doing penance for minor offences, and whose pains are lessened by
the hope of future happiness, is represented in the form of a
mountain, to whose summit one ascends by nine successive degrees, as
the descent through the {270} funnel of hell was by nine lessening
circles. At the top of the mountain is placed that earthly paradise
which was lost by the sins of our first parents, and from which the
way to heaven leads. Having arrived in the terrestrial paradise, Dante
suddenly finds himself deserted by Virgil, who from the beginning had
promised to guide him only so far. But Beatrice meets our poet here,
Beatrice the beloved of his youth. She teaches him the science of God,
and, aided by the light of faith and revelation, which Virgil had not,
she shows him the higher knowledge given to human reason under the
influence of Christianity. At her voice and teaching, Dante is moved
to repentance for his transgressions, and she becomes his future
guide.

Dante paints in the most lively colors, and describes with the
greatest beauty, in episodes and conversations, the intimate relation
of the souls in purgatory with each other, and with those they left
behind them on earth, and with the blessed in heaven. This latter
point is illustrated by the frequent appearance of angels, who descend
from time to time into the dusky realms of purgatory.

Led by his beloved Beatrice, our poet now mounts to heaven, and
traverses its various spheres, which are represented according to the
system of Ptolemy. Beginning by the moon, the poet travels through
Mercury, Venus, the Sun, Mars, Jupiter, and Saturn, the glory and
happiness of the beatified increasing as he advances, in proportion
with their virtues and holiness, till he arrives at the so-called
Empyrean, at the very throne of God. In the highest sphere Dante
beholds the mystical rose, that is, the glory of the Blessed Virgin,
who is surrounded by the highest saints and angels in the form of a
rose; and among these glorified spirits he sees with delight his
Beatrice near the Mother of God, who gives an honorable place to those
who had been her fervent followers during life. The Vision of Heaven
ends by a glance at the mysteries of the Holy Trinity and the
Incarnation, which mortal eye, though supernaturally strengthened, is
unable to dwell upon for excess of light.

Dante in this part of his work treats the most difficult questions,
not only of philosophy, which he had also done in the preceding
cantos, but also of theology, with the greatest clearness, depth, and
poetic grace. He treats in it of the fundamental ideas of
Christianity, of faith, hope, and charity. The spirits that he
represents to the reader in hell, purgatory, and paradise are by no
means the mere wilful creations of his fancy, but for the most part
are historical characters, some of them but little removed from his
own time, others contemporary; and even those which he borrows from
Judaism or paganism to embellish his poem are symbolical, and have an
intimate connection with some reality. On this very account we should
not judge the Vision as an allegory, although in many respects it has
the peculiarities of an allegorical poem. It is, rather, a mystic
poem, in which the deepest religious and philosophical truths are
represented under the shadow of visionary forms and ethereal
similitudes; and realities are raised to an ideal sphere, where the
mind's eye can penetrate through their misty covering and contemplate
them to satiety. But what is the cause of the great influence which
this poem has exerted on mankind? This is the question which we have
undertaken to answer, and which we shall now endeavor to solve.



II.

As in the history of nations and of mankind there are certain epochs
in which the elements that had formed the groundwork of society, and
of national life, in their gradual development, culminate in a certain
point, where the mental powers of the people put forth all their
strength in the production of facts, or works of various kinds that
give expression to the spirit {271} of the age; so in the history of
poetry there are poets and poems in which the ruling ideas of their
time and nation appear in all their truth and power.

In the works of great poets we have, as it were, a copy of God's
creative power. He seems to lend it to the poet. Of all the
productions of the human mind, the poem has the greatest similarity
with the works of Almighty power, and both offer to human
contemplation beauties ever varying and ever new. But between the
works of divine and of human skill there is an essential difference.
The works of God express the thoughts of the Creator, whose glory and
invisibility, according to the Psalmist, the heavens declare, and
whose eternal might and divinity creatures proclaim; but with the
effects of human genius it is entirely different.

Every individual is but a member of the great whole, which we call the
human family; he can do nothing alone, but depends on others both for
his material and spiritual support; and the degree of culture which he
attains, the aim which he proposes to himself in life, and the germ of
his future progress, are as much the result of the influences
exercised on him from the cradle to the grave, by the family circle,
by the school, and by the associations of society, as they are the
effects of his own independent strength and originality. Hence the
work of the poet, no matter how great he may be, is not to be
considered the exclusive product of the individual, for it must bear
on it the stamp of his education, and of the people among whom he
dwells, and of the age in which he lives. As the waters of a lake do
not merely reflect their own color, but also the green shore of the
surrounding woods and hills, the passing clouds, the deep blue of the
heavens above, and of the stars that glitter in it; so in the poem we
see not only the soul of its creator, but every great emotion that
swelled in the breast of the men of his age and nation. In a word, we
see the whole circle of contemporary ideas more or less vividly
expressed in it. Nor are the productions of human genius lessened by
this fact; they are, on the contrary, enhanced in value. For it is no
longer one person, with his subjective views of his own world and
life, who speaks to us in them, but it is the spirit of a portion of
mankind, expressing to us the ideas of a certain stage in the progress
of civilization.

Now, if such a work of genius be at the same time the foundation of a
further development in the future, and of such a character that it
represents the condition not only of one nation, but of several; and
if the ideas which it contains and which sway men be such as by their
truth and universality overleap the limits of time and space; then
such a power will maintain its hold upon the admiration and esteem of
men, not only in a certain epoch and among a certain people, but for
ever and among all nations where the same order of civilization
reigns. Poets who are distinguished above others by the creative power
and superiority of their genius in the production of such a work, are
not merely the poets of one age, or of one nation, but they belong to
all times and to all nations. They will not be merely read once, and
then thrown aside; but they will be reperused and studied with ever
increasing pleasure.

The age of Dante was an epoch of this character among the Christian
nations. He has hardly his superior as a poet, either among the
ancients or the moderns. Hence, if we contemplate the _Commedia_ from
this point of view, we shall be able not only to understand the
general scope of the work, but even to comprehend with ease all its
details and peculiarities.

But in order to show that the period at which Dante appeared (the
second half of the thirteenth and the beginning of the fourteenth
century) was one like that which we have described, we must briefly
recall to mind the condition of the Church, of the state of science
and art, and give {272} expression to the spirit of the age in a
scientific formula.

If we then look at the Church, we find her displaying such fecundity
and power as we shall hardly find at any other period in her history.
She is not only busy in the work of converting the still pagan nations
of Europe, especially in the north, and strengthening the faith among
believers by missions, voyages, and diplomacy; by the foundation of
new congregations and bishoprics; by councils; by stringency of
external discipline, and greater solemnity in the public worship; but
also by the internal reformation effected by such men as popes
Alexander III., Innocent III., and Innocent IV., who continued the
good work begun by Gregory VII., of freeing the Church from the
oppressions of secular power. They succeeded at length in propagating
and realizing among the Christian nations of the West the idea of one
vast spiritual community, under the headship of one spiritual ruler,
who, instead of destroying national diversity and independence,
protected and favored them. This idea prevailed through the agency of
the supreme pontiffs over the pagan idea so cherished by the emperors
of a universal monarchy. The crusades, too, fostered and led by the
Church, and which are the clearest expression of the thoroughly
Christian spirit of those centuries, bring the West into closer
intimacy with the East, and enrich the former with all the material
and spiritual treasures of the latter. Then arise those great orders
which--half religious and half secular, as the Knights Hospitallers
and the Templars, or entirely religious, like the Dominicans and
Franciscans--defended the Church, cared for the sick and the poor,
sacrificed themselves in spreading Christian faith and morality, and
gave birth to countless institutions of charity.

If we now glance at the political condition of the people, a spectacle
equally grand as that just described offers itself to our view. On the
imperial throne of Germany appear those powerful princes of the house
of Hohenstaufen, who contended so heroically with the papacy for the
success of the Ghibelline idea of a universal monarchy, but who in the
end were worsted in the fight; while in France a St. Louis IX., and in
England a Richard the Lion-hearted, excite the admiration of the
world. In Italy, even in the midst of the struggle between the secular
and the spiritual powers, and between the Guelphs and Ghibellines,
mighty republics spring up under the protection of the Church; and in
the other nations also we see a powerful effort for national
independence and freedom appearing in the many guilds, corporations,
free cities, states, and parliaments which were everywhere rising into
a dignified existence. But above all, the order of chivalry in the
twelfth and thirteenth centuries--an order which even yet throws such a
halo of poetry and romance around the middle ages in which it
nourished, walking hand in hand with religion, which had consecrated
it--helped much to civilize the barbarian character of the age, and
improve the moral condition of society.

As to science in the epoch of which we write, it was mostly occupied
in the investigation of those subjects which lay next the Christian
heart of the people; namely, in theology, philosophy, and ethics. And
how great has been its success! What great results has not mediaeval
science effected! I need only mention the immortal names of Anselem of
Canterbury, of St. Bernard, Albert the Great, Thomas Aquinas,
Bonaventure, Roger Bacon, and Vincent of Beauvais; men whose works in
theology, philosophy, history, and in the natural sciences, remain to
the present time as monuments of genius, hardly equalled by ancient or
modern productions.

At this period, too, sprang up the universities, which realize in
their conception the universal idea of catholicity. They were founded
in every land, and all the sciences were taught in {273} them. The
Church herself, in the Council of Vienne, in 1311, decreed that,
beside the chairs of theology, philosophy, medicine, and
jurisprudence, there should be in the four principal universities, and
wherever the papal court should be held, professors of Hebrew,
Chaldaic, Arabic, and Greek. But what especially shows the
intellectual bent of this age is the zeal and youthful ardor
manifested in every rank for all the different branches of science.
Popes, emperors, kings, and nobles emulated each other in this
respect, and consecrated their energies to the furtherance of
learning.

If we now turn to the state of art and poetry, on every side the old
cathedrals and monuments erected in the twelfth and thirteenth
centuries meet our eyes, and in their various styles of Gothic and
Roman architecture excite our admiration, fill us with holy awe, and,
as they lift their spires to heaven, speak more eloquently of the
greatness of the spirit and aesthetic feeling of the people than any
words of ours could do. In the suite of architecture the other arts
followed and were elevated to its height; and even before Dante, and
contemporaneously with him, lived the founders of the Italian schools
of painting and sculpture, which so soon after attained to such
perfection. As for poetry, we need only remember that at this time
most of the modern languages began to be developed and become the
mediums of literature. "It was the gay time of the troubadours and
incense-singers," says Vilmar, in his History of German National
Literature, "in which the melody of song rang out from hamlet to
hamlet, from city to city, from castle to castle, and court to court,
and a thousand harmonious echoes, near and far, from hill and valley,
answered out of the people's heart." It was the first classic period
of German literature, in which the national and artistic epic appear
well developed in such works as the _Nibelungen, Gudrun, Parceval_,
and others.

No doubt there are shadows on the picture of the age just described,
as there are in our own. But still, whoever considers the facts we
have alleged, cannot fail to admit the age as a real epoch in the
history of the Christian world, unless he is blind or wilfully shuts
his eyes to the light. In view of these facts, also, he must perceive
that the civilization of the various western nations was most
intimately connected; that it rested on the same common foundation;
and that the ideas which ruled them and constituted their vital
principle were eternally and universally true, and became the platform
of succeeding intellectual evolution. Hence, those nations, though
differing in origin and political independence, made but one grand
spiritual community, bound together by a common faith and a common
church. But if we would now express the spirit of this epoch in a
philosophical formula, we should say that it was the period in which
the Roman and Germanic races were converted to Christianity after the
decease of the old world and of pagan civilization; and after these
races had become a spiritual community under the hierarchy of the
popes, and become bound together under the government of one worldly
empire, after various combats with outward enemies and triumphs over
internal elements of discord; when these races had appropriated to
themselves Christianity as their vital element, and recognized it as
the power which moved and governed the world, and sought to produce,
realize, and use Christian ideas in every direction, in the sciences,
in arts, in society, in the state, and in the Church. The Protestant,
Vilmar, whom we have already cited, agrees with this assertion, when
he writes: "It was the spirit of Christianity which had become the
spirit of the western nations, and which inspired, in the highest
degree, the higher ranks of society, the nobility, and the clergy; and
which penetrated into the masses, not so much as a theory, but as a
fact--not as a science, but as an element of their life; it was
Christianity, not as a simple doctrine or idea, but as a practical
{274} boon and benefit; it was a joy to the Christian Church and to
its internal and external glory, and a blessing with its gifts, more
general than it has been since, and so strong that even the struggle
between the popes and the emperors, for over two centuries, could not
affect the great happiness of men whose social and individual
existence was actuated by the spirit of Christianity."



III.

Taking, therefore, this comprehensive view of the state of society;
considering the triumph of the Christian idea in history, the
consciousness of Christianity as the principle of life in the
newly-organized world, and the struggle of this element to mould and
fashion everything according to its nature, we may easily answer the
question as to the character of a poem which should thoroughly express
the spirit of the age. It would not be hard to show that the Divine
Comedy of Dante derived its matter, its form, its name, and its
sentiment from the peculiar condition of the epoch. In fact, any poem
that represents, the conquest of the Christian idea in all conditions
of private and public life must ever exercise great influence over
men. But in order to give a poetical representation of this thought,
the poet should choose a framework sufficiently large to contain the
vast picture in which God and man, heaven and earth, nature and grace,
creation and redemption, past, present, and future, science and life,
church and state, appear; and such a framework was offered to him in
the Christian idea of the judgment, of God, and of the existence of
the other world, in its three divisions of hell, purgatory, and
paradise.

Now, only by carrying up ordinary facts to this higher, ideal sphere
was it possible to overleap the limits of time and space, and give
greater unity to the picture, and make it a masterpiece. But he who
lives here below is ignorant of the future, and of the condition of
the departed souls. Only by a supernatural revelation can we know
their lot. Consequently, the form of a wonderful vision, in which the
poet enters into communion with the spirits of the dead, and wanders
through their regions, is the most natural manner of representing his
idea in the poem; consequently, it should be called by right a "divine
drama," a _Divina Commedia_, as the most appropriate title.

The true scope of the poem, therefore, must not be sought for either
in a purely religious, or a purely political, or a purely scientific
or personal point of view; but in the prosecution of a far more
general, comprehensive, higher, philosophic, theological, and
particularly moral or ethical object, to which all the details of the
work are subordinated. Hence, he who examines these details from this
or that stand-point may give them the most different explanations, as
in fact many commentators of the poem do--not having fathomed its
depths and perceived the general object of the sacred epic.

Dante himself leaves us no reason to doubt on this point. In his
dedicatory epistle to Cardinal Grande della Scala, he speaks thus:
"The meaning of this poem is not simple, but multiple. The first sense
is in the words, the second in the things expressed: the one is called
literal, the other moral or allegorical. Taken literally, the whole
work is simple, and expresses the condition of souls after death, for
this is expressed by the whole tenor of the poem. But taken in the
higher sense, its object is man, either deserving rewards or
chastisements through the exercise of his free will. And if we wish to
name the kind of philosophy contained in the work, we must call it
moral, or ethics. For the whole tends to practice and action, and is
not content with simple contemplation and speculation."

Giacomo di Dante, the son of the poet, develops more clearly the scope
of the work, in the preface to his {275} commentary. "The whole work,"
says he, "is divided into three parts; the first of which treats of
hell, the second of purgatory, and the third of paradise. In order to
understand the general allegorical bearing, I say that the object of
the poet is to represent to us in figurative language the three
several divisions of mankind. The first part considers vice in man,
and is called hell, to show us that mortal sin by its depth of
iniquity is directly opposed to the sublimity of virtue. The second
contemplates those who detach themselves from vice and strive after
virtue. His place for such persons he calls purgatory, or place of
purification, to show the condition of the soul, which cleanses itself
from its sins in time, for time is the medium in which all changes
happen. The third considers perfect man, and is called paradise, in
order to express the greatness of its bliss, and the elevation of mind
connected with it; two things without which a knowledge of the supreme
good cannot be attained. And thus the poet pursues his object through
the three several parts of his poem by means of the figures and
representations with which he surrounds himself."

But the poet, in order to realize his grand idea, should be gifted not
only with the highest poetical genius in order to represent the
philosophical principles of Christianity in the peculiar characters
and types of Christian art, and give them a new, independent, and
majestic appearance; but he should be also possessed, on the one hand,
of a clear and perfect knowledge of Christian doctrine and ethics, and
a deep and extensive knowledge of philosophy and theology; and, on the
other, of a profound and extensive acquaintance with men and human
life, as well as with the history of the human race. Both these
requisites are found in Dante in the highest degree. Christian faith
and morality is as well and correctly explained by him as by the best
approved theologians. But this fact will not excite our surprise if we
consider that, in his Vision, without however sacrificing his
individuality, he adheres strictly to the great doctors of the age,
Saints Thomas Aquinas and Bonaventure, as King John of Saxony clearly
proves in his commentary on the Divine Comedy.

Hence, at an early period Dante's work became a favorite theme of
scholastic study, and under the portal of the cathedral at Florence
there is seen an old statue of the poet near that of the patron saint
of the city, with this inscription: _Theologus Dante, nullius dogmatis
expers_--"Dante the theologian, to whom no dogma was unknown." In the
Raphael chamber in the Vatican, he is represented crowned with laurel
on the famous painting of the _disputa_, among the popes, bishops, and
doctors assembled round the holy sacrament of the altar.

An occasional writer has suspected the faith of Dante, because in his
poem he deplores several abuses in the Church, such as the corruption
of some of the clergy and monks, and lashes some of the popes and the
relation of the papacy to the secular power in his time. But such a
suspicion is unwarranted when we consider that many Catholic
reformers, even saints like Peter Damien, Saint Thomas of Canterbury,
Saint Bernard, Saint Hildegard, Jacopone, and others, have spoken even
more strongly than Dante against abuses; and that he never confounds
the use with the abuse, excrescences of an institution with the
institution itself, or persons with principles.

Dante's thorough knowledge of human life and of history is fully shown
in his surprising explanations, and by the manner in which with one
trait he paints the famous characters and facts in the _Commedia_, as
well as by the examples and narrations which he takes from all times,
regions, and nations of the earth. But in his judgment of persons and
facts in the past and present, Dante is not always impartial or just,
for, being {276} subject to human frailties and prejudices, he is
often guilty of great injustice to those against whom he had motives
of hatred. Consequently, in order to appreciate Dante's poem on this
point, we must consider the character of his life and fortunes, as
well as the history of his native city and country.

Dante Alighieri was born at Florence in the year 1265, and received in
baptism the name of Durante, which was shortened to that of Dante.
Early in his youth an event happened which determined his life, and to
which posterity is indebted for his great work. In the year 1274, in
the ninth year of his age, Dante saw, at a church festival, the
daughter of Falco Portinari, Beatrice, a child eight years old, whom
he says, in one of his poems, no one could see without crying out,
"This is not a woman, but one of the most beautiful of the heavenly
angels!" He conceived for her, on the spot, the most violent passion,
but, at the same time, one so pure and holy that Beatrice, even on
earth and wedded to another, became for him and his muse a perfect
ideal that inspired all his first and tenderest poems, and moved him
to high and holy thoughts. But after Beatrice's untimely death, she
became, in the imagination of the poet, a holy spirit, whose glory he
undertook to exalt after a wonderful vision which he had, and who
became, in all the sorrows of his life, a star of hope and anchor of
safety to him. A few years after the decease of his beloved, Dante
espoused Gemma di Donati, a lady of a noble family in Florence, and
through this marriage, as well as by his profound theological and
philosophical studies, he was drawn into the vortex of the politics of
his native city, in which, after many struggles, the Guelph party
gained the ascendency, toward the end of the thirteenth century.

Sprung from a Guelph family and surrounded by Guelph influences, and
prominent by his genius in the party, although keeping clear of its
excesses, Dante, from 1293 to 1299, filled many posts of honor,
especially many places of ambassador, and was elected, with five
others, in the year 1300, to the priorate, the highest office in the
republic. But soon after his prosperous career was changed to one of
misfortune. In 1292 a division was made in the Guelph party, when,
under the tribune Giano della Bella, the constitution of the state was
changed, the nobles driven from the magistracy, and the government of
the city given entirely into the hands of the plebeians; and this
division led gradually to an open rupture between the parties called
the Blacks and the Whites "_Neri_" and "_Bianchi_." The latter were by
far the more moderate, and the Ghibellines, both nobles and plebeians,
joined them. Dante belonged to the Whites, who stood at the head of
affairs. But by the interference of Charles of Valois, whom the Blacks
called to Florence in order to seize the government with his aid, the
Whites lost their power, and Dante, who was then on an embassy to
Rome, together with the other chiefs of the party, was exiled by a
decree, which was repealed in the year 1302.

This trial was important in two ways to our poet. It excited his
hatred against one party of the Guelphs, and then against them all;
and evoked his inclination for the Ghibellines and his dislike toward
the popes, who gave assistance to the Guelph party, and finally made
him a strong partisan of the Ghibellines and their operations against
Florence, and of the empire against the papacy. On the other hand, he
became, by his misfortunes, more devoted to virtue, his studies, and
his poem, from the prosecution of which he had been distracted by
political cares; so that the whole history of his exile is nothing
else than the history of his scientific life and the execution of the
Divine Comedy. After having wandered from city to city, from country
to country, to Verona, Bologna, Padua, Paris, and England, and dwelt
for a time in Pisa, and in {277} Lucca at the monastery of
Fonteavelluna and in Udine, and after having finished his great
works--"The Banquet," "_De Vulgari Eloquio_," "_De Monarchia_"--and
the three parts of his great poem, he rested at last in Ravenna,
where, in the year 1321, he fell sick and died, in the 56th year of
his age, after having received, as Boccacio tells us, the last
sacraments with humility and piety, and become reconciled to God by
true repentance for all he had done contrary to his holy will. The
poet was buried in the Franciscan church, where his ashes still
repose.

This sketch of his life and fortunes gives us the key to the solution
of many peculiarities of the Divine Comedy. We can now understand why
politics play so conspicuous a _rôle_ in the great poem, in spite of
its higher philosophico-theological and ethical scope; and why some
should have considered the work as of a purely political character.
This sketch of his life also shows the partial truth contained in the
assertion of Wegele, a German commentator on Dante. This writer says
the leading thought of the poet was to work out his own salvation by
considering the state of the world at his time; and in fact Dante
found consolation and strength against earthly misfortune, found the
way of virtue and eternal salvation, in the execution of his poem. For
similar reasons, others considered the poem as purely didactic, and
this view has a foundation in the confession of the poet himself.

But above all, the life of Dante explains his ideas about the
relations between the papacy and the empire, expressed not only in his
book on monarchy, but also in the Divine Comedy; and his strange
judgments about persons and circumstances, especially of his own age.
It is true Dante never for a moment disputes the primacy and divine
appointment of the popes in the Church; and even in hell he describes
those pontiffs whom he condemns to it as having certain distinctions.
He maintains in the clearest manner the freedom and independence of
the divine power in regard to the secular, and acknowledges a certain
superiority in the former, for he requires that Caesar should have
that reverence for Peter which the first-born son should have to his
father, so that Caesar, illuminated by the light of paternal grace,
might shine more brilliantly over the earth. But as Dante was
possessed with the Ghibelline idea, and as he saw in the temporal
power of the popes, who were the head of the Guelph party, the
greatest obstacle to the success of his principles, we must not be
surprised to find him the enemy of the pope's temporal power, and, in
his judgment of men and things, to see him frequently led away by
party rage and revenge for injuries received.

Dante, however, was noble and Christian enough to keep his eyes open
even to the faults of his own party, and he spared not even the heads
of the Ghibellines, as Frederic II. and other noble and popular
persons, if they seemed to him deserving of blame. Nor must we imagine
that Dante really thought all those were in hell whom he places there,
any more than he thought the real pains of hell were such as he
described them: only the vulgar could believe this. Those persons were
only such as in his eyes were guilty of mortal sins; and the
punishments inflicted were such as his fancy conceived to be adequate
to the guilt. But we must bear in mind that his judgments must always
be received with caution when there is question of facts, persons, and
circumstances connected with the opposite party; and we have the right
to examine and correct the criticisms of Dante by the light of
history. Dante, for instance, goes so far as to put in hell even Pope
Celestine, who, after governing the Church for six months, tired of
the tiara, went into solitude; because, in the opinion of the poet,
Celestine renounced the pontificate through timidity and weakness, and
made way {278} for the hated Boniface, VIII. The Church, on the
contrary, puts Celestine among the saints on account of his
extraordinary virtues.

But let us now turn from the dark side of the picture, and from the
weakness of the great man, to take a view of the fortunes of the
_Commedia_ in the course of six centuries. We have already in the
beginning of this essay spoken of the great number of editions,
translations, and commentaries on the great work, and in this respect
no other work can compare with it except the Holy Scripture and the
Following of Christ. But these proofs of admiration and study of the
Divine Comedy are not equally divided among the centuries, and the
recent and renowned writer of Dante's life, Count Caesar Balbo, justly
remarks that, at those periods in which an earnest religious and truly
patriotic feeling pervaded the fatherland of the poet and Christian
Europe in general, those proofs are to be found in greater number than
when the knowledge and study of supreme truth had grown less, love of
religion and country had died or gone astray, and the minds of men
sunk in the earthly and the sensible. Thus, in the fifteenth century,
after the invention of the art of printing, nineteen or twenty
editions of Dante appeared; in the sixteenth century, forty; in the
seventeenth, only three; in the eighteenth, thirty-four; in the
nineteenth, up to 1839, over seventy, and perhaps up to the present
year one hundred. This is a striking proof of the increasing love of
the spiritual in our century, in spite of the great influence of
materialism.

But in this age of surprises and contradictions, a new glory of which
he had never dreamt has been added to Dante's name. For some time in
Italy that political party which aims at the subversion of the
existing order of things, and the establishment of a single republic
or monarchy, and which finds in the papacy or States of the Church the
principal obstacle to the carrying out of its plans, has made use of
commentaries on the Divine Comedy, among other means, to spread its
principles among the people. Hence, two Italian refugees, Ugo Foscolo
and Rosetti, during their sojourn in England, undertook the dreary
task of explaining Dante's poem in a purely political point of view,
and with learning and wit they have attempted to prove that the poet
was opposed to the temporal power of the pope, and the head, or at
least a member, of a secret society.

In Italy, however, and in Germany, especially by the great critic,
Schlegel, this theory has been refuted. It falls to the ground by the
simple consideration of the fact, that if the Divine Comedy was as
clear in every point as where he speaks against the popes of his time
and their earthly possessions, no commentary on the poem would be
necessary. Yet, no sooner was war against Rome proclaimed at Paris and
Turin, than recourse was had to Dante, and an attempt made to conjure
up his spirit as a partisan in the fight. Rosetti already occupies a
chair in the Sardinian capital, from which he expounds Dante in the
interest of Italian unity, and in Germany the secret societies applaud
his course; so that, if in 1865 there be in Italy a celebration of
Dante's six hundredth birthday, as in Germany there is of Schiller, we
may expect to find the politicians make use of it to further their
ends.

So then we have lived to see the day when Dante, the Ghibelline and
fanatical adherent of the German empire; who was opposed to the
temporal power of the pope only because it stood in the way of a
universal secular monarchy; who invoked the wrath of heaven on the
German Albert because he delayed coming to subjugate Italy; and who
wrote the famous letter to the Emperor Henry VII., inviting him to
come and chastise his native city; when that Dante, I say, has become
the herald and standard-bearer of a party which calls itself the old
national Guelph party, whose {279} watch-word is "Death to the Germans
and foreign rulers," and which, like the ancient Guelphs, is aided by
French soldiers in its struggle against the German emperors.

In spite of his Ghibelline proclivities, Dante was filled with lively
faith, and he had so great a veneration for the power of the keys
entrusted by Christ to Peter and his successors that even in hell he
bowed with respect before one of those who had borne them, and even in
his narration of the arrest and ill-treatment of Boniface VIII., whom
he hated and placed in hell, he breaks out into the following strains:

      "Lo! the flower de luce
  Enters Alagna; in his Vicar Christ?
  Himself a captive, and his mockery
  Acted again. Lo! to his holy lip
  The vinegar and gall once more applied;
  And he 'twixt living robbers doomed to bleed.
  Lo! the new Pilate, of whose cruelty
  Such violence cannot fill the measure up,
  With no decree to sanction, pushes on
  Into the temple his yet eager sails.
  O sovereign Master! when shall I rejoice
  To see the vengeance, which thy wrath, well pleased,
  In secret silence broods?"

        (Purg. xx. 85-97. _Carey's translation_.)

So we have lived to see the day when the author of the above lines is
represented as the herald of a party which has treated so shamefully
the gentle successor of Boniface VIII., Pius IX., whose only fault was
to have opened the prison doors to his enemies, and recalled them from
exile with too great indulgence. They have made him drink the chalice
of humiliation to the dregs, and, leagued with a French despot, they
renew in the Vicar of Christ all the insults heaped of old on the
Saviour by the Roman soldiers, when, putting on him the mantle of
purple and the crown of thorns, they mocked him, saying, "Hail, King
of the Jews!" Dante was no such Christ-killer.

And what folly is it not to imagine Dante, the haughty aristocrat,
whose pride of birth shows itself everywhere in his poem, a partisan
of a faction which, like that which governed Florence during the
middle ages, is made up of the rabble and of levelers, haters of all
nobility.

In another age, when it was not the principle of public life to have
no principle at all, such contradictions as those of which we write
would have been incomprehensible; but in our own century, in which
truth wages an unequal conflict with falsehood, not so much because
men do not know how to separate truth from falsehood, as because men
find truth less useful for their purposes than falsehood, the conduct
of the so-called national party in Italy is easily explained. But if
Dante were to rise up from the grave, how strongly he would rebuke
those who are making such an unwarrantable use of his name! He would
quote for them, perhaps, as he does in many parts of his great work,
an apt text of the Holy Scriptures; and none, probably, would come
sooner to his mind than the following:

"Why have the Gentiles raged, and the people devised vain things?

"The kings of the earth stood up, and the princes met together,
against the Lord and against his Christ.

"Let us break their bonds asunder: and let us cast away their yoke
from us.

"He that dwelleth in heaven shall laugh at them; and the Lord shall
deride them. Then shall he speak to them in his anger, and trouble
them in his rage."

------

{280}


MISCELLANY.


SCIENCE.


_Important Geological Discovery_.--Sir Charles Lyell, in his address
to the British Association a few months ago, mentioned the discovery
of a fossil animal much more ancient than any previously supposed to
exist. Heretofore, as is well known, an immense series of rocks below
the silurians have been termed _azoic_, as exhibiting no remains of
animal life; but this term must now be dismissed.

It is well known that a staff of competent geologists, under the
direction of Sir William E. Logan, have been engaged for some years in
a geological survey of Canada. The oldest rocks in that country are
granite, described as upper and lower Laurentian, their thickness
being 40,000 feet, with bands of limestone intervening. In one of
these bands in the lower series of rocks, which are the most ancient,
there were discovered, in 1858, certain flattish rounded masses, which
seemed to be of organic origin. These were examined under the
microscope by Dr. Dawson of Montreal, who, from their structure,
declared them to be _foraminifera_, similar in character, but by no
means in size, to the _foraminifera_ living at the present day in vast
multitudes at the bottom of the sea; and to this newly-discovered and
wonder-exciting creature he gave the significant name _Eozoon
Canadense_, or the Dawn-animal of Canada.

The _foraminifer_ of the present day is a microscopic creature; the
_eozoon_ was enormous in comparison, about twelve inches diameter, and
from four to six inches in thickness, presenting the general form of a
much flattened globe. Its growth was by the process technically known
as gemmation, or the continued development of cells upon the surface;
hence, these cells form successive layers of chambers, separated by
exceedingly thin walls or laminae of calcareous matter. They are now
all filled with solid matter, mineral silicates, serpentine, and
others; but sections or slices cut from the mass, and examined, show
the form of the cells still perfect, and what is more remarkable, the
very minute tubes (tubuli) by which communication was maintained from
one to the other throughout the entire animal. Mr. Sterry Hunt, the
chemist employed on the Canadian survey, is of opinion that the
silicates and solid matters were directly deposited in waters in the
midst of which the _eozoon_ was still growing, or had only recently
perished, and that these solid matters penetrated, enclosed, and
preserved the structure of the animals precisely as carbonate of lime
might have done. Here, then, we have an example of fossilization,
accomplished by reactions going on at the earth's surface, not by slow
metamorphism in deeply-buried sediments.

Papers on this subject and one by Sir W. Logan himself--have been read
before the Geological Society, and will shortly be published; and at a
recent meeting of the Royal Society, a highly, interesting
communication in further elucidation of the matter was made by Dr.
Carpenter, who has devoted himself for some years to the study of
_foraminifera_. He confirms Dr. Dawson's general conclusions, and
identifies among living _foraminifera_ the species which has most
affinity with this very ancient dawn-animal. He makes out the
identification in an ingenious way, resting his proof on the peculiar
structure of the cell-walls, and of the minute tubuli by which, as
before observed, communication between the cells was maintained.
Henceforth, we shall have to regard the silurian fossils as modern.

Since this discovery was made public, it has been ascertained that
there are fossil remains of the eozoon in the serpentine rocks of
Great Britain. The importance of this of course depends on the age of
serpentine, and that is a question which geologists have not yet
settled; but some of them are of opinion that the British serpentines
are of the same age as the Laurentian rocks in which the Canadian
eozoon was found. Pending their decision of the question, keen
explorers are on the search for other specimens.


_Curious and Delicate Experiments_.--Dr. Bence Jones recently
communicated to the Royal Society of Great Britain the result of a
series of experiments by {281} which he had attempted to ascertain the
time required for certain crystallized substances to reach the
textures of the body after being taken into the stomach. In other
words, he proposed to solve these problems: If a dose of medicine be
given, what becomes of it, and does it arrive quickly or slowly at the
parts for which it is intended? It is obvious, that if these questions
could be accurately determined, medical men would have a better
knowledge than at present of the action and progress, so to speak, of
medicine within the body. Substances, when taken into the stomach,
pass into the blood, which may be supposed to distribute them to all
parts of the body. If, in ordinary circumstances, no trace of a
particular substance can be found in a body, but is found after doses
of the substance have been administered, it is clear that the doses
are the source from which that trace is derived.

Lithium is a substance sometimes given as medicine. Dr. Jones gave
half a grain of chloride of lithium to a guinea-pig, on three
successive days; and, by means of the spectrum analysis, he found
lithium in every tissue of the animal's body, even in the cartilages,
the cornea, and the crystalline lens of the eye. In another
experiment, the lithium was found in the eye eight hours after the
dose had been administered; and in another, four hours after. In
another, the lithium was found after thirty-two minutes, in the
cartilage of the hip, and in the outer part of the eye. These cases
show that chemical substances do find their way very quickly into the
tissues of the body; and a similar result appears from experiments on
the human subject. A patient, dying of diseased heart, took fifteen
grains of nitrate of lithia thirty-six hours before death, and a
similar quantity six hours before death. Lithium was afterward found
distinctly in the cartilage of one of the joints, and faintly in the
eye and the blood. A like result was obtained with a patient who had
taken ten grains of carbonate of lithia five and a half hours before
death. And to this Dr. Bence Jones adds, that he expects to find
lithium in the lens of the eye after operation for cataract.



_Giant Trees of California_.--Some time ago, much regret was expressed
that the giant trees (_Wellingtonia_) of California had been
recklessly cut down. Their fall was a loss to the world. But Sir
William Hooker has received a letter in which Professor Brewer, of the
California State Geological Survey, reports that "an interesting
discovery has been made this year of the existence of the big trees in
great abundance on the western flanks of the Sierra Nevada. They
abound along a belt at 5,000-7,000 feet of altitude for a distance of
more than twenty-five miles, sometimes in groves, at others scattered
through the forest in great numbers. You can have no idea of the
grandeur they impart to the scenery, where at times a hundred trees
are in sight at once, over fifteen feet in diameter, their rich
foliage contrasting so finely with their bright cinnamon-colored bark.
The largest I saw was 106 feet in circumference at four feet from the
ground, and 276 feet high.

"There seems no danger of the speedy extinction of the species, as it
is now known in quite a number of localities; and, contrary to the
popular notion, there are immense numbers of younger trees of all
sizes, from the seedling up to the largest. There has been much
nonsense and error published regarding them."



_Photographing the Interior of the Great Pyramid_.--Our readers may
remember that some time last winter a distinguished English savant,
Professor Piazzi Smyth, went out to Egypt for the purpose of taking
photographic views of the interior chambers of the great pyramid. The
impossibility of lighting these vast halls had hitherto proved an
insuperable bar to the undertaking; ordinary methods of illumination
seemed, if we may so speak, to make no impression upon the thick
darkness. But with the discovery of the wonderful powers of the
magnesium wire light, this difficulty was removed. Professor Smyth
writes as follows to the London Chemical News; his letter is dated
East Tomb, Great Pyramid, February 2d:

"We are settled down at last to the measuring; the chief part of the
time hitherto (about three weeks) having been occupied in concert with
a party of laborers, furnished by the Egyptian government, in clearing
away rubbish from important parts of the interior, {282} and in
cleansing and preparing it for nice observation. The magnesium wire
light is something astounding in its power of illuminating difficult
places. With any number of wax candles which we have yet taken into
either the king's chamber or the grand gallery, the impression left on
the mind is merely seeing the candles and whatever is very close to
them, so that you have small idea whether you are in a palace or a
cottage; but burn a triple strand of magnesium wire, and in a moment
you see the whole apartment and appreciate the grandeur of its size
and the beauty of its proportions. This effect, so admirably complete,
too, as it is, and perfect in its way, probably results from the
extraordinary intensity of the light, apart from its useful
photographic property; for side by side with the magnesium light the
wax candle flame looked not much brighter than the red granite of the
walls of the room. ... Whatever can be reached by hand is chipped, and
hammered, and fractured to a frightful degree; and this maltreatment
by modern men, combined with the natural wear and tear of some of the
softer stones under so huge a pressure as they are exposed to, and for
so long duration, has made the measuring of what is excessively
tedious and difficult, and the concluding what _was_, in some cases,
rather ambiguous."



ART.

_Domestic_.--The National Academy exhibition will probably be open
before our readers receive these pages; and from those cognizant of
the internal arrangements of the new building, and of the preparations
making by our resident artists, we learn that the collection will
exceed in the number, and probably in the merit of the pictures, any
of its predecessors. The make-shift character and unsuitableness of
the rooms in which the Academy has of late years held its annual
exhibitions, have deterred many of its most prominent members from
sending in contributions, which they were satisfied could not be seen
to advantage; and this sin of omission was so evident in the last two
or three exhibitions, that one of the leading objects of the
Academy--the improvement of public taste by the display of the annual
productions of our best artists--seemed in danger of being defeated.
The new galleries, it is said, can exhibit to advantage more than
fifteen hundred pictures, and a capacity so ample, in conjunction with
the prestige attending the opening of the new building, ought to cover
the walls to their fullest extent. The public will not be surprised
then to learn that an unusual number of artists have been, and are
still, busily applying the final touches to their works, in
anticipation of "opening day" (to borrow a phrase from the milliners);
and it is to be hoped that the Academy, having now "ample room and
verge enough" to satisfy fastidious members, may soon become the
fostering abode of art which its projectors intended to make it. A
slight foretaste of what the exhibition is likely to contain was
afforded at the recent reception of the Brooklyn Art Association,
where an elaborate and effective work by Grignoux, entitled "Among the
Alps," and several by Leutze, Gifford, Huntington, Stone, White, Hart,
Beard, and others, were on view. A number of pictures destined for the
Academy were also exhibited at the monthly social gatherings of the
Century and Athenaeum clubs of this city in the beginning of April. We
propose to give an extended notice of the new building and its art
collections in our next number.

The inaugural ceremonies of the New York association for "The
Advancement of Science and Art" took place at the Cooper Institute on
the evening of March 31st. One of the objects of the association is
the collection and preservation of works of art, and one of the
fifteen sections into which it is divided is devoted to the fine arts.
Amid the multiplicity of special branches, which the association
proposes to investigate and promote, from jurisprudence and the
prevention of pauperism down to chronology, the fine arts must
necessarily receive but a limited share of attention; but even this,
if guided by taste and intelligence, is better than the indifference
to aesthetic matters which is too often characteristic of a commercial
metropolis; and the association will find plenty of well-wishers, and,
we trust, some who will add substantial aid to their sympathy.

Among the attractions of the Central Park will be a hall of statuary,
now in the course of preparation in the old {283} arsenal building
near the Fifth Avenue, which is not yet open to public inspection. It
will contain, what ought to prove a boon to all students of form, a
collection of casts from Crawford's principal works. The Park
Commissioners have, in this instance, shown an enlightened enterprise
which might be imitated by wealthy private individuals. A few bronze
statues of American statesmen, soldiers, or authors, placed on
appropriate sites in the park, would add greatly to its attractions.
And if it should be thought desirable to illustrate a national era,
what one more worthy than the memorable epoch through which we are now
passing, the termination of which will be coeval with the completion
of the park?

A new group by Rogers, entitled "The Home Guard--Midnight on the
Border," attracts throngs of gazers before the windows of Williams and
Stevens's art emporium in Broadway. The story is naturally and
effectively told. A mother and her daughter, the only inmates,
probably, of some lonely farm-house, have been aroused from their
slumbers by marauding bushwhackers, and tremblingly prepare to repel
the assailants, or sell their lives dearly. The elder of the two
females, with her body slightly poised on one foot, stands in attitude
of rapt attention, while mechanically cocking a revolver, her sole
weapon of defence. The daughter, less resolute in expression and
action, cowers at her side. As a work of art, it is perhaps inferior
to the "Wounded Scout" or "One Shot More," which exhibit the artist's
highest efforts in characteristic expression and the management of
details; but it presents a vivid idea of a scene we fear only too
frequently enacted along the border, and will speak to aftertimes of
the horrors of civil war. The steady improvement which Mr. Rogers has
shown in his groups, illustrating the episodes of our great struggle,
can be readily seen by an inspection of his collected works, the
earliest of which were scarcely better than clever caricatures; and it
is not surprising to learn that there is a demand for them in Europe,
whither the artist himself proposes going during the present season.
Foreign critics may now obtain a correct notion of the outward aspects
of the participators in the war, if they cannot appreciate its motives
or character. Mr. Rogers is at present engaged upon a group entitled
"The Bushwhacker," which he will finish before his departure.
According to one of the daily newspapers it "represents a wife in the
act of drawing away from her husband--an old, grizzled, and care-worn
fighter--his gun, and at the same time appealing to him to leave his
perilous vocation. The Bushwhacker clasps in his arms his little
child, who is toying with his shaggy beard. If we may judge from the
half-relenting expression of his countenance, we can safely conclude
that the wife will not sue in vain, although he still resistingly
grasps his musket with one hand. The pose and execution of the figures
are carefully attended to, and the work is one of the most spirited
and successful of Mr. Rogers' productions."

Among other American artists who intend to visit Europe the present
season, are Ives, the sculptor, and Haseltine and Dix, painters of
coast and marine scenery. The last named gentleman four years ago
forsook his profession, in which he had begun to attain some skill, to
accept a place on the military staff of his father, Major General Dix,
and now, with renewed ardor, resumes his pencil. He will study
principally along the Mediterranean coasts.

A very miscellaneous collection of pictures, containing a vast deal of
rubbish, and a few good specimens of foreign artists, was disposed of
at auction by Messrs. Leeds & Miner, in the latter part of March, at
tolerably fair prices. The following will serve as examples: "Snow
Scene" by Gignoux, $900 (quite as much as it was worth); "Lady with
Flowers," by Plassan, $750; "A Reverie," by Chavet, $850; "Evening
Prayer," by E. Frère, $1,000; "The Alchemyst," by Webb, $380. A
curious essay of Col. Trumbull in the perilous regions of "high art,"
entitled "The Knighting of De Wilton," fetched the moderate sum of
$150. As an example of the style of composition and treatment affected
by the painters who illustrated Boydell's Shakespeare Gallery, it was
both amusing and instructive. Fortunately for his reputation, the
painter of "Bunker Hill" and the "Sortie from Gibraltar" did not often
recur to Walter Scott for subjects.

Quite recently there has been on exhibition at Goupil's gallery a
remarkable picture by the French artist Jean Léon Gérôme, entitled
_L'Almée_, which {284} may be thus briefly described: Scene, a
dilapidated Egyptian Khan or coffee shop; in the foreground and centre
of the picture a Ghawazee, or dancing girl, performing a striking but
immodest dance, which consists wholly of movements of the body from
the hips, the legs remaining stationary; a group of fierce looking and
fantastically bedizened Bashi-Bazouks, sitting cross-legged on a
divan, spectators of the performance; and in the background some
musicians and an attendant or two. It would be almost impossible to
over-praise the marvellous finish of this work, the skilful blending
of the colors, the subdued yet appropriate tone, or the dramatic force
of the composition. If these qualities were all that are demanded in a
work of art, we might stop here; but when the subject is repulsive,
they prove a source of aggravation rather than of pleasure, and few,
we think, will deny that the scene depicted by Gérôme, though
illustrating a peculiar and perhaps important phase of Oriental life,
is one of too gross a character to subserve the purposes of true art.
A vast deal of sentiment has been wasted upon the "moral significance"
of pictures of this type. The less said upon that score, the better.
We do not instruct children to abstain from vice by putting immoral
books into their hands, trusting that some innate sense of propriety
may prompt them thereby to see virtue in a clearer light. If disposed
to criticise the technical part of this work, we should say that the
finish is too elaborate. Everything, to the smallest minutiae, is
polished almost to the degree of hardness, and one instinctively longs
for an occasional roughness or evidence of the brush--something of
that manual movement which indicates the passing thought of the
painter. Where all is of so regular and level a merit, the contrasts
which should give strength and spirit to a painting are sure to be
wanting. In this respect Gérôme compares unfavorably with Meissonier.
Both finish with scrupulous exactness; but the latter never makes
finish paramount to the proper expression of his subject. Hence the
life and action, so to speak, of his most nicely elaborated figures.
In the _Almée_, on the other hand, the group of soldiers, though
wearing an admirable expression of stoical sensuality, are too rigid
and immovable, too much like well painted copies of the lay figures
which served as models for them. So, too, of many of the details,
excepting always the draperies, which could not be improved. A little
more attention to the _ars celare artem_ would render Gérôme almost
unapproachable in his peculiar style.

Before leaving Goupil's, we cannot avoid drawing attention to some
studies of trees and foliage, by Richards, of Philadelphia, now
exhibited there. One of them, representing the interior of a wood in
early autumn, is the best delineation of that phase of nature we have
recently seen. Generally, the pictures of this artist are wanting in
relief; his foliage lies flat upon the canvas; the trunks of his trees
have no rounded outline, nor can the eye penetrate through the
recesses of the wood; there is, in fact, no atmosphere to speak of.
These defects have been happily overcome in the present instance, and,
with no lack of Pre-Raphaelite power in delineating the outward aspect
of nature, there is a pervading tone of melancholy appropriate to the
scene and the season. Less remarkable than this, but of considerable
merit, is a mountain landscape, in which the season depicted is also
the autumn.



_Foreign_.--Abroad there seems to be a perfect fever to buy and sell
works of art. "Everybody," says the London Athenaeum, "who has a
collection, seems determined to dispose of it, and accident has thrown
a large number of works on the art-market; but as those who have taste
and means seem just as eager to buy as the collectors are to sell, the
activity of the art-marts is but a natural consequence of the law of
supply and demand, the natural limit having been extended in several
instances by the accidental re-appearance of many works twice or three
times during the season." This has been the case especially with
respect to the pictures of Delacroix. It is always dangerous to assume
the prophetic character; but it appears very improbable that, on the
average, works of art will fetch higher sums than they have during the
present season.'' In Paris the Pourtalès sale continues, and is daily
crowded by eager _virtuosi_, whose competition runs up prices to an
extent bordering on the extravagant. The proceeds of the third portion
of the sale, which occupied three days, and included the engraved
{285} gems, antique jewelry and glass, were 45,743 francs; those of
the fourth section, the coins and medals, 18,430 francs; and of the
fifth, which comprised the sculpture in ivory and wood, the
renaissance bronzes, arms, _faiences_, glass, and some miscellaneous
articles, 505,640 francs. The following are some of the prices
obtained for the sculptures in ivory, of which there was a magnificent
collection of 70 pieces: A statuette of Hercules resting on his club,
one foot on the head of the Hydra, purchased for England,
$3,280.--Venus with Cupid at her side, left by Fiamingo as security in
the house at Leghorn wherein he died, $1,180.--A renaissance bronze
bust of Charles IX., of France, life size, artist unknown, formerly
the property of the Duc de Berri, brought $9,000.--"Henry II. ware,"
the well-known _biberon_, with cover bearing the arms of France,
surmounted by a coronet, and bearing the arms and initials of _Diane
de Poitiers_, uninjured, just over ten inches in height, $5,500.--The
celebrated Marie Stuart cup, presented to her when affianced to the
Dauphin, was disposed of for $5,420. It is but a few inches in height,
but is covered, inside and out, with designs illustrating classical
mythology and allegory, and with profuse ornamentation, all in
exquisite taste and of perfect workmanship. It was executed by Jean
Court _dit_ Vigier, about 1556.--A round basin, in grisaille, by
Pierre Raymond (1558), representing the history of Adam and Eve, in
enamel on a black ground, brought $4,040; a large oval salver, by Jean
Courtois, enamelled in the richest manner, representing the passage of
the Red Sea, with borders decorated with figures, medallions, etc.,
$6,000. These prices, it may be observed, were considered by competent
judges to be rather low! The vases and goblets of rock crystal were
also well contested. A magnificent head, of Apollo, in marble,
formerly in the Justiniani gallery, was bought, it is said, for the
British Museum, for $9,000; and the celebrated Pallas vase, the most
perfect specimen of Greek work in porphyry extant, fetched $3,400.

The new chapel of the Palais de l'Elysée has just been completed, and
is said to be a perfect gem of artistic decoration. The style is
Byzantine, the mosaic work of the altar being executed in marbles of
the rarest kinds; but the pillars and vaulted roof are in stucco,
imitating porphyry, vert antique, and gold, in such perfection that it
is difficult to believe that the mines of Sweden and Russia had not
been ransacked to produce the rich coloring and massive effect which
strikes the eye of the visitor. The twelve patron saints of France are
represented--including Charlemagne and St. Louis.

The Aguado pictures were announced for sale, in Paris, on the 10th of
April. They include the famous "Death of Sainte Claire," by Murillo,
brought from the convent of Saint François d'Asrise in Seville, by
Mathieu Fabirer, Commissary-General of Napoleon's army--a very large
canvas, including no less than twenty-eight figures.

The collection of ancient and modern pictures and water-color drawings
formed by Mr. Thomas Blackburn, of Liverpool, was recently disposed of
at auction in London for £8,763. Some of the water-color drawings by
Copley Fielding, Louis Haghe, John Gilbert, Prout, Birket Foster, and
others, realized very large sums.

Theed's colossal statue of the Prince Consort, which has been cast in
bronze at Nuremberg, has recently arrived in London. The model of this
figure was originally executed by command of her majesty, and sent as
a present to Coburg, where it at present remains, a bronze cast having
been taken from it. The town of Sydney being desirous of erecting a
statue of the prince, this second cast was executed by command of the
Duke of Newcastle, on the ground that of all the numerous likenesses
now extant this was the best. The figure is ten feet high, and
represents the prince in a commanding attitude, dressed in the robes
of the garter.

The alterations in progress in the Wolsey Chapel, at Windsor Castle,
have brought to light three full-length portraits of knights of the
garter, attired in the military costume of the order, capped with
helmets, and wearing cloaks with the insignia. These were hidden by
stone slabs, and as there are upwards of twenty similar slabs, it is
probable that other similar paintings may be discovered.

Mr. G. T. Doo's large line-engraving from Sebastiano del Piombo's
"Resurrection of Lazarus," in the National Gallery, by far the most
important of its kind produced for many years past, is {286} now
finished. The figure of Christ is 13 inches high, that of Lazarus is
still larger, and, being naked, invoked the utmost care and knowledge
of the engraver to deal with its superbly drawn forms and perfect
surface. The execution, if not the whole design, of this figure has
been, on good grounds, attributed to Michael Angelo. Mr. Doo has
rendered these with great success, even to giving the somewhat hard
and positive tone of the original; and with one or two exceptions, the
drawing is described as admirable throughout. In view of the few
really good line-engravings now produced, and of the prospect of the
art perhaps becoming extinct within the present century, the
production of such a work possesses a genuine though somewhat
melancholy interest.



Kaulbach, it is said, will finish his paintings in the Berlin Museum
this spring. The price he has received for them is given at $187,000,
with an addition of $18,700 for the cost of materials. One of the
smaller pictures for the series represents Germany absorbed in reading
Humboldt's "Cosmos," and letting the imperial crown fall off her head
in the abstraction caused by her studies. Underneath, the various
small states that compose the confederation are poking out their heads
as far as possible to escape from under a hat which is coming down
upon them--an illusion to the popular phrase of uniting the whole of
Germany "under one hat."



The Pontifical Academy of Roman Archaeology has decreed that the
collossal statue of Hercules in gilt bronze, recently discovered among
the ruins of Pompey's theatre, and sent to the Vatican, shall bear the
name of "The Hercules Mastai," in honor of Pius IX.

------

NEW PUBLICATIONS.


THE BOYNE WATER: A TALE. By John Banim. Post 8vo., pp. 578, Boston:
Patrick Donahoe. [For sale in New York by P. O'Shea, Bleecker street].
This story is reprinted from _The Boston Pilot_, of whose columns it has
formed for some months past a principal attraction. It is one of the
earliest of Banim's works, and the favorable judgment which it
received on its first appearance has now a success of forty years to
confirm it. It is a novel of the historical school which Scott made so
popular in the last generation, the incidents upon which it is founded
belonging to the revolution of 1688, which established William of
Orange on the throne of Great Britain. It gives a graphic picture of
the siege and capitulation of Limerick, and brings upon the scene
James and William, Sarsfield, Tyrconnel, Ginkell, and other familiar
characters of that stirring epoch. Banim delights, also, in
descriptions of natural scenery. In these he is spirited, and, we
believe, accurate. He spared no pains to make himself thoroughly
familiar with the localities of which he wrote. While he was engaged
upon his novels he used to journey, in company with his brother,
through the theatre of action, and study each historical spot with the
care of an antiquary. The perfect acquaintance thus obtained with the
places of which he wrote had, of course, no little effect upon the
vivacity of his narrative.

His pictures of Irish life are vivid and truthful, though he is
happier in narrative or description than in dialogue. His heroes and
heroines are too much addicted to stilted conversation and to
sentimental remarks, which look very well in print, but are never
heard in ordinary life. The minor characters, especially those of the
peasant class, such as Rory na Choppell, the "whisperer," or
horse-tamer, have the gift of speech in a much more natural and
agreeable manner. The subordinate parts of the book, in fact, are its
best parts. The Gaelic chieftain, reduced to poverty by the English
conquerors, but retaining all his pride of spirit and {287} authority
over his people, in a sequestered hut among the mountains; the blind
harper; the old priest; the mad woman of the cavern; the fanatical
soldier of Cromwell; and the lawless Rapparees, are depicted with
great skill. The heroes of the story--for there are two--are the one a
Catholic, the other a Protestant. They fight on opposite sides, and in
the delineation of their characters, and the division of fine
sentiments between them, Banim holds an even hand. He wrote for an
English public, and fearful of offending by too warm an avowal of his
religious convictions, he seems to us to have gone occasionally to the
opposite extreme, and penned several passages which Catholics cannot
read without displeasure. But, despite these faults, which are neither
very many nor very serious, "The Boyne Water" ranks among the best of
Irish novels, and Banim as a worthy companion of Carleton and Gerald
Griffin.


SERMONS ON MORAL SUBJECTS. By his Eminence Cardinal Wiseman. 8vo.,
pp.434. New York: D. & J. Sadlier & Co.

The discourses contained in this volume form an appropriate supplement
to the "Sermons on our Lord and on His Blessed Mother" which we
noticed last month. They were delivered under the same circumstances
as the previous collection--that is, for the most part, at the English
College in Rome--and ought not, therefore, to be considered as a
regular course. But if they do not pretend to be a complete series of
moral instructions, they will, nevertheless, be found to touch upon
nearly all the fashionable sins, and to afford ample food for
reflection to all classes of persons. They have the same
characteristics of thought and expression which mark the cardinal's
other writings--the same kind tone of remonstrance with sinners and
encouragement for the penitent, the same earnest love of God and man,
and the same, rich, sometimes exuberant, diction. Cardinal Wiseman
ranged through a great variety of subjects, and touched nothing that
he did not adorn, but his style never varied much; from one of his
books you can easily judge of all. There is little difference between
the style of the "Sermons on Moral Subjects" and that, for instance,
of "Fabiola," or the "Lectures on Science and Revealed Religion." It
is an ornate mode of writing which accommodates itself to a diversity
of subjects, and never, in the cardinal's pages, seems out of place.

The sermons now before us are eminently practical; and, although a
large proportion of them are addressed directly to irreligious
persons, and treat of such subjects as "The Love of the World,"
"Scandal," "Detraction," "Unworthy Communion," "Unprepared Death," and
the "Hatefulness of Sin," they display, in a very marked manner, that
affectionateness to which we have elsewhere alluded as a
characteristic of the cardinal's discourses. He seems to love rather
to expostulate than to upbraid; rather to remind us of the happiness
we have lost by sin than to threaten us with the punishment of
impenitence; and even when his subject calls for stern language, the
kindly spirit continually breaks out.

The last sermon in the volume is entitled "Conclusion of a Course." It
contains the following passage, explanatory of the purpose of the
whole collection:

"These instructions, my dear brethren, have obviously one tendency;
they are all directed to expound what the law of God commands us to
believe and to practice, in order to reach those rewards which he has
prepared for his faithful servants. They are directed to suggest such
motives as may induce us to fulfil these commands; to encourage those
who are already on the path to persevere in it; to bring back those
who have wandered; to impart strength to the weak and resolution to
the wavering and undecided."



AT ANCHOR; A STORY OF OUR CIVIL WAR. By an American. 12mo., pp. 311.
New York: D. Appleton & Company.

The writer of this novel is evidently a Catholic, but the story is
political, not religious. It purports to be the autobiography of a
loyal Massachusetts woman. She marries a Carolinian whom she does not
love, and accompanies him to his plantation-home. At the breaking out
of the war, the husband accepts a commission in the Confederate
service. He is reported killed, and the wife, having learned during
his absence to love him, devotes herself to the sick and wounded in
Richmond. After a time she makes her way back to Massachusetts, and
there, at the end of the book, the missing lord turns up; not only
safe and sound, but converted from the political errors of his ways,
and eager to fight under the Federal {288} flag. He enlists as a
private, and has risen to be sergeant when a wound disables him for
further service, and husband and wife are at last united and happy in
each other. This plot, if it is a plot, is interwoven--we cannot say
complicated--with several interesting incidents. The heroine has
another lover, toward whom she leans a willing ear,  both in maiden
life and during her supposed widowhood; and he, on his part, has
another mistress, who turns out to be our heroine's half-sister. Of
course he marries this lady; and so both couples, after much tossing
about, are peacefully "at anchor."

This is something far better than the common sort of sensational
war-stories. It contains neither a guerrilla nor a spy; narrates no
thrilling deed of blood or hair's-breadth escape; describes no battle;
and admits that both parties embrace many noble and honorable men. The
writer (it needs little penetration to see that she is a woman)
expresses herself fearlessly, but without undue bitterness, on
political matters, and scatters over her pages many excellent
reflections.


THE MYSTICAL ROSE; OR, MARY OF NAZARETH, THE LILY OF THE HOUSE OF
DAVID. By Marie Josephine. 12mo., pp. viii., 290. New York: D.
Appleton & Company.

The authoress of this work is a Vermont lady of some literary
experience. Her book gives ample evidence of a cultivated and
well-stored mind. It is an attempt to present, in irregular verse, a
legendary narrative of the life of the Blessed Virgin; and if the
poetry is not all of the first order, it is at least devotional, or
perhaps we should, say consistent with devotional ideas--for the
writer deals more with the poetical than the religious aspect of her
subject. She has drawn the rough materials for her poem from a great
variety of sources, to which she gives reference in copious notes. She
claims to have "appropriated every coveted relic or tradition handed
down by historian, Christian or pagan, from the archives of Latin
Church, Hebrew, or Greek, coming within scope of her original plan."
She has certainly succeeded in bringing together a great number of
beautiful legends, which she handles in the most affectionate manner.


THE CORRELATION AND CONSERVATION OF FORCES: A series of Expositions,
by Prof. Grove, Prof. Helmholtz, Dr. Mayer, Dr. Faraday, Prof. Liebig,
and Dr. Carpenter. With an Introduction and brief Biographical Notices
of the Chief Promoters of the New Views. By Edward L. Youmans, M. D.
12mo., pp. xlii., 438. New York: D. Appleton & Company.

This excellent work reached us too late for an extended notice in the
present number. We shall speak of it at greater length next month. In
the meantime we warmly recommend our readers to buy it.



We have received the April number of _The New Path: a Monthly Art
Journal_, the publication of which, after an interval of several
months, is resumed under the auspices of James Miller, 522 Broadway.
This little periodical represents radical and peculiar views or art,
Being allied in opinions to the Pre-Raphaelite school; but its
independent and out-spoken, and often valuable, criticisms must have
struck the limited circle of readers to whom it formerly appealed. We
hope under its new management it will exercise a healthful influence
on American art. The present number contains articles on Miss Hosmer's
Statue of Zenobia, "Our Furniture," notices of recent exhibitions,
etc., etc.


Murphy & Co., Baltimore, send us _The Mysteries of the Living Rosary_,
printed in sheets, and accompanied by appropriate instructions,
prayers, and meditations.


----------------
{289}


THE CATHOLIC WORLD,


VOL. I., NO. 3. JUNE, 1865.


THE WORKINGS OF THE HOLY SPIRIT IN THE CHURCH OF ENGLAND.


A LETTER TO THE REV. E. B. PUSEY, D.D. BY HENRY EDWARD MANNING, D.D.


MY DEAR FRIEND,--I do not know why twelve years of silence should
forbid my calling you still by the name we used both to give and to
accept of old. Aristotle says indeed--

[Greek text]

but he did not know the basis and the affections of a Christian
friendship such as that to which--though I acknowledge in myself no
claim to it--you were so kind as to admit me. Silence and suspension
of communications cannot prevail against the kindliness and confidence
which springs from such years and such events as once united us.
Contentions and variances might indeed more seriously try and strain
such a friendship. But, though we have been both parted and opposed,
there has been between us neither variance nor contention. We have
both been in the field indeed where a warfare has been waging, but,
happily, we have not met in contest. Sometimes we have been very near
to each other, and have even felt the opposition of each other's will
and hand; but I believe on neither side has there ever been a word or
an act which has left a needless wound. That I should have grieved and
displeased you is inevitable. The simple fact of my submitting to the
Catholic Church must have done so, much more the duties which bind me
as a pastor. If, in the discharge of that office, I have given you or
any one either pain or wound by personal faults in the manner of its
discharge, I should be open to just censure. If the displeasure arise
only from the substance of my duties, "necessity is laid upon me," and
you would be the last to blame me.

You will perhaps be surprised at my beginning thus to write to you. I
will at once tell you why I do so. Yesterday I saw, for the first
time, your pamphlet on the legal force of the Judgment of the Privy
Council, and I found my name often in its pages. I have nothing to
complain of in the way you use it. And I trust that in this reply you
will feel that I have not forgotten your example. But your mention of
me, and of old days, kindled in me a strong desire to pour out many
things which have been for years rising in my mind. I have long wished
for the occasion to do so, but I {290} have always felt that it is
more fitting to take than to make such an occasion: and as your
kindness has made it, I will take it.

But before I enter upon the subject of this letter I wish to say a few
words of yourself, and of some others whom I am wont to class with
you.

Among the many challenges to controversy and public disputation which
it has been my fortune to receive, and, I may add, my happiness to
refuse, in the last twelve or thirteen years, one was sent me last
autumn at Bath. It was the only one to which, for a moment, I was
tempted to write a reply. The challenger paid me compliments on my
honesty in leaving the Church of England, denouncing those who,
holding my principles, still eat its bread. I was almost induced to
write a few words to say that my old friends and I are parted because
we hold principles which are irreconcileable; that I once held what
they hold now, and was then united with them; that they have never
held what I hold now, and therefore we are separated; that they are as
honest in the Church of England now as I was once; and that our
separation was my own act in abandoning as untenable the Anglican
Church and its rule of faith, Scripture and antiquity, which you and
they hold still, and in submitting to the voice of the Catholic and
Roman Church at this hour, which I believe to be the sole
authoritative interpreter of Scripture and of antiquity. This
principle no friend known to me in the Church of England has ever
accepted. In all these years, both in England and in foreign
countries, and on occasions both private and public, and with persons
of every condition, I have borne this witness for you and for others.

I felt no little indignation at what seemed to me the insincerity of
my correspondent, but on reflection I felt that silence was the best
answer.

I will now turn to your pamphlet, and to the subject of this letter.

You speak at the outset of "the jubilee of triumph among
half-believers" on the occasion of the late Judgment of the Crown in
Council; and you add, "A class of believers joined in the triumph. And
while I know that a very earnest body of Roman Catholics rejoice in
all the workings of God the Holy Ghost in the Church of England
(whatever they think of her), and are saddened in what weakens her who
is, in God's hands, the great bulwark against infidelity in this land,
others seemed to be in an ecstasy of triumph at this victory of
Satan."  [Footnote 55] Now, I will not ask where you intended to class
me. But as an anonymous critic of a pamphlet lately published by me
accused me of rejoicing in your troubles, and another more
recently--with a want of candor visible in every line of the attack--
accused me of being "merry" over these miseries of the Church of
England, I think the time is made for me to declare how I regard the
Church of England, and events like these; and I know no one to whom I
would rather address what I Have to say than to yourself.

  [Footnote 55: "Legal Force of the Judgment of the Privy Council," by
  the Rev. E. B. Pusey, D.D., pp. 3, 4.]

I will, then, say at once:

1. That I rejoice with all my heart in all the workings of the Holy
Ghost in the Church of England.

2. That I lament whensoever what remains of truth in it gives way
before unbelief.

3. That I rejoice whensoever what is imperfect in it is unfolded into
a more perfect truth.

4. But that I cannot regard the Church of England as "the great
bulwark against infidelity in this land," for reasons which I will
give in their place.

1. First, then, I will say what I believe of the Church of England,
and why I rejoice in every working of the Holy Spirit in it. And I do
this the more gladly because I have been sometimes grieved at hearing,
and once at even seeing in a handwriting which I reverence with
affection, the {291} statement that Catholics--or at least the worst
of Catholics called converts--deny the validity of Anglican baptism,
regard our own past spiritual life as a mockery, look upon our
departed parents as heathen, and deny the operations of the Holy
Spirit in those who are out of the Church. I do not believe that those
who say such things have ever read the Condemned Propositions, or are
aware that a Catholic who so spoke would come under the weight of at
least two pontifical censures, and the decrees of at least two general
councils.

I need not, however, do more than remind you that, according to the
faith and theology of the Catholic Church, the operations of the Holy
Spirit of God have been from the beginning of the world co-extensive
with the whole human race.  [Footnote 56]

  [Footnote 56: Suarez, _De Divina Gratia_. Pars Secunda, lib. iv., c.
  viii. xi. xii. Ripalda, _De Ente Supenaturali_, lib. i., disp. xx.,
  s. xii. and s. xxii. Viva, _Cursus Theol_., pars iii., disp. i.,
  quaest. v. iii.]

Believing, then, in the operations of the Holy Spirit, even among the
nations of the world who have neither the revelation of the faith nor
the sacraments, how much more must we believe his presence and grace
in those who are regenerate by water and the Holy Ghost? It would be
impertinent for me to say to you--whose name first became celebrated
for a tract on baptism, which, notwithstanding certain imperfections
inseparable from a work written when and where you wrote it, is in
substance deep, true, and elevating--that baptism, if rightly
administered with the due form and matter, is always 'valid by
whatsoever hand it may be given.  [Footnote 57]

  [Footnote 57: _Concil. Florent. Decretum Eugenii IV. Mansi Concil._,
  tom, xviii. 547. "In casu autem necessitatis non solum sacerdos vel
  diaconus sed etiam laicus vel mulier, immo etiam paganus et
  haereticus baptizare potest, dummodo formam servet Ecclesiae, et
  facere intendat quod facit Ecclesia." The Council of Trent repeats
  this under anathema, Sess. vii., can. iv.: "Si quis dixerit
  Baptismum qui etiam datur ab haereticis in Nomine Patris, et Filii,
  et Spiritus Sancti, cum intentione esse verum Baptismum, anathema
  sit." See also Bellarm. _Controversial, De Baptismo_, lib. i., c.]

Let me, then, say at once

1. That in denying the Church of England to be the Catholic Church, or
any part of it, or in any divine and true sense a church at all, and
in denying the validity of its absolutions and its orders, no Catholic
ever denies the workings of the Spirit of God or the operations of
grace in it.

2. That in affirming the workings of grace in the Church of England,
no Catholic ever thereby affirms that it possesses the character of a
church.

They who most inflexibly deny to it the character of a church affirm
most explicitly the presence and the operations of grace among its
people, and that for the following reasons:

In the judgment of the Catholic Church, a baptized people is no longer
in the state of nature, but is admitted to a state of supernatural
grace. And though I believe the number of those who have never been
baptized to be very great in England, and to be increasing every year,
nevertheless I believe the English people, as a mass, to be a Baptized
people. I say the number of the unbaptized is great, because there are
many causes which contribute to produce this result. First, the
imperfect, and therefore invalid, administration of baptism through
the carelessness of the administrators. You, perhaps, think that this
is exaggerated, through an erroneous belief of Catholics as to the
extent of such carelessness among the Protestant ministers, both in
and out of the Church of England. It is, however, undeniable, as I
know from the evidence of eye-witnesses, that such carelessness has,
in times past, been great and frequent. This I consider the least, but
a sufficient, reason for believing that many have never been baptized.
Add to this, negligence caused by the formal disbelief of baptismal
regeneration in a large number of Protestant ministers. There are,
however, two other reasons far more direct. The one is the studied
rejection, as a point of religious profession, of the practice of
infant baptism. Many therefore grow up without baptism who in adult
life, for various causes, never seek it. {292} The other, the sinful
unbelief and neglect of parents in every class of the English people,
who often leave whole families of children to grow up without baptism.
Of the fact that many have never been baptized, I, or any Catholic
priest actively employed in England, can bear witness. There are few
among us who have not had to baptize grown people of every condition,
poor and rich; and, of children, often whole families together. There
has indeed been, in the last thirty years, a revival of care in the
administration of baptism on the part of the Anglican ministers, and
of attention on the part of parents in bringing their children to be
baptized; but this reaction is by no means proportionate to the
neglect, which on the other side has been extending. My fear is that,
after all, the number of persons unbaptized in England is greater at
this moment than at any previous time.

Still the English people as a body are baptized, and therefore
elevated to the order of supernatural grace. Every infant, and also
every adult baptized, having the necessary dispositions, is thereby
placed in a state of justification; and, if they die without
committing any mortal sin, would certainly be saved. They are also, in
the sight of the Church, Catholics. St. Augustine says, "Ecclesia
etiam inter eos qui foris sunt per baptismum generat suos." A mortal
sin of any kind, including _prava voluntatis electio_, the perverse
election of the will, by which in riper years such persons chose for
themselves, notwithstanding sufficient light, heresy instead of the
true faith, and schism instead of the unity of the Church, would
indeed deprive them of their state of grace. But before such act of
self-privation all such people are regarded by the Catholic Church as
in the way of eternal life. With perfect confidence of faith, we
extend the shelter of this truth over the millions of infants and
young children who every year pass to their Heavenly Father. We extend
it also in hope to many more who grow up in their baptismal grace.
Catholic missionaries in this country have often assured me of a fact,
attested also by my own experience, that they have received into the
Church persons grown to adult life, in whom their baptismal grace was
still preserved. Now how can we then be supposed to regard such
persons as no better than heathens? To ascribe the good lives of such
persons to the power of nature would be Pelagianism. To deny their
goodness, would be Jansenism. And, with such a consciousness, how
could any one regard his past spiritual life in the Church of England
as a mockery? I have no deeper conviction than that the grace of the
Holy Spirit was with me from my earliest consciousness. Though at the
time, perhaps, I knew it not as I know it now, yet I can clearly
perceive the order and chain of grace by which God mercifully led me
onward from childhood to the age of twenty years. From that time the
interior workings of his light and grace, which continued through all
my life, till the hour in which that light and grace had its perfect
work, to which all its operations had been converging, in submission
to the fulness of truth of the Spirit of the Church of God, is a
reality as profoundly certain, intimate, and sensible to me now as
that I live. Never have I by the lightest word breathed a doubt of
this fact in the divine order of grace. Never have I allowed any one
who has come to me for guidance or instruction to harbor a doubt of
the past workings of grace in them. It would be not only a sin of
ingratitude, but a sin against truth. The working of the Holy Spirit
in individual souls is, as I have said, as old as the fall of man, and
as wide as the human race. It is not we who ever breathe or harbor a
doubt of this. It is rather they who accuse us of it. Because, to
believe such an error possible in others shows how little
consciousness there must be of the true doctrine of grace in
themselves. And such, I am forced {293} to add, is my belief, because
I know by experience how inadequately I understood the doctrine of
grace until I learned it of the Catholic Church. And I trace the same
inadequate conception of the workings of grace in almost every
Anglican writer I know, not excepting even those who are nearest to
the truth.

But, further, our theologians teach, not only that the state of
baptismal innocence exists, and may be preserved out of the Church,
but that they who in good faith are out of it, if they shall
correspond with the grace they have already received, will receive an
increase or augmentation of grace.  [Footnote 58] I do not for a
moment doubt that there are to be found among the English people
individuals who practise in a high degree the four cardinal virtues,
and in no small degree, though with the limits and blemishes
inseparable from their state, the three theological virtues of faith,
[Footnote 59] hope, and charity, infused into them in their baptism. I
do not think, my dear friend, in all that I have said or written in
the last fourteen years, that you can find a word implying so much as
a doubt of the workings of the Holy Spirit among all the baptized who
are separated from the Catholic Church.

  [Footnote 58: Suarez, _De Div. Gratia_, lib. iv., c. xi. Ripalda,
  _De Ente Supernaturali_, lib. i., disp. xx., sect. xii. _et seq. S.
  Alphonsi Theol. Moral._, lib. i., tract, 1. 5, 6. ]

  [Footnote 59: De Lugo, _De Virtute divinae Fidei_, disp. xvii.,
  sect. iv, v. Viva, _Cursus Theol._, p. iv., disp. iv., quaest. iii.  7.]

I will go further still. The doctrine, "_Extra ecclesiam nulla salus_"
is to be interpreted both by dogmatic and by moral theology. As a
dogma, theologians teach that many belong to the Church who are out of
its visible unity;  [Footnote 60] as a moral truth, that to be out of
the Church is no personal sin, except to those who sin in being out of
it. That is, they will be lost, not because they are _geographically_
out of it, but because they are _culpably_ out of it. And they who are
culpably out of it are those who know--or might, and therefore ought
to, know--that it is their duty to submit to it. The Church teaches
that men may be _inculpably_ out of its pale. Now they are inculpably
out of it who are and have always been either physically or morally
unable to see their obligation to submit to it. And they only are
culpably out of it who are both physically and morally able to know
that it is God's will they should submit to the Church; and either
knowing it will not obey that knowledge, or, not knowing it, are
culpable for that ignorance. I will say then at once, that we apply
this benign law of our Divine Master as far as possible to the English
people. First, it is applicable in the letter to the whole multitude
of those baptized persons who are under the age of reason. Secondly,
to all who are in good faith, of whatsoever age they be: such as a
great many of the poor and unlettered, to whom it is often physically,
and very often morally, impossible to judge which is the true
revelation or Church of God. I say physically, because in these three
hundred years the Catholic Church has been so swept off the face of
England that nine or ten generations of men have lived and died
without the faith being so much as proposed to them, or the Church
ever visible to them; and I say morally, because the great majority of
the poor, from lifelong prejudice, are often incapable of judging in a
question so far removed from the primary truths of conscience and
Christianity. Of such simple persons it may be said that, _infantibus
aequiparantur_, they are to be classed morally with infants. Again, to
these may be added the unlearned in all classes, among whom many have
no contact with the Catholic Church, or with Catholic books. Under
this head will come a great number of wives and daughters, whose
freedom of religious inquiry and religious thought is unjustly {294}
limited or suspended by the authority of parents and husbands. Add,
lastly, the large class who have been studiously brought up, with all
the dominant authority of the English tradition of three hundred
years, to believe sincerely, and without a doubt, that the Catholic
Church is corrupt, has changed the doctrines of the faith, and that
the author of the Reformation is the Spirit of holiness and truth. It
may seem incredible to some that such an illusion exists. But it is
credible to me, because for nearly forty years of my life I was fully
possessed by this erroneous belief. To all such persons it is morally
difficult in no small degree to discover the falsehood of this
illusion. All the better parts of their nature are engaged in its
support: dutifulness, self-mistrust, submission, respect for others
older, better, more learned than themselves, all combine to form a
false conscience of the duty to refuse to hear anything against "the
religion of their fathers," "the church of their baptism," or to read
anything which could unsettle them. Such people are told that it is
their duty to extinguish a doubt against the Church of England, as
they would extinguish a temptation against their virtue. A conscience
so subdued and held in subjection exercises true virtues upon a false
object, and renders to a human authority the submissive trust which is
due only to the divine voice of the Church of God.

  [Footnote 60: See Perrone _Praelect. Theolog_., pars i., c. ii. 1, 2:

    "Omnes et soli justi pertinent ad Ecclesiae animam."

    "Ad Christi Ecclesiae corpus spectant fideles omnes tam justi quam
    peccatores."

    St. Augustine expresses these two propositions in six words,
    "Multae oves foris, multi lupi intus." St. Aug., tom, iii., p. ii.
    600.]

One last point I will add. I believe that the people of England were
not all guilty of the first acts of heresy and schism by which they
were separated from the Catholic unity and faith. They were robbed of
it. In many places they rose in arms for it. The children, the poor,
the unlearned at that time, were certainly innocent: much more the
next generation. They were born into a state of privation. They knew
no better. No choice was before them. They made no perverse act of the
will in remaining where they were born. Every successive generation
was still less culpable, in proportion as they were born into a
greater privation, and under the dominion of a tradition of error
already grown strong. For three centuries they have been born further
and further out of the truth, and their culpability is perpetually
diminishing; and as they were passively borne onward in the course of
the English separation, the moral responsibility for the past is
proportionately less.

The divine law is peremptory--"to him who knoweth to do good, and
doeth it not, to him it is sin."  [Footnote 61] Every divine truth, as
it shines in upon us, lays its obligation on our conscience to believe
and to obey it. When the divine authority of the Church manifests
itself to our intellect, it lays its jurisdiction upon our conscience
to submit to it. To refuse is an act of infidelity, and the least act
of infidelity in its measure expels faith; one mortal act of it will
expel the habit of faith altogether.   [Footnote 62] Every such act of
infidelity grieves the Holy Ghost by a direct opposition to his divine
voice speaking through the Church; the habit of such opposition is one
of the six sins against the Holy Ghost defined as "impugning the known
truth." All that I have said above in no way modifies the absolute and
vital necessity of submitting to the Catholic Church as the only way
of salvation to those who know it, by the revelation of God, to be
such. But I must not attempt now to treat of this point.

  [Footnote 61: St. James iv. 17. ]

  [Footnote 62: De Lugo, _De Virtute Fidel Divinae_, disp. xvii.,
  sect. iv. 53 _et seq_. ]

Nevertheless for the reasons above given we make the largest allowance
for all who are in invincible ignorance; always supposing that there
is a preparation of heart to embrace the truth when they see it, at
any cost, a desire to know it, and a faithful use of the means of
knowing it, such as study, docility, prayer, and the like. But I do
not now enter into the case of the educated or the learned, or of
those who have liberty of mind and means of inquiry. I cannot class
them under {295} the above enumeration of those who are inculpably out
of the truth. I leave them, therefore, to the only Judge of all men.

Lastly, I will not here attempt to estimate how far all I have said is
being modified by the liberation and expansion of the Catholic Church
in England during the last thirty years. It is certain that the
restoration of the Catholic hierarchy, with the universal tumult which
published it to the whole world, still more by its steady,
wide-spread, and penetrating action throughout England, is taking away
every year the plea of invincible ignorance.

It is certain, however, that to those who, being in invincible
ignorance, faithfully co-operate with the grace they have received, an
augmentation of grace is given; and this at once places the English
people, so far as they come within the limits of these conditions, in
a state of supernatural grace, even though they be out of the visible
unity of the Church. I do not now enter into the question of the state
of those who fall from baptismal grace by mortal sin, or of the great
difficulty and uncertainty of their restoration. This would lead me
too far; and it lies beyond the limits of this letter.

It must not, however, be forgotten, for a moment, that this applies to
the whole English people, of all forms of Christianity, or, as it is
called, of all denominations. What I have said does not recognize the
grace _of_ the Church of England as such. The working of grace _in_ the
Church of England is a truth we joyfully hold and always teach. But we
as joyfully recognize the working of the Holy Spirit among Dissenters
of every kind. Indeed, I must say that I am far more able to assure
myself of the invincible ignorance of Dissenters as a mass than of
Anglicans as a mass. They are far more deprived of what survived of
Catholic truth; far more distant from the idea of a Church; far more
traditionally opposed to it by the prejudice of education; I must add,
for the most part, far more simple in their belief in the person and
passion of our Divine Lord. Their piety is more like the personal
service of disciples to a personal Master than the Anglican piety,
which has always been more dim and distant from this central light of
souls. Witness Jeremy Taylor's works, much as I have loved them,
compared with Baxter's, or even those of Andrews compared with
Leighton's, who was formed by the Kirk of Scotland.

I do not here forget all you have done to provide ascetical and
devotional books for the use of the Church of England, both by your
own writings, and, may I not say it, from your neighbor's vineyard?

With truth, then, I can say that I rejoice in all the operations of
the Holy Spirit out of the Catholic Church, whether in the Anglican or
other Protestant bodies; not that those communions are thereby
invested with any supernatural character, but because more souls, I
trust, are saved. If I have a greater joy over these workings of grace
in the Church of England, it is only because more that are dear to me
are in it, for whom every day I never fail to pray. These graces to
individuals were given before the Church was founded, and are given
still out of its unity. They are no more tokens of an ecclesiastical
character, or a sacramental power in the Church of England, than in
the Kirk of Scotland, or in the Wesleyan connexion; they prove only
the manifold grace of God, which, after all the sins of men, and in
the midst of all the ruins he has made, still works in the souls for
whom Christ died. Such, then, is our estimate of the Church of England
in regard to the grace that works not _by_ it, nor _through_ it, but _in_
it and among those who, without faults of their own, are detained by
it from the true Church of their baptism.

And here it is necessary to guard against a possible misuse of what I
have said. Let no one imagine that he may still continue in the Church
of England because God has hitherto mercifully bestowed his grace upon
{296} him. As I have shown, this is no evidence that salvation is to
be had _by_ the Church of England. It is an axiom that _to those who do
all they can God never refuses his grace_. He bestows it that he may
lead them on from grace to grace, and from truth to truth, until they
enter the full and perfect light of faith in his only true fold. The
grace they have received, therefore, was given, not to detain them in
the Church of England, but to call them out of it. The grace of their
past life lays on them the obligation of seeking and submitting to the
perfect truth. God would "have all men to be saved, and to come to the
knowledge of the truth."   [Footnote 63] But his Church is an eminent
doctrine, and member of that truth; and all grace given out of the
Church is given in order to bring men into the Church, wheresoever the
Church is present to them. If they refuse to submit to the Church they
resist the divine intention of the graces they have hitherto received,
and are thereby in grave danger of losing them, as we see too often in
men who once were on the threshold of the Church, and now are in
rationalism, or in states of which I desire to say no more.

  [Footnote 63: 1 Tim. ii. 4.]

2. Let me next speak of the truths which the Church of England still
retains. I have no pleasure in its present trials; and the anonymous
writer who describes me as being "positively merry" over its disasters
little knows me. If I am to speak plainly, he seems to me to be guilty
of one of the greatest offences--a rash accusation against one whom he
evidently does not know. I will further say that I lament with all my
heart whensoever what remains of truth in the Anglican system gives
way before unbelief.

I do not, indeed, regard the Church of England as a teacher of _truth_,
for that would imply that it teaches the truth in all its
circumference, and in all its divine certainty. Now this is precisely
what the Church of England does not, and, as I will show presently,
has destroyed in itself the power of doing. I am willing to call it a
teacher of _truths_, because many fragmentary truths, shattered,
disjointed from the perfect unity of the Christian revelation, still
survive the Reformation, and, with much variation and in the midst of
much contradiction, are still taught in it. I have been wont always to
say, and to say with joy, that the Reformation, which has done its
work with such a terrible completeness in Germany, was arrested in
England; that here much of the Christian belief and Christian order
has survived. Until lately I have been in the habit of saying that
there are three things which missionaries may take for granted in
England: first, the existence of a supernatural world; secondly, the
revelation of Christianity; and thirdly, the inspiration of Scripture.
The Church of England has also preserved other doctrines with more or
less of exactness, such as the doctrine of the Holy Trinity, the
incarnation, baptism, and the like. I will not now enter into the
question as to what other doctrines are retained by it, because a few
more or a few less would make little difference in the final estimate
a Catholic must make of it. A teacher of Christian truths I gladly
admit it to be. A teacher of Christian truth--no, because it rejects
much of that truth, and also the divine principle of its perpetuity in
the world. Nevertheless, I rejoice in every fragment of doctrine which
remains in it; and I should lament the enfeebling or diminution of any
particle of that truth. I have ever regarded with regret the so-called
Low-Church and Latitudinarian schools in the Anglican Church, because
I believe their action and effect is to diminish what remains of truth
in it. I have always regarded with joy, and I have never ceased to
regard with sympathy, notwithstanding much which I cannot either like
or respect, the labors of the High-Church or Anglo-Catholic party,
because I believe that their action and effect are "to strengthen the
things which remain, which were ready {297} to die." For myself, I am
conscious how little I have ever done in my life; but as it is now
drawing toward its end, I have at least this consolation, that I
cannot remember at any time, by word or act, to have undermined a
revealed truth; but that, according to my power, little enough as I
know, I have endeavored to build up what truth I knew, truth upon
truth, if only as one grain of sand upon another, and to bind it
together by the only bond and principle of cohesion which holds in
unity the perfect revelation of God. A very dear friend, whose
friendship has been to me one of the most instructive, and the loss of
which was to me one of the hardest sacrifices I had to make, has often
objected to me, with the subtlety which marks his mind, that my act in
leaving the Church of England has helped forward the unbelief which is
now invading it. No doubt he meant to say that the tendency of such an
act helped to shake the confidence of others in the Church of England
as a teacher of truth. This objection was, like his mind, ingenious
and refined. But a moment's thought unravelled it, and I answered it
much in these words:

  I do not believe that by submitting to the Catholic Church any one
  can weaken the witness of the Church of England for the truth which
  it retains. So far as it holds the truth, it is in conformity to the
  Catholic Church. In submitting to the Catholic Church, I all the
  more strongly give testimony to the same truths which the Church of
  England still retains. If I give testimony against the Church of
  England, it is in those points in which, being at variance with the
  truth, the Church of England is itself undermining the faith of
  Christianity.

It was for this reason I always lamented the legalizing of the
sacramentarian errors of the Low-Church party by the Gorham Judgment;
and that I lament now the legalizing of the heresies of the "Essays
and Reviews," and the spreading unbelief of Dr. Colenso. I believe
that anything which undermines the Christianity of England is drawing
it further and further from us. In proportion as men believe more of
Christianity, they are nearer to the perfect truth. The mission of the
Church in the world is to fill up the truth. Our Divine Lord said, "I
am not come to destroy, but to fulfil;" and St. Paul did not overthrow
the altar of the Unknown God, but gave to it an object of divine
worship and a true adoration. For this cause I regard the present
downward course of the Church of England and the Christianity of
England with great sorrow and fear. And I am all the more alarmed
because of those who are involved in it so many not only refuse to
acknowledge the fact, but treat us who give warning of the danger as
enemies and accusers.

One of my critics has imagined, that I propose to myself and others
the alternative of Catholicism or atheism. I have never attempted to
bring any one to the perfect truth by destroying or by threatening the
imperfect faith they might still possess. I do not believe that the
alternative before us is Catholicism or atheism. There are lights of
the natural order, divine witnesses of himself inscribed by the
Creator on his works, characters engraven upon the conscience, and
testimonies of mankind in all the ages of the world, which prove the
existence and perfections of God, the moral nature and responsibility
of man anterior to Catholicism, and independently of revelation. If a
man, through any intellectual or moral aberration, should reject
Christianity, that is Catholicism, the belief of God and of his
perfections stands immutably upon the foundations of nature.
Catholicism, or deism, is indeed the only ultimately logical and
consistent alternative, though, happily, few men in rejecting
Catholicism are logically consistent enough to reject Christianity.
Atheism is an aberration which implies not only an intellectual
blindness, but a moral insensibility. The theism {298} of the world
has its foundation on the face of the natural world, and on the
intellect and the heart of the human race. The old paganism and modern
pantheism are reverent, filial, and elevating compared with the
atheism of Comte and of our modern secularists. It would be both
intellectually and morally impossible to propose to any one the
alternative of Catholicism or atheism. Not only then do I lament to
see any truth in the Church of England give way before unbelief, but I
should regard with sorrow and impatience any attempt to promote the
belief of the whole revelation of Christianity by a mode of logic
which undermines even the truths of the natural order. The Holy See
has authoritatively declared that the existence of God may be proved
by reason and the light of nature,  [Footnote 64] and Alexander VIII.
declared that men who do not know of the existence of God are without
excuse. [Footnote 65] Atheism is not the condition of man without
revelation. As Viva truly says in his comment on this declaration,
atheists are anomalies and exceptions in the intellectual tradition of
mankind.

  [Footnote 64: "Ratiocinatio Dei existentiam, animae spiritualitatem,
  hominis libertatem, cum certitudine probare potest." _Theses a SS.
  D. N. Pio IX. approbatae_, 11 _Junii_ 1855. Denzinger's Enchiridion,
  p. MS. Ed. 1856. ]

  [Footnote 65: Viva, _Propos. damnatae,_ p. 372. Ripalda, De _Ente
  Supernaturali_. disp. xx., s. 12, 59. ]

Nay, I will go further. I can conceive a person to reject Catholicism
without logically rejecting Christianity. He would indeed reject the
divine certainty which guarantees and proposes to us the whole
revelation of the day of Pentecost. But, as Catholic theologians
teach, the infallible authority of the Church does not of necessity
enter into the essence of an act of faith.  [Footnote 66] It is,
indeed, the divine provision for the perfection and perpetuity of the
faith, and _in hac providentia_, the ordinary means whereby men are
illuminated in the revelation of God; but the known and historical
evidence of Christianity is enough to convince any prudent man that
Christianity is a divine revelation. It is quite true that by this
process he cannot attain an explicit faith in all the doctrines of
revelation, and that in rejecting Catholicism he reduces himself to
human and historical evidence as the maximum of extrinsic certainty
for his religion, and that this almost inevitably resolves itself in
the long run into rationalism. It is an inclined plane on which, if
individuals may stand, generations cannot. Nevertheless, though the
alternative in the last analysis of speculation be Catholicism or
deism, the practical alternative may be Catholicism and fragmentary
Christianity.

  [Footnote 66: De Lugo,--De Virtute Fidei Divinae, disp. i., sect.
  xii. 250-53. Viva, _Cursus Theol._, p. iv., disp. i., quaest. iv.,
  art. iii. Ripalda, _De Ente Supern._, disp. xx., seet. xxii. 117.]

I have said this to show how far I am from sympathizing with those, if
any there be, and I can truly say I know none such, who regard the
giving way of any lingering truth in the Church of England under the
action of unbelief with any feeling but that of sorrow. The Psalmist
lamented over the dying out of truths. "Diminutae sunt veritates a
filiis hominum," and I believe that every one who loves God, and
souls, and truth must lament when a single truth, speculative or
moral, even of the natural order, is obscured; much more when any
revealed truth of the elder or of the Christian revelation is rejected
or even doubted. Allow me also to answer, not only for myself, which
is of no great moment, but for an eminent personage to whom you have
referred in your pamphlet. I can say, with a personal and perfect
knowledge, that no other feeling has ever arisen in His Eminence's
mind, in contemplating the troubles of the Anglican Church, than a
sincere desire that God may use these things to open the eyes of men
to see the untenableness of their positions; coupled with a very
sincere sorrow at the havoc which the advance of unbelief is making
among the truths which yet linger in the Church of England.

3. It is, however, but reason that I {299} should rejoice when
whatsoever remains in it of imperfect truth is unfolded into a more
perfect faith: and that therefore I desire to see not only the
conversion of England, but the conversion of every soul to whom the
more perfect truth can be made known. You would not respect me if I
did not. Your own zeal for truth and for souls here speaks in my
behalf. There are two kinds of proselytism. There are the Jews whom
our Lord condemned. There are also the Apostles whom he sent into all
the world. If by proselytizing be meant the employing of unlawful and
unworthy means, motives, or influences to change a person's religion,
I should consider the man who used such means to commit _lèse-majesté_
against truth, and against our Lord who is the truth. But if by
proselytizing be meant the using all the means of conviction and
persuasion which our divine Master has committed to us to bring any
soul who will listen to us into the only faith and fold, then of this
I plead guilty with all my heart. I do heartily desire to see the
Church of England dissolve and pass away, as the glow of lingering
embers in the rise and steady light of a reviving flame. If the Church
of England were to perish to-morrow under the action of a higher and
more perfect truth, there would be no void left in England. All the
truths hitherto taught in fragments and piecemeal would be still more
vividly and firmly impressed upon the minds of the English people. All
of Christianity which survives in Anglicanism would be perfected by
the restoration of the truths which have been lost, and the whole
would be fixed and perpetuated by the evidence of divine certainty and
the voice of a divine Teacher. No Catholic desires to see the Church
of England swept away by an infidel revolution, such as that of 1789
in France. But every Catholic must wish to see it give way year by
year, and day by day, under the intellectual and spiritual action of
the Catholic Church: and must watch with satisfaction every change,
social and political, which weakens its hold on the country, and would
faithfully use all his power and influence for its complete removal as
speedily as possible.

4. But lastly, I am afraid we have reached a point of divergence.
Hitherto I hope we may have been able to agree together; but now I
fear every step of advance will carry us more wide of each other. I am
unable to consider the Church of England to be "in God's hands the
great bulwark against infidelity in this land." And my reasons are
these:

1.) First, I must regard the Anglican Reformation, and therefore the
Anglican Church, as the true and original source of the present
spiritual anarchy of England. Three centuries ago the English people
were in faith _unius labii:_ they were in perfect unity. Now they are
divided and subdivided by a numberless multiplication of errors. What
has generated them? From what source do they descend? Is it not
self-evident that the Reformation is responsible for the production of
every sect and every error which has sprung up in England in these
three hundred years, and of all which cover the face of the land at
this day? It is usual to hear Anglicans lament the multiplication of
religious error. But what is the productive cause of all? Is it not
Anglicanism itself which, by appealing from the voice of the Church
throughout the world, has set the example to its own people of
appealing from the voice of a local and provincial authority?

I am afraid, then, that the Church of England, so far from, a barrier
against infidelity, must be recognized as the mother of all the
intellectual and spiritual aberrations which now cover the face of
England.

2.) It is true, indeed, that the Church of England retains many truths
in it. But it has in two ways weakened the evidence of these very
truths which it retains. It has detached them from {300} other truths
which by contact gave solidity to all by rendering them coherent and
intelligible. It has detached them from the divine voice of the
Church, which guarantees to us the truth incorruptible and changeless.
The Anglican Reformation destroyed the principle of cohesion, by which
all truths are bound together into one. The whole idea of theology, as
the science of God and of his revelation, has been broken up.
Thirty-nine Articles, heterogeneous, disjointed, and mixed with error,
is all that remains instead of the unity and harmony of Catholic
truth. Surely this has been among the most prolific causes of error,
doubt, and unbelief. So far from the bulwark against it, Anglicanism
appears to me to be the cause and spring of its existence. As I have
already said, the Reformation placed the English people upon an
inclined plane, and they have steadily obeyed the law of their
position, by descending gradually from age to age, sometimes with a
more rapid, sometimes with a slower motion, but always tending
downward. Surely it would be unreasonable to say of a body always
descending, that it is the great barrier against reaching the bottom.

I do not, indeed, forget that the Church of England has produced
writers who have vindicated many Christian truths. I am not unmindful
of the service rendered by Anglican writers to Christianity in
general, nor, in particular, of the works of Bull and Waterland in
behalf of the Holy Trinity; of Hammond and Pearson in behalf of
Episcopacy; of Butler and Warburton in behalf of Revelation, and the
like. But whence came the errors and unbeliefs against which they
wrote? Were they not generated by the Reformation abroad and in
England? This is like the spear which healed the wounds it had made.
But it is not the divine office of the Church to make wounds in the
faith that it may use its skill in healing. They were quelling the
mutiny which Protestantism had raised, and arresting the progress of
the Reformation which, like Saturn, devours its own children.

Moreover, to be just I must say that if the Church of England be a
barrier against infidelity, the Dissenters must also be admitted to a
share in this office and commendation. And in truth I do not know
among the Dissenters any works like the Essays and Reviews, or any
Biblical criticism like that of Dr. Colenso. They may not be very
dogmatic in their teaching, but they bear their witness for
Christianity as a divine revelation, for the Scriptures as an inspired
book, and, I must add further, for the personal Christianity of
conversion and repentance, with an explicitness and consistency which
is not less effectual against infidelity than the testimony of the
Church of England. I do not think the Wesleyan Conference or the
authorities of the three denominations would accept readily this
assumed superiority of the Anglican Church as a witness against
unbelief. They would not unjustly point to the doctrinal confusions of
the Church of England as causes of scepticism, from which they are
comparatively free. And I am bound to say that I think they would have
an advantage. I well remember that while I was in the Church of
England I used to regard Dissenters from it with a certain, I will not
say aversion, but distance and recoil. I never remember to have borne
animosity against them, or to have attacked or pursued them with
unkindness. I always believed many of them to be very earnest and
devoted men. I did not like their theology, and I believed them to be
in disobedience to the Church of England; but I respected them, and
lived at peace with them. Indeed, I may say that some of the best
people I have ever known out of the Church were Dissenters or children
of Dissenters. Nevertheless, I had a dislike of their system, and of
their meeting-houses. They seemed to me to be rivals of the Church of
England, and my loyalty to it made me look somewhat impatiently upon
them. But I remember, from {301} the hour I submitted to the Catholic
Church, all this underwent a sensible change. I saw that the whole
revelation was perpetuated in the Church alone, and that all forms of
Christianity lying round about it were but fragments more or less
mutilated. But with this a sensible increase of kindly feeling grew
upon me. The Church of England and the dissenting communions all alike
appeared to me to be upon the same level. I rejoiced in all the truth
that remains in them, in all the good I could see or hope in them, and
all the workings of the Holy Spirit in them. I had no temptation to
animosity toward them; for neither they nor the Church of England
could be rivals of the imperishable and immutable Church of God. The
only sense, then, in which I could regard the Church of England as a
barrier against infidelity, I must extend also to the dissenting
bodies; and I cannot put this high, for reasons I will give.

3.) If the Church of England be a barrier to infidelity by the truths
which yet remain in it, I must submit that it is a source of unbelief
by all the denials of other truths which it has rejected. If it
sustains a belief in two sacraments, it formally propagates unbelief
in five; if it recognizes an undefined presence of Christ in the
sacrament, it formally imposes on its people a disbelief in
transubstantiation and the sacrifice of the altar; if it teaches that
there is a church upon earth, it formally denies its indissoluble
unity, its visible head, and its perpetual divine voice.

It is not easy to see how a system can be a barrier against unbelief
when by its Thirty-nine Articles it rejects, and binds its teachers to
propagate the rejection, of so many revealed truths.

4.) But this is not all. It is not only by the rejection of particular
doctrines that the Church of England propagates unbelief. It does so
by principle, and in the essence of its whole system. What is the
ultimate guarantee of the divine revelation but the divine authority
of the Church? Deny this, and we descend at once to human teachers.
But it is this that the Church of England formally and expressly
denies. The perpetual and ever-present assistance of the Holy Spirit,
whereby the Church in every age is not only preserved from error, but
enabled at all times to declare the truth, that is the infallibility
of the living Church at this hour--this it is that the Anglican Church
in terms denies. But this is the formal antagonist of infidelity,
because it is the evidence on which God wills that we should believe
that which his veracity reveals. Do not be displeased with me. It
appears to me that the Anglican system, by this one fact alone,
perpetually undoes what it strives to do in behalf of particular
doctrines. What are they, one by one, when the divine certainty of all
is destroyed? Now, for three hundred years the Anglican clergy have
been trained, ordained, and bound by subscriptions to deny not only
many Christian truths, but the divine authority of the [Greek text],
the living Church of every age. The barrier against infidelity is the
divine voice which generates faith. But this the Anglican clergy are
bound to deny. And this denial opens a flood-gate in the bulwark,
through which the whole stream of unbelief at once finds way.
Seventeen or eighteen thousand men, educated with all the advantages
of the English schools and universities, endowed with large corporate
revenues, and distributed all over England, maintain a perpetual
protest, not only against the Catholic Church, but against the belief
that there is any divine voice immutably and infallibly guiding the
Church at this hour in its declaration of the Christian revelation to
mankind. How can this be regarded as "the great bulwark in God's hand
against infidelity?"

It seems to me that the Church of England, so far from being a bulwark
against the flood, has floated before it. Every age has exhibited an
advance to a more indefinite and heterogeneous state of religious
opinion within its {302} pale. I will not go again over ground I have
already traversed. Even in our memory the onward progress of the
Church of England is manifest. That I may not seem to draw an
unfavorable picture from my own view, I will quote a very unsuspected
witness. Dr. Irons, in a recent pamphlet, says: "The religion of the
Church has sunk far deeper into conscience now than the surviving men
of 1833-1843 are aware of. _And all that Churchmen want_ of their
separated brethren is that they accept nothing, and profess nothing,
and submit to nothing which has 'no root' in their conscience."
[Footnote 67] If this means anything, it means that objective truth
has given place to subjective sincerity as the Anglican rule of faith.
You will know better than I whether this be the state of men's minds
among you. To me it is as strange as it is incoherent, and a sign how
far men have drifted. This certainly was not the faith or religion
that we held together in the years when I had the happiness of being
united in friendship with you. Latitudinarian sincerity was not our
basis, and if the men of 1833 and 1843 have arrived at this, it is
very unlike the definite, earnest, consistent belief which animated us
at that time. You say in your note (page 21) kindly, but a little
upbraidingly, that my comment on your letter to the _"Record"_ was not
like me in those days: forasmuch as I used then to join with those
with whom even then you could not. It was this that made me note your
doing so now. It was this which seemed to me to be a drifting backward
from old moorings. For myself, it is true, indeed, that I have moved
likewise. I have been carried onward to what you then were, and beyond
it. What I might have done then, I could not do now. What you do now
seems to me what you would not have done then. I did not note this
unkindly, but with regret, because, as I rejoice in every truth, and
in every true principle retained in the Church of England, it would
have given me great joy to see you maintaining with all firmness, not
only all the particular truths you held, but also the impossibility of
uniting with those who deny both those truths and the principles on
which you have rested through your laborious life of the last thirty
years.

  [Footnote 67: "Apologia pro vita Ecclesias Anglicanae," p. 22.]

And now I will add only a few more words of a personal sort, and then
make an end. It was not my fate in the Church of England to be
regarded as a contentious or controversial spirit, nor as a man of
extreme opinions, or of a bitter temper. I remember indeed that I was
regarded, and even censured, as slow to advance, somewhat tame,
cautious to excess, morbidly moderate, as some one said. I remember
that the Catholics [Greek text] used to hold me somewhat cheap, and to
think me behindhand, uncatholic, over-English, and the like. But now,
is there anything in the extreme opposite of all this which I am not?
Ultramontane, violent, unreasoning, bitter, rejoicing in the miseries
of my neighbors, destructive, a very Apollyon, and the like. Some who
so describe me now are the same who were wont then to describe me as
the reverse of all this. They are yet catholicizing the Church of
England, without doubt more catholic still than I am. Well, what shall
I say? If I should say that I am not conscious of these changes, you
would only think me self-deceived. I will therefore only tell you
where I believe I am unchanged, and then where I am conscious of a
change, which, perhaps, will account for all you have to say of me.

I am unconscious, then, of any change in my love to England in all
that relates to the natural order. I am no politician, and I do not
set up for a patriot; but I believe, as St. Thomas teaches, that love
of country is a part of charity, and assuredly I have ever loved
England with a very filial love. My love for England {303} begins with
the England of St. Bede. Saxon England, with all its tumults, seems to
me saintly and beautiful. Norman England I have always loved less,
because, though more majestic, it became continually less Catholic,
until the evil spirit of the world broke off the light yoke of faith
at the so-called Reformation. Still, I loved the Christian England
which survived, and all the lingering outlines of dioceses and
parishes, cathedrals and churches, with the names of saints upon them.
It is this vision of the past which still hovers over England and
makes, it beautiful, and full of memories of the kingdom of God. Nay,
I loved the parish church of my childhood, and the college chapel of
my youth, and the little church under a green hillside, where the
morning and evening prayers, and the music of the English Bible, for
seventeen years, became a part of my soul. Nothing is more beautiful
in the natural order, and if there were no eternal world I could have
made it my home. But these things are not England, they are only its
features, and I may say that my love was and is to the England which
lives and breathes about me, to my countrymen whether in or out of the
Church of England. With all our faults as a race, I recognize in them
noble Christian virtues, exalted characters, beautiful examples of
domestic life, and of every personal excellence which can be found,
where the fulness of grace and truth is not, and much, too, which puts
to shame those who are where the fulness of grace and truth abounds.
So long as I believed the Church of England to be a part of the Church
of God I loved it, how well you know, and honored it with a filial
reverence, and labored to serve it, with what fidelity I can affirm,
with what, or if with any utility, it is not for me to say. And I love
still those who are in it, and I would rather suffer anything than
wrong them in word or deed, or pain them without a cause. To all this
I must add, lastly, and in a way above all, the love I bear to many
personal friends, so dear to me, whose letters I kept by me till two
years ago, though more than fifty of them are gone into the world
unseen, all these things are sweet to me still beyond all words that I
can find to express it.

You will ask me then, perhaps, why I have never manifested this
before? It is because when I left you, in the full, calm, deliberate,
and undoubting belief that the light of the only truth led me from a
fragmentary Christianity into the perfect revelation of the day of
Pentecost, I believed it to be my duty to walk alone in the path in
which it led me, leaving you all unmolested by any advance on my part.
If any old friend has ever written to me, or signified to me his wish
to renew our friendship, I believe he will bear witness to the
happiness with which I have accepted the kindness offered to me. But I
felt that it was my act which had changed our relations, and that I
had no warrant to assume that a friendship, founded upon agreement in
our old convictions, would be continued when that foundation had been
destroyed by myself, or restored upon a foundation altogether new. And
I felt, too, a jealousy for truth. It was no human pride which made me
feel that I ought not to expose the Catholic Church to be rejected in
my person. Therefore I held on my own course, seeking no one, but
welcoming every old friend--and they have been many--who came to me.
This has caused a suspension of nearly fourteen years in which I have
never so much as met or exchanged a line with many who till then were
among my nearest friends. This, too, has given room for many
misapprehensions. It would hardly surprise me if I heard that my old
friends believed me to have become a cannibal.

But perhaps you will say, This does not account for your hard words
against us and the Church of England. When I read your late pamphlet I
said to myself, Have I ever written such hard words as these? I will
not quote them, but truly I do not think {304} that, in anything I
have ever written, I have handled at least any person as you, my dear
friend, in your zeal, which I respect and honor, have treated certain
very exalted personages who are opposed to you. But let this pass. It
would not excuse me even if I were to find you in the same
condemnation.

One of my anonymous censors writes that "as in times past I had
written violently against the Church of Rome, so now I must do the
same against the Church of England." Now I wish he would find, in the
books I published when out of the Church, the hard sayings he speaks
of. It has been my happiness to know that such do not exist. I feel
sure that my accuser had nothing before his mind when he risked this
controversial trick. I argued, indeed, against the Catholic and Roman
Church, but I do not know of any railing accusations. How I was
preserved from it I cannot tell, except by the same divine goodness
which afterward led me into the perfect light of faith.

But I have written, some say, hard things of the Church of England.
Are they hard truths or hard epithets? If they are hard epithets, show
them to me, and I will erase them with a prompt and public expression
of regret; but if they be hard facts, I cannot change them. It is
true, indeed, that I have for the last fourteen years incessantly and
unchangingly, by word and by writing, borne my witness to the truths
by which God has delivered me from the bondage of a human authority in
matters of faith. I have borne my witness to the presence and voice of
a divine, and therefore infallible, teacher, guiding the Church with
his perpetual assistance, and speaking through it as his organ. I have
also borne witness that the Church through which he teaches is that
which St. Augustine describes by the two incommunicable notes--that it
is "spread throughout the word" and "united to the Chair of Peter."
[Footnote 68] I know that the corollaries of these truths are severe,
peremptory, and inevitable. If the Catholic faith be the perfect
revelation of Christianity, the Anglican Reformation is a cloud of
heresies; if the Catholic Church be the organ of the Holy Ghost, the
Anglican Church is not only no part of the Church, but no church of
divine foundation. It is a human institution, sustained as it was
founded by a human authority, without priesthood, without sacraments,
without absolution, without the real presence of Jesus upon its
altars. I know these truths are hard. It seems heartless, cruel,
unfilial, unbrotherly, ungrateful so to speak of all the beautiful
fragments of Christianity which mark the face of England, from its
thousand towns to its green villages, so dear even to us who believe
it to be both in heresy and in schism. You must feel it so. You must
turn from me and turn against me for saying it; but if I believe it,
must I not say it? And if I say it, can I find words more weighed,
measured, and deliberate than those I have used? If you can, show them
to me, and so that they are adequate, I will use them always
hereafter. God knows I have never written a syllable with the intent
to leave a wound. I have erased, I have refrained from writing and
speaking, many, lest I should give more pain than duty commanded me to
give. I cannot hope that you will allow of all I say. But it is the
truth. I have refrained from it, not only because it is a duty, but
because I wish to disarm those who divert men from the real point at
issue by accusations of bitterness and the like. It has been my lot,
more than of most, to be in these late years on the frontier which
divides us. And--why I know not--people have come to me with their
anxieties and their doubts. What would you have done in my place? That
which you have done in your own; which, _mutato nomine_, has been my
duty and my burden.

  [Footnote 68: _S. Aug. Op._, tom, ii., pp. 119, 120; torn, x.,  p. 93]

And now I have done. I have a hope that the day is coming when all
{305} in England who believe in the supernatural order, in the
revelation of Christianity, in the inspiration of Holy Scripture, in
the divine certainty of dogmatic tradition, in the divine obligation
of holding no communion with heresy and with schism, will be driven in
upon the lines of the only stronghold which God has constituted as
"the pillar and ground of the truth." This may not be, perhaps, as
yet; but already it is time for those who love the faith of
Christianity, and look with sorrow and fear on the havoc which is
laying it waste among us, to draw together in mutual kindness and
mutual equity of judgment. That I have so ever treated you I can truly
say; that I may claim it at your hands I am calmly conscious; but
whether you and others accord it to me or not, I must leave it to the
Disposer of hearts alone to determine. Though we are parted now, it
may not be for ever; and morning by morning, in the holy Sacrifice, I
pray that the same light of faith which so profusely fell upon myself,
notwithstanding all I am, may in like manner abundantly descend upon
you who are in all things so far above me, save only in that one gift
which is not mine, but his alone who is the Sovereign Giver of all
grace.

  Believe me, my dear friend,
  Always affectionately yours,
  HENRY EDWARD MANNING.

  ST. MARY'S, BAYSWATER,
  Sept. 27, 1864.

P.S.--My attention has just been called to the concluding pages of the
last number of the _Quarterly Review_, in which I am again described
by a writer who evidently has abilities to know better, to be in
"ecstasies." The writer represents, as the sum or chief argument of my
"Second Letter to an Anglican Friend," the passing reference I there
made to the Lord Chancellor's speech. I quoted this to prove that the
late judgment is a part of the law, both of the land and of the Church
of England. But the whole of the letter, excepting this single point,
is an argument to show that the vote of the Convocation carries with
it no divine certainty, and resolves itself into the private judgment
of the majority who passed it. For all this argument the writer has
not a word. I cannot be surprised that he fills out his periods with
my "ecstasies," "shouts of joy," "wild paeans," a quotation from
"Shylock," and other things less fitting. This is not to reason, but
to rail. Is it worthy? Is it love of truth? Is it good faith? Is it
not simply the fallacy of evasion? I can assure him that this kind of
controversy is work that will not stand. We are in days when
personalities and flimsy rhetoric will not last long. Neither will it
bear to be tried by "the fire," nor will it satisfy, I was about to
say, nor will it mislead, men who are in earnest for truth or for
salvation. I had hoped that this style of controversy had been cured
or suppressed by a greater sincerity and reality of religious thought
in these days of anxiety and unbelief. There either is, or is not, a
divine Person teaching perpetually through the Church in every age,
and therefore now as always, generating faith with divine certainty in
the minds of men. This question must be answered; and, as men answer
it, we know where to class them, and how to deal with them. All the
evasions and half-arguments of such writers are becoming daily more
and more intolerable to those of the English people--and they are a
multitude--who would give all that they count dear, and life itself, to
know and to die in the full and certain light of the revelation of God
in Jesus Christ.

H. E. M.

----

{306}

Translated from Le Correspondant.


A RUSSIAN RELIGIOUS.

BY PRINCE AUGUSTIN GALITZIN.


On the 6th of May, 1840, in a little hut upon the slope of that chain
of mountains which separates the northern from the southern states of
the American Union, died an old man who had spent his life in
spreading the faith through those distant regions. A crowd of persons
surrounded his bed in tears; for during half a century he had been the
depositary of public misfortunes, domestic troubles, and spiritual
distress. Though known by the humble name of Father Smith, this priest
was not a native of the land which received his last breath: he was a
Russian by birth, and his name was Galitzin.

On the 1st of September in the same year eight women landed at New
York, clad all in black, and wearing no ornament but a cross on the
breast. They came to educate new generations in the New World. The
eldest of them was not, like her sisters, a Frenchwoman; the same
blood ran in her veins as in those of the missionary just dead, and
her heart beat with the same love. She too was a Russian, and her name
was Madame Elizabeth Galitzin.

Born at St. Petersburg in 1795, the Princess Elizabeth was the
daughter of a woman of whom it is praise enough to say that she was
the worthiest and most intimate friend of Madame Swetchine, who called
her "her second conscience."   [Footnote 69] On the day when Elizabeth
reached her fifteenth year, her mother confided to her the secret that
she had become a Catholic, and told the reasons which had induced her
not, as is still supposed in Russia, to abandon the faith of her
fathers, but to return to it in all its integrity. Elizabeth thus
describes the emotion which she felt in listening to this disclosure,
and the influence which it had upon her own future. [Footnote 70]

  [Footnote 69:  _Lettres de Mme. Swetchine_, I. 321. ]

  [Footnote 70: This extract and the details that follow are taken
  from or confirmed by the Rev. A. Guidée's _Vie du P. Rozaven_ and
  the Rev. J. Gagarin's notice of Madame Galitzin in his _Etudes de
  théologie, de philosophie et d'histoire_, vol. ii.]

"The secret which my mother confided to me filled me with despair; I
burst into tears, without uttering a word. For several days I wept
bitterly whenever I was alone, and during the night. I believed that
my mother had committed a great sin, because the government punished
so severely those who forsook the religion of the country. The reasons
which she gave made no impression on me; I did not even understand
them: the moment of the _fiat lux_ was not yet come. From that day I
felt an implacable hatred of the Catholic religion and its ministers,
especially of the Jesuits, who, as I supposed, had effected my
mother's conversion. One night, as I was lamenting my isolated
condition, separated from my mother by this division of sentiments, I
was struck by the sudden thought, 'If the Jesuits have gained over so
excellent a woman as mamma,--a woman so reasonable, so well-informed,
and of so much experience, what will they not do with an ignorant,
unsophisticated girl like me? I must protect myself against their
persecutions. I firmly believe that the Greek Church is the true
church; I am resolved to be faithful to it unto death. To withdraw
myself effectually from the seductions of the Jesuits, I will write
down a vow that I will never change my religion.' No sooner said than
{307} done. I rose at once, and despite the darkness wrote out my vow
in due form, invoking the wrath of God if I ever broke it. Then I went
back to bed, feeling much more composed, and believing that I had
gained a great victory over the devil. Alas! it was he that guided my
pen. For four years I repeated that vow every day when I said my
prayers; I never omitted it. I gloried in my obstinacy, and took every
opportunity to show my aversion to the Catholic religion, and above
all to the Jesuits. In this I was encouraged by my confessor. He asked
me one day if I had any leaning toward Catholicism.

"'I, father! I detest the Catholic religion and the Jesuits!'

"'Good, good!' said he; 'that is as it should be.'

"I let slip no occasion of defaming these holy men. I delighted in
repeating all the absurd stories that I heard against them, and
believed them as much as if they were articles of faith. But about the
middle of the fourth year an excellent Italian priest, who had given
me lessons, died. My mother sometimes requested me to go to the
Catholic church on days of great ceremony, and I durst not refuse,
though I used to go with rage in my heart. When she invited me,
however, to go with her to the funeral of the poor priest, I consented
willingly, out of gratitude, and respect for the memory of the
deceased. As soon as I entered the church a voice within me seemed to
say, 'You hate this church, but you will one day belong to it
yourself.' The words sank into my heart. I was deeply moved, and shed
abundance of tears all the while I remained in the church--I could not
tell why. A thought all at once occurred to me: 'You hate the
Jesuits,' said I to myself; 'is not hatred a sin? When did you learn
to consider this feeling a virtue? If it is a sin, I must not commit
it again: I will not hate the Jesuits then; I will pray for them.' And
so, in fact, I did, every day from that moment. I struggled against my
dislike for them.

"In the meanwhile we went to pass the summer away from home. In this
retirement our good Lord vouchsafed to speak to my heart and inspire
me with such a lively sorrow for my sins that I often passed part of
the night in weeping. I watered my couch with tears, and judging
myself unworthy to sleep on a bed, I cast myself on the ground, and
used to lie there until fatigue obliged me to return to my pillow. At
the end of three months we went back to St. Petersburg, and I there
learned that a cousin of mine [Footnote 71] had become a convert. I
was deeply pained. I accused the Jesuits of being the cause of the
step, and had hard work not to yield to my old hatred of them. I
avoided speaking with my cousin alone, because I did not want to
receive the confidence which I knew she was anxious to give me. But at
last, to my great regret, I had to listen to her. When she had told me
what I was so unwilling to know, I burst into tears, and replied:

  [Footnote 71: The lady here mentioned was the mother of Monseigneur
  de Ségur. ]

"'If you believe that the Catholic religion is the true one, you were
right to embrace it; but I do not understand how you could believe
it.'

"'Oh,' said she, 'if you would only read something that my mother
[Footnote 72] has written on the Greek schism and the truth of the
Catholic Church, you would be persuaded as I was.'

  [Footnote 72: The Countess Rostopchine, whom Madame de Staël
  mentions with so much praise in her _Dix années d'exil_. ]

"'You may send me whatever you wish,' I answered, 'but you may be
certain that it will not affect me. I am too firmly convinced that
truth lives in the Greek Church.'

"I went home in great distress of mind. For the first time in four
years I omitted to repeat my vow before going to bed; it seemed to me
rash. I retired, but God would not let me sleep; he filled my mind
with salutary thoughts. 'I must examine this matter,' said I, 'it is
certainly worth the {308} trouble; it is something of too much
consequence to be deceived about.' I thought over all that I knew
about the Catholic faith, and at that moment God opened my eyes. I saw
as clear as day that hitherto I had been in the wrong, and the truth
was to be found only in the Catholic Church. 'It is our pride,' I
exclaimed, 'which prevents our acknowledging the supremacy of the
Pope: to-morrow I will embrace the truth. Yet how can I? And my vow?
Ah, but the vow is null; it can be no obstacle to the fulfilment of my
resolution. If I had taken an oath to commit a murder, the oath would
have been a sin, and to fulfil it would be another. I will not commit
the second sin. I will not put off being a Catholic beyond to-morrow.'

"I waited impatiently for day that I might read my aunt's little
treatise,--not because I needed arguments to convince me, but I
wanted to have it to say that I had read something. At day-break I
wrote to my cousin these words: 'Send me the manuscript, pray for me,
and hope.' I read it quickly; it consisted of not more than thirty
pages. I found in it all that I had said to myself during the night. I
hesitated no longer, but hastened to my mother, declared myself a
Catholic, and begged her to send for Father Rozaven. He came the same
morning. He was not a little surprised at the unexpected intelligence,
and asked me if I was ready to suffer persecution, even death itself,
if need were, for the love of the religion which I was going to
embrace. My blood froze in my veins, but I answered: 'I hope
everything from the grace of God.' The good father doubted no longer
the sincerity of my conversion, and promised to hear my confession the
next day but one, that is, the 18th of October. It was during the
night of the 15th and 16th of October, 1815, that God spoke for me the
words _fiat lux._"



After she had been received into the Church, Father Rozaven said to
her: "I wish to establish in your heart a great love of God which
shall manifest itself not by fine sentiments but by practical results,
and shall lead you to fulfil with zeal and courage all your duties
without exception. I want you to strive ardently to acquire the solid
virtues of humility, love of your neighbor, patience and conformity to
the will of God. I want to see in you a grandeur, an elevation, and a
firmness of soul, and to teach you to seek and find your consolation
in God."

The princess became all that her wise director wished her to be; and
the constant practice of the fundamental Christian virtues soon led
her to aim at a still more perfect life. Even her mother for a long
time opposed her design. Her friends ridiculed her for wanting to lead
what they called a "useless" life. Sensitive to this reproach, so
constantly made by people who themselves do nothing at all, she begged
the learned Jesuit to furnish her with weapons to repel it. Her
request called forth the following excellent reply, which may be read
with especial profit just now, when so much is said about the
uselessness of nuns:

"Tell me, my child, have you read the catechism? One of the first
questions is, Why has God created us and placed us in this world? To
know him, love him, and serve him, and by this means to obtain
everlasting life. It does not say, to be 'useful.' Even when a nun is
of no use to others, she is useful to herself, and to be so is her
first duty; she labors to sanctify herself and to save her soul. Is
not this the motive which led St. Paul, St. Anthony, and so many
thousands of anchorets into the desert? These saints were certainly
not fools. Beside, is it true that nuns are useless? Was it not the
story of the virtues of St. Anthony which determined the conversion of
St. Augustine? and certainly this conversion was something far greater
than all that St. Anthony could have done by remaining in the world.
But to say nothing of the example of the saints, are not nuns useful
to each {309} other? Do you see no advantage in the union of twenty or
thirty persons, more or less, who incite each other to the acquisition
of virtue, and take each other by the hand in their journey to the
same goal, the salvation of their souls? And then again, many
religious communities devote themselves to the education of youth; and
surely there are few occupations more useful than bringing up in the
knowledge and practice of religion young girls who are destined to
become mothers of families, and to fulfil all the duties of society
that belong to their sex."



A devotion of this sort commended itself especially to our young
convert. She made choice of the new order of the Sacred Heart, and
after eleven years' delay finally entered it at Metz in 1826. She made
her vows in 1828 at Rome, and remained there until she was ordered to
France in 1834 and made general secretary of the congregation. In 1839
she was chosen assistant mother, and appointed to visit the houses of
the Sacred Heart in America, and to found some new ones. Her
correspondence during this period with her mother is now before me,
and will show, far better than any words of mine, not only her piety,
but the serenity of her soul and that love of country and kindred,
which religion, far from extinguishing, can alone purify by carrying
it beyond the narrow boundaries of this life. Like those austere
Christians whose lives Count de Montalembert has written, she kept a
large place in her heart for love and friendship, and clung ardently
to those natural ties which she did not feel called upon to break when
she gave herself to God.

I shall then leave Madame Elizabeth to speak in her own words; and in
so doing, it seems to me that I am fulfilling the wish of Madame
Swetchine, who wrote thus to Father Gagarin (ii. 360): "There are many
details respecting her life which might be found and authenticated,
and I am convinced that many interesting particulars might be obtained
from her correspondence during her two journeys in America."



  NEW YORK, Sept. 1, 1840.

  MY DEAREST MAMMA,--I arrived at New York a few hours ago, after a
  voyage of forty-five days. Our voyage, thank God, was a good one,
  despite thirty-two days of contrary winds. We had neither storms nor
  rough weather; the trip was a long one, that is all. Having two
  priests with us, we had mass often; you may imagine what a
  consolation it was to us. I was sea-sick only one week; after that,
  so well that I passed a great part of my time in drawing.

  "I am here for only four days; at least I trust that the business
  which I have to transact with the bishop will not keep me longer.
  Then I shall go with my seven companions and a worthy priest who has
  us in charge, to St. Louis in the state of Missouri, 2,000 versts
  from New York. They say that we shall reach there in twelve days; by
  this reckoning we shall arrive at our first house about the 20th of
  September. I believe that I shall die of joy when I get there; for
  here in the midst of the world, though surrounded by excellent
  people, who show us a thousand attentions, I am like a fish out of
  water. I will write to you as soon as I reach St. Louis. I cannot
  remain with our family of the Sacred Heart there more than a
  fortnight, for I must then visit two other establishments not far
  distant. I shall return to St. Louis, and leave there about the
  middle of November for our house at St. Michael, near New Orleans,
  which is 1,500 versts from St. Louis. After a few days' rest I shall
  then go to our house at Grand Coteau, also in Louisiana; and after
  staying there three weeks I shall return to pass the winter at St.
  Michael. I hope to do well there, for the climate is warmer than
  that of Rome. In the spring I shall make another visitation of the
  houses in Missouri, and then go back to New York to begin the
  foundation {310} of a new establishment there. So you see I shall
  not be very long in any one place.

  "What a consolation it will be for me if I find a letter from you at
  St. Louis! I am impatient for news of you and my brothers. How did
  they take the news of my departure for America? With indifference
  perhaps; but they are far from being indifferent to me. God knows
  what wishes I form for them, and how sweet it is to me to be able to
  offer up for them the fatigues and petty sufferings which divine
  Providence sends us. When you write to my brothers do not fail to
  remember me to them, for, they are dearer to me than ever in our
  Lord.

  "I was in hopes of finding our relative in America; but he is dead.
  He died universally regretted. Everybody looked upon him as a saint.
  I will make it a point to obtain his works and send them to you."


  "St. Louis, Nov. 9, 1840.

  "I have had the consolation of receiving your letter dated the 15th
  of July. Write to me now at St. Louis, at the _Academy_ of the
  Ladies of the Sacred Heart, for so they call here those religious
  houses which receive pupils as boarders. For my part, I am
  determined to send you this letter at once, because I am afraid that
  Paris will be turned topsy-turvy by the remains of Bonaparte, which
  are to be removed thither in the month of November.

  "It is too true that our 'American uncle' is dead. You may suppose
  how deeply I regret it. He was not a bishop; only a simple
  missionary. He invariably refused all dignities, and devoted himself
  for more than forty years to the missions, in which he displayed a
  zeal worthy of an apostle. He died at the age of seventy-two, like a
  saint as he had lived, having given himself to God since his
  seventeenth year. The whole country in which he preached the gospel
  weeps for him as for a father. His memory is revered in America
  among Protestants as well as Catholics. I have been shown an article
  about him in the _Gazette_: it gives his whole history, and it would
  be impossible to write a more touching eulogy of him. I have some of
  his works; they are excellent.

  "I expected that my departure for America would have but little
  effect upon my brothers. Our good Lord permits it to be so, and we
  must wish whatever he wishes. A day will come, I trust, when their
  hearts will be touched. Let us wait and pray, and suffer with more
  fervor than ever. Remember me to them and to my aunts. Beg for me
  the light of the Holy Ghost: I need it sorely, for my post is a very
  difficult one."


  "ST. MICHAEL, Dec. 6, 1840.,

  "Here I am, near New Orleans; but I shall soon start on another
  journey, and not be at rest again before the month of June. I am now
  in the land of the sugar-cane; it is very nice to eat, or rather to
  suck. As if I brought the cold with me in all my travels, I had
  scarcely arrived here when bitter cold weather set in, and the ice
  was as thick as a good fat finger. The weather has moderated since
  then--to my great satisfaction, for I have not enough of the spirit
  of mortification to bear cold very well. I begin to believe that
  there is not a single warm country under the sun, and that the
  reputation of those lands that are called so is not well-founded.

  "I send you only these few words, that you may not be uneasy about
  me; for I have no leisure. Remember me to my brothers. Bless me, and
  believe, dear mamma, in my tender and respectful attachment."


  "ST. MICHAEL, Feb. 28, 1841.

  "I leave this place on the 15th of March, and shall be in St. Louis
  for the feast of the Annunciation. I shall remain three weeks at
  three of our houses in Missouri, and then go to Cincinnati and
  Philadelphia; so I hope to be in New York by the beginning of May.
  Do not fear on my {311} account the dangers of railroads and
  steamboats. Those who are sent on a mission are under the special
  protection of divine Providence. I have never met with the slightest
  accident; and this constant journeying about has moreover rid me of
  my fever. I am perfectly well. I rise every morning at twenty
  minutes after four; I fast and abstain; and nothing hurts me. So
  don't be uneasy about me. I think I shall stay in New York until
  November, if God opposes no obstacle to my doing so; I shall then
  make a last visit to our houses in Louisiana and Missouri, and sail
  for Europe probably during the summer of 1842. In fifteen months I
  shall be afloat again on the great ocean. I hope Alexander will not
  be off again before that, so that I may have the consolation of
  seeing him once more. He is the only one of my brothers whom I may
  never see again, and he was my Benjamin. Tell them I do not forget
  them in my prayers, and I wish they would also remember me before
  God: that will come some day, I hope. Pray have some masses said for
  me; I have great need of them. If you only knew what it was to hold
  such an office as mine! The responsibility is enough to make one
  tremble."


  "LOUISIANA, March 29, 1841.

  "Before starting on my journey I must send you a few lines. It is a
  little before my accustomed time for writing; but I shall be nearly
  two months on the route before reaching New York, and I am afraid I
  shall have no opportunity of writing except on my arrival in that
  city, and after my return here. So do not be anxious on account of
  my future silence: it will not be a sign of anything bad. I am
  better than ever. Make your mind at rest about my health. Our Lord
  gives me astonishing strength. Fatigue has no effect upon me."


  "NEW YORK, May 15, 1841.

  "I arrived here without accident, and take comfort in thinking that
  I shall be stationary now until October. Since I left Rome I have
  not been six weeks at a time in any one place. I am about founding
  an establishment here, and the task is no easy one, in any point of
  view. The expenses to be incurred are enormous, and our resources,
  to say the best of them, are very moderate. So I have begged our
  mother-general to allow the 200 francs which you were so good as to
  send us for postage, to be devoted to the first expenses of the
  chapel.

  "You have no idea how deeply our 'relative' is regretted here. He
  was universally loved and respected. People look upon me with favor,
  because I bear the same name."



  "NEW YORK, June 20, 1841.

  "The climate of New York is very disagreeable. It was so cold
  yesterday that even with a woollen coverlid I had hard work to keep
  warm through the night. It is not cold two days in succession. The
  temperature varies even between morning and evening--that is, when it
  is not continually raining. I believe after all that the climate of
  St. Petersburg is the best. Oar summers at least are superb, and we
  have long days; but here it is hardly light, this time of year, at
  half after four in the morning, and by half after seven in the
  evening we need lamps. In fact, you must go to a cold climate if you
  want to keep warm and to see well!

  "I have had an agreeable surprise here, and you would never guess
  what it is. It is to have _klioukva_ [Footnote 73 ] to eat nearly
  every day; it is the first time I have seen them since I left
  Russia. This is absurd, I know, but I cannot tell you what pleasure
  it gave me.

     [Footnote 73: Cranberries. ]

  "New York is an immense city; it has nearly 400,000 inhabitants, and
  is as noisy as Paris. There are some 80,000 Catholics and only eight
  churches, but religion is making progress. The next time I write to
  you, it will be from our house of the Sacred {312} Heart. I am
  burning with impatience to be in it; for though we are extremely
  comfortable with the good Sisters of Charity, who are truly sisters
  to us, we nevertheless long to be at home, where we can live in
  conformity to our rule and customs.

  "What news of my brothers? How happy I shall be when you can tell me
  that all is well with them! I would give a thousand lives for that.
  The day and hour of God will come; let us be patient and pray. Say a
  thousand affectionate things to them for me."


  "NEW YORK, Aug. 2, 1841.

  "I dare say you will be pleased to learn, dear mamma, that I have
  just opened a little mission among the Indian savages in Missouri,
  300 miles beyond St. Louis. Four of our community have been
  established there. The population consists of 900 Indians, all
  converted by the Jesuits. Thanks be to God, his kingdom is extending
  itself, and what it loses on one side through the wiles of the
  enemy, it gains on another.

  "I never let a month pass without writing to you, despite my many
  occupations, because I know your anxiety; but do not distress
  yourself. I am, if possible, but too well, in every respect. Our
  houses here are like those in Europe; while within doors we never
  could suspect that we had been transplanted into the new world (that
  used to be). Don't be afraid about crocodiles. The country abounds
  in them, as it does in snakes; but nobody thinks of them, and I have
  never even seen one. Several, however, have been pointed out to me;
  but as my eyes were cast down, I saw nothing."


  "NEW YORK, Sept. 13, 1841.

  "Our establishment is well under way; the house is finished, and we
  have already twelve pupils. I have no doubt their number will
  increase next month to twenty, and perhaps more, for there have been
  already at least forty applications. Beside this, I have just
  established a mission among the Potawatamie Indians in the Indian
  Territory. There is a population of 3,000 Indians in the place where
  our ladies are, 1,000 of whom are fervent Catholics; the others are
  pagans, but to some extent civilized. We have there already a school
  of fifty little girls, and a great many women come to learn from us
  how to work.

  "I shall leave New York and pass the winter in Louisiana. I am quite
  well--better than in Europe; but I am over-burdened with work. You
  may readily believe it when I tell you that beside governing this
  house, and my province, which comprises seven houses, I have had to
  paint three large pictures for the chapel, and to finish them in six
  weeks. At last, thank God, they are done, and our chapel is really
  charming. What a pity that you cannot come and hear mass in it!"


  "_En route_, between St. Michael and Grand Coteau, Dec. 4, 1841.

  "From a tavern on the banks of the Mississippi I write to wish you
  and all the family a happy New Year! I pray devoutly that it may be
  fertile in graces and divine blessings; everything else is
  superfluous and valueless, and therefore unnecessary. I have
  travelled a good deal since I wrote you from Harrisburg, Penn. I am
  now going to our house at Grand Coteau, where I shall stay about
  five weeks; then I shall spend an equal time at St. Michael. This
  will bring me to the end of February; after which I shall start for
  St. Louis, and visit our other establishments in Missouri, including
  our new mission among the Potawatamie savages. Don't let the word
  'savages' frighten you. They won't eat me; for they are more than
  civilized. One thousand of them are Catholics, in the place to which
  I have sent our sisters, who are only four in number, and have a
  school which succeeds admirably. Our good savages are so fervent
  that they come every day to church at half-past five in the morning.
  They say their prayers, meditate for half an hour, and then hear
  mass, {313} during which they sing canticles in their savage
  fashion. After mass one of the Indians teaches the catechism to
  about thirty little boys and a like number of girls; that over, they
  go off to their respective employments, and about six in the evening
  they come back to the church to say their prayers together. It was
  the Jesuits who converted this tribe, and they are still doing a
  vast amount of good out there. I shall probably go there in April;
  it will be a three-weeks' journey. After that I mean to return to
  New York, and probably about the 1st of June I shall sail for Havre.
  So there you have my route; you see that I lead the life of a
  regular courier more than ever. But fortunately, to one who has the
  happiness of being a religious, all things are indifferent, provided
  they are in accordance with holy obedience. I am very much afraid I
  shall miss some of your letters, for they must follow me at a
  gallopping pace or they will not overtake me.

  "Assure yourself, my dear mamma, that Russia is not the coldest
  country in the world. The so-called burning Louisiana is colder.
  From the 25th to the 30th of November we had hard frosts which
  chilled us through and through. Perhaps I am mistaken, but I have a
  pleasant recollection that in November at St. Petersburg we have
  more rain than frost. In a word, now that I have tried, so to speak,
  all climates, I am firmly persuaded that there is not a warm country
  on the face of the earth, and I have resigned myself to look for
  pleasant and eternal warmth only in the next world.

  "What news of my brothers and my sisters-in-law? Are they as great
  vagabonds as I? Ah, if their hearts and minds could only be composed
  and settled in God alone! It will come, some day or other; we must
  hope, even against all hope. Our Lord is the master of hearts, and
  he wills from all eternity that these hearts shall be wholly his. A
  touch of his grace will soften those of my brothers; the day of
  illusions will pass away, and we shall sing eternally with them that
  God is good and his mercies are unspeakable. A thousand kisses, dear
  mamma; bless your dutiful and grateful daughter
    ELIZABETH."


In 1842 Madame Elizabeth went to Rome to give an account of her
fruitful mission to her superiors. I have before me a last letter of
hers, written to her mother, whom she had just lost at St. Petersburg
almost at the same hour in which her eldest brother died in Paris in
the bosom of the Catholic Church.

  "I confess to you," she says, "that for several months past, I have
  continually felt impelled to make a sacrifice of my life for my
  brothers. Perhaps you will think this presumptuous on my part, so I
  will explain myself. When I am making my preparation for death,
  according to custom, the thought often comes into my mind to offer
  the sacrifice of my life in advance, and to beseech our Lord to
  accept it, as well as all the sufferings I may have to undergo,
  especially at that terrible moment when the soul is separated from
  the body, in order that I may obtain the conversion of my brothers.
  I have asked permission to transfer to them all the merit which, by
  God's grace, I may acquire through resignation or suffering--not only
  in my last sickness, but even during the period of life which yet
  remains to me--so that, accumulating no more merits by way of
  satisfaction for my own sins, I may have, for my part, purgatory
  without any alleviation; for in that place of propitiation and peace
  I can no longer be of any use to them. I hope our Lord will grant my
  request: all I know is that since that time my habitual gladness of
  heart is increased a hundred-fold, and that I think of death with
  unspeakable consolation."

This sacrifice, which reminds one of a similar incident in the life of
St. Vincent de Paul,  [Footnote 74] seems to have been {314} accepted
by God. Returning to America in 1843, Madame Elizabeth had not time to
enjoy the fruits of her labors. She was attacked at St. Michael by the
yellow fever, and there fell asleep in the Lord on the feast of the
Immaculate Conception, saying: "I do not fear death; I long for it, if
it is God's will."   [Footnote 75]

  [Footnote 74: One day, moved with compassion at the state of an
  unfortunate priest, a doctor of theology, who had lost his faith,
  because he had ceased to study the science of divinity, St. Vincent
  de Paul besought God to restore to this man the liveliness of his
  faith, offering to take up himself, if necessary, the burden which
  this poor brother was unable to bear. His prayer was heard at once,
  and for four years this great saint remained as it were deprived of
  that faith which was nevertheless his life. "Do you know how he
  passed through this trial?" says an admirable master of the
  spiritual life. "He passed through it by becoming St. Vincent de
  Paul; that is to say, all that this name signifies."--GRATRY, _Les
  Sources_, p. 82.]

  [Footnote 75: Writing from Lyons to Bishop Hughes in September,
  1842, Madame Galitzm said: "I avail myself of this opportunity to
  write a few lines, although detained in my bed with the fever for
  upward of three weeks. My health is in a poor state, and if I go on
  as I did these two months, there is more prospect for me to go to
  heaven next year than to return to America." The letter is in
  English, which she wrote with apparent ease and considerable
  approach to purity. ED. CATH. WORLD. ]


"What more glorious title of nobility," says Monseigneur the Duke
d'Aumale, "than to count saints and martyrs among one's ancestors?" My
object is not so much to lay claim to this distinction, as to show,
for the honor of my country, the part which some of her children have
taken in the genesis of civilization and Catholicism in America. And
this ambition will perhaps seem excusable to those who admit that
every gift of God ought to be an object of our most religious care.

----

From The Month.

THE STOLEN SKETCH.


I was sitting in the National Gallery, copying one of Murillo's
glorious little beggar-boys. A tube of color fell from my box and
rolled out upon the floor. A gentleman passing picked it up, and
restored it to me. I thanked him; and then he lingered some minutes by
my chair, watching my work and giving me some useful hints with the
air of a person who thoroughly understands the art. I was striving to
be an artist, struggling through difficult uphill labor. I was not
acquainted with any one of the profession. I had no one to give me
counsel. Those few friendly words of advice from a stranger fell on my
ear like so many pearls, and I gathered them gratefully and stored
them fast in memory's richest jewel-casket.

After that he seemed to take an interest in my progress, gave me
valuable lessons, and occasionally lent me colors or brushes. I
wondered at myself for conversing with him fearlessly, for I was
usually shy of strangers; but his manner was so quiet and easy, his
tone so deferential, and he spoke so well on the subjects which
interested me most, that I forgot to be nervous, and listened and
answered with delight. He was copying a picture quite near to me, and
I felt humbled when returning to my own effort after glancing at his
masterly work. But he cheered me with kind words of encouragement,
which had a different effect upon me from my mother's fond admiration
and Hessie's eloquent praises. It was so new to be told to expect
success by one whose words might be hailed as a prophecy. I grew to
look forward with increased interest to my long day's work in the
gallery, and to think the place lonely when the kind artist {315} was
not there. Before my picture was finished I felt that I had gained a
friend.

One afternoon on leaving the gallery I was dismayed to find that it
rained heavily. Quite unprepared for the wet, I yet shrank from the
expense of a cab. While standing irresolute upon the steps, I
presently saw my artist friend at my side. He shot open his umbrella,
and remarked on the unpleasant change in the weather. Perhaps he saw
my distress in my face, for he asked me how far I had to go. He also
was going to Kensington, he said, and begged permission to shelter me.
I was obliged to accept his offer, for it was getting late. It was one
of those evenings so dreaded by women who are forced to walk alone in
London, when the light fades quickly out, and darkness drops suddenly
upon the city.

Tying my thick veil over my face, and wondering at myself, I took his
arm and walked by his side through the twilight streets. I thought of
a time long ago when I used to get upon tiptoe to clasp my father's
arm, he laughing at my childish pride, while we sauntered up and down
the old garden at home, far away. Never, since that dear arm had been
draped in the shroud, had my hand rested on a man's sleeve. Memory
kept vexing me sorely; and I, who seldom cried, swallowed tears behind
my veil and went along in silence. Still I liked the walk. As we
passed on, sliding easily through those rough crowds which at other
times I dreaded so much, I felt keenly how good it is to be taken care
of. I seemed to be moving along in a dream. Even when it began to
thunder, and lightning flashed across our eyes, the storm could not
rouse me from my reverie. I felt no fear, stoutly protected as I was.



II.

When we reached my home, a violent gust of rain made my friend step
inside the open doorway. I asked him to come into the parlor till the
shower should lighten; and he did so. My mother sat by the fender in
her armchair, the fire burned blithely, the tea-things were on the
table. The room looked very cosy after the stormy streets.

My mother received the unexpected visitor cordially. She had heard of
his kindness to me before. Hessie came in with the bread and butter,
in her brown housefrock, with her bright curls a little tossed, and
her blue eyes wondering wide at sight of a stranger. My mother asked
him to stay for tea, and I went upstairs to take off my bonnet.

Never before had I felt so anxious to have my hair neat, and to find
an immaculate collar and cuffs. My hands trembled as I tied my apron
and drew on my slippers. This was always to me a pleasant hour, when
my return made Hessie and my mother glad, when I got refreshingly
purified from the stains and odor of paint, and when we all had tea
together. To-night a certain excitement mingled with my usual quiet
thankful satisfaction.

I hurried down to the parlor. Hessie was filling the cups, and Edward
Vance (our new friend) was talking pleasantly to my mother. He looked
up as I came in, and when I reached my seat a sensation of gladness
was tingling from my heart's core to my finger-ends. My mother took my
hand and fondled it in hers, and thanked him for his kindness to her
"good child." I felt that he could not but sympathize with my dear,
sick, uncomplaining mother, and I somehow felt it sweet that she
should give me that little word of praise while speaking to him. After
tea Hessie played us dreamy melodies from Mozart in the firelight, and
I sat by mother's side tracing pictures in the burning coals.

After that first evening Edward Vance often came to our house. At
these times our conversation was chiefly upon art-subjects. Hessie and
my mother were deeply interested in them for my sake; I, for their
own, and for {316} the hopes which were entwined about them.

I thought him an ambitious man, one whose whole soul was bent upon
success. I liked him for it. I thought, "The noblest man is he who
concentrates all his powers upon one worthy aim, and wins a
laurel-crown from his fellow-men as the reward of his stead-fastness."
Yet he seemed often troubled when we asked him about his own works.

A remark I overheard one day in the gallery puzzled me. Some one said,
"Vance? Oh, yes! he's a clever copyist--a determined plodder; but he
originates nothing." I don't know that I had any right to be
indignant; but I was. That very evening I asked him to show us some of
his designs. His face got a dark troubled look upon it, and he evaded
the promise.

Meantime he took a keen interest in my work. He taught me how to
finish my etchings more delicately, and his remarks on my compositions
were always most useful. His suggestions were peculiarly happy. The
drawing was ever enhanced in strength or beauty by his advice. His
ideas were just and true; his taste daintily critical. This convinced
me that the remark overheard in the gallery was made either in
ignorance or ill-nature; or perhaps that there were more artists
called Vance than one.

He came often now, very often. I ceased to feel angry at myself for
starting when his knock came. Many small things, too trivial to be
mentioned, filled my life with a delicious calm, and breathed a
rose-colored atmosphere around me. Everything in my inner and outer
world had undergone a change. I grew subject to idle fits at my work;
but then the suspended energy came back with such a rush of power,
almost like inspiration, that I accomplished far more than I ever had
done in the former quiet days when there was little sunshine to be
had, and I thought I had been born to live contentedly under a cloud
all my life. Art seemed glorified a thousandfold in my eyes. The
galleries had looked to me before like dim treasuries of phantom
beauty, shadowy regions of romance and perfection, through the gates
of which I might peer, though the key was not mine. Now they teemed
with a ripe meaning; the meaning which many glorious souls that once
breathed and wrought on this earth have woven into their creations;--a
meaning which unlocked for me the world of love, and gave me long
bright visions of its beautiful vistas.

My mother looked from Edward Vance to me, and from me to him; and I
knew her thought. It sweetened yet more that food of happiness on
which I lived. Something said to me, "You may meet his eye fearlessly,
place your hand frankly in his clasp, follow his feet gladly."

One evening after he had gone my mother stroked my head lying on her
knee.

"You are very happy, Grace?" she said.

"I am, mother," I whispered.

"Ah! your life is set to music, my love," she murmured; "the old
tune."


III.

Never was one sister so proud of another as I of Hessie. She was only
seventeen, three years younger than I, and I felt almost a motherly
love for her. She was slight and fair, and childish both in face and
disposition. I gloried in her beauty; her head reminded me of
Raffaelle's angels. I thought that one day I should paint a picture
with Hessie for my model--a picture which should win the love and
admiration of all who gazed. One leisure time, in the midst of my
happiness, I suddenly resolved to commence the work. I chose a scene
from our favorite poem of _Enid_--the part where the mother goes to
her daughter's chamber, bearing Geraint's message, and finds

{317}

  'Half disarrayed, as to her rest, the girl,
  Whom first she kissed on either cheek, and then
  On either shining shoulder laid a hand,
  And kept her off, and gazed into her face,
  And told her all their converse in the hall,
  Proving her heart. But never light and shade
  Coursed one another more on open ground,
  Beneath a troubled heaven, than red and pale
  Across the face of Enid, hearing her;
  While slowly falling, as a scale that falls
  When weight is added only grain by grain,
  Sank her sweet head upon her gentle breast.
  Nor did she lift an eye, nor speak a word,
  Rapt in the fear, and in the wonder of it."

I made a sketch. Never had I been so happy in any attempt. My own
mother, worn, sad, dignified--I gave her face and form to the poet's
conception of Enid's mother. And Hessie made a very lovely Enid, with
the white drapery clinging to her round shoulders, and her golden head
drooped. I wrought out all the accessories with scrupulous care--the
shadowy old tower-chamber; the open window, and the dim drifts of
cloud beyond; the stirring tapestry; the lamp upon the table, flinging
its yellow light on the rich faded dress of the mother and on Enid's
glistening hair.

I toiled at the sketch almost as if I had meant to make it a finished
picture. It was large. I lavished labor upon it with a passionate
energy. I never wearied of conjuring up ideas of beauty, to lay them
in luxurious profusion under my brush. I gloried in the work of my
hands; and yet I felt impatient when others praised it. I burned to
show them what the finished picture should prove to be. This sketch,
much as I prized it as an earnest of future success, I held only as
the shadow of that which must one day live in perfection on the
canvas. So I raved in my dreams.

I had resolved not to speak of it to Edward Vance till I had completed
the sketch. I had Hessie's promise not to show it, not to tell him. I
worked at it daily, not feeling that I worked, but only that I
lived--only that my soul was accomplishing its appointed task of
creation; that it breathed in its element, revelled in its God-given
power; that it was uttering that which should stir many other souls
with a myriad blessed inspirations, long after the worn body had
refused to shelter it longer, and eternity had summoned it from the
world of endeavor to that rest which, in the fever of its earnestness,
it knew not yet how to appreciate.

And Hessie stood for me, patient day after day.

        "But never light and shade
  Coursed one another more on open ground,
  Beneath a troubled heaven, than red and pale
  Across the face of Enid, hearing her."

I read aloud the passage again and again, that Hessie might feel it as
well as I. And truly, as I worked, the color on Hessie's cheek changed
and changed under my eyes, till I forgot my purpose in wondering at
her. One day, while I laid down my brush questioning her, she burst
into tears, and sobbed in childish impetuous distress. She would not
answer my anxious questions; she shunned my sympathy.

But that night, before I slept, I had my little sister's secret. She
worshipped Edward Vance as simple childish natures worship heroes whom
they exalt to the rank of gods.



IV.

I had no more joy, no more heart to work. I laid my sketch in my
portfolio, and said that it was finished, and that I should not
commence the picture at present. I could not work looking at Hessie's
changed face.

What should I do? How should I restore happiness to my little sister?
This was the question which haunted me. Night or day it would give me
no peace. I could not rest at home. I undertook a work once more at
the National Gallery, and stayed away all day. Often I sat for hours,
and did nothing, thinking with painful pertinacity of that one
question, "How should I restore happiness to my little sister?" Edward
Vance had never asked me to be his wife. Perhaps Hessie did not guess
that I had believed and hoped that he would. My mother--but then a
mother's eye will see where others are blind.

I sat in my deserted corner of the gallery, dropping tears into my
lap, {318} and pondering my question. If my mother were dead, if I
were married, how lonely would not Hessie be in her misery! But if
Hessie were a happy wife, why, I could support myself and live in
peace and independence, blessed with congenial occupation, solaced by
the love and joy of my art. "Edward Vance must never ask me to be his
wife." I repeated the words again and again, till the resolve burnt
itself into my heart.

"I believe that he has loved me, that he loves me now; but I can so
wrap myself up in my work, so seem to forget him in my art, that I
shall cease to be loveable; and then he must, he will, perceive
Hessie's affection, and take her to his heart. He cannot help it,
beautiful and fresh and simple as she is." So I looked at her face as
she lay dreaming, sullen and grieved like a vexed child, even in
sleep; and I vowed to carry out my strange resolve--to crush my love
for Edward, to destroy his for me, to link the two dear ones together,
and go on my life alone, with no comforter but God and my toil. It was
but a short time since I had contemplated such a prospect with calm
content; and why could I not forget all that had lately been, and
return to my serene quiet? I said it should be so.

But in this I assumed a power over my own destiny and the destinies of
others which none but God had a right to sway, and he had entered it
against me in the great book of good and evil. He had planted in my
heart a natural affection, and laid at my feet a treasure of
happiness. I had stretched forth my hand to uproot that beautiful
flower which should have borne me joy. I had turned aside from the
rich gift, and thought to sweep it from my path. I had vowed to do
evil, that good might come of it; and a mighty hand was already
extended to punish my presumption.



V.

In pursuance of my resolve, I absented myself from home as much as
possible, leaving Hessie to entertain Edward Vance when he came. I did
not intend to quarrel with him--I could not have done that; but I
wanted him to see more of Hessie and less of me. I had so much faith
in her superior beauty and loveableness, that in the morbid frame of
mind into which I had fretted myself, I believed my object would soon
be accomplished.

I had succeeded in obtaining some tuitions; and between the time which
they occupied and the hours spent in the galleries, I was very little
at home. My mother looked at me uneasily; but I smiled and deceived
her with pleasant words. On coming home late, I sometimes heard that
Mr. Vance had been there; my mother always told me--Hessie never. I
longed to lay my head on my mother's knee and say, "Did he ask for
me?" but the voice never would come.

Sometimes he came, as of old, to spend the whole evening. I would not
notice how he bore my altered ways. I sat all the time apart by the
window, seemingly absorbed, puzzling out some difficult design, or
working up some careful etching. I did not ask his advice; I did not
claim his sympathy with my occupation. I sat wrapped up within myself,
grave and ungenial, while he lingered by Hessie at the piano, and
asked her to play her soft airs again. And all the time I sat staring
from my paper into the little patch of garden under the window,
twining my sorrow about the old solitary tree, building my unhealthy
purpose into the dull wall of discolored brick, which shut us and our
troubles from our neighbors. I sat listening to the plaintive tunes
with which so many associations were inwoven, hearing Hessie's musical
prattle--she was always gay while he stayed--and Edward's rich voice
and pleasant laugh, contrasting with them as a deep wave breaks in
among the echoes of a rippling creek. I sat and listened in silence,
while all my life {319} rebelled in every vein and pulse at the false
part I acted.

But it was too late now to retract. Though every day proved to me that
the task I had undertaken was too difficult, the step had been made
and could not be retraced. I had lifted my burden, and I must bear it
even to the end. I had no doubt from Hessie's shy happy face that at
least my object must be attained, whatever it might cost myself.

I had never shown Edward Vance the dear sketch for which I had once so
keenly coveted his approval. So absorbed had I lately been in other
thoughts, that it lay by forgotten. One evening my mother desired
Hessie to bring it out and show it to him. I seldom looked at him, but
for a moment I now glanced at his face. His eyelids flickered, and a
strange expression passed over his countenance. It was admiration,
surprise, and something else--I knew not what; something strange and
unpleasant. The admiration, I jealously believed, was for Hessie's
face in its downcast beauty. He gazed at it long, but put it aside
with a few cold words of commendation. I felt, with an intolerable
pang, that even so he had put me aside, and thought no more about me.
But at different times afterward I saw him glance to where the sketch
lay.

That night my mother kept me with her after Hessie had gone to bed.
She questioned me anxiously; asked me if I had quarrelled with Edward
Vance. I said, "No, mother, why should we quarrel?"

By-and-by she said, "Grace, can it be that he has not asked you to be
his wife?"

I answered quickly, "Oh, no; it is Hessie whom he loves."

My mother looked puzzled and grieved, though I smiled in her face.


VI.

One evening I came home and found Hessie dull and out of humor. My
mother told me that Mr. Vance had called and mentioned that he was
about to leave town for some weeks. He had left his regards for me. I
knew by Hessie's face that he had said nothing to make her happy
during his absence.

Some evenings after, I found my mother sitting alone in the parlor,
and on going upstairs Hessie curled up on our bed with her face in the
pillows. I so loved this little sister, that I could not endure to see
her grieve without sharing her vexation. So I sat down by her side and
drew her head upon my shoulder. Sitting thus I coaxed her trouble from
her. She had been out walking, and had met Edward Vance in Kensington.
He had seen her. He had pretended not to see her. He had avoided her.

At first this seemed so very unlikely, I jested with her, laughed at
her, said she must have been mistaken. He had been delayed in London,
and had not recognized her. But Hessie declared vehemently that he had
purposely avoided her, and cried as though her heart would break.

Then I said: "Hessie, if he be a person to behave so, we need neither
of us trouble ourselves about him. We lived before we knew him, and I
dare say we shall get on very well now that he has gone." But Hessie
only stared and turned her face from me. She could not understand such
a view of the case. She thought I did not feel for her.

After that the weeks passed drearily. We heard no news of Edward
Vance; but he had not left London, for I saw him once in the street. I
told Hessie, for I thought it right to rouse her a little rudely from
the despondent state into which she had fallen. I tried, gently but
decidedly, to make her understand that we had looked on as a steadfast
friend one who for some reason had been tired of us, and made an
excuse to drop our acquaintance; and that she would be doing serious
injury to her self-respect did she give him one more thought.

For myself I mused much upon his {320} strange conduct. It remained an
enigma to me. A dull listlessness hung upon me, which was more
terrible than physical pain. I spent the days at home, because I could
not leave Hessie to mope her life away, and damp my mother's spirits
with her sad face. So I had not even the obligation of going out to
daily work to stimulate me to healthful action. Now, indeed, was my
life weary and burdensome for one dark space, which, thank God and his
gift of strong energy, was not of vast compass. So long as we
sacrifice ourselves for those we love, whether in reality or in
imagination, something sublime in the idea of our purpose--whether that
purpose be mistaken or not--is yet a rock to lean on in the weakest
hour of anguish. But when our eyes are opened, and we see that we have
only dragged others as well as ourselves deeper into misery, then
indeed it is hard to "suffer and be strong."



VII.

I had done nothing of late--nothing, although I had toiled
incessantly; for I did not dignify with the name of "work" the
soulless mechanical drudgery which had kept me from home during the
past months. My spirit had grovelled in a state of prostration,
stripped of its wings and its wand of power. I now knelt and cried:
"Give, oh, give me back my creative impulse!"

I had never since looked at the beloved sketch. I longed now to draw
it forth, and commence the picture while I stayed at home. But Hessie
shuddered when I spoke of it, and looked so terrified, pleading that
she could not stand for me, that I gave up the idea for the time. I
thought she had distressing memories connected with it, and I tried to
rid her of them by speaking cheerfully of how successful I expected
the picture to be, and what pleasure we should have in working at it.
I regretted bitterly that I had not commenced it long before, just
after I had made the sketch. I should then, perhaps, have had it
finished in time for the Exhibition drawing near. But that was
impossible now. I must wait in patience for another year. I did not at
that time even look between the leaves of the portfolio. Though I
thought it right to talk briskly and cheerily about it for both our
sakes, I had sickening associations with that work of my short,
brilliant day of happiness which Hessie, with all her childish
grieving, could hardly have comprehended.

I allowed some time to pass, and at last I thought Hessie's whim had
been indulged long enough. She must learn how to meet a shock and
outlive it. I did not like the idea of having ghosts in the house--
skeletons of unhealthy sentiment hidden away in unapproachable
chambers. The shadow should be hunted from its corner into the light.
The sketch must grow into a picture, which a new aspect of things must
despoil of all stinging associations.

I went to seek the sketch; but the sketch was gone. I sought it in
every part of the house; but to no purpose. It had quite disappeared.
I mentioned the strange circumstance to my mother in Hessie's
presence, and Hessie suddenly left the room. Then it struck me for the
first time that my sister had either destroyed it (which I could
hardly believe), or that some accident had happened to it in her
hands. I observed that she never alluded to it, never inquired if I
had found it. I did not question her about it. Indeed I felt too much
vexed to speak of it. I grieved more for its loss than I had believed
it remained in me to grieve at any fresh trial. I loved it as we do
love the creation on which we have lavished the most precious riches
of our mind, on which we have spent our toil, in which we have
conquered difficulty, striven and achieved, struggled and triumphed. I
should have loved it all my life, hanging in my own chamber, if no one
might ever see it but myself; and borne my {321} sorrows with a better
spirit, and tasted keener joys, while thanking God that I had been
permitted to call it into existence. I gloried too much in the work of
my own hands, and I was punished.

Never since have I tasted that vivid sense of delight in any
achievement of my own. I have worked as zealously, and more
successfully, but it has been with a humbler heart. And looking
backward, I now believe that it was my inner happiness which haloed my
creation with a beauty that was half in my own glad eyes.


VIII.

The succeeding few months were quiet, in the dullest sense of the
word. Strive as I would, the sunshine had gone from our home. Hessie
was no longer the bright Hessie of old days.

I tried to forget my dear sketch of "Enid," and made several attempts
to paint some other picture; but the Exhibition drew near, and I had
nothing done.

One bright May morning I read in the newspaper an account of the
Academy Exhibition. The list of artists and their works stirred me
with a strange trouble. Tears rose in my eyes and blotted out the
words. I spread the paper on the table before me, pressed my temples
with my fingers, and travelled slowly through the criticisms and
praises which occupied some columns. Why was there no work of mine
mentioned there? Why had I lost my time so miserably during the past
months? And questioning myself thus, I was conscious of two sins upon
my own head. The first was in glorying in and worshipping the creation
of my own labor: the second, in exalting myself upon an imaginary
pinnacle of heroism by a fancied self-sacrifice, and having brought
deeper trouble upon the sister whose happiness I thought to compass. I
wept the choking tears out of my throat and read on.

Something dazzled my eyes for a moment, and brought the blood to my
forehead. A picture was mentioned with enthusiastic praise; a picture
by E. Vance. It was called "Enid," and was interpreted by a quotation
from the poem; my passage--the subject of my lost sketch! A strange
idea glanced across my mind. I half smiled at it and put it away. But
all day I was restless; and that evening I proposed to Hessie an
expedition early next morning to see the pictures. My mother longed to
go with us; but as she could not, I promised to bring home a
catalogue, and describe each painting to the best of my memory.

With a feverish haste I sought out the picture of "Enid" by E. Vance.
Was I dreaming? I passed my hand across my eyes as though some
imaginary scene had come between me and the canvas. I did not feel
Hessie's hand dropping from my arm. I stood transfixed, grasping the
catalogue, and staring at the picture before me.

It was my "Enid." My own in form, attitude, tint, and expression. It
was the "Enid" of my dreams realized; the "Enid" of my labor wrought
to completion; the "Enid" of my lost sketch ennobled, perfected,
glorified.

My work on which I had lavished my love and toil was there, and it was
not mine.

Another, a more skilled, a subtler hand, had brought out its meaning
with delicate appreciation, ripened its original purpose, enriched the
subdued depths of its coloring, etherealized the whole by the purest
finish. But that hand had robbed me, with cruel cowardly deliberation.
It had stolen my mellow fruit; taken my sweetest rose and planted it
in a strange garden. I felt the wrong heavy and sore upon me. I
resented it fiercely. I could not endure to look at the admiring faces
around me. I turned away sick and trembling, while the blood pulsed
indignantly in my throat and beat painfully at my temples.

Why should he who had already so troubled my life enjoy success and
gold which should have been mine? {322} "O mother, mother!" I inwardly
cried, "how much would the price of this picture have done for you!"
And I thought of her yearnings for the scent of sea spray, and the
taste of sea breath, which the scanty purse forbade to be satisfied.

I sought Hessie, and found her sitting alone and very pale. I said,
"Come home, Hessie;" and she followed me, obeying like a child.

When we reached our house, I was thankful that my mother slept upon
the couch, for I needed a time to calm myself, and think and pray. I
threw away my bonnet, and sat down by our bedside. Hessie came and
crept to my feet.

"Grace," she sobbed, "can you ever forgive me? I gave him the sketch;
but I declare on my knees that I did not know why he wanted it."

For a moment I felt very harsh and stern, but my woman's nature
conquered. What were all the pictures in the world compared with my
little sister's grief? I bent over her, and wiped away the tears from
her face.

"Don't say any more about it, Hessie," I said; "I'd rather not hear
any more. I know that you meant to do me no wrong. It is with him that
the injustice lies. But, Hessie, I will only ask you one question: Can
you--do you think you ought to waste a regret on such a person?"

Hessie dried up her tears with more resolution than I had ever seen
her show before, and answered:

"No, no, Grace dear; I am cured now."

And then she put her arms about my neck, asking my pardon for all her
past wilful conduct; and in one long embrace all the estrangement was
swept away, and we two sisters were restored to one another. Hessie
went off to get tea ready with a cheerful step, and I to make the room
cosy and kiss my mother awake, when the fire glowed and the pleasant
meal was on the table. We both sat by her with bright faces, and told
her all about the pictures we could remember; all except one.



IX.

* * * * * *

I have outlived all that trouble about the picture of "Enid," and many
troubles beside; I have kissed my mother's dear face in her coffin. I
have won success, and I have won gold; and neither seem to me quite
the boons some hold them to be.

Hessie's early grief passed away like a spring shower. She is now a
happy wife; and I have at this moment by my side a little gold-haired
fairy thing, her child. My dear sister's happiness is secured; her
boat of life is safe at anchor. Edward Vance's shadow only crossed her
path and passed away. She never met him since the old days; I but
once. His career has strangely disappointed his friends.

For me, my life is calm and contented. I think the healthy-spirited
always make for themselves happiness out of whatever materials may be
around them; and I find rich un-wrought treasure on every side,
whithersoever I turn my eyes. My sister's glad smile is a blessing on
my life; and one rare joy is the bright-faced little lisper at my
side, who peers over my shoulder with spiritual eyes, and asks
mysterious questions about my work. And, standing always by my side
like an angel, bearing the wand of power and the wings of peace, I
have my friend, my beautiful art. She fills my days with purpose and
my nights with sweet rest and dreams. She places in my hands the means
of doing good to others. While illumining my upward path, she seems to
beckon me higher and yet higher. Looking ever in her dear eyes, I
bless God for the abundance of his gifts; and I muse serenely on the
time when she, the interpreter of the ideal here on earth, will
conduct me to the gates of eternal beauty.

------

{323}

From Once a Week.

IMPERIAL AND ROYAL AUTHORS.


BY S. BARING GOULD.


Is the present Emperor of the French aware that in publishing his _Vie
de César_, he is treading a beaten path? that his predecessors on the
French throne have, from a remote age, sought to unite the fame of
authorship with the glory of regal position? and is he aware of the
fact, that their efforts in this quarter have not unfrequently been
accounted dead failures? Julius Caesar has already been handled by one
of them, and with poor success, for Louis XIV., at the age of sixteen,
produced a translation of the first book of the Commentaries of
Caesar, under the title _Guerre des Suisses, traduite dupremier livre
des Commentaires de Jules César, par Louis XI V., Dieu-Donné, roi de
France et de Navarre_. This work, consisting of eighteen pages, was
printed at the royal press in folio, 1651.

Louis XIV., however, was not the first French monarch to try his hand
upon Julius Caesar; he had been preceded by Henry IV., who translated
the whole work, and did not give it up after the first book. Will the
present _Vie de César_ reach a second volume? and, if it does, will it
extend to a fourth? Those who know best the occupations of the
imperial writer, say that it might be rash to feel sure beyond the
first volume, or to calculate on more than a second. Let us see
whether there is much novelty in the circumstance of a monarch
becoming an author. We shall only look at the emperors of Rome and the
kings of France. We know well enough that our own Alfred translated
Boethius, Orosius, and Bede, and that Henry VIII. won the title of
"Defender of the Faith" by his literary tilt with Luther; and that
James I. wrote against tobacco; and we are not disposed to revive the
dispute about the Eikon Basilike.

Let us then turn to the Roman emperors after Caesar, who was an author
himself, or neither Henry IV., nor Louis XIV., nor Louis Napoleon,
would have had much to say about him.

Augustus, we are told by Suetonius, composed several works, which he
was wont to read to a circle of friends. Among these were,
"Exhortations to the Study of Philosophy," which we have no doubt the
select circle listened to with possible edification, and probable
ennui. He wrote likewise his own memoirs in thirteen books, but he
never finished them, or brought them beyond the Cantabrian war. His
epigrams were written in his bath. He commenced a tragedy upon Ajax,
but, little pleased with it, he destroyed it; and in answer to the
select circle which asked, "What had become of Ajax?" "Ah! poor
fellow!" replied the emperor, "he fell upon the sponge, and perished;"
meaning that he had washed the composition off his papyrus.

Tiberius, says the same author, composed a lyric poem on the death of
Julius Caesar, but his style was full of affectation and conceits.

Claudius suffered from the same passion for becoming an author, and
composed several books of history, as well as memoirs of his own life,
and these were read in public, for the friendly circle was too narrow
for his ambition.

He also invented three letters, which he supposed were necessary for
the perfection of the alphabet, and he wrote a pamphlet on the
subject, before assuming the purple. {324} After having become
emperor, he enforced their use. He wrote also, in Greek, twenty books
of Tyrian, and eight of Carthaginian history, which were read publicly
every year in Alexandria. Nero composed verses, Domitian a treatise on
hair-dressing, Adrian his own life; Marcus Aurelius wrote his
commentaries, which are lost, and his moral reflections, and letters
to Fronto, which are still extant. Julian the Apostate was the author
of a curious work, the "Misopogon, or Foe to the Beard," a clever and
witty squib directed against the effeminate inhabitants of Antioch. A
few passages from this work will not be out of place.

"I begin at my face, which is wanting in all that is agreeable, noble,
and good; so I, morose and old, have tacked on to it this long beard,
to punish it for its ugliness. In this dense beard perhaps little
insects stroll, as do beasts in a forest; I leave them alone. This
beard constrains me to eat and to drink with the utmost
circumspection, or I should infallibly make a mess of it. As good luck
will have it, I am not given to kissing, or to receiving kisses, for a
beard like mine is inconvenient on that head, as it does not allow the
contact of lips. .... You say that you could twine ropes out of my
beard; try it, only take care that the roughness of the hair does not
take the skin off your soft and delicate hands."

Valentinian I. is said to have emulated Ausonius in licentious poetry.

Of the later emperors some have obtained celebrity by their writings.

Leo VI., surnamed the Wise, was the author of a very interesting and
precious treatise on the art of warfare. He also composed some
prophecies, sufficiently obscure to make the Greeks in after ages find
them apply to various events as they occurred. Constantine VI. was
also an eminent contributor to literature. This prince had been early
kept from public affairs by his uncle Alexander, and his mother Zoe,
so that he had sought pleasure and employment in study. After having
collected an enormous library, which he threw open to the public, he
employed both himself and numerous scribes in making collections of
extracts from the principal classic authors. The most important of
these, and that to which he attached his own name, consisted of a mass
of choice fragments, gathered into fifty-three books. This vast work
is lost, together with many of the books cited, except only two parts:
one treating of embassies, the other of virtues and vices. Constantine
also wrote a curious geographical account of the provinces of the
Greek empire, a treatise on the administration of government, and
another on the ceremonies observed in the Byzantine Court; a life of
the Emperor Basil, an account of the famous image of Edessa, and a few
other trifles.

Let us now turn to the French monarchs, and we shall find that they
began early to take the pen in hand; and, unfortunately, the very
first royal literary work in France was a blunder. King Chilperic
wrote a treatise on the Trinity, under the impression that he had a
gift for theological definition, and he signalized his error by
asserting that the word person should not be used in speaking of the
three members of the Trinity. Having burned his fingers by touching
theology, the semi-barbarian king attempted poetry with like success.
But his pretensions did not end there. He added the Greek letter u to
the Latin alphabet, and three characters of his own invention, so as
to introduce into that language certain Teutonic sounds. "He sent
orders," writes Gregory of Tours, "into every city of his kingdom,
that all children should be taught in this manner, and that ancient
written books should be effaced, and rewritten in the new style."

The great and wise Charlemagne, perceiving the glories of his native
tongue, and the beauties of his national poetry, carefully collected
the Teutonic national poems, and commenced a grammar of the language.
Robert II. {325} was not only a scholar, but a musician; he composed
some of the Latin hymns still in use in the Church, with their
accompanying melodies. His queen, Constantia, seeing him engaged on
his sacred poetry, one day, in joke, asked him to write something in
memory of her. He at once composed the hymn, _O constantia martyrum_,
which the queen, not understanding Latin, but hearing her name
occurring in the first line, supposed to be a poem in her honor.

Louis XI. is supposed to have contributed to the _Cent Nouvelles
nouvelles_, which collection, however much credit it may do him in a
literary point of view, is inexcusably wanting in decency.

A volume of poems by Francis I. exists in MS. in the Imperial Library.
It contains, among other interesting matter, a prose letter, and
another in verse, written from his prison to one of his mistresses.
The king was bad in his orthography, as may be judged from the
following portion of a letter written by him to his mother at the
raising of the siege of Mézieres:--

_"Madame, tout asetheure (à cette heure), yn sy (ainsi) que je me
vouloys mettre o lyt (au lit), est arycé (arrivé) Laval, lequel m'a
aporté la serteneté (certitude) deu lèvemant du syège de Mésyères."_

I presume a schoolboy would be whipped if he wrote as bad a letter as
this king.

Louis XIII. had, says his epitaph, "a hundred virtues of a valet, not
one of a master;" but he could write sonnets, and compose the music
for them. The best, perhaps, is that composed on, or for, Madame de
Hautefort,--

      "Tu crois, bean soleil!
  Qu'à ton éclat rien n'est pareil;
      Mais quoi! tu pâlis
      Auprès d'Amaryllis,"

--set to music which is charming. But Louis XIII. was more of a barber,
gardener, pastrycook, and farmer, than an author.

Louis XIV., beside his translation of Caesar's Commentaries, Book I.,
composed _Memoires historiques, politiques, et militaires;_ but his
writings were not remarkable, as his education had been so neglected
by his mother and Mazarin, that, according to La Porte, his valet, he
was not allowed to have the history of France read to him, even for
the sake of sending him to sleep.

Louis XV. wrote a little treatise on the course of the rivers of
Europe, and printed it with his own hands. It consisted of sixty-two
pages, and contained nothing which was not perfectly well known
before, as, for instance, that the Thames ran into the North Sea or
German Ocean, and that the Rhone actually fell into the Mediterranean.
In 1766 appeared a description of the forest of Compiègne, and guide
to the forest, by Louis, afterward Louis XVI., composed by the
unfortunate prince at the age of twelve.

Louis XVIII. wrote an account of a journey from Paris to Coblentz,
which was published in 1823.

This work was full of inaccuracies and mistakes, so that it became the
prey of critics.

Finally, Napoleon I. wrote much, but not in the way of bookmaking,
though he began a history of Corsica, which remained in MS. His
writings have been collected and published in five volumes, under the
title, _OEuvres de Napoléon Bonaparte._ 8vo. 1821.

----

{326}

From The Lamp.

HISTORY OF A BLIND DEAF-MUTE.


TRANSLATED FROM THE FRENCH OF M. CARTON,
HEAD OF THE INSTITUTE FOR THE
DEAF AND DUMB AT BRUGES, BY CECILIA CADDELL.


Anna, the deaf, dumb, and blind girl, whose story I am about to
relate, was born at Ostend, of poor but honest parents, in the year
1818. She was blind from her birth, but during the first years of her
infancy appeared to have some sense of hearing. This, unfortunately,
soon vanished, leaving her blind, deaf, and dumb; one of the three
persons thus trebly afflicted existing at this moment in the province
of West Flanders. Losing both her parents while still an infant, she
was brought up by her grandmother, who received aid for the purpose
from the "Commission des Hospices" of the town. To the good offices of
these gentlemen she is likewise indebted for the education she has
since received; for when I first proposed taking her into my
establishment, both her aunt and her grandmother were most unwilling
to part with her, fearing, very naturally, that strangers would never
give her the affectionate care which, in her helpless condition, she
so abundantly required; they only yielded at last to the
representations and entreaties of their charitable friends. Their love
for this poor child, who could never have been anything but an anxiety
and expense to them, was indeed most touching; and they wept bitterly
when they parted from her; declaring, in their simple but expressive
language, that I was taking away from them the blessing of their
house. They were soon satisfied, however, that they had acted for the
best; and having once convinced themselves of her improvement both in
health and happiness, they never, to the day of their death, ceased to
rejoice at the decision which they had come to in her regard. When
Anna was first entrusted to my care, her relations, and every one else
who knew her, supposed her to be an idiot, and this had been their
principal reason for opposing me in my first efforts for her
instruction. Poor themselves and ignorant, and earning their bread by
the labor of their own hands, they had had neither time nor thought to
bestow on the development of this intellect, closed as it was against
all the more ordinary methods of instruction; and the child had been
left, of necessity, to her own resources for occupation and amusement.
Few, indeed, and trivial these resources were! Blind, and fearing even
to move without assistance; deaf, and incapable of hearing a syllable
of the conversation that was going on around her; dumb, and unable to
communicate her most pressing wants save by that unearthly and
unwilling cry which the deaf mutes are compelled to resort to, like
animals in the moment of their utmost need,--the child had remained day
after day seated in the same corner of the cottage. Knowing nothing of
the bright sunshine, or the green field, or the sweet smell of
flowers; nothing of the sports of childhood or its tasks; night the
same as day in her estimation, excepting for its sleep; winter only
distinguished from summer by the sharper air without, and the
increased heat of the wood-piled fire within--no wonder that she
seemed an idiot. Her only amusement--the only thing approaching to
occupation which her friends had been able to procure her--consisted,
at first, in a string of glass beads. These Anna amused herself by
taking off and {327} putting on again at least twenty times a day; and
this and the poor meals, which she seemed to take without appetite or
pleasure, were the only breaks in the twelve long hours of her
solitary days. Some charitable person at last made her a present of a
doll; and with this doll she played, after her own fashion, until she
was twenty years of age. She never, in fact, lost her taste for it
until she had succeeded in learning to knit; then it was cast from her
with disdain, and she never afterward recurred to it for amusement.

Notwithstanding her enforced inaction, she managed to tear her clothes
continually. Perhaps, poor child, she found some relief from the
tedium of her daily life in this semblance of an occupation, for she
had an insuperable objection to changing her tattered garments; and it
was a long time before we could induce her to do so with a good grace.
Once, however, accustomed to the change, she seemed to take pleasure
in it, delighted in new clothes, and used often to come of her own
accord to beg that the old ones might be washed. There was nothing
very prepossessing in her external appearance; at first it was almost
repulsive. She was of the ordinary height of a girl of her age; but
her hands were small and thin, from want of use, as those of a little
child. When she first came to my establishment her head was bowed down
on her neck from weakness; she had sore eyes; her face was covered
with a cutaneous eruption; she walked with difficulty, and appeared to
dislike the exertion excessively. Afterward, care and good feeding
improved her very much. She acquired strength; and the skin disease
which had been her chief disfigurement entirely disappeared. I have no
intention of describing all that she did and said (by signs), or all
the pains and trouble that she cost us in the early months of her
residence among us. During that time, however, I kept a journal of her
conduct; which, as a history of her mental development, is so curious,
that I venture to lay some extracts from it before my readers, the
remainder being reserved for future publication.

I must begin by explaining my ideas as to the proper method to be
pursued in instructing these unfortunates. I try, in the first place,
to put myself in the place of a person deaf, blind, and dumb; and then
ask myself, "What do I know, what can I know, in such a state?" In my
first course of instruction, therefore, I make it a rule never to give
the word until certain that the thing which that word expresses has
been clearly understood. In the case of Anna there was an additional
difficulty. Not only had she no' preconceived idea of the use or
nature of a word, but her blindness prevented her seeing the
connection between it and the substance it was intended to represent.
Nor would it be sufficient for her full instruction that she should
learn by the touch to distinguish one word from another; she would
also require to be taught the elements of which words were themselves
composed. If I began by giving her words alone, she would never have
learned to distinguish letters. If, on the other hand, I commenced
with letters, without attaching any especial idea to them, she would
have been disgusted, and have left off at the second lesson. A letter,
in fact, would have been nothing but a letter to her; for there would
be no means of making her comprehend that it was but the first step
toward the knowledge I was desirous of imparting. I resolved,
therefore, neither to try letters by themselves nor whole words in the
first lesson which I gave her. It was in the Flemish language, of
course; but the method I pursued would be equally applicable to any
other.

In order to give, at one and the same moment, the double idea of a
letter and a word, I chose a letter which had some resemblance to the
form I intended it to express, and gave it the significance of an
entire word. For {328} this purpose I fixed upon the letter _O_, and
made her understand that this letter signified mouth, in fact it is
one of the four letters which express the word in Flemish--_mond_,
mouth. Afterward I took a double _o(00)_, which are the first letters
in the Flemish, _oog_, eye. One O, then, signified mouth; two meant
eyes. The lesson was easy; she caught it in a moment; and thus, with
two words and two ideas attached to them, her dictionary was
commenced. It was quite possible, however, that as these letters
represented, to a certain extent, the objects of which they were the
expression, she might fall into the error of supposing that all
letters did the same; and in order to prevent this mistake, I
immediately added the letter _R_ to her collection.

This not only became a new acquisition for her dictionary, but, by
forming with the two previous letters the Flemish word _oor_ (ear), it
became an easy transition between the natural expression dependent on
the form, which she had already acquired, and the arbitrary, dependent
on the spelling, which it was my object she should acquire. Proceeding
on this principle, and always taking care to commence the lesson from
a point already known, we lessened the difficulties, and made rapid
progress. A cap, an apron, a ribbon, or gown, always interest the sex;
and, like any other girl, Anna valued them extremely. I took care
likewise often to choose words expressive of anything she liked,
especially to eat; and it was by the proper use of these words that
she first convinced me how completely she had seized upon the meaning
of my lessons. Whenever she was desirous of obtaining any little
dainty, she used to point to the word in her collection; and of course
it was given to her immediately. Poor child! her joy, when she found
she could really make herself understood, was very touching; and her
surprise was nearly equal to her joy.

A person born blind does not naturally make signs; for a sign
addresses itself to the sight, and of the faculty of sight they have
no conception. A sign in relief, however--a sign which they can
distinguish by the touch, and by means of which they can communicate
with their fellow-men--must come to these benighted intelligences like
a message of mercy from God himself. We always gave Anna the object,
in order to make her comprehend the word--the substance, to explain
the substantive. One day, not long after her arrival, her instructress
gave her the word _egg_, placing one at the same time before her; and
Anna immediately made signs that she wished to eat it. She offered me
at the same moment a small piece of money, which some one had given
her, as if for the purpose of buying the food. The bargain was made at
once; and she ate the egg, while I pocketed the money. I quite
expected she would try this over again, for she had some money, and
was fond of eggs. The very next day, in fact, she searched the word
out in her vocabulary, and brought it to her instructress, with an air
that quite explained her meaning. I placed an egg before her; she
touched it--touched the word; coaxed and patted the egg; and at last
burst into a fit of laughter, caused, no doubt, by pleasant
astonishment at having so easily obtained her wish. I hoped and
expected that she would propose to purchase, for I was anxious to find
out if she had any real notion of the use of money. My hopes were
fulfilled, for she offered at once her price of two centimes, with the
evident intention of making a purchase. Much to her astonishment,
however, this time I took both the money and the egg. At first she
laughed, evidently thinking that I was only joking. I gave her time to
comprehend that I was serious, and that, having taken both, I meant to
keep them. She acquiesced at last with regard to the egg; it was mine,
and I had a right to keep it if I liked; but she was indignant that I
did not return the money. She asked for it in {329} every way she was
capable of asking, and grew at last both red and angry at the delay. I
had tried her sufficiently. It was high time to prove myself an honest
man; so I gave her back her money, and she restored me to her good
graces. I was happy indeed to find so clear a sense of justice, so
complete a knowledge of the value of "mine" and "thine," in a creature
so defective in her animal organization.

Once in possession of a little stock of words, Anna was never weary of
augmenting it, and she soon found out a way of compelling us, almost,
to satisfy her wish. She would take the hand of her mistress, and with
it imitate the action of writing, by making points upon the paper with
the finger. If her wishes were complied with, she was delighted; but
if, to try her, the mistress pretended to hesitate, then Anna took the
matter into her own hands, and positively refused to do anything else.
Every other employment suggested to her would be indignantly rejected,
and she would persist in asking over and over again for the word she
wanted, never resting or letting any one else rest until she got it.
The nuns, of course, always ended by complying with her desires; and
it would be hard to say which felt most delight,--the blind girl, who
had succeeded in adding to her small stock of knowledge, or the
religious, who by the aid of Providence had enabled her to do so.

A mother who hears for the first time the low stammering of her child
can alone form a conception of all one feels at such a moment, for God
is very good; and when he imposed upon society the task of instructing
the ignorant, he attached an ineffable delight to the accomplishment
of that duty.

When Anna knew how to read and understand about forty substantives, I
taught her the manual alphabet, and from that moment I could test her
knowledge with unfailing exactitude. She first read the word with her
fingers, and then repeated it by means of the dactology; it was a
lesson in reading and writing both. She was soon sufficiently advanced
to venture upon verbs. I began with the imperative mood; not only
because it is the simplest form of the verb, but also because I myself
would have to use it in giving her the lesson. She seized with
wonderful facility upon the relative positions of the substantive and
verb.

I always made her perform the action signified by the verb which she
had learned, and thus the lesson became quite an amusement to her.
However silly in appearance might be the association between the verb
and substantive, she never failed to apprehend it; and when told to do
anything ridiculous or out of the common way, she enjoyed the fun, and
never failed to execute the commission to the best of her ability. If
I told her to walk upon the table, she would take off her shoes, climb
up, and walk cautiously upon it; if told to eat the chair, after a
minute's hesitation as to the best manner of complying with the order,
she would take it up and pretend to devour it. One day she was
terribly embarrassed by some one writing the following phrase: "Throw
your head on the floor." She read the sentence over and over again to
make sure that she was not mistaken, laughed very much, and then
suddenly growing serious, shook her head, as much as to say, the thing
was absolutely impossible. At last, however, and as if to finish the
business, she took her head in both her hands, and made a gesture, as
if to fling it on the floor. Having done this, she evidently felt that
nothing more could be expected from her, and showed herself both
pleased and proud at having understood the phrase, and found so easy a
method of getting out of the difficulty.

She distinguished very readily between the verbs "to lay down" and "to
throw down," clearly comprehending that the one action was to be {330}
done with vivacity, the other with caution; and it was curious to
watch her perplexity when commanded to throw down anything liable to
be broken. She knew well what would be the consequence of the command,
and you could see the questioning that went on in her own mind as to
how it could be accomplished with least damage to the article in
question. She would begin by feeling all along the ground, and trying
to form an exact idea of the distance it would have to fall; and then
at last she would throw it down with a mixture of care and yet of
caution, which showed she was perfectly aware of the mischief she was
doing.

The moment she thoroughly understood the imperative, we had only to
add her name or that of one of the sisters to produce the indicative;
and then, by changing Anna into I, she passed easily to the pronouns,
as thus: "Strike the table;" "Anna strikes the table;" "I strike the
table." I had at first omitted the article; but I soon perceived my
mistake. We have no means of teaching a deaf-mute the reason for
preceding a substantive by an article; and still more impossible would
it be to give any plausible explanation of the distinction between the
genders. Habit does this for each of us when we learn our mother
tongue; and habit and frequent repetition did it so well for Anna,
that now she rarely, if ever, makes any mistake.

When she had advanced thus far, I made her observe that by adding the
letters _en_, which constitute our Flemish plural, several of the same
sort of substantives were intended to be expressed; and passing from
this to numbers, I gave her a lesson in numeration. She readily seized
upon both ideas; and constant practice soon made her perfect in their
application.

Verbs such as _jeter_, to throw down, _poser_, to lay down, naturally
introduced the use of prepositions to express the mode in which the
verb acts upon the substantive. This enabled me to make various
combinations with words known to her already; and I found it of great
use to place the same word in such different positions in a phrase as
to alter entirely, or at least modify, the meaning.

The last lesson which she received was to make use of and understand
the meaning of the pronouns "my," "your," "our," and the conjunction
"and." We have also made her comprehend the use and meaning of
adjectives expressive of forms, as "square," "round," etc., as well as
the physical and mental state of being implied in the words "good,"
"bad," "sick," "well," etc. She makes such phrases as the following,
and reads them easily when they are given to her in writing: "Give me
my knitting;" "My work is on the table;" "My apron is square."

One last observation I must make about the pronouns. The third person
singular or plural would have been difficult to Anna, since, being
blind, she could not have distinguished whether the action spoken of
had been done by one person or by several; by "him," in fact, or by
"they." The pronouns which she can most readily comprehend are the
first and second; and to these I generally confine her. For "he" or
"they" I have substituted "one:" "One strikes the table."

Anna might have been taught the others; but she would often probably
have been mistaken in their application, and would perhaps have ended
by supposing that there was no positive rule in their regard, and that
they might be used as it were at random.

People only learn willingly what they can clearly comprehend; and if
children dislike instruction, the fault is almost always with the
master. If the latter would but bring his intelligence to the level of
his pupils, he might be almost certain of their attention.

To sum up the whole, I will give the order in which I taught her the
different parts of speech necessary for the knowledge of a language.
The substantive, because, being itself an object, it falls more
immediately beneath the {331} recognition of the senses; the verb,
because by the verb alone we speak, and without it there could be no
language; the preposition, because it indicates the nature of the
action expressed by the verb; and finally, the adjective and the
adverb. I had many reasons for keeping back these two last to the end.
Neither of them is essential to a phrase which can be complete without
them. Anna would have been much retarded in her progress if I had
stopped to teach her the attributes of words, when words themselves
were what she wanted. She could learn language only by use and habit;
and it was of the highest importance that she should acquire that
habit as speedily as possible. I threw aside, therefore, without
hesitation, all that could embarrass her progress, and confined
myself, in the first instance, to such things as it was absolutely
essential she should know, in order to be able to converse at all. It
may be asked why I taught her to make phrases by means of whole words,
instead of giving her the letters of the alphabet and teaching her to
make words themselves. The result of the mode I did adopt must be my
answer. Anna has already a clear idea of language; all her
acquisitions in the way of words are classed in her mind as in a
dictionary, and ready to come forth at a moment's notice. The reason
for this rapid progress is very plain. It is far less troublesome to
take a whole word, and put it in the grammatical order it ought to
occupy, than to be obliged to make the word itself by means of
separate letters. She had need of all her attention to learn the
elements of a phrase; and it would have been imprudent to weaken that
attention by directing it also to learn the elements of words. I
divided difficulties in order to overcome them: this was the secret of
my method, and the cause of its success. My lessons were also almost
or entirely an amusement to her; and sometimes I composed a phrase
which she first read, and acted afterward. Sometimes it was I who
performed the action, while she gave me an account of what I had done
in writing.

It was a lesson at once in reading and in writing, in hearing and in
speaking; and the moment we had got thus far, communication by means
of language was established between us. I had given my lessons at
first by words or phrases written in a book; but now, to test more
perfectly the knowledge she had acquired, and to prevent her reading
becoming a mere matter of form and guess-work, I cut all her phrases
into words, gummed them upon cardboard, and threw them pell-mell into
a box, from which she had to take out every separate word that she
required for a phrase. This new exercise vexed her very much at first;
but if it was tedious, it was also sure. By degrees she became
accustomed to it, and at last seemed to prefer it to the book,
probably because it admitted of greater facilities for varying her
phrases. Nevertheless it was troublesome work; and I was curious to
see if Anna would seek, of her own accord, to arrange her words in
such a way as to avoid the trouble of hunting through the whole mass
for every separate one she wanted. It seemed not unlikely, for she was
very ingenious; and so, in fact, it happened.

From time to time I observed that she put aside certain words, and
kept them separate from the others; and it was impossible to mistake
her exultation when these selected words were called for in her
lesson. Of course I saw them as she put them by; and, in order to
encourage her, I managed to introduce them pretty often into our
conversations. Acting also upon this hint, I had a drawer divided into
small compartments placed in the table at which she took her lessons.
Each compartment was intended for a separate class of words, but she
was permitted to arrange them according to her own ideas; and the
moment a word had been examined and understood, she placed it in the
compartment to which she imagined it belonged. Nouns, pronouns, verbs,
articles--each {332} had their separate partition; but I observed, with
delight, that when I gave her the verb "to drink," instead of placing
it with the other verbs, she put it at once into the compartment she
had destined for liquids. Having remarked that it was always employed
with these substantives, it naturally struck her that its proper place
would be among them. To casual observers this may seem but a trifling
thing to mention, but it was an act of reasoning; and in their
half-mutilated natures the whole power of instruction hangs so
entirely on the capacity for passing by an act of reason from one fact
to another, from the known to that which is still unknown, that every
indication which a pupil gives of possessing such capacity is hailed
with delight by her teacher as an assurance of further progress.
Without it he knows that instruction would be impossible.



When Anna was first introduced into my establishment, she evidently
comprehended that she had fallen among strangers. She brought us her
poor playthings, and insisted on our examining them attentively, for
she was a baby still; a baby of twenty years of age indeed, but as
anxious to be caressed and as requiring of notice as a child of two
years old. When led in the evening to her bedside, she immediately
began to undress herself, and the next morning rose gaily, showing
herself much pleased with the good bed in which she had passed the
night. She made a little inclination of the head to the sister who
waited on her, as if to salute her. At breakfast we observed that she
ate with more cleanliness and propriety than is usual among the blind.

Her first regular lesson was to knit; and we found it far less
difficult to teach her the stitch itself than to habituate her to work
steadily for a long time together. She had evidently no idea of making
it the regular occupation of the day. She would begin by knitting a
little; then she would undo or tear up all that was already done; and
this would happen regularly over and over again at least twenty times
a day. It was weary work at first; but after a time we managed to turn
this dislike for continuous occupation into a means of teaching her
more important things. The moment she threw aside her work, we took it
up, and pretended to insist upon her continuing it; and then at last,
when we saw that she was quite vexed and wearied out by our
solicitations, we used to offer her her letters. She would take them,
and, evidently to avoid further worry, begin to study them; but the
letters, like the knitting, were soon flung aside, and then the work
once more was put into her hands. In this way, and while she fancied
she was only indulging in her own caprices, we were advancing steadily
toward our object--training her to occupation, and giving her the
means of future communication with her fellow-creatures. We also
discovered that it was quite possible to pique her out of her idle
habits; for one day in the earlier period of her education, when she
happened to be more than usually idle and inattentive, her mistress
led her toward a class of children busily employed in working, and
said to her by signs, "These little children work; and you, who are
twice their size, do you wish to sit there doing nothing?" From that
time we had less trouble with her; and once she had learned to knit
well and easily, this kind of work seemed to become a positive
necessity to her. She delighted in feeling with her fingers the
progress she was making, and the needles were scarcely ever out of her
hands. When Sunday came, she asked as usual for her knitting, and was
terribly disappointed when she found that it was withheld. I took the
opportunity to give her an idea of time--a very important point in her
future education; so I said to her, "You shall not knit _to-day;_ but
after having slept once more--_to-morrow_ in fact--the needles shall
be given to you again." I foresaw this to be an explanation that would
need repeating; and {333} accordingly, the very next Sunday, she asked
again for her knitting, and was again refused. She was vexed at first,
but grew calm directly I had assured her she should have it "on the
morrow."

Many weeks afterward, and when she seemed quite to understand that
work on this day was forbidden, she came with a very serious
countenance and demanded her knitting; then bursting into a fit of
laughing, made signs that she knew she was not to knit on that day,
but that to-morrow she should have her work again. She obtained a
knowledge of the past and future much sooner than she did of the
present, using the signs expressive of the two first long before she
made an attempt even at the latter.

It was a matter of great importance that she should understand them
all; therefore I not only introduced them over and over again in our
conversations, in order to render her familiar with them, but I
watched her carefully to see that she made a right use of them in her
communications with her companions. A circumstance at last occurred
which satisfied me that she was perfect in the lesson. On the feast of
St. Aloysius Gonzaga she went with the other children to a church
where the festival was being celebrated. On her return she expressed
her gratitude for the pleasure she had received, and the next morning
I observed that she told every one she met that "yesterday she had
been to such a church;" while the day afterward I perceived that in
telling the same story she made the sign of "yesterday" twice over--a
proof how perfectly she comprehended the nature and division of time.

For a long time after she began to reside with us, she never mentioned
either her grandmother or aunt, probably because she was so completely
absorbed by the lessons of her new existence as to have no time to
think of them. Gradually, however, they came back to her recollection,
and then she spoke of them with gratitude and affection. She began
also to compare her present state with her past, evidently considering
the change for the better in her physical and mental being as due to
the care that has been bestowed on her here. She has twenty little
ways of expressing her gratitude. "My face was all over blotches," she
says by signs; "I could neither write nor walk; now I can hold myself
upright, and I can read, and know how to knit." This consciousness,
however, does not at all interfere with her affection for her
grandmother; and when the old woman died she grieved for some time
bitterly. What idea does the word "death" bring to the mind of this
child? I know not; but when we told her about her grandmother, her
mistress made her lie down on the floor, and then reminded her of a
child who had died in the establishment about a year before; after
which we explained to her that the body would be laid in the ground,
and be seen upon earth no more. She wept a great deal at first; but
suddenly drying her tears knelt down, making signs to her mistress and
companions that they should do the same; and, that there might be no
mistake about her meaning, she held up her rosary, to show them they
must pray. She did not forget her poor grandmother for a considerable
time, and every morning made it a point to inquire from her companions
if they also had remembered her that day. One of her aunts died about
the same time, leaving to Anna as a legacy a portion of her wardrobe.
Anna's attention instantly became concentrated upon this new
acquisition, and gowns and handkerchiefs underwent a minute and
searching examination. The gowns pleased her exceedingly; so also did
some woollen pelerines, which she instantly observed must be intended
for the winter. At that moment she was a complete woman, with all a
woman's innate love of dress and desire for ornamentation. "Are there
not also ear-rings?" she asked, anxiously; and being answered in the
negative, she expressed clearly, by her gestures, that it was a pity:
it was quite a pity.

{334}

Anna soon came to understand that I was her master, and she attached
herself in consequence more strongly to me than to any one else, for
she perfectly appreciated the service she has received. One day after
a lesson, at which I had kept her until she thoroughly understood it,
she showed herself more than usually grateful. She took my hand and
kissed it repeatedly, gratitude and affection beaming in her face, and
then, drawing her mistress toward her, she made her write, "I love M.
Carton." I, on my part, was enchanted to find that she thus, of her
own accord, asked for words to express the sentiments of the heart;
and I felt not a little proud of being the object by whom this latent
feeling had first been called into expression. But if Anna loves me,
she also fears me. In the beginning of her education, I was the only
person about her who had strength enough to prevent her scratching or
kicking--exercises to which she was rather addicted when put in a
passion. She likewise knew that it was I who imposed any penance on
her, and that when she was compelled to remain without handkerchief or
cap in the schoolroom, it was to M. Carton she was indebted for the
humiliation. One day, in a fit of anger, she tore her cap; and her
mistress, as soon as she was calm enough to understand her,
remonstrated with her, telling her at the same time that I should be
informed of her misdeeds. To escape the punishment which she knew must
follow, she had recourse to the other children, acknowledged her fault
to them, and begged them to kneel down and join their hands, in order
to obtain her pardon. Not one of the children, whether among the blind
or deaf mutes, misunderstood her signs, and this was one of the
actions of Anna which astonished me the most. Some one was foolish
enough once to tell her that I was going away for some days, and she
took advantage of the chance to behave extremely bad. They made the
sign by which she understands that they mean me, and by which they
generally contrived to frighten her into submission; but it was all in
vain. She laughed in the face of her mistress, and told her she was
quite aware that I should not be back for three days. They have taken
good care ever since not to let her know when I am absent, though it
probably would make no difference now, for her character has
completely changed since those early days, and it is six months at
least since she has indulged in anything like a fit of passion. After
me, her greatest affection is reserved for my friend, M. Cauwe. She is
quite delighted when he comes, and feels his face all over to make
sure that it is he. If she has a new dress, he must feel and remark
it; if she learns a new phrase, or a new kind of work, it must be
shown to him immediately, in order that she may receive his praise;
and if by any chance his visit has been delayed, she is sure to
perceive it, and to inquire into the cause of his absence.

Anna is also very fond of all the younger deaf and dumb children. She
takes them on her knees, carries them in her arms, pets and punishes
them, and adopts a general and motherly air of kindness and protection
toward them. One of them the other day happened to be in an
exceedingly troublesome and tormenting mood. Anna could not keep her
quiet, or prevent her teasing; and at last, rather than lose her
temper, and strike her, as she would formerly have done, she left her
usual place, and went to sit at the opposite side of the room. In
fact, she never now attempts to attack any of her companions, though
she does not fail in some way or other to pay back any provocation she
has received. She takes nothing belonging to others, but attaches
herself strongly to her own possessions, and is particularly indignant
if they attempt to meddle with her objects for instruction. One of the
blind children happened to take a sheet of her writing in points, in
order to try and read it; but Anna was no {335} sooner aware of the
theft than she angrily reclaimed it. The next day the same child
begged as a favor that she would lend her a sheet, in order to
practise her reading; but Anna curtly refused, observing, that
yesterday she had taken it without leave, and that to-day she
certainly should not have it, even for the asking. Anna's chief pet
and charge among the little children is a child, blind, and maimed of
one arm, called Eugénie. When this little thing was coming first to
the establishment Anna was told of it, and the expected day named for
her arrival. She immediately set to work and made all sorts of
arrangements in her own mind for the reception of the new child. The
mistress would, of course, teach it to read; but it would have a seat
beside Anna, and with the companion whom she already had, there would
be three to walk and amuse themselves together. It so happened that
Eugénie did not arrive on the expected day. Anna was quite downcast in
consequence; and when at last it did appear, it instantly became the
object of all her tenderest petting and endearment. She led it to its
seat, tried to make it understand all that it would have to do and
learn, and at last, when she touched its little arm, and found that it
was maimed, and incapable of being used, she burst into tears, and was
for a long time inconsolable. I tried to find out the cause of her
grief, and in what she considered the greatness of the child's
misfortune to consist, and she immediately directed my attention to
the fact that the child would never be able to learn to knit. The
power of occupation had been such an inestimable boon to herself, that
she naturally felt any inability on that score to be the most
intolerable misfortune that could befall a human being. When we
assured her that Eugénie would be able to knit as well and easily as
she did herself, she became calm. The next day, however, she was
discovered trying to knit with both hands shut, as if they had been
maimed like the blind child's, and she immediately made her mistress
observe that in such a state she could neither knit, blow her nose,
nor dress herself, ending all by expressing the immense happiness she
felt at possessing the free use of her hands. Providence has provided
an antidote to every misfortune. The blind child pities the deaf-mute,
the deaf-mute sighs over the blind, and the blind, deaf, and dumb girl
feels her heart filled with inexpressible compassion for one deprived
of the free use of her hands. Anna kept her word, and took great care
of the little Eugénie. She placed herself indeed somewhat in the
position of a mother to the child, watched over its conduct, examined
its work, and went so far as occasionally to administer a slight
correction.

If the weather was cold, she never went to bed herself without feeling
that Eugénie was well covered up, and giving her her blessing; a good
deed she always took care to make known to me in the morning. When
first the little thing came it was rather refractory and disinclined
to submit to rules, and the mistress acquainted Anna with the fact.
"Does not she like to knit?" asked Anna. "It is not with that,"
answered the mistress, "but with her reading lesson, that she will not
take pains." Anna immediately went over to the child, to try and
persuade her to fulfil her duty. She took her hand, laid it on the
book, remained for at least a quarter of an hour persuading and
encouraging her; and then, perceiving that she had begun to be really
attentive, bade her get up and ask pardon of her mistress for her past
disobedience.

Another day she examined the child's knitting, and finding it badly
done, shook her head gravely, in sign of disapprobation. She then took
Eugénie's hand, made her feel with her own fingers the long loose
stitches she had made; and making her kneel down in the middle of the
room, pinned the work to her back, with threats of even more serious
punishment in the future. Just then the {336} mistress joined the
class, and found Eugénie in tears, and on her knees, with her work
pinned behind her. "Eugénie," she asked, "what are you doing there,
and why do you cry?" "The deaf and dumb girl has punished me because
my knitting was badly done," said the child; "and she says, when M.
Carton comes in, he will throw a glass of water in my face." In order
to prevent this terrible assault, the mistress advised her to ask
pardon of Anna, which she immediately did; but the latter felt it due
to the dignity of the situation to allow herself to be entreated a
long time before she consented to grant it.

But though Anna considered it a part of her duty to punish Eugénie for
her idleness, she was always otherwise very gentle to the child. In
giving her a lesson, her mistress, with a view of testing her
knowledge of the verb in question, once bade her "strike Eugénie."
Anna behaved very prettily on this occasion. Before she would perform
the act required, she took the blind child's hand and laid it on the
letters, in order to show her that if she struck her, it was not
because she was angry with her, but simply because that phrase had
been given to her as an exercise in language. On another occasion one
of the blind children disturbed the arrangement of her words in their
separate cases, and one or two of them were lost. Anna wept bitterly;
and not content with doing everything in her own power to discover the
author of the mischief, she asked her mistress to assist in her
researches. The guilty one was found out at last, and, in the heat of
the moment, Anna demanded that she should be punished; but yielding
afterward to the natural goodness of her heart, she went herself and
interceded for the little criminal. "She is blind, like myself," she
said, by way of excuse; and then embraced her with great cordiality in
token of forgiveness. From that time, however, she became suspicious,
and scarcely dared to leave her place for fear of a similar
misfortune. Some one, seeing this, advised her to keep her letters in
her pocket. "Very pleasant indeed!" she answered, bursting into a fit
of laughter; "and a nice way, certainly, of preventing confusion! No;
I will ask M. Carton to give me a lock and key for my box, and then no
one can touch them without my knowing it." This was accordingly done;
and the key once safe in her pocket, Anna could leave her property in
perfect security that it would not be injured or stolen in her
absence.



Anna likes dainty food, and is very fond of fruit. I suspected,
however, when first she came, that she had not an idea of the way in
which it was procured. She had been so shut up in her old home, that
nature was still an unexplored page to her; and blind, deaf, and dumb
as she was, it was only through the fingers that even now this poor
child could ever be taught to read and comprehend it. It is not
difficult, therefore, to imagine her astonishment and joy at each new
discovery of this kind which she makes. One day I led her to an
apricot tree, and made her feel and examine it all over. She dislikes
trees extremely, probably because in her solitary excursions she must
have often hurt herself against them. She obeyed me, however, though
very languidly and unwillingly at first; but I never saw such
astonishment on any face before as I did on hers, when, after a short
delay, I took her hand and laid it on an apricot. She clasped her
hands delightedly together, then made me touch the fruit, as if she
expected that I also would be astonished; and then recommenced her
examination of the tree, returning over and over again, with an
expression of intense joy over all her person, to the fruit she had so
unexpectedly discovered. I permitted her at last to pull the fruit and
eat it, and she kissed my hand most affectionately, in token of
gratitude for the immense favor I had conferred upon her. After
classtime she returned alone to the garden; {337} and as I foresaw
that the discovery of the morning would not be sterile, but that, once
put on the track, she would continue her explorations on her own
account, I watched her closely. So, in fact, it happened.

She was no sooner in the garden than she began carefully to examine
all the plants and trees around her, and it was amusing beyond
anything to watch her making her way cautiously among the cabbages,
touching the leaves and stems, and trying with great care and prudence
to discover if this plant also produced apricots. I suffered her to
continue this exercise for a little time in vain; then coming to the
rescue, after making her comprehend that cabbages, though good in
themselves to be eaten, did not bear apricots, I led her to various
kinds of fruit-trees growing in the garden. I did not name any of them
to her then, for I knew that in time she would learn to distinguish
one from the other, and she had still so much to discover of nature
and her ways, that I did not like to delay her by dwelling on
distinctions which were, comparatively speaking, of little consequence
to her in that early stage of her education. This little course of
botany we continued throughout the year. She was taught to observe the
fall of the leaf, encouraged to examine the tree when entirely bereft
of foliage, and when the spring-buds began to swell she was once more
brought to touch them, and made to understand that they were about to
burst again into leaf and flowers. The moment the leaves were visible
she inquired of one of her companions if the tree was going to bear
fruit likewise; and received for answer that it would certainly do so
whenever the weather should become sufficiently warm. Satisfied with
this information, she waited some time with patience; but a few very
warm days chancing to occur in the month of May, she reminded her
companion of what she had been told, and inquired eagerly if the fruit
was at last come.

In this way, during all that summer, she found constant amusement in
watching the progress of the different fruit-trees, and I found her
one day examining a pear with great attention. She had not met with
one before, so it was quite a discovery to her, and she begged me to
let her have it in order that she might show it to her mistress and
learn its name. With all her love of fruit, however, I must record it
to the honor of this poor child that she never attempted to touch it
without permission; and that having been guided once to a tree by one
of her deaf-mute companions, and incited to gather the fruit, she made
a very intelligible sign that it must not be done without an order
from me. On another occasion I gave her a bunch of currants and told
her to eat them, but the moment she touched them she discovered that
they were not ripe, and made signs to me that she "must wait for a few
days longer, and that then they would be good to eat."

Her delicacy of touch is in fact surprising. I have often effaced her
letters, and flattened them with my nail until it seemed impossible to
discover even a trace of them, and yet with her finger she has never
failed in following out the form. She often also finds pins and small
pieces of money, and picks them up when walking. She is very proud on
these occasions, and takes good care to inform any one who comes near
her of the fact. She is very active now, and always ready to go and
look for any thing or person that she wants; and if she does not
succeed in finding them, she engages one of her companions to aid her
in the search. She seemed indeed always to suspect that we knew better
than she did what was passing around us; though it was probably some
time before she asked herself what the nature of her own deficiency
might be. A day came, however, upon which she obtained some clearer
knowledge on the subject; and this was the way it happened.

She had dropped one of her knitting-needles, and after a vain attempt
to {338} find it for herself, she was obliged to have recourse to her
mistress, who immediately picked it up and gave it back to her. Anna
appeared to reflect earnestly for a moment, and then drawing the
sister toward her writing-table, she wrote: "Theresa," naming one of
the pupils of the institution--"Theresa is deaf; Lucy is deaf; Jane is
blind; I am blind and deaf; you are--;" and then she presented her
tablets to the sister, in order that the latter might explain to her
the nature of that other faculty which she possessed, and which
enabled her to find so easily anything that was lost.

This was a problem which had evidently occupied her for a long time;
and with her head bent forward and fingers ready to seize the
slightest gesture, Anna waited eagerly for the answer by which she
hoped the mystery would be solved to her at last. In a second or two
the embarrassment of the mistress was nearly equal to the eagerness of
the pupil; but after a minute's hesitation she, with great tact,
resolved to repeat the action which had caused Anna's question. Making
the blind-mute walk down the room with her, she desired her once more
to drop her needle and then to pick it up again, after which she wrote
upon the board, "The needle falls; you touch the needle with your
hand; you pick it up with your fingers." Anna read these words with an
air which seemed to say, "I know all that already; but there must be
something more;" and so there was.

Her mistress made her once more drop her needle; and then, just as
Anna was stooping to pick it up, she dragged her, in spite of the poor
girl's resistance, so far from it that she could not touch it either
with her hands or feet. "It is ever so far away," Anna said, in her
mute language; and stooping down to the floor, she stretched out her
hand as far as ever it would go in a vain attempt to reach it. The
sister waited until she was a little pacified, and then wrote: "The
needle falls." Anna answered: "Yes." "The needle is far off," the
sister wrote again; and Anna replied: "Alas, it is." "Sister N. cannot
touch the needle with her hand." "Nor I either," Anna wrote in answer.
"Sister N. can touch the needle with her eyes." Then followed a mimic
scene, in which the thing expressed by words was put into action. Anna
understood at last; but, evidently in order to make certain that she
did, she desired the sister to guide her hand once more to the fallen
needle. Her mistress complied with her request, and Anna was
convinced. The experiment was repeated over and over again. Anna threw
her needle into various places, and then asked the sister if she could
touch it without stooping. "Yes," replied her mistress; "I touch the
needle with my eyes." "Can you pick it up with your eyes?" asked Anna.
The sister made her feel that her eyes were not fingers; and then once
more picking up the needle she gave it to Anna, to be satisfied that
she at last understood the nature of the faculty which her
instructress possessed and which was wanting in herself.

From that time she invariably made a distinction between the blind
children and those who were merely deaf-mutes. She had always hitherto
been ready enough to avenge herself on any of her companions who
struck her, whether accidentally or on purpose. Now if she found it
was a blind child who had done so, she would of her own accord excuse
her, saying, "She is blind; she cannot touch me with her eyes when I
am at a distance from her." In the same manner, if she lost anything,
she would ask the first deaf-mute whom she met to help her to look for
it, while she never attempted to seek a similar service from any of
the children whom she knew to be blind. She showed her knowledge of
the difference between the two classes most distinctly upon one
occasion, when her knitting having got irretrievably out of order, she
communicated her perplexity to the {339} blind child at her side. The
latter wanted to take it from her in order to arrange it; but Anna
drew it back, and, touching first the eyes of the child and then her
own, as if she would have said, "You also are blind, and can do no
better than myself," she waited quietly until she could give it to the
mistress to disentangle for her.

Anna delights in telling her companions all her adventures, though she
takes care never to mention her faults or their punishment. She will
acknowledge the former if taxed with them, but she does not like to be
reminded either of the one or of the other. "I have done my penance,"
she says: "it is past; you must not speak of it any more." With this
exception she tells all that she has done or intends to do; and she is
enchanted beyond measure when she can inform them that she has
succeeded in playing a trick on her mistress. She will tell the story
with infinite glee, and always contrives exceedingly well to put the
thing in its most ridiculous light before them.

She was fond of milk, and observed, or was told, one day that a cup of
milk had been given to a child who was sick. The next morning, while
in chapel, she burst into tears. Her mistress led her from the class,
and asked what was the matter. She coughed, showed her tongue, held
out her hand, that the mistress might feel her pulse; in fact she was
as ill as she could be, and excessively thirsty. A cup of milk was
brought; and the medicine was so good, that five minutes afterward she
managed to eat her breakfast with an excellent appetite. During the
recreation that followed, she took care to explain to her companions
the means by which she had procured herself the milk. A few days
afterward she recommenced the comedy, and played it so well, that,
thinking she really was ill, her mistress desired her to go to bed.
This was more than she wished for; but she went upstairs, trusting, no
doubt, that something would happen to extricate her from the dilemma.
Her mistress went to see her; and finding her sitting on the side of
the bed, asked why she did not get into it, as she had been desired.
"Madame," said Anna, "it is very cold, but I should get warm if you
would give me a cup of milk; that would cure me in no time; and a
little bread and butter with it would also do me good." The sister
then perceived how the case really stood, and answered promptly, "If
you will get into bed you shall have the milk, but not the bread and
butter. If, on the contrary, you prefer to go downstairs, you shall
have the bread and butter, but not the milk. Which do you choose?"
"Both," quoth Anna. But as both were not to be had, she was obliged to
content herself with the amusement of telling her intended trick to
her companions, which she did with many regrets that it had not been
successful.

But though Anna likes to tell all these little schemes and adventures
to any one who will listen to her; and though, if taxed with them by
her mistress, she is quite ready to acknowledge them with a laugh, it
is far otherwise when the action itself contains anything seriously
contrary to honesty or justice. In that case she takes good care to be
silent on the subject; and if silence is impossible, she endeavors, in
all manner of ways, to explain it away or excuse it.

One day she entered the schoolroom before any of the other pupils, and
finding that a piece of wire, belonging to the pedal of the piano, was
loose, she broke it quite off, put it into her pocket, and returned
triumphantly to her place. Her mistress, happening to be in the room
at the moment, saw the whole affair, and placed herself in her way, in
order that Anna might know she had been observed. She then asked her
what she had put in her pocket, and Anna instantly replied that it was
her beads. Her mistress gave her to understand that she was trying to
deceive her, and made her touch, as a {340} proof, the other end of
the wire which she had broken. She was evidently confused, and became
as red as fire, but with marvellous adroitness managed to let the wire
slip out of her pocket to the ground. She had, of course, no idea that
it would make a noise in falling; and fancying that she had concealed
the theft, continued positively to deny it. In order still better to
prove her innocence, she then knelt down and began feeling all over
the floor, until she had found the wire which she had dropped, and
holding it up in triumph, said, by signs, "I will ask M. Carton to
give it to me that I may make it into a cross for my beads."

In this way she is always being ingenious in finding excuses for her
faults. Her mistress once complained of her knitting, and she
immediately held up her needles, which were bent, as if she would have
said, "How is it possible to knit with such needles as these?" Another
day, feeling more idle than usual, and wishing to remain in bed, she
made them count her pulse, and begged by signs that they would send
immediately for M. Verte, the physician of the house. We knew well it
was only a trick to stay a little longer in bed, and she was the first
to acknowledge it as soon as she had risen.

I like to watch her when she fancies herself alone, as I then often
find in her most trivial actions a something interesting or suggestive
for her future improvement. I discovered her once alone in the
class-room and busily engaged in examining every corner of the desks.
All at once she went toward the black table on which the deaf-mutes
write their exercises, and taking a piece of chalk, began to trace
lines upon it at random. I was curious to know what discovery she was
trying to make, and in a few minutes I perceived it. As soon as she
had traced her lines, she passed her hands over them to see if she
could read them. She was aware that her companions read upon this
board; and as she knew of no other method of reading than by letters
in relief, she naturally supposed that the lines she had traced would
be sufficiently raised to enable her to do so. For a few minutes she
continued thus trying to follow with her finger the chalk-lines she
had made; but finding considerable difficulty in doing so, she at last
returned to her book, compared the letters in it with the lines on the
board, and evidently pronounced a verdict in favor of the former. I
could see, in fact, that she was quite delighted with its apparent
superiority, and she never attempted to write on the black-board
again.

She often makes signs that seem to indicate an inexplicable knowledge
of things of which it is impossible she can naturally have any real
perception. She was born blind; she can look at the sun without
blinking, and the pupil of the eye is as opaque as the skin.
Nevertheless her mistress happening to ask her one night why she had
left off her work, she answered that it was too dark to work any
longer, and that she must wait for a light.  [Footnote 76] In chapel,
also, she has evidently impressions which she does not receive
elsewhere. She likes to go there; often asks to be permitted to do so,
and while in it always remains in an attitude and with an expression
of face which would indicate a profound consciousness of the presence
of God. One of her companions once told her that I was ill. Anna
perceived that the child was crying: "I will not cry," she said
immediately, "but I will pray;" and she actually did go down on her
knees, and remained in that position for nearly a quarter of an hour.
She told me this herself, and I was enchanted; for who can doubt that
God held himself honored by the supplicating attitude of his poor
mutilated creature? And yet what passes in the mind of this child
during the moments which she spends in the attitude of prayer? What is
her idea of {341} God? What is the language of her heart when she thus
places herself in solemn adoration in his presence? What is, in fact,
her prayer? I know not; it is a mystery yet a mystery--which I trust
she will some day find words to explain to me herself. One thing alone
is certain;--there is _that_ in her heart and mind which has not been
placed there by man, and which tells her there is a Father and a God
for her in heaven.

  [Footnote 76: She possibly may have learned the expression from some
  of the deaf-mutes not blind.--TR.]


CONCLUSION.

Extract of a letter from M. Carton, announcing the death of the blind
mute, Anna Timmermans, after a residence of twenty-one years in his
establishment at Bruges:

   BRUGES, Sept. 26, 1859.

  GENTLEMEN,--I write to you in deep affliction, for death hath this
  day deprived me of my blind mute, Anna Timmermans, whom you may
  remember to have seen at my establishment last year.

  She was just forty-three years of age; and twenty-one of these had
  been passed at my asylum. God has taken her from this life to bestow
  upon her a better, and his holy will be done! It was a great mercy
  to her, but I shall regret her all my lifetime, even while rejoicing
  at her present happiness, and feeling most thankful for that love
  and knowledge of Almighty God to which, through all the physical
  difficulties of her position, he enabled her to attain. She loved
  him indeed with all the _náiveté_, and invoked him with the simple
  confidence of a child; and the last weeks of her life were almost
  entirely devoted to earnest entreaties that he would call her to
  himself.

  You are the first to whom I announce my loss, because of all those
  persons who have visited my house, you seem best to have
  comprehended the painful position of a deaf-mute, and the exquisite
  sensibility which they are capable of feeling toward any one who
  shows them sympathy and affection. I have already described Anna as
  she was when she came first among us--a girl twenty-one years of age,
  with the stature of a woman and the habits of a child. I need not
  recall her to your remembrance as she appeared to you last year, a
  woman thoughtful beyond the common, and endowed with such true
  knowledge of God and of religion, that you deemed it no indignity to
  ask her prayers, and were pleased by her simple promise never to
  forget you.

  Thanks be to God for his great goodness toward his poor, afflicted
  child! She not only learned to know him and to love him, but we were
  enabled by degrees to place her in still closer communication with
  him, by means of those sacraments which he has appointed to convey
  grace to the soul. The last confession which she made previous to
  receiving extreme unction reminds me of all the difficulty we had
  long ago experienced in persuading her to make her first.

  "It will soon be Easter," said one day to her the sister appointed
  to prepare her for this duty. "It will soon be Easter, and then you
  and all of us will have to go to confession."

  "What is confession?" asked Anna. "It is to tell our sins to the
  priest," explained the sister; "and to ask pardon of them from God."

  "But why should we do that?" quoth Anna.

  "Because," replied the sister, "God himself has commanded us to
  confess our sins. You will have to do it, therefore, like the rest
  of us; and when you go to confession, you must say in your heart to
  God, 'I am sorry for my sins. Forgive me, O my God; and I promise I
  will sin no more.'"

  "And what are the sins I must confess?" asked Anna. She was standing
  in the midst of her class, who had all assembled to receive
  instruction, at the moment when she put the question.

  "You have been in a passion," replied the sister; "you must confess
  {342} that. You have broken M. Carton's spectacles. You have torn
  the cap of Sister So-and-so. You have scratched one of the blind
  children;--and you must mention all these things when you go to
  confession."

  "All these things are past and gone," replied Anna, resolutely;
  "when I broke M. Carton's spectacles, I was made, for my punishment,
  to kneel down; and," she continued, lightly passing one hand over
  the other, as if rubbing out something, "that was effaced. When I
  tore Sister So-and-so's cap, I was not allowed any coffee; and,"
  repeating the action with her hands, "that was effaced. When I
  scratched the blind child, I went to bed without supper; and that
  was effaced. I will not, therefore, confess any of these things."

  "But, Anna," replied the sister, "we are all obliged to go to
  confession. I am going myself, as well as you."

  "Oui da! Have you, then, also, been in a passion, my sister? Have
  you broken M. Carton's spectacles, torn our sister's cap, and
  scratched a blind child?"

  Anna asked these questions with an immense air of triumph, and
  waited the answer with a wicked smile, which seemed to say she had
  put the sister in a dilemma. Not one of the class misunderstood the
  little malice of her questions. Indeed, the uncharitable surmise as
  to the nature of their mistress's conduct appeared so piquant to all
  of them, that they unanimously insisted on its receiving a reply. It
  is not difficult, indeed, to imagine their amusement, for they were
  all daughters of Eve; and, beside, the best of children have an
  especial delight in embarrassing their superiors. Altogether it was
  a scene for a painter.

  "I have not been in a passion; God forbid!" replied the poor sister,
  gently. "And I have not scratched or done injury to any one; but I
  _have_ done so-and-so, and so-and-so." And here, with the greatest
  _náiveté_ and humility, the sister mentioned some of her own
  shortcomings. "I have done so-and-so and so-and-so, and am going to
  confess them; for I know I have sinned by doing these things; but I
  hope God will pardon me, and give me grace not to offend him again
  in like manner."

  When the children heard this humble confession, they one by one
  quietly left the class, like those in the gospel, beginning with the
  eldest; but Anna, even while acknowledging herself defeated, could
  not resist the small vengeance of giving the sister a lecture on her
  peccadilloes.

  "Remember, my sister, you are never again to do so-and-so and
  so-and-so. You must be very sorry, and promise to be wiser another
  time. And above all other things, you must go to confession to
  obtain God's pardon."

  "And you?" asked the sister, as her only answer to this grave
  exhortation.

  "And I also will go to confession," replied Anna, completely
  vanquished at last by the tenderness and humility of the good
  religious.

  From that time, in fact, Anna went regularly to confession; and so
  far from having any difficulty in persuading her to do so, she often
  reminded us herself when the time was approaching for the
  performance of that duty.

  During the winter preceding her death she grew weaker from day to
  day; and her loss of appetite, extreme emaciation, and inability to
  exert herself, all convinced us that we were about to lose her. She
  herself often spoke about dying, though for a long time she would
  not permit any one else to address her on the subject. If any of the
  sisters even hinted at her danger, she would grow quite pale, and
  turn off the conversation; and even when she alluded of her own
  accord to the symptoms that alarmed her, it seemed as if, like many
  other invalids, she did so in order to be reassured as to her state.
  She became convinced at last, however, that she could not recover,
  and from that moment her life was one uninterrupted act of
  resignation {343} to the will of God, submission to his providence,
  and hope and confidence in his mercy. These sentiments never forsook
  her even for a moment. "I suffer," she used to say,--"I suffer a
  great deal; but Jesus suffered more;" and, embracing her crucifix,
  she would renew all her good resolutions to suffer patiently, and
  her earnest entreaties for grace to do so.

  Previous to receiving the last sacraments, Anna disposed of
  everything belonging to her in favor of her companions, and then
  causing them all to be brought to her bedside, she kissed each one
  affectionately, and bade her adieu. After that she refused to see
  any of them again, seeking only the company of the sisters, and of
  that one in particular who best understood the silent language of
  the fingers. "Let us speak a little," the poor sufferer would often
  say, "of God and heaven;" and then would follow long and earnest
  conversations full of faith and hope and love, confidence in the
  mercies of Almighty God, and gratitude for his goodness.

  During these communications Anna would become quite absorbed, as it
  were, in the love of God; her poor face would brighten into an
  expression of absolute beauty; and she seemed to lose all sense of
  present suffering in her certain hope and expectation of the joy
  that was about to come in on her soul.

  "A little more," she would often say, when she fancied the
  conversation was about to finish; "speak to me a little more of God.
  I love him and he loves me. O my dear sister, will you not also come
  soon to heaven, and love him for evermore?"

  Her agony commenced on the morning of the 26th of September, and she
  expired about noon, so quietly that we scarce perceived the moment
  in which she passed away (safe and happy, as I trust) to the
  presence of her God.

  I recommend her to your good prayers; and I trust that she also will
  sometimes think of us and pray for us in heaven.

----

{344}


From Macmillan's Magazine.

TWILIGHT IN THE NORTH.

"UNTIL THE DAY BREAK, AND THE SHADOWS FLEE AWAY."


  Oh the long northern twilight between the day and the night,
  When the heat and the weariness of the world are ended quite;
  When the hills grow dim as dreams; and the crystal river seems
  Like that River of Life from out the Throne where the blessed walk in white.

  Oh the weird northern twilight, which is neither night nor day,
  When the amber wake of the long-set sun still marks his western way;
  And but one great golden star in the deep blue east afar
  Warns of sleep and dark and midnight--of oblivion and decay.

  Oh the calm northern twilight, when labor is all done,
  And the birds in drowsy twitter have dropped silent one by one;
  And nothing stirs or sighs in mountains, waters, skies--
  Earth sleeps--but her heart waketh, till the rising of the sun.

  Oh the sweet, sweet twilight, just before the time of rest,
  When the black clouds are driven away, and the stormy winds suppressed:
  And the dead day smiles so bright, filling earth and heaven with light--
  You would think 'twas dawn come back again--but the light is in the west.

  Oh the grand solemn twilight, spreading peace from pole to pole!--
  Ere the rains sweep o'er the hill-sides, and the waters rise and roll,
  In the lull and the calm, come, O angel with the palm--
  In the still northern twilight, Azrael, take my soul.

----

{345}

From Chambers's Journal.


A NIGHT IN A GLACIER.


Nothing is more common than to hear the wish expressed among ordinary
tourists "to see Switzerland in the winter;" and nothing is more
disappointing than its fulfilment. To _see_ Switzerland then is just
what you cannot do; all that is visible is one vast sheet of blinding
snow, unrelieved by a particle of color; and the view is not even
grand--it is simply monotonous. However, in April, 1864, I made the
experiment of choosing that month, instead of the conventional August,
for a mountaineering ramble; and having been weather-bound at least
half a dozen times, in various places, found myself in the same
miserable predicament, at the hospice of the Great St. Bernard. It was
terribly wearisome work. We had exhausted all our small-talk, had
discussed all the celebrated passages of the Alps, from that of
Hannibal with his vinegar-cruets to that of Macdonald with his
dragoons; had worked the piano to death by playing derisive waltzes;
had elicited fearful wheezings from the harmonium, and blundered
inappropriate marches on the organ--when, early on the third morning,
two momentous events occurred. In the first place, the weather had
become suddenly fine; and in the second, the news had arrived that a
party of Italian wood-carvers had reached St. Remy, on their passage
to the Rhone valley, and that two of their number had left the main
body on the previous evening, avowing their intention of making their
way to a little stone hut, which is used in summer as a dairy for the
supply of the hospice, and passing the night there. This hut, however,
had been visited that morning, and found to be untenanted; and as the
traces of the two wanderers had been obliterated by the snow during
the night, the messenger had been sent forward to obtain assistance in
the search for them.

Though the unusually large fall of snow in the winter of 1863-64 made
mountain-climbing singularly easy in the past autumn (Mont Blanc was
ascended by more than seventy tourists in the latter year), yet in the
spring the passes were rendered more than usually difficult by the
loose snow which the sun had not yet been powerful enough to solidify
by regelation. Most travellers who cross in summer must have noticed a
line of stout posts about ten or twelve feet high, which are placed on
the most elevated points of the path, so that their summits, which the
snow rarely reaches, may serve as landmarks in the winter; but at this
time the posts were entirely covered, and it was not without great
difficulty that the man who brought the news had been able to find his
way to the Hospice. There was no time to be lost. Abandoning their
usual costume for a dress more suited to do battle with the elements,
four of the "fathers" were soon ready to start, two of them
shouldering knapsacks of provisions, one bearing a stout rope, and the
fourth carrying an axe, with which to cut steps, if necessary, in the
ice. Just as they were leaving, it was discovered that the last-named
implement had a crack in its handle, which would most probably cause
it to break short off when brought into active service; and as some
delay would be caused by fitting a fresh handle, Père Christophe, to
whose cordial politeness few travellers are not indebted, came to ask
for the loan of my axe for the day. "Perhaps, however," he said, "as
monsieur is used to glacier expeditions, he would like to accompany us
in our search, and so to carry his axe himself?"--a proposal {346} with
which I eagerly closed, promising that my preparations should not
delay them above five minutes.

The messenger had arrived at eight in the morning; and in less than
half an hour afterward, we were making our way over the lake on the
Italian side of the pass. Two of the renowned dogs were with us; but
their proceedings did not confirm the idea which had long ago been
produced on my childish mind by the well-known print of a St. Bernard
dog, with a bottle of wine and a basket of food round its neck,
scratching away the snow under which a wayfarer was supposed to lie
buried. For finding lost travellers, indeed, they are, as I was
assured by the monks, in no-wise adapted; their function, and a most
important one it is, is to find the direct path up and down the pass,
when it is covered with snow, and in this duty they are unrivalled.
Fortunately, the frosts had been very severe, so that we were able to
tramp cheerily over the crisp snow, instead of having to undergo the
fatigue of sinking up to our knees at every step. But probably the
poor fellows down below wished that the frost had been lighter, and
our walk heavier. The scene was grand in its wildness. Huge clouds
hung along the mountain-sides at our feet, now whirling boisterously,
now creeping sullenly along; and rough gusts of wind dashed the snow
with blinding coldness into our faces, and produced on ears and nose a
tingling terribly suggestive of frost-bites. It was unusual, M.
Christophe said, for the fathers themselves to go out in search of
travellers; the latter generally waited at the house of refuge near
the Cantine, or that near St. Remy, and a servant was sent down with a
dog to lead them up; but in cases like the present, where search must
be made in different directions, it was of advantage to have three or
four people with local knowledge to join in it. Beside, the expedition
was a relief to the ordinary monotony of convent life; though the
kindness of English travellers had done much for the comfort of the
brethren, in supplying them with musical instruments, books, and
similar means of recreation. The circumstances under which the Prince
of Wales sent them their piano were curious enough. He had bought one
of the dogs, which, being quite young and very fat, was given into the
charge of a porter to carry down. The man stupidly let it fall, and it
was killed on the spot. The prince (this was some time ago) burst into
tears, and was almost inconsolable; but the monks, on hearing of the
loss, sent another dog, which the prince received while at Martigny;
and when he reached Paris, he forwarded, as a royal acknowledgment for
the gift, one of Erard's best piano-fortes, which has been the great
cheerer of their winter evenings, and on which they set no small
store.

Pleasantly chatting after this fashion, my friend beguiled the way to
the house of refuge, which we reached before ten o'clock, and where we
found collected about five-and-twenty people, waiting to be led up to
the hospice. Leaving them in charge of one of the monks, we proceeded
along the valley where the _vacherie_ of the hospice is situated,
toward the Col de la Fenêtre, in search of the man and woman who were
missing. It appeared that they were natives of the Val de Lys, which
descends from Monte Rosa toward Italy, and the inhabitants of which
have, from time immemorial, held themselves aloof from all
communication with their neighbors, and have formed of their little
community a sort of nation within a nation, to which a native of
Alagna or St. Martin would have no more chance of being admitted by
marriage, than a reformer of the franchise would of being elected a
member of the Carlton Club. So we discovered that the two lost sheep,
presuming on their fortunate accident of birth, had been sneering at
the others as having been "raised" in the country of cretins and lean
pigs, and had excited such a storm of abuse about their ears, that,
finding themselves only two to twenty, they {347} had beaten a
retreat, and decided to sleep at the cow-hut. At this we arrived in
about half an hour; but it was evident that it had not been tenanted
for some weeks by anything but marmots, of which we saw a couple
scudding along with that awkward mixture of scratch and shuffle which
is their ordinary mode of locomotion. From here we each made casts, to
use the hunting phrase, in different directions, especially trying
places which lay on the leeward side of rocks, and on which,
therefore, any tracks might not have been effaced by the night's snow.
A diabolical yell, which was the result of an attempt to imitate the
_jödel_ of the Oberland guides, met with no human response, but was
taken up, as it seemed, by a chorus of imps in the depths of the
mountain; and by the multiplying echoes so common in Switzerland was
carried on from crag to crag, till it appeared to be lost only at the
top of the valley. We fixed on a point about a mile off at which to
reunite, as what was snow in the lower part of the valley would be ice
higher up, and would probably be crossed by crevasses, among which it
would be dangerous to go singly, and without the protection of the
rope. Presently there came a shout from the extreme left of our
quartett, and we saw the young _marronnier_ (that is, a half-fledged
monk or deacon) standing on the top of some rocks, and indulging in
various contortions and gesticulations, which we interpreted as a
summons for our help; and when we reached him, he wanted it badly
enough, for right before him were the objects of our search; but how
to get at them was a problem which required all our skill and all our
strength for its solution.

He had come to where the glacier joined the rocks over which our
course had hitherto been, when his progress was stopped by a
_bergschrund_ or deep chasm between a nearly perpendicular wall of
rock on one side, and a wall of ice on the other, inclined at an angle
of probably sixty-five degrees. On reaching this, we could see the
fugitives about fifty feet below us, and were relieved by the
assurance that they were neither of them seriously injured, except by
the cold, which had made them unable to do anything to extricate
themselves. It was evident that nothing could be done from the side of
the rocks, so we made our way as quickly-as-possible along the side of
the bergschrund, to cross on to the glacier. This involved a long
detour; but the bergschrund was too wide to be jumped, and far too
steep to be scaled, while the insecurity of the snow-bridges over it
was apparent. At last we found one that seemed solid, and M.
Christophe led the way upon it boldly, but had scarcely reached the
middle, when it suddenly broke down; and but for the rope--that great
protection of mountaineers--he would have had very little chance of
seeing the hospice again. As it was, I was the chief sufferer, for I
happened to be second in line, and had my waist (round which the rope
was tied in a slip-knot) reduced to wasp-like proportions by the jerk
of a man of fourteen stone falling in front, and the counteracting
strain which my rear-rank man forthwith put on behind. At last we
crossed, and hastily made our way to the scene of action. I have
estimated the angle of the ice-wall at sixty-five degrees, and
tremendous as that inclination is, I believe I have rather understated
it, though, as my clinometer was left behind, I could only compare it
mentally with the well-known ice-wall on the Strahleck, which seemed
about fifteen degrees less. Our rope was about ten feet too short to
reach the bottom, so the axe was brought into requisition to cut steps
for that distance, and to carve out a ledge which should give us
secure hand-hold as well. This done, we let down the rope; but the
man's fingers were so benumbed with the night's exposure, that he was
unable to tie it round his wife; and though she offered to attach it
to him first, he refused to be drawn up until after her. This
punctilio seemed rather misplaced, as it involved {348} the descent of
one of our number; but you cannot argue with a man who has spent the
night in the heart of a glacier; so the lightest of our party lost no
time in descending, which was only difficult from the piercing cold
that was beginning to get the better of us, and which was so
benumbing, that cutting the five-and-fifty steps for the descent was a
rather formidable task.

The appearance of the girl's face--she was scarcely more than a girl--
was one to fix itself in the memory. It was white--almost as white as
the snow which had so nearly formed her cold winding-sheet; stains of
blood were on the blue lips, which she had involuntarily bitten
through in that night's agony. Her large Italian eyes seemed
fascinated by the wall of snow at which she glared; and even now, when
rescue was certain, she could only burst into a flood of tears, and
repeatedly ejaculate _"gerettet!"_ (saved!) having again sunk into the
crouching position from which the question as to the rope had roused
her. The tears indeed gave relief to the heart over which a shadow of
a terrible death had for long hours been brooding. The shortness of
our rope caused the only difficulty in the ascent; but we managed to
hew out a sort of stage on the ice at which we could rest with her,
while the two younger monks carried the rope to the top, and then
completed her restoration to the upper day. The husband's ascent was
rather harder of achievement, as his chilled limbs made him as
helpless as a child in arms, without reducing his weight in the same
proportion; but after some awkward slips, it was managed; and having
refreshed the inner man, we made our way painfully toward the hospice,
obliging the husband to walk, in spite of the agony which it caused
him, as the only means of saving his limbs. We then learned that on
the previous evening they had started for the chalet, the situation of
which was well known to them, but had been completely enveloped in a
cloud of thick mist which had risen from the valley, and had obscured
their way; that after numerous turnings, they had decided, just before
darkness came on, to make their way up the St. Bernard valley, knowing
that in time they must come to the hospice, but that they had actually
mistaken for it the valley leading up to the Col de la Fenêtre, which
is nearly at right angles to the other, and had come upon the
bergschrund at a point where there was fortunately a huge cornice of
snow. On this they must have unwittingly walked, as they believed, for
many yards, when it suddenly gave way with that terrible rushing sound
at which most explorers of the great ice-world have shuddered once or
twice in their lives. Fortunately, an immense mass of snow gave way,
and its bulk broke their fall, and saved them from being dashed with
fatal violence against the rocks. They were warmly clad, and had the
courage to keep in motion during nearly the whole night, performing an
evolution corresponding to the goose-step of the volunteers, as they
dared not change their ground in the darkness.

When the gray morning showed that there was no possibility of their
extricating themselves, and the snow fell, which they knew would hide
their track, the husband sank down in despair, saying: "Nun bedeckt
mich mien Grabtuch" (Now my shroud is covering me)--and two hours of
inaction were sufficient to allow the cold to seize his hands and
feet. It was curious to observe how, as we gleaned the story from
husband and wife, each praised the other's endurance, and depreciated
his or her own. They had only been married at Gressonnay St. Giacomo
four days before, and were on their way to the celebrated wood-carving
manufactory at Freyburg. We had nearly reached the hospice, having had
hard work in helping our friend to walk, and in beating his fingers
smartly to restore circulation, when the girl, who had refused our aid
_en route_, suddenly gave a shriek and fainted away. The cause of this
had not to be sought for long. Our path had led {349} us close by the
Morgue, in which, as is well known, the rarity of the air preserves
the corpses so thoroughly that they retain for years the appearance of
only recent death. There, placed upright against the wall, is the
ghastly row; and one figure--that of a woman with a child in her arms--
is especially noticeable for having preserved not only the features,
but even the expression which marked the last agony of despair. To see
these, you must generally wait some moments before your eyes get
accustomed to the dim light in which they are; but on this occasion,
the glare reflected from the snow threw the whole interior of the
charnel-house into full view, and the revulsion of feeling was too
much for the poor girl, who had so narrowly escaped a similar fate.
She was borne into the hospice, and soon recovered; and on the
following morning, both were able to resume their journey, though it
was feared by the monks, who had had large experience of frostbites,
that one of the man's fingers would be sacrificed. They were profuse
in their gratitude, and left, determined that the superiority of the
inhabitants of the Val de Lys over all other Piedmontese, Italians,
and Savoyards, was not best maintained by spending a night in a
bergschrund.

----

From The Month.

CONSTANCE SHERWOOD.

AN AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.


BY LADY GEORGIANA FULLERTON.


CHAPTER VI.

I was to travel, as had been ordered for our mutual convenience and
protection, with Mistress Ward, a gentlewoman who resided some months
in our vicinity, and had heard mass in our chapel on such rare
occasions as of late had occurred, when a priest was at our house, and
we had commodity to give notice thereof to such as were Catholic in
the adjacent villages. We had with us on the journey two serving-men
and a waiting-woman, who had been my mother's chambermaid; and so
accompanied, we set out on our way, singing as we went, for greater
safety, the litanies of our Lady; to whom we did commend ourselves, as
my father had willed us to do, with many fervent prayers. The
gentlewoman to whose charge I was committed was a lady of singular
zeal and discretion, as well as great virtue; albeit, where religion
was not concerned, of an exceeding timid disposition; which, to my no
small diversion then, and great shame since, I took particular notice
of on this journey. Much talk had been ministered in the county
touching the number of rogues and vagabonds which infested the public
roads, of which sundry had been taken up and whipped during the last
months, in Lichfield, Stafford, and other places. I did perceive that
good Mistress Ward glanced uneasily as we rode along at every
foot-passenger or horseman that came in sight. Albeit my heart was
heavy, and may be also that when the affections are inclined to tears
they be likewise prone to laughter, I scarce could restrain from
smiling at these her fears and the manner of her showing them.

"Mistress Constance," she said at last, as we came to the foot of a
steep {350} ascent, "methinks you have a great heart concerning the
dangers which may befall us on the road, and that the sight of a
robber would move you not one whit more than that of an honest pedler
or hawker, such as I take those men to be who are mounting the hill in
advance of us. Doth it not seem to you that the box which they do
carry betokens them to be such worthy persons as I wish them to
prove?"

"Now surely," I answered, "good Mistress Ward, 'tis my opinion that
they be not such honest knaves as you do suppose. I perceive somewhat
I mislike in the shape of that box. What an if it be framed to entice
travellers to their ruin by such displays and shows of rare ribbons
and gewgaws as may prove the means of detaining them on the road, and
a-robbing of them in the end?"

Mistress Ward laughed, and commended my jesting, but was yet ill at
ease; and, as a mischievous and thoughtless creature, I did somewhat
excite and maintain her fears, in order to set her on asking questions
of our attendants touching the perils of the road, which led them to
relate such fearful stories of what they had seen of this sort as
served to increase her apprehensions, and greatly to divert me, who
had not the like fears; but rather entertained myself with hers, in a
manner such as I have been since ashamed to think of, who should have
kissed the ground on which she had trodden.

The fairness of the sky, the beauty of the fields and hedges, the
motion of the horse, stirred up my spirits; albeit my heart was at
moments so brimful of sorrow that I hated my tongue for its
wantonness, my eyes for their curious gazing, and my fancy for its
eager thoughts anent London and the new scenes I should behold there.
What mostly dwelt in them was the hope to see my Lady Surrey, of whom
I had had of late but brief and scanty tidings. The last letter I had
from her was writ at the time when the Duke of Norfolk was for the
second time thrown in the Tower, which she said was the greatest
sorrow that had befallen her since the death of my Lady Mounteagle,
which had happened at his grace's house a few months back, with all
the assistance she desired touching her religion. She had been urged,
my Lady Surrey said, by the duke some time before to do something
contrary to her faith; but though she much esteemed and respected him,
her answer was so round and resolute that he never mentioned the like
to her any more. Since then I had no more tidings of her, who was
dearer to me than our brief acquaintance and the slender tie of such
correspondence as had taken place between us might in most cases
warrant; but whether owing to some congeniality of mind, or to a
presentiment of future friendship, 'tis most certain my heart was
bound to her in an extraordinary manner; so that she was the continual
theme of my thoughts and mirror of my fancy.

The first night of our journey we lay at a small inn, which was held
by persons Mistress Ward was acquainted with, and by whom we were
entertained in a decent chamber, looking on unto a little garden, and
with as much comfort as the fashion of the place might afford, and
greater cleanliness than is often to be found in larger hostelries.
After supper, being somewhat weary with travel, but not yet inclined
for bed, and the evening fine, we sat out of doors in a bower of
eglantine near to some bee-hives, of which our hostess had a great
store; and methinks she took example from them, for we could see her
through the window as busy in the kitchen amongst her maids as the
queen-bee amidst her subjects. Mistress Ward took occasion to observe,
as we watched one of these little commonwealths of nature, that she
admired how they do live, laboring and swarming, and gathering honey
together so neat and finely, that they abhor nothing so much as
uncleanliness, drinking pure and clear water, even the dew-drops on
the leaves and flowers, {351} and delighting in sweet music, which if
they hear but once out of tune they fly out of sight.

"They live," she said, "under a law, and use great reverence to their
elders. Every one hath his office; some trimming the honey, another
framing hives, another the combs. When they go forth to work, they
mark the wind and the clouds, and whatsoever doth threaten their ruin;
and having gathered, out of every flower, honey, they return loaded in
their mouths and on their wings, whom they that tarried at home
receive readily, easing their backs of their great burthens with as
great care as can be thought of."

"Methinks," I answered, "that if it be as you say, Mistress Ward, the
bees be wiser than men."

At the which she smiled; but withal, sighing, made reply:

"One might have wished of late years rather to be a bee than such as
we see men sometimes to be. But, Mistress Constance, if they are
indeed so wise and so happy, 'tis that they are fixed in a condition
in which they must needs do the will of him who created them; and the
like wisdom and happiness in a far higher state we may ourselves
enjoy, if we do but choose of our free will to live by the same rule."

Then, after some further discourse on the habits of these little
citizens, I inquired of Mistress Ward if she were acquainted with mine
aunt, Mistress Congleton; at the which question she seemed surprised,
and said,

"Methought, my dear, you had known my condition in your aunt's family,
having been governess for many years to her three daughters, and only
by reason of my sister's sickness having stayed away from them for
some time."

At the which intelligence I greatly rejoiced; for the few hours we had
rode together, and our discourse that evening, had wrought in me a
liking for this lady as great as could arise in so short a period. But
I minded me then of my jests at her fears anent robbers, and also of
having been less dutiful in my manners than I should have been toward
one who was like to be set over me; and I likewise bethought me this
might be the cause that she had spoken of the bees having a reverence
for their elders, and doubted if I should crave her pardon for my want
of it. But, like many good thoughts which we give not entertainment to
by reason that they be irksome, I changed that intent for one which
had in it more of pleasantness, though less of virtue. Kissing her, I
said it was the best news I had heard for a long time that I should
live in the same house with her, and, as I hoped, under her care and
good government. And she answered, that she was well pleased with it
too, and would be a good friend to me as long as she lived. Then I
asked her touching my cousins, and of their sundry looks and
qualities. She answered, that the eldest, Kate, was very fair, and
said nothing further concerning her. Polly, she told me, was
marvellous witty and very pleasant, and could give a quick answer,
full of entertaining conceits.

"And is she, then, not fair?" I asked.

"Neither fair nor foul," was her reply; "but well favored enough, and
has an excellent head."

"Then," I cried, letting my words exceed good behavior, "I shall like
her better than the pretty fool her sister." For the which speech I
received the first, but not the last, chiding I ever had from Mistress
Ward for foolish talking and pert behavior, which was what I very well
deserved. When she had done speaking, I put my arm round her neck--for
it put me in mind of my mother to be so gravely yet so sweetly
corrected--and said, "Forgive me, dear Mistress Ward, for my saucy
words, and tell me somewhat I beseech you touching my youngest cousin,
who must be nearest to mine own age."

"She is no pearl to hang at one's ear," quoth she, "yet so gifted with
a well-disposed mind that in her grace {352} seems almost to supersede
nature. Muriel is deformed in body, and slow in speech; but in
behavior so honest, in prayer so devout, so noble in all her dealings,
that I never heard her speak anything that either concerned not good
instruction or godly mirth."

"And doth she not care to be ugly?" I asked.

"So little doth she value beauty," quoth Mistress Ward, "save in the
admiring of it in others, that I have known her to look into a glass
and smiling cry out, 'This face were fair if it were turned and every
feature the opposite to what it is;' and so jest pleasantly at her own
deformities, and would have others do so too. Oh, she is a rare
treasure of goodness and piety, and a true comfort to her friends!"

With suchlike pleasant discourse we whiled away the time until going
to rest; and next day were on horseback betimes on our way to
Coventry, where we were to lie that night at the house of Mr. Page, a
Catholic, albeit not openly, by reason of the times. This gentleman is
for his hospitality so much haunted, that no news stirs but comes to
his ears, and no gentlefolks pass his door but have a cheerful welcome
to his house; and 'tis said no music is so sweet to his ears as
deserved thanks. He vouchsafed much favor to us, and by his merry
speeches procured us much entertainment, provoking me to laughter
thereby more than I desired. He took us to see St. Mary's Hall, which
is a building which has not its equal for magnificence in any town I
have seen, no, not even in London. As we walked through the streets he
showed us a window in which was an inscription, set up in the reign of
King Richard the Second, which did run thus:

  "I, Luriche, for the love of thee
  Do make Coventry toll free."

And further on, the figure of Peeping Tom of Coventry, that false
knave I was so angry with when my father (ah, me! how sharp and sudden
was the pain which went through my heart as I called to mind the hours
I was wont to sit on his knee hearkening to the like tales) told me
the story of the Lady Godiva, who won mercy for her townsfolk by a
ride which none had dared to take but one so holy as herself. And, as
I said before, being then in a humor as prone to tears at one moment
as laughter at another, I fell to weeping for the noble lady who had
been in so sore a strait that she must needs have chosen between
complying with her savage lord's conditions or the misery of her poor
clients. When Mr. Page noticed my tears, which flowed partly for
myself and partly for one who had been long dead, but yet lived in the
hearts of these citizens, he sought to cheer me by the recital of the
fair and rare pageant which doth take place every year in Coventry,
and is of the most admirable beauty, and such as is not witnessed in
any other city in the world. He said I should not weep if I were to
see it, which he very much desired I should; and he hoped he might be
then alive, and ride by my side in the procession as my esquire; at
the which I smiled, for the good gentleman had a face and figure such
as would not grace a pageant, and methought I might be ashamed some
years hence to have him for my knight; and I said, "Good Mr. Page, be
the shutters closed on those days as when the Lady Godiva rode?" at
the which he laughed, and answered,

"No; and that for one Tom who then peeped, there were a thousand eyes
to gaze on the show as it passed."

"Then if it please you, sir, when the time comes," I said, "I would
like to look on and not to ride;" and he replied, it should be as I
pleased; and with such merry discourse we spent the time till supper
was ready. And afterward that good gentleman slackened not his efforts
in entertaining us; but related so many laughable stories, and took so
great notice of me, that I was moved to answer him sometimes in a
manner too forward for my years. He told us of the queen's visit to
that {353} city, and that the mayor, who had heard her grace's majesty
considered poets, and herself wrote verses, thought to commend himself
to her favor by such rare rhymes as these, wherewith he did greet her
at her entrance into the town:

  "We, the men of Coventry,
  Be pleased to see your majesty,
  Good Lord! how fair you be!"

at the which her highness made but an instant's pause, and then
straightway replied,

  "It pleaseth well her majesty
  To see the men of Coventry.
  Good Lord! what fools you be!"

"But," quoth Mr. Page, "the good man was so well pleased that the
Queen had answered his compliment, that 'tis said he has had her
majesty's speech framed, and hung up in his parlor."

"Pity 'tis not in the town-hall," I cried; and he laughing commended
me for sharpness; but Mistress Ward said:

"A sharp tongue in a woman's head was always a stinging weapon; but in
a queen's she prayed God it might never prove a murtherous one." Which
words somewhat checked our merriment, for that they savored of rebuke
to me for forward speech, and I ween awoke in Mr. Page thoughts of a
graver sort.

When we rode through the town next day, he went with us for the space
of some miles, and then bade us farewell with singular courtesy, and
professions of good will and proffered service if we should do him the
good at any time to remember his poor house; which we told him he had
given us sufficient reason not to forget. Toward evening, when the sun
was setting, we did see the towers of Warwick Castle; and I would fain
have discerned the one which doth bear the name of the great earl who
in a poor pilgrim's garb slew the giant Colbrand, and the cave 'neath
Guy's Cliff where he spent his last years in prayer. But the light was
declining as we rode into Leamington, where we lay that night, and
darkness hid from us that fair country, which methought was a meet
abode for such as would lead a hermit's life.

The next day we had the longest ride and the hottest sun we had yet
met with; and at noon we halted to rest in a thicket on the roadside,
which we made our pavilion, and from which our eyes did feast
themselves on a delightful prospect. There were heights on one side
garnished with stately oaks, and a meadow betwixt the road and the
hill enamelled with all sorts of pleasing flowers, and stored with
sheep, which were feeding in sober security. Mistress Ward, who was
greatly tired with the journey, fell asleep with her head on her hand,
and I pulled from my pocket a volume with which Mr. Page had gifted me
at parting, and which contained sundry tales anent Amadis de Gaul,
Huon de Bordeaux, Palmerin of England, and suchlike famous knights,
which he said, as I knew how to read, for which he greatly commended
my parents' care, I should entertain myself with on the road. So,
one-half sitting, one-half lying on the grass, I reclined in an easy
posture, with my head resting against the trunk of a tree, pleasing my
fancy with the writers' conceits; but ever and anon lifting my eyes to
the blue sky above my head, seen through the green branches, or fixed
them on the quaint patterns the quivering light drew on the grass, or
else on the valley refreshed with a silver river, and the fair hills
beyond it. And as I read of knights and ladies, and the many perils
which befel them, and passages of love betwixt them, which was new to
me, and what I had not met with in any of the books I had yet read, I
fell into a fit of musing, wondering if in London the folks I should
see would discourse in the same fashion, and the gentlemen have so
much bravery and the ladies so great beauty as those my book treated
of. And as I noticed it was chiefly on the high-roads they did come
into such dangerous adventures, {354} I gazed as far as I could
discern on the one I had in view before me with a foolish kind of
desire for some robbers to come and assail us, and then a great
nobleman or gallant esquire to ride up and fall on them, and to
deliver us from a great peril, and may be to be wounded in the
encounter, and I to bind up those wounds as from my mother's teaching
I knew how to do, and then give thanks to the noble gentleman in such
courteous and well-picked words as I could think of. But for all my
gazing I could naught perceive save a wain slowly ascending the hill
loaden with corn, midst clouds of dust, and some poorer sort of
people, who had been gleaning, and were carrying sheaves on their
heads. After an hour Mistress Ward awoke from her nap; and methinks I
had been dozing also, for when she called to me, and said it was time
to eat somewhat, and then get to horse, I cried out, "Good sir, I wait
your pleasure;" and rubbed my eyes to see her standing before me in
her riding-habit, and not the gentleman whose wounds I had been
tending.

That night we slept at Northampton, at Mistress Engerfield's house.
She was a cousin of Mr. Congleton's, and a lady whose sweet affability
and gravity would have extorted reverence from those that least loved
her. She was then very aged, and had been a nun in King Henry's reign;
and, since her convent had been despoiled, and the religious driven
out of it, having a large fortune of her own, which she inherited
about that time, she made her house a secret monastery, wherein God
was served in a religious manner by such persons as the circumstances
of the time, and not their own desires, had forced back into the
world, and who as yet had found no commodity for passing beyond seas
into countries where that manner of life is allowed. They dressed in
sober black, and kept stated hours of prayer, and went not abroad
unless necessity compelled them thereunto. When we went into the
dining-room, which I noticed Mistress Engerfield called the refectory,
grace was said in Latin; and whilst we did eat one lady read out loud
out of a book, which methinks was the life of a saint; but the fatigue
of the journey, and the darkness of the room, which was wainscotted
with oak-wood, so overpowered my senses with drowsiness, that before
the meal was ended I had fallen asleep, which was discovered, to my
great confusion, when the company rose from table. But that good lady,
in whose face was so great a kindliness that I never saw one to be
compared with it in that respect before or since, took me by the hand
and said, "Young eyes wax heavy for lack of rest, and travellers
should have repose. Come to thy chamber, sweet one, and, after
commending thyself by a brief prayer to him who sleepeth not nor
slumbereth, and to her who is the Mother of the motherless, get thee
to bed and take thy fill of the sleep thou hast so great need of, and
good angels will watch near thee."

Oh, how I did weep then, partly from fatigue, and partly from the dear
comfort her words did yield me, and, kneeling, asked her blessing, as
I had been wont to do of my dear parents. And she, whose countenance
was full of majesty, and withal of most attractive gentleness, which
made me deem her to be more than an ordinary woman, and a great
servant of God, as indeed she was, raised me from the ground, and
herself assisted to get me to bed, having first said my prayers by her
side, whose inflamed devotion, visible in her face, awakened in me a
greater fervor than I had hitherto experienced when performing this
duty. After I had slept heavily for the space of two or three hours I
awoke, as is the wont of those who be over-fatigued, and could not get
to sleep again, so that I heard the clock of a church strike twelve;
and as the last stroke fell on my ear, it was followed by a sound of
chanting, as if close unto my chamber, which resembled what on rare
occasions I had heard performed {355} by two or three persons in our
chapel; but here, with so full a concord of voices, and so great
melody and sweetness, that methought, being at that time of night and
every one abed, it must be the angels that were singing. But the next
day, questioning Mrs. Ward thereupon as of a strange thing which had
happened to me, she said, the ladies in that house rose always at
midnight, as they had been used to do in their several convents, to
sing God's praises and give him thanks, which was what they did vow to
do when they became religious. Before we departed, Mistress Engerfield
took me into her own room, which was small and plainly furnished, with
no other furniture in it but a bed, table, and kneeling-stool, and
against the wall a large crucifix, and she bestowed upon me a small
book in French, titled "The Spiritual Combat," which she said was a
treasury of pious riches, which she counselled me by frequent study to
make my own; and with many prayers and blessings she then bade us
God-speed, and took leave of us. Our last day's lodging on the road
was at Bedford; and there being no Catholics of note in that town wont
to entertain travellers, we halted at a quiet hostelry, which was kept
by very decent people, who showed us much civility; and the landlady,
after we had supped, the evening being rainy (for else she said we
might have walked through her means into the fair grounds of the Abbey
of Woburn, which she thanked God was not now a hive for drones, as it
had once been, but the seat of a worthy nobleman; which did more
credit to the town, and drew customers to the inn), brought us for our
entertainment a huge book, which she said had as much godliness in
each of its pages as might serve to convert as many Papists--God save
the mark!--as there were leaves in the volume. My cheeks glowed like
fire when she thus spoke, and I looked at Mistress Ward, wondering
what she would say. But she only bowed her head, and made pretence to
open the book, which, when the good woman was gone,

"Mistress Constance," quoth she, "this is a book writ by Mr. Fox, the
Duke of Norfolk's old schoolmaster, touching those he doth call
martyrs, who suffered for treason and for heresy in the days of Queen
Mary,--God rest her soul!--and if it ever did convert a Papist, I do not
say on his deathbed, but at any time of his life, except it was
greatly for his own interest, I be ready. . ."

"To be a martyr yourself, Mistress Ward," I cried, with my ever too
great proneness to let my tongue loose from restraint. The color rose
in her cheek, which was usually pale, and she said:

"Child, I was about to say, that in the case I have named, I be ready
to forego the hope of that which I thank God I be wise enough to
desire, though unworthy to obtain; but for which I do pray each day
that I live."

"Then would you not be afraid to die on a scaffold," I asked, "or to
be hanged, Mistress Ward?"

"Not in a good cause," she said.

But before the words were out of her mouth our landlady knocked at the
door, and said a gentleman was in the house with his two sons, who
asked to pay their compliments to Mistress Ward and the young lady
under her care. The name of this gentleman was Rookwood, of Rookwood
Hall in Suffolk, and Mistress Ward desired the landlady presently to
bring them in, for she had often met them at my aunt's house, as she
afterward told me, and had great contentment we should have such good
company under the same roof with us; whom when they came in she very
pleasantly received, and informed Mr. Rookwood of my name and
relationship to Mistress Congleton; which when he heard, he asked if I
was Mr. Henry Sherwood's daughter; which being certified of, he
saluted me, and said my father was at one time, when both were at
college, the closest friend that ever he had, and his esteem for him
was so great that he would be better {356} pleased with the news that
he should see him but once again, than if any one was to give him a
thousand pounds. I told him my father often spake of him with singular
affection, and that the letter I should write to him from London would
be more welcome than anything else could make it, by the mention of
the honor I had had of his notice. Mistress Ward then asked him what
was the news in London, from whence he had come that morning. He
answered that the news was not so good as he would wish it to be; for
that the queen's marriage with monsieur was broke off, and the King of
France greatly incensed at the favor M. de Montgomeri had experienced
at her hands; and that when he had demanded he should be given up, she
had answered that she did not see why she should be the King of
France's hangman; which was what his father had replied to her sister,
when she had made the like request anent some of her traitors who had
fled to France.

"Her majesty," he said, "was greatly incensed against the Bishop of
Ross, and had determined to put him to death; but that she was
dissuaded from it by her council; and that he prayed God Catholics
should not fare worse now that Ridolfi's plot had been discovered to
declare her highness illegitimate, and place the Queen of Scots on the
throne, which had moved her to greater anger than even the rising in
the north.

"And touching the Duke of Norfolk," Mistress Ward did ask, "what is
like to befal him?"

Mr. Rookwood said, "His grace had been removed from the Tower to his
own house on account of the plague; but it is reported the queen is
more urgent against him than ever, and will have his head in the end."

"If her majesty will not marry monsieur," Mistress Ward said, "it will
fare worse with recusants."

Upon which one of the young gentlemen cried out, "'Tis not her majesty
will not have him; but monsieur will not have her. My Lord of Oxford,
who is to marry my Lord Burleigh's daughter, said yesterday at the
tennis court, that that matter of monsieur is grieviously taken on her
grace's part; but that my lord is of opinion that where amity is so
needful, her majesty should stomach it; and so she doth pretend to
break it off herself by reason of her religious scruples."

At the which both brothers did laugh, but Mr. Rookwood bade them have
a care how they did suffer their tongues to wag anent her grace and
such matters as her grace's marriage; which although in the present
company might be without danger, was an ill habit, which in these
times was like to bring divers persons into troubles.

"Hang it!" cried the eldest of his sons, who was of a well-pleasing
favor and exceeding goodly figure; "recusants be always in trouble,
whatsoever they do; both taxed for silence and checked for speech, as
the play hath it. For good Mr. Weston was racked for silence last week
till he fainted, for that he would not reveal what he had heard in
confession from one concerned in Ridolfi's plot; and as to my Lord
Morley, he hath been examined before the council, touching his having
said he would go abroad poorly and would return in glory, which he did
speak concerning his health; but they would have it meant treason."

"Methinks, Master Basil," said his father, "thou art not like to be
taxed for silence; unless indeed on the rack, which the freedom of thy
speech may yet bring thee to, an thou hast not more care of thy words.
See now, thy brother keeps his lips closed in modest silence."

"Ay, as if butter would not melt in his mouth," cried Basil, laughing.

And I then noticed the countenance of the younger brother, who was
fairer and shorter by a head than Basil, and had the most beautiful
eyes imaginable, and a high forehead betokening thoughtfulness. Mr.
Rookwood drew his chair further from the table, and conversed in a low
voice with Mrs. Ward, {357} touching matters which I ween were of too
great import to be lightly treated of. I heard the name of Mr. Felton
mentioned in their discourse, and somewhat about the Pope's Bull, in
the affixing of which at the Bishop of London's gate he had lent a
hand; but my ears were not free to listen to them, for the young
gentlemen began to entertain me with divers accounts of the shows in
London; which, as they were some years older than myself, who was then
no better than a child, though tall of mine age, I took as a great
favor, and answered them in the best way I could. Basil spoke mostly
of the sights he had seen, and a fight between a lion and three dogs,
in which the dogs were victorious; and Hubert of books, which he said,
for his part, he had always a care to keep handsome and well bound.

"Ay," quoth his brother, "gilding them and stringing them like the
prayer-books of girls and gallants, which are carried to church but
for their outsides. I do hate a book with clasps, 'tis a trouble to
open them."

"A trouble thou dost seldom take," quoth Hubert. "Thou art ready
enough to unclasp the book of thy inward soul to whosoever will read
in it, and thy purse to whosoever begs or borrows of thee; but with
such clasps as shut in the various stores of thought which have issued
forth from men's minds thou dost not often meddle."

"Beshrew me if I do! The best prayer-book I take to be a pair of
beads; and the most entertaining reading, the 'Rules for the Hunting
of Deer;' which, by what I have heard from Sir Roger Ashlon, my Lord
Stafford hath grievously transgressed by assaulting Lord Lyttleton's
keepers in Teddesley Haye."

"What have you here?" Hubert asked, glancing at Mr. Fox's _Book of
Martyrs_, and another which the landlady had left on the table; _A
profitable New Year's Gift to all England._

"They are not mine," I answered, "nor such as I do care to read; but
this," I said, holding out Mr. Page's gift, which I had in my pocket,
"is a rare fund of entertainment and very full of pleasant tales."

"But," quoth he, "you should read the _Morte d'Arthur_ and the _Seven
Champions of Christendom."_

Which I said I should be glad to do when I had the good chance to meet
with them. He said, "My cousin Polly had a store of such pleasant
volumes, and would, no doubt, lend them to me. She has such a sharp
wit," he added, "that she is ever exercising it on herself or on
others; on herself by the bettering of her mind through reading; and
on others by such applications, of what she thus acquires as leaves
them no chance in discoursing with her but to yield to her superior
knowledge."

"Methinks," I said, "if that be her aim in reading, may be she will
not lend to others the means of sharpening their wits to encounter
hers."

At the which both of them laughed, and Basil said he hoped I might
prove a match for Mistress Polly, who carried herself too high, and
despised such as were slower of speech and less witty than herself.
"For my part," he cried, "I am of opinion that too much reading doth
lead to too much thinking, and too much thinking doth consume the
spirits; and often it falls out that while one thinks too much of his
doing, he leaves to do the effect of his thinking."

At the which Hubert smiled, and I bethought myself that if Basil was
no book-worm neither was he a fool. With such like discourse the
evening sped away, and Mr. Rookwood and his sons took their leave with
many civilities and pleasant speeches, such as gentlemen are wont to
address to ladies, and hopes expressed to meet again in London, and
good wishes for the safe ending of our journey thither.

Ah, me! 'tis passing strange to sit here and write in this little
chamber, after so many years, of that first meeting with those
brothers, Basil and Hubert; to call to mind how they did look and
speak, and of the pretty kind {358} of natural affection there was
betwixt them in their manner to each other. Ah, me! the old trick of
sighing is coming over me again, which I had well-nigh corrected
myself of, who have more reason to give thanks than to complain. Good
Lord, what fools you be! sighing heart and watering eyes! As great
fools, I ween, as the Mayor of Coventry, whose foolish rhymes do keep
running in my head.

The day following we came to London, which being, as it were, the
beginning of a new life to me, I will defer to speak of until I find
myself, after a night's rest and special prayers unto that end, less
heavy of heart than at present.


CHAPTER VII.

Upon a sultry evening which did follow an exceeding hot day, with no
clouds in the sky, and a great store of dust on the road, we entered
London, that great fair of the whole world, as some have titled it.
When for many years we do think of a place we have not seen, a picture
forms itself in the mind as distinct as if the eye had taken
cognizance thereof, and a singular curiosity attends the actual vision
of what the imagination hath so oft portrayed. On this occasion my
eyes were slow servants to my desires, which longed to embrace in the
compass of one glance the various objects they craved to behold.
Albeit the sky was cloudless above our heads, I feared it would rain
in London, by reason of a dark vapor which did hang over it; but
Mistress Ward informed me that this appearance was owing to the smoke
of sea-coal, of which so great a store is used in the houses that the
air is filled with it. "And do those in London always live in that
smoke?" I inquired, not greatly contented to think it should be so;
but she said Mr. Congleton's house was not in the city, but in a very
pleasant suburb outside of it, close unto Holborn Hill and Ely Place,
the bishop's palace, in whose garden the roses were so plentiful that
in June the air is perfumed with their odor. I troubled her not with
further questions at that time, being soon wholly taken up with the
new sights which then did meet us at every step. So great a number of
gay horsemen, and litters carried by footmen with fine liveries, and
coaches drawn by horses richly caparisoned and men running alongside
of them, and withal so many carts, that I was constrained to give over
the guiding of mine own horse by reason of the confusion which the
noise of wheels and men's cries and the rapid motion of so many
vehicles did cause in me, who had never rode before in so great a
crowd.

At about six o'clock of the afternoon we did reach Ely Place, and
passing by the bishop's palace stopped at the gate of Mr. Congleton's
house, which doth stand somewhat retired from the high-road, and the
first sight of which did greatly content me. It is built of fair and
strong stone, not affecting fineness, but honorably representing a
firm stateliness, for it was handsome without curiosity, and homely
without negligence. At the front of it was a well-arranged ground
cunningly set with trees, through which we rode to the foot of the
stairs, where we were met by a gentleman dressed in a coat of black
satin and a quilted waistcoat, with a white beaver in his hand, whom I
guessed to be my good uncle. He shook Mistress Ward by the hand,
saluted me on both cheeks, and vowed I was the precise counterpart of
my mother, who at my age, he said, was the prettiest Lancashire witch
that ever he had looked upon. He seemed to me not so old as I did
suppose him to be, lean of body and something low of stature, with a
long visage and a little sharp beard upon the chin of a brown color; a
countenance not very grave, and, for his age, wanting the authority of
gray hairs. He conducted me to mine aunt's chamber, who was seated in
an easy-chair near unto the window, with a cat upon her knees and
{359} a tambour-frame before her. She oped her arms and kissed me with
great affection, and I, sliding down, knelt at her feet and prayed her
to be a good mother to me, which was what my father had charged me to
do when I should come into her presence. She raised me with her hand
and made me sit on a stool beside her, and stroking my face gently,
gazed upon it, and said it put her in mind of both of my parents, for
that I had my father's brow and eyes, and my mother's mouth and
dimpling smiles.

"Mr. Congleton," she cried, "you do hear what this wench saith. I pray
you to bear it in mind, and how near in blood she is to me, so that
you may show her favor when I am gone, which may be sooner than you
think for."

I looked up into her face greatly concerned that she was like so soon
to die. Methought she had the semblance of one in good health and a
reasonable good color in her cheeks, and I perceived Mr. Congleton did
smile as he answered:

"I will show favor to thy pretty niece, good Moll, I promise thee, be
thou alive or be thou dead; but if the leeches are to be credited, who
do affirm thou hast the best strength and stomach of the twain, thou
art more like to bury me than I thee."

Upon which the good lady did sigh deeply and cast up her eyes and
lifted up her hands as one grievously injured, and he cried:

"Prithee, sweetheart, take it not amiss, for beshrew me if I be not
willing to grant thee to be as diseased as will pleasure thee, so that
thou wilt continue to eat and sleep as well as thou dost at the
present and so keep thyself from dying."

Upon which she said that she did admire how a man could have so much
cruelty as to jest and jeer at her ill-health, but that she would
spend no more of her breath upon him; and turning toward me she asked
a store of questions anent my father, whom for many years she had not
seen, and touching the manner of my mother's death, at the mention of
which my tears flowed afresh, which caused her also to weep; and
calling for her women she bade one of them bring her some hartshorn,
for that sorrow, she said, would occasion the vapors to rise in her
head, and the other she sent for to fetch her case of trinkets, for
that she would wear the ring her brother had presented her with some
years back, in which was a stone which doth cure melancholy. When the
case was brought she displayed before my eyes its rich contents, and
gifted me with a brooch set with turquoises, the wearing of which, she
said, doth often keep persons from falling into divers sorts of peril.
Then presently kissing me she said she felt fatigued, and would send
for her daughters to take charge of me; who, when they came, embraced
me with exceeding great affection, and carried me to what had been
their schoolroom and was now Mrs. Ward's chamber, who no longer was
their governess, they said, but as a friend abode in the house for to
go abroad with them, their mother being of so delicate a constitution
that she seldom left her room. Next to this chamber was a closet,
wherein Kate said I should lie, and as it is one I inhabited for a
long space of time, and the remembrance of which doth connect itself
with very many events which, as they did take place, I therein mused
on, and prayed or wept, or sometimes laughed over in solitude, I will
here set down what it was like when first I saw it.

The bed was in an alcove, closed in the day by fair curtains of
taffety; and the walls, which were in wood, had carvings above the
door and over the chimney of very dainty workmanship. The floor was
strewn with dried neatly-cut rushes, and in the projecting space where
the window was, a table was set, and two chairs with backs and seats
cunningly furnished with tapestry. In another recess betwixt the
alcove and the chimney stood a praying stool and a desk with a cushion
for a book to lie on. Ah, me! how often has my head {360} rested on
that cushion and my knees on that stool when my heart has been too
full to utter other prayers than a "God ha' mercy on me!" which at
such times broke as a cry from an overcharged breast. But, oh! what a
vain pleasure I did take on that first day in the bravery of this
little chamber, which Kate said was to be mine own! With what great
contentment I viewed each part of it, and looked out of the window on
the beds of flowers which did form a mosaical floor in the garden
around the house, in the midst of which was a fair pond whose shaking
crystal mirrored the shrubs which grew about it, and a thicket beyond,
which did appear to me a place for pleasantness and not unfit to
flatter solitariness, albeit so close unto the city. Beyond were the
bishop's grounds, and I could smell the scent of roses coming thence
as the wind blew. I could have stood there many hours gazing on this
new scene, but that my cousins brought me down to sup with them in the
garden, which was not fairer in natural ornaments than in artificial
inventions. The table was set in a small banqueting-house among
certain pleasant trees near to a pretty water-work; and now I had
leisure to scan my cousins' faces and compare what I did notice in
them with what Mistress Ward had said the first night of our journey.

Kate, the eldest of the three, was in sooth a very fair creature,
proportioned without any fault, and by nature endowed with the most
delightful colors; but there was a made countenance about her mouth,
between simpering and smiling, and somewhat in her bowed-down head
which seemed to languish with over-much idleness, and an inviting look
in her eyes as if they would over-persuade those she spoke to, which
betokened a lack of those nobler powers of the mind which are the
highest gifts of womanhood. Polly's face fault-finding wits might
scoff at as too little for the rest of the body, her features as not
so well proportioned as Kate's, and her skin somewhat browner than
doth consist with beauty; but in her eyes there was a cheerfulness as
if nature smiled in them, in her mouth so pretty a demureness, and in
her countenance such a spark of wit that, if it struck not with
admiration, filled with delight. No indifferent soul there was which,
if it resisted making her its princess, would not long to have such a
playfellow. Muriel, the youngest of these sisters, was deformed in
shape, sallow in hue, in speech, as Mistress Ward had said, slow; but
withal in her eyes, which were deep-set, there was lacking neither the
fire which betokens intelligence, nor the sweetness which commands
affection, and somewhat in her plain face which, though it may not be
called beauty, had some of its qualities. Methought it savored more of
heaven than earth. The ill-shaped body seemed but a case for a soul
the fairness of which did shine through the foul lineaments which
enclosed it. Albeit her lips opened but seldom that evening, only
twice or thrice, and they were common words she uttered and fraught
with hesitation, my heart did more incline toward her than to the
pretty Kate or the lively Polly.

An hour before we retired to rest, Mr. Congleton came into the garden,
and brought with him Mr. Swithin Wells and Mr. Bryan Lacy, two
gentlemen who lived also in Holborn; the latter of which, Polly
whispered in mine ear, was her sister Kate's suitor. Talk was
ministered among them touching the queen's marriage with Monsieur;
which, as Mr. Rookwood had said, was broken off; but that day they had
heard that M. de la Motte had proposed to her majesty the Due
d'Alençon, who would be more complying, he promised, touching religion
than his brother. She inquired of the prince's age, and of his height;
to the which he did answer, "About your majesty's own height." But her
highness would not be so put off, and willed the ambassador to write
for the precise measurement of the prince's stature.

"She will never marry," quoth Mr. Wells, "but only amuse the French
{361} court and her council with further negotiations touching this
new suitor, as heretofore anent the archduke and Monsieur. But I would
to God her majesty were well married, and to a Catholic prince; which
would do us more good than anything else which can be thought of."

"What news did you hear, sir, of Mr. Felton?" Mistress Ward asked.
Upon which their countenances fell; and one of them answered that that
gentleman had been racked the day before, but steadily refused, though
in the extremity of torture, to name his accomplices; and would give
her majesty no title but that of the Pretender; which they said was
greatly to be regretted, and what no other Catholic had done. But when
his sentence was read to him, for that he was to die on Friday, he
drew from his finger a ring, which had diamonds in it, and was worth
four hundred pounds, and requested the Earl of Sussex to give it to
the queen, in token that he bore her no ill-will or malice, but rather
the contrary.

Mr. Wells said he was a gentleman of very great heart and noble
disposition, but for his part he would as lief this ring had been
sold, and the money bestowed on the poorer sort of prisoners in
Newgate, than see it grace her majesty's finger; who would thus play
the hangman's part, who inherits the spoils of such as he doth put to
death. But the others affirmed it was done in a Christian manner, and
so greatly to be commended; and that Mr. Felton, albeit he was
somewhat rash in his actions, and by some titled Don Magnifico, by
reason of a certain bravery in his style of dress and fashion of
speaking, which smacked of Monsieur Traveller, was a right worthy
gentleman, and his death a blow to his friends, amongst whom there
were some, nevertheless, to be found who did blame him for the act
which had brought him into trouble. Mistress Ward cried, that such as
fell into trouble, be the cause ever so good, did always find those
who would blame them. Mr. Lacy said, one should not cast himself into
danger wilfully, but when occasion offered take it with patience.
Polly replied, that some were so prudent, occasions never came to
them. And then those two fell to disputing, in a merry but withal
sharp fashion. As he did pick his words, and used new-fangled terms,
and she spoke roundly and to the point, methinks she was the nimblest
in this encounter of wit.

Meanwhile Mr. Wells asked Mr. Congleton if he had had news from the
north, where much blood was spilt since the rising; and he apprehended
that his kinsmen in Richmondshire should suffer under the last orders
sent to Sir George Bowes by my Lord Sussex. But Mr. Congleton did
minister to him this comfort, that if they were noted wealthy, and had
freeholds, it was the queen's special commandment they should not be
executed, but two hundred of the commoner sort to lose their lives in
each town; which was about one to each five.

"But none of note?" quoth Mr. Wells.

"None which can pay the worth of their heads," Mr. Congleton replied.

"And who, then, doth price them?" asked Kate, in a languishing voice.

"Nay, sister," quoth Polly, "I warrant thee they do price themselves;
for he that will not pay well for his head must needs opine he hath a
worthless one."

Upon which Mr. Lacy said to Kate, "One hundred angels would not pay
for thine, sweet Kate."

"Then she must needs be an archangel, sir," quoth Polly, "if she be of
greater worth than one hundred angels."

"Ah, me!" cried Kate, very earnestly, "I would I had but half one
hundred gold-pieces to buy me a gown with!"

"Hast thou not gowns enough, wench?" asked her father. "Methought thou
wert indifferently well provided in that respect."

"Ah, but I would have, sir, such a {362} velvet suit as I did see some
weeks back at the Italian house in Cheapside, where the ladies of the
court do buy their vestures. It had a border the daintiest I ever
beheld, all powdered with gold and pearls. Ruffiano said it was the
rarest suit he had ever made; and he is the Queen of France's tailor,
which Sir Nicholas Throgmorton did secretly entice away, by the
queen's desire, from that court to her own."

"And what fair nymph owns this rare suit, sweetest Kate?" Mr. Lacy
asked. "I'll warrant none so fair that it should become her, or rather
that she should become it, more than her who doth covet it."

"I know not if she be fair or foul," quoth Kate, "but she is the Lady
Mary Howard, one of the maids of honor of her majesty, and so may wear
what pleaseth her."

"By that token of the gold and pearls," cried Mr. Wells, "I doubt not
but 'tis the very suit anent which the court have been wagging their
tongues for the last week; and if it be so, indeed, Mistress Kate, you
have no need to envy the poor lady that doth own it."

Kate protested she had not envied her, and taxed Mr. Wells with
unkindness that he did charge her with it; and for all he could say
would not be pacified, but kept casting up her eyes, and the tears
streaming down her lovely cheeks. Upon which Mr. Lacy cried:

"Sweet one, thou hast indeed no cause to envy her or any one else,
howsoever rare or dainty their suits may be; for thy teeth are more
beauteous than pearls, and thine hair more bright than the purest
gold, and thine eyes more black and soft than the finest velvet, which
nature so made that we might bear their wonderful shining, which else
had dazzled us:" and so went on till her weeping was stayed, and then
Mr. Wells said:

"The lady who owned that rich suit, which I did falsely and
feloniously advance Mistress Kate did envy, had not great or long
comfort in its possession; for it is very well known at court, and
hence bruited in the city, what passed at Richmond last week
concerning this rare vesture. It pleased not the queen, who thought it
did exceed her own. And one day her majesty did send privately for it,
and put it on herself, and came forth into the chamber among the
ladies. The kirtle and border was far too short for her majesty's
height, and she asked every one how they liked her new fancied suit.
At length she asked the owner herself if it was not made too short and
ill-becoming; which the poor lady did presently consent to. Upon which
her highness cried: 'Why, then, if it become me not as being too
short, I am minded it shall never become thee as being too fine, so it
fitteth neither well.' This sharp rebuke so abashed the poor lady that
she never adorned her herewith any more."

"Ah," cried Mr. Congleton, laughing, "her majesty's bishops do come by
reproofs as well as her maids. Have you heard how one Sunday, last
April, my Lord of London preached to the queen's majesty, and seemed
to touch on the vanity of decking the body too finely. Her grace told
the ladies after the sermon, that if the bishop held more discourse on
such matters she would fit him for heaven, but he should walk thither
without a staff and leave his mantle behind him."

"Nay," quoth Mr. Wells, "but if she makes such as be Catholics taste
of the sharpness of the rack, and the edge of the axe, she doth then
treat those of her own way of thinking with the edge of her wit and
the sharpness of her tongue. 'Tis reported, Mr. Congleton, I know not
with what truth, that a near neighbor of yours has been served with a
letter, by which a new sheep is let into his pastures."

"What," cried Polly, "is Pecora Campi to roam amidst the roses, and go
in and out at his pleasure through the bishop's gate? The 'sweet lids'
have then danced away a large slice of the Church's acres. But what, I
pray you, sir, did her majesty write?"

"Even this," quoth her father, "I {363} had it from Sir Robert
Arundell: 'Proud Prelate! you know what you were before I made you,
and what you are now. If you do not immediately comply with my
request, I will unfrock you, by God!--ELIZABETH R.'"

"Our good neighbor," saith Polly, "must show a like patience with Job,
and cry out touching his bishopric, 'The queen did give it; the queen
doth take it away; the will of the queen be done.'"

"He is like to be encroached upon yet further by yon cunning Sir
Christopher," Mr. Wells said; "I'll warrant Ely Place will soon be
Hatton Garden."

"Well, for a neighbor," answered Polly, "I'd as soon have the queen's
lids as her hedge-bishop, and her sheep as her shepherd. 'Tis not all
for love of her sweet dancer her majesty doth despoil him. She never,
'tis said, hath forgiven him that he did remonstrate with her for
keeping a crucifix and lighted tapers in her own chapel, and that her
fool, set on by such as were of the same mind with him, did one day
put them out."

In suchlike talk the time was spent; and when the gentlemen had taken
leave, we retired to rest; and being greatly tired, I slept heavily,
and had many quaint dreams, in which past scenes and present objects
were curiously blended with the tales I had read on the journey, and
the discourse I had heard that evening. When I awoke in the morning,
my thoughts first flew to my father, of whom I had a very passionate
desire to receive tidings. When my waiting-woman entered, with a
letter in her hand, I foolishly did fancy it came from him, which
could scarcely be, so soon after our coming to town; but I quickly
discerned, by the rose-colored string which it was bounden with, and
then the handwriting, that it was not from him, but from her whom,
next to him, I most desired to hear from, to wit, the Countess of
Surrey. That sweet lady wrote that she had an exceeding great desire
to see me, and would be more beholden to my aunt than she could well
express, if she would confer on her so great a benefit as to permit me
to spend the day with her at the Charter House, and she would send her
coach for to convey me there, which should never have done her so much
good pleasure before as in that service. And more to that effect, with
many kind and gracious words touching our previous meeting and
correspondence.

When I was dressed, I took her ladyship's letter to Mrs. Ward, who was
pleased to say she would herself ask permission for me to wait upon
that noble lady; but that her ladyship might not be at the charge of
sending for me, she would herself, if my aunt gave her license, carry
me to the Charter House, for that she was to spend some hours that day
with friends in the city, and "it would greatly content her," she
added, "to further the expressed wish of the young countess, whose
grandmother, Lady Mounteagle, and so many of her kinsfolk, were
Catholics, or at the least, good friends to such as were so." My aunt
did give leave for me to go, as she mostly did to whatsoever Mrs. Ward
proposed, whom she trusted entirely, with a singular great affection,
only bidding her to pray that she might not die in her absence, for
that she feared some peaches she had eaten the day before had
disordered her, and that she had heard of one who had died of the
plague some weeks before in the Tower. Mrs. Ward exhorted her to be of
good cheer, and to comfort herself both ways, for that the air of
Holborn was so good, the plague was not likely to come into it, and
that the kernels of peaches being medicinal, would rather prove an
antidote to pestilence than an occasion to it; and left her better
satisfied, insomuch that she sent for another dish of peaches for to
secure the benefit. Before I left, Kate bade me note the fashion of
the suit my Lady Surrey did wear, and if she had on her own hair, and
if she dyed it, and if she covered her bosom, or wore plaits, and if
her stomacher was straight {364} and broad, or formed a long waist,
extending downward, and many more points touching her attire, which I
cannot now call to mind. As I went through the hall to the steps where
Mistress Ward was already standing, Muriel came hurrying toward me,
with a faint color coming and going in her sallow cheek, and twice she
tried to speak and failed. But when I kissed her she put her lips
close to my ear and whispered,

"Sweet little cousin, there be in London prisoners in a very bad
plight, in filthy dungeons, because of their religion. The noble young
Lady Surrey hath a tender heart toward such if she do but hear of
them. Prithee, sweet coz, move her to send them relief in food, money,
or clothing."

Then Mistress Ward called to me to hasten, and I ran away, but Muriel
stood at the window, and as we passed she kissed her hand, in which
was a gold angel, which my father had gifted me with at parting.

"Mrs. Ward," I said, as we went along, "my cousin Muriel is not fair,
and yet her face doth commend itself to my fancy more than many fair
ones I have seen; it is so kindly."

"I have even from her infancy loved her," she answered, "and thus much
I will say of her, that many have been titled saints who had not,
methinks, more virtue than I have noticed in Muriel."

"Doth she herself visit the prisoners she spoke of?"

"She and I do visit them and carry them relief when we can by any
means prevail with the gaolers from compassion or through bribing of
them to admit us. But it is not always convenient to let this be
known, not even at home, but I ween, Constance, as thou wilt have me
to call thee so, that Muriel saw in thee--for she has a wonderful
penetrative spirit--that thou dost know when to speak and when to keep
silence."

"And may I go with you to the prisons?" I asked with a hot feeling in
my heart, which I had not felt since I had left home.

"Thou art far too young," she answered. "But I will tell thee what
thou canst do. Thou mayst work and beg for these good men, and not be
ashamed of so doing. None may visit them who have not made up their
minds to die, if they should be denounced for their charity."

"But Muriel is young," I answered. "Hath she so resolved?"

"Muriel is young," was the reply; "but she is one in whom wisdom and
holiness have forestalled age. For two years that she hath been my
companion on such occasions, she has each day prepared for martyrdom
by such devout exercises as strengthen the soul at the approach of
death."

"And Kate and Polly," I asked, "are they privy to the dangers that you
do run, and have they no like ambition?"

"Rather the contrary," she answered; "but neither they nor any one
else in the house is fully acquainted with these secret errands save
Mr. Congleton, and he did for a long time refuse his daughter license
to go with me, until at last, by prayers and tears, she won him over
to suffer it. But he will never permit thee to do the like, for that
thy father hath intrusted thee to his care for greater safety in these
troublesome times."

"Pish!" I cried pettishly, "safety has a dull mean sound in it which I
mislike. I would I were mine own mistress."

"Wish no such thing, Constance Sherwood," was her grave answer.
"Wilfulness was never nurse to virtue, but rather her foe; nor ever
did a rebellious spirit prove the herald of true greatness. And now,
mark my words. Almighty God hath given thee a friend far above thee in
rank, and I doubt not in merit also, but whose faith, if report saith
true, doth run great dangers, and with few to advise her in these evil
days in which we live. Peradventure he hath appointed thee a work in a
palace as weighty as that of {365} others in a dungeon. Set thyself to
it with thy whole heart, and such prayers as draw down blessings from
above. There be great need in these times to bear in remembrance what
the Lord says, that he will be ashamed in heaven before his angels of
such as be ashamed of him on earth. And many there are, I greatly
fear, who though they be Catholics, do assist the heretics by their
cowardice to suppress the true religion in this land; and I pray to
God this may never be our case. Yet I would not have thee to be rash
in speech, using harsh words, or needlessly rebuking others, which
would not become thy age, or be fitting and modest in one of inferior
rank, but only where faith and conscience be in question not to be
afraid to speak. And now God bless thee, who should be an Esther in
this house, wherein so many true confessors of Christ some years ago
surrendered their lives in great misery and torments, rather than
yield up their faith."

This she said as we stopped at the gate of the Charter House, where
one of the serving-men of the Countess of Surrey was waiting to
conduct me to her lodgings, having had orders to that effect. She left
me in his charge, and I followed him across the square, and through
the cloisters and passages which led to the gallery, where my lady's
chamber was situated. My heart fluttered like a frightened caged bird
during that walk, for there was a solemnity about the place such as I
had not been used to, and which filled me with apprehension lest I
should be wanting in due respect where so much state was carried on.
But when the door was opened at one end of the gallery, and my sweet
lady ran out to meet me with a cry of joy, the silly heart, like a
caught bird, nestled in her embrace, and my lips joined themselves to
hers in a fond manner, as if not willing to part again, but by fervent
kisses supplying the place of words, which were lacking, to express
the great mutual joy of that meeting, until at last my lady raised her
head, and still holding my hands, cried out as she gazed on my face:

"You are more welcome, sweet one, than my poor words can say. I pray
you, doff your hat and mantle, and come and sit by me, for 'tis a
weary while since we have met, and those are gone from us who loved us
then, and for their sakes we must needs love one another dearly, if
our hearts did not of themselves move us unto it, which indeed they
do, if I may judge of yours, Mistress Constance, by mine own."

Then we kissed again, and she passed her arm around my neck with so
many graceful endearments, in which were blended girlish simplicity
and a youthful yet matronly dignity, that I felt that day the love
which, methinks, up to that time had had its seat mostly in the fancy,
take such root in mine heart, that it never lost its hold on it.

At the first our tongues were somewhat tied by joy and lack of
knowledge how to begin to converse on the many subjects whereon both
desired to hear the other speak, and the disuse of such intercourse as
maketh it easy to discourse on what the heart is full of. Howsoever,
Lady Surrey questioned me touching my father, and what had befallen us
since my mother's death. I told her that he had left his home, and
sent me to London by reason of the present troubles; but without
mention of what I did apprehend to be his further intent. And she then
said that the concern she was in anent her good father the Duke of
Norfolk did cause her to pity those who were also in trouble.

"But his grace," I answered, "is, I hope, in safety at present, and in
his own house?"

"In this house, indeed," she did reply, "but a strait prisoner in Sir
Henry Neville's custody, and not suffered to see his friends without
her majesty's especial permission. He did send for his son and me last
evening, having obtained leave for to see us, which he had not done
since the day my lord and I were married again, by {366} his order,
from the Tower, out of fear lest our first marriage, being made before
Phil was quite twelve years old, it should have been annulled by order
of the queen, or by some other means. It grieved me much to notice how
gray his hair had grown, and that his eyes lacked their wonted fire.
When we entered he was sitting in a chair, leaning backward, with his
head almost over the back of it, looking at a candle which burnt
before him, and a letter in his hand. He smiled when he saw us, and
said the greatest comfort he had in the world was that we were now so
joined together that nothing could ever part us. You see, Mistress
Constance," she said, with a pretty blush and smile, "I now do wear my
wedding-ring below the middle joint."

"And do you live alone with my lord now in these grand chambers?" I
said, looking round at the walls, which were hung with rare tapestry
and fine pictures.

"Bess is with me," she answered, "and so will remain I hope until she
is fourteen, when she will be married to my Lord William, my lord's
brother. Our Moll is likewise here, and was to have wedded my Lord
Thomas when she did grow up; but she is not like to live, the
physicians do say."

The sweet lady's eyes filled with tears, but, as if unwilling to
entertain me with her griefs, she quickly changed discourse, and spoke
of my coming unto London, and inquired if my aunt's house were a
pleasant one, and if she was like to prove a good kinswoman to me. I
told her how comfortable had been the manner of my reception, and of
my cousins' goodness to me; at the which she did express great
contentment, and would not be satisfied until I had described each of
them in turn, and what good looks or what good qualities they had;
which I could the more easily do that the first could be discerned
even at first sight, and touching the last, I had warrant from Mrs.
Ward's commendations, which had more weight than my own speerings,
even if I had been a year and not solely a day in their company. She
was vastly taken with what I related to her of Muriel, and that she
did visit and relieve poor persons and prisoners, and wished she had
liberty to do the like; and with a lovely blush and a modest
confusion, as of one who doth not willingly disclose her good deeds,
she told me all the time she could spare she did employ in making
clothes for such as she could hear of, and also salves and cordials
(such as she had learnt to compound from her dear grandmother), and
privately sent them by her waiting-maid, who was a young gentlewoman
of good family, who had lost her parents, and was most excellently
endowed with virtue and piety.

"Come to my closet, Miss Constance," she said, "and I doubt not but we
shall find Milicent at work, if so be she has not gone abroad to-day
on some such errand of charity." Upon which she led the way through a
second chamber, still more richly fitted up than the first, into a
smaller one, wherein, when she opened the door, I saw a pretty living
picture of two girls at a table, busily engaged with a store of
bottles and herbs and ointments, which were strewn upon it in great
abundance. One of them was a young maid, who was measuring drops into
a phial, with a look so attentive upon it as if that little bottle had
been the circle of her thoughts. She was very fair and slim, and had a
delicate appearance, which minded me of a snow-drop; and indeed, by
what my lady said, she was a floweret which had blossomed amidst the
frosts and cold winds of adversity. By her side was the most gleesome
wench, of not more than eight years, I ever did set eyes on; of a
fatness that at her age was comely, and a face so full of waggery and
saucy mirth, that but to look upon it drove away melancholy. She was
compounding in a cup a store of various liquids, which she said did
cure shrewishness, and said she would pour some into her nurse's
night-draught, to mend her of that disorder.

{367}

"Ah, Nan," she cried, as we entered, "I'll help thee to a taste of
this rare medicine, for methinks thou art somewhat shrewish also and
not so conformable to thy husband's will, my lady, as a good wife
should be. By that same token that my lord willed to take me behind
him on his horse a gay ride round the square, and, forsooth, because I
had not learnt my lesson, thou didst shut me up to die of melancholy.
Ah, me! My mother had a maid called Barbara--

  'Sing willow, willow, willow.'

That is one of Phil's favorite songs. Milicent, methinks I will call
thee Barbara, and thou shalt sing with me--

  'The poor soul sat sighing by a sycamore tree,--
  Sing all a green willow;
  Her hand on her bosom,'--

There, put thy hand in that fashion--

  'her head on her knee,'--

Nay, prithee, thou must bend thy head lower--

  'Sing willow, willow, willow.'"

"My lady," said the gentlewoman, smiling, "I promise you I dare not
take upon me to fulfil my tasks with credit to myself or your
ladyship, if Mistress Bess hath the run of this room, and doth prepare
cordials after her fashion from your ladyship's stores."

"Ah, Bess!" quoth my lady, shaking her finger at the saucy one; "I'll
deliver thee up to Mrs. Fawcett, who will give thee a taste of the
place of correction; and Phil is not here to-day to beg thee off. And
now, good Milicent, prithee make a bundle of such clothes as we have
in hand, and such comforts as be suitable to such as are sick and in
prison, for this sweet young lady hath need of them for some who be in
that sad plight."

"And, my lady," quoth the gentlewoman, "I would fain learn how to
dress wounds when the flesh is galled; for I do sometimes meet with
poor men who do suffer in that way, and would relieve them if I
could."

"I know," I cried, "of a rare ointment my mother used to make for that
sort of hurt; and if my Lady Surrey gives me license, I will remember
you, mistress, with the receipt of it."

My lady, with a kindly smile and expressed thanks, assented; and when
we left the closet, I greatly commending the young gentlewoman's
beauty, she said that beauty in her was the worst half of her merit.

"But, Mistress Constance," she said, when we had returned to the
saloon, "I may not send her to such poor men, and above all, priests,
who be in prison for their faith, as I hear, to my great sorrow, there
be so many at this time, and who suffer great hardships, more than can
be easily believed, for she is Protestant, and not through conforming
to the times, but so settled in her way of thinking, and earnest
therein, having been brought up to it, that she would not so much as
open a Catholic book or listen to a word in defence of papists."

"But how, then, doth she serve a Catholic lady?" I asked, with a
beating heart; and oh, with what a sad one did hear her answer, for it
was as follows:

"Dear Constance, I must needs obey those who have a right to command
me, such as his grace my good father and my husband; and they are both
very urgent and resolved that by all means I shall conform to the
times. So I do go to Protestant service; but I use at home my prayers,
as my grandmother did teach me; and Phil says them too, when I can get
him to say any."

"Then you do not hear mass," I said, sorrowfully, "or confess your
sins to a priest?"

"No," she answered, in a sad manner; "I once asked my Lady Lumley, who
is a good Catholic, if she could procure I should see a priest with
that intent at Arundel House; but she turned pale as a sheet, and said
that to get any one to be reconciled who had {368} once conformed to
the Protestant religion, was to run danger of death; and albeit for
her own part she would not refuse to die for so good a cause, she
dared not bring her father's gray hairs to the block."

As we were holding this discourse--and she so intent in speaking, and
I in listening, that we had not heard the door open--Lord Surrey
suddenly stood before us. His height made him more than a boy, and his
face would not allow him a man; for the rest, he was
well-proportioned, and did all things with so notable a grace, that
nature had stamped him with the mark of true nobility. He made a
slight obeisance to me, and I noticed that his cheek was flushed, and
that he grasped the handle of his sword with an anger which took not
away the sweetness of his countenance, but gave it an amiable sort of
fierceness. Then, as if unable to restrain himself, he burst forth,

"Nan, an order is come for his grace to be forthwith removed to the
Tower, and I'll warrant that was the cause he was suffered to see us
yesterday. God send it prove not a final parting!"

"Is his grace gone?" cried the countess, starting to her feet, and
clasping her hands with a sorrowful gesture.

"He goes even now," answered the earl; and both went to the window,
whence they could see the coach in which the duke was for the third
time carried from his home to the last lodging he was to have on this
earth. Oh, what a sorrowful sight it was for those young eyes which
gazed on the sad removal of the sole parent both had left! How her
tears did flow silently like a stream from a deep fount, and his with
wild bursts of grief, like the gushings of a torrent over rocks! His
head fell on her shoulder, and as she threw her arms round him, her
tears wetted his hair. Methought then that in the pensive tenderness
of her downcast face there was somewhat of motherly as well as of
wifely affection. She put her arm in his, and led him from the room;
and I remained alone for a short time entertaining myself with sad
thoughts anent these two young noble creatures, who at so early an age
had become acquainted with so much sorrow, and hoping that the
darkness which did beset the morning of their lives might prove but as
the clouds which at times deface the sky before a brilliant sunshine
doth take possession of it, and dislodge these deceitful harbingers,
which do but heighten in the end by contrast the resplendency they did
threaten to obscure.


[TO BE CONTINUED.]


{369}


From Temple Bar.


FRENCH COCHIN CHINA.


Between India and the Chinese empire lies the peninsula of Indo-China,
jutting out far into the Indian Ocean. The south-eastern portion of
this peninsula is occupied by the empire of Anam, of which the chief
maritime province is known to Europeans as Cochin China, but to the
natives as Dang-trong, or the outer kingdom. It is in lower Cochin
China that the French have succeeded in recently establishing a
military settlement. In extent these new territorial acquisitions of
our somewhat ambitious neighbors may be compared to Brittany, though
in no other respect can any resemblance be detected. The country is,
in fact, a strictly alluvial formation. Not only is it watered by the
Dong-nai and Saigon rivers, but it also embraces the delta of the
Mekong, at the mouth of which noble stream the Portuguese poet Camoens
was ship-wrecked in the year 1556, swimming to the shore with his left
hand, while in his right he held above the waters his manuscript copy
of the _Lusiad_. It is almost needless to add that a level plain
spreads far and wide, except quite in the north, and that fevers and
dysentery prevail throughout the greater part of the year. The climate
is certainly not a healthy one for Europeans. The rainy season lasts
from April to December, during which the inhabitants live in a
vapor-bath. The consequence is, that the French soldiers die off with
such frightful rapidity that it has been urgently recommended that
every regiment should be relieved after two years' service. The
authorities, however, have lost no time in improving the sanitary
condition of the new settlement. By means of native labor large tracts
of marsh-land have been drained, and good roads made in lieu of the
shallow tidal canals which previously constituted the sole channels of
traffic and mutual intercourse. Formerly every villager owned a small
boat, in which he moved about from place to place, taking with him his
small merchandise, or conveying home to his family the proceeds of his
marketing. The town of Saigon itself is estimated to contain one
hundred thousand inhabitants. The houses are exceedingly mean, being
constructed either of wood or of palm-leaves fastened together. Though
situated seventy miles inland, Ghia-din, as it is called by the
natives, is a very flourishing port, and exhibits a very active
movement at all seasons of the year. It is frequented by a large
number of Chinese vessels, and is now rising into importance as the
head of the French possessions in the East. So far back, indeed, as
the ninth century Saigon was noted for its muslin manufactures, the
fineness of which was such that an entire dress could be drawn through
the circumference of a signet-ring. Owing to the comparative absence
of noxious insects it is regarded by Europeans as a not altogether
unpleasant residence.

The population of the empire of Anam has been estimated at thirty
millions; but on this point there are not sufficient data to form a
very accurate opinion. But whatever may be their exact number, the
inhabitants are derived from three sources. The Anamites proper--that
is, the Cochin Chinese and the Tonkinese--are of a Chinese origin;
while the people of Camboge are descended from Hindoo ancestors; and
those in the interior--such as the Lao, Moi, and others--claim to be
the sons of the soil, with Malay blood flowing in their veins. Of the
early history of the Anamites few authentic details have reached us,
nor {370} are these of a nature to interest the general reader.
Although from an early date European missionaries appear to have
labored in their self-denying task of converting these disciples of
Buddhism to the purer tenets of Christianity, it was not until the
latter part of the eighteenth century that their influence was
sensibly appreciated. Even then they were indebted to an accident for
the increased importance they have since continued to possess. Fleeing
from a formidable and partially successful insurrection, the only
survivor of the royal family and heir to the throne--afterward the
celebrated Ghia-loung--took refuge in the house of Father Pigneau, a
French missionary of unblemished life and reputation. That worthy man
bravely afforded shelter not only to the fugitive, but also to his
wife, his sister, and his son, and even encouraged him to make a
strenuous effort to recover his rights. Foiled, however, for a time by
the superior forces of the rebels, the prince and his faithful
counsellor were compelled to flee for their lives to a small island in
the Gulf of Siam. Yielding to the advice of the missionary, Ghia-loung
now resolved to despatch an embassy to France, in the hope of
obtaining sufficient assistance to place himself on the throne of his
ancestors. Accordingly, in the year 1787, Father Pigneau, accompanied
by the youthful son of the unfortunate prince, proceeded to
Versailles, and actually prevailed upon Louis XVI. to conclude an
alliance, offensive and defensive, with his royal client. The terms of
this treaty are so far curious that they illustrate the practical and
realistic notion of an "idea" which characterized the old French
monarchy quite as much as it does the second Napoleonic empire.
Convinced of the justice of the Anamite prince's claim to the crown,
and moved by a desire to afford him a signal mark of his friendship,
as well as of his love of justice, his most Christian majesty agreed
to despatch immediately to the coasts of Cochin China a squadron
consisting of four frigates, conveying a land force of 1,200
foot-soldiers, 200 artillerymen, and 250 Caffres, thoroughly equipped
for service, and supported by an efficient field-battery. In return
for--or rather in expectation of receiving--this succor, the king of
Cochin China surrendered the absolute ownership and sovereignty of the
islands of Hoi-nan and Pulo Condor, together with a half-share in the
port of Touron, where the French were authorized to establish whatever
works and factories they might deem requisite for their safety and
commercial advantage. They were further to enjoy the exclusive
privilege of trading with the Cochin Chinese, and of introducing their
merchandise free of all charges and imposts. Neither was any trading
vessel or ship of war to be permitted to enter any port on the Cochin
China coast save only under the French flag. And in the event of his
most Christian majesty becoming involved in hostilities with any other
power, whether Asiatic or European, his faithful ally undertook to fit
out at his own expense both naval and land forces to co-operate with
the French troops anywhere in the Indian seas, but not beyond the
Moluccas or the Straits of Malacca. In consideration of his services
in negotiating this treaty, the ratifications of which were to be
exchanged within twelve months at the latest, Father Pigneau was
raised to the dignity of Bishop of Adran, and appointed ambassador
extraordinary from the court of Versailles to that of Cochin China.
The next step was to select a commander for the projected expedition;
and on the new prelate's urgent solicitation the king consented,
though with marked reluctance, to confer that distinction upon the
Count de Conway, at that time governor of the French establishments in
India. The selection proved an unfortunate one. Bishop Pigneau had
omitted one very important element from his calculation. He had made
no allowance for the disturbing influences of an improper {371}
connection with a "lovely woman." He may even have been ignorant of M.
de Conway's misplaced devotion to Mdme. de Vienne. Be this as it may,
on his arrival at Pondicherry he refused to wait upon that all-potent
lady, and offered her such slights that she became his avowed and
bitter enemy. It was through her, indeed, that the expedition was
never organized, and that the king of Cochin China was left to his own
resources to bring about his restoration. This he at length
accomplished, and in some small degree by the aid of a handful of
volunteers whom the Bishop of Adran had induced to accompany him to
Saigon. A sincere friendship appears to have existed between the
French prelate and the Anamite prince, which terminated only with the
death of the former in the last year of the eighteenth century. But
though Ghia-loung was fully sensible of the advantages to be derived
from maintaining a friendly intercourse with European nations, he was
not blind to the inconveniences likely to arise from allowing the
subjects of a foreign power to form independent settlements within his
dominions. Feeling that his end was at hand, the aged monarch
emphatically warned his son not to allow the French to possess a
single inch of land in his territories; but at the same time advised
him to cultivate amicable relations with that people. His successor
obeyed the paternal counsels only in part. He took care, indeed, to
prevent the French from settling permanently in his country; but he
went very much further, for he actively persecuted the Christian
converts, and exerted himself to the utmost to oppose the introduction
of western ideas and civilization. In the year 1825 Miñ-mâng--for so
was this emperor called--refused even to receive a letter and presents
forwarded by Louis XVIII., and expressed his determination to keep
aloof from all intercourse with European powers.

As Captain de Bougainville was provided neither with instructions how
to act under such circumstances, nor "with a sufficient force to
compel the acceptance of what was declined to be taken with a good
grace"--we quote from M. Leon de Rosny's _Tableau de Cochinchine_, to
which we are indebted for the matter of this article he formed the
wise resolution of withdrawing from those inhospitable shores. But
before he did so, he succeeded in landing Father Régéreau, a French
priest who had devoted himself to the work of making Christians of the
Anamites, whether they would or not. No sooner did this unwelcome news
reach the ears of the monarch, than it caused an edict to appear
enjoining the mandarins to exercise the utmost vigilance in preventing
the ingress of the teachers of "the perverse religion of the
Europeans," which is described as prejudicial to the rectitude and
right-mindedness of mankind. The doctrine of the missionaries was
further represented, in a petition said to have been inspired by the
emperor himself, as of a nature to corrupt and seduce the common
people by abusing their credulity. They employ, it was said, the fear
of hell and eternal punishment to terrify the timid; while, to attract
individuals of a different temperament, they promise the enjoyment of
heavenly bliss as the reward of virtue. By degrees the ill-feeling
entertained by the emperor toward the missionaries grew in intensity,
until they became the object of his bitter aversion; and as his
subordinates, according to custom, were anxious to recommend
themselves to favor by their demonstrative zeal, it was not long
before "the church of Cochin China was enriched by the crown of
numerous martyrs." The first of these martyrs was the Abbe Gagelin,
who was strangled on the 17th October, 1833; but then his offence was
twofold, for he had not only preached the forbidden doctrines, but, in
contravention of the king's commands, had quitted the town of Dong-nai
to do so. A very naive letter from a missionary named Jacquard
conveyed to the abbe the tidings of his forthcoming martyrdom. "Your
sentence," {372} he wrote, "has been irrevocably pronounced. As soon
as you have undergone the punishment of the cord, your head will be
cut off and sent into the provinces in which you have preached
Christianity. Behold you, then, a martyr! How fortunate you are!" To
this pious effusion the abbe replied in a similar strain: "The news
you announce of my being irrevocably condemned to death penetrates my
very heart's core with joy. No; I do not hesitate to avow it, never
did any news give me so much pleasure."

In the following year another missionary was tortured to death, not
merely as a teacher of the new religion, but because he was found in
the company of some rebels who had seized upon a fort. No other
martyrdom occurred after this until 1837, in which year the Abbé
Cornay was beheaded and quartered, after being imprisoned for three
months; and, in 1838, M. Jacquard himself escaped by strangulation
from the insults and outrages to which he had been for some time
subjected. Nor was it the missionaries alone who shared the fate and
emulated the calm heroism of the early apostles. The native neophytes
were not a whit less zealous to suffer in their Master's cause, and to
bear witness to the truth, in death as in life. The common people
eagerly flocked to behold their execution, not indeed to taunt and
revile the patient victims, but to secure some relic, however trifling
or otherwise disgusting, and to dip their garments in the
still-flowing blood. Pagans and Christians alike yielded to this
superstition or veneration, while the soldiers on duty drove a
lucrative trade in selling to the scrambling crowd fragments of the
dress and person of the yet-quivering martyr. Even the executioners
are reported to have affirmed that at the moment the head was severed
from the body a certain perfume exhaled from the gushing blood, as if
anticipating glorification in heaven. M. de Rosny, however, frankly
admits that Miñ-mâng was chiefly moved by political considerations to
persecute the followers of the new religion, whom he believed to be in
league with his worst enemies, especially after the capture of a
missionary in one of the rebel forts. His policy, whatever may have
been its real springs, was adopted by his son Thieou-tri, one of whose
first public acts was to command the governors of provinces to track
out the Christians to their most secret asylums. These orders were
only too faithfully obeyed. The French missionaries were ferreted out
of their lurking-places, thrown into prison, and otherwise
ill-treated, throughout this reign, which did not terminate before the
end of 1847.

The new monarch, commonly known as Tu-Duk, walked in the footsteps of
his father. An edict was issued almost immediately after his accession
to the throne, commanding that every European missionary found in Anam
should be thrown into the sea with a rope round his neck. And when the
mandarins hesitated to execute such sanguinary orders, a second edict
appeared enjoining that whosoever concealed in his house a propagator
of the Christian faith should be cut in two and thrown into the river.
The fiendish work then began in earnest. The sword of the executioner
was again called into request, and several most estimable men suffered
death on the scaffold. At last even a bishop, Monseigneur Diaz,
experienced the fate of his humbler brethren, on the 20th July, 1857;
and as this prelate happened to be a Spaniard, his death was avenged
by an allied Franco-Spanish expedition, which resulted in the conquest
of Lower Cochin China, and the cession of the provinces of Saigon,
Bien-hoa, and Myt-ho to the French. Let us now see what manner of men
were these Anamites whom the French, failing to convert, were
compelled, by their sense of spiritual duty, to conquer and subjugate.
M. de Rosny shall continue to be our guide.

The people of Anam Proper are evidently of Mongol extraction. Their
complexion is of a dark sallow hue, varying from a dirty white to a
yellowish {373} olive color. In stature they are short, but thickset,
and remarkably active. Their features are by no means beautiful
according to the European idea of beauty. They have short square
noses, prominent cheek-bones, thin lips, an small black eyes--the
eyeball being rather yellow than white. Their teeth, which are
naturally of a pure white, are stained almost black and otherwise
disfigured by the excessive use of betel-nut. Their countenances are
chiefly marked by the breadth and height of the cheek-bones, and are
nearly of the shape of a lozenge. The women are better-looking, and
decidedly more graceful, than the men, even in the lower classes, but
both sexes are particularly cheerful and vivacious. The upper classes,
however, affect the solemn air and grave deportment of the Chinese,
and are consequently much less agreeable to strangers than are the
less-dignified orders. Corpulence is considered a great beauty--a fat
face and a protuberant stomach constituting the ideal of an Adonis.
Both men and women wear their hair long, but gathered up at the back
of the head in a knot. It is never cut save in early youth, when it is
all shaved off with the exception of a small tuft on the top of the
crown. A close-cropped head of hair, indeed, is looked upon as a badge
of infamy, and is one of the distinguishing marks of a convicted
criminal. The beard is allowed to grow naturally, but consists of
little more than a few scattered hairs at the end of the chin; the
upper lip being as scantily furnished. The nails should be very long,
thin, and sharp-pointed, and by the women are usually stained of a red
color.

The Anamites dress themselves in silk or cotton according to their
means; but whatever the material, the form of their garb is always the
same. In addition to wide trousers fastened round the waist by a
silken girdle, they wear a robe descending to the knees, and
occasionally a shorter one over that; both equally opening on the
right side, but closed by five or six buttons. The men's sleeves are
very wide, and so long that they descend considerably lower than the
ends of the fingers. The women, however, who in other respects dress
precisely as do the men, have their sleeves somewhat shorter, in order
to display their metal or pearl bracelets. The under-garment is
generally made of country cotton, but the upper one, as worn by the
higher classes, is invariably of silk or flowered muslin, of Chinese
manufacture. Cotton trousers are often dyed brown, but even the
laboring population make use of silk as much as possible. For mourning
garments cotton alone is employed, white being the funereal color.

Out of doors men and women alike wear varnished straw hats, upward of
two feet in diameter, fastened under the chin, and very useful as a
protection against sun and rain, though somewhat grotesque in
appearance. Within doors the women go bareheaded, not unfrequently
allowing their fine black tresses to hang loose down their backs
almost to the ground. Ear-rings, bracelets, and rings on their fingers
are favorite objects of female vanity; but a modest demeanor is a
thing unknown; a bold, dashing manner being most admired by the men.
They are certainly not good-looking; but their natural gaiety and
liveliness amply compensate for the absence of personal charms.

Old men and persons of distinction alone wear sandals, the people
generally preferring to go barefooted. A pair of silken purses, or
bags, to carry betel, money, and tobacco, may be seen in the hand, or
hanging over the shoulder, of every man and woman not actually
employed in hard labor. They are, for the most part, of blue satin,
and sometimes richly embroidered. Like their neighbors the Chinese,
the Anamites are scrupulous observers of the distinctive insignia of
rank, but pay no regard to personal cleanliness. Notwithstanding their
frequent ablutions, their clothes, their hair, their fingers and
nails, are disgustingly filthy. Even wealthy persons wear dirty cotton
dresses within doors, over which {374} they throw their smart silken
robes when they go out.

Taste is proverbially a matter beyond dispute; but it would be very
hard for any European to agree with an Anamite as to what constituted
a delicacy and what an abomination. A Cochin Chinese epicure delights,
for instance, in rotten eggs, and is especially fond of them after
they have been under a hen for ten or twelve days. From stale fish,
again, he extracts his choicest sauce, and feasts greedily upon meat
in a state of putrefaction. Vermin of all sorts is highly appreciated.
Crocodile's flesh is also greatly prized; though boiled rice and a
little fish fresh,--smoked, or salted--are the ordinary food of the
poor. Among delicacies may be mentioned silk-worms fried in fat, ants
and ants' eggs, bees, insects, swallows'-nests, and a large white worm
found in decayed wood; but no dainty is more dearly relished than a
still-born calf served up whole in its skin and almost raw. In the way
of pastry the women greatly affect _beignets_ made of herbs, sugar,
and clay. Among the rich the dishes are placed on low tables a foot or
two in height, round which the diners seat themselves on the ground in
the attitude of tailors. Forks and spoons are equally unknown, but
chop-sticks are used after the Chinese fashion. The dinner usually
begins, instead of ending, with fruit and pastry. During the meal
nothing liquid is taken, but before sitting down it is customary to
take a gulp or two of strong spirits distilled from fermented rice,
and after dinner several small cups of tea are drunk by those who can
afford to do so. Cold or unadulterated water is thought unwholesome,
and is therefore never taken by itself. Betel-nut mixed with quicklime
is constantly chewed by both men and women, and of late years the use
of opium has partially crept in.

The houses of the Anamites are only one story high, and very low in
the roof. They are, in fact, mere halls, the roof of which is usually
supported on bamboo pillars, on which are pasted strips of
many-colored paper inscribed with Chinese proverbs. The roof slopes
rather sharply, and consists of reed or straw. Neither windows nor
chimneys are seen. The smoke escapes and the light enters by the door.
The walls are made of palm leaves, though rich people often employ
wood for that purpose. In either case they are filthily dirty and
swarm with insects. At the further end of the house is a raised
platform, which serves as a bed for the entire family. The floor is of
earth, not unfrequently traversed by channels hollowed out by the rain
which descends through the roof. In every household one member remains
awake all night, to give the alarm in case of thieves attempting to
come in.

It is usual for the men to marry as soon as they have the means to
purchase a wife. The price of such an article varies, according to
circumstances, from two to ten shillings, though rich people will give
as much as twice or three times that sum for anything out of the
common run. Polygamy is permitted by the laws; but practically it is a
luxury confined to the wealthy, and even with them the first wife
reigns supreme over the household. The privilege of divorce is
reserved exclusively for the husbands, who can put away a disagreeable
partner by breaking in twain a copper coin or a piece of wood, in the
presence of a witness. Parents cannot dispose of their daughters in
marriage without their free consent. Previous to marriage the Cochin
Chinese are perfectly unrestrained; but as chastity is nothing thought
of, this is not a matter of much moment. Infanticide is punished as a
crime, but not so abortion. Adultery is a capital offense. The guilty
woman is trampled to death under the feet of an elephant, while her
lover is strangled or beheaded; but these sentences are frequently
commuted into exile. Wives are not locked up as in Mohammedan
countries, but with that exception they are quite as badly treated,
being altogether at the mercy of their husbands. They are, in truth,
little better than slaves or {375} beasts of burden. It is they who
build the houses, who cultivate the ground, who manufacture the
clothes, who prepare the food, who, in short, do everything. They have
nine lives, say their ungrateful husbands, and can afford to lose one
without being the worse for it. They are described as being less timid
than the men, more intelligent, more gay, and quite ready to adapt
themselves to the manners and customs of their French rulers. The men,
though by no means destitute of strength and courage, are lazy,
indolent, and averse to bodily exercise, and chiefly at home in the
petty intrigues of an almost retail commerce.

Great importance is attached to the funeral ceremonies. The dead are
interred--not burnt, according to the custom of neighboring nations--
and much taste is displayed in their burial-places. There is no more
acceptable present than a coffin, and thus it usually happens that one
is provided years before it can be turned to a proper account. The
deceased is clothed in his choicest apparel, and in his coffin is
placed an abundant supply of whatever he is likely to want in the new
life upon which he has entered through the portals of death. The
obsequies are generally deferred for six months, or for even a whole
year, in order to give more time for the necessary preparations. On
such occasions friends and relatives flock from afar to the "funeral
baked meats;" for a handsome banquet forms an essential part of the
otherwise melancholy details. From twenty to thirty bearers convey the
corpse to its last abode, amid the deafening discord of drums,
cymbals, and tom-toms. The procession moves with slow and measured
step, and on the coffin is placed a shell filled with water, which
enables the master of the ceremonies to ascertain that the coffin is
borne with becoming steadiness. Mourning is worn for twenty-seven
months for a father, mother, or husband; but only twelve months for a
wife. During this period it is forbidden to be present at any
spectacle, to attend any meeting, or to marry. At various intervals
after the interment, offerings of eatables are presented to the dead,
but which are scrupulously consumed by the offerers themselves.
Respect, bordering on reverence, is shown to old age; but then old
people are a rarity, few individuals attaining to half a century.
Sickness of all kinds is rife, including "the whole cohort of fevers."
The want of cleanliness is undoubtedly at the bottom of most of the
complaints from which the natives suffer. The system of medicine most
in vogue is borrowed from the Chinese. Every well-to-do family
maintains its own physician, who physics all its members to their
heart's content. Doctors, however, agree no more in Cochin China than
in any other region of the globe. There are two schools of
medicine--the one employing nothing but stimulants, the other adhering
solely to refrigerants, and both citing in favor of their respective
systems the most astounding and well-nigh miraculous cures.

The rules of politeness and etiquette are distinctly drawn and rigidly
observed. An inferior meeting a superior prostrates himself at full
length upon the ground, and repeats the act again and again according
to the amount of deference he wishes to exhibit. To address one by the
title of great-grand-father is to show the highest possible respect,
while grandfather, father, uncle, and elder brother mark the downward
gradations from that supreme point. There is, in truth, somewhat too
much of veneering visible in all that pertains to the private life and
character of the Anamites. Their moral code, based on the precepts of
Confucius, is irreproachable, but they seldom pause to regulate their
conduct after its wholesome doctrines. Pleasure, indeed, is more
thought of than morality, and gambling is a raging passion with all
classes. Cock-fighting, and even the combats of red-fishes, fill them
with especial delight; and when thoroughly excited they will stake on
any chance their wives and children, and even {376} themselves. Music,
dancing, and theatrical exhibitions are likewise much to their taste,
though the dancers are invariably women hired for the purpose.

The laws and police regulations are for the most part wise and
sensible, but are more frequently neglected than observed. Here, as in
other Asiatic countries, a gift in the hand perverteth the wisdom of
the wise, and thus only the poor and the stingy need suffer for their
sins. For most offences the bastinado is inflicted, but for heinous
crimes capital punishments are enforced. There is a sufficient variety
in the modes of execution. Sometimes the criminal is sentenced to be
strangled; at other time's he is decapitated, or  trampled to death by
an elephant, or even hacked to pieces if his crime has been in any way
extraordinary. For minor delinquencies recourse is had to
transportation in irons to a distant province, or to hard labor, such
as cutting grass for the emperor's elephants.

Society is divided into two classes--the people and the mandarins.
Nobility is hereditary, but the son of a mandarin of the first order
ranks only with the second until he has done something to merit
promotion to his father's rank. In like manner the son of a
second-class mandarin belongs to the third rank, and so on to the
lowest grade; and there are nine of these--the highest two sitting in
the imperial council. But the most exalted honors are open to the most
humble. No man is so low born as to despair of becoming one of the
pillars of the empire. The competition system prevails here in its
full vigor. Everything depends upon the passing certain examinations;
but for all that the mandarins are described as oppressors of the
poor, evil advisers of the sovereign, addicted to fraud, given up to
their appetites, wasting their time in sensual and frivolous pursuits,
corrupt and venal in the administration of justice.

The patrimony is distributed equally among all the sons, whether
legitimate or otherwise, except that the eldest receives one-tenth of
the entire property in addition to his own share; in return for which
he is expected to guard the interests of the family, and above all to
look after his sisters, who cannot marry without his consent. The
daughters have no part in the inheritance save in the absence of male
heirs, but in that case they are treated as if they were sons. Through
extreme poverty children are often sold as slaves by their parents. An
insolvent debtor likewise becomes the bondsman of his creditor; and as
the legal rate of interest is thirty per cent., a debt rapidly
accumulates.

An Anamite hour is twice the length of a European one, and the night
is divided into five watches. A year consists of twelve lunar months;
so that every two or three years it becomes necessary to add another
month: in nineteen years there are seventeen of these intercalated
months. The lapse of time is marked by periods of twelve years, five
of which constitute a "grand cycle;" but in historical narratives the
dates are calculated from the accession of the reigning monarch. The
year begins with the month of February. The decimal system of
enumeration is the one adopted by the Cochin Chinese.

The religion of the people is a superstitious Buddhism; that of the
lettered classes a dormant belief in the moral teachings of Confucius.
Whatever temples there are, are of a mean order, and are served by an
ignorant and ill-paid priesthood. The malignant spirits are
propitiated by offerings of burnt paper inscribed with prayers, of
bundles of sweet-scented wood, and of other articles of trifling
value; the good spirits are mostly neglected. Sincere veneration,
however, is shown to the manes of deceased ancestors. The priests take
a vow of celibacy, to which they occasionally adhere. They abstain
entirely from animal food, and affect a yellow or red hue in their
apparel. After death their bodies are burned, and not buried as is the
case with the laity.

{377}

The inhabitants of Cochin China are naturally industrious, and possess
considerable skill as carpenters and upholsterers. They also work in
iron with some success, and display no mean taste in their pottery.
Their cotton and silk manufactures are, however, coarse and greatly
inferior to the Chinese. Their lackered boxes are famous throughout
the world, nor are their filigree ornaments unworthy of admiration.
But though skilful and intelligent as artisans, and abundantly endowed
with the faculty of imitation, they are wretchedly deficient in
imagination, and have no idea of invention. This defect is perhaps of
less consequence now that they have the benefit of receiving their
impulses from the most inventive nation in the world. Without doubt,
their material prosperity will be largely augmented by the French
domination, nor have they anything to lose in moral and social
respects. The conquest of Cochin China may therefore be regarded as an
advantage to the people themselves; but how far it is likely to yield
any profit to the French is altogether another question, and one which
at present we are not called upon to discuss. Sufficient for the day
is the evil thereof.



------

From The Dublin Review.


CONSALVI'S MEMOIRS.


_Memoires du Cardinal Consalvi, Secrétaire d'État du Pape Pie VII.,
avec une Introduction et des Notes._ Par J. CRÉTINEAU-JOLY. 2 vols.
8vo. Paris: Plon. 1864.

M. Crétineau-Joly is a Vendéan, and there seems to be in his blood
something of that pugnacious and warlike quality which so
distinguished his forefathers. Each of his former publications betrays
this combative propensity, and the introduction which accompanies
Cardinal Consalvi's Memoirs is worthy of its predecessors. M.
Crétineau-Joly is well known on the continent by his "History of the
Jesuits"--a work containing a considerable amount of valuable
information concerning that celebrated and much maligned order; but,
at the same time, it may be considered in the light of an Armstrong
gun, which batters and reduces to dust the bastions of an enemy.
Indeed, it was ushered forth at the very height of the warfare which
raged against the Church in France, a few years previous to the
downfall of Louis Philippe. In 1858 the same writer produced a
brochure bearing the following title, "The Church versus the
Revolution," another broadside fired against crowned revolutionists,
no less than against the sectarian hordes of a Mazzini and a
Garibaldi. Hardly a year had elapsed when the French emperor invaded
Lombardy, with what result the whole world is aware. So M.
Crétineau-Joly had taken time by the forelock. And now, again, he
comes forth with these highly interesting and authentic memoirs,
written by the cardinal and prime minister of Pius VII. In every
respect they may be proclaimed the most important, if not the most
voluminous, of the editor's publications. No one, at the same time,
will fail to perceive that between the actual situation of the Holy
See and that which marked its history in the eventful years between
1799 and 1811, there underlies a startling similarity. Singularly
enough, the second half of the nineteenth {378} century begins with
the same picture of violence, the same hypocrisy, the same contempt of
right by might, that characterized the dawn of the present age. On the
one side, an all-powerful ruler, intoxicated by success, backed by a
host of servile demagogues, and hardly less servile, though royal
infidels; on the other, a weak old man, backed by a calm, deliberate,
truly Christian genius--both wielding no other weapons but faith,
hope, and charity--both torn from their home and judgment-seat by the
iron hand of revolutionary despotism--and yet both riding triumphant
over the seething waves, whilst the grim corpses of their enemies are
washed to the shore, or startle the traveller as he comes suddenly
upon them in his wanderings through Russian wilds. Ay, there she goes,
that tiny ship of Peter's, with a Pius at her helm; now, as in bygone
days, with an Antonelli as a commander--much about the same man as a
Consalvi.

  "Blow fair, thou breeze! She anchors ere the dark.
  Already doubled is the cape--our bay
  Receives that prow which proudly spurns the spray.
  How gloriously her gallant course she goes!
  Her white wings flying--never from her foes--
  She walks the waters like a thing of life,
  And seems to dare the elements to strife."

Setting aside metaphors and poetry, these memoirs are certainly one of
the most remarkable instances of calm self-possession and confidence
in a just cause that are to be met with in any time or country. Here
is a man, and prime minister of a captive sovereign, himself a
prisoner, who undertakes to write the history of the important events
in which he had played a most conspicuous part. He is closely watched,
and consequently obliged to write by fits and starts; he is deprived
of every source of documentary information, and consequently must
trust to his own memory. Will these hasty yet truthful sheets escape
his jailer's eye? He cannot tell. Will he ever recover his liberty, be
restored to his dear master's bosom and confidence? He cannot tell:
but nevertheless the great cardinal--for great he was universally
acknowledged--goes on bringing forth certain facts, known to himself
alone, and which throw more light on the true character of the first
Napoleon than the ponderous and garbled evidence of a Thiers, or even
the more trustworthy pages of M. Artaud, in his "Life of Pius VII."
Indeed, there are few comparisons of higher interest than to open
those two works at the parts which refer to the events narrated in
these memoirs. A labor of this kind, first originating in a spirit of
fair play, soon becomes a labor of love, so strong is the contrast
between the worldly, scheming, truckling, infidel historian of the
first empire, and the unassuming and conscientious, though bold and
resolute cardinal. One may safely say, that M. Thiers would have never
dreamt of bearding the headstrong Bonaparte, as Consalvi did on a
memorable occasion, which reminds us of those legates of old, who
daunted by their steady looks and unruffled patience the burly
violence of a Richard, or unveiled the cunning of a Frederic
Hohenstaufen.

At the very outset of these memoirs, the cardinal gives us their true
and solemn character. His last will, which accompanies them, and may
be considered as a sort of preface, contains the following lines:

"My heir and trustee, as well as those who may hereafter take charge
of my inheritance, are bound to bestow the greatest care on my
personal writings relative to the conclave held at Venice in 1799 and
1800; to the concordat of 1801; to the marriage of the Emperor
Napoleon with the Archduchess Maria Louisa of Austria; and, lastly, to
the papers on different periods of my life and ministry. These five
papers, some of which are nearly finished, and the others in course of
preparation, are not to be published before the death of those eminent
personages who are mentioned therein. In this way many disputes may be
avoided, for, though utterly unfounded, as my own writings rest on
truth alone, still {379} they might injure that very truth, and the
interests of the Holy See, to which I am desirous of leaving the means
of repelling any false attack published hereafter on these matters.
These memoirs on the conclave, the concordat of 1801, the marriage,
and the ministry, belonging more especially to the Holy Sec, and to
the pontifical government, my heir and trustee shall present them to
the reigning pontiff, and beseech the Holy Father to preserve them
carefully within the archives of the Vatican. They may be of use to
the Holy See on many occasions, but more particularly if any future
history be published of the events which form the object of the
present writings, or if it should become necessary to refute any false
statement. In regard to the memoirs concerning the different periods
of my own life, as the extinction of my family will leave behind me no
one directly interested in the following pages, they are to remain in
the hands of my heir and trustee, or in those of the successive
administrators of my fortune; or, again, they may be likewise handed
over to the archives of the Vatican, if they be deemed worthy of
preservation. My only desire is, that in case of the biography of the
cardinals being continued, my heir and executors shall cause these
memoirs to be known, so that nothing may be published contrary to
truth about myself; for I am ambitious of maintaining immaculate my
own reputation--a wish grounded on the prescriptions of Scripture. As
for the truth of the facts brought forward in my writings, I may make
bold to say, _Deus scit quia non mentior._"

Cardinal Consalvi was born at Rome, of a noble family, in 1757, and
was the eldest of five children, two of whom died at an early age. His
father bore the title of marquess, and his mother, the Marchioness
Claudia Carandini, was of Modenese origin.

The family itself, on the father's side, had sprung up in Tuscany at
Pisa, though not under the same name; but emigrated about a century
and a half ago to the Roman States, where it expanded, and gradually
grew into political, or rather ecclesiastical importance. Consalvi's
forefathers still, however, held in Tuscany some property, to which he
would have been entitled had he felt disposed to dispute the equity of
certain Leopoldine laws concerning trustees. But, with characteristic
disinterestedness the future cardinal never gave the matter a second
thought.

"I never felt (says he) a passion for riches; beside, my resources,
though far from opulent, were sufficient for a modest way of living,
thanks to the income arising out of the different offices which I held
successively. And thus being lifted, by Divine Providence, above
vanity and ambition, I never was tempted to prove that I was descended
from the Brunaccis and not from the Consalvis, whenever envy or
ignorance represented me as belonging to a stock unblessed with old
nobility. It would have been an easy matter to dispel these
imputations or errors. Being fully convinced that the best nobility
springs from the heart and from good deeds; knowing, likewise, that I
was a genuine Brunacci and not a Consalvi, I despised all such rumors.
. . . Nor did I alter my views when the high position which I
afterward attained afforded so many opportunities for putting an end
to those idle reports."

In the above passage we have already the whole man. During his long
and chequered life he never once exposed himself to the charge of
making his own fortune out of the numerous and even honorable
occasions which would have tempted a less exalted soul. It would be
useless to follow the young Consalvi through his course of studies,
which were brilliant, and partly gone through under the eye of
Cardinal York, the last of a fated race, who entertained for the
future minister an affectionate friendship that never cooled until his
death.

Hercules Consalvi had hardly finished his academical curriculum at
{380} Rome when he was called to the prelature, in 1783, as reporter
to the tribunal of the Curia. His talents and deep knowledge, though
so young, in canon and civil law, soon made him conspicuous among his
competitors. In 1786, the Pope Pius VI. appointed him _Ponente del
buono govemo_, a board, or congregation, charged with giving its
opinion on all municipal questions. This promotion was due to his
merit, but the cardinal himself confesses that it was a tardy one, not
on account of any neglect on the part of the pontifical government,
but merely because he did not avail himself of favorable
opportunities. "On the one hand," observes he, "my own disposition
never inclined to ask for favor, and still less to court the patronage
of those placed in high positions; whilst, on the other hand, I had
before my eyes, in such respects, the fine example of my own guardian,
the Cardinal Negroni. . . . He was wont to say, 'We never ought to ask
for anything; we must never flatter to obtain preferment; but manage
in such a way as to overcome every obstacle, through a most punctual
fulfilment of our duties, and the enjoyment of a sound reputation.' To
this piece of advice I strictly adhered through life." To those who
are so prone to malign the pomp and splendor of the Roman prelature,
it will be a matter of surprise to learn that at this very time the
only benefice conferred upon Consalvi amounted to the paltry stipend
of £12 a year.

The Pope, however, who seems to have been an excellent judge of true
merit, soon placed the young prelate at the head of the hospital of
San Michele, the largest and most important in Rome. The establishment
required a thorough reform; and Consalvi soon worked wonders, being
led on by his own innate ardor, and by a strong predilection for the
management of charitable institutions. But he had hardly realized his
intended labor of reformation, when he was superseded by another
prelate. Pius VI., in fact, did not wish Consalvi to wear out his
energies in the routine of administrative bureaucracy. The incident
which led to his promotion is so truly characteristic of both
personages, that we cannot refrain from a copious quotation:

  "The sudden death of one of the _votanti di segnatura_, or Supreme
  Court of Cassation, made a vacancy in that court. All my friends
  engaged me not to lose a moment in applying for it. I did not yield
  to their entreaties, nor, indeed, did the Pope allow me time for
  that purpose. The above death had taken place on Maunday Thursday.
  The very next morning, though it was Good Friday, and the sacred
  services of the day were about to be solemnized; though all the
  public offices were closed, according to custom, the Pope sent to
  the Secretary of State an order to forward my immediate appointment
  as _votanti di segnatura_. As soon as it arrived, I hastened to the
  Pope to thank him. His Holiness was not in the habit of receiving
  any one merely for the sake of hearing expressions of gratitude;
  still less did I expect to be introduced on such a day, when the
  Pope, after attending at the holy function, had retired to his
  apartments, with a view of coming back for  _Tenebra_, and was in
  the very act of reciting Complin, which was to be followed by his
  dinner.

  "On learning that I was in the antechamber, where he had previously
  given orders that I should not be sent away in case I should come,
  he admitted me at once. After finishing Complin in my presence, he
  addressed me so kindly that I shall remember his words as long as I
  live. 'My dear Monsignor,' said he, 'you are well aware that we
  receive no one merely to hear thanksgivings; and yet we have gone
  against our usual custom, notwithstanding this busy day, and though
  our dinner has just been served up, in order that we may have the
  pleasure of making you the present communication. If you were not
  included in the last promotion, it was {381} because we were obliged
  to hand over to another the post really destined to yourself; and in
  doing so we felt as much aggrieved as we are now delighted to offer
  you immediately the vacant charge of _votanti di segnatura_. We do
  it to show you the satisfaction which you afford us by your conduct,
  We took you away from an administrative station merely to place you
  on higher ground.'

  "The Holy Father then added a few words concerning the opinion which
  his kindness, and by no means my own merit, suggested to him
  relatively to my future career. Indeed, the knowledge which I have
  of myself would not allow me to transcribe those words. He then
  continued as follows: 'What we now bestow upon you is really not
  worth much, but I have nothing else for the present. Take it,
  however, as a positive pledge of what I am disposed to do as soon as
  an opportunity offers.'

  "It is easy to understand that after such a speech, uttered in that
  easy, affable, and yet majestic manner so peculiar to Pius VI., I
  was at a loss for expressions to answer him. I could hardly stammer
  out, that after the language he had just used about my
  promotion--language showing that I had not incurred his disapproval
  by my conduct at San Michele--my mind was quite at ease as to the
  future. Indeed, I had no other ambition but to please him, and to
  fulfil my duty in any station he might think fit to confer upon me.

  "Here I was interrupted. 'I am satisfied--nay, highly
  satisfied'--said the Pope, 'by your behavior at San Michele; but I
  again say that I destine you to other purposes. What I promised
  formerly was sincere, but still it was but empty words. This is
  something matter of fact; not much, indeed, but yet better than
  words. So don't refuse it; and now be off, for, you see, our dinner
  is getting cold, and we must soon go back to chapel.'"

It would be doubtless congenial to our feelings to dwell upon these
touching details; but we are already in the year 1790, and the knell
of the old French monarchy is tolling. Let us plunge, therefore, at
once _in medias res_, and skip over the eight intervening years
between the time which saw Rome invaded by a revolutionary army, the
Pope torn from his throne, and led a prisoner, first to Florence, then
to Valence, where he was to die a martyr. On reading this part of the
memoirs, one is particularly struck with the similarity which it
presents with the history of Piedmontese invasion--the same hypocrisy,
the same attempts at provoking to insurrection the inhabitants at
Rome, and, these failing, the same recourse to violence. The
accidental death of General Duphot at last appears in its true colors,
but of course it supplied the Directory with a pretence for seizing
the Papal States, an act of spoliation it had been long preparing.
[Footnote 77] Thanks to the energy of Consalvi, to whom had been
entrusted the maintenance of public order, previous to the entry of
the French troops into the capital, no insurrection took place; but
for that very reason he was obnoxious to the government of the
invaders. After the Pope's departure he was thrown into prison, with
the prospect of being transported, together with many Roman
ecclesiastical and pontifical officers, to the fatal colony of
Cayenne. {382} To the honor of the French commander it must be said,
that he did all in his power to defend the energetic prelate against
his contemptible enemies, and to alleviate his captivity. The Paris
Directory had first banished him to Civita Vecchia, and then altered
his destination to Naples. But the Roman demagogues were determined
upon wreaking their vengeance on Consalvi:

  [Footnote 77: As a proof of this, we may produce the secret
  instructions forwarded, two months and a half before the general's
  death and the Roman insurrection, by the French government to Joseph
  Bonaparte, their plenipotentiary at Rome: "You have two things to
  bear in mind: (1) To prevent the King of Naples from coming to Rome;
  (2) To help, instead of opposing, the favorable dispositions of
  those who believe that it is time for the Papal dominion to come to
  an end. In short, you must encourage the impulse toward freedom by
  which the people of Rome seems to be animated." Instructions like
  these (observes, very justly, M. Crétineau-Joly) could have no other
  object but to lay a diplomatical snare, or to provoke an
  insurrection. The fact is so clear that Cacault, who succeeded to
  Joseph Bonaparte at Rome, wrote in 1801 to the First Consul--"You
  know, quite as well as I do, the details of this melancholy event.
  Nobody in Rome ordered either to fire or to kill any one. General
  Duphot was imprudent; nay, more--let us out with the word--he was
  guilty. There is a law of nations at Rome not a whit less than
  elsewhere." The admission does credit to the honest man who
  contributed so largely to bring about the concordat of 1801.]


"I had been detained (says he) about four or five and twenty days,
when I was visited in my prison by my dear brother Andrea, as well as
by my two friends, the Princes Chigi and Teano. This piece of good
fortune I owed to the kind commander of the fortress. They informed me
that they were bearers of both good and bad news. I was at last to be
transported, not, indeed, to Tuscany, but to Naples, so that I might
not join the Pope. At the same time, it had been ordained that I was
to ride through the streets of the city mounted on an ass, escorted by
policemen, and lashed all along with a horsewhip. Many a window under
which I was to pass by was already hired; and our Jacobins, as well as
the wives of our consuls, promised themselves much pleasure at the
sight of this execution. My friends were quite amazed at my
indifference on receiving this last piece of news, which, indeed,
caused me but little pain; for I really considered it rather as a
source of triumph and glory. On the contrary, I was deeply vexed at
not being able to proceed to Tuscany, where I was so desirous of
meeting the Pope."

The humanity of the French general prevented the Roman demagogues from
carrying into execution the latter part of the sentence; but he
remained inflexible as to Consalvi's removal to Naples. The latter
had, therefore, but to obey; and started for his destination, in
company with a band of eighteen convicts, and several political
prisoners like himself. After many difficulties, arising out of
Acton's tortuous policy, he succeeded at length in reaching Leghorn,
where he had to encounter obstacles of a different nature. His very
first step was to proceed to Florence, in hopes that the Duke of
Tuscany would facilitate his access to the captive Pontiff, who was
detained in a neighboring Carthusian monastery. But the jealous
watchfulness of the French plenipotentiary struck terror into the
heart of the Tuscan minister, who peremptorily refused to have
anything to do with the matter. Consalvi was not, however, to be
daunted when on the path of duty; he consequently set out on foot for
the Chartreuse, situated at about three miles from Florence, and
contrived his visit so secretly that he baffled detection. On
approaching the foot of the hill, the faithful servant could hardly
repress his emotions. But let us hear him in his own words:

  "Every step which brought me nearer to the Holy Father increased the
  strong feelings that welled up from my soul. The poverty and
  solitude of the place, the sight of the two or three unfortunates
  who attended him, brought tears to my eyes. At last I was introduced
  into his presence. O God! what were my emotions at that moment; my
  heart throbbed almost to breaking!

  "Pius VI. was seated before a table, a posture which concealed his
  weakness, for he had almost lost the use of his legs, and he could
  not move without the help of two strong men. The beauty and majesty
  of his features were still the same as at Rome; he still inspired a
  deep veneration and a most ardent attachment. I fell prostrate at
  his feet, which I bathed with my tears; I told him the difficulties
  I had to encounter, and how ardently I desired to remain with him,
  in order to serve him, assist him--in fact, share his fate. I
  promised not to spare any effort for the furtherance of this
  object."

A full hour quickly fled in thus communing with each other, and
Consalvi was obliged to take his leave. The aged Pope foresaw that
this prop of {383} his declining and martyred life would not be
allowed him; but still he clung fondly to the idea, and when his
faithful adherent, on a second and last visit, admitted that he had
failed in every endeavor to gain his end, and had even been ordered
out of the country, Pius evinced a strong feeling of regret, though no
surprise. This farewell visit is related in terms no less touching
than the former:

  "During this audience, which lasted also a full hour, he bestowed
  upon me the greatest marks of kindness, exhorting me successively to
  practise resignation, wisdom, and those acts of firmness of which
  his own life and his whole demeanor set such a fine example. He
  appeared to me quite as great, and even far greater, than when he
  reigned at Rome. I besought him to give me his blessing. He laid his
  hands on my head, and, like the most venerable among the patriarchs
  of old, raising his eyes toward heaven, he prayed unto the Lord, and
  blessed me, with an attitude so resigned, so august, so holy, so
  full of real tenderness, that to the last day of my life the
  remembrance will remain graven on my heart in indelible characters.

  "When I retired, my eyes were swimming with tears; I was beside
  myself with grief; and yet I felt both encouraged and re-assured by
  the inexpressible calmness of my sovereign, and the sweet serenity
  of his features. It was indeed the greatness of a good man
  struggling against misfortune."

Four-and-twenty hours afterward, Consalvi was obliged to leave
Florence for Venice; the Pope was hurried through Alpine snows to
Valence, in Dauphine, where he died of his sufferings on the 29th of
August, 1799.

And what a time for the election of a new pope! Italy overrun by the
French revolutionary armies, Rome in their possession, and ruled by a
horde of incendiary demagogues; the Russians, headed by Suwarow,
pouring into the Peninsula to oppose the French; whilst Austria,
governed by a Thugut, was watching her opportunity to get hold of the
new Pope--if there should be a Pope--and make him the pliant tool of her
ambition. Nor let us forget that Bonaparte was on his way back from
Egypt, preparing to swoop down, eagle-like, on those very Austrian
possessions wherein the conclave was to meet. And yet the conclave _did_
meet at Venice, on an island of that famous republic, which had so
often defied the bans and interdicts of the Roman pontiffs;--the
cardinals hurried from their neighboring cities or secret abodes,
though with views and intentions not perhaps exactly in accordance
with the solemnity and urgency of the occasion. It is, indeed, a
curious picture of human passions, though blended with higher motives
and purposes,--that truthful memoir drawn up by Consalvi on the
conclave of 1800, wherein he was unanimously elected secretary to the
assembly. The election lasted more than three long months, on account
of the two contending factions, headed by Cardinal Herzan, on the part
of Austria, and by the celebrated Maury, then Bishop of Montefiascone
in the Papal States. Consalvi, notwithstanding his wonted moderation,
boldly proclaims these divisions to have been _scandalous_ in such
circumstances, and animadverts severely on the intrigues of the
imperial court. And yet he cannot help observing that, on such
occasions, the Sacred College seem led on, little by little, as it
were, by some higher power, to sacrifice their own private views and
interests to the common weal of Christendom. So it was, indeed, in the
present juncture, thanks to the extraordinary ability, to the
self-renouncement, prudence, and true Catholic spirit displayed
throughout by the youthful secretary. The votes were gradually won
over to Cardinal Chiaramonti, so well known afterward by the name of
Pius VII. Consalvi had truly displayed a master-mind; and the new
pontiff immediately showed how highly he appreciated his merit, by
appointing him Secretary of State. We can easily believe the surprise
and {384} alarm of the new minister; for doubtless his was no easy
task. The Austrians possessed nearly all the Papal States, whilst the
King of Naples held Rome itself. The court of Vienna, intent upon
keeping at least the three legations, which had recently been wrested
from the French, offered at the same time to restore to the Pope the
remaining parts of his dominions. To such a proposal the latter could
but oppose a flat denial, accompanied by a firm resolution to return
to Rome without delay. The imperial negotiator, Ghislieri, then
reduced his demands to the two legations of Bologna and Ferrara; but
he met with no better success. The spoliation of the Holy See, as the
reader may now perceive, is after all an old story. The Pope, indeed,
went so far as to write to the emperor a letter, in which he formally
demanded the restitution of all his provinces. No notice whatsoever
was taken of the Papal missive. At last, utterly worn out by Austrian
duplicity, Pius one day addressed Ghislieri in the following terms:
"Since the emperor refuses obstinately a restitution, which both
religion and equity require, I really do not see what new argument I
can produce to convince him. Let his majesty take care, however, not
to lay by in his wardrobe any clothes belonging, not to himself, but
to the Church. For not only will his majesty be unable to wear them,
but most probably they will pester with the grub his own hereditary
dominions, which may be worm-eaten in a short time."

The Marquess Ghislieri hurried out of the Papal presence in a rage,
which found vent when he met Consalvi. "The new Pope," he exclaimed,
"has hardly donned his own clothes; he is not yet accustomed to his
own craft, and he talks of the Austrian wardrobe being worm-eaten! He
knows but little of our power; it would require thousands of moths to
nibble it to dust." Two months after, the battle of Marengo had been
fought and won: the legations, Lombardy, Venetia, the hereditary
German states, the capital itself, had fallen a prey to the Corsican
conqueror! Pius VII. had scarcely set his foot on the shore of his own
dominions when the news of the famous defeat arrived: "Ah!" exclaimed
Ghislieri, a religious man, after all, "I now see fulfilled the Pope's
prediction: our wardrobe has truly been worm-eaten to tatters."

Pius VII. had but just returned to Rome, in the midst of a delighted
and grateful population, when he received the astounding news that the
conqueror of the Austrians was desirous of negotiating with the Holy
See for the restoration of religion in France. Whilst at Vercelli,
Bonaparte had met with Cardinal Martiniana, who was returning from the
conclave at Venice; and he expressed himself so clearly, so pointedly,
as to his future plans, that both Consalvi and the Pope were taken by
surprise. Their approbation was immediately given, and the Pope
himself wrote to Martiniana: "You may tell the First Consul that we
will readily enter into a negotiation tending to an object so truly
honorable, so congenial to our apostolical administration, and so
thoroughly conformable to our own views."

The history of this celebrated treaty, on which so much hangs in
France even in our own time, has been often related, and yet many a
detail of the intricate negotiations which preceded its conclusion had
remained secret until the publication of the present memoirs. Three
personages stand out in strong relief on that occasion, each with his
individual character: Cacault, the French ambassador at Rome,
Bonaparte, and Consalvi himself. Of the second, little need be said;
but M. Cacault is, we believe, hardly known in England. He was a
Breton by birth, and, as such, had imbibed those religious feelings
which stamp so strongly the most western province of France. As a
republican representative of the Directory, he did all in his power to
avert from the Papal See those evils and that invasion which {385}
ended in the captivity of Pius VI. When Napoleon's star was in the
ascendant, M. Cacault quickly discovered the depth and extent of his
genius, and thenceforward abetted his plans. At the same time, he was
by no means a flatterer, but ever plain-spoken to bluntness. A time
came, indeed, when the greatest conqueror of modern times found the
noble-hearted Breton rather too sincere, and consigned him to the
peaceful life of a seat in his new-fangled senate. But that day was
yet to come. In 1801, M. Cacault enjoyed the whole confidence of the
First Consul.

On leaving Bonaparte, the ambassador heard him utter those famous
words, which have been so often quoted: "Mind you treat the Pope as if
he had 200,000 men at his back. Remember, also, that in October, 1796,
I wrote to you how much I wished to save the Holy See, not to
overthrow it, and that both you and I entertained the same feelings in
this respect." With credentials like these, M. Cacault should have
found it an easy matter to negotiate with Rome; but, singularly
enough, the conservative government of Austria threw many an obstacle
in the way. The very idea of a reconciliation between revolutionary
France and the Papacy seems to have disquieted M. de Thugut, and he
did all in his power to breed a feeling of distrust, on the part of
Rome at least. The court of Naples was animated by the same policy;
and even Bonaparte himself, at one time, appeared to waver between the
impulse of his own good sense and the suggestions of his infidel
advisers. In the eyes of M. Cacault, the Pope stood too much on
theological tenets and opinions, when dealing with a victorious
adventurer. At any rate, matters soon grew from bad to worse. In a fit
of impatience, the consul ordered his ambassador to leave Rome in five
days, if the concordat sent from Paris was not signed at the
expiration of that short time.

At this critical juncture, the Breton came to a determination so truly
characteristic of the man, that we must allow him to speak for
himself. We borrow the following narrative from his secretary, M.
Artaud:

"We are bound to obey our government," said he, addressing himself to
me; "but then a government must be guided by a head capable of
understanding negotiations, by ministers capable of advising him
properly, and lastly, all must agree together. Every government ought
to have a plan, a will, an aim of its own. But this is no easy matter
with a new government. Now, though in a secondary station, I am really
master of this business; but if we go on in Rome as they are going on
in Paris, nothing can come out of it but a sort of chaos. .... It is
fully understood that the head of the state wished for a concordat; he
wished for it so far back as Tolentino, and even before, when he
called himself _the best friend of the Pope_.... In fact, he has sent
me here to negotiate a concordat, and for that purpose has given me in
yourself the prop I myself desired. But then his ministers probably
don't wish for a concordat, and they have constant access to his ear.
Now the character most easy to irritate and to deceive, is that of a
warrior, who as yet understands nothing about politics, and is ever
returning to military orders and to the sword.... Shall we, like two
fools, leave Rome in this way because the despatch orders us to do so,
and give up France to _irreligiosity_--a word no less barbarous than
the thing itself? Shall we leave her to a sort of spurious
Catholicism, or that hybrid system which advises the establishment of
a patriarch? God knows, then, that the future destinies of the First
Consul will probably never be fulfilled....

"I am fond of Bonaparte, fond of the general; but this patch-work name
of a First Consul is in itself ridiculous; he borrowed it from Rome,
where he has never set his foot. But in my eyes he is still nothing
more than an {386} Italian general. As for the fate of this terrible
general, it is now in my hands more than in his own; he is turning
into a sort of Henry the Eighth, flattering and scaring the Holy See
by turns; but how many sources of true glory will be dried up for him,
if he merely mimics Henry the Eighth! The measure is full; nations
now-a-days will not allow their rulers to dispose of them in regard to
religious matters. With concordats, on the contrary, miracles may be
wrought, more especially by him, or if not by him, supposing him to be
unwise, by France herself. Be sure, my dear sir, that great deeds
brought about at the proper moment, and bearing fruitful results, no
matter by what genius they are accomplished, are a wealthy dowry for
any country. In case of embarrassments, that country may ward off many
an attack by pointing to its history. France, with all her faults,
requires true grandeur. Our consul jeopardizes all by this pistol-shot
fired in time of peace, merely for the sake of pleasing his generals
whom he loves, but whose soldierlike jokes he fears, because he
himself now and then gives way to them. He thus breaks off a
negotiation which he wishes to succeed, and goes on casting rotten
seed. What can really be a religious concordat, that most solemn of
all human undertakings, if it is to be signed in five days? It reminds
one of the twelve hours granted by a general to a besieged town, which
can hope for no succor."

The result of the above conversation on the part of M. Cacault was a
determination to quit Rome, but to leave his secretary in that city,
whilst Consalvi himself was to set out immediately for Paris, as the
only means of preventing a positive rupture between the two courts,
for Bonaparte had already both a court and courtiers. The French
minister was by no means blind to the consequences of his boldness in
undertaking to correct the false steps of his own government; but, to
his credit be it said, the fear of those consequences did not make him
swerve one minute from his purpose. His very first step was,
therefore, to request an interview with Consalvi, and an audience from
the Pope. On meeting the cardinal, he began by reading_ in extenso_
the angry despatch which he had received, not even omitting the
epithets _"turbulent and guilty priest"_ which the Consul applied to
his eminence. M. Cacault then resumed as follows:

  "There must be some misunderstanding; the First Consul is
  unacquainted with your person, and still more with your talents,
  your ability, your precedents, your adroitness, and your anxiety to
  terminate this business. So you must start for Paris." "When?"
  "To-morrow: you will please him; you are fit to understand each
  other; he will then learn to know a statesmanlike cardinal, and you
  will draw up the concordat together. But if you don't go to Paris, I
  shall be obliged to break off all intercourse with you; and there
  are yonder certain ministers, who advised the Directory to transport
  Pius VI. to Guyana....

  "I again repeat it, you must go to Paris, you will draw up the
  concordat yourself--nay more, you will dictate a part of it,
  obtaining at the same time far better conditions than I could ever
  do, fettered as I am by so many shackles.... One word more: In a
  place like this, where there is so much gossipping, I can't allow
  you to bear alone the responsibility of this action. I consider it
  as something truly grand; but as it may turn out a false step,
  to-morrow I must see the Pope, and take the whole upon my shoulders.
  I shall not bore the Pope, having but a few words to tell him, in
  order to fulfil the Consul's former instructions."

Consalvi, fired at the boldness of the plan, hurried to the Pope,
rather to prepare him for this unforeseen separation than to ask for
permission. When, on the other hand, the French diplomatist was
admitted to his presence, {387} he showed so much candor, such a true
spirit of Christian feeling, such a total forgetfulness of self, that
the pontiff could not refrain from shedding tears, and ended by
breaking out into these words: "Indeed, indeed, you are a true friend,
and we love you as we loved our own mother. At this very moment, we
will retire to our oratory, in order to implore God's blessing on this
journey, as well as for the successful issue of an undertaking, which
may afford us some consolation in the midst of so much affliction."

It was indeed a bereavement for the Pope, who, having hardly ascended
the throne, was accustomed to consider Consalvi as his main prop and
right hand in every affair of any importance. He, however, readily
consented to the separation, and on the following day the cardinal
left Rome, accompanied by M. Cacault, in an open carriage, to show the
gossipping Romans that no real coolness existed between the two
governments. This, in fact, strengthened the hands of the Papal
administration, as reports were already rife that a French army was
about to march once more into Rome, with a view of restoring the
republic.

At the distance of more than half a century Consalvi's determination
scarcely seems an act of daring; but, at that period, it was
considered in a different light. We must remember that France had been
for ten long years the scene of anarchy and bloodshed within, while
she had proved the terror of Europe on the field of battle. She was
but just emerging from that anarchy, thanks to the iron grasp of a
fortunate soldier, who might yet, for aught the world knew, turn out
to be a bloody tyrant quite as well as a sagacious ruler. For a
priest, and still more for a cardinal, to venture alone of his own
accord into the lair of those beasts of prey, as they were then
termed, certainly showed an extraordinary degree of moral courage,
however M. Thiers may taunt Consalvi with his fears. Those fears the
Papal minister _did_ really entertain, as is proved by a few unwary
lines which he addressed before his departure to Acton at Naples, and
which were betrayed to Bonaparte in Paris. But then the cardinal,
prompted by a strong feeling of duty, overcame these apprehensions,
which is more perhaps than M. Thiers would vouch to have done on a
similar occasion, if we may judge from the infidel spirit and
intriguing disposition that are conspicuous alike throughout his own
career and writings. Success, not principle, ever appears to be his
leading star.

Once in Paris, Consalvi was not long in conquering that position which
the keenness of his friend Cacault foresaw that he was destined to
assume. Bonaparte approved in every respect the conduct of his
ambassador at Rome, appeared even flattered at being feared, at first
received the cardinal with affected coolness, but little by little
yielded to better feelings, and ended by turning into ridicule "that
fool Acton, who thought that he could stop the rush of a torrent with
cobwebs." To these friendly dispositions soon succeeded on both sides
a sincere confidence, and on one occasion the First Consul laughingly
inquired of Consalvi whether he was not considered as a _priest-eater_
in Italy; and then suddenly launched into one of those splendid
expositions of his future plans, by which he endeavored to fascinate
and charm those he aimed at winning over to his own views. In this
sparkling conversation the concordat held a foremost place. Napoleon
developed, just as he pleased, opinions half Protestant, half
Jansenist--in other words, exactly what he wanted the concordat to be,
and exactly what Consalvi could not allow. The contest between those
two rival spirits may well detain us a few moments longer. And why not
say at once that by degrees the master-genius of the age was obliged
to modify his own views, yielding, _nolens volens_, as he himself
admitted, to the graceful bearing and sound good sense of the man
whose countrymen had named him the Roman Syren?

{388}

We may gather from M. Thiers' work that Consalvi had undertaken a most
arduous task. Paris itself must have offered a strange sight to a
Roman cardinal in the very first year of the present century. The
churches were still shut, and bore upon their porches such
inscriptions as savored more of heathenism than of Christianity.
Wherever the legate's eye fell he was sure to meet with a temple of
plenty, of fraternity, of liberty, of trade, of abundance, and so
forth. And then when he went to court he found a ruler disposed to
break out into the most violent fits of anger if his will was
disputed, whilst on every hand he had to encounter a host of scoffers
and infidels, belonging to every hue and grade. The army, the bench,
the schools, the _savants_, and the very clergy, all vied in showing off
Rome as the hotbed of an obsolete superstition which it was high time
to do away with altogether. And when we mention the clergy, we mean
the remains of that schismatic body which had hailed the civil
constitution so formally condemned by the Holy See in 1791. They were
active, intriguing, influential, and had the ear of Bonaparte himself.
He was intent upon distributing among them a portion of the new sees
about to be erected, and it required all the firmness of Consalvi to
ward off this impending danger. If we may believe M. Thiers, many
among them were by no means of dissolute lives; yet he cannot disguise
the fact that they were ambitious, servile, and disposed to bend to
every caprice of the ruling power. But that power was fully aware that
the French population had no confidence whatever in their
ministrations; the non-jurors, or priests who had unflinchingly
remained faithful to their duty, were, on the contrary, sought out and
held in high esteem. In this strange society the functions of
Catholicism and the rites of our religion were openly resumed by
believers, who attended them in back streets, in by-ways, in dark
warehouses, whither some aged priest repaired at dawn, after escaping
but shortly before from the dungeons of the Directory or the scaffolds
of the Revolutionary Committee. The writer of these lines has known
more than one man who was baptized at that period in a miserable
garret by some ecclesiastic disguised as a common laborer, before the
eyes of his parents, though without any sponsors, for fear of
detection. That such men should turn round in the streets of Paris and
stare with wonder at the sight of a cardinal publicly making for the
Tuileries in one of the Consul's carriages is by no means surprising;
but the fact increases our admiration for the two eminent statesmen
who both cast such a firm glance into the depths of futurity.

Consalvi had only been a few hours in Paris when he was summoned
before the First Consul, who sent him word that "he was to show off as
much of a cardinal as possible." The able diplomatist was, however,
not in the least disposed to "show off," and contented himself with
wearing the indispensable insignia of his dignity. It will be well to
remember that, at the time we are speaking of, no priest would have
ventured to put on the clerical costume in the French capital. This
first audience took place in public, in the midst of all the high
functionaries of the state. On the cardinal approaching, Bonaparte
rose and said abruptly: "I am aware of the object of your journey to
France. My will is, that the conferences shall begin immediately. I
give you five days for the purpose, and tell you beforehand that, if
on the fifth day the negotiations have not come to a conclusion, you
may return to Rome; for, within my own mind, I have come to a
determination should such an event take place."

"By sending his prime minister to Paris (replied coolly the cardinal)
His Holiness proves at any rate the interest he takes in the
conclusion of a concordat with the French government, and I fully hope
to terminate this business in the time you have marked." {389}
Apparently satisfied with this answer, Bonaparte immediately broke
forth into one of those eloquent displays for which he was
remarkable--the concordat, the Holy See, the interests of religion,
the articles which had been rejected by the Pope, all became, on his
part, the subject of a most vehement and exhaustive speech, which was
silently listened to by the surrounding audience.

One of the most amusing and almost ludicrous instances of the Consul's
ignorance in regard to religious matters took place on this occasion.
He bore a bitter hatred to the Jesuits, and was constantly harping on
the subject. "I am quite astounded and scandalized (said he all of a
sudden) that the Pope should be allied to a non-Catholic power like
Russia, as is evident by the restoration of the Jesuits in that
country. Such a union ought surely to wound and irritate a Catholic
sovereign, since it contributes to please a schismatical monarch."

"I must answer candidly (resumed the cardinal) that your informations
are incorrect on this matter. Doubtless the Pope has deemed it
advisable not to refuse the request of the Russian emperor for the
restoration of the Jesuits in his own states, but, at the same time,
His Holiness has shown no less fatherly affection and deference for
the King of Spain, since an interval of several months has elapsed
between Paul's request and the bull, which was not sent before the
court of Spain had expressly stated that it would in no way complain
of the act."

When Bonaparte had fixed such a short term for the conclusion of the
concordat, he fully intended that not a single jot of his own plan
should be rejected by Rome. That plan, as we have already observed,
was half schismatic, and would have bound over the French Church to
the supreme will and power of the ruling government. But Consalvi
showed himself equally firm as to essentials, whilst he gracefully
yielded to every demand of minor importance. As to the wisdom of this
conduct, the present circumstances bear ample testimony; for, had the
cardinal been less firm, what might not be in 1865 the painful
situation of the French episcopacy? But the negotiations, instead of
ending in five days, were prolonged for more than three weeks, during
which the Abbé Bernier, who represented his government, was constantly
starting new difficulties, and threatening Consalvi with some new
outbreak of violence on the part of the First Consul.

At last, toward the middle of July, every difficulty being overcome,
and Bonaparte having formally promised to accept every article of the
concordat as it had been agreed to at Rome, nothing remained but to
copy and sign that famous treaty. The First Consul was to give a grand
dinner on the 14th of July to foreigners of distinction, and to men of
high standing in the country. His intention was to inform publicly his
guests of this happy event, and on the 13th the _Moniteur_ published
the following laconic piece of news: "Cardinal Consalvi has succeeded
in the object which brought him to Paris." Bonaparte had selected his
brother Joseph, a councillor of state, and Bernier to sign the deed,
whilst on the other side were Consalvi, Monsignor Spina, and a
theologian named Father Caselli. But at the last moment there occurred
one of the most astounding incidents contained in the history of
diplomacy. As it has never been mentioned in any memoirs or documents
of those times, we cannot do better than let the cardinal relate it in
his own words:

"Toward four o'clock in the afternoon, Bernier arrived with a roll of
paper, which he did not unfold, but stated to be a copy of the
concordat that we were about to sign. We took our own with us, and set
out all together for the house of citizen Joseph, as was the slang of
the day, the brother to the First Consul. He received me with the
utmost politeness. Though he had been ambassador at Rome, I had not
been introduced to him, being yet but {390} a prelate. During the few
days I passed in Paris, I had not met him on a formal visit which I
paid him, for he often resided in the country. This was, therefore,
the first time we saw each other. After the usual compliments, he bade
us to sit down round a table, adding: 'We shall have soon done, having
but to sign the compact, as all is concluded.'

"On being seated round the table, the question arose who should sign
first. Joseph Bonaparte claimed the right as brother to the head of
the government. I observed with great mildness and firmness, that both
as a cardinal and a legate of the Holy See, I could not consent to
assume the second rank in signing; beside, under the old _régime_ in
France, as well as everywhere else, the cardinals enjoyed a right of
precedence, which I could not give up, not indeed from any personal
motive, but on account of the dignity with which I was invested. It is
but due to Joseph to state, that after a momentary hesitation, he
yielded with very good grace, and begged of me to sign first. He
himself was to come after, followed by the prelate Spina, Councillor
Cretet, Father Caselli, and the Abbé Bernier.

"We set to work at once, and I had taken up the pen, when to my great
surprise the Abbé Bernier presented to me his copy, with the view of
making me sign it without examining its contents. On casting my eyes
upon it in order to ascertain its identity with my own copy, I
perceived that this ecclesiastical treaty was not the one agreed to by
the respective commissioners, not the one adopted by the First Consul
himself, but another totally different! The difference existing at the
very first outset induced me to examine the whole with the most
scrupulous attention, and I soon found out that this copy contained
the draught which the Pope had refused to accept without his
correction, the very refusal that had provoked an order to the French
agent to leave Rome; nay more, that this self-same draught was
modified in many respects by the insertion of certain clauses,
previously declared to be inacceptable even before it had been sent to
Rome.

"A proceeding of this character, so truly incredible, and yet so real,
which I shall not venture to qualify--for the fact speaks sufficiently
for itself--a proceeding of this kind literally paralyzed my hand. I
expressed my astonishment, declaring positively that on no condition
could I give my approval to such a deed. The First Consul's brother
did not appear less surprised than myself, pretending not to
understand the matter. The First Consul, he added, had assured him
that, everything being agreed to, nothing remained but to sign. As for
himself, he had just come up from the country, where he was busy with
Count Cobenzel about the affairs of Austria, being called upon merely
for the formality of signing the treaty. Concerning the matter itself,
he absolutely knew nothing about it."

Cardinal Consalvi, even when writing the above lines, does not seem to
doubt Joseph's sincerity, nor that of Councillor Cretet, who affirmed
his own innocence in terms equally strong. The latter could hardly
believe his own eyes, when the legate pointed out to him the glaring
discrepancies between both copies. The Pope's minister then turning
suddenly to Bernier: "Nobody better than yourself," said he, "can
attest the truth of what I affirm; I am highly astonished at the
studied silence which you maintain, and I must therefore call upon you
positively to communicate to us what you must know so pertinently."

"Then, with an air of confusion and an embarrassed countenance, he
faltered out that doubtless my language was but too true, and that he
would not deny the difference of the documents now proposed for our
signatures. 'But the First Consul has so ordained,' continued he,
'telling me that as long as no signature has been given, one is always
at liberty to make any alteration. So he requires these alterations,
{391} after duly considering the whole matter, he is not satisfied
with the previous stipulations.'"

The doctrine was so contrary to all precedents, that Consalvi had no
difficulty in convincing his auditors of its futility. He moreover
maintained his ground steadfastly, and refused to make any further
concession contrary to his duties. They cajoled him, they threatened
him with the violence and "fury" of the omnipotent Consul; he remained
unshaken. Joseph entreated him at least to go over the same ground
once more, following the Papal copy, and to this the cardinal
consented, firmly resolved not to give up one single point of
importance, but to modify such expressions as might induce Bonaparte
to accept the original treaty. So these six men sat down again at five
o'clock in the afternoon to discuss the whole question. The discussion
was laborious, precise, searching, and heated on both sides. It lasted
nineteen long hours, without interruption, without rest, without food,
without even sending away the servants or the carriages, as will often
happen when people hope to conclude at every minute some important
business. On one article alone they could never agree, and it was
specially reserved to the Pope's own decision. It was twelve o'clock
the next day before they came to a conclusion. But would the First
Consul adopt this plan? Would he not break all bounds, on finding his
duplicity discovered, and himself balked by the cardinal's firmness?
Joseph hurried to the Tuileries, in order to lay the whole before his
imperious brother, and in less than one hour came back, his features
evidently showing the grief of his soul. Says Consalvi:

"He told us that the First Consul had broken forth into the greatest
fury on being apprised of what had taken place. In his fit of anger he
had torn to pieces the concordat we had drawn up among us; but at
last, yielding to Joseph's entreaties and arguments, he had promised,
though with the most extreme repugnance, to accept every article we
had agreed to, except the one we had reserved, and about which he was
no less inflexible than irritated. The First Consul, added Joseph, had
closed the interview by telling him to inform me that he (Bonaparte)
was decided upon maintaining this article as it was expressed in
Bernier's copy:--consequently I had but two ways before me: either to
adopt this article just as it was in the concordat, or to give up the
negotiations. As for him, he had made up his mind to announce either
the signature or the rupture of the affair at the grand dinner he was
to give on that day.

"The reader will easily imagine our consternation at this message. We
had yet three hours until five o'clock, the time appointed for the
dinner, at which we were all to attend. I really am unable to repeat
all the Consul's brother and the two other commissioners said, to
conquer my resistance. The picture of the consequences likely to ensue
upon the rupture was indeed of the darkest color; they gave me to
understand that I alone should become responsible for those evils in
the face of France and Europe, as well as to my own sovereign and
Rome. I should be accused of an unreasonable stiffness, and of having
brought on the results of such a refusal. I felt a death-like anguish,
on conjuring up before my eyes the realization of these prophecies,
and I was--if I may be allowed such words--like unto the man of
sorrow. But my duty won the victory: thanks to heaven, I did not
betray it. I persisted in my refusal during the two hours of this
contest, and the negotiation was broken off.

"Such was the ending of this sad debate, which had lasted
four-and-twenty hours, having begun at four o'clock on the preceding
day, and closed toward the same hour of this unfortunate one. Our
bodily sufferings were doubtless very great, but they were nothing
when compared to our moral anxiety, which rose to such a pitch that
one must really have undergone {392} such tortures to form an idea of
them.

"I was condemned--and this was indeed a most cruel circumstance at
such a moment--to appear in an hour after at the famous banquet. I was
bound to front in public the very first shock of that headstrong anger
which the General Bonaparte would feel on being apprised by his
brother of the rupture.

"We hastened back to our hotel, in order to make a few rapid
preparations, and then hurried all three to the Tuileries. We had
hardly entered the saloon where the First Consul was standing--a
saloon filled with a crowd of magistrates, officers, state grandees,
ministers, ambassadors, and illustrious foreigners, who had been
invited to the dinner--when we were greeted in a way which may easily
be imagined, as he had already seen his brother. As soon as he
perceived me, he exclaimed, his face flushed with anger, and in a loud
and indignant tone:

"'Well, Monsieur le Cardinal, you have had your fling; you have broken
off: be it so! I don't stand in need of Rome. I will act for myself. I
don't stand in need of the Pope. If Henry the Eighth, who had not
one-twentieth part of my power, was enabled to change the religion of
his country, and to succeed in his plans, far better shall I know how
to do it, and to will it. By changing the religion in France, I shall
change it throughout the best part of Europe--everywhere, in fact,
where my power is felt. Rome will soon perceive her own faults; she
will rue them, but it will then be too late. You may take your leave;
it is the best thing you can do. You have willed a rupture: be it so!
When do you intend setting out?'

"'After dinner, general,' replied I, with the greatest calmness.

"These few words acted as an electric shock on the First Consul. He
stared at me for a few minutes; and, taking advantage of his surprise,
I replied to his vehement outbreak, that I neither could nor would go
beyond my instructions on matters which were positively opposed to the
maxims of the Holy See."

Here the Consul interrupted Consalvi, though in a milder tone, to tell
him that he insisted upon having the concordat signed according to his
own views, or not at all. "Well, then," retorted the cardinal, "in
that form I neither shall nor will ever subscribe to it; no--never."
"And that is the very reason," cried out Bonaparte, "why I tell you
that you are bent upon breaking off, and why Rome will shed tears of
blood on this rupture."

What a scene! and how finely the bold, calm demeanor of the Pope's
legate shows in strong relief against that dark, passionate, and
ominous, though intelligent face of Napoleon Bonaparte! What a
splendid subject for a painter, and how it calls up at once to our
mind those barbaric chieftains of old, fit enough to wield the
sword--fit enough even to lay the snares of a savage, but unable to
cope with the spiritual strength of a Christian bishop, and utterly
cowed by the meek sedateness of some missionary monk, just wafted over
from the shores of Ireland! Write the seventh, or the thirteenth,
instead of the nineteenth century, and say if the incident would be
clothed in different colors; for, in fact, what was Bonaparte himself
but the Hohenstaufen of his age--a strange mixture of real grandeur,
of seething passions, and of mean, crafty, fox-like cunning?

The French editor of these memoirs very justly observes that some
vestige of the above scene must still exist in the documents of the
Imperial archives, and expresses the wish that the charge of duplicity
so terribly brought home to the first Bonaparte may be properly sifted
and repelled. Of the existence of such information we have scarcely
any doubt, but we hardly believe that the select committee, headed by
Prince Napoleon, who have already so unscrupulously tampered with
{393} the correspondence of the great founder of the present dynasty,
will ever rebut the accusation, or even take notice of the narrative.
And yet it bears the stamp of truth in every line, so prone was
Napoleon to those fits of anger, which he sometimes used, Thiers
himself admits it, as tools for his policy, and to serve his end.

After all, the First Consul was glad to escape from the consequences
of his own violence, since, on the personal interference of the
Austrian ambassador, he again consented that the conferences should be
renewed. The two cardinal points on which, in the eyes of Rome, the
whole fabric of the concordat rested, were the freedom and publicity
of the Catholic worship. Without these two essential conditions, the
Pope and his ministers deemed that the Church obtained no compensation
for the numerous sacrifices which she consented to undergo in other
respects. The French government, on the contrary, admitted that
freedom and publicity, only so far as they were allowed to other forms
of worship, and saddled the article with the following rider: "The
public worship shall be free, as long as it conforms to the police
regulations." Such was the final difficulty against which Consalvi
maintained a most obstinate opposition, and it must be admitted that
his grounds were of a very serious nature. Taught by the experience of
other times and countries, he considered the obnoxious condition as a
bold attempt to enslave the Church by subjecting her to the secular
power. On the flimsy pretext of acting as the protector and defender
of the Church, a government was enabled to lord it over her, and
cripple her best endeavors for the fulfilment of her divine mission.
If such had been the case, even under the old French monarchy,
notwithstanding the strong Catholic dispositions of the Bourbon
sovereigns in general, as well as in the times of a Joseph II. and a
Leopold of Tuscany, what greater changes were to be feared on the part
of the revolutionary powers, which now swayed over France? The
cardinal readily admitted that, in the present state of the country,
it might be proper for the government to restrict on certain occasions
the publicity of the Catholic worship, for the very sake of protecting
its followers against the outbreaks of popular frenzy; but why lay
down such a sweeping and such an elastic rule? "With a clause of this
kind," said the legate, "the police, or rather the government, will be
enabled to lay their hands on everything, and may subject all to their
own will and discretion, whilst the Church, constantly fettered by the
words, 'As long as it conforms,' will have no right even to complain."
To these arguments the Consul constantly replied, "Well, if the Pope
can't accept such an indefinite and mild restriction, let him omit the
article, and give up publicity of worship altogether." As a curious
specimen of sincerity and candor, we must observe that Consalvi was
not even allowed to consult with his own court, nor to send a courier,
the French government refusing to supply him with the necessary
passports. So much for the international privileges of ambassadors.
Who can be astonished that the Papal minister should feel but little
confidence in the good faith of those he had to deal with?

Their attitude, indeed, seems to have strengthened his own unbending
firmness. In the course of these everlasting debates, he clenched the
subject in the following terms: "Either you are sincere in maintaining
that the government is obliged to impose a restriction upon the
publicity of the religious worship, being impelled thereunto by the
necessity of upholding the public peace and order, and in that case
the government cannot and ought not to hesitate as to asserting the
fact in the article itself; or the government does not wish it to be
so expressed; and in that case they show their bad faith, as also that
the only object of the aforesaid restriction is {394} the enslavement
of the Church to their own will."

The commissioners found nothing to reply to this dilemma; for, in
fact, Consalvi only asked that the reserve itself should be laid down
as a temporary restriction. At last they yielded, despairing of ever
overcoming, on this subject, their unflinching and powerful
antagonist. The concordat, duly signed and authenticated, was sent up
for approval to the First Consul, who, after another fit of anger,
gave his consent; but, as Consalvi himself presumes, from that hour he
resolved to annul the intrinsic and most beneficial effects of the
concordat by those celebrated organic articles which are even at this
moment a bone of contention between the French clergy and the Imperial
government.

It is, indeed, a most remarkable fact that the same man who
imperiously prescribed that the concordat should be drawn up and
signed in the course of five days, allowed a full year to elapse
before he published it and sent the official ratifications to Rome.
When he did fulfil these formalities, he coupled them with the
promulgation of those famous laws which, in reality, tended to cut off
all free communication between the Holy See and the Gallican clergy,
and to spread throughout Europe the false belief that the Pope himself
had concurred in the adoption of these obnoxious measures. In vain did
Pius VII. protest against them--in vain, at a later period, was he
induced to crown the emperor in Paris, in hopes of obtaining the
fulfilment of his own promises. Napoleon turned a deaf ear to the most
touching importunities. On considering the whole of his conduct, it is
hardly possible to refrain from concluding that Bonaparte ever looked
upon the Pope's supremacy and power as an appendage and satellite of
his own paramount omnipotence. Viewed by this light, many of his acts
in latter years will appear at least consistent, though by no means
justifiable on any principle whatsoever. Is there not often a certain
consistency in madness? And if so in ordinary life, why not in the
freaks and starts of despotism? And again, is not despotism itself
madness in disguise?

But why indulge in our own speculations and surmises, when we have
before us positive evidence that in 1801, as well as ten years
afterward, Napoleon entertained and maintained a plan for arrogating
to himself both the spiritual and temporal power? The examples set by
Henry VIII., Albert of Brandenburg, and Peter I. of Russia, were ever
before his eyes, blinding his own innate good sense, and exerting a
sort of ominous fascination over his best impulses. The reader has
doubtless heard of, if not perused, those wonderful pages in which the
fallen giant whiled away his tedious hours at St. Helena, pretending
to write his own history, but in reality veiling truth under fiction,
and endeavoring to palm upon the world certain far-fetched views of
benevolence or civilization, which he never dreamt of whilst he was on
the throne. Still, that strange _Memorial of St. Helena_ often
contains many a startling proof of candor, as if the mask suddenly
fell, and revealed to our astonished gaze the inner man. Among such
passages, none perhaps are so remarkable as those referring to the
concordat and to the religious difficulties of later years. One day
Napoleon dictated to General Montholon these lines, which so strongly
justify Consalvi's fears and opposition:

"When I seized the helm, I already held the most precise and definite
ideas on all those principles which cement together the social body. I
fully weighed the importance of religion--on that head I was
convinced--and had resolved to restore it. But one can hardly realize
the difficulties I had to contend with when about to bring back
Catholicism. I should have been readily supported had I unfurled the
Protestant standard. This feeling went so far that, in the {395}
council of state, where I met with the strongest opposition against
the concordat, many a man tacitly determined to plot its destruction.
'Well,' used they to say, 'let us turn Protestants at once, and then
we may wash our hands of the business.' It is, indeed, quite true
that, in the midst of so much confusion and so many errors, I was at
liberty to choose between Catholicism and Protestantism; and still
truer that everything favored the latter. But, _beside_ my own personal
bias inclining toward my national religion, I had most weighty reasons
to decide otherwise. I should thus have created in France two great
parties of equal strength, though I was determined to do away with
every party whatsoever; I should have conjured up all the frenzy of
religious warfare, whilst the enlightenment of the age and my own will
aimed at crushing it altogether. By their mutual strife these two
parties would have torn France asunder, and made her a slave to
Europe, whilst my ambition was to make her its mistress. Through
Catholicism I was far surer of attaining all my great objects. At
home, the majority absorbed the minority, which I was disposed to
treat with so much equity that any difference between both would soon
disappear; abroad, Catholicism kept me on good terms with the Pope.
Beside, thanks to my own influence and to our forces in Italy, I did
not despair, sooner or later, by some means or other, _to obtain the
direction and guidance of the Pope; and then what a new source of
influence! what a lever to act upon public opinion, and to govern the
world!"_

A few moments after the emperor resumed:

"Francis I. had a capital opportunity to embrace Protestantism, and to
become its acknowledged head throughout Europe. His rival, Charles V.,
resolutely sided with Rome, because he considered this the best way to
subject Europe. This alone should have induced Francis to defend
European independence. Instead of that, he left a reality to run after
a shadow, following up his pitiful quarrels in Italy, allying himself
with the Pope, and burning the reformers in Paris.

"Had Francis I. embraced Lutheranism, which is so favorable to the
royal supremacy, he would have spared France those dreadful
convulsions which were afterward brought on by the Calvinists, whose
republican organization was so near ruining both the throne and our
fine monarchy. Unfortunately, Francis was unable to understand
anything of the kind. As to his scruples, they are quite out of the
question, since this self-same man made an alliance with the Turks,
whom he introduced among us. Oh, those stupid times! Oh, that feudal
intellect! After all, Francis I. was but a tilting king--a
drawing-room dandy--a would-be giant, but a real pigmy."

It is scarce necessary to add, that at the time Napoleon is speaking
of he was an unbeliever, though a lurking respect for his national
religion still lingered at the bottom of his heart. But then, how
fully does he admit that religion was but a tool of his ambition! How
openly does he confess his plan to get hold of the Pope _by some means
or other!_ How glaringly true must now appear in our eyes that
narrative of Consalvi's in which he exposes the mean trick that
Napoleon endeavored to play upon his vigilance! Lastly, how faithfully
does the emperor adhere to the plans secretly laid within the dark
mind of the First Consul! For, as if to leave no doubt as to the
fulfilment of those plans, he related to Montholon the most minute
details of what took place during the Pope's captivity at
Fontainebleau:

"The English," said Napoleon, "plotted an escape for him from Savona;
the very thing I could have wished for. I had him brought to
Fontainebleau, where his misfortunes were to end, and his splendor to
be restored. All my grand views had been thus fulfilled under disguise
and in secrecy. I had so managed that {396} success was infallible,
even without an effort. Indeed, the Pope adopted the famous concordat
of Fontainebleau, notwithstanding my reverses in Russia. But how far
different had I returned triumphant and victorious! So at last I had
obtained the long-wished-for separation of the spiritual and temporal
powers; whilst their confusion is so fatal to the former, by causing
trouble and disorder within society in the name of him who ought to
become a centre of union and harmony. Henceforward I intended to place
the Pope on a pinnacle; we would not even have regretted his temporal
power, for I would have made an idol of him, and he would have dwelt
close to me. Paris should have become the capital of the Christian
world, and _I would have governed the spiritual as well as the
political world._ By this means I should have been enabled to
strengthen the federative portions of the empire, and to maintain
peace in such parts as were beyond its limits. I should have had my
religious sessions, just the same as my legislative sessions: my
councils would have represented, all Christendom, and the popes would
have merely acted as their presidents. I should myself have opened
their assemblies, approved and promulgated their decrees, as was the
case under Constantine and Charlemagne. In fact, if the emperors lost
this kind of supremacy, it was because they allowed the spiritual
ruler to reside at a distance from them; and those rulers took
advantage of this act of weakness, or this result of the times, to
escape from the prince's government, and even to overrule it."

What words of ours could add to the bold significance of these? How
the proud spirit of the despot towers even within his prison! and how
little had he profited by the bitter lessons of experience! Never
before, do we believe, since the advent of Christianity, did any king
or conqueror profess such a barefaced contempt for the deepest
feelings of a Christian soul--the freedom of his spiritual being!
This pretended liberation from the court of Rome, this religious
government concentrated within the hands of the sovereign, became,
indeed, at one time, the constant object of Napoleon's thoughts and
meditations:

"England, Russia, Sweden, a large part of Germany (was he wont to
say), are in possession of it; Venice and Naples enjoyed it in former
times. Indeed, there is no doing without it, for otherwise a nation is
ever and anon wounded in its peace, in its dignity, in its
independence. But then such an undertaking is most arduous; at every
attempt I was beset with new dangers; and, once thoroughly embarked in
it, the nation would have abandoned me. More than once I tried to
awaken public opinion; but all was in vain, and I was obliged to
acknowledge that the people would not follow me."

On reading these last words, who will not remember Cacault's apothegm,
uttered in 1801: "Nations now-a-days will not allow their rulers to
dispose of them in regard to religious matters."

We hope that the reader will not accuse us of prolixity for having
related rather fully the negotiations which proceeded the concordat of
1801. Hitherto the main facts of this important event have been
gleaned from French sources of information. No voice had been raised,
we believe, on the part of Rome, and no one, it must be admitted, had
a better right to speak of that celebrated treaty than the man who
contributed so largely, so exclusively, we might almost say, to its
final adoption. And then, throughout the whole of his simple and
unpretending, yet clear and spirited memoirs, the great cardinal reads
us a grand lesson, which may be felt and understood by every human
soul. During the perusal of these two volumes, we have ever before our
eyes the struggle of right against might, of duty against tyranny, of
a true Christian soul against the truckling, shuffling, intriguing
spirit of the world. Ever {397} and anon, this able, firm, and yet
amiable diplomatist allows some expression to escape him which shows
that his heart and soul are elsewhere, that his beacon is on high, and
that he views everything and all things in this nether world from the
light of the gospel. And this, perhaps, is the very reason why,
throughout a long career of such numerous difficulties and dangers, he
moved serene, undaunted, unblemished in his honor, proclaimed wisest
amongst the wise, until kings, princes, warriors, and statesmen,
Protestants and Catholics, counted his friendship and esteem of
priceless value.



----

From Once a Week.

HYMN BY MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS.

  O Domine Deus, speravi in te!
  O care mi Jesu, nunc libera me!
  In dura catena, in misera pcena,
  Desidero te;
  Languendo, gemendo et genuflectendo,
  Adoro, imploro, ut liberes me!


(TRANSLATION.)


  O Lord, O my God, I have hoped but in thee;
  Jesu, my dearest, now liberate me:
  In hard chains, in fierce pains,
  I am longing for thee:
  Languishing, groaning and bending the knee,
  I adore, I implore thou wouldst liberate me!

      ASTLEY H. BALDWIN.


----

{398}


From The Lamp.


MANY YEARS AGO AT UPFIELD.


In the last decade of the last century, Upfield was a very healthy,
pretty, prosperous town in Suffolk. Its centre was a green;
undulating, irregular, and from four to five acres in area. Round it
were laborers' cottages, a forge, the inn, the veterinary surgeon's
house, the doctor's, the vicarage, and the Grey House, each with land
proportioned to its character. A little, very little way off, was the
church; belonging anciently to a Carthusian monastery, of which some
ruins still existed; and beyond that, but within a quarter of a mile
of Upfield, was Edward's Hall, the fine baronial residence of the
Scharderlowes, who had owned it since the reign of Henry IV., and
never forsaken the Catholic faith. Upfield was eloquent about the
past, as well as actually charming. The church, early English, was
little injured exteriorly. Inside it reminded one of a nun compelled
to wear a masquerade dress. The beautiful arches and lofty roof had
defied time and the vulgar rage of vicious fanaticism; so had the
pavement, rich in slabs imploring humbly prayers for the repose of the
dead who lay under it; but devotion and taste mourned over the changed
use of the sacred building, and the characteristics thereof; for
instance, a singing-gallery in the western end, with the royal arms
done in red and gilded plaster, fastened to it; high deal pews for the
mass of the congregation, and the squire's praying-made-comfortable
one within the carved oak screen in the south transept, where had been
the chapel of the Blessed Sacrament.

The Grey House was low, rambling, picturesque; the _beau-ideal _of a
happy, hospitable old English home. It had been built by instalments,
at distant intervals; and had derived its name from a Lord Grey, of
Codnoure, who had formerly possessed lands in the neighborhood. At the
time whence this story starts, it had been for a hundred years or more
in the family of the Wickhams, who claimed to be descended
collaterally from William of Wykeham--whether they were or not, had
never been discussed, and therefore never formally established; nor
did any one in the neighborhood, except Mr. Scharderlowe and his
family, know that a former Wickham had bartered his religion for a
wealthy Protestant wife, and allowed her to bring up their children in
her own way. In January, 1790, George Wickham, the head of the family,
died at the Grey House, of inflammation of the lungs, in his
forty-second year, and no one was ever more regretted. A
kinder-hearted man had never breathed. His attachments had been warm
and numerous; he had helped every one whom he could help, been
peculiarly gentle to the poor and his dependents, hated nothing but
wickedness, and believed in that only when it was impossible to be
blind to it. "Poor dear Mr. Wickham," said Mrs. Scharderlowe, when her
husband told her the news; "I'm heartily sorry. I always thought he
would become a Catholic--he was so liberal in all his feelings; only
the last time we met, conversation taking that turn--I forget why--he
said it was too bad that we could not worship God as we pleased,
without suffering for it; and that he was ashamed of Englishmen who
forgot that their noblest laws were made, and their most glorious
victories won, in Catholic times. What a loss he will be to Upfield
and his family!" "Yes," returned her husband, "that poor pretty little
widow is about as helpless and ignorant of the world as possible; she
never had occasion to think of anything but how to make {399} home
happy, which I believe she did; they were a particularly united
family. I hope he made a will; but I think it is likely he did not;
his illness was short and painful, and previously to it no one ever
had a fairer prospect of long life than he had."

Mr. Wickham's funeral was talked of in Upfield and the neighborhood
many years afterward. Mr. Scharderlowe sent his carriage; the county
member, and persons of every class, attended. The clergyman from an
adjacent parish, who had been requested to perform the burial-service,
because the vicar, Mr. Wickham's nephew, felt unequal to it, burst
into tears, and had to pause some minutes to recover himself. The
widow fainted; and her eldest son Robert, a youth in his nineteenth
year, tried to jump into the vault when his father's coffin was
lowered.

There was a will, made during Mr. Wickham's last illness, and the
vicar was sole executor and trustee, with a legacy of £500. There was
ample provision for the younger children; and Robert was, when of age,
to succeed to a brewery, which his father had started many years
previously, and which was the most lucrative in the county. He was to
learn its management from James Deane, the confidential clerk, whose
salary was to be raised, and to whom £100 was left in token of Mr.
Wickham's appreciation of his services. The Grey House, and everything
in it, with £200 a year, was to be Mrs. Wickham's, and at her disposal
at death.

The brewery was half a mile from Upfield; Mr. Wickham had built it
where it would not injure the prospect, and Deane had a pretty cottage
attached to it, where he, a widower, lived with his sister and only
child, a daughter. He was a Catholic, son of a former steward of Mr.
Scharderlowe's, and extremely attached to Mr. Wickham, who had taken
him when a boy into the brewery, and advanced him steadily. He was a
well-principled, intelligent man, who had improved himself by taking
lessons in geography, grammar, and algebra, as the opportunities
offered; and he was, from his position, well-known in the
neighborhood. He told his sister that he feared that Mr. Wickham's
death was only the beginning of trouble for his family; for he
distrusted Mr. William, the vicar. "It isn't that he's a dishonorable
man, Lizzy; but it isn't likely that a crack shot, a bold rider after
the hounds, a gentleman who is as fond of a ball as anyone, and who
takes no trouble about his own affairs, will do justice to a dead
man's, though I don't doubt he means it now."

"But what harm can he do, James?"

"Why, he can ruin the younger children. Everything except the brewery
and what is left to Mrs. Wickham is as much in his power as it was in
his uncle's. I doubt if the poor dear gentleman wouldn't have arranged
differently if he'd had longer time: it's an awful lesson to be always
prepared for death; I'm sure I thought Mr. Wickham might live to be a
hundred. No doubt pain and sorrow confused his mind, and anyhow it was
natural that he should trust his own relations."

"He had better have trusted you, James."

"That was not to be expected, Lizzy, and I mightn't have been fit for
it. There's plenty on my hands. It is a large, increasing business,
and I have to teach it to Mr. Robert; and one can't tell how he'll
take to it; I've been afraid he would be unsteady, but he has taken
his father's death to heart uncommonly, and I hope he'll try to be as
good a man."

About this time people had begun to remark that Polly Deane, then in
her fifteenth year, was growing up a remarkably pretty girl; she was
an old established pet of the Wickhams; her mother had been the
daughter of a tenant, and so great a favorite that when she married
Deane, the wedding was celebrated at the Grey House. When, two years
later, she was dying of fever, Mr. and Mrs. Wickham promised to watch
over her child. All that {400} they undertook they carried out
generously, and Polly lived as much with them as with Aunt Lizzie, who
did her part toward her well--loving her fondly, keeping her fresh,
healthy, and merry, checking her quick temper, teaching her her
prayers, and taking her often to Mr. Scharderlowe's, to get his
chaplain's--Father Armand's--blessing; and when she was old enough,
to mass and the sacraments. The fact of the Wickhams having no
daughter increased their tenderness for her, and her father was
delighted and flattered by Mrs. Wickham's watchfulness over her dress
and manner, and Mr. Wickham's care for her education; it was the best
that could be had in Upfield, and good enough to make her as charming
as she need be. She did plain sewing extremely well, and some quaint
embroidery of hideous designs in wool and floss silks; she had worked
a cat in tent-stitch, and a parrot of unknown species in cross; her
sampler was believed to be the finest in the county; she could read
aloud very pleasantly, spell wonderfully, write a clear, stiff hand,
which one might decipher without glasses at eighty; she could not have
gone up for honors in grammar, but she talked very prettily; she had
never had occasion to write a letter; as to geography, she believed
that the world was round, for her father and Mr. Wickham said so, and
she had heard that Captain Cook had been round it; but only that she
was ashamed, she would have liked to ask some one how it could be, and
how it was found out; it was such a contradiction of observation, if
only because of the sea; she had never seen the sea, but she believed
in it, and could understand water remaining on level ground; there was
the horse-pond, for instance, but that thousands of miles of roaring,
angry, deep water should hold on to a round world was too much for
her. You could not puzzle her in the multiplication table, but she did
not take kindly to weights and measures. She had learned no history,
her father could not get a Catholic to teach her, and would trust no
one else, but she had picked up a few facts and notions; for instance,
she had heard of Alfred the Great and his lanterns; of St. Edward the
Confessor, and that he made good laws; of King Charles I., and those
wicked men--she fancied Guy Fawkes was one of them--had cut his head
off; when he lived she was not sure, and she hoped Mr. Wickham would
never ask her, for she should not like to say that she did not know,
and she was sometimes afraid that he would when he talked of Carlo's
being a King Charles spaniel. It was puzzling, because she remembered
Carlo a puppy, and she was sure that the king's name had been George
ever since she was born. She had an exquisite ear for music, and a
voice of great promise. Mr. Wickham was passionately fond of music,
and therefore, appreciating peculiarly this talent of Polly's, had
engaged a good master from the county-town to teach her to play on the
piano. She had profited well by his instructions, and only a few days
before Mr. Wickham was taken ill, she had played the accompaniment
when he sang "From the white-blossomed thorn my dear Chloe requested,"
"O lady fair," and "Oh life is a river, and man is the boat;" and he
had patted her head and kissed her, and asked her for the "Slow
movement in Artaxerxes" and "The harmonious Blacksmith," and--she was
so glad--she had played them without one mistake. Of course she
danced, and made cakes and pastry, beauty-washes, elder-wine, and
various preserves and salves; knitted her father's stockings and her
aunt's mittens, and read a romance whenever she could get one, but
that was very rarely.

The vicar made, at any rate, a good start, fulfilling his uncle's
instructions exactly; apprenticed his second son, Alfred, to the
College of Surgeons--that was the most liberal way in those days of
entering the medical profession--and placed him {401} to board with an
old family friend, an opulent practitioner. The third son was articled
to an eminent attorney; the others were sent to school. The void made
by the death of those even most important and most fondly loved is
soon filled up externally; how otherwise could justice be done to the
living? The widow acquiesced in the separation from her children; it
was her husband's plan, and for their advantage. She was sure she
could not long survive him; she might even be sinful enough to wish to
die, but for her sons' sakes, she was so utterly lonely. They loved
her truly, the darlings; but they could not understand her, never
would, unless--which God in his great mercy forbid--they ever came to
suffer as she suffered. To lose such a husband! so manly, yet so
tender and thoughtful. She had always looked forward to his nursing
her in her last illness, and receiving her last breath. He would have
grieved for her truly, she was sure of that; but he could have borne
it better; he would have been of more use to the boys. Thus she mused
often, weeping plentifully; but she never denied that she had many
consolations. No one could have suited her better than Polly, and she
was never more than a day or two absent from her. They were alike in
character--simple, self-sacrificing, and affectionate in an uncommon
degree. Polly's caresses seldom failed to arouse her; the gentle girl
felt how much more she could have done had Mrs. Wickham been
accessible to the comfort in which her own, the dear old faith,
abounded; and prayed daily that it might soon be hers, and did her
best. She never attempted direct consolation, but interested the
mourner in some trifle, or coaxed her into conversation or employment.
Sometimes she really could not arrange some obstinate flowers;
sometimes her work was all wrong, and no one but Mrs. Wickham could
show her how to put it right, and Mary Hodge's baby ought to have the
garment that evening. Once, when all her ingenuity failed, she was
actually delighted by Betty's running in with her darling kitten, wet
to the skin, just saved out of the water-butt; Mrs. Wickham dried her
eyes, and pitied it, and watched Polly wiping it, and arranging a
cushion inside the fender for it; and at last smiled at the endearing
nonsense she talked, and told her she was more than a mother to it.

Robert was quite steady; regular at the brewery, pleasant at home. Of
course it would have been dull for him without Polly: her youth,
beauty, and sisterly at-homeness made a glow in the dear old house.
Did he or his mother ever calculate on what was likely to come of that
near companionship? No: their actual life engrossed them. He first
drew his mother to look on while he and Polly played cribbage or
backgammon, and then to play herself a little. He took in the
_Gentleman's Magazine_, and showed her the curious old prints, and read
the odds and ends of news aloud. Music was unendurable to her for some
months; but she conquered herself by degrees, and came to enjoy it.
Then Robert and Polly sang every evening, she playing the
accompaniments. Summer brought the boys home for holidays, and that
did good. When the anniversary of the father's death came round, its
melancholy associations pressed evidently on the widow, and she spent
the greater portion of the day in her room; but she was resigned, and
better than those who watched her lovingly expected her to be.

The great feature of those Christmas holidays was Alfred's return in
an altered character. He had left Upfield a lout--the despair of his
mother and the maids; who were the more provoked, because he was
undeniably the handsomest of the family. To keep him clean, or make
him put on his clothes properly, had been impossible. He had credit
for talent; for, when sufficiently excited, he wrote what were deemed
wonderfully pretty {402} verses, and he was quick at repartee and
sarcasm; but he had been in perpetual disgrace at school, and silent
and awkward--sulky as a bear, his brothers called him at home. He made
a great sensation on the first evening of his return from London: he
was fluent in conversation, perfectly well dressed, and--chief
marvel--had clean, carefully-shaped nails. Polly smiled, wondered,
and said to herself that he was really very handsome, and sang
beautifully. All the Wickhams sang, but none of them, she thought,
could be compared to him. The change was not agreeable to Robert, and
he showed it; grumbled in an undertone about fops; and asked his
brother if he could play cricket or quoits, or skate, or take a
five-barred gate, or shoot snipe.

Alfred yawned, and replied:

"My dear Bob, don't you remember that I was never fond of trouble?
Those rough amusements are very well for country gentlemen and
farmers; and I give them up to them with all my heart. As to skating,
you none of you know anything about it; you should see the gentlemen,
and elegant ladies too, cutting out flowers, and other complicated
figures, on the Serpentine."

Then addressing himself to his mother and Polly--Robert's countenance
lowering as he observed the innocent girl's natural interest in
such-topics--he talked about the last drawing-room and the fashionable
plays. He had seen _The School for Scandal_ and _The Haunted Tower,_
at Drury Lane; _Othello_ and _The Conscious Lovers_, at Covent Garden,
and he recited--really well--some of the tender passages in _Othello_.
Next he described the lying-in-state of the Duke of Cumberland; the
trial and execution of Jobbins and Lowe for arson; the recent storms,
which had not touched Upfield, but had been terrible
elsewhere--chimneys killing people in their beds, the lightning
flowing like a stream of fluid from a glasshouse. And no one
interrupted him, till Robert said, savagely:

"That fellow will talk us all deaf."

"Not this time, Bob: you and I will sing 'Love in thine eyes' now. I
know Polly will play for us."

They did it; Alfred directing the sentiment to her, so as to make her
feel shy and uncomfortable, and his brother vowing inwardly that "he'd
give that puppy a good thrashing before he went back to London, if he
didn't mind what he was about."

Alfred had seen a good deal of what country folk call "finery" in
London; but he declared that breakfast at home was unrivalled,
particularly in winter. There was the superb fire of coal and oak
blocks, throwing a glow on the massive family plate and fine, spotless
damask: such a silver urn and teapot were not often seen. Further, the
young gentleman inherited a family predilection for an abundant show
of viands; liked to see--as was usual at an everyday breakfast
there--a ham just cut, a cold turkey, round of beef, and delicate
clear honey, with other sweet things, for which his mother's
housekeeping was famed. This was not all. The room formed one side of
a light angle in the picturesque old house, and from two sides of the
table one could see a magnificent pyrocanthus, the contrast between
its scarlet berries and the table-cloth positively delicious.

Robert and Alfred lingered one morning after the rest of the family
had left this room. Alfred was considering that it might be possible
to enjoy life in the country; Robert was watching him, half-curiously,
half-jealously: he did not believe that his brother was handsomer than
himself; but he detested the ease of manner and ready wit that gave
him ascendancy disproportioned to his years. He threw himself back in
a large armchair, stretched his legs, and said: "I'm not sure that I
don't envy you, Bob, after all."

"Your condescension is great certainly. Have you been all this time
finding out that it is a good thing to be George Wickham's eldest
son?"

{403}

"Ah, yes!--eldest son. Well, it's a comfort for the younger ones that
there's no superior merit in being born first. But I'm not going to
philosophize; it's too much trouble, and not your line. But, really,
to breakfast here every morning in all this splendid comfort, the
prettiest and gentlest of mothers pressing you to eat and drink more
than is good for you; and that lovely fairy, Polly--that perfect Hebe
--flitting about--is more than even an eldest son ought to enjoy. How
sorry you will be next year, when you come of age, unless"--and he
looked searchingly, through half-closed eyes, at Bob.

"Why, pray? And unless what?"

"Only that I conclude you will then set up a house of your own, unless--
as it is evident my mother could not part from pretty Polly--unless you
arrange to live here, and marry our pet."

Strange flushings and palenesses passed over Robert's face, and he had
to master a choking in his throat and heaving of his chest before he
spoke. He had never had his hidden feelings put into words before--he
had not even any definite intention about the young girl whom his eye
followed stealthily every where, and whose voice, the rustling of
whose dress even, was music to him. He only knew that he should
throttle any one who laid a finger on her. He had not guessed that any
one connected him with her, even in thought; and now here was all that
was most secret and sacred in his heart dragged out, and held
mockingly before him by a boy two years younger than himself. It
seemed to him hours instead of seconds before he spoke, and his voice
had the passionate tremulousness which betrays great interior tumult;
he was sure that he should say something he would rather not say, but
conscious every moment's delay gave an advantage to his abhorred
tormentor. Without raising his eyes, he said hoarsely, "The Wickhams
are proud--they don't make low marriages."

"Upon my word, Bob," returned his brother patronizingly, "I respect
you; I did not give you credit for so much good sense. The girl's a
perfect beauty, no doubt. What a sensation she'd make in London! But,
after all, she's our servant's daughter, and old Molly Brown's
grandchild. Then, again, that unlucky religion of hers! The
Scharderlowes throw a respectability over it here, for they are
well-born and wealthy, but anywhere else it would be extremely awkward
for you. I confess I had a motive for sounding you. Farmer Briggs's
eldest son hinted to me yesterday that he should be happy to lay West
Hill at Polly's feet."

"He 's an insolent rascal!" said Robert furiously.

"My dearest Bob, why? The poor fellow has eyes, and uses them; and one
would not wish our Hebe to be an old maid."

"I say," reiterated Robert, deadly pale, and stamping, "he's an
insolent rascal; and if I catch him coming to this house I'll tell him
so. A rustic boor like that to hint at marrying a girl who has always
been my parents' pet, and is my mother's favorite companion--"

He stopped abruptly; and his brother, who was a perfect mimic,
continued in precisely his tone, "And is so dear to Robert Wickham,
that he will not hear her name coupled with another man's--"

He had gone too far; Robert's indignation boiled over--he sprang at
him--and before he had time to stir, struck him a blow between the
eyes, which brought sparks from them, and blood from his nose. A crash
and struggle followed, which Polly heard. She ran to the room,
anticipating nothing more than that some of the large dogs, privileged
to roam about the house, were quarrelling over the cold meat. Amazed,
beyond all power of words, she stood silent and very pale. Then,
feeling, young as she was, instinctive womanly power over the
disgraced young men, and holding herself {404} so erect that she
looked a head taller than usual, she said, coldly and firmly, "I am
ashamed of you!"

By that time they were ashamed of themselves. Alfred, covering his
disfigured face with his handkerchief, left the room slowly. Robert,
who had received no visible hurt, threw up a sash, jumped out, and
when he turned to shut the window, looked earnestly and sadly at
Polly, so as to bring a strange unwelcome sensation to her heart.

There was an awkwardness at dinner that day. Polly had removed the
traces of the fray, and kept her counsel; but Alfred's features defied
concealment. He stayed in his room with raw beef on them, and
mutton-broth and barley-water for his regimen. His mother and Betty
could get nothing out of him but that Bob was a fool, and had licked
him for teasing him. He was by no means given to repentance; but his
bruises, and a message from the vicar, desiring to see him early next
morning, led him to the conclusion that he had better have "kept his
tongue within his teeth." He was sufficiently humbled to receive
silently unusually severe reproofs from his guardian, who had informed
him that he had sent for him in order to avoid the risk of paining his
excellent mother. It was not only that he knew all that Betty could
tell of "the row" between the brothers, and that he denounced the
"ruffianliness" of "brawling in a widowed mother's house," but that
Mr. Kemp, in whose house in London he lived, had inclosed bills of
disgraceful amount, in a letter complaining that Alfred's taste for
pleasure threatened to be his ruin; and regretting that justice to his
own family compelled him to decline retaining him as an inmate after
the approaching midsummer. The young man's unusual power of pleasing,
he said, made his example peculiarly dangerous.

"And now," said the vicar, "I ask you if your heart is not touched by
the thought of the pain that this letter would give your dead father,
were he living; and if you could bear your mother to know it? It is
only for her sake that I spare you. I will beg Mr. Kemp to retract his
resolution to dismiss you, if you become steadier, and I shall charge
him to let it be known that I will not pay any bills that exceed the
limit of your very handsome allowance: and I warn you that my natural
easiness and indolence shall not prevent my being severe if you
require it. As to the affair yesterday, I shall not inquire into it;
but I warn you that the recurrence of anything so disgraceful shall
prevent your spending your vacations at home; and I am sorry to say to
one of my good uncle's sons, that I am glad he must return to town the
day after to-morrow."

Alfred was surprised and alarmed, and made professions of penitence,
and promises of amendment.



There was a visible change thenceforward in Robert. He became more
manly in his bearing; and variable in his manner to Polly, saying even
at times very sharp things to her. The sweet-tempered girl gave no
provocation, and felt no resentment; but hid sometimes a tear. She did
not like to displease any one whom Mrs. Wickham loved. Robert attended
to business, took his proper place in society, and was popular; and
she felt it a relief when he was out, and she had not to play for him.
It was within three months of his twenty-first birthday, when, on
one of the frequent occasions of his dining with the vicar, that
gentleman asked him what were his plans. He replied that he hadn't
any.

"But, my dear boy, my authority over you is near its end, and so is
your enforced residence with your mother. It is time to think where
you will live."

"I don't think my mother will turn me out."

"No; but as her allowance for you ceases with your minority, you must,
in fairness to her, either contribute to {405} the household income,
or get a home of your own."

"I don't anticipate any difficulty about it."

"Merton Paddocks is to be let," continued William. "It is a nice
little place, and suitable to you in many ways. If you let it slip,
you may regret it. Your marrying is to be calculated on, and in that
event your living with your mother might not be agreeable to all
parties."

"I don't think of marrying."

"Oh, nonsense! every man's turn comes; and why should you escape?"

"As you escaped, perhaps."

"Me!--one old bachelor in a family is enough in two generations; and my
case may not be obstinate. I'm not actually too old."

"May I ask whom you think of elevating to the vicarage?" asked Robert,
laughing; but there was a pause which, he could not imagine why, made
him uncomfortable, before his cousin said:

"I have thought of Polly--do you forbid the banns?"

The room seemed turning round with Robert; but he swallowed a glass of
wine hastily, and said, as carelessly as he could, "That child!"

"Child! I don't know--she's seventeen, and I'm thirty-two--the
difference there was between your parents' ages when they married; and
Polly is two years older than your mother was then."

"Perhaps I'm no judge of the matter, William, but as you have broached
the subject, excuse me if I ask if you have any notion that Polly is
attached to you."

"None whatever; but any man can marry any woman provided he have a
fair field and no favor. What has really kept me doubtful has been a
distinct difficulty about pretty Polly's birth. It is awkward; and the
Wickhams have always been sensitive on such points; but I've nearly
resolved to sacrifice pride to Polly's charms. Her beauty and grace
would adorn any position; and as soon as my guardianship, and
consequent business relations with her father, ceases, I shall
probably ask my aunt's consent and blessing. It will be great
promotion for her pet, and insure her having her near her for life.
Meanwhile, Bob, I rely on your silence."

"Certainly."

Poor Robert! Here was one of his own family seeing no difficulty about
marrying the girl of whom he had spoken as beneath himself! another
man talking with assurance of being Polly's husband as soon as he
thought fit! while he, who had been domesticated with her from her
infancy--had never dared to give her a playful kiss since they had
ceased to be children--had never ventured on the least demonstration
of the fondness that tormented him for expression. He made an excuse
to go home early; walked in the shrubbery, wretched and irresolute,
till midnight; went to his room, threw himself undressed on the bed,
had some uneasy sleep, rose early, walked again, and appeared at
breakfast haggard and irritable. His mother observed it, and was
distressed. He had sat up too late, he said; and, for once, William's
wine was bad. He would not go to the brewery that day; but, if she
liked, he would drive her and Polly in the phaeton to Larchton, and
they could give Betty a treat by taking her. She was always glad to
visit her native place, and he knew she had not been there for a long
time. His mother was willing. Larchton was a two hours' drive; and
they put up the horses there.

Mrs. Wickham and Betty went to see some old people; and Robert
proposed to Polly to take a walk. She remembered afterward that she
had had an unusual feeling about that walk. They had often walked
together before, as a brother and sister might.

For the first time, however, Robert said, "Take my arm, Polly."

She took it; and they proceeded in silence in the fields for some
minutes.

Then he said abruptly, "Do you {406} ever think of getting married,
Polly?"

"No," she replied with an innocent laugh; "what would Mrs. Wickham do
without me?"

"And do you expect never to love any one better than my mother?"

"I really don't think it would be possible."

"But, Polly, you're not a child. You know there's a different--love
the love my father had for my mother."

"I have never thought about it," she said carelessly.

Her manner gave him courage; it was so easy and unconscious. Taking
the little hand that was on his arm, and holding it so firmly that he
could not feel her effort to withdraw it, he went on: "Polly, I made
an excuse to come here that I might talk to you without interruption.
The love that my father had for my mother, I have for you. I cannot
tell when it began; but I first knew how strong it was when Alfred
came home first from London. I was madly jealous of him because he was
forward and I was bashful. Do you remember the morning you found us
fighting in the breakfast-parlor? He had provoked me so much by
something that he said about you, that I could not help striking him.
I don't know what I might have done if you hadn't come in then; and
I've never been happy since. I've been irritable, and sometimes, I
know, cross and disagreeable. Something occurred last night which I
can't tell you now--I may another time--which made me wretched; and I
made up my mind this morning to put myself out of suspense, and ask
you, Polly, to be my wife."

He had been too full of his story to look at her while he was
speaking, but he looked then eagerly for her answer. He could not read
the lovely countenance which new and various feelings made different
from anything he had ever seen. The soft eyelids down, the lashes
moist, the lips trembling, the flush so deep that it would have
spoiled a less delicate skin. She was surprised to find how much he
loved her; grateful to him; sorry she had made him unhappy, and
believed him ill-tempered. Then came a rapid thought of how handsome
he was; but, sweeping everything away, perplexity followed. What would
Mrs. Wickham and her father wish her to do? What would Father Armand
say?

Robert could not guess all this; and there was almost agony in his
voice as he said, "Oh, Polly, Polly, do speak to me!"

She made a great effort, and replied, "I don't know what to say, or
what I ought to do!"

"Say, at any rate, that you don't dislike me."

"Oh, no!" she said readily, almost laughing to think that he could
suppose that possible.

"One thing more, Polly; do you prefer any one else?"

She hesitated a minute, for her quick wit told her that the question
involved a great deal; but she answered firmly, though shyly, "No; I
do not."

Distrustful as he had been of his power to please her, this was enough
for the time to make him almost beside himself with delight.

He said "God bless you!" heartily; and was silent awhile because he
could not command his voice. He resumed, "As to your 'ought to do,'
don't say anything to any one till I've spoken to my mother. We'll go
and look for her now." He talked a great deal of nonsense on the way,
and Polly said very little then, or during the drive. She was ashamed
to look at Mrs. Wickham, and was glad that her attention was drawn
from her to Robert. He "touched up" the young horses so wildly, that
she declared he should never drive her again, if he did not behave
better. Directly they got home, he told her that he wanted to speak to
her that moment alone; and he poured out his story. Such an old, old
story! So like what her own dead and buried George had told her long,
long ago. _She_ stand in the way of an innocent love, and between two
of the creatures dearest to her on earth! She would be very glad {407}
to have Polly as a daughter--she loved her as one. As to pride and
such nonsense, people who had loved and lost, as she had, knew all its
profound folly. Polly's beauty and goodness might make any husband
proud, any home happy. As to William, there was no injustice done him.
In the first place, she was sure that Polly could never be brought to
think of him as a husband. She looked on him as quite an old man--he
_was_ getting very bald; and in the next place, if he had had any real
love for her, he could not have spoken so coolly and confidently of
winning her. Robert said that the last observation was corroborated by
his own experience, and that his mother was a remarkably sensible
woman. Thereupon she smiled, and kissed and blessed him, and advised
him to go directly and tell the simple truth to the vicar.

Polly, meanwhile, sat alone in her pretty bedroom--her face buried in
her hands, her rich golden hair unbound and falling loosely over her
shoulders, dreading to go down to dinner. Not that she was ashamed of
dear, dear Mrs. Wickham. No; she could throw her arms around her neck
and hide her face there, and make her a confidante without any fear of
being repulsed; but how could she look at Robert, much less speak to
him? and of course the servant would see and understand all about it.
She wished she might stay in her room. If she had but a headache! but
she was really perfectly well; and false excuses she never dreamed of
making. Robert would be talking to her again as he had talked in the
fields. Really, really she did not know what to say to him. Indeed she
had never thought of getting married. She had looked forward to living
between the Grey House and her father's, beloved and welcome in both;
adding to his and Mrs. Wickham's happiness more and more as they grew
older and wanted greater care. Why could not this go on, with only the
difference that Robert should never be displeased with her? That _had_
made her unhappy. She did like him very much; better than any one,
next to her father and Mrs. Wickham; better than good old Aunt Lizzy.
He was very handsome, and sang well, and so attentive to his mother;
and ever since his father's death he had been quite fond of home. How
could he ever have supposed that she preferred any one else? But as to
being his wife--he was a Protestant. How she should feel his never
going to mass with her, his thinking confession useless, his not
believing in the dear Lord in the Blessed Sacrament! She had often
felt it hard that conversation about these things must be avoided in
the dear Grey House, and that her friends there, fond as they were of
her, wished her religion different. If she married Robert, it would be
worse, for she should love him better than any one on earth then; her
anxiety about his salvation would be so great as to make her quite
wretched, and he might not like her to talk to him about it. From her
earliest childhood, she prayed for the conversion of the Wickhams. She
began by saying one Hail Mary daily for the intention; and since she
had been older, she had said many novenas, and offered many communions
for it. She really did not think her father would give his consent;
and Father Armand would at any rate look grave and sad. She had heard
him tell pitiful stories of the unhappiness that had come of mixed
marriages among persons whom he knew. She did feel truly unhappy. She
walked to her window; she could see thence dear venerable Edward's
Hall, and knew exactly where the chapel was. She knelt down, fixing
her eyes there, and her heart on her divine Lord in the tabernacle,
and asked him that, for the love of his blessed mother, he would help
and direct her, and convert her friends.

Robert had not expected to feel it formidable to tell his story to his
cousin, and he was equally grieved and surprised by the way in which
he received it. He changed countenance so that he looked ten years
older; walked rapidly up and down the room; {408} threw himself into a
great chair, and buried his face in his hands; asked Robert to ring;
ordered sherry, and drank several glasses. Robert, utterly mystified,
was trying to say something soothing, when he interrupted him.

"My dear fellow, I'm not simply love-sick; but circumstances, which I
will explain another time, do make this a terrible shock to me. I have
been such a fool! To any one but myself, your falling in love with
Polly would have seemed the most natural thing in the world; but I was
blinded, stultified, as men who have--never mind now--go away--I'm not
fit to talk--I will call or write to you tomorrow. Blame you!
Certainly not. Give my love to your mother and Polly. God bless you
all!"

Next morning early came a note stating that he was going from home for
a few days; and that if he did not return, he would explain himself
fully in the following week.

Worthy of a peerage as Polly Deane seemed to Robert, he could not be
ignorant that to marry him was great promotion for her; and though
delicacy in her regard, and real respect for her father, made him ask
his consent with the utmost deference, he felt that this was a mere
matter of good manners.

Mr. Deane was visibly gratified; said that he could never have
expected a proposal so complimentary to his child, though he might be
pardoned for saying that he thought any one might be proud of her. His
obligations to the Wickham family were of many years' standing; in
fact, he owed everything to Mr. Wickham. He could never, making all
due allowance for Polly's beauty and goodness, express how honored he
felt himself and her on that occasion; but--and he made a long pause
in evident difficulty how to express himself; and Robert was mute with
surprise and alarm.

"But is it possible, Mr. Robert, that Mrs. Wickham and you don't see
one very great objection?"

"In the name of heaven, what is it?" gasped Robert.

"Why, surely, sir, the dear child's religion."

"Now is it possible, Deane, that you think we would ever interfere
with that? Have we ever done so by word, or look, or deed, in all the
years we've known you? Have not you, ever since you came into this
business, been free to observe your holy days in your own way? Have we
not always been ready--even when my mother's spirits were at the
lowest--to spare Polly to go to mass or confession? I am really hurt,
and feel that we don't deserve this?"

"It is all true, Mr. Robert, and the Lord reward you, as he will; but
don't you see it might be different--I don't say that it would; but
I'm bound to do my best for my girl's soul no less than her body--if
she was your wife, and so completely in your power? There's no doubt
that a young man in love will promise anything, and mean to keep his
word too; but ours is a despised religion (God be praised for it!');
it is one among many signs that it is the true one; and you might come
to be ashamed that one so near and dear to you belonged to it, and
that would breed great unhappiness. Then, again, you might have
children, and I should not dare give my consent to their being reared
Protestants. Perhaps, if some ancestor of yours had been firm in such
a case as this, you and yours might be still of the old faith."

"I'm sure, as far as I'm concerned, Deane, I wish we were. No one will
go to heaven, if Polly doesn't; and the religion that would take her
there can't be bad for any one. She might make a Catholic of me."

"God grant it, sir; but don't you see that I must not act on chance?
If the child was breaking her heart for you, and"--smiling--"it's not
come to that yet, I could not let her risk her soul, and perhaps her
children's souls."

"Look here, Mr. Deane: I'm quite ready to give you a written promise
{409} that I will never interfere in any way with Polly's practising
her religion, and that all her children--boys as well as girls--shall
be brought up in it; and I'm sure my mother will make no difficulty."

"You cannot say more, Mr. Robert; but still, if you please, I will
take a week to think the matter over, and talk about it to Father
Armand and Polly, and for that time I think she'd better come home.
She must feel awkward in the same house with you under present
circumstances. Will you give my respects to Mrs. Wickham, and say that
I will call for the child this evening?"

Numerous, and all wide of the truth, were Mrs. Wickham's and Robert's
conjectures respecting the vicar. They began even to consider whether
he had ever shown any symptoms of insanity, and were thankful to know
that it was not hereditary in the family.

The week stipulated for by Mr. Deane passed; and after consulting
Father Armand and Mr. Scharderlowe, he agreed to give his consent to
Polly's marrying Robert at the end of a year, if he were then equally
willing to bind himself by a written promise to respect her faith, and
have his children brought up in it. They said they thought that the
kind, liberal, honorable character of the Wickhams being considered,
and having been proved in all their conduct to the Deanes, and the
difficulty of Catholic marrying Catholic (which was far, _far_ greater
in England then than it is now) being weighed, the case was as hopeful
as a mixed marriage could be.

Robert grumbled about the delay, every one else approved of it. His
mother thought a man young to even at twenty-two; and the time seemed
to Polly none too long for becoming accustomed to new feelings and new
prospects.

Two days after all this was arranged came the vicar's
anxiously-expected letter, dated Scarborough. It said:

  "MY DEAR ROBERT,--The punishment of my youthful sins and follies,
  which has been pursuing me for years, has at last fallen so heavily
  upon me, that I feel inclined to cry out, like Cain, that it is
  greater than I can bear. Try to believe, as you read my humiliating
  confession, that the bitterest portion of my suffering is the fact
  that I have injured my uncle's family; and that I shall regret my
  pangs less if they prove a useful warning to you and your brothers.
  I can hardly remember when I was not in debt. Before I was eight
  years old I owed pence continually for fruits, sweets, toys. I
  suffered torture for fear of detection while these trifles were
  owing, but directly they were paid, I began a fresh score. At school
  I borrowed money of every one who would lend it, and had a bill at
  every shop to which a boy would be attracted. The misery I continued
  to endure while I could not pay was always forgotten directly I had
  paid; and I was in the same difficulty over and over again. I must
  own, moreover, that I was absolutely without excuse. I had as much
  money and indulgence of every kind as any boy of my age and
  position. I went to the university. My allowance was liberal, but my
  debts became tremendous. I gave endless wine-parties; drove to
  London frequently; entered into all its pleasures, made expensive
  presents, bought horses, and betted; and was of course done;
  finally, I got into the hands of Jews. It is singular that my father
  never suspected my delinquencies, and that I was wonderfully helped
  by circumstances. I was young when I succeeded to the living and a
  large amount of ready money. All was swallowed up in the dreadful
  gulf that my unprincipled extravagance had made. Year after year the
  greater portion of my income has gone in payment of exorbitant
  interest. Your dear father's legacy went that way; and my infamous
  creditors, having ascertained that his will placed a great deal in
  my power, threatened me with exposure--which would have {410} been
  fatal to a man in my position--till I had pacified them with
  thousands not my own--with, in fact, a considerable portion of your
  brothers' inheritance.

  "At first I stifled my conscience by representing to myself that
  being released from pressure which had worried me for years, I
  should have a clear head for business; and recover, by judicious
  speculation, the sums that I had appropriated--as I hoped--but for a
  time. I have speculated unfortunately, and made matters infinitely
  worse; for whereas my previous creditors were rapacious rascals to
  whom, in justice, nothing was due, my present ones are the helpless
  children of my warm-hearted, trustful, dead uncle.

  "By this time old Smith is, I suppose, dead, and you are aware of
  his will--as singular as all we know of his life--but he is
  necessary to my story. A day or two before I told you that I thought
  of marrying Polly he sent for me, said that he felt himself
  breaking, and wished me to witness his will, and be aware of its
  purport, that it might not be said, when he was gone, that he had
  acted at the priest's instigation. He said that at that moment no
  one knew he was a Catholic, that he had led a godless life for
  years, but he meant to make his peace with God before he died. He
  had no relations who had any claim on him; he had left £100 to Mr.
  Armand for religious uses, and the rest of his money--nearly
  £20,000--to Polly. I thought the man mad, and humored him. He
  understood me, and said so; told me that existence had ceased to be
  more than endurable when, twenty years ago, he entered Upfield a
  stranger; and that therefore he had confined himself to the
  necessaries of life, and been glad to be believed poor. That he had
  thought of leaving his money to a hospital; but that Polly had
  become so like the only woman he had ever loved--and whom he had
  lost by death--that he had grown to feel very fatherly toward her;
  and his intention to make her his heiress had been decided by a
  little fact very characteristic of Polly. She was walking with your
  mother one very windy day, when he was out for nearly the last time,
  and his hat blew off. He was too infirm to follow it, and every one
  but Polly was too lazy or too much amused to do so. She ran for it,
  and brought it to him with a kindness which seems to have thoroughly
  melted him. If he be still living, this must not be mentioned; but,
  as I said before, I think it is impossible. It is an old saying that
  'drowning men catch at straws.' Oppressed as I was by hopeless
  remorse, I caught at the notion that I would marry Polly. Her
  father, I thought, would be pleased with her elevation. I did not
  anticipate any difficulty in making such a gentle creature love me.
  I intended to do my utmost to make her life happy; and I knew that
  she would give up anything to do good to your family. I calculated
  that, living moderately, my income would be ample, and that I could
  appropriate Polly's fortune to repaying what I had misused, and
  still without wronging her--for that, as my wife, she would have
  advantages far beyond her father's expectations. How all this
  scheming is defeated, you know. The only reparation now in my power,
  I make willingly. Deducting a curate's stipend and eighty pounds a
  year for myself, I will furnish you with full powers to receive the
  residue of my income, and apply it to your brothers' use. I will
  appoint Deane guardian in my stead, and furnish him with all
  necessary documents. If I live--and I pray that I may live for that
  object--your brothers will not suffer ultimately. I have made my
  will, and left them whatever property I may possess when I die. I
  have, you know, expectations from the Heathcotes.

  "There is, I hope, some guarantee for my reform in the willingness
  with which I accept my punishment. I am glad that, with luxurious
  tastes, I must exist on very narrow means for years; {411} that with
  sturdy English prejudices I must live among foreigners. I had not
  courage to make my shameful confession verbally, or to see any of
  you afterward. I cross hence to Hamburg to-morrow. My further course
  is undecided, but I will write to you; and Hangham and Hunt, Fleet
  street, will forward letters to me. Think of all I have lost, of all
  I have suffered secretly, for years, of my dreary prospects, and try
  to be merciful to your miserable cousin,--WILLIAM WICKHAM."

Polly had returned to the Grey House. Mrs. Wickham fretted, and
Robert--to be candid--was disagreeable in her absence. Shy and
conscious though she felt, she was quite willing to go back. Her
father was never at home till the evening--not always then. Aunt
Lizzie wanted no help or cheering up, and Polly's happiness depended
mainly on her being necessary to some one. There is, moreover, no
denying that, differently educated as she had been, her aunt's habits
and notions were not hers; and I could not say positively that she did
not miss Robert, and admit to herself that it was pleasant to expect
him at certain times, and to spend a good deal of time in his society.
When the vicar's letter arrived, she was at the breakfast-table, doing
the duties of president deftly and satisfactorily, as she did
everything--housewifely genius as she was.

"What a long affair!" exclaimed Robert, as he glanced at the letter.
"What can he have to say? I can't wait to read it now; I must be off
to the brewery. Here, my mother, you take it, and tell me all about it
when I come back."

She put it in her pocket, remembering that Polly was concerned in it,
and not liking to read it before her without mentioning its purport.
The thoughtful, methodical damsel soon departed for an hour's duty
among birds and flowers, and then the thunderbolt fell on poor Mrs.
Wickham. Her darling younger sons were not only fatherless, but almost
dependent on their brother. She was no woman of business; but she
guessed that there would not be more than £300 a year to come from the
vicar, when the deductions he mentioned had been made. She could of
course spare £100. What did she want with money? This would meet all
the expenses of education, supposing the vicar lived--and if he died!
In any case there was no capital to start her sons in their
professions; and, unluckily, Alfred, who would want it first, had
never been a favorite of Robert's. His assumption of superiority and
his sarcasm had nettled him extremely; and he dropped expressions
occasionally which showed he had not forgiven him. But Robert would be
very well able to help. Even supposing that--as she hoped he would--
he did marry Polly, and have a family, his brothers would be off his
hands before his children became expensive. If the story about poor
old Mr. Smith proved true, he would be a rich man. Polly would of
course do something handsome for her father and aunt, and yet have a
large fortune. That incident about the hat Mrs. Wickham remembered
perfectly; the poor old man looked enraptured when, lovelier even than
usual, glowing from her running and good-nature, she gave it to him.
It was, however, very wonderful. How much had happened in quiet
Upfield during the last two years! Then she began to pity the vicar
heartily; to make excuses for him, and forgive him. The sacrifices he
made proved the sincerity of his repentance: how miserable he would be
for years, poor and lonely in a foreign land! In those days anywhere
"abroad" seemed to simple inland folk something terrible. He might get
yellow fever, or the plague. She believed them to be imminent anywhere
out of the British Isles. She must talk to Polly, and have her for a
staunch ally before Robert came home. He had not his father's noble
impulsiveness, but he was just and honorable, and she and Polly could
do a great deal with him. Of {412} course she should omit telling her
about the vicar's having thought of marrying her, and the story about
old Smith. One fact would be painful to her; the other might be
untrue.

The two guileless creatures agreed fully that Robert must be worked
upon to forgive his cousin, and do all that was necessary for his
brothers. They were so radiant with hope and charity that their
countenances struck Robert peculiarly when he returned, and he said he
saw plainly that they had good news to tell him. It was an awkward
beginning: his mother feared that the contrary character of her
intelligence would displease him the more, and said timidly, "You had
really better read William's letter yourself, my dear boy; he tells
his story much better than I can."

The rush of events at Upfield seemed, for a few days, overpowering to
those whom it concerned; and those whom it concerned not were very
much excited. There was the vicar gone--no one knew wherefore or
whither, or for how long; and a curate with a wife and seven children
had taken possession of his trim bachelor's hall. Then there was Mr.
Smith, not very old, probably not more than fifty, dead. And he had
turned out to be a rich man! why who could have guessed it? He had
appeared one day at the inn, as suddenly as if he had dropped from the
clouds--had evidently come a long way afoot--had no luggage but a
valise; and was altogether so equivocal-looking that Mr. Mogg, the
veterinary surgeon, would not take him as a lodger without his paying
six months' rent in advance. He had paid his way regularly, certainly;
but no one could have supposed that he had anything to spare. He would
never talk of his affairs except to say that he had out-lived all his
near relations, and been a great deal in foreign parts. People had
suggested that he might be an escaped felon, a man resuscitated after
hanging, a deserter, a Jew. On the strength of the last notion Mr.
Mogg tested him with roast pig; and he liked it.

Then he never went to church. To be sure he was not the only person in
Upfield of whom that might be said; but no one guessed that he was a
papist. They had, at last, no proof that he was; but it was
understood, though not formally acknowledged, that the librarian at
Edward's Hall was a Catholic priest, and that persons of his communion
could and did benefit by his ministrations. Such things were winked
at, in spite of penal enactments, in the case of some Catholics of
high social standing, like Mr. Scharderlowe.

Now this librarian, Mr. Armand, had been sent for by Mr. Smith when he
was taken ill, had visited him frequently, and been with him when he
died. No doubt he was a papist. That might be the reason he left his
money to Polly Deane. Well, well! what luck some people had! Upfield
wouldn't be surprised if Robert Wickham married her; and the
neighborhood supposed it must call upon her, whether he did or not. It
wondered if Mr. and Mrs. Wickham had known all along of Mr. Smith's
intention; it wouldn't be surprised; there was something odd in the
way they had educated the girl, and taken her out of her sphere. But,
after all, Mrs. Pogram said, she mightn't like Robert Wickham; and
with such a fortune as hers, she could afford to please herself. Mrs.
Pogram's own sons were decidedly finer young men, had more dash, and
were in the army--every one knew that girls liked red coats.
Lancaster would be coming home soon, on leave. She would call at once;
let others do as they pleased. Deane was a highly-respectable man, and
no one could be ashamed of his daughter.


A year later there was a large family-gathering at the Grey House at
dinner, and Mrs. Wickham presided. Her grief had settled into a
placid, subdued character, which, with the weeds, gave a kind of
moonlight tone to her appearance, and became her so {413} well that no
one could wish to see her ever otherwise.

Robert and Polly, man and wife, had returned that day from a bridal
excursion to the English lakes. The younger brothers were assembled to
meet them. Aunt Heathcote was there with her ear-trumpet; and
queer-tempered Mrs. Trumball, all smiles. Mr. Deane, of the firm of
Wickham and Deane, urbane in shorts, black-silk stockings, and silver
knee and shoe buckles, was a father of whom the lovely bride felt
proud, as she did too of Aunt Lizzie; who looked as if she had worn
silks and laces, and kept her soft white large hands in mittens all
her life. Deep in every one's heart was the memory of warm-hearted,
generous George Wickham, gone for ever from those whose meeting there,
and in their mutual relations, he would have made more joyous; but no
one named him, for no one could have done it then and there in a voice
which would not have been thick with emotion. Tears must have followed
any mention of him; and who would have caused their flow at such a
happy gathering? Every one knew what every one was feeling and what a
long pause meant, which Robert broke by saying with a sigh, "Well, I
do wish that poor dear William were here; I am so happy that I wish
every one else was; and I hate to think of him, hospitable,
affectionate creature, dragging out his days among fat phlegmatic
Dutch boors, without a single soul to speak to." Polly, at his side,
contrived to give him, under the table, a little squeeze expressive of
the fullest approbation.

"I'm glad you have forgiven him, Bob," said his mother.

"Well, really, mother, it was but natural that I should be savage at
first. Men can't be quite as tender-hearted as women, I suppose; and
they see the consequences of pecuniary frailties more clearly, and
suffer more from them, than they do; but I must be a brute if, happy
as I am, I didn't wish well to everybody, especially to that good
fellow. Now don't cry,  Polly."

Her father observed that there were great excuses for the vicar, and
that every one must admit that he had done his utmost to make
reparation.

"Yes," said Alfred, with mock gravity. It was his delight to puzzle
Aunt Lizzie; she never could make out whether he were joking or
oracular. "I have learned wisdom through the rudiments of a painful
experience; and, steady reformed man of mature years as I find myself,
I pronounce that William might have done much worse."

"Shall I write and urge him to come back?" asked Robert.

"Do! do! do!" resounded in various voices all around the table.

"Very well; I'm more than willing. Polly told me confidentially a few
days ago that she had no turn for extravagance; and I feel so domestic
and moderate, that I fancy we may manage to provide for the fine young
family that William's indiscretions have thrown on our hands, though
he will be able to give less help than if he remained at Rotterdam."

"Mr. Ridlem's stipend would be saved, you know, Bob."

"Not exactly, mother. William couldn't live at home as he lives now;
that would be painful to us and impossible for him."

"True; I forgot that."

"It is difficult for me to put in a word," said Alfred, "because I've
been a great expense to Bob, and he hasn't done with me yet; in fact
I've no right to make a suggestion; but it is my full intention to
reimburse him one of these days. I shouldn't have said so, only the
chance of helping to bring William back--"

"You're a good fellow, Alfred; I believe you; and must confess that I
have found you less trouble than I expected."



The result of the consultation was a letter to the vicar, signed by
every one present, entreating him to return forthwith; a letter over
which he cried like {414} a girl. It brought him back speedily, a
wiser and not a sadder man. He said indeed that, though down among the
dykes, he had never been so happy as since he made all square with his
conscience.

To follow the affairs of Upfield and the Wickhams further would
involve a series of stories. It must suffice to say that Robert's
marriage turned out really well; and that from the day of her
betrothal, the dearest wish of Polly's heart was gratified; for he,
unasked, joined her and the other stragglers who--the laws
notwithstanding--made their way on Sundays and holidays to a
side-entrance in venerable old Edward's Hall, and were admitted to
mass in the little well-loved chapel; Mr. Armand the librarian,
identical with Father Armand the priest, thanking God devoutly for the
addition to the fold.



------

From The Month.


A LOST CHAPTER OF CHURCH HISTORY RECOVERED.

BY JAMES SPENCER NORTHCOTE, D.D.


If we set before a skilful professor of comparative anatomy a few
bones dug out of the bowels of the earth, he will re-construct for us
the whole form of the animal to which they belonged; and it sometimes
happens that these theoretical constructions are singularly justified
by later discoveries. It is the province of an archaeologian to
attempt something of the same kind. A historian transcribes for our
use annals more or less fully composed and faithfully transmitted by
his predecessors. He may have to gather his materials from various
sources; he must distinguish the true from the false; and he gives
shape, consistency, and life to the whole; but, for the most part at
least, he has little to supply that is new from any resources of his
own. The archaeologian, on the contrary, if he be really a man of
learning and science, and not a mere collector of old curiosities,
aims at discovering and restoring annals that are lost, by means of a
careful and intelligent use of every fragment of most heterogeneous
materials that happens to come across him. And there is certainly
nobody in the present age whose talent and industry in this branch of
learning, so far at least as _Christian_ archaeology is concerned, can
at all compare with that of Cavaliere G. B. de Rossi. For more than
twenty years he has devoted himself to the study of the Roman
catacombs, and at length we begin to enter upon the fruit of his
labors. He has just published (by order of the Pope, and at the
expense, we believe, of the Commission of Sacred Archaeology,
instituted by his Holiness in 1851) the first volume of _Roma
Sotteranea_; a magnificent volume, splendidly illustrated, and full of
new and varied information. An abstract of its contents would hardly
be suitable to our pages; but none, we think, can fail to be
interested in what we may venture to call _the first chapter_ of the
History of the Catacombs--a chapter that had certainly never before
been written, even if it had been attempted.

All earlier authors upon subterranean Rome, so far as our experience
goes, whilst describing fully, and it may be illustrating with
considerable learning, the catacombs as they now exist, and all the
monuments they {415} contain, have been content to pass over with a
few words of apology and conjecture the question of their origin and
early history. They have told us that the Jewish residents in Rome had
burial-places of a similar character; and they have shown how natural
and probable it was that the first Roman Christians, unwilling to burn
their dead in pagan fashion, should have imitated the practices of the
ancient people of God. When pressed to explain how so gigantic a work,
as the Roman catacombs undoubtedly are, could have been carried on by
the Christians under the very feet of their bitter persecutors, yet
without their knowledge, they have pointed to the rare instance of a
cemetery entered by a staircase hidden within the recesses of a
sand-pit; they have guessed that here or there some Christian
patrician, some senator or his wife, may have given up a garden or a
vineyard for use as a burial-ground; and then they have passed on to
the much easier task of enumerating the subterranean chapels, tracing
the intricacies of the galleries, or describing the paintings,
sculptures, and inscriptions. The work of De Rossi is of a very
different character. It begins _ab ovo_, and proceeds scientifically.
It shows not only how these wonderful cemeteries _may_ have been made,
but also--as far as is practicable, and a great deal further than
nine-tenths even of the most learned archaeologians ever supposed to
be practicable--how and when each cemetery really _was_ made. From the
few scattered bones, so to speak, which lay buried, and for the most
part _broken_, partly in the depths of the catacombs themselves,
partly in the Acts of the Martyrs, the Liber Pontificalis, and a few
other records of ecclesiastical history, he has reconstructed with
consummate skill the complete skeleton, if we should not rather say
has reproduced the whole body, and set it full of life and vigor
before us. Not that he has indulged in hasty conjectures, or given
unlimited scope to a lively imagination; far from it. On the contrary,
we fear many of his less learned readers will be disposed to find
fault with the slow and deliberate, almost ponderous, method of his
progress, and to grow impatient under the mass of minute criticisms
with which some of his pages are filled, and by which he insists upon
justifying each step that he takes. Indeed, we have some scruple at
presenting our readers with the sum and substance of his argument,
divested of all these _pièces justificatives_, as our neighbors would
call them, lest they should suspect us of inventing rather than
describing. However, we think it is too precious a page of Church
history to be lost, and we therefore proceed to publish it, only
premising that nobody must pretend to judge of its truth merely from
the naked abstract of it which we propose to give, but that all who
are really interested in the study should examine for themselves in
detail the whole mass of evidence by which, in De Rossi's pages, it is
supported, most of which is new, and all newly applied.

To tell our story correctly, it is necessary we should step back into
pagan times, and first take a peep at their laws and usages in the
matter of burials. No classical scholar need be told how strictly
prohibited by old Roman law was all intra-mural interment. Indeed
every traveller knows that all the great roads leading into Rome were
once lined on either side with sepulchral monuments, many of which
still remain; and the letters inscribed upon them tell us how many
feet of frontage, and how many feet at the back (into the field),
belonged to each monument, [IN. FR. P. so many. IN. AG. P. so many.
_In fronte, pedum--. In agro, pedum--_.] M. de Rossi (the brother of
our author) has published a very interesting plan of one of these
monuments with all its dependencies, as represented on an ancient
marble slab dug up on the Via Lavicana. On this slab, not only are the
usual measurements of frontage and depth carefully recorded, but also
the private or public roads which crossed the {416} property, the
gardens and vineyards of which it consisted, the swampy land on which
grew nothing but reeds (it is called _Harundinetum_), and the ditch by
which, on one side at least, it was bounded. Unfortunately the slab is
not perfect, so that we cannot tell the exact measurement of the
whole. Enough, however, remains to show that the property altogether
was not less than twelve Roman _jugera_, or nearly 350,000 square
feet; and other inscriptions are extant, specifying an amount of
property almost equal to this as belonging to a single monument (e.g.
_Huic monumento cedunt agri puri jugera decem_). The necessity for so
large an assignment of property to a single tomb was not so much the
vastness of the mausoleum to be erected, as because certain funeral
rites were to be celebrated there year by year, on the anniversary of
the death, and at other times; sacrifices to be offered, feasts to be
given, etc.; and for these purposes _exedrae_ were provided, or
semi-circular recesses, furnished with sofas and all things necessary
for the convenience of guests. A house also (_custodia_) was often
added, in which a person should always live to look after the
monument, for whose support these gardens, vineyards, or other
hereditaments were set apart as a perpetual endowment. It only remains
to add, that upon all these ancient monuments may be found these
letters, or something equivalent to them, H.M.H.EX.T.N.S. (_Hoc
monumentum haeredes ex testamento ne sequatur_); in other words, "This
tomb and all that belongs to it is sacred; henceforth it can neither
be bought nor sold; it does not descend to my heirs with the rest of
my property; but must ever be retained inviolate for the purpose to
which I have destined it, viz., as a place of sepulchre for myself and
my family," or certain specified members only of the family; or, in
some rare instances, others also external to the family. The same
sacred character which attached to the monuments themselves belonged
also to the _area_ in which they stood, the _hypogeum_ or subterranean
chamber, which not unfrequently was formed beneath them; but it is a
question whether it extended to the houses or other possessions
attached to them.

Nor were these monuments confined to the noblest and wealthiest
citizens. Even in the absence of all direct evidence upon the subject,
we should have found it hard to believe that any but the very meanest
of the slaves were buried (or rather were thrown without any burial at
all) into those open pits (_puticoli_) of which Horace and others have
told us. And in fact, a multitude of testimonies have come down to us
of the existence, both in republican and imperial Rome, of a number of
colleges, as they were called, or corporations (clubs or
confraternities, as we should more probably call them), whose members
were associated, partly in honor of some particular deity, but far
more with a view to mutual assistance for the performance of the just
funeral rites. Inscriptions which are still extant testify to nearly
fourscore of these _collegia_, each consisting of the members of a
different trade or profession. There are the masons and carpenters,
soldiers and sailors, bakers and cooks, corn-merchants and
wine-merchants, hunters and fishermen, goldsmiths and blacksmiths,
dealers in drugs and carders of wool, boatmen and divers, doctors and
bankers, scribes and musicians--in a word, it would be hard to say
what trade or employment is not here represented. Not, however, that
this is the only bond of fellowship upon which such confraternities
were built; sometimes, indeed generally, the members were united, as
we have already said, in the worship of some deity; they were
_cultores Jovis_, or _Herculis_, or _Apollinis et Diana_; sometimes
they merely took the title of some deceased benefactor whose memory
they desired to honor; e. g. _cultores statuarum et clipeorum L.
Abulli Dextri;_ and sometimes the only bond of union seems to have
been service in the same house or family. A long {417} and curious
inscription belonging to one of these colleges, consisting mainly of
slaves, and erected in honor of Diana and Antinous, _and for the
burial of the dead_, in the year 133 of our era, reveals a number of
most interesting particulars as to its internal organization, which
are worth repeating in this place. So much was to be paid at entrance,
and a keg of good wine beside, and then so much a month afterward; for
every member who has regularly paid up his contribution, so much to be
allowed for his funeral, of which a certain proportion to be
distributed amongst those who assist; if a member dies at a distance
of more than twenty miles from Rome, three members are to be sent to
fetch the body, and so much is to be allowed them for travelling
expenses; if the master (of the slave) will not give up the body, he
is nevertheless to receive all the funeral rites; he is to be buried
in effigy; if any of the members, being a slave, receives his freedom,
he owes the college an amphora of good wine; he who is elected
president (_magister_), must inaugurate his accession to office by
giving a supper to all the members; six times a year the members dine
together in honor of Diana, Antinous, and the patron of the college,
and the allowance of bread and of wine on these occasions is
specified; so much to every _mess_ of four; no complaints or disputed
questions may be mooted at these festivals, "to the end that our
feasts may be merry and glad;" finally, whoever wishes to enter this
confraternity is requested to study all the rules first before he
enters, lest he afterward grumble or leave a dispute as a legacy to
his heir.

We are afraid we have gone into the details of this ancient burial
club more than was strictly necessary for our purpose; but we have
been insensibly drawn on by their extremely interesting character,
reminding us (as the Count de Champagny, from whom we have taken them,
most justly remarks) both of the ancient Christian _Agapae_, or
love-feasts, and (we may add) the mediaeval guilds. This, however,
suggests a train of thought which we must not be tempted to pursue. De
Rossi has been more self-denying on the subject; he confines himself
to a brief mention of the existence of the clubs, refers us to other
authors for an account of them, and then calls our attention to this
very singular, and for our purpose most important fact concerning
them: viz., that at a time when institutions of this kind had been
made a cover for political combinations and conspiracies, or at least
when the emperors suspected and feared such an abuse of them, and
therefore rigorously suppressed them, nevertheless an exception was
expressly made in favor of those which consisted of "poorer members of
society, who met together _every month_ to make a small contribution
toward the expenses of their _funeral_;" and then he puts side by side
with this law the words of Tertullian in his _Apology_, written about
the very same time, where he speaks of the Christians contributing
_every month_, or when and as each can and chooses, a certain sum to
be spent on feeding and _burying_ the poor. The identity of language
in the two passages, when thus brought into juxtaposition, is very
striking; and we suppose that most of our readers will now recognize
the bearing of all we have hitherto been saying upon the history of
the Christian catacombs, from which we have seemed to be wandering so,
far.

We have already said that one of the first questions which persons are
inclined to ask when they either visit, or begin to study, the
catacombs, is this: How was so vast a work ever accomplished without
the knowledge and against the will of the local authorities? And we
answer (in part at least), as the Royal Scientific Society _should_
have answered King Charles the Second's famous question about the live
fish and the dead fish in the tub of water, "Are you quite sure of
your facts? Don't call upon us to {418} find the reason of a problem
which, after all, only exists perhaps in your own imagination." And so
in truth it is. The arguments of the Cavaliere de Rossi have satisfied
us that the Christians of the first ages were under no necessity of
having recourse to extraordinary means of secrecy with reference to
the burial of their dead; it was quite possible for them to have
cemeteries on every side of Rome, under the protection of the ordinary
laws and practices of their pagan neighbors.

But is not this to revolutionize the whole history of these wonderful
excavations? We cannot help it, if it be so; it is at least one of
those revolutions which are generally accepted as justifiable, and
certainly are approved in their consequences; for when it is complete,
everything finds its proper place; books and grave-stones, the
cemeteries and their ancient historians, every witness concerned gives
its own independent testimony, all in harmony with one another, and
with the presumed facts of the case. Let us see how the early history
of the catacombs runs, when reconstructed according to this new
theory. The first Christian cemeteries were made in ground given for
that very purpose by some wealthier member of the community, and
secured to it in perpetuity in accordance with the laws of the
country. There was nothing to prevent the erection of a public
monument in the area thus secured, and the excavation of chambers and
galleries beneath. And history tells us of several of the most ancient
catacombs that they had their origin from this very circumstance, that
some pious Christian, generally a Roman matron of noble rank, buried
the relics of some famous martyr on her own property (_in praedio
suo_.)

The oldest memorial we have about the tomb of St. Peter himself is
this, that Anacletus "_memoriam construxit B. Petri_, and places where
the bishops (of Rome) should be buried;" and this language is far more
intelligible and correct, if spoken of some public tomb, than of an
obscure subterranean grave; _memoria_, or _cella memoriae_, being the
classical designation of such tombs. How much more appropriate also
does the language of Caius the presbyter, preserved to us by Eusebius,
now appear, wherein he speaks (in the days of Zephyrinus) of the
_trophies_ of the apostles being _to be seen_ at the Vatican and on
the Ostian way? Tertullian, too, speaks of the bodies of the martyrs
lying in _mausoleums and monuments_, awaiting the general
resurrection. From the same writer we learn that the _areae_ of the
Christian burials were known to and were sacrilegiously attacked by
the enraged heathens in the very first years of the third century; and
quite recently there has reached us from this same writer's country a
most valuable inscription, discovered among the ruins of a Roman
building, not far from the walls of the ancient Caesarea of
Mauritania, which runs in this wise: "Euelpius, a worshipper of the
word (_cultor Verbi_; mark the word, and call to mind the _cultores
Jovis_, etc.), has given this area for sepulchres, and has built a
_cella_ at his own cost. He left this _memoria_ to the holy church.
Hail, brethren: Euelpius, with a pure and simple heart, salutes you,
born of the Holy Spirit." It is true that this inscription, as we now
have it, is not the original stone; it is expressly added at the foot
of the tablet, that _Ecclesia fratrum_ has restored this _titulus_ at
a period subsequent to the persecution during which the original had
been destroyed; but both the sense and the words forbid us to suppose
that any change had been made in the language of the epitaph, to which
we cannot assign a date later than the middle of the third century.
But, finally, and above all, let us descend into the catacombs
themselves, and put them to the question. Michael Stephen de Rossi,
the constant companion of his brother's studies, having invented some
new mechanical contrivance for taking plans of subterranean
excavations,  [Footnote 78] has made exact {419} plans of several
catacombs, not only of each level (or _floor_, so to speak) within
itself, but also in its relations to the superficial soil, and in the
relations of the several floors one with another. A specimen of these
is set before us by means of different colors or tints, representing
the galleries of the different levels, in the map of the cemetery of
St. Callixtus, which accompanies this volume; and a careful study of
this map is sufficient to demonstrate that the vast net-work of paths
in this famous cemetery originally consisted of several smaller
cemeteries, confined each within strict and narrow limits, and that
they were only united at some later, though still very ancient period.
For it cannot have been without reason that the subterranean galleries
should have doubled and re-doubled upon themselves within the limits
of a certain well-defined area; that they should never have
overstepped a certain boundary-line in this or that direction, though
the nature of the soil and every other consideration would have seemed
to invite them to proceed; that they should have been suddenly
interrupted by a flight of steps, penetrating more deeply into the
bowels of the earth, and there been reproduced exactly upon the same
scale and within the same limits. These facts can only be fully
appreciated by an actual examination of the map, where they speak for
themselves; but even those who have not this advantage will scarcely
call in question the conclusion that is drawn from them, when they
call to mind how exactly it coincides with all the ancient testimonies
we have already adduced on the subject, and when they learn the
singular and most interesting fact, that the Cav. de Rossi has been
able in more than one instance, by means of the sepulchral
inscriptions, to identify the noble family by whom the site of the
cemetery was originally granted.

  [Footnote 78: It was highly commended and received a prize at the
  International Exhibition of 1862.]

It will be of course understood that we have been speaking of the
earliest ages of the Church's history, and that we are far from
denying that there were other periods during which secrecy was an
essential condition of the Christian cemeteries; on the contrary, did
our space allow, we could show what parts of the catacombs belonged to
the one period, and what to the other, and what are the essential
characteristics of each. We might unfold also, with considerable
minuteness, the _economy_ of these cemeteries, even during the ages of
persecution; under whose management they were administered, whether
they were parochial or otherwise, together with many other highly
interesting particulars. But we have already exceeded the limits
assigned us, and we hope that those of our readers who wish to know
more on the subject will take care to possess themselves of the book
from which we have drawn our information, that so funds may not be
wanting for the completion of so useful a work. Nothing but a
deficiency of funds, in the present condition of the pontifical
treasury, hinders the immediate issue of other volumes of this and its
kindred work, the _Inscriptiones Christianae,_ by the same author. He
announces his intention to bring out the volumes of _Roma Sotterranea_
and of the _Inscriptions_ alternately, for they mutually explain and
illustrate one another, and are in fact parts of the same whole; and
the public has been long impatient for the volume which is promised
next, viz., the ancient inscriptions which illustrate Christian dogma.

------

{420}


MISCELLANY.


ART.

_Domestic._--The fortieth annual exhibition of the National Academy of
Design was opened to the public on the evening of April 27th, under
circumstances which may well mark an era in the history of that
institution. After drifting from place to place through forty long
years, now deficient in funds, and now in danger of losing public
sympathy or support, sometimes unable to carry out its specific
purposes, and almost always cramped for space, or otherwise perplexed
in the details of its public exhibitions, the Academy, like Noah's
ark, long buffetted by waves and driven by tempests, finds a resting
place, not on Mount Ararat, but at the corner of Fourth avenue and
Twenty-third street. And as the "world's gray fathers," after their
troubled voyage, regarded with infinite satisfaction _terra firma_ and
the blue sky, so doubtless the older of the academicians, those who
have accompanied the institution in all its wanderings, are doubtless
both pleased and amazed to find themselves arrived at a goodly haven
with secure anchorage. To drop the figure, the Academy is now
permanently established in an attractive and convenient building, well
situated in a central locality, and bids fair to enter upon a career
of usefulness far beyond the results of its previous experience.

The new building has been for so long a time completed externally,
that its merits have been canvassed with every shade of opinion, from
enthusiastic commendation to quite as decided disapprobation. The
majority of critics, having their reputation at stake, are afraid to
hazard an opinion, and prudently remain neutral, until some
authoritative decision shall be made. As an architectural effort it
may be called an experiment, on which account it presents perhaps as
many claims to critical notice as the works of art which adorn its
walls. The style, singularly enough, is assigned to no special era or
country, but is described to be of "that revived Gothic, now the
dominant style in England, which combines those features of the
different schools of architecture of the Middle Ages which are most
appropriate to our nineteenth-century buildings," which means probably
that the building is of an eclectic Gothic pattern. All modern styles
since the renaissance may be said to be eclectic, whether founded on
antique or mediaeval models, and the building in question differs from
other Gothic edifices, of more familiar aspect to us, chiefly in form,
external decoration, and the arrangement of its component parts. In
the American mind Gothic architecture is associated chiefly with
ecclesiastical structures and is popularly supposed to be subject to
no fixed laws, beyond an adherence to the irregular and picturesque.
Given a cruciform ground-plan, a pointed spire, steep roof, narrow
arched windows, buttresses, and pinnacles _ad libitum_, and you have
as good a Gothic building as the public taste can appreciate. Here,
however, is a nearly square building, covering an area of eighty by
about a hundred feet, which is neither a church nor a college, and is
without steep roof, spire, buttresses, or pinnacles. The public
evidently do not fathom the mystery at present, and those whose praise
of the new Academy borders on the extravagant, are perhaps as much
astray in their adherence to the _omne ignotum pro magnifico_
principle as those wiseacres who tell you knowingly that the architect
has tried to palm off upon us a palpable imitation of the doge's
palace in Venice. If the latter class of critics will refresh their
memory a little, or consult any good print of Venetian architecture,
they will find about as much resemblance between the two buildings as
exists between the old Custom House in Wall street and the Parthenon.
The plain fact is that we are so unused to Gothic architecture,
applied to secular purposes, and to any other forms of it than the
ecclesiastical, as to be without sufficient data to form a correct
idea of the present edifice. And yet, such is the conceit of
criticism, that thousands of persons pronounce their judgment upon it
with as much confidence as they would upon a trivial matter perfectly
{421} familiar to them. These may yet find that hasty opinions are
dangerous.

The Academy, as has been hinted above, is of rectangular shape, having
three stories, of which the first is devoted to the life school and
the school of design, the second to the library, reception rooms,
council room, and similar apartments, and the third to the exhibition
galleries, five in number, with which at present we have specially to
deal. The main entrance to the building is on Twenty-third street.
Passing up a double flight of marble steps and through a magnificent
Gothic portal into a vestibule, the visitor next enters the great
hall, in the centre of which commences a broad stairway, consisting at
first of a double flight of steps, and ultimately of a single flight,
leading to the level of the exhibition floor. Running all around the
open space on this story caused by the stairway is a corridor, two
sides of which, parallel with the stairway, comprise a double arcade,
supported on columns of variegated and polished marble, the capitals
of which, of white marble, are hereafter to be sculptured in delicate
leaf-and-flower work from nature. Opening from this corridor are the
exhibition rooms, which also communicate with each other, and of which
the largest is thirty by seventy-six feet, and the smallest, used as a
gallery of sculpture, is twenty-one feet square. These are all lighted
by sky-lights, and are intended for the purposes of the annual
exhibitions. In the corridor surrounding the stairway are to be hung
the works of art belonging to the Academy, although at present its
walls are covered with pictures contributed to this year's exhibition.
The several rooms described are well-lighted, and though smaller
perhaps than the large outlay upon the building might have led the
public to expect, seem excellently adapted for their purposes. The
largest of them is a model exhibition gallery in respect to
proportions and light, and all are tastefully finished and pannelled
with walnut from floor to ceiling. Throughout the building the same
costly and durable style prevails, the wood-work being of oak and
walnut, and the vestibules floored with mosaic of tiles.

So much for the interior, against which no serious complaint has been
uttered. Externally the walls of the basement story are of gray marble
relieved by bands of graywacke, those of the story above of white
marble with similar bands, while the uppermost story is of white
marble with checker-work pattern of oblong gray blocks, laid
stair-fashion. The whole is surmounted by a rich arcaded cornice of
white marble. The double flight of white marble steps on Twenty-third
street, leading to the main entrance, is, perhaps, the most marked
feature of the building, at once graceful, rich, and substantial, and
may fairly challenge comparison with any similar structure of like
pattern in the country. Under the platform is a triple arcade,
inclosing a drinking-fountain, and profusely decorated with sculpture,
and from the upper landing springs the great arched Gothic portal,
large enough almost for the entrance to a cathedral. On either side of
this are two columns of red Vermont marble with white marble capitals
and bases, on which rests a broad archivolt enriched with sculpture
and varied by voussoirs, alternately white and gray. The tympanum
above the door is to be filled with an elaborate mosaic of colored
tile work. The basement windows, on Fourth avenue, are double, with
segmental arches, each pair of which is supported in the middle on a
clustered column with rich carved capital and base. All the other
windows in the building have pointed arches, and the archivolts of
those in the first story are decorated like that of the doorway. In
the place of windows on the gallery floor are circular openings for
ventilation, filled with elaborate tracery. The building was designed
by Mr. P. B. Wight, and erected at a cost of over two hundred thousand
dollars.

Without attempting to inquire whether this or that portion of the
building is correctly designed, or even whether the whole is entirely
satisfactory, or the reverse, we may say that in the opinion of most
persons the external flight of steps and the entrance are too large
and elaborate for the building, reminding one of those remarkable
edifices for banking or other public purposes occasionally to be seen
in this city, which are all portico, as if the main structure had
walked away, or had not been considered of sufficient importance to be
added to the entrance. It is partly owing to this defect, and partly
to the insufficient area on which it is built, {422} that the Academy
seems wanting in height and depth, and therefore devoid of just
proportions--has in fact an unmistakable _dumpy look_. Many an
architect before Mr. Wight has been prevented by want of space from
effectively developing ideas intrinsically good, and perhaps the
severest criticism that can be pronounced against him in the present
instance is that ambition has led him to attempt what his better
judgment might have taught him was impossible. "Cut your coat
according to your cloth," is a maxim of which the applicability is not
yet exhausted. Again, the obtrusive ugliness of the skylights, rising
clear above the sculptured cornices, can hardly fail to offend the
eye, and suggests the idea of an encumbered or even an overloaded
roof. If to these defects be added the curious optical delusion by
which the gray marble checker-work on the upper story appears uneven
and awry, and which denotes a radical error in design, we believe we
have mentioned the chief features of the building which even those who
profess to admire it unite in condemning. The objection that the
building is of unusual form and appearance, and out of keeping with
the styles of architecture in vogue with us, is not worthy of serious
consideration.

Having said so much in depreciation of the Academy, we must also say
that it conveys on the whole an elegant, artistic, and even cheerful
impression to the mind, relieving, with its beautiful contrasts of
white and gray and slate, the sombre blocks of red or brown buildings
which surround it, and actually lightening up the rather prosaic
quarter in which it stands. Too much praise cannot be accorded to the
architect for the combinations of color which he has infused into his
design; and, granting that in this respect he has committed some
errors of detail, they are trifling in comparison with the good
effects which will probably result from the future employment of this
means of embellishment. What if the idea, imperfectly embodied in this
experimental building, should in the end compass the overthrow of that
taste which leads us to build gloomy piles of brown houses, overlaid
with tawdry ornamentation, and pronounce them beautiful? When such an
innovation is attempted and finds even a moderate degree of favor,
there is hope that the era of architectural coldness and poverty may
yet pass away. The carving profusely distributed on both the exterior
and interior of the building, and of which, we are told, "the flowers
and leaves of our woods have furnished the models," is for the most
part exquisite in design and execution. Here, at least, is
naturalistic art, against which the sticklers for idealism can offer
no objection, so beautiful and appropriate are the designs, and so
suggestive of the necessity of going back to nature for inspiration.
If the new Academy possessed no other merit than this, it would
nevertheless subserve a useful purpose in the development of taste.

Having devoted so much space to the building, we can only allude
generally to the contents of its galleries, of which we propose to
speak more at length in a future notice. The exhibition, though
inferior to those of some years in the number, exceeds them all in the
quality of its pictures, and presents on the whole a creditable and
encouraging view of the progress of American art. If the capacity of
the galleries is not so great as was expected, there is on the other
hand less danger that the eye will be offended by a long array of
unsightly works, and we may probably bid good-bye to the monstrosities
of composition and color which the Academy was formerly compelled to
receive, in order to eke out its annual exhibitions. Such has been the
increase in the number of our resident artists of late years, that but
a limited number of pictures, and those consequently their best
efforts, can henceforth be contributed by each. This fact alone will
ensure a constantly increasing improvement to succeeding exhibitions.
As usual, landscape predominates, with every variety of treatment and
motive, from Academic generalization and pure naturalism down to
Pre-Raphaelitism and hopeful though somewhat imperfect attempts at
ideal sentiment. Portraiture and genre are also well represented, with
a fair proportion of animal, flower, and still-life pieces, and of the
numerous family of miscellaneous subjects which defy classification.
History is even less affected than usual, the dramatic episodes of the
great rebellion failing to suggest subjects to our painters other than
those of an indirect or merely probable character. So far as the
present exhibition may be supposed to afford an {423} indication,
"high art," and particularly that branch of it which illustrates
sacred history, is defunct among--us a circumstance which those who
have witnessed previous efforts by contemporary American painters in
that department will not perhaps regret. The pictures are generally
hung with judgment, and in a spirit of fairness which ought to
satisfy, though it will not probably in every instance, the demands of
exhibitors. And it may be added that they appear to good effect, and
are daily admired, using the word in its derived as well as its more
common sense, by throngs of visitors.



Church, the landscape painter, has recently gone to the West Indies,
with the intention of passing the summer in the mountain region of
Jamaica, where he will doubtless find abundant materials for study. He
leaves behind a large unfinished work of great promise, "The Rainbow
in the Tropics," and some completed ones of less dimensions.

Augero, an Italian artist, has recently completed for a church in
Boston a picture of St. Andrew bearing the cross, of which a
contemporary says: "Mr. Augero has departed from the traditional types
that have descended to him, and has treated the picture in a manner
entirely his own. The head of the saint is finely handled, and,
without being too much spiritualized, has sufficient of the ideal to
give it value both as a church picture and a work of art. In general
arrangement and color the work is especially to be admired." This
artist is said to have received quite a number of commissions for
ecclesiastical decoration.

Palmer is completing a bust of Washington Irving, which has been
pronounced by the friends of the latter a successful likeness.

An essay on Gustave Doré, by B. P. G. Hamilton, will soon be published
by Leypoldt of Philadelphia.

The spring exhibition of the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts is now
open in Philadelphia. The collections are said to be large and to
represent all departments of painting.



_Foreign_.--The Exhibition of the Society of British Artists and the
General Exhibition of Water Color Drawings opened in London in the
latter part of April. The former contains more than a thousand
pictures, few of which, it is said, rise above the most common average
of picture-making, while the greater part fall below it. "There is
something very depressing," says the _Reader_, "about such a large
display of commonplace art. It is almost painful to have the fact
forced upon one's mind, that the thought and labor represented in all
these pictures is misapplied, if not wasted; for to this conclusion we
must come, if we bring the display in Suffolk street to the test of
comparison with any real work of art. A fine picture by Landseer or
Millais would outweigh, in intrinsic value, the whole collection.
Denude the Royal Academy exhibition of the works of Landseer, Millais,
Philip, and other of its most accomplished contributors, and subtract
from it at the same time the works of promise which lend to it so
great an interest, and we should have a second Suffolk street
exhibition, characterized by a similar dead level of mediocrity and
insipidity; for neither highly accomplished work nor sign of promise
is to be seen in this the forty-second annual exhibition of the
Society of British Artists." From which it would appear that
contemporary art in England gives no remarkable promise.

A large collection of the late John Leech's sketches, etc., was lately
sold in London. It comprised the original designs for the political
cartoons and pictures of life and character which have appeared in
Punch during the last twenty years; the designs for the "Ingoldsby
Legends," "Jorrock's Hunt," "Ask Mamma," "Mr. Facey Romford's Hounds,"
and other sporting novels, and several pictures in oil. The prices ran
very high, the net result being £4,089.

The collection of paintings and water color drawings by the best
modern British artists, formed by Mr. John Knowles, of Manchester, was
recently disposed of in London at very handsome prices. The chief
attraction was Rosa Bonheur's "Muleteers Crossing the Pyrenees," which
brought 2,000 guineas. The collection realized £21,750.

Preparations are making to remove the cartoons of Raphael from Hampton
Court to the new north fire-proof gallery in the South Kensington
Museum, formerly occupied by the British pictures of the National
Gallery.

The Great Pourtalès sale has closed {424} after lasting upward of a
month and realizing a sum total of nearly three millions of francs. A
Paris paper states that, considering the interest of the sums expended
in forming the collection as money lost, the sale will give a profit
on the outlay of a million and a half of francs, or about a hundred
per cent.--a notable illustration of the mania for picture buying now
prevailing in Europe. The owner died ten years ago, leaving directions
that the collection should not be sold until 1864, for which his heirs
and representatives are doubtless properly grateful. The following
will give an idea of the prices fetched by the best pictures:
Campagne, Ph. de: The Marriage of the Virgin, formerly the altar-piece
of the chapel of the Palais Royal, sold for 43,500f. Hals, Francis: An
unknown portrait of a man; his left hand leaning on his hip and
touching the handle of his sword, 51,000f. Rembrandt: Portrait of a
Burgomaster, 34,500f. By the same: Portrait of a veteran soldier
seated at a table, 27,000f. Murillo: The Triumph of the Eucharist;
with the words _"In finem dilexit eos,"_ 67,500f.; bought for the
Louvre. By the same: The Virgin bending over the infant Christ, whom
she presses to her bosom, 18,000f. By the same: St. Joseph holding the
infant Christ by the hand, 15,000f. Velasquez: The Orlando Muerto, a
bare-headed warrior, in a black cuirass, lying dead in a grotto strewn
with human bones, his right hand on his breast, his left on the guard
of his sword; from the roof of the grotto hangs a lamp, in which the
flame is flickering, 37,000f. Albert Durer: A pen drawing,
representing Samson, of colossal size, routing the Philistines with
the jaw-bone of an ass, 4,500f. A portrait by Antonelli di Messina,
bought years ago in Florence by Pourtalès for 1,500f., and appraised
in his inventory at 20,000f., was sold to the Louvre, where it now
hangs in the _salon carré_, for 113,000f.

Gustave Doré is announced to have undertaken to illustrate Shakespeare
and the Bible.

The sale of the Due de Moray's gallery of paintings will take place in
June. It contains six Meissoniers, which cost, at the utmost, not
above 60,000 francs, but which will now probably fetch more than
double that price.

A picture by Ribera, representing St. Luke taking the likeness of the
Virgin, was sold recently in Paris for 21,000f.

French landscape art has lost one of its chief illustrators in the
person of Constant Troyon, who died in the latter part of March, aged
about fifty-two. He has been called the creator of the modern French
school of landscape, and delighted in cheerful aspects of nature,
which he rendered with masterly skill. Rural life, with its pleasing
accessories of winding streams, picturesque low banks, groups of
cattle, and shady hamlets, formed the favorite subjects of his pencil;
and though his style was not always exact, he succeeded in infusing an
unusual degree of physical life into his pictures, without ever
degenerating into mere naturalism. As a colorist he excelled all
contemporary animal and landscape painters, and used his brush with a
freedom rivalling that of Delacroix. He died insane, and is said to
have left a fortune of 1,200,000 francs. Some of his pictures are
owned in New York.

A painting by Murillo, from the collection of the late Marquis Aguado,
representing the death of Santa Clara, has been sold to the Royal
Gallery of Madrid for 75,000 francs.


----

{425}


NEW PUBLICATIONS.


THE CORRELATION AND CONSERVATION OF FORCES:
A SERIES OF EXPOSITIONS,
by Prof. Grove, Prof. Helmholtz, Dr. Mayer, Dr. Faraday, Prof. Liebig,
and Dr. Carpenter. With an Introduction and brief Biographical Notices
of the chief Promoters of the new views. By Edward L. Youmans, M.D.
12mo., pp. xlii., 438. New York: D. Appleton & Company.

Religious writers have repeatedly deplored the materialistic tendency
of modern scientific research, and in many cases, no doubt, the
complaint is a just one. But we must not forget that the bad tendency
is in the philosophical system which is sought to be built upon the
facts of discovery, not in the facts themselves. Every development, of
truth, every fresh unveiling of the mechanism of the universe, must of
necessity redound to the greater glory of God. And it seems to us that
no scientific theory which has been broached for many years speaks
more gloriously of the disposing and over-ruling hand of an all-wise
Creator than the one to which the volume now before us is devoted. If
there could be any place for comparison in speaking of the exercise of
omnipotence, we might say that the new view of the nature and mode of
action of the physical forces represents creation as a far more
marvellous act than the old one did.

We speak of the correlation and conservation of force as a "new"
theory because it is only lately that it has attracted much attention
beyond the higher scientific circles, and indeed it would perhaps be
going too far to say that it is yet firmly established. It has been
developing however for a number of years, and the most distinguished
experts in physical science have for some time accepted it with
remarkable unanimity. In the book whose title we have given above, Dr.
Yournans has brought together eight of the most valuable essays in
which the theory has been maintained or explained by its founders and
chief supporters. He has made his selection with excellent judgment,
and prefixed to the whole a clear and well-written introduction, by
the aid of which any reader of ordinary education will be able to
appreciate what follows. The longest and most important essay is that
by Professor Grove on "The Correlation of Physical Forces."

Force is defined by Professor Grove as that active principle
inseparable from matter which induces its various changes. In other
words, it is the agent or producer of change or motion. The
modifications of this general agent--heat, light, electricity,
magnetism, chemical affinity, gravity, cohesive attraction, etc.--are
called the physical forces. In many cases, where one of these is
excited all the others are set in motion: thus when sulphuret of
antimony is _electrified_, at the moment of electrization it becomes
_magnetic_; at the same time it is _heated_; if the heat is raised to
a certain intensity, _light_ is produced; the compound is decomposed,
and _chemical action_ is thereby brought into play; and so on.
Moreover, we cannot magnetize a body without electrizing it, and
vice-versa. This necessary reciprocal production is what is understood
by the term "correlation of forces"--or in other words, we may say
that any one of the natural forces may be converted into another mode
of force, and may be reproduced by the same force. A striking example
of the conversion of heat into electricity is furnished by an
experiment of Seebeck's. Two dissimilar metals are brought together
and heated at the point of contact. A current of electricity flows
through the metals, having a definite direction according to the
metals employed; continues as long as an increasing temperature is
pervading the metals; ceases when the temperature is stationary; and
flows backward when the heat begins to decrease. The immediate
convertibility of heat into light is not yet established beyond
question, although these two forces exhibit many curious analogies
with each other. But heat through the medium of electricity may easily
be turned into light, chemical affinity, magnetism, etc. Electricity
directly produces heat, as in the ignited wire, the electric spark,
and the {426} voltaic arc. The last-named phenomenon--the flame which
plays between the terminal points of a powerful voltaic battery
produces the most intense heat with which we are acquainted; so
intense, in fact, that it cannot be measured, as every sort of matter
is dissipated by it. For instance, it actually _distils_ or
volatilizes iron, a metal which by ordinary means is fusible only at a
very high temperature. The voltaic arc also produces the most intense
light that we know of. Instances of the conversion of electricity into
magnetism and chemical action are familiar to everybody. The
reciprocal relations of light with other modes of force are thus far
very imperfectly known. Professor Grove however describes an
experiment by which light is made to produce simultaneously chemical
action, electricity, magnetism, heat, and motion. The conversion of
light into chemical force in photography is another exemplification of
the law of correlation, and Bunsen and Roscoe have experimentally
shown that certain rays of light are extinguished or absorbed in doing
chemical work. A familiar example of the change of light into heat is
seen in the phenomena of what is termed the absorption of light. Place
different colored pieces of cloth on snow exposed to sunshine: black
will absorb the most light, and will also develop the most heat, as
may be seen by its sinking deepest in the snow; white, which absorbs
little or no light, will not sink at all.

The evolution of one force or mode of force into another has naturally
induced many to regard all the different natural agencies as reducible
to unity, and much ingenuity has been expended on the question which
force is the efficient cause of all the others. One says electricity,
another chemical action, another gravity. Professor Grove believes
that all are wrong: each mode of force may produce the others, and
none can be produced except by some other as an anterior force. We can
no more determine which is the efficient cause than we can determine
whether the chicken is the cause of the egg, or the egg the cause of
the chicken. The tendency of recent researches however is toward the
conclusion that all the physical forces are simply modes of motion;
that as, in the case of friction, the gross or palpable motion which
is arrested by the contact of another body, is subdivided into
molecular motions or vibrations (or as Helmholtz expresses it,
peculiar shivering motions of the ultimate particles of bodies), which
motions are only heat or electricity, as the case may be; so the other
affections are only matter moved or molecularly agitated in certain
definite directions. The identity of motion with heat was established
in the last century by our countryman, Count Rumford, and has lately
been beautifully illustrated by Professor Tyndall in his charming
lectures on "Heat considered as a Mode of Motion." Dr. Mayer, of
Heilbronn, and Mr. Joule, of Manchester, independently of each other,
established the exact ratio between heat and motive power, showing
that a quantity of heat sufficient to raise one pound of water one
degree Fahrenheit in temperature is able to raise to the height of one
foot a weight of 772 pounds; and conversely, that a weight of 772
pounds falling from a height of one foot evolves enough heat to raise
the temperature of a pound of water one degree. That is, this quantity
of force, expressed as 772 "foot-pounds," is to be regarded as the
mechanical equivalent of 1° of temperature. Professor Grove considers
at some length the identity of motion with other forms of force,
especially electricity and magnetism, and alludes briefly to the
inevitable consequence of this theory, that the different forces must
bear an exact _quantitative_ relation to each other. "The great
problem which remains to be solved," he says, "in regard to the
correlation of physical forces, is this establishment of their
equivalents of power, or their measurable relation to a given
standard."

The doctrine of the conservation or persistence of force seems to flow
naturally from what has been said above. It means simply that force is
never destroyed: when it ceases to exist in one form it only passes
into another. Power or energy, like matter, is neither created nor
annihilated: "Though ever changing form, its total quantity in the
universe remains constant and unalterable. Every manifestation of
force must have come from a pre-existing equivalent force, and must
give rise to a subsequent and equal amount of some other force. When,
therefore, a force or effect appears, we are not at liberty to assume
that it was self-originated, or {427} came from nothing; when it
disappears we are forbidden to conclude that it is annihilated: we
must search and find whence it came and whither it has gone; that is,
what produced it, and what effect it has itself produced."
(_Introduction_, p. xiii.) This branch of the subject will be found
clearly and concisely treated in Professor Faraday's paper on "The
Conservation of Force" (pp. 359-383).

Dr. Carpenter carries the new theory into the higher realms of nature,
and shows the applicability of the principle of correlation and
conservation to the vital phenomena of growth and development. "These
forces," he says, "are generated in living bodies by the
transformation of the light, heat, and chemical action supplied by the
world around, and are given back to it again, either during their
life, or after its cessation, chiefly in motion and heat, but also, to
a less degree, in light and electricity." Vital force is that power by
virtue of which a germ endowed with life is developed into an
organization of a type resembling that of its parents, and which
subsequently maintains that organism in its integrity. The prevalent
opinion until lately has been that this force is inherent in the germ,
which has been supposed to derive from its parent not merely its
material substance, but a _germ-force_, in virtue of which it develops
and maintains itself, beside imparting a fraction of the same force to
each of its descendants. In this view of the question, the aggregate
of all the germ-forces appertaining to the descendants, however
numerous, of a common parentage, must have existed in the original
progenitors. Take the case of the successive viviparous broods of
_Aphides_, which (it has been calculated) would amount in the tenth
brood to the bulk of _five hundred millions_ of stout men: a
germ-force capable of organizing this vast mass of living structure
must have been shut up in the single individual, weighing perhaps the
1-1000th of a grain, from which the first brood was evolved! So, too,
in Adam must have been concentrated the germ-force of every individual
of the human race, from the creation to the end of the world. This,
says Dr. Carpenter, is a complete _reductio ad absurdum_. According to
his theory, the germ supplies not the force, but the directive agency.
The vital force of an animal or a plant is supplied by the same
physical agencies which we have considered above.

Dr. Youmans in his introduction is disposed to push this part of the
subject yet further, and to identify physical with intellectual force;
but into this dangerous region it is unnecessary to follow him.

Some of the explanations of natural phenomena which are drawn as
corollaries from the new theory of forces are in the highest degree
curious and beautiful. Many of our readers will find Dr. Mayer's paper
"On Celestial Dynamics" one of the most interesting portions of the
book. He applies the principle of the convertibility of heat and
motion to the question of the origin of the sun's heat, which he
ascribes to the fall of asteroids upon the sun's surface. That an
immense number of cosmical bodies are moving through the heavens and
streaming toward the solar surface, is well known to all physicists.
Now it is calculated that a single asteroid falling into the sun
generates from 4,600 to 9,200 times as much heat as would be generated
by the combustion of an equal mass of coal, and the mass of matter
which in the form of asteroids falls into the sun every minute is from
two to four hundred thousand billions of pounds! The enormous heat
which must be evolved by such a bombardment is almost inconceivable.



REAL AND IDEAL. By John W. Montclair. 12mo., pp. 119. Philadelphia:
Frederick Leypoldt. New York: Hurd & Houghton.

This is a dainty little volume of poems, partly translated from the
German, partly the offspring of the native muse. They are simple,
unpretending, and as a general thing melodious. The author probably
has not aspired to a very high place in the temple of fame; without
the ambition to produce anything very striking or very original, he
has been satisfied with the endeavor which he pithily expresses in his
"Prologue:"

  "Clearer to think what others thought before--
  Keenly to feel th' afflictions of our race--
  Better to say what others oft have said--"

and if he does not always think clearer and speak better than those in
whose footsteps he treads, there is at all events that in his verse
which promises better {428} things after more practice. His faults are
chiefly those of carelessness and inexperience. His metaphors are
superabundant, and sometimes incongruous. He has a good ear for
rhythm; but we often find him tripping in his prosody. Often too the
requirements of the metre lead him to eke out a line with expletives,
or weaken it with unnecessary epithets.

But we can commend the book for its healthy tone. Mr. Montclair has no
tendency toward the morbid psychological school of poetry. He delights
rather in the contemplation of nature, and in moralizing on the life
and aspirations of man. In neither does he discover much that is new;
but the natural beauties which he sings are those of which we do not
easily tire, and his moral reflections are just though they may not be
profound. For the matter of his translations he has chosen some of the
simplest and shortest of the German legendary ballads. Several of them
are rendered with considerable neatness and delicacy. The following
version of a ballad to which attention has been particularly called of
late, is a favorable specimen of Mr. Montclair's powers:


    "LENORE.

  "Above the stars are twinkling--
  The moon is shining bright--
  And the dead they ride by night.

  "'My love, wilt ope thy window?
  I cannot long remain,
  And may not come again.

  "'The cock already crows--
  Tells of the dawning day,
  And warns me far away.

  "'My journey distant lies;
  Afar with thee, my bride,
  A hundred leagues we'll ride.

  "'In Hungary's fair land
  I've found a tranquil spot,
  A little garden plot.

  "'And there, within the green,
  A little cottage rests,
  Befitting bridal guests.'

  "'Oh, thou hast lingered long;
  Beloved, welcome here--
  Lead on, I'll never fear.'

  "'So, wrap my mantle 'round;
  The moon will be our guide,
  And quick by night we'll ride.'

  "'When will our journey end?
  For heavy grows my sight,
  And lonely is the night.'

  "'Yon gate leads to our home:
  Our bridal tour is done--
  My purpose now is won.

  "'Dismount we from our steed;
  Here lay thy aching head--
  This tomb's our bridal bed.

  "'Now art thou truly mine:
  I rode away thy breath--
  Thou art the bride of death!'"


FAITH, THE VICTORY; ON A COMPREHENSIVE VIEW OF
THE PRINCIPAL DOCTRINES OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION.
By Rt. Rev. John McGill, D.D.,
Bishop of Richmond. 12mo., pp. viii.,
336. Richmond: J. W. Randolph.

This work is a curiosity as a specimen of the literature of the late
"Confederate States of America," and of course its typography and
general execution are plain and unpretending. The work itself is the
production of a prelate of high character and reputation for his
thorough theological erudition and ability as a writer, and as a clear
logical expounder of Catholic doctrine. It is written in a very
systematic and exact manner; the style is terse, the treatment of
topics brief but comprehensive; and yet, so lucid are the statements
and so simple the language, that it is throughout intelligible to the
ordinary reader, and in great part so to any one of good common sense
who can read English and is able to understand a plain, simple
treatise on religious doctrine. It may be characterized as an
elementary treatise on theology for the laity, and as such is adapted
to be very useful to Catholics, and also to those non-Catholics who
retain the doctrine of the old orthodox Protestant tradition. The
right reverend author is throughout careful to discriminate between
the defined doctrine of the Church and the teaching of theologians,
and is extremely cautious in expounding his opinion on those topics
which are controverted between the different schools. The authority of
the Catholic Church is established by the usual plain and irresistible
deductions from the premises admitted by those who fully accept
Christianity as a divine revelation and the Scripture as the
infallible word of God. The dogmas of the {429} Catholic faith are
stated in the plain ordinary language of the Church, with some account
of the principal methods of explaining difficulties in vogue among
theologians, and with proofs derived from Scriptures and tradition.
The stress of the entire argument rests principally on the evidence
that the Catholic dogmas have been revealed by God and clearly deduced
by the infallible authority of the Church, consequently must be
believed as certain truths. The line of fracture, where that fragment
of Christianity called orthodox Protestantism was broken off from the
integral system of Christian doctrine at the Reformation, is
distinctly traced, and orthodox Protestants are shown that they are
logically compelled to complete their own belief by becoming
Catholics. The old Protestant tradition has a far more extensive sway
in the southern states than among ourselves, and this excellent
treatise will no doubt be the means of bringing numbers of those who
are well-disposed, and need only to be taught what the revealed
doctrines of Christianity really are, into the bosom of the Church. In
this section of the United States, the greater portion of those who
are willing to examine the evidences of the Catholic religion have
floated far away from their old land-marks. In order to reach their
minds, it is necessary to present the rational arguments which will
solve their difficulties much more fully than is done in this
treatise, and to interpret for them ecclesiastical and theological
formulas in which divine truths are embodied in language which is
intelligible to their intellect in its present state. They are either
extreme rationalists or moderate rationalists; that is, they either
reject the supernatural revelation entirely, or admit only so much of
it as can be proved to them to be true on grounds of pure reason.
Hence, we are obliged to begin with the intrinsic evidence of the
truth and reasonableness of the Catholic faith, before we can bring
the force of extrinsic revelation by the authority of the Church to
bear upon their mind.

We welcome the present of this treatise from the Bishop of Richmond
for another reason, as well as for its intrinsic value. It is a sign
of the renewal of that ecclesiastical intercourse with our brethren of
the southern states which has so long been interrupted.

And, in conclusion, we desire to call particular attention to the
ensuing extract, as an evidence of the falsehood of the charge which
our enemies are at present disposed to make against the Catholic
Church of "sanctioning some of the worst enormities of slavery:"

"And here we would take occasion to deplore the conduct of the civil
government in this country, regarding the matrimonial contract of
slaves, which, though the rulers profess Christianity, is completely
ignored even as a civil contract, and left entirely to the caprice of
owners, who frequently without scruple or hesitation, and for the sake
of interest or gain, part man and wife,  separate parents from their
children, and treat the matrimonial union among them as if it were
really no more than the chance association of unreasoning animals.
Often, also, some of these marriages are indissoluble by the
sacramental bond, as well as by the original design of the Creator,
and by the action of Christian proprietors and the neglect of a
Christian government, these separated parties are subjected to the
temptation to form criminal and forbidden alliances, from which
frequency, custom, and the condition of servitude have removed, in the
public view, the shame and stigma which they possess before God, and
according to the maxims of the gospel. Christian proprietors will know
and tolerate these alliances in their slaves, even when made without
any formality, and where they are aware that one or both is under the
obligation of other ties.

"It is not certain that the present dreadful calamities which afflict
the country are not the scourge of God, chiefly for this sin, among
the many that provoke his anger, in our people. He is not likely to
leave long unpunished in a nation the palpable and flagrant contempt
of his holy laws, such as is evinced in this neglect or refusal to
respect in slaves the holiness, the unity, and the indissolubility of
marriage. It would appear that by the present convulsions his
providence is preparing for them at least a recognition of those
rights as immortal beings which are required for the observance of the
paramount laws of God. And if citizens desire to see the nation
prosper and enjoy the blessing of God, let all unite to procure from
the civil government, for the slaves, that their marriages be esteemed
as God intends, and not be dealt with in future as they have been
hitherto."

----

{430}

MATER ADMIRABLIS; OR, FIRST FIFTEEN YEARS OF MARY IMMACULATE.
By Rev. Alfred Monnin, author of "The Life of the Curé d'Ars."
Translated from the French by the Sisters of Charity, Mount St.
Vincent, KY. 12mo., pp. 535. New York: James B. Kirker.

On the wall of a corridor in the convent of _Trinità del Monti_, at
Rome, there is a fresco representing the Blessed Virgin, _Mater
admirabilis_, at the age of fifteen. She is depicted spinning flax
within the precincts of the temple, with her work-basket and an open
book beside her. The picture was painted some twenty years ago by a
young postulant of the community of Ladies of the Sacred Heart, to
whom the _Trinità_ belongs. It is not said that it is in any way
remarkable as a work of art; but it has acquired a celebrity among
pious Catholics second to that of hardly any picture in the world.
Since the year 1846, when the Holy Father gave his solemn blessing to
the picture, remarking that "it was a pious thought to represent the
most Holy Virgin at an age when she seemed to have been forgotten,"
signal favors have repeatedly been bestowed upon persons who have
prayed before it. The Rev. Mr. Blampin, a missionary from Oceanica,
recovered his voice at the feet of the _Mater admirabilis_, in 1846,
after having been deprived of it for twenty-one months. In a transport
of gratitude he obtained permission to say mass before the fresco, and
from that day the corridor became a real sanctuary. A great number of
miraculous cures were reported as having been wrought there, and
multitudes of sinners who came out of mere curiosity to gaze upon a
picture of which so much had been said, were converted by an
instantaneous infusion of divine grace. In 1849 Pope Pius IX., by an
apostolic brief, granted permission for the celebration of the
festival of the _Mater admirabilis_ on the 20th of October, and
enriched the sanctuary with indulgences. In 1854, by a second
rescript, he confirmed an indulgence of three hundred days, which he
had previously granted verbally to all the faithful who should recite
three Hail Maries before this holy painting, adding the invocation,
_Mater admirabilis, ora pro nobis;_ and in the following year the
indulgences were extended to the entire order of the Sacred Heart. The
devotion to the "Mother most admirable" spread rapidly, and copies of
the painting at the _Trinità_ were soon to be found in various parts
of Europe and America. There is one in the Convent of the Sacred Heart
at Manhattanville, N. Y., from which the frontispiece to the volume
before us has been engraved. "I admit," says Father Monnin, speaking
of the original, "that of all the different ways by which art has
represented this Virgin by excellence, there is not one which better
corresponds with the _beau ideal_ which, as a priest, I had loved to
form in my mind. Like the chaste Madonnas of the most fervent
ages--those of _Beato_ in particular--this Madonna of the Lily makes
one feel and understand that its designer had prayed before painting
it, and that her imagination, fed by faith and the love of God, has
delineated the most holy virgin child by interior lights derived from
her meditations. By means of a constant communion with things divine,
the disciples of Fiesole have succeeded in placing themselves as so
many mediums between the Creator and the creature, by transmitting a
ray of that eternal light amidst which they live; we may say that
_Mater admirabilis_ is of the school of Fra Angelico, although several
centuries have elapsed since his time. There is, as it were, the image
of a pure soul preserved ever from all stain, sent into the world to
be joined to a perfect and immaculate body, and to become, in this
twofold perfection and purity, the ineffable instrument of our
salvation! It is thus the prophet deserved to see her, brilliantly
resplendent with grace and innocence, with the clearness of eternal
light, and the splendor of eternal or perpetual virginity. The
ineffable peace which took possession of me, made me understand that
beauty of which St. Thomas speaks, the sight whereof purifies the
senses. . . . There in the wall, within a niche contiguous to the
great church of the monastery, is the most holy Virgin, painted in
fresco at full size. . . . The pilgrim looks in surprise, and very
soon feels as if the air around this fair flower of the field and lily
of the valley were embalmed with the perfumes of silence and
recollection. He sees her occupied in simply spinning flax; near her,
on the right, is a distaff resting upon a slender standard, and on the
left a lily rising out of a crystal vase, and bending its flexible
stalk toward Mary. .... Absorbed in her meditation, the most holy
child has suspended her work; her shuttle, become motionless, falls
from her hand, while her left hand still holds {431} a light thread
which remains joined to the flax in the distaff; one foot of this most
holy spinner rests upon a stool, near which lies an open book, spread
out on a work-basket, filled with shuttles and skeins. The features of
the youthful Mary express a purity in which there is nothing of earth;
her countenance is modestly tinged, the ringlets of her golden hair
are just perceptible through the wavings of a transparent veil which
covers her neck; her pure virginal brow, slender figure, and delicate
limbs give her a youthful appearance, full of grace and truthfulness.
It is truly the Virgin of virgins; it is truly Mary,--and Mary at an
age when but few works of art have sought to represent her."

The little chapel was soon decorated with votive offerings from all
parts of the world. It became a venerated shrine, and few devout
travellers now leave Rome without having prayed at it. The "archives
of _Mater admirabilis_," preserved at the _Trinità_, contain records
of the conversions, vocations, and cures effected at this consecrated
spot; and these, together with some devotional writings composed by
the pupils of the convent, form the groundwork of Father Monnin's
book. The matter is arranged in such a way that the work may be used
for the devotions of the month of May. It is divided into thirty-one
chapters, or "days," each of which contains a meditation having
special reference either to some virtue indicated by the picture, or
to Mary's childhood; this is followed by an appropriate prayer, and a
narrative taken from the archives.

Having explained the purpose of Father Monnin's book, we do not know
that we need say more by way of recommending it. Whatever tends to
foster love and veneration for the Blessed Virgin must commend itself
strongly to every pious Catholic; and in the new devotion, which is
here explained and illustrated, there is something so beautiful and
touching, that we believe it has only to be known in this country to
be embraced with the same eager affection as in Europe.

The external appearance of the volume is very attractive. We hail with
great pleasure the improvement in taste and liberality evinced by the
manufacture of such books as Kirker's "Mater Admirabilis" and O'Shea's
edition of Dr. Curnmings's "Spiritual Progress."

There is no sufficient reason why Catholics should not print and bind
books as well as other people.


THE LOVE Of RELIGIOUS PERFECTION; ON, HOW TO AWAKEN, INCREASE,
AND PRESERVE IT IN THE RELIGIOUS SOUL.
By Father Joseph Bayma, of the Society of Jesus. Translated from the
Latin by a Member of the same Society. 24mo., pp. 254. Baltimore: John
Murphy & Company.

The style and method of this little treatise are modelled upon those
of "The Imitation of Christ." The style is clear and severely simple,
not above the plainest comprehension, and not without attraction for
those who are somewhat fastidious in literary matters. Father Bayma
professes in his preface to have disregarded all ornaments of
composition, having written his little book not so much for the
edification of others as for the profit of his own soul. Our readers
can readily understand that it is for that very reason all the more
searching in its mental examinations and practical in its precepts.
Father Bayma divides his work into three books. The first treats of
the motives which should urge us toward religious perfection; the
second, of the means by which perfection is most easily obtained; and
the third, of the virtues in which it consists. The chapters are
short, and broken up into verses, and open where we will, we find
something to turn our thoughts toward God. Nor must it be supposed
that, because the book was written by a religious for his own
instruction, it contains only those more difficult counsels of
perfection which few people in the world are found strong enough to
follow. Like its prototype, "The Imitation of Christ" is a work for
all classes--for the easy-going Christian no less than for the saint.
Here is an extract from the chapter on "The Choice and Perfection of
Virtues;" we choose it because it illustrates how well even those
passages which are directly addressed to religious persons are adapted
to the use of persons in the world:

"1. So long as we are weighed down by our mortal flesh, we cannot
acquire the perfection of all virtues; and therefore, we have need of
selection that we may not labor in vain.

"Choose then a virtue to practise, until, {432} by the assistance of
God, thou become most perfect in it.

"Some virtues are continually called for in our daily actions, and are
necessary for all; and therefore, should be acquired with particular
industry.

"The more thou shalt make progress in meekness, patience, modesty,
temperance, humility, and others, that come into more frequent use,
the sooner wilt thou become holy.

"2. Some seek after virtues which have a greater appearance of
nobility, and are reckoned amongst men to be more glorious.

"They instruct with pleasure, but it must be in famous churches, and
to a large assembly of noble and learned men.

"They visit the sick with pleasure, and hear confessions, but only of
those that are conspicuous for riches or honors.

"See that thou set not a high value upon these things: it is more
perfect and safer to imitate Christ our Lord, and to go about
villages, than to hunt for the praise of eloquence and learning in
cities.

"It is more useful to thee to visit and console the poor and the rude,
than the rich and noble, who, moreover, are less prepared to listen to
and obey thy words.

"3. Some are content with the virtues that agree with their natural
inclinations; because they seem easier, and require not any, or a less
violent struggle.

"But when they have need of self-denial and mortification, they have
not the courage to practise virtue; but they lose heart, turn
faint-hearted, and think it is best to spare themselves.

"Do thou follow them not, for they that are such make no progress, but
rather fall away from the way of perfection, because they follow not
the teaching and example of Christ.

"For it was not those who spare themselves, and fear the hardship of
the struggle, whom Christ declared blessed, but those that mourn, and
fight manfully for justice sake."

----

LA MERE DE DIEU. From the Italian of Father Alphonse Capecelatro, of
the Oratory of Naples. 24mo., pp. 180. Philadelphia: Peter F.
Cunningham. New York: D. & J. Sadlier & Company.

Why not say "The Mother of God?" And why should Father Capecelatro,
being an Italian, figure with the French name of _Alphonse_? If we
cannot have the title of the book in English, at least let us have it
in Italian--the language in which it was written--not in French.

But despite the bad taste displayed on the title-page, this is a very
good little book. It exhales a genuine aroma of piety; it is written
with great simplicity; and it is devoted to a subject which is dear to
all of us. It is supposed to be addressed by a Tuscan priest to his
sister. The first part treats of the respect to which the Blessed
Virgin is entitled; the second traces her life, principally in the
pages of the Holy Scriptures; and the third is devoted to an
exhibition of the marks of veneration which she has received from the
Church since the very beginning of Christianity. "It is charmingly,
almost plaintively sweet," says Father Gratry, of the Oratory of
Paris. "It is written as a prayer, not as a book; it is learned and
affectionate, religious and instructive."


COUNT LESLIE; OR, THE TRIUMPH OF FILIAL PIETY.
A Catholic Tale. From the French. 24mo., pp. 108.

PHILIP HARTLEY; OR, A BOY'S TRIALS AND TRIUMPHS.
A Tale for Young People. By the author of "The Confessors of
Connaught." 24mo., pp. 122.

THE CHILDREN OF THE VALLEY; OR, THE GHOST OF THE RUINS.
Translated from the French. 24mo., pp. 123.

MAY CARLETON'S STORY; OR, THE CATHOLIC MAIDEN'S CROSS.
THE MILLER'S DAUGHTER.
Catholic Tales. 24mo., pp. 115.

COTTAGE EVENING TALES FOR YOUNG PEOPLE.
Compiled by the author of "Grace Morton." 24mo., pp. 126.
Philadelphia: Peter F. Cunningham. New York: D. & J. Sadlier &
Company.

The above five volumes are portions of Cunningham's "Young Catholic's
Library." They seem to have an excellent moral tendency, and as a
general thing are well written--better written, we believe, than the
majority of tales intended, as these are, for sodality and
Sunday-school libraries. The first mentioned, however, "Count Leslie,"
is not rendered into irreproachable English. What respect can we
expect children to entertain for the English grammar if our school
libraries give them such cruel sentences to read as the following: "It
was this young man, and _him_, only, who knew the cause of his mother's
sadness?" With this exception we can honestly recommend so much as we
have seen of the Young Catholic's Library to public favor. Mr.
Cunningham has other volumes in preparation.

----------

{433}

THE CATHOLIC WORLD



VOL. I., NO. 4. JULY, 1865.



THE TRUTH OF SUPPOSED LEGENDS AND FABLES.


BY H. E. CARDINAL WISEMAN.   [Footnote 79 ]

  [Footnote 79: From "Essays on Religion and Literature. By Various
  Writers." Edited by H. E. Manning, D.D. London; Longman, Green & Co.
  1865.]

The subject of the address which I am about to deliver is as follows:
Events and things which have been considered legendary, or even
fabulous, have been proved by further research to be historical and
true.

Before coming directly to the subject upon which I wish to occupy your
attention, I will give a little account of a very extraordinary
discovery which may throw some light upon the general character and
tendency of our investigation. In the year 1775 Pius VI. laid the
foundation of the sacristy of St. Peter's. Of course, as is the case
whenever the ground is turned up in Rome, a number of inscriptions
came to light; these were carefully put aside, and formed the lining,
if I may so say, of the corridor which unites the sacristy with the
church. It was observed, however, that a great many of these
inscriptions referred to the same subject, and a subject which was
totally unknown to antiquarians: they all spoke of certain Arval
Brethren--_Fratres Arvales_. Some were mere fragments, others were
entire inscriptions.

These, to the number of sixty-seven, were carefully put together and
illustrated by the then librarian of the Vatican, Mgr. Marini. It was
an age when in Rome antiquarian learning abounded. There were many,
perhaps, who could have undertaken the task, but it naturally belonged
to him as being attached to the church near which the inscriptions
were found. He put the fragments together, collated them one with
another, and with the entire inscriptions. He procured copies at
least, when he could not examine the originals, of such other slight
fragments as seemed to have reference to the subject, the key having
now been found, and the result was two quarto volumes,  [Footnote 80]
giving us the entire history, constitution, and ritual of this
singular fraternity. Before this period two brief notices in Varro,
one passage in Pliny, and allusions in two later writers, Minutius
Felix and Fulgentius, were all that was known concerning it. One
merely told the origin of it from the time of the kings, and the
others only stated that it had something to do with questions about
land; and there the matter ended. Now, out of this ignorance, out of
this darkness, there springs, through the researches of Mgr. Marini,
perhaps the most {434} complete account or history that we have of any
institution of antiquity. So complete was the work, in fact, that only
two inscriptions relating to this subject have been found since; one
by Melchiorri, who undertook to write an appendix to the work; and the
other in 1855 in excavating the Dominican garden at Santa Sabina,
which indeed threw great light upon the subject. From these
inscriptions we learn that this was one of the most powerful bodies of
augurs or priests in Rome. Yet neither Pliny, nor Livy, nor Cicero,
when expressly enumerating all the classes of augurs, ever alludes to
them. Now, we know how they were elected. On one tablet is an order of
Claudius to elect a new member, so to fill up their number of twelve,
in consequence of the death of one. They wrote every year, and
published, at least put up in their gardens, a full and minute account
of all the sacrifices and the feasts celebrated by them. They were
allied to the imperial family, and all the great families in Rome took
part in their assemblies. They had a sacred grove, the site of which
was perfectly unknown until the last inscription, found in 1855,
revealed it. It was out of Porta Portese, on the road to the English
vineyard at La Magliana. There they had sacrifices to the _Dea Dia_,
whose name occurs nowhere else among all the writers on ancient
mythology. It is supposed to be Ceres. They had magnificent sacrifices
at the beginning of the year. There are tablets which say where the
meetings will be held, whether at the house of the rector or
pro-rector, leaving the date in blank, to be filled in the course of
the year. We are told who were at the meetings, especially who among
the youths from the first families--four of whom acted somewhat as
acolytes; and we are told how they were dressed, which of their two
dresses they wore. Then there is a most minute ritual given. We are
told how each victim was slain; how the brethren took off the toga
praetexta, their crowns and golden ears of corn, then put them on
again, and examined the entrails of the sacrifices; all as minutely
detailed as the rubrics of any office of unction and coronation could
possibly be. Then we are told how many baskets of fruit they carried
away, and what distribution there was of sweetmeats at the end, every
one taking a certain quantity. All this is recorded, and with it their
song in barbarous Oscan or early Etruscan, perfectly unintelligible,
in which their acclamations were made. So that now we know perfectly
everything about them. I may mention as an interesting fact, that
Marini's own copy of his work on the Arval Brethren, two quarto
volumes, having their margins covered with notes for a second edition,
which was never published, and filled with slips of paper with
annotations and new inscriptions of other sorts, which he subsequently
found, is now in the library at Oscott.

  [Footnote 80: _Atti e Monumenti dei Fratelli Arvali_. Da Mgr.
  Marini. 2 tom. Roma, 1795. ]

What do I wish to draw from this account? It is that history may have
remained silent upon points which it seems impossible, in the
multiplicity of writers that have been preserved to us, should not
have cropped out, not have been mentioned in some way, not even have
been made known to us through innumerable anterior discoveries. One
fortunate circumstance brought to light the whole history of this
body. How unfair, then, is it, on the reticence of history, at once to
condemn anything, or to say, "We should have heard of it; writers who
ought to have told us would not have concealed it from us." For a
circumstance may arise which will bring out the whole history of a
thing, and make that plain and clear before us which has been scouted
completely by others, or of which we have been kept in the completest
ignorance.

I could illustrate this by several other examples which I have
collected together, but I foresee that I shall not get anything like
through the subject I propose to myself. But here is one such instance
bearing on Scripture truth. It was said by infidel writers {435} of
the last century, "How is it that there could have been such a
remarkable occurrence as the massacre of the Innocents without a
single profane historian ever mentioning it--Josephus, if no one
else?" Of course the answer was, "We do not know why, except that we
might give plausible reasons why it should not have been noticed."
That is all we need say. It is our duty to accept the fact. We must
not reject things because we cannot find corroboration of them all at
once. We may have to wait with patience; the world has had to wait
centuries even before some doubted truth has come out clearly.

I. The subject which I wish to bring before you is one of those which,
perhaps beyond any other, may be said to be considered thoroughly
legendary, and even perhaps worse:--it is the history of St. Ursula
and her eleven thousand companions, virgins and martyrs. At first
sight it may appear bold to undertake a vindication of that narrative,
or to bring it within the compass of history by detaching from it what
has been embellishment, what has been perhaps even wilful invention,
and bringing out in its perfect completeness a history corroborated on
all sides by every variety of research. Such, however, is the object
at which I aim to-day; other instances may occupy us afterward.

It has, in fact, been treated as fabulous by Protestants, beginning
with the Centuriators of Magdeburg down to the present time. There is
hardly any story more sneered at than this, that an English lady, with
eleven thousand companions, all virgins, should have met with
martyrdom at Cologne, and should have even gone to Rome on their
journey by some route which is very difficult to comprehend; for they
are always represented in ships. Hence the whole thing has been
treated as a fable. But the more refined Germanism of later times
takes what is perhaps meant to be a mitigated view, and treats it as a
myth, that is, a sort of mythological tale. Thus the writer of a late
work, [Footnote 81] entitled the History, or fable, of St. Ursula and
the Eleven Thousand Virgins, printed in Hanover, in 1854, considers
that St. Ursula is the ancient German goddess Rehalennia, and explains
the history by the mythology of that ancient divinity.

  [Footnote 81: _Die Sage von der heilige Ursula und den, 11,000
  Jungfrauen._ Von Oskar Schade. Hanover, 1854. ]

But let us come to Catholics. A great number have been staggered
completely by this history, and have said, "It is incredible; it is
impossible to believe it; we must reject it: what foundation is there
for it?" Some have tried to search one out; and perhaps one of the
most ingenious explanations, though the most devoid of any foundation,
is that which Sirmondus and Valesius   [Footnote 82] and several other
Catholics have brought forward--that there were only two saints, St.
Ursula and St. Undecimilla, and that this last has been turned into
the eleven thousand. This name Undecimilla has nowhere been found;
there have been some like it, but that name is not known. The
explanation is the purest conjecture, and has now been completely
rejected. But still many find it very difficult to accept the history.
If they were interrogated, and required to answer distinctly the
question, "What do you think about St. Ursula?" there are very few who
would venture to face the question and say, "I believe there is a
foundation for it in truth."--For that is all one might be expected
to say about a matter which has come down to us through ages, probably
with additions.--"I believe the substance of it; it has been so
altered by time as to reach us clogged with difficulties; still I
believe there were martyrs in great number who had come from England
that were martyred at Cologne." But there are few who like to talk
about it: most say it is a legendary story. Even Butler only gives
about two pages of history. He rejects the explanation which I have
{436} just mentioned; but he throws the whole narrative into the
shade, and passes it over with one of those little sermons which he
gives us, to make up for not knowing much about a saint; so that his
readers are left quite in the dark.

  [Footnote 82: _Acta Sanct._ Bolland, Oct. tom. ix. p. 144. ]

Then unfortunately while many Catholics have been inclined to look at
it as more legendary than historical, they have been badly served by
those who have undertaken the defence or explanation of the event.
There may be many here who have gone into what is called the golden
chamber in the church of St. Ursula at Cologne, and have seen that
multitude of skulls and bones that line the walls, and have been
inclined to give an incredulous shrug and to say, "How could these
martyrs have been got together? where did they come from? how do we
know they were martyrs?"

We generally content ourselves with looking at such things through the
eyes of Mr. Murray's traveller who tells us about them. Accordingly we
look round at these startling objects, and say, "It is very singular;
it is very extraordinary." But there is very little awe, very little
devotion felt by us; while, to a good native of Cologne, it is the
most venerable, sacred, and holy place almost in Christendom. He prays
earnestly to the virgins of Cologne, and considers that they are his
powerful patrons and intercessors.

However, little has been done to help us. Works have been published in
favor of the truth of this history, but then they have run into
excess. The most celebrated of all is one by a Jesuit named Crombach,
who was led to compose it by Bebius, another learned Jesuit, whose
papers were unfortunately burned in a conflagration at the college in
Cologne. Crombach in 1647 published two large volumes entitled _"St.
Ursula vindicata."_ In them he has included an immense variety of
things. He has accepted with scarce any discrimination works that are
entitled to little or no credit--contradictory works; he has mingled
them all up; and he insists upon the story or the history being true
with all details. The consequence is that the work has been very much
thrown aside, or severely attacked.

Yet it is acknowledged that it contains a great deal of valuable
information, together with an immense quantity of documents which may
be made good use of when properly examined, when the chaff is
separated from the wheat. On the whole, however, it has not been
favorable to the cause of the martyrs.

Now, however, there has appeared such a vindication, such a wonderful
re-examination of the whole history, as it is impossible to resist. It
is impossible to read the account of St. Ursula given in the 9th
volume for October of the Bollandists, published in 1858, without
being perfectly amazed at the quantity of real knowledge that has been
gained upon the subject, and still more at the powerful manner in
which this knowledge has been handled;--an erudition which, merely
glancing over the pages and notes, reminds us of the scholars of three
hundred years ago, in whom we have often wondered at the learning
which they brought to bear on any one point.

This treatise occupies from page 73 to 303, 230 pages of closely
printed folio in two columns. I acknowledge that it is not quite a
recreation to read it, but still it is very well worth reading. All
documents are printed at full length. Now, it so happened, that just
after the volume had come out, I was at Brussels, and called at the
library of the Bollandists, and had a most interesting conversation
with Father Victor de Buck, the author of this history. He gave me an
interesting outline of what he had been enabled to do. He told me that
when they came to October 21, and he had to write a life of St. Ursula
and her companions, his provincial wrote to him from Cologne and said,
"Take care what you say, for the people are tremendously alarmed lest
you should knock down all their traditions, and I {437} do not know
what will be the case if you do." He replied, "Don't be at all afraid;
I shall confirm every point, and I am sure they will be pleased with
what I have to say." He was kind enough to put down in a letter the
chief points of his vindication for me; but I have lost it, and so
there was nothing left but to read through the whole of this great
work. But, beside, a very excellent compendium has appeared, which
takes pretty nearly the same view on every point, and approves of
everything the author has said; indeed some points are perhaps put
more popularly in it, though the history is reduced to a much smaller
compass. I have the work before me. It is entitled, "St. Ursula and
her Companions: A Critical, Historical Monograph. By John Hubert
Kessel. Cologne, 1863." It is a work which is not too long to be
translated and made known. What I have to say, after having gone
through this preliminary matter, is, that I lay claim to nothing
whatever beyond having been diligent, and having endeavored to grasp
all the points in question, and reduce them to a moderate compass. I
have changed the order altogether, taking that which seems to me most
suitable to the subject, and co-ordinating the different parts and
facts so as to make it popularly intelligible. In this I have the
satisfaction to find that in a chapter at the end of the book, in
which the history is summed up, exactly the same order is taken which
I have adopted here. It will not be necessary to give a reference for
every assertion that I shall have occasion to make; but I may say that
I have the page carefully noted where the subject is fully drawn out
and illustrated.

Now, let me first of all give, in a brief sketch, what Father de Buck
considers the real history, which has been wrapt up in such a quantity
of legendary matter--that which comes out from the different documents
laid before us, as the kernel or the nucleus of the history, as Kessel
calls it. He supposes that this army of martyrs, as we may well call
them, was composed of two different bodies: a body of virgins who
happened, under circumstances which I shall describe to you, to be at
Cologne, and a body of the inhabitants, citizens of Cologne, and
others, very probably many English and other virgins who had there
sought safety. It may be asked how came these English to be there?
About the year 446 the Britons began to be immensely annoyed by the
incursions of the Picts and Scots, which led to their calling in
(after the manner of the old fable, about the man calling in the dogs
to hunt the hare in his garden) the Anglo-Saxons, who in return took
possession of the country; and the inhabitants that they did not
exterminate they made serfs. At this period we know the English were
put to sad straits. Having so long lain quiet and undisturbed under
the Roman dominion, they had almost lost their natural valor, and were
unable to defend themselves. There was, therefore, a natural tendency
to emigrate and get away. They had already done this before; for as De
Buck shows, with extraordinary erudition, the occupation of Brittany
or Armorica was a quiet emigration from England, which sought the
continent, and also established colonies in Holland and Batavia, and
by that means obtained a peace which they could not have at home. We
have a very interesting document upon this subject. The celebrated
senator Aëtius was at that time governor of Gaul; the Britons sent to
him for help, and this is one passage of a most touching letter which
has been preserved by Gildas: "Repellunt nos barbari ad mare, repellit
nos mare ad barbaros; oriuntur duo genera funerum; aut jugulamur aut
mergimur."  [Footnote 83] They were tossed backward and forward by the
sea to the barbarians, and by the barbarians to the sea; when they
fell upon the barbarians they were cut to pieces, and when they were
driven into the {438} sea "mergimur"--we go to the bottom. It does not
mean that they ran into the sea, but that they went to their ships,
and many of them perished in the sea by shipwreck or by sinking--"aut
jugulamur aut mergimur." That shows that the English were leaving
England to go to the continent. I am only giving you the web of the
history, without its proofs; but I quote this passage to show it is
not at all unlikely that at that moment, when they were in a manner
straitened between the barbarians of the north and those coming upon
them in the south, a great many of them went out of the country, and
that especially being Christians they would wend their way to Catholic
countries. Religious and other persons of a like character, we know,
in every invasion of barbarians, were the first to suffer a double
martyrdom. This is a supposition, therefore, about which there is no
improbability, that a certain number, I do not say how many, of
Christian ladies of good family, some of them, perhaps, royal, got
over to Batavia or Holland (where there have been always traditions
and names of places in confirmation of this), and made their way to
Cologne, which was a capital and a seat of the Roman government, a
Christian city, and in every probability considered a stronghold, both
on account of its immense fortifications, and on account of the river.

  [Footnote 83: _Gildas de Excidio Britanniae_, pars i., cap. xvii.
  Ed. Migne: _Patrologia_, tom. lxix., p. 342.]

Well, then comes the history, very difficult indeed to reconcile, of a
pilgrimage to Rome, which it is said they made; but let us suppose
that instead of the whole of them a certain number of them might go
there. It is not at all improbable that at that time, as De Buck
observes, a deputation, or a certain number of citizens and others,
did go to Rome to obtain assistance there, as their only hope against
the invasion, which I shall describe just now. There is no great
difficulty in supposing this; and assuming that some of the English
virgins also went, that would be a foundation for the great legendary
history, I might say the fabulous history, which has been built upon
it. Now, there is a strong confirmation of such a thing being done.
St. Gregory of Tours  [Footnote 84] mentions that at this very time
Bishop Servatius did go to Rome to pray the Apostles Sts. Peter and
Paul to protect his country and city against the coming invasion, and
he saw no other hope of safety. He must have passed through Cologne
exactly at that time, and, therefore, there is nothing absurd or
improbable in supposing that some inhabitants of Cologne went with him
as a deputation to Rome, and that some of the English virgins may have
accompanied them. In the year following, Attila, the scourge of God,
the most cruel of all the leaders of barbaric tribes who invaded the
Roman empire, was marching along the Rhine with the known view of
invading Gaul, and not only invading it, but, as he said, of
completely conquering and destroying it; for his maxim was, "Where
Attila sets his foot no more grass shall ever grow"--nothing but
destruction and devastation. I will say a little more about the Huns
later. In the meantime we leave them, in 450, on their way to cross
the Rhine, with the intention of invading and occupying France. Attila
united great cunning with his barbarity; he pretended to the Goths
that he was coming to help them against the Romans, and to the Romans
that he was going to help them to expel the Goths. By that means he
paralyzed both for a time, until it was too well seen that he was the
enemy of all. It is most probable, knowing the character as we shall
see just now of the Huns, that the inhabitants of the neighboring
towns would seek refuge in the capital, and that all living in the
country would get within the strong walls of cities. We have important
confirmation, at this very time, in the history of St. Genevieve,
[Footnote 65] who was {439} a virgin living out in the country, but
who, upon the approach of the Huns, hastened, we are told, immediately
to seek safety in Paris, and was there the means of saving the city,
by exhorting the inhabitants to build up walls, to close their gates,
and to fight. This they did, and so saved themselves. That is just an
example. When it is known that throughout his march Attila destroyed
every city, committing incredible barbarities (ruins of some of the
places remaining to this day), not sparing man, woman, or child, it is
more than probable that there would be a great conflux and influx to
the city of Cologne, where the Roman government still kept its seat,
and where, of course, there was something like order, although we have
unfortunate proofs, in the works of Salvianus,  [Footnote 86] that the
morality of the city had become so very corrupt that it deserved great
chastisement. However, so far all is coherent. In 451, after Attila
had gone to France, and had been completely defeated, he made his way
back, greatly exasperated, burning and destroying everything in his
way, sparing no one. Then he appeared before Cologne; and this is the
invasion in which it is supposed the martyrdom took place.

  [Footnote 84: S. Greg. Turon., _Hist. Franc_., lib. ii., cap. v. Ed.
  Migne: _Patrologia_. tom. lxviii., pp. 197, 576.]

  [Footnote 85: Vid. Tillemont, _Hist. des Emp.,_ vi. p. 151. _Acta
  Sanct. Boll.,_ Jan. tom. i. in vit. S. Genovevae.]

  [Footnote 86: _De Gubernatione Dei_, Ed. Baluzii, Paris, 1864, pp.
  140, 141. ]

Having given you what the Bollandist considers the historical thread,
every part of which can be confirmed and made most probable, I will
now, before going into proofs of the narrative, direct your attention
for a few minutes to what we may call the legendary parts of the
history. When we speak of legends we must not confound them with
fables, that is, with pure inventions. We must not suppose that people
sat down to write a lie under the idea that they were edifying the
Church or anybody. There have been such cases, no doubt; for
Tertullian mentions the delinquency of a person's writing false acts
of St. Paul, and being suspended from his office of priest in
consequence. Such follies have happened in all times. We have had many
instances in our own day of attempts at forging documents, and
committing the worst of social crimes; but old legends as we have
them, and even the false acts as they were called, were no doubt
written without any intention of actually deceiving, or of passing off
what was spurious for genuine. The person who first suggested this was
a man certainly no friend of Catholics, Le Clerc, better known by his
literary name of Clericus; who observes that school exercises were
sometimes drawn from martyrdoms, as in our day from a classical
subject, as Juvenal says of Hannibal:

      "I demens et saevas curre per Alpes
  Ut pueris placeas et declamatio flas."

Not that students professed to write a real history, but they gave
wonderful descriptions of deeds of valor and marvellous events which
had never occurred, and were never intended to be believed. In the
same way, at a time when nothing but a religious subject could create
interest, that sort of composition came to be applied to acts of
saints and martyrs; so that many books and narratives which we have of
that description may be thus accounted for. It is much like our
historical novels, or the historical plays of Shakespeare, for
instance. Nobody imagines that their authors wished to pass them off
for history, but they did not contradict history; they kept to
history, so that you may find it in them; and you might almost write a
history from some of those books which are called historical works of
fiction. In early times such compositions were of a religious
character. Then came times of greater ignorance, and those works came
to be regarded as true historical accounts. But, are we to reject them
on that ground altogether? Are we to say, any more than we should with
regard to the fictitious works of which I have just spoken, that there
is no truth in them? We should proceed in the same way as people do
who seek for gold. A {440} man goes to a gold-field, and tries to
obtain gold from auriferous sand. Now suppose he took a sieve full,
and said at once, "It's all rubbish," and threw it away; he might go
on for a long time and never get a grain of gold. But if he knows how
to set to work, if he washes what he obtains, picks out grain by
grain, and puts by, he gets a small hoard of real genuine gold; and
nobody denies that when, many such supplies are put together they make
a treasure of sterling metal. So it is with these legendary accounts.
They are never altogether falsehoods--I will not say never, but
rarely. Whenever they have an air of history about them, the chances
are that, by examining and sifting them well, we may get out a certain
amount of real and solid material for history.

The legendary works upon these virgins are numerous and begin early.
The first is one which I shall call, as all our writers do, by its
first words, "Regnante Domino." This is an account of traditions,
evidently written between the ninth and eleventh centuries. It is
impossible to determine more closely than this. But we know that it
cannot have been written earlier than the ninth century, nor later
than the eleventh. It contains a long history of these virgins while
in England, who they were, and what they were; of a certain marriage
contract that was made with the father of St. Ursula, a very powerful
king; how it was arranged that she should have eleven companions, and
each of these a thousand followers; how they should embark for three
years and amuse themselves with nautical exercises; how the ships went
to the other side of the channel. It is an absurd story and full of
fable, but there are three or four most important points in it.
Geoffrey of Monmouth comes next. He gives another history, totally
different from that of the "Regnante Domino;" but retains two or three
points of identity. His is evidently a British tradition, which, of
course, it is most important to compare with the German one; and we
shall find how singularly they agree. Then, after these, come a number
of legends called _Passiones_, long accounts filled with a variety of
incongruous particulars which may be safely put aside; but in the same
way germs or remnants of something good, which have been thus
preserved, are found in them all, and when brought together may give
us some valuable results. We next meet with what is more difficult to
explain--the supposed revelations of St. Elizabeth of Schönau, and of
Blessed Hermann of Steinfeld. It is not for us to enter into the
discussion, which is a very subtle one, of how persons who are saints
really canonized and field in immense veneration--one of them,
Hermann, singularly so--can be supposed to have been allowed to follow
their own imaginations on some points, while at the same time there
seems no doubt that they lived in an almost ecstatic state. This
question is gone into fully; and the best authorities are quoted by
the Bollandist. It would require a long discussion, and it would not
be to our purpose, to pursue it further. These supposed revelations
are rejected altogether. Now we come to positive forgeries, consisting
of inscriptions, or of engraved stones with legends carved upon them.
One of these mentions a pope who never existed, and also a bishop of
Milan who never lived, beside a number of other imaginary people. From
the texture and state of these inscriptions there can be no doubt
whatever that they are absolute forgeries, and the author of them is
pretty well discovered. He was a sacristan of the name of Theodorus.
In order to enhance the glory of these virgins, they are represented,
as you see in legendary pictures, as being in a ship accompanied by a
pope, bishops, abbots, and persons of high dignity, who are supposed
to have come from Rome with them. All this we discard, making out what
we can from the sounder traditions.

And this is the result. There are {441} two or three points on which,
whether we take the English or the German traditions, all are agreed.
First, we have that a great many of these virgins were English: that
the Germans all agree upon; the earliest historical documents say the
same. Secondly, that they were martyred by the Huns: that we are told
both by the English and the German writers. It is singular that they
should agree on such a point as this; and you will see how--I do not
say corroborated, but absolutely proved it is. The third fact is, that
there was a tremendous slaughter at the time, a singular slaughter of
people committed at Cologne by these Huns. This comes out from all the
legendary histories, which agree upon this point, and we can hardly
know how they should do so except through separate traditions; for
they evidently have nothing else in common. Their separate narratives
we may reject as legendary.

Thus we come to an investigation of the true history, and see how it
is proved. And first I must put before you what I may call the
foundation-stone of the whole history on which it is based--the
inscription now kept in the church of St. Ursula. It had remained very
much neglected, though it had been given by different authors, until,
when the Bollandists were going to write their history, they took
three casts of it; one they gave to the archbishop of Cologne, another
they kept for themselves; the third--I cannot say what became of it,
but I think it went to Rome, having been taken by De Rossi. I could
not afford to have a cast brought here, but I have had a most accurate
tracing made of it. Those of you who are judges of graphic character
will see the nature of the letters; they are capital, or uncial
letters. First, you may ask what is the age of this inscription? It is
pretty well agreed that it cannot be later than the year 500--that
would be fifty years after that assigned to the martyrdom of the
virgins. De Buck, who is really almost hypercritical in rejecting,
says he does not see a single objection to the genuineness of this
inscription. There is not a trace of Lombard or later character about
it; it is purely Roman. The union of some of the letters is just what
we find about that time in Roman inscriptions. It is then, as nearly
as one can judge, of the age I have mentioned--about the year 500. De
Rossi, passing through Cologne three or four years ago, examined it
and pronounced it to be genuine, and said it could not be of a later
period than that. Dr. Enner, a layman of Cologne, when writing his
"History of Cologne," could not bring himself to believe that the
inscription was so old, and he sent an exact copy in plaster (perhaps
that was the third) to Professor Ritschl, the well-known editor of
Plautus, and a Protestant, at Bonn. I have a copy of the Professor's
letter here, in which he says that he has minutely examined the
inscription, and that he cannot see anything in it to make it more
modern than the date assigned to it, and that it contains
peculiarities which no forger would ever hit upon, such as the double
_i,_ and other forms. He says, "I am not sufficiently acquainted with
the history of St. Ursula to connect it in any way; but I have no
hesitation in saying that the inscription cannot be later than the
beginning of the sixth century;" which, you see, takes us back very
nearly to the time when the martyrdom is supposed to have occurred.
Then I may mention that the very inscription is copied in the next
historical document that we have, as being already in the church. This
is the translation of the inscription, of which I present an exact
copy:

"Clematius came from the East; he was terrified by fiery visions, and
by the great majesty and the holiness of these virgins, and, according
to a vow that he made, he rebuilt at his own expense, on his own land,
this basilica." Then follows a commination at the end, which is not
unusual in such cases. Now, every expression here is to be found in
inscriptions of the time.

{442}

[Illustration: ]

{443}

For instance, "de proprio;" "votum;" "loco suo" (sometimes it is "loco
empto"), meaning of course land which one made his own, or which was
his own before. There had been then a basilica--not the church that
now exists, but a basilica--at the tombs where these saints were
buried, which we shall have to describe later. He rebuilt the basilica
fifty years after the martyrdom, destroyed no doubt during the
constant incursions of barbarians. It was probably a very small one;
for we know that at Rome every entrance to the tombs of martyrs had
its basilica. De Rossi has been successful in finding one or two. One
was built by St. Damasus, who wrote: "Not daring to put my ashes among
so many martyrs, I have built this basilica for myself, my mother and
sister;" and there are three niches at the end for three sarcophagi.
It is universally allowed that there never was a catacomb without its
basilica. In fact, in that of Pope St. Alexander, and Sts. Evantius
and Theodulus, found lately, there is a basilica completely standing,
and the bodies of these saints were found--one under the altar--and
the others near it. Then from the basilica you go into the catacomb.
So that nothing is more natural than that in the place where these
martyrs were buried, Clematius should rebuild their basilica. After
this monument we proceed to the next genuine document, though one of a
later date, and by an unknown author--the "Sermo in Natali." This,
there is no doubt, was written between the years 751 and 839; and I
will give the ingenious argument by which this date is proved. But
first it quotes the inscription I have read, with the exception of the
threat at the end; in the second place it mentions that the virgins
were probably Britons--that it was not certain, but the general
opinion was that they had come from Britain; thirdly, it attributes
the martyrdom to the Huns; fourthly, it insinuates what is of great
importance in filling up the history, that it is by no means to be
supposed that they were all virgins, but that many were widows and
married people. The reason for fixing the earliest date at 751 is,
that it quotes Bede's Ecclesiastical History, which was written in
that year, giving apparently his account of the conversion of Lucius;
though one cannot say that it is certainly a copy from Bede, because
Bede himself copied from more ancient books, and both may have drawn
from the same source. Then it could not have been written after 839
for two reasons. In 834 there was a tremendous incursion of other
barbarians--of Normans; and it is plain from our book that there had
been no such invasion when it was written; nothing was known of it,
because the writer speaks of countries, particularly Holland, as being
flourishing, which were completely destroyed by them. There is also
this singular circumstance. In speaking of the great devotion to the
virgins in Batavia, the writer states that this happened at a time
when Batavia was an island formed by the two branches of the Rhine.
Now in 839 an inundation completely destroyed it, one of the horns or
arms being entirely obliterated. Therefore that gives us a certain
compass within which the book was written. The author himself was a
native of Cologne--for in referring to the inhabitants he once or
twice speaks of "us"--and he would therefore be familiar with the
traditions of the people. He says there was no written history at that
time; he defends the traditions, and shows how natural it was that the
people should have kept them. I ought to mention that he calls the
head of the band of martyrs Pinnosa. He says, "She is called in her
own country Vinosa, in ours Pinnosa;" and there is evidence that this
was the name first given to the leader; how, by what transformation,
it came to be St. Ursula, we cannot tell; it is certain that up to
that time hers was not the name of the leader. Afterward Pinnosa
appears on the list, but not as the chief, St. Ursula being the
prominent name.

{444}

After that period there comes a mass of historical proofs that one can
have no difficulty about. From 852 there are an immense number of
diplomas giving grants of land to the nuns of the monastery of St.
Ursula, at her place of burial. There is no doubt of the existence of
that church, from other documents. Then the martyrologies repeat the
whole tradition again and again. Thus, then, we fill up that gap of
four hundred years (from A.D. 400 to A.D. 800). There is the
inscription; there is the "Sermo in Natali," which quotes it, and
gives old traditions; and afterward there are diplomas and other
testimonies which are abundant.

We now proceed to compare the whole tradition with history, with known
history, for after all this is our chief business. When we possess a
tradition of a country and people, we ask, "What confirmation, what
corroboration, have we? what does history tell us?" Let us then see
what history does tell. It tells us, in the first place, that in the
year 450 Attila was known to be coming to invade and take possession
of Gaul, having been ejected from Italy. His army is said by
contemporary writers to have been composed of 700,000 men. It was a
hostile emigration. They brought their women and children in carts, as
the Huns always used to do, and they of course marched but slowly.
They went along both sides of the Danube, and got at length into
France. De Buck, by a most interesting series of proofs, makes it
almost as evident as anything can be that they crossed over at
Coblentz, therefore not coming near Cologne. They entered, as I have
said, into Gaul, destroying everything in their march. Some of their
barbarities and massacres are almost incredible. After devastating
nearly the whole of the country, they besieged Orleans. The
inhabitants having been encouraged to resist, at last succeeded in
obtaining certain terms; that is, Attila and his chiefs went into the
city and took what they liked, but left the city standing. After this
they were pursued by the general whom I have mentioned--Aetius, a
Gaul, but who got together all the troops he could, Goths, Visigoths,
Franks, and others, who saw what the design of these horrible
barbarians was.

A most tremendous battle was now fought, that of Catalaunia
(Châlons-sur-Marne), in which contemporary historians tell us 300,000
men were left on the field; but that number has been reduced to
200,000. Such battles, thank God! we seldom hear of now-a-days.
Attila, routed, immediately took to flight, and got clear away from
his pursuers. He went through Belgium, destroying city after city,
leaving nothing standing, and massacring the people in the most
barbarous way.

Here comes the most difficult knot of the whole history. Authors agree
that Attila now made his way into Thuringia, that is to the heart of
Germany; he must therefore be supposed to have got clear over the
Rhine, and marched a long way through the country. On this subject De
Buck has one of the most exquisite and beautiful geographical
investigations, I should think, that have ever appeared. He proves, so
that you can no more doubt it than you can doubt my having this paper
before me, that there was Thuringia which lay on this side of the
Rhine; he proves it by a series documents taken from mediaeval
writers, and from inscriptions, that there was a Thuringia which
stretched from Louvain to the Rhine. Indeed, it is impossible to
conceive how Attila could have got, as by a leap, into the very midst
of Germany. He traces the natural course of march (which you can
follow by any map), taking the cities destroyed as landmarks, and
brings him to this province; and when there, there was no possible way
of crossing the Rhine but by Cologne; there was the only bridge, the
only military pass of any sort. So there can be no doubt that the
Huns, exasperated by their tremendous losses, and by being driven
{445} out of Gaul, which they intended to occupy, having revenged
themselves as they went on, were obliged to go through Cologne; and if
you calculate the date of the victory, and consider the country
through which Attila passed, destroying everything as he went, you
bring him almost to a certainty to Cologne about the 21st of October,
nearly the day of the martyrdom. The "Regnante Domino," which
attributes the martyrdom to the Huns, corroborates all this account,
which is the result of a most painstaking examination, extending over
many pages.

Next we come to another important point. Why attribute this massacre
to the Huns? Because there was no other invasion and passage of
savages except that one. It accords, then, both with geographical and
chronological facts. We have the martyrs at Cologne at the very time
when these barbarians came.

But we must needs say something about the Huns. There is no question
that the Huns were the most frightful, cruel, and licentious
barbarians that ever invaded the Roman empire. They were not of a
northern race, Germans or Scandinavians; they were, no doubt, Mongols
or Tartars; they came from Tartary, from Scythia, and settled on the
Caspian sea; they then moved on to the mouths of the Danube, and again
to Hungary, and rolled on in this way toward the richer countries of
the west. There are several authors of that period--Jornandes,
Procopius, and others--who describe them to us.  [Footnote 87] They
tell us that when they were infants their mothers bound down their
noses, and flattened them in such a way that they should not come
beyond the cheek-bones; that their eyes were so sunk that they looked
like two caverns; that they scarified all the lower part of the face
with hot irons when young, so that no hair could grow; that they had
no beard, and were more hideous than demons; that they wore no dress
except a shirt fabricated by the women in the carts in which they
entirely lived; it was never changed, but was worn till it dropped
off, under a mantle made entirely of wild-rat skins. Their chaussure
consisted of kid skins round their legs, with most extraordinary shoes
or sandals, which had no shape whatever, and did not adapt themselves
to the form; the consequence was that they could not walk, and they
fought entirely on their wretched horses. They had no _cuisine_ except
between the saddle and the back of the horse, where they put their
steaks and softened them a little before eating; but as to drink, they
could take any amount of it. With regard to their morality it cannot
be described. The writers of that age tell us that no Roman woman
would allow herself to be seen by a Hun. They were licentious to a
degree, and they carried off all the women they could into captivity;
probably they destroyed a great many; which was their custom when they
became a burden to them. These, then, were the sort of savages that
reached Cologne.

  [Footnote 87: Ammianua Marcellinus, lib. xxxi., cap. ii. ]

They had another peculiarity; of all the hordes of savages that
invaded the Roman empire, they are the only ones that used the bow and
arrow. The Germans hardly made any use of the bow, except a few men
who mixed in the ranks; as a body their execution was with the sword,
the lance, and the pike. The use of the bow was distinctly Tartar, or
Scythian. Then we are told that their aim from horseback was
infallible; that when flying from a foe they could turn round and
shoot with perfect facility; that they rode equally well astride or
seated sideways like a woman; in fact that they flew and turned just
like the Parthians and Scythians from whom they were descended. In
this great battle of Catalaunia they either lost heart or steadiness,
and they could not fire upon their enemies, so that they were pursued
and tremendously routed. That their mode of fighting was by the bow
and arrow, you {446} will see in the representations given in the
beautiful shrine at Hamelink, where the martyrs are fired into by the
barbarians with bows and arrows. Let us see what this has to do with
our question. The "Regnante Domino," which we have mentioned as
legendary, gives a most beautiful description of the mode of dealing
with the bodies. The writer says that when the inhabitants saw that
the enemy were gone they came out, and in a field they found this
great number of virgins lying on the ground. They collected their
blood, got sarcophagi, or made graves, and put them in; "and there
they lay, as they were placed," the writer says, "as any one can tell
who has seen them," evidently suggesting that he had seen them. Now,
in the year 1640, on July 2, Papebroch, an authority beyond all
question, and Crombach, whose word may be relied on as that of a most
excellent and holy man, were at the opening of the tombs. From all
tradition this was no doubt the place of the stone of Clematius; there
has always been a convent there; and you remember that part of the
inscription which threatens eternal punishment to those who should
bury any but virgins there. It is now called "St. Ursula's Acker," a
sort of sacred field where the basilica was. Here they were buried,
and so they remained undisturbed except by some translations of the
middle ages, which do not concern us. In 1640 there was a formal
exhumation, and eye-witnesses tell us what they saw. A nuncio came
afterward to verify the facts.

I will give you the account of how these bodies were found. Many of
them were in graves, in rows, but each body separate, there being a
space of a foot between them. In other places there were stone
sarcophagi in which they were laid separately. Then Crombach describes
that there were some large fosses, sixty feet long, eight feet deep,
and sixteen wide, containing a large number of bodies. They were
placed in a row with a space between them; at their feet was another
row; then a quantity of earth was thrown on, and another row was
placed, and so on, until you came to the fourth. Every skeleton in the
three rows was entire, and they all looked toward the east. They had
their arms crossed upon their bosoms, and almost every one had a
vessel containing blood, or sand tinged with blood. The fourth, or
upper stratum, consisted of disjointed bones, and with these also
there were vessels containing blood or colored sand. In this way, the
writer says, he saw a hundred bodies. Then there was this remarkable
circumstance about their clothes. Eutychianus,  [Footnote 88] the
pope, had published a decree that no body of a martyr was ever to be
buried without having a dalmatic put upon it; and clothes in abundance
were found upon these bodies.

  [Footnote 88: _Acta SS._ Bolland. Octob., tom, ix., p. 139.
  _Constant. Rom. Pont. Epist._ Paris, 1721, p. 299. ]

Another important discovery was, that immense quantities of arrows
were found mingled with the bones; some sticking in the skull, others
in the breast, others in the arms--right in the bones. So it was clear
that all these bodies had been put to death by means of arrows, and
there was no other tribe but the Huns which made use of the arrow as
its instrument of death. I may add that there were no signs of
burning, or of any heathen burial about them. This also is most
important. I have said that there had been other exhumations in the
eleventh and twelfth centuries. There are pictures of these, and there
are sarcophagi preserved in which bodies were found. These are laid in
exactly the same manner as others were found in 1640. Crombach says
the whole had been done most scientifically, that the distances were
all arranged by measure, so that there was not a quarter of a foot
difference anywhere.

Now, I ask, could these bodies have been put there in consequence of a
plague, or an earthquake, or any event of that kind? Putting aside the
arrows found in immense quantities, and the {447} vessels containing
blood, we know that when people die in a plague to the number of
hundreds, a foss is made, and they are thrown in, and there is an end
of them. This could not have been a common cemetery. It contained
nothing but the bodies of these women (I will speak of their physical
characteristics later), all laid in studied order, with great care,
and with such peculiarities, and all evidently buried at the same
time. After reading all this, may we not exclaim with St. Ambrose, "We
have found the signs of martyrdom," and with St. Gaudentius, "What can
you desire more to show that they were all martyred?"   [Footnote 89]
And who does not see here confirmed the history of Clematius?
Comparing the whole with traditions, both English and German, it seems
to me that you have as much proof as you can reasonably require.

  [Footnote 89: S. Ambros., class, i., epist. xxii Ed Ben., tom, iii.,
  p. 927. S. Gaud., _Serm. in Dedic. SS. XL. Martyr_, ap. Migne, tom,
  xx., col. 963.]

Having given you concisely the facts and corroborations of history,
let me now proceed to answer objections.

And, first there is the question, Were all these martyrs? Well, if
they were to be tried by the rules established very justly in the
modern Church, it would no doubt be difficult to say; because how can
you prove that each of these women laid down her life voluntarily for
Christ? The tradition of Cologne is that they would not sacrifice
their virtue to those heathens, and that they were surrounded and
shot. But in those times a wider meaning was sometimes attached to the
word "martyr." There were what are called _martyres improprie dicti_,
where there could not be the same kind of evidence as in the case of
others; or _martyres latiore sensu_. A person was called a martyr when
he was put to death without his will being consulted, as in the case
of our own St. Edmund, and in the case of St. Wenceslaus, who was put
to death without being interrogated as to whether he would remain a
Christian or not, and many others. De Buck shows that there was
nothing more common. We have the remarkable case of the Theban
legion--another instance of a large number of men being surrounded and
cut down by soldiers without being questioned as to whether they were
in a state of grace, or whether they were prepared to die. The deed
was done _in odium religionis_, by people who merely looked to the
gratification of their own passions and their desire for revenge. In
those days the question of such persons being martyrs would be a very
simple one, if it were known that they were killed by the Huns in
hatred, as was supposed, of their virginity and because of their
resistance. We have in martyrologies the account of Nicomedia and its
twelve thousand martyrs. De Buck supposes that the number included all
the martyrs of the persecution. And the 6,700 of the Theban legion are
explained in the same way.

The next question is, Were these persons all virgins? Who can know? It
is quite certain that even married persons, when martyred, had
sometimes the title of virgins given to them. Many instances are
supplied by the martyrologies and offices. St. Sabina,  [Footnote
90]for instance, is called a virgin martyr, though she was a married
person. It was considered that martyrdom raised all women to a higher
degree of excellence. There are some curious questions, too, arising,
which would not very well do for a discussion here. It is, however,
sufficiently proved that when there was a great number of virgins, and
others were mixed with them, the nobler title was given to all. Just
as, if you have a great many martyrs and some confessors united, the
title of martyrs is applied to all, as they are included in one
office, each sharing in the glory of martyrdom. The "Sermo in Natali"
expressly tells us that it was not supposed at its early period that
all were virgins, but that there were ladies of all ranks and children
amongst them. Indeed, some remains of children were found.

  [Footnote 90: _Acta SS._ Bolland. Octob., tom, ix., p. 143.]

{448}

Then comes the question, Were there eleven thousand? Certainly not as
all one company. It is supposed, and there appears nothing
unreasonable in it, that when once the rage of the Huns was excited
they would give way to an indiscriminate massacre, and that the eleven
thousand most probably included persons who had sought refuge, perhaps
their own captives, and probably a great number of the inhabitants of
the city.

But does it not seem a frightful number of persons to be massacred?
Not by the Huns. In the year 436 these same Huns slaughtered at once
in Burgundy 30,000 men. They were of the same race, the same family of
men, as Tamerlane, who had 70,000 heads cut off in Ispahan. And the
Turks, when they took the island of Chios, reduced the population of
120,000 to 8,000. So that those slaughters, which to us seem so
fearful, are not to be considered in the same light when occurring in
those times. We have a frightful example in the case of Theodosius and
the inhabitants of Thessalonica. It is said that 15,000 persons were
put to death in the theatre for a simple insult. The most moderate
calculation is that by St. Ambrose, who gives the number as 7,000.
Human life, of course, was not then regarded as by us, especially by
men who devastated whole cities and burned them to the ground. Hence
the difficulty as to the number of persons, including among them not
merely the followers of St. Ursula, but the bulk of the female
inhabitants, is explained.

Another question arises, Were they English, or were there English
amongst them? That is answered unhesitatingly, Yes. All the
traditions, English and German, agree that these ladies had come from
England and sought refuge.

I have mentioned the facilities for emigration, and the way in which
many went out of the country; so that there would be nothing wonderful
in a certain number of British women being at Cologne at that time.
Now there is this curious fact illustrating the subject. Very lately
the Golden Chamber, as it is called, adjoining the church, where the
chief remains are deposited, was visited by Dr. Braubach and Dr. Gortz
of Cologne, Dr. Buschhausen of Ratingen, and others, who examined the
skulls and pronounced them to be Celtic, not German. The Celtic
characteristics, as given by Blumenbach and other writers, are quite
distinct--the chin falls back considerably, the skull is very long,
and the vertex of the head goes far behind--quite distinct from the
Romans or Germans. Moreover, with the exception of ten or fifteen out
of from eighty to a hundred, they were all the bodies of females. Now
all the writers--all that I have seen at least--say that there could
not have been an emigration of some hundreds of women without some
men, some persons to guard them, and these would be with them and
would share their martyrdom. Then, in the next place, they were all
young people, there was no sign of their having died of a plague or
any other casualty, but they appeared to be strong, healthy young
women; which of course, as far as we can judge, verifies the narrative
to the utmost.

I now leave you to judge how very different historical research has
made this legend, as it is called, appear, and how much we have a
right to regard it in a devotional spirit, as the inhabitants of
Germany certainly do. I do not say that there have not been many
exaggerations, false relics, and stories; but critical investigation
enables us to put all these aside, and to sift their evidence. But
certainly we have a strong historical verification of what has been
considered until within the last few years as legendary, not only by
real discoveries which have come to light, but also by a right use of
evidence which before had been overlooked and neglected.

The whole of what I have said relates to events. But my subject
embraces "events and things." The latter part remains untouched, and I
have {449} yet to show how things or objects which have been looked
upon as fabulous have been proved to be real and genuine.

II. I proceed, therefore, to objects which have been, or may be,
easily misrepresented, as if asserted to be what they are not, and
involving an imputation of imposture on the part of those who propose
them to the notice or veneration of Catholics.

I will begin with a rather singular example, but one which, I trust,
will verify the assertion which I have made; and if time permits, I
will multiply the examples by giving two or three other instances.

I do not know whether any of you in your foreign travels have visited
the cathedral of Chartres; I have not seen it myself, but I believe
that it is one of the most noble, most majestic, and most inspiring of
all Gothic buildings on the continent. The French always speak of it
as combining the great effects of a mediaeval church, more perhaps
than any other in their country; and as my address will relate to that
cathedral, I think it is necessary to give a little preliminary
account of it; at the same time warning you that I do not by any means
intend to plunge into the depths of the singular mystery in which the
origin of that cathedral is involved. It takes its rise from a
Druidical cavern which was for some time the only church or cathedral.
Over that the Christians--for the town was early converted to
Christianity--built a church, of course modest, and simple, and poor,
as the early churches of the Christians were; but in this was
preserved, with the greatest jealousy, and with the deepest devotion,
what was called a Druidical image of Our Lady, which was always kept
in the crypt, for it was over the crypt that the church was built. It
was said to have existed there before the building of the church; but
into that part of the history it is not necessary to enter. In the
year 1020 this poor old church was struck by lightning, was set on
fire, and entirely consumed. The bishop at that time was one of the
most remarkable men in the French Church--Fulbert, who has left us a
full account of what was done in his time there. He immediately set to
work to build another church, proposing that it should be perfectly
magnificent according to all the ideas of the age; and to enable him
to do so, he had recourse to our modern practice of collecting money
on all sides. Among others Canute, king of England and Denmark, and
Richard, duke of Normandy, and almost all the sovereigns of the north
contributed largely. The result was the beginning of a very
magnificent church. The singularity of the building was this, that
everybody labored with his hands, not only men, but women, not only
the poor, but the noble. These furnished with their own hands
provisions or whatever was necessary for the workmen. However, after
Fulbert's death, like most undertakings of that class, the work became
more languid; and before it was completed (that was in 1094), the
building, in which there was a great quantity of wood used, was again
burnt to the ground. Well, this time it was determined that there
should be a splendid church, such as had never been seen before; and
here, again, that same plan of working with their hands was adopted to
an extent which, as stated in an account given us by Haymon and one or
two others, seems incredible. The laborers relieved one another day
and night, lighting up the whole place with torches; provisions were
abundantly furnished to all the workmen without their having to move
from their places. In fact, the writer says that you might see
noblemen, not a few, but hundreds and thousands, dragging carts or
drawing materials and provisions; in fact, not resting until, in 1160,
seventy years after the destruction, the church was consecrated; and
there it remains, the grand cathedral church of Chartres at this day.

Now, it may be asked, what was {450} there which most particularly
made Chartres a place of such great devotion, and so attached the
inhabitants to its cathedral that they thus sacrificed their ease and
comfort so many years to build a church worthy of their object? It was
a relic--a relic which had existed for several hundred years at that
time in the church, which made it a place of pilgrimage, and which was
considered most venerable. What was this relic? The name which it has
always borne in the mouths of the simple, honest, and devoted people
of Chartres and its neighborhood, and in fact of all France, is _La
Chemise de la Sainte Vierge_--that is, a tunic which was supposed and
believed to have been worn by the Blessed Virgin, her under-clothing,
and was of course considered most venerable from having been in
contact with her pure virginal flesh. However, you may suppose that
you require strong proof of such a relic at all, and you will remember
that my object is to show how things which may have been doubtful, and
perhaps considered almost incredible, have received great proof and
elucidation by research. I do not pretend to say that in all respects
you can prove the relic: the research to which I allude is modern, but
it may guide us back, may confirm a tradition, may give us strong
reasons in its favor, showing that it has not been received without
good ground, though it may not be able to penetrate the darkness which
sometimes surrounds the beginning of anything in very remote
antiquity. I am not going, then, to prove the relic, but I am going to
show you the grounds on which it had been accepted, and then come to
the modern verification of it.

The history is this. A Byzantine writer of the fourteenth century,
Nicephorus Calixtus,  [Footnote 91] tells us that this very relic was
in the possession of persons in Judaea, to whom it was left by our
Blessed Lady before her death; that it fell, in the course of time,
into the hands of a Jew in Galilee; that two patricians of
Constantinople, Galbius and Candidus, traced it, purchased it, and
took it to Constantinople, where, considering themselves in possession
of a great treasure, they concealed it, and would not let it be known
(this was in the middle of the fifth century); that the Emperor Leo,
in consequence of the miracles which were wrought, and by which this
relic was discovered, in spite of those who possessed it, immediately
entered into negotiations, obtained it, and built a splendid church in
Constantinople expressly to keep it; and that the church so built was
considered as the safety, the palladium as it were, of the city of
Constantinople. He mentions another fact which is important; that is,
that there were at that time in Constantinople three other churches,
each built expressly for the preservation of one relic of our Lady. I
mention these facts for this purpose: there is a very prevalent idea,
I believe among Catholics as well as certainly among Protestants, that
what may be called the great tide of relics came into Europe through
the crusades; that the poor ignorant crusaders, who were more able to
handle a sword than to use their discretion, were imposed upon, and
bought anything that was offered to them at any price, and so deluged
Europe with spurious and false relics. Now, you will observe, that all
that I have been relating is referred to an age quite anterior to the
crusades, or to any movement of the west into the east. It is true
that Nicephorus Calixtus is a comparatively modern writer, but he
could bear testimony to churches that were existing, and tell by whom
they were built. The mere writer of a hand-book can trace out the
history of a church or any other public monument which is before the
eyes of all: but he was not of that character: he was a historian, and
he tells us that there were  [Footnote 92] three churches in
Constantinople, just as we might say that {451} in Rome there is the
church of Santa Croce, built by Constantine to preserve the relics of
the cross. Nobody can doubt that the church was built for the relic,
that the relic was deposited there, and that earth from the Holy Land
was put into its chapel. Monuments like that preserve their own
history. Therefore, when this writer tells us that these churches
existed from that period, we can hardly doubt that he could arrive at
a knowledge of such facts; and at any rate it removes the impression
that these wonderful relics were merely the sweepings, as it were, of
Palestine during a fervent and pious but at the same time ignorant and
unenlightened age.

  [Footnote 91:  _Hist. Eccles._, lib. xv., cap. xxiv.]

  [Footnote 92:  _Hist. Eccles._, lib. xv., cap. xxv., xxvi.]

Thus, we get the history so far. Now, we know that there was no one
who valued relics to such an extent as Charlemagne. We see, by
Aix-la-Chapelle and other places, what exceedingly curious relics he
collected. I am not here to defend them individually, because I do not
know their history; nor is it to our purpose. He was in close
correspondence with the east, from which he received large presents;
for it was very well known what he valued most. There was a particular
reason for this. The Empress Irene at that time (Charlemagne died in
814) wished to have his daughter Rothrude in marriage for her son
Porphyrogenitus, and later offered her own hand to himself.

Many relics existed at the time of this correspondence; and as
presents are now made of Arab horses and China services, so were they
then made of relics, which, if true, monarchs preferred to anything
else. Now, there is every reason to suppose that among the presents
sent by Irene to Charlemagne was this veil or tunic.  [Footnote 93]
There is in the cathedral of Chartres a window expressly commemorating
the passage of this relic from the east to Chartres. Secondly, the
relic, as you will see later, was, up to a few years ago, wrapped in a
veil of gauze, which was entirely covered with Byzantine work in gold
and in silk, which had never been taken off; and it was wrapped up in
it till the last time it was verified. We have every reason to suppose
that it had come from Constantinople, and that it was delivered at
Chartres in that covering. In the third place, it is historical--there
is no question about it, for all chronicles and authorities agree upon
the point--that Charles the Bald, the grandson of Charlemagne, being
obliged to leave Aix-la-Chapelle, in consequence of going to settle in
France, which was the portion of the empire allotted to him, took the
relic away, and deposited it in the cathedral of Chartres. So that, as
far as we can trace a transaction of this sort, there seems to be as
much evidence as would be accepted in respect to the transmission of
any object of a profane character from one country to another. There
is the correspondence of the workmanship; there are the records of the
place; and there is the fact that the relics were brought from
Aix-la-Chapelle, where Charlemagne had collected so many relics that
he had received from Constantinople. Mabillon, who certainly is an
authority in matters of ecclesiastical history, says it would be the
greatest rashness to deny the genuineness of this relic. "Who will
presume to deny that it is real and genuine?" This is in a letter to
the bishop of Blois, in which he is expressly treating the subject of
discerning true relics. Everything so far, therefore, helps to give
authenticity to this extraordinary relic which made Chartres a place
of immense pilgrimage.

  [Footnote 93: See note at p. 455.]

Bringing it down so far, we may ask, what was the common, and we may
say the vulgar, opinion of the people regarding it? It had never been
opened, and was never seen until the end of the last century. The
consequence was, that it was called by the name I have mentioned. It
was represented as a sort of tunic. It was the custom to make tunics
of that form, which were laid upon the shrine and {452} worn in
devotion; they were sent specially to ladies of great rank, and were
so held in veneration that it was the rule, that if any person going
to fight a duel had on one of these chemisettes, as they were called,
he must take it off; as it was supposed his rival had not fair play so
long as he carried it upon him. In giving an account of the building I
forgot to mention the wonderful miracles in connection with the relic
there, which are believed by everybody to have taken place. It is even
on record that the _Chevalier sans peur et sans reproche_ went to
Chartres _pour se faire enchemiser_ before he went to war.

In 1712, we find that the relic was in a cedar case richly ornamented
with gold and jewels--the original case in which it had arrived. The
wood being worm-eaten and crumbling, it was thought proper to remove
and clean it, and put it in some better place. The cedar case had no
opening by which it could in any way be examined, and the bishop of
the time, Mgr. de Merinville, proposed to open it. He chose a jury of
the most respectable inhabitants of the town, clergy and laity, to
assist. The box was unclosed, and the relic was found wrapped up, as I
have said, in the veil of Byzantine work. The veil was not unclosed,
so that they did not see the relic itself. The debris of the box was
swept away, and the relic, as it was, was put into a silver case that
had been prepared; this was locked up, and then deposited in a larger
shrine distinct from all the other relics. The _procès verbal_ still
exists in the archives of Chartres giving an account of all that took
place, from which the account I have given you is taken.

Infidelity was then spreading in France, and, as you may know, a great
deal of ridicule was thrown on this relic. It was said that such a
garment was not worn in those days, that the system of dress was quite
different, and that it was absurd to imagine any article like this.
Now, as no one had seen the relic, there was no way of answering these
reproaches. In 1793, three commissioners came from the French
government, went into the sacristy, and imperiously desired to look at
the relic; it was very richly enshrined, and they intended to carry it
off. The shrine was brought to them, as the _procès verbal_ of the
second examination relates, when they seemed to be seized with a
certain awe, and said, "We will not touch it; let it be opened by
priests." Two priests were ordered to open the box, and they did so.
These men had come prepared to have a good laugh, and scoffing at this
wonderful relic. For antiquarians had been saying that such inward
clothing was not known so early as the first century, but that instead
a long veil used to be wrapped round the body.

Well, they found a long piece of cloth four and a half ells in
length--exactly what had been said should be the proper garment. The
commissioners were startled and amazed, and said, "It is clear that
this is not the relic the people have imagined; perhaps it is all an
imposture." They then cut off a considerable piece and sent it to the
Abbé Barthélemy, author of the "Travels of Anacharsis" and member of
the Institute--a man who had made the customs and usages of antiquity
his study; they did not tell him where it came from, but desired him
to give an opinion of what it might be. He returned this answer: that
it must be about 2,000 years old, and that from the description given
him it appeared to be exactly like what the ladies in the East wear at
this day, and always have worn--that is, a veil which went over the
head, across the chest, and then involved the whole body, being the
first dress worn. I ask, could a verification be more complete than
this? And, recollect, it comes entirely from enemies. It was not the
bishop or clergy that sought it. The relic was in the hands of those
three infidel commissioners, who sent a portion to Paris without
saying or giving any hint of what it was (they {453} wanted to make
out that the whole was an imposture), and the answer was returned
which I have mentioned, and which is contained in the _procès_ in the
archives of the episcopal palace at Chartres. If any one wants to read
the whole history, I refer him to a most interesting book just
published by the curé of St. Sulpice (Abbé Hamon), entitled "Notre
Dame de France, ou Histoire du Culte de la Sainte Vierge en France."
The first volume, the only one out, contains the history of the
dioceses of the province of Paris.

I will proceed to a second popular charge, and it is one the
opportunity of easily verifying which may never occur again. It refers
to the head of St. John the Baptist, or, shall I say, to the three
heads of St. John the Baptist? Because, if you read English travellers
of the old stamp, like Forsyth, you will find that they make coarse
jokes about it. Forsyth, I think, says something about Cerberus; but
more gravely it has been said, that St. John must have had three
heads--one being at Amiens, one at Genoa, and another at Rome; that
at each place they are equally positive in their claims; and that
there is no way of explaining this but by supposing that St. John was
a triceps.

When we speak of a body you can easily imagine that one piece may be
in one place, another in another, a third elsewhere, and so on. That
is the common way in which we say that the bodies of saints are
multiplied; because the Church considers that the place which contains
the head or one of the larger limbs of a saint, or the part in which,
if a martyr, he was killed or received his death-wound, has the right
of keeping his festival and honoring him just as if it had the whole
body. Therefore, in cathedrals and places where festivals are held in
honor of a particular saint, where they have relics, which have
perhaps been sealed up for years, and never examined, they often speak
as if they have the entire body. This is a common practice, and if I
had time I might give you an interesting exemplification of it.
[Footnote 94] Suffice it to say, that according to travellers there
are three heads of St. John. Now as I have said, a body can be
divided, but you can hardly imagine this to be the case with a head.

  [Footnote 94: Since published in _The Month_, "Story of a French
  Officer." (See CATH. WORLD, No. 1.)]

A very interesting old English traveller--Sir John Mandeville--went
into the East very early, and returned in 1366; soon after which,
almost as soon as any books were published, his travels appeared. He
is a very well-known writer. Of course you must not expect that
accuracy in his works which a person would now exhibit who has books
at his command and all the conveniences for travelling. He was not a
profound scholar: he believes almost whatever is told him, so what we
must do is to let him guide us as well as he can, and endeavor to
judge how far he is right. I will read you an extract, then, from Sir
John Mandeville:  [Footnote 95]

  [Footnote 95: "Travels," chap, ix., p. 182. Ed. Bohn.]

"From thence we go up to Samaria, which is now called Sebaste; it is
the chief city of that country. There was wont to be the head of St.
John the Baptist inclosed in the wall; but the Emperor Theodosius had
it drawn out, and found it wrapped in a little cloth, all bloody; and
so he carried it to Constantinople; and the hinder part of the head is
still at Constantinople; and the fore part of the head to under the
chin, under the church of St. Silvester, where are nuns; and it is yet
all broiled, as though it were half burnt; for the Emperor Julian
above mentioned, of his wickedness and malice, burned that part with
the other bones, as may still be seen; and this thing hath been proved
both by popes and emperors. And the jaws beneath which hold to the
chin, and a part of the ashes, and the platter on which the head was
laid when it was smitten off, are at Genoa; and the Genoese make a
great feast in honor of it, and so do the Saracens also. And some men
say that the {454} head of St. John is at Amiens in Picardy; and other
men say that it is the head of St. John the bishop. I know not which
is correct, but God knows; but however men worship it, the blessed St.
John is satisfied."

This is a true Catholic sentiment. Right or wrong, all mean to honor
St. John, and there is an end of it. We could not expect a traveller
going through the country like Sir John, not visiting every place, but
hearing one thing from one and another from another, to tell us the
exact full truth. But we have here two very important points gained.
First, we have the singular fact of the division of the head at all.
We occasionally hear of the head of a saint being at a particular
place, but seldom of a part of a head being in one place and a part in
another. Here we have an unprejudiced traveller going into the East;
he comes to the place where the head of St. John used to be kept, and
he finds there the tradition that it was divided into three parts, one
of which was at Constantinople, one at Genoa, and another at Rome.
Then he adds, "Other people say that the head is at Amiens." So much
Sir John Mandeville further informs us: he mentions the places where
it was reported the head was, telling us that it was divided into
three.

This is a statement worthy of being verified. It was made a long time
ago, and yet the tradition remains the same. It was as well believed
in the thirteenth century in the East, at Sebaste, as it is in Europe
at the present moment.

The church of S. Silvestro in Capite, which many of you remember, is a
small church on the east side of the Corso, entered by a sort of
vestibule: it has an atrium or court, with arches round, and dwellings
for the chaplains; the outer gates can be shut at night so as to
prevent completely any access to the church. The rest is an immense
building, belonging to the nuns, running out toward the Propaganda.
When the republicans in the late invasion got hold of Rome, the first
thing, of course, which they did was to turn out the monks and nuns
right and left, to make barracks; and the poor nuns of S. Silvestro
were ordered to move. The head of St. John is in a shrine which looks
very brilliant, but is poor in reality. I think it is exposed high
beyond the altar, and the nuns kept it in jealous custody in their
house. The republicans sent away the nuns in the middle of the night,
at ten or eleven o'clock, just as they were, with what clothes they
could get made into bundles: there were carriages at the door to send
them off to some other convent, without the slightest warning or
notice. The poor creatures were ordered to take up their abode in the
convent of St. Pudentiana. The only thing they thought of was their
relic, and that they carried with them. The good nuns received them
though late at night, and did what they could to give them good cheer;
they gave up one of their dormitories to them, putting themselves to
immense inconvenience.

When the French came to Rome, they found S. Silvestro so useful a
building for public purposes that they continued to hold it, but
permitted the nuns to occupy some rooms near the church. I was in Rome
while they were still at my titular church, and went to visit the nuns
attached to it. Their guests asked, "Would you not like to see our
relic of St. John?" I said, "Certainly I should; perhaps I shall never
have another opportunity." I do not suppose it had been out of their
house for hundreds of years. There is a chapel within the convent
which the nuns of St. Pudentiana consider a sacred oratory, having a
miraculous picture there, to which they are much attached; and in this
they kept the shrine. On examination I found that there was no part of
the head except the back. It is said in the extract I have read to you
that the front part of the head is at Rome; but it is the back of the
skull merely; the rest is filled up with some stuffing {455} and silk
over it. The nuns have but a third of the head; and the assertion that
they pretend to possess the head, which travellers make, is clearly
false. I can say from my own ocular inspection that it is but the
third part--the back part, which is the most interesting, because
there the stroke of martyrdom fell. I was certainly glad of this
fortunate opportunity of verifying the relic.

Some time afterward I was at Amiens. I was very intimate with the late
bishop, and spent some days with him. One day he said to me, "Would
you wish to see our head of St. John?" "Yes," I replied, "I should
much desire it." "Well," he said, "we will wait till the afternoon;
then I will have the gates of the cathedral closed, that we may
examine it at leisure."

We dined early, and went into the chapel of the Blessed Sacrament,
where the relic was exposed, with candles. After saying prayers, it
was brought, and I had it in my hands; it was nothing but the mask,
the middle and back portions being totally wanting. You could almost
trace the expression and character of the countenance in the bony
structure. It was of the same size and color as the portion which I
had seen at St. Pudentiana; but the remarkable thing about it is that
there are stiletto marks in the face. We are told by Fathers, that
Herodias stabbed the head with a bodkin when she got it into her hand,
and here are the marks of such an operation visible. You could almost
say that you had seen him as he was alive. I have not seen the third
fragment, but I can hardly doubt that it is a portion of the same
head, and that it would comprise the parts, the chin and the jaw,
because there is no lower jaw in the front part, which is a mere mask.
The only other claimant is Genoa, and its relic I have not seen. But
this is exactly the portion allotted by Mandeville to that city. I
have, however, had the satisfaction of personally verifying two of the
relics, each of which comprises a third part of the head, leaving for
the other remainder exactly the place which our old traveller allots
to it.



  Mr. Cashel Hoey, one of our learned contributors, has kindly
  furnished me with a most interesting corroboration of this account.
  It is an extract from the _Revue Archéologique_, new series, Jan.
  1861, p. 36, in a paper by M. Louis Moland, entitled "Charlemagne à
  Constantinople," etc., giving an account of a MS. in the library of
  the Arsenal, anterior to the thirteenth century.

  The following is the account of the relic which the emperor is
  stated to have brought from Constantinople to Aix-la-Chapelle:

  "Li empereres prist les saintuaires tot en disant ses orisons, si
  les mist en eskerpes (_écharpes_) totes de drap de soie et si les
  enporta molt saintement avoec lui trosqu Ais la Capele en l'eglise
  Nostre Dame qu'il avoit ediflie. Là fu establis par l'apostolie (_Le
  Pape_) et par les archevesques et les evesques as pelerins li grans
  pardons, qui por Deu i venoient. Oiés une partie des reliques, que
  li empereres ot aportées: il i fu la moitiés de la corone dont
  Nostre Sires fu coronés des poignans espines. Et si i ot des claus
  dont Nostre Sires fu atachiés en la crois al jor que li Jui le
  crucifierent. Et si i ot de la vraie crois une pieche et del suaire
  Nostre Segnor, _O le chemise Nostre Dame._"

----

{456}

From The Month.

MADAME SWETCHINE AND HER SALON.


The _salons_ of Paris form a distinctive feature of French society.
Nowhere else is the same thing exactly to be found. Frenchwomen have a
peculiar gift for conversation, due in a great measure to their
graceful language, with its delicate shades of expression. We are
prone to smile at French sentimentality, or to apply their own word
_verbiage_, prefacing it with _unmeaning_. But when the epithet does
truly fit, it is because the real thing has been abused, not because
it does not exist. Conversation in France is cultivated as an art,
just the same as epistolary style: both form an important branch of
female education. When the soil is bad, the attempt at culture only
betrays more clearly native poverty; in other words, a mind of little
thought or taste becomes ridiculous in straining after the expression
of what it can neither conceive nor feel. But when a well-informed and
cultivated intelligence blossoms into keen appreciation of the
beautiful, no language so delicately as French conveys minute shades
of thought and feeling. 'Tis not repetition, then, but variety; and
when such an instrument is handled with feminine tact, perfection in
its kind is achieved.

No wonder that _salons_ are exclusively French from the days of Julie
de Rambouillet down to Madame Récamier. No wonder at the influence
exercised by a woman who really has a _salon_. Few, very few, arrive
at this result. Thousands may receive; hundreds glitter in the gay
world of fashion, renowned for beauty, wit, good dressing, or good
parties; two or three at most in a century are the presiding spirits
of their social circles, and that is what constitutes having a
_salon_. No one quality alone will do it; a combination is required;
not always the same, but one or two together, whichsoever, attracting
sympathy and producing influence. Influence--the effect, not the
quality itself--can never be absent.

Strangers settling in Paris have had their _salon_; but we do not know
that they could transport it with them to any other atmosphere. Beside
Madame Récamier--whose rare beauty, joined to her goodness and her
tact, helped to form her _salon_--two other women in our day, or just
before it, have been the leading stars of their circles. Others, no
doubt, there are; but the names of these three have escaped beyond
Paris. Strange to say, two are foreigners, and both of these Russians.
Except, however, as regards country and influence, no comparison can
of course be established between the Princess Lieven and Madame
Swetchine. One sought and gained a political object; the other
accepted circumstances, and found them fame.

Madame Swetchine was already thirty-four years of age when she arrived
in Paris. She had no beauty, and no pretensions to wit; indeed, her
timidity was such that her expressions were always obscure when she
began to speak; and it was only by degrees, as she went on, that she
gathered confidence, and then her language flowed with ease,
betraying, rather than fully revealing, the deep current of thought
beneath. Still her advantages were many. As regards outward
circumstances, she possessed good birth and high position; her manners
were such as the early culture of a polished court bestows; she was
accustomed to wield a large fortune, and to hold a prominent place in
the social world. These were advantages that might be fairly set
against the absence of beauty, wondrous as is that charm: beside, her
person was not unpleasing. Though {457} small, she was graceful in her
motions; despite little blue eyes, rather irregular, and a nose of
Calmuck form, her face wore a soft kindly expression that attracted
sympathy. Her complexion was remarkably fresh and clear.

But Madame Swetchine possessed innate qualities of heart and mind of
the rarest description, that only unfolded themselves gradually the
more closely she could be observed. Unlike mankind in general, the
better she was known, the more was she beloved and admired. Her
intelligence of richly-varied powers had been carefully cultivated;
what she acquired in youth, with the aid of masters, had been since
matured by her own unceasing study, and by reading of the most
widely-discursive character. Not only was she familiar with ancient
and modern literatures, perusing them in their originals, but she also
conversed fluently in all the languages of Europe. Her imagination,
enthusiastic and wild almost, as belongs to the north, successfully
sought for outpourings, both in music and painting. By a strange
combination, no natural quality of mind was more remarkable in Madame
Swetchine than her good sense: the only feature that shone above it
was her eminent gift of piety.

But virtues, and particularly religious virtues, proceed from the
heart quite as much as from the intelligence; often, indeed, far more
especially. Madame Swetchine possessed the warmest feelings, a nature
both loving and expansive. As daughter, wife, and friend she evinced
rare devotion; but the sentiment and thought that most filled heart
and mind was undoubtedly her love for God.

What a rich assemblage of qualities is here! how strange that they
should go to make up a Parisian woman of fashion! Such, however, in
its most usual acceptation, Madame Swetchine never was: she never
mingled in the light brilliant world; but she did form the centre of
attraction to a large circle she had her _salon_.

General Swetchine, deeply wounded by the emperor, who lent too ready
credence to unfounded reports whispered against so faithful a subject,
would not stoop to justify himself, but quitted Russia in disgust,
accompanied by his wife. When they reached Paris, in the spring of
1816, Louis XVIII. was on the throne of France. Madame Swetchine found
now restored to their high positions those friends of her youth whom
as exiles she had known and loved at St. Petersburg. Her place was
naturally amongst them; new intimacies were soon added to the old. The
Duchesse de Duras, authoress of _Ourika_, and friend of Madame de
Staël, gained a strong hold on her affections. Yet it did not seem at
first as if Madame Swetchine were destined to so much influence in
French society. Modesty made her reserved. Madame de Staël had been
invited to meet her at a small dinner-party; and Madame Swetchine,
though seated opposite, was intimidated, and allowed the meal to pass
over without speaking or scarcely raising her eyes. Afterward Madame
de Staël came up and said, "I had been told that you desired my
acquaintance; was I misinformed?" "By no means," was the reply; "but
it is customary for royalty to speak first." Such was the homage she
paid to genius.

At first it had seemed uncertain how long General and Madame Swetchine
might remain absent from Russia; but after the lapse of a few years
they took up their definite residence in Paris. Their hotel, Rue St.
Dominique, was hired on a long lease, and fitted up as a permanent
abode. They sent for their pictures and other articles from St.
Petersburg. The general occupied the ground-floor; Madame Swetchine
took the rooms above. Her apartments consisted of a _salon_ and a
library commanding an extensive view of gardens. Here it was that her
friends used to assemble; not many at a time, but successively. She
never gave _soirées_, and her dinner-parties consisted of a few
intimates round a small table. Her hours for {458} reception were
every day from three till six, and then from nine till midnight.
Debarred by her health from paying visits, she contented herself with
receiving in this manner; and for thirty years a continuous stream of
persons was for ever passing on through her rooms. She had not sought
to form it; but there was her _salon_, and one of a peculiar
character.

Two features distinguished it: the religious tone that prevailed, and
the absence of party spirit. Madame Swetchine herself was eminently
religious, and she had a large way of viewing all things. Her
influence, though partly moral and intellectual, was ever chiefly
religious; and she gave that presiding characteristic to the
atmosphere around. So long as faith and morality were not attacked,
all other points she considered secondary, and admitted the widest
diversity of opinion on them. Her own views on all subjects were
firmly held, and she expressed them with freedom. There could be no
mistake about it. In religion she was a strict Catholic, and in
philosophy Christian; in politics she preferred a liberal monarchy;
but far from seeking to give that color to her salon, she would not
allow any friend holding the same views to try to impose them on
others. This was equally the case in matters of art and taste; she
tolerated nothing exclusive; but the principle is much more difficult
to be followed out when applied to politics, which involve interests
of such magnitude, appealing to all the passions, and especially in
such an excitable atmosphere as that of Paris. Nothing better shows
Madame Swetchine's tact and gentleness of temper than her intimacies
with men of such different stamps, and the way in which she made them
to a certain extent amalgamate. But the above qualities would have
failed to do it, had their spring been a worldly one; hers flowed
truly from the Christian charity with which her whole soul was full.
In this she and her _salon_ were unique.

She lived to see two great revolutions in France: the one of 1830, and
that which substituted the republic for Louis Philippe, ending with
the empire. Members of all these _régimes_ were among her visitors.
Ministers of state under the Restoration, those who embraced the
Orleans cause, men belonging to the republican government, ambassadors
from most of the foreign courts in Europe; all these in turn enjoyed
her conversation, some her esteem or affection, according to the
degrees of intimacy and sympathy. Her own feelings, as well as
convictions, lay with legitimists; but others were no less welcomed,
and some of various parties were highly valued. True, however, to
religion, she never gave her friendship to men not devoted to the
interests of the Church. Her great object was to do good to souls, but
in a quiet, unostentatious, womanly way; gently leading to virtue,
never inculcating it. This of course became more exclusively her
province as she grew older.

She was truly liberal in all her sentiments; not assuredly from
indifference, but through a large philosophy of spirit that allowed
for diversities of opinion in all things not essential. At the same
time her own convictions were unflinchingly avowed, as well as her
ideas and tastes in smaller matters.

The men with whom she was most intimate have all more or less been
known to fame, and are eminent also for their religious spirit. We
might begin a list with Monsieur de Maistre at St. Petersburg, when
she was but twenty-five; then following her to Paris, see her make
acquaintance with his friend Monsieur de Bonald; exercise maternal
influence over MM. de Falloux, de Montalembert, and Lacordaire; and
finally wind up with Donoso Cortès, the Marquis de Valdegamas, Prince
Albert de Broglie, and Alexis de Tocqueville.

Each one of the distinguished personages above has figured prominently
on the great stage, more or less renowned in politics and letters, and
{459} always holding a high moral character. It may seem fastidious to
recall their titles to fame. In our day, when all are acquainted with
continental literature, who is not familiar with the witty author of
the _Soirées de St. Pétersbourg_, although it be permitted somewhat to
ignore the rather dry philosophical works of his friend de Bonald?
Monsieur de Falloux, with filial love, has raised a monument to Madame
Swetchine that will endure beside his life of Pope Pius V., and
jointly with the remembrance of his political integrity. Who that has
followed the late history of Europe does not know Donoso Cortès, the
great orator, whose famous three discourses in the Spanish chambers
instantaneously reached so far and wide, whose written style is the
very music of that rich Castilian idiom, and whose liberal political
views kept pace with his large Catholic heart? Soeur Rosalie and
Madame Swetchine together soothed his dying hours. The author of _La
Démocratic en Amérique_ has been indiscreetly praised, but none can
deny his ability, Prince Albert de Broglie, _doctrinaire_ in his
views, still advocates with talent the cause of religion and of
constitutional monarchy. These two latter were among the latest
acquisitions to Madame Swetchine's salon.

MM. de Montalembert and de Falloux were like her sons; she knew them
from their early manhood, called them by their Christian names, loved
and counselled them as any mother might. But if her influence over
them was so salutary, we cannot help admiring most the unswerving
attachment of these young men to her; Madame Swetchine's letters show
her expostulating with Comte de Montalembert, then little past twenty,
and endeavoring to convince him he is wrong. He will not yield; but
acknowledges afterward the justness of her views, and allows now these
letters to be published. Alfred de Falloux is _the son_ sent for when
danger seems impending; he tends her dying couch in that same _salon_
where he had so often and for so many years _walked_ with her
conversing; to him she confides her papers and last wishes.

The celebrated Père Lacordaire was very dear to her; and she certainly
acted the part of a mother toward him. Monsieur de Montalembert
presented him to her when Abbé Lacordaire was but twenty-eight, and
quite unknown. His genius--which she immediately discerned--and his
ardent soul interested her wonderfully. Soon after he became
connected, through Abbé de Lamennais, with the journal _L'Avenir;_ by
his own generous and oft-repeated avowal she kept him from any
deviation at this trying moment. "You appeared to me as the angel of
the Lord," writes he, "to a soul floating between life and death,
between earth and heaven."

Nor was this the only time. Her letters show her following him with
breathless interest through his chequered career, and assuring him of
her warm undying friendship, "so long as he remains faithful to God
and his Church."

And this was a beautiful affection, whichever side we view it. For
more than twenty years it lasted; that is, for the rest of her life.
The ardent young man is seen with the erratic impulses of his glowing
intellect, yet docile to the motherly admonitions of his old friend;
and by degrees, as time mellows him somewhat--though it never could
subdue nature altogether--he sinks into a calmer strain, still asking
advice, and taking it, with language more respectful, though not a
whit less tender. Madame Swetchine brought to bear on him a species of
idolatry; she admired his genius to excess, and loved his fine nature
as any doting parent might; but these sentiments never rendered her
blind to his faults; and she constantly blended reproof with
admiration, while strenuously endeavoring to keep him ever in the most
perfect path. She had the satisfaction of seeing him, ere she departed
this life, safely anchored in a religious order, and the Dominicans
fairly re-established in France; one of her pre-occupations on her
death-bed, after bidding him adieu, was to secure {460} that his
letters should be one day given to the public. For thus she knew he
would be better appreciated.

Other names of men well-known in the Parisian world of letters, or for
their deeds of charity, might here be added as having adorned her
_salon_. There was the Vicomte de Melun, connected with every good
work (literary or other) in the French capital; and her two relatives,
Prince Augustin Galitzin and Prince (afterward Père) Gagarin. The
former still writes; the latter, erst a gay man of fashion and then
metamorphosed into a zealous Jesuit, is now devoting his missionary
labors to Syria.

And lastly may be named one who, though he never mingled in the world
of her _salon_, yet visited Madame Swetchine and esteemed her greatly.
Père de Ravignan presided at one time in her house over meetings of
charitable ladies, who were afterward united with the Enfants de Marie
at the convent of the Sacré Coeur.

Nor were her friendships exclusively confined to men. Madame Swetchine
had not that foible into which many superior women fall of affecting
to despise their own sex; and which always shows that they innately,
unconsciously often, separate their individual selves from all the
rest of womankind as alone superior to it. Hers was a larger view: she
loved _souls_; and "souls," says one of her aphorisms, "have neither
age nor sex." When shall we in general begin to live here as we are to
do for ever hereafter?

She had had her early friendships in Russia, and most passionate they
were; too girlish in their romantic enthusiasm, too wordily tender in
expression; but time mellowed these affections, without wearing them
out. The two principal women-friends of her youth in Russia, after her
sister, were Roxandre Stourdja, a Greek by birth, afterward Comtesse
Edlinz, and the Comtesse de Nesselrode. Both of these in later years
visited her Paris salon. But she also formed several new French
intimacies. Her grief for the loss of Madame de Duras, when death
deprived her of that friend, was a little softened by her warm
sympathy for the two daughters left, Mesdames de Rauzan and de la
Rochejacquelain. If she saw most of the former, the latter had for
Madame Swetchine a second tie through her early marriage with a
grandson of the Princesse de Tarente, whom Madame Swetchine had so
revered in her girlish days at St. Petersburg. Both the Duchesse de
Rauzan and Comtesse de la Rochejacquelain were very beautiful; and
Madame Swetchine dearly loved beauty, especially when combined, as in
them, with grace and elegance, cleverness and piety. For both the
sisters were remarkable: one had more fascinating softness united with
good sense; the other was more witty and brilliant. The last
country-house visited by Madame Swetchine shortly before her death was
the chateau de Fleury, belonging to Madame de la Rochejacquelain,
where we read that she loved to find still mementos of the Princesse
de Tarente.

Madame Swetchine was very intimate with Madame Récamier, her
fellow-star as leader of a contemporary _salon_. She greatly prized
her worth. Another friend much loved was the Comtesse de Gontant
Biron, in youth eminent for her beauty, and always for her many
virtues. Among younger women distinguished by Madame Swetchine were
Mrs. Craven, née la Ferronaye; the Princess Wittgenstein, lovely as
clever, a Russian by birth, and a convert to the Catholic Church; and
quite at the last period, the Duchess of Hamilton.

She was always partial to youth, taking a warm interest in anything
that might minister to the welfare or pleasures of that age. Thus she
liked the young women of her acquaintance to be well dressed, and
would admire their taste or try to improve it, even in that respect,
with perfectly motherly solicitude. Those going to balls frequently
stopped on their way to show their toilettes to Madame Swetchine; and
not seldom, too, they would {461} return in the morning to ask advice
on graver matters, or to display the progress of their children. The
good Madame Swetchine did to persons of the world by quiet friendly
counsel is incalculable; she never spared the truth when she thought
it could be of use, and as she had great perspicacity, she was not
often deceived. Beside, her natural penetration became yet keener, not
only by long experience, but also by the numerous confidences she
received from the many souls in a measure laid bare before her. M. de
Falloux has well said that she "possessed the science of souls, as
_savants_ do that of bodies." However one might be pained at what she
said, it was impossible to feel wounded; her manner was so kind, and
her rectitude of intention so evident. And thus did she render her
_salon_ useful: living in public, as it might appear, surrounded
chiefly by the great ones of earth, her thought was yet ever with God,
and she positively worked for him day by day without even quitting
those few rooms. Nay, so completely is Madame Swetchine identified
with her _salon_ for those who knew her through any part of the thirty
years spent in Paris, that it is difficult for our idea to separate
her from it.

Even materially speaking she seldom left it. With a simplicity that
seems strange indeed to our English notions, she caused her little
iron bedstead to be set up every night in one of her reception-rooms;
each morning it was doubled up again and consigned to a closet. During
her last illness it was just the same; she lay in her _salon_, the
only difference being that then the bed remained permanently. Not an
iota else was changed in the aspect of her apartment; no table was
near the sick-couch with glass or cup ready to hand; what she wanted
in this way she signed for to a deaf-and-dumb attendant, Parisse,
whose grateful eyes were ever fixed upon her benefactress, to divine
or anticipate what might be wished. And there, too, she died.

To us with our exclusive family feelings, or indeed to the general
human sentiment that courts the utmost privacy for that solemn closing
scene, there is something which jars in the account of Madame
Swetchine's last days on earth. Doubtless all the consolations of
religion were there to hallow her dying moments; she continued to the
last to devote long hours to prayer; and by an enviable privilege she
possessed a domestic chapel blessed with the perpetual presence of the
Blessed Sacrament; but what strikes us strangely is, that her _salon_
had chanced to remain open while extreme unction was being
administered; and so, as it was her usual reception hour, the few
friends in Paris at that season (September) continued to drop in one
by one, and kneeling, each new-comer behind the other, prayed with and
for her. Those last visitors were Père Chocarn, prior of the
Dominicans; Père Gagarin; Mesdames Fredro, de Meyendorf, and Craven;
Messieurs de Broglie, de Falloux, de Melun, and Zermolof. But the
_strange_ feeling we cannot help experiencing must be reasoned with.
Her _salon_ and her friends were to Madame Swetchine home and family.

And now it might seem that nothing more could be said of her; but, in
truth, a very small portion has yet been expressed. Beside the six
hours devoted to reception, the day counted eighteen more. There were
religious duties to be performed, and home duties no less imperative;
there were the poor to be visited, and there were the claims of study,
which Madame Swetchine never neglected up to the latest period of
existence. All these calls upon her time were recognized by
conscience, and therefore duly responded to. Madame Swetchine was, of
course, an early riser; by eight or nine o'clock she had heard mass,
visited her poor, and was ready to commence the business of the day.

After breakfast, an hour or two were devoted to General Swetchine, who
liked her to read to him. During the {462} last fifteen years of his
life, and his death only preceded hers seven years, he had become so
deaf as to enjoy general society but little; but he would not allow
her to give up her receptions on that account, as she wished to do.
The rest of the morning was employed in study with strictly closed
doors, only opened to cases of misfortune, and these Madame Swetchine
never considered as intrusions. Her confidential servant knew it well,
and did not scruple to disturb her when real want or sorrow begged for
admittance. Her persevering love of study is well illustrated by her
own assurance, but a few months before her death, that even then she
never sat down to her writing-table without "feeling her heart beat
with joy." She advised Mrs. Craven always to reserve a few morning
hours for study, saying the quality of time was different at that
period of day.

Several hours in the evening were again spent with the general. At
midnight, when all visitors departed, Madame Swetchine retired to
rest; but her repose never lasted much beyond two in the morning.
Painful infirmities made her suffer all day long, and at night
debarred her from sleep. Motion alone brought comparative ease, and
therefore it was that, with intimate friends, she carried on
conversation walking up and down her rooms. At night, suffocation
increased, as also a nervous kind of excitement. It was at these
hours, during the intervals snatched from pain, that she mostly
composed the writings which M. de Falloux has given to the world. No
wonder that they bear the impress of the cross; nor can we marvel that
she speaks feelingly and scientifically of resignation, for good need
had she to practise that. Such were usually her twenty-four hours in
Paris.

If we look back to the past, religion had not always been the guiding
principle with Madame Swetchine. Her father, M. Soymonof, was a
disciple of Voltaire, and he brought her up without any pious
training. She never even repeated morning or evening prayers; simply
attended the imperial chapel as a matter of course. But Voltaire did
not excite her admiration; his infidelity was too cold, his immorality
too coarse; it was Rousseau who charmed her. His passionate language
pleased her imagination, and the pages of _La Nouvelle Héloise_ were
almost entirely transcribed, to be again and again dwelt on. She could
not detect the sophistry beneath. But the first deep sorrow of her
youth taught her prayer, and brought her to the feet of God, never to
abandon him. M. Soymonof was suddenly snatched from his children by
death, and Madame Swetchine, the anguish of this bereavement, turned
to heaven for help and consolation. Another sorrow, the nature of
which we ignore, overtook her at this period; and, to use her own
expression, she "threw herself then into the arms of God with such
enthusiasm as naught else ever awakened."

The first effect was to render her a fervent adherent of Russian
orthodoxy; but her mind was too philosophic to rest long satisfied
with half conclusions. She was struck with the piety of French
Catholics at St. Petersburg; especially the modest merit of the
Chevalier d'Augard won her highest esteem. Finally, after much
voluminous study, and despite the resistance her rebellious spirit
loved to oppose to what she at first called M. de Maistre's "dogmatic
absolutism," she entered the Catholic Church.

The absurd idea that religion renders the heart cold has been too
often refuted to need any comment here. But it may be said that Madame
Swetchine affords another example of how much devotion, by purifying
human feeling, intensifies it also. God had given her a loving nature;
and as her piety deepens with years, so does her tender affection for
family ties, for friends, country, and finally for all the poor,
suffering, helpless ones of earth. Her first great attachment was for
her father, and so her first great sorrow was at his loss; for thus
intimately {463} are love and pain ever conjoined in this world.
Another deep affection of childhood and early youth, extending through
life, was for her sister. Madame Swetchine was quite a mother to this
child, ten years her junior. When she married, she still kept her with
her; and when the young sister also married, becoming the wife of
Prince Gagarin, Madame Swetchine became a mother also to the five boys
who were successively brought into the world. "They are all my
nephews," would she say; "but the two eldest are especially my
children." And well did they respond to the feelings of their aunt,
scarcely separating her from their own parent. When she shut herself
up for study, it was their amusement to try and get her out to play
with them; if she remained deaf to entreaties, the little boys would
besiege her door, making deafening noises with their playthings, until
she mostly yielded and let them in. A very short time before her
death, when Madame Swetchine could hardly sit or speak, she assembled
a large family party of young nephews and nieces, with their
preceptors and governesses, to dine at her house, and was greatly
diverted with their innocent mirth.

There is something disappointing in Madame Swetchine's marriage. The
favor enjoyed by Monsieur Soymonof at court, her own position as
maid-of-honor to the Empress Marie, her birth, fortune, extreme youth,
and many individual qualifications, all alike rendered her a fitting
match for any man in the empire. She certainly could have chosen.
Several asked her hand. Amongst them was Count Strogonof, young, rich,
noble, and talented. But Monsieur Soymonof preferred his own friend
General Swetchine; and Sophie, we are told, accepted with affectionate
deference her father's choice. The general was twenty-five years her
senior, and though a fine military-looking man, with noble
soldier-like feelings, scrupulously honorable, and with much to win
esteem, yet he does not appear the sort of person suited to her ardent
enthusiastic temperament. He possessed qualities fitted to command the
respect of a young wife; but not exactly those that win her to
admiration and love. Wherever honor was not concerned, he lapsed into
his natural apathy: neither intellect nor imagination were by any
means on a par with hers. And the girl of seventeen who prematurely
linked her fate with his was full of romance: nurtured as she had been
by a fond ill-judging father, with Rousseau to guide her opening
thought, her early dreams probably had fed on some chivalrous St.
Preux with whom to course the stream of life. Perhaps she was dreaming
of wedding some stern military personification of the same. What an
awakening there must have been! Was this the second deep sorrow that
clouded her nineteenth summer? Was there a struggle then? Then did she
"fling herself into the arms of God" victorious.

There is no clue to trace aught of this save that which guides to the
usual windings of the human heart. Madame Swetchine was far too nice
in her sense of duty, and far too delicate in feeling, to allow any
such admissions to escape.

The devotion of a life-time was given unreservedly to General
Swetchine. She never knew the happiness of becoming a mother, the tie
that would of all others have been dearest to her heart. But the
general had bestowed paternal affection on a young girl called Nadine
Staeline, and Madame Swetchine also generously insisted on adopting
her. Nadine, welcomed to their roof, was treated by Madame Swetchine
like her own child.

Her attentions to the general continued unremitting. When he quitted
Russia, she accompanied him to Paris; when he was summoned to return,
though condemned to banishment from St. Petersburg and Moscow, she
profited by the respite gained to go alone in her old age and
infirmity to plead his cause herself with the emperor. Nor did she
complain of the illness in Russia that followed such fatigue, for
{464} her suit was granted. Still less did she regret the yet more
serious malady that overtook her on returning to Paris with the glad
tidings that brought such relief to his declining years. He lived to
the age of ninety-two, and her grief at his loss was intense. Then
indeed it was the long companion of a life-time that was taken from
her; and we all know the tender attachment that strengthens with years
between two persons who pass them together, and mutually esteem each
other.

The general, on his part, always showed Madame Swetchine affection
that had gradually become mixed up with a species of veneration.
Though he never thwarted her religious views, he did not himself
embrace them; he liked to see her Catholic friends, even priests, and
especially Père de Ravignan; but remained satisfied with the Greek
Church. Beside her duties as a wife, we have seen Madame Swetchine
embrace those of a mother toward young Nadine. She never slackened in
them until Nadine by her marriage ceased to require their exercise.
Then she contrived to gratify her maternal instincts by undertaking
the charge of Helene de Nesselrode, the daughter of her friend, just
aged fourteen, and whose health demanded a warmer climate than that of
Russia. Nor did she give her up till Helene married.

Faithful to all the sentiments she experienced, and warm in her
friendships, Madame Swetchine's most enthusiastic attachment appears
to have been for Mademoiselle Stourdja. It dated from her early
married life, and continued through the whole of existence. At first
it well-nigh provokes a smile to see how, scarcely parted for a few
hours from her friend, she rushes to her pen, that it may express the
pangs of separation. But girlhood has not passed over, ere thought,
reason, duty, figure largely in the letters of Madame Swetchine. Her
correspondence was extensive, and portrays herself just as she
appeared in daily life--a wise, gentle, and affectionate friend or
counsellor, as circumstances might dictate. Nowhere does this show her
to greater advantage than in the letters--too few, unfortunately--that
we possess from Madame Swetchine to Père Lacordaire. The difference
between the two minds is striking. Her good sense and exquisite
judgment contrast with his fiery impetuosity of thought and feeling;
it is evident that her soul moves in the serene atmosphere of near
union with God; while he, the religious of already some years'
standing, is yet battling with strong human torrents. How gently she
calls him up a higher path, never forgetting her womanhood nor his
priestly character. His tone becomes much more religious; with rare
candor and simplicity he sees and owns past imperfections.

Patriotism was one of her ardent sentiments, and she considered the
feeling as a duty incumbent on women no less than men: of course,
conduct was to be in accordance. Like many Russians, love of country
centred for her in devotion to the sovereign; and of this her letters
afford curious exemplification. She calls Alexander "the hero of
humanity," and, after enumerating his many perfections, rejoices that
this young sage is our emperor! When her husband was harshly summoned
back to Russia, that the disgrace of exile from court might be
inflicted, she exclaims: "God knows that I have never uttered a word
of complaint against my sovereigns, nor so much as blamed them in
heart!" Strange loyalty this to our modern western notions!

Her tender charity toward the poor began to show itself at an early
age. At twenty-five in St. Petersburg she was already the soul of all
good works there: nor did she content herself with merely giving alms,
nor even with seeking to promote moral improvement; her ingenious
kindness displayed itself also in endeavouring to procure pleasure or
innocent amusements. She took flowers to those she visited, or tried
to adorn their rooms with pictures. The {465} friendless deaf-and-dumb
girl whom she had adopted became her constant attendant; and Madame
Swetchine bore with her violence of temper until the defect was partly
overcome.

She undertook the charge of a poor boy at Vichy, because his many
maladies and their repulsive nature rendered him an object almost of
disgust. Each summer that she returned there, he was among the first
to greet her, sure of the kindest welcome. For years all his wants
were supplied at her expense; and when he died, she said he had now
become her benefactor.

To know Madame Swetchine thoroughly, her writings must be read. They
were never meant for publication, but are either self-communings, or
thoughts poured out before God. Some of her aphorisms are touchingly
delicate in sentiment.

"Loving hearts are like paupers; they live on what is given them."

"Our alms form our sole riches, and what we withhold constitutes our
real poverty."

Her prayers and meditations may be used with advantage for spiritual
reading. Her unfinished treatise on Old Age is very beautiful; but
more exquisite still is that more complete one on Resignation. Any
passage chosen at random would show elevated thought.

"The first degree of submission produces respectful acquiescence to
God's will; then this sentiment becomes transformed into a pious and
sincere acceptation full of confidence; until confidence itself
gradually acquires a filial character."

"Faith," she says, "makes resignation reasonable, and hope renders it
easy."

"The love of God draws us away from our long love of self."

"Patience is so near to resignation, that it often seems one and the
same thing."

She acknowledges that the hardest trials of resignation are found in
those misfortunes irreparable here on earth. Such are death, old age,
physical infirmity, loss of worldly honor, final impenitence. But the
death of those we love, she says, may be deeply mourned in the midst
of resignation; and our own certain death affords not only a
counterbalance to such affliction, but also to the other evils of
life. Old age is a halt between the world overcome, and eternity about
to begin. Physical infirmities make us live in the atmosphere of the
gospel beatitudes; we are then truly the poor ones of Christ, or
rather poverty itself. The world sometimes forgets, but never pardons;
what matters, provided virtue remain unscathed, or that it be restored
through repentance?

"Suffering teaches us how to suffer; suffering teaches us how to live;
suffering teaches us how to die."

And here we take our leave of this remarkable woman, who offers such a
bright example to our generation.

----

{466}

From The Dublin Review.

RECENT IRISH POETRY.

_Lays of the Western Gael and other Poems_. By SAMUEL FERGUSON.
London: Bell & Daldy. 1865.



_Poems_. By SPERANZA (LADY WILDE). Dublin: Duffy. 1864.


_Laurence Bloomfield in Ireland_. A modern Poem. By WILLIAM ALLINGHAM.
London: Macmillan &Co. 1864.


_Inisfail, a Lyrical Chronicle of Ireland_. By AUBREY DE VERE. Dublin:
Duffy. 1864.


In the palmy days of Young Ireland, its writers and speakers were
particularly prone to the quotation of that strange saying of Fletcher
of Saltoun: "If a man were permitted to make all the ballads, he need
not care who should make the laws of a country." It has been the
destiny of Young Ireland to make and to administer the laws of other
countries than that for which its hot youth hoped to legislate. But it
has certainly left Ireland a legacy of excellent ballads. A glance at
the fortunes of some of the more prominent members of this brilliant
but ill-fated party, as they present themselves to view at this
moment, suggests curious contrasts and strange reflections. Mr. Gavan
Duffy, who was assuredly the source of its noblest and wisest
inspirations, after having within ten years occupied high office in
three Victorian ministries, and laid the impress of his organizing
genius deep on the constitutional foundations of that most rising of
the Australian states, is on his way home from Melbourne for a brief
European vacation. Mr. John Mitchel,  [Footnote 96] who represented
the more violent and revolutionary section of Young Ireland, was,
before the American war commenced, editor of the _Richmond Enquirer_,
one of the most extreme organs of secession, and afterward visited
Paris with the hope of inducing the Emperor Napoleon to invade
Ireland; but since the war was declared, he has resumed his post at
Richmond--sometimes writing articles that are supposed more
particularly to forecast President Davis's policy; sometimes serving
in the ranks of General Lee's army as the driver of an ambulance
wagon. His eldest son fired the first shot that struck Fort Sumter,
and afterward was himself struck at the heart in its command by a
northern bullet. Mitchel's favorite lieutenant, Devin Reilly, on the
other hand, died in office at Washington, and his illness was
attributed at the time to over-fatigue in one of the earliest of those
great electioneering contests in which the supremacy of Mr. Lincoln
finally came to be established over Mr. Stephen Douglas, "the little
giant of the west," and the only man, in Mr. Reilly's ardent
conviction, who could have saved the American Union. Mr. D'Arcy McGee,
whose character bore to that of Devin Reilly about the same relation
as Mr. Duffy's did to that of Mr. Mitchel, is at present a leading
member of the executive council of Canada, and (the Duke of Newcastle
was of opinion) the ablest statesman of British America; in proof of
which it may suffice to say, that the project of the Canadian
confederation was in a great degree originated and elaborated by him.
The handsome young orator, whose fiery eloquence surpassed in its
influence on an Irish audience in the Rotunda even the most brilliant
effects of Sheil at the old Catholic Association, is now to be
recognized in a bronzed and war-worn soldier, under {467} the style
and title of Major-General Thomas Francis Meagher, of the United
States army, commanding a division, which, after Sherman commenced his
marvellous march on Savannah, was sent forward to hold the southern
section of Tennessee, and was last heard of in camp at Chattanooga.
One of this orator's favorite disciples, Eugene O'Reilly, holds an
equivalent rank; but his line of service has lain not in America, but
in Asia--his allegiance is not to the President Abraham Lincoln, but
to the Sultan Abdul Aziz; he is known to all true believers under the
style of O'Reilly Bey, one of the earliest of the Christian officers
who took rank under the Hatti Hamayoun; and his sword's avenging
justice was freely felt among the Mohammedan mob who horrified
Christendom five years ago by the massacres of Syria. What region of
the earth is not full of the labors of this party, sect, and school of
all the Irish talents, of whom may well be sung the antique Milesian
elegy, to which their prophet and guide gave words that complain "they
have left but few heirs of their company?"  [Footnote 97] The rabid
violence and the underbred vulgarity of style which belong to so many
of the Irish Nationalist party of the present day, are all unlike even
the errors of Young Ireland. That party, though it tragically failed
in fulfilling its hopes at home, has at all events justified its
ambition abroad; and it was always and everywhere singularly true to
its ideas. Scattered as it is, broken, and often apparently divided
against itself, its members have not failed to yield loyal, valiant,
and signal service to whatever cause they espoused or country they
adopted. Its poets have had a principal hand in framing the
constitutions of states manifestly destined to future greatness. Its
orators have led forlorn hopes against fearful odds; and, whether in
the marshes of the Chickahominy or in Syrian defiles, have not known
how to show their backs to the enemy. It would be easy to trace over a
far wider range the fortunes of its members since the great emigration
that scattered them in the years that followed their catastrophe in
'48. It is possible any day to find a Young Irelander, who at a more
or less brief period after Ballingarry _abiit, evasit, erupit_, in the
red baggy breeches of the Zouave, or in judicial crimson and ermine at
the antipodes; in the black robe of a Passionist father or the silk
gown of a queen's counsel; surveying a railroad in Dakotah, or
organizing brigands in Sicily; helping in some subordinate way the
Emperor Maximilian to found the Mexican empire, or on the high road to
make himself a Yellow Button at Peking. As for American generals north
and south, and colonial law-givers east and west, their names are
legion and the legion's name very much begins with Mac or O'. May they
make war and law to good advantage! It was not given to them to make
either for Ireland; but, if Fletcher of Saltoun was a wise man in his
generation, they in theirs have left their country a far more precious
heritage.

  [Footnote 96: Our American readers need hardly be reminded that some
  of the biographical statements which follow are very wide of the
  truth.--Ed. C. W.]

  [Footnote 97: _As truagh gan oidir 'n-a bh-farradk_--literally,
  "What a pity that there is no heir of their company." See the
  "Lament for the Milesians," in "The Poems of Thomas Davis." Dublin:
  Duffy.]

Irish poetry certainly existed before Young Ireland, and was even
considered, like oratory, to be a quality naturally and easily
indigenous to the Irish genius. Moore had not unworthily sustained the
reputation of his country in an age of great poets; and it was Moore's
own avowed belief that his "Irish Melodies" were the very flowering of
his inspiration, and were indeed alone warranted to preserve his fame
to future ages. But neither Moore, nor any other poet of Irish birth,
had attempted to give to the Irish that poetry "racy of the soil,"
wherein every image and syllable smacks of their own native
nationality, which Burns and Scott, and a host of minor poets, had
created for the Scotch. This is the work which Young Ireland
deliberately and avowedly attempted, and in which it has assuredly
succeeded. When the effort was first made, it is {468} told that
several of the writers who afterward wrote what, in its order of
ballad poetry, is unexcelled in the language--and notably Mr. Davis--
were quite unaware of any possession of the poetic faculty, and took
to the task as a boy takes to his tale of Latin spondees and dactyls
at college. But the stream was in the rock, and when the rock was
tapped the stream flowed. In the course of less than a year "The
Spirit of the _Nation_" was published, in which, with much undeniable
rubbish, there appeared a number of ballads and songs that won the
admiration of all good critics; and to which the far more important
testimony of their popular acceptance is still given in the form of
continuously recurring and increasing editions. A Scotch publisher--
Mr. Griffin, of Glasgow--ten years ago had heard such accounts of this
curious flood-tide of Irish verse, that he thought it might be a safe
speculation to try whether, despite its politics, it might not make
its way in the British market. The edition was very soon exhausted,
and the book is now, we believe, out of print. These facts are of even
more value than the high opinion which so experienced and accomplished
a critic as Lord Jeffrey expressed about the same time of the poetic
gifts of Davis and Duffy; for by universal consent the test of sale
loses all its vulgarity when applied to that most ethereal compound of
the human intellect, poetry. The poet is born, and not made, according
to Horace; but in so far as he is made anything by man, it is by
process of universal suffrage over the counter. Gradual, growing,
general recognition, testified by many editions, at last, in the
course of thirty years, establishes the irrefragable position of a
Tennyson; against which a Tupper, long struggling, in the end finds
his level, and lines trunks.

Much of the poetry of this time was, consciously or unconsciously,
mimetic--mainly of Sir Walter Scott and of Lord Macaulay, whose "Lays
of Ancient Rome" had recently been published. Scott, indeed, more
distinctly suggested the elements out of which the Young Ireland
poetry grew. Burns wrote in a peculiar provincial dialect, and with
the exception of a few glorious lyrics, which will occur to every
reader's recollection, he wrote for a district and for a class. But in
Scott's mind all the elements of the Scottish nationality were equally
confluent and homogeneous--the Highlander, the Lowlander, and the
Islander; the Celt, the Saxon, and the Dane; the laird, the presbyter,
and the peasant; and his imagination equally vivified all times--from
those of the Varangians at Constantinople to those of the Jacobites at
Culloden. But in Ireland there was no formed dialect like the Lowland
Scotch, with a settled vocabulary and a concrete form. The language of
the peasantry in many parts of the country was the same sort of base
English that a foreigner speaks--scanty in its range of words,
ill-articulated and aspirated, loose in the use of the liquid letters,
formed according to alien idioms, and flavored with alien expletives.
The language of the best of the ballads of the peasantry was that of a
period in which the people still thought in Irish, and expressed
themselves in broken English, uttered with the deep and somewhat
guttural tones of the Celt, and garnished now and then with the more
racy epithets, or endearments, or shibboleths, of their native speech.
For a time the example of Lord Macaulay's ballad poetry prevailed,
with its long rolling metre, its picturesque nomenclature, its
contrasts rather rhetorical than poetical. It was possible to describe
that decisive charge of the Irish brigade at Fontenoy, which Mr.
Carlyle treats as a mere myth, in strains which instantly suggest
those of the "Battle of Ivry." And so did Davis in a very memorable
ballad; but the likeness was mainly in the measure, and Lord Macaulay
had no copyright in lines of fourteen feet. The poem itself was Irish
to the manor born; and, it might be pleaded, was only as like the
verse of Lord Macaulay as the prose of Lord Macaulay is like the prose
of Edmund Burke. {469} Beyond this task-work, however, which, although
very ingeniously and fluently done, was still as much task-work as
college themes, there arose a difficulty and a hope. Was it possible
to transfuse the peculiar spirit of the Irish native poetry into the
English tongue? The researches of the Archaeological Society were at
this time rapidly disentombing the long-hidden historical and poetical
treasures of the Irish language. Many of these had been translated by
Clarence Mangan, in a style which did not pretend to be literally
faithful, but which so expanded, illustrated, and harmonized the
original that the poem, while losing none of its idiosyncrasy, gained
in every quality of grace, freedom, and force. The rich, the sometimes
redundant array of epithets, the mobile, passionate transitions, the
tender and melancholy spirit of veneration for a vanishing
civilization, for perishing houses, scattering clans, and a persecuted
Church--some even of the more graceful of the idioms and more musical
of the metres--might surely be naturalized in the English language;
and so an Irish poetical dialect be absolutely invented in the middle
of the nineteenth century. It was known how an Irish peasant spoke
broken English, and put it into rhyme that did not want a strange wild
melody, that was to more finished and scholarly verse as the flavor of
_poteen_ is to the flavor of Burgundy. But how would an Irish bard,
drawing his inspiration from the primeval Ossianic sources, and
thinking in the true ecstatic spirit of the Irish muse, speak, if he
were condemned to speak, in the speech of the Saxon? This was the bold
conception; and no one who is familiar with the poetry of Ireland
during the last twenty years, will deny that it has been in great part
fulfilled.

The poet to whom its execution is especially due can hardly be called
a Young Irelander in the political sense of the word. But Young
Ireland was a literary school as well as a political sect; and any one
who remembers, or may read, Mr. Ferguson's wonderful "Lament for
Thomas Davis," which it is to be greatly regretted he has not included
in the present edition of his poems, will recognize the strong
elective affinities which attached him to their action and influence.
As it is, this volume is by far the most remarkable recent
contribution of the Irish poetical genius to English literature. Mr.
Ferguson has accomplished the problem of conveying the absolute spirit
of Irish poetry into English verse, and he has done so under the most
difficult conceivable conditions--for he prefers a certain simple and
unluxuriant structure in the plan of his poems, and he uses in their
composition the most strictly Saxon words he can find. But all the
accessories and figures, and still more a certain weird melody in the
rhythm that reminds the ear of the wild grace of the native music,
indicate at every turn what Mr. Froude has half-reproachfully called
"the subtle spell of the Irish mind." It is not surprising to find
even careful and accomplished English critics unable to reach to the
essential meaning of this poetry, which, to many, evidently appears as
bald as the style of Burns first seemed to southron eyes when he
became the fashion at Edinburgh eighty years ago. And yet to master
the dialect of Burns is at least as difficult as to master the dialect
of Chaucer, while Mr. Ferguson rarely uses a word that would not be
passed by Swift or Defoe. Before one of the most beautiful, simple,
and graceful of his later poems a recent critic paused, evidently
dismayed by the introduction, of which, however, not willing to
dispute the beauty, he quoted a few lines. It was an old Irish legend,
versified with surpassing grace and spirit, of which this is the
argument. Fergus MacRoy, king of Ulster in the old pagan times, was a
very good king of his kind. He loved his people and they loved him. He
was handsome, and strong, and tall. He bore himself well in war and in
the chase. He drank with discretion. {470} Nevertheless his life had
two troubles. He did not love the law; and he did love a widow. To
listen as chief justiciary to the causes, of which a constant crop
sprang up at Emania, tares and corn thickly set together, troubled him
sorely. To make verses to the widow, on the other hand, came as easy
as sipping usquebaugh or metheglin. He proposed, and though a king was
refused; but not discouraged, pressed his suit again and again. And at
last Nessa the fair yielded, but she made a condition that her son
Conor should sit on the judgment-seat daily by his stepfather's side..
This easily agreed, Nessa became queen, while, as Fergus tells the
tale:

  While in council and debate
  Conor daily by me sate;
  Modest was his mien in sooth,
  Beautiful the studious youth,

  Questioning with eager gaze,
  All the reasons and the ways
  In the which, and why because,
  Kings administer the laws.

In this wise a year passed, the youth diligently observant, with
faculties ripening and brightening as his majesty's grew more
consciously rusty and slow; and then a crisis came, which Mr. Ferguson
describes in verses of which it is hard to say whether they best
deserve the coif or the laurel, for in every line there is the sharp
wit of the lawyer as well as the vivid fancy of the poet:

  Till upon a day in court
  Rose a plea of weightier sort,
  Tangled as a briery thicket
  Were the rights and wrongs intricate

  Which the litigants disputed,
  Challenged, mooted, and confuted,
  Till when all the plea was ended
  Naught at all I comprehended.

  Scorning an affected show
  Of the thing I did not know,
  Yet my own defect to hide,
  I said, "Boy judge, thou decide."

  Conor with unalter'd mien,
  In a clear sweet voice serene,
  Took in hand the tangled skein,
  And began to make it plain.

  As a sheep-dog sorts his cattle,
  As a king arrays his battle,
  So the facts on either side
  He did marshal and divide.

  Every branching side-dispute
  Traced he downward to the root
  Of the strife's main stem, and there
  Laid the ground of difference bare.

  Then to scope of either cause,
  Set the compass of the laws,
  This adopting, that rejecting,--
  Reasons to a head collecting,--

  As a charging cohort goes
  Through and over scatter'd foes,
  So, from point to point he brought
  Onward still the weight of thought

  Through all error and confusion,
  Till he set the clear conclusion,
  Standing like a king alone,
  All things adverse overthrown,

  And gave judgment clear and sound:--
  Praises filled the hall around;
  Yea, the man that lost the cause
  Hardly could withhold applause.

In these exquisite verses, the language is as strict to the point as
if it were taken from Mr. Smith's "Action at Law;" but the reader will
remark how every figure reminds him, and yet not in any mere mimetic
fashion, of the spirit and illustrations of the Ossianic poetry.
Nevertheless each word taken by itself is simple Saxon. Its Celtic
character only runs like a vein through the poem, but it colors and
saturates it through and through.

The greatest of Mr. Ferguson's poems, however, is undoubtedly "The
Welshmen of Tirawley," a ballad which, we do not fear to say, is
unsurpassed in the English language, or perhaps in even the Spanish.
Its epic proportion and integrity, the vivid picturesqueness of its
phraseology, its wild and original metre, its extraordinary
realization of the laws and customs of an Irish clan's daily life, the
stern brevity of its general narrative, and the richness of its
figures, though all barbaric pearl and gold, give it a pre-eminent
place among ballads. Scott would have devoted three volumes to the
story, were it not for the difficulty of telling some of its
incidents. Mr. Ferguson exhibits no little skill in the way that he
hurries his readers past what he could not altogether omit. For the
facts upon which the ballad is founded are simply horrible, and they
are historically true.

After the time of Strongbow, several Welsh families who had followed
his flag settled in Connaught. Among {471} these "kindly Britons" of
Tirawley, were the Walshes or Wallises, the Heils (_a quibus_ MacHale,
and, possibly, that most perfect instance of the _Hibernis ipsis
Hibemior_, the archbishop of Tuam); also the Lynotts and the Barretts,
with whom we are at present more particularly concerned. These last
claimed descent from the high steward of the manor of Camelot, and
their end is a story fit for the Round Table. The great toparch of the
territory was the MacWilliam Burke, as the Irish called the head of
the de Burgos, descended from William FitzAdelm de Burgo, conqueror of
Connaught, and therein commonly called William Conquer--of whom the
Marquis of Clanricarde is the present lineal representative; being to
Connaught even still somewhat as the MacCallummore is to Argyle, more
especially when he happens to be in the cabinet, and to have the
patronage of the post-office. Now the Lynotts were subject to the
Barretts, and the Barretts were subject to the Burkes. But when the
Barretts' bailiff, Scorna Boy, came to collect the Lynotts' taxes, he
so demeaned himself that the whole clan rose as one man, even as Jack
Cade, and slew him. Whereupon the vengeful Barretts gave to all
mankind among the Lynott clan a terrible choice--of which one
alternative was blindness; and the bearded men were all of their own
preference blinded, and led to the river Duvowen, and told to walk
over the stepping stones of Clochan-na-n'all; and they all stumbled
into the flood and were drowned, except old Emon Lynott, of
Garranard--whom accordingly the Barretts brought back and blinded
over again, by running needles through his eyeballs.

  But with prompt-projected footsteps, sure as ever,
  Emon Lynott again crossed the river,
  Though Duvowen was rising fast,
  And the shaking stones o'ercast,
  By cold floods boiling past;
      Yet you never,
      Emon Lynott,
  Faltered once before your foemen of Tirawley.

  But turning on Ballintubber bank, you stood
  And the Barretts thus bespoke o'er the flood--
  "Oh, ye foolish sons of Wattin,
  Small amends are these you've gotten,
  For, while Scorna Boy lies rotten,
      I am good
      For vengeance!"
  Sing the vengeance of the Welshmen of Tirawley.

  For 'tis neither in eye nor eyesight that a man.
  Bears the fortunes of himself and his clan,
  But in the manly mind
  These darken'd orbs behind,
  That your needles could never find,
      Though they ran
      Through my heartstrings.
  Sing the vengeance of the Welshmen of Tirawley.

  But little your women's needles do I reck,
  For the night from heaven never fell so black,
  But Tirawley and abroad
  From the Moy to Cuan-an-fod,
  I could walk it, every sod,
      Path and track,
      Ford and togher,
  Seeking vengeance on you, Barretts of Tirawley!

And so leaving "loud-shriek-echoing Garranard," the Lynott, with his
wife and seven children, abandons his home, and takes refuge in Glen
Nephin, where, in the course of a year, a son is born to him, whom he
dedicates from the first breath to his vengeance. He trains this boy
with assiduous care to all the accomplishments of a Celtic cavalier;

  And, as ever the bright boy grew in strength and size,
  Made him perfect in each manly exercise,
  The salmon in the flood,
  The dun deer in the wood,
  The eagle in the cloud,
      To surprise,
      On Ben Nephin,
  Far above the foggy fields of Tirawley.

  With the yellow-knotted spear-shaft, with the bow,
  With the steel, prompt to deal shot and blow,
  He taught him from year to year,
  And trained him, without a peer,
  For a perfect cavalier,
      Hoping so--
      Far his forethought--
  For vengeance on the Barretts of Tirawley.

  And when mounted on his proud-bounding steed,
  Emon Oge sat a cavalier indeed;
  Like the ear upon the wheat,
  When the winds in autumn beat
  On the bending stems his seat;
      And the speed
      Of his courser
  Was the wind from Barna-na-gee o'er Tirawley!

Fifteen years have passed and the youth is perfected in all the
accomplishments of sport and war, and the Lynott thinks it is time to
return to the world and work out the scheme of his vengeance. So the
father and son quit their mountain solitude, and journey southward to
the bailey of Castlebar; and in a few fine touches the picture of Mac
William's grandeur, as it strikes {472} the boy's wondering eyes,
rises before us; the stone house, strong and great, and the horse-host
at the gate and their captain in armor, and the beautiful _Bantierna_
by his side with her little pearl of a daughter. Who should this be
but the mighty MacWilliam! Into his presence ride the Lynotts; and,
after salutations, the old man declares his business. He has come to
claim, as gossip-law allows, the fosterage of MacWilliam's son. Ever
since William Conquer's time, his race were wont to place a MacWilliam
Oge in the charge of a Briton of Tirawley; and the young Lynott was a
pledge for his father's capacity in such tutelage. When MacWilliam saw
the young Lynott ride, run, and shoot, he said he would give the spoil
of a county to have his son so accomplished. When Lady MacWilliam
heard him speak, and scanned his fresh and hardy air, she said she
would give a purse of red gold that her Tibbot had such a nurse as had
reared the young Briton. The custom was allowed. The young MacWilliam
was sent under the guidance of old Lynott into Tirawley, and Emon Oge
remained as a hostage in Castlebar. So back to Garranard, no longer
the "loud-shriek-echoing," old Lynott returns--

  So back to strong-throng-gathering Garranard,
  Like a lord of the country with his guard,
  Came the Lynott before them all,
  Once again o'er Clochan-ua-n'all,
  Steady-striding, erect, and tall,
      And his ward
      On his shoulders;
  To the wonder of the Welshmen of Tirawley.

And then the young Tibbot was taught all manner of feats of body, to
swim, to shoot, to gallop, to wrestle, to fence, and to run, until he
grew up as deft and as tough as Emon Oge. But he was taught other
lessons as well, which were not in the bond of his foster-father.

  The lesson of hell he taught him in heart and mind;
  For to what desire soever he inclined,
  Of anger, lust, or pride,
  He had it gratified,
  Till he ranged the circle wide
      Of a blind
      Self-indulgence,
  Ere he came to youthful manhood in Tirawley.

Shame and rage track his passage, till one night the young Barretts of
the Bac fell upon him at Cornassack and slew him. His body was borne
to Castlebar. The Brehons were summoned to judgment; and over the bier
of MacWilliam Oge began the plea for an eric to be imposed upon the
Barretts for their crime; and the Brehons decreed the mulct, and
Lynott's share of it was nine ploughlands and nine score of cattle.
And now the ultimate hour of the blind old man's vengeance had come,
not to be sated with land and kine. "Rejoice," he cried, "in your
ploughlands and your cattle, which I renounce throughout Tirawley."
But, expert in all the rules and customs of the clans, he asks the
Brehons, Is it not the law that the foster-father may, if he please,
applot the short eric? And they say it is so. Whereupon, formally
rejecting his own share of the mulct, he makes his award--that the land
of the Barretts shall be equally divided on every side with the
Burkes, and that MacWilliam shall have a seat in every Barrett's hall,
a stall in every Barrett's stable, and needful grooming from every
hosteler for every Burke who shall ride throughout Tirawley for ever.
And then, in a speech full of barbaric sublimity and tragic
concentration of passion, he confesses "the patient search and vigil
long" of his vengeance. It is almost unjust to break the
closely-wrought chain of this speech by a single quotation, and we
have been already unduly tempted to extract from this extraordinary
poem; but, perhaps, this one verse may be separated from the rest as
containing the very culmination of the old man's hideous rage.

  I take not your eyesight from you as you took
  Mine and ours: I would have you daily look
  On one another's eyes,
  When the strangers tyrannize
  By your hearths, and blushes rise
      That ye brook
      Without vengeance
  The insults of troops of Tibbots throughout Tirawley.

Another moment and he has done. "Father and son," says MacWilliam,
{473} "hang them high!" and old Lynott they hanged forthwith; but
young Lynott had eloped with MacWilliam's daughter to Scotland, and
there changed his name to Edmund Lindsay. The judgment of the short
eric was, however, held good; and the Burkes rode rough-shod over the
Barretts, until, as Mr. Ferguson, almost verbally versifying the
Chronicle of Duald Mac Firbis, says:

  Till the Saxon Oliver Cromwell,
  And his valiant Bible-guided
  Free heretics of Clan London
  Coming in, in their succession,
  Rooted out both Burke and Barrett;

a process of eviction which Mr. Ferguson, not merely for the sake of
poetical justice, but out of the invincible ignorance of pure
puritanical Protestantism, appears on the whole very highly to
approve.

This ballad is indeed unique in its order: no Irish ballad approaches
its wild sublimity and the thoroughness of detail with which it is
conceived and executed. The only Irish narrative ballad which can bear
a general comparison with it is Mr. Florence MacCarthy's "Foray of Con
O'Donnell," a poem as perfect in its historical reality, in the
aptness of all its figures, illustrations, and feats of phrase to a
purely Celtic ideal, and which even surpasses "The Welshmen" in a
certain easy and lissome grace of melody, that falls on the ear like
the delicately drawn notes of Carolan's music. But this grace is
disdained by the grim and compressed character which animates every
line of Mr. Ferguson's ballad. His other works, fine of fancy and ripe
of phrase as they are, fall far below it, "The Tain-Quest" does not on
the whole enthral the reader, or magnetize the memory. "The Healing of
Conall Carnach," and "The Burial of King Cormac" are poems that will
hold their place in many future Books of Irish Ballads; they are
unusually spirited versifications of passages from the more heroic
period of early Irish history; but excepting occasional lines, they
only appear to be the versifications of already written legends. The
ballad of Grace O'Malley, commonly called _Grana Uaile_, may be
advantageously contrasted with these, and it contains some verses of
singular power--as, for example, where the poet denies the imputation
of piracy against this lady who loved to roam the high seas under her
own commission--

  But no: 'twas not for sordid spoil
  Of barque or sea-board borough,
  She plough'd with unfatiguing toil
  The fluent-rolling furrow;
  Delighting on the broad-back'd deep
  To feel the quivering galley and sweep
  Strain up the opposing hill, and sweep
  Down the withdrawing valley.

"Aideen's Grave" is a poem of a different kind, full of an exquisite
melancholy grace; and where Ossian is supposed to apostrophise his
future imitator, it is as if he thought after the manner of the
Fenians, but was withal master of every symphony of the English
tongue:

  Imperfect in an alien speech
  When wandering here some child of chance,
  Through pangs of keen delight shall reach.
  The gift of utterance,--
  To speak the air, the sky to speak,
  The freshness of the hill to tell,
  Who roaming bare Ben Edar's peak,
  And Aideen's briery dell,
  And gazing on the Cromlech vast,
  And on the mountain and the sea,
  Shall catch communion with the past,
  And mix himself with me.

There are lines in this poem that a little remind us of Gray, as--

  At Gavra, when by Oscar's side
  She rode _the ridge of war;_

and again in the "Farewell to Deirdre" there is something in the cast
and rhythm of the poem, rather than in any individual word or line,
that recalls Scott's "Farewell to North Maven." But to say so is not
to hit blots. Mr. Ferguson's is beyond question the most thoroughly
original vein of poetry that any Irish bard of late days has wrought
out; and in laying down this volume we can only regret that the
specimens he has thought worthy of collection are so few in comparison
not merely with what he might have done, but with what he actually has
done. For {474} this modesty, let us hope that the prompt penance of a
second and enlarged edition may atone.

We have said that though Mr. Ferguson could hardly be called a Young
Irelander in politics, all the elective affinities of his genius
tended toward that school of thought. But Lady Wilde, then known if
she wrote prose as Mr. John Fanshawe Ellis, and if she wrote verse as
Speranza, had an extraordinary influence on all the intellectual and
political activities of Young Ireland. It was a favorite phantasy of
that time, when Lamartine's book was intoxicating all Young Europe
with the idea of a grand coming revolutionary epopoeia, and the
atrocities of socialism in France and Mazzinianism in Italy had not
yet horrified all Christendom, to find the model men for a modern
Plutarch in the ranks of the Girondists. Notably Meagher was supposed
to be gifted with all the qualities of Vergniaud, and Speranza to have
more than the genius of Madame Roland. But when we come to real
comparisons of character, the parallel easily gives way. If Smith
O'Brien was like any Frenchman of the first revolution, it was
Lafayette. Mitchel had in certain respects a suspicious resemblance to
the earlier and milder phases of Robespierre's peculiar intellectual
idiosyncrasy. The base of Carnot's character was that faculty for
organization which was the mainspring of Gavan Duffy's various and
powerful genius. The parallel was, even so far as it went,
intrinsically unjust. Lamartine's glowing imagination gave to the
Girondists a grandeur largely ideal. It is fair to say that Meagher's
oratory was on the whole of a higher order than Vergniaud's; and
certainly Madame Roland, great as may have been the influence of her
character and her conversation, has left us no example of her talent
that will bear comparison with Lady Wilde's poems or prose.

These poems, however, if full justice is to be done to them, ought to
be read from first to last with a running commentary in the memory
from the history of those few tragic years whose episodes they in a
manner mark. One poem is a mournfully passionate appeal to O'Connell
against the alliance with the Whigs, which was charged as one of the
causes of the secession. Another is a ballad of the famine, with
lights as ghastly as ever glowed in the imagination of Euripides or
Dante, and founded on horrors such as Greek or Italian never
witnessed. There is then a picture of "the young patriot leader"--
which an artist would characterize as a decidedly idealized portrait
of Meagher--that American general who has since proved his title to be
called "of the sword." Again, a gloomy series of images recalls to us
the awful state of the country--the corpses that were buried without
coffins, and the men and women that walked the roads more like corpses
than living creatures, spectres and skeletons at once; the little
children out of whose sunken eyes the very tears were dried, and over
whose bare little bones the hideous fur of famine had begun to grow;
the cholera cart, with its load of helpless huddled humanity, on its
way to the hospital; the emigrant ship sending back its woeful wail of
farewell from swarming poop to stern in the offing; and, far as the
eye could search the land, the blackened potato-fields, filling all
the air with the fetid odors of decay. Again and again such pictures
are contrasted with passionate lyrics full of rebellious fire, urging
the people to die, if die they must, by the sword rather than by
hunger--and sometimes, too, with an angry, unreasonable,
readily-forgiven reproach to the priesthood, who bore with such noble
fortitude and self-immolating charity the very cross of all the
crosses of that terrible time.

It is a curious fact, and reminds one of the myth of Achilles' heel,
that O'Connell, who marched among his myriad foes like one clad in
panoply of mail from head to foot, with a sort of inexpugnable vigor
and endurance, not to be wounded, not to be stunned, with his buckler
ready for every {475} thrust, and a blow for every blow that rained on
his casque, was weak as a child under the influence of verse. Any one
who may count over the number of times his favorite quotations, such
as the lines beginning "Hereditary bondsmen" from "Childe Harold" for
example, crop up in the course of his speeches, will be inclined to
say that his fondness for poetry was almost preposterous. It was
always tempting him, indeed, into dangerous ways--for while his prose
preached "the ethereal principles of moral force," and the tenet that
"no political amelioration is worth the shedding of a single drop of
human blood," his favorite quotations were strictly in favor of
fighting. The "hereditary bondsmen" were to "strike the blow;" and the
Irish are a nation only too well disposed to interpret such a precept
literally. Moore's melodies were always at the tip of his tongue; and
Moore's "Slave so lowly" is indignantly urged not to pine in his
chains, but to raise the green flag forthwith, and do or die. Some
verses of O'Connell's own, of which he was at least equally fond,
began:

  Oh Erin! shall it e'er be mine
  To see thy sons in battle line?

It was not altogether politic, especially when Young Ireland was
gaining the ascendant, to use such quotations habitually; but the
temptation seems to have been irresistible. So, on the other hand, may
be conceived his excessive sensitiveness to anything sounding like a
reproach that reached him through the vehicle of verse. When Brougham
or Stanley or Peel struck their hardest, they got in return rather
more than they gave--when the whole House of Commons tried to stifle
his voice, over all the din Mr. Speaker heard himself with horror
called upon to stop this "beastly bellowing." But when Moore wrote
those lines--so cruelly touching, so terribly caustic--"The dream of
those days," which appeared in the last number of the Melodies, the
Liberator was, it is said, so deeply affected that he shed tears. So
again, these lines of Speranza, which appeared in the _Nation_ at the
time of the secession, stung him to the very heart:

  Gone from us--dead to us--he whom we worshipped so!
    Low lies the altar we raised to his name;
  Madly his own hand hath shattered and laid it low--
    Madly his own breath hath blasted his fame.
  He whose proud bosom once raged with humanity.
    He whose broad forehead was circled with might;
  Sunk to a time-serving, driveling inanity--
    God! why not spare our loved country the sight?

  Was it the gold of the stranger that tempted him?
    Ah! we'd have pledged to him body and soul--
  Toiled for him--fought for him--starved for him--died for him--
    Smiled though our graves were the steps to hi s goal.
  Breathed he one word in his deep, earnest whispering?
    Wealth, crown, and kingdom were laid at his feet;
  Raised he his right hand, the millions would round him cling--
    Hush! 'tis the Sassenach ally you greet.

It is a curious and, indeed, a very touching trait in O'Connell's
character that an imputation conveyed in this form had a power to
wound him which all the articles of the morning papers and all the
speeches of the evening debates had not. This redoubtable master of
every weapon of invective, whose weighty words sometimes fell on his
adversary like one of Ossian's Titans hurling boulders, or again burst
into a motley cascade of quip, and crank, and chaff, and wild, rampant
ridicule, that (sometimes rather coarse and personal) was at its best,
to other rhetoric, as the music of an Irish jig is to all other music,
nevertheless had his Achilles' tendon. The man who loved to call
himself "the best abused man in the universe" was as weak before the
enemy who attacked him according to the rules of prosody as if he
lived in the age when every Celt in Kerry piously believed that a man,
if the metre were only made sufficiently acrid, might be rhymed to
death, in the same manner {476} as an ancestor of Lord Derby was,
according to the Four Masters.  [Footnote 98]

  [Footnote 98: "John Stanley came to Ireland as the king of England's
  viceroy--a man who gave neither toleration nor sanctuary to
  ecclesiastics, laymen, or literary men; but all with whom he came in
  contact he subjected to cold, hardship, and famine; and he it was
  who plundered Niall, the son of Hugh O'Higgin, at Uisneach of Meath;
  but Henry D'Alton plundered James Tuite and the king's people, and
  gave to the O'Higgins a cow in lieu of each cow of which they had
  been plundered, and afterward escorted them into Connaught. The
  O'Higgins, on account of Niall, then satirized John Stanley, who
  only lived live weeks after the satirizing, having died from the
  venom of their satires. This was the second instance of the poetical
  influence of Niall O'Higgin's satires, the first having been the
  Clan Conway turning gray the night they plundered Niall at Clodoin,
  and the second the death of John Stanley."--_Annals of the Four
  Masters._ A.D. 1414.]

Lady Wilde's verse has not at all the same distinctively Celtic
character as Mr. Ferguson's. He aspires to be

  Kindly Irish of the Irish,
  Neither Saxon nor Italian;

and his choice inspirations come from the life of the clans.
Speranza's verse, so far as it has a specially Irish character, is of
the most ancient type of that character. It is full of oriental
figures and illustrations. It is, when it is most Irish, rather
cognate to Persian and Hebrew ways of thinking, forms of metaphor,
redundance of expression--in its tendency to adjuration, in its habit
of apostrophe, in its very peculiar and powerful but monotonous
rhythm, which seems to pulsate on the ear with the even, strident
stroke of a Hindoo drum. Where this peculiar poetry at all adapts
itself to the vogue of the modern muse, it is easy to see that Miss
Barrett had very great influence in determining the mere manner of
Lady Wilde's genius. When in the midst of one very powerful poem, "The
Voice of the Poor," these lines come in--

  When the human rests upon the human,
    All grief is light;
  But who lends one kind glance to illumine
    Our life-long night?
  The air around is ringing with their laughter--
    God has only made the rich to smile,
  But we--in our rags, and want, and woe--we follow after,
    Weeping the while.

--we are tempted to note an unconscious homage to the author of
"Aurora Leigh." But the character of Lady Wilde's verse is far more
colored by the range of her studies than by the influence of any
special style. The general reader, who may not breathe at ease the
political atmosphere of the earlier part of this volume, will pause
with pleasure to observe the spirit, grace, and fidelity of the
translations which succeed. They are from almost every language in
Europe, whether of Latin or Teutonic origin, French, Spanish,
Portuguese, Italian, German, Swedish, Danish, and Russian. Among these
may be mentioned in particular two hymns of Savonarola, which are
rendered so exquisitely that one is tempted to suggest that the
_"Carmina Sedulii,"_ with much more of the ancient Irish hymnology,
are as yet untranslated into the tongue now used in Ireland. It is a
work peculiarly adapted to her genius. The first quality of Lady
Wilde's poetry is that lyrical power of which the hymn is the finest
development; and her most striking poems are those which assume the
character of the older and more regular form of ode.

The readers of Mr. William Allingham's early writings were in general
gratefully surprised when it was announced that he was the author of a
very remarkable poem, of the order of eclogue, which appeared by parts
in _Fraser's Magazine_ in 1863. His earlier poems, chiefly songs and
verse of society, were pleasing from a certain airy grace and
lightness; but on the whole their style was thin and jejune. Of late,
his faculties have evidently mellowed very rapidly, and his language
has become more animated, more concentrated, and more sustained.
"Laurence Bloomfield in Ireland" has had, as it were, a triple
success--the success of a pamphlet, the success of a novel of Irish
life, and its own more proper and legitimate success, as a regular
pastoral, skilfully conceived, carefully executed, in which the flow
of thought is sustained at a very even, if not a very lofty level
throughout, {477} and whose language is on the whole admirably
harmonized, full of happy allusional effects, of quaint, minute,
picturesque delineation, and of a certain graceful and easy energy.
Mr. Gladstone has quoted some of its lines in a speech on the budget
as an excuse for maintaining the duty on whisky; and he is not the
only Englishman who has derived from its perusal an unexpected insight
into some of the more perplexing problems of Irish life. Certainly,
Mr. Allingham's views of Irish society, when he touches on questions
of religion and politics, are not our views. He is an Ulster
Protestant by religion, and an advanced liberal (we take it) in
politics. But making those allowances, it must be admitted that he
shows the poet's many-sided sympathetic mind in every page of this
very remarkable poem. "It is," as he fairly says, "free from
personalities, and neither of an orange nor a green complexion; but it
is Irish in phraseology, character, and local color--with as little
use as might be of a corrupt dialect, and with no deference at all to
the stage traditions of Paddyism." It is divided into twelve chapters,
and it is written in pleasantly modulated pentameters.

The story is of the life of a young squire, who was on the point of
declaring himself a Young Irelander in his youth. His guardian, to cut
the folly short, sent him incontinently to Cambridge, thence to the
continent. He returns to Ireland in his twenty-sixth year, and finds
the population decimated by the famine, and agitated by agrarian
conspiracy. The neighboring gentry are bent, as conacre has ceased to
pay, on supplanting the population by cattle. The population
suppurates into secret societies. Laurence Bloomfield, long revolving
the difficulties of his lot, and abhorring pretty equally the crimes
of each class against the other--determined, moreover, to be neither
exterminator, demagogue, nor absentee--resolves to live among the
people of his estate like a modern patriarch, and see what patience,
kindness, a good understanding, and enlightened management may be able
to effect. He extinguishes the Ribbon lodge, fastens his tenantry by
equitable leases to the glebe, and gradually finds in the management
of his estate a career of easy, pleasant, and even prosperous power.
In the course of ten years, Lisnamoy has become an Irish Arcadia, and
Mr. Allingham's honest muse rises accordingly to sing a hero even more
memorable in his way than the Man of Ross.

Bloomfield first promulgates his peculiar views of territorial
administration at a dinner of his landlord neighbors in Lisnamoy
House, where the wholesale eviction of the tenantry of a large
neighboring district is proposed on the plea that--

      "This country sorely needs
  A quicker clearance of its human weeds;
  But still the proper system is begun,
  And forty holdings we shall change to one."

  Bloomfield his inexperience much confessed,
  Doubts if the large dispeopled farms be best,--
  Best in a wide sense, best for all the world
  (At this expression sundry lips were curl'd),--
  "I wish but know not how each peasant's hand
  Might work, nay, hope to win, a share of land;
  For ownership, however small it be,
  Breeds diligence, content, and loyalty,
  And tirelessly compels the rudest field,
  Inch after inch, its very most to yield.
  Wealth might its true prerogatives retain;
  And no man lose, and all men greatly gain."

It is from the ill-concealed contempt of his class for such thoughts
as these, that Bloomfield's resolution to remain in Ireland and
administer his own estate arises.

The story, as it is evolved, presents some charming sketches of
character. Hardly even Carleton has delineated so admirably the nature
and habits of the Irish peasant family as Mr. Allingham has done in
his picture of the Dorans. How easy and natural, for example, is the
portrait of Bridget Doran:

  Mild oval face, a freckle here and there,
  Clear eyes, broad forehead, dark abundant hair,
  Pure placid look that show'd a gentle nature,
  Firm, unperplex'd, were hers; the maiden's stature
  Graceful arose, and strong, to middle height,
  With fair round arms, and footstep free and light;
  She was not showy, she was always neat
  In every gesture, native and complete,
  Disliking noise, yet neither dull nor slack,
  Could throw a rustic banter briskly back,
  Reserved but ready, innocently shrewd,--
  In brief, a charming flower of womanhood.

{478}

The occasional sketches of Irish scenery are also very vividly
outlined. This of Lough Braccan is not perhaps the best, but it is the
most easily detached from the text:

  Among those mountain skirts a league away,
  Lough Braccan spread, with many a silver bay
  And islet green; a dark cliff, tall and bold,
  Half-muffled in its cloak of ivy old,
  Bastioned the southern brink, beside a glen,
  Where birch and hazel hid the badger's den,
  And through the moist ferns and firm hollies play'd
  A rapid rivulet, from light to shade.
  Above the glen, and wood, and cliff, was seen,
  Majestically simple and serene,
  Like some great soul above the various crowd,
  A purple mountain-top, at times in cloud
  Or mist, as in celestial veils of thought,
  Abstracted heavenward.

We may give another specimen of Mr. Allingham's power of delineation,
which shows that he has studied Irish country life as well as Irish
scenery and Irish physiognomy.

  Mud hovels fringe the "fair green" of this town,
  A spot misnamed, at every season brown,
  O'erspread with countless man and beast to-day,
  Which bellow, squeak, and shout, bleat, bray, and neigh.
  The "jobbers" there each more or less a rogue,
  Noisy or smooth, with each his various brogue,
  Cool, wiry Dublin, Connaught's golden mouth,
  Blunt northern, plaintive sing-song of the south,
  Feel cattle's ribs, or jaws of horses try.
  For truth, since men's are very sure to lie,
  And shun, with parrying blow and practised heed,
  The rushing horns, the wildly prancing steed.
  The moistened penny greets with sounding smack
  The rugged palm, which smites the greeting back;
  Oaths fly, the bargain like a quarrel burns,
  And oft the buyer turns, and oft returns:
  Now mingle Sassenach and Gaelic tongue;
  On either side are slow concessions wrung;
  An anxious audience interfere; at last
  The sale is closed, and whisky binds it fast,
  In case of quilting upon oziers bent,
  With many an ancient patch and breezy rent.

This is as true a picture in its way as Mdlle. Rosa Bonheur's
"Horse-fair."

Mr. Aubrey de Vere's "Inisfail" comes last on our list, but certainly
not least in our estimation. No poet of Young Ireland has like him
seized and breathed the spirit of his country's Catholic nationality,
its virginal purity of faith, its invincible patience of hope, and all
the gentle sweetness of its charity. Young Ireland rather studied the
martial muse, and that with an avowed purpose. "The Irish harp," said
Davis, "too much loves to weep. Let us, while our strength is great
and our hopes high, cultivate its bolder strains, its raging and
rejoicing; or if we weep, let it be like men whose eyes are lifted
though their tears fall." Mr. de Vere has tried every mood of the
native lyre, and proved himself master of all. His "Inisfail" is a
ballad chronicle of Ireland, such as Young Ireland would have thought
to be a worthy result of all its talents, and such as, in fact, Mr.
Duffy at one time proposed. But it must be said that its heroic
ballads are not equal to those of Young Ireland. Some one said of a
very finished, but occasionally frigid, Irish speaker, fifteen years
ago, that he spoke like "Sheil with the chill on." A few of Mr. de
Vere's ballads have the same effect of "Young Ireland with the chill
on." They want the verve, the glow, the energy, the resonance, which
belong to the best ballads of "The Spirit of the _Nation_." Of the
writers of that time, Mr. D'Arcy McGee is perhaps, on the whole, the
most kindred genius to his. Mr. de Vere has an insight into all the
periods of Irish history in their most poetical expression which Mr.
McGee alone of his comrades seems to have equally possessed. Indeed,
if Mr. Me Gee's poems were all collected and chronologically
arranged--as it is to be hoped they may be some day soon--it would be
found that he had unconsciously and desultorily traversed very nearly
the same complete extent of ground that Mr. de Vere has systematically
and deliberately gone over. But though no one has written more nobly
of the dimly glorious Celtic ages, and many of his battle-ballads are
instinct with life, and wonderfully picturesque, it is easy to see
that Mr. McGee's best desire was to follow the footsteps of the early
saints, and the _Via Dolorosa_ of the period of the penal laws. These,
{479} too, are the passages over which Mr. de Vere's genius most loves
to brood, and his prevailing view of Ireland is the supernatural view
of her destiny to carry the cross and spread the faith. Young Ireland
wrote its bold, brilliant ballads as a part of the education of the
new nationality that it believed was growing up, and destined to take
possession of the island--"a nationality that," to use Davis's words
again, "must contain and represent all the races of Ireland. It must
not be Celtic; it must not be Saxon; it must be Irish. The Brehon law
and the maxims of Westminster, the cloudy and lightning genius of the
Gael, the placid strength of the Saxon, the marshalling insight of the
Norman; a literature which shall exhibit in combination the passions
and idioms of all, and which shall equally express our mind, in its
romantic, its religious, its forensic, and its practical tendencies.
Finally, a native government, which shall know and rule by the might
and right of all, yet yield to the arrogance of none;--these are the
components of such a nationality." And such was the dream that seemed
an easy eventuality twenty years ago. But Mr. de Vere writes after the
famine and in view of the exodus. His mind goes from the present to
the past by ages of sorrow--of sorrow, nevertheless, illumined,
nurtured, and sustained by divine faith and the living presence of the
Church. So in the most beautiful poem of this volume, he sees the
whole Irish race carrying an inner spiritual life through all their
tribulation in the guise of a great religious order of which England
is the foundress, and the rules are written in the statute-book. We
cannot select a better specimen of the thorough Catholic tone of Mr.
de Vere's genius, and of the vivid power and finished grace of his
poetry, than this:

  There is an order by a northern sea
    Far in the west, of rule and life more strict
  Than that which Basil rear'd in Galilee,
    In Egypt Paul, in Umbria Benedict.

  Discalced it walks; a stony land of tombs,
    A strange Petraea of late days, it treads!
  Within its court no high-tossed censer fumes;
    The night-rain beats its cells, the wind its beds.

  Before its eyes no brass-bound, blazon'd tome
    Reflects the splendor of a lamp high hung:
  Knowledge is banish'd from her earliest home
    Like wealth: it whispers psalms that once it sung.

  It is not bound by the vow celibate,
    Lest, through its ceasing, anguish too might cease;
  In sorrow it brings forth; and death and fate
    Watch at life's gate, and tithe the unripe increase.

  It wears not the Franciscan's sheltering gown;
    The cord that binds it is the strangers chain;
  Scarce seen for scorn, in fields of old renown
    It breaks the clod; another reaps the grain.

  Year after year it fasts; each third or fourth
    So fasts that common fasts to it are feast;
  Then of its brethren many in the earth
    Are laid unrequiem'd like the mountain beast.

  Where are its cloisters? Where the felon sleeps!
    Where its novitiate? Where the last wolf died!
  From sea to sea its vigil long it keeps--
    Stern foundress! is its rule not mortified?

  Thou that hast laid so many an order waste,
    A nation is thine order! It was thine
  Wide as a realm that order's seed to cast,
    And undispensed sustain its discipline!

It is another curious illustration of the _Hibernis ipsis Hibernior_
that a de Vere, who is, moreover, "of the caste of Vere de Vere,"
should have so intimate a comprehension of the Celtic spirit as is
often shown in these poems, especially in the use of those allegories
which are so characteristic of the period of persecution, and in some
of his metres that appear to be instinct with the very melody of the
oldest Irish music. Here, indeed, we seem to taste, in a certain vague
and dreamy sensation, which the mere murmur of such verses even
without strict reference to the words produces, all the charm of which
that ancient poetry might have been capable, if it were still
cultivated in a language of living civilization. Several of these
poems, if translated into Irish verse, would probably pass back
without the change of an idiom--so completely Celtic is the whole
conception of the language. The dirges, for example, appear on a first
reading to be only English versions of Irish poems belonging to the
time of the Jacobites and the Brigade--until, as we examine more
carefully, we observe that the allegory is {480} wrought out with all
the finish of more modern art, and that the metaphors are brought into
a more just inter-dependence than the native bard usually thought
necessary.

The tenderness that approaches to a sort of worship of Ireland under
the poetical personification of a mother wailing for her children,
again and again breaks out in Mr. de Vere's verse; and in all the
range of Irish poetry it is nowhere more exquisitely expressed. The
solemn beauty of the following verses is like that of some of those
earliest of the melodies, whose long lines, with their curious
rippling rhythm, were evidently meant for recitation as well as for
musical effect:

  In the night, in the night, O my country, the stream calls out from afar;
    So swells thy voice through the ages, sonorous and vast;
  In the night, in the night, O my country, clear flashes the star:
    So flashes on me thy face through the gloom of the past.

  I sleep not; I watch: in blows the wind ice-wing'd and ice-fingered:
    My forehead it cools and slakes the fire in my breast;
  Though it sighs o'er the plains where oft thine exiles look'd back, and long lingered,
    And the graves where thy famish'd lie dumb and thine outcasts find rest.

Hardly less sad, but in so different a spirit as to afford a contrast
that brings us to a fair measure of the variety of Mr. de Vere's
powers, is a poem of the days of the brigade. The wife of one of the
soldiers who followed Sarsfield to France after the capitulation of
Limerick, and entered the Irish brigade of Louis XIV., is supposed,
sitting by the banks of the Shannon, to speak:

  River that through this purple plain
  Toilest (once redder) to the main,
  Go, kiss for me the banks of Seine!

  Tell him I loved, and love for aye,
  That his I am though far away--
  More his than on the marriage-day.

  Tell him thy flowers for him I twine
  When first the slow sad mornings shine
  In thy dim glass; for he is mine.

  Tell him when evening's tearful light
  Bathes those dark towers on Aughrim's height,
  There where he fought, in heart, I fight.

  A freeman's banner o'er him waves!
  So be it! I but tend the graves
  Where freemen sleep whose sons are slaves.

  Tell him I nurse his noble race,
  Nor weep save o'er one sleeping face
  Wherein those looks of his I trace.

  For him my beads I count when falls
  Moonbeam or shower at intervals
  Upon our burn'd and blacken'd walls:

  And bless him! bless the bold brigade--
  May God go with them, horse and blade,
  For faith's defense, and Ireland's aid!

Here the abrupt transition of tone in the last verse from the subdued
melancholy of those which precede it is very fine and very Irish. One
can fancy the widowed wife, in all her desolation, starting, even from
her beads, as she thinks of Lord Clare's dragoons coming down on the
enemy with their "_Viva la_ for Ireland's wrong!"

Twenty years have now passed since "The Spirit of the _Nation_" gave
some glimpses of the mine of poetry then latent in the Irish mind. In
1845 Mr. Gavan Duffy published his "Ballad Poetry of Ireland"--a book
which had the largest sale of any published in Ireland since the union
and probably the widest influence. Upon this common and neutral ground
Orange-man and Ribbon-man, Tory, and Nationalist, were perforce
brought into harmonious contact; and "The Boyne Water" lost half its
virus as a political psalm when it was embalmed side by side with the
"Wild Geese" or "Willy Reilly." Behind the produce of his own
immediate period, Mr. Duffy, in arranging his materials, could only
find a few ballads by Moore, a few by Gerald Griffin, a few by Banim,
Callanan, Furlong, and Drennan, that could be accounted legitimate
ballad poetry. The rest was fast cropping up while he was actually
compiling his collection, under the hot breath of the National
movement, in a lavish and luxuriant growth. This impulse seems to have
spent itself some years ago. Anything of real merit in the way of
Irish poetry does not now appear in periodical literature more than
once or twice in a year; and Mr. Thomas Irwin is the only recent
writer whose verse may fairly be named in the same breath with that
which we have now noticed. A rich grace and finish of {481}
expression, a most quaint and delicate humor, and a fine-poised
aptness of phrase, distinguish his poetry, which is more according to
the taste that Mr. Tennyson has established in England than that of
any Irish writer of the day.

Irish poetry seems now, therefore, to have passed into a new and more
advanced stage of development. Here are four volumes, by four separate
writers, of poems, old and new--all published within a year; and all,
we believe, decidedly successful, and in satisfactory course of sale.
Mr. Florence MacCarthy's poems had previously gone through several
editions, and won enduring fame--perhaps more widely spread in America
than even at home, on account of a quality somewhat kindred to the
peculiar genius of the best American poets, and especially Longfellow,
Poe, and Irving, that the reader will readily recognize in his
finely-finished and most melodious verse. Nor should we omit to
mention, in cataloguing the library of recent Irish poets, "The Monks
of Kilcrea," a long romantic poem in the style of "The Lady of the
Lake," which contains many a passage that Scott might own, but of
which the writer remains unknown. Thus Irish national poetry is
accumulating, as it were, in strata. Mr. Duffy set on the title-page
of his "Ballad Poetry" the Irish motto, _Bolg an dana_, which not all
his readers clearly understood; but which, to all who did, seemed
extremely appropriate at the time. "This man," say the Four Masters,
speaking of a great bard of the fifteenth century, "was called the
_Bolg an dana_, which signifies that he was a common budget of poetry."
And this was all that Mr. Duffy's Ballad Poetry professed to be. But
what was only a budget of desultory jetsam and flotsam in 1845 is
taking the shape of a solid literature in 1865; and those twenty
golden years have at all events been well filled with ranks of rhyme.

----

{482}

From The Month.

CONSTANCE SHERWOOD.


AN AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.


BY LADY GEORGIANA FULLERTON.


CHAPTER VIII.

After I had been musing a little while, Mistress Bess ran into the
room, and cried to some one behind her:

"Nan's friend is here, and she is mine too, for we all played in a
garden with her when I was little. Prithee, come and see her." Then
turning to me, but yet holding the handle of the door, she said: "Will
is so unmannerly, I be ashamed of him. He will not so much as show
himself."

"Then, prithee, come alone," I answered. Upon which she came and sat
on my knee, with her arm round my neck, and whispered in mine ear:

"Moll is very sick to-day; will you not see her, Mistress Sherwood?"

"Yea, if so be I have license," I answered; and she, taking me by the
hand, offered to lead me up the stairs to the room where she lay. I,
following her, came to the door of the chamber, but would not enter
till Bess fetched the nurse, who was the same had been at Sherwood
Hall, and who, knowing my name, was glad to see me, and with a curtsey
invited me in. White as a lily was the little face resting on a
pillow, with its blue eyes half shut, and a store of golden hair about
it, which minded me of the glories round angels' heads in my mother's
missal.

"Sweet lamb!" quoth the nurse, as I stooped to kiss the pale forehead.
"She be too good for this world. Ofttimes she doth babble in her sleep
of heaven, and angels, and saints, and a wreath of white roses
wherewith a bright lady will crown her."

"Kiss my lips," the sick child softly whispered, as I bent over her
bed. Which when I did, she asked, "What is your name? I mind your
face." When I answered, "Constance Sherwood," she smiled, as if
remembering where we had met. "I heard my grandam calling me last
night," she said; "I be going to her soon." Then a fit of pain came
on, and I had to leave her. She did go from this world a few days
after; and the nurse then told me her last words had been "Jesu!
Mary!"

That day I did converse again alone with my Lady Surrey after dinner,
and walked in the garden; and when we came in, before I left, she gave
me a purse with some gold pieces in it, which the earl her husband
willed to bestow on Catholics in prison for their faith. For she said
he had so tender and compassionate a spirit, that if he did but hear
of one in distress he would never rest until he had relieved him; and
out of the affection he had for Mr. Martin, who was one while his
tutor, he was favorably inclined toward Catholics, albeit himself
resolved to conform to the queen's religion. When Mistress Ward came
for me, the countess would have her shown into her chamber, and would
not be contented without she ordered her coach to carry us back to
Holborn, that we might take with us the clothes and cordials which she
did bestow upon us for our poor clients. She begged Mrs. Ward's
prayers for his grace, that he might soon be set at liberty; for she
said in a pretty manner, "It must needs be that Almighty God takes
most heed of the prayers of {483} such as visit him in his affliction
in the person of poor prisoners; and she hoped one day to be free to
do so herself." Then she questioned of the wants of those Mistress
Ward had at that time knowledge of; and when she heard in what sore
plight they stood, it did move her to so great compassion, that she
declared it would be now one of her chiefest cares and pleasures in
life to provide conveniences for them. And she besought Mistress Ward
to be a good friend to her with mine aunt, and procure her to permit
of my frequent visits to Howard House, as the Charter House is now
often called: which would be the greatest good she could do her; and
that she would be most glad also if she herself would likewise favor
her sometimes with her company; which, "if it be not for mine own
sake, Mistress Ward," she sweetly said, "let it be for his sake who,
in the person of his afflicted priests, doth need assistance."

When we reached home, we hid what we had brought under our mantles,
and then in Mistress Ward's chamber, where Muriel followed us. When
the door was shut we displayed these jewelled stores before her
pleased eyes, which did beam with joy at the sight.

"Ah, Muriel," cried Mistress Ward, "we have found an Esther in a
palace; and I pray to God there may be other such in this town we ken
not of, who in secret do yet bear affection to the ancient faith."

Muriel said in her slow way: "We must needs go to the Clink to-morrow;
for there is there a priest whose flesh has fallen off his feet by
reason of his long stay in a pestered and infected dungeon. Mr. Roper
told my father of him, and he says the gaoler will let us in if he be
reasonably dealt with."

"We will essay your ointment, Mistress Sherwood," said Mistress Ward,
"if so be you can make it in time."

"I care not if I sit up all night," I cried, "if any one will buy me
the herbs I have need of for the compounding thereof." Which Muriel
said she would prevail on one of the servants to do.

The bell did then ring for supper; and when we were all seated, Kate
was urgent with me for to tell her how my Lady Surrey was dressed;
which I declared to her as follows: "She had on a brown juste au corps
embroidered, with puffed sleeves, and petticoat braided of a deeper
nuance; and on her head a lace cap, and a lace handkerchief on her
bosom."

"And, prithee, what jewels had she on, sweet coz?"

"A long double chain of gold and a brooch of pearls," I answered.

"And his grace of Norfolk is once more removed to the Tower," said Mr.
Congleton sorrowfully. "'Tis like to kill him soon, and so save her
majesty's ministers the pains to bring him to the block. His
physician, Dr. Rhuenbeck, says he is afflicted with the dropsy."

Polly said she had been to visit the Countess of Northumberland, who
was so grievously afflicted at her husband's death, that it was feared
she would fall sick of grief if she had not company to divert her from
her sad thoughts.

"Which I warrant none could effect so well as thee, wench," her father
said; "for, beshrew me, if thou wouldst not make a man laugh on his
way to the scaffold with thy mad talk. And was the poor lady of better
cheer for thy company?"

"Yea, for mine," Polly answered; "or else for M. de la Motte's, who
came in to pay his devoirs to her, for the first time, I take it,
since her lord's death. And after his first speech, which caused her
to weep a little, he did carry on so brisk a discourse as I never
noticed any but a Frenchman able to do. And she was not the worst
pleased with it that the cunning gentleman did interweave it with
anecdotes of the queen's majesty; which, albeit he related them with
gravity, did carry somewhat of ridicule in them. Such as of her
grace's dancing on Sunday before last at Lord Northampton's wedding,
and calling him to witness {484} her paces, so that he might let
monsieur know how high and disposedly she danced; so that he would not
have had cause to complain, in case he had married her, that she was a
boiteuse, as had been maliciously reported of her by the friends of
the Queen of Scots. And also how, some days since, she had flamed out
in great choler when he went to visit her at Hampton Court; and told
him, so loud that all her ladies and officers could hear her
discourse, that Lord North had let her know the queen-mother and the
Duke of Guise had dressed up a buffoon in an English fashion, and
called him a Milor du Nord; and that two female dwarfs had been
likewise dressed up in that queen's chamber, and invited to mimic her,
the queen of England, with great derision and mockery. 'I did assure
her,' M. de la Motte said, 'with my hand on my heart, and such an
aggrieved visage, that she must needs have accepted my words as true,
that Milor North had mistaken the whole intent of what he had
witnessed, from his great ignorance of the French tongue, which did
render him a bad interpreter between princes; for that the
queen-mother did never cease to praise her English majesty's beauty to
her son, and all her good qualities, which greatly appeased her grace,
who desired to be excused if she, likewise out of ignorance of the
French language, had said aught unbecoming touching the queen-mother.'
'Tis a rare dish of fun, fit to set before a king, to hear this
Monsieur Ambassador speak of the queen when none are present but such
as make an idol of her, as some do."

"For my part," said her father, when she paused in her speech, "I
mislike men with double visages and double tongues; and methinks this
monseer hath both, and withal a rare art for what courtiers do call
diplomacy, and plain men lying. His speeches to her majesty be so
fulsome in her praise, as I have heard some say who are at court, and
his flattery so palpable, that they have been ashamed to hear it; but
behind her back he doth disclose her failings with an admirable
slyness."

"If he be sly," answered Polly, "I'll warrant he finds his match in
her majesty."

"Yea," cried Kate, "even as poor Madge Arundell experienced to her
cost."

"Ay," quoth Polly, "she catcheth many poor fish, who little know what
snare is laid for them."

"And how did her highness catch Mistress Arundell?" I asked.

"In this way, coz," quoth Polly: "she doth often ask the ladies round
her chamber, 'If they love to think of marriage?' and the wise ones do
conceal well their liking thereunto, knowing the queen's judgment in
the matter. But pretty, simple Madge Arundell, not knowing so deeply
as her fellows, was asked one day hereof, and said, 'She had thought
much about marriage, if her father did consent to the man she loved.'
'You seem honest, i' fait said the queen; 'I will sue for you your
father.' At which the dam was well pleased; and when father, Sir
Robert Arundell, came court, the queen questioned him his daughter's
marriage, and pressed him to give consent if the match were discreet.
Sir Robert, much astonished, said, 'He never had heard his daughter
had liking to any man; but he would give his free consent to what was
most pleasing to her highness's will and consent.' Then I will do the
rest,' saith the queen. Poor Madge was called in, and told by the
queen that her father had given his free consent. 'Then,' replied the
simple one, 'I shall be happy, an' it please your grace.' 'So thou
shalt; but not to be a fool and marry,' said the queen. 'I have his
consent given to me, and I vow thou shalt never get it in thy
possession. So go-to about thy business. I see thou art a bold one to
own thy foolishness so readily.'"

"Ah me!" cried Kate, "I be glad not to be a maid to her majesty; for I
would not know how to answer her {485} grace if she should ask me a
like question; for if it be bold to say one hath a reasonable desire
to be married, I must needs be bold then, for I would not for two
thousand pounds break Mr. Lacy's heart; and he saith he will die if I
do not marry him. But, Polly, thou wouldst never be at a loss to
answer her majesty."

"No more than Pace her fool," quoth Polly, "who, when she said, as he
entered the room, 'Now we shall hear of our faults,' cried out, 'Where
is the use of speaking of what all the town doth talk of?'"

"The fool should have been whipped," Mistress Ward said.

"For his wisdom, or for his folly, good Mistress Ward?" asked Polly.
"If for wisdom, 'tis hard to beat a man for being wise. If for folly,
to whip a fool for that he doth follow his calling, and as I be the
licensed fool in this house--which I do take to be the highest
exercise of wit in these days, when all is turned upside down--I do
wish you all good-night, and to be no wiser than is good for your
healths, and no more foolish than suffices to lighten the heart;" and
so laughing she ran away, and Kate said in a lamentable voice,

"I would I were foolish, if it lightens the heart."

"Content thee, good Kate," I said; but in so low a voice none did
hear. And she went on,

"Mr. Lacy is gone to Yorkshire for three weeks, which doth make me
more sad than can be thought of."

I smiled; but Muriel, who had not yet oped her lips whilst the others
were talking, rising, kissed her sister, and said, "Thou wilt have,
sweet one, so great a contentment in his letters as will give thee
patience to bear the loss of his good company."

At the which Kate brightened a little. To live with Muriel was a
preachment, as I have often had occasion since to find.

On the first Sunday I was at London, we heard mass at the Portuguese
ambassador's house, whither many Catholics of his acquaintance
resorted for that purpose from our side of the city. In the afternoon
a gentleman, who had travelled day and night from Staffordshire on
some urgent business, brought me a letter from my father, writ only
four days before it came to hand, and about a week after my departure
from home. It was as follows:

  "MINE OWN DEAR CHILD,--The bearer of this letter hath promised to do
  me the good service to deliver it to thee as soon as he shall reach
  London; which, as he did intend to travel day and night, I compute
  will be no later than the end of this week, or on Sunday at the
  furthest. And for this his civility I do stand greatly indebted to
  him; for in these straitened times 'tis no easy matter to get
  letters conveyed from one part of the kingdom to another without
  danger of discovering that which for the present should rather be
  concealed. I received notice two days ago from Mistress Ward's
  sister of your good journey and arrival at London; and I thank God,
  my very good child, that he has had thee in his holy keeping and
  bestowed thee under the roof of my good sister and brother; so that,
  with a mind at ease in respect to thee, my dear sole earthly
  treasure, I may be free to follow whatever course his providence may
  appoint to me, who, albeit unworthy, do aspire to leave all things
  to follow him. And indeed he hath already, at the outset of my
  wanderings, sweetly disposed events in such wise that chance hath
  proved, as it were, the servant of his providence; and, when I did
  least look for it, by a divine ordination furnished me, who so short
  a time back parted from a dear child, with the company of one who
  doth stand to me in lieu of her who, by reason of her tender sex and
  age, I am compelled to send from me. For being necessitated, for the
  preservation of my life, to make seldom any long stay in one place,
  I had need of a youth to ride with me on those frequent journeys,
  and keep me company in such places {486} as I may withdraw unto for
  quietness and study. So being in Stafford some few days back, I
  inquired of the master of the inn where I did lay for one night, if
  it were not possible to get in that city a youth to serve me as a
  page, whom I said I would maintain as a gentleman if he had
  learning, nurture, and behavior becoming such a person. He said his
  son, who was a schoolmaster, had a youth for a pupil who carried
  virtue in his very countenance; but that he was the child of a
  widow, who, he much feared, would not easily be persuaded to part
  from him. Thereupon I expressed a great desire to have a sight of
  this youth and charged him to deal with his master so that he should
  be sent to my lodgings; which, when he came there, lo and behold, I
  perceived with no small amazement that he was no other than Edmund
  Genings, who straightway ran into my arms, and with much ado
  restrained himself from weeping, so greatly was he moved with
  conflicting passions of present joy and recollected sorrow at this
  our unlooked-for meeting; and truly mine own contentment therein was
  in no wise less than his. He told me that his mother's poverty
  increasing, she had moved from Lichfield, where it was more bitter
  to her, by reason of the affluence in which she had before lived in
  that city, to Stafford, where none did know them; and she dwelt in a
  mean lodging in a poor sort of manner. And whereas he had desired to
  accept the offer of a stranger, with a view to relieve his mother
  from the burden of his support, and maybe yield her some assistance
  in her straits, he now passionately coveted to throw his fortune
  with mine, and to be entered as a page in my service. But though she
  had been willing before, from necessity, albeit averse by
  inclination, to part with him, when she knew me it seemed awhile
  impossible to gain her consent. Methinks she was privy to Edmund's
  secret good opinion of Catholic religion, and feared, if he should
  live with me, the effect thereof would follow. But her necessities
  were so sharp, and likewise her regrets that he should lack
  opportunities for his further advance in learning, which she herself
  was unable to supply, that at length by long entreaty he prevailed
  on her to give him license for that which his heart did prompt him
  to desire for his own sake and hers. And when she had given this
  consent, but not before, lest it should appear I did seek to bribe
  her by such offers to so much condescension as she then evinced, I
  proposed to assist her in any way she wished to the bettering of her
  fortunes, and said I would do as much whether she suffered her son
  to abide with me or no: which did greatly work with her to conceive
  a more favorable opinion of me than she had heretofore held, and to
  be contented he should remain in my service, as he himself so
  greatly desired. After some further discourse, it was resolved that
  I should furnish her with so much money as would pay her debts and
  carry her to La Rochelle, where her youngest son was with her
  brother, who albeit he had met with great losses, would
  nevertheless, she felt assured, assist her in her need. Thus has
  Edmund become to me less a page than a pupil, less a servant than a
  son. I will keep a watchful eye over his actions, whom I already
  perceive to be tractable, capable, willing to learn, and altogether
  such as his early years did promise he should be. I thank God, who
  has given me so great a comfort in the midst of so great trials, and
  to this youth in me a father rather than a master, who will ever
  deal with him in an honorable and loving manner, both in respect to
  his own deserts and to her merits, whose prayers have, I doubt not,
  procured this admirable result of what was in no wise designed, but
  by God's providence fell out of the asking a simple question in an
  inn and of a stranger.

  "And now, mine only and very dear child, I commend thee to God's
  holy keeping; and I beseech thee to be as mindful of thy duty to him
  as thou {487} hast been (and most especially of late) of thine to
  me; and imprint in thy heart those words of holy writ, 'Not to fear
  those that kill the body, but cannot destroy the soul;' but withal,
  in whatever is just and reasonable, and not clearly against Catholic
  religion, to observe a most exact obedience to such as stand to thee
  at present in place of thy unworthy father, and who, moreover, are
  of such virtue and piety as I doubt not would move them rather to
  give thee an example how to suffer the loss of all things for Christ
  his sake than to offend him by a contrary disposition. I do write to
  my good brother by the same convenience to yield him and my sister
  humble thanks for their great kindness to me in thee, and send this
  written in haste; for I fear I shall not often have means hereafter.
  Therefore I desire Almighty God to protect, bless, and establish
  thee. So in haste, and _in visceribus Christi_, adieu."


The lively joy I received from this letter was greater than I can
rehearse, for I had now no longer before my eyes the sorrowful vision
of my dear father with none to tend and comfort him in his wanderings;
and no less was my contentment that Edmund, my dearly-loved playmate,
was now within reach of his good instructions, and free to follow that
which I was persuaded his conscience had been prompting him to seek
since he had attained the age of reason.

I note not down in this history the many visits I paid to the Charter
House that autumn, except to notice the growing care Lady Surrey did
take to supply the needs of prisoners and poor people, and how this
brought her into frequent occasions of discourse with Mistress Ward
and Muriel, who nevertheless, as I also had care to observe, kept
these interviews secret, which might have caused suspicion in those
who, albeit Catholic, were ill-disposed to adventure the loss of
worldly advantages by the profession of what Protestants do term
perverse and open papistry. Kate and Polly were of this way of
thinking--prudence was ever the word with them when talk of religion
was ministered in their presence; and they would not keep as much as a
prayer-book in their chambers for fear of evil results. They were
sometimes very urgent with their father for to suffer them to attend
Protestant service, which they said would not hinder them from hearing
mass at convenient times, and saying such prayers as they listed; and
Polly the more so that a young gentleman of good birth and high
breeding, who conformed to the times, had become a suitor for her
hand, and was very strenuous with her on the necessity of such
compliance, which nevertheless her father would not allow of. Much
company came to the house, both Protestant and Catholic; for my aunt,
who was sick at other times, did greatly mend toward the evening. When
I was first in London for some weeks, she kept me with her at such
times in the parlor, and encouraged me to discourse with the visitors;
for she said I had a forwardness and vivacity of speech which, if
practised in conversation, would in time obtain for me as great a
reputation of wit as Polly ever enjoyed. I was nothing loth to study
in this new school, and not slow to improve in it. At the same time I
gave myself greatly to the reading of such books as I found in my
cousins' chambers; amongst which were some M. de la Motte had lent to
Polly, marvellous witty and entertaining, such as _Les Nouvelles de la
Reine de Navarre_ and the _Cents Histoires tragiques;_ and others done
in English out of French by Mr. Thomas Fortescue; and a poem, writ by
one Mr. Edmund Spenser, very beautiful, and which did so much bewitch
me, that I was wont to rise in the night to read it by the light of
the moon at my casement window; and the _Morte d' Arthur_, which Mr.
Hubert Rookwood had willed me to read, whom I met at Bedford, and
which so filled my head with fantastic images and imagined scenes,
that I did, as it were, fall in love with {488} Sir Launcelot, and
would blush if his name were but mentioned, and wax as angry if his
fame were questioned as if he had been a living man, and I in a
foolish manner fond of him.

This continued for some little time, and methinks, had it proceeded
further, I should have received much damage from a mode of life with
so little of discipline in it, and so great incitements to faults and
follies which my nature was prone to, but which my conscience secretly
reproved. And among the many reasons I have to be thankful to Mistress
"Ward, that never-to-be-forgotten friend, whose care restrained me in
these dangerous courses, partly by compulsion through means of her
influence with my aunt and her husband, and partly by such admonitions
and counsel as she favored me with, I reckon amongst the greatest
that, at an age when the will is weak, albeit the impulses be good,
she lent a helping hand to the superior part of my soul to surmount
the evil tendencies which bad example on the one hand, and weak
indulgence on the other, fostered in me, whose virtuous inclinations
had been, up to that time, hedged in by the strong safeguards of
parental watchfulness. She procured that I should not tarry, save for
brief and scanty spaces of time, in my aunt's parlor when she had
visitors, and so contrived that it should be when she herself was
present, who, by wholesome checks and studied separation from the rest
of the company, reduced my forwardness with just restraints such as
became my age. And when she discovered what books I read, oh, with
what fervent and strenuous speech she drove into my soul the edge of a
salutary remorse; with what tearful eyes and pleading voice she
brought before me the memory of my mother's care and my father's love,
which had ever kept me from drinking such empoisoned draughts from the
well-springs of corruption which in our days books of entertainment
too often prove, and if not altogether bad, yet be such as vitiate the
palate and destroy the appetite for higher and purer kinds of mental
sustenance. Sharp was her correction, but withal so seasoned with
tenderness, and a grief the keenness of which I could discern was
heightened by the thought that my two elder cousins (one time her
pupils) should be so drawn aside by the world and its pleasures as to
forget their pious habits, and minister to others the means of such
injury as their own souls had sustained, that every word she uttered
seemed to sink into my heart as if writ with a pen of fire; and mostly
when she thus concluded her discourse:

"There hath been times, Constance, when men, yea and women also, might
play the fool for a while, without so great danger as now, and dally
with idle folly like children who do sport on a smooth lawn nigh to a
running stream, under their parents' eyes, who, if their feet do but
slip, are prompt to retrieve them. But such days are gone by for the
Catholics of this land. I would have thee to bear in mind that 'tis no
common virtue--no convenient religion--faces the rack, the dungeon, and
the rope; that wanton tales and light verses are no _viaticum_ for a
journey beset with such perils. And thou--thou least of all--whose
gentle mother, as thou well knowest, died of a broken heart from the
fear to betray her faith--thou, whose father doth even now gird
himself for a fight, where to win is to die on a scaffold--shouldst
scorn to omit such preparation as may befit thee to live, if it so
please God, or to die, if such be his will, a true member of his holy
Catholic Church. O Constance, it doth grieve me to the heart that thou
shouldst so much as once have risen from thy bed at night to feed thy
mind with the vain words of profane writers, in place of nurturing thy
soul by such reasonable exercises and means as God, through the
teaching of his Church, doth provide for the spiritual growth of his
children, and by prayer and penance make ready for coming conflicts.
Bethink thee of the many holy priests, yea and laymen also, who be in
uneasy {489} dungeons at this time, lying on filthy straw, with chains
on their bruised limbs, but lately racked and tormented for their
religion, whilst thou didst offend God by such wanton conduct. Count
up the times thou hast thus offended; and so many times rise in the
night, my good child, and say the psalm 'Miserere,' through which we
do especially entreat forgiveness for our sins."

I cast myself in her arms, and with many bitter tears lamented my
folly; and did promise her then, and, I thank God, ever after did keep
that promise, whilst I abode under the same roof with her, to read no
books but such as she should warrant me to peruse. Some days after she
procured Mr. Congleton's consent, who also went with us, to carry me
to the Marshalsea, whither she had free access at that time by reason
of her acquaintanceship with the gaoler's wife, who, when a maid, had
been a servant in her family, and who, having been once Catholic, did
willingly assist such prisoners as came there for their religion.
There we saw Mr. Hart, who hath been this long while confined in a
dark cell, with nothing but boards to lie on till Mistress Ward gave
him a counterpane, which she concealed under her shawl, and the gaoler
was prevailed on by his wife not to take from him. He was cruelly
tortured some time since, and condemned to die on the same day as Mr.
Luke Kirby and some others on a like charge, that he did deny the
queen's supremacy in spiritual matters; but he was taken off the
sledge and returned to prison. He did take it very quietly and
patiently; and when Mr. Congleton expressed a hope he might soon be
released from prison, he smiled and said:

"My good friend, my crosses are light and easy; and the being deprived
of all earthly comfort affords a heavenly joy, which maketh my prison
happy, my confinement merciful, my solitude full of blessings. To God,
therefore, be all praise, honor, and glory, for so unspeakable a
benefit bestowed upon his poor, wretched, and unworthy servant."

So did he comfort those who were more grieved for him than he for
himself; and each in turn we did confess; and after I had disburdened
my conscience in such wise that he perceived the temper of my mind,
and where to apply remedies to the dangers the nature of which his
clearsightedness did foresee, he thus addressed me:

"The world, my dear daughter, soon begins to seem insipid, and all its
pleasures grow bitter as gall; all the fine shows and delights it
affords appear empty and good for nothing to such as have tasted the
happiness of conversing with Christ, though it be amidst torments and
tribulations, yea and in the near approach of death itself. This joy
so penetrates the soul, so elevates the spirit, so changes the
affections, that a prison seems not a prison but a paradise, death a
goal long time desired, and the torments which do accompany it jewels
of great price. Take with thee these words, which be the greatest
treasure and the rarest lesson for these times: 'He that loveth his
life in this world shall lose it, and he that hateth it shall find
it;' and remember the devil is always upon the watch. Be you also
watchful. Pray you for me. I have a great confidence that we shall see
one another in heaven, if you keep inviolable the word you have given
to God to be true to his Catholic Church and obedient to its precepts,
and he gives me the grace to attain unto that same blessed end."

These words, like the sower's seed, fell into a field where thorns
oftentimes threatened to choke their effect; but persecution, when it
arose, consumed the thorns as with fire, and the plant, which would
have withered in stony ground, bore fruit in a prepared soil.

As we left the prison, it did happen that, passing by the gaoler's
lodge, I saw him sitting at a table drinking ale with one whose back
was to the door. A suspicion came over me, the most unlikely in the
world, for it was against all credibility, and I had not seen so much
as that person's face; but in the shape of his head and the manner of
{490} his sitting, but for a moment observed, there was a resemblance
to Edmund Genings, the thought of which I could not shake off. When we
were walking home, Mr. Congleton said Mr. Hart had told him that a
short time back a gentleman had been seized, and committed to close
confinement, whom he believed, though he had not attained to the
certainty thereof, to be Mr. Willisden; and if it were so, that much
trouble might ensue to many recusants, by reason of that gentleman
having dealt in matters of great importance to such persons touching
lands and other affairs whereby their fortunes and maybe their lives
might be compromised. On hearing of this, I straightway conceived a
sudden fear lest it should be my father and not Mr. Willisden was
confined in that prison; and the impression I had received touching
the youth who was at table with the gaoler grew so strong in
consequence, that all sorts of fears founded thereon ran through my
mind, for I had often heard how persons did deceive recusants by
feigning themselves to be their friends, and then did denounce them to
the council, and procured their arrest and oftentimes their
condemnation by distorting and false swearing touching the speech they
held with them. One Eliot in particular, who was a man of great
modesty and ingenuity of countenance, so as to defy suspicion (but a
very wicked man in more ways than one, as has been since proved), who
pretended to be Catholic, and when he did suspect any to be a Jesuit,
or a seminary priest, or only a recusant, he would straightway enter
into discourse with him, and in an artful manner cause him to betray
himself; whereupon he was not slow to throw off the mask, whereby
several had been already brought to the rope. And albeit I would not
credit that Edmund should be such a one, the evil of the times was so
great that my heart did misgive me concerning him, if indeed he was
the youth whom I had espied on such familiar terms with that ruffianly
gaoler. I had no rest for some days, lacking the means to discover the
truth of that suspicion; for Mrs. Ward, to whom I did impart it, dared
not adventure again that week to the Marshalsea, by reason of the
gaoler's wife having charged her not to come frequently, for that her
husband had suddenly suspected her to be a recusant, and would by no
means allow of her visits to the prisoners; but that when he was drunk
she could sometimes herself get his keys and let her in, but not too
often. Mr. Congleton would have it the prisoner must be Mr. Willisden
and no other, and took no heed of my fears, which he said had no
reasonable grounds, as I had not so much as seen the features of the
youth I took to be my father's page. But I could by no means be
satisfied, and wept very much; and I mind me how, in the midst of my
tears that evening, my eyes fell on the frontispiece of a volume of
the _Morte d' Arthur_ which had been loosened when the book was in my
chamber, and in which was picture of Sir Launcelot, the present mirror
of my fancy. I had pinned it to my curtain, and jewelled it as a
treasure and fund of foolish musings, even after yielding up, with
promise to read no more therein, the book which had once held it. And
thus were kept alive the fantastic imaginings wherewith I clothed a
creature conceived in a writer's brain, whose nobility was the
offspring of his thoughts and the continual entertainment of mine own.
But, oh, how just did I now find the words of a virtuous friend, and
how childish my folly, when the true sharp edge of present fear
dispersed these vapory clouds, even as the keen blast of a north wind
doth drive away a noxious mist! The sight of the dismal dungeon that
day visited, the pallid features of that true confessor therein
immured, his soul-piercing words, and the apprehensions which were
wringing my heart--banished of a sudden an idle dream engendered by
vain readings and vainer musings, and Sir Launcelot held henceforward
no higher, or not so high, a {491} place in my esteem as the good Sir
Guy of Warwick, or the brave Hector de Valence.

A day or two after, my Lady Surrey sent her coach for me; and I found
her in her dressing-room seated on a couch with her waiting-women and
Mistress Milicent around her, who were displaying a great store of
rich suits and jewels and such-like gear drawn from wardrobes and
closets, the doors of which were thrown open, and little Mistress Bess
was on tiptoe on a stool afore a mirror with a diamond necklace on,
ribbons flaring about her head, and a fan of ostrich-feathers in her
hand.

"Ah, sweet one," said my lady, when I came in, "thou must needs be
surprised at this show of bravery, which ill consorts with the
mourning of our present garb or the grief of our hearts; but, i'
faith, Constance, strange things do come to pass, and such as I would
fain hinder if I could."

"Make ready thine ears for great news, good Constance," cried Bess,
running toward me encumbered with her finery, and tumbling over sundry
pieces of head-gear in her way, to the waiting-woman's no small
discomfiture. "The queen's majesty doth visit upon next Sunday the
Earl and Countess of Surrey; and as her highness cannot endure the
sight of dool, they and their household must needs put it off and
array themselves in their costliest suits; and Nan is to put on her
choicest jewels, and my Lady Bess must be grand too, to salute the
queen."

"Hush, Bessy," said my lady; and leading me into the adjoining
chamber, "'tis hard," quoth she, holding my hand in hers,--"'tis hard
when his grace is in the Tower and in disgrace with her majesty, and
only six weeks since our Moll died, that she must needs visit this
house, where there be none to entertain her highness but his grace's
poor children; 'tis hard, Constance, to be constrained to kiss the
hand which threatens his life who gave my lord his, and mostly to
smile at the queen's jesting, which my Lord Arundel saith we must of
all things take heed to observe, for that she as little can endure
dool in the face as in the dress."

A few tears fell from those sweet eyes upon my hand, which she still
held, and I said, "Comfort you, my sweet lady. It must needs be that
her majesty doth intend favor to his grace through this visit. Her
highness would never be minded to do so much honor to the children if
she did not purpose mercy to the father."

"I would fain believe it were so," said the countess, thoughtfully;
"but my Lord Arundel and my Lady Lumley hold not, I fear, the same
opinion. And I do hear from them that his grace is much troubled
thereat, and hath written to the Earl of Leicester and my Lord
Burleigh to lament the queen's determination to visit his son, who is
not of age to receive her."  [Footnote 99]

  [Footnote 99: Calendar of State Papers, Domestic Series, 1547 to
  1580: "Duke of Norfolk to the Earl of Leicester and Lord Burleigh;
  laments the queen's determination to visit his son's house, who is
  not of age to receive her."]

"And doth my Lord of Surrey take the matter to heart?"

"My lord's disposition doth incline him to conceive hope where others
see reason to fear," she replied. "He saith he is glad her majesty
should come to this house, and that he will take occasion to petition
her grace to release his father from the Tower; and he hath drawn up
an address to that effect, which is marvellous well expressed; and,
since 'tis written, he makes no more doubt that her majesty will
accede to it than if the upshot was not yet to come, but already past.
And he hath set himself with a skill beyond his years, and altogether
wonderful in one so young, to prepare all things for the queen's
reception; so that when his grandfather did depute my Lord Berkeley
and my Lady Lumley to assist us (he himself being too sick to go out
of his house) in the ordering of the collation in the banqueting-room,
and the music wherewith to greet her highness on her arrival, as well
as the ceremonial to be observed during her visit, they did find that
my lord had so {492} disposedly and with so great taste ordained the
rules to be observed, and the proper setting forth of all things, that
little remained for them to do. And he will have me to be richly
dressed, and to put on the jewels which were his mother's, which,
since her death, have not been worn by the two Duchesses of Norfolk
which did succeed her. Ah me, Mistress Constance, I often wish my lord
and I had been born far from the court, in some quiet country place,
where there are no queens to entertain, and no plots which do bring
nobles into so great dangers."

"Alack," I cried, "dear lady, 'tis not the highest in the land that be
alone to suffer. Their troubles do stand forth in men's eyes; and when
a noble head is imperilled all the world doth know of it; but blood is
spilt in this land, and torments endured, which no pen doth chronicle,
and of which scant mention is made in palaces."

"There is a passion in thy speech," my lady said, "which betrayeth a
secret uneasiness of heart. Hast thou had ill news, my Constance?"

"No news," I answered, "but that which my fears do invent and
whisper;" and then I related to her the cause of my disturbance, which
she sought to allay by kind words, which nevertheless failed to
comfort me.

Before I left she did propose I should come to the Charter House on
the morning of the queen's visit, and bring Mistress Ward and my
cousins also, as it would pleasure them to stand in the gallery and
witness the entertainment, and albeit my heart was heavy, methought it
was an occasion not to be overpast to feast my eyes with the sight of
majesty, and to behold that great queen who doth hold in her hands her
subjects' lives, and who, if she do but nod, like the god of the
heathen which books do speak of, such terrible effects ensue, greater
than can be thought of; and so I gave my lady mine humble thanks, and
also for that she did gift me with a dainty hat and a well-embroidered
suit to wear on that day; which, when Kate saw, she fell into a
wonderful admiration of the pattern, and did set about to get it
copied afore the day of the royal visit to Howard House. As I returned
to Holborn in my lady's coach there was a great crowd in the Cornhill,
and the passage for a while arrested by the number of persons on their
way to what is now called the Royal Exchange, which her majesty was to
visit in the evening. I sat very quietly with mine eyes fixed on the
foot-passengers, not so much looking at their faces as watching their
passage, which, like the running of a river, did seem endless. But at
last it somewhat slackened, and the coach moved on, when, at the
corner of a street, nigh unto a lamp over a shop, which did throw a
light on his face, I beheld Edmund Genings. Oh, how my heart did beat,
and with what a loud cry I did call to the running footmen to stop!
But the noise of the street was so great they did not hear me, and I
saw him turn and pursue his way down another street toward the river.
My good uncle, when he heard I had verily seen my father's new page in
the city, gave more heed to my suspicions, and did promise to go
himself unto the Marshalsea on the next day, and seek to verify the
name of the prisoner Mr. Hart had made mention of.

[TO BE CONTINUED.]

------

{493}

From The Cornhill Magazine.

MODERN FALCONRY.


Hunting and hawking were, as every one knows, the great sports of our
forefathers. Angling was but little understood before the time of
Walton and Cotton, and not thoroughly even by those great masters
themselves. In the olden time, the bow and arrow, being scarcely
adapted for fowling, were used almost exclusively against large game,
such as deer; the crossbow was perhaps not a very efficient weapon;
and the art of shooting flying with a fowling-piece may be said to be
of recent invention. It is true that, a couple of hundred years ago,
men (the sportsmen of those days) might have been seen, armed with a
match-lock, or some such wonderful contrivance, crawling toward a
covey of basking partridges, with the intention of shooting them on
the ground; and Dame Juliana Berners, who wrote upon falconry in the
middle of the fifteenth century, invented a fly-rod of such excessive
weight that the strongest salmon-fisher in these days would be
unwilling to wield it. But this was sorry work, and we can well
understand that, of itself, it was very far from satisfying a
sport-loving people. They still held by the old sports. Hunting and
hawking were in their glory when what we now call "shooting" and
"fishing" were scarcely understood at all. Deer were in abundance, and
so was other game, especially if we consider the few people privileged
to kill it. In those days, though not in these, the most sportsmanlike
way was the most profitable; and more quarry could be taken with dogs
and hawks than in any other, and perhaps less legitimate, manner.

Hunting we retain, as our great and national sport, though
circumstances, rather than choice, have led to our exchanging the stag
for the fox. But falconry, the great sport of chivalry, once the
national sport of these islands, has been permitted so nearly to die
out that but few people are aware of its existence amongst us. That it
does still live, however, though under a cloud,--to what extent and in
what manner it is carried out,--it is the purport of this paper to
show.

The causes of the decrease, and almost the loss, of this sport are
obvious enough. Amongst the chief are, the present enclosed state of
the country; the perfection--or what is almost perfection--of modern
gunnery, and of the marksman's skill, and the desire to make large
bags. Add to these, perhaps, the trouble and expense attendant upon
keeping hawks. But the links have at no time absolutely been broken
which, in England, unite falconry in the time of Ethelbert to falconry
of the present day. Lord Orford and Colonel Thornton took them up and
strengthened them at the end of the last, and the beginning of the
present, century. Later still, the Loo Club in Holland saved falconry
from extinction in England, because its English members brought their
falcons to this country, and flew them here. The Barrs, first-rate
Scotch falconers, and John Pells, of Norfolk, helped the course by
training and selling hawks; and a work entitled "Falconry in the
British Isles," published in 1855, together with some chapters which
appeared rather later in one of the leading sporting newspapers (and
were afterward collected in a volume), served to create or encourage a
love for falconry.

It was said that the present Duke of St. Albans, the grand falconer,
would take to the sport _con amore_, and not as a mere form; but this
is very far indeed from being the case. {494} The Maharajah Dhuleep
Singh was perhaps the most considerable falconer of the present day;
and last season but one he killed 119 grouse with his young hawks; but
he has lately given up the greater part of his hawking establishment.
In Ireland there are some good falcons, flown occasionally at herons,
and frequently, and with great success, at other quarry; many officers
in the army are falconers; and, in the wilds of Cheshire, there lives
a poor gentleman who has flown hawks for fifteen years, and contrives,
through the courtesy of his friends, to make a bag on the moors with
his famous grouse-hawk "The Princess," and one or two others.

Those who have been accustomed to regard falconry as entirely a thing
of the past, and the secret of hawk-training as utterly lost as that
of Stonehenge or the Pyramids, will be surprised to hear that there
are, at the present time, hawks in England of such proved excellence,
that it is impossible to conceive even princes in the olden time,
notwithstanding the monstrous prices they are said to have paid for
some falcons, ever possessing better. When a peregrine falcon will
"wait on," as it is called, at the height of a hundred or a hundred
and fifty yards above her master, as he beats the moors for her, and,
when the birds rise, chase them with almost the speed of an arrow;
when she is sure to kill, unless the grouse escapes in cover; when she
will not attempt to "carry" her game, even should a dog run by her,
and when she is ready to fly two or three times in one morning--it can
easily be imagined, even by those who know nothing of falconry, that
she has reached excellence.

And so, in heron-hawking. If a cast of falcons, unhooded at a quarter
of a mile from a passing heron (especially a "light" heron, i. e., a
heron _going_ to feed, and therefore not weighted), capture him in a
wind, and after a two-mile flight, it is difficult to suppose,
_caeteris paribus_, that any hawks could possibly be superior to them.
And, as such hawks as we have described exist, the inevitable
conclusion is, that where falconry is really understood, it is
understood as well as it ever was; or, in other words, that modern
falconry, as far as the perfection of individual hawks is concerned,
is equal to ancient.

Our forefathers, excellent falconers as they were, chose to make a
wonderful mystery of their craft; and when they did publish a book on
the subject of their great sport, its directions could only avail the
gentry of those exclusive times. In examining these books, one is
sometimes almost tempted to doubt whether the writers really offered
the whole of their contents in a spirit of good faith; at any rate,
some of the advice is very startling to modern ears; and no sane man
of the present day would dream of following it. Perhaps the reader
would like an extract. Here, then, is a recipe for a sick hawk,
extracted from _The Gentleman's Recreation_, published 1677: "Take
germander, pelamountain, basil, grummel-seed, and broom-flowers, of
each half an ounce; hyssop, sassafras, polypodium, and horse-mints, of
each a quarter of an ounce, and the like of nutmegs; cubebs, borage,
mummy, mugwort, sage, and the four kinds of mirobolans, of each half
an ounce; of aloes soccotrine the fifth part of an ounce, and of
saffron one whole ounce. To be put into a hen's gut, tied at both
ends." What was supposed to be the effect of this marvellous mixture,
it is somewhat hard to divine; but our modern pharmacopoeia would be
content with a little rhubarb and a few peppercorns. With regard to
food, we are told, in the same work, that cock's flesh is proper for
falcons that are "melancholick;" and that "phlegmatick" birds are to
be treated in a different way--possibly fed on pullets. Were this paper
intended as a notice of ancient, instead of modern falconry, we might
multiply instances to show the extreme _faddiness_ of the old
falconers.

{495}

Simply to _tame_ a hawk is excessively easy. To train it, up to
a certain point, is not at all difficult. But it requires an old and
practised hand to produce a bird of first-rate excellence.

The modern routine of training the peregrine falcon is shortly as
follows: Young birds are procured, generally from Scotland, either
just before they can fly, or just after. They are placed in some
straw, on a platform, in an outhouse, which ought to open to the
southeast. They are furnished each with a large bell (the size of a
very small walnut) for the leg; and each with a couple of jessies
(short straps of leather) for both legs. If they are unable to fly,
the door of the coach-house (or whatever the outhouse may be) should
be left open; but if they have tolerable use of their wings, it will
be necessary to close it for the first few days. They are fed twice a
day with beefsteak--changed, occasionally, for rabbit, rook, or
pigeon; and, if the birds are very young, the food must be cut up
small; but it is improper to take them from the nest until the
feathers have shown themselves thoroughly through the white down. A
lure is then used. This instrument need be nothing more than a forked
and somewhat heavy piece of wood (sometimes covered with leather), to
which is fastened a strap and a couple of pigeons' wings. To this meat
is tied; and the young hawks are encouraged to fly down from their
platform, at the stated feeding times, to take their meals from it,
the falconer either loudly whistling or shouting to them the while.
Presently, and as they become acquainted with the lures, they are
permitted to fly at large for a fortnight or three weeks; and, if the
feeding-times be kept, the lures well furnished with food, and the
shout or whistle employed, the hawks will certainly return when they
are due; unless, indeed, they have been injured or destroyed when from
home, by accident or malice. This flying at liberty is termed "flying
at hack." When the young hawks show any disposition to prey for
themselves (though the heavy bells are intended slightly to delay
this), they are taken up from "hack," either with a small net, or with
the hand. They are then taught to wear the hood, and are carried on
the fist. In a few days they are sufficiently tame to be trusted at
large, and may be flown at young grouse or pigeons, the heavy bells
having been changed for the lightest procurable. At this period great
pains are taken by the falconer to prevent his bird "carrying" her
game; for it is obvious that, were the hawk to move when he approached
her, he would be subject constantly to the greatest trouble and
disappointment. The tales told in books about hawks _bringing_ quarry to
their master are absurd; the falconer must go to his hawk. Such is a
sketch of the training in modern times of the eyas or young bird.
Wild-caught hawks, however, called "haggards," are occasionally used.
These, though excellent for herons and rooks, are not good for
game-hawking, as it is difficult to make them "wait on" about the
falconer, and all game must be flown from the air, and not from the
hood; _i.e._, by a hawk from her pitch, and not from the fist of her
master. Haggards, of course, are never flown at "hack." The tiercel,
or male peregrine, is excellent for partridges and pigeons; but the
female bird only can have a chance with herons, and is to be preferred
also for grouse and rooks.

We have in this country several trained goshawks, which are flown at
rabbits; also sometimes at hares and pheasants. The merlin, too, is
occasionally trained: the present writer flew these beautiful little
birds at larks for years; but gave them up in 1857, and confined
himself entirely to peregrines and goshawks. The sparrow-hawk, the
wildest of hawks, is sometimes used for small birds. The hobby is
hardly to be procured. The Iceland and Greenland falcons are prized,
but are rarely met with.

These large birds are called gerfalcons; and, when very white, and
good in the field, fetched extravagant prices in the old times. They
may now sometimes be procured untrained for £5 or £6 each; but the
peregrine is large enough for the game of this country.

{496}

It may be interesting to know, in something like detail, what a flight
at game, rooks, pigeons, or magpies is like how it is conducted, and
to what extent the sagacity of hawks may be developed. To this end, we
will give a sketch or two of what is being done now, and what will be
done in the game season.

At this season of the year, and in this country, falconers are obliged
to be content with rook, pigeon, or magpie flying. Such quarry is
flown "out of the hood," and not from the air; _i.e._ the hawk,
instead of "waiting on" over the falconer in expectation of quarry
being sprung, is unhooded as it rises, and is cast off from the fist.
At least the only exception to this is when pigeons are thrown from
the hand in order to teach a hawk to "wait on."

It will be understood that, in the following description, the
peregrine is supposed to be used, for a long-winged hawk is necessary
for the flights about to be described, and the merlin is too small to
be depended upon for anything larger than a black-bird, or a young
partridge; though the best females are good for pigeons.

Let us go out to-day, then, and try to kill a rook or two on the
neighboring common. The hawks are in good condition; not indeed as fat
as though they were put up to moult, but with plenty of flesh and
muscle, and wind kept good by almost daily exercise. We have a haggard
tiercel and a haggard falcon; also two eyas falcons; all are up to
their work and have been well entered to rooks. We shall not trouble
ourselves to take out the cadge to-day, for our party is quite strong
enough to carry the hawks on the fist. Only two of us are mounted, a
lady and a gentleman; the rest will run. The lady would carry the
little tiercel, but she is afraid lest she should make a blunder in
unhooding him, as her mare is rather fresh this morning; but her
companion, who has flown many a hawk, willingly takes charge of him.

We are well on the common now; and lo! a black mass on the ground
there, with a few black spots floating over. Hark to the distant
"caw!" A clerical meeting. "Let us give them a bishop, then," says the
bearer of the tiercel, which is called by that name. The wind is from
them to us. The horseman and his companion canter onward; we follow at
a slow run. The horses approach the flock; the black mass becomes
disturbed and rises; the "bishop" is thrown off with a shout of "Hoo,
ha! ha!" and rushes amongst his clergy with even more than episcopal
energy. There is full enough wind; the rooks are soon into it, and
ringing up in a compact body with a pace which, for them, is very
good. His lordship, too, is mounting: he rose in a straight line the
moment he left the fist, but he is now making a large circle to get
above his quarry. He has reached them, but he does not grapple with
the first bird he comes near, though he seems exceedingly close to it.
But there is something so thoroughly systematic in his movements,
something which so suggests a long and deadly experience, that even
the uninitiated of the party feel certain that he is doing the right
thing. He is nearly above them. A rook has left the flock--the very
worst thing he could possibly do for his own sake: he has saved the
bishop the trouble of selection. He makes for some trees in the
distance, but it is inconceivable that he can reach them. There! and
there! Now again! He is clutched at the third stoop, and both birds,
in a deadly embrace, flap and twist to the ground together. The rest
are high in the air, and a long way off.

It must not be considered that this tiercel did not dash at once into
the whole flock because he was afraid to do so. He had no fear
whatever; but nature or experience taught him that a stoop from above
was worth half-a-dozen attempts to fly level and grapple.

"It's poor work after all," said one of the party, who had run for it
notwithstanding; "these brutes can't fly, {497} and it's almost an
insult to a first-rate hawk to unhood him at such quarry. Even the
hawks don't fly with the same dash that one sees when a strong pigeon
is on the wing. Beside, it's spoiling the eyases for game-hawking;
when they ought to be 'waiting on' over grouse, they will be starting
after the first rook that passes."

"My good fellow," answered another, "you _must_ hawk rooks now, or be
content with pigeons, unless you can find magpies (we will try that
presently): there are no herons anywhere near (and I don't know that
the eyases would fly them if there were); and, as for flying a
house-pigeon, which has been brought to the field in a basket, though
I grant the goodness of the flight, I don't see the sport. If we could
find wood-pigeons far enough from trees, I should like that. As for
the game next season, there are not many rooks on the _moors_; and, as
these falcons would fly rooks even if they had not seen them for a
year, I don't think we are losing much by what we are doing. It is
exercise at any rate; and, beside, I assure you that I have seen an
old cock-rook, in a wind like this, live for a mile, before one of the
best falcons in the world, where there was not a single tree to
shelter him."

We are compelled to go some distance before we can see a black
feather; for rooks, once frightened, are very careful; or rather, we
should have been so compelled had it not happened that an old
carrion-crow, perhaps led near the spot by curiosity, is seen passing
at the distance of about two hundred yards. The passage-falcon is
instantly unhooded and cast off; and, as we are now in the
neighborhood of a few scattered trees, it takes ten minutes to kill
him; and a short time, too, for he has "treed" himself some eight or
ten times in spite of our efforts to make him take the open.

Our time is short to-day; but let us get a magpie, if possible, before
we go home. Our fair companion is fully as anxious for the sport as we
are. Only a mile off there is a nice country; large grass fields,
small fences, with a bush here and there. We have reached it. A magpie
has flown from the top of that single tree in the hedgerow, and is
skimming down the field. Off with the young falcons: wait till the
first sees him; now unhood the second. Ah! he sees _them_, and flies
along the side of the hedge. Let us ride and run! Get him out of cover
as fast as possible, while the hawks "wait on" above. Pray, sir, jump
the fence a little lower down, and help to get him out from the other
side. Hoo-ha-ha! there he goes. Well stooped, "Vengeance," and nearly
clutched, "Guinevere," but he has reached the tree in the hedgerow,
and is moving his long tail about in the most absurd manner. A good
smack of the whip, and he is off again. And so we go on for a quarter
of an hour, riding, running, shouting, till "Guinevere" clutches him
just as he is about to enter a clump of trees. Who-whoop!

Such is rook-hawking and magpie-hawking. In an open plain, and on a
tolerably still day, a great number of rooks may be killed with good
hawks. Either eyas or passage-falcons may be used. Last year, one
hundred and fifty-two rooks and two carrion-crows were killed by some
officers, on the finest place for rook-flying in England, with some
passage-hawks and two eyases. In 1863, ninety rooks were killed, near
the same spot, with eyases. Tiercels are better than falcons for
magpie-hawking, as they are unquestionably quicker amongst hedgerows,
and can turn in a smaller compass. One tiercel has been known to kill
eight magpies in a day; but this is extraordinary work.

To prevent confusion, it may be as well to mention here that the term
"haggard" and "passage-hawk" both mean a wild-caught hawk; while
"eyas" signifies a bird taken from the nest or eyrie.

Heron-hawking requires an open country, with a heronry in the
neighborhood. The quarry is flown at generally by passage-hawks; but a
few {498} very good eyases have been found equal to the flight.

Game-hawking is conducted in the following manner: Let us suppose, in
the first instance, that the falconer is living in the immediate
neighborhood of grouse-moors, and that he wishes, on some fine morning
at the end of October or the beginning of November, to show his friend
a flight or two at grouse, without going very far for the sport. The
old pointer is summoned; "The Princess," an eyas falcon in the second
plumage, is hooded; and the walk is commenced.

Now, very early in the season on the moors, and through the whole of
September with partridges, it is better to wait for a point before the
hawk is cast oft, for this saves time, and you know that you have game
under you; but at that period of the season which we have named,
grouse rise the moment man or dog is seen, and you would have a bad
chance indeed were you to fly your hawk out of the hood (_i.e._, from
the fist) at them. The best way is to keep your dog to heel, not to
talk, and, just before you show yourself in some likely place, to
throw up the falcon. When she has reached her pitch, which she will
soon do, hurry the dog on, run, clap your hands, and get the birds up
as soon as may be.

The hill is ascended, "The Princess" is at her pitch--where she would
remain, following her master and "Shot" the pointer, for ten minutes
if necessary. Some minutes pass: an old cock-grouse, put up by a
shepherd-dog, rises a couple of hundred yards off. Hoo-ha-ha-ha! "The
Princess" vanishes from her post, more rapidly than the knights in
"Ivanhoe" left theirs. She does not droop or fly near the ground (she
has had too much experience for that),  but almost rises as she shoots
off after him. Had he risen under her, she would have cut him over;
but this is a different affair. They are soon out of sight down the
hill; but a marker has been placed that way. "I think she has killed
him, sir," he shouts presently; "but it's a long way. No, she's coming
back; she must have put him into cover." Up and down hill, it would
take us twenty minutes to get there; and see! she is over our heads,
"waiting on" again, and telling us, as well as she can, to spring
another. A point! how is that?--only that there are some more which
dare not rise because they have seen _her_. "Hi in, 'Shot!'" Again the
falconer's shout startles his friend; again "The Princess" passes
through the air like an arrow. "All right this time, sir," cries the
marker; "I see her with it under yon wall." She has scarcely begun to
eat the head as we reach her. One more flight. She is lifted on the
grouse; the leash is passed through the jesses, and then she is
hooded. Let us rest for ten minutes. Again, she is "waiting on," again
she flies; but this time, though we see the flight for three-quarters
of a mile, the birds top a hill, and we are an hour in finding them.
The grouse, however, is fit for cooking even then; only the head,
neck, and some of the back have vanished: it is plucked nearly as well
as though it had been in the hands of a cook. That will do, and very
good sport, too, considering we had but one hawk. Let us now feed her
up on beef, and hood her.

In the very early part of the season, with grouse, and commonly with
partridges, it is usual (as we have hinted) to wait for a point; the
hawk is then cast off, and the birds are sprung when she has reached
her pitch.

Goshawks, which may be occasionally procured from the Regent's Park
Zoological Gardens, or directly from Sweden or Germany, are considered
by some falconers to be difficult birds to manage. That they are
sulkily disposed is certain; but in hands _accustomed to them_, and
when they are constantly at work, they are exceedingly trustworthy,
even affectionate, and will take as many as eight or ten rabbits in a
day. They are short-winged hawks, and have no chance with anything
faster than a rising pheasant; they are {499} excellent for rabbits,
and a few large ones will sometimes hold a hare. In modern practice
they are never hooded, except in travelling, and are always flown from
the fist, or from some tree in which they may have perched after an
unsuccessful flight.

There are probably, in these islands, about fifteen practical
falconers, three or four of whom are professional; of the latter, John
Pells and the Barrs are well worthy of mention.

John Pells was born at Lowestoft in 1815, and went, when he was
thirteen, with his father to Valkneswaard to take passage-hawks for
the Didlington Subscription Club; so that he was very soon in harness.
The elder Pells commenced his career at the age of eleven, and was in
every respect a perfect falconer; he was presented by Napoleon I. with
a falconer's bag, which is now in possession of the Duke of Leeds. He
died in 1838. The present John Pells has had all possible advantages
in his calling, and has made every use of them. He was falconer to the
Duke of Leeds, to Mr. O'Keeffe, to Mr. E. C. Newcome, to the late Duke
of St. Albans, and now attends to the hawks which the present duke is
bound, either by etiquette or necessity, to maintain. Pells also sells
trained hawks, and gives lessons in the art of falconry. He was at one
time an exceedingly active man, and spent six months in Iceland,
catching Iceland falcons. After enduring a good deal of cold and
fatigue, he brought fifteen of these birds to Brandon, in Norfolk, in
November, 1845. He is now too stout and too gouty for strong exercise,
but his experience is very valuable.

Too much can hardly be said in raise of John and Robert Barr
(brothers). Their father, a gamekeeper in Scotland, taught them, in a
rough way, the rudiments of falconry, They are now, and have been for
a long time, most accomplished falconers, When in the employment of
the Indian prince Dhuleep Singh, John Barr was sent to India to learn
the Indian system of falconry. There is some notion now of his being
placed at the head of a hawking club about to be established in Paris;
and English falconry might well be proud of such a representative.
Beside the Pells and the Barrs, we have Paul Möllen, Gibbs, and
Bots--and one or two more--all good.

In consequence of the great rage for game-preserving which obtains in
the present day, it does not seem unlikely that the peregrine falcon
may, in time, be as thoroughly exterminated in Scotland and Ireland as
the goshawk has already been. At present, however, falconers find no
difficulty in procuring these birds, if they are willing to pay for
them. In a selfish point of view, therefore, they have nothing of
which to complain. But it might become a question, at least of
conscience, whether mankind have the right, though they possibly may
have the power, of blotting out from the face of creation--so long as
there is no danger to human life and limb--any conspicuous type of
strength or of beauty. The kingfisher is sought to be exterminated on
our rivers, the eagle and the falcon on our hills; and it is brought
forward in justification of this slaughter--at least it is brought
forward in effect--that the sportsman's bag and the angler's creel are
of much more importance than the wonderful works of God. To all that
is selfish in these strict preservers of fish and of game it may be
opposed that part of the food of the kingfisher consists in minnows;
that the fry of trout and salmon, when not confined in breeding-boxes,
are rarely procured by this bird, which constantly feeds upon the
larvae of the _Dytiscce_ and _Libelluae_, the real foes of the fry;
that the peregrine falcon, though she undoubtedly kills very many
healthy grouse, purges the moors of diseased ones, and drives away the
egg-stealing birds. And to all that is generous in these martinets of
preservation it may be submitted that true sport has other elements
than those of acquisition and slaughter; that the pleasure of a ramble
on the hills {500} or by the river is sadly dashed if you have struck
out some of the beauty of the landscape; and that the incident of a
flight made by a wild hawk, or the flash of a kingfisher near the
angler's rod, is as lively and as well worth relating as the fall of
an extra grouse to the gun, or the addition of another trout to the
basket.

------

From The Lamp.

ALL-HALLOW EVE; OR, THE TEST OF FUTURITY.

BY ROBERT CURTIS.


CHAPTER I.


I could have wished that the incidents which I am about to describe in
the following tale had taken place in some locality with a less
Celtic, and to English tongues a more pronounceable, name than
_Boher-na-Milthiogue._ I had at first commenced the tale with the word
itself, thus: "Boher-na-Milthiogue, though in a wild and remote part
of Ireland," etc. But I was afraid that, should an English reader take
up and open the book, he would at the very first word slap it together
again between the palms of his hands, saying, "Oh, that is quite
enough for me!" Now, as my English readers have done me vastly good
service on former occasions, I should be sorry to frighten them at the
outset of this new tale; and I have therefore endeavored to lead them
quietly into it. With my Irish friends no such circumlocution would
have been necessary. Perhaps, if I dissever and explain the word, it
may enable even my English readers in some degree to approach a
successful attempt at its pronunciation. I am aware, however, of the
difficulty they experience in this respect, and that their attempts at
some of our easiest names of Irish places are really
laughable--laughable, at least, to our Celtic familiarity with the
correct sound.

_Boher_ is the Irish for "bridge," and _milthiogue_ for a "midge;"
Boher-na-Milthiogue, "the midge's bridge."

There now, if my English friends cannot yet pronounce the word
properly, which I still doubt, they can at least understand what it
means. It were idle, I fear to hope, that they can see any _beauty_ in
it; and yet that it is beautiful there can be no Celtic doubt
whatever.

Perhaps it might have been well to have written thus far in the shape
of a preface; but as nobody nowadays reads prefaces, the matter would
have been as bad as ever. I shall therefore continue now as I had
intended to have commenced at first.

Boher-na-Milthiogue, though in a wild and remote part of Ireland, is
not without a certain degree of natural and romantic beauty, suiting
well the features of the scene in which it lies.

Towering above a fertile and well-cultivated plain frown and smile the
brother and sister mountains of Slieve-dhu and Slieve-bawn, the solid
masonry of whose massive and perpendicular precipices was built by no
human architect. The ponderous and scowling rocks of Slieve-dhu, the
brother, are dark and indistinct; while, separated from it by a narrow
and abrupt ravine, those of Slieve-bawn, the sister, are of a whitish
spotted gray, contrasting cheerfully with those of her gloomy brother.

{501}

There is generally a story in Ireland about mountains or rivers or old
ruins which present any peculiarity of shape or feature. Now it is an
undoubted fact, which any tourist can satisfy himself of, that
although from sixty to a hundred yards asunder, there are huge bumps
upon the side of Slieve-bawn, corresponding to which in every respect
as to size and shape are cavities precisely opposite them in the side
of Slieve-dhu. The story in this case is, that although formerly the
mountains were, like a loving brother and sister, clasped in each
other's arms, they quarrelled one dark night (I believe about the
cause of thunder), when Slieve-dhu in a passion struck his sister a
blow in the face, and staggered her back to where she now stands, too
far for the possibility of reconciliation; and that she, knowing the
superiority of her personal appearance, stands her ground, as a proud
contrast to her savage and unfeeling relative.

Deep straight gullies, worn by the winter floods, mark the sides of
both mountains into compartments, the proportion and regularity of
which might almost be a matter of surprise, looking like huge stripes
down the white dress of Slieve-bawn, while down that of Slieve-dhu
they might be compared to black and purple plaid.

"Far to the north," in the bosom of the minor hills, lies a glittering
lake--glittering when the sun shines; dark, sombre, and almost
imperceptible when the clouds prevail.

The origin of the beautiful name in which the spot itself rejoices I
believe to be this; but why do I say "believe?" It is a self-evident
and well-known fact.

Along the base of Slieve-bawn there runs a narrow _roadeen_, turning
almost at right angles through the ravine already mentioned, and
leading to the flat and populous portion of the country on the other
side of the mountains, and cutting the journey, for any person
requiring to go there, into the sixteenth of the distance by the main
road. In this instance the proverb would not be fulfilled, that "the
longest way round was the shortest way home." Across one of the
winter-torrent beds which runs down the mountain side, almost at the
entrance of the ravine, is a rough-built rustic bridge, at a
considerable elevation from the road below. To those approaching it
from the lower level, it forms a conspicuous and exceedingly
picturesque object, looking not unlike a sort of castellated defence
to the mouth of the narrow pass between the mountains.

This bridge, toward sunset upon a summer's evening, presents a very
curious and (except in that spot) an unusual sight. Whether it arises
from any peculiarity of the herbage in the vicinity, or the fissures
in the mountains, or the crevices in the bridge itself, as calculated
to engender them, it would be hard to say; but it would be impossible
for any arithmetician to compute at the roughest guess the millions,
the billions of small midges which dance in the sunbeams immediately
above and around the bridge, but in no other spot for miles within
view. The singularity of their movements, and the peculiarity of their
distribution in the air, cannot fail to attract the observation of the
most careless beholder. In separate and distinct batches of some
hundreds of millions each, they rise in almost solid masses until they
are lost sight of, as they attain the level of the heathered brow of
the mountain behind them, becoming visible again as they descend into
the bright sunshine that lies upon the white rocks of Slieve-bawn. In
no instance can you perceive individual or scattered midges; each
batch is connected and distinct in itself, sometimes oval, sometimes
almost square, but most frequently in a perfectly round ball. No two
of these batches rise or fall at the same moment. I was fortunate
enough to see them myself upon more than one occasion in high
perfection. They reminded me of large balls thrown up and caught
successively by some distinguished {502} acrobat. During the
performance, a tiny little sharp whir of music fills the atmosphere,
which would almost set you to sleep as you sit on the battlement of
the bridge watching and wondering.

By what law of creation, or what instinct of nature, or, if by
neither, by what union of sympathy the movements of these milthiogues
are governed--for I am certain there are millions of them at the same
work in the same spot this fine summer's evening--would be a curious
and proper study for an entomologist; but I have no time here to do
more than describe the facts, were I even competent to enter into the
inquiry. Fancy say fifty millions of midges in a round ball, so
arranged that, under no suddenness or intricacy of movement, any one
touches another. There is no saying amongst them, "Keep out of my way,
and don't be _pushin'_ me," as Larry Doolan says.

So far, the thing in itself appears miraculous; but when we come to
consider that their motions, upward to a certain point, and downward
to another, are simultaneous, that the slightest turn of their wings
is collectively instantaneous, rendering them at one moment like a
black target, and another turn rendering them almost invisible, all
their movements being as if guided by a single will--we are not only
lost in wonder, but we are perfectly unable to account for or
comprehend it. I have often been surprised, and so, no doubt, may many
of my readers have been, at the regularity of the evolutions of a
flock of stares in the air, where every twist and turn of a few
thousand pairs of wings seemed as if moved by some connecting wire;
but even this fact, surprising as it is, sinks into insignificance
when compared with the movements of these milthiogues.

But putting all these inquiries and considerations aside, the simple
facts recorded have been the origin of the name with which this tale
commences.



CHAPTER II.

Winifred Cavana was an only daughter, indeed an only child. Her
father, old Ned Cavana of Rathcash, had been always a thrifty and
industrious man. During the many years he had been able to attend to
business--and he was an experienced farmer--he had realized a sum of
money, which, in his rank of life and by his less prosperous
neighbors, would be called "unbounded wealth," but which, divested of
that envious exaggeration, was really a comfortable independence for
his declining years, and would one of those days be a handsome
inheritance for his handsome daughter. Not that Ned Cavana intended to
huxter the whole of it up, so that she should not enjoy any of it
until its possession might serve to lighten her grief for his
death--no; should Winny marry some "likely boy," of whom her father
could in every respect approve, she should have six hundred pounds,
R.M.D.; and at his death by which time Ned hoped some of his
grandchildren would make the residue more necessary--she should have
all that he was able to demise, which was no paltry matter. In the
meantime they would live happily and comfortable, not niggardly.

With this view--a distant one, he still hoped--before him, and knowing
that he had already sown a good crop, and reaped a sufficient harvest
to live liberally, die peacefully, and be _berrid dacently_, he had
set a great portion of his land upon a lease during his own life, at
the termination of which it was to revert to his son-in-law, of whose
existence, long before that time, he could have no doubt, and for
whose name a blank had been left in his will, to be filled up in due
time before he died, or, failing that event--not his death, but a
son-in-law--it was left solely to his daughter Winifred.

Winny Cavana was, beyond doubt or question, a very handsome girl and
she knew it. She knew, too, {503} that she was "a catch;" the only one
in that side of the country; and no person wondered at the many
admirers she could boast of, though it was a thing she was never known
to do; nor did she wonder at it herself. Without her six hundred
pounds, Winny could have had scores of "bachelors;" and it was not
very surprising if she was hard to be pleased. Indeed, had Winny
Cavana been penniless, it is possible she would have had a greater
number of open admirers, for her reputed wealth kept many a faint
heart at a distance. It was not to be wondered at either, if a wealthy
country beauty had the name of a coquette, whether she deserved it or
not; nor was it to be expected that she could give unmixed
satisfaction to each of her admirers; and we all know what
censoriousness unsuccessful admiration is likely to cause in a
disappointed heart.

Amongst all those who were said to have entered for the prize of
Winny's heart, Thomas Murdock was the favorite--not with herself, but
the neighbors. At all events he was the "likely boy" whom Winny's
father had in his eye as a husband for his daughter; and in writing
his will, he had lifted his pen from the paper at the blank already
mentioned, and written the name Thomas Murdock in the air, so that, in
case matters turned out as he wished and anticipated, it would fit in
to a nicety.

The townlands of Rathcash and Rathcashmore, upon which the Cavanas and
Murdocks lived, was rather a thickly populated district, and they had
some well-to-do neighbors, beside many who were not quite so
well-to-do, but were yet decent and respectable. There were the Boyds,
the Beattys, and the Brennans, with the Cahils, the Cartys, and the
Clearys beyond them; the Doyles, the Dempseys, and the Dolans not far
off; with the Mulveys, the Mooneys, and the Morans quite close. The
people seemed to live in alphabetical batches in that district, as if
for the convenience of the county cess-collector and his book. Many
others lived still further off, but not so far (in Ireland) as not to
be called neighbors.

Kate Mulvey, one of the nearest neighbors, was a great friend and
companion of Winny's. If Kate had six hundred pounds she could easily
have rivalled Winny's good looks, but she had not six hundred pence;
and notwithstanding her magnificent eyes, her white teeth, and her
glossy brown hair, she could not look within miles as high into the
clouds as Winny could. Still Kate had her admirers, some of whom even
Winny's fondest glance, with all her money, could not betray into
treachery. But it so happened that the person at whom she had thrown
her cap had not (as yet, at least) picked it up.



CHAPTER III.

It was toward the end of October, 1826. There had been an early
spring, and the crops had been got in favorably, and in good time.
There had been "a wet and a windy May;" a warm, bright summer had
succeeded it; and the harvest had been now all gathered in, except the
potatoes, which were in rapid progress of being dug and pitted. It was
a great day for Ireland, let the advocates for "breadstuffs" say what
they will, before the blight and yellow meal had either of them become
familiar with the poor. There were the Cork reds and the cups, the
benefits and the Brown's fancies, for half nothing in every direction,
beside many other sorts of potatoes, bulging up the surface of the
ridges--there were no drills in those days; _mehils_ in almost every
field, with their coats off at the digging-in.

"Bill, don't lane on that boy on the ridge wid you; he's not much more
nor a _gossoon_; give him a start of you."

"_Gossoon aniow_; be gorra, he's as smart a chap on the face of a
ridge as the best of us, Tom."

{504}

"Ay; but don't take it out of him too soon, Bill."

"Work away, boys," said the _gossoon_ in question; "I'll engage I'll
shoulder my loy at the end of the ridge as soon as some of ye that's
spaking."

"It was wan word for the _gossoon_, as he calls him, an' two for
himself, Bill," chimed in the man on the next ridge. "Don't hurry Tom
Nolan; his feet's sore afther all he danced with Nelly Gaffeny last
night."

Here there was a loud and general laugh at poor Tom Nolan's expense,
and the pickers women and girls, with handkerchiefs tied over their
heads looked up with one accord, annoyed that they were too far off to
hear the joke. It was well for one of them that they had not heard it,
for Nelly Gaffeny was amongst them.

"It's many a day, Pat, since you seen the likes of them turned out of
a ridge."

"They bate the world."

"They bang Banagher; and Banagher, they say--"

"Whist, Larry; don't be dhrawing that chap down at all."

"I seen but wan betther the year," said Tim Meaney.

"I say you didn't, nor the sorra take the betther, nor so good."

"Arra, didn't I? I say I did though."

"Where, _avic ma cree?_"

"Beyant at Tony Kilroy's."

"Ay, ay; Tony always had a pet acre on the side of the hill toward the
sun. He has the best bit of land in the parish."

"You may say that, Micky, with your own purty mouth. I led his
_mehil_, come this hollintide will be three years; an' there wasn't a
man of forty of us but turned out eight stone of cup off every ten
yards a a' four-split ridge. Devil a the like of them I ever seen
afore or since."

"Lumpers you mane, Andy; wasn't I there?"

"Is it you, Darby? no, nor the sorra take the foot; we all know where
you were that same year."

"Down in the lower part of Cavan, Phil. In throth, it wasn't cup
potatoes was throublin' him that time; but cups and saucers. He dhrank
a power of tay that harvest, boys."

Here there was another loud laugh, and the women with the
handkerchiefs upon their heads looked up again.

"Well, I brought her home dacent, boys; an' what can ye say to her?"

"Be gor, nothing, Darby avic, but that she's an iligant purty crathur,
and a credit to them that owns her, an' them that reared her."

"The sorra word of lie in that," echoed every man in the _mehil_.

Thus the merry chat and laugh went on in every potato-field. The
women, finding that they had too much to do to enable them to keep
close to the men, and that they were losing the fun, of course got up
a chat for themselves, and took good care to have some loud and hearty
laughs, which made the men in their turn look up, and lean upon their
loys.

Everything about Rathcash and Rathcashmore was prosperous and happy,
and the farmers were cheerful and open-hearted.

"That's grand weather, glory be to God, Ned, for the time of year,"
said Mick Murdock to his neighbor Cavana, who was leaning, with his
arms folded, on a field-gate near the mearing of their two farms. The
farms lay alongside of each other one in the town-land of Rathcash,
and the other in Rathcashmore.

"Couldn't be bet, Mick. I'm upward of forty years stannin' in this
spot, an' I never seen the batin' of it."

"Be gorra, you have a right to be tired, Ned; that's a long stannin'."

"The sorra tired, Mick a _wochal_. You know very well what I mane, an'
you needn't be so sharp. I'd never be tired of the same spot."

"Them's a good score of calves, Ned; God bless you an' them!" said
Mick, making up for his sharpness.

"An' you too, Mick. They are a fine lot of calves, an' all reared
since Candlemas."

{505}

"There's no denying, Ned, but you med the most of that bit of land of
yours."

"'Tis about the same as your own, Mick; an' I think you med as good a
fist of yours."

"Well, maybe so, indeed; but I doubt it is going into worse hands than
what yours will, Ned."

"Why that, Mick?"

"Ah, that Tom of mine is a wild extravagant hero. He doesn't know much
about the value of money, and never paid any attention to farming
business, only what he was obliged to pick up from being with me. He
thinks he'll be rich enough when I'm in my clay, without much work.
An' so he will, Ned, so far as that goes; but it's only of
book-larnin' an' horse-racin' an' coorsin' he's thinkin', by way of
being a sort of gentleman one of those days; but he'll find to his
cost, in the lather end, that there's more wantin' to grow good crops
than 'The Farmer's Calendar of Operations.'"

"He's young, Mick, an' no doubt he'll mend. I hope you don't
discourage him."

"Not at all, Ned. The book-larnin 's all well enough, as far as it
goes, if he'd put the practice along with it, an' be studdy."

"So he will, Mick. His wild-oats will soon be all sown, an' then
you'll see what a chap he'll be."

"Faix, I'd rather see him sowing a crop of yallow Aberdeens, Ned, next
June; an' maybe it's what it's at the Curragh of Kildare he'll be, as
I can hear. My advice to him is to get married to some dacent nice
girl, that id take the wildness out of him, and lay himself down to
business. You know, Ned, he'll have every penny and stick I have in
the world; and the lease of my houlding in Rathcashmore is as good as
an estate at the rent I pay. If he'd give up his meandherin', and take
a dacent liking to them that's fit for him, I'd set him up all at
wanst, an' not be keeping him out of it until I was dead an' berrid."

The above was not a bad feeler, nor was it badly put by old Mick
Murdock to his neighbor. "Them that's fit for him" could hardly be
mistaken; yet there was a certain degree of disparagement of his own
son calculated to conceal his object. It elicited nothing, however,
but a long thoughtful silence upon old Ned Cavana's part, which Mick
was not slow to interpret, and did not wish to interrupt. At last Ned
stood up from the gate, and smoothing down the sleeves of his coat, as
if he supposed they had contracted some dust, he observed, "I'm
afear'd, Mick, you're puttin' the cart before the horse; come until I
show you a few ridges of red apples I'm diggin' out to-day. You'd
think I actially got them carted in, an' threune them upon the ridges:
the like of them I never seen."

And the two old men walked down the lane together.

But Mick Murdock's feeler was not forgotten by either of them. Mick
was as well pleased--perhaps better--that no further discussion took
place upon the subject at the time. He knew Ned Cavana was not a man
to commit himself to a hasty opinion upon any matter, much less upon
one of such importance as was so plainly suggested by his
observations.

Ned Cavana, too, brooded over the conversation in silence, determined
to throw out a feeler of his own to his daughter.

Ned had himself more than once contemplated the possibility as well as
the prudence of a match between Tom Murdock and his daughter. The
union, not of themselves alone, but of the two farms, would almost
make a gentleman of the person holding them. Both farms were held upon
unusually long leases, and at less than one-third of their value. If
joined, there could be no doubt but, with the careful and industrious
management of an experienced man, they would turn in a clear income of
between five and six hundred a year; quite sufficient in that part of
the world to entitle {506} a person of even tolerably good education
to look up to the grand-jury list and a "justice of the pace."

The only question with Ned Cavana was, Did Tom Murdock possess the
attributes required for success in all or any of the above respects?
Ned, although he had taken his part with his father, feared _not_. Ay,
there was another question, Was Winny inclined for him? He feared not
also.

The other old man had not forgotten the feeler he had thrown out
either, nor the thoughtful silence with which it had been received;
for Mick Murdock could not believe that a man of Ned Cavana's
penetration had misunderstood him. Indeed, he was inclined to think
that the same matter might have originated in Ned's own mind, from
some words he had once or twice dropped about poor Winny's prospects
when he was gone, and the suspense it would be to him if she were not
settled in life before that day; "snaffled perhaps by some
good-for-nothing, extravagant fortune-hunter, with a handsome face,
when she had no one to look after her."

There was but one word in the above which Mick thought could be justly
applied to Tom; "extravagant" he undoubtedly was, but he was neither
handsome--at least not handsome enough to be called so as a matter of
course--nor was he good-for-nothing. He was a well-educated sharp
fellow, if he would only lay himself down to business. He was not a
fortune-hunter, for he did not require it; but idleness and
extravagance might make him one in the end. Yet old Mick was by no
means certain that the propriety of a match between these only and
rich children had not suggested itself to his neighbor Ned as well as
to himself. He hoped that if Tom had a "dacent hankerrin' afther" any
one, it was for Winny Cavana; but, like her father, he doubted if the
girl herself was inclined for him. He knew that she was proud and
self-willed. He was determined, however, to follow the matter up, and
throw out another feeler upon the subject to his son.



CHAPTER IV.

It was now the 25th of October, just six days from All-Hallow Eve.
Mick would ask a few of the neighbors to burn nuts and eat apples, and
then, perhaps, he might find out how the wind blew.

"Tom," said he to his son, "I believe this is a good year for nuts."

"Well, father, I met a couple of chaps ere yesterday with their
pockets full of fine brown shellers, coming from Clonard Wood."

"I dare say they are not all gone yet, Tom; an' I wish you would set
them to get us a few pockets full, and we would ask a few of the
neighbors here to burn them on All-Hallow Eve."

"That's easy done, father; I can get three or four quarts by to-morrow
night. Those two very chaps would be glad to earn a few pence for
them; they wanted me to buy what they had; and if I knew your
intentions at the time, I should have done so; but it's not too late.
Who do you intend to ask, father?"

"Why, old Cavana and his daughter, of course, and the Mulveys; in
short, you know, all the neighbors. I won't leave any of them out,
Tom. The Cavanas, you know, are all as wan as ourselves, livin' at the
doore with us; and they're much like us too, Tom, in many respects.
Old Ned is rich, an' has but one child--a very fine girl. I'm old, an'
as rich as what Ned is, and I have but one child; I'll say though
you're to the fore, Tom--a very fine young man."

Old Mick paused. He wanted to see if his son's intelligence was on the
alert. It must have been very dull indeed had it failed to perceive
what his father was driving at; but he was silent.

"That Winny Cavana is a very fine girl, Tom," he continued; "and I
often wonder that a handsome young fellow like you doesn't make more
of her. She'll have six hundred pounds fortune, as round as a hoop;
beside, whoever gets her will fall in for that farm at her {507}
father's death. There's ninety-nine years of it, Tom, just like our
own."

"She's a conceited proud piece of goods, father; and I suspect she
would rather give her six hundred pounds to some _skauhawn_ than to a
man of substance like me."

"Maybe not now. Did you ever thry?"

"No, father, I never did. People don't often hold their face up to the
hail."

"_Na-bockleish_, Tom, she'd do a grate dale for her father, for you
know she must owe everything to him; an' if she vexes him he can cut
her out of her six hundred pounds, and lave the interest in his farm
to any one he likes; and I know what he thinks about you, Tom."

"Ay, and he's so fond of that one that she can twist him round her
finger. Wait now, father, until you see if I'm not up to every twist
and turn of the pair of them."

"But you never seem to spake to her or mind her at all, Tom; and I
know, when I was your age, I always found that the girls liked the man
best that looked afther them most. I'm purty sure too, Tom, that
there's no one afore you there."

"I'm not so sure of that, father. But I'll tell you what it is: I have
not been either blind or idle on what you are talking about; but up to
this moment she seems to scorn me, father; there's the truth for you.
And as for there being no one before me, all I can say is that she
manages, somehow or other, to come out of the chapel-door every Sunday
at the same moment with that whelp, Edward Lennon, from the mountain;
_Emon-a-knock_, as they call him, and as I have heard her call him
herself. Rathcash chapel is not in his parish at all, and I don't know
what brings him there."

"Is it that poor penniless pauper, depending on his day's labor? Ah,
Tom, she's too proud for that."

"Yes, that very fellow; and there's no getting a word with her where
he is."

"Well, Tom, all I can say is this, an' it's to my own son I'm sayin'
it--that if you let that fellow pick up that fine girl with her six
hundred pounds and fall into that rich farm, an' you livin' at the
doore with her, you're not worth staggering-bob broth, with all your
book-larnin' an' good looks, to say nothin' of your manners, Tom
avic." And he left him, saying to himself, "He may put that in his
pocket to balance his knife."

Thus ended what old Murdock commenced as a feeler, but which became
very plain speaking in the end. But the All-Hallow Eve party was to
come off all the same.

A word or two now of comparison, or perhaps, more properly speaking,
of contrast, between these two aspirants to Winny Cavana's favor,
though young Lennon was still more hopeless than the other, from his
position.

Thomas Murdock was more conspicuous for the manliness of his person
than for the beauties of his mind or the amiability of his
disposition. Although manifestly well-looking in a group, take him
singly, and he could not be called very handsome. There was a
suspicious fidgetiness about his green-spotted eyes, as if he feared
you could read his thoughts; and at times, if vexed or opposed, a dark
scowl upon his heavy brow indicated that these thoughts were not
always amiable. This unpleasing peculiarity of expression marred the
good looks which the shape of his face and the fit of his curly black
whiskers unquestionably gave him. In form he was fully six feet high,
and beautifully made. At nineteen years of age he had mastered not
only all the learning which could be attained at a neighboring
national school, but had actually mastered the master himself in more
ways than one, and was considered by the eighty-four youngsters whom
he had outstripped as a prodigy of valor as well as learning. But Tom
turned his schooling to a bad account; it was too superficial, and
served more to set his head astray than to correct his heart; and
there were some respectable {508} persons in the neighborhood who were
not free from doubts that he had already become a parish-patriot, and
joined the Ribbon Society. He was high and overbearing toward his
equals, harsh and unkind to his inferiors, while he was cringing and
sycophantic toward his superiors. There was nothing manly or
straightforward, nothing ingenuous or affectionate, about him. In
fact, if ever a man's temper and disposition justified the opinion
that he had "the two ways" in him, they were those of Thomas Murdock.
His father was a rich farmer, whose land joined that of old Ned
Cavana, of whom he was a contemporary in years, and with whom he had
kept pace in industry and wealth.

Thomas Murdock was an only son, as Winny Cavana was an only daughter,
and the two old men were of the same mind now as regarded the future
lot of their children.

A few words now of Edward Lennon, and we can get on.

He was the eldest of five in the family. They lived upon the
mountain-side in the parish of Shanvilla, about two "short miles" from
the Cavanas and Murdocks. His father and mother were both alive. They
were respectable so far as character and conduct can make people
respectable who are unquestionably poor. Their marriage was what has
been sarcastically, but perhaps not inaptly, called by an English
newspaper a "_potato marriage;_" that is--but no, it will not bear
explanation. The result, however, after many years' struggling, may be
stated. The Lennons had lived, and were still living, in a small
thatched house upon the side of a mountain, with about four acres of
reclaimed ground. It had been reclaimed gradually by the father and
his two sons--for Emon had a younger brother--and they paid little or
no rent for it. The second son and eldest daughter were now at
service, "doin' for theirselves;" and those at home consisted of the
father, the mother, the eldest son, and two younger daughters, mere
children. For the house and garden they paid a small rent, which "a
slip of a pig" was always ready to realize in sufficient time; while a
couple of goats, staggering through the furze, yoked together by the
necks, gave milk to the family.

Edward, though not so well-looking as to the actual cut of his
features, nor so tall by an inch and a half, as our friend Murdock,
was far more agreeable to look upon. There was a confident good-nature
in his countenance which assured you of its reality, and the honesty
of his heart. His figure, from his well-shaped head, which was
beautifully set upon his shoulders, to his small, well-turned feet,
was faultless. In disposition and character young Lennon was a full
distance before the man to whom he was a secret rival, while in talent
and learning he had nothing to fear by a comparison. He had commenced
his education when a mere gossoon at a poor-school with "his turf an'
his read-a-ma-daisy," and as he progressed from A-b-e-l, bel, a man's
name; A-b-l-e, ble, Able, powerful, strong, until finally he could
spell Antitrinitarian pat, he then cut the concern, and was promoted
by his parish-priest--"of whom more anon," as they say to Rathcash
national school, where he soon stood in the class beside Tom Murdock,
and ere a week had passed he "took him down a peg." This, added to his
supposed presumptuous thoughts in the quarter which Tom had considered
almost his exclusive right, sowed the seed of hatred in Murdock's
heart against Lennon, which one day might bear a heavy crop.

That young Lennon was devotedly but secretly attached to Winny Cavana
there was no doubt whatever in his own mind, and there were few who
did not agree with him, although he had "never told his love;" and as
we Irish have leave to say, there was still less that his love was
more disinterested than that of his richer rival. There was another
point upon which there was still less doubt than either, and that was
that Winny Cavana's heart secretly leaned to _"Emon-a-knock,"_ as
{509} young Lennon was familiarly called by all those who knew and
loved him. One exception existed to this cordial recognition of Emon's
good qualities, and that was, as may be anticipated, by Thomas
Murdock, who always called him "_that_ Lennon," and on one occasion,
as we have seen, substituted the word "whelp."

Winny, however, kept her secret in this matter to herself. She knew
her father would go "tanterin' tearin' mad, if he suspected such a
thing." She conscientiously endeavored to hide her preference from
young Lennon himself, knowing that it would only get them both into
trouble. Beside, he had never (yet) shown a decided preference for her
above Kate Mulvey. Whether she succeeded in her endeavors is another
question; women seldom fail where they are in earnest.

It is not considered amongst the class of Irish to which our _dramatis
persona_ belong as any undue familiarity, upon even a very short
acquaintance, for the young persons of both the sexes to call each
other by their Christian names. It is the admitted custom of the
country, and Winny Cavana, rich and proud as she was, made no
exception to the general rule. She even went further, and sometimes
called young Lennon by his pet name. As regarded Tom Murdock, although
she could have wished it otherwise, she would not make herself
particular by acting differently. The first three letters of his name,
coupled with the scowl she had more than once detected on his
countenance, sounded unpleasantly upon her ear, Mur-dock. She always
thought people were going to say murder before the "dock" was out. She
never could think well of him; and although she called him Tom, it was
more to be in keeping with the habit of the country, and as a refuge
from the other name, than from a friendly feeling.

These were the materials upon which the two old men had to work, to
bring about a union of their landed interests and their only children.



CHAPTER V.

The invitations for All-Hallow Eve were forthwith issued in person by
old Murdock, who went from house to house in his Sunday clothes, and
asked all the respectable neighbors in the politest manner. Edward
Lennon, although he could scarcely be called a neighbor, and moreover
was not considered as "belonging to their set," was nevertheless asked
to be of the party. Old Murdock had his reasons for asking him;
although, to tell the truth, he and his son had a difference of
opinion upon the subject. Tom thought to "put a spoke in his wheel,"
but was overruled by the old man, who said it would look as if they
were afraid to bring him and Winny Cavana together; that it was much
better to let the young fellow see at once that he had no chance,
which would no doubt be an easy matter on that night: "it was betther
to _humiliate_ him at wanst."

Tom was ashamed not to acquiesce, but wished nevertheless that he
might have had his own way. Edward Lennon lived too far from the
Murdocks for the old man to go there specifically upon the mission of
invitation; and the moment this difficulty was hinted by his father,
Tom, who was not in the habit of making such offers, was ready at once
to "go over to Shanvilla, and save his father the walk: he would
deliver the message."

There was an anxiety in Tom's manner which betrayed itself; and old
Mick was not the man to _miss_ a thing of the kind.

"No, Tom _a wochal_" he observed, "I won't put such a thramp upon you.
Sure I'll see him a Sunda'; he always comes to our chapel."

"Fitter for him stick to his own," said Tom.

"It answers well this turn, at all events," replied the old man.

Upon the following Sunday he was as good as his word. He watched young
Lennon coming out of the chapel, and asked him, with more cordiality
than Tom, who happened to be by, approved of.

{510}

Had nothing else been necessary to secure an acceptance, the fact of
Tom Murdock being present would have been sufficient. The look which
he caught from under the rim of Tom's hat roused Lennon's pride, and
he accepted the old man's invitation with unhesitating civility.
Lennon on this, as on all Sunday occasions, "was dressed in all his
best;" and that look seemed to say, "I wonder where that fellow got
them clothes, and if they're paid for:" he understood the look very
well. But the clothed were paid for,--perhaps, too, more promptly
than Tom's own; and a better fitting suit, from top to toe, was not to
be met with in the whole parish. A "Caroline hat," smooth and new, set
a wee taste jauntily upon his well-shaped head; a shirt like the
drifted snow, loose at the throat, but buttoned down the breast with
tiny blue buttons round as sweet-pea seeds; a bright plaid waistcoat,
with ditto buttons to match, but a size larger; a pair of
"spic-an'-span" knee-breeches of fine kersey-mere, with
unexceptionable steel buttons and blue silk-ribbon strings, tied to
perfection at the knee; while closely-fitting lamb's-wool long
stockings showed off the shape of a pair of legs which, for symmetry,
looked as if they had been turned in a lathe. Of his feet I have
already spoken; and on this occasion they did not belie what I said.

Old Mick desired Edward Lennon "to bring Phil M'Dermot the smith's son
with him. He was a fine young man, a good dancer, and had mended a
couple of ploughs for him in first-rate style, an' very raisonable,
for the winther plowing."

Tom Murdock did not want for fine clothes, of course. Two or three
suits were at his command; and as this was Sunday, he had one of his
best on. It was "given up to him" by most of the girls that he was the
handsomest and best-dressed man in the parish of Rathcash, and some
would have added Shanvilla; yet he now felt, as he stole envious
glances at young Lennon, that his case with Winny Cavana might not be
altogether a "walk over." All Tom's comparisons and metaphors had
reference to horse-racing.

This little incident, however, cut young Lennon out of his usual few
words with Winny; for, as a girl with a well-regulated mind, she could
not venture to dawdle on the road until old Murdock had done speaking
to Emon: she knew that would be remarked. She had never happened to
see old Murdock speaking to Emon before, and her secret wonder now was
"Could it be possible that he was asking Edward Lennon for All-Hallow
Eve?"

Quite possible, Winny; but you scarcely have time to find out before
you meet him there, for another Sunday will not intervene before the
party.



CHAPTER VI.

The last day of October came round apace, and about six o'clock in the
evening the company began to arrive at old Mick Murdock's. Winny
Cavana and her father took their time. They were near enough to make
their entree at any moment; and Winny had some idea, like her betters,
that it was not genteel to be the first. She now delayed, however, to
the other extreme, and kept her father waiting, under the pretence
that she was finishing her toilet, until, on their arrival, they found
all the guests assembled. Winny flaunted in, leaning upon her father's
arm, "the admired of all admirers." Not being very learned in the
mysteries of the toilet, I shall not attempt to describe the dresses
of the girls upon this occasion, nor the elaborate manner in which
their heads were set out, oiled, and bedizened to an amazing extent,
while the roses above their left ears seemed to have been all culled
from the same tree.

{511}

Altogether there were about sixteen young persons, pretty equally
divided as to boys and girls, beside some--and some only--of their
fathers and mothers. Soon after the arrival of Ned Cavana and his
daughter, who were the guests of the evening, supper was announced,
and there was a general move into the "large parlor," where a long
table was set out with a snow-white cloth, where plates (if not
covers) were laid for at least twenty-four. In the middle of the table
stood a smoking dish of _calcannon_, which appeared to defy them, and
as many more; while at either end was a _raking_ pot of tea, surrounded
with cups and saucers innumerable, with pyramids of cut
bread-and-butter nearly an inch thick.

The company having taken their seats, it was announced by the host
that there were "two goold weddin'-rings in the _calcannon;_" but
whereabouts, of course, no one could tell. He had borrowed them from
two of the married women present, and was bound to restore them; so he
begged of his young friends, for his sake as well as their own, to be
careful not to swallow them. It was too well known what was to be the
lot of the happy finders before that day twelvemonth for him to say
anything upon that part of the subject. He would request of Mrs.
Moran, who had seen more All-Hallow Eves than any woman there
present--he meant no offence--to help the calcannon.

After this little introduction, Mrs. Moran, who by previous
arrangement was sitting opposite the savory volcano, distributed it
with unquestionable impartiality. It was a well-known rule on all such
occasions that no one commenced until all were helped, when a signal
was given, and a simultaneous plunge of spoons took place.

Another rule was that all the married persons should content
themselves with tea and bread-and-butter, in order that none of them
might possibly rob the youngsters of their chance of the ring. Upon
this occasion, however, this restriction had been neatly obviated by
Mrs. Moran's experience in such matters; and there was a _knock-oge_
of the same delicious food without any ring, which she called "the
married dish." The tea was handed up and down from each end of the
table until it met in the middle, and for some time there was a silent
onslaught on the calcannon, washed down now and then by a copious
draught of tea.

"I have it! I have it!" shouted Phil M'Dermott, taking it from between
his teeth and holding it up, while his cheeks deepened three shades
nearer to the color of the rose in Kate Mulvey's hair, nearly
opposite.

"A lucky man," observed Mrs. Moran, methodically, who seemed to be
mistress of the mysteries. "Now for the lucky girl; and lucky
everybody will say she must be."

The words were scarcely finished when Kate Mulvey coughed as if she
were choking; but pulling the other ring from her mouth, she soon
recovered herself, declaring that she had nearly swallowed it.

Matters, as Mrs. Moran thought, had so far gone quite right, and a
hearty quizzing the young couple got; but, to tell the truth, one of
them did not seem to be particularly satisfied with the result. The
attack upon the calcannon from this point waxed very weak, for the
charm was broken, and the tea and bread-and-butter came into play.
Apples and nuts were now laid down in abundance, and the young girls
might be seen picking a couple of pairs of nice nuts out of those on
the plate, as nearly as fancy might suggest, to match the figures of
those whom they were intended to represent upon the bar of the grate.
Almost as if by magic a regiment of nuts in pairs were seen smoking,
and some of them stirring and purring on the flat bar at the bottom of
the grate, which had been swept, and the fire brightened up, for the
purpose. Of course Mrs. Moran insisted upon openly putting down Phil
M'Dermott and Kate Mulvey of the rings; for in general there is a
secrecy observed as to _who_ the _nuts_ are, in order to save {512} the
constant girl from a laugh at the fickleness of her bachelor, should
he go off in a shot from her side, and _vice versâ_. And here the
mistress of the mysteries was not at fault. Kate Mulvey, without
either smoking or getting red at one end (which was a good sign), went
off like the report of a pistol, and was actually heard striking
against the door as if to get out. There was a general laugh at Mrs.
Moran's expense, who was told that it was a strong proof in favor of
putting the pairs down secretly.

But Mrs. Moran was too experienced a mistress of her position to be
taken aback, and quietly said, "Not at all, my dears. I have three
times to burn them, if he does not follow her; but he has three
minutes to do so."

As she spoke there was another shot. Phil M'Dermott could not stand
the heat by himself, and was off to the door after Kate Mulvey.

This was a crowning triumph to Mrs. Moran, who quietly put back the
second pair of nuts which she had just selected for another test of
the same couple, and remarked that "it was all right now."

The couples, generally speaking, seemed to answer the expectations of
their respective match-makers better than perhaps the results in real
life might subsequently justify. It is not to be supposed that on this
occasion Tom Murdock and Winny Cavana did not find a place upon the
bar of the grate. But as Winny had given no encouragement to any one
to put her down with him, and as the mistress of the mysteries alone
could claim a right to do so openly, as in the case of the rings,
their place, with the result, could be known only to those who put
them down, and perhaps a confidant.

There were a few pops occasionally, calling forth exclamations of "The
good-for-nothing fellow!" or "The fickle lass!" while some burned into
bright balls--the admiration of all the true and constant lovers
present.

The next portion of the mysteries were three plates, placed in a row
upon the table; one contained earth, another water, and the third a
gold ring. This was, by some, considered rather a nervous test of
futurity, and some objections were whispered by the timid amongst
them. The fearless and enthusiastic, however, clamored that nothing
should be left out, and a handkerchief to blind the adventurers was
produced. The mystery was this: a young person was taken outside the
door, and there blindfolded; he, or she, was then led in again, and
placed opposite to the plates, sufficiently near to touch them; when
told that "all was right," he, with his fore-finger pointed, placed it
upon one of the plates. That with the earth symbolled forth sudden, or
perhaps violent, death; that with the water, emigration or ship-wreck;
while that with the ring, of course a wedding and domestic happiness.

Young people were not generally averse to subject themselves to this
ordeal, as in nine cases out of ten they managed either to be
previously acquainted with the position of the plates, or, having been
blindfolded by their own bachelor, to have a peep-hole down by the
corner of their nose, which enabled them to secure the most gratifying
result of the three.

With this usual course before his mind, Tom Murdock, as junior host,
presented himself for the test, hoping that Winny Cavana, whom he had
asked to do so, would blindfold him. But in this instance he had
presumed too far; and while she hesitated to comply, the mistress of
the mysteries came to her relief.

"No, no, Tom," she said, folding the handkerchief; "that is my
business, and I'll transfer it to no one; come outside with me."

Tom was ashamed to draw back, and retired with Mrs. Moran to the hall.
He soon returned, led in by her, with a handkerchief tied tightly over
his eyes; there was no peep-hole by the side of his nose, let him hold
back {513} his head as he might, Mrs. Moran took care of that. Having
been placed near the table, he was told that he was exactly opposite
the plates. He pointed out his fore-finger, and threw back his head as
much as possible, as if considering, but in fact to try if he could
get a peep at the plates; but it was no use. Mrs. Moran had rendered
his temporary blindness cruelly secure. At length his hand descended,
and he placed his finger into the middle of the earth.

"Pshaw," said he, pulling the handkerchief off his eyes, "it is all
humbug! Let Lennon try it."

"Certainly, certainly," ran from one to the other. It might have been
remarked, however, if any one had been observing, that Winny Cavana
had not spoken.

Young Lennon then retired to the hall with Mrs. Moran, and was soon
led in tightly blindfolded, for the young man was no more to her than
the other; beside, she was strictly honorable. The plates had been
re-arranged by Tom Murdock himself, which most people remarked, as it
was some time before he was satisfied with their position. Lennon was
then placed, as Tom had been, and told that "all was right." There was
some nervousness in more hearts than one as he pointed his finger and
brought down his hand. He also placed his finger in the centre of the
plate with the earth, and pulled the handkerchief from his eyes.

"Now, you see," said Tom, "others can fail as well as me;" and he
seemed greatly pleased that young Lennon had been as unsuccessful as
himself.

A murmur of dissatisfaction now ran through the girls. The two
favorites had been unfortunate in their attempts at divination, and
there was one young girl there who, when she saw Emon-a-knock's finger
fall on the plate with the earth, felt as if a weight had been tied
round her heart. It was unanimously agreed by the elderly women
present, Mrs. Moran amongst the number, that these tests had turned
out directly contrary to what the circumstances of the locality, and
the characters of the individuals, would indicate as probable, and the
whole process was ridiculed as false and unprophetic. "Time will tell,
jewel," said one old croaking crone.

A loud burst of laughter from the kitchen at this moment told that the
servant-boys and girls, who had also been invited, were not idle. The
matches having been all either clenched or broken off in the parlor,
and the test of the plates, as if by mutual consent, having been
declared unsatisfactory, old Murdock thought it a good opportunity to
move an adjournment of the whole party, to see the fun in the kitchen,
which was seconded by Mrs. Moran, and carried _nem. con._

[TO BE CONTINUED.]

----

{514}

Translated from Etudes Religieusea, Historiques, et Littéraires, par
des Pères de la Compagnie de Jesus.

A CITY OF WOMEN.

THE ANCIENT BEGUINAGE OF GHENT.
BY THE REV. A. NAMPON, S.J.


According to some authors, St. Begghe, daughter of Pepin, Duke of
Brabant, and sister of St. Gertrude, must have given her name to those
pious assemblages of Christian virgins and widows called from very
remote times _beguinages_.

These holy women, united under the protection and the rule of St.
Begghe, had nothing in common except the name with those Beguines
whose errors were condemned by the council of Vienne.

Beguinages exist at Ghent, Antwerp, Mechlin, Alost, Louvain, Bruges,
etc., etc. The rule is not in all places the same, but everywhere
these pious establishments are places of refuge open to devout women,
wherein they may sanctify themselves by prayer, labor, and retirement
from the distractions of the world.

Let us transport ourselves to the capital of Flanders. From the centre
of that tumultuous city, in which industry, commerce, activity, and
pleasure reign supreme, are separated two other smaller towns of
venerable aspect--closed to the world, destitute of shops, coaches,
public criers, and all modern inventions. These two towns are the
_Great_ and the _Little Beguinage_.

These places are delightful oases, wherein you breathe a pure air,
where, in the noonday of the nineteenth century, you find the
simplicity of the faith and customs of antiquity. They are surrounded,
as they were five or six centuries ago, by a ditch and a wall; you
enter them by a single gate carefully closed at night, and not less
carefully watched all day. This gate, surmounted by the cross, was
formerly protected by a drawbridge.

As soon as you have passed through this gateway, you are forcibly
struck with the calm and pious atmosphere of this peaceful city, and
with the grave and edifying looks of its _female_ inhabitants. I say
female inhabitants, for no man has ever dwelt in this enclosure. The
priests who serve the beguinages only enter to fulfil their sacred
offices, and have no place therein save the pulpit, the altar, and the
confessional. The dress of the inmates is not elegant, but it is in
strict conformity with the model traced in their thirteenth century
rule.

All the streets, which are at right angles, are named after saints.
The houses are also distinguished by the names, and frequently by the
statue, of some saint, under whose protection they are placed; thus
you may read, gate of St. Martha, gate of St. Mary-Magdalen, etc.,
etc.

The houses, which are whitewashed annually, display in their
furniture, as in their construction, no other luxury but a charming
cleanliness. They are of two kinds, _convents_ and _hermitages_. The
convents are inhabited by communities, each governed by a superior.
The hermitages, which resemble very much the dwellings of the
Carthusians, consist of two or three bed-rooms, a parlor, a kitchen,
and a small garden. Prominent among the convents is the dwelling of
the superior-general, called _Grande Dame_, who has charge of the
infirmary, and who is conservator of the documents, traditions and
pictures, which date from five or six centuries ago. Lastly, in the
midst of this peaceful city rises the house of God, a large church,
very commodious and clean, surrounded by a {515} cemetery, in
conformity with an ancient custom, which all the beguinages, however,
have not been able to retain.

The object of these societies is very clearly stated in a paragraph of
the rule of the beguinage of Notre Dame du Pré', founded at Ghent in
1234. We retain the old style:

"Louis, Count of Flanders, of Nevers, and of Rethel, etc., etc., to
all present and to come makes known, that Dame Jane, and Margaret, her
sister of happy memory, who were successively Countesses of Flanders
and of Hainault (as we are,  [Footnote 100] by the grace of God),
having remarked that in the Flemish territory there were a great
number of women, who, from their condition in life and that of their
parents, were unable to find a fitting match; observing that honorable
persons, the daughters of nobles and burgesses, who desired to live in
a state of chastity, could not all enter into convents of women, by
reason of their too great number, or for want of means; remarking,
moreover, that many young ladies of noble extraction and others had
fallen into a state of decadence, so that they were reduced to
mendicity, or to a painful existence, to the dishonor of their
families, unless they could be provided for in a discreet and becoming
manner; incited by God, and with the advice, knowledge, and consent of
several bishops and other persons of probity, the aforesaid countesses
founded, in several cities of Flanders, establishments with spacious
dwellings and lands, called beguinages, where noble young ladies and
children of good families were received, to live therein chastely in
community, with or without vows, without humiliation to themselves or
their families, and where they might, by applying themselves to
reasonable labor, procure their food and clothing. They founded among
others a beguinage in our city of Ghent, called the beguinage of Notre
Dame du Pré, enclosed by the river Scheldt, and by walls. In the
centre is a church, a cemetery, and a hospital for infirm or invalid
beguines, the whole given by the before-mentioned princesses, etc."

  [Footnote 100: This bull is in the original French: _"Comteses de
  Flandre et de Hainault, comme nous aussi, par la grace de Dieu."_]

Those young persons who desire to be admitted to the beguinage must
first become postulants, and afterward make their noviciate in the
convents or communities. They remain there even after their profession
up to thirty years of age. Thus are they protected during the most
stormy period of life by the watchfulness of their superior and their
companions, by prayer and labor in common. Later they can enjoy
without danger a larger measure of freedom. They then live two or
three together in one of the hermitages, where they pass their time in
exercises of prayer and labor, to which the early years of their
cenobitical life have accustomed them.

"The great beguinage at Ghent," says M. Chantrel, "contains four
hundred small houses, eighteen common halls, one large and one small
church. There are sometimes as many as seven hundred beguines
assembled in the church. The assembly of these pious women, in their
ancient Flemish black dresses, and white bonnets, is very solemn and
impressive. The novices are distinguished by their dress. Those who
have recently taken the veil have their heads encircled by a crown.

"The beguines admit within their enclosure, as boarders, persons of
the gentler sex, of every age and condition, who find in these
establishments an asylum for the inexperience of youth, or a calm and
peaceful sojourn where those who are tired of the world may pass their
days without any other rule than that of a Christian life. In the
great beguinage at Ghent there are nearly two hundred secular
boarders, who live either privately or in community with the nuns."

Among the novices of the great beguinage at Ghent there lived, fifteen
years ago, a Mlle, de Soubiran, the niece of a former vicar of
Carcassonne. For twenty years this worthy ecclesiastic had communed
with Almighty God, in incessant prayers, to obtain an {516} answer to
this question: "Would it be a useful work to introduce, or rather to
resuscitate, beguinages in France?"

Monseigneur de la Bouillerie, whose eloquence and zeal for good works
have made him famous, interpreted in a favorable sense the signs
furnished by a concurrence of providential circumstances; and a small
establishment was opened twelve years ago, in a suburb of
Castelnaudary, under the direction of the Abbé de Soubiran. Since
1856, it has had its postulants, novices, and professed sisters.

The buildings of the new beguinage were too small and poor. This
defect was remedied by a great fire which consumed them, and compelled
their reconstruction on a larger plan, and with better materials than
the planks and bricks of the original buildings.

There is doubtless a vast distance between this feeble beginning and
the extensive beguinage in Belgium, which so many centuries have
enlarged and brought to perfection. But Mlle, de Soubiran and her
first companions brought with them from Flanders the old traditions,
with the spirit of fervor and of poverty and humble labor. The trials
which they have undergone have only improved their work. They are
happy in the blessing of their bishop, and his alms would not be
wanting in case of need.

The Castelnaudary beguinage is already fruitful. A second
establishment is forming at Toulouse, on the Calvary road. Those of
our readers who are acquainted with the capital of Languedoc know the
situation of that road, but all Christians have long since learnt that
the road to Calvary is the way of salvation.

Suffice it for the present that we notice the existence of these two
establishments. We shall have at a future time to narrate their
progress and development.

----

{517}

From The Month.

THE DREAM OF GERONTIUS.

BY JOHN HENRY NEWMAN, D.D.

§ 1.

GERONTIUS.

  JESU, MARIA--I am near to death,
    And thou art calling me; I know it now.
  Not by the token of this faltering breath,
    This chill at heart, this dampness on my brow,--
  (Jesu, have mercy! Mary, pray for me!)
    'Tis this new feeling, never felt before,
  (Be with me, Lord, in my extremity!)
    That I am going, that I am no more.
  'Tis this strange innermost abandonment,
    (Lover of souls! great God! I look to thee,)
  This emptying out of each constituent
    And natural force, by which I come to be.
  Pray for me, O my friends; a visitant
    Is knocking his dire summons at my door,
  The like of whom, to scare me and to daunt,
    Has never, never come to me before.
  'Tis death,--loving friends, your prayers!--'tis he! ....
  As though my very being had given way,
    As though I was no more a substance now,
  And could fall back on naught to be my stay,
    (Help, loving Lord! Thou my sole refuge, thou,)
  And turn no whither, but must needs decay
    And drop from out this universal frame
  Into that shapeless, scopeless, blank abyss,
    That utter nothingness, of which I came:
  This is it that has come to pass in me;
  O horror! this it is, my dearest, this;
  So pray for me, my friends, who have not strength to pray.


  ASSISTANTS.

  Kyrie eleïson, Christe eleïson, Kyrie eleïson.
  Holy Mary, pray for him.
  All holy angels, pray for him.
  Choirs of the righteous, pray for him.
  Holy Abraham, pray for him.
  St. John Baptist, St. Joseph, pray for him.
  St. Peter, St. Paul, St. Andrew, St. John,
  All apostles, all evangelists, pray for him.
  All holy disciples of the Lord, pray for him.
  All holy innocents, pray for him.
  All holy martyrs, all holy confessors,
  All holy hermits, all holy virgins,
  All ye saints of God, pray for him.

{518}

  GERONTIUS.

  Rouse thee, my fainting soul, and play the man;
      And through such waning span
  Of life and thought as still has to be trod,
      Prepare to meet thy God.
  And while the storm of that bewilderment
      Is for a season spent,
  And, ere afresh the ruin on thee fall,
      Use well the interval.

  ASSISTANTS.

  Be merciful, be gracious; spare him, Lord.
  Be merciful, be gracious; Lord, deliver him.
  From the sins that are passed;
      From thy frown and thine ire;
            From the perils of dying;
            From any complying
            With sin, or denying
            His God, or relying
  On self, at the last;
      From the nethermost fire;
  From all that is evil;
  From power of the devil;
  Thy servant deliver,
  For once and for ever.

  By thy birth, and by thy cross,
  Rescue him from endless loss;
  By thy death and burial,
  Save him from a final fall;
  By thy rising from the tomb,
            By thy mounting up above,
            By the Spirit's gracious love,
  Save him in the day of doom.

  GERONTIUS.

  Sanctus fortis, Sanctus Deus,
      De profundis oro te,
  Miserere, judex meus,
      Parce mihi, Domine.
  Firmly I believe and truly
      God is Three, and God is One;
  And I next acknowledge duly
      Manhood taken by the Son.
  And I trust and hope most fully
      In that manhood crucified;
  And each thought and deed unruly
      Do to death, as he has died.
  Simply to his grace and wholly
      Light and life and strength belong,
  And I love supremely, solely,
      Him the holy, him the strong.

{519}

  Sanctus fortis, Sanctus Deus,
      De profundis oro te,
  Miserere, judex meus,
      Parce mihi, Domine.
  And I hold in veneration,
      For the love of him alone,
  Holy Church, as his creation.
      And her teachings, as his own.
  And I take with joy whatever
      Now besets me, pain or fear,
  And with a strong will I sever
      All the ties which bind me here.
  Adoration aye be given,
      With and through the angelic host,
  To the God of earth and heaven,
      Father, Son, and Holy Ghost.
  Sanctus fortis, Sanctus Deus,
      De profundis oro te,
  Miserere, judex meus,
      Mortis in discrimine.

  I can no more; for now it comes again,
  That sense of ruin, which is worse than pain,
  That masterful negation and collapse
  Of all that makes me man; as though I bent
  Over the dizzy brink
  Of some sheer infinite descent;
  Or worse, as though
  Down, down for ever I was falling through
  The solid framework of created things,
  And needs must sink and sink
  Into the vast abyss. And, crueller still,
  A fierce and restless fright begins to fill
  The mansion of my soul. And, worse and worse,
  Some bodily form of ill
  Floats on the wind, with many a loathsome curse
  Tainting the hallowed air, and laughs and flaps
  Its hideous wings,
  And makes me wild with horror and dismay.
  O Jesu, help! pray for me, Mary, pray!
  Some angel, Jesu! such as came to thee
  In thine own agony......
  Mary, pray for me. Joseph, pray for me. Mary, pray for me.

  ASSISTANTS.

  Rescue him, O Lord, in this his evil hour,
  As of old so many by thy gracious power:--Amen.
  Enoch and Elias from the common doom; Amen.
  Noe from the waters in a saving home; Amen.
  Abraham from th' abounding guilt of heathenesse; Amen.
  Job from all his multiform and fell distress; Amen.
  Isaac, when his father's knife was raised to slay; Amen.
  Lot from burning Sodom on its judgment-day; Amen.

{520}

  Moses from the land of bondage and despair; Amen.
  Daniel from the hungry lions in their lair; Amen.
  And the children three amid the furnace-flame; Amen.
  Chaste Susanna from the slander and the shame; Amen.
  David from Golia and the wrath of Saul; Amen.
  And the two apostles from their prison-thrall; Amen.
  Thecla from her torments; Amen:
            --so, to show thy power,
  Rescue this thy servant in his evil hour.

  GERONTIUS.

  Novissima hora est; and I fain would sleep.
  The pain has wearied me. . . . Into thy hands,
  Lord, into thy hands. . . . .

  THE PRIEST.

  Proficiscere, anima Christiana de hoc mundo!
  Go forth upon thy journey, Christian soul!
  Go from this world! Go, in the name of God,
  The omnipotent Father, who created thee!
  Go, in the name of Jesus Christ our Lord,
  Son of the Living God, who bled for thee!
  Go, in the name of th' Holy Spirit, who
  Hath been poured out on thee! Go, in the name
  Of angels and archangels; in the name
  Of thrones and dominations; in the name
  Of princedoms and of powers; and in the name
  Of cherubim and seraphim, go forth!
  Go, in the name of patriarchs and prophets;
  And of apostles and evangelists,
  Of martyrs and confessors; in the name
  Of holy monks and hermits; in the name
  Of holy virgins; and all saints of God,
  Both men and women, go! Go on thy course;
  And may thy place to-day be found in peace,
  And may thy dwelling be the holy mount
  Of Sion: through the same, through Christ, our Lord.

§ 2.

  SOUL Of GERONTIUS.

  I went to sleep; and now I am refreshed.
  A strange refreshment: for I feel in me
  An inexpressive lightness, and a sense
  Of freedom, as I were at length myself,
  And ne'er had been before. How still it is!
  I hear no more the busy beat of time,
  No, nor my fluttering breath, nor struggling pulse;
  Nor does one moment differ from the next.
  I had a dream; yes:--some one softly said
  "He's gone;" and then a sigh went round the room.
  And then I surely heard a priestly voice
  Cry "Subvenite;" and they knelt in prayer.

{521}

  I seem to hear him still; but thin and low,
  And fainter and more faint the accents come,
  As at an ever-widening interval.
  Ah! whence is this? What is this severance?
  This silence pours a solitariness
  Into the very essence of my soul;
  And the deep rest, so soothing and so sweet,
  Hath something too of sternness and of pain.
  For it drives back my thoughts upon their spring
  By a strange introversion, and perforce
  I now begin to feed upon myself,
  Because I have naught else to feed upon.

  Am I alive or dead? I am not dead,
  But in the body still; for I possess
  A sort of confidence, which clings to me,
  That each particular organ holds its place
  As heretofore, combining with the rest
  Into one symmetry, that wraps me round,
  And makes me man; and surely I could move,
  Did I but will it, every part of me.
  And yet I cannot to my sense bring home,
  By very trial, that I have the power.
  'Tis strange; I cannot stir a hand or foot,
  I cannot make my fingers or my lips
  By mutual pressure witness each to each,
  Nor by the eyelid's instantaneous stroke
  Assure myself I have a body still.
  Nor do I know my very attitude,
  Nor if I stand, or lie, or sit, or kneel.

  So much I know, not knowing how I know,
  That the vast universe, where I have dwelt,
  Is quitting me, or I am quitting it.
  Or I or it is rushing on the wings
  Of light or lightning on an onward course,
  And we e'en now are million miles apart.
  Yet . . is this peremptory severance
  Wrought out in lengthy measurements of space,
  Which grow and multiply by speed and time?
  Or am I traversing infinity
  By endless subdivision, hurrying back
  From finite toward infinitesimal,
  Thus dying out of the expanded world?

  Another marvel; some one has me fast
  Within his ample palm; 'tis not a grasp
  Such as they use on earth, but all around
  Over the surface of my subtle being,
  As though I were a sphere, and capable
  To be accosted thus, a uniform
  And gentle pressure tells me I am not
  Self-moving, but borne forward on my way.
  And hark! I hear a singing; yet in sooth

{522}

  I cannot of that music rightly say
  Whether I hear or touch or taste the tones.
  Oh what a heart-subduing melody!

  ANGEL.

    My work is done,'
        My task is o er,
            And so I come,
            Taking it home,
    For the crown is won.
            Alleluia,
    For evermore.

    My Father gave
        In charge to me
            This child of earth
            E'en from its birth,
    To serve and save,
            Alleluia,
    And saved is he.

    This child of clay
        To me was given,
            To rear and train
            By sorrow and pain
    In the narrow way,
            Alleluia,
    From earth to heaven.

  SOUL.

  It is a member of that family
  Of wondrous beings, who, ere the worlds were made,
  Millions of ages back, have stood around
  The throne of God:--he never has known sin;
  But through those cycles all but infinite,
  Has had a strong and pure celestial life,
  And bore to gaze on th' unveiled face of God,
  And drank from the eternal fount of truth,
  And served him with a keen ecstatic love.
  Hark! he begins again.

  ANGEL.

    Lord, how wonderful in depth and height,
            But most in man, how wonderful thou art!
    With what a love, what soft persuasive might,
            Victorious o'er the stubborn fleshly heart,
        Thy tale complete of saints thou dost provide,
        To fill the throne which angels lost through pride!

{523}

    He lay a grovelling babe upon the ground,
            Polluted in the blood of his first sire,
    With his whole essence shattered and unsound,
            And, coiled around his heart, a demon dire,
        Which was not of his nature, but had skill
        To bind and form his opening mind to ill.

    Then was I sent from heaven to set right
            The balance in his soul of truth and sin,
    And I have waged a long relentless fight,
            Resolved that death-environed spirit to win,
    Which from its fallen state, when all was lost,
    Had been repurchased at so dread a cost.

    Oh what a shifting parti-colored scene
            Of hope and fear, of triumph and dismay,
    Of recklessness and penitence, has been
            The history of that dreary, lifelong fray!
        And oh the grace, to nerve him and to lead,
        How patient, prompt, and lavish at his need!

    O man, strange composite of heaven and earth!
            Majesty dwarfed to baseness! fragrant flower
    Running to poisonous seed! and seeming worth
            Cloaking corruption! weakness mastering power!
        Who never art so near to crime and shame,
        As when thou hast achieved some deed of name;

    How should ethereal natures comprehend
            A thing made up of spirit and of clay,
    Were we not tasked to nurse it and to tend,
            Linked one to one throughout its mortal day?
        More than the seraph in his height of place,
        The angel-guardian knows and loves the ransomed race.

  SOUL.

  Now know I surely that I am at length
  Out of the body: had I part with earth,
  I never could have drunk those accents in,
  And not have worshipped as a god the voice
  That was so musical; but now I am
  So whole of heart, so calm, so self-possessed,
  With such a full content, and with a sense
  So apprehensive and discriminant,
  As no temptation can intoxicate.
  Nor have I even terror at the thought
  That I am clasped by such a saintliness.

  ANGEL.

    All praise to him, at whose sublime decree
            The last are first, the first become the last;
    By whom the suppliant prisoner is set free,
            By whom proud first-borns from their thrones are cast;
        Who raises Mary to be queen of heaven,
        While Lucifer is left, condemned and unforgiven.

{524}

§ 3.

  SOUL.

  I will address him. Mighty one, my Lord,
  My guardian spirit, all hail!

  ANGEL.

            All hail, my child!
    My child and brother, hail! what wouldest thou?

  SOUL.

  I would have nothing but to speak with thee
  For speaking's sake. I wish to hold with thee
  Conscious communion; though I fain would know
  A maze of things, were it but meet to ask,
  And not a curiousness.

  ANGEL.

            You cannot now
    Cherish a wish which ought not to be wished.

  SOUL.

  Then I will speak. I ever had believed
  That on the moment when the struggling soul
  Quitted its mortal case, forthwith it fell
  Under the awful presence of its God,
  There to be judged and sent to its own place.
  What lets me now from going to my Lord?

  ANGEL.

  Thou art not let; but with extremest speed
  Art hurrying to the just and holy Judge:
  For scarcely art thou disembodied yet.
  Divide a moment, as men measure time,
  Into its million-million-millionth part,
  Yet even less than that the interval
  Since thou didst leave the body; and the priest
  Cried "Subvenite," and they fell to prayer;
  Nay, scarcely yet have they begun to pray.
  For spirits and men by different standards mete
  The less and greater in the flow of time.
  By sun and moon, primeval ordinances--
  By stars which rise and set harmoniously--
  By the recurring seasons, and the swing,
  This way and that, of the suspended rod
  Precise and punctual, men divide the hours,
  Equal, continuous, for their common use.
  Not so with us in th' immaterial world;
  But intervals in their succession

{525}

  Are measured by the living thought alone,
  And grow or wane with its intensity.
  And time is not a common property;
  But what is long is short, and swift is slow,
  And near is distant, as received and grasped
  By this mind and by that, and every one
  Is standard of his own chronology.
  And memory lacks its natural resting-points,
  Of years, and centuries, and periods.
  It is thy very energy of thought
  Which keeps thee from thy God.

  SOUL.

            Dear angel, say,
  Why have I now no fear at meeting him?
  Along my earthly life, the thought of death
  And judgment was to me most terrible.
  I had it aye before me, and I saw
  The Judge severe e'en in the crucifix.
  Now that the hour is come, my fear is fled;
  And at this balance of my destiny,
  Now close upon me, I can forward look
  With a serenest joy.

  ANGEL.

            It is because
  Then thou didst fear, that now thou dost not fear.
  Thou hast forestalled the agony, and so
  For thee the bitterness of death is passed
  Also, because already in thy soul
  The judgment is begun. That day of doom,
  One and the same for the collected world--
  That solemn consummation for all flesh,
  Is, in the case of each, anticipate
  Upon his death; and, as the last great day
  In the particular judgment is rehearsed,
  So now too, ere thou comest to the throne,
  A presage falls upon thee, as a ray
  Straight from the Judge, expressive of thy lot.
  That calm and joy uprising in thy soul
  Is first-fruit to thee of thy recompense,
  And heaven begun.

§ 4.

  SOUL.

          But hark! upon my sense
  Comes a fierce hubbub, which would make me fear,
  Could I be frighted.

(TO BE CONTINUED.)

------

{526}

From The St. James Magazine

EXTINCT SPECIES

The study of geology teaches us that our planet, has undergone many
successive physical revolutions, the crust of it being made up of
layer upon layer, after the manner of the successive peels of an
onion. Each of these successive depositions constitutes the tomb of
animal forms that have lived and passed away. Now it is a fresh-water
or a marine shell that the exploratory geologist discloses; now the
skeleton, or parts of a skeleton, from the evidence of which a
comparative anatomist can reproduce, by model or picture, the exact
forms. Occasionally science has to build up her presentment of animals
that were, from the scanty evidence of their mere footfalls. As the
poacher is guided to the timid hare, crouching in her seat, by the
vestiges of her footprints on the snow, so the geologist can in many
cases arrive at tolerably certain conclusions relative to the size and
aspect of an extinct animal by the evidence of footsteps on now solid
rock. And if it be demanded how it happens that now solid rocks can
bear the traces of such soft impressions, the reply is simple. There
evidently was a time when these rocks, now so hard and solid, were
mere agglomerations of plastic matter, comparable for consistence to
ordinary clay. It needs not even the weight of a footfall to impress
material of temper so soft as this. The plashes of rain are distinctly
visible upon many rocks now hard, and which have only acquired their
consistence with the lapse of countless ages.

The geologist's notion of the word "recent" comprehends a span of time
of beginning so remote that the oldest records of human history fade
to insignificance by comparison. Since this world of ours acquired its
final surface settlement, so to speak, numerous species have become
extinct. The process of exhaustion has gone steadily on. It has been
determined by various causes, some readily explicable, others involved
in doubt. It is a matter well established, for example, that all
northern Asia was at one time, not geologically remote, overrun by
herds of mammoth creatures which, as to size, dwarf the largest
elephants now existing; and which, among other points distinguishing
them from modern elephants, were, unlike these, covered by a crop of
long hair. Very much of the ivory manufactured in Russia consists of
the tusks of these now extinct mammoths, untombed from time to time.

Tilesius declares his belief that mammoth skeletons still left in
northern Russia exceed in number all the elephants now existing upon
the globe. Doubtless the process of mammoth extinction was very
gradual, and extended over an enormous space of time. This
circumstance is indicated by the varying condition in which the tusks
and teeth are found. Whereas the gelatine, or soft animal matter, of
many specimens remains, imparting one of the characteristics necessary
to the being of ivory, other specimens have lost this material, and
mineral substances, infiltrating, have taken its place. The gem
turquoise is pretty generally conceded to be nothing else than the
fossilized tooth of some extinct animal--probably the mammoth.

Curiosity of speculation prompts the mind to imagine to itself the
time when the last of these gigantic animals succumbed to influences
that were finally destined to sweep them all from the earth. Had men
come upon the scene when they roamed their native wilds? Were those
wilds the same as now as to climate and vegetable growths? {527}
Testimony is mute. Time silently unveils the sepulchred remains,
leaving fancy to expatiate as she will on a topic wholly beyond the
scope of mortal intelligence.

Inasmuch as bones and tusks of the mammoth are dug up in enormous
quantities over tracts now almost bare of trees, and scanty as to
other vegetation, certain naturalists have assumed that in times
coeval with mammoth or mastodonic life the vegetation of these regions
must have been richer than now, otherwise how could such troops of
enormous beasts have gained their sustenance?

On this point Sir Charles Lyell bids us not to be too confident
affirmatively. He remarks that luxuriance of vegetable growth is not
seen at the time being to correspond with the prevalence of the
associated fauna. The northern island of the New Zealand group, at the
period when Europeans first set foot there, was mostly covered by a
luxuriant growth of forest trees, of shrubs and grasses. Admirably
adapted to the being of herbivorous animals, the land was wholly
devoid of the same. Brazilian forests offer another case in
illustration; a stronger case than the wilds of New Zealand, inasmuch
as the climate may be assumed as more congenial to the development of
animal life. Nowhere on earth does nature teem with an equal amount of
vegetable luxuriance; yet Brazilian forests are remarkable for almost
the total absence of large animals. Perhaps no present tract is so
densely endowed with animal life as that of South Africa, a region
where sterility is the prevailing characteristic; where forest trees
are rare and other vegetation scant; where water, too, is infrequent.

Present examples, such as these, should make a naturalist hesitate
before coming to the conclusion that Siberian wilds, even as now, were
wholly incompatible with the existence and support of troops of
mammoths or mastodons. Speculating now as to the latest time of the
existence of mastodons in Siberia, a circumstance has to be noted that
would seem to countenance the belief in the existence of it up to a
not very remote period of historic times. In the year 1843, the season
being warmer than usual, a mass of Siberian ice thawed, and, in
thawing, untombed one of these animals, perfect in all respects, even
to the skin and hair. The flesh of this creature furnished repast to
wolves and bears, so little alteration had it undergone. Another
mastodon was disentombed on the Tas, between the Obi and Yenesei, near
the arctic circle, about lat. 66° 30' N., with some parts of its flesh
in so perfect a state that the bulb of the eye now exists preserved in
the Moscow museum. Another adult carcass, accompanied by an individual
of the same species, was found in 1843, in lat. 75° 15' N., near the
river Taimyr, the flesh being decayed. Associated with it, Middendorf
observed the trunk of a larch tree (_Pinus larix_), the same wood that
now grows in the same neighborhood abundantly.

It is no part of our intention to discuss the causes of mammoth
extinction. This result has assuredly not been caused by any onslaught
of the destroyer man. The Siberian wilds are scantily populated now,
and it has never been suggested that at any anterior period their
human denizens were more plentiful. Nature often establishes the
balance of her organic life through a series of agencies so abstrusely
refined, and acting, beside, over so long a period, that they
altogether escape man's cognizance. The believer in the God of
nature's adaptation of means to ends will see no reason to make an
exception in animal species to what is demonstrated by examples in so
many other cases to be a general law. The dogma, that no general law
is without exceptions, though one to which implicit credence has been
given, may nevertheless be devoid of the universality commonly
imputed. On the contrary, the application of this dogma may extend
over a very narrow field; may be only referable to the codifications,
artificial and wholly {528} conventional, which mankind for their
convenience establish, and under a false impression elevate to the
position of laws. If logical proof in syllogistic form be demanded as
to the proposition that laws established by nature have no exceptions,
the fulfilment of demand would not be possible; inasmuch as human
reason is too impotent for grasping, and too restricted in its
energies for investigating, the multifarious issues which the
discussion of such a thesis would involve. As coming events, however,
are said by the poet to cast their shadows in advance, so, as heralds
and harbingers of truths beyond logical proof, come beliefs, faiths,
even moral convictions. Of this sort is the assurance of the balance
established by nature at each passing epoch of being in the world.

The naturalist is impressed with the firm belief that the number of
animal species existing on the earth, and the number of individuals in
each species, are balanced and apportioned in some way and by some
mysterious co-relation to the needs of the universe.

Some presumptive testimony in favor of this belief is afforded by the
discussion, barely yet concluded, relative to the effect of small bird
destruction. Without any more elaborate reasoning on this topic than
follows necessarily as the result of newspaper reading, the general
concession will be made by any one of unbiased mind, that if small
bird destruction could be enacted to its exhaustive limits--if every
small bird could be destroyed--the aggregate of vitality thus
disposed of would be balanced through the increase of other organisms.
Insect life would teem and multiply to an extent proportionate with
the removal of an anterior restraining cause.

The nature of the topic on which we are engaged does not force upon us
the question whether such proportionate increase of insect life be
advantageous or disadvantageous. What we are wholly concerned in
placing in evidence is the balance kept up between vital organisms of
different species by nature. Nor is the balance of vitality
established between different animal species. It also may be traced,
and even more distinctly, between the vegetable and animal kingdoms;
each regarded in its entirety. Vegetables can only grow by the
assimilation of an element (carbon) which animals evolve by
respiration, as being a poison. Consideration of this fact well-nigh
forces the conclusion upon the mind--if, indeed, the conclusion be
not inevitable--that if through any vast cataclysm animated life were
to become suddenly extinct throughout the world, vegetable life would
languish until the last traces of atmospheric carbon had become
exhausted, and then perish.

In maintenance of her vital balance through the operation of some
occult law, it often happens that animals that have ceased to be
"obviously useful," as taking part in a general economy around them,
are seen to die out. Whilst wolves and elks roamed over Ireland the
magnificent Irish wolf-dog was common. With the disappearance of
wolves the breed of wolf-dogs languished, and has ultimately become
extinct. As a matter of zoological curiosity many an Irish gentleman
would have desired to perpetuate this gigantic and interesting race of
dogs; but the operation, the tendency to vital equilibrium has been
over-strong to be contravened--the race of Irish wolf-dogs has fleeted
away. Speaking now of the huge Siberian mammoths, from which we
diverged, of these faith in nature's balanced adaptation assures us
that they died out so soon as they ceased to be necessary as a
compensation to some unknown force in the vital economy.

Spans and periods of time, such as those comprehended by the human
mind, and compared with the normal period of individual human
existence, dwindle to nothingness when attempted to be made the units
of measurement in calculations involving the duration of species.
Perhaps the data are not available for enabling the most careful
investigator to come to an approximate {529} conclusion as to the
number of years that must elapse before the race of existing
elephants, African and Indian, will become extinct, departing from the
earth as mammoths have departed. The time, however, must inevitably
arrive for that consummation under the rule of the present course of
things.

Without forest for shade and sustenance the race of wild elephants
cannot exist; and, inasmuch as elephants never breed in captivity,
each tame elephant having been once reclaimed from the forests, it
follows, from the consideration of inevitable results, that sooner or
later, but some day, nevertheless, one of two possible issues must be
consummated--either that man shall cease to go on subduing the earth,
cutting down forests and bringing the land into cultivation, or else
elephants must become extinct. Who can entertain a doubt as to the
alternative issue? Man has gone on conquering and to conquer from the
time he came upon the scene. Animals, save those he can domesticate,
have gone on fleeting and fleeting away. It is most probable,
nevertheless, that one proportionate aggregate of vitality has at
every period been maintained.

The most marked examples of the passing away of animal species within
periods of time, in some cases not very remote, pronounced of even in
a historical sense, is seen in the record of certain gigantic birds.
The largest individuals of the feathered tribes now extant are
ostriches; but the time was when these plumed denizens of the Sahara
were small indeed by comparison with existing species. Some idea of
the bulk of the epiornis--an extinct species--may be gathered from a
comparison of the bulk of one of its eggs with that of other birds.
According to M. Isidore Geoffroy, who some time since presented one of
these eggs to the French Academy of Sciences, the capacity of it was
no less than eight litres and three-fourths. This would prove it to be
about six times the size of the ostrich's egg, 148 times that of an
ordinary fowl, and no less than 50,000 times the size of the egg of
the humming-bird. The egg exhibited was one of very few that have been
discovered; hence nothing tends to the belief that it was one of the
largest. The first knowledge of the existence of this gigantic bird
was acquired in 1851. The sole remains of the species hitherto found
are some egg-shells and a few bones. These suffice, however, for an
ideal reproduction of the creature under the synthetical treatment of
comparative anatomy. The epiornis inhabited Madagascar. The creature's
height could not have been less than from nine to twelve feet, and the
preservation of its remains is such as to warrant the belief in its
comparatively recent existence.

Of a structure as large as the epiornis, probably larger, though
differing from the latter in certain anatomical particulars, according
to the belief of Professor Owen, is a certain New Zealand giant bird,
called by him the dinornis. As in the case of the Madagascar bird, the
evidence relating to this is very recent. Some few years ago an
English gentleman received from a relative settled in New Zealand some
fragments of large bones that had belonged to some creature of species
undetermined. He sent them to Professor Owen for examination, and was
not a little surprised at the assurance that the bones in question,
although seemingly having belonged to an animal as large as an ox,
were actually those of a bird. The comparative anatomist was guided in
coming to this conclusion by a certain cancellated structure possessed
by the bony fragments, a characteristic of the bones of birds. For a
time Professor Owen's dictum was received with hesitation, not to say
disbelief, on the part of some people. The subsequent finding of more
remains, eggs as well as bones, soon justified the naturalist's
verdict, however. Not the slightest doubt remains now upon the mind of
any zoologist relative to the past existence of the dinornis; nay, the
{530} impression prevails that this feathered monster may be living in
some of the more inaccessible parts of the southern island of New
Zealand at the present time. Be that as it may, the dinornis can only
have become extinct recently, even using this word in a historical
sense, as the following testimony will make manifest:--

A sort of mummification prevailed amongst the Maories until
Christianity had gained ground amongst them. The process was not
exactly similar to that by which Egyptian mummies were formed, but
resembled it, nevertheless, in the particular of desiccation. Smoking
was the exact process followed; and smoked Maori heads are common
enough in naturalists' museums. In a general way Maori heads alone
were smoked, certain principles of food economy prompting a more
utilitarian treatment for entire bodies. Nevertheless, as a mark of
particular respect to some important chief now and then, affectionate
survivors exempted his corpse from the oven, and smoking it entire,
set it up amongst the Maori lares and penates as an ornament. This
explanation is not altogether _par parenthèse_, for it brings me to
the point of narrating some evidence favorable to the opinion that the
dinornis cannot have been extinct in New Zealand even at a recent
historical period. Not long ago the body of a Maori was found in a
certain remote crypt, and resting on one hand was an egg of this bird
giant. Contemplate now the bearings of the testimony. The Maori race
is not indigenous to New Zealand, but arrived there by migration from
Hawai. Not alone do the records of the two groups of Pacific islands
in question advert to such migration, but certain radical coincidences
of language lend confirmation. It is further a matter of tradition
that the migration took place about three hundred years ago. Now, even
if the recently discovered specimen of Maori mummy art had been
executed on the very first advent of the race, the period elapsed
would be, historically speaking, recent. The laws of chance, however,
are adverse to any such assumption; and, moreover, the degree of
civilization--if the expression may be used--implied by the dedication
of an entire human body to an aesthetic purpose, instead of devoting
it to one of common utility--could only have been achieved after a
certain lapse of time.

According to Professor Owen, there must have been many species of
dinornis. The largest individuals of one species, according to him,
could not have been less than four yards high. According to the same
naturalist, moreover, these birds were not remarkable by their size
alone; they had, he avers, certain peculiarities of form establishing
a link between them and the cassowary and apteryx: the latter a
curious bird still found in New Zealand, but very rare nevertheless.

Of colossal dimensions as were the dinornis and epiornis, the size of
both sinks into insignificance by comparison with another giant bird,
traces of which, and only traces, are discoverable in North America,
at the epoch when the deposit of the conchylian stage of Massachusetts
was yet soft enough to yield under the feet of creatures stepping upon
its surface. Footsteps, indeed, are the only traces left of these
giant birds, and they are found side by side with the imprints of
drops of rain which fell on the yielding surface in those early times.
Mostly the footmarks only correspond with three toes, but occasionally
there are traces of a fourth--a toe comparable to a thumb, only
directed forward, not backward. Marks of claws are occasionally found.
Every trace and lineament of the Massachusetts bird is marvellously
exceptional. The feet must have been no less than fifteen inches long,
without reckoning the hinder claw, the length of which alone is two
inches. The width must have been ten inches. The intervals between
these footmarks correspond evidently with the stride of the monster,
which got over the ground by covering successive stages of from {531}
four to five feet! When we consider that the stride of an ostrich is
no more than from ten to twelve inches, the application of this record
will be obvious. Here closes the testimony already revealed in respect
of this bird, except we also refer to it--which is apocryphal--certain
coprolites or excrementitious matters found in the same formation.

For the preceding facts naturalists are indebted to the investigations
of Mr. Hitchcock. The evidence adduced leaves no place for doubt as to
the previous existence of a giant bird to which the traces are
referable. Naturalists, however, were slow to come to this conclusion;
so extraordinary did it seem that a bird should have lived at a period
so remote as that when these geological formations were deposited. To
gain some idea of the antiquity of that formation, one has only to
remember that the conchylian stage is only the fifth in the order of
time of the twenty-eight stages of which, according to Alcide
D'Orbigny, the crust of the earth is made up, from the period of
primitive rocks to the present date. However, many recent facts have
tended to prove that several animals, mammalians and saurians amongst
others, are far more ancient than had been imagined; after which
evidence these giant bird footprints have lost much of the
improbability which once seemed to attach to them.

Pass we on now to the traces of another very curious bird, the
existence of which has been demonstrated by Professor Owen, according
to whom the creature must have lived at the epoch of the schists of
Sobenhofen. The name given by Professor Owen to this curious extinct
bird is _archeopterix_. Its peculiarities are so numerous that for
some time naturalists doubted whether it should be considered a
reptile or a bird; between which two there exist numerous points of
similarity. And now, whilst dealing with bird-giants, it would be
wrong not to make some reference to a discovery made in 1855, at Bas
Meudon, of certain osseous remains, referable to a bird that must have
attained the dimensions of a horse; that floated on water like a swan,
and poised itself at roost upon one leg. Monsieur Constant Prevost,
the naturalist who has most studied the bird, gave to it the name of
gastornis Parisiensis. The bony remains of this creature were found in
the tertiary formation in a conglomerate associated with chalk, which
refers the gastornis to a date more remote than any yet accorded to
any other bird.

From a bare record of facts contemplate we now our planet as it must
have been when inhabited by the monstrous birds and reptiles and
quadrupeds which preceded the advent of man. These were times when
animated forms attained dimensions which are now wholly exceptional.
That may be described as the age when physical and physiological
forces were dominant, as the force of moral agency dominates over the
present, and is destined, as appearances tend to prove, to rule even
more fully hereafter. Might it not seem that in nature an economy is
recognizable similar to the economy of human existence? Can we not
recognize an antagonism between the development of brute force and of
the quality of mind? Would it not even seem that nature could not at
one and the same time develop mental and corporeal giants? The
physiological reign has only declined to prepare the advent of moral
ascendancy. Giant bodies seem fading from the earth, and giant spirits
commencing to rule. Humanity is progressive; is not its progression
made manifest by these zoological revelations? The first bone traces
of human beings range back to an epoch posterior to the monstrous
quadrupeds entombed in the diluvium. Hereafter giants, probably, will
only be seen in the moral world, grosser corporeal giant forms having
become extinct. The physical gigantesque is not yet indeed banished
from the earth, but the period of its {532} banishment would seem to
be at hand.

The probability is that all the great birds to which reference has
been made were, like the ostrich, incapable of flight. This defect,
when contemplated from the point of view suggested by modern
classifications, seems one of the most remarkable aberrations of
nature of which we have cognizance. For a bird to be deprived of what
seems the most essential characteristic of bird-life--to be banished
from the region that we have come to regard as the special domain of
bird-life--bound to the earth, forced to mingle with quadrupeds--seems
to the mind the completest of all possible departures from established
type.

Thoughts such as these result from our artificial systems and
classifications. Apart from these, the conditions of giant walking
birds that were, and to a limited extent are, will be found to
harmonize well with surrounding conditions. Suppose we take the case
of the ostrich for example; this bird being the chief living
representative of giant bird-life remaining to us from the past. In
the ostrich, then, do we view a creature so perfectly adapted to
conditions which surround it that no need falls short and no quality
is in excess. A complete bird in most anatomical characteristics, it
borrows others from another type. The sum of the vital elements which
normally, had the ostrich been like flying birds, should have gone to
endow the wings, has been directed toward the legs and feet, and
thereupon concentrated. Bird qualities and beast qualities have
mingled, and, as we now perceive, have harmonized. If to the ostrich
flying is denied--if it can only travel on foot, yet is it an
excellent pedestrian. A quality of which it has been deprived we now
find to have been transmuted into another quality--the ostrich has
found its equivalent.

Reflecting thus, we cease to pity the ostrich; we begin to see that
nature has been supremely wise, our classifications only having led us
into error. A new thought dawns upon our apprehension; instead of
longer regarding the ostrich as furnishing an example of nature's
bird-creative power gone astray, we come to look upon this creature as
designed upon the type of ordinary walking animals, and having some
bird characteristics added. Assuredly this point of view is better
than the other; for whereas the first reveals nature to us through the
distorting medium of an abstraction, the other shows us nature
herself. It is not a matter of complete certainty that the bird-type,
as naturalists explain and define it in their systems, exists; but
there can be no doubt as to the existence of the ostrich. In this mode
of expression there is nothing paradoxical; and doubtless, when we
come to reflect upon it, the case will not fail to seem a little
strange that we are so commonly in the habit of testing the
inequalities of beings by reference to systems, instead of following
the opposite course, viz., that of testing the value and completeness
of systems by reference to the qualities of individuals they embrace.
Naturalists invent a system and make it their touchstone of truth;
whereas the real touchstone would be the creature systematized. The
ostrich simply goes to prove that the zoological types imagined by
naturalists are endowed with less of the absolute than philosophers in
their pride of science had imagined. Animal types are not the
strangers to each other that artificial classifications would make
them appear.

Nor is flexibility of bird-type only manifested by the examples
wherein a bird acquires characteristics of quadrupeds and other
walking animals. Wings may even become metamorphosed into a sort of
fins, thus establishing a connection between bird-life and fish-life.
This occurs in the manchot, a bird not less aquatic in its habits than
the seal--of flying and walking almost equally incapable--a bird the
natural locomotive condition of which is to be plunged {533} in water
up to the neck. Assuredly nothing can be more absurd than the attempt
to recognize, in these ambiguous organizations, so many attempts of
nature to pass from one type to another.

No matter what religious system one may have adopted, or what
philosophical code: the interpretation of nature (according to which
she is represented as making essays--trying experiments) is alike
inadmissible. Neither God omniscient, nor nature infallible, can be
assumed by the philosopher as trying experiments. There are, indeed,
no essays in nature but degrees--transitions. Wherefore these
transitions? is a question that brings philosophy to bay, and
demonstrates her weakness. It is a question that cannot be pondered
too deeply. Therein lies the germ of some great mystery.

Reverting to bird-giants, past and present, it is assuredly incorrect
to assume, as certain naturalists have assumed, that flying would have
been incompatible with their bulk. There exist birds of prey, of whose
bodies the specific gravity does not differ much from that of the
ostrich, and are powerful in flight nevertheless. Then another class
of facts rises up in opposition to the hypothesis, that mere grandeur
of dimensions is the limit to winged flying. Neither the apteryx nor
the manchot fly any more than the ostrich. Neither is a large bird,
nor, relatively to size, a heavy bird. As regards the epiornis, the
position is not universally acceded to by naturalists that the
creature was like the ostrich, the apteryx, and cassowary, a mere
walking bird. An Italian naturalist, Signor Bianconi, has noted a
certain peculiarity in the metatarsal bones of the creature which
induces him to refer it to the category of winged birds of prey. If
this hypothesis be tenable, then a sort of giant vulture the epiornis
would have been: one in whose imposing presence the condor of the
Andes would have dwindled to the dimensions of a buzzard. Further, if
Signor Bianconi's assumption hold good, then may we not have done
amiss in banishing the "roc" to the realms of fiction? Old Marco Polo,
writing in the thirteenth century, described the roc circumstantially,
and the account has been long considered as either a fiction or a
mistake. Signor Bianconi, coming to the rescue of his
fellow-countryman, thinks that the Italian traveller may have actually
described a giant bird of prey extant at the time when he wrote, but
which has now become extinct.

A notice of extinct birds would be incomplete without reference to the
dodo, the very existence of which had been lately questioned; so
completely has it fleeted away from the earth. Messrs. Broderip,
Strickland, and Melville, however, have amply vindicated the dodo's
claim to be regarded a former denizen of the world we live in. The
dodo was first seen by the Dutch when they landed on the Isle of
France, at that time uninhabited, immediately subsequent to the
doubling of Cape Horn by the Portuguese. These birds were described as
having no wings, but in the place of them three or four black
feathers. Where the tail should be, there grew instead four or five
curling plumes of a grayish color. In their stomachs they were said to
have commonly a stone as big as a fist, and hard as the gray Bentemer
stone. The boat's crew of the _Jacob Van Neck_ called them
Walgh-vogels (surfeit birds), because they could not cook them or make
them tender, or because they were able to get so many turtle-doves,
which had a much more pleasant flavor, so that they took a disgust to
these birds. Likewise, it is said that three or four of these birds
were enough to afford a whole ship's company one full meal. Indeed,
the sailors salted down some of them, and carried them on the voyage.

Many descriptions of the dodo were given by naturalists after the
commencement of the seventeenth century; and the British Museum
contains a painting said to have been copied {534} from a living
individual. Underneath the painting is a leg still finely preserved;
and in respect of this leg naturalists are agreed that it cannot
belong to any existing species. The dodo must have been a curious
bird, if Mr. Strickland's notion of him be correct; and Professor
Reinhardt, of Copenhagen, holds a similar opinion. The dodo, these
naturalists affirm, was a vulture-like dove--a sort of ugly giant
pigeon--but with beak and claws like a vulture. He had companions or
neighbors, at least, not dissimilar in nature. Thus a bird called the
solitaire inhabited the small island of Roderigues, three hundred
miles east of the Mauritius. Man has exterminated the solitaire, as
well as other birds nearly allied, formerly denizens of the Isle of
Bourbon.

The dodo will be seen no more; the race has fleeted away. Among birds,
the emeu, the cassowary, and the apteryx are species rapidly
vanishing; amongst quadrupeds, the kangaroo--the platypus: others
slowly, but not less surely. After a while they will be gone from the
earth wholly, as bears, wolves, mammoths, and hyenas have gone from
our own island. The _Bos primigenius_, or great wild bull, was common
in Germany when Julius Caesar flourished. The race has become wholly
extinct, if, indeed, not incorporated with the breed of large tame
oxen of northern Europe. The urus would have become extinct but for
the care taken by Russian emperors to preserve a remnant in Lithuanian
forests. The beaver built his mud huts along the Saone and Rhone up to
the last few generations of man; and when Hannibal passed through Gaul
on his way to Italy, beavers in Gaul were common. Thus have animals
migrated or died out, passed away, but the balance of life has been
preserved. Man has gone on conquering: now exterminating, now
subjecting. Save the fishes of the sea and the birds of the air, the
time will perhaps come when creatures will have to choose between
subjection and death. Ostriches would seem to be reserved for the
first alternative, seeing that in South Africa, in southern France,
and Italy, these birds have lately been bred, domiciled into tame
fowls, in behalf of their feathers. Very profitable would ostrich
farming seem to be. These giant birds want no food but grass, and the
yearly feather yield of each adult ostrich realizes about twenty-five
pounds sterling.

----

{535}

From Chambers's Journal.

A DINNER BY MISTAKE.

"Only one poun'-ten a week, sir, and no extras; and I may say you
won't find such cheap airy lodgings anywhere else in the place; not to
speak of the sea-view;" and the bustling landlady threw open the door
of the tiny sitting-room with an air which would have become a
Belgravian lackey. It certainly was a cosy, sunny little apartment,
with just such a view of the sea, and of nothing else whatsoever, as
is the delight of an inland heart, I was revolving in my mind how to
make terms on one most important point, when she again broke forth: "I
can assure you, sir, I could have let these same rooms again and again
in the last two days, if I had not given my promise to Mrs. Johnson
that she should have them next Friday fortnight, and I would never go
from my word, sir--never! though this month is our harvest, and it's
hard for me to have the rooms standing empty. As I told my niece only
yesterday, I won't let forward again, not to please anybody, for it
don't answer, and it worrits me out of my life. And I'm sure, sir, if
you like to come for the fortnight, I'll do my utmost to make you
comfortable; and I always have given satisfaction; and you could not
get nicer rooms nowhere."

"No," said I, taking advantage of her pause for breath; "these are
very nice. I--I suppose you don't object to smoking?"

The good woman's face assumed a severe expression, though I detected a
comical twinkle in her eye. "Why, sir, we always do say--but if it's
only a cigar, and not one of them nasty pipes"--

I smiled: "To tell the truth, it generally is a pipe."

"Is it now? Well, sir, if _you_ please, we won't say anything about it
now. We have a lady-lodger upstairs, and if she should complain, I can
but say that it is against my rules, and that I'll mention it to you.
And so, sir, if you please, I'll go now, and see to your portmanteau
being taken up;" and thereupon she vanished, leaving me in sole
possession.

I threw my bag and rug on to the sofa, pushed a slippery horsehair
armchair up to the window, and sat down to rest and inhale the
sea-breezes with a certain satisfaction at being in harbor. As I
before remarked, the prospect was in the strictest sense of the words
a sea-view. Far away to east and west stretched the blue ocean; and
beside it, I could see only a steep grass-bank just beneath my window,
with a broad shingly path running at its base, evidently designed for
an esplanade, though no human form was visible thereon. Away to the
right, I just caught a glimpse of shelving beach, dotted with
fishermen's boats; and of a long wooden jetty, with half-a-dozen
figures slowly pacing from end to end, while the dismal screeching of
a brass band told of an attempt at music more ambitious than
successful. It was not a lively look-out for a solitary man, and I
half wished myself back in my mother's comfortable house at Brompton.
However, I was in for it now; and I could but try how far a fortnight
of open air and exercise would recruit my wasted strength. I had been
reading really hard at Oxford through the last term, and my very
unusual industry had been followed by a languor and weariness which so
awakened my dear mother's solicitude that she never rested till she
had persuaded Dr. Busby to prescribe sea-air and a total separation
from my books. She could not come {536} with me, as she longed to do,
kind soul! but she packed my properties, and gave endless instructions
as to diet, all of which I had forgotten before I had accomplished the
first mile of my journey. I don't know why I came to that
out-of-the-way watering-place, except that I was too languid to have a
will of my own, or to care for the noisy life of country-houses full
of sportsmen. So, on the following morning, behold me in gray
travelling suit and wide-awake, strolling along the beach, watching
the pretty bathers as they dipped their heads under water, and then
reappeared, shaking the dripping tresses from their eyes. Then there
were the fishermen, brawny, bare-legged Goliahs, setting forth on
their day's toil, and launching their boats with such shouts and cries
as, to the uninitiated, might indicate some direful calamity. The
beach was alive now, for the whole visiting population, such as it
was, seemed to have turned out this bright September morning, and were
scattered about, sketching, working, and chattering. I scanned each
group, envying them their merry laughter and gay talk, and half hoping
to recognize some familiar face among those lazy lounging youths and
sun-burned damsels; but my quest was fruitless, and I pursued my
lonely way apart.

Really, though, the little place improved upon acquaintance. There
were fine bold cliffs, just precipitous enough to make a scramble to
the top almost irresistible; there were long stretches of yellow sand
and shallow pools glittering in the sunlight; and there was a breeze
coming straight from the north pole, which quickened my blood, and
brought the color into my sallow cheeks, even as I drank it in. I
bathed, I walked, I climbed, I made friends with the boatmen, and got
them to take me out in their fishing-smacks; but still, with returning
vigor, I began to crave not a little for some converse with more
congenial spirits than these honest tars and my loquacious landlady. I
inscribed my name on the big board at the library; I did all that man
could do to make my existence known, but nearly a week passed away,
and still my fellow-creatures held aloof. I had been out for the whole
of one windy afternoon tossing on the waves, watching the
lobster-fishing, and came in at sunset tolerably drenched with spray,
and with a terrific appetite. As I opened the door of my little
sitting-room, I beheld--most welcome sight--the white dinner-cloth,
and lying upon it a card--a large, highly-glazed, most unmistakable
visiting-card. With eager curiosity, I snatched it up, but curiosity
changed to amazement when I read the name, "Sir Philip Hetherton,
Grantham Park." Sir Philip Hetherton! Why, in the name of all that's
incomprehensible, should he call on me? I had never even heard his
name; I knew no more of him than of the man in the moon. Could he be
some country magnate who made it a duty to cultivate the acquaintance
of every visitor to Linbeach? If so, he must have a hard time of it,
even in this little unfrequented region. My impatience could not be
restrained till Mrs. Plumb's natural arrival with the chops; and an
energetic pull at the bell brought her at once courtesying and
smiling.

"I suppose," began I, holding the card with assumed carelessness
between my finger and thumb--"I suppose this gentleman, Sir Philip
Hetherton, called here to-day?"

"Oh yes, sir, this afternoon; not an hour ago."

"He inquired for me?"

"Yes, sir; he asked particularly for young Mr. Olifant, and said he
was very sorry to miss you. He's a very pleasant-spoken gentleman, is
Sir Philip."

"Ah, I see. Is he often in Linbeach? Does he know many people living
in the place?"

"Well, I don't think he has many friends here, sir; at least, I never
understood so; but he owns some of the {537} houses in the town, and
he is very kind to the poor. No one is ever turned away empty-handed
from his door, and I've a right to say so, sir, for my brother's widow
lives in one of the lodges at Grantham. He put her into it when her
husband was drowned at sea, and he's been a good friend to her ever
since."

All this was not what I wanted to find out, but I had learned by
experience that Mrs. Plumb's tongue must have its swing. I now mildly
brought her back to the point: "Does he see anything of the visitors?"

"Not to my knowledge, sir. He sometimes rides in of an afternoon, for
Grantham is only four miles from Linbeach; but I don't think he ever
stays long."

So it was not apparently an eccentric instance of universal
friendliness, but a special mark of honor paid to me. It grew more and
more mysterious. However, there was nothing to be gained by pumping
Mrs. Plumb further; and as I was discreetly minded to keep my own
counsel, I dismissed her. But meditating long and deeply over my
solitary dinner, I came at length to the unwelcome conclusion, that
Sir Philip Hetherton must have been laboring under some strange
delusion, and that I should see and hear no more of him. I was rather
in the habit of priding myself on my judgment and discrimination; but
in this instance they were certainly at fault, for within three days,
I met him face to face. I was strolling slowly along one of the shady
country lanes which led inland between cornfields and hedge-rows, when
I encountered a portly, gray-haired gentleman, mounted on an iron-gray
cob, and trotting soberly toward Linbeach. He surveyed me so
inquisitively out of his merry blue eyes, that the thought crossed me,
could this be the veritable Sir Philip? I smiled at my own vivid
imagination; but I must confess that before I had proceeded another
half mile, I faced round, and returned to Linbeach for more briskly
than I had left it. I had scarcely stepped into Mrs. Plumb's passage,
when that personage herself met me open-mouthed, with a pencil-note in
her hand. "Oh, Mr. Olifant, I wish you had come in rather sooner. Sir
Philip has been here again, and as he could not see you, he wrote this
note, for he had not time to wait. I was quite vexed that it should
happen so."

Evidently the good woman was fully impressed with the dignity of the
event, and not a little flattered at the honor paid to her lodger. I
opened the note, and it contained--oh marvel of marvels!--an
invitation to dinner for the following day, coupled with many warm
expressions of regard for my family, and regrets at having been
hitherto unable to see me.

"I told Sir Philip that I thought you had only gone down to the beach,
sir; but he laughed, and said he should not know you if he met you. I
suppose you don't know him, do you, sir?" Mrs. Plumb added
insinuatingly.

"No." said I; thinking within myself that the baronet need not have
been quite so communicative. However, this confession of his, at any
rate, threw same light upon the subject, and suggested a solution. He
might have known my father or mother. Of course, indeed, he must have
known them, or somebody belonging to me. His own apparent confidence
began to infect me, and I wrote off an elaborate and gracefully-worded
acceptance; and then sat down to my pipe, and a complacent
contemplation of all the benefits that might accrue to me through his
most praiseworthy cordiality. "After all," I reflected, "'tis no
matter where one goes; friends are sure to turn up everywhere;" and
thereon arose visions of partridge-shooting in the dewy mornings, to
be followed by pleasant little dinners with my host and a bevy of
lovely daughters. But on the morrow certain misgivings revisited me,
and I came to the conclusion that it would only be the civil thing to
ride over to Grantham in the afternoon, and get through {538} the
first introductions and explanations before appearing there as a
guest. Accordingly, I hired a long-legged, broken-winded hack, the
only one to be got for love or money, and set forth upon my way. It
was a fruitless journey; the fatal "not at home" greeted my ears, and
I could only drop a card, turn the Roman nose of my gallant steed
toward home, and resign myself to my fate.

Seven o'clock was the hour named for dinner, and I had intended to be
particularly punctual, but misfortunes crowded thick upon me. The
first white tie that came to hand was a miserable failure. My favorite
curl would not be adjusted becomingly upon my brow; and the wretched
donkey-boy who had solemnly promised to bring the basket-carriage
punctually to the door, did not appear till ten minutes after the
time. Last of all, when I had descended "got up" to perfection, and
was on the point of starting, I discovered that I was minus gloves,
and the little maid-of-all-work had to be sent fleeing off to the
corner shop, where haberdashery and grocery were picturesquely
combined. So it fell out that, despite hard driving, it was several
minutes past the hour when we drew up under the portico at Grantham. I
had no time to compose my nerves or prepare my opening address. A
gorgeously-arrayed flunkie appeared at the hall-door; a solemn butler,
behind, waved me on to the guidance of another beplushed and
bepowdered individual; and before I fully realized my position, I
stood in a brilliantly-lighted drawing-room, full of people, and heard
my name proclaimed in stentorian tones. The next moment, the florid
gentleman whom I had encountered on the previous day came forward with
outstretched hands and a beaming face, and a perfect torrent of
welcomes burst upon me.

"Glad to see you at last, Mr. Olifant, very glad to see you; I began
to think there was a fate against our meeting. Let me introduce you.
Lady Hetherton--my daughter--my son Fred. Come this way, this way."

And I was hurried along helpless as an infant in the jovial baronet's
hands. How could I--I appeal to any reasonable being--how could I
stand stock-still, and, under the eyes of all that company,
cross-examine my host as to the why and wherefore of his hospitality?
It will be owned, I think, that in what afterward occurred I was not
wholly to blame. Lady Hetherton was a quiet well-bred woman, with a
mild face and soft voice; she greeted me with a certain sleepy warmth,
and after a few placid commonplaces, resumed her conversation with the
elderly lady by her side, and left me to the care of her son, a
bright, frank young Harrovian, with whom I speedily made friends.
Really it was very pleasant to drop in this way into the centre of a
genial circle, and I found my spirits rising fast as we talked
together, _con amore_, of cricket, boating, hunting. A fresh arrival,
however, soon disturbed the party, and, directly afterward, dinner was
announced. Sir Philip, who had been busily engaged in welcoming the
last comers, led off a stately dame upon his arm, and we followed in
procession, a demure young daughter of the house being assigned to me.
We were slowly making our way round the dining-room, when, just as we
passed the end of the table, Sir Philip turned and laid his hand upon
my shoulder.

"I have scarcely had time for a word yet," he said; "but how are they
all in Yorkshire?"

I don't know what answer I gave; some one from behind begged leave to
pass, and I was borne on utterly bewildered. Yorkshire! what had I to
do with Yorkshire? And then, all at once, the appalling truth burst on
me like a thunder-clap--I was the wrong man! Yes; _now_ I recalled a
certain Captain Olifant, whom I had once met at a mess-dinner, and
who, as I had then heard, belonged to an old Yorkshire family. We
could count no sort of kinship with them {539} but here I was, for
some inexplicable reason, assumed as one of them, perhaps as the
eldest son and heir of their broad acres, and regaled accordingly. My
situation was sufficiently unpleasant, and in the first impulse of
dismay, I made a dash at a central seat where I might be as far as
possible from both host and hostess. But my manoeuvre failed. Lady
Hetherton's soft tones were all too audible as she said: "Mr. Olifant,
perhaps you will come up here; the post of honor;" and of danger too,
in my case; but there was no help for it, and I went. As I unfolded my
napkin, striving hard for a cool and easy demeanor, I mentally
surveyed my position, and decided on my tactics. I could not and would
not there and then declare myself an embodied mistake; I must trust to
chance and my own wits to carry me through the evening, and leave my
explanations for another season. Alas! my trials full soon began. "We
had hardly been seated three minutes, when Lady Hetherton turned to
me.

"We were so very glad you were able to come to-night, Mr. Olifant; Sir
Philip had quite set his heart upon seeing you here. It is such a
great pleasure to him to revive an old friendship; and he was saying
that he had almost lost sight of your family."

I murmured something not very coherent about distance and active life.

"Ah, yes, country gentlemen have so much to do that they really are
greatly tied at home. I think, though, that I once had the pleasure of
meeting a sister of yours in town--Margaret her name was, and she was
suffering from some affection of the spine. I hope she is better now?"

"Much better, thank you." And then, in the faint hope of turning the
conversation, I asked if they were often in town.

"Not so often as I should wish. Sir Philip has a great dislike to
London; but I always enjoy it, for one meets everybody there.
By-the-by, Olifant, the Fordes must be near neighbors of yours. I am
sure I have heard them speak of Calveston."

I did not dare to say they were not, lest inquiries should follow
which might betray my extreme ignorance of Yorkshire geography in
general, and the locality of Calveston in particular; so I chose the
lesser peril, and answered cheerfully; "Oh yes, quite near within an
easy walk of us."

"What charming people they are!" said Lady Hetherton, growing almost
enthusiastic. "The two eldest girls were staying here last spring, and
we all lost our hearts to them, they were so bright and pleasant; and
Katie, too, is growing so very pretty. She isn't out yet, is she?"

"No; I fancy she is to be presented next year," I responded,
reflecting that while I was about it I might as well do it thoroughly.
"She ought to make a sensation."

"Ah, then," said Lady Hetherton eagerly, "you agree with me about her
beauty."

"Oh, entirely. I expect she will be quite the belle of our country
balls." And then, in the same breath, I turned to the shy Miss
Hetherton beside me, and startled her by an abrupt inquiry whether she
liked balls. She must have thought, at any rate, that I liked talking,
for her timid, orthodox reply was scarcely uttered, before I plied her
with fresh questions, and deluged her with a flood of varied
eloquence. Races, archery, croquet, Switzerland, Paris, Garibaldi, the
American war, Müller's capture, and Tennyson's new poem, all played
their part in turn. For why? Was I not aware that Lady Hetherton's
conversation with the solemn old archdeacon opposite flagged from time
to time, and that, at every lull, she looked toward me, as though
concocting fresh means of torture. But I gained the day; and at
length, with secret exultation, watched the ladies slowly defiling
from the room. Poor innocent! I little knew what was impending. The
last voluminous skirt had scarcely disappeared, when Sir Philip left
his chair, and advancing {540} up the table, glass in hand, seated
himself in his wife's place at my elbow. I tried to believe that he
might intend to devote himself to the arch-deacon, but that good
gentleman was more than half inclined to nod, and my left-hand
neighbor was deep in a geological discussion; so I sat on,
spell-bound, like the sparrow beneath the awful shadow of the hawk.
Certainly, there was not much outward resemblance between that bird of
prey and Sir Philip's comely, smiling visage, as he leaned forward,
and said cheerily: "Well, now, I want to hear all about them."

It was not an encouraging beginning for me, but I had committed myself
with Lady Hetherton too far for a retreat. Like Cortes, I had burned
my ships. Before I had framed my answer, the baronet proceeded: "I
don't know any of you young ones, but your father and I were fast
friends once upon a time. Many's the lark we've had together at
Harrow, ay, and at Oxford too; for he was a wild-spirited fellow then,
was Harry Olifant, though, I daresay, he has settled down into a sober
country squire long ago."

It was plain that Sir Philip liked to hear himself talk, and my
courage revived.

"Why, yes," I said; "years and cares do work great changes in most
men; I daresay you would hardly know him now."

"I daresay not. But he is well, and as good a shot as in the old
Oxford days?"

"Just as good. He is never happier than among his turnips." And then I
shuddered at my own audacity, as I pictured my veritable parent, a
hard-worked barrister, long since dead, and with about as much notion
of firing a gun as one of his own briefs.

"Quite right, quite right," exclaimed Sir Philip energetically,  "and
we can find you some fair sport here, my boy, though the birds are
wild this year. Come over as often as you like while you are at
Linbeach; or, better still, come and slay here."

I thanked him, and explained that I was staying at Linbeach for the
sea-air, and that I must be in town in a few days.

"I'm sorry for that. We ought to have found you out sooner; but I only
chanced to see your name at the library last Friday. And so you are at
Merton?"

"Yes, I'm at Merton," said I, feeling it quite refreshing to speak the
truth.

"Ah, I'm glad your father's stuck to the old college; you could not be
at a better one. That boy of mine is wild for soldiering, or I should
have sent him there."

The mystery stood revealed. I had recorded my name on the visitors'
board as H. Olifant, Merton College, Oxford; and by a strange
coincidence, Sir Philip's former friend had belonged to the same
college, and owned the same initial. The coincidence was indeed so
complete, that it had evidently never dawned upon the baronet that I
could be other than the son of his old chum. He sat now sipping his
wine, with almost a sad expression on his honest face.

"Ah, my lad," he said presently, "when you come to my age, you'll look
back to your old college and your old friends as I do now. But what
was I going to ask you? Oh, I remember. Have you seen any of the
Fordes lately?"

I glanced round despairingly at the geologists, but they were lost to
everything except blue lias and old red sandstone, and there was no
hope of effecting a diversion in that quarter.

"Well, no--not very lately," I responded slowly, as though trying to
recall the exact date when I last had that felicity. "To tell the
truth, I don't go down into those parts so often as I ought to do."

"There's a family for you!" Sir Philip went on triumphantly; "how well
they are doing. That young George Forde will distinguish himself one
of these days, or I'm much mistaken; and Willie, too--do you know
{541} whether he has passed for Woolwich yet?"

I could not say that I did, but the good baronet's confidence in Forde
genius was as satisfactory as certainty.

"He's sure to pass, quite sure; never knew such clever lads; and as
for beauty--that little Katie"--But here the slumbering archdeacon
came to my aid by waking up with a terrific start and a loud "Eh!--
what! time to join the ladies."

There was a general stir, and I contrived to make my escape to the
drawing-room. If I could only have escaped altogether; but it was not
yet half-past nine. The tall footmen and severe butler were lounging
in the hall, and I felt convinced that if I pleaded illness, Sir
Philip would lay violent hands on me, and insist on my spending the
night there. After all, the worst was over, and in the crowded
drawing-room, I might with slight dexterity avoid all shoals and
quicksands. So I ensconced myself in a low chair, guarded by a big
table on one side, and on the other by a comfortable motherly-looking
woman in crimson satin, to whom I made myself agreeable. We got on
very well together, and I breathed and chatted freely in the
delightful persuasion that she at least knew no more of the Fordes
than I did. But my malignant star was in the ascendant. I was in the
midst of a glowing description of the charms of a reading-party at the
lakes, when Sir Philip again assailed me: "Well, Mrs. Sullivan," he
said, addressing my companion, "have you been asking after your little
favorite?"

"My little favorite?" repeated Mrs. Sullivan inquiringly.

She did not know whom he meant, but I did; I knew quite well.

"Katie Forde, I mean; the little black-eyed girl who used to go into
such ecstasies over your roses and ferns--you have not forgotten her
yet, have you?"

No, unluckily for me, Mrs. Sullivan had not forgotten her. I was
charged with a string of the fond, unmeaning messages which ladies
love to exchange; and it was only by emphatically declaring that I
should not be in Yorkshire for many months, that I escaped being made
the bearer of sundry curious roots and bulbs to the fair Katharine.

But Sir Philip soon interrupted us: "There's a cousin of yours in the
next room, Mr. Olifant," he said, evidently thinking that he was
making a most agreeable announcement: "she would like to see you, if
you will let me take you to her."

I heard and trembled. A cousin. Oh, the Fordes were nothing to this!
Why did people have cousins; and why, oh why, should every imaginable
evil befal me on this disastrous evening! Such were my agonized
reflections while with unwilling steps I followed my host to
execution. He led me to a young lady who was serenely examining some
prints. "I have brought him to you, Miss Hunter; here's your cousin,
Mr. Olifant."

She looked at me, but there was no recognition in her eyes. How could
there be, indeed, when we had never met before! What would she do
next? What she _did_ do was to hold out her hand with a good-humored
smile, and at the same time Sir Philip observed complacently: "You
don't know one another, you know." Not know one another; of course we
didn't; but I could have hugged him for telling me so; and in the joy
of my reprieve, I devoted myself readily to my supposed cousin, a
bright, pleasant girl, happily as benighted regarding her real
relatives as I was about my imaginary ones. The minutes slipped fast
away, the hands of the clock pointed at ten, the guests were beginning
to depart, and I was congratulating myself that the ordeal was safely
passed, when, happening to turn my head, I saw Sir Philip once more
advancing upon me, holding in his hand a photograph book. My doom was
sealed! My relentless persecutor was resolved to expose me, and with
diabolical craft had planned the certain {542} means. Horrible visions
of public disgrace, forcible ejection, nay, even of the pump itself,
floated before my dizzy brain, while on he came nearer and ever
nearer. "There!" he exclaimed, stopping just in front of me, and
holding out the ill-omened book--"There! you can tell me who that is,
can't you?"

It was a baby--a baby of a year old, sitting on a cushion, with a
rattle in its hand, and it was of course unlike any creature I had
ever beheld. "Hm, haw," murmured I, contemplating it in utter
desperation; "children are so much alike that really--but"--as a
brilliant idea suddenly flashed on me: "surely it must be a Forde!"

"Of course it is," and Sir Philip clapped me on the back in a
transport of delight. "I thought you would recognize it. Capital!
isn't it? The little thing must be exactly like its mother; and I
fancy I see a look of Willie in it too."

I could endure no more. Another such victory would be almost worse
than a defeat; and while "my cousin" was rhapsodizing over the
infantine charms so touchingly portrayed, I started up, took an abrupt
farewell of my host, and despite his vehement remonstrances, went off
in search of Lady Hetherton, and beat a successful retreat. As I
stepped out into the portico, the pony-trap which I had ordered drove
up to the door, and jumping in, I rattled away toward Linbeach,
exhausted in body and mind, yet relieved to feel that each succeeding
moment found me further and further from the precincts of Grantham.
Not till I was snugly seated in the arm-chair in Mrs. Plumb's parlor,
watching the blue smoke-wreaths wafted up from my best beloved pipe
--not till then could I believe that I was thoroughly safe, and begin
to review calmly the events of the evening. And now arose the very
embarrassing inquiry: What was next to be done? Sir Philip's parting
words had been an energetic exhortation to come over and shoot, the
next day, or, in fact, whenever I pleased. "We can't give you the
grouse of your native moors," he said as a final thrust, "but we can
find you some partridges, I hope;" and I had agreed with a
hypocritical smile, while internally resolving that no mortal power
should take me to Grantham again. Of one thing there could be no
doubt--an explanation was due to the kind-hearted baronet, and it must
be given. Of course I might have stolen off from Linbeach still
undiscovered, but I dismissed the notion instantly. I had gone far
enough already--too far, Sir Philip might not unnaturally think. No; I
must write to him, and it had best be done at once. "Heigh-ho," I
sighed, as I rummaged out ink and paper, and sat down to the great
work; "so ends my solitary friendship at Linbeach." It took me a long
time to concoct the epistle, but it was accomplished at last. In terms
which I would fain hope were melting and persuasive, I described my
birth and parentage, related how I had only discovered my mistaken
identity after my arrival at Grantham, and made a full apology for
having then, in my embarrassment, perpetuated the delusion. I wound up
by the following eloquent and dignified words: "Of course, I can have
no claim whatever to continue an acquaintance so formed, and I can
only tender my grateful thanks for the warm hospitality of which I
have accidentally been the recipient." The letter was sealed and sent,
and I was left to speculate how it might be received. Would Sir Philip
vouchsafe a reply, or would he treat me with silent contempt? I could
fancy him capable of a very tolerable degree of anger, in spite of his
_bonhomie_, and I blushed up to my brows when I pictured quiet Lady
Hetherton recalling my remarks about Miss Katie Forde. The second
day's post came in and brought me nothing; and now I began to be
seized with a nervous dread of encountering any of the Grantham Park
party by chance, and this dread grew so {543} unpleasant that I
determined to cut short my visit, and return to town at once. My
resolution was no sooner made than acted on. I packed my portmanteau,
settled accounts with Mrs. Plumb, and went off to take my place by the
next morning's coach. Coming hastily out of the booking-office in the
dusk, I almost ran against somebody standing by the door. It was Sir
Philip, and I stepped hastily back; but he recognized me at once, and
held out his hand with a hearty laugh. "Ah, Mr. Olifant, is it you? I
was on my way to your lodgings, so we'll walk together;" and not
noticing my confusion, he linked his arm in mine, and continued: "I
got your letter last evening, when I came in from a long day's
shooting, and very much amazed I was, that I must own. I did not
answer it at once, for I was half-dead with walking, and, beside, I
always like talking better than writing, So now I have come to tell
you that I think you've behaved like an honest man and a gentleman in
writing that letter; and I'm very glad to have made your acquaintance,
though you are not Harry Olifant's son. As for the mistake, why, 'twas
my own fault for taking it for granted you must be the man I fancied
you. My lady is just the least bit vexed that we should have made such
geese of ourselves; but come over and shoot to-morrow, and we'll give
you a quiet dinner and a bed in your own proper person; and she will
be very glad to see you. Mind I expect you."

After all my resolutions, I did go to Grantham on the following day;
and my dinner by mistake was the precursor of a most pleasant
acquaintance, which became in time a warm and lasting friendship.

------

From All the Year Round.

NOAH'S ARKS.


In Kew Gardens is a seldom-visited collection of all the kinds of wood
which we have ever heard of, accompanied by specimens of various
articles customarily made of those woods in the countries of their
growth. Tools, implements, small articles of furniture, musical
instruments, sabots and wooden-shoes, boot-trees and shoe-lasts, bows
and arrows, planes, saw-handles--all are here, and thousands of other
things which it would take a very long summer day indeed even to
glance at. The fine display of colonial woods, which were built up
into fanciful trophies at the International Exhibition of eighteen
hundred and sixty-two, has been transferred to one of these museums;
and a noble collection it makes.

We know comparatively little in England of the minor uses of wood. We
use wood enough in building houses and railway structures; our
carriage-builders and wheelwrights cut up and fashion a great deal
more; and our cabinet-makers know how to stock our rooms with
furniture, from three-legged stools up to costly cabinets; but
implements and minor articles are less extensively made of wood in
England than in foreign countries--partly because our forests are
becoming thinned, and partly because iron and iron-work are so
abundant and cheap. In America, matters are very different. There are
thousands of square miles of forest which belong to no one in
particular, and the wood of which may be claimed by those who are at
the trouble of felling the trees. {544} Nay, a backwoodsman would be
very glad to effect a clearing on such terms as these, seeing that the
trees encumber the ground on which he wishes to grow corn crops.

The wood, when the trees have been felled and converted into boards
and planks, is applied to almost countless purposes of use. Of use, we
say; for the Americans are too bustling a people to devote much time
to the fabricating of ornaments; they prefer to buy these ready made
from Britishers and other Europeans. Pails, bowls, washing-machines,
wringing-machines, knife-cleaning boards, neat light vehicles, neat
light furniture, dairy vessels, kitchen utensils, all are made by the
Americans of clean, tidy-looking wood, and are sold at very low
prices. Machinery is used to a large extent in this turnery and
wood-ware: the manufacturers not having the fear of strikes before
their eyes, use machines just where they think this kind of aid is
likely to be most serviceable. The way in which they get a little bowl
out of a big bowl, and this out of a bigger, and this out of a bigger
still, is a notable example of economy in workmanship. On the
continent of Europe the wood-workers are mostly handicraftsmen, who
niggle away at their little bits of wood without much aid from
machinery. Witness the briar-root pipes of St. Claude. Smart young
fellows who sport this kind of smoking-bowl in England, neither know
nor care for the fact that it comes from a secluded spot in the Jura
mountains. Men and women, boys and girls, earn from threepence to four
shillings a day in various little bits of carved and turned work; but
the crack wages are paid to the briar-root pipe-makers. England
imports many more than she smokes, and sends off the rest to America.
M. Audiganne says that "in those monster armies which have sprung up
so suddenly on the soil of the great republic, there is scarcely a
soldier but has his St. Claude briar-root pipe in his pocket." The
truth is, that, unlike cutties and meerschaums, and other clay and
earthen pipes, these briar-root productions are very strong, and will
bear a great deal of knocking about. The same French writer says that
when his countrymen came here to see our International Exhibition,
some of them bought and carried home specimens of these pipes as
English curiosities: not aware that the little French town of St.
Claude was the place of their production.

In Germany the wood-work, so far as English importers know anything of
it, is mostly in the form of small trinkets and toys for children. The
production of these is immense. In the Tyrol, and near the Thuringian
Forest, in the middle states of the ill-organized confederacy, and
wherever forests abound, there the peasants spend much of their time
in making toys. In the Tyrol, for example, there is a valley called
the Grödnerthal, about twenty miles long, in which the rough climate
and barren soil will not suffice to grow corn for the inhabitants, who
are rather numerous. Shut out from the agricultural labor customary in
other districts, the people earn their bread chiefly by wood carving.
They make toys of numberless kinds (in which Noah's Ark animals are
very predominant) of the soft wood of the Siberian pine--known to the
Germans as ziebelnusskiefer. The tree is of slow growth, found on the
higher slopes of the valley, but now becoming scarce, owing to the
improvidence of the peasants in cutting down the forests without
saving or planting others to succeed them. For a hundred years and
more the peasants have been carvers. Nearly every cottage is a
workshop. All the occupants, male and female, down to very young
children, seat themselves round a table, and fashion their little bits
of wood. They use twenty or thirty different kinds of tools, under the
magic of which the wood is transformed into a dog, a lion, a man, or
what not. Agents represent these carvers in various cities of Europe,
to dispose of the wares; but they nearly all find their way back again
{545} to their native valleys, to spend their earnings in peace.

Many of the specimens shown at the Kew museums are more elaborate than
those which could be produced wholly by hand. A turning-lathe of some
power must have been needed. Indeed, the manner in which these
zoological productions are fabricated is exceedingly curious, and is
little likely to be anticipated by ordinary observers. Who, for
instance, would imagine for a moment that a wooden horse, elephant, or
tiger, or any other member of the Noah's Ark family, could be turned
in a lathe, like a ball, bowl, or bedpost? How could the turner's
cutting tool, while the piece of wood is rotating in the lathe, make
the head stick out in the front, and the ears at the top, and the tail
in the rear, and the legs underneath? And how could the animal be made
longer than he is high, and higher than he is broad? And how could all
the ins and outs, the ups and downs, the swellings and sinkings, be
produced by a manipulation which only seems* suitable for circular
objects? These questions are all fair ones, and deserve a fair answer.
The articles, then, are not fully made in the lathe; they are brought
to the state of flat pieces, the outline or contour of which bears an
approximate resemblance to the profile of an animal. These flat pieces
are in themselves a puzzle; for it is difficult to see how the lathe
can have had anything to do with their production. The truth is, the
wood is first turned into _rings_. Say that a horse three inches long is
to be fabricated. A block of soft pine wood is prepared, and cut into
a slab three inches thick, by perhaps fifteen inches in diameter; the
grain running in the direction of the thickness. Out of this circular
slab a circular piece is cut from the center, possibly six inches in
diameter, leaving the slab in the form of a ring, like an extra thick
india-rubber elastic band. While this ring is in the lathe, the turner
applies his chisels and gouges to it in every part, on the outer edge,
on the inner edge, and on both sides. All sorts of curves are made,
now deep, now shallow; now convex, now concave; now with single
curvature, now with double. A looker-on could hardly by any
possibility guess what these curvings and twistings have to do with
each other, for the ring is still a ring, and nothing else; but the
cunning workman has got it all in his mind's eye. When the turning is
finished, the ring is bisected or cut across, not into two slices, but
into two segments or semicircular pieces. Looking at either end of
either piece, lo! there is the profile of a horse--without a tail,
certainly, but a respectably good horse in other respects. The secret
is now divulged. The turner, while the ring or annulus is in the
lathe--a Saturn's ring without a Saturn--turns the outer edge into the
profile of the top of the head and the back of a horse, the one flat
surface into the profile of the chest and the fore legs, and the other
flat surface into the profile of the hind quarters and hind legs, and
the inner edge of the ring into the profile of the belly, and the deep
recess between the fore and hind legs. The curvatures are really very
well done, for the workmen have good models to copy from, and long
practice gives them accuracy of hand and eye.

An endless ring of tailless horses has been produced, doubtless the
most important part of the affair; but there is much ingenuity yet to
be shown in developing from this abstract ring a certain number of
single, concrete, individual, proper Noah's Ark horses, with proper
Noah's Ark tails. The ring is chopped or sawn up into a great many
pieces. Each piece is thicker at one end than the other, because the
outer diameter of the ring was necessarily greater than the inner; but
with this allowance each piece may be considered flat. The thick end
is the head of the horse, the thin end the hind quarter; one
projecting piece represents the position and profile of the fore legs,
but they are not separated; and similarly of the hind {546} legs. Now
is the time for the carver to set to work. He takes the piece of wood
in hand, equalizes the thickness where needful, and pares off the
sharp edges. He separates into two ears the little projecting piece
which juts out from the head, separates into two pairs of legs the two
projecting pieces which jut out from the body, and makes a respectable
pair of eyes, with nostrils and mouth of proper thorough-bred
character; he jags the back of the neck in the proper way to form a
mane, and makes, not a tail, but a little recess to which a tail may
comfortably be glued. The tail is a separate affair. An endless ring
of horses' tails is first turned in a lathe. A much smaller slab,
smaller in diameter and in thickness than the other, is cut into an
annulus or ring; and this ring is turned by tools on both edges and
both sides. When bisected, each end of each half of the ring exhibits
the profile of a horse's tail; and when cut up into small bits, each
bit has the wherewithal in it for fashioning one tail. After the
carver has done his work, each horse receives its proper tail; and
they are all proper long tails too, such as nature may be supposed to
have made, and not the clipped and cropped affairs which farriers and
grooms produce.

This continuous ring system is carried faithfully through the whole
Noah's Ark family. One big slab is for an endless ring of elephants;
another of appropriate size for camels; others for lions, leopards,
wolves, foxes, dogs, donkeys, ducks, and all the rest. Sometimes the
ears are so shaped as not very conveniently to be produced in the same
ring as the other part of the animal; in this case an endless ring of
ears is made, and chopped up into twice as many ears as there are
animals. Elephant's trunks stick out in a way that would perplex the
turner somewhat; he therefore makes an endless ring of trunks, chops
it up, and hands over the pieces to the carver to be fashioned into as
many trunks as there are elephants. In some instances, where the
animal is rather a bullet-headed sort of an individual, the head is
turned in a lathe separately, and glued on to the headless body. If a
carnivorous animal has a tail very much like that of one of the
graminivorous sort, the carver says nothing about it, but makes the
same endless ring of tails serve both; or they may belong to the same
order but different families--as, for instance, the camel and the cow,
which are presented by these Noah's Ark people with tails cut from the
same endless ring. Other toys are made in the same way. Those eternal
soldiers which German boys are always supposed to love so much, as if
there were no end of Schleswig-Holsteins for them to conquer, are--if
made of wood (for tin soldiers are also immensely in request)--turned
separately in a lathe, so far as their martial frames admit of this
mode of shaping; but the muskets and some other portions are made on
the endless ring system. All this may be seen very well at Kew; for
there are the blocks of soft pine, the slabs cut from them (with the
grain of the wood in the direction of the thickness), the rings turned
from the slabs, the turnings and curvatures of the rings, the profile
of an animal seen at each end, the slices cut from each ring, the
animal fashioned from each slice, the ring of tails, the separate
tails for each ring, the animal properly tailed in all its glory, and
a painted specimen or two to show the finished form in which the
loving couples go into the ark--pigs not so much smaller than
elephants as they ought to be, but piggishly shaped nevertheless.

All the English toy-makers agree, with one accord, that we cannot for
an instant compete with the Germans and Tyrolese in the fabrication of
such articles, price for price. We have not made it a large and
important branch of handicraft; and our workmen have not studied
natural history with sufficient assiduity to give the proper
distinctive forms to the animals. {547} The more elaborate
productions--such as the baby-dolls which can say "mamma," and make
their chests heave like any sentimental damsels--are of French, rather
than German manufacture, and are not so much wooden productions as
combinations of many different materials. Papier-mache, moulded into
form, is becoming very useful in the doll and animal trade; while
india-rubber and gutta-percha are doing wonders. The real Noah's Ark
work, however, is thoroughly German, and is specially connected with
wood-working. Some of the more delicate and elaborate specimens of
carving--such as the groups for chimney-piece ornaments, honored by
the protection of glass shades--are made of lime-tree or linden-wood,
by the peasants of Oberammergau, in the mountain parts of Bavaria.
There were specimens of these kinds of work at our two exhibitions
which could not have been produced in England at thrice the price; our
good carvers are few, and their services are in request at good wages
for mediaeval church-work. We should be curious to know what an
English carver would require to be paid for a half-guinea Bavarian
group now before us--a Tyrolese mountaineer seated on a rock, his
rifle resting on his arm, the studded nails in his climbing shoes, a
dead chamois at his feet, his wife leaning her hand lightly on his
shoulder, his thumb pointing over his shoulder to denote the quarter
where he had shot the chamois, his wooden bowl of porridge held on his
left knee, the easy fit and flow of the garments of both man and woman--
all artistically grouped and nicely cut, and looking clean and white
in linden-wood. No English carver would dream of such a thing at such
a price. However, these are not the most important of the productions
of the peasant carvers, commercially speaking; like as our Mintons and
Copelands make more money by everyday crockery than by beautiful
Parian statuettes, so do the German toy-makers look to the Noah's Ark
class of productions as their main stay in the market, rather than to
more elegant and artistic works.

------

{548}


WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE.

BY CARDINAL WISEMAN.


  [In the autumn of last year a communication was made to his eminence
  the late Cardinal Wiseman by H. Bence Jones, Esq., M.D., as Secretary
  of the Royal Institution of Great Britain, requesting him to deliver
  a lecture before that society. The cardinal, with the prompt
  kindness usual to him, at once assented. The Shakespeare
  Tercentenary seemed to prescribe the subject, which his eminence
  therefore selected.

  The following pages were dictated by him in the last weeks of his
  life. The latter part was taken down in the beginning of January;
  the earlier part was dictated on Saturday the fourteenth of that
  month. It was his last intellectual exertion, and it overtaxed his
  failing strength.

  The Rev. Dr. Clifford, chaplain to the Hospital of St. John and St.
  Elizabeth, who acted as his amanuensis, states, from the lips of his
  eminence, that the matter contained in these pages is the beginning
  and the ending of what he intended to deliver. We have, therefore,
  only a fragment of a whole which was never completed except in the
  author's mind.]

I.

There have been some men in the world's history--and they are
necessarily few--who by their deaths have deprived mankind of the
power to do justice to their merits, in those particular spheres of
excellence in which they had been pre-eminent. When the "immortal"
Raphael for the last time laid down his palette, still moist with the
brilliant colors which he had spread upon his unfinished masterpiece,
destined to be exposed to admiration above his bier, he left none
behind him who could worthily depict and transmit to us his beautiful
lineaments: so that posterity has had to seek in his own paintings,
among the guards at a sepulchre, or among the youthful disciples in an
ancient school, some figure which may be considered as representing
himself.

When his mighty rival, Michelangelo, cast down that massive chisel
which no one after him was worthy or able to wield, none survived him
who could venture to repeat in marble the rugged grandeur of his
countenance; but we imagine that we can trace in the head of some
unfinished satyr, or in the sublime countenance of his Moses, the
natural or the idealized type from which he drew his stern and noble
inspirations.

And, to turn to another great art, when Mozart closed his last
uncompleted score, and laid him down to pass from the regions of
earthly to those of heavenly music, which none had so closely
approached as he, the science over which he ruled could find no
strains in which worthily to mourn him except his own, and was
compelled to sing for the first time his own marvelous requiem at his
funeral.  [Footnote 101]

  [Footnote 101: The same may be said of the celebrated Cimarosa.]

No less can it be said that when the pen dropped from Shakespeare's
hand, when his last mortal illness mastered the strength of even his
genius, the world was left powerless to describe in writing his noble
and unrivalled characteristics. Hence we turn back upon himself, and
endeavor to draw from his own works the only true records of his
genius and his mind.  [Footnote 102]

  [Footnote 102: Even in his lifetime this seems to have been
  foreseen. In 1664, in an epigram addressed to "Master William
  Shakespeare," and first published by Mr. Halliwell, occurred the
  following lines: "Besides in places thy wit windes like Maeander.
  When (_whence_) needy new composers borrow more Thence (_than_)
  Terence doth from Plautus or Menander, But to praise thee aright I
  want thy store. Then let thine owne words thine owne worth upraise
  And help t' adorne thee with deserved baies." _Halliwell's Life of
  Shakespeare_, p. 160.]

{549}

We apply to him phrases which he has uttered of others; we believe
that he must have involuntarily described himself, when he says,

          "Take him all in all,
  We shall not look upon his like again;"

or that he must even consciously have given a reflection of himself
when he so richly represents to us "the poet's eye in a fine phrenzy
rolling." ("Midsummer-Night's Dream," act v., scene 1.)

But in fact, considering that the character of a man is like that
which he describes, "as compounded of many simples extracted from many
objects" ("As You Like It," act iv., scene 1), we naturally seek for
those qualities which enter into his composition; we look for them in
his own pages; we endeavor to cull from every part of his works such
attributions of great and noble qualities to his characters, and unite
them so as to form what we believe is his truest portrait. In truth,
no other author has perhaps existed who has so completely reflected
himself in his works as Shakespeare. For, as artists will tell us that
every great master has more or less reproduced in his works
characteristics to be found in himself, this is far more true of our
greatest dramatist, whose genius, whose mind, whose heart, and whose
entire soul live and breathe in every page and every line of his
imperishable works. Indeed, as in these there is infinitely greater
variety, and consequently greater versatility of power necessary to
produce it, so must the amount of elements which enter into is
composition represent changeable yet blending qualities beyond what
the most finished master in any other art an be supposed to have
possessed.

The positive and directly applicable materials which we possess for
constructing a biography of this our greatest writer, are more scanty
than have been collected to illustrate the life of many an inferior
author. His contemporaries, his friends, perhaps admirers, have left
us but few anecdotes of his life, and have recorded but few traits of
either his appearance or his character. Those who immediately
succeeded him seem to have taken but little pains to collect early
traditions concerning him, while yet they must have been fresh in the
recollections of his fellow-countrymen, and still more of his
fellow-townsmen.  [Footnote 103]

  [Footnote 103: As evidence of this neglect we may cite the "Journal"
  of the Rev. John Ward, Incumbent of Stratford-upon-Avon, to which he
  was appointed in 1662. This diary, which has been published by
  Doctor Severn, "from the original MSS.," preserved in the library of
  the Medical Society of London, contains but two pages relating to
  Shakespeare, and those contain but scanty and unsatisfactory
  notices. I will quote only two sentences: "Remember to peruse
  Shakespeare's Plays--bee much versed in them, that I may not bee
  ignorant in that matter, whether Dr. Heylin does well, in reckoning
  up the dramatick poets which have been famous in England, to omit
  Shakespeare" (p. 184). Shakespeare's daughter was still alive when
  this was written, as appears from the sentence that immediately
  follows: it seems to us wonderful that so soon after the poet's
  death a shrewd and clever clergyman and physician (for Mr. Ward was
  both) should have known so little about his celebrated townsman's
  works or life. ]

It appears as though they were scarcely conscious of the great and
brilliant luminary of English literature which was shining still, or
had but lately passed away; and as though they could not anticipate
either the admiration which was to succeed their duller perceptions of
his unapproachable grandeur, or the eager desire which this would
generate of knowing even the smallest details of its rise, its
appearance, its departure. For by the biography of Shakespeare one
cannot understand the records of what he bought, of what he sold, or
the recital of those acts which only confound him with the common mass
which surrounded him, and make him appear as the worthy burgess or the
thrifty merchant; though even about the ordinary commonplace portions
of his life such uncertainty exists, that doubts have been thrown on
the very genuineness of that house which he is supposed to have
inhabited.

Now, it is the characteristic individualizing quality, actions, and
mode of executing his works, to whatever class of excellence he may
belong, that we long to be familiar with in order to say that we know
the man. What matters it to us that he paid so many marks or {550}
shillings to purchase a homestead in Stratford-upon-Avon? The simple
autograph of his name is now worth all the sums that he thus expended.
One single line of one of his dramas, written in his own hand, would
be worth to his admirers all the sums which are known to have passed
between him and others. What has become of the goodly folios which
must have once existed written in his own hand? Where are the books
annotated or even scratched by his pen, from which he drew the
subjects and sometimes the substance of his dramas? What vandalism
destroyed the first, or dispersed the second of these valuable
treasures? How is it that we know nothing of his method of
composition? Was it in solitude and sacred seclusion, self-imprisoned
for hours beyond the reach of the turmoil of the street or the
domestic sounds of home? Or were his unrivalled works produced in
scraps of time and fugitive moments, even perhaps in the waiting-room
of the theatre, or the brawling or jovial sounds of the tavern?

Was he silent, thoughtful, while his fertile brain was seething and
heaving in the fermentation of his glorious conceptions; so that men
should have said--"Hush! Shakespeare is at work with some new and
mighty imaginings!" or wore he always that light and careless spirit
which often belongs to the spontaneous facility of genius; so that his
comrades may have wondered when, and where, and how his grave
characters, his solemn scenes, his fearful catastrophes, and his
sublime maxims of original wisdom, were conceived, planned, matured,
and finally written down, to rule for ever the world of letters?
Almost the only fact connected with his literary life which has come
down to us is one which has been recorded, perhaps with jealousy,
certainly with ill-temper, by his friend Ben Jonson--that he wrote
with overhaste, and hardly ever erased a line, though it would have
been better had he done so with many.

This almost total absence of all external information, this drying-up
of the ordinary channels of personal history, forces us to seek for
the character and the very life of Shakespeare in his own works. But
how difficult, in analyzing the complex constitution of such a man's
principles, motives, passions, and affections, to discriminate between
what he has drawn for himself, and what he has created by the force of
his imagination. Dealing habitually with fictions, sometimes in their
noblest, sometimes in their vilest forms--here gross and even savage,
there refined and sometimes ethereal, how shall we discover what
portions of them were copied from the glass which he held before
himself, what from the magic mirrors across which flitted illusive or
fanciful imagery? The work seems hopeless. It is not like that of the
printer, who, from a chaotic heap of seemingly unmeaning lead, draws
out letter after letter, and so disposes them that they shall make
senseful and even brilliant lines. It is more like the hopeless labor
of one who, from the fragments of a tesselated pavement, should try to
draw the elegant and exquisitely tinted figure which once it bore.

This difficulty of appreciating, and still more of delineating, the
character of our great poet, makes him, without perhaps an exception,
the most difficult literary theme in English letters.

How to reduce the subject to a lecture seems indeed a literal paradox.
But when to this difficulty is added that of an impossible compression
into narrow limits of the widest and vastest compass ever embraced by
any one man's genius, it must appear an excess of rashness in any-one
to presume that he can do justice to the subject on which I am
addressing you.

It seems, therefore, hardly wonderful that even the last year,
dedicated naturally to the tercentenary commemoration of William
Shakespeare, should have passed over without any public eulogy of his
greatness in this our metropolis. It seemed, indeed, as if the
magnitude of that one man's genius was too oppressive for this
generation. It was not, I believe, an undervaluing {551} of his merits
which produced the frustration of efforts, and the disappointment of
expectations, that seemed to put to rout and confusion, or rather to
paralyze, the exertions so strenuously commenced to mark the year as a
great epoch in England's literary history. I believe, on the contrary,
that the dimensions of Shakespeare had grown so immeasurably in the
estimation of his fellow-countrymen, that the proportions of his
genius to all that had followed him, and all that surround us, had
grown so enormously in the judgment and feeling of the country, from
the nobleman to the workman, that the genius of the man oppressed us,
and made us feel that all our multiplied resources of art and speech
were unequal to his worthy commemoration. No plan proposed for this
purpose seemed adequate to attain it. Nothing solid and permanent that
could either come up to his merits or to our aspirations seemed to be
within the grasp either of the arts or of the wealth of our country.
The year has passed away, and Shakespeare remains without any
monument, except that which, by his wonderful writings, he has raised
for himself. Even the research after a site fit for the erection of a
monument to him, in the city of squares, of gardens, and of parks,
seemed only to work perplexity and hopelessness.

Presumptuous as it may appear, the claim to connect myself with that
expired and extinct movement is my only apology for my appearing
before you. If, a year after its time, I take upon myself the eulogy
of Shakespeare, if I appear to come forward as with a funeral oration,
to give him, in a manner, posthumous glory, it is because my work has
dropped out of its place, and not because I have inopportunely
misplaced it. In the course of the last year, it was proposed to me,
both directly and indirectly, to deliver a lecture on Shakespeare. I
was bold enough to yield my assent, and thus felt that I had
contracted an obligation to the memory of the bard, as well as to
those who thought that my sharing what was done for his honor would
possess any value. A task undertaken becomes a duty unfulfilled. When,
therefore, it was proposed to me to perform my portion of the homage
which I considered due to him, though it was to be a month too late, I
felt it would be cowardice to shrink from its performance.

For in truth the undertaking required some courage; and to retire
before its difficulties might be stigmatized as a dastardly timidity.
It is a work of courage at any time and in any place to undertake a
lecture upon Shakespeare, more in fact than to venture on the delivery
of a series. The latter gives scope for the thousand things which one
would wish to say--it affords ample space for apposite
illustration--and it enables one to enrich the subject with the
innumerable and inimitable beauties that are flung like gems or
flowers over every page of his magnificent works. But in the midst of
public, or rather universal, celebration of a national and secular
festival in his honor, in the presence probably of the most finished
literary characters in this highly-educated country, still more
certainly before numbers of those whom the nation acknowledges as
deeply read in the works of our poet as the most accomplished critic
of any age has been in the writings of the classics--men who have
introduced into our literature a class-name--that of "Shakespearian
scholars"--to have ventured to speak on this great theme might seem to
have required, not courage, but temerity. Why, it might have been
justly asked, do none of those who have consumed their lives in the
study of him, not page by page, but line by line, who have pressed his
sweet fruits between their lips till they have absorbed all their
lusciousness, who have made his words their study, his thoughts their
meditation,--why does not one at least among them stand forward now,
and leave for posterity the record of his matured observation? Perhaps
I may assign the reason which I have before, that they {552} know,
too, the unapproachable granduer of the theme, and the rare powers
which are required to grasp and to hold it.

Be it so; but at any rate, if in the presence of others so much more
capable it would have been rash to speak, to express one's thoughts,
when there is no competition, may be pardonable at least.

And yet, when everybody else is silent, it may be very naturally
asked, Have I a single claim to put forward upon your attention and
indulgence? I think I may have _one_; though I fear that when I
mention it, it may be considered either a paradox or a refutation of
my pretensions. My claim, then, to be heard and borne with is
this--that I have never in my life seen Shakespeare acted; I have
never heard his eloquent speeches declaimed by gifted performers; I
have not listened to his noble poetry as uttered by the kings or
queens of tragedy; I have not witnessed his grand, richly-concerted
scenes endowed with life by the graceful gestures, the classical
attitudes, the contrasting emotions, and the pointed emphasis of those
who in modern times may be considered to have even added to that which
his genius produced; I know nothing of the original and striking
readings or renderings of particular passages by masters of mimic art;
I know him only on his flat page, as he is represented in immovable,
featureless, unemotional type.

Nor am I acquainted with him surrounded, perhaps sometimes sustained,
but, at any rate, worthily adorned and enhanced in accessory beauty,
by the magic illusion of scenic decorations, the splendid pageantry
which he simply hints at, but which, I believe, has been now realized
to its most ideal exactness and richness--banquets, tournaments, and
battles, with the almost deceptive accuracy of costume and of
architecture. When I hear of all these additional ornaments hung
around his noble works, the impression which they make upon my mind
creates a deeper sense of amazement and admiration, how dramas written
for the "Globe" Theatre, wretchedly lighted, incapable of grandeur
even from want of space, and without those mechanical and artistical
resources which belong to a later age, should be capable of bearing
all this additional weight of lustre and magnificence without its
being necessary to alter a word, still less a passage, from their
original delivery.  [Footnote 104 ] This exhibits the nicely-balanced
point of excellence which is equally poised between simplicity and
gorgeousness; which can retain its power and beauty, whether stript to
its barest form or loaded with exuberant appurtenances.

  [Footnote 104: The chorus which serves as a prologue to "King Henry
  V.," shows how Shakespeare's own mind keenly felt the deficiencies
  of his time, and almost anticipatingly wrote for the effects which a
  future age might supply:

          "But pardon, gentles all,
    This flat unraised spirit that hath dar'd,
    On this unworthy scaffold, to bring forth
    So great an object. Can this cock-pit hold
    The vasty fields of France? Or may we cram
    Within this wooden O the very casques
    That did affright the air at Agincourt.
    . . . .
    Piece out our imperfections with your thoughts;
    Into a thousand parts divide one man,
    And make imaginary puissance:
    Think, when we talk of horses, that ye see them
    Printing their proud hoofs i' the receiving earth;
    For 'tis your thoughts that now must deck our kings."]

After having said thus much of my own probably unenvied position, I
think I shall not be wrong in assuming that none of Shakespeare's
enthusiastic admirers, one of whom I profess myself to be, and that
few of my audience, are in this exceptional position. They will
probably consider this a disadvantage on my side; and to some extent I
must acknowledge it--for Shakespeare wrote to be acted, and not to be
read.

But, on the other hand, is it not something to have approached this
wonderful man, and to have communed with him in silence and in
solitude, face to face, alone with him alone; to have read and studied
and meditated on him in early youth, without gloss or commentary, or
preface or glossary? For such was my good or evil fortune; not during
the still hours of night, but during that stiller portion of an
Italian {553} afternoon, when silence is deeper than in the night,
under a bright and sultry sun when all are at rest, all around you
hushed to the very footsteps in a well-peopled house, except the
unquelled murmuring of a fountain beneath orange trees, which mingled
thus the most delicate of fragrance with the most soothing of sounds,
both stealing together through the half-closed windows of wide and
lofty corridors. Is there not more of that reverence and that relish
which constitute the classical taste to be derived from the
concentration of thought and feelings which the perusal of the simple
unmarred and unoverlaid text produces; when you can ponder on a verse,
can linger over a word, can repeat mentally and even orally with your
own deliberation and your own emphasis, whenever dignity, beauty, or
wisdom invite you to pause, or compel you to ruminate?

In fact, were you desired to give your judgment on the refreshing
water of a pure fountain, you would not care to taste it from a
richly-jewelled and delicately-chased cup; you would not consent to
have it mingled with the choicest wine, nor flavored by a single drop
of the most exquisite essence; you would not have it chilled with ice,
or gently attempered by warmth. No, you would choose the most
transparent crystal vessel, however homely; you would fill at the very
cleft of the rock from which it bubbles fresh and bright, and drink it
yet sparkling, and beading with its own air-pearls the walls of the
goblet. Nay, is not an opposite course that which the poet himself
censures as "wasteful, ridiculous excess?"

  "To gild refined gold, to paint the lily;
  To throw a perfume on the violet.
  . . . .
  Or with a taper light
  To seek the beauteous eye of heaven to varnish."
            (_"King John" act iv., scene 2._)

You will easily understand, from long and almost apologetic preamble,
in the first place, that I take it for granted that I am addressing an
audience which is not assembled to receive elementary or new
information concerning England's greatest poet. On the contrary, I
believe myself to stand before many who are able to judge, rather than
merely accept, my opinions, and in the presence of an assembly
exclusively composed of his admirers, thoroughly conversant with his
works. A further consequence is this, that my lecture will not consist
of extracts--still less of recitations of any of those beautiful
passages which occur in every play of Shakespeare. The most celebrated
of these are present to the mind of every English scholar, from his
school-boy days to his maturer studies.



II.

It would be superfluous for a lecturer on Shakespeare to put to
himself the question, What place do you intend to give to the subject
of your discourse in the literature of England or of Europe? Whatever
difference of opinion may exist elsewhere, I believe that in this
country only one answer will be given. Among our native writers no one
questions that Shakespeare is supremely pre-eminent, and most of us
will probably assign him as lofty a position in the whole range of
modern European literature. Perhaps no other nation possesses among
its writers any one name to which there is no rival claim, nor even an
approximation of equality, to make a balance against it. Were we to
imagine in England a Walhalla erected to contain the effigies of great
men, and were one especial hall to contain those of our most eminent
dramatists, it must needs be so constructed as to have one central
niche. Were a similar structure prepared in France, it would be
natural to place in equal prominence at least two figures, or, in
classical language, two different muses of Tragedy and of Comedy would
have to be separately represented. But in England, assign what place
we may to those who have excelled in either branch in mimic art, {554}
the highest excellence in both would be found centered in one man; and
from him on either side would have to range the successful cultivators
of the drama.

But this claim to so undisputed an elevation does not rest upon his
merits only in this field of our literature. Shakespeare has
established his claim to the noblest position in English literature on
a wider and more solid basis than the mere composition of skilful
plays could deserve. As the great master of our language, as almost
its regenerator, quite its refiner--as the author whose use of a word
stamps it with the mark of purest English coinage--whose employment
of a phrase makes it household and proverbial--whose sententious
sayings, flowing without effort from his mind, seem almost sacred, and
are quoted as axioms or maxims indisputable--as the orator whose
speeches, not only apt, but natural to the lips from which they issue,
are more eloquent than the discourses of senators or finished public
speakers--as the poet whose notes are richer, more wondrously varied
than those of the greatest professed bards--as the writer who has run
through the most varied ways and to the greatest extent through every
department of literature and learning, through the history of many
nations, their domestic manners, their characteristics, and even their
personal distinctives, and who seems to have visited every part of
nature, to have intuitively studied the heavens and the earth--as the
man, in fine, who has shown himself supreme in so many things,
superiority in any one of which gains reputation in life and glory
after death, he is preeminent above all, and beyond the reach of envy
or jealousy.

And if no other nation can show us another man whose head rises above
all their other men of letters, as Shakespeare does over ours, they
cannot pretend, by the accumulation of separated excellences, to put
in competition with him a type rather than a realization of possible
worth.

Until, therefore, some other writer can be produced, no matter from
what nation, who unites in himself personally these gifts of our bard
in an equally sublime degree, his stature overtops them all, wherever
born and however celebrated.

The question, however, may be raised, Is he so securely placed upon
his pedestal that a rival may not one day thrust him from it?--is he so
secure upon his throne that a rebel may not usurp it? To these
interrogations I answer unhesitatingly, Yes.

In the first place, there have only been two poets in the world before
Shakespeare who have attained the same position with him. Each came at
the moment which closed the volume of the period past and opened that
of a new epoch. Of what preceded Homer we can know but little; the
songs by bards or rhapsodists had, no doubt, preceded him, and
prepared the way for the first and greatest epic. This, it is
acknowledged, has never been surpassed; it became the standard of
language, the steadfast rule of versification, and the model of
poetical composition. His supremacy, once attained, was shaken by no
competition; it was as well assured after a hundred years as it has
been by thousands. Dante again stood between the remnants of the old
Roman civilization and the construction of a new and Christian system
of arts and letters. He, too, consolidated the floating fragments of
an indefinite language, and with them built and thence himself fitted
and adorned that stately vessel which bears him through all the
regions of life and of death, of glory, of trial, and of perdition.

A word found in Dante is classical to the Italian ear; a form, however
strange in grammar, traced to him, is considered justifiable if used
by any modern sonneteer.  [Footnote 105] He holds the place in his own
country which Shakespeare does in ours; not only is his _terza rima_
considered inimitable, {555} but the concentration of brilliant
imagery in our words, the flashes of his great thoughts and the
copious variety of his learning, marvellous in his age, make his
volume be to this day the delight of every refined intelligence and
every polished mind in Italy.

  [Footnote 105: Any one acquainted with Mastrofini's "Dictionary of
  Italian Verbs" will understand this.]

And he, too, like Homer, notwithstanding the magnificent poets who
succeeded him, has never for a moment lost that fascination which he
alone exercises over the domain of Italian poetry. He was as much its
ruler in his own age as he is in the present.

In like manner, the two centuries and more which have elapsed since
Shakespeare's death have as completely confirmed him in his legitimate
command as the same period did his two only real predecessors. No one
can possibly either be placed in a similar position or come up to his
great qualities, except at the expense of the destruction of our
present civilization, the annihilation of its past traditions, the
resolution of our language into jargon, and its regeneration, by a new
birth, into something "more rich and strange" than the powerful idiom
which so splendidly combines the Saxon and the Norman elements. Should
such a devastation and reconstruction take place, whether they come
from New Zealand or from Siberia, then there may spring up the poet of
that time and condition who may be the fourth in that great series of
unrivalled bards, but will no more interfere with his predecessor's
rights than Dante or Shakespeare does with those of Homer.

But further, we may truly say that the legislator of a people can be
but one, and, as such, can have no rival beyond his own shores. Solon,
Lycurgus, and Numa are the only three men in profane history who have
reached the dignity of this singular title. The first seized on the
character of the bland and polished Athenians, and framed his code in
such harmony with it, that no subsequent laws, even in the periods of
most corrupt relaxation, could efface their primitive stamp, cease to
make the republic proud of their lawgiver's name.

Lycurgus understood the stern and almost savage hardihood and
simplicity of the Spartan disposition, and perpetuated it and
regulated it by his harsh and unfeeling system, of which,
notwithstanding, the Lacedaemonian was proud. And so Numa Pompilius
comprehended the readiness of the infant republic, sprung from so
doubtful and discreditable a parentage, to discover a noble descent,
and connect its birth and education with gods and heroes; took hold of
this weakness for the sanction of his legislation; and feigned his
conferences with the nymph Egeria as the sources of his wisdom. No;
whatever may become of kings, legislators are never dethroned.

And so is Shakespeare the unquestioned legislator of modern literary
art. No one will contend that, without certain detriment, it would be
possible for a modern writer, especially of dramatic fiction, to go
back beyond him and endeavor to establish a pre-Shakespearian school
of English literature, as we have the pre-Raphaelite in art. Struggle
and writhe as any genius may--even if endowed with giant strength
it--will be but as the battle of the Titans against Jove. Huge rocks
will be rolled down upon him, and the lightning from Shakespeare's
hand will assuredly tear his laurels, if it do not strike his head.
Byron could not appreciate the dramatic genius of Shakespeare; perhaps
his sympathies ranged more freely among corsairs and Suliotes than
among purer and nobler spirits. Certainly he speaks of him with a
superciliousness which betrays his inability fully to comprehend him.
[Footnote 106] And yet, would "Manfred" have existed if the romantic
drama and the spirit-agency of Shakespeare {556} had not given it life
and rule? So in other nations. I shall probably quote to you the
sentiments of foreign writers of highest eminence concerning
Shakespeare, not as authorities, but as illustrations of what I may
say.

  [Footnote 106: Lord Byron thus writes to Mr. Murray, July 14, 1821:
  "I trust that Sardanapalus will not be mistaken for a political play
  . . . . You will find all this very unlike Shakespeare; and so much
  the better, in one sense, for I look upon him to be the worst of
  models, though the most extraordinary of writers."--_Moore's Life of
  Lord Byron._]

Singularly enough, the greatest of German modern writers has nowhere
recorded a full and deliberate opinion on our poet. But who can doubt
that "Götz von Berlichingen with the Iron Hand," and even the grand
and tender "Faust," and no less Schiller's "Wallenstein," belong to
the family of Shakespeare, are remotely offsprings of his genius, and
have to be placed as tributary garlands round his pedestal. To imagine
Shakespeare even in intention removed from his sovereignty would be a
treachery parallel only to that of Lear dethroned by his own
daughters.

But still more may we say that, in all such positions as that which we
have assigned to Shakespeare, there has always been a culminating
point to which succeeds decline--if not downfall. It is so in art.
Immediately after the death of Raphael, and the dispersion of his
school, art took a downward direction, and has never risen again to
the same height. And while he marks the highest elevation ever reached
in the arts of Europe, a similar observation will apply to their
particular schools. Leonardo and Luini in Lombardy; the Carracci in
Bologna; Fra Angelico in Umbria; Garofalo in Ferrara, not only take
the place of chiefs in their respective districts, but mark the period
from which degeneracy has to date. And so surely is it in our case,
whatever may have been the course of literature which led up to
Shakespeare, without pronouncing judgment on Spenser, or "rare Ben
Jonson," it is certain that after him, although England has possessed
great poets, there stands not one forward among them as Shakespeare's
competitor. Milton, and Dryden, and Addison, and Rowe have given us
specimens of high dramatic writing of no mean quality; others as well,
and even these have written much and nobly, in lofty as in familiar
verse; yet not one has the public judgment of the nation placed on a
level with him. The intermediate space from them to our own times has
left only the traces of a weak and enervated school. It would be
unbecoming to speak disparagingly of the poets of the present age; but
no one, I believe, has ventured to consider them as superior to the
noble spirits of our Augustan age. The easy descent from the loftiest
eminence is not easily reclimbed.

Surely, then, we may consider Shakespeare, as an ancient mythologist
would have done, as "enskied" among "the invulnerable clouds," where
no shaft, even of envy, can assail him. From this elevation we may
safely predict that he never can be plucked.


III.

The next point which seems to claim attention is the very root of all
that I have said or shall have still to say. To what does Shakespeare
owe this supremacy, or whence flow all the extraordinary qualities
which we attribute to him? You are all prepared with the answer in one
single word his GENIUS.

The genius of Shakespeare is our familiar thought and ready expression
when we study him, and when we characterize him. Nevertheless, simple
and intelligible as is the word, it is extremely difficult to analyze
or to define it. Yet everything that is great and beautiful in his
writings seems to require an explanation of the cause to which it owes
its origin.

One great characteristic of genius, easily and universally admitted,
is, that it is a gift, and not an acquisition. It belongs inherently
to the person possessing it; it cannot be transmitted by heritage; it
cannot be infused by parental affection; it cannot be bestowed by
earliest care; neither can it be communicated by the most finished
{557} culture or the most studied education. It must be congenital, or
rather inborn to its possessor. It is as much a living, a natural
power, as is reason to every man. As surely as the very first germ of
the plant contains in itself the faculty of one day evolving from
itself leaves, flowers, and fruit, so does genius hold, however
hidden, however unseen, the power to open, to bring forth, and to
mature what other men cannot do, but what to it is instinctive and
almost spontaneous. It may begin to manifest itself with the very dawn
of reason; it may remain asleep for years, till a spark, perhaps
accidentally, kindles up into a sudden and irrepressible splendor that
unseen intellectual fuel which has been almost unknown to its
unambitious owner.

In our own minds we easily distinguish between the highest abilities
or the most rare attainments, when the fruit of education and of
application, and what we habitually distinguish as the manifestation
of genius. But still we do not find it so easy to reduce to words this
mental distinction; the one, after all, however gracefully and however
brightly, walks upon the earth, adorning it by the good or fair things
which it scatters on its way; the other has wings, and flies above the
surface--it is like the aurora of Homer or of Thorwaldsen, which, as
it flies above the plane of mortal actions, sheds down its flowers
along its brilliant path upon those worthy to gaze upward toward it.
We connect in our minds with genius the ideas of flashing splendor and
eccentric movement. It is an intellectual meteor, the laws of which
cannot be defined or reduced to any given theory. We regard it with a
certain awe, and leave it to soar or to droop, to shine or disappear,
to dash irregularly first in one direction and then in another; no one
dare curb it or direct it; but all feel sure that its course, however
inexplicable, is subject to higher and controlling rule. But in order
to define more closely what we in reality understand by genius, it may
be well to consider its action in divided and more restricted spheres
of activity. For although we habitually attribute this singular
quality to many, and often but on light grounds, it is seldom that we
do so seriously and deliberately without some qualifying epithet. We
speak of a military genius, of a mechanical genius, of a poetical
genius, of a musical genius, or of an artistic genius. All these
expressions contain a restrictive clause. We do not understand when we
use them that the person to whom they were attributed possessed any
power beyond the limits of a particular sphere. We do not mean by the
use of the word genius that the soldier knew anything of poetry, or
the printer of mechanism. We understand that each in his own
profession or stage of excellence possessed a complete elevation over
the bulk of those who followed the same pursuits; a superiority so
visible, so acknowledged, and so clearly individual, that no one else
considered it inferiority, still less felt shame at not being able to
rise to the same level. They gather round them acknowledged disciples
and admirers, who rather glory to have been guided by their teaching,
and formed on their example.

And in what consisted that complete though limited excellence? If I
might venture to express a judgment, I would say that genius in these
different courses of science or art may be defined a natural sympathy
with all that relates to each of them, with the power of giving full
and certain execution to the mental conception. The military genius is
one who, either untrained by studious preparation, or else starting
out of the lines in which many were ranged level with himself, seizes
the staff of command, and receives the homage of comrades and
superiors. While others have been plodding through the long drill of
theory and of practice, he is found to have discovered a new system of
the science, bold, irregular, but successful. But to possess this
genius, there must be a universal sympathy with all that relates {558}
to its own peculiar province. The military genius of which we are
speaking must embrace or acquire that which relates to the soldier's
life and duty, from the _dress_ of a single soldier, from his duties
in the sentry-box, or on the picquet, to the practice of the regiment
and the evolutions of a field-day; from the complete command of tens
of thousands on the battle-field, with an eagle's eye and a lion's
heart, to the scientific planning, on the chessboard of an empire, of
the campaign, which he meditates, move by move and check by check,
till the final victory is crowned in the capital city. He who has not
given proof of his being equal to all this, has not made good his
claim to military genius. But such a one will find, wherever he puts
his hand, generals and marshals, each able to command a host, or to
take his place in his roughest of enterprises.

I need not pass through other forms of genius to reach similar
results; Stephenson, from the labor of the mine, creating that system
of mechanical motion, which may be said to have subdued the world, and
bound the earth in iron links; Mozart giving concerts at the age of
seven that astonished gray-headed musicians; Raphael, before the
ordinary age of finished pupilage, master of every known detail in art
of oil or fresco, drawing, expression, and grand composition; Giotto,
caught in the field as a young shepherd by Cimabue, drawing his sheep
upon a stone, and soon becoming the master of modern art.  [Footnote
107] These and many others repeat to us what I have said of the
military genius--an inborn capacity, comprehensive and complete, with
the power of fully carrying out the suggestions of mind. Had there
been a single portion of their pursuits in which they did not excel,
if the result of their work had not exhibited the happy union and
concord of the many qualities requisite for its perfection, they never
would have attained the attribution of genius.

  [Footnote 107: The early manifestation of artistic power is so
  frequent and well known, that it would be superfluous to enumerate
  other instances. The expression _"anch' io son pittore"_ is become
  proverbial. One of the Carracci, on being translated from an
  inferior profession to the family studio, was found at once to
  possess the pictorial skill of his race. At the present, Mintropp at
  Düsseldorf, and Ackermann at Berlin, are both instances of very high
  artists, the one in drawing, the other in sculpture, both originally
  shepherds.]

If this sympathy with one branch of higher pursuits passes beyond it
and associates with it a similar facility of acquisition and execution
in some other and distinct art or science, it is clear that the claim
to genius is higher and more extensive. Raphael was before the world a
painter, but he could scarcely have been so without embracing every
other department of art. Before the science of perspective was matured
or popularly known, when, in consequence, defects are to be found in
the disposition of figures, and in the adjustment of aerial distances,
[Footnote 108] his architecture shows an instinctive familiarity with
its rules and proportions; a proof that he possessed an architectural
eye. And consequently the one statue which he is supposed to have
carved, and the one palace which he is said to have built, show how
easily he could have undertaken and executed beautiful works in either
of those two classes of art. In Orcagna and Michelangelo we have the
three branches of art supremely united; and the second of these adds
poetry and literature to his artistic excellence. In like manner,
Leonardo has left proof of most varied and accurate mechanical as well
as literary genius.

  [Footnote 108: See Mr. Lloyd's article on "Raphael's School of
  Athens," in Mr. Woodward's _Fine Art Quarterly Review_, January,
  1864, p. 67.]

It is evident, however, that while a genius has its point of
concentration, every remove from this, though wider, will be fainter
and less complete. We may describe it as Shakespeare himself describes
glory, and say:

  "Genius is like a circle in the water,
  Which never ceaseth to enlarge itself,
  Till, by broad spreading, it disperse to naught."
        (_"Henry VI.," act i., scene 3._)

The sympathies with more remote subjects and pursuits will be rather
the means of illustration, adornment, and {559} pleasing variety, than
for the essential requirements of the principal aim. But though less
minute in their application, in the hand of genius they will be
wonderfully accurate and apt.



IV.

All that I have been saying is applicable in the most complete and
marvellous way to Shakespeare's genius. His sympathies are universal,
perfect in their own immediate use, infinitely varied, and strikingly
beautiful, when they reach remoter objects. And hence, though at first
sight he might be classified among those who have displayed a literary
genius, he stretches his mind and his feelings so beyond them on every
side, that to him, almost, perhaps, beyond any other man, the simple
distinctive, without any qualification, belongs. No one need fear to
call Shakespeare simply a grand, a sublime genius.

The centre-point of his sympathies is clearly his dramatic art. From
this they expand, for many degrees, with scarce perceptible
diminution, till they lose themselves in far distant, and, to him,
unexplored space. This nucleus of his genius has certainly never been
equalled before or since. Its essence consists in what is the very
soul of the dramatic idea, the power to throw himself into the
situation, the circumstances, the nature, the acquired habits, the
feelings, true or fictitious, of every character which he introduces.
This forms, in fact, the most perfect of sympathies. We do not, of
course, use the word in that more usual sense of harmony of affection,
or consent of feeling. Shakespeare has sympathy as complete for
Shylock or Iago as he as for Arthur or King Lear. For a time he lives
in the astute villain as in the innocent child; he works his entire
power of thought into intricacies of the traitor's brain; he makes his
heart beat in concord with the usurer's sanguinary spite, and then,
like some beautiful creature in the animal world, draws himself out of
the hateful evil, and is himself again; and able, even, often to hold
his own noble and gentle qualities as a mirror, or exhibit the
loftiest, the most generous, and amiable examples of our nature. And
this is all done without study, and apparently without effort. His
infinitely varied characters come naturally into their places, never
for a moment lose their proprieties, their personality, and the exact
flexibility which results from the necessary combination in every man
of many qualities. From the beginning to the end each one is the same,
yet reflecting in himself the lights and shadows which flit around
him.

This extraordinary versatility stands in striking contrast with the
dramatic productions of other countries. The Greek tragedian is Greek
throughout--his subjects, his mythology, his sentences, play
wonderfully indeed, but yet restrictedly, within a given sphere. And
Rome is but the imitator in all its literature of its great mistress
and model.

  "Graiis eloquium, Gratis dedit ore rotundo, Musa loqui."

Even through the French school, with the strict adhesion to the
ancient rule of the unities, seems to have descended the partiality
for what may be called the chastely classical subjects. Not so with
Shakespeare.

Who, a stranger might ask, is the man, and where was he born, and
where does he live, that not only his acts and scenes are placed in
any age, or in any land, but that he can fill his stage with the very
living men of the time and place represented; make them move as easily
as if he held them in strings; and make them speak not only with
general conformity to their common position, but with individual and
distinctive propriety, so that each is different from the rest? Did he
live in ancient Rome, strolling the Forum, or climbing the Capitol;
hear ancient matrons converse with modest dignity; listen to
conspirators among the columns of its porticos; mingle among senators
around Pompey's {560} statue; or with plebeians crowding to hear
Brutus or Anthony harangue? Was he one accustomed to idle in the
piazza of St. Mark, or shoot his gondola under the Rialto? Or was he a
knight or even archer in the fields of France or England during the
period of the Plantagenets or Tudors, and witnessed and wrote down the
great deeds of those times, and knew intimately and personally each
puissant lord who distinguished himself by his valor, by his wisdom,
or even by his crimes? Did he live in the courts of princes, perchance
holding some office which enabled him to listen to the grave
utterances of kings and their counsellors, or to the witty sayings of
court jesters? Did he consort with banished princes, and partake of
their sports or their sufferings? In fine, did he live in great
cities, or in shepherds' cottages, or in fields and woods; and does he
date from John and live on to the eighth Henry--a thread connecting in
himself the different epochs of mediaeval England? One would almost
say so; or multiply one man into many, whose works have been united
under one man.

This ubiquity, if we may so call it, of Shakespeare's sympathies,
constitutes the unlimited extent and might of his dramatic genius. It
would be difficult to imagine where a boundary line could at length
have been drawn, beyond which nothing original, nothing new, and
nothing beautiful, could be supposed to have come forth from his mind.
We are compelled to say that his genius was inexhaustible.



V.



This rare and wonderful faculty becomes more interesting if we follow
it into further details.

I remember an anecdote of Garrick, who, in company with another
performer of some eminence, was walking in the country, and about to
enter a village. "Let us pass off," said the younger comedian to his
more distinguished companion, "as two intoxicated fellows." They did
so, apparently with perfect success, being saluted by the jeers and
abuse of the inhabitants. When they came forth at the other end of the
village, the younger performer asked Garrick how he had fulfilled his
part. "Very well," was the reply, "except that you were not perfectly
tipsy in your legs."

Now, in Shakespeare there is no danger of a similar defect. Whatever
his character is intended to be it is carried out to its very
extremities. Nothing is forgotten, nothing overlooked. Many of you, no
doubt, are aware that a controversy has long existed whether the
madness of Hamlet is intended by Shakespeare to be real or simulated.
If a dramatist wished to represent one of his persons as feigning
madness, that assumed condition would be naturally desired by the
writer to be as like as possible to the real affliction. If the other
persons associated with him could at once discover that the madness
was put on, of course the entire action would be marred, and the
object for which the pretended madness was designed would be defeated
by the discovery. How consummate must be the poet's art, who can have
so skilfully described, to the minutest symptoms, the mental malady of
a great mind, as to leave it uncertain to the present day, even among
learned physicians versed in such maladies, whether Hamlet's madness
was real or assumed.

This controversy may be said to have been brought to a close by one of
the ablest among those in England who have every opportunity of
studying the almost innumerable shades through which alienation of
mind can pass.  [Footnote 109] And so delicate are the changeful
characteristics which Shakespeare describes, that Dr. Conolly
considers that a twofold form of {561} disease is placed before us in
the Danish prince. He concludes that he was laboring under real
madness, yet able to put on a fictitious and artificial derangement
for the purposes which he kept in view. Passing through act by act and
scene by scene, analyzing, with experienced eye, each new symptom as
it occurs, dividing and anatomatizing, with the finest scalpel, every
fibre of his brain, he exhibits, step by step, the transitionary
characters of the natural disease in a mind naturally, and by
education, great and noble, but thrown off his pivot by the anguish of
his sufferings and the strain of aroused passion. And to this is
superadded another and not genuine affection, which serves its turn
with that estranged mind when it suits it to act, more especially that
part which the natural ailment did not suffice for. Now, Dr. Conolly
considers these symptoms so accurately as well as minutely described,
that he throws out the conjecture that Shakespeare may have borrowed
the account of them from some unknown papers by his son-in-law, Dr.
Hall.

  [Footnote 109: "A Study of Hamlet," by John Conolly, M.D., London,
  1863. In p. 52 the author quotes Mr. Coleridge and M. Killemain as
  holding the opinion that Shakespeare has "contrived to blend both
  (feigned and real madness) in the extraordinary character of Hamlet;
  and to join together the light of reason, the cunning of intentional
  error, and the involuntary disorder of a soul."]

But let it be remembered that in those days mental phenomena were by
no means accurately examined or generally known. There was but little
attention paid to the peculiar forms of monomania, or to its
treatment, beyond restraint and often cruelty. The poor idiot was
allowed, if harmless, to wander about the village or the country, to
drivel or gibber amidst the teasing or ill-natured treatment of boys
or rustics. The poor maniac was chained or tied in some wretched
out-house, at the mercy of some heartless guardian, with no protector
but the constable. Shakespeare could not be supposed, in the little
town of Stratford, nor indeed in London itself, to have had
opportunities of studying the influence and the appearance of mental
derangement of a high-minded and finely-cultivated prince. How then
did Shakespeare contrive to paint so highly-finished and yet so
complex an image? Simply by the exercise of that strong sympathetic
will which enabled him to transport, or rather to transmute, himself
into another personality. While this character was strongly before him
he changed himself into a maniac; he felt intuitively what would be
his own thought, what his feelings, were he in that situation; he
played with himself the part of the madman, with his own grand mind as
the basis of its action; he grasped on every side the imagery which he
felt would have come into his mind, beautiful even when dislorded,
sublime even when it was grovelling, brilliant even when dulled, and
clothed it in words of fire and of tenderness, with a varied rapidity
which partakes of wildness and of sense. He needed not to look for a
model out of himself, for it cost him no effort to change the angle of
his mirror and sketch his own countenance awry. It was but little for
him to pluck away the crown from reason and contemplate it dethroned.

Before taking leave of Dr. Conolly's most interesting monography, I
will allow myself to make only one remark. Having determined to
represent Hamlet in this anomalous and perplexing condition, it was of
the utmost importance to the course and end of this sublime drama,
that one principal incident should be most decisively separated from
Hamlet's reverse of mind. Had it been possible to attribute the
appearance of the Ghost, as the Queen, his mother, does attribute it
in the fifth act, to the delusion of his bewildered phantasy, the
whole groundwork of the drama would have crumbled beneath its
superincumbent weight. Had the spectre been seen by Hamlet, or by him
first, we should have been perpetually troubled with the doubt whether
or not it was the hallucination of a distracted, or the invention of a
deceitful brain. But Shakespeare felt the necessity of making this
apparition be held for a reality, and therefore he makes it the very
first incident in his tragedy, antecedent to the slightest symptom
{562} of either natural or affected derangement, and makes it first be
seen by two witnesses together, and then conjointly by a third
unbelieving and fearless witness. It is the testimony of these three
which first brings to the knowledge of the incredulous prince this
extraordinary occurrence. One may doubt whether any other writer has
ever made a ghost appear successively to those whom we may call the
wrong persons, before showing himself to the one whom alone he cared
to visit. The extraordinary exigencies of Shakespeare's plot rendered
necessary this unusual fiction. And it serves, moreover, to give the
only color of justice to acts which otherwise must have appeared
unqualified as mad freaks or frightful crimes.

What Dr. Conolly has done for Hamlet and Ophelia, Dr. Bucknill had
previously performed on a more extensive scale. In his "Psychology of
Shakespeare"  [Footnote 110] he has minutely investigated the mental
condition of Macbeth, King Lear, Timon, and other characters. On
Hamlet he seems inclined to take a different view from Dr. Conolly;
inasmuch as he considers the simulated madness the principal feature,
and the natural unsoundness which it is impossible to overlook as
secondary. But this eminent physician, well known for his extensive
studies of insanity, bears similar testimony to the extraordinary
accuracy of Shakespeare's delineations of mental diseases; the nicety
with which he traces their various steps in one individual, the
accuracy with which he distinguishes these morbid affections in
different persons. He seems unable to account for the exact minuteness
in any other way than by external observation. He acknowledges that
"indefinable possession of genius, call it spiritual tact or insight,
or whatever term may suggest itself, by which the great lords of mind
estimate all phases of mind with little aid from reflected light," as
the mental instrument through which Shakespeare looked upon others at
a distance or within reach of minute observation. Still he seems to
think that Shakespeare must have had many opportunities of observing
mental phenomena. I own I am more inclined to think that the process
by which the genius of Shakespeare reached this painful yet strange
accuracy was rather that of introversion than of external observation.
At any rate, it is most interesting to see eminent physicians
maintaining by some means or other that Shakespeare arrived by some
sort of intuition at the possession of a psychological or even medical
knowledge, fully verified and proved to be exact by the researches two
centuries later of distinguished men in a science only recently
developed. Mrs. Jameson has well distinguished the different forms of
mental aberration in Shakespeare's characters, when she says that
"Constance is frantic, Lear is mad, Ophelia is insane."   [Footnote
111]

  [Footnote 110: Pages 58 and 100.]

  [Footnote 111: "Characteristics of Women." New York 1833, p. 142.]


VI.

This last quotation may serve to introduce a further and a more
delicate test of Shakespeare's insight into character. That a man
should be able to throw himself into a variety of mind and characters
among his fellow-men, may be not unreasonably expected. He has
naturally a community of feelings, of passions, of temptations, and of
motives with them. He can understand what is courage, what ambition,
what strength or feebleness of mind. Inward observation and matured
experience help much to guide him to a conception and delineation of
the character of his fellow-men. But of the stronger emotions, the
wilder passions, the subdued gentleness and tenderness, the heroic
endurance, the meek bearing, and the saintly patience of the woman, he
can have had no experience. Looking into himself for a reflection, he
will probably find a blank.

{563}

It has often been said that in his female characters Shakespeare is
not equal to himself. The work to which I have just alluded meets, I
think completely, this objection, which, I believe, even Schlegel
raises. It required a lady, with mind highly cultivated, with the
nicest powers of discrimination, and with happiness of expression, to
vindicate at once Shakespeare and her sex. The difficulty of this task
can hardly be appreciated without the study of its performance. Its
great difficulty consists in the almost family resemblance of the
different portraits which make up Shakespeare's female gallery. There
is scarcely any room for events, even for incident, still less for
actions, say for bold and unfeminine deeds. Several of the heroines of
Shakespeare are subjected to similar persecutions, and almost the same
trials. In almost every one the affections and their expression have
alone to interest us. From Miranda, the desert-nurtured child in the
simplicity of untempted innocence, to Isabella in her cloistered
virtue, or Hermione in her unyielding fortitude--there are such
shades, such varying yet delicate tints, that not two of these
numerous conceptions can be said to resemble another. And whence did
Shakespeare derive his models? Some are lofty queens, others most
noble ladies, some foreigners, some native; different types in mind
and heart, as in the lineament or complexion. Where did he find them?
Where did he meet them? In the cottages of Stratford, or in the
purlieus of Blackfriars? Among the ladies of the court, or in the
audience in his pit? No one can say--no one need say. They were the
formations of his own quickened and fertile brain, which required but
one stroke, one line, to sketch him a portrait to which he would give
immortality. Far more difficult was this success, and not less
completely was it achieved, in that character which medical writers
seem hardly to believe could be but a conception. We may compare the
mind of Shakespeare to a diamond pellucid, bright, and untinted, cut
into countless polished facets, which, in constant movement, at every
smallest change of direction or of angle caught a new reflection, so
that not one of its brilliant mirrors could be for a moment idle, but
by a power beyond its control was ever busy with the reflection of
innumerable images, either distinct or running into one another, or
repeated each so clearly as to allow him, when he chose, to fix it in
his memory.



VII.

We may safely conclude that, in whatever constitutes the dramatic art
in its strictest sense, Shakespeare possessed matchless sympathies
with all its attributes. The next and most essential quality required
for true genius is the power to give outward life to the inward
conception. Without this the poet is dumb. He may be a "mute,
inglorious Milton;" he cannot be a speaking, noble Shakespeare. I
should think that I was almost insulting such an audience, were I to
descant upon Shakespeare's position among the bards and writers of
England, and of the modern world. Upon this point there can scarcely
be a dissentient opinion. His language is the purest and best, his
verses the most flowing and rich; and as for his sentiments, it would
be difficult without the command of his own language to characterize
them. No other writer has ever given such periods of sententious
wisdom.

. . . . .

I have spoken of genius as a gift to an individual man. I will
conclude by the reflection that that man becomes himself a gift; a
gift to his nation; a gift to his age; a gift to the world of all
times. That same Providence which bestows greatness, majesty,
abundance, and grace, no less presents, from time to time, to a people
or a race, these few transcendent men who mark for it {564} periods no
less decisively, though more nobly, than victories or conquests. On
England that supreme power has lavished the choicest blessings of this
worldly life; it has made it vast in dominion, matchless in strength;
it has made it the arbiter of the earth, and mistress of the sea; it
has made it able to stretch its arm for war to the savage antipodes,
and, if it chose, its hand for peace to the utter civilized west; it
has brought the produce of north and south to its feet with skill and
power, to transform and to refashion in forms graceful or useful, to
send them back, almost as new creations, to its very source. Industry
has clothed its most barren plains with luxuriant crops, and with
Titan boldness hollowed its sternest rocks, to plunder them of their
ever-hidden treasures. Its gigantic strength seems but to play with
every work of venturesome enterprise, till its cities seem to the
stranger to overflow with riches, and its country to be overspread
with exuberant prosperity.

Well, these are great and magnificent favors of an over-ruling, most
benignant Power; and yet there is a boast which belongs to our country
that may seem to be overlooked. Yet it is a double gift that that same
creating and directing rule has made this country the birthplace and
the seat of the two men who, within a short period, were made the
rulers each of a great and separate intellectual dominion, never to be
deposed, never to be rivalled, never to be envied. To Newton was given
the sway over the science of the civilized world; to Shakespeare the
sovereignty over its literature.

The one stands before us passionless and grave, embracing in his
intellectual grandeur every portion of the universe, from the stars,
to him invisible, to the rippling of the tiny waves which the tide
brought to his feet. The host of heaven, that seemed in causeless
dispersion, he marshalled into order, and bound in safest discipline.
He made known to his fellow-men the secret laws of heaven, the springs
of movement, and the chains of connection, which invariably and
unchangeably impel and guide the course of its many worlds.

In this aspect one's imagination figures him as truly the director of
what he only describes--as the leader of a complicated army, who, with
his staff, seems to draw or to send forward the wheeling battalions,
intent on their own errands, combining or resolving movements far
remote; or, under a more benign and pleasing form, we may contemplate
him, like a great master in musical science, standing in the midst of
a throng, in which are mingled together the elements of sublimest
harmonies, confused to the eye, but sweetly attuned to the ear,
mingling into orderly combination and flowing sequence, as they float
through the air, which, though he elicit not nor produce, he seems by
his outstretched hand to direct, or, at least, he proves himself fully
to understand. For what each one separately does, unconscious of what
even his companion is doing, he from afar knows, and almost beholds,
understanding from his centre the concerted and sure results of their
united action. And so Newton, from his chamber on this little earth,
without being able more than the most helpless insect to add power or
give guidance to one single element in the composition of this
universe, could trace the orbits of planet or satellite, and calculate
the oscillations and the reciprocal influences of celestial spheres.

Then his directing wand seems to contract itself to a space within his
grasp. It becomes that magic prism with which he intercepts a ray from
the sun on his passage to earth; and as a bird seizes in its flight
the bee laden with its honey, and robs it of its sweet treasure--even
so he compels the messenger of light to unfold itself before us, and
lay bare to our sight the rich colors which the rainbow had exhibited
to man since the deluge, and which had lain concealed since creation,
in every sunbeam that had passed through our atmosphere. And further
still, he bequeathes that wonderful alembic of light {565} to
succeeding generations, till, in the hand of new discoverers, it has
become the key of nature's laboratory, in which she has been surprised
melting and compounding, in crucibles huge as ocean, the rich hues
with which she overlays the surfaces of suns and stars, yet, at the
same time, breathes its delicate blush upon the tenderest petals of
the opening rose.

And all the laws and all the rules which form his code of nature seem
engraved, as with a diamond point, upon a granite surface of the
primitive rocks--inflexible, immovable, unchangeable as the system
which they represent.

Beside him stands the Ruler of that world, which, though even
sublimely intellectual, is governed by him with laws in which the
affections, even the passions, the moralities, and the anxieties of
life have their share; in which there is no severity but for vice, no
slavery but for baseness, no unforgivingness but for calculating
wickedness. In his hand is not the staff of authority, whether it take
the form of a royal sceptre or of a knightly lance, whether it be the
shepherdess's crook or the fool's bauble, it is still the same, the
magician's wand. Whether it be the divining rod with which he draws up
to light the most hidden streams of nature's emotions, or the
potential instrument of Prospero's spells, which raises storms in the
deep or works spirit-music in the air, or the wicked implement with
which the witches mingle their unholy charm, its cunning and its might
have no limit among created things. But it is not a world of stately
order which he rules, nor are the laws of unvarying rigor by which it
is commanded. The wildest paroxysms of passion; the softest delicacy
of emotions; the most extravagant accident of fortune; the tenderest
incidents of home; the king and the beggar, the sage and the jester,
the tyrant and his victim; the maiden from the cloister and the
peasant from the mountains; the Italian school-child and the Roman
matron; the princes of Denmark and the lords of Troy--all these and
much more are comprised in the vast embrace of his dominions. Scarcely
a rule can be drawn from them, yet each forms a model separately, a
finished group in combination. Unconsciously as he weaves his work,
apparently without pattern or design, he interlaces and combines in
its surface and its depth images of the most charming variety and
beauty; now the stern mosaic, without coloring, of an ancient
pavement, now the flowing and intertwining arabesque of the fanciful
east; now the rude scenes of ancient mediaeval tapestry like that of
Beauvais, and then the finished and richly tinted production of the
Gobelins loom.

And yet through this seeming chaos the light permeates, and that so
clear and so brilliant as equally to define and to dazzle. Every
portion, every fragment, every particle, stands forth separate and
particular, so as to be handled, measured, and weighed in the balance
of critic and poet. Each has its own exact form and accurate place, so
that, while separately they are beautiful, united they are perfect.
Hence their combinations have become sacred rules, and have given
inviolable maxims not only to English but to universal literature.
Germany, as we have seen, studies with love and almost veneration
every page of Shakespeare; national sympathies and kindred speech make
it not merely easy but natural to all people of the Teutonic family to
assimilate their literature to that its highest standard. France has
departed, or is fast departing, from its favorite classical type, and
adopting, though with unequal power, the broader and more natural
lines of the Shakespearian model. His practice is an example, his
declarations are oracles.

Still, as I have said, the wide region of intellectual enjoyment over
which our great bard exerts dominion, is not one parcelled out or
divided into formal and state-like provinces. While the student of
science is reading in his {566} chamber the great "Principia" of
Newton, he must keep before him the solution of only one problem. On
that his mind must undistractedly rest, on that his power of thought
be intensely concentrated. Woe to him if imagination leads his reason
into truant wanderings; woe if he drop the thread of finely-drawn
deductions! He will find his wearied intelligence drowsily floundering
in a sea of swimming figures and evanescent quantities, or floating
amidst the fragments of a shipwrecked diagram. But over Shakespeare
one may dream no less than pore; we may drop the book from our hand
and the contents remain equally before us. Stretched in the shade by a
brook in summer, or sunk in the reading chair by the hearth in winter,
in the imaginative vigor of health, in the drooping spirits of
indisposition, one may read, and allow the trains of fancy which
spring up in any scene to pursue their own way, and minister their own
varied pleasure or relief; and when by degrees we have become familiar
with the inexhaustible resources of his genius, there is scarcely a
want in mind or the affections that needs no higher than human succor,
which will not find in one or other of his works that which will
soothe suffering, comfort grief, strengthen good desires, and present
some majestic example to copy, or some fearful phantom. But when we
endeavor to contemplate all his infinitely varied conceptions as
blended together in one picture, so as to take in, if possible, at one
glance the prodigious extent of his prolific genius, we thereby build
up what he himself so beautifully called the "fabric of a vision,"
matchless in its architecture as in the airiness of its materials.
There are forms fantastically sketched in cloud-shapes, such as Hamlet
showed to Polonius, in the midst of others rounded and full, which
open and unfold ever-changing varieties, now gloomy and threatening,
then tipped with gold and tinted with azure, ever-rolling,
ever-moving, melting the one into the other, or extricating each
itself from the general mass. Dwelling upon this maze of things and
imaginations, the most incongruous combinations come before the dreamy
thought, fascinated, spell-bound, and entranced. The wild Ardennes and
Windsor Park seem to run into one another, their firs and their oaks
mingle together; the boisterous ocean boiling round "the still vexed
Bermoothes" runs smoothly into the lagoons of Venice; the old gray
porticos of republican Rome, like the transition in a dissolving view,
are confused and entangled with the slim and fluted pillars of a
Gothic hall; here the golden orb, dropped from the hand of a captive
king, rolls on the ground side by side with a jester's mouldy
skull--both emblems of a common fate in human things. Then the grave
chief-justice seems incorporated in the bloated Falstaff; King John
and his barons are wassailing with Poins and Bardolph at an inn door;
Coriolanus and Shylock are contending for the right of human
sensibilities; Macbeth and Jacques are moralizing together on
tenderness even to the brute. And so of other more delicate creations
of the poet's mind--Isabella and Ophelia, Desdemona and the Scotch
Thane's wife, produce respectively composite figures of inextricable
confusion. And around and above is that filmy world, Ariel and Titania
and Peas-blossom and Cobweb and Moth, who weave as a gossamer cloud
around the vision, dimming it gradually before our eyes, in the last
drooping of weariness, or the last hour of wakefulness.

* * * * * * *

{567}

MISCELLANY.


ART.

_Domestic._--The south gallery of the new academy is the largest and
best lighted of the several exhibition rooms, and contains some of the
most ambitious pictures of the year. As the visitor, pausing for a
moment to survey the paintings, drawings, studies, architectural
designs, and miscellanea which are hung around the four sides of the
open corridor at the head of the grand staircase, turns naturally into
the great gallery, through whose wide entrance he catches glimpses of
the art treasures within, so do we propose to conduct the reader
thither without further parley. Here confront us specimens of almost
every subject legitimate to the art, and of some not legitimate--great
pictures and little pictures, grave pictures and gay pictures,
landscape and _genre_, history and portraiture, beasts, birds, fishes,
and flowers. At either end of the room hangs a full-length portrait of
a gentleman of note, which challenges the visitor's attention, be he
never so reluctant. No. 464, the late Governor Gamble, of Missouri, by
F.T.L. Boyle, belongs to a family only too numerous among us (we speak
of the picture only), and whose acquaintance one feels strongly
inclined to cut in the present instance. But that is impossible. There
stands the familiar lay-figure in the old conventional attitude, which
we feel sure the governor never assumed of his own accord. The marble
columns, the draped curtain, the library table and the books--all the
stock accessories in fine--are there; and either for the purpose of
pointing a moral, of instituting a personal comparison, or of calling
attention to its workmanship, the governor blandly directs your
attention to a bust of Washington. He might be intending to do any one
or all of these things so far as the expression of his face affords an
indication. The idea on which the portrait is painted is thoroughly
false, and ought to be by this time discarded; but year after year
artists continue to mint these modish, stiff, and ridiculous figures,
when with a little regard to common sense they could produce portraits
which all would recognize as natural and effective. Especially is this
the case with the present picture, which evinces considerable
executive ability. The other portrait to which we alluded, No. 412, a
full length of Ex-Governor Morgan, painted by Huntington, for the
Governor's Room in the City Hall, is one of the least creditable works
ever produced by that artist, cold and repulsive in color, awkward in
attitude, and unsatisfactory as a likeness.

Occupying a less prominent position than either of these pictures, but
conspicuous enough to attract a large share of attention, is the
full-length portrait of Archbishop McCloskey, No. 438, by G.P.A.
Healy. Mr. Healy, though never very happy as a colorist and often
disposed to sacrifice characteristic expression to a passion for
painting brocades and draperies, has generally succeeded in imparting
a refined air to his portraits, however feeble they might be as
likenesses. The present work is coarse in expression, and untrue as a
likeness. It is a mistake to suppose that a free, rapid touch is
adapted to every style of face. The small and delicate features of the
archbishop, with their shrewd, yet refined and benevolent expression,
cannot be dashed off with a few strokes of the brush, but require
careful painting, and, above all, patient painting. Mr. Healy's
portrait of Dr. Brownson in last year's exhibition, though of little
merit as a painting, was much better than this. No. 448, a portrait of
the late Peletiah Perit, by Hicks, is one of the most creditable
specimens of that very unequal painter that we have recently seen. Mr.
Perit is sitting easily and naturally in his library chair, and is not
made to assume the attitude of a posture-master for the time being, in
order that posterity may know how he did _not_ look in life. The
likeness is not remarkable; but the accessories are carefully painted
and agreeably colored. No. 423, portrait of a lady, by R.M. Staigg, is
exactly what it assumes to be--a lady. In the refined air of the
gentlewoman which the artist has so happily conveyed, he recalls some
of the female heads of Stuart, though in the present instance he had
no wide scope for the display {568} of Stuart's charming gift of
color. The resemblance is more in the general sentiment than in any
technical qualities. Almost adjoining this work is another portrait of
a lady, No. 425, by W.H. Furness, a forcible example of the
naturalistic school, of great solidity of texture and purity of color.
There is intelligence, earnestness, and strength in this face, and in
the attitude, though the latter, as well as the accessories, is
studiously simple. Baker and Stone contribute some attractive
portraits to this room. No. 454, a lady, by the latter, is a good
specimen of a style neither strong nor founded on true principles, but
which, on account of a certain conventional gracefulness, which amply
satisfies those who look no deeper than the surface of the canvas,
will always find admirers. No. 458, a portrait of Capt. Riblett, of
the New York 7th Regiment, by Baker, is a clever work, noticeable for
the easy pose of the figure, the clear fresh coloring, and the firm
handling.

Two other portrait pieces may be noticed in this room, of very
opposite degrees of merit. They illustrate a method of treating this
branch of the art which has become popular of late years, and which
seeks to combine portraiture with _genre_; that is to say, the figures
represent real personages, but to the uninitiated seem merely the
actors in some little domestic scene. Any subject verging on the
dramatic is of course inappropriate to this method. Thus the stiffness
too often inseparable from portraiture and its unsympathetic character
to a stranger are avoided, and the "gentlemen" and "ladies" who have
monopolized so much space on the walls awaken an interest in a wider
circle than when appearing simply in their proper persons. No. 441, "A
Picnic in the Highlands," by Rossiter, presents us with portraits of
some twenty ladies and gentlemen, including a fair proportion of
generals, who have been ruthlessly summoned from the pleasures of the
rural banquet or of social intercourse to place themselves in
attitudes which a travelling photographer would blush to copy, and be
thus handed down to posterity. In submitting to this dreadful process
Generals Warren and Seymour afforded a new proof of courage under
adverse circumstances; and one scarcely knows whether they deserve
most to be pitied, or the artist to be denounced for putting brave men
in so ridiculous a position. The picture is simply disgraceful, and
would naturally be passed over in silence had it not been hung in a
position to challenge attention, while many works of merit are placed
far above the line. Thirty or forty years ago, when the academy was
glad to enroll painters of the calibre of Mr. Rossiter among its
members, such productions were perhaps acceptable on the line. But
have hanging committees no appreciation that there is such a thing as
progress? The other picture above alluded to is No. 435, "Claiming the
Shot," by J.G. Brown. It represents a hunting scene in the
Adirondacks, and though thinly painted, with no merit in the
landscape, and of a general commonplace character, tells its story
with humor and point. We have not the pleasure of knowing the party of
amateur hunters whose good-natured altercation forms the subject of
Mr. Brown's picture, but their faces are perfectly familiar to us, and
may be seen any day on Broadway, until the shooting season summons
them to a purer atmosphere than our civic rulers permit us to breathe.
That good-looking and well-dressed young man, with the incipient
aristocratic baldness, and the languid, gentleman-like air, reclining
in a not ungraceful attitude on a stump, and whose incredulous shake
of the head denotes that he will not resign his claim to the
successful shot--is he not a type of our _jeunesse dorée?_ And who has
not met the portly, florid gentleman, his face beaming with good
nature and good living, who claps our young friend on the back and
advises him to give it up? The earnest expression of the half-kneeling
hunter, clinching the argument as he identifies his bullet-hole in the
side of the slain buck, is well rendered, as is also that of another
florid gentleman who looks on, a quiet but highly amused witness of
the dispute. In the background are a party of guides and boatmen
engaged in preparing supper for the disputants, over whose perplexity
they appear to be indulging in a little quiet "chaff." We imagine that
the faces of the principal actors in this group are good likenesses,
and we feel sure that to see them thus depicted amidst scenes
suggesting healthful out-door sports will be pleasant to their
friends.

{569}

From portraits we pass naturally to figure pieces, and first pause
with astonishment before No. 394, "The Two Marys at the Sepulchre," by
R.W. Weir. Here is a work which has doubtless cost much thought and
patient labor, but which is so hopelessly beneath the dignity of the
subject as to seem almost like a caricature. When will modern painters
recognize that sacred history is a branch of their art not to be
attempted except under very peculiar and favorable
circumstances?--that the artist must feel and believe what he paints,
unless he wishes to degenerate into insipidity? We do not desire to
impugn Mr. Weir's sincerity, but a work so cold, lifeless, and void of
propriety shows that he is either hiding his light under a bushel, or
is incapable of feeling, perhaps we should say of reflecting, the
religious fervor which should be associated with so awful a scene. Had
he even stuck to the conventional forms and accessories which have
satisfied six centuries of Christian painters, he might have produced
something of respectable mediocrity. But modern realism would not
permit this, and therefore the Virgin is represented as a commonplace
middle-aged woman, who might as well be Mr. Weir's housekeeper, and
whose mawkish expression is positively repulsive. Of St. Mary Magdalen
the attitude, figure, and expression are not less inappropriate.
Surely these personages are raised above the level of ordinary
women--no believer in Christianity will deny that--and cannot the
painter so represent them? In other respects the picture has little
merit, being stiff and mannered in the drawing and of a mixture of
dull gray and salmon in its local coloring.

The most conspicuous landscape in this room is Bierstadt's immense
view of the Yo Semite Valley in California, No. 436, which occupies
the place of honor in the middle of the south wall. For months past
the artist has been announced as at work on this picture, and in view
of the great merits recognized in his "Rocky Mountains," public
expectation has been raised to a high pitch. But public expectation
has been doomed to disappointment this time, for the Yo Semite is much
inferior to its predecessor, though, in several respects, both works
show the same characteristics in equal perfection. They have breadth
of drawing, admirable perspective, and convey an idea of the solemn
grandeur of nature in the virgin solitudes of the west. But while in
the older work Mr. Bierstadt succeeded in forgetting for a time the
academic mannerisms which he brought with him from Germany, in the
present one he has, unconsciously, perhaps, lapsed into them again,
and produced something of great mechanical excellence, and with about
as much nature as can be seen through the atmosphere of a Düsseldorf
studio. Yellow appears to be his weakness, and the canvas is
accordingly suffused with yellow tints of every gradation of tone; not
a luminous yellow which the eye may rest upon with pleasure, but a
hard, dusty-looking pigment, without warmth, or transparency, or
depth; such a yellow as never tinged the skies of California or any
other part of the world, but is begotten of men who derive their ideas
of nature from copying _pictures_ of landscapes, instead of going
directly to nature. The grass and the foliage which receive the
sunlight are of a dirty, yellowish green, those in the shadow of the
great mountain ridge on the right of the scene of a yellowish black,
the very rocks and water are yellow, and if Indians or emigrants had
been introduced into the foreground, we feel convinced they would have
received the prevailing hue. Only in the mountain peaks, checkered
with sunlight and shadow, does the artist seem to escape from this
thraldom to one color, and paint with force and truthfulness. The
picture is therefore a failure; and yet viewed from the head of the
great stair-case, across the open space, and through the entrance to
the exhibition-room, it has a mellowness of tone and truthfulness of
perspective which almost induce us to retract our criticism. Approach
it, however, and the illusion vanishes. Another Californian scene by
Bierstadt, in this room, No. 472, "the Golden Gate," shows the
artist's predominant fault even more conspicuously, and is not only
unworthy of him, but absolutely unpleasant to look at. No. 487, "Among
the Alps," by Gignoux, is a solidly, though coarsely painted work, and
notwithstanding a prevalent cold, leaden tone, tolerably effective.
The idea of solemn repose is well conveyed, although scarcely one of
the details is truthfully rendered. The water of the mountain lake is
not water, but an opaque mass, the trees and rocks are so slurred in
the drawing as to be {570} unrecognizable by the naturalist, and the
shadows are unnecessarily deep and sombre. Such painting, however,
pleases the multitude, who do not care much for absolute truth,
provided effect is obtained; and Mr. Gignoux's picture is considered
very fine indeed. No. 466, "A Mountain Lake in the Blue Ridge," by
Sonntag, is a fine piece of scene painting, and, if properly enlarged,
would form an excellent design for a stage drop-curtain. As a
representation of nature it is false in nearly every detail. And yet
no landscape painter deals more readily and dexterously with the
external forms of American forest scenery, or perhaps has more
neatness of touch; and none, it may be added, has wandered further
from the true path.

No. 465, "Greenwood Lake," by Cropsey, is a pleasanter picture than we
commonly see from this artist, who, to judge from his productions,
scarcely ever saw a cloudy day, and has a very indifferent
acquaintance with shadows. Here is a still, serene summer afternoon,
in the foreground a newly-mown hayfield, with a group of mowers and
rakers, just pausing from their labor, and beyond the placid bosom of
the lake. Despite its somewhat monotonous uniformity of tone, the
picture is pervaded by an agreeable sentiment of repose,
characteristic of midsummer; and as an honest attempt to portray a
pleasing phase of nature it is welcome. No. 493, "Afternoon in the
Housatonic Valley," by J.B. Bristol, represents the period of the day
selected by Mr. Cropsey, but the tone of his picture is lower and
cooler, and the coloring more harmonious. Its most noticeable feature
is a noble mountain in the background, whose wooded sides afford fine
contrasts of light and shadow. No. 494, "A Foggy Morning--Coast of
France," by Dana, evinces more desire to catch the secret of rich
coloring than success. It is not by scattering warm pigments about,
without regard to harmony or gradation, that Mr. Dana can attain his
end; and so far as color is concerned he shows no improvement upon his
work of former years. In composition he wields, as usual, a graceful
pencil, and his children are pleasingly and naturally drawn.

------

NEW PUBLICATIONS.


THE ILIAD OF HOMER RENDERED INTO ENGLISH BLANK VERSE.
By Edward, Earl of Derby. 2 vols. 8vo., pp. 430 and 457. New York:
Charles Scribner & Company.

There have been several translations of the Iliad into English verse,
but, practically, only three have hitherto been much in vogue. The
first of these, by Chapman, is a work of considerable spirit, of a
rude, fiery kind; but it is unfaithful, and has long been antiquated.
Pope's brilliant and thoroughly un-Homeric version will always be
popular as a poem, though anything more widely different from the
original was probably never published as a translation. Cowper is
verbally accurate, but tame and tiresome. A translation in blank
verse, by William Munford, of Richmond, Va., appeared in Boston some
twenty years ago, but does not seem to have attracted the attention it
deserved.

Lord Derby appears to have avoided nearly all the defects and combined
nearly all the merits of his predecessors. He has aimed "to produce a
translation and not a paraphrase; not, indeed, such a translation as
would satisfy, with regard to each word, the rigid requirements of
accurate scholarship, but such as would fairly and honestly give the
sense and spirit of every passage and of every line, omitting nothing
and expanding nothing, and adhering as closely as our language will
allow, even to every epithet which is capable of being translated, and
which has, in the particular passage, anything of a special and
distinctive character." The testimony of critics is almost unanimous
as to the success with which he has carried out his design. His
translation is incomparably more faithful than either of those we have
mentioned. He almost invariably perceives the delicate shades of
meaning which Pope was {571} not scholar enough to notice, and he is
often wonderfully happy in expressing them in English. His language is
dignified and pure; his style animated and idiomatic; and his verse
has more of the majestic flow of Homer than that of any previous
translator. He has produced by all odds the best version of the Iliad
in the English language.

That a statesman should have succeeded in a task of this sort, where
Pope and Cowper failed, is strange indeed. But let our readers judge
for themselves: we give first a somewhat celebrated passage from
Pope--the bivouac of the Trojans, at the end of the eighth
book--premising that Pope prefixes to it four lines which have no
equivalent in the Greek, and which are not only an interpolation but a
positive injury to the sense:

  "The troops exulting sat in order round,
  And beaming fires illumined all the ground.
  As when the moon, refulgent lamp of night,
  O'er heaven's clear azure spreads her sacred light,
  When not a breath disturbs the deep serene,
  And not a cloud o'ercasts the solemn scene;
  Around her throne the vivid planets roll,
  And stars unnumbered gild the glowing pole,
  O'er the dark trees a yellower verdure shed,
  And tip with silver every mountain's head;
  Then shine the vales, the rocks in prospect rise,
  A flood of glory bursts from all the skies;
  The conscious swains, rejoicing in the sight,
  Eye the blue vault, and bless the useful light.
  So many flames before proud Ilion blaze,
  And lighten glimmering Xanthus with their rays:
  The long reflections of the distant fires
  Gleam on the walls, and tremble on the spires;
  A thousand piles the dusky horrors gild,
  And shoot a shady lustre o'er the field,
  Full fifty guards each flaming pile attend,
  Whose umbered arms, by fits, thick flashes send,
  Loud neigh the coursers o'er their heaps of corn,
  And ardent warriors wait the rising morn."

This is not a faultless passage, but no one can help admiring the
felicitous imagery, the vivid word-painting, the wonderful harmony of
the versification. Yet what reader of Homer will hesitate to prefer
Lord Derby's simpler and almost strictly literal rendering?

  "Full of proud hopes, upon the pass of war,
  All night they camped; and frequent blazed their fires.
  As when in heaven, around the glittering moon
  The stars shine bright amid the breathless air;
  And every crag, and every jutting peak
  Stands boldly forth, and every forest glade;
  _Ev'n to the gates of heaven is opened wide
  The boundless sky;_ shines each particular star
  Distinct; joy fills the gazing shepherd's heart.
  So bright, so thickly scattered o'er the plain,
  Before the walls of Troy, between the ships
  And Xanthus' stream, the Trojan watchfires blazed.
  A thousand fires burnt brightly; and round each
  Sat fifty warriors in the ruddy glare;
  With store of provender before them laid,
  Barley and rye, the tethered horses stood
  Beside the cars, and waited for the morn."

Take now the description of Vulcan serving the gods at a banquet, from
the conclusion of the first book. Cowper gives it as follows:

  "So he; then Juno smiled, goddess white-armed,
  And smiling still, from his unwonted hand
  Received the goblet. He from right to left  [Footnote 112]
  Rich nectar from the beaker drawn, alert
  Distributed to all the powers divine.
  Heaven rang with laughter inextinguishable,
  Peal after peal, such pleasure all conceived
  At sight of Vulcan in his new employ.
    So spent they in festivity the day,
  And all were cheered; nor was Apollo's harp
  Silent, nor did the muses spare to add
  Responsive melody of vocal sweets.
  But when the sun's bright orb had now declined,
  Each to his mansion, wheresoever built
  By the same matchless architect, withdrew.
  Jove also, kindler of the fires of heaven,
  His couch ascending as at other times
  When gentle sleep approached him, slept serene,
  With golden-sceptred Juno by his side."

  [Footnote 112: Just the reverse,--_from left to right_, [Greek text]
  Cowper's blunder is serious, because to proceed from right to left
  was looked upon by the Greeks as unlucky.]

{572}

Cowper is better than Pope here; but Lord Derby is the most literal
and by far the best of the three. His lines have a dignified
simplicity not unworthy the father of poetry himself; yet the
translation is nearly verbatim:

  "Thus as he spoke, the white-armed goddess smiled,
  And smiling from his hand received the cup,
  Then to th' immortals all in order due
  He ministered, and from the flagon poured
  The luscious nectar; while among the gods
  Rose laughter irrepressible, at sight
  Of Vulcan hobbling round the spacious hall.
    Thus they till sunset passed the festive hours;
  Nor lacked the banquet aught to please the sense,
  Nor sound of tuneful lyre, by Phoebus touched,
  Nor muses' voice, who in alternate strains
  Responsive sang; but when the sun was set,
  Each for his home departed, where for each
  The cripple Vulcan, matchless architect,
  With wondrous skill a noble house had reared.
    To his own couch, where he was wont of old,
  When overcome by gentle sleep, to rest,
  Olympian Jove ascended; there he slept,
  And by his side the golden-thronèd queen."

If our space permitted we might easily extend these comparisons, and
show that Lord Derby excels other translators in every phase of his
undertaking--in the rude shock of war, the touching emotions of human
sentiment, the debates of the gods, and the beauties and phenomena of
nature. We cannot refrain, however, from quoting a few passages of
conspicuous excellence.

Hector's assault on the ships in the fifteenth book is thus spiritedly
rendered:

  "Fiercely he raged, as terrible as Mars
  With brandished spear; or as a raging fire
  'Mid the dense thickets on the mountain side.
  The foam was on his lips; bright flashed his eyes
  Beneath his awful brows, and terribly
  Above his temples waved amid the fray
  The helm of Hector; Jove himself from heaven
  His guardian hand extending, him alone
  With glory crowning 'mid the host of men,
  But short his term of glory; for the day
  Was fast approaching, when, with Pallas' aid
  The might of Peleus' son should work his doom.
  Oft he essayed to break the ranks, where'er
  The densest throng and noblest arms he saw;
  But strenuous though his efforts, all were vain;
  They, massed in close array, his charge withstood;
  Firm as a craggy rock, upstanding high
  Close by the hoary sea, which meets unmoved
  The boist'rous currents of the whistling winds,
  And the big waves that bellow round its
  So stood unmoved the Greeks, and undismayed.
  At length, all blazing in his arms, he sprang
  Upon the mass; so plunging down as when
  On some tall vessel, from beneath the clouds
  A giant billow, _tempest-nursed_, descends:
  The deck is drenched in foam; the stormy wind
  Howls in the shrouds; th' affrighted seamen quail
  In fear, but little way from death removed;  [Footnote 113]
  So quailed the spirit in every Grecian breast."

  [Footnote 113: We are particularly struck with the
  excellence of Lord Derby's translation of this
  magnificent image when we contrast it with Mr.,
  Munford's:

  "As on a ship a wat'ry mountain falls,
  Driven from the clouds by all the furious winds;
  With foam the deck is covered, pitiless
  The deafening tempest roars among the shrouds;
  The sailors, whirled along by raging waves.
  Tremble, confused and faint; immediate death
  Appears before them."

  Yet, no less an authority than the late President
  Felton, of Harvard, pronounced Munford's
  the best of all English metrical versions of the
  Iliad.]

In book sixth Hector is accosted by his mother on his return from the
battle-field. She offers him wine, wherewith to pour a libation to
Jove and then to refresh himself. Lord Darby's translation of his
answer is very neat and very close to the original:

{573}

  "No, not for me, mine honored mother, pour
  The luscious wine, lest thou unnerve my limbs
  And make me all my wonted prowess lose.
  The ruddy wine I dare not pour to Jove
  With hands unwashed; nor to the cloud-girt son
  Of Saturn may the voice of prayer ascend
  From one with blood bespattered and defiled."

We close our extracts with a few lines from book third. Priam, sitting
with "the sage chiefs and councillors of Troy" at the Scaean gate
watching the hostile armies, thus addresses Helen:

  "'Come here, my child, and sitting by my side,
  From whence thou canst discern thy former lord,
  His kindred and his friends (not thee I blame,
  But to the gods I owe this woful war),
  Tell me the name of yonder mighty chief
  Among the Greeks a warrior brave and strong:
  Others in height surpass him; but my eyes
  A form so noble never yet beheld,
  Nor so august; he moves, a king indeed.'
  To whom in answer, Helen, heav'nly fair:
  'With rev'rence, dearest father, and with shame
  I look on thee: oh, would that I had died
  That day when hither with thy son I came,
  And left my husband, friends, and darling child,
  And all the loved companions of my youth:
  That I died not, with grief I pine away.
  But to thy question; I will tell thee true;
  Yon chief is Agamemnon, Atreus' son,
  Wide-reigning, mighty monarch, ruler good,
  And valiant warrior; in my husband's name,
  Lost as I am, I called him brother once.'"

----

LIFE OF MARCUS TULLIUS CICERO.
By William Forsyth, M.A., Q.C., author of "Hortensius," "Napoleon at
St. Helena and Sir Hudson Lowe," "History of Trial by Jury," etc., and
late fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge. Two volumes, 8vo., pp. 364
and 341. New York: Charles Scribner & Co.

Mr. Forsyth has a very correct notion of the business of a biographer.
His object has been not only to tell Cicero's history but to describe
his private life--to make us acquainted with minute details of his
domestic habits, and to represent him as far as possible in the same
manner as he would a man of the present generation. "The more we
accustom ourselves," he says, "to regard the ancients as persons of
like passions as ourselves, and familiarize ourselves with the idea of
them as fathers, husbands, friends, and _gentlemen_, the better we
shall understand them." He has therefore carefully gathered up from
the letters and other writings of the Roman orator those little bits
of personal allusion, domestic history, and unconsidered trifles which
indicate, more clearly sometimes than important actions, the bent of
one's mind or the inmost character of one's heart; and he has arranged
them with great skill, and a good eye for effect. He shows but slight
literary polish; his style is not elegant, nor always clear, nor even
dignified; but he has a logical way of putting things, a happy knack
of arrangement, and a habit of keeping to the point and throwing aside
superfluous matter, for which we dare say he is indebted to his
training as a pleader in the courts. As a lawyer, too, he is specially
qualified to give the history of the causes in which Cicero's orations
were delivered; and this he does better than we have ever seen it done
before, explaining the narrative by copious illustrations from modern
jurisprudence. But if in some respects he writes like a lawyer, in
another very important point his practice as an advocate seems not to
have affected him. He is thoroughly impartial. He sums up Cicero's
character more like a judge than a queen's counsel. He admires him but
not blindly; holding the safe middle path between the excessive
veneration shown by Middleton and Niebuhr and the unreasonable
animosity of Drumann and Mommsen. He admits that Cicero was weak,
timid, and irresolute; but these defects were counter-balanced by the
display, at critical periods of his life, of the very opposite
qualities. In the contest with Catiline and the final struggle with
Antony he was as firm and brave as a man need be. One principal cause
of his irresolution was an anxiety to do what was right. If he knew
that he had acted wrongly, he instantly felt all the agony of remorse.
His standard of morality was as high as it was perhaps possible to
elevate it by the mere light of nature. The chief fault of his moral
character was a want of sincerity. In a different sense of the words
from that expressed by St. Paul, he wished to become all things to all
men, if by any means he might win some. His private correspondence and
{574} his public speeches were often in direct contradiction with each
other as to the opinions he expressed of his contemporaries. His
foible was vanity. He was never tired of speaking of himself. As a
philosopher he had no pretensions to originality, but he was the first
to make known to his countrymen the philosophy of Greece, which until
he appeared may be said to have spoken to the Romans in an unknown
tongue. He adhered to no particular sect, but affected chiefly the
school of the new academy. He was a firm believer in a providence and
a future state. As an orator his faults are coarseness in invective,
exaggeration in matter, and prolixity in style. "Many of his sentences
are intolerably long, and he dwells upon a topic with an exhaustive
fulness which leaves nothing to the imagination. The pure gold of his
eloquence is beaten out too thin, and what is gained in surface is
lost in solidity and depth."

The position of Cicero with respect to the political parties into
which the republic was divided in his time is not so well described as
his personal character. While Mr. Forsyth displays industry and good
judgment in collecting and arranging the little traits which go to
make up a life-like portrait, he lacks the comprehensive and
philosophical view with which Merivale has recently surveyed the same
period of history. Forsyth writes as one who, having mingled with the
busy crowd in the forum, should come away and tell us what he had seen
and heard, and describe the men with whom he had talked. Merivale
surveys the scene from a distance; and though his perception of
individual objects is less distinct than Forsyth's, his view is
broader and takes in better the relative situations and proportions of
the various features spread out before him. Both are excellent in
their kind: the historian is the more instructive, the biographer the
more entertaining.


BEATRICE.
By Julia Kavanagh, author of "Nathalie," "Adele," "Queen Mab," etc.,
etc. Three volumes in one. 12mo., pp. 520. New York: D. Appleton &
Company.

The readers of "Adele" and "Nathalie" will hardly be prepared for what
awaits them in the novel now upon our table. Miss Kavanagh has won a
high reputation by her delicate pictures of quiet home life, and
thorough analyses of female character. But lately the prevailing
thirst for sensational stories appears to have enticed her away from
the old path, and led her to attempt a style of novel which will no
doubt please the majority of readers better than her earlier efforts,
though as a work of art it is inferior to them. It is by no means
however a merely sensation story. The heroine is painted with all Miss
Kavanagh's accustomed clearness and skill; although the uninterrupted
series of plots and counterplots, the dramatic terseness of the
dialogue, and the effectiveness of the situations, tempt one to forget
sometimes, in the absorbing interest of the narrative, the higher
merit of vivid and truthful drawing of character. That of Beatrice is
charmingly conceived, and admirably worked out, recalling those
delightful heroines who first gave Miss Kavanagh a hold upon the
popular heart. Beatrice is a spirited, proud, natural, warm-hearted
girl, born in poverty and fallen heiress unexpectedly to great wealth.
Her guardian and step-father, Mr. Gervoise, subjects her to
innumerable wrongs in order that he may get possession of the
property. Poison even and a mad-house are hinted at. The book is
principally a narrative of battle between the defenceless girl and
this villain. Our readers who may wish to know how the struggle ends
are referred to the book itself; they will have no reason to regret
the time they may spend in reading it.


GRACE MORTON; OR, THE INHERITANCE.
A Catholic Tale. By M.L.M. 12mo., pp. 324.


THE CONFESSORS OF CONNAUGHT; OR,
THE TENANTS OF A LORD BISHOP.
A Tale of our Times. By M. L. M., author of Grace Morton, etc. 12mo.,
pp.319. Philadelphia: Peter F. Cunningham. New York: D. & J. Sadlier &
Company.

These are both religious stories. The first is inscribed to the
Catholic youth of America, and the scene is laid in Pennsylvania. The
second is founded upon the evictions in 1860, in the parish of Partry,
Ireland, of a number of tenants of the Protestant bishop of Tuam, who
had refused to send their children to proselytizing schools. The
well-known missionary, Father Lavelle, is a {575} prominent figure in
the book, slightly disguised under the name of Father Dillon.


A GENERAL HISTORY OF THE CATHOLIC CHURCH:
FROM THE COMMENCEMENT OF THE
CHRISTIAN ERA UNTIL THE PRESENT TIME.
By M. l'Abbé J.E. Darras. First American from the last French edition.
With an Introduction and Notes, by the Most Rev. M.J. Spalding, D.D.,
Archbishop of Baltimore. Numbers 6, 7, and 8. 8vo. pp. (each) 48. New
York: P. O'Shea.

We are pleased to learn that two valuable appendices are to be added
to the American translation of this important work; one by an eminent
Jesuit on the history of the Church in Ireland, the other by the Rev.
C.I. White, D.D., on the history of the Church in America. The English
version of the book ought thus to be far superior to the original
French. The numbers appear with great promptness, and present the same
neat and tasteful appearance which we took occasion to praise in
noticing some of the earlier parts.


LIFE OF THE CURÉ D'ARS.
From the French of the Abbé Alfred Monnin. 12mo., pp. 355. Baltimore:
Kelly & Piet.

It is only six years since Jean Baptist Marie Vianney, better known as
the Curé of Ars, closed his mortal life in that little village near
Lyons which will probably be henceforth for ever associated with his
name. "A common consent," says Dr. Manning, in a preface to the book
before us, "seems to have numbered him, even while living, among the
servants of God; and an expectation prevails that the day is not far
off when the Church will raise him to veneration upon her altars." He
was the son of a farmer of Dardilly, near Lyons, and appears to have
inherited virtue from both his parents. God gave him neither graces of
person nor gifts of intellect. His face was pale and thin, his stature
low, his gait awkward, his manner shy and timid, his whole air common
and unattractive. His education was so defective that his teachers
hesitated to recommend him for ordination. But the want of human
learning seems to have been supplied by supernatural illumination.
When he went to Ars, virtue was little known there. To say that he
speedily wrought an entire reformation is but a faint expression of
the extraordinary effect of his ministry. Drunkenness and quarreling
were soon unknown. At the sound of the midday _Angelus_ the laborers
would stop in their work to recite the _Ave Maria_ with uncovered
head. Men and women used to repair to the church after their work was
done, and often came again to pray at two or three o'clock in the
morning. The curé himself, it may be said, never left the church
except to discharge some function of his ministry, to take one scanty
meal a day, of bread or potatoes, and to sleep two or three hours. In
the seventh year of his ministry he founded an asylum for orphan or
destitute girls which he called "The Providence." It is believed that
he was miraculously assisted in providing food and clothing for these
poor children. Once the stock of flour was exhausted, except enough to
make two loaves. "Put your leaven into the little flour you have,"
said the curé to the baker, "and to-morrow go on with your baking as
usual." "The next day," says this person, "I know not how it happened,
but as I kneaded, the dough seemed to rise and rise under my fingers;
I could not put in the water quick enough; the more I put in, the more
it swelled and thickened, so that I was able to make, with a handful
of flour, ten large loaves of from twenty to twenty-two pounds each,
as much, in fact, as could have been made with a whole sack of flour."

It was in consequence partly of circumstances of this nature connected
with the Providence, and partly of the reputation of M. Vianney as a
spiritual director, that a stream of pilgrims set in toward Ars that
has continued to flow ever since. Before the close of his life, as
many as eighty thousand persons are said to have visited him in a
single year, by a single route. Most of them came to confess; many to
be cured of deformities or disease; others to ask advice in special
difficulties. The number of cures effected at his hands was
prodigious. His labors in the confessional were almost beyond belief;
for thirty years he spent in this severest of all the duties of a
parish priest sixteen or eighteen hours a day. Penitents were content
to await their turn in the church all night, all the next day--even two
{576} days. Devout persons were so eager to get relics of him during
his life, that whenever he laid aside his hat or his surplice the
garment was immediately appropriated. So after a time he never put on
a hat, and never took off his surplice.

It seemed at last that his humility could no longer endure the
veneration that was paid him. He resolved to retire to a quiet place,
and spend the rest of his life in prayer. He attempted to escape
secretly by night; but one of his assistant priests discovered his
purpose, and contrived to delay him, until the alarm was sounded
through the village. The inhabitants were roused at the first stroke.
The clangor of the bell was soon mingled with confused cries of "M. le
curé!" The women crowded the market-place and prayed aloud in the
church; the men armed themselves with whatever came first to hand;
guns, forks, sticks, and axes. M. Vianney made his way with difficulty
to the street door, but the villagers would not let him open it. "He
went from one door to another," says his old servant, "without getting
angry; but I think he was weeping." At last he reached the street, and
stood still for a moment, considering how to escape. His assistant
made a last effort to persuade him to remain. The populace fell at his
feet, and cried, with heart-rending sobs, "Father, let us finish our
confession; do not go without hearing us!" And thus saying, they
carried rather than led him to the church. He knelt before the altar
and wept for a long time. Then he went quietly into his confessional
as if nothing had happened.

We would gladly quote the whole of the beautiful scene of which we
have attempted to give an outline; but our space forbids. We must pass
over also the graphic description of the abbé's death and funeral, as
well as the narrative of the extraordinary sufferings which made his
life one long purgatory. Let our readers get the book, and they will
find it as interesting as a romance.


THE LIFE OF JOHN MARY DECALOGNE,
STUDENT IN THE UNIVERSITY OF PARIS.
Translated from the French. 18mo., pp. 162. Baltimore: Kelly & Piet.

This edifying narrative of the short and almost angelic career of a
school-boy who died in the odor of sanctity, in his seventeenth year,
was a great favorite with our fathers and grandfathers, but we believe
has long been out of print. Its re-publication is a praiseworthy
adventure, which we hope will have the success it deserves. The book
is especially recommended to lads preparing for their first communion.



_The New Path_, for June (New York: James Miller, publisher), is
devoted wholly to the fortieth annual exhibition of the National
Academy of Design. Our spicy little contemporary has no mercy on the
artists.


_Trübner's American and Oriental Literary Record_, the first number of
which was published in London last March, is "a monthly register of
the most important works published in North and South America, in
India, China, and the British Colonies; with occasional notes on
German, Dutch, Danish, French, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, and
Russian books." We believe it is the first systematic attempt to bring
the young literature of America and the East before the public of
Europe. We commend it to the attention of our book-writing and
publishing friends.


The American News Company issue a little pamphlet on _The Russo-Greek
Church, by a former resident of Russia_. Its aim is to expose the
absurdity of the attempts at union between the Russian and Protestant
Episcopal Churches.

----

BOOKS RECEIVED.

History of England from the fall of Wolsey to the death of Elizabeth.
By James Anthony Froude, M.A. New York: Charles Scribner & Company.

The History of the Protestant Reformation, etc. By M.J. Spalding,
D.D., Archbishop of Baltimore. Fourth revised edition. Baltimore: John
Murphy & Company.

Ceremonial for the use of the Catholic Churches in the United States
of America. Third edition, revised and enlarged. Baltimore: Kelly &
Piet.

Meditations and Considerations for a Retreat of One Day in each Month.
Compiled from the writings of Fathers of the Society of Jesus.
Baltimore: Kelly & Piet.

The Year of Mary. Translated from the French of the Rev. M. d'Arville,
Apostolic Prothonotary. Edited and in part translated by Mrs. J.
Sadlier. Philadelphia: Peter F. Cunningham.

------

{577}

THE CATHOLIC WORLD,

VOL. I., NO. 5. AUGUST, 1865.

Translated from Études Religieuses, Historiques, et Littéraires,
par des Pères de la Compagnie de Jésus.

DRAMATIC MYSTERIES OF
THE FIFTEENTH AND SIXTEENTH CENTURIES.

BY A. CAHOUR, S. J.


The drama of the Middle Ages ends with a sort of theatrical explosion.
Everything disappears at once, under all forms and on every side. It
included, like that of earlier times, "mysteries" drawn from the Old
and the New Testament; "miracles" and plays borrowed from legends,
tragedies inspired by the acts of the martyrs and by chivalric
romances, by ancient history and by modern history; "moralities" whose
allegorical impersonations represent the vices and the virtues; pious
comedies like those of Marguerite de Valois, Queen of Navarre, upon
the Nativity of Jesus Christ, upon the Adoration of the Magi, upon the
Holy Family in the desert; profane comedies like those of the "Two
Daughters" and the "Two Wives" by the same princess; ludicrous farces
like that of Patelin the Advocate; licentious farces _ad nauseam;_
finally, the _"Soties,"_ satirical plays in which the _Clercs de la
Basoche_ and the _Enfants sans souci_ renewed the audacity of
Aristophanes without reviving his talent. There were representations
for all solemn occasions, for the patron-feasts of cities and
parishes, for the assemblies of a whole country, for the "joyous
entry" of kings and princes. There were also scenic _entremets_ for
banquets; and nearly all these displays were made with proportions so
gigantic, with so much pomp and expense, that everybody must have
participated in them, priests and magistrates, lords and citizens,
carpenters and minstrels. The representation of a "mystery" became the
affair of a whole city, of a whole province. The hangings of the
theatre, the costume of the actors, exhibited the most beautiful
tapestries, the richest dresses, the most precious jewels of the
neighboring chateaux, and even the ornaments of the churches--copes
for the eternal Father, dalmatics for the angels.

One of our most ingenious and learned critics, whom it is impossible
not to cite frequently when writing upon the dramatic poetry of the
sixteenth century, M. Sainte-Beuve, in speaking of this prodigious
fecundity, has remarked, that "when things are close to their end they
often have a final season of remarkable brilliancy--it is their
autumn--their vintage; {578} or it is like the last brilliant
discharge in a piece of fireworks." Perhaps there is no better
illustration of this phenomenon than that of a pyrotechnic display,
which multiplying its jets of light, and illuminating the entire
horizon at the very moment of its extinction, disappears into the
night and leaves naught behind but its smoke. What is there left, in
fact, after all this theatrical effervescence? One natural and truly
French inspiration alone--the immortal farce of Patelin, dating from
the second half of the fifteenth century, and revived at the
commencement of the eighteenth by Brueys and Palaprat.

However, despite its poverty, this dramatic epoch merits our close
attention. In giving us a picture of the public amusements of our
forefathers, it will indicate, on the one hand, the nature of their
morality and their literary tastes, and on the other, the causes of
the decline of the old Christian drama at the verge of the revolution
which delivered over the French stage to the ideas and the philosophy
of paganism.

If we wished to give a catalogue of the productions of the fifteenth
and the sixteenth centuries, we might easily compile it from the
history of the brothers Parfait, the _"Recherches"_ of Beauchamps, and
the _"Bibliothèque"_ of the Duke de la Vallière. Such a task, however
abridged, would require a long chapter, and we neither have time to
undertake it nor are we sorry at being obliged to omit it. Passing
straight to our goal, let us occupy ourselves with the tragic dramas
alone, and even here we must put bounds to our inquiry under penalty
of losing ourselves in endless and uninteresting details. All that
which characterizes the Melpomene of the fifteenth and the
commencement of the sixteenth centuries is found in the two great
works, "The Mystery of the Passion," and "The Mystery of the Acts of
the Apostles." In these, and we may almost say in these only, shall we
study its power and its originality.

"The Mystery of the Passion" is the work of two Angevin poets, named
alike Jehan Michel. The first, born toward the end of the fourteenth
century, after having been a canon and at the same time secretary of
Queen Yolande of Aragon, mother of the good King René, Count of Anjou
and of Provence, became bishop of Angers, February 19, 1438, and died
in the odor of sanctity, September 12, 1447. The second Jehan Michel,
a very eloquent and scientific doctor, as la Croix du Maine informs
us, was the chief physician of King Charles VIII., and died in
Piedmont, August 22, 1493. He edited and printed, in 1486, the work of
his namesake.

This mystery was played at Metz and at Paris in 1437, and at Angers
three years afterward upon the commencement of the episcopacy of its
first author. It is a gigantic trilogy, into which are fused and
co-ordinated all the dramatic representations borrowed for three
centuries from the canonical and apocryphal gospels.

"It is," remarks M. Douhaire, in his eleventh lecture on the History
of Christian Poetry before the Renaissance,--"it is a great central
sea into which flow all the streams of a common poetic region. From
the refreshing pictures of the patriarchal life of Joachim and Ann to
the sublime scenes of the resurrection of Jesus Christ and the saints
of the ancient law, all, or nearly all, that has caught our eyes
before is here found anew, sometimes as a reminiscence, sometimes in
the lifelike and spirited form of a dialogue. The legend of the death
of the Holy Virgin, the legends of the apostles, of Pilate, and of the
Wandering Jew, have alone been omitted; whether because they appeared
to the authors of the mystery to break the theological unity of their
work, or because their length excluded them from a composition already
swollen far beyond reasonable limits."

The mystery opens with a council held in heaven upon the redemption
{579} of the human race. On the one side Mercy and Peace, in
allegorical character, implore pardon for our first parents and their
posterity. On the other, Justice and Truth demand the eternal
condemnation of the guilty. To conciliate them, there must be found a
man without sin who will freely die for the salvation of all. They go
forth to seek him on the earth. To the council of heaven succeeds that
of hell. Lucifer in terror convokes his demons to oppose the
redemption of the world. During their tumultuous deliberation the four
virtues return in despair to heaven. They have failed to find the
generous and pure victim necessary for expiation. The Son of God
offers himself, and the mystery of the incarnation is decreed.
[Footnote 114] St. Joachim espouses St. Ann, and Mary is born of the
union so long sterile. Then follows the scenic display of all the
legendary and gospel narratives of her education, her marriage with
St. Joseph, the incarnation of the Word, the birth of Jesus Christ,
and all the wonders of his infancy up to his dispute in the temple
with the doctors. It is at this point that the great drama completes
its first part, which is entitled "The Mystery of the Conception." It
is adapted, after the style of the time, for ninety-seven persons.

  [Footnote 114: This is the idea of St. Bernard dramatized. _In festo
  Annunciationis B.M.V. Sermo primus_, No. 9; vol. i., p. 974.]

The second part, which has given its name to the entire drama, is the
"Mystery of the Passion of Jesus Christ." It is divided into four
"days," each of which has its appropriate actors. The first day, which
is for eighty-seven persons, extends from the preaching of St. John
the Baptist, in the wilderness, to his beheading. The second requires
a hundred persons. It comprises the sermons and miracles of our
Saviour, and ends with the resurrection of Lazarus. The third
commences with the triumphal entry of Jesus Christ into Jerusalem and
ends with Annas and Caiphas. This day is for eighty-seven persons,
like the first. The fourth requires five hundred. It is the
representation of all the scenes in the tribunal of Pilate and at the
court of Herod, at Calvary and at the holy sepulchre.

The third part, entitled "The Resurrection," represents Jesus Christ
manifesting himself to his disciples in different places after he has
risen from the tomb; then his ascension and entrance into heaven in
the midst of concerts of angels; and finally, the descent of the Holy
Spirit upon the apostles assembled together in an upper chamber. We
have two different forms of this third part. One is in three days; the
other in one. The former has only forty-five persons; one hundred and
forty are needed for the latter.

These three dramas, of which the trilogy of the Passion is composed,
were played for a century and a half, sometimes together, sometimes
separately. When represented at Paris, in 1437, at the entrance of
Charles VII., they closed with a spectacle of the final judgment.
[Footnote 115] There are even found amplifiers who carry it back as
far as the origin of the world. It will be difficult to say how much
time the performance of this agglomeration of dramas required. Some
idea, however, can be formed from a representation of the Old
Testament, arranged about 1500, which set out with the creation of the
angels and did not arrive at the nativity of our Lord Jesus Christ
until after twenty-two days. Was the trilogy of the two Angevin poets
sometimes preceded by this immense prelude? We cannot tell. But the
length of the spectacle would render this conjecture incredible, since
the "Triumphant Mystery of the Acts of the Apostles," played at
Bruges, in 1536, lasted forty days, morning and afternoon. {580} These
spectacles commenced ordinarily at nine in the morning. Then at eleven
o'clock the people went to dinner, and returned again two hours after.

  [Footnote 115: "All along the great Rue St. Denis," according to
  Alain Chartier, "to the distance of a stone's throw on both sides,
  were erected scaffoldings of great and costly construction, where
  were played The Annunciation of Our Lady, The Nativity of our Lord,
  his Passion, his Resurrection, Pentecost, and the Last Judgment, the
  whole passing off quite well." (Beauchamps' _Recherches sur les
  théâters de France,_ t. i., p. 254-256).]

This drama, thirty or forty times longer than our longest classical
tragedies, contains, at the least, sixty-six thousand verses. It was
printed for the first time, in 1537, in two volumes folio, and proved
its popularity by three different editions within four years. The
emphasis of its title attests, moreover, the immense success of its
representation at Bruges the year before. It was the composition of
two brothers, Arnoul and Simon Greban, born at Compiegne. Arnoul, by
whom it was conceived and commenced about 1450, was a canon of Mans.
He died before he had finished versifying it. Simon, monk of St.
Riquier, in Ponthieu, completed it during the reign of Charles VII.,
and, consequently, before 1461. Their dramatic composition is divided
into nine books. They have left to the "directors" of the spectacle
the care of dividing it into more or fewer days, according to
circumstances.

The first book commences with the assembling of the disciples in the
upper chamber, and represents the election of St. Matthias, the
descent of the Holy Spirit, and the earlier preaching of the apostles
when braving the persecutions of the synagogue. The second book
extends from the martyrdom of St. Stephen to the conversion of St.
Paul. The third is filled with the legendary traditions concerning the
apostleship of St Thomas in India. The fourth brings back the
spectacle to Jerusalem, where Herod dies after having cut off the head
of St. James the Greater; then the scene is transferred to Antioch,
where St. Peter, at the solicitation of Simon the Magician, is put
into prison, and obtains his liberty by restoring to life the son of
the prince of that city who had been dead ten years. The fifth book
contains, first, the preaching of St. Paul at Athens, where he
converts St. Denis, the future apostle of France; then, the death of
the Blessed Virgin, at which the apostles are present, brought
together suddenly by a miracle. The sixth book is consecrated to the
apostleship and martyrdom of St. Matthew in Ethiopia, of St. Barnabas
in the Isle of Cyprus, of St. Simon and St. Jude at Babylon, and,
finally, of St. Bartholomew, whom Prince Astyages flayed alive. In the
seventh book, St. Thomas ends his apostleship in India, slain by the
sword; St. Matthias is stoned to death by the Jews; St. Andrew is
crucified by the provost of Achaia; the Emperor Claudius dies and Nero
succeeds him. In the eighth book, St. Philip and St. James the Less
suffer martyrdom at Hierapolis. The two princes combine with the
apostles against Simon the Magician and bring his miracles to naught.
St Paul recalls Patroclus to life, who had fallen from a high window
while sleeping over the apostolic sermon. In the ninth and last book,
Simon the Magician, availing himself of his most powerful enchantments
in order to deceive the Romans, having caused himself to be lifted
into the air by the demons, falls at the voice of St. Peter and is
killed. Nero avenges him by imprisoning St. Peter and St. Paul--puts
to death Proces and Martinian, their gaolers, whom they had converted
and by whom they were set at liberty--arrests the two apostles anew,
and condemns one to be crucified, the other to be beheaded. Then,
terrified by the successive apparitions of the two martyrs, who
announce to him the vengeance of heaven, he invokes the demons,
demands their counsel, kills himself, and the devils bear away his
soul to hell.

When we add that each book is filled with striking conversions, that
some terminate with the baptism of a whole city or a whole people, and
that the apostles insure the triumph of the gospel even in death, a
sufficient idea will have been given of the historic procession and
the moral unity of this drama, or rather of this epic worked up in
dialogue and arranged for the {581} stage. But in order to get a
clearer notion of its theatrical power and poetic features, it is
necessary to direct our attention, in the first place, to the interest
of the legends which are here blended constantly with history; and, in
the second place, to the fairy art and the magnificence of the
spectacle.

Here, for instance, is an example of the legendary poetry interwoven
in the piece. We borrow it from the third book. Gondoforus, king of
India, wishes to build a magnificent palace; but he is in want of
architects, and therefore sends his provost Abanes to Rome in search
of one. The messenger mounts at once on a dromedary: he is followed by
a servant leading a camel. In three and a half hours they are at
Caesarea in Palestine, where the apostle St. James is dwelling. St.
Michael had descended from heaven to anticipate the arrival of Abanes,
and commands the apostle, in the name of our Lord, to offer himself as
architect. Directed by the archangel, he accosts Abanes and tells him
that he is the man he seeks. They breakfast together and set out, not
this time on a dromedary and a camel, but in a ship conducted by
Palinurus, who had just arrived, bringing St. James, the son of
Zebedee, from Spain to Palestine. While they are making the voyage,
the king of Andrinopolis is holding counsel upon the manner of
celebrating the nuptials of his daughter Pelagia, who is espoused to
the young chevalier Denis; and the result of this deliberation is that
he must invite everybody who can come. The apostle and the Provost
disembark at Andrinopolis at very moment when the herald the
proclamation, in the name of the king, summoning to the banquet
citizens of all conditions and even rangers--pilgrims and wayfarers.
St. Thomas consequently is present at the nuptial feast. A young
Jewess chants a roundelay:

  There is a God of Hebrew story.
  Dwelling in eternal glory
  Who first of all things claims our love:
  Who made the earth, sea, sky above,
  And taught the morning stars to sing.
  High would I laud this virtuous king,
  And blaming naught, his praises ring
  Through every hall, through every grove.
  There is a God of Hebrew story,
  Dwelling in eternal glory,
  Who first of all things claims our love.  [Footnote 116]

  [Footnote 116: She commences in Hebrew: A sarahel zadab aheboin, Aga
  sela tanmeth thavehel Elyphaleth a der deaninin, etc. Then she
  translates her roundelay into French.]

St. Thomas, charmed with this song, begs that it may be repeated, and
the king's butler boxes his ears.

  Ere the morrow shall be through,
  Thy hand its fault will sorely rue,

says the apostle, adding--

  'Twere better for thy purgatory,
  To suffer anguish transitory.

This prediction is not tardy of accomplishment. The butler is sent to
the fountain by the cup-bearer. A lion comes up, and with a snap of
his teeth bites off the guilty hand, while the poor man dies repentant
and commending his soul to God. In the banquet hall all is gay
confusion, when presently a dog enters with the dissevered hand. The
king, informed of the prophecy and its accomplishment, prostrates
himself with his whole family at the feet of the apostle, who blesses
him. All at once there appears a branch of palm covered with dates.
The wedded couple eat of it and then fall asleep. In their dreams
angels counsel them to preserve their virginity. After having baptized
the king of Andrinopolis and all his household, St. Thomas renews his
journey with his guide, and arrives in India.

Gondoforus and his brother Agatus salute the architect whom Abanes has
brought. "Well, master, at what school did you study your art?" "My
master surpasses all others in excellence." "And of whom did he learn
his science?"

  "Master and teacher had he none,
  He learneth from himself alone."

"Where is he?"

  "In a country far away,
  He lives and ruleth regally:
  The sons of men his servants be,
  His twelve apprentices are we."

{582}

The king, amazed at the knowledge of the stranger, gives him a vast
sum of gold, for the construction of his palace. But it was not an
earthly edifice that the apostle proposed to build--it was a heavenly
and spiritual edifice whose materials were alms and good works. He
therefore distributes among the beggars whom he meets all the money
which has been given him. At the end of two years, Gondoforus comes to
see the building, and not finding it, he thus addresses St. Thomas and
Abanes:

  "Scoundrels without conscience born,
  Where has all my money gone?
  My trust in you has cost me dear.

THOMAS

  Sire, therewith I did uprear
  A palace fair, of rare device
  For you--

AGATUS.

  Where is't?

THOMAS.

  In Paradise."

The Indian king, who does not understand that style of architecture,
throws St. Thomas and Abanes into prison. Scarcely has he returned
home with his followers, when Agatus suddenly dies. The angels descend
in haste to bear his soul to heaven.  [Footnote 117] "What do I see?"
he cries. "The palace which Thomas has made for thy brother," replies
Raphael. "Great God, but I am not pure enough to be its porter!" "Thy
brother," said Uriel, "has made himself unworthy of it. But if thou
desirest, we will supplicate our Lord to restore thee to earth, and
this palace shall be thine when thou hast repaid the king his money."
The soul of Agatus joyfully agreed to this, and was restored to its
body by Uriel. Then Agatus, as soon as life returned, arose and told
Gondoforus all that he had seen, proposing to reimburse him for all
the expenses of this heavenly palace the possession of which he
desired. The amazed king, wishing to secure the beautiful palace for
himself, goes and flings himself at the feet of St. Thomas, beseeching
baptism for himself and court.

  [Footnote 117: "Although the arts of the middle ages," says Father
  Cahier, "did not adopt an absolutely invariable form for the
  representation of souls, the most ordinary symbol is that of a
  small, nude figure escaping from the mouth, like a sword drawn from
  the sheath." _Monagraphie de la Cathédrale de Bourges_, p. 158, note
  2.]

When the "Mystery of the Acts of the Apostles" was played at Bruges in
1536, so perfect was the representation of this legend and the other
marvels of the piece, says the old historian Du Berry, that many of
the hearers thought it real and not feigned. They saw, among a
thousand other wondrous sights, the provost of the king of the Indies
enter riding on a huge dromedary, very well constructed, which moved
its head, opened its mouth, and ran out its tongue. When the butler
was punished, they saw a lion steal up and bite off the hand, and a
dog who bore it still bleeding into the midst of the feasters. These
were not the only animal prodigies that passed under the eyes of the
spectators. In the representation of the sixteenth book, for example,
two sorcerers, irritated against St. Matthew, caused a multitude of
serpents to appear, and the apostle summoned forth from the earth a
very terrible dragon which devoured them. In another part of this same
book, St. Philip, having been led before the god Mars, makes a dragon
leap forth from the mouth of the idol, which kills the son of the
pagan bishop, two tribunes, and two varlets. In the course of the
seventh book, a still more extraordinary automaton appears. St. Andrew
delivers Greece from a monstrous serpent fifty cubits long. "Here,"
says the note introduced for the ordering of the mystery, "an oak must
be planted, and a serpent must be coiled beneath the said oak,
glaring, and must vomit forth a great quantity of blood and then die."

The marvels of the art multiply themselves infinitely and in all
directions. We see, for example, idols crumbling into powder at the
voice of the apostles, and temples crushing the pagans in their fall.
We see Saul {583} struck down from his horse by a great light out of
heaven; St. Thomas walking over red-hot iron; St. Barnabas fast bound
upon a cart-wheel over a pan of live coals, which burn him to cinders.
[Footnote 118] We see, also, the apostles borne through the air to
assist at the death of the Virgin. "Here lightning must be made in a
white cloud, and this cloud must float around St. John, who is
preaching at Ephesus, and he must be borne in the cloud to the gates
of Notre Dame." A moment after, "thunder and lightning must burst
forth from a white cloud which shall veil over the apostles as they
preach in different countries, and bear them before the gates of Notre
Dame." While the apostles are carrying the body of the Holy Virgin to
the tomb, chanting _In exitu Israel de Egypto_, "a rosy cloud in shape
like a coronet must descend, on which should be many holy saints
holding naked swords and darts." A mob of Jews come to lay hands on
the shrine. "As soon as they touch it, their hands must be glued to
the litter and become withered and black; and the angels in the cloud
must cast down fire upon them and a storm of darts." The sacrilegious
Jews are struck with blindness. Some of them are converted and recover
their sight. Five remain obstinate. The devils come to torment them,
and finally strangle them. "Here their souls rise in the air and the
devils bear them away." Lastly, we have the Assumption of the Holy
Virgin. "Here Gabriel puts a soul into the body of Mary, after Michael
has rolled away the stone. And the Virgin Mary rises to her knees, a
halo of glory round her like the sun. Then a grand pause of the organ
or anthem, while Mary is being placed in the cloud on which she will
ascend. The angels should sing as they disappear _Venite ascendamus_,
and the angels ought to surround the Virgin and bear her above Gabriel
and the other angels." Lifted thus above nine choirs of angels, she
elicits vast admiration, and beholding from the height of heaven St.
Thomas, who could not arrive in time to assist at her death and
receive her last benediction, she throws him her girdle.

  [Footnote 118: "Daru will pretend to burn Barnabas, and will burn a
  feigned body, and will lower Barnabas under the earth."]

Thus in this drama, requiring forty days and five hundred and thirty
persons [Footnote 119] for its performance, heaven, air, earth, hell,
all participated in the movement and the spectacle. What kind of a
theatre was required for such scenic action? In the sixteenth century
men saw theatres with two stages for the miracles of Notre Dame. The
Mysteries of the Acts of the Apostles and of the Passion required
three. Heaven was on high, hell below, earth in mid-space. Let us
attempt to build anew these theatres before the eyes of our readers.

  [Footnote 119: This is the number of actors employed in the
  representation made at Bruges in 1536, according to the calculation
  of M. Chevalier de Saint-Amand. Cahier, "_Monographie de la
  Cathédrale de Bourges,_" p. 153. We find only 484 persons in the
  "_Repertoire, des noms contenus au jeu des actes des apôtres_." See
  the edition of this "Mystery" published at Paris in 1541 by Arnoul
  and Charles les Angliers, under this title: "_Les catholiques
  OEuvres et Actes des Apôtres_."]

Paradise was an amphitheatre in form. High above appeared the Deity,
seated upon a golden throne and overlooking all--the stage and the
audience. At the four corners of his throne sat four persons
representing Peace, Mercy, Justice, Truth. At their feet were nine
choirs of angels ranged by hierarchies upon the steps. There was space
also for the blessed spirits and for the organ which accompanied the
celestial chants. Everything flashed and glittered. The painter and
the carver were prodigal of their wonders. Of this we can form a
judgment from a description of the paradise displayed at Bruges on the
representation of the "Triumphant Mystery of the Acts of the
Apostles." According to a contemporary narrative, five hundred and odd
actors, sallying forth from the abbey of St. Sulpice on Sunday
afternoon, April 30, 1536, bore with them in great pomp the apparatus
of a spectacle which they were about to give at the amphitheatre of
the _Arènes_. {584} They had a paradise twelve feet long, and eight
feet wide. "It had all around it open thrones painted to resemble
passing clouds, and both without and within were little angels as
cherubim and seraphim, powers and dominations, in bas-relief, their
hands joined and always moving. In the middle was a seat fashioned
like a rainbow, upon which was seated the Godhead--Father, Son, and
Holy Ghost; and behind were two gold suns revolving continuously in
opposing orbits. At the four corners were seats on which reposed
Justice, Peace, Truth, and Mercy, richly clothed; and beside the said
Godhead were two small angels chanting hymns and canticles to the
music of the players on the flute, the harp, the lute, the rebec, and
the viol, who circled about the paradise."

The same account describes a hell fourteen feet in length and eight in
width. "It was made in the fashion of a rock, upon which was raised a
tower always burning and sending forth flames. At the four corners of
the said rock were four small towers, within which appeared spirits
undergoing diverse torments, and on the fore-edge of the rock writhed
a great serpent, hissing and emitting fire from his mouth and ears and
nostrils; and along the passages of the said rock twined and crawled
all kinds of serpents and great toads."

"The form and dimensions of this fiery cavern varied according to the
exigencies of the dramatic action; but its place was invariably in the
lower part of the theatre. In this were assembled all the _diablerie_,
usually comprising a dozen principal personages; and from thence
issued a terrible storm of howls and shrieks. Lucifer was there, and
Satan, Belial, Cerberus, Astaroth, Burgibus, Leviathan, Proserpine,
and other devils great and small. The gate through which they passed
when coming to earth to torment mankind, appeared in shape like the
enormous jaws of a dragon, and was called hell's mouth."   [Footnote
120]

  [Footnote 120: At the representation of the "Mystery of the Passion"
  at Metz, in July, 1437. "The mouth of hell was exceedingly well
  made, for it opened and shut when the devils wished to enter or go
  forth, and it had a great steel under-work." _Chronique de Metz_,
  MS.; composed by a curé of St. Eustache, cited by Beauchamps, in the
  _Recherches sur les theatres_.'']

Limbo, when demanded by the peculiar features of the play, as in the
Mystery of the Resurrection, was placed below hell, and was symbolized
by a huge tower with slits and gratings on all sides, in order that
the spectators might catch glimpses of the spirits confined there. As
these spirits were only statuettes, there was stationed behind the
tower a body of men who howled and shrieked in concert, and when
anything was to be said to the audience, a strong and lusty voice
spoke in the name of all.  [Footnote 121] When a purgatory was needed,
it was located and constructed after nearly the same manner.

  [Footnote 121: "_Mysteres inèdits du XVe siècle_" published by
  Achille Jubinal, t.i., preface, p. xlii. (Paris, 1837). Let us
  remark here in passing, that M. Jubinal, who is better acquainted
  with the manuscripts of the middle ages than with his catechism, has
  confounded limbo with purgatory. ]

The stage, properly so called, which was on a level with the audience,
represented earth--that is, the different countries to which the
dramatic action was successively transferred. It therefore required a
vastly greater space than hell or paradise; the one symbolized by a
cavern, and the other by an amphitheatre. It was divided into
compartments, and inscriptions indicated the countries and the cities.
This division was effected by scaffolds entirely separate, when there
was room enough. Thus at the "Mystery of the Passion," represented at
Paris in 1437, at the entrance of King Charles VII., the scaffolds
occupied the whole of the Rue St. Denis for a distance of a stone's
throw on either side, and the more remote stage, on which the last
judgment was exhibited, was before Le Chatelet. The spectators were
obliged to travel from one part to the other with the actors. But they
remained seated, and could see the whole without change of place, at
the performance of the same mystery, given the same year at Metz, in
the {585} plain of Veximiel. For the vast semicircle destined for the
assembly had nine rows of seats, and behind were the grand chairs for
the lords and dames assembled from all parts of the province, and even
from Germany. It was the same at Bruges on the preceding year at the
representation of the "Acts of the Apostles." The enclosure occupied
the whole space of the ancient amphitheatre, commonly called the Ditch
of the Arènes. It had two stages, and vast pavilions protected the
spectators from the inclemency of the weather and the heat of the sun.

But three years after, in 1541, when the burgesses of Paris played
that immense drama in the hall of l'Hotel de Flandre, or when the
Fraternity of the Passion gave their representations for a century and
a half, at their theatre of the Trinity, in a hall one hundred and
twenty-nine feet long and thirty-six feet deep, how were local
distinctions indicated? Then the stage, in default of space, was
divided by simple partitions, and inscriptions, indicating beyond
mistake the houses, cities, and diverse countries, were more
indispensable than ever. We may remark, finally, that in the great
mysteries, divided by days, it was easy during the temporary
suspension of the play to give a new aspect to the stage by a change
of scenery. Sometimes, also, as in the preceding century, the actors
were obliged to inform the audience that they were transported from
one place to another by saying, "Here we come to Bethlehem--to
Jerusalem. We are making sail for Rome--for Athens, etc." And the
illusion was kept up, as far as could be, by the cessation of the
music, in the interval during which, to use an expression of M.
Sainte-Beuve, the mighty train swept on across space and time.

Passing from the architecture of the theatre to the physiognomy of the
actors, let us study the manner in which they were recruited. There
were stock companies, and extemporized companies. Of the first
description were the "Fraternity of the Passion," so celebrated in the
history of the representations of the "mysteries" at the end of the
middle ages. There were also the burgesses of Paris, artisans of all
handicrafts, who, at the end of the fourteenth century, assembled at
the village of St. Maur, near Vincennes, to give on festal days their
pious spectacles. Interdicted June 3, 1398, by ordinance of the
provost of Paris, who mistrusted this novelty, they obtained from King
Charles VI., by letters patent of December 4, 1402, permission to play
even at Paris, and at the same time their society was elevated into a
permanent fraternity, under the title of _De la Passion de Notre
Seigneur,_ and was installed near the gate St. Denis in the ancient
hospital of the Trinity, then for some time disused.

It would appear that in certain provinces, cities, and even parishes,
had, like Paris, their association of miracle-players. But, most
commonly, these companies were improvised, and consisted of
volunteers. This was the case at the gigantic representations of the
Mystery of the Acts of the Apostles at Bruges and at Paris. We have
still "the cry and public proclamation made at Paris, Thursday, the
sixteenth of December, 1540, by the command of our lord the king,
Francis I. by name, and monsieur the provost of Paris, summoning the
people to fill the parts necessary for the playing of said mystery."
At eight o'clock of the morning there were assembled at the Hotel de
Flandre, where the "mystery" was to be performed, all those who were
charged with its management, rhetoricians, gentlemen of the long robe
and the short, lawyers and commoners, clergymen and laity, in vast
numbers. They paraded through the streets in fine apparel, all well
mounted according to their estate and capacity, preceded by six
trumpeters and escorted by numerous sergeants of the provost, who kept
the crowd in check. They halted at every square, and, after a triple
flourish of trumpets, a public crier made the proclamation, which was
in bad rhyme. Ten days {586} after, on St. Stephen's day, the large
hall of the Hotel de Flandre--the usual place, says the narrative, for
making the records and holding the rehearsals of the mysteries, was
filled with a crowd of burgesses and merchants, clergy and laity, who
came to exhibit their talents in the presence of the commissioners and
lawyers deputed to hear the voice of each person, retaining and
remunerating them according to the measure of their excellence in the
parts required. The selections having been made, the rehearsals
commenced and continued every day until the performance of the
mystery, which was played at the beginning of the next year.

Whoever deemed himself of any value responded generously to these
appeals, not only among the _bourgeois_ and gentlemen--artisans and
magistrates--but also the curés and their vicars, the canons, and
sometimes even the friars. Women alone were excluded, the female parts
being always filled by men. The participation of the clergy in these
scenic diversions is readily accounted for, when one considers the
moral aim and the religious character of the plays. All these dramas
represent the mysteries and history of Christianity. All commence,
either with readings from the Holy Scripture or by the chanting of the
hymns of the Church, or by the recitation of the Ave Maria--the whole
assemblage kneeling and joining in the services. All ended, moreover,
as in preceding centuries, with the _Te Deum_. The spectacle was
frequently interrupted by preaching, and more than once, at the end of
a dramatic day, actors and spectators might be seen wending their way
to church to offer up thanks to heaven. Beside, did not the clergy
find themselves on their own ground, in these plays, instituted in
order to increase the solemnity of their sacred days, and evincing
unquestionable traces of a liturgic origin? Let us add finally, with
Dom Piolin, that a distinction was rigorously maintained between
profane pieces and those whose aim was the edification and the
instruction of the faithful; that while zealously keeping in check all
acting which could possibly be turned to license, the clergy furthered
with all their power the exhibiting of the "mysteries." The learned
Benedictin presents to us the chapter of St. Julien at Mans
preventing, in 1539, the ringing of the cathedral bells in order not
to interrupt a representation of the Miracle of Theophilus; and
stopping them again, in 1556, and, in addition, hastening the morning
offices and delaying those of evening, in order to accommodate them to
the time of the performance of the "Mystery of the Conception of the
most Holy Virgin."

After the distribution of parts, all the actors were obliged on the
spot to pledge themselves by oath and under penalty of a fine never to
be absent from the rehearsals. A second appeal to the public good-will
was necessary to secure a wardrobe for the hundreds of players, who on
the day of exhibition wore sometimes the richest jewels and the most
beautiful stuffs of a whole province. The magnificence of the
spectacle at Bruges, in 1536, would strike us as incredible, if the
author of the narrative which has preserved us the details, had not
taken the precaution to forewarn his readers at the start that he kept
within the truth. As illustrating its splendor, take the following
examples, gathered here and there from the volume.

St. James the Lesser wore a scarf estimated at 450 gold crowns. The
girdle of St. Matthew was valued at more than 500 crowns sterling.
Queen Dampdeomopolis, who was mounted on an ambling pad which was
covered with a housing of black velvet and had a gold fringed harness,
wore a petticoat of cloth of gold, beneath a robe of crimson damask
bordered with gold chains, while down the front ran a rich beading of
precious stones, rubies and diamonds, of the value of more than 2,000
crowns. This is not all. From head to foot gold and jewels glittered
{587} on her person. Her head-dress was surmounted by a white feather,
and on her forehead hung by a little thread of black silk a huge
oriental pearl. The wife of Herod Agrippa had for her girdle a great
gold chain of more than 1,000 crowns in value; from which hung
chaplets carved in facets. She had on her neck another great chain and
a collar of pearls, whence hung a ring and sprig of four diamonds, and
on her stomacher was a _dorure_ which bore a gold dog having a great
ruby hanging from its neck, and a great pearl suspended to the tail.

All these princesses--and they could be counted by dozens--had with
them their maids, their squires, and their pages, handsomely clothed.
There were likewise princes, kings, and emperors, who came from all
quarters of the world.

Nothing approaches to the magnificence of Nero. It would carry us too
far out of our way if we should mention in detail the numerous and
brilliant cortege which preceded the formidable emperor when the
actors issued from the abbey of St. Sulpice, where they robed
themselves before entering the theatre. First came a troop of
musicians composed of a fifer, six trumpeters, and four players on the
tamborine; next the grand provost of Rome, mounted on a splendid horse
caparisoned with violet-colored satin, fringed with white silk; then
four cavaliers attending the ensign-bearer of Nero; presently four
companies of Moors crowned with laurels and bearing, some, masses of
gilded silver, others, vases of silver and gold or _cornucopiae_
filled with _fleurs de lis_--or the armorial bearings of the empire
inter-worked on triumphal hats. Lastly, a horse appeared covered to
the ground with flesh-colored velvet, bordered with tracery of gold,
into which were woven the devices of Nero. This horse, conducted by
two lackeys clothed also with flesh-colored velvet, bore a cushion of
silk and cloth-of-gold in Turkish work, on which lay three crowns, the
first, solid gold; the second, all pearls; the third, composed of
every kind of precious stone of marvellous beauty and richness--and
these three crowns formed the imperial head-gear.

Next there came into sight another horse, whose harness and caparison
were of blue satin, fringed with gold and bestrewn with stars made of
embroidery of gold stuff on a violet field. The two lackeys who led it
by the bridle, had their heads uncovered and were clothed with velvet
of a violet crimson, purfled with gold, slashed with broad slashes,
through which the lining of white satin showed itself in folds. This
was the saddle-horse of the emperor.

Afterward came six players on the hautboy clothed in sarcinet of a
violet crimson.

Nero appeared last, borne on a high tribunal eight feet wide and ten
long, and covered to the earth with cloth-of-gold, strewn with large
embroidered eagles, "copied as closely as possible from the life." The
chair on which he was seated was entirely covered with another
cloth-of-gold crimped. His _sagum_, or military cloak, was of blue
velvet all purfled with gold, with large flowers in needle-work after
the antique; the sleeves slashed, and displaying beneath the
undulating folds of the lining, which was of gold stuff on a violet
field. His robe, a crimson velvet, adorned with flowers and interlaced
with gold thread, was lined with velvet of the same color. The cape
was serrated, the points interblending, and was bestrewn with a
profusion of great pearls, and at each point hung a great tassel of
other pearls. His hat, of Persian velvet and of _a tyrannical
fashion_, was bordered with chains of gold and strewn with a great
quantity of rings. His gold crown, with its triple branches, was
filled with gems so numerous, so varied, and of so great a price that
it is impossible to specify them. And his collar was not less
garnished. His buskins, of Persian velvet, with small slashes, were
laced with chains of gold, and some rings hung from his {588} garters.
He placed one of his feet upon a casket which enclosed the imperial
seal and was covered with silver cloth sown with gems, thus
symbolizing that the power of the empire was his, and that all things
were submissive to him. In his hand was a battle-axe well gilded. His
port was haughty and his mien very magnificent. The tribunal, with the
monarch upon it, was borne by eight captive kings, the drapery
concealing from the audience everything save their heads, on which
rested crowns of gold. A troupe of musicians followed with trumpets,
clarions, tamborines, and fifes. The procession was closed by
twenty-four cavaliers, captains, chevaliers, squires,
cup-bearers--some wearing the imperial livery, others clad according
to their pleasure; and by chariots which were loaded with the
emperor's baggage and _vivanderie_, and were drawn by eighteen or
twenty horses.

Nero's sagum, with its splendid flower-work _after the antique_, his
hat of _tyrannical fashion_, his battle-axe, the eagles embroidered on
the drapery which covered his tribunal, the laurel crowns which begirt
the brows of his Moorish guards, the _cornucopiae_, the vases of gold
and silver which they carried, all indicate a tendency toward
historical costume. This is also seen in the robes of the seventy-two
disciples _approaching the ancient manner_--the caps of the high priests,
Josephus and Abiachar, made _according to the Jewish manner_--the
dagger of Polemius, king of Armenia, the golden handle of which was
prepared _after the antique_--the robe, _fashioned after the Hebrew
manner_, which was worn by the young Jew whom we saw singing at the
marriage of Pelagia and Denis. But apart from these examples and some
others which are found here and there in the pompous catalogue of the
actors of Bruges, everybody used great liberty and much fancifulness
in the choice of habiliments. Each person took the most beautiful
things he could lay hands on. The cortege of Nero closed, as we have
seen, by cavaliers dressed _after their own pleasure_. The marechal of
Migdeus, king of Greater Ynde, and his valet, had taffeta clothes
while bearing on their shoulders bars of iron and mallets. The lord of
Quantilly, author of the relation from which we have derived our
details, after having spoken of a group of eighteen or twenty persons
blind, halt, demoniac, lepers and vagabonds, confesses that they were
too well clad to accord with their condition.

Thus far we have concerned ourselves with the history of the mysteries
and their representation; we shall now proceed to a critical
retrospect of the subject.

The trilogy of the "Mystery of the Passion" and the "Triumphant
Mystery of the Acts of the Apostles," deserve an important place in
the history of French dramatic art, not only because they characterize
the epoch of which they were the two chief works, but also because
they have an intimate and an essential connection with the tragic
masterpieces of the eighteenth century--a connection also which has
been little noticed. We propose to consider the literary value and the
influence of those two plays, commencing with an estimate of the _mise
en scène_ and the spectacle whose fairy-like pomp and immense
popularity we have just taken in view.

The dramatic writers and the managers of the "mysteries" were well
aware that to move the multitude the eye is of greater power than the
ear. We have seen that they directed all their energies to the marvels
of stage effect. But they did not listen to the precept of the poet, a
precept founded on the very nature of art, which enjoins that only
those things should be interwoven into the composition which can be
witnessed without incredulity and without disgust. If the devils
intervene, they must be introduced with their bat-shaped wings ever
moving, and fire issuing from their nostrils, their mouth, and their
ears, while they held in their hands {589} fiery distaffs shaped like
serpents; that Cerberus, porter of hell, should have on his helmet
three heads emitting flame, and that the keys he carried in his hand
should seem to have just issued from a furnace, they sparkled so; that
the long and hideous breasts of Proserpine should drip incessantly
with blood, and with jets of fire at intervals; that Lucifer should
have a casque vomiting forth flames unceasingly, and should hold in
his grasp handfuls of vipers which moved in fiery twists. It was then
everywhere fire, and, above all, real fire--for the contemporary
authority who furnishes us with the details is particular to tell us,
two several times, that there were people employed to feed this fire.

The fire thus carried about by the devils in all their goings and
comings, and ever bursting from the mouth of hell when opened, became
naturally the occasion of numerous accidents. We have an example of
this nature which might have been tragical, but by good luck was only
ludicrous, in the performance of the "Mystery of St. Martin" at
Seurre, in 1496. At the commencement of the spectacle, which lasted
three days, and opened with a scene of _diablerie_, the man who held
the rôle of Satan having wished, says an official report of this
epoch, to ascend to earth, caught fire in his nether garments, and was
severely burnt. But he was so suddenly rescued and reclothed, that,
without any one being aware of the accident, he went through with his
part and then retired to his house. The affair had occurred in the
morning between seven and eight o'clock. When he returned at one in
the afternoon, the interval allowed, according to usage, for the
audience to dine in being now over, he addressed to Lucifer, who was
the cause of his misadventure, four impromptu verses that the public
applauded exceedingly, but their grossness prevents our reproducing
them.

These material imitations of physical nature and these exaggerations
of the spectacle appear everywhere. When they wished, for example, to
represent a martyr, it was necessary that the victim should be visibly
tortured. We have even, in the representation of the "Mystery of the
Acts of the Apostles," St. Barnabas disappearing adroitly and leaving
his counterfeit presentment in the hands of the executioner, who binds
it upon a wheel and sets it revolving over a burning brazier before
the eyes of the spectators. When St. Paul was decapitated, it was
requisite that his head, as it fell to the ground, should leap three
times, and that at each bound, in accordance with the tradition, a
fountain should gush forth. When they represented the crucifixion of
our Lord, and the despair of Judas, it was necessary that the Saviour
of the world should be seen nailed to the cross for the space of three
hours, and that the traitor be hung miserably from a tree. On the
performance of the "Mystery of the Passion" before the people of
Lorraine in 1437, God, according to a chronicler of the time, was
impersonated by "Sir Nicole don Neuf-Chastel, who was curé of St.
Victor at Metz, and would have nearly died on the cross, had he not
been succored; and another priest had to be put in his place to
perfect the representation of the crucifixion. The next day the said
curé, after having reposed, played the resurrection and bore his part
superbly. Another priest, who was called Messire Jehan de Nicey, and
who was chaplain of Metrange, acted Judas, and was almost killed by
hanging, for his heart failed him, and he was right speedily cut
down."

The taste of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries for these
materialistic representations was such that for the scenic features of
the longer mysteries they contented themselves sometimes with a simple
pantomime. Indeed, on September 8, 1424, at the solemn entry of the
Duke of Bedford, the English Regent of France, the children of Paris,
to adopt the expression of Sauval, played the Mystery of the Old and
New Testament without {590} speech or sign, as if they had been images
carved on a frieze.

The infancy of art, which appeared everywhere at this epoch in the
representation of the "Mysteries," was especially visible in their
style and in their composition. A rapid examination of its literary
faults will suffice to show that the French drama of the middle ages,
progressive, if not as regards its truthfulness, at least in the pomp
of its spectacle, was in rapid decline in respect to poetry.

The first and gravest literary fault of this drama in its
decadence--that which includes all the others--is the absence of all
that makes the soul and life of the drama--of everything which
distinguishes it most essentially from history. There is neither plot,
nor peripetia, nor characters, nor passions. In the thirteenth
century, Ruteboeuf, in the Miracle of Theophilus, bestows on his hero
a passionate nature, and develops the action not by events in their
ordinary sequence, but by the stormy struggles of the heart and the
agitations of conscience. One principal personage is put upon the
stage, and a single incident carries the play rapidly forward to a
unique denouement. Jean Bodel, in the "Play of St. Nicholas," less
skilled than his contemporaries in making his intrigue keep step to
the movements of passion, consoled himself with laying violent hands
on the legend, to which he gives an entirely new form. In the
fourteenth century we find no longer, it is true, in the anonymous
authors of the "Miracles of Notre Dame" either that creating power, or
those passionate intrigues, or that simple and rapid movement, but at
least we meet with some true pathos in certain scenes, and in a great
number of monologues there are pronounced and well-sustained
characters in the female parts, especially while the dramatic interest
concentrates on one person. Open the two most celebrated works of the
fifteenth and sixteenth centuries--the "Mystery of the Passion" of the
two Jehan Michels, and the "Triumphant Mystery of the Acts of the
Apostles" of the brothers Greban--there is nothing more than a pure
and simple _mise en scène_ of history or of legend, unrolling itself
slowly as the events arrive in their chronological order. There is no
unity either of time or of place, as in the past; nor is there unity
of action. Personal interest has ceased; the passions have ceased;
vigorous characterizations have ceased. Everybody speaks frigidly from
one end of the piece to the other, and for forty days, and one can
scarcely find throughout the plays a terse or impassioned line. There
is no progression in the movement; no advance in intrigue; no fresh
complication; the tiresome dramatist jogs along without troubling
himself about denouement.

This drama, which has no longer a dramatic art save in its dialogue
and its spectacle--is it then absolutely without poetry? Some critics
seem to have thought so, since they dwelt only on its absurdities and
its literary poverty. And it must be avowed that puerility,
triviality, indecency even, so dominate there, that it is easy, when
approaching it, to give one's self over to a universal disgust.
Others, recognizing its poverty as a whole, have found some redeeming
features. Of this number are M. Onesime Le Roy, whose patriotic
admiration of the Artesian works has perhaps led him too far, and M.
Douhaire, who has better controlled his enthusiasm. M. Douhaire is, in
our opinion, the critic who was not only the first to study, but has
also most clearly comprehended the religious beauties of the later
mediaeval "mysteries." "We appeal," he says in 1840, in his lectures
on the History of Christian Poetry,--"we appeal to the memory and the
emotions of the reader. Who is there that does not recall with the
most ineffable sentiments of joy those graceful scenes of the gospel
of the Nativity of our Lady, the interior of the house of Joachim, his
retirement among the shepherds, the triumphal song of St. Ann after
the birth of Mary, the life of the {591} Virgin in the temple? Who has
not present in his memory the grand pictures of the Gospel of
Nicodemus, the conversations of the patriarchs in limbo, the descent
of Jesus Christ into hell, the silent apparition of Charinus and
Leucius in the Sanhedrim, the terrible portrayal of the last days of
Pilate, and that personification of the Jew in Ahasuerus whose
grandeur surpasses the loftiest conceptions of profane poetry? But it
is not alone for its depth, it is also for its form, or at least for
the arrangement and effect of its combinations, that our mysteries are
remarkable. Doubtless in respect to theatrical art they are more than
defective. They have indeed, to speak truly, no art at all. The events
are not co-ordinated with a preconceived idea, and distributed in a
manner to lead forward to a catastrophe or to a final peripetia. The
order of facts is habitually that of time. They are historic dialogues
and nothing more. But as in history the divine and the human, the
supernatural and the real, are almost always blended together, the
composers of the 'mysteries' have diligently worked out this
interrelation. Aided by the construction of their theatres, which
permitted them to move many scenes, they combined these actions in a
manner to elicit extraordinary effects, unfolding simultaneously to
the eye of the spectator heaven, earth, hell. They initiated him into
the secret of life, showed to him the mysterious warfare of souls, and
by this spectacle made his spirit pass through terrors that any other
drama would be powerless to produce."

Subscribing entirely, and it is an easy thing for us, to the judgment
of the author of the "Course upon Christian Poetry," let us guard
ourselves from going too far by extending the conclusion beyond the
premises. Where does M. Douhaire find these poetical beauties which he
offers for our admiration? In the trilogy of the "Mystery of the
Passion." Now this vast dramatic composition is nothing more, in fact,
than an agglomeration of the "mysteries" which preceded the work of
the two Jehan Michels. These charming scenes, these grand pictures,
which are met with here and there, are only the fragments of a more
ancient poetry, that have been gathered up anew. When the dramatists
of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries enter upon original
composition, the decline of poetry is seen everywhere, in the detail
as well as in the whole, in the style as in the conception. We know of
but one merit which truly belongs to them--it is the happy development
they have given to stage effect by a simultaneous presentation of
heaven, hell, and the earth--shadowing forth by this triple
theatrical action the incessant intervention of the supernatural
powers in the destinies of humanity. But while this conception is
majestic, its literary execution is wretched. We have a proof in the
"Triumphant Mystery of the Acts of the Apostles," written from
beginning to end without verve, or coloring, or nobleness, by the two
most celebrated dramatic poets of their age, whom Marot calls--

  "The two Grebans of high-resounding line."

Having noticed the literary poverty of the dramatic poetry of this
epoch, we will now point out the principal sources of its faults. They
are two. The first is a misconception of the dramatists respecting the
nature of the types proposed for the imitation of art. The second is a
consequence of the popularity and the indefinite length of their
spectacles.

It is impossible to compare the meagreness, the languor, and the
stupidity of the two brothers Greban with the bright and graceful
vivacity of the writer who praises them, without being amazed at the
eulogies he bestows, and demanding what can be the reason of this
misjudgment on the part of a poet, the most spiritual and the most
delicate of the reign of Francis I. It comes from the false idea which
the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries formed of the dramatic style,
or, to speak more {592} exactly, of the entire dramatic art. In place
of seeking the ideal, they sought reality, and, what is worse, it was
in the commonest realities that the dramatists of that time searched
after the type of their language and the morals of their heroes. We
have already remarked the same aberration of public taste in the far
too materialistic imitations of the spectacle.

"Under a literary and dramatic point of view," says M. Sainte-Beuve,
"that which is the essential characteristic of the mysteries of the
sixteenth century is its low vulgarity and its too minute triviality.
The authors had but one aim. They sought to portray in the men and
events of other times the scenes of the common life which went on
under their eyes. With them the whole art was reduced to this
imitation, or rather to this faithful _facsimile_. If they exhibited a
populace, it was recognizable at once as that of the market-places or
of the city. Every tribunal was a copy of the Châtelet or of the
Parliament. The headsmen of Nero, of Domitian, Daru, Pesart, Torneau,
Mollestin, seemed taken from the _Place du Palais de Justice_ or from
Montfaucon. . . .  What the public above all admired, was the perfect
conformity of the dialogue, and of the other features of the play,
with everyday realities. The good townsmen could not cease gazing at
and listening to so natural an imitation of their daily customs and
their domestic bickerings. All contemporary praise bears upon this
exact resemblance. It is in this way that common and uncultured
minds--strangers to the intimate and profound joys of art--readily
accept false coin, and content themselves with pleasures at a low
price."

This habitual imitation of the common life and of everything trivial
is found even in scenes of a wholly ideal nature in heaven and in
hell. The language of God and of paradise is vulgar; that of the
devils is grotesque, sometimes even indecent. At the commencement of
the mysteries of the brothers Greban, while the apostles have
assembled together in an upper chamber to elect St. Matthias, Lucifer
orders the demons to wander over the earth, and before going the evil
spirits request his benediction. He replies to them:

  "Devils damned, in malediction
  O'er you each, with power blighted,
  My paw I stretch, of God accursed,
  From sins and misdeeds all absolving,
  Up! Set forth!" etc.

When Satan and Astaroth bring the souls of Ananias and Saphira to
hell, Lucifer is so transported with joy that he bids the demon hosts
exult:

  "Let the crowd of the damned,
  Here, before my tribunal,
  Sing an anthem infernal!"

Belial and Burgibus, he adds, will lead the treble: Berits, Cerberus,
and some others, the tenor; Astaroth and Leviathan, the bass. At once
they all begin to chant in chorus:

  "The more he has, the more he asks for
  Our grand devil, Lucifer.
  Does he wish the sky to pour
  Souls by thousands running o'er?
  The more they come, he longs for more,
  For his appetite is sore.
  The more he has, the more he asks for,
  Our grand devil, Lucifer."

Lucifer, deafened by their hubbub, stops his ears, and tries to
silence them. Impossible! "On with the song!" cries Belial, and the
uproar continues.

The "Mystery of the Passion" also commences with a scene in hell, the
tone of which appears still more singular. God is in consultation with
the heavenly court upon the redemption of the human race. Lucifer,
alarmed, convokes his assembly.

  "Devils of hell-fire, horned and terrible,
  Infamous dogs, why sit ye idle?
  Start up, ye fat ones, young, old, and naked;
  Serpents atrocious, hump-backed and twisted."

The devils hastily assemble. Satan is the first to respond to the
gracious appeal.

  "What is't thou wishest, bull-dog outrageous--
  Fetid, infected, abhorrent, mendacious?
  For thee we have forfeited heaven and all,
  To suffer such evils as no one can measure--
  And now, is cursing your only pleasure?"

Belial calls Lucifer a _bag full of rottenness,_ whose only food is
toads, and {593} complains also that it is his nature to torment them.

"This constant habit with the mystery-makers of representing the
demons as insulting each other in their colloquies," says M. Douhaire,
"is born of a profound thought. We are told that the wicked despise
each other. It is this which the Christian dramatists put into action.
Nothing can give a more terrible idea of hell than these disputes,
where the demons mutually accuse each other of sufferings which cannot
be abated."

Here is a reflection full of justice, and indispensable for a right
interpretation of the moral aim of the "mysteries." But there still
remains the literary and philosophical remark of M. Saint-Beuve upon
the general tendency of this epoch to a reproduction of the morals and
language of the most common and vulgar life. For the dramatists might
have represented the wickedness of the demons--the horror and disorder
of hell--without seeking their phrases in a vocabulary of the lowest
stamp.

The frequent change from seriousness to buffoonery, from the beautiful
to the burlesque, has a similar origin in the tastes of our ancestors
for the actualities of ordinary life, where these transitions are
habitual. But it also rose out of the necessity of keeping up the
interest of a spectacle which continued many days, sometimes many
weeks. Variety was a necessity. That popular assembly would consent to
weep or even to be serious morning and evening for a month? Let us
take an example where triviality, liveliness, and morality are all
united together, We borrow it from M. Onesime Le Roy, who found it in
an unedited "Mystery of the Passion." and published it in 1837.

The anonymous dramatist, after having depicted in beautiful and
touching scenes the sweet virtues and good deeds of St. Joachim and
St. Ann, brings on the stage two knaves who wish to make experiments
on their pious simplicity. "The fellow, who has more than one trick in
his bag," says the learned critic from whom we transcribe the
analysis, "pretending that cold weather makes him insane, styles
himself Claquedent [chatterer]; and the other is called Babin, which
word, according to the lexicographer Rouchi, signifies 'foolish,'
'imbecile.' Babin, despite his name and simple air, is more artful
than even Claquedent, whom he persuades to imitate madness and to let
himself be bound, the better to excite compassion. Claquedent, tied up
with cords by Babin, begins to gnash his teeth and to utter piteous
cries, which bring the wife of Joachim. This holy woman wishes to
relieve him. Babin shouts out not to touch him:

  "Ha, good dame! be wary,
  Touch him not, I pray thee,
  Lest, perchance, he slay thee!"

After a long scene of horrible contortions on one side, and of tender
compassion on the other, Babin says he is going to lead away
Claquedent, and receives money from the charitable dame, who bids him
take good care of his friend, and to return _when the money is gone_.
Babin, upon the latter part of this advice, replies pleasantly, "O
madame, _without fail!_" As soon as Ann has gone away, Claquedent says
to Babin, "Quick, untie me!" But the latter, wishing to profit, like
Raton, from the misfortune which another Bertrand has brought on
himself, says to him,

  Wait awhile, I beg you, do;
  You have what is best for you;
  And since I am a trifle clever,
  I will manage all this silver.

Claquedent, who sees himself caught in a snare, fills the air with his
shrieks, which have no sham in them now. Babin is not at all
frightened, and tells him, with a remarkable allusion to the fable of
the fox and the goat,

  Adieu, good Claquedent. In the well
  Till to-morrow you must dwell.

"Murder! a thief, a thief!" cries the entrapped rogue, while the
other, as he runs off, doubtless tells {594} everybody he meets on the
way not to approach the infuriated man. "Don't touch him. He will bite
you!" Finally, they come to Claquedent's assistance, and when they
inquire who put him in this condition, he replies:

  _Un laroncheau, plein de malfalct_.
  (A roguish fellow full of mischief).

"All the comedy of this scene," says M. Onesime Le Roy, "lies in this
single word, _un laroncheau_" a diminutive of _larron_ (rogue), who
has taken in a triple scamp, who thinks himself past mastery! It is
thus that Patelin says of another scamp, his younger brother, "He has
deceived me, who have deceived so many others." "Is there not," adds
M. Douhaire,--"is there not, moreover, in this burlesque and merry
episode, a lesson for those very foolish persons who from excess of
goodness are so easily victimized by the ruses of professional
beggars?"

These gay scenes quite naturally turn to farce, and these moralities
degenerate into satires. This occurs, and in a deplorable manner, even
in the representation of the gravest and most solemn "mysteries." The
Fraternity of the Passion, perceiving that the people grew tired of
their pious spectacles, called to their rescue a mischievous and merry
troupe, whose duty it was to attract the crowd to their hall at the
Hospital de la Trinité. It was the _Enfants sans souci_ company,
celebrated at the end of the fourteenth century, and composed of young
gentlemen of family, who, having invented a kingdom founded on the
faults and vices of the human race, called it the Fool's Kingdom,
named as its king the Prince of Fools, and styled their plays
"Fooleries" (sotties)--plays which they made upon everybody, in a
fantastic and allegorical form. At the court and among the subjects of
the prince figure his well-beloved son, the "Prince of Jollity," the
"Mother Fool," the "Affianced Fool," the "Fool Occasion," the
"Dissolute Fool," the "Boasting Fool," the "Cheating Fool," the
"Ignorant Fool," the "Corrupt Fool," and twenty other personages whose
names and qualities vary according to the requirements of the farce,
and of a satire which spared none. In a _sottie_ played on Shrove
Tuesday, in 1511, and directed against Pope Julius II., then at war
with Louis XII., the "Mother Fool" represents the Church. In another
_sottie_ where _l'ancien monde_ is introduced, the "Dissolute Fool" is
dressed as a churchman, the "Boasting Fool" as a _gendarme_, and the
"Lying Fool" as a merchant. It was the scandalous conduct of these
young Aristophaneses, whose licentiousness equalled their boldness,
which, in 1547, provoked the order of the Parliament against the
representation of "mysteries." The Hospital de la Trinité reverted to
its first destination, and the Fraternity of the Passion, driven from
their theatre after a century and a half of popularity, could only
obtain permission on the following year to construct a new stage at
the Hotel de Bourgogne, on the express condition that they would play
only profane subjects, which should also be lawful and proper. They
accepted this new mode of existence; but their time was past, and
their glory was constantly in a decline. However, they held out
bravely till 1588, at which period they leased their theatre to a
company of travelling comedians, who for some years had been trying to
establish themselves in Paris. The cleverest of them, we are told by
the brothers Parfait, attempted to preserve their fame by giving out
that the religious title of their fraternity did not permit them to
play profane pieces. They had realized this a trifle late in the day;
some forty years too late indeed!

The resuscitation of the Greek theatre, four years after the
parliamentary decree, completed the ruin of the medieval spectacles.
They still played the miracles in the provinces, they even composed
new ones. But the pious representations went out, changing more and
more; and the {595} next century, which was that of Boileau, merely
amused itself with ridiculing them. However, in the very simplicity of
the miracles there was something too popular to be completely
forgotten, in countries where the faith and the innocent manners of
our good ancestors survived. On May 18, 1835, M. Guizot, then
minister, recommended to the attention of his historical
correspondents the still surviving traditions of the moralities and
mysteries of the middle ages. "There are yet preserved on festal days,
in certain districts of France," said he, "certain popular dramatic
performances. It will not be a useless labor to examine and note down
these relics of the past, before modern civilization and the usages of
the common language cause their disappearance."

The author of "Researches into the Mysteries which have been
represented in Maine," Dom Piolin, has traced these performances from
the end of the sixteenth century up to the present time. He finds the
last one at Laval, during the procession of Corpus Christi. "At its
origin," he says, "one of the principal features of this fete, the
one, at least, which peculiarly attracted the attention of the mob,
consisted in scenes from the Old and New Testament which were
represented on theatres erected along the route of the procession, but
chiefly at the main court of the Convent des Cordeliers, they
belonged, unquestionably, to the miracles' proper, having retained
that characteristic simplicity and brevity which is found in the most
ancient pieces. We know that King René established a similar custom in
the city of Aix. Afterward, when the _marionettes_ were introduced
into France by Catharine de Medicis, puppets were substituted for the
players. This theatre--a remnant of the ancient manners--continued
until the end of the restoration, the last performance being in ??37."

M. Douhaire closes his "Course upon the History of Christian Poetry"
by account of a foreign performance, extending from the creation of
the world to the resurrection of the dead, of which he was an
eye-witness. It was in 1830, at a small town on the banks of the
Loire. "What I came to see," he adds, "was the 'Mystery of the
Passion' played by puppets. I did not suppose, before this curious
adventure, that there could be any existing trace of the scenic plays
of the middle ages; but I have since learnt that there still remain
many considerable vestiges in our western and southern provinces--where
not only professional actors and puppets represent the principal
scenes of both Testaments, but even families amuse themselves with
this holy recreation on days of solemn feasts."

Permit us to mention, in our turn, the performance of a mystery
witnessed by men still alive, and whose simplicity carries one quite
back to the middle ages. We get the fact from the president of the
modern Bollandists. At the commencement of our century a good priest
of French Hainaut took upon himself to bring out the "Mystery of the
Passion," for the welfare of his flock. An appeal was made to all
well-disposed people, and, as at Paris in 1437, for the "Mystery of
the Acts of the Apostles," the parts were distributed to the burgesses
and artisans of every description, according to the measure of their
talent in such case required. A Judas was wanting. The priest at once
hit upon the apothecary of the place, whose modesty kept him in his
laboratory, and he went in search of him. "My friend," said he, "we
are going, as you know, to represent a fine 'mystery,' and it is
necessary, for the common good, that you should do something. I have
found your place. Your rôle is Judas." "But M. le curé, my memory is
not worth a sou, and you would never be able to stuff so many words
into my head." "Exactly so, my friend. I have selected for you the
shortest part, and I pledge myself to teach you it in no time."
Straightway our man is enrolled in the {596} company. The solemn day
arrives. The parish and all the country round are there. The spectacle
commences, and the actors, duly costumed and seated on benches along
each side of the stage, rise in turn to go through with what they have
to say. The moment of the kiss of Judas is at hand. The poor
apothecary remains glued to his chair, pale with terror. The priest,
who is all eyes, hastens to him, and forces him to get up. Arrived
before the person who represents Jesus Christ, he falls on his knees,
trembling in every limb, and crying with joined hands, "Oh Lord! thou
well knowest it was not my fault! It is monsieur the curé who forces
me."

This grand trilogy of the "Mystery of the Passion"--which history
exhibits as closely connected with puppet shows and village
performances, naïve even to the grotesque--has quite another
importance and quite another destiny in the eyes of philosophy, which
discerns therein the principal features of the modern dramatic art.
Let us not quit this subject before presenting a confirmation of the
thesis which the readers of these essays have already seen maintained
in an article where Corneille, Racine, and even Voltaire himself were
shown to be unconsciously the lineal successors of our old dramatists
far more than of AEschylus, of Sophocles, and of Euripides. The father
of French tragedy, who discoursed upon his art with so much philosophy
and toiled night and day to make our poetry Aristotle's--Pierre
Corneille, after having for half a century attempted himself, and seen
attempted around him, every possible denouement, was led to recognize
the necessity in this particular of going contrary to the tragic art
of the Greeks. "The ancients," he wrote at the close of his career,
"very often content themselves in their tragedies with depicting vices
in such a manner as to cause us to hate them, and virtues so as to
cause us to love them, without troubling themselves with recompensing
good actions or punishing bad ones. Clytemnestra and her paramour slay
Agamemnon, and go free. Medea does the same with her children, and
Atreus with those of her brother. It is true that by carefully
studying the actions which were selected for the catastrophe of their
tragedies, there were some criminals whom they punished, but by crimes
greater than their own. . . .  Our drama hardly tolerates such
subjects. . . . . It is the interest which we love to extend to the
virtuous that has obliged us to resort to this other mode of finishing
the dramatic poem by punishing the bad actions and by recompensing the
good. It is not a precept of art, but a custom, which we have
observed."

Whence originated this custom Corneille gave his own century the
credit of it; but it is from the middle ages that it dates. What
tragic drama was it which was the most important--the most popular--the
longest played--of that first epoch of the modern theatre? Was it not
the "Mystery of the Passion," which we have seen commencing with a
simple dramatizing of the gospel--growing century by century--and
ending with an immense trilogy, extending from the fall of man to the
birth of our Saviour, from the passion and the death of the Saviour to
his resurrection, from the establishment of the Church to the last
judgment--that solution of human doctrines which regulates all things
retribution for the wicked and recompense for the good, and by making
virtue rise victorious from its battle with the passions? What the
middle ages show us in the "mystery" which was its masterpiece,
appears without exception in all those dramatic compositions which
have come down to us. We have already remarked, and it is moreover a
fact recognized by all scholars, that there is not a tragic drama of
this epoch, whatever may be its subject, which does not close with the
_Te Deum_ or with some other chant of joy, of triumph, or of
forgiveness. Its denouement is always homage rendered by the justice
{597} heaven avenging innocence, or by mercy bestowing on the guilty
repentance and pardon.

In speaking three years ago upon the liturgic origin of the modern
tragedy, and the influence of Christianity on the dramatic passions,
we ended by saying that we need no longer seek, as has been too often
done, in Corneille or Racine for the restorers of the ancient tragedy;
that those great dramatists, it is true, received from Greece the
science of the pageant and the _mise en scene_; but that as much as
they approach the Greek art in their literary form, so much they
depart from it not only by their denouement but also by the moral
character of their intrigue. It was impossible, in fact, to change the
nature of the tragic denouement without changing that of the passions
and of the events which led to them. Let us develop this conclusion of
our essay by showing what it is that prevents our comprehending French
tragedy and defining it.

Voltaire has said, "To compress an illustrious and interesting event
into the space of two or three hours, to introduce the _personae_ only
when they ought to appear, to never leave the stage empty, to
construct an intrigue which shall be probable as well as striking, to
say nothing useless, to instruct the mind and to move the heart, to be
always eloquent in verse, and with an eloquence appropriate to each
character represented, to make the dialogue as pure as the choicest
prose, without the constraint of the rhyme appearing to fetter the
thoughts, and never to admit an obscure or harsh or declamatory
verse--these are the conditions which are exacted from a tragedy of
_our_ day, before it can pass to posterity with the approbation of
critics, without which it can never have a true reputation."

This definition, or rather this exposition, otherwise so clear and so
elegant, of the demands of our Melpomene, are far from being complete.
In the time of Euripides, a Greek could have said almost as much. It
is because Voltaire has only taken into account the style and the
_mise en scène_, the laws of which were at Athens what they are at
Paris. The difference between the ancient tragedies and the modern
tragic art consists essentially in their moral character and in that
alone. Christianity, by modifying the passions of the human heart, has
been able to modify them on the stage likewise. It is, then, from the
philosophy of the drama that we ought to set out with Aristotle to
study its nature.

The French tragedy, such as our own great century has made it, is the
representation of an action more probable than real, more ideal than
historic, wholly noble, serious, and becoming, restricted to one
place, accomplished in a few hours, without any interruption, except
the interval of the acts, constructed with the majestic simplicity of
the epic, drawing its startling changes from the play of passions
rather from that of events, and leading forward the mind by admiration
and enthusiasm to emotions of pity and of terror.

It is not the Greek tragedy--although the ancient Melpomene has
transmitted to our time its _cothurnus_, its _mise en scène_, its
triple unity, its heroes themselves, with their terrors and their
tears. The poetic form is the same, the moral force is entirely
different. On the Athenian stage, the will was subjugated by a brutal
fatality; upon ours, the will makes the destiny. Vice becomes more
terrible, virtue more magnanimous, and the struggles of the soul hold
a larger place than the tricks of fortune. The heroes of the ancient
tragedy, to become endurable with us, would have not only to take on
something of our character, of our manners, of our sentiments, and,
above all, of our conscience, but it would be necessary to change
their mode of action, and to lead them to a denouement by paths wholly
new.

Returning to the trilogy of the Passion, let us conclude this essay
with a {598} reflection which appears to us of a nature to throw great
light upon the popularity and the gigantic proportions of this
"mystery." The middle age, so penetrated with Christian beliefs and
ideas, loved it only because it found there the supreme manifestation
of Divine Providence, at once merciful and just. It had been induced
to thus represent the whole history of the human race, only to give to
that manifestation all the development demanded by the religious
conscience and the ethics of nations. There was needed the
representation of sin and the fall of the first man to explain the
justice and the pardon of Cavalry: there was needed the spectacle of a
universal judgment to solve the grand tragedy of human destinies.

We may blame the literary tastes of our good ancestors, but not their
philosophy. It has established on an immovable basis the fundamental
laws of our dramatic art. We may laugh at the puerile simplicity of
their theatre, but let us laugh reverently, since we find in their
literary infancy the germ, the strength, the character of the manhood
of the great century.

------

Translated and Abridged from the Civiltà Cattolica.

ANTONIO CANOVA.


_Memorie di Antonio Canova, scritte da Antonio d'Este, e publicate per
cura, di Alessandro d'Este_. Firenze: Felice Le Monnier. 1864.

"It must be known," says Signor Antonio d'Este, "that when the learned
Missirini undertook to publish the artist-life of Canova, he had
recourse to me as the only person living who could inform him
thoroughly and truly of the principles of the Venetian artist, and
instruct him in some details of a life which I had known intimately
for the space of fifty years. . . . I put upon paper whatever might
serve to illustrate not only the disposition and character of my
friend, but also the excellent qualities of his heart. . . . I was
disappointed when the illustrious writer, in sending back my
manuscript, said: 'I have made use of many things, and of some
anecdotes, but not of all, since they appeared to me too familiar.' To
tell the truth, such an answer hurt my self-love, and offended the
unquenchable affection which I felt for Canova."

Hence the book before us. The author has apparently endeavored chiefly
to exhibit Canova the artist as a model for the studious, but he has
not overlooked Canova the citizen and the Christian. He begins with
him in the humble Possagno, and shows us his life in Venice, where his
genius first displayed itself, even in the degenerate school with
which alone he was then acquainted. It was in Rome that the young
sculptor saw the ancient purity in its full splendor. It burst upon
him like a sudden revelation. For several days he was like one in a
trance. Then, with his conceptions enlightened, his manner fixed, and
his aim determined, he threw himself into his work. Yet he was never a
servile copyist of Greek or Roman models. He imbibed the spirit of the
classical school, but his genius never was trammelled by imitation.
The last group which he carved under the inspiration drawn from the
ancient masterpieces,--his _Daedalus and Icarus_,--compared with his
_Theseus_, the first work which he executed in Rome, shows in a marked
{599} manner the change in his style--we might almost say his
conversion to the true principles of art.

From this time Canova, though endowed with rare modesty, and always
ready to take advice, showed a fixed resolution to free sculpture from
the mannerism then so common; and neither the advice of friends nor
the abuse of evil-minded critics could shake his purpose.

Nature undoubtedly lavished talents upon him with unsparing hand; but
he was without a parallel in the industry and care with which he
fostered the divine flame. His whole time not passed in labor was
devoted to monuments and museums of art. With his friend d'Este he
often paid a reverential visit to the famous horses at the Quirinal,
before which he gave free vent to his fancy. He used to spend many
hours in contemplating these masterpieces. Long before sunrise he
would spring from his bed and shut himself up in his studio. He took
no relaxation--scarcely even food and rest. After hammering at the
marble all day, he examined it by candlelight, and dreamed about it at
night. He so consumed himself in work that his friends had to wrench
the tools from his hands by force. But if he laid down the chisel, it
was only to return to the study of ancient masterpieces. Not content
with contemplating the works themselves under every possible aspect,
he tried to study out what instruments the artists probably made use
of. He would throw open his studio, and then hide or disguise himself
in order to overhear the honest opinions of his visitors. Extravagant
praise always made him suspicious. Once he was so much pained at a
lavish eulogium upon one of his works that he ran, all trembling, to
his friend Hamilton, and begged him to point out some defect in it;
and having obtained the criticism that he asked, he ran home again in
great glee to correct the fault. He gladly accepted criticism from the
ignorant as well as the learned. One day, when he was quite old, and
recognized as the first sculptor of the time, he begged d'Este to move
to a certain spot a beautiful group that he had finished. Several
laborers were called in to move it. When they had done their task, one
of them, with that connoisseur-air which the Roman laborer knows so
well how to assume, shrugged his shoulders and exclaimed:

"Well, perhaps the marchese" (Canova bore this title in his later
years) "knows best; but to me this statue seems to have the goitre."

The pupils in the studio sprang up in a rage and loaded the poor man
with abuse, and in the midst of the noisy dispute Canova rushed into
the room, and with some difficulty learned what was the laborer's
offence. He darted a glance of fire at the marble.

"Bravo!" he exclaimed after a moment's pause. "You are right. 'Take
this watch--it is yours--you have done me a great service."

So saying, he threw his watch and chain upon the man's neck; and
taking up a chisel began immediately to retouch the statue.

At the age of twenty-five, Canova was selected by Volpato to execute
the monument of Clement XIV., and it is not too much to say that the
restoration of the art of sculpture dates from this immortal work. The
governments of Venice, Russia, Austria, and France invited him to take
up his residence in their respective capitals; but he was never happy
out of Rome; the ground seemed to burn under his feet whenever he was
away from his beloved studio and the great works of the ancient
sculptors. Few artists ever enjoyed so high a reputation in Europe
during their lifetime as Canova, and few certainly ever sought it
less. He was wholly absorbed in love for his art. and eagerness for
its advancement.

But the character of a great artist, according to the Italian ideal,
is not complete without a touch of oddity, and Canova was not free
from some amiable eccentricities. His love passage with the Signorina
Volpato, and the {600} way he got out of it, will perhaps furnish the
subject for a poem by some future Goldoni; but we have no space to
tell of it here.

D'Este describes the moral character of Canova extremely well. He was
upright, brave, and sincere, an ardent patriot, and a sensible,
practical Christian. In the midst of his labors he was not insensible
to the dark clouds which obscured the political horizon, and he felt
so deeply the misfortunes which threatened his country that he took
the pains to retouch his _Dancing Girls_ because their expression was
too joyful to accord with his own sadness of heart. He was still
employed on this work when the pope was carried into captivity. He
felt the misfortune as a personal affliction, and on the statue wrote
these words: "Modelled in the most unhappy days of my life, June,
1809."

A few weeks after the establishment of the Roman republic, a National
Institute was erected, and Canova was chosen a member. He accepted the
appointment willingly, in the hope of being useful to Rome and to her
artists; but when, on the evening appointed for his formal admission,
the oath of membership was tendered to him, and he heard the words, "I
swear hatred to princes," etc., he sprang to his feet, cried out in
his Venetian dialect, _"Mi non odio nessun!"_ (I hate no one), and left
the hall.

------

From The Month.

CONSTANCE SHERWOOD.

AN AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
BY LADY GEORGIANA FULLERTON.


CHAPTER IX.

On the next morning Mr. Congleton called me into the library from the
garden, where I was gathering for Muriel a few of such hardy flowers
as had survived the early frost. She was wont to carry them with her
to the prisons; for it was one of her kindly apprehensions of the
sufferings of others to divide the comfort wherewith things seemingly
indifferent do affect those that be shut out of all kinds of
enjoyments; and where a less tender nature should have been content to
provide necessaries, she, through a more delicate acquaintanceship and
light touch, as it were, on the strings of the human heart, ever
bethought herself when it was possible to minister if but one minute's
pleasure to those who had often well-nigh forgotten the very taste of
it. And she hath told me touching that point of flowers, how it had
once happened that the scent of some violets she had concealed in her
bosom with a like intent did move to tears an aged man, who for many
years past had not seen, no not so much as one green leaf in his
prison; which tears, he said, did him more good than anything else
which could have happened to him.

I threw down on a bench the chrysanthemums and other bold blossoms I
had gathered, and running into the house, opened the door of the
library, where, lo and behold, to my no small agitation and amaze, I
discovered Edmund Genings, who cried out as I entered:

"O my dear master's daughter and well-remembered playmate, I do greet
you with all mine heart; and I thank God that I see you in so good a
condition, as I may with infinite gladness {601} make report of to
your good father, who through me doth impart to you his paternal
blessing and most affectionate commendations."

"Edmund," I cried, scarce able to speak for haste, "is he in London?
is he in prison?"

"No, forsooth," quoth Mr. Congleton.

"No, verily," quoth Edmund; both at the same time.

"Thy fears, silly wench," added the first, "have run away with thy
wits, and I do counsel thee another time to be at more pains to
restrain them; for when there be so many occasions to be afraid of
veritable evils, 'tis but sorry waste to spend fears on present
fancies."

By which I did conjecture my uncle not to be greatly pleased with
Edmund's coming to his house, and noticed that he did fidget in his
chair and ever and anon glanced at the windows which opened on the
garden in an uneasy manner.

"And wherefore art thou then in London?" I asked of Edmund; who thus
answered:

"Because Mr. James Fenn, who is also called Williesden, was taken and
committed close prisoner to the Marshalsea a short time back; which,
when my dear master did hear of, he was greatly disturbed and
turmoiled thereby, by reason of weighty matters having passed betwixt
him and that gentleman touching lands belonging to recusants, and that
extraordinary damage was likely to ensue to several persons of great
merit, if he could not advertise him in time how to answer to those
accusations which would be laid against him; and did seek if by any
means he could have access to him; but could find no hope thereof
without imminent danger not to himself only, but to many beside, if he
had come to London and been recognized."

"Wherein he did judge rightly," quoth my uncle; and then Edmund--

"So, seeing my master and others of a like faith with him in so great
straits touching their property and their lives also, I did most
earnestly crave his licence, being unknown and of no account in the
world, and so least to be suspected, to undertake this enterprise,
which he could not himself perform; which at last he did grant me,
albeit not without reluctance. And thus resolved I came to town."

"And has your hope been frustrated?" Mr. Congleton asked. To whom
Edmund--"I thank God, the end hath answered my expectations. I
committed the cause to him to whom nothing is impossible, and
determined, like a trusty servant, to do all that in me did lie
thereunto. And thinking on no other means, I took up my abode near to
the prison, hoping in time to get acquainted with the keeper; for
which purpose I had to drink with him each day, standing the cost,
beside paying him well, which I was furnished with the means to do. At
last I did, by his means, procure to see Mr. Fenn, and not only come
to speak to him, but to have access to his cell three or four times
with pen and ink and paper to write his mind. So I have furnished him
with the information he had need of, and likewise brought away with me
such answers to my master's questions as should solve his doubts how
to proceed in the aforesaid matters."

"God reward thee, my good youth," Mr. Congleton said, "for this thing
which thou hast done; for verily, under the laws lately set forth,
recusants be in such condition that, if not death, beggary doth stare
them in the face, and no remedy thereunto except by such assistance as
well-disposed Protestants be willing to yield to them."

"And where doth my father stay at this present time?" I asked; and
Edmund answered:

"Not so much as to you, Mistress Constance, am I free to reply to that
question; for when I left, 'Edmund,' quoth my master, 'it is a part of
prudence in these days to guard those that be dear to us from dangers
ensuing on what men do call our perversity; and as these new laws
enact {602} that he which knoweth any one which doth hear mass, be it
ever so privately, or suffers a priest to absolve him, or performs any
other action appertaining to Catholic religion, and doth not discover
him before some public magistrate within the space of twenty days next
following, shall suffer the punishment of high treason, than which
nothing can be more horrible; and that neither sex nor age be a cause
of exemption from the like penalties, so that father must accuse son,
and sister brother, and children their parents;--it is, I say, a
merciful part to hide from our friends where we do conceal ourselves,
whose consciences do charge us with these novel crimes, lest theirs be
also burdened with the choice either to denounce us if called upon to
testify thereon, or else to speak falsely. Therefore I do charge thee,
my son Edmund' (for thus indeed doth my master term me, his unworthy
servant), 'that thou keep from my good child, and my dear sister, and
her no less dear husband, the knowledge of my present, but indeed
ever-shifting, abode; and solely inform them, by word of mouth, that I
am in good health, and in very good heart also, and do most earnestly
pray for them, that their strength and patience be such as the times
do require.'"

"And art thou reconciled, Edmund?" I asked, ever speaking hastily and
beforehand with prudence. Mr. Congleton checked me sharply; whereupon,
with great confusion, I interrupted my speech; but Edmund, albeit not
in words yet by signs, answered my question so as I should be
certified it was even as I hoped. He then asked if I should not be
glad to write a letter to my father,--which he would carry to him, so
that it was neither signed nor addressed,--which letter I did sit down
to compose in a hurried manner, my heart prompting my pen to utter
what it listed, rather than weighing the words in which those
affectionate sentiments were expressed. Mr. Congleton likewise did
write to him, whilst Edmund took some food, which he greatly needed;
for he had scarce eaten so much as one comfortable meal since he had
been in London, and was to ride day and night till he reached his
master. I wept very bitterly when he went away; for the sight of him
recalled the dear mother I had lost, the sole parent whose company I
was likewise reft of, and the home I was never like to see again. But
when those tears were stayed, that which at the time did cause sadness
ministered comfort in the retrospect, and relief from worse fears made
the present separation from my father more tolerable. And on the next
Sunday, when I went to the Charter House, with my cousins and Mistress
Ward, I was in such good cheer that Polly commended my prating; which
she said for some days had been so stayed that she had greatly feared
I had caught the infectious plague of melancholy from Kate, whom she
vowed did half kill her with the sound of her doleful sighing since
Mr. Lacy was gone, which she said was a dismal music brought into
fashion by love-sick ladies, and such as she never did intend to
practise; "for," quoth she, "I hold care to be the worst enemy in
life; and to be in love very dull sport, if it serve not to make one
merry." This she said turning to Sir Ralph Ingoldby, the
afore-mentioned suitor for her hand, who went with us, and thereupon
cried out, "Mercy on us, fair mistress, if we must be merry when we be
sad, and by merriment win a lady's love, the lack of which doth so
take away merriment that we must needs be sad, and so lose that which
should cure sadness;" and much more he in that style, and she
answering and making sport of his discourse, as was her wont with all
gentlemen.

When we reached the house, Mrs. Milicent was awaiting us at the door
of the gallery for to conduct us to the best place wherein we could
see her majesty's entrance. There were some seats there and other
persons present, some of which were of Polly's acquaintance, with whom
she did keep up a {603} brisk conversation, in which I had occasion to
notice the sharpness of her wit, in which she did surpass any woman I
have since known, for she was never at a loss for an answer; as when
one said to her--

"Truly, you have no mean opinion of yourself, fair mistress."

"As one shall prize himself," quoth she, "so let him look to be valued
by others."

And another: "You think yourself to be Minerva."

Whereupon she: "No, sir, not when I be at your elbow;" meaning he was
no Ulysses.

And when one gentleman asked her of a book, if she had read it:

"The epistle," she said, "and no more."

"And wherefore no more," quoth he, "since that hath wit in it?"

"Because," she answered, "an author who sets all his wit in his
epistle is like to make his book resemble a bankrupt's doublet."

"How so?" asked the gentleman.

"In this wise," saith she, "that he sets the velvet before, though the
back be but of buckram."

"For my part," quoth a foppish young man, "I have thoughts in my mind
should fill many volumes."

"Alack, good sir," cries she, "is there no type good enough to set
them in?"

He, somewhat nettled, declares that she reads no books but of one
sort, and doats on _Sir Bevis and Owlglass_, or _Fashion's Mirror_,
and such like idle stuff, wherein he himself had never found so much
as one word of profitable use or reasonable entertainment.

"I have read a fable," she said, "which speaks of a pasture in which
oxen find fodder, hounds, hares, storks, lizards, and some animals
nothing."

"To deliver you my opinion," said a lady who sat next to Polly's
disputant, "I have no great esteem for letters in gentlewomen. The
greatest readers be oft the worst doers."

"Letters!" cries Polly; "why, surely they be the most weighty things
in creation; for so much as the difference of one letter mistaken in
the order in which it should stand in a short sentence doth alter the
expression of a man's resolve in a matter of life and death."

"How prove you that, madam?" quoth the lady.

"By the same token," answered Polly, "that I once did hear a gentleman
say, 'I must go die a beggar,' who willed to say, 'I must go buy a
dagger.'"

They all did laugh, and then some one said, "There was a witty book of
emblems made on all the cardinals at Rome, in which these scarlet
princes were very roughly handled. Bellarmine, for instance, as a
tiger fast chained to a post, and a scroll proceeding from the beast's
mouth--'Give me my liberty; you shall see what I am.' I wish," quoth
the speaker, "he were let loose in this island. The queen's judges
would soon constrain him to eat his words."

"Peradventure," answered Polly, "his own words should be too good food
for a recusant in her majesty's prisons."

"Maybe, madam, you have tasted of that food," quoth the aforesaid
lady, "that you be so well acquainted with its qualities."

Then I perceived that Mistress Ward did nudge Polly for to stay her
from carrying on a further encounter of words on this subject; for, as
she did remind us afterward, many persons had been thrown into prison
for only so much as a word lightly spoken in conversation which should
be supposed even in a remote manner to infer a favorable opinion of
Catholic religion; as, for instance, a bookseller in Oxford, for a
jest touching the queen's supremacy in ecclesiastical matters, had
been a short time before arrested, pilloried, whipped, and his ears
nailed to a counter, which with a knife he had himself to cut through
to free himself; which maybe had not been taken much notice of, as
nothing singular in these days, the man being a Catholic and of no
great note, but that much talk had {604} been ministered concerning a
terrible disease which broke out immediately after the passing of that
sentence, by which the judge which had pronounced it, the jury, and
many other persons concerned in it, had died raving mad; to the no
small affright of the whole city. I ween, howsoever, no nudging should
have stopped Polly from talking, which indeed was a passion with her,
but that a burst of music at that time did announce the queen's
approach, and we did all stand up on the tiptoe of expectation to see
her majesty enter.

My heart did beat as fast as the pendulum of a clock when the cries
outside resounded, "Long live Queen Elizabeth!" and her majesty's
voice was distinctly heard answering, "I thank you, my good people;"
and the ushers crying out, "La Royne!" as the great door was thrown
open; through which we did see her majesty alight from her coach,
followed by many nobles and lords, and amongst them one of her
bishops, and my Lord and my Lady Surrey, kneeling to receive her on
the steps, with a goodly company of kinsfolks and friends around them.
Oh, how I did note every lineament of that royal lady, of so great
power and majesty, that it should seem as if she were not made of the
same mould as those of whom the Scriptures do say, that dust they are,
and to dust must they return. Very majestic did she appear; her
stature neither tall nor low, but her air exceedingly stately. Her
eyes small and black, her face fair, her nose a little hooked, and her
lips narrow. Upon her head she had a small crown, her bosom was
uncovered; she wore an oblong collar of gold and jewels, and on her
neck an exceeding fine necklace. She was dressed in white silk
bordered with pearls, and over it a mantle of black silk shot with
silver threads; her train, which was borne by her ladies, was very
long. When my lord knelt, she pulled off her glove, and gave him her
right hand to kiss, sparkling with rings and jewels; but when my lady,
in as sweet and modest a manner as can be thought of, advanced to pay
her the same homage, she did withdraw it hastily and moved on. I can
even now, at this distance of time, call to mind the look of that
sweet lady's face as she rose to follow her majesty, who leant on my
lord's arm with a show of singular favor, addressing herself to him in
a mild, playful, and obliging manner. How the young countess's cheek
did glow with a burning blush, as if doubting if she had offended in
the manner of her behavior, or had anyways merited the repulse she had
met with! How she stood for one moment irresolute, seeking to catch my
lord's eye, so as to be directed by him; and failing to do so, with a
pretty smile, but with what I, who loved her, fancied to be a
quivering lip, addressed herself to the ladies of the queen, and
conducted them through the cloisters to the garden, whither her
highness and my lord had gone.

In a brief time Mistress Milicent came to fetch us to a window which
looked on the square, where a great open tent was set for a collation,
and seats all round it for the concert which was to follow. As we went
along, I took occasion to ask of her the name of a waiting-gentleman,
who ordered about the servants with no small alacrity, and met her
majesty with many bows and quirks and a long compliment in verse.

"Tis Mr. Churchyard," she said; "a retainer of his grace's, and a poet
withal."

"Not a _grave one_, I hope," said Polly.

"Nay," answered the simple gentlewoman, "but one well versed in
pageants and tournaments and suchlike devices, as well as in writing
of verses and epigrams very fine and witty. Her majesty doth sometimes
send for him when any pageant is on hand."

"Ah, then, I doubt not," quoth Polly, "he doth take himself to be no
mean personage in the state, and so behaves accordingly."

{605}

Pretty Milicent left us to seek for Mistress Bess, whom she had charge
of that day; and now our eyes were so intent on watching the spectacle
before us that even Polly for a while was silent. The queen did sit at
table with a store of noblemen waiting on her; and a more goodly sight
and a rarer one is not to be seen than a store of men famed for so
much bravery and wit and arts of state, that none have been found to
surpass them in any age, who be so loyal to a queen and so reverent to
a woman as these to this lady, who doth wear the crown of so great a
kingdom, so that all the world doth hold it in respect, and her hand
sought by so many great princes. But all this time I could not
perceive that she so much as once did look toward my Lady Surrey, or
spoke one single word to her or to my Lady Lumley, or little Bess, and
took very scanty notice also of my Lady Berkeley, his grace's sister,
who was a lady of so great and haughty a stomach, and of speech so
eloquent and ready, that I have heard the queen did say, that albeit
Lady Berkeley bent her knee when she made obeisance to her, she could
very well see she bent not her will to love or serve her, and that she
liked not such as have a man's heart in a woman's body. 'Tis said that
parity breedeth not affection, or affinity respect, of which saying
this opinion of the queen's should seem a notable example. But to see
my Lady Surrey so treated in her own husband's father's house worked
in me such effects of choler, mingled with sadness, that I could
scarce restrain my tears. Methought there was a greater nobleness and
a more true queenly greatness in her meek and withal dignified
endurance of these slights who was the subject, than in the sovereign
who did so insult one who least of all did deserve it. What the queen
did, others took pattern from; and neither my Lord Burleigh, nor my
Lord Leicester, or Sir Christopher Hatton, or young Lord Essex (albeit
my lord's own friend ), or little Sir John Harrington, her majesty's
godson, did so much as speak one civil word or show her the least
attention; but she did bear herself with so much sweetness, and,
though I knew her heart was full almost to bursting, kept up so brave
an appearance that none should see it except such as had their own
hearts wounded through hers, that some were present that day who since
have told me that, for promise of future distinction and true nobility
of aspect and behavior, they had not in their whole lives known one to
be compared with the young Countess of Surrey.

Polly did point out to us the aforesaid noblemen and gentlemen, and
also Dr. Cheney, the bishop of Gloucester, who had accompanied her
majesty, and M. de la Motte, the French ambassador, whom she did seem
greatly to favor; but none that day so much as my Lord Surrey, on whom
she let fall many gracious smiles, and used playful fashions with him,
such as nipping him once or twice on the forehead, and shaking her
fan, as if to reprove him for his answers to her questions, which
nevertheless, if her countenance might be judged of, did greatly
content her; albeit I once observed her to frown (and methought, then,
what a terror doth lie in a sovereign's frown) and speak sharply to
him; at the which a high color came into his cheek, and rose up even
to his temples, which her majesty perceiving, she did again use the
same blandishments as before; and when the collation was ended, and
the concert began, which had been provided for her grace's
entertainment, she would have him sit at her feet, and gave him so
many tokens of good-will, that I heard Sir Ralph Ingoldby, who was
standing behind me, say to another gentleman:

"If that young nobleman's father is like to be shorter by the head,
his father's son is like to have his own raised higher than ever his
father's was, so he doth keep clear of papistry and overmuch fondness
for his wife, which be the two things her {606}majesty doth most abhor
in her courtiers."

My heart moving me to curiosity, I could not forbear to ask:

"I pray you, sir, wherefore doth not her majesty like her courtiers to
love their wives?"

At the which question he laughed, and said:

"By reason, Mistress Constance, that when they be in that case they do
become stayers at home, and wait not on her majesty with a like
diligence as when they are unmarried, or leastways love not their
ladies. The Bible saith a man cannot serve God and mammon. Now her
grace doth opine men cannot serve the queen and their wives also."

"Then," I warmly cried, "I hope my Lord Surrey shall never serve the
queen!"

"I' faith, say it not so loud, young Mistress Papist," said Sir Ralph,
laughing, "or we shall have you committed for high treason. Some are
in the Tower, I warrant you, for no worse offence than the uttering of
such like rash words. How should you fancy to have your pretty ears
bored with a rougher instrument than Master Anselm's the jeweller?"

And so he; but Polly, who methinks was not well pleased that he should
notice mine ears, which were little and well-shaped, whereas hers were
somewhat larger than did accord with her small face, did stop his
further speech with me by asking him if he were an enemy to papists;
for if so, she would have naught to say to him, and he might become a
courtier to the queen, or any one else's husband, for anything she did
care, yea, if she were to lose her ears for it.

And he answered, he did very much love some papists, albeit he hated
papistry when it proved not conformable to reason and the laws of the
country.

And so they fell to whispering and suchlike discourses as lovers hold
together; and I, being seated betwixt this enamored gentleman and the
wall on the other side, had no one then to talk with. But if my tongue
and mine ears also, save for the music below, were idle, not so mine
eyes; for they did stray from one point to another of the fair
spectacle which the garden did then present, now resting on the queen
and those near unto her, and anon on my Lady Surrey, who sat on a
couch to the left of her majesty's raised canopy, together with Lady
Southwell, Lady Arundell (Sir Robert's wife), and other ladies of the
queen, and on one side of her the bishop of Gloucester, whom, by
reason of his assiduous talking with her, I took more special note of
than I should otherwise have done; albeit he was a man which did
attract the eye, even at the first sight, by a most amiable suavity of
countenance, and a sweet and dignified behavior both in speech and
action such as I have seldom observed greater in any one. His manners
were free and unconstrained; and only to look at him converse, it was
easy to perceive he had a most ready wit tempered with benevolence. He
seemed vastly taken with my Lady Surrey; and either had not noticed
how others kept aloof from her, or was rather moved thereby to show
her civility; for they soon did fall into such eager, and in some sort
familiar, discourse, as it should seem to run on some subject of like
interest to both. Her color went and came as the conversation
advanced; and when she spoke, he listened with such grave suavity,
and, when she stayed her speech, answered in so obliging a manner, and
seemed so loth to break off, that I could not but admire how two
persons, hitherto strangers to each other, and of such various ages
and standing, should be so companionable on a first acquaintanceship.

When the queen rose to depart, in the same order in which she came,
every one kneeling as she passed, I did keenly watch to see what
visage she would show to my Lady Surrey, whom she did indeed this time
salute; but in no gracious manner, as one who looks without looking,
notices without {607} heeding, and in tendering of thanks thanketh
not. As my lord walked by her majesty's side through the cloisters to
the door, he suddenly dropped on one knee, and drawing a paper from
his bosom, did present it to her highness, who started as if
surprised, and shook her head in a playful manner--(oh, what a cruel
playfulness methought it was, who knew, as her majesty must needs also
have done, what that paper did contain)--as if she would not be at that
time troubled with such grave matters, and did hand it to my Lord
Burleigh; then gave again her hand to my lord to kiss, who did kneel
with a like reverence as before; but with a shade of melancholy in his
fair young face, which methought became it better than the smiles it
had worn that day.

After the queen had left, and all the guests were gone save such few
as my lord had willed to stay to supper in his private apartments, I
went unto my lady's chamber, where I found Mistress Milicent, who said
she was with my lord, and prayed me to await her return; for that she
was urgent I should not depart without speaking with her, which was
also what I greatly desired. So I took a book and read for the space
of an hour or more, whilst she tarried with my lord. When she came in,
I could see she had been weeping. But her women being present, and
likewise Mistress Bess, she tried to smile, and pressed my hand,
bidding me to stay till she was rid of her trappings, as she did term
them; and, sitting down before her mirror,--though I ween she never
looked at her own face, which that evening had in it more of the
whiteness of a lily than the color of the rose,--she desired her women
to unbraid her hair, and remove from her head the diamond circlet, and
from her neck the heavy gold chain with a pearl cross, which had
belonged to her husband's mother. Then stepping out of her robe, she
put on a silk wrapper, and so dismissed them, and likewise little
Bess, who before she went whispered in her ear:

"Nan, methinks the queen is foul and red-haired, and I should not care
to kiss her hand for all the fine jewels she doth wear."

And so hugged her round the neck and stopped her mouth with kisses.
When they were gone,

"Constance," quoth she, "we be full young, I ween, for the burden laid
upon us, my lord and me."

"Ay, sweet one," I cried; "and God defend thou shouldst have to carry
it alone;" for my heart was sore that she had had so little favor
shown to her and my lord so much. A faint color tinged her cheek as
she replied:

"God knows I should be well cotent that Phil should stand so well in
her majesty's good graces as should be convenient to his honor and the
furtherance of his fortunes, if so be his father was out of prison;
and 'tis little I should reck of such slights as her highness should
choose to put upon me, if I saw him not so covetous of her favor that
he shall think less well of his poor Nan hereafter by reason of the
lack of her majesty's good opinion of her, which was so plainly showed
to-day. For, good Constance, bethink thee what a galling thing it is
to a young nobleman to see his wife so meanly entreated; and for her
majesty to ask him, as she did, if the pale-faced chit by his side,
when she arrived, was his sister or his cousin. And when he said it
was his wife who had knelt with him to greet her majesty"--"Wife!"
quoth the queen; "i' faith, I had forgotten thou wast married--if
indeed that is to be called a marriage which children do contract
before they come to the age of reason; and said she would take
measures for that a law should be passed which should make such
foolish marriages unlawful. And when my lord tried to tell her we had
been married a second time a few months since, she pretended not to
hear, and asked M. de la Motte if, in his country, children were made
to marry in their infancy. To which he gave answer, that the like
practice did sometimes take place {608} in France; and that he had
himself been present at a wedding where the bridegroom was whipped
because he did refuse to open the ball with the bride. At the which
her majesty very much laughed, and said she hoped my lord had not been
so used on his wedding-day. I promise you Phil was very angry; but the
wound these jests made was so salved over with compliments, which
pleasantly tickle the ears when uttered by so great a queen, and marks
of favor more numerous than can be thought of, in the matter of
inviting him to hunt with her in Marylebone and Greenwich park, and
telling him he deserved better treatment than he had, as to his
household and setting forward in the world, that methinks the scar was
not long in healing; albeit in the relating of these passages the pain
somewhat revived. But what doth afflict me the most is the refusal her
highness made to read my lord's letter, lamenting the unhappy position
of the duke his father, and hoping the queen, by his means and those
of other friends, should mitigate her anger. I would have had Phil not
only go down on his knees as he did, but lie on the threshold of the
door, so that she should have walked over the son's body if she
refused to show mercy to the father; but he yet doth greatly hope from
the favor showed him that he may sue her majesty with better effect
some other time; and I pray God he may be right."

Here did the dear lady break off her speech, and, hiding her face in
her hands, remained silent for a short space; and I, seeing her so
deeply moved, with the intent to draw away her thoughts from painful
musings, inquired of her if the good entertainment she had found in
conversing with the bishop had been attributable to his witty
discourse, or to the subjects therein treated of.

"Ah, good Constance," she answered, "our talk was of one whom you have
often heard me speak of--Mr. Martin's friend, Master Campion,
[Footnote 122] who is now beyond seas at Douay, and whom this bishop
once did hold to be more dear to him than the apple of his eye. He
says his qualifications were so excellent, and he so beloved by all
persons in and outside of his college at Oxford, that none more so;
and that he did himself see in him so great a present merit and
promise of future excellence, that it had caused him more grief than
anything else which had happened to him, and been the occasion of his
shedding more tears than he had ever thought to have done, when he who
had received from him deacon's orders, and whom he had hoped should
have been an honor and a prop to the Church of England, did forsake it
and fly in the face of his queen and his country: first, by going into
Ireland; and then, as he understood, beyond seas, to serve the bishop
of Rome, against the laws of God and man. But that he did yet so
dearly affection him that, understanding we had sometimes tidings of
Mr. Martin, by whose means he had mostly been moved to this lamentable
defection, he should be contented to hear somewhat of his whilom son,
still dear to him, albeit estranged. I told him we did often see
Master Campion when Mr. Martin was here; and that, from what I had
heard, both were like to be at Douay, but that no letters passed
between Mr. Martin and ourselves; for that his grace did not allow of
such correspondence since he had been reconciled and gone beyond seas.
Which the bishop said was a commendable prudence in his grace, and the
part of a careful father; and added, that then maybe he knew more of
what had befallen Master Campion than I did; for that he had a long
epistle from him, so full of moving arguments and pithy remonstrances
as might have shaken one not well grounded and settled in his
religion, and which also contained a recital of his near arrest in
Dublin, where the queen's officers would have arrested him, if a
friend had not privately warned him of his danger. And I do know, good
{609} Constance, who that friend was; for albeit I would not tell the
bishop we had seen Master Campion since he was reconciled, he, in
truth, was here some months ago: my lord met him in the street,
disguised as a common travelling man, and brought him into the garden,
whither he also called me; and we heard then from him how he would
have been taken in Ireland, if the viceroy himself, Sir Henry Sydney,
who did greatly favor him,--as indeed all who know him incline to do,
for his great parts, and nobleness of mind and heart, and withal most
attractive manners,--had not sent him a message, in the middle of the
night, to the effect that he should instantly leave the city, and take
measures for to escape abroad. So, under the name of Patrick, and
wearing the livery of the Earl of Kildare, he travelled to a port
twenty miles from Dublin, and there embarked for England. The queen's
officers, coming on board the ship whereon he had taken his passage,
before it sailed, searched it all over; but through God's mercy, he
said, and St. Patrick's prayers, whose name he had taken, no one did
recognize him, and he passed to London; and the day after, my lord
sent him over to Flanders. So much as the bishop did know thereon, he
related unto me, and stinted not in his praise of his great merits,
and lamentations for what he called his perversion; and hence he took
occasion to speak of religion. And when I said I had been brought up
in the Catholic religion, albeit I now conformed to the times, he said
he would show me the way to be Catholic and still obey the laws, and
that I might yet believe for the most part what I had learnt from my
teachers, so be I renounced the Pope, and commended my saying the
prayers I had been used to; which, he doubted not, were more pleasing
to God than such as some ministers do recite out of their own heads,
whom he did grieve to hear frequented our house, and were no better
than heretics, such as Mr. Fox and Mr. Fulke and Mr. Charke, and the
like of them. But what did much content me was, that he mislikes the
cruel usage recusants do meet with; and he said, not as if boasting of
it, but to declare his mind thereon, that he had often sent them alms
who suffered for their conscience' sake, as many do at this time. But
that I was to remember many Protestants were burnt in the late queen's
time, and that if Papists were not kept under by strict laws, the like
might happen again."

  [Footnote 122: State Papers.]

"You should have told him," I cried, who had been silent longer than I
liked, "that Protestants are burnt also in this reign, by the same
token that some Anabaptists did so suffer a short time back, to your
Mr. Fox's no small disgust, who should will none but Catholics to be
put to death."

"Content thee, good Constance," my lady answered; "I be not so
furnished with arguments as thou in a like case wouldst be. So I only
said, I would to God none were burnt, or hanged, or tortured any more
in this country, or in the world at all, for religion; and my lord of
Gloucester declared he was of the same mind, and would have none so
dealt with, if he could mend it, here or abroad. Then the queen rising
to go, our discourse came to an end; but this good bishop says he will
visit me when he next doth come to London, and make that matter plain
to me how I can remain Catholic, and obey the queen, and content his
grace."

"Then he will show you," I cried, "how to serve God and the world,
which the gospel saith is a thing not to be thought of, and full of
peril to the soul."

My Lady Surrey burst into tears, and I was angered with myself that I
had spoken peradventure over sharply to her who had too much trouble
already; but it did make me mad to see her so beset that the faith
which had been once so rooted in her, and should be her sure and only
stay in the dangerous path she had entered on, should be in such wise
shaken as her words did indicate. {610} But she was not angered, the
sweet soul; and drawing me to herself, laid her head on my bosom, and
said:

"Thou art a true friend, though a bold one; and I pray God I may never
lack the benefit of such friendship as thine, for he knoweth I have
great need thereof."

And so we parted with many tender embraces, and our hearts more
strictly linked together than heretofore.



CHAPTER X.

In the month of November of the same year in which the queen did visit
Lord and Lady Surrey at the Charter House, a person, who mentioned not
his name, delivered into the porter's hands at our gate a letter for
me, which I found to be from my good father, and which I do here
transcribe, as a memorial of his great piety toward God, and tender
love for me his unworthy child.

  "MY DEARLY BELOVED DAUGHTER (so he),--Your comfortable letter has
  not a little cheered me; and the more so that this present one is
  like to be the last I shall be able to write on this side of the
  sea, if it so happen that it shall please God to prosper my intent,
  which is to pass over into Flanders at the first convenient
  opportunity: for the stress of the times, and mine own earnest
  desire to live within the compass of a religious life, have moved me
  to forsake for a while this realm, and betake myself to a place
  which shall afford opportunity and a sufficiency of leisure for the
  prosecution of my design. The comfortable report Edmund made of thy
  health, increased height, and good condition, as also of thy
  exceeding pleasant and affectionate behavior to him, as deputed from
  thy poor father to convey to thee his paternal blessing, together
  with such tokens as a third person may exhibit of that most natural
  and tender affection which he bears to thee, his sole child, whom
  next to God he doth most entirely value and love,--of which charge
  this good youth assured me he did acquit himself as my true son in
  Christ, which indeed he now is,--and my good brother's letter and
  thine, which both do give proof of the exceeding great favor shown
  toward thee in his house, wherein he doth reckon my Constance not so
  much a niece (for such be his words) as a most cherished daughter,
  whose good qualities and lively parts have so endeared her to his
  family, that the greatest sorrow which could befal them should be to
  lose her company; which I do not here recite for to awaken in thee
  motions of pride or a vain conceit of thine own deserts, but rather
  gratitude to those whose goodness is so great as to overlook thy
  defects and magnify thy merits;--Edmund's report, I say, coupled with
  these letters, have yielded me all the contentment I desire at this
  time, when I am about to embark on a perilous voyage, of which none
  can foresee the course or the end; one in which I take the cross of
  Christ as my only staff; his words, "Follow me," for my motto; and
  his promise to all such as do confess him before men, as the assured
  anchor of my hope.

  "Our ingenuous youth informed thee (albeit I doubt not in such wise
  as to conceal, if it had been possible, his own ability, which, with
  his devotedness, do exceed praise) how he acquitted both me and
  others of much trouble and imminent danger by his fortunate despatch
  with that close prisoner. I had determined to place him with some of
  my acquaintance, lest perhaps he should return, not without some
  danger of his soul, to his own friends; but when he understood my
  resolution, he cried out with like words to those of St. Lawrence,
  'Whither goeth my master without his servant? Whither goeth my
  father without his son?' and with tears distilling from his eyes, he
  humbly entreated he might go together with me, saying, as it were
  with St. Peter, 'Master, I am {611} ready to go with you to prison,
  yea to death;' but, forecasting his future ability, as also to try
  his spirit a little further, I made him answer it was impossible; to
  which our Edmund replied, 'Alas! and is it impossible? Shall my
  native soil restrain free will? or home-made laws alter devout
  resolutions? Am I not young? Can I not study? May I not in time get
  what you now have got--learning for a scholar? yea, virtue for a
  priest, perhaps; and so at length obtain that for which you now are
  ready? Direct me the way, I beseech you; and let me, if you please,
  be your precursor. Tell me what I shall do, or whither I must go;
  and for the rest, God, who knows my desire, will provide and supply
  the want. Can it be possible that he who clothes the lilies of the
  field, and feeds the fowls of the air, will forsake him who forsakes
  all to fulfil his divine precept, "Seek first the kingdom of God and
  his justice, and all other things shall be given to you?"' Finally,
  he ended, to my no small admiration, by reciting the words of our
  Saviour, 'Whosoever shall forsake home, or brethren, or sisters, or
  father, or mother, for my sake and the gospel's, shall receive a
  hundredfold and possess life everlasting.'

  "By these impulses, often repeated with great fervor of spirit, I
  perceived God Almighty's calling in him, and therefore at last
  condescended to let him take his adventures, procuring him
  commendations to such friends beyond seas as should assist him in
  his purpose, and furnishing him with money sufficient for such a
  journey; not judging it to be prudent to keep him with me, who have
  not ability to warrant mine own passage; and so noted a recusant,
  that I run a greater risk to be arrested in any port where I embark.
  And so, in all love and affection, we did part; and I have since had
  intelligence, for the which I do return most humble and hearty
  thanks to God, that he hath safely crossed the seas, and has now
  reached a sure harbor, where his religious desires may take effect.
  And now, daughter Constance, mine own good child, fare thee well!
  Pray for thy poor father, who would fain give thee the blessing of
  the elder as of the younger son--Jacob's portion and Esau's also.
  But methinks the blessings of this world be not at the present time
  for the Catholics of this land; and so we must needs be content, for
  our children as for ourselves (and a covetous man he is which should
  not therewith be satisfied), with the blessings our Lord did utter
  on the mountain, and mostly with that in which he doth say, 'Blessed
  are ye when men shall persecute you, and revile you, and say all
  manner of evil against you falsely, for my name's sake; for great is
  your reward in heaven.'

  "Your loving father in natural affection and ten thousand times more
  in the love of Christ,   H. S."

Oh, what a gulf of tenfold separation did those words "beyond seas"
suggest betwixt that sole parent and his poor child! Thoughts travel
not with ease beyond the limits which nature hath set to this isle;
and what lies beyond the watery waste wherewith Providence hath
engirdled our shores offers no apt images to the mind picturing the
invisible from the visible, as it is wont to do with home-scenes,
where one city or one landscape beareth a close resemblance to
another. And if, in the forsaking of this realm, so much danger did
lie, yea, in the very ports whence he might sail, so that I, who
should otherwise have prayed that the winds might detain him, and the
waves force him back on his native soil, was constrained to supplicate
that they should assist him to abandon it,--how much greater,
methought, should be the perils of his return, when, as he indeed
hoped, a mark should be set on him which in our country dooms men to a
cruel death! Many natural tears I shed at this parting, which until
then had not seemed so desperate and final; {612} and for a while
would not listen to the consolations which were offered by the good
friends who were so tender to me, but continued to wander about in a
disconsolate manner in the garden, or passionately to weep in my own
chamber, until Muriel, the sovereign mistress of comfort to others,
albeit ever ailing in her body, and contemned by such as dived not
through exterior deformity into the interior excellences of her soul,
with sweet compulsion and authoritative arguments drawn from her
admirable faith and simple devotion, rekindled in mine the more noble
sentiments sorrow had obscured, not so much through diverting, as by
elevating and sweetening, my thoughts to a greater sense of the
goodness of God in calling my father, and peradventure Edmund also, to
so great an honor as the priesthood, and never more honorable than in
these days, wherein it oftentimes doth prove the road to martyrdom.

In December of that year my Lord and my Lady Surrey, by the Duke of
Norfolk's desire, removed for some weeks to Kenninghall for change of
air, and also Lady Lumley, his grace judging them to be as yet too
young to keep house alone. My lord's brothers and Mistress Bess, with
her governess, were likewise carried there. Lady Surrey wrote from
that seat, that, were it not for the duke's imprisonment and constant
fears touching his life, she should have had great contentment in that
retirement, and been most glad to have tarried there, if it had
pleased God, so long as she lived, my lord taking so much pleasure in
field-sports, and otherwise so companionable, that he often offered to
ride with her; and in the evenings they did entertain themselves with
books, chiefly poetry, and sometimes played at cards. They had but few
visitors, by reason of the disgrace and trouble his grace was in at
that time; only such of their neighbors as did hunt and shoot with the
earl her husband; mostly Sir Henry Stafford and Mr. Rookwood's two
sons, whom she commended; the one for his good qualities and honest
carriage, and the other for wit and learning; as also Sir Hammond
l'Estrange, a gentleman who stayed no longer away from Kenninghall,
she observed, than thereunto compelled by lack of an excuse for
tarrying if present, or returning when absent. He often procured to be
invited by my lord, who used to meet him out of doors, and frequently
carried him back with him to dine or to sup, and often both.

"And albeit" (so my lady wrote) "I doubt not but he doth set a
reasonable value on my lord's society,--who, although young enough to
be his son, is exceedingly conversable and pleasant, as every one who
knows him doth testify,--and mislikes not, I ween, the good cheer, or
the wine from his grace's cellar; yet I warrant thee, good Constance,
'tis not for the sake only of our poor company or hospitable table
that this good knight doth haunt us, but rather from the passion I
plainly see he hath conceived for our Milicent since a day when he
hurt his arm by a fall not far from hence, and I procured she should
dress it with that rare ointment of thine, which verily doth prove of
great efficacy in cases where the skin is rubbed off. Methinks the
wound in his arm was then transplanted into his heart, and the good
man so bewitched with the blue eyes and dove-like countenance of his
chirurgeon, that he has fallen head-over-ears in love, and is, as I
hope, minded to address her in a lawful manner. His wound did take an
exceeding long time in healing, to the no small discredit of thy
ointment; for he came several days to have it dressed, and I could not
choose but smile when at last our sweet practitioner did ask him, in
an innocent manner, if the wound did yet smart, for indeed she could
see no appearance in it but what betokened it to be healed. He
answered, 'There be wounds, Mistress Milicent, which smart, albeit no
outward marks of such suffering do show themselves.' {613} 'Ay,' quoth
Milicent, 'but for such I be of opinion further dressing is needless;
and with my lady's licence, I will furnish you, sir, with a liquid
which shall strengthen the skin, and so relieve the aching, if so you
be careful to apply it night and morning to the injured part, and to
cork the bottle after using it.' 'My memory is so bad, fair
physician,' quoth the knight, 'that I am like to forget the
prescription.' She answered, he should stand the bottle so as it
should meet his eyes when he rose, and then he must needs remember it.

"And so broke off the discourse. But when he is here I notice how his
eyes do follow her when she sets the table for primero, or works at
the tambour-frame, or plays with Bess, to whom he often talks as she
sits on _her_ knees, who, if I mistake not, shall be, one of these
days, Lady l'Estrange, and is as worthy to be so well married as any
girl in the kingdom, both as touching her birth and her exceeding
great virtue and good disposition. He is an extreme Protestant, and
very bitter against Catholics; but as she, albeit mild in temper, is
as firmly settled in the new religion as he is, no difference will
exist between them on a point in which 'tis most of all to be desired
husbands and wives should be agreed. Thou mayst think that I have been
over apt to note the signs of this good knight's passion, and to draw
deductions from such tokens as have appeared of it, visible maybe to
no other eyes than mine; but, trust me, Constance, those who do
themselves know what 'tis to love with an engrossing affection are
quick to mark the same effects in others. When Phil is in the room, I
find it a hard matter at times to restrain mine eyes from gazing on
that dear husband, whom I do so entirely love that I have no other
pleasure in life but in his company. And not to seem to him or to
others too fond, which is not a beseeming thing even in a wife, I
study to conceal my constant thinking on him by such devices as
cunningly to provoke others to speak of my lord, and so appear only to
follow whereunto my own desire doth point, or to propose questions,--a
pastime wherein he doth excel,--and so minister to mine own pride in
him without direct flattery, or in an unbecoming manner setting forth
his praise. And thus I do grow learned in the tricks of true
affection, and to perceive in such as are in love what mine own heart
doth teach me to be the signals of that passion."

So far my lady; and not long after, on the first day of February, I
had a note from her, written in great distraction of mind at the
Charter House, where she and all his grace's children had returned in
a sudden manner on the hearing that the queen had issued a warrant for
the duke's execution on the next Monday. Preparations were made with
the expectation of all London, and a concourse of many thousands to
witness it, the tread of whose feet was heard at night, like to the
roll of muffled drums, along the streets; but on the Sunday, late in
the night, the queen's majesty entered into a great misliking that the
duke should die the next day, and sent an order to the sheriffs to
forbear until they should hear further. His grace's mother, the
dowager countess, and my Lady Berkeley his sister (now indeed lowering
her pride to most humble supplication), and my Lord Arundel from his
sick-bed, and the French ambassador, together with many others, sued
with singular earnestness to her majesty for his life, who, albeit she
had stayed the execution of his sentence, would by no means recall it.
I hasted to the Charter House, Mistress Ward going with me, and both
were admitted into her ladyship's chamber, with whom did sit that day
the fairest picture of grief I ever beheld--the Lady Margaret Howard,
who for some months had resided with the Countess of Sussex, who was a
very good lady to her and all these afflicted children. Albeit Lady
Surrey had often greatly commended this young lady, and styled her so
rare a piece of perfection that no one {614} could know and not admire
her, the loveliness of her face, nobility of her figure, and
attractiveness of her manners exceeded my expectations. The sight of
these sisters minded me then of what Lady Surrey had written when they
were yet children, touching my Lord Surrey, styling them "two twin
cherries on one stalk;" and methought, now that the lovely pair had
ripened into early maturity, their likeness in beauty (though
differing in complexion) justified the saying. Lady Margaret greeted
us as though we had not been strangers, and in the midst of her great
and natural sorrow showed a grateful sense of the share we did take in
a grief which methinks was deeper in her than in any other of these
mourners.

Oh, what a period of anxious suspense did follow that first reprieve!
what alternations of hope and fear! what affectionate letters were
exchanged between that loving father and good master and his sorrowful
children and servants; now writing to Mr. Dyx, his faithful steward:

  "Farewell, good Dyx! your service hath been so faithful unto me, as
  I am sorry that I cannot make proof of my good-will to recompense
  it. I trust my death shall make no change in you toward mine, but
  that you will faithfully perform the trust that I have reposed in
  you. Forget me, and remember me in mine. Forget not to counsel and
  advise Philip and Nan's unexperienced years; the rest of their
  brothers' and sisters' well-doing resteth much upon their virtuous
  and considerate dealings. God grant them his grace, which is able to
  work better in them than my natural well-meaning heart can wish unto
  them. Amen. And so, hoping of your honesty and faithfulness when I
  am dead, I bid you this my last farewell. T. H."

Now to another trusty friend and honest dependent:

  "Good friend George, farewell. I have no other tokens to send my
  friends but my books; and I know how sorrowful you are, amongst the
  rest, for my hard hap, whereof I thank God; because I hope his
  merciful chastisement will prepare me for a better world. Look well
  throughout this book, and you shall find the name of duke very
  unhappy. I pray God it may end with me, and that others may speed
  better hereafter. But if I might have my wish, and were in as good a
  state as ever you knew me, yet I would wish for a lower degree. Be a
  friend, I pray you, to mine; and do my hearty commendations to your
  good wife and to gentle Mr. Dennye. I die in the faith that you have
  ever known me to be of. Farewell, good friend.

  "Yours dying, as he was living,

  "NORFOLK."

These letters and some others did pass from hand to hand in that
afflicted house; and sometimes hope and sometimes despair prevailed in
the hearts of the great store of relatives and friends which often
assembled there to confer on the means of softening the queen's anger
and moving her to mercy; one time through letters from the king of
France and other princes, which was an ill shot, for to be so
entreated by foreign potentates did but inflame her majesty's anger
against the duke; at others, by my Lord Sussex and my Lord Arundel, or
such persons in her court as nearly approached her highness and could
deal with her when she was merry and chose to condescend to their
discourse. But the wind shifts not oftener than did the queen's mind
at that time, so diverse were her dispositions toward this nobleman,
and always opposed to such as appeared in those who spoke on this
topic, whether as pressing for his execution, or suing for mercy to be
extended to him. I heard much talk at that time touching his grace's
good qualities: how noble had been his spirit; how moderate his
disposition; how plain his attire; how bountiful his alms.

{615}

As the fates of many do in these days hang on the doom of one, much
eagerness was shown amongst those who haunted my uncle's house to
learn the news afloat concerning the issue of the duke's affair. Some
Catholics of note were lying in prison at that time in Norwich, most
of them friends of these gentlemen; of which four were condemned to
death at that time, and one to perpetual imprisonment and loss of all
his property for reconcilement; but whilst the Duke of Norfolk was yet
alive, they held the hope he should, if once out of prison, recover
the queen's favor and drive from their seats his and their mortal
enemies, my Lords Burleigh and Leicester. And verily the axe was held
suspended on the head of that duke for four months and more, to the
unspeakable anguish of many; and, amongst others, his aged and
afflicted mother, the Dowager Countess of Surrey, who came to London
from the country to be near her son in this extremity. Three times did
the queen issue a warrant for his death and then recalled it; so that
those trembling relatives and well-wishers in and out of his house did
look each day to hear the fatal issue had been compassed, In the month
of March, when her majesty was sick with a severe inflammation and
agonizing pain, occasioned, some said, by poison administered by
papists, but by her own physicians declared to arise from her contempt
of their prescriptions, there was a strange turmoil, I ween, in some
men's breasts, albeit silent as a storm brewing on a sultry day. Under
their breath, and with faces shaped to conceal the wish which bred the
inquiry, they asked of the queen's health; whilst others tore their
hair and beat their breasts with no affected grief, and the most part
of the people lamented her danger. Oh, what five days were those when
the shadow of death did hover over that royal couch, and men's hearts
failed them for fear, or else wildly whispered hopes such as they
durst not utter aloud,--not so much as to a close friend,--lest the
walls should have ears, or the pavement open under their feet! My God,
in thy hands lie the issues of life and death. Thou dost assign to
each one his space of existence, his length of days. Thy ways are not
as our ways, nor thy thoughts as our thoughts. She lived who was yet
to doom so many princely heads to the block, so many saintly forms to
the dungeon and the rack. She lived whose first act was to stretch
forth a hand yet weakened by sickness to sign, a fourth time, a
warrant for a kinsman's death, and once again recalled it. Each day
some one should come in with various reports touching the queen's
dispositions. Sometimes she had been heard to opine that her dangers
from her enemies were so great that justice must be done. At others
she vehemently spoke of the nearness of blood to herself, of the
superiority in honor of this duke; and once she wrote to Lord Burleigh
(a copy of this letter Lord Surrey saw in Lord Oxford's hands), "that
she was more beholden to the hinder part of her head than she dared
trust the forward part of the same;" and expressed great fear lest an
irrevocable deed should be committed. But she would not see Lord
Surrey, or suffer him to plead in person for his father's life. Yet
there were good hopes amongst his friends he should yet be released,
till one day--I mind it well, for I was sitting with Lady Surrey,
reading out loud to her, as I was often used to do--my Lord Berkeley
burst into the chamber, and cried, throwing his gloves on the table
and swearing a terrible oath:

"That woman has undone us!"

"What, the queen?" said my lady, white as a smock.

"Verily a queen," he answered gloomily. "I warrant you the Queen of
Scots hath ended as she did begin, and dragged his grace into a pit
from whence I promise you he will never now rise. A letter writ in her
cipher to the Duke of Alva hath been intercepted, in which that
luckless royal {616} wight, ever fatal to her friends as to herself,
doth say, 'that she hath a strong party in England, and lords who
favor her cause; some of whom, albeit prisoners, so powerful, that the
Queen of England should not dare to touch their lives.' Alack! those
words, 'should not dare,' shall prove the death-warrant of my noble
brother. Cursed be the day when he did get entangled in that popish
siren's plots!"

"Speak not harshly of her, good my lord," quoth Lady Surrey, in her
gentle voice. "Her sorrows do bear too great a semblance to our own
not to bespeak from us patience in this mishap."

"Nan," said Lord Berkeley, "thou art of too mild a disposition. 'Tis
the only fault I do find with thee. Beshrew me, if my wife and thee
could not make exchange of some portion of her spirit and thy meekness
to the advantage of both. I warrant thee Phil's wife should hold a
tight hand over him."

"I read not that precept in the Bible, my lord," quoth she, smiling.
"It speaketh roundly of the duty of wives to obey, but not so much as
one word of their ruling."

"Thou hadst best preach thy theology to my Lady Berkeley," he
answered; "and then she--"

"But I pray you, my lord, is it indeed your opinion that the queen
will have his grace's life?"

"I should not give so much as a brass pin, Nan, for his present chance
of mercy at her hands," he replied sadly. And his words were justified
in the event.

Those relentless enemies of the duke, my Lords Burleigh and Leicester,
--who, at the time of the queen's illness, had stood three days and
three nights without stirring from her bedside in so great terror lest
she should die and he should compass the throne through a marriage
with the Queen of Scots, that they vowed to have his blood at any cost
if her majesty did recover,--so dealt with parliament as to move it to
send a petition praying that, for the safety of her highness and the
quieting of her realm, he should be forthwith executed. And from that
day to the mournful one of his death, albeit from the great reluctance
her majesty had evinced to have him despatched, his friends, yea unto
the last moment, lived in expectancy of a reprieve; he himself made up
his mind to die with extraordinary fortitude, not choosing to
entertain so much as the least hope of life.

One day at that time I saw my Lady Margaret mending some hose, and at
each stitch she made with her needle tears fell from her eyes. I
offered to assist her ladyship; but she said, pressing the hose to her
heart, "I thank thee, good Constance; but no other hands than mine
shall put a stitch in these hose, for they be my father's, who hath
worn them with these holes for many months, till poor Master Dyx
bethought himself to bring them here to be patched and mended, which
task I would have none perform but myself. My father would not suffer
him to procure a new pair, lest it should be misconstrued as a sign of
his hope or desire of a longer life, and with the same intent he
refuseth to eat flesh as often as the physicians do order; 'for,'
quoth he, 'why should I care to nourish a body doomed to such near
decay?'" Then, after a pause, she said, "He will not wear clothes
which have any velvet on them, being, he saith, a condemned person."

Lady Surrey took one of the hose in her hand, but Lady Margeret, with
a filial jealousy, sadly smiling, shook her head: "Nay, Nan," quoth
she, "not even to thee, sweet one, will I yield one jot or tittle of
this mean, but, in relation to him who doth own these poor hose,
exalted labor." Then she asked her sister if she had heard of the
duke's request that Mr. Fox, his old schoolmaster, should attend on
him in the Tower, to whom he desired to profess that faith he did
first ground him in.

And my Lady Surrey answered yea, that my lord had informed her of
{617} it, and many other proofs beside that his grace sought to
prepare for death in the best manner he could think of.

"Some ill-disposed persons have said," quoth Lady Margaret, "that it
is with the intent to propitiate the queen that my father doth show
himself to be so settled in his religion, and that he is not what he
seems; but tis a slander on his grace, who hath been of this way of
thinking since he attained to the age of reason, and was never at any
time reconciled, as some have put forth."

This was the last time I did see these afflicted daughters until long
after their father's death, who was beheaded in the chapel of the
Tower shortly afterward. When the blow fell which, striking at him,
struck a no less fatal blow to the peace and well-doing of his
children, they all left the Charter House, and removed for a time into
the country, to the houses of divers relatives, in such wise as before
his death the duke had desired. A letter which I received from Lady
Surrey a few weeks after she left London doth best serve to show the
manner of this disposal, and the temper of the writer's mind at that
melancholy time.


  "My OWN DEAR CONSTANCE,--It may like you to hear that your afflicted
  friend is improved in bodily health, and somewhat recovered from the
  great suffering of mind which the duke, their good father's death,
  has caused to all his poor children--mostly to Megg and Phil and me;
  for their brothers and my sister are too young greatly to grieve. My
  Lord Arundel is sorely afflicted, I hear, and hath writ a very
  lamentable letter to our good Lady Sussex concerning this sad
  mishap. My Lady Berkeley and my Lady Westmoreland are almost
  distracted with grief for the death of a brother they did singularly
  love. That poor lady (of Westmoreland) is much to be pitied, for
  that she is parted from her husband, maybe for ever, and has lost
  two fair daughters in one year.

  "My lord hath shown much affection for his father, and natural
  sorrow in this sad loss; and when his last letters written a short
  time before he suffered, and addressed "To my loving children,"
  specially the one to Philip and Nan, reached his hands, he wept so
  long and bitterly that it seemed as if his tears should never cease.
  My lord is forthwith to make his chief abode at Cambridge for a year
  or two; and Meg and I, with Lady Sussex, and I do hope Bess
  also--albeit his grace doth appear in his letter to be otherwise
  minded. But methinks he apprehended to lay too heavy a charge on
  her, who is indeed a good lady to us all in this our unhappy
  condition, and was loth Megg should be out of my company.

  "The parting with my lord is a sore trial, and what I had not looked
  to; but God's will be done; and if it be for the advantage of his
  soul, as well as the advancement of his learning, he should reside
  at the university, it should ill befit me to repine. And now
  methinks I will transcribe, if my tears do not hinder me, his
  grace's letters, which will inform thee of his last wishes better
  than I could explain them; for I would have thee know how tender and
  forecasting was his love for us, and the good counsel he hath left
  unto his son, who, I pray to God, may always follow it. And I would
  have thee likewise note one point of his advice, which indeed I
  should have been better contented he had not touched upon, forasmuch
  as his having done so must needs hinder that which thy fond love for
  my poor self, and resolved adherence to what he calls 'blind
  papistry,' doth so greatly prompt thee to desire; for if on his
  blessing he doth charge us to beware of it, and then I should move
  my lord to so much neglect of his last wishes as at any time to be
  reconciled, bethink thee with what an ill grace I should urge on
  him, in other respects, obedience to his commands, which indeed are
  such as do commend themselves to any Christian soul as most wise and
  profitable. {618} And now, breaking off mine own discourse to
  transcribe his words--a far more noble and worthy employment of my
  pen--and praying God to bless thee, I remain thy tender and loving
  friend,
  "ANN SURREY."


"The Duke of Norfolk's letters to
his children:

  "DEAR CHILDREN,--This is the last letter that ever I think to write
  to you; and therefore, if you loved me, or that you will seem
  grateful to me for the special love that I have ever borne unto you,
  then remember and follow these my last lessons. Oh, Philip, serve
  and fear God, above all things. I find the fault in myself, that I
  have (God forgive me!) been too negligent in this point. Love and
  make much of your wife; for therein, considering the great adversity
  you are now in, by reason of my fall, is your greatest present
  comfort and relief, beside your happiness in having a wife which is
  endued with so great towardness in virtue and good qualities, and in
  person comparable with the best sort. Follow these two lessons, and
  God will bless you; and without these, as you may see by divers
  examples out of the Scripture, and also by ordinary worldly proof,
  where God is not feared, all goeth to wreck; and where love is not
  between the husband and wife, there God doth not prosper. My third
  lesson is, that you show yourself loving and natural to your
  brothers and sister and sister-in-law. Though you be very young in
  years, yet you must strive with consideration to become a man; for
  it is your own presence and good government of yourself that must
  get friends; and if you take that course, then have I been so
  careful a father unto you, as I have taken such order as you, by
  God's grace, shall be well able, beside your wife's lands, to
  maintain yourself like a gentleman. Marry! the world is greedy and
  covetous; and if the show of the well government of yourself do not
  fear and restrain their greedy appetite, it is like that, by
  undirect means, they will either put you from that which law layeth
  upon you, or else drive you to much trouble in trying and holding
  your right. When my grandfather died, I was not much above a year
  elder than you are now; and yet, I thank God, I took such order with
  myself, as you shall reap the commodity of my so long passed travel,
  if you do now imitate the like. Help to strengthen your young and
  raw years with good counsel. I send you herewith a brief schedule,
  whom I wish you to make account of as friends, and whom as servants;
  and I charge you, as a father may do, to follow my direction
  therein; my experience can better tell what is fit for you than your
  young years can judge of. I would wish you for the present to make
  your chief abode at Cambridge, which is the place fittest for you to
  promote your learning in; and beside, it is not very far hence,
  whereby you may, within a day's warning, be here to follow your own
  causes, as occasion serveth. If, after a year or two, you spend some
  time in a house of the law, there is nothing that will prove more to
  your commodity, considering how for the time you shall have
  continual business about your own law affairs; and thereby also, if
  you spend your time well, you shall be ever after better able to
  judge in your own causes. I too late repent that I followed not this
  course that now I wish to you; for if I had, then my case perchance
  had not been in so ill state as now it is.

  "When God shall send you to those years as that it shall be fit for
  you to keep house with your wife (which I had rather were sooner,
  than that you should fall into ill company), then I would wish you
  to withdraw yourself into some private dwelling of your own. And if
  your hap may be so good as you may so live without being called to
  higher degree, oh, Philip, Philip, then shall you enjoy that blessed
  life which your woful father would fain have done, and never could
  be so happy. Beware of high degree. To a vain-glorious, proud
  stomach it seemeth at the first sweet. Look into all {619}
  chronicles, and you shall find that in the end it brings heaps of
  cares, toils in the state, and most commonly in the end utter
  overthrow. Look into the whole state of the nobility in times past,
  and into their state now, and then judge whether my lessons be true
  or no. Assure yourself, as you may see by the book of my accounts,
  and you shall find that my living did hardly maintain my expenses;
  for all the help that I had by Tom's lands, and somewhat by your
  wife's and sister's-in-law, I was ever a beggar. You may, by the
  grace of God, be a great deal richer and quieter in your low degree,
  wherein I once again wish you to continue. They may, that shall wish
  you the contrary, have a good meaning; but believe your father, who
  of love wishes you best, and with the mind that he is at this
  present fully armed to God, who sees both states, both high and low,
  as it were even before his eyes. Beware of the court, except it be
  to do your prince service, and that, as near as you can, in the
  lowest degree, for that place hath no certainty; either a man, by
  following thereof, hath too much of worldly pomp, which, in the end,
  throws him down headlong, or else he liveth there unsatisfied;
  either that he cannot attain for himself that he would, or else that
  he cannot do for his friends as his heart desireth. Remember these
  notes, and follow them; and then you, by God's help, shall reap the
  commodity of them in your old years.

  "If your brothers may be suffered to remain in your company, I would
  be most glad thereof, because continuing together should still
  increase love between you. But the world is so catching of
  everything that falls, that Tom being, as I believe, after my death,
  the queen's majesty's ward, shall be begged by one or another. But
  yet you are sure to have your brother William left still with you,
  because, poor boy, he hath nothing to feed cormorants withal; to
  whom you will as well be a father as a brother; for upon my blessing
  I commit him to your charge to provide for, if that which I have
  assured him by law shall not be so sufficient as I mean it. If law
  may take place, your sister-in-law will be surely enough conveyed to
  his behoof, and then I should wish her to be brought up with some
  friend of mine; as for the present I allow best of Sir Christopher
  Heydon, if he will so much befriend you as to receive her to sojourn
  with him; if not there in some other place, as your friends shall
  best allow of. And touching the bestowing of your wife and Megg, who
  I would be loth should be out of your wife's company; for as she
  should be a good companion for Nan, so I commit Megg of especial
  trust to her. I think good, till you keep house together, if my Lady
  of Sussex might be entreated to take them to her as sojourners,
  there were no place so fit considering her kindred unto you, and the
  assured friend that I hope you shall find of her; beside she is a
  good lady. If it will not be so brought to pass, then, by the advice
  of your friends, take some other order; but in no case I would wish
  you to keep any house except it be together with your wife.

  "Thus I have advised you as my troubled memory can at present suffer
  me. Beware of pride, stubbornness, taunting, and sullenness, which
  vices nature doth somewhat kindle in you; and therefore you must
  with reason and discretion make a new nature in yourself. Give not
  your mind too much and too greedily to gaming; make a pastime of it,
  and no toil. And lastly, delight to spend some time in reading of
  the Scriptures; for therein is the whole comfort of man's life; all
  other things are vain and transitory; and if you be diligent in
  reading of them, they will remain with you continually, to your
  profit and commodity in this world, and to your comfort and
  salvation in the world to come, whither, in grace of God, I am now
  with joy and consolation preparing myself. And, upon my blessing,
  beware of blind papistry, which brings nothing but bondage to men's
  consciences. {620} Mix your prayers with fasting, not thinking
  thereby to merit; for there is nothing that we ourselves can do that
  is good,--we are but unprofitable servants; but fast, I say, thereby
  to tame the wicked affection of the mind, and trust only to be saved
  by Christ's precious blood; for without a perfect faith therein,
  there is no salvation. Let works follow your faith; thereby to show
  to the world that you do not only say you have faith, but that you
  give testimony thereof to the full satisfaction of the godly. I
  write somewhat the more herein, because perchance you have
  heretofore heard, or perchance may hereafter hear, false bruits that
  I was a papist;   [Footnote 123] but trust unto it, I never, since I
  knew what religion meant (I thank God) was of other mind than now
  you shall hear that I die in; although (I cry God mercy) I have not
  given fruits and testimony of my faith as I ought to have done; the
  which is the thing that I do now chiefliest repent.

    [Footnote 123: There would seem to be no doubt that the Duke of
    Norfolk was a sincere Protestant. The strenuous advice to his
    children to beware of Popery affords evidence of it. Greatly,
    however, as it would have tended to their worldly prosperity to
    have followed their father's last injunctions in this respect, all
    but one of those he thus counselled were subsequently reconciled
    to the Catholic Church.

    The Duke's letters in this chapter are all authentic. See the Rev.
    M. Tierney's History of Arundel, and the Appendix to Nott's
    edition of Lord Surrey's poems.]

  "When I am gone, forget my condemning, and forgive, I charge you, my
  false accusers, as I protest to God I do; but have nothing to do
  with them if they live. Surely, Bannister dealt no way but honestly
  and truly. Hickford did not hurt me in my conscience, willingly; nor
  did not charge me with any great matter that was of weight otherways
  than truly. But the Bishop of Ross, and specially Barber, did
  falsely accuse me, and laid their own treasons upon my back. God
  forgive them, and I do, and once again I will you to do; bear no
  malice in your mind. And now, dear Philip, farewell. Read this my
  letter sometimes over; it may chance make you remember yourself the
  better; and by the same, when your father is dead and rotten, you
  may see what counsel I would give you if I were alive. If you follow
  these admonitions, there is no doubt but God will bless you; and I,
  your earthly father, do give you God's blessing and mine, with my
  humble prayers to Almighty God that it will please him to bless you
  and your good Nan; that you may both, if it be his will, see your
  children's children, to the comfort of you both; and afterward that
  you may be partakers of the heavenly kingdom. Amen, amen. Written by
  the hand of your loving father. T. H."

"And to Tom his grace did write:

  "Tom, out of this that I have written to your brother, you may learn
  such lessons as are fit for you. That I write to one, that I write
  to all, except it be somewhat which particularly touches any of you.
  To fear and serve God is generally to you all; and, on my blessing,
  take greatest care thereof, for it is the foundation of all
  goodness. You have, even from your infancy, been given to be
  stubborn. Beware of that vice, Tom, and bridle nature with wisdom.
  Though you be her majesty's ward, yet if you use yourself well to my
  Lord Burleigh, he will, I hope, help you to buy your own wardship.
  Follow your elder brother's advice, who, I hope, will take such a
  course as may be to all your comforts. God send him grace so to do,
  and to you too! I give you God's blessing and mine, and I hope he
  will prosper you."

  "And to Will he saith (whom methinks his heart did incline to, as
  Jacob's did to Benjamin):

  "Will, though you be now young, yet I hope, if it shall please God
  to send you life, that you will then consider of the precepts
  heretofore written to your brethren. I have committed the charge of
  your bringing-up to your elder brother; and therefore I charge you
  to be obedient to him, as you would have been to me if I had been
  {621} living. If you shall have a liking to my daughter-in-law, Bess
  Dacres, I hope you shall have it in your own choice to marry her. I
  will not advise you otherways than yourself, when you are of fit
  years, shall think good; but this assure yourself, it will be a good
  augmentation to your small living, considering how chargeable the
  world groweth to be. As you are youngest, so the more you ought to
  be obedient to your elders. God send you a good younger brother's
  fortune in this world, and his grace, that you may ever be his, both
  in this world and in the world to come."

"To me, his unworthy daughter, were these lines written, which I be
ashamed to transcribe, but that his goodness doth appear in his good
opinion of me rather than my so poor merits:

  "Well-beloved Nan, that hath been as dear to me as if you had been
  my own daughter, although, considering this ill hap that has now
  chanced, you might have had a greater marriage than now your husband
  shall be; yet I hope that you will remember that, when you were
  married, the case was far otherways; and therefore I hope your
  dutiful dealings shall be so to your husband, and your sisterly love
  to your brothers-in-law and sister-in-law, as my friends that shall
  see it may think that my great affection to you was well bestowed.
  Thanks be to God, you have hitherto taken a good course; whereby all
  that wish you well take great hope rather of your going forward
  therein than backward--which God forbid! I will request no more at
  your hands, now that I am gone, in recompense of my former love to
  you, but that you will observe my three lessons: to fear and serve
  God, flying idleness; to love faithfully your husband; and to be
  kind to your brothers and sisters--specially committing to your care
  mine only daughter Megg, hoping that you will not be a sister-in-law
  to her, but rather a natural sister, yea even a very mother; and
  that as I took care for the well bestowing of you, so you will take
  care for the well bestowing of her, and be a continual caller on
  your husband for the same. If this mishap had not chanced, you and
  your husband might have been awhile still young, and I would, by
  God's help, have supplied your wants. But now the case is changed,
  and you must, at your years of fifteen, attain to the consideration
  and discretion of twenty; or else, if God send you to live in your
  age, you shall have cause to repent your folly in youth, beside the
  endangering the casting away of those who do wholly depend upon your
  two well-doings. I do not mistrust that you will be mindful of my
  last requests; and so doing God bless you, and send you to be old
  parents to virtuous children, which is likeliest to be if you give
  them good example. Farewell! for this is the last that you shall
  ever receive from your loving father. Farewell, my dear Nan!"

  "And to his own sweet Megg he subjoined in the same letter these
  words:

  "Megg, I have, as you see, committed you to your loving sister. I
  charge you therefore, upon my blessing, that you obey her in all
  things, as you would do me or your own mother, if we were living;
  and then I doubt not but by her good means you shall be in fit time
  bestowed to your own comfort and contentment. Be good; no babbler,
  and ever be busied and doing of somewhat; and give your mind to
  reading in the Bible and such other good books, whereby you may
  learn to fear God; and so you shall prove, by his help, hereafter
  the better wife, and a virtuous woman in all other respects. If you
  follow these my lessons, then God's blessing and mine I give you,
  and pray that you may both live and die his servant. Amen."

When I read these letters, and my Lady Surrey's comments upon them,
what pangs seized my heart! Her {622} messenger was awaiting an
answer, which he said must be brief, for he had to ride to Bermondsey
with a message for my Lord Sussex, and had been long delayed in the
city. I seized a pen, and hastily wrote:

  "Oh, my dear and honored lady, what grief, what pain, your letter
  hath caused me! Forgive me if, having but brief time in which to
  write a few lines by your messenger, I dwell not on the sorrow which
  doth oppress you, nor on the many excellences apparent in those
  farewell letters, which give token of so great virtue and wisdom in
  the writer, that one should be prompted to exclaim he did lack but
  one thing to be perfect, that being a true faith,--but rather
  direct my answer to that passage in yours which doth work in me such
  regret, yea such anguish of heart, as my poor words can ill express.
  For verily there can be no greater danger to a soul than to be lured
  from the profession of a true Catholic faith, once firmly received
  and yet inwardly held, by deceptive arguments, whereby it doth
  conceal its own weakness under the garb of respect for the dead and
  duty to the living. For, I pray you, mine own dear lady, what
  respect and what duty is owing to men which be not rather due to him
  who reads the heart, and will ask a strict account of such as,
  having known his will, yet have not done it? Believe me, 'tis a
  perilous thing to do evil that good may come. Is it possible you
  should resolve never to profess that religion which, in your
  conscience, you do believe to be true, nor to move your lord
  thereunto, for any human respect, however dear and sacred? I hope
  other feelings may return, and God's hand will support, uphold, and
  never fail you in your need. I beseech him to guard and keep you in
  the right way.

  "Your humble servant and truly loving poor friend,

  "CONSTANCE SHERWOOD."


[TO BE CONTINUED.]


------

{623}

From The Fortnightly Review.

THE HEART AND THE BRAIN.

BY GEORGE HENRY LEWES.


Heart and brain are the two lords of life. In the metaphors of
ordinary speech and in the stricter language of science, we use these
terms to indicate two central powers, from which all motives radiate,
to which all influences converge. They rule the moral and the physical
life: the moral owes to them its continuous supply of feelings and
ideas; the physical its continuous supply of food and stimulus. All
the composite material which serves to build up the bodily fabric, and
repair its daily waste, is only so much "carted material" awaiting the
architect, until it has twice passed through the heart--until having
been sent by the heart to the lungs it has there received its plastic
virtues, and returns to the heart to be thence distributed throughout
the organism. So much is familiar to every one; but less familiar is
the fact that this transmission of the blood from heart to lungs, and
its distribution throughout the organism, are rendered possible and
made effective only under the influence of the brain. Life is
sustained by food and stimulus. The operation of nutrition itself is
indissolubly connected with sensibility. Life is a plexus of nutrition
and sensation, the threads of which may ideally be separated, but
which in reality are so interwoven as to be indissoluble. This is a
paradox which even many physiologists will reject; but it is only a
paradox because biological questions have constantly been regarded
from a chemical point of view.

To render my proposition free from ambiguity, it is needful to premise
that the term heart, by a familiar device of rhetoric, here expresses
the whole of that great circulatory apparatus of which it is only a
part; and in like manner the term brain here expresses the whole of
the sensory apparatus. The reader knows perfectly well that in strict
anatomical language the heart is only one organ having a definite
function; and that the brain--although the term is used with
considerable laxity--is only one portion of the complex nervous
mechanism, having also its definite functions. But I am not here
addressing anatomists, and for purposes of simplification I shall
generally speak of the heart as if it were the whole of the vascular
system, and of the brain as if it were the whole of the nervous
system. And there is a philosophic truth suggested by this departure
from the limitations of anatomical definition, namely, that if the
brain as a nervous centre requires to be distinguished from all other
nervous centres, it also requires to be affiliated on them: it has its
special functions as an organ, but it has also a community of
property--_i.e._, sensibility--with all other nervous centres.

In the study of animal organisms, the scientific artifice called
analysis, which separates ideally what nature has indissolubly united,
isolating each portion of a complex whole to study it undisturbed by
the influences of other portions, has established a division of life
into animal and vegetable. The division is as old as Aristotle, but
has become the common property of science only since the days of
Bichat. It is not exact, but it is convenient. As an artifice it has
proved its utility, but like all such distinctions it has a tendency
to divert the mind from contemplation of the real synthesis of nature.
Even as an artifice the classification is not free from ambiguities;
and perhaps it would be less exceptionable if {624} instead of vegetal
and animal we were to substitute nutritive and sensitive. All the
phenomena of growth, development, and decay--phenomena common to
plants as to animals--may range under the laws of nutrition. All the
phenomena of feeling and motion which specially distinguish animals,
will range under the laws of sensibility. Plants, it is true, manifest
motion, some few of them even locomotion; but in them it is believed
that these phenomena are never due to the stimulus of sensibility.

Viewing the animal organism as thus differentiated, we see on the one
hand a complex system of organs--glands, membranes, vessels--all
harmoniously working to one end, which is to build up the body, and
silently repair its continual waste. They evolve the successive phases
of development. They prepare successive generations. On the other
hand, we see a complex system of organs--muscles, tendons, bones,
nerves, and nerve-centres--also harmoniously co-operative. They
stimulate the organs of nutrition. They work first for the
preservation of the individual in the struggle of existence; next, for
the perfection of the individual in the development of his highest
qualities.

But it is important to remember that this division is purely ideal--a
scientific artifice, not a reality. Nature knows of none such. In the
organism the two lives are one. The two systems interlace,
interpenetrate each other, so that the slightest modification of the
one is followed by a corresponding change in the other. The brain is
nourished by the heart, and were it not for the blood which is
momently pumped into it by the heart, its sensibility would vanish.
And the heart in turn depends upon the brain, not for food, but for
stimulus, for motive power, without which food is inert. That we may
feel, it is necessary we should feed; that we may feed, it is
necessary we should feel. Nutrition cannot be dissociated from
sensation. The blood which nourishes the brain, giving it impulse and
sustaining power, could never have become arterial blood, could never
have reached the brain, had not the heart which sent it there been
subjected to influences from the brain. The blood itself has no
locomotive impulse. The heart has no spontaneous power: it is a
muscle, and like all other muscles must be stimulated into activity.
Unless the sensitive mechanism were in action, the lungs could not
expand, the blood would not become oxygenated, the heart would not
pump. Look on the corpse from which the life has just vanished. Why is
it inert? There is food within it. It has blood in abundance. There is
air in the lungs. The muscles are contractile, and the tendons
elastic. So little is the wondrous mechanism impaired, that if by any
means we could supply a stimulus to awaken the dormant sensibility,
the chest would expand, the heart would beat, the blood would
circulate, the corpse would revive.

It is unnecessary to point out in detail how dependent the brain is
upon the heart; but mention may be made of the fact that more blood is
sent to the brain than to any other organ in the body: according to
some estimates a fifth of the whole, according to others a third. Not
only is a large quantity of blood demanded for the continuous activity
of the brain, but such is the peculiar nature of this great nervous
centre, that of all organs it is the most delicately susceptible to
every variation in the quality of the blood sent to it. If the heart
pumps feebly, the brain acts feebly. If the blood be vitiated, the
brain is lethargic; and when the brain is lethargic, the heart is
weak. Thus do the two great centres interact. They are both lords of
life, and both mutually indispensable.

There are two objections which it may be well to anticipate:
Nutrition, it may be objected, cannot be so indissolubly blended with
sensation as I have affirmed, because, in the first place, most of the
nutritive processes go on without the intervention of {625}
sensibility; and in the second place, the nutritive life of plants is
confessedly independent of sensation, since in plants there is no
sensitive mechanism whatever. Nutrition is simply a chemical process.

The answers to these objections may be very brief. Nutrition is a
biological not a chemical process: it involves the operation of
chemical laws, but these laws are themselves subordinated to
physiological laws; and one of these laws is the necessary dependence
of organic activity on a nervous mechanism wherever such a mechanism
exists. Although popular language, and the mistaken views (as I
conceive) of physiologists, allow us to say, without any apparent
absurdity, that the processes of respiration, digestion, circulation,
and secretion go on without feeling or sensation--because these
processes do not habitually become distinct in consciousness, but are
merged in the general feeling of existence--we have only to replace the
word feeling, or sensation, by the phrase "nervous influence," and it
then becomes a serious biological error to speak of nutrition as
dissociated from the stimulus of nervous centres, as capable of
continuance without the intervention of sensibility. The chemical
combinations and decompositions do not of course depend on this
intervention, but the _transport_ of materials does. All the disputes
which have been waged on this subject would have been silenced had the
disputants borne in mind this distinction between the chemical and
organic elements in every nutritive process. It is not the stoker who
makes the steam; but if the stoker were not to supply the fire with
coals, and the safety-valve were not to regulate the amount of
pressure, steam might indeed be generated, but no steam-engine would
perform its useful work. In like manner, it is not the vascular system
which makes a secretion; but if the blood did not supply the gland
with materials, the secreting process would quickly end, and the blood
can only be brought to the gland through the agency of muscular
contractions stimulated by nervous influence.

Granting that plants have no sensibility, and that in them the process
of nutrition must go on without such an intervention, we are able to
demonstrate that in animals in whose organism the sensitive apparatus
is an integral portion, the processes of nutrition are more or less
under the influence of this apparatus. In saying "more or less," I
indicate the greater or less perfection of the organism; for, as every
one knows, the perfection of each type is due to the predominance of
its sensitive mechanism. In some of the lowest types, no trace of a
nervous mechanism can be discovered. A little higher in the scale, the
mechanism is very slight and simple. Still higher, it becomes complex
and important. It culminates in man. Corresponding with this scale of
complexity in the sensitive life is the scale of complexity in the
nutritive life. As the two rise in importance they rise in the scale
of dependence. Thus a frog or a triton will live long after its brain
is removed. I have kept frogs for several weeks without their brains,
and tritons without their heads. Redi, the illustrious Italian
naturalist, kept a turtle alive five months after the removal of its
brain. Now it is needless to say that in higher animals death would
rapidly follow the loss of the brain. A somewhat similar parallelism
is seen on the removal of the heart. None of the higher animals can
survive a serious injury to the heart; but that organ may be removed
from a reptile, and the animal will crawl away seemingly as lively as
ever. A frog will live several hours without a heart, and will hop,
swim, and struggle as if uninjured. Stilling once removed all the
viscera from a frog, which, however, continued for one hour to hop,
defend itself, and in various ways manifest its vivacity. [Footnote
124]

  [Footnote 124: Stilling, _Untersuchungen über die Functionen des
  Rückenmarks_, p. 38. ]

{626}

In spite of these evidences of a temporary independence of brain and
heart, as individual organs, there is nothing more certain than the
intimate interdependence of the sensitive and circulating systems; and
if in lower animals the interdependence of the two great central
organs is less energetic than in the higher, the law of the
intervention of sensibility in all processes of nutrition is
unaffected. In fact, wherever the motor mechanism is muscular, as it
is in all but the simplest animals, the necessary intervention of
sensibility is an _à priori_ axiom. Every action in the organs of such
animals is a manifestation of muscular contractility, and there is no
known means of exciting this contractility except by the stimulus of a
nerve.

The heart is a muscle. Some years ago there was a school of
physiologists advocating the hypothesis that the action of the heart
was due to the irritability of its muscular tissue, which was
stimulated by the presence of blood. The great Haller was the head of
this school, and his _"Memoires sur la nature sensible et irritable
des parties"_ [Footnote 125] is still worthy the attention of
experimentalists. And, indeed, when men saw the heart continue its
pulsations some time after death, and even after removal from the
body, and saw, moreover, that after pulsation had ceased it could be
revived by the injection of warm blood, there seemed the strongest
arguments in favor of the hypothesis. Unhappily for the hypothesis,
the heart continues to beat long after all the blood has been pumped
out of it, consequently its beating cannot be due to the stimulus of
the blood.

  [Footnote 125: Lausanne, 1756, in 4 vols. ]

In our own day the difficulty has to a considerable extent been
removed by the discovery of a small nervous system specially allotted
to the heart,--nerves and ganglia imbedded in its substance, which
there do the work of nerves and ganglia everywhere else. Cut the heart
into pieces, and each piece containing a ganglion will beat as before;
the other pieces will be still. Beside this special cardiac system
which influences the regular pulsations, there is the general nervous
system, which accelerates and arrests these pulsations at every moment
of our lives. The heart is thus connected with the general organism
through the intervention of the great sensory apparatus. Filaments of
what are called the pneumogastric nerves connect the heart with the
spinal chord and cerebral masses; but it is not the influence of these
filaments which causes the regular beatings of the heart (as
physiologists formerly supposed), and the proof is that these
filaments may all be cut, thus entirely isolating the heart from all
connection with the great nervous centres, and yet the heart will
continue tranquilly beating. What causes this? Obviously the stimulus
comes from the heart's own nerves; and these are, presumably, excited
by the molecular changes going on within it.

Physiologists, as we said just now, supposed that the filaments of the
pneumogastric nerves distributed to the heart caused its beating. What
then was their surprise, a few years since, when Weber announced that
the stimulation of these fibres, instead of accelerating the heart's
action, arrested it! Here was a paradox. All other muscles, it was
said (but erroneously said), are excited to increased action when
their nerves are stimulated, and here is a muscle which is paralyzed
by the stimulation of its nerves. The fact was indisputable; an
electric current passed through the pneumogastric did suddenly and
invariably arrest the heart. Physiologists were interested. The frogs
and rabbits of Europe had a bad time of it, called upon to answer
categorically such questions put to their hearts. In a little while it
appeared that although a strong electric current arrested the
pulsations--and in mammals instantaneously--yet a feeble current
accelerated instead of arresting them. The same opposite results
followed a powerful and a gentle excitation of the upper region of the
spinal chord.

{627}

To these very important and suggestive facts, which throw a strong
light on many phenomena hitherto obscure, let us add the interesting
facts that in a healthy, vigorous animal, the heart quickly recovers
its normal activity after the withdrawal of the electric stimulus; but
in a sickly or highly sensitive animal the arrest is final.

Who does not read here the physiological explanation of the familiar
fact that powerful mental shocks momently arrest the heart, and
sometimes arrest it for ever? That which a powerful current will do
applied to the pneumogastric nerve, will be done by a profound
agitation of grief or joy--truly called a heart-shaking influence. The
agitation of the great centres of thought is communicated to the
spinal chord, and from it to the nerves which issue to various parts
of the body: the limbs are violently moved, the glands are excited to
increased activity, the tears flow, the facial muscles contract, the
chest expands, laughter or sobs, dances of delight and shouts of joy,
these and the manifold expressions of an agitated emotion, are the
after results--the first effect is an arrest, more or less fugitive,
followed by an increase of the heart's action. If the organism be
vigorous, the effect of a powerful emotion is a sudden paleness,
indicating a momentary arrest of the heart. This may be but for an
instant; the heart pauses, and the lungs pause with it--"the breath is
taken away." This is succeeded by an energetic palpitation; the lungs
expand, the blood rushes to face and brain with increased force.
Should the organism be sickly or highly sensitive, the arrest is of
longer duration, and fainting, more or less prolonged, is the result.
In a very sensitive or very sickly organism the arrest is final. The
shock of joy and the shock of grief have both been known to kill.

The effects of a gentle stimulus we may expect to be very different,
since we know that a feeble electric current stimulates the heart's
action. The nature of the stimulus is always the same, no matter on
what occasion it arises. It may arise from a dash of cold water on the
face--as we see in the revival of the heart's action when we throw
water on the face of a fainting person. It may arise from inhaling an
irritant odor. It may arise from the pleasurable sight of a dear
friend, or the thrill of delight at the new birth of an idea. In every
case the brain is excited, either through an impression on a sensitive
nerve, or through the impulses of thought; and the sensibility thus
called into action necessarily discharges itself through one or more
of the easiest channels; and among the easiest is that of the
pneumogastric nerve. But the heart thus acted on in turn reacts. Its
increased energy throws more blood into the brain, which draws its
sustaining power from the blood.

Experimentalists have discovered another luminous fact connected with
this influence of the brain upon the heart, namely, that although a
current of a certain intensity (varying of course with the nature of
the organism) will infallibly arrest the heart, if applied at once,
yet if we begin with a feeble current and go on gradually increasing
its intensity, we may at last surpass the degree which would have
produced instantaneous arrest, and yet the heart will continue to beat
energetically.

The effect of repetition in diminishing a stimulus is here very
noticeable. It will serve to explain why, according to the traditions
of familiar experience, we are careful to break the announcement of
disastrous news, by intimating something much less calamitous,
wherewith to produce the first shock, and then, when the heart has
withstood that, we hope it may have energy to meet the more agitating
emotions. The same fact will also serve, partly, to explain why from
repetition the effect of smoking is no longer as it is at first to
produce paleness, sweating, and sickness. The heart ceases to be
sensibly affected by the stimulus.

{628}

Returning to the effects of a gentle stimulus, we can read therein the
rationale of change of scene, especially of foreign travel, in
restoring the exhausted energies. The gentle excitement of novel and
pleasurable sights is not, as people generally suppose, merely a
mental stimulus--a pleasure which passes away without a physical
influence; on the contrary, it is inseparably connected with an
increased activity of the circulation, and _this_ brings with it an
increased activity of all the processes of waste and repair. If the
excitement and fatigue be not too great, even the sickly traveller
finds himself stronger and happier, in spite of bad food, irregular
hours, and many other conditions which at home would have enfeebled
him. I have heard a very distinguished physician (Sir Henry Holland)
say that such is his conviction of the beneficial influence of even
slight nervous stimulus on the nutritive processes, that when the
patient cannot have change of scene, change of room is of some
advantage--nay, even change of furniture, if there cannot be change
of room!

To those who have thoroughly grasped the principle of the indissoluble
conjunction of nutrition and sensation, such effects are obvious
deductions. They point to the great importance of pleasure as an
element of effective life. They lead to the question whether much of
the superior health of youth is not due to the greater amount of
pleasurable excitement which life affords to young minds.

Certain it is that much of the marvellous activity of some old men,
especially of men engaged in politics or in interesting professions,
may be assigned to the greater stimulus given to their bodily
functions by the pleasurable excitement of their minds. Men who
vegetate sink prematurely into old age. The fervid wheels of life
revolve upon excitement. If the excitement be too intense, the wheels
take fire; but if the mental stimulus be simply pleasurable, it is
eminently beneficial.

Every impression reacts on the circulation, a slight impression
producing a slight acceleration, a powerful impression, producing an
arrest more or less prolonged. The "shock" of a wound and the "pain"
of an operation cause faintness, sometimes death. Indeed, it is useful
to know that many severe operations are dangerous only because of the
shock or pain, and can be performed with impunity if the patient first
be rendered insensible by chloroform. On the other hand, the mere
irritation of a nerve so as to produce severe pain will produce
syncope or death in an animal which is very feeble or exhausted. It is
possible to crush the whole of the upper part of the spinal chord (the
_medulla oblongata_) without arresting the action of the heart, if the
animal has been rendered insensible by chloroform; whereas without
such precautions a very slight irritation of the medulla suffices to
arrest the heart.

A moment's reflection will disclose the reason of the remarkable
differences observed in human beings in the matter of sensitiveness.
The stupid are stupid, not simply because their nervous development is
below the average, but also because the connection between the two
great central organs, brain and heart, is comparatively languid; the
pneumogastric is not in them a ready channel for the discharge of
nervous excitement. The sensitive are sensitive because in them the
connection is rapid and easy. All nervous excitement must discharge
itself through one or more channels; but _what_ channels, will depend
on the native and acquired tendencies of the organism. In highly
sensitive animals a mere prick on the skin can be proved to affect the
beating of the heart; but you may lacerate a reptile without sensibly
affecting its pulse. In like manner, a pleasurable sight or a
suggestive thought will quicken the pulse of an intelligent man,
whereas his stupid brother may be the spectator of festal or solemn
scenes and the auditor of noble eloquence with scarcely a change.

{629}

The highly sensitive organism is one in which the reactions of
sensibility on the circulation, and of the circulation on the
sensibility, are most direct and rapid. This is often the source of
weakness and inefficiency--as we see in certain feminine natures of
both sexes, wherein the excessive sensitiveness does not lie in an
unusual development of the nervous centres, but in an unusual
development of the direct connection between brain and heart. There
are men and women of powerful brains in whom this rapid transmission
of sensation to the heart is not observable; the nervous force
discharges itself through other channels. There are men and women of
small brains in whom "the irritability" is so great that almost every
sensation transmits its agitating influence to the heart.

And now we are in a condition to appreciate the truth which was
confusedly expressed in the ancient doctrine respecting the heart as
the great emotional organ. It still lives in our ordinary speech, but
has long been banished from the text-books of physiology, though it is
not, in my opinion, a whit more unscientific than the modern doctrine
respecting the brain (meaning the cerebral hemispheres) as the
exclusive organ of sensation. That the heart, as a muscle, is not
endowed with the property of sensibility--a property exclusively
possessed by ganglionic tissue--we all admit. But the heart, as the
central organ of the circulation, is so indissolubly connected with
every manifestation of sensibility, and is so delicately susceptible
to all emotional agitations, that we may not improperly regard it as
the ancients regarded it, in the light of the chief centre of feeling;
for the ancients had no conception of the heart as an organ specially
endowed with sensibility--they only thought of it as the chief agent
of the sensitive soul. And is not this the conception we moderns form
of the brain? We do not imagine the cerebral mass, as a mere mass, and
unrelated to the rest of the organism, to have in itself sensibility;
but we conceive it as the centre of a great system, dependent for its
activity on a thousand influences, sensitive because sensibility is
the form of life peculiar to it, but living only in virtue of the
vital activities of the whole organism. Thus the heart, because its
action is momently involved in every emotion, and because every
emotion reacts upon it, may, as truly as the brain, be called the
great emotional centre. Neither brain nor heart can claim that title
exclusively. They may claim it together.


----

{630}

[Transcriber: Read this section with a fixed pitch font so the
two columns are correctly aligned.]

From The Month.

THE DREAM OF GERONTIUS.

BY JOHN HENRY NEWMAN, D.D.

[Concluded.]

§4.

SOUL.

        But hark! upon my sense
  Comes a fierce hubbub, which would make me fear,
  Could I be frighted.

ANGEL.

          We are now arrived
  Close on the judgment-court; that sullen howl
  Is from the demons who assemble there.
  It is the middle region, where of old
  Satan appeared among the sons of God,
  To cast his jibes and scoffs at holy Job.
  So now his legions throng the vestibule,
  Hungry and wild, to claim their property,
  And gather souls for hell. Hist to their cry.

SOUL.

  How sour and how uncouth a dissonance!

DEMONS.

  Low-born clods
     Of brute earth,             They aspire
  To become gods,
     By a new birth,             And an extra grace,
  And a score of merits,
     As if ought                 Could stand in place
     Of the high thought,        And the glance of fire
  Of the great spirits,
     The powers blest,           The lords by right,
                                     The primal owners
  Of the proud dwelling          And realm of light,
     Dispossessed,               Aside thrust,
                                 Chucked down,
                                 By the sheer might
                                     Of a despot's will,
                                 Of a tyrant's frown,
  Who after expelling            Their hosts, gave,
                                     Triumphant still,
                                 And still unjust,
                                 Each forfeit crown
                                     To psalm-droners
                                     And canting groaners,
                                 To every slave,
                                     And pious cheat,
                                 And crawling knave,
                                 Who licked the dust
                                     Under his feet.

{631}

ANGEL.

  It is the restless panting of their being;
  Like beasts of prey, who, caged within their bars,
  In a deep hideous purring have their life,
  And an incessant pacing to and fro.

DEMONS.

  The mind bold
      And independent,
  The purpose free,
  So we are told,
  Must not think
      To have the ascendant,     What's a saint?
      One whose breath           Doth the air taint
      Before his death;          A bundle of bones,
      Which fools adore,         Ha! ha!
      When life is o'er,
  Which rattle and stink,
      E'en in the flesh.         We cry his pardon!
  No flesh hath he;
      Ha! ha!                    For it hath died,
                                 'Tis crucified
                                     Day by day,
  Afresh, afresh,                Ha! ha!
                                     That holy clay,
                                 Ha! ha!
                                     And such fudge,
  As priestlings prate,          Is his guerdon
                                     Before the judge,
                                 And pleads and atones
                                     For spite and grudge,
                                 And bigot mood,
  And envy and hate              And greed of blood.

SOUL.

  How impotent they are! and yet on earth
  They have repute for wondrous power and skill;
  And books describe, how that the very face
  Of th' evil one, if seen, would have a force
  To freeze the very blood, and choke the life
  Of him who saw it.

{632}

ANGEL.

         In thy trial state
  Thou hadst a traitor nestling close at home,
  Connatural, who with the powers of hell
  Was leagued, and of thy senses kept the keys,
  And to that deadliest foe unlocked thy heart.
  And therefore is it, in respect of man,
  Those fallen ones show so majestical.
  But, when some child of grace, angel or saint,
  Pure and upright in his integrity
  Of nature, meets the demons on their raid,
  They scud away as cowards from the fight.
  Nay, oft hath holy hermit in his cell,
  Not yet disburdened of mortality,
  Mocked at their threats and warlike overtures;
  Or, dying, when they swarmed like flies, around,
  Defied them, and departed to his judge.

DEMONS.

  Virtue and vice,            A knave's pretence.
  'Tis all the same;          Ha! ha!                  Dread of hell-fire,
  Of the venomous flame,      A coward's plea.
  Give him his price,         Saint though he be,      Ha! ha!
                              From shrewd good sense   He'll slave for hire;
                              Ha! ha!                  And does but aspire
                              To the heaven above
  With sordid aim,            Not from love.           Ha! ha!

SOUL.

  I see not those false spirits; shall I see
  My dearest Master, when I reach his throne?
  Or hear, at least, his awful judgment-word
  With personal intonation, as I now
  Hear thee, not see thee, angel? Hitherto
  All has been darkness since I left the earth;
  Shall I remain thus sight-bereft all through
  My penance-time? if so, how comes it then
  That I have hearing still, and taste, and touch,
  Yet not a glimmer of that princely sense
  Which binds ideas in one, and makes them live?

{633}

ANGEL.

  Nor touch, nor taste, nor hearing hast thou now;
  Thou livest in a world of signs and types,
  The presentations of most holy truths,
  Living and strong, which now encompass thee.
  A disembodied soul, thou hast by right
  No converse with aught else beside thyself;
  But, lest so stern a solitude should load
  And break thy being, in mercy are vouchsafed
  Some lower measures of perception,
  Which seem to thee, as though through channels brought,
  Through ear, or nerves, or palate, which are gone.
  And thou art wrapped and swathed around in dreams,
  Dreams that are true, yet enigmatical;
  For the belongings of thy present state,
  Save through such symbols, come not home to thee.
  And thus thou tell'st of space and time and size,
  Of fragrant, solid, bitter, musical,
  Of fire, and of refreshment after fire;
  As (let me use similitude of earth,
  To aid thee in the knowledge thou dost ask)--
  As ice which blisters may be said to burn.
  Nor hast thou now extension, with its parts
  Correlative,--long habit cozens thee,--
  Nor power to move thyself, nor limbs to move.
  Hast thou not heard of those, who after loss
  Of hand or foot, still cried that they had pains
  In hand or foot, as though they had it still?
  So is it now with thee, who hast not lost
  Thy hand or foot, but all which made up man.
  So will it be, until the joyous day
  Of resurrection, when thou wilt regain
  All thou hast lost, new-made and glorified.--
  --How, even now, the consummated saints
  See God in heaven, I may not explicate:--
  Meanwhile let it suffice thee to possess
  Such means of converse as are granted thee,
  Though till the beatific vision thou art blind;
  For e'en thy purgatory, which comes like fire,
  Is fire without its light.

SOUL.

               His will be done!
  I am not worthy e'er to see again
  The face of day; far less his countenance,
  Who is the very sun. Natheless, in life,
  When I looked forward to my purgatory,
  It ever was my solace to believe,
  That, ere I plunged into th' avenging flame,
  I had one sight of him to strengthen me.

ANGEL.

  Nor rash nor vain is that presentiment;
  Yes,--for one moment thou shalt see thy Lord.
  Thus will it be: what time thou art arraigned
  Before the dread tribunal, and thy lot
  Is cast for ever, should it be to sit
  On his right hand among his pure elect,
  Then sight, or that which to the soul is sight,
  As by a lightning-flash, will come to thee,
  And thou shalt see, amid the dark profound,
  Whom thy soul loveth, and would fain approach,
  One moment; but thou knowest not, my child,
  What thou dost ask: that sight of the Most Fair
  Will gladden thee, but it will pierce thee too.

{634}

SOUL.

  Thou speakest darkly, angel; and an awe
  Falls on me, and I fear lest I be rash.

ANGEL.

  There was a mortal, who is now above
  In the mid glory; he, when near to die,
  Was given communion with the Crucified,--
  Such, that the Master's very wounds were stamped
  Upon his flesh; and, from the agony
  Which thrilled through body and soul in that embrace,
  Learn that the flame of the Everlasting Love
  Doth burn, ere it transform. . . .

§ 5.

  . . . Hark to those sounds!
  They come of tender beings angelical,
  Least and most childlike of the sons of God.

FIRST CHOIR OF ANGELICALS.

  Praise to the Holiest in the height,         And in the depth be praise:
  In all his words most wonderful;             Most sure in all his ways!

  To us his elder race he gave                 To battle and to win,
  Without the chastisement of pain,            Without the soil of sin.

  The younger son he willed to be              A marvel in his birth:
  Spirit and flesh his parents were;           His home was heaven and earth.

  The Eternal blessed his child and armed,     And sent him hence afar,
  To serve as champion in the field            Of elemental war.

  To be his vice-roy in the world              Of matter, and of sense;
  Upon the frontier, toward the foe,           A resolute defence.

ANGEL.

  We now have passed the gate, and are within
  The house of judgment; and whereas on earth
  Temples and palaces are formed of parts
  Costly and rare, but all material,
  So in the world of spirits nought is found,
  To mould withal and form a whole,
  But what is immaterial; and thus
  The smallest portions of this edifice,
  Cornice, or frieze, or balustrade, or stair,
  The very pavement is made up of life--
  Of holy, blessed, and immortal beings,
  Who hymn their Maker's praise continually.

{635}

SECOND CHOIR OF ANGELICALS.

  Praise to the Holiest in the height,      And in the depth be praise:
  In all his words most wonderful; 	    Most sure in all his ways!

  Woe to thee, man! for he was found 	    A recreant in the fight;
  And lost his heritage of heaven, 	    And fellowship with light.

  Above him now the angry sky, 		    Around the tempest's din
  Who once had angels for his friends,      Has but the brutes for kin.

  O man! a savage kindred they:             To flee that monster brood
  He scaled the sea-side cave and clomb     The giants of the wood.

  With now a fear and now a hope,           With aids which chance supplied,
  From youth to old, from sire to son, 	    He lived, and toiled, and died.

  He dreed his penance age by age; 	    And step by step began
  Slowly to doff his savage garb, 	    And be again a man.

  And quickened by the Almighty's breath,   And chastened by his rod,
  And taught by angel-visitings,            At length he sought his God;

  And learned to call upon his name,        And in his faith create
  A household and a fatherland, 	    A city and a state.

  Glory to him who from the mire, 	    In patient length of days,
  Elaborated into life 			    A people to his praise!

SOUL.

  The sound is like the rushing of the wind--
  The summer wind--among the lofty pines;
  Swelling and dying, echoing round about,
  Now here, now distant, wild and beautiful;
  While scattered from the branches it has stirred,
  Descend ecstatic odors.

THIRD CHOIR OF ANGELICALS.

  Praise to the Holiest in the height,        And in the depth be praise:
  In all his words most wonderful;            Most sure in all his ways!

  The angels, as beseemingly                  To spirit-kind was given,
  At once were tried and perfected,           And took their seats in heaven.

  For them no twilight or eclipse;            No growth and no decay:
  Twas hopeless, all-engulfing night,         Or beatific day.

  But to the younger race there rose          A hope upon its fall;
  And slowly, surely, gracefully,             The morning dawned on all.

  And ages, opening out, divide               The precious and the base,
  And from the hard and sullen mass           Mature the heirs of grace.

  O man! albeit the quickening ray            Lit from his second birth,
  Takes him at length what once he was,       And heaven grows out of earth;

  Yet still between that earth and heaven--   His journey and its goal--
  A double agony awaits                       His body and his soul.

  A double debt he has to pay--               The forfeit of his sins:
  The chill of death is past, and now         The penance-fire begins.

  Glory to him, who evermore                  By truth and justice reigns;
  Who tears the soul from out its case,       And burns away its stains!

{636}

ANGEL.

  They sing of thy approaching agony,
  Which thou so eagerly didst question of:
  It is the face of the incarnate God
  Shall smite thee with that keen and subtle pain;
  And yet the memory which it leaves will be
  A sovereign febrifuge to heal the wound;
  And yet withal it will the wound provoke,
  And aggravate and widen it the more.

SOUL.

  Thou speakest mysteries; still methinks I know
  To disengage the tangle of thy words:
  Yet rather would I hear thy angel voice,
  Than for myself be thy interpreter.

ANGEL.

  When then--if such thy lot--thou seest thy Judge,
  The sight of him will kindle in thy heart
  All tender, gracious, reverential thoughts.
  Thou wilt be sick with love, and yearn for him,
  And feel as though thou couldst but pity him,
  That one so sweet should e'er have placed himself
  At disadvantage such, as to be used
  So vilely by a being so vile as thee.
  There is a pleading in his pensive eyes
  Will pierce thee to the quick, and trouble thee.
  And thou wilt hate and loathe thyself; for, though
  Now sinless, thou wilt feel that thou hast sinned,
  As never thou didst feel; and wilt desire
  To slink away, and hide thee from his sight;
  And yet wilt have a longing aye to dwell
  Within the beauty of his countenance.
  And these two pains, so counter and so keen,--
  The longing for him, when thou seest him not;
  The shame of self at thought of seeing him,--
  Will be thy veriest, sharpest purgatory.

SOUL.

  My soul is in my hand: I have no fear,--
  In his dear might prepared for weal or woe.
  But hark! a deep, mysterious harmony
  It floods me, like the deep and solemn sound
  Of many waters.

{637}

ANGEL.

             We have gained the stairs
  Which rise toward the presence-chamber; there
  A band of mighty angels keep the way
  On either side, and hymn the incarnate God.

ANGELS OF THE SACRED STAIR.

  Father, whose goodness none can know, but they
      Who see thee face to face,
  By man hath come the infinite display
      Of thine all-loving grace;
  But fallen man--the creature of a day--
      Skills not that love to trace.
  It needs, to tell the triumph thou hast wrought,
  An angel's deathless fire, an angel's reach of thought.

  It needs that very angel, who with awe
      Amid the garden shade,
  The great Creator in his sickness saw,
      Soothed by a creature's aid,
  And agonized, as victim of the law
      Which he himself had made;
  For who can praise him in his depth and height,
  But he who saw him reel in that victorious fight?

SOUL.

  Hark! for the lintels of the presence-gate
  Are vibrating and echoing back the strain.

FOURTH CHOIR OF ANGELICALS.

  Praise to the Holiest in the height,       And in the depth be praise
  In all his words most wonderful;           Most sure in all his ways!

  The foe blasphemed the holy Lord,          As if he reckoned ill,
  In that he placed his puppet man           The frontier place to fill.

  For even in his best estate,               With amplest gifts endued,
  A sorry sentinel was he,                   A being of flesh and blood.

  As though a thing, who for his help        Must needs possess a wife,
  Could cope with those proud rebel hosts,   Who had angelic life.

  And when, by blandishment of Eve,          That earth-born Adam fell,
  He shrieked in triumph, and he cried,      "A sorry sentinel.

  The Maker by his word is bound,            Escape or cure is none;
  He must abandon to his doom,               And slay his darling Son."

ANGEL.

  And now the threshold, as we traverse it,
  Utters aloud its glad responsive chant.

{638}

FIFTH CHOIR OF ANGELICALS.

  Praise to the Holiest in the height,      And in the depth be praise:
  In all his words most wonderful;          Most sure in all his ways!

  O loving wisdom of our God!               When all was sin and shame,
  A second Adam to the fight                And to the rescue came.

  O wisest love! that flesh and blood       Which did in Adam fail,
  Should strive afresh against the foe,     Should strive and should prevail.

  And that a higher gift than grace         Should flesh and blood refine,
  God's presence and his very self,         And essence all-divine.

  O generous love! that he who smote        In man for man the foe,
  The double agony in man                   For man should undergo;

  And in the garden secretly,               And on the cross on high,
  Should teach his brethren and inspire     To suffer and to die.

§ 6.

ANGEL.

  The judgment now is near, for we are come
  Into the veiled presence of our God.

SOUL.

  I hear the voices that I left on earth.

ANGEL.

  It is the voice of friends around thy bed,
  Who say the "Subvenite" with the priest.
  Hither the echoes come; before the throne
  Stands the great angel of the agony,
  The same who strengthened him, what time he knelt
  Lone in the garden shade, bedewed with blood.
  That angel best can plead with him for all
  Tormented souls, the dying and the dead.

ANGEL OF THE AGONY.

  Jesu! by that shuddering dread which fell on thee;
  Jesu! by that cold dismay which sickened thee;
  Jesu! by that pang of heart which thrilled in thee;
  Jesu! by that mount of sins which crippled thee;
  Jesu! by that sense of guilt which stifled thee;
  Jesu! by that innocence which girdled thee;
  Jesu! by that sanctity which reigned in thee;
  Jesu! by that Godhead which was one with thee;
  Jesu! spare these souls which are so dear to thee,
  Who in prison, calm and patient, wait for thee;
  Hasten, Lord, their hour, and bid them come to thee,
  To that glorious home, where they shall ever gaze on thee.

{639}

SOUL.

  I go before my Judge. Ah! . . . .

ANGEL.

        .... Praise to his name!
  The eager spirit has darted from my hold,
  And, with the intemperate energy of love,
  Flies to the dear feet of Emmanuel;
  But, ere it reach them, the keen sanctity,
  Which with its effluence, like a glory, clothes
  And circles round the Crucified, has seized,
  And scorched, and shrivelled it; and now it lies
  Passive and still before the awful throne.
  O happy, suffering soul! for it is safe,
  Consumed, yet quickened, by the glance of God.

SOUL.

  Take me away, and in the lowest deep
      There let me be,
  And there in hope the lone night-watches keep,
      Told out for me.
  There, motionless and happy in my pain,
      Lone, not forlorn,--
  There will I sing my sad perpetual strain,
      Until the morn.
  There will I sing, and soothe my stricken breast,
      Which ne'er can cease
  To throb, and pine, and languish, till possessed
      Of its sole peace.
  There will I sing my absent Lord and love:--
      Take me away,
  That sooner I may rise, and go above,
  And see him in the truth of everlasting day.

§ 7.

ANGEL.

  Now let the golden prison ope its gates,
  Making sweet music, as each fold revolves
  Upon its ready hinge. And ye, great powers,
  Angels of purgatory, receive from me
  My charge, a precious soul, until the day,
  When, from all bond and forfeiture released,
  I shall reclaim it for the courts of light.

{640}

SOULS IN PURGATORY.

1. Lord, thou hast been our refuge: in every generation;

2. Before the hills were born, and the world was:
   from age to age thou art God.

3. Bring us not, Lord, very low: for thou hast said,
   Come back again, ye sons of Adam.

4. A thousand years before thine eyes are but as yesterday:
   and as a watch of the night which is come and gone.

5. Though the grass spring up in the morning;
   yet in the evening it shall shrivel up and die.

6. Thus we fail in thine anger; and in thy wrath we are troubled.

7. Thou hast set our sins in thy sight:
   and our round of days in the light of thy countenance.

8. Come back, O Lord! how long? and be entreated for thy servants.

9. In thy morning we shall be filled with thy mercy:
   we shall rejoice and be in pleasure all our days.

10. We shall be glad according to the days of our humiliation;
    and the years in which we have seen evil.

11. Look, O Lord, upon thy servants and on thy work;
    and direct their children,

12. And let the beauty of the Lord our God be upon us:
    and the work of our hands direct thou it.
   Glory be to the father and to the Son: and to the Holy Ghost.
   As it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be;
   world without end. Amen.

ANGEL.

  Softly and gently, dearest, sweetest soul
    In my most loving arms I now enfold thee,
  And, o'er the penal waters, as they roll,
    I poise thee, and I lower thee, and hold thee.

  And carefully I dip thee in the lake,
    And thou, without a sob or a resistance,
  Dost through the flood thy rapid passage take
    Sinking deep, deeper, into the dim distance.

  Angels, to whom the willing task is given,
    Shall tend, and nurse, and lull thee, as thou liest;
  And masses on the earth, and prayers in heaven,
    Shall aid thee at the throne of the Most Highest.

  Farewell, but not for ever! brother dear,
    Be brave and patient on thy bed of sorrow;
  Swiftly shall pass thy night of trial here,
    And I will come and wake thee on the morrow.


----

{641}

From The Edinburgh Review. (Abridged.)

THE CHURCH AND MOSQUE OF ST. SOPHIA.


1. _Byzantine Architecture; illustrated by Examples of Edifices
erected in the East during the earliest ages of Christianity_. With
Historical and Archaeological Descriptions. By C. TEXIER and E. P.
PULLAN. Folio. London: 1864.

2. _Epigraphik von Byzantium und Constantinopolis, von den ältesten
Zeiten bis zum J._ 1453. Von Dr. S. A. DETHIER und Dr. A. D.
MORDTMANN. 4to. Wien: 1864.

3. _Acta Patriarchates Constantinopolitani_, 1305-1402, _e Codice MS.
Bibliothecae Palat. Vindobonensis; edentibus_ D. D. MIKLOVISCH et
MULLER. 8vo. 2 vols. Viennse: 1860-2.

4. _Die alt-christliche Baudenkmale Konstantinopels von V. bis XII.
Jahrhundert. Auf Befehl seiner Majestät des Königs aufgenommen und
historisch erläutert von_ W. SALZENBERG. _Im Anhange des Silentiarius
Paulus Beschreibung der heiligen Sophia und der Ambon, metrisch
übersetzt und mit Anmerkungen versehen, von_ Dr. C. W. KORTÜM. Fol.
Berlin: 1854.

5. _Aya Sofia, Constantinople, as recently restored by Order of H. M.
the Sultan Abdul Medjid_. From the original Drawings of Chevalier
GASPARD FOSSATI. Lithographed by Louis HAGHE, Esq. Imperial folio.
London: 1854.


There is not one among the evidences of Moslem conquest more galling
to Christian associations than the occupation of Justinian's ancient
basilica for the purposes of Mohammedan worship. The most commonplace
sight-seer from the west feels a thrill when his eye falls for the
first time upon the flaring cresent which surmounts "Sophia's cupola
with golden gleam;" and this emotion deepens into a feeling of awe at
the mysterious dispensations of Providence, when he has stood beneath
the unaltered and still stately dome, and

     "surveyed
  The sanctuary, the while the usurping Moslem prayed."

For oriental Christians, this sense of bitterness is hardly second to
that with which they regard the Turkish occupation of Jerusalem
itself. In the latter, however they may writhe under the political
supremacy of their unbelieving master, still, as the right of access
to those monuments which form the peculiar object of Christian
veneration is practically undisturbed, they are spared the double
indignity of religious profanation super-added to social wrong. But
the mosque of St. Sophia is, in Christian eyes, a standing monument at
once of Moslem sacrilege and of Christian defeat, the sense of which
is perpetuated and embittered by the preservation of its ancient, but
now desecrated name.

To an imaginative visitor of the modern mosque, it might seem as if
the structure itself were not unconscious of this wrong. The very
position of the building is a kind of silent protest against the
unholy use to which its Turkish masters have perverted it. Like all
ancient Christian churches, it was built exactly in the line of east
and west; and, as the great altar, which stood in the semicircular
apse, was directly at the eastern point of the building, the
worshippers in the old St. Sophia necessarily faced directly eastward;
and all the appliances of their worship were arranged with a view to
that position. Now, in the exigencies of Mohammedan ecclesiology,
since the worshipper must turn to the Kibla at Mecca (that is, in
Constantinople, to the south-east), the _mihrab_, or sacred niche, in
the modern St. Sophia is {642} necessarily placed out of the centre of
the apse; and thus the _mimber_ (pulpit), the prayer carpets, and the
long ranks of worshippers themselves, present an appearance singularly
at variance with every notion of architectural harmony, being arranged
in lines, not parallel, but oblique, to the length of the edifice, and
out of keeping with all the details of the original construction. It
is as though the dead walls of this venerable pile had retained more
of the spirit of their founder than the degenerate sons of the fallen
Rome of the east, and had refused to bend themselves at the will of
that hateful domination before which the living worshippers tamely
yielded or impotently fled!

The mosque of St. Sophia had long been an object of curious interest
to travellers in the east. Their interest, however, had seldom risen
beyond curiosity; and it was directed rather toward St. Sophia as it
is, than to the Christian events and traditions with which it is
connected. For those, indeed, who know the grudging and capricious
conditions under which alone a Christian visitor is admitted to a
mosque, and the jealous scrutiny to which he is subjected during his
visit, it will be easy to understand how rare and how precarious have
been the opportunities for a complete or exact study of this, the most
important of all the monuments of Byzantine art; and, notwithstanding
its exceeding interest for antiquarian and artistic purposes, far more
of our knowledge of its details was derived from the contemporary
description of Procopius  [Footnote 126] or Agathias,  [Footnote 127]
from the verses of Paulus Silentiarius, [Footnote 128] from the casual
allusions of other ancient authorities, and, above all, from the
invaluable work of Du Gauge, which is the great repertory of
everything that has been written upon ancient or mediaeval Byzantium,
than from the observation even of the most favored modern visitors of
Constantinople, until the publication of the works named at the head
of these pages.

  [Footnote 126: _De Edificiis_, lib. i. c. i.  ]

  [Footnote 127: Pp. 152-3.]

  [Footnote 128: A very good German version, with most valuable notes,
  is appended to the text of Saltzenberg's _Baudenkmale._]

For the elaborate account of the present condition of the mosque of
St. Sophia which we now possess, we are indebted to the happy
necessity by which the Turkish officials, in undertaking the recent
restoration of the building, were led to engage the services of an
eminent European architect, Chevalier Fossati, in whose admirable
drawings, as lithographed in the "Aya Sofia," every arch and pillar of
the structure is reproduced. The archaeological and historical
details, which lay beyond the province of a volume mainly professional
in its object, are supplied in the learned and careful work of M.
Salzenberg, who during the progress of the restoration was sent to
Constantinople at the cost of the late King of Prussia, for the
express purpose of copying and describing exactly every object which
might serve to throw light on Byzantine history, religion, or art, or
on the history and condition of the ancient church of St. Sophia, the
most venerable monument of them all.

Nor is it possible to imagine, under all the circumstances of the
case, a combination of opportunities more favorable for the purpose.
From long neglect and injudicious or insufficient reparation, the
mosque had fallen into so ruinous a condition, that, in the year 1847,
the late sultan, Abdul Medjid, found it necessary to direct a
searching survey of the entire building, and eventually a thorough
repair. In the progress of the work, while engaged near the entrance
of the northern transept, M. Fossati discovered, beneath a thin coat
of plaster (evidently laid on to conceal the design from the eyes of
true believers) a beautiful mosaic picture, almost uninjured, and
retaining all its original brilliancy of color. A further examination
showed that these mosaics extended throughout the building; and, with
a liberality which every lover of art must gratefully applaud, the
sultan at once acceded to the suggestion of M. Fossati, {643} and
ordered that the plaster should be removed throughout the interior;
thus exposing once more to view the original decorations of the
ancient basilica. It was while the mosque was still crowded with the
scaffolding erected to carry on this most interesting work, that M.
Salzenberg arrived in Constantinople. He thankfully acknowledges the
facilities afforded to him, as well by the Turkish officials as by the
Chevalier Fossati; and, although the specimens of the purely pictorial
decorations of the ancient church which he has published are not as
numerous as the reader may possibly expect, yet they are extremely
characteristic, and full of religious as well as of historical and
antiquarian interest.

Notwithstanding the beauty and attractiveness of M. Louis Haghe's
magnificent lithographs of Chevalier Fossati's drawings published in
the "Aya Sofia," the subject has received in England far less
attention than it deserves. There is not an incident in Byzantine
history with which the church of St. Sophia is not associated. There
is not a characteristic of Byzantine art of which it does not contain
abundant examples. It recalls in numberless details, preserved in
monuments in which time has wrought little change and which the
jealousy or contempt of the conquerors has failed to destroy or even
to travesty, interesting illustrations of the doctrine, the worship,
and the disciplinary usages of the ancient Eastern Church, which are
with difficulty traced, at present, in the living system of her
degenerate representative. To all these researches the wider
cultivation of art and of history, which our age has accepted as its
calling, ought to lend a deeper significance and a more solemn
interest. St. Sophia ought no longer to be a mere lounge for the
sightseer or a spectacle for the lover of the picturesque.

The history of this venerable church may be said to reach back as far
as the first selection of Byzantium by Constantine as the new capital
of his empire. Originally, the pretensions of Byzantium to
ecclesiastical rank were sufficiently humble, its bishop being but a
suffragan of the metropolitan of Heraclea. But, from the date of the
translation of the seat of empire, Constantine's new capital began to
rise in dignity. The personal importance which accrued to the bishop
from his position at the court of the emperor, was soon reflected upon
his see. The first steps of its upward progress are unrecorded; but
within little more than half a century from the foundation of the
imperial city, the celebrated fifth canon of the council which was
held therein in 381 not only distinctly assigned to the Bishop of
Constantinople "the primacy of honor, next after the Bishop of Rome,"
but, by alleging as the ground of this precedence the principle "that
Constantinople is the new Rome," laid the foundation of that rivalry
with the older Rome which had its final issue in the complete
separation of the Eastern from the Western Church.

The dignity of the see was represented in the beauty and magnificence
of its churches, and especially of its cathedral. One of the
considerations by which Constantine was influenced in the selection of
Byzantium for his new capital, lay in the advantages for architectural
purposes which the position commanded. The rich and various marbles of
Proconnesus; the unlimited supply of timber from the forests of the
Euxine; the artistic genius and the manual dexterity of the architects
and artisans of Greece--all lay within easy reach of Byzantium; and,
freely as Constantine availed himself of these resources for the
embellishment of the new city in its palaces, its offices of state,
and its other public buildings, the magnificence which he exhibited in
his churches outstripped all his other undertakings. Of these churches
by far the most magnificent was that which forms the subject of the
present notice. Its title is often a subject of misapprehension to
those who, being accustomed to regard {644} "Sophia" merely as a
feminine name, are led to suppose that the church of Constantine was
dedicated to a saint so called. The calendar, as well of the Greek as
of the Latin Church, does, it is true, commemorate more than one saint
named Sophia. Thus one Sophia is recorded as having suffered martyrdom
under Adrian, in company with her three daughters, Faith, Hope, and
Charity. Another is said to have been martyred in one of the latter
persecutions together with St. Irene; and a third is still specially
venerated as a martyr at Fermo (the ancient Firmum). But it was not
any of these that supplied the title of Constantine's basilica. That
church was dedicated to the [Greek text]--the HOLY WISDOM; that is,
to the Divine Logos, or Word of God, under the title of the "Holy
Wisdom," borrowed by adaptation from the well-known prophetic allusion
contained in the eighth chapter of Proverbs, and familiar in the
theological language of the fourth century.

The original church, however, which Constantine erected in 325-6 was
but the germ out of which the latter St. Sophia grew. The early
history of St. Sophia is marked by many vicissitudes, and comprises,
in truth, the history of four distinct churches, that of Constantine,
that of Constantius, that of Theodosius, and finally that of
Justinian.

Thirty-four years after the foundation of St. Sophia by the first
Christian emperor, his son, Constantius, either because of its
insufficient size, or owing to some injury which it had sustained in
an earthquake, rebuilt it, and united with it the adjoining church of
the _Irene_, or "peace" (also built by his father), forming both into
one grand edifice. And, although the church of Constantius was not
much longer lived than that of his father, it is memorable as the
theatre for several years of the eloquence of St. John Chrysostom,
while its destruction was a monument at once of the triumph and of the
fall of that great father. It was within the walls of this church that
his more than human eloquence was wont to draw, even from the light
and frivolous audiences of that pleasure-loving city, plaudits, the
notice of which in his own pages reads so strange to modern eyes. It
was here that he provoked the petty malice of the imperial directress
of fashion, by his inimitable denunciation of the indelicacy of female
dress. Here, too, was enacted that memorable scene, which, for deep
dramatic interest, has seldom been surpassed in history--the fallen
minister Eutropius clinging to the altar of St. Sophia for protection
against the popular fury, while Chrysostom, in a glorious exordium on
the instability of human greatness,  [Footnote 129] disarms the rage
of the populace by exciting their commiseration for their fallen
enemy. Nor can we wonder that those who had hung entranced upon that
eloquent voice should, when it was silenced by his cruel and arbitrary
banishment, have recognized a Nemesis in the destruction of the church
which had so often echoed with the golden melody of its tones. St.
Sophia, by a divine judgment, as the people believed, was destroyed
for the second time in 404, in the tumult which followed the
banishment of St. John Chrysostom.

  [Footnote 129: _Horn, in Eutropium Patricium._ Opp. tom iii., p. 399
  _et seq._ (Migne ed.) ]

The third St. Sophia was built in 415 by Theodosius the Younger. The
church of Theodosius lasted longer than either of those which went
before it. It endured through the long series of controversies on the
Incarnation. It witnessed their first beginning, and it almost
survived their close. It was beneath the golden roof of the Theodosian
basilica that Nestorius scandalized the orthodoxy of his flock, and
gave the first impulse to the controversy which bears his name, by
applauding the vehement declaration of the preacher who denied to the
Virgin Mary the title of mother of God. And it was from its ambo or
{645} pulpit that the Emperor Zeno promulgated his celebrated
Henoticon--the "decree of union" by which he vainly hoped to heal the
disastrous division. The St. Sophia of Theodosius was the scene of the
first act in the long struggle between Constantinople and Rome, the
great Acacian schism; when, at the hazard of his life, an impetuous
monk, one of the fiery "Sleepless Brotherhood," pinned the papal
excommunication on the cope of Acacius as he was advancing to the
altar. And it witnessed the close of that protracted contest, in the
complete and unreserved submission to Rome which was exacted by the
formulary of Pope Hormisdas as the condition of reconciliation. The
structure of Theodosius stood a hundred and fourteen years--from 415
to 529, but perished at length in the fifth year of Justinian, in a
disaster which, for a time, made Constantinople all but a desert--the
memorable battle of the blue and green factions of the hippodrome,
known in history as the _Nika_ sedition.

The restoration of St. Sophia, which had been destroyed in the
conflagration caused by the violence of the rioters, became, in the
view of Justinian, a duty of Christian atonement no less than of
imperial munificence. There is no evidence that the burning of the
church arose from any special act of impiety directed against it in
particular; but it is certain that the ancient feuds of the religious
parties in the east entered vitally as an element of discord into this
fatal sedition; and even the soldiers who had been engaged on the side
of the civil power in the repression of the tumult, and who were
chiefly legionaries enlisted from among the Heruli, the most savage of
the barbarian tribes of the empire, had contributed largely to the
sacrilegious enormities by which, even more than by the destruction of
human life, the religious feelings of the city had been outraged.

The entire history of the reconstruction exhibits most curiously the
operation of the same impulse. It was undertaken with a
large-handedness, and urged on with an energy, which bespeak for other
than merely human motives. Scarce had Constantinople begun to recover
after the sedition from the stupor of its alarm, and the affrighted
citizens to steal back from the Asiatic shore to which they had fled
in terror with their families and their most valuable effects, when
Justinian commissioned Anthemius of Tralles to prepare the plans of
the new basilica, on a scale of magnificence till then unknown. On the
23d of February, 532, within forty days from the catastrophe, the
first stone of the new edifice was solemnly laid. Orders, to borrow
the words of the chronicler,  [Footnote 130] "were issued
simultaneously to all the dukes, satraps, judges, quaestors, and
prefects" throughout the empire, to send in from their several
governments pillars, peristyles, bronzes, gates, marbles, and all
other materials suitable for the projected undertaking. How
efficiently the order was carried out may yet be read in the motley,
though magnificent array of pillars and marbles which form the most
striking characteristic of St. Sophia, and which are for the most
part, as we shall see, the spoil of the older glories of Roman and
Grecian architecture. We shall only mention here eight porphyry
columns from the Temple of the Sun at Baalbec, which Aurelian had sent
to Rome, and which, having come into the possession of a noble Roman
widow, named Marcia, as her dowry, were presented by that pious lady
to Justinian, as an offering [Greek text], "for the Salvation of her
soul."   [Footnote 131]

  [Footnote 130: _Anonymi de Antiquit. Constantinop._ (in Banduri's
  _Imperium Orientale_), p. 55.]

  [Footnote 131: _Anonymi_, p. 55.]

Indeed, some of the incidents of the undertaking are so curious in
themselves, and illustrate so curiously the manners and feelings of
the age, that we are induced to select a few of them from among a mass
of more or less legendary details, supplied by the anonymous {646}
chronicler already referred to, whose work Banduri has printed in his
_Imperium Orientals_  [Footnote 132] and who, if less trustworthy than
Procopius or the Silentiary, has preserved a much greater amount of
the traditionary gossip connected with the building.

  [Footnote 132: Under the title _Anonymi de Antiquitatibus
  Constantinopoleos_. The third part is devoted entirely to a "History
  and Description of the Church of St. Sophia."]

For the vastly enlarged scale of Justinian's structure, it became
necessary to make extensive purchases in the immediate circuit of the
ancient church; and, as commonly happens, the demands of the
proprietors rose in proportion to the necessity in which the imperial
purchaser was placed. It is interesting to contrast the different
spirit in which each sought to use the legal rights of a proprietor.

The first was a widow, named Anna, whose tenement was valued by the
imperial commissaries at eighty-five pounds of gold. This offer on the
part of the commissary the widow unhesitatingly refused, and declared
that she would consider her house cheap at fifty hundred-weight of
gold; but when Justinian, in his anxiety to secure the site, did not
hesitate to wait upon the widow herself in person, she was so struck
by his condescension, and so fired by the contagion of his pious
enthusiasm, that she not only surrendered the required ground, but
refused all payment for it in money: only praying that she might be
buried near the spot, in order that, from the site of her former
dwelling itself, she "might claim the purchase-money on the day of
judgment." She was buried, accordingly, near the _Skeuophylacium_, or
treasury of the sacred vessels.  [Footnote 133]

  [Footnote 133: _Anonymi_, p. 58.]

Very different, but yet hardly less characteristic of the time, was
the conduct of one Antiochus, a eunuch, and _ostiarius_ of the palace.
His house stood on the spot now directly under the great dome, and was
valued by the imperial surveyor at thirty-five pounds of gold. But
Antiochus exacted a far larger sum, and obstinately refused to abate
his demand. Justinian, in his eagerness, was disposed to yield; but
Strategus, the prefect of the treasury, begged the emperor to leave
the matter in his hands, and proceeded to arrest the obdurate
proprietor and throw him into prison. It chanced that Antiochus was a
passionate lover of the sports of the hippodrome, and Strategus so
timed the period of his imprisonment that it would include an
unusually attractive exhibition in the hippodrome--what in the
language of the modern turf would be called "the best meeting of the
season." At first Antiochus kept up a determined front; but, as the
time of the games approached, the temptation proved too strong; his
resolution began to waver; and, at length, when the morning arrived,
he "bawled out lustily" from the prison, and promised that, if he were
released in time to enjoy his favorite spectacle, he would yield up
possession on the emperor's own terms. By this time the races had
begun, and the emperor had already taken his seat; but Strategus did
not hesitate to have the sport suspended, led Antiochus at once to the
emperor's tribunal, and, in the midst of the assembled spectators,
completed the negotiation.  [Footnote 134]

  [Footnote 134: _Anonymi_ p. 59.]

A third was a cobbler, called by the classic name of Xenophon. His
sole earthly possession was the stall in which he exercised his trade,
abutting on the wall of one of the houses doomed to demolition in the
clearance of the new site. A liberal price was offered for the stall;
but the cobbler, although he did not refuse to surrender it,
whimsically exacted, as a condition precedent, that the several
factions of the charioteers should salute him, in the same way as they
saluted the emperor, while passing his seat in the hippodrome.
Justinian agreed; but took what must be considered an ungenerous
advantage of the simple man of leather. The letter of Xenophon's.
condition was fulfilled. He was placed {647} in the front of the
centre tribune, gorgeously arrayed in a scarlet and white robe. The
factions, as they passed his seat in procession, duly rendered the
prescribed salute; but the poor cobbler was balked of his anticipated
triumph, being compelled, amid the derisive cheers and laughter of the
multitude, _to receive the solute with his back turned to the
assembly!_  [Footnote 135]

  [Footnote 135: _Anonymi_, p. 59. ]

But it is around the imperial builder himself that the incidents of
the history of the work, and still more its legendary marvels, group
themselves in the pages of the anonymous chronicler. For although the
chief architect, Anthemius, was assisted by Agathias, by Isidorus of
Miletus, and by a countless staff of minor subordinates, Justinian,
from the first to the last, may be truly said to have been the very
life and soul of the undertaking, and the director even of its
smallest details. From the moment when, at the close of the
inauguratory prayer, he threw the first shovelful of mortar into the
foundation, till its solemn opening for worship on Christmas-day, 538,
his enthusiasm never abated, nor did his energy relax. Under the glare
of the noon-day sun, while others were indulging in the customary
siesta, Justinian was to be seen, clad in a coarse linen tunic, staff
in hand, and his head bound with a cloth, directing, encouraging, and
urging on the workmen, stimulating the industrious by liberal
donations, visiting the loiterers with his displeasure. Some of his
expedients, as detailed by the chronicler, are extremely curious. We
shall mention only one. In order to expedite the work, it was
desirable to induce the men to work after-hours. The natural way of
effecting this would have been to offer them a proportionate increase
of pay; but Justinian chose rather to obtain the same result
indirectly. Accordingly, he was accustomed--if our authority can be
relied on--to scatter a quantity of coins about the building; and the
workmen, afraid to search for them in the open day, were led to
continue their work till the shades of evening began to fall, in order
that they might more securely carry off the spoil under cover of the
darkness!

Some of the building operations which this writer describes are
equally singular. The mortar, to secure greater tenacity, was made
with barley-water; the foundations were filled up with huge
rectangular masses, fifty feet long, of a concrete of lime and sand,
moistened with barley-water and other glutinous fluid, and bound
together by wicker framework. The tiles or bricks of which the cupola
was formed were made of Rhodian clay, so light that twelve of them did
not exceed the weight of one ordinary tile. The pillars and buttresses
were built of cubical and triangular blocks of stone, with a cement
made of lime and oil, soldered with lead, and bound, within and
without, with clamps of iron.

It is plain, however, that these particulars, however curious they may
seem, are not to be accepted implicitly, at least if they are judged
by the palpable incredibility of some of the other statements of the
writer. The supernatural appears largely as an element in his history.
On three several occasions, according to this chronicler, the emperor
was favored with angelic apparitions, in which were imparted to him
successive instructions, first as to the plan of the building, again
as to urging on its progress, and finally as to finding funds for its
completion. One of these narratives is extremely curious, as showing
the intermixture of earth and heaven in the legendary notions of the
time. A boy, during the absence of the masons, had been left in charge
of their tools, when, as the boy believed, one of the eunuchs of the
palace, in a resplendent white dress, came to him, ordered him at once
to call back the masons, that the work of heaven might not be longer
retarded. {648} On the boy's refusing to quit the post of which he had
been left in charge, the supposed eunuch volunteered to take his
place, and swore "by the wisdom of God" that he would not depart from
the place till the boy should return. Justinian ordered all the
eunuchs of the palace to be paraded before the boy; and on the boy's
declaring that the visitor who had appeared to him was not any of the
number, at once concluded that the apparition was supernatural; but,
while he accepted the exhortation to greater zeal and energy in
forwarding the work, he took a characteristic advantage of the oath by
which the angel had sworn not to leave the church till the return of
his youthful messenger. Without permitting the boy to go back to the
building where the angel had appeared to him, Justinian _sent him away
to the Cyclades for the rest of his life,_ in order that the perpetual
presence and protection of the angel might thus be secured for the
church, which that divine messenger was pledged never to leave till
the boy should return to relieve him at his post!   [Footnote 136]

  [Footnote 136: _Anonymi_, p. 61.]

Without dwelling further, however, on the legendary details, we shall
find marvels enough in the results, such as they appear in the real
history of the building. And perhaps the greatest marvel of all is the
shortness of the period in which so vast a work was completed, the new
church being actually opened for worship within less than seven years
from the day of the conflagration. Ten thousand workmen were employed
on the edifice, if it be true that a hundred master-builders, each of
whom had a hundred men under him, were engaged to accelerate and
complete the undertaking. For the philosophical student of history,
there is a deep subject of study in the bare enumeration of the
materials brought together for this great Christian enterprise, and of
the various quarters from which they were collected. It is not alone
the rich assortment of precious marbles--the spotless white of Paros;
the green of Croceae; the blue of Libya; together with parti-colored
marbles in a variety hardly ever equalled before--the costly
cipolline, the rose-veined white marble of Phrygia, the curiously
streaked black marble of Gaul, and the countless varieties of Egyptian
porphyry and granite. Far more curious is it to consider how the
materials of the structure were selected so as to present in
themselves a series of trophies of the triumphs of Christianity over
all the proudest forms of worship in the old world of paganism. In the
forest of pillars which surround the dome and sustain the graceful
arches of the gynaeconitis, the visitor may still trace the spoils of
the Temple of the Sun at Baalbec, of the famous Temple of Diana at
Ephesus, or that of the Delian Apollo, of Minerva at Athens, of Cybele
at Cyzicus, and of a host of less distinguished shrines of paganism.
When the mere cost of the transport of these massive monuments to
Constantinople is taken into account, all wonder ceases at the
vastness of the sums which are said to have been expended in the work.
It is easy to understand how, "before the walls had risen two cubits
from the ground, forty-five thousand two hundred pounds were
consumed."   [Footnote 137] It is not difficult to account for the
enormous general taxation, the oppressive exactions from individuals,
the percentages on prefects' incomes, and the deductions from the
salaries of judges and professors, which went to swell the almost
fabulous aggregate of the expenditure; and there is perhaps an
economical lesson in the legend of the apparition of the angel, who,
when the building had risen as far as the cupola, conducted the master
of the imperial treasury to a subterranean vault in which eighty
hundred weight of gold were discovered ready for the completion of the
work!   [Footnote 138]

  [Footnote 137: Gibbon's "Decline and Fall," vol. iii. p. 633.]

  [Footnote 138: _Anonymi_, p. 62.]

Even independently of the building itself and its artistic
decorations, the value of the sacred furniture and appliances exceeded
all that had ever before been devised. The sedilia of the {649}
priests and the throne of the patriarch were of silver gilt. The dome
of the tabernacle was of pure gold, ornamented with golden lilies, and
surmounted by a gold cross seventy-five pounds weight and encrusted
with precious stones. All the sacred vessels--chalices, beakers,
ewers, dishes, and patens, were of gold. The candelabra which stood on
the altar, on the ambo, and on the upper gynaeconitis; the two
colossal candelabra placed at either side of the altar; the dome of
the ambo; the several crosses within the bema; the pillars of the
iconastasis; the covers of the sacred books--all were likewise of
gold, and many of them loaded with pearls, diamonds, and carbuncles.
The sacred linens of the altar and the communion cloths were
embroidered with gold and pearls. But when it came to the construction
of the altar itself, no single one of these costly materials was
considered sufficiently precious. Pious ingenuity was tasked to its
utmost to devise a new and richer substance, and the table of the
great altar was formed of a combination of all varieties of precious
materials. Into the still fluid mass of molten gold were thrown pearls
and other gems, rubies, crystals, topazes, sapphires, onyxes, and
amethysts, blended in such proportions as might seem best suited to
enhance to the highest imaginable limit the costliness of what was
prepared as the throne of the Most High on earth! And to this
combination of all that is most precious in nature, art added all the
wealth at its disposal, by the richness of the chasing and the
elaborateness and beauty of the design.

The total cost of the structure has been variously estimated. It
amounted, according to the ancient authorities, to "three hundred and
twenty thousand pounds;" but whether these were of silver or of gold
is not expressly stated. Gibbon  [Footnote 139] leaves it to each
reader, "according to the measure of his belief," to estimate it in
one or the other metal; but Mr. Neale  [Footnote 140] is not deterred
by the sneer of Gibbon from expressing his "belief that gold must be
intended." According to this supposition the expenditure, if this can
be believed possible, would have reached the enormous sum of thirteen
millions sterling!

  [Footnote 139: "Decline and Fall," vol. iii., p. 523.]

  [Footnote 140: "Eastern Church," vol. i., p. 237.  ]

It was, no doubt, with profound self-gratulation that, at the end of
almost six years of anxious toil, Justinian received the intelligence
of the completion of this great labor of love. At his special
entreaty, the last details had been urged forward with headlong haste,
in order that all might be ready for the great festival of Christmas
in the year 538; and his architect had not disappointed his hopes.
There is some uncertainty as to the precise date of the dedication;
and indeed it is probable that the festival may have extended over
several days, and thus have been assigned to different dates by
different writers. But when it came (probably on Christmas eve,
December 24, 538) it was a day of triumph for Justinian. A thousand
oxen, a thousand sheep, a thousand swine, six hundred deer, ten
thousand poultry, and thirty thousand measures of corn, were
distributed to the poor. Largesses to a fabulous amount were divided
among the people. The emperor, attended by the patriarch and all the
great officers of state, went in procession from his palace to the
entrance of the church. But, from that spot, as though he would claim
to be alone in the final act of offering, Justinian ran, unattended,
to the foot of the ambo, and with arms outstretched and lifted up in
the attitude of prayer, exclaimed in words which the event has made
memorable: "Glory to God, who hath accounted me worthy of such a work!
I have conquered thee, O Solomon!"

Justinian's works in St. Sophia, however, were not destined to cease
with this first completion of the building. Notwithstanding the care
bestowed on {650} the dome, the selection of the lightest materials
for it, and the science employed in its construction, an earthquake
which occurred in the year 558 overthrew the semi-dome at the east end
of the church. Its fall was followed by that of the eastern half of
the great dome itself; and in the ruin perished the altar, the
tabernacle, and the whole bema, with its costly furniture and
appurtenances. This catastrophe, however, only supplied a new
incentive to the zeal of Justinian. Anthemius and his fellow-laborers
were now dead, but the task of repairing the injury was entrusted to
Isidorus the Younger, nephew of the Isidorus who had been associated
with Anthemius in the original construction of the church. It was
completed, and the church rededicated, at the Christmas of the year
561; nor can it be doubted that the change which Isidorus now
introduced in the proportions of the dome, by adding twenty-five feet
to its height, contributed materially as well to the elegance of the
dome itself as to the general beauty of the church and the harmony of
its several parts.

The church of Justinian thus completed may be regarded as
substantially the same building which is now the chief temple of
Islam. The few modifications which it has undergone will be mentioned
in the proper place; but it may be convenient to describe the
building, such as it came from the hands of its first founder, before
we proceed to its later history.

St. Sophia, in its primitive form, may be taken as the type of
Byzantine ecclesiology in almost all its details. Although its walls
enclose what may be roughly  [Footnote 141] called a square of 241
feet, the internal plan is not inaptly described as a Greek cross, of
which the nave and transepts constitute the arm, while the aisles,
which are surmounted by the gynaeconitis, or women's gallery, may be
said to complete it into a square, within which the cross is
inscribed. The head of the cross is prolonged at the eastern extremity
into a slightly projecting apse. The aisle is approached at its
western end through a double narthex or porch, extending over the
entire breadth of the building, and about 100 feet in depth; so that
the whole length of the structure, from the eastern wall of the apse
to the wall of the outer porch, is about 340 feet. In the centre, from
four massive piers, rises the great dome, beneath which, to the east
and to the west, spring two great semi-domes, the eastern supported by
three, the western by two, semi-domes of smaller dimensions. The
central of the three lesser semi-domes, to the east, constitutes the
roof of the apse to which allusion has already been made. The piers of
the dome (differing in this respect from those of St. Peter's at Rome)
present from within a singularly light and elegant appearance; they
are nevertheless constructed with great strength and solidity,
supported by four massive buttresses, which, in the exterior, rise as
high as the base of the dome, and are capacious enough to contain the
exterior staircases of the gynaeconitis. The lightness of the
dome-piers is in great part due to the lightness of the materials of
the dome itself already described. The diameter of the dome at its
base is 100 feet, its height at the central point above the floor is
179 feet, the original height, before the reconstruction in 561,
having been twenty-five feet less.  [Footnote 142] The effect of this
combination of domes, semi-domes, and plane arches, on entering the
nave, is singularly striking. It constitutes, in the opinion of the
authors of "Byzantine Architecture," what may regarded as the
characteristic beauty be of St. Sophia; and the effect is heightened
in the modern mosque by the nakedness of the lower part of the {651}
building, and by the absence of those appurtenances of a Christian
church,--as the altar, the screen, and the ambo,--which, by arresting
the eye in more minute observation, withdrew it in the Christian times
from the general proportions of the structure. This effect of
lightness is also increased by numerous window's, which encircle the
tympanum. They are twenty-four in number, small, low, and
circular-headed; and in the spaces between them spring the twenty-four
groined ribs of the dome, which meet in the centre and divide the
vault into twenty-four equal segments. The interior was richly
decorated with mosaic work. At the four angles beneath the dome were
four colossal figures of winged seraphim; and from the summit of the
dome looked down that majestic face of Christ the Sovereign Judge,
which still remains the leading type of our Lord's countenance in the
school of Byzantine art, and even in the Latin reproductions of it
fills the mind with a feeling of reverence and awe, hardly to be
equalled by any other production of Christian art. The exterior of the
dome is covered with lead, and it was originally surmounted by a
stately cross, which in the modern mosque is replaced by a gigantic
crescent fifty yards in diameter; on the gilding of this ornament
Murad III. expended 50,000 ducats, and the glitter of it in the
sunshine is said to be visible from the summit of Mount Olympus--a
distance of a hundred miles. To an eye accustomed to the convexity of
the cupola of western churches, the interior height of the dome of
Sophia is perhaps somewhat disappointing, especially considering the
name "aerial," by which it is called by the ancient authorities. This
name, however, was given to it, not so much to convey the idea of
lightness or "airiness" in the structure, as because its proportions,
as designed by the architect, were intended to represent or reproduce
the supposed convexity of the "aerial vault" itself.

  [Footnote 141: This is not exactly true. The precise dimensions of
  the building (excluding the apse and narthex) are 241 feet by 226
  feet.]

   [Footnote 142: Later Greek authorities, for the purpose of exalting
   the glories of the older church, allege that the second dome is
   fifteen feet lower than the first; and even Von Hammer
   (_Constantinople und der Bosporus_, vol. i., p. 346) adopts this
   view. But Zonaras and the older writers agree that the height was
   increased by twenty-five feet. See Neale's "Eastern Church," vol.
   i., p. 239.]

With Justinian's St. Sophia begins what may be called the second or
classic period of Byzantine archaeology. It is proper, therefore, that
we should describe, although of necessity very briefly, its general
outline and arrangements.

With very few exceptions, the Greek churches of the earlier period
(including the older church of St. Sophia, whether as originally built
by Constantine and restored by his son, or as rebuilt by Theodosius)
were of that oblong form which the Greeks called "dromic" and which is
known in the west as the type of the basilica. The present St. Sophia,
on the contrary, may be regarded as practically the type of the
cruciform structure. This cruciform appearance, however, is, as has
been already explained, confined to the internal arrangement, the
exterior presenting the appearance of a square, or if the porch be
regarded as part of the church, of an oblong rectangle.

To begin with the narthex or porch:--That of St. Sophia is double,
consisting of an outer (exonarthcx) as well as an inner (esonarthex)
porch. Most Byzantine churches have but a single narthex--often a
lean-to against the western wall; and in some few churches the narthex
is altogether wanting. But in St. Sophia it is a substantive part of
the edifice; and, the roof of the inner compartment being arched, it
forms the substructure of the western gynaeconitis, or women's choir,
which is also carried upon a series of unrivalled arches supported by
pillars, most of which are historical, around the northern and
southern sides of the nave. The outer porch is comparatively plain,
and communicates with the inner one by five marble doorways (of which
one is now walled up), the doors being of bronze, wrought in floriated
crosses, still distinguishable, although much mutilated by the Turkish
occupants. The inner porch is much more rich, the floor of watered
marble, and the walls lined with marbles of various colors and with
richly carved alabaster. It opens on {652} the church by nine gates of
highly-wrought bronze; over the central portal is a well-preserved
group in mosaic, bearing the inscription: [Greek text]--and
representing our Lord, with the Virgin and St. John the Baptist on
either hand, in the act of giving with uplifted right hand his
benediction to an emperor (no doubt Justinian) prostrate at his feet.
This group is represented in one of M. Salzenberg's plates; and it is
specially interesting for the commentary, explanatory of the attitude
of our Lord, given in the poem of Paul the Silentiary, according to
whom the position of our Lord's fingers represents, in the language of
signs then received, the initial and final letters of the sacred name,
[Greek text]:

[Greek text]

The outstretched forefinger meant I; the bent second finger, C or
[sigma]; the third finger applied to the thumb, X; and the little
finger, [sigma]. It may also be noted that Justinian in this curious
group is represented with the nimbus. During the progress of the
restoration of the building in 1847, this mosaic was uncovered, and
exactly copied; but like all the other mosaics which contain
representations of the human form, it has been covered with canvas,
and again carefully coated with plaster. It was on the _phiale_ or
fountain of the outer court of this narthex that the famous
palindromic inscription was placed:

  [Greek text]
  "Wash thy sins, not thy countenance only."

The interior of St. Sophia, exclusive of the women's choir, consisted
of three great divisions--the nave, which was the place of the laity;
the _soleas_, or choir, which was assigned to the assisting clergy of
the various grades; and the _bema_, or sanctuary, the semi-circular
apse at the eastern end in which the sacred mysteries were celebrated,
shut off from the soleas by the _inconastasis_ or screen, and flanked
by two smaller, but similar, semicircular recesses; the _diaconicon_,
corresponding with the modern vestry; and the _prothesis_, in which
the bread and wine were prepared for the eucharistic offering, whence
they were carried, in the procession called the "Great Entrance," to
the high altar within the bema.

The position of these several parts is still generally traceable in
the modern mosque, although, the divisions having been all swept away,
there is some controversy as to details.

The nave, of course, occupies the western end, and is entered directly
from the porch. It was separated from the soleas, or choir, at the
_ambo_--the pulpit, or more properly gallery, which was used not only
for preaching, but also for the reading or chanting of the lessons and
the gospel, for ecclesiastical announcements or proclamations, and in
St. Sophia for the coronation of the emperor. The ambo of St. Sophia
was a very massive and stately structure of rich and costly material
and of most elaborate workmanship; it was crowned by a canopy or
baldachin, surmounted by a solid golden cross a hundred pounds in
weight. All trace of the ambo has long disappeared from the mosque;
but from the number of clergy, priests, deacons, subdeacons, lectors,
and singers (numbering, even on the reduced scale prescribed by
Justinian, 385) which the soleas was designed to accommodate, as well
as from other indications, it is believed that the ambo, which was at
the extreme end of the soleas, must have stood under the dome, a
little to the east of the centre. The seat of the emperor was on the
left side of the soleas, immediately below the seats of the priests,
close to the ambo, and opposite to the throne of the patriarch. The
seats assigned in the present patriarchal church to the princes of
Wallachia and Moldavia correspond in position to those formerly
occupied by the throne of the emperor and are directly opposite that
of the patriarch. Beside its sacred uses, the ambo of St. Sophia was
{653} the scene of many a striking incident in Byzantine history. The
reader of Gibbon will recall the graphic picture of Heracleonas
compelled by the turbulent multitude to appear in the ambo of St.
Sophia with his infant nephew in his arms for the purpose of receiving
their homage to the child as emperor; [Footnote 143] or his still more
vivid description of the five sons of Copronimus, of whom the eldest,
Nicephorus, had been made blind, and the other four had their tongues
cut out, escaping from their dungeon and taking sanctuary in St.
Sophia. There are few more touching stories in all the bloody annals
of Byzantium than that which presents the blind Nicephorus employing
that faculty of speech which had been spared in him alone, by
appealing from the ambo on behalf of his mute brothers to the pity and
protection of the people!  [Footnote 144]

  [Footnote 143: "Decline and Fall," vol. iv.. p. 403. ]

  [Footnote 144: _Ibid_., vol. iv., p. 413. ]

But it was upon the bema of St. Sophia, as we have already seen, that
the wealth and pious munificence of Justinian were most lavishly
expended. It was shut off from the soleas by the inconastasis, which
in Byzantine art is a screen resembling, in all except its position,
the rood-screen of western architecture, and derived its name from the
sacred pictures ([Greek text]) represented upon it. In that of St.
Sophia the material was silver, the lower part being highly wrought
with arabesque devices, and the upper composed of twelve pillars,
twined two and two, and separated by panels on which were depicted in
oval medallions the figures of our Lord, his Virgin Mother, and the
prophets and apostles. It had three doors; the central one (called
[Greek text], "sacred door") leading directly to the altar, that on
the right to the diaconicon, and that on the left to the prothesis.
The figures on either side of the central door, following what appears
to have been the universal rule, were those of our Lord and the
Virgin, and above the door stood a massive cross of gold. The altar,
with its canopy or tabernacle, has been already described. The
_synthronus_, or bench with stalls, for the officiating bishop and
clergy, are at the back of the altar along the circular wall of the
bema. The seats were of silver gilt. The pillars which separated them
were of pure gold. All this costly and gorgeous structure has of
course disappeared from the modern mosque. The eye now ranges without
interruption from the entrance of the royal doors to the very
extremity of the bema;--the only objects to arrest observation being
the sultan's gallery (maksure), which stands at the left or north side
of the bema; the mimber, or pulpit for the Friday prayer, which is
placed at the right or southern end of the ancient inconastasis; the
mahfil, or ordinary preaching pulpit, in the centre of the mosque; and
the mihrab, or sacred niche, which is at the south-east side of the
bema.

It was more difficult, in converting the church into a mosque, to get
rid of the numerous sacred pictures in gold and mosaic which adorned
the walls and arches. Accordingly, instead of attempting to remove or
destroy them, the Moslem invaders of the church were content with
covering all these Christian representations with a coat of plaster;
and thus in the late reparation of the mosque, the architect, having
removed the plaster, was enabled to have copies made of all the groups
which still remained uninjured. Of the principal of them M. Salzenberg
has given fac-similes. On the great western arch was represented the
Virgin Mary, with Sts. Peter and Paul. On the side walls of the nave,
above the women's choir upon either side, were figures, in part now
defaced, of prophets, martyrs, and other saints. M. Salzenberg has
reproduced in his volume Sts. Anthemius, Basil, Gregory, Dionysius the
Areopagite, Nicolas of Myra, Gregory the Armenian apostle, and the
prophets Jeremiah, Isaiah, and Habakkuk. On the great eastern arch was
a group consisting of the Virgin Mary, St. John the Baptist, and {654}
the Emperor John Palaeologus, the last Christian restorer of the
building; but these figures--and still more the group which decorated
the arch of the bema, our Lord, the Virgin, and the Archangel
Michael--are now much defaced. Much to the credit of the late sultan,
however, he not only declined to permit the removal of these relics of
ancient Christian art, but gave orders that every means should be
taken to preserve them; at the same time directing that they should be
carefully concealed from Moslem eyes, as before, by a covering of
plaster, the outer surface of which is decorated in harmony with those
portions of the ancient mosaic, which, not containing any object
inconsistent with the Moslem worship, have been restored to their
original condition. Accordingly, the winged seraphim at the angles of
the buttresses which support the dome have been preserved, and, to a
Christian visitor, appear in strange contrast with the gigantic Arabic
inscriptions in gold and colors which arrest the eye upon either side
of the nave and within the dome, commemorating the four companions of
the Prophet, Abu-bekr, Omar, Osman, and Ali.

But there is one characteristic of St. Sophia which neither time nor
the revolutions which time has brought have been able to efface or
even substantially to modify--the strikingly graceful and elegant,
although far from classically correct, grouping of the pillars which
support the lesser semidomes and the women's choir. It would be
impossible, without the aid of a plan, to convey any idea of the
arrangement of this matchless assemblage of columns, which, as we have
already observed, are even less precious for the intrinsic richness
and beauty of their material than for the interesting associations
which their presence in a Christian temple involves. Most of these may
still be identified. The eight red porphyry pillars standing, two and
two, under the semi-domes at either end of the nave, are the
celebrated columns from the Temple of the Sun, already recorded as the
gift of Marcia, offered by her "for the salvation of her soul." The
eight pillars of green serpentine which support the women's choir, at
either side of the nave, are from the Temple of Diana at Ephesus; and
among the remaining pillars on the ground floor, twenty-four in
number, arranged in groups of four, are still pointed out
representatives of almost every form of the olden worship of the Roman
empire--spoils of the pagan temples of Athens, Delos, Troas, Cyzicus,
and other sanctuaries of the heathen gods.

Less grand, but hardly less graceful, are the groups of pillars,
sixty-seven in number, in the women's choir above the aisles and the
inner porch. The occasional absence of uniformity which they present,
differing from each other in material, in color, in style, and even in
height, although it may offend the rules of art, is by no means
ungrateful to the eye. In the total number of the pillars of St.
Sophia, which is the broken number one hundred and seven, there is
supposed to be a mystic allusion to the seven pillars of the House of
Wisdom.  [Footnote 145]

  [Footnote 145: Proverbs ix. 1.]

Such was St. Sophia in the days of its early glory--a fitting theatre
for the stately ceremonial which constituted the peculiar
characteristic of the Byzantine court and Church. On all the great
festivals of the year--Christmas, Epiphany, Palm Sunday, Easter,
Pentecost, and the Ascension; at the ceremony of the emperor's
coronation; at imperial marriages; and on occasions, more rare in the
inglorious annals of the Lower Empire, of imperial triumphs,--the
emperor, attended by the full array of his family I and court, went in
state to St. Sophia and assisted at the celebration of the divine
mysteries. The emperor himself, with his distinctive purple buskins
and close tiara; the Caesar, {655} and, in later times, the
Sebastocrator, in green buskins and open tiara; the Despots, the
Panhypersebastos, and the Protosebastos; the long and carefully
graduated line of functionaries, civil and military--the Curopalata,
the Logothete and Great Logothete, the Domestic and Great Domestic,
the Prostostrator, the Stratospedarch, the Protospatharius, the Great
AEteriarch, and the Acolyth, with the several trains of attendants in
appropriate costume which belonged to each department,--combined to
form an array for which it would be difficult to find a parallel in
the history of ceremonial; and when to these are added the purely
ecclesiastical functionaries, for whose number even the munificent
provision of space allotted by Justinian's architect was found at
times insufficient, some idea may be formed of the grandeur of the
service, which, for so many ages, lent to that lofty dome and these
stately colonnades a life and a significance now utterly lost in the
worship which has usurped its place. As a purely ecclesiastical
ceremony, probably some of the great functions at St. Peter's in Rome
surpass in splendor such a ceremonial as the "Great Entrance" at St.
Sophia on one of the emperor's days. But the latter had the additional
element of grandeur derived from the presence of a court unrivalled
for the elaborate stateliness and splendor of its ceremonial code.

We have said that the church of Justinian is, in all substantial
particulars, the St. Sophia of the present day. In an architectural
view the later history of the building is hardly worth recording. The
eastern half of the dome, in consequence of some settling of the
foundation of the buttresses, having shown indications of a tendency
to give way, it became necessary in the reign of Basil the Macedonian,
toward the end of the ninth century, to support it by four exterior
buttresses, which still form a conspicuous object from the Seraglio
Place. The Emperor Michael, in 896, erected the tower still standing
at the western entrance, to receive a set of bells which were
presented by the doge of Venice, but which the Turks have melted down
into cannon. About half a century later, a further work for the
purpose of strengthening the dome was undertaken by the Emperor
Romanus; and in the year 987 a complete reparation and
re-strengthening of the dome, within and without, was executed under
Basil the Bulgaricide, in which work the cost of the scaffolding alone
amounted to ten hundred weight of gold.

No further reparations are recorded for upward of two centuries. But,
to the shame of the founders of the Latin empire of Constantinople,
the church of St. Sophia suffered so much in their hands, that, after
the recovery of the city by the Greeks, more than one of the later
Greek emperors is found engaged in repairing the injuries of the
building. Andronicus the Elder, Cantacuzenus, and John IV.
Palaeologus, each had a share in the work; and, by a curious though
fortuitous coincidence, Palaeologus, the last of the Christian
emperors who are recorded as restorers of St. Sophia, appears to be
the only one admitted to the same honor which was accorded to its
first founder Justinian--that of having his portrait introduced into
the mosaic decorations of the building. John Palaeologus, as we saw,
is represented in the group which adorned the eastern arch supporting
the great dome. The figures, however, are now much defaced.

How much of the injury which, from whatever cause, the mosaic and
other decorations of St. Sophia have suffered, is due to the
fanaticism of the Turkish conquerors of Constantinople it is
impossible to say with certainty. Probably, however, it was far less
considerable than might at first be supposed. Owing to the peculiar
discipline of the Greek Church, which, while it freely admits painted
images, endures no sculptured Christian representations except that of
the cross itself, there was little in the marble or bronze of St.
Sophia to provoke Moslem {656} fanaticism. The crosses throughout
the building, and especially in the women's choir, have been modified,
rather than completely destroyed; the mutilator being generally
satisfied with merely chiselling off _the head of the cross_ (the
cruciform character being thus destroyed), sparing the other three
arms of the Christian emblem. For the rest, as we have already said,
the change consisted in simply denuding the church of all its
Christian furniture and appliances, whether movable objects or
permanent structures, and in covering up from view all the purely
Christian decorations of the walls, roof, and domes. The mosaic work,
where it has perished, seems to have fallen, less from intentional
outrage or direct and voluntary defacement, than from the
long-continued neglect under which the building had suffered for
generations, down to the restoration by the late sultan.

The alterations of the exterior under Moslem rule are far more
striking, as well as more considerable. Much of the undoubtedly heavy
and inelegant appearance of the exterior of St. Sophia is owing to the
absence of several groups of statues and other artistic objects which
were designed to relieve the massive and ungraceful proportions of the
buttresses and supports of the building as seen from without. Of these
groups the most important was that of the celebrated horses now at St.
Mark's in Venice. On the other hand, the addition of the four minarets
has, in a different way, contributed to produce the same effect of
heaviness and incongruity of proportion. Of these minarets, the first,
that at the south-east angle, was built by Mahomet II. The second, at
the north-east, was erected by Selim, to whose care the mosque was
indebted for many important works, intended as well for its actual
restoration as for its prospective maintenance and preservation. The
north-western and south-western minarets are both the work of Amurath
III. These structures, although exceedingly light and elegant in
themselves, are altogether out of keeping with the massive structure
to which they were intended as an appendage, and the pretentious style
of their decoration only heightens by the contrast the bald and
unarchitectural appearance of the exterior of the church. It is not
too much to say that the effect of these peculiarly Mohammedan
additions to the structure is externally to destroy its Christian
character.

But whatever may be said of the works of former sultans, it is
impossible not to regard the late Sultan Abdul Medjid as a benefactor
to Christian art, even in the works which he undertook directly in the
interest of his own worship. From the time of Amurath III. the
building had been entirely neglected. Dangerous cracks had appeared in
the dome, as well as in several of the semi-domes. The lead covering
of all was in a ruinous condition; and the apertures not only admitted
the rain and snow, but permitted free entrance to flocks of pigeons
and even more destructive birds. The arches of the gynaeconitis were
in many places split and in a tottering condition The pillars,
especially on the upper floor, were displaced and thrown out of the
perpendicular; and the whole structure, in all its parts and in all
its appointments, presented painful evidence of gross and
long-continued neglect. M. Louis Haghe has represented, in two
contrasted lithographed sketches, the interior of the mosque such as
it was and such as it now is since the restoration. The contrast in
appearance, even on paper, is very striking; although this can only be
realized by those who have had the actual opportunity of comparing the
new with the old. But the substantial repairs are far more important,
as tending to the security of a pile so venerable and the object of so
many precious associations. The great dome, while it is relieved from
the four heavy and unsightly buttresses, is made more permanently
secure by a double girder of wrought iron around the base. The lead of
the dome and the roof has been {657} renewed throughout. The tottering
pillars of the women's choir have been replaced in the perpendicular,
and the arches which they sustain are now shored up and strengthened.
The mosaic work throughout the building has been thoroughly cleaned
and restored, the defective portions being replaced by a skilful
imitation of the original. All the fittings and furniture of the
mosque--the sultan's gallery, the pulpits, the mihrab, and other
appurtenances of its worship--have been renewed in a style of great
splendor. The work of reparation extended over two years, and owed
much of its success, as well as of the spirit in which it was
executed, to the enlightened liberality of Redschid Pacha. An effort
is said to have been made by the fanatical party in Constantinople to
induce the sultan to order the complete demolition of the mosaic
pictures on the walls, as being utterly prohibited by the Koran. But
he firmly refused to accede to the demand; and it was with his express
permission that the king of Prussia commissioned M. Salzenberg to
avail himself of the occasion of their being uncovered, in order to
secure for the students of the Christian art of Byzantium the
advantage of accurate copies of every detail of its most ancient as
well as most characteristic monument.

------

From The Lamp.

ALL-HALLOW EVE; OR, THE TEST OF FUTURITY.

BY ROBERT CURTIS.


CHAPTER VII.

Here it was that the real fun was going on! From the centre of the
veiling hung a strong piece of cord, with cross sticks, about eighteen
inches long, at the end. On each end of one of these sticks was stuck
a short piece of lighted candle, while on the ends of the other were
stuck small apples of a peculiarly good kind. The cross was then set
turning, when some plucky hero snapped at the apples as they went
round, but as often caught the lighted candle in his mouth, when a
hearty laugh from the circle of spectators proclaimed his
discomfiture. On the other hand, if fortunate enough to secure one of
the apples, a clapping of hands, and shouts of "Well done!" proclaimed
his victory.

A little to one side of this "merry-go-round" was a huge tub of
spring-water, fresh from the pump, and as clear as crystal. It was
intended that the performers at this portion of the fun should,
stripped to the waist, dive for pence or whatever silver the
by-standers chose to throw in. Up to this it had not come into play,
for until their "betthers came down from the parlor" no silver was
thrown in; and the youngsters were "loth to wet theirsel's for
nothin'." Now, however, a _tenpenny-bit_ from Tom Murdock soon
glittered on the bottom of the tub, a full foot and a half under
water. Forthwith two or three young fellows "peeled off," to prove
their abilities as divers. The first, a black-haired fellow, with a
head as round as a cannon-ball, after struggling and bubbling until
the people began to think he was smothering, came up without the
prize. He was handed a kitchen towel to rub himself with; while one of
the other young gladiators adjusted the tenpenny-bit in the middle of
the tub, drew {658} in a long breath, and down he went like a duck. He
was not nearly so long down as the other had been; he neither
struggled nor bubbled, and came up with the money between his teeth.

"It wasn't your first time, Jamesy, anyhow," said one.

"How did you get a hoult of it, Jamesy avic?" said another.

But he kept drying his head, and never minding them.

Another tenpenny was then thrown in by old Ned Cavana; it withstood
repeated efforts, but was at last fairly brought up. Jamesy seemed to
be the most expert, for having lifted this second tenpenny, his
abilities were finally tested with a _fippenny-bit_, which after one
or two failures he brought up triumphantly in his teeth; all the other
divers having declined to try their powers upon it.

By this time the kitchen floor was very wet, and it was thought,
particularly by the contributors to the tub, that there had been
enough of that sort of fun. The girls, who were standing in whatever
dry spots of the flags they could find, thought so too; they, did not
wish to wet their shoes before the dance, and there was another move
back to the parlor.

Here the scene was completely changed, as if indeed by magic, as
nobody had been missed for the performance. The long table was no
where to be seen, while the chairs and forms were ranged along the
walls, and old Murrin the piper greeted their entrance with an
enlivening jig.

Partners were of course selected at once, and as young Lennon _happened_
to be coming in from the kitchen with Winny Cavana at the moment, they
were soon with arms akimbo footing it to admiration opposite each
other. Not far from them another couple were exhibiting in like
manner. They were Tom Murdock and Kate Mulvey; while several other
pairs were "footing it" through the room. To judge from the
self-satisfied smile upon Kate Mulvey's handsome lips, she was not a
little proud or well pleased at having taken Tom Murdock from the
belle of the party; for she had too much self-esteem to think that it
was the belle of the party had been taken from Tom Murdock.

I need not pursue the several sets which were danced, nor
particularize the pairs who were partners on the occasion. Of course
Tom Murdock took the first opportunity possible to claim the hand of
Winifred Cavana for a dance. Indeed, he was ill-pleased that in his
own house he had permitted any chance circumstance to prevent his
having opened the dance with her, and apologized for it--"but it
happened in a manner over which he had no control." He had picked up
that expression at a race-course.

With all his bitterness he had the good sense not to make a scene by
endeavoring to frustrate that which he had not the tact to obviate by
pre-arrangement. Winny had made no reply to his apology, and he
continued, "I did not ask Kate Mulvey to dance until I saw you led out
by young Lennon."

"That is a bad compliment to Kate," she observed.

"I can't help that," said he gruffly; "some people take time d-mn-bly
by the forelock."

"That cannot apply to either him or me in this case; there were two
pairs dancing before he asked me."

Now although this was certainly not said by way of reproach to Tom for
not himself being sooner, it was unanswerable, and he did not try to
answer it. He was not however in such good humor as to forward himself
much in Winny's good opinion, and Emon-a-knock, who watched him
closely, was content that he should be her sole beau for the rest of
the evening.

Refreshments were now brought in; cold punch for the boys and "nagus"
for the girls; for old Murdock could afford to make a splash, and this
he thought "was his time to do it. If any one was hungry, there was
plenty {659} of cold mate and bread on the kitchen dresser." But after
the calcannon and tea, nobody seemed to hear him.

After the liquor on the first tray was disposed of, and the glasses
collected for a replenish, a solo jig was universally called for. The
two best dancers in the province were present--Tom Murdock and Edward
Lennon, so there could be no failure.

Old Murdock had never seen young Lennon dance until that night, and so
far as he could judge, "he was not the man that Tom need be afraid
of." He had often seen Tom's best dancing, and certainly nothing which
young Lennon had exhibited there up to that time could at all touch
it.

"Come, Tom," said he, "give the girls a specimen of what you can do,
your lone," and he laid the poker and tongs across each other in the
middle of the floor.

Paddy Murrin struck up a spirit-stirring jig, which no one could
resist. The girls were all dancing it "to themselves," and young
Lennon's feet were dying to be at it, but of course he must wait.

Indeed he was not anxious to exhibit in opposition to his host's son,
but feared his reputation as a dancer would put him in for it.

Tom Murdock having been thus called on, was tightening the fung of one
of his pumps, to begin. Turning then to Murrin, he called for "the
fox-hunter's jig."

He now commenced, and like a knowing professor of his art "took it
easy" at the commencement, determined however to astonish them ere he
had done. He felt that he was dancing well, but knew that he could
dance much better, and would presently do so. He had often tried the
"poker and tongs jig," but hitherto never quite to his satisfaction.
He had sometimes come off perfectly victorious, without touching them,
but as often managed to kick them about the floor. He was now on his
mettle, not only on account of Winny Cavana, but also because "that
whelp, Lennon, was looking on, which he had no right to be." For a
while he succeeded admirably. He had tipped each division of the cross
with both heel and toe, several times with rapid and successful
precision; but becoming enthusiastic, as the plaudits passed round, he
called to Murrin "to play faster," when after a few moments of
increased speed, he tripped in the tongs, and came flat on his back
upon the floor. He was soon up again, and a few touches of the
clothes-brush set all to rights, except the irrepressible titter that
ran round the room.

Of course there was an excuse one of the fungs of his pump had again
loosened and caught in the tongs. This was not merely an excuse, but a
fact, upon which Tom Murdock built much consolation for his "partial
failure," as he himself jocosely called it; but he was savage at
heart.

There was a general call now from the girls for young Lennon, and
"Emon-a-knock, Emon-a-knock," resounded on all sides. He would not
rise, however; he was now more unwilling than ever to "dance a match,"
as he called it to himself, with his host's son.

The "partial failure" of his rival--and he was honest enough to admit
that it was but partial, and could not have been avoided--gave him
well-founded hopes of a triumph. He too had tried his powers of
agility by the poker and tongs test, and oftener with success than
otherwise. It was some time now since he had tried it, as latterly he
had not much time to spare for such amusements. He was unwilling, but
not from fear of failure, to get up; but no excuse would be taken; he
was caught by the collar of his coat by two sturdy handsome girls, and
dragged into the middle of the room. Thus placed before the
spectators, he could not refuse the ordeal, as it might be called.

He had his wits about him, however. He had seen Tom Murdock whisper
something to the piper when he was first called on to stand up, and it
{660} proved that he was not astray as to its purport.

Recollecting the jig he was in the habit of dancing the poker and
tongs to, he asked the piper to play it. Murrin hesitated, and at last
came out with a stammer that "he hadn't it, but he'd give him one as
good," striking up the most difficult jig in the Irish catalogue to
dance to.

"No," said Lennon stoutly, "I heard you play the jig I called for a
hundred times, and no later than last night, Pat, at Jemmy Mullarky's,
as I passed home from work, and I'll have no other."

"I took whatever jig he happened to strike up," said Tom with a sneer.

"You might have had your choice, for that matter, and I daresay you
had," replied Lennon, "and I'll have mine! It is my right."

"If a man can dance," continued Tom, "he ought to be able to dance to
any jig that's given him; it's like a man that can only say his
prayers out of his own book." And there was a suppressed smile at
Lennon's expense.

He saw it, and his blood was up in a moment.

"He may play any jig he chooses now," exclaimed Lennon, "except one,
and that is the one _you_ told him to play," taking his chance that his
suspicions were correct as to the purport of the whisper.

"I'll play the one I pled for the young masther himself; an' if that
doesn't shoot you, you needn't dance at all," said Murrin, apparently
prompted again by Tom Murdock.

This was a decision from which no impartial person could dissent, and
Lennon seemed perfectly satisfied, but after all this jaw and
interruption he felt in no great humor to dance, and almost feared the
result.

As he stood up he caught a glance from Winny's eye which banished
every thought save that of complying with that look. If ever a look
planted an undying resolve in a man's heart it was that. It called him
"Emon" as plain as if she had spoken it, and said, "Don't let _that
fellow_ put you down," and quick as the glance was it added, "he's a
nasty fellow."

To it now Emon went with his whole heart. He cared not what jig Pat
Murrin played, "or any other piper," he was able for them.

At first the quiet tipping of his heel and toe upon the floor, with
now and then a flat stamp which threw up the dust, was inimitable. As
he got into the "merits of the thing," the music was obliged to vie
with him in activity. It seemed as much as if he was dancing for the
piper to play to, as that the piper was playing for him to dance.
Those who were up to the merits of an Irish jig, could have told the
one he was dancing to if there had been no music at all. There was a
tip, a curl, or a stamp for every note in the tune. In fact he played
the jig upon the floor with his feet. He now closed the poker and
tongs with confidence, while Tom Murdock looked on with a malicious
hope that he too would bungle the business; and Winny Cavana looked on
with a timid fear of the same result. But he danced through and
amongst them as if by magic--a toe here, and a heel there, in each
compartment of the crossed irons with the rapidity of lightning, but
he never touched one of them.

"Quicker! quicker," cried Murdock to the piper, seeing that Lennon was
perfect master of his position.

"Aye, as quick as you like," stammered Lennon, almost out of breath;
and the increased speed of the music brought forth more striking
performance, testified to by the applause which greeted his finishing
bow.

He caught a short glance again from Winny's eye, as he passed to a
vacant seat. "Thank you, Emon, from my heart," it said, as plainly as
the other had spoken when he stood up.

It was now well on in the small hours, and as old Murdock and his son
had both ceased in a manner to do any more honors, their silence was
accepted as a sort of "notice to quit," {661} and there was a general
move in search of bonnets and cloaks. Tom Murdock knew that he was in
the dumps, and wisely left Winny to her father's escort. Lennon's way
lay by the Mulveys, and he was "that far" with Kate and some others.
Indeed, all the branch roads and pathways were echoing to the noisy
chat and opinions of the scattered party on their several ways home.



CHAPTER VIII.

The after-reflections of those most interested in the above gathering
were various, and it must be admitted to some extent unsatisfactory.
First of all, old Murdock was keen enough to perceive that he had not
furthered his object in the least by having given the party at all.
From what Tom had told him he had kept a close watch upon young
Lennon, of whose aspirations toward Winny Cavana he had now no doubt,
and if he was not sure of a preference upon her part toward him, he
was quite certain that she had none toward Tom. This was the natural
result of old Murdock's observations of Winny's conduct during the
evening,--who, while she could and did hide the one, could not, and
did not, hide the other.

Tom Murdock was the least satisfied of them all with the whole
business, and sullenly told his father, who had done it all to serve
him, that "he had done more harm than good, and that he knew he would,
by asking that whelp Lennon; and he hoped he might never die till he
broke every bone in his body. By hook or by crook, by fair means or
foul, he must put a stop to his hopes in that quarter."

His father was silent. He felt that he had not advanced matters by his
party. Old Cavana was not the sharp old man in these matters, either
to mind or divine from how many points the wind blew, and quietly
supposed all had gone on smoothly, as he and old Murdock wished.

Winifred had been more than confirmed in her dislike to Tom Murdock,
while her secret preference for Emon-a-knock had been in no respect
diminished. She had depth enough also to perceive that Kate Mulvey was
anxious enough to propitiate the good opinion, to which she had taken
no pains to hide her indifference. She was aware that Kate Mulvey's
name had been associated with young Lennon's by the village gossips,
but she had seen nothing on that night to justify any apprehension, if
she chose to set herself to work. She would take an opportunity of
sounding her friend upon this momentous subject, and finding out how
the land really lay. If that was the side of her head Kate's cap was
inclined to lean to, might they not strike a quiet and confidential
little bargain between them, as regarded these two young men?

Kate Mulvey's thoughts were not very much at variance with those of
her friend Winny. She, not having the same penetration into the
probable results of sinister looks and scowling brows; or not,
perhaps, having ever perceived them, had thrown one of the nicest caps
that ever came from a smoothing-iron at Tom Murdock, but she feared he
had not yet picked it up. She was afraid, until the night of the
party, that her friend and rival--yes, it is only in the higher ranks
of society that the two cannot be united--had thrown a still more
richly trimmed one at him; but on that night, and she had watched
closely, she had formed a reasonable belief that her fear was totally
unfounded. She was not quite sure that it had not been let drop in
Emon-a-knock's way, if not actually thrown at him. These girls, in
such cases, are so sharp!

The very same thought had struck her. She also had determined upon
sounding her friend Winny, and would {662} take the first favorable
opportunity of having a confidential chat with her upon the subject.
The girls were very intimate, and were not rivals, only they did not
know it. We shall see by-and-by how they "sounded" each other.

Young Lennon's after-thoughts, upon the whole, were more satisfactory
than perhaps those of any of the other principal persons concerned. If
Winny Cavana had not shown him a decided preference over the general
set of young men there, she had certainly been still less particular
in her conduct and manner toward Tom Murdock. These matters, no doubt,
are managed pretty much the same in all ranks of society, though, of
course, not with the same refinement; and to young Lennon, whose heart
was on the watch, as well as his eyes, one or two little incidents
during the night gave him some faint hopes that, as yet at least, his
rich rival had not made much way against him. Hitherto, young Lennon
had looked upon the rich heiress of Rathcash as a fruit too high for
him to reach from the low ground upon which he stood, and had given
more of his attention to her poorer neighbor Kate Mulvey. He, however,
met with decided reluctance in that quarter, and being neither
cowardly, ignorant, nor shy, he had improved one or two favorable
occasions with Winny Cavana at the party, whom he now had some,
perhaps delusive, notion was not so far above his reach after all.

These are the only persons with whose after-thoughts we are concerned.
There may have been some other by-play on the part of two or three
fine young men and handsome girls, who burned themselves upon the bar,
and danced together after they became cinders, but as they are in no
respect mixed up with our story, we may pass them by without
investigating their thoughts, further than to declare that they were
all well pleased, and that the praises of old Murdock's munificence
rang from one end of the parish to the other.



CHAPTER IX.

I must now describe a portion of the garden which stretched out from
the back of old Ned Cavana's premises. A large well-enclosed farmyard,
almost immediately at the rear of the house, gave evidence of the
comfort and plenty belonging not only to the old man himself, but to
everything living and dead about the place; and as we shall be obliged
to pass through this farm-yard to get into the garden, we may as well
describe it first. Stacks of corn, wheat, oats, and barley, in great
variety of size, pointed the pinnacles of their finishing touch to the
sky. Sticking up from some of these were sham weather-cocks, made of
straw, in the shape of fish, fowl, dogs, and cats, the handiwork of
Jamesy Doyle, the servant boy,--the same black-headed urchin who lifted
the tenpenny-bit out of the tub at old Murdock's party. They were
fastened upon sticks, which did not turn round, and were therefore put
up more to frighten away the sparrows than for the purpose of
indicating which way the wind blew, or, more likely still, as mere
specimens of Jamesy Doyle's ingenuity. The whole yard was covered a
foot deep with loose straw, for the double purpose of giving comfort
to two or three litters of young pigs, and that of being used up, by
the constant tramping, into manure for the farm; for cows, heifers,
and calves strayed about it without interruption. A grand flock of
geese, as white as snow and as large nearly as swans, marched in from
the fields, headed by their gander, every evening about the same hour,
to spend their night gaggling and watching and sleeping by turns under
the stacks of corn, which were raised upon stone pillars with mushroom
metal-caps, to keep out the rats and mice. A big black cock, with a
hanging red comb and white jowls, and innumerable hens belonging to
him, something on the Brigham Young system, marched triumphantly
about, calling his favorites {663} every now and then with a quick
melancholy little chuckle as often as he found a tit-bit amongst the
straw. Ducks, half as large as the geese, coming home without a
feather raffled, in a mottled string of all colors, from the stream
below the hill, diving, for variety, into the clean straw, emerging
now and then, and smattering with their flat bills in any little
puddle of water that lay between the pavement in the bare part of the
yard. "Bullydhu," the watch-dog, as evening closed, taking possession
of a small wooden house upon wheels,--Jamesy Doyle's handiwork
too,--that it might be turned to the shelter, whichever way the wind
blew. It was a miracle to see Bully getting into it, the door was so
low; another piece of consideration of Jamesy's for the dog's comfort.
You could only know when he was in it by seeing his large soft paws
under the arch of the low door.

Beyond this farm-yard--farm in all its appearance and realities--was
the garden. A thick, high, furze hedge, about sixty yards long, ran
down one side of it, from the corner of the farmyard wall; and at the
further end of this hedge, which was the square of the garden, and
facing the sun, was certainly the most complete and beautiful
summer-house in the parish of Rathcash, or Jamesy Doyle was very much
mistaken. It also was his handiwork. In fact, there was nothing Jamesy
could not turn his hands to, and his heart was as ready as his hands,
so that he was always successful, but here he had outstripped all his
former ingenuity. The bower was now of four years' standing, and every
summer Jamesy was proud to see that nature had approved of his plan by
endorsing it with a hundred different signatures. With the other
portions of the garden or its several crops, we have nothing to do; we
will therefore linger for a while about the furze hedge and in
"Jamesy's bower" to see what may turn up. But I must describe another
item in the locality.

Immediately outside the hedge there was a lane, common to a certain
extent to both farms. It might be said to divide them. It lay quite
close to the furze hedge, which ran in a straight line a long distance
beyond where "Jamesy's bower" formed one of the angles of the garden.
There was a gate across the lane precisely outside the corner where
the bower had been made, and this was the extent of Murdock's right or
title to the commonalty of the lane. Passing through this gate,
Murdock branched off to the left with the produce of his farm. It is a
long lane, they say, that has no turning, and although the portion of
this one with which we are concerned was only sixty yards long, I have
not, perhaps, brought the reader to the spot so quickly as I might. I
certainly could have brought him through the yard without putting even
the word "farm" before it, or without saying a word about the stacks
of corn and the weather-cocks, the pigs, cows, heifers, and calves,
the geese, ducks, cock, and hens, "Bullydhu" and his house, etc., and
with a hop, step, and a leap I might have placed him in "Jamesy's
bower" if he had been the person to occupy it--but he was not. With
every twig, however, of the hedge and the bower it is necessary that
my readers should be well acquainted; and I hope I have succeeded in
making them so.

Winny Cavana was a thoughtful, thrifty girl, an experienced
housekeeper, never allowing one job to overtake another where it could
be avoided. Of course incidental difficulties would sometimes arise;
but in general she managed everything so nicely and systematically
that matters fell into their own time and place as regularly as
possible.

When Winny got the invitation for Mick Murdock's party, which was only
in the forenoon of the day before it came off, her first thought was,
that she would be very tired and ill-fitted for business the day after
it was over. She therefore called Jamesy Doyle to her assistance, and
on that day and {664} the next, she got through whatever household
jobs would bear performance in advance, and instructed Jamesy as to
some little matters which she used to oversee herself, but which on
this occasion she would entrust solely to his own intelligence and
judgment for the day after the party. She could not have committed
them to a more competent or conscientious lad. Anything Jamesy
undertook to do, he did it well, as we have already seen both in the
haggard, the garden, and the tub--for it was he who brought up the
fippenny-bit at Murdock's, and he would lay down his life to serve or
even to oblige Winny Cavana.

Having thus purchased an idle day after the party, Winny was
determined to enjoy it, and after a very late breakfast, for her
father, poor soul, was dead tired, she called Jamesy, and examined him
as to what he had done or left undone. Finding that, notwithstanding
he had been up as late as she had been herself the night before, he
had been faithful to the trust reposed in him, and that everything was
in trim order, she then complimented him upon his snapping and diving
abilities.

"How much did you take up out of the tub, Jamesy?" she asked.

"Be gorra, Miss Winny, I took up two tenpenny-bits an' a fippenny."

"And what will you do with all that money, Jamesy? it is nearly a
month's wages."

"Be gorra, my mother has it afore this, Miss Winny."

"That is a good boy, Jamesy, but you shouldn't curse."

"Be gorra, I won't, miss; but I didn't think that was cursing, at all,
at all."

"Well, it is swearing, Jamesy, and that is just as bad."

"Well, Miss Winny, you'll never hear me say it agen."

"That's right, James. Is the garden open?

"It is, miss; I'm afther bringing out an armful of leaves to bile for
the pigs."

Winny passed on through the yard into the garden. It was a fine, mild
day for the time of year, and she was soon sitting in the bower with
an unopened story-book in her lap. It was a piece of idle folly her
bringing the book there at all. In the first place, she had it by
heart--for books were scarce in that locality, and were often
read--and in the next, she was more in a humor to think than to read.
It was no strange thing, under the circumstances, if, like some
heroines of a higher stamp, "she fell into a reverie." "How long she
remained thus," to use the patent phrase in such a case, must be a
mere matter of surmise; but a step at the gate outside the hedge, and
her own name distinctly pronounced, caused her to start.
Eaves-dropping has been universally condemned, and "listeners," they
say, "never hear good of themselves." But where is the young girl, or
indeed any person, hearing their own name pronounced, and being in a
position to listen unobserved, who would not do so? Our heroine, at
all events, was not "above that sort of thing," and instead of
hemming, or coughing, or shuffling her feet in the gravel, she cocked
her ears and held her breath. We would be a little indulgent to a
person so sorely tempted, whatever our readers may think.

"If Winny Cavana," she heard, "was twice as proud, an' twice as great
a lady, you may believe me, Tom, she wouldn't refuse you. She'll have
six hundred pounds as round as the crown of your hat; an' that fine
farm we're afther walkin' over; like her, or not like her, take my
advice an' don't lose the fortune an' the farm."

"Not if I can help it, father. There's more reason than you know of
why I should secure the ready money of her fortune at any rate; as to
herself, if it wasn't for that, she might marry Tom Naddy _th'
aumadhawn_ if she had a mind."

"Had you any chat with her last night, Tom? Oh then, wasn't she
lookin' elegant!"

{665}

"As elegant as you please, father, but as proud as a peacock. No, I
had no chat with her, except what the whole room could hear; she was
determined on that, and I'm still of opinion that you did more harm
than good."

"Not if you were worth a _thrawncen_, Tom. Arrah avic machree, you
don't undherstand her; that was all put on, man alive. I'm afeerd
she'll think you haven't the pluck in you; she's a sperited girl
herself, and depend upon it she expects you to spake, an' its what
she's vexed at, your dilly-dallyin'. Why did you let that fellow take
her out for the first dance? I heerd Mrs. Moran remark it to Kitty
Mulvey's mother."

"That was a mistake, father; he had her out before I got in from the
kitchen."

"They don't like them mistakes, Tom, an' that's the very thing I blame
you for; you should have stuck to her like a leech the whole night;
they like a man that's in earnest. Take my advice, Tom avic, an put
the question plump to her at wanst fore Shraftide. Tell her I'll lay
down a pound for you for every pound her father gives her, and I'll
make over this place to you out an out. Old Ned an I will live
together while we last, an that can't be long, Tom avic. I know he'll
settle Rathcash upon Winny, and he'll have the interest of her fortune
beside--"

"Interest be d--d!" interrupted Tom; "won't he pay the money down?"

"He might do that same, but I think not; he's afeerd it might be
dribbled away, but with Rathcash, an Rathcashmore joined, the devil's
in it and she can't live like a lady; at all events, Tom, you can live
like a gentleman; ould Ned's for you entirely, Tom, I can tell you
that."

"That is all very well, father, and I wish that you could make me
think that your words would come true, but I'm not come to
four-and-twenty years of age without knowing something of the way
girls get on; and if that one is not set on young Lennon, my name is
not Tom Murdock; and I'll tell you what's more, that if it wasn't for
her fortune and that farm, he might have her and welcome. There are
many girls in the parish as handsome, and handsomer for that matter,
than what she is, that would just jump at me."

"I know that, Tom agra, but maybe it's what you'll only fix her on
that whelp, as you call him, the stronger, if you be houldin' back the
way you do. They like pluck, Tom; they like pluck, I tell you, and in
my opinion she's only makin' b'lief, to dhraw you out. Try her, Tom,
try her."

"I will, father, and if I fail, and I find that that spalpeen Lennon
is at the bottom of it, let them both look out, that's all. For his
part, I have a way of dealing with him that he knows nothing about,
and as for her--"

Here Jamesy Doyle came out into the lane from the farm-yard, and
father and son immediately branched off in the direction of their own
house, leaving Tom Murdock's second part of the threat unfinished.

But Winny had heard enough. Her heart, which had been beating with
indignation the whole time, had nearly betrayed itself when she heard
Emon-a-knock called a spalpeen.

One thing she was now certain of, and the certainty gave her whole
soul relief,--that if ever Tom Murdock could have had any chance of
success through her father's influence, and her love for him, it was
now entirely at an end for ever. Should her father urge the match upon
her, she had, as a last remedy, but to reveal this conversation, to
gain him over indignantly to her side.

{666}

Winny was seldom very wrong in her likings or dislikings, although
perhaps both were formed in some instances rather hastily, and she
often knew not why. In Tom Murdock's case, she was glad, and now
rather "proud out of herself," that she had never liked him.

"I knew the dirt was in him," she said to herself as she returned to
the house. "I wish he did not live so near us, for I foresee nothing
but trouble and vexation before me on his account. I'm sorry Jamesy
Doyle came out so soon. I'd like to have heard what he was going to
say of myself, but sure he said enough. Em-on-a-knock may despise
himself and his threat." And she went into the house to prepare the
dinner.

Tom Murdock, notwithstanding his shortcomings, and they were neither
few nor far between, was a shrewd, clever fellow in most matters. It
was owing to this shrewdness that he resolved to watch for some
favorable opportunity, rather than seek a formal meeting with Winny
Cavana "_at wanst_" as had been 'advised by his father.

[TO BE CONTINUED.]

------

From Once a Week.

SAINT DOROTHEA.

  The sun blazed fiercely out of cloudless blue,
  And the deep sea flung back the glare again,
  As though there were indeed another sun
  Within the mimic sky reflected there;
  Not steadily and straight, as from above,
  But all athwart the little rippling waves
  The broken daybeams sparkling leapt aloft
  In glittering ruin; scarce a breath of air
  To stir the waters or to wave the trees;
  The flowers hung drooping, and the leaves lay close
  Against their branches, as if sick and faint
  With the dull heat and needing strong support.
  The city walls, the stones of every street,
  The houses glow'd, you would have thought that none
  Would venture forth, till that the gracious night
  Should come with sable robe and wrap the earth
  In softest folds, and shade men from the day.
  But see, from every street the seething crowds
  Pour out, and all along the way they stand,
  And ribald jest and song resound aloud,
  And light accost and careless revelry:
  What means this, wherefore flock the people forth?
  Ceases the hum, a sudden silence falls
  On all around, the tramp of armed men
  Rings through the air; and hark, what further sound?
  A girl's fresh voice, a sad sweet song is heard
  Above the clank of arms, men hold their breath;
  Yet not all sadness is that wondrous chant,
  That hushes the wild crowd with sudden awe.
  As when the nightingale's mellifluous tones
  Rise in the woodland, ere the other birds         {667}
  Have ceased their vesper hymn, that moment drops
  Each fluttering songster's wild thanksgiving lay,
  So for awhile did silence fall on all
  Within the seething crowd at that sweet voice.
  She comes, they bring her forth to die, for she
  This day must win the martyr's palm, this day
  Must witness for her faith, this day must reap
  The fruit of all her pains, long rest in heaven!
  Long had they spared her, for the governor
  Was loth that she should suffer, and her race
  Was noble, so they hoped to make her yield,
  And waited still and waited; but at length
  They grew enraged at her calm steadfastness,
  They knew not whence a resolution such
  As made a young maid baffle aged men,
  So she must die.

            Now as she went along
  'Midst all her guards, again burst forth the mob
  Into such bitter taunts, such foul wild words,
  As sent the hot blood mantling to her cheek
  For shame that she, a maid, must hear such things;
  And yet was no remorse within their hearts,
  No light of pity in their savage eyes,
  Like hungry wolves that scent the blood from far
  They howled with joy, expectant of their prey.
  There was one there, he in old days had loved
  Her fair young face, but he too now, with scorn
  Written in his dark eyes and on his brow,
  And in the curl of his short lip, stood by;
  It 'seemed not such a face, that bitter smile,
  For he was passing fair, in youth's heyday;
  But if contemptuous was his mien, his words
  Were worse for her to bear, for he cried out--
  He, whom her heart yet own'd its only love!
  He, whom she held first of all living men!
  He, whom she honor'd yet, though left by him
  In her distress and danger!--this man cried,
  "Ho, Dorothea! doth the bridegroom wait?
  And goest thou to his arms? Joy go with thee!
  But yet when in his palace courts above,
  Whereof thou tellest, fair one, think on us
  Who toil in this sad world below; on me
  Think thou before all others, thine old love,
  And send me somewhat for a token, send
  Of that same heavenly fruit and of those flowers
  That fade not!"

                Then she turn'd and answer'd him,
  "As thou hast said, so be it, thy request
  Is granted!" and she pass'd on to her death.
  She died: her soul was rapt into the skies.
  The vulgar horde who watch'd her torture, knew
  Nought of the great unfathomable bliss                  {668}
  Which waited her, and when her spirit fled
  None saw the angel bands receive her, none
  Heard the long jubilant sweet sound that burst
  Through heaven's high gates, swept from ten thousand harps
  By seraph choirs, for she had died on earth
  Only to enter on the life above.
  Night fell upon the earth, the city lay
  Slumb'ring in cool repose, the restless sea,
  Weary with dancing all day 'neath the sun,
  Was hushed to sleep by the faint whisp'ring breeze
  That, wanting force to sport, but rose and fell
  With soothing murmur, like to pine boughs stirr'd
  By the north wind: sleep held men's eyelids close.
  And he, that youth, slept, aye, slept peacefully,
  Nor reck'd of the vile insult he had pour'd
  Upon the head of one whom once he swore
  To love beyond all others. As he lay,
  Wrapt in the dreamless slumber of young health,
  Sudden a light unearthly clear hath fill'd
  The chamber, and he starts up from his couch,
  Gazing in troubled wonder: by his side
  What sees he?

                    A young boy he deems him first,
  But when had mortal such a calm pure smile
  Since our first father lost his purity?
  A radiant angel, rather, should he be,
  Who stands all glorious, bearing in his hands
  Such fruit and flowers as surely never grew
  On this dull earth; their fragrance fill'd the air,
  And smote the senses of Theophilus,
  That a sad yearning rose within his heart,
  Such as at times a strain of song will raise,
  Or some chance word will bring (we know not why),
  Flooding the inmost soul with that strange sense,
  Half pain, half pleasure, of some bygone time--
  Some far off and forgotten happiness,
  We know not where nor what.

                    The stranger spoke,
  And thus he said, "Rise up, Theophilus!
  And take these gifts which I from heaven bring.
  Fair Dorothea, mindful of her words,
  Hath sent thee these, and bids thee that henceforth
  Thou scoff not, but believe!"

                    With those same words
  Vanish'd the cherub, and the room was dark,
  Save where the moonbeams made uncertain light,
  And where remain'd those blossoms and that fruit,
  For from each leaf and stem there stream'd a ray
  As of the morning.

                    Down upon his couch
  Theophilus sank prone, with awe oppress'd;                {669}
  But for a moment. Starting wildly up,
  He cried, "My love, my Dorothea, list!
  If thou canst hear me in those starry halls
  Where now thou dwellest, I accept thy gift.
  Do thou take mine, for I do give myself
  Up to the service of thy Lord; thy faith
  Shall from this hour be mine, for I believe!"

------

Translated from Der Katholik.

THE TWO SIDES OF CATHOLICISM.

[Second Article.]

I. THE PROBLEM.

"Neither," says Jesus Christ, "do they put new wine into old bottles;
otherwise the bottles break, and the wine runneth out." The parable
teaches that the new spirit of Christianity requires a new form,
corresponding to its essence. The essence and the form of Christianity
are, therefore, intimately connected.

What is thus generally enunciated in regard to the essential
connection of the spirit of Christianity with the forms of its
expression, is equally true of the mutual relations subsisting between
the substance and the manifestation of the Church. Christianity and
the Church are virtually identical. The former, considered as a source
of union and brotherhood, constitutes the Church, In a former article
we have recognized Catholicism as the type of the Church Founded by
Christ. Hence the interdependence of the essence with the form of
Christianity in general is not more thorough than that of the spirit
of the Church with the historical development of Catholicism.

These remarks will be found to designate the object of the present
essay. An inquiry into the fundamental principle of Catholicism must
address itself to the elucidation of the cause of the necessary
connection between the spirit and the outer shape of the Church just
mentioned. The direction in which the light is to be sought appears by
the parable cited above.

The new wine requires new bottles, because they only correspond with
its nature. By the same induction it is affirmed that if the true
Church is realized only in the form of Catholicism, the reason is to
be found in the inmost nature of the Church, in the catholicity of her
spirit.

This idea of the inherent catholicity of the Church, as well as the
foregoing assertion of a necessary inter-dependence of the essence
with the image of Catholicism, is to be established on scriptural
authority by the following disquisition.


II. THE KINGDOM OF GOD ON EARTH.

The shape and form in which Catholicism appears in history has its
root in the papacy. It is certainly deserving of attention, that
precisely in the institution of the papacy the Church is designated by
a name which affords an insight into her inmost nature.

On that occasion the Church--meaning the Church as apparent in
history--is called the kingdom of heaven.  [Footnote 146] The Lord
says to Peter, "I will give {670} unto thee the keys of the kingdom of
heaven;" a promise substantially the same with that given in the same
breath to the same apostle, though under a different metaphor, when
Jesus calls him the rock upon which he will build his Church. The
primate is the subject of both predictions. The apostle Peter is to be
the foundation of the Church, and he is to receive the keys of the
same edifice, that is to say, he is to be the master of the house.

  [Footnote 146: Matt. xvi. 18, 19. ]

That the epithet of "kingdom of heaven" expresses the essential
character of the Church, is easily shown by a glance at the passages
of Scripture in which the Church is mentioned. Such is always the case
where the kingdom of God or of heaven is represented as in course of
realization on earth. In this respect the parables of Jesus are
especially significant. They address themselves principally to the
spirit, the organization, and the most essential peculiarities of the
new order of things which Jesus Christ had come into the world to
establish. In these discourses the new foundation is constantly
brought forward as the kingdom of God or of heaven. Thus we cannot but
recognize in this expression a designation of the inner essence of the
institution of Jesus.

At a time when his destined kingdom had not yet become historically
manifest, Jesus might still say, in the same acceptation of the term,
that it was already present, and palpable to all who sought to grasp
it. This actual presence of the kingdom is deduced by the Lord from
the efficacy of his miracles. In them the vital principle of
Catholicism was already at work. It had entered the world at the same
instant with the person of the Son of Man. But not until after Christ
was exalted did it assume a historical palpability. No less does the
declaration of Jesus, that from the days of John the Baptist the
kingdom of heaven suffereth violence, display Catholicism as a power
even before it came to figure in history. For this very forwardness
with which even then the violent took it by force, was a product of
the Christ-like power which had entered humanity simultaneously with
the person of the Messiah. And where the Jews are called sons of the
kingdom, it is likewise in reference to this elementary principle of
Catholicism. It had been planted in the first instance on the
historical soil of Judaism, thence, of course, to spread its benign
influence over the earth, and thus to make historically manifest the
vital substance of the Church in its only adequate expression. "Many
shall come from the east and the west, and shall sit down with
Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob, in the kingdom." On the other hand, the
kingdom shall be taken from the Jews, because they have made it
unfruitful.

No Christian sermon should omit to give this inner view of
Catholicism, or of the advent of the kingdom. Therein lies its
peculiar force. The preacher of the gospel has no more effective word
of consolation for the pious souls who give him a ready hearing, than
the assurance that the kingdom of God has come nigh unto them. In this
word, also, the apostle of Christ has his most potent weapon against
the assailants of the Church. If they receive you not, says the Lord
unto his disciples, go your ways out into the streets of the same
city, and say, Even the very dust of your city, which cleaveth on us,
we do wipe off against you; yet know this, that the kingdom of God is
at hand. The invincibility of Catholicism grows out of the power of
its principle. As of old in enabling the apostles to heal the sick, so
at the present day in her varied fortunes the Church approves herself
the kingdom of God.

But how is the interior of the Church related to the exterior? The
word of the kingdom is the seed of Catholicism. According to the
quality of the hearers of the word, the growing grain is fruitful or
empty, the members genuine or spurious. Again, the kingdom of heaven
is like to a net, cast into the sea, and gathering together all kind
of fishes. The kingdom of the Son of Man is not without scandals, and
them that work {671} iniquity.  [Footnote 147] Hence the kingdom of
God on earth embraces the entire Church in her temporal existence. The
latter is shown to be a kingdom of long-suffering, in preserving her
connection even with ingredients estranged from her in spirit, leaving
the ultimate separation of the false members to the final judgment.
Even these erring ones carry on their souls the impress of the
kingdom, the signature of baptism. Nevertheless their adhesion to the
kingdom is external and objective merely. In the more accurate sense
of the word, the idea of the kingdom applies only to the marrow, the
soul of the Church. The good seed only are the real children of the
kingdom.

  [Footnote 147: Matt. xiii. 41.]

This account of the formation of the kingdom of God explains how the
essence of the true Church becomes a historical reality in the actual
condition of Catholicism, notwithstanding its imperfections. The
position, therefore, that the spirit of the Church is inseparable from
her temporal existence by no means denies that this historical
exterior of Catholicism may be infected with elements having nothing
in common with, and even hostile to, the character of the true Church.
This results from the fact that the true Church, though always
preserving a unitary organization, realizes herself by degrees only.
The form of Catholicism is gradually purified and disclosed by the
sanctifying virtue of its inner life. Thus it is that parasites take
root in the soil of the Church.

It is therefore a shifting of the real issue when Mr. Hase defines the
Catholic antagonism to the ideal Church of Protestantism as consisting
in a notion of Catholicism that in all essential attributes there is a
perfect congruity between the idea of the Church and the concrete
Church of Rome; or in other words, that the latter Church is at all
tunes the perfect type of Christianity. Two distinct things are here
confounded. The position of Catholicism--that the essence of the true
Church, so far as realized at all, exists only within the Catholic
Church, where alone, therefore, a further development of this essence
can be accomplished or the ideal of the Church attained--is by no
means equivalent to the pretension, attributed to Catholicism by Hase,
that Catholicism has already attained the ideal, or that it is at all
times the most perfect representation of Christianity. After this
misrepresentation of the position of Catholicism, Hase has no
difficulty in distorting the well-known Catholic doctrine that sinners
also belong to the Church into an unconscious acknowledgment of the
ideal Church of Protestantism.

While the toleration of spurious members is a mandate of the
educational mission of the Church, it involves, moreover, a special
dispensation of Divine Providence. Like her divine principle, the
Church appears as a servant among men. The beauty of her inner life is
veiled beneath an exterior covered with manifold imperfections. This
serves as a constant admonition to the Church not to rely upon
externals. Yet even these shadows on the image of the Church are
evidences of her vitality. How superhuman must be an organization
which outlasts all enemies in spite of many deficiencies! It is error,
therefore, to infer from the undeniable, practical incongruity between
the essence of the Church and her outward form that there cannot be an
exclusive, concrete realization of the true Church in history.

To make the growth of Catholicism intelligible to his hearers, Jesus
compares the kingdom of heaven with a grain of mustard, which unfolds
the least of all seeds to a stately tree. Immediately thereafter it is
said that the kingdom of heaven penetrates the mass of humanity like
leaven. The law of development of Catholicism is further illustrated
by the following parable: The earth, says Jesus, bringeth forth fruit;
first the blade, then the ear, afterward the full corn in the ear; man
has but to cast the seed into the earth; then he may sleep, and the
seed shall {672} spring and grow up, he knoweth not how. Even so is
the kingdom of God. The Church therefore carries the germs of her
growth in her inmost nature. Catholicism is gradually developed out of
itself, from within. Thanks to the energy of her own principle, the
Church with her arms encircles nation after nation. The faculty of
being all things unto all men she owes to her being the kingdom of
God. Here is the root of Catholicism. As the kingdom of God, the
Church is fraught with a wealth adequate to the mental requirements of
all individuals and all nations. As the kingdom of God, the Church is
adapted to every age and clime.

The word "Church" is used by Jesus Christ far more rarely than that of
the "kingdom of heaven;" indeed but twice, and on each occasion in
direct reference to the external form of the Church.

That this historical exterior of Catholicism, designated the Church,
is the manifestation of the kingdom of God, We have already deduced
from Matt. xvi. 18, 19, and xiii. 41. The same truth is expressed in
the parable of the treasure hid in the field. He who would possess the
treasure, that is to say, the kingdom of heaven, or the vital
principle of Catholicism, must buy the field in which the gem is
concealed. The field, the Catholic exterior of the Church, is not the
inner life; but the latter is realized only in the historical form of
Catholicism.

It now behooves us to more precisely expound this relation between the
spirit and the outer form of the Church from the words of Jesus. The
way to do this is indicated by our Lord himself. It consists in an
extended analysis of the biblical idea of the kingdom of God. In it is
disclosed the inmost nature of the Church and thereby the ultimate
origin of her historical figure as instituted by Christ, or the
principle of Catholicism, which is the object of our search.

My kingdom, says the Lord, is not of this world; that is to say, its
origin is not here, and it is not established by the exercise of
worldly power. _Regnum meum non est hinc_. True, the kingdom of Christ
is established in the midst of the world, but it was not generated
there: from above, from heaven, it was planted in the world as a
supernatural _realm of grace_. Therefore its existence and its
extension is in no wise dependent on worldly power; its foundations
lie deeper, in the principle of truth which has entered the world with
Christ. For this cause came he into the world, that he should bear
witness unto the truth. All they that are of the truth, do him homage
as their king, and hear his kingly voice. The same principle works in
them as that of a new worship; they worship the Father in spirit and
in truth.

But this elevated sense of truth in individual souls is the fruit of a
higher form of being. He that is of God heareth the words of God; but
they hear them not who are not of God. The entrance into the kingdom
of God therefore necessarily presupposes a new beginning of man's
life, a new birth of water and of the Spirit. Wherever the kingdom of
God obtains a foothold, it assumes the form of an entirely new state
of things, of a new creation, of the principle of a new mental
activity, a new _nature_ of the spirit.

A transmutation of our souls, such as just described, necessarily
involves a rupture with the natural man, a discarding of the original
individuality. Without this alteration we are impervious to the new
light which is to enter our souls together with the kingdom of God.
This indispensable self-denial is accomplished by a two-fold
instrumentality--by the love of God, which is the first commandment,
and by the love of our neighbor as ourselves. Whoever is in this frame
of mind is pronounced by Jesus to be not far from the kingdom of God.

What has been said reveals another peculiarity of the kingdom of God
on earth. It is a _supernatural_ kingdom. At this point only do we
fully comprehend the title of the Church to {673} the designation of
the kingdom of heaven. The kingdom of God historically manifested in
the Church is intimately connected with the intro-divine relations or
the inmost life of the Deity. By admission into the Church God the
Father translates us into the kingdom of his beloved Son. This is not
merely an exercise of the creative love common to the three persons of
the Trinity. On the contrary, it is an evidence what manner of love
the Father hath bestowed upon us that we should be called the sons of
God. Precisely in this is the peculiar supernatural character of this
dispensation made manifest. It is this supernatural characteristic of
the Church which accounts for the bestowal upon the Church of the name
of the coming realm of glory. The germ of the latter is already
contained in the existing Church. While, for this reason, the Church
visible is called the kingdom of heaven, so the latter continues to
bear the name of the Church even in the splendor of its eternal glory.
This circumstance warrants the bold utterance of the apostle that our
conversation is in heaven. In the same sense it is laid down in the
catechism of the council of Trent that the Church militant and the
Church triumphant are but two parts of the one Church, not two
churches; and with entire consistency the same authority speaks of the
Church militant as synonymous with the kingdom of heaven.

It is but another expression for the supernatural character of the
Church if she is called the Jerusalem which is above, even in her
historical form and figure. And precisely because this epithet applies
to her, she is free and is our mother. The catholicity of the Church,
her faculty of enfolding all mankind, of being the spiritual mother of
us all, is owing to her supernatural character.

This doctrine of the supernaturalness of the Church is the connecting
link between the essence and the form of Catholicism. As the latter is
supernatural in its character, so must the form of its establishment
bear a supernatural impress. How can anything utterly supernatural
attain an adequate form of expression by mere natural development? It
assumes a historical reality in so far only as it assumes
simultaneously with its supernatural essence a corresponding
supernatural image. The form as well as the substance of the Church
must needs be the fruit of an immediate interposition of God, because
the substance must needs exercise its supernatural functions.

The idea just expressed may have been dimly present to the mind of
Moehler when he wrote: "But it is the conviction of Catholics that
this purpose of the divine revelation in Christ Jesus would not have
been attained at all, or at least would have been attained but very
imperfectly, if this embodiment of the truth had been but momentary,
and if the personal manifestation of the Word had not been
sufficiently powerful to give its tones the highest degree of
intensified animation, and the most perfect conceivable efficacy, that
is to say, to breathe into it the breath of life, and to create a
union once more setting forth the truth in its vitality, and remaining
emblematically the conclusive authority for all time, or, in other
words, representing Christ himself."

Viewed in this light, the historical manifestation of the Church,
instituted Matt. xvi. 18, 19, presents itself as a postulate of her
essence. Because the Church was essentially destined historically to
manifest the kingdom of God, the Lord built her upon Peter, the rock.
A temporal establishment of the kingdom of heaven in the midst of this
world required the divine installation of an individual keeper of the
keys. Thus the idea of the papacy flows from that of a kingdom of God
on earth.

If, then, this explanation presents Catholicism as a supernatural
kingdom, and if this very attribute constitutes the characteristic
feature of its being, its inmost life and fundamental {674} principle,
it is manifestly inadmissible to place the kingdom of God as
established in the Church on the same footing with the works of
creation. A juxtaposition like this would entirely ignore the vital
essence of the Church, that is to say, her superiority to nature.

The same distinction is overlooked by those who regard Church and
state as simply two manifestations of the same kingdom of God. Such is
the point of view of a system of moral theology, the influence of
which upon the opinions prevailing among a considerable fraction of
the present generation of theologians is not to be mistaken. In the
eye of that doctrine "Mosaism and Christianism--state and Church--both
externally represent the kingdom, and both represent one and the same
kingdom; the former [the state] rather in its negative, the latter
[the Church] rather in its positive aspect. And thus we have two great
formations in which the kingdom on earth is made manifest, Church and
state." Could Hirscher have reached any other conclusion? He regards
it as his task "to dispose of the question whether the germs of the
divine kingdom, like seeds, are implanted in the character of man as
in a fruitful soil, and whether they can spring forth from it [_i.e._,
from the character or nature of man himself] and blossom as the
kingdom of God."

Although it is here said that "God abode in man with his Holy Spirit
and with its sanctifying grace," yet the Holy Spirit or his grace is
not made the foundation upon which the kingdom is erected; that
foundation is sought, on the contrary, in the "divine powers" infused
into man at his creation. God only assists at the upraising of the
kingdom through them by "dwelling in them for ever as the principle of
divine guidance."

The logical inference from these premises, which seek the germs of the
kingdom of God as established on earth in human nature itself, that is
to say, in the "heavenly faculties" inherent in man, is well disclosed
in the definition of the kingdom of God on earth given by Petersen, a
theologian reared in the school of Schleiermacher. "The kingdom of God
on earth," says he, "is at once Church, state, and civilization,
_i.e._, it is an organism of community in religion, morals, and
society, and by these three special organisms it essentially
approaches, develops, and perfects its organic unity, in organizing
its religious principle in the Church, its moral framework in the
state, and its natural base in civilization, thus in the unity of all
three rounding its proportions as a universal organism of genuine
humanity." If "the germs of the divine kingdom, like seeds, are
implanted in the character of man as in a fruitful soil," it is
entirely consistent to regard the kingdom of God on earth as
"substantially identical with the idea of the human race," as "the
realization of that idea."

It gives us pleasure to state that the notion of the kingdom of God on
earth just alluded to has been declared unscriptural even in a
Protestant exegesis of greater thoroughness.   [Footnote 148]

  [Footnote 148: Hofman, _Schriftbeweis_, 1855. ]

III. THE BODY OF CHRIST.

Next to the idea of the kingdom of God, the most significant
expression for the inner essence of Catholicism is found in the
scriptural conception of the body of Christ. As his body, the Church
is intimately connected with him. Christ and the Church belong
together as the head and the body; both constitute a single whole.
This intimate relation between Christ and the Church is described by
the Scriptures in animated terms. The Church, it says, is for Christ
what our own body is for us; as members of the Church we are members
of the body of Christ, of his flesh, and of his bones. On one
occasion, indeed, the apostle uses the word Christ as synonymous with
the Church, so intimate is their relation.

{675}

And it is the Son of Man, or Christ in his human capacity, as whose
body the Church is regarded. For as the head thereof the apostle
designates him who was raised from the dead. The Church here enters
into a profoundly intimate relation to the sacred humanity of Christ.
We shall seek further profit from this idea in the sequel.

Immediately after having called the Church the body of Christ, he
calls her the [Greek text]. This epithet results from the foregoing.
It is because she is the body of Christ that the Church is the [Greek
text]. I translate these difficult words, the fulness of him who
filleth all in all. God who filleth all things with his essential
presence, in whom we live, and move, and have our being, hath his
fulness in the Church. The Church is entirely filled with God. But
how? Is not God, in his very nature, present everywhere? How then can
the Church be filled with God in a greater degree than the world
without? As the body of Christ, she has this capacity. For if the
Church, as Christ's body, assumes a special relation, peculiar to
herself, to his sacred humanity, then, by that very assumption, she
acquires a share in the [Greek text] of the Deity which dwells bodily
in that sacred humanity. She thereby becomes the spot where God is
especially revealed and glorified. For while God, in the fulness of
his nature, is present over all the world, nevertheless this presence
is more largely apparent in the Church than elsewhere. By the Church
alone the manifold wisdom of God is known unto the principalities and
powers in heavenly places. In him is glory in the Church by Christ
Jesus throughout all ages, world without end. Thus she stands approved
as his pleroma, as entirely filled with God.

But how are we to understand this repletion of the Church with God? It
is well known that Moehler sees in the visible Church the "Son of God
continually appearing among men in human form, constantly re-creating,
eternally rejuvenating himself, his perpetual incarnation." In this
sense he apprehends the scriptural conception of the body of Christ,
the "interpretation of the divine and the human in the Church." This
proposition, which has become celebrated, was intended, in the first
instance, to afford a more profound insight into the visibility of the
Church, in addition to which it is inseparable from Moehler's views on
the subject of the means of grace. In this twofold light we must make
it the subject of examination.

Moehler goes on to argue that, if the Church is a continuance of the
incarnation, she must be, like the latter, a visible one. This can
mean no more than that even as the Son of God during his stay upon
earth wrought visibly for mankind in the flesh, so also the saving
efficacy of Christ, abiding after his departure from the earth,
requires a visible medium. Such a point, however, Protestantism is far
from disputing. In the separate congregations, in their visible means
of grace, and in the audible exposition of the word of God, even
Protestants admit that the efficacy of Christ is visibly perpetuated,
and the idea of Christianity and the Church gradually realized. Every
Protestant denomination aspires to be the palpable image, the living
presentment, of the Christian religion. Moehler's conception of the
Son of God continually appearing among men in human form has even
become a favorite theme of modern Protestant theology. This will
appear from the mere perusal of the disquisitions on this head of the
so-called Christological school. The advantage gained for the Catholic
interpretation amounts to nothing. For the point is not that the
efficacy of Christ is perpetually exercised among men in a visible
manner, but it is in question whether this continued exercise ensues
only in the fold of a particular institution, and by particular means
of grace.

Moehler arrived at his doctrine in {676} reference to the Church
through the medium of his views regarding the means of grace. In his
opinion "the Eucharistic descent of the Son of God" (and the same must
be inferred to apply to all the means of grace which it is the
function of the Church to administer  [Footnote 149]) "is a part of
the totality of his merit, wherewith we are redeemed." The sacramental
offering of Christ is "the conclusion of his great sacrifice for us,"
and in it "all the other parts of the same sacrifice are to be
bestowed upon us; in this final portion of the objective offering, the
whole is to become subjective, a part of our individual being." But
the incarnation of God, or, in other words, the work of our salvation
accomplished by Christ during his walk upon earth, stands in need of
no continuation or completion by a posthumous labor of Christ,
constituting "a part of the totality of his merit, wherewith we are
redeemed." The perpetual condescension of Christ, administered by the
Church, to our helplessness, does not form a complement to the
objective work of salvation; it is not an integral part of it, but
only its continued application. "_Christus_" says Suarez, "_jam vero
nos non redimit, sed applicat nobis redemptionem suam_"  [Footnote
150] If this work of redemption were even now in progress--that is to
say, if "the Eucharistic descent of the Son of God" were "a part of
the totality of his merits, wherewith we are redeemed," then Christ
would not have fully taken away the sin of the world once for all on
Golgotha. Who would maintain such a proposition? Moehler would be the
last man to do so. He would therefore undoubtedly have renounced the
opinion in question if these, its logical results, had presented
themselves to his mind. The sacramental offering of Christ, as indeed
the whole of his perennial saving efficacy in the sacraments of the
Church, wherewith we are saved, is only the _means_ by which it is
applied to our salvation. The _ground_ of salvation for all mankind
was perfected in the sufferings and death of Christ. The _realization_
of salvation for individuals is accomplished by their appropriating to
themselves the salvation purchased or achieved for all mankind by the
precious blood of Jesus Christ; a work in which, undoubtedly, Christ
himself co-operates as the head of the Church.

  [Footnote 149: For, according to St. Thomas, "the Eucharist is the
  _perfectio omnis sacramenti, habens quasi in capitulo et summo
  omnia, quae alia sacramenta continent singillatim;_ the perfection
  of the whole sacrament, having as it were in an epitome and a
  summary all the virtues which, other sacraments contain
  singly."--IV. Sent. a. 8. q. 1, a. 2, _solut_. 2 _ad_. 4.]

  [Footnote 150: At present Christ does not redeem us, but applies
  to us his redemption. _De Incarnat., Par. I., Disp_. 39, _Sec_. 3.]

In this sense the apostle says that he fills up those things that are
wanting of the sufferings of Christ in his flesh. By faithfully
following Christ, we partake more and more of the fruits of
redemption. Thus is Christ likewise gradually fulfilled in the
individual Christians--that is to say, he finds in them a more and
more ample expression. And in the same degree in which Christ stamps
himself upon the single members of the Church, the latter also is more
and more filled with him.

Scarce has the apostle declared of Christ, in Col. ii. 9, that in him
dwelleth all the [Greek text] of the Godhead corporally, when he turns
to the Colossians with the words, "And you are filled in"--God that is
to say, "in him," _i.e._ in Christ, in so far as ye stand in communion
with him, "which is the head of all principality and power." This
communion of individuals with Christ, and their attendant
participation in the fulness of the Godhead which dwelleth in him, is
accomplished by the instrumentality of the Church, particularly by the
sacrament of baptism, which incorporates the individual with the
Church. Verse 10-12: "_Et estis in illo repleti. In quo et circumcisi
estis, circumcisione non manu facta, sed in circumcisione Christi,
consepulti ei in baptismo._"

Thus the Church is seen to be the pleroma of the Godhead in a twofold
{677} point of view. First, in her members, which, being gradually
filled with God, become partakers of the divine nature. In the second
place, in the active cooperation of the Church herself in the
performance of this work.

In the first regard, the repletion of the Church with God is not a
state attained once for all. It is rather a process of measured growth
[Greek text]. The measure of the age of the fulness of Christ is the
goal and the objective point of the entire development of the Church.
It will be attained when every individual shall have become complete
in Christ, and therewith also in his own person a pleroma of Christ.
In the edifying of the body of Christ, or in the establishment of the
Church, therefore, we must work without repose till we all meet in the
unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God. In this
sense only can it be said that there is a progress in the Church. This
continued development of Catholicism the apostle regards as a gradual
repletion of the single members of the Church with all the fulness of
God, [Greek text].

We have as yet, however, come to know but the one phase of this
relation of the Church to Christ, or to the pleroma of the Godhead.
The Church is not only destined to present herself at the close of her
historical development as the pleroma of him that filleth all in all;
she is even now entitled to this attribute, by virtue of her essential
character.

On this head we derive instruction from a nearer contemplation of the
process of development in which the erection of the Church is
completed. "The whole body," says the apostle, meaning the body of
Christ himself, "maketh increase of the body unto the edifying of
itself in charity." The Church therefore carries within herself, in
the inmost recesses of her being, the principle and the germinal power
of her whole development. This fundamental principle of Catholicism is
Christ himself, who pervades the Church as his body.

There is a subjective and an objective repletion of the Church with
Christ. The former progresses gradually, in so far as the single
members of the Church assimilate themselves more and more to Christ.
The latter is a given state of things from the first. In it consists
the most subtle essence of the Church. This objective presence of
Christ in her approves itself as the vital power of her growth. The
gradual ripening of the Church therefore grows up into Christ ([Greek
text], Eph. iv. 15) on the one hand, and proceeds from him ([Greek
text]) on the other. From him--that is to say, by means of the
vivifying influence of the Son of God, present in the Church, she
maketh increase of herself unto the edifying of herself in charity.

It is the same idea, when the apostle characterizes the growth of the
Church as an [Greek text], an _augmentum Dei, i.e._, a growth
emanating from God. God effects it, but by the instrumentality of the
Church, within her and as issuing from her. For this purpose God hath
installed her as his pleroma. Precisely because the Church is filled
with God, or is his pleroma, the members of the Church may gradually
become complete in him. Thus there is a development and a progress
only for the individual members of the Church. She herself, by virtue
of her essential character, is superior to development, and acts as
the impelling force of this development. Christianity _has_ a history,
but it _is_ not itself a history. The essence of Christianity, which
is that of the Church, is not a thing in process of formation, it is a
thing accomplished and perfect from the beginning.

The scriptural idea of the body of Christ presents the principle of
Catholicism in a new light. The Church alone has Christ for her head.
It is her exclusive privilege to be the body of Christ. This gives her
a fellowship of life with Christ, by which she is distinguished from
the world, the {678} latter sustaining to him no relation but that of
subjection and dependence. But upon what rests this privilege of the
Church? Why is she alone the body of Christ, the pleroma of the
God-head?

Christology must supply the fundamental reason. According to the
Catholic dogma of the person of Christ, he filleth the universe only
by virtue of his Godhead. With his life as the Son of Man he filleth
only the Church, his body. But how much more largely does God reveal
himself by his personal inhabitation of the sacred humanity of Christ
than by the creative power wherewith he penetrateth and filleth all in
all! Here a single ray, a faint reflection of his glory, flutters
through the veil of created nature, there the fulness of the Godhead
dwelleth bodily.

The idea of Catholicism, therefore, coincides with that of fulness. As
the pleroma of him who filleth all in all, the Church harbors in her
bosom a treasure, the richness of which is inexhaustible. Every
created thing, every single period, every particular phase of the
culture of the human mind, has some good attribute. Yet this attribute
is a mere special advantage, a peculiar quality, a feeble reflex of
the chief good, a single ray of the shining sea of goodness inclosed
in the unfathomable abyss of the divine essence, of the fulness of the
Godhead. The completeness of the revelation of God's goodness is found
only in the sacred humanity of Christ, and therefore in the Church.
Hence the Church is the highest good that is to be found on earth. Let
the productions of the human mind, at a given stage of its
development, be ever so glorious and sublime, they can never supplant
the pleroma of the Church. Her wealth is fraught with all the possible
results of the human intellect and imagination; and these, in the
fulness of the Church, are intensified, raised, as it were, to a
higher power of goodness. Every production of the human mind is more
or less in danger of falling short of the requirements of later ages.
The metal of all such fabrics needs to be recast from time to time, as
forms and fashions change. In default of this, it gradually
degenerates into mere antiquity, or, in the most fortunate event, it
preserves only the character of an honored relic. From this fate of
all that comes into existence the Church is exempt. She alone is ever
young, and always on a level with the times. This qualifies her to be
the teacher of the world from age to age. Hence, also, she is enabled
to minister an appropriate remedy for the disease of every generation.
How, then, can a movement which makes war on the Church claim to be an
advance of the human mind in the right direction? The interests of
true civilization will never interfere with those of the Church.

As well that the Church is the body of Christ as that in her is the
fulness of him who filleth all in all--both of these attributes adhere
to her in virtue of her divine foundation. Thus Catholicism, whose
fundamental principle we have contemplated in this twofold scriptural
aspect, is not the product of the combination of any external
circumstances. It is grounded in the very idea of the Church, in the
inmost depths of her being. Therefore she remains the Catholic Church
in every vicissitude of her external condition, whether in the
splendor of princely honors, or under the crushing weight of Neronic
persecution.

If, then, Catholicism is of the essence of the Church, the momentous
conclusion is irresistible, that the true Church is capable of
realization in such an image only as enables her to present herself in
her essential feature of catholicity. It follows that the papacy, as
necessary to the Catholic manifestation of the Church, is imperatively
demanded by the law of her being.

------
{679}

From Once a Week.

THE CATHEDRAL LIBRARY.

It is now between forty and fifty years ago that I obtained leave from
the dean and chapter of Winterbury Cathedral to read for some weeks in
their cathedral library. The editions of the fathers and of some
important middle-age writers which are preserved in that quiet library
boast of peculiar excellence, and I well remember the exultation with
which I, then a very young man, received news of the desired
information to ransack those treasures. Having secured a small lodging
in the close, or cathedral enclosure, I set out for Winterbury early
in the year 182-. Through the kindness of one of the canons, who
seldom had to consult the library on his own account, I was provided
with a key to the library buildings, and allowed to keep undisturbed
possession of it as long as my visit lasted. This key gave access not
only to the library, but to all parts of the cathedral likewise,
including even the cloisters, so that I was able to let myself in and
out of the noble edifice at all hours of the day or night, and to
ramble unchallenged through aisle, crypt, stalls, triforium, and
organ-loft.

I have never forgotten, and shall never forget, the day on which I
first took my seat in the room which was to be the special scene of my
labors. The library lay on the south side of the cathedral, being a
lower continuation of the south transept, and forming one side of the
cloister court. It was obviously, therefore, raised above the height
of the cloister vaulting, and it was reached by a flight of stairs
opening into the cathedral itself. Narrowness (it measured about
eighty feet by thirty), and a certain antique collegiate air (and
smell, too, to be perfectly accurate) about the bindings of the books
and the coverings of the chairs, were its chief characteristics. There
was a bust of Cicero at one end, and of Seneca at the other. Some
smaller busts of the principal Greek fathers adorned the side-shelves,
and a dingy portrait of the "judicious" Hooker abode in a musty frame
over the heavy stone mantelpiece. The fender itself was of stone, or
rather the fireplace was not protected by a fender at all, but by a
small stone wall, about three inches thick and six inches high, which
afforded blissful repose to the outstretched foot.

One April evening, shortly after sunset, when there was still daylight
enough to read the titles on the backs of books, I walked across the
close in order to fetch and bring away with me a couple of volumes of
which I stood in need. It was an hour when the grand old cathedral is
accustomed to put on its very best appearance. The heaven-kissing
spire and the far lower, but beautiful, western towers are tinted with
the faint rose color which suits old stonework so admirably; and the
deep gloom of the cloisters, tempered by the glow from the noble piles
of masonry overhead, makes it possible and easy to realize some of the
rapturous visions of the recluse. I passed as usual down the nave, and
having ascended the little staircase, let myself into the library, and
was on the point of attacking the necessary bookshelf, when instead of
placing the key in my pocket, as it was my habit to do, I tossed it
carelessly on to the sill of an adjoining window. The woodwork of the
library was by no means in a sound condition, and between the inner
edge of the sill and the wall there was a wide chink, opening down
into unseen depths of distance. Into this chink, impelled by my evil
genius, or by one of the ghostly beings that (as {680} I was assured
by the verger) haunt the library and cloisters, down tumbled my
unlucky key. I saw it disappear with a sharp twinge of vexation,
principally, however, at the thought of the time and trouble that
would be consumed in bringing it to light again. To-morrow, I said to
myself, I shall be forced to get a carpenter to remove this sill, and
rake up the key from heaven knows where; while smirking Mr. Screens,
the verger, will watch the whole proceeding, and insinuate with silent
suavity a doubt whether I am a fit person to be entrusted with Canon
Doolittle's key. It was not until I had come down from the short
ladder with the books under my arm, and, warned by the deepening
shades, was about to leave the library, that the full effect of the
key's disappearance presented itself to my mind. The outer gate and
inner door of the nave had been carefully shut by me, according to
custom, on entering the cathedral. All the gates and doors were fitted
with a spring-lock, so that without my key I was double-locked into
the building. My first thought was one of amusement, and I fairly
laughed aloud at my own perplexity. It seemed an impossible and
inconceivable thing that one might really have to pass the entire
night in this situation. Presently I left the library, the door of
which I had not shut on entering, and went down the staircase into the
transept, and then into the nave. I carefully tried the inner door,
but without effect. I had done my duty on entering, and it was
hopelessly and mercilessly fastened against me. Resolved on
maintaining unbroken self-possession, I returned to the library. It
was now quite dark, the only light being that reflected from the
shafts of the cloisters, on which the moonbeams were now beginning to
fall. I sat down in a large arm-chair which stood at one end of the
library table, and thought over all the possible means of extricating
myself from an unexpected durance. Should I go up to the belfry in the
north-western tower and toll one of the bells until the verger, roused
from his first sleep, should come to see what was the matter? but even
this I could not do without the key, which would be required to open
the door at the entrance of the tower. Or should I make my way into
the organ-loft, and filling the bellows quite full, strike a
succession of loud chords, until the music might attract the attention
of some passer-by? this might be done, but it would be a perilous
experiment. Half Winterbury would be seized with the belief that their
old cathedral was haunted. The organ-loft would be invaded by vergers,
beadles, and constables--there were no blue-coated police in those days--
and I should move about the ancient city ever after with the stigma of
a madcap on my head. People would nod knowingly to one another as I
passed, and significantly tap their foreheads, by way of hinting that
I was "a little touched." Canon Doolittle would recall his key, and
abstain from inviting me to his hospitable table. Gradually,
therefore, I gave up the scheme of saving myself by means of the
organ; and the belfry being already set aside, no other resource
remained but to stay where I was, and quietly to pass the hours as
best I could until Mr. Screens should open the doors at about
half-past six in the morning, ready for the seven o'clock prayers in
the Lady chapel.

I was luckily undisturbed by any fears arising from the possible
anxiety of my landlady. Winterbury is near the sea; and I had on more
than one occasion spent the greater part of the night on the cliffs,
watching the glorious moonlit effects upon the romantic coast scenery
of that district. These Mrs. Jollisole was accustomed to call my
"coast-guard nights;" and I made no doubt that, should I fail to
appear, the sensible old lady would go contentedly to bed, supposing
me to have mounted guard on the cliffs.

I therefore lost no time in composing myself, if not to sleep, at any
rate to an attempt at sleep. The library table was always surrounded
by an {681} array of solemn old oak chairs, padded with cushions of
yellowish leather, and looking as though--if their own opinion were
consulted--no mortal man of lower degree than a prebendary should ever
be allowed to seat himself upon them. At each end of the table there
was a chair of a superior order--a couple of deans, as it were,
keeping high state amidst the surrounding canons. These chairs were
made of precisely the same kind of oak, and covered with leather of
exactly the same yellowish tinge as the others, but their whole design
was larger and more imposing, and what was of the most consequence to
me in my present position--they were _arm_-chairs, affording opportunity
for all manner of easy and sleep-inviting postures. Throwing myself
into one of these dignified receptacles, I soon fell asleep, and soon
afterward took to dreaming.

Leaning in my dream on the sill of the library window, I fancied
myself to be gazing down into a peaceful church-yard. One by one, like
gleams of moonlight in the dark shade of the surrounding cloisters, I
saw a number of young girls assemble, and fall with easy exactitude
into rank, as if about to take part in a procession. Each slender
figure was draped in the purest white muslin, with a veil of the same
material arranged over the head, and partially concealing the face.
Just as one sees at the present day in Roman Catholic churches at the
more important _fêtes_, the procession was arranged according to the
gradations of height. The very young children were in the front, and
as the other end of the line was approached, the pretty white figures
grew gradually taller, until girls of eighteen or nineteen brought up
the rear. They presently began to move, and it was clear that they
were about to take part in some solemn office for the dead. With two
priests at their head, they made the circuit of the cloisters, moving
along with graceful regularity of step. Between each pair of the
slender columns of the cloister building, I imagined that a small
stone basin (or "_benitier_") was set, standing on a low pedestal, and
filled with holy water. Each girl walking on the side next to these
basins was furnished with a small broom of feathers, like those which
may at any time be seen in the Continental churches. Dipping these
brooms from time to time into the basins of water, they waved them in
beautiful harmony with their own harmonious movements, sprinkling the
ancient monumental slabs over which they were stepping. They sang to a
strain of rare melody the familiar words of _Requiem AEternam_.

Presently they seemed to change time and tune, and to sing a hymn of
many verses, each verse ending with a refrain. A single voice would
give the verse, but all joined together in the plaintive music of the
refrain:

  "Through life's long day and death's dark night,
  O gentle Jesus! be our light!"

I have heard much music, secular and sacred, since then; but I know of
no musical effect which abides with me so constantly as that imagined
chanting of young voices heard long ago.

One girl in particular attracted my attention as I dreamt. She was one
of the pair who closed the procession, and was of a commanding height
and extremely elegant figure. She had, as it seemed to me, taken
excessive precaution in drawing her ample veil closely around her head
and face,

* * * *

On a sudden I awoke. There, in one of the decanal arm-chairs, I was
sitting--in an easy, familiar posture, as if I had been myself a dean--
and there beside me, close at hand, within reach of my outstretched
arm, was a tall figure in white, clearly a female form, and the
precaution had been taken of drawing an ample veil closely around the
head and face. Any one but an imbecile would have acted as I did,
though I remember taking some credit to myself at the time for my
coolness and presence of mind. I simply sat still and stared; and by
degrees I observed, I conned. Years before, in my boyhood, I had
walked a good {682} deal on the stretch; and I had known what it was
in North Devon to wake up "upon the middle of the night," to feel the
hard, unyielding turf underneath one's back, and see and gaze, gaze
wistfully upon the bright unanswering stars above one's head. Even
then one could divine the true value of a bed. But to wake on the
downs in the small hours is a trifle compared with waking in a
cathedral any time between dew and dawn. More especially when, as was
my case, you have a ghost at your elbow. Not that my ghost remained
long stationary. She did not. Starting from my arm-chair, she began a
survey of the shelves by moonlight in so active and business-like a
manner that I felt no doubt, given her _quondam_ or present mortality,
she was or had been a "blue." In five minutes, my powers of decision
were wide awake, and the question of her mortality was settled. She
was not a thing of the past, but alive as I myself was; and the only
scruple was, how or how soon to awaken her from her somnambulist's
dream. While I was debating with myself the best means to pursue, she
suddenly passed out of the library door on to the stone staircase. My
alarm was now fairly excited. She had two courses to pursue in her
sensational career--I employ the word in a more correct use than it is
commonly put to. She might either turn downward toward the floor of
the church itself, in which case she could do herself little or no
harm; or she could mount the ascending staircase, and reach an outward
parapet, with heaven knew what mad scheme in view, before I had time
to overtake her. She chose the second alternative, and--she leading, I
following--we mounted the lofty staircase that leads to the base of
the spire. I was aware that the door at the top of this particular
ascent was not furnished with a lock; it was fastened by a simple
bolt, and I had little doubt that my sleep-walking friend would shoot
that bolt back as readily as she had taken down and replaced the books
on the library shelves. My greatest fear was that she might begin
playing some mad prank upon the parapet before I was sufficiently near
to arrest her movements. I need hardly add that, influenced by the
dread of consequences commonly said to follow on a sudden awakening
from a fit of somnambulism, I inwardly resolved to try every means of
humoring and coaxing my companion down again to _terra firma_, and
only as a last resort to attempt arousing her. In a few moments we
stood side by side on the platform looking down on Winterbury, which
lay outstretched in the white moonlight. It was a tranquil and
beautiful scene. There was the church of St. Werburgh, a noble
monument of thirteenth century building, which would attract
instantaneous admiration anywhere but under the shadow of Winterbury
cathedral. There was the fine old market-place, with the carved stone
pump at which Cromwell drank as he passed through the city; and the
charmingly quaint guildhall, and the ruins of the abbey skirting the
river in the distance. I was not permitted, however, long to enjoy the
prospect. Before I could lift a finger to arrest her rapid movements,
my mysterious companion had stepped lightly on to the parapet, and
began a quick and perfectly unembarrassed walk around it. Dreading the
experiment of forcible rescue, it occurred to me to try the effect of
quietly accosting her, and endeavoring--by humoring her present mental
condition--to decoy her away from her perilous amusement. It was an
awful moment of suspense. Should she lose her balance and her life, it
would be next to impossible for me ever totally to clear up the
enigmatical circumstance of my having been actually present by her
side during that weird moonlit dance upon the parapet. If, on the
other hand, I were to seize and lift her from the top-stone, she might
rouse the whole close with frightful screams, she might faint--might
even die--in my arms, or from the shock of sudden awakening she might
lose her reason.

{683}

But there was no time to stand balancing chances. Accordingly, I
gently drew toward her side, and said, in as easy and collected a tone
as I could command,

"I think we left the library door unlocked; before you complete your
rounds, had we not better go down the stairs and secure it? Having
been allowed the entry of the cathedral, I think we are bound in honor
to shut doors after us."

"To be sure," she replied, and instantly, to my intense relief,
dropped cleverly down into the space between the parapet and the lower
courses of the spire. "To be sure, the door should be locked at once.
Let us go down. I cannot make out who you are. In none of my former
visits to the cathedral have I met you; but you seem to be no
intruder, and I will certainly go down and secure the door as you
suggest."

All this was uttered quickly and easily, but with an abstracted air,
and without the slightest motion of her steadfast eyes. While still
speaking, she stooped under the low door-way at the stair-head, and
began to descend. I followed, busily devising plans for preventing any
fresh ascent, and yet still avoiding the necessity of breaking the
curious spell which bound her. We reached the library door. To my
surprise, she produced a key of her own, and was about to turn the
lock, when I remembered that at this rate I should be deprived for the
rest of the night of my only comforts, the warm atmosphere of the
library and the decanal arm-chair. I therefore extemporized a bold
stroke.

"Excuse me," I said, "I have left my hat and a few papers inside, and
having a canon's key, I will save you the trouble of locking up. But
permit me to suggest that it is still very early in April and the
night is cold. Why not give up the rest of your walk for to-night, and
return again on one the glorious nights in May or June?"

Without uttering a syllable in reply, she turned on her heel, and
began slowly descending the staircase into the transept. My curiosity
was now fairly on the alert, and I resolved to unravel the mystery, at
least so far as to discover by what means she would leave the
cathedral, and in what direction she would go. Stepping for a moment
inside the library, I hastily but quietly slipped off my shoes on the
matting of the floor, and followed her barefoot and silent. She was
just stepping from the staircase into the transept, when I caught
sight of her again. With the same steady and self-possessed action
which she had displayed throughout, she crossed the transept, and made
straight for a small postern door which led, as I knew, into the
garden of the bishop's palace. This she unlocked, and I made sure
that, having passed through, she would lock it again behind her.
Whether, however, she was a little forgetful that night, or whether
the unexpected _rencontre_ with a stranger had ruffled the tranquil
serenity of her trance, it so happened that she omitted to turn the
lock, and I was able, after gently reopening the door, to trace her
progress still further. Under the noble cedars of the episcopal
gardens, past long flower-beds and fresh-mown lawns, I followed her
barefoot, until we arrived within a few yards of the hinder buildings
of the palace. Here I stopped under the dark shade of a cedar, and
watched my companion walk coolly up to a little oaken, iron-clamped
door, open it, and disappear within the house. Then of course I
retraced my steps toward the cathedral. But stopping again under one
of the magnificent cedars, I could not avoid a few moments' reflection
on the exceedingly odd position into which accident had brought me.
Here was I, alone and barefooted, standing, at two o'clock in the
morning, on the lawn of the palace, where I had no more business than
I had at the top of the spire; and the only place in which I could
find shelter for the night was the cathedral itself, a building {684}
that most people would rather avoid than enter during the small hours.
The queerness of my situation, however, did not prevent me from
enjoying to the full the extreme loveliness of the gardens, and the
glorious view of the splendid edifice, rising white and clear in the
moonlight above their shady alleys and recesses.

On regaining the library, I dozed away the remainder of the dark hours
in the same commodious arm-chair, and as soon as the bell began to
toll for the seven o'clock prayers, I passed unnoticed out of the
building and regained my lodgings.

"Been keeping a coast-guard night, sir?" said Mrs. Jollisole, as she
set the breakfast things in order.

"Why, yes, Mrs. Jollisole," I answered; "I did enjoy some rather
extensive prospects last night."

And that was all that passed. I had fixed it in my own mind that I
would keep my own counsel strictly until I should have called at the
palace, and communicated the whole of the circumstances in confidence
to the bishop, with whom I was slightly acquainted.

This plan I carried into effect in the course of the morning. His
lordship was at home, and listened with his customary kindness and
courtesy to the whole of my romantic recital. Just as I was finishing,
his study door opened, and a young lady entered, dressed in black,
tall, and strikingly beautiful, though looking pale and fagged.
Glancing at me she gave a slight start, and taking a book from one of
the shelves, instantly left the room, after a few muttered words of
apology for disturbing the bishop. It was my companion of the library
and the tower.

"I see," said his lordship, "that you have recognized the ghost. That
young lady is an orphan niece of mine, and has been brought up in my
house from her infancy. Never strong, she has reduced what vigor she
possesses by her ardent love of books, and her intellectual interest
is awake to all kinds of subjects. She is equally unwearied in
visiting amongst the poor, and often returns home from her rounds in a
state of exhaustion from which it is difficult to rouse her. About a
twelvemonth ago we first noticed the appearance of a tendency to
somnambulism. She was removed for several weeks to the sea-side, and
we began to hope that a permanent improvement had set in. A severe
loss, however, which she has lately sustained, has, I fear, done her
great injury, and here is proof of the old malady returning. We are
indebted to you, sir," added the kind old man, "for your judicious and
thoughtful way of proceeding under the circumstances of last night,
and for at once putting me in possession of the details, which will
enable me to take the necessary precautions."

Before leaving the bishop's company, I begged him to go with me into
the cathedral, and to be present while a carpenter removed the
woodwork of the library window in order to recover the key. This he
consented at once to do, and we crossed the gardens by the very route
which "the ghost" and I had traversed during the night. On removing
the panelling, we found that the depth of the chink was comparatively
trifling, and the key was soon seen shining among the dust.

I was further gratified by another discovery, which, together with the
extreme pleasure that it gave the bishop, quite indemnified me for my
night's imprisonment.  We noticed, partially concealed by rubbish in a
niche of the wall below the panelling, the corner of a vellum
covering. On further examination, this proved to be a MS. copy of St.
Matthew's Gospel, not indeed of the most ancient date, but adorned
with very rare and curious illumination, and making an excellent
addition to the stores of the library. After a _tête-à-tête_ dinner
that evening with the friendly bishop, we spent a pleasant hour or two
in a thorough inspection of the newly-found treasure.

It was little more than a month afterward that I heard the great bell
in the western tower toll the tidings {685} of a death. One week more,
and a sorrowing procession of school-children and women of the
alms-houses filed from the transept into the quiet cloister-ground,
there to bury the last remains of one who would seem to have been to
them in life a loving and much-loved friend. It was so. The eager
brain and the yearning heart, worn out with unequal labors, were laid
to rest for ever. The bishop's frail nursling was dead.

----

From The Month.

CATHOLIC PHILOSOPHY IN THE THIRTEENTH CENTURY


The errors of the present day are generally the consequences of some
false principle admitted long ago, and many may be traced clearly to
the calamities of the sixteenth century. One of these is, that the
mediaeval learning preserved (as was declared at the Council of Trent)
chiefly among the monks was in its nature useless and trifling, fitted
only to amuse ignorant and narrow-minded men in the darkness of the
middle ages, and consisted in certain metaphysical speculations and
logical quibbles, called scholastic teaching. Several French writers
have done much to disabuse men of this prejudice, by making known the
amount of knowledge and science attained by mediaeval scholars, whose
works are despised because they are too scarce to be read, and perhaps
too deep to be understood in a less studious age. One of these
champions of he truth is Ozanam, who has traced with a master-hand the
preservation of all that was valuable in antiquity, through the
downfall of the empire; and he has rendered a subject which otherwise
it would have been presumption to approach a plain matter of history,
which the reader has only to receive, like other facts; so that we see
how, under the safeguard of the Church, the same powers which were
formerly used in vain by the philosophers for the discovery of truth,
were successfully used for the attainment its deeper mysteries. But
all that is human is marked by imperfection; and the very instinct
which led philosophers to "feel after" their Creator, and seek that
supreme good for which we were created, was misled by errors which all
ultimately ended in infidelity. It is not necessary to dwell on these.
A few words will remind the classical scholar that the Ionian school,
which sought truth by experiment, through the perception of the
senses, leads to fatalism and pantheism; while Pythagoras, who sought
by reason and the sciences him who is above and beyond their sphere,
left the disappointed reason in a state of doubt and indifference, or
else despair. Plato alone pursued a course of safety. Taking the
existence of God as a truth derived perhaps from patriarchal teaching,
he used the Socratic method of induction only for the destruction of
falsehood, and received with fearless candor all that the poets taught
of superhuman goodness and beauty; for though the symbolism of the
poets degenerated into disgusting idolatry, they have been called the
truest of heathen teachers. It is well known how Aristotle
strengthened the reasoning power; but the mighty power had no object
on which to put forth its strength, and the more noble minds rejected
at once both reasoning and experiment, and sought for religion in the
mysticism of Alexandria. Such was the wreck and waste of all that man
could do without revelation, {686} and so sickening was the
disappointment, that St. Augustin would fain have closed the Christian
schools to Virgil and Cicero, which he loved once too well; but St.
Gregory, brought up as he was a Roman and a Christian, had nothing to
repent of or to destroy, and classic letters were preserved by
Christians.

Ozanam found pleasure in believing that Christianity, while as yet
concealed in the catacombs, was "in all senses undermining ancient
Rome," and that it had an ameliorating effect on the Stoic, which was
then the best sect of the philosophers; so that Seneca, instead of
following the lantern of Zeno, who confused the natures of God and
man, learnt from St. Paul not only to distinguish them, but also the
relation in which man regards his Creator and Father, whom he serves
with free-will and love, by subduing his body to the command of his
soul. But the pride of philosophy may be modified without being
subdued. The principle of heathenism is "the antagonist of
Christianity: one is from man, and for man; the other from God, and
for God." It was the object of St. Paul and the first fathers of the
Church to liberate the intellect as well as the affections from
perversion, and to teach how the treasures of antiquity might be used
by Christians for religion, as the spoils of Egypt and the luxurious
perfumes of the Magdalen. And after the fierce battle of Christianity
with paganism was over, the triumph of the Church was completed under
Constantine by the Christianization of literature; that is, by using
in the service of truth all those powers which had been wasted in the
ineffectual efforts for its discovery. "A mixed mass of ancient
learning was saved from the wreck of the Roman world; and as Pope
Boniface preserved the splendid temple of the Pantheon, and dedicated
it to the worship of God glorified in his saints, so the doctors of
the Church employed the logic and eloquence of the philosophers
without adopting their theories. This was not always easy, and some,
like Origen and Tertullian, fell into error; for the distinctive
character of Christian teaching is to be dogmatic, not argumentative,
submitting the conclusions of reason to the decisions of inspired
authority, and the province of reason has bounds which it cannot
pass."

Gradually a Christian literature arose. Not only in the still
classical Roman schools, but in those of Constantinople, Asia, and
Africa, pagan writings were used as subservient to the training of
Christian authors, and the fourth century was the golden age of
intellect as well as sanctity. The fathers employed their classical
training in the study of the Holy Scriptures; but, according to the
true principle of sacred study, they sought from Almighty God himself
the grace which alone can direct the use of the intellectual powers.
"From the three senses of Holy Scripture" (says St. Bonaventure, in a
passage quoted by Ozanam out of his _Redactio Artium ad Theologiam_)
"descended three schools of Scriptural teaching. The _allegorical_,
which declares matters of faith, in which St. Augustin was a doctor,
and in which he was followed by St. Anselm and others, who taught by
discussion. The _moral_, on which St. Gregory founded his preaching
and taught men the rule of life, in which he was followed by St.
Bernard who belongs also to the mystical school and by a host of
preachers. While from the third or _analogical_ sense, St. Dionysius
taught by contemplation the manner in which man may unite himself to
God." Ozanam names a chain of authors as belonging to this school of
"Boethius, who on the eve of martyrdom wrote the consolations of that
sorrow which is concealed under the illusions of the world; Isidore,
Bede, Rabanus, Anselm, Bernard, Peter Damian, Peter the Lombard, who
rejoiced 'to cast his sentences like the widow's mite into the
treasury of the temple, Hugo, and Richard of St. Victor, Peter the
Spaniard, Albert, St. Bonaventure, and St. Thomas."

{687}

"Under the barbarian rule, all the intellectual, an well as the
devout, took sanctuary in the cloister; so that when the Arian
Lombards attacked the centre of Christendom, they were opposed only by
the teaching and discipline of the Church as perfected by St. Gregory;
and the power of these must have been supernatural, as the influence
of letters was nearly lost in Rome. Then, in defence of the faith, St.
Benedict marshalled a new band of devoted champions in the mountains
of Subiaco, and he made it a part of their duty to preserve the
treasures of learning, and to employ them in the service of religion;
and these monks," says Ozanam, "who spent six hours in choir,
transcribed in their cells the historians and even the poets of Greece
and Rome, and bequeathed to the middle ages the most valuable writings
of antiquity."

It is agreed by all that Charlemagne was the founder of the middle
ages; and he opened the schools in which theology was formed into a
science, and gained the title of scholastics. Alcuin was the
instrument by whom Charlemagne remodelled European literature, with
the authority of the Church and councils, tradition and the fathers.
Of these the Greek were little known west of Constantinople; and the
chief representative of the Latin fathers was St. Augustin. There were
a few later writers, as Boethius on the "Consolation of Philosophy,"
and Cassidorus, who wrote _De Septem Disciplinis_.

"Every one knows," says Ozanam, "that when Europe was robbed of
ancient literature by the invasion of barbarians, the remains of
science, saved by pious hands, were divided into seven arts, and
enclosed in the Trivium and Quadrivium." These arts were grammar,
rhetoric, logic, and mathematics, which last comprehended arithmetic
and geometry, music and astronomy. "The establishment of public
schools in cent, ix.," says Ozanam, "assisted the progress of
reasoning, till it became in itself an art capable of being employed
indifferently to prove either side of an argument. The science of
words was no longer that of grammar, but became dialectics; and words
were used lightly as a mere play of the intellect, or as a mechanical
process to analyze truth." But it can never be lawful for a Christian
to discuss what has been revealed, as though it were possible that
those who reject it may be right; nor to consider truth as an open
question, which is still to be decided, and may be sought by those
rules of reasoning which had been laid down by Aristotle for the
discovery of what was as yet unknown. It was for this reason that, as
Ozanam says, Tertullian called Aristotle the patriarch of heretics;
yet his rules of reasoning were right, and the error lay in using them
amiss. Thus the Manichaeans reasoned when they should have believed,
and the Paulicians subjected the Holy Scriptures to their own
interpretation, and rejected all that was above their comprehension;
and thus in after-times did the Albigenses, and then the Protestants
of the sixteenth, and the Liberals of the nineteenth, century.

It was in 891 that Paschasius wrote, for the instruction of his
convent, a treatise on the Holy Eucharist, in which he proved by
reasoning that doctrine which "the whole world believes and
confesses;" but he was contradicted by Ratram, who first put forth the
heresy that the real presence is only figurative, and then the Church
pronounced the dogma of transubstantiation. From that time theologians
were obliged to confute the intellectual heresies of philosophers by
fighting, as on common ground, with the weapons of argument which were
used by both, in order to defend the doctrines which had been hitherto
declared simply and by authority, as by our Lord himself. "Now," says
Ozanam, "mysteries were subjected to definitions, and revelation was
divided into syllogisms. And as the love of argument 'increased, the
disputants took up the question which {688} had been discussed among
heathen philosophers as to the abstract existences which are called
universal forms or ideas; types of created things eternally existing
in the mind of God, according to the teaching of St. Bonaventure. And
when these were discovered by metaphysics, logic was exercised upon
them; and a dispute arose as to whether truth exists independently of
the perceptions of man. The Platonists asserted that it does, and this
belief, which they called idealism, was held by the divines, and was
called realism, while those who denied that it exists independently of
man were said to be nominalists." In modern days the dispute of
realism and nominalism is laughed at as an idle war of words; but the
war is, in truth, on principles, and still divides the orthodox and
unbeliever, and the names of realism and nominalism are only changed
for objective and subjective truth.

A painful experience had long prevailed that the spirit of controversy
is destructive of devotion; and the more devout, weary of the wars of
philosophers, rejected logic, and found in the mystic school that
repose which had been sought even by heathens in a counterfeit
mysticism, in which the evil powers deluded men by imitating divine
inspirations. According to Ozanam, "Christian mysticism is idealism in
its most brilliant form, which seeks truth in the higher regions of
spontaneous inspiration;" and he goes on to explain, from the writings
of St. Dionysius, that its nature is contemplative, ascetic, and
symbolical. It is _contemplative_, as it brings man into the presence
of the immense indivisible God, from whom all power, life, and wisdom
descend upon man through the hierarchies of the angels and through the
Church, and whose divine influences act in nine successive spheres
through all the gradations between existence and nothing. It is
_ascetic_, as it acts on the will through the link which connects the
body with the mind, and regulates the passions through the inferior
part of the soul. This "medicine of souls" was taught by the fathers
of the desert, who were followed by all the mystic doctors; and it was
on this reciprocal action of physics and morals that St. Bonaventure
afterward wrote the Compendium. It is _symbolic_, because it takes the
creation as a symbol of spiritual things, and the external world as
the shadow of what is invisible. The union of man with God is the
object and fullness of the knowledge which regards both the divine and
human nature, and levels all intellects in the immediate presence of
God. This was imparted to Adam, and restored by Christ our Lord, who
left it in the keeping of the Church. The first uninspired teacher of
this mystic theology is thought to have been Dionysius the Areopagite,
and the martyred Bishop of Athens, or, as some say, of Paris. In the
festival of his martyrdom it is declared "that he wrote books, which
are admirable and heavenly, concerning the divine names, the heavenly
and ecclesiastical hierarchy, and on mystical theology." Ozanam quotes
a fragment from his writings, which teaches that the indivisibility of
God is intangible by mathematical abstractions of quantity, and
indefinable by logic, because definition is analysis; and it is
incomparable, because there are no terms of comparison.

The teaching of St. Dionysius was not forgotten when the knowledge of
Greek was lost in the west. He was succeeded in this religious and
Christian philosophy by St. Anselm in the eleventh century. In his
_Monologium, De Ratione Fidei_, he supposes an ignorant man to be
seeking the truth with the sole force of his reason, and disputing in
order to discover a truth hitherto unknown. "Every one, for the most
part," he says, "if he has moderate understanding, may persuade
himself, by reason alone, as to what we necessarily believe of God;
and this he may do in many ways, each according to that best suited to
himself;" {689} and he goes on to say that his own mode consists in
deducing all theological truths from one point--the being of God. All
the diversity of beautiful, great, and good things supposes an ideal
one or unity of beauty, and this unity is God. Hence St. Anselm
derives the attributes of God--the creation, the Holy Trinity, the
relation of man to God, in a word, all theology. The _Proslogium_, or
truth demonstrating itself, is a second work, in which St. Anselm
proposes to demonstrate truth which has been already attained. "As in
the first he had, at the request of some brothers, written _De Ratione
Fidei_ in the person who seeks by reasoning what he 'does not know, so
he now seeks for some one of these many arguments which should require
no proof but from itself. He was the first to use the famous argument,
that from the sole idea of God is derived the demonstration of his
existence. He thus begins the _Proslogium:_ 'The fool hath said in his
heart, there is no God. Wherefore the most foolish atheist has in his
mind the idea of the sovereign good, which good cannot exist in
thought only, because a yet greater good can still be conceived. This
sovereign good therefore exists independently of the thought, and is
God.'" It is not worth while to follow out the errors which arose in
the middle ages from nominalism. In the eleventh century Roscelin
carried it to the absurdity of saying that ideas are only words, and
that nothing real exists except in particulars. And Philip of
Champeaux asserted the opposite extreme, and denied the existence of
all but universals; as that humanity alone exists, of which men are
mere parts or fragments. It was in the twelfth century that Abelard,
who had been trained in both these systems, came forth in the pride of
his vast intellect to reconcile them by a new theory, but his search
after truth was by a mere intellectual machinery, to be employed by
science in order to construct general scheme of human knowledge; while
it led to the rejection of that simple faith which believes without
examination, and substituted the system of rationalism, so fruitful to
this day of error and unbelief.

It was while men were constructing this intellectual tower of Babel
that Almighty God raised up as the champion of the truth the meek and
holy St. Bernard. Like David he laid aside his weapons of reasoning,
and left his cloister to overthrow the gigantic foe. In the cowl of
St. Benedict, he declared that the truth, which men sought by human
efforts, was to be received in faith as the gift of God, from whom all
knowledge and light proceeds. And it was not the powers of his
well-trained faculties, nor his classical and poetical studies, but
his prayers, which gained the victory; so that, as by miracle,
Abelard, the most eloquent disputant of his age, stood mute before the
saint, who taught that faith is no opinion attained by reasoning, but
a conviction beyond all proof that truth is revealed by God. This had
been the teaching of St. Gregory, who said that faith which is founded
on reason has no merit; and of St. Augustin, who said that faith is no
opinion founded on reflection, but an interior conviction; and of the
apostle, who said that faith is the certainty of things unseen. It is
consoling to read that the holy influence of St. Bernard did not only
silence his adversary; the heart of Abelard was melted, he laid aside
the studies in which he had so nearly lost his soul, and he made his
submission to the Church, and sought the forgiveness of St. Bernard.
Soon afterward he died a penitent, sorrowing for his moral and
intellectual offences. But evil does not end with the guilty; and his
school has continued brilliant in intellect and taste, but
presumptuous in applying them to the examination of truth. On the
other hand, the two folio volumes of St. Bernard have been always a
treasury of devotion, where the saints and pious of all succeeding
ages have been trained. It is impossible for words to {690} contain
more thought; and he had the gift of penetrating thoughts contained in
the inspired writings; as when he wrote twenty-four sermons on the
three first verses of the Canticles. Ozanam says that St. Pierre
perceived a fresh world of insects each day that he examined a single
strawberry-leaf; and thus in the spiritual world the intellect of St.
Bernard contemplated and beheld wonders with a sort of microscopic
infinity, while his vast comprehension was analogous in its
discoveries to the telescope. Such were the gifts conferred by God on
the humble abbot of Clairvaux.

There were in the time of St. Bernard other great teachers: Peter the
Venerable, St. Norbert, Godfrey, Richard, and Hugo, all monks of St.
Victor. Ozanam says that he embraced the three great modes of
teaching--that is, the allegorical, moral, and analogical; and
preceded St. Bonaventure in a gigantic attempt to form an
encyclopaedia of human knowledge, based on the truth declared by St.
James, that every good and perfect gift descends from the Father of
light, who is above.

With a vast amount of literary treasures the crusaders had brought
from the east, in the twelfth century, the Greek authors, with their
Arab commentators. They brought the physics, metaphysics, and morals
of Aristotle; and they brought also the pantheism, which, says
Ratisbon, the Saracens, like the early Stoics, had learnt from the
Brahmins, who believe that men have two souls--one inferior and led by
instinct, the other united and identical with God. This fatal error
was received by a daring school, to which Frederic of Sicily was
suspected to belong. It was to confute this school that St. Bernard
had taught in his sermons on the Canticles that union with God is not
by confusion of natures, but conformity of will. The poison entered
Europe from the west as well as the east; the Arabs in Spain mixed the
delusions of Alexandria with the subtleties of Aristotle, and the
result was such men as Averroes and Avicenna. Gerbert, afterward
Silvester II., had himself studied in Spain, and brought back into the
European schools not only the philosophy of Aristotle, but the Jewish
translations of Averroes. The unlearned monks of the west were
naturally alarmed at the new works on physics, astronomy, and alchemy,
and especially at the logic of Aristotle, and the terrible eruption of
pantheism. It was then that the Church exercised her paternal
authority, and condemned the confusion of the limits between faith and
opinion, and the degradation of the sciences to mere worldly purposes.
Ozanam gives the bull issued in 1254 by Innocent IV., in which he
complains that the study of civil law was substituted for that of
philosophy, and that theology itself was banished from the education
of priests. "We desire to bring back men's minds to the teaching of
theology, which is the science of salvation; or at least to the study
of philosophy, which, though it does not possess the gentle pleasures
of piety, yet has the first glimpses of that eternal truth which frees
the mind from the hindrance of covetousness, which is idolatry."

The tendency of philosophical errors was now rendered apparent by
their development, so that what was at first a vague opinion was now a
broad and well-defined system. Those who were firm in the teaching of
the Church found it necessary to use every means for opposing such
multiplied evils, and they boldly ventured on a Christian eclecticism,
which should employ all the faculties and all the modes of using them
in the service of religion; but it was not like the eclecticism of
Alexandria, where the ideas of Plato were united with the forms of
Aristotle, and adorned by the delusions of magic. The strength of
Christian eclecticism lay in the pure unity of faith, defended by all
the powers of man. {691} "Both analysis and synthesis," says Ozanam,
"are harmonized in true science: they are the two poles of the
intellectual world, and have the same axis and horizon. The
intersecting point of the two systems was the union of what is true in
realism and nominalism with mystic teaching, and the eclectic admitted
the experience of the senses as well as the deductions of reason and
the intuition of mysticism with the testimony of learning. Thus were
united in the study of truth the four great powers of the soul,
reason, tradition, experience, and intuition." But it has been
remarked that some of the masters who taught by experiment and
tradition were persecuted as magicians, and some of those who used
reason and intuition were canonized. Both, however, observed the
ascetic life, of which the abstinence of Pythagoras and the endurance
of the Stoics were imitations, and all practised the virtues most
opposite to heathen morality, namely, humility and charity. The first
attempt at uniting the different opinions of the learned was made by
Peter Lombard, who collected the sentences of the fathers into a work,
which gained him the title of Master of the Sentences, and which was
afterward perfected in the _Summa_ of St. Thomas. Albert the Great
left the palace of his ancestors for the Dominican cloister. He
studied at Cologne, and was unequalled in learning and psychology.
While he reasoned on ideas, he made experiments on matter; nay, he
used alchemy, to discover unknown powers and supernatural agents. It
is said that his twenty-one folio volumes have never been sufficiently
studied by any one to pronounce on their merits. His work on the
universe was written against pantheism, and declares the presence of
God in every part of creation, without being confused with it. That
divine presence is the source of all power. "He was," says Ozanam (p.
33), "an Atlas, who carried on his shoulders the whole world of
science, and did not bend beneath its weight." He was familiar with
the languages of the ancients and of the east, and had imbibed
gigantic strength at these fountains of tradition. He believed in the
title of magician, which his disciples gave him; and he is remembered
by posterity rather as a mythological being than as a man.

The contemporary of Albert, says Ozanam, was Alexander Hales, who
wrote the "Summa of Universal Theology." William of Auvergne was a
Dominican and preceptor of St. Louis; he wrote _Specimen Doctrinale,
Naturale, Historiale;_ a division of the sciences and their end,
containing--1, theology, physics, and mathematics; 2, practice,
monastic, economic, and politic; 3, mechanics and arts; 4, logic and
words. Duns Scotus, a Franciscan, was more accurate in learning than
Albert himself; sound, though no discoverer in physics, and deep in
mathematics. He commented on Aristotle and Peter Lombard. From his
strength, sagacity, and precision, he was named the Doctor Subtilis.
He wrote on free will, and says that its perfection is conformity to
the will of God; and derives the moral law from the will of God,
according to St. Paul, "Sin is the transgression of the law." When St.
Thomas taught that the moral law is necessarily good because God is
good, and this question divided the learned into the schools of
Scotists and Thomists, Roger Bacon, an English Franciscan, was the
pupil of Scotus; but he was eclectic, and admitted both exterior and
interior experience, and the deductions of reason, into the
intercourse of the soul with God. Though he condemned magic as an
imposture, he wrote on alchemy, and with the simplicity of enthusiasm
he hoped to find the philosopher's stone, and to read the fall of
empires in the stars. He believed in the powers of human science, and
he hints at the possibility of a vessel moving without sails or oars;
and imagined a balloon, a diving-bell, a suspension bridge, and other
miracles of art, especially a telescope and a multiplying-glass.
Speaking of Greek {692} fire and unquenchable lamps, he says that art
as well as nature has its thunders, and describes the effect of
gun-powder, the attraction of the loadstone, and the sympathies
between minerals, plants, and animals; and says, "When I see the
prodigies of nature, nothing startles my faith either in the works of
man or in the miracles of God;" concluding, that Aristotle may not
have penetrated the deepest secrets of nature, and that the sages of
his own time will be surpassed by the novices of future days. He had
the same clear and sound views of supernatural things, and wrote on
the secret works of art and nature, and the falsehood of magic. "Man
cannot influence the spiritual world except by the lawful use of
prayer addressed to God and the angels, who govern not only the world
of spirits, but the destinies of man." Though called the Doctor
Mirabilis, he was suspected of magic, and died neglected in a prison,
where he had no light to finish his last works. His manuscripts were
burned at the Reformation, in a convent of his order, by men "who
professed," says Ozanam, "to restore the torch of reason, which had
been extinguished by the monks of the middle ages."

Raymond Lulli, the Doctor Illuminatus, was a Franciscan, the great
inventor of arts; but he was a philosophical adventurer, whose cast of
mind was Spanish, Arabian, African, and eastern. His youth was
licentious, his life turbulent, and his imagination restless; but he
died as a saint and a martyr on his return from liberating the
Christian slaves in Spain.

The glory of the Franciscan order is the Seraphical Doctor, St.
Bonaventure. He was educated under Hales, the Irrefragable Doctor. His
genius was keen and his judgment just, and he was a master of
scholastic theology and philosophy. But when he studied, it was at the
foot of a crucifix, with eyes drowned in tears from incessant
meditation on the passion of Christ. His life was dedicated to the
glory of God and his own sanctification; yet he spent much time in
actual prayer, because he knew from mystic theology that knowledge and
obedience are the gifts of God; and devoted himself to mortifications,
because they alone prepare the soul for the reception of divine grace
and intuition. Yet though he obtained the gift of ecstacy and the
grace of crucifying the human nature, he placed Christian perfection
not in heroic acts of virtue, but in performing ordinary actions well.
Ozanam quotes his words: "A constant fidelity in small things is a
great and heroic virtue; it is a continued crucifixion of self-love, a
complete sacrifice of self, an entice submission to grace." And his
own pale and worn countenance shone with a happiness and peace which
exemplified his maxim that spiritual joy is a sign that grace is
present in the soul. Though his desire for sacramental communion was
intense, yet we are told his great humility once kept him at a
distance from the altar, till an angel bore to him the consecrated
host; and the raptures with which he always received his God are
expressed, though doubtless imperfectly, in the burning words,
_Transfige Domine_, etc., which he was wont to utter after he had
himself offered the holy sacrifice. His devotional works, written for
St. Louis and others in his court, fill the heart with their unction,
and rank him as the great master of spiritual life. It was during the
intervals of ecstasies that he wrote; and while he was occupied on the
life of St. Francis, St. Thomas beheld him in his cell raised above
the earth, and the future saint exclaimed: "Leave a saint to write the
life of a saint."

It is with profound reverence that we must inquire what was the
intellectual teaching of so holy a man; and it is, indeed, so vast and
yet so deep that it exhausts all the human powers in contemplating the
nature of God and the end of man, which is his union to God. Ozanam
gives a passage from his work on the "Reduction of Arts to
Philosophy," in which he {693} says that philosophy is the medium by
which the theologian forms for himself a mirror (_speculum_) from
created things, which serve him as steps by which he may ascend to
heaven. He begins by the revealed truth, that every good and perfect
gift descends from the Father of light, and teaches of its descent by
these four ways--exterior, inferior, interior, and superior--through
successive irradiations, namely, Holy Scripture, experimental
mechanics, and philosophy, which succeed each other like the days of
creation, all converging in the light of Holy Scripture, and all
succeeded by that seventh day in which the soul will rest in the
perfect knowledge of heaven.

1. Exterior light, or tradition, relates to the exterior forms of
matter, and produces the mechanical arts, which were divided by Hugo
into seven--weaving, work in wood and in stone, agriculture, hunting,
navigation, theatricals, and medicine.

2. Inferior light, or that of the senses, awakens in the mind the
perceptions of the five senses, as St. Augustin says, by that fine
essence whose nature and whose seat baffles all our discoveries.

3. Interior light, or reason, teaches us by the processes of thought
those intellectual truths which are fixed in the human mind by
physics, logic, and ethics, through rational, natural, and moral
action on the will, the conduct, and the speech, which are the triple
functions of the understanding, and on the three faculties of the
reason--apprehension, judgment, and action; this interior light acts
on outward things by physics, mathematics, and metaphysics, and
perceives God in all things by logic, by physics, and by ethics. And
he goes on to consider truth as it is in the essence of words, things,
and actions.

4. The superior light proceeds from grace and from the Holy
Scriptures, and reveals the truths relating to salvation and
sanctification. It is named from its raising us to the knowledge of
things above us, and because it descends from God by way of
inspiration and not by reflection. This light also is threefold. Holy
Scripture contains, under the literal sense of the words, the
allegorical, which declares what must be believed concerning God and
man; the moral, which teaches us how to live; the analogical, which
gives the laws by which man may unite himself to God. And the teaching
of Holy Scripture contains three points--faith, virtue, and beatitude.
The course by which knowledge must be sought is by,

1, tradition; 2, experiment; 3, reason; and 4, a descent as it were by
the same road, so as to find the stamp of the divinity on all which is
conceived, or felt, or thought. All sciences are pervaded by
mysteries; and it is by laying hold of the clue of the mystery that
all the depths of each science are explored.

It was to Mount Alvernia, where his master, St. Francis, so lately
received the stigmata, that St. Bonaventure retired to write the
_Itinerarium Mentis ad Deum_, in which he treats on the divine nature,
and considers God as manifesting himself in three modes, and man as
receiving the knowledge of him by the three functions of memory,
understanding, and will.

Ozanam says: "To these triple functions of the mind God manifests
himself in three ways: 1, by the traces of his creation in the world;
2, by his image in human nature; 3, by the light which he sheds on the
superior region of the soul. Those who contemplate him in the first
are in the vestibule of the tabernacle; those who rise to the second
are in the holy place; those who reach the third are within the holy
of holies, where the two cherubim figured the unity of the divine
essence and the plurality of divine persons." He likens the invisible
existence of God to the light, which, though unseen, enables the eye
to perceive colors; and proves from his existence his unity, eternity,
and perfection; and from the eternal action of his goodness he deduces
the doctrine of the Trinity.

{694}

The _Breviloquium_ treats on the nature of man, who exists not of
himself, nor by emanation from God, but was called into life out of
nothing by the Creator, and lives by no mortal life borrowed from the
outer world, but by its own and immortal life, intelligent and free.
These attributes of God are communicated by him to his creatures
according to his own law, "that the superior shall be the medium of
grace to the inferior." The happiness of the soul must be immortal and
is in God, and she can exist separated from this body which she
inhabits and moves. Ozanam says: "The _Compendium Theologies
Veritatis_ treats of the connection between physics and morals, and
inquires how the body indicates the variations of the soul by that
mysterious link on which the scientific speculate, but which the saint
treats as a subject not for dogmatizing but for contemplation,
assisted by the mortification which alone brings the passions into
subserviency. But the Seraphic Doctor left his teaching unfinished.
Some of his spiritual works have been translated by the Abbé
Berthaumier; and the reader will find that what has been said gives an
imperfect idea of the writings of this doctor of the Church, which
fill six folio volumes, and have scarcely been mastered by a few,
though they have warmed the devotion of many; and one short treatise,
called the "Soliloquy," is of such a nature as to include the whole
science of devotion. It represents the soul contemplating God, not in
his creatures, but within itself, and asking what is her own position
in his presence: created by him, and sinning against him; redeemed by
him, and yet sinning; full of contrition, yet firm in the hope of
glory. The teaching of St. Paul is continued by St. Augustin, St.
Ambrose, and St. Bernard; and it seems as if no other book were
needful. One passage, and one only, may show the treasures it
contains. The soul is convinced of the vanity of created things, and
asks how men are so blinded as to love them. Because the soul is
created with so glorious and sensitive a nature, that it cannot live
without love; and while the elect find nothing in created things which
can satisfy their desire of happiness, and therefore rest in the
contemplation of God, the deluded multitude neglect themselves for
passing objects, and love their exile as if it were their home. But
Ozanam does not leave his history of intellectual progress to treat of
spiritual gifts.

St. Thomas was born nearly at the same time as St. Bonaventure, in the
same wild valleys of the Apennines. They studied together at Paris;
they lived and died and were canonized together.

It was said by Pallavicini that "when, in the twelfth century, the
Arabs made Cordova a second Athens, and Averroes used the philosophy
of Aristotle as a weapon against the faith, God raised up the
intellect of St. Thomas, who, by deep study of Aristotle, found in his
own principles a solution of the arguments used by infidels; and the
scholastics, following him, have so employed Aristotle to defend
Christianity, that whosoever rebels against the Vatican rebels also
against the Lycaeum." St. Thomas had, however, to confute the errors
of Aristotle, and of Abelard and others who had followed them, while
he set forth the great truths of reason which he taught. It was in
1248 that he published a comment on the "Ethics." He had himself, says
Ozanam, the learning and the weight of Aristotle; his power of
analysis and classification, and the same sobriety of language. He had
also studied the Timaeus of Plato, the doctrines of Albert, Alexander
Hales, and John of Salisbury. He followed the school of St. Augustin,
and drew from St. Gregory his rule of morals. His comments on the
Sentences contain a methodical course of philosophy, as his _Summa_
contains an abridgment of divinity. In an extract given by Ozanam, St.
Thomas says, faith considers beings in relation to God; philosophy, as
they {695} are in themselves. Philosophy studies second causes; faith,
the first cause alone. In philosophy the notion of God is sought from
the knowledge of creatures, so that the notion of God is second to
that of his creatures; faith teaches first the notion of God, and
reveals in him the universal order of which he is the centre, and so
ends by the knowledge of creatures; and this is the most perfect
method, because human understanding is thus assimilated to the divine;
which contemplating itself contemplates all things in itself.
Theology, therefore, only borrows from philosophy illustrations of the
dogmas she offers to our faith.

It was in 1265 that, at the request of St. Raymond de Pennafort, St.
Thomas wrote the _Summa Theologies_ against the infidels in Spain; a
book which has ever since been considered as a perfect body of
theology and the manual of the saints. "In the philosophy of St.
Bonaventure," says Ozanam, "the leading guide was perhaps rather the
divine love than the researches of intellect." St. Thomas combined all
the faculties under the rule of a lofty meditation and a solemn
reason, uniting the abstract perceptions beheld by the understanding
with the images of external things received by the senses. "It was a
vast encyclopaedia of moral sciences, in which was said all that can
be known of God, of man and his relations to God; in short, _Summa
totius theologies_. This monument, harmonious though diverse, colossal
in its dimensions, and magnificent in its plan, remained unfinished,
like all the great political, literary, and architectural creations of
the middle age, which seem only to be shown and not suffered to
exist." And the Doctor Angelicus left the vast outline incomplete.
That outline is to be appreciated only by the learned; the ignorant
may guess its greatness by a catalogue, however meagre, of its
contents. In the first part, or the natural, St. Thomas treats of the
nature of God and of creatures; his essence, his attributes, and the
mystery of the Holy Trinity; then, in relation to his creatures, as
their Creator and Preserver. In the second, or moral, part he treats
of general principles, of virtues and vices, of the movement of the
reasonable creature toward God, of his chief end, and on the qualities
of the actions by which he can attain it, of the theological and moral
virtues. In the third, or theological, part he examines the means of
attaining God, the incarnation and the sacraments. In the _Summa_,
says Ozanam, "the notions of things lead to the attributes of the
divinity, unity, goodness, and truth; thus, natural theology arrived
at the unity as well as the attributes of God, while from his action
is deduced his Personality and Trinity. Then follows the nature of
good and bad angels, of souls in a separate state; and then the
science of man considered as a compound being of soul and body,
endowed with intellect for receiving impressions from the divine light
above, and from its reflection on things below. He is also endowed
with desire, by which he is formed to seek goodness and happiness, but
is free in will to chose vice or virtue; and the rejection of sin, and
acquisition of virtue, in a life regulated by divine human law, is a
shadow of life in heaven. Enough has been said to show how lofty was
the teaching of the saint; to whose invocation large indulgences are
attached, and who had the task of composing the office used on the
festival of Corpus Domini. The great object of his adoration and
contemplation was the mystery of the real presence; and his _Adoro Te
devote_ may be used as an act of worship at the holiest moment of the
sacrifice of the altar. The ecstasy of his joy in communion is
expressed in the _Gratias Tibi ago_; and he declared his faith in the
mystery as he lay on the ashes where he died. And this pure faith is
recorded by Raphael, who represents him in his picture of the 'Dispute
on the Blessed Eucharist' among the doctors of all ages before the
miraculous host."

{696}

Like all other saints, he sought detachment by mortification, and the
love of God by prayer. His principle was, that prayer must precede
study, because more is learnt from the crucifix than from books; and
his last maxim was, that in order to avoid being separated from God by
sin, a man must walk as in the sight of God and prepared for judgment.
When he laid aside his religious studies to prepare for eternity, he
used the words of St. Augustin: "Then shall I truly live when I am
full of thee and thy love; now am I a burden to myself, because I am
not entirely full of thee."

Mystic theology was now carried to perfection by Gersen, abbot of the
Benedictine monastery of Verceuil from 1220 to 1240. Many attribute to
him the authorship of the "Imitation of Christ;" there are, however, a
number of others who do not agree with this opinion. The "Imitation"
is generally ranked as coming very close after the inspired writings.
What is said of the interior life is more or less intelligible to
those who are endeavoring after perfection, but must be unintelligible
to any who have not the faith: _"Una vox librorum"_ (iii. 43), says
the author; but the one voice does not teach all alike, for he who is
within is the teacher of truth. The four books are in the hands of
all. The contents of the first are on the conduct of men as to the
exterior world, and the qualities necessary for the following of
Christ--humility, detachment, charity, and obedience; then grace will
be found, not in external things, but within, in a mind calm,
obedient, and seeking not to adapt but to master circumstances. The
second teaches him who turns from creatures that the kingdom of God is
within, and that the government of this inner world is the science of
perfection: "Give room to Christ and refuse entrance to others; then
will man be free amid the chaos, and creatures will be to him only the
_speculum vitae_." Seek Christ in all, and you will find him in all;
seek self, and you will find it everywhere: one thing is above all,
that leaving all you leave self. In the third book the soul listens to
the internal voice of God, who makes known to her that he is her
salvation; and she therefore prays for the one gift of divine love. It
is impossible, perhaps not desirable, to repeat the devout aspirations
of this divine love. May those who read the holy words receive their
import through the light of grace! The fourth book relates to the
union of the soul with her Lord through sacramental communion; and
this can only be read in the hours of devotion.

It is presumptuous to say even thus much of the great saints who lived
in the thirteenth century, how is it possible to undervalue the
progress they made in all the highest powers of the soul? or who can
speak of the schools of the middle ages as deserving of contempt in
days which cannot comprehend them?

Ozanam desires to show that Dante was trained in this exalted
learning, and has embodied what he learnt in his _Divina Commedia_. He
speaks of the full development attained by scholastic teaching in
those great teachers, after whom no efforts were made to extend the
limits of human knowledge; and he speaks of the perplexities which
arose with the anti-papal schism. "It was to the calm and majestic
philosophy of the thirteenth century," says Ozanam, "that Dante turned
his eyes; and his great poem declared to an age, which understood him
not, the contemplative, ascetic, and symbolical teaching of the mystic
school, which he had studied in the _Compendium_ of St. Bonaventure
and the _Summa_ of St. Thomas;" and he proves by an analysis of that
wonderful poem that it contains not only the great truths of
revelation, but the spirit of the decaying mediaeval philosophy:

  "O voi che avete gli intelletti sani,
  Mirate la dottrina che ascende
  Sotto 'l velame del versi strani."

------

{697}

Translated from the Revue du Monde Catholique.

WHAT CAME OF A PRAYER.


In the fifth story of an old house in the Rue du Four-Saint-Germain,
lay a sick woman whose pale emaciated face bore traces of age and
sorrow. Beside her bed was a young man, whose tender care showed him
to be her son. The furniture of the apartment, though of the plainest
kind, was neatly and carefully arranged, while the crucifix at the
head of the bed and a statue of the Blessed Virgin marked the
Christian family. The youth had just given his mother a spoonful of
gruel, and she had fallen asleep smiling on her son--that quiet sleep
attendant on recovery from severe illness. He knelt to thank God for
having saved his mother's life, and while he prays, and she sleeps,
without disturbing the prayer of the one, or the sleep of the other, I
will tell you their story in a few words.

The father was a printer at Sceaux. Industrious, prudent, of
scrupulous integrity, loving justice and fearing God, he acquired by
his honest labor a competence for his old age and a fair prospect for
his son. Losses, failures, and unforeseen misfortunes ruined him, and
he found himself bankrupt. This blow sensibly affected him, but did
not overwhelm him. He was offered a situation as compositor in a
printing office in Paris, resumed the workman's dress, and
courageously began to work. His wife, as strong as he, never uttered a
complaint or regret. Their son was withdrawn from college to learn his
father's trade, and although so young, his heart was penetrated with
profound religious faith. Thus lived this humble household, resigned
and happy, because they loved each other, feared God, and accepted
trials. Several years elapsed, years of toil in their endeavors to
liquidate the debts of the past: fruitful, however, in domestic joys.
The child became a young man, and fulfilled the promises of his
childhood. God blessed these afflicted parents in their son.

Suddenly the father fell sick and died. Those of us who have wept at
the death-bed of a father, know the anguish of those hours when we
contemplate for the last time the beloved features which we are to see
no more on earth; the impressions of which grief time softens but can
never efface. For those who live entirely in the domestic circle, the
separation, in breaking the heart, breaks at the same time the tie to
life. Left thus alone, the mother and son were more closely united,
each gave to the other the love formerly bestowed upon him who was no
more. Jacques Durand was now twenty-five years old. His countenance
was frank and open, but serious and grave. He had the esteem of his
employer, the respect of his companions, and the sympathy of all who
knew him. He was not ashamed to be a mechanic, knowing the hidden
charm of labor when that labor is offered to God. During the month of
his mother's illness he did not leave her pillow. The physician
pronounced her, the day before our story opens, out of danger. You
understand now why the young man prayed with so much fervor while his
mother slept. His devotions were interrupted by a knock at the door.
It was Mme. Antoine, the porter's wife, a little loquacious, but
obliging to her tenants, in a word, such a portress as we find only in
books. Jacques, who was going out, had requested her to take his place
beside his mother. She entered quietly for fear of disturbing the
patient, received the directions which the young man gave her in a low
voice, and seating herself near the bedside, busied her skilful
fingers with her knitting. Old Antoine, the porter, stopped our friend
Jacques at the foot {698} of the staircase. He was polite, benevolent,
attached to his tenants, did not despise them if they were poor, and
rendered them a service if he could. He was an old soldier of 1814. He
delighted to speak of the French campaign, wore with pride the medal
of St. Helena, and showed a seal which he received at Champaubert. "In
remembrance of Napoleon," he says, raising his hat and straightening
his bent figure. I don't know of any fault that he had except relating
too often the battle of Champaubert.

"Well," said he, "how is Mme. Durand?" "Much better," replied the
youth, "she has just fallen into a quiet sleep, which the doctor
declares favorable to her recovery." "God be praised," resumes
Antoine. "Beg pardon, M. Jacques, I can tell you now Mme. Durand has
made us very uneasy." In saying this he gave the young man a cordial
shake of the hand, which the latter heartily returned.

In going out Jacques took the Rue du Vieux-Colembier, and entered the
office of the Mont-de-piété at the corner of La Croix-Rouge.

During his mother's illness he had spent many hard-earned savings, for
you already know he had imposed on himself the obligation of paying
the debts of the failure, and beside, detained at home with his
mother, he had been unable to earn anything during the month. Still
the doctor had to be paid, and medicines bought; the small sum
advanced by his employer was nearly exhausted, and he was now on his
way to pawn a silver fork and spoon. A young girl stood beside him in
the office, and as there were many to be served before himself, he
relieved the weariness of waiting by watching her. Her cap had no
ribbons, but was gracefully placed on her light hair; a woollen dress,
not new, nor of the latest fashion, but clean and well kept, a wedding
ring (doubtless her mother's legacy), and a plain shawl, completed her
poor toilette. Jacques was attracted by her modest air. Some
industrious seamstress, he said to himself. As his turn had now come,
he presented the fork and spoon--the value was ascertained--and the
sum paid. The girl, following him, drew from a napkin a half worn
cloak, which she offered with a timid air.

"Ten francs," says the clerk.

"Oh!" said she blushing, "if you could give me fifteen for it! See,
sir, the cloak is still good."

"Well, twelve francs; will you trade at that price?"

Having given her assent, she took the money and the receipt, and went
out. Jacques preceded her, and before passing out the door, he saw her
dry a tear. "She is weeping," he said to himself; "I suppose the rent
is unpaid. Poor girl! Stupid clerk!" With these reflections he arrived
at the druggist's; he bought the remedies prescribed by the doctor;
then certain that Mme. Antoine was taking good care of his charge, he
thought he should have time to say a prayer at the church of St.
Sulpice. Jacques had a particular devotion to the Blessed Virgin. It
is to her intercession he attributed his mother's cure: it is before
her altar that he knelt. His prayer was an act of thanksgiving and a
petition for a new favor. His mother wished him to marry; he had often
dreamed of cheering her old age by the affection of a daughter, and he
asked the Virgin to guide him in his choice.

Happiness disposes the soul to charity. He thought of the motherless,
the suffering, and the sorrowful, and prayed for them. He remembered
the young girl he had just seen weeping, and prayed for her. At this
moment, a woman kneeling in front of him rose, and as she passed him
to leave the church he recognized the young girl. Prayer has the
secret of drying our tears; her face had resumed its usual serenity.
He still prayed for her: "Holy Virgin, watch over that child, grant
that she may be ever pious and chaste, and all else shall be added to
her." As he prepared to leave, he saw a letter beside the chair where
{699} the girl had knelt. He made haste to rejoin her in order to
restore it; but she had already left the church. He put it in his
pocket, intending to burn it when he reached home.

That evening, as he sat by his mother's side while she slept,
here-viewed the events of the day, according to his custom,
preparatory to his examination of conscience. Thus he recalled the
incidents of the morning, and having drawn the letter from his pocket
prepared to burn it. He approached the fire and was about to throw it
in. What restrains his hand? In the letter he feels something--a piece
of gold, perhaps. It was not sealed; he opened it, and drew out a
medal of the Blessed Virgin. The open letter excited his curiosity; he
was tempted to read it. Do not blame him too severely, reader, if he
yields to the temptation. He has finished his perusal, and I see he is
affected. His emotion excites my curiosity, and I am tempted to read
it in my turn. Will you be angry with me, or will you be accomplices
in my fault? Here are the contents of the letter:

  TO M. LUCIEN RIGAUT,
  CORPORAL IN THE 110TH REGIMENT, METZ.

  "MY DEAR BROTHER:--I cannot send you the hundred francs you ask me
  for. Do not blame me, it is not my fault; work is not well paid, and
  everything is very dear in Paris, and you must know last month I had
  to pay something to the man who takes care of mamma's tomb. When you
  return I am sure you will be much grieved if that is neglected. You
  shall receive fifty francs. Here are thirty from me; the remainder
  is from the good Abbé Garnier whom I went to see, and who wishes
  also to assist his extravagant child. At the same time he gave me
  for you a medal of the Blessed Virgin, which you will find in my
  letter, and which you must wear on your neck. That, my naughty
  brother, will preserve you from danger and keep you from sin.
  Promise me never more to associate with bad companions, who lead you
  to the cafes and who are not too pious, I am sure. You must say your
  prayers morning and night, go to mass on Sunday, confess, and live
  like a good Christian. I will not reproach you for having neglected
  your duties, but I am grieved, and if you could have seen your poor
  sister weep I am sure you would reform. Do you remember when mamma
  was about to leave us, and we were beside her bed restraining our
  tears that she might have as a last joy in this world the smile of
  her children, how she made us promise to be always good and
  religious? Never forget that promise, Lucien, for the good God
  punishes perjured children. What will you think of my letter? Oh,
  you will call me a little scold. You will be angry at first, then
  you will pardon me; you will put the medal around your neck, and you
  will write me a good letter to restore gaiety to my heart. You do
  not know how well I have arranged my room. When you return you will
  recognize our old furniture. Mamma's portrait hangs over the bureau,
  and I have placed our first communion pictures on each side. When I
  have money I buy flowers, and for four sous I give to my abode the
  sweet odor of the country. Shall I tell you how I employ my time? I
  am an early riser. First my housekeeping, then my breakfast;
  afterward I hear mass, and from the church to my day's work. Thanks
  to the recommendation of the Abbé Garnier and of the sister at the
  Patronage, I do not want for work. In the evening, before returning,
  I say a prayer in the church; then my supper, and a little reading
  or mending till bed-time. On Sunday after mass I go to the cemetery
  to pray at mamma's tomb, afterward to the Patronage, where we enjoy
  ourselves much. I wish you could see how good the sister is, how she
  spoils me, how gently she scolds me when I am not good, for in spite
  of all my sermons it sometimes happens that I deserve to be scolded.
  You see, brother, that I have no time to be sad. If in the evening I
  feel {700} lonely, I think of God, who is always near us, of my good
  friends, of you, whom I shall see next year, and these sweet
  thoughts make me forget the isolation of my little room. How proud I
  shall be to go out leaning on your arm, and to walk with you on
  Sunday in the Luxembourg! With the corporal's ribbons and the
  Italian medal, I am sure everybody will turn round to look at you.
  Do you know I have made a novena that you may be made sergeant
  before the beginning of next year? I will send you every month ten
  francs to finish paying your debt. Have no scruples in accepting
  them; it is superfluous money which would have served to buy
  gew-gaws. You do me a favor in taking it,  as I shall be prevented
  from becoming a coquette. What shall I say more to you? Be good, be
  a Christian; but I have already said that. Do not forget me, but
  write often. We must love one another, since each of us is all the
  family of the other. Farewell, Lucien.
    "Your affectionate sister,
    MADELEINE."

I do not regret having been curious. I understand the emotion of
Jacques. I am also moved. This letter from a sister to a brother, so
simple and naive, breathes in every word the perfume of sincere piety,
and in each line is found the candor of an innocent heart. When
Jacques had finished reading it, he still lingered before throwing it
into the fire. He wished to read it again. He read it several times;
then he shut it up in a drawer, and put the medal around his neck. He
was charmed. He loved this simple letter, and he loved, almost without
knowing it, this child whose thoughts had been accidentally made known
to him. He guessed what the sister did not tell her brother, the
pawning of the cloak to complete the fifty francs, the privations to
which she submits in order to send every month the promised ten
francs. "I understand now," said he, "the secret of her tears. Three
francs are wanting for the required sum."

He was still more moved by her tears now that he had the secret of
them. "A good Christian girl," thought he. In his evening prayer she
was not forgotten.

The following day, as his mother was tolerably restored, he returned
to the printing office. As he worked he thought of Madeleine, and was
sad that he should see her no more. It was a folly, but who has not
been foolish? A little folly is the poetry of youth.

Time passed, the impression grew fainter, but was not effaced. It was
like a dream we try to retain on awakening, but whose brilliant colors
fade by the light of day. Mme. Durand was fully restored, but although
occupied with the care of the household, she did not go out, and this
explains why on Easter Sunday Jacques was alone at high mass in the
church of St. Sulpice. This festival, when the faithful are united in
one common joy, disposes the heart to serene impressions. After having
thanked God for his mother's recovery, he dreamed of a new affection,
and begged the blessed Virgin to guide him in his choice. Mass being
ended, a young girl on her knees in front of him rose to leave the
church, and he recognized Madeleine. He left in his turn, and during
the day he thought of that sweet face, which had twice appeared to
him, as if in answer to his prayer. It is Madeleine whom he will
marry, her smile shall make the joy of his Christian fireside; still,
how is he to see her again? He knows not; the Blessed Virgin, when she
chooses, will bring him back to her.

In their evening chats, when his mother made plans of marriage for
him, he never uttered Madeleine's name.

Again, on one of those mild days which are the charm of the month of
April, he was walking in the Luxembourg. It was a beautiful Sunday,
the lilacs were in flower, and the old garden seemed rejuvenated in
its new dress. As he thought of Madeleine, {701} two verses from
Brizeux recurred to his memory:

  "Vienne Avril, et jeunesse, amours, fleurs sont écloses;
  Dieu sous la même loi mit les plus belles choses."

At the turn of a walk, in a fresh, simple dress, he saw her once more.
When she had passed he followed her. He knew not why himself, but an
indescribable charm attracted and retained him near her. He left the
Luxembourg, went down the Boulevard Mont Parnasse, and saw her enter a
house which he recognized as an asylum for young work-women.

One morning, as he stopped at Antoine's lodging, he saw on his face
traces of sorrow.

"You seem sad," he said to him; "has any misfortune happened to you?"

"No," replied Antoine, "but I am grieved. A young woman, beg pardon,
who has lived above for two months, has just fallen ill, of bad fever,
the doctor says. She is a good girl, M. Jacques--a good industrious
girl. She has worked hard and sat up late, which brought on fever, and
when I think of it I am troubled."

"Is she alone?" asked Jacques.

"Entirely alone; but so gay, of a disposition so sweet, that though
poorly fed and overworked she never complained. When she passed,
morning and night, she had always a pleasant word for old Antoine. You
will not believe it, but for three days she has not been down. I have
been as much afflicted as if she were my own child."

So saying, he wiped a tear which fell on his white mustache.

During the day Jacques recalled the words of the old man. He was sad
at the thought of the poor girl, sick without a friend near her, for
even Antoine was detained at the lodge during his wife's absence. He
did not know her (and that was not surprising, as in Paris two
neighbors often live strangers to each other) and had never seen her:
he was troubled that she suffered, and that no one was near her to
alleviate her suffering. He resolved to speak to his mother in the
evening of her case, that she might go and take care of her. He
thought how Madeleine might fall sick, and have no one near her. He
determined to confide to his mother the secret of his love, and to beg
her to see Madeleine and obtain her consent to their marriage.

In the evening he informed his mother of their neighbor's illness, and
the next day Mme. Durand took her place at her bedside. It was a
dangerous illness, but youth, good care, prayer, and a novena to the
Blessed Virgin triumphed, and at the end of fifteen days she began to
improve. During this time Mme. Durand devoted herself to this sweet,
patient child. When her care was no longer necessary she continued to
go every morning to her patient's room. They worked and talked
together. Mme. Durand spoke of her son and she of her mother whom she
had lost, and insensibly a mutual affection sprang up between them.
Jacques listened with interest to his mother's praise of the sick
child, and was for a moment distracted from his remembrance of
Madeleine. He had, moreover, that modesty of true love which shrank
from the avowal of its tenderness. His mother knew nothing of his
love, and touched by the sweetness and patience of the young girl whom
she had nursed, hoped she might yet become her son's wife.

One evening in the month of June he was walking with his mother in the
gardens of the Luxembourg. He remembered his last meeting with
Madeleine, which recalled these verses of Brizeux:

                "Un jeune homme
  Natlf du même eudroit, travailleur, économe
  En vòyant sa belle âme, en voyant sou beau corps
  L'airnée: les vieilles gens firent lea deux accords."

He was about to speak to his mother of Madeleine when she said to him,
"My son, you are entering your {702} twenty-sixth year, it is time for
you to marry, and if you wish, I should like to call our neighbor, the
young girl whom I have nursed, my daughter."

"Mother," said Jacques, "I cannot marry her, I love another." He then
related his simple story, and pronounced for the first time
Madeleine's name. Mme. Durand listened much moved. She understood and
shared the trusting faith of her son. "My child," said she, "it shall
be as you desire. I will go on Sunday to the Patronage."

The week passed. Mme. Durand continued to see her patient often, and
she, nearly restored, came sometimes to her apartment at the time
Jacques was at the printing office, for his mother wished to prevent a
meeting which might perhaps trouble an innocent heart. But on
Saturday, having returned sooner than usual, he found the young girl
in his mother's room. They conversed a moment, and she withdrew. In
the pallid face he recognized the sweet countenance of Madeleine. When
she had gone, he embraced his mother, weeping and smiling at the same
time. "It is she, it is my sweet Madeleine." His mother, returning his
embrace, exclaimed, "She shall be your wife and my daughter."

I must tell you how, on Jacques' return from work, Mme. Durand went
for Madeleine, how they passed many a pleasant evening in conversation
or in reading a good book, and under their mother's eye loved each
other with a pure and earnest love.

At the end of a month Mme. Durand obtained the consent of Madeleine,
but she said nothing to her of her son's secret, of their meeting, of
the letter, of the feelings so long cherished, nor of the protection
of Mary, who had brought together these two Christian souls. This she
left for him to relate one day when he was alone with his betrothed.
She listened much affected, and you may be surprised to learn that she
forgot to ask for the lost letter and the medal of the Virgin.

Mme. Durand saw the good abbé and the sister at the Patronage, and
they approved the marriage. The consent of the soldier brother was
asked and obtained.

The marriage was to take place in a few days. "Beg pardon," says
Antoine, "these two young people were made for each other--a fine
match really. You will not believe me, but I love them as if they were
my own children."

Lucien came to Paris for the wedding. From the first he made a
conquest of Antoine. It turned out that Antoine too had served in the
110th. The two heroes talked of their campaigns. One related the
battle of Champaubert, the other that of Solferino. The medal of St.
Helena fraternized with the Italian medal; they drank to the laurels
of the old 110th, to the triumphs of the new. The veteran and the
conscript became the best friends in the world.

The great day arrived. The abbé blessed the union and Antoine gave
away the bride. He straightened his bent figure; he put a new ribbon
in his medal. He was prouder than on the evening of Champaubert, when
Napoleon said, "Soldiers of the 110th, you are heroes?" Brother
Lucien, with his corporal's badge and his Italian medal, added much to
the brilliancy of the cortege. Mesdames Durand and Antoine put on
their richest dresses. What shall we say of Madeleine in her bridal
dress? of her veil, and the wreath upon her auburn tresses? of the
sweet face reflecting the purity of an innocent heart and a chaste
love? of the tears which flow when the heart is too full? of the
sacred hour when this Christian couple unite in a common prayer?

Now they are married they do not seek pleasures abroad. Their
happiness is found in their daily labor, their evening conversation,
or reading; on Sunday, after mass, a walk to the Tuileries, while
their mother at their side smiles on their love. Their hearts are
drawn so near together that {703} they beat in unison, they think and
feel at the same time. At last a child makes one more joy in this
joyous house--one stronger bond between these united souls. Such is
their pure affection: a love which age can never wither, a love born
of a prayer, and blest by God.

Jacques has reaped the fruit of his labor; he has paid all the debts
of the past, and ease and plenty have returned to the household. He
hopes to be soon taken into partnership with his employer.

They do not wish to leave the old house in the Rue du
Four-Saint-Germain, so filled with sweet memories, but they have taken
a lower floor, they have a large apartment, and are almost rich. The
poor have their share of their riches.

Lucien, the soldier, has entirely reformed, and has risen to the rank
of sergeant. Perhaps he may yet wear an officer's epaulettes.

Old Antoine grows old, but his heart remains young; his figure is more
bent, but he still straightens it when he speaks of Napoleon, and
relates to our friends the battle of Champaubert. He was the godfather
of the little boy. "A fine child," said he "Beg pardon, we will make a
general of him." "I am willing, I am sure," said Madeleine, "but we
must first make him a Christian."

------

From The London Review.

CATHOLIC PROGRESS IN LONDON.


There are few questions upon which there exists a greater variety of
opinion, and with regard to which such contradictory statements are
published, as upon the increase of Roman Catholicism in the
metropolis. There are those on one hand who believe that it has made
no progress at all, and that the rumors of "conversions," and even
those Roman Catholic buildings which have of late years sprung up in
such abundance around us, are not to be taken as proofs of such an
increase in the numbers of Roman Catholics as the latter at least seem
to indicate. Others believe without doubting that the Catholic Church
is silently and energetically spreading its ramifications over the
metropolis, and that there is hardly a household of any respectability
in which its agents, in some form or other, have not contrived to get
a footing; while there are persons who go so far as to assert that
many of the Protestant clergy themselves are the direct emissaries of
Rome, doing her work, and doing it consciously--nay, doing it under
compact--while receiving the pay of the National Church. We believe
that the truth will be found to lie between these extreme views. Not
only has the Church of Rome gained ground in London, but it is
steadily progressing, even at the present time, though by no means at
such a rate, except in certain parishes, as to occasion the slightest
danger to the Protestant cause, if only a moderate amount of energy
and good will is shown by the Reformed denominations in securing their
flocks within their own folds. We have already stated our belief that
the fact of a clergyman holding High or Low Church views is not in any
manner whatever necessarily connected with the increase of Catholicism
among his congregation, but that such increase is owing either to the
lack of a sufficient staff of the Protestant clergy to {704} repel its
advances, or to the apathy or inefficiency of the incumbent, or, as
may be especially shown in some wealthy districts, to that mysterious
want of power in the clergy of the Church of England over the minds of
the rich and influential of their parishioners. And that this view is
not without some basis in fact, will be seen when we have described
the present relative position of the Catholic and Anglican Churches in
the wealthy, aristocratic, and populous parish of Kensington,
comprising as it does the three wards of Notting-hill, Kensington, and
Brompton.

Formerly, for the accommodation of the whole of the Roman Catholics of
the parish of Kensington, there was but one small chapel near the High
street, which appeared amply sufficient for the members of that creed.
But ten or twelve years ago a Roman Catholic builder purchased, at an
enormous price, a plot of ground about three acres in extent beside
the church of the Holy Trinity, Brompton. For a time considerable
mystery prevailed as to the uses it was to be applied to; but, shortly
after the buildings were commenced, they were discovered to be for the
future residence and church of the Oratorian fathers, then established
in King William street, Strand. As soon as a portion of the building
was finished, the fathers removed to it from their former dwelling;
and the chapel, a small and commodious erection, was opened for divine
service. At first the congregation was of the scantiest description;
even on Sundays at high mass, small as the chapel was, it was
frequently only half filled, while, on week days, at many of the
services, it was no uncommon circumstance to find the attendances
scarcely more numerous than the number of priests serving at the
altar. By degrees the congregation increased, till the chapel was
found too small for their accommodation, and extensive additions were
made to it; but these, again, were soon filled to overflowing, and
further alterations had to be made, till at last the building was
capable of holding without difficulty from 2,000 to 2,500 persons. It
is now frequently so crowded at high mass that it is difficult for an
individual entering it after the commencement of the service to find
even standing room. In the meantime the monastery itself, if that is
the proper term, was completed--a splendid appearance it presents--
and we believe is now fully occupied.

The Roman Catholic population in the parish, or mission, under the
spiritual direction of the fathers of the Oratory, now comprises
between 7,000 and 8,000 souls. The average attendance at mass on
Sundays is about 5,000, and the average number of communions for the
last two years has been about 45,000 annually. But in addition to this
church, Kensington has three others, St. Mary's, Upper Holland street,
St. Simon Stock, belonging to the Carmelite Friars, and the church of
St. Francis Assissi in Notting Hill. Of monasteries, or religious
communities of men, it has the Oratorians before mentioned, and the
Discalced Carmelites, in Vicarage place. Of convents of ladies, it has
the Assumption in Kensington square, the Poor Clares Convent in Edmond
terrace, the Franciscan Convent in Portobello road, the Sisters of
Misericorde, 195 Brompton road, and the Sisters of Jesus, 4 Holland
villas. Of schools, the Roman Catholics possess, in the parish of
Kensingtion, the Orphanage in the Fulham road, the Industrial School
of St. Vincent de Paul, as well as the large Industrial Schools for
girls in the southern ward. All these schools are very numerously
attended, the gross number of pupils amounting to 1,200, those of the
Oratory alone being 1,000. The kindness and consideration shown by the
Roman Catholic teachers to the children of the poor is above all
praise, not only in Kensington, but in all localities where they are
under their charge.

It might be imagined from this account of the Roman Catholic
institutions in Kensington, that a general {705} rush had been made
upon that parish, and that the surrounding districts were
comparatively free from Roman Catholics. Such, however, is very far
from being the case. In the union of Fulham and Hammersmith we have
the Roman Catholic church of St. Thomas of Canterbury, the church of
the Holy Trinity, Brook-green, and the church of Our Lady of Grace,
Turnham-green. Of monasteries there are the St. Mary's Training
College and the Brothers of Mercy, and for ladies there is the order
of the Good Shepherd. Of charities and schools they have the Holy
Trinity alms-houses on Brook-green, a home for aged females, a refuge
for female penitents, most admirably managed and producing a most
beneficial effect, an excellent reformatory for criminal boys, the
large industrial schools of St. Vincent de Paul, and a home, St.
Joseph's, for destitute boys. In Bays-water there is the cathedral of
St. Mary's of the Angels (of which the celebrated Dr. Manning is the
superior) and the convent of Notre Dame de Sion. In Chelsea there is
the church of St. Mary's, Cadogan terrace, a convent for the Sisters
of Mercy, another for the Third Order of Servites, as well as two well
conducted and numerously attended schools.

In the united parishes of St. Margaret's and St. John's, Westminster,
a few years since, the priests opened their campaign with considerable
energy. In addition to their church in the Horsferry road, which was
opened in 1813, they erected those of St. Peter's and St. Edmond's in
Palace street, the superior priest of the latter being the celebrated
Father Roberts, a man not only respected for the energy he shows in
the cause of his religion, but beloved by all classes for his
philanthropy. To these some schools and convents were added, the most
celebrated of the latter being that of the Sisters of Charity in
Victoria street. At first the priests seemed to be sanguine of success
in the parish; but their advance was met by men of as much ability,
courage, and energy as themselves.

On the Surrey side of the water the Catholic Church has the
magnificent cathedral dedicated to St. George, in St. George's Fields;
the church of the Most Holy Trinity, Parker's road, Dockhead,
Bermondsey; the church of Our Lady of the Immaculate Conception,
Trinity road, Rotherithe; that of Our Lady of La Salette and St.
Joseph, Melior street, Southwark; and the church of the Sacred Heart
of Jesus, Windham street, Camberwell; beside several others in
Peckham, Clapham, Lambeth, and the surrounding districts. Of
communities of men there are the Capuchines at Peckham and at Clapham,
the Redemptorists, and the Brothers of the Christian Schools. Of
convents they have the Religious of the Faithful Virgin at Norwood,
which also comprises an orphanage; the order of the Sisters of Mercy
in Bermondsey; the order of the Sisters of the Christian Retreat, St.
Joseph's, Kennington; the Little Sisters of the Poor, Fentiman road,
Lambeth; beside one or two others of minor importance. It should also
be remarked that all these establishments, with one or two exceptions,
have sprung up within the last ten or twenty years. Of the numbers of
the congregations of the different churches it would be difficult to
form a just idea, but they are certainly very great; that properly
attached to St. George's cathedral alone we have been assured, on most
reliable Roman Catholic authority, amounting to 12,000 or 13,000. The
number of children attending the schools is doubtless proportionably
great.

In the north-eastern portion of the metropolis, we find the Roman
Catholics, although they have lately built several new churches, are
fully occupied in holding their own ground without exerting themselves
to make converts. And here, opposed as we are to their creed on
doctrinal points, it would be unjust to withhold our meed of praise to
the exertions of the priests in relieving the temporal miseries of
{706} their poor. It would be difficult to imagine charitable efforts
carried on more indefatigably or nobly. Few who have not visited and
personally inspected the different courts and alleys in the
neighborhood of Spitalfields, Bethnal-green, St. George's-in-the-East,
and Ratcliffe Highway, inhabited as they are by the poor Irish, can
have an idea of the abject poverty which reigns in them, or the amount
of patience, courage, and Christian feeling necessary to relieve it.
Yet all this is cheerfully performed by the Roman Catholic priesthood,
their energies appearing to increase in proportion as the difficulties
and dangers before them become greater. It would perhaps be an
injustice to their body in this district to select any for notice in
preference to the rest; but we cannot refrain from making special
mention of the labors of the Rev. Father Kelley, of Ratcliffe Highway,
and the Rev. Father Chaurain, of Spitalfields, into the results of
whose exertions we have made personal investigation.

In the northern districts of the metropolis, especially in Islington
and its surrounding neighborhoods, the Roman Catholics appear to have
made considerable progress. They have lately built several new
churches as well as houses for religious communities, both for men and
women. That their progress in the metropolis is not solely the result
of the High-Church practices in the establishment may be presumed from
the fact that, although the inhabitants of Islington and its vicinity
are particularly noted for their attachment to Low-Church principles,
Catholicism has gained more ground there than in localities where
Puseyism is dominant. In the north-western districts it does not
appear to have increased, though the churches are well attended, and
the congregations apparently very numerous. That of one of the
largest, Our Lady's church, in St. John's Wood, is 6,000, and the
children in the schools 600. In the central districts of London Roman
Catholic churches are very numerous and proportionately well attended;
those in Moorfields, and those in the neighborhood of Covent Garden
and Piccadilly, being particularly so.

One of the most effective means employed by the Roman Catholics to
make the conversions is the opening of schools for the education of
children of the poor; nor do they hesitate to admit that these schools
are not only open to the children of their own persuasion, but to all
who may choose to avail themselves of them. This is clear from the
speech of the late Cardinal Wiseman at the Roman Catholic Congress
held at Malines in the autumn of 1863. Speaking of the hundreds of
ragged children, scarcely knowing their parents, he had been
accustomed to meet in the different lanes and alleys of the poorer
London localities, he says: "We are doing all we can to gather these
poor little outcasts together, and to give them Christian training.
The schools in which they are taught, and to which I am at present
alluding, are themselves situated in a truly fearful spot, Charles
street, Drury lane. We owe them in a great measure to the great zeal
of the fathers of the Oratory. Their cost has been no less than
£12,000. The Religious Sisters from Tournay, with a devotion truly
heroic, have undertaken the care of the girls' school. For some time
past we have had the consolation of seeing increased, by 1,000 a year,
the number of children attending our schools for the poor; there still
remain 17,000 poor children who attend no school."

The Catholic Church judges rightly that a few years hence the children
under its care will not only augment the number of adult members of
its faith, but will proportionately swell their ranks in the next
generation. Nor is this danger to the Protestant cause to be despised.
All their schools are admirably managed, and the children in them are
treated with the greatest kindness and consideration. We have visited
several, and in all we remarked a great affection and {707} respect
existing in the minds of the pupils for their teachers, the latter not
considering that their duties are over when the classes are dismissed,
but afterward entering into their amusements and occupations with
great patience and good humor. We lately visited unexpectedly the
school alluded to by Cardinal Wiseman, and although lessons were over
we found one of the masters in the large play-room busily employed in
instructing a dozen of the most ragged urchins it would be possible to
find in that squalid and impoverished locality in the mysteries of
spinning peg-tops. Such acts of kindness to children are not forgotten
when they grow up, and a better means of binding them to their faith
when adults it would be impossible to imagine.

In Gate street, Lincoln's Inn-fields, is another school of the same
description. We have watched its progress since its establishment, and
marked the great increase in the number of its scholars. It commenced
with very few, but must now number several hundreds. Those in
Drury-lane have more than four hundred children, among whom, perhaps,
not ten before the buildings were erected were receiving any
instruction whatever. All the Roman Catholic charities appear to be
admirably managed; their orphanages especially so. Those of the
Sisters of Charity in Victoria street, Westminster, and Norwood,
considering the comparatively small means at the disposal of their
priesthood, are perfect models of what institutions of the kind ought
to be; at the same time, it must not be imagined that the Roman
Catholic charities in London are solely of a description calculated to
obtain converts to their creed. Their reformatories for fallen women
and their exertions for the relief of the sick are worthy of the
highest praise. An hospital, with a church attached, solely for
chronic and incurable diseases, has for some time been established in
Great Ormond street, at the expense of a gentleman of wealth. The
hospital is under the care of the prioress and sisters of the Order of
St. John of Jerusalem, and we never saw an infirmary of the kind
better managed. A large staff of nuns nurse the sick; and not only are
their numbers greater in proportion to those of the patients than in
any of our metropolitan hospitals, but their attention and kindness to
those under their charge might serve as a model to many of our
Protestant institutions of a similar character.

----

{708}


From Chambers's Journal.

A VANISHING RACE.


The residence of Captain C. F. Hall in the arctic regions, and his
explorations among the solemn and majestic wastes surrounded by the
"hyperborean seas," have invested the Esquimaux with a degree of
interest which they had never previously excited. The savage
inhabitants of the more beautiful and fertile regions of the earth
have been observed by travellers with close and careful attention,
which leads to hopeful efforts for their civilization. As the map of
the world is opened up to our comprehension, new schemes and prospects
for the advance of the human race are opened with it; savans, artists,
missionaries, merchants, gird themselves to the contest with the
material and moral conditions of the peoples yet, though the world's
day has lasted so long, in their infancy, whose unknown future may
contain histories as brilliant as those of the civilizations of the
present and the past. But there is a race who have not excited such
hopes, who have not given rise to such exertions--a race whose life of
unimaginable hardship gives them a mysterious resemblance to the
phantoms of mythological belief, and places them beyond the reach of
the sympathies of civilization by its physical conditions, the
amelioration of which is impossible. Beyond the stern barrier which
nature has set in the northernmost part of her awful realm, behind the
terrible rampart of snow and ice, and storm and darkness, these
creatures of her wrath, rather than of her bounty, dwell. To reach
their land, the traveller must leave behind him every familiar object,
and abandon every habit or need of ordinary life. He must bid farewell
to green trees, to fertile fields, to the crops which give food to man
and beast, to the domestic animals, to every mode of conveyance, to
every implement of common use, to food and clothing such as even the
poorest and roughest sons of a less terrible clime may command; to the
thousand voices of nature, even in its secluded nooks, It is a mockery
to speak of the arctic regions as the land of the Esquimaux, for
nowhere on the earth is man less sovereign. Here nature is indeed
grand beyond conception, but also terrible, implacable, and
impenetrable. She sets man aside in her awful scorn; he is a thing of
no moment, a cumberer of the ice-fields, learning the simple lessons
whereby he supports his squalid existence from the brutes, which are
lordlier than he, inasmuch as the ice-slavery is no chain of servitude
to them; and heedless of him, of his terrible hunger and destitution,
of his hopeless isolation, she builds her ice-palaces upon the seas,
and locks the land in her glittering ice-chains, and flings her
terrific banners of flame wide against the northern sky; and sends her
voice abroad, without a tone of pity in its vibrations, sounding
through the troubled depths of the waters and the rent masses of the
many-tinted icebergs. Nature is indeed beautiful in her northern
strongholds, but her beauty shows only its terrible aspects, its dread
grandeur. The face of the mighty mother does not soften into a smile
for the feebleness of her youngest-born offspring, but is fixed in its
awful sublimity. There is no point of contact between this ice-kingdon
and European civilization, and men of our race and tongue shrink from
it with an appalled sadness, for has it now been the tomb of many of
our brave and beloved? Three centuries ago it earned that evil
reputation, which, in the then elementary state of geographical
knowledge, and the general prevalence of superstition, assumed a weird
and baleful form. It has but increased {709} in degree, though
differing in kind, in our days, and we think of the arctic regions as
the sepulchre of the beloved dead, the land toward which the heart of
England yearned, and which kept pitiless silence through long years of
hope deferred. But of its people we do not think; we are satisfied to
have but a vague notion of them; to wonder, amid the many marvels of
that mighty problem--the distribution of the human race--how human
beings ever found their way to those dreadful fastnesses, more cruel
in their exaction of human suffering than the desert and the forest.
This indifference gives way when we learn what manner of people these
are whom we call Esquimaux, a word which signifies "eaters of raw
food," but who call themselves _Innuit_, or "the people," and explain
their own origin by a story which is a pleasing testimony to the
common possession of self-conceit by all nations. They say that the
Creator made white men first, but was dissatisfied with them, regarded
them as worthless unfinished creatures, and straightway set about
making the Innuit people, who proved perfectly satisfactory.

Captain Hall lived among this strange race for two years and a half,
and he is about to return and prosecute his researches in Boothia and
King William's Land. This time, his object is to trace the remnants of
the Franklin expedition, which--as he finds the history of the few
events which have ever marked the progress of time in that distant
land handed down by oral tradition with extraordinary distinctness--he
has no doubt of being able to do. His first journey was in search of
relics of the Frobisher expedition, and was as successful as it was
daring, patient, and persevering. His experiences were strange in all
respects, and in many most revolting; but we owe much to this
cheerful, courageous, simple-hearted American gentleman, who has
revealed the Esquimaux to us as Captain Grant has revealed the African
tribes, and oriental tourists the dwellers in the deserts. There is
poetical harmony in the stern conditions of life among the Innuits;
there is the impress of sadness and of sterility upon them all. Time
itself changes its meaning in a land where

  "The sun starts redly up
  To shine for half a year,"

and dim wintry twilight lasts throughout the other half, and hunger is
the normal state of the people. The traveller's route is to be traced
on the map, which is mere guess-work hitherto, up the western side of
Davis's Strait; and once away from Holsteinborg, the journey assumes
all its savage features. The terrible icebergs rear their menacing
masses in the track of the ship; the sun pours its beams upon them,
and bathes them in golden light; they appear in fantastic shapes of
Gothic cathedral, of battlemented tower, of clear single-pierced
spire, of strong fenced city, of jewel-mountain, of vast crystal
hills; and so, as the voyager leaves art and civilization behind,
their most supreme forms flash a mirage-like reminiscence upon him,
intensifying the contrast of the prospect, and luring him to a frantic
and futile regret.

A grand and terrible confusion reigns around; the voyager shrinks from
the overwhelming scene, where ranges of mountains, islands, rocks,
castles, huge formless masses, and gorgeous prismatic lights, surround
that laboring speck upon the mystic sea, of whose littleness he is so
small an atom; and a strange sense, which is not fear, but awe, comes
to him with the knowledge that nothing of this sublime confusion is
real, on the horizon or beyond it. For all the time of his stay in the
arctic regions he is to be surrounded by contradictions, by the
sublimest manifestations of nature, by the lowest conditions of
humanity, by gorgeous and majestic optical delusions, and by the
hardest and most grovelling facts of daily existence; he must share,
to their fullest extent, the relentless physical needs of the {710}
people, and live, if he would live at all, in close contact with
them--and yet his solitude must be inwardly profound and
unapproachable; his purposes unintelligible to his associates; and
their language, elementary in itself, dimly and scantily comprehended
by him even in its most sparing forms. All this without any of the
alleviations of life among savages in southern countries--without the
warmth, which, if sometimes oppressive, is ordinarily
grateful--without the rich and genial beauties of nature--without the
resources of sport without the natural fruits of the earth--without
the intellectual occupation of speculating upon development, of
ascertaining capabilities, or of investigating sources of wealth. The
civilized dweller in arctic regions has none of these. He beholds,
with admiration so solemn as to be painful, the unapproachable dignity
and hard implacable stillness of nature; but he never dreams of
treasure to be wrested from the cells of the ice-prison; he seeks the
dead--the dead of centuries ago--the dead of a decade since, to be
found, it may be, incorporated with their frozen resting place; for
the fiat of nature arrests decay in these terrible regions, where
death and life are always at close gripes with one another. While the
mind is ceaselessly impressed with sadness and solemnity, the body
asserts its claim to superiority; it will not be forgotten or
neglected, for cold encompasses it with unrelaxing menace of death,
and hunger preys upon the vitals, whose heat wanes rapidly in the
pitiless climate, and which crave for the nutriment so hard to
procure, so repulsive when procured.

Toil is the law of the ice-clad land--toil, not to wrest from the
bosom of the earth her children's sustenance, but to tear from the
amphibious creatures, from whom they have learned how to shelter
themselves from the cold, and whose skins cover them, the unctuous
flesh, which they devour raw in enormous quantities. The Innuit are,
on the whole, a gentle people, driven by the relentless need and
severity of their lives into close and peaceful companionship. They
have no king, no government, no law, no defined religion, no property;
they have, for all these, custom--the oldest law; they are animated by
the same spirit that dictated the reply once made to one who sat by
Jacob's well: "Our fathers worshipped in this mountain, and we
worship." As "the old Innuits" did, so do their successors. They have
no bread, no medicine, no household furniture; they are poor human
waifs upon the wide white bosom of the frozen seas; and they have, no
help or resource but in the seal, the walrus, the white bear, the
rein-deer, and the wonderful Esquimaux dogs, which are by far the
noblest living creatures in all those sterile wastes. From the seal
they have learned to make the _igloo_, which is the house of the
Innuit. They eat the flesh of this animal, and drink its fresh warm
blood; they kill its young, and eagerly swallow the milk of the
mother, found in the stomach of the baby seal. When the sudden summer
comes, and the snow melts, and leaves the surface of the ice bare,
they are houseless; the igloo melts away; their home is but of frozen
water, and suddenly it disappears. Then they have recourse to the
_tupic_, which is a huge sheet of skins hung across a horizontal pole,
supported at either end. Their bed is a snow platform, strewn with the
moss which is the rein-deer's food, and covered with skins. Their
choicest dainties are the fat of the _tuktoo_, or rein-deer, the
marrow procured by mashing the bones of the legs, and the thick,
white, unctuous lining of the whale-hide.

The interior of an igloo presents a picture more repulsive than that
of any African hut or Indian wigwam, more distressing to human
feelings and degrading to human pride. The igloo is a dome-shaped
building, made of ice-blocks, with an aperture in the roof, and a rude
doorway at one side, closed {711} with ice-blocks, when the inmates
are assembled. The snow platform which forms the bed is occupied by
the women and the stranger. Men and women are clad in skins, put
together with neatness and ingenuity. The dress of the sexes differs
only in two particulars; that of the women is furnished with a long
tail, depending from the jacket, and has a sort of hood, in which
loads and children are carried. The life of the infant is preserved by
its naked body being kept in contact with that of the mother. One
household implement they possess--it is a stone lamp; something like
a trough, with a deep groove in it, in which the dried moss, used as a
wick, floats in the seal oil, expressed by the teeth of the women from
lumps of blubber, which they patiently "mill" until the precious
unguent is all procured. But this lamp too often fails them, and
darkness and hunger take up frequent abode with the Innuit. Days and
nights are passed by the men, sitting singly, in death-like stillness
and silence, by the hole which they have found, far under the snow, at
which the seal will "blow." It is strange and terrible to think of
those watches, in the midst of the desolation, under that arctic sky,
with the cold dense fog now swooping, now lifting, in the enforced
stillness, with famine gnawing the watcher, and famine at home in the
igloo, and the chance of food depending on the sureness of one
instantaneous stroke, down through the snow, through the narrow
orifice in the ice, into the throat of the animal with the sleek skin,
and the mournful human eyes, which vainly implore mercy from raging
hunger.

When the Innuit brings the seal to the igloo, a crowd invades the
narrow space, for the simplest hospitality prevails, and the long
watch, the skilful stroke, do not constitute sole ownership of the
prize. The skin is stripped off the huge unsightly carcass, and a
horrible scene ensues. The flesh is torn or cut with the stone knives
in large lumps, and having been first licked by the women, to remove
any hairs or other adhesive matter, is distributed to the party, and
devoured raw; the blood is drunk, the bones are mashed, the entrails
are greedily eaten, the dogs sharing in all; and the blubber is made
to yield its oil by the disgusting process already described. One
turns silenced from the picture; from the sights, and sounds, and
scents; from the vision of dark faces, eager with gluttonous longing,
gathered round the red, flaring light; from the skin-clothed bodies,
reeking with grease and filth, and the foul exhalations of the
mutilated animal; from the lumps of flesh torn by savage hands, and
crammed dripping into distended mouths; from the steaming blood, and
the human creatures who rapturously quaff it in the presence of the
white man, who sits among them and feeds with them, whose heart yearns
with dumb compassion for them, who has wonderful scientific
instruments in his pockets, and his Bible in his breast. As the seal
teaches the Innuits the art of housing themselves, so the white bear
teaches them how to kill the walrus, their most plentiful and frequent
food, when the ice is drifting, and the unwieldy creatures lie upon
the blocks close inshore; then the bear climbs the overhanging
precipice, and taking a heavy block in his deft forepaws, he hurls it
with rare skill and nicety of aim upon the basking monster below. So
brutes train men in those dreadful regions, and not men brutes. The
life of the Innuits is full of such contradictions. And their deaths?
From the contemplation of these one turns away appalled, for they die
in utter solitude.

When Captain Hall first heard of this horrible custom, he started off
at once to see its truth; and having removed the blocks with which the
doorway had been built up, entered an igloo, and found a woman who
had yet many days to linger thus fastened up in her living tomb.
Again, hearing that a woman had been abandoned to die, at a great
distance, he set forth, {712} and having reached the spot with immense
difficulty and danger, he managed to remove the snow and the block
which closed the hole in the top of the igloo, lowered himself into
it, and found the woman dead, and frozen as hard as her bier and her
tomb, with a sweet serene smile upon the marble face. So this is the
close of a life of toil and privation--the withdrawal of every kindred
face, the fearful solitude of the ice-walls, the terrible arctic
darkness and silence, and the frozen corpse lying unshrouded, naked,
beneath the frozen skins, until the resurrection. Surely the angel of
death is an angel of mercy there, and does his errand gently, bearing
away the lonely, terrified spirit to the city of gold, the gates of
pearl, the jasper sea, the land where there is no darkness, physical
or mental, for evermore. The earth, always pitiless to them, which
never feeds them from her bosom, does not suffer her dead children of
the Innuit people to sleep their last sleep in her lap. Their graves
are only blocks of ice piled around and above the corpses, which
remain unharmed, unless when the blocks melt, as they sometimes do,
and the wolves, dogs, or bears gain access to the frozen remains. The
Innuits are dying out; disease is making havoc among them;
consumption, formerly unknown, is thinning their numbers by its slow,
furtive, murderous advance; their children are few, and fewer still
are reared; and the long story of awful desolation draws to a close.
Who can regret it? Who can do aught but desire that the giant wastes
of the arctic regions should be left to the soulless creatures of God;
that the great discord between them and human life has ceased to
trouble the harmony of creation; that the mystery of such an existence
is quietly laid at rest, among the things which "we know not now, but
which we shall know hereafter?"

--------

MISCELLANY.


SCIENCE.


_A New Kind of Mirror.--The Chemical News_ states that M. Dode, a
French chemist, has introduced platinum mirrors, which are greatly
admired, and which present this advantage, that the reflecting metal
is deposited on the outer surface of the glass, and thus any defect in
the latter is concealed. The process, which is patented in Paris, is
described as follows: Chloride of platinum is dissolved in water, and
a certain quantity of oil of lavender is added to the solution. The
platinum immediately leaves the aqueous solution and passes to the
oil, which holds it in suspension in a finely divided state. To the
oil so charged the author adds litharge and borate of lead, and paints
a thin coat of this mixture over the surface of the glass, which is
then carried to a proper furnace. At a red heat the litharge and
borate of lead are fused, and cause the adhesion of the platinum to
the softened glass. The process is very expeditious. A single baking,
M. Dode says, will furnish 200 metres of glass ready for commerce. It
would take fifteen days, he says, to coat the same extent with mercury
by the ordinary plan.



_African Silkworm_.--A silkworm before unknown in Europe has been
introduced into France from Senegal, and without suffering from change
of climate. It yields a richer silk than that of any other worm known
to naturalists, and its cocoons are twice the ordinary weight. It is
to be tried in Algiers, and if successful there, this new and rich
silk may become in time an important article of commerce.



_Science in a Balloon_.--Mr. Glaisher has {713} given, in a lecture at
the Royal Institution, a _resumé_ of his scientific experiments in
balloons. Tables recording the decline of temperature with elevation,
show that when the sky was clear a more rapid decline took place than
when the sky was cloudy. Under a clear sky, a fall of 1° takes place
within 100 feet of the earth, but at heights exceeding 25,000 feet it
is necessary to pass through 1,000 feet of vertical height to obtain a
fall of 1° in temperature. At extreme elevations, in both states of
the sky, the air became very dry, but as far as his experiments went,
was never quite free from water. From ascents made before and after
sunset, Mr. Glaisher concludes that the laws which hold good by day do
not hold good by night; indeed, it seemed probable that at night, for
some little distance, the temperature may increase with elevation,
instead of decreasing. From experiments made on solar radiation with a
blackened bulb thermometer, and with Herschel's actinometer, it was
inferred that the heat rays from the sun pass through space without
loss, and become effective in proportion to the density or the amount
of water present in the atmosphere through which they pass. If this be
so, the proportion of heat received at Mercury, Venus, Jupiter, and
Saturn may be the same as that received at the earth, if the
constituents of their atmospheres be the same as that of the earth,
and greater if the amount of aqueous vapor be greater, so that the
effective solar heat at Jupiter and Saturn may be greater than at
either the inferior planets, Mercury or Venus, notwithstanding their
far greater distances from the sun. This conclusion is most important
as corroborating Professor Tyndall's experiments on aqueous vapor.
Experiments on the wind showed that the velocity of the air at the
earth's surface was very much less than at a high elevation. A
comparison of the temperature of the dew point, as shown by different
instruments, gave results proving that the temperatures of the dew
point, as found by the use of the dry and wet bulb thermometers, and
Daniell's hygrometer, are worthy of full confidence as far as the
experiments went.



_The Eruption of Mount Etna_.--At a recent meeting of the Paris
Academy of Sciences, an important letter was read from M. Fouqué to M.
Saint-Claire Deville on the eruption of Etna, which has presented
several phenomena of great scientific interest.

The eruption commenced at half-past ten on the evening of January 31.
On the previous day two successive shakings of the earth had been
noticed. Just before the eruption began a violent earthquake was felt,
the wave travelling to the north-east; after this, slight oscillations
continued until about 4 A.M. Large flames now rose from a point on the
north-east side of Etna 5,500 feet above the snow line, and lava began
to flow rapidly. In two or three days the lava traversed a space of
19,000 feet, with a width of from 10,000 to 12,000, and a variable
thickness, but often reaching to the depth of 30 or 60 feet. After
destroying for some distance everything in its passage, the current of
lava struck one of the old craters, and then bifurcated. The stream on
the west side moved very slowly, and, becoming subdivided, it nearly
ceased to move; the stream on the east side fell over a deep and
precipitous valley, which it soon filled, being then able to continue
its progress, until finally it was stopped by a lava mound of a
previous eruption.

The number of the craters is seven; of these five form a vast
elliptical enclosure, the major axis of which is directed toward the
north-east. A deep fissure, 1,500 feet in length, opened from the base
of a former crater, Frumento, to the nearest of the present cones.
This chasm, M. Fouqué shows, was probably formed by the shock at the
commencement of the eruption. This fissure, and also a depression of
the crater Frumento, is in a right line with the major axis of the
ellipse formed by the craters. The same general fact has been several
times noticed in previous eruptions.

The vapors attending an eruption have been divided into the dry,
containing chiefly chloride of sodium and no water, the acid, which
contain a large amount of watery vapor, the alkaline, and the
carbonic. The first indicates the maximum, and the last the minimum of
volcanic action. Each of these varieties of vapor, succeeding in their
order, were noticed at this eruption. M. Fouqué found the dry vapor
upon the still incandescent lava; the acid vapor in those parts where
the temperature was over {714} 400°; the alkaline, where the
temperature was lower, but generally over 100°; and finally, carbonic
acid has been detected in one of the adjacent old craters, which was
at the ordinary temperature. The first three varieties of vapor were
thus found upon the same transverse section of the lava, less than 150
feet distant from each other. In all these vapors the atmospheric air
which accompanied them was deprived of part of its oxygen, generally
containing only from 18 to 19 per cent., and in some alkaline vapors
the proportion was still less.

In this eruption there was a remarkable absence of sulphur and its
compounds; chemical tests as well as the sense of smell could detect
no trace of them. The eruption indeed was characterized by the absence
of the compounds of sulphur and the abundance of the compounds of
chlorine. Hydro-chlorate of ammonia, which was found in abundance, has
generally been regarded as exclusively belonging to the alkaline
vapors; but here it has been discovered among the other varieties,
whilst the alkaline vapors were distinguished by the carbonate rather
than by the hydrochlorate of ammonia.

At the present time, M. Fouqué writes, the eruption is most active in
the four lowest craters; these throw liquid lava into the air, and
emit a nearly colorless smoke; the three superior craters eject
solidified lava and black stones, at the same time pouring out a dense
smoke charged with aqueous vapor and brown-colored ashes.

The three higher craters produce every two or three minutes a very
loud report resembling the rolling of thunder; the four lower craters,
on the contrary, send forth a rapid succession of ringing sounds,
which it is impossible to count. These sounds follow each other
without any cessation, and are only to be compared to the noise
produced by a series of blows from a hammer falling on an anvil. If
the ancients heard these noises in former eruptions, it is easily
conceivable how they imagined a forge to exist in the centre of the
volcano, with Cyclops for the master workman. The lava is black, rich
in pyroxene, and strongly attracted by a magnet. Since the
commencement of the eruption, the central crater of Etna has emitted
white vapors, which continually cover its summit. Several good
photographs of the eruption have been taken by M. Berthier, who
accompanied M. Fouqué in his explorations, which were by no means
unattended with danger.

M. Saint-Claire Deville then made some observations on this paper. He
explained the almost entire absence of sulphur by the fact that M.
Fouqué only examined the vapors from the lava. These nearly always
contain chlorine for their electro-negative element, and scarcely
show, and that not until later, sulphuretted and carbonic vapors.
After the eruption of Vesuvius in 1861, very light deposits of sulphur
were found covering the hydrochlorate of ammonia, which shows that the
former body is not absent from the lava. The existence of
hydrochlorate of ammonia in the emanations does not necessarily
exclude that of the vapors of hydrochloric and sulphuric acids.


_Magnetism of Iron-clad Ships_.--Staff-Commander Evans, of the British
navy, and Mr. Archibald Smith, who have devoted themselves for several
years to investigations into the character of the magnetism of
iron-built and armor-plated ships, have embodied the results of their
studies in an interesting paper read at a recent meeting of the Royal
Society. It is well known that iron ships have been very difficult to
navigate because of the disturbing effect of the iron upon the
compass, and serious accidents have happened in consequence. But
underwriters, and the whole naval profession, will be glad to hear
that the difficulty and risk are now greatly lessened, if not entirely
removed. For the results established by the paper in question
are--That it is no longer necessary to swing a ship in order to
ascertain the compass deviation, or error, seeing that it is possible
to determine the various forms of error by mathematics; that an iron
ship should always be built with her head to the south; if built head
north, there is such a confused amount of magnetism concentrated in
the stern as to have a violent disturbing effect on the compass; that
if, after building, a ship is to be armor-plated, the head, during the
fixing of the plates, should be turned in the opposite direction--
that is, to the north; and that especial pains should be taken while
building an iron ship to provide a {715} suitable place for the
standard-compass. Beside these particulars, the shot and shell stowed
in the vessel, the iron water-tanks, and, indeed, all the iron used in
her interior fittings, are to be taken into account; and it is
satisfactory to know that the influence exerted on the compass by any
one or all of these conditions can be ascertained, and allowed for, as
in the other cases above mentioned.


_"Gyges" Explained_.--The London _Reader_ gives the following
explanation of a curious experiment in optics which has been performed
at one of the London theatres under the name of "Eidos AEides," and
reproduced in New York under the appellation of "Gyges." It consists
in causing an actor or an inanimate object which is in full view of
the audience at one moment to disappear instantly, and then to
reappear with the same rapidity. The means by which this is
accomplished are very simple, and are to some extent similar to those
used in exhibiting "Pepper's Ghost." A sheet of plain unsilvered glass
is placed upon the stage, either upright or inclined at a suitable
angle, at the place where the actor or object is to disappear. This
glass is not perceived by the audience, and it does not interfere with
their view of the scenery, etc., behind the plate. A duplicate scene
representing that part of the back of the stage covered by the glass
is placed at the wing, out of sight of the spectators. With the
ordinary lighting of the stage the reflection of this counterfeit
scene in the glass is too faint to be observed; but when a strong
light is thrown upon the scene, the stage lights being lowered at the
same time, the image becomes visible. This duplicate scene being an
exact _fac-simile_ of the background of the stage, the change is not
noticed by the audience, the only difference being that they now see
by reflection that which they saw a moment previously by direct
vision. The actor, standing a sufficient distance behind the glass, is
completely hidden from view, and he is again rendered visible by
turning down the light on the false scene and allowing the stage
lights to predominate. When "Eidos AEides" was being performed at Her
Majesty's Theatre, it was, however, possible, with a good opera-glass,
to distinguish the outline of the figure behind the plate. The effects
produced may of course be modified. An actor may be made to appear
walking or flying in the air, or dancing on a tight-rope, by eclipsing
or obscuring a raised platform on which he may be placed.

------

NEW PUBLICATIONS.


HISTORY OF ENGLAND FROM THE FALL OF WOLSEY
TO THE DEATH OF ELIZABETH.
By James Anthony Froude, M.A., late fellow of Exeter College, Oxford.
Volumes I. and II. 8vo., pp. 447 and 501. New York: Charles Scribner &
Company.

In these two luxurious volumes we have the first instalment of an
important work upon the most important period of English history. Six
other volumes are to follow. Mr. Froude is a thorough good Protestant.
His main purpose in this history seems to have been the glorification
of the English reformers. For the worst sovereigns of the house of
Tudor he displays an enthusiastic admiration which, one is tempted to
believe, is half genuine sentiment, and half love of paradox.
Catholics, of course, he could not have expected to satisfy; but he
has gone too far to please even the members of his own Church. Of
Henry VIII., whose apologist he has appropriately been called, he
draws a flattering portrait:

"If Henry VIII.," he says, "had died previous to the first agitation
of the divorce, his loss would have been deplored as one of the
heaviest misfortunes which had ever befallen the country; and he would
have left a name which would have taken its place in history by the
side of that of the Black {716} Prince or of the conqueror of
Agincourt. Left at the most trying age, with his character unformed,
with the means at his disposal of gratifying every inclination, and
married by his ministers when a boy to an unattractive woman far his
senior, he had lived for thirty-six years almost without blame, and
bore through England the reputation of an upright and virtuous king.
Nature had been prodigal to him of her rarest gifts. In person he is
said to have resembled his grandfather, Edward IV., who was the
handsomest man in Europe. His form and bearing were princely; and
amidst the easy freedom of his address, his manner remained majestic.
No knight in England could match him in the tournament except the Duke
of Suffolk; he drew with ease as strong a bow as was borne by any
yeoman of his guard; and these powers were sustained in unfailing
vigor by a temperate habit and by constant exercise." His state papers
and letters lose nothing by comparison with those of Wolsey and
Cromwell. He was an accomplished musician; he wrote and spoke in four
languages; he was one of the best physicians of his age, an engineer,
and a theologian. "He was 'attentive,' as it is called, 'to his
religious duties,' being present at the services in the chapel two or
three times a day with unfailing regularity, and showing to outward
appearance a real sense of religious obligation in the energy and
purity of his life." In private he was good-humored and good-natured.
But "like all princes of the Plantageuet blood, he was a person of a
most intense and imperious will. His impulses, in general nobly
directed, had never known contradiction; and late in life, when his
character was formed, he was forced into collision with difficulties
with which the experience of discipline had not fitted him to
contend." "He had capacity, if his training had been equal to it, to
be one of the greatest of men. With all his faults about him he was
perhaps the greatest of his contemporaries."

Mr. Froude does not believe that the king's scruples respecting the
validity of his marriage with Catharine of Aragon were inspired by his
affection for Anne Boleyn. "They had arisen to their worst dimensions
before he had ever seen Anne Boleyn." But Mr. Froude's narrative of
the king's early intercourse with Anne is extremely unsatisfactory,
not to say disingenuous. How long Henry may have cherished his
scruples in secret, our author affords us no means of guessing; but
the earliest intimation which he finds of an intended divorce was in
June, 1527. It was in 1525, he says, that Anne came back from France
and appeared at the English court. This is an error, and is
inconsistent with other statements in the same chapter; the date was
1522; and almost immediately afterward the king began to pay Anne
marked attention. Her celebrated love-passage with Lord Percy took
place in 1523. Mr. Froude speaks of it as follows: "Lord Percy, eldest
son of Lord Northumberland, as we all know, was said to have been
engaged to her. He was in the household of Cardinal Wolsey; and
Cavendish, who was with him there, tells a long romantic story of the
affair, which, if his account be true, was ultimately interrupted by
Lord Northumberland himself." Now what will be thought of our author's
honesty when we say that Cavendish repeats again and again that the
match was broken off _by command of the king?_ Lord Northumberland did
not appear in the matter at all until Wolsey, by his majesty's orders,
had remonstrated with the young nobleman, and threatened him with dire
consequences if he should persist in a pursuit which was displeasing
to his sovereign. Mr. Froude carefully suppresses all allusion to
intercourse between the king and his fair favorite, until the project
of the divorce was well advanced,--not discussing or discrediting the
statements of other historians respecting Henry's early passion for
Anne Boleyn; but simply putting them behind his back, as matters of
which it did not suit his purpose to take notice. This fashion of
writing may do for romance, but not for history.

In demanding a divorce from his first queen, Henry has, as we might
suppose, Mr. Froude's full approval:

"It may be admitted, or it ought to be admitted, that if Henry VIII.
had been contented to rest his demand for a divorce merely on the
interests of the kingdom; if he had forborne, while his request was
pending, to affront the princess who had for many years been his
companion and his queen; if he had shown her that respect which her
{717} high character gave her a right to demand, and which her
situation as a stranger ought to have made it impossible to him to
refuse, his conduct would have been liable to no imputation, and our
sympathies would without reserve have been on his side. . . . . His
kingdom demanded the security of a stable succession; his conscience,
it may not be doubted, was seriously agitated by the loss of his
children; and looking upon it as the sentence of heaven upon a
connection the legality of which had from the first been violently
disputed, he believed that he had been living in incest and that his
misfortunes were the consequence of it. Under these circumstances he
had a full right to apply for a divorce."

With all its faults, Mr. Froude's book tells many wholesome truths in
a very forcible manner. Here is an admission which from such an
out-and-out Protestant we should hardly have looked for; he is
speaking of religious persecution:

"We think bitterly of these things, and yet we are but quarrelling
with what is inevitable from the constitution of the world. . . . The
value of a doctrine cannot be determined on its own apparent merits by
men whose habits of mind are settled in other forms; while men of
experience know well that out of the thousands of theories which rise
in the fertile soil below them, it is but one here and there which
grows to maturity; and the precarious chances of possible vitality,
where the opposite probabilities are so enormous, oblige them to
discourage and repress opinions which threaten to disturb established
order, or which, by the rules of existing beliefs, imperil the souls
of those who entertain them. Persecution has ceased among ourselves,
because we do not any more believe that want of theoretic orthodoxy in
matters of faith is necessarily fraught with the tremendous
consequences which once were supposed to be attached to it. If,
however, a school of Thugs were to rise among us, making murder a
religious service; if they gained proselytes, and the proselytes put
their teaching in execution, we should speedily begin again to
persecute opinion. What teachers of Thuggism would appear to
ourselves, the teachers of heresy actually appeared to Sir Thomas
More, only being as much more hateful as the eternal death of the soul
is more terrible than the single and momentary separation of it from
the body. There is, I think, no just ground on which to condemn
conscientious Catholics on the score of persecution, except only this:
that as we are now convinced of the injustice of the persecuting laws,
so among those who believed them to be just, there were some who were
led by an instinctive protest of human feeling to be lenient in the
execution of those laws; while others of harder nature and more narrow
sympathies enforced them without reluctance, and even with
exultation."

The following extract from an account of the feelings of the mass of
the English people during the early stages of the divorce affair, must
be rather unpalatable to the High-Church Episcopalians:

"They believed--and Wolsey was, perhaps, the only leading member of
the privy council, except Archbishop Warham, who was not under the
same delusion--that it was possible for a national church to separate
itself from the unity of Christendom, and at the same time to crush or
prevent innovation of doctrine; that faith in the sacramental system
could still be maintained, though the priesthood by whom those
mysteries were dispensed should minister in golden chains. This was
the English historical theory handed down from William Rufus, the
second Henry, and the Edwards; yet it was and is a mere phantasm, a
thing of words and paper fictions, as Wolsey saw it to be. Wolsey knew
well that an ecclesiastical revolt implied, as a certainty, innovation
of doctrine; that plain men could not and would not continue to
reverence the office of the priesthood, when the priests were treated
as the paid officials of an earthly authority higher than their own.
He was not to be blamed if he took the people at their word; if he
believed that, in their doctrinal conservatism, they knew and meant
what they were saying; and the reaction which took place under Queen
Mary, when the Anglican system had been tried and failed, and the
alternative was seen to be absolute union with Rome, or a forfeiture
of Catholic orthodoxy, proves after all that he was wiser than in the
immediate event he seemed to be; that if his policy had succeeded, and
if, {718} strengthened by success, he had introduced into the Church
those reforms which he had promised and desired, he would have
satisfied the substantial wishes of the majority of the nation."

From an introductory chapter on the social condition of England in the
early part of the sixteenth century, we extract the following graphic
passage, as an example of Mr. Froude's fascinating style. Doubtless
most of our readers will agree with us in wishing that so graceful a
pen had been more worthily employed:

  "The habits of all classes were open, free, and liberal. There are
  two expressions, corresponding one to the other, which we frequently
  meet with in old writings, and which are used as a kind of index,
  marking whether the condition of things was or was not what it ought
  to be. We read of 'merry England';--when England was not merry,
  things were not going well with it. We hear of the 'glory of
  hospitality,' England's pre-eminent boast,--by the rules of which all
  tables, from the table of the twenty-shilling freeholder to the
  table in the baron's hall and abbey refectory, were open at the
  dinner hour to all comers, without stint or reserve, or question
  asked: to every man, according to his degree, who chose to ask for
  it, there was free fare and free lodging; bread, beef, and beer for
  his dinner; for his lodging, perhaps, only a mat of rushes in a
  spare corner of the hall, with a billet of wood for a pillow, but
  freely offered and freely taken, the guest probably faring much as
  his host fared, neither worse nor better. There was little fear of
  an abuse of such licence, for suspicious characters had no leave to
  wander at pleasure; and for any man found at large, and unable to
  give a sufficient account of himself, there were the ever-ready
  parish stocks or town gaol. The 'glory of hospitality' lasted far
  down into Elizabeth's time; and then, as Camden says, 'came in great
  bravery of building, to the great beautifying of the realm, but to
  the decay' of what he valued more.

  "In such frank style the people lived, hating three things with all
  their hearts: idleness, want, and cowardice; and for the rest,
  carrying their hearts high, and having their hands full. The hour of
  rising, winter and summer, was four o'clock, with breakfast at five,
  after which the laborers went to work, and the gentlemen to
  business, of which they had no little. In the country every unknown
  face was challenged and examined,--if the account given was
  insufficient, he was brought before the justice; if the village
  shopkeeper sold bad wares, if the village cobbler made 'unhonest'
  shoes, if servants and masters quarrelled, all was to be looked to
  by the justice; there was no fear lest time should hang heavy with
  him. At twelve he dined; after dinner he went hunting, or to his
  farm, or to do what be pleased. It was a life unrefined, perhaps,
  but colored with a broad, rosy English health."


THE AMERICAN ANNUAL CYCLOPEDIA AND REGISTER OF
IMPORTANT EVENTS OF THE YEAR 1864.
8vo., pp. 838. New York: D. Appleton & Company.

The Annual Cyclopedia grows more and more valuable and interesting
every year. The present volume is a great improvement upon all that
have gone before it. The course of events has been unusually varied
and startling, and the topics suggested by it appear to have been for
the most part selected with good judgment and treated by competent
writers. We have under the head of "Army Operations" an admirable
history of Sherman's great march and of Grant's campaign in the
wilderness, both illustrated with maps. The article on the "Army of
the United States" abounds in information respecting the number of
troops, organization, supplies, department and corps commanders, etc.,
such as everybody wants to have, but nobody knows where to look for.
Under the titles of "Confederate" and "United States Congress" we have
a complete political history of our country during the last year,
while the condition and progress of the several foreign states are
treated in their proper places. A great deal of interesting matter is
given in the articles on the "Anglican" and "Greek" Churches,
"Commerce" and "Commercial Intercourse," "Diplomatic Correspondence
and Foreign Relations," "Finances of the United States," "Freedmen,"
"Freedom of the Press," "Geographical Explorations and Discoveries,"
"Literature and Literary Progress," "Military Surgery and Medicine"
(profusely illustrated), "Navy," "Ordnance," "Petroleum," etc., etc.
{719} Under the head of "Public Documents" is the most correct
translation of the Pope's Encyclical and syllabus of errors condemned
that has yet appeared in this country. Biographical sketches are also
given of the most distinguished men who died during the course of the
year.


SONGS FOR ALL SEASONS. By Alfred Tennyson. With illustrations by D.
Maclise, T. Creswick, S. Eytinge, C. A. Barry, H. Fenn, and G.
Perkins. 16mo., pp. 84. Boston: Ticknor & Fields.


HOUSEHOLD POEMS. By Henry W. Longfellow. With illustrations by John
Gilbert, Birket Foster, and John Absolon. 16mo., pp. 96. Boston:
Ticknor & Fields.

The series of "Companion Poets for the People," of which these two
volumes are the first issues, deserves special commendation as an
example of the way in which cheapness and elegance may be combined.
For half a dollar Messrs. Ticknor & Fields offer us a neat little
book, printed in the best style of typography, on rich tinted paper,
with a clean broad margin, and some twelve or fifteen wood-cuts by
reputable artists. The selections appear to have been made with good
judgment, and include some late pieces of both Tennyson and Longfellow
which are not to be found in previous editions of their works.


THE HISTORY OF THE PROTESTANT REFORMATION IN GERMANY AND
SWITZERLAND, AND IN ENGLAND, IRELAND, SCOTLAND, THE NETHERLANDS,
FRANCE, AND NORTHERN EUROPE.
IN A SERIES OF ESSAYS, REVIEWING D'AUBIGNÉ, MENZEL, HALLAM,
BISHOP SHORT, PRESCOTT, RANKE, FRYXELL, AND OTHERS.
By M.J. Spalding, D.D., Archbishop Baltimore. Fourth revised edition,
Two volumes in one. 8vo., pp. 494 and 509. Baltimore: John Murphy &
Company.

We welcome this new and improved edition of the best antidote that has
yet been prepared for English readers to the common misrepresentations
of Protestant historians of the reformation. Archbishop Spalding's
book has been so long before the public, and has been received with
such general favor, that it would be superfluous at this late day to
enter upon a general examination of its merits. It will prove a
valuable guide to the student of English and continental history; he
will find here the chief points made against the Church, by the long
list of writers named in the title-page, taken up and answered by a
prelate of high reputation for sound and thorough scholarship. Dr.
Spalding of course does not deny that there were abuses in the 16th
century which ought to have been abolished; but he contends that the
gravity and extent of these disorders have been greatly exaggerated;
that they generally originated in the world and its princes, not in
the Church; most of them being due to the fact that bad men were
thrust into high ecclesiastical places by worldly-minded and
avaricious sovereigns; that there was a lawful and efficacious remedy
for all such evils, which consisted in giving to the popes their due
power and influence in the nomination of bishops and in the
deliberations of general councils; in a word, that "reformation within
the Church, and not revolution outside of it, was the only proper,
lawful, and efficacious remedy for existing evils;" and finally, "that
the fact of Christians having at length felt prepared to resort to the
desperate and totally wrong remedy of revolution was owing to a train
of circumstances which had caused faith to wane and grow cold, and
which now appealed more to the passions than to reason, more to human
considerations than to the principles of divine faith and the
interests of eternity."


THE YEAR OF MARY; OR, THE TRUE
SERVANT OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN.
Translated from the French of Rev. M. d'Arville, Apostolic
Prothonotary. Edited, and in part translated, by Mrs. J. Sadlier.
12mo. Philadelphia: Peter F. Cunningham.

This is a work intended for the use either of private persons or of
confraternities, sodalities, and similar associations formed in honor
of the Blessed Virgin. The matter is distributed into exercises, the
number of which is fixed at seventy-two, because our Lady is supposed
to have lived seventy-two years on earth. One exercise is appropriated
to each of the Sundays and principal festivals of the year.

{720}

The reverend author writes with simplicity and unction, and has given
us a really devout book. The translation seems to be very well done.


CEREMONIAL, FOR THE USE OF THE CATHOLIC CHURCHES
IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. Published by order of the First
Council of Baltimore, with the approbation of the Holy See. Third
edition, carefully revised and considerably enlarged. With
illustrations. 12mo., pp. 534. Baltimore: Kelly & Piet.

This book is almost indispensable to clergymen, and very convenient
for laymen who wish to understand the beautiful ceremonies which the
Church has appointed for the various festivals and services of the
ecclesiastical year. It was originally compiled by Bishop Rosati, of
St. Louis, and formally adopted by the council of Baltimore in 1852.
The extensive additions which are now published with it were made by
direction of the late Archbishop Kenrick, of Baltimore. They consist
of the ceremonies of low mass, low mass for the dead, and the manner
of giving holy communion within the mass or at other times;
instructions for the priest who is obliged to say two masses, from the
decrees of the sacred congregation of rites, approved under the
present pope; the manner of singing mass without deacon and
sub-deacon, and the vespers without cope-bearers, in accordance with
approved usages of the best-regulated churches in Italy; the mode of
giving benediction with the blessed sacrament, in which the ceremonial
of bishops and the various decrees of the sacred congregation of rites
are strictly followed; Gregorian notes to guide the celebrant and
sacred ministers in singing the prayers, gospel, epistle, confiteor,
etc.

The illustrations, intended to show the proper form of various church
utensils, church furniture, etc., constitute a valuable feature of the
book.


MEDITATIONS AND CONSIDERATIONS FOR A RETREAT OF
ONE DAY IN EACH MONTH.
Compiled from the writings of Fathers of the Society of Jesus, by a
Religious. Published with the approbation of the Most Rev. Archbishop
of Baltimore. 18mo., pp. viii., 154. Baltimore: Kelly & Piet.

This little book is designed for the use not only of religious
communities, but of persons in the world who may feel disposed to
devote a day now and then exclusively to the affairs of their souls.
The exercises consist of three meditations and a "consideration," for
each month in the year, arranged after the manner of the exercises of
St. Ignatius.


STREET BALLADS, POPULAR POETRY,
AND HOUSEHOLD SONGS OF IRELAND.
16mo., pp. 312. Boston: Patrick Donahoe.

The poems contained in this little volume are by a great number of
authors, and of course of very different degrees of merit. Most of
them are of a patriotic nature; a good many are amatory; and two or
three seem to have no business in the collection at all. For example,
Lieut-Colonel Halpine's "April 20, 1864," is a poem of the American
rebellion. Mr. John Savage's "At Niagara" is certainly neither a
street ballad nor a household song, nor is it part of the popular
poetry of Ireland any more than of our own country. We dare say,
however, that nobody will feel disposed to quarrel with the editor for
including these spirited pieces, as well as others we might mention,
which do not properly belong under the categories mentioned in the
title-page.

Among the best known writers whose names appear in the table of
contents are William Allinghain, Aubrey De Vere, Samuel Fergusson,
Lady Wilde, Gerald Griffin, and Clarence Mangan.


THE MONTH OF MARY, FOR THE USE OF ECCLESIASTICS.
Translated from the French. 32mo., pp. 207. Baltimore: John Murphy &
Company.

This little manual is intended exclusively for ecclesiastics,
especially students in theological seminaries. It sets forth, for each
day of the month, some trait of the life of the Blessed Virgin, first
as an object of veneration and love, secondly, as a model of some
virtue of the clerical state, and finally, as a motive of confidence.
It is brief, suggestive, and practical.


_The Man without a Country_ (Boston: Ticknor & Fields) is a reprint in
pamphlet form of a remarkable narrative which appeared originally in
_The Atlantic Monthly_.

----------
{721}

THE CATHOLIC WORLD.

VOL. I., NO. 6. SEPTEMBER, 1865.


From The Dublin Review.

THE CHRISTIAN SCHOOLS OF ALEXANDRIA.--ORIGEN.


_Origenis Opera Omnia_. Ed. De la Rue, accurante J. P. MIGNE. Paris.

_Origenes_, Eine Darstellung seines Lebens und seiner Lehre, von Dr.
REDEPENNING. (Origen: A History of his Life and Doctrine. By Dr.
REDEPENNING). 1841. Bonn.

In a former article we have given some account of the labors and
teaching of Pantaenus and Clement in the twenty years after the death
of Marcus Aurelius (180-202), during which the Church enjoyed
comparative peace. Commodus was not a persecutor, like his philosophic
father. Personally, he was a signal instance of the total break-down
of philosophy as a training for a prince imperial; for whatever
advantages the most enlightened methods and the most complete
establishment of philosophic tutors could afford were his, probably to
his great disgust. But the Church has often found that an imperial
philosopher is something even worse than an imperial debauchee.
Pertinax and Didius Julianus, who succeeded Commodus, had little time
either for philosophy or pleasure, for they followed their
predecessor, after the violent fashion so popular with conspirators
and Praetorians, in less than a twelvemonth. Septimius Severus, the
first, and, with one exception, the only Roman emperor who was a
native African, during the earlier years of his reign protected the
Christians rather than otherwise. How and why he saw occasion to
change we shall have to consider further on.

During these twenty years of tranquillity the great Church of
Alexandria had been making no little progress. Her children had not
been entirely undisturbed. The populace, and sometimes the
magistrates, often did not wait for an imperial edict to set upon the
Christians, and the commotions that followed the death of Commodus
were the occasion of more than one martyr's crown. We learn from
Clement of Alexandria, speaking of this very time of comparative
quiet, that burnings, beheadings, and crucifixions took place "daily;"
whereby he seems to point to some particular local persecutions. But
the Alexandrian Church, on the whole, was left in peace, and was
rapidly extending herself among the student population of the city,
among the Greeks, but, above all, among the poorer classes of the
native Egyptians. Christianity seems to have spread in Egypt with a
{722} rapidity almost unexampled elsewhere, and historians have taken
much pains to point out that this was the effect of the considerable
agreement there is between the asceticism of the early Church and that
of the native worship. Without discussing the point, we may note that
rapidity of extension was the rule, not the exception, when an apostle
was the missionary; and that the Alexandrian Church was founded by
direct commission from St. Peter, and, therefore, shared with Rome and
Antioch the distinction of being the mother-city of Christianity.
Moreover, the Nile valley, which above the Delta is nowhere more than
eleven miles in width, contained a teeming population, the whole of
which was thoroughly accessible by means of the river itself. For
nearly five hundred miles every city and town, every least village and
hamlet, stood right on the banks of the great water-way; and it is
probable that half the inhabitants of Upper Egypt and the Thebaid were
often floating on its bosom at one and the same time. The high road
that was so serviceable for traffic and pleasure could be made of
equal service to religion. How unweariedly the successors of St. Mark
must have traversed it from end to end may be read in the history of
those lauras and hermitages that at one time were to be found wherever
its rocky barriers were indented by a sandy valley, and wherever the
old builders of Thebes and Memphis had left a quarried opening in the
limestone. There was not a stronger contrast between these monastic
dwellings and the bosom of the gay river than there was between
Egyptians Christian and Egyptians pagan. If the Church's converts
rushed into the deserts and the caves, it was not especially because
they liked them, but because there was absolutely no other means of
getting out of a society not to be matched for immorality except,
perhaps, by pagan Rome at its very worst. Of the number of Christians
in Alexandria itself at the commencement of the third century we can
only form an approximate judgment. On the one hand, Eusebius tells us
that the Church had spread over the whole Thebaid. As the Thebaid was
the southern division of Egypt proper, and, therefore, the most
distant from Alexandria, we may safely say as much, at least, for the
Delta and Middle Egypt. On the other hand, we are told by Origen that
the Christians in the city were not so numerous as the pagans, or even
the Jews. This will not appear surprising if we recollect that the
Alexandrian Jews were more numerous, as well as richer and more
powerful, than any other Jewish community in the world. We know enough
to be quite sure that the Alexandrian Church was working quietly but
vigorously. From the heads of the Catechetical school down to the
humblest little child that was marked out by baptism in the great city
of sin, there was a great work going on. The impulse that Pantaenus
and Clement were giving was felt downward and around, and when Origen
begins to rise on the scene, we can mark what an advance there has
been even in the short twenty years since the death of Marcus
Aurelius.

Septimus Severus had reigned for ten years, as we said above, before
he began to persecute. He was undoubtedly an able and vigorous
emperor; he could meet his enemies and get rid of his friends, bribe
the Praetorians and slaughter his prisoners of war, with equal
coolness and generally with equal success. In the course of a reign of
twenty years he seems to have visited with hostile intent the greater
part of his extensive empire, from the Syrtes of Africa, where he was
born, to the banks of the Euphrates, and thence to Britain, where he
died, at York, A.D. 211. At the time we speak of (198) he had just
concluded a brilliant campaign against those pests of the Roman
soldiery, the Parthians; and having then engaged the Arabs, still in
arms for a chief whose head he had had the pleasure {723} of sending
to Rome twelve months before, had got rather the worst of it in two
battles. It was between this and the year 202 that he visited
Alexandria. There can be no doubt he must have been received at
Alexandria with no little triumph by one class of its citizens. Some
six years before, he had restored to the Greek inhabitants their
senate and municipal privileges. The Greeks, who, as far as intellect
went, were the indisputable rulers of Alexandria, must have been
highly elated at being now restored to civil importance; for though
their senate was little more than an ornament, and their municipal
rights confined to holding certain assemblies for the discussion of
grievances, still, to have a recognized machinery of wards and tribes,
and to be called "men of Macedon," as of old, was not without
advantage, and was, indeed, all that their fathers had presumed to
seek for, even in the days of the lamented Ptolemies. We cannot doubt,
therefore, that by the Greeks Severus was received with much
enthusiasm, and he, on his part, seems to have been equally satisfied
with his reception, for we find that he enriched Alexandria with a
temple of Rhea, and with public baths which he named after himself.
But more came of this visit than compliments or temples. It was an
hour of favor for the Greeks; the chief among them were also the
chiefs and ruling spirits of the university; we know they must have
come across Christianity during the preceding twenty years in many
ways, but chiefly as a teaching that was gaining ground yearly among
their best men; as philosophers, we know they loathed it; as
worshippers of the immortal myths, they were burning to put it down.
Does it seem in any way connected with these facts that Severus at
this very time changes his policy of mildness, and issues a decree
forbidding, under severest penalties, all conversions to Christianity
or Judaism? There is something suggestive in the juxtaposition of
facts, and it is not at all impossible that the commencement of the
fifth persecution was a compliment to Clement of Alexandria. Severus,
indeed, must have frequently come into contact with Christianity
himself during the three or four years he spent in Syria and the East;
he could not have visited Antioch, Edessa, and Caesarea without being
obliged to notice the development of the Church. The Jews, too, had
given him a great deal of trouble, which may account for that part of
the edict which affected them, and perhaps the Montanist fanatics had
helped to irritate him against the name of Christian. However these
things may be, the prohibition, though apparently moderate in its
scope, was the signal for the outburst of a tremendous persecution.
Laetus, the prefect of Alexandria, was so zealous in his work, that it
is impossible not to suspect that he was acting under the very eye of
his imperial master. He was not content with torturing and slaying in
the city itself, but sent his emissaries up the Nile to the very
extremity of the Thebaid to hunt up the Christians and send them by
boatloads to the capital for judgment and punishment. Numbers of the
Alexandrian Christians fled to Palestine and elsewhere on the first
intimation of danger. Pantaenus, who had returned from his Indian
mission, had perhaps already left Alexandria; but Clement was at the
head of the Catechisms, and he was of the number of those who fled.
The great school was for a time broken up. The functions of the Church
were suspended for want of ministers, or prevented by the
impossibility of meeting in safety. It was taught in the Alexandrian
Church that if they were persecuted in one city, they should flee into
another; and, just at this time, the Motanist error, that it was
unlawful to flee from persecution, caused this teaching to be acted
upon with less hesitation than usual; and so, in the year 202,
Christians in Alexandria, from being a comparatively flourishing
community, became a proscribed and secret sect.

{724}

It would be very far from the truth, however, to suppose that the
teachings of the Catechetical school had not been able to form
martyrs. We know that multitudes stood up for their faith and shed
their blood for it at Alexandria, during the first years of this
persecution, and this amidst horrors so unusual even with persecutors,
that it was thought they portended the coming of the last day. The
name of Potamiana alone will serve to raise associations sufficient to
picture both the heroism of the confessors and the enormities of the
tyrants. But there is another name with which we are more nearly
concerned at present. Leonides, the father of Origen, was one of those
Christians who had not fled from the persecution. He was an inhabitant
of Alexandria, a man of some position and substance, and when the
troubles began he was living in Alexandria with his wife and family.
It was not long before he was marked down by Laetus and dragged to
prison. The martyr's crown was now within his grasp; but he left
behind him in his desolate home another who was burning to share it by
his side. His son, Origen, was not yet seventeen when his father was
torn away by the Roman soldiers, and, in spite of the entreaties of
his mother, he insisted upon following him to prison. His mother
finally kept him beside her by a device which may raise a smile in
this generation. She "hid all his clothes," says Eusebius, and so
compelled him to stop at home. But his zeal was all aroused and on
fire, and, indeed, in this, the earliest incident known to us of his
life, we seem to read the zeal and fire of the man that was to be. He
sent a message to his father in these words, "Be sure not to waver on
_our_ account." The exact words seem to have been handed down to us,
and Eusebius, who gives them, probably received them from Origen's own
disciples in Caesarea of Palestine. The boy well knew what would be
the martyr's chief and only anxiety in his prison. The thought of the
wife and seven young children whom he was leaving desolate would be a
far bitterer martyrdom than the Roman prisons. But Leonides gloriously
persevered, confessed the faith, and was beheaded, while the whole of
his property was confiscated to the emperor.

Origen, as we have said, was not quite seventeen years old at his
father's martyrdom, having been born about the year 185. Both his
father and mother were Christians, and apparently had dwelt a long
time in Alexandria. He had therefore been brought up from his infancy
in that careful Christian training which it is the pride and joy of a
good and earnest Christian father to bestow upon his son. The traces
of this training, as we find them in Eusebius, are touching in the
extreme. Leonides, to whom the teachings of Clement had made the Holy
Scriptures a very fountain of life and sweetness, made them the
principal means of the education of his son. Every day the child
repeated to his father a portion of the holy books, and was instructed
according to his capacity. Knowing what, in after life, was to be
Origen's connection with the Holy Scriptures, we are not surprised to
find that his father soon began to experience some difficulty in
answering his questions. The boy, with true Alexandrian instinct, was
not content with the bare letter of the book; he would know its hidden
meaning and prophetic sense. Leonides discouraged these questions and
speculations, not, it would seem, because he disapproved of them, but
because he sensibly thought them premature in so young a child. But in
the secret of his heart he was full of joy to see the ardor,
eagerness, and amazing quickness of his dear child, and often, when
the boy was asleep, would he uncover his breast and reverently kiss
it, as the temple of the Holy Spirit. It is of very great importance
for the right comprehension of the great Origen to bear in view this
picture of his tender youth, and to reflect that he was no convert
from heathenism, no {725} Christianized philosopher, whose early
notions might from time to time be expected to crop up in the field of
his orthodoxy, but a Christian child, born and bred in the Church's
bosom, brought up by a father of unquestioned ability, who died a
martyr and is honored as a saint. Origen began to think rightly as
soon as he could think at all; his early education left him nothing to
forget. As he grew up and began to be familiar with Alexandria the
beautiful, he received that subtle education of the eye and
imagination that every Alexandrian, like every Athenian, succeeded to
as an heirloom. But with the heathen philosophers he had nothing to
do, and it may be questioned whether he ever entered the walls of the
Museum. His father had not neglected to teach him the ordinary
branches of Greek learning. He attended the lectures of Clement, those
brilliant and winning discourses, half apology, half exhortation, that
he himself was afterward to emulate so well. He heard Pantaenus, also,
after the venerable teacher had returned from his Indian mission. We
may be sure that he dreaded worse than poison the society of the pagan
youth of the university; this his subsequent conduct proves. But he
had his circle of friends, and among them was a young man, somewhat
older than himself, who was hereafter to leave an undying name as St.
Alexander of Jerusalem. Thus, by ear and eye, by master and by
fellow-student, by his father's labor, and by the workings of his own
wonderful intellect and indomitable will, he was formed into a man.
His education came to a premature end; but his father's martyrdom,
though to outward seeming it left him a destitute orphan, really
hardened the boy of seventeen into the man and the hero.

"When his father was martyred," continues Eusebius, writing, in all
probability, from the relation of those who had heard Origen's own
account, "he was left an orphan, with his mother and six young
brothers and sisters, being of the age of seventeen. All his father's
property was confiscated to the emperor's treasury, and they were in
the utmost destitution; but God's providence took care of Origen." A
rich and illustrious lady of Alexandria received him into her house.
Whether this lady was professedly a Christian, a pagan, or a heretic,
history does not say. She can hardly have been a pagan, though it is
not impossible that a philosophic and liberal pagan lady should have
taken a fancy to help such a youth as Origen. It is not likely that
she was a heretic, for in that case Origen would never have entered
her door. Thanks to the Gnostics, heretics in those days were looked
upon in Alexandria as more to be dreaded than pagans. She was
probably, by outward profession at least, a Christian, "illustrious,"
says the historian, "for what she had done, and illustrious in every
other way." What she had done we are not permitted even to guess; but
one fact in her history we do know, and it is very significant. She
had living in her house, on the footing of an adopted son, one Paul, a
native of Antioch, and one of the chiefs of the Alexandrian heretics.
It is certain that Origen's patroness must have had either very
uncertain or very easy notions of Christianity, if she could lend her
house, her money, and her influence to an arch-heretic, who had come
from Syria to trouble the Church of Alexandria, as Basilides and
Valentine had come before him. Gnosticism had probably lost ground in
the city, under the eloquent attacks of St. Clement. This Paul was a
man of great eloquence, and his reputation attracted great numbers to
hear him, not only of heretics, but also of Christians. He came from
Antioch, the headquarters of an unknown number of Gnostic sects, and,
with the usual instinct of false teachers, he had "led captive" this
Alexandrian lady. Mark, of infamous memory, had already done the same
thing by others, and perhaps by her, and Paul had succeeded to his
position and was now {726} the rival of the head of the Catechisms.
Such a state of things makes it easier to understand why St. Clement,
in his _Stromata_, calls those who lean to heresy "traitors to
Christ," and compares perverts to the companions of Ulysses in the sty
of Circe, and why he makes the very treating with heretics to be
nothing less than desertion in the soldier of Christ. It does seem a
little strange, at first sight, that the uncompromising Origen should
have consented to receive assistance from one whose orthodoxy must
have been in such bad odor. The difficulty grows less, however, if we
consider the circumstances. It was in the very heat of a terrible
persecution, when the canons of the Church must have been suspended.
Origen had lost his father, and had nowhere to turn for bare
subsistence. We can hardly wonder if, in such a strait as this, he
asked few questions when the charitable lady wished to take him in.
But when the grief and agitation of his orphaned state had somewhat
subsided, and when the persecutors had begun to slacken their fury, we
may suppose that he began to examine the harbor of his refuge, and
that it pleased him not. He was under the same roof as Paul of
Antioch, a heretic and a leader of heretics; but never, young as he
was, could he be induced to associate with him in prayer, or in any
way that could violate the canons of the Church, as far as it was
possible to keep them in such times. "From his childhood," says his
biographer, "he kept the canons, and execrated the teachings of
heretics;" and he tells us that this last phrase is Origen's own. And
it seems that he took the most energetic measures to get away from a
companionship that he must have loathed. He had been well instructed,
as we have said, by his father in the ordinary branches of education.
After his father's death he again applied himself to study with
greater ardor than before, for he had an object in view now. It was
not long before he was offering himself as a public teacher of those
sciences that are designated by the general term "_Grammatica_." It
was the first public step in a life that was afterward to be little
less than the entire history of the Eastern Church. He was not yet
eighteen, but there was no help for it. He must have bread, and he
could not eat of the loaf that was shared by Paul of Antioch. Early
writers lay much stress on this first exhibition of orthodox zeal in
him who was afterward to be the "hammer" of heretics, from Egypt to
Greece. Certain it is that his conduct as a boy was the same as his
sentiments when he was in his sixtieth year. "To err in morals," he
wrote in his commentary on Matthew, at Caesarea, forty years after his
first essay as a teacher of grammar,--"to err in morals is bad, but to
err in dogma and to contradict Holy Writ is much worse." If in after
life he was to be so singularly earnest and so unaffectedly devout, so
enthusiastic for the Gospel, so eager in exploring the depths of
sacred science, and so unwavering in his faith, all this was but the
growth and development of what was already springing in his soul in
those early years of his trials and zeal. The strong will was already
trying its first flights, the sensitive heart was being schooled to
throw all its motive power into duty, and the quick, clear
apprehension and the wonderful memory for which he was to be so
famous, were already beginning to show what they would one day be.

Origen was now a teacher of grammar and the sciences, but he had not
kept school for many months when his teachings took a turn that he can
hardly have anticipated. His text-books were the common pagan
historians, poets, and philosophers that have been thumbed by the
school-boy from that generation to this. It was no part of Origen's
character to leave his hearers in error when plain speaking would
prevent it; and so it happened that his exposition of his author often
took in hand not merely the parts of speech, but the doctrine. Though
he was only {727} school-master by profession, his scholars soon found
out he was a Christian, and a Christian of uncommon power and
clear-sightedness. The Catechetical school was closed; masters and
scholars were scattered in flight or in concealment. It was not long,
therefore, before the young teacher found himself applied to by first
one heathen and then another, who, under other circumstances, would
have applied to the school of the Catechisms. Among these were
Plutarchus, who soon afterward showed how a young Alexandrian student
could die a glorious martyr; and Heraclas, his brother, who, after his
conversion, left everything to remain with his master, became his
assistant and successor in his catechetical work, and finally died
Patriarch of Alexandria. These were the first-fruits of his zeal for
souls. Many others followed; and as the persecution was somewhat
abating, Demetrius, bishop of Alexandria, looking round for men to
resume the work of the schools, saw no one better fitted to be
intrusted with its direction than Origen himself. He was accordingly,
though not yet eighteen, appointed the successor of Clement.

Laetus, prefect of Alexandria, who had exerted himself so strenuously
to please Severus when the persecution commenced, had now been
recalled; probably he had reaped the reward of his zeal, and was
promoted. His successor, Aquila, signalized his entering upon office
by an activity that outdid that of Laetus himself. The persecution
that had calmed down a little toward the end of the first year and
when Laetus was leaving, now raged with redoubled fury. We have
already said that the authoritative tradition, and, in great measure,
also the practice, of the Alexandrian Church was flight at a time like
this. Origen, however, was very far from fleeing; never at any time of
his life did he display such fearless baldness, such energetic
contempt for the enemy, as during these years of blood, from 204 to
211. There was no prison so well-guarded, no dungeon so deep, that he
could not hold communication with the confessors of Christ. He went up
to the tribunals with them, and stood beside them at the interrogatory
and at the torture. He went back with them in a sort of defiant
triumph, after sentence of death had been pronounced. He walked
undauntedly by their side up to the stake and the beheading block, and
kissed them and bade them adieu when it was time for them to die. It
is no wonder that Eusebius sets down his own safety to a miraculous
interposition of the right hand of God. Once, as he stood by a dying
martyr, embracing him as he expired, the Alexandrian mob set on him
with stones and nearly killed him; how he escaped none could tell.
Again and again the persecutors tried to seize him; as often ("it is
impossible," says the historian, "to tell how often") was he delivered
from their hands. He was nowhere safe: no sooner did the mob get a
suspicion of where he was than they surrounded the house, and hounded
in the soldiers to drag him out. He fled from house to house; perhaps
he was assisted to escape by some of his numerous friends; perhaps he
hid himself, as St. Athanasius in the next century did, in some of
those underground wells and cisterns with which every house in
Alexander's city was provided, and then sought other quarters when the
mob had gone off. But it was not long before he was again discovered.
The numbers that came to hear him soon let the infuriated pagans know
where their victim was, and he was again besieged and hunted out.
Once, St. Epiphanius relates, he was caught, apparently by a
street-mob, and some of the low Egyptian priests as their leaders. It
was near the Egyptian quarter of the city; perhaps, even, he was
visiting some poor native convert in the dirty streets of the Rhacôtis
itself. If so, the name of Origen would have been enough to empty the
whole quarter of its pariah race, and bring them yelling and cursing
into the {728} Heptastadion. They showed him no mercy; they abused him
horribly; they beat him and bruised him; they dragged him along the
ground. But before killing him outright, the idea seized them that
they should make him deny his religion, and at the same time make a
shameful exhibition of himself. There must have been Greeks in the
crowd, for Egyptians would never have had patience to spare him so
long. The Serapeion, however, was at hand, and thither they dragged
him. As they hauled him along, "they shaved his head," says St.
Epiphanius--that is, they tried to make him look like the Egyptian
priests, who were distinguished by a womanish smoothness of face; and
we may imagine that they did it with no gentle hands. When at length
the rushing mob had surged up the steps of the great temple, their
victim in the midst of them, they set him on his feet, and gave him
some palm branches, telling him to act the priest and distribute them
to the votaries of Serapis. The palm, we know, was a favorite tree
with the Egyptian priests; it was sculptured and painted on the walls
of their huge temples, and it was borne in the hands of worshippers on
solemn festivals. On the present occasion there were, probably,
priests of one rank or another standing before the vestibule of the
Serapeion, ready to supply those who should enter. It was, therefore,
the work of a moment to seize the stock of one of these ministers, and
force Origen to take his place. If they anticipated the pleasure of
seeing the hated Christian teacher humiliated to the position of an
_ostiarius_ of an idolatrous temple, they were never more mistaken in
their lives. Origen took the palms, and began without hesitation to
distribute them; but, as he did so, he cried out in a voice as loud
and steady as if neither suffering nor danger could affect him, "Take
the palms, good people!--not the palms of idols, but the palms of
Christ!" How he escaped after this piece of daring, we are only left
to conjecture. Perhaps the Roman troops came suddenly on the scene to
quell the riot; and as they hated the dwellers in the Rhacôtis almost
as much as the latter hated Origen, the neighborhood of the Serapeion
would have been speedily cleared of Egyptians. However it came about,
Origen was saved.

Meanwhile, he saw his own scholars daily going to death. The young
student Plutarchus fell among the first victims of Aquila's new vigor;
Origen was by his side when he was led to execution, was recognized by
the mob, and once more narrowly escaped with his life. Serenus,
another of his disciples, was burnt; Heraclides, a catechumen, and
Hero, who had just been baptized, were beheaded; a second Serenus,
after enduring many torments, suffered in the same way. A woman named
Heraeis, one of his converts, was burned before she could be baptized,
receiving the baptism of fire, as her instructor said. Another who is
numbered among his disciples is Basilides, the soldier who protected
St. Potamiana from the insults of the mob, and whom she converted by
appealing to him three nights afterward. We are told that the
brethren, and we know who would be foremost among the brethren in such
a case, visited him in prison as soon as they heard of his wonderful
and unexpected confession. He told them his vision, was baptized, and
the following day died a martyr. Probably it was Origen who addressed
to him the few hurried words of instruction there was time to say.
"All the martyrs," says Eusebius, "whether he knew them or knew them
not, he ministered to with the most eager affection." His reputation,
it may well be conceived, suffered no diminution as these things came
to be known. The horrors of the persecution could not keep scholars
away from him, nor prevent increasing numbers from coming to seek him.
Many of the unbelieving pagans, full of admiration for a holiness of
life and a heroism they could not comprehend, came to his {729}
instructions; and even literary Greeks who had gone through the
curriculum of the Museum, and were deeply versed in Platonic myths and
Pythagorean theories of mortification, came to listen to this fearless
young philosopher, in whom they found a learning that could not be
gainsaid, combined with a practical contempt for the things of the
body that was quite unknown in their own schools.

The persecution seems to have died down and gone out toward the year
211, nine years after its commencement. Origen's labors became the
more extraordinary in proportion as he had freer scope for pursuing
them. The feature in his life at this time, which is most
characteristic of the time and the city, and which more than anything
else attracted the cultivated heathens to listen to him, was his
severe asceticism. Times of persecution may be considered to dispense
with asceticism; but Origen did not think so. It was a saying of his
master, St. Clement, and, indeed, appears to have been a common
proverb in that reformed school of heathen philosophy which resulted
in Neo-Platonism, "As your words, so be your life." A philosopher in
Alexandria at that time, if he would not be thought to belong to an
effete race of thinkers who had long been left behind, or who only
survived in the well-paid and well-fed professorships of the
university, was of necessity a man whose strict and sober living
corresponded to the high and serious truths which he considered it his
mission to utter. St. Clement did not forget this, either in principle
or in practice, when he undertook to win the heathen men of science to
Christ. Origen, born a Christian, made a teacher apparently by chance
and in the confusion of a persecution, cared little, in the first
instance, for what pagan philosophy would think of him. The fact that
all who pretended to be philosophers pretended also to asceticism may,
indeed, have caused him to embrace a life of denial more as a matter
of course. But the holy gospels and the teachings of Clement were the
reasons of his asceticism. It is amazing that Protestant writers, when
they write of the asceticism of the early Church, can see in it
nothing but the reflection of Buddhism, or Judaism, or of the tenets
of Pythagoras, and that they always seem nervously glad to prove by
the assistance of the Egyptian climate or the Platonic hatred of
matter, that it was not the carrying out of the law of Christ, but
merely a self-imposed burden. Climate, doubtless, has great influence
on food, and English dinners would no more suit an Egyptian sun than
would the two regulation _paximatia_ of the Abbot Moses in Cassian be
enough for even the most willing of English Cistercians. But why go to
climate, to Plato, to Pythagoras, and to Buddha, to account for what
is one of the most striking recommendations of the gospels? We need
not stop to inquire the reason, but we may be sure that a child who
had been taught the Holy Scriptures by heart would not be unlikely to
know something of their teaching. His biographer tells us expressly,
with regard to several of his acts of mortification, that they were
done in the endeavor to carry out literally our Lord's commands. And
yet it is very remarkable, and a trait of the times, that Eusebius, in
describing his mode of life, uses the word philosophy three times
where we should use asceticism. Origen, soon after being appointed
head of the Catechetic school, found he could not do his duty by his
hearers as thoroughly as he could wish, on account of his other
occupation of teacher of grammar. He therefore resolved to give it up.
It was his only means of subsistence, but he might reasonably have
expected "to live by the gospel" as long as he was in such a post as
chief catechist. If he had expected this he would not have been
disappointed, for there would have been no lack of charity. But he had
an entirely different view of the matter. He would be a burden {730}
to no one, and would live a life of the strictest poverty. Simple,
straightforward, and great, here as ever, we may conceive how he would
appreciate the fetters of a rich man's patronage. But, if we may trust
the utterances of his whole life, his love for holy poverty was such
that, while it makes some refer once more to Pythagoras, to a Catholic
it rather suggests St. Francis of Assisi. "I tremble," he said thirty
years afterward, "when I think how Jesus commands his children to
leave all they have. For my own part, I plead guilty to my accusers
and I pronounce my own sentence; I will not conceal my guiltiness lest
I become doubly guilty. I will preach the precepts of the Lord, though
I am conscious of not having followed them myself. Let us now at least
lose no time in becoming true priests of the Lord, whose inheritance
is not on earth but in heaven." Such language from one who can hardly
be said to have possessed anything during his whole life can only be
explained on one hypothesis. In order, therefore, at once to secure
his independence in God's work, and to oblige himself to practise
rigorous poverty, he made a sacrifice which none but a poor student
can appreciate. He sold his manuscripts, and secured to himself, from
the sale, a sum of four oboli a day, which was to be his whole income.
This sum, which was about the ordinary pay of a common sailor, who had
his food and lodging provided for him, was little enough to live upon;
but miserable as it was, Origen must have paid a dear premium to
obtain it. Those manuscripts of "ancient authors" were probably the
fruits and the assistance of his early studies; he must have written
many of them under the eye of his martyred father. He had "labored
with care and love to write them out fairly," we are told, and
doubtless he prized them at once as a scholar prizes his library and a
laborious worker the work of his hands. For many years, probably until
he went to Rome in 211, he continued to receive his twopence or
threepence every day from the person who had bought his books. But we
cease in great part to wonder how little he lived on when we know how
he lived. In obedience to our Lord's command, and in opposition to the
prevailing practice of all but the poorest classes, he wore the tunic
single, and as for the pallium, he seems either to have dispensed with
it altogether, or only to have worn it whilst teaching. For many years
he went entirely barefoot. He fasted continually from all that was not
absolutely necessary to keep him alive; he never touched wine; he
worked hard all day in teaching and visiting the poor; and after
studying what we should call theology the greater part of the night,
he did not go to bed, but took a little rest on the floor. This
"vehemently philosophic" life, as Eusebius calls it, reduced him in
time, as might have been expected, to a mere wreck; insufficient food
and scanty clothing brought on severe stomachic complaints, which
nearly caused his death. It is not to be supposed that his disciples
and the Church in general looked on with indifference whilst he
practised these austerities. On the contrary, he was solicited over
and over again to receive assistance and to take care of himself; and
many were even somewhat offended because he refused their well-meant
offers. But Origen had chosen to put his hand to the plough, and he
would not have been Origen if he had turned back. It is probable,
indeed, that he somewhat moderated his austerities when his health
began to give way seriously; but hard work and hard living were his
lot to the end, and the name of Adamantine, which he received at this
time, and which all ages and countries have confirmed to him, shows
what the popular impression was of what he actually went through. As
might have been expected, a man of such singleness and determination
had many imitators. We have seen that the very pagan philosophers came
to listen to him. {731} The young scholars whom he instructed, and
many of whom he converted, did more than listen to him; they joined
him, and imitated as nearly as they could what Eusebius again calls
the "philosophy" of his life. It was no barren aping of externals,
such as might have been seen going on a little way off at the Museum;
he, on his part, taught them deep and earnest lessons in the deepest
and most earnest of all philosophies; they, on theirs, proved that his
words were power by the severest of all tests--they stood firm in the
horrors of a fearful persecution, and more than one of them witnessed
to them by a cruel death.

As long as the persecution lasted, anything like regularity and
completeness in a work like that of Origen was clearly impossible. But
a persecution at Alexandria, though generally furious as long as it
lasted, happily seldom lasted very long. Popular opinion was, no
doubt, very bitter against Christianity. But popular opinion was one
thing; the will of the prince-governor another. Moreover, the popular
opinion of the Greek philosophers was generally diametrically opposed
to that of their Roman masters, and the beliefs and traditions of the
Rhacôtis tended to the instant extermination of the Jews; and though
these four antagonistic elements could, upon occasion, so far forget
their differences as to unite in an onslaught against the Christians,
yet, before long, quarrels arose and riots ensued among the allied
parties to such an extent that the legionaries had no choice but to
clear the streets in the most impartial manner. Again, it is quite
certain that the Christian party included in it not a few men of rank;
and, what is more important, of power and authority. This we know from
the trouble St. Dionysius, one of Origen's scholars, afterward had
with many such persons who had "lapsed" in the Decian persecution. As
everything, therefore, depended on the humor of the governor, and as
the governor was, as other men, liable to be influenced by bribes
suggestions, and caprice, a furious persecution might suddenly die
out, and the Church begin to enjoy comparative peace at the very time
when things looked worst. Until the year 211, "Adamantius" taught,
studied, prayed, and fasted amidst disturbance, martyrdoms, and
fleeings from house to house; but that year wrought a change, not only
in Alexandria, but over the whole world. It was simply the year of the
death of Septimus Severus at York, and of the accession of Caracalla
and Geta; but this was an event which, if precedents were to be
trusted, invited all the nations that recognized the Roman eagle to be
ready for any change, however unreasonable, beginning with the senate,
and ending with the Christians. It was, probably, in this same year,
211, that Origen took advantage of the restoration of tranquillity to
visit the city and Church of Rome. It would seem that this episode of
his journey to Rome has not been sufficiently considered in the
greater part of the accounts of his life. Protestant writers, as may
be expected, pass it over quietly, either barely mentioning it, or, if
they do put a gloss upon it, confining themselves to generalities
about the interchange of ideas or the antiquity and renown of the
Roman Church. But there is evidently more in it than this. Origen was
just twenty-six years of age: though so young, he was already famous
as a teacher and a holy liver in the most learned of cities, and one
of the most ascetical of churches. His work was immense, and daily
increasing. On the cessation of the persecution, the great school was
to be reorganized, and put once more into that thorough working order
which had made it so effective under Pantaenus and Clement. Yet, just
at this busy crisis, he hurries off to Rome, stays there a short time,
and hurries back again. In the first place, why go at all? What could
Rome or any other church give him that he had not already at
Alexandria? Not scientific learning, certainly; not a systematic {732}
organization of work; not reverence for Holy Scripture; not the method
of confuting learned philosophy. Again: why go specially to Rome? Was
there not a high road, easy and comparatively short, to Caesarea of
Palestine, and would he not find there facilities enough for the
"interchange of thought?" For there, about fifteen years before, had
assembled one of the first councils ever held since the council of
Jerusalem. Was there not Jerusalem, the cradle of the Church? It was
then, indeed, shorn of its glory, both spiritual and historical; for
it was subject, at least not superior, to Caesarea, and was known to
the empire by the name of Aelia Capitolina; but its aged bishop was a
worker of miracles. Was there not Antioch, the great central see of
busy, intellectual Syria, the see of St. Theophilus, wherein saintly
bishops on the one hand, and Marcionite heresy and Paschal schism on
the other, kept the traditions of the faith bright and polished? Were
there not the Seven Churches? Was there not many a "mother-city"
between the Mediterranean and the mountain ranges where apostolic
teachings were strong yet, and apostolic men yet ruled? Origen's
motive in going to "see Rome" is given us by himself, or, rather, by
his biographer in his words; but, unfortunately, in such an ambiguous
way that it is almost useless as an argument; he wished, says
Eusebius, "to see the very ancient Church of Rome." The word we have
translated "very ancient" ([Greek text]) may also mean, as we need not
say, "first in dignity." It is hardly worth while to argue upon it,
but it will not fail to strike the reader that Jerusalem and Antioch,
not to mention other sees, were both older than Rome, if age was the
only recommendation. Origen's visit to Rome, then, is a very
remarkable event in his life, for it shows undoubtedly that the chief
of the greatest school of the Church found he required something which
could only be obtained in Rome, and that something can only have been
an approach to the chief and supreme depositary of tradition. He was
at the very beginning of his career, and he could begin no better than
by invoking the blessing of that rock of the Church of whom his
master, Clement, had taught him to think so nobly and lovingly. We
shall see that, many a year after this, in the midst of troubles and
calumnies, when his great life was nearly closed, the same see of
Peter received the professions and obedience of his failing voice, as
it had witnessed and blessed the ardor of his youth. He was not,
indeed, the first who, though already great in his own country, had
been drawn toward a greatness which something told them was without a
rival. Three-quarters of a century before Rome had attracted from
far-off Jerusalem that great St. Hegesippus, the founder of church
history, whose works are lost, but whose fame remains. A convert from
Judaism, he left his native city, travelled to Rome, and sojourned
there for twenty years, busily learning and committing to writing
those practices and traditions of the Roman Church which he afterward
appears to have disseminated all over the East, and which he conveyed,
toward the end of his life, to his own Jerusalem, where he died. From
Assyria and beyond the Tigris the "perfume of Rome" had enticed the
great Tatian--happy if, on his return, he had still kept pure that
faith which, at Rome, he defended so well against Crescens the cynic.
A great mind and a widely cultivated genius found the sphere of its
rest in Rome, when St. Justin finished his wanderings there and sealed
the workings of his active intellect by shedding his blood at the
bidding of the ruling clique of Stoics--_"philosophus et martyr"_ as
the old martyrologies call him. A famous name, too, is that of Rhodon,
of Asia, well known for his steady and able defence of the faith
against Marcionites and other heretics. These, and such as these, had
come from the world's ends to visit the great apostolic see before
Origen's day dawned. But there were others, and as great, whom {733}
he may actually have met in the city, either on a visit like himself,
or because they were members of the Roman clergy. There was the great
Carthaginian, Tertullian, who, for many years, lived, learned, and
wrote in Rome; his works show how well he knew the Roman Church, and
how often afterward he had occasion, in his polemical battles, to
allude to the _"Ecclesia transmarina"_ as Africa called Rome. A
meeting between Origen and Tertullian is a very suggestive idea; the
only misfortune is, that we have no warrant whatever for supposing it
beyond the bare possibility. But by naming Tertullian we suggest one
view, at least, of the ecclesiastical society which Origen would meet
when he visited Rome. Another celebrated man, whom there is more
likelihood that Origen did meet, is the convert Roman lawyer, Minucius
Felix, who employed his recognized talents and trained skill in
vigorous apologetic writings, one of which we still possess. A third
was the priest Caius, one of the Roman clergy, famed as the adversary
of Proclus the Montanist, unless he had already started on his
missionary career as regionary bishop. Finally, there was St.
Hippolytus, who, like Caius, was from the school of St. Irenaeus, and
had come from Lyons to Rome, where he seems to have been no unworthy
representative of his teacher's zeal against heretics. Nearly every
step of the life of St. Hippolytus is encumbered by the ruin of a
learned theory or the useless rubbish of an abandoned position; but he
as far as we can conjecture, the chief scientific adviser of the Roman
pontiffs in the measures they took at this time regarding Easter and
against the Noetians. Until scientific men have settled their disputes
as to who was the author of the _Philosophumena_, or Treatise _against
All Heresies_, little more can be said about St. Hippolytus. The
Treatise itself, however, whose recovery some twenty years ago excited
so much interest, must have had an author, and it is nearly certain
the author must have been one of the Roman clergy at this very time.
It is still more certain that the matters therein discussed must
represent very completely one view of Church matters at Rome in the
early part of the third century; and, therefore, even if Origen did
not meet the author in person, he must have met many who thought as he
did. Now it is rather interesting to read the _Philosophumena_ in this
light, and to conjecture what Origen would think of some of its views.
The leading idea of the work, which is not even yet extant complete,
is to prove that all heresies have sprung from Greek philosophy. This
it attempts to do by detailing, first, the systems of the
philosophers, then those of the heretics, and showing their mutual
connection. The scandalous attack on St. Callistus, in the ninth book,
may or may not be an interpolation by a later hand; if not, the author
must have been much more ingenious than reputable. There is no denying
the historical and literary value of the Treatise; but where it
professes to draw deductions and to give philosophical analyses of
systems, it seems of comparatively moderate worth. For instance, the
author's analysis and appreciation of the philosophy of Aristotle is
little better than a libel on the great _"maestro di lor chi sanno;"_
and Basilides, though doubtless a clever personage in his way, can
hardly have taken the trouble to go so far for the small amount of
philosophy that seasons his fantastical speculations. But a general
opinion resembling the opinion maintained in the Treatise seems to
have been common in the West; and when Tertullian says of the
philosophy of Plato that it was _"haereticorum omnium
condimentarium,"_ he was doubtless expressing the idea of many beside
himself. To Origen, fresh from the school of Clement and the
atmosphere of Alexandria, such language must have sounded startling,
to say the least, and we cannot help feeling he would be rather {734}
sorry, if not indignant, to hear the great names he had been taught to
think of with so much admiration and compassion unfeelingly
caricatured into a relationship of paternity with such men as the
founders of Gnosticism. He does not appear to have been very familiar
yet with the Greek systems; they had not come specially in his way,
though he had heard of them in the Christian schools, and there is
little doubt that he had already seen the necessity of studying them
more closely, as he actually did on his return to Alexandria. What
effect the views of the Western Church had on his teaching, and how he
treated the philosophers, we shall have to consider in the sequel.
Meanwhile, his stay at Rome was over; he had studied the faith and
heresy, discipline and schism, church organization and sectarian
rebellion, in the most important centre of the whole Church, and his
school at Alexandria was awaiting him, to reap the benefit of his
journey.

On the return of Origen to Alexandria, it would almost appear
as if he had wished to decline, for a time, the office of chief of the
Catechisms. The historian tells us that he only resumed it at the
strongly expressed desire of his bishop, Demetrius, who was anxious
for the "profit and advantage of the brethren." Perhaps he wished for
greater leisure than such a post would permit of, in order to carry
into execution certain projects that were forming in his mind. But
neither the patriarch nor his scholars would hear of his giving up,
and so he had to settle to his work again; "which he did," says
Eusebius, "with the greatest zeal," as he did everything. From this
time, with one or two short interruptions, he lived and taught in
Alexandria for twenty years. His life as an authoritative teacher and
"master in Israel" may be said to commence from this point. It was an
epoch resembling in some degree that other epoch, thirty years before,
when Pantaenus had been called upon to take the charge of chief
teacher in the Alexandrian Church. Now, as then, the winter of a
persecution had passed, and the season was sunny and promising. Now,
as then, men were high in hope, and set to work with valiant hearts to
repair the breaches the straggle had left, and to restore to the
rock-built fortress that glory and comeliness that became her so well;
but with which, if need was, she could securely dispense. But there
was no slight difference between 180 and 211. The tide of Christianity
had risen perceptibly all over the Church; most of all on the shores
of its greatest scientific centre. The possibility of appealing to
those who had heard the apostles had long been past, but now even the
disciples of Polycarp, Simeon, and Ignatius had disappeared; instead
of Irenaeus there was Hippolytus, and Demetrius of Alexandria was the
eleventh successor of St. Mark. Heretics had multiplied, questions had
been asked, tradition was developing itself, dogma was being fixed.
The form of teaching was, therefore, in process of change as other
things changed. Greater precision, more "positive theology," a more
constant look-out for what authority had said or might say--these
necessities would make the teacher's office more difficult, even if
more definite. The position of the Church toward its enemies, also,
was sensibly changing. The "gain-sayers" were not of the same class as
had been addressed by St. Theophilus or St. Justin. The state of
things had grown more distinctly marked. Christianity was no longer an
idea that might, in a burst of noble rhetoric, be made to set on fire,
for a moment, even the camp of the enemy. It was now known to the
Gentile world as a stern and unyielding praxis; susceptible, perhaps,
of scientific and literary treatment, but quite distinct from both
science and letters. Enthusiastic but timid _dilettanti_ had lost
their enthusiasm, and gave full scope to their fears. Amiable
philosophers took back the right hand of fellowship, and retreated
behind those who, by a {735} special instinct, had always refused to
be amiable, and now thought themselves more justified than ever. On
the Christian side the war had lost much of the adventure which
accompanies the first dashing inroads into an enemy's country.
Surprises were not so easy, systematic opposition was frequent, and
their writers were obliged to fight by tactics, and in the prosaic
array of argument for argument. Documents, moral testimony,
institutions, were the objects of attack from without. The apostles
were vilified, faith was proved to be irrational, the Bible was ranked
with Syrian impostures and Jewish charm-books. And here, in the matter
of the Bible, was a mighty enterprise for the Christian teacher. The
canon had not yet been officially promulgated. A generation that would
despise an apocryphal book of Homer or a false Orphic hymn would not
be easily satisfied with the credentials of a religion. Great, then,
would be that Christian teacher who should at once teach the faithful,
and yet not "take away from" the faith; win the philosophers, and yet
fight them hand to hand; and give to the world a critical edition of
the Bible, yet hold fast to ancient tradition. Such was the work of
Origen.

He began by external organization; he divided the multitudes that
flocked to the Catechisms into two grand classes; one of those who
were commencing, another of those who were more advanced. The former
class he gave to his first convert, Heraclas; the latter he kept to
himself. Heraclas was "skilled in theology," and "in other respects a
very eloquent man;" and, moreover, he was "fairly conversant with
philosophy," three qualifications in an Alexandrian catechist none of
which could be dispensed with. In any case, the division was a matter
of absolute necessity, for these extraordinary Alexandrian scholars,
models and patterns that deserve to be imitated more extensively than
they have been, gave him no respite and kept no regular school-hours,
but crowded in and out "from morning till night;" "not even a
breathing-space did they afford him," says his biographer. In such
circumstances theological study and scriptural labors were out of the
question, even if he had been the man of adamant that his admirers,
with the true Alexandrian passion for nicknames, had already begun to
call him. He therefore looked about among "his familiars," those of
his disciples who had attached themselves to him and lived with him a
life of study and asceticism; and from them he chose out Heraclas, the
brother of the martyred Plutarchus, to be the chief associate of his
work.

It need not be again mentioned that Origen's work, as that of
Pantaenus and of Clement before him, had three classes of persons to
deal with--catechumens, heretics, and philosophers. His dealings with
the heretics and philosophers will be treated of more appropriately
when we come to consider his journeys, the most important of which
occurred after the expiration of the twenty years with which we are
now concerned. As the school of Alexandria was chiefly and primarily
connected with the catechumens, the account of the twenty years of his
presidency will naturally be concerned chiefly and primarily with the
latter, that is to say, with those whom that great school undertook to
instruct in faith and discipline. And here we approach and stand close
beneath one side of that monumental fane that bears upon it for all
generations the name of Origen. The neophytes of Alexandria were
chiefly taught out of one book; it was the custom handed from teacher
to teacher; each held up the book and explained it, according to the
"unvarying tradition of the ancients." For two hundred and ten years
the work had gone on; but time has destroyed nearly every trace of
what was written and spoken. For the first time since St. Mark wrote
the gospel, Alexandria speaks now in history with a voice that shall
commence a new era in the history of {736} Holy Scripture. Pantaemus
had written "Commentaries" on the whole of the Bible; Clement had
left, in the _Hypotyposes_, a summary exposition of all the canonical
Scripture, not forgetting a glance at the "Contradictions" of
heretics. Both these writings have perished long ago. When Origen
came, in his turn, to take the same work in hand, a pressing want soon
forced itself upon his mind. There was no authentic version of the
sacred Word. The New Testament canon was still uncertain, one Church
upholding a greater number of books, another less. The Roman canon
was, indeed, from the first identical with the Tridentine (see
Perrone, _"De Locis Theologicis"_). But the Church of Antioch, _e.g._,
ignored no less than five of the canonical books. Alexandria, well
supplied with learned expositors, and not a little influenced by the
native Alexandrian instinct for criticism and grammar, had got further
in the development of the canon than the majority of its sisters. Yet,
so far, there had hardly been any distinct interference on the part of
authority, and though, as we shall see, Origen's New Testament canon
was the same as that of the Council of Trent, yet there were not
wanting private writers who expressed doubts about the Epistle to the
Hebrews or the Apocalypse. One thing, however, is very clear in all
these somewhat troublesome disputes about the canon; whether we turn
to Tertullian in Africa, to St. Jerome in Italy, to St. Irenaeus in
the West, or to Clement and Origen in the East, we find one grand and
large criterion put forth as the test of all authenticity, viz., the
tradition of the ancients. "Go to the oldest churches," says St.
Irenaeus. "The truest," says Tertullian, "is the oldest; the oldest is
what always was; what always was is from the apostles; go therefore to
the churches of the apostles, and find what is there held sacred." "We
must not transgress the bounds set by our fathers," says Origen. It
took several centuries to complete this process; but the principle was
a strong and a living one, and its working out was only a matter of
time. It was worked out something in this fashion. A provincial
presbyter, we will say from Pelusium, or Syene, or Arsinoe, came up to
Alexandria (he may easily have done so, thanks to the police
arrangements and engineering enterprise of Ptolemy Philadelphus);
having much ecclesiastical news to communicate, and perhaps important
business to arrange on the part of his bishop, he would be thrown into
close contact with the presbytery of the metropolitan Church. Let us
suppose that, in order to support some point of practical morality,
touching the "lapsed" or the converts, he quoted Hermas' "Shepherd" as
canonical Scripture. The archdeacon with whom he was arguing would
demur to such an authority; let him quote Paul, or Jude, or Peter, or
John, but not Hernias; Hernias was not in the canon. The presbyter
from the provinces would be a little amazed and even ruffled; how
could he say it was not in the canon when he himself had heard it read
on the Lord's day before the sacred mysteries in the patriarchal
Church, in the presence of the very patriarch himself, seated on his
throne, and surrounded by the clergy? A canonical book meant a book
within the Church's general rule ([Greek text]), and the rule of the
Church was that a book read at such a time was thereby declared true
Scripture. The archdeacon would reply that the presbyter was right in
the main, both as to facts and principles; but would point out that at
Alexandria they had a set of books which were read at the solemn time
he mentioned, beside regular Scripture; and if he had known their
usages better, or if he had asked any of the clergy, or the patriarch,
he would be aware that such writings were only _read to the people_ as
pious exhortations, not _defined_ as the repository of the faith. The
presbyter would consider this inconvenient, and would doubtless be
right in thinking so. The practice was {737} condemned by various
councils in the next century. But he would at once admit that if the
tradition were so, then the Alexandrian Church certainly appeared to
reject Hernias. But he would have another difficulty. Did not Clement,
of blessed memory, consider Hernias as authentic, or, at any rate, the
Epistle of Barnabas, which was quite a parallel case? And did not
Origen (whom we suppose to be then teaching) call the "Shepherd"
"divinely inspired?" It was true, the archdeacon would rejoin, that
both Clement in former years and Origen then spoke very highly of
several writings of this class; but he must refer him once more to the
authoritative tradition of the Alexandrian Church, to be learned, in
the last instance, from the lips of Demetrius himself: this would at
once show that Clement and Origen could not mean to put Hernias on a
level with Paul, and Origen himself would certainly admit so much, if
he were asked. The presbyter would inquire, during his stay, of the
heads of the Catechetical school, of the ancient priests, and of the
patriarch; he would be satisfied that what the archdeacon said was
true; and he would return to his city on the Red Sea, or at the
extremity of the Thebaid, or on the north-western coast of the
continent, with authentic intelligence that the Apostolic Church of
Alexandria rejected Hermas from the Scripture canon, and that,
therefore, it certainly ought to be rejected by his own Church. He
would, perhaps, in addition to this, bring the information that the
metropolitan Church, so he had found out in his researches, upheld the
Epistle to the Hebrews, or the Apocalypse of the Apostle John, to be
true and genuine Scripture; would it not, therefore, be well to
consider whether these also should not be admitted by themselves? In
this way, or in some way analogous, the Churches that lay within the
"circumscription" of a patriarchal or apostolic see would by degrees
be led to conform their canon to the canon of the principal Church. As
time went on, the great metropolitan sees themselves became grouped
round the three grand centres of Alexandria, Antioch, and Rome; and,
finally, in the process of the development of tradition, at least as
early as A.D. 800, the whole Church had adopted the canon as approved
by Rome in the decretal of Innocent I. It is, therefore, a remarkable
fact that Origen quotes the canon of the New Testament precisely as it
now stands in the Vulgate. It would hardly be true to say that he
formally states as exclusively authentic the complete list of the
Catholic canon; but that he does enumerate it is certain. Moreover, in
addition to the remarkable correctness of his investigations on the
canon, Origen did much, in other ways, for a book that was
emphatically the textbook of his school. The exemplars in general use
were in a most unsatisfactory state: there were hardly two alike.
Writers had been careless, audacious innovators had inserted their
interpolations, honest but mistaken bunglers had added and taken away
whenever the sense seemed to require it. It is Origen himself who
makes these complaints, and nobody had better occasion to know how
true they were. The manuscript used in the great Church probably
differed from that used by the chief catechist; his, again, differed
from every one of those brought to class by the wealthier of his
scholars. One would bring up a copy of St. Matthew's Gospel, which, on
investigation, would turn out to be full of Nazarite or Ebionite
"improvements"--another would have an Acts of the Apostles, which had
been bequeathed to him by some venerable Judaizant, and wherein St.
James of Jerusalem would be found to have assumed more importance than
St. Luke was generally supposed to have given him. A third would have
a copy so full of monstrous corruptions in the way of mutilation and
deliberate heretical glossing, that the orthodox ears of the {738}
master would certainly have detected a quotation from it in two lines:
it would be one of Valentine's editions. A fourth, newly arrived from
some place where Tertullian had never been heard of, would appear with
a bulky set of _volumina_, which Origen would find to his great
disgust to be the New Testament "according to Marcion." That first and
chief of reckless falsifiers had "circumcised" the New Testament, as
St. Irenaeus calls it, to such an extent that he had to invent a
quantity of new Acts and Apocalypses to keep up appearances, and what
he retained he had freely cut and tortured into Marcionism; for he
said openly that the apostles were moderately well-informed, but that
his lights were far in advance of them. Such examples as these are, of
course, extremes; but even in orthodox copies there must have been a
bewildering number of _variantes_. Origen's position would bring him
into contact with exemplars from many distant churches. The work of
copying fresh ones for the "missions," or to supply the wants of the
provinces, would necessitate some choice of manuscripts; and in a
matter so important, we may be sure that his catechists,
fellow-townsmen of Aristarchus, rather enjoyed than otherwise the
vigorous critical disputes which the collation of MSS. has a special
tendency to engender. It is nearly established--indeed, we may say, it
is certain--that Origen wrote a copy of the New Testament with his own
hand. It was not a new edition, apparently, but a corrected copy of
the generally received version. He corrected the blunders of copyists;
he struck out of the text everything that was evidently a mere gloss;
he re-inserted what had clearly dropped out by mischance, and adopted
a few readings that were unmistakable improvements. But he made no
alteration of the text on mere conjecture. However faulty a reading
might seem, he never changed it without authority; he had too much
reverence for Holy Scripture, and probably, also, too bitter an
experience of conjectural emendations, to sanction such dangerous
proceedings by his own practice. This precious copy, the fruit of his
labors and study, the depositary of his wide experience, and the
record of his "adamantine" industry, was apparently the one from which
he himself always quoted, and, therefore, we may conclude, which he
always used. It lay, after his death, in the archives of Caesarea of
Palestine, with his other Biblical MSS. Pamphilus the Martyr is
related to have copied it; and in the time of Constantine, Eusebius
sent many transcripts of it to the imperial city. Eusebius himself
copied it with all the reverence he would necessarily feel for his
hero, Origen; and by means of his copy, or of copies made by his
direction, it became the basis of that recension of the New Testament
known as the Alexandrine. St. Jerome was well acquainted with the
library of Caesarea, and often mentions the _"Codices Adamantii"_
which he was privileged to consult there; and we need not remind the
reader of the well-known agreement of the Latin versions with those of
Palestine and Alexandria. Now Palestine meant--first, Jerusalem, where
was the celebrated library formed by St. Alexander, Origen's own
college friend and an Alexandria man, as we should say, and partly
under Origen's influence; and, secondly, Caesarea, which inherited
Origen's traditions and teaching, at least equally with Alexandria, as
we shall see later on, and in which the originals of his works were
preserved with religious veneration, until war and sack of Persian or
Moslem destroyed them. Thus the work of Origen on the New Testament,
begun and mainly carried out during those twenty years at Alexandria,
is living and active at this very day. But if the New Testament needed
setting to rights, it was correct and accurate in comparison with the
Old. How he treated the Septuagint, and how the Hexapla and the
Tetrapla grew under nimble hands and learned heads, we must for the
present defer to tell.



{739}

From The Fortnightly Review.

MARTIN'S PUZZLE.

I.

  There she goes up the street with her book in her hand,
    And her "Good morning, Martin!" "Ay, lass, how d'ye do?"
  "Very well, thank you, Martin!" I can't understand;
    I might just as well never have cobbled a shoe!
  I can't understand it. She talks like a song:
    Her voice takes your ear like the ring of a glass;
  She seems to give gladness while limping along;
    Yet sinner ne'er suffered like that little lass.

II.

  Now, I'm a rough fellow--what's happen'd to me?
    Since last I left Falmouth I've not had a fight
  With a miner come down for a dip in the sea;
    I cobble contented from morning to night.
  The Lord gives me all that a man should require;
    Protects me, and "cuddles me up," as it were.
  But what have I done to be saved from the fire?
    And why does his punishment fall upon her?

III.

  First, a fool of a boy ran her down with a cart.
    Then, her fool of a father--a blacksmith by trade--
  Why the deuce does he tell us it hah broke his heart?
    His heart!--where's the leg of the poor little maid!
  Well, that's not enough; they must push her downstairs,
    To make her go crooked: but why count the list?
  If it's right to suppose that our human affairs
    Are all order'd by heaven--there, bang goes my fist!

IV.

  For if angels can look on such sights--never mind!
    When you're next to blaspheming, it's best to be mum.
  The parson declares that her woes weren't design'd;
    But, then, with the parson it's all kingdom-come.
  "Lose a leg, save a soul "--a convenient text;
    I call it "Tea doctrine," not savoring of God.
  When poor little Molly wants "chastening," why, next--
    The Archangel Michael might taste of the rod.

{740}

V.

  But, to see the poor darling go limping for miles
    To read books to sick people!--and just of an age
  When girls learn the meaning of ribbons and smiles,--
    Makes me feel like a squirrel that turns in a cage.
  The more I push thinking, the more I resolve:
    I never get further:--and as to her face,
  It starts up when near on my puzzle I solve,
    And says, "This crush'd body seems such a sad case."

VI.

  Not that she's for complaining: she reads to earn pence;
    And from those who can't pay, simple thanks are enough.
  Does she leave lamentation for chaps without sense?
    Howsoever, she's made up of wonderful stuff.
  Ay, the soul in her body must be a stout cord;
    She sings little hymns at the close of the day,
  Though she has but three fingers to lift to the Lord,
    And only one leg to kneel down with to pray.

VII.

  What I ask is, Why persecute such a poor dear,
    If there's law above all? Answer that if you can!
  Irreligious I'm not; but I look on this sphere
    As a place where a man should just think like a man.
  It isn't fair dealing! But, contrariwise,
    Do bullets in battle the wicked select?
  Why, then it's all chance-work! And yet, in her eyes,
    She hold's a fixed something by which I am check'd.

VIII.

  Yonder ribbon of sunshine aslope on the wall,
    If you eye it a minute, 'll have the same look:
  So kind! and so merciful! God of us all!
    It's the very same lesson we get from thy book.
  Then is life but a trial? Is that what is meant?
    Some must toil, and some perish, for others below:
  The injustice to each spreads a common content;
    Ay! I've lost it again, for it can't be quite so.

IX.

  She's the victim of fools: that seems nearer the mark.
    On earth there are engines and numerous fools.
  Why the Lord can permit them, we're still in the dark;
    He does, and in some sort of way they're his tools.
  It's a roundabout way, with respect let me add,
    If Molly goes crippled that we may be taught:
  But, perhaps, it's the only way, though it's so bad;
    In that case we'll bow down our heads, as we ought.

{741}

X.

  But the worst of _me_ is, that when I bow my head,
    I perceive a thought wriggling away in the dust,
  And I follow its tracks, quite forgetful, instead
    Of humble acceptance: for, question I must!
  Here's a creature made carefully--carefully made
    Put together with craft, and then stampt on, and why?
  The answer seems nowhere: it's discord that's play'd.
    The sky's a blue dish!--an implacable sky!

XI.

  Stop a moment. I seize an idea from the pit.
    They tell us that discord, though discord, alone,
  Can be harmony when the notes properly fit:
    Am I judging all things from a single false tone?
  Is the universe one immense organ, that rolls
    From devils to angels? I'm blind with the sight.
  It pours such a splendor on heaps of poor souls!
    Suppose I try kneeling with Molly to-night.

GEORGE MEREDITH.

------

Translated from Der Katholik.

THE TWO SIDES OF CATHOLICISM.

[Third and concluding Article.]


IV. THE HEART OF THE CHURCH.

Christ approves himself as the head of the Church inasmuch as her
individual members are subject to his guidance, and live and move in
him.  [Footnote 151] This protracted influence of Christ is exercised
by means of an innate harmonizing and vivifying principle of the
Church. We have arrived at the heart of the Church. Our ancient
theology bestows this epithet on the Holy Ghost.  [Footnote 152]  The
Church receives the Holy Ghost through Christ. Such is the doctrine of
Scripture, clearly expressed. Jesus promises his disciples to send
them after his departure the Holy Spirit, the Spirit of truth, in whom
they will find a compensation for the Master. For it is the function
of the Spirit to testify of Christ, and to bring all things to the
remembrance of the Church, whatsoever Jesus has said. Thus are all
things taught unto the Church. This efficacy, which has the glory of
Christ for its aim, the Holy Ghost derives from the fulness of
Christ's Godhead, _de meo accipiet._ The Holy Ghost was not given
until after Jesus was glorified. Christ being exalted, and having
received the Holy Ghost promised of the Father, sheds forth the Spirit
upon the Church. Even the prior inspiration of the apostles was the
result of an act of Christ. Jesus breathed on them and said unto them,
Receive ye the Holy Ghost.

  [Footnote 151: St. Thomas, iii. 93, a. 6.]

  [Footnote 152: _Ibid, a. 1, ad. S: Caput habet manifestam eminentiam
  respectu caeterorum exteriorum membrorum; sed cor habet quandam
  influentiam occultam. Et ideo cordi comparatur Spiritus sanctus, qui
  invisibiliter ecclesiam viviflcat et unit._]

The Spirit acts as the heart of the Church under the control and
influence of the head. The fundamental theological reason of this is
not difficult of demonstration. The external relations {742} of the
several divine persons, or their relations to the works of God, such
as the one just described of the Holy Ghost to the Church, are
intimately connected with the intro-divine relations of the members of
the most Holy Trinity to each other. It is in this sense that Holy
Writ makes mention of a _mission_ of the Son and of the Spirit. The
expression implies that the person concerning whom it is used,
occupies toward the remaining divine persons a position admitting of
the giving of a mission by them or one of them, that is to say, of a
particular work done by the one by the power and at the delegation of
the other. For one person of the Trinity to act in a mission,
therefore, it is requisite that the power and the will to act must
emanate from the person conferring the mission. Thus Jesus says that
his doctrine is not his own, but the doctrine of him by whom he was
sent. But one person of the Trinity can be a recipient from another in
so far only as the recipient issues from the giver for ever and ever,
or only in respect of the eternal procession. It follows that a divine
person can receive a mission only in emanating from another, that is
to say, none but the _personae productae_, the Son and the Holy Ghost,
can be sent; while, on the other hand, only the _personae
producentes_, the Father and the Son, can confer a mission. Hence the
fundamental reason why the sway of the Spirit in the Church is
exercised under the influence of Christ, is to be found in the manner
of the eternal procession, _i.e._, in the coming of the Spirit from
the Father and the Son.

The essence of Christianity consists in spiritual intercourse and
spiritual influence. As distinguished from the old covenant, the
characteristic of the New Testament dispensation consists in this:
that it is done by the agency of the Holy Ghost, sent down from
heaven. The Spirit of Christ was in the prophets; but the same Spirit
manifests a new activity since the mission from heaven. When the
apostle desires to make the true foundation of faith clear to the
Galatians, he contents himself with asking them whence they had
received the Spirit? By its descent the blessing of Abraham came on
the Gentiles through Jesus Christ, in fulfilment of the prophecies.
The pouring out of the Holy Ghost is the crowning work of Christ's
mediation.

But what is the badge of this more profuse dispensation of the Spirit,
thus recognized in Scripture as the peculiar mark of Christianity?
Under the ancient covenant, answers St. Gregory of Naziance, the Holy
Ghost was present only by its efficacy ([Greek text]); now it abides
among us [Greek text] _i.e._, in its essence, or _substantialiter_, as
our theologians phrase it. The efficacy of the Spirit in the prophets
is described by St. Cyril of Alexandria as a mere irradiation [[Greek
text]]; they received only the effulgence of the light, as those who
follow a torch-bearer [[Greek text]]; while the Spirit in proper
person enters into the souls of those who believe in Christ, and
dwells therein [Greek text]. It is only since the ascension of Christ
that the inhabitation of the Spirit in the souls of men has reached
its completion as [Greek text]. This is the reason assigned by St.
Cyril for the declaration of the Lord that he that is least in the
kingdom of heaven is greater than John the Baptist, than whom there
hath not risen a greater among them that are born of women. He
interprets the kingdom of heaven here referred to to be the impartment
[Greek text] of the Holy Ghost. From this interpretation he deduces
the reason wherefore the humblest citizen of the kingdom of heaven is
above the Baptist. For the latter is born of woman, the former of God.
In consequence of this regeneration we are partakers of the divine
nature, which St. Cyril interprets to mean neither more nor less than
the dwelling of the Holy Ghost in our souls.   [Footnote 153 ]

  [Footnote 153: _Comment, in Joann. Evangel._, lib. 5. _Oper Lutet_,
  1638, A. IV., p. 474 et seq. ]

As the head of the Church, the Son {743} of man, being lifted up from
the earth, draws all men unto him. The Scripture concludes the
narration of the miraculous events of the first Christian Passover and
of their immediate results with the remark that the Lord added to the
Church daily such as should be saved. Therefore, immediately after the
outpouring of the Holy Ghost, began the daily increase of the Church
through the fructifying influence of the grace of its head. They were
multiplied in proportion as they walked in the comfort, the [Greek
text], of the Holy Ghost. By one Spirit the Church of Christ is
baptized into one body, which Spirit overflows it and saturates it
with its essence. In him we were sealed as the possession of Christ,
and we know that he abideth in us by the Spirit which he hath given
us. On being received into the Church the members are built into an
edifice, the foundation of which has its cornerstone in Christ. By
this incorporation they are united into a mansion of God in the
Spirit. In so far as we are joined unto the Lord we are one spirit
with him, and our bodies are temples of the Holy Ghost.

On account of its intimate relations with Christ, the Spirit is called
the Spirit of Christ. Even the Lord himself is directly called the
Spirit. By him, the Spirit of the Lord, we are transformed into his
image, the image the Lord. Thereby the Spirit evinces itself the
principle of our liberty.

The main result of the action of the Spirit in the Church is,
therefore, the union of the latter and of her individual members with
Christ, the Christ who is within us. The union between Christ and the
Church is effected by the Spirit, who acts as the connecting link,
while Christ himself is the efficient cause of the union, in so far as
he sends his Spirit to accomplish it. How, then, is the inhabitation
of the Spirit, which is identical with that of Christ, in the Church
brought about? The answer to this question involves results decisive
of the present investigation.

If the Church were an unattained ideal, according to the Protestant
acceptation, the promise of Christ to be with his followers even unto
the end of the world would admit of no more profound interpretation
than that, after his personal departure, the Lord would continue to
occupy the minds of his disciples, thus giving their thoughts a right
direction through all time. The presence of Christ in the visible
Church would no longer be vouchsafed by a _substantial_ pledge, making
the repletion of the Church with Christ, which is the ideal of that
institution, a historical reality even at the present day, in so far
as the pledge is actually present. If, on the other hand, the latter
view is the only scriptural one, then the true Church is not to be
handed over exclusively to the future and to the realm of ideas. She
is herself within the sphere of reality, she belongs to the living
present, if the inmost principle of her being is even now actually at
work, as a gift coeval with her establishment, not the mere object of
search and speculation.

The idea of Catholicism presupposes one thing more. Such a principle
dwelling in the Church as a reality must necessarily exercise its
functions in a single individual image only. Both of these positions
are the necessary results of the teachings of Holy   Writ.

The Scriptures describe the Holy Ghost, by whom the love of God is
shed abroad in our hearts, as something conferred upon us, _per
spiritum sanctum qui datus est nobis_. In the capacity of abiding in
our souls as something bestowed upon us, as _donum_, the fathers
distinguish a personal attribute of the Holy Ghost, having its
foundation in the peculiar manner of its eternal emanation from the
Father and Son. This emanation is wrought as a common infusion of
being from Father and Son, as an intro-divine overflowing of love.
[Footnote 154] Together {744} with the Holy Ghost that is given unto
us, that is to say, by means of the love shed abroad in our hearts
through him, the two other persons of the Trinity likewise come and
take up their abode within our souls. The unity of the three divine
persons is not only the antetype of the unity of the Church, but is at
the same time its fundamental principle. In his high sacerdotal
invocation the Lord prays that all those who believe through the word
may be one, even as the Father is in him and he in the Father; and
that we may be one in the Father and the Son, _ut et ipsi eis nolis
unum sint_. The unity of the Father and the Son, who take up their
abode within us simultaneously with the Holy Ghost, is the foundation
of our own ecclesiastical unity. There is the fundamental, the
ultimate principle of Catholicism. In it, through the Holy Ghost, we
have a fellowship with the Father and with his Son Jesus Christ.

  [Footnote 154: _St. Augustinus, de Trinit._, lib. v., cap. 14:
  _Exiit enim non quomodo natus, sed quomodo datus; et ideo non
  dicitur filius._ Cap. 15: _Quia sic procedebat ut esset donabile,
  jam donum erat et antequam esset cui daretur_. Cap. 11: _Spiritus
  sanctus ineffabilis est quaedam Patris Filiique communio. . . . hoc
  ipse proprie dicitur, quod illi communiter: quia et Pater spiritus
  et Filius spiritus et Pater sanctus et Filius sanctus. Ut ergo ex
  nomine, quod utrique convenit, utriusque communio significetur,
  vocatur donum amborum Spiritus sanctus._]

The other functions ascribed to the Spirit by Holy Writ are also of
such a nature as to constrain us to assume that the essence of the
true Church is a reality even at this day. By the Holy Ghost we
receive even now an earnest of the inheritance in store for us. Its
testimony assures us that we are the children of God. We have become
such even now, and through him. We are born of the Spirit. The renewal
accomplished by him is a bath of regeneration, the putting on of a new
man. In the hearts of believers he is a well of water springing up
into everlasting life. In this sense our justification may be regarded
as a glorification in the germ. Christ has anointed the Church with a
chrism which abides and exerts itself in her as a permanent teacher.

It is an entire misapprehension of the creative power of Christianity
to ascribe to the Spirit of Christ which governs the Church no more
profitable efficacy than the barren, resultless chase of an ideal
which constantly eludes realization. The very idea that a law of
steady development is to be traced in Christianity itself, this very
favorite view of all the advocates of an ideal Church, ought to have
led to a more profound appreciation of the essence and history of the
Church. If the Church is to undergo a development, the realization of
her ideal should not be postponed to the end of time. What is its
course in history? This point is decisive of our position respecting
the ideal Church.

The doctrine relies upon Matt, xviii. 20. Here the Catholic
acceptation of a realization of the essence of the Church,
historically manifested, would appear to be directly excluded. The
passage adduced makes Christ abide among us, and accordingly makes the
true Church come into being simply in consequence of the casual
assemblage of two or three, so that it takes place in his name--a
condition the performance or breach of which is a matter by no means
patent to the senses. But these words are to be read in connection
with what precedes them. Verses 17 and 18 allude to the authority of'
the Church as historically manifest. The resolutions of that authority
are ratified in heaven, and are valid before God. For--such is the
logical thread of the discourse of Jesus--what the Church, as
historically manifested, ordains, is at the same time ordained by the
Holy Ghost dwelling within her. That such is actually the case, the
Lord then proceeds to show by the concluding illustration. The
agreement of two is alone sufficient to secure a fulfilment of the
prayer: for where two or three are assembled together in the name of
Christ, there is he in the midst of them: how much more amply then is
the presence and the countenance of Christ assured to the entire
Church, and to the organ intrusted with the execution of her {745}
power!  [Footnote 55] True, Christ is present even where only two or
three are assembled in his name; but the result of his presence
corresponds to the extent of the assembly. There Christ simply effects
the fulfilment of the common prayer. That the arbitrary concourse of a
few individuals in the name of Christ is the realization of the
essence of the Church, nowhere in the whole passage is there a word to
confirm such an interpretation.

  [Footnote 155: This is the interpretation of this passage by the
  council of Chalcedon, in its missive to Pope Leo the Great. Compare
  _Ballerini, op. S. Leonis_ t. i., p. 1087.]

The advocates of the ideal Church also cite Eph. v. 27.  [Footnote
156] There the Church is called holy and without blemish, not having
spot or wrinkle; a description supposed to be applicable exclusively
to the Church that is to be, and by no means to the Church as it is.
The remark is an idle one, and does not touch the real question. In
our view it is the work of the present to lay the foundation for the
future glory of the Church. This position is fully borne out by the
words of Scripture. For in verse 26 the apostle points out the
sanctification of the Church as the immediate object of the sacrifice
of Christ, and at the same time indicates the means by which the
Church is to be sanctified. This is done by the washing of water,
which owes its purifying efficacy to the simultaneous utterance of the
word. The presentation of the Church in unblemished holiness and
glory, the object of the sacrificial death of Christ, is therefore
gradually effected in the present world in proportion as the
purification by the sacrament, under the continued influence of
Christ, exerts its efficacy in he Church.

  [Footnote 156: Hase, _Handbuch der prot. Polemik_ (Manual of
  Protestant Polemics), p. 42. ]

If the apostle were here speaking simply of a remote future holiness
of the Church, his whole course of reasoning would lose its point. The
love of Christ is here presented to husbands and wives as a model for
their own connubial relations. As the self-sacrifice of Christ for the
Church has for its object the sanctification of the latter, so the
mutual self-devotion of husbands and wives is to invest their lives
with a higher grace. It is not the mere act of the self-sacrifice of
Christ which is to be emulated in marriage. No admonition would be
needed for such a purpose. Marriage is necessarily a type of this
relation. The discourse of the apostle tends, on the contrary, to
recommend the motive of the sacrifice of Christ, and its influence
upon the sanctification of the Church, to husbands and wives for
imitation. How feeble, how little calculated to fortify the admonition
of the apostle, would be their reference to the relation of Christ to
the Church, if the sanctification of the Church by Christ, thus held
up to husbands and wives for emulation, were something totally unreal,
a mere creature of reflection! If the purpose of the sacrifice of
Christ, the sanctification of the Church, were still unattained, how
could husbands and wives be expected to make their intercourse bear
those moral fruits by which it is to approve itself a type of the
relation of Christ to the Church?

The holiness of the Church, then, has its origin in the sacraments.
But that which makes the Church holy appertains to her essential
character. It follows that this character also is evolved by means of
the sacraments. This proves, finally, that this evolution of the
character of the true Church is only possible in a single, individual
historical manifestation, that is to say, only within, or at least by
the agency  [Footnote 157] of, that visible body politic which is in
possession of the sacraments.

  [Footnote 157: The means of grace administered by the Church
  sometimes exert their influence beyond the pale, _i.e._, outside of,
  her historical image. This is seen in the validity of the baptism of
  heretics. ]

Protestantism is untrue to its own principle in representing the
administration of the sacraments according to their institution as an
index of the true Church. The whole force of this position lies in the
presumption of a {746} distinct historical organization as the
necessary exponent of the inward essence of the true Church. A
contrary doctrine is in danger of bestowing the name of the true
Church on a society which may possibly be composed exclusively of
hypocrites. The inference is obvious. If the essence of the true
Church is only to be found in the domain of the mind, or if it even
remains a mere ideal, where is the guarantee that the mantle of the
sacramental organization covers that silent, invisible congregation of
spirits in which alone the Protestant looks for the essence of the
true Church? The reformer's idea of the Church is here entangled in a
contradiction in terms. On the principle of justification by faith
alone, the character of the true Church must be wholly expressed in
something incorporeal. And yet the true Church is to be recognized by
the use of the sacraments according to their institution. Where is the
connecting link between the external and the internal Church? The
congruence of the Spirit and the body of the Church, if it occurs, is
purely accidental. The visible Church, taken by itself, is a mere
external thing, possibly void of all substantial essence. The doctrine
of _sola fides_ is incapable of a profound appreciation of the visible
Church. This, taken in connection with the old Protestant theory that
the phase of the Church manifested in preaching and in the sacraments
is of the essence of the Church, makes it clear that the attempt of
the reformers to spiritualize Christianity leads on the contrary to a
materialization of the idea of the Church.

The modern Protestant theology was far from being deterred by its
reverence for the reformers from laying bare this unsound portion of
their system. They attempted to make up for it by the well known
theory of the ideal Church, which begins by renouncing, in entire
consistency with the Protestant principle of justification by faith
alone, every outward manifestation of the essence of the Church.

The manifold forms in which Christianity becomes palpable as a power
in history are here treated as something purely accidental, easily
capable of severance from the essence of the true Church. How does
this explanation comport with the doctrine of Scripture just
expounded?

The Church of Christ, says Holy Writ, receives her unseen bridal
ornaments by means of the palpable sacraments. In consequence of their
efficacy she conceals the germs of her future glory under the guise of
her temporal image. The most profound and super-sensual characteristic
of the Church is, therefore, closely though mysteriously allied with
the palpable exterior. It is not our present task to show how this
alliance is formed. We simply inquire into the foundation of this
necessary combination of the spirit and the form of the Church. This
foundation we claim to discover in the sublimity of the principle
heretofore recognized by us as the marrow, the heart of the Church.

If that which constitutes the heart of the Church is supernatural, and
beyond the reach of the natural powers of the human mind, its
impartment and preservation necessarily presuppose a peculiar
influence of God upon man, different from the creative power. Under
these circumstances, the precise method of the divine influence
pervading the Church is only to be learned with certainty from
revelation. And here we find the most explicit teachings on this
subject. According to the testimony of Scripture, the Lord promotes
the growth of the Church by means palpable to the senses. This
suggests inquiry into the laws under which these means of grace find
their application. Those laws are derived from the object of their
institution. It consists in the adhibition of instrumentalities in the
production of a divine effect. Consequently the means employed, or the
sacraments, can manifest their efficacy only under certain conditions
divinely ordained.

The correct understanding of the {747} mutual relations subsisting
between the spirit and the body of the Church is further assisted by
reference to another idea also derived from the Church. The regular
growth of the Church is made intelligible to us as a self-edification
in love. The means required for the attainment of this purpose have
been given into the hands of the Church herself. For this end Peter
received the keys of the kingdom of heaven. He is not only the thread
of the historical development of the Church, but the interior
organization also necessarily presupposes a union with Peter. The
organs of this organization are the sacraments. But they manifest
their saving efficacy on those only who have not knowingly interrupted
the chain of union between themselves and Peter, and their use is
totally void of effect if the party by whom they are administered is
not actuated by the desire of doing that which is done in sacramental
ceremonies by the Church, united with Peter (_intentio faciendi quod
facit ecclesia._)

The inmost principle, the heart of the Church, is inseparably
connected with these visible actions, which are efficaciously
administered only according to the intention and in the name of the
visible Church, and in virtue of their efficacy the latter approves
herself as holy. Thus the present inquiry leads to the same result
already reached by other investigations. The spirit and the body of
Catholicism are not to be separated. The connecting link which binds
them together is Peter, the bearer of the keys of the kingdom of
heaven, who still lives in his successors. But the fountain-head of
this necessary relationship is in the vital principle of the Church,
in her supernatural principle.

The idea of a supernatural principle, and that of the papacy, together
constitute the principle of Catholicism. In the former we behold its
fundamental essence, in the latter the cement of its historical unity,
as well as the connecting link between the interior and the exterior
catholicity of the Church.

------

From The Month.

SONNET.

UNSPIRITUAL CIVILIZATION.

  We have been piping, Lord; we have been singing;
  Five hundred years have passed o'er lawn and lea,
  Marked by the blowing bud and falling tree,
  While all the ways with melody were ringing:
  In tented lists, high-stationed and flower-flinging,
  Beauty looked down on conquering chivalry;
  Science made wise the nations; laws made free;
  Art, like an angel ever onward winging,
  Brightened the world. But, O great Lord and Father!
  Have these, thy bounties, drawn to thee man's race,
  That stood so far aloof? Have they not rather
  His soul subjected? with a blind embrace
  Gulfed it in sense? Prime blessings changed to curse
  'Twixt God and man can set God's universe.

AUBREY DE VERE.

------

{748}

From The Month

CONSTANCE SHERWOOD.

AN AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.

BY LADY GEORGIANA FULLERTON.


CHAPTER XI.

During the two years which followed the Duke of Norfolk's death I did
only see my Lady Surrey once, which was when she came to Arundel
House, on a visit to her lord's grandfather; and her letters for a
while were both scanty and brief. She made no mention of religion, and
but little of her husband; and chiefly touched on such themes as Lady
Margaret's nuptials with Mr. Sackville (Lord Dorset's heir) and
Mistress Milicent's with Sir Hammond l'Estrange. She had great
contentment, she wrote, to see them both so well married according to
their degree; but that for herself she did very much miss her good
sister's company and her gentlewoman's affectionate services, who
would now reside all the year at her husband's seat in Norfolk; but
she looked when my lord and herself should be at Kenninghall, when he
left the university, that they might yet, being neighbors, spend some
happy days together, if it so pleased God. Once she wrote in exceeding
great joy, so that she said she hardly knew how to contain herself,
for that my lord was coming in a few days to spend the long vacation
at Lord Sussex's house at Bermondsey. But when she wrote again,
methought--albeit her letter was cheerful, and she did jest in it
somewhat more than was her wont--that there was a silence touching her
husband, and her own contentment in his society, which betokened a
reserve such as I had not noticed in her before. About that time it
was bruited in London that my Lord Surrey had received no small
detriment by the bad example he had at Cambridge, and the liberty
permitted him.

And now, forsaking for a while the theme of that noble pair, whose
mishaps and felicities have ever saddened and rejoiced mine heart
almost equally with mine own good or evil fortune, I here purpose to
set down such occurrences as should be worthy of note in the more
obscure sphere in which my lot was cast.

When I was about sixteen, my cousin Kate was married to Mr. Lacy;
first in a secret manner, in the night, by Mr. Plasden, a priest, in
her father's library, and the next day at the parish church at
Holborn. Methinks a fairer bride never rode to church than our Kate.
Her mother went with her, which was the first time she had been out of
doors for a long space of time, for she feared to catch cold if the
wind did blow from the north or the east; and if from the south she
feared it should bring noxious vapors from the river; and the west,
infection from the city, and so stayed at home for greater safety. But
on Kate's wedding day we did all protest the wind blew not at all, so
that from no quarter of the sky should mischief arise; and in a closed
litter, which she reckoned to be safer than a coach, she consented to
go to church.

"Marry, good wife," cried Mr. Congleton, when she had been magnifying
all the dangers she mostly feared, "thou dost forget the greatest of
all in these days, which doth hold us all by the neck, as it were. For
hearing mass, as we did in this room last night, we do all run the
risk of being hanged, which should be a greater peril methinks than a
breath of foul air."

{749}

She, being in a merry mood, replied: "Twittle twattle, Mr. Congleton;
the one may be avoided, the other not. 'Tis no reason I should get a
cold to-day because I be like to be hanged to-morrow."

"I' faith," cried Polly, "my mother hath well parried your thrust,
sir; and methinks the holy Bishop of Rochester was of the same mind
with her."

"How so, Polly?" quoth her father; and she, "There happened a false
rumor to rise suddenly among the people when he was in the prison, so
I have heard Mr. Roper relate, that he should be brought to execution
on a certain day; wherefore his cook, that was wont to dress his
dinner and carry it daily unto him, hearing of his execution, dressed
him no dinner at all that day. Wherefore, at the cook's next repair
unto him, he demanded the cause why he brought him not his dinner.
'Sir,' said the cook, 'it was commonly talked all over the town that
you should have died to-day, and therefore I thought it but vain to
dress anything for you.' 'Well,' quoth the bishop merrily, 'for all
that report, thou seest me yet alive; and therefore, whatsoever news
thou shalt hear of me hereafter, prithee let me no more lack my
dinner, but make it ready; and if thou see me dead when thou comest,
then eat it thyself. But I promise thee, if I be alive, by God's
grace, to eat never a bit the less.'"

"And on the day he was verily executed," said Mistress Ward, "when the
lieutenant came to fetch him, he said to his man, 'Reach me my furred
tippet, to put about my neck.' 'O my lord!' said the lieutenant, 'what
need you be so careful of your health for this little time, being not
much above in hour?' 'I think no otherwise,' said this blessed father;
'but yet, in he mean time, I will keep myself as well as I can; for I
tell you truth, though I have, I thank our Lord, a very good desire
and a willing mind to die at this present, and so I trust of his
infinite mercy and goodness he will continue it, yet I will not
willingly hinder my health one minute of an hour, but still prolong
the same as long as I can by such reasonable ways as Almighty God hath
provided for me.'" Upon which my good aunt fastened her veil about her
head, and said the holy bishop was the most wise saint and
reasonablest martyr she had yet heard of.

Kate was dressed in a kirtle of white silk, her head attired with an
habiliment of gold, and her hair, brighter itself than gold, woven
about her face in cunningly wrought tresses. She was led to church
between two gentlemen--Mr. Tresham and Mr. Hogdson--friends of the
bridegroom, who had bride-laces and rosemary tied about their silken
sleeves. There was a fair cup of silver gilt carried before her,
wherein was a goodly branch of rosemary, gilded very fair, and hung
about with silken ribbons of all colors. Musicians came next; then a
group of maidens bearing garlands finely gilded; and thus we passed on
to the church. The common people at the door cheered the bride, whose
fair face was a passport to their favor; but as Muriel crept along,
leaning on my arm, I caught sound of murmured blessings.

"Sweet saint," quoth an aged man, leaning on his staff, near the
porch, "I ween thine espousals be not of earth." A woman, with a child
in her arms, whispered to her as she past, "He thou knowest of is
dead, and died praying for thee." A man, whose eyes had watched her
painfully ascending the steps, called her an angel; whereupon a beggar
with a crutch cried out, "Marry, a lame angel!" A sweet smile was on
her face as she turned toward him; and drawing a piece of silver from
her pocket, she bestowed it on him, with some such words as
these--that she prayed they might both be so happy, albeit lame, as to
hobble to heaven, and get there in good time, if it should please God.
Then he fell to blessing her so loud, that she hurried me into the
church, not content to be thanked in so public a manner.

{750}

After the ceremony, we returned in the same order to Ely Place. The
banquet which followed, and the sports succeeding it, were conducted
in a private and somewhat quiet fashion, and not many guests invited,
by reason of the times, and Mr. Congleton misliking to draw notice to
his house, which had hitherto been but little molested, partly for
that Sir Francis Walsingham had a friendship for him, and also for his
sister, Lady Egerton of Ridley, which procured for them greater favor,
in the way of toleration, than is extended to others; and likewise the
Portuguese ambassador was his very good friend, and his chapel open to
us at all times; so that priests did not need to come to his house for
the performance of any religious actions, except that one of the
marriage, which had taken place the night before in his library.
Howsoever, he was very well known to be a recusant, for that neither
himself, nor any belonging to him, attended Protestant worship; and
Sir Francis sometimes told him that the clemency with which he was
treated was shown toward him with the hope that, by mild courses, he
might be soon brought to some better conformity.

Mr. Lacy's house was in Gray's Inn Lane, a few doors from Mr. Swithin
Wells's; and through this proximity an intimate acquaintanceship did
arise between that worthy gentleman and his wife and Kate's friends.
He was very good-natured, pleasant in conversation, courteous, and
generous; and Mrs. Wells a most virtuous gentlewoman. Although he (Mr.
Swithin) much delighted in hawking, hunting, and other suchlike
diversions, yet he so soberly governed his affections therein, as to
be content to deprive himself of a good part of those pleasures, and
retire to a more profitable employment of training up young gentlemen
in virtue and learning; and with such success that his house has been,
as it were, a fruitful seminary to many worthy members of the Catholic
Church. Among the young gentlemen who resided with him at that time
was Mr. Hubert Rookwood, the youngest of the two sons of Mr. Rookwood,
of Euston, whom I had seen at the inn at Bedford, when I was
journeying to London. We did speedily enter into a somewhat close
acquaintanceship, founded on a similarity of tastes and agreeable
interchange of civilities, touching the lending of books and likewise
pieces of music, which I did make fair copies of for him, and which we
sometimes practiced in the evening; for he had a pleasant voice and an
aptness to catch the trick of a song, albeit unlearned in the art,
wherein he styled me proficient; and I, nothing loth to impart my
knowledge, became his instructor, and did teach him both to sing and
play the lute. He was not much taller than when I had seen him before;
but his figure was changed, and his visage had grown pale, and his
hair thick and flowing, especially toward the back of the head,
discovering in front a high and thoughtful forehead. There was a great
deal of good young company at that time in Mr. Wells's house; for some
Catholics tabled there beside those that were his pupils, and others
resorted to it by reason of the pleasant entertainment they found in
the society of ingenuous persons, well qualified, and of their own
religion. I had most days opportunities of conversing with Hubert,
though we were never alone; and, by reason of the friendship which had
existed between his father and mine, I allowed him a kindness I did
not commonly afford to others.

Mr. Lacy had had his training in that house, and, albeit his natural
parts did not title him to the praise of an eminent scholar, he had
thence derived a great esteem for learning, a taste for books, of the
which he did possess a great store (many hundred volumes), and a
discreet manner of talking, though something tinctured with
affectation, inasmuch as he should seem to be rather enamored of the
words he uttered, than careful of the {751} substance. Hubert was wont
to say that his speech was like to the drawing of a leaden sword out
of a gilded sheath. He was a very virtuous young man; and his wife had
never but one complaint to set forth, which was that his books took up
so much of his time that she was almost as jealous of them as if they
had been her rivals. She would have it he did kill himself with study;
and, in a particular manner, with the writing of the life of one
Thomas à Kempis, which was a work he had had a long time on hand. One
day she comes into his library, and salutes him thus: "Mr. Lacy, I
would I were a book; and then methinks you would a little more respect
me." Polly, who was by, cried out, "Madam, you must then be an
almanac, that he might change every year;" whereat she was not a
little displeased. And another time, when her husband was sick, she
said, if Mr. Lacy died, she would burn Thomas a Kempis for the killing
of her husband. I, hearing this, answered that to do so were a great
pity; to whom she replied, "Why, who was Thomas a Kempis?" to which I
answered, "One of the saintliest men of the age wherein he lived."
Wherewith she was so satisfied, that she said, then she would not do
it for all the world.

Methinks I read more in that one year than in all the rest of my life
beside. Mine aunt was more sick than usual, and Mistress Ward so taken
up with the nursing of her, that she did not often leave her room.
Polly was married in the winter to Sir Ralph Ingoldby, and went to
reside for some months in the country. Muriel prevailed on her father
to visit the prison with her, in Mistress Ward's stead, so that
sometimes they were abroad the whole of the day; by reason of which, I
was oftener in Gray's Inn Lane than at home, sometimes at Kate's
house, and sometimes at Mistress Wells's mansion, where I became
infected with a zeal for learning, which Hubert's example and
conversation did greatly invite me to. He had the most winning tongue,
and the aptest spirit in the world to divine the natural inclinations
of those he consorted with. The books he advised me to read were
mostly such as Mistress Ward, to whom I did faithfully recite their
titles, accounted to be not otherwise than good and profitable, having
learned so much from good men she consulted thereon, for she was
herself no scholar; but they bred in me a great thirst for knowledge,
a craving to converse with those who had more learning than myself,
and withal so keen a relish for Hubert's society, that I had no
contentment so welcome as to listen to his discourse, which was
seasoned with a rare kind of eloquence and a discursive fancy, to
which, also, the perfection of his carriage, his pronunciation of
speech, and the deportment of his body lent no mean lustre. Naught
arrogant or affected disfigured his conversation, in which did lie so
efficacious a power of persuasion, and at times, when the occasion
called for it, so great a vehemency of passion, as enforced admiration
of his great parts, if not approval of his arguments. I made him at
that time judge of the new thoughts which books, like so many keys
opening secret chambers in the mind, did unlock in mine; and I mind me
how eagerly I looked for his answers--how I hung on his lips when he
was speaking, not from any singular affection toward his person, but
by reason of the extraordinary fascination of his speech, and the
interest of the themes we discoursed upon; one time touching on the
histories of great men of past ages, at another on the changes wrought
in our own by the new art of printing books, which had produced such
great changes in the world, and yet greater to be expected. And as he
was well skilled in the Italian as well as the French language, I came
by his means to be acquainted with many great writers of those
nations. He translated for me sundry passages from the divine play of
Signor Dante Alighieri, in which {752} hell and purgatory and heaven
are depicted, as it were by an eye-witness, with so much pregnancy of
meaning and force of genius, that it should almost appear as if some
special revelation had been vouchsafed to the poet beyond his natural
thoughts, to disclose to him the secrets of other spheres. He also
made me read a portion of that most fine and sweet poem on the
delivery of the holy city Jerusalem, composed by Signor Torquato
Tasso, a gentleman who resided at that time at the court of the Duke
of Ferrara, and which one Mr. Fairfax has since done into English
verse. The first four cantos thereof were given to Mr. Wells by a
young gentleman, who had for a while studied at the University of
Padua. This fair poem, and mostly the second book thereof, hath
remained imprinted in my memory with a singular fixity, by reason that
it proved the occasion of my discerning for the first time a special
inclination on Hubert's side toward myself, who thought nothing of
love, but was only glad to have acquired a friend endowed with so much
wit and superior knowledge, and willing to impart it. This book, I
say, did contain a narration which bred in me so great a resentment of
the author's merits, and so quick a sympathy with the feigned subjects
of his muse, that never before or since methinks has a fiction so
moved me as the story of Olindo and Sophronisba.

Methinks this was partly ascribable to a certain likeness between the
scenes described by the poet and some which take place at this time in
our country. In the maiden of high and noble thoughts, fair, but
heedless of her beauty, who stood in the presence of the soldan, once
a Christian, then a renegade, taking on herself the sole guilt,--O
virtuous guilt! O worthy crime!--of which all the Christians were
accused, to wit, of rescuing sacred Mary's image from the hands of the
infidels who did curse and blaspheme it, and, when all were to die for
the act of one unknown, offered herself a ransom for all, and with a
shamefaced courage, such as became a maid, and a bold modesty
befitting a saint--a bosom moved indeed, but not dismayed, a fair but
not pallid cheek--was content to perish for that the rest should
live;--in her, I say, I saw a likeness in spirit to those who suffer
nowadays for a like faith with hers, not at the hands of infidels, but
of such whose parents did for the most part hold that same belief
which they do now make out to be treason.

Hubert, observing me to be thus moved, smiled, and asked if, in the
like case, I should have willed to die as Sophronisba.

"Yes," I answered, "if God did give me grace;" and then, as I uttered
the words, I thought it should not be lawful to tell a lie, not for to
save all the lives in the world; which doubt I imparted to him, who
laughed and said he was of the poet's mind, who doth exclaim, touching
this lie, "O noble deceit! worthier than truth itself!" and that he
thought a soul should not suffer long in purgatory for such a sin.
"Maybe not," I answered; "yet, I ween, there should be more faith in a
sole commitment to God of the events than in doing the least evil so
that good should come of it."

He said, "I marvel, Mistress Constance, what should be your thoughts
thereon if the life of a priest was in your hands, and you able to
save him by a lie."

"Verily," I answered, "I know not, Master Rookwood; but I have so much
trust in Almighty God that he would, in such a case, put words into my
mouth which should be true, and yet mislead evil-purposed men, or that
he shall keep me from such fearful straits, or forgive me if, in the
stress of a great peril, I unwittingly should err."

"And I pray you," Hubert then said, as if not greatly caring to pursue
the theme, "what be your thought concerning the unhappy youth Olindo,
who did so dote on this maiden that, fearful of offending there where
above {753} all he desired to please, had, greatly as he loved, little
hoped, nothing asked, and not so much as revealed his passion until a
common fate bound both to an equal death?"

"I thought not at all on him," I answered; "but only on Sophronisba."

At which he sighed and read further: "That all wept for her who,
albeit doomed to a cruel death, wept not for herself, but in this wise
secretly reproved the fond youth's weeping: 'Friend,' quoth she,
'other thoughts, other tears, other sighs, do beseem this hour. Think
of thy sins, and God's great recompense for the good. Suffer for his
sole sake, and torment shall be sweet. See how fair the heavens do
show, the sun how bright, as it were to cheer and lure us onward!'"

"Ah!" I exclaimed, "shame on him who did need to be so exhorted, who
should have been the most valiant, being a man!" To the which he
quickly replied:

"He willed to die of his own free will rather than to live without her
whom he jewelled more than life: but in the matter of grieving love
doth make cowards of those who should else have been brave."

"Me thinks, rather," I answered, "that in noble hearts love's effects
should be noble."

"Bethink you, Mistress Constance," he then asked, "that Sophronisba
did act commendably, insomuch that when an unlooked-for deliverance
came, she refused not to be united in life to him that had willed to
be united to her in death."

"You may think me ungrateful, sir," answered; "but other merits
methinks than fondness for herself should have won so great a heart."

"You be hard to content, Mistress Constance," he answered somewhat
resentfully. "To satisfy you, I perceive one should have a hard as
well as a great heart."

"Nay," I cried, "I praise not hardness, but love not softness either.
You that be so learned, I pray you find the word which doth express
what pleaseth me in a man."

"I know not the word," he answered; "I would I knew the substance of
your liking, that I might furnish myself with it."

Whereupon our discourse ended that day; but it ministered food to my
thoughts, and I fear me also to a vain content that one so gifted with
learning and great promise of future greatness should evince something
of regard beyond a mutual friendship for one as ignorant and young as
I then was.

Some months after Kate's marriage, matters became very troublesome, by
reason of the killing of a great store, as was reported, of French
Huguenots in Paris on St. Bartholomew's day, and afterward in many
cities of France, which did consternate the English Catholics for more
reasons than one, and awoke so much rage in the breasts of
Protestants, that the French ambassador told Lady Tregony, a friend,
of Mistress Wells, that he did scarce venture to show his face; and
none, save only the queen herself, who is always his very good friend,
would speak to him. I was one evening at the house of Lady Ingoldby,
Polly's mother-in-law, some time after this dismal news had been
bruited, and the company there assembled did for the most part
discourse on these events, not only as deploring what had taken place,
and condemning the authors thereof,--which, indeed, was what all good
persons must needs have done,--but took occasion thence to use such
vile terms and opprobrious language touching Catholic religion, and
the cruelty and wickedness of such as did profess it, without so much
as a thought of the miseries inflicted on them in England, that--albeit
I had been schooled in the hard lesson of silence--so strong a passion
overcame me then, that I had well nigh, as the Psalmist saith, spoken
with my tongue, yea, young as I was, uttered words rising hot from my
heart, in the midst of that adverse company, which I did know, them to
be, if one had not at {754} that moment lifted up his voice, whose
presence I had already noted, though not acquainted with his name; a
man of reverent and exceedingly benevolent aspect; aged, but with an
eye so bright, and silvery hair crowning a noble forehead, that so
much excellence and dignity is seldom to be observed in any one as was
apparent in this gentleman.

"Good friends," he said, and at the sound of his voice the speakers
hushed their eager discoursing, "God defend I should in any way differ
with you touching the massacres in France; for verily it has been a
lamentable and horrible thing that so many persons should be killed,
and religion to be the pretence for it; but to hear some speak of it,
one should think none did suffer in this country for their faith, and
bloody laws did not exist, whereby Papists are put to death in a
legal, cold-blooded fashion, more terrible, if possible, than the
sudden bursts of wild passions and civil strife, which revenge for
late cruelties committed by the Huguenots, wherein many thousand
Catholics had perished, the destruction of churches, havoc of fierce
soldiery, and apprehension of the like attempts in Paris, had stirred
up to fury; so that when the word went forth to fall on the leaders of
the party, the savage work once begun, even as a fire in a city built
of wood, raged as a madness for one while, and men in a panic struck
at foes, whose gripe they did think to feel about their throats."

Here the speaker paused an instant. This so bold opening of his speech
did seem to take all present by surprise, and almost robbed me of my
breath; for it is well known that nowadays a word, yea a piece of a
word, or a nod of the head, whereby any suspicion may arise of a
favorable disposition toward Catholics, is often-times a sufficient
cause for a man to be accused and cast into prison; and I waited his
next words (which every one, peradventure from curiosity, did likewise
seem inclined to hear) with downcast eyes, which dared not to glance
at any one's face, and cheeks which burned like hot coals.

"It is well known," quoth he, "that the sufferings which be endured by
recusants at this time in our country are such, that many should
prefer to die at once than to be subjected to so constant a fear and
terror as doth beset them. I speak not now of the truth or the falsity
of their religion, which, if it be ever so damnable and wicked, is no
new invention of their own, but what all Christian people did agree
in, one hundred years ago; so that the aged do but abide by what they
were taught by undoubted authority in their youth, and the young have
received from their parents as true. But I do solely aver that Papists
are subjected to a thousand vexations, both of bonds, imprisonments,
and torments worse than death, yea and oftentimes to death itself; and
that so dreadful, that to be slain by the sword, or drowned, yea even
burned at the stake, is not so terrible; for they do hang a man and
then cut him down yet alive, and butcher him in such ways--plucking out
his heart and tearing his limbs asunder--that nothing more horrible can
be thought of."

"They be traitors who are so used," cried one gentleman, somewhat
recovering from the surprise which these bold words had caused.

"If to be of a different religion from the sovereign of the country be
a proof of treason," continued the venerable speaker, "then were the
Huguenots, which have perished in France, a whole mass and nest of
traitors."

A gentleman seated behind me, who had a trick of sleeping in his
chair, woke up and cried out, "Not half a one, sirs; not so much as
half a one is allowed," meaning the mass, which he did suppose to have
been spoken of.

"And if so, deserved all to die,' continued the speaker.

"Ay, and so they do, sir," quoth the sleeper. "I pray you let them all
be hanged." Upon which every one {755} laughed, and the aged gentleman
also; and then he said,

"Good my friends, I ween 'tis a rash thing to speak in favor of
recusants nowadays, and what few could dare to do but such as cannot
be suspected of disloyalty to the queen and the country, and who,
having drunk of the cup of affliction in their youth, even to the
dregs, and held life for a long time as a burden which hath need to be
borne day by day, until the wished for hour of release doth come--and
the sooner, the more welcome--have no enemies to fear, and no object
to attain. And if so be that you will bear with me for a few moments,
yea, if ye procure me to be hanged to-morrow" (this he said with a
pleasant smile; and, "Marry, fear not, Mr. Roper," and "I' faith,
speak on, sir," was bruited round him by his astonished auditors), "I
will recite to you some small part of the miseries which have been
endured of late years by such as cannot be charged with the least
thought of treason, or so much as the least offence against the laws,
except in what touches the secret practice of their religion. Women
have, to my certain knowledge, been hung up by the hands in prisons
(which do overflow with recusants, so that at this time there
remaineth no room for common malefactors), and cruelly scourged, for
that they would not confess by which priest they had been reconciled
or absolved, or where they had heard mass. Priests are often tortured
to force them to declare what they hear in confession, who harbor
priests and Papists, where such and such recusants are to be found,
and the like questions; and in so strenuous a manner, that needles
have been thrust under their nails, and one man, not long since, died
of his racking. O sirs and gentle ladies, I have seen with mine own
eyes a youth, the son of one of my friends--young Mark Typper, born of
honest and rich parents, skilful in human learning, having left his
study for a time, and going home to see his friends--whipped through
the streets of London, and burnt in the ear, because, forsooth, a
forward judge, to whom he had been accused as a Papist, and finding no
proof thereof, condemned him as a vagabond. And what think you, good
people, of the death of Sir Robert Tyrwit's son, who was accused for
hearing of a mass at the marriage of his sister, and albeit at the
time of his arrest in a grievous fever, was pulled out of the house
and thrust into prison, even as he then was, feeble, faint, and
grievously sick? His afflicted parents entreat, make intercession, and
use all the means they can to move the justices to have consideration
of the sick; not to heap sorrow upon sorrow, nor affliction on the
afflicted; not to take away the life of so comely a young gentleman,
whom the physicians come and affirm will certainly die if he should be
removed. All this is nothing regarded. They lay hold on the sick man,
pull him away, shut him up in prison, and within two days next after
he dies. They bury him, and make no scruple or regard at all. O sirs,
bethink you what these parents do feel when they hear Englishmen speak
of the murders of Protestants in France as an unheard of crime. If, in
these days, one in a family of recusants doth covet the inheritance of
an elder brother--yea, of a father--he hath but to conform to the now
established religion (I leave you to think with how much of piety and
conscience), and denounce his parent as a Papist, and straightway he
doth procure him to be despoiled, and his lands given up to him. Thus
the seeds of strife and bitter enmity have been sown broadcast through
the land, the bands of love in families destroyed, the foundations of
honor and beneficence blown up, the veins and sinews of the common
society of men cut asunder, and a fiendly force of violence and a
deadly poison of suspicion used against such as are accused of no
other crime than their religion, which they yet adhere to; albeit
their fortunes be ruined by fines and their lives in {756} constant
jeopardy from strenuous laws made yet more urgent by private malice.
My friends, I would that not one hair of the head of so much as one
Huguenot had been touched in France; that not one Protestant had
perished in the flames in the late queen's reign, or in that of her
present majesty; and also that the persecution now framed in this
country against Papists, and so handled as to blind men's eyes and
work in them a strange hypocrisy, yea and in some an innocent belief
that freedom of men's souls be the offspring of Protestant religion,
should pass away from this land. I care not how soon (as mine honored
father-in-law, and in God too, I verily might add, was wont to say),--I
care not how soon I be sewn up in a bag and cast into the Thames, if
so be I might first see religious differences at an end, and men of
one mind touching God's truth."

Here this noble and courageous speaker ceased, and various murmurs
rose among the company. One lady remarked to her neighbor: "A
marvellous preacher that of seditious doctrines, methinks."

And one gentleman said that if such talk were suffered to pass
unpunished in her majesty's subjects, he should look to see massing
and Popery to rear again their heads in the land.

And many loudly affirmed none could be Papists, or wish them well, and
be friends to the queen's government, and so it did stand to reason
that Papists were traitors.

And another said that, for his part, he should desire to see them less
mercifully dealt with; and that the great clemency shown to such as
did refuse to come to church, by only laying fines on them, and not
dealing so roundly as should compel them to obedience, did but
maintain them in their obstinacy; and he himself would as lief shoot
down a seminary priest as a wolf, or any other evil beast.

I noticed this last speaker to be one of those who had spoken with
most abhorrence of the massacres in France.

One lady called out in a loud voice that Papists, and such as take
their part, among which she did lament to see Mr. Roper, should be
ashamed so much as to speak of persecution; and began to relate the
cruelties practised upon Protestants twenty years back, and the
burning at Oxford of those excellent godly men, the bishops of London
and Worcester.

Mr. Roper listened to her with an attentive countenance, and then
said:

"I' faith, madam, I cannot choose but think Dr. Latimer, if it be he
you speak of, did somewhat approve of such a method of dealing with
persons obstinate touching religion, when others than himself and
those of his own way of thinking were the subjects of it, if we judge
by a letter he wrote in 1538 to his singular good friend the Lord
Privy Seal Cromwell, at the time he was appointed to preach at the
burning at Smithfield of Friar Forest of Greenwich, a learned divine I
often did converse with in my young years."

"What wrote the good bishop?" two or three persons asked; and the lady
who had spoken before said she should warrant it to be something
pious, for a more virtuous Protestant never did live than this holy
martyr.

Whereupon Mr. Roper: "This holy bishop did open his discourse right
merrily, for in a pleasant manner he thus begins his letter: 'And,
sir, if it be your pleasure, as it is, that I shall play the fool in
my customable manner when Forest shall suffer, I would wish my stage
stood near unto Forest; for I would endeavor myself so to content the
people that therewith I might also convert Forest, God so helping.'
And further on he doth greatly lament that the White Friars of
Doncaster had access to the prisoner, and through the fault of the
sheriff or jailers, or both, he should be allowed to hear mass and
receive the sacrament, by which he is rather comforted in his way than
discouraged. And _such is his foolishness_, this good {757} doth
humbly say, that if Forest would abjure his religion, he should yet
(for all his past obstinacy) wish him pardoned. O sirs, think you that
when at Oxford this aged man, seventeen years after, did see the
flames gather round himself, that he did not call to mind what time he
preached, playing the fool, as he saith, before a man in like agonies,
and never urged so much as one word against his sentence?"

"Marry, if he did not," said one, whom I take to have been Sir
Christopher Wray, who had been a silent listener until then, "if his
conscience pricked him not thereon, it must needs have been by the
same rule as the lawyer used to the countryman, who did put to him
this question: 'Sir, if my cow should stray into your field and feed
there one whole day, what should be the law touching compensation
therefor?' 'Marry, friend, assuredly to pay the damage to the full,
which thou art bounden at once to do.' 'Ay,' quoth the countryman;
'but 'tis your cow hath strayed into my field.' Upon which, 'Go to, go
to,' cries the lawyer; 'for I warrant thee that doth altogether alter
the law.'"

Some smiled, and others murmured at this story; and meanwhile one of
the company, who from his dress I perceived to be a minister, and
moreover to hold some dignity in the Protestant Church, rose from his
place, and crossing the room, came up to Mr. Roper (for that bold
speaker was no other than Sir Thomas More's son-in--law, whose great
charity and goodness I had often heard of), and, shaking hands with
him, said: "I be of the same mind with you, friend Roper, in every
word you have uttered tonight. And I pray to God my soul may be with
yours after this life, and our end in heaven, albeit I should not sail
there in the same boat with thou."

"Good Mr. Dean," quoth Mr. Roper, "I do say amen to your prayer." and
then he added somewhat in a low voice, and methinks it was that there
is but one ship chartered for safety in such a voyage.

At the which the other shook his head and waved his hand, and then
calling to him a youth not more than twelve or thirteen years old, his
son, he did present him to Mr. Roper. I had observed this young
gentleman to listen, with an eagerness betokening more keenness for
information than is usually to be found in youths of his years, to the
discourses held that evening. His father told Mr. Roper that this his
son's parts and quick apprehension in learning did lead him to hope he
should be one day, if it pleased God, an ornament to the church. Mr.
Roper smiled as he saluted the youth, and said a few words to him,
which he answered very readily. I never saw again that father or that
son. The one was Dr. Mathews, whom the queen made Bishop of Durham;
and the other, Toby Mathews, his son, who was reconciled some years
ago, and, as I have heard from some, is now a Jesuit.

The venerable aspect of the good Mr. Roper so engaged my thoughts,
that I asked Lady Tregony, by whose side I was sitting, if she was
acquainted with him, and if his virtue was as great as his appearance
was noble. She smiled, and answered that his appearance, albeit
honorable and comely, was not one half so honorable as his life had
been, or so comely as his mind. That he had been the husband of Sir
Thomas More's never-to-be-forgotten daughter, Margaret, whose memory
he so reverently did cherish that he had never so much as thought of a
second marriage; and of late years, since he had resigned the office
of sub-notary in the Queen's Bench to his son, he did give his whole
substance and his time to the service of the poor, and especially to
prisoners, by reason of which he was called the staff of the
sorrowful, and sure refuge of the afflicted. Now, then, I looked on
the face of this good aged man with a deeper reverence than
heretofore. Now I longed to be favored with so {758} much of his
notice as one passing word. Now I watched for an opportunity to
compass my desire, and I thank God not without effect; for I do count
it as a chief blessing to have been honored, during the remaining
years of this virtuous gentleman's life, with so much of his
condescending goodness, that if the word friendship may be used in
regard to such affectionate feelings as can exist between one verging
on four-score years of age and of such exalted merit, and a foolish
creature yet in her teens, whom he honored with his notice, it should
be so in this instance; wherein on the one side a singular reverence
and humble great affection did arise almost on first acquaintance, and
on the other so much benignity and goodness shown in the pains taken
to cultivate such good dispositions as had been implanted in this
young person's heart by careful parents, and to guard her mind against
the evils of the times, that nothing could be greater.

Mr. Roper chancing to come near us, Lady Tregony said somewhat, which
caused him to address me in this wise:

"And are there, then, maidens in these days not averse to the sight of
gray hairs, and who mislike not to converse with aged men?"

This was said with so kindly a smile that timidity vanished, and
confidence took its place.

"Oh, sir," I cried, "when I was not so much as five years old, my good
father showed me a picture of Sir Thomas More, and told me he was a
man of such angelic wit as England never had the like before, nor is
ever like to have again, and of a most famous and holy memory; and
methinks, sir, that you, being his son-in-law, who knew his doings and
his mind so well, and lived so long in his house, must needs in many
things resemble him."

"As to his doings and his mind," Mr. Roper replied, "no man living
knoweth them so well, and if my mean wit, memory, and knowledge could
serve me now, could declare so much thereof. But touching resemblance,
alas! there was but one in all the world that represented the likeness
of his virtues and perfections; one whom he loved in a particular
manner, and who was worthiest of that love more than any creature God
has made."

Here the good man's voice faltered a little, and he made a stop in his
discourse; but in a little while said that he had thought it behoved
him to set down in writing such matters concerning Sir Thomas's life
as he could then call to remembrance, and that he would lend me the
manuscript to read, which I did esteem an exceeding great favor, and
one I could not sufficiently thank him for. Then he spoke somewhat of
the times, which were waxing every day more troublesome, and told me
he often called to mind a conversation he once had with Sir Thomas,
walking along the side of the Thames at Chelsea, which he related in
these words:

"'Now would to God, my son Roper,' quoth Sir Thomas, 'I were put in a
sack, and presently cast into the Thames, upon condition that three
things were well established throughout Christendom.' 'And what mighty
things are those, sir?' I asked. Whereupon he: 'Wouldst thou know, son
Roper, what they be?' 'Yea, marry, sir, with a good will, if it please
you,' quoth I. 'I' faith, son, they be these,' he said: 'The first is
that, whereas the most part of Christian princes are at mortal wars,
they were all at peace; the second that, whereas the church of Christ
is at present sorely afflicted with so many heresies, it were settled
in perfect uniformity of religion; the third that, where the matter of
the king's marriage is now come in question, it were, to the glory of
God and the quietness of all parties, brought to a good conclusion.'
'Ay, sir,' quoth I, 'those were indeed three things greatly to be
desired; but'--I continued with a certain joy--'where shall one see a
happier state than in this realm, that has so Catholic a prince that
no heretic {759} durst show his face; so virtuous and learned a
clergy; so grave and sound a nobility; and so loving, obedient
subjects, all in one faith agreeing together?' 'Truth it is indeed,
son Roper,' quoth he; and in all degrees and estates of the same went
far beyond me in commendation thereof. 'And yet, son Roper, I pray
God,' said he, 'that some of us, as high as we seem to sit on the
mountains, treading heretics under our feet like ants, live not the
day that we would gladly be at league and composition with them, to
let them have their churches quietly to themselves, so that they would
be contented to let us have ours quietly to ourselves.' After I had
told him many considerations why he had no cause to say so: 'Well,'
said he, 'I pray God, son Roper, some of us will live not to see that
day.' To whom I replied: 'By my troth, sir, it is very desperately
spoken.' These vile terms, I cry God mercy, did I give him, who,
perceiving me to be in a passion, said merrily unto me, 'It shall not
be so; it shall not be so.' In sixteen years and more, being in the
house conversing with him, I could not perceive him to be so much as
once out of temper."

This was the first of many conversations I held, during the years I
lived in Holborn, with this worthy gentleman, who was not more pleased
to relate, than I to hear, sundry anecdotes concerning Sir Thomas
More, his house, and his family.

Before he left me that day, I did make bold to ask him if he feared
not ill consequences from the courageous words he had used in a mixed,
yea rather, with few exceptions, wholly adverse, company.

"Not much," he answered. "Mine age; the knowledge that there are those
who would not willingly see me roughly handled, and have power to
prevent it; and withal no great concern, if it should be so, to have
my liberty constrained, yea, my life shortened by a few years, or
rather days,--doth move me to a greater freedom of speech than may
generally be used, and a notable indifference to the results of such
freedom."

Having whispered the like fears I had expressed to him to Lady
Tregony, she did assure me his confidence was well based, and that he
had connexions which would by no means suffer him to be thrown into
prison, which should be the fate of any one else in that room who had
spoken but one half, yea one tenth part, as boldly as he had ventured
on.



CHAPTER XII.

It was some time before I could restore myself to my countenance,
after so much moving discourse, so as to join with spirit in the
sports and the dancing which did ensue among the young people that
evening. But sober thoughts and painful themes after a while gave
place to merriment; and the sound of music, gay tattle, and cheerful
steps lured me to such enjoyment as youth is wont to take in these
kinds of pastimes. It was too much my wont to pursue with eagerness
the present humor, and drink deeply of innocent pleasure wherein no
harm should exist if enjoyed with moderation. But like in a horse on
whose neck the bridle is cast, what began in a gentle ambling ends in
wild gallopping; so lawful merriment, if unrestrained, often ends in
what is unbeseeming, and in some sort blameable. So this time, when
dancing tired, a ring was formed for conversation, and the choice of
the night's pastime yielded to my discretion; alack, rather to my
imprudence and folly, methinks I might style it. I chose that
arguments should be held by two persons of the company, turn by turn,
and that a judge should be named to allot a reward to the worthiest,
and a penance to the worst. This liked them all exceedingly, and by
one consent they appointed me to be judge, and to summon such as
should dispute. {760} There were there two young gentlemen which
haunted our house, and Lady Ingoldby's also. One was Martin Tregony,
Lady Tregony's nephew, an ill-favored young man, with manners worse
than his face, and so apish and foppish in his dress and behavior,
that no young woman could abide him, much less would receive his
addresses, or if she did entertain him in conversation, it was to make
sport of his so great conceit. He had an ill-natured kind of wit, more
sharp than keen, more biting than sarcastic. He studied the art of
giving pain, and oftentimes did cause shamefaced merit to blush. The
other was Mr. Thomas Sherwood, who, albeit not very near in blood to
my father, was, howsoever, of the same family as ourselves. He had
been to the English College in Douay, and had brought me tidings a
short time back of my father and Edmund Genings' safe arrival thither,
and afterward came often to see us, and much frequented Lady Tregony's
house. He had exceedingly good parts, but was somewhat diffident and
bashful. Martin Tregony was wont to make him a mark, as it were, of
his ill-natured wit, and did fancy himself to be greatly his superior
in sharpness, partly because Mr. Sherwood's disposition was retiring,
and partly that he had too much goodness and sense to bandy words with
so ill-mannered a young man. I pray you who read this, could aught be
more indiscreet than, in a thoughtless manner, to have summoned these
two to dispute? which nevertheless I did, thinking some sport should
arise out of it, to see Master Martin foisted in argument by one he
despised, and also from his extravagant gestures and affected
countenances. So I said:

"Master Tregony, your task shall be to dispute with Master Sherwood;
and this the theme of your argument, 'The Art of Tormenting.' He who
shall describe the nicest instances of such skill, when exercised by a
master toward his servant, a parent to his child, a husband to his
wife, a wife to her husband, a lover to his mistress, or a friend to
his friend, shall be proclaimed victorious; and his adversary submit
to such penance as the court shall inflict."

Master Sherwood shook his head for to decline to enter these lists;
but all the young gentlemen and ladies cried, he should not be
suffered to show contempt of the court, and forced him to stand up.

Master Martin was nothing loth, and in his ill-favored countenance
there appeared a made smile, which did indicate an assurance of
victory; so he began:

"The more wit a man hath, the better able he shall be at times to
torment another; so I do premise, and at the outset of this argument
declare, that to blame a man for the exercise of a talent he doth
possess is downright impiety, and that to wound another by the
pungency of home-thrusts in conversation is as just a liberty in an
ingenious man, as the use of his sword in a battle is to a soldier."

Mr. Sherwood upon this replied, that he did allow a public
disputation, appointed by meet judges, to come under the name of a
fair battle; but even in a battle (he said) generous combatants aim
not so much at wounding their adversaries, as to the disarming of
them; and that he who in private conversation doth make a weapon of
his tongue is like unto the man who provokes another to a single
combat, which for Christians is not lawful, and pierces him easily who
has less skill in wielding the sword than himself.

"Marry, sir," quoth Master Martin, "if you dobring piety into your
discourse, methinks the rules of just debate be not observed; for it
is an unfair thing for to overrule a man with arguments he doth not
dare to reply to under pain of spiritual censures."

"I cry you mercy, Master Martin," quoth the other; "you did bring in
_im_piety, and so methought piety should not be excluded." At the which
we all applauded, and Martin began to perceive his adversary to be
less {761} contemptible than he had supposed.

"Now to the point," I cried; "for exordiums be tedious. I pray you,
gentlemen, begin, and point out some notable fashion wherewith a
master might torment his servant."

Upon which quoth Martin: "If a man hath a sick servant, and doth note
his fancy to be set on some indulgence not of strict necessity, and
should therefore deny it to him, methinks that should be a rare
opportunity to exercise his talent."

"Nay," cried Master Sherwood, "a nicer one, and ever at hand
afterward, should be to show kindness once to a dependent when sick,
and to use him ten times the worse for it when he is well, upbraiding
him for such past favors, as if one should say: 'Alack, be as kind as
you will, see what return you do meet with!'"

This last piece of ingenuity was allowed by the court to surpass the
first. "Now," I cried, "what should be the greatest torment a parent
could inflict on a child?"

Martin answered: "If it should be fond of public diversion, to confine
it in-doors. If retirement suits its temper, to compel it abroad. If
it should delight in the theatre, to take it to see a good play, and
at the moment when the plot shall wax most moving, to say it must be
tired, and procure to send it home. Or, in more weighty matters,--a
daughter's marriage, for instance,--to detect if the wench hath set her
heart on one lover, and if so, to keep from her the knowledge of this
gentleman's addresses; and when she hath accepted another, to let her
know the first had sued for her hand, and been dismissed."

Here all the young gentlewomen did exclaim that Master Sherwood could
by no means think of a more skilful torment than this should prove. He
thought for an instant, and then said:

"It should be a finer and more delicate torment to stir up in a young
gentlewoman's mind suspicions of one she loved, and so work on her
natural passions of jealousy and pride, that she should herself, in a
hasty mood, discard her lover; and ever after, when the act was not
recallable, remind her she herself had wrought her own unhappiness,
and wounded one she loved."

"Yea, that should be worse than the first torment," all but one young
lady cried out; who, for her part, could better endure, she said, to
have injured herself than to be deceived, as in the first case.

"Then do come husbands," quoth Mr. Martin; "and I vow," he cried, "I
know not how to credit there be such vile wretches in the world as
should wish to torment their wives; but if such there be, methinks the
surest method they may practise is, to loving wives to show
indifferency; to such as be jealous, secrecy; to such as be pious,
profaneness; and the like in all the points whereon their affections
are set."

"Alack!" cried Mistress Frances Bellamy, "what a study the man hath
made of this fine art! Gentlewomen should needs beware of such a one
for a husband. What doth Master Sherwood say?"

Whereupon he: "Methinks the greatest torment a husband might inflict
on a worthy wife should be to dishonor her love by his baseness; or if
he had injured her, to doubt her proneness to forgive."

"And wives," quoth Mistress Southwell,--"what of their skill therein,
gentlemen?"

"It be such," cried Martin, "as should exceed men's ability thereof to
speak. The greatest instance of talent of this sort I have witnessed
is in a young married lady, whose husband is very willing to stay in
his house or go abroad, or reside in town, or at his seat in the
country, as should most please her, so she would let him know her
wishes. But she is so artful in concealing them, that the poor man can
never learn so much as should cause him to guess what they may be; but
with a meek voice she doth reply to his asking, 'An it please you,
sir, let it {762} be as you choose, for you very well know I never do
oppose your will.' Then if he resolve to leave town, she maketh not
much ado till they have rode twenty or thirty miles out of London.
Then she doth begin to sigh and weep, for that she should be a most
ill-used creature, and her heart almost broken for to leave her
friends, and be shut up for six months in a swamp, for such she doth
term his estate; and if she should not have left London that same day,
she should have been at the Lord Mayor's banquet, and seen the French
princes, which, above all things, she had desired. But some husbands
be so hard-hearted, if they can hunt and hawk, 'tis little count they
make of their wives' pleasures. Then when she hath almost provoked the
good man to swear, she hangeth down her head and saith, 'Content you,
sir--content you; 'tis your good fortune to have an obedient wife.'
And so mopes all the time of the journey."

Whilst Martin was speaking, I noted a young gentlewoman who did deeply
blush whilst he spoke, and tears came into her eyes. I heard afterward
she had been lately married, and that he counterfeited her voice in so
precise a manner, so that all such as knew her must needs believe her
to be the wife he spoke of; and that there was so much of truth in the
picture he had drawn, as to make it seem a likeness, albeit most
unjust toward one who, though apt to boast of her obedience, and to
utter sundry trifling complaints, was a fond wife and toward lady to
her dear husband; and that this malice in Mr. Tregony, over and above
his wonted spite, was due to her rejection of his hand some short time
before her marriage. Master Sherwood, seeing the ungracious
gentleman's ill-nature and the lady's confusion, stood up the more
speedily to reply, and so cut him short. "I will relate," he said, "a
yet more ingenious practice of tormenting, which should seem the
highest proof of skill in a wife, albeit also practised by husbands,
only not so aptly, or peradventure so often. And this is when one hath
offered to another a notable insult or affront, so to turn the tables,
even as a conjuror the cards he doth handle, that straightway the
offended party shall seem to be the offender, and be obliged to sue
forgiveness for that wherein he himself is hurt. I pray you, gentlemen
and ladies, can anything more ingenious than this practice be thought
on?"

All did admit it to be a rare example of ability in tormenting; but
some objected it was not solely exercised by wives and husbands, but
that friends, lovers, and all sorts of persons might use it. Then one
gentleman called for some special instance of the art in lovers. But
another said it was a natural instinct, and not an art, in such to
torment one another, and likewise their own selves, and proposed the
behavior of friends in that respect as a more new and admirable theme.

"Ah," quoth Master Martin, with an affected wave of his hand, "first
show me an instance of a true friendship betwixt ladies, or a sincere
affection betwixt gentlemen; and then it will be time for to describe
the arts whereby they do plague and torment each other."

Mr. Sherwood answered, "A French gentleman said, a short time since,
that it should be a piece of commendable prudence to live with your
friend as looking that he should one day be your enemy. Now we be
warranted, by Master Tregony's speech, to conclude his friendships to
be enmities in fair disguise; and the practices wherewith friends
torment each other no doubt should apply to this case also; and so his
exceptions need in no wise alter the theme of our argument. I pray
you, sir, begin, and name some notable instance in which, without any
apparent breach of friendship, the appearance of which is in both
instances supposed, one may best wound his friend, or, as Mr. Tregony
hath it, the disguised object of his hatred."

I noticed that Master Martin glanced {763} maliciously at his
adversary, and then answered, "The highest exercise of such ability
should be, methinks, to get possession of a secret which your friend,
_or disguised enemy_, has been at great pains to conceal, and to let
him know, by such means as shall hold him in perpetual fear, but never
in full assurance of the same, that you have it in your power to
accuse him at any time of that which should procure him to be thrown
into prison, or maybe hanged on a gibbet."

A paleness spread over Master Sherwood's face, not caused, I ween, by
fear so much as by anger at the meanness of one who, from envy and
spite, even in the freedom of social hours, should hint at secrets so
weighty as would touch the liberty, yea, the life, of one he called
his friend; and standing up, he answered, whilst I, now too late
discerning mine own folly in the proposing of a dangerous pastime,
trembled in every limb.

"I know," quoth he,--"I know a yet more ingenious instance of the
skill of a malicious heart. To hang a sword over a friend's head, and
cause him to apprehend its fall, must needs be a well-practised
device; but if it be done in so skilful a manner that the weapon shall
threaten not himself alone, but make him, as it were, the instrument
of ruin to others dearer to him than his own life,--if, by the
appearance of friendship, the reality of which such a heart knoweth
not, he hath been to such confidence as shall be the means of sorrow
to those who have befriended him in another manner than this false
friend, this true foe,--the triumph is then complete. Malice and hatred
can devise naught beyond it."

Martin's eyes glared so fearfully, and his voice sounded so hoarse, as
he hesitated in answering, that, in a sort of desperation, I stood up,
and cried, "Long enough have these two gentlemen had the talk to
themselves. Verily, methinks there be no conqueror, but a drawn game
in this instance."

But a murmur rose among the company that Master Sherwood was
victorious, and Master Tregony should do penance.

"What shall it be?" was asked; and all with one voice did opine Master
Sherwood should name it, for he was as much beloved as Master Tregony
was misliked. He (Sherwood), albeit somewhat inwardly moved, I ween,
had restrained his indignation, and cried out merrily, "Marry, so will
I! Look me in the face, Martin, and give me thy hand. This shall be
thy penance."

The other did so; but a fiendly look of resentment was in his eyes;
and methinks Thomas Sherwood must needs have remembered the grasp of
his hand to forgive it, I doubt not, even at the foot of the scaffold.

From that day Martin Tregony conceived an implacable hatred for Master
Sherwood, whom he had feigned a great friendship for on his first
arrival in London, because he hoped, by his means and influence with
his aunt, to procure her to pay his debts. But after he had thrown off
the mask, he only waited for an opportunity to denounce him, being
privy to his having brought a priest to Lady Tregony's house, who had
also said mass in her chapel. So one day meeting him in the streets,
he cried out, "Stop the traitor! stop the traitor!" and so causing him
to be apprehended, had him before the next justice of the peace;
where, when they were come, he could allege nothing against him, but
that he suspected him to be a Papist. Upon which he was examined
concerning his religion, and, refusing to admit the queen's
church-headship, he was cast into a dungeon in the Tower. His lodgings
were plundered, and £25, which he had amassed, as I knew, who had
assisted him to procure it, for the use of his aged and sick father,
who had been lately cast into prison in Lancaster, was carried off
with the rest. He was cruelly racked, we heard, for that he would not
reveal where he had heard mass; and kept {764} in a dark filthy hole,
where he endured very much from hunger, stench, and cold. No one being
allowed to visit him--for the Tower was not like some other prisons
where Mistress Ward and others could sometimes penetrate--or afford
him any comfort, Mr. Roper had, by means of another prisoner, conveyed
to his keeper some money for his use; but the keeper returned it the
next day, because the lieutenant of the Tower would not suffer him to
have the benefit of it. All he could be prevailed upon to do was to
lay out one poor sixpence for a little fresh straw for him to lie on.
About six months after, he was brought to trial, and condemned to die,
for denying the queen's supremacy, and was executed at Tyburn,
according to sentence, being cut down whilst he was yet alive,
dismembered, bowelled, and quartered.

Poor Lady Tregony's heart did almost break at this his end and her
kinsman's part in it; and during those six months--for she would not
leave London whilst Thomas Sherwood was yet alive--I did constantly
visit her, almost every day, and betwixt us there did exist a sort of
fellowship in our sorrow for this worthy young man's sufferings; for
that she did reproach herself for lack of prudence in not sufficient
distrust of her own nephew, whom now she refused to see, at least, she
said, until he had repented of his sin, which he, glorying in, had
told her, the only time they had met, he should serve her in the same
manner, and if he could ever find out she heard mass, should get her a
lodging in the Tower, and for himself her estate in Norfolk, whither
she was then purposing to retire, and did do so after Master
Sherwood's execution. For mine own part, as once before my father's
apprehended danger had diverted my mind from childish folly, so did
the tragical result of an entertainment, wherein I had been carried
away by thoughtless mirth, somewhat sicken me of company and sports. I
went abroad not much the next year; only was often at Mr. Wells's
house, and in Hubert's society, which had become so habitual to me
that I was almost persuaded the pleasure I took therein proceeded from
a mutual inclination, and I could observe with what jealousy he
watched any whom I did seem to speak with or allow of any civility at
their hands. Even Master Sherwood he would jalouse, if he found me
weeping over his fate; and said he was happier in prison, for whom
such tears did flow, than he at liberty, for whom I showed no like
regard. "Oh," I would answer, "he is happy because, Master Rookwood,
his sufferings are for his God and his conscience' sake, and not such
as arise from a poor human love. Envy him his faith, his patience, his
hope, which make him cry out, as I know he doth, 'O my Lord Jesu! I am
not worthy that I should suffer these things for thee;' and not the
compassionate tears of a paltry wench that in some sort was the means
to plunge him in these straits."

In the spring of the year which did follow, I heard from my father,
who had been ordained at the English College at Rheims, and was on the
watch, he advertised me, for an opportunity to return to England, for
to exercise the sacred ministry amongst his poor Catholic brethren.
But at which port he should land, or whither direct his steps, if he
effected a safe landing, he dared not for to commit to paper. He said
Edmund Genings had fallen into a most dangerous consumption, partly by
the extraordinary pains he took in his studies, and partly in his
spiritual exercises, insomuch that the physicians had almost despaired
of his recovery, and that the president had in consequence resolved to
send him into England, to try change of air. That he had left Rheims
with great regret, and went on his journey, as far as Havre de Grace,
and, after a fortnight's stay in that place, having prayed to God very
heartily for the recovery of his health, so that he might return, and,
without further {765} delay, continue his studies for the priesthood,
he felt himself very much better, almost as well as ever he was in his
life; upon which he returned to his college, and took up again, with
exceeding great fervor, his former manner of life; "and," my father
added, "his common expression, as often as talk is ministered of
England and martyrdom there, is this: _'Vivamus in spe! Vivamus in
spe!_'"

This letter did throw me into an exceeding great apprehension that my
father might fall into the hands of the queen's officers at any time
he should land, and the first news I should hear of him to be that he
was cast into prison. And as I knew no Catholic priest could dwell in
England with out he did assume a feigned name, and mostly so one of
his station, and at one time well noted as a gentleman and a recusant,
I now never heard of any priest arrested in any part of England but I
feared it should be him.

Hubert Rookwood was now more than ever at Mr. Lacy's house, and in his
library, for they did both affection the same pursuits, albeit with
very different abilities; and I was used to transcribe for them divers
passages from manuscripts and books, taking greater pleasure, so to
spend time, than to embroider in Kate's room, the compass of whose
thoughts became each day more narrow, and her manner of talk more
tasteless. Hubert seemed not well pleased when I told him my father
had been ordained abroad. I gathered this from a troubled look in his
eyes, and an increasing paleness, which betokened, to my now observant
eyes, emotions which he gave not vent to in words at all, or leastways
in any that should express strong resentment. His silence always
frighted me more than anger in others. He had acquired a great
influence over me, and, albeit I was often ill at ease in his company,
I ill brooked his absence. He was a zealous Catholic, and did adduce
arguments and proofs in behalf of his religion with rare ability. Some
of his writings which I copied at that time had a cogency and
clearness in their reasons and style, which in my poor judgment
betokened a singular sharp understanding and ingenuity of learning;
but in his conversation, and writings also, was lacking the fervency
of spirit, the warmth of devout aims, the indifferency to worldly
regards, which should belong to a truly Christian soul, or else the
nobleness and freedom of speech which some do possess from natural
temper. But his attainments were far superior to those of the young
men I used to see at Mr. Wells's, and such as gave him an
extraordinary reputation amongst the persons I was wont to associate
with, which contributed not a little to the value I did set on his
preference, of which no proofs were wanting, save an open paying of
his addresses to me, which by reason of his young age and mine, and
the poorness of his prospects, being but a younger son of a country
gentleman, was easy of account. He had a great desire for wealth and
for all kind of greatness, and used to speak of learning as a road to
it.

In the spring of that year, my Lord Surrey left Cambridge, and came to
live at Howard House with his lady. They were then both in their
eighteenth years, and a more comely pair could not be seen. The years
that had passed since she had left London had greatly matured her
beauty. She was taller of stature than the common sort, and very fair
and graceful. The earl was likewise tall, very straight, long-visaged,
but of a pleasant and noble countenance. I could not choose but admire
her perfect carriage, toward her lord, her relatives, and her
servants; the good order she established in her house; the care she
took of her sister's education, who in two years was to be married to
Lord William Howard; and her great charity to the poor, which she then
began to visit herself, and to relieve in all sorts of ways, and was
wont to say the angels of that old house where God had been served by
so many prayers and alms must needs assist her in her care for {766}
those in trouble. My lord appeared exceedingly fond of her then. One
day when I was visiting her ladyship, he asked me if I had read the
life of that sweet holy Queen Elizabeth of Hungary; and as I said I
had not met with it, he gifted me with a copy fairly printed and well
ornamented, which Mr. Martin had left behind him when he went beyond
seas, and said:

"Mistress Sherwood, see if in this book you find not the likeness of a
lady which you mislike not any more than I do. Beshrew me, but I fear
I may find some day strange guests in mine house if she do copy the
pattern herein set down; and so I will e'en send the book out of the
house, for my lady is too good for me already, and I be no fitting
husband for a saint, which a very little more of virtue should make
her."

And so he laughing, and she prettily checking his wanton speech, and
such sweet loving looks and playful words passing between them as
gladdened my heart to see.

Some time after, I found one day my Lady Surrey looking somewhat grave
and thoughtful. She greeted me with an affectionate kiss, and said,

"Ah, sweet Constance, I be glad thou art come; for methinks we shall
soon leave London."

"So soon?" I answered.

"Not _too_ soon, dear Constance," she said somewhat sadly.

I did look wistfully in her sweet face. Methought there was trouble in
it, and doubt if she should further speak or not; for she rested her
head on her hand, and her dark eyes did fix themselves wistfully on
mine, as if asking somewhat of me, but what I knew not. "Constance,"
she said at last, "I have no mother, no sister of mine own age, no
brother, no ghostly father, to speak my mind to. Methinks it should
not be wrong to unbosom my cares to thee, who, albeit young, hast a
thoughtful spirit, and, as I have often observed, an aptness to give
good counsel. And then thou art of that way of thinking wherein I was
brought up, and though in outward show we now do differ, I am not
greatly changed therein, as thou well knowest."

"Alack!" I cried, "too well I do know it, dear lady; and, albeit my
tongue is silent thereon, my heart doth grieve to see you comfortless
of that which is the sole source of true comfort."

"Tis not that troubles me," she answered, a little impatiently. "Thou
art unreasonable, Constance. My duty to my lord shapes my outward
behavior; but I have weighty cares, nevertheless. Dost thou mind that
passage in the late duke our father's letter to his son and me?--that
we should live in a lower degree, and out of London and from the
court. Methinks a prophetic spirit did move him thus to write. My lord
has a great heart and a generous temper, and loves to spend money in
all sorts of ways, profitable and unprofitable, as I too well observe
since we have been in London. And the queen sent him a store of
messages by my Lord Essex, and others of his friends, that she was
surprised not to see him at court; and that it was her highness's
pleasure he should wait upon her, and she shall show him so much favor
as he deserves, and such like inducements."

"And hath my lord been to court?" I asked.

"Yea, he hath been," she answered, sighing deeply. "He hath been
forced to kiss the hand which signed his father's death-warrant.
Constance, it is this which doth so pain me, that her majesty should
think he hath in his heart no resentment of that mishap. She said to
my Lady Berkeley some days since, when she sued for some favor at her
hands, 'No, no, my Lady Berkeley; you love us not, and never will. You
cannot forgive us your brother's death.' Why should her grace think a
son hath less resentment of a father's loss than a sister?"

Willing to minister comfort to her touching that on which I did,
nevertheless, but too much consent to her thinking, I said, "In my
lord's case, he must have needs appeared to mislike {767} the queen
and her government if he stayed away from court, and his duty to his
sovereign compelleth him to render her so much homage as is due to her
majesty."

"Yea," cried my lady, "I be of the same mind with thee, that if my
lord do live in London he is in a manner forced to swim with the tide,
and God only knoweth into what a flood of troubles he may thus be led.
But I have prevailed on him to go to Kenninghall, and there to enjoy
that retired life his father passionately wished him to be contented
with. So I do look, if it please God, to happy days when we leave this
great city, where so many and great dangers beset us."

"Have you been to court likewise, dear lady?" I asked; and she
answered,

"No; her majesty doth deny me that privilege which the wife of a
nobleman should enjoy without so much as the asking for it. My Lord
Arundel and my Lord Sussex are mad thereon, and swear 'tis the gipsy's
doing, as they do always title Lord Leicester, and a sign of his
hatred to my lord. But I be not of their mind; for methinks he doth
but aid my lord to win the queen's favor by the slights which are put
on his wife, which, if he doth take patiently, must needs secure for
him such favor as my Lord Leicester should wish, if report speaks
truly, none should enjoy but himself."

"But surely," I cried, "my lord's spirit is too noble to stomach so
mean a treatment of his lady?"

A burning blush spread over the countess's face, and she answered,

"Constance, nobility of soul is shaped into action by divers motives
and influences. And, I pray thee, since his father's death and the
loss of his first tutor, who hath my lord had to fashion the aims of
his eager spirit to a worthy ambition, and teach him virtuous
contentment with a meaner rank and lower fortunes than his birth do
entitle him to? He chafes to be degraded, and would fain rise to the
heights his ancestors occupied; and, alas! the ladder which those who
beset him--for that they would climb after him--do ever set before his
eyes is the queen's majesty's favor. 'Tis the breath of their
nostrils, the perpetual theme of their discourse. Mine ears sometimes
ache with the sound of their oft-repeated words."

Then she broke off her speech for an instant, but soon asked me if to
consult fortune-tellers was not a sin.

"Yea," I answered, "the Church doth hold it to be unlawful."

"Ah!" she replied, "I would to God my lord had never resorted to a
person of that sort, which hath filled his mind with an apprehension
which will work us great evil, if I do mistake not."

"Alas!" I said, "hath my lord been so deluded?"

"Thou hast heard, I ween," my lady continued, "of one Dr. Dee, whom
the queen doth greatly favor, and often charge him to cast her
horoscope. Some time ago my lord was riding with her majesty and the
most part of her court near unto this learned gentleman's house at
Mortlake, which her highness, taking notice of, she must needs propose
to visit him with all her retinue, in order, she said, to examine his
library and hold conference with him. But learning that his wife had
been buried only four hours, her majesty would not enter, but desired
my Lord Leicester to take her down from her horse at the church-wall
at Mortlake and to fetch the doctor unto her, who did bring out for
her grace's inspection his magic-glass, of which she and all those
with her did see some of the properties. Several of the noblemen
thereunto present were greatly contented and delighted with this
cunning witchery, and did agree to visit again, in a private manner,
this learned man, for to have their nativities calculated; and my
lord, I grieve to say, went with them. And this cheat or wizard, for
methinks one or other of those names must needs belong to him,
predicted to my lord that he should be in great danger to be
overthrown by a woman. And, I {768} ween, good Constance, there was a
craft in this most deep and deceptive, for doth it not tend, whichever
way it be understood, to draw and urge onward my lord to a careful
seeking to avoid this danger by a diligent serving and waiting on her
majesty, if she be the woman like to undo him, or else to move him to
the thought that his marriage--as I doubt not many endeavor to
insinuate into his mind--should be an obstacle to her favor such as
must needs mar his fortunes? Not that my lord hath breathed so much as
one such painful word in my hearing, or abated in his kind behavior;
but there are others who be not slow to hint so much to myself; and, I
pray you, shall they not then deal with him in the same manner, albeit
he is too noble and gentle to let me hear of it? But since that day he
is often thoughtful when we are alone, and his mind ever running on
means to propitiate her majesty, and doth send her many presents, the
value of which should rather mark them as gifts from one royal person
to another than from a subject to his prince. O Constance, I would
Kenninghall were a thousand miles from London, and a wild sea to run
between it and the court, such as could with difficulty be crossed;
but 'tis vain wishing; and I thank God my lord should be willing to
remove there, and so we shall be in quiet."

"God send it!" I answered; "and that you, my sweet lady, may find
there all manner of contentment." Then I asked her ladyship if she had
tidings of my Lady l'Estrange.

"Yea," she answered; "excellent good tidings, for that she was a
contented wife to a loving husband. Sir Hammond," she said, "hath a
most imperious temper, and, as I hear, doth not brook the least
contradiction; so that a woman less mild and affectionate than
Milicent should not, I ween, live at peace with him. But her sweet
temper doth move her to such strict condescension to his humors, that
she doth style herself most fortunate in marriage and a singular happy
wife. Dost mind Master Chaucer's tale of the patient Grizzel, which
Phil read to me some years back, soon after our first marriage, for to
give me a lesson on wifely duty, and which I did then write to thee
the story of?"

"Yea, well," I cried; "and that I was so angered at her patience,
which methought was foolish, yea, wicked in its excess, that it did
throw me into a passion."

My lady laughed and said, indeed she thought so too; but Milicent, in
her behavior and the style of her letters, did mind her so much of
that singular obedient wife, that she did sometimes call her Grizzel
to her face. "She is now gone to reside with her husband," she said,
"at a seat of his not very far from Lynn. 'Tis a poor and wild
district; and the people, I hear, do resort to her in great numbers
for assistance in the way of medicine and surgery, and for much help
of various sorts. She is greatly contented that her husband doth in
nowise impede her in these charitable duties, but rather the contrary.
She is a creature of such natural good impulses and compassionate
spirit that must needs show kindness to all who do come in her way."

Then my lady questioned me touching Muriel and Mistress Ward, and Kate
and Polly, who were now both married; and I told her Kate had a fair
son and Polly a little daughter, like to prove as sharp as her mother
if her infant vivacity did not belie her. As to Muriel and her guide
and friend, I told her ladyship that few were like to have speech with
them, save such as were in so destitute a condition that nothing could
exceed it. Now that my two elder cousins had left home, mine uncle's
house was become a sort of refuge for the poor, and an hospital for
distressed Catholics.

"And thou, Constance," my lady said, "dost thou not think on
marriage?"

I smiled and answered I did sometimes; but had not yet met with any
one altogether conformable to my liking.

{769}

"Not Mr. Hubert Rookwood?" she said smiling; "I have been told he
haunts Mrs. Lacy's house, and would fain be admitted as Mistress
Sherwood's suitor."

"I will not deny," I answered, "but that he doth testify a vast regard
for me, or that he is a gentleman of such great parts and exceedingly
winning speech that a gentlewoman should be flattered to be addressed
by him; but, dear lady," I continued, opening my heart to her, "albeit
I relish greatly his society, mine heart doth not altogether incline
to his suit; and Mr. Congleton hath lately warned me to be less free
in allowing of his attentions than hath hitherto been my wont; for, he
said, his means be so scanty, that it behoveth him not to think of
marriage until his fortunes do improve; and that his father would not
be competent to make such settlements as should be needful in such a
case, or without which he should suffer us to marry. As Hubert had
never opened to me himself thereon in so pointed a fashion as to
demand an answer from me, I was somewhat surprised at mine uncle's
speech; but I found he had often ministered talk of his passion for
me--for so he termed it--to Kate and her husband."

"And did it work in thee, sweet one, no regrets," my lady asked, "that
the course of this poor gentleman's true love should be marred by his
lack of wealth?"

"In truth no, dear lady," I replied; "except that I did notice, with
so much of pain as a good heart must needs feel in the sufferings of
another, that he was both sad and wroth at the change in my manner.
And indeed I had always seen--and methinks this was the reason that my
heart inclined not warmly toward his suit--that his affection was of
that sort that doth readily breed anger; and that if he had occasion
to misdoubt a return from me of such-like regard as he professed, his
looks of love sometimes changed into a scowl, or something nearly
resembling one. Yet I had a kindness toward him, yea, more than a
kindness, an attachment, which methinks should have led me to
correspond to his affection so far as to be willing to marry him, if
mine uncle had not forbade me to think on it; but since he hath laid
his commands upon me on that point, methinks I have experienced a
freedom of soul and a greater peace than I had known for some time
past."

"'Tis well then as it is," my lady said; and after some further
discourse we parted that day.

It had been with me even as I had said to her. My mind had been more
at ease since the contending would and would not, the desire to please
Hubert and the fear to be false in so doing, had been stayed,--and
mostly since he had urged me to entertain him as a friend, albeit
defended to receive him as a lover. And that peace lasted until a
day--ay, a day which began like other days with no perceptible
presentiment of joy or sorrow, the sun shining as brightly, and no
more, at its rise than on any other morning in June; and the
thunder-clouds toward noon overshadowing its glory not more darkly
than a storm is wont to do the clear sky it doth invade; nor yet
evening smiling again more brightly and peacefully than is usually
seen when nature's commotion is hushed, and the brilliant orb of day
doth sink to rest in a bed of purple glory; and yet that day did
herald the greatest joys, presage the greatest anguish, mark the most
mighty beginnings of most varied endings that can be thought of in the
life of a creature not altogether untried by sorrow, but on the brink
of deeper waters than she had yet sounded, on the verge of such
passages as to have looked forward to had caused her to tremble with a
two-fold resentment of hope and of fear, and to look back to doth
constrain her to lay down her pen awhile for to crave strength to
recount the same.

[TO BE CONTINUED]

--------

{770}

From Chambers's Journal.

TERRENE PHOSPHORESCENCE.


It has been suggested that light, heat, magnetism, and electricity are
only the effects of motion among the molecules of matter. Our earth is
but an aggregation of atoms, and every substance upon which we lay our
hands is in like manner formed of infinitesimal particles, so small as
to baffle microscopic investigation. When we consider that animalcula
have been discovered so minute that it would take a million of them to
form a grain of sand, it is evident that motion _as_ motion among the
ultimate particles of matter is beyond man's powers of observation.
Physical investigations have led us to believe that these atoms have
an action or circulation of their own, and as this action of necessity
escapes our eye, it is not irrational, when looking for some evidence
of this disturbance, to attribute to it physical forces for which we
cannot satisfactorily account, yet which appertain to the earth. Thus
has arisen the hypothesis above stated; and intimately connected with
those forces (heat, electricity, etc.) is phosphorescence, a power on
which the examinations of twenty years have thrown little light, and
which still remains of doubtful origin.

The power in minerals, plants, and animals of producing light is
apparently a consequence of these objects being under the direct
influence, permanently, or for a time, of heat, light, or electricity,
as some substances become phosphorescent after insolation, or exposure
to the sun's rays; others, from heat: others, by having an electric
current passed through them; and lastly, some give forth a phosphoric
light of their own, without any appreciable warmth. Whatever may be
the cause of this property, it is found to pervade all parts of
creation: the atmosphere, the common stones by the wayside, the
flowers in cottage gardens, and the humble insects or worms crawling
at our feet, can shed around a faint glimmer of light. The earth
itself is occasionally, if not always, self-luminous, as are other of
the heavenly bodies. Venus, Jupiter, the moon, and comets, are
conjectured to have a certain portion of phosphoric light, which is
independent of and unborrowed from the sun. The luminosity of the
earth is made evident to us on starless, moonless nights. We may not
have thought of it, but still it is certain that light surrounds us
from some source or other in varying quantities, on such nights as are
above described; for our movements are very different, even when
walking in the open air on the darkest nights, from what they would be
in a cave, or when groping in a room with closed shutters. This phase
of phosphorescence, and also that of faint flickering clouds against
the horizon, is distinct from meteorological phosphorescence, which
branch of the subject includes luminous rain, fog, dust,
_ignis-fatuus_, northern and southern lights. A shower of dust which
fell during an eruption of Vesuvius in 1794, had a faint luminosity in
the dark, distinctly visible on the sails of vessels on which it had
fallen. Many instances are recorded of rain producing sparks as it
touched the ground, and Arago collected the authentic accounts of this
phenomenon. In June, 1731, an ecclesiastic near Constance described
the rain during a thunder-storm as falling like drops of red-hot
liquid metal; and it is observable that most of these sparkling
showers seem to have occurred during thunder-storms, or when the air
was highly charged with electricity.

But complete mystery still surrounds the cause of luminous fogs and
mists, {771} which are of rare occurrence. Of these there are few well
founded accounts, and the most recent instance of one was, we believe,
in 1859, continuing for a succession of nights. It lasted from then
18th to the 26th of November, and, in the absence of any moon, so
illuminated the heavens as to render small objects distinctly visible
in the sitting room of M. Wartenan of Geneva, whose description of it
will be found in the _Comptes Rendus_ of the Academy of Sciences,
Paris, for December, 1859. It was not a wet fog, but a sort of dry
mist, so impenetrable as to render invisible the banks of the river
Leman, but at the same time diffusing sufficient phosphoric light to
make small objects clear as on a moonlight night. This was also
testified by persons travelling on foot from Geneva to Annemasse,
between the hours of 10 and 12 P.M. Another famous instance was in
1783, when a dry fog, lasting for a month, covered the northern parts
of America, and Europe from Sweden to Africa. It resembled moonlight
through a veil of clouds, and was equally diffused on all sides,
making objects visible at a distance of six hundred yards. Being, as
it were, a deep mass of phosphoric vapor, reaching to the summit of
the highest mountains, no storms of rain or wind seemed to affect it;
but in Europe it was thought to emit an unpleasant sulphurous smell.

Another feature of meteorological phosphorescence is that of luminous
appearances at sea, quite distinct from the luminosity of the ocean
itself as produced by marine animalcula. Mrs. Somerville gives the
following interesting description of one of these phosphoric
phenomena: "Captain Bonnycastle, coming up the Gulf of St. Lawrence on
the 7th of September, 1826, was roused by the mate of the vessel in
great alarm from an unusual appearance. It was a starlight night, when
suddenly the sky became overcast in the direction of the highland of
Cornwallis country, and an instantaneous and intensely vivid light,
resembling the aurora, shot out of the hitherto gloomy and dark sea on
the lee-bow, which was so brilliant that it lighted every thing
distinctly, even to the mast-head. The light spread over the whole sea
between the two shores, and the waves, which before had been tranquil,
now began to be agitated. Captain Bonnycastle describes the scene as
that of a blazing sheet of awful and most brilliant light. A long and
vivid line of light, superior in brightness to the parts of the sea
not immediately near the vessel, showed the base of the high,
frowning, and dark land abreast; the sky became lowering and more
intensely obscure. Long tortuous lines of light showed immense numbers
of very large fish darting about, as if in consternation. The
sprit-sail-yard and mizzen-boom were lighted by the glare, as if
gas-lights had been burning directly below them; and until just before
daybreak, at four o'clock, the most minute objects were distinctly
visible. Day broke very slowly, and the sun rose of a fiery and
threatening aspect. Rain followed. Captain Bonnycastle caused a bucket
of this fiery water to be drawn up: it was one mass of light when
stirred by the hand, and not in sparks, as usual, but in actual
coruscations. A portion of the water preserved its luminosity for
seven nights. On the third night, scintillations of the sea
reappeared; in the evening the sun went down very singularly,
exhibiting in its descent a double sun; and when only a few degrees
high, its spherical figure changed into that of a long cylinder, which
reached the horizon. In the night the sea became nearly as luminous as
before; but on the fifth night the appearance entirely ceased. Captain
Bonnycastle does not think it proceeded from animalcula, but imagines
it might be some compound of phosphorus, suddenly evolved, and
disposed over the surface of the sea; perhaps from the exuviae or
secretions of fish connected with the oceanic salts, muriate of soda
and sulphate of magnesia."

{772}

Quite distinct from luminous mists is another species of phosphoric
phenomenon in the shape of luminous bodies of considerable size and
brilliancy. We find Arago saying, in 1838, "that great luminous
meteors, similar to lightning in their nature, show themselves
sometimes at the surface of the globe, even when the sky does not
appear stormy." An instance of this is given by a Mr. Edwards, as
having been seen by him when crossing Loch Scavig in a boat at night.
In this instance, a light swept rapidly over the face of the water,
resembling the light in a cabin window, but moving with great
rapidity. It passed near the boat, and caused much consternation among
the boatmen, who viewed it as something supernatural; but it was soon
out of sight, following a curved course. A far more startling
occurrence was seen by the ship _Montague_ when "a few minutes before
mid-day, and in perfectly serene weather, a large bluish globe of fire
rolled up to the ship, the _Montague_, and exploded, shattering one of
the masts. This globe of fire appeared as large as a millstone." This
appearance does not seem to have had the swiftness of motion we should
expect if it had been a species of globular lightning, but rather
resembled a gigantic _ignis-fatuus_, which sometimes takes a globular
form, and although generally attributed to the combustion of
phosphuretted hydrogen gas, may and does arise from certain electrical
conditions of the atmosphere. A remarkable _ignis-fatuus_ is described
by Dr. Shaw in his travels in the Holy Land. He observed it on Mount
Ephraim, and it followed him for more than an hour. "Sometimes it
appeared globular, at others it spread itself to such a degree as to
involve the whole company in a pale inoffensive light; then it
contracted itself, and suddenly disappeared, but in less than a minute
would appear again; sometimes running swiftly along, it would expand
itself over two or three acres of the adjacent mountains."

We will not dwell on other instances of _ignis-fatuus_, a phenomenon
so common as to be known to all. But although this form of
gas--phosphuretted hydrogen--has been long known as luminous, it is
only since 1859 that gases in general have been discovered to possess
phosphoric qualities when exposed to the sun's light. It is a
remarkable fact, but one which has been proved, that, with the
exception of metals, nearly all terrestrial bodies appear luminous
when taken into the dark after insolation or exposure to the sun. They
absorb so much light as to give it back again when removed from its
influence, and this property is opposed to electricity, for we find
that good conductors of that fluid are not liable to insolated
phosphorescence. The first discovery of this property was made by
Viscenzo Cascariolo, a shoemaker of Bologna, who, loving alchemy, and
seeking gold, found in his ramble a heavy stone, from which he hoped
and longed to produce the precious metal. Failing in this, he found
what till then was unknown, that sulphuret of baryta would "absorb the
sun's rays by day, to emit them by night." From him this substance has
received the name of Bologna stone; and this first discovery has been
followed by others, which prove that phosphoric light may be produced
by heat, friction, cleavage, and many other forces beside insolation.
Some diamonds shine in the dark after a few minutes' exposure to the
sun; others cannot be made phosphorescent by heat if uncut, but when
polished, or submitted to two or three electric discharges, easily
become luminous. So slight a heat is required to call forth this
light-giving property in some substances, that rare kinds of
clorophane shine in a dark room from the mere warmth of the hand; and
other substances are phosphorized by the slightest friction. Thus Dana
says: "Merely the rapid motion of a feather across some specimens of
sulphuret of zinc will often elicit light more or less intense from
this metal."

Several simple and amusing experiments may be made to show the {773}
phosphorescence of minerals. The power of cleavage to produce light is
seen when sugar is broken in a mortar. If a sufficient quantity is
ground rapidly in the dark, the whole will appear a mass of fire. If
phosphuretted hydrogen is evolved by throwing phosphuret of calcium
into water, each bubble as if rises will fire spontaneously on
combining with the air. But the most elegant production of light is
the result of an experiment by Professor Pontus in 1833: "He showed
that a vivid spark is produced when water is made to freeze rapidly. A
small glass, terminating in a short tube, is filled with water; the
whole is covered with a sponge or cotton-wool imbibed with ether, and
placed in an air pump. As soon as the experimenter begins to produce a
vacuum, the ether evaporates, and the sponge or cotton-wool descends,
the temperature of the water rises rapidly. But some instants before
congelation takes place, a brilliant spark, perfectly visible in the
daytime, is suddenly shot out of the little tube that terminates the
glass globe."

Before passing on to the consideration of animal phosphorescence, let
us glance at the luminosity of plants. This is found in many
phanerogams and cryptogams. In the latter, it is well known, from
being found frequently in mines, where the fungus _mycelium_ is seen
spreading its web-like growth, and diffusing a tranquil light,
sufficiently strong to read by, as some have affirmed. The most
beautiful instance of this is found in the mines in Hesse, where the
galleries for supplying air are illumined with this soft phosphoric
light. No example of phosphorescence among sea-weed has been known,
but the delicate little moss _Schistostega osmundacea_ is luminous.
Among phanerogams, or ordinary plants, are many examples of
phosphorescence. Several kinds of garden nasturtiums, sun-flowers,
French and African marigolds, yellow lilies, and poppies, have been
seen to emit either sparks or a steady light. By some it is thought
that it is produced when the pollen flies off and is scattered over
the petals, but it is invariably noticed on warm tranquil evenings,
when there is electricity in the atmosphere. It is observed that
nearly all the flowers proved to be phosphoric are of a yellow color,
but the cause of this has not been ascertained. The leaves of an
American plant (_OEnothera macrocapa_) have been seen, during a severe
storm of thunder and lightning, to emit brilliant flashes of light,
and this is, we believe, the only plant as yet discovered with
phosphoric foliage. M. Martins of Montpellier has noticed that the
juice of the _Euphorbia phosphorea_, when rubbed on paper, appears
luminous in the dark, or when heated. But the most remarkable instance
is that of the common potato emitting a brilliant light: Mr. Phipson
states that a soldier of Strasburg thought that the barracks were, on
one occasion, on fire, from the light which was found to proceed from
a cellar full of potatoes. It is a question whether they were in a
state of decomposition, and if so, it differs slightly from the
luminosity of decaying wood, which is usually caused by the presence
of phosphoric fungi.

To attempt to enumerate the animals of inferior organism which are
phosphoric would be impossible, as almost every known zoophyte is
possessed of this light-giving quality; and perhaps no branch of the
subject has received so much attention as that which concerns animals,
from the fact of the phosphorescence of dead animal matter and insects
being phenomena of daily occurrence. On the former, very early
observations were made. In 1592, Fabricius d'Acquapendente relates the
astonishment of three Roman youths who found the remains of their
Easter lamb shining like candles in the dark. Nearly a century later,
Robert Boyle described the phosphorescence of a neck of veal "as a
very splendid show," and in a paper in the _Philosophical
Transactions_ tried to {774} account for it. It is found that flesh
will continue luminous about four days.

Among the insect-world there are numerous light-giving members. The
common glowworm needs no description, and the _lantern_ flies of the
tropics are almost as well known. Tropical regions abound with these
fire-flies, seventy kinds of which are found in South America and the
southern states of the northern continent. Some of them emit the light
from the abdomen, others from the head. The famous _Fulgora
lanternaria_, or lantern-fly of Linnaeus, produces the light from the
long transparent horn or proboscis curving upward from the head. The
light of one of these is sufficiently bright to read a newspaper by,
and two or three of them in a bottle is the common form of lamp. The
natives also light their way on a dark night by tying one or two at
the end of a stick. The _Noctua psi_, a little gray night-flying moth,
is luminous, as also are some kinds of caterpillars; and the cricket
and "daddy long-legs" have the same property attributed to them by
some naturalists. The reader cannot fail to have noticed that there is
no instance recorded of any larger animal producing phosphoric light.
Invisible animalcula and insects are numerous, and of late years the
common earthworm, or _Lambricus_, has been proved beyond doubt to have
a phosphoric power; but beyond this, and the crawling centipede
(_Scolopendra_), there is no animal with light-giving power. The
gleaming light seen in the eyes of cats, dogs, and wild animals has
been called phosphoric; but this is doubtful, and more nearly
resembles some phase of reflected light. Humboldt, and later the
natural historian, Reuger, speak of a monkey, _Nyctipithecus
trivirgatus_ as having eyes so brilliant as to illumine objects some
inches off.

But this is the only case of at all probable phosphoric light.
Perhaps, in this very instance, it arose from some peculiar physical
condition of the animal; in the same way as the scintillation in the
eyes of one or two human beings was found connected with extreme
delicacy of constitution. The phenomenon of brilliant colors being
perceived on a person pressing his eye, or on the injury of the optic
nerve, is called by Mr. Phipson _subjective_ phosphorescence, but this
is only an undeveloped hypothesis.

Old dames and superstitious northerners speak of _Elf-candles_ as
preceding death; and of the fact of human bodies during life
exhibiting phosphoric light there is no doubt, but it also depends on
the state of the body, and does not signify the sure approach of
death. A lady in Italy is described by Bartholin as producing
phosphoric radiation when her body was gently rubbed with dry linen,
and more than one instance of pale light surrounding sick persons is
recorded on good authority. This portion of the science of
phosphorescence is involved in the same mystery as the previously
described branches; theories are suggested; but no real satisfactory
explanation is found for the different kinds of luminosity. We will
close this article with an account given by Dr. Kane of an
extraordinary case of phosphorescence on the human body which occurred
in the polar regions. It was on the night of January 2, 1854, that the
party sought shelter from an icy death-dealing wind in an Esquimaux
hut. Exhaustion, added to the intense cold, induced sleep, but as the
doctor was composing himself for the night, he was aroused by an
exclamation that the fire was out. To try and relight it was the
instant endeavor of Dr. Kane and his man. The latter failing, the
doctor, in despair, sought to do so himself. "It was so intensely
dark," says he, "that I had to grope for it (the pistol with which
they strove to produce a spark), and in doing so touched his hand. At
that instant, the pistol became distinctly visible. A pale bluish
light, slightly tremulous, but not broken, covered the metallic parts
of it--the barrel, lock, and trigger. The {775} stock, too, was
clearly discernible, as if by the reflected light, and to the
amazement of both of us, the thumb and two fingers with which Petersen
was holding it, the creases, wrinkles, and circuit of the nails
clearly defined upon the skin. The phosphorescence was not unlike the
ineffectual fire of the glowworm. As I took the pistol, my hand became
illuminated also, and so did the powder-rubbed paper when I raised it
against the muzzle. The paper did not ignite at the first trial; but
the light from it continuing, I was able to charge the pistol without
difficulty."

------

From The Month.

CIVILIZATION IN THE FIFTH CENTURY.


The name of Ozanam was already celebrated in the world of letters, and
he had published some portions of his historical course, when he died,
in the midst of his unfinished labors. His early death is a fresh
proof of the truth of the old adage, _Ars longa, vita brevis_, and the
interest of his short autobiography is intense. He tells us of
himself: "In the midst of an age of scepticism God gave me the
blessing of having a Christian father and a religious mother; and he
gave me for my first instructress a sister full of intelligence, and
devout, like the angels whom she has gone to join. But, in the course
of time, the rumors of an infidel world reached even to me, and I knew
all the horror of those doubts which weigh down the heart during the
day, and which return at night upon the pillow moistened with tears.
The uncertainty of my eternal destiny left me no repose. I clung with
despair to the sacred dogmas, and I thought I felt them give way in my
grasp. It was then that I was saved by the teaching of a priest well
versed in philosophy. He arranged and cleared up my ideas. I believed
from that time with a firm faith, and, penetrated with the sense of so
rare a blessing, I vowed to God that I would devote my life to the
service of that truth which had given me peace. Twenty years have
passed away since that time. Providence has done everything to snatch
me from business and to fix me in intellectual labors. The combination
of circumstances has led me to study chiefly religion, law, and
letters. I have visited the places which could afford me information.
The historian Gibbon, as he wandered on the capitol, beheld issuing
from the gates of the basilica of Ara Coeli a long procession of
Franciscans, who marked with their sandals the pavement trodden by so
many triumphs. It was then that, inspired by indignation, he formed
the design of avenging antiquity thus outraged by Christian barbarism,
and he conceived the plan of a History of the Fall of the Roman
Empire. I too have seen the monks of Ara Coeli tread the ancient
pavement of Jupiter Capitolinus, and I rejoiced at it, as the victory
of love over strength; and I resolved to write the history of progress
in those ages where philosophy finds only decadence; the history of
civilization in barbarous times, the history of thought escaping the
shipwreck of letters, _forti tegente brachio_" (Pref., pp. 2, 5.)

The professor relates himself, with all the vigor of his intellect,
the great and glorious plan of history which was the object of his
life, in a letter dated Jan. 25, 1848: "This will be the literary
history of barbarous times, the history of letters, and consequently
{776} of civilization, from the Latin decadence, and the first
beginning of Christian genius, to the end of the thirteenth century. I
shall make it the subject of my lectures during ten years, if it is
necessary, and if God prolongs my life. The subject would be
admirable, for it would consist in making known this long and
laborious education which the Church bestowed on modern nations." He
then marks the salient points of his picture--the intellectual state
of the world at the commencement of Christianity--the _monde barbare_
and its irruption into civilized society, and met by the labors of
Boethius, Isidore of Seville, Ven. Bede, and St. Boniface, who carried
the torch of learning from one country to another, and handed it down
to Charlemagne. Then follow the crusades, and then the three glorious
centuries of the middle ages, when St. Anselm, St. Bernard, Peter
Lombard, Albert the Great, St. Thomas, and St. Bonaventure achieved
for the world of intellect all that the Church and state acquired from
Gregory VII., Alexander III., Innocent III. and IV., Frederic II., St.
Louis, and Alfonso X. He gives a _résumé_ of the events which
influenced modern history, and ends by saying, "My labors would be
completed by _la Divina Commedia_, the greatest monument of a period,
of which it may be called an abridgment, and of which it is the
glory." "This is proposed to himself by a man who was near dying, a
year and a half ago, and who is not yet wholly recovered. But I depend
entirely on the goodness of God, in case he is pleased to restore my
health and preserve to me the love for these noble studies with which
he has inspired me." (Pref., pp. 3-6.)

Such was the object and occupation of his life from the age of
eighteen, when he was an obscure student, to the time when he
pronounced, as professor, the lectures which contained the labors of
twenty years. Happily for himself, he had learnt early the result of
labor. When he was twenty years of age, he wrote, "We exist on earth
only to accomplish the will of God. This will is fulfilled day by day;
and he who dies, leaving his task unfinished, is, in the sight of the
divine maker, as far advanced as he who has had time to bring his to
completion."

It was at Pisa, April 23, 1853, that M. Ozanam wrote a prayer so
solemn, as well as so touching, that his friend, Father Ampère, seems
to hesitate whether it ought to be laid before the public. His
hesitation was conquered by the desire of making what is so excellent
known, and he publishes the soliloquy of the dying man:

"I have said, 'In the midst of my days I shall go down to the gates of
death,' etc. (Canticle Ezek.)

"This day is completed my fortieth year: more than half the ordinary
span of life. I am, however, dangerously ill. Must I, then, quit all
these possessions which thou thyself hast given me, my God? Wilt thou
not, O Lord, accept a part of the sacrifice? Which of my ill-regulated
affections shall I offer up to thee? Wilt not thou accept the
holocaust of my literary self-love, my academical ambition, my
prospects for study, in which, perhaps, there is mingled more pride
than zeal for truth? If I sold the half of my books and gave the price
of them to the poor, and if I restricted myself to fulfilling the
duties of my office, and consecrated the rest of my life to visiting
the poor and instructing apprentices and soldiers, Lord, would this be
a sufficient satisfaction, and wouldst thou leave me the happiness of
living to old age with my wife, and completing the education of my
child? Perhaps, O my God, this is not thy will. Thou wilt not accept
these selfish offerings. Thou rejectest my holocaust and my
sacrifices. It is myself whom thou requirest. It is written in the
commencement of the book that I must do thy will, and I have said, O
Lord, I come."

It is with a solemn interest that we turn to the fragments of that
work to which Ozanam devoted his life and {777} energies, and we find
it to be the history of modern Europe. He himself lays down the three
elements of history. "First, chronology, which preserves the general
succession of events; then legend, which gives them life and color;
and then philosophy, which fills them, as it were, with soul and
intelligence."

In the childhood of the world, when the desire of knowledge was fresh
and strong, all pagan histories began with the siege of Troy, and all
Christian histories from Adam and Eve. Authors gained fame by
chronicles of all past events, because it satisfied the natural
curiosity of man to know the antecedents of his country or race. As
time went on, history became the expression of popular feelings; and
what took place generally may be inferred from what we know of our own
country. The British monk, Geoffrey of Monmouth, wrote of Arthur, the
champion of the faith and the model of chivalry; and the Venerable
Bede wrote of the saints among his own Saxon countrymen; then came,
with the evils of the reformation, a reverence for what was ancient,
and Stow wrote of Catholic England with a fidelity which ranked him
among the benefactors of his country. But then also egotism began.
Each must think for himself, and appropriate the results of former
labors; each must analyze, or generalize, or criticise; and perhaps it
is true that the original writer is he who gives to the world his own
view of things, and not the things themselves. If he is unselfish and
loves truth for itself, he is a poet; if he subjects truth to his own
views, he writes of history, but he does not write history; facts
become subservient to theories, and he mentions only a few, as
necessary illustrations of his own system. The reader yawns over the
succession of kings and events, and chooses for his guide the infidel
Hume, the philanthropic Mackintosh, or the Hanoverian Macaulay. The
fashion of the present day is the idolization of nature. This has made
art pre-Raphaelite, and poetry euphuistic. History, too, is perhaps
becoming a laborious restoration of the past. With a taste for detail
which is truly Gothic, the popular historian must reproduce his
characters with their own features, costume, and _entourage_, and the
long forgotten personages, as if restored to life by the genius of Sir
Walter Scott, must walk about the stage in mediaeval garb. History has
gone through nearly the same phases on the continent until the period
of the reformation. Then in Catholic countries--as France, Spain, and
Italy--arose a more reasoning but a grave and instructive school of
history, which preserved past events as a deposit of the ages of
faith; and latterly, since excitement is become necessary to all, and
the speculations of German literature have taught almost all to think,
the French and German historians have adopted the philosophy of
history. The German school takes a naked problem and proves it by a
series of abstractions. We read Schlegel and Guizot, and we find,
instead of facts or dates or persons, a sort of allegorical
personification of civilization, liberty, progress, etc. This is
rather declamation than narration, and those among the learned who
value antiquity have found the art of realizing not the externals but
the spirit of the past. Thus when Ozanam, as the professor of foreign
literature at Paris, writes of the middle ages, the persons whom he
names are, for the moment, living, not petrified, as in the
stereoscope, but thinking, speaking, and acting, as if the writer
could open a bright glimpse into the eternal world, where St. Denys,
St. Bernard, St. Bonaventure, and St. Thomas still contemplate the
author and giver of all they knew. And when he speaks of the
succession of events, it seems as if we passed from the midst of a
crowded procession, jostling along the dusty highway, to an eminence
from which we see the points of its departure and arrival, the
distinguished persons, the great objects, and the direction of the
march, and that we {778} not only see but understand and sympathize
with the spirit of the undertaking. The thought is from above, but it
becomes our own. For he not only classifies and generalizes, but he
christianizes his glimpses into history. His pictures are indeed only
illustrative of his principles; but when he introduces a person or a
fact, he speaks of them with such intimacy of knowledge that it
creates a keen curiosity as well as a consciousness of ignorance in
the reader. But the reader of Ozanam must be already a historian
before he can appreciate the benefit of having his knowledge
classified and animated by a living principle, as well as vivified and
rendered distinct, as the objects in a dull landscape by a beam of
sunshine.

The mission of Ozanam seems to be the destruction of those errors as
to the value of the knowledge possessed in the middle ages, which have
existed since the renaissance.

It was natural that when the calamities of Europe were so far past as
to permit the development of the intellectual faculties, men should be
elated by their new powers, and undervalue the painful labors of men
interrupted by violence and crime. Maitland, by the evidence of his
own reading, saw the injustice of this, and said wittily, that "by the
dark ages were meant the ages about which we are in the dark." But he
could see only the outward face of mediaeval knowledge, and missed its
vivifying spirit--the faith of the Church. Ozanam had the gift of
faith, and traces with a firm hand the progress of human intellect,
often concealed and limited, but always advancing, and often breaking
out in power and glory when some sainted pope or doctor of the Church
explained the principles of religion and philosophy.

But it would be presumptuous to anticipate Ozanam himself, whose own
words as well as his very life itself have given a _résumé_ of his
great object. It is at the conclusion of a lecture that he thus
addresses the students:

"It is not my intention to follow out into its minor details the
literary history of the fifth century. I only seek in it that light
which will clear up the obscurity of the following ages. Travellers
tell us of rivers which flow underneath rocks, and which reappear at a
distance from the place where they were lost to the view. I trace up
the stream of these traditions above the point where it seems to be
lost, and I shall endeavor to descend with the stream into the abyss,
in order to assure myself that I really behold the same waters at
their outlet. Historians have opened a chasm between antiquity and
barbarism. I have attempted to replace the connections which
Providence has never suffered to fail in time any more than in space,
etc. I should not brave the difficulties of such a study, gentlemen,
if I were not supported, nay, urged onwards, by you. I call to witness
these walls, that if ever, at rare intervals, I have been visited by
inspiration, it was within their circuit; whether they have given back
some of the glorious echoes with which they have formerly rung, or
whether I have felt myself carried away by your ardent sympathies.
Perhaps my design is rash; but you must share the responsibility. You
will make up the deficiency of my strength. I shall grow old and
gray-haired in the labor, if God permits; but the coldness of age
shall not gain upon me so far as that I shall not be able to return,
as this day, in order to renew the young vigor of my heart in the
warmth of your youthful days."

It is in his lecture on pagan empires that Ozanam lays down the
principle on which his views of mediaeval history are based: "Each
epoch has a ruin and a conquest--a decadence and a renaissance." The
greatest epoch of the world's history is that when all that was given
to man at his creation was exchanged for a better nature at his
redemption. This truth of destruction and regeneration is repeated
over and over again through all created things--the seed must die
before the {779} new grain can live. As each individual must be
changed from the excellence of what he is still by nature to a
heavenly model, so nations must be changed, and institutions perish
and revive, and the great republic of letters, founded before the
flood and perfected in Greece and Rome, must die and be regenerated in
the Christian Church. The first decadence is that of pagan Rome.

It is impossible to represent by quotations the grand but terrible
picture which Ozanam draws of paganism, in its glory, its worldly
splendor, and its spiritual darkness. He does full justice to the
excellence of every art and science which the heathens attained; but
he shows that while the court of Augustus was the model of refinement
and civilization, the altars were smoking with incense to devils, who
were the personifications of every vice, and the rites of the temples
were incantations and abominations. An audience of Christian students
could not bear the too revolting details.

His object was the same as that of the great author of
"_Callista_"--to destroy the prestige which still invests all that is
classical. Rome was in truth a majestic empire, and even St. Jerome
trembled at its fall: _"Elle est captive la cité qui mit en captivité
le monde."_

St. Augustin was not a Roman, and was less overpowered by the terror
of its fall. In the midst of the outcries which accused Christianity
as the cause of the ruin which involved the world by the evident
vengeance of heaven, the saint wrote his "City of God," and developed
from the creation of the world to the times in which he lived the
great Christian law of _progress_. A new empire--that of
conscience--was to rule all nations. In this new empire strength and
courage were of no avail, and women were as powerful as men in
converting the world. Clotilde converted the heathen Franks, and
Theodolind the Arian Lombards. The holy bishop St. Patrick converted
in his lifetime the whole Irish nation; and the holy monk St. Benedict
founded in the desert of Cassino the monastic armies of the Church;
while St. Gregory, from his bed of sickness, headed the battle of
civilization against barbarism. The victory was complete, and every
converted country sent forth its missionaries to form Christian
colonies.

Thus fell the _power_ of Rome, but not her _influence_, for the great
influence of paganism was the excellence of its literature. Though the
Augustan writers were no more, yet Ammianus Marcellinus wrote history
with the spirit of a soldier, and Vegetius wrote the precepts of the
art of conquering. Symmachus was thought to rival Pliny in his
letters; and, at the same time, Claudian, the last and not the least
of Latin poets, succeeded Lucan in those historical epics so popular
at Rome. He celebrated the war of Gildo and the victories of Stilicho
over the Goths in verses equal to the "_Pharsalia;_" and his
invectives against Eutropius and Rufinus, in defense of Stilicho his
patron, are still considered masterpieces. He ignored not only
Christianity but Christian writers, though St. Ambrose was at Milan
and St. Augustin at Carthage, and wrote gravely of mythology in an age
when few pagans believed its fables. He was an Egyptian by birth, and
trained in the schools of Alexandria, and was patronized by the
Christian emperor Honorius, who erected to him--as to the best of poets--
a statue in Trajan's Forum. Yet Claudian had truly pagan morals; he
praised the vices of his patron Stilicho, and when he was murdered he
wrote a poem to his enemy; "he misused both panegyric and satire, the
powers of a good understanding and a rich fancy and flowing
versification, which place him, after an interval of three hundred
years, among the poets of ancient Rome." But while Claudian celebrated
the conflict of Rome with the barbarians, he perceived not the mighty
war between Christianity and paganism; and while our Lord and his
blessed Mother {780} triumphed over the idols and their temples, he
wasted his poetry in their praise; and when he recited a poem in the
presence of Honorius and the senate, he spoke to them as if they
believed in mythology. Ozanam gives one remarkable proof of the hold
over men's minds retained by paganism. When Honorius took possession
of the palace of Augustus on Mount Palatine, he assembled the senate,
and in the presence of all these great persons, many of whom were
Christian, Claudian unrolled the parchment whereon his verses were
written in letters of gold, and addressed Honorius as resembling
Jupiter conquering the giants. And again, when he had the office of
showing the splendors of Rome to Honorius, when he visited it for the
first time (404), he spoke of the city as a pagan in the language of
idolatry. And the poet Rutilius, though born in Gaul, idolized Rome.
"Rome was the last divinity of the ancients. Mother of men and gods"
(he calls her, as he wrote his "Itinerary to Gaul"), "the sun rises
and sets in thy dominions; thou hast made one country of many
nations--one city of the world. Thy year is an eternal spring; the
winter dares not stay thy joy." So powerful was the influence of pagan
Rome over a foreigner; and that influence may be yet better perceived
in the Christian poet Sidonius Apollinaris, who, though brought up,
like Ausonius, in the Gallic schools, and sound in faith, could not
write hexameters without mythology. The only language of poetry was
pagan; and when he wrote to St. Patient, bishop of Lyons (who fed his
people in famine), he compared him to Triptolemus.

The first antagonist of the Church, in her task of regenerating
society, was paganism; the second, barbarism. Charlemagne constructed,
on the ruins of the Roman empire, an empire of enlightened
Christianity; but another decadence followed. The Normans sacked
monasteries, and burned the Holy Scriptures, together with Aristotle
and Virgil. The Huns destroyed the very grass of the fields. The
Lombards seemed to be sent for the destruction of all that was left of
human kind. Ozanam says, "Providence loves to surprise." The monks who
escaped the Norman pirates preached to them amidst the ashes of their
monasteries, and the Normans became Christians. Then arose the
basilicas of Palermo and Monreale in Sicily, and the churches of
Italy, Normandy, and England. St. Adalbert converted the Huns, and
they defended Christendom against the vices of Byzantium and the
invasions of Mohammedans. On the ruins of the Roman empire arose the
kingdoms of France, Germany, and Italy. Of this new empire, feudality
and chivalry were the opposite elements. Feudality was the principle
of division, chivalry that of fraternity; and these remodelled
society.

The calamities attending this final disruption of the empire
interrupted study, and learning was confined to the islands of Great
Britain and Ireland, from whence missionaries carried not only
religion but learning into the countries where they were almost
extinguished by the Goths. Germany had three great
monasteries--Nouvelle Corbie, Fulda, and St. Gall. At this last
monastery was preserved the classic literature. Monks studied grammar
and wrote AEneids. The royal Hedwige introduced the study of Greek at
St. Gull; and Ozanam relates it in one of those graphic incidents
which are worth volumes. A new period began with Gregory VII. When he
said, "Lord, I have loved justice, and hated iniquity; wherefore I die
in exile," a bishop replied, "You cannot die in exile, because God has
given you the earth for your jurisdiction, and the nations for your
inheritance." Then followed the crusades, that wonderful and
providential means by which the civilization of the East was brought
into the service of the Western Church. They destroyed feudalism; for
all who fought gained glory, whether serf or noble. {781} Chivalric
poetry arose. Germany had its Niebelungen, Spain its Cid. Then arose
the arts around Giotto and the tomb of St. Francis. Christian
architecture was not Roman. The small temples and large amphitheatres,
etc., were replaced by large churches, public halls, schools and
hospitals, a small town round a large cathedral. There were three
capitals: Rome, the seat of the Papacy; Aix-la-Chapelle, the seat of
empire; and Paris, of the schools.

How paganism perished is perhaps one of the most useful lectures in
the course, as it bears upon the doubts which are still felt by some
as to the use of pagan books in Christian education. Ozanam shows that
the monks preserved by transcribing the works of Seneca and Cicero,
and that St. Augustin brought Plato and Aristotle into Christian
schools; that St. Augustin, St. Jerome, and St. Basil preserved the
heathen poets till Christian poets had learnt their art; nay, how the
Church protected the Gallic bards and German scalds, and taught them
to sing the praises of God. St. Gregory preserved the Saxon temples,
and even adapted their rites and festivals to be used in Christian
worship, that what had been perverted to the service of devils might
be restored to God.

The contrast--the abyss--between the middle ages and the renaissance
has been exaggerated. There was literary paganism in the ages of
faith. The troubadours sang of mythology, and the language of idolatry
was purified by its application to the praises of the martyrs, as is
shown in the poems of St. Paulinus. When the Church emerged from
persecution, the Roman schools became Christian; and when the Lombards
threatened to plunge Christendom in darkness, there were two lamps
still burning in the night--episcopal and monastic teaching; and in
these, by degrees, the pagan books and pagan literature were replaced
by Christian works, in which, however, there were still abundant
traces of their pagan masters.

It is in a fragment that Ozanam speaks of the way in which the
valuable part of antiquity was preserved. "When winter begins, it
seems as if vegetation would perish. The wind sweeps away the flowers
and leaves; but the seeds remain. The providence of God watches over
them. They are defended by a husk against the cold, and have wings
which bear them to congenial places, where they spring again. So, when
the ages of barbarism came, the winter of human nature, it seems as if
poetry and all the vegetation of thought would perish; but it was
preserved in the dry questions of the schools through three or four
centuries; and when the time and place came, the man of genius was
raised up, and in his hands they grew again. Such was St. Thomas of
Aquin, the champion of dogmatism; and St. Bonaventure, of mysticism;
and Christendom had its own philosophy." Perhaps we do not realize
sufficiently the despair which was the lot of reflecting heathens.
They sought the aid of philosophy to console them "for hopeless
deterioration from a golden to an iron age; but philosophy could only
teach that the world was perishing, and that the pride of man must
preserve him from erring and perishing with its possessions. The
heathens knew not the idea of progress; but the gospel teaches and
commands human perfectibility, and says to each, Be ye perfect; and to
all, Let the Church grow into the fulness of Christ." It was faith,
hope, and charity which produced progress.

And, first, faith set free the human mind from the ignorance of God.
Idolatry was not only that men gave to devils the worship which they
owed to God; it was the love of what is mortal and perishable, instead
of what is spiritual and eternal; it sunk mankind into materialism and
sensuality. "Painters and sculptors represented only corporeal beauty:
there was no expression in the figures of Phidias or Parrhasius."
Ozanam shows how Christian art used what is material {782} only as
symbolism, and expressed by form and color what is invisible and
celestial; while poetry was rescued from degradation, and became what
it really is, the noblest aspiration after truth of which man in his
present state is capable. Philosophy was freed from the trammels of
false systems, and speculated securely and deeply on the divine and
human nature. "Origen formed in the Catechetical schools of Alexandria
the science of theology," and in "the golden age of this new science
St. Jerome taught exegesis, St. Augustin dogmatic, and St. Ambrose
moral theology. St. Anselm was tormented by the desire of finding a
short proof that God exists, and with him began metaphysics." These
were the rich treasures which lay concealed in the scholastic teaching
of the middle ages.

As theology and Christian philosophy had sprung from faith, so hope
extended knowledge, because men labored with fresh vigor in improving
science. "The course of ages offers no grander spectacle than that of
man taking possession of nature by knowledge." In the seventh century
the Byzantine monks pierced the steppes of Central Asia, and passed
the wall of China; monks took the message of the Pope to the Khan
before Marco Polo visited the East; and monks, in the eighth century,
visited Iceland and even America. It was the calculations of the
middle ages which emboldened Columbus to discover a new world and new
creation; and when Magellan sailed round the globe, "man was master of
his abode." He goes on: "When man had conquered the earth, he could
not rest; Copernicus burst through the false heavens of Ptolemy; the
telescope discovered the secrets of the stars, and calculation
numbered their laws and orbits in the abyss of heaven. Woe be to those
who are led away by such a sight from God! The stars told his glory to
David, and so they did also to Kepler and to Newton."

It was by the third and greatest of the theological virtues, charity,
that the moral as well as the intellectual nature of man was
regenerated, though the change was wrought, perhaps, by slower
degrees. Slavery of the most revolting kind--that slavery which
ignores the soul and the reason, as well as the social rights of the
slave, was replaced by liberty, oppression and injustice by laws which
are still based upon the letter of the Roman laws; but administered
with the equity of the Christian code. Cruelty and indifference to
human life, as shown in the national passion for gladiatorial games,
was replaced by gentleness and all good works; and the luxury of
palaces, baths, etc., was replaced by gorgeous churches and hospitals.
Education, which had been restricted to the few, was thrown open to
all by free schools and by Christian preaching. Above all, the
daughters of Eve, who were degraded below the condition of the very
slaves, were raised to be helps-meet for Christians, either by the
sacrament of marriage or by the holiness of virginity.

In speaking of the reconstruction of intellectual action in the
civilization of Western Christendom, Ozanam has a grand and striking
thought, that the first step to this was uniformity of language. The
confusion of tongues which began at Babel was silenced throughout the
world by the universal use of the Latin language, which was adopted by
the Church; and that language, which was formed to express all the
passions and vices, as well as the strength and intelligence of man,
conveyed, by the words of St. Gelasius and St. Gregory, the most
sublime devotion; by those of St. Jerome, the deep senses of the Holy
Scriptures; and when the Christian intellect was free to develop
itself, there arose that Christian eloquence in preaching the gospel
which influenced, for the first time, all ranks and all dispositions
of men.

The present edition of the author's works is conducted by friends who
understood and valued his object, and {783} who were able to fill up,
without blemishing, the unfinished parts of his lectures. Nothing can
be done more faithfully, or in better taste; but there are many blanks
too wide to be filled even by such skilful hands. Ozanam says himself,
that the two poles of his work are the "Essays on the Germans before
Christianity," and that on Dante. These form the third and fourth
volumes. In the fifth volume is his "Essay on the Franciscan Poets;"
and that on Dante closes the series. We have confined ourselves to the
subject-matter of the first and second volumes, which contain the
lectures on the civilization of the fifth century, and which suffice
to show the lofty Christian philosophy with which Ozanam beholds the
course of modern history. More than this it would be difficult to
show. The lectures themselves are fragments; ideas snatched from the
rapid flow of his eloquence, and that eloquence itself could feebly
express the thoughts which visited his mind, and the impressions of
glory which left no trace but sensation. There is no chronology, no
succession. He fixes his eyes on the fifth century--he penetrates its
mysteries, and the secret influences which it sends forth to after
times. He speaks of what he sees; and we learn that the world of
Christendom has had its decadence and renaissance, yet that progress
continues. The crimes of the middle ages conceal that progress, and so
do the troubles of the present time. _O passi graviora, dabit Deus hic
quoque finem_.

------

From Chambers's Journal.

THE BELLS OF AVIGNON.

  Avignon was a joyous city,
  A joyous town with many a steeple,
  Towers and tourelles, roofs and turrets,
  Sheltering a merry people.
  In each tower, the bells of silver,
  Bronze or iron, swayed so proudly,
  Tolling deep and swinging cheerly,
  Beating fast and beating loudly.

  One! Two! Three! Four! ever sounding;
  Two! Four! One! Three! still repeating;
  Five! Seven! Six! Eight! hurrying, chasing;
  Bim-bom-bing-bang merry beating.
  All the day the dancing sextons
  Dragged at bell-ropes, rising, falling;
  Clanging bells, inquiring, answering,
  From the towers were ever calling.

  Cardinals, in crimson garments,
  Stood and listened to the chiming;
  And within his lofty chateau
  Sate the pope, and beat the timing.
  Minstrels, soldiers, monks, and jesters
  Laughed to hear the merry clamor,
  As above them in the turrets
  Music clashed from many a hammer.

{784}

  Avignon was a joyous city:
  Far away across the bridges,
  'Mong the vine-slopes, upward lessening,
  To the brown cliffs' highest ridges,
  Clamored those sonorous bells;
  In the summer's noontide wrangling,
  In one silver knot of music
  All their chimes together tangling.

  Showering music on the people
  Round the town-house in the mornings;
  Scattering joy and jubilations,
  Hope and welcome, wrath and scornings;
  Ushering kings, or mourning pontiffs;
  Clanging in the times of thunder,
  And on nights when conflagrations
  Clove the city half asunder.

  Nights and nights across the river,
  Through the darkness starry-dotted,
  Far across the bridge so stately.
  Now by lichens blurred and blotted,
  Came that floating, mournful music,
  As from bands of angels flying,
  With the loud blasts of the tempest
  Still victoriously vieing.

  Who could tell why Avignon
  All its bells was ever pealing?
  Whether to scare evil spirits,
  Still round holy cities stealing.
  Yet, perhaps, that ceaseless chiming,
  And that pleasant silver beating,
  Was but as of children playing,
  And their mother's name repeating.

  One! Two! Three! the bells went prattling,
  With a music so untiring;
  One! Two! Three! in merry cadence,
  Rolling, crashing, clanging, firing.
  Hence it was that in past ages,
  When 'mid war those sounds seemed sweeter,
  _La Ville Sonnante_ people called it,
  City sacred to Saint Peter.

  Years ago! but now all silent,
  Lone and sad, the grass-grown city,
  Has its bell-towers all deserted
  By those ringers--more's the pity.
  Pope and cardinal are vanished,
  And no music fills the night-air;
  Gone the red robes and the sable;
  Gone the crosier and the mitre.

------

{785}

From The Lamp.

ALL-HALLOW EVE; OR, THE TEST OF FUTURITY.

BY ROBERT CURTIS.


CHAPTER X.

It is not to be wondered at that two persons, equally clever in all
respects, and having a similar though not identical object in view,
should have pretty much the same thoughts respecting the manner of
carrying it out, and finally pursue the same course to effect their
purpose. But the matter involves some nicety, if not difficulty, when
it so happens that those two persons have to work upon each other in a
double case. It is then a matter of diamond cut diamond; and if, as I
have suggested, both are equally clever, the discussion of the subject
between them would make no bad scene in a play. Winny wanted to find
out something from Kate Mulvey, and at the same time to hide something
from her. Kate Mulvey was on precisely the same intent with Winny
Cavana in both ways; so that some such tournament must come off
between them the first time they met, with sufficient opportunity to
"have it out" without interruption.

You have seen that Winny had determined to sound her friend Kate, as
to how her land lay between these two young men. If Kate had not made
a like determination as to sounding Winny, she was, at all events,
ready for the encounter at any moment, and had discussed the matter
over and over in her own mind. Their mutual object, then, was to find
out which of the young men was the real object of the other's
affections; and up to the present moment each believed the other to be
a formidable rival to her own hopes.

Winny was not one who hesitated about any matter which she felt to
require immediate performance; and as she knew that some indefinite
time might elapse before an opportunity could occur to have her chat
out with Kate Mulvey, she was resolved to make one.

Her father's house, as the reader has seen in the commencement, was
not on the roadside. There was no general pass that way; and except
persons had business to old Cavana's or Mick Murdock's, they never
went up the lane, which was common to both the houses of these rich
farmers. It was not so with the house where Kate Mulvey resided. Its
full front was to the high-road, with a space not more than three
perches between. This space had been originally what is termed in that
rank of life "a bawn," but was now wisely converted into a
cabbage-garden, with a broad clean gravel-walk running through the
centre of the plot, from the road to the door. It was about half a
mile from Cavana's, and there was a full view of the road, for a long
stretch, from the door or window of the house--that is, of Mulvey's.

It was now a fine mild day toward the end of November. Old Mick
Murdock's party had ceased to be spoken of, and perhaps forgotten,
except by the few with whom we have to do. Winny Cavana put on her
everyday bonnet and her everyday cloak, and started for a walk.
Bully-dhu capered round her in an awkward playful manner, with a
deep-toned howl of joy when he saw these preparations, and trotted
down the lane before her. As may be anticipated, she bent her steps
down the road toward Mulvey's house. She knew she could be seen coming
for some distance, and hoped that Kate might greet her from the door
as she passed. She {786} was not mistaken; Kate had seen her from the
first turn in the road toward the house, and was all alive on her own
account. She had tact and vanity enough, however,--for she had plenty
of time before Winny came alongside of the house,--to slip in and put
on a decent gown, and brush her beautiful and abundant hair; and she
came to the door, as if by mere accident, but looking her very best,
as Winny approached. Kate knew that she was looking very handsome, and
Winny Cavana, at the very first glance, felt the same fact.

"Good morrow, Kate," said Winny; "that's a fine day."

"Good morrow kindly, Winny; won't you come in and sit down awhile?"

"No, thank you; the day is so fine, I'm out for a walk. You may as
well put on your bonnet, and come along with me; it will do you good,
Kitty."

"With all my heart; step up to the house, and I'll be ready in two
twos." But she was not so sure that it would do her good.

The girls then turned up to the house, for Kate had run down in her
hair to shake hands with her friend. Winny would not go in, but stood
at the door, ordering Bully-dhu not to growl at Captain, and begging
of Captain not to growl at Bully-dhu. Kate was scarcely the "two twos"
she gave herself until she came out ready for the road; and the two
friends, and the two dogs, having at once entered into most amicable
relations with each other, went off together.

Winny was resolved that no "awkward pause" on her part should give
Kate reason to suppose there was anything unusual upon her mind, and
went on at once, as if from where she had left off.

"The day was so fine, Kate," she continued, "that I was anxious to get
some fresh air. I have been churning, and packing butter, every day
since Monday, and could not get out. Biddy Murtagh is very clean and
honest, but she is very slow, and I could not leave her."

"It is well for you, Winny, that has the butter to pack."

"Yes, Kate, I suppose it will be well for me some day or other; but as
long as my poor father lives--God between him and harm!--I don't feel
the want of anything."

"God spare him to you, Winny _mavourneen!_ He's a fine hale old man,
and I hope he'll live to be at the christening of many a grandchild.
If report speaks thrue, Winny dear, that same is not unlikely to come
round."

"Report does not always speak the truth, Kate; don't you know that?"

"I do; but I also know that there's seldom smoke without fire, and
that it sometimes makes a good hit. And sure, nothin's more reasonable
than that it's right this time. Tom's a fine young fellow; an' like
yourself, sure, he's an only child. There wasn't such a weddin' this
hundred years--no, nor never--in the parish of Rathcash, as it will
be--come now!"

"Tom is a fine young man, Kate; I don't deny it--"

"You couldn't--you couldn't, Winny Cavana! you'd belie yoursel' if you
did," said Kate, with a little more warmth of manner than was quite
politic under the circumstances.

"But I don't, Kate; and I can't see why _you_ need fly at me in that
way."

"I beg your pardon, Winny dear; but sure everybody sees an' knows that
you're on for one another; an' why not?--wasn't he as cross as a bag of
cats at his father's party because he let 'that whelp' (as he called
him) Edward Lennon take you out for the first dance?"

"Emon-a-knock is no whelp; he couldn't call him a whelp. Did he call
him one?"

"Didn't you hear him? for if you didn't you might; it wasn't but he
spoke loud enough."

"It is well for him, Kate, that Emon did not hear him. He's as good a
man as Tom Murdock at any rate. {787} He didn't fall over the poker
and tongs as Tom did."

"That was a mere accident, Winny. I seen the fung of his pump loose
myself; didn't I help to shut it for him, afther he fell?"

"You were well employed indeed, Kate," said Winny sneeringly.

"You would have done it yourself if he axed you as he did me," replied
Kate.

"Certainly not," said Winny.

So far they seemed both to have the worst of it, in spite of all their
caution. What they wanted was to find out how the other's heart stood
between these two young men, without betraying their own--which latter
they had both nearly done.

There was a pause, and Kate was the next to speak.

"Not but I must admit that Emon-a-knock is a milder, better boy in
some respects than Tom. He has a nicer way with him, Winny, and I
think it is easier somehow to like him than to like Tom."

"Report says you do, Kate dear."

"But you know, Winny, report does not always spake thrue, as you say
yourself."

"Ay, but as you said just now, Kate, it sometimes makes a good hit."

"Well, Winny, I wish you joy at all events, with all my heart. Both
your fathers is anxious for your match; an' sure, when the two farms
is joined in one, with you an' Tom, you can live like a lady. I
suppose you'll hould your head too high for poor Kate an' Emon-a-knock
then."

There was a sadness in Kate's tone as she said this, which, from
ignorance of how matters really stood, was partly genuine, and, from
anxiety to find it out, was partly assumed.

But she had turned the key and the door flew open. Winny could fence
with her feelings no longer.

"Kate Mulvey," she exclaimed, "do not believe the reports you hear
about me and Tom Murdock. I'm aware of what you say about his father
and mine being anxious to unite the farms by our marriage. I don't
want to say anything against Tom Murdock; but he'll never call me
wife. There now, Kate jewel, you have the truth. I'll be well enough
off, Kitty, without Tom Murdock's money or land; and when I really
don't care for him, don't you think it would be much better and
handsomer of him to bestow himself and it upon some nice girl without
a penny" (and she glanced slyly at Kate, whose cheeks got rosy red),
"than to be striving to force it upon one that doesn't want it--nor
wish for it? And don't you think it would be much better and handsomer
for me, who has a nice little fodeen, and must come in for my father's
land,--God between him and harm!--to do the same, if I could meet with
a nice boy that really cared for myself, and not for my money? Answer
me them questions, Kate."

Kate was silent; but her eyes had assumed quite a different
expression, if they had not altogether turned almost a different
color. The weight of Winny's rich rivalry had been lifted from her
heart, and so far as that obstacle had been dreaded, the coast was now
clear. Of course she secretly agreed in the propriety of Winny's
views, and it was only necessary that she should now do so openly.

"You didn't answer me them questions yet, Kate."

"Well I could, Winny, if I liked it; but I don't wish to have act,
hand, or part in setting you against your father's wishes."

"You need not fear that, Kitty; my father won't force me to do what I
really do not wish to do. He never put the matter to me plainly yet,
but I expect it every day. He's always praising Tom Murdock, and
hinting at the business, by saying he wishes he could see me
comfortably settled; that he is growing old and is not the man he used
to be; and all that. I know very well, Kate, what he means, both ways;
and, God between him and harm! I say again; but he'll never see me Tom
Murdock's wife. {788} I have my answer ready for them both."

"Well, Winny, as you seem determined, I suppose I may spake; and, to
tell you the truth, I always thought it would be a pity to put them
two farms into one, and so spoil two good establishments; for sure any
one of them is lashings, Winny, for any decent boy and girl in the
parish; an' what's more, if they were joined together tomorrow, there
is not a gentleman in the county would think a bit the better of them
that had them."

"Never, Kitty, except it was some poor broken-down fellow that wanted
to borrow a couple of hundred pounds, and rob them in the end. And
now, Kitty, let us be plain and free with one another. My opinion is
that Tom could raise you--I won't say out of poverty, Kate; for,
thanks be to God, it is not come to that with you, and that it never
may--but into comfort and plenty; and that I could, some day, do the
same, if I could meet with a nice boy that, as I said, would care for
myself and not for my money. If Tom took a liking to you, Kitty, you
might know he was in earnest for yourself; I _know_ he's only put up
to his make-belief liking for me by his own father and mine. But,
Kitty dear, I'm afraid, like myself, you have no fancy for him."

"Well, Winny, to tell you the truth, I always believed what the
neighbors said about you an' him; an' I tried not to think of him for
that same reason. There's no doubt, Winny dear, but it would be a fine
match for me; but I know he's out an' out for you: only for that,
Winny, I could love every bone in his body--there now! you have it
out."

"He'll soon find his mistake, Kate dear, about me. I'm sure the thing
will be brought to a point before long between us, and between my
father and me too. When Tom finds I'm positive, he can't be blind to
your merits and beauty, Kitty--yes, I will say it out, your
beauty!--you needn't be putting your hand to my mouth that way;
there's no mistake about it."

"Ah, Winny, Winny dear, you're too lenient to me entirely; sure I
couldn't sit or stand beside you in that respect at all, an' with your
money; sure they'll settle it all between themselves."

"They may settle what they like, Kitty; but they can't make me do what
I am determined not to do; so as far as that goes, you have nothing to
fear."

"Well, Winny dear, I'm glad I know the truth; for now I won't be
afeard of crossing you, at any rate; and I know another that wouldn't
be sorry to know as much as I do."

"Who, Kitty? tell us."

"Ah, then now, Winny, can't you guess? or maybe it's what you know
better than I do myself."

"Well, I suppose you mean Emon-a-knock; for indeed, Kitty, he's always
on the top of your tongue, and the parish has it that you and he are
promised. Come now, Kitty, tell us the truth. I told you how there was
no truth in the report about me and Tom Murdock, and how there never
could be."

If this was not leading Kate Mulvey to the answer most devoutly wished
for, I do not know what the meaning of the latter part of the sentence
could be. It was what the lawyers would call a "leading question." The
excitement too of Winny, during the pause which ensued, showed very
plainly the object with which she spoke, and the anxiety she felt for
the result.

Kate did not in the least misunderstand her. Perhaps she knew more of
her thoughts than Winny was aware of, and that it was not then she
found them out for the first time; for Kate was a shrewd observer. She
had gained her own object, and it was only fair she should now permit
Winny to gain hers.

"Ah, Winny dear," she said, after a contemplative pause, "there never
was a word of the kind between us. {789} You know, Winny, in the first
place, it wouldn't do at all--two empty sacks could never stand; and
in the next place, neither his heart was on me, nor mine on him. It
was all idle talk of the neighbors. Not but Emon is a nice boy as
there is to be found in this or any other parish, and you know that,
Winny; don't you, now?"

"Kitty dear, there's nobody can deny what you say, and for that
self-same reason I believed what the neighbors said regarding you and
him."

"Tell me this now, Winny,--you know we were reared, I may say, at the
door with one another, and have been fast friends since we were that
height" (and she held her hand within about two feet of the ground, at
the same time looking fully and very kindly into her friend's face),--
"tell me now, Winny dear, did it fret you to believe what you heard?
Come now."

"For your sake, and for his, Kitty, it could not fret me; but for my
own sake--there now, don't ask me."

"No, _avourneen_, I won't; what need have I, Winny, when I see them
cheeks of yours,--or is it the sun that cum suddenly out upon you,
Winny _asthore?_"

"Kate Mulvey, I'll tell you the truth, as I believe you have told it
to me. For many a long day I'm striving to keep myself from liking
that boy on your account. I think, Kate, if I hadn't a penny-piece in
the world no more than yourself, I would have done my very best to
take him from you; it would have been a fair fight then, Kitty; but I
didn't like to use any odds against you, Kitty dear; and I never gave
him so much as one word to go upon."

"I'm very thankful to you, Winny dear; an' signs on the boy, he
thought you were for a high match with rich Tom Murdock; an' any
private chat Emon an' I ever had was about that same thing."

"Then he has spoken to you about me! O Kitty, dear Kitty, what used he
to be saying of me? do tell me."

"The never a word I'll tell you, Winny dear. Let him spake to
yourself; which maybe he'll do when he finds you give Tom the go-by;
but I'm book-sworn; so don't ask me."

"Well, Kitty, I'm glad I happened to come across you this morning; for
now we understand each other, and there's no fear of our interrupting
one another in our thoughts any more."

"None, thank God," said Kitty.

By this time the girls had wandered along the road to nearly a mile
from home. They had both gained their object, though not in the
roundabout _sounding_ manner which we had anticipated, and they were
now both happy. They were no longer even the imaginary rivals which it
appears was all they had ever been; and as this light broke upon them
the endearing epithets of "dear" and "jewel" became more frequent and
emphatic than was usual in a conversation of the same length.

Their mutual confidences, as they retraced their steps, were imparted
to the fullest extent. They now perfectly "understood each other," as
Winny had said; and to their cordial shake-hands at the turn up to
Kate Mulvey's house was added an affectionate kiss, as good as if they
swore never to interfere with each other in love-affairs.



CHAPTER XI.

Winny Cavana, as far as her own feelings and belief were concerned,
had not made a bad morning's work of it. Hitherto she had supposed
that Kate Mulvey had forestalled her in the affections of
Emon-a-knock. The neighbors had given them to each other, and she
feared that Emon was not free from the power of her charms. With these
doubts, or almost with this belief, upon her mind, she could not have
met her father's {790} importunities about Tom Murdock with the same
careless and happy determination which matters, as they now stood,
would enable her to do. Being assured, from her conversation with
Kate, that there was nothing between her and Emon, she could "riddle"
more easily some circumstances and expressions which, to say the least
of it, were puzzling, with a belief that these two persons were
mutually attached. Winny knew now how to reconcile them; and the view
she took of them was anything but favorable to her father's wishes or
Tom Murdock's hopes.

She could not hope, however,--perhaps she did not wish,--for any
interview with Emon just then, when her change of manner, emanating
from her knowledge of facts, might draw him out, for her heart now
told her that this would surely come. She had some fears that her
father might sound her about Emon, and she wished to be able to say
with a clear conscience that he had never spoken, or even hinted at
the subject, to her; but she was determined, nevertheless, to act
toward her father, and subsequently toward Tom Murdock, as if her
troth and Emon's had been already irrevocably plighted. She was in
hopes that if she had an interview with her father upon the subject of
Tom Murdock in the first instance, the unalterable dislike which she
would exhibit to the match might save her the horrible necessity of
going through the business with the man himself. But poor Winny had
settled matters in her own mind in an order in which they did not
occur; and it so happened that, although she thought her heart had
gone through enough excitement for one day, and that she would, for
the rest of that evening, hide beneath the happiness which was
creeping over her, yet she was mistaken.

Tom Murdock had seen her pass down the road; and hastily putting on
one of his best coats and his very best hat, he followed her,
determined to have good news in return for his father's advice; but he
was disappointed. Before he could overtake her, he perceived that she
had been joined by Kate Mulvey, and that they went coshering away
together. Of course he saw that it was "no go," as he said, for that
time; but he would watch her returning, when he could not fail to meet
her alone.

"Hang me," said he, as he saw them walking away, "if I don't think
Kate Mulvey is the finest girl of the two, and very nearly as handsome
as ever she was--some people say handsomer. If it was not for her
money, and that grand farm she'll have, I'd let her see how soon I
could get a girl in every other respect as good, if not better, than
she is. Look at the two of them: upon my faith, I think Kate is the
lightest stepper of the two."

Tom paused for a few moments, if not in his thoughts, at least in the
expression of them; for all the above had been uttered aloud. Then, as
if they had received a sudden spur which made him start, he muttered
with his usual scowl, "No, no; I'll follow it up to the death if
necessary. That whelp shall never have it to say that Tom Murdock
failed, and perhaps add, where he did not. I'll have her, by fair
means if I can; but if not, by them five crosses," and he clasped his
hands together, "she shall be mine by foul. Sure it is not possible
they are going to meet that whelp this blessed moment!" And he dogged
them at so long a distance behind that, even if their conversation had
been less interesting, they would not have been aware of his stealthy
espionage.

When they turned to return, he turned also, and was then so far before
them that, with the bushes and the bends in the road, he could not be
perceived. Thus he watched and watched, until, to his great
satisfaction, he saw them part company at Kate's house. Winny Cavana,
as we have seen, had still some distance to walk ere she reached the
lane turning up to her father's; and Kate having gone in and shut the
{791} door, Tom strolled on, as if by mere accident, until he met
Winny on the road.

Tom was determined to be as mild and as bland, as cordial and
good-natured, as possible. He felt there had always been a sort of
undefined snappish battle between him and Winny; and he had the
honesty of mind, as well as the vanity, to blame his own harsh and
abrupt manner for this. Perhaps it arose no less from a consciousness
of his personal advantages than from a belief that in his position as
an only son, and heir to his father's interest in a rich and
profitable farm, he had no great need of those blandishments of
expression so generally requisite in making way to a young and
unhackneyed heart. He resolved, therefore, upon this occasion to give
Winny no cause to accuse him of uncouthness of manner; neither was he
inclined to be uncouth when he beheld the glowing beauty of her face,
heightened, as he thought, solely by the exercise of her walk; but not
a little increased, without his knowledge of the fact, by the new
light which had just dawned upon the horizon of her hopes.

Her heart bounced in her bosom as she saw him approach.

"Good morning, Winny," he said, holding out his hand.

"Good morrow kindly, Tom," she replied, wishing to be civil, and
taking it. She knew she was "in for it," as she expressed it to
herself; but encouraged "by the hope within her springing," and
softened by the anticipation of its fulfilment, she was determined to
be kind but firm.

"Have you been walking far, Winny? Upon my life, it seems to agree
with you. It has improved your beauty, Winny, if that was possible."

"Tom, don't flatter me; you're always paying me compliments, and I
often told you that I did not like it. Beside, you did not let me
answer your question until you begin at your old work. I walked about
a mile of the road with Kate Mulvey."

"Kate Mulvey is a complete nice girl. You are not tired, Winny, are
you?"

"Ah, then, what would tire me? is it a mile of a walk, and the road
under my feet? I could walk to _Boher-na-Milthiogue_ and back this
minute."

By this time they had come to the end of the lane turning up to
Rathcash House.

"I'm glad to find you are not tired, Winny. You may as well come on
toward the cross; I have something to say to you."

"And welcome, Tom; what is it?"

Winny felt that the thing was coming, and she wished to appear as
careless and unconscious as possible. When she recollected all Kate
Mulvey had said to her, she was just in the humor to have it over.
Upon reflection, too, she was not sorry that it should so happen
before the grand passage between her and her father upon the same
subject. She could the more easily dispose of the case with him,
having already disposed of it with Tom himself. She therefore went on,
past the end of her own lane; and Tom, taking this for an unequivocal
token in his favor, was beginning to get really fond of her--at least
he thought so.

"Well, Winny, I'm very glad I happened to meet you, and that you seem
inclined to take a walk with me; for to tell you the truth, Winny, I
can't help thinking of you."

"Perhaps you don't try, Tom."

"True for you, Winny dear; I wouldn't help thinking of you if I could,
and I couldn't if I would."

"Is that the way with you, Tom?"

But Winny did not smile or look at him, as he had hoped she would have
done.

"You know it is, Winny dear; but I can keep the truth, in plain
English, from you no longer."

"See that now! Ah, then, Tom, I pity you."

And Tom could not tell from her manner, or from the tone of her voice,
whether she was in earnest or {792} only joking. He preferred the
former.

"Well, Winny Cavana, if you knew how much I love you, you would surely
take pity on me, my own _colleen dhass_."

"Faith, Tom, I believe it's in earnest you are, sure enough."

"In earnest! Yes, Winny, by the bright sky over me--and it is not
brighter than your own eyes--I am in earnest! It is a long day now
since I first took to loving you, though it was only of late you might
have picked it out of my looks. Ah, Winny dear, if you hadn't a
penny-piece but yourself, I would have spoken to you long ago. But
there was a great deal of talk among the neighbors about the joining
of them two farms together, and I was afraid you might think--"

"I understand. You were afraid I might think it was my money and the
farm you were after, and not myself. Was not that it, Tom?"

"Just so, Winny. But I am indeed in earnest, and for yourself alone,
Winny dear; and I'm willing to prove my words by making you my wife,
and mistress of all I have coming Shraftide, God willing." And he took
her by the hand.

She withdrew it at once, after a slight struggle, and replied, "Tom
Murdock, put such a thing totally out of your head, for it can never
be--never, by the same oath you swore just now, and that is the blue
heaven above me!" And she turned back toward the lane.

"I cross, Winny. Don't say that. I know that your father and mine
would both be willing for the match. As to what your father would do
for you, Winny _mavourneen_, I don't care a _boughalawn lui_; for I'm
rich enough without a cross of his money or his land. My own father
will make over to me by lawful deed, the day you become my wife, his
house and furniture, together with the whole of his land and cattle.
Your father, I know, Winny, would do the same for you, for he has but
yourself belonging to him; and although your fortune or your land has
nothing to say to my love, yet, Winny, dear, between us, if you will
consent to my prayer, for it is nothing less, there's few grandees in
the country could compare to you,--I'll say nothing for myself, Winny
dear, only say the word."

"No, Tom, I'll say no word but what I'm after saying; and you are only
making matters worse, talking of grandeur and riches that way. You
would only be striving at what you would not be able for, nor allowed
to keep up, Tom, and as for myself, I'd look well, wouldn't I? stuck
up on a new sidecar, and a drawn bonnet and feathers, coming down the
lane of a Sunday, and the neighbors thronging to mass,--aping my
betters, and getting myself and yourself laughed at. Devil a one, Tom,
but they'd call you Lord _Boher-na-Milthiogue_. No, Tom; put it out of
your head; that is my first and last word to you." And she hastened
her step.

"No, Winny, you won't leave me that way, will you? By all the books
that were ever shut and opened, you may make what you please of me.
I'll never ask to put yourself or myself a pin's-point beyond what we
always were, either in grandeur or anything else. But wouldn't it be a
fine thing, Winny dear, to have our children able to hold up their
heads with the best in the county, in a manner?"

"Ay, in a manner, indeed. No, Tom; they would never be anything but
the Murdocks of Rathcashmore--grandchildren of ould Mick Murdock and
ould Ned Cavana, the common farmers."

"And what have you to say against old Mick Murdock?" exclaimed Tom,
beginning to feel that his suit was hopeless, and flaming up inwardly
in the spirit which was most natural to him.

"Nothing indeed, Tom; you need not be so angry, I meant no offence; I
said as much against my own father as against yours, if there was
anything against either. But we must soon {793} part now, Tom, and let
us part friends at all events, living as we do within a stone's-throw
of each other." She held out her hand, but he took it coldly and
loosely. He felt that his game was up.

"Take my advice, Tom Murdock"--this was the second time she had found
it necessary to overcome her antipathy to pronounce the name--"take
my advice, and never speak to me again upon the subject. Sure, there's
many a fine handsome girl would be glad to listen to you; and I'll now
ask you one question before we part. Wouldn't it be better and fitter
for you to bestow yourself and your land upon some handsome young girl
who has nothing of her own, and was, maybe, well inclined for you, and
to rise her up to be independent, than to be striving to force
yourself and it upon them that doesn't want your land, and cannot care
for yourself? Why don't you look about you? There's many a girl in the
parish as handsome, and handsomer, than I am, that would just jump at
you."

Winny had no sooner uttered these latter words than she regretted
them. She did not wish Tom Murdock to know that she had overheard him.
She was glad however to perceive that, in his anger, he had not
recognized them as a quotation from his conversation with his father
at the gate.

There was a silence now for a minute or two. Tom's blood was 'up; his
hopes of success were over, and he was determined to speak his mind in
an opposite direction.

"Have I set you thinking, Tom?" said Winny, half timidly.

"I'm d--d but you have, Winny Cavana; and I'll answer your question
with one much like it. And would not it be better and fitter for
_you_--of course it would--to bestow yourself and your fortune and your
land upon some handsome young fellow that has nothing but his day's
wages, and was well inclined for you, and to rise him up out of
poverty, than to spoil a good chance for a friend by joining yours to
them that has enough without it? Why didn't you follow up your first
question with that, Winny Cavana?" And he stopped short, enjoying the
evident confusion he had caused.

Winny thought, too, for a few moments in silence. She was considering
the probability of Tom Murdock's having overheard her conversation
with Kate Mulvey from behind some hedge. But the result of her
calculations was that it was impossible.

She was right. It was a mere paraphrase of her own question to him,
and only shows how two clever people may hit upon the same idea, and
express it in nearly the same language. And the question was prompted
by his suspicions in the quarter already intimated.

"Yes, I see how it is," he exclaimed, breaking the silence, and giving
way to his ungovernable temper. "But, by the hatred I bear to that
whelp, that shall never be, at all events. I'll go to your father this
moment, and let him know what's going on--"

"And who do you dare to call 'a whelp,' Tom Murdock? If it be Edward
Lennon, let me tell you that his little finger is worth your whole
head and heart--body and bones together."

"There, there--she acknowledges it. But I'll put a spoke in that
whelp's wheel,--for it was him I called a whelp, since you must
know,--see if I don't; so let him look out, that's all."

"I have acknowledged nothing, Tom Murdock. A word beyond common
civility never passed between Edward Lennon and myself; and take care
how you venture to interfere between my father and me. You have got
your answer, and I have sworn to it. You have no right to interfere
further."

By this time they had reached the end of the lane again; and Winny,
with her heart on fire, and her face in a flame, hurried to the house.
Fortunately, her father had not returned {794} from the fields, and
rushing to her own room, she locked the door, took off her bonnet and
cloak, and "threw herself" (I believe that is the proper expression)
upon the bed. Perhaps a sensation novelist would add that she "burst
into an agony of tears."



CHAPTER XII.

Winny lay for nearly an hour meditating upon the past, the present,
and the future. Upon the whole she did not regret what had occurred,
either before or after she had met Tom Murdock, and she cooled down
into her accustomed self-possession sooner than she had supposed
possible.

One grand object had been attained. Tom Murdock had come to the point,
and she had given him his final and irrevocable answer, if she had
twenty fathers thundering parental authority in her ears. A spot of
blue sky had appeared too in the east, above the outline of Shanvilla
mountain, in which the morning-star of her young life might soon
arise, and shine brightly through the flimsy clouds--or she could call
them nothing but flimsy--now which had hitherto darkened her hopes.
What if Tom Murdock was a villain?--and she believed he was: what
dared he--what could he do? Pshaw, nothing! But, oh that the
passage-of-arms between herself and her father was over! "Then,"
thought she, "all might be plain sailing before me."

But, Winny, supposing all these matters fairly over,--and the battle
with your father is likely to be as cranky and tough upon his part as
it is certain to be straightforward and determined upon yours,--there
will still be a doubtful blank upon your mind and in your heart, and
one the solution of which you cannot, even with Kate Mulvey's
assistance, seek an occasion to fill up. Ah, no, you must trust to
chance for time and opportunity for that most important of all your
interviews. And what if you be mistaken after all, and, if mistaken,
crushed for ever by the result?

Let Winny alone for that. Women seldom make a bad guess in such a
case.

Winny's mental and nervous system having both regained their ordinary
degree of composure, she left her room, and proceeded through the
house upon her usual occupations. She was not, however, quite free
from a certain degree of anxiety at the anticipated interview with her
father. He had not in any way intimated his intention to ask certain
questions touching any communication she might have received from Tom
Murdock, together with her answers thereto; and yet she felt certain
that on the first favorable occasion he would ask the questions,
without any notice whatever. She had subsided for the day, after a
very exciting morning upon two very different subjects. Yes; she
called them different, though they were pretty much akin; and she
would now prefer a cessation of her anxiety for the remainder of that
afternoon at least.

So far she was fortunate. Her father did not come in until it was very
late; and being much fatigued by his stewardship of the day, he did
not appear inclined to enter upon any important subject, but fell
asleep in his arm-chair after a hasty and (Winny observed)
scarcely-touched dinner.

Winny was an affectionate good child. She was devotedly fond of her
father, with whose image were associated all her thoughts of happiness
and love since she was able to clasp his knees and clamber to his lap.
Even yet no absolute allegiance of a decided nature claimed the
disloyalty of her heart; but she felt that the time was not far
distant when either he must abdicate his royalty, or she must rebel.

{795}

"It is clearly my duty now," she said to herself, "not to delay this
business about Tom, upon the chance of his being the first to speak of
it: to-morrow, before the cares and labors of the day occupy his mind,
and perhaps make him ever so little a bit cross, I will tell him what
has happened. I am afraid he will be very angry with me for refusing
that man; but it cannot be helped: not for all the gold they both
possess would I marry Tom Murdock. I shall not betray his sordid
villany, however, until all other resources fail; but I know my father
will scorn the fellow as I do when he knows the whole truth--but ah, I
have no witness," thought she, "and they will make a liar of me."

If the old man could have ever perceived any difference in the kind
and affectionate attention so uniformly bestowed upon him by his fond
daughter, perhaps it might have been upon that night after he awoke
from a rather lengthened nap in his easy chair.

Winny had sat during the whole time gazing upon the loved features of
the sleeping old man. She could not call to mind, from the day upon
which her memory first became conscious, a single unkind or even a
harsh word which he had uttered to her. That he could be more than
harsh to others she knew, and she was now in her nineteenth year;
fifteen clear years, she might say, of unbroken memory. She could
remember her fifth birthday quite well, and so much as a snappish word
or a commanding look she had never received from him; not, God knows,
but he had good reason, many's the time, for more than either. And
there he lay now, calm, and fast asleep, the only one belonging to her
on the wide earth, and she meditating an opposition in her heart to
his plans respecting her--all, she knew, arising from the great love
he had for her, and the frustration of which, she was aware, would vex
him sore. "Oh, Tom Murdock, Tom Murdock, why are you Tom Murdock? or
Emon-a-knock, why did I ever see you?" was the conclusion to this
train of thought, as she sat still, gazing on her sleeping father.

Then a happier train succeeded, and a fond smile lit up her handsome
face. "Ah no, no! I am the only being belonging to him, the only one
he loves. The father who for nearly twenty years never spoke an unkind
word--and if he had reason to reprove me did so by example and
request, and not the rod--has only to know that a marriage with Tom
Murdock would make me miserable to make him spurn him, as I did
myself. As to the other boy, I know nothing for certain myself about
him, and I can fairly deny any accusation he may make; and I am
certain he has been put up to it by old Murdock through his son. Yet
even on this score I'll deny as little as I can."

Here it was her father awakened; and Winny had only time to conclude
her thoughts by wondering how that fellow dare call Emon "a whelp."

"Well, father dear," she said, "you have had a nice nap; you must have
been very tired. I wish I was a man, that I might help you on the
farm."

"Winny darlin', I wouldn't have you anything but what you are for the
world. I have not much to do at all on the farm but to poke about, and
see that the men I have at work don't rob me by idling; and I must say
I never saw honester work than what they leave after them. But, Winny,
I came across old Murdock shortly after I went out, and he came over
my land with me, and I went over his with him, so that we had rather a
long walk. I'll engage he's as tired as what I am. I did not think his
farm was so extensive as it is, or that the land was so good, or in
such to-au-op caun-di-shon." And poor old Ned yawned and stretched
himself.

Winny saw through the whole thing at once. The matter of a marriage
between herself and Tom Murdock, and a union of the farms, had
doubtless been discussed between her father and old Mick Murdock, and
a final arrangement, so far as they were concerned, had been arrived
at. A hitch upon her part she was certain neither {796} of them had
ever dreamt of; and yet "hitch" was a slight word to express the
opposition she was determined to give to their wishes.

She knew that if her father had got so far as where he had been
interrupted by the yawn when he was fresh after breakfast, the whole
thing would have come out. She was, however, a considerate girl; and
although she knew there was at that moment a good opening, where a
word would have brought the matter on, she knew that the result would
have completely driven rest and sleep from the poor old man's pillow
for the night, tired and fatigued as he was. She therefore adroitly
changed the conversation to his own comforts in a cup of tea before he
went to bed.

"Yes, _mavourneen_" he said, "I fell asleep before I mixed a tumbler
of punch, and I'll take the tea now instead; for, Winny, my love, you
can join me at that. Do you know, Winny, I'm very thirsty?"

"Well, father dear, I'll soon give you what will refresh you."

While Winny was busying herself for the tea, putting down a huge
kettle of water in the kitchen, and rattling the cups and saucers
until you'd think she was trying to break them, the old man wakened up
into a train of thought not altogether dissimilar to that which Winny
herself had indulged in over his sleeping form.

Winny was quite right. The whole matter had been discussed on that day
between the old men during their perambulations round the two farms;
the respective value and condition of the land forming a minute
calculation not unconnected with the other portion of their
discourse--settlements, deeds of conveyance, etc., etc., had all been
touched upon.

Winny was right in another of her surmises, although at the time she
scarcely believed so herself. Old Murdock, taking his cue from Tom,
told old Ned that if he found Winny at all averse to marrying Tom, he
was certain young Lennon would be at the bottom of it--at least Tom
had more than hinted such to him.

Old Ned was furious at this, declaring that if Tom Murdock was never
to the fore, his daughter should never bestow his long and hard
earnings upon a pauper like that, looking for a day's wages here and
there, and as often without it as with it; how dare the likes of him
lift his eyes to his little girl! But he'd soon put a stop to that, if
there was anything in it, let what would turn up. Every penny-piece he
was worth in the world was in his own power, and there was a very easy
way of bringing Miss Winny to her senses, if she had that wild notion
in her head.

Poor old Ned, in his indignation for what he thought Winny's welfare,
forgot that she was the only being belonging to him in the world, and
that when it came to the point he would find it impossible to put this
threat of "cutting her off" into execution.

Old Murdock was delighted with this tirade against young Lennon, whom
he looked upon as the only real obstacle to Tom's acquisition of land
and money, to say nothing of a handsome wife.

"Be studdy with her, Ned," said he, "she has a very floostherin' way
wid her where you're concerned; I often remarked it. Don't let her
come round you, Ned, wid her pillaverin' about that 'whelp,' as Tom
calls him."

"An' he calls him quite right. If he daars to look up to my little
girl, he'll soon find out his mistake, I can tell him."

"Nothin' would show him his mistake so much as to have Tom's business
an' hers settled at Shraft, Ned."

"I know that, Mick; an' with the blessing I'll spake to her in the
mornin' upon the subjict. I dunna did Tom ever spake to herself,
Mick?"

"If he didn't he will afore to-morrow night; he's on the watch to meet
with her by accident; he says it's betther nor to go straight up to
her, an' maybe frighten her."

"Very well, Mick; I'll have an eye to them; maybe it would be betther
{797} let Tom himself spake first. These girls are so dam' proud; an'
I can tell you it is betther not vex Winny."

Of course these two old men said a great deal more; but the above is
the pith of what set old Ned Cavana thinking the greater part of the
night; for the tea Winny made was very strong, and, as he said, he was
thirsty, having missed his tumbler of punch after dinner. He fell
asleep, however, much sooner than he would have done had the sequel to
his plans become known to him before he went to bed.



[TO BE CONTINUED.]

------

From The Book of Days.

YOUNG'S NARCISSA.


The Third Night of Young's Complaint is entitled Narcissa, from its
being dedicated to the sad history of the early death of a beautiful
lady, thus poetically designated by the author. Whatever doubts may
exist with respect to the reality or personal identity of the other
characters noticed in the "Night Thoughts," there can be none whatever
as regards Narcissa. She was the daughter of Young's wife, by her
first husband, Colonel Lee. When scarcely seventeen years of age she
was married to Mr. Henry Temple, son of the then Lord Palmerston.
[Footnote 158] Soon afterward, being attacked by consumption, she was
taken by Young to the south of France in hopes of a change for the
better; but she died there about a year after her marriage, and Dr.
Johnson tells us, in his "Lives of the Poets," that "her funeral was
attended with the difficulties painted in such animated colors in
Night the Third." Young's words in relation to the burial of Narcissa,
eliminating, for brevity's sake, some extraneous and redundant lines,
are as follows:

  [Footnote 158: By a second wife, grandfather of the present
  Premier.]

  "While nature melted, superstition raved;
  That mourned the dead; and this denied a grave.
  For oh! the curst ungodliness of zeal!
  While sinful flesh retarded, spirit nursed
  In blind infallibility's embrace,
  Denied the charity of dust to spread
  O'er dust! a charity their dogs enjoy.
  What could I do? what succor? what resource?
  With pious sacrilege a grave I stole;
  With impious piety that grave I wronged;
  Short in my duty: coward in my grief!
  More like her murderer than friend, I crept
  With soft suspended step, and muffled deep
  In midnight darkness, whispered my last sigh.
  I whispered what should echo through their realms,
  Nor writ her name whose tomb should pierce the skies."

All Young's biographers have told the same story from Johnson down to
the last edition of the "Night Thoughts," edited by Mr. Gilfillan,
who, speaking of Narcissa, says "her remains were brutally denied
sepulture as the dust of a Protestant." Le Tourneure translated the
"Night Thoughts" into French in 1770, and, strange to say, the work
soon became exceedingly popular in France, more so probably than ever
it has been in England. Naturally enough, then, curiosity became
excited as to where the unfortunate Narcissa was buried, and it was
soon discovered that she had been interred in the Botanic Garden of
Montpellier. An old gate-keeper of the garden, named Mercier,
confessed that many years previously he had assisted to bury an
English lady in a hollow, waste spot of the garden. As he told the
story, an English clergyman came to him and begged that he would bury
a lady; but he refused, until the Englishman, with tears in his eyes,
said that she was his only daughter; on hearing this, he (the
gate-keeper), being a father himself, consented. Accordingly the
Englishman brought the dead {798} body on his shoulders, his eyes
raining tears, to the garden at midnight, and he there and then buried
the corpse. About the time this confession was made, Professor Gouan,
an eminent botanist, was writing a work on the plants in the garden,
into which he introduced the above story, thus giving it a sort of
scientific authority; and consequently the grave of Narcissa became
one of the treasures of the garden, and one of the leading lions of
Montpellier. A writer in the "Evangelical Magazine" of 1797 gives an
account of a visit to the garden, and a conversation with one Bannal,
who had succeeded Mercier in his office, and who had often heard the
sad story of the burial of Narcissa from Mercier's lips. Subsequently,
Talma, the tragedian, was so profoundly impressed with the story that
he commenced a subscription to erect a magnificent tomb to the memory
of Narcissa; but as the days of bigotry in matters of sepulture had
nearly passed away, it was thought better to erect a simple monument,
inscribed, as we learn from "Murray's Handbook," with the words:

  "Placandis Narcissae manibus,"

the "Handbook" adding, "She was buried here at a time when the
atrocious laws which accompanied the Revocation of Nantes, backed by
the superstition of a fanatic populace, denied Christian burial to
Protestants."

Strange to say, this striking story is almost wholly devoid of truth.
Narcissa never was at Montpellier. That she died at Lyons we know from
Mr. Herbert Crofts's account of Young, published by Dr. Johnson; that
she was buried there we know by her burial registry and her tombstone,
both of which are yet in existence. And by these we also learn that
Young's "animated" account of her funeral in the "Night Thoughts" is
simply untrue. She was not denied a grave:

  "Denied the charity of dust to spread
  O'er dust,"

nor did he steal a grave, as he asserts, but bought and paid for it.

Her name was not unwrit, as her tombstone still testifies. The central
square of the Hotel de Dieu at Lyons was long used as a burial place
for Protestants; but the alteration in the laws at the time of the
great Revolution doing away with the necessity of having separate
burial places for different religions, the central garden was
converted into a medical garden for the use of the hospital. The
Protestants of Lyons being of the poorer class, there were few
memorials to move when the ancient burying place was made into a
garden. The principal one, however, consisting of a large slab of
black marble, was set up against a wall, close beside an old Spanish
mulberry-tree. About twenty years ago the increasing growth of this
tree necessitated the removal of the slab, when it was found that the
side which had been placed against the wall contained a Latin
inscription to the memory of Narcissa. The inscription, which is too
long to be quoted here, leaves no doubt upon the matter. It mentions
the names of her father and mother, her connection with the noble
family of Lichfield, her descent from Charles II., and concludes by
stating that she died on the 8th of Oct., 1736, aged 18 years. On
discovering this inscription M. Ozanam, the director of the Hotel de
Dieu, searched the registry of the Protestant burial, still preserved
in the Hotel de Ville at Lyons, and found an entry, of which the
following is a correct translation: "Madam Lee, daughter of Col. Lee,
aged about eighteen years, wife of Henry Temple, English by birth, was
buried at the Hotel de Dieu at Lyons, in the cemetery of persons of
the Reformed religion of the Swiss nation, the 12th of Oct., 1736, at
eleven o'clock at night, by order of the Prévôt of merchants."
"Received 729 livres 12 sols. Signed, Para, priest and treasurer."
From this document, the authenticity of which is indisputable, we
learn the utter untruthfulness of Young's recital. True, Narcissa was
buried at night, and most probably {799} without any religious
service, and a considerable sum charged for the privilege of
interment, but she was not denied the "charity their dogs enjoy."
Calculating according to the average rate of exchange at the period,
729 livres would amount to thirty-five pounds sterling. Was it this
sum that excited a poetical imagination so strong as to overstep the
bounds of veracity? We could grant the excuse of poetical license had
not Young declared in his preface that the poem was "real, not
fictitious." The subject is not a pleasing one, and we need not carry
it any further; but may conclude, in the words of Mr. Cecil, who,
alluding to Young's renunciation of the world in his writings when he
was eagerly hunting for church preferment, says: "Young is, of all
other men, one of the most striking examples of the sad disunion of
piety from truth."

----

From The Dublin Review.

MADAME DE MAINTENON.


_Madame de Maintenon et sa Famille. Lettres et Documents inédits._ Par
HONORÉ BONHOMME. Paris: Didier. 1863.


_Histoire de Madame de Maintenon, et des principaux Evénements du Règne
de Louis XIV_. Par M. le DUC DE NOAILLES, de l'Académie Française.
Tomes 4. Paris: Comon. 1849-1858.


_The Life of Madame de Maintenon_. Translated from the French. London:
Lockyer Davis. 1772.


_The Secret Correspondence of Madame de Maintenon with the Princess des
Ursins, from the original manuscripts in the possession of the Duke of
Choiseul_. Translated from the French. 3 vols. London: Whittaker. 1827.


Mémorial de Saint-Cyr. Paris: Fulgence. 1846.


Female characters have, for good or ill, played a larger part on the
stage of French history than of English. We have no names which
correspond in extensive influence to those of Mesdames de Sévigné, de
Maintenon, de Genlis, and Récamier; while the extraordinary power,
both political and social, exercised by royal mistresses in France,
finds no parallel in England, even in the worst days of courtly
profligacy. Nor is it easy to say to what cause this difference
between the two countries is to be ascribed. It may be that public
opinion has been brought to bear more fully on individual action here
than in France, and acts as a more powerful restraint; and it may be
also that extreme prominence in society is repugnant to the more
modest and retiring habits of Englishwomen. There is no lady in our
annals who has occupied a position similar to that of Madame de
Maintenon in relation to royalty except Mrs. Fitzherbert; but she,
though highly distinguished for her virtues, was altogether wanting in
those intellectual endowments which adorned that gifted woman who won
the esteem and fixed the affections of Louis XIV. Many circumstances
combined to make her the most striking example of female ascendency in
France; and the object of this paper will be to trace the causes which
led to it, as well as to her being, to this day, an object of
never-failing interest to the French people. Like all great women, she
has had many virulent detractors and many ardent eulogists; but we
shall endeavor to avoid the {800} extremes of both, more especially as
M. Bonhomme is of opinion that her biography has still to be written.
If there were no higher consideration, self-respect alone would demand
scrupulous impartiality in a historical inquiry; and we are the less
tempted to depart from this rule in the present instance because we
are convinced that in Madame de Maintenon's history there is ample
scope for the most chivalrous vindication of her fame, and that, as
time goes on, and the materials relative to her contemporaries are
collated, her apparent defects will lessen in importance, and her
character stand out in fairer proportions and clearer light. It needs
only to compare recent memoirs of her with the jejune attempts of the
last century, to perceive how much her cause gains from fuller and
closer investigation. The Due de Noailles has rendered good service to
the literature of his country by his voluminous history of this lady,
conducted as it is on the sound and admirable principle of making the
subject of the biography speak for herself. There is no historical
personage about whom more untruths have been circulated; and, after
all that has been said and written, the only way to know her is to
read her correspondence.

Lord Macaulay speaks of Franchise de Maintenon in terms so pointed,
that they well deserve to be quoted at the outset:

"It would be hard to name any woman who, with so little romance in her
temper, has had so much in her life. Her early years had been passed
in poverty and obscurity. Her first husband had supported himself by
writing burlesques, farces, and poems. When she attracted the notice
of her sovereign, she could no longer boast of youth or beauty; but
she possessed in an extraordinary degree those more lasting charms,
which men of sense, whose passions age has tamed, and whose life is a
life of business and care, prize most highly in a female companion.
Her character was such as has well been compared to that soft green on
which the eye, wearied by warm tints and glaring lights, reposes with
pleasure. A just understanding; an inexhaustible yet never redundant
flow of rational, gentle, and sprightly conversation; a temper of
which the serenity was never for a moment ruffled; a tact which
surpassed the tact of her sex as much as the tact of her sex surpasses
the tact of ours; such were the qualities which made the widow of a
buffoon first the confidential friend, and then the spouse, of the
proudest and most powerful of European kings. It was said that Louis
had been with difficulty prevented by the arguments and vehement
entreaties of Louvois from declaring her Queen of France." [Footnote
159]

  [Footnote 159: "History of England," chap, xi., 1689.]

The romance of her life began with her birth, which took place on the
27th of November, 1635,  [Footnote 160] in the prison of Niort, where
her father was confined. His life had been full of adventure and
crime, and he was unworthy of the faithful and affectionate wife who
shared his imprisonment. He changed his religious profession several
times, but at the moment of Frances' birth he called himself
Protestant. The child accordingly was baptized in the Calvinist church
of Niort, though her mother was a Catholic, and was placed under the
charge of her aunt, Madame de Vilette, at Murçay, about a league from
the prison. The prisoner, Constant d'Aubigné, was at length released,
and being disinherited by his father for his ill conduct, embarked a
second time for America about the year 1643,  [Footnote 161] taking
with him his wife and children. Little Frances suffered so much from
the voyage that at one time she was thought to be dead, and a sailor
held her in his arms, ready to sink her in a watery grave. "_On ne
revient pas_" as the Bishop of Metz said long after {801} to Madame de
Maintenon, _"de si loin pour pen de chose."_   [Footnote 162]

  [Footnote 160: "_Bonhomme_," p. 235.]

  [Footnote 161: _Ibid._, p. 230. ]

  [Footnote 162: "One does not return from so far but for a great object."]

Notwithstanding her father's evil example, there was enough in Frances
d'Aubigné's ancestral remembrances to have dazzled her imagination in
after life. Her aunt, who had been her earliest instructress, was a
zealous Protestant; and her grandfather, Agrippa d'Aubigné, as a
soldier, a historian, and a satirical poet, was one of the first men
of his day. He had served Henry IV. in various capacities, and was
used to address his royal master so freely as to reproach him for his
change of religion. One day, when the king was showing a courtier his
lip pierced by an assassin's knife, d'Aubigné said, "Sire, you have as
yet renounced God only with your lips, and he has pierced them; if you
renounce him in heart, he will pierce your heart also."

Frances' father died in Martinique, having lost all he had gained by
gambling. Madame d'Aubigné therefore returned to France, and devoted
herself to the education of her child. She made her familiar with
"Plutarch's Lives," and exercised her in composition. She would gladly
have kept the task of instruction to herself, but poverty constrained
her at last to resign Frances with many fears into the hands of her
aunt, Madame de Vilette. The effect of this transfer was her becoming
imbued with Calvinist tenets; and when, through the interference of
the government,  [Footnote 163] she was removed from Madame de
Vilette's care, and made over to a Catholic relative, she proved very
refractory, and persisted in turning her back to the altar during
mass. Various means of persuasion were tried in vain; and it was not
till the Ursuline sisters in Paris took her in hand that her scruples
vanished, and she consented to abjure her errors and to believe
anything except that her aunt Vilette would be damned. In after-life
she used often to say that her mother and several of the nuns had been
very injudicious and severe with her, and that, but for the kindness
and good sense of one lady in the convent, she should probably never
have embraced the Catholic faith.

  [Footnote 163: "_Duc de Noailles," tome_ I., p. 77.]

Only a few years passed before she had to choose between a conventual
life and a distasteful marriage. Her mother was dead, and "the
beautiful Indian," as she was called, was left almost without
resources. She had become acquainted with the comic poet Scarron, and
often visited him. He was five-and-twenty years older than herself,
and hideously deformed. A singular paralysis, caused by quack
medicines, had deprived him of the use of his limbs, his hands and
mouth only being left free. His satirical pieces had been very
popular, and, though fixed to his chair, he received a great deal of
company, and joked incessantly. He was much struck by Frances
d'Aubigné, and appreciated her talents the more highly because mental
culture was rapidly advancing, and the conversation in drawing-rooms
began to be rational. His offer of marriage was accepted by her, for
"she preferred," as she said, "marrying him to marrying a convent." In
the summer of 1652 she became his bride. Such a union deserved a place
in one of his own farces, and gave little promise of happiness or
virtue. But the consequences were far different from what might have
been expected. A change for the better had taken place in public
morals, and Madame Scarron had no sooner a house of her own than she
took a prominent part in the movement. She carefully tended her
helpless spouse; brushed the flies from his nose when he could not use
his fingers, and administered to him the opiate draught without which
he could not sleep. She received his guests with a dignity beyond her
years, and her conduct was regulated on a plan of general reserve. No
one dared address her in words of double signification; and one of the
young men of fashion who frequented the house declared that he {802}
would sooner think of venturing on any familiarity with the queen than
with Madame Scarron. People saw that she was in earnest. During Lent,
she would eat a herring at the lower end of the table, and retire
before the rest. So young and attractive, in a capital of brilliant
dissipation, and with such a husband as Scarron, her example could not
but have an effect. Meanwhile she cultivated her mind, and learned
Italian, Spanish, and Latin. She knew not what might be required of
her, for Scarron's fortune was dwindling away, and he had been
compelled to resign the prebend of Mans. He was a lay-ecclesiastic,
and, like many literary men of that day, bore the title of abbé.
Poverty again stared her in the face, and the servant who waited at
table had often to whisper, "Madame, no roast again to-day!" Devoted
to her husband's sick chamber, she avoided society abroad, and wrote,
only two years after her marriage, letters which might have come from
an aged saint on the brink of eternity. "All below is vanity," she
said, "and vexation of spirit. Throw yourself into the arms of God;
one wearies of all but him, who never wearies of those who love him."

Her enemies have strongly contested her virtue at this period, and
appealed to her intimacy with Ninon de Lenclos in proof of their
allegations. This modern Leontium certainly frequented Scarron's
drawing-room and also (such were the dissolute manners of the age)
that of most other celebrities in Paris. But the unhappy woman herself
has left behind her an unquestionable testimony to Madame Scarron's
purity. "In her youth," she says, "she was virtuous through weakness
of mind: I tried to cure her of it, but she feared God too much." She
had, of course, many admirers, and she must needs have gone out of the
world not to have them. But to be admired and courted is one thing, to
yield and sin mortally is another. It might be wished that Madame
Scarron's name had never been mixed up with that of Ninon, to whom
virtue was "_faibleese d'esprit_" but the freedom of her conduct must
not be tried too severely by the stricter laws of propriety which
prevail among us now. She never forgot Ninon, corresponded with her at
times, aided her when she was in distress, and was consoled by her
dying like a Christian at the age of 90.  [Footnote 164 ] She who had
boasted that Epicurus was her model gave the closing years of her life
to God.  [Footnote 165]

  [Footnote 164: In 1705.]

  [Footnote 165: "_Duc de Noailles," tome_ i., p. 206.]

Madame Scarron's resistance to the importunities of Villarceaux was
well known, and is thus alluded to by Bois-Robert in verses addressed
to the marquis himself:   [Footnote 166]

  "Si c'est cette rare beauté
  Qui tieut ton esprit enchaîné,
  Marquis, j'ai raison de te plaindre;
  Car son humeur est fort à craindre:
  Elle a presque autant de fierté
  Qu'elle a de grâce et de beauté."

  [Footnote 166: "Marquis, if it is this rare beauty who holds you in
  chains, I have reason to pity you; for she as of a temper much to be
  feared. She has almost as much pride as she has grace and beauty."]

But those who follow the course of Madame de Maintenon's interior life
know perfectly well how to interpret what Bois-Robert called
"haughtiness," and Ninon "weakness of mind." It is a matter of no
small importance to rescue such characters from the foul grasp of
calumny. Gilles Boileau was the only one of her contemporaries while
she was young who dared to throw out any suspicion against her honor,
but this he did evidently to avenge himself on Scarron, against whom
he had a mortal pique.

A new era was dawning on France. Richelieu and Mazarin had by their
policy prepared the triumphs of monarchy; Turenne and Condé had
displayed their genius in war; the great ministers and captains waited
for the moment when their master should call them to his service; and
arts and letters were ready to embellish all with their rich coloring.
Louis XIV. really mounted the throne in 1660, and the glory and
greatness of France rose {803} with him. Pascal, Molière, La Fontaine,
and Boileau published their works almost at the same time. Racine
presented to the king the first-fruits of his master mind, and the
voice of Bossuet had already been heard from the pulpit. Scarron
foresaw the brilliancy of the epoch, but he saw also that his own end
was nigh. "I shall have," he said, "no cause for regret in dying,
except that I have no fortune to leave my wife, who deserves more than
I can tell, and for whom I have every reason in the world to be
thankful." Humorous to the last, he made a jest of his sufferings,
and, when seized with violent hiccough, said if he could only get over
it, he would write a good satire upon it. He died perfectly himself,
and was not even for a moment untrue to his character. A few seconds
before his end, seeing those around him in tears, he said, "You weep,
my children; ah! I shall never make you cry as much as I have made you
laugh." He had but one serious interval to give to death--that in
which Madame Scarron caused him to fulfil his religious duties. He had
always been a Christian, and neither in his writings nor in his
conversation had allowed anything prejudicial to religion to escape
him. A chaplain came every Sunday to say mass at his house. "I leave
you no fortune," he said to his wife when dying, "and virtue will
bring none: nevertheless be always virtuous." The point of this
admonition must be gathered from the corruption of the times. Her
mother's last words also had sunk deep into Frances' memory, for she
had warned her "to hope everything from God and to fear everything
from man." Scarron died in 1660, and was soon forgotten. His name
would now scarcely be known, nor would any at this day be conversant
with his comedies and satires but for the exalted position which his
widow subsequently attained. His immediate successors obeyed
unconsciously the epitaph which he had himself composed, and made no
noise over the grave where poor Scarron took his "first night's rest."

  "Passants, ne faites pas de bruit,
  De crainte que je ne m'éveille;
  Car voilà la première nuit
  Que le pauvre Scarron sommeille."   [Footnote 167]

  [Footnote 167: "Poor Scarron his first night of sleep enjoys: Hush,
  passers-by, nor wake him with your noise!"]

Was there ever a more pathetic joke?

When Mazarin died in 1661, the young king summoned his council and
said, "Gentlemen, I have hitherto allowed the affairs of state to be
conducted by the late cardinal; henceforward I intend to govern
myself, and you will aid me with your advice when I ask it." From that
day, the face of society in France rapidly changed. Then, as Voltaire
says, the revolution in arts, intellect, and morals which had been
preparing for half a century took effect, and at the court of Louis
XIV. were formed that refinement of manners and those social
principles which have since extended through Europe. The example long
set by the Hôtel de Rambouillet in Paris was followed by many others,
and numerous _salons_ which have since become matter of history united
all that was most brilliant in genius and talent with much that was
estimable for worth and even piety.

The first ten years of Madame Scarron's widowhood were passed in the
midst of these elegant and intellectual circles. The assemblies of
Madame de Sévigné, Madame de Coulanges, Louvois' cousin, and Madame
de Lafayette, the novelist, were, with the hôtels of Albret and
Richelieu, those which she principally frequented. She was in great
distress, and her friends tried to obtain for her the pension her
husband had once enjoyed. But Cardinal Mazarin was inflexible. He
remembered the "Mazarinade," in which Scarron had satirized him, and
refused to grant any relief to his charming widow. But she would be
beholden to none for a subsistence. She retired into the {804} convent
of the Hospitalers, where a relation lent her an apartment, and lived
for some time on a pittance she had hoarded. The queen-mother then
became interested in her behalf, and a pension of £50 a year was
assigned her. "Henceforward," she said in a letter to Madame d'Albret,
"I shall be able to labor for my salvation in peace. I have made a
promise to God that I will give one fourth of my pension to the poor."
She now removed to the Ursuline convent, where she lived simply and
modestly, but visited constantly, and received, as the sisters
complained, "a furious deal of company." Her dress was elegant, but of
cheap materials, and she managed by rare economy to keep a maid, pay
her wages, and have a little over at the end of the year. She might
have accepted the Maréchal d'Albret's offer of a home in her hôtel,
but she preferred entire independence in her own humble asylum. Many a
page could we fill with accounts of the friendships she formed at this
period. To epitomize her life is in one respect a painful task, for
the records we possess respecting her are equally interesting and
copious. She has found at last a biographer worthy of her, and it is
to the Due de Noailles' volumes we must refer those who long for
further details than our space allows us to give. He is the ablest
champion of her honor that has yet appeared, and refutes triumphantly
the calumnies of the Duc de Saint Simon by which so many have been
deceived.

At the Hôtel d'Albret Madame Scarron often met Madame de Montespan,
who soon after became the mistress of Louis. The two ladies had many
tastes in common, and an intimacy sprang up between them. How
strangely they became related to each other afterward we shall
presently see. Meanwhile Madame Scarron was overtaken by another
reverse. The queen-mother died in 1666, and with her the pension
ceased. Many splendid mansions were eager to receive and entertain
her, but she declined them all as permanent abodes. A rich and
dissolute old man proposed to marry her, and her friends unwisely
seconded his overtures; but she was proof against them, and wrote to
Ninon to express her gratitude, because the voice of that licentious
woman alone was raised in approval of her conduct. She was indignant
at the comparison her friends made between the unworthy aspirant and
her late husband, and avowed her readiness to endure any hardships
rather than sacrifice her liberty, and entangle herself in an
engagement which conscience could not approve. Constrained, therefore,
by want, she was about to expatriate herself, and follow in the train
of the Duchesse de Nemours, who was affianced to the King of Portugal.
It was a sore trial, for none are more attached to their country, none
endure exile with less fortitude, than the French. She saw Madame de
Montespan once more; it was in the royal palace, and that incident
changed her destiny. The future rivals met under conditions how
different from those which were one day to exist! Madame de Montespan,
though not yet the king's mistress, was already in high favor, and the
patroness of that poor widow who was afterward, by winning Louis'
esteem, to supplant her in his affections, and become, all but in
name, Queen of France. Through her mediation the forfeited pension was
restored, and we find her name in the list of ladies invited to a
court fête in 1688. Nevertheless, her troubles withdrew her very much
from the world, and she thought for a time of adopting a religious
habit. Indeed, it is not impossible that she might actually have done
so, had she not been made averse to the step by the severity of her
confessor, the Abbé Gobelin. With a view of mortifying her ambition to
please and be admired, he recommended her to dress still more plainly,
and be silent in company. She obeyed, and became so disagreeable to
herself and others that she sometimes felt inclined to {805} renounce
her habits of devotion.  [Footnote 168] She retired, however, to a
small lodging in the Rue des Tournelles, lived more alone, and, as she
wrote to Ninon, "read nothing but the Book of Job and the Maxims."

  [Footnote 168: _"Duc de Noailles,_" tome i., pp. 310-12.]

Here fortune came to her relief. The infidelities of Louis XIV. are
unhappily too well known. Suffice it in this place to say that Madame
de Montespan bore him a daughter in 1669, and a son, afterward the Duc
du Maine, in 1670. Circumstances required that the existence of these
children should be concealed, and their mother, in whose heart the
voice of conscience was never stifled, bethought her of the good
Madame Scarron as one who was well fitted to take charge of their
education. Accordingly, she was sounded on the subject. The king's
name was not mentioned, but she was informed that the secret regarding
the children was to be kept inviolate. She hesitated, refused,
reconsidered the matter, and at last consented on condition that the
king himself should command her services. The office was far from
dishonorable in the eyes of the world. Madame Colbert, the minister's
wife, had been intrusted with two of his majesty's children by Madame
de la Vallière. It was not on this point that Madame Scarron was
anxious, but she feared lest she should give scandal and entangle her
conscience by a seeming indulgence to such immorality. Louis at last
requested that she would be as a mother to his babes. They were placed
with a nurse in an obscure little house outside the walls of Paris.
Madame Scarron was to live as before in her own lodgings, but without
losing sight of the infants. It was a point of honor with her to
observe the utmost secrecy. She visited each of them separately, for
they were kept apart, and passed in and out disguised as a poor woman,
and carrying linen or meat in a basket. Returning home on foot, she
entered by a private door, dressed, and drove to the Hôtel d'Albret or
Richelieu to lull suspicion asleep. When the secret was at length
known, she caused herself to be bled lest she should blush.  [Footnote
169] In two years' time the number of children had increased, and a
different arrangement was adopted. A large house was purchased in the
country, not far from Vaugirard, and Madame Scarron, now enjoying a
certain degree of opulence, established herself there, and gave all
her time to the task of education. She was lost to the world, and her
friends deeply lamented her disappearance. But she was sowing the seed
of her future greatness. The king, who had a great love for his
children, often saw her when he visited them; the aversion he had felt
for her at first gradually melted away; he admired her tender and
maternal care of his offspring, contrasted it with the comparative
indifference of their own mother, greatly increased her pension, and,
having legitimized the Duc du Maine, the Count de Vexin, and
Mademoiselle de Nantes in 1673, soon after appointed them with their
gouvernante a place at court. Thus, step by step, without her own
seeking, she was led on to exercise a higher and most salutary
influence on the king's moral character, till, in reward of her
long-tried virtue, she was ultimately to fix his wandering affections
and effect his conversion; an object which for so many years she had
regarded as the end of her being. She was nearly forty years of age
when she entered on her duties in the palace; and, in that difficult
and trying position, she set the glorious example of one who was
guided in all things by principle, and who thought that the highest
talents were best devoted to leading an irreproachable life. She had a
work before her, and it was great. She contributed to withdraw the
king from his disorderly habits, to restore him to the queen, and to
bring about a reformation of morals in a quarter where it {806} had
been most wantonly retarded by the royal example. The king, in that
day, was all in all. The ideal of the government was royalty. The
Fronde had died away, and with it the power of the nobles. That of the
people, in the sense in which it is now generally understood, was
unknown; even infidels and scoffers scarcely dreamed of it. The
monarch, like Cyrus  [Footnote 170] and the Caesars, believed himself
something more than man. Diseases fled at his touch, and he virtually
set himself above all laws, human and divine. It needed the eloquence
of a Bossuet to convince Louis that a priest had done his duty in
refusing absolution to the mother of his illegitimate children,
[Footnote 171] The success of his arms enhanced his self-esteem, and
the atmosphere of his court was so tainted with corruption that Madame
Scarron often sighed for retirement, and resolved to flee from so
perilous and painful a promotion. Her intercourse with Madame de
Montespan was chequered with stormy dissensions, and the jealousy of
the latter became almost insupportable. The education of the children
was a constant subject of contention, and Madame Scarron, who knew
that they would be ruined if left to their mother, was not disposed to
yield any of her rights. But the Duc du Maine was the idol of his
father and mother, and this served to attach them both to the
incomparable gouvernante, who loved the boy with an affection truly
maternal.

  [Footnote 169: "_Deuxième Entretien à Saint-Cyr._" ]

  [Footnote 170: "Herodotus, Clio," cciv.]

  [Footnote 171: "_Duc de Noailles," tome_ i., p. 316.]

Being disgusted with the court, and having received from the king a
present of 200,000 francs, she bought in 1674 the estate of Maintenon,
about thirty miles from Versailles, with the intention of retiring
thither. But a rupture between the king and his favorite mistress was
at hand, and on this circumstance hinged Madame Scarron's future
career.

In spite of his profligacy, Louis XIV. was at bottom religiously
disposed. His serious attention to business proved him to be a man of
thought and reflection, and, when the great festivals came round, it
grieved him not to be in a condition to fulfil his religious duties.
The sermons of Bourdaloue during the Lent of 1675 touched him, and the
expostulations of Bossuet in private deepened their effect. He
resolved to dismiss Madame de Montespan, and departed to join the army
without seeing her. "I have satisfied you, father," he said to
Bourdaloue: "Madame de Montespan is at Clagny." "Yes, sire," replied
the preacher; "but God would be better satisfied if Clagny were
seventy leagues from Versailles." Meanwhile Madame Scarron, with the
Duc du Maine, went to Barèges, and, as the king had, before creating
her a marchioness, graciously called her, in presence of his nobles,
Madame de Maintenon, we shall henceforward speak of her by the name
which she bears in history. The three most important personages in our
drama were now separated. The king, at the head of his army, received
the letters of Bossuet, conjuring him to persevere in his promises of
amendment, while Madame de Montespan, in her retreat, was pressed by
the same fervid eloquence to return to the path of virtue. But the Duc
du Maine was everywhere entertained as the king's son, and fetes that
vied with each other in splendor awaited him and his gouvernante
everywhere. So popular was the king, so loyal his people, that his
vice passed for virtue or innocent gallantry.

Barèges was not then what it has now become. A few thatched cottages
and one house with a slated roof were all it could boast. Madame de
Maintenon and her sick charge, the little duke, had but one room,
meanly furnished, where he slept by her side. The place was then
scarcely known; but the physician Fagon had discovered it during his
excursions among the Pyrenees, and, by making Madame de Maintenon
acquainted with the {807} efficacy of its baths, he raised it to
importance and secured for himself fortune and renown. Here she
received many letters from the king in attestation of his friendship;
and returning hence, she visited Niort and the prison where she was
born, the aunt she had so tenderly loved, and the Ursuline convent
where she had first been schooled and supported by charity. Attentions
were lavished on her in every quarter, and many valuable records of
her family fell into her hands. Among these was the life of her
illustrious grandfather, Agrippa d'Aubigné, written by himself.

Her reception by the king was more cordial than ever; but the high
favor in which she stood did not break her resolution to renounce a
court life as soon as circumstances should permit. She corresponded
regularly with the Abbé Gobelin, and often expressed her willingness
to follow implicitly his advice. Madame de Montespan regained her
ascendancy, at least in appearance; but many thought that the king was
fast becoming weaned from her, through the new influence. Madame de
Maintenon exerted daily a more manifest empire. Everything, as Madame
de Sévigné wrote in 1676, yielded to her. One attendant held the
pommade before her on bended knee, another brought her gloves, and a
third lulled her to sleep. She saluted no one; but those who knew her
believed that she laughed in her heart at these formalities. "I desire
more than ever," she said to M. Gobelin, "to be away from this place;
and I am more and more confirmed in my opinion that I cannot serve God
here." Madame de Montespan, during some years, continued to be the
recognized favorite; but the beautiful Fontanges divided with her the
unenviable distinction till, having just been made a duchess, she died
in the flower of her youth. But amidst all this levity, Louis paid the
severe Madame de Maintenon the most delicate attentions, which failed
not to excite the utmost indignation in the breast of the royal
mistress. At length, in 1680, the dauphin espoused the daughter of the
Elector of Bavaria, and Louis, anxious to retain Madame de Maintenon
in the service of the court, made her lady of the bed-chamber to the
dauphiness. In this honorable office she was set free from the bondage
she had endured. She had now nothing in common with Madame de
Montespan; and she exchanged the apartments she had occupied for
others immediately over those of the king, where he could visit her at
will, and, by her lively and flowing conversation, refresh his mind
when weary with business, or jaded with pleasures that had long since
begun to pall. Surrounded by minions of every sort, it was something
new to him to be addressed freely and without any selfish view. This
was the secret of Madame de Maintenon's power over his heart, and he
confessed the potency of the spell. Madame de Montespan was visited
less and less, and Louis passed hours every day in the apartments of
the dauphiness, where he found also her lady of the bed-chamber. A
cabal was formed by the deserted mistresses and some profligate
ministers against the new and truly estimable object of Louis' favor;
but their machinations failed. The sovereign at last broke his chains,
and Madame de Montespan, like Ninon and La Vallière, made profit of
the time which was allowed to her for repentance, but which had been
denied to Fontanges. The miserable death-bed of that young creature,
distracted by remorse, but still clinging passionately to her unlawful
love, deeply affected the king,  [Footnote 172] and is said to have
powerfully contributed to reclaim him from his evil habits. The benign
influence of Madame de Maintenon reunited him to the long abandoned
queen, who, with all her exalted piety and Christian virtue, was
deficient, it must be confessed, in tact and discernment, as well as
in those intellectual {808} gifts which would have made her an
acceptable companion to Louis; while her strict devotional practices
and retiring habits--habits which her native modesty and timidity of
character, combined with her husband's neglect, tended to confirm--may
have had no small share in increasing his estrangement. His evenings
were now frequently spent with her; and every member of the royal
family was delighted with the happy change, and grateful to her by
whom it had been brought about. The king himself found the paths of
virtue to be those of peace, and the finer parts of his character were
displayed to advantage. He had naturally a kind and feeling heart, and
was by no means that monster of selfishness and formality which
historians so often make him.  [Footnote 173]

  [Footnote 172: _Gabourd, "Histoire de France," tome_ xiv., p. 453,
  note. ]

  [Footnote 173: _"Duc de Noailles," tome_ ii., p. 28.]

After the peace of Nimeguen, Louis XIV., having seen his enterprises
everywhere crowned with victory, became intoxicated with his own
greatness, and arrogant toward foreign powers. But the counsels of
Madame de Maintenon tended to restrain his ambition and modify the
defiant tone of his government. She well knew that such an attitude,
beside being wrong in itself, was the certain forerunner of formidable
coalitions. However lightly she might have thought of the Prince of
Orange, if singly matched with the greatest potentate of Europe, she
wisely judged his talents and prowess capable of inflicting great
injury on France if he were in union with exasperated allies. While
her hand thus nearly touched the helm of state, it was busy as ever in
dispensing private charities; and it was about this time also that she
founded an establishment at Rueil which was the origin of "Saint-Cyr."
"For the first time," she said, in a letter to her brother, [Footnote
174] "I am happy."

  [Footnote 174: 20th February, 1682.]

In 1683 the queen died, and Louis, who had become convinced of her
merits too late, wept over her when expiring and said, "It is the
first trouble she has ever caused me." Madame de Maintenon, who had
staid with her to the last, was about to retire, when the Duc de la
Rochefoucauld, taking her by the arm, drew her toward the king,
saying, "It is no time, madame, to leave him: he needs you in his
present condition." Her position at court was now very embarrassing.
She was aware of the king's predilections, and he was no less
persuaded that she could be attached to him by none but virtuous ties.
The dauphiness requested her to accept the place of lady of honor, but
she steadily refused. Was it indeed that she aspired higher? Could she
fancy for one moment that Louis would exalt her to the rank of his
wife? An anecdote related by Madame de Caylus would lead us to suppose
that the thought had crossed her mind, and that the king himself had
perhaps given her some pledge of his intentions. Madame de Caylus was
astonished at her declining a post of such high dignity. "Would you,"
asked her aunt, "rather be the niece of a lady of honor, or the niece
of one who refused to be such?" Madame de Caylus replied that she
should look upon her who refused as immeasurably higher than her who
accepted: on which Madame de Maintenon kissed her. She had given the
right answer. Madame de Montespan was still at court with her
children, but her day was gone by; and she whose silent influence had
wrought her overthrow never triumphed over her, and even deemed it
prudent to abstain from any overt attempt to prevent the king's seeing
her.

The decorations at Versailles were at this time conducted on such a
scale as to make that spot one of the wonders of the world. All Europe
was curious to see its gardens or read of their matchless splendor.
Its fountains and cascades were never to be silent, night or day, and
the waters of the Eure were to supply them by means of a canal and
aqueduct more than fourteen leagues in length. {809} Twenty-two
thousand men worked on the line, which traversed the estate and valley
of Maintenon. The aqueduct was there supported by magnificent arcades,
and its entire cost, without counting purchase of land, was about nine
millions of francs. To the town of Maintenon the "very powerful and
pious" lady who bore its name was a great benefactress. She obtained
for it fairs and markets, and founded in it a hospital and schools.
She rebuilt, entirely at her own cost, the church and presbytery, as
well as those of two adjoining parishes. She brought thither Normans
and Flemings to teach the villagers how to weave, and distributed
abundant alms to the poor and infirm. The king staid at her chateau
repeatedly, and inspected the works that were rapidly advancing among
the hills. Racine also was her guest about this period, and was
charmed with his visit. Here, too, in the very house where Charles X.,
and with him the direct Bourbon line, afterward ceased to reign, was
probably fixed that remarkable marriage of which we shall have much to
record.

Madame de Maintenon was still beautiful, though in her fiftieth year.
She was three years older than the king, and the influence she exerted
over him was no matter of surprise to those who were used to watch her
radiant eyes and face beaming with animation and intelligence. Severe
virtue gave additional dignity to her distinguished and graceful
manners, and, while she yielded to none in conversational powers, she
was also a good listener. The proud king found in her one to whom he
could bow without humiliation, and her conquest of his heart was a
signal triumph of moral worth. The marriage was private, and the
secrecy so well preserved that its date cannot be ascertained. It is
supposed to have taken place in 1685, and was celebrated by the
Archbishop of Paris, in the presence of Père la Chaise; Bontemps, a
valet-de-chambre, who served the mass; and M. de Montchevreuil, Madame
de Maintenon's intimate friend. A union satisfactory to her conscience
was all she required, and this being obtained, she took the utmost
pains to prevent the matter becoming public. The court remained for
some time in ignorance of the marriage; but the fact is beyond all
doubt, and is dwelt on with little disguise by the Bishop of Chartres,
in letters to the king and his wife, and by Bourdaloue in his private
instructions to the latter. While Saint-Simon denounces it as "so
profound a humiliation for the proudest of kings that posterity will
never credit it," Voltaire, with more good sense, maintains that Louis
in this marriage in no degree compromised his dignity, and that the
court, never having any certainty on the subject, respected the king's
choice without treating Madame de Maintenon as queen.  [Footnote 175]
There is not the slightest proof that Louis ever contemplated sharing
his throne with her openly, and still less that her ambition extended
so far. In the passage we quoted from Macaulay the reader will have
observed that he introduces the fable with "It was said." He is, in
fact, there following Saint-Simon and the Abbé de Choisy,  [Footnote
176] whose "Memoirs" are, in this particular, altogether at variance
with Madame de Maintenon's character as revealed in her letters, with
the modesty and reserve which distinguished her in so high a station,
and with the impenetrable silence she always observed with regard to
the fact of the king being her husband.  [Footnote 177]

   [Footnote 175: _"Siècle de Louis XIV.," tome_ ii.]

  [Footnote 176: _Livre_ vii.]

  [Footnote 177: _"Duc de Noailles," tome_ ii., pp. 131-2.]

Though living in the midst of the court, her elevation was, as
Voltaire says, nothing but a retreat. She restricted her society to a
small number of female friends, and devoted herself almost exclusively
to the king. No distinction marked her in public, except that she
occupied in chapel a gilded tribune made for the queen. {810} Louis
spoke of her as _Madame_, and if the Abbé de Choisy may be trusted,
Bontemps, the valet, addressed her in private as "your majesty." She
was seldom seen in the reception-halls, but the king passed all the
time that was not occupied with public affairs in her apartment. He
rose at eight, surrounded by his officers; as soon as dressed, he was
closeted with his ministers, with whom he remained till midday; at
half-past twelve he heard mass, and in passing and repassing through
the grand gallery, to which the public was admitted, might be
addressed by any one who asked permission of the captain of his
guards. After mass, he visited Madame de Montespan daily till the year
1691,  [Footnote 178] and staid with her till dinner was announced.
This was ordinarily about half-past one. Madame de Maintenon, though
she supped in her own room, dined always at the king's table, sitting
opposite him. Then followed shooting in the park, which was his
favorite amusement. Sometimes he hunted the stag, the wolf, or the
wild boar; but from the time he dislocated his arm in 1683, through
his horse's stumbling over a rabbit-burrow, he seldom went to the
chase mounted, but in a calash, which he drove himself, with some
ladies, and very often Madame de Maintenon. Banquets were spread in
the woods, and in the summer evenings gondolas with music plied on the
canal, and Madame de Maintenon's place was always in that of the king.
At six or seven he returned home, and worked or amused himself till
ten, the hour for supper; after which he passed an hour with his
children, lawful and legitimized, his brother sitting in an arm-chair
like himself, the dauphin and the other princes standing, and the
princesses on tabourets. During winter at Versailles, a ball, a
comedy, or an _appartement_ followed every evening in regular
succession. The _appartement_ was an assembly of the entire court, and
sometimes ended with dancing, after music, chess, billiards, and all
sorts of games.

  [Footnote 178: _"Duc de Noailles" tome_ ii., p. 147, note. ]

There was nothing in Madame de Maintenon's temper opposed to the
ceaseless festivities of Versailles, Marly, and Fontainebleau. She
heightened them, indeed, by the noble pleasures of the mind, which her
influence could not fail to introduce. Her style of dress was
exquisite, and elderly beyond what her age required; and while she
treated all around her with the utmost attention, she was altogether
free from airs of importance. She rose between six and seven, went
straight to mass, and communicated three or four times a week. While
she was dressing, one of her attendants read the New Testament or the
"Imitation of Jesus Christ;" and during the rest of the day her
movements were regulated by those of the king. Whenever she was at
liberty, she passed her mornings at Saint-Cyr, and Louis came to her
regularly several hours before supper. She never went to him except
when he was ill. Her income amounted to nearly four thousand pounds a
year of our money; and of this the larger part was given to the poor.
In vain the members of her family looked to her for promotion, in vain
they reproached her with forgetting the claims of kindred: "I refer
you, madam," she wrote to the Princesse des Ursins, "to the valley of
Josaphat to see whether I have been a bad kinswoman. I may be
deceived, but I believe I have done as I ought, and that God has not
placed me where I am to persecute him continually for whom I wish to
procure that repose which he does not enjoy. No, madam, it is only in
the vale of Josaphat that the reasons for my conduct toward my
relatives will be apparent. Meanwhile, I conjure you not to condemn
me."  [Footnote 179]

  [Footnote 179: Letter of 16th February, 1710. ]

The poor and unfortunate had no cause for similar complaints. She gave
away between two and three {811} thousand pounds a year. During the
scarcity of 1694, having parted with all she had, she sold a beautiful
ring and a pair of horses, to supply the wants of the sufferers.
"Distribute my alms," she wrote to her steward, "as quickly as you
can. Spare no pains, and repine at no difficulty. Circumstances
require unusual charities. See if peas, beans, milk, and barley-meal,
if anything, in short, will supply the place of the bread which is so
dear. Do in my house as you would in your own family. I leave it in
your charge. Incite the people to courage and to labor. If they do not
sow, they will reap nothing next year."

She often visited the needy, and relieved their wants with her own
hand. She would put off buying anything for herself to the last
moment, and then say, "There, I have taken that from the poor." Her
charity inspired others with the spirit of self-denial, and the king
and his chief almoner often dispensed their bounty through her. But
neither poor nor rich diverted her attention from Louis. To his ease,
his tastes, his sentiments--even when they shocked her--his time, and
his very friendships, she sacrificed everything. He was her vocation;
and her own friends could not, as she said, but look upon her as dead
to them. To her the king confided all; and thus the cares of state,
the perils of war, the intrigues of the court, cabals, petitions,
private interests, and even family disputes, were continually rolling
their din at her feet. Princes, princesses, ministers, and a crowd of
persons anxious to secure their own interests, forced themselves upon
her, and broke up all the pleasures of solitude and society, of study,
meditation, and correspondence, for which she pined. But she had
counted the cost, and bore with equanimity the absence of that perfect
happiness which she never expected to attain on earth. The honors
which encircled her were brilliant fetters, and galled her no less
because they glittered. "I can hold out no longer," she said one day
to her brother, Count d'Aubigné; "I would that I were dead!" The sense
of duty was her abiding strength, and she derived consolation from
reflecting that her elevation was not of her own seeking. The path by
which she had been led was strange--so strange that she could not but
believe she had a divine mission to accomplish. It was easy to
interpret her conduct in a worldly and ambitious sense; but when,
since the Master of the house was called Beelzebub, have the children
of his household been rightly understood? Whatever is in the heart
comes out sooner or later in the writings, and those who read Madame
de Maintenon in her letters, will be in no doubt as to what were her
guiding principles. Always true to herself, she was an enigma to those
only who had not the key to her true character. The year of her
marriage was signalized by one of the most important legislative acts
in the history of modern Europe. This was the revocation of the edict
of Nantes, by which, eighty-seven years before, Henry IV. had, shortly
after his abjuration of Protestantism, terminated a long civil war by
granting to the Calvinists freedom of religious worship and admission
to offices of state. The edict itself was as contrary to the spirit of
that age as it would be consonant with the ideas of this. Those who
regarded each other respectively as idolaters and heretics had not yet
learned to live together in social and political brotherhood. The
popes and saintly doctors of those times looked on such fraternity
with horror, and foresaw that, if it became general, indifference and
widespread infidelity would be its certain results. Events have
justified their anticipations; and though it may be doubted whether
this or that act of intolerance, such as the revocation of the edict
in question by Louis XIV., were wise and expedient under the
circumstances, it ought never to be forgotten that the establishment
and maintenance of Catholic unity in a {812} kingdom redounds,
abstractly considered, to the glory of a Christian prince. To this
glory the government of Louis aspired; and while it is clear from
Madame de Maintenon's correspondence that she took no active part in
the matter, it is evident also that she approved it, as did the nation
in general. Voltaire concurs with the Duc de Noailles in exonerating
her from the charge of having instigated the revocation and applauded
its results. No traces of a spirit of persecution can be discovered in
her character. Nothing can exceed the sweetness of disposition with
which she reproved her brother, when governor of Cognac, for having
treated the Calvinists with needless severity. "Have pity," she wrote,
"on persons more unfortunate than culpable. They hold the errors we
once held ourselves, and from which violence never withdrew us. Do not
disquiet them; such men must be allured by gentleness and love: Jesus
Christ has set us the example."  [Footnote 180] Ruvigny, a Protestant,
afterward made Earl of Galway by William III., spoke of her to the
king as one who had a leaning to the Reformed religion; and though
nothing could be more untrue, it shows that her zeal as a Catholic
could not have been intemperate. The king himself told her that her
tenderness toward the Huguenots came, he thought, of her having
formerly been one of them; and the historians of the French refugees
in Brandeburg, Erman and Reclam, allow that she never advised the
violent measures that were used, and declare that she abhorred the
persecutions consequent on the revocation. The authors of them, they
add, concealed them from her as far as possible, knowing that she
desired the adoption of no other means but instruction and kindness.
[Footnote 181] In her conversations with the sisters at Saint-Cyr, her
language was always in conformity with these statements. The king, she
told them, who had a wonderful zeal for religion, pressed her to
dismiss some Huguenots from her service, or oblige them to enter the
fold of the Church. "I pray you, sire," she replied, "to let me be
mistress of my own domestics, and manage them in my own way."
Accordingly, she never pressed them to renounce their errors. She
showed them the more excellent way when ever she had an opportunity,
and in good time had the satisfaction of seeing them all embrace the
Catholic faith.

  [Footnote 180: _Lettre à M. d' Aubigné_, 1682.]

  [Footnote 181: _Tome_ i., p. 77.]

If, then, Madame de Maintenon applauded the revocation of the edict of
Nantes, she must not be held responsible for the forced conversions,
the dragonades, imprisonments, and emigration in which it issued. Her
approval must be interpreted in the same sense as the brief addressed
to Louis by Innocent XI.,   [Footnote 182] in which the pontiff
congratulated him on "revoking all the ordinances issued in favor of
heretics throughout his kingdom, and providing, by very sage edicts,
for the propagation of the orthodox faith." The immunities granted to
the Calvinists by Henry IV. involved, according to Ranke, a Protestant
historian, "a degree of independence which seems hardly compatible
with the idea of a state."  [Footnote 183] Religious dissent naturally
engendered political disaffection. The Protestant assemblies in the
time of Louis XIII. endeavored to establish a kind of federal
republic. Six times during that king's reign the Calvinists took up
arms. Richelieu maintained that nothing great could be undertaken so
long as the Huguenots had a footing in the kingdom. They formed a
treaty with Spain, with a view to their independence, and were
regarded by the nation at large as a public enemy.

  [Footnote 182: 13th November, 1685. ]

  [Footnote 183: "Lives of the Popes," vol. ii., p. 439.]

Zealously as Madame de Maintenon labored for the conversion of her own
relatives--particularly M. de Vilette and his children--it is no
wonder that she concurred with the king, the clergy, and the people in
thinking that the {813} time was come to withdraw from the Protestants
of France privileges dangerous to religion and to the state, and to
concert more effective measures for their conversion. She held with
Bossuet that a Christian prince "ought to use his authority for the
destruction of false religions in his realm, and that he is at liberty
to employ rigorous measures, but that gentleness is to be preferred."
[Footnote 184] She believed with Fénelon that the religious toleration
which is necessary in one country may be dangerous in another--for the
mild and loving prelate of Cambray agreed at bottom with the sterner
Bossuet on this subject.  [Footnote 185] Whether subsequent events
vindicated the political expediency of the revocation; whether the
evils it produced were not greater than the good it proposed; whether
those who recommended it would not, if furnished with our experience,
have wished it had never been carried into effect--are questions of
great importance and interest, but foreign to the purpose of this
paper.

  [Footnote 184: _"Politique tirée de l'Ecriture Sainte," livre_ vii.]

  [Footnote 185: _"Essai sur le Gouvernement civil," tome_ xxii.]

We have more than once alluded to Saint-Cyr, and it is time now to
give some account of the origin and nature of that noble institution,
which perished with the monarchy and old aristocracy of France, on
which it depended, and of which it was a support. Like most other
great works, its beginnings were small. Before Madame de Maintenon was
raised so near the throne, she used often to meet at the Chateau de
Montchevreuil an Ursuline sister named Madame de Brinon, whose convent
had been ruined. Devoted to the work of education, this lady spent her
days in giving instruction to some children in the village. Her
resources being very low, Madame de Maintenon intrusted her with the
care of several children whom she charitably maintained, and often
visited them and their mistress, first at Rueil, and afterward at
Noisy, where the king placed a chateau at her disposal, and enabled
her to enlarge the establishment. The daughters of poor gentlemen were
then admitted to the school. The king, returning from the chase one
day, paid them an unexpected visit, and was so pleased with all he saw
that Madame de Maintenon had little difficulty in inducing him to
extend his royal patronage much further, and provide means whereby two
hundred and fifty young ladies, of noble birth and poor fortunes,
might be instructed, clothed, and fed, from the age of seven or twelve
years to twenty. The domain of Saint-Cyr was purchased; and twelve
young persons belonging to the establishment, and destined for the
most part to a religious life, were selected as mistresses to direct
the larger institution. They entered on their duties after a noviciate
of nine months, and were called _Dames de Saint Louis_. Their vows
were simple, had reference to the purpose in hand, and were not
binding for life. The young ladies were nominated by the king, and
were required to prove their poverty and four degrees of nobility on
the father's side. The final transfer of the revenues of the abbey of
St. Denis to the establishment of Saint-Cyr was not approved by the
Holy See till after some years, in consequence of the dispute existing
between Louis and the court of Rome. In 1689, however, Alexander VIII.
formally authorized the foundation, and in the February of the next
year addressed a suitable brief to Madame de Maintenon, expressing the
warm interest he felt in her undertaking. Madame de Brinon was elected
superior for life, but, as she did not altogether second the designs
of the foundress, relaxed the rules, and introduced amusements which
were thought too worldly, a change became necessary. It was not
without much patience on the part of Madame de Maintenon that the
difficulties were at last overcome. Madame de Montchevreuil, their
mutual friend, was charged with a _lettre de cachet_ by which the king
commanded Madame de Brinon to quit {814} Saint-Cyr. She retired to the
abbey of Maubisson, of which the Princess Louisa of Hanover was
abbess, and there passed the remainder of her days in honorable
retirement, and in the enjoyment of a small pension. She was fond of
great personages, and of playing an important part, and this feeling
led to her becoming the intermediary between Leibnitz and Bossuet, in
a correspondence which aimed at the reunion of Catholics and
Protestants, and which, as might have been expected, produced no
results.

After Madame de Brinon's departure, Madame de Maintenon devoted
herself more and more to her important enterprise. As the young ladies
were educated for home and the world, not the cloister, they were
indulged occasionally with dramatic representations. This gave rise to
two of Racine's finest pieces. Having been requested by Madame de
Maintenon to invent some moral or historical poem in dialogue, from
which love should be excluded, he produced "Esther," which was first
acted at Saint-Cyr in 1689, in presence of the king. His majesty was
charmed; the prince wept. Racine had never written anything finer, or
more touching. Esther's prayer to Assuerus transported the audience.
Madame de Sévigné only lamented that a little girl personated that
great king. Numerous representations followed, and crowds of eager
spectators, courtiers, ecclesiastics, literati, and religious sat
beside the ex-king and queen of England, to hear the pure and
harmonious verses of Racine recited by the young, the innocent, and
the beautiful, to the richest and softest music Moreau could compose.
This success was but the forerunner of a still greater. At the request
of Louis, Racine wrote another tragedy the following year--viz.,
"Athalie;" in the opinion of French critics the most perfect of all
tragedies. But the excitement attending the play of "Esther" had been
too great to allow of a renewal of the experiment. The "comedy," as it
was called, of "Athalie" was performed therefore by "the blue class,"
without stage or costume, in presence only of the king, Madame de
Maintenon, James II., and six or seven other persons, among whom was
Fénelon.

In the midst of such amusements, pride and frivolity crept into
Saint-Cyr, and Madame de Maintenon became convinced that she had
allowed its pupils more freedom than they could enjoy without abuse.
Reform was indispensable. The _Dames de Saint Louis_ took monastic
vows under the rule of St. Augustin. No effort was spared to inculcate
piety and make religion loved. Bossuet and Fénelon were frequently
invited to address the young people. One of the sermons thus delivered
is found in the works of Bossuet, but the original manuscript is said
to be in the handwriting of the Archbishop of Cambray. It bears, in
fact, the impress of their twofold genius, but the pathos of its style
stamps it as more peculiarly the production of Fénelon.  [Footnote 86]

  [Footnote 186: _"Duc de Noailles," tome_ iii., p. 140.]

The Duc de Saint-Simon, incapable of mastering ideas of a religious
order, carps and jeers at Madame de Maintenon as one who thought
herself an "universal abbess." Those who carefully examine the annals
of Saint-Cyr, and weigh the difficulties that arose from the various
characters of the superiors chosen, the tendency at one time to relax
and at another to overstrain the religious education of the pupils,
will arrive at the conclusion that few ladies in an exalted position,
and in the midst of all that is most worldly, ever possessed so much
of that wise and loving spirit of government which should distinguish
an abbess, as the wife, friend, companion, and counsellor of Louis
XIV. One might almost say that Saint-Cyr was the passion of her life.
When at Versailles she went there daily, and often arrived at six in
the morning. The young ladies, scarcely yet awake, had the joy of
seeing her beloved and {815} revered figure among them in the sleeping
apartments; and she frequently helped to dress the little ones and
comb their hair, with unaffected and maternal kindness. The
unremitting attention she gave to the establishment was soon rewarded,
and its beneficial effects on society were placed beyond all doubt.
The pupils and mistresses alike of Saint-Cyr were held in great
esteem, and many of them, scattered through the kingdom, filled
important educational and conventual posts; while in Hungary, Austria,
Russia, and the Milanese, institutions were formed on its model. By
interesting the king in its details, and inducing him to visit it very
often, Madame de Maintenon partly secured the other great aim of her
existence, namely, his amusement.

Of all the errors that have, from time to time, insinuated themselves
into the minds of Catholics, none has worn a more plausible and poetic
aspect than Quietism. It crept into Saint-Cyr under the auspices of
Madame de la Maisonfort, a person of a peculiarly imaginative and
mystic temperament. She discoursed with like fluency with Racine and
Fénelon, and always appeared brimful of intelligence and devotional
feelings. Madame de Maintenon had received her as a friend, and hailed
with delight her resolution to adopt a religious habit and become one
of the _Dames de Saint Louis_. She made her profession in 1692, and by
moderating her vivacity for a time deceived others, and perhaps
herself also. Errors akin to those of Molinos were then spreading
fast, and Madame Guyon, their chief propagandist, happened to be a
relation of Madame de la Maisonfort. When the former lady was arrested
for the first time in 1688, her kinswoman and Madame de Maintenon
interceded for her. After this she often visited Saint-Cyr, and
gradually became intimate with the ladies engaged in the institution.
Her manuscripts were eagerly read, and a chosen few who were first
initiated in their mysteries inoculated others with the subtle poison,
until all the novices, one confessor, the lay-sisters, and many under
instruction, abandoning themselves, as they believed, to the sole
guidance of the Holy Spirit, practiced all kinds of mystic devotion,
talked incessantly the pious jargon of Quietism, looked down upon
those who could not embrace the new tenets, and strangely forgot their
vows of obedience to superiors. Nothing was heard but the praises of
pure love, holy indifference, inactive contemplation, passive prayer,
and that entire abandonment of one's self to God which exempts us from
caring about anything, and even from being anxious about our own
salvation.  [Footnote 187] Fénelon, by his intimacy with Madame Guyon,
whose director he was, lent life and vigor to these extravagant ideas.

  [Footnote 187: Madame Guyon herself disowned many of the monstrous
  conclusions of the Quietists, while her own opinions were in excess
  of those of Fénelon.]

His elevation to the see of Cambray, in 1695, was regarded by them as
the triumph of their cause, and Saint-Cyr bade fair to rival Port
Royal as a stronghold of suspected tenets. But episcopal authority
interfered at last, and through the remonstrances of the Bishop of
Chartres, Madame Guyon was dismissed, and her books were forbidden.
She continued, however, to correspond with the inmates of Saint-Cyr;
and when, in December, 1695, she was imprisoned anew, they exhorted
each other to remain firm and endure the coming persecution. Bossuet
himself, at the request of Madame de Maintenon, now fully alive to the
danger, came to assist in extinguishing the nascent error, while
Fénelon, on the contrary, defended his own and Madame Guyon's opinions
from what he considered to be exaggerated charges, and wrote his
famous _"Maximes des Saints"_ in opposition to Bossuet's _"Etats d'
Oraison."_ It is a question whether Bossuet was not led, in the zeal
of his antagonism, to make indefensible statements of a different
tendency. Fénelon, in fact, charged him with so doing, and the spirit
{816} displayed by the Bishop of Meaux in defending himself and
prosecuting the condemnation of his former friend, does not present
the most pleasing incident in the great Bossuet's career. Perhaps
Fénelon has won more glory by his ready and humble submission to the
ultimate decision of the Holy See than has Bossuet by his zeal in
procuring a just censure on Fénelon's errors. The temper and ability
with which Fénelon pleaded his cause began to enlist public opinion in
his favor. He utterly disclaimed all participation in the errors of
Quietism, and said he could easily have calmed the heated minds of the
sisters of Saint-Cyr, and have brought them in all docility under
their bishop's yoke.  [Footnote 188] But Bossuet invoked the authority
of the king, the decision of his brother prelates, and the judgment of
the Holy See. The Bishop of Chartres, on making a personal inquiry
into the state of things, required that not only Madame Guyon's
writings, but those of Fénelon himself, should be delivered into his
hands. Whatever the merits of the question in other respects, and
whatever opinion may be formed of the respective teaching of these two
great men, there can be no doubt that the _"Maximes des Saints"_ had
fostered prevailing errors. The king expressed great displeasure at
the course events had taken, and by a _lettre de cachet_ in 1698
ordered Madame de la Maisonfort and another lady to quit the
establishment, and all other infected persons to be removed. They
passed the night in tears in the superior's apartment; and the next
day Madame de Maintenon come to console the community for their loss.
If she erred at all throughout this perplexing affair, it was by
over-indulgence and by forbearing too long. When her duty became clear
and imperative, she was never undecided, nor showed any inclination to
encourage novelties in religion.

  [Footnote 188: _"Duc de Noailles," tome_ iii., p. 241.]

A history of Madame de Maintenon, however detailed, must always be
wanting in those personal traits which distinguish most striking
biographies, and this for the simple reason that her habits and
disposition were retiring, and her daily effort was to throw a veil
over herself. That her influence in the long run was enhanced by this
modesty, no one can doubt; yet it is not on that account the less
true, that in the scenes through which she passed it is difficult to
seize and depict her individually. We must, nevertheless, endeavor to
give some idea of her relations with the royal family, by some of whom
she was beloved, by others hated, and by all held in high
consideration. Monsieur, the king's brother, liked and respected her
for Louis' sake, to whom he was sincerely attached; but it was far
otherwise with Madame. A Bavarian by birth, she was completely German
in her tastes, and in the midst of Parisian splendor sighed for her
home beyond the Rhine. She was, she said, a hermit in a crowd, and
passed her days in utter loneliness. She was a Protestant at heart,
intensely masculine, and had little sympathy with Madame de
Maintenon's quiet mode of life. So fond was she of the chase, that she
continued to follow it, though she had been thrown from her horse
six-and-twenty times. Madame de Maintenon was her special aversion,
and this antipathy arose principally from her national prejudices
against unequal marriages. The king's wife was, in her view, an
upstart, and the credit she had obtained at court did not diminish
this impression. She spoke with contempt of her piety as mere
hypocrisy, and laid to her charge every species of enormity. She had
pandered to the dauphin's profligacy; killed the dauphiness by means
of her accoucheur; led the young Duchess of Bourgogne into sin;
monopolized corn during a famine to enrich herself; and never dreamed
of anything but her own pleasures and ambition; she had poisoned
Louvois and, nobody knew why, the architect Mansart; she, with Père
{817} la Chaise, had instigated the persecution of the Protestants;
she had set fire to the chateau of Lunéville; and, from her retreat at
Saint-Cyr, fomented conspiracies against the regent! Truly the poison
of asps was under the lips of Madame Elizabeth of Bavaria. The
dauphiness, on the other hand, neglected by her dissolute husband,
made Madame de Maintenon her friend, and found consolation in pouring
her troubles into her ear, and listening in return to her sage and
tender counsels. After ten years of sickness and sorrow in her married
life, she died of consumption in 1690. "See," said the king to her
unworthy partner, "what the grandeur of this world comes to! This is
what awaits you and me. God grant us the grace to die as holily as she
has done!"

The pages of French history present few pictures more replete with
grandeur and interest than the retreat of the great Condé at
Chantilly. Crowned with the laurels of a hundred victories, the
princely veteran there gathered around him a more distinguished staff
than had ever sat in his councils of war--men who, endued with
intellectual might and moral greatness, were to achieve lasting
conquests in the realm of mind. Profoundly skilled himself in history,
philosophy, art, science, and even theology, he loved to entertain
those who, in various ways, had devoted their lives to the triumph of
knowledge and reflection over ignorance and sensuality. All that was
noblest in birth and cultivated in mind met together in his
orangeries, and sauntered among his gardens and fountains. There the
most eminent prelates of their time were seen side by side with the
greatest dramatists, historians, and poets. There was Fléchier and
Fleury; there La Fontaine, Boileau, and Molière; there Rapin and Huet,
La Bruyère and Bossuet. There wit sparkled and wisdom shone as
incessantly as the jets and cascades that rose and fell in light and
music by night and day. Thither came often the entire court, and with
it Madame de Maintenon, a star among stars, brilliant but retiring, to
enhance the glory of the illustrious and aged chief. There, honored by
the king and closeted with him daily, as at Versailles and elsewhere,
she could not fail to receive the willing homage of every member of
the house of Condé. There, too, after the general's death, she saw her
former pupil, the king's daughter, Mademoiselle de Nantes, espoused to
Condé's grandson; and thus, as time went on, she watched the career of
those whom she had educated, and who formed the more noble alliances
because the king had raised them to the rank of royal princesses.
Never did any lady occupy a more remarkable and in some respects a
more enviable position than herself. "There never was a case like it,"
says Madame de Sévigné, "and there never will be such a one again."
She united the most opposite conditions. By her union with Louis she
was all but queen, and by her admirable tact exerted over state
affairs a far greater influence than belongs in general to a
sovereign's consort. She had been the servant of that very king of
whom she was now the helpmate; a wise instructress to his children,
and a mother in her affection and care. At one moment she was acting
abbess, controlling the complicated irregularities which had crept
into the religious and secular economy of Saint-Cyr, and at another
she was mediating as peace-maker in the family quarrels and petty
jealousies of pampered courtiers, or by her sage counsels arresting
the ravages of war, and rescuing harmless populations from the scourge
of fire and sword. Children loved to hear her voice, and hung upon her
smiles; the poor and afflicted were fain to touch the hem of her
garment, for they felt that virtue went forth from her; none were so
great as to look down upon her; none so lowly as to think that she
despised them. Her sovereignty over others was that to which men
render the most willing obedience--the sovereignty, not merely of
station or {818} intellect, but of character of sterling worth, of
wisdom learned in the school of suffering, of virtue tried like gold
in the fire.

As Madame de Maintenon's talents and merits prevented her being lost
in a crowd of courtiers, or in any way identified with them, so, on
the other hand, her affectionate disposition kept her from being
isolated and closing herself round against any intrusion of private
friendship. So far from it, she had with her a select group of ladies
who were called her familiars, who shared with her, in a measure, the
king's intimacy, accompanied her in her walks and drives at Marly, and
were her guests at the dinners and suppers she gave at Versailles and
Trianon. They were in some sort her ladies of honor, though, like
herself, without any visible distinction. Of these the principal were
Madame de Montchevreuil and Madame d'Heudicourt, both old friends, and
with them nine others, among whom were her two nieces, Mesdames de
Mailly and de Caylus. To each of these a history attaches; for the
constant companions of so extraordinary a woman could not but have
special attractions and remarkable qualities. There were in this
number those who had drunk deeply of the intoxicating cup of worldly
pleasure, and having drained its poisonous dregs, thirsted for the
fountain of living waters. It was Madame de Maintenon's especial care
to encourage such friends in their heavenly aspirations, and lead
them, in the midst of the court, to enter the devotional life. Often
she called the fervent Fénelon to her assistance, and his letters
addressed to Madame de Grammont are a lasting proof of the readiness
with which he answered to the call. If, as all her contemporaries
assure us, it was impossible to combine more that was pleasing and
solid in conversation than did Madame de Maintenon--if, in her case,
reason, as Fénelon expressed it, spoke by the lips of the Graces--how
admirable must she have appeared when she directed her powers of
persuasion to the highest and most blessed of all ends! Neither pen
nor pencil can adequately recall the charms which surrounded her; but
the captive heart of Louis and the unanimous voice of the richest and
most lettered court in Europe attest their reality and power. In her
ceaseless efforts to amuse the king, his immortal interests were never
lost sight of; and if she spoke to him comparatively seldom on the
subject, it was because it occupied all her thoughts. Out of the
abundance of the heart the lips are often mute.

In 1686 Louis suffered extreme pain and incurred great danger from a
tumor, which at last required an operation. This circumstance brought
Madame de Maintenon's capacity for nursing into full play. It was she
who watched by his bedside, and alleviated the sufferings of the
nation's idol. The surgery of that day was wretched, and the operation
for fistula which had to be performed was attended with great danger.
Intense solicitude prevailed through the country; for, in spite of all
efforts to prevent anxiety, the report spread rapidly that the king's
life was in peril. The churches were thronged, and the people's
attachment found vent in prayer. The royal patient alone was unmoved.
The _grande operation_, as it was called, had been decided on six
weeks previously, and the evening before it was to take place he
walked in his gardens as usual, and then slept soundly through the
night, as if nothing were to happen. On waking he commended himself to
God, and submitted to the painful operation with the utmost coolness.
Louvois held his hand, and Madame de Maintenon was in the room. In the
afternoon he sent for his ministers, and continued to hold councils
daily, though the surgeon's knife cruelly renewed the incisions
several times. "It is in God," wrote Madame de Maintenon, "that we
must place our trust; for men know not what they say, nor what they
do." The fourteen physicians of {819} Charles II. were still more
unskilful in his last illness,  [Footnote 189] and justify equally the
opinion of the Northern Farmer:

  "Doctors, they knaws nowt, for a says what's nawways true:
  Naw soort a' koind o' use to saäy the things that a do."

  [Footnote 189: "The king was in a chair--they had placed a hot iron
  on his head, and they held his teeth open by force." Agnes
  Strickland's "Lives of the Queens of England;" vol. viii., p. 447.

  "A loathsome volatile salt, extracted from human skulls, was forced
  into his mouth." Macaulay's "History of England," chap. iv.. 1685.]

In the case of Louis, however, the operator Félix answered to his
name. A cure was effected, and the kingdom was filled with
demonstrations of joy. "Every one," as Madame de Maintenon wrote, "was
in raptures. Father Bourdaloue preached a most beautiful sermon.
Toward the close he addressed the king. He spoke to him of his health,
his love for his people, and the fears of his court. He caused many
tears to be shed; he shed them himself. It was his heart that spoke,
and he touched all hearts. You know well what I mean." After dining
with the citizens of Paris at the Hôtel de Ville, Louis drove through
every quarter amid the loudest acclamations. "The king," wrote his
wife again, "has never been in such a good humor as since he has
witnessed the enthusiastic love the capital bears toward him. I very
much like his sentiments: perhaps they will inspire him with the
design of relieving his people." Absolute as the sovereignty of Louis
was, his subjects delighted in his rule. He was the last of a long
line who, century after century, had formed the nation out of the
confusion of feudal times, and had, of all kings, the best right to
say, if indeed he ever did say,  [Footnote 190]  _"L'état, c'est
moi!"_

  [Footnote 190: See _"Duc de Noailles," tome_ iii., p. 668.]

In him the state was summed up, and the kingdom was impersonated in
him. The soldier expiring on the battlefield cried _"Vive le roi!"_
and vessels have gone down at sea with the entire crew shouting the
same words; for _"Vive le roi!"_ was, in their minds, equivalent to
_"Vive la France!"_ The government of Louis XIV., though despotic,
was, on the whole, marked by moderation, particularly after the death
of Louvois; and if sometimes, seduced by the glory of foreign
conquests and the love of regal display he forgot the interests of his
people and the misery his magnificence entailed on them, Madame de
Maintenon was always near to counteract the arrogant minister, urge
counsels of peace, and heal the bleeding wounds of a loyal population.
Yet she was far from being a meddling politician, Her advice was not
offered, but asked. She abstained from entering into details, and
confined herself to general suggestions of a moral character, dictated
by conscience, not ambition. If she guided, or, rather, gently
disposed, the king to this or that measure, she was in turn guided
herself. Her correspondence with the Abbé Gobelin, Fénelon, and the
Bishop of Chartres sufficiently proves that her highest ambition was
to be a servant of God. That Racine, of whom she was the friend and
patroness, should extol her in his verse  [Footnote 191] is not
surprising; but the satirist Boileau, be it remembered, was no less
her eulogist. If Byron's beautiful lines on Kirke White had the more
weight because they occurred in his most biting satire, something of
the same kind may be said of Boileau's testimony to Madame de
Maintenon:

  [Footnote 191: "Esther," act ii., scene vii.]

  "J'en sais une, chérie et du monde et de Dieu;
  Humble dans les grandeurs, sage dana la fortune:
  Qui gémit comme Esther de sa gloire importune;
  Que le vice lui-même est contraint d'estimer,
  Et que, sur ce tableau, d'abord tu sais nonmer."
    [Footnote 192]

  [Footnote 192: "I know one beloved of God and man, who is humble in
  her grandeur and wise in her good fortune; who groans like Esther
  over her trying glory; whom vice itself is compelled to respect; and
  whom, on seeing this picture, you will name in an instant." Satire
  X.]

The Duc de Noailles is not the only member of the French Academy who
has arisen of late years to refute the calumnies of Saint-Simon. M.
Saint-Marc Girardin has ably defended the {820} victim of his
malignity in the _Journal des Débats_,  [Footnote 193] and Messieurs
Rigault, de Pontmartin, Monty, Chasles, and Hocquet, have pursued
successfully the same generous and equitable course.

  [Footnote 193: 4th and 16th October, 1856.]

When James II., in December, 1688, fled from his kingdom, the
sympathies of more than half the French people were enlisted on his
side. Ignorant of the British constitution, they knew little of the
peril it had incurred through the king's extraordinary extension of
the dispensing power, and they saw in the landing and success of the
Prince of Orange nothing but a horrible domestic tragedy, in which,
through personal ambition and hatred of the true religion, a Catholic
sovereign was hurled from his throne by an unnatural daughter and
son-in-law. They joined, therefore, without any misgiving, in the
cordial reception given to the royal fugitives by Louis, and desired
nothing so much as to make common cause with them, and take vengeance
on their foes. Madame de Maintenon was not among those who pressed
with all ceremony into the presence of the exiled king and queen; but
she visited them in private, and was received as became her station.
The compassion she felt for their fate, her respectful address and
Christian consolations, so won upon Mary Beatrice, that a lasting
friendship was formed between the queen in name, not in reality, and
the queen in reality, not in name. It continued without interruption
during five-and-twenty years, and was cemented by unity of sentiments
and mutual services. The ex-queen had married in her fifteenth year,
and had overcome, by the advice of her mother and the Pope, her desire
to devote herself to a religious life.  [Footnote 194] Whatever may
have been her trials in a convent, they could hardly have equalled
those which befel her as queen. A hundred and forty-five of her
letters to Madame de Maintenon are extant, and the readers of Miss
Strickland's "Lives" are familiar with the Chaillot correspondence, in
which the desolate and sorrowful queen pours forth the fulness of her
sensitive heart, and never tires of expressing her love and esteem for
that remarkable friend whom Providence has led across her thorny path.
Often Madame de Maintenon repaired to Saint-Germain to visit her, and
still more frequently the latter came to Versailles to see Madame de
Maintenon. It was some relief to escape for a time from that downcast,
dreary court in exile, where a crowd of poor but faithful followers
gathered around a master equally wrong-headed and unfortunate. The
semblance of royalty which was there kept up only increased the
sadness of the place, and fostered those jealousies, intrigues, and
cabals of which a banished court is so often the parent and victim.

  [Footnote 194: _"Duc de Noailles," tome_ iv., p. 231.]

A powerful coalition, in the creation of which the Prince of Orange
was the chief agent, had long been menacing France, and was now
actually formed. Louis found himself opposed to the greater part of
Europe, for the Emperor Leopold, the Germanic and Batavian
federations, the kings of Spain and Sweden, and the Pope himself,
obliged to act on the defensive, adhered to the league of Augsburg.
[Footnote 195]

  [Footnote 195: _"Duc de Noailles,"_ p. 253. ]

Three powerful armies were sent by the king of France to the seat of
war. The mission of one of them was to capture Philipsburg; and from
the camp before that stronghold the king's brother wrote many letters
to Madame de Maintenon, describing the operations in progress. The Duc
du Maine also, once her pupil, and now in his eighteenth year, wrote
to her from time to time, and received thankfully the advice she
offered him with all a mother's solicitude. The second of the three
armies was charged with the devastation of the Palatinate, and
fulfilled the part assigned it with distressing precision. If its soil
was not to supply the French, it must {821} furnish nought to the
Germans. It was a perfect garden, and Duras received orders to reduce
it to a wilderness. Half a million of human beings were warned that in
three days their houses would be burned and their fields laid waste.
Fiercely the flames went up from city and hamlet, and the fugitives
sank with fatigue and hunger in the snow, or, escaping beyond the
borders, filled the towns of Europe with squalid beggary. Every
orchard was hewn down, every vine and almond tree was destroyed. The
castle of the Elector Palatine was a heap of ruins; the stones of
Manheim were hurled into the Rhine. The cathedral of Spires and the
marble sepulchres of eight Caesars were no more; and the fair city of
Trèves was doomed to the same cruel fate. It was time for the voice of
mercy to speak. Marshal Duras had already written to Louvois,
[Footnote 196] to remonstrate against the barbarous orders he was
compelled to execute, and Madame de Maintenon herself is said to have
interceded with Louis for the suffering people of the Rhine. The Duc
de Noailles, indeed, does not state this, like Macaulay,  [Footnote
197] as matter of history, though he allows that it is probably true;
and this variety in the views of the two historians, each anxious to
do justice in this particular to the king's wife, proves how difficult
it is for even the most sagacious and unprejudiced writers to arrive
at the exact truth in reference to bygone days. Macaulay is certainly
inclined to attribute to Madame de Maintenon a much larger measure of
political power than she really exercised; and it is curious to
observe the chain of pure assumptions by which, having taken it for
granted that she "governed" Louis, he arrives at the conclusion that
she induced him to recognize the Pretender as James III.   [Footnote
198] In a letter written [Footnote 199] soon after the taking of
Philipsburg, she seems to disclaim all active interference in state
affairs. In speaking of Louvois, she says that she never contradicted
him, and adds, "People think that I govern the kingdom, and they do
not know that I am convinced God has bestowed on me so many favors
only that I may seek more earnestly the king's salvation. I pray God
daily to enlighten and sanctify, him." But it is evident how
completely an earnest recommendation to Louis to spare Trèves, and
stay the ravages in the Palatinate, may have tallied with that unique
and hallowed purpose. Have not those from whom such truculent orders
emanate a terrible account to render? Has not she who dissuades a
ruler from an iniquitous measure done something toward saving his
soul?

  [Footnote 196: 21st May, 1689.]

  [Footnote 197: Hist., chap, xi., 1689.]

  [Footnote 198: Hist, chap, xxv, 1701.]

  [Footnote 199: 4th October, 1688.]

There are stories afloat respecting Madame de Maintenon, and in
everybody's mouth, which the Duc de Noailles scarcely condescends to
notice. That she who always spoke and wrote of Louis in terms of
affectionate homage should have seriously committed herself to such
assertions, as that her daily task ever since her marriage was to
amuse a king who could not be amused, and that he was so selfish that
he never loved anything but himself, is an improbability as
inconsistent with her character and policy as it is at variance with
the facts of the case. That in his latter years her life was
embittered by his fretful and querulous temper, and by the fits of
passion into which he often fell, and that in one of her letters
written at that period she complains of the difficulty of amusing him,
is undoubtedly true; but this and similar complaints ought not to be
stretched beyond their natural meaning, and made to tell too severely
against the king. When, in the early part of 1691, Louis appeared in
the camp before Mons, his wife, separated from him for the first time
since their marriage, retired to Saint-Cyr, alarmed at the dangers he
was about to incur, and unable to conceal her sadness. Consolatory
letters poured in upon her from all quarters, especially {822} from
her spiritual friends and advisers--the Abbé Gobelin, the Bishop of
Chartres, and Fénelon. But, "the selfish monarch who could not be
amused," did he, amid the bustle of a siege, find time to write to a
lady fifty-five years old, whose only business had been to amuse him
or fail in the attempt? He did; and that not once now and then; not
briefly and drily, as a matter of form; not like a man who had little
to say, and still less attachment, to the person to whom he said it.
No; every day in her solitude Madame de Maintenon was consoled by
seeing a royal dragoon ride into the court-yard with a letter for her
from his majesty, and almost every day with one from the king's
brother also. Nor was this all; the king, "who had never loved any one
but himself," proved that there was at least one exception to this
rule, and that he loved his wife. In 1692 she joined him at Mons, by
his command, in company with other ladies of the court, and followed
him to the siege of Namur. Amusements were not wanting in the royal
camp. The king and his courtiers dined to the music of timbrels,
trumpets, and hautboys, and he reviewed his troops in the presence of
carriages full of fair faces. But, with all this, he visited the
different quarters so diligently, and inspected so closely the works
and trenches, riding continually within range of the enemy's guns,
that his wife had almost as much anxiety for his safety as when she
pondered at a distance the cruel chances of war.

In spite of his many faults, there was much in Louis XIV. to captivate
the imagination of one like Madame de Maintenon. "No prince," says the
Duke of Berwick,  [Footnote 200] "was ever so little known as this
monarch. He has been represented as a man not only cruel and false,
but difficult of access. I have frequently had the honor of audiences
from him, and have been very familiarly admitted to his presence; and
I can affirm that his pride is only in appearance. He was born with an
air of majesty, which struck every one so much, that nobody could
approach him without being seized with awe and respect; but as soon as
you spoke to him, he softened his countenance, and put you quite at
ease. He was the most polite man in his kingdom; and his answers were
accompanied by so many obliging expressions, that, if he granted your
request, the obligation was doubled by the manner of conferring it;
and if he refused, you could not complain."

  [Footnote 200:  Memoirs, vol. ii.]

Madame de Maintenon's campaigning life was not altogether free from
disagreeables. On one occasion, writing from Dinant,  [Footnote 201]
she relates how they encountered more difficulty in retiring from
Namur than in approaching it. They were eleven hours and a half on the
road, and wholly unprovided with food. She arrived at her journey's
end exhausted with hunger and suffering also from rheumatism and
headache; but, it being an abstinence day, the only repast that
awaited her was oil-soup. The king likewise, though throughout the
campaign he dined ordinarily with all the sumptuousness of Versailles,
found himself obliged sometimes to partake of a cold collation under a
hedge, without quitting his travelling carriage. Warfare would be an
easy calling if such were its worst hardships.

  [Footnote 201: 12th June, 1693.]

In Flanders, as in France, Madame de Maintenon continued to take the
most lively interest in the course of events, martial, political, and
social. Proximity to the scene of action did not induce her to exceed
those limits of reserve which she had long since marked out for
herself. Though informed of all that happened, and forming a sound
judgment on almost every occurrence, though earnestly desiring peace
rather than aggrandizement, and justice rather than glory, she
obtruded no views of her own in the cabinet of the king, nor even
influenced the choice of generals. It was her habit of close
observation, and her exact description {823} of all that passed, which
made Napoleon Bonaparte delight in reading her correspondence, and
pronounce it superior to that of Madame de Sévigné, because it had
more in it. Madame de Maintenon speaks in one place of her own style
as "dry and succinct;" and, indeed, were it not for the piety which
constantly breathes through them, her letters would often read like
the despatches of a general. She is brief, terse, sententious; her
mind being evidently bent on things rather than on words. As a
letter-writer, she resembles Napoleon himself more than any other
French authoress. Her style is free from that vacillation, that timid
adoption of a definite line, which always indicates a weak thinker and
a total absence of system in the mind. Had it been otherwise, she
would never have stood so high in the esteem of foreign courts, nor
would princes and sovereigns, such as the Elector of Cologne, the Duc
de Lorraine, and his mother, Queen Eleanor, have written to ask favors
at her hands.

The reign of Louis XIV. lasted so long, that neither his son nor
grandson ever sat on the throne. If the latter, the Duc de Bourgogne,
had not died in his thirtieth year, he might, as the once docile pupil
of Fénelon and Madame de Maintenon, have fulfilled his promises of
excellence, and have left to his successors a rich inheritance of
wisdom. "Telemachus" was not composed expressly for him in vain. He
was born in 1682, and at an early age was affianced to Marie-Adélaïde
of Savoy. The princess was at that time only eleven years old, and
was, by the marriage contract, to remove to France, and be wedded in
the ensuing year. The union of the young couple was celebrated in
1697, but on account of their extreme youth they continued to live
apart two years longer. During this time, Madame de Maintenon
undertook to complete Marie-Adélaïde's education. The instructress was
worthy of a princess destined, as it was believed, to govern France.
All day she sat by her when sick, and Racine read Plutarch's "Lives"
to her during the pauses of the night; Bossuet was her chaplain, and
Dangeau, whose manuscript memoirs of Louis' court have proved so
useful to historians,  [Footnote 202] was her knight of honor. She was
the delight of all around, and so charmed the king, that he was never
willing to part with her. But there were no apartments Marie-Adélaïde
so much loved to frequent as those of Madame de Maintenon. Severe as
her admonitions often were, she possessed in the highest degree the
art of attaching young persons to her, and inspired them insensibly
with taste, wisdom, and nobility of mind. She had long been convinced
that the education of princes was conducted, generally, in such a way
as to prepare them for habitual _ennui_. They learned and saw
everything in childhood, and, when grown up, had nothing fresh to see
or learn. She withdrew her, therefore, as far as possible from the
court, and submitted her to the simple and wholesome routine of
Saint-Cyr. The princess proved extremely docile, and her amiability
was as striking as her diligence. The society of the religious in
Saint-Cyr, so far from putting a constraint on her lively and winning
ways, seemed only to fit her more completely to be the pet companion
of Louis XIV. Her sprightly talk, her opening mind, her elegant
simplicity, amused him in his walks and drives, in the gardens, the
galleries, and the chase; and while he contrived daily some new
diversion for the fascinating child, he could not but trace in her the
happy results of Madame de Maintenon's unwearied attention. She
entered into all her childish pleasures, and even played hide-and-seek
with her, that she might, as she said afterward, gain her ear for
serious truths, and by yielding all she could, have the better reason
for withholding what would have been hurtful. At last--nor was the
time long--Marie-Adélaïde quitted Madame de Maintenon's embrace, and
with her heavenly counsels {824} graven on her memory, and given in
writing into her hands, bidding farewell to the hallowed cloisters of
Saint-Cyr, and to her daily gambols and prattle with the loving and
indulgent king, she took her place beside her destined bridegroom, and
"entered other realms of love."

 [Footnote 202: They were first published entire in 1856.]

Such was the woman of whom the worldly and sceptical speak jeeringly
as the proud widow of Scarron; the intriguing, austere, ambitious
Marquise de Maintenon; the persecutrix of Huguenots, and the despot of
her royal spouse. They know not what they speak, nor whereof they
affirm; for they are incapable of estimating the character of the
righteous. Outward acts are to them an enigma and a stumbling-block,
because the soul and its guiding principles cannot be seen. A true
Christian, such as Madame de Maintenon, is an object of faith, as is
the Church, and as was the Church's Lord in the days of his
humiliation. Seated, to say the least, on the footstool of the throne,
and surrounded by all the pomp and circumstance of royal life, she was
to jaundiced eyes but one in a crowd of princes and courtiers, and
differing from them only in that she was more astute; but, seen as the
prelates of Cambray and Meaux saw her--seen as her letters and
conversations with the nuns of Saint-Cyr exhibit her--seen as the Duc
de Noailles describes her, and "time, the beautifier of the dead," has
rendered her--she was using this world and not abusing it; seeking
society only to improve it, and solitude only to pray; holding all she
possessed in fealty to her unseen King, and making every occupation
subordinate to that of loosening her affections from earthly vanities,
and fastening them wholly upon God. The Duc de Noailles' history does
not end with the fourth volume. It leaves Madame de Maintenon in her
sixty-second year--two-and-twenty years before her death. To trace her
intercourse with Louis during the long and disastrous war with Spain,
called the War of the Succession--her counsels and influence during
the defeats by Marlborough and Prince Eugene, and the triumphant
reprisals of Vendôme and Villars--her grief at the king's death in
1715, when she had reached her eightieth year--her retirement to the
long-loved shades of Saint-Cyr--her devotion and zeal heightening as
age advanced, and the celestial goal was neared--her conversations
with the sisters, and her letters to the Princesse des Ursins--to
analyze her correspondence, and her _vade-mecum_ as published by M.
Bonhomme--to record the pillage of Saint-Cyr, and the outrage done to
her venerable remains, as to those of the royal dead in St. Denis, by
the frantic revolutionists of 1792--would supply ample materials for
another article, but would only confirm the views already formed of
her prevailing character and principles. Enough, perhaps, has been
said to place our readers on their guard against the malice and
fictions of the Duc de Saint-Simon and a host of detractors who rely
too readily on his word, and to dispose them favorably toward a most
judicious and remarkable history, which does honor to the French
Academy and the illustrious house of de Noailles.

------

{825}


From All The Year Round.

A DUBLIN MAY MORNING.


When I look down on this gay May morning from a window into Great
Sackville street, where there is a huge column to Admiral Nelson, and
a golden shop-front board dedicated to O'Connell, on the site for his
statue, and which is by-and-by to be made into a French boulevard and
planted with trees--I say, on this May morning it is easy to see that
one of the many great days for Ireland has come round once more. For
the crowds in the great thoroughfares, and the "boys" sitting on the
bridges, and the flags and streamers, and the rolling carriages, and
the general air of busy idleness, tell me that a great festival is
toward; and placards in fiercely carbuncled letters proclaim in an
angry fit of St. Anthony's fire that the Prince of Wales is to "OPEN"
something: which something a still greater scorbutic operation of type
tells us is THE DUBLIN EXHIBITION OF 1865.

Not without charms, and marked and special features of its own, is
this Dublin city--to say nothing of the fresh and fair Irish faces and
violet eyes which pass by in streams, or of the cheerful voices and
the gay laughs heard at every turn; or of the giant policemen who wear
moustaches and beards, and thus compete on more favorable terms with
military rivals; or of the rollicking drivers, who stand up as they
drive, very like the _cocchieri_ of Rome, and who look out for "fares"
in a debonnaire indifferent fashion. There is a gay, busy, foreign,
particolored look about the place, which reminds one of a foreign
town. The background is composed of wide spacious streets, Grecian
buildings wonderfully classic in tone and shape, fitted into corners
with porticoes that belong _to_ the street, and under which the people
walk--pretty breaks where the bridges come, and the masts of shipping
seen in the sun half way down a long, long thoroughfare. There are no
warehouses or ugly business associations; but all is shops and
shopping, and color and liveliness, and carriages and walkers.

I think, as I look out on this May morning, that it is curious that a
people popularly supposed to want "self-reliance" and "independence,"
and who are utterly ignorant of the "self-help" principle, should,
after all, have done some few self-reliant things in this very matter
of exhibitions. Some one tells me that many decades of years before
glass palaces were thought of, and when the universal peace and
brotherhood glass palaces were mysteriously supposed to bring with
them were not quite believed in, this "un-self-reliant" people had
their regular triennial exhibition of manufactures, on the French
model. Further, that close on the footsteps of the Hyde Park
Exhibition came the great one of Cork, and closer again on the
footsteps of Cork the really great Dublin Exhibition of 1853, the
building of which cost nearly eighty thousand pounds, and which was
remarkable for the first international collection of pictures, and for
the first performance of Handel on a colossal scale. Not content with
this, I am told that this people, who were not self-reliant, went
further, had two more successful exhibitions on a smaller scale, and
have now finally girded themselves up for this yet more complete
effort of 1865. Not so bad, this, for our poor wo-begone sister with
the harp, especially when we consider that our well-to-do Scotch
sister has not "fashed" herself with such follies, justly considering
the margin of profit too uncertain or too slight to repay the trouble.
{826} But this is a grim and statistical ungracious view, not all
suited to this Dublin May morning.

It is known, then, on this gay Dublin May morning, that the young
prince, who in this island has always been looked to with an
affectionate interest, has been in the city since over-night, and out
at the pretty lodge, which lies out in the "Phaynix." Hence the flags
and the streamers. Hence, too, in front of the palace, the balconies
fringed with scarlet, and the softened and melodious buzz of distant
military music, with the staff officers flying north and south, and
the regiments tramping by. But the flags grow thicker, and the
balconies gayer, and the music more distinct, as I find myself at the
corner of the great _place_, or square dedicated to St. Stephen, which
is a good mile's walking all round, and near which I see the great
building, with the heavy porches and pillars, round which, and over
which, run delicately, the light entrance of a Moorish-looking glass
temple--a silver howdah on the back of a gray elephant. Such is the
rather novel design for this last comer in the long series of
exhibitions.

After all the miles of glass greenhouse, and the long protracted
repetitions of gorgeous decorated pillars and girders, I cannot but
think what a happy combination this is of solidity and lightness; and
acknowledge that in these days, when Paxton Palace succeeds Paxton
Palace with some monotony, there is something original in striking out
the idea of fitting the glass-house to a great solid building, with
huge halls, and long, cool passages, and spacious rooms, and
surrounding the whole with a garden, and greenery, and cascades.

There has been the usual crush and pressure, the tremendous toiling
against time, to get all done; the straining of every nerve, the
sitting up all night, the hammering and sawing, the stitching of a
hundred workmen and workwomen, changing the utter disorder and the
naked deal boards and the rude planks of five o'clock last evening to
perfect order--to the regularity of a drawing-room and acres of
scarlet cloth. And in a crowd of light May morning dresses we drift
into the huge concert hall, which is to hold thousands, and to echo to
brass throats, and where there are the great organ, and the orchestra
which holds the musical army a thousand strong: on the floor of which
have grown up beds upon beds of human lilies that flutter and flutter
again, whose flowers are white parasols and gossamer shawls. This
hall, as a feature, is not so remarkable, for there are many great
halls; but at its far end it is open and crossed half way by a
gallery: and through this opening we see far on into a Winter Garden
and Crystal Palace, where are the light airy galleries, with the old
familiar rimson labels, and the French trophies, and the bright
objects, and the great apse like a glass cathedral, and Mr. Doyle's
pale coloring, the faint lines of delicate green, chosen with rare
good taste, which in itself is a novelty.

Looking out through the open end of the concert hall, and facing the
organ, I see a grand marone velvet eastern canopy and dais, under
which the Pasha of Egypt is to sit a few months hereafter and receive
his tribes; and on this dais are the nobles and gentlemen gathering,
in the fine rich theatrical suits which give a coloring to a festival,
and of which we have not half enough. Judges in scarlet and ermine,
privy councillors with coats that seem "clotted" with gold, the
never-failing lords-lieutenant and deputy-lieutenants, knights of St.
Patrick, deans, doctors in scarlet, soldiers in scarlet, a lord
chancellor all black and gold, eastern dervishes (it may be, from the
pillow-case look of their caps), a lord mayor of York, a lord provost
of Edinburgh; in short, all shapes of particolored finery. Turning
round for a second, I see that the black musical army has debouched
and taken ground, and that {827} the great orchestra has spread like a
large dark fan from floor to ceiling. I can see "Ulster" in a gorgeous
tabard, flitting to and fro, marshalling grandees, as none so well
know how to marshal them, each according to his or her degree. That
marvellous tabard is so stiff and gorgeous, that when it is laid by,
it surely cannot be hung up or folded or put to sleep on its back like
other robes, but, I fancy, must stand up straight in a wardrobe on its
end, like a steel cuirass.

We seem to riot in mayors. The eye can be feasted on mayors; they can
become as the air we breathe if we so choose it. They have flowed in
from every town in the three kingdoms. And it does strike one, with
having such a municipal gathering brought together, that there is a
sort of corporate expression, a kind of municipal smirk or perk, a
kind of smiling burgess air of complacency which makes the whole of
this world akin. Every one, too, seems to be invested with the collar
of the Golden Fleece.

Here, also, are many known faces, who wear no scarlet nor gold nor
collars. Faces like that of the famous dog and animal painter whose
four-footed friends look down at him from the walls: faces like that
of the Sir David who invented the most popular toy in the world: faces
from the science and art: from South Kensington, which, as we all
know, is science and art: faces from France, from Canada, Rome, India,
and a hundred other places.

Now, I hear the hum of distant martial music, and the yet fainter but
more inspiriting sound of distant cheering. Then the scarlet and
ermine, the privy council clotted gold, the May morning bonnets,
glitter and rustle with excitement. The hum and chatter of voices full
of expectation travel on softly down the glass aisles and into the
great hall. There has been a grand plunging of military troopers
outside, a violent arrest of fiery horses pulled up suddenly, and the
prince and a royal duke and the vice-king and all their attendants
have descended. From the outside, the shouting creeps in gradually,
until at last it comes to its fullest pitch; when the crimson and gold
crowd parts a little, we see this prince standing modestly under the
Egyptian pasha's canopy, with thirty thousand eyes upon him. At this
moment a speck half way up the dark orchestra, but which is a very
skilful and most musical speck, gives a signal with what seems a white
pin, and the musical army advances with the fine Old Hundredth. The
grand Old Hundredth travels out in rising waves through the open end
of the hall into the glass cathedral, then loses itself up and down in
the aisles. For two verses the voices do the battle by themselves;
but, at the third, the trumpets and the grand brass and the rolling of
monster drums burst out, and every syllable is emphasized with a
stirring crash. It is like the deluge after a drought.

Then the sun gets up, and the gold and colored figures cross, and
crowd, and flit past, as some business is being transacted under that
Egyptian pasha's canopy; for there are addresses to be read and
spoken, and there is much advancing and backing to be done. Now, the
party under the pasha's canopy breaks up for a time, and the stiff
gold and scarlet and privy council strait-waistcoats, and the
corporate dressing-gowns, having formed themselves into a procession,
take the prince round to look at the place.

And there is a great deal to see. There are many charming pictures,
and among the choicest those of which the queen of Spain has stripped
her palaces, and sent here. Is there not a hint of many a Velasquez
most exquisite, and of Mr. Stirling, which are worth a journey to the
Escurial to worship? Here is many a rare Reynolds which Mr. Tom Taylor
might find worth making a note of, and here are walls covered with
noble cartoons of the severe Munich school. These, with the
photographs and water-colors, and mediaeval objects, are common to
many {828} an exhibition held before; but there is one feature
unique--a noble sculpture gallery, artistic, charmingly lighted,
sufficient to delight Mr. Gibson, and drive the Royal Academy to
despair. A sculpture-hall, on which you can look down from a
balustrade in a room overhead, as if into a Pompeiian court. A
sculpture-hall, in which you can look up to an arching glass roof,
and, half way down again, to the balustrade just mentioned, which is
dotted with small statutes. A sculpture-hall, where I can walk round
and think myself in a Roman palace, to which these fine objects
belong, and not in a temporary shed where some scattered objects that
have been lent are shown. For here I see that the Roman studios have
been emptied of their treasures; that Miss Hosmer has sent her Faun,
in toned yellow marble: a marvellous--if the speech be not impolite--
work for a woman. With Story's wonderful Judith, and a Baby Girl by
Mogni--a pendant for the now famous Reading Girl. But it is easy to
prophesy that this Baby Girl will be photographed, and stereoscoped,
and binocularized in a hundred ways, and watched over by policemen
specially, and visited by a steady crowd. This hall and its
contents--the like of which it is no boast to say has not been yet
seen in these kingdoms--is the feature of this exhibition.

Then, having seen all that is most curious and beautiful--in the
fashion in which such things _must_ be seen where there is only a
quarter of an hour to see them--the stiff' gold and crimson strands,
which we call the procession, came back to the pasha's dais. And then,
with a crash and a smash, and a thundering of monster drums, and the
rattle and rolling of little drums, and the sharp brassy bark of
trumpets, the true English national Old Hundredth, in which musical
and unmusical--people with ears, and people without, even people with
voices, and people without--can join, then God save the Queen is sung.
Sung! Rather fired off! Discharged! Salvoed!

And then the glittering mass begins to dissolve and fade away. The
stage, which has been laid out under the pasha's canopy, gradually
clears. At the door there is a struggle, and the scatter of new
gravel, with the frantic leaping up behind carriages of many footmen,
and the closing in of mounted soldiers. And then the pageant melts
away, and the work of the day is done.

As I walk and wander from the light glass arcades to the darker
courts, and from the courts to the open terraces, and hear the hum of
Saxons' voices, and from at least every third mouth the sharp "burr"
of some Saxon dialect, and when I meet burly shoulders and massive
chests which are not of the country, some out-of-place speculations
come into my mind, and I am tempted to make suppositions. First, I
speculate--of course shrinking away from the dry bones of
politics--whether there might not have been some mistake in the old
and constant treatment of a people who seem cheerful and grateful for
a kind word or a kinder act, and who are "willing" and even clever in
their way--and think whether the "want of progress" and want of
"capital" and of "self-reliance," and the want of a hundred other
things which puzzle and dispirit the political physician, may not in
some degree be laid to the account of old mistakes, old laws, old
errors, old harsh treatment, old jealousies and restraints, the folly
of which is now seen and admitted, but the fruits of which remain to
this day?

Just as the fruits of a bad education linger in a grown man, and the
marks of early hardship are stamped upon the face and constitution, it
will take many years yet, in the life of a nation, before old faults
are worked out of its constitution. And I think--still in the walks of
the Winter Garden--that if my friendly Briton tell me that his
experience of the lower orders of Irish is that "you can't depend upon
a word they say," I cannot but recollect that half a century ago they
were civilly slaves, without rights; {829} and that a century ago they
were a proscribed caste, against whom one-half the laws of the land
were directed. If we have found them indolent, and disinclined to
perseverance and the making of money, have we not dim recollections of
seeing acts of parliament passed again and again to cripple their
trade? A people must grow up, as a child must grow up; and it is hard
to expect that a child whose body has suffered by an unkind or an
injudicious nurse, should become at once strong under better
treatment. Then I speculate on the mysterious relation of Irishmen to
Irish land, through which the "bit" of land is as necessary as the
"bit" of bread; where a tenant holds his tiny scrap, on which he pays
his thirty-shilling rent; and during the whole year is struggling
desperately to work out of this great estate a few potatoes, and fewer
clothes for himself and family, beside the miserable thirty-shilling
margin for the landlord. I think how some estates have two, four, six,
eight thousand tenants of this valuable class--and think beside, in
answer to a natural objection, how this miserable system was created
for political ends, to multiply voters "to support government," If the
Palace and Winter Garden were twice as long and twice as broad, I
should not have half time or space enough for the speculations that
come crowding on me with reference to this perplexing country.

And having made these speculations, and having gone quite round the
garden, I begin--in addition to my speculations--to make some rather
wild suppositions. As, suppose that, for a mere experiment, there were
a greater spirit of charity of speech introduced into our dealings
with this country. Suppose that we gave the people time and reasonable
allowance--looked on with encouragement where there was any good
attempt made, and with indulgence where there was failure. Suppose
that some of our journals gave over writing "slashing" articles, and
some men desisted from speeches and bitter epigrams on the "mere
Irish," which, being copied in every cheap print, and brought to every
cabin door, do incalculable mischief, fatally widening the breach, and
causing England and Englishmen to be sometimes almost hated. Suppose
that there were _some_ little restraint on the traditional stock
ridicule of Irish matters. Suppose that the Englishmen who visited the
country carried themselves with a little less of William the Conqueror
and Strongbow air, and suppose that--

But here are the umbrellas, and the sticks, and the gate.

------

From Chambers's Journal.

SPEECH.

  Be choice and frugal of thy speech alway:
  The arrow from the engine of the thoughts
  Once shot, is past recall; for scorn is barbed,
  And will not out, but rankles in the wound;
  And calumny doth leave a darkening spot
  On wounded fame, which, as it would infect,
  Marks its sad victim in the eyes of men,
  Till no one dare approach and know the truth.

------

{830}

From The Lamp.

A VISIT TO THE GRANDE CHARTREUSE.


Our pilgrimage to La Grande Chartreuse was an event in our lives worth
remembering. At about half-past five on the morning of the 22d of June
we left Lyons. Nothing could have been more auspicious than the
brilliant sun and balmy air of that early morning. The birds sang
cheerily as we walked from St. Irénée down to the railway station,
where our kind friends took leave of us. The country in the
neighborhood of Lyons was exceedingly pretty; but as we drew nearer to
Grenoble, it became more and more attractive. The railway passes
through two ranges of mountains, whose snow-capped summits stood out
in beautiful contrast to the azure sky. Our only fellow-traveller was
a priest, who for a long time had been intent on his breviary. Amused
perhaps at our exclamations of delight, he entered into conversation
with us; and we were soon very good friends. He expressed particular
interest in the condition of the Catholic Church in England, having
heard that there were many conversions in consequence of the hard work
doing in our missions. He spoke very highly in favor of a visit to La
Grande Chartreuse. He kindly promised always to pray for us, and the
conversion of those we had left behind, and to remember us in the mass
he was about to offer. We reached Grenoble at about twenty minutes to
ten. It will not do to stop to describe the magnificent situation of
this old city, completely surrounded as it is with mountains, between
the rivers Isère and Drac. Until recently it was a frontier town; a
very strong one too, judging from the appearance of the citadel, piled
fortress after fortress up the steep mountain side. The cathedral is
interesting, as having belonged to St. Hugo, the friend of the great
founder of the Grande Chartreuse.

We made an agreement with the driver of a carriage to take us to the
Grande Chartreuse; and he promised to take us there in about five
hours, and put us down at the door of the convent; so, at least, we
understood him. We returned to the hotel, got some refreshment, and
started in an open carriage at about twelve o'clock. The road for
several miles runs through a richly cultivated valley, with wooded
mountains on either side. Everywhere the vine was trained in graceful
festoons, and stately walnut and chestnut trees grew along the
roadside, shading us from the mid-day sun with their rich foliage.
Every now and then we caught beautiful glimpses of the distant Alps,
abruptly rising from the green level of the valley, beyond the hills
clad with the dark verdure of the pine forests, piled curiously one
over another, which run the whole length of the plain, forming the
first steps, as it were, of those mighty Alpine mountains which rear
their magnificent heights, shrouded in eternal glaciers, behind these
graduated ranges. Just before reaching St. Laurent du Pont, what was
our astonishment to hear our driver proclaim we should shortly reach
our destination! We could not conceive how that could be, for we were
evidently approaching a small town. How different it looked from all
we had read and heard of La Grande Chartreuse! Our amazement increased
when the carriage was driven up in front of a small inn; the driver,
getting down, opened the door, and said, with evident satisfaction,
_"Nous voilà."_ We demanded an explanation, and his reply was that
this was St. Laurent du Pont, and as far as he could take us. Here we
{831} could either procure another carriage or mules to carry us up
the mountain to the monastery, which we might reach in about two
hours.

It was difficult to suppress all the indignation one felt at being so
completely taken in; and we threatened the unfortunate driver with all
kinds of complaints on our return to Grenoble. There was nothing to be
done, so we agreed we had better make the best of it. It was five
o'clock, and we could not afford to waste our time in words; so we
ordered another carriage, and in a few minutes a most rickety,
uninviting conveyance was brought to the door. St. Laurent du Pont is
situated at the opening of the narrow gorge leading to the wild
solitude where the monastery is built. The scenery was grand and
beautiful as we gradually began the ascent about a mile from St.
Laurent du Pont, where the mountains closed upon our road, and the
rocky stream of the Guiers Mort brawling beneath us. Tall pines and
stately trees overshadowed us, rising from the almost naked rocks
themselves. One of the great peculiarities of the Chartreuse mountain
is the extreme luxuriance of the vegetation, mingled as it is with the
huge blocks of limestone, which sometimes formed walls on either side
of our way. We had a miserable horse, which stoutly refused to go
beyond a sleepy walk, the driver and the horse being of the same
dreamy nature. We lost all patience, and got out. No language can
adequately describe the enjoyment of that walk. The scenery, so
sublimely wild; the sound of the rushing torrent, now far below our
road, filled us with awe. The pines, rising like weird giants by the
mountain side, mile after mile; the scene changing and becoming more
majestic with every curve of the road. Every now and then we crossed a
handsomely built stone bridge, erected by the good monks, across the
torrent, and passed under several tunnels cut through the rock. The
sun was declining, and nothing could exceed the beauty of the evening;
we had walked for nearly two hours in almost uninterrupted silence,
for there was that in the solemnity of the scene, as we penetrated
further into the heart of the desert, which filled one's mind with
thoughts and one's soul with feelings which could not be uttered. At
length, on a sudden turn in the road, the breeze wafted toward us the
sound of the chapel-bell, ringing, we supposed, for vespers. This was
truly a most grateful sound to our ears, for we were weary with our
walk and the excitement of the scene, and longed for our journey's
end. A few steps further, and the vast monastery lay before us. How
solemn and silent it looked! The tones of the bell, how sweetly
musical they were! To listen to them, to gaze on that gray pile, and,
high above it, on the lofty snow-capped peaks of the mountains, was an
indescribable rest. How wonderfully grand was that mountain top! and
far beyond the forests of pine rose still more distant mountain peaks,
ascending until they reached the very skies, now gilded with all the
glories of a setting sun. It filled one with peace the thought of all
the centuries that that vast pile had lasted; of the long ages the
voices of the monks had mingled with the varied voices of nature in
one hymn of praise to the almighty Creator of all. We waited until the
arrival of our carriage interrupted our musings. It could go no
further; so, followed by the driver carrying our baggage, we walked up
to the door of the convent of the Soeurs de la Providence, where we
were most hospitably received. A friendly sister took us to our cells,
and said supper would shortly be ready. The blazing logs of pine in a
huge fireplace in the refectory were most cheering, for the evening
air was quite cold in these high regions even at the close of a hot
June day. A maigre supper was served at half-past seven. We were
amused to hear that it had all been cooked by the monks, and sent to
us from the monastery, {832} where nothing but maigre is ever allowed.

From eight to nine we walked round the monastery, following a path
close to the dark pine forest, which forms the background to the
building. We could look down from this height upon the cells, church,
and little gardens of the monks. Returning toward the hospice, we met
the reverend mother and a sister; they took us into the little chapel
where we were to hear mass the following morning. It was very plain
and small; there was a grille in front of the altar, on which the
blessed sacrament was not reserved. What a trial this must be to the
good sisters!

At half-past nine, rev. mother advised our retiring to our cells, as
we were to be up early the next morning, and _en route_ for St.
Bruno's chapel by half-past four. A very intelligent young guide was
provided us; he told us he had spent his life with the fathers, and
hoped to live there to the end. He was extremely communicative and
willing to answer all our questions.

There are about forty monks in this monastery, beside several lay
brothers. The monks live each in his cell, which has a little garden
attached to it. They maintain silence, excepting on Sundays and great
festivals, and during their Monday walk together through the desert
for four hours. They eat alone in their cells, excepting on Sundays;
each one's maigre meal is passed by a lay brother from the cloister
through a little turn into his cell. On Sundays they go to the choir
at all the hours except complin; on other days they only go to sing
matins and lauds at midnight; for high mass and vespers; the other
hours are recited in their cells. Women are not only excluded their
enclosure, but even their church, under pain of excommunication. It
was very tantalizing to hear of their solemn midnight office, sung as
it is in darkness; each monk takes with him into choir a dark lantern,
and for each antiphon he does not know opens a slide which throws the
light on it. It must have a wonderful effect these sudden flashes of
light, lighting up the Chartreux, clothed in their white woollen
habits, with their patriarchal beards and hooded heads. Beside the
divine office, they say the office of our Blessed Lady, and, almost
every day, the office of the dead. Their library was plundered by the
revolutionists, and now forms the public library at Grenoble, one of
the finest small collections of books in France. Nearly all this we
learnt from our guide while walking up to the chapel of St. Bruno.
Before we reached it, far into the midst of a dark forest, we came to
the chapel called De Casalibus, erected upon the very spot where the
first convent stood, which was destroyed by an avalanche. The chapel
of St. Bruno is built over the same rock under which he dwelt, beside
a gushing spring, his only beverage, which supplies the monastery to
this day.

The chapel is about an hour's walk above the present monastery. It is
very plain, but adorned with frescoes, representing some of the early
fathers of the order. A most beautiful altar stands at one end of it,
of exquisitely carved Italian marbles, on which has been placed the
same altar-stone on which St. Bruno celebrated the holy mysteries;
behind this is a basso-relievo of St. Bruno, with our Blessed Lady
appearing to him, beautifully executed. We lingered here awhile, loth
to leave so holy a spot. The guide told us that there are frequently
as many as sixty masses said in the Chartreuse church in one morning.
Many hundred priests make their annual retreat here. What place,
indeed, could they find more fitting for the repose their souls thirst
for! Here truly they might die to the world and all its allurements,
and meditate in peace on the deep mysteries of God and eternity. We
descended the mountain to assist at the offering of the holy sacrifice
at seven o'clock in the little chapel we had {833} visited on the
previous evening, It was a great joy to make our communion in this
vast mountain solitude, where all combined to elevate the soul to God.
We had hoped a Carthusian would say mass, but in this were
disappointed, for a secular priest had been requested to do so by the
ladies of his party.

At the _Homo factus est_ of the Credo, the fathers prostrate
themselves on the ground, and the mode of celebrating mass is strange,
and differs in many points from the ordinary mass of seculars. As the
blessed sacrament was not reserved in the chapel, we preferred
finishing our thanksgiving beneath the blue sky on the skirts of the
forest of pines. After breakfast we tasted the celebrated liqueur made
by the monks from the wild mountain flowers. It was very good; there
was a certain charm in taking it on the spot where it was made. We had
a talk with the reverend mother, and left with her a long list of
intentions to be given to the fathers, asking especially their prayers
for the conversion of England. This, we were thankful to hear, was
frequently an object of their devotions. Before leaving, our curiosity
to see some of the fathers was gratified; for two came out to give
instructions to some workmen. We began to descend the mountain at
about half-past eight, arrived at St. Laurent du Pont about ten, and
as soon as our carriage of the previous day was ready started for
Grenoble. Once the horse came to a dead stop, and we fancied the
driver wished to prolong our journey as long as he could, that we
might have no time for making the threatened complaints on reaching
Grenoble. As it was, we arrived there five minutes before the time
fixed for our departure at half past-one. There was hardly a minute to
get anything to eat beyond some fruit and bread which we took with us.
So the driver escaped his punishment, after all.

------

From The Reader.

DEATH BY LIGHTNING.


People in general imagine, if they think at all about the matter, that
an impression upon the nerves--a blow, for example, or the prick of a
pin--is felt the moment it is inflicted. But this is not the case. The
nerves are not the repositories of sensation; they are but the
conductors of the motion which produces sensation. The seat of
sensation is the brain, and to it the intelligence of any injury done
to the nerves has to be transmitted, before that injury becomes
manifest in consciousness. The transmission, moreover, requires
_time_, and the consequence is, that a wound inflicted at a portion of
the body distant from the brain is more tardily appreciated than one
inflicted adjacent to the brain. By an extremely ingenious
experimental arrangement, Helmholtz has determined the velocity of
nervous transmission both in warm-blooded and cold-blooded animals. In
a frog, he found the velocity to be about eighty feet a second, or
less than one-thirteenth of the velocity of sound in air. If this
holds good, which it probably does, in the case of a whale, then a
creature of this class, eighty feet long, if wounded in the tail,
would not, as Helmholtz has remarked, be conscious of the injury till
a second after the wound had been inflicted. But this is not the only
ingredient in the delay that occurs between the impression on {834}
the nerves and the consciousness of the impression. There can scarcely
be a doubt that to every act of consciousness belongs a determinate
molecular arrangement of the brain--that every thought or feeling has
its physical correlative in that organ; and nothing can be more
certain than that every physical change, whether molecular or
mechanical, requires time for its accomplishment. So that, even after
the intelligence of an impression, made upon a distant portion of the
body, has reached the brain, a still further time is necessary for the
brain itself to put its house in order--for its molecules to take up
the position necessary to the completion of consciousness. Helmholtz
considers one-tenth of a second necessary for this purpose. Thus, in
the case of the whale above supposed, we have first one second
consumed in the transmission of intelligence through the sensor nerves
from the tail to the head; one-tenth of a second is required by the
brain to become conscious of the intelligence it has received; and, if
the velocity of transmission through the motor be the same as that
through the sensor nerves, a second would be consumed in sending a
command to the tail to defend itself. Thus more than two seconds would
elapse before an impression made upon its caudal nerves could be
responded to by a whale eighty feet long.

Now, it is quite conceivable that an injury might be inflicted which
would render the nerves unfit to be the conductors of the motion which
results in sensation; and if such a thing occurred, no matter how
severe the injury might be, we should not be conscious of it. Or it
may be, that long before the time required for the brain itself to
complete the arrangement necessary for the act of consciousness, its
power of arrangement might be wholly suspended. In such case also,
though the injury might be of such a nature as to cause death, this
would occur not only without pain, but absolutely without feeling of
any kind.

Death, in this case, would be simply the sudden negation of life,
accomplished without any intervention of consciousness. Doubtless,
there are many kinds of death of this character. The passage of a
musket bullet through the brain is a case in point; and the placid
aspect of a man thus killed is in perfect accordance with the
conclusion which might be drawn _à priori_ from the experiments of
Helmholtz. Cases of insensibility, moreover, are not uncommon, which
do not result in death, and after which the person affected has been
able to testify that no pain was felt prior to the loss of
consciousness.

The time required for a rifle-bullet to pass clean through a man's
head may be roughly estimated at one-thousandth of a second. Here,
therefore, we should have no room for sensation, and death would be
painless. But there are other actions which far transcend in rapidity
that of the rifle-bullet. A flash of lightning cleaves a cloud,
appearing and disappearing in less than one-hundred-thousandth of a
second, and the velocity of electricity is such as would carry it over
a distance equal to that which separates the earth and moon in a
single second. It is well known that a luminous impression once made
upon the retina endures for about one-sixth of a second, and that this
is the reason why we see a ribbon of light when a glowing coal is
caused to pass rapidly through the air. A body illuminated by an
instantaneous flash continues to be seen for the sixth of a second
after the flash has become extinct; and if the body thus illuminated
be in motion, it appears at rest at the place which it occupied when
the flash fell upon it. The color-top is familiar to most of us. By
this instrument a disk with differently colored sectors is caused to
rotate rapidly; the colors blend together, and if they are chosen in
the proportions necessary to form white light, the disk appears white
when the motion is sufficiently rapid. Such a top, rotating {835} in a
dark room, and illuminated by an electric spark, appears motionless,
each distinct color being clearly seen. Professor Dove has found that
a flash of lightning produces the same effect. During a thunder-storm
he put a color-top in exceedingly rapid motion, and found that every
flash revealed the top as a motionless object with colors distinct. If
illuminated solely by a flash of lightning, the motion of all bodies
on the earth's surface would, as Dove has remarked, appear suspended.
A cannon-ball, for example, would have its flight apparently arrested,
and would seem to hang motionless in space as long as the luminous
impression which revealed the ball remained upon the eye.

If, then, a rifle-bullet move with sufficient rapidity to destroy life
without the interposition of sensation, much more is a flash of
lightning competent to produce this effect. Accordingly, we have well
authenticated cases of people being struck senseless by lightning who,
on recovery, had no memory of pain. The following circumstantial case
is described by Hemmer: On the 30th of June, 1788, a soldier in the
neighborhood of Manheim, being overtaken by rain, placed himself under
a tree, beneath which a woman had previously taken shelter. He looked
upward to see whether the branches were thick enough to afford the
required protection, and, in doing so, was struck by lightning, and
fell senseless to the earth. The woman at his side experienced the
shock in her foot, but was not struck down. Some hours afterward the
man revived, but knew nothing about what had occurred, save the fact
of his looking up at the branches. This was his last act of
consciousness, and he passed from the conscious to the unconscious
condition without pain. The visible marks of a lightning stroke are
usually insignificant: the hair is sometimes burnt; slight wounds are
observed; while, in some instances, a red streak marks the track of
the discharge over the skin.

The effects of a shock of artificial lightning on a gentleman of our
acquaintance, who is very sensitive to the electric discharge, may be
here described. Under ordinary circumstances the discharge from a
small Leyden jar is exceedingly unpleasant to him. Some time ago he
happened to stand in the presence of a numerous audience, with a
battery of fifteen large Leyden jars charged beside him. Through some
awkwardness on his part, he touched a wire which he had no right to
touch, and the discharge of the battery went through his body. Here
life was absolutely blotted out for a very sensible interval, without
a trace of pain. In a second or two consciousness returned; the
recipient of the shock saw himself in the presence of his audience and
apparatus, and by the help of these external facts immediately
concluded that he had received the battery discharge. His
_intellectual_ consciousness of his position was restored with
exceeding rapidity, but not so his _optical_ consciousness. To prevent
the audience from being alarmed, he observed that it had often been
his desire to receive accidentally such a shock, and that his wish had
at length been fulfilled. But while making this remark, the appearance
which his body presented to him was that of a number of separate
pieces. The arms, for example, were detached from the trunk, and
seemed suspended in the air. In fact, memory, and the power of
reasoning, appeared to be complete long before the optic nerve was
restored to healthy action. But what we wish chiefly to dwell upon
here is, the absolute painlessness of the shock; and there cannot be a
doubt, to a person struck dead by lightning, the passage from life to
death occurs without consciousness being in the least degree
implicated. It is an abrupt stoppage of sensation, unaccompanied by a
pang.

------

{836}

From The Dublin University Magazine

LONDON.


A Dublin saunterer of antiquarian propensities pacing the flags in
front of Christ church, or elbowing his troublesome way down the
narrow defile called Castle street, can scarcely escape a certain
sense of awe as he looks on the houses and the passengers, and darts a
thought back through dim and troubled time till he strives to arrive
at an idea of' the first inhabitants and the scene in which they
played out their short parts.

Passing over the mysterious and weak race that preceded the Gaels, he
fancies these last in their quaint garb going about their ordinary
occupations, or rushing to their earth mounds and dykes to repel the
fierce Northmen. Then pass before his mind's eye the successive races
of different speech, and different garb, and different interests--the
Danes, Dano-Celts, and the Anglo Normans, employed in fierce struggles
with each other, and each looking on the events of his own times as
paramount to all that ever agitated society till then. All now quiet
and silent in the dust. The shopkeeper attending to his customers, the
tippler stepping into the corner shop for a dram, and the carman
smoking his pipe, and giving his beast a mouthful of hay, are as
unconscious of any personal connection with the dead generations as if
they had sprung full grown and furnished with clothing from the fat
glebe of the neighboring Phoenix Park.

So would feel still more intensely an archaeologist on Tower Hill, or
by the Fleet Ditch, or on London Bridge, if the ever hurrying and
feverish crowd would allow him to concentrate his thoughts on
anything.

How it should make the feelings of the most dried up anatomy of an
archaeologist glow, when, throwing his thoughts nearly nineteen
centuries back, he sees the mighty robber conducting his band, guarded
by strong defences of bronze, and leather, and wood, to the bank of
the then clear river, and preparing to invest and destroy that
ill-armed but heroic body of brave men on the other side, who, in
defence of their weak children, and loving and high-souled wives and
daughters, will soon send many an armed and ruthless Roman soldier to
shiver on the cold banks of Styx.

And what was the profit of all the plotting, and all the unjust
warfare, waged by men single or in masses against those they
considered their foemen? They shortened the career of their opponents,
they shortened their own lives. They preferred a short and turbulent
existence to the longer and quieter span intended for them, they
passed away, and were either speedily forgotten, or remembered but to
be cursed.

It is a bewildering occupation to a stranger to contemplate a map of
London in order to acquire some distinct notion of the number and
arrangement of the streets (an idea of the inhabitants is out of the
question), to ponder how the countless multitude can be fed and
clothed, and to reflect that if old mother earth should lose her
fruit-bearing qualities for one year, how little would avail the
beauty, the bravery, the wit, the ingenuity, the industry, and the
intelligence of the three million inhabitants, to prevent the circuit
of famed London from becoming a vast charnel-house.

Our earliest historians were the poets, these were succeeded by the
romancers. Geoffry of Monmouth, translating the "Chronicle of Kings"
brought from Brittany, informed the {837} people of the twelfth
century that Brutus, great-grandson of Eneas, after many voyages and
adventures, founded a town about where the Tower has long stood, and
called it New Troy. This was afterward changed to Trinobantum. Lud,
brother to Cassibelan, again gave it his own name--_Caer Lud_. Hence
Ludstown softened to London. Other derivations for the city's name are
not at all rare. From the Celtic words _Leana_, marsh or meadow;
_Linn_, a pool; _Lung_, or _Long_, a ship; and _Dunn_, a fort, it is
easy to make out the fort among the meadows, the fort of the pool, or
the fort of the ships. The sister city, Dublin, is simply black pool.

As ancient Dublin occupied at first only the hill of which the castle
occupies the south-eastern spur, so Tower Hill, Ludgate Hill,
Cornhill, and Holborn Hill, formed the site of the original British
Dun or Duns. Hence the most interesting portion of London to an
antiquary must include those places of strength. But as the more
easterly eminences have much longer ceased to be fashionable than our
Fishamble and Essex streets, and the traditions of London literary
characters from the time of Elizabeth date from regions further west,
most writers choose to expatiate on the buildings that lie between
Whitehall and Temple Bar, and on the remarkable personages and
incidents connected with them. Charles Knight was unable to say his
say concerning the modern Babylon in fewer than six royal octavo
volumes, and the portly octavo lately put forth by Mr. Thornbury is
concerned with a very small area of the city, Temple Bar being at its
south-east angle, and the Strand, St. Martin's lane, Holborn, and
Chancery lane its boundaries.


THE STRAND.

Temple Bar, that narrow neck through which the struggling sands find
their way with difficulty from the Strand and the Fleet portions of
the great hour-glass, and which is looked on by shallow readers as a
relic of hoar antiquity, dates only from 1670, four years after the
great fire. It forms the point of junction between the cities of
London and Westminster, and in early times was only provided with
posts, rails, and a chain. These were succeeded by a wooden house with
a narrow gate-way and a passage on one side. The present structure is
incumbered with the statues of Elizabeth, James I., Charles I., and
Charles II., all distinguished, according to Mr. Thornbury, by feeble
heads, crimped drapery, and feet and hands kept whitish by the rain,
the non-projecting portions of the bodies rejoicing in more than a
century of dark atmospheric deposits.

Mr. Thornbury's selection includes the long line of palaces that once
adorned the Strand or River-bank street, the haunts of artists in St.
Martin's lane, the traditions of Long Acre, the reminiscences
connected with Drury lane, and the old houses of the nobility in
Lincoln's-Inn Fields.

One of the most remarkable of the fine buildings of the Strand is that
which bears the name of the ambitious brother of Jane Seymour, the
Duke of Somerset, who boasted that he could muster retainers to the
number of 10,000. To erect his palace, which, by the way, was
unfinished at his death, he demolished the parish church of St. Mary,
and pulled down the houses of the bishops of Worcester, Llandaff, and
Lichfield. He would also have appropriated St. Margaret's at
Westminster, but the mob would not sanction the sacrilege. "Moreover,
he destroyed a chapel in St. Paul's Church-yard, with a cloister
containing the Dance of Death, and a charnel-house (burying the bones
in unconsecrated ground)." To crown his acts of rapine he stole the
stone of a church of St. John near Smithfield. It is not worth
mentioning the carrying away of the stone of the Strand Inn, it being
the property of the lawyers, who could afford to be robbed.

{838}

The Danish consort of our Solomon I. here delighted all who had no
objection to spectacles, in which the handsome queen and her ladies
masqueraded to their own and their admirers' content. Rare Ben Jonson
was surely elated by the lists of royal and noble personages who
presented his masques. From this same noble residence Charles I. had
some trouble in dislodging the Gallic followers of his sturdy queen,
with whom his hard-headed and wooden-shoe-abhorring subjects had come
to be at deadly feud. As they were rather too tedious in "shifting the
halter, and traversing the cart," the poor king was obliged to write
thus to Buckingham:


  "STEENIE,--I have received your letter by Dick Greame. This is my
  answer. I command you to send all the French away to-morrow out of
  the town, if you can by fair means (but stick not long in
  disputing), otherwise force them away, driving them away like so
  many wild beasts until you have shipped them, and the--go with them!
  Let me hear no answer but of the performance of my command. So I rest,
  "Your faithful, constant, loving friend,   C. R.
  "Oaking, the seventh of August, 1626."

  "The French inventing all sorts of vexatious delays, the yeomen of
  the guard at last jostled them out, carting them off in nearly forty
  coaches. They arrived at Dover after four days' tedious travelling,
  wrangling and bewailing."


Queen Henrietta taking part in a masque at Christmas in 1632-3, and
Prynne's _Histriomastix_ happening to be published the next day, the
poor man lost his ears for an uncomplimentary remark on women-actors,
which was found in the margin, though it could not possibly have been
written with any reference to the queen's appearance on that occasion.

To Somerset House returned Henrietta Maria after the restoration, and
there the garrulous Pepys paid his respects to her as well as to
Madame Castlemaine. "By-and-by, in came the king and Duke and Duchess
of York. The conversation was not a very decorous one, and the young
queen (Catherine of Braganza) said to Charles, 'you lie,' which made
good sport, as the chuckling and delighted Pepys remarks, those being
the first English words he had heard her say; and the king then tried
to make her reply, 'confess and be hanged.'"

The most striking object in the old days of the Strand was the new
Maypole which replaced the old one taken down by Oliver's Parliament.
It was of cedar wood, 134 feet high, and stood in front of the church
of St. Mary. It was brought in two pieces from below Bridge, the
splicing made secure by iron bands, three crowns fastened toward its
top, and then the tall article was raised by twelve sailors to a
vertical position, and firmly imbedded. The operation was happily
accomplished under the superintendence of the Duke of York in four
hours. Then sounded trumpets and drums; and morris-dancers in motley
attire, and enlivened by the music of pipe and tabor, danced in glee
around it, while thousands of throats became hoarse with loyal
shouting. James would have found little enjoyment in the general glee,
if he could at the moment have had a prophetic glimpse of his wife,
with her infant son folded to her breast, pacing along the river bank
in doubt and fear, and watching for the friendly boat that was to
convey her from the unfriendly city.

When the pole that succeeded this was obliged to abdicate, it was
presented to Sir Isaac Newton, who again presented it to the rector of
Wanstead, and in Wanstead park it helped to support the largest
telescope then known.

From this memorable if unedifying goal, Pope started the racers in the
Dunciad:

{839}

  "Amidst the area wide they took their stand,
  Where the tall maypole once o'erlooked the Strand;
  But now, as Anne and piety ordain,
  A church collects the saints of Drury lane."

In the old palace of the Savoy once lived John of Gaunt; John, King of
France, the Black Prince's captive, died there; George Wither, the
poet, is buried there; and there also was Geoffry Chaucer married.
Simon, earl of Montfort, once lived within its precincts; but where
kings, archbishops, and high nobles once walked and held high council,
pickles are now sold, printing types set up, and glass rolled out and
spun.

Wat Tyler's mob being forbidden to plunder, and supposing a couple of
barrels to contain money, flung them into a great fire. The money,
alas, was gunpowder, as in the Dunleary ballad, and blew up the great
hall, shook down the neighboring houses, killed sundry of the social
reformers, and reduced the palace to ruins.

Henry VII. instituted within its precincts a house of refuge for every
indigent person passing down the River-side-road, and by a natural
process of abuse the poor wayfarers derived little advantages from it.
Loiterers, sham cripples, and vagabonds of both sexes begged abroad
all day, and came in the evening to the Savoy to sup and sleep. Edward
VI. transferred a good portion of its revenue to Bridewell Prison and
Christ's Hospital. Mary replaced the charity on its old footing, much
to the enjoyment of inveterate beggars; but Elizabeth in her turn
disagreeably surprised the lazy inmates and the corrupt governor, and
they had to look out for victims in other quarters.

The building had not lost its privilege of sheltering imposture and
knavery in the last century, having served as an asylum for fraudulent
debtors in Queen Anne's time; it became the darling haunt of such
chaplains as Mr. Lever's Reverend Paul; and in 1754 we find in the
_Public Advertiser_ this precious document put forth by them:


  "BY AUTHORITY.--Marriages performed with the utmost privacy,
  secrecy, and regularity, at the ancient royal chapel of St. John the
  Baptist in the Savoy, where regular and authentic registers have
  been kept from the time of the reformation (being two hundred years
  and upward) to this day, the expense not being more than one guinea,
  the five-shilling stamp included. There are five private ways to
  this chapel by land, and two by water."


Wither, the Cromwellian poet, who had a hard time of it after the
restoration, lies in the Savoy. Denman, petitioning for his life, used
this ingenious device: "As long as Wither lives, I shall not be
considered the worst poet in England."

It is not easy to a passenger sauntering or hurrying down the Strand
at this day, admiring the facade of Somerset House, glancing into the
windows of rich shops, elbowing his way through an eager and bustling
crowd, and having his ears stunned by the thundering rumble of cabs,
busses, and wagons, to fancy it once a sandy and marshy road, and the
footpath very disagreeable to the feet, and interfered with by bushes
and thickets. Three water-courses from the northern fields found their
way across it to the river, and these were spanned by three bridges.
The building of Westminster Abbey encouraged the erection of the first
houses along the River-side-way, but the bad state of the road made a
subject for a petition so late as the reign of Edward II.


PUBLISHING IN THE SEVENTEENTH CENTURY.

Of the coffee-houses in the neighborhood of the Strand and Fleet
street frequented by the witty and the learned from the restoration to
the close of last century, we shall gladly speak if our limits permit.
Meanwhile, being on a literary subject, we must not omit to mention
that the father of {840} Mudie's and all other circulating libraries
in London, was established at 132 Strand, in 1740, by a bookseller
named Bathoe.

Had there been such establishments in Pepys' time, they would have
saved him some money and some trouble. Witness his disappointment
about "Hudibras:"

  "26th of September, 1662. To the Wardrobe. Hither come Mr.
  Battersby, and we falling into discourse of a new book of drollery
  in use, called 'Hudibras,' I would needs go find it out, and met
  with it at the Temple; cost me 2_s_. 6_d_. But when I come to read
  it, it is so silly an abuse of the presbyter-knight going to the
  wars, that I am ashamed at it, and meeting at Mr. Townsend's at
  dinner, I sold it him for 18_d_." (The new book of drollery
  continuing to be the rage), "February 6th, 1663. To a bookseller's
  in the Strand, and there bought 'Hudibras' again. I am resolved once
  more to read him, and see whether I can find him an example of wit
  or no." (Success very doubtful.) "28th November. To Paul's
  Church-yard, and there looked upon the second part of 'Hudibras,'
  which I buy not, but borrow to read." (He bought it a few days
  after, however.) "The world hath mightily cried up this book, though
  it hath not a good liking in me, though I had tried but (by?) two or
  three times reading to bring myself to think it witty."

We find him a few days after these researches purchasing "Fuller's
Worthies," the "Cabbala, or Collection of Letters of State," "Les
Delices de Holland," and "Hudibras" again, "now in great fashion for
drollery, though I cannot, I confess, see enough where the wit lies."

Pepys' great acquaintances seem to have discovered this sore spot in
his mental configuration, and to have angered it oftentimes by quoting
"Hudibras" at him, and chuckling over the fun, which, alas, was the
reverse of fun to him.

It was long after the introduction of printing into the country that
bookseller's shops became an institution. At and before the time of
the great fire, St. Paul's Church-yard was the chief bookselling mart.
On the 31st November, 1660, Pepys bought a copy of the play of Henry
IV. in that place, "and so went to the new theatre, and saw it acted,
but my expectation being too great, it did not please me as otherwise
I believe it would, and my having a book did, I believe, spoil it a
little."

Poor Pepys! A leaf out of the scandalous chronicle of the court would
have interested him more than all the wit and wisdom of Shakespeare.
He tells us in his diary how his wife and he laughed a whole evening
over a pamphlet written about the queen.

The fire destroyed thousands of fine works in the Church-yard; and so
much was the value of books increased, that Ricaut's "Turkey," 8_s_.
before the fire, could not be got under 55_s._ after it.

Later in time, Little Britain, from Duck-lane to the Pump, became a
literary quarter. When Benjamin Franklin first visited London he took
lodgings in Little Britain at 3_s_. 6_d_, per week, next door to a
bookseller's, from whom, as circulating libraries were not in vogue,
he purchased volumes, read them, sold them again to the same man, and
bought others.

A great deal of information on bookselling and other subjects that
interested the people near 200 years since, may be obtained from the
perusal of the "Life and Errors of John Dunton," bookseller, an
autobiography. The son of a clergyman in Huntingdonshire, he says he
learned Latin so as to speak it pretty well extempore, but he could
not get on well with the Greek; and this, coupled with an affection
entertained for a "virgin in his father's house," such passion
carefully concealed from its object, completely unhinged the classical
and clerical designs of his father on him. He became a bookseller's
apprentice, and in {841} 1685 a bookseller in his own person. He
speaks very disparagingly of the mere men of letters of his day. He
says, good simple-minded man, that what they got per sheet interested
them more than zeal for the advancement of literature. Very little we
blame the poor fellows, but they were really inexcusable for
pretending to have ransacked the whole Bodleian Library, to have gone
through the fathers, and to have read and digested all human and
ecclesiastical history, while they had never mastered a single page in
"St. Cyprian," nor could tell whether the fathers lived before or
after our Saviour.

That was the golden age of sermons and pamphlets, the latter occupying
the place of our monthlies. Mr. John Dunton's first essay in the
publishing line was "The Sufferings of Christ," by the Rev. Mr.
Doolittle. All the trade took copies in exchange for their own books,
a feature peculiar to the business 160 years since. John throve and
took a helpmate to himself, not Mrs. Mary Saunders, the virgin before
mentioned. The beautiful Rachel Seaton, the innocent Sarah Day, the
religious Sarah Briscow, had successively paled the image of the
preceding lady in the mirror of his rather susceptible heart, and at
the end he became the fond husband of Miss Annesley, daughter of a
nonconformist divine. The happy pair always called each other by the
endearing and poetic names of _Iris_ and _Philaret_, but this tender
attachment did not prevent Philaret from leaving Iris alone, and
making excursions to Ireland, to America, and to Holland, and delaying
in those regions for long periods. These separations and distant
wanderings did not tend to make our bookseller's old age comfortable
and independent.

Dunton has left an interesting account of most of the then eminent
booksellers in the three kingdoms. He says that in general they were
not much better than knaves and atheists. He also gave information of
the writers he employed, the licensers of the press, etc. It would
appear that the publishing business of the time was in a very vigorous
condition. The shoals of pamphlets satisfied the literary hunger of
those to whom, if they lived in the nineteenth century, _Athenaeums_
and _Examiners_, _Chambers's Journals_ and _All the Year Rounds_,
would be as necessary as atmospheric air. The chief booksellers of
that day, if not to be compared with continental Alduses or Stephenses
or Elzevirs, were men of good literary taste and much information. Of
the booksellers amber-preserved in the "Dunciad," Dunton mentions only
Lintot and Tonson. The disreputable Curll was not known in his day.
This genius, embalmed in the hearts of the rascally paper-men of
Holywell street, being once condemned for a vile publication, and
promoted to the pillory, cunningly averted the wrath of the mob by a
plentiful distribution of handbills, in which he stated his offence to
be a pamphlet complimentary to the memory of good Queen Anne. Edward
Cave, in starting the _Gentleman's Magazine_, 31st January, 1731, gave
healthy employment to many a pamphleteer, though he diminished the
number of separate pamphlets.



BEN JONSON AND LINCOLN'S INN.

Our fancy to speak of books, and their writers and sellers, has led us
aside from the area marked out by Mr. Thornbury for his own
explorations, so we must return to bounds, within which we find
Lincoln's-Inn Fields. These inns were originally established as places
of entertainment, where pilgrims and other travellers were hospitably
attended by the monks. The town houses of noblemen were also called
inns, just as in Paris they were styled hostels. The inn in question
derives its name from the Earl of Lincoln, Henry de Lacy, to whom it
was granted by Edward I. Many eminent men have used chambers in
Lincoln's Inn, since it became the resort {842} of legal students. Sir
Thomas More had chambers there, and there Dr. Donne, the poetical
divine, attempted to study law in his seventeenth year. Dr. Tillotson
preached to the lawyers (with what effect is not told) in 1663, our
own Archbishop Ussher in 1647. Sir Mathew Hale was at first a wild
student of Lincoln's Inn, till reclaimed by the sight of a drunkard
seized by a fit. Shaftesbury; Ashmole, the antiquary; Prynne, of
pillory notoriety; Secretary Thurloe; Sir John Denham; George Wither,
omitting mention of modern celebrities, all endeavored to penetrate
the mysteries of law and equity in this long-enduring institution.

One of the most remarkable, though not the most reputable, of lawyers
connected with Lincoln's Inn was Sir Edmund Saunders, who gave his aid
to the crown while endeavoring, in 1683, to overthrow the charter of
London. The following extract concerning him is taken from Granger:
"Sir Edmund Saunders was originally a strolling beggar about the
streets, without known parents or relations. He came often to beg
scraps at Clement's Inn, where he was taken notice of for his uncommon
sprightliness; and as he expressed a strong inclination to learn to
write, one of the attorney's clerks taught him, and soon qualified him
for a hackney writer. He took all opportunities of improving himself
by reading such books as he borrowed from his friends; and in the
course of a few years became an able attorney and a very eminent
counsel. His practice in the Court of King's Bench was exceeded by
none. His art and cunning was equal to his knowledge, and he gained
many a cause by laying snares. If he was detected he was never put out
of countenance, but evaded the matter with a jest, which he had always
at hand. He was much employed by the king (Charles II.) against the
city of London in the business of the _Quo Warranto_. His person was
as heavy and _ungain_ as his wit was alert and sprightly. He is said
to have been a mere lump of morbid flesh. The smell from him was so
offensive that people held their noses when he came into court. One of
his jests on such occasions was, 'That none could say he wanted issue,
for he had no less than nine on his back.'"

The literary students of the inn, as they sit in their lonely
chambers, or converse with their comrades, Arthur Pendennis and Mr.
Warrington, in the pleasant grounds, delight to fancy brave old Ben
Jonson helping to raise the wall on the Chancery lane side, and
reciting a passage from Homer. Whether Sutton or Camden sent him back
to college to pursue his studies is not so certain. His fighting
single-handed in Flanders in the sight of the two armies, and the
subsequent carrying away of the _"Spolia Opima"_ of his foeman, were
in strict accordance with the practice of the heroes of his studies.
His college life and his deeds in foreign fields were all over in his
twenty-third year, 1597, when we find him a player and writer for the
stage in London; his critics asserting that he walked the boards as if
he were treading mortar. Poor Ben, with a countenance compared to a
rotten russet apple, and described by himself as remarkable for a
"mountain belly and a rocky face," was equally ragged in temper.
Quarreling with a brother actor, he killed him in a duel in Hogsden
Fields, and was brought very near the gallows-foot for his non-command
of temper. He had not the gentle character nor the expansive intellect
of his friend, the "Gentle Shakespeare," nor did his characters
embrace entire humanity, nor did he possess the soaring and
far-seizing imagination of his brother poet and player, but he more
closely pictured the modes of society in which they moved, the social
and politic features of the locality and the era; all those outward
manifestations, in fact, that distinguish the intercourse, and the
morals, and the character of this or that locality or time, from those
of {843} its neighbors. Hence a better idea can be had of the scenic
features of Old London, and the costumes, the idioms, and usages of
its people at the end of the sixteenth and beginning of the
seventeenth century, from the literary remains of Ben Jonson than from
those of William Shakespeare. Aubrey remarked that "Shakespeare's
comedies would remain wit as long as the English tongue is understood;
while our present writers reflect so much upon particular persons and
coxcombeties, that twenty years hence they will not be understood."

London was Ben Jonson's world; its people, such as they appeared to
him, the whole human race. The humorists that he knew were reproduced
with the utmost truth--and the class-modes and manners that came under
his observation were sketched from and to the life. There was local
truth of costume and character, but little generalization.
Illustrative instances abound in all his plays and poems. In
Elizabeth's time, Finsbury Fields were covered with trees and
windmills. So we find Master Stephen ("Every Man in his Humor"), who
dwells at Hogsden (Hoxton), despising the archers of Finsbury and the
citizens that come a-ducking to Islington Ponds. "The Strand was the
chief road for ladies to pass through in their coaches, and there
_Lafoole_ in the 'Silent Woman' has a lodging to watch when ladies are
gone to the china houses or the exchange, that he may meet them by
chance, and give them presents. The general character of the streets
before the fire is not forgotten. In 'The Devil is an Ass' the lady
and her lover speak closely and gently from the windows of two
contiguous buildings. Such are a few of the examples of the local
proprieties which constantly turn up in Jonson's dramas."

To those who accuse rare Ben of intemperate habits it is useless to
object that he lashed intemperance and the other vices of his time as
severely as the most rigid moralist could; there are too many
instances extant of the sons of Satan correcting sin in their speeches
and writings. However, the club at the Mermaid in Friday street to
which he belonged, consisted of such men as we cannot suppose to be of
intemperate habits, nor willing to cherish a noted drunkard. For Sir
Walter Raleigh, Shakespeare, Beaumont, Fletcher, Selden, Cotton,
Carew, Martin, Donne, flashes of wit, and sallies of imagination, and
touches of genial humor, had more charms then beastly wallowing in
liquor. Hear what Jonson himself says in his invitation to a friend to
supper where canary, his darling liquor, was to flow:

  "Of this we will sup free but moderately,
  Nor shall our cups make any guilty men,
  But at our parting we will be as when
  We innocently met. No simple word
  That shall be uttered at our mirthful board
  Shall make us sad next morning, or affright
  The liberty that we'll enjoy to-night."

It was to the middle aisle of the old cathedral of St. Paul's that
Jonson and others like him resorted to obtain such wayward and
grotesque characters as would take the attention of an audience. It
was the favorite lounge at the time of coxcombs, bullies, adventurers,
and cut-purses. Here a new man, wishing to be in the height of
fashion, would bring his tailor, and set him to mark the garb of the
foremost gallant in vogue. Country squires anxious for a varnishing of
courtly polish, would be found there observing the dress and demeanor
of the people of fashion, and afterward flinging away the produce of
their good lands in entertainments shared with these envied darlings
of the courtly goddess. _Captain Bobadil_, we may be certain, was met
among the crowd at Paul's. Here it was that all those niceties of the
mode which crop up through his plays were observed. In the "Midas" of
Lily, quoted by Charles Knight in his "London," are found collected
several of these distinctive marks of the courtier _comme il faut:_

"How will you be trimmed, sir? Will you have your beard like a spade
{844} or a bodkin? A pent-house on your upper lip, or an alley on your
chin? A low curl on your head like a bull, or dangling locks like a
spaniel? Your mustachioes sharp at the end like shoemakers' awls, or
hanging down to your mouth like goat's flakes? Your love-locks
wreathed like a silken twist, or shaggy, to fall on your shoulder?"

Few dramatists in his or our days would venture to speak so fearlessly
to his audience as honest Ben Jonson:

  "If any here chance to behold himself,
  Let him not dare to challenge me of wrong;
  For if he shame to have his follies known,
  First he should shame to act 'em. My strict hand
  Was made to seize on vice, and with a gripe,
  Squeeze out the humor of such spongy souls
  As lick up every idle vanity."

Our bard was not left to struggle with the hardships of an ordinary
theatrical career. He was employed to compose the plots and verses of
the stately and splendid masques in which Elizabeth, and Anne of
Denmark, and her "Royal Doggie" delighted. Had space permitted, we
should gladly have quoted some of the verses and stage directions of
these court shows. Among the rest is an Irish masque in which Dennish,
Donnell, Dermott, and Patrick come in their long glibbs and shaggy
mantles to present their compliments to King _Yamish_, and
congratulate him on the marriage of some lord or other. Having been
roughly received by the janitors, they sounded their grievance aloud:

"_Don_.--Ish it te fashion to beate te imbashaters here? and knock
'hem o' te head phit te phoite stick?"

"_Der_.--Ant make ter meshage run out a ter mouthsh before tey shpeake
vit te king?"

They announce their intention to dance as well as that of their
masters, who as yet stand outside:

"_Don_.--But tey musht eene come, and daunch i' teyr mantles, and show
tee how teye can foot te _fading_ and te _fadow_, and te phip a
dunboyne I trow."

"_Der_.--Tey will fight for tee, King Yamish, and for my mishtress
tere."   [Footnote: 203]

  [Footnote 203: As out of all late or still living writers, not
  natives of Ireland, there are not three who quote our
  peasant-pronunciation correctly, so it is more than probable that
  Jonson, acute as his observation was, mistook the pronunciation of
  his own day.]

After much soft-sawder about their love and their loyalty to Shamus,
six men and boys danced to bagpipes and other rude music. Then the
Irish gentlemen danced in their mantles to the sound of harps; and one
of them called on a bard to celebrate the fame of him who was to make
Erin the world's wonder for peace and plenty:

  "Advance, immortal bard; come up and view
  The gladdening face of that great king, in whom
  So many prophecies of thine are knit.
  This is that James, of which long since thou sungst,
  Should end our country's most unnatural broils."

Would he had done so! Ben was not so blind but that he could spy out
some little defects in Solomon and his queen. As he could not apply
his talents to their correction, he recompensed himself in unmerciful
handling of court vices. Toward the end of James's reign he enjoyed a
competent fortune, and owned an extensive library. Distress and
illness succeeded; but Charles I. being made aware of his forlorn
condition, granted him an additional pension, and that tierce of
canary, whose successors have been drained by all poet-laureates since
his day. A blue marble stone lies over his remains in the north aisle
of Westminster Abbey. The epitaph, RARE BEN JONSON, was cut in the
flag at the order and charge of Jack Young (afterward knighted).
Eighteen-pence requited the sculptor.

Whether we have improved on the feats of artists of another kind, in
Queen Anne's reign, is questionable. At Bartholomew Fair, in the reign
of that good-natured sovereign, a girl, of ten years, walked backward
up a sloping rope, driving a wheelbarrow behind her. {845} Scaramouch
danced on the rope with two children, and a dog, in a wheelbarrow, and
a duck on his head. Our authority leaves us in some doubt as to the
relative positions of man, children, dog, duck, and wheel-barrow, and
whether the duck took position on head of dog or man. The eighteenth
century was inaugurated by an intelligent tiger picking the feathers
from a fowl in such style as to elicit the hearty applause of a
discerning public. Continental sovereigns of our own time prefer the
stirring spectacle of men and horses gored by sharp horned bulls. The
tiger merely removed the feathers from the skin of the dead fowl; the
viscera of the living quadruped follow the thrust of the bull's horn.

------

Translated from Etudes Religieuses, Historiques, et Littéraires, par
des Pères de la Compagnie de Jésus.


THE ORIGIN AND MUTABILITY OF SPECIES.


_Origines et Transformations de l'homme et des autres êtres. lre
partie. Par_ TRÉMAUX. Paris: Hachette. 1865.

Anthropology is a recent science, and yet its votaries have produced
numerous treatises. The delicate questions which it raises have given
birth to various and contradictory opinions. The most important
problem of this science is that which relates to the origin of man. At
what epoch did man for the first time tread the surface of our globe?
How did he appear? What cause produced him? Two first class scholars,
Humboldt and Bompland, said, not long ago, "The general question of
the origin of the inhabitants of a continent is beyond the limits
prescribed to history, perhaps it is not even a philosophical
question." Bolder than they, the anthropologists put a question a
thousand times more complex, as to the origin of the whole human race,
and they do not hesitate to believe that, sooner or later, science
will be able to answer it with certainty. As to the present, we may
say, _Quot capita, tot sensus;_ the most opposite ideas divide the
world, and _it is the main discord which pervades science._ These last
words are those of M. Trémaux. To remedy this confusion, the learned
traveller puts forth a new idea, which in his opinion should, in
throwing light on all the aspects of the question, cause the discord
to vanish; trace the way we ought to follow; and at no very distant
day arrive at a complete solution. It remains to be seen whether these
happy auguries will be realized, or if, on the contrary, the theory of
M. Trémaux, added to the others, will not have the fatal effect of
increasing the confusion it would abolish.

The opinions relating to the origin of man may be reduced to three. In
the first place, we will state that of the monogenists, who behold in
all the human types scattered over the world only races and varieties
of the same species, and regard mankind as descending, or at least as
capable of descending, from a single couple primitively sprung from
the hands of the Creator. This opinion is evidently conformable to the
Bible narrative; this reflection will not escape the sincere
Christian, and we must make it at the risk of exciting the pity or
indignation of certain positivists, who reproach us with bringing into
scientific questions prejudices and arguments which are
extra-scientific.

{846}

The opinion of the polygenists is diametrically opposed to the
preceding. According to them, the typical differences which exist
between the races of men are so decided, so profound, that they could
not be the result of the conditions of existence; these differences
are then original; men, instead of belonging to a single zoological
species, form a genera or even a family, the bimanous family;
community of origin is then impossible, and the account in Genesis
must be considered as legendary.

Lastly, a third school separates itself entirely from the preceding,
and considers the question under discussion as a phase of the general
question--the stability of the species. The naturalists connected with
this school regard the species as something essentially changeable.
They deduce this opinion from the examples of the endless varieties of
forms which our domestic animals above all others present. It is
possible, by known processes, to obtain, after several generations,
products so different from the primitive type, that to judge them by
the form only we should believe in the existence of a new species; the
continued fecundity between the two varieties alone attesting the
specific unity of both types. Would it not be possible, by new
methods, or by a better employment of the means already known, to
arrive at such a complete transformation that the fecundity between
the new and the primitive species should cease to exist, or at least
cease to be unlimited? We should have thus obtained a novel species by
a simple transformation due to the forces of nature. The result which
man might obtain at the end of several generations, nature, left to
itself, would inevitably arrive at, after a longer or shorter time,
according as circumstances should be more or less favorable. This is
admitted by Lamark, and the two Geoffroy Saint-Hilaire; it is admitted
also by the English naturalist Darwin. The latter regards all animals
actually existing as descending from four or five progenitors; an
equal number would suffice for plants. He even adds that, guided by
analogy, he would willingly admit that, all organized beings, plants
and animals, descend from one single primordial type, and that man
should constitute no exception to the general laws; he springs from
the ape or some extinct type, and thence from the primitive.

It is to this last school that M. Trémaux belongs: the title of his
book sufficiently shows it. He concedes the variability and the
transformation of the species; but separates himself distinctly from
Darwin relative to the causes which produce this variation.

M. Trémaux' book may be summed up entirely in the statement of the
great law of the improvement of beings which is printed in large
letters on the front page of the first part: "The improvement of
creatures is or becomes proportionate to the degree of elaboration of
the soil on which they live! And the soil is in general elaborated in
proportion as it belongs to a more recent geological formation." To
prove this law, and to deduce from it every possible consequence, is
the object of the book.

The first requisite in judging a work is to understand its aim or end.
Thus we have endeavored to seize the sense and the bearing which the
author attaches to the great law he thinks he has discovered. Such a
soil gives such a product, we are told. We understand this when the
direct fruits of the earth are in question that is, of the vegetables
which draw directly from the earth the principles which should
assimilate them. But as to animals, what influence can the soil
exercise over them? This is what M. Trémaux should have explained, and
what he has forgotten to tell us. Must we understand that the land, by
virtue of its chemical and mineralogical composition, possesses a
mysterious action of an unknown nature, determining according to the
case the improvement or degeneracy of the species of {847} animals?
Such is in fact the meaning which many passages seem to attribute to
this law. Thus, after having shown that the causes generally assigned
cannot explain those typical changes which nature presents, the author
adds: "By the action of cross-breeding, food, and climate alone, we
shall meet with contradictions at every step. With the action of the
sun, the whole globe exhibits the same effects." Since it is neither
through food nor by climate that the sun acts, it is by some
mysterious agency; and behold us thus, in the nineteenth century,
thrown back upon occult causes. May we be permitted to observe that
this is not scientific?

Entirely engaged in proving by facts the law which must serve as a
oasis to his system, M. Trémaux seems never to have thought of
explaining to himself the manner of the earth's action. Thus, beside
numerous places which clearly imply an immediate action, others could
be quoted which only attribute to the soil an indirect action due to
the aliments drawn from it. For example, _apropos_ of cretinism, we
read: "This scourge is above all endemical, because in fact those
persons who can profit by the _products_ of another soil feel in a
lesser degree the unfavorable results of that condition." And further
on: "To avoid living permanently on a soil which produces cretinism is
the sole remedy, or rather the only palliative, against its pernicious
effects on man. It is best to abandon it completely, or at least _to
make use of products other than those destined to feed its
inhabitants._" In brief, what is necessary to bring humanity to
perfection? "Firstly, To choose carefully those lands whose products
are more directly intended for man. Secondly, To have recourse to
every proper means of improving the land. Thirdly, Planting with
suitable trees those lands which are unfavorable to the growth of
human food. Fourthly, To subject to agriculture those forest lands
which occupy a favorable soil."

These passages appear clear that it is not of itself, but by its
productions, and also doubtless through its climate, the soil acts on
man and on the animals. This explanation is more philosophical than
novel.

Between the monogenists and the polygenists, the question reduces
itself very nearly to this: Can beings differing so much as the
Europeans and the Bushmen, the Hottentot and the Australian, descend
from the same ancestors? No, reply the polygenists; for the
differences are greater than those which characterize certain species.
In order to meet this objection, the monogenists have had recourse to
what is called the middle theory, and to that of the cross-breeds. The
whole of the external circumstances under which the representatives of
a species exist, constitute what is called the middle or medium, to
which monogenists, supporting themselves on undoubted facts, attribute
the power of gradually changing the medium type of a species. The
crossing of many types thus modified will give birth to new forms,
all, however, belonging to one common kind.

Where do we find the difference between this middle theory and the law
of M. Trémaux? In nothing but a greater or less importance attributed
to the influence of soil; and even this difference is more apparent
than real. The _fundamental law_ so understood--and it appears to us
hard to understand it otherwise--constitutes no novel idea or theory;
it is nothing more than a variation of the classic theory of the
influence of media.

How is this law proved? It is impossible for us to follow the author
in the development of his arguments. He gives proof in them of rare
learning, and of profound and varied knowledge of ethnography. We
observe the marked predilection of M. Trémaux for the soil of Africa,
which he has ably described in special works. But when we have
finished reading him, and would give an account of his arguments and
of their value, we do {848} not find in them all the elements of
conviction. We know that many writers have expressed an opinion very
different from ours, but even should we be deemed too exacting, we
must acknowledge that an attentive perusal has not convinced us. There
are no doubt remarkable coincidences in the work; but they are not of
a sufficiently trenchant character, and, moreover, most of the facts
may be explained otherwise than by the influence of soil. Let us give
some examples. "We cannot meet with a single instance of a
civilization which has developed itself, nor even been maintained in
cases of emigration, under adverse geological conditions." Nothing is
more natural, in fact. Why should emigrants on the way of civilization
settle preferentially in unfertile countries? For it must not be
forgotten that what are here called geological conditions refer simply
to the fertility of the soil.

Another argument extensively developed is drawn from the persistence
of the same types in the same countries. After having examined Africa
and Europe from this point of view, the author concludes thus: "In
short, what have the migrations from the East peopling the West
produced? They have created Hellenes in Greece, Romans in Rome, Gauls
in France, and children of Albion in England." Must we conclude, from
this persistence, that the conquering races have in each generation
felt the influence of the soil, so as to resemble after some centuries
the former populations? Such is the reasoning of M. Trémaux. But the
same fact is appealed to by polygenists, who interpret it in a
different manner. According to them, this persistence proves that the
conquering race has always been absorbed by the indigenous; and they
do not fail to conclude from it that between these two races
illimitable fecundity, the specific character of unity, is hardly ever
realized.

We read at the same page: "If we pass over other continents, the same
results strike us on all sides. On certain points of Australia and
America, the English type is attached from the very first generation."
This fact is stated by some naturalists, but it is denied by others.
We can say as much of the pretended transformation of negroes. Messrs.
Reiset, Lyell, and E. Reclus tell us that they are transformed in
about one hundred and fifty years to approach the white type by one
quarter of the distance which separated them from it. But American
anthropologists, who are nearly all polygenists, resolutely affirm the
contrary.

Thus we see the facts are difficult to ascertain, and still more
difficult to interpret. It is one of the grand difficulties of
anthropology. We rarely succeed in agreeing about the facts
themselves, which only happens in some exceptional cases supported by
perfectly exact statistics; and many facts are not of a nature to be
consigned to the columns of an official register. Even in a case where
the facts are placed beyond doubt, they are generally of a nature to
be variously interpreted, and every one with preconceived ideas
tortures them at his pleasure, and does not fail to find in them a
confirmation of his theories. M. Trémaux is so filled with his idea
that he finds proofs in support of it even in politics; and
reciprocally, does not hesitate, in the name of geology, to counsel
princes on the manner of governing their subjects. For example, we
remember the war carried on in 1848 by Hungary against Austria. At
that time Transylvania withdrew from the common cause and rallied to
the Austrian government. The emperor Francis Joseph rejoiced at this
result, hoping to easily propitiate the Croats; but he experienced
from them an unexpected resistance, and their assembly of notables
declared that Croatia should continue to share the fate of Hungary.
Upon this M. Trémaux says: "This would appear paradoxical if we
considered only geographical positions, but consult {849} geology and
all this will appear perfectly rational, since Transylvania reposes
like Austria upon a great surface of old ground; whilst Hungary,
Croatia, and Dalmatia stand upon more recent layers." We leave our
readers to appreciate this.

The author adds: "As to Venetia, not only is its soil of recent
formation, but it possesses a distinct and very different nationality;
thus each one recognizes its unalterable tendencies."

What caused the sanguinary war which has just desolated America? Why,
because the Southerns, dwelling on virgin soil, fought for their
independence and would not be governed by men from old lands. And
reflecting that the new lands of the South are more fitted to improve
the races which cultivate them, M. Trémaux fears not to predict,
notwithstanding the unforeseen victory of the North, that "in the
future the South will govern the North, if it be not separated from
it."

As to Ireland and Poland, it is again in the name of geology that our
author defends their independence. Not hoping to obtain this result,
he at least gives the princes who govern them wise counsels for their
guidance.

Let us come to the scientific conclusions which the author pretends to
draw from his principle in favor of natural history in general and of
anthropology in particular. Since the soil acts so energetically in
the modification of types, it is evident that the species ought to be
essentially variable. Let a race be found isolated on a favorable
ground, without any communication with the rest of mankind, and the
modifications will be produced, transmitted, and increased in every
generation; and, after a longer or shorter time, the new type will be
so different from the old one, that illimitable fecundity will no
longer exist between them; there will only be one species the more.
Transformations in reality are not made as rapidly as might be
believed, because the isolation which we have supposed never exists.
It thence follows that the crossings with the primitive race, or even
with a race on the road to degeneracy on an imperfect soil, constantly
check the effect of the superior soil. At length there is an
equilibrium between these two causes, and then there appears a medium
type, which preserves its identity so long as the circumstances remain
the same. This necessarily happens in a period of several thousand
years, like our historic period. But if we take in at a glance several
thousand ages, we shall understand that the geological changes
effected by time on the surface of the world will cause the action of
the soil to prevail over the influence of crossings, in such a manner
as to modify slowly but progressively the types and the species.

Starting from these principles, what does M. Trémaux require in order
to explain the actual state of creation? A simple _primordial cell_ or
_utricle_, the most simply organized being, whether animal or
vegetable matters little. If this being so simple existed at the epoch
which geologists term the _Silurian period_, it is many millions of
ages past. Since then the surface of the globe has been constantly
modified and ameliorated, life has been constantly developed, and form
been brought nearer to perfection. It is thus that even in the most
elementary beings nature has arrived at the numerous and complicated
forms which we know. In this manner man at his appointed hour appeared
on earth, where he strove to improve himself and is striving in that
direction still. M. Trémaux does not exactly admit that we are
descended from apes. No; but he contends that both man and ape sprang
from one common source, which has now disappeared; and that whilst the
quadruman, placed under unfavorable geological conditions, has
suffered from its inevitable influence and been degraded, man has on
the contrary, under happier influences, developed himself, and is
become able, by {850} his intelligent activity, to combat those
external influences. Hence his actual superiority--hence his future
progress.

A serious objection here presents itself. Does the influence of the
soil perfect the _instinct_ of animals as well as their bodies? Has _it_
given man that intelligence which, better than all zoological
characters, especially distinguishes him from the brute creation? M.
Trémaux meets this difficulty with a reply which might have been taken
from Nysten's dictionary. In his comparison "of man with the ape," he
tells us "that M. Gratiolet divides the subject into two sections, the
one referring to organization, the other to faculties. He concedes the
resemblances of the first, he refuses to acknowledge those of the
second, without observing that _these differences in faculties_ are
only the consequence of a greater or less degree of organic
development." This philosophical heresy does not slip by chance from
the writer's pen; we find it repeated in several places, nearly in the
same terms. Moreover, in refuting another passage from Gratiolet, he
says: "I am astonished that Gratiolet does not recognize in instinct a
rudiment of intelligence; in the constructions of the beaver, in the
nests of birds, in the cells of bees, elements of sculpture and of
design, etc."

M. Trémaux divides the opinions of Gratiolet into two; the first part
is serious, and is that of the learned anatomist; the second is that
of sentiment, wherein he speaks by the same title as the philosophers
_who develop the void of their entities_. This contempt for philosophy
well explains the strange ideas of our author about the intelligence
of man and the souls of brutes. To see nothing between both but a
difference of organization is not philosophical. A little metaphysics
would spoil nothing, and it really does not require a strong dose to
behold the abyss which separates human intelligence, capable of
seizing the abstract and the absolute as well as the concrete and the
continent, from that of brutes, acting by instinct, able only at the
most to combine some sensations, without ever having any general
ideas.

We think we have now given a pretty exact epitome of M. Trémaux'
ideas. The whole work rests upon an ill defined principle, which, in
the sense in which we have understood it, the only one which appears
to us to be feasible, cannot be considered new. This principle,
although true in a certain sense and within certain limits, is not to
be proved irrefragable, as the basis of any theory should be. The
consequences which are sought to be drawn from the premises are not
necessarily contained in them, and many bear not the seal of a
wholesome philosophy. We shall perhaps be thought a little too severe
upon this work. We think we should be so, especially as the author is
in many respects recommendable. _Apropos_ of the question of species,
M. Trémaux writes: "M. Kourens has his merits, but they lie elsewhere;
it is in his researches on the periosteum and on the vital cord that
he acquires them." We may be allowed to use the same expressions and
to say: "M. Trémaux deserves well, but not herein; his actual labors
on ethnography and archaeology are very good. Read the account of his
travels to Soudan and into Asia Minor, and you will acknowledge him a
man of talent and undoubted science. But as to his theoretical ideas
on the question of the species, he must not reckon upon them to
support his reputation." Some journals may waste their incense upon
him; the _Constitutional_ may exclaim: "The veil has been lifted... a
new law is about to unite all disputants. . the arguments of M.
Trémaux abound, and we feel only an embarrassment in choosing."_
L'Independance Beige_ will join the chorus. Even the _Moniteur_ will
grant its approval. But all this is no set-off against the opinions of
the learned, and M. Trémaux knows very well that our great naturalists
do not {851} look upon his ideas as acceptable, or his arguments as
conclusive.

It will be observed that we have not spoken of the Bible, although its
narrative appears compromised by the transformation theory. We believe
it to be useless to mix up theology with scientific debates, at least,
when it is not directly attacked. Now, M. Trémaux is far from
attacking revelation; he does not believe his ideas reconcileable with
Genesis; he never speaks of the Bible narrative but with the greatest
respect. Hence we believe it advisable to show great tolerance toward
sciences which are still in their infancy, which require their elbows
free for development, and which must wander a little in unknown
countries, free to make a false step from time to time. It is thus
they will progress and arrive at the truth.

We will add one last remark on the address of the anthropologists. The
origin of man concerns historians as much as naturalists; for this
reason we should not, in works of this character, neglect historic
monuments. Of all those monuments, books are the surest. Even in
abstracting the special value which the Bible possesses as an inspired
volume, it is not the less true that it is a document which must be
considered, and which as a written document has an incontestably safer
meaning than all the fossils in the world.

For a higher reason we should beware of all theories or hypotheses
which do not agree with the sacred text. The Bible no doubt is not
intended to instruct us in the secrets of the natural order, and it is
perhaps for that that we find in it so little relating to these
subjects; but the Holy Ghost, who inspired the sacred writers, could
not have dictated to them errors, and every assertion which would be
contrary to the _clear_ and _certain_ sense of a passage in it should,
for this reason, be rejected as untrue. When the sense is obscure or
doubtful, which is nearly always the case in passages relating to
physics, we should, we think, be very cautious, and it is prudent for
the learned to be on their guard, for fear of falling into very
numerous and grave errors.

------

From The Victoria Magazine.

WISDOM BY EXPERIENCE.


What a shame! What abominable interference! What cruelty! What
tyranny! These and many other strong expressions of the same kind
proceeded from a collection of rose-stocks planted ready for budding.
They were all fiercely angry and indignant, and first one and then
another uttered some exclamation of disgust, and then all joined in a
chorus of maledictions on the gardener who had done them so much
injury. It was in the month of June that their feelings were so much
excited, just when the sap was most active, and they were throwing out
their most luxuriant shoots. I don't know how they went on when the
gardener first dug them up out of the hedges, and cut away all their
side branches and left only a single straight stem. If they did not
make a fight for it then, it must have been because their sap was all
dried up, and their leaves had fallen off, and they were in low
spirits, and did not much care what became of them. But even then I
don't think they yielded without a struggle, and I have no doubt there
was a good deal of scratching and dragging back, {852} and a great
show of independence and sullenness. But they had not the spirits to
keep up resistance, and the gardener did not give them much chance,
for he pruned them close, and planted them in rows just far enough
apart to prevent the possibility of their having much intercourse, or
of the evil disposed corrupting the more docile. But it was different
in June, when, as I said, the sap was active, and their branches began
to grow out on all sides, so that they could reach each other and even
take a sly pinch at the gardener or any of his friends who happened to
come near. And the particular irritation now was because the gardener
had discovered how wild they were becoming, and set resolutely about
restraining them. First of all he cut off all the suckers that grew
from the roots, and the lower shoots, leaving only those that grew at
the crown of the stock, and then he put them all straight up, and
would not let them loll about or hang over the path--a habit they had
got into which was very disagreeable to those who passed by. And if
they would not stand upright without, he fastened them to pieces of
board let into the ground. This was a great grievance, but I think
they most rebelled at having their lower boughs cut off, for if left
to themselves they would have spread and puffed themselves out in a
most ridiculous way.

Now it so happened that Madame Boll, a stock of a former year which
had been budded, but left in its place and not removed with the rest
into the flower-garden, heard their exclamations of anger and
impatience, and having perhaps gone through some such phase of feeling
herself, and thus gained wisdom by experience, she thought she would
try if she could put their case to them in a better light; so she took
advantage of a little lull in the storm, and said in a gentle,
ladylike tone,

"My young friends, I am very sorry to see you so unhappy; but perhaps
if you will hear what I have got to say, you might think better of
your present position."

"Well," said Miss Strong, who was tossing her long arms about in a
very excited way, only luckily she was out of reach, "if you are going
to take the gardener's part, and preach patience and submission, and
that sort of thing, I can tell you you had better keep your remarks to
yourself, or if I can get at you, I'll spoil that neat head-dress of
yours, which, let me tell you, is not half as pretty as hundreds in
the hedgerows, or as ours would have been, if we had been left to our
own devices as we were last year;" which tirade she ended with a
scornful laugh in which many of the others joined.

But little Miss Wild-Rose, who was nearer, said quietly,

"Perhaps it would be as well to hear what is said on the other side;
particularly as, it is too hot to go on screaming and abusing people
who don't seem to care about it;" and as several of the others were of
the same opinion, Madame Boll took courage, and said what was in her
mind.

"Perhaps it may give you more confidence in me to know, that when I
was first placed here I had many of the same thoughts and feelings
that you appear to have. I did not know why I was taken out of the
hedgerow, and trimmed and restrained, and not allowed to have my own
way; and I confess I thought it very hard. Particularly I was
indignant, as no doubt you will be when the time comes (for you have
still a good deal to undergo which you know nothing about at
present),--I was, I say, very indignant when the gardener cut a slit
in the only shoot which he had left me, and which was growing very
luxuriant, and I was quite proud of it; and introduced a meagre little
bud from another tree, and made me nourish and strengthen it, though I
knew that my own shoot would suffer by it; and so it turned out; for
after a while, when the bud began to grow, he cut away {853} my
natural shoot altogether, and left only that which had been inserted."

Here Miss Strong broke in.

"You were very tame to submit to it. I would have banged and twisted
about till I had got rid of it some way or other."

"Ah!" said Madame Boll, "we shall see; you are stronger and more
resolute than I was. All I know is, I could not help myself."

"Cowardly creature!" muttered Miss Strong, scornfully. But Madame Boll
resumed:

"I soon got used to the change, and gradually began to take an
interest in the bud I had adopted; and though of course Miss Strong
may affect to despise its beauty, I can assure you that most people
have a different opinion."

Whereupon, Madame Boll gave herself airs, and coquettishly moved aside
a leaf or two, and displayed a most perfect and symmetrical rose.

"But," said Miss Wild-Rose and her party all in a breath, "do you mean
that we shall all bear roses like that?"

"Not all, certainly, possibly none of you exactly like, for there are
hundreds of varieties, and many of them much more beautiful. It will
be just as the gardener fancies, though he is generally guided in his
selection by the habit and vigor of the stock, I daresay he will give
Miss Strong, who is so energetic, a bud of Gloire de Dijon, or Anna de
Diesbach, and you, being weaker, will have Devoniensis, or Niphetos."

Miss Strong gave a scornful toss at this, but did not vouchsafe any
remark, though I think she felt rather complimented, and the others
began to muse, since it must be so, what rose they would be likely to
have, and which would become them best.

A little time after this it turned out just as Madame Boll had
said--the gardener came one morning and began to bud the stocks, and
just as he was preparing Miss Wild-Rose for the operation, a young
lady came by, and asked what bud he intended for that one, for, she
said, "I want a Devoniensis, and I think it would just suit it."

"I have got a Devoniensis bud here," he said, "and will put it in."

"And that tall one I think I should like for Gloire de Dijon."

"I will try," he said, "but somehow I am half afraid I shall have some
trouble with it, for though vigorous it is rather awkward, and the
thorns are very spiteful. To say the truth, I am half afraid of it,
and have been leaving it till the last."

"But what," said the lady, "is this in the corner? Surely it is Madame
Boll; and such a beauty! What is it doing here?"

"To say the truth, ma'am, I overlooked it when I planted the others
out, and now it must remain where it is for another year."

"Well," she said, "I hope the others will take pattern from it and do
as well."

"So," said Madame Boll, after they were gone, "that accounts for my
being left here: I must confess I was a little mortified, for I
thought it was a slight; but I generally find, if we wait awhile,
everything comes right in the end, and possibly my being here has done
you some good, or given you comfort; and if so, instead of regret, I
ought to feel pleasure. But now, my young friends, I will tell you a
conversation I overheard one day, between the young lady who was here
just now and another, which your foolish behavior a short time ago
brought to my mind. They were talking about the children in the
school, and how difficult it was to make them feel the advantage of
being submissive and conforming to their rules. They said they were so
anxious to have their own way, and seemed to think it was a pleasure
to their teachers to thwart them, or make them do what they did not
wish, and not that it was intended for their good; and if their
teachers thought they paid too much attention to their dress, {854}
and wished to be smart, and wear flowers and feathers, when they ought
rather to be adorning their minds, and beautifying their tempers, and
enriching their understanding, they were ready to cry out, as you did
just now, 'What tyranny!' 'How interfering!' 'Why can't they let us
dress as we like?' But what they were particularly complaining about
on that occasion, was that the children would persist in wearing hoops
which stuck out their clothes, and made them take up twice as much
room as they otherwise would have done. For, it seems, the benches
where they sat were only large enough for them if they sat close
together, which they could not do with hoops on, so they were obliged
to tell them they could not take them into the school if they did not
lay aside their hoops, and some of them were foolish enough to say
that they would not come to school if they were not allowed to wear
hoops. Now, it struck me, this was just like your folly in wishing to
keep your wild-growing suckers and lower branches, when you know very
well that they would take away all the nourishment which is needed to
bring the beautiful rose-buds to perfection; the bud, in your place,
answering to the knowledge and other excellences which it is the
object of education to impart to their ignorant and lawless natures,
and which, in after years, when they are able to appreciate them, they
prize highly, and can hardly understand what it was that made them so
averse to go through the process necessary for their acquirement."

A year or two afterward I saw the young lady and the gardener looking
at a bed of beautiful roses on the lawn, and heard the young lady ask
what had become of the Devoniensis she had asked him to bud.

"Don't you see it, ma'am," he said, "growing against the wall? I think
it is almost the gem of the whole garden."

"Oh, what a beauty!" she exclaimed; "and how well it has grown!"

"Yes, ma'am," he said; "it has always done well; it seemed to take to
it kindly from the very first, and has never gone back at all. But I
had a good deal of trouble with this one; perhaps you may remember my
saying I thought it likely I should. It is that strong growing one you
remarked at the same time when you told me to bud the Devoniensis. It
won't make much show this year. It wasted so much energy in putting
out side-shoots and suckers. But I think it has got out of its bad
ways, and next year I hope it will make quite a grand tree."

"Oh!" she said, "and here is my old friend Madame Boll, I see. I am
glad you put it here, it is well worth a good place."

"You hear," said Madame Boll, after they were gone, to her neighbor
Gloire de Dijon, "what they say of us, and I hope you have become
reconciled to the change, and will let the good that is in you show
itself."

Whereupon there seemed to come rather a lachrymose murmur from the
dwarfed shoot of Gloire de Dijon. "But am I not to flower at all this
year?"

"Well, my dear," said Madame Boll, tenderly, "I do not wish to be
severe or say anything to hurt your feelings, but you must know that
your present disappointment is the natural result of your past
conduct. You were so determined to indulge in perverse and self-willed
suckers, and you never let the gardener touch you without trying to
prick his fingers or tear his clothes. And now all you want is a
little patience. Who knows but you may be allowed to bloom in the
autumn, and perhaps win the prize at the last flower show? But if not,
why it will be all right next year. Do you think it was no
mortification to me to be neglected and almost unnoticed last year,
and that, as it appears, entirely owing to the carelessness of others,
and not from any fault of mine? Well, you see, I have got over it; and
very likely next year {855} you will have the gratification of hearing
the lady praise you as she did me just now. Be thankful that
experience with you has not come too late."

When Madame Boll ended, I could see on the edge of one of her delicate
leaves a drop of dew, and I said to myself, "How very like a tear!"

------

From The Month.

LABORERS GONE TO THEIR REWARD.


In the days in which we live, more perhaps than at any other time,
education, the school, and the college are made the positions of vital
importance in the battle-field of contending principles. Services
rendered and losses sustained on such points are, therefore, worthy of
special notice, of particular gratitude, or of sorrow. In the month of
May of this year two souls went to their rest, both of whom had
labored long, signally, and successfully in the cause of Catholic
education--especially for the higher classes; both of whom have left
behind them institutions in which their spirit is enshrined: destined,
we trust, to continue through centuries yet to come the work, the
beginnings of which were committed to those whose loss we are now
lamenting. On the 14th of May Monsignor de Ram, the restorer of
Catholic university education in the countries over which the French
revolution had swept, died peacefully, but almost without warning; and
a few days later, his decease was followed by that of the reverend
mother Madeline Sophie Barat, the foundress and first
superioress-general of the congregation of the nuns of the Sacred
Heart. Let us devote a few lines to each.

Monsignor de Ram was born at Louvain, of parents distinguished for
piety and noble descent, September 2, 1804. He early devoted himself
to the service of the Church; was ordained priest, March 19,1827; and
became at once professor in the ecclesiastical seminary of his native
diocese, Mechlin. He had no sooner grown up than he was struck by
observing that his native language, the Flemish, which of all European
tongues most nearly resembles our own, was almost wholly without books
of a good tendency. The reason was evident. The population by which it
is spoken is comparatively small, and is hemmed in by others which
speak French, Dutch, or German. Hence it has almost sunk into a
_patois_. Men who speak Flemish to their servants and laborers read
and write in French. The first labors of Mons. de Ram were devoted to
meet this want, by publishing several very useful books in Flemish. He
was only thirty when the bishops of Belgium resolved to erect a
Catholic university. The attempt could never before have been made;
for in Belgium, almost more than anywhere else, education had for two
hundred years been seized by the state, and used to an irreligious
purpose. The revolution of 1830, though not made by the Church nor in
its interests, had given it a freedom which it never possessed before.
The first use made of this freedom by the bishops of Belgium was to
erect a Catholic university, and the young and zealous priest de Ram
was set over it by their deliberate choice. To its service he devoted
the rest of his life. Beneath his care were trained during thirty
years a continual succession of young men, who are at this day the
strength of the Church in Belgium, and to a considerable degree in
France. {856} England also has sent students there. Those who have had
the happiness of attending the meetings of the Catholic congress in
Belgium must, we think, have been struck by the high Catholic tone of
a number of young men of the middle and higher classes, and by their
intelligence. For those men Belgium and the Church are indebted to the
Catholic university of Louvain, and of that university Monsignor de
Ram has, until his death, been the soul. On Friday, May 12, he
returned from attending a meeting of the academy of Brussels. On the
evening of Sunday, 14th, he had entered into the unseen world. His age
was only sixty; and as he was willing, so it might have been expected
that he would be able, to continue for years to come the labors in
which his life had been spent. Such was not the will of his Lord,
whose call he was at once ready to obey.

At Paris, on the morning of Monday, May 22, only seven whole days
later, the superioress of the Society of the Sacred Heart had attended
the mass of the community. She had completed in the preceding December
her eighty-fifth year. Her day of labor was at last over. She was
seized with apoplexy, and never recovered the power of speech. She
gave, however, clear signs of intelligence, and received the viaticum,
as well as the last unction. On the 24th the blessing of the Holy
Father reached her by a telegraphic message. On the 25th she slept the
sleep of the just.

She was born in December, 1779. She had an elder brother, who before
1800 was a priest, and had joined himself to a society which was
formed at Vienna in the latter part of the French revolution, under
the title of the "Fathers of the Sacred Heart." The first superior of
this society, Father Tournely, had been a pupil of the illustrious
Father Emery at St. Sulpice. His object seems to have been to continue
under another name the spirit and practices of the Society of Jesus,
which had been swept away twenty years before by the insane union of
the monarchs of Europe with the revolutionary infidels, until times
should allow of its re-establishment. This, however, he did not live
to see. His successor, Father Varin, joined it at its restoration. He
relates that the great desire of Father Tournely was the foundation of
a congregation of nuns devoted, under the protection of the Sacred
Heart, to the education of young persons of their own sex. At one time
he had hoped to see this project carried into execution by the
Princess Louisa of Bourbon-Condé, who actually came from Switzerland,
where she was in exile, to Vienna, to confer with him on the subject.
But God called her to the contemplative life, and she became a
Benedictine. Father Tournely, however, never doubted its execution.
Walking one day on the fortifications now destroyed, but then
surrounding Vienna, he said to Father Varin, alluding to this
disappointment, "Dear friend, I thought this had been the work of God,
and if it is not, I confess I do not know how to discern between the
spirit of truth and the spirit of falsehood." Then, after remaining
silent awhile in recollection, he turned to his friend, with something
of fire more than natural in his expression, and added: "It is the
will of God. As to the occasion and the instrument, I may have been
deceived; but, sooner or later, this society will be founded." His
friend used to say that the impression left by these words, and the
manner in which they were spoken, never faded from his mind. They
impressed him with the same conviction; and he added, that when he
repeated them to his brethren, it took possession of all their minds.

"In truth," said Fr. Varin, "God had not chosen for the commencement
of this work instruments great in this world. That the glory might be
his alone, he was pleased that the foundation of the building should
be simplicity, littleness, nothingness."

Fr. Tournely died soon afterward, {857} in the flower of his age. Fr.
Varin succeeded him, and the conclusion of the revolution enabled him
and his brethren to return to Paris. To Paris they went in the year
1800. It was exactly the moment when to human eyes the night seemed
darkest, but when the morning was ready to spring. Pius VI. died a
prisoner in the hands of the infidel French revolutionists, August 29,
1799. "At this moment," says Macaulay, "it is not strange that even
sagacious observers should have thought that at length the hour of the
Church of Rome was come. An infidel power in the ascendant, the pope
dying in captivity, the most illustrious prelates of France living in
a foreign country on Protestant alms, the noblest edifices which the
munificence of former ages had consecrated to the worship of God
turned into temples of victory, or into banqueting-houses for
political societies, or into theophilanthropic chapels; such signs
might well be supposed to indicate the approaching end of that long
domination. But the end was not yet. Again doomed to death, the
milk-white hind was still fated not to die. Even before the funeral
rites had been performed over the ashes of Pius VI., a great reaction
had commenced, which after the lapse of [sixty-five] years appears to
be still in progress." As yet, however, no human foresight would have
observed the tokens of that reaction. Paris was no longer the city
where the eldest son of the Church was enthroned, and where the great
of this world were rejoiced to heap their wealth upon any new plan
which promised to promote the glory of God. Still, Napoleon Bonaparte
had just seized the reins as first consul, and there was at least
toleration to priests. The community lived in a single mean room,
which served them as dormitory, refectory, kitchen, and study. Here
Fr. Varin was sitting upon the edge of a very shabby bed, and by his
side sat one of his community, Fr. Barat. "I asked him what relations
he had. He said, one _little sister_. The words made a strong
impression upon me. I asked how old she was, and what were her powers.
He said she was eighteen or nineteen; that she had learned Latin and
Greek, and translated Virgil and Homer with ease; that she had
qualities to make a good teacher; but that for the present she had
gone to pass some time in her family." Father Barat, good man as he
was, was not above human infirmity, and like other elder brothers,
however proud he might be of his younger sister, could never fancy
that she was really grown up; for when he said she was about eighteen
or nineteen, she was one-and-twenty. Two months later she came to
Paris. "I went to see her, and found a young person of very delicate
appearance, extremely retiring, and very timid. What a
foundation-stone! said I to myself, in reply to the feeling I had had
within me when her brother had mentioned her to me for the first time.
And yet it was upon her that it was the will of God to raise the
building of the Society of His Divine Heart. This was the grain of
mustard-seed which was to produce the tree whose branches have already
spread so wide."

On November 21, 1800, she dedicated herself to the Sacred Heart, under
the patronage of the Blessed Virgin, together with an intimate friend,
Mlle. Octavia Bailly, who shared her aspirations. It was the first
streak on the sky which told of the coming day. The day the society
was formed, in 1802, she became superioress of the first house, which
was at Amiens. In 1806, a second was founded at Grenoble; that year
the first general congregation elected her superioress-general. In
1826 there were seventeen houses, and the rules were approved by Leo
XII. Before her death she had under her rule ninety-seven houses and
3,500 nuns. She had been superioress of the congregation for
sixty-three years; and it is probable that the majority of the French
ladies now living who have received a religious {858} education at all
have received it at the hands of herself or of her children in
religion.

Her body was taken to Conflans, where is the novitiate in the
neighborhood of Paris. During three days her cell was visited by all
whom the rules of the community permitted to enter--the nuns of the
different houses in Paris, pupils present and former of all ages. Not
only these, but many priests were so desirous to have medals,
chaplets, etc., touched by her remains, that two sisters, who were
continually employed, were hardly able to satisfy the general desire.

At the beginning of this short notice we spoke of sorrow and a sense
of loss as feelings natural in those interested in the great works
undertaken by such laborers as Mons. de Ram and Madame Barat on the
occasion of their removal from the scene of action. We need hardly do
more than allude to the other feelings which must at the same time
blend with and qualify these; to the joy and exultation that must
always hail the close of a noble career long persevered in, from the
thought of the rest and the crown that have been so faithfully won;
and to the confidence that the works which those who have been removed
from us have been allowed, while in the flesh, so happily to found,
promote, and guide, will certainly not suffer by the Providence that
has now, as we trust, placed them where they are enabled to see,
without any intervening shadow, the value of the great end for which
these works were undertaken, and where their power to help them on is
to be measured, not by the feeble and inconstant energies of a will
still subject to failure and perversion, but by the mighty intensity
of the intercession of those who are at rest with God.

------

MISCELLANY.

_Mont Cenis Railway_.--Pending the completion of the great Mont Cenis
tunnel, a temporary railway on inclined planes is to be carried along
the present road over the mountain. The French Government, on its
portion of the line, will use locomotives with a peculiar mechanism,
to produce adhesion, on a middle rail placed between the two ordinary
rails. On the Italian side a traction carriage will be employed, which
will wind the carriages up by means of a drum acting on a heavy fixed
cable laid along the line. The mechanism of the traction wagon will be
put in motion by an endless wire rope actuated by water-wheels at the
base of the incline.



_Homes without Hands_.--A new book by Mr. Woods, with the above title,
gives an account of the habitations, "which are never marred by
incompetence or improved by practice," constructed by various animals,
classed according to their principles of construction, and illustrated
by some excellent engravings, from drawings made expressly for the
work. The author first describes the homes of the burrowing mammalia,
and then proceeds to those of the social birds and insects. The mole
appears to take the first place in Mr. Wood's list of mammalia. "This
extraordinary animal does not merely dig tunnels in the ground and sit
at the end of them, but forms a complicated subterranean
dwelling-place, with chambers, passages, and other arrangements of
wonderful completeness. It has regular roads leading to its feeding
grounds; establishes a system of communication as elaborate as that of
a modern railway, or, to be more correct, as that of the subterranean
network of metropolitan sewers." . . . "How it manages to form its
burrows in such admirably straight lines is not an easy problem,
because it is always in {859} black darkness, and we know of nothing
which can act as a guide to the animal." The real abode of the mole is
most extraordinary. "The central apartment is a nearly spherical
chamber, the roof of which is nearly on a level with the earth around
the hill; and, therefore, situated at a considerable depth from the
apex of the heap. Around this heap are driven two circular passages,
or galleries, one just level with the ceiling, and the other at some
height above. The upper circle is much smaller than the lower. Five
short descending passages connect the galleries with each other, but
the only entrance into the keep is from the upper gallery, out of
which three passages lead into the ceiling of the keep. Therefore,
when the mole enters the house from one of his tunnels, he has first
to get into the lower gallery, to ascend thence to the upper gallery,
and so descend into the keep." The mole appears unequalled in
ferocity, activity, and voracity. The fox prefers to avoid the labor
of burrowing, and avails itself of the deserted home of the badger, or
even the rabbit; for, though it needs a larger tunnel than the latter,
the cunning animal finds its labor considerably decreased by only
having to enlarge a ready-made burrow instead of driving a passage
through solid earth.

Of the weasel tribe, the badger is the most powerful and industrious
excavator; there are several chambers in its domicile, one of which is
appropriated as a nursery, and is warmly padded with dry mosses and
grass. The rabbit, like the eider duck, lines her nursery with the
soft fur from her own breast; but Mr. Wood deprecates this being set
forth as an act of self-sacrifice, and held up as an example of such
to human beings, and declares it to be as purely instinctive as the
act of laying eggs.


_The Wealth of Mexico_.--M. Laur, the engineer deputed by the French
government to explore the mineral wealth of Mexico, and who has
already published several reports in the _Moniteur_, has completed his
task. These reports, according to a paragraph in the _Moniteur Belge_,
are shortly to be published in a more extended form, giving the exact
situation, extent, and richness of the principal mineral veins of that
country. It is hoped that under the new administration many of the old
workings, abandoned during the civil wars, will be resumed, and that
they will prove as valuable to the empire as they were during the
early days of the Spanish occupation.

------

NEW PUBLICATIONS.


DIE HEILIGE ELIZABETH. Ein Buch für Christen, von Alben Stolz.
Freiburg im Breisgau. 1865. 8vo, pp. 315.

The Life of Saint Elizabeth of Hungary. A book for Christians, by
Alben Stolz.

The author of this new life of Saint Elizabeth is one of the popular
Catholic writers of Germany, if not the foremost. He is the Abraham of
Sancta Clara of this century.

The principal events of the saint's life are narrated in simple and
familiar language. The point treated of in each chapter is concluded
with a practical instruction. These are far from being dry. We would
suggest the translation of this book into English, were it not that it
is, like all this author writes, thoroughly German, and exclusively
adapted to the circumstances and difficulties of the Catholics of
Germany. What our Catholic English reading public needs, is that some
of our writers should take a lesson from this agreeable as well as
edifying writer, and do for them what he is doing with so much zeal
for the good of his countrymen.


WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE. By His Eminence Cardinal Wiseman. 32mo, pp. 64.
Boston: Patrick Donahoe.

This is an American edition of the lecture of the late Cardinal
Wiseman on William Shakespeare, which appeared in THE CATHOLIC WORLD
for July. It contains, in addition to the lecture, an appendix, in
which the eminent author makes suggestions for, and observations on,
"a tercentenary memorial of Shakespeare." {860} The cardinal suggested
a splendid edition of the great poet's works, illustrated, and printed
in the best and most elaborate style possible. His eminence went into
the most minute details in regard to the manner in which such an
edition should be illustrated, printed, bound, etc. The binding and
paper of this little volume are excellent; but the type from which it
is printed is too small. We are sorry Mr. Donahoe did not get it out
in larger type. Were it not for this slight defect, the book would be
faultless.


NATIONAL LYRICS. By John Greenleaf Whittier. Illustrated. 32mo, pp.
104. Boston: Ticknor & Fields.

This is another of the cheap volumes of poetry issued by Ticknor &
Fields. It contains several of Mr. Whittier's earlier pieces, as well
as many of his late poems. Among the latter are "Barbara Frietchie,"
and "The Poor Voter on Election Day."


SYBIL: A Tragedy, in Five Acts. By John Savage. 12mo, pp. 105. New
York: J. B. Kirker.

This tragedy was written by Mr. Savage--well known in the literary
world as the author of several excellent poems, and now editor of the
New Orleans _Times_--some years ago, and met with a good reception in
the cities in which it was played. It contains many good passages of
high poetical merit, and is, we should think, well adapted for the
stage. The scene is laid in Kentucky, in the beginning of the present
century, and describes society as it is supposed to have existed at
that time.


A GENERAL HISTORY OF THE CATHOLIC CHURCH,
FROM THE COMMENCEMENT OF THE CHRISTIAN ERA
UNTIL THE PRESENT TIME.
By M. l'Abbé J. E. Darras. With an Introduction and Notes. By the Most
Rev. M. J. Spalding, D.D., Archbishop of Baltimore. New York: P.
O'Shea.

We have received numbers 9, 10, 11, and 12 of this excellent history.
Number 12 brings the work down to the pontificate of Sixtus III., 432.


THE MARTYR'S MONUMENT. Being the patriotism and political wisdom of
Abraham Lincoln, as exhibited in his speeches, messages, orders, and
proclamations from the presidential canvass of 1860 until his
assassination, April 14, 1865. 12mo, pp. 297. New York: The American
News Company.

The title of this handsome volume sufficiently explains its purpose.
The origin of the work is set forth in the following extract from the
preface:

"A few days after the assassination of President Lincoln, the
publishers of the present volume received the following letter from
the distinguished gentleman whose name it bears:

  "_Gentlemen_: Collect and publish, in the speediest possible manner,
  the inaugural and other addresses of Abraham Lincoln, his
  proclamations, messages, and public letters, indeed, all he has
  written as President, and you will contribute to the mournful
  celebrations of the American people your share of lasting value, and
  of far more impressive eloquence than the most fervent orator could
  utter. You would thus make the martyr rear his own monument, which
  no years, no centuries, could level and cause to mingle again with
  the dust.
    "Your obedient,
    "FRANCIS LIEBER.
    "NEW YORK, April 18, 1865."

This book is got out in elegant style, and will be valuable hereafter
on account of the many documents it contains which relate to the late
civil war.


_Received_: PASTORAL LETTER OF THE RT. REV. M. DOMENEC, D.D., BISHOP
OF PITTSBURG TO THE CLERGY AND LAITY OF THE DIOCESE, PROMULGATING THE
JUBILEE: together with the late Encyclical of the Holy Father.
Published at the office of the Pittsburg _Catholic_.


THE STORY OF THE GREAT MARCH, FROM THE DIARY OF A STAFF OFFICER.
By Brevet-major George Ward Nichols, aid-de-camp to General Sherman.
New York: Harper & Brothers.






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