Classic Audiobook Collection - Library of the Worlds Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, volume 17 by Various ~ Full Audiobook [history]

Starting point is 00:00:00 Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Volume 17. Selected excerpts by Horace Greeley. Horace Greeley, 1811 to 1872 by Clarence Cloughbuehl. 25 years after his death, Horace Greeley's name remains at the head of the role of American journalists. Successors in their primacy of current discussion may surpass him, as doubt as some of them already have, consistency and learning, but hardly in the chief essentials of a journalistic style. Others may exert a more salutary influence, if not so personally diffused, but in the respect of high ideals, courage, intellectual force, and personal magnetism, the qualities which

Starting point is 00:00:48 impel a man of letters to be also a man of action, Horace Greeley was of heroic mold. He was no pop-gun journalist firing from a sky sanctum, but a face-to-y-lawful. the face champion in the arena of public affairs, laying about him with pen and speech like an ancient Bayard with his sword. The battles he fought for humanity and the blows he gave and received have made him for all time the epic figure of the American press. Born in rural New Hampshire, of English and Scottish Irish descent, he epitomized his heritage and his attainment in the dedication of his autobiography. To our American boys who, born in poverty, cradled in obscurity, and early called from school to rugged labor,

Starting point is 00:01:36 are seeking to convert obstacle into opportunity and rest achievement from difficulty. Though physically a weak child, his intellect was strong, and when near his tenth year, his father removed to Vermont, the boy took with him the reputation of a mental prodigy, so with little schooling and much reading, he was thought when 14 to be a fit apprentice, to a printer, setting forth four years later as a journeyman. His parents had moved to western Pennsylvania, and he followed, but after a desultory practice of his art, he came to the metropolis on August 17, 1831, with $10 in his pocket and so rustic in dress and manners as to fall under suspicion of being a

Starting point is 00:02:22 runaway apprentice. Later in life, at least, his face and his figure would have lent distinction to the utmost elegance of style, but his dress was so careless even after the long period of comparative poverty was passed that the peculiarity became one of his distinguishing features as a public character. And to the last, there were friends of little discernment who thought this eccentricity was studied affectation. But manifestly, his dress, like his unkempt handwriting, was the unconscious expression of his spirit so concentrated on the intellectual interest. of its life as to be oblivious to mere appearances.

Starting point is 00:03:05 After 18 months of dubious success as a journeyman in the city, in his 21st year he joined a friend in setting up a modest praying office, which on March 22, 1834, issued the New Yorker a literary weekly in the general style of Willis's Mirror under the firm name of H. Greeley & Company. For four years, the young printer showed, his editorial aptitude to such good effect that in 1838, he was asked to conduct the Jeffersonian, a Whig campaign paper. This was so effective that in 1840 he was encouraged to edit and publish the log cabin, a weekly which gained a circulation of 80,000, brought him reputation as a political writer

Starting point is 00:03:51 and active participation in politics with the Whig leaders, Governor Seward and Thurlow Weed. It contributed much to the election of General Harrison, but very little to the purse of the ambitious editor. On April 10th of the following year, 1841, he issued the first number of the New York Tribune as a Whig Daily of Independent Spirit. He was still editing the New Yorker in the log cabin, both of which were soon discontinued, the weekly tribune in a way taking their place. Though the New Yorker had brought him literary reputation, it had not been profitable because of uncollectable bills, which at the end amounted to $10,000. Still at the outset of the Tribune, he was able to count $2,000 to his credit and cash and material. He was then 30 years of age, and for 30 years thereafter, the paper grew steadily in circulation, influence, and profit, until a few weeks after his death, of the majority interest indicated that the goodwill of the Tribune, aside from its material

Starting point is 00:05:00 and real estate, was held to be worth about a million dollars. The Greeley interest was then small, since he had parted with most of it to sustain his generous methods of giving and lending. He had great capacity for literary work, and when absent for travel or business, was a copious contributor to his paper. To his rather delicate fiscal habit was perhaps, do his distaste for all stimulants, alcoholic or otherwise, and his adherence through life to the vegetarian doctrines of Dr. Graham. Another follower of the latter being his wife, Mary Young Cheney, also a writer, whom he married in 1836. His moderate advocacy of temperance in food and drink, coupled with his then unorthodox denial of eternal punishment,

Starting point is 00:05:50 helped to identify him in the public mind with most of the is-a-easternism. of the time, including furrierism and spiritualism, when in fact his mind and his paper were merely open to free inquiry and were active and exposing vagaries of opinion were ever manifested. Protection to American industry and abolitionism were the only varieties which he accepted without qualification, and while their pro-slavery party detested him as a dangerous agitator, it is possible at this day even from their point of view to admire the moderation, the candor, and the general humanity of his treatment of the slavery question. In all issues concerning the practical affairs of life, like marriage and divorce,

Starting point is 00:06:37 he was guided by rare common sense, and usually his arguments were scholarly and moderate, but in matters of personal controversy, he was distinctly human, uniting with a taste for the intellectual fray, a command of facts, and a force and pungency of presentation, which never seemed admirable than an opponent. He was in great demand as a lecturer and as a speaker at agricultural affairs. His address is always being distinguished by a desire to be helpful to working humanity and by elevated motives. Though not a jester, genial humor and intellectual exchange were characteristic of his social, intercourse. His books, with one or two exceptions, were collections of his addresses and newspaper articles.

Starting point is 00:07:25 His first book, Hints Toward Reforms, appeared in 1850, and was followed by Glances at Europe, 1851. A History of the Struggle for Slavery Extension or Restriction, 1856, The Overland Journey to California, 1859, an address on success in business, 1867, recollections of a busy life formed on a series of articles in the New York ledger, 1869, essays designed to elucidate the science of political economy, 1870, letters from Texas and the Lower Mississippi, and then addressed to the farmers of Texas, 1871. What I Know of Farming, 1871, and the American Conflict, written as a book, the first volume appearing in 1864 and the second in 1867.

Starting point is 00:08:22 This work on the Civil War is remarkable, when considered in the light of his purpose to show, the inevitable sequence whereby ideas proved the germ of events. But it was hastily prepared, and while strikingly accurate in the large sense, will not bear scrutiny in some of the minor details of war history. Neither his political friends nor his party, nor the causes he has spoken. spouse could hold him to a course of partisan loyalty, contrary to his own convictions, of right and duty. As a member of the Seward Weed Greeley Triumvirate, he was often a thorn in the flesh of the senior members. His letter of November 11, 1854, dissolving the political

Starting point is 00:09:07 firm, being one of the frankest documents in the history of American politics. During the Civil War, he occasionally embarrassed Mr. Lincoln's administration by what seemed then to be untimely cries of on to Richmond, immediate emancipation and peace. On the whole, his influence for the union cause was powerful, but when the war being over, he advocated general amnesty, and finally as an object lesson went on the bail bond of Jefferson Davis, he lost the support of a large body of his most ardent anti-slavery admirers. The clamor against him called forth a characteristic defiance in his letter to members of the Union League Club who were seeking to discipline him. Having further alienated the Republican Party by his general attitude in reconstruction matters, he became the logical candidate for the presidency in 1872 of the Democrats at Baltimore and the liberal Republicans at Cincinnati, in opposition to a second term for General Grant. though personally he made a brilliant canvas, the influences that work in his favor were inharmonious and disintegrating, and the result was the most humiliating defeat.

Starting point is 00:10:24 This appeared to bear with mental buoyancy, despite the affliction of his wife's death, which occurred a week before the election, he having left the stump in September to watch unremittingly at her bedside. On November 6th, the day after his defeat, he resumed the edit. of the Tribune, which six months before he had relinquished to Whitlaw Reed. Thereafter, he contributed to only four issues of the paper, for the strain of his domestic and political misfortunes had aggravated his tendency to insomnia. On the 12th, he was seriously ill, and on the 29th, he succumbed to inflammation of the brain.

Starting point is 00:11:05 The last few months of his eventful career supplied most of the elements essential to a Greek tragedy. On December 23rd, the Tribune, having been reorganized with Mr. Reed in permanent control, their first appeared at the head of the editorial page, the line, founded by Horace Greeley, as a memorial to the great journalist and reformer. A bronze statue has been erected in the portal of the new Tribune office, and another statue in the angle made by Broadway and 6th Avenue, appropriately named Greeley Square, after the man who were second to no other citizen

Starting point is 00:11:42 in establishing the intellectual ascendancy of the metropolis. Clarence Cloughbue The United States just after the revolution from the American conflict reprinted by permission of O.D. Case and Company, publishers, Hartford, Connecticut. The difficulties which surrounded the infancy and impeded the growth of the 13 original, or at least, Atlantic states were less formidable, but kindred and not less real. Our fathers emerged from

Starting point is 00:12:15 their arduous, protracted, desolating revolutionary struggle, rich indeed in hope, but poor in worldly goods. Their country had for seven years been traversed and wasted by contending armies, almost from end to end. Cities and villages had been laid in ashes. Habitations had been deserted and left to decay. Farms stripped of their fendent. and deserted by their owners had for years produced only weeds. Camp fevers, with the hardships and privations of war, had destroyed many more than the sword, and all alike had been subtracted from the most effective

Starting point is 00:12:53 and valuable part of a population always, as yet quite inadequate. Cripples and invalids, melancholy mementos of the yet recent struggle abounded in every village and township. Habits of industry had been unsettled and destroyed by the anxieties and uncertainties of war. The gold and silver of anti-revolutionary days had crossed the ocean in exchange for arms and munitions. The continental paper, which for a time more than supplied in volume, its place, had become utterly worthless. In the absence of a tariff, which the Confederate Congress lacked power to impose, our reports, immediately after, peace were glutted with foreign luxuries.

Starting point is 00:13:40 Gougas, which our people were eager enough to buy, but for which they soon found themselves utterly unable to pay. They were almost exclusively in agricultural people, and their products, save only tobacco and indigo, were not wandered by the old world, and found but a very restricted and inconsiderable market, even in the West Indies, whose trade was closely monopolized by the nations to which they respectively belonged. Indian corn and potatoes, the two principal edibles for which the poor of the old world are largely indebted to America, were consumed to a very limited extent and not at all imported

Starting point is 00:14:20 by their people of the eastern hemisphere. Though wheat-producing capacity of our soil, at first unsurpassed, was soon exhausted by the unskilled-and-th-thill-ful and thriftless cultivation of the 18th century. Though one-third of the labor of the country was probably devoted to the cutting of timber, the axe held was but a pudding stick, while the plow was a rude structure of wood, clumsily pointed and shielded with iron. A thousand bushels of corn, maize, are now grown in our western prairies at a cost of fewer days' labor than were required for the production of 100 in New York or New England 80 years ago. and though the settlements of that day were nearly all within a hundred miles of tide water,

Starting point is 00:15:06 the cost of transporting bulky staples for even that distance over the exocrabble roads that then existed was about equal to the present charge for transportation from Illinois to New York. Industry was paralyzed by the absence or uncertainty of markets. Idleness tempted the dissipation of which the tumult and excitement of Civil War had long been the school. Unquestionably, the moral condition of our people had sadly deteriorated through the course of the revolution. Intemperance had extended its ravages, profoundly and licentiousness had overspread the land. A course in scoffing infidelity had become fashionable, even in high quarters, and the letters of Washington and his compatriots bear testimony to the widespread prevalence

Starting point is 00:15:56 of finality and corruption, even while the great issue of independence or subjugation was still undecided. The return of peace, though it arrested the calamities, the miseries, and the desolations of war, was far from ushering in that halcyon state of universal prosperity and happiness, which had been fondly and sanguantly anticipated. Thousands were suddenly deprived by it of their a custom employment and means of subsistence and were unable at once to replace them. Those accepted, though precarious avenues to fame and fortune in which they had found at least competence were instantly closed and no new one seemed to open before them. In the absence of ought that could with justice be termed a currency, trade and business

Starting point is 00:16:45 were even more depressed than industry. Commerce and navigation, unfettered by legislative restriction, ought to have have been or ought soon to have become more flourishing if the dicta of the world's accepted political economists had been sound but the facts were deplorably at variance with their inculcations trade emancipated from the vexatious trammels of the custom-house barker and gauger fell tangled and prostrate in the toils of the usurer and the sheriff the common people writhing under the intolerable pressure of debt for which no means of payment existed were continually prompting their legislators to authorize and direct those baseless issues of irredeemable paper money by which a temporary relief is achieved at the cost of more pervading and less curable disorders. In the year 1786, the legislature of New Hampshire, then sitting at Exeter, was surrounded, evidently by pre-concert, by a gathering

Starting point is 00:17:49 of angry and desperate men intent on overawing it into an authorization of such an issue. In 1786, the famous Shays' insurrection occurred in western Massachusetts, were in 1,500 men, stung to madness by the snow-shower of writs to which they could not respond, and executions which they had no means of satisfying, undertook to relieve themselves from intolerable infestation and save their families from being turned into the high. highways by dispersing the courts and arresting the enforcement of legal process altogether, that the seaboard cities, depending entirely on foreign commerce, neither manufacturing themselves nor having any other than foreign fabrics to dispose of, should participate in the general

Starting point is 00:18:37 suffering and earnestly scan the political and social horizon in quest of sources and conditions of comprehensive and enduring relief was inevitable. and thus industrial paralysis, commercial embarrassment, and political disorder combined to overbear inveterate prejudice, sectional jealousy, and the ambition of local magnets in creating that more perfect union, where of the foundations were laid and pillars erected by Washington, Hamilton, Franklin, Madison, and their compiers in the convention which framed their federal constitution. Yet it would not be just to close this hasty and case. casual glance at our country under the old federation, without noting some features which

Starting point is 00:19:24 tend to relieve the darkness of the picture. The abundance and excellence of the timber, which still covered at least two-thirds of the area of the then states, enabled the common people to supply themselves with habitations, which, however rude and uncomely, were more substantial and comfortable than those possessed by the masses of any other country on earth. The Luxuriant and omnipresent forests were likewise the sources of cheap and ample supplies of fuel, whereby the severity of our northern winters was mitigated, and the warm, bright fireside of even the humblest family in the long winter evenings of our latitude rendered centers of cheer and enjoyment. Social intercourse was more general, less formal, more hearty, more valued than at

Starting point is 00:20:12 present. Friendships were warmer and deeper. Relationship by blood or by marriage, was more profoundly regarded. Men were not ashamed to own that they loved their cousins better than their other neighbors and their neighbors better than the rest of mankind. To spend a month in the dead of winter in a visit to the dear old homestead and in interchanges of affectionate greetings with brothers and sisters, married and settled at distances of 20 to 50 miles apart, was not deemed an absolute waste of time,

Starting point is 00:20:45 nor even an experiment in fraternal civility and hospitality. And though cultivation was far less effective than now, it must not be inferred that food was scanty or hunger predominant. The woods were alive with game, and nearly every boy and man between 15 and 60 years of age was a hunter. The larger and smaller rivers, as yet unobstructed by the dams and wheels of the cotton spinner and power loomweaver, abounded in excellent fish, and its seasons fairly sworn with them.

Starting point is 00:21:19 The potato, usually planted in the vegetable mold left by a recently exterminated forest, yielded its edible tubers with a bounteous profusion unknown to the husbandry of our day. Hills, the most granitic and apparently sterile, from which the wood was burned one season, would the next year produce any grain in ample measure and at a moderate cost of labor and care. Almost every farmer's house was a hive, where in the great wheel and the little wheel, the former kept in motion by the hands and feet of all the daughters, ten years old and upward, the latter applied by their not less industrious mother, hummed in word from morning till night. In the back room or some convenient appendage, the loom responded day by day to the movements of the busy shuttle,

Starting point is 00:22:07 whereby the fleeces of the farmer's flock and the flax of his field were slowly but sun. subtly converted into substantial, though homely cloth, sufficient for the annual wear of the family, and often with something over to exchange at the neighboring merchants for his groceries and wares. A few bushels of corn, a few sheep, a fat and steer, with perhaps a few saw logs, or loads of hoop poles made up the annual surplus of the husbandman's products, helping to square accounts with the blacksmith, the wheelwright, the minister, and the lawyer, if the farmer was so unfortunate as to have any dealings with the latter personage. His life during peace was passed in a narrower round than ours,

Starting point is 00:22:53 and may well seem to us tame, limited, monotonous, but the sun which warmed him was identical with ours, the breezes which refreshed him were like those we gladly welcome, and while his roads to mill and to meeting were longer and rougher than those we daily traverse, he doubtless passed them, unvexed by apprehensions of a snorting locomotive, at least as content as we, and with small suspicion of his ill fortune in having been born in the 18th instead of the 19th century. The illusion that the times that were are better than those that are

Starting point is 00:23:30 has probably pervaded all ages, yet a passionately earnest assertion, which many of us have heard from the lips of the old men of 30 to 50 years ago, that the days of their youth were sweeter and happier than those we have known, will doubtless justify us in believing that they were by no means intolerable. It is not too much to assume that the men by whose valor and virtue American independence was achieved and who lived to enjoy for half a century thereafter, the gratitude of their country and the honest pride of their children, saw wealth as fairly distributed,

Starting point is 00:24:07 and the labor of freemen as adequately rewarded, as those of almost any other country or of any previous generation. Political compromises and political log rolling from the American conflict reprinted by permission of OD Case and Company publishers, Hartford, Connecticut. Political compromises, though they have been rendered unsavory by abuse, are a necessary incident of mixed or balanced governments, that is of all but simple unchecked despotisms.

Starting point is 00:24:44 Wherever liberty exists, their diversities of judgment will be developed, and unless one will dominates over all others, a practical mean between widely differing convictions must sometimes be sought. If, for example, a legislature is composed of two distinct bodies or houses, and they differ as they occasionally will, with regard to their propriety or the amount of an appropriation, appropriation required for a certain purpose, and neither is disposed to give way. A partial concession, on either hand, is often the most feasible mode of practical adjustment. Where the object contemplated

Starting point is 00:25:22 is novel or non-essential to the general efficiency of the public service, such as a construction of a new railroad, canal, or other public work, the repugnance of either house should suffice entirely to defeat or at least to postpone it, for neither branch has a right to exact from the other conformity with its views on a disputed point as the price of its own concurrence in measures essential to the existence of the government. The attempt, therefore, of the Senate of February March 1849 to dictate to the House, you shall consent to such an organization of the territories as we prescribe or we will defeat the civil appropriation bill, and thus will. derange, if not arrest, the most vital machinery of the government, was utterly unjustifiable.

Starting point is 00:26:12 Yet this should not blind us to the fact that differences of opinion are at times developed on questions of decided moment, where the rights of each party are equal, and where an ultimate concurrence in one common line of action is essential. Without some deference to adverse convictions, no confederation of the insurgent colonies was attainable. No union of the state, states could have been affected. And where the executive is, by according him the veto, clothed with a limited power over the making of laws, it is inevitable that some deference to his views, his convictions, should be evinced by those who fashion and mature those laws. Under this aspect, compromise in government is sometimes indispensable and laudable. But what is known in state

Starting point is 00:27:00 legislation as log rolling is quite another matter. A has a bill which is intent on passing, but which has no intrinsic worth that commends it to his fellow members. But B, C, and D, and the residue of the alphabet have each his little bill, not perhaps specially obnoxious or objectionable, but such as could not be passed on its naked merits. All alike must fail unless carried by that reciprocity of support suggested by their common need and peril. An understanding is effective between their several backers so that A votes for the bills of B, C, D, etc. as the indispensable means of securing the passage of his own darling. And thus a whole letter of bills become laws, or of no single one was demanded by the public interest or could have passed

Starting point is 00:27:54 without the aid of others as unworthy as itself. Such as substantially the process whereby our statute books are loaded with acts which subserved no end but to fill the pockets of the few at the expense of the rights or the interests of the many. End of Section 1, read by Bryce Christ. Section 2 of Library the World's Best Literature,

Starting point is 00:28:25 Ancient and Modern Volume 17. This is a liberal book recording. All Libervox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit livervox.org. Library of the World's Best Literature Ancient and Modern, Volume 17. Selected excerpts from the history of the English people by John Richard Green 1837 to 1883, Part 1. Dean Stanley on Reading 1, On Reading 1, Reading 1, on reading 1, of Green's first literary production said, I see you are in danger of becoming picturesque.

Starting point is 00:29:07 Beware of it. I have suffered from it. Though Green was then at an age when advice from such a source might well have had some influence, his natural bent was even then too strong to be affected by the warning. Born in Oxford in 1837, he entered Jesus College. We showed the same remarkable power

Starting point is 00:29:29 of reconstructing the life of the past that marked his historical writings in after years, and where his preference for historical chronicles over the classics, and his lack of verbal memory, puzzled his tutor and prevented his winning a special distinction in the studies of his college course. On graduating in 1859, he entered the church, and in 1866 became vicar of Stepney in East London. Here, besides preaching and visiting, he was a leader in the movement for improving the condition of the East Side, and in the organization of an effective system of charitable relief. Nearly the whole of his meager income being expended on his parish,

Starting point is 00:30:16 he was obliged to make up the deficit by writing articles for the Saturday Review. These were mainly brief historical reviews and essays, but some were of a light character, dealing with social topics, hastily written but incisive and original many of them have permanent value and they were invented and published in a separate volume under the title of stray studies in england and italy after his short history of the english people had made him famous his health was fast-breaking under the strain of his parish work and this combined with the growing spirit of scepticism induced him to withdraw from active clerical work and accept an appointment as librarian at Lambeth, where he was able to give much of his time to historical study. He had at first planned a treatise on the Angerfin Kings, but was urged by his friends to undertake something of wider scope

Starting point is 00:31:18 and of more general interest. Accordingly, he set to work on the short history of the English people. The task before him was difficult. He wished to. to make a book that would entertain the general reader and at the same time be suggestive and instructive to the scholar and to compress it all within the limits of an outline. A term usually associated with those bare, crabbed summaries, which are sometimes inflicted by teachers upon the young and defenseless, but are avoided by general reader and scholar alike. How far he succeeded appears from the fact that with the exception of a clock, work. No treatise on English history has ever met with such prompt and complete success among all classes of readers.

Starting point is 00:32:09 The vivid, picturesque style made it exceedingly popular, while the originality of method and of interpretation won forth the praise of men like Freeman and Stubbs. As to its accuracy, there is some difference of opinion. When the book first came out, 1874, Sharp Review, caught the historian in many slips, usually of a kind not to affect his general conclusions, but serious enough to injure his reputation for accuracy. Most of these errors were corrected in later editions, and are not to be found in the longer history of the English People four volumes, which contains the material of the earlier work in an expanded but as something in a less interesting form.

Starting point is 00:32:59 His next work was in a field in which none could refuse him credit for original research. The Making of England, dealing with the early part of the Anglo-Saxon period, and the conquest of England, which carried the narrative down to 1052, show extraordinary skill in handling the scanty historical materials of those times. He was at work on the conquest at the time of his death, which occurred in 1883. During the last years of his life, his illness had frequently interrupted his work,

Starting point is 00:33:35 and but for the aid of his wife in historical research, as well as the mechanical labor of a man Uensis. He would not have accomplished what he did. As it is, his friends regard his actual achievements as slight compared to what his talents promised had he lived. Still, these achievements entitle him to a hundred, high place among modern historians. In accuracy has many superiors, but in brilliancy of style in human sympathy and above all, in the power to make the past, present, and real, he has

Starting point is 00:34:11 few equals. Fiction, he once said, is history that didn't happen. His own books had the interest of novels without departing in essentials from the truth. Besides writing the works above mentioned, he issued a selection of readings from English history, 1879, and wrote with his wife a short geography of the British Isles, 1881. The Battle of Hastings, from History of the English people. On the 14th of October, William led his men at dawn along the higher ground that leads from Hastings to the battlefield which Harold had chosen. From the mound of Telem, the Norman saw the host of the English gathered thickly behind a rough trench and a stockade on the height of Selnack. Marjorie ground covered their right, on the left, the most exposed part of the position,

Starting point is 00:35:10 the husk-carls or bodyguard of Harold, men in full armor and wielding huge axes, were grouped round the golden dragon of Wessex and the standard of the king. The rest of the ground was covered by thick masses of half-armed rustics, who had flocked at Harold's summons to the fight with the stranger. It was against the center of this formidable position that William arrayed his Norman knighthood, while the mercenary forces he had gathered in France and Brittany were ordered to attack its flanks. A general charge of the Norman foot opened the battle In front rode the minstrel telefare

Starting point is 00:35:51 Tossing his sword in the air and catching it again while he chanted the song of Roland He was the first of the host who struck a blow And he was the first to fall The charge broke vainly on the stout stockade Behind which the English warriors plied axe And javelin with fierce cries Of out, out!

Starting point is 00:36:13 and the repulse of the Norman footman was followed by a repulse of the Norman horse. Again and again the Duke rallied and led them to the fatal stockade. All the fury of fight that glowed in the Norseman's blood, all the headlong fowler that spur them over the slope of valley dunes mingled that day with the coolness of head, the dogged perseverance,

Starting point is 00:36:38 the inexhaustible faculty of resource, which shone at Mortimer, and Farreville. His Breton troops, entangled in the marshy ground on his left, broke in disorder, and his panic spread through the army a cry of rose that the Duke was slain. William tore off his helmet. I live, he shouted, and by God's help I will conquer yet. Maddened by a fresh repulse, the Duke spurred right at the standard.

Starting point is 00:37:06 Unhoashed, his terrible maze struck down girth, the king's brother, again dismounted. a blow from his hand hurled to the ground in unmannerly rider who would not lend him his steed. Amidst the roar and tumult of the battle, he turned the flight he had arrested into the means of victory. Broken, as the stockade was by his desperate onset, the shield wall of the warriors behind it still held the Normans at bay, till William, by a faint of flight, drew a part of the English force from their post of vantage. Turning on his disorderly pursuers, the Duke cut them to pieces, broke through the abandoned line, and made himself master the central ground. Meanwhile, the French and Britons made good they were sent on either flank. At three, the hill seemed won.

Starting point is 00:37:59 At six, the fight still raged around the standard, where Harrow's husk-cars stood stubbornly at bay on a spot marked afterward by the high altar of Battle Abbey. An order from the Duke at last brought his arches to the front. The arrow flight tulled heavily on the dense masses crowded around the king, and as the sun went down, a shaft pierced harrow's right eye. He fell between the royal ensigns, and the battle closed with the desperate Melly over his corpse. The rising of the baronage against King John, from History of the English People.

Starting point is 00:38:40 The open resistance of the northern barons nerd the rest of their order to action. The great houses, who had cast away their older, feudal traditions for a more national policy, were drawn by the crisis into close union with the families, which had sprung from the ministers and counselors of the two henries. To the first group belong such men as Sayre de Quincy, the Earl of Winchester, Jeffrey of Mandifel, Earl of Usicks. the Earl of Clare, Folk Fitzwarren,

Starting point is 00:39:14 William Mallet, the House of Fitz Allen and Gant. Among the second group were Henry Bowen and Roger B. Godd, the earls of her fit in Norfolk, the younger William Marshall, and Robert DeVier. Robert Fitzwalter,

Starting point is 00:39:30 who took the command of their United Force, represented both parties equally, but he was sprung from the Norman House of Brien, or the Justice Trier, of Henry II, Richard Deluce, had been his grandfather. Secretly and on the pretext of pilgrimage, these nobles met at St. Edmundsbury, resolute to bear no longer with John's delays. If he refused to restore their liberties, they swore to make war on him,

Starting point is 00:39:59 till he confirmed them by charter under the king's seal, and they parted to raise forces with the purpose of presenting their demands at Christmas. John, knowing nothing of the coming storm, pursued his policy of winning over the church by granting a freedom of election, while he embittered still more the strife with his nobles by demanding scuttage from the northern nobles who had refused to follow him to point in. But the barons were now ready to act, and early in January in the memorable year of 1215, they appeared in arms to lay as they had planned, their demands before the king. John was taken by surprise. He had asked for a truce till Easter died

Starting point is 00:40:45 and spent the interval in fevered efforts to avoid the blow. Again, he offered freedom to the church and took vows as a crusader against whom war was a sacrilege, while he called for a general oath of allegiance and fealty from the whole body of his subjects. But month after month only showed the king

Starting point is 00:41:05 the uselessness of the vowsness of for the resistance. Though Paldov was with him, his vassalage had as yet brought little frubin way of aid from Rome. The commission is whom he sent to plead his cause at the Shire courts, brought back news that no man would help him against the charter that the barons claimed, and his efforts to detach the clergy from the league of his opponents utterly failed. The nation was against the king. He was far, indeed, from being utterly deserted. His ministers still clung to him.

Starting point is 00:41:41 But cling, as such men might to John, they clung to him rather as mediators than adherents. Their sympathies went with the demands of the barons, when the delay which had been granted was over. And the nobles again gathered in arms at Brackley and Northamptonshire to lay their claims before. for the king. Nothing marks more strongly the absolutely despotic idea of his sovereignty, which John had formed, then the passionate surprise which breaks out in his reply.

Starting point is 00:42:13 Why do they not ask for my kingdom, he cried. I will never grant such liberties as will make me a slave. The imperialist theories of the lawyers of his father's court had done their work, held it by the practical sense of Henry. They had told, on the more and strong nature of his sons. Richard and John both held with Granville that the will of the prince was the law of the land, and to fatter that will by the customs and franchises which were more embodied in the baron's claim seemed to John, a monstrous usurpation of his rights. But no imperialist theories had touched the minds of his people.

Starting point is 00:42:57 The country rose as one man at his refusal. At the close of May, London threw open the gates to the forces of the barons, now arrayed under Robert Fitzwalter as marshal of the Army of God and Holy Church. Exeter and Lincoln followed the example of the capital. Promises of aid came from Scotland and Wales. The northern barons marched hastily under Eustacek to join their comrades in London. Even the nobles who had as yet clung to the king, but whose hopes of conciliation were blasted by his obstinacy,

Starting point is 00:43:33 yielded at last to the summons of the army of God. Pandolf, indeed, and Archbishop Langton, still remained with John, but they counseled, as Earl Ranoff and William Marshall counseled, his acceptance of the charter. None, in fact, counseled its rejection, save his new justiciar, the Porte Van Peter de Roche,

Starting point is 00:43:57 and other foreigners who knew the baron's purpose driving them from the land. But even a number of these were small. There was a moment when John found himself with but seven nights at his back and before him a nation in arms. Quick as he was, he had been taken utterly by surprise. It was in vain that in the short respite he had gained from Christmas to Easter, he had summoned mercenaries to his aid and appealed to his new Cusoran, The Pope.

Starting point is 00:44:29 Summons and appeal were alike too late. Nursing wrath in his heart. John bowed to necessity and called the barons to a conference on an island in the Thames, between Windsor and Staines, near a marshy meadow by the riverside, the meadow of Roney Mead. The king encamped on one bank of the river. The barons covered the flat of Rony Mead on the other. Their delegates met on the 15th of July on the island between them. But the negotiations were a mere cloak to cover John's purpose of unconditional submission.

Starting point is 00:45:04 The Great Charter was discussed and agreed to in a single day. Copies of it were made and sent for preservation to the cathedrals and churches, and one copy may still be seen in the British Museum, injured by age and fire, but with the royal seals still hanging from the brown shriveled parchment. It is impossible to gaze without reverence. on the earliest monument of English freedom, which we can see with our own eyes and touch with our own hands. The great charter, to which from age to age men have looked back as the groundwork of English liberty. But in itself the charter was no novelty, nor did it claim to establish any new constitutional principles.

Starting point is 00:45:49 The Charter of Henry I formed the basis of the whole, and the additions to it, for the most part, formal recognitions of the judicial and administrative changes introduced by Henry II. What was new in it was its origin. In form, like the charter on which it was based, it was nothing but a royal grant. In actual fact, it was a treaty between the whole English people and its king. In it, England found itself for the first time since the conquest, a nation bound together by common national interest, by a common national sympathy. in words which almost close the charter.

Starting point is 00:46:30 The community of the whole land is recognized as the great body from which the restraining power of the baronage takes its validity. There is no distinction of blood or class. Of Norman or not Norman. Of noble or not noble. All are recognized as Englishmen. The rights of all are owned as English rights. Bishops and nobles claimed in.

Starting point is 00:46:55 security at Runnymede, the rights not a baron and churchmen only, but those of freeholder and merchant, a townsman in Philly. The provisions against wrong and extortion, which the parents drew up as against the king for themselves. They drew up as against themselves for their tenants. Base too, as it is professed to be on Henry's charter, it was far from being a mere copy of what had gone before. The vague expressions of the old charter were now exchanged for precise and elaborate provisions. The bonds of unwritten custom, which the Alder Grant did little more than recognize, had proved too weak to hold the Antivans, and the baronage set them aside for the restraints of written and defined law. It is in this way that the Great Charter marks the transition

Starting point is 00:47:48 from the age of traditional rights, preserved in the nation's memory and officially declared by the primate, to the age of written legislation, of parliaments and statutes, which was to come. Its opening indeed is in general terms. The Church had shown its power of self-defense in the struggle of the interdite. In the clause, which recognized its rights alone, retained the older and general form. All vagueness ceases when the Charter passes on to deal with the rights of Englishmen, at large, their right to justice, to security of person and property, to good government. No Freeman ran a memorable article that lies at the base of our whole judicial system

Starting point is 00:48:37 shall be seized or imprisoned, or dispossessed, or outlawed, or in any way, brought to ruin. We will not go against any man nor send against him, save by legal judgment of his peers or by the law of the land. To no man will we sell, runs another, or deny, or delay, right or justice. The great reforms of the past reigns were now formally recognized. Judges of Assize were to hold its circuits four times in the year, and the king's court was no longer to follow the king in his wanderings over the realm, but to sit in a fixed place.

Starting point is 00:49:16 But the denial of justice under John was a small danger compared with the lawless exactions both of himself and his predecessor. Richard had increased the amount of the scudage, which Henry II had introduced and applied it to raise funds for his ransom. He had restored the Danigal or land tax, so often abolished,

Starting point is 00:49:38 under the new name of Curicage, had seized the world, of the Cistercians and the plate of the churches, and made it movables as well as land. John had again raised the rate of scudage, and imposed aides, fines, and ransoms at his pleasure with our Council of the Baronage. The Great Charter met this abuse by a provision on which our constitutional system rests. No scudage or aid, other than the three customary feudal aides, shall be imposed in our realm, saved by the Common Council, of the realm, and to this great council was provided that prelates and the greater barons should be summoned by special writ, and all tenants in chief, through the sheriffs and bail-ups at least forty days before.

Starting point is 00:50:28 The provision defined what had probably been the common usage of the realm, but the definition turned it into a national right, a right so momentous that on it rests our whole parliamentary life. Even the parentage seemed to have been startled when they realized the extent of their claim, and the provision was dropped from the later issue of the charter at the outset of the next reign. But the clause brought home to the nation at large their possession of a right which became dearer as years went by. More and more clearly the nation discovered that in these simple words lay the secret of political power. It was the right of self-taxation that, England fought for under Earl Simon as she fought for it under Hamden. It was the establishment of this right, which established English freedom.

Starting point is 00:51:22 End of Section 2. Section 3 of Library the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Volume 17. This is a Livervox recording. All Livervox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit Livervox. Box.org. Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Volume 17. Selected excerpts from the history of the English people by John Richard Green, Part 2. England's growth in commerce and comfort under Elizabeth from history of the English people. A middle class of

Starting point is 00:52:10 wealthier landowners and merchants was fast-rising in importance. The wealth of the meaner sort wrote one to Cecil, is the very fount of rebellion, the occasion of their indolence, of the contempt of the nobility, and of the hatred they have conceived against them. But Cecil and his mistress could watch the upgrowth of national wealth with cooler eyes. In the country, its effect was to undo much of the evil which the diminution of small holdings had done. Whatever social embarrassment it might bring about. The revolution in agriculture which Latimer deplored undoubtedly favored production. Not only was a larger capital barred to bear upon the land, but the mere change in the system of cultivation introduced a taste for new and better modes of farming. The breed of horses

Starting point is 00:53:05 and of cattle was improved, and a far greater use made of manure and dressings. One acre under the new system produced it was said as much as two under the old as a more careful and constant cultivation was introduced a greater number of hands came to be required on every farm and much of the surplus labor which had been flung off the land in the commencement of the new system was thus recalled to it and yet more efficient agency in absorbing the unemployed was found in the development of manufacturers The linen trade was as yet of small value, and that of silk weaving was only just introduced. But the woolen manufacture was fast becoming an important element in the national wealth. England no longer sent her fleeces to be woven in Flanders and to be dyed at Florence.

Starting point is 00:53:59 The spinning of yarn, the weaving, fulling, and dyeing of cloth, were spreading rapidly from the towns over the countryside. The Worcester trade, of which not. Norwich was the center, extended over the whole of the eastern counties. Farmers' wives began everywhere to spin their wool from their own sheep's barracks into a coarse homespun. The South and West however still remained the great seats of industry and of wealth, for they were the homes of mining and manufacturing activity. The iron manufacturers were limited to Kent and Sussex, though their prosperity in this quarter was already

Starting point is 00:54:39 threatened by the growing scarcity of the wood which fed their furnaces, and by the exhaustion of the forests of the wield. Cornwall was then, as now, the sole exporter of tin, and the exportation of its copper was just beginning. The broadcass of the West claimed the palm among the woollen stuffs of England. The sink ports held almost a monopoly of the commerce of the channel. Every little harbor from the foreland to the land's end sent out its fleets of fishing boats, manned with bowels seamen who were to furnish crews with Drake and the buccaneers. Northern England still lag far behind the rest of the realm in its industrial activity. But in the reign of Elizabeth, the poverty and inaction to which it had been doomed for so many centuries,

Starting point is 00:55:31 began at last to be broken. We see the first sign of the revolution, which has transferred English manufacturers and English wealth to the north of the Mercy and of the Humber, in the mention which now meets us of the freezes of Manchester, the coverlets of York, the cutlery of Sheffield, and the cloth trade of Halifax. Elizabeth lent a ready patronage to the newcomers. She shared in its speculations. She considered its extension and protection as part of public policy. and she sanctioned the formation of the great merchant companies which could alone secure the trader against wrong or injustice in distant countries. The Merchant Adventurers of London, a body which had existed long before, and had received a charter of incorporation under Henry the Seventh, furnished a model for the Russia Company, and the company which absorbed the newcomers to the Indies. but it was not wholly with satisfaction that either the queen or her ministers watched the social change which wealth was producing around them.

Starting point is 00:56:42 They feared the increased expenditure in comfort which necessarily followed it, as likely to impoverish the land and to eat out the hardihood of the people. England spendeth more on wines in one year, complains Cecil, than it did in ancient times in four years. In the upper classes, the lavishness of a new wealth combined with the lavishness of life, a love of beauty of color of display, to revolutionize English dress. Men wore a manor on their backs. The queen's three thousand robes were rivaled in their bravery by the slashed velvets, the ruffs, the jeweled fur points, of the crudiers around her. But signs of the growing wealth were as evident in the lower class as in the higher. The disuse of saltfish and the greater consumption of meat marked the improvement which had taken place among the country folk.

Starting point is 00:57:41 Their rough and wattle farmhouses were being superseded by dwellings of brick and stone. Puder was replacing the wooden trenches of the early yeomanry, and there were yeomen who could boast of a phaco of silver plate. It is from this period indeed that we can first date the rise of a conception which seems to us now a peculiarly English one. The conception of domestic comfort. The chimney corner, so closely associated with family life, came into existence with the general introduction of chimneys, a feature rare and ordinary houses at the beginning of this rain.

Starting point is 00:58:20 Pillows, which had before been despised by the farmer and the trader is fit only for women in childbed, were now in general use. Carpets superseded the farm. filthy flooring of rushes, the loftier houses of the wealthy merchants, their parapetted fronts and costly wainscoting, their compassed but elaborate beds, their carved staircases, their quaintly figured gables, not only contrasted with the scholar which had till then characterized English towns, but marked the rise of a new middle class which was to play its part in later history. A transformation of an even war-striking kind

Starting point is 00:59:01 marked the extinction of the feudal character of the nobles. Gloomy walls and serried battlements disappeared from the dwellings of the gentry. The strength of the medieval fortress gave way to the pomp and grace of the Elizabethan Hall. Noel Longbleet, Burley, and Hatfield, Hardwick and Audley End, are familiar instances of a social

Starting point is 00:59:26 as well as an architectural change, which covered England with buildings where the thought of defense was abandoned but that of domestic comfort and refinement. We still gaze with pleasure on their picturesque line of gables. They're fretted fronts. Their gilded turrets in fanciful veins.

Starting point is 00:59:45 Their castellated gateways, the jutting orioles from which the great noble looked down on his new Italian garden, on its stately terraces and broad flights of steps, its vases and fountains, its quaint mazes, its formal walks, its lines of views cut into grotesque shapes, in hopeless rivalry at the Cypress avenues of the south,

Starting point is 01:00:09 nor was the change less within than without. The life of the Middle Ages concentrated itself in the vast castle hall, where the baron looked from his upper dais, on the retainers who gathered at his board, but the great households were fast breaking up, and the whole feudal economy disappeared when the lord of the household withdrew with his family into his parlor or withdrawing room and left the hall to his dependence. The Italian refinement of life which told unpleasant and garden told on the remodeling of the house within, raised the principal apartments to an upper floor, a change to which we owe the grand staircases of the time,

Starting point is 01:00:52 surrounded the quiet courts by long galleries of the presence, crowned in rude hearth, with huge chimney pieces adorned with fons and cupids, with quaintly interlaced monograms and fantastic arabesques, hung tapestries on the walls, and crowded each chamber with quaintly carved jayers and costly cabinets. The prodigal use of glass became a marked feature in the domestic architecture of the time,

Starting point is 01:01:21 and one whose influence on the general health of the people can hardly be overrated. Long lines of windows stretched over the fronts of the new manor halls. Every merchant's house had its or real. You shall have sometimes, Lord Bacon grumbled, your house is so full of glass that we cannot tell where to come to be out of the sun or the cold.

Starting point is 01:01:44 What Elizabeth contributed to this upgrowth of national prosperity was the peace and social order from which it sprang. While Carter Defei were blazing at Rome and Madrid, while the Inquisition was driving the sole traders of the Netherlands to madness, while Scotland was tossing with religious strife, while the policy of Catherine secured for France, but a brief respite from the horrors of civil war. England remained untroubled and at peace.

Starting point is 01:02:14 Religious order was little disturbed. recusants were few. There was little cry as yet for freedom of worship. Freedom of conscience was the right of every man. Persecution had ceased. It was only as the tale of a darker past that men recalled how, ten years back, heretics had been sent to the fire. Civil order was even more profound than religious order.

Starting point is 01:02:40 The failure of the Northern Revolt proved the political tranquility of the country. The social troubles from vagrancy and evictions were slowly passing away. Taxation was light. The country was firmly and steadily governed. The popular favor which had met Elizabeth at her accession was growing into a passionate devotion. Of her faults, indeed, England, beyond the circle of her court, knew little or nothing. The shiftings of her diplomacy were never seen outside the royal closet. the nation at large could only judge her foreign policy by its main outlines, by its temperance and good sense, and above all, by its success.

Starting point is 01:03:24 But every Englishman was able to judge Elizabeth in her rule at home, in her love of peace, her instinct of order, the firmness and moderation of her government, the judicious spirit of conciliation and compromise among warring factions, which gave the country an understanding of her government, which gave the country an understanding, example tranquility at a time when almost every other country in Europe was torn with civil war. Every sign of the growing prosperity, the sight of London as became the mart of the world, of stately mansions as they rose on every manner, told and justly told, in the Queen's favor. Her statue in the center of the London Exchange was a tribute on the part of the merchant class to the interest with which she watched and shared personally in the country. its enterprises. Her thrift won a general gratitude. The memories of the terror and of the martyrs through interbrightly the aversion from bloodshed, which was conspicuous in her earlier reign,

Starting point is 01:04:27 and never wholly wanting through its fears of clothes. Above all, there was a general confidence in her instinctive knowledge of the national temper. Her finger was always on the public pulse. She knew exactly when she could resist the feeling of her people, and when she must give way before the new sentiment of freedom, which her policy unconsciously fostered. But when she retreated, her defeat had all the grace of victory, and the frankness and unreserve of her surrender won back at once the love that her resistance lost. Her attitude at home, in fact, was that of a woman whose pride in the well-being of her subjects and whose longing for her love. for their favor was the one warm touch in the coldness of her natural temper. If Elizabeth could be said to love anything,

Starting point is 01:05:18 she loved England. Nothing she said to her first parliament, in words of unwanted fire, nothing, no worldly thing under the sun is so dear to me as the love and goodwill of my subjects. And the love and good will which was so dear to her, she fully won. William Pitt, from history,

Starting point is 01:05:39 of the English people. Out of the union are these two strangely contrasted leaders, in fact, rose the greatest, as it was the last, of the purely Whig administrations, but its real power lay from beginning to end in Pitt himself. Poor as he was, for his income was little more than 200 a year, and springing as he did from a family of no political importance, it was by sheer dent of genius that the young Cornett

Starting point is 01:06:09 of horse, and whose youth and inexperienced Walpole had sneered, seized a power which the weak houses had ever since the revolution kept in their grasp. The real significance of his entry into the ministry was that the national opinion entered with him. He had no strength save from his popularity, but this popularity showed that the political torpor of the nation was passing away, and had a new interest in public affairs, and a resolve to hand. have weight in them was becoming felt in the nation at large. It was by the same instinct of a great people that this interest and resolve gathered themselves round William Pitt. If he was ambitious, his ambition had no petty aim. I want to call England, he said, as he took office,

Starting point is 01:07:01 out of that innovate state in which 20,000 men from France can shake her. His call was soon answered. He at once breathed his own lofty spirit into the country he served, as he communicated something of his own grandeur to the men who served him. No man, said a soldier at the time, ever entered Mr. Pitts' closet, who did not feel himself braver when he came out than when he went in. Ill combined as were his earlier expeditions, and many as were his failures.

Starting point is 01:07:34 He roused a temper in the nation at large, which made ultimate defeat in front. possible. England has been a long time in labor, exclaimed Frederick of Prussia as he recognized a greatness like his own, but she has at last brought forth a man. It is this personal and solitary grandeur, which strikes us most as we look back to William Pitt. The tone of his speech and action stands out in utter contrast with the tone of his time, in the midst of a society critical, polite, indifferent, simple even to the affectation of simplicity, witty and amusing but absolutely prosaic, cool of heart and of head, skeptical of virtue and enthusiasm, skeptical above all of itself. Pitt stood absolutely alone, the depth of his conviction, his passionate love for all that he deemed lofty and true, his fiery energy, his poetic imaginativeness, his theatrical ears and

Starting point is 01:08:38 rhetoric, his hearty self-assumption, his pompousness and extravagance were not more puzzling to his contemporaries than the confidence with which he appealed to the higher sentiments of mankind. The scorn with which he turned from a corruption, which had till then been the great engine of politics, the undoubting faith which he felt in himself, in the grandeur of his aims, and in his power to carry them out. I know that I can save the country, he said to the Duke of Devonshire, on his entry into the ministry, and I know no other man can. The groundwork of Pitt's character was an intense and passionate pride, but it was a pride which kept him from stooping to the level of the men who had so long held England in their hands. He was the first statesman since the restoration, who set the example of a purely public spirit. keen as was his love of power

Starting point is 01:09:37 no man ever refused office so often or accepted it was so strict a regard to the principles he professed I will not go to court he replied to an offer which was made him if I may not bring the constitution with me for the corruption about him he had nothing but disdain he left to Newcastle the buying of seats and the purchase of members at the outset of his career Palma pointed him

Starting point is 01:10:05 to the most lucrative office in his administration, that a paymaster of the forces. But its profits were of an illicit kind, and poor as he was, Pitt refused to accept one farthing beyond his salary. His pride never appeared in loftier and nobler form than in his attitudes toward the people at large. No leader had ever a wider popularity than the great commoner,

Starting point is 01:10:30 as Pitt was styled. But his ear was always that of, a man who commands popularity, not that of one who seeks it. He never been too flat or popular prejudice. When moms were roaring themselves hoarse for Wilkes in liberty, he denounced Wilkes as a worthless profligate, and when all England went mad in its hatred of the Scots, Pitt haughtily declared his esteem for a people whose courage he had been the first to enlist on the side of loyalty. His noble figure, the hawk-like eye, which flashed from the small thin face. His majestic voice, the fire and grandeur of his eloquence,

Starting point is 01:11:12 gave him a sway over the House of Commons far greater than any other minister has possessed. He could silence an opponent with the look of scorn, or hush the whole house with a single word. But he never stooped to the arts by which men form a political party, and at the height of his power, his personal following hardly numbered half. a dozen members. His real strength indeed lay not in Parliament, but in the people at large. His title of the Great Cominer marks a political revolution. It is the people who have sent me here.

Starting point is 01:11:47 Pitt boasted with a haughty pride when the nobles of the cabinet opposed his will. He was the first to see that the long political inactivity of the public mind had ceased, and that the progress of commerce and industry have produced a great middle. class, which no longer found its representatives in the legislature. You have taught me, said George II when Pitts sought to save Bing, by appealing to the sentiment of Parliament, to look for the voice of my people in other places than within the House of Commons. It was this unrepresented class which had forced him into power. During his struggle with Newcastle, the greater towns backed him with the gift to

Starting point is 01:12:30 their freedom and addresses of confidence. Four weeks left's Horace Walpole. It rained gold boxes. London stood by him through good report and evil report, and the wealthiest of English merchants, Alderman Beckford, was proud to figure as his political lieutenant. The temper of Pitt indeed harmonized admirably with the temper of the commercial England which rallied round him, with its energy, its self-confidence, its pride, its patriotism, its honesty, its moral earnestness. The merchant and the traitor were drawn by a natural attraction to the one statesman of their time whose aims were unselfish, whose hands were clean, whose life was pure and full of tender affection for wife and child. But there was a far deeper ground for their enthusiastic reverence, and for the reverence with Jewish country, has born Pitt ever since.

Starting point is 01:13:28 He loved England with an intense and personal love. He believed in her power, her glory, her public virtue, till England learned to believe in herself. Her triumphs were his triumphs. Her defeats, his defeats. Her dangers lifted him high above all thought of self-party spirit. Be one people, he cried to the factions who rose to bring about his fall. Forget everything but the public.

Starting point is 01:13:56 I set you the example. His glowing patriotism was the real spell by which he held England, but even the faults which checkered his character told for him with the middle classes. The Whig statesman, who preceded him, had been men whose pride expressed itself in a marked simplicity, an absence of pretense. Pitt was essentially an actor, dramatic in the cabinet, in the house, in his very office. He transacted business with his clerks in full dress. His letters to his family, genuine as his love for them was,

Starting point is 01:14:33 a stilted and unnatural in tone. It was easy for the wits of his day to just his affectation, his pompous gait, the dramatic appearance which he made on great debates, with his slim swaths and flannel and his crutch by his side. Early in life, while Paul sneered at him, for bringing into the house, of commons, the gestures and emotions of the stage. But the classes to whom Pitt appealed were classes not easily offended by faults of taste, and saw nothing to laugh at in the statesman who was

Starting point is 01:15:08 born into the lobby amidst the torches of the gout, or carried into a house of lords to breathe his last in a protest against national dishonor. Above all, Pitt wielded the strength of resistless eloquence. The power of political speech had been revealed in the stormy debates of the long parliament, but it was cramped in its utterance by the legal and theological pedantry of the time. Pedantry was flung off by the age of the revolution, but in the eloquence of Summers and his rivals, we see ability rather than genius, knowledge, clearness of expression, precision of thought, the lucidity of the pleader or the man of business, rather than the passion of the orator. Of this clearness of statement, Pitt had little or none. He was no ready

Starting point is 01:15:59 debater like Walpole. No speaker or set speeches like Chesterfield. His said speeches were always his worst, for in these his want of taste, his love of effect, his trite quotations and extravagant metaphors came at once to the front. That with defects like these he stood far above every orator of his time, was due above all to his profound conviction, to the earnestness and sincerity with which he spoke. I must sit still, he whispered once to a friend, for when once I am up, everything that is in my mind comes out. But the reality of his eloquence was transfigured by a large and poetic imagination, an imagination so strong that, as he said himself, Most things returned to him with stronger force the second time than the first,

Starting point is 01:16:50 and by a glow of passion, which not only raised him high above the men of his own day, but set him in the front rank among the orators of the world. The cool reasoning, the wit, the common sense of his age, made way for a splendid audacity, a sympathy with popular emotion, a sustained grandeur, a lofty vehemence, a command over the whole world, range of human feeling. He passed without an effort from the most solemn appeal to the gayest raillery, from the keenest sarcasm to the tenderest pathos. Every word was driven home by the grand self-consciousness of the speaker. He spoke always as one having authority. He was in fact the first English orator

Starting point is 01:17:35 whose words were a power, a power not over Parliament only, but over the nation at large. Parliamentary reporting was as yet unknown, and it was only in detached phrases and half-remembered outbursts that the voice of Pitt reached beyond the walls of St. Stevens. But it was especially in these sudden outbursts of inspiration, in these brief passionate appeals, that the might of his eloquence lay. The few broken words we have of him stirred the same thrilling men of our day, which they stirred in the men of his own. attempt on the five members preparations for war from history of the English people. The brawls of the two parties who gave each other the nicknames of roundheads and cavaliers created fresh alarm in the parliament, but Charles persisted in refusing it a guard. On the honor of a king, he engaged to defend them from violence as completely as his own children.

Starting point is 01:18:40 But the answer had hardly been given when his attorney appeared at the bar. at the Lords and accused Hampton, Pin, Hollis, Strowd, and Hasselrig of high treason in their correspondence with the Scots. A herald at arms appeared at the bar of the Commons and demanded the surrender of the five members. If Charles believed himself to be within legal forms, the Commons saw a mere act of arbitrary violence in a charge which proceeded personally from the King, which set aside the most cherished privileges of Parliament. and summoned the accused before a tribunal, which had no pretense to a jurisdiction over them. The Commons simply promised to take the demand into consideration, and again requested a guard. I will reply to morrow, said the king.

Starting point is 01:19:33 On the morrow he summoned the gentleman who clustered round Whitehall to follow him, and embracing the queen, promised her that in an hour he would return master of his kingdom, A mob of Cavaliers joined him as they left the palace, and remained in Westminster Hall as Charles, accompanied by his nephew the Elector Palatine, entered the House of Commons. Mr. Speaker, he said, I must for a time borrow your chair. He paused with a sudden confusion as his eye fell on the vacant spot with Pym commonly sat. For, at the news of his approach, the house had ordered the five members to withdraw. gentlemen he began in a slow broken sentence i am sorry for this occasion of coming unto you yesterday i sent a sergeant at arms upon a very important occasion to apprehend some that by my command were accused of my treason where unto i did expect obedience and not a message treason he went on had no privilege and therefore i am come to know if any of these persons that were accused are here

Starting point is 01:20:41 There was a dead silence, only broken by his reiterated. I must have them, wheresoever, I find them. He again paused, but the stillness was unbroken. Then he called out, is Mr. Pim here? There was no answer. And Charles, turning to the speaker, asked him whether the five members were there. Lenthal felt on his knees. I have neither eyes to see, he replied, no tongue to speak in this.

Starting point is 01:21:11 place, but as this house is pleased to direct me. Well, well, Charles angrily retorted, tis no matter. I think my eyes are as good as another's. There was another long pause while he looked carefully over the ranks of members. I see, he said at last, all the birds are flown. I do expect you will send them to me as soon as they return hither. If they did not, he added, he would seek them himself. and with the closing protests that he never intended any force.

Starting point is 01:21:45 He went out of the house, says an eyewitness, and a more discontented and angry passion, then he came in. Nothing but the absence of the five members and the calm dignity of the commons had prevented the king's outrage from ending in bloodshed. Five hundred gentlemen of the best blood in England would hardly have stood tamely by, while the bravos of Whitehall laid hands on their leaders

Starting point is 01:22:11 in the midst of the parliament. The five members had taken refuge in the city, and it was there that on the next day, the king himself demanded their surrender from the alderman at Guildhall. Cries of privilege rang round him as he returned through the streets. The writs issued for the arrest of the five were disregarded by the sheriffs, and a proclamation issued four days later, declaring them traitors,

Starting point is 01:22:38 passed without notice. Terror drove the captain. cavaliers from Whitehall, and Charles stood absolutely alone, for the outrage had severed him for the moment from his new friends in the Parliament, and from the ministers, Falkland and Cole Pepper, whom he had chosen among them. But lonely as he was, Charles had resolved on war. The Earl of Newcastle was dispatched to muster a royal force in the north, and on the 10th of January, news that the five members were about to return and triumph to Westminster, drove Charles from Whitehall. He retired to Hampton Corden to Windsor, while the trained bands of London and Southwark on foot and the London watermen

Starting point is 01:23:21 on the river all sworn to guard the Parliament, the kingdom and the king, escorted Pim and his fellow members along the Dames to the House of Commons. Both sides prepared for the coming struggle. The Queen sailed from Dover with the crown jewels to buy munitions. of war. The cavaliers again gathered Brown the king, and the royalist press flooded the country with state's papers, drawn up by Hyde. On the other hand, the Commons resolved by vote to secure the great arsenals of the kingdom, Hull, Portsmouth, and the Tower, while mounted processions of freeholders from Buckinghamshire and Kent traversed London on their way to St. Stevens, vowing to live and die with the parliament.

Starting point is 01:24:08 The great point, however, was to secure armed support from the nation at large, and here both sides were in a difficulty. Previous to the innovations introduced by the tutors, and which had been already questioned by the commons in a debate on pressing soldiers, the king and himself had no power of calling on his subjects generally to bear arms, save for purposes of restoring order of meeting foreign invasion. on the other hand no one contended that such a power had ever been exercised by the two houses without the king and charles steadily refused to consent to a militia bill in which the command of the national force was given in every county to men devoted to the parliamentary cause both parties therefore broke through constitutional precedent the parliament in appointing the lord lieutenants who commanded the militia by ordnance of the two houses

Starting point is 01:25:05 Charles and Levinen forces by Royal Commissions of Array. The King's great difficulty lay in procuring arms, and on the 23rd of April he suddenly appeared before all, the magazine of the North, and demanded admission. The new governor, Sir John Hotham, fell on his knees but refused to open the gates, and the avowal of his act by the Parliament was followed by the withdrawal of the Royalist Party among its members from their seats at Westminster. The two houses gained in unity and vigor by the withdrawal of the royalists.

Starting point is 01:25:42 The militia was rapidly enrolled. Lord Warwick named to the command of the fleet and a loan opened in the city to which the women brought even their wedding rings. The tone of the two houses had risen with the threat of force and their last proposals demanded the powers of appointing and dismissing the royal ministers. naming guardians for the royal children and a virtually controlling military, civil and religious affairs.

Starting point is 01:26:11 If I granted your demands, replied Charles, I should be no more than the mere phantom of a king. End of Section 3. Section 4 of Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Volume 17. This is Librevox recording. All Librevox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org, recording by Arwai in May 2003. Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Volume 17.

Starting point is 01:26:54 Section 4 The Scope of the Novelist by Thomas Hill Green Thomas Hill Green 1836 to 1882 One of the most interesting phases of thought in the second half of the 19th century is that known as the Neo-Hagalian movement in England. Certain English students of the deeper problems of life, dissatisfied with the prevailing philosophies in their own country,

Starting point is 01:27:25 turned to Germany for light and believed that they found it in the philosophy of Kant as modified and supplemented by Hegel. Among the leaders of the men, movement were J. W. Stirling, the brothers John and Edward Caird, and William Wallace, all of whom have helped to make Hegel's doctrine known to English and American students. But the most prominent and influential of the group was the subject of this sketch, Thomas Hill Green. Green was born in Berkin, Yorkshire, on the 7th of April 1836, and was the youngest of four children.

Starting point is 01:28:02 His mother died in his infancy, and the children were left to be cared for and educated by their father. In 1850, when he was 14, Thomas went to Rugby, where he did not shine as a scholar, being uninterested in his studies and lacking behind his class. In 1855, he entered Balliol College, Oxford, and came fortunately under the teaching of Benjamin Joet, who succeeded in rousing his latent energies. He became interested in history and philosophy, and in 1860 was elected a fellow of Balliol, beginning his career as a teacher by lecturing on ancient and modern history. Two years later, he gained the Chancellor's Prize for an essay on the value and influence of works of fiction. In 1864, he lectured before the Edinburgh Philosophical Institution on the English Commonwealth, a favorite subject which he treated with.

Starting point is 01:29:02 much ability. The course of his philosophic studies is not known, nor at what time he became acquainted with Hegel's work, which were destined to have so great an influence on his opinions and life. But after lecturing for a short time on history, he began to teach philosophy, which he had come to recognize as the true field of his life work. For a time, indeed, he had hesitated in the choice of a profession. Changes in his religious views prevented him from following his father's example and entering the ministry. And notwithstanding his interest in public affairs, he seems to have had no inclination toward journalism. But in teaching philosophy, he found a congenial occupation, which made him pecuniarily independent. For many years, however,

Starting point is 01:29:53 his position at Oxford was that of a tutor only, and it was not until 1878 that his abilities received adequate recognition in his appointment as White's professor of moral philosophy. In 1871, he had married Charlotte Simons, daughter of Dr. Simons of Clifton, and sister of John Addington Simons, one of Green's oldest friends. Whether she was interested in his philosophical work or not, she shared his sympathy with the poor and devoted herself largely to their cause. Only seven years of married life, however, were granted to Green, and only four years in his profession, for on March 26, 1882, after a brief illness, he died. His biographer, Mr. Nettleship, gives many interesting reminiscences of this fine thinker.

Starting point is 01:30:47 Ordinarily very undemonstrative, he was capable of strong affection, and whenever he broke through his reserve was a delightful companion. He had a true love for social equality and a high sense of the dignity of simple human nature, and he hoped, he said, for a condition of English society in which all honest citizens would recognize themselves and be recognized by each other as gentlemen. We hold fast, he wrote, to the faith that the cultivation of the masses, which has for the present superseded the development of the individual, will in its maturity produce some some higher type even of individual manhood than any which the old world has known.

Starting point is 01:31:32 With such sentiments, he was naturally a radical in politics, and so far as his professional duties permitted, he took an active part in political discussion. He declared his political aim to be the removal of all obstructions which the law can remove to the free development of English citizens. He was a warm friend of the American Union during the Civil War and a sympathizer with liberal movements throughout the world.

Starting point is 01:32:01 He was pledged also to the advancement of popular education and labored especially, like Matthew Arnold, for the better education of the middle classes. Taking him all in all, he stands for the most noble and thoughtful type of modern citizens, devoted to the pursuit of truth and to the highest interests of his fellow man. of Green's writings, only a small portion were published during his lifetime, the most important being perhaps the two introductory essays prepared for the complete edition of Hume edited by himself and T.H. Grose in 1874. His principal ethical work, the Collegomena to Ethics,

Starting point is 01:32:46 appeared in 1883 under the editorship of his friend A.C. Bradley, and all his writings except the prolegomena were issued a few years later in three volumes, edited with a memoir by R. L. Nettleship. In literary form, his essays display his most finished work, his philosophical paper as being often obscure from overcrowding of the thought. The main outlines of his ideas and the leading principles of his philosophy are, however, unmistakable. philosophy was to him, says Mr. Nethelship, the medium in which the theoretic impulse, the impulse to see and feel things more clearly and intensely than everyday life allows,

Starting point is 01:33:31 found its most congenial satisfaction. The strength, the repose, the mental purgation which come to some men through artistic imagination or religious emotion, came to him through thinking. From Kant, Green took his own. theory of knowledge, according to which, substance and cause, and all the relations that subsist between things, are mental creations, while the material world, which to most men appears so substantial, has no real existence. From Hegel, he took the doctrine of pantheism, which formed the metaphysical basis of his ethics and his religion. According to this view, our minds are only manifestations of God, or, as he otherwise expresses it, the divine spirit

Starting point is 01:34:20 reproduces itself in the human spirit, while the material world exists only for thought. In ethics also he was indebted to Hegel, holding with him that the ultimate end of moral action is the self-realization or self-perfection of the individual, a theory not easily reconcilable with Green's political views, nor with his self-reliable. ardent interest in social reforms. The best expression of his doctrines is found in the polygomena to ethics, his ablest constructive work, which, though mainly devoted to the discussion of ethical subjects, contains several chapters on the metaphysical questions with which ethics is so closely connected.

Starting point is 01:35:05 His ethical instructions are the most valuable, not only in the polygomena, but in certain of the essays and in the lectures on the principles of political obligation. If he impresses the impartial critic as an able and earnest inquirer whose system of philosophy is incomplete, yet the world has reason to be grateful to so honest and brave a thinker, for Green's writings must long remain suggestive and stimulating in a high degree. The scope of the novelist. From the essay on the value and influence of works of fiction. The novelist not only works on more various elements, he appeals to more ordinary minds than the poet.

Starting point is 01:35:53 This indeed is the strongest practical proof of his essential inferiority as an artist. All who are capable of an interest in incidents of life which do not affect themselves may feel the same interest more keenly in a novel, but to those only who can lift the curtain does a poem speak intelligibly. It is the twofold characteristic of universal intelligibility and indiscriminate adoption of materials that gives the novel its place as the great reformer and leveler of our time. Reforming and leveling are indeed more closely allied than we are commonly disposed to admit. Social abuses are nearly always the result of defective organization. The demarcations of family, of territory or of class prevent the proper

Starting point is 01:36:43 fusion of parts into the whole. The work of the reformer progresses as the social force is brought to bear more and more fully on classes and individuals, merging distinctions of privilege and position in the one social organism. The novel is one of the main agencies through which this force acts. It gathers up manifold experiences, corresponding to manyfold situations of life, and subordinating each to the whole, gives to every particular situation a new character as qualified by all the rest. Every good novel, therefore, does something to check what may be called the despotism of situations, to prevent that ossification into prejudices arising from situation to which all feel a tendency.

Starting point is 01:37:33 The general novel literature of any age may be regarded as an assertion by mankind at large in its then development, of its claims as against the influence. of class and position, whether that influence appear in the form of positive social injustice, of oppressive custom, or simply of deficient sympathy. To be what he is, the novelist must be a man with large powers of sympathetic observation. He must have an eye for the humanities which underlie the estranging barriers of social demarcation, and in relation to which the influence of those barriers can alone be rightly appreciated. We have already spoken of that acquiescence in the dominion of circumstance to which we are all too ready to give way, and which exclusive novel reading tends to foster.

Starting point is 01:38:24 The circumstances, however, whose rule we recognize, are apt to be merely our own or those of our class. We are blind to other idola than those of our own cave. We do not understand that the feelings which betray us into indiscretions may, when, differently modified by a different situation, lead others to game-stealing or trade outrages. From this narrowness of view, the novelist may do much to deliver us. The variations of feeling and action

Starting point is 01:38:57 with those of circumstance, and the essential human identity which these variations cannot touch, are his special province. He shows us that crime does not always imply sin, that a social heresy may be the assertion of a native right, that an offense which leads to conventional outlawry may be nearly the rebellion of a generous nature

Starting point is 01:39:19 against conventional tyranny. Thus, if he does not do everything, he does much. Though he cannot reveal to us the inner side of life, he at least gives a more adequate conception of its surface. Though he cannot raise us to a point of view from which circumstances appear subordinate to spiritual laws, he yet saves us from being blinded. if not from being influenced, by the circumstances of our own position.

Starting point is 01:39:48 Though we cannot show the prisoners the way of escape from their earthly confinement, yet by breaking down the partitions between the cells, he enables them to combine their strength for a better arrangement of the prison house. The most wounding social wrongs more often arise from ignorance than from malice, from acquiescence in the opinion of a class, rather than from deliberate self-reuthers, selfishness. The master cannot enter into the feelings of a servant, nor the servant into those of his master. The master cannot understand how any good quality can lead one to forget his station. To the servant, the spirit of management in the master seems mere driving. This is only a sample

Starting point is 01:40:33 of what is going on, all society over. The relation between the higher and lower classes becomes irritating and therefore injurious, not from any conscious unfairness on either side, but simply from the want of a common understanding, while at the same time every class suffers within its own limits from the prevalence of habits and ideas, under the authority of class convention which could not long maintain themselves if once placed in the light of general opinion. Against this twofold oppression, the novel, from its first establishment, as a substantive branch of literature

Starting point is 01:41:12 has made vigorous war. From Defoe to Kingsley, its history boasts of a noble army of social reformers. Yet the work which these writers have achieved has had little to do with the morals, commonly valueless, if not false and sentimental, which they have severally believed themselves to convey.

Starting point is 01:41:32 Defoe's notion of a moral seems to have been the vulgar one, that vice must be palpably punished and virtue rewarded. He recommends his small flanders to the reader on the ground that, there is not a wicked action in any part of it, but is first or last rendered unhappy or unfortunate. The moral of Fielding's novels, if moral it can be called,

Starting point is 01:41:56 is simply the importance of that prudence which his heroes might have dispensed with, but for the wildness of their animal license. Yet, both the foe and Fielding had a real lesson to teach mankind. The thieves and harlots whom the foe prides himself on punishing, but whose adventures he describes with the minuteness of affection are what we ourselves might have been, and in their histories we hear, if not the music, yet the harsh and grating cry of suffering humanity.

Starting point is 01:42:29 Fielding's merit is of the same kind, but the sympathies which he excites are more general, as his scenes are more varied than those of the foe. His coarseness is everywhere redeemed by a genuine feeling for the contumliest buffets to which weakness is exposed. He has the practical insight of Dickens and Thackeray without their infusion of sentiment. He does not moralize over the contrast between the rich man's law and the poor man's, over the indifference of rural justice, over the lying and adultery of fashionable life. He simply makes us see the facts which are everywhere under our eyes,

Starting point is 01:43:07 but too close to us for discernment. He shows society where it sores lie, appealing from the judgment of the diseased class itself to that public intelligence which, in spite of the cynic sneer on the task of producing an honesty from the combined action of knaves, has really power to override private selfishness. The same sermon has found many preachers since,

Starting point is 01:43:33 the unconscious missionaries being perhaps the greatest. Scott was a Tory of the purest water. His mind was busy with the revival of a pseudo-fudalism. No thought of reforming abuses probably ever entered it. Yet his genial human insight made him a reformer against his will. He who makes man better known to man takes the first steps towards healing the wounds which man inflicts on man. The permanent value of Scott's novels lies in his pictures of the Scotch peasantry.

Starting point is 01:44:06 He popularized the work which the lake poets had begun of reopening the primary springs of human passion. Love he had found in huts where poor men lie, and he announced a discovery, teaching the world of English gentry what for a century and a half they had seemed to forget that the human soul, in its strength no less than in its weakness, is independent of the accessories of fortune.

Starting point is 01:44:33 He left no equals, but the combined, force of his successors has been constantly growing in practical effect. They have probably done more than the journalists to produce that improvement in the organization of modern life, which leads to the notion that because social grievances are less obvious, they have ceased to exist. The novelist catches the cry of suffering before it has obtained the strength or general recognition which are presupposed when the newspaper becomes its mouthpiece. The miseries of the marriage market

Starting point is 01:45:07 had been told by Thackeray which almost wearis some iteration many years before they found utterance in the columns of the times. It may indeed be truly said that after all human selfishness is much the same as it ever was,

Starting point is 01:45:23 that luxury still drowns sympathy, that riches and poverty have still their old estranging influence. The novel, as has been shown, cannot give a new birth to the spirit, or initiate the effort to transcend the separations of place and circumstance, but it is no small thing that it should remove the barriers of ignorance and antipathy, which would otherwise render the effort unavailing.

Starting point is 01:45:49 It at least brings man nearer to his neighbor, and enables each class to see itself as others see it. And from the fusion of opinions and sympathies thus produced, a general sentiment is elicited, to which oppression of any kind, whether of one class by another or of individuals by the tyranny of sectarian custom seldom appeals in vain. The novelist is a leveler also in another sense than that of which we have already spoken. He helps to level intellects as well as situations.

Starting point is 01:46:24 He supplies a kind of literary food which the weakest natures can assimilate as well as the strongest, and by the consumption of which the former sort lose much of their weakness and the latter much of their strength. While minds of the lower order acquire from novel reading a cultivation which they previously lacked, the higher seem proportionally to sink. They lose that aspiring pride which arises from the sense of walking in intellect on the necks of a subject crowd. They no longer feel the bracing influence of living solely among the highest forms of art. they become conformed insensibly to the general opinion which the new literature of the people creates.

Starting point is 01:47:07 A similar change is going on in every department of man's activity. The history of thought in its artistic form is parallel to its history in its other manifestation. The spirit descends that it may rise again, it penetrates more and more widely into matter, that it may make the world more completely its own. Political life seems no longer. longer attractive, now that political ideas and power are disseminated among the mass,

Starting point is 01:47:35 and the reason is recognized as belonging not to a ruling class merely, but to all. A statesman in a political society resting on a substratum of slavery and admitting no limits to the province of government was a very different person from the modern servant of a nation of shopkeepers, whose best work is to save the pockets of the poor. It would seem as if men lost his nobleness when he ceased to govern, and as if the equal rule of all was equivalent to that rule of none. Yet we hold fast to the faith that the cultivation of the masses, which has for the present superseded the development of the individual,

Starting point is 01:48:17 will in its maturity produce some higher type, even of individual manhood, than any which the old world has known. We may rest on the same faith in tracing the history of literature, In the novel we must admit that the creative faculty has taken a lower form than it held in the epic and the tragedy. But since in this form it acts on more extensive material and reaches more men, we may well believe that this temporary declension is preparatory to some higher development, when the poet shall idealize life without making abstraction of any of its elements, and when the secret of existence, which he now speaks to the inward ear of,

Starting point is 01:49:00 of a few may be proclaimed on the house tops to the common intelligence of mankind. End of Section 5 of Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Volume 17. This is a Libravox recording. All Libravox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit Libavox.org. Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Volume 17. Robert Green 1560 to 1592

Starting point is 01:49:42 Green was a true Elizabethan Englishman impulsive, reckless with a roving instinct that in many a life of that restless age found a safe fin in adventure on the sea. But with his gifts and failings and the conditions in which his life was cast the ruin that overwhelmed him was the fate of many poets of great mind and weak will.

Starting point is 01:50:07 Yet with all his sin and weakness, there were struggles toward a better life and nobler work, which should make our judgment lenient, remembering Burns' lines. What's done, we partly may compute, but know not what's resisted. Green was born about 1560 in Norwich, and belonged to a family of good standing, that his father was a man of some wealth may be inferred from Green's tour to Italy and other countries, a great expense in those days, which he made after taking his BA degree at Cambridge in 1578. In his repentances, he shows that he was affected by the vices of Italy and became fixed in those disillate habits which were his ruin. On his return, he was engaged in literary work at Cambridge and took his MA degree from both universities.

Starting point is 01:50:59 He then went to London and became an author of plays and pener of love pamphlets so that I soon grew famous in that quality, that who for that trade grown so ordinary about London as Robin Green? In 1585 he married and apparently lived for a time in Norwich. After the birth of a child, he deserted his wife because she tried to persuade him from his bad habits. From that time he lived permanently in London, where he seems to have. have had some influential patrons. Among those to whom his works are dedicated, we find the names of Lord Derby, the Earl of Cumberland, Lady Talbot, and Lord Fitzwater. He tells us that,

Starting point is 01:51:42 in short space, I fell into favor with such as were of honorable and good calling. Yet his restless temper made such a society irksome to him, and as there was no reputable literary bohemia, such as arose later under Shakespeare and Ben Johnson, he sank to the company of the lowest classes of London. In spite of his dissipated life, he was constantly at work, and his purse, like the sea, sometimes swelled, anon like the same sea, fell to a low ebb, yet seldom he wanted. His labors were so well esteemed. Not only did he write for the stage, but it is probable that he appeared at times as an actor. At one time, when a gust of repentance swept over him, he resolved to write no more loved pamphlets and to devote himself to more serious writings.

Starting point is 01:52:34 He then published a series of tracks exposing the tricks of London swindlers in, Trust that those my discourses will do great good and be very beneficial to the Commonwealth of England. His repentances were intended to warn young men by the unhappy example of his own life. His career was cut short in 1592 by an illness resulting from too much indulgence in Rhenish wine and pickled herrings. Deserted by his friends, he died in extreme poverty at the house of a poor shoemaker who had befriended him. Just before his death, he wrote to his forsaken wife this touching letter.

Starting point is 01:53:13 Sweet wife! As ever there was any goodwill or friendship between thee and me, see this bearer, my host, satisfied of his death. I owe him ten pound, and but for him I had perished in the streets. Forget and forgive my wrongs done unto thee, and Almighty God have mercy on my soul. Farewell till we meet in heaven, for on earth thou shalt never see me more. This two of September, 1592, written by thy dying husband, Robert Green. Gabriel Harvey soon after published in his four letters of virulent authority,

Starting point is 01:53:52 attack on Green's character. That and Green's confessions, in which, like many another, he no doubt exaggerated his sins, have given rise to a probably too harsh estimate of the poet's failings. Of his numerous dramatic works, but five have survived, all published after his death. Orlando Furioso, Friar Bacon and Friar Bungay, James V. Alphonsus, King of Aragon, and Georgia Green, the Pinner of Wakefield. A looking glass for London and England was a joint work of Thomas Lodge and Green. Green did for the romantic drama what Marlowe accomplished for tragedy, and his works form a noteworthy step in the development of the old English drama. His most popular drama was Fire Bacon and Fire Bungay, in which he pictures Old English Life at Fussingfield

Starting point is 01:54:48 with a touching love story. His Georgia Green has a best constructed plot of any of his plays, and in the Pinner, a popular English hero like Robin Hood, he portrays an ideal English yeoman, faithful, sturdy, and independent. Nash call Green the homer of women, and it is remarkable that, Dizzlet as he was, he has given the charm of modest womanhood to all his female characters. Besides Green's non-dramatic works, there are four kinds. First, the romantic pamphlets, second, the semi-patriotic tracks, third, the coney-catching pamphlets, fourth, his repentances. In his love pamphlets may be found traces of the beginnings of the English novel.

Starting point is 01:55:35 Several of the repentances, the never-too-late, and a groatsworth of wit, are largely autobiographical. Scattered through his romances are the many charming lyrics on which his fame mainly rests. In several respects, Green was accepted. exceptionally in advance of his time, in the pinner, he plainly acknowledges popular rights, and in the looking-glass is found a forecast of coming disaster, resulting from the disorders of the times and the oppression of the poor. Green's peasants are portrayed with sympathetic realism most unusual at that time. He gives the wise humor of the low-born clown, as does none but Shakespeare,

Starting point is 01:56:17 who was no doubt indebted to Green for the material of several of its place. The winter's tale is founded on Pandoosto in all points but Antigonus, Polina, Atolysses, and the Young Shepherd. Lear has a strong likeness to the looking glass. Orlando points to Lear and Hamlet and the Ferry framework of James IV, suggests some features of Midsummer Night's Dream. Green and the University men of his set drew for the old chroniclers for their dramas, but Shakespeare took whatever was at hand. His ignoring of their rule and his growing fame were the probable cause of the bitter-feeling

Starting point is 01:56:58 green shows in the address to his fellow dramatists in the groatsworth of width, when he refers to Shakespeare as an upstar crow beautified with our feathers that with his tiger's heart wrapped in a player's hide, supposes he is as well able to bombast out a blank verse as the best of you, and being an absolute Johannes factatum, is in his own conceit the only shakes scene in the country. Alexander Dice edited Green's plays and poems in 1831. Dr. Grossert edited the Complete Works of Robert Green, 1881 to 6, in 15 volumes,

Starting point is 01:57:39 and AW Ward published Friar Bacon in Olding, English drama, 1892. Both earlier editions contain memoirs and accounts are found in J.A. Simmons, Shakespeare's predecessors in English drama, and Jusron's English novel in the time of Shakespeare. Green's writings give vivid pictures of life in the Elizabethan age and at the same time form a most interesting autobiography of that wrecked life. Unlike Herrick who could say that if his verse were impure, his life was chased. Green's writing shows scarcely any of the uncleanness so prevalent in books of that period. Deceiving world from our groats worth of wit. Deceiving world that with alluring toys hast made my life the subject of thy scorn, and scornness now to lend thy fading joys

Starting point is 01:58:35 to outlength my life whom friends have left forlorn. How well are they that die ere they be born? and never see thy slights which few men shun till unawares they helpless are undone. oft have I sung of love and of his fire, but now I find that poet was advised, which made full feasts increases of desire, and proves weak love was with the poor despised. For when the life with food does not suffice, what thoughts of love, what motion of delight, what pleasance can proceed from such a white. Witness my want, the murder of my wit, my ravished sense of wanted fury reft, want such concede as should in poems fit, set down the sorrow wherein I am left, but therefore have high heavens their gifts be reft, because so long they lent them me to use, and I so long their bounty

Starting point is 01:59:35 did abuse. O that year were granted me to live, and for that year my former wits received, stored. What rules of life? What counsel would I give? How should my sin with sorrow be deplored? But I must die of every man abhorred. Time loosely spent will not again be won. My time is loosely spent and I undone. The shepherd's wife song. From the morning garment. Ah, what is love? It is a pretty thing, as sweet unto a shepherd as a king. And sweeter to too, for kings have cares that wait upon a crown, and cares can make the sweetest love to frown. Ah, then, ah then, if country loves such sweet desires do gain, what lady would not love a shepherd's swain? His flocks are folded, he comes home at night, as merry as a king in his delight, and merrier too,

Starting point is 02:00:37 for kings bethink them what the state require, were a shepherd's careless, carol by the fire. Ah, then, ah, then, if country loves such sweet desires do gain, what lady would not love a shepherd swain. He kisseth first, then sits as blithe to eat, his cream and curds, as doth the king his meat, and blithe are too, for kings have often fears when they deuce up, where shepherds dread no poison in their cup. Ah, then, ah then, if country loves such sweet desires do gain, what lady would not be. not love a shepherd swain. Upon his couch of straw, he sleeps as sound, as doth the king upon his beds of down. More sounder, too, for cares cause kings full off their sleep to spill,

Starting point is 02:01:29 where rery shepherds lie and snort their fill. Ah, then, ah then, if country loves such sweet desires do gain, what lady would not love a shepherd swain. Thus with his wife he spends the year, as blithe as doth the king at every tide or sith, and blithe or two, for kings have wars and boils to take in hand when shepherds laugh and love upon the land. Ah, then, ah then, if country loves such sweet desires do gain, well, a lady would not love a shepherd's swain. Down the valley, from never too late. Down the valley again, his track, bag and bottle at his back, in a surcoat, all of gray, such were palmers on the way, when with scrip and staff they see Jesus' grave on cavalry. A hat of straw, like a swain, shelter for the sun and

Starting point is 02:02:28 rain, with a scallop shell before, sandals on his feet he wore, legs were bare, arms unclad, such attire this palmer had, his face fair like titans shine, gray and buxom were his ein, where out-dropped, pearls of sorrow, such sweet tears love doth borrow. When an outward dues she plains, hearts distress at lovers pains, ruby lips, cherry cheeks, such rare mixture venous seeks. When to keep her damsels quiet, beauty sets them down their diet. Aidan was not thought more fair, curled locks of amber hair, locks where love did sit and twine, nets to ne'er the gazers'-eye. Such a palmer ne'er was seen,

Starting point is 02:03:17 lest love himself had Palmer been. Yet, for all he was so quaint, sorrow did his visage taint. Midst the riches of his face, grief deciphered high disgrace. Every step strained a tear, sudden sigh showed his fear. And yet his fears by his sight

Starting point is 02:03:36 ended in a strange delight, that his passions did approve weeds and sorrow were for love. of Philomila's ode from Philomila. Sitting by a riverside where a silent stream did glide, muse I did of many things that the mind in quiet brings. I again think how some men deem gold their God, and some esteem, honor is the chief content,

Starting point is 02:04:07 that two men in life is lent. And some others do contend, quiet none, like to a friend. Others hold there is no wealth compared to a perfect health. Some men's mind in quiet stands when he is lord of many lands. But I did sigh and said all this was but a shade of perfect bliss. And in my thoughts I did approve, not so sweet as is true love. Sweet are the thoughts from farewell to folly. Sweet are the thoughts that savor of content.

Starting point is 02:04:43 The quiet mind is richer than a crown. Sweet are the nights and careless slumber spent. The poor estate scorns, fortunes, angry frown. Such sweet content, such minds, such sleep, such bliss, beggars enjoy when princes off do miss. The homely house that harbors quiet rest, the cottage that affords no pride nor care, the mean that greased with country music best, the sweet consort of mirth and music's fair. Obscured life sets down a type of bliss, a mind content both crown and kingdom is. Sophestius song to her child.

Starting point is 02:05:27 From Menophan Weep not, my wanton, smile upon my knee. When thou art old, there's grief enough for thee. Mother's wag, pretty boy. Father's sorrow, Father's joy. When thy father first did see, Such a boy by him and me, He was glad, I was woe.

Starting point is 02:05:48 Fortune change made him so. When he left his pretty boy, Last his sorrow, first his joy. Weep not, my wanton, smile upon my knee. When thou art old, there's grief enough for thee. Streaming tears at never stint, Like pearl drops from a flint, fell by course from his eyes that one another's place supplies. Thus he grieved in every part,

Starting point is 02:06:15 tears of blood fell from his heart. When he left his pretty boy, father's sorrow, father's joy. Weep not my wanton, smile upon my knee. When thou art old, there's grief enough for thee. The wanton smiled, father wept. Mother cried, baby leapt. More he crowed, more we cried, nature could not sorrow hide. He must go, he must kiss. Child and mother, baby bless. For he left his pretty boy, father sorrow, father's joy. Weep not my wanton, smile upon my knee. When thou art old, there's grief enough for thee. End of Section 5, read by Bryce Christ. Section 6 of Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Volume 17.

Starting point is 02:07:11 This is a Libervox recording. All Libervox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit livervox.org. Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Volume 17. Selected works by Gerald Griffin, 1803 to 1840. Under the words never acted, and date October 23, 1842, the play, Giusepice, by the late Gerald Griffin, author of the Collegians, was announced to Drury Lane Theatre, London. McCready made money and fame out of the work, which had lain

Starting point is 02:07:53 for years in his reading desk uncared for, while the patient poet scribbled his way along a life of little joy to an unnoted grave in the burying ground of the voluntary poor. The drama was Griffin's first inspiration. And though he died untimely, the drama gives him back the honor he bestowed. Shegrinned and humiliated with failure to get a hearing for his play of Aguire, and sick from hope deferred for Gisipus. He wrote The Collegians so full of Irish art and love that its stage child, the Colleen Bone, has delighted the souls of millions. Born in Limerick December 12, 1803, Gerald Grissel, When his parents came to America to settle in northern Pennsylvania,

Starting point is 02:08:42 chose to go at 17 years of age with only the equipment of a home education, to seek honors and fortune in the paths, which led up to the printing house. John Bannum's recent success had blazed out a new trail in the stifling, starving jungle of bookmaking, and the youth of Ireland was on fire to follow him. One of the sweetest memories of Griffin's career is the delicacy and generosity of Bannon's friendship for the pale, shy, delicate boy from the distant Shannon's side during all the awful and lonely days of his early London residence. After hovering under Bannon's wing about the green rooms of Covent Garden and Drury Lane, until the sensitive nature could bear the torture of well-bred and ill-concealed indifference no longer. Griffin made his way to the office of one of the weekly periodicals with some sketches of Irish peasant life. The publication of these brought him to notice, but did not keep him free from days and nights of enforced fasting.

Starting point is 02:09:49 It was not until 1827 that he was able to publish a book, and that year appeared Hall and Tide and the Tales of the Munster Festivals, both to be forever treasured heart songs of the Irishmen separated worldwide. The Collegians in 1828 was eagerly and unstintingly accorded the first place in the new order of literature, the sadly joyous romance of contemporary Ireland. Griffin now became well and safely established in London. Easily compare of the best writers of his race and in all affairs but those of pecuniary fortune, a favored and envied man. A nature filled with the instinct of devotion kept him safe from some of the evils which rode the shoulders of too many of his fellow countrymen. In the midst of a scurrying and scoffing route, he kept the heart of his boyhood innocent and unsullied, tired of the shows and shames of the world. In 1838, he asked and obtained

Starting point is 02:10:56 admission into the society of the Christian brothers in his native city. A few days before he entered upon this resolution, he was interrupted by his brother and biographer, Dr. Griffin, in the actor destroying all his manuscripts. It had been his intention to make a complete renunciation by leaving nothing to the world but his published works. His brother was able to save but a few fragments in the great quantity of half-destroyed stories. poems and plays, and these, with the earlier publications, were included in the only collected edition of his works ever made, published in New York in the decade of 1850. Two years after he had assumed the habit and duty of a religious Gerald Griffin died,

Starting point is 02:11:46 after many days of patient illness in the house of his brothers in religion at Cork, Ireland, June 12, 1840, his family living at... Susquehanna, Pennsylvania, has given several distinguished names to the literature and politics of our country. How Miles Murphy is heard on behalf of his ponies from the Collegians. Pat Falvey, supposing that he had remained a sufficient time without, to prevent the suspicion of any private understanding between him and Mr. Daly, now made his appearance with luncheon, a collared head. cream cheese, honey, a decanter of gooseberry wine, and some garden fruit, were speedily arranged on the table, and the visitors no way loth, were pressed to make a liberal use of the little banquet.

Starting point is 02:12:41 But the time had not yet gone by when people imagined that they could not display their regard for a friend more effectually than by cramming him up to the throat with food and strong drink. Curl Daly was in the act of taking wine with Mrs. Shoot. When he observed, Fouty stooped to his young mistress's ear and whispered something with a face of much seriousness. A boy wanting to speak to me, said Miss Shoot. Has he got letters? Let him send up his message. He says he must see yourself, Miss.

Starting point is 02:13:17 Tis in regard of some ponies of his that were impounded by Mr. Dolly, but trespassing above here last night. He hasn't the mains of release in him, poor Crather, and he's far from home. I'm sure he's an honest boy. He says he'd have a good friend to Mr. Cragan if he knew he was below. Me, said Mr. Cragan. Why? What's the fellow's name?

Starting point is 02:13:44 Miles Murphy, sir, from Killarney, Westwoods. Oh, Miles Nacoppeline. Poor fellow, is he in tribulation? We must have his ponies out by all means. It requires more courage that I can always commands, said Miss Chute, to revoke any command of dollies. He is an old man, and whether that he was crossed in love

Starting point is 02:14:10 or from a natural peevishness of disposition, he is such a morose creature that I am quite afraid of him. But I will hear this, Miles, at all events. she was moving to the door when her uncle's voice made her turn stay and said mr cragan let him come up twill be as good as a play to hear him and the steward pro and con curle daily here who is intended for the bar will be our assessor to decide on the points of law i can tell you curl that miles will give you a lesson in the art of pleading that may be of use to you on circuit at one time or another. Anne laughed and looked to Mrs. Schutt, who, with a smile of tolerating condescension, said, while she cleared with the silken curtreat the glasses of her spectacles. If your uncle desires it, my love, I can see no objection. Those mountaineers are amusing creatures. Anne returned to her seat

Starting point is 02:15:13 in the conversation proceeded, while Valvey, with an air of great and perplexed importance, went to summon miles upstairs. Mountaineers exclaimed Captain Gibson. You call every upland a mountaineer in Ireland and everyone that lives out of sight of the sea a mountaineer. But this fellow is a genuine mountaineer, cried Mr. Gregan, with a cabin two thousand feet above the level of the sea. If you are in the country next week and we'll come down and see us at the lakes along with our friends here. I promised to show you a sturdier race of mountaineers as any in Europe. Dr. Leake can give you a history of him up to Noah's flood. Sometime when you're alone together, when the country was first people by one parable,

Starting point is 02:16:04 or sparable. Parallon, said Dr. Leake, paralon, or Macdonia, as the Salter sings. On the 14th day being Tuesday, they brought their both ship. to anger in the blue fair port with future shore of well-defended inverse gain in the rest of munster where yes well you'll see em all as the doctor says if you come to calarney resumed mr cragan interrupting the latter to whose discourse a country residence a national turn of character and a limited course of reading had given a tinge of penitry and who was moreover a firm believer in all the ancient Shanicus, from the yellow book of Molling to the Black Book of Mollega. And if you like to listen to him, he'll explain to you every action that ever befell on land or water,

Starting point is 02:17:02 from Ross Castle, up to Carragalene. Curl, who felt both surprise and concern at learning that Miss Schute was leaving home so soon, and without having thought it worth a while to make him aware of her intention, was about to address her on the subject when the clatter of a pair of heavy and well-paved brogues on small-flight of stairs in the lobby produced a sudden hush of expectation

Starting point is 02:17:28 amongst the company. They heard Pat Falvey, urging some instructions in a low and smothered tone, to which a strong and not unmusical voice replied, in that complaining accent, which distinguishes the dialect of the more western descendants of hate, Ah, lay me alone, you foolish boy. Do you think did I never speak to equality in my life before?

Starting point is 02:17:55 The door opened, and the unconvician master of horse made his appearance. His appearance was at one strikingly majestic and prepossessing, and the natural ease and dignity with which he entered the room might almost have become a peer of the realm, coming to solicit the interest of the family for an electioneering candidate. A broad and sunny forehead, light and wavy hair, a blue cheerful eye, a nose that in Persia might have won him a throne.

Starting point is 02:18:27 Healthful cheeks, a mouth that was full of character, and a well-knit and almost gigantic person, constituted his external claims to attention, of which his lofty and confident, although most unassuming carriage, showed him to be, in some degree, He wore a complete suit of brown frieze with a great-colored cotton handkerchief around his neck, blue-wisted stockings, and brooks carefully greased, while he held in his right hand an immaculate felt hat.

Starting point is 02:18:59 The purchase of the preceding day is fair. In the left, he held a straight-hand whip and a wooden rattle, which he used for the purpose of collecting his ponies when they happened to straggle. An involuntary murmur of admiration ran amongst the guest at his entrance. Dr. Leek was heard to pronounce him a true guldelian, and Captain Gibson thought he would cut a splendid figure in a helmet and cuirous under one of the arches and the horse guards. Before he had spoken, and while the door yet remained open, Hyland Craig roused Pinscher with a chirping noise and gave him the well-known countersign a bathershan.

Starting point is 02:19:44 Pinchia waddled towards the door, raised himself on his hind legs, closed it fast, and then trotted back to his master's feet, followed by the staring and bewildered gaze of the mountaineer. Well, he exclaimed, that flog's clock fighting. I never thought I lived to have a dog teach me manners anyway. pay the shen says he and he sheds the door like a christian the mountaineer now commenced a series of most profound obeisances to every individual of the company beginning with the ladies and ending with the officer after which he remained glancing from one to another with a smile of mingled sadness and courtesy as if waiting like an evoke spirit the spellword of the enchantress who had called him up tisn't managed to speak first before quality was the answer he would have been prepared to render in case any one had inquired the motive of his conduct

Starting point is 02:20:46 well myles what wind has brought you to this part of the country said mr barney cragan the old wind always then mr cragan said miles with another deep obeisance seeing would i get afail of the ponies off Long life to you, sir. I was proud to hear you were above stairs, for it isn't the first time you stood my friend in trouble. My father, the heavens be his bed this day, was a flusterer of your uncle mix, and a first and second cousin be the mother's side to old Mrs. O'Leary, your honor's aunt, Westwood,

Starting point is 02:21:28 so tis kind for your honor to have a leaning toward us. A clear case, smile. But what have you to say to Mrs. Schult about the trespass? What have I to say to her? Why then, a deal. It's a long while since I see her now. And she wears finely, the Lord bless her. Ah, Miss Anne, oh, you mother, mother.

Starting point is 02:21:54 Sure, I know that place all over the world. Your own living image, ma'am. Turning to Mrs. Schult. In a little day we touch a little. master heaven rest his soul about the gin you'd think my grandmother and his self were third cousins oh voe vaux he has made out three relations in the company already said aunt gerald could any curdie and make interest more skillfully well miles about the ponies poor creatures true for you sir there's mr craig there long life to him no how well I am for ponies. You see what trouble I had with them, Mr. Craig, the day you fought the jeweled with young but farland from the north.

Starting point is 02:22:44 They were scalping like mad over the hills down to Gleena when they heard the shot. Ah, indeed, Mr. Craig, you cowed the north countrymen that morning fairly. My honor is satisfied, says he, and Mr. Craig will apologize. I didn't come to the ground to apologize, says Mr. Craig, it's what I never done to any man, says he, and it'll be long for me to do it to you. Well, my honor is satisfied anyway, says the other. When he hid the pistols clocking for a second shot, I thought I'd split laughing. Pooh-poo nonsense, man, said Craig, endeavoring to hide a smile of gratified vanity.

Starting point is 02:23:28 Your unfortunate poemies will starve while you stay inventing wild stories. he has gained another friend since whispered miss shooke invent echoed the mountaineer the astraterly was on the spot and he knows if i invent and you did a good job too that time doctor he continued turning to the ladder oh keys the piper gives it up to you of all the doctors going for curing his eyesight and he has a great learning to you moreover it's such a fine ironsor another said miss shoot apart yourself and old mr daly he continued i hope the master is well in his health sir turning to curl with another profound conjure may the lord fasten the life in you and him that's a gentleman that wouldn't see a poor boy in want of his supper or a bed to sleep in and he far from his own people nor persecute him in regard of a little trespass that was done on own. This fellow is irresistible, said Curl, a perfect Ulysses. And have you nothing to say to the Captain Miles? Is he no relation of yours? The Captain, Mr. Cragon, except insofar as we are all servants of the Almighty and children of Adam.

Starting point is 02:24:54 I know of none, but I have a feeling for the Red Cope for all. I have three brothers in the Army serving in America. One of him was made a corps. or an admiral or some real or other, but behaving well at Quebec, the time of wolf's death. The English showed themselves the great people that day, surely. Having thus secured to himself what lawyers call the ear of the court, the mountaineer proceeded to plead the cause of his ponies with much force and pathos, dwelling on their distance from home, their wild habits of life, which left them ignorant of the common rules of boundaries, enclosures, and field gates, setting forth with equal emphasis the length of road they had traveled, their hungry condition, and the barrenness of the common on which they had been

Starting point is 02:25:46 turned out, and finally urged in mitigation a penalty, the circumstances of this being a first offense and the improbability of its being ever renewed in future. The Sir Leo Stuart Dan Dolly was accordingly summoned for the purpose of ordering the discharge of the prisoners, a commission which he received with a face as black as winter. Miss Anne might folly her liking, he said, but it was the last time he'd ever trouble himself about damage or trespass anymore. What a fear was it of his, if all the horses in the barony were turned loose into the kitchen garden itself. Horses, do you call them? exclaimed Miles.

Starting point is 02:26:31 ending on the old man a frown of dark remonstrance a parcel of little ponies not the height of that chair what signify is it sirrah the steward they'd eat as much and more than a racer is it they the creatures they'd hardly injure a plate of cere about if it was put before em heyah hugh and tisn't what i'd expect from you mr dolly to be gone again a relation of your own in this manner. A relation of mine, growled Dolly, scarcely deigning to cast a glance back over his shoulder as he hobbled out of the room.

Starting point is 02:27:13 Guess then are yours? Dolly paused at the door and looked back. Will you deny it on me if you can? Continued Miles, fixing his eye on him. That bitty nail, your own gossip, and Larry Foley, were of second cousins. Deny that of me if you can.

Starting point is 02:27:34 Well, what would I deny it? Well, why? And Larry Foley was uncle to my father's first wife. The angel spread her bed this night, and I tell you another thing. The dollies would cut a poor figure in many a fair westwards if they hadn't the Murphys to back them. So they would.

Starting point is 02:27:54 But what hurt? Sure, you can follow your own pleasure. The old Stuart Murphs. muttered something which nobody could hear and left the room. Miles of the ponies, after many profound bows to all his relations, and a profusion of thanks to the ladies, followed him, and was observed in a few minutes after, on the avenue, talking with much earnestness and apparent agitation to Lowry Luby.

Starting point is 02:28:22 Curl Daly, who remembered the story of the mountaineer's misfortune at Owen's Garden, concluded that Lowry was making him aware of the abduction of the beautiful Ely. How Mr. Daly the metal man rose up from breakfast, from the Collegians. The person who opened the door acted as the kind of herdsman or outdoor servant to the family and was a man of a rather singular appearance.

Starting point is 02:28:49 The nether parts of his frame were of a size considerably out of proportion with the trunk and head which they supported. His feet were broad and flat like those of a duck, His legs long and clumsy. His knees and ankles like the knobs on one of those grotesque walking sticks, which were in fashion among the fine gentlemen of our own day. Sometimes since. His joints hung loosely like those of a pasteboard Mary Andrew.

Starting point is 02:29:17 His body was very small, his chest narrow, and his head so diminutive as to be even too little for his herring shoulders. It seemed as if nature, like an extravagant projector, had laid the foundation of a giant, but running short of material as the structure proceeded had been compelled to terminate her undertaking within the dimensions of a dwarf. So far was this economy pursued that the head,

Starting point is 02:29:45 small as it was, was very scantily furnished with hair, and the nose with which the face was garnished might be compared for its flatness to that of a young kid. It looked as the owner of this mournful piece of journey work himself facetiously observed, as if his head was not thought with a roof, nor his countenance worth a handle. His hands and arms were likewise of a smallness, which was much to be admired, when contrasted with the hugeness of the lower members, and brought to mind the forepaws of a kangaroo or the fins of a seal, the latter similitude,

Starting point is 02:30:24 revealing when the body was put in motion, on which occasions they dabbled about in a very extraordinary manner. But there was one feature in which a corresponding protagality had been manifested, namely the ears, which were as long as those of ricket with the tuft, or of any ass in the barony. The costume which enveloped the singular frame was no less anonymous than was the nature of its own construction. A huge riding coat of gray frieze hung lazily from his shoulders

Starting point is 02:30:59 and gave to view in front a west coat of calfskin with the hairy side outward. A shirt of a texture almost as coarse as sailcloth made from the refuse of flax and a pair of corduroy nether garments with two bright new patches upon the knees. Gray-wisted stockings with dogskin brogues well paved in the soul and greased until they shone again.

Starting point is 02:31:24 completed the personal adornments of this uninspiring personage. On the whole, his appearance might have brought to the recollection of a modern beholder one of those architectural edifices so fashionable in our time, in which the artist, with their adverbal ambition, seeks to unite all that is excellent in the Tuscan, Doric, Corinthian, and Ionic Orders, and in one Coteale. The expression of the figure, though it geared with circumstances, was for the most part thoughtful and deliberative, the effect in a great measure of habitual penury independence. At the time of Lord Halifax's administration, Lowry Luby, then a very young man,

Starting point is 02:32:11 held a spot of ground in the neighborhood of Limerick, and was well to do in the world, but the scarcity which prevailed in England at the time, and which occasioned a sudden rise in the the price of beer, butter, and other produce of grazing land in Ireland, through all the agriculturists out of their little holdings and occasioned a general destitution, similar to that produced by the anti-Claughtier system in the present day. Lowry was among the sufferers. He was saved, however, from the necessity of adopting one of the three ultimatah of Irish misery, begging and listing or eminent. by the kindness of Mr. Daly, who took him into his service as a kind of runner between his farms, an officer which Lowry, by his long and muscular legs, and the likeness of the body that encumbered them,

Starting point is 02:33:07 was qualified in an eminent degree. His excelling honesty, one of the characteristics of his country, which he was known to possess, rendered him a still more valuable acquisition to the family than had been at first, anticipated. He had moreover the national talent for a joint flattery, a quality which made him more acceptable to his patron than the latter would willingly admit. And every emulsion of this kind was applied under the disguise of a simpleness which gave it a wonderful efficacy. Ha, Lowry, said Mr. Daly. Well, have you made your fortune since you have agreed with the postmaster? "'Lowery put his hands behind his back,

Starting point is 02:33:54 "'looks successively at the four corners of the room, "'then round the corners, then cast his eyes down at his feet, "'turned up the soles a little, and finally, "'straightening his person and gazing on his master, replied, "'To lose it, I did, sir, for a place. "'To lose what? "'The place a postman, sir, through the country westwards. "'Sure, there I was a gentleman,

Starting point is 02:34:20 for life if it wasn't my luck. I do not understand you, Lowry. I'll tell you how it was, Master. After the last postman died, sir, I took your recommendation to the postmaster and asked him for the place. I'm used to traveling, sir, says I, for Mr. Daly, over, and

Starting point is 02:34:42 I, says he, taking me up short, and you have a good long pair of legs, I see. Midland, sir, says I. he's a very pleasant gentleman it's equal to me any day winter or summer whether i go ten miles or twenty so as i have the nourishment it would be hard if you didn't get that anyway says he well i think i might as well give you the place for i don't know any gentleman that i'd soon to take his recommendation than mr daly's or one that i'd sooner pay him a compliment if i could well and what was your agreement ten pounds a year sir answered lowry opening his eyes as if he announced something of wonderful importance and speaking in a loud voice to suit the magnitude of the sum besides my clothing and shoes throughout the year twas very handsome lowry handsome master twas wages were a prince sir sure there i was i made gentlemen all my days if it wasn't my luck as i said before well and how did you lose it i'll tell you sir hanselowary i was gone over to the past master yesterday to get the thoroughly mail from him and to start off with myself on my first journey while in my first journey while in my first journey while in my first journey while in my first

Starting point is 02:36:07 Well, and good of all the world, who should I meet upon the road, just did the turn down to the post office. But that red-headed woman that sells the freestone in the streets, so I've turned back. Turned back for what? Sure, the world knows, master, that it isn't luck to meet a red-haired woman, and you're going on a journey. And you never went for the mailbags.

Starting point is 02:36:35 Fakes? I'm sure I didn't that day. Well, in the next morning. The next morning, that's this morning when I went, I found that he engaged another boy in my place. And you lost the situation. For this turn, sir, anyway, disluck that does it all. Sure, I thought I was cocksure of it.

Starting point is 02:36:59 And I have in the post-master's word. But indeed, if I meet that freesome, crazed her again, I'll knock a red head against the wall. Well, Lowry, this ought to show you the folly of your superstition. If you had not minded that woman, when you met her, you might have had your situation now. But she had fault still, begging your pardon, sir, said Lowry. For sure, if I didn't meet her at all, this wouldn't have happened me. Oh, said Mr. Daly, laughing, I see you are well-proper-puburned.

Starting point is 02:37:35 write it against all argument. I have no more to say, Lowry. The man now walks slowly towards Curl, and bending down with the look of solemn importance as if he had some waiting intelligence to communicate, he said, the horse, sir, is ready this way, at the door abroad. Very well, Lowry, I shall set out this instant. Lowry raised himself erect again, turned slowly round, and walked to the door. With his eyes on the ground and his hand, Ray is to his temple, as if endeavouring to recollect something further,

Starting point is 02:38:12 which he had intended to say. Lowry, said Mr. Daly, as the hand of the door was turned a second time, Lowry looked round. Lowry, tell me, did you see Ely O'Connor, the rope make his daughter, at the fair Gary Owen yesterday?

Starting point is 02:38:32 Ah, you're welcome to you again. Game Master. Upon my word then, he leaves a very pretty girl, Lowry, and I'm told the old father can give her something besides her pretty face. Lowry opened his huge mouth. We forgot to mention

Starting point is 02:38:48 that it was a huge one, and gave vent to a few explosions of laughter, which much more nearly resembled the braying of an ass. You're welcome to your game master, he repeated. Long life to your honor. But is it truly? Lowry, as I have heard it insinuated, that O'Mill O'Connor used, and still does, twist ropes for the use of the county jail.

Starting point is 02:39:14 Lowry closed his lips hard, while the blood rushed into his face at this unworthy allegation, treating it, however, as a new piece of the master's game. He laughed and tossed his head, "'Folly on, sir, falling on.' "'Because if that were the case, Lowry, I should expect to-execkel. I should expect to-he's head. to find you a fellow of too much spirit to become connected, even by affinity, with such a calling, a ropemaker, a manufacturer of rope's glass neckcloths, an understrapher to the gallows, a species of collateral hangman.

Starting point is 02:39:52 Oh, then, Mrs. Did you hear this? And I'll rise in out of a little old fable of a story that happened as good as five years ago, because Moriarty, the crooked hangman, the thief, stepped into Mehill's little place of a night, and nobody known of him, and bought a couple of hen who were, with cord, with some vagary or other of his own. And there's all to call Mahel O'Connor had ever to gallows or hangman in his life.

Starting point is 02:40:23 That's the whole total of their insinuations. Never mind your master, Lowry, said Mrs. Daly. he is only amusing himself with you oh ha i'm sure i know it ma'am long life to him and tis he that's welcome to his joke but lowry ah heaven bless you now master and let me alone i'll say nothing to you nay nay i only wanted to ask you what's a little affair it was at gary owen yesterday midland sir like the small peaties they tell me said larry suddenly changing his manner to her appearance of serious occupation but it's hard to make out what sort of a fail is when one has nothing to sell himself i met a hoxter and she told me twas a bad fare because she could not sell her piggins and i met a pig-jobber and he told me twas a dear fare pork ran so high and i meant another little meegger creature, a neighbor that has a cabin on the road above, and he said, t'was the best fare that ever come out of the sky, because he got a power for his pig. But Mr. Hardress

Starting point is 02:41:38 Cragan was there, and if he didn't make it a deer fair to some of them, you may call me an honest man. A very notable undertaking that would be, Lowry, but how was it? Some of them, boys, and Gary Owen, lad, sir, to get about Danny. man the Lord, Mr. Hardress's boatman, as he was coming down from the hills with a new rope for some part of the boat, and to begin reflecting on him and regarded the hump on his back, poor creature. Well, if they did, Master Hardress freed him, and he, having a stout blackthorn in his hand this way, and he made up to the foremost of him. What's that you're saying, you scoundrel, says he.

Starting point is 02:42:24 What would you give to know, says the other mighty? impudent. Master Hardris made no move. Only up with the stick, and without saying this or that, or by your leave, or how do you do? He stretched him. Well, such a scuffle-ass began among them, was never seen. They all fell upon Master Hardress, but they had only the half of it, for he made his way through the thick of him, without as much as a mark. Ah, indeed, it is an the gooseer and duck they had to do with when they came across Mr. Craygan for all. And where were you in all this, Lowry? Above in the hill's door, standing and looking about the fair for myself.

Starting point is 02:43:11 And Ely? Ah, here to this again now. I'll run away out of the place entirely from you, Master. That's what I'll do, and suiting the action to the phrase, exit Lowry Lobey. All times, all times. All times, old times, the gay old times, when I was young and free and heard the merry Easter chimes under the sally tree.

Starting point is 02:43:39 My Sunday palm beside me placed, my cross upon my hand, a heart at rest within my breast, and sunshine on the land. All times, all times. It is not that my fortunes flee, nor that my cheek is pale. I warn what air I think of thee,

Starting point is 02:43:59 my darling native veil. A wise ahead I have, I know, then when I loiter there, but in my wisdom there is woe, and in my knowledge care. All times, all times. I've lived to know my share of joy, to feel my share of pain,

Starting point is 02:44:17 to learn that friendship's self can cloy, to love and love in vain, To feel a pang and wear a smile, To tire of other climbs, To like my own unhappy aisle, And sing the gay old times. Old times, old times. And sure, the land has nothing changed,

Starting point is 02:44:39 The birds are singing still. The flowers are springing where we ranged. There's sunshine on the hill. The sally, waving o'er my head, still sweetly shades my frame. But ah, those happy days have fled, and I am not the same. Old times, old times. Oh, come again, ye merry times.

Starting point is 02:45:03 Sweet, sunny, fresh and calm. And let me hear those Easter chimes and wear my Sunday palm. If I could dry away mine eyes, my tears would flow in vain. If I could waste my heart in size, they'll never come again. old times, all times. A place in thy memory dearest. A place in thy memory, dearest, is all that I claim. To pause and look back when thou hearest, the sound of my name.

Starting point is 02:45:36 Another may woo thee nearer, another may win and wearer. I cannot, though, he be dearer, if I are remembered there. Remember me, not as a lover whose hope was crossed, whose bosom can never recover, the light it hath lost. As the young bride remembers the mother she loves, though she never may see, as a sister remembers a brother, O dearest, remember me. Could I be thy true lover, dearest, couldst thou smile on me? I would be the fondest and nearest that ever loved thee.

Starting point is 02:46:13 But a cloud on my pathway is glooming that never must burst upon thine. and heaven that made thee all blooming never made thee to wither on mine. Remember me then, or remember, my calm, light love. Though bleak as the blast of November, my life may prove, that life will, though lonely, be sweet, if its brightest enjoyment should be a smile and kind word when we meet, and a place in thy memory. End of Section 6

Starting point is 02:46:48 Section 7 of Library of the World's Best Literature Ancient and Modern, Volume 17. This is the Livervox recording. All Livervox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit livervox.org. Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Volume 17.

Starting point is 02:47:18 Selected scenes from Sappho by Franz Grilparzer, 1791 to 1872. Grilparzer, the most distinguished dramatist that Austria has produced, was born in Vienna on January 15, 1791. His father, an esteemed advocate of the Austrian capital, seems to have been, like Curtis's father, a man of cold austerity. His mother, on the other hand, had a deeply emotional nature, lived in a world of music, and ended her life a suicide. From her, as in the case of so many poets, Gril Parsa deroges his poetic gifts and his musical taste. At the age of 22, he entered the service of the state, in which he remained until, at his own request, he was retired on a pension in 1856. In 1847, he was made a member of the Royal Academy of Sciences. In his quiet and well-ordered life, there is little that is striking to record.

Starting point is 02:48:25 Its most picturesque periods were those of its extensive travels in Turkey, Italy, and Greece. Of these travels, he has left fragmentary accounts in his volume of autobiographical sketches. In literature, Grilparza took his own independent course. It was filled with the spirit of Greek tragedy, but far from attempting a strict modern adaptation of the classic forms, he gave his plays a frankly romantic and sentimental coloring. He made a close study of the Spanish drama, but was not dominated by it. Shakespeare, too, whose colossal genius had first created and then crushed the German drama, never overmastered Grilpalser. Among his autobiographical works Occurs this remarkable passage

Starting point is 02:49:16 You ask what books I shall take with me? Many and few Herodotus, Plutarch and the two Spanish dramatists And not Shakespeare? Not Shakespeare Although he is perhaps the greatest thing The modern world has produced

Starting point is 02:49:33 Not Shakespeare He tyrannizes over my mind And I wish to remain free I thank God for him, and that it was my very good fortune to read and reread him and make him mine. But now I strive to forget him. The ancients strengthened me. The Spaniards inspire me to produce. But the giant Shakespeare usurps the place of nature, whose most glorious organ of expression he was,

Starting point is 02:50:03 and whoever gives himself up to him will, to every question asked of nature, forever receive an answer from Shakespeare only. No more Shakespeare. German literature will be ruined in that very abyss out of which it once arose, but I will be free and independent. Grilpar's public career as a dramatist began in 1817 with the famous tragedy of D. Enfrau, the ancestress, which is typical of the class to which it belongs. the so-called tragedies of fate.

Starting point is 02:50:41 Two years later came Sappho. In Byron's journal, under date of January 12, 1821, we find this entry. Read the Italian translation by Guido Sorrelli of the German Grilfarcer. A devil of a name, to be sure, for posterity. But they must learn to pronounce it. The tragedy of Sappho is superb and sublime. There is no denying it. The man has done a great thing in writing that play.

Starting point is 02:51:12 And who is he? I know him not, but ages will. Tis a high intellect. Grilparzer is grand, antique, not so simple as the ancients, but very simple for a modern. To madame distalish now and then, but altogether a great and goodly writer. This critical estimate is singularly just.

Starting point is 02:51:36 What Grilparza lacks in simplicity is offset by his lyric tenderness and portrayal of complex emotions. In 1834 was performed Demir's Under Liebervellin, the waves of the sea and of love. Grilparza was conscious that the title was affected. The theme is the tale of Hero and Leander. It was my purpose, he wrote, to indicate at the outset that although of an antique coloring, My treatment of the material was intended to be romantic. In short, it was an attempt to combine the true dramatic styles. This confirms Myron's judgment.

Starting point is 02:52:17 There was something of timidity in grill parts of nature. The first acts are often grand and imposing, but the catastrophe frequently passes away in an elegiate mode, like fading music. But he has produced plays in his own peculiar manner, which are full of genuine humanity and vigorous dramatic action, and their place is still secure in the repertory of the German stage. Grill Pars' collected works filled 16 volumes.

Starting point is 02:52:48 His most extensive undertaking was the trilogy A Dust Golden Veas, the golden fleece, of which Medea is still a favorite. The most important of his works is King Otokar, which occupies a place in the national life of Austria, comparable to that held by Shakespeare's historical plays in English literature, and the excellent tragedy, Ein Freya Dina Sines-Eern, a faithful servant of his master,

Starting point is 02:53:21 is likewise the product of Austrian national life. The direct influence of Calderon is manifest in the fairy tale character of the charming drama, Dertram Eindleven. Dream is a life in which the title of the famous Spanish play is reversed. Gril pars is comedy. Vedem Drut.

Starting point is 02:53:44 Wo to him who lies. Was not at first his success. And for a long time thereafter, the poet refused and discussed to submit his dramas to the stage. The play subsequently became popular, but this disregard of all pecuniary consideration. in relation to his plays was characteristic of Grilparzer. At Beethoven's request, he wrote the opera text of Melisine,

Starting point is 02:54:12 and the poet has told us in his recollections of Beethoven, how insistent the composer was that a contract be drawn to fighting the proceeds. But Grilparzer refused to allow this. He was satisfied to know that Beethoven liked his poem and was willing to devote his genius to giving it a music. setting. The great composer died before the music had taken definite form, and it was Grilpar's office to deliver the funeral oration. I loved Beethoven, he says simply in one of his touching paragraphs. Grilpar's are outlived his productivity, but his fame increased. At the

Starting point is 02:54:52 celebration of his 80th birthday, honors were showered thick upon him. He was named by the side of Gerta and Schiller, and the highest aristocracy of that most aristocratic land, joined with the common people to do him homage. In the following year, January 21st, 1872, Gril parser died. His place in the front rank of German dramatists is as assured today as when, at the culmination of a long life, all Germany brought tributes to the genius of the greatest of Austrian poets. Sappho and Fayon. From Sappho. Fayon lies slumbering on the grassy bank.

Starting point is 02:55:37 Sappho, entering from Grotto. Tis all in vain, rebellious to my will. Thought wanders and returns void of all sense. Whilst ever and anon, whatever I do, before me stands that horrid, hated sight I fain would flee from. Ene beyond this earth, how he upheld her, how she clasped his arm, till, gently yielding to its soft embrace, she on his lips,

Starting point is 02:56:06 away, away the thought, for in that thought are deaths innumerable. But why torment myself, and thus complain of what perhaps is after all a dream? Who knows with transient feeling soon forgot? What momentary impulse led him on? Which quickly passed, ean as it quickly came, unheeded, undeserving of reproach, who bad me seek the measure of his love within my own impassioned aching breast.

Starting point is 02:56:37 He who have studied life with earnest care by man's affection, judged not woman's heart. A restless thing is his impetuous soul, the slave of change and changing with each change. Boldly man enters on the path of life, illumined by the morning ray of hope. begirt with sword and shield courage and faith impatient to commence a glorious strife too narrow seems to him domestic joy his wild ambition overlaps repose and hurries madly on through endless space and if upon his wayward path he meets the humble beaute his flower called love and should he stoop to raise it from the earth he coldly places it upon his helm he knoweth not what holy are

Starting point is 02:57:27 in flame, it doth awaken in a woman's heart, how all her being, every thought, each wish, revolves forever on this single point. Like to the young bird, round its mother's nest, while fluttering, does her anxious boating care watch o'er her love, her cradle, and her grave, her whole of life, a jewel of rich price, she hangs upon the bosom of her faith. Man loves tis true, but his capace his heart finds room for other feelings than his love and much that woman's purity condemns he deems amusement or an idle jest a kiss from other lips he takes at will alas that is so yet so it is turns and sees fayon sleeping ha see beneath the shadow of yon rose the faithless dear once slumbers ay he sleeps and quiet rest hath settled on his brow thus only slumbers gentle innocence, alone thus gently breathes the unburdened breast. Yes, dearest, I will trust thy peaceful sleep.

Starting point is 02:58:39 What e'er thy waking painful may disclose? Forgive me then, if I have injured thee by unjust doubt, or if I dared to think that falsehood could approach a shrine so pure. A smile plays o'er his mouth, his lips divide, a name is hovering, in his burning breath. Awake and call thy Sappho. She is near. Her arms are clasped about thee.

Starting point is 02:59:06 She kisses his brow. Fian awakes and with half-opened eyes exclaims. Melita! Sappho starting back. Ha! Fion! Who hath disturbed me? What envious hand hath driven from my soul the happy dream?

Starting point is 02:59:25 Recollecting himself. Thou say, Saffo, welcome. Well, I knew indeed that something buttress must be near my side to lend such glowing colors to my dream. But why so sad? I am quite happy now. The anxious care that lay upon my breast hath disappeared, and I am glad again, like to some wretch who hath been headlong plunged, into some deep abyss, where all was dark when lifted upward by a friendly arm, so that once more he breathes the air heaven and in the golden sunlight bathes again he he heareth happy voices sounding near thus in the wild excitement of my heart i feel it overflow with happiness and wish half sinking neath the weight of joy the keenest senses o'er less of bliss saffo lost in thought molita phaon be gay and happy dear one all round us here is beautiful and favour

Starting point is 03:00:27 On weary wings the summer evening sinks, And placid rest upon the quiet earth. The sea heaves timidly her billowy breast, The bride expectant of the Lord of Day, Whose fiery steeds have almost reached the west, The gentle breeze sighs through the poplar boughs, And far near all nature whispers love. Is there no echo in our hearts, we love?

Starting point is 03:00:55 Saffo, aside. oh i could trust again this faithless one but no too deeply have i read his heart the feon the feverish spell that pressed upon my brain hath vanished quite and ah believe me dear zaffo i ne'er have loved thee till this hour let us be happy but tell me loved one what faith hast thou in dreams Saffo, they always lie, and I hate liars. Féon, for as I slept just now, I had a heavenly dream. I thought myself again, again upon Olympia's height, as when I saw thee first the queen of song, amid the voices of the noisy crowd,

Starting point is 03:01:44 the clang of chariot wheels and warrior shouts, a strain of music stole upon my ear, "'Twas thou. Again thou sweetly sanctest of love, "'and deep within my soul I felt its power. "'I rushed impetuous toward thee when behold. "'It seemed at once, as though I knew thee not. "'And yet the Tyrion mantle clasped thy form, "'the liest to lay upon thy snow-white arm.

Starting point is 03:02:12 "'The face alone was changed, "'like as a cloud obscures the brightness of a summer sky. the laurel wreath had vanished from thy brow upon thy lips from which immortal sounds had scarcely died away sat naught but smiles and in the profile a proud phallus's face i traced the features of a lovely child it was thyself and yet twas not it was saffle almost shrieking molita fayon's starting thou hadst well I frightened me. Who said that would she? I knew it not. Oh, Saffel, I have grieved thee.

Starting point is 03:02:57 Saffel motions him to leave. Ah, what now? Thou wish me to be gone? Let me first say. She again motions him to leave. Must I indeed then go? Then fear thee well. Exit, Thion.

Starting point is 03:03:15 Saffel, after a pause, the bow hathes sprung. pressing her hands to her breast. The arrow wankles here. To her vain to doubt. It is, it must be so. To she that dwells within his virgin heart. Her image ever floats before his eyes.

Starting point is 03:03:34 His very dreams enshrined that one loved form. The death of Sappho. From Sappho. Saffo enters richly dressed, the Tyrion mantle on her shoulders, the lower crown upon her head, and the golden liar in her hand, surrounded by her people. She slowly and solemnly descends the steps. A long pause. Melita, oh, Sappho, oh, my mistress.

Starting point is 03:04:05 Sappho, calmly and gravely, what's thou? Melita, now is the darkness fallen from my eyes. Oh, let me be to thee again a slave. again but once I was and oh forgive Sappho in the same tone Thinks thou that Sappho Hath become so poor

Starting point is 03:04:26 As to have need of gifts for one like thee That which is mine I shall ere long possess Phelon Hear me but once O Sappho Saffo Touch me not

Starting point is 03:04:40 I am henceforth devoted to the gods Phion If they are with love eyes thou didst behold. Saffo, thou speak'st of things forever past and gone. I sought for thee, and I have found, myself. Thou couldst not understand my heart. Fare well on firmer ground, then thee my hopes must rest. Pay on, and doth thou hate me now? Saffo, to love, to hate, is there no other feeling? Thou were dear, and art so still. and so shall ever be like to some pleasant fellow-traveller whom accident had brought a little way in the same bark until the goal be reached when parting each pursues a different road yet often in some strange and distant land

Starting point is 03:05:34 Remembrance will recall that traveller still. Her voice falters. Fayon moved. Sappho. Sappho. Be still, and let us part in peace. To her people, ye, you have seen your Sappho weak, forgive.

Starting point is 03:05:53 But Sappho's weakness well, will I atone. Alone when bent the bow's full prowess is shown. Pointing to the altar in the background, Kindle the flames at Aphrodite's shrine Till up to heaven They mount like morning beams They obey her And now retire and leave me here alone

Starting point is 03:06:14 I would seek counsel only from the gods Roundness to the people It is her wish, let us obey Come all They retire Sappho advancing Gracious immortal gods List to my prayer

Starting point is 03:06:32 ye have adorned my life with blessings rich. Within my hand he had placed the bow of song. The quiver of the poet gave him to me. A heart to feel, a mind to quickly think, a power to reveal my inmost thoughts. Yes, ye have crowned my life with blessings rich, for this all thanks. Upon this lovely head, ye placed a wreath

Starting point is 03:06:58 and sowed in distant lands the poet's peaceful fame. immortal seed my songs are sung in strange and foreign climes my name shall perish only with the earth for this all thanks yet it hath been your will that i should drink not deep of life's weak-cup but only taste the overflowing draught behold obedient to your high behest i set it down untouched for this all thanks all that ye have decreed i have obeyed therefore deny me not a last reward they who belong to heaven no weakness show the coils of sickness cannot round them twine in their full strength and all their beings bloom ye take them to yourselves such be my lot forbid that ere your priestess should become the scorn of those who dare despise your power the sport of fools in their own folly wise he broke the blossom now then break the bow. Let my life close as it once began. From this soul's struggle quickly set me free. I am too weak to bear a further strife.

Starting point is 03:08:14 Give me the triumph, but the conflict spare. As if inspired. The flames are kindled and the sun ascends. I feel that I am heard. I thank the gods. Fayon, Melita, hither come to me. She kisses the of phaon. A friend from other worlds doth greet thee thus. She embraces Melita. Tis thy dead mother sends this kiss to thee. Upon yon altar consecrate to love. Be love's mysterious destiny fulfilled. She hurries to the altar. Ramness, what is her purpose? glorified her form. The radiance of the gods doth round her shine. Sappho, ascending a high rock.

Starting point is 03:09:02 and stretching her hands over Fayon and Melita. Give love to mortals, reverence to the gods, and joy what blooms for ye, and think of me. Thus still, I pay the last great depth of life. Bless them, ye gods, and bear me hence to heaven. Throws herself from the rock into the sea. End of Section 7. Section 8 of Library of the World's Best Literature.

Starting point is 03:09:37 Ancient and Modern, Volume 17. This is a Libravox recording. All Libravox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit Libravox.org, recording by Rita Butros. Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Volume 17. Herman Grimm, 1828 to 1901. In the sense in which the English spirit,

Starting point is 03:10:07 speaking people use the phrase, Herman Grimm was for years the leading man of letters in Germany and chief representative of German culture. His style is the perfection of simplicity, purity, and beauty. His interests and sympathies are wide as humanity. His treatment of a subject is never pedantic, and his scholarship is always human. He is spiritually the descendant of Gerta, from whom he inherits his serenity of judgment and his sympathetic insight into the new, strange, and steadily changing life of his contemporaries. His essays and briefer articles

Starting point is 03:10:48 form a running commentary upon the great currents of thought that influence our time, and without dwelling upon the surface, except for purposes of illustration, they present the structure of our intellectual life and exhibit its essential features. Herman Grimm was born at Kessel on January 6, 1828.

Starting point is 03:11:12 His father was Wilhelm Grimm. He was accustomed to call his uncle Jacob a Papa, with the Greek alpha privative, not Papa. It was in the stimulating circle that gathered about the brothers Grimm that he grew up, the Arnims, Brentanos, and the group of eminent scholars that gave luster to the universities of Gantingen and Berlin. In the social intercourse of the Prussian

Starting point is 03:11:41 capital, it was to the house of Bettina von Arnim that Grimm was chiefly drawn. He subsequently married Gisela, Bettina's youngest daughter. Grimm's earliest literary efforts were in dramatic form. His novellon, a series of short stories distinguished by great beauty of form and tenderness of feeling were published in 1856, and have proved their vitality after 40 years by a new edition in 1896. He was about 30 years of age when the first volume of his essays appeared. Up to this point, his life had been the irresponsible one of a highly gifted man of artistic temperament, who has not yet found his special aptitude, nor set himself a definite goal. The late Professor Brune has told how, when he and Grimm were young men, together in Rome,

Starting point is 03:12:40 the latter finally came to see the necessity of winning a firm foothold in some special field and of accomplishing some well-defined task. It was in pursuance of this thought and under the stimulating influence of his young wife's genius that Grim wrote the famous Life of Michelangelo and placed himself, at one stroke in the front rank of German letters. This work is now universally recognized as one of the finest specimens of biographical writing that modern literature has produced. It also marked an epoch in the study of the Italian Renaissance.

Starting point is 03:13:23 In 1867, his ambitious novel, Unubour Vindlech Macht, insuperable powers, appeared, and was received with an enthusiasm which it has not been able to maintain. In 1873, he was made, Professor of Art History, a chair which was created for him at the University of Berlin. The freshness of his ideas and the free grace of his delivery attracted thousands to his auditorium, and many Americans were always among his enthusiastic hearers.

Starting point is 03:13:59 Grimm was bound to America by many ties. First among these was his love for Emerson. He found a volume of Emerson's essays upon the table at Bancroft's House. He thought that his command of English was good, but this book presented difficulties. He took it home and soon discovered that these difficulties grew out of the fact that the writer had original ideas and his own way of expressing them. He translated the essays on Gerta and Shakespeare's. into German. His own two essays on Emerson are finely appreciative, both of the character of American life and of Emerson as its interpreter and exponent. He was thus with Julian Schmidt,

Starting point is 03:14:48 the first to make the American philosopher known to the German public. His life of Raphael, which first appeared in 1872, was the cause of much unrefreshing strife. In which which, however, the author never deigned to take part. Bitter opposition to his views generally took the form of contemptuous silence on the part of specialists and the press. Meanwhile, the Raphael reached its fifth edition and was translated into English. Most popular among his works, after the Michelangelo, is the volume of lectures on Gerta. This fascinating work was the outgrowth of a series of a series of, of public lectures delivered in 1876 at the University of Berlin.

Starting point is 03:15:39 They do not attempt a systematic life of Gerta, but in them is presented the poet as he lived and wrought, and, as in Michelangelo, the splendid life in Rome and Florence is restored, so the golden age of German letters lives again in these lectures. The English translation by Miss Sarah H. Adams, is dedicated to Emerson. In 1889 he lost his wife. It was characteristic of the man that in these days of overwhelming bereavement, he should seek consolation in the poetry of Homer. The result of these loving studies is now before the world in two stately volumes entitled Homer's Iliad. The Iliad is treated as if it had never before been read, and regard is paid. only to its poetic contents, its marvelous composition, its delineation of character, its essential modernness. This book was a labor of love and is an inspiring introduction

Starting point is 03:16:46 to an unprejudiced and appreciative study of Homer. Grimm continues to exert a wide and fine influence upon the intellectual life of his countrymen. In the forefront of every important movement, he was among the first to advocate the admission of women into the university. Himself a thorough classical scholar, he nevertheless held liberal views on the great question of educational reform, and although rooted in the romanticism of the early part of the century, he displays the keenest understanding of the tumultuous life of the modern empire. In his five volumes of essays may be found a precise,

Starting point is 03:17:32 of all that is best in German culture during the last 40 years. To the ties which already bound him to this country, there was added in 1896 another. He was elected to membership in the American Academy of Arts and Sciences to succeed the late Sir John R. Seeley. His death occurred June 17, 1901. selection Florence From the life of Michelangelo by Herman Grimm

Starting point is 03:18:06 Translation of Fanny Elizabeth Bonnet Little Brown and Company Publishers Boston There are names which carry with them Something of a charm We utter them And like the prince in the Arabian Knights Who mounted the marvelous horse And spoke the magic words

Starting point is 03:18:25 We feel ourselves lifted from the earth into the clouds we have but to say Athens and all the great deeds of antiquity break upon our hearts like a sudden gleam of sunshine we perceive nothing definite we see no separate figures but a cloudy train of glorious men passes over the heavens and a breath touches us which like the first warm wind in the year seems to give promise of the spring in the midst of snow and rain florence and the magnificence and passionate agitation of italy's prime sends forth its fragrance toward us like blossom-laden boughs from whose dusky shadow we catch whispers of the beautiful tongue we will now however step nearer and examine more clearly the things which taken collectively at a glance we call the history of athens and florence the glowing images now grow cold

Starting point is 03:19:28 and become dull and empty. Here, as everywhere, we see the strife of common passions, the martyrdom and ruin of the best citizens, the demon-like opposition of the multitude to all that is pure and elevated, and the disinterestedness of the noblest patriots suspiciously misunderstood and arrogantly rejected. Vexation, sadness, and sorrow steal over us,

Starting point is 03:19:56 instead of the admiration which at first moved us. And yet, what is it all? Turning away, we cast back one glance from afar, and the old glory lies again on the picture, and a light in the distance seems to reveal to us the paradise, which attracts us afresh, as if we set foot on it for the first time. Athens was the first city of Greece,

Starting point is 03:20:23 rich, powerful, with a policy which accepted, extended almost over the entire world of that age. We can conceive that from her emanated all the great things that were done. Florence, however, in her fairest days, was never the first city of Italy, and in no respect possessed extraordinary advantages. She lies not on the sea, not even on a river at any time navigable, for the Arno, on both sides of which the city rises, often affords in summer scarcely water sufficient to cover the soil of its broad bed, at that point of its course where it emerges from narrow valleys into the plain situated between the diverging arms of the mountain range.

Starting point is 03:21:12 The situation of Naples is more beautiful, that of Genoa more royal than Florence. Rome is richer in treasures of art. Venice possessed a political power, in comparison with which the influence of the Florentines appears small. Lastly, these cities and others, such as Pisa and Milan, have gone through an external history, compared with which, that of Florence, contains nothing extraordinary. And yet, notwithstanding, all else that happened in Italy between 1250 and 1530

Starting point is 03:21:51 is colorless when placed side by side with the history, of this one city. Her internal life surpasses in splendor the efforts of the others at home and abroad. The events through the intricacies of which she worked her way with vigorous determination and the men whom she produced raised her fame above that of the whole of Italy besides, and place Florence as a younger sister by the side of Athens. The earlier history of the city before the days of her highest splendor, stands in the same relation to the subsequent events as the contests of the Homeric heroes to that which happened in the historic ages in Greece. The incessant strife between the hostile nobles, which lasted for centuries

Starting point is 03:22:43 and ended with the annihilation of all, presents to us, on the whole, as well as in detail, the course of an epic poem. These contests in which the whole body of the citizens became involved began with the strife of two families brought about by a woman with murder and revenge in its train, and it is ever the passion of the leaders which fans the dying flames into new life. From their ashes at length arose the true Florence. She had now no longer a warlike aristocracy like Venice, no popes nor nobles like Rome, no fleet, no soldiers, scarcely a territory. Within her walls was a fickle, avaricious, ungrateful people of parvenus,

Starting point is 03:23:34 artisans, and merchants, who had been subdued, now here and now there, by the energy or the intrigues of foreign and native tyranny, until at length exhausted they had actually given up their liberty. And it is the history of these very times which is surrounded with such glory, and the remembrance of which awakens such enthusiasm among her own people at the present day, at the remembrance of their past. Whatever attracts us in nature and in art,

Starting point is 03:24:09 that higher nature which man has created, may be felt also of the deeds of individuals and of nations. A melody, incomprehensible and enticing, is breathed forth from the events, filling them with importance and animation. Thus, we should like to live and to act, to have joined in obtaining this, to have assisted in the contest there. It becomes evident to us that this is true existence. Events follow each other like a work of art. A marvelous thread unites them. There are no disjointed convulsive shocks which startle us as at the fall of a rock, making the ground tremble, which for centuries had lain tranquil, and again, perhaps for centuries, sinks back into its old repose, for it is not repose, order and a lawful progress on the

Starting point is 03:25:06 smooth path of peace which we desire, nor the fearful breaking up of long-established habits, and the chaos that succeeds. But we are struck by deeds and characters whose outset promises results and allows us to auger an end where the powers of men and nations strive after perfection, and our feelings aspire

Starting point is 03:25:32 toward a harmonious aim, which we hope for or dread, and which we see reached at length. Our pleasure in these events, in no degree, resembles the satisfaction with which, per chance, a modern officer of police, would express himself respecting the excellent condition of a country. There are so-called quiet times, within which, nevertheless, the best actions appear hollow and inspire a secret mistrust. When peace,

Starting point is 03:26:05 order, and impartial administration of justice are words with no real meaning, and piety sounds even like blasphemy, while in other epochs open depravity, errors, injustice, crime, and vice form only the shadows of a great and elevating picture, to which they impart the just truth.

Starting point is 03:26:28 The blacker, the dark places, the brighter, the light ones. An indestructible power seems to necessitate both. We are at once convinced that we are not deceived. It is all so clear, so plain, so intelligible.

Starting point is 03:26:45 We are struck with the strife of inevitable dark necessity, with the will whose freedom nothing can conquer. On both sides we see great powers rising, shaping events and perishing in their course, or maintaining themselves above them. We see blood flowing, the rage of parties flashes before us like the sheet lightning of storms

Starting point is 03:27:10 that have long seen, We stand here and there and fight once more in the old battles. But we want truth, no concealing of aims or the means with which they desired to obtain them. Thus we see the people in a state of agitation, just as the lava in the crater of a volcanic mountain rises in itself. And from the fermenting mass, there sounds forth the magic melody which we call to mind when the names Athens or Florence are pronounced. Yet how poor seem the treasures of the Italian city compared with the riches of the Greek.

Starting point is 03:27:52 A succession of great Athenians appear where only single Florentines could be pointed out. Athens surpassed Florence as far as the Greeks surpassed the Romans. But Florence touches us the more closely. We tread less certain ground in the history of Athens. and the city herself has been swept away from her old rocky soil, leaving only insignificant ruins behind. Florence still lives. If at the present day we look down from the height of old Fiasole on the mountainside north of the city,

Starting point is 03:28:29 the cathedral of Florence, Santa Maria del Fiori, or Santa Liparata, as it is called, with its cupola and slender bell tower, and the churches, palaces, and houses, and the walls that enclose them still lie in the depth below as they did in years gone by. All is standing, upright, and undecayed. The city is like a flower, which, when fully blown,

Starting point is 03:28:59 instead of withering on its stalk, turned as it were into stone. Thus she stands at the present day, and to him who forgets the former ages, life and fragrance seem not to be lacking many a time we could fancy it is still as once it was just as when traversing the canals of venice under the soft beams of the moon we are delusively carried back to the times of her ancient splendor but freedom has vanished and that succession of great men has long ceased which year by year of alt sprung up afresh Yet the remembrance of these men and of the old freedom still lives. Their remains are preserved with religious care.

Starting point is 03:29:49 To live with consciousness in Florence is, to a cultivated man, nothing else than the study of the beauty of a free people in its very purest instincts. The city possesses something that penetrates and sways the mind. We lose ourselves in her riches, while we feel that everything drew its life from that one freedom, the past obtains an influence, even in its most insignificant relations, which almost blinds us to the rest of Italy.

Starting point is 03:30:23 We become fanatical Florentines in the old sense. The most beautiful pictures of Titian begin to be indifferent to us as we follow the progress of Florentine art in its almost hourly advance from the most close, clumsy beginnings up to perfection. The historians carry us into the intricacies of their age, as if we were initiated into the secrets of living persons. We walk along the streets where they walked. We step over the thresholds which they trod. We look down from the windows at which they have stood. Florence has never been taken by assault, nor destroyed, nor changed by some all-devastating

Starting point is 03:31:07 fire. The buildings of which they tell us stand there almost as if they had grown up, stone by stone, to charm and gratify our eyes. If I, a stranger, am attracted with such magnetic power, how strong must have been the feeling with which the free old citizens clung to their native city, which was the world to them. It seemed to them impossible to live and die elsewhere. Hence, the tragic and often frantic attempts of the exiled to return to their home. Unhappy was he who at Even Tide might not meet his friends in her squares, who was not baptized in the Church of San Giovanni, and could not have his children baptized there.

Starting point is 03:31:57 It is the oldest church in the town and bears in its interior the proud inscription that it will not be thrown down until the day of judgment, a belief as strong as that of the romans to whom eternity was to be the duration of their capital horace sang that his songs would last as long as the priestess ascended the steps there athens and florence owed their greatness to their freedom we are free when our longing to do all that we do for the good of our country is satisfied but it must be independently and voluntary We must perceive ourselves to be a part of a whole, and that while we advance, we promote the advance of the whole at the same time. This feeling must be paramount to any other. With the Florentines, it rose above the bloodiest hostility of parties and families.

Starting point is 03:32:58 Passions stooped before it. The city and her freedom lay nearest to every heart, and form the end and aim of every dispute. No power without was to oppress them. None within the city herself was to have greater authority than another. Every citizen desired to cooperate for the general good. No third party was to come between to help forward their interests. So long as this jealousy of a personal right in the state, ruled in the minds of the citizens, Florence was a free city.

Starting point is 03:33:35 With the extinguishing of this passion, freedom perished, and in vain was every energy exerted to maintain it. That which, however, exhibits Athens and Florence as raised above other states, which likewise flourished through their freedom, is a second gift of nature, by which freedom was either circumscribed or extended, for both may be said of it, namely the capability in their citizens for an equal development of all human power. One-sided energy may do much whether men or nations possess it. Egyptians, Romans, Englishmen are grand examples of this. The one-sidedness of their character, however, discovers itself again in their undertakings and sometimes robs that which they achieve of the praise of beauty.

Starting point is 03:34:31 In Athens and Florence, no passion for any time gained such a sentency over the individuality of the people as to preponderate over others. If it happened at times for a short period, a speedy subversion of things brought back the equilibrium. The Florentine constitution depended on the resolutions of the moment made by an Assembly of Citizens entitled to vote. any power could be legally annuled, and with equal legality, another could be raised up in its stead.

Starting point is 03:35:08 Nothing was wanting but a decree of the great parliament of citizens. A countervote was all that was necessary. So long as the great bell sounded, which called all the citizens together to the square in front of the palace of the government, any revenge borne by one towards another might be dissoned. by open force in the public street. Parliament was the lawfully appointed scene of revolution, in case the will of the people no longer accorded with that of the government. The citizens in that case invested a committee with dictatorial authority.

Starting point is 03:35:49 The offices were newly felt. All offices were accessible to all citizens. Any man was qualified and called upon for any position. What sort of men must these citizens have been, who formed a stable and flourishing state, with institutions so variable? Sorted merchants and manufacturers? Yet how they fought for their freedom? Selfish policy and commerce their sole interest? Yet were they the poets and historians of their country?

Starting point is 03:36:24 Avaricious shopkeepers and money changers? But dwelling in princely palest, and these palaces built by their own masters and adorned with paintings and sculptures, which had been likewise produced within the city. Everything put forth blossom, every blossom bore fruit. The fate of the country is like a ball, which in its eternal motion still rests ever on the right point. Every Florentine work of art carries the whole of Florence within it. Dante's poems are the result of the wars,

Starting point is 03:36:59 the negotiations the religion the philosophy the gossip the faults the vice the hatred the love and the revenge of the florentines all unconsciously assisted nothing might be lacking from such a soil alone could such a work spring forth from the athenian mind alone could the tragedies of sophocles and eschalus proceed the history of the city has as much share in them as the genius of the men in whose minds imagination and passion sought expression in words. It makes a difference whether an artist is the self-conscious citizen of a free land or the richly rewarded subject of a ruler in whose ears liberty sounds like sedition and treason. A people is free, not because it obeys no prince, but because of its own accord, it loves and supports the highest authority. whether this be a prince or an aristocracy who hold the government in their hands a prince there always is in the freest republics one man gives after all the casting vote but he must be there because he is the first and because all need him

Starting point is 03:38:19 it is only where each single man feels himself a part of the common basis upon which the commonwealth rests that we can speak of freedom and freedom and all need him-it is only where each single man feels himself a part of the common basis upon which the commonwealth rests that we can speak of freedom and art. What have the statues in the villa of Hadrian to do with Rome and the desires of Rome? What the mighty columns of the baths of Caracalla, with the ideal of the people in whose capital they arose? In Athens and Florence, however, we could say that no stone was laid on another, no picture, no poem, came forth, but the entire population was its sponsor. Whether Santa Maria del Fiori was rebuilt, whether the Church of San Giovanni gained a couple of golden gates, whether Pisa was besieged, peace concluded, or a mad carnival procession celebrated. Everyone was concerned in it. The same general interest was evinced in it.

Starting point is 03:39:18 The beautiful Simonetta, the most beautiful young maiden in the city, is buried. The whole of Florence follow her with tears in their eyes, and, Lordeufus. Morenzo Medici, the first man in the state, writes an elegiac sonnet on her loss, which is on the lips of all. A newly painted chapel is opened. No one may be missing. A foot race through the streets is arranged. Carpets hang out from every window. Contemplated from afar, the two cities stand before us like beautiful human figures, like women with dark, sad glances, and yet, laughing. lips. We step nearer. It seems one great united family. We pass into the midst of them. It is like a beehive of human beings. Athens and her destiny is a symbol of the whole life of Greece.

Starting point is 03:40:14 Florence is a symbol of the prime of Roman Italy. Both so long as their liberty lasted are a reflection of the golden age of their land and people. After liberty was lost, They are an image of the decline of both until their final ruin. End of Section 8. Section 9 of Library of the World's Best Literature in Shent and Modern, Volume 17. This is a Librevox recording. All Libre Fox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibreVox.org.

Starting point is 03:41:01 Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Volume 17 Selected Tales by the Grimm Brothers The Grimm Brothers by Benjamin W. Wells Grim, Jacob Ludwig Carl, 1785, 1863 and Billan Karl, 1786, 1859, whose names are inseparably connected in the history of German antiquities, philology and literature were the oldest sons of a peepofficial dance stationed at Hano in Hesse Castle. Their father died in 1796 but though poor they were

Starting point is 03:41:47 able to study for the law at the University of Marburg where Professor Savigny gave them their first inspiration and directed their minds to early German literature and institutions. After their graduation, Jacob occupied for a time as subordinate civil and diplomatic positions, and after 1816, both were connected with a library at Castle, which they exchanged in 1828 for the university library at Göttingen, where Jacob also lectured, though without popular success, until they were rejected from office for a manly protest in 1837 against the broken pledges of the King of Hanover. With no desire of applause or fear of blame when he had acted as he must.

Starting point is 03:42:37 Words that show his whole character, Jacob withdrew with his brother to Castle and danced in 1940 to Berlin, where they had been appointed professors and members of the Academy. Here they passed a life of tireless investigation, interrupted only by Jacob's brief and not very happy share in the National Assembly at Frankfurt in 1848. Here they died and here they were buried as they had lived together. The brothers had passed their whole lives in common labor, of which the elder thus spoke in a memorial oration.

Starting point is 03:43:15 Quote, In the slow-gliding school years, one bed and one study held us. There we sat working at the same table, and afterward, in our student years, two beds and two tables stood in the same room. in later life, still two tables in the same room, and at last, to the very end, two rooms beside one another, always under one roof, in undisturbed and untroubled community of our money and books, except for a few that each must have immediately at hand, and which were therefore bought in duplicate, and so also our last beds will be laid, it seems, closed by one another. Let one consider then whether in speaking of him I can avoid speaking of myself. End of quote.

Starting point is 03:44:07 The work may be treated as a unit, though Jacobs was the most dominant spirit. He had an iron industry, a clear vision, an unfailing cheerfulness in labor. His style has a peculiar rag earnestness. It is not unpolished, but picturesque and full of a woodland saver, while Willem had a frailer constitution and a gentler nature that showed itself in the graceful naïve day of those legends and tales to which he gave literary reform. The genius of their common studies was a noble patriotism. One could say of both what Jacob said of himself that nearly all their labors were directed to the investigation of early German language, laws and poetry. laborers which might seem useless to some but were to them inseparably connected with the fatherland and calculated to foster the love of it again he says i strove to penetrate into the wild forest of our ancestors listening to their noble language watching their pure customs recognizing their ancient freedom and their rational entirety faith these labors took the foreword

Starting point is 03:45:25 of studies in early law, rextalter tumour or legal antiquities, in 1828, mythology, Deutsche Mythology in 1835, Sagen, or Legends, 1816, revised 1868, essays on Old German poetry, Alt-Deutscher Meister Gesang, 1811, and numerous editions of Old German, Danish, Norse, and English texts. Most important,

Starting point is 03:45:55 to the scientific world, however, were the Deutsche Grammatique, 1819 and 1822 to 1840, and the still unfinished dictionary, perhaps the most vast undertaking of modern philologists. But monumental as these works are, they belong only indirectly to literature, nor is there much of general interest in the eight volumes of Jacob Grimm's minor writings, 1864 to 1890. On the other hand, all the world knows the brothers for their household tales, 1812 to 1815, and often for these alone. They were meant for a contribution to folklore,

Starting point is 03:46:41 as may be seen from the volume of notes that accompany them, of which the extracts that follow contain two specimens. But in a single generation, they became one of the most popular books of the world, they were translated into every civilized dog and may be found today tattered and worn in a million nurseries, but never outworn in the hearts of nature's children. Artists like Walter Crane have illustrated them. Critics like Andrew Lang have introduced them to English readers, not where the German scholars and critics, Schererertius, Berndt, have bestowed on them the tribute of learning.

Starting point is 03:47:23 But perhaps no one has spoken better of them than Dylan Grimm in his preface, a part of which is translated below, and none has paid a nobler tribute to the fraternal love of the authors than Jacob Grimm in the first volume of his minor writings. A word to the reader, from the preface to the household tales. We sometimes find when a whole confield has been beaten down by a storm that a little place has sheltered itself by the low hedges or bushes, and a few years remain upright. Then, if the sun shines kindly again, they grow alone and unnoticed.

Starting point is 03:48:08 No early sickle cast them for the great granaries, but late in summer, when they are ripe and full, can poor hands that glean them and carry them home, laid year to year, bound carefully, and more highly treasured than whole sheaves. and their food all winter long, perhaps also the only seed for the future. So it seemed to us when we saw how nothing was left of so much that had bloomed in old times, how even the memory of it was almost lost, except among the people in songs, a few books, legends, and these innocent household tales. The fireside, the earth, the attic stairs, ancient holidays, mountain paths and forests in their

Starting point is 03:48:55 silence, but above all an untroubled fantasy have been the hedges that have guarded them and transmitted them from one age to another. It was high time to seize these tales, for their guardians grow even rarer. To be sure, those who know them usually know many, for it is men who are dead to them, not they to men. That which has given such manifold and repeated joy and emotion and instruction, bears in it its own excuse for being, and has surely come from that eternal spring that produce all life. And though it were only a single drop that has caught on a little crumpled leaf, yet it sparkles in the first blush of dawn. Hence it is that all these fancies are pervaded with that purity by which children seem to us so wonderful and blessed.

Starting point is 03:49:51 They have the same blue, white, immaculate, bright eyes. And so, by our collection, we thought to serve not only the study of poetry and mythology, but also to let the poetry itself that palpitates in it, touch and delight whomever it can delight, so that it may serve also as a book of education. For this, we seek not such purity as is obtained by an anxious exclusion of all that bears on certain conditions and relations, such as occur daily and cannot power daily, and cannot possibly be hidden, which also produces the deception that what is possible in a book can be practiced in real life. We seek purity in the truth of a straightforward narration.

Starting point is 03:50:37 Nothing defends us better than nature herself, who has let these plants grow in just this color and form. He whose special needs they may not suit has no right to ask that they should be differently cut and colored, or again, Or again, rain and dew fall to benefit all that grows. If anyone does not dare to put his plants under the rain and dew because they are too delicate and might be hurt, if he prefers to give them lukewarm water in the house, yet he must not demand that there shall be no rain and dew. All that is natural may be helpful, and it is at this that we ought to aim.

Starting point is 03:51:19 We have been collecting these stories from oral tradition for about 13 years. If one is accustomed to heed such things, one has more chances than one would suppose. But it was a piece of special good fortune that we made the acquaintance of a peasant woman of neither's fan, a village near castle, who told us most of the tales in the second volume and the most beautiful of these. Frau Fie Menin was still active and not much over 50 years old. Her features were firm, sensible and agreeable, and she cast clear keen glances from her great eyes. She remembered the old stories exactly, and said herself that this gift was not granted to all, and that Mania One could keep nothing in its proper connection. She told her stories deliberately,

Starting point is 03:52:11 confidently, with much life and self-satisfaction. First, quite naturally, then if you wished, slowly, so that with a little practice you could take them down. A good deal has been preserved verbally in this way and will be unmistakable in its truth to nature. One who believes in the easy alteration of tradition, in negligence in guarding it, and hence as a rule in the impossibility of its long continuance, should have heard how exact she always was in her story

Starting point is 03:52:44 and how eager for its accuracy. In repeating, she never changed anything in the substance, and corrected an oversight as soon as she observed it while she was speaking. As for the way in which we have collected, our first care was for faithfulness and truth. So we have added nothing of our own, have embellished no circumstance or trade in the story, but have rendered its contents just as we received it. That style and development of detail are largely ours is a matter of course, but we have tried to preserve every peculiarity that we noticed,

Starting point is 03:53:24 so as to live in our collection in this regard also the endless variety of nature. In this sense, there is, so far as we know, no collection of legends in Germany. Either a few preserved by chance have been printed, or they are looked at as raw material from which to form longer stories. Against such treatment, we declare ourselves absolutely. The practiced hand in such reconstructions is like that unhappily gifted hand that turned all it touched, even meat and drink, to gold, and cannot for all its wealth, still our hunger or quench our thirst. For when mythology, with all its pictures, is to be conjured out of mere imagination, how bare, how empty, how formless does all seem, in spite of the best and strongest words. however this is said only of such so-called reconstructions

Starting point is 03:54:20 as pretend to beautify and poetize the legends not toward a free appropriation of them for modern and individual purposes for who would seek to set limits to poetry we commit these tales to gracious hands and think the well of the kindly power that lies in them and wish that our book may be forever hidden from those who grudge these crumbs of poetry

Starting point is 03:54:46 to the poor and simple. Castle July 3, 1819. Little briar rose from household tales. Long ago, there was a king and a queen. They said every day, oh, if we only had a

Starting point is 03:55:06 child, and still they never got one. Then it happened when once the queen was bathing, that a frog crept ashore out of the water and said to her, Your wish shall be before a year passes you shall bring a daughter into the world what the frog said happened and the queen had a little girl that was so beautiful that the king could not contain himself for joy and made a great feast he invited not only his relatives friends and acquaintances but also the wise women that they might be gracious and kind to the child now there were thirteen of them in his kingdom, but because he had only 12 gold plates for them to eat from, one of them had to stay at home.

Starting point is 03:55:56 The feast was splendidly celebrated and when it was over the wise women gave the child their wonderful gifts. One gave her virtue, another beauty, another wealth, and so with everything that people want in the world. But when 11 had spoken, suddenly the 13th came in. She wished to avenge herself because she had not been asked, and without greeting or looking at anyone, she cried out. In her 15th year, the king's daughter shall wound herself on a spindle and fall down dead. And without saying another word, she turned around and left the hall. All were frightened.

Starting point is 03:56:40 When the 12th came up, who had her wish still to give, since she could not remove the sentence but only soften it, she said. Yet it shall not be a real death but only a hundred years deep sleep into which the king's daughter shall fall. The king, who wanted to save his dear child from home, sent out an order that all the spindles in the kingdom should be burned. But in the girl, the gifts of the wise women were all fulfilled, for she was so beautiful, good, kind and sensible that nobody who saw her could help loving her. It happened that just on the day when she was 15 years old, the king and queen were not at home, and the little girl was left quite alone in the castle. Then she went wherever

Starting point is 03:57:30 she pleased, looked in the rooms and chambers, and at last she got to an old tower. She went up the narrow winding stairs and came to a little door. In the keyhole was a rusty key, and when she turned it, the door sprung open, and there in a little room sat an old woman with a spindle and spun busied busily her plaques. Could they, Auntie, said the king's daughter, what are you doing there? I am spinning, said the old woman, and nodded.

Starting point is 03:58:04 What sort of a thing is that the jumps about so gaily? said the girl. She took the spindle and wanted to spin too, but she had hardly touched the spindle before the spell was fulfilled, and she pricked her finger with it. At the instant she felt the prick, she fell down on the bed that stood there and lay in a deep sleep. And this leap spread over all the castle. The king and queen, who had just come home and entered the hall, began to go to sleep, and all the courtiers with them.

Starting point is 03:58:37 The horses went to sleep in the stalls, the dogs in the yard, the doves on the roof, the flies on the wall, Yes, the fire that was flickering on the heart grew still and went to sleep. And the roast meat stopped sputtering, and the cook, who was going to take the cook boy by the hair because he had forgotten something, let him go and slept. And the wind was still, and no leaf stirred in the trees by the castle. But all around the castle, a hedge of briars grew that got higher every year, and at last surrounded the whole castle and grew. up over it so that nothing more could be seen of it, not even the flag on the roof.

Starting point is 03:59:22 But the story went about in the country of the beautiful sleeping briar rose, for so the king's daughter was called, so that from time to time King's sons came and tried to get through the hedge into the castle. But they could not, for the briars, as though they had hands, lined fast together and a young man stuck fast in them could not be. it out again and died at wretched death. After long, long years, there came again a king's son to that country and heard how an old man told about the Briar Hedge, that there was a castle behind it, in which a wonderfully beautiful king's daughter called Briar Rose had been sleeping for a hundred years, and that the king and the queen and all the court were sleeping with her.

Starting point is 04:00:13 He knew too from his grandfather that many king's sons had already come and tried to get through the briar hedge, but had all been caught in it and died at sad death. Then the young man said, I am not afraid, I will go and see the beautiful briar rose. The good old man might warn him as much as he pleased. He did not listen to his words. But now the hundred years were just. passed and the day was come when briar rose was to wake again. So when the king's son went up to the briars, they were just great beautiful flowers that opened of their own accord and let him through unhurt, and behind him they closed together as a hedge again. In the yard he saw the horses and the model towns flying and sleeping. On the roof perched the doves, their heads stuck under their wings,

Starting point is 04:01:13 And when he came into the house, the flies were sleeping on the wall. In the kitchen the cook still held up his hand as though to grab the boy, and the maid was sitting before the black hand that was to be plucked. Then he went further, and in the hall he saw all the courtiers lying and sleeping, and upon the throne lay the king and the queen. Then he went further, and all was so still that you could hear yourself breathe, and at last he came to the tower and opened the door of the little room where Briar Rose was sleeping. There she lay, and she was so beautiful that he could not take his eyes off her,

Starting point is 04:01:57 and he bent down and gave her a kiss. But just as he touched her with a kiss, Briya Rose opened her eyes a walk and looked at him very kindly. Then they went downstairs together, and the king awoke and the queen and all the courtiers and made great eyes at one another and the horses in the yard got up and shook themselves the hounds sprang about and wiped their tails the doves on the roof pulled out their heads from under the wings looked around and flew into the field the flies on the wall went on crawling the fire in the kitchen started up and blazed and cooked the dinner The roast began to sputter again, and the cook gave the boy such a box on the ear that he screamed, and the maid finished plucking the hen. Then the wedding of the king's son with Briar Rose was splendidly celebrated, and they lived happy till their life's end.

Starting point is 04:03:04 Note by the Grims from Hesse. The maid who sleeps in the castle, surrounded by a hedge until the right prince releases, her, before whom the flowers part, is the sleeping brunhild, according to the old Norse saga, whom a wall of flame surrounds which Sigurd alone can penetrate to wake her. The spindle on which she pricks herself and from which she falls asleep is the slumberthorn with which Odin pricks Brunhilt. In the pentamaron it is a flax route. In Perrault, Labello, Baudot.

Starting point is 04:03:40 Similar is the sleep of Schneier-Bittgen. The Italian and French stories both have the conclusion that is wanting in the German, but occurs in our fragment of the wicked stepmother. It is not worthy that in the important deviations of Perrault from Basil, who alone preserves the pretty trait that the nurseling sacks the bit of flax from the finger of the sleeping mother, both agree so far as to the names of the children that the twins in the pentameron called Sun and Moon in Perrault, Day and Dom. These names recall the compounds of day, sun and moon

Starting point is 04:04:18 in the genealogy of the Eda. The three spinners from the household tales. There was a lazy girl who would not spin, and her mother might say what she would, she could not make her do it. At last anger and the patients overcame the mother so that she struck the girl and at that she began to cry aloud.

Starting point is 04:04:45 Now the queen was just driving by, and when she heard the crying, she had the courage stop, went into the house, and asked the mother why she bet her daughter so that one could hear the crying out on the street. Then the woman was ashamed to confess the laziness of her daughter and said,

Starting point is 04:05:03 I cannot keep her from spinning. She wants to spin all the time, and they am poor and can't get the flags. Then the queen answered, There is nothing I'd like to hear so much as spinning, and I am never happier than when the will's home. Let me take your daughter to the castle. I have flags enough.

Starting point is 04:05:23 There she shall spin as much as she will. The mother was well pleased at it, and the queen took the girl with her. When they came to the castle, she took her up to three rooms, which lay from top to bottom full of the finest flags. Now spin me this plaques, she said, and if you finish it, you shall have my eldest son for husband. Though you are poor, I don't mind that. Your cheerful diligence is dowry enough.

Starting point is 04:05:53 The girl was secretly frightened, for she could not have spanned the flags if she had lived 300 years and had sat at it every day from morning till evening. When she was alone, she began to cry and sat so three days without living. a hand. On the third day the queen came and when she saw that nothing was pun yet she was surprised but the girl excused herself by saying that she had not been able to begin on account of her great sorrow at leaving her mother's house. The queen was satisfied with that but she said as she went away tomorrow you must begin to work. When the girl was alone again she did not know what to

Starting point is 04:06:37 think or to do and in her trouble she went up to the window and there she saw three women coming along the first had a broad paddle food the second had such a big under lip that it hung down over her chin and the third had a broad thumb they stopped before the window looked up and asked the girl what was the matter she told them her trouble then they offered her help and said if If you will invite us to your wedding, not be ashamed of us, and call us your cousins, and seat us at your table too, then we will spin your flags up and that quickly." Gladly, said she, come in and set to work immediately.

Starting point is 04:07:24 So she let the three queer women in and cleared a little space in the first room where they could sit down and begin their spinning. One of them drew the thread and trod the wheel, the second wet the thread, the third, twisted it and struck with her finger on the table, and as often as she struck, a skin of yarn fell to the floor, and it was of the finest. She hid the three spinners from the queen, and showed her as often as she came,

Starting point is 04:07:52 the pile of spun yarn, so that the queen could not praise her enough. When the first room was empty, they began on the second, and then on the third, and that was soon cleared up, too. Now the three women took their leave and said to the girl, Do not forget what you promised us. It will be your good fortune. When the girl showed the queen the empty rooms and the great heap of yarn, she prepared for the wedding, and the bridegroom was delighted to get such a clever and industrious wife and praised her very much.

Starting point is 04:08:27 I have three cousins, said the girl, and since they have been very kind to me, I should not like to forget them in my happiness. Permit me to invite them to the wedding and to have them sit with me at the table. The queen and the bridegroom said, Why should not be permitted? Now, when the feast began, the three women came in queer dress, and the bride said,

Starting point is 04:08:50 welcome, dear cousins. Oh, said the bridegroom, how did you get such ill-favored friends? Then he went to the one with a broad battlefoot and asked, where did you get such a broad foot? From the trestrel, she answered, from the treadle.

Starting point is 04:09:09 Then the bridegroom went to the second and said, where did you get that hanging lip? From wetting yarn, she said, from wedding yarn. Then he asked the third, where did you get the broad thumb? From twisting thread, she answered, from twisting thread. Then the king's son was frightened and said, Then my fair bride shall never, never touch a spinning wheel.

Starting point is 04:09:37 again and so she was read of the horace spinning note by the Grims from a tale from the duch of Corbe but that there are three women each with a peculiar fault due to spinning is taken from a Hessian story in the former there are two very old women who have grown so broad by sitting that they can hardly get into the room from white in the thread they have thick lips and from pulling and drawing it ugly fines and both hands. The Hessian story begins differently, too,

Starting point is 04:10:16 namely, that a king liked nothing better than spinning, and so at his farewell before a journey, left his daughters a great chest of flanks that was to be spun on his return. To relieve them, the queen invited the three deformed women

Starting point is 04:10:31 and put them before the king's eyes on his return. Pretorius, in his look stop, tells the story thus. A mother cannot make her daughter spin and so often beats her. A man who happens to see it asks what it means. The mother answers, I cannot keep her from spinning. She spins more flags than I can buy.

Starting point is 04:10:54 The man answers, Then give her to me for wife. I shall be satisfied with her cheerful diligence, though she brings no dowry. The mother is delighted and the bridegroom brings the bride immediately a great provision of flags. She is secretly frightened, but accepts it, puts it in her room and considers what she shall do. Then three women come to the window, one so abroad from sitting that she cannot get in at the door, the second with an immense nose, the third with a broad thumb. They offered their services and promised to spin the task, if the bride on her wedding day would not be ashamed of them,

Starting point is 04:11:34 would proclaim them her cousins and set them at her table. She consents, they spin off the flags, and the lover praises his betrothed. When now the wedding day comes, the three orrit women present themselves. The bride does them honor and calls them cousins. The bridegroom is surprised and asks how she comes by such ill-favored friends. Oh, said the bride, it's by spinning that they have become so deformed. One has such a broad back from sitting, the second has licked her mouth quite off. the fore her nose stands out so,

Starting point is 04:12:10 and the third has twisted thread so much with her thumb. Then the bridegroom was troubled and said to the bride she should never spin another thread as long as she lived, that she might not become such a monstrosity. A third tale from the Ober Lancets by T. Pechek is in Bushing's weekly news. It agrees in general with Pretorius. One of the three old women has sore eyes

Starting point is 04:12:38 because the impurities of the flags have got into them, the second has a mouth from year to year on account of wetting thread, the third is fat and clumsy by much sitting at the spinning wheel. A part of the story is in Norwegian in Asbjernsen, and in Swedish in Caballius. Manusel Les Retiers Ricked in Rigdon agrees in the introduction, and the set the colonel of the pentameron is also connected with this tale. The author to the reader, from the preface to the Deutsche Grammatic,

Starting point is 04:13:15 It has cost me no long hesitation to prune back to the stock the first shoots of my granaries. A second growth, firmer and finer, has quickly followed. Perhaps one may hope for flowers and ripening fruit. Which joy I give to the public this work, now become more worthy of its attention, that I have carefully tended and brought to these ends. amid cares and privations, in which labor was sometimes a drudgery, and sometimes, and by God's goodness, oftener my comfort. The fruitfulness of the field is of such a nature that it never fails, and no leave from the sources can be re-examined that does not arouse by a more distant prospect

Starting point is 04:14:00 or make one repent of past errors. If now a rich booty should win me less praised than a many-sided, careful, economical administration of a smaller treasure, the blame may fall on me, that I have not known how to draw from all the principles I have discovered the uses of which they were capable, and even that important observations sometimes stand in obscure places. Not all my assertions will stand, but by the discoveries of their weakness, other paths will be opened, through which will break at last the truth. The only goal of honest labor and the only thing that lasts when men have ceased to care for the names of like aspirants. What was hardest for us may be chance-played posterity, hardly worth speaking of.

Starting point is 04:14:52 Then truth will yield herself to new solutions of which we had yet to hint, and will struggle with obstacles where we thought all made plain. End of Section 9, read by Claudia Cald. of the world's best literature, ancient and modern, volume 17. This is a Liverpoolx recording. All LibraVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visitlibervox.org. Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Volume 17, selected excerpts from the history of Greece by George Grote.

Starting point is 04:15:41 1794 to 1871. it is a coincidence so striking as almost to put the english university system itself on the defensive that neither grope nor given owed anything to academic training given indeed spent fourteen months at oxford the most idle and unprofitable of my whole life george groat the son of a london banker ended his school days at sixteen when he left the charter house he had been grounded in latin by a devoted at five years. However, and he took with him to the bank little or no mathematics, an enthusiastic love for metaphysics, classical literature and history, which proved to be lifelong. From 1810 to 1820, under his father's roof, he devoted his early mornings and evenings to study. His most important older friends were the political economist James Mill, Ricardo, and Bentham. But they did not divert him from historical interests. Even during his long engagement, he guided by letter

Starting point is 04:16:51 the education and reading of his future wife, with a constant view to his own far-reaching plans for study and creative work. With Grote's marriage to the brilliant and devoted Harry Lewin in 1820 began a happier epic. He had now his own home and a moderate income. Mrs. Groat drew him somewhat into society, travel, and a widened circle of friendship on the continent, as well as in London. These digressions only aided what would else have been too bookish and secluded a development. Mrs. Grote, however, was mistaken in her recollection that she herself first, in the autumn of 1823, suggested the subject of his chief life work. At least a year previous, the plan for the great history of Greece had been formed.

Starting point is 04:17:43 In 1830, his father's death left Mr. Grote abundant wealth. Nevertheless, the decade, 1831 to 41, which was spent in active political work as the leader in Parliament of the group known as philosophic radicals, did indeed reduce his systematic and untiring studies to mere desultory reading and seemingly endangered his literary career. Yet even this experience, as he himself declared, was of indispensable use to him in comprehending the fierce and democratic politics of ancient Athens. Returning early in 1842 from a brief stay in Italy, now severing altogether his relations with the bank the next year. He now first, in his 50th year, devoted his whole strength to his appointed task. His powerful review of Mitt FitzGreece in 1843 prepared the way for the way for

Starting point is 04:18:43 the enthusiastic welcome, according in 1845, to the first two volumes of his history of Greece. The 12th and closing volume did not appear until 1856. Some adequate outlines of his life and character are essential to any fair appreciation of Mr. Grode's chief work. Defatigable as a student, a fearless lover of the truth, widely familiar with men in affairs, a wise philanthropist and far-sighted reformer. Mr. Grote's noble personality gives weight to his every sentence, as an athlete's whole frame in training goes into each blow he strikes. It seems a trifling criticism upon such a man,

Starting point is 04:19:27 to say he was not a literary artist. This is true indeed, as to his choice of idiom and phrase. He has not that curious felicity, which makes us linger lovingly over the fact, words in which a Plato, a montaigne, a Burke cast his thoughts. Even in the delineation of a great scene, like the defeat at Syracuse or the downfall of Athens, he is really picturesque. He does not appeal indeed to the youthful imagination, but to the mature judgment. We can well imagine that this calm, even-toned, judicious voice made itself heard effectively in the debates of the English

Starting point is 04:20:09 Commons. Of course, no one man can ever write an ideal history of that unique, creative, many-sided, Helena Grace. But the work of Mr. Grode is still, a half-century after its creation, indispensable as an account of political institutions among the Greeks. Even here, the thousands of newly discovered inscriptions, the fortunate reappearance of Aristotle's treatise on the Athenian Constitution and the ceaseless march of special investigation make desirable some fresh annotation upon almost every page. The familiarity with Greek lands and folk, which gives a charm to Professor Curtis's work, is missing from Mr. Groats. Still more do we miss any warm enthusiasm for the Hellenic art, which was so indispensable an element in their life. Even their literature is to him

Starting point is 04:21:07 less a beautiful organism quivering with life than a source for more or less accurate information. In this and in many other respects, he is curiously like the Athenian student of history and of truth, Thucydides, who could write in the day of Phidias and Sophocles, as if he had never heard of a myth or a statue. It is true also that Grot is always an English liberal, finding it every page of history fresh reason for hope and trust in modern democracy. This indeed we do not regard as adverse criticism at all. If a man be not actually blinded to truth by narrow prejudices, the more cordially his own convictions color his writings, the greater will be their value and vitality. Posterity will bring more and more human experience to the interpretation of the remote past. They may yet

Starting point is 04:22:05 understand Periclesian Athens, out of their own similar life, infinitely better than our centric could do, like Chapman's or Pope's Homer, quotes Greece may yet have a value of its own, quite apart from the question of its truthfulness to Hellenic antiquity, as a monument of Victorian England. To us, however, it is still the largest, truest, most adequate general picture yet drawn of Hellas, from the days of Homer to the time of Alexander. Hardly less intense was Mr. Grote's interest in the Greek philosophy. The chapters on Socrates and on the Sophist are perhaps the ablest of the most original in the history.

Starting point is 04:22:50 Moreover, as soon as that great work was completed, he began the series of treatises on the philosophic schools, which was an indispensable portion of his task. The three volumes on Plato and his companions, however, did not appear until 1865, and of the great projected work on Aristotle, only a small segment took shape before death overtook the noble, generous old scholar. His wife long survived him and a personal life of George Grote, despite numerous minor lapses of memory, as one of the most valuable books in its class. The important article in Mr. Groat, in the Dictionary of National Biography by Professor Robertson, is based on part on intimate personal acquaintance. Mr. Groot's minor works are all mentioned there. Least known of all to the general public is a small volume of poems. These were printed privately by his widow in 1872 and were chiefly written during his courtship,

Starting point is 04:23:54 which was unduly prolonged and embittered by parental opposition. We intentionally reserve for a final detail this especially appealing human experience of the statesman, metaphysician, and historian. The death character and work of Alexander the Great, from A History of Greece. The intense sorrow felt by Alexander for the death of Hephassian, not merely an attached friend, but of the same age and exuberant figure as himself, laid his mind open to glooming forebodings from numerous omens, as well as to jealous mistrust even of his oldest officers. Antipater, especially, no longer protected against the calumnies of Olympias by the support of Hephecian, fell more and more into discredit, whilst his son Cassander, who had recently come into Asia with the Macedonian reinforcement, underwent from Alexander,

Starting point is 04:24:55 erascible moments, much insulting violence. In spite of the dissuasive warming of the Chaldean priests, Alexander had been persuaded to distrust their sincerity, and had entered Babylon, though not without hesitation and uneasiness. However, what after having entered the town, he went out of it again safely on his expedition, for the survey of the lower Euphrates. He conceived himself to have exposed them as deceitful alarmist. and returned to the city with increased confidence for the obsequies of his deceased friend. The sacrifices connected with these obsequies were on the most prodigious scale. Victims enough were offered to furnish a feast for the army,

Starting point is 04:25:42 who also received ample distributions of wine. Alexander presided in person at the feast and abandoned himself to conviviality like the rest. Already full of wine, he was persuaded by his first. friend Medius, to sup with him, and to pass the whole night and yet further drinking, with the boisterous indulgence called by the Greeks, comus or revelry. Having slept off his intoxication during the next day, he in the evening again sucked with Medias, and spent the second night in the like unmeasured indulgence. It appears that he already had the seeds of fever upon him, which is so fatally aggravated

Starting point is 04:26:22 by his intemperance that it was too ill to return to his palace. He took the bath and slept in the house of Medius. On the next morning he was unable to rise, after having been carried out on a couch to celebrate sacrifice, which was his daily habit. He was obliged to lie in bed all day. Nevertheless, he summoned the generals to his presence, prescribing all the details of the impending expedition,

Starting point is 04:26:48 and ordering that the land force should begin its march on the fourth day following, while the fleet, with himself aboard, would sail on the fifth day. In the evening he was carried on a couch across the Euphrates into a garden on the other side, where he bathes and rested for the night.

Starting point is 04:27:08 The fever still continued, so that in the morning, after bathing and being carried out to perform the sacrifices, he remained on his couch all day, talking and playing at dice with Medias. In the evening he bathed, sacrificed again and ate a light suffer, but endured a bad night with increased fever.

Starting point is 04:27:28 The next two days passed in the same manner, the fever becoming worse and worse. Nevertheless, Alexander still summoned Nyrkus to his bedside, discussed with him many points about his maritime projects, and repeated his order that the fleet should be ready by the third day. On the ensuing morning, the fever was violent. Alexander reposed all day in a bathing house in the garden, yet still calling in the generals to direct the filling up of vacancies among the officers and ordering that the armament should be ready to move.

Starting point is 04:28:03 Throughout the next two days, his malady became hourly more aggravated. On the second of the two, Alexander could, with difficulty support the being lifted out of bed to perform the sacrifice. Even then, however, he continued to give orders to the, the generals about the expedition. On the morrow, though desperately ill, he still made the effort requisite for performing the sacrifice. He was then carried across from the garden house to the palace, giving orders that the generals and officers should remain in permanent attendance in and near the hall.

Starting point is 04:28:38 He caused some of them to be called to his bedside, but though he knew them perfectly, he had by this time become incapable of utterance. One of his last words spoken is said to have been on being asked to whom he bequeathed his kingdom. To the strongest, one of his last acts was to take the signet ring from his finger and handed to Perdicius. The two nights in a day he continued in this state without either amendment or repose. Meanwhile, the news of his malady had spread through the army, filling them with grief and consternation. Many of the soldiers eager to see him once more, forced their way into the palace, and were admitted unarmed. They passed along by the bedside with all the demonstrations of affliction and sympathy.

Starting point is 04:29:28 Alexander knew them and made show a friendly recognition as well as he could, but was unable to say a word. Several of the generals slept in the temple of Serapus, hoping to be informed by the God in a dream whether they ought to bring Alexander in. to it as a suppliant to experience the divine healing power, that God informed them in their dream that Alexander not to be brought into the temple, that it would be better for him to be left where he was. In the afternoon, he expired June 323 BC, after a life of 32 years and eight months, and a reign of 12 years and eight months. The death of Alexander, thus suddenly cut off by a fever in the plenitude of health, figure, and aspirations, was an event impressive as well as important in the highest possible degree, to his contemporaries far and near.

Starting point is 04:30:27 When the first report of it was brought to Athens, the orator Demides exclaimed, it cannot be true. If Alexander were dead, the whole habitable world would have smelt of his carcass. This course, but emphatic comparison illustrates the immediate, and wide-reaching impression produced by the sudden extinction of the great conqueror. It was felt by each of the many remote envoys who had so recently come to propitiate this far shooting of Bolo. By every man among the nations who had sent these envoys, throughout Europe, Asia, and Africa, as then known, to affect either his actual condition or his probable future. The first growth in development of Macedonia, during the 22 years,

Starting point is 04:31:14 is preceding the Battle of Cheronia, from an embarrassed secondary state into the first of all known powers, had excited the astonishment of contemporaries and admiration for Phillips' organizing genius. But the achievements of Alexander, during his 12 years of rain, throwing Philip into the shade, had been on a scale so much grander and faster, and so completely without serious reverse or even interruption, as to transcend the measure not only a few, expectation, but almost of human belief. The great king, as the king of Persia was called by excellence, was and had long been the type of worldly power and felicity, even down to the time when Alexander crossed the

Starting point is 04:32:00 Hellespont. Within four years and three months from this event, by one stupendous defeat after another, Darius had lost all his Western Empire and had become a fugitive eastward of the Caspian gates, escaping activity at the hands of Alexander, only to perish by those of the satrapsis. All antecedent historical parallels, the ruin and captivity of the Lydian creases, the expulsion and mean life of the Syracusian Dionysius, both of them impressive examples of the mutability of human condition, sank into trifles compared with the overthrow of this towering Persian Colossus.

Starting point is 04:32:44 The orator Eskinis expressed the genuine sentiment of a Grecian spectator when he exclaimed, in a speech delivered at Athens shortly before the death of Darius, what is there among the list of strange and unexpected events

Starting point is 04:32:59 that has not occurred in our time? Our lives have transcended the limits of humanity. We are born to serve as a theme for incredible tales to posterity. Is not the Persian king? who dug through Athos and bridged the Hellespont, who demanded earth and water from the Greeks,

Starting point is 04:33:18 who dared to proclaim himself in public epistles, master of all mankind from the rising to the setting sun. Is not he now struggling to the last, not for dominion over others, but for the safety of his own person? Such were the sentiments excited by Alexander's career, even in the middle of 330 BC, more than seven years before his death. During the following seven years, his additional achievements

Starting point is 04:33:46 had carried astonishment yet farther. He had mastered in defiance of fatigue, hardship, and combat, not merely all the eastern half of the Persian Empire, but unknown Indian regions beyond its easternmost limits. Besides Macedonia, Greece, and Thrace, he possessed all that immense treasure and military force, which had once rendered the great king so formidable. But no contemporary man had any such power ever been known or conceived. With the turn of imagination, then prevalent, many were doubtless disposed to take him for a god on earth, as Christian spectators had once supposed with regard to Xerxes, when they beheld the innumerable Persian host, crossing the Hellespont.

Starting point is 04:34:34 Exalted to this prodigious grandeur, Alexander was at the time of his death little more than 32 years old. The age which a citizen of Athens was growing into important commands. Ten years less than the age for a consul at Rome. Two years younger than the age of which Timor first acquired the crown and began his foreign conquests. His extraordinary bodily powers were unabated. He had acquired a large stock of military experience.

Starting point is 04:35:05 And what was still more important. important, his appetite for further conquest was as voracious, and his readiness to purchase it at the largest cost of toil or danger as complete, as it had been when he first crossed the hellespont. Great as his past career had been, his future achievements, with such increased means and experience were likely to be yet greater. His ambition would have been satisfied with nothing less than the conquest of the whole habitable world as then known. and if his life had been prolonged, he would probably have accomplished it. Nowhere, so far as our knowledge reaches, did there reside any military power capable of making head against him?

Starting point is 04:35:50 Nor were his soldiers, when he commanded them, daunted or baffled by any extremity of cold, heat, or fatigue. The patriarch feelings of Livy disposed him to maintain that Alexander, had he invaded Italy and assailed Romans or Sand Nights. would have failed and perished like his relative, Alexander of Iperus. But this conclusion cannot be accepted. If we grant the courage and discipline of the Roman infantry to have been equal to the best infantry of Alexander's army, the same cannot be said of the Roman cavalry,

Starting point is 04:36:26 as compared with the Macedonian companions. Still less is it likely that a Roman consul annually changed would have been found a match for Alexander in military genius and combinations, nor even if personally equal, would he have possessed the same variety of troops and arms, each effective in its separate way and all conspiring to one common purpose, nor the same unbounded influence over their minds in stimulating them to full effort? I do not think that even the Romans could have successfully resisted Alexander the Great.

Starting point is 04:37:04 Thou it is certain that he never threw out all his long marches and countered such enemies as they, nor even such as Samnites, and Luchanians, combining courage, patriotism, discipline, with effective arms both for defense and for close combat. Among all the qualities which go to constitute the highest military excellence, either as a general or as a soldier, none was wanting in the character of Alexander, together with his own chivalrous coverage, sometimes indeed both excessive and unseasonable, so as to form the only military defect which can be fairly imputed to him. We trace in all his operations the most careful dispositions taken beforehand. Vigilant precaution in guarding against boss will reverse, an abundant resource in adapting himself to new contingencies. Amidst constant success, these precautionary combinations were,

Starting point is 04:38:03 Nevid has continued. His achievements are the earliest recorded evidence of scientific military organization on a large scale and of its overwhelming effects. Alexander overhaws the imagination more than any other personage of antiquity, by the matchless development of all that constitutes effective force, as an individual warrior and as organizer and leader of armed masses, not merely the blind impetuosity ascribed by Homer to Ares, but also the intelligent methodized, and all subduing compression which he personifies in Athena. But all his great qualities were fit for use only against enemies,

Starting point is 04:38:48 in which category indeed were numbered all mankind, known and unknown, except those who chose to submit to him. In his Indian campaigns, amidst tribes of utter strangers, we perceive not only those who stand on their defense, but also those who abandon their property and flee to the mountains, are like pursued and slaughtered. Apart from the transcendent merits of Alexander as a soldier and a general, some authors give him credit for grand and beneficent views on the subject of imperial government, and for intentions highly favorable to the improvement of mankind. I see no ground for adopting this opinion. as far as we can venture to anticipate what would have been Alexander's future. We see nothing in prospect except years of ever repeated aggression and conquest, not to be concluded until he had

Starting point is 04:39:43 traversed and subjugated all the inhabited globe. The acquisition of universal dominion, conceived not metaphorically but literally, and conceived with greater facility and consequence of the imperfect geographical knowledge of the time, was the master's. to passion of his soul. At the moment of his death, he was commencing fresh aggression in the south against the Arabians to an indefinite extent, while his vast projects against

Starting point is 04:40:13 the Western tribes in Africa and Europe, as far as the pillars of Heracles, were consigned in the orders of memoranda confidentially communicated to Crateras. Italy, Gaul, and Spain would have been successfully attacked and conquered. The Enterprise's proposed, to him when in Bactria by the Coromersian prince Faramannes.

Starting point is 04:40:37 But postponed then, until a more convenient season, would have been next taken up, and he would have marched from the Danube northward round the Yusin and Palace meyotus, against the Scythians and the tribes of Glococcus. They remain moreover the Asiatic regions east of the Hyphysus, which his soldiers have refused to enter upon, but which he's soldiers, certainly would have invaded at a future opportunity, were it only to efface the poignant humiliation of having been compelled to relinquish his proclaimed purpose. Though this sounds like romance and hyperbole, it was nothing more than the real insatiate aspiration of Alexander,

Starting point is 04:41:18 who looked upon every new acquisition, mainly as a capital for acquiring more. You are a man, like all of us, Alexander, said the naked Indian to him, except, that you abandon your home like a meddlesome destroyer, to invade the most distant regions, enduring hardship yourself and inflicting hardship upon others. Now, how an empire the spondless and heterogeneous, such as no prince has ever yet realized, could have been administered with any superior advantages to subjects,

Starting point is 04:41:52 it would be difficult to show. The mere task of acquiring and maintaining of keeping satraps and tribute garatheers in up, authority, as well as subordination, of suppressing resistances ever liable to recur in regions distant by months of March would occupy the whole life of a world conqueror, without leaving any leisure for the improvements suited to peace and stability, if we give him credit for such purposes in theory. But even this last is more than can be granted.

Starting point is 04:42:27 X indicate that he desired nothing better than to take up the traditions of the Persian Empire, a tribute levying, an army levying system, under Macedonians in large proportion as his instruments, yet partly also under the very same Persians who had administered before, provided they submitted to him. It has indeed been extolled among his merits that it was thus willing to reappoint Persian grandees, putting their armed force over under the command of a Macedonian officer, and to continue native princes in their dominions, if they did willing homage to him as tributary subordinates. But all this had been done before him by the Persian kings,

Starting point is 04:43:12 whose estimate was to lead the conquered princes undisturbed, subject only to the payment of tribute, and to the obligation of furnishing a military contingent one required. In like manner, Alexander's Asiatic Empire would thus have been composed of an aggregate of satrapies and dependent principalities, furnishing money and soldiers, in other respects left to the discretion of local rule, with occasional extreme inflictions of punishment, but no systematic examination or control. Upon this, the condition of Asiatic Empire in all ages, Alexander would have grafted one special improvement, the military organization of the empire. Feeble under the Eskimated princes would have been greatly strengthened by his genius and by the able officers formed in his school, both for foreign aggression and for home control.

Starting point is 04:44:10 In respect of intelligence and combining genius, Alexander was Hellenic to the full. In respect to disposition and purpose, no one could be less Hellenic. The acts attesting his Oriental violence of impone. unmeasured self-will, and exaction of reverence above the limits of humanity, have been already recounted. To describe him as the son of Hellas, imbued with the political maxims of Aristotle, and bent on the systematic diffusion of Hellenic culture for the improvement of mankind, is in my judgment an estimate of his character, contrary to the evidence. Alexander is indeed said to have invited suggestions from Aristotle as to the best mode of colonizing. But his temper altered so much after a few years of Asiatic conquest

Starting point is 04:45:01 that he came not only to lose all deference for Aristotle's advice, but even to hate him bitterly. Moreover, though the philosopher's full suggestions have not been preserved, yet we are told generally that he recommended Alexander to behave to the Greeks as a leader or president or limited chief and to the barbarians, non-Haleens, as a master, a distinction substantially coinciding with that pointed out by Burke and his speeches at the beginning of the American war between the principles of government proper to be followed by England in the American colonies and in British India.

Starting point is 04:45:43 No Greek thinker believed the Asiatics to be capable of that free civil. of a polity upon which the march of every grecian community was based. Aristotle did not wish to degrade the Asiatics below the level to which they had been accustomed, but rather to preserve the Greeks from being degraded to the same level. Now Alexander recognized no such distinction as that drawn by his preceptor. He treated Greeks and Asiatics alike, not by elevating the latter, but by degrading the former. Though he employed all indiscreet, terminately as instruments. Yet he presently found the free speech of Greeks, and even of Macedonians, so distasteful and offensive that his preferences turned more and more in favor of the servile,

Starting point is 04:46:31 Asiatic sentiment, and customs. Instead of Hellenizing Asia, he was tending to asiatize Macedonia and Hellas. His temper and character is modified by a few years of conquest, rendered him quite unfit to follow the course recommended by Aristotle towards the Greeks, quite as unfit as any of the Persian kings, or as the French Emperor Napoleon, to endure that partial frustration, compromise, and sparked from free criticism, which is inseparable from the position of a limited chief. Among a multitude of subjects worn to first-colored than even the army of Xerxes, it is quite possible that he might have turned his power towards the improvement of the rudest portions. We are told, though the fact is difficult to credit from his want of time, that he abolished

Starting point is 04:47:25 furious barbarisms of the Herkernians, Arricotians, and Sardidians. But Macedonians, as well as Greeks, would have been pure losers by being absorbed into an immense Asiatic aggregate. This process of Hellenizing Asia, insofar of, as Asia was ever Hellenized, which has often been ascribed to Alexander, was in reality the work of the diodoki who came after him, though his conquest doubtless opened the door and established the military ascendancy, which rendered such a work practicable. The position, the aspirations, and the interests of these diodokie, indigenous, telome, salukis, lysimachus, etc., were materially different from those of Alexander.

Starting point is 04:48:15 They had neither appetite nor means, but new and remote conquest. Their great rivalry was with each other. Each sought to strengthen himself near home against the rest. It became a matter of fashion and pride with them, not less than of interest, defound loose cities immortalizing their family names.

Starting point is 04:48:35 These foundations were chiefly made in the regions of Asia near and known to Greeks, where Alexander had planted none. Thus the great and numerous foundations of Seleucus Nicator and his successors covered Syria, Mesopotamia, and parts of Asia Minor. All these regions were known to Greeks and more or less tempting to new Grecian immigrants, not out of reach or hearing of the Olympic and other festivals, as the Dixardis and the Indus were. In this way, a considerable influx of new Hellenic blood was poured into Asia during the century's success. exceeding Alexander, probably in great measure from Italy and Sicily, where the condition of the Greek cities became more and more calamitous,

Starting point is 04:49:22 besides the numerous Greeks who took service as individuals under these Asiatic kings, Greeks and Macedonian-speaking Greek, became predominant, if not in numbers, at least in importance, throughout most of the cities in Western Asia. In particular, the Macedonian military organization, discipline, and administration were maintained systematically among these Asiatic kings, in the account of the Battle of Magnesia, fought by the Salucid king Antiochus the Great against the Romans of 190 BC. The Macedonian phalanx constituted the main force of his Asiatic army, appears in all its completeness, just as disdisc. that stood under Philip and Perseus in Macedonia itself. Moreover, besides this, there was the still more important fact that the many new cities founded in Asia by the Salucadie and the other contemporary kings. Each of these cities had a considerable infusion of Greek and Macedonian citizens among the native orientals located here, often brought by compulsion from neighboring villages.

Starting point is 04:50:35 In what numerical ratio these two elements of the civic population stood to each other, we cannot say. But the Greeks and Macedonians were the leading and active portion, who exercised the greatest dissimulating force, gave imposing, in fact, to the public manifestations of religion, had wider views and sympathies, dealt with the central government, and carried on that contracted measure of municipal autonomy, which the city was permitted to retain. In these cities, the Greek inhabitants, though, departed from political freedom, enjoyed a range of social activities suited to their tastes. In each, Greek was the language of public business and dealing. Each formed a center of attraction and commerce for an extensive neighborhood.

Starting point is 04:51:25 Altogether, they were the main Hellenic or Quasi-Hellenic element in Asia under the Greek-co-Aziatic kings, as contrasted with the rustic villages, when native manners and probably native speech still continued with little modification. But the Greeks of Antioch, or Alexandria, or Seleucia, were not like citizens of Athens or Thebes, nor even like men, of Tarantam or Ephesus. While they communicated their language to Orientals,

Starting point is 04:51:56 they became themselves substantially orientalized. Their feelings, judgments, and habits of action ceased to be Hellenic. Polyvius, when he visited Alexandria, looked with surprise and aversion on the Greeks there resident, though they were superior to the non-Hellenic population, whom he considered worthless. Greek social habits. Festivals and legends passed with the Hellenic settlers into Asia, all becoming amalgamated and transformed so as to suit a new Asiatic abode. Important social and political consequences turned upon the diffusion of the language and upon the establishment of such a common medium of communication throughout Western Asia. But after all, the Hellenized Asiatic

Starting point is 04:52:45 was not so much a Greek as a foreigner with Christian speech, exterior varnish, and superficial manifestations, distinguished fundamentally from those Greek citizens with whom the present history has been concerned, so he would have been considered by Sophocles, by Thucydides, by Socrates. We read that Alexander felt so much interest in the extension of science that he gave to Aristotle the immense sum of 800 talents in money, placing under his directions several thousand men for the purpose of prosecuting sociological researchers. These exaggerations are probably the work of those enemies, other philosopher,

Starting point is 04:53:27 who decried him as a pensioner of the Macedonian court. But it is probable enough that Philip and Alexander in the early part of his reign may have helped Aristotle in the difficult process of getting together facts and specimens for observation, from esteem towards him personally, rather than from interest in his discoveries. The intellectual turn of Alexander was towards literature, poetry, and history. He was fond of the Iliad especially, as well as of the attic tragedians,

Starting point is 04:54:00 so that Harpalis, being directed to send some books to him in Upper Asia, selected as the most acceptable packet, various tragedies of Escalis, Sophocles, and Euripides, with the diatheramic poems of testes and the histories of Philistus. The rise of Cleon from the history of Greece.

Starting point is 04:54:23 Upon the great increase of trade and population in Athens and Pyrrhus. During the last 40 years, a new class of politicians seems to have grown up. Men engaged in various descriptions of trade and manufacture who began to rival more or less in importance the ancient families

Starting point is 04:54:41 of added proprietors. This change was substantially analogous to that which took place in the cities of medieval Europe when the merchants and traders of the various gills gradually came to compete with and ultimately supplanted

Starting point is 04:54:56 the patrician families in whom the supremacy had originally resided. In Athens, persons of ancient family and station endured at this time. No political privilege. And since the reforms of Ephelitis and Pericles, the political constitution had become thoroughly democratical, but they still continue to form the two highest classes in the Salonian census founded on property. The Pentecost Simeo-Simio-Durricular,

Starting point is 04:55:26 the Menni, and the Hepes or Knights. An individual Athenian of this class, though without any legal title to preference, yet when he stood forward as candidate for political influence, continued to be decidedly preferred and welcomed by the social sentiment of Athens, which preserved in its spontaneous sympathy's distinctions are faced from the political code. Besides this place, ready prepared for him in the public sympathy, especially advantageous at the outset of political life. He found himself further borne up by the family connections,

Starting point is 04:56:03 associations of political clubs, etc., which exercised very great influence, both on the politics and the judicature of Athens, and of which he became a member as a matter of course. Such advantages were doubtless only auxiliary, carrying a man up to a certain point of influence, but leaving him to achieve the risk by his own, personal qualities and capacity. But their effect was nevertheless very real, and those who,

Starting point is 04:56:32 without possessing them, met and puffeted him in the public assembly, contended against great disadvantages. A person of such low or middling station obtained no favorable presumptions or indulgence on the part of the public to meet him halfway, no had he established connections to encourage for successes, or help him out of early scrapes. He found others already in possession of ascendancy and well-disposed to keep down new competitors so that he had to win his own way unaided. From the first step to the last, by qualities personal to himself,

Starting point is 04:57:10 by assiduity of attendance, by acquaintance with business, by powers of striking speech, and withal by unflungent audacity, indispensable to enable him to bear up against that opposition and enmity, which he would incur from the high-born politicians and organized party clubs, as soon as they appeared to be rising up into ascendancy. The free march of political and judicial affairs raised up several such men, during the years beginning and immediately preceding the Peloponnesian War.

Starting point is 04:57:43 Even during the lifetime of Pericles, they appeared to have arisen in greater or less numbers, but the personal ascendancy of that great man, who combined and overrexia, Aristocratical position with a strong and genuine democratic sentiment and an enlarged intellect rarely found attached to either, impressed a peculiar character on Athenian politics. The Athenian world was divided into his partisans and his opponents. Among each of whom, there were individuals high-born and low-born, though the aristocratic party properly so-called the majority of wealthy and high-born Athenians, either opposed or disliked him.

Starting point is 04:58:25 It is about two years after his death that we begin to hear of a new class of politicians. Among them all, the most distinguished was Cleon, son of Clonidas. Cleon acquired his first importance among the speakers against Pericles,

Starting point is 04:58:41 so that he would thus obtain for himself during his early political career, the countenance of the numerous and aristocratical anti-Pericles He is described by Thucydides, in general terms, as a person of the most violent temper and character in Athens, as being dishonest in his calumnies and virulent in his infective accusation. Aristophanes, in his comedy of the Knights, reproduces these features, with others new and distinct as well as with exaggerated details, comic, satirical, and contemptuous. His comedy depicts Cleon in the point of view in which it would appear to the Knights of Athens,

Starting point is 04:59:26 a leather dresser, smelling of the tan yard, a low-born brawler, terrifying opponents by the violence of his discriminations, the loudness of his voice, the impudence of his gestures. Moreover, as venal in his politics, threatening men with accusations and then receiving money to withdraw them,

Starting point is 04:59:46 a robber of the public treasury, persecuting merit as well as ring and courting the favor of the assembly by the basis of most guilty cajolary the general attributes set forth by thucydides apart from aristophanes who does not profess to write history we may well respect the powerful and violent invective of cleon often dishonest together with his self-confidence and audacity in the public assembly men of the middle in class like Cleon and hyperbulous, who persevered in addressing the public assembly and trying to take a leading part in it against persons of greater family pretension than themselves, were pretty sure to be men of more than usual audacity. Had they not possessed this quality, they would never have surmounted the opposition made to them. We may well believe that they had it to a displeasing excess, and even if they had not, the same measure of self-assumption which in Akabetes would be tolerated from his rank and station would in them pass for insupportable impudence.

Starting point is 05:00:58 Unhappily, we have no specimens to enable us to appreciate the invective of Cleon. We cannot determine whether it was more virulent than that of Demosthenes and Esquinis. Sevent years afterwards, each of those eminent orities impugetius impughey's impughey. Cuting to the other the grossest impudence, calumny, perjury, corruption, loud voice, and revolting audacity of manner. In language with Cleon can hardly have surpassed an intensity of it by tuburation, though he doubtless fell immeasurably short of it in classical finish. Nor can we even tell him what to grie Cleon's denunciations are the veteran Pericles, were fiercer than those memorable invectives against the old age of Sir Robert Walpole,

Starting point is 05:01:44 with which Lord Chatham's political career opened. His personal hold on the Public Assembly had grown into a sort of ascendancy, which Thucydides describes by saying that Cleon was, at that time by far the most persuasive speaker in the eyes of the people. The fact of Cleon's great power of speech and his capacity of handling public business is a popular manner, is better attested than anything else respecting him, because it depends upon two witnesses both hostile to him, the Cedities and Aristophanes.

Starting point is 05:02:21 The Assembly and the Deccastery were Cleon's theater and holding ground, for the Athenian people taken collectively in their place of meeting, and the Athenian people taking individually were not always the same person and had not the same mode of judgment. Demov's sitting in the fix was a different man from Deimos at home. The lofty combination of qualities possessed by Pericles exercised ascendancy over both one and the other. But the qualities of Cleon

Starting point is 05:02:52 swayed considerably the former without standing high in the esteem of the latter. End of Section 10. Section 11 of Library the World's Best Literature Ancient and Modern, Volume 17. This is a liverbox recording. All Livervox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit livervox.org.

Starting point is 05:03:26 Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Volume 17. Selected excerpts by Eugenie, 1805 to 1848, and Maurice, 1810 to 1839, de Guerin. This remarkable brother and sister might have have been written the words. They were lovely and pleasant in their lives, and in their death, they were not divided. We were, says Eugenie, two eyes looking out of one head. The history as well as their literary work is left in the form of journals and letters, not written for publication. These are most intimate records of their characters and spirits. Eugenie and George Maurice de Guerin were born in the old chateau of Kaley, Languedoc, of a noble but impoverished family.

Starting point is 05:04:22 Eugenie, the oldest of four children in 1805, and Maurice, the youngest, August 5th, 1810. On the death of their mother, Eugenie assumed care of the delicate brother, to whom her life was thenceforth devoted, to a desolate home with sorrow and an austere religion held sway. The morbid note of Maurice's impressionable nature must be attributed. He went to school and Toulouse, spent five years in college, joined in 1832 the famous Laminase in his monastic retreat at La Channes, and finally went to Paris to seek fame by literary work. Here he taught, wrote, and married, dying at the early age of 29 on July 19, 1839.

Starting point is 05:05:11 In 1840, Madame George Sand brought out in the Review de de de de mong, his principal composition, Ler Centaur. Maurice was a dreamer from his infancy, possessed of a melancholy spirit and a wonderful insight into nature's physical and mystical beauties. He has a truly interpretive faculty, says Matthew Arnold, the most profound and delicate sense of the life of nature, and the most exquisite felicity in finding expressions to render that sense. We may divide his life into two periods, the first under the influence of Lemonet at Le Cheney, where so much of his journal was written, and the second in Paris,

Starting point is 05:05:57 where he soon became Saint-Byrd tells us, a man of the world, elegant, even fashionable, a conversationalist who could hold his own against the most brilliant talkers of Paris. to the first period belongs the greater part of his journal upon which with the centaur his fame rests for his verses possessed little value of the suggestions of landscapes in the journal st berth says they are delicate they are felt and painted at the same time they are painted from nearby on the spot according to nature but without crudeness there is no trace of the palette the colors have their original freshness and truth and also a certain tenderness. They have passed into the mirror of the inner man and are seen by reflection. One finds in them above all expression, and they

Starting point is 05:06:52 breathe the very soul of things. Maurice de Garron describes his own life as made up of serious projects ever-changing and of permanent but idle dreams, of long intoxications of the fancy, and of almost absurd contest between my will and my soul, which is independent and is light in flight as a wild creature. While in the most sensitive and hidden depths of my being, there is always acute suffering or dull discomfort, according as the disorder increases or diminishes. Here then he gives us the keynote to his life and writings.

Starting point is 05:07:31 Morbid introspection combined with a rare poetic fancy, and it is largely owing to this combination that the journal is an interesting psychological study. The centaur was suggested by a visit to the Musei des Antique with his friend Trebutian and is masterly in its conception of that strange imaginative borderland between animal and human life. This being, partaking equally of both these lives, is supposed to stand in his melancholy old age on the summit of a mountain while he relates to inquisitive mortal the history of his youth.

Starting point is 05:08:12 St. Burr considers Eugenie de Garron of equal rank with her brother. But Matthew Arnold, in his essays in criticism, says that Eugenie's words are but intellectual signs, not symbols of nature like Mauritius. They bring the notion of the thing described to the mind. They do not bring the feeling of it to the imagination.

Starting point is 05:08:34 The literary interest in Eugenie centers also in her journal. Her life was passed at Lake Kayla, in the simple routine of household duties and neighborhood charities. Once only she went to Paris, on the occasion of her brother's marriage, she was intensely religious and spent lunchtime in prayer, meditation, and preparation for death. Despite her pleasure and the beauty of nature and in the trivial incidents of her life. She was subject to the moods of morbid depression noted in worries. She condemns this, calling it languor, en wee or weariness. Of course, the Roman Catholic Eugenie de Guerin is ignorant

Starting point is 05:09:20 of Puritan dogma. But allowing for her poetic temperament and tenderness, her rigid asceticism is strangely identical with Puritanism. Everything that gives her pleasure seems to herself indulgent, even writing. She says, I have renounced poetry because I have seen that God did not ask it of me. But the sacrifice has been so much the more painful as an abandoning poetry. Poetry has not abandoned me. Again, she writes, shall I tell you why I gave up the journal? Because I find the time lost that I spend in writing. We owe an account of our minutes to God, and is a it not making a bad use of them, to employ them in tracing the days that are departing? Would to God that my thoughts, my spirit, had never taken their flight beyond the narrow round

Starting point is 05:10:15 in which it is my lot to live? In spite of all that, people say to the contrary, I feel that I cannot go beyond my needlework and my spinning without going too far. I feel it, I believe it. Well then, I will keep in my proper sphere. However much I am tempted, my spirit shall not be allowed to occupy itself with great matters until it occupies itself with them in heaven. And Maurice writes, so long as the wind wafts me from time to time, whiffs of wild fragrance, and my ear catches distant accents of the melodies of nature, what shall I have to regret? Does the spider, which it even tied, hangs suspended on its thread between two leaves, concern itself with the flight of the eagle and the pinions of the birds? And does the imagination of the bird, as it broods over its nestlings, while sheltered beneath some bush,

Starting point is 05:11:16 regret the caprices of its liberty and the soft undulations of its flight through the airy heights? Never have I had the freedom of the bird, nor has my thought ever been. as happy as its wings. Then let us sleep in resignation, as does the bird in its nest. Maurice was the one thought of you, Jenny's life, and all her journal is addressed to him. Two days after his death, she writes,

Starting point is 05:11:45 No, my dear, death shall not part us, shall not remove you from my thoughts. Death only separates our bodies. The soul, instead of being there, is in heaven, and the change of abodes takes nothing away from its affections. Far from it, I trust one loves better in heaven, where all becomes divine. Determined that the world should know Maurice, she wrote to his friends and prepared a memoir for his works.

Starting point is 05:12:15 Yet she died on May 31, 1848, before their publication. St. Burr made her the subject of a Clossary to Lundy. and Tribusian published her relique at Kane, 1855. In 1862, this tribute appeared with public circulation, was crowned by the French Academy and passed through 16 editions in eight months. From the Journal of Eugenie de Guerin, Christmas has come, the beautiful festival, the one I love most, that gives me the same joy that it gave the shepherds of the,

Starting point is 05:12:54 Bethlehem. In real truth, one's whole soul sings with joy this beautiful coming of God upon earth, a coming which here is announced on all sides of us by music and by our charming nette note chimes, end of footnote. Nothing at Paris can give you a notion of what Christmas is with us. You have not even the midnight mass. We all of us went to it, Papa at our head, the most perfect night possible. Never was there a finer sky than ours, was that midnight, so fine that Papa kept perpetually throwing back the hood of his cloak that he might look up at the sky. The ground was white with wharfrosk, but we were not cold. Besides the air, as we met it, was wound by the bundles of blazing torchwood, which our servants carried in front of us

Starting point is 05:13:50 to light us on our way. It was delightful, I do a show. you and I should like you to have seen us there on our road to church in those lanes with the bushes along their banks as white as if they were in flower. The hoar frost makes the most lovely flowers. We saw a long spray so beautiful that we wanted to take it with us as a garland for the communion table, but it melted in our hands. All flowers fade so soon. I was very sorry about my garland. It was wonderful to see it drip away and get smaller and smaller

Starting point is 05:14:28 every minute. Oh, how pleasant it is, when the rain is dropping from the sky with the soft sound, to sit by one's fire, holding the tongs and making sparks. That was my pastime just now. I am fond of it.

Starting point is 05:14:46 The sparks are so pretty. They are the flowers of the hearth. Fairly, charming things take place in the embers, and When I am not busy, I am amused with the fantastmogoria of the fireplace. There are a thousand little forms in the ashes that come and go. Grow bigger, change, and vanish. Sometimes angels, horned demons, children, old women, butterflies, dogs, sparrows, everything,

Starting point is 05:15:13 may be seen under the logs. I remember a figure with an air of heavenly suffering. It seemed to me what a soul might be in purgatory. I was struck and wished an artist had been near me. Never was vision more perfect. Watch the embers, and you will agree that there are beautiful things there, and that unless one was blind, one need never be weary by the fire. Be sure you listen to the little whistling that comes out of the embers, like a voice of song.

Starting point is 05:15:45 Nothing can be sweeter or purer. It is like the singing of some tiny spirit of the fire. these my dear are my evenings and their delights and sleep which is not the slightest you will like to hear that i had just passed a nice quarter of an hour on the terrace steps sitting by a poor old woman who was singing me a lamentable ballad on an incident that once happened at kahoozak it was apropos of a gold cross that was stolen off the holy virgin's neck the old woman recollects her grandmother's telling her grandmother's her, she had heard that there had been a still more sacrilegious robbery in the same church, namely of the host itself, one day when it was left alone in the chancel. It was a girl, who while everybody was at harvest, went to the altar, and climbing upon it, put the monstrance into her apron and placed it under a wild rose in the wood. The shepherds who found it accused her, and nine priests came in procession to adore the holy sacrament

Starting point is 05:16:51 of the rose bush and carry it back to the wood. But the poor shepherdess was taken, tried and condemned to be burned. Just before her death she asked to confess and owned her theft to the priest, saying that she was not a thief, but she wanted to have the holy sacrament in the forest. I thought that Le Bon Dieu would be as well pleased under a rose bush as on an altar. At these words an angel descended from heaven, to announce her pardon and consoled the guilty saint, who nevertheless was burned on a pile,

Starting point is 05:17:27 of which the wild rose formed the first faggot. There is the story of the beggar, to whom I listened as to a nightingale. I thanked her heartily and offered her something as a recompense for her ditty, but she would only take flowers. Give me a bow with that beautiful lilac. I gave her four, as large as plumes, and the poor creature went off.

Starting point is 05:17:51 her stick in one hand and her nosegay in the other and left me her ballad never have i seen a more beautiful effect of light on the paper but does not god make beauty for all the world all our birds were singing this morning whilst i was praying the accompaniment delights though it distracts me i stopped to listen then i resume with the thought that the birds and i are carolling our hymns to god and these little creatures sing, perhaps, better than I. But the charm of prayer, the charm of communion with God, they cannot taste. We must have a soul to feel that. I have this happiness above theirs. Today, and now for a long time, I am tranquil. Peace in head and heart. A state of graceful which I bless God. My window is open. How calm it is. All the little noises outside come to me. I love that. of the stream. Now I hear a church clock in the little pendulum, which answers it. This sound of hours in the distance and in the room has in the night something mysterious. I think of the trappists who

Starting point is 05:19:04 wait to pray, of the sick who count all the hours of their suffering, of the afflictor who weep, of the dead who sleep still and frozen in their beds. From the journal of Maurice de Guerin. It has been raining. Nature is fresh and and radiant. The earth seems to taste with rapture the water which brings it life. One would say that the throats of the birds had also been refreshed by the rain. Their song is purer, more vivacious, more brilliant, and vibrates wonderfully in the air, which has become more sonorous and resounding. The nightingales, the bullfinches, the blackbirds, the thrushes, the golden orioles, the finches, the wrens.

Starting point is 05:19:49 All these sing and rejoice. A goose, shrieking like a trumpet, adds by contrast to the charm. The motionless trees seem to listen to all these sounds. Inumerable apple trees in full bloom look like balls of snow in the distance. The cherry trees, all white as well, rise like pyramids are spread out like fans of flowers. The birds seem at times to aim at those orchestral effects when all the instruments are blended in a mass of harmony. Would that we could identify ourselves with spring, that we could go so far as to believe that in ourselves breathe all the life and all the love that ferment in nature, that we could feel ourselves to be at the same time verdure, song, freshness, elasticity, rapture, serenity.

Starting point is 05:20:40 But what then should I become? There are moments when by dint of concentrating ourselves upon this idea and gazing fixedly on nature, We fancy that we experience something like this. Nothing can more faithfully represent this state of the soul than the shades of evening, falling at this very moment. Gray clouds just edged with silver covered the whole face of the sky. The sun, which set but a few moments ago, has left behind light enough to temper for a while the black shadows and to soften in a measure the fall of night.

Starting point is 05:21:17 The winds are hushed, and the peaceful ocean. as I come to listen on the threshold of the door, sends me only a melodious murmur, which softly spreads over the soul like a beautiful wave over the beach. The birds, the first to feel the influence of the night, fly toward the woods, and their wings rustle in the clouds.

Starting point is 05:21:36 The corpus, which covers the entire slope of the hill of LaBow, and resounds all day long with the chirps of the wren, the gay whistle of the woodpecker, and the various notes of a multitude of birds, a multitude of birds has no more a sound along its path or within its thickets unless it be the shrill call of the black birds as they play together and chase one another after the other birds have hidden their heads under their wings the noise of men always the last to become silent gradually dies away over the face of the fields the general of brocest ceases and not a sound is heard except from the towns and hamlets where far to the night, the children cry and the dogs bark. Silence enraps me. All things yearn for rest except my pen, which disturbs for a chance the slumber of some living Adam asleep in the falls of my notebook,

Starting point is 05:22:33 for it makes its little sound as it writes these idle thoughts. Then let it cease, for what I write have written, and shall write will never be worth the sleep of a single atom. The thoughts of Macarius from The Centaur by Marius de Garan. I had my birth in the caves of these mountains, like the stream of this valley, whose first drops trickle from some weeping rock in a deep cavern. The first moment of my life fell in the darkness of a remote abode, and without breaking the silence. When our mothers draw near to the time of their delivery,

Starting point is 05:23:11 they withdraw to the caverns, and in the depth of the loneliest of them, in the thickest of its gloom, bring forth without uttering a plaint, offspring silent as themselves. Their puissant milk makes a surmount without weakness or dovious struggle, the first difficulties of life, and yet we leave our caverns later than you, your cradles. The reason is that we have a doctrine that the early days of existence should be kept apart and enshrouded, as days filled with the presence of the gods. Nearly the whole term of my growth was passed in the darkness where I was born.

Starting point is 05:23:50 The recesses of my dwelling ran so far under the mountain that I should not have known on which side was the exit, had not the winds when they sometimes made their way through the opening, sent fresh ears in and a sudden trouble. Sometimes, too, my mother came back to me, having about her the odors of the valleys, or streaming from the waters which were her haunt. returning thus without a word said of the valleys or the rivers, but with the emanations from

Starting point is 05:24:20 them hanging about her, troubled my spirit, and I moved up and down restlessly in my darkness. What is it? I cried. This outside world within my mother is born, and what reigns there in it so potent as to attract her so often. At these moments my own force began to make me unquiet. I felt in it a power which could not remain idle And be taking myself either to toss my arms Or to gallop backward and forward in the spacious darkness of the cavern I tried to make out From the blows which I dealt in the empty space

Starting point is 05:24:57 Or from the transport of my course through it In what direction my arms were meant to reach or my feet to bear me Since that day I have wound my arms round the busts of centaurs And round the bodies of heroes and round the trunks of oaks my hands have assayed the rocks of waters plants without number and the subtlest impressions of the air for i uplift them in the dark and still nights to catch the breaths of wind and to draw signs whereby i may augur my road my feet look oh malampus how worn they are and yet i'll be numbed as i am in this extremity of age there are days when a broad sunlight on the mountain top I renew these galloping of my youth in the cavern, and with the same object, brandishing my arms and employing all the fleetness which yet is left to me. O Malampus, thou who wouldst know the life of the centaurs,

Starting point is 05:25:57 wherefore have the gods willed that thy steps should lead thee to me, the old is the most forlorn of them all. It is long since I have ceased to practice any part of their life. I quit no more this mountain summit, to which age has confined me. The point of my arrows now serves me only to uproot some tough-fibered plant. The tranquil lakes know me still, but the rivers have forgotten me. I will tell thee a little of my youth, but these recollections, issuing from a worn memory, come like the drops of a nakedly libation poured from a damaged urn.

Starting point is 05:26:36 The course of my youth was rapid and full of agitation. movement was my life, and my steps knew no bound. One day when I was following the course of a valley seldom entered by the centaurs. I discovered a man making his way up the streamside on the opposite bank. He was the first whom my eyes had lighted on. I despised him. Behold, I cried, at the utmost but the half of what I am. How short are his steps and his movement how full of labor. doubtless he is a centaur overthrown by the gods and reduced by them to drag himself along thus wandering along at my own will like the rivers feeling wherever i went the presence of sibelie whether in the bed of the valleys or on the height of the mountains i bounded whither i would like a blind and chainless life but when night filled with the charm of the gods overtook me on the slopes of the mountain she guided me to the mountain she guided me me to the mouth of the cabins, and there tranquilized me, as she tranquilizes the billows of the sea.

Starting point is 05:27:46 Stretched across the threshold of my retreat, my flanks hidden within the cave, and my head under the open sky. I watched the spectacle of the dark. The sea gods, it is said, quick during the hours of darkness, their palaces unto the deep. They seat themselves on the promontories, and their eyes wander over the expanse of the waves. Even so I kept watch, having at my feet an expanse of life like the hush sea. My regards had free range, and traveled to the most distant points, like sea beaches, which never lose their witness. The line of mountains to the west retained the imprint of gleams, not perfectly wiped out by the shadows. In that quarter still survived in pale clearness, mountain summits bare and pure. There I beheld at one time the gods.

Starting point is 05:28:39 Pian descend ever solitary, at another, the choir of mystic divinities, or I saw past a mountain nymph charm struck by the night. Sometimes the eagles of Mount Olympus traverses the upper sky, and when lost a view among the far-off constellations, are in the shade of the dreaming forests. Thou pursuest after wisdom, O Malampus, which is the science of the will of the gods, and thou roamest from people to people like a mortal driven by the destinies. In the times when I kept my night-waters before the caverns, I have sometimes believed that I was about to surprise the thoughts of the sleeping side belly, and that the mother of the gods, betrayed by her dreams, would let follow some of her secrets, but I have never made out more than sounds which faded away in the murmur of night, or words inarticulate as the bubbling of the rivers. Oh, Macarius, one day,

Starting point is 05:29:39 day said to me the great Chiron, whose old age I tended, we are both of us centaurs of the mountain, but how different are our lives? Of my days, all the study is thou seest it, the search for plants. Thou, thou art like those mortals who had picked up on the waters or in the woods, and carried to their lips some pieces of the reed pipe thrown away by the god pan. From that hour these mortals, having clobiles, having from their relics of the god a passion for wild life, or perhaps smitten with some secret madness, enter into the wildness, plunge among the forest,

Starting point is 05:30:19 follow the course of the streams, bury themselves in the heart of the mountains, restless and haunted by an unknown purpose. The mayors beloved of the wind in the farther Scythia are not wilder than thou, nor more cast down at nightfall, when the north wind has departed, Seekest thou to know the gods, O Macarius, and from what sores men, animals and elements of the universal fire have their origin.

Starting point is 05:30:48 But the aged ocean, the father of all things, keeps locked within his own breast these secrets, and the nymphs who stand around sing as they weave their eternal dance before him to cover any sound which might escape from his lips have opened by slumber. The mortals dear to the gods for their virtue Have received from their hands liars to give delight to man Or the seeds of new plants to make him rich But from their inexorable lips, nothing Such were the lessons which O Chiron gave me Wain to the very extremity of life The centaur yet nourished in his spirit

Starting point is 05:31:28 The most lofty decourse For me, O Melampus, I decline into my last day's calm as the setting of the constellations. I still retain Enterprise, enough to climb to the top of the rocks, and there I linger late, either gazing on the wild and restless clouds, or to see come up from the horizon, the rainy hiatus, the Pliades, or the great Orion. But I feel myself perishing and passing quickly away, like a snow-wreath floating on the stream, and soon shall I be mingled with the waters which flow in the vast bosom of earth. Translation of Matthew Arnold.

Starting point is 05:32:11 End of Section 11. Section 12 of Library of the World's best literature, ancient and modern. Volume 17. This is a Libervox recording. All Libervox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit livervox.org. Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Volume 17, selected excerpts by Francois Giesel, 1787 to 1874, by Charles Gross.

Starting point is 05:32:52 Francois Pierre-Giom Giesel was born at Neames, October 4, 1787. His career was eventful. He was a prolific writer, a successful professor, a great historian, and an influential statesman. Though we are mainly concerned with this literary activity, Gissel, the author cannot be isolated from Gisle of the Patriot, the Calvinist statesman, the political champion of the bourgeoisie, and of constitutional monarchy.

Starting point is 05:33:24 He is one of the few great historians who have helped to make history. The polities and statecraft of the past should be less mysterious to the experience and judicious statesman than to the secluded scholar. On the other hand, Gizot's training in historical research may have reacted on his political life, widening his mental horizon

Starting point is 05:33:48 and helping to develop in him the liberal spirit of Catholicity and impartiality which he evinced in his public life. His father, a lawyer, was a victim of the revolution in 1794. In 1812, Gisot was appointed professor of history at the Sorbonne. In 1814, he began his political career as Secretary General of the Interior,

Starting point is 05:34:15 and in 1817, he became a counselor of state. In 1822, his lectures at the Sorbonne were suppressed on account of his liberal ideas. In 1828, he recovered his chair at the Sorbonne. And during the next two years lectured on the history of the Sorbonne, civilization in Europe and France. Under Louis Philippe, he was Minister of Instruction and did much to improve the French system of education. From 1840 to 1848, he was at the head of the French Cabinet as Minister of Foreign Affairs. With the dethronement of Louis Philippe in 1848, his political activity came to an end. Throughout his life, he was a liberal, though he advocated the political

Starting point is 05:35:03 preponderance of the middle classes and the maintenance of a constitutional government. He firmly combated revolutionary and ultra-democratic theories. He tried to reconcile the enjoyment of liberty with the preservation of social order. He died September 12, 1874. Of his numerous writings, the most important are the history of civilization in Europe, and the history of civilization in France. of the English Revolution, Shakespeare in his times, his memoirs, and the history of France, related from my grandchildren.

Starting point is 05:35:43 As a historian, he is noted for his philosophic grasp of important historical questions, his clear discernment of the broad lines of historical development, and his insight into the relations of cause and effect, paying little heed to amusing and dramatic details of personal exploits, he tries to determine the dominant ideas or principles of each period of history. All his works are marked by a seriousness of purpose, which often assumes the form of ardent patriotism or earnest religious conviction. He believed that the study of the past has an ethical value, that an accurate knowledge of the past helps us to comprehend the present and to provide for the future. He also believed in the progressive development of mankind

Starting point is 05:36:33 through the various ages. The fundamental idea contained in the word civilization, he says, is progress or development, the caring to higher perfection the relations between man and man. Such a philosophic treatment of history, though stimulating to thoughtful students, may easily degenerate into vague and misleading generalizations. The philosophic is,

Starting point is 05:36:59 historian is tempted to weave his subjective ideas into the tissue which he fabricates, allowing the imagination to dominate over reason. The successful application of the philosophic method presupposes not merely a high order of mental capacity, but also an accurate knowledge of facts, which was less attainable in Giseau's time than it is at present. When he wrote his civilization in Europe and civilization in Europe, and civilization in France, 1828 to 30, the modern method of historical research was still in its infancy. Rank had just begun his epic-making career. It must be admitted, however, that Giesot's books are still suggestive and instructive, despite the fact that critical investigation during the past

Starting point is 05:37:50 50 years has revolutionized our knowledge of events and institutions. Many of the broadlines of development that he laid down still remain unchanged. It should also be said that Gisot did much for the advancement of historical research by aiding to establish the society for the history of France and by creating the Historical Commission, both of which have actively promoted this branch of study in France since 1835. Each of the 14 brief lectures in his history of civilization in Europe is the delineation of a cardinal event or principle, and these principles are linked into one chain of development. At first, he considers the influence of the three main sources of modern civilization, the Christian Church, the Romans, and the Germans. In the light of recent

Starting point is 05:38:43 research, we may safely say that he underrates the influence of the Germanic element and overestimates that of Rome. Next, he examines for later card. factors in historical development, namely feudalism, the church, the communes, and royalty, and traces their interaction down through the period of monarchical centralization and of the Reformation to the French Revolution. He regards France as the center of focus of European civilization. He admits that at various epics, Italy has outstripped France in the arts, and that England has had the lead in developing political institutions. But even those leading ideas or institutions

Starting point is 05:39:29 whose birth must be referred to other countries had to be clarified in France before they were diffused throughout Europe. Therefore, France is eminently qualified to march at the head of European civilization. Though France does not hold this leadership at present, what Gisot says is certainly applicable in large measure to the past. The centuries the influence of French civilization, radiated in all directions in no other country, forms a better nucleus for the study of general European history. The prominence or dominance of French ideas in European history

Starting point is 05:40:09 is also emphasized in Giseau's history of civilization in France. Though this series of lectures extends only to the 14th century, It is a more elaborate work than the history of civilization in Europe. The author gives a detailed account of the leading factors which entered into the developments of France and shows how from the relations between feudalism, the communes, and royalty, national and political unity was gradually evolved. His portrayal of feudalism is particularly detailed and attractive, though his account of the origin of that institution is now. antiquated. He believes that two great lessons may be learned from the study of French history. One, that the rivalry of the nobility and the commons prevented their union

Starting point is 05:40:59 against despotism, and two, that Frenchmen have a tendency to follow an idea or principle to its logical conclusion, regardless of consequences. These lessons help us understand certain great divergences in the constitutional development of France and England. He saw his account of what he calls the English Revolution, comprises three separate works. The history of Charles I, 1826 to 27, the history of Oliver Cromwell, 1854, and the history of Richard Cromwell, 1856. Like the German historian least, he studied English history in order to determine what France could learn from the annals of her neighbor.

Starting point is 05:41:47 passionately preoccupied with the future of his country, he wished to ascertain just how a great people succeeded in securing and conceiving a free government. In dealing with the history of England during the 17th century, Gissel exhibits an admirable spirit of impartiality and a firm grasp of the dominant political ideas of the whole period. He also presents much new documentary evidence derived from the French archives.

Starting point is 05:42:19 These volumes are still instructive, though Gardner and other recent writers have overthrown some of Gisot's conclusions. In the memoirs of my own time, 1858 to 67, Gissel comments upon contemporary political events, many of which he had helped to shape. This work is particularly important

Starting point is 05:42:40 for the study of Louis-Folief's reign, and especially for the period of Gisot's minister, from 1840 to 48. In his extreme old age, he wrote, The History of France, related for my grandchildren, 1870 to 75. In this work,

Starting point is 05:42:59 the Octogenarian tries to impress upon the rising generation of Frenchmen, the need of a lofty spirit of patriotism, and a strong faith in their vanquished country. A faith which the past history of French should knowledge and strengthen. He tries to be a lofty spirit of French, to awaken the interest of his readers by dwelling upon great persons and great events,

Starting point is 05:43:21 and he succeeds in giving an admirable account of the general history of France. Many of Gisov's books have been translated into English, but most of the translations are marred by serious defects. His style, which has been assailed by some critics and admired by others, shows an improvement in his later works, though he was not a great historical artist, His style is usually clear. All his writings are marked by a Calvinistic soberness of tone, which, though it may repel those in quest to picturesque historical details, attracts and stimulates thoughtful students.

Starting point is 05:44:03 Civilization, from the general history of civilization in Europe. The situation in which we are placed is Frenchmen, affords us a great advantage for entering from the study of European civilization. But without intending to flatter the country, which I am bound by so many times, I cannot but regard France as the center, as the focus of the civilization of Europe. It would be going too far to say

Starting point is 05:44:31 that she has always been upon every occasion in advance of other nations. Italy, various epics, is out stricter in the arts. England, as regards political institutions, is by far before her, and perhaps at certain moments we may find other nations of Europe, superior to her imperious particulars, but it must still be allowed that whenever France is set forward in the career of civilization,

Starting point is 05:44:58 she is thrown forth with new vigor and has come up with or passed by all her rivals. Not only is this the case, but those ideas, those institutions which promote civilization, but whose birth must be referred to other countries, have, before they could become general or produce fruit, before they could be transplanted to other lands, or benefit the common stock of European civilization, beneflige to undergo in France a new preparation. It is from France, as from a secondary country more rich and fertile, that they have started forth to make the conquest of Europe. There is not a single great idea, not a single great prince, of civilization, which in order to become universally spread, has not first passed through France.

Starting point is 05:45:49 There is indeed in the genius of the French something of a sociableness, of a sympathy, something which spreads itself with more facility and energy than in the genius of any other people. It may be in the language or the particular turn of mind of the French nation. It may be in their manners, or that their ideas be more popular, present themselves more clearly to the masses, penetrate among themselves with greater ease. But in a word, clearness, sociability, sympathy, are the particular characteristics of France, of its civilization, and these qualities render it eminently qualified to march at the head of European civilization. In studying then the history of this great fact, It is neither an arbitrary choice nor a convention that leads us to make friends the central point from which we shall study it.

Starting point is 05:46:46 But it is because we feel that in doing so, we are in a manner place ourselves in the very heart of civilization itself, in the heart of the very fact which we desire to investigate. Civilization is just one of this kind of facts. It is so general in its nature that it can scarcely be seen. so complicated and can scarcely be unraveled, so hidden as to be scarcely discernible. The difficulty of describing it of recounting its history is apparent and acknowledged, but its existence, its worthiness to be described and to be recounted, are not less certain and manifest.

Starting point is 05:47:30 Then, respecting civilization, would a number of problems remain to be solved? It may be asked. It is even now disputed, whether civilization be a good or an evil. One party decries it is teeming with mischief to man, while another lords it as the means by which he will attain his highest dignity and excellence. Again, it is asked whether this fact is universal, whether there is a general civilization of the whole human race, a course for humanity to run, a destiny for it to accomplish, but the nations have not transmitted from age to age, something to their successes which is never lost, but which grows and continues as a common stock,

Starting point is 05:48:18 and will thus be carried on to the end of all things. For my part, I feel assured that human nature has such a destiny, that a general civilization pervades the human race, that at every epic it augments, and that consequently there is a universally, history of civilization yet to be written. Nor have I any hesitation in asserting that this history is the most noble, the most interesting of any, and that it comprehends every other. Is it not indeed clear that civilization is the great fact in which all others merge, in which they all end,

Starting point is 05:48:57 in which they are all condensed, in which all others find their importance? Take all the facts of which the history of a nation is composed, all the facts which are accustomed to consider as the elements of its existence. Take its institutions, its commerce, its industry, its wars, the various details of its government, and if you would form some idea of them as a whole, if you would seed their various bearings on each other, if you would appreciate their value, if you would pass a judgment upon them, what is it you desire to know? Why? What they have done to forward the progress of civilization? What part they have acted in this great drama.

Starting point is 05:49:42 What influence they have exercised in aiding its advance. It is not only by this that we form a general opinion of these facts, but it is by this standard that we try them, that we estimate their true value. These are, as it were, the rivers of which we ask how much water they have carried in the ocean. civilization is as it were the grand emporian of a people in which all its wealth all the elements of its life all the powers of its existence are stored up it is so true that we judge of minor facts accordingly as they affect this greater one that even some which are naturally detested and hated which prove a heavy calamity to the nation upon which they fall save for instant despotism anarchy and so forth. Even these are partly forgiven.

Starting point is 05:50:39 The evil nature is partly overlooked if they have aided in any considerable degree the march of civilization. Wherever the progress of this principle is visible, together with the facts which have urged it forward, we are tempted to forget the price it has cost. We overlook the dearness of the purchase. Again, there are certain facts

Starting point is 05:51:02 which, properly speaking, cannot be call social. Individual facts would rather concern the human intellect than public life. Such are religious doctrines, philosophical opinions, literature, the sciences, and arts. All these seem to offer themselves to individual man for his improvement, instruction, or amusement, and to be directed rather to his intellectual amelioration and pleasure than to his social condition. Yet still, how often do these facts come before us. How often are we compelled to consider them as influencing civilization? In all times, in all countries, it has been the boast of religion that it has civilized the people upon whom it has dwelt. Literature, the arts and sciences, have put in their claim

Starting point is 05:51:53 for a share of this glory, and mankind has been ready to lord and honored them whatever it has felt that this praise was fairly their due. same manner, facts the most important, facts of themselves, and independently of their exterior consequences, the most sublime in their nature, have increased in importance, have reached a higher degree of sublimity, by their connection with civilization, such is the word of this great principle that it gives the value to all it touches. Not only so, but there are even cases in which the facts of which we have spoken, in which philosophy, literature, the sciences, and the arts are especially judged and condemned or applauded according to their influence upon civilization.

Starting point is 05:52:44 The example of Shakespeare, from Shakespeare in his times. Voltaire was the first person in France who spoke of Shakespeare's genius, and although he spoke of him merely as a barbarian genius, the French public were of opinion that Voltaire had said too much in his favor. Indeed, they thought, if nothing less than profanation, to apply the words genius and glory to dramas which they considered as crude as they were coarse. At the present day, all controversy regarding Shakespeare's genius and glory has come to an end. No inventions any longer to dispute them, but a greater question has arisen,

Starting point is 05:53:26 namely whether Shakespeare's dramatic system is not far superior to that of Altair. This question I do not presume to decide. I merely say that it is now open for discussion. We have been led to it by the onward progress of ideas. I shall endeavor to point out the clauses which have brought it about, but at present I insist merely upon the fact itself and deduce from it one simple consequence, that literary criticism has changed its ground

Starting point is 05:53:58 and can no longer remain restricted to the limit, within which it was formally confined. Literature does not escape from the revolutions of the human mind. It is compelled to follow in its course. To transport itself beneath the horizon under which it is conveyed, to gain elevation and extension with the ideas which occupy its notice, and to consider the questions which it discusses under the new aspects and novel circumstances in which they are placed,

Starting point is 05:54:30 but the new state of thought and of society. When we embrace human destiny in all its aspects, and human nature and all the conditions of man upon earth, we enter into possession of an exhaustless treasure. It is the peculiar advantage of such a system that it escapes, by its extent, from the dominion of any particular genius. We may discover its principles in Shakespeare's works, but he was not fully acquainted with them.

Starting point is 05:55:00 them, or did he always respect them? He should serve as an example, not as a model. Some men, even of superior talent, have attempted to write plays according to Shakespeare's taste, without perceiving that they were deficient in one important qualification for the task, and that was to write as he did, to write them for our age, just as Shakespeare's plays were written for the age in which he lived. This is an entominy. surprise, the difficulties of which have hit the two perhaps been maturely considered by no one. We have seen how much art and effort were employed by Shakespeare to surmount those which are inherent in his system. They are still greater in our times, and would impale themselves

Starting point is 05:55:49 much more completely to the spirit of criticism, which now accompanies the boldest essays of genius. It is not only with spectators of more fastidious taste, and of more idle and inattemptive imagination, that the poet would have to do, who should venture to follow in Shakespeare's footsteps. He would be called upon to give movement to personages, embarrassed in much more complicated interests, preoccupied with much more various feelings,

Starting point is 05:56:20 and subject to less simple habits of mind, and to less decided tendencies. Neither science nor reflection, nor the scruples of conscience, nor the uncertainties of thought frequently encumber Shakespeare's heroes. Doubt is of little use among them, and the violence of their passions speedily transfers their belief to the side of their desires, or sets their actions above their belief.

Starting point is 05:56:48 Hamlet alone presents the confused spectacle of a mind, formed by the enlightenment of society, in conflict with the position contrary to its laws, and he needs a super-examination. a natural apparition to determine him to act, and a fortuitous event to accomplish his project. If incessantly placed in an analogous position, the personages of a tragedy conceived at the present day, according to the romantic system, would offer us the same picture of indecision. Ideas now crowd and intersect each other in the mind of man. Duties multiply in his conscience

Starting point is 05:57:27 and obstacles and bonds around his life. Instead of those electric brains, prompt to communicate the spark which they have received, instead of those ardent and simple-minded men, whose projects like Macbeth's will to hand, the world now presents to the poet minds like Hamlets, deep in the observation of those inward conflicts, which our classical system has derived

Starting point is 05:57:54 or a stated society more advanced than that at the time it would Shakespeare lived. So many feelings, interests, and ideas, the necessary consequences of modern civilization, might become even in their simplest form of expression, a troublesome burden, which it would be difficult to carry through the rapid evolutions and bold advances of the romantic system. We must, however, satisfy every demand. success itself requires it. The reason must be contented at the same time that the imagination is occupied. The progress of taste, of enlightenment, of society, and of mankind must serve not to diminish

Starting point is 05:58:38 or disturb our enjoyment, but to render them worthy of ourselves and capable of supplying the nuance which we have contracted. Advance without rule and art in the romantic system, and you will produce melodraming. calculated to excite a passing emotion in the multitude, but in the multitude alone, and for a few days, just as by dragging along without originality in the classical system, you will satisfy only that cold literary class who are acquainted with nothing in nature, which is more important than the interests of versification, or more imposing than the three unities. This is not the work of the poet who is called to power in depth. destined for glory. He acts upon a grand scale and can address the superior intellects as well as the general and simple faculties of all men. It is doubtless necessary that the crowd should throng to behold those dramatic works, of which you desire to make a national spectacle. But do not hope to become national. If you do not unite in your festivities all those

Starting point is 05:59:47 classes of persons and minds, whose well-arranged hierarchy, is as a nation to its loftiest dignity. Junius is bound to follow human nature in all its developments. Its strength consists in finding within itself, the means for constantly satisfying the whole of the public. The same task is now imposed upon government and upon poetry. Both should exist for all, and suffice at once for the wants of the masses and for the requirements

Starting point is 06:00:17 are the most exalted minds. Doubtless stopped and is caused by these. conditions, the full severity of which will only be revealed of the talent that can comply with them. Dramatic art, even in England, where under the protection of Shakespeare it would have liberty to attempt anything, scarcely ventures at the present day even to try timidly to follow him. Meanwhile, England, France and the whole of Europe demand of the drama, pleasures and emotions that can no longer be supplied by the inanimate representation of a world that has ceased to exist. The classical system has its origin in the life of its time.

Starting point is 06:01:01 That time has passed. Its image subsists in brilliant colors in its works, but can no more be reproduced. Near the monuments of past ages, the monuments of another age are now beginning to arise. What would be there for them? I cannot tell. but the ground upon which their foundations may rest is already perceptible. This ground is not the ground of Cornel and Racine, nor is it that of Shakespeare. It is our own, but Shakespeare system, as it appears to me, may furnish the plans according to which genius ought now to work.

Starting point is 06:01:39 This system alone includes all those social conditions and all those general and diverse feelings, the simultaneous conjunction and activity of which constitute for us at the present day the spectacle of human things. Witnesses during 30 years of the greatest revolutions of society, we shall no longer willingly confine the movement of our mind within the narrow space of some family event, or the agitations of a purely individual passion. The nature and destiny of man have appeared to us under their most striking and their, simplest aspect and all their extent and all their variableness we require pictures in which this spectacle is reproduced in which man is displayed in his completeness and excites our entire sympathy

Starting point is 06:02:28 end of section 12 section 13 of library of the world's best literature ancient and modern volume 17 this is a Librevox recording all Librevox recordings are a the public domain. For more information or to volunteer please visit Librivox.org, recording by Abayi in May 2003. Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Volume 17. Selected excerpts from A visit to Ceylon by Ernst Heckel. Ernst Heckel, born 1834. Ernst Heckel, the German naturalist, is a scholar who unites to eminence in scientific research and discovery, the gift of attractive literary presentation. In his own country, his position is that of one who has made valuable original contributions to the study of morphology and been the ablest exponent of the Darwinian

Starting point is 06:03:40 theory. His more untechnical writings have a charm, a literary value, rarely to be found in the work of a specialist in science. In Potsdam, Germany, February 16, 1834, Heckel studied the natural sciences at Berlin, Wurzburg and Vienna, taking his medical degree in 1858 and practicing that profession a short time in the former city. During 1859 and 1860, he made a journey through Italy and Sicily in the interest of science, his work on the radiator, 1862, being a result. Later portions were added in 1887 and 1888. In 1861, he settled in Jena for the study of comparative anatomy,

Starting point is 06:04:31 but soon turned to the specific investigation of zoology. After holding subordinate positions, he was appointed in 1865, full professor Ed Yena, and his lectures embraced, besides zoology, the subjects of comparative anatomy, evolution, histology, and paleontology. His researchers had to do especially with the lower ranks of marine animals and above all with deep sea life in its simplest forms. The material for such study was gathered from many and extended experiences in the North Sea, the Mediterranean, the Canary Isles and the Indian Ocean. These travels and researchers were the basis of works like that on the history of the development of the Siphonophonophora, 1860s.

Starting point is 06:05:21 and his Biological Studies, 1870. Books of this nature, too, were introductory to greater representative works on natural philosophy and the development theory, such as Calceria's Sponges, 1872, Natural History of Creation, 1868, which has received the honor of translation into 12 languages, and the masterwork, General Morphology of Organisms, 1866. More popular writings, making him known to a public much wider than the biologist ever addresses, are those on the division of labor in nature and human life, 1869, on the origin and genealogy of the human race, 1870,

Starting point is 06:06:10 life in the great marine animals, 1870, the Arabian corals, 1873, based on studies in the Red Sea, the system of the Medusa, 1880, and a visit to Ceylon, the latter a work which in English translation has won many admiring readers. For the last dozen years or more, Professor Heckel has given much of his time to the deep-sea explorations of the HMS Challenger expedition, and his voluminous reports written in the English tongue with accompanying illustrations contain descriptions of no less than 4,000 new kinds of marine animals.

Starting point is 06:06:52 His plankton studies, 1890, state his general biologic conclusions upon the life and growth of sea organisms, and his very interesting monism as the link between religion and science constitutes a great naturalist's confession of faith. A man of many travels and much culture of immense energy, learning and power, of original research, Professor Heckel holds a dominant position in his own land among the savants of science. His great work in morphology brought into a systematic philosophy the brilliant hypothesis of Darwin, whom he was the first German to defend and expound, at a time when the development theory was looked at as Scants. And in writings like that from which the

Starting point is 06:07:41 selections are made, he adds aesthetic and human interest to subjects more of the and treated after the manner of the arid and technical specialist. The Salon sketches have picturesqueness, color, enthusiasm. They impart the sense not only of the order, but of the wonder and beauty of science. At Peradena, from a visit to Salon. In the central province of Salon and at a height of 1500 feet above the sea, stands the capital, formerly the residence of the kings of the island, the famous town of Kandi,

Starting point is 06:08:21 and only a few miles away from it is a small town, which was also for a short time a royal residence five centuries ago. At this place, the English government made a botanical garden in 1819, and Dr. Gardner was the first director. His successor, the late Dr. Thwaites, the very meritorious compiler of the first Flora Zelanica, for 30 years did all he could to improve and keep, carry out the purpose of this garden in a manner worthy of its advantages of climate and position.

Starting point is 06:08:54 When he retired, a year or two before his death, Dr. Henry Tremon was appointed director, and from him, immediately on my arrival, I received a most friendly invitation. I accepted it all the more gladly because in Europe I had already read and heard much of the marvels of plant life at Peradenia. Nor were my high anticipations disappointing. If Ceylon is a paradise for every botanist and lover of flowers, then Peradenia deserve to be called the very heart of paradise. Peradena and Kandi are connected with Colombo by a railway, the first made in Ceylon, the journey occupying from first to last between four and five hours.

Starting point is 06:09:42 I started from Colombo at 7 in the morning of the 4th of December and reached Peradena at about a day and a bit of the first of the year. 11. Like all Europeans in Ceylon, I found I must travel in the first class, not nobles but whiteness oblige. The second class is used only by the yellow and tawny burgers and half-breeds, the descendants of the Portuguese and Dutch. The third class, of course, carries the natives, the dark Singhalese and the nearly black Tamils. The only wonder to me is that there is not a fourth for these last, and a fifth for the despite. low-cased Hindus.

Starting point is 06:10:21 The natives are always great patrons of railway traveling. It is the only pleasure on which they are prepared to spend money, all the more so as it is a cheap one. Directly after the railway was opened, the natives began traveling by the wonderful road every day and all day long for the mere pleasure of it. The carriages are airy and light, the first class well provided with protection against the heat,

Starting point is 06:10:47 with white eaves and Venetian blinds. The engine drivers and the guards in their white clothes with solar helmets are Englishmen. The line is worked with order and punctuality, like all the English railways. The first two hours' ride from Colombo to Perradenia lies across a level country, most of it covered with marshy jungle, varied by rice fields and water meadows. In these, herds of black buffaloes lie. half in the water, while graceful white herons pick the insects of their backs. Farther on, the line gradually approaches the hills, and after Rambucana station begins to work

Starting point is 06:11:29 upwards. For an hour, between this and the next station, Cadoganaba, the line is in point of scenery one of the most beautiful I have ever seen. The road winds with many zigzags up the steep northern face of a vast basin or cirque. At first, the eye is fascinated by the changing aspect of the immediate foreground. Immense blocks of Gnice stand up amid the luxuriant masses of dense forest which fill the ravines on each side. Creepers of the loveliest species fling themselves from one treetop to the next as they tower above the undergrowth. Enchanting little Cascades tumble down the cliffs, and close by the railroad, we often come upon the old high road from Colombo to Candy, formerly so busy as scene, which was constructed by the

Starting point is 06:12:21 English government to enable them to keep possession of the ancient capital. Further on, we command wider views, now of the vast park-like valley which grows below us as we mount higher, and now of the lofty blue mountain range which stands up calm and proud beyond that southern wall. Although the forms of the higher hills are monotonous and not particularly picturesque, for the most part low, undulating shoulders of granite and gneiss, still a few more prominent peaks rise conspicuous, as for instance the curious table rock known as the Bible rock. Sensation rock, as it is called, is one of the most striking and impressive features of the scenery. The railway, after passing through several tunnels, here runs under overhanging rocks

Starting point is 06:13:13 along the very edge of a cliff, with a fall of from 12 to 1400 feet, almost perpendicular, into the verdurous abyss below. Dashing waterfalls come foaming down from the mountain wall on the left, rush under the bridges over which the line is carried, and throwing themselves with a mighty leap into mid-air, are lost in mist, before they reach the bottom of the gorge, making floating rainbows where the sun falls upon them. The green depths below and the valley at our feet are covered partly with jungle and partly with cultivation. Scattered huts, gardens and terraced rice fields can be discerned. The lofty head of the tallypot palm, the proud queen of the tribe in Ceylon,

Starting point is 06:14:01 towers above the scrub on every side. its trunk is perfectly straight and white, like a slender marble column, and often more than a hundred feet high. Each of the fans that compose its crown of leaves covers a semicircle from 12 to 16 feet radius, a surface of 150 to 200 square feet, and they, like every part of the plant, have their uses, particularly for thatching roofs. But they are more famous because they were formerly used exclusively, instead of paper by the Singhalese, and even now often serve this purpose. The ancient Puskola manuscripts in the Buddhist monasteries are all written with an iron stylus on this Ola paper, made of narrow strips of tallypot leaves boiled and then dried.

Starting point is 06:14:53 The proud talipod palm flowers but once in its life, usually between its 50th and 80th year. The tall pyramidal spike of bloom rises in. immediately above the sheaf of leaves to a height of 30 or 40 feet, and is composed of myriads of small, yellowish-white blossoms. As soon as the nuts are ripe, the tree dies. By a happy accident, an unusual number of tallypod palms were in flower at the time of my visit. I counted 60 between Rambucana and Kaduganawa, and above a hundred in my whole journey. excursions are frequently made to this point from Colombo

Starting point is 06:15:34 to see the strange and magnificent scene. The railroad, like the old high road, is at its highest level above the sea at the Kaduganawa Pass, and the lighthouse-shaped column stands here in memory of the engineer of the carriage road, Captain Dawson. We are here on the dividing ridge of two watersheds. All the hundred little streams which we have hitherto passed threading their silver way through the velvet verdure of the valley,

Starting point is 06:16:04 flow either to the Kelani Ganga or to the Mahauya, both reaching the sea on the western coast. The brooks which tumble from the eastern shoulder of Kaduganawa all join the Mahavelli Ganga, which flows southward not far below. This is the largest river in the island, being about 134 miles long, and it enters the sea on the east coast near three. in Comali. The railway runs along its banks, which are crowded with plantations of sugarcane, and in a quarter of an hour from the pass we reach Peradena, the last station before Kandi.

Starting point is 06:16:45 The entrance to the garden is through a fine avenue of old India rubber trees. This is the same as the Indian species, of which the milky juice, when in spisated, becomes kautchuk, and of which young plants are frequently grown in sitting rooms in our cold northern climate for the sake of the bright polished green of its oval leathery leaves. But while with us these India rubber plants are greatly admired when their inch-thick stems reach the ceiling and their rare branches bear 50 leaves, more or less, in the hot moisture of their native land they attain the size of a noble forest tree

Starting point is 06:17:25 worthy to compare with our oaks. An enormous crown of thousands of leaves growing on horizontal boughs, spreading 40 to 50 feet on every side, covers a surface as wide as a good-sized mansion, and the base of the trunk throws out a circle of roots often from 100 to 200 feet in diameter, more than the whole height of the tree. These very remarkable roots generally consist of 20 or 30 main roots,

Starting point is 06:17:55 thrown out from strongly marked ribs in the lower part of the trunk, and spreading like huge creeping snakes over the surface of the soil. The India rubber tree is indeed called the snake tree by the natives, and has been compared by poets to laocon entwined by serpents. Very often, however, the roots grow up from the ground like strong upright poles, and so form stout props, enabling the parent tree to defyed. all storms unmoved. The spaces between these props form perfect little rooms or sentry boxes, in which a man can stand upright and be hidden. These pillar roots are developed here in many other

Starting point is 06:18:39 gigantic trees of very different families. I had scarcely exhausted my surprise at this avenue of snake trees when exactly in the middle, beyond the entrance of the gate, my eye was caught by another wonderful sight. An immense bouquet there greets the visitor, a clump of all the palms indigenous to the island, together with many foreign members of this noblest growth of the tropics, all wreathed with flowering creepers, and their trunks covered with graceful parasitical ferns. Another but even larger and finer group of palms stood further on at the end of the entrance Avenue and was moreover surrounded by a splendid parterre of flowering plants. The path here divided, that to the left leading to the director's bungalow situated on a

Starting point is 06:19:31 slight rise. This inviting home is like most of the villa residences in Ceylon, a low, one-storied building surrounded by an airy veranda with a projecting roof supported on light white columns. Both pillars and roof are covered with garlands of the wallings of the walled. the loveliest climbers, large-flowered orchids, fragrant vanilla, splendid fuchsas and other brilliant blossoms, and a choice collection of flowering plants and ferns decorate the beds which lie near the house. Above it weigh the shadowy boughs of the finest Indian trees, and numbers of butterflies and chafers, lizards and birds animate the beautiful spot. I was

Starting point is 06:20:15 especially delighted with the small-barred squirrels which looked particularly pretty here, though they are common and very tame in all the gardens of Salem. As the bundalo stands on the highest point of the gardens and a broad velvet lawn slopes down from it, the open hall of the veranda commands a view of a large portion of the garden with a few of the finest groups, as well as the belt of tall trees which enclose the planted land. beyond this park-like ground rise the wooded heads of the mountains which guard the basin of Peradena. The beautiful Mahavelli River flows round the garden in a wide reach

Starting point is 06:20:56 and divides it from the hill country. Thus it lies in a horseshoe-shaped peninsula on the landward side where it opens into the valley of Kandi, it is effectually protected by a high and impenetrable thicket of bamboo mixed with a chevot-de-fris of thorny ratten palms and other creepers. The climate, too, is extraordinarily favorable to vegetation. At a height of 1,500 feet above the sea, the tropical heat of the mountain basin,

Starting point is 06:21:27 combined with the heavy rainfall on the neighboring mountains, make of Perradenia an admirable natural forcing house, and it can easily be conceived, how lavishly the tropical flora here displays its wonderful product. powers. My first walk through the garden in the company of the accomplished director convinced me that this was in fact the case, and although I had heard and read much of the charms of the prodigal vegetation of the tropics, and longed and dreamed of seeing them, still, the actual enjoyment of the fabulous reality far exceeded my highest expectations, even after I had

Starting point is 06:22:07 already made acquaintance with the more conspicuous forms of this, southern flora at and near Colombo and Bombay. During the four days I was so happy as to spend at Peradeña, I made greater strides in my purview of life and nature in the vegetable world than I could have made at home by the most diligent study in so many months. Indeed, when two months later I visited Peradeña for the second, and, alas, for the last time, and spent three more happy days in that paradise, it enchanted me to the full as much when I quitted it as it had at the first glance.

Starting point is 06:22:47 Only I saw it with wider understanding and increased knowledge. I cannot sufficiently thank my excellent friend Dr. Triman for his kind hospitality and valuable instruction. The seven days I spent in his delightful bungalow were indeed to me seven days of creation. Translation of Clara Bell color and form in the Salon Coral Banks From A Visit to Salon Nine years since in 1873 When I made an excursion among the coral reefs of the Sinai Coast

Starting point is 06:23:26 and for the first time had a glimpse of the wonderful forms of life in their submarine gardens of marvels, they had excited my utmost interest and in a popular series of lectures on Arabian corals published with five colors, published with five colors, colored plates, I had endeavored to sketch these wonderful creatures in their communities with various other animals. The corals of Ceylon, which I first became acquainted with here at Gale, and subsequently studied more closely at Bellingham, reminded me vividly of that delightful experience, and at the same time afforded me a multitude of new ones.

Starting point is 06:24:04 For though the marine fauna of the Indian seas is, on the whole, nearly allied to the Arabian fauna, of the Red Sea, many genera and species being common to both, yet the number and variety of forms of life is considerably greater in the vast basin of the Indian Ocean with its diversified coast than in the pent-up waters of the Arabian Gulf with its uniform conditions of existence. Thus I found the general physiognomy of the coral reefs in the two situations different, in spite of many features in common. While the reefs at Tour are for the most part conspicuous for warm coloring, yellow, orange, red, and brown, in the coral gardens of Ceylon, green predominates in a great variety of shades and tones,

Starting point is 06:24:54 yellow-green Alcyonia growing with sea-green heteropora, and malachite-like anthophila side by side with olive-green millipora, madrepora and asteria of emerald hue, with brown. brown-green montipora and mandrina. Ransonnette had already pointed out how singularly and universally green prevails in the coloring of Ceylon. Not only is the greater portion of this evergreen aisle clothed with an unfading tapestry of rich verdure, but the animals of the most widely dissimilar classes which live in its

Starting point is 06:25:32 woods are conspicuous for their green coloring. This is seen in all the commonest birds and lizards. butterflies and beetles, which are of every shade of brilliant green. In the same way, the innumerable inhabitants of the sea, of all classes, are coloured green, such as many fishes and crustacea, warms and sea anemones. Indeed, creatures which elsewhere seldom or never appear in green livery wear it here, for instance, several starfish, sea urchins, sea cucumbers, also some eagles, or so some eerie, or so many, enormous bivalves and brachio-poda and others.

Starting point is 06:26:14 An explanation of this phenomenon is to be found in Darwin's principles, particularly in the law of adaptation by selection of similar coloring or sympathetic affinity of color, as I have elucidated in my history of creation. The less the predominant coloring of any creature varies from that of its surroundings, the less will it be seen by its foes. the more easily can it steal upon its prey, and the more it is protected and fitted for the struggle for existence. Natural selection will at the same time constantly confirm the similarity

Starting point is 06:26:50 between the prevailing color of the animal and of its surroundings, because it is beneficial to the animal. The green coral banks of Ceylon, with their preponderance of green inhabitants, are as instructive in their bearing on this theory, as are the green land animals which people the evergreen forests and thickets of the island. But in purity and splendor of coloring, the sea creatures are even more remarkable than the fauna of the forests. It would, however, be a mistake to suppose that this prevailing green hue produces a monotonous uniformity of coloring. On the contrary, it is impossible to weary of admiring it, for on the one hand the most wonderful great

Starting point is 06:27:36 gradations and modifications may be traced through it, and on the other, numbers of vividly and gaudily colored forms are scattered among them. And just as the gorgeous red, yellow, violet, or blue colors of many birds and insects look doubly splendid in the dark green forest of Ceylon, so do the no less brilliant hues of some marine creatures on the coral banks. Many small fishes and crustaceans are particularly distinguished by such gaudy, coloring with very elegant and extremely singular markings, as they seek their food among the ramifications of the coral trees. Some few large corals are also conspicuously and strikingly colored. Thus, for instance, many posilopore are rose-colored, many of the astrayide are red and yellow, and many of the heteropore and maripore are violet and brown, etc. But, but

Starting point is 06:28:36 unfortunately these gorgeous colors are for the most part very evanescent and disappear as soon as the coral is taken out of the water often at a mere touch the sensitive creatures which have displayed their open cups of tentacles in the greatest beauty then suddenly close and become inconspicuous dull and colorless but if the eye is enchanted merely by the lovely hues of the coral reef and its crowded population, it is still more delighted by the beauty and variety of form displayed by these creatures. Just as the radiated structure of one individual coral polyp resembles a true flower, so the whole structure of the branded coral stock resembles the growth of plants, trees, and shrubs.

Starting point is 06:29:25 It was for this reason that corals were universally supposed to be really plants, and it was long before their true nature as animals was generally believed in. These coral gardens display indeed a lovely and truly fairy-like scene as we row over them in a boat at low tide and on a calm sea. Close under the fort of Gale, the sea is so shallow that the keel of the boat grates on the points of the stony structure, and from the wall of the fort above, the separate coral growths can be distinguished through the crystal water.

Starting point is 06:30:00 A great variety of most beautiful and singular species here grow close to together on so narrow a space that in a very few days I had made a splendid collection. Mr. Scott's Garden, in which my kind host allowed me to place them to dry, looked strange indeed during these days. The splendid tropical plants seemed to vie with the strange marine creatures who had intruded on their domain for the prize for beauty and splendor, and the enchanted naturalist, whose gladdened eye wandered from one to the other, could not decide whether the fauna or the flora best deserved to take it.

Starting point is 06:30:40 The coral animals imitated the forms of the loveliest flowers in astonishing variety, and the orchids, on the other hand, mimicked the forms of insects. The two great kingdoms of the organized world seemed here to have exchanged aspects. Most of the corals which I collected in Gully and Belegum I procured by the help of divers. These I found here to be quite as clever and capable of endurance as the Arabs of Tuar nine years before. Armed with a strong crowbar, they uprooted the limestone structure of even very large coral stocks from their attachment to the rocky base and raised them most skillfully up to the boat. These masses often weighed from 50 to 80 pounds, and it cost no small toil and care to lift them

Starting point is 06:31:30 unendured into the boat. Some kinds of coral are so fragile than in taking them out of the water they break by their own weight, and so, unfortunately, it is impossible to convey many of the most delicate kinds uninjured to land. This is the case, for instance, with certain trail turbinarié, whose foliaceous stock grows in the shape of an inverted spiral cone, and of the many-branched heteropora, which resembles an enormous stag's antler with hundreds of tweaks. It is not from above, however, that a coral reef displays its full beauty, even when we row close over it, and when the eptide has left the water so shallow that its projections grind against the boat. On the contrary, it is essential to take a plunge into the sea. In the absence

Starting point is 06:32:23 of a diving bell, I tried to dive to the bottom and keep my eyes open on the water, and after a little practice I found this easy. Nothing could be more wonderful than the mysterious green sheen which pervades this submarine world. The enchanted eye is startled by the wonderful effects of light, which are so different from those of the upper world with its warm and rosy coloring, and they lend a double interest and strangeness

Starting point is 06:32:50 to the forms and movements of the myriads of creatures that swarm among the corals. The diver is in all reality in a new one. world. There is in fact a whole multitude of singular fishes, crustacea, molusca, radiator, warms, etc., whose food consists solely of the coral polyps among which they live, and these coral eaters, which may be regarded as parasites in the true sense of the word, have acquired, by adaptation to their peculiar mode of life, the most extraordinary forms. More especially are they provided with weapons of offense and defense in the most remarkable character.

Starting point is 06:33:32 But just as it is well known that no man may walk unpunished under the palms, so the naturalist cannot swim with impunity among the coral banks. The oceanites under whose protection these coral fairy bowers of the sea flourish threaten the intruding mortal with a thousand perils. The millipora, as well as the bedouza, which float among them, burn him wherever they touch like the most venomous nettles. The sting of the fish known as Sina Saneaea is as painful and dangerous as that of the scorpion. Numbers of crabs nip his tender flesh with their powerful claws.

Starting point is 06:34:12 Black sea urchins thrust their footlong spines, covered with fine prickles set the wrong way into the soul of his foot, where they break off and remain, causing very serious wounds. But worst of all is the injury to the skin in trying to secure the coral itself. The numberless points and angles with which their limestone skeleton is armed inflict a thousand little wounds at every attempt to detach and remove a portion. Never in my life have I been so gashed and mangled as after a few days of diving and coral fishing at Gale, and I suffered from the consequences for several weeks after.

Starting point is 06:34:53 But what are these transient sufferings to a naturalist when set in the scale against the fairy-like scenes of delight with which a plunge among these marvelous coral groves enriches his memory for life? Translation of Clara Bell End of Section 13 In the Library of the World's Best Literature Ancient and Modern, Volume 17.

Starting point is 06:35:27 This is a Libervox recording. All Livervox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit livervox.org. Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Volume 17. Selected poems by Hyphiaths, 14th century AD by A.V. Williams Jackson. High Feets, the famous lyric poet of Persia in the 14th century, is sometimes called the Persian anachryon. I feats sang the praises of the rose and of the springtide,

Starting point is 06:36:07 enchanted the glories of spiritual beauty and love, or fluted in plaintive strings the sad note of the Bobel or Nightingale in Persia, at a time not far distant from that in which England listened to the rhythmical conflict and minstrelate between the owl and the nightingale, or was entranced by the dulcet measures of the stanched. Characarian Romant of the Rose. Iphiates, the tender and sensitive poet, was born about the opening of the 14th century. His full name was Kowaja, Shams Hadin, Muhammad, Afiz.

Starting point is 06:36:45 We are told that he was of good family, and we know that he must have had an excellent education. Islam de plume, Ifitz, retainer, i.e., one who remembers, or who knows the Quran by heart, is significant and his native city of Shiraz, whose praises he sounds has become synonymous with poetic inspiration. Hafiz stands almost as the last and greatest in the line of Persian poetry, which can boast of producee, Nizami, Omar Kaim, Jala adin, Rumi, Sadi, and Jami. The term of his style, the beauty of his language,

Starting point is 06:37:29 the pure flow of his verse and the passionate depth of his thought and feeling, whether it be in a lyrical outpouring of his own soul, or in the failed mystic ecstasy of spiritual devotion, concealed under the guise of material images. Rightly render a fees, a poet's poet. His life seems not to have been very eventful, and it is only surmise that presumes that his youth may have been anachryontic. A tradition, however, is preserved which shows that his first early won him worldwide fame.

Starting point is 06:38:06 His name reached India and came to the ears of the Deccan prince, Sultan Mummond Shah Bhamani. His Majesty invited the gifted bard to visit his court and sent him a handsome present to defray the expenses of his journey. I feats, like Horace, if the story be true, seems to have been a poor sailor. In terror of Shipwreck, he turned back before he had fairly started on his voyage and sent to the generous literary patron a poem or panegyric instead of presenting himself. He apologized for his absence on the ground of dread of the dangers of the deep, and his expressed preference for the quiet life and charming beauty of Shiraz does not seem to a displease the liberal-minded potentate. A pretty story is also told regarding one of Hyphesus odes that became known to the Scythian conqueror Timor Lang, Tamilang. This was the castle beginning. Agaranturk is Shirazi, but Dasd Arad Dallimara, which is below translated in the lines opening with, if that beauty of Shiraz would take my heart in hand. In this sonnet, the passionate poet offers to give the cities a Samarkand and Bukhara for the dark mole on his favorites cheek. When the great ptermaline subdued Faristan, he is said to have summoned Havis to his presence

Starting point is 06:39:42 and to have sternly rebuked him for his lavish recklessness and giving away cities that were not a poet's to bestow. The brilliancy of the minstreligious's wit was equal to the occasion, Kissing the ground at the conqueror's feet, he replied, Sultan of the world, it is through such generosity that I am come to this disastrous or joyous day. It is needless to add the happy result, and one wishes that the truth of the story will less uncertain. Like Pindar and other famous poets, stories are also not wanting as to how high fees receive the gift of song, fanciful as they may be, They all show the esteem in which he was held, not in Persia alone, but abroad. A feast was married, if we rightly interpret the pathetic lines that lamenta home left desolate

Starting point is 06:40:37 by the departure of a being for whom his soul breathed the divine awe. His own death occurred about 1389. It is said that the Muslim priest had first declined to perform the last solemn rites over his body, as exceptions were taken to the orthodoxy of some of his poetical compositions. It was determined to decide the matter by lot. A number of verses chosen at random from Hafe's own poems were tossed into an urn, and a child was appointed to draw one out. The verse read,

Starting point is 06:41:13 From the beer of Hyphi's, keep not back thy foot, for though he be immersed in sin, he goeth to paradise. The body was at once accorded proper burial, and his grave in a fair shaded garden near Shiraz. With its beautifully inscribed alabasca slum, still forms a living monument, if one were needed besides the lovely odes that we have of this passionate poet. A feast was a prolific writer. The manuscript and printed editions of his works comprised more than 500 gazelles or odes, a gazelle, oads. A gazelle, ode, or perhaps rather sonnet, is a poem not exceeding 16 or 17 couplets. The last two words of the first couplet rhyme together, and with these also rhymes the second line of every couplet in the poem.

Starting point is 06:42:07 All the odd lines are entirely independent of rhyme. The signature of the poet as a rule is woven into the last verse of the gazelle. Parallels for signatures, thus inserted an option. far to seek in the Greek anthology or in English or even in Anglo-Saxon poetry. A series of gazelles, moreover, when gathered into a collection, is called a divan. The poems or odes in a divan are regularly arranged alphabetically, according to the initial letter of the Persian word with which the poem begins. A parallel might be imagined if our hymn books were arranged according to the table,

Starting point is 06:42:50 of first lines. Atheist also wrote Quatrains and a number of other short poetical compositions. So popular was his divan that he came to be consulted as an oracle by opening the book and putting the finger on any chance verse. As to the poetic merit of Hythe's work, there is no question. His title to fame is acknowledged. as to the interpretation of his poems, however, there is much question and debate whether they are to be taken in a literal or in a spiritual sense. Some readers see in his praises of love and of wine, of musky tresses and slender cypress forms,

Starting point is 06:43:32 merely the passion of an ovid or an anachryon. Other admirers of Hafiz, however, and especially as oriental worshippers, read spiritual thoughts of divine love, of the soul and God behind the physical imagery. Wine is the spirit. It is not the juice of the grape. And the draft from the tavern is but quaffing the cup of self-oblivion.

Starting point is 06:43:59 There is undoubted truth in this interpretation, which is in accordance with the mystic doctrines of Sufism. The idea is oriental, and the analogous interpretation of the song of Solomon is familiar. In the Occident, moreover, medieval poets employed similar physical images for religious awe and adoration. Parallels even of English poets in the 17th century, like the Fletcher's, Dunn and Crohaw, might be cited. But as in the latter instances also, they can be little doubt that numerous odes of high peace, perhaps those of his earlier youth, hardly allow of anything but a material and passionate. interpretation. In any case, the grace, charm, beauty, and delicate feeling is never absent in Hafiz's poetry. The most complete edition of Hafiz in translation is the English prose rendering by H. Wilberforce Clark, the Devon E. Hafiz, translated three volumes,

Starting point is 06:45:05 London, 1891. It also contains extensive, biographical, bibliographical, and bibliographical, and critical matter, and should certainly be consulted. Selections from Hafiz have been translated into many languages. Sir William Jones, who himself was a poet, made Hafiz familiar in English as early as 1795. Among other names might be mentioned H. Pignall. Selections from Hafiz, London, 1875, and S. Robinson, Persian poetry for English readers,

Starting point is 06:45:42 privately printed in Glasgow 1883. Robinson's work has evidently been drawn upon by J.H. McCarthy, gazelles from the Defon of Hafiz, London and New York, 1893. The best German translation, complete, is by Fie Non-Risenzweig, three volumes, 1856 to 64. Selected Gazales or Odes If that beauty of Shiraz should take my heart in hand, I would give for her dark mole, Samarikand, and Bukhara.

Starting point is 06:46:21 Boy, bring me the wine that remaineth, for in paradise, that wilt not see the banks of the water of Roknikbad, nor the rosebower of Arm of Sala. Alas, those saucy lovely ones, those charming disturbers of our city, bear away patience from my heart as turcomans they will. past of plunder. Yet the beauty of our maidens is independent of our imperfect love. To a lovely face, what need is there of paint or dyes, of mole or down? Speak to me of the musician and of wine, and search less into the secrets of futurity, for no one in his wisdom ever hath discovered or ever will discover that mystery. I can understand how the beauty of Joseph, which added

Starting point is 06:47:10 new luster to the day, withdrew Zuleika from the veil of her modesty. Thou hast spoken evil of me and I am contented. God forgive thee. Thou has spoken well, for even a bitter word is be seeming when it cometh from a ruby-sugar dropping lip. Give ear, O my soul, to good counsel, for better than their own souls love youths of a happy disposition, the admonition of the aged wise. Thou hast composed thy gazelle, thou hast strung thy pearls, come and sing it sweetly,

Starting point is 06:47:48 O high fees, thy heaven has shed upon the poetry, the harmony of the pliades. The heart is the veil behind which is hidden his love. His eye is the mirror-holder which reflected his countenance. I, who would not bow my head to both worlds, submit my neck to the burden of his mercies. Thou is joyous the tuber tree.

Starting point is 06:48:14 I, the image of my beloved one. Everyone's thoughts are fashioned to the measure of his aims. What should I be within that holy place in which the morning breeze is the veil holder who guarded the sanctuary of his honor? If I have soiled the skirts of my raiment, what is the damage which I can do? The universe is the pledge for his purity.

Starting point is 06:48:39 Menznan is long departed. Now it is our turn. To each one is allowed a five days sojourning. The kingdom of love and the wealth of enjoyment. All that I possess is bestowed by the hand of his destination. If we have offered for a ransom ourselves and our hearts, why need we fear? The goal towards which we strive is the purpose of his salvation.

Starting point is 06:49:03 Never cease to make his image. the object of thine eye, for itself is the peculiar chamber of his privacy. Every new rose which adorn at the meadow is a mark of the color and perfume of his benevolence. Look not on his external poverty, but the bosom of fites is a rich treasury in the exuberance of his benevolence. Is there aught sweeter than the delights of the garden and companionship of the spring? But where is the cup bearer? Say, What is the cause of his lingering? Every pleasant moment that cometh to your hand, score up as an invaluable prize.

Starting point is 06:49:44 Let no one hesitate, for who knoweth the conclusion of the matter? The tie of life is but a hair. Use thine intelligence. Be thyself thine own comrade in sorrow, and what then is the sorrow which fate can deal thee? The meaning of the fountain of life in the gardens of Vrem. What is it but the enjoyment of a running stream and a delicious wine? The temperate man and the intemperate are both of one tribe.

Starting point is 06:50:14 What choices there between them, that we should surrender our souls to dubious reasonings? What revealed the silent heavens of that which is behind the veil? Oh, litigant, why dispute with the keeper of the veil? If to him who is bound up in error or sin, there is no room. for warning or amendment. What meaning is there in the words, canceling, and the mercy of the forgiving one? The devotee longs for drafts from the writer Luther, and I fees from a cup of wine. Between these, the will of the creator, what would that be? In the hour of dawn, the bird at the garden thus spoke to a freshly blown rose. Be less disdainful, for in this garden

Starting point is 06:51:03 hath bloomed many a one like thee. The rose smiled and said, We have never agreed at hearing the truth, but no lover would speak so harshly to his beloved. To all eternity, the odor of love will never reach the brain of that man, who hath never swept with his brow, the dust from the sill of the winehouse. Dost thou desire to drink the ruby-tinted wine from that gold-be-gemmed goblet? How many a pearl must thou first pierce? with the point of thine eyelashes. Yesterday, when in the rose garden of a rim,

Starting point is 06:51:39 the morning breeze, with its gentle breath, began to disturb the hair of the spike-heart. I exclaimed, O throne of Jim Shid, where is thy magic world reflecting mirror? And it replied, alas, that that watchful fortune should be slumbering. The words of love are not those that come to the tongue.

Starting point is 06:52:01 Oh, cut bearer, Cut short this asking and answering. The tears of high fees have cast patience and wisdom into the sea. How could it be otherwise? The burning pangs of love, how could he conceal? The fast is over. The festival has come, and hearts are lifted up, and the wine is sparkling in the winehouse. And wine, we must drink.

Starting point is 06:52:27 The turn of the heavy dealer in abstinence is passed. the season of joy is arrived and of joyous revelers. Why should reproach be heaped upon him, who, like me, clofteth wine? This is neither sin nor fault in the jovial lover. The drinker of wine, in whom is no false show and no dissimulation, is better than he who is a traitor in semblances. We are neither dissembling rebellers, nor the comrades of hypocrites. he who is the know of all secrets knoweth this.

Starting point is 06:53:02 We discharge all our divine obligations into evil to no man, and whatever we are told is not right. We say not that it is right. What mattereth it, that thou and I should coughed a few gobbots of wine. Wine is the blood of the vine. It is not thy blood. This is not a fault which throweth all into confusion, and were it at fault.

Starting point is 06:53:27 Where is the man to be found who is free from faults? I fees, leave thou the how and the wherefore, and drink for a moment thy wine. His wisdom hath withholding from us. What is the force of the words how and wherefore? Hail Shiraz, incomparable sight. Oh, Lord, preserve it from every disaster. God forgive a hundred times that our rocabat be dimmed,

Starting point is 06:53:56 to which the life of Kizar hath given its brightness. For between Jaffirabad and Ossala, cometh his north wind perfumed with amber. Oh, come to Shiraz, and the overflow of the Holy Spirit implore for it from the man who is the possessor of all perfection. Let no one boast here, the sugar candy of Egypt, for our sweet ones have no reason for the blush of shame.

Starting point is 06:54:24 Oh, morning breeze, What knows, bringest thou of thy tipsy lovely one? What information canst thou give me for a condition? Awaken me, not for my dream, O God. Then I may sweeten my solitude with that fair vision. Yea, if that sweet one should desire me to pour out my blood, yield it up my heart, as freely as mother's milk. Wherefore, O high fizz,

Starting point is 06:54:52 If thou wouldst be terrified by the thought of separate, Was thou not grateful for the days of her presence? O Lord, that smiling rose which thou gavest me in charge, I returned to thy charge to preserve her from the envious eye of her meadow. Although she be removed a hundred stages from the village of faithfulness, far be the mischiefs of the revolutions of the moon from her soul and body. Whithers so ever she goeth, the heart of her friend shall be companion of her journey, the kindness of the benevolent the shield of his soul and body if morning wind thou passest by the bounds of selima station i shall look that thou carry a salutation from me to

Starting point is 06:55:41 scolima scatter thy musky fragrance gently upon those black dresses they are the abode of dear hearts do not disturb them say to her my heart preserves its vow of fidelity to the mole and doth of your cheek. Wherefore, whole sacred, those amber-plated ringlets. In the place where they drink to the memory of her lip, base would be the intoxicated one who should remain conscious of himself. Merchandise and money expect not to gain at the door

Starting point is 06:56:13 at the wine house. Whoever partaketh of this beverage will cast his pack into the sea. Whoever is in dreaded the restlessness of anxiety, not genuine in his love, Either be her foot upon my head or be my lip upon her mouth. The poetry of Hafiz is the primary couplet of wisdom. Praise beyond her soul attracting and grace inspiring breath.

Starting point is 06:56:42 I have made a compact with the mistress of my soul. At so long as I have a soul within my body, I will hold his mind own soul, the well wishes of her village. In the privacy of my breast, I see a little. light from that taper of Shigil, splendid to mine eye, and brightness to my heart from that moon of Cotin, since in accordance with my wishes and yearnings I have gained the privacy of my breast, why need I care of the slander of evil speakers in the midst of the crowd? If a hundred armies of lovely one should be lying in ambush to assault my heart,

Starting point is 06:57:20 I have, by the mercy into the praise of heaven, an idol which will shatter, armies to pieces. Would to heaven, I rival, that this night thou wouldst close thine eye for a while, that I might whisper a hundred words to her silent ruby lips. No inclination, have I for two of a white rose, or the leaf of the narcissus, so long as by heaven's grace I walk proudly in the rose garden of her favor. O mine ancient wise one, lie not thy prohibition on the winehouse, for a bernabye, to mean the wine cup, I should break a pledge to my own heart. My beverage is easy of digestion, and my love is beautiful as a picture. No one had the love, such a love as I have.

Starting point is 06:58:10 I have a cypress in my dwelling. Under the shade of whose tall stature, I can dispense with the cypress of the grove and the balk street of the meadow. I can boast that the seal of her ruby lip is a potent, as was that of Solomon. in possession of the great name, why should I dread the evil one? After long abstinence, I fees has become a notorious reveller. But why grieve, so long as there is in the world an emin adin Hassan? Spring has come again, and the joy exciting and foul-breaking rose,

Starting point is 06:58:48 and the delight of gazing on the cheek of the rose, tear up the root of sorrow from thy heart. The soft east wind has arrived. The rosebud, in its passion, hath burst forth and torn its own garment. Learn, oh my heart, the way of sincerity from the clear water, and uprightness seek freedom from the cypress of the meadow. The bride of the rosebud, with her jewels and sweet smile, had stolen away with their black eye, my heart, and my religion. The warbling of the enamoured nightingale and the piping of the bird at the thousand notes. come to enjoy the meeting with the rose from her house of mourning, i.e. her pond.

Starting point is 06:59:30 See how the gentle breeze had then twined with his hand the ringlets of the rose. Look how the plated locks of the hyacinth bend over the face of the jessamine. The story of the revolving sphere. Seek to learn from the cup, oh high fees, as the voice of the minstrel in the judgment of the wives advised thee. The bird of my heart is a sacred bird Whose nest is the throne of God Seek of its cage of the body It is satiated with the things of the world

Starting point is 07:00:02 If once the bird of the spirit winketh its flight From this pit of Meyer It findeth its resting place once more Only at the door of that palace And when the bird in my heart Flyeth upward Its place in the sitter tree For know that a falcon reposeth only on the

Starting point is 07:00:21 pinnacle of the throne. The shadow of good fortune falleth upon the world, whenever our bird spreadeth its pinions and feathers over the earth. In both worlds, its station is only in the loftiest sphere. Its body is from the quarry, but its soul is confined to no dwelling. Only the highest heaven is the secret bow of our bird. Its drinking places in the rose arbors of the Garden of Paradise. Thou perplexed, one, when thou breathest a word about unity, inscribe unity with thy read on the page of man and spirit. If it had the voice of the turtle dove and the nightingale, that wilt not clothe wine, how can I cure thee,

Starting point is 07:01:07 saved by the last remedy, burning? When the rose had cast her veil, and the bird is reciting his who, who, put not the cup from thy hand, What meaneth thine, oh, oh. Whilst the water of life is in thy hand, Dye not a thirst. Water giveth life to all things. Lay of treasures for thyself from the hues and odors of springtide.

Starting point is 07:01:34 We'll follow quickly on its heels the autumn and the winter. Fate bestoweth no gift, which it takeeth not back. Ask not aught of sword its humanity. The trifle it, bestoweth is a nothing. the grandeur of sovereignty and power, how should it be stable? Of the throne of Gem and the diadem of Kai, what is left save a fable? Whoso heapeth up riches to be the heritage of the mean is an infidel. So say the minstrel and the cup-bearer, such as the decree of the symbol and the fife. It is written on the portico of the mansion of paradise, woe to him who hath purchased the smiles of the world. generosity is departed

Starting point is 07:02:19 I fold up my words Where is the wine That I may give May the soul of Hatim Kai Dwell in bliss forever The miser will never breathe The fragrance of heaven Come, Hafiz

Starting point is 07:02:34 Take the cup and practice Liberality And I will be thy surety Translation by S. Robinson Three gazals or Odes From the Garden of Union with thee even the gardens of Rizvon, Paradise, gained lustre of joy. From the torment of separation from thee, even hell's flame hath torment.

Starting point is 07:02:59 In the beauty of thy cheek and stature, shelter had taken paradise and the tuba tree. For them, it the shelter is good, and a good place of returning from this world. All night, even as my eye seeeth, so the stream of paradise seeeth. in sleep the image of thy intoxicated eye of mercy. In every season, spring giveth description of thy beauty. In every book, Paradise maketh mention of thy grace. This heart consumed, and my soul attained not to the heart's desire. If it had attained to its desire, it would not have poured forth blood of grief. Oh, many the salt rites of their lip and mouth, which they have against rent livers and roast hearts. Think not that in thy circle only lovers are intoxicated with love for thee.

Starting point is 07:03:56 Of the state of Saheed's distraught with love, no moose hath thou. By the circle of thy ruddy lip in thy face resplendent as the sun, I knew that the jewel luster of the ruby was produced by the sun, world illuminating. Open the veil. This modesty, how long will thou practice? with this veil what hast thou bound save modesty? The rose beheld thy face and fell into the fire of love. Proceed thy fragrance and through shame became soft and fragrant like rose water.

Starting point is 07:04:34 In love for thy face, I fees is immersed in the sea of calamity. Behold he dieth. Calm ones. Help. A fees, that love should pass in folly. permit not, strive, and understand the value of dear life. When the roses in the bosom, wine in the hand, and the beloved to my desire, on such a day, the world's sultan is my slave. Say, into this assembly, bring ye no candle for tonight.

Starting point is 07:05:08 In our assembly, the moon of the friend's face is full. In our order of profligates, the wine cup is lawful. But O cypress rose of body, without thy face presence unlawful. In our assembly of lovers, mix not itter perfume, for our soul every moment receiveeth perfume, from the fragrance of the tip of thy tress. My ear is all intent on the voice of the reed, and the melody of the harp, the instruction of the merchid.

Starting point is 07:05:42 My eye is all intent on thy ruby lip, and on the circulation of the cup, the manifestations of glories of God in the night's season. Say he not of the sweetness of candy and sugar, the delights of the world, but my desire is for thy sweet lip, the sweet dream of divine grace the source of endless delight. From the time when the treasure of grief for thee

Starting point is 07:06:07 was dweller in my ruined heart, the corner of the tavern is ever my abode. of shame why speakest thou? For from shame is my name, renown. Of name renown, why actest thou? For from name, renown is my shame. Wine drinker, distraught of head, profligate and glance player, I am.

Starting point is 07:06:33 In this city, who is that one who is not like this? To the matur-sib, utter not my crime, for he also is ever like me in desire. of the drinkers of wine a fies sit not a moment without wine and the beloved tis the season of the rose and of the jessamine and of the id of siam without the beloved's face the rose is not pleasant without wine spring is not pleasant the border of the sward and the air of the garden without the beloved of tulip cheek is not pleasant With the beloved sugar of lip, rose of body, to be without kiss and embrace, is not pleasant. The dancing of the cypress and the rapture of the rose, without the song of the Hazar, is not pleasant. Every picture that Reason's hand depicteth, save the picture of the living beauter's idol, is not pleasant.

Starting point is 07:07:36 The garden in the rose and wine, all is pleasant, but without the beloved society, is not pleasant. pleasant. A fees, the soul is but a despicable coin, but scattering on the true beloved it is not pleasant. That friend by whom a house the happy dwelling of the parry was, head to foot, free from defect, a parf, was, acceptable to all the wise of mine is that moon, for his with beauty of manner, the way of one endowed with vision, My heart said, in hope of her, in this city I will sojourn. Helpless, I knew not that its friend a traveler, was. Out from my grasp, a malignant star plucked her. Yes, what can I do? The calamity of the revolution of the moon, it was. Not only for my heart's mystery fell the screen, since the sky time was, screen rending its habit. was sweet was the merge of the water and the rose and the verger but alas that moving treasure away fair was happy were those times which passed with the friend or without result without knowledge the rest was the bubble the true lover slew himself through jealousy of this that to the rose the true beloved at morning time the last breath of life with the morning bruce of the morning the angel of death, splendor of heavenly messages, was.

Starting point is 07:09:20 O heart, establish an excuse, for thou art a beggar and here, in the kingdom of beauty, the head of a crowned one, was. Every treasure of happiness that God gave to her fees from the auspiciousness of the evening prayer and of the morning supplication was. translations of Lieutenant Colonel H. Wilberforce Clark. Three gaziles or odes. Oh, cup bearer, bring the joy of youth. Bring cup after cup of red wine.

Starting point is 07:09:55 Bring medicine for the disease of love. Bring wine, which is the balm of old and young. Do not grieve for the revolution of time, that it wield thus and not thus. Touch the lute in peace. wisdom is very wearisome Bring for its neck The noose of wine

Starting point is 07:10:13 When the rose goes Say go gladly And drink wine Red like the rose If the moan of the turtle Does not remain what matter Bring music in the jug of wine The sun is wine

Starting point is 07:10:28 In the moon the cup Pour the sun into the moon To drink wine is either good or bad Drink if it be bad Or if it be good Her face cannot be seen except in a dream. Bring then the medicine of sleep. Give cup after cup to her fees,

Starting point is 07:10:48 pour whether it be sin or sanctity. The east wind at the dawn of day brought a perfume from the tresses of my beloved, which immediately cast my foolish art into fresh agitation. I imagined that I had uprooted the flower from the garden of my heart. For every blossom which sprang up from its suffering, bore only the fruits of pain. From fear of the attacks of her love,

Starting point is 07:11:14 I set my heart free with bloody strife. My heart dropped gouts of blood, which marked my footsteps. I beheld from her terrors how the glory of the moon failed itself in confusion before the face of that dazzling sun. At the voice of the singer and the cup bear, I go to the door in and out of season,

Starting point is 07:11:36 for the messenger cometh with trouble from a weary road. Any gift of my beloved I take as a courteous and kind, whether it be Mohammedan, Christian, or Jewish. Heaven protect her eyebrows from harm, for though they brought me to despair, yet with a gracious greeting they have given consolation to the sick heart. Joy to the time in the hour when I freed myself from the snare of her braided dresses,

Starting point is 07:12:03 and gained a victory which even my foe admitted. From envy of the tresses of my beloved, the breeze lavished all the musk which he had carried from tartary. I was amazed when I discovered last night cup and jugged beside Hafiz, but I said no word, for he used them in Sufi manner. Yesterday morning I chanced to drink a cup of two from the lip of the cup-bearer wine had fallen into my heart. From the joy of intoxication I was longing to call back the beloved of my youth but divorce had befallen. I dreamed that I might kiss those divine eyes

Starting point is 07:12:44 I had lost strength and patience on account of her arched eyebrow. Oh, Saki, give the cup frequently because in the journey on the path where is the lover who has not fallen into hypocrisy? Oh, interpreter of dreams, give good tidings because last night the sun seemed to be my ally in the joy of the morning's sleep. At the hour when Haphiz was writing this troubled verse,

Starting point is 07:13:13 the brood of his heart had fallen into the snare of love. Translations of Justin Huntley McCarthy. End of Section 14. Section 15 of Library the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Volume 17. This is a Liverpool's recording. All Libervox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit livervox.org.

Starting point is 07:13:49 Library the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Volume 17. Expectation of America by Richard Hacklute 1552 to 1616. Richard Hacklute has himself told how, when he was one of Queen Elizabeth scholars at Westminster. He was inspired to the study of cosmography by a visit to the Chamber of a Kinsman, a gentleman of the Inner Temple in London.

Starting point is 07:14:18 He saw there all manner of books of geography and resolved thereupon to make their acquaintance, and while studying for Holy Orders at Oxford and afterward in France, as chaplain to Sir Edward Stafford, both reading and observation, gave him knowledge of English slothfulness, in maritime discovery and enterprise.

Starting point is 07:14:40 Before Hucklut was sent as ambassador's chaplain to Paris, however, he had published his first work, diverse voyages touching the discovery of America, and the islands adjacent unto the same, made first of all by our Englishmen, and afterwards by the Frenchmen and Britons, and certain notes of advertisements for observations, necessary for such as shall he,

Starting point is 07:15:06 Hereafter make the like attempt, with two maps annexed here on two for the plainer understanding of the whole matter, imprinted at London for Thomas Woodcock, dwelling in Paul's churchyard at the sign of the Black Bear, 1582. The book, which appeared when he was 30, he was born about 1552, was dedicated to the right, worshipful and very virtuous gentleman, Master Philip Sidney Esquire, and in the address to his patron, Hocklut complains of England's failure to possess herself of lands rightly hers. This was to preface a plea for the establishment of a lectureship to advance the art of navigation, for which cause I have dealt with the right worshipful Sir Francis Drake, that seeing God hath blessed him so wonderfully. He would do this,

Starting point is 07:16:02 honor to himself and benefit to his country, to be at the cost to erect such a lecture. But his efforts proved futile. The most memorable fruit of Hacklut's life in Paris was, a particular discourse concerning the great necessity and manifold commodities that are like to grow to this realm of England by the Western discoveries lately attempted, written in the year of 1884 by Richard Hacklute of Oxford, at the request and direction of the rightful worshipful, Mr. Walter Raleigh, now night, before the coming home of his two barks, a part of which notable paper is given at the end of this article. The energy zeal, vigor, and conviction, the peace displays

Starting point is 07:16:51 bear out the claims of Robertson, who, in his History of America, asserts that it is the Elizabethan preacher, to whom England is more indebted for its American possessions than to any man of that age. Hoclut's faith and earnestness was so eager that he even had a thought, a personal hazard, as the second letter to Walsingham, Bay as witness. During a visit to England in 1584, he had presented his particular discourse concerning Western discoveries, along with one in Latin upon Aristotle's politics, to his royal mistress, who in recognition of his pains and loyalty

Starting point is 07:17:33 had given him a prebent at Bristol. In May 1585, he brought in person before the chapter of the cathedral at Bristol, the Queen's order for the preferment. Upon this and like ecclesiastical stipends, he lived and did his work. The most first man in that skill Cosmography, says Hackett, that England bred.

Starting point is 07:17:58 While in Paris, Haclut translated and published in 1587, Londomiers Histoire Notable de La Florida, under the title, a notable history containing four voyages made by certain French captains into Florida. At the same time and in the same year, he was preparing and publishing the Ornovo Petrie Matreus, Angelé, Decades Octo Illustrati, Labore A. Industrial, Ricardo Hacluti.

Starting point is 07:18:32 In this work is the copperplate map upon which the name of Virginia is for the first time set down. In 1588, Haclut returned to England, and in the following year published a solitary volume, the precursor of his magnus opus, the principal navigations, voyages, traffics, and discoveries of the english nation which appeared in london in three folio volumes between fifteen ninety eight and sixteen hundred in a word says thomas fuller in his worthies many of such useful tracts of sea adventure which before were scattered as several ships mr hucklut hath embodied into a fleet divided into three squadrons so many several volumes a work of great honour to england it being possible that many ports and islands in america which being bare and barren be only a bare name for the present may prove rich places for the future and then these voyages will be produced and pleaded as good evidence of their belonging to england as first discovered and dominated by englishmen the work is invaluable a storehouse of the facts of life the habits of thinking and doing of the discoveries of brosven brought of the Englishmen of the high seas and Elizabeth's Day.

Starting point is 07:19:56 The salt air of the northern seas blows over Hucklitz pages, as well as the hot simoon and baffling winds. We run aground with the castaways, adventure in bargaining with natives, and in company with the mariners lament the casting overboard to save our good bark of three tons of spice. The men of that day were seekers after a golden fleece, the argonauts of the modern world, and their ruffeons stories are untellable, save in their party vernacular.

Starting point is 07:20:31 Some of them were traitors, with now and them the excitement of a skirmish or free-booting expedition, a salt to harden, the true tender flush of easy commerce. All were self-gainers and all soldiers of fortune, and by the simplest fact the forerunners of the 17th century buccaneers, and every sort of excess interfetude that name connotes. After Hacklut had completed his great work he edited translation from the Portuguese, the discoveries of the world's 1601, and in 1609, published his own translation of Desoto's discoveries in Florida. In this work, called Virginia Richly Valued, he endeavored to promote the interest of the infant settlement.

Starting point is 07:21:19 certain of his manuscripts fell after his death into the hands of Samuel Purchase and were by him edited and included in his pilgrims 1625 to 26 he paid his last debt to nature's as Anthony Edward 23rd November in 1616 and was buried in the avid church of Westminster dedicated to St. Peter on the 26th of the same month. particular discourse was first printed from a contemporary manuscript by Dr. Woods of Bordeauxan College and Mr. Charles Dean of Cambridge, Massachusetts in 1877. Dr. Woods hit trace of the paper while searching in England for historical documents on behalf of the Historical Society of Maine. The copy from which he made his transcript was doubtless one of the forward talklet prepared at the time he presented

Starting point is 07:22:17 this discourse to Queen Elizabeth. Its object was evidently to gain Elizabeth's support for Raleigh's adventure, which he had undertaken under a patent granted him in March 584. The paper is most curious and valuable, and from the point of view of today, seems to a degree prophetic. Besides proving that Hocklett had sagacity, penetrative insight, and an imagination that could seize upon a construct and practical affairs. It is typical of the English attitude through all centuries. A moral impulse is in Anglo-Saxon blood, and whatever it undertakes, morality,

Starting point is 07:23:00 or an admixture of morality and religion, is its potential incentive. The English, in all such works as Hacklett deals with, has started out with religion or a moral question and ended with commerce. Hocklets, Principle, Navigations, and Voyages were republished in 1809 to 1812. The Voyagers of the English Nation to America were edited by Mr. Edmund Goldsmith in 1889. The particular discourse appears in these later volumes, as well as in the publications of the main historical society.

Starting point is 07:23:40 Expectations of America. A particular discourse concerning the great... necessity and manifold commodities that are like to grow to this realm of England by the Western discoveries lately attempted written in the year 1584 by Richard Hacklett of Oxford at the request and direction of the right worshipful Mr. Walter Raleigh now night before the coming home of his two barks copyrighted by the main historical society and reprinted by its permission sing that the people of that part of america from thirty degrees in florida northward into sixty-three degrees with years yet is no christian princess actual possession are idolaters

Starting point is 07:24:29 and that those which stephen gomes brought from the coast of noremberg in the year fifteen twenty four worshipped the sun the moon and the stars and used other idolatry it remains to be thoroughly weighed and considered by what means and by whom this most godly and christian work may be performed of in lorange the glorious gospel of christ Now the kings and queens of England had the name of defenders of the faith, by which title I think they are not only charged to maintain and patronize the faith of Christ, but also to enlarge and advance the same. Neither ought this to be their last work, but rather the principle and chief of all others. According to the commandments of our Savior, Christ, Matthew 6th, first seek the kingdoms of God and the righteousness. thereof, and all other things shall misinterred unto you. Now the means to send such, as shall labor effectually in this business, is, by planting one or two colonies of our nation upon that farm,

Starting point is 07:25:39 where they shall remain in safety and first learn the language of the people near adjoining, the gift of tongues being now taken away, and by little and little acquaint themselves with their manner, and so with discretion and mildness, distill in the terms. into their purged minds, the sweet and lively liquor of the gospel. Now, therefore, I trust the time is at hand, when by Her Majesty's forewitness in this enterprise, not only this objection and such like, shall be answered by our fruitful labor in God's harvest among the infidels,

Starting point is 07:26:16 but also many inconveniences and stripes amongst ourselves at home, and matters of ceremony shall be ended, but those of the clergy which by reason of idleness here at home are now always copying of new opinions, having by this voyage to set themselves on work in reducing the savages to the chief principles of our faith, will become less contentious and be contented with the truth and religion already established by authority. So they, that shall bear, the name of Christians, shall show themselves worthy of their vocation. The next thing is that now I declare unto you the commodities of this new Western discovery, and what merchandise are there to be had, and from thence to be expected,

Starting point is 07:27:07 wherein first you are to have regard unto the situation of the places which are left for us to be possessed. The countries, therefore, of America, where unto we have just titled, as being first discovered by Sebastian Cabot, at the cost of that prudent prince, King Henry the 7th, from Florida northwards to 67 degrees, and not yet in any Christian prince's actual possession. Being answerable to climate to barbary, Egypt, Syria, Persia, Turkey, Greece, all the islands of the Levant Sea, Italy, Spain, Portugal, France, Flanders, High Al-Main, Denmark, Estlin, Poland, and Moscow.

Starting point is 07:27:52 may presently are within a short space afford unto us, for little or nothing, and with much more safety, either all or a great part of the commodities which therefore said countries do yield us at a very dear hand, and with manifold dangers. First, therefore, to begin at the south from 30 degrees, and to quote unto you the leaf and page of the printed voyagers of those which personally have with diligence, searched and viewed these countries. John Ribald wrote it thus, in the first leaf of his discourse, extend in print, both in French and English. We entered, saith he, and viewed the country,

Starting point is 07:28:38 which is the fairest, fruitfulness, and pleasantest of all the world, abounding in honey, wax, venice, and wild fowl, forests, woods of all sorts, palm trees, cypresses, cedars, bays, the highest and greatest, which also the fairest vines in all the world, with grapes according, which naturally without art or man's help, or trimming, will grow to tops of

Starting point is 07:29:06 oaks and other trees that be of wonderful greatness and height. And the sight of the fair meadows is a pleasure, not able to be expressed with tongue, full of herons, curlers, bitters, mallards, epigrets, woodcocks, and all other kind of small birds, with hearts, hinds, bucks, wild swine, and all other kind of wild beasts, as we perceived well, both by their footings there, and also afterward in other places by their cry, and roaring in the night.

Starting point is 07:29:39 Also there be conies and hares, silkworms in marvelous number, a great deal fairer and better than be our silkworms. again in the sixth leaf and second page they showed unto us by signs that they had in the land gold and silver and copper whereof we have brought some home also led like unto ours which we showed them also turkises and great abundance of pearls which as they are declared unto us they took out of oysters whereof there is taken ever along the river-side and among the those reeds and in the marshes, in so marvelous abundance as it is scant credible. And we have perceived that there be as many and as great perils found there as in any country in the world. In the seventh leaf, it followed with thus. The situation is under 30 degrees, a good climate, healthful, and of good temperature, marvelous pleasant, the people good

Starting point is 07:30:46 and of a gentle and amiable nature, which willingly will obey, yea, be contented to serve those that shall with gentleness and humanity, go about to allure them, as yet is necessary for those that be sent, thither hereafter, so to do. in the eighth leaf it is a place wonderful fertile and upstrong situation the ground fat so that it is like that it would bring forth wheat and all other corn twice a year ferrisana falling in the latitude at thirty four degrees described the situation and commodities in this manner beyond this we saw the open country rising in height above the sandy shore with many fair fields and plains full of mighty great woods, some very thick and some very thin, replenished with diverse sorts of trees, and pleasant and delectable to behold, as is possible to imagine. And your majesty may not think that those are like the woods of Hycena, or the wild deserts of Tartaria, and the northern coasts full of fruitless trees, but full of palm, day trees, and high cypresses, and many of the sorts of trees to us are known in Europe, which yield more sweet savers

Starting point is 07:32:11 far from the shore. Neither do we think that they, partaking of the estate world round about them, are altogether void of drugs and spicery, and other riches of gold, seeing the color of the land, doth altogether argue yet. And the land is full of many beasts, as red deer, fallow deer, and hares, and likewise of lakes and pools of fresh water, with great plenty of fowls convenient for all pleasant game. This land is in latitude 34 degrees, with good and wholesome air, temperate between hot and cold. No vehement winds do blow in these regions, etc.

Starting point is 07:32:58 Again, in the fourth leaf as it is in English, speaking of the next country, he saith we saw in this country many vines growing naturally which springing up took hold of the trees as they do in lombardy which if by husbandmen they were dressed in good order without all doubt they would yield excellent wines by having often as serene the fute thereof dried which was sweet and pleasant as not differing from ours we think they do esteem of the same because then it every place where they grow, they take away the underbranchers growing round about, that the fruit thereof may ripen the better. We found also roses, violets, lullies, and many sorts of herbs, and sweet in odiferous flowers. And after, in the sixth leaf, he saith, we were oftentimes within the land five or six leagues, which we found as pleasant as is possible to declare. apt for any kind of husbandry of corn, wine, and oil.

Starting point is 07:34:08 For therein there are plains, 25 or 30 leagues broad, open without any impediment of trees, of such fruitfulness that any seed being sown herein will bring forth most excellent fruit. We entered afterwards into the woods, which we found so great and thick that an army, where it never so great, might have hit itself therein,

Starting point is 07:34:33 The trees were of were oaks, cypress, and other sorts unknown in Europe. We found Pomey Appy, plumes, and nuts, and many other sorts of fruits to us unknown. There are beasts in great abundance as red deer and fallow deer, leopards and other kinds, which they take with their bows and arrows, which are their chiefest weapon. This land is situated in the parallel of Rome, in forty one degrees and two terseys and towards the end he saith we saw many of the people wear earrings of copper hanging at their ears thus far out of the relation of verisana this coast from cape britain two hundred leagues to the southwest was again discovered at the charges of the cardinal of bourbon by my friend stephen bellinger of rhone the last year fifteen eighty three who found

Starting point is 07:35:33 the town of four score houses, covered with the barks of trees upon a river side, about 100 leagues from the aforesaid Cape Britain. He reported that the country is of the temperature of the coast of Casgling and Goughif. He brought home a kind of mineral matter, supposed to hold silver, whereof he gave me some, a kind of muffs called castor, divers be skins, as beavers, otters, martins, lucerne, seals, buffs, deerskins, all dressed and painted on the inner side with diverse excellent colors, as red, tawn, yellow, and vermilion, all which things I saw, and diverse other merchandise

Starting point is 07:36:18 he had, which I saw not, but he told me that he had four hundred and forty crowns, for that in Rome, which in trifles bestowed upon the savages, strode him not in forty crowns. The nature and quality of the other part of America from Cape Britain, being in 46 degrees unto the latitude of 52, for 200 leagues within the land even to Hawk Lega, is notably described in the two voyages of Jacques Cartier. In the fifth chapter of his second relation, thus he rideth. From the 19th till the 28th of September, we sailed up the river, never losing one hour of time, all which space we saw as goodly a country as possibly could be wished for, full of all sorts of goodly trees, that is to say, oaks, elms, walnut trees, cedies, firs, ashes, balks, willows,

Starting point is 07:37:19 and great store of vines, all as full of graves as could be, that if any of our fellows went on shore, they came home latent with them. There were likewise many cranes, swans, geese, mallards, fessons, partridges, thrushes, blackbirds, turtles, finches, redbreasts, nightingale, sparrows, with other sorts of birds, even as in France, and great plenty in store. Again, in the tenth chapter of the said relation, there you mention of silver and gold to be upon a river that is three months sailing, navigable southward. from Holiginga. And that red copper is in Saginae. All that country is full of sundry sorts of wood and many vines. There is great store of stags, red deer, fallow deer, bears, and other such, like sorts of beasts, as conies, hares, martens, foxes, ardures, beavers, squirrels, badgers, and rattles, exceedingly great. And divers other sorts of beasts

Starting point is 07:38:29 for hunting. There are also many sorts of fowls as cranes, swans, outards, wild geese, white and gray, ducks, thrushes, blackbirds, turtles, wild pigeons, linets, finches, red breasts, stares, nightingale, sparrows, and other birds even as in frat. Also, as we have said before, the said river is the plentiful list of fish that ever hath been seen or heard of. because that from the head to the mouth of it, you shall find all kind of fresh and saltwater fish, according to their season. There are also many whales porpoises, seahorses, and at hoodies, which is a kind of fish, which we have never seen nor heard of before. And in the 11th chapter thus, we understood of Donacana and others that there are people clad with cloth as we are, very honest and many inhabited towns,

Starting point is 07:39:32 and that they had great store of gold and red copper, and that within the land beyond, the said first round to Hokka Laga and Saganae is an island and vire and round about with that and other rivers, and that there is a sea of fresh water found, and as they have heard, say of those of Saginae, there was never man heard of, that found out the beginning and end thereof,

Starting point is 07:39:59 Finally, in the postscript of the second relation, we read these words, Day of Canada say that it is a moon sailing to go to a land where cinnamon and clothes are gathered, thus having alleged many printed testimonies of these credible persons, which were personally between 30 and 63 degrees in America, as well as on the coast as within the land, which affirmed unto the princes and kings which set them out that they found there. I may well and truly conclude with reason and authority that all the commodities of all are old-gayed and dangerous trades in all Europe,

Starting point is 07:40:42 Africa and Asia, haunted by us, may insured space for little or nothing, and many for the very workmanship, in a manner he had in that part of America, which lie at between 30 and 60 degrees, of northerly latitude, if by our slackness we suffer not the French or others to prevent us. Chapter 4. That this enterprise will be for the manifold employment of numbers of idle men, and for breeding of many sufficient, and for utterance of the great quantity of the commodities of our realm. It is well worth the observation to see and consider with the like voyage,

Starting point is 07:41:26 of discovery and planting in the east and west indies had throught in the kingdoms of portugal and spain both which realms behind of themselves poor and barren and are they able to sustain their inhabitants by their discoveries have found such occasion of employment that these many years we have not heard scarcely of any pirate or those two nations whereas we in the french are most infamous for our outrageous comment and daily privacies. Again, when heard, we almost of one thief amongst them. The reason is that by these new discoveries,

Starting point is 07:42:08 they have so many honest ways to set them on work, as they rather want men than means to employ them. But we, for all the statutes that hitherto can be devised, and the sharp execution of the same in punishing idle

Starting point is 07:42:24 lazy persons. For one, a sufficient occasion of honest employment cannot deliver our commonwealth from multitudes of loiterers and idle vagabonds. Truth it is that through our long peace and seldom sickness, two singular blessings of Almighty God, we are grown more populous than ever heretofore, so that now there are of every art and science so many that they can hardly live one by another, nay rather they are ready to eat up one another. Yea many thousands of idle persons are within this realm, which, having no way to be set on work,

Starting point is 07:43:05 be either mutinous or seek alteration in the state, or at least very burdensome, to the Commonwealth, and often fall to pilfering and thieving and other lewdness, whereby all the prisons of the land are daily pestered and stuffed full of them, where either they pitifully pine away or else at length are miserably hanged, even twenty, at a clap out of someone jail. Whereas if this voyage were put in execution, these petty thieves might be condemned for certain years in the western parts, especially in Newfoundland, in saying and felling of timber afore mass of ships and deal boards, in burning of the fires and pious, and pardts, in burning of the fires and pikes, trees to make pitch, tar, rosin, and soap ashes. In beating and working of hem for cordage,

Starting point is 07:43:59 and in the more southern parts, in setting them to work in mines of gold, silver, copper, lead, and iron, in dragging for pearls and curiole, in planting of sugar canes, as the Portugal's have done in Maldara, in maintenance and increasing of silkworms with silk, and in dressing the same, and gathering up cotton whereof there is plenty, in tilling of the soil there for grain, in dressing of vines whereof there is great abundance of wine, olives, whereof the soil is capable for oil, trees for oranges, lemons, almonds, figs, and other fruits, all which are found to grow there already, in sewing of wood and matter for dyers, as the Portuguese have done in the azores

Starting point is 07:44:51 in dressing of raw hides of diverse kinds of beasts in making and gathering of salt as in roquel and bayon which may serve for the new land fishing and killing the whale seal porpoise and whirlpool for train oil

Starting point is 07:45:09 in fishing, salting and draining of linge cod salmon herring in making and gathering of honey wax turpour In hewing and shaping of stone as Marvel, jute, crystal, freestone, which will be good ballast for our ships homewards, and after serve for noble buildings, in making of casks, oars, and all other matter of staves, in building of Ford's town's churches, in ponderage and barrelage of fish, fowls, and flesh, which will be notable provision for sea and land. and drying, sorting, and packing of feathers, whereof may be had their marvellously quantity. Besides this, such as by any kind of infirmity, cannot pass the seas thither, and now are

Starting point is 07:46:04 chargeable to the realm at home. By this voyage shall be, made profitable members by employing them in England, in making of a thousand trifling things, which will be very good merchandise for those countries where we shall have most ample vent thereof. And seeing the savages of the Grand Bay, and all along the mighty river runneth up to Canada and Halklaga, are greatly delighted with any cap of garment made of coarse woolen cloth. Their country being cold and sharp in the winter, it is manifest, we shall find great utterance of our clothes,

Starting point is 07:46:45 especially of our courses and bassists, more than dozens. And our Irish and Wells freezes and rugs, whereby all occupations belonging to clothing and knitting, shall be freshly set on work, as cappers, knitters, clothiers, woolmen, carders, spinners, weavers, fullers, shearmen, dyers, drapers, haters, and such like, whereby many decayed towns may be repaired. In sum, this enterprise will minister matter for all sorts and states of men to work upon. Namely, all several kinds of artifices, husbandmen, seamen, merchants, merchants, physicians, lawyers, divines, cosmographers, hydrographers, astronomers, astronomers, historiographers, yea, old folk, lame persons, women and young children,

Starting point is 07:47:41 by many means which hereby shall still be ministered unto them, shall be kept, from idleness and be made able by their own honest and easy labor, define themselves without surcharging others. Whatsoever clothe, we shall vent on the tract of that frame, or in the island of the same, or in other lands, islands, and territories beyond, be they within the Circle Arctic, or without, all these clothes, I say, are to pass out of this realm, full wrought by our natural subjects in all degrees of labor.

Starting point is 07:48:19 And if it come about in time that we shall vent that mass, there that we vented in the base countries, which is hoped by great reason, then shall all that cloth pass out of this realm in all degrees of labor full wrought by the poor natural subjects of this realm. Like as the quantity of our clothes doth pass, that goeth hence to Russia, Barbary, Turkey, Persia, etc.

Starting point is 07:48:47 And then consequently it followeth, that the like number of people alleged to the emperor shall be set on work in England of our poor subjects more than hath been. And so her majesty shall not be troubled with the pitiful outcries of cappers, knitters, spinners, etc. And on the other side, we are to note that all the commodities

Starting point is 07:49:11 we shall bring thence. We shall not bring them wrought, as we bring now the commodities of France and Flanders, etc., but shall receive them all substances unwrought, to the employment of a wonderful multitude of the poor subjects of this realm in return. And so to conclude, what in the number of things to go out wrought, and to come in unwrought, they need not one poor creature to steal to starve or to beg, as they do. And to answer objections, where fools for the swarming of beggars allege that the realm is too populous, Solomon sayeth that the honor and strength of a prince consist of the multitude of the people, and if this come about, that work may be had for the multitude, where the realm hath now one thousand for the defense thereof. The same may have five thousand, but when people know how to live,

Starting point is 07:50:11 and how to maintain and feed their wires and children. They will not abstain, for marriage is now they do. And the soil thus abounding with corn, flesh, milk, butter, cheese, herbs, roots and fruits, etc. And the seas that environed the same so infinitely abounding in fish. I dare truly affirm that if the number in this realm were as great as all Spain and France have, the people being industrious i say they should be found fiddles enough at the full and all bounty to spice them all and taking order to carry hence thither are clothes made in hose coats cloaks woods etc and to return there the hides of their own beasts canned and turned into shoes and boots and other skins of goats whereof they have store into gloves as etc. No doubt but we shall set on work in this realm. Besides sailors and such as shall be seated there in those western discovered countries, at the least CM subjects, to the great abating

Starting point is 07:51:24 of the goodest state of subjects of foreign princes, enemies, or doubtful friends, and this aftque injuria, as the lawyer say, albeit not Senadano. Chapter 15 That speedy planting in diverse fit places is most necessary upon those last Lucky Western discoveries for fear of the danger of being prevented by other nations which had the like intention

Starting point is 07:51:54 With the other thereof and other reasons therewithal all all alleged Having by God's good guidance and merciful direction Achieved happily this present Western discovery after the seeking the advancement of the kingdom of Christ, the second chief, the principal end of the same is traffic, which consisted in the vent of the mass of our clothes and other commodities of England,

Starting point is 07:52:21 and in receiving back of the needful commodities that we now receive from all of the places of the world. But for as much as this is a matter of great importance, and a thing of so great gain as foreign princes will stomach at. This one thing is to be done without which it were in vain to go about this, and that is the matter of planting and fortification. Without due consideration we're of in vain were to think of the former, and therefore upon the first said view taken by the ships that are to be sent thither,

Starting point is 07:53:00 We are to plant upon the mouths of the great navigable rivers, which are there, by strong order of fortification, and there to plant our colonies. And so being first settled in strength with men, armor, munition, and having our navy within our bays, havens, and roads, we shall be able to let the entrance of all subjects a foreign princes, and so with our fresh powers to encounter their ships at the sea, and to renew the same with fresh. men as the sodden freight shall require, and by our ford shall be able to hold fast our first footing, and readily to annoy such weary power of any that shall seek to arrive, and shall be able without navy, to send advertisement into England upon every sodden whatsoever shall happen, and these fortifications shall keep the natural people of the country in obedience and good order. And these forts, at the mouths of those great portable and navigable rivers, may at all times send up their ships, barks, barges, and boats into the inland with all the

Starting point is 07:54:11 commodities of England, and return unto the said forts all the commodities of the inland that we shall receive an exchange, and thence at pleasure conveyed the same into England, and thus settled in those forts, if the next neighbors shall attempt any annoy to our people, we are kept safe by our forts, and we may, upon violence and wrong offered by them, run upon the rivers with our ships, pyrnices, barks, and boats,

Starting point is 07:54:43 and enter into league with the petite princes, their neighbors, that have always likely wars one with another, and so entrenched league now with the one and then with the other. We shall purchase our own safety and make ourselves lords of the whole. Contrary wise, without this planting in due time, we shall never be able to have full knowledge of the language, manners, and customs of the people of those regions. Neither shall we be able to thoroughly,

Starting point is 07:55:15 to know the riches and commodities of the inland, with many other secrets, whereof as yet we have but a small taste, and although by other means we might attain to the knowledge thereof, yet being not there fortified and strongly seated, the French that swarmed with multitude of people or other nations might secretly fortify and settle themselves before us, hearing of the benefit that is to be reaped of that voyage. And so we should beat the bush and other men,

Starting point is 07:55:48 take the birds. We should be at the charge in travail and other men reap the gain. If we do procrastinate the planting, and where our men have now presently discovered, and found it to be the best part of America that is left, and in truth more agreeable to our natures, and more near unto us, than Nova Hispania, the French, the Normans, the Britons, or the Dutch, or some other nation will not only prevent us of the mighty bay of St. Lawrence, where they have gotten the start of us already, though we had the same revealed to us by books published and printed in English before them, but also will deprive us of that good land,

Starting point is 07:56:33 which now we have discovered. God, which draught all things in his true time, and hath in his hand the hearts of all princes, stir up the mind of her majesty at length to assist her most willing and forward subjects to the performance of this most godly and profitable action, which was begun at the charges of King Henry, the seventh, her grandfather, followed by King Henry VIII, her father, and left as it seemeth to be accomplished by her

Starting point is 07:57:06 as the three years golden voyage to Ophilo by Solomon, to the making of her realm and subjects most happy and herself most famous to all posterity. Amen. End of Section 15. Section 16 of Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Volume 17. This is a Librevox recording. All Libravox recordings are in the public domain.

Starting point is 07:57:43 For more information or to volunteer, here, please visit Libravogs.org, recording by Rita Boutros. Library of the World's Best Literature Ancient and Modern, Volume 17. Edward Everett Hale, born 1822. The city of Boston has been long remarkable for its distinguished figures in science, politics, and affairs in art and literature, and particularly in the walk of letter. Edward Everett Hale is one of these figures. Dr. Hale's long and still productive life

Starting point is 07:58:23 has been one of great and varied usefulness. The religious, philanthropic, civic, and literary circles of his community have felt for many years the impact of his vigorous personality, and his reputation as preacher and writer has become national. His family is a noted one. His father was Nathan Hale, first editor of the Boston Daily advertiser, Nathan Hale, the martyr being of the same line,

Starting point is 07:58:54 while several of the immediate kin of Edward Hale find places in American biography. Born in Boston, April 3, 1822, Edward Everett Hale, was educated at the famous Latin school, then at Harvard, of which he is one of the most noteworthy sons. Hale read theology and was licensed to preach by the Boston Association of Congregational Ministers, his first regular settlement being in Worcester, where he was pastor of the Church of the Unity from 1846 to 1856.

Starting point is 07:59:35 Thence he went to the Boston Unitarian Society, known as the South Congregational Church, and for more than 40 years has been its active head. As a clergyman, Dr. Hale has shown rare qualities as preacher and organizer. His theology has been of the advanced liberal type, his teaching emphasizing good works. His earnest, helpful efforts in the broadest humanitarian undertakings have gone far outside the conventional limits of his calling,

Starting point is 08:00:12 making him more widely known as a public man, both by direct personal endeavor and through the influence of his writings, he has been instrumental in founding many societies for a beneficent work of all kinds, of which the Harry Wadsworth Clubs and the Lookup Legion, with members by the tens of thousands in different lands, are examples. He has kept closely in touch with his alma mater at Cambridge, serving it as

Starting point is 08:00:43 member of the Board of Overseers and as president of the Phi Beta Kappa Society. The degree of STD was conferred upon him by Harvard in 1879. His journalistic enterprises have been too many for enumeration here. He began early, setting time. in his father's office as a lad and showing himself a diligent scribbler. Perhaps his best-known editorial connections have been with the magazine, old and new, started under Unitarian auspices with the idea of giving literary expression to liberal Christianity, and afterwards merged in Scribner's Monthly and Lend a Hand, a sort of record of organized charity,

Starting point is 08:01:35 founded in 1886. Few writing clergymen have been so voluminous as Dr. Hale, few so successful. In addition to the long list of his magazine papers and articles of every sort, his books number upwards of 50 titles, as is inevitable in one who is so prolific, throwing off literary work with a running pen,

Starting point is 08:02:03 often with a practical rather than and artistic aim. Much of his writing is occasional in motive and ephemeral in character. It includes histories, essays, novels, poems, and short stories, and the average quality, considering the variety and extent of the performance, and the fact that with Dr. Hale, literature is an advocation, and aside from his main business in life, is decidedly high. The short story is the literary form in which he has best expressed his gift and character. One of his stories, The Man Without a Country, is a Little American Classic. Others, such as My Double and How He Undid Me, and The Skeleton in the Closet, have also won permanent popularity.

Starting point is 08:02:59 They were written a generation ago, when the short story was not the familiar form it had, since become so that in addition to their merit they are of interest as early ventures in the tale distinguished from the full-length novel the man without a country selections from which follow well represents dr. Hale's characteristics its manner has ease felicity and good breeding the narrative runs along in such an honest straightforward way there is such an air of verisimilitude that the reader is half inclined to accept it all as history, although the idea of a United States naval officer kept a prisoner at sea for a long lifetime, and never permitted

Starting point is 08:03:51 to hear or know of his native land, is hardly more credible than the idea of the flying Dutchman or the wandering Jew. Yet, when the tale appeared, the writer received letters of inquiry, indicating that the fiction was taken in sober earnest, and in a later addition, he stated in an appendix that it lacked all foundation in fact. But over and above its literary fascination, the man without a country is surcharged with ethical significance. It is a beautiful allegory showing the dire results of a momentary and heedless lapse from patriotism and so preaching love of country. It develops a lively sense of what it is to have a flag to fight for, a land to love.

Starting point is 08:04:47 This lesson is conveyed with power and pathos, and the story's instant and continued acceptance is testimony, or any needed, that Americans felt the appeal while enjoying the lovely fiction for its own sake. Such work on the moral side is typical of Dr. Hale. He cannot write without a spiritual or moral purpose. If his literature is didactic, it is not dull, and hence doing good, it also justifies itself as art. Selection Philip Nolan by Edward Everett Hale From The Man Without a Country,

Starting point is 08:05:31 Copyrighted, Reprinted by Permitted by Permission, of Dr. Hale and J.S. Smith and Company, Publishers, Boston. Philip Nolan was as fine a young officer as there was in the Legion of the West, as the Western Division of Our Army was then called. When Aaron Burr made his first dashing expedition down to New Orleans in 1805 at Fort DeMassack, or somewhere above on the river, he met, as the devil would, have it, this gay-dashing bright young fellow, at some dinner party, I think. Burr marked him, talked to him, walked with him, took him a day or two's voyage in his flatboat, and in short,

Starting point is 08:06:18 fascinated him. For the next year, Barrack life was very tame to poor Nolan. He occasionally availed himself of the permission the great man had given him to write to him. Long, high-worded stilted letters the poor boy wrote and rewrote and copied, but never a line did he have in reply from the gay deceiver. The other boys in the garrison sneered at him, because he sacrificed in this unrequited affection for a politician, the time which they devoted to Manongahila, hazard, and high-low jack. Bourbon, yuker, and poker were still unknown. But one day Nolan had his revenge. This time Burr came down the river,

Starting point is 08:07:09 not as an attorney seeking a place for his office, but as a distinguished conqueror. He had defeated I Know Not how many district attorneys. He had dined at I Know Not how many public dinners. He had been heralded in I know not how many weekly Argusis, and it was rumored that he had an army behind him and an empire before him. It was a great day, his arrival, to poor Nolan.

Starting point is 08:07:40 Burr had not been at the fort an hour before he sent for him. That evening, he asked Nolan to take him out in his skiff, to show him a cane break, or a cottonwood tree, as he said, really to seduce him, and by the time the sale was over, Nolan was enlisted body and soul. from that time, though he did not yet know it, he lived as a man without a country. What Burr meant to do, I know no more than you, dear reader, it is none of our business just now. Only when the grand catastrophe came, and Jefferson and the House of Virginia of that day undertook to break on the wheel

Starting point is 08:08:25 all the possible clarances of the then House of York by the great treason trial at Richmond, some of the lesser fry in that distant Mississippi Valley, which was further down from us than Puget Sound, is today, introduced the like novelty on their provincial stage, and to while away the monotony of the summer at Fort Adams got up for spectacles a string of court-martials on the office, officers there. One and another of the colonels and majors were tried, and to fill out the list,

Starting point is 08:09:03 little Nolan, against whom, heaven knows there was evidence enough that he was sick of the service, had been willing to be false to it, and would have obeyed any order to march any wither, with any one who would follow him, had the order been signed by command of his Excellency, A. Burr. The courts dragged on. The big flies escaped, rightly for all I know. Nolan was proved guilty enough, as I say. Yet you and I would never have heard of him, Reader, but that when the president of the court asked him at the close whether he wished to say anything to show that he had always been faithful to the United States, he cried out in a fit of frenzy, Damned the United States. I wish I may never hear of the United States again.

Starting point is 08:10:00 I suppose he did not know how the words shocked old Colonel Morgan, who was holding the court. Half the officers who sat in it had served through the revolution, and their lives, not to say their necks, had been risked for the very idea which he so cavalierly cursed in his madness. He on his part had grown up in the west of those days in the midst of Spanish plot, Orleans plot, and all the rest. He had been educated on a plantation where the finest company was a Spanish officer or a French merchant from Orleans. His education, such as it was, had been perfected in commercial expeditions to Veracruz, and I think he told me his father once hired an Englishman to be a private tutor for a winter on the plantation.

Starting point is 08:10:55 He had spent half his youth with an older brother, hunting horses in Texas, and, in a word, to him, United States was scarcely a reality. Yet he had been fed by United States for all the years since he had been in the army. He had sworn on his faith as a Christian to be true to United States. It was United States, which gave him the uniform he wore and the sword by his side. Nay, my poor Nolan, it was only because United States had picked you out first as one of her own confidential men of honor, that A. Burr cared for you a straw more than for the flatboat men who sailed his ark for him. I do not excuse, Nolan, I only explain to the reader why he damned.

Starting point is 08:11:48 his country and wished he might never hear her name again. He never did hear her name but once again. From that moment, September 23, 1807, till the day he died, May 11, 1863, he never heard her name again. For that half-century and more, he was a man without a country. Old Morgan, as I said, was terribly shocked. If Nolan had compared George Washington to Benedict Arnold or had cried God save King George, Morgan would not have felt worse. He called the court into his private room and returned in 15 minutes with a face like a sheet to say, Prisoner, hear the sentence of the court.

Starting point is 08:12:38 The court decides, subject to the approval of the president, that you never hear the name of the United States again. Nolan laughed, but nobody else laughed. Old Morgan was too solemn, and the whole room was hushed dead as night for a minute. Even Nolan lost his swagger in a moment. Then Morgan added, Mr. Marshall take the prisoner to Orleans in an armed boat and deliver him to the naval commander there. The marshal gave his orders, and the prisoner was taken out of court. Mr. Marshall continued. old Morgan, see that no one mentions the United States to the prisoner. Mr. Marshall, make my respects to Lieutenant Mitchell at Orleans, and request him to order that no one shall mention the United States to the prisoner while he is on board ship. You will receive your written orders from the officer on duty here this evening. The court is adjourned without day. Since writing this, and while considering whether or no I would print it as a warning to the young Nolan's and Valandingham's and tantal's of today of what it is to throw away a country. I have received from Danforth, who is

Starting point is 08:14:00 on board the Levant, a letter which gives an account of Nolan's last hours. It removes all my doubts about telling this story. To understand the first words of the letter, the non-professional reader should remember that after 1817, the position of every officer who had Nolan in charge was one of the greatest delicacy. The government had failed to renew the order of 1807 regarding him. What was a man to do? Should he let him go? What then if he were called to account by the department for violating the order of 1807? Should he keep him? What then if Nolan, should be liberated some day and should bring an action

Starting point is 08:14:48 for false imprisonment or kidnapping against every man who had had him in charge. I urged and pressed this upon Southerd, and I have reason to think that other officers did the same thing. But the Secretary always said, as they so often do at Washington,

Starting point is 08:15:07 that there were no special orders to give, and that we must act on our own judgment. That means, If you succeed, you will be sustained. If you fail, you will be disavowed. Well, as Danforth says, all that is over now, though I do not know, but I expose myself to a criminal prosecution on the evidence of the very revelation I am making. Here is the letter. Levant, 2 degrees, 2 seconds south at 131 degrees west. Dear Fred, I try to find heart and life to tell you that it is all over with dear old Nolan.

Starting point is 08:15:50 I have been with him on this voyage more than I ever was, and I can understand wholly now the way in which you used to speak of the dear old fellow. I could see that he was not strong, but I had no idea the end was so near. The doctor has been watching him very carefully, and yesterday morning came to me, and told me that Nolan was not so well, and had not left his stateroom, a thing I never remember before. He had let the doctor come and see him as he lay there, the first time the doctor had been in the stateroom,

Starting point is 08:16:27 and he said he should like to see me. Oh dear, do you remember the mysteries we boys used to invent about his room in the old intrepid days? Well, I went in, and there to be sure, the poor fellow lay in his birth, smiling pleasantly as he gave me his hand, but looking very frail. I could not help a glance round, which showed me what a little shrine he had made of the box he was lying in. The stars and stripes were triced up above and around a picture of Washington, and he had painted

Starting point is 08:17:03 a majestic eagle with lightnings blazing from his beak, and his foot just clasping the whole globe, his wings overshadowed. The dear old boy saw my glance and said with a sad smile, Here you see I have a country. And then he pointed to the foot of his bed, where I had not seen before a great map of the United States, as he had drawn it from memory, and which he had there to look upon as he lay. Quaint, queer old names were on it in large letters, Indiana Territory, Mississippi Territory, and Louisiana Territory. As I suppose our fathers learned such things, but the old fellow had patched in Texas, too. He had carried his western boundary all the way to the Pacific, but on that shore he had

Starting point is 08:17:58 defined nothing. Oh, Danforth, he said, I know I am dying, I cannot get home. surely you will tell me something now stop stop do not speak till i say what i am sure you know that there is not in this ship that there is not in america god bless her a more loyal man than i there cannot be a man who loves the old flag as i do or prays for it as i do or hopes for it as i do there are thirty-four stars in it now danforth i thank god for that that, though I do not know what their names are. There has never been one taken away. I thank God for that. I know by that that there has never been any successful burr. Oh, Danforth, Danforth, he sighed out. How like a wretched knight's dream a boy's idea of personal fame or of separate sovereignty seems, when one looks back on it after such a life as mine. But tell me, tell me something,

Starting point is 08:19:04 tell me everything downforth before I die. Angam, I swear to you that I felt like a monster that I had not told him everything before. Danger or no danger, delicacy or no delicacy. Who was I that I should have been acting the tyrant all this time over this dear sainted old man, who had years ago expiated in his whole manhood's life the madness of a boy's treason?

Starting point is 08:19:33 Mr. Nolan said I I will tell you everything you ask about Only where shall I begin Oh the blessed smile that crept over his white face And he pressed my hand and said God bless you tell me their names he said And he pointed to the stars on the flag The last I know is Ohio

Starting point is 08:19:55 My father lived in Kentucky But I have guessed Michigan and Indiana And Mississippi that was where Fort Adams is. They make twenty. But where are your other fourteen? You have not cut up any of the old ones, I hope. Well, that was not a bad text,

Starting point is 08:20:16 and I told him the names in as good order as I could, and he bade me take down his beautiful map and draw them in as I best could with my pencil. He was wild with delight about Texas, told me how his cousin died there. He had marked a gold cross near where he supposed his grave was, and he had guessed at Texas. Then he was delighted as he saw California and Oregon, that he said he had suspected, partly because he had never been permitted to land on that shore, though the ships were there so much.

Starting point is 08:20:54 And the men, said he, laughing, brought off a good deal besides furs. then he went back Heavens how far to ask about the Chesapeake and what was done to Baron for surrendering her to the leopard and whether Burr ever tried again

Starting point is 08:21:11 and he ground his teeth with the only passion he showed but in a moment that was over and he said God forgive me for I am sure I forgive him then he asked about the old war told me the true story of his serving the gun the day we took the Java, asked about dear old David Porter as he called him.

Starting point is 08:21:34 Then he settled down more quietly and very happily, to hear me tell in an hour, the history of 50 years. How I wished it had been somebody who knew something. But I did as well as I could. I told him of the English war. I told him about Fulton and the steamboat beginning. I told him about old Scott and Jackson. told him all I could think of about the Mississippi and New Orleans and Texas, and his own old Kentucky. And do you think he asked who was in command of the Legion of the West? I told him it was a very gallant officer named Grant, and that by our last news he was about to establish his headquarters at Vicksburg. Then where was Vicksburg? I worked that out on the map.

Starting point is 08:22:28 It was about a hundred miles, more or less, above his old Fort Adams. And I thought Fort Adams must be a ruin now. It must be at old Vicks Plantation at Walnut Hills, said he. Well, that is a change. I tell you, Ingram, it was a hard thing to condense the history of half a century into that talk with a sick man. And I do not now know what I told him, of immigration and the means of it.

Starting point is 08:22:58 of steamboats and railroads and telegraphs, of inventions and books and literature, of the colleges and West Point and the Naval School. But with the queerest interruptions that ever you heard, you see, it was Robinson Crusoe asking all the accumulated questions of 56 years. I remember he asked all of a sudden who was president now, and when I told him, he asked if, Old Abe was General Benjamin Lincoln's son. He said he met old General Lincoln when he was quite a boy himself at some Indian treaty.

Starting point is 08:23:38 I said no, that Old Abe was a Kentuckian like himself, but I could not tell him of what family he had worked up from the ranks. Good for him, cried Nolan. I am glad of that. As I have brooded and wondered, I have thought our danger was in keeping up those regular or successions in the first families. Then I got talking about my visit to Washington. I told him of meeting the Oregon Congressman Harding. I told him about the Smithsonian and the exploring expedition.

Starting point is 08:24:13 I told him about the Capitol and the statues for the pediment, and Crawford's Liberty, and Greenhouse, Washington. Ingham, I told him everything I could think of that would show the grandeur of his. country and its prosperity, but I could not make up my mouth to tell him a word about this infernal rebellion. And he drank it in and enjoyed it as I cannot tell you. He grew more and more silent, yet I never thought he was tired or faint. I gave him a glass of water, but he just wet his lips and told me not to go away. Then he asked me to bring the Presbyterian,

Starting point is 08:24:58 of public prayer which lay there and said with a smile that it would open at the right place and so it did there was his double red mark down the page and I knelt down and read and he repeated with me for ourselves and our country oh gracious God we thank thee that notwithstanding our manifold transgressions of thy holy loss thou hast continued to us thy marvelous kindness, and so to the end of that Thanksgiving. Then he turned to the end of the same book, and I read the words more familiar to me. Most heartily we beseech thee with thy favor, to behold and bless thy servant,

Starting point is 08:25:44 the President of the United States, and all others in authority, and the rest of the Episcopal collect. Danforth, said he, I have repeated those prayers night and morning. it is now fifty-five years. And then he said he would go to sleep. He bent me down over him and kissed me, and he said, Look in my Bible Danforth when I am gone.

Starting point is 08:26:10 And I went away. But I had no thought it was the end. I thought he was tired and would sleep. I knew he was happy, and I wanted him to be alone. But in an hour when the doctor went in gently, he found Nolan had breathed, his life away with a smile. He had something pressed close to his lips. It was his father's badge of the order of the Cincinnati. We looked in his Bible, and there was a slip of paper at the place where he had

Starting point is 08:26:41 marked the text. They desire a country, even a heavenly, wherefore God is not ashamed to be called their God, for he hath prepared for them a city. On this slip of paper he had written, bury me in the sea. It has been my home, and I love it. But will not someone set up a stone for my memory at Fort Adams or at Orleans, that my disgrace may not be more than I ought to bear, say on it, in memory of Philip Nolan, lieutenant in the Army of the United States? He loved his country as no other man has loved her, but no man deserved less at her hands. Section 16. Section 17 of Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Volume 17. This is a Libravox recording. All Libravox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit Libravox.org. Recording by Rita Boutros Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Volume 17.

Starting point is 08:28:02 Ludovic Alevi, born 1834. Ludovic Alevi, known to American readers chiefly as the author of the graceful little novel, the Abbe Constantine, entered French letters as a dramatist and writer of librettos. Born in Paris in 1834 of Jewish parentage, he is the son of Leon Alavi, a poet and literature of some note in his day. And he is, as well, the nephew of the composer of the Jewish and of the Queen of Cyprus. He grew up in the atmosphere of the theater. After leaving college, he entered his country's civil service and rapidly rose to occupy positions of distinction. At the same time, he gave his

Starting point is 08:28:56 leisure to writing plays and short stories, looking forward to the day when he would be able to throw off the burdensome yoke of clerical duties and to devote himself entirely to literature. Unsuccessful at first, Alivey finally worked his way into public favor, especially after associating his pen with that of Henri Mayek. In collaboration with the latter, Alivey wrote many of the librettos of Offenbach's most brilliant and satiric operettos, including the Pericol, the Briggins, the Bellelaine, and the Grand Duchess of Gerolstein, a burlesque opera which had such vogue that it is said to have been the first thing the Emperor Alexander of Russia wished to hear when he came to Paris to attend the exposition of 1867.

Starting point is 08:29:57 Several serious librettos of high excellence are from the same hands, including that for Bizet's Carmen. In spoken drama, Froufru and Tricosh and Cacolet are among the most popular plays the two dramatists produce together. In speaking of the collaboration of Aleve with Mayak, in humorous drama, Francis Sarsi says, gifted with an exquisite appreciation of the real, Alivei, has preserved, the more fantastic and bizarre characteristics of the imagination of the latter. From this mutual work have sprung plays, which, in my opinion, are not sufficiently estimated by us. We have seen them hundreds of times, and have referred to them with a grimace of contempt.

Starting point is 08:30:56 There is a great deal of imagination, of wit, and... parodies of everyday life. Yet, great as was the success of his dramatic work, Alawi's claim to a place in French literature rests on what he produced alone after the collaboration with Mayek had suffered a rupture in 1881. At the same time, he ceased writing for the stage

Starting point is 08:31:25 and turned to fiction. La Be Constantin, the first of his novels, is also the most popular. It opened to him the French Academy. It was for more than one season the French story of the day. It is a charming story, full of fresh air and sun, simply and skillfully told. It presented a view of American character and temperament

Starting point is 08:31:51 not usual in French fiction, and irreproachable in its moral tone, it has become a sort of classic for a man. schools and colleges. La Famille Cardinal, the Cardinal family, and Creschette, are others of Alavi's studies in fiction of aspects of Parisian life. Notes and souvenirs embody observations during the Prussian invasion of 1871. They are interesting as giving faithful pictures of the temper of the people during those days.

Starting point is 08:32:30 Among his short stories, a marriage d'amour, a marriage for love, is one of the most delightful, and a highly characteristic one. The most beautiful woman in Paris is appended to this sketch, says Mr. Brander Matthews. In all these books, there are the same artistic qualities, the same sharpness of vision, the same gentle irony, the same constructive skill, and the same dramatic textual. much. Monsieur Aleve's irony is delicate and playful. There is no harshness in his manner and no hatred in his mind. We do not find in his pages any of the pessimism which is perhaps the dominant characteristic of the best French fiction of our time. More than Montpessin or Flaubert or Mary May is Monsieur

Starting point is 08:33:27 Alevei a Parisian. Whether or not the character of his tales are dwellers in the capital whether or not the scene of his story is laid in the city by the sen the point of view is always parisian his style even his swift and limpid prose the prose which somehow corresponds to the best verse de societe in its brilliancy and buoyancy is the style of one who lives at the centre of things cardinal Newman once said that while Livy and Tacitus and Terrence and Seneca wrote Latin, Cicero wrote Roman. So while Monsieur Zola on one side and Monsieur Georges-O'Ne on the other may write French, Monsieur Aleve writes Parisian. Selection The Most Beautiful Woman in Paris by Ludové Galavei,

Starting point is 08:34:27 from Parisian points of view, Copyright 1894 by Harper and Brothers. On Friday, April 19th, Prince Agenor was really distracted at the opera during the second act of Seguard. The prince kept going from box to box, and his enthusiasm increased as he went. That blonde! Oh, that blonde! She is ideal! Look at that blonde! Do you know that blonde? It was from the front part of Madame de Marisi's large first-tier box that all these exclamations were coming at that moment.

Starting point is 08:35:09 Which blonde? asked Madame de Marizzi. Which blonde? Why, there is but one this evening in the house, opposite to you, over there in the first box, the Saint-Mem box. Look, Baroness, look straight over there. Yes, I am looking at her. is atrociously got up, but pretty. Pretty? She is a wonder, simply a wonder.

Starting point is 08:35:36 Got up? Yes, agreed. Some country relative. The Saint-Mem have cousins in Peregord. But what a smile. How well her neck is set on. And the slope of the shoulders. Ah, especially the shoulders.

Starting point is 08:35:53 Come, either keep still or go away. Let me listen to Madame Caron. The prince went away, as no one knew that incomparable blonde. Yet she had often been to the opera, but in an unpretentious way, in the second tier of boxes. And to Prince Aginor, above the first tier of boxes, there was nothing, absolutely nothing. There was emptiness, space. The prince had never been in a second tier box, so the second tier boxes did not exist. while Madame Caron was marvelously singing the marvelous phrase of ryer,

Starting point is 08:36:35 Oh, man sovere, silencio, la Valkyrie eta conquette, the prince strolled along the passages of the opera. Who was that blonde? He wanted to know, and he would know. And suddenly he remembered that good Madame Picard was the box-opener of the Saint-Mem, and that he, prince of Nareem, Prince of Narein, had had the honour of being for a long time a friend of that good Madame Picard. Ah, Prince, said Madame Picard on seeing Agonore,

Starting point is 08:37:10 there is no one for you tonight in my boxes. Madame de Simeon is not here, and Madame de Saint-Mem has rented her box. That's precisely it. Don't you know the people in Madame de Saint-Mem's box? Not at all, Prince. It's the first time I have seen them in the Marquis box. Then you have no idea. None, Prince, only to me they don't appear to be people of...

Starting point is 08:37:39 She was going to say of our set. A box opener of the first tier of boxes at the opera, having generally only to do with absolutely high-born people, considers herself as being a little of their set, and shows extreme distinctions. for unimportant people. It displeases her to receive these unimportant people in her boxes. Madame Picard, however, had tact which rarely forsook her,

Starting point is 08:38:11 and so stopped herself in time to say, People of your set. They belong to the middle class, to the wealthy middle class, but still the middle class. That doesn't satisfy you. You wish to know more on account of the blonde, Is it not so, Prince? Those last words were spoken with rare delicacy.

Starting point is 08:38:34 They were murmured more than spoken, box-opener to Prince. It would have been unacceptable without that perfect reserve in accent and tone. Yes, it was a box-opener who spoke, but a box-opener who was a little bit the aunt of former times, the aunt la mode de cether. Madame Picard continued. Ah, she is a beauty. She came with a little dark man, her husband, I'm sure. For a while she was taking off her cloak, it always takes some time.

Starting point is 08:39:11 He didn't say a word to her. No eagerness, no little attentions. Yes, he could only be a husband. I examined the cloak. People one doesn't know, puzzle me, and my colleague. Madame Flaché and I always am. amuse ourselves by trying to guess from appearances. Well, the cloak comes from a good dressmaker, but not from a great one.

Starting point is 08:39:37 It is fine and well-made, but it has no style. I think they are middle-class people, Prince. But how stupid I am! You know, Monsieur Palmer? Well, a little while ago he came to see the beautiful blonde. Monsieur Palmer? Yes, and he... can tell you. Thanks, Madame Picard, thanks. Goodbye, Prince, goodbye. And Madame Picard went back

Starting point is 08:40:06 to her stall near her colleague, Madame Flache, and said to her, ah, my dear, what a charming man the prince is. True gentle folks, there is nothing like them. But they are dying out, they are dying out. There are many less than formerly. Prince Agonor was willing to do Palmer, Big Palmer, Rich Palmer, Vain Palmer, the honor of being one of his friends. He deigned, and very frequently, to confide to Palmer, his financial difficulties, and the banker was delighted to come to his aid. The prince had been obliged to resign himself to becoming a member of two boards of directors, presided over by Palmer, who was much pleased at having under obligations to him the representative of one of the noblest families in France.

Starting point is 08:41:03 Besides, the prince proved himself to be a good prince and publicly acknowledged Palmer, showing himself in his box, taking charge of his entertainments, and occupying himself with his racing stable. He had even pushed his gratitude to the point of compromising Madame Palmer, in the most showy way.

Starting point is 08:41:27 I am removing her from the middle class, he said. I owe it to Palmer, who is one of the best fellows in the world. The prince found the banker alone in a lower box. What is the name, the name of that blonde in the Saint-Mem box? Madame Derlein. Is there a Monsieur Derlein? Certainly, a lawyer, my lawyer, the Saint-Mem lawyer.

Starting point is 08:41:55 And if you want to see Madame Durlin close to, come to my ball next Thursday, she will be there. The wife of a lawyer. She was only the wife of a lawyer. The prince sat down in the front of the box opposite Madame Durlin, and while looking at that lawyeress, he was thinking, have I, he said to himself, sufficient credit, sufficient power, to make of Madame D'Auline, the most beautiful woman in Paris? For there was always a most beautiful woman in Paris,

Starting point is 08:42:33 and it was he, Prince Agonore, who flattered himself that he could discover, proclaim, crown, and consecrate that most beautiful woman in Paris. Launch Madame Darlene in, in society why not he had never launched anyone from the middle class the enterprise would be new amusing and bold he looked at madame d'erlien through his opera glass and discovered thousands of beauties and perfections in her delightful face after the opera the prince during the exit placed himself at the bottom of the great staircase he had enlisted two of his friends. Come, he had said to them,

Starting point is 08:43:21 I will show you the most beautiful woman in Paris. While he was speaking, two steps away from the prince was an alert young man who was attached to a morning paper, a very widely red paper. The young man had sharp ears. He caught on the fly

Starting point is 08:43:40 the phrase of the prince Agonor, whose high social position he knew. He succeeded in keeping close to the prince, and when Madame Dirline passed, the young reporter had the luck of hearing the conversation, without losing a word, of the three brilliant nobleman. A quarter of an hour later, he arrived at the office of the paper. Is there time, he asked, to write a dozen lines in the society notebook? Yes, but hurry. The young man was a quick writer. The 15 lines were done in the twinkling of an eye. They brought seven francs fifty to the reporter, but cost

Starting point is 08:44:24 Monsieur Darlene a little more than that. During this time, Prince Agonore, seated in the club at the whist table, was saying, while shuffling the cart, this evening at the opera, there was a marvelous woman, a certain Madame Darlene. She is the most beautiful woman in Paris. The following morning in the gossip corner of the bois in the spring sunshine, the prince surrounded by a little group of respectful disciples, was solemnly delivering from the back of his roan mare the following opinion. Listen well to what I say. The most beautiful woman in Paris is a certain Madame Darlene. This star will be visible Thursday evening at the Palmer's. Go and don't forget the name, Madame Darlene.

Starting point is 08:45:18 The disciples dispersed and went abroad spreading the great news. Madame Dirline had been admirably brought up by an irreproachable mother. She had been taught that she ought to get up in the morning, keep a strict account of her expenses, not go to a great dressmaker, believe in God, love her husband, visit the poor, and never spend but half her income, in order to prepare dowries for her daughters.

Starting point is 08:45:50 Madame Darlene performed all these duties. She led a peaceful and serene life in the old house in the Rue Dragan, which had sheltered since 1825 three generations of Dirlines. The husbands had all three been lawyers, the wives had all three been virtuous. The three generations had passed there a happy and, moderate life, never having any great pleasures, but also never being very much bored. The next day, Madame D'Aarlene awoke at eight o'clock in the morning with an uneasy feeling.

Starting point is 08:46:30 She had passed a troubled night, she who usually slept like a child. The evening before, in the box at the opera, Madame D'erlene had vaguely felt that something was going on around her, and during the entire last hour, and during the entire last hour, act, an opera glass obstinately fixed on her, the prince's opera glass, had thrown her into a certain agitation, though not a disagreeable one. She had worn a low dress, too low in her mother's opinion, and two or three times, under the fixity of that opera glass, she had raised the shoulder straps of her dress. So after opening her eyes, Madame Darlene reclosed them lazily, indolently, with thoughts floating between dreamland and reality she again saw the opera house and a hundred two hundred five hundred opera glasses obstinately fixed on her on her alone

Starting point is 08:47:31 the maid entered placed a tray on a little table made up a big fire in the fireplace and went away there was a cup of chocolate and the morning paper on the tray the same as every morning Then Madame Darlene courageously got up, slipped her little bare feet into fur slippers, wrapped herself in a white cashmere dressing-gown, and crouched shivering in an armchair by the fire. She sipped the chocolate and slightly burnt herself. She must wait a little while. She put down the cup, took up the paper, unfolded it, and rapidly ran her eye over the six columns of the front page. At the bottom, quite at the bottom of the sixth column, were the following lines. Last evening at the opera, there was a very brilliant performance of Sigard. Society was well represented there. The beautiful Duchess of Montagnan, the pretty Countess Verdinier of Lardac, the marvellous Marquis of Muriel, the lively baroness of...

Starting point is 08:48:41 To read the name of the Baroness, it was necessary to... to turn the page. Madame Dirline did not turn it. She was thinking, reflecting. The evening before, she had amused herself by having Palmer point out to her the social leaders in the house, and it so happened that the banker had pointed out to her

Starting point is 08:49:03 the marvelous marquise. And Madame Dirline, who was 22, raised herself a little to look in the glass. She exchanged a slight smile. with a young blonde, who was very pink and white. Ah, she said to herself, if I were a marquise, the man who wrote this would perhaps have paid some attention to me, and my name would perhaps be there.

Starting point is 08:49:30 I wonder if it's fun to see one's name printed in a paper. And while addressing this question to herself, she turned the page and continued reading. the lively baroness of Mervois, etc. We have to announce the appearance of a new star which has abruptly burst forth in the Parisian constellation. The house was in ecstasy over a strange and disturbing blonde, whose dark steel eyes and whose shoulders, ah, what shoulders?

Starting point is 08:50:04 The shoulders were the event of the evening. From all quarters one heard asked, who is she? Who is she? To whom do those divine shoulders belong? To whom? We know, and our readers will doubtless thank us for telling them the name of this ideal wonder. It is Madame Darlene. Her name! She had read her name. She was dazzled. Her eyes clouded. All the letters in the alphabet began to dance wildly on the paper. Then they called. down, stopped, and regained their places. She was able to find her name and continue reading. It is Madame Darlene, the wife of one of the richest and most agreeable lawyers in Paris.

Starting point is 08:50:55 The Prince of Narein, whose word has so much weight in such matters, said yesterday evening to everyone who would listen. She is the most beautiful woman in Paris. We are absolutely of that opinion. A single paragraph, and that was all. It was enough. It was too much. Madame Darlene was seized with a feeling of indefinable confusion. It was a combination of fear and pleasure, of joy and trouble, of satisfied vanity and wounded modesty. Her dressing gown was a little open. She folded it over with a sort of violence and cross-exam. upon her feet, abruptly drawn back towards the armchair. She had a feeling of nudity. It seemed to her that All Paris was there in her room, and that the Prince de Nguyen was in front

Starting point is 08:51:53 saying to All Paris, look, look, she is the most beautiful woman in Paris, the Prince of Neren. She knew the name well, for she read with keen interest in the papers all the articles entitled Parisian life, high life, society echoes, etc. And all the society columns assigned Mucelin, Fanfrelouch, Brimboriant, Velotine, all the accounts of great marriages, great balls, of great comings out, and of great charity sales.

Starting point is 08:52:31 The name of the prince often figured in these articles, and he was always quoted as supreme arbiter of Parisian elegances. And it was he who had declared, Ah, decidedly pleasure got the better of fear. Still trembling with emotion, Madame Darlene went and placed herself before a long looking-glass,

Starting point is 08:52:56 an old cheval glass from Jacobs, which never till now had reflected other than good middle-class women, married to good lawyers. In that glass, she looked at herself, examined herself, studied herself, long, curiously, and eagerly. Of course, she knew she was pretty, but, oh, the power of print! She found herself absolutely delightful.

Starting point is 08:53:24 She was no longer Madame D'Auleen. She was the most beautiful woman in Paris. Her feet, her little feet, their bareness no longer troubled her, left the ground. She raised herself gently towards. the heavens, towards the clouds, and felt herself become a goddess. But suddenly an anxiety seized her. Edward, what would Edward say? Edward was her husband.

Starting point is 08:53:53 There had been but one man's surname in her life, her husband's. The lawyer was well-loved. And almost at the same moment when she was asking herself what Edward would say, Edward abruptly opened the door. He was a little out of breath. He had run upstairs two at a time. He was peacefully rummaging among old papers in his study on the ground floor when one of his brother lawyers, with forced congratulations, however,

Starting point is 08:54:24 had made him read the famous article. He had soon got rid of his brother lawyer, and he had come, much irritated, to his room. At first there was simply a torrent of words Why do these journalists meddle? It's an outrage. Your name. Look, there is your name in this paper.

Starting point is 08:54:46 Yes, I know. I've seen... Ah, you know, you have seen, and you think it quite natural. But dear... What times do we live in? It's your fault, too. My fault? Yes, your fault.

Starting point is 08:55:03 And how? Your dress last night was too low. much too low. Besides, your mother told you so. Oh, Mama! You needn't say, Oh, Mama, your mother was right. There, read, and whose shoulders, ah, what shoulders.

Starting point is 08:55:22 And it is of your shoulders they are speaking. And that prince who dares to award you a prize for beauty. The good man had plebeian Gothic ideas, the ideas of a lawyer of old times, of a lawyer of the ill- Rue Dregon, the lawyers of the Boulevard Malacherep, are no longer like that. Madame Duralin, very gently, very quietly, brought the rebel back to reason. Of course there was charm and eloquence in her speech,

Starting point is 08:55:53 but how much more charm and eloquence in the tenderness of her glance and smile. Why, this great rage and despair! He was accused of being the husband of the most beautiful woman, in Paris? Was that such a horrible thing? Such a terrible misfortune? And who was the brother-lawyer, the good-brother lawyer, who had taken pleasure in coming to show him the hateful article? Monsieur Renault! Oh, it was, Monsieur Reynot, dear Monsieur Renault! Thereupon, Madame Derlein was seized with a hearty fit of laughter, so much so that the blonde hair, which had been loosely done up, came down, and framed the pretty face from which

Starting point is 08:56:43 gleamed the dark eyes, which could also, when they gave themselves the trouble, look very gentle, very caressing, very loving. Oh, it was Monsieur Renaud, the husband of that delightful Madame Renaud. Well, do you know what you will do immediately without losing a minute? Go to the president of the tribunal and ask for a divorce. You will say to him, Monsieur Obopin, deliver me from my wife. Her crime is being pretty, very pretty, too pretty. I wish another one who is ugly, very ugly,

Starting point is 08:57:20 who has Madame Reno's large nose, colossal foot, pointed chin, skinny shoulders and eternal pimples. That's what you want, isn't it? Come, you big stupid, kiss your... poor wife and forgive her for not being a monster. As rather lively gestures had illustrated this little speech, the white cashmere dressing-gown had slipped, slipped a good deal, and had opened, very much opened, the criminal shoulders were within reach of Monsieur D'erlien's lips.

Starting point is 08:57:53 He succumbed. Besides, he too felt the abominable influence of the press. His wife had never seemed so pretty to him. and brought back to subjection, Monsieur Derlein returned to his study in order to make money for the most beautiful woman in Paris. A very wise and opportune occupation,

Starting point is 08:58:15 for scarcely was Madame Derlein left alone, when an idea flashed through her head, which was to call forth a very pretty collection of banknotes from the cash box of the lawyer of the Rue d'regon. Madame Durlin had intended wearing to the Palmer's ball, a dress which had already been much seen. Madame Durlien had kept the dressmaker of her wedding dress,

Starting point is 08:58:42 her mother's dressmaker, a dressmaker of the left bank. It seemed to her that her new position imposed new duties on her. She could not appear at the Palmer's without a dress which had not been seen, and one stamped with a well-known name. She ordered the carriage in the afternoon, and resolutely gave her coachman the address of one of the most illustrious dressmakers in Paris. She arrived a little agitated, and to reach the great artist was obliged to pass through a veritable crowd of footmen, who were in the ante chamber, chatting and laughing, used to meeting

Starting point is 08:59:23 there and making long stops. Nearly all the footmen were those of society, the highest society. They had spent the previous evening together at the English Embassy, and were to be that evening at the Duchess of Gré-Mois. Madame Gerlien entered a sumptuous parlor. It was very sumptuous, too sumptuous. Twenty great customers were there, society women and actresses, all agitated, anxious, feverish, looking at the beautiful, tall saleswomen come and go before them, wearing the last creations of the master of the house. The great artist had a diplomatic bearing, buttoned up black frock coat, long cravat with pin,

Starting point is 09:00:12 a present from a royal highness who paid her bills slowly, and many-colored rosette in his button-hole, the gift of a small reigning prince, who paid slower yet the bills of an opera dancer. He came and went, precise, calm and cool in the midst of the solicitations and supplications of his customers. Monsieur Arthur, Monsieur Arthur! One heard nothing but that phrase.

Starting point is 09:00:42 He was Monsieur Arthur. He went from one to the other, respectful without too much humility to the Duchesses, and easy without too much familiarity to the actresses. There was an extraordinary liveliness and a confusion of marvelous velvets, satins and embroidered, brocated, and gold or silver-threaded stuffs, all thrown here and there as though by accident. But what's science in that accident, on armchairs, tables, and divans? In the first place, Madame Darlene ran against a shop-girl, who was bearing with outstretched

Starting point is 09:01:24 arms a white dress, and was almost hidden beneath a light, mountain of muslins and laces. The only thing visible was the shopgirl's must black hair and sly suburban expression. Madame Darlene backed away, wishing to place herself against the wall, but a trier on was there, a large energetic brunette, who spoke authoritatively in a high staccato. At once, she was saying, bring me at once the princess's dress. Frightened and dave. Madame Darlene stood in a corner and watched an opportunity to seize a saleswoman on the fly. She even thought of giving up the game. Never certainly should she dare to address directly that terrible Monsieur Arthur,

Starting point is 09:02:14 who had just given her a rapid glance in which she believed to have read. Who is she? She isn't properly dressed. She doesn't go to a fashionable dressmaker. At last, Madame D'Soucéevelde. Darlene succeeded in getting hold of a disengaged saleswoman, and there was the same slightly disdainful glance, a glance which was accompanied by the phrase, Madame is not a regular customer of the house? No, I am not a customer.

Starting point is 09:02:46 And you wish? A dress, a ball dress, and I want the dress for next Thursday evening. Thursday next? Yes, Thursday next. "'Oh, madame, it is not to be thought of. "'Even for a customer of the house, it would be impossible. "'But I wished it so much. "'Go and see Monsieur Arthur.

Starting point is 09:03:09 "'He alone can. "'And where is Monsieur Arthur? "'In his office, he has just gone into his office. "'Over there, Madame, opposite.' "'Madame Durlein, through a half-open door, "'saw a somber and severe, but luxurious room, an ambassador's office. On the walls, the great European powers

Starting point is 09:03:32 were represented by photographs, the Empress Eugenie, the Princess of Wales, a Grand Duchess of Russia, and an Arch-Duchess of Austria. Monsieur Arthur was there, taking a few moments rest, seated in a large armchair,

Starting point is 09:03:50 with an air of lassitude and exhaustion, and with a newspaper spread out over his knees. He arose on seeing Madame Durlien enter. In a trembling voice, she repeated her wish. Oh, madame, a ball-dress, a beautiful ball-dress for Thursday. I couldn't make such a promise. I couldn't keep it. There are responsibilities to which I never expose myself.

Starting point is 09:04:17 He spoke slowly, gravely, as a man conscious of his high position. Oh, I am so disappointed. it was a particular occasion, and I was told that you alone could... Two tears, two little tears, glittered on her eyelashes. Monsieur Arthur was moved. A woman, a pretty woman,

Starting point is 09:04:41 crying there before him. Never had such homage been paid to his genius. Well, madame, I am willing to make an attempt. A very simple dress. Oh, no, not simple. very brilliant on the contrary everything that is most brilliant two of my friends are customers of yours she named them and i am madame der lorline madame derleine you are madame derleine the two madame derleens were followed by a glance and a smile the glance was at the newspaper and the smile was at madame derleine but it was a discreet self-contained smile, the smile of a perfectly gallant man.

Starting point is 09:05:29 This is what the glance and smile said with admirable clearness. Ah, you are Madame Dirlene, that already celebrated Madame D'erlien, who, yesterday at the opera, I understand, I understand. I was reading just now in this paper. Words are no longer necessary. You should have told your name at once. Yes, you need me. Yes, you shall have your dress.

Starting point is 09:05:58 Yes, I want to divide your success with you. Monsieur Arthur called Mademoiselle Blanche, come here at once. Mademoiselle Blanche! And turning towards Madame Durlien, he said, She has great talent, but I shall myself superintend it. So be easy. Yes, I myself. Madame Durlaine was a little confused, a little,

Starting point is 09:06:25 embarrassed by her glory, but happy nevertheless. Mademoiselle Blanche came forward. Conduct Madame, said Monsieur Arthur, and take the necessary measures for a ball-dress, very low and with absolutely bare arms. During that time, Madame, I am going to think seriously of what I can do for you. It must be something entirely new.

Starting point is 09:06:51 Ah, before going, permit me. He won't. very slowly around Madame D'erlien and examined her with profound attention. Then he walked away and considered her from a little distance. His face was serious, thoughtful, and anxious, a great thinker wrestling with a great problem. He passed his hand over his forehead, raised his eyes to the sky, getting inspiration by a painful delivery. But suddenly his face lit up. The spirit from above had answered,

Starting point is 09:07:27 Go, Madame, he said, go. Your dress is thought out. When you come back, Mademoiselle, bring me that piece of pink satin. You know the one that I was keeping for some great occasion. Thus, Madame Dirline found herself with Mademoiselle Blanche in a trying-on-room, which was a sort of little cabin lined with mirrors. A quarter of an hour later, when the measures had been, taken. Madame Darlene came back and discovered Monsieur

Starting point is 09:07:58 Arthur in the midst of pieces of satin of all colors, of crepes, of tools, of lace, and of brocaded stuffs. No, no, not the pink satin, he said to Mademoiselle Blanche, who was bringing the asked for peace. No, I have found something better. Listen to me. This is what I wish. I have given up the pink, and I have decided on this, this piece. colored satin, a classic robe outlining all the fine lines and showing the suppleness of the body. This robe must be very clinging, hardly any underskirts. It must be of surrah.

Starting point is 09:08:39 Madame must be melted into it. Do you thoroughly understand? Absolutely melted into the robe. We will drop over the dress this crape. Yes, that one, but in small light pleats, The crape will be as a cloud thrown over the dress, a transparent, vapoury, impalpable cloud. The arms are to be absolutely bare, as I already told you. On each shoulder there must be a simple knot showing the upper part of the arm. Of what is the knot to be? I'm still undecided. I need to think it over.

Starting point is 09:09:19 Till tomorrow, madem, till tomorrow. Madame D'erline came back the next day and the next, and every day, till the day before the famous Thursday. And each time that she came back, while awaiting her turn to try on, she ordered dresses, very simple ones, but yet costing from seven to eight hundred francs each. And that was not all. On the day of her first visit to Monsieur Arthur, when Madame D'Earline came out. of the great house, she was broken-hearted, positively broken-hearted, at the sight of her broom. It really did make a pitiful appearance among all the stylish carriages which were waiting in three rows and taking up half the street. It was the broom of her late mother-in-law,

Starting point is 09:10:11 and it still rolled through the streets of Paris after 15-year service. Madame Darlene got into the woe-be-gone broom to drive straight to a while. a very well-known carriage-maker, and that evening, cleverly seizing the psychological moment, she explained to Monsieur D'Urille that she had seen a certain little black coupe lined with a blue satin that would frame delightfully her new dresses. The coupé was bought the next day by Monsieur D'erlien, who also was beginning fully to realize the extent of his new duties. But the next day it was discovered that, It was impossible to harness to that jewel of a coupe the old horse who had pulled the old carriage,

Starting point is 09:10:59 and no less impossible to put on the box the old coachman who drove the old horse. This is how, on Thursday, April 25th, at half-past ten in the evening, a very pretty chestnut mare, driven by a very correct English coachman, took Monsieur and Madame Darlene to the Palmer's. they still lacked something a little groom to sit beside the english coachman but a certain amount of discretion had to be employed the most beautiful woman in paris intended to wait ten days before asking for the little groom while she was going upstairs at the palmer's she distinctly felt her heart beat like the strokes of a hammer she was going to play a decisive game she knew that that the Palmer's had been going everywhere, saying, Come on Thursday, we will show you Madame D'Aleine,

Starting point is 09:11:58 the most beautiful woman in Paris. Curiosity as well as jealousy had been well awakened. She entered, and from the first minute, she had the delicious sensation of her success. Throughout the long gallery of the Palmer's house, it was a true triumphal march. She advanced with firm and precise step, erect and head well held.

Starting point is 09:12:25 She appeared to see nothing, to hear nothing, but how well she saw. How well she felt the fire of all those eyes on her shoulders. Around her arose a little murmur of admiration, and never had music been sweeter to her. Yes, decidedly all went well. She was on a fair way to conquer Paris, and, sure of herself, at each step, She became more confident, lighter, and bolder, as she advanced on the arm of Palmer, who in passing pointed out the Counts, the Marquise, and the Dukes.

Starting point is 09:13:03 And then Palmer suddenly said to her, I want to present to you one of your greatest admirers, who the other night at the opera spoke of nothing but your beauty. He is the prince of Neren. She became as red as a cherry. Palmer looked at her. and began to laugh. Ah, you read the other day in that paper.

Starting point is 09:13:27 I read, yes, I read. But where is the prince? Where is he? I saw him during the day, and he was to be here early. Madame Darlene was not to see the Prince of Néren that evening, and yet he had intended to go to the Palmer's and preside at the deification of his lawyeress.

Starting point is 09:13:50 He had dined at the club, and had allowed himself to be dragged off to a first performance at a minor theatre. An operetta of the regulation type was being played. The principal personage was a young queen, who was always escorted by the customary four maids of honor. Three of these young ladies were very well known to first-nighters, as having already figured in the tableau of operettos and in groups of fairies. But the fourth, oh the fourth, she was a new one, a tall brunette of the most striking beauty.

Starting point is 09:14:30 The prince made himself remarked more than all others by his enthusiasm. He completely forgot that he was to leave after the first act. The play was over very late, and the prince was still there, having paid no attention to the piece or the music, having seen nothing but the wonderful brunette, having heard nothing but the stanza which she had unworthily massacred in the middle of the second act. And while they were leaving the theatre, the prince was saying to whoever would listen, that brunette, oh, that brunette, she hasn't an equal in any theater.

Starting point is 09:15:11 She is the most beautiful woman in Paris, the most beautiful. It was one o'clock in the morning. The prince asked himself if he should go to the prince. Palmer's. Poor Madame Durlein, she was of very slight importance beside this new wonder, and then, too, the prince was a methodical man. The hour for Wist had arrived, so he departed to play Whist. The following morning, Madame Darlene found ten lines on the Palmer's ball in the society column. There was mention of the Marquise, the countesses, and the Duchesses who were there, but about Madame Durlaine there was not a word, not a word.

Starting point is 09:15:57 On the other hand, the writer of theatrical gossip celebrated in enthusiastic terms the beauty of that ideal maid of honour and said, besides, the Prince of Nérenne declared that Mademoiselle Miranda was indisputably the most beautiful woman in Paris. Madame Darlene threw the paper into the fire. She did not wish her husband to know that she was already not the most beautiful woman in Paris. She has, however, kept the great dressmaker and the English coachman, but she has never dared to ask for the little groom. End of Section 17.

Starting point is 09:16:48 Section 18 of Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Volume 17. This is a Libervox recording. All LibraVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit Libavox.org. Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Volume 17. Mr. Samuel Slick from The Clockmaker by Thomas C. Halliburton. Thomas C. Halliburton, 1796 to 1865.

Starting point is 09:17:24 In 1835, there appeared in a Nova Scotian journal, a series of articles satirizing the New England character, as expressed in the person of Sam Slick, a Yankee clock peddler. Within a few weeks, these had become so popular that they were republished in book form, the little duodecimo volume called The Clockmaker, or the sayings and doings of Samuel Slick of Slickville, being read by all classes of people. Indeed, the popularity of this skit wholly obscured the importance of the author's more serious work as a historian and publicist. Thomas C. Halliburton, the inventor of this famous Yankee character, was born in Windsor, Nova Scotia, 1796, educated in his native town and called to the bar there in 1820. Eight years later, he was appointed Chief Justice of Common Pleas and presently transferred to the Supreme Court, in which he said, sat until 1856 when he moved to England, where he died in 1865. While his historical work is not important, his history of Nova Scotia has done more to make Acadia known to the outside world than any other work except Evangeline, and Longfellow acknowledged himself much indebted to Halliburton

Starting point is 09:18:45 for material. His bubbles of Canada and rule and misrules of the English and America dealing with political situations of importance in his time, and his half-dozen other books are now forgotten. It is as a humorist only that he is remembered. Of his Sam Slick, Professor Felton of Harvard wrote, We can distinguish the reel from the counterfeit Yankee at the first sound of the voice, and by the turn of a single sentence, and we have no hesitation in declaring that Sam Slick is not what he pretends to be, that there is no organic life in him, that he is an animal. an imposter and impossibility, a non-entity.

Starting point is 09:19:28 The London Anthony, on the other hand, pronounced that he, the clockmaker, deserves to be entered on our list of friends containing the names of Tristram Shandy, the shepherd of the Noctahs Ambrosianni, and other rhapsodical discoursers on time and change, who, besides the delight of their discourse, possess also the charm of individuality. Farcical, as is his delineation of the shrewd, conceited, bragging, cozening, hard-working, garrulous Yankee, little as he admires the institutions that produce this type of citizen. It is plain that Judge Halliburton uses the clockmaker and his kind to point the moral against the dullness, lack of enterprise, laziness, and provincial shiftlessness of the Nova Scotians.

Starting point is 09:20:17 He means to sting his fellow countrymen into effort and action if he can. Whether the book really served for admonition and correction, whether the Yankee clock really struck the hour for the Blue Nose Awakening, as its author fondly believed, at least he created the conventional Yankee of general acceptation. The lank, awkward figure, ill-articulated and ill-dressed, with trousers and coat-sleeves too short, with hat too large, with hair too long,

Starting point is 09:20:47 with sharp nose, keen eyes, shrewd smile, with flattened vowels and nasal tones, with queer vocabulary and queerer syntax. In short, the Yankee of the stage of caricature of tradition universally believed in, at least across the seas, until Lowell's genius revealed a true New Englander in Hosea Bigelow. Even as a pretender, therefore, Sam Slick has his important place in the Republic of Letters. A place the more important as interest in him becomes more and more merely historic. Mr. Samuel Slick from the Clockmaker, Copyright 1871 by Hurd and Hofton, reprinted by permission of Hoffton Mifflin and Company, publishers, Boston. I had heard of Yankee clock peddlers, tin peddlers, and Bible peddlers, especially of him who sold Polyglot Bibles, all in English, to the amount of 16,000 pounds.

Starting point is 09:21:47 The house of every substantial farmer had three substantial ornaments, a wooden clock, a tin reflector, and a polyglot Bible. How is it that an American can sell his wares at whatever price he pleases where a blue nose would fail to make a sale at all? I will inquire of the clockmaker the secret of his success. What a pity it is, Mr. Slick, for such was his name. What a pity it is, said I, that you, who are so successful in teaching these people the value of clocks could not also teach them the value of time. I guess, said he, they have got that ring to grow on their horns yet, which every four-year-old has in our country. We reckon hours and minutes to be dollars and cents.

Starting point is 09:22:34 They do nothing in these parts but eat, drinks, smoke, sleep, ride about, lounge at taverns, make speeches at temperance meetings, and talk about House of Assembly. If a man don't hold his corn and he don't get a crop, he says it is owing to the bank. And if he runs into debt and is sued, why he says the lawyers are are cursed to the country. There are a most idle set of folks, I tell you. But how is it, said I, that you manage to sell such an immense number of clocks, which certainly cannot be called necessary articles, among a people with whom there seems to be so great a scarcity of money? Mr. Slick paused as if considering their propriety of answering the question, and looking me in the face, said in a confidential tone,

Starting point is 09:23:22 well, I don't care if I do tell you, for the market is glutted and I shall quit the circuit. It is done by a knowledge of soft solder and human nature. But here's Deacon Flint's, said he. I have about one clock left, and I guess I will sell it to him. At the gate of a most comfortable-looking farmhouse stood Deacon Flint, a respectable old man who had understood the value of time better than most of his neighbors, if one might judge from the appearance of everything about him. After the usual salutation, an invitation to alight was accepted by Mr. Slick,

Starting point is 09:23:57 who said he wished to take leave of Mrs. Flint before he left Colchester. We had hardly entered the house before the clockmaker pointed to the view from the window, and addressing himself to me, said, If I was to tell them in Connecticut there was such a farm as this way down east here in Nova Scotia, they wouldn't believe me. Why, there ain't such a location in all New England. The deacon has a hundred acres of dike. Seventy, said the deacon, only 70. Well, 70, but then there's your fine, deep bottom, why I could run a ramrod into it. Interval, we call it, said the deacon, who, though evidently pleased at this eulogium, seemed to wish the experiment of the ramrod to be

Starting point is 09:24:39 tried in the right place. Well, interval, if you please, though Professor Leeser Comstick, his work on Ohio, calls them bottoms, is just as good as Dyke. Then there is that water privilege worth $3,000 or $4,000, twice as good as what Governor Cass paid, $15,000 for. I wonder, Deacon, you don't put up a carding mill on it. The same works would carry a turning lathe, a shingle machine, a circular saw, grind bark, and too old, said the deacon, too old for all those speculations. Old, repeated the clockmaker. "'Not you. Why, you are worth a half dozen of the young men we see nowadays.

Starting point is 09:25:20 "'You are young enough to have—' "'Here he said something in a lower tone of voice, which I did not distinctly hear. "'But whatever it was, the deacon was pleased, he smiled and said he did not think of such things now. "'But your beasts, dear me, your beasts must be put in and have a feed, "'saying which he went out to order them to be taken to the stable. "'As the old gentleman closed the door after him, Mr. Slick, drew nearer to me and said in an undertone, that is what I call soft solder. An Englishman would pass that man as a sheep passes a hog in a pasture without looking at him, or, said he, looking

Starting point is 09:25:58 rather archly. If he was mounted on a pretty smart horse, I guess he trot away if he could. Now I find, here his lecture on soft solder was cut short by the entrance of Mrs. Flint. Just come to say goodbye, Mrs. Flint. What, have you sold all your clocks? Yes, and very low, too, for money is scarce. And I wish to close the concern. No, I am wrong in saying all, for I have just one left. Neighbor Steele's wife asked me to have the refusal of it, but I guess I won't sell it. I had but two of them, this one and the fellow of it, that I sold Governor Lincoln.

Starting point is 09:26:36 General Green, the Secretary of State for Maine, said he'd give me $50 for this one here. It has composition wheels, and patent axles is a beautiful art. article, a real first chop, no mistake, genuine, super fine. But I guess I'll take it back, and besides, Squire Hawk might think kinder hard that I did not give him the offer. Dear me, said Mrs. Flint, I should like to see it. Where is it? It is in a chest of mine over the way at Tom Taped store. I guess he can ship it on to Eastport. That's a good man, said Mrs. Flynn. Just let's look at it. Mr. Slick, willing to oblige, yielded to these and treaties and soon produced the clock, a gaudy, highly furnished, trumpery-looking affair.

Starting point is 09:27:22 He placed it on the chimney-piece where its beauties were pointed out and duly appreciated by Mrs. Flint, whose admiration was about ending in a proposal when Mr. Flint returned from giving his directions about the care of the horses. The deacon praised the clock. He too thought it a handsome one, but the deacon was a prudent man. He had a watch. He was sorry, but he had no occasion for a clock. I guess you're in the wrong furrow this time, Deacon. It ain't for sale, said Mr. Slick. And if it was, I reckon neighbor Steele's wife would have it, for she gave me no peace about

Starting point is 09:27:57 it. Mrs. Flynn said that Mr. Steele had enough to do, poor man, to pay his interest without buying clocks for his wife. It is no concern of mine, said Mr. Slick, as long as he pays me what he has to do, but I guess I don't want to sell it, and besides it comes too high. That clock can't be made at Rhode Island under $40. Why, it ain't possible, said the clockmaker, in apparent surprise, looking at his watch. Why, as I'm alive, it is four o'clock and if I haven't been two hours here?

Starting point is 09:28:28 How on earth shall I reach River Phillip tonight? I'll tell you what, Mrs. Flint, I'll leave the clock in your care till I return on my way to the States. I'll set it a going and put it to the right time. As soon as this operation was performed, he delivered the key to the day. deacon with a sort of serio-comic injunction to wind up the clock every Saturday night, which Mrs. Flint said she would take care should be done and promised to remind her husband of it in case you should chance to forget it. That, said the clockmaker as soon as we were mounted, that I call human nature. Now that clock is sold for $40. It cost me just $6.50.

Starting point is 09:29:09 Mrs. Flint will never let Mrs. Steele have the refusal, nor will the deacon learn. until I call for the clock, having once indulged in the use of a superfluity, how difficult it is to give it up. We can do without any article of luxury we have never had, but when once obtained, it is not inhuman nature to surrender it voluntarily. Of 15,000 sold by myself and partners in this province, 12,000 were left in this manner, and only 10 clocks were ever returned. When we called for them, they invariably bought them. We trust. to soft solder to get them into the house and to human nature that they never come out of it. End of Section 18, read by Bryce cries.

Starting point is 09:30:00 Section 19 of the Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Volume 17. This is a Libravox recording. All Libravox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit Librevox.org. recording by Rita Boutros. Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Volume 17. Henry Hallam, 1777 to 1859. The work of Henry Hallam as a historian was timely. He filled a distinct want,

Starting point is 09:30:40 and he seems likely to hold his place for decades to come. His security rests not upon his power of philosophizing, from the great events, crises, and epochs in human affairs, not upon broad generalizations regarding the development and trend of civilization, but rather upon his clear and comprehensive vision of the all-important facts of history, upon his calm and legal-like presentation of these facts. He walks forth in the vast valley of crumbling bones and dust, the chaos of the ages, and with painstaking care and unerring judgment,

Starting point is 09:31:25 takes up on this side and on that from the heap of rubbish, the few perfect parts that go to make up a complete framework. He compels us to clothe the skeleton and construct a body of our own fashioning, to form our own theories, to deduce our own philosophy. That then is the reason that Hallam will remain a source of profit and inspiration to his readers. In his great work, the Middle Ages, as it is commonly known, though its fuller title is View of the State of Europe During the Middle Ages, published in 1818, Hallam adopted a method to such an end that was peculiarly his own,

Starting point is 09:32:15 at the risk of repetition and retracing, he took up first one country after another and sketched in outline its growth into a nation, devoting to each a chapter that was a complete book in itself, and bringing in the doings of nearby countries only so much as was absolutely necessary. In this way, Hallam traces with admirable arrangement and sense, of proportion, the main lines in the history of France, Italy, Spain, Germany, and of the Greeks and Saracens. To give a detailed narration is furthest from his thought and furthest from his achievement. He deals primarily with results, and with him, as he himself has said, a single

Starting point is 09:33:09 sentence or paragraph is often sufficient to give the character of entire general. He takes the continent in magnificent sweeps, casting aside legend, tradition, intrigue, and disaster, and catching up only those greater facts and results, which he puts together dexterously and accurately, to form indeed the framework of the long story of the Middle Ages. This brief summary of Hallam's methods and system applies it should be said more to his middle ages than to any other work of his. In fact, it would seem that his name for the future rests upon this work almost wholly. For while his compendious and careful introduction to the literature of Europe in the 15th, 16th and 17th centuries, published in 1813, to 1839, shows immense erudition and amazingly wide reading.

Starting point is 09:34:16 One cannot help getting the impression of confusion and clumsiness in its construction. In it, Hallam's opinions are discriminating, as in everything he ever wrote, but they are by no means profound, and to the average student, his literature can hardly fail to be dispiriting and dull. It is not surprising that a legal acumen and a logical arrangement of his facts should characterize Hallam's historical writings, born at Windsor, July 9, 1777, and a Christchurch college graduate in 1799. He studied for the law at Christ College, Oxford, and practiced industriously for some years on the Oxford circuit. Of independent means, he relinquished the law

Starting point is 09:35:13 and devoted himself to his literary life and to his important personal interests and his friends. Of the latter, he had many, and they were among the most distinguished of his contemporaries. He was a member of the famous Holland House Circle and a guest at Bowwood, and Sidney Smith, McColle, and other social and literary lights esteemed his society.

Starting point is 09:35:42 He passed most of his time, season by season, in his London house in Wimpole Street, an uninteresting and retired neighborhood, as pictured in a line of that in-memorium, which Lord Tennyson wrote as his tribute to a friendship with Hallam's beloved son, Arthur. Various societies, British and foreign, honored his works emphatically. He was a member of the Institute of France, and it is interesting to Americans to know that he and Washington Irving

Starting point is 09:36:17 received in 1830 the medals offered by King George IV for eminence in historical writings. His life was relatively quiet and uneventful. It is somewhat curious, that we have not more reminiscences and pen pictures of him, especially as his contemporaries held him in such affection. He had almost nothing to say to political life,

Starting point is 09:36:46 though his prime came to him during the Corn Law agitations. Indeed, he kept himself during all his busy years until his death in 1859, a student of the past, rather than a worker of his day. We owe much to his profound studies of the centuries preceding his own. Yet, a real admirer of Hallam could wish that he had been less concentrated on his analysis of the past and bolder to cope with questions of the present. As he himself says, he ended his constitutional history of England, published in 1827, at the accession of George III, because he had had, been influenced by unwillingness to excite the prejudices of modern politics.

Starting point is 09:37:40 It must be a matter of regret that Hallam should thus stop, ingloriously, we might almost say, just at the threshold of what was a most interesting part of England's modern constitutional history. At this ending of a century, every student and historian specializes, takes up some one period and attempts to exhaust it. Those were not the methods of Hallam's time. Some of the advantages of those methods, Hallam undoubtedly missed. This weakness shows occasionally on points

Starting point is 09:38:18 which seemed to be so obscure in Hallam's thought as to render his expression blind and ambiguous. On the whole, however, such instances are infrequent. It is sufficient praise to say that Hallam has done what he set out to do, to furnish for the intelligent and seeking reader, a just and accurate outline, to point out the landmarks and beacons on the way that will guide him unfailingly in his future search. In these respects, Hallam's achievements are remarkable and incomparable. selection English domestic comfort in the 15th century by Henry Hallam from view of the state of Europe during the Middle Ages

Starting point is 09:39:10 It is an error to suppose that the English gentry were lodged in stately or even in well-sized houses generally speaking their dwellings were almost as inferior to those of their descendants in capacity as they were in convenience. The usual arrangement consisted of an entrance passage running through the house, with a hall on one side, a parlor beyond, and one or two chambers above, and on the opposite side, a kitchen, pantry, and other offices. such was the ordinary manor house of the 15th and 16th centuries. Larger structures were erected by men of greatest states after the wars of the roses. But I should conceive it difficult to name a house in England,

Starting point is 09:40:04 still inhabited by a gentleman and not belonging to the order of castles, the principal apartments of which are older than the reign of Henry the 7th. the instances at least must be extremely few. France, by no means, appears to have made a greater progress than our own country in domestic architecture. Except fortified castles, I do not find any considerable dwellings mentioned before the reign of Charles V, and very few of so early a date. even in Italy where from the size of her cities and social refinements of her inhabitants, greater elegance and splendor in building were justly to be expected. The domestic architecture of the Middle Ages did not attain any perfection.

Starting point is 09:41:01 In several towns, the houses were covered with thatch, and suffered consequently from destructive fires. The two most essential improvements in architecture during this period, one of which had been missed by the sagacity of Greece and Rome, were chimneys and glass windows. Nothing apparently can be more simple than the former, yet the wisdom of ancient times had been content to let the smoke escape by an aperture in the center of the roof, and a discovery of which Vitruvius had not a glimpse was made, perhaps in this country, by some forgotten semi-barbarian. About the middle of the 14th century, the use of chimneys is distinctly mentioned in England

Starting point is 09:41:50 and in Italy, but they are found in several of our castles which bear a much older date. This country seems to have lost very early the art of making glass, which was preserved in France, whence artificers were brought into England to furnish the windows in some new churches in the 7th century. But if the domestic buildings of the 15th century would not seem very spacious or convenient at present, far less would this luxurious generation be content with their internal accommodations. A gentleman's house containing three or four beds was extraordinary, extraordinarily well provided. Few probably had more than two. The walls were commonly bare, without Wayne Scott or even plaster, except that some great houses were furnished with hangings,

Starting point is 09:42:49 and that perhaps hardly so soon as the reign of Edward IV. It is unnecessary to add that neither libraries of books nor pictures could have found a place among furniture. silver plate was very rare and hardly used for the table. A few inventories of furniture that still remain exhibit a miserable deficiency, and this was incomparably greater in private gentleman's houses than among citizens, and especially foreign merchants. We have an inventory of the goods belonging to Contarini, a rich Venetian trader at his house in his house in,

Starting point is 09:43:34 St. Botolph's Lane, AD 1481. There appear to have been no less than ten beds, and glass windows are especially noticed as movable furniture. No mention, however, is made of chairs or looking glasses. If we compare this account, however, trifling in our estimation, with a similar inventory of furniture in Skipton Castle, the great honor of the the earls of Cumberland, and among the most splendid mansions of the north, not at the same period, for I have not found any inventory of a nobleman's furniture so ancient. But in 1572, after almost a century of continual improvement, we shall be astonished at the inferior provision of the baronial residence. There were not more than seven or eight beds in this great

Starting point is 09:44:33 castle, nor had any of the chambers, either chairs, glasses, or carpets. It is in this sense probably that we must understand Ania Silvius, if he meant anything more than to express a traveler's discontent, when he declares that the kings of Scotland would rejoice to be as well lodged as the second class of citizens at Nuremberg. The Middle Ages as a period of intellectual darkness from a view of the state of Europe during the Middle Ages. If we would listen to some literary historians, we should believe that the darkest ages contained many individuals,

Starting point is 09:45:20 not only distinguished among their contemporaries, but positively eminent for abilities and knowledge, a proneness to extol every monk of whose production a few letters or a devotional treatise survives. Every bishop of whom it is related that he composed homilies runs through the laborious work of the Benedictines of St. Moore. The literary history of France, and in a less degree, is observable even in Tiraboshi and in most books of this class.

Starting point is 09:45:56 Bede, Alsouin, Hinkmar, Raban, and a number of inferior names, become real giants of learning in their uncritical panegyrics. But one might justly say that ignorance is the smallest defect of the writers of these dark ages. Several of them were tolerably acquainted with books, but that wherein they are uniformly deficient is original argument or expression. Almost every one is a compiler of scraps from the fathers, or from such semi-classical authors as Boteus, Cassiodorus, or Martianus Capella. Indeed, I am not aware that there appeared more than two really considerable men in the Republic of Letters from the sixth to the middle of the 11th century. John, surnamed Scotus or Eregena, a nascent. A nathan of Ireland and Gerbert, who became Pope by the name of Sylvester the second,

Starting point is 09:47:03 the first endowed with a bold and acute metaphysical genius, the second excellent for the time when he lived in mathematical science and mechanical inventions. If it be demanded by what cause it happened that a few sparks of ancient learning survived throughout this long winter, we can only assume. their preservation to the establishment of Christianity. Religion alone made a bridge, as it were, across the chaos, and has linked the two periods of ancient and modern civilization. Without this connecting principle, Europe might indeed have awakened to intellectual pursuits,

Starting point is 09:47:49 and the genius of recent times needed not to be invigorated by the imitation of antiquity. but the memory of Greece and Rome would have been feebly preserved by tradition and the monuments of those nations might have excited on the return of civilization that vague sentiment of speculation and wonder with which men now contemplate Persepolus or the pyramids

Starting point is 09:48:18 it is not however from religion simply that we have derived this advantage but from religion as it was modified in the dark ages. Such is the complex reciprocation of good and evil in the dispensations of providence that we may assert with only an apparent paradox that had religion been more pure,

Starting point is 09:48:43 it would have been less permanent, and that Christianity has been preserved by means of its corruptions. The sole hope for literature depended on the Latin language, and I do not see why that should not have been lost, if three circumstances in the prevailing religious system, all of which we are justly accustomed to disapprove,

Starting point is 09:49:09 had not conspired to maintain it, the papal supremacy, the monastic institutions, and the use of a Latin liturgy. Number one, a continual intercourse was kept up, in consequence of the first, between Rome and the several nations of Europe. Her laws were received by the bishops. Her legates presided in councils,

Starting point is 09:49:35 so that a common language was as necessary in the church as it is at present in the diplomatic relations of kingdoms. Number two, throughout the whole course of the Middle Ages, there was no learning, and very little regularity of manners among the parochial clergy. Almost every distinguished man was either the member of a chapter or a convent.

Starting point is 09:50:03 The monasteries were subjected to strict rules of discipline and held out more opportunities for study than the secular clergy possessed and fewer for worldly dissipations. But their most important service was as secure repositories for books. All our manuscripts have been preserved in this manner,

Starting point is 09:50:27 and could hardly have descended to us by any other channel. At least there were intervals when I do not conceive that any royal or private libraries existed. In the shadows of this universal ignorance, a thousand superstitions, like foul animals of night, were propagated and nourished. It would be very unsatisfactory to a thousand superstitions, to exhibit a few specimens of this odious brood,

Starting point is 09:50:57 when the real character of those times is only to be judged by their accumulated multitude. There are many books from which a sufficient number of instances may be collected to show the absurdity and ignorance of the Middle Ages in this respect. I shall only mention, too, as affording more general evidence than any local or obscure.

Starting point is 09:51:23 superstition. In the 10th century, an opinion prevailed everywhere that the end of the world was approaching. Many charters begin with these words, as the world is now drawing to its close, an army marching under the Emperor Otto I was so terrified by an eclipse of the sun, which it conceived to announce this consummation as to disperse hastily on all sun. As this notion seems to have been founded on some confused theory of the millennium, it naturally died away when the seasons proceeded in the 11th century with their usual regularity. A far more remarkable and permanent superstition was the appeal to heaven in judicial controversies, whether through the means of combat or of ordeal.

Starting point is 09:52:20 The principle of these was the same, but in the former it was mingled with feelings independent of religion, the natural dictates of resentment in a brave man, unjustly accused, and the sympathy of a warlike people with the display of skill and intrepidity. These, in course of time, almost obliterated the primary character of judicial combat, and ultimately changed it into the modern duel, in which assuredly there is no mixture of superstition. But in the various tests of innocence which were called ordeals, this stood undisguised and unqualified. It is not necessary to describe what is so well known, the ceremonies of trial by handling hot iron, by plunging the arduxied, by plunging the arm into boiling fluids, by floating or sinking in cold water, or by swallowing a piece of

Starting point is 09:53:23 consecrated bread. It is observable that as the interference of heaven was relied upon as a matter of course, it seems to have been reckoned nearly indifferent whether such a test were adopted as must, humanly considered, absolve all the guilty, or one that must convict all the innocent. The ordeals of hot iron or water were however more commonly used, and it has been a perplexing question by what dexterity these tremendous proofs were eluded. They seem at least to have placed the decision of all judicial controversies in the hands of the clergy, who must have known the secret, whatever that might be, of satisfying the spectators that an accused person had held a mass of burning iron with impunity. For several centuries, this mode of investigation

Starting point is 09:54:23 was in great repute, though not without opposition from some eminent bishops. It does discredit to the memory of Charlemagne that he was one of its warmest advocates, but the judicial combat, which indeed might be reckoned one species of ordeal, gradually put an end to the rest, and as the church acquired better notions of law and a code of her own, she strenuously exerted herself against all these barbarous superstitions. At the same time, it must be admitted that the evils of superstition in the Middle Ages, though separately considered very serious, are not to be weighed against the benefits of the religion with which they were so mingled.

Starting point is 09:55:13 in the original principles of monastic orders and the rules by which they ought at least to have been governed there was a character of meekness self-denial and charity that could not wholly be effaced these virtues rather than justice and veracity were inculcated by the religious ethics of the Middle Ages and in the relief of indigence it may upon the whole be a certain

Starting point is 09:55:43 that the monks did not fall short of their profession. This elemasonary spirit, indeed, remarkably distinguishes both Christianity and Mohammedanism from the moral systems of Greece and Rome, which were very deficient in general humanity and sympathy with suffering. Nor do we find in any single instance during ancient times, if I mistake not, those public institutions, for the alleviation of human miseries, which have long been scattered over every part of Europe.

Starting point is 09:56:21 The virtues of the monks assumed a still higher character when they stood forward as protectors of the oppressed. By an established law founded on very ancient superstition, the precincts of a church afforded sanctuary to accused persons. Under a due administration of justice, this privilege would have been simply and constantly mischievous, as we properly consider it to be in those countries where it still subsists. But in the rapine and tumult of the Middle Ages, the right of sanctuary might as often be a shield to innocence as an immunity to crime. We can hardly regret in reflecting on the desolating violence which prevailed that there should have been some green spots in the

Starting point is 09:57:11 wilderness where the feeble and the persecuted could find refuge. How must this right have enhanced the veneration for religious institutions? How gladly must the victims of internal warfare have turned their eyes from the baronial castle, the dread and scourge of the neighborhood, to those venerable walls within which not even the clamor of arms could be heard to disturb the chant of holy men and the same Sacred Service of the Altar End of section 19 Section 20 of

Starting point is 09:57:55 Library of the World's Best Literature Ancient and Modern Volume 17 This is a Librivox recording All Libri Box recordings are in the public domain For more informational to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org Library of the World's Best Literature

Starting point is 09:58:14 Ancient and Modern Volume 17 Selected Poems by Fitzgreen-Haleck 1790 to 1867 Fitzgreen Halleck did his share as an American poet in giving dignity to the native literature during the first half of the 19th century

Starting point is 09:58:40 like his friend and fellow worker Drake he wrote polished and pleasing verse at a time when such work was rare and not fostered by the social conditions. A New Englander of good Puritan stock, he was born July 8th, 1790, in the old Connecticut coast town of Guilford. He had such schooling as the place afforded, but at 15 became a clerk in his uncle's store, where he remained until his majority. His bookish ancestry, or the writing-eye-chore of a man predestined to letters, led him while yet a school lad to scribble verses, practicing a prentice hand. When 21, he went to New York, entering a counting house, and only leaving it, after 20 years of service, for a similar position with John Jacob Astor, held for 16 years.

Starting point is 09:59:45 a long life of mercantile employment. But Halleck's interests lay in another direction. All his spare money went for books, and soon after arriving in the great city, he formed the friendship with Drake, which lasted until the latter's death in 1820, and inspired what is perhaps Halleck's best short lyric. Halleck and Drake were collaborators

Starting point is 10:00:11 in the clever satiric croaker papers, which, appearing during 1819 in the New York Evening Post, caught the public fancy, as Irving and Pordling caught it with the Salmogundi papers. The same year, Halleck's long satirical poem Fanny was published and met with success. A European trip at the age of 32 broadened his culture, and in the poems issued in 1827, several pieces show this influence, including the familiar martial lay of Marco Bozomeris. In 1849, Mr. Astor having grounded him a small annuity, the poet returned to his native Guilford to live with his sister in one of the town's

Starting point is 10:01:06 old-time houses, and to lead a life of quiet, studious retirements. Between brother and sister, neither of whom had married, a tender and beautiful friendship existed. Not much literary work was done by Halleck during the last 20 years, although his poem, Connecticut, belongs to this period, and reflects his love of his own state. He died at Guildford, November the 19th, 1867, aged 77. Full honour has been awarded him since. On the 80th anniversary of his birth, a fine obelisk erected through the efforts of leading men of letters, was dedicated with imposing ceremony at Guildford,

Starting point is 10:01:56 and was the first monument to an American poet as the statue of Alec in Centiote. Park, New York, set up in 1877, is the first memorial of its kind. An address by Bayard Taylor and a poem by Dr. Holmes on this occasion indicated the quality of the respect felt for the poet. His poetical writings have been edited by James Grant Wilson, 1869, who at the same time prepared his biography. Fitzgreen Halleck will always have a place in the American anthology. His verse today strikes the ear as somewhat academic and confined. The body of his work is slender, nor was his range wide.

Starting point is 10:02:47 But as a forerunner of greater singers, and within his limitations, he produced poetry that is felicitous in diction, skillful in the handling of meters, and possessed of feeling in the lyric vein, and a fire in the heroic two or three of his compositions certainly have vitality enough for a prolonged existence he cannot be overlooked in tracing the development of letters in the united states marco bozaris at midnight in his guarded tent the turk was dreaming of the hour when greece her knee in suppliance bent should tremble at his power in dreams through camp and court he bore the trophies of a conqueror in dreams his song of triumph heard then wore his monarch's signet ring then press that monarchs throne a king as wild his thoughts and gay of wing as eden's garden bird at midnight in the forest shades posaris reigned his suliate band true as the steel of their tried blades heroes in heart and hand

Starting point is 10:04:13 there had the persians thousands stood there had the glad earth drunk their blood on old pletias day and now there breathed that haunted air the sons of sires who conquered there with arm to strike and soul to dare as quick as far as they an hour passed on the turk awoke that bright dream was his last he woke to hear his centuries shriek to arms they come the greek the greek he woke to die mids flame and smoke, and shout and groan and sabre stroke, and death shots falling thick and fast, as lightnings from the mountain cloud, and heard with voices trumpet loud, Bozaris cheer his band. Strike till the last arm foe expires, strike for your altars and your fires, strike for the green graves of your sires, God and your native land, They fought like brave men long and well

Starting point is 10:05:25 They piled that ground with Muslims slain They conquered, but Bozaris fell, bleeding at every vein His few surviving comrades saw His smile when rang their proud hurrah And the red field was won Then saw in death his eyelids close calmly as to a knight's repose like flowers at set of sun.

Starting point is 10:05:53 Come to the bridal chamber, death. Come to the mothers when she feels, for the first time her firstborn's breath. Come when the blessed seals that close the pestilence are broke, and crowded cities wail its stroke. Come in consumption's ghastly form, the earthquake shock, the ocean's storm.

Starting point is 10:06:17 Come when the heart beats, high and warm with banquet song and dance and wine and thou art terrible the tear the groan the knell the pall the beer and all we know or dream or fear of agony are thine but to the hero when his sword has won the battle for the free thy voice sounds like a prophet's word and in its hollow tone are heard the thanks of millions yet to be come when his task of fame is wrought come with her laurel leaf blood bought come in her crowning hour and then thy sunken eyes unearthly light to him is welcome as the sight of sky and stars to prisoned men thy grasp is welcome as the hand of brother in a foreign land thy summons welcome as the cry that told the indian isles were nigh to the world-seeking genoese when the land wind from woods of palm and orange groves and fields of balm blew o'er the haitian seas bozumris with the storied brave greece nurtured in her glory's time rest thee there is no prouder grave even in her own proud clime she wore no funeral weeds for thee nor bade the dark hearth wave its plume like torn branch from death's leafless tree in sorrows pomp and pageantry the heartless luxury of the tomb

Starting point is 10:08:10 but she remembers thee as one long-loved and for a season gone for thee her poet's lyre is wreathed her marble wrought her music breathed for thee she rings the birthday bells of thee her babe's first lisping tells for thine her evening prayer is said at palace couch and cottage bed her soldier closing with the foe gives for thy sake a deadlier blow. His plighted maiden when she fears, For him, the joy of her young years, Thinks of thy fate and checks her tears. And she, the mother of thy boys, Though in her eye and faded cheek,

Starting point is 10:09:01 Is red the grief she will not speak, The memory of her buried joys, And even she who gave thee birth, will by their pilgrim-circled hearth talk of thy doom without a sigh for thou art freedoms now and fames one of the few the immortal names that were not born to die robert burns there have been loftier themes than his and longer scrolls and louder liars and lays lit up with poise purer and holier fires yet read the names that know not deaf few nobler ones than burns are there and few have won a greener wreath than that which binds his hair his is that language of the heart in which the answering heart would speak thought word that bids the warm tear start or the smile light the cheek and his that music to whose tone the common pulse of man keeps time in cot or castles mirth or moan in cold or sunny clime

Starting point is 10:10:22 and who hath heard his song nor knelt before its spell with willing knee and listened and believed and felt the poet's mastery or the mind see in calm and storm or the heart's sunshine and its showers or passions moments bright and warm or reasons dark cold hours on fields where brave men die or do in halls where rings the banquet's mirth where mourners weep where lovers woo from throne to cottage hearth what sweet tears dim the eyes unshed what wild vows falter on the tongue when scots wheehaye wales bled or old lang syne is sung pure hopes that lift the soul above come with his cotters hymn of praise and dreams of youth and truth and love with logan's banks and braze and when he breathes his master lay of aloway's which haunted wall all passions in our frames of clay come thronging at his call imagination's world of air and our own world its gloom and glee wit pathos poetry are there and death sublimity am burns though brief the race he ran though rough and dark the path he trod lived

Starting point is 10:12:00 died in form and soul a man, the image of his God. Through care and pain and want and woe, with wounds that only death could heal, tortures the poor alone can know, the proud alone can feel. He kept his honesty and truth, his independent tongue and pen, and moved in manhood as in youth, of his fellow men strong sense deep feeling passion strong a hate of tyrant and of knave a love of right a scorn of wrong of coward and of slave a kind true heart a spirit high that could not fear and would not bow were written in his manly eye and on his manly brow praise to the bard his word are driven, like flower seeds by the far winds sown,

Starting point is 10:13:05 where'er beneath the sky of heaven, the birds of fame have flown. Praise to the man, a nation stood beside his coffin with wet eyes, her brave, her beautiful, her good, as when a loved one dies. And still, as on his funeral day, men stand his cold earth couch around, with the mute homage that we pay to consecrated ground and consecrated ground it is the last the hallowed home of one who lives upon all memories though with the buried gone

Starting point is 10:13:48 such graves as his are pilgrim shrines shrines shrines to no code or creed confined the delphian veils the palestines the meccails the mechres of the mind. Sages, with wisdom's garland reed, crowned kings and mitered priests of power, and warriors with their bright sword sheathed, the mightiest of the hour. And lowlier names whose humble home is lit by fortune's dimmer star

Starting point is 10:14:23 are there, or wave a mountain come, from countries near and far. Pilgrims whose wandering feet have pressed, The Swites'ers' snow, the Arab's sand, Or trod the piled leaves of the west, My own green forest land. All ask the cottage of his birth, Gaze on the scenes he loved and sung,

Starting point is 10:14:49 And gather feelings not of earth, His fields and streams among. They linger by the dunes low trees, and pastoral knife and wooded air and round thy sepulchres dumfries the poet's tomb is there but what to them the sculptor's art his funeral columns wreaths and urns where they not graven on the heart the name of robert burns on the death of joseph rodman drake green be the turf above thee, friend of my better days. None knew thee but to love thee, nor name thee but to praise. Tears fell when thou wert dying, from eyes unused to weep, and long where thou art lying, will tears the cold turf steep. When hearts whose truth was proven, like thine, are laid in

Starting point is 10:15:57 earth, there should a wreath be woven, to tell the world their worth. And I who woke each morrow, to clasp thy hand in mine, who shared thy joy and sorrow, whose wheel and woe were thine. It should be mine to braid it, around thy faded brow, but I've in vain assayed it, and feel I cannot now. while memory bids me weep thee, nor thoughts nor words are free, the grief is fixed too deeply that mourns a man like thee.

Starting point is 10:16:40 End of Section 20, read by Alan Mapstone. Section 21 of Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Volume 17. This is a Librevox recording. All Librevox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit Libravogs.org.

Starting point is 10:17:08 Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Volume 17. Yehuda Halevi, 1080 to Unknown, by Richard Gautheil. In the sunny lands of Spain, the Jews outcast from their eastern homes had found a second fatherland. Under the rule of Arabic caliphs, orientals as they themselves were, occasion had been given them to develop that taste for literature which their continued occupation with the Bible had instilled into them. Cordova, Granada, and Toledo, soon became homes of Jewish learning, in which the glory of the schools of Babylon and Palestine was well-nigh hidden. Under the influence of a quieter life, the heart of the Jew expanded,

Starting point is 10:17:56 and his imagination had freedom to run its own course. The Hebrew muse, which had a almost forgotten the force with which it had poured forth psalm and song in ancient days, awoke again to a sense of its power. The harp of David was once more strung to catch the outpourings of hearts, thankful and gay. The priests in the temple of God, less grand outwardly now, but more fully the expression of the feelings of the individual, chanted anew Israel's songs of praise and of sanctification. Of the many poets which this new love produced, lived as it was, among a people to whom poetry was so natural a mode of expression, to Abdul Hassan, Yehuda Ben-Halevi, all unite in giving the crown.

Starting point is 10:18:44 Born in Toledo, Old Castile, in 1080, his songs and verses soon became so well-known and so oft-recided that the person of their author has been almost forgotten in the love shown his productions. He lived only for his pen, and no deeds or accounted him, which might make the telling of his life more than of passing interest. He was learned, as most of the men of his race then were, in all the sciences of the Arabians, had made himself proficient in the language of both Quran and Bible, was learned in the practice of medicine and facile in the discussion of philosophy. His was a thoroughly religious nature, and in joining together philosophy, and poetry and medicine,

Starting point is 10:19:31 he was following a custom not unknown in the Jewish high schools. In philosophy, he communed with man about God, in poetry, with God about man, while his service to his fellow men was through his power in the healing art. I occupy myself in the hours which belong neither to the day nor to the night

Starting point is 10:19:53 with the vanity of medical science, though I am unable to heal. I physic babel, but it continues in firm, are his own words in a letter to a friend. This art he practiced in Toledo and Cordova, and in one of these places he wrote in the Arabic tongue, a philosophical work, Khuzari, which, though perhaps bad philosophy,

Starting point is 10:20:17 is a poetical and beautiful defense of his own faith against the conflicting claims of Christianity and Mohammedism. But at the early age of 13th, his pen had commenced to run in the cadence of rhyme and meter. His first poems were upon subjects which touched the young. Poems of friendship, of love, and of wine, in which he made the old, sedate and stately language of the Bible shake with youthful mirth and laughter.

Starting point is 10:20:47 And though he never really forsook such subjects, light and gay, these poems were not the real expression of his inmost being. A strong sense of the divine presence, a romantic love for the home of his faith, in spite of its second home in Spain, have made Yehuda Halavi, the chief of the national poets of Israel, whose love was rooted in the land of the patriarchs and prophets. Of all his three hundred religious poems, almost one-third of the poet's legacy, none bear the stamp of intense feeling as to these national ones. In verse after verse, he bemoans the ruins of the ancient places, bewhales the exile of Israel's children,

Starting point is 10:21:30 and sings the larger hope of her returned glory. So strong was the love of Zion within him that he could not rest until he had seen in the flesh that which his spiritual eye had beheld since his youth. He had already reached the age of 60 when he set out on his long journey to the Holy Land, alone because he had not sufficiently persuaded others up to his age of 60, the pitch of his own faith, and yet not entirely alone. His muse went with him, and his track was strewn with the brightest pearls which have fallen from his lips. He reached Palestine, but our knowledge of his further doings there is cut off. His body must have been laid in the

Starting point is 10:22:13 sacred soil, but no man knoweth the place of his sepulcher. Like Elijah of old, he went up to heaven. the popular fancy has seized upon so welcome a figure and has told how he was cut down by an Arab at the very walls of Jerusalem after he had poured forth the ode to Zion which has done more than any of his other pieces to keep his memory alive and of Wutaina of the elder poet's race

Starting point is 10:22:41 and inwardly also of his faith has said tears of pearl that on the golden thread of rhyme are strung together from the shining forge of poetry have come forth in song celestial, and this is the song of Zion, that Yehuda Ben-Halevi sang when dying on the holy ruins

Starting point is 10:23:01 of Jerusalem. Yehuda Halavi has thus become the exponent of suffering Israel, the teller of its woes, the prophet of its hopes. A depth of pure feeling is revealed in him, of freedom from artificial constraint, and a power

Starting point is 10:23:18 of description which we meet nowhere among the middle-age Hebrew poets. As a true poet, love remains his theme to the end, but the love of the fair one is exchanged for a love pure and greater, his people, his faith. But a wan and woeful maiden was his love, a mournful image of despair and desolation, who was named Jerusalem.

Starting point is 10:23:44 Even in his early boyhood, did he love her, deeply, truly, and a thrill of passion shook him at the word Jerusalem. And that people has returned his love a thousandfold. Signed, Richard Gotthiel. Ode to Zion, Art thou not Zion, feign to send forth greetings from thy sacred rock

Starting point is 10:24:08 unto thy captive train, who greet thee as the remnants of thy flock? Take thou on every side, east, west, and south, and north, Their greetings multiplied. Sadly, he greets thee still, The prisoner of hope, Who day and night, sheds ceaseless tears, Like dew on Herman's hill,

Starting point is 10:24:31 Would that they fell on thy mountain's height? Harsh is my voice when I bewail thy woes, But when in fancy's dream, I see thy freedom, Forth its cadence flows, Sweet as the harps that hung by Babel's stream. My heart is, is so distressed for Bethel ever blessed,

Starting point is 10:24:52 for Pennial and each sacred place, the holy presence there, to thee is present where thy maker opes like gates, the gates of heaven to face. Oh, who will lead me on to seek the spots where, in far distant years,

Starting point is 10:25:10 the angels in their glory dawned upon thy messengers and seers? Oh, who will give me wings that I may fly away, and there at rest from all my wanderings the ruins of my heart among thy ruins lay I'll bend my face unto thy soil and hold thy stones as precious gold

Starting point is 10:25:31 and when in Hebron I have stood beside my father's tomb Then will I pace in turn Thy plains and thy forest wide Until I stand in Gilead And discern Mount Horr and Mount Abram Neath whose crest the luminaries twain, thy guides and beacons rest. Thy air is life unto my soul,

Starting point is 10:25:55 thy grains of dust are myrrh, thy streams with honey flow, naked and barefoot, to thy ruin fains, how gladly would I go? To where the ark was treasured, and in dim recesses dwelt the holy cherubim.

Starting point is 10:26:11 Perfect in beauty Zion, how in thee do love and grace unite, the souls of thy companions tenderly turn onto thee. Thy joy was their delight. And weeping, they lament thy ruin now, in distant exile, for thy sacred height they long, and towards thy gates in prayer, they bow. Thy flocks are scattered o'er the barren waste, yet do they not forget thy sheltering fold. Unto thy garments fringe they cling, and haste the branches of their palms to seize and hope shinar and Patros come they near to thee not are they by thy light and right divine to what can be compared the majesty of thy anointed line to what the singers seers and levites thine the rule of idols fails and is cast down thy power eternal is from age to age thy crown the lord desires thee for his dwelling place eternally and

Starting point is 10:27:17 And blessed is he whom God has chosen, For the grace within thy courts to rest. Happy is he that watches, drawing near, Until he sees thy glorious lights arise, And over whom thy dawn breaks, Full and clear, Set in the Orient skies. But happiest,

Starting point is 10:27:38 He who with exultant eyes, The bliss of thy redeemed ones shall behold, And see thy youth renewed, As in the days. of old. Translation of Alice Lucas. Separation. And so we twain must part. Oh, linger yet, let me still feed my glance upon thine eyes. Forget not, love, the days of our delight, and I are knights of bliss shall ever prize. In dreams thy shadowy image I shall see. Oh, even in my dreams, be kind to me. Though I were dead, I know, I know,

Starting point is 10:28:17 Nonetheless should hear thy step, thy garment rustling on the sand, And if thou waft me greetings from the grave, I shall drink deep the breath of that cold land. Take thou my days, command this life of mine, If it can lengthen out the space of thine. No voice I hear, from lips, death pale and chill, Yet deep within my heart it echoes still. My frame remains,

Starting point is 10:28:45 My soul to thee yearns forth. A shadow I must tarry still on earth. Back to the body dwelling here in pain. Return my soul. Make haste and come again. Translation of Emma Lazarus. The earth in spring. Then day by day, her broidered gown,

Starting point is 10:29:09 she changes for fresh wonder. A rich profusion of gay robes she scatters all around her. From day to ten, day her flowers tints change quick, like eyes that brighten. Now white like pearl, now ruby red, now emerald green they'll lighten. She turns all pale. From time to time red blushes quick or cover. She's like a fair, fond bride that pours warm kisses on her lover. The beauty of her bursting spring so far exceeds my telling. Me thinks sometimes she pales the stars that have in their dwelling. Translation of Edward G. King. Longing for Jerusalem. O city of the world,

Starting point is 10:29:58 with sacred splendor blessed, my spirit yearns to thee from out the far off west. A stream of love wells forth when I recall thy day. Now is thy temple waste. Thy glory passed away. Had I an eagle's wings, straight would I fly to thee. Moisten thy holy dust With wet cheeks streaming free. Ah, how I long for thee, albeit thy king has gone. I'll be it where balm once flowed,

Starting point is 10:30:30 The serpent dwells alone. Could I but kiss thy dust, So would I fain expire. As sweet as honey then, My passion, my desire. Translation of Emma Lazarus. End of Section 21. Section 22 of Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Volume 17.

Starting point is 10:31:03 This is a Libravox recording. All Libravox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit Libravox.org, recording by Rita Boutros. Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Volume 17. Philip Gilbert Hamilton 1834 to 1894 The sneer of Disraeli

Starting point is 10:31:31 that a critic is a man who has failed in the branch of work he sets up to judge is like saying that a mill race is a stream which has failed to run in its own channel making a definition serve as an insult

Starting point is 10:31:46 the man who does not fail is too busy with his own creations to spare much time for shaping judgments on others. And so far as it implies that the failure leaves the critic no claim to be heard, it is shallow to the point of stupidity. On the contrary, the only thing which does give his verdict's weight is the fact that he has wrought enough in the given field to know its technique and its implications.

Starting point is 10:32:17 Experience without success is the very condition, of most good professional criticism. The limitations and perversions involved by this are equally clear and must be allowed for. Mr. Hamilton was in this generation the best literary exponent of art to the public and of different classes of art to each other. For artists are often as narrow and distorted in their estimates of other branches than their own as the public is, in its estimates of all, and are perhaps even more accurate and unreasonable. This position he owed precisely to the fact that he was a trained and learned artist, versed in the techniques of a singularly wide range of artistic methods,

Starting point is 10:33:10 but neither a great nor a popular artist, combined, of course, with other qualities which marked him out for an efficient interpreter. His analytic powers, his remarkable freedom from bias or bigotry, his catholicity of taste and sanity of mind, gave him unusual insight and foresight. Few men have measured work or reputations with more sobriety of judgment or made fewer mistakes in prophecy.

Starting point is 10:33:43 The character and purpose of his writing must be born in mind. He was not instructing artists but the public, even though a special, wealthy, and fairly cultivated public, a body which, as he has said, is at once practically ignorant of art and sorely affronted at being taxed with such ignorance. He was, therefore, in the general position of a schoolmaster with a voluntary school of jealous and conceded pupils, his lucid and pleasing literary style, his clearness of analysis, his justness of spirit, and a temper never ruffled even into a too cock, gave him unequalled power of persuasiveness over this audience, but great depth or

Starting point is 10:34:34 originality of exposition would have been worse than wasted. He says himself that the vulgarization of rudiments has nothing to do with the advance of science, nor has it any of anything to do with the advance of art, except, and the exception is of the first importance, by raising the level of the buyers of artwork. Hence, it is unreasonable to blame him for the commonplaceness which artists fret over in his art writing. It was an indispensable part of his service and influence, and probably fewer are beyond the need and scope of his common places than would like to acknowledge it. Indeed, through his guiding of public taste, he had much more influence even on the development of art forms themselves than is generally

Starting point is 10:35:31 supposed. It is due mainly to him that etching, the most individual and expressive of the methods of engraving, has been raised from an unfamiliar specialty to the foremost place in the favor of cultivated art lovers. His literary services to art taken as a whole, his quarter-century editing of the portfolio, which he founded, with his clear and patient analysis of current works of art, and his indirect and conciliatory but all the more effective rebuffs to public ignorance and presumption. His thorough technical works on etching, on landscape, all the graphic arts, his life of Turner, his thoughts on art, steadily readable and clarifying, and much other matter, have probably done more than all other art writing of the age

Starting point is 10:36:31 together to put the public mind into the only state from which anything good can be hoped for art. To wit, a willing recognition of its ignorance of the primary laws and limitations of, artistic processes and its lack of any right to pass on their embodiments till the proper knowledge is acquired he has removed some of that ignorance but in the very process contrives to explain how vast a body is still left and how crude random and worthless any judgments based upon that vacuity of knowledge must be To do this and yet rouse no irritation in his pupils, but leave instead a great personal liking, is a signal triumph of good exposition, good manners, and intrinsic good feeling.

Starting point is 10:37:30 Mr. Hammerton never indulges in the acrimony by which critics so often mar their influence. He assumes that when his readers make mistakes, they do so from misunderstanding. and would be glad of knowledge courteously presented, and he is rewarded by being both listened to and liked. And to the uninstructed, who listened teachably, his incomparably lucid explanations of the principles of artistic values and sacrifices, the piecemeal attempts of different forms of art to interpret nature, and their insuperable boundaries,

Starting point is 10:38:12 the techniques of materials, the compulsion to imaginative work by physical limitations, and other pieces of analysis, form the best of preliminary trainings in rational judgment of art, and render the worst class of ignorant misjudgments wholly impossible. His literary work, unconnected with art, was of considerable volume, and equals the other in general repute and appreciation. Best known of all his books is the intellectual life, which deserves its fame as being the chief storehouse of philosophic consolation to the vast class of literary weaklings, developed by a comfortable democracy.

Starting point is 10:39:02 It is a perpetual healing in the hours of despondency that come to every aspiring but. limited worker, when he looks on his petty accomplishment by the light of his ambition. It consists of a set of short conversational articles, many of them in the form of letters, developing the thesis that the intellectual life is not a matter of volume but of quality and tendency, that it may be lived intensely and satisfyingly with little actual acquirement and no recognized position, that it consists not in the amassing of facts or even in power of creation, but in the constant preference of higher thought to lower, in aspiration rather than

Starting point is 10:39:53 attainment, and that any one mind is in itself as worthy as another. The single utterance that, it never could have been intended that everybody should write great books, naively obvious as it is, was worth writing the book for as an aid to self-content. It is full of the gentlest, firmest, most sympathetically sensible advice and suggestion and remonstrance as to the limitations of time and strength, the way in which most advantages breed compensating obstacles so that conditions are far more equal than they appear. the impossibility of achievement without sacrifice the need of choice among incompatible ends and many other aspects of life as related to study and production its teaching of sobriety and attainability of aim of patient utilization of means and of contentment in such goal as our powers can reach is of inestimable value in an age of a general

Starting point is 10:41:06 education which breeds ambitions in far greater number than can be realized human intercourse is a collection of essays on life and society some of them ranking among his best the admirable chapter on the noble bohemianism is really an astray from the intellectual life the book French and English most of it first published in the Atlantic Monthly, is a comparison of the two peoples and modes of life and thought of great charm and suggestiveness. His double position as a loyal Englishman by birth and long residence and a sort of adoptive Frenchman by marriage and also long residence made him solicitous to clear up the misunderstandings each people had of the other.

Starting point is 10:42:03 and he wrote much to this end with his usual calm sense and gentlemanly urbanity. Five modern Frenchmen is a set of excellent biographies of French artists and others. Chapters on Animals explains itself. He wrote two novels, Wendorholm and Marmourne, deserving of more reading than they receive. And a number of other works besides Bresides. publishing collected volumes of shorter papers, and at 21 a volume of poems. Mr. Hammerton was born in Laneside near Shaw, Lancashire, England, September 10, 1834. After preparing for Oxford, he went to Paris to study art and literature.

Starting point is 10:42:55 A few years later, he set up a camp at Loch Awe, Scotland, to paint landscapes. This he described in a painter's camp in the Highlands and began to gain the note as a man of letters which he vainly hoped to gain as an artist. From 1866 to 1868, he was art critic for the London Saturday Review. In 1869, he established the portfolio, a high-grade art review, addressing a public of supposedly cultivated art-lover,

Starting point is 10:43:31 rather than the miscellaneous mass. But how little he felt himself dispensed from rudimentary exposition, and how low an estimate he set on even their connoisseurship may be learned from the first chapter of the thoughts on art. He married a French lady of Oton, and spent the latter part of his life mostly there or in Boulogne. He died in the latter place, November 5, 1894. Greater geniuses in dying have deprived the world of less service and less enjoyment.

Starting point is 10:44:12 Many of his readers felt a personal bereavement in his loss, as in that of a companion with a nature at once lofty and tender, a safe guide and elevating friend, unfailing in charm, comfort, and in terms. instructiveness. Selection, Peach Bloom, by Philip Gilbert Hammerton, from the Sylvan Year. There is a corner of a neglected old garden at the Val Saint Veronique, in which grows a certain plant very abundantly, that inevitably reminds us of an ancient philosopher.

Starting point is 10:44:53 Towards the end of March, it is all carpeted with young hemlock, which at this stage, of its existence lies almost perfectly flat upon the ground and covers it with one of the most minutely beautiful designs that can possibly be imagined. The delicate division of the fresh green leaves, making a pattern that would be fit for some room if a skillful manufacturer copied it. Our own hemlock is believed to be identical with that which caused the death of Socrates, but its act in northern countries is much feebler than in the warmer climate of the Mediterranean. In the same old abandoned garden where the hemlock grows on the walls, there remain a few fruit trees, and amongst these some peaches and apricots. They are in full bloom towards the end of March,

Starting point is 10:45:50 and of all the beautiful sights to be seen at this time of the year, I know of none to be compared to these old peach trees with their wreath of rosy bloom, which would be beautiful in any situation, but is especially in this, because there happened to be some mellow-tinted walls behind them, the very background that a painter would delight in. There is some pretty coloring in the apricot blossoms, on account of the pink calyx and the pinkish-brown of the young twigs,

Starting point is 10:46:24 which has an influence on the effect. but the peach is incomparably richer and after the grays of wintry trees and wintry skies the sight is gladdened beyond measure by the flush of peach blossom and the blue of the clear spring heaven but to enjoy these two fresh and pure colors to the utmost we need some quiet coloring in the picture and nothing supplies this better than such old walls as those of the monastic buildings at the Val Saint-Vernique, walls that nature has been painting in her own way for full 400 years, with the most delicate changes of grey and brown and dark gleamings of bronze and gold.

Starting point is 10:47:13 There is something too which gratifies other feelings than those of simple vision in the renewal of the youth of nature, contrasting with the steady decay of any ancient human work, and in the contrast between her exquisiteness, her delicacy, her freshness, as exhibited in a thing so perfect as a fresh peach blossom, with its rosy color, its almond perfume, its promise of luscious fruit, and the roughness of all that man can do, even at his best. selection the fascination of the remote by Philip Gilbert Hamilton from the life of JMW Turner

Starting point is 10:48:00 it has been remarked before that whereas with most men the maturing of the faculties leads from imagination to reason from poetry to prose this was not the case with Turner who became more and more poetical as he advanced in life,

Starting point is 10:48:21 and this might in some measure account for his ever-increasing tendency to desert the foreground, where objects are too near to have much enchantment about them, in order to dream and make others dream of distances which seem hardly of this world.

Starting point is 10:48:40 The fascination of the remote, for minds which have any imaginative faculty at all, is so universal and sense, so unfailing that it must be due to some cause in the depths of man's spiritual nature. It may be due to a religious instinct, which makes him forget the meanness and triviality of common life in this world, to look as far beyond it as he can to a mysterious infinity of glory, where earth itself seems to pass easily into heaven. It may be due to a progressive instinct, which,

Starting point is 10:49:19 draws men to the future and the unknown, leading them ever to fix their gaze on the far horizon, like mariners looking for some visionary Atlantis across the spaces of the wearisome sea. Be this as it may, the enchantments of landscape distances are certainly due far more to the imagination of the beholder than to any tangible or explicable beauty of their own. of their own. It is probable that minds of a common order which see with the bodily eyes only and have no imaginative perception receive no impressions of the kind which affected Turner. But the conditions of modern life have developed a great sensitiveness to such impressions in minds of a higher class. It would be difficult, if not impossible, to name any important imaginative work and literature produced during the present century, in which there is not some expression

Starting point is 10:50:26 proving the author's sensitiveness to the poetry of distance. I will not weary the reader with quotations, but here is just one from Shelley, which owes most of its effect upon the mind to his perception of two elements of sublimity, distance, and height, in which perception, as in many other mental gifts, he strikingly resembled Turner. The stanza is in the revolt of Islam. Upon that rock a mighty column stood, whose capital seemed sculptured in the sky, which to the wanderers or the solitude of distant seas from ages long gone by, had made a landmine. or its height to fly.

Starting point is 10:51:16 Scarcely the cloud, the vulture, or the blast, has power, and when the shades of evening lie on earth and ocean, its carved summits cast the sunken daylight far through the aerial waste. This was written in 1817, just about the time when Turner was passing from his early manner to the sublimities of his maturity. and there is ample evidence of which more may be said later, that Turner and Shelley were as much in sympathy as two men can be,

Starting point is 10:51:53 when one is cultivated almost exclusively by means of literature, and the other by graphic art. But however great may have been the similarity of their minds, whatever susceptibility to certain impressions they may have had in common, the two arts which they present, suit differed widely in technical conditions. It may or it may not be as easy to write verses as to paint, when both are to be supremely well done. But it is certain that poetic description requires less realization than pictorial, so that less accurate observation will suffice for

Starting point is 10:52:37 it and an inferior gift of memory. In the whole range of the difficulties which painters endeavor to overcome. There is not one which tries their powers more severely than the representation of distant effects in landscape. They can never be studied from nature, for they come and go so rapidly as to permit nothing but the most inadequate memoranda. They can never be really imitated, being usually in such a high key of light and color as to go beyond the resources of the palate, and the finest of them are so mysterious that the most piercing eyesight is baffled, perceiving at the utmost but little of all that they contain. The interpretation of such effects, however able and intelligent it may be, always requires

Starting point is 10:53:34 a great deal of goodwill on the part of the spectator, who must be content if he can read the painter's work as a sort of shorthand, without finding in it any of the amusement which may be derived from the imitation of what is really imitable. For all these reasons, it would be a sufficiently rash enterprise for an artist to stake his prospects on the painting of distances, but there is another objection even yet more serious. Such painting requires not only much goodwill in the spectator, but also great knowledge, freedom from vulgar prejudices, and some degree of faith in the painter himself. When people see a noble effect in nature, there is one stock observation which they almost invariably make. They always say, or nearly always, now if we

Starting point is 10:54:33 were to see that effect in a picture, we should not believe it to be possible. One would think that after such a reflection on their own tendency to unbelief in art and to astonishment in the presence of nature, people would be forewarned against their own injustice, but it is not so. They will make that observation every time they see a fine sunset or a remarkable cloud in the natural world, and remain as unjust as ever to the art which represents phenomena of the same order. Turner had to contend against this disposition to deny the truth of everything that is not commonplace. He was too proud and courageous to allow it to arrest his development and would not submit to dictation from anyone as to the subjects of his larger pictures. He knew the value of

Starting point is 10:55:34 money and would work very hard to earn it, but no money consideration whatever. was permitted to interfere between him and the higher manifestations of his art. Selection. Trees in Art by Philip Gilbert Hammerton from Landscape. It may, however, not be absolutely safe to conclude that the Greeks had no landscape painting because we find only conventional and decorative representations of trees on vases. If it is true that the mural paintings at Herculaneum and Pompeii were not always essentially modern at the time when they were painted upon the wall,

Starting point is 10:56:20 but rather in many cases copies and reminiscences of much more ancient art, it would seem possible that the painters of antiquity may have at least gone so far in the direction of true landscape painting as to have attained the notion of mass in foliage. Some of the Pompeian pictures give large leafed shrubs seen near the figures, with much of the liberty and naturalness in this disposal of the leaves that were afterwards fully attained by the Venetians. Whilst many of the landscapes really show foliage in mass, not so learnedly as in modern landscape painting, but quite with the knowledge that masses had a light side and a dark side, and a roundness which might be painted without insisting on the form of each leaf. The same observation of mass is to be seen in the companion interpretation of mountains, which, though extremely simple and primitive, and without any of the refinements of mountain form that are perceptible to ourselves,

Starting point is 10:57:32 exhibit nevertheless the important truth that the facets of a mountain catch the light. In medieval landscape painting, trees were of great importance from the first, on account of the free decorative inventiveness of the medieval mind that exercised itself in illumination and tapestry and in patterns for dress, for all of which, leaves and flowers, were the best natural materials or suggestions. The history of tree drawing in the Middle Ages is very like its history in great, Greece. As Apollo and Semeli were placed on each side the laurel, of which the leaves were few and distinctly individualized, so Adam and Eve were placed on each side the apple tree,

Starting point is 10:58:23 which was often represented as a bare, thin stem branching into a sort of flat oval at the top that was filled with distinct leaves and fruit, and sometimes even surrounded by a line. In other drawings or paintings, the tree was allowed to develop itself more freely, but the artist still attended to the individual leaves, and the tree was usually kept small like the young trees in our gardens. even in hunting scenes where a forest is represented, as in the manuscript of the hunting book by Gaston Phoebus, the trees have short bare trunks and a few leaves, and are about the height of a man on horseback, often not so high. They answer in short to the trees and boxes of toys for children, except that they are more prettily designed. The nearest approach to foliage attained by the medieval love of the distinct leaf is in the backgrounds to tapestries and decorative paintings designed on the same principles,

Starting point is 10:59:34 where the leaves, although individually perfect, are so multiplied that the mere numbers make them appear innumerable. In this way, the distinct designers of the Middle Ages attained a sort of infinity, though it is not the same as the real infinity of nature where details cannot be counted. One of the best examples of this is the background to Orcaña's fresco of the dream of life in the Campo Santo of Pisa, where the orange trees stand behind the figures and fill the upper part of the picture from side to side with their dense foliage studded with fruit. and between their thin stems every inch of space is filled with a diaper of flat green leaves

Starting point is 11:00:26 to represent the close shrubbery or underwood in the garden. This is still quite medieval in spirit because the leaves are distinctly drawn and all are countable, however numerous. They are also decorative as primitive art was sure to be. It is difficult to fix with precision the date when the idea of mass and foliage began to acquire importance, and I know that if I give a date, some earlier examples may be found, which would seem to throw it farther back in art history. But occasional precursors do not invalidate the rights of a century,

Starting point is 11:01:10 in which an idea first takes effectual root. There is a very remarkable landscape background by Giovanni Bellini in his picture of The Death of Peter Martyr in our National Gallery, the most elaborate example of tree painting among our older pictures. The idea is to show trees in a wood, with stems crossing each other and supporting an immense quantity of highly wrought foliage. Well, in this picture, the foliage. is not flat. There is a sense of mass, and yet to a modern eye it is easily visible that

Starting point is 11:01:51 Bellini was still hampered by the medieval interest in the leaf, and driven by that to bestow prodigious pains upon the individual leaves that he portrayed by thousands. In the same 15th century, a manuscript of the epistles of Ovid, now in the National Library of Paris, was illuminated with subjects that have landscape backgrounds of a very advanced kind, and here the foliage is completely massed, with considerable breadth of shaded parts and only touches for the lights. We may remember, then, that classical tree painting began with the stem and a reduced number of distinct leaves, but attained masses of foliage in the Campanian paintings or early, and that medieval painting began in the same way with the leaf and the stem,

Starting point is 11:02:49 but led to masses about the 15th century after passing through an intermediate stage in which there was a great multiplicity of distinctly painted leaves. Selection The Noble Bohemianism by Philip Gilbert Hammerton from Human Intercourse. amongst the common injustices of the world there have been few more complete than its reprobation of the state of mind and manner of life that have been called bohemianism and so closely is that reprobation attached to the word

Starting point is 11:03:29 that I would gladly have substituted some other term for the better bohemianism had the English language provided me with one It may, however, be a gain to justice itself that we should be compelled to use the same expression, qualified only by an adjective for two states of existence that are the good and the bad conditions of the same, as it will tend to make us more charitable to those whom we must always blame, and yet may blame with a more or less perfect understanding of the causes that led them into error, The lower forms of Bohemianism are associated with several kinds of vice, and are therefore justly disliked by people who know the value of a well-regulated life, and when at the worst, regarded by them with feelings of positive abhorrence.

Starting point is 11:04:30 The vices connected with these forms of bohemianism are idleness, irregularity, extravagance, drunkenness, drunkenness, and, immorality and besides these vices the worst bohemianism is associated with many repulsive faults that may not be exactly vices and yet are almost as much disliked by decent people these faults are slaveliness dirt a degree of carelessness in matters of business often scarcely to be distinguished from dishonesty and habitual neglect of the decorousness of the decorousness observances that are inseparable from a high state of civilization. After such an account of the worst bohemianism, in which, as the reader perceives, I have extenuated nothing, it may seem

Starting point is 11:05:24 almost an act of temerity to advance the theory that this is only the bad side of a state of mind and feeling that has its good and perfectly respectable side also. If this seems, difficult to believe the reader has only to consider how certain other instincts of humanity have also their good and bad developments. The religious and the sexual instincts in their best action are on the side of national and domestic order, but in their worst action, they produce sanguinary quarrels, ferocious persecutions, and the excesses of the most degrading sensuality. Again, before going to the raison d'est of bohemianism,

Starting point is 11:06:14 let me point to one consideration of great importance to us if we desire to think quite justly. It is and has always been a characteristic of bohemianism to be extremely careless of appearances and to live outside the shelter of hypocrisy, so its vices are far more visible than the same vices when practiced by men of the world, and incomparably more offensive to persons

Starting point is 11:06:44 with a strong sense of what is called propriety. At the time when the worst form of bohemianism was more common than it is now, its most serious vices were also the vices of the best society. If the bohemian drank to excess, so did the nobility and gentry. If the Bohemian had a mistress, so had the most exalted personages. The Bohemian was not so much blamed for being a sepulchre

Starting point is 11:07:17 as for being an ill-kept sepulchre, and not a whited sepulchre like the rest. It was far more his slovenliness and poverty than his graver vices that made him offensive to a corrupt society with fine clothes and ceremonious manners. Bohemianism and Philistinism are the terms by which, for want of better, we designate two opposite ways of estimating wealth and culture. There are two categories of advantages in wealth, the intellectual and the material. The intellectual advantages are leisure to think and read, travel, and intelligent conversation. The material advantages are large. and comfortable houses, tables well served and abundant, good coats, clean linen, fine dresses

Starting point is 11:08:15 and diamonds, horses, carriages, servants, hot houses, wine cellars, shootings. Evidently, the most perfect condition of wealth would unite both classes of advantages, but this is not always or often possible, and it so happens that in most situations a choice has to be made between them. The Bohemian is the man who, with small means, desires and contrives to obtain the intellectual advantages of wealth, which he considers to be leisure to think and read, travel, and intelligent conversation. The Philistine is the man who, whether his means are small or large, devotes to the himself wholly to the attainment of the other set of advantages, a large house, good food and wine,

Starting point is 11:09:10 clothes, horses, and servants. The intelligent bohemian does not despise them. On the contrary, when he can afford it, he encourages them and often surrounds himself with beautiful things. But he will not barter his mental liberty in exchange for them, as the Philistine does so readily. If the Bohemian simply prefers sordid idleness to the comfort which is the reward of industry, he has no part in the higher bohemianism, but combines the Philistine fault of intellectual apathy with the bohemian fault of standing aloof from industrial civilization. If a man abstains from furthering the industrial civilization of his country, he is only a man abstains from furthering the industrial civilization of his country, he is only excusable if he pursues some object of at least equal importance.

Starting point is 11:10:08 Intellectual civilization really is such an object, and the noble bohemianism is excusable for serving it rather than that other civilization of arts and manufactures, which has such numerous servants of its own. If the bohemian does not redeem his negligence of material things, by superior intellectual brightness, he is half a Philistine. He is destitute of what is best in bohemianism. I had nearly written of all that is worth having in it, and his contempt for material perfection has no longer any charm, because it is not the sacrifice of a lower merit to a higher, but the blank absence of the lower merit, not compensated or condoned by the presence of anything nobler or better.

Starting point is 11:11:04 I have said that the intelligent Bohemian is generally a man of small or moderate means, whose object is to enjoy the best advantages, not the most visible of riches. In his view, these advantages are leisure, travel, reading, and conversational. His estimate is different from that of the Philistine, who sets his heart on the lower advantages of riches, sacrificing leisure, travel, reading, and conversation, in order to have a larger house and more servants. But how, without riches, is the bohemian to secure the advantages that he desires, for they also belong to riches? There lies the difficulty, and the Bohemian's way of overcoming it constitutes the romance of his existence. In absolute destitution, the intelligent Bohemian life is not possible. A little money is necessary for it, and the art and craft of bohemianism is to get for that small amount of money,

Starting point is 11:12:16 such an amount of leisure, reading, travel, and good conversation, as may suffice to make life interesting. The way in which an old-fashioned bohemian usually said about it was this. He treated material comfort and outward appearances as matters of no consequence, accepting them when they came in his way, but enduring the privation of them gaily. He learned the art of living on a little. He spent the little that he had, first for what was really necessary, and next for what really gave him pleasure.

Starting point is 11:12:55 But he spent hardly anything in deference to the usages of society. In this way, he got what he wanted. His books were second-hand and ill-bound, but he had books and read them. His clothes were shabby, yet still kept him warm. He traveled in all sorts of cheap ways and frequently on foot. He lived a good deal in some unfashionable. quarters in a capital city, and saw much of art, nature, and humanity. To exemplify the true theory of bohemianism, let me describe from memory two rooms,

Starting point is 11:13:34 one of them inhabited by an English lady, not at all bohemian, the other by a German of the coarser sex, who was essentially and thoroughly bohemian. The lady's room was not a drawing room, being a reasonable sort of sitting room without any exasperating inutilities, but it was extremely excessively comfortable. Half hidden amongst its material comforts might be found a little rosewood bookcase containing a number of pretty volumes in purple Morocco that were seldom, if ever, opened. My German Bohemian was a steady reader in six languages, and if he had seen, such a room as that, he would probably have criticized it as follows. He would have said, it is rich in superfluities, but has not what is necessary. The carpet is superfluous,

Starting point is 11:14:32 plain boards are quite comfortable enough. One or two cheap chairs and tables might replace this costly furniture. That pretty Rosewood bookcase holds the smallest number of books at the greatest cost, and is therefore contrary to true economy. Give me rather a sufficiency of long-deal shelves, all innocent of paint. What is the use of fine bindings and gilt edges? This little library is miserably poor. It is all in one language, and does not represent even English literature adequately. There are a few novels, books of poems and travels, but I find neither science nor philosophy. Such a room as that, with all its comfort, would seem to me like a prison.

Starting point is 11:15:25 My mind needs wider pastures. I remember his own room, a place to make a rich Englishman shudder. One climbed up to it by a stone corkscrew stair, half ruinous, in an old medieval house. It was a large room, with a bed in one corner, and it was wholly destitute of anything resembling a carver. or a curtain. The remaining furniture consisted of two or three rush-bottom chairs, one large cheap lounging chair, and two large plain tables. There were plenty of shelves, common deal, unpainted, and on them an immense litter of books in different languages, most of them in paper covers and bought second-hand, but in readable editions. In the way of material

Starting point is 11:16:18 luxury, there was a pot of tobacco, and if a friend dropped in for an evening, a jug of ale would make its appearance. My bohemian was shabby in his dress and unfashionable, but he had seen more, read more, and passed more hours in intelligent conversation than many who considered themselves his superiors. The entire material side of life had been systematically neglected in his case in order that the intellectual side might flourish. It is hardly necessary to observe that any attempt at luxury or visible comfort, any conformity to fashion, would have been incompatible on small means with the intellectual existence that this German scholar enjoyed.

Starting point is 11:17:11 The class in which the higher bohemianism has most steadily flourished, is the artistic and literary class, and here it is visible and recognizable because there is often poverty enough to compel the choice between the objects of the intelligent bohemian and those of ordinary men. The early life of Goldsmith, for example,

Starting point is 11:17:36 was that of a genuine bohemian. He had scarcely any money, and yet he contrived to get for himself what the intelligent bohemian always desires, namely, leisure to read and think, travel, and interesting conversation. When penniless and unknown, he lounged about the world thinking and observing. He traveled in Holland, France, Switzerland, and Italy, not as people do in railway carriages, but in leisurely intercourse with the inhabitants. Notwithstanding his poverty, he was received by the

Starting point is 11:18:15 learned in different European cities, and notably heard Voltaire and Dieterot talk till three o'clock in the morning. So long as he remained faithful to the true principles of bohemianism, he was happy in his own strange and eccentric way, and all the anxieties, all the slavery of his later years, were due to his apostasy from those principles. He no longer estimated leisure at its true value, when he allowed himself to be placed in such a situation that he was compelled to toil like a slave in order to clear off work that had been already paid for, such advances having been rendered necessary by expenditure on Philistine luxuries. He no longer enjoyed humble travel, but on his later tour in France with Mrs. Hornick and her two

Starting point is 11:19:12 beautiful daughters. Instead of enjoying the country in his own old, simple, innocent way, he allowed his mind to be poisoned with Philistine ideas and constantly complained of the want of physical comfort, though he lived far more expensively than in his youth. The new apartments, taken on the success of the good-natured man, consisted, says Irving, of three rooms, which he furnished with mahogany sofas, card tables and bookcases, with curtains, mirrors, and Wilton carpets. At the same time, he went even beyond the precept of Polonius, for his garments were costlier than his purse could buy, and his entertainments were so extravagant as to give pain to his acquaintances. All this is a desertion of real bohemian principles. Goldsmith ought to have

Starting point is 11:20:12 protected his own leisure, which, from the bohemian point of view, was incomparably more precious to himself than Wilton carpets and coats of Tyrion bloom. Corot, the French landscape painter, was a model of consistent bohemianism of the best kind. When his father said, You shall have 80 pounds a year, your plate at my table and be a painter, or you shall have 4,000 pounds to start with, if you will be a shopkeeper, his choice was made at once. He remained always faithful to true bohemian principles, fully understanding the value of leisure, and protecting his artistic independence by the extreme simplicity of his living. He never gave way to the modern rage for luxuries, but in his latter years, when enriched by tardy

Starting point is 11:21:10 professional success and hereditary fortune, he employed his money in acts of fraternal generosity to enable others to lead the intelligent bohemian life. Wordsworth had in him a very strong element of bohemianism. His long pedestrian rambles, his interest in humble life and familiar intercourse with the poor, his passion for wild nature and preference of natural beauty, to find society, his simple and economical habits are enough to reveal the tendency. His plain living and high thinking is a thoroughly bohemian idea in striking opposition to the Philistine passion for rich living and low thinking. There is a story that he was seen at a breakfast table to cut open a new volume with a greasy

Starting point is 11:22:07 butter knife. To every lover of books, this must seem horribly barbarous, yet at the same time it was Bohemian, in that Wordsworth valued the thought only and cared nothing for the material condition of the

Starting point is 11:22:23 volume. I have observed alike indifference to the material condition of books in other Bohemians who took the most lively interest in their contents. I have also seen bibliophile who had beautiful libraries in excellent preservation,

Starting point is 11:22:41 and who love to fondle fine copies of books that they never read. That is Philistine. It is the preference of material perfection to intellectual values. Some practical experience of the higher bohemianism is a valuable part of education. It enables us to estimate things at their true worth, and to extract happiness from situations in which the Philistine is both dull and miserable. A true bohemian of the best kind knows the value of mere shelter, of food enough to satisfy hunger, of plain clothes that will keep him sufficiently warm,

Starting point is 11:23:27 and in the things of the mind he values the liberty to use his own faculties as a kind of happiness in itself. His philosophy leads him to take an interest in talking with human beings of all sorts and conditions and in different countries. He does not despise the poor, for whether poor or rich in his own person, he understands simplicity of life, and if the poor man lives in a small cottage, he too has probably been lodged less spaciously still in some small hut or tent.

Starting point is 11:24:05 He has lived often in rough travel As the poor live every day I maintain that such tastes and experiences Are valuable both in prosperity And in adversity If we are prosperous They enhance our appreciation Of the things around us

Starting point is 11:24:26 And yet at the same time Make us really know That they are not indispensable As so many believe them to be If we fall into adversity, they prepare us to accept lightly and cheerfully what would be depressing privations to others. End of Section 22. Section 23 of the Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Volume 17. This is Libravox recording.

Starting point is 11:25:03 All Liberbox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit Librevox.org. read by Chris Pyle Library of the World's Best Literature Ancient and Modern Volume 17 Alexander Hamilton 1757 to 1804

Starting point is 11:25:23 by Daniel C. Gilman Hamilton's distinction among the founders of the government of the United States is everywhere acknowledged Washington stands alone next to him in the rank with Adams, Jefferson, Madison, Jay and Sherman

Starting point is 11:25:39 Alexander Hamilton is placed. Among these illustrious men no claim could surpass Hamilton's. He was a gallant soldier, an eloquent orator, a persuasive writer, a skillful financier, a successful administrator, and a political philosopher practical as well as wise. He is worthy to be compared in political debate with Pitt, Burke, Fox, and Webster,

Starting point is 11:26:04 in organization with Kavar and Bismarck. In finance with Sully, Colbert, Robert Morris, and Gladstone. My three friends said Guizot to a young American many years ago, pointing to three portraits which hung upon the walls of his library, Aberdeen, Hamilton, and Washington. Even his opponents acknowledged his powers. Thus Jefferson called Hamilton the colossus of the Federalists,

Starting point is 11:26:31 and Ambrose Spencer said he was the greatest man this country ever produced. James Kent, an admirer, used terms of more descriptive, preys. Hallibone has collected similar tributes from Talorand, Guizot, and Governor Morris, Story and Webster. Yet Hamilton was severely criticized during his life by his political enemies, and he encountered attacks from the newspapers as severe as those which befall any of our contemporaries. Lodge says of him that he was pre-eminently a leader of leaders. He could do the thinking of his time. No single sentence could express more completely the distinction of his genius. He could do the thinking of his time.

Starting point is 11:27:16 Fortunately, a good deal of the thinking of his time is now irrevocably fixed in the Constitution, the laws, the administration, and the institutions of this country, and the name of Halton now stands above reproach among the immortals. His public life began precociously and ended prematurely. Before he was of age, his powers were acknowledged, and his reputation was established. Before he was 50, all was over. Born in Nevis, one of the smallest of the West Indies, the son of a Scotch merchant and a French mother, he was sent to this country for his education, and unprotected by family ties with small pecuniary resources.

Starting point is 11:27:55 He entered Columbia College, New York, in 1774. From that time onward for 30 years he was pushed forward to one influential station after another, and he was adequate to the highest of them all, beginning his military service as a captain of artillery. He was soon afterwards aid to camp and secretary to General Washington, with the rank of lieutenant colonel. At a much later period of his life, 1797, he was commissioned as a major general and served two years as a specter general

Starting point is 11:28:23 at the head of the United States Army. In political life, he was always prominent, first as a receiver of continental taxes, then successively, as a member of the Continental Congress, 1782, the New York Legislature, 1786, the Annapolis Convention, 1786, and finally the Constitutional Convention, and of the ratifying convention in New York. Equal but hardly greater service was rendered to the country by this extraordinary patriot in the Treasury Department of the United States, of which he was secretary for five years under Washington,

Starting point is 11:28:59 from 1789 to 1794. The memoirs of Hamilton have been edited by several hands. Shortly after his death, three volumes of his works were printed. Subsequently, John C. Hamilton, the son published a memoir in two volumes. And many years later, he wrote in seven volumes, a history of the United States, as it may be read in the writings of Alexander Hamilton. A complete edition of Hamilton's works was edited by Henry Cabot Lodge in nine octavo volumes. In addition to the memoir just referred to by J.C. Hamilton, there were several biographies,

Starting point is 11:29:36 of which the most recent and valuable are those by John T. Morse Jr., two volumes, 1876, Henry Cabot Lodge, American Statesman Series, 1882, and George Shea, second edition, 1880. All the standard histories of the United States, Bancroft, Hildreth, Schuller, Van Holst, Curtis, Fisk, etc., may be consulted advantageously. It is easy to form an image of the person of Hamilton, for there are several portraits in oil and a bust in marble by Giuseppe Sirachi, besides the Talleyran miniature.

Starting point is 11:30:17 All these have been frequently engraved, but as valuable in another way is the description by Judge Shea of Hamilton's personal appearance, as it was remembered by some that knew and one that loved him. This sketch is so good that it would be a pity to abridget. He was, said Judge Shea, a small lithe figure, indistinct life, erect and steady and gait to military presence

Starting point is 11:30:41 without the intolerable accuracy of a martinet, and his general address was graceful and nervous indicating the beauty, energy, and activity of his mind, a bright ruddy complexion, light-colored hair, a mouth infinite in expression. Its sweet smile being most observable and most spoken of, eyes lustrous with meaning and reflection or glancing with quick, canny pleasantry, and the whole countenance decidedly Scottish, in form and expression. He was, as may be inferred, the welcome guest and cheery companion of all relations of civil

Starting point is 11:31:15 and social life. His political enemies, frankly, spoke of his manner and conversation and regretted its irresistible charm. He certainly had a correct sense of that which is appropriate to the occasion and its object, the attribute which we call good taste. His manner, with a natural change, became very calm and grave when deliberation and public care claimed his whole attention. At the time of which we now speak particularly, 1787, he was continually brooding over the state convention then at hand. Moods of engrossing thought came upon him even as he trod the crowded streets, and then his pace would become slower, his head be slightly bent

Starting point is 11:31:55 downward, and with hands joined together behind, he winded his way, his lips moving in concert with the thoughts forming in his mind. This habit of thinking, and this attitude, became involuntary with him as he grew in years. But without these portraits, it would be easy to discover in the incidence of Hamilton's life the characteristics of a gallant, independent, high-spirited man, who never shrunk from danger and who placed the public interests above all private considerations. At times he was rash and unexpected, but his rashness was the result of swift and accurate reasoning and of unswerving will. His integrity was faultless and bore the severest scrutiny, sometimes under circumstances of stress. We can easily imagine that such a brave and honest knight

Starting point is 11:32:41 would have been welcomed to a seat at the round table of King Arthur. Recall his career. A mere boy he leaves his West Indies home to get a college education in this country. Princeton, for technical reasons, would not receive him, and he proceeds at once, and not in vain to the halls of King's College, now known as Columbia. Just after entering college, he goes to a mass meeting of the citizens in the open fields near the city of New York, and not quite satisfied with the arguments there set forth,

Starting point is 11:33:12 he mounts the platform, and after a slight hesitation, carries with them the entire assembly. When the Revolutionary War begins, he enlists at once and takes part in the Battle of Long Island, the consequent retreat to White Plains and the contest at Trenton and Princeton. He makes a brilliant assault upon the enemy's redoubts at Yorktown, while on the staff of Washington, her reproof from the general cuts him to the quick, and on the instant he says, we part, and so retires from military service. His standing at the bar of New York is that of a leader.

Starting point is 11:33:44 When the Constitutional Convention assembles, he takes part in its deliberations, and though not entirely satisfied with the conclusions reached, he accepts them, and becomes with Jay and Madison one of the chief exponents and defenders of the new Constitution. Under Washington as president, he is placed in charge of the national finances and soon establishes the public credit on the basis which has never since been shaken. Low creatures endeavor to blackmail him and circulate scandalous stories, respecting his financial management. He bravely tells the whole truth and stands absolutely acquitted of the least suspicion of official malfeasance. In 1799, when war with France is imminent, Washington again

Starting point is 11:34:28 selected his commander-in-chief, selects him as the first of three major generals on whom he must depend. Finally, when Aaron Burr challenges him, he accepts the challenge. He makes his will, meets his enemy and falls with a mortal wound. The news of his death sent a thrill of horror through the country, not unlike that which followed the assassination of Lincoln and Garfield. The story of the duel has often been told, but nowhere so vividly is in the diary of Governor Morris recently published. His countrymen mourned the death of Hamilton as they had mourned for no other statesmen

Starting point is 11:35:03 except Washington. Morris's speech at the funeral, under circumstances of great popular excitement, brings to mind the speech of Brutus over the body of Caesar. Unless there had been great restraint on the part of the orator, the passions of the multitude would have been inflamed against the rival who fired the fatal shot. It is time to pass from that which is transient in Hamilton's life, to that which will endure as long as this government shall last, to the ideas suggested and embodied by the framers of the Constitution in fundamental measures. The distinction of Hamilton does not depend upon the

Starting point is 11:35:38 stations that he held, however exalted they may appear, in either the political or the military service of his country. It was his thinking that made him famous, his thinking that perpetuated his influence as well as his fame, through the nine decades that have followed since his death. Even now, when his personalities obscurely remembered, his political doctrines are more firmly established than ever before, the adjustment of the democratic principles, of which Jefferson was the exponent and the national principles which Hamilton advocated still prevails, but as Morris sagaciously says, the democratic system of Jefferson is administered in the form and on the principles of Hamilton.

Starting point is 11:36:23 In the anxious days of the Confederation, when the old government had been thrown off and when men were groping with conflicting motives, after a new government which should secure union with independence, national or continental authority with the preservation of state rights, Hamilton was one of the earliest to perceive the true solution to the problem. He bore his part in the debates, always inclining toward a strong federal government. The conclusions which were reached by the convention did not meet his unqualified assent. But he accepted them as the best results that could then be secured. He became their expounder and their defender.

Starting point is 11:36:58 The essays which he wrote, with those of his two colleagues, Jay and Madison, were collected in a volume known as the Federalist, a volume which is of the first importance in the interpretation of the Constitution of the United States. Successive generations of judges, senators, statesmen, and publicists recur to its pages as to a commentary of the highest value. The opinion of Mr. Curtis, the historian of the Constitution, will not be questioned. These essays, he says, gave birth to American constitutional law, which was thus placed above arbitrary construction

Starting point is 11:37:33 and brought into the domain of legal truth. They made it as science, and so long as the Constitution shall exist, they will continue to be resorted to as the most important source of contemporaneous interpretation which the annals of the country afford. Hamilton's confidence in the power of the press to enlighten and guide the public were balanced by grave apprehensions as to the fate of the Constitution. A nation, he said, without a national government is an awful spectacle.

Starting point is 11:38:02 The establishment of a constitution, in a time of profound peace, by the voluntary consent of a whole people, is a prodigy to the completion of which I look forward with trembling anxiety. We who have lived to see the end of a century of constitutional government, in the course of which appeal has been made to the sword, we who live secure in the unique advantages of our dual governments, find it hard even to imagine the rocks through which the ship of state was steered by the frame, of the Constitution. As a financier, not less than as a statesman, Hamilton showed exceptional ability. He had the rare qualities of intellect which enabled him to receive the legitimate

Starting point is 11:38:43 sources of revenue, the proper conditions of national credit, and the best method of distributing over a term of years the payment required by the emergencies of the state. Commerce and trade were palsied, currency was wanting, confidence was shaken, counsels were conflicting. These difficulties were like a stimulant to the mind of Hamilton. He mastered this situation. He proposed remedies. He secured support. He restored credit.

Starting point is 11:39:10 From his time to the present, in peace and war, notwithstanding temporary embarrassments and occasional panics, the finances of the government have been sound, and its obligations accepted wherever offered.

Starting point is 11:39:22 In the long line of honest and able secretaries who have administered the Treasury, Hamilton stands as the first and greatest financier. His ability, he was not alone that of a reasoner upon the principles of political economy. He was ingenious and wise in devising methods by which principles may be reduced to practice. The Treasury Department was to be organized. Hamilton became the organizer. While Congress imposed upon him the duty of preparing far-reaching plans for the creation of revenue, which he produced with promptness and sagacity,

Starting point is 11:39:55 he also found time to devise the complex machinery that was requisite and the system of accounts. So, well were these tasks performed, says Morris, that the plans still subsist, developing and growing with the nation, but at the bottom the original arrangements of Hamilton. This administrative ability was shown on a large scale, the second time, but in another field. When it became necessary in view of a foreign war that seemed impending to organize an army, it was Washington who called to this service his former comrade in arms, the man who had organized the treasury at the beginning of his first administration. Here, as before, Hamilton's ability. were employed successfully.

Starting point is 11:40:34 The limits of this article preclude the enumeration of Hamilton's services in many subordinate ways, for example as influence in securing the acceptance of the treaty with England. It is enough, in conclusion, to repeat the words of two great thinkers. Daniel Webster spoke as follows in 1831. He was made Secretary of the Treasury in how he fulfilled the duties of such a place at such a time the whole country proceeded with delight and the whole world saw with admiration He smote the rock of the national resources, and abundant streams of revenue gushed forth.

Starting point is 11:41:08 He touched the dead corpse of the public credit, and it sprung upon its feet. The fabled birth of Minerva from the brain of Joe was hardly more sudden or more perfect than the financial system of the United States as it burst forth from the conceptions of Alexander Hamilton. And Francis Lieber, in his civil liberty and self-government, wrote thus in 1853, The framers of our Constitution boldly conceived of Federal Republic, or the application of the representative principle with its two houses to a confederacy. It was the first instance in history. The Netherlands, which served our forefathers as models in many respects,

Starting point is 11:41:48 even the name bestowed on our Confederacy, furnished them with no example for this great conception. It is the chief American contribution to the common treasures of political civilization. It is that by which America will influence other parts of the world, more than by any other political institution or principle. I consider the mixture of wisdom and daring shown in the framing of our Constitution as one of the most remarkable facts in all history.

Starting point is 11:42:15 End of Section 23. Section 24 of Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Volume 17. This is a Libra Box recording. All Liberbox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit Liberbox.org.

Starting point is 11:42:38 Read by Chris Pyle. Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Volume 17. Selected Writings of Alexander Hamilton From the Federalist. Defense of His Views of the Constitution That's have I, fellow citizens, executed the task I had assigned to myself. With what success, your conduct must determine.

Starting point is 11:43:03 I trust at least you will admit that I have not failed in the assurance I gave you respecting the spirit with which my endeavors should be conducted. I have addressed myself purely to your judgments, and have studiously avoided those asperities which are too apt to disgrace political disputants of all parties, and which have been not a little provoked by the language and conduct of the opponents of the Constitution. The charge of a conspiracy against the liberties of the people, which has been indiscriminately brought against the advocates of the plan, has something in a too. too wanton and too malignant not to excite the indignation of every man who feels in his own bosom,

Starting point is 11:43:42 a refutation of the calumny. The perpetual changes which have been rung upon the wealthy, the well-born, and the great, have been such as to inspire the disgust of all sensible men, and the unwarrantable concealments and misrepresentations, which have been in various ways practiced to keep the truth from the public eye, have been of a nature to demand the reprobation of all honest men. It is not impossible that these circumstances may have occasionally betrayed me into intemperances of expression which I did not intend.

Starting point is 11:44:14 It is certain that I have frequently felt a struggle between sensibility and moderation, and if the former has in some instances prevailed, it must be my excuse that it has been neither often nor much, the wisdom of brief presidential terms of office. It may perhaps be asked how the shortness of the duration in office can affect the independence of the executive on the legislature, unless the one were possessed of the power of appointing or displacing the other. One answer to this inquiry may be drawn from the principal already remarked,

Starting point is 11:44:48 that is, from the slender interest a man is apt to take in a short-lived advantage, and the little inducement it affords him to expose himself on account of it to any considerable inconvenience or hazard. Another answer, perhaps more obvious, though not more conclusive, We result from the consideration of the influence of the legislative body over the people, which might be employed to prevent the re-election of a man who, by an upright resistance to any sinister project of that body, should have made himself obnoxious to its resentment. It may be asked also whether a duration of four years would answer the end proposed,

Starting point is 11:45:24 and if it would not, whether a less period, which would at least be recommended by greater security against ambitious designs, would not, for that reason, be preferable to a long period, which was at the same time too short for the purpose of inspiring the desired firmness and independence of the magistrate. It cannot be affirmed that a duration of four years or any other limited duration would completely answer the end proposed, but it would contribute toward it and a degree which would have a material influence upon the spirit and character of the government. Between the commencement and termination of such a period, there would always be a considerable interval, in which the prospect of annihilation would be sufficiently remote not

Starting point is 11:46:04 have an improper effect upon the conduct of a man endued with a tolerable portion of fortitude, and in which he might reasonably promise himself that there will be time enough before it arrived to make the community sensible of the propriety of the measures he might incline to pursue. Though it would be probable that, as he approached the moment when the public were by a new election to signify their sense of his conduct, his confidence, and with it his firmness, would decline, yet both the one and the other would derive. support from the opportunities which his previous continuance in the station had afforded him of establishing himself in the esteem and goodwill of his constituents.

Starting point is 11:46:43 He might then hazard with safety in proportion to the proofs he had given of his wisdom and integrity, and to the title he had acquired to the respect and attachment of his fellow citizens, as on the one hand a duration of four years will contribute to the firmness of the executive in a sufficient degree to render it a very valuable ingredient in the composition. so on the other it is not enough to justify any alarm for the public liberty. If a British House of Commons, from the most feeble beginnings, from the mere power of assenting or disagreeing to the imposition of a new tax, had by rapid strides reduced the prerogatives of the Crown,

Starting point is 11:47:20 and the privileges of nobility within the limits they conceived to be compatible with the principles of a free government, while they raised themselves to the rank and consequence of a co-equal branch of the legislature, if they had been able in one instance to abolish both the royalty and the aristocracy, and to overturn all the ancient establishments as well in the church as state, if they have been able on a recent occasion to make the monarch tremble at the prospect of an innovation attempted by them, what would be to be feared from an elective magistrate of four years' duration with the confined authorities of a president of the United States?

Starting point is 11:47:56 What, but that he might be unequal to the task which the Constitution assigns it? of the distinction between a president and a sovereign. And it appears yet more unequivocally that there is no pretense for the parallel which has been attempted between him and the King of Great Britain. But to render the contrast in this respect still more striking, it may be of used to throw the principal circumstances of dissimilitude into a closer group.

Starting point is 11:48:21 The President of the United States would be an officer elected by the people for four years. The King of Great Britain is a perpetual and hereditary prince, The one would be amenable to personal punishment and disgrace. The person of the other is sacred and inviable. The one would have a qualified negative upon the acts of the legislative body. The other has an absolute negative. The one would have a right to command the military and naval forces of the nation. The other, in addition to this right, possesses that of declaring war

Starting point is 11:48:54 and of raising and regulating fleets and armies by his own authority. The one would have a concurrent power with a branch of the legislature in the formation of treaties. The other is the sole possessor of the power of making treaties. The one would have a like concurrent authority in appointing to offices. The other is the sole author of all appointments. The one can offer no privileges whatever. The other can make denizens of aliens, nobleman of commoners, can erect corporations with all the rights incident to corporate bodies.

Starting point is 11:49:25 The one can prescribe no rules concerning the commerce or currency of the nation. The other is in several respects the arbiter of commerce, and in this capacity can establish markets and fares, can regulate weights and measures, can lay embargoes for a limited time, can coin money, can authorize or prohibit the circulation of foreign coin. The one has no particle of spiritual jurisdiction. The other is the supreme head and governor of the National Church, What answer shall we give to those who would persuade us that things so unlike resemble each other,

Starting point is 11:50:02 the same that ought to be given to those who tell us that a government, the whole power of which would be in the hands of the elective and periodical servants of the people, is an aristocracy, a monarchy, and a despotism? The militia system has distinguished from a standing army. Were I to deliver my sentiments to a member of the federal legislature from this state on the subject of a militia establishment, I should hold him in substance the following discourse. The project of disciplining all the militia of the United States

Starting point is 11:50:34 is as futile as it would be injurious, if we were capable of being carried into execution. A tolerable expertness in military movements is a business that requires time and practice. It is not a day or even a week that will suffice for the attainment of it, to oblige the great body of the yeomanry and of the other classes of the citizens to be under arms for the purpose of the purpose of it,

Starting point is 11:50:54 of going through military exercises and evolutions, as often as might be necessary to acquire the degree of perfection, which would entitle them to the character of a well-regulated militia, would be a real grievance to the people, and a serious public inconvenience and loss. It would form an annual deduction from the productive labor of the country, to an amount which, calculating upon the present numbers of the people, would not fall far short of the whole expense

Starting point is 11:51:20 of the civil establishments of all the states, to attempt a thing which would abridge the mass of labor and industry to so considerable an extent would be unwise, and the experiment, if made, could not succeed, because it would not long be endured. Little more can reasonably be aimed at, with respect to the people at large, than to have them properly armed and equipped. And in order to see that this be not neglected, it will be necessary to assemble them once or twice in the course of a year. But though the scheme of disciplining the whole nation must be abandoned as mischievous or impractical. Yet it is a matter of the utmost importance that a well-degested plan

Starting point is 11:51:58 should as soon as possible be adopted for the proper establishment of the militia. The attention of the government ought particularly to be directed to the formation of a select core of moderate extent, upon such principles as will really fit them for service in case of need. By thus circumscribing the plan, it will be possible to have an excellent body of well-trained militia, ready to take the field whenever the defense of the state shall require it. This will not only lessen the call for military establishments, but if circumstances should, at any time oblige the government to form an army of any magnitude, that army can ever be formidable to the liberties of the people. While there is a large body of citizens,

Starting point is 11:52:41 little, if at all, inferior to them in discipline, and the use of arms, who stand ready to defend their own rights and those of their fellow citizens, this appears to me, the only one of the substitute that can be devised for a standing army and the best possible security against it if it should exist. Confederacy is expressed in the federal system. Though the ancient feudal systems were not, strictly speaking, confederacies, yet they partook of the nature of that species of association. There was a common head, chieftain or sovereign, whose authority extended over the whole nation, and a number of subordinate vassals or feudatories, who had large portions of land allotted to them and numerous trains of inferior vassals or retainers, who occupied and cultivated that

Starting point is 11:53:26 land upon the tenure of fealty or obedience to the persons of whom they held it. Each principal vassal was a kind of sovereign within his particular demence. The consequences of this situation were a continual opposition to the authority of the sovereign, and frequent wars between the great barons or chief feudal. territories themselves. The power of the head of the nation was commonly too weak either to preserve the public peace or to protect the people against the oppressions of their immediate lords. This period of European affairs emphatically styled by historians the times of feudal anarchy. When the sovereign happened to be a man of vigorous and warlike temper, and of superior

Starting point is 11:54:06 abilities, he would acquire personal weight and influence which answered for the time the purposes of a more regular authority. But in general, the power of the barrens, triumphed over that of the prince, and in many instances his dominion was entirely thrown off, and the great fiefs were erected into independent principalities or states. In those instances in which the monarch finally prevailed over his vassals, his success was chiefly owing to the tyranny of those vassals over their dependents. The barons or nobles, equally the enemies of the sovereign and the oppressors of the common people, were dreaded and detested by both, till mutual danger and mutual interest,

Starting point is 11:54:45 a union between them fatal to the power of the aristocracy, had the nobles by a conduct of clemency and justice preserved the fidelity and devotion of their retainers and followers, the contests between them and the prince must almost always have ended in their favor, and in the abridgment of a subversion of the royal authority. This is not an assertion founded merely in speculation or conjecture. Among other illustrations of its truth, which might be cited, Scotland will furnish a cogent example.

Starting point is 11:55:15 The spirit of clanship, which was, at an early day introduced into that kingdom, uniting the nobles and their dependents by ties, equivalent to those of kindred, rendered the aristocracy a constant overmatch for the power of the monarch, till the incorporation with England subdued its fierce and ungovernable spirit, and reduced it within those rules of subordination, which a more rational and more energetic system of civil polity had previously established in the latter kingdom. The separate governments in the Confederacy may aptly be compared with the feudal baronies,

Starting point is 11:55:48 with this advantage in their favor, that from the reasons already explained they will generally possess the confidence and goodwill of the people, and with so important as support, will be able effectually to oppose all encroachment to the national government of the geographical aspects of the United States as related to its commerce. The relative situation of these states, the number of rivers with which they are intersected, and obeys the wash their shores, the facility of communication in every direction, the affinity of language and manners, the familiar habits of intercourse. All these are circumstances that would conspire to render an illicit trade between them

Starting point is 11:56:28 a matter of little difficulty, and would ensure frequent evasions of the commercial regulations of each other. The separate states or confederacies would be necessitated by mutual jealousy to avoid the temptations to that kind of trade by the lowness of their duties. The temper of our governments, for a long time to come, would not permit those rigorous precautions by which the European nations guard the avenues into their respective countries, as well by land as by water, and which even there are found insufficient obstacles

Starting point is 11:57:00 to the adventurous stratagems of avarice. In France there is an army of patrols, as they are called, constantly employed to secure their fiscal regulations against the inroads of the dealers in contraband trade. Mr. Necker computes the number of these patrols at upwards of 20,000. This shows the immense difficulty in preventing that species of traffic, where there is an inland communication, and places in a strong light the disadvantages,

Starting point is 11:57:27 with which the collection of duties in this country would be encumbered, if by disunion the states should be placed in a situation with respect to each other, resembling that of France with respect to her neighbors. The arbitrary and vexatious powers, with which the patrols are necessarily armed, would be intolerable in a free country. If on the contrary there be but one government pervading all the states, there will be as to the principal part of our commerce but one side to guard, the Atlantic Coast. Vessels arriving directly from foreign countries, laden with valuable cargoes,

Starting point is 11:58:03 would rarely choose to hazard themselves to the complicated and critical perils, which would attempt attempts to unlaid prior to their coming into port. They would have to dread both the dangers of the coast and of detection, as well after as before, their arrival at the places of their final destination. An ordinary degree of vigilance would be competent to the prevention of any material infractions upon the rights of the revenue. A few armed vessels, judiciously stationed at the entrances of our ports, might at a small expense be made useful sentinels of the laws,

Starting point is 11:58:36 and the government, having the same interest to provide against violations everywhere, the cooperation of its measures in each state would have a powerful tendency to render them effectual. Here also we should preserve, by Union, an advantage which nature holds out to us and which would be relinquished by separation. The United States lie at a great distance from Europe, and at a considerable distance from all other places, with which they would have extensive connections of foreign trade. The passage from them to us in a few hours, or in a single night, as between the coasts of France and Britain, and of other neighboring nations would be impracticable.

Starting point is 11:59:14 This is a prodigious security against the direct contraband with foreign countries, but a circuitous contraband to one state, through the medium of another, would be both easy and safe. The difference between a direct importation, from abroad and an indirect importation to the channel of a neighboring state in small parcels, according to time and opportunity, with the additional facilities of inland communication, must be palpable to every man of discernment. It is therefore evident that one national government would be able,

Starting point is 11:59:45 at much less expense, to extend the duties on imports, beyond comparison further, than it would be practicable to the states separately, or to any partial confederacies. The standing army is a peril to a republic. The disciplined armies always kept on foot on the continent of Europe, though they bear a malignant aspect to liberty and economy, have notwithstanding been productive of the signal advantage of rendering sudden conquest impracticable and of preventing that rapid desolation

Starting point is 12:00:15 which used to mark the progress of war prior to their introduction. The art of fortification has contributed to the same ends. The nations of Europe are encircled with chains of fortified places, which mutually obstruct invasion. Campaigns are wasted in reducing two or three frontiers, garisons, to gain admittance into an enemy's country. Similar impediments occur at every step to exhaust the strength and delay the progress of an invader. Formerly, an invading army would

Starting point is 12:00:45 penetrate into the heart of a neighboring country almost as soon as intelligence of its approach could be received. But now a comparatively small force of disciplined troops, acting on the defensive with the aid of posts, is able to impede and finally to frustrate the enterprises of one much more considerable. The history of war in that quarter of the globe is no longer a history of nation subdued and empires overturned, but of towns taken and retaken, of battles that decide nothing, of retreats more beneficial than victories, of much effort and little acquisition. In this country the scene would be altogether reversed. The jealousy of military establishments would postpone them as long as possible. The want of fortifications,

Starting point is 12:01:28 leaving the frontiers of one state open to another, would facilitate. facilitate inroads. The populous states would, with little difficulty, overrun their less populous neighbors. Conquest would be as easy to be made as difficult to be retained. War, therefore, would be desultory and predatory. Plunder and devastation ever march in the train of irregulars. The calamities of individuals would make the principal figure in the events, which we characterize our military exploits. This picture is not too highly wrought, though I confess it would not long remain a just one. Safety from external danger is the most powerful dictator of national conduct. Even the ardent love of liberty will, after a time, give way to its

Starting point is 12:02:11 dictates. The violent destruction of life and property incident to war, the continual effort and alarm attendant on a state of continual danger, will compel nations the most attached to liberty to resort for repose and security to institutions which have a tendency to destroy their civil and political rights. To be more safe, they at length become willing to run the risk of being less free. The institutions chiefly alluded to are standing armies and the correspondent appendages of military establishments. Standing armies, it is said, are not provided against in the new constitution, and it is therefore inferred that they may exist under it. Their existence, however, from the very terms of the proposition, is at most problematical and uncertain, but standing armies, it may be

Starting point is 12:02:58 replied, must inevitably result from a disillusion of the Confederacy. Frequent war and constant apprehension, which requires a state of as constant preparation, will infallibly produce them. The weaker states or confederacies would at first have recourse to them to put themselves upon inequality with their more potent neighbors. They would endeavor to supply the inferiority of population and resources by a more regular and effective system of defense, by disciplined troops, and by fortifications. They would at the same time be necessitated to strengthen the executive arm of government, in doing which their constitutions would acquire a progressive direction towards monarchy. It is of the nature of war to increase

Starting point is 12:03:43 the executive at the expense of the legislative authority. The expedients, which have been mentioned, would soon give the states or confederacies that made use of them a superiority over their neighbors. small states, or states of less natural strength, under vigorous governments and with the assistance of disciplined armies, have often triumphed over large states or states of greater natural strength, which have been destitute of these advantages. Neither the pride nor the safety of the more important states or confederacies would permit them long to submit to this mortifying and adventitious superiority.

Starting point is 12:04:21 They would quickly resort to mean similar to those, by which it had been affected, to reinstate themselves in their lost preeminence. Thus we should, in a little time, see established in every part of this country the same engines of despotism, which have been the scourge of the old world. This at least would be the natural course of things, and our reasonings will be the more likely to be just in proportion as they are accommodated to this standard. New republics promote peace. Notwithstanding the concurring testimony of experience in this particular, there are still to be found visionary or designing men who stand ready to advocate the paradox of perpetual peace between the states, though dismembered and alienated from each other.

Starting point is 12:05:06 The genius of republics, say they, is Pacific. The spirit of commerce has a tendency to soften the manners of men and to extinguish those inflammable humors, which have so often kindled into wars. commercial republics like ours will never be disposed to waste themselves and ruinous contentions with each other. They will be governed by mutual interest and will cultivate a spirit of mutual amity and concord. Is it not, we may ask these projectors in politics? The true interest of all nations to cultivate the same benevolent and philosophic spirit. If this be their true interest, have they in fact pursued it? Has it not, on the contrary, invariably been found,

Starting point is 12:05:49 that momentary passions and immediate interests have a more active and imperious control over human conduct than general or remote considerations of policy, utility, or justice. Have republics in practice been less addicted to war than monarchies? Are not the former administered by men as well as the latter? Are there not aversions, predilections, rivalships, and desires of unjust acquisitions that affect nations as well as kings?

Starting point is 12:06:17 Are not popular assemblies, frequently subject to the impulses of rage, resentment, jealousy, avarice, and of other irregular and violent propensities. Is it not well known that their determinations are often governed by a few individuals in whom they place confidence, and are of course liable to be tinctured by the passions and views of those individuals, has commerce hitherto done anything more than changed the objects of war? He is not the love of wealth as domineering and enterprise, a passion as that of power or glory. Have there not been, as many wars founded upon commercial motives, since that has become the

Starting point is 12:06:58 prevailing system of nations, as were before occasioned by the cupidity of territory or dominion, has not the spirit of commerce in many instances administered new incentives to the appetite both for the one and for the other? Let experience the least fallible guide of human opinions be appealed to for an answer to these inquiries. Sparta, Athens, Rome, and Carthage were all republics. Two of them, Athens and Carthage, of the commercial kind. Yet were they as often engaged in wars, offensive and defensive,

Starting point is 12:07:31 as the neighboring monarchies of the same times. Sparta was little better than a well-regulated camp, and Rome was never sated of carnage and conquest. Carthage, though a commercial republic, was the aggressor in the very war that ended in her destruction. Hannibal had carried her arms into the heart of Italy and to the gates of Rome, Vorsipio in turn, gave him an overthrow in the territories of Carthage, and made a conquest of the Commonwealth.

Starting point is 12:08:00 Venice in later times figured more than once in wars of ambition, till, becoming an object of terror to the other Italian states, Pope Julius II found means to accomplish that formidable league, which gave a deadly blow to the power and pride of this haughty republic. the provinces of holland till they were overwhelmed in debts and taxes took a leading and conspicuous part in the wars of europe they had furious contests with england for the dominion of the sea and were among the most persevering and most implacable of the opponents of louis the fourteenth In the government of Britain, the representatives of the people compose one branch of the national legislature. Commerce has been for ages the predominant pursuit of that country.

Starting point is 12:08:44 Few nations, nevertheless, have been more frequently engaged in war, and the wars in which the kingdom has been engaged have in numerous instances preceded from the people. There have been, if I may so express it, almost as many popular as royal wars. The cries of the nation and the importunities of their representatives have upon very various occasions dragged their monarchs into war, or continued them in it, contrary to their inclinations, and sometimes contrary to the real interest of the state. In that memorable struggle for superiority between the rival houses of Austria and Bourbon, which so long kept Europe

Starting point is 12:09:20 in a flame, it is well known that the antipathies of the English against the French, seconding the ambition, or rather the avarice of a favorite leader, protracted the war beyond the limits marked out by sound policy, and for a considerable time, in opposition to the views of the court. The wars of these two last-mentioned nations have, in a great measure, grown out of commercial considerations. The desire of supplanting, and the fear of being supplanted, either in particular branches of traffic, or in the general advantages of trade and navigation.

Starting point is 12:09:55 Personal influence in national politics. The causes of hostility among nations are innumerable. There are some, which have a general and almost cost in operation upon the country. collective bodies of society. Of this description are the love of power, or the desire of preeminence and dominion, the jealousy of power, or the desire of equality and safety. There are others which have a more circumscribed, though an equally operative influence within their spheres. Such are the rivalships and competitions of commerce between commercial nations, and there are others, not less numerous than either of the former, which take their origin entirely in private passions.

Starting point is 12:10:36 attachments, enmities, interests, hopes, and fears, of leading individuals in the communities of which they are members. Men of this class, whether the favorites of a king or of a people, have in too many instances abused the confidence they possessed, and assuming the pretext of some public motive, have not scrupled to sacrifice the national tranquility to personal advantage or personal gratification. The celebrated Pyricles, in compliance with the resentment of a prostitute, at the expense of much of the blood and treasure of his countrymen, attacked, vanquished, and destroyed the city of the Samnians, the same man, stimulated by a private peak,

Starting point is 12:11:19 against the Megarincians, another nation of Greece, or to avoid a prosecution with which he was threatened as an accomplice and disposed theft of the statuary fiducius. or to get rid of the accusations prepared to be brought against him for dissipating the funds of the state in the purchase of popularity, or from a combination of all these causes, was the primitive author of that famous and fatal war distinguished in the Grecian annals by the name of the Peloponnesian War, which after various vicissitudes, intermissions, and renewals, terminated in the ruin of the Athenian Commonwealth.

Starting point is 12:11:55 The ambitious cardinal, who was prime minister to Henry VIII, permitting his vanity to aspire to the Triple Crown, entertained hopes of succeeding in the acquisition of that splendid prize by the influence of the Emperor Charles V. To secure the favor and interest of this enterprising and powerful monarch, he precipitated England to a war with France, contrary to the plaintiff's dictates of policy, and at the hazard of the safety and independence,

Starting point is 12:12:21 as well of the kingdom over which he presided by his councils, as of Europe in general. For if there ever was a sovereign who bid fair to realize the project of universal monarchy, it was the Emperor Charles V, of whose intrigues Woolsey was at once the instrument and the dupe. The influence which the bigotry of one female, the petulance of another, and the cabals of a third, had in the contemporary policy, ferments, and pacifications of a considerable part of Europe,

Starting point is 12:12:51 are topics that have been too often discanted upon not to be generally known. To multiply examples of the agency of personal considerations in the production of great national events, either foreign or domestic, according to their direction, will be an unnecessary waste of time. Those who have but a superficial acquaintance

Starting point is 12:13:10 with the sources from which they are to be drawn will themselves recollect a variety of instances, and those who have a tolerable knowledge of human nature, will not stand in need of such lights to form their opinion either of the reality or extent of that agency. Results of the Confederation. We may indeed, with propriety,

Starting point is 12:13:32 he said, have reached almost the last stage of national humiliation. There is scarcely anything that can wound the pride or degrade the character of an independent nation which we do not experience. Are there engagements to the performance of which we are held by every tie respectable among men? These are the subjects of constant and unblushing violation. Do we owe debts to foreigners,

Starting point is 12:13:54 and to our own citizens, contracted in a time of imminent peril for the preservation of our political existence? These remain without any proper or satisfactory provision for their discharge. Have we valuable territories and important posts in the possession of a foreign power, which, by express stipulations, ought long since to have been surrendered? These are still retained, to the prejudice of our interests not less than of our rights. Are we in a condition to resent or to repel the aggression? We have neither troops, nor treasury, nor government. Are we even in a condition to remonstrate with dignity,

Starting point is 12:14:31 that just imputations on our own faith? In respect to the same treaty, ought first to be removed. Are we entitled by nature and compact to a free participation in the navigation of the Mississippi? Spain excludes us from it. Is public credit an indispensable resource in time of public danger? We seem to have abandoned its cause as desperate and irretrievable. Is commerce of importance to national wealth? Ours is at the lowest point of declension.

Starting point is 12:15:01 His respectability in the eyes of foreign powers is safeguard against foreign encroachments? The imbecility of our government even forbids them to treat with us. Our ambassadors abroad are the mere pageants of mimic sovereignty. Is a violent and unnatural decrease in the value of land a symptom of national distress? The price of improved land in most, parts of the country is much lower than can be accounted for by the quantity of wasteland at market,

Starting point is 12:15:29 and can only be fully explained by that want of private and public confidence, which are so alarmingly prevalent among all ranks, and which have a direct tendency to depreciate property of every kind. Is private credit the friend and patron of industry? That most useful kind, which relates to borrowing and lending, is reduced within the narrowest limits, and this still more from an opinion of insecurity than from the scarcity of money. To shorten an enumeration of particulars which can afford neither pleasure nor instruction, it may in general be demanded. One indication is there of national disorder, poverty, and insignificance

Starting point is 12:16:09 that could befall a community so peculiarly blessed with natural advantages as we are, which does not form a part of the dark catalog of our public misfortunes. instances of the evils of state sovereignty. From such a parade of constitutional powers, in the representatives and head of this, the German, Confederacy, the national supposition would be that it must form an exception to the general character which belongs to its kindred systems. Nothing would be further from the reality,

Starting point is 12:16:42 the fundamental principle on which it rests, that the empire is a community of sovereigns, that the diet is a representation of sovereigns, and that the laws are addressed to sovereigns, renders the empire a nerveless body, incapable of regulating its own members, insecure against external dangers, and agitated with unceasing,

Starting point is 12:17:01 fermentations and its own bowels. The history of Germany is a history of wars between the emperor and the princes and states themselves, of the licentiousness of the strong and the oppression of the weak, of foreign intrusions and foreign intrigues, of requisitions of men and money, disregarded or partially complied with, of attempts to enforce them, altogether abortive,

Starting point is 12:17:26 or attended with slaughter and desolation, involving the innocent with the guilty, of general imbecility, confusion, and misery. In the 16th century, the emperor, with one part of the empire on his side, was seen engaged against the other princes and states. In one of the conflicts, the emperor himself was put to flight, and very near being made prisoner by the elector of Saxony. The late King of Prussia was more than once pitted against his imperial sovereign and commonly proved an overmatch for him. Controversies and wars among the members themselves have been so common that the German annals are crowded with the bloody pages which describe them.

Starting point is 12:18:04 Previous to the peace of Westphalia, Germany was desolated by a war of 30 years in which the emperor, with one half of the empire, was on one side, and Sweden, with the other half on the opposite side. peace was at length negotiated and dictated by foreign powers, and the articles of it, to which foreign powers are parties, made a fundamental part of the Germanic Constitution. The impossibility of maintaining order and dispensing justice among these sovereign subjects produced the experiment of dividing the empire into nine or ten circles or districts,

Starting point is 12:18:37 of giving them an interior organization, and of charging them with the military execution of the laws against delinquent and contumacious members. This experiment has only served to demonstrate more fully the radical vice of the Constitution. Each circle is the miniature picture of the deformities of this political monster. They either fail to execute their commissions, or they do it with all the devastation and carnage of civil war. Sometimes whole circles are defaulters, and then they increased the mischief, which they were instituted to remedy.

Starting point is 12:19:10 It may be asked, perhaps. what has so long kept this disjointed machine from falling entirely to pieces? The answer is obvious. The weakness of most of the members, who are unwilling to expose themselves to the mercy of foreign powers, the weakness of most of the principal members, compared with the formidable powers all around them, the vast weight and influence which the emperor derives from his separate and hereditary dominions,

Starting point is 12:19:34 and the interest he feels in preserving a system with which his family pride is connected, and which constitutes him the first prince, in Europe, these causes support a feeble and precarious union. Whilst the repellent quality incident to the nature of sovereignty and which time continually strengthens prevents any reform whatsoever founded on a proper consolidation, nor is it to be imagined if this obstacle could be surmounted, that the neighboring powers would suffer a revolution to take place which would give to the empire the force and preeminence to which it is entitled. Foreign nations have long considered themselves as interested in the

Starting point is 12:20:11 the changes made by events in this constitution, and have on various occasions betrayed their policy of perpetuating its anarchy and weakness. If more direct examples were wanting, Poland as a government over local sovereigns might not improperly be taken notice of. Nor could any proof more striking be given of the calamities flowing from such institutions. Equally unfit for self-government and self-defense, it has long been at the mercy of its powerful neighbors, who have lately had the mercy to disburden it of one-third of its people and territories. End of Section 25 of Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Volume 17. This is a Libravox recording. All Libravox recordings are in the public domain. For more information

Starting point is 12:21:06 or to volunteer, please visit LibraVox.org. Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Volume 17. Anthony Hamilton, approximately 1646 to 1720. The author of Gromont's memoirs, usually known as Count Hamilton, was a man without a nationality. Born in Ireland of Scotch Blood, grandson of the Earl of Abercorn, he was a baby when his parents followed the relics of the royal family to France after the execution of Charles I. and he remained there till 1660, his education and formative influences during childhood being wholly French, which language was really his mother tongue.

Starting point is 12:21:55 At the restoration, he returned to England and became an ornament of Charles II's court, though debarred from office for being a Catholic. James II gave him command of an Irish regiment and made him governor of Limerick, but on James's abdication, he returned to France and returned to France and, remain there, a notable figure in Louis XIV, the 14th court, whose wit and elastic moral atmosphere were alike congenial to him. He made a good French translation of Pope's essay on man, cordially acknowledged by the author. He wrote graceful poems, and in ridicule of the prevalent craze for oriental tales, which he declared quite within the powers of anyone with

Starting point is 12:22:38 the slenderous literary faculty, wrote several stories of the Arabian. in Knights' Order, without plot or denouement, usually promising to finish in the next volume, which was never written. These stories are clever and witty enough to be still read, and some of their expressions have become stocked literary quotations, but they are curios rather than living works. More can be said for another work, which has permanent vitality, the memoirs of his brother-in-law, the Duke of Grimont. The latter was a conspicuous soldier and courtier during the Regency and Hamilton's senior by 20 years. This dashing witty profligate with generous impulses and no conscious was a true product of the court of Louis XIV, and that of the English Charles II.

Starting point is 12:23:29 An aristocrat of long descent, a soldier of renown, with his laughing eyes, his dimple, and his conversational gift, he was popular everywhere. hamilton met him first in england whither a social imprudence had led him and where he became engaged to his biographer's beautiful sister then he was recalled and started for home unmindful of his promises the young lady's brothers hurried after him chivalry shivalry haven't you forgotten something at london beg your pardon gentlemen said the chivalier i have forgotten to marry your sister he was went back with them, married Miss Hamilton, and took her to France. The incident is characteristic of his careless ready wit, and it did not seem to weaken Hamilton's admiring affection. Grameau's prime quality was social talent. He loved extravagant living, intrigue, and Beaumois, and the life that receives most stimulus from other personalities. To write as he conversed was

Starting point is 12:24:34 impossible to him, yet he had been told that the record of his life was too interesting to be lost and his vanity like the thought. There was talk of giving the tasks to Bois Lo, who wanted it, but Bois Lo might be severe or satiric, so Hamilton was preferred. Hamilton, in spite of his knowledge of court life in France and England, and his somewhat malicious wit, was rather taciturn and unsuccessful as a society man. He loved better the quiet of St. Germain and solitary, thoughtful, constitutionals in the forest. To write was easier for him than to talk. He appreciated the life in which he did not shine and could do justice to the Duke's reminiscences. The result is a brilliant picture of the Court of Charles II, of that pleasure-seeking

Starting point is 12:25:24 king and the beauties and fascinations of his mistresses. There are many other scandalous tales as well, involving the Duke of Buckingham, Lord and Lady Chesterfield, Grimaud himself, and other celebrities. In spirit and style, the work is wholly French, a long succession of witty, malicious gossip. The author addresses himself in the opening sentence to those who read for amusements. To such, the memoirs are perennially interesting. Nothing Venture, Nothing Have, from Grimont's Memoirs. De Grameon and his friend, Monsieur Mouin. Mata, being much pressed for money, the count relates an incident of his early years and suggests

Starting point is 12:26:08 acting on its hint to raise the sum they require. They had never yet conferred about the state of their finances, although the steward had acquainted each separately that he must either receive money to continue the expenses or give in his accounts. One day when the Chevalier came home sooner than usual, he found Mata fast asleep in an easy chair, and being unwilling to disturb his rest, he began musing on his project. Mata awoke without his perceiving it, and having for a short time observed the deep contemplation he seemed involved in, and the profound silence between two persons who had never before held their tongues for a moment went together, he broke it by a sudden fit of laughter, which increased in proportion as the others stared at him.

Starting point is 12:26:55 A merry way of waking, and ludicrous enough, said the Chevalier. What is the matter, and whom do you laugh at? Faith Chevalier, said Mata, I am laughing at a dream I had just now, which is so natural and diverting that I must make you laugh at it also. I was dreaming that we had dismissed our matre de hotel, our coke, and our confectioner, having resolved for the remainder of the campaign to live upon others as others have lived upon us. This was my dream. Now tell me, Chevalier, on what were you musing?

Starting point is 12:27:29 Poor fellow, said the Chevalier, shrugging his shoulders. You are knocked down at once and thrown into the utmost consternation and despair at some silly stories which the matre de hotel has been telling you as well as me. What, after the figure we have made in the face of the nobility and foreigners in the army, shall we give it up and, like fools and beggars, sneak off upon the first failure of our money? have you no sentiments of honor? Where is the dignity of France? And where's the money, said Mata.

Starting point is 12:28:01 For my men say the devil may take them if there be ten crowns in the house, and I believe you have not much more, for it is above a week since I have seen you pull out your purse and count your money and amusement you are very fond of in prosperity. I own all this, said the Chevalier, but yet I will force you to confess that you are but a mean-spirited fellow upon this occasion. What would have become a view if you had been reduced to the situation I was in at Leone

Starting point is 12:28:30 four days before I arrived here? I will tell you the story. When I returned to my mother's house, I had so much the air of a courtier and a man of the world that she began to respect me instead of chiding me for my infatuation towards the army. I became her favorite, and finding me inflexible, she only thought of keeping me with her as long as she could, while my little equipage was preparing. The faithful Brennan, who had to attend me as fillet de Chalmers, was likewise to discharge the office of governor in equerry, being perhaps the only gaskin who was ever possessed of so

Starting point is 12:29:08 much gravity and ill-temper. He passed his word for my good behavior and morality, and promised my mother that he would give a good account of my person in the dangers of the war, but I hope he will keep his word better as to this, last article than he has done to the former. My equipage was sent away a week before me. This was so much time gained by my mother to give me good advice. At length, after having solemnly enjoined me to have the fear of God before my eyes and to love my neighbor as myself, she suffered me to depart under the protection of the

Starting point is 12:29:43 Lord and the sage Brinnan. At the second stage we quarreled. He had received 400 Louis Dore for the expenses of the United States. the campaign, I wish to have the keeping of them myself, which he strenuously opposed. "'Thou old scondrel,' said I, "'is the money thine, or was it given thee for me? You suppose I must have a treasurer and receive no money without his order?' I know not whether it is from a presentiment of what afterwards happened that he grew melancholy, however it was with the greatest reluctance and the most poignant anguish that

Starting point is 12:30:18 he found himself obliged to yield. one would have thought that I had rested his very soul from him. I found myself more light and merry after I had eased him of his trust. He, on the contrary, appeared so overwhelmed with grief that it seemed as if I had laid four hundred pounds of lead upon his back instead of taking away those four hundred louis. He went on so heavily that I was forced to whip his horse myself and turning to me now and then.

Starting point is 12:30:47 Ah, sir, said he, my lady did not think it would. be so. His reflections and sorrows were renewed at every stage, for instead of giving a shilling to the post-boy, I gave him half a crown. Having at last reached Leon, two soldiers stopped us at the gate of the city to carry us before the governor. I took one of them to conduct me to the best inn, and delivered Brennan into the hands of the other, to acquaint the commandant with the particulars of my journey and my future intentions. There are as good taverns as that Leon as at Paris, but my soldier, according to Custom, carried me to a friend of his own, whose house he extolled us having the best accommodations and the greatest resort of good company

Starting point is 12:31:32 in the whole town. The master of this hotel was as big as a hogshead. His name, Cirrice, a Swiss by birth, a poisoner by profession, and a thief by custom. He showed me into a tolerably neat room and desired to know whether I pleased to sup by myself or at the ordinary. I chose the latter on account of the Beaumont, which the soldier had boasted of. Brennan, who was quite out of temper at the many questions which the governor had asked him, returned more surly than an old ape, and seeing that I was dressing my hair in order to go downstairs, what are you about now, sir, said he. Are you going to tramp about the town? No, no. Have we not. had tramping enough ever since the morning. Eat a bit of supper and go to bed betimes that you may

Starting point is 12:32:22 get on horseback by daybreak. Mr. Comptroller said I. I shall neither tramp about the town, nor eat alone, nor go to bed early. I intend to sup with the company below. At the ordinary, cried he, I beseech you, sir. Do not think of it. Devil take me if there be not a dozen brawling fellows playing at cards and dice who make noise enough to drown the loudest thunder. I was grown insolence since I had seized the money and being desirous to shake off the yoke of a governor. Do you know, Mr. Brennan, said I, that I don't like a blockhead to set up for a reasoner? Do you go to supper, if you please, but take care that I have post-horses ready before daybreak? The moment he mentioned cards and dice, I felt the money burned in my pocket.

Starting point is 12:33:09 I was somewhat surprised, however, to find the room where the ordinary was served, filled with odd-looking creatures. host after presenting me to the company assured me that there were but 18 or 20 of those gentlemen who would have the honor to sup with me. I approached one of the tables where they were playing and thought that I should have died with laughing. I expected to have seen good company in deep play, but I only met with two Germans playing at backgammon. Never did two country boobies play like them, but their figures beggared all description. The fellow near whom I stood was short, thick, fat and as round as a ball with a rough and a prodigious high-crowned hat. Anyone at a moderate distance would have taken him for the dome of a church with the

Starting point is 12:33:57 staple on the top of it. I inquired of the host who he was. A merchant from Basil, said he, who comes hither to sell horses, but from the method he pursues I think he will not dispose of many, for he does nothing but play. Does he play deep, said I? Not now, said he. They're only playing for their reckoning while supper is getting ready. But he has no objection to play as deep as anyone. Has he money, said I? As for that, replied the treacherous serise. Would to God you had won a thousand pistoles of him, and I went your halves.

Starting point is 12:34:32 We should not be long without our money. I wanted no further encouragement to meditate the ruin of the high-crowned hat. I went nearer him in order to take a closer survey. Never was such a bungler. he made blots upon blots god knows i began to feel some remorse at winning of such an ignoramus who knew so little of the game and i desired him to sit next me it was a long table and there were at least five-and-twenty in company notwithstanding the landlord's promise the most execrable were passed that ever was begun being finished all the crowd insensibly dispersed except the little swiss who kept near me and the landlord who placed himself on the other side of me they both smoked like dragons and the swiss was continually saying in bad french i ask your pardon sir for my great freedom at the same time blowing such whist of tobacco echo in my face has almost suffocated me. M. Ceresireiret, on the other hand, desired he might

Starting point is 12:35:34 take the liberty of asking me whether I had ever been in his country and seemed surprised that I had so genteel in air without having traveled in Switzerland. The little chub I had to encounter was full as inquisitive as the other. He desired to know whether I came from the army in Piedmont, and having told him I was going thither, he asked me whether I had a mind to buy any horses, that he had about 200 to dispose of and that he would sell them cheap. I began to be smoked like a gammon of bacon and being quite wearied out, both with their tobacco and their questions. I asked my companion if he would play for a single pistoli at backgammon

Starting point is 12:36:15 while our men were supping. It was not without great ceremony that he consented, at the same time asking my pardon for his great freedom. I won the game. I gave him his revenge. and won again. We then played double or quit. I won that too, and all in the twinkling of an eye, for he grew vexed and suffered himself to be taken in so that I began to bless my stars for my good fortune. Brennan came in about the end of the third game to put me to bed. He made a

Starting point is 12:36:46 great sign of the cross, but paid no attention to the signs I made him to retire. I was forced to rise to give him that order in private. He began to reprimand. me for disgracing myself by keeping company with such a low-bred rich. It was in vain that I told him he was a great merchant, that he had a great deal of money, and that he played like a child. He, a merchant, cried Brennan. Do not believe that, sir. May the devil take me if he is not some conjurer. Hold your tongue, old fool, said I. He is no more a conjurer than you are, and that is decisive. And to prove it to you, I am resolved to win four or five hundred pistoles of him before I go to bed. With these words, I turned him out, strictly

Starting point is 12:37:32 enjoining him not to return or in any manner to disturb us. The game being done, the little Swiss unbuttoned his pockets to pull out a new four-pistoli piece and presenting it to me, he asked my pardon for his great freedom, and seemed as if he wished to retire. This was not what I wanted. I told him we only played for amusement that I had no designs upon his money, and that if he pleased I would play him a single game for his four pistoles. He raised some objections, but consented at last and won back his money. I was piqued at it. I played another game, fortune changed sides.

Starting point is 12:38:11 The dice ran for him. He made no more blots. I lost the game, another game, and double or quit. We doubled the stake and played double or quit again. I was vexed. He, like a true game sir, took every bet I offered, and won all before him without my getting more than six points in eight or ten games. I asked him to play a single game for 100 Pistoles,

Starting point is 12:38:35 but as he saw I did not stake, he told me it was late, that he must go and look after his horses and went away, still asking my pardon for his great freedom. The cool manner of his refusal and the politeness with which he took his leave provoked me to such a degree that I almost could have killed him. I was so confounded at losing my money so fast even to the last pistoli that I did not immediately consider the miserable situation to which I was reduced. I durst not go up to my chamber for fear of Brennan.

Starting point is 12:39:10 By good luck, however, he was tired with waiting for me and had gone to bed. This was some consolation, though but of short continuance. As soon as I was laid down, all the fatal consequences of my adventure presented themselves to my imagination. I could not sleep. I saw all the horrors of my misfortune without being able to find any remedy. In vain did I rack my brain. It supplied me with no expedient. I feared nothing so much as daybreak, however it did come, and the cruel Brennan along with it. He was booted up to the middle and cracking a cursed whip which he held in his hand. Up, Monsieur Le Chevalier, cried he, opening the curtains. The horses are at the door, and you are still asleep. We ought by this time

Starting point is 12:39:57 to have ridden two stages. Give me money to pay the reckoning. Brennan, said I, in a dejected tone, draw the curtains. What, cried he, draw the curtains. Do you intend then to make your campaign at Lyon? You seem to have taken a liking to the place, and for the great merchant you have stripped him, I suppose. No, no, monsieur de Chevalier, this money will. never do you any good. This wretch has perhaps a family, and it is his children's bread that he has been playing with, and that you have won. Was this an object to sit up all night for? What would my lady say if she knew what life you lead? Monsieur Brennan, said I. Pray draw the curtains. But instead of obeying me, one would have

Starting point is 12:40:43 thought that the devil had prompted him to use the most pointed and galling terms to a person under such misfortunes. And how much have you won, said he? Five hundred pistoles. What must the poor man do? Recollect, Monsieur de Chevalier, what I have said, this money will never thrive with you. It is perhaps but four hundred, three, two.

Starting point is 12:41:05 Well, if it is but one hundred Louis Dors, continued he, seeing that I shook my head at every sum, which he had named, there is no great mischief done. One hundred pistoles will not ruin him, provided you have won them fairly. Friend, Brennan, said I, fetching a deep sigh, draw the curtains. I am unworthy to see daylight.

Starting point is 12:41:26 Brinand was much affected by these melancholy words, but I thought he would have fainted when I told him the whole adventure. He tore his hair, made grievous lamentations, the burden of which still was, What will my lady say? And after having exhausted his unprofitable complaints, What will become of you now, Monsieur de Chevalier, said he. What do you intend to do?

Starting point is 12:41:52 Nothing, said I, for I am fit for nothing. After this, being somewhat eased after making him my confession, I thought upon several projects, to none of which could I gain his approbation. I would have had him post after my equipage to have sold some of my clothes. I was for proposing to the horse dealer to buy some horses of him at a high price. on credit to sell again cheap. Brendan laughed at all these schemes, and after having had the cruelty of keeping me upon the rack for a long time, he at last extricated me.

Starting point is 12:42:28 Parents are always stingy towards their poor children. My mother intended to have given me 500 Louis Doors, but she kept back 50, as well for some little repairs in the Abbey as to pay for her praying for me. Brendan had the charge of the other fifty, with strict injunctions not to speak of them unless upon some urgent necessity. And this, you see, soon happened. Thus you have a brief account of my first adventure. Play has hitherto favored me, for since my arrival I've had at one time after paying all expenses, 1500 Louis Doors. Fortune has now again become unfavorable. We must mend her.

Starting point is 12:43:07 Our cash runs low. We must therefore endeavor to recruit. "'Nothing is more easy,' said Mata. "'It is only to find out such another dupe as the horse-dealer at Leone, "'but now I think on it, as not the faithful Brennan some reserve for the last extremity. "'Faith, the time is now common we cannot do better than to make use of it.' "'Your raillery would be very seasonable,' said the Chevalier. "'If you knew how to extricate us out of this difficulty, "'you must certainly have an overflow of whip to be throwing it away upon every

Starting point is 12:43:40 upon every occasion as at present. What the devil will you always be bantering without considering what a serious situation we are reduced to? Mind what I say. I will go tomorrow to the headquarters. I will dine with the Count de Cameron, and I will invite him to supper. Where, said Mata?

Starting point is 12:44:00 Here, said the Chevalier. You are mad, my poor friend, replied Mata. This is some such project as you formed at Leone. You know we have neither money nor money. credit and to re-establish our circumstances you intend to give a supper? Stupid fellow, said the Chevalier, is it possible that, so long as we've been acquainted, you should have learned no more invention? The Count of Cameron plays at Gins, and so do I. We want money. He has more than he knows what to do with. I will bespeak a splendid supper.

Starting point is 12:44:33 He shall pay for it. Send your matri de hotel to me, and trouble yourself no farther, except in some precautions which it is necessary to take on such an occasion. What are they, said Mata? I will tell you, said the Chevalier, for I find one must explain to you things that are as clear as noonday. You command the guards that are here, don't you? As soon as night comes on, you shall order 15 or 20 men under the command of your sergeant Laplace to be under arms and to lay themselves flat on the ground between this place and the headquarters.

Starting point is 12:45:08 What the devil, cried Mata. And ambuscade? God forgive me. I believe you intend to rob the poor Savoyard. If that be your intention, I declare I will have nothing to do with it. Poor devil, said the Chevalier, the matter is this. It is very likely that we shall win his money. The Piedmontese, though otherwise good fellows, are apt to be suspicious and distrustful.

Starting point is 12:45:33 He commands the horse, you know you cannot hold your tongue, and are very likely to let slip some jest or other that may vex him. Should he take it into his head that he is cheated and resent it, who knows what the consequences might be, for he is commonly attended by eight or ten horsemen. Therefore, however he may be provoked at his loss, it is proper to be in such a situation as not to dread his resentment. Embrace me, my dear chevalier, said Mata, holding his sides and laughing.

Starting point is 12:46:04 embrace me for thou art not to be matched. What a fool was I to think when you talked to me of taking precautions, that nothing more was necessary than to prepare a table on cards, or perhaps to provide some false dice. I should never have thought of supporting a man who plays at Gaines by a detachment of foot. I must indeed confess that you are already a great soldier. The next day everything happened as a Chevalier-Gremont had planned it. The unfortunate Cameron fell into the snare.

Starting point is 12:46:36 They supped in the most agreeable manner possible. Mata drank five or six bumpers to drown a few scruples, which made him somewhat uneasy. The Chevalier de Grimont shone as usual, and almost made his guest die with laughing, whom he was soon after to make very serious. And the good nature of Cameron ate like a man whose affections were divided between good cheer and a love of play. That is to say, he hurried down his victuals that he might not lose any of the precious time which he had devoted to Ginn's. Supper being done, the Sergeant Laplace posted his ambuscade, and the Chevalier de Grimont engaged his man. The perfidy of Ceres and the high-crowned hat were still fresh in remembrance,

Starting point is 12:47:21 and enabled him to get the better of a few grains of remorse and conquer some scruples which arose in his mind. Mata, unwilling to be a spectator of violated hospitality, sat down in an easy chair in order to fall asleep while the Chevalier was stripping the poor count of his money. They only staked three or four pistoles at first, just for amusement. But Cameron, having lost three or four times, he staked high and the game became serious. He still lost and became outrageous.

Starting point is 12:47:52 The cards flew about the room and the exclamations awoke Mata. As his head was heavy with sleep and hot with wine, he began to laugh at the passion of the Piedmontese instead of consoling him. Faith, my poor count, said he, if I was in your place, I would play no more. Why so, said the other. I don't know, said he, but my heart tells me that your ill luck will continue. I will try that, said Cameron, calling for fresh cards. Do so, said Mata, and fell asleep again. it was but for a short time. All cards were equally unfortunate for the loser. He held none but tens or

Starting point is 12:48:33 court cards, and if by chance he had Gins, he was sure to be the younger hand and therefore lost it. Again, he stormed. Did I not tell you, said Mata, starting out of his sleep? All your storming is in vain. As long as you play, you will lose. Believe me, the shortest follies are the best. Leave off, for the devil may take me if it is possible for you. you to win. Why, said Cameron, who began to be impatient? Do you wish to know, said Mata? Why, faith, it is because we are cheating you. The Chevalier de Grimont provoked at so ill time to jest, more especially as it carried along with it some appearance of truth. Monsieur Mata, said he, do you think it can be very agreeable for a man who plays with such

Starting point is 12:49:20 ill luck as a count to be pestered with your insipid jests? For my part, I am so weary of the game that I would desist immediately if he was not so great a loser. Nothing is more dreaded by losing gameser than such a threat, and the count in a softened tone told the chevalier that Monsieur Mada might say would he pleased if he did not offend him, that as to himself it did not give him the smallest uneasiness. The Chevalier de Grimont gave the count far better treatment than he himself had experienced from the Swiss at Leone, for he played upon grandin.

Starting point is 12:49:54 for he played upon credit as long as he pleased, which Cameron took so kindly that he lost 1,500 pistoles and paid them the next morning. As for Mata, he was severely reprimanded for the intemperance of his tongue. All the reason he gave for his conduct was that he made it a point of conscious not to suffer the poor Savoyer to be cheated without informing him of it. Besides, said he, it would have given me pleasure

Starting point is 12:50:22 to have seen my infantry engaged with his whole, horse if he had been inclined to mischief. This adventure, having recruited their finances, fortune favored them the remainder of the campaign, and the Chevalier de Grimont, to prove that he had only seized upon the count's effects by way of reprisal, and to indemnify himself for the losses he had sustained at Leon, began from this time to make the same use of his money that he has been known to do since upon all occasions. He found out the distress, in order to relieve them, officers who had lost their equipage in the war, or their money at play, soldiers who were disabled in the trenches, in short, everyone felt the influence of his benevolence,

Starting point is 12:51:07 but his manner of conferring a favor exceeded even the favor itself. Every man possessed of such amiable qualities must meet with success in all his undertakings. The soldiers knew his person and adored him. The generals were sure to meet him in every scene of action, and sought his company at other times. As soon as fortune declared for him, his first care was to make restitution by desiring Cameron to go his halves in all parties

Starting point is 12:51:35 where the odds were in his favor. End of Section 25, read by Bryce Christ. Section 26 of Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Volume 17. This is a Libervocation. recording. All Libravox recordings are in the public domain. For more information nor to volunteer, please visit Libravox.org. Library of the world's best literature, ancient and modern, volume 17. Father LeBlanc makes a call from But Yet a Woman by Arthur Sherburn Hardy. Arthur Sherburn

Starting point is 12:52:27 Hardy, born 1847, a special taste for the abstract in mathematics, along with a practical interest in the military profession. Do not generally enter into the stuff out of which romance writers and poets are made. Mr. Hardy, however, is an interesting example of the temperament that takes hold of both the real and the ideal. Successively, a hardworking professor of civil engineering and applied mathematical science, in two or three institutions, he has built up a reputation in Bayes letters by working in them with an industry that has given him a distinctive place in what he once reckoned only an ablocation. Mr. Hardy was born in 1847 at Andover, Massachusetts. by school life at Nochatel, Switzerland, he was early put into touch with French letters and French life. After a single year at Amherst College, he entered the West Point Military Academy, graduating in 1869.

Starting point is 12:53:42 He became a second lieutenant in the third artillery regiment, saw some soldier life during 1869 and 1870, and then resigned from the service to become a professor of civil engineering at Iowa College for a brief time. In 1874, he went abroad to take a course in scientific bridge building and road constructing in Paris, returning to take a professorship in that line of instruction at the Chandler Scientific School connected with Dartmouth College. He assumed a similar professorship at Dartmouth College in 1860. this position in connection with which he published at least one established textbook, Elements of Quaternions, followed by his translation of Argon's imaginary quantities, by his own analytical geometry and by other practical works in applied mathematics.

Starting point is 12:54:46 He held until recently when he became undividedly a man of letters and an editor of a well-known magazine. Mr. Hardy in literature is a novelist and a poet. His stories are three in number. The first one, but yet a woman, 1883, is of peculiar grace, united with firmness of construction, with a decided French touch in the style, especially as to its epigrammatic flash, and with types of careful, if delicate, definiteness prominent in it, particularly in the delineation of Father LeBlanc, the philosophic and kindly curate. A story of more subtle psychological quality,

Starting point is 12:55:38 the wind of destiny, came a little later, its scenery and characters, partly French and partly American, and its little drama, a tragic one. Passe Rose, a quasi-historic novel, dealing with the days and court of Charlemagne, the heroine of it, a dancing girl, with a princess as her rival in love, appeared first as a serial in the Atlantic Monthly in 1888, to be published as a book in 1889. It is a romance of that human quality, which meets with a response in every novel reader's heart.

Starting point is 12:56:20 Mr. Hardy's heroines are all charming, but he has presented us to no more winning type than this flower of a medieval day, with the hues of the southern sea in her eyes and under the rose-brown flush of her skin, the sound of its waves, and the ripple of her laughter. Father LeBlanc makes a call and preaches a sermon,

Starting point is 12:56:50 from, but yet a woman, copyright 1883 by author S. Hardy, and reprinted by permission of Houghton, Nifflin, and Company publishers, Boston. Father LeBlanc had a profound belief in human agencies. He loved play the ministering angel, for his heart was a well of sympathy. There was even a latent chiding of providence at the bottom of this well sometimes when the sight of the poor and suffering stirred its depths with pity for those lonely wayfarers

Starting point is 12:57:28 who neglected by this world seemed forgotten also. of God. This was but one of those many themes which his mind, at once simple, honest and profound, turned over and over reflectively, never seeing its one aspect except as on the way to the other. The difficulty does not lie in believing the truths of the church, he once said, but in those other things which we must believe also. Or again, belief is is an edifice never completed, because we do not yet comprehend its plan. Every day some workman brings a new stone from the quarry. So that while Father LeBlanc was very devout, he was not a devotee.

Starting point is 12:58:21 He flavored his religious belief with the salt of a good sense, against which he endeavored to be on his guard, as he was even against his charity and compassion. The vision of Milton's fallen spirit, beating its wings of vainly and a non-resisting air, drew from his heart a profound sigh. His thoughts turned very naturally to Stephanie and her journey that day, for he was on the way to secure the 19th volume of the VIAHE

Starting point is 12:58:59 de espagna of ponds, for which he had been long on the search, and which awaited him at last on the Quavertre. Those old books which filled the shelves of his room in the Rue Ticotone had left his purse a light one. But, said Father LeBlanc, I am not poor, since I have what I want. After possessing himself of his coveted book, he took up his way along the quay with his treasure under his arm. I have a mind to call on her, he said, still thinking of Stephanie. The art of knowing when one is needed is more difficult than that of helping. And he paused on the curbstone to watch a company of the line coming from the concern of the Cite. A carriage, arrested a moment by the passage of the troops, approached the spot where he was

Starting point is 13:00:04 standing, and he recognized Monsieur de Morzac. The priest was evidently sauntering, and Monsieur de Marzac called to his driver to stop. I see you are out for a promenade, he said. Except this seat beside me, and take a turn with me in the boys. Father LeBlanc was not in his second childhood, for he had not yet outgrown his first. Consequently, the temptation was a strong one. But Monsieur de Mursaq was no favorite of his, and not even the fine day, nor this opportunity to enjoy it, could counterbalance Monsieur de Varsak's company. Dislike at first sight is more common than love, as discord.

Starting point is 13:00:54 is more common than harmony. So he excused himself as about to make a visit. Well, then that decides it, he said to himself, as he trudged down the quay, with the gate of a man with an object in view. Now I must go. At the door of the hotel in the Boulevard St. Germain, he stopped a moment before entering and took a deep inspiration. To tell the truth,

Starting point is 13:01:24 was so fine he regretted going indoors. I feel that I have a pair of lungs, he said, as he rang the porter's bell. Stephanie was not expecting a visit from Father LeBlanc, yet was glad to see him. She was in that period which lies after decision and before action, when having made all her preparation for an early start in the express of the next morning, there was nothing to be done but sit down and wait for the hour of departure. The air is so pure that I feared to find you are out, and you go tomorrow.

Starting point is 13:02:06 Yes, Stephanie said. Sidioskiere, as the Spaniards say, but I shall be there before you. I leave this evening. This evening? And without fear, fatigue, said the priest, mysteriously, drawing his volume from under his arm. It is my 19th journey.

Starting point is 13:02:30 You have been to Spain, said Stephanie, taking the book, but still perplexed. Oh, never, except in those leaves which you are turning, and for two reasons, he added, laughingly. The guidebooks tell us that there are in Spain priests by the thousand. but not a single cook. Still, you perceive that I am about to follow you, and, who knows, shall perhaps lodge at the same inn. That is a country in which nothing becomes obsolete, and I have no doubt that if you inquire for it, they will show you in Toboso the very fonda at which Don Quixote dismounted.

Starting point is 13:03:19 Stephanie thought she heard in this pleasantry something more than was said. Certainly, Father LeBlanc had not even whispered, Though you are going away my child, I shall follow you in my thoughts and in my prayers, and yet that was what she heard. Some of his most commonplace sentences were so many half-hidden channels, such as the brooks made under the grass of the meadows, into which overflowed the currents of his sympathy and kindliness. In spite of a strong natural reserve,

Starting point is 13:04:00 an invincible trust in this homely face, crowned with white hairs, mastered her. You are very good to think of me, father, she said, in a voice so full, that it brought straight from his heart the message he had come, to deliver. All who suffer are my children, and you suffer, and that grieves me. The master who took upon himself the sorrows of the world bade his followers imitate him. Why will you not mean a little upon me, daughter? I am an old man who has traveled the path

Starting point is 13:04:39 before you. She turned her eyes upon him, and they said, I do not speak, but read, and comfort me. The sorrow is a very real thing. He continued in a voice full of sweetness and authority. It is neither a morbid nor an unhealthy state when it seems deepest. When, after all, the world has failed us, self also proves insufficient.

Starting point is 13:05:09 It may even be a blessed one. I do not chide. I even agree with you, but I wish you also to agree with me. Be our life wide or narrow, whether we live humbly or sit on a throne, whether we dwell on our own thoughts, in the midst of action or in the search of pleasure, we come to the verdict of the Hebrew king. That verdict which I read in your face, and which broods over your life, All is emptiness and vanity. It is not the range, but the depth of our experience, which convinces us, and from the first we apprehend this truth dimly.

Starting point is 13:05:56 We own this sad statue of sorrow in the block from the outset. Before experience chisels it out for us. In our first search for happiness, when we look on the splendors of the young world for what they do not contain, it is this imitation of what they cannot yield, in the capacity of our own natures, which both allure and deceive us. She seemed to be listening to the story of her own life,

Starting point is 13:06:32 and as we live on, this conviction deepens, The voices without echo and reinforce those within. We are ever looking to something better than we have or are, and whether we attain it or lose it, there is no rest for our feet. It is the man who is fooled and deluded that is to be pitied. Yvai's life and self, sufficient is either a monster or a caricature. Do you not see that I do not argue with your tears, but do not think to dry them in Spain, my child? Sorrow is the handmaid of God, not of Satan.

Starting point is 13:07:23 She would lead us, as she did the psalmist, to say, Who will show us any good? But after having said this, we may also say with him, Lord, lift thou the light of thy countenance upon us. All else is a broken cistern, said Father LeBlanc, taking up his thoughts after a pause. See how time deceives us, he covers the sore, he even heals the wound, but gives no immunity from a fresh one. Stephanie's eyes fell.

Starting point is 13:08:04 God only renders us superior to calamity. Honestly, said he, lifting his hands as if he appealed to his own conscience, Priest of God, though I am, in understanding I am as a child, I cannot explain, I testify, I witness to you this mystery that out of the very hurt which brings me, though, the spiritual life is developed. And he added, as he would, the benediction, to a discourse at St. Eustache,

Starting point is 13:08:48 blessed are the poor in spirit. Lest are they which mourn? Lest are they which hunger and thirst. For these are they which shall be filled. for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. How much soever of gratefulness she felt for these words, she could not answer them. Had he held her hand,

Starting point is 13:09:16 her answer would have been a pressure, but Father LeBlanc was not hurt by her silence. Though words bubbled easily over his lips, none better knew the difficulty of sometimes saying, Thank you. He sat quietly, smoothing the wrinkles of his sutton over his broad knee with his eyes on the floor. When you return, he said at last, looking up, I shall ask you all the questions which are not answered in my nineteen volumes.

Starting point is 13:09:51 Think of it, at my age, never to have seen the sea. yet I have lain stretched out on its yellow sands in the sun listening to the music of its blue waves in the rude picatin and when I go to my window at night it is to stand on the summit of some high cliff and the roar of the city is that of the sea at its base chained as we are to our little patrick

Starting point is 13:10:26 and the rude ticketon, the imagination is a free rover in space and time. I wager, you are surprised to hear an old man talk of imagination, he said, taking her share of the conversation and putting in her mouth the replies which he wished to answer. Imagination which is supposed to belong only to youth. I say, rather, youth, be used. belongs to imagination, which is then a wild-barry cult, and carries one wherever it wills, but at my age it has become domesticated, and it is on its back that I have ridden, as did Sancho on that of his patient donkey over all the byways of Spain. And when you see some worthy colleague of mine on his ass, plodding before you with a shovel hat on his

Starting point is 13:11:26 a meter in length. You shall say to yourself, there is my friend ahead of me. Her hands crossed on her knees, plunged in a delicious reverie which his voice penetrated without disturbing. Stephanie raised her eyes to his face and smiled. He took his book from the table where she had laid it and put it under his arm again. He had dropped his few seeds comfort and was ready to permit God to water them. So he sought an excuse to go. I am like a schoolboy, he said, tapping the volume. With a new copybook, he cannot rest until he has written something on the first page.

Starting point is 13:12:14 What a good friend this book will be. I count upon him in advance. And his eyes spoke to hers. He will not speak unless I question him. We shall perchance differ profoundly, but he will not reproach me. I shall rifle his pockets and put him aside at my pleasure. Yet he will not feel neglected. I shall invite him tonight to a te-tete before my fire,

Starting point is 13:12:45 and fall asleep while he is doing his best to entertain me. But when I awake, his countenance will be unruffled. doubtless because all the while he is aware that I still prize him. What strange things we do to those whom we love. Absolutely, madam, said Father LeBlake, rising and with a self-accusing gesture, I am an inveterate sermonizer, and I have not given you even the opportunity to interrupt me. Stephanie followed him to the door of the room and at the threshold put her hand softly upon his arm. Thanks, father, for this visit, she said.

Starting point is 13:13:32 Her voice was low. It was all, she said, but her look and that gesture were more eloquent than words. I say to you, as they will say to you in Spain, replied Father LeBlanc. Go your way with God, my daughter. when he had gone she went to the window and watched him as he crossed the courtyard following him out through the gates where he stopped to say something to the porter who touched his hat to him she seated herself there in the wide-open window which projected over the area as did its counterpart at the other end of the room over the garden in the rear flanked by two long and narrow projections this courtyard with its large large paving blocks of stone was not very inviting in its aspect. It was in the other window overhanging the garden, whose casement the trees brushed, over which the vines swayed with the wind

Starting point is 13:14:36 that she loved to sit. But her thoughts were far away. It was still early in the afternoon, but the sun went slowly down behind the tall roofs of the neighboring houses before she rose to do what greatly surprised Lizette, who thought Madam altogether too much of a saint for a woman who neglected Mass and confession. When Madame was dressed and Lizette had taken her place beside her in the carriage, she wondered at the route taken by the coachman, whose instructions she had not overheard. She supposed they were going to the Bois or the Park Monceau, and still greater was her surprise when she found herself a little later in St. Eustache, placing a chair for Madame at the Vesper Service. It was nearly over. Father LeBlanc himself in the pulpit was finishing his exhortation.

Starting point is 13:15:36 The words of the preacher gathered force from the immense space in which they were uttered, from those dim, aspiring vaults into which they were gathered, and where they died away without a confusing murmur. Break your theological rocks, O ritual-hating, brother, on the king's highway and worship him after your own fashion.

Starting point is 13:16:02 For every wayfaring heart overfed upon these symbols, you shall show us one starved on your formula. Not only for thy weaker brother, to whom God has not given the brains of the doctor's in the temple. Shall these waltz of stone be the very arches of heaven, not only for thy frailer sister,

Starting point is 13:16:28 in the keeping of whose warm heart God has placed the sacred things of this life? Shall the incense of this swinging censor be the very fragrance of celestial fields, but into many of thine own dignity also shall this star. above the altar, be the very star of Bethlehem. My children, Father LeBlanc was saying, you put all your treasures into earthen vessels. Your aspirations so noble, soar upward like the branches of the tree, but your roots are in the earth that you must certainly leave, all your faith which will not take denial, all your hopes, which will not be gained said, all your wide embracing affections, you place in humanity in a few frail hearts which cannot meet the

Starting point is 13:17:31 infinity of your need and of your desire. All these things which must fail you and pass away, which you have perchance already gauged and found wanting. Why will you put them in the place of heaven? To which you go to live forever in the place of God whose love knows no variableness nor shadow of turning. It is not I who undervalue them. It is you who overestimate them. Measure them rightly.

Starting point is 13:18:09 and I shall no longer be to you a prophet of woe or a sorrowful comforter. Love them without sacrificing yourself to them. Make them the rivers that water your life and also the rivers that bear you to the infinite sea into which they shall be merged. Then shall this life cease to be for you a veil of tears walled about with tombs and become the pathway to your abiding country

Starting point is 13:18:46 its beauties shall not satiate if you see behind them the world of spiritual beauty what will it matter to you that its fetters chafe that your soul discovers it is imprisoned when that end in which every beauty of flesh and color is engulfed is not an end but a beginning. Verily, verily I say unto you, who so loses his life for my sake shall find it. For my sake, thought Stephanie,

Starting point is 13:19:32 and Father LeBlanc, who had not seen his listener, Having sown the seed had left it humbly to God, was himself permitted to water it. End of Section 26. Read by Bill Mosley, Lano County, Texas, USA, March 18, 2023. Section 27 of Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Volume 17. This is our Libravox recording. All Libravox recordings are in the public domain. volunteer please visit libavox.org Library of the world's best literature ancient and modern

Starting point is 13:20:19 volume 17 Thomas Hardy Thomas Hardy born 1840 by Anna McClure Scholle Thomas Hardy is one of that rare fellowship of novel writers who are actuated in their portrayal of life by a spirit as disinterested and as seemingly unsympathetic as the spirit of nature or His realism is indeed less than realism of art than of the raw material of everyday existence. His straightforward account of the changes and chances of this mortal state is unsoftened by optimistic prejudice. But precisely how far as creations are true to the facts of human experience is a matter of individual rather than of general judgment. An analysis of his most characteristic novels may show that their realism is, after all, one-sided, and that they are closer exponents of a Hardy theory regarding life than of life itself.

Starting point is 13:21:19 What is this theory, and how is it embodied in Hardy's novels? Stating it briefly, it is that the law which governs human events is rendered just beyond calculation by an admixture of luck. There is just enough of chance in the moral order to warrant the implication of jugglery in the Ten Commandments. Acknowledging no creed, this most modern of modern novelists is eminently Calvinistic in his portrayal of men and women as predestined to misfortune or failure, as pulled about or tossed about at the impish pleasure of the God's circumstance. The keynote of his work indeed is the effect of circumstance, of luck, upon man's war with the lower elements in his nature. Some foreordained event for which he is in no wise responsible turns the tide of the battle against him, yet he is held accountable for his defeat. He reaped where he has not sown.

Starting point is 13:22:20 He is overwhelmed with punishments for sins committed by others. He is literally badgered through life by the modern devil of ill luck. In a pair of blue eyes, the heroine Elfried is victimized by circumstances. The adverse star has already risen above her brow when the book opens. She goes artlessly as a child into the hopeless labyrinth of mischance from which death alone can release her. Tess is an innocent sinner, brow beaten by bad luck into a guilty one. So persistent is this evil fortune, this malign spell which might be broken by a word more or less, that Tess becomes well-nigh and irresponsible being, a mere bruised flower,

Starting point is 13:23:06 floating on an irresistible current of doom. Between those two heroines, the one of Hardy's earliest, the other of his latest day, is a long sequence of men and women, all more or less handicapped by fortune. Their humanity is traceable with greater distinctness in their failures and in their successes. Hardy is perhaps the first novelist except George Elliott, who has had their courage to portray a failure. what he himself calls the optimistic grin which ends a story happily is never present in his work. His stories end much as the little dramas of real life end in compromise in the tacit acknowledgement that it is better to make the best of a bad bargain and so live on in the semblance of security

Starting point is 13:23:53 than to die for the impossible. Hardy himself began to undergo life in 1840. At the age of 16 he entered upon the study. of architecture. For several years, he vacillated between literary pursuits and his chosen profession. His first novel, Desperate Remedies, published in 1870, showed at least that he was a good storyteller. Characteristically, the persons of the book were all engaged more or less in a tussle with adverse circumstances, but the melodramatic elements in the intricate plot remove it from the sphere of great art. Under the Greenwood tree followed fast upon desperate remedies. In this woodland story, Hardy first exhibits the fairest qualities of his genius.

Starting point is 13:24:43 It is free from the taint of the Battle Door and Shuttlecock conception of man and the almighty something in the clutch of which he wriggles. It is an idol of the fields. That wonderful grasp of rural life which marks Hardy out from his contemporaries and leaks him at times with Shakespeare, is here shown in its fullness. The smell of the primeval earth is here. Between Hardy and the rustic, there is a living bond. Few authors have been able to do as he has done,

Starting point is 13:25:14 to depict Hodge in his native fields in such a manner that the humorous aspect of the picture will be most apparent. Hardy's peasantry say nothing, which is consciously witty. His art has discovered the unconscious humor of their homely talk. The serenade of the church choir in Under the Greenwood Tree, the gossip of the rustics opening a vault in a pair of blue eyes, are rich in this elemental humor. So talk the clowns of Shakespeare.

Starting point is 13:25:45 Granford Cantle is linked with Dogberry, yet the clowns of Hardy have worldly wisdom of their own. In the return of the native, the question of the advisability of churchgoing is discussed by the natives of Edgan Heath. "'I ain't been there in three years,' said Humphrey, "'for I'm so mortal sleepy of a Sunday, "'and tis so mortal far to get there,

Starting point is 13:26:08 "'and when you do get there to such a mortal poor chance "'that you'll be chosen for up above, "'when so many baint, "'that I abide at home and don't go at all. "'Here are a few observations on dancing. "'You be bound to dance at Christmas "'because it's the time of the year. "'You must dance at weddings

Starting point is 13:26:27 "'because it is the time of life. "'At christening's, folks will even smuggle in a reel or two, if tis no further on than the first or second child. And this is not naming the songs you've got to sing. For my part, I like a good Hardy funeral as well as anything. You've had splendid victuals and drink as at other parties, and even better, and don't wear your legs to stumps and talking over a poor fellow's ways as it do to stand up in hornpipes. In a pair of blue eyes, Hardy's third novel, he passes under the third novel. He passes under the domination of one aspect of life which has impressed him most forcibly.

Starting point is 13:27:06 Little Elfried, the blue-eyed heroine, the dainty child of the hills, formed by nature for tenderness and joy, is unlucky enough to have been beloved, before the story opens, by a village youth in her father's parish. She was not altogether unconscious of his far-off worship. She led him on a little. Through that slight girlish concession to a passing coquetry, she blighted. her life. Her punishment is out of all proportion to her offense. The youth pines away and dies. His mother becomes the active enemy of Elfried. She blackens a thoughtless adventure of the girls with a subsequent lover into a sin, and by means of this scandal alienates forever the one

Starting point is 13:27:49 man above all others whom Elfried really loves. She and her turn tightens the miserable tangle of affairs by an over-exaggeration of her imprudence. She makes a mistake, of a schoolgirl and is punished for the sins of a woman. In the return of the native, it is a hero who plays this uneven game with chance, and chance, as so often happens in Hardy's novels, takes the form of a woman. It is Eustacia Vi, with pagan eyes full of nocturnal mysteries, who leads Climb Yield Bright into the wilderness of love, stripped of his ambitions. Throw a woman into this bargaining matter of life and its intricacies are increased tenfold

Starting point is 13:28:33 might be Hardy's motto in the treatment of his dainty heroines. And here a word may be said concerning these heroines. Hardy's women are even more real than his men. He understands woman nature, or rather the nature of the eternal woman, as opposed to the woman, who is an artificial product of a period or of a system. Sue and Jude the Obscure is one of the striking exceptions to this rule. She is a type of the over-civilized neurotic female who has unholy shivers over nature's pure ordinance of marriage.

Starting point is 13:29:09 Happily, she has no predecessors. She has little in common with the warm, bright Beth Sheba, with a tender, fair Lady Constantine, with demure little Anne, with a quaint and gentle Elizabeth Jane, with Elfrey, or with a frankly human group of noble dames. Hardy's women are always lovable, and because they are so, they make men more or less irresponsible, and thus add to the confusion, the moral disorder, of which Hardy sees so much in the working out of character.

Starting point is 13:29:43 In two on a tower, Lady Constantine draws the eyes of the boy astronomer from the stars to gaze into her own. She enters his life only to render his primitive, of austere devotion to science forever impossible. Eustacia of I leads climb Yield Bright, a devious dance in the direction of nowhere. Jude is purloined from a possible Oxford career, first by Arabella, then by Sue. But women are not altogether to blame for the mischief, which is always brewing in Hardy's novels. The mayor of Castabridge is the story of a man hampered by himself. In a fit of drunkenness, he sells his wife and child to the highest bitter.

Starting point is 13:30:27 For this hour of dissipation, he pays a lifetime of struggle and remorse. The irony of circumstance is ever present in Hardy's portrayal of the ambitions and good intentions of men and women. Their hopes and fears, so blind and yet so sweet, have always death about them to Hardy, the trickery of death, its hideous surprises, its untimely interventions. In life's little ironies, a middle-aged man, laboring under the delusion that marriage can patch up or a wrong done to a woman,

Starting point is 13:31:02 heroically resolves to take this step after many years of cowardice. His melodramatic self-sacrifice to the woman once sacrificed to him is turned by the irony of circumstance into mere clumsiness since his appearance in a neglected little family ruins the chances of his daughter to make a match of smug respectability. In fellow townsmen, one of the Wessex tales, Lucy Savo, a middle-aged widow, says no to the man who has loved her and waited for her through many years because she does not think at good form to say yes at once.

Starting point is 13:31:39 She sends a note after him, however, asking him to call again, but he has taken her at her word and has left the town forever. such an incident has a marked resemblance to certain incidents of real life. Hardy has a courage always to tell a thing as it really happened, not as weak-hearted humanity, would like it to happen. In Tass, Hardy has written the modern classic of misfortune. In Tass, the finest and most characteristic qualities of his art are focused. In the portrayal of this primitive tragedy, this spirit-rending story of a girl's struggle with destiny, hardiest put forth his consummate effort.

Starting point is 13:32:21 In test, the Calvinistic idea of fate, predestination, the treacherous power outside of ourselves, which makes for confusion, as opposed to the rational Greek idea of pursuing punishment for sins committed. In test, this Calvinistic idea receives its finished embodiment. The subtle poison of the book lies in the false theory

Starting point is 13:32:43 which actuated its production, not in the working out of it. theory. Tess is a pure woman. The defiant subtitle is unnecessary. Only the inexperience would wag their heads dubiously over it as they read the tale in sheltered and respectable parlors. Hardy, to the contrary, it is society, not the Almighty, which is to blame for the moral gauhery for the malignant blunders which entrap tests. Nature is non-moral. She herself would have put no obstacles in a way of the recuperation of this fair-souled, high-minded country lass, knocked into the mud by a lustful hoof. The virginal spirit of the maiden would have regained

Starting point is 13:33:28 the birthright violently snatched from her if conventional opinion in the form of Angel Claire had not intervened. This young man, half seraph, half prig, meets Tess at a dairy, miles away from the scene of her trouble. He is a gentleman's son, and the gentle nature in him is drawn to this rare wild flower sprung from the forgotten graves of the Duberville Knights. He loves the maiden Tess. On their marriage day, he confesses a certain folly of his, a three days unholy fever with an unworthy woman. Tess gives back confession for confession. Claire, under the spell of false tradition, throws her from the heights which she has regained into the limbo of the hopeless.

Starting point is 13:34:14 He cannot separate her body from her soul. He, the deliberate sinner, passes judgment on her the sinned against. Rejected by love itself as unclean, test drifts on to her tragic doom. The mercifulness of nature and of God are alike unknown to her, her cases against man, in tests hardy as perhaps unconsciously stigmatized the man-made moral order. The soil which smells of grass and flowers under the greenwood tree in Jude the obscure sends up a sour odor to the nostrils. If Tess is the classic of the unlucky, Jude is the classic of the neurotic woman. The hero has, after all, little to do with the working out of the story.

Starting point is 13:35:04 His part is to a great degree passive. Like certain other heroes of Hardy, he is born under an evil star. His boyish ambition to become a student at Oxford is thwarted continually by the assertions of his lower nature, but, and this again is essentially in the spirit of Hardy, accident, chance, take sides with his baser elements. He is tricked into marriage with the sensual arabella. He has a misfortune to run across his cousin Sue at a time when it is most necessary for the accomplishment of his purpose that he should enter into the sexless temper of the scholar. Sue is intellectual, pseudo-passionate, morbidly pure.

Starting point is 13:35:46 She is a type of the modern woman whose intellect is developed at the expense of her earthy nature. The awful innocence of Sue throughout the book is the innocence of the bold thinker whose flights of fancy reach to Mars, but who know nothing of the soil underfoot. It is futile to call the actions of the two bewildered children Jude and Sue immoral. a new adjective will have to be evolved to meet their essentially modern case. Jude is the book of an era where between one and one there is always a shadowy third. Hardy's novels of Rustick Life will give probably the most pleasure to coming generations. The chapters of the dairy life in Tess, the idol of the lush green meadows,

Starting point is 13:36:32 will save her tragedy from oblivion. Far from the maddening crowd, with its troop of men and maidens of the fields, will give solace when a leodician is well-migh forgotten. The trumpet major and the return of the native are revivingly sweet and clean with their breath of the sea and the heather-scented wind of the moors. In hearty stories of his beloved Wessex country, there is the perennial refreshment of nature. His peasantry are primitive, their quaint humor,

Starting point is 13:37:04 their wise saws, their hold upon Mother Earth, might have been characteristic of the homely parents of the race in the first dawn of the world. They are representative of a magnificent antiquity. Hardy is as much in sympathy with the natural world as he is with those men and women who seem a part of the soil on which they live. He has a love of genius for the open air.

Starting point is 13:37:31 Nature is a perpetual background for the scenes of his novels. and, as in Shakespeare, the aspect of nature reflects the moral atmosphere of the scene. The happiest time of Tessa's life begins in the flowery months of May and June. Her desolate existence, after she has been forsaken by her husband, coincides with the bitter, barren wintertime upon the upland moors. Elfrid's love story seems well-nigh a part of the processes of nature in its interchange of storm and sunshine. The majority of Hardy's people are near to nature, sensitive, passionate, lovers of the sea and of the heath.

Starting point is 13:38:11 His genius comprehends a once a natural, primitive man and man the product of modern hypercultivation. In this wideness of human view lies perhaps his surest claim to greatness. Anna MacLear Scholl End of Section 27, read by Bryce Cries. 28 of Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Volume 17. This is a Libravox recording. All Libravox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit Libavox.org. Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Volume 17.

Starting point is 13:39:02 The Melstock Waits From Under the Greenwood Tree by Thomas Hardy. Shortly after 10 o'clock, the single. boys arrived at the Tranter's house, which was invariably the place of meeting, and preparations were made for the start. The older men and musicians wore thick coats with stiff perpendicular collars and colored handkerchiefs wound round and round the neck till the end came to hand, overall which they just showed their ears and noses like people looking over a wall. The remainder, stalwart, ruddy men and boys were mainly dressed in snow-white smock-frocks,

Starting point is 13:39:40 embroidered upon the shoulders and breasts and ornamental forms of hearts, diamonds, and zigzags. The cider mug was emptied for the ninth time. The music books were arranged, and the pieces finally decided upon. The boys in the meantime put the old horn lanterns in order, cut candles to short lengths to fit the lanterns, and a thin fleece of snow having fallen since the early part of the evening. Those who had no leggings went to the stable and wound wisps of hay round their ankles, to keep the insidious flakes from the interior of their boots.

Starting point is 13:40:14 Melstock was a parish of considerable acreage, the hamlets composing it lying at a much greater distance from each other than is ordinarily the case. Hence several hours were consumed in playing and singing within hearing of every family, even if but a single air were bestowed on each. There was East Melstock, the main village. Half a mile from this were the church and the vicarage, called West Millstock, and originally the most thickly populated portion. A mile northeast lay the hamlet of Lugate, where the Tranter lived,

Starting point is 13:40:49 and at other points knots of cottages besides solitary farmsteads and dairies. Old William Dewey, with a violin cello, played the bass, his grandson Dick, the treble violin, and Rubin and Michael Mail, the tenor and second violins, respectively. The singers consisted of four men and seven violins, seven boys, upon whom devolved the task of carrying and attending to the lanterns and holding the books open for the players. Directly, music was the theme, old William Ever and instinctively came to the front. Now, my neighbors, he said as they all went out one by one at the door, he himself holding

Starting point is 13:41:28 at ajar and regarding them with a critical face as they passed, like a shepherd counting out a sheep. You two counterboys keep your ears open to Michael's fingering, and don't you go straying into the treble part along O Dick and his set as you did last year, and mind this especially when we be in a rise and hail. Billy Chamlin, don't you sing quite so raving mad as you feign would? And all of you, whatever you do, keep from making a great scuffle on the ground when we go in at people's gates, but go quietly so as to strike up all of a sudden, like spirits. Farmer Ledlow's first? Farmer Ledlow's first, the rest as usual.

Starting point is 13:42:10 And Voss, said the Tranter, terminatively. You keep house here till about half-past two, then heat the methaglin and cider in the warmer you'll find turned upon the copper, and bring it with the victuals to church porch as the snow. Just before the clock struck twelve they lighted the lanterns and started. The moon in her third quarter had risen since the snowstorm, but the dense accumulations of snow cloud weakened her power to a faint twilight, which was rather pervasive of the landscape than traceable to the sky. The breeze had gone down, and the rustle of their feet and tones of their speech echoed with an alert rebound from every post, boundary stone, and ancient wall they passed,

Starting point is 13:42:52 even where the distance of the echo's origin was less than a few yards. Beyond their own slight noises nothing was to be heard, save the occasional howl foxes in the direction of Yalbury Wood, or their brush of a rabbit along the grass now and then as it scampered out of their way. Most of the outlying homesteads and hamlets had been visited by about two o'clock. They then passed across the home plantation toward the main village. Pursuing no recognized track, great care was necessary in walking, lest their faces should come in contact with the low-hanging boughs of the old trees, which in many spots formed dense undergrowth of interlaced branches. Times have changed from the times they used to be, said Mail, regarding nobody, can tell

Starting point is 13:43:39 what interesting old panoramas from an inward eye, and letting his outward glance rest on the ground because it was as convenient a position as any. People don't care much about us now. I've been thinking we must be almost the last left in the country of the old string players, barrel organs, and they next door to them, that you blow with your foot, have come in terribly of late years. Ah, said Bowman, shaking his head, and old William on seeing him did the same thing. More's the pity, replied another. Time was, long and merry ago now, when not one of the varmints had to be heard of, but it served

Starting point is 13:44:19 some of the choirs right. They should have stuck to strings as we did, and kept out of clarinets and done away with serpents. If you thrive in musical religion, stick to strings, says I. Strings are well enough, as far as that goes, said Mr. Spinks. There's worse things than serpents, said Mr. Penny. Old things pass away, it is true, but a serpent was a good old note. A deep, rich note was the serpent. Clarinets, however, be bad at all times, said Michael Mell.

Starting point is 13:44:48 One Christmas, years are gone now, years, I went the rounds with the Beach Choir. "'Twas a hard frosty night, and the keys of all the clarinets froze. Ah, they did freeze, so that was like drawing a cork every time a key was opened. The players all of them had to go into hedgers and ditchers, chimney-corner, and thaw their clarinets every now and then. An icicle or spit hung down from the end of every man's clarinet, a span long, and as to fingers, well there, if you'll believe me, we had no fingers at all, to our knowledge. I can well bring back to my mine," said Mr. Penny. What I said to poor Joseph Rime, who took the tribal part in High Story Church for two-and-forty

Starting point is 13:45:31 year, when they thought of having clarinets there. Joseph, I said, says I, depend upon it. If so you be have them tooting clarinets, you'll spoil the whole set-out. Clarinets were not made for the service of Providence, you can see it by looking at him," I said. And what came on it? Well, my dear souls, the person set up a barrel organ on his own account. within two years of the time I spoke, and the old choir went to nothing. As far as look is concerned, said the Tranter,

Starting point is 13:46:02 I don't for my part see that the fiddle is much nearer heaven than a clarinet to spire there's always a rakeish, scampish continents about a fiddle that seems to say the wicked one had a hand in making on it, while angels may be supposed to play clarinets in heaven, or some would like them, if you may believe pictures. "'Rober Penny, you were in the right,' broke in the eldest Dewey. "'They should have stuck the strings. "'Your brass man is brass, well and good. "'Your reed man is reed, well and good. "'Your percussion man is percussion, good again.

Starting point is 13:46:36 "'But I don't care who hears me say it. "'Nothing will speak to your heart with the sweetness of the man of strings.' "'Strings forever,' said little Jimmy. "'Strings alone would have held their ground against all the newcomers in creation.' "'True, true,' said Bowman. But the clarinets was death. Death they was, said Mr. Penny. And harmoniums, William continued in a louder voice

Starting point is 13:46:58 and getting excited by these signs of approval. Harmoniums and barrel organs. Ah, and groans from Spinks. Be miserable. What shall I call them? Miserable. Sinners suggested Jimmy, who made large strides like the men and did not lag behind like the other little boys.

Starting point is 13:47:18 Miserable machines for such a divine thing as music. right william and so they be said the choir with earnest unanimity by this time they were crossing to a wicket in the direction of the school which standing on a slight eminence on the opposite side of a cross-lane now rose in unvarying and dark flatness against the sky the instruments were retuned and all the band entered the enclosure and joined by old william to keep upon the grass number seventy-eight he softly gave out as they formed browned in a semicircle, the boys opening the lanterns to get clearer light and directing their rays on the books, then passed forth into the quiet night an ancient and well-worn hymn, embodying Christianity in words peculiarly fitting the simple and honest hearts of the quaint characters who sang them so earnestly. Remember Adam's fall, O thou man. Remember Adams fall from heaven to hell? Remember Adam's fall

Starting point is 13:48:22 How he have condemned all In hell perpetual Therefore to dwell Remember God's goodness O thou man Remember God's goodness His promise made Remember God's goodness

Starting point is 13:48:38 He sent his son sinless Our ails for to redress Our hearts to aid In Bethlehem he was born O thou man In Bethlehem he was born for mankind's sake. In Bethlehem he was born Christmas Day in the morn. Our Savior did not scorn our faults to take.

Starting point is 13:49:04 Give thanks to God all way, O thou man. Give thanks to God away with heartfelt joy. Give thanks to God all way on this our joyful day. Let all men sing and sing. say, holy, holy. Having concluded the last note, they listened for a minute or two, but found that no sound issued from the schoolhouse. Forty breaths, and then, oh, what unbounded goodness, number of 59, said William. This was duly gone through, and no notice would ever seem to be taken of the performance. Surely tisn't an empty house as befell us in the year 39 and 43,

Starting point is 13:49:47 said old Dewey, with much disappointment. Perhaps you just come from some noble city and sneers at our doings, the Tranter whispered. Odd rabbit her, said Mr. Penny, with an annihilating look at the corner of the school chimney. I don't quite stomach her, if this is it. Your plain music well done is as worthy as your other sort done bad, I believe souls, so say I. Forty breasts and then the last, said the leader, authoritatively. rejoice ye tennis of the earth number sixty four at the close waiting yet another minute he said in a clear loud voice as he had said in the village at that hour and season for the previous forty years a merry christmas to ye when the expected stillness consequent upon the exclamation had nearly died out of them all an increasing light made itself visible as one of the windows of the upper floor it came so close to the blind that the exact position of the flame could be perceived from the outside

Starting point is 13:50:50 remaining steady for an instant the blind went upward from before it revealing to thirty concentrated eyes a young girl framed as a picture by the window architrave and unconsciously illuminating her continents to a vivid brightness by a candle she held in her left hand, close to her face, her right hand being extended to the side of the window. She was wrapped in a white robe of some kind, while down her shoulders fell a twining profusion of marvelously rich hair in a wild disorder which proclaimed it to be only during the invisible hours of the night that such a condition was discoverable. Her bright eyes were looking into the gray world outside with a little. and uncertain expression, oscillating between courage and shyness, which as she recognized

Starting point is 13:51:39 a semicircular group of dark forms gathered before her, transformed itself into a pleasant resolution. Opening the window, she said, lightly and warmly, thank you, singers, thank you. Together went the window quickly and quietly, and the blind started downward on its return to its place. Her fair forehead and eyes vanished, her little mouth, her nose. neck and shoulders, all of her, then the spot of candlelight shone nebulously as before, then it moved away. How pretty! exclaimed Dick Dewey. If she'd been real waxwork, she couldn't have been calmed here, said Michael Mail.

Starting point is 13:52:19 As nearer thing to a spiritual vision as ever I wish to see, said Tranter, Dewey, fervently. Oh, such I never, never see, said Leif. All the rest, after clearing their throats and adjusting their hats, agreed that such a sight was worth singing for. Now to Farmer Shiner's and then replenish our insides, father, said the Tranter. Well, all my heart, said Old William, shouldering his bass viol. Farmer Shiner's was a queer lump of a house, standing at the corner of a lane that ran obliquely to the principal thoroughfare. The upper windows were much wider than they were high, and this feature, together with a broad bay window where the door might have been expected,

Starting point is 13:53:03 Gave it by day the aspect of a human continent's turned askance and wearing a sly and wicked leer. Tonight nothing was visible but the outline of the roof upon the sky. The front of this building was reached and their preliminaries arranged as usual. Forty breaths and number 32, behold the morning star, said Old William. They had reached the end of the second verse and the fiddlers were doing the up bow stroke previously to pouring forth the opening-courtheworth. of the third verse, when, without a light appearing or any signal being given, a roaring voice exclaimed, "'Shut up!

Starting point is 13:53:41 Don't make your blaring row here! A fellow with a headache enough to split like's a quiet night!' Slam went the window. "'Hello! That's an ugly blow for we artists,' said the Tranter in a keenly appreciative voice, and turning to his companions. "'Finish the Carol, all who will be friends of harmony,' said Old William, commandingly, and they continued to the end.

Starting point is 13:54:05 Forty breasts and number 19, said William firmly. Give it him well, the choir can't be insulted in this manner. A light now flashed into existence, the window opened, and the farmer stood revealed as one in a terrific passion. Drown him, drown him, the tranter cried, fiddling frantically. Play Fortissommy, and drown is spaking. Fortissomy, said Michael Mayle, and the music and singing wax so loud that it was impossible

Starting point is 13:54:32 to know what Mr. Shiner had said, was saying, or was about to say, but wildly flinging his arms and body about in the form of capital X's and Wyes, he appeared to utter enough invectives to consign the whole parish to perdition. Very unseemly, very, said Old William, as they retired. Never such a dreadful scene in the whole round of my carol practice, never. And he a churchwarden. Only a drap a drink got into his head, said the Tranter. Man's well enough when he's in his religious frame. He's in his worldly frame now. Must ask him to our bit of a party tomorrow night, I suppose, and so put in in track again. We bear no mortal man ill will. They now crossed 20 acres to proceed to the lower village and met Voss with the hot mead and bread and cheese as they were crossing the churchyard.

Starting point is 13:55:26 This determined them to eat and drink before proceeding further, and they entered the belfry. The lanterns were open and the whole body sat round against the walls on benches and whatever else was available and made a hearty meal. In the pauses of conversation could be heard through the floor overhead a little world of undertones and creeks from the halting clockwork, which never spread further than the tower they were born in, and raised in the more meditative minds the fancy that here lay the direct pathway of time. having done eating and drinking, the instruments were again tuned, and once more the party merged into the night air. The gallery of Melstock Church had a status and sentient of its own. A stranger there was regarded with a feeling, altogether differing from that entertained towards him by the congregation below. Banished from the knave as an intruder whom no originality could make interesting,

Starting point is 13:56:24 he was received above as a curiosity that no unfitness could render dull. The gallery, too, looked down upon and knew the habits of the knave to its remotest peculiarity and had an extensive stock of exclusive information about it, while the nave knew nothing of the gallery people beyond their loud-sounding minims and chest notes. Such topics as the clerk was always chewing tobacco, except at the moment of crime, Amen, that he had a dust-hole in his pew, that during the sermon certain young daughters of the village had left off caring to read anything so mild as the marriage service for some years, and now regularly studied the one which chronologically follows it, that a pair of lovers touched fingers through a knothole between their pews and the manner ordained by their great exemplars, Paramis and Thysby, that Mrs. Ledd though, the farmer's wife, counted her money and reckoned her week's marketing. expenses during the first lesson, all news to those below, were stale subjects here. Old William sat in the center of the front row, his violin cello, between his knees, and two singers on each hand.

Starting point is 13:57:35 Behind him, on the left, came the treble singers and Dick, and on the right the Tranter and the tenors. Farther back was old male, with the altos and supernumeraries. But before they had taken in their places and while they were standing in a circle at the back of the gallery practicing a psalm or two, Dick cast his eyes over his grandfather's shoulder and saw the vision of the past night enter the porch door as pathetically as if she had never been a vision at all. A new atmosphere seemed suddenly to be puffed into the ancient edifice by her movement, which made Dick's body and soul tingle with novel sensations. Directed by Shiner the churchward, she proceeded to the short aisle in the north side of the chancel, a spot now allotted to a throng of Sunday school girls

Starting point is 13:58:23 and distinctly visible from the gallery front by looking under the curve of the furthest arch on that side. Before this moment the church had seemed comparatively empty, now it was thronged, and as Miss Fancy rose from her knees and looked around her for a permanent place in which to deposit herself, finally choosing the remotest corner, Dick began to breathe more freely, the warm new air she had brought with her, to feel rushings of blood, and to have impressions that there was a tie between her and himself visible to all the congregation. Ever afterward, the young man could recollect individually each part of the service of that bright Christmas morning and the minute occurrences which took place as its hours slowly drew along, the duties of that

Starting point is 13:59:11 day dividing themselves by a complete line from the service of other times. The tune, Tuesday that morning essayed remained with him for years, apart from all others, also the text, also the appearance of the layer of dust upon the capitals of the piers, that the holly bow and the chancel archway was hung a little out of the center, all the ideas in short that creep into the mind when reason is only exercising its lowest activity through the eye. By chance or by fate, another young man who attended Melstock Church on that Christmas morning had towards the end of the service the same instinctive perception of an interesting presence in the shape of the same bright maiden, though his emotion reached a far less developed stage. And there was this difference,

Starting point is 13:59:59 too, that the person in question was surprised at his condition and sedulously endeavored to reduce himself to his normal state of mind. He was the young vicar, Mr. Maybold. End of Section 28 read by Bryce Christ. excerpts by thomas hardy part two selection sociability in the malt house from far from the matting crowd gabriel's nose was greeted by an atmosphere laden with the sweet smell of new malt the conversation which seemed to have been concerning the origin of the fire immediately ceased and everyone ocularly criticized him to the degree expressed by contracting the flesh of their foreheads, and looking at him with narrow eyelids, as if he had been a light too strong for their sight. Several exclaimed meditatively after this operation had been completed. Oh, tis the new shepherd, I believe? We thought we heard a handpon about the door for the bobbin, but weren't sure twere not a dead leaf blowed across, said another. Come in, shepherd, sure ye be well. Welcome, though we don't know your name. Gabriel Oak, that's my name, neighbors. The ancient Malmster, sitting in the midst, turned at this,

Starting point is 14:01:59 his turning being as the turning of a rusty crane. That's never Gable Oaks grandson over at Norcombe, he said, as a formula expressive of surprise, which nobody was supposed for a moment to take literally. my father and my grandfather were all the men of the name of Gabriel, said the shepherd placidly. Thought I knowed the man's face as I seed him on the rick, thought I did, and where be you trading out to now, shepherd? I'm thinking about in here, said Mr. Oak. Knowed your grandfather for years and years, continued the Malta.

Starting point is 14:02:42 The words coming forth of their own accord, as if the most of the most. momentum previously imparted had been sufficient. Ah, and did you? Knowed your grandmother, and her too. Likewise, knowed your father when he was a child. Why, my boy, Jacob there, and your father were sworn brothers, that they were sure, weren't ye, Jacob? I, sure, said his son, a young man about sixty-five, with his semi-bald head, and one tooth in the left center of his upper jaw, which made much of itself by standing prominent, like a milestone in a bank. But twas Joe had most to do with him. However, my son William must know the very man afore us, didn't you, Billy? Before you left Narkham? No, twas Andrew,

Starting point is 14:03:39 says Jacob's son, Billy, a child of forty or thereabouts, who manifested the peculiarity. of possessing a cheerful soul in a gloomy body, and whose whiskers were assuming a chinchilla shade here and there. I can mind Andrew, said Oak, as being a man in the place when I was quite a child. I, the other day I and my youngest daughter Liddy were over at my grandson's christening, continued Billy. We were talking about this very family,

Starting point is 14:04:14 and twas only last purification day in this very world, when they used money as gied away to the second-best poor folk. You know, Shepherd, and I can mind the day, because they all had to traips up to the vestry. Yes, this very man's family. Come, Shepherd, and drink. Tis gape and swaller with us, a drop a summit, but not of much account,

Starting point is 14:04:41 said the Malster, removing from the fire his eyes, which were vermilion red and bleared by gazing into it for so many years. Take up the God forgive me, Jacob. See if tis warm, Jacob. Jacob stooped to the God forgive me, which was a two-handled tall mug standing in the ashes, cracked and charred with heat. It was rather furred with extraneous matter about the outside, especially in the crevices of the handle, the innermost curves of which may not have seen daylight for several years by reason of this incrustation thereon, formed of ashes accidentally wedded with cider and baked hard. But to the mind of any sensible drinker, the cup was no worse for that, being incontestably clean on the inside and about the rim. It may be observed that such a class of mug is called a God forgive me in,

Starting point is 14:05:43 weather bray and its vicinity for uncertain reasons, probably because its size makes any given toper feel ashamed of himself when he sees its bottom in drinking it empty. Jacob, on receiving the order to see if the liquor was warm enough, placidly dipped his forefinger into it by way of thermometer, and having pronounced it nearly of the proper degree, raised the cup, and very civilly attempted to dust some of the ashes from the bottom with the skirt of his smock-frock, because Shepherd Oak was a stranger. A clean cup for the shepherd, said the maltster commandingly. No, not at all, said Gabriel, in a reproving tone of considerateness.

Starting point is 14:06:33 I never fuss about dirt in its pure state, and when I know what sort it is. taking the mug he drank an inch or more from the depths of its contents and duly passed it to the next man oh i wouldn't think of given such trouble to neighbors in washing up when there are so much work to be done in the world already continued oak in a moister tone after recovering from the stoppage of breath which is occasioned by pulls at large mugs a right sensible man said jacob true true it can't be gain said observed a brisk young man mark clark by name a genial and pleasant gentleman whom to meet anywhere in your travels was to know to know was to drink with and to drink with was unfortunately to pay for "'And here's a mouthful of bread and bacon "'that misses of scent, Shepherd. "'The cider will go down better with a bit of vectuals. "'Don't you chalk quite close, Shepherd, "'for I let the bacon fall in the road outside

Starting point is 14:07:44 "'as I was bringing it along, "'and maybe tis rather gritty. "'There, tis clean dirt, "'and we all know what that is, as you say, "'and you baint a particular man we see, shepherd.' true true not at all said the friendly oak don't let your teeth quite meet and you won't feel the sandinness at all ah tis wonderful what can be done by contrivance my own mind exactly neighbor oh he's his grandfather's own grandson his grandfather were just such a nice unparticular man said the maltster drink and refrain drink bank magnanimously said jan cogan a person who held st simonian notions of share and share alike where liquor was concerned as the vessel showed signs of approaching him in its gradual revolution among them

Starting point is 14:08:47 having at this moment reached the end of a wistful gaze into mid-air henry did not refuse he was a man of more than middle age with eyebrows high up in his forehead who laid it down that the law of the world was bad, with a long-suffering look through his listeners at the world alluded to, as it presented itself to his imagination. He always signed his name, Annery, strenuously insisting upon that spelling, and if any passing schoolmaster ventured to remark that the second E was superfluous and old-fashioned,

Starting point is 14:09:25 he received the reply that H-E-N-E-E, was the name he was christened and the name he would stick to, in the tone of one to whom orthographical differences were matters which had a great deal to do with personal character. Mr. Jan Coggin, who had passed the cup to Ennery, was a crimson man with a spacious countenance and private glimmer in his eye, whose name had appeared on the marriage register of Weatherbury and neighboring parishes as best man and chief witness in countless unions of the previous twenty years. He also very frequently filled the post of head godfather in baptisms of the subtly jovial kind. Come, our Clark, come, there is plenty more in the barrel, said Jan.

Starting point is 14:10:20 Aye, that I will, tis my only doctor, replied Mr. Clark, who, twenty-one. years younger than Jan Coggin revolved in the same orbit. He secreted mirth on all occasions for special discharge at popular parties. Why, Joseph Poor Grass, he hadn't had a drop,

Starting point is 14:10:42 said Mr. Coggin to a self-conscious man in the background, thrusting the cup towards him. Such a modest man as he is, said Jacob Smallbury. Why ye've hardly had strength of awe enough to look in our young Mrs. face, so I ear her Joseph.

Starting point is 14:11:01 Oh, looked at Joseph Porgrass with pitying reproach. No, I've hardly looked at her at all, simpered Joseph, reducing his body smaller whilst talking, apparently from a meek sense of undue prominence. And when I see her, twas nothing but blushes with me. Poor feller, said Mr. Clark, "'Tis a curious nature for a man,' said Jan Coggin. "'Yes,' continued Joseph Porgras,

Starting point is 14:11:33 "'his shyness which was so painful as a defect, "'filling him with a mild complacency now that it was regarded "'as an interesting study. "'Toyer blush, blush with me every minute of the time "'when she was speaking to me? "'I believe ye, Joseph Pourgrass, "'for we'll know ye to be a very very very time, a bashful man.

Starting point is 14:11:56 Tis a awkward gift for a man, poor soul, said the monster, and how long have you suffered from it, Joseph? Oh, ever since I was a boy, yes, mother was concerned to her heart about it, yes, but twas all not. Did you ever go into the world to try and stop it, Joseph Porgrass? Oh, I, tried all sorts a company. They took me to Green Hill Fair and into a great large Jerry-Go-Nimble show, where there were women folk riding round, standing upon horses with hardly anything on but their smocks,

Starting point is 14:12:36 but it didn't cure me a morsel. And then I was put errant man at the women's skiddle alley, at the back of the tailor's arms in Castorbridge. It was a horrible evil situation and a very curious place for a good man. i had to stand and look baddy people in the face from morning till night but twas no use i was just as bad as ever after all blushes have been in the family for generations there tis a happy providence that i be no worse and i feel the blessing true said jacob smallberry deepening his thoughts to a profounder view of the subject tis a thought to look at that ye might have be amorous but even as you be tis a very bad affliction for ye joseph for ye see shepherd though tis very well for a woman dang it all tis awkward for a man like him poor feller he appealed to the shepherd by a feeling glance tis "'Tis,' said Gabriel, recovering from a meditation.

Starting point is 14:13:48 "'Yes, very awkward for the man.' "'Aye, and he's very timid, too,' observed Jan Coggin. "'Once he had been working late at Yelberry Bottom, "'and it had a drap of drink, and lost his way "'as he was coming home along through Yelburywood, "'didn't he master, poor grass?' "'No, no, no, not that story,' expostulated the modest man, forcing a laugh to bury his concern.

Starting point is 14:14:18 "'And so lost himself quite,' continued Mr. Coggin, with an impassive face, implying that a true narrative, like time and tide, must run its course and would respect no man. And as he was coming along in the middle of the night, much of feared and not able to find his way out of the tree's no-how, cried out, man a lost, man a lost. A owl in a tree happened to be crying, woo, woo, woo, as owls do, you know, shepherd.

Starting point is 14:14:55 Gabriel nodded. And Joseph all in a tremble said, Joseph poor grass of Weatherbury, sir. No, no, now, that's too much, said the timid man, becoming a man of brazen courage all of a sudden. I didn't say, sir, I'll take my oath, I didn't say Joseph Poor Grass of Weatherbury, Sir. No, no, what's right is right, and I never said, sir, to the bird,

Starting point is 14:15:25 knowing very well that no man of a gentleman's rank would be hollerin there at that time a night. Joseph Poor Grass of Weatherbury, that's every word I said, and I shouldn't have said that, if it hadn't been for keeper days methiglin. There twas a merciful thing attended where it did. The question of which was right, being tacitly waived by the company, Jan went on meditatively. And he's the fearfulest man, bain she, Joseph.

Starting point is 14:15:59 Aye, another time you were lost by Laman Down Gate, weren't he, Joseph? I was, replied poor grass, as if there were some conditions too serious even for modesty to remember itself under, this being one. Yes, that were the middle of the night too. The gate would not open, try how he would, and knowing there was the devil's hand in it, he kneeled down. Aye, said Joseph, acquiring confidence from the warmth of the fire, the cider,

Starting point is 14:16:33 and a perception of the narrative capabilities of the experience. alluded to. My art died within me that time, but I kneeled down and said the Lord's Prayer, and then the belief right through, and then the Ten Commandments in earnest prayer. But no, the gate wouldn't open,

Starting point is 14:16:55 and then I went on with dearly beloved brethren, and thinks I this makes four, and tis all I know out of book, and if this don't do it, nothing will. And I'm a lot of, lost men. Well, when I got to say in after me, I rose from my knees and found the gate would open, yes, neighbors, the gate opened the same as ever. A meditation on the obvious inference was indulged in by all, and during its continuance each directed his vision into the ash pit,

Starting point is 14:17:30 which glowed like a desert in the tropics under a vertical sun, shaping their eyes long and liny, partly because of the light, partly from the depth of the subject discussed. Gabriel broke the silence. What sort of a place is this to live at? And what sort of a mistress is she to work under? Gabriel's bosom thrilled gently, as he thus slipped under the notice of the assembly the innermost subject of his heart. We do no little of her, nothing. She only showed herself a few days ago. Her uncle was took bad, and the doctor was called with his worldwide skill, but he couldn't save the man. As I take it, she's going to keep on the farm. That's about the shape of it, I believe, said Jan Coggin. I tis a very good family. I de soon be

Starting point is 14:18:26 under him as under one near and there. Her uncle was a very fair sort of men. Did you know in shepherd, a bachelor man. Not at all. I used to go to his house, a court in my first wife, Charlotte, who was his dairy-maid. Well, a very good-hearted man, where Farmer Everdeen, and I being a respectable young fellow, was allowed to call and see her and drink as much ale as I liked, but not to carry away any outside my skin, I mean, of course. I, aye, I, Jan Coggin, we know. We know your man'n'n'n. And so, you see, t'was beautiful ale, and I wish to value his kindness as much as I could, and not to be so ill-mannered as to drink only a thimbleful, which would have been insult in the man's generosity. True, Master Coggin, twould so, corroborated Mark Clark,

Starting point is 14:19:25 and so I used to eat a lot of salt fish aforegoing, and then by the time I got there, I was as dry as a lime basket, so thoroughly dry, that that ale would slip down, heart would slip down sweet, happy times, heavenly times, such lovely drunks as I used to have at that house. You can mind, Jacob, you used to go with me sometimes? I can, I can, said Jacob. That one too, that we had at Buck's head on a white Monday was a pretty tip. "'Twas, but for a drunk of really a noble class "'that brought you no nearer to the dark man "'than you were afore you begun.

Starting point is 14:20:13 "'There was none like those in Farmer Everdean's kitchen. "'Not a single damned aloud. "'No, not a bear, poor one, "'even at the most cheerful moment "'when all were blindest, "'though the good old word of sin "'thrown in here and there at such times "'is a great relief to a merry soul.

Starting point is 14:20:33 "'True,' said the maltster, "'nator requires her swearing at the regular times, "'or she's not herself, "'and unholy exclamations is a necessity of life.' "'Gabriel thought fit to change the subject. "'You must be a very aged man, Malter, "'to have sons growed up so old and ancient,' he remarked. "'Father so old that I can't mind his age,

Starting point is 14:21:02 "'can ye father?' interposed Jacob. And he's growed terrible crooked too lately. Jacob continued, surveying his father's figure, which was rather more bowed than his own. Really one may say that father there is three double. Crooked folk will last a long while, said the maltster grimly and not in the best humor.

Starting point is 14:21:27 Shepherd would like to hear the pedigree of your life, Father, wouldn't she, Shepherd? "'I that I should,' said Gabriel, with the heartiness of a man who had longed to hear it for several months. "'What may your age be, Malter?' The Malmterer cleared his throat in an exaggerated form for emphasis, and, elongating his gaze, to the remotest point of the ash pit, said, In the slow speech justifiable, when the importance of a subject is so generally felt, that any mannerism must be tolerated in getting at it.

Starting point is 14:22:06 Well, I don't mind the year I were born in, but perhaps I can reckon up the places I've lived at, and so get it that way. I bowed at upper long puddle across there, nodding to the north till I were eleven. I bowed seven at Kingsbury, nodding to the east, where I took to Malton.

Starting point is 14:22:33 I went there from to Norcom, and malted there two and twenty years, and two and twenty years I was there, turn a-poen and harvesting. Aye, I know that old place, Norcom, years afore you were thought of Master Oak. Oak smiled a corroboration of the fact. Then I malted at Durnover four-year,

Starting point is 14:22:58 and four-year turn up Owen, and I was fourteen times eleven months at Mill Pond St. Jude's, nodding northwest by north. Oh, twills wouldn't tire me for more than eleven months at a time, to keep me from being chargeable to the parish. If so be, I was disabled. Then I was three-year at Malesstock, and I've been here one-and-thirty-year.

Starting point is 14:23:26 Come, Candlemas? How much is it? that hundred and seventeen chuckled another old gentleman given to mental arithmetic and little conversation who had hitherto sat unobserved in a corner well then that's my age said the malts stir emphatically oh no father said jacob your turn of owen were in the summer and your moulton in the winter of the same years and you don't ought to count both father. Chalk it all. I lived through the summers, didn't I? That's my question. I suppose you'll say next, I be in no age at all to speak of. Sure we shan't, said Gabriel soothingly.

Starting point is 14:24:15 You be a very old-aged person, Malter, attested Jan Coggin also soothingly. We all know that, and you must have a wonderful, talented constitution, to be able to live so long, mustn't he neighbors? True, true, ye must, Malter, wonderful, said the meeting unanimously. The Malta, being now pacified, was even generous enough to voluntarily disparage in a slight degree the virtue of having lived a great many years, by mentioning that the cup they were drinking out of, was three years older than he. While the cup was being examined, the end of Gabriel Oaks flute became visible over his smock-frock pocket, and Enery Frey exclaimed,

Starting point is 14:25:07 "'Surely, Shepherd, I seed you blown into a great flute by now at Castorbridge?' "'You did,' said Gabriel, blushing faintly. "'I've been in great trouble, neighbours, and was driven to it. "'I used not to be so poor as I be now.' never mind art said mark clark you should take it careless like shepherd and your time will come but we could thank ye for a tune if you bein too tired neither drum nor trumpet have i heard this christmas said jan cogan come raise a tune master oak i that i will said gabriel readily pulling out his flute and putting it together a poor tool neighbor but such as I can do ye shall have and welcome. Oak then struck up Jockey to the fair

Starting point is 14:26:03 and played that sparkling melody three times through, accenting the notes in the third round in a most artistic and lively manner, by bending his body in small jerks and tapping with his foot to beat time. "'He can blow the flute very well that can,' said a young married man, who, having no individual,

Starting point is 14:26:25 was known as Susan Tall's husband. He continued admiringly, "'Oid his leaf has not be able to blow into a flute as well as that. He's a clever man, and tis a true comfort for us to have such a shepherd,' murmured Joseph Pourgrass in a soft cadence. We ought to feel real Thanksgiving that he's not a player of bad dee songs instead of these merry tunes, for twid have been in just as easy for God to have made the shepherd a loose low man, a man of inequity, so to speak

Starting point is 14:27:02 as what he is. Yes, for our wives and daughters' sakes, we should feel real thanksgiven. True, true, real thanksgiven, dashed in Mark Clark conclusively, not feeling it to be of any consequence to his opinion that he had only heard about a word and three-quarters of what Joseph had said. Yes, added Joseph, beginning to feel like a man in the Bible. For evil do thrive so in these times that he may be as much deceived in the clannist-shaved and whitest-shirted men as in the raggedest tramp upon the turnpike

Starting point is 14:27:44 if I may term it so. I, I can mind your face now, Shepherd, said Henry Frey, criticizing Gabriel with misty, as he entered upon his second tune yes now i see ye blowing into the flute i know ye to be the same man i see play at castorbridge for your mouth were scrimped up and your eyes are staring out like a strangled man's just as they be now "'Tis a pity that playing the flute should make a man look such a scarecrow,' observed Mr. Mark Clark, with additional criticism of Gabriel's countenance, the latter person jerking out with the ghastly grimace required by the instrument, the chorus of Dame Durden.

Starting point is 14:28:33 "'Twas Mole and Bet and Dal and Kate and Dorothy Dragletale.' "'I hope you don't mind that young man Mark Clark's bad man, manners in name in your features, whispered Joseph to Gabriel privately. No, not at all, said Mr. Oak. For by nature ye be a very handsome man, shepherd, continued Joseph Porgrass with winning suavity. Aye, that ye be, shepherd, said the company. Thank you very much, said Oak, in the modest tone good manners demanded,

Starting point is 14:29:11 thinking, however, that he would never let Bathsheba see him playing the flute. Selection, the Grave-Diggers, by Thomas Hardy, from a pair of blue eyes. All eyes were turned to the entrance, as Stephen spoke, and the ancient-mannered conclave scrutinized him inquiringly. "'Why, tis our Stephen,' said his father, rising from his seat, and still retaining the frothy mug in his left hand, he swung forward his right for a grasp. Your mother as expecting ye, thought you were to come a foredark,

Starting point is 14:29:50 but you'll wait and go home with me. I have all but done for the day, and was going directly. Yes, Tis, Master Steffy, sure enough. Glad to see you so soon again, Master Smith, said Martin Canister, chasing the gladness expressed in his words, by a strict neutrality of countenance, in order to harmonize the feeling as much as possible with the solemnity of a family vault.

Starting point is 14:30:19 The same to you, Martin and you, William, said Stephen, nodding around to the rest, who, having their mouths full of bread and cheese, were of necessity compelled to reply merely by compressing their eyes two friendly lines and wrinkles. And who is dead? Stephen repeated. Lady Luxilian, poor gentlewoman,

Starting point is 14:30:43 as we all shall, said the under-Mason. Aye, and we be going to enlarge the vault to make room for her. When did she die? Early this morning, his father replied, with an appearance of recurring to a chronic thought. Yes, this morning. Martin have been told ever since, almost. There, t'was expected.

Starting point is 14:31:08 she was a very limber. Ah, poor soul this morning, resumed the under-Mason, a marvellously old man whose skin seemed so much too large for his body that it would not stay in position. She must know by this time

Starting point is 14:31:26 whether she is to go up or down, poor woman. What was her age? Not more than seven or eight and twenty by candlelight, but lowered by her age. but Lord, by day, I was forty-f hour an hour. Aye, night-time or daytime, makes a difference of twenty years to rich females, observed Martin.

Starting point is 14:31:50 She was one and thirty, really, said John Smith. I had it from them that no. Not more than that. I looked very bad, poor lady. In faith you might say she was dead for years, a four-a-for-a-for-a-one. I would own it. As my old father used to say, dead, but wouldn't drop down. I see her, poor soul, said a laborer from behind some removed coffins.

Starting point is 14:32:19 Only but last Valentine's Day of all the world. I was arming crook with my lord. I says to myself, you be ticketed churchyard, my noble lady, although you don't dream on it. I suppose my lord will write. to all the other lords anointed in the nation, to let him know that she that was is now no more. Tis done and past.

Starting point is 14:32:46 I see a bundle of letters go off an hour after the death. Such wonderful black rims as their letters had, half an inch wide at the very least. Too much, observed Martin. In short, tis out of the question that a human being can be so mournful as black edges, half an inch wide. I'm sure people don't feel more

Starting point is 14:33:09 than a very narrow border when they feels most of all. And there are two little girls, are they or not? said Stephen. Nice clane little faces left motherless now. They used to come to Parsons-Swan courts to play with Miss Elfright

Starting point is 14:33:27 when I was there, said William Worm. Ah, they did soes! The latter sentence was introduced to add the necessary melancholy to a remark which intrinsically could hardly be made to possess enough for the occasion. Yes, continued Worm, they'd run upstairs, they'd run down, flitting about with her everywhere. Very fond of her they were. Ah, well, fonder than ever they were of their mother, so tis said here and there, added a laborer.

Starting point is 14:34:02 Well, you see, it is natural. Lady Luxellian stood aloof from him so, was so drowsy-like, that they couldn't love her in the jolly companion way. Children want to like, folks. Only last winter I see'd Miss Elfride talking to my lady and the two children, and Miss Elfride wiped their noses for I'm so careful.

Starting point is 14:34:27 My lady never once saying that it wanted doing, and naturally children take to people that's their best friend. Be as twill, the woman is dead and gone, and we must make a place for her, said John. Come, lads, drink up your ale, and we'll just rid this corner, so as to have all clear for beginning at the wall, as soon as till's light tomorrow. Stephen then asked where Lady Luxellion was to lie.

Starting point is 14:34:57 "'Ear,' said his father, "'we're going to set back this wall and make a recess, "'and tis enough for us to do before the funeral. "'When my Lord's mother died, she said, "'John, the place must be enlarged "'before another can be put in. "'But I never expected twould be wanted so soon. "'Better move Lord George first, I suppose, Simeon.'

Starting point is 14:35:23 "'He pointed with his foot to a heavy coffin, covered with what had originally been red velvet, the color of which could only just be distinguished now. Just as you think best, Master John, replied the shriveled Mason. Ah, poor Lord George, he continued, looking contemplatively at the huge coffin. He and I were as bitter enemies once as any could be, when one is a lord and t'other only a mortal man. Poor fella!

Starting point is 14:35:55 he'd clap his hand upon my shoulder, and cussed me as familiar and neighborly as if he'd been a common chap. I accost me uphill and accost me down, and then I would rave out again, and the gould clamps of his fine new teeth would glisten in the sun, like fetters of brass, while I, being a small man and poor, was fain to say nothing at all.

Starting point is 14:36:23 Such a strap and fine gentleman, as he was, too. Yes, I rather liked in sometimes. But once now and then, when I looked at his towering height, I'd think in my inside, what a weight you'll be, my lord, for our arms to lower under the Isle of Endostow Church someday. And was he? inquired a young labourer. He was. He was five hundred weight, if it were a pound. What with his lead and his oak, and his sandals, and his one thing and other?

Starting point is 14:36:58 Here the ancient man slapped his hand upon the cover, with a force that caused a rattle among the bones inside. He half broke me back when I took his feet to lower him down the steps there. Ah, sayeth I to John there,

Starting point is 14:37:14 didn't I, John, that ever one man's glory should be such a weight upon another man. But there, I liked my Lord George sometimes. Tis a strange thought, said another, that while they be all here under one roof, a snug United family, a luxelians, they be really scattered miles away from one another,

Starting point is 14:37:38 in a form of good sheep and wicked goats, isn't it? True, tis a thought to look at. And that one, if he's gone upward, don't know what his wife is doing no more than the man in the moon if she's gone downward, and that some unfortunate one in the hot place is a hollering across to a lucky one up in the clouds, and quite forgetting their bodies be boxed close together all the time. I, tis a thought to look at too, that I can say, hello, close to fiery Lord George, and they can't hear me.

Starting point is 14:38:16 and that I be eaten my onion close to dainty Lady Jane's nose, and she can't smell me. What do I put all their heads one way for? inquired a young man. Because tis churchyard law you're simple. The law the living is that a man shall be upright and downright, and the law the dead is that a man shall be east and west. Every state of society have its laws. We must break the law with a few of the poor souls, however.

Starting point is 14:38:50 Come, a buckle to, said the master mason, and they set to work anew. End of Section 29. Section 30 of Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Volume 17. This is a Labor Vox recording. All Labor Vox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit Laborvox.org. Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Volume 17.

Starting point is 14:39:29 Selected excerpts by Joel Chandler Harris Joel Chandler Harris, born 1848. One evening recently, the lady whom Uncle Weemus calls Miss Sally, Mr. Little Seven-year-old, making search for him through the house and through the yard, she heard the sound of voices in the old man's cabin, and looking through the window she saw the child sitting by Uncle Remus. His head rested on the old man's arm, and he was gazing with an expression of the most intense interest

Starting point is 14:40:02 into the rough, weather-beaten face that beamed so kindly on him. With this charming picture, Mr. Joel Chandler Harris opens a historic adventure of that Ulysses of the Fields, Brer Rabbit. Uncle Remus, the raconteur of the adventures, as a prototype in every southern plantation, and his stories are familiar to all southerners. The art of Mr. Harris lies in the way he has transferred their impalpable charm to canvas. Before the appearance of Uncle Remus, his songs and sayings, New York, 1880, the Negro had figured in literature, but he had figured for a purpose,

Starting point is 14:40:43 either to illustrate a principle as in Mrs. Stowe's great novels, Uncle Tom's Cabin, and dread, or he was a staged negro of the minstrel show, an intolerable misrepresentation. Perhaps he was too familiar a feature in the landscape of the southern author for him to appreciate his artistic value, and as for the foreigner's conception of him, what Dr. Johnson said of the descriptive poems of the blind poet Blacklock may very well be applied to these efforts. If, said Johnson, you found that a paralytic had left his room you would conclude that he had been carried, meaning that the blind man had described what he had read, not what he had seen.

Starting point is 14:41:28 No such charge can be brought to the author of these inimitable sketches. Like his own hero, Brayer Rabbit, he was born and bred in a briar patch in Middle Georgia in the town of Edenton. December 8, 1848, and his happy and adventurous youth, pleasantly commemorated in his on the plantation, passed in the society he had made famous the world over. Uncle Remus, Mink, Sist Tempe, Daddy Jake, were not more real personages to him than the creeders they taught him to know and admire. In true American fashion, he passed from their printers case to the bar,

Starting point is 14:42:08 but forsook law for literature, his first love, became a member of the staff and later an editor of the Atlanta Constitution, and the author of many books, of which Uncle Remus is the initial. Nights with Uncle Remus, rainy days with Uncle Remus, Mingo and other sketches, Daddy Jake the Runaway, and On the Plantation

Starting point is 14:42:31 belong to the same series. Mr. Harris has written other books of plantation romance and actualities that betray the charm of which he is a master, but to the volumes we have named he owes his high and permanent place in American literature.

Starting point is 14:42:47 Those who are familiar with the subject, know that when Mr. Harris chose the plantation negro, he had a character of some subtlety to deal with. Like the selt, he is a creature of extremes, carelessly happy one day, and despairing the next, but saved from revolt by a pathetic philosophy born of his helplessness, and also by a sense of humor that restores his equilibrium. These peculiarities are not so evident from his actions, for he has been suppressed by his surroundings, as in his songs and stories which display his poetical temperament and his picturesque imagination. With the self-confidence of the artist, Mr. Harrison portraying his character chooses the most

Starting point is 14:43:32 difficult, that is, the dramatic form. Uncle Remus, the seer of the plantation, sits before his lightwood fire making shuck horse-collars, with a little boy for Audium, and, and buried by occasional visits from his satellite Sist Tempe, or his enemy, the incomparable, the irrepressible, Tildy, and as he works at his self-imposed task, levies on the whole community for illustrations of weakness and folly. Or like a child watching his elders, he imitates their manners and customs, makes his shrewd comments, gives his hard thrusts,

Starting point is 14:44:12 and dispenses his deep philosophy. Only when Mr. Harris drops the dramatic form, as in on the plantation, Mingo and other sketches, and Daddy Jake the Runaway, does he permit himself the luxury of pathos so obvious in the Negro's life. When Uncle Remus or any of his confrers is speaking in propria persona, he shows the same reserve in displaying his deepest emotions as the wounded animal who seeks his layer. nor is strange that the life of the plantation negro should have developed his mystical side. Much of it is spent alone with only the creedars between whom and the white man he occupies a middle distance for companions. Nor is strange that, like St. Francis of Assisi, each living thing becomes a brother and sister to him, endowed with personality and a sentient nature. St. Francis preached to the birds and the four-footed felons, the Phariseimo Lupo de Gobe, and Uncle Remus, though he considers them far too

Starting point is 14:45:19 wise to learn from so poor a creature as man, endows them with all our vices and virtues. Did not the mystics, Esop, and LaFontaine the same? But the old darky in a dim fashion does more. Through them he expresses a revolt from his own condition, and the not unnatural desire to circumvent the master who has so long controlled him. Not to the swift in these stories is the race, nor to the strong the battle. The weakest, the most helpless of all the animals, the rabbit, is a hero and the champion, and in every contest is victorious over the wolf, the fox, the bear. Not virtue, but weakness triumphs when brer rabbit milks the cow, fools the fox, and scalds

Starting point is 14:46:07 the wolf, not passion but mischievous them. With the view to edification which cannot be too sternly deprecated, etymologists have claimed Uncle Remus and his songs as a contribution to the folklore society. Better can we spare him to the Natural History Societies, to which he may contribute to chapters on how Mr. Rabbit lost his fine, bushy tail, why Mr. Rabbit whipped his young ones, why the Negro is black, and the use Miss Goose put her hands to. But Mr. Harris has a higher motive in letters and utility, we believe.

Starting point is 14:46:46 His province is the charm and to amuse. Why Brother Wolf didn't eat the little rabbits? From Uncle Remus and his friends, Copyright 1892 by Joel Chandler Harris, and reprinted here by permission of and special arrangement with Hoffton, Mifflin, and Company, publishers, Boston. Uncle Remus, said the little boy one day, why don't you come up to the big house sometimes and tell me stories?

Starting point is 14:47:17 Shue, honey, the spoon better go to the bowl's house. If I was at you to tell me tales, I'd come up there and sit in the back porch and listen at you every day and sometimes every night. But when the spoon want anything, it better go to the bowl. It bleeds to be that away. "'Well, you used to come.' "'Dez so!' exclaimed Uncle Remus.

Starting point is 14:47:40 "'But where was you about that time? "'Right flat on your back. That's where you was. "'You lay there and swallowed that doctor truck, "'twhile I'd be blessed if you had more a heft "'than the partridge egg with the inners blowed out. "'And there was Sally a-crying and Gwynn-on-Constant, "'but she wasn't crying about you. "'She was coiling at me on Mars John.

Starting point is 14:48:01 "'Oh, man, tongue ain't got no Sunday. Because when I get to where you was, I had her sit down and tell tales for to make you forget about the fuss that was Gwen on. I remember one time, Uncle Remus went on laughing, I was sitting there by your bed, telling you some great tail or nutter, and the fuss news I knowed I woke up and found myself fast asleep, and you woke up and found yourself into land or nod. There we was, me and the chair and you into bed, and I'd nod at you and you'd snowballed. back at me, and there was the old tortoise-shell cats sitting by the hoth, running that air buzz wheel, what cats has got somewhere in their innards, and the clock was o'clocking, and the candle was spluttering. And just about that time, Miss Sally came in and rat me upon topper

Starting point is 14:48:52 the naked place on my head with her thimble, and I cut my breath like a cow of coughing, and then Miss Sally started in her coiling, and Mars John asked her what she doing, and she lo, she does a whispering to me. And Mars John said, if she called that whispering, he didn't know what she calls squalling. Then I get up and groaned one of these your meeting house groans. Them was great times, Mon, continued the old man,

Starting point is 14:49:19 after pausing to recover his breath. They most surely was. It looked like to me about them days that you was no bigger than a young rabbit at her your hideman took off. You certainly was spare maid, then. I sought there by your bed, And I say to myself that if I was the old Bear Wolf and you was a young rabbit,

Starting point is 14:49:39 I wouldn't get hungry enough for to eat you because you was too bony. When did Brother Wolf want to eat the young rabbit, Uncle Remus? inquired the little boy, thinking that he saw the suggestion of his story here. He was not mistaken. The old man regarded him with well-fained astonishment. Ain't I done told you about that, honey? Just run over in your mind and see if I ain't. The youngster shook his head. most emphatically.

Starting point is 14:50:06 Well, said Uncle Remus, old Brer Wolf went to eat the little rabs all the time, but there was one time in Ticular that they made his mouth flutter, and that was the time when him to Bear Fox was visiting at Brer Rabbit's house. The times was hard, but the little rabs was slick and fat, and is as frisky as kittens. Old Brer Rabbit was off-simmers, and Brer Wolf and Brer Fox was waiting for him.

Starting point is 14:50:34 The little rabs was playing round, and though they was little, they kept their ears open. Bear wolf look at him out of the corner of his eyes and lick his chops and wink at Bear Fox, and Bear Fawk wink back at him. Bear Wolf crossed his legs and then Bear Fawks cross his and. The little rabs, they frisk and they frolic. Brer Wolf hold his head towards him and low. They are mighty fat. Brer Fox grinned and say,

Starting point is 14:51:03 man, hush your mouth. The little rabs frisk and frolic and play further off, but they keep their ears primed. Brer wolf look at them in low, ain't they slick and purdy? Breerfrocks chuckle and say, Oh, I wish you'd hush. The little rabs play off further and farder,

Starting point is 14:51:22 but they keep their ears open. Bear wolf smack his mouth and though. They are juicy and tender. Bear fox roll his eye and say, man ain't you goin to hush up for you give me the fidgets the little rabs they frisk and they frolic but they hear everything that pass brer wolf look out his tongue quick and low let's us whirl in and eat em berr fox say man you make me hungry please hush up the little rabs play off further and further but they know exactly what's going on they frisk and they frolic but they got their ears wide open then brer Bear Wolf make a bargain with Bear Fox that when Bear Rabbit get home, one of them get them wrapped up in a spute about first one thing and then another, while the other one

Starting point is 14:52:11 go out and catch the little rabs. Brer Fox, Lo, you better do the talking, Bear Wolf, and let me coax the little rabs off. I got more winning ways with children than what you is. Bear Wolf say, You can't make gore out of pumpkin, Bear Fox. I ain't no talker. You tongue lots slicker than mine. I can bite slots better than I can talk. Them little rabs don't want no coaxing.

Starting point is 14:52:38 They want's catching. That's what they wants. You keep old brayer rabid busy, and I'll tend to little rabs. Both of them know that whichever catch the little rabs, the tutter one ain't when they smell hide nor hair of them, and they flew up and got their sputin' and while they were sputin'n and gwin on that away, the little rabs put off down the road, blickety-blickety for to meet their daddy,

Starting point is 14:53:02 because they knowed if they stayed they'd get in big trouble. They went off down the road, the little rabs did, and they ain't gone so mighty fur, for they meet their daddy coming along home. He had his walking cane in one hand and a jug in the other, and he looked as big as life and twice as natural. The little rabs run toward him and holler, What you got, Daddy? What you got, Daddy?

Starting point is 14:53:27 Brer rabbits say, Nothing, but your jug o' lasses. The little rabs holler, Let me taste, Daddy, let me taste, Daddy. Then old brer rabbits set the jug down in the road and let them lick the stopper a time or two, and now they're done get their wind back. They up and tell them about the agreement

Starting point is 14:53:46 that Brer Wolf and Brer Fox done make and about to spute what they had. Old Brer rabbits sort of laughed to himself, and then he pick up his jug and jog on towards home. When they get most there, he stopped to tell the little rabs for to stay back they're out of sight, and wait twill he call them foe they come. They was mighty glad to do just like this, because they done seed brer wolf tushes and brayer fox red tongue, and they huddle up in the broom-sage as still as a mouse in the flower-barrel. Brer rabbit went on home, and shown off he found Brer Wolf and Brer Fox waiting for him. They done settled their spute, and they were sitting there just as smiling as a basket or chips.

Starting point is 14:54:30 They passed their time a day with Brer Rabbit, and then they asked him what he got into jug. Brer Rabbit hummed and hawed and looked sort of solemn. Brer Wolf looked like he was bledged to find out what was in the jug, and he kept a pestering Brer Rabbit about it, but Brer Rabbit just shake his head and look solemn, and talk about the weather and the crops, and one thing and another. By and by, Brauer Fox make out, he was going after a drink of water, and he slipped out, he did, for to catch the little rabs. Time he get out of the house, Brer Rabbit looked all around to see if he'd listening,

Starting point is 14:55:08 and then he went to the jug and pulled out the stopper. He handed it to Brer Wolf and say, "'Taste that.' Brer Wolf tastes the lasses and smack his mouth. He lo, what kind of truck that? His show is good. Brer Rabbit get up close to Brer Wolf and say, Don't tell nobody.

Starting point is 14:55:29 It's fox blood. Brer wolf looks astonish. He lo. How you know? Brer rabbit say, I knows what I knows. Braer wolf say, Give me some moll.

Starting point is 14:55:42 Bear rabbits say, You can get some mole for yourself, easy enough. And to fresher, tis to better. Brer wolf, low, how you know. Bearer rabbits say, I knows what I knows. With that, Brer Wolf stepped out and start towards Bear Fox. Bear Fox seed him coming, and he sort of back off.

Starting point is 14:56:03 Bear Wolf got a little closer, and by and by he made a dash of Bear Fox. Bear Fox dodge, he did, and then he put out for the woods with Bear Wolf right at his heels. Then at her so long a time, had her Brer Rabbit got done laughing, he called up to little rabs, give him some lasses for supper, and spanked him and sent him to bed. Well, what did he spank him for, Uncle Remus? asked the little boy. To make him grow, honey. That's to make them grow.

Starting point is 14:56:34 Young creeders got to have their hide loosened that away, same as young chillins. Did Brother Wolf catch Brother Fox? How I know, honey? Much as I can do to follow the tail when it keeps into a big road, let alone to keep up with them creatures when they go. go sailing through the woods. The tail I pursue on Adder I'm no further than the place where they make their disappearance. I tell you now when I goes into woods, I got to know where I'm Gwynn. Brother Mud Turtle's Trickery from Uncle Remus and his friends, copyright 1892 by Joel Chandler

Starting point is 14:57:12 Harris, and reprinted here by permission of and special arrangement with Hoffton, Mifflin and company, publishers, Boston. I don't like these here tales about folks no matter how you can fix them, said Uncle Remus after an unusually long pause, during which he rubbed his left hand with the right in order to run the rheumatism out. No, sir, I don't like them, because folks can't play no tricks, nor get even with their neighbors without hurting somebody's feelings, or breaking some law or nutter, or gwyn against what the preacher say. Look at that man what I does been telling you about. other man fool him and catch him. In more than that, he let him towed him off to the calaboose. He oughter been tucked, I ain't spooting that. Yet if that had been some of the creatures, they'd have surely got loose from there. When it comes to talking about getting loose, Uncle Remus

Starting point is 14:58:08 continued, settling himself comfortably in his chair. I get to run it on in my mind about old brer fox and old brer mud-turkle. They had some kinder fallen out once upon a time, I don't know what. I spec it's got a tail hung on it, but the tail doesn't switch itself out of my mind. Yet they done had a fallen out, and they weren't no love loss betwixt them. Well, sir, one day Brer Fox was going down to creek fishing. Little as you may think on it, Brer Fox was monstrous fawn their fishes, so every chance he got he'd go fishing.

Starting point is 14:58:45 On Sunday, too, inquired the little boy. He had been lectured on that subject not long before. "'Well, I'll tell you now,' replied Uncle Remus, laughing. "'Bare Fox is like a woman's tongue. He ain't got no Sunday.' "'What kind of bait did he have?' the youngster asked. "'What do you want with bait, honey? He ain't got no bait, and no pole and no hook. He just went down to the creek, and when he come to a good place, he'd wade in and feel under rocks and under bank. Sometimes he'd catch a horny head, and then again he'd catch a perch.

Starting point is 14:59:21 well sir he went on and went on and he had bad luck looked like the fishes was all gone from home but he kept on and he kept on he loath to himself that he bleeds to have some fish for dinner one time he put his hand in a crawfish's nest and got nipped Another time he catched the eel, and it made a cold chills run across him, yet he kept on. By and by, brer far come to where old brer mud-turkle live at. I don't know what made old brer mud-turkle live in such a damp place like that. Looked like him and his folks that have a bad cold the whole blessed time. But there he was in the water and the bank, laying there fast asleep, dreaming about the good times he'd have when the fresh had come. he is a lander with his eyes shut when the first news he know he feels some nutter fumbling round his head twain't nobody but old brer fox feeling round on the bank for fishes

Starting point is 15:00:21 brer mud-turkle moved his head he did but the fumbling kept on and by me by he opened his mouth and brer fox fumble and fumble twill by and by he got his hand in there and time he'd do that old brer mud-turkel shut down on it And I'll let you know, continued Uncle Remus, shaking his head slowly from side to side, as if to add emphasis to the statement. I'll let you know when old Brer Mudturkle shut down on your hand, you got to cut off his head and then wait till it thunder, for he turned loose. Well, sir, he shut down on old Brer Fox, and if you'd have been anywhere in that settlement, you'd a heard squallin, then if you ain't never heard none before.

Starting point is 15:01:05 Brer Fox just hilt his head back and holler. Ouch! Ouch! What this got me? Ouch. Turn me loose. Ouch. Somebody better run here quick.

Starting point is 15:01:17 Laws a mussy. Ouch. But Brer Mudturkel, he held on and he felt so much comfort that he during about winter sleep again if Brer Fox hadn't her snatched and jerk so hard and hollered so loud. Brer Fox holler and Brer Mudderkel hold. Hold on, Bear Fox holler, and Brer Mudturkle, hold on. There they was, nip and tug, hollering hole fast.

Starting point is 15:01:44 By and by it hurt so bad that Bear Fox just fetched one loud squall and made one big pull, and out come old Brer Mudturkle a hangin' to his hand. Well so, when I got out of the bank on Brer Mud Turkle sort of woke up, he tuck and turned Brer Fox loose without waiting for the thunder. The ex-Brar Fox pardon, but Brer Foxe ain't got no pardon for to give him. Brer Mutturkel make like he's skeered. He lo. I clare to gracious, Bear Fox, if I'd known twas you, I'd never shut down on you in the round world,

Starting point is 15:02:20 because I know what a dangerous man you is. I know yo daddy before you and he was a dangerous man. But Brer Fox fused to listen to that kinder talk. He say, I've been wanting you a long time, and now I got you. I got you right where I want you, and when I get through with you, your own folks would know you if they was to meet you in the middle of the road. Brer Mudturkle cry on one side of his face and laugh on Tudder.

Starting point is 15:02:49 Hello. Please, sir, Brer Fox, just let me off this time, and I'll be a good friend long with you all the balance of the time. Please, sir, Brer Fox, let me off this time. Brer Fawks say, Oh, yes, I'll let you off. I'm all the time letting off folks who bite me tear the bone. Oh, yes, I'll let you off.

Starting point is 15:03:10 But I'll take in your skin first. Brer Muddturkle low. Sposing I ain't got no hide on me. Then what you're going to do? Brerfrox griddish is tushes. He say, if you ain't got no hide, I'll find a place where to hide otter be. That's what.

Starting point is 15:03:28 With that, he make a grab at Brer Muntur. Neck, but Bear Mudtrakle draw his head and his foot's under his shell and quill up his tail, and there he was. He saw all and tough he got moss on his shell. Burr fox full with him and yawn and gouge at the shell, but he does might as well gong gouged at a flint rock. He work and he work, but tain't do no good. He can't get Brer Mudturkel out of his house, no way he can fix it.

Starting point is 15:04:00 Old Bear Mudturkle talk at him. He lo. Heart ain't no name for a Bear Fox. He'll be Jimberjod long for you gnaw through my hide. Bear Fox gawed and gouge and gauge and yaw. Bear mud turtle, lo. They ain't but one way for to get that shell off, Bear Fox. Bear fox fused to make answer.

Starting point is 15:04:24 He gouged and yaw and gnaw and gouged. Bearer mudturcle low. Tushers ain't. When to get it off? Claws ain't when to get it off. Yet mud and water will do the work. Now I'm going to sleep. Brer Fox and yawn gouged and gouge and gowl. And by and by he got tired, more especially when he heard old Brer Mudturkle laying in there snoring this like somebody saw in Gordes. Then he sat down and watched Burrow Mudturkle, but he ain't moved. He do just like he sleep. Then Bearer Fox give the idea that he'll play

Starting point is 15:04:59 he'll play a trick on Brer Mudturkle. He holler out. Goodbye, Brer Mudturkel. You are too much for me this time. My hand hurt me so bad I got to go home and get a poultice on it. But I'll pay you back if it's the last act. Brer Fox makes like he gwin off,

Starting point is 15:05:18 but he does run round and hide into bushes. Yet does you spec he gwin fool, Brer Mudturkle? Shue, honey. That creature got moss in his back and he got so much sense and his head, his eyes look red. He just lay there, old Brer Mud Turkle did,

Starting point is 15:05:34 and son himself, same as if he was on a rock and the creek. He lay there so still that Brer Fox got his impatience stirred up, and he come out to bushes and went to Brer Mud Turkle and chuck him up and axed him how are we going to get the shell off. Brer Mud Turkle low. Tushes ain't going to get it off. Claws ain't going to get it off. Yet mud and water will do de work. Brer Fox say

Starting point is 15:06:00 Don't riddle me no riddles Up and tell me like a man How I gwyn to get your shell off Brer Mud Turkle low Put me into mud and rub my back hard as you can Dender shell bleeds to come off That's the reason they call me Brer Mudturkle

Starting point is 15:06:18 Well sir said Uncle Remus laughing heartily Brer Fox ain't got no better sense Than to believe all that truck So he tucked and shirred and shoved Brer Mudturkel long while they got him into mud. Then he gunned to rub on his back like somebody carrying a horse. What happened then? Well, there ain't nothing to all happen, excepting what leads to happen.

Starting point is 15:06:42 The more he rub on the back, the deeper Brer Mud Turkle go into the mud. By and by, whilst Brer Fox was rubbing right hard, Brer Mud Turkle sort of guns itself aflert and went down out of reach. Of course, this makes Brer Foxx. splunging the water, and a little more, and he'd have drowned it right then and there. He went out on the bank he did, and whilst he's sitting there drying himself, he knowed that Brer Mudturkle was laughing at him, because he kind of seed the signs on it. The little boy laughed, but he shook his head incredulously.

Starting point is 15:07:17 Well, said Uncle Remus, if you going to dispute that, you just as well there stand up and face me down about the whole tail, because when Brer Foxy, bubbles rising onto water, and following at her one another, he bleeds to know that Brer Mud Turkle down under there laughing fit to kill herself. This settled the matter the child was convinced. Uncle Remus at the telephone. From Uncle Remus and his friends, copyright 1892 by Joel Chandler Harris, and reprinted here by permission of and special arrangement with Hoffton Mifflin and Company. Publishers, Boston. One night recently, as Uncle Remus's Miss Sally was sitting by the fire

Starting point is 15:08:04 sewing and singing softly to herself, she heard the old man come into the backyard and enter the dining room, where a bright fire was still burning in the grate. Everything had been cleared away, the cook had gone, and the house girl had disappeared, and the little boy was asleep. Uncle Remus had many privileges in the house of the daughter of his old mistress and man. and one of these was to warm himself by the dining room fire whenever he felt lonely, especially at night. To the lady there was a whimsical suggestion of pathos and everything the old negro said and did, and yet her attitude toward Uncle Remus was one of bustling criticism and depreciation. By leaning back in her chair a little, she could see him as he sat before the fire

Starting point is 15:08:52 and enjoying the warmth. I should think it was time for you to be. I should think it was time for you to be. be in bed, she exclaimed. Noam, taint, responded Uncle Remus. I year tell that when old folks get through bed soon, they feelings been hurted, and goodness knows they ain't nobody hurted my feelings

Starting point is 15:09:11 at this day. Well, there isn't anything in there that you can pick up. I've had everything put under lock and key. Yism, they have something in year and year two, because you're Mars John's supper setting right down your forward to fire, and

Starting point is 15:09:27 little more, it had been dry spang up if I hadn't dropped in, does when I did. I hear Mars John tell that er nigger woman, West you call you a cook, for to have him some fried eggs for supper, and if these ain't fried and dried, I ain't never seen none what is. When Mars John come, you can set plum and dare and year him crack him up in his mouth, same like cow chow and fodder. Last Saturday night, Mars John fetched some fried Ister's home, and if this year nigger woman stay on this hill many more days, he'll get all his vittles cooked downtown and fetch it home in a basket. Where am I's John now? Just then there was a call at the telephone. The little gong rattled away like a house on fire. As a lady went to answer it, Uncle Remus rose

Starting point is 15:10:17 from his chair and crept on his tiptoes to the door that opened into the sitting room. He heard his Miss Sally talking. Well, what's wanted? Oh, is that you? Well, I couldn't imagine. No. Fast asleep too long ago to talk about. Why, of course, no. Why should I be frightened? I declare you ought to be ashamed. Remus is here. Two hours. I think you are a horrid mean. Bye-bye. Uncle Remus stood looking suspiciously at the telephone after his Miss Sally had turned away. Miss Sally, he said presently, Was you talking to Mars John?

Starting point is 15:10:59 Certainly. Who do you suppose it was? Whereabouts was Mars John? At his office? Way down Yan on Yallabammer Street? Yes. At this piece of information, Uncle Remus emitted a groan that was full of doubt and pity and went into the dining room.

Starting point is 15:11:18 His Miss Sally laughed, and then an idea seemed to strike her. She called him back and went again to the telephone. Is that you central? Please connect 1140 with 1460. There was a fluttering sound in the instrument and then the lady said, Yes, it's me. Here's Remus. Yes, he wants to talk to you. Here, Remus, take this and put it to your ear. Here, Simpleton, it won't hurt you. Uncle Remus took the earpiece and handled it as though it had been a loaded pistol. He tried to look in at both ends and then he placed it to his ear and grinned sheepishie.

Starting point is 15:11:56 He heard a thin, sepulchral, but familiar voice calling out. Hello, Remus! And the sheepish grin gave place to an expression of uneasy astonishment. Hello, Riemus! Hello! Hello, hello, hello, hello. Is that you, Mars, John? Of course it is, you bandy-legged old villain.

Starting point is 15:12:19 I have no time to be standing here. What do you want? How in the name of God do you get in there, Mars, John? In where? In this year, in this year apparatus. Oh, you be fiddlestick. What do you want? Mars John, can you see me?

Starting point is 15:12:37 Or is it all dark in there? Are you crazy? Where is you, Miss Sally? She's in here, hollering and laughing. There's John, how you gwin'n't get out in Dar. Dry up, good night. Here it is, Miss Sally, said Uncle Remus, after listening a moment. There's a mighty zooming gwin on in there, and I don't know whether Mars John is trying to scramble out or weary this trying for her to make yourself comfortable in there.

Starting point is 15:13:06 What did he say, Remus? He up and load that one on us was a villain, but they were such a buzzing going on in there. I couldn't exactly catch the rights on it. Uncle Remus went back to his place by the dining room fire, and after a while began to mutter and talk to himself. What's the matter now, his miscarriage. Sally asked. Is this a saying that I know Myers-John must be suffering some hers? Why?

Starting point is 15:13:33 Oh, I does knows it. Because if he ain't, what made his talk so weak? He bleats to be in trouble. I'm telling you the Lord's truth. That white man talked like he ain't bigger than one of these your little tinchy, shiny dolls. I bound you, he continued.

Starting point is 15:13:51 If I was a white woman and Mars John was my old man, I snatch up. my bonnetally sail around this cheer town till i found out what to matter with him i would dat the old man's miss sally laughed until the tears came in her eyes and then she said there's a piece of pie in the sideboard do get it and hush so much talking thank you mrs thank he exclaimed uncle remus shuffling across the room he got the pie and returned to his chair dish your pie he continued holding it up between his eyes and the fire. Dissure of pie come in good time because Mayor's John talks so weak and fur off and make me feel right empty. I expect he be well time he get home. And if he is to get hold of your dishier pie, he might make him have bad dreams.

Starting point is 15:14:42 In a few moments, the pie had disappeared. And when his Miss Sally looked at him a little later, he was fast to sleep. End of Section 30, read by Bryce Cries, Ohio. of Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Volume 17. This is a Libravox recording. All Libravox recordings are in the public domain. For more information, or to volunteer, please visit Librevox.org, read by Beeswax Candle. Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Volume 17.

Starting point is 15:15:25 The use and selection of books from the choice of books and other literary pieces by Frederick Harris. Frederick Harrison 1831 Frederick Harrison is a man of striking personality whose activity has been varied he is a brilliant essay writer and controversialist whose literary work is full of life and savour he is a student and writer of history

Starting point is 15:15:51 especially in its modern and socialistic aspects and he is a thinker who in England is the most stalwart champion of the positivist philosophy of Comte He has himself told the story of his education in early life, born in London, October 18, 1831, of good family, with both English and Irish blood in his veins. He went to King's College School, and then to Oxford, where he was a scholar at Wadham College and displayed a talent for the classics.

Starting point is 15:16:21 His student days fell at the turn of the half-century, 1848 to 1852, a time when, instead of dealing with abstract themes in true sophomoric fashion, he was, as he says, absorbed in current affairs, impressed with the tumultuous succession of events that surged across Europe. He felt the complexity of modern society and desired to study it. His sympathy for the popular cause was deep and grew deeper with the years. On being graduated, Mr. Harrison taught for some years in the Working Men's College, associated with such men as F.D. Morris and Thomas Hughes.

Starting point is 15:16:59 He also served on the Trade's Union Commission for three years. These positions brought him into touch with leading economists and humanitarian. Gradually the idea of teaching the principles of positivism took possession of him, and having private fortune enough for independence, his chief aim for five and twenty years has been to do this work. This devotion to philosophic exposition leads him to disclaim any other profession. He asserts that he has never started. studied literature as art, nor has he been a great reader, even in his historical studies,

Starting point is 15:17:36 always preferring to talk with men and see things for the forming of an opinion. This trait and training give to Harrison's writing an incisive vigour that is marked. By the time he was 35, Mr. Harrison had come to an acceptance of the cardinal tenets of Comte. Successively, he was convinced to the truth of that French philosopher's views on history, education, society, politics, philosophy, and religion. The English disciple preaches the brotherhood of man, the divinness of humanity, the hope of that altruistic immortality desired by George Eliot, which comes from living in the lives of those made better by our presence.

Starting point is 15:18:19 This modern faith, so sharply opposed to all supernatural religious conceptions, finds few followers, as he frankly confesses. But he defends and expounds it in all honesty, and is never more trenchant and individual then when writing about it. A good example of his polemical power is the book in which he and Herbert Spencer took up a lance for their opposing religious views. The controversy appeared first in the 19th century in 84, and the wide attention it attracted showed that the disputants were regarded as authoritative exponents of their respective creeds.

Starting point is 15:18:56 Mr. Harrison has translated Comte's social statics. In history, his views are modern and liberal, while his style makes the expression of exceptional interest. Works in this field are The Meaning of History, 1862, Oliver Cromwell, 1888, Annals of an Old Manor House, 1893, and The Study of History, 1895. Other books are Order and Progress, 1875, and The Choice of Books and Other Literary Pieces, 1886. The essay on The Choice of Books has always been popular, and is distinguished by a fine culture, independence of judgment, good sense, and happy presentation. The use and selection of books from the choice of books and other literary pieces. It is most right that in the Great Republic. of letters, there should be freedom of intercourse and a spirit of equality. Every reader who

Starting point is 15:19:58 holds a book in his hand is free of the inmost minds of men past and present. Their lives, both within and without the pale of their utter thoughts, are unveiled to him. He needs no introduction to the greatest. He stands on no ceremony with them. He may, if it be so-minded, scribbled doggerel on his Shelley, where he may kick Lord Byron, if he please. into a corner. He hears Burke pererate and Johnson dogmatise, and Scott tell his border tales and Wordsworth muse on the hillside without the leave of any man or the payment of any toll. In the Republic of Letters, there are no privileged orders or places reserved. Every man who has written a book, even the diligent Mr. Whittaker, is in one sense an author. A book's a book,

Starting point is 15:20:50 although there's nothing in't. And every man who can decipher a penny journal is in one sense a reader. And your general reader, like the grave-digger and Hamlet, is hail-fellow with all the mighty dead. He pats the skull of the jester, batters the cheek of Lord, Lady or Curtia,

Starting point is 15:21:11 and uses Imperious Caesar to teach boys the Latin declensions. But this noble equality of all writers, Of all writers and of all readers has a perilous side to it. It is apt to make us indiscriminate in the books we read and somewhat contemptuous of the mighty men of the past. Men who are most observant as to the friends they make or the conversation they share are carelessness itself as to the books to whom they entrust themselves in the printed language with which they saturate their minds. Yet can any friendship or society be more important to us than that of the books which form so large a part of our minds and even of our characters.

Starting point is 15:21:59 Do we in real life take any pleasant fellow to our homes and chat with some agreeable rascal by our firesides? We who will take up any pleasant fellow's printed memoirs, we who delight in the agreeable rascal when he's cut up into pages and bounden calf. If any person given to reading were honestly to keep a register of all the printed stuff that he or she consumes it a year, or the idle tales of which the very names in the story are forgotten in a week, the bookmakers prattle about nothing at so much a sheet, the fugitive trifling about silly things and empty people, the memoirs of the unmemorable, and

Starting point is 15:22:36 lives of those who never really lived at all. Of what a mountain of rubbish would it be the catalogue? for the eye and the memory as mechanical as if we set ourselves to learn the names, ages, and family histories of everyone who lives in our street, the flirtations of their maiden arts, and the circumstances surrounding the birth of their grandmother's first baby. It is impossible to give any method to our reading to we get nerve enough to reject. The most exclusive and careful amongst us will, in literature, take boon companions out of the street as easily as an eye.

Starting point is 15:23:14 in a tavern. I came across such and such a book that I never heard mentioned, says one, and found it curious, though entirely worthless. I strayed on a volume by a know-not-whoom, on a subject for which I never cared,

Starting point is 15:23:31 and so on. There are curious and worthless creatures enough in any pot-house all day long, and there is incest talk in omnibus, train or street by we know-not-whoom about we cannot Not what. Yet, if a printer and a bookseller can be induced to make this gavel as immortal

Starting point is 15:23:50 as print and publication can make it, then it straightway is literature, and in due time it becomes curious. I have no intention to moralise or to indulge in a homily against the reading of what is deliberately evil. There is not so much need for this now, and I am not discussing on the whole duty of man. I take that part of our reading, which by itself is no doubt harmless, entertaining and even gently instructive. But of this enormous mass of literature, how much deserves to be chosen out, to be preferred to all the great books of the world, to be set apart for those precious hours which are all that the most of us can give to solid reading. The vast proportion of books are books that we shall never be able to read. A serious percentage

Starting point is 15:24:39 of books are not worth reading at all. The really vital books for us, we also know to be a very trifling portion of the whole. Yet we act as if every book were as good as any other, as if it were merely a question of order which we take up first, as if any book were good enough for us, and as if all were like honourable, precious and satisfying. Alas, books cannot be more than the men who write them, and as a fair proportion of the human race now write books, with motives and objects as various as human activity, books as books, are entitled a priori, until their value is proved, to the same attention and respect as houses,

Starting point is 15:25:21 steam engines, pictures, fiddles, bonnets, and other products of human industry. In the shelves of those libraries, which are our pride, libraries, public or private, circulating, or very stationary, are to be found those great books of the world, Rari, Niburie, Nibes, Those books, which are truly the precious lifeblood of a master spirit. But the very familiarity which their mighty fame is bred in us makes us indifferent. We grow weary of what everyone is supposed to have read, and we take down something that looks a little eccentric, some worthless book, on the mere ground that we had never heard of it before.

Starting point is 15:26:03 Thus the difficulties of literature are in their way as great as those of the world, The obstacles to finding the right friends are as great. The peril is as great of being lost in a babel of voices and an ever-changing mass of beings. Books are not wiser than men. The true books are not easier to find than the true men. The bad books or the vulgar books are not less obtrusive and not less ubiquitous than the bad or vulgar men are everywhere. The art of right reading is as long and difficult to learn as the unbiased. of right living. Those who are on good terms as the first author they meet run as much

Starting point is 15:26:44 risk as men who surrender their time to the first passer in the street. For to be open to every book is for the most part to gain as little as possible from any. A man aimlessly wandering about in a crowded city is of all men the most lonely, so he who takes up only the books that he comes across is pretty certain to meet but few that are worth knowing. Now, this danger is one to which we are especially exposed in this age. A high-pressure life of emergencies, a whirling industrial organization or disorganization, have brought us in this, as in most things, their peculiar difficulties and drawbacks. In almost everything, vast opportunities and gigantic means of multiplying our products

Starting point is 15:27:31 bring with them new perils and troubles, which are often at first, neglected. Our huge cities, where wealth is piled up, and the requirements and appliances of life extended beyond the dreams of our forefathers seem to breed in themselves new forms of squalor, disease, blights, or risks to life, such as we are yet unable to master. So the enormous multiplicity of modern books is not altogether favourable to the knowing of the best. I listen with mixed satisfaction to the Pians that they chant over the the works which issue from the press each day. How the books poured forth from Patinoste de Roe might in a few years be built into a pyramid that would fill the dome of St. Paul's? How in

Starting point is 15:28:18 this mountain of literature am I to find the really useful book? How, when I have found it and found its value, am I to get others to read it? How am I to keep my head clear in the torrent and din of works, all of which distract my attention, most of which promised me something, whilst so few fulfil that promise. The Nile is the source of the Egyptians' bread, and without it he perishes of hunger. But the Nile may be rather too liberal in his flood, and then the Egyptian runs imminent risk of drowning.

Starting point is 15:28:52 And thus there never was a time, at least during the last 200 years, when the difficulties in the way of making an efficient use of books were greater than they are today, when the obstacles were more real between readers and the right books to read, when it was practically so troublesome to find out that which it is of vital importance to know, and that not by the dearth, but by the plethora of printed matter. But it comes to nearly the same thing, whether we are actually debarred by physical impossibility

Starting point is 15:29:22 of getting the right book into our hand, or whether we are choked off from the right book by the obtrusive crowd of the wrong books, so that it needs a strong character and a resolute system of reading to keep the head cool in the storm of literature around us. We read nowadays in the marketplace. I should rather say in some large steam factory of letterpress, where damp sheets of new print whirl round us perpetually. If it be not rather some noisy book fair where literary showmen tempt us with performing dolls and the gongs of rival booths are stunning our ears from morn till night.

Starting point is 15:30:00 Contrast with this pandemonium of Leipzig and Patonoste de Roe, the sublime picture of Ambilton in his early retirement at Horton, when, musing over his coming flight to the epic heaven, practicing his pinions, as he tells Diodati, he consumed five years of solitude in reading the ancient writers. At totum rapiunt me, mea vita libri. Who now reads the ancient writers? Who systematically reads the great writers, be they ancient or modern, whom the consent of ages is marked out as classics? Typical, immortal, peculiar teachers of our race? Alas, the paradise lost is lost again to us beneath an inundation of graceful academic verse, sugary stanzas of ladylike prettiness, and ceaseless explanations in more or less readable prose of what John Milton meant. or did not mean, or what he saw or did not see, who married his great aunt, and why Adam or

Starting point is 15:31:02 Satan is like that or unlike the other. We read a perfect library about the Paradise Lost, but the Paradise Lost itself we do not read. I'm not presumptuous enough to assert that the larger part of modern literature is not worth reading in itself, that the prose is not readable, entertaining, one may say highly instructive. Nor do I pretend that the verses which we read so zealously in place of Milton's are not good verses. On the contrary, I think them sweetly conceived, as musical and as graceful as the verse of any age in our history. A great deal of our modern literature is such that it is exceedingly difficult to resist it, and it is undeniable that it gives us real information.

Starting point is 15:31:47 It seems perhaps unreasonable to many to assert that a decent, readable book which gives us actual instruction can be otherwise than a useful companion in a solid game. Possibly, many people are ready to cry out upon me as an obscurantist for venturing to doubt a genial confidence in all literature simply as such. But the question which weighs upon me with such really crushing urgency is this. What are the books that in our little remnant of reading time it is most vital for us to know. For the true use of books is of such sacred value to us that to be simply entertained is to cease to be taught, elevated,

Starting point is 15:32:32 inspired by books. Merely to gather information of a chance kind is to close the mind and knowledge of the urgent kind. Every book that we take up without a purpose is an opportunity lost of taking up a book with a purpose. Every bit of stray information which we cram into our heads without any sense of its importance is, for the most part, a bit of the most useful information driven out of our heads and choked off from our minds. It is so certain that information, ae. the knowledge, the stored thoughts and observations of mankind,

Starting point is 15:33:08 is now grown to proportion so utterly incalculable and prodigious that even the learned whose lives are given to study can but pick up pick up some crumbs that fall from the table of truth. They delve and tend but a plot in that vast and teeming kingdom, whilst those whom active life leaves with but a few cramped hours of study can hardly come to know the very vastness of the field before them, or how infinitesimally small as the corner they can traverse at the best. We know all is not of equal value. We know the books differ in value as much as diamonds differ from the sand on the best,

Starting point is 15:33:47 the seashore, as much as our living friend differs from a dead rat. We know that much in the myriad peopled world of books, very much in all kinds, is trivial, innovating, inane, even noxious. And thus, where we have infinite opportunities of wasting our efforts to no end, of fatiguing our minds without enriching them, of clogging the spirit without satisfying it, There I cannot but think the very infinity of opportunities is robbing us of the actual power of using them. And thus I come often, in my less hopeful moods, to watch the remorseless cataract of daily literature which thunders over the remnants of the past, as if it were a fresh impediment to the men

Starting point is 15:34:33 of our day in the way of systematic knowledge and consistent powers of thought. if it were destined one day to overwhelm the great inheritance of mankind in prose and verse. And so, I say it most confidently, the first intellectual task of our age is rightly to order and make serviceable the vast realm of printed material which four centuries have swept across our path. To organise our knowledge, to systematize our reading, to save out to the relentless cataract of ink the immortal thoughts of the greatest. This is a necessity, unless the productive ingenuity of man is to lead us at last to a measureless and pathless chaos.

Starting point is 15:35:18 To know anything that turns up is, in the infinity of knowledge, to know nothing. To read the first book we come across in the wilderness of books is to learn nothing. To turn over the pages of 10,000 volumes is to be practically indifferent to all that is good. But how are we to know the best? How are we to gain this definite idea of the vast world of letters? There are some who appear to suppose that the best are known only to experts in an esoteric way, who may reveal to inquiries what schoolboys and betting men describe as tips. There are no tips in literature.

Starting point is 15:35:58 The best authors are never dark horses. We need no crammers and coaches to thrust us into the presence of the great writers of all time. crammers will only lead us wrong. It is a thing far easier and more common than many imagine to discover the best. It needs no research, no learning, and is only misguided by recondite information. The world has long ago closed the great to size of letters and judged the first places everywhere. In such a matter, the judgment of the world, guided and informed by a long succession of accomplished critics, is almost unerring.

Starting point is 15:36:38 When some Zoelis finds blemishes in Homer and prefers it may be the work of some Apollonius of his own discovering, we only laugh. There may be doubts about the third and the fourth rank, but the first and the second are hardly open to discussion. The gates which lead to the Elysian fields may slowly wheel back on their adamantine hinges to admit now and then some new and chosen modern.

Starting point is 15:37:03 But the company of the masters, of those who know, and in a special degree of the great poets, is a role long-closed and complete, and they who are of it hold ever-peaceful converse together. Hence, we may find it a useful maxim that if our reading be utterly closed to the great poems of the world, there are something amiss with our reading. If you find Milton, Dante, Colderon, Gerta, so much Hebrew-Greek to you, If your Homer and Virgil, your Moliere and Scott, rest year after year, undisturbed on your shelves beside your school trigonometry in your old college textbooks. If you have never opened the SID, the Nebelungen, Crusoe, and Don Quixote, since you were a boy and a wont to leave the Bible and the imitation for some wet Sunday afternoon, no friend that your reading can do you little real good. your mental digestion is ruined or sadly out of order.

Starting point is 15:38:08 No doubt to thousands of intelligent, educated men who call themselves readers, the reading through a canto of the Purgatorio, or a book of the Paradise Lost, is a task as irksome as would be to decipher an ill-written manuscript in a language that is almost forgotten. But although we are not to always be reading epics and are chiefly in the mood for slighter things, to be absolutely unable to read Milton or Dante with injurcation, is to be in a very bad way. Aristophanes, Theocritus, Boccaccio, Savantes, Moliere are often as light as the driven foam. But they are not light enough for the general reader. Their humour is too bright and lovely for the groundlings. They are alas classics, somewhat apart from our everyday ways. They're not banal enough for us, and so for us they slumber unknown and a long night. just because they are immortal poets that are not scribblers of today.

Starting point is 15:39:08 When will men understand that the reading of great books is a faculty to be acquired, not a natural gift, at least not to those who are spoiled by our current education and habits of life, Chechi Tuere a cella, the last great poet might have said to the first circulating library. An insatiable appetite for new novels makes it as hard to read a master's, as it seems to a Parisian boulevardier to live in a quiet country. Until a man can truly enjoy a draught of clear water bubbling from a mountainside, his taste is in an unwholesome state. And so he who finds the heliconian spring insipid should look to the state of his nerves.

Starting point is 15:39:52 Putting aside the iced air of the difficult mountaintops of epic tragedy or psal, there are some simple pieces which may serve as an unerring test of a healthy or a vicious taste for imaginative work. If the Sid, the Vita Nuova, the Canterbury tales, Shakespeare's sonnets and Lysidius, Paul on a man, if he care not for Mallory's Murt atour

Starting point is 15:40:13 and the Red Cross knight, if he thinks Crusoe and the Vicar books for the young, if he threw not with the ode to the West Wind and the ode to a Grecian urn, if he have no stomach for Christabel, or the lines written on the Y above Tintin Abbey, he should fall on his knees and pray for a clean,

Starting point is 15:40:31 and quieter spirit. The intellectual system of most of us in these days needs to purge and to live cleanly. Only by such a course of treatment shall we bring our minds to feel at peace with the grand, pure works of the world. Something we ought all to know of the masterpieces of antiquity and of the other nations of Europe. To understand a great national poet such as Dante, Corderon, Connais or Gerta, is to know other types of human civilization in ways,

Starting point is 15:41:01 which a library of histories does not sufficiently teach. The great masterpieces of the world are thus, quite apart from the charm and solace they give us the master instruments of a solid education. End of Section 31. Section 32 of Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Volume 17. This is a Librevox recording.

Starting point is 15:41:34 All Libravox recordings are in the public don't For more information or to volunteer, please visit Libravox.org, recording by Rita Boutros. Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Volume 17. Brett Hart, 1839 to 1902, by William Henry Hudson. Francis Brett Hart, from whose name, so far as pen purposes are concerned, the Francis was long since dropped, was born in Albany, New York, August 25, 1839. After an ordinary school education, he went in 1854 to California, drawn thither, like so many other ambitious youths, by the gold excitement and the prospects of fortune. At first he tried his hand at teaching and

Starting point is 15:42:32 mining and had ample opportunity to study in close contact the wild frontier life, which he was afterwards to portray. Unsuccessful in both lines of experiment, he presently entered a printing office, and in 1857 was in San Francisco as compositor on the Golden Era. Unsigned sketches from his pen soon after this began to attract notice, and he was invited to join the staff of the Californian, to which he contributed a series of clever parodies on the styles and methods of famous contemporary writers of fiction, subsequently published in volume form under the title Condensed Novels.

Starting point is 15:43:23 Meanwhile, in 1864, Mr. Hart had been made secretary of the U.S. branch mint, and during his six years tenure of office, he produced some of his best-known poems, John Burns of Gettysburg, the Playaocene's skull, and the Society Upon the Stanislaus among the number. In 1868, the Overland Monthly was started with Mr. Hart as editor. It was now that he began in a systematic way to work up the material furnished by his earlier frontier life. The first result was the luck of Roaring Camp, which upon its appearance in the second number of the magazine instantly made its mark, and was accepted as heralding the rise of a new star in the literary heavens. No other prose production of,

Starting point is 15:44:23 its author has enjoyed greater popularity, though as a work of art it will hardly bear comparison with such stories as Miggles, Tennessee's partner, and the outcasts of Poker Flat, which followed in rapid succession, and the last named of which is generally considered the most perfect of his works. In 1871, Mr. Hart settled in New York and became a regular contributor to the Atlantic Monthly. In 1878, he was appointed United States Consul in Krafelt, Germany. Once in 1880, he was removed to the more lucrative post in Glasgow, after which time he resided abroad, principally in England, where his books enjoyed wide popularity. His pen still remained.

Starting point is 15:45:23 active, but despite a long absence from the land, out of whose life his initial successes were wrought, he continued, for the most part, to deal with the old California themes, remaining a facile prancep in a field in which he soon had many imitators. That he ever did anything quite so good as his first group of stories and poems cannot be said, for he undoubtedly paid the the penalty of working an exhausted soil, and his later volumes are marked as a hull by the repetition of well-worn motives and by declining spontaneity and power. Hence it is by his earlier writings that he will always be known. Still, the average quality of his output remained unusually high. And when the circumstances of its production are born in mind, it may perhaps seem remarkable

Starting point is 15:46:26 that it should have preserved so many traces of the writer's youthful freshness and vigor. In estimating Mr. Hart's work, allowance has, of course, to be made for the fact that it was his rare good fortune to break new ground and to become the first literary interpreter of a life which, with its primitive breadth and freedom, its unconventionality and picturesqueness, its striking contrasts of circumstance and character, offered singular opportunities to the novelist. But appreciation of this point

Starting point is 15:47:06 must not lead us to underrate the strength and certainty with which the chance of the moment was seized on and turned to use. In the last analysm, the secret of Mr. Hart's success will be found to inhere not so much in the novelty of the people and incidents described as in the sterling qualities of his own genius and art. Among such qualities, those which perhaps most constantly impress the critical reader of his total work, are his splendid dramatic instinct, his keen insight into character, his broad sympathy, and his subtle and pervasive humor. In his handling of certain of the more commonplace comic types, he frequently reveals the strong early influence of Dickens,

Starting point is 15:48:01 whose familiar method is to be detected, for instance, in Sal, Mrs. Markle, and even Colonel Starbottle of Gabriel Conroy, and of whom we are often unexpectedly reminded here and there in the author's more distinctive studies. But at his best, and in his own particular field, in such characters as the gamblers, Hamlin and Oakhurst, Tennessee's partner, Kentucky, Miggles, Melissa, Ollie, and many others, from his earlier stories especially, Mr. Hart is altogether himself.

Starting point is 15:48:42 dealing for the most part with large strongly marked elemental types as these develop and express themselves under conditions which give free play to instinct and passion he does not indulge in lengthy analyses or detailed descriptions his men and women are sketched with a few bold firm strokes and are left to work out their own personalities in speech and deed. And yet, such is the skill with which this is accomplished that they stand out before us as creatures of real flesh and blood, whom we unquestioningly, even if sometimes against our

Starting point is 15:49:27 cooler judgment, accept and believe in. Mr. Hart does not purposely soften the shadows in his pictures, the baseness and extravagance, the sin and wretchedness of frontier life, are frankly portrayed, as well as its rough chivalry and its crude romance. Nonetheless, there can be little doubt that consciously or unconsciously, he contrived to throw an idealizing glamour over the fret and fever, the squalor and misery of the mine and the camp, and that many of his most lifelike and successful characters are wrought in the imagination, though out of this stuff of fact his place is emphatically not among the realists realistic as much of his work undoubtedly is for the shaping power of dramatic genius moulds and fashions the raw material furnished by experience and observation

Starting point is 15:50:32 That, to take a single example, the reprobate Hamlin had no counterpart or original in actual life is altogether improbable. Yet it is certain that, in the picture as we have it, much, perhaps very much, is attributable to the cunning and delicacy of the artist's hand. Thus, what he gives us is something very different from a photograph, but it is just here, that we touch upon what is perhaps one of the finest qualities of his work, a quality not to be separated from his tendency towards idealization. Rarely falling into the didactic and dwelling habitually upon life's unexplained and inexplicable tragic complexities, he nevertheless suffuses his stories with an atmosphere of charity, eminently clear, sweet, and wholesome. His characteristic men and women, products of rude conditions, are generally rough and often

Starting point is 15:51:40 positively vicious, but he succeeds in convincing his readers of their common humanity, and in showing the keen responsiveness to nobler influences, still possessed by hearts, which superficially considered, might well seem hopelessly callous and dead, and he does this simply and naturally, without maudlin sentiment or forced rhetoric, without, in a word, playing to the gallery. The weakness of Mr. Hart's writing is closely connected with some of its main elements of strength, a master of condensed and rapid narration, he produced many stories, which are too episodical in character and sketchy in method to,

Starting point is 15:52:31 be completely satisfactory from the artistic point of view. While in his desire to achieve terseness, he occasionally sacrificed clearness of plot. This is particularly the case with his more ambitious efforts, especially with his long novel Gabriel Conroy, an elaborate study of the culture conditions of early California civilization. The book has many admirable points. The book has many admirable points. It abounds in memorable descriptions, vivid and humorous character sketches, and separate scenes of remarkable power. But it lacks wholeness, proportion, lucidity. It is a bundle of episodes, and these episodes do not hang together. Its plot is unduly intricate, while the conduct of the story everywhere shows the author's inability to hold in hand and weave into definite pattern the multitudinous threads indispensable to his design.

Starting point is 15:53:40 Undoubtedly written under the influence of the huge novels of Dickens, the contrast that it presents on the structural side with such an orderly and well-sustained work as Bleak House is, is almost painful. As a writer of verse, Mr. Hart is unequal. Some of his humorous poetry is too racy and original to be lost. Much on the other hand is too temporary and extravagant to find an abiding place in literature. His best verse artistically considered is perhaps to be sought in his wonderfully dramatic monologues

Starting point is 15:54:23 in dialect. Jim and In the Tunnel are masterpieces of this kind, while plain language from truthful James, currently known as the heathen Chinese, must remain secure of a distinct place in American verse. He died after a brief illness at Camberley, England, May 5, 1902. End of Section 32. Section 33 of Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Volume 17. This is a Libravox recording. All Libravox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit Libravox.org, recording by Rita Boutros.

Starting point is 15:55:21 Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Volume 17. selected poems of Brett Hart The following poems are all taken from the poetical works of Brett Hart Copyright 1882 by Houghton Mifflin and Company Boston And are reprinted by special arrangement with the publishers Jim Say there, perhaps some on you chaps might know Jim Wilde. Well, no offense, there ain't no sense in getting riled.

Starting point is 15:55:56 Jim was my chum up on the bar. That's why I come down from up y'ar, looking for Jim. Thank ye, sir. You ain't of that crew, blessed if you are. Money, not much. That ain't my kind. I ain't no such. Rum? I don't mind, saying it's you. Well, this year, Jim, did you know him? Just about your size. Same kind of eyes. Well, that is strange. Why, it's two years since he came here. Sick for a change. Well, here's to us, eh? The hell you say. Dead? That little cuss? What makes you stare? You over thar. Can't a man drop his glass in your shop, but you must rar? It wouldn't take damn much to break you and your bar. Dead. Poor little Jim. Why, thar was me. Jones and Bomb Lee. Harry and Ben, no account men. Then, to take him. Well, thar, good-bye.

Starting point is 15:57:01 No more, sir, I. A, what's that you say? Why, darn it, show? No, yes, by Joe. Sold, sold. Why, you limb, you ornery, durned old, long-legged Jim. Selection. Dow's flat by Brett Hart, 1856.

Starting point is 15:57:26 "'Dow's flat, that's its name, and I reckon that you are a stranger. "'The same? Well, I thought it was true. "'For there isn't a man on the river, as can't spot the place at first view. "'It was called after Dow, which the same was an ass. "'And as to the how, that the thing came to pass. "'Just tie up your horse to that buck-eye and sit you down here in the grass. "'You see this, your Dow? had the worst kind of luck

Starting point is 15:57:57 he slipped up somehow on each thing that he struck why if Ada straddled that fence rail the darn thing it'd get up and buck he mined on the bar till he couldn't pay rates he was smashed by a car when he tunneled

Starting point is 15:58:13 with bait and right on the top of his trouble came his wife and five kids from the states it was rough mighty rough but the boys they stood by and they brought him the stuff for a house on the sly and the old woman well she did washing and took on when no one was nigh but this your luck of dows was so powerful mean that the spring near his house

Starting point is 15:58:40 dried right up on the green and he sunk forty feet down for water but nary a drop to be seen then the bar petered out and the boys wouldn't stay and the chills got about and his wife away, but Dow and his well-kept a pagan in his usual ridiculous way. One day it was June, and a year ago, just, this Tao came at noon to his work like the rest, with a shovel and pick on his shoulder and a derringer hid in his breast. He goes to the well, and he stands on the brink, and stops for a spell just to listen and think. For the sun in his eyes, just like this, sir, you see kinder made the cuss blink his two ragged gals and the gulch were at play and a gown that was sals kinder flapped on a bay not much for a man to be leavin but his all as i heard the folks say hand that's a pair of horse that you've got ain't it now what might be our cost eh oh well then dow let's see well that forty-foot grave wasn't his sir

Starting point is 15:59:55 that day anyhow. For a blow of his pick, Sorter caved in the side, and he looked and turned sick. Then he trembled and cried, for you see the darn cuss had struck, water? Beg your pardon, young man, there you lied. It was gold in the courts, and it ran all alike. And I reckon five aughts was the worth of that strike, and that house with the cupola's hisen, which the same isn't bad for a pike. That's why it's Dow's flat, and the thing of it is that he kinder got that through sheer contrariness, for twas water the darned cuss was seeking, and his luck made him certain to miss. That's so, thar's your way, to the left of yon tree. But a look here, say, won't you come up to tea? No? Well, then, the next time you're passing and ask after Dow, and that's me.

Starting point is 16:00:55 selection in the tunnel by Brett Hart Didn't know Flynn Flynn of Virginia long as he's been y'ar Looky here stranger Where have you been? Here in this tunnel he was my partner That same Tom Flynn Working together in wind and weather

Starting point is 16:01:17 Day out and in Didn't know Flynn Well that is queer Why it's a sin to think of Tom Flynn Tom with his cheer, Tom without fear. Stranger, look y'ar. Thar in the drift, back to the wall, he held the timbers ready to fall. Then in the darkness I heard him call. Run for your life, Jake, run for your wife's sake. Don't wait for me. And that was all heard in the din, heard of Tom Flynn, Flynn of Virginia. That's all about Flynn of Virginia. That lets me out. here in the damp out of the sun that our darned lamp makes my eyes run well there i'm done but sir when you'll hear the next fool askin of flin of virginia just you chip in say you knew flin say that you've been y'ar selection the society upon the stanislaus by brett hart i reside at table mountain and And my name is truthful James.

Starting point is 16:02:27 I am not up to small deceit or any sinful games. And I'll tell in simple language what I know about the row that broke up our society upon the Stanislau. But first I would remark that it is not a proper plan for any scientific gent to wail his fellow man. And if a member don't agree with his peculiar whim, to lay for that same member for to put a head, head on him. Now nothing could be finer or more beautiful to see than the first six months

Starting point is 16:03:02 proceedings of that same society. Till Brown of Calaveras brought a lot of fossil bones that he found within a tunnel near the tenement of Jones. Then Brown, he read a paper, and he reconstructed there from those same bones, an animal that was extremely rare. And Jones then asked the chair for a suspension of the rules, till he could prove that those same bones was one of his lost mules. Then Brown, he smiled a bitter smile and said he was at fault. It seemed he had been trespassing on Jones's family vault. He was a most sarcastic man, this quiet Mr. Brown,

Starting point is 16:03:47 and on several occasions he had cleaned out the town. Now, I hold it is not decent for a scientific gent to say another is an ass, at least to all intent, nor should the individual who happens to be meant reply by heaving rocks at him to any great extent. Then Abner-Deen of angels raised a point of order when a chunk of old red sandstone took him in the abdomen, and he smiled a kind of sickly smile and curled up on the floor,

Starting point is 16:04:22 and the subsequent proceedings interested him no more. For in less time than I write it, every member did engage in a warfare with the remnants of a Paleozoic age, and the way they heaved those fossils in their anger was a sin, tis the skull of an old mammoth caved the head of Thompson in. And this is all I have to say of these improperly. games, for I live at Table Mountain, and my name is truthful James, and I've told in simple language what I knew about the row that broke up our society upon the Stanislau. Selection Thompson of Angels by Brett Hart

Starting point is 16:05:07 It is the story of Thompson, of Thompson the hero of angels, frequently drunk was Thompson, but always polite to the stranger. light and free was the touch of Thompson upon his revolver. Great the mortality incident on that lightness and freedom. Yet not happy or gay was Thompson, the hero of angels, often spoke to himself in accents of anguish and sorrow. Why do I make the graves of the frivolous youth, who in folly thoughtlessly pass my revolver,

Starting point is 16:05:44 forgetting its lightness and freedom? Why in my daily walks Does the surgeon drop his left eyelid? The undertaker's smile And the sculptor of gravestone marbles Lean on his chisel and gaze I care not or much for attention Simple am I in my ways

Starting point is 16:06:04 Save for this lightness and freedom So spake that pensive man This Thompson, the hero of angels Bitterly smile to himself As he strode through the chaparral musing. Why, oh why, echoed the pines in the dark olive depth far resounding.

Starting point is 16:06:25 Why, indeed, whispered the sagebrush that bent beneath his feet non-elastic. Pleasant indeed was that morn that dawned over the bar-room at angels. Where in their manhood's prime was gathered the pride of the hamlet. Six took sugar in theirs, and nine to the barkeeper light-es

Starting point is 16:06:46 lightly, smiled as they said, Well, Jim, you can give us our regular fusel. Suddenly, as the Greyhawk swoops down on the barnyard, alighting where, pensively picking their corn, the favorite pullets are gathered. So in that festive barroom dropped Thompson, the hero of angels, grasping his weapon dread with his pristine lightness and freedom.

Starting point is 16:07:13 Never a word he spoke, divesting himself of his garments, danced the war-dance of the playful yet truculent modoc, uttered a single whoop, and then, in the accents of challenge, spake, O behold in me, a crested j-hawk of the mountain. Then rose a pallid man, a man sick with fever and ague, small was he, and his step was tremulous, weak and uncertain. slowly a derringer drew and covered the person of Thompson, said in his feeblest pipe, I'm a bald-headed snipe of the valley. As on its native plains, the kangaroo, startled by hunters,

Starting point is 16:07:57 leaps with successive bounds, and hurries away to the thickets. So leaped the crested hawk, and quietly hopping behind him, ran, and occasionally shot, that bald-headed snipe of the valley. Vane at the festive bar still lingered the people of angels, hearing afar in the woods the petulant pop of the pistol. Never again returned the crested j-hawk of the mountains. Never again was seen the bald-headed snipe of the valley. Yet in the hamlet of angels, when truculent speeches are uttered, when bloodshed and life alone will atone for some trifling misstatement, Maidens and men in their prime Recall the last hero of angels

Starting point is 16:08:46 Think of and vainly regret The bald-headed snipe of the valley Selection Plain Language from Truthful James By Brethart Table Mountain Which I wish to remark And my language is plain

Starting point is 16:09:04 That for ways that are dark And for tricks that are vain The heathen Chinese is peculiar which the same I would rise to explain. Ah, sin was his name, and I shall not deny, in regard to the same, what that name might imply. But his smile it was pensive and childlike, as I frequent remarked to Bill Nye. It was August the third, and quite soft was the skies, which it might be inferred, that Ah, sin was likewise. Yet he played it that day upon William, and

Starting point is 16:09:41 me in a way I despise, which we had a small game, and Ah Sin took a hand. It was Yucar the same he did not understand, but he smiled as he sat by the table with a smile that was childlike and bland. Yet the cards they were stocked in a way that I grieve, and my feelings were shocked at the state of Nye's sleeve, which was stuffed full of aces and bowers, and the same with intent to deceive. But the hands that were played by that heathen Chinese, and the points that he made were quite frightful to see, till at last he put down a right bower, which the same Nye had dealt unto me. Then I looked up at Nye, and he gazed upon me, and he rose with a sigh and said, Can this be? We are ruined by Chinese cheap labor, and he went for that heathen Chinese. In the

Starting point is 16:10:41 that ensued I did not take a hand, but the floor it was strewed like the leaves on the strand, with the cards that Ah Sin had been hiding in the game he did not understand. In his sleeves, which were long, he had twenty-four packs, which was coming at strong, yet I state but the facts, and we found on his nails which were taper what is frequent in tapers, that's wax. which is why I remark, and my language is plain, that for ways that are dark and for tricks that are vain, the heathen Chinese is peculiar, which the same I am free to maintain.

Starting point is 16:11:26 From the Overland Monthly Selection on a cone of the big trees By Brethart, Sequoia Gigantea Brown foundling of the western wood babe of primeval wildernesses, long on my table thou hath stood, encounters strange and rude caresses, perchance contented with thy lot, surroundings new and curious faces, as though ten centuries were not imprisoned in thy shining cases. Thou bringest me back the halcyon days of grateful rest, the week of leisure.

Starting point is 16:12:06 The journey lapped in autumn haze, the sweet fatigue, that seemed a pleasure. The morning ride, the noonday halt, the blazing slopes, the red dust rising, and then the dim, brown, columned vault, with its cool damp, sepulchral spicing. Once more I see the rocking mass that scrape the sky, their only tenant, the Jaybird, that in frolic casts from some high yard his broad blue pennant. I see the Indian files that keep their places in the dusty, heather. Their red trunks standing ankle-deep in moccasins of rusty leather. I see all this and marvel much, that thou sweet woodland waif, art able to keep the company of such,

Starting point is 16:12:54 as throng thy friends the poet's table. The latest spawn, the press hath cast, the modern popes, the later Byron's, when e'en the best may not outlast, thy poor relation semperverence. thy sire saw the light that shone on Muhammad's uplifted crescent, on many a royal gilded throne, indeed forgotten in the present. He saw the age of sacred trees and druid groves and mystic larches, and saw from forest domes like these the builder bring his Gothic arches. And must thou foundling still forego thy heritage and high ambition, to lie full lowly and full low adjusted to thy new condition.

Starting point is 16:13:43 Not hidden in the drifted snows, but under ink drops idly spattered, and leaves ephemeral as those that on thy woodland tomb were scattered. Selection Dickinson Camp by Brett Hart Above the pines the moon was slowly drifting, the river sang below, the dims, sierras, far below, uplifting their minarets of snow. The roaring campfire with rude humor painted the ruddy tints of health on haggard face and form

Starting point is 16:14:19 that drooped and fainted in the fierce race for wealth. Till one arose and from his pack's scant treasure, a hoarded volume drew, and cards were dropped from hands of listless leisure to hear the tale anew. And then, while round them shadows gathered faster, and as the firelight fell, he read aloud the book wherein the master had writ of little knell. Perhaps twas boyish fancy, for the reader was youngest of them all, but as he read from clustering pine and cedar, a silence seemed to fall. The fir trees gathering closer in the shadows listened in every spray while the whole camp with Nell on English meadows

Starting point is 16:15:10 wandered and lost their way And so in mountain solitudes Or taken as by some spell divine Their cares dropped from them Like the needles shaken from out the gusty pine Lost is that camp And wasted all its fire and he who wrought that spell ah towering pine and stately kentish spire ye have one tale to tell lost is that camp but let its fragrant story blend with the breath that thrills with hopvines incense all the pence of glory that fills the kentish hills

Starting point is 16:15:52 and on that grave where english oak and holly and laurel wreaths and twine deem it not all a too presumptuous folly this spray of western pine end of section thirty three section thirty four of library of the world's best literature ancient and modern volume seventeen this is a librovoc's recording all librovoc's recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer, please visit Libravox.org, recording by Rita Boutros. Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Volume 17. An heiress of Red Dog by Brett Hart. From the Twins of Table Mountain and Other Stories, Copyright 1879 by Houghton, Osgood and Company, Boston, reprinted by Special Arrangement with the publishers. The first intimation given of the eccentricity of the testator was, I think, in the spring of 1854.

Starting point is 16:17:08 He was at that time in possession of a considerable property, heavily mortgaged to one friend, and a wife of some attraction, on whose affections another friend held an encumbering lien. One day it was found that he had secretly dug, or cause to be dug, a deep trap before the front door of his dwelling, into which a few friends in the course of the evening casually and familiarly dropped. This circumstance slight in itself seemed to point to the existence of a certain humor in the man,

Starting point is 16:17:46 which might eventually get into literature. Although his wife's lover, a man of quick discernment, whose leg was broken by the fall, took other views, It was some weeks later that while dining with certain other friends of his wife, he excused himself from the table to quietly reappear at the front window with a three-quarter-inch hydraulic pipe and a stream of water projected at the assembled company. An attempt was made to take public cognizance of this, but a majority of the citizens of Red Dog, who were not at dinner,

Starting point is 16:18:26 decided that a man had a right to choose his own methods of diverting his company. Nevertheless, there were some hints of his insanity. His wife recalled other acts clearly attributable to dementia. The crippled lover argued from his own experience that the integrity of her limbs could only be secured by leaving her husband's house, and the mortgagee, fearing a further damage to his property, foreclosed. But here the cause of all this anxiety took matters into his own hands and disappeared. When we next heard from him, he had in some mysterious way been relieved alike of his wife and property,

Starting point is 16:19:16 and was living alone at Rockville 50 miles away and editing a newspaper. but that originality he had displayed when dealing with the problems of his own private life, when applied to politics in the columns of the Rockville vanguard, was singularly unsuccessful. An amusing exaggeration, purporting to be an exact account of the manner in which the opposing candidate had murdered his Chinese laundromen, was, I regret to say, answered only by a soul. and battery. A gratuitous and purely imaginative description of a great religious revival in

Starting point is 16:20:01 Calaveras, in which the sheriff of the county, a notoriously profane skeptic, was alleged to have been the chief exorter, resulted only in the withdrawal of the county advertising from the paper. In the midst of this practical confusion, he suddenly died. It was the then discovered as a crowning proof of his absurdity that he had left a will, bequeathing his entire effects to a freckle-faced maid-servant at the Rockville Hotel. But that absurdity became serious when it was also discovered that among these effects were a thousand shares in the Rising Sun Mining Company, which, a day or two after his demise, and while people were,

Starting point is 16:20:53 still laughing at his grotesque benefaction, suddenly sprang into opulence and celebrity. Three millions of dollars was roughly estimated as the value of the estate, thus wantonly sacrificed, for it is only fair to state as a just tribute to the enterprise and energy of that young and thriving settlement,

Starting point is 16:21:19 that there was not probably a single citizen who did not feel himself better able to control the deceased humorous property. Some had expressed a doubt of their ability to support a family. Others had felt perhaps too keenly the deep responsibility resting upon them when chosen from the panel as jurors, and had evaded their public duties. A few had declined office and a low salary, but no one shrank from the possibility of having been called upon to assume the functions of Peggy Moffat the heiress.

Starting point is 16:22:01 The will was contested, first by the widow, who it now appeared had never been legally divorced from the deceased, next by four of his cousins, who awoke only too late to a consciousness of his moral and pecuniary worth. But the humble legatee, a singularly plain, unpretending, uneducated Western girl, exhibited a dogged pertinacity in claiming her rights. She rejected all compromises. A rough sense of justice in the community, while doubting her ability to take care of the whole fortune, suggested that she ought to be content with $300,000. She is bound to us.

Starting point is 16:22:48 throw even that away on some darned skunk of a man naturally but three millions is too much to give a chap for makin are unhappy it's off'er an attemptation to cussedness the only opposing voice to this council came from the sardonic lips of mr jack hamlin suppose suggested that gentleman turning abruptly on the speaker suppose when you won twenty thousand dollars of me last friday night. Suppose that instead of handing you over the money as I did, suppose I'd got up on my hind legs and said, look you're Bill Wethersby, you're a damned fool. If I give you that 20,000, you'll throw it away in the first skin game in Frisco, and hand it over to the first short card sharp you'll meet. There's a thousand, enough for you to fling away, take it and get. Suppose what I'd say, said to you was the frozen truth, and you noted, would that have been the square thing to play on you? But here, Wethersby quickly pointed out the inefficiency of the comparison by stating that he

Starting point is 16:24:03 had won the money fairly with a stake. And how do you know, demanded Hamlin savagely, venting his black eyes on the astonished casuist. How do you know that the gal hasn't put down a stake. The man stammered an unintelligible reply. The gambler laid his white hand on Weatherby's shoulder. Look, your old man, he said, every gal stakes her whole pile. You can bet your life on that, whatever is her little game. If she took to Keards instead of her feelings, if she'd put up chips instead of body and soul, she'd burst every bank twixt this in frisco, you hear me somewhat of this idea was conveyed i fear not quite as sentimentally to peggy moffit herself the best legal wisdom of san francisco retained by the widow and relatives took occasion in a private interview with peggy to point out that she stood in the quasi-criminal attitude of having unlawfully practised upon the affections of an insane elderly gentleman with a view of getting possession of his property,

Starting point is 16:25:19 and suggested to her that no vestige of her moral character would remain after the trial if she persisted in forcing her claims to that issue. It is said that Peggy, on hearing this, stopped washing the plate she had in her hands, and twisting the towel around her fingers, fixed her small pale blue eyes at the lawyer. And is that the kind of chirpin these critters keep up?

Starting point is 16:25:48 I regret to say, my dear young lady, responded the lawyer, that the world is censorious. I must add, he continued, with engaging frankness, that we professional lawyers are apt to study the opinion of the world, and that such will be the theory of our side. Then, said Peggy Stoutly, I allow I've got to go into court to defend my character. I might as well pack in them three millions too. There is hearsay evidence that Pegg added to this speech a wish and desire to bus the crust of her traducers,

Starting point is 16:26:31 and remarking that, that was the kind of hairpin she was, closed the conversation with an unfortunate accident to the plate that left a severe contusion on the last. legal brow of her companion. But this story, popular in the barrooms and gulches, lacked confirmation in higher circles. Better authenticated was the legend related of an interview with her own lawyer. That gentleman had pointed out to her the advantage of being able to show some reasonable cause for the singular generosity of the testator. Although, he continued, the law does not go back of the will for reason or cause for its provisions.

Starting point is 16:27:18 It would be a strong point with the judge and jury, particularly if the theory of insanity were set up, for us to show that the act was logical and natural. Of course you have, I speak confidently, Miss Moffat, certain ideas of your own, why the late Mr. Byways was so singularly generous. to you?" No, I haven't," said Peg, decidedly. Think again. Had he not expressed to you, you understand that this is confidential between us, although

Starting point is 16:27:55 I protest, my dear young lady, that I see no reason why it should not be made public. Had he not given utterance to sentiments of a nature consistent with some future matrimonial relations? but here Miss Pegg's large mouth, which had been slowly relaxing over her irregular teeth, stopped him. If you mean he wanted to marry me, no. I see, but were there any conditions? Of course you know the law takes no cognizance of any not expressed in the will,

Starting point is 16:28:32 but still, for the sake of mere corroboration of the bequest, Do you know of any conditions on which he gave you the property? You mean did he want anything in return? Exactly, my dear young lady. Pegg's face on one side turned a deep magenta color, on the other a lighter cherry, while her nose was purple and her forehead an Indian red. To add to the effect of this awkward and discomposing dramatic exhibition,

Starting point is 16:29:07 of embarrassment. She began to wipe her hands on her dress and sat silent. I understand, said the lawyer hastily. No matter, the conditions were fulfilled. No, said Pegg amazingly, how could they be until he was dead? It was the lawyer's turn to color and grow embarrassed. He did say something and make some conditions, continued Peg, with a certain firmness through her awkwardness. But that's nobody's business but mine and his'n, and it's no call o'ers or theirs. But, my dear Miss Moffat, if these very conditions were proofs of his right mind, you surely would not object to make them known, if only to enable you to put yourself

Starting point is 16:30:01 in a condition to carry them out. but said Peg cunningly suppose you and the court didn't think them satisfactory suppose you thought em queer eh with this helpless limitation on the part of the defense the case came to trial everybody remembers it how for six weeks it was the daily food of calaveras county how for six weeks the intellectual and moral and social and moral and spiritual competency of Mr. James byways to dispose of his property, was discussed with learned and formal obscurity in the court, and with unlettered and independent prejudice by campfires and in bar rooms. At the end of that time, when it was logically established that at least nine-tenths of the population of Calaveras were harmless lunatics, and everybody else's reason seemed to totter on its throne. An exhausted jury succumbed one day to the presence of Peg in the

Starting point is 16:31:11 courtroom. It was not a prepossessing presence at any time, but the excitement and an injudicious attempt to ornament herself brought her defects into a glaring relief that was almost unreal. Every freckle on her face stood out and asserted itself singly. Her pale blue eyes that gave no indication of her force of character were weak and wandering, or stared blankly at the judge. Her oversized head brought at the base, terminating in the scantiest possible light-colored braid in the middle of her narrow shoulders,

Starting point is 16:31:53 was as hard and uninteresting as the wooden spheres that topped the railing against which she sat. The jury, who for six weeks had had her described to them by the plaintiffs as an arch wily enchantress, who had sapped the failing reason of Jim Byways, revolted to a man. There was something so appallingly gratuitous in her plainness

Starting point is 16:32:22 that it was felt that three millions was scarcely a compensation for it. If that money was give to her, she earned it, sure, boys. It wasn't no softness of the old man, said the foreman. When the jury retired, it was felt that she had cleared her character. When they re-entered the room with their verdict, it was known that she had been awarded three millions' damages for its defamation. She got the money, but those who had confidently expected to see her squander it were disappointed. On the contrary, it was presently whispered that she was exceeding Peonorious.

Starting point is 16:33:09 That admirable woman, Mrs. Stiver of Red Dog, who accompanied her to San Francisco to assist her in making purchases, was loud in her indignation. She cares more for two bits than I do for five dollars. She wouldn't buy anything at the city of Paris because it was too expensive. and at last rigged herself out a perfect guy at some cheap slop-shops in Market Street. And after all the care Jane and me took of her, given up our time and experience to her, she never so much has made Jane a single present. Popular opinion, which regarded Mrs. Stiver's attention as purely speculative,

Starting point is 16:33:56 was not shocked at this unprofitable denouement. But when Pegg refused to give it, anything to clear the mortgage off the new Presbyterian Church, and even declined to take shares in the Union ditch, considered by many as an equally sacred and safe investment, she began to lose favor. Nevertheless, she seemed to be as regardless of public opinion as she had been before the trial, took a small house in which she lived with an old woman who had once been a fellow-series, on apparently terms of perfect equality and looked after her money. I wish I could say that she did this discreetly, but the fact is she blundered.

Starting point is 16:34:45 The same dogged persistency she had displayed in claiming her rights was visible in her unsuccessful ventures. She sunk $200,000 in a worn-out shaft originally projected by the deceased, testator. She prolonged the miserable existence of the Rockville vanguard long after it had ceased to interest even its enemies. She kept the doors of the Rockville Hotel open when its custom had departed. She lost the cooperation and favor of a fellow capitalist through a trifling misunderstanding, in which she was derelict and impenitent. She had three losses. She had three losses. suits on her hands that could have been settled for a trifle. I note these defects to show that she was by no means a heroine.

Starting point is 16:35:42 I quote her affair with Jack Follensby to show she was scarcely the average woman. That handsome, graceless vagabond had struck the outskirts of Red Dog in a cyclone of dissipation, which left him astranded, but still rather interesting. wreck in a ruinous cabin not far from Peg Moffat's Virgin Bower. Pale, crippled from excesses, with a voice quite tremulous from sympathetic emotion, more or less developed by stimulants. He lingered languidly, with much time on his hands, and only a few neighbors. In this fascinating kind of general Dei of morals, dress, and the emotions, he appeared before Peg Moffett.

Starting point is 16:36:34 More than that, he occasionally limped with her through the settlement. The critical eye of Red Dog took in the singular pair. Jack, voluble, suffering, apparently overcome by remorse, conscience, vituperation, and disease, and Pegg, open-mouthed, high-colored, awkward, yet delighted. and the critical eye of Red Dog, seeing this, wanked meaningly at Rockville. No one knew what passed between them, but all observed that one summer day,

Starting point is 16:37:11 Jack drove down the main street of Red Dog in an open buggy, with the heiress of that town beside him. Jack, albeit a trifle shaky, held the reins with something of his old dash, and Mistress Peggy, in an enormous bonnet with pearl-colored ribbons a shade darker than her hair holding in her short pink-gloved fingers a bouquet of yellow roses absolutely glowed crimson in distressful gratification over the dashboard so these two fared on out of the busy settlement into the woods against the rosy sunset possibly it was not a pretty picture nevertheless

Starting point is 16:37:58 as the dim aisles of the solemn pines opened to receive them, miners leaned upon their spades, and mechanics stopped in their toil to look after them. The critical eye of red dog, perhaps from the sun, perhaps from the fact that it had itself once been young and dissipated, took on a kindly moisture as it gazed. The moon was high when they returned, those who had waited to congratulate Jack on this near prospect of a favorable change in his fortunes, were chagrined to find that having seen the lady safe home, he had himself departed from Red Dog. Nothing was to be gained from Pegg, who, on the next day and ensuing days, kept the even tenor of her way, sunk a thousand

Starting point is 16:38:52 or two more in unsuccessful speculation, and made no change in her habit. of personal economy. Weeks passed without any apparent sequel to this romantic idyll. Nothing was known definitely until Jack, a month later, turned up in Sacramento, with a billiard cue in his hand, and a heart overcharged with indignant emotion. I don't mind saying to a gentleman in confidence, said Jack to a circle of sympathizing players. I don't mind telling your regard in this thing that I was as soft on that freckle-faced, red-eyed, tall-haired gal, as if she'd been a, uh, an actress. And I don't mind saying,

Starting point is 16:39:40 gentlemen, that as far as I understand women, she was just as soft on me. You can laugh, but it's so. One day I took her out buggy riding, in style, too, and out on the road I offered to do the square thing, just as if she'd been a lady, offered to marry her then and there. And what did she do? said Jack with a hysterical laugh. Why, blank it all, offered me $25 a week allowance, pay to be stopped when I wasn't at home. The roar of laughter that greeted this frank confession was broken by a quiet voice asking, and what did you say? "'Say!' screamed Jack. "'I just told her to go to hell with her money.'

Starting point is 16:40:32 "'They say,' continued the quiet voice, "'that you asked her for the loan of $250 to get you to Sacramento "'and that you got it.' "'Who says so?' roared Jack. "'Show me the blank liar.' "'There was a dead silence. "'Then the possessor of the quiet voice, Mr. Jack Hamlin, languidly reached under the table, took the chalk, and, rubbing the end of his billiard cue, began with gentle gravity.

Starting point is 16:41:07 It was an old friend of mine in Sacramento, a man with a wooden leg, a game eye, three fingers on his right hand, and a consumptive cough. Being unable naturally to back himself, he leaves things to make. So, for the sake of argument, continued Hamlin, suddenly laying down his cue and fixing his wicked black eyes on the speaker, Say it's me. I am afraid that this story, whether truthful or not, did not tend to increase Peg's popularity, in a community where recklessness and generosity condoned for the absence of all the other virtues, and it is possible also that Red Dog was no more free from prejudice than other more civilized but equally disappointed matchmakers. Likewise, during the following year, she made several more foolish ventures and lost heavily.

Starting point is 16:42:15 In fact, a feverish desire to increase her store at almost any risk seemed to possess her. At last it was announced that she intended to reopen the in Felix Rockville Hotel and keep it herself. Wild as this scheme appeared in theory, when put into practical operation, there seemed to be some chance of success. Much doubtless was owing to her practical knowledge of hotel keeping, but more to her rigid economy and untiring industry. The mistress of millions, she cooked, washed, waited on table, made the beds, and labored like a common menial. Visitors were attracted by this novel spectacle. The income of the house increased as their respect for the hostess lessened. No anecdote of her avarice was too extravagant for current belief.

Starting point is 16:43:16 It was even alleged that she had been known to carry the luggage of guests to their rooms, that she might anticipate the usual porter's gratuity. She denied herself the ordinary necessaries of life. She was poorly clad, she was ill-fed, but the hotel was making money. A few hinted of insanity. Others shook their heads and said a curse was in terms, on the property. It was believed also from her appearance that she could not long survive this tax on her energies, and already there was discussion as to the probable final disposition of her

Starting point is 16:44:01 property. It was the particular fortune of Mr. Jack Hamlin, to be able to set the world right on this and other questions regarding her. A stormy December evening had set in when he chance to be a guest of the Rockville Hotel. He had, during the past week, been engaged in the prosecution of his noble profession at Red Dog, and had, in the graphic language of a co-adjutor, cleared out the town, except his fare in the pockets of the stage driver. The Red Dog's standard had bewailed his departure in playful obituary verse, beginning, dearest Johnny, that hast left us, wherein the rhymes bereft us and deplore, carried a vague illusion to a thousand dollars more. A quiet contentment naturally suffused his personality, and he was more than usually

Starting point is 16:45:02 lazy and deliberate in his speech. At midnight, when he was about to retire, he was a little surprised, however, by a tap on his door, followed by the presence of mistress Peg Moffat, Aris, and landlady of Rockville Hotel. Mr. Hamlin, despite his previous defense of Pegg, had no liking for her. His fastidious taste rejected her uncomeliness. His habits of thought and life were all antagonistic to what he had heard of her niggardliness and greed. as she stood there in a dirty calico wrapper still redolent with the day's cuisine crimson with embarrassment and the recent heat of the kitchen range she certainly was not an alluring apparition happily for the lateness of the hour her loneliness and the in felix reputation of the man before her she was at least a safe one and i fear the very consciousness of this scarcely relieved her embanked her

Starting point is 16:46:10 "'Oh, I wanted to say a few words to ye alone, Mr. Amlin,' she began, taking an unoffered seat on the end of his portmanteau. "'Or I shouldn't have intruded, but it's the only time I can catch you, or you me, for I'm down in the kitchen from sun up till now.' She stopped awkwardly as if to listen to the wind, which was rattling the windows and spreading a film of rain against the the opaque darkness without. Then smoothing her wrapper over her knees, she remarked, as if opening a desultory conversation, "'There's a power of rain outside!' Mr. Hamlin's only response to this meteorological observation was a yawn and a preliminary tug at his coat as he began to remove it.

Starting point is 16:47:04 "'I thought you couldn't mind doing me a favor,' continued Pegg, with a hard, awkward laugh. Particularly seeing any folks aloud, you'd sort of been a friend of mine, and had stood up for me at times when you hadn't any particular call to do it. I haven't. She continued, looking down at her lap and following with her finger and thumb a seam of her gown. I haven't so many friends. He slings a kind word for me these times that I disremember them. Her under lip quivered a little here, and after vainly hunting for a forgotten handkerchief, she finally lifted the hem of her gown,

Starting point is 16:47:46 wiped her snub nose upon it, but left the tears still in her eyes as she raised them to the man. Mr. Hamlin, who had by this time divested himself of his coat, stopped unbuttoning his waistcoat, and looked at her, Like he's not there'll be high water on the north fork, if this rain keeps on, said Peg, as if apologetically, looking toward the window. The other rain having ceased, Mr. Hamlin began to unbutton his waistcoat again.

Starting point is 16:48:21 I wanted to ask ye a favor about Mr.—about Jack Follensby, began Pegg again hurriedly. He's ailing again and is mighty low, and he's losing a heap of money here and there, and mostly to you. You cleaned him out $2,000 last night All he had. Well, said the gambler coldly, Well, I thought, as you was a friend of mine,

Starting point is 16:48:51 I'd ask you to let up a little on him, said Pegg with an affected laugh. You can do it, don't let him play with you. Mistress Margaret Moffat, said Jack with lazy deliberation, taking off his watch, and beginning to wind it up. If you're that much stuck after Jack Follensby,

Starting point is 16:49:14 you can keep him off of me much easier than I can. You're a rich woman. Give him enough money to break my bank, or break himself for good and all. But don't keep him forlun round me in hopes to make a raise. It don't pay, Mistress Moffat, it don't pay. A finer nature than Peggs would have misunderings, would have misunderstood or resented the gambler's slang

Starting point is 16:49:42 and the miserable truths that underlay it. But she comprehended him instantly and sat hopelessly silent. If you'll take my advice, continued Jack, placing his watch and chain under his pillow, and quietly unloosing his cravat. You'll quit this year Farlin,

Starting point is 16:50:03 marry that chap, and hand over to him the money and the money-making that's killing you. He'll get rid of it soon enough. I don't say this because I expect to get it. For when he's got that much of a raise, he'll make a break for Frisco and lose it to some first-class sport there.

Starting point is 16:50:23 I don't say neither, that you mayn't be in luck enough to reform him. I don't say neither, and it's a darn sight more likely, that you mayn't be luckier yet, and he'll up and die, "'for he gets rid of your money. "'But I do say you'll make him happy now,

Starting point is 16:50:40 "'and Ease I reckon you're about these badly stock "'after that chap Ease I ever saw any woman, "'you won't be hurting your own feelings either.' "'The blood left Peg's face as she looked up. "'But that's why I can't give him the money, "'and he won't marry me without it.' "'Mr. Hamlin's hand dropped from the last button of his waistcoat. can't give him the money?

Starting point is 16:51:09 He repeated slowly. No. Why? Because, because I love him. Mr. Hamlin rebuttoned his waistcoat and sat down patiently on the bed. Pegg arose and awkwardly drew the portmanteau a little nearer to him. When Jim Byways left me this year property, she began looking, cautiously around. He left it to me on conditions. Not conditions as was in his written will,

Starting point is 16:51:42 but conditions as was spoken. A promise I made him in this very Rome, Mr. Amlin, this very Rome, and on that very bed you're sitting on, in which he died. Like most gamblers, Mr. Hamlin was superstitious. He rose hastily from the bed and took a chair beside the winter, The wind shook it as if the discontented spirit of Mr. Byways were without, reinforcing his last injunction. I don't know if you remember him, said Peg feverishly. He was a man as it suffered. Oh, that he loved, wife, family, friends, had gone back on him. He tried to make light of it afore, folks, but with me being a poor gal, he let himself out. I never told anybody this.

Starting point is 16:52:37 I don't know why he told me. I don't know, continued Pegg with a sniffle, why he wanted to make me unappy-too. But he made me promise that if he left me his fortune, I'd never, never, so help me God, never share it with any man or woman that I loved. I didn't think it would be hard to keep that promise then, Mr. Amlin, for I was very poor, and hadn't a friend nor a living being that was kind to me but him.

Starting point is 16:53:13 But you've as good as broken your promise already, said Hamlin. You've given Jack money, as I know. Only what I made myself. Listen to me, Mr. Amlin. When Jack proposed to me, I offered him about what I calculated I could earn myself. When he went to me, away and was sick and in trouble. I came here and took this hotel. I knew that by artwork I could make it pay. Don't laugh at me, please. I did work hard and did make it pay

Starting point is 16:53:49 without taking what cent of the fortin. And all I made working by night and day I gave to him. I did, Mr. Amlin. I ain't so hard to him as you think, though I might be kinder I know. Mr. Hamlin rose deliberately resumed his coat, watch, hat, and overcoat. When he was completely dressed again, he turned to peg. Do you mean to say that you've been given all the money you made here to this A1 first-class cherubim?

Starting point is 16:54:24 Yes, but he didn't know where I got it? Oh, Mr. Amlin, he didn't know that. Do I understand you That he's been bucking again, Farrow with the money, that you raised on ash, And you making the hash? But he didn't know that. He wouldn't have took it if I'd told him. No, he'd have died first, said Mr. Hamlin gravely.

Starting point is 16:54:53 Why, he's that sensitive as Jack Follensby, That it nearly kills him to take money even of me. But where does this angel reside when he isn't fighting the tiger and is, so to speak, visible to the naked eye? He stops here, said Pegg with an awkward blush. I see, might I ask the number of his room, or should I be a disturbing him in his meditations? continued Jack Hamlin with grave politeness.

Starting point is 16:55:30 Oh, then you'll promise, and you'll talk to him, and make him promise? Of course, said Hamlin quietly. And you'll remember he's sick, very sick. His room's number 44 at the end of the hall. Perhaps I'd better go with you. I'll find it, and you won't be too hard on him? "'I'll be a father to him,' said Hamlin demurely, as he opened the door and stepped into the hall.

Starting point is 16:56:06 But he hesitated a moment and then turned, and gravely held out his hand. Pegg took it timidly. He did not seem quite in earnest, and his black eyes, vainly questioned, indicated nothing. But he shook her hand warmly, and the next moment was gone. He found the room with no difficulty. A faint cough from within, and a querulous protest answered his knock.

Starting point is 16:56:36 Mr. Hamlin entered without a further ceremony. A sickening smell of drugs, a palpable flavor of stale dissipation, and the wasted figure of Jack Follensby, half-dressed, extended upon the bed, greeted him. Mr. Hamlin was, for an instant startled. There were hollow circles round the sick man's eyes. There was palsy in his trembling limbs. There was dissolution in his feverish breath. What's up?

Starting point is 16:57:09 He asked huskily and nervously. I am, and I want you to get up too. I can't, Jack. I am regularly done up. He reached his shaking hand towards a glass, half filled with suspicious, pungent. smelling liquid, but Mr. Hamlin stated, Do you want to get back that $2,000 you're lost?

Starting point is 16:57:34 Yes. Well, get up and marry that woman downstairs. Fallonsby laughed, half hysterically, half sardonically. She won't give it to me? No, but I will. You? Yes. Fallonsby, with an attempt at a reckless laugh,

Starting point is 16:57:56 rose trembling and with the difficulty to his swollen feet. Hamlin eyed him narrowly and then bade him lie down again. Tomorrow will do, he said, and then, if I don't. If you don't, responded Hamlin, why I'll just wait in and cut you out. But on the morrow, Mr. Hamlin was spared that possible act of disloyalty, for in the night the already hesitating spirit of Mr. Jack Follensby took flight on the wings of the southeast storm. When or how it happened, nobody knew. Whether this last excitement and the near prospect of matrimony, or whether an overdose of Anodyne had hastened his end was never known.

Starting point is 16:58:47 I only know that when they came to awaken him the next morning, the best that was left up, him, a face still beautiful and boylike, looked up coldly at the tearful eyes of Peg Moffat. "'It serves me right, it's a judgment,' she said in a low whisper to Jack Hamlin, "'for God knew that I'd broken my word and willed all my property to him.' She did not long survive him. Whether Mr. Hamlin ever clothed with action, the suggestion indicated in his speech to the lamented Jack that night is not of record. He was always her friend, and on her demise became her executor.

Starting point is 16:59:35 But the bulk of her property was left to a distant relation of handsome Jack Follensby, and so passed out of the control of Red Dog forever. End of Section 34 Section 35 of Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Volume 17. This is a Librivox recording. All Librivox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit Librivox.org. Read by Leanne Sveton. Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Volume 17.

Starting point is 17:00:21 Section 35. The Story of Caliph Stork from the Caravan by Wilhelm Howell. Wilhelm Hauff 1802 to 1827 Wilhelm Hauff was born at Stuttgart, November 29th, 1802 His brief life was as happy as it was uneventful. He died at the age of 25, and the period of his literary work was comprised within his last two years. This short time, however, suffice to express his extraordinary genius,

Starting point is 17:00:50 though the lost literature by his early death cannot be estimated. He was the son of August Friedrich Hauff, government secretary of foreign affairs. His father died when he was but seven years of age, and the education of the children devolved upon the mother, a woman of great intelligence, whose influence over her sensitive son was the result of a perfect understanding of his emotional nature. As a lad, Wilhelm Hauff showed very little indication of talent.

Starting point is 17:01:17 His school career was far from brilliant, and it was only in the family circle that he gave evidence of his real abilities. He had absorbed Goethe and Schiller into his inmost fiber. And with his mother and sisters for an indulgent audience, he declaimed long passages from Egmont and Wallenstein. He roved at liberty in the library of his grandfather, which appears to have been a large miscellaneous collection from various languages and literatures,

Starting point is 17:01:42 and the fantastic character of his imagination was early manifested by his love for weird tales and stories of adventure. His education was necessarily somewhat desultory, as his constitution was delicate, and periodical attacks of illness precluded any systematic or rigorous course. In 1820 he entered the University of Tübingen, where, following the wishes of his mother, rather than his own inclinations, he studied theology, and in 1824 received his degree. In 1826 appeared his first volume of tales, The Mertchen Almanach, the Story Almanac, two other volumes of The Mairchen Almanach followed.

Starting point is 17:02:20 This first little collection of stories, although over the Mertchen Almanach, followed. this first little collection of stories, although overshadowed by his later works, nevertheless strikes the keynote of his peculiar fancy. Nowhere are more strikingly shown his dramatic power and his delicious humor. The success of this first effort encouraged him to devote himself wholly to literature. The first volume of Mitellungen out of Demoare of Satan. Communications from the Memoirs of Satan,

Starting point is 17:02:43 A fragmentary production of much humor, published anonymously, a period immediately after, in 1826, and in the same year followed the man in the moon von Ha Claren the man in the moon by H. Claren this was originally intended as a caricature of the sentimentality

Starting point is 17:02:59 of Claren, but what was meant as a parody became a distinct imitation. As it was published under the name of Claren, that a grieved author had grounds for legal redress and won the suit which he brought against Hauf. To some extent, however, the tables were turned by the amusing controversy

Starting point is 17:03:15 which ensued, and in the lists of wit and satire, Hauph came off Victor. Lichtenstein, Romantic Saga out of Wurtenberg's history, Lichtenstein, a romantic tale from Wurtenberg history, 1826, a so-called historical romance, none the worse from the fact that its history, though always justified, was pure fabrication, was received with great favor, and on the high tide of prosperity, the young author set out for a tour through France, Belgium and Germany. In 1827, he undertook the editorship of the Stuttgart Morgenblatt and, secure of the future, through the powerful patronage of

Starting point is 17:03:53 the publisher Cotta, he married a distant cousin of his own name to whom he had long been attached. He spent the summer of 1827 in the Tyrol, where he was engaged upon another historical novel, which was to deal with the War of Freedom of 1890. This was never finished. In the autumn of the same year, his health began to fail, and on October 18, 1827, he died at Stuttgart. Hauff's powers of work were enormous, and he produced his stories in rapid succession, Des Bildes Caesars, the portrait of the emperor, a poetic piece of romance, and The Bettlerin from Pondesar, the beggar of the Pontezart, are masterpieces of their kind. Among the best of his productions must be ranked Fantasian in Bremer Ratzkeller,

Starting point is 17:04:39 fantasies in the Bremen Ratzkiller 1827. It is, however, most especially in the series of tales, The Caravan, chic of Alexandria and the inn in Spesart that Hauff's high originality is best exemplified. He is pre-eminently a storyteller and his pure and lucid style is the transparent medium for the expression of strikingly bold dramatic ideas. His wit is singularly delicate yet penetrating, and he exercises a fascination over persons of all ages and conditions. The popularity which he at once attained is still unabated.

Starting point is 17:05:13 His collected works continue to be issued in numerous editions, and his place in German literature seems now as assured as it has always been in the hearts of his countrymen. Wilhelm Hauff, the story of the Caliph's stork, from the caravan. The Caliph Chazid of Baghdad was sitting one fine summer afternoon comfortably on his divan. He had slept a little, for it was a psaltery day, and he looked quite refreshed after his nap. He smoked a long, rosewood pipe, sipped now and then a little coffee which a slave poured out for him, and stroked his beard contentedly whenever he had enjoyed it. In short, it could be seen at a glance that the Caliph felt very comfortable. At such a time it was easy to approach him as he was very good-tempered

Starting point is 17:06:01 and affable, wherefore his grand vizier Mansour visited him every day about this time. This afternoon he came as usual, looking however very grave, a rare thing for him. The Caliph took the pipe out of his mouth and said, Why dost thou make so grave a face, Grand Vizier? The Grand Vizier folded his arms across his breast, bowed to his master and answered, Master, whether I assume a grave appearance I know not, but down below in the palace stands a peddler who has such fine wares

Starting point is 17:06:33 that it vexes me that I have no money to spare. The Caliph, who had long desired to rejoice the heart of his Grand Vizier, ordered his black slave to fetch the peddler, In a few moments the slave returned with him. He was a little stout man swarthy in the face and dressed in rags. He carried a box in which he had all sorts of wares, pearls and rings, pistols with richly inlaid stalks, goblets and combs. The caliph and his vizier inspected everything, and the caliph at last bought for himself and vizier a pair of pistols, and for the vizier's wife a comb. As the peddler was about to close his box again, the caliph caught sight of a little drawer.

Starting point is 17:07:13 and asked whether that also contained some wares. The peddler pulled out the drawer and exhibited a snuff-box containing a black powder and a piece of paper with peculiar writing on it, which neither the Caliph nor Mansor could read. These things were given to me one day by a merchant who found them in the streets of Mecca, said the peddler. I know not what they are, but you may have them for a small sum, for they are of no use to me.

Starting point is 17:07:38 The Caliph, who was very fond of having old manuscripts in his library, though unable to read them, bought both paper and box and dismissed the peddler. He thought, however, he would like to know what the writing meant, and asked the vizier if he knew of no one who could decipher it. Most gracious Lord and Master, answered the latter. Near the great mosque lives a man called Salem the Lernod. He knows all languages. Send for him. Perhaps he can explain these mysterious signs.

Starting point is 17:08:07 The Lernod Salem soon arrived. Salem, said the Caliph to him, Salem it is said thou art very learned. Look at this writing, whether thou canst read it. If thou canst read, thou gettest a new robe of honor from me. If thou canst not, thou gettest twelve boxes on the ears and twenty-five lashes on the souls of the feet for having been called Salem the learned without cause. Salem bowed and said,

Starting point is 17:08:32 Thy will be done, O master. For a long time he looked at the writing, then suddenly he exclaimed, that is Latin, O master, or let me be hung. Say what it means, demanded the Caliph, if it is Latin. Salem began to translate, Man who find is this, praise Allah for his goodness. He who takes a pinch of this powder in this box, and wherewith says Mutabor can change himself into any animal

Starting point is 17:09:00 and also understand the language of animals. If he afterwards wished to resume his human form, let him bow thrice to the east and say the same, word, but beware when thou art changed, that thou laughest not, or the magic word departeth from thy memory forever, and thou remainest a beast. When Salem the learned had read this, the caliph was pleased beyond measure. He made the learned man swear not to reveal the secret to anyone, presented him with a splendid robe and dismissed him. Then turning to his grand vizier, he said, this I call getting a bargain, Mansour. How glad I am at being able to become an animal!

Starting point is 17:09:36 come thou to me tomorrow morning we will go then together into the fields take a pinch out of the box and listen to what is said in the air and the water in wood and field next morning scarcely had the caliph chasse had breakfasted and dressed himself and the grand vizier appeared as ordered to accompany him on his walk The Caliph put the box with the magic powder in his girdle, and after having ordered his suite to remain behind, he and the Grand Vizier set out alone on the journey. They first passed through the large gardens of the Caliph, but looked in vain for any living thing on which to try the experiment. The vizier at last proposed to pursue their journey to a pond, where he had often seen many animals, especially storks, whose grave manners and clappings had always excited his attention. The Caliph approved of the vizier's proposal and went with him towards the pond. Having arrived there, they saw a stork, soberly pacing up and down, looking for frogs and chattering something now and then to itself. At the same moment they saw far up in the sky another stork hovering in this direction.

Starting point is 17:10:41 I wager my beard, most gracious master, said the Grand Vizier. This long-legged pair are now having a pleasant talk. How would it be if we turned into storks? wisely spoken replied the caliph but first let us consider once more how we may become men again it is easy enough if we bow thrice to the east and say mutabor i shall be caliph and thou vizier again but for heaven's sake no laughing or we are lost While the Caliph spoke thus, he saw the other stork hovering over their heads and slowly alighting on the ground. Quickly he snatched the box from his girdle and took a hearty pinch, gave the box to the Grand Vizier who did the like, and both exclaimed Mutabor. Then their legs shriveled and became thin and red. The beautiful yellow slippers of the Caliph and his vizier changed into ugly stork's feet. Their arms grew into wings. Their necks shot up from their shoulders and reached a yacht.

Starting point is 17:11:40 garden length, their beards vanished, and soft feathers covered their bodies. You have a pretty beak, Grand Vizier, said the Caliph after a long surprise. By the beard of the prophet, I have never seen such things in my life. Thanks, humbly, replied the vizier, bowing. But if I might dare to say it, I should avow that your highness looks almost handsomer as a stork than as a caliph. But come, if it It pleases you. Let us listen to our comrades yonder, and hear if we really speak storkish. Meanwhile, the other stork had reached the ground. It cleaned its feet with its beak, settled its feathers, and walked up to the first stork. The two new storks hastened to get near them,

Starting point is 17:12:26 and to their surprise, heard the following conversation. Good morning, Madame Longlegs. You are early on the meadows. Thank you, dear Clapperbeek. I have been to get a little breakfast. Would you like to have a quarter of lizard or a little leg of frog. Much obliged, but I have no appetite this morning. Besides, I have come upon quite a different errand on the meadow. I am to dance before my father's guests today, and I want to practice a little quietly. Thereupon the young stork began to caper about the field in peculiar movements. The Caliph and Mansour watched her very much surprised, but when she stood on one leg in a picturesque attitude and fluttered her wings to increase the effort,

Starting point is 17:13:09 neither of them could resist any longer laughter without stopping burst from their beaks from which they only recovered a long time afterwards the caliph was the first to recover self-possession that was a joke he explained which cannot be bought for gold what a pity the stupid animal should have been scared by our laughter else they would also have sung to be sure but it now occurred to the grand vizier that laughing during the enchantment was forbidden he therefore communicated his fear to the caliph. By Mecca and Medina, that would be a bad joke if I were to remain a stork. Do bethink thee of the stupid word, I cannot recall it. Three times we must bow to the east and say, Moo, moo, moo. They turned towards the east and kept on bowing continually to their beaks nearly touched the ground, but alas, the magic word had escaped them, and often as the caliph bowed, and however eagerly his vizier added, Moo,

Starting point is 17:14:14 Moo! Yet every recollection of it had gone, and the portchastid and his vizier were and remained storks. Sadly, wandered the enchanted ones through the fields, not knowing what they should do in their misery. They could not discard their stork plumage, nor could they return into the town and make themselves known. For who would have believed a stork that he was the caliph,

Starting point is 17:14:38 and even if one had believed it, Would the inhabitants of Baghdad accept a stork for a caliph? Thus they wandered about for several days, living miserably on the fruits of the field, which, however, they could not swallow very well on account of their long beaks. As for lizards and frogs, their stomachs would not relish such foods.

Starting point is 17:14:58 Besides, they were afraid of spoiling their appetite with such tidbits. Their only pleasure in their sad situation was that they could fly, and thus they flew often to the high roofs of Baghdad, to see what was going on in the town. During the first days, they remarked great uneasiness and grief in the streets, but on the fourth day of their enchantment, while sitting on the roof of the Caliph's Palace, they saw down below in the street a splendid array. The drums and fiefs played, a man dressed in a gold-embroidered scarlet mantle, rode a richly comparisoned horse, surrounded by a gaudy train of servants. Half Baghdad rushed about him and everybody shouted,

Starting point is 17:15:38 Hail Miserra, the ruler of Baghdad! Then the two storks upon the roof of the palace looked at each other, and the Caliph Chassad said, Do you guess now why I am enchanted Grand Vizier? This Miserra is the son of my mortal enemy, the mighty magician Kashnur, who in an evil hour swore revenge on me. But still I do not despair.

Starting point is 17:16:02 Come with me, thou faithful companion of my misery, we will betake ourselves to the grave of the prophet. Perhaps at that sacred shrine the magic may be dispelled. They arose from the roof of the palace and flew towards Medina. They did not succeed very well in their flying, for the two storks had as yet very little practice. "'O master,' sighed the Grand Vizier, after a couple of hours' flight, with your leave, I can hold out no longer.

Starting point is 17:16:31 You fly too swiftly for me. Besides, it is dark already, and we should do well to seek shelter for the night. Chassett listened to the request of his servant, and, seeing beneath them in the valley some ruins, which promised a lodging, they flew towards it. The place where they had settled for the night seemed formerly to have been a castle.

Starting point is 17:16:51 Splendid pillars rose from among the ruins, several chambers which were still tolerably preserved, testified to the bygone splendor of the building. Chasset and his companion strolled through the passages in search of some dry nook. when suddenly the stork Mansour stopped. Lord and master, he whispered below his breath, were it not foolish for a grand vizier,

Starting point is 17:17:14 and still more so for a stork, to fear ghosts? I feel very uneasy, for close by someone sighed and groaned quite distinctly. The caliph now also stopped, and heard quite plainly a low sob, which seemed rather to come from a man than an animal. Full of anxiety, he wanted to go towards a, spot whence preceded the sound of sorrow, but the vizier seized him by the wing with his beak,

Starting point is 17:17:41 and begged him entreatingly not to rush upon new and unknown perils, but all was of no avail. The caliph, who bore a brave heart beneath his stork plumage, tore himself away with the loss of some feathers, and ran toward a gloomy passage. Soon he came to a door which was ajar, and behind which he heard distinct sighs and moans. He pushed open the door with his beak, but stopped on the threshold and astonishment. In the ruined chamber, which was only dimly lighted by a little iron-barred window, he saw a great night owl sitting on the ground.

Starting point is 17:18:14 Heavy tears rolled out of its large round eyes, and with a hoarse voice it uttered its moans from its hooked beak. But when it saw the caliph and his vizier, who had also come up in the meantime, it gave a loud cry of joy. Elegantly it wiped the tears from its eye with its brown-flecked wings. and to the great astonishment of both, it cried in good human Arabic, Welcome, ye storks, you are a good omen to me of my deliverance,

Starting point is 17:18:43 for through storks I am to be lucky, as it was once foretold me. When the caliph had recovered from his astonishment, he bowed his long neck, set his thin legs in a graceful position, and said, Night owl, from thy words I believe I see a fellow-suffer, But alas, thy hope of deliverance through us is in vain. Thou wilt recognize our helplessness in hearing our tale. The night owl begged him to relate it, and the Caliph commenced to relate what we already know.

Starting point is 17:19:15 When the Caliph had related his story to the owl, she thanked him and said, Now also listen to my tale, and learn how I am no less unlucky than thyself. My father is the king of the Indies, I, his unhappy only daughter, am called Lusa. That magician Kashnur, who has enchanted you, has also brought misfortune upon me. One day he came to my father and asked me in marriage for his son, Miserra.

Starting point is 17:19:42 But my father, who was a fiery man, had him thrown downstairs. The wretch knew how to approach me again under another shape, and one day, while I was taking some refreshments in my garden, he administered to me, disguised as a slave, a draft which changed me into the his hideous shape. Fainting from fear he brought me hither, and shouted with a terrible voice into my ear, Here shalt thou remain, detestable, abhorred, even by beasts, to thy end, or till someone, himself in this horrid form, voluntarily asks thee to be his wife, and thus I revenge myself on thee and on thy haughty father. Since then, many months have passed. Lonely and sad I live as a

Starting point is 17:20:27 recluse within these ruins, shunned by the world, a scarecrow even to beasts. Beautiful nature is hidden from me, for I am blind by daylight, and only when the moon pours her wane light over these ruins does the obscuring veil drop from my eyes. When the owl had finished, she again wiped her eyes with her wings, for the story of her woes had moved her to tears. The caliph was plunged into deep thought by the story of the princess. If I am not mistaken, said he, there is between our misfortunes a secret connection. But where can I find the key to this riddle? The owl answered him,

Starting point is 17:21:08 O master, such is also my belief. For once in my infancy, a wise woman foretold of me that a stork should bring me a great fortune, and I know one way by which perhaps we may free ourselves. The Caliph was very much surprised and asked what way she meant. The enchanter who has made us both unhappy, said she, comes once a month to these ruins. Not far from here is a hall where he holds orgies with numerous companions. Often I have spied them there.

Starting point is 17:21:41 They then relate to one another their vile deeds. Perhaps he may pronounce the magic word which you have forgotten. Oh, dearest princess, exclaimed the caliph. Caliph. Say, when comes he, and where is the hall? The owl was silent a moment, and then said, You must not take it ill, but only on one condition can I fulfill your wish. Speak out, speak out, cried Chassett, command all, everything of me. It is this, that I may also become free, which can only be if one of you offer me his hand. The storks seem somewhat taken a bag of this proposition, and the caliph beckoned his servant to go out with him a little.

Starting point is 17:22:23 Grand vizier, said the caliph outside. This is a sorry bargain, but you might take her. Indeed, answered the grand vizier, that my wife, when I come home, I scratch my eyes out. Besides, I am an old man, while you are still young and single, and could better give your hand to a young and fair princess. That is just it, sighed the caliph, whilst sadly drooping his wings. Who then has told thee that she is young and fair? That is buying a pig and a poke. They counseled one another for a long time.

Starting point is 17:22:58 At last, however, when the caliph saw that his vizier would rather remain a stork, than wed the owl, he resolved to fulfill the condition himself. The owl was immensely pleased. She confessed to them that they could not have come at a more favorable time, for the enchanters were very likely to assemble that night. She quitted the chamber with the storks to lead them to the hall. They went for a long time through a gloomy passage. At length, through a half-fallen wall, gleamed a bright light towards them.

Starting point is 17:23:29 Having arrived there, the owl advised them to remain perfectly quiet. They could, through the gap near which they stood, overlook a great hall. It was supported all around by pillars and splendidly decked. Many brilliant colored lamps replaced the light of day. In the center of the hall was a round table, covered with many in choicest meets. Round this table was a couch, on which sat eight men. In one of these men, the stork recognized the peddler, who had sold them the magic powder. His neighbor asked him to relate his latest deeds.

Starting point is 17:24:02 Amongst others, he also related the story of the caliph and his vizier. "'What sort of word hast thou given them?' asked another and chief. enterer. A very difficult Latin one, namely Mutabor. When the storks heard this at their hole in the wall, they were nearly beside themselves with joy. They ran on their long legs so quickly to the threshold of the ruins that the owl could hardly follow them. There, the caliph addressed the owl with emotion. Deliverer of my life, and the life of my friend, accept me for thy spouse, in eternal gratitude for that which thou hast done for us. then he turned to the east thrice the storks bowed their long next to the sun which just then was rising above the mountains mutabor they exclaimed and straightway they were changed and in the great joy of their new sent life master and servant fell into each other's arms laughing and crying

Starting point is 17:25:01 But who can describe their astonishment on turning round? A lovely lady, grandly dressed, stood before them. Smiling, she gave her hand to the Caliph. Do you no longer recognize your night owl? She said. It was she. The Caliph was so charmed with her beauty and grace that he exclaimed, My greatest fortune was that of having been a stork.

Starting point is 17:25:27 The three now traveled together towards Baghdad. The Caliph found in. his clothes not only the box with the magic powder, but also his purse. He therefore bought in the nearest village what was needful for their journey, and so they soon came to the gates of Baghdad. But there, the arrival of the Caliph caused much surprise. People had believed him dead, and they were therefore highly pleased to have again their beloved ruler. All the more, however, burned their hatred toward the imposter Miserra. They entered the palace and took prisoner, the old enchanturer, and his son.

Starting point is 17:26:00 The caliph sent the old man to the same chamber in the ruins that the princess had lived in as an owl and had him hanged there. But to the son, who knew nothing of his father's art, the caliph gave the choice whether he would die or snuff, and when he chose the ladder, the grand vizier handed him the box. A good, strong pinch, and the magic word of the caliph changed him into a stork.

Starting point is 17:26:26 The caliph had him shut up in an iron cage and placed in his garden. long and happy lived the caliph chast with his wife the princess his most pleasant hours were always those when the grand vizier visited him during the afternoon then they very frequently spoke of their stork adventures and when the caliph was very jovial he amused himself with imitating the grand vizier when he was a stork he strutted up and down the chamber with stiff legs clapped fluttered his arms as though they were wings and showed how vainly the latter had turned to the east east, crying all the while, Mu, this entertainment was at all times a great pleasure to Madam Caliph and her children, but when the Caliph kept on clapping a little too long, and nodded and cried,

Starting point is 17:27:16 Mu, moo, moo. Then the vizier threatened him, smiling that he would communicate to Madame Caliph what had been discussed outside the door of the Night Owl Princess. End of Section 35. Section 36 of Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Volume 17. This is Librivox recording. All Librivox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit Librivox.org.

Starting point is 17:27:52 Read by Leanne Sveton. Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Volume 17. Section 36, The Death and Awakening of Hanela. Hanelah by Gerhard Hauptmann Gerhard Hauptmann 1862 to 1946 When Gerhard Hauptmann's first dramas were represented on the stage it was generally assumed that the author had joined the ranks of those realists

Starting point is 17:28:22 who delight in picturing only the most depraved side of human nature although a leader in that school whose chief tendency is socialism it is said that Hauptmann is really an idealist who hopes to redeem the social world by inspiring disgust with existing evils and thus awakening a desire for general reform. He was greatly disappointed at the class of spectators which his plays attracted. Instead of appealing to sympathetic audiences, the indifferent or coarser elements of society witnessed the performances, and it was not unusual that scenes of revolting degradation elicited applause. With great skill and strength, the author

Starting point is 17:29:01 unfolds characters that reflect social degradation and the worst passions, the unavoidable consequences of heredity and environment, the sufferings of the lower working classes, the brutality of their unclean lives, the terrors of starvation are described with vivid force worthy of a better subject. These gruesome scenes are sometimes relieved by a rare bit of poetic feeling, which brings into bright contrast the beauty of a true and noble emotion. Before some of the sudden, sunrise is intensely morbid and represents a succession of horrors. The climax is reached when the one innocent being, who has excited interest and sympathy, is swept away in the whirlpool of misfortune through no fault of her own. Even virtuous qualities have no chance of survival.

Starting point is 17:29:49 And the curse of heredity falls upon the innocent and wicked alike, everywhere claiming untold victims. Notwithstanding his choice of material, Hauptmann's early writings were replete with strong situations. At last, his poetic nature asserted itself more forcibly, and an occasional gleam of light brightened the dark realism of his plays. In his more recent works, there is no longer a general and hopeless destruction of character under adverse conditions. He sometimes even permits the higher qualities of human nature to triumph over evil. In Crampton College, there is a touch of grandeur when the child Gertrude, with her generous little heart, bids defiance to the whole world. With her strong little arms about her father's neck, she sustains the weak, disgraced man,

Starting point is 17:30:37 never failing in her love and devotion until she succeeds in redeeming him. The Weavers is a socialistic play of intense dramatic power. It has passed over the greatest stages of the world, and everywhere has produced a profound impression. The play is founded on scenes that occurred during the uprising of the Weavers in Silesia in 1844. On one side, Hauptmann shows the opulent employer, who oppresses his starving workmen beyond their powers of endurance. On the other side are the poor weavers, driven to rage in desperation by the sufferings of poverty, with neither laws to protect them nor a mediator to speak the conciliatory word. A leading spirit among the weavers is Becker, who declares that it is all the same to him,

Starting point is 17:31:24 whether he starves at the loom or out in the ditch, and he bursts forth indignantly. The right kind of employer can get along with three or four hundred workmen in the turning of his hand, and he leaves a few pickings for his men, but a man such as you has four bellies like a cow and teeth like a wolf. The weavers has been criticized as representing only a secession of unconnected scenes. One German critic observes that if the angel of starvation is imagined hovering over each scene, the play will not be lacking in unity. In the dream poem, Hanela, Hauptmann reveals his full poetic powers.

Starting point is 17:32:06 The performance of this drama created a great sensation. In one of the great European cities, the actors are said to have been so profoundly affected that they refused to repeat the representation. Hanelah is the innocent victim of a brutal, drunken stepfather. Abused until death, the poor child is carried to the hospital, where everything is done to alleviate the agony of her last. hours. As her mind wanders, the misery of her short young life is revealed in a series of tabloes. In a vision, the good teacher appears to lead her gently by the hand to another life,

Starting point is 17:32:42 free from sin and suffering. Heaven opens before her, and all the joys of a blessed future descend upon the innocent, abused child. It is a poem of heart-rendering pathos, and the esteem in which the work is held as a literary production is shown by the fact that the grill part surprise at Vienna was recently awarded to Hauptmann for this tender and poetic drama. Gerhard Hauptmann The Death and Awakening of Hanela From Hanela. Little Hanala Matarn, the starved and ill-used stepdaughter of a brutal workman,

Starting point is 17:33:20 has been so cruelly treated by her father that the child has tried to drown herself. Rescued by the young village schoolmaster, her only friend among the villagers, a kind of allegorical type of Christ, she has brought to the squalid almshouse of the place to die. The child lies in a darkened room watched by a sister of mercy. Terrible visions of her past suffering occur, and the early part of the drama largely represents what is passing in her tired and confused brain. Presently an angel enters the death chamber and sues the child, giving her a flower from heaven, a flower which none save herself can see, and other kinds,

Starting point is 17:33:59 spirits cheer her. After they have gone, the little sufferer is left in happy surprise and expectancy. Everything is as it was before the appearance of the angels. The Sister of Mercy is seated beside the bed in which Hanala is lying. She relights the candle and Hanala opens her eyes. Her inward vision seems still to be present to her. Her features still wear an expression of heavenly rapture. As soon as she recognizes the sister, she begins to speak with joyful eagerness. Hanala Sister Angels

Starting point is 17:34:32 Sister Martha Angels Do you know who have been here? Sister Are you awake again already? Hanela Just guess, do Unable to contain herself

Starting point is 17:34:47 Angels Angels, real angels angels, angels from heaven Sister Martha Angels you know with long wings Sister Well then if you've had such beautiful dreams, Hanala.

Starting point is 17:35:01 There now, she says I dreamt it, but look at what I've got here. Just look at it. She makes emotion as though she held a flower in her hand, and we're showing it to the sister. Sister, what is it? Hanala, just look at it, sister. Hmm? Hanela, here it is. Look at it. Sister.

Starting point is 17:35:25 Aha. Hanela, just smell it. Sister, pretending to smell a flower. Mmm, lovely. Hanela, not so close to it, you'll break the stock. Sister, oh, I'm very sorry. What sort of flower is it? Hanala, why don't you know?

Starting point is 17:35:46 The key of heaven. Sister, is it really? Hanala, why surely you are, too, bring the Light, quick, quick! Sister, holding up the candle. Ah, yes, now I see it. Hanala. Isn't it lovely?

Starting point is 17:36:05 Sister, but you're talking a great deal too much. We must keep quiet now, or the doctor will scold us. And here he has sent you your medicine. We must take it as he bids us. Hanala. Oh, sister, you're far too much troubled about me. You don't know what has happened, do you? Do you?

Starting point is 17:36:25 Do tell me if you know. Who gave me this? Well, the little golden key. Who? Say. What is the little golden key meant to open? Well? Sister, you'll tell me all about it tomorrow morning.

Starting point is 17:36:41 Then after a good night's rest, you'll be strong and well. Hanala, but I am well. She sits up and puts her feet to the ground. You see, sister, I'm quite, quite well. Sister. Why, Hanala, no, you mustn't do that, you really mustn't. Hanala, rising and pushing the sister away, makes a few steps forward. You must let me, you must, let me, I must go.

Starting point is 17:37:09 She starts in terror and gayses fixedly at a certain point. Oh, heavenly Savior! A black-robed and black-winged angel becomes visible. He is great, strong and beautiful, and bears a long serpentine soul. sword, the hilt of which is draped in black gauze. Grave and silent, he sits beside the stove and gasees at Hanala calmly and immovably. A white dreamlike light fills the room. Hanala, who are you? No answer. Are you an angel? No answer. Is it to me you come? No answer. I am Hanela Matern. Is it to me you come? No answer.

Starting point is 17:37:50 Sister Martha has stood by with folded hands devoutly and humbly. Now she moves slowly out of the room. Hanela. Has God taken the gift of speech from your tongue? No answer. Are you a friend to me? Do you come as an enemy? No answer.

Starting point is 17:38:07 Have you a sword in the folds of your garment? No answer. Bur, I am cold. Piercing frost spreads from your wings. Cold breathes around you. No answer. Who are you? are you? No answer. A sudden horror overcomes her, and she turns with a scream as though someone

Starting point is 17:38:26 stood behind her. Mother! Little Mother! A figure in the dress of the Sister of Mercy, but younger and more beautiful, with long white pinions, comes in. Hanala, shrinking up close to the figure and seizing her hand. Mother! Little Mother, there is someone here. Sister, where? Hanala. There, There! Sister, why are you trembling so? Hanala, I'm frightened. Sister, fear nothing. I am with you.

Starting point is 17:39:00 Hanala, my teeth are chattering with terror. I can't help it. He makes me shudder. Sister, do not be frightened. He is your friend. Hanala, who is he, mother? Sister, do you not know him? Hanala, who is he?

Starting point is 17:39:19 Sister, death, Hanala, death. She looks for a while at the black angel in awe-stricken silence. Must it be then? Sister, it is the entrance, Hanala. Must everyone pass through the entrance? Sister, everyone, Hanala. Will you grasp me hard, death? He is silent.

Starting point is 17:39:47 He makes no answer, mother, to anything I say. Sister, the words of God are loud within you. Hanala, I have often longed for you from the depths of my heart, but now I am afraid, Sister, make you ready. Hanala, to die, sister, yes. Hanala, after a pause timidly, must I lie in the coffin in these rags and tatters? Sister, God will clothe you. She produces a small silver-balt,

Starting point is 17:40:20 bell and rings it, immediately there appears, moving noiselessly, as to all the succeeding apparitions, a little humpbacked village tailor, carrying over his arm a bridle gown, veil and wreath, and in his hands a pair of glass slippers, he has a comical halting gate, he bows in silence to the angel, then to the sister, and last and lowest, to Hanala. The tailor, with a profusion of bows, Mistress Johanna, Katarina, Martan, he clears his throat. His serene highness, your most gracious father, has condescended to order your bridal dress of me. Sister, takes the gown from the tailor and begins to dress Hanala. Come, I will put it on for you.

Starting point is 17:41:04 Hanela and joyful excitement. Oh, how it rustles! Sister, white silk, Hanala. Hanela, looking down in rapture at the gown. Won't people be astonished to see me so beautifully dressed in my coffin? Taylor. Mistress Johanna, Katarina, Matan, clears his throat. The whole village is talking of nothing but clears his throat. What good fortune death is bringing you, Mistress Hannah, clears his throat.

Starting point is 17:41:34 His serene highness, clears his throat. Your most gracious father, clears his throat. Has been to the overseer, sister, placing the wreath on her. Hanala's head. Now bend thy head, thy bride of heaven. Hanala, quivering with childish joy. Do you know, Sister Martha? I'm looking forward so to death. All of a sudden she looks dubiously at the sister. It is you, isn't it? Sister. Yes. Hanela. You are really, Sister Martha? Oh no, you are my mother. Sister, yes. Hanala. Are you both? Sister. The children of heaven are as one. in God, Taylor.

Starting point is 17:42:17 If I might be permitted, Princess Hanala, kneeling before her with the slippers, these are the tiniest little slippers in the land. They have all two large feet. Hedwig and Agnes and Lisa and Martha and Minna and Anna and Kate and Greta. He has put the slippers on her feet. They fit! They fit! The bride is found. Mistress Hanela has the smallest feet.

Starting point is 17:42:44 When you have any further orders, your servant, your servant, goes off, bowing profusely. Hanala, I can scarcely bear to wait, little mother. Sister, now you need not take any more medicine. Hanala, no. Sister, now you'll soon be as fresh and sound as a mountain trout, Hanala. Come now and lay you down on your deathbed. She takes Hanala's hand and leads her gently to the bed on which Hanala lies. down. Hanala, at last I shall know what it is to die. Sister, yes, you will, Hanala. Hanala, lying on her

Starting point is 17:43:25 back with her hands as if they were holding a flower. I have a pledge, sister, press it close to your breast. Hanala, with a renewal of dread looking shrinkingly towards the angel. Must it be, then? Sister, it must. From the far distant, from the far distant, are heard strains of a funeral march. Hanala, listening, Now they're playing for the burial. Meister Zyfred and the musicians. The angel rises. Now he stands up.

Starting point is 17:43:57 The storm without has increased. The angel moves slowly and solemnly towards Hanalah. Now he is coming to me. Oh, sister, mother, I can't see you. Where are you? To the angel imploringly, quick, quick, thou dumb black spirit. as though groaning under an insupportable weight. It is crushing me, crushing me like a stone.

Starting point is 17:44:22 The angel slowly raises his great sword. He is going to, going to destroy me utterly. In an agony of terror, help, help, sister! Sister, interposing with dignity between the angel and Hanala and laying both her hands in an attitude of protection upon Hanala's heart, speaking loftily, solemnly and with a sword. He dare not, I lay my consecrated hands upon thy heart. The black angel disappears.

Starting point is 17:44:53 Silence. The sister folds her hands and looks down upon Hanila with a gentle smile. Then she becomes absorbed in thought and moves her lips in silent prayer. The strains of the funeral march have in the meantime continued without interruption. A sound as of many lightly pattering feet is heard. Presently the figure of the schoolmaster Gottwe. appears in the middle doorway. The funeral march ceases. Gotwald is dressed in black as though for a funeral and carries in his hand a bunch of beautiful lilies of the valley. He has reverently taken off his hat,

Starting point is 17:45:26 and while still on the threshold, turns to those who follow him, with a gesture commanding silence. Behind him appear his schoolchildren, boys and girls in their best clothes. In obedience to his gesture, they stop their whispering and remain quite silent. They do not venture to cross the threshold. With Salomeen, Gottwald now approaches the sister who is still praying. Gottwald, in a low voice. Good day, Sister Martha. Sister. Mr. Gottwald, God's greeting to you. Gottwald, looking at Hanala, shakes his head sadly and pityingly. Poor little thing. Sister. Why are you so sad, Mr. Gottwalt? Gotwalt. Because she is dead. Sister, we will not grieve for that. She has found peace in front.

Starting point is 17:46:11 For her sake, I am glad. Godwald, sighing. Yes, it is well with her. Now she is free from all trouble and sorrow. Sister, sunk in contemplation. How beautiful she looks as she lies there. Godwald. Yes, yes, beautiful. Now that you are dead, you bloom forth in all your loveliness. Sister, God has made her so beautiful because she had faith in him. Godwald.

Starting point is 17:46:41 Yes, she had faith and she was good. He heaves a deep sigh, opens his hymn book, and look sadly into it. Sister, also looking into the hymn book, we must not mourn. We must be still and patient. Gottwald. Ah, my heart is heavy, sister. Because she is set free? Godfalt.

Starting point is 17:47:05 Because my two flowers are withered. Sister. What flowers? Gotwalt. Two violets here in my book. They are the dead eyes of my dear Hanala. Sister. In God's heaven they will bloom again far more sweetly.

Starting point is 17:47:24 Godvalt. Oh God, how much longer will our pilgrimage last through this veil of darkness and of tears? With a sudden change, briskly and busily, producing sheets of music, what do you think? I thought we might begin, here in the house by singing the hymn,

Starting point is 17:47:43 Jesus, oh, I trust in thee. Sister, yes, that is a beautiful hymn, and Hannah Le Matern's heart was full of faith. Gottwald. And then out in the churchyard we will sing, Set me free, he turns to the school children and says, Number 62, set me free. He intoned softly, beating time.

Starting point is 17:48:05 Set me free, oh, set me. free that I may Jesus see. The children have joined in softly. Children, are you all warmly dressed? It will be very cold out in the churchyard. Come in for a moment. Look at poor Hanala once more. The children crowd in and ranged themselves solemnly around the bed. Just see how beautiful death has made the poor girl. She was huddled in rags. Now she was. She wears silk and raiment. She ran about barefoot. Now she has glass slippers on her feet. Soon she will dwell in a golden palace and eat roast meat every day. Here she lived on cold potatoes and often had not enough of them. Here you always called her the beggar princess.

Starting point is 17:49:00 Now she will soon be a princess, in very deed. So if any of you have anything that you want to beg her pardon for, do it now, or she will tell the dear God about it. and then it will go ill with you. A little boy, stepping forward, Dear Princess Hanela, don't be angry with me and don't tell dear God that I always called you the bigger princess. All the children in a confused murmur, We are all so very sorry, very sorry.

Starting point is 17:49:29 Godwald. So, now poor Hanala has already forgiven you. Now go into the other room and wait for me there. Sister, come, I'll take you into the back room and there I'll tell you what you must do if you want to become beautiful angels, as beautiful as Hanela will soon be. She leads the way, the children follow her, the door is closed. Gottwald, now alone with Hanelah, he lays the flowers at her feet with emotion.

Starting point is 17:49:55 Hanela, dear, here I've brought you another bunch of beautiful lilies of the valley, kneeling by her bed with trembling voice, Don't quite, quite forget me in your glory. He sobs with his face buried into the folds of her dry, dress. It breaks my heart to part from you. Voices are heard. Godwald rises and covers Hanala with a sheet. Two old women

Starting point is 17:50:19 dressed for a funeral with handkerchiefs and gilt-edged hembooks in their hands. Enter softly. First woman, looking round. I suppose we're the first. Second woman. No, the schoolmaster is already here. Good day, Mr. Gottwald. Gotwold. Good day. First woman. "'Ah, this will be a sore trouble to you, Mr. Godwald.

Starting point is 17:50:43 "'She was such a good pupil to you, always industrious, always busy.' "'Second woman. "'Is it true what people are saying? "'Surely it can't be. "'They say she took her own life.' "'A third woman who has entered. "'That would be a sin against the Holy Spirit.' "'Second woman.

Starting point is 17:51:02 "'A sin against the Holy Ghost?' "'Third woman.' "'And the pastor says such a sin can never be forgiven. and gotwald have you forgotten what the saviour said suffer the little children to come unto me a fourth woman who has entered oh good people good people what weather it's enough to freeze the feet off you i only hope the pastor won't be too long about the snow is lying a yard deep in the churchyard a fifth woman entering the pastor is not going to bury her good people he's going to refuse her consecrated ground "'Pleshka, also appearing, "'Have you heard? Have you heard? "'A grand gentleman has been to see the pastor,

Starting point is 17:51:46 "'has been to see the pastor, "'and has told him, yes, told him that Hannah Le Matern is a blessed saint.' "'Hunker, entering hastily, "'do you know what they are bringing? "'A crystal coffin?' "'Several voices. "'A crystal coffin, a crystal coffin, a crystal coffin!' "'Hanka, oh, Lord, it must have cost a pretty penny.'

Starting point is 17:52:08 Several voices. A crystal coffin! A crystal coffin! Sidel, who has appeared, We're going to see fine things that we are. An angel has passed right through the village as tall as a poplar tree, if you'll believe me. And two others are sitting by the smithy pond,

Starting point is 17:52:26 but they're small like little children. The girl was more than a beggar girl. Several voices. The girl was more than a beggar girl. They're bringing a crystal coffin. An angel has passed through the village. Four white-robed youths carry in a crystal coffin which they set down near Hanela's bed. The mourners whisper to each other full of curiosity and astonishment.

Starting point is 17:52:50 Gottwald, raising the sheet a little from Hanelah's face. Look at the dead child, too. First woman, peering curiously under the sheet. Why, her hair is like gold! Gottwald drawing the cloth away from Hanala, who is illuminated with a pale light. and she has silk and garments and glass slippers all shrink back as though dazzled with exclamations of the utmost surprise several voices ah how beautiful she is who can it be little hanla matern hanle matern no i don't believe it pleshka the girl the girl is a saint the four youths with tender care lay hannala in the crystal coffin hanka They say she isn't to be buried at all.

Starting point is 17:53:39 First woman. Her coffin is to be set up in the church. Second woman. I believe the girl isn't really dead. She looks as alive as ever she can be. Pleshka. Just give me. Just give me a down feather.

Starting point is 17:53:54 We'll try. We'll try holding a down feather to her mouth. Yes. And we'll see if she's still breathing. We will. They give him a down feather and he holds it to handle his mouth. It doesn't stir. The girl is dead. She hasn't a breath of life in her. Third woman. I'll give her my bunch of rosemary. She lays it in the coffin.

Starting point is 17:54:17 Fourth woman. She can take my bit of lavender with her too. Fifth woman. But where's matern? First woman. Yes, where's matern? Second woman. Oh, he. He's sitting over there in the alehouse. First woman. Most like he doesn't know a word of what has happened. Second woman. He cares for nothing as long as he has his dram. He knows nothing about it. Pleshka. Haven't you, haven't you told him then, told him that there's death in his house? Third woman. He might know that without any telling. Fourth woman. I don't say anything, heaven forbid, but everyone knows who has killed the girl. Sidel, you're right. The whole village as you might say knows that. there's a lump on her as big as my fist.

Starting point is 17:55:08 Fifth woman, no grass grows where that fellow sets his feet. Sidel, I was there when they changed her wet clothes, and I saw it as plainly as I see you. She has a lump on her as big as my fist, and that's what has killed her. First woman, it's muttern must answer for her, and no one else. All, speaking all at once in vehemently, but in a whisper, No one else, no one else.

Starting point is 17:55:34 Second woman. He's a murderer, he is. All full of fury, but in a low tone. A murderer, a murderer! The harsh voice of the tipsy matern is heard. A conscience from all trouble free. What softer pillow can there be? He appears in the doorway and shouts,

Starting point is 17:56:00 Hanelah, you brat, where are you, He staggers in, leaning against the door jam. I'll count up to five, and I'll wait not a moment longer. One, two, three, and one are, I tell you, my girl, you'd better not make me wild. If I have to search for you and find you, you hussy, I'll pound you to a jelly I will. Starts as he notices the others who are present

Starting point is 17:56:25 and who remain as still as death. What do you want here? No answer. How do you come here? Was it the devil sent you, eh? Just clear out of here now. Well, are you going to stop all night? He laughs to himself. Wait a minute. I know what it is. It's nothing but that. I have a little too much in my noddle. That's what brings him. He sings, A conscience from all trouble free. What softer pillow can.

Starting point is 17:57:02 Can there be? Starts in fear. Are you still there? In a sudden outburst of fury, looking around for something to attack them with. I'll take the first thing that comes handy. A man has entered, wearing a threadbare brown cloak.

Starting point is 17:57:18 He is about thirty, has long black hair and a pale face, with the features of the schoolmaster Gottwald. He has a slouch hat in his left hand and sandals on his feet. He appears weary and travel-stained. He touches. Matturn lightly on the arm, interrupting his speech.

Starting point is 17:57:35 Maturn turns sharply round. The stranger looks him straight in the face, gravely and quietly, and says humbly. Stranger, Maturn, God's greeting to you. Mutern, how have you come here? What do you want? Stranger in a tone of humble entreaty.

Starting point is 17:57:52 I have walked till my feet are bleeding. Give me water to wash them. The hot sun has parched me, give me wine to drink and to refresh me. I have not broken bread since I set forth in the morning. I am hungry. Maturn, what's that to me? What brings you tramping around here? Go and work. I have work too. Stranger, I am a workman. Maturn, you're a tramp, that's what you are. A workman need not go about begging.

Starting point is 17:58:25 Stranger, I am a workman without wages. "'Matern, you're a tramp you are.' "'Stranger, diffidently, submissively, but at the same time impressively. "'I am a physician. It may be that you have need of me.' "'Matern, I'm all right, I don't need any doctor.' Stranger, his voice trembling with inward emotion. "'Matern, bethink you. "'You need give me no water, and yet I will heal you.

Starting point is 17:58:55 "'You may give me no bread to eat, and yet God helping me, me, I will make you whole. Mutern, you get out of this. Go about your business. I have sound bones in my body. I need no doctor. Do you understand? Stranger.

Starting point is 17:59:12 Muttern, bethink you. I will wash your feet for you. I will give you wine to drink. You shall eat white bread. Tread me under your foot, and yet, God helping me, I will make you whole and sound. Muttern, now will you go or will you not? If you won't get out of this, I tell you I'll...

Starting point is 17:59:31 Stranger, in a tone of earnest admonition. Maturn, do you know what you have in your house? Maturn. All that belongs here. All that belongs here. All that belongs here. You don't belong here. Just get out now.

Starting point is 17:59:49 Stranger, simply. Your daughter is ill. Maturn. Her illness doesn't need any doctor. It's nothing but laziness. illness isn't. I can knock that out of her without your help. Stranger, solemnly. Mater, I come as a messenger to you.

Starting point is 18:00:07 Mattern. As a messenger, eh? Who from? Stranger. I come from the father, and I go to the father. What have you done with his child? Matern, how am I to know what's become of her? What have I to do with his children?

Starting point is 18:00:24 He's never troubled about her. He hasn't. Stranger, firmly. You have death in your house. Mattern now notices Hanala lying there, goes in speechless astonishment up to the coffin, and looks into it, then murmurs. Where have you got the beautiful clothes?

Starting point is 18:00:42 Who has bought you the crystal coffin? The mourners whisper to each other vehemently but softly. The word murderer is heard again and again, uttered in a threatening tone. Maturn, softly, trembling, I have never ill-used you. I've clothed you. I have fed you, turning insolently upon the stranger,

Starting point is 18:01:02 What do you want from me? What have I to do with all this? Stranger, muttern, have you anything to say to me? The muttering among the mourners becomes more vehement and angry, and the word murderer, murderer becomes more frequently audible. Stranger, have you nothing to reproach yourself with? Have you never torn her from her bed by night? Has she never fallen as though dead under your blows?

Starting point is 18:01:28 madern beside himself with rage strike me dead if she has here on the spot heaven's lightning blast me if i've been to blame a flash of pale blue lightning and distant thunder all speaking together there's a thunderstorm coming right in the middle of winter he's perjured himself the child murderer has perjured himself stranger impressively but kindly have you still nothing to say to me madern madern in pitiful terror Who loves this child chasens it? I've done nothing but good to the girl. I've kept her as my child. I've a right to punish her when she does wrong. The women advancing threateningly towards him. Murderer, murderer, murderer, mutterne.

Starting point is 18:02:15 She's lied to me and cheated me. She has robbed me day by day. Stranger, are you speaking the truth? Muttern. God strike me. At this moment a cow slip, the key of head. heaven is seen in Hanelah's folded hands, emitting a yellow-green radiance. Matern stares at it as though out of his senses trembling all over.

Starting point is 18:02:36 Stranger, Maturne, you are lying. All in the greatest excitement. A miracle! A miracle! Pletchka, the girl, the girl is a, a saint. He has, he has sworn away, body, body and soul. Maturne shrieks, I'll go and hang myself! clasps his head between his hands and rushes off. Stranger goes up to Hanela's coffin and turns so as to face the others,

Starting point is 18:03:04 who all draw back reverently from the figure which now stands in full majesty addressing them. Fear nothing. He bends down and takes hold of Hanala's hand. He speaks with the deepest tenderness. The maiden is not dead, but sleepeth. With intensity and assured power, Johanna Matarn, arise. A gold-green.

Starting point is 18:03:26 radiance fills the room. Hanela opens her eyes and raises herself by the aid of the stranger's hand, but without daring to look in his face. She steps out of the coffin and at once sinks to the ground at the feet of the awakeninger. Terror seizes upon all the others and they flee. The stranger and Hanela remain alone. The brown mantle has slipped from his shoulders and he stands in a golden white robe. Stranger tenderly. Hanela. Hanela, in ecstasy, her head bowed as low, as possible. He is there, stranger. Who am I? Hanela, thou, stranger. Name my name, Hanela, whispers, trembling with awe. Holy, stranger, I know all thy sorrows and thy sufferings, Hanala. Thou dear, dear, stranger, arise. Hanala, thy robe is spotless. I am full of stains. Stranger laying his right hand on

Starting point is 18:04:31 Hanela's head. Thus I take away all baseness from thee. Raising her face toward him with gentle force, he touches her eyes. Behold, I bestow on thine eyes eternal light. Let them be filled with the light of countless suns, with the light of endless day, from morning glow to evening glow, from evening glow to morning glow, let them be filled with the brightness of all that shines. Blue sea, blue sky, and the green plains of eternity. He touches her ear. Behold, I give to thine ear, to hear all the rejoicing of all the millions of angels in the million heavens of God.

Starting point is 18:05:12 He touches her lips. Behold, I set free thy stammering tongue, and lay upon it thy soul and my soul, and the soul of God in the highest. Hanela, her whole body trembling, attempts to rise, as though weighted down by an infinite burden of rapture. She cannot do so. In a storm of sobs and tears,

Starting point is 18:05:34 she buries her head on the stranger's breast. Stranger, With these tears I wash from thy soul, all the dust and anguish of the world. I will exalt thy feet above the stars of God. To soft music and stroking Hanela's hair with his hand, The stranger speaks its follows. As he is speaking, angelic forms appear in the doorway, great and small. Youths and maidens, they pause diffidently, then venture in, swinging censors,

Starting point is 18:06:01 and decorating the chamber with hangings and reeds. The city of the blessed is marvelously fair, and peace and utter happiness are never ending there. Harps, at first played softly, gradually ring out, loud and clear. The houses are of marble, the roofs of gold so fine, and down their silver channels bubble brooks of ruby wine. The streets that shine so white, so white, are all bestrown with flowers, and endless peals of wedding bells ring out from all the towers. The pinnacles as green as may gleam in the morning light,

Starting point is 18:06:40 beset with flickering butterflies, with rose wreaths decked and dyed. Twelve milk-white swans fly round them in mazy circles wide, and preen themselves and ruffle up their plumage in their pride. They soar aloft so bravely through the shining heavenly air, with fragrance all a quiver and with golden trumpet blare. In circle sweeps, majesticle, forever they are winging, and the pulse of their pinions is like harp strings, softly ringing. They look abroad over Zion on gardens and on sea,

Starting point is 18:07:16 and green and filmy streamers behind them flutter free. and underneath them wander throughout the heavenly land the people in their feast array forever hand in hand and then into the wide wide sea filled with the red red wine behold they plunge their bodies with glory all a shine they plunge their shining bodies into the gleaming sea till in the deep clear purple they swallowed utterly and when again they leap aloft rejoicing from the flood. Their sins have all been washed away in Jesus' blessed blood. End of Section 36. Section 37 of Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Volume 17. This is a Libravox recording.

Starting point is 18:08:14 All Libravox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit Libravox.orgs. recording by Rita Boutros. Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Volume 17. Julian Hawthorne, born 1846. Mr. Hawthorne is to be added to the group of men who enter into active literary life, with the handicap of being the sons of authors of such high distinction, that only a brave struggle ensures individuality.

Starting point is 18:08:52 The only son of Nathaniel Hawthorne, he was born in Boston in 1846, the same year that gave to the American reading public mosses from an old manse. His early boyhood was passed in Liverpool during his father's consulate, but on the return of the family to America after 1860, Julian became a pupil in the famous school of Frank Sanborn in Concord. He entered Harvard in 1863, where he was, on the whole, more distinguished for athletics than for application to study. He took a course in civil engineering, both at Harvard and in Dresden, and even practiced that congenial outdoor occupation and practical hydrographics for some years, until literature as a profession engrossed him. His first successful story was Brescent, 1872,

Starting point is 18:09:58 the forerunner of a long list of novels, of which may be particularized three, Garth, 1875, Sebastian Strom and Archibald Malmaison, 1884. Mr. Hawthorne made his home in London, for about seven years, actively engaged in literary work in connection with the English and the American press. He returned to the United States in 1882, but presently went across the ocean again, with an idea of remaining in England indefinitely. And of late years, his homes have been London, Long Island, and the island of Jamaica,

Starting point is 18:10:43 in which last convenient West Indian retreat, he resided for several seasons prior to 1896. His novel, A Fool of Nature, which won him in 1896, a prize of $10,000 in a literary competition arranged by the New York Herald, the contest enlisting 1100 other competitors, was written in that West Indian hermitage.

Starting point is 18:11:13 Mr. Hawthorne's best work suggests more than one element that distinguishes his father's stories. There is the psychological accent, the touch of mystery, the avoidance of the stock properties of romance. He is an expert literary craftsman. One cannot but feel that with a firmer grip on his own fancy, and with an early discipline in style and in methods of treatment, his fictions would be of a finer individuality, but they hold the interest and they show an aim at reaching beyond the scope of the ordinary novel of human character.

Starting point is 18:11:56 Garth and Archibald Malmaison have been cited as perhaps his two most successful novels. into Garth is woven the history of a New England home and family line, with a kind of curse upon them inherited from the shadowy past of Indian days, and the career of a curiously fascinating young hero, a survival or reincarnation of primeval man, who declares that he feels, as though the earth were my body and I saw through it, and live through it just as I do my human body,

Starting point is 18:12:37 and then I was as strong as the whole world and as happy as heaven. In Archibald Malmaison, we have a brief gloomy drama, turning on a central character whose mental personality every few years inevitably and shockingly reverts. At seven years, the little boy goes back to his boyhood of two or three, forgetting everything that has been in his mind and life since that term. In his early teens, he lapses to nearly his development at mere babyhood, with the intervening time a blank.

Starting point is 18:13:18 At last a man grown, this weird fatality, combined with his knowledge of a hidden room, known only to himself in his home, and a mad love affair, bring about a terrible misadventure, closing the story. Selection. The East Wing, Archibald is a changeling, by Julian Hawthorne,

Starting point is 18:13:44 from Archibald Malmaison, copyright 1884 by Funk and Wagnalls. The room itself was long, narrow, and comparatively low. The latticed windows were sunk several feet into the massive walls, lengths of brownish-green, and yellow tapestry, none the fresher for its two centuries and more of existence, still protested

Starting point is 18:14:12 against the modern heresy of wallpaper, and in a panel frame over the fireplace was seen the portrait by Sir Godfrey Neller of the Jacobite baronet. It was a half-length in officers' uniform, one hand holding the hilt of a sword against the breast, while the forefinger of the other hand, and pointed diagonally downward, as much as to say, I vanished in that direction. The fireplace, it should be noted, was built on the side of the room opposite to the windows, that is to say, in one of the partition walls. And what was on the other side of this partition? Not the large chamber opening into the corridor.

Starting point is 18:14:59 That lay at right angles to the east chamber, along the southern front of the wall. wing. Not the corridor either, though it ran for some distance parallel to the east chamber, and had a door on the east side. But this door led into a great dark closet, as big as an ordinary room, and used as a receptacle for rubbish. Was it the dark closet then that adjoined the east chamber on the other side of the partition? No, once more. Had a window been opened through the closet wall, it would have looked not into Archibald's room, but into a narrow blind court or well, entirely enclosed between four stone walls, and of no apparent use, save as a somewhat clumsy architectural expedient. There was no present way of getting into this

Starting point is 18:15:56 well, or even of looking into it, unless one had been at the panes to mount on the roof of the house and peered down. As a matter of fact, its existence was only made known by the reports of an occasional workman engaged in renewing the tiles or mending a decayed chimney. An accurate survey of the building would of course have revealed it at once, but nothing of the kind had been thought of within the memory of man. Such a survey would also have revealed what no one in the least suspected, but which was nevertheless a fact of startling significance, namely that the blind court was at least 15 feet shorter and 25 feet narrower than it ought to have been. Archibald was as far from suspecting it as anybody. Indeed, he most likely never troubled

Starting point is 18:16:57 his head about builder's plans in his life, but he thought a great deal of his great grandfather's portrait, and since it was so placed as to be in view of the most comfortable chair before the fire, he spent many hours of every week gazing at it. What was Sir Charles pointing at with that left forefinger, and what meant that peculiarly intent and slightly frowning glance, which the painted eyes forever bent upon his own? Archibald probably had a few of Mrs. Radcliffe's romances, along with the other valuable books on his shelves, and he may have cherished a notion that a treasure or an important secret of some sort was concealed in the vicinity. Following down the direction of the pointing finger, he found that it intersected

Starting point is 18:17:54 the floor at a spot about five feet to the right of the side of the fireplace. The floor of the chamber was of solid oak planking, blackened by age, and it appeared to be no less solid at this point than at any other. Nevertheless, he thought it would be good fun, and at all events would do no harm, to cut a hole there and see what was underneath. Accordingly, he quietly procured a saw and a hammer and chisel, and one day when the family were away from home, he locked himself into his room and went to work. The job was not an easy one, the tough oak wood being almost enough to turn the edge of his chisel, and there being no purchase at all for the saw.

Starting point is 18:18:48 After a quarter of an hour's chipping and hammering, with very little result, he paused to rest. The board at which he had been working, and which met the wall at right angles, was very short, not more than 18 inches long, indeed, being inserted merely to fill up the gap caused by a deficiency in length of the plank of which it was the continuation. Between the two adjoining ends was a crack of some width, and into that crack did Archibald idly stick his chisel. It seemed to him that the crack widened, so that he was able to press the blade of the chisel down to its thickest part. He now worked it eagerly backward and forward, and to his delight, the crack rapidly widened still further. In fact, the short board was sliding back underneath the wainscote.

Starting point is 18:19:48 A small oblong cavity was thus revealed, into which the young discoverer, glowered with beating heart and vast anticipations. What he found could scarcely be said to do those anticipations justice. It was neither a cascade of precious stones nor a document establishing the family right of ownership of the whole County of Sussex. It was nothing more than a tarnished rod of silver, about nine inches in length and twisted into an irregular sort of course. work-screw shape. One end terminated in a broad flat button, the other in a blunted point. There was nothing else in the hull, nothing to show what the rod was meant for, or why it was so ingeniously hidden there. And yet, reflected Archibald, could it have been so hidden, and its

Starting point is 18:20:47 place of concealment so mysteriously indicated, without any ulterior purpose whatever? It was incredible. Why, the whole portrait was evidently painted with no other object than that of indicating the rod's whereabouts. Either then there was, or had been something else in the cavity, in addition to the rod, or the rod was intended to be used in some way still unexplained. So much was beyond question. Thus cogitated Archibald, that is to see, say, thus he might have cogitated, for there is no direct evidence of what passed through his mind. And in the first place, he made an exhaustive examination of the cavity, and convinced himself not only that there was nothing else except dust to be got out of it,

Starting point is 18:21:44 but also that it opened into no other cavity which might prove more fruitful. his next step was to study the silver rod in the hope that scrutiny or inspiration might suggest to him what it was good for. His pains were rewarded by finding on the flat head the nearly obliterated figures three and five inscribed one above the other in the manner of a vulgar fraction, thus three-fifths, and by the conviction that the spiral confirmation of the rod was not the result of accident, as he had at first supposed, but had been communicated to it intentionally, for some purpose unknown. These conclusions naturally stimulated his curiosity more than ever,

Starting point is 18:22:39 but nothing came of it. The boy was a clever boy, but he was not a detective trained, in this species of research, and the problem was beyond his ingenuity. He made every application of the figures three and five that imagination could suggest. He took them in feet, in inches, in yards, he added them together, and he subtracted one from the other, all in vain. The only thing he did not do was to take anyone else into his confidence. He said not, a word about the affair even to Kate, being resolved that if there was a mystery it should be revealed, at least in the first instance, to no one else besides himself. At length, after several

Starting point is 18:23:32 days spent in fruitless experiments and loss of temper, he returned the rod to its hiding place, with the determination to give himself a rest for a while, and see what time and accident would do for him. This plan, though undoubtedly prudent, seemed likely to affect no more than the others, and over a year passed away without the rods being again disturbed. By degrees, his thoughts ceased to dwell

Starting point is 18:24:04 so persistently upon the unsolved puzzle and other interests took possession of his mind. The tragedy of his aunt's death, his love for Kate, his studies, his prospects a hundred things gave him occupation until the silver rod was half forgotten in the latter part of 1813 however he accidentally made a rather remarkable discovery he had for the first time been out hunting with his father and the neighboring country gentleman in the autumn of this year and it appears that on two occasions he had the brush awarded to him At his request the heads of the two foxes were mounted for him, and he proposed to put them up on either side his fireplace. The wall, above and for a few inches to the right and left of the mantelpiece, was bare of tapestry,

Starting point is 18:25:04 the first-named place being occupied by the portrait, while the sides were four feet up the oaken wainscot, which surrounded the whole room behind the tapestry, and from thence to the ceiling plaster. The mantelpiece and fireplace were of a dark slady stone and of brick, respectively. Archibald fixed upon what he considered the most effective positions for his heads, just above the level of the wainscot

Starting point is 18:25:35 and near enough to the mantelpiece not to be interfered with by the tapestry. He nailed up one of them on the left-hand side, the nails penetrating with just sufficient resistance in the firm plaster. And then, measuring carefully to the corresponding point on the right-hand side, he proceeded to affix the other head there. But the nail, on this occasion, could not be made to go in, and on his attempting to force it with a heavier stroke of the hammer, it bent beneath the blow, and the hammer came sharply into contact with the white surface of the wall, producing a clinking sound as from an impact on metal. A brief investigation now revealed the fact that a circular disk of iron,

Starting point is 18:26:27 about three inches in diameter, and painted white to match the plaster, was here let into the wall. What could be the object of it? With a fresh nail, the boy began to scratch off the paint from the surface of the disc in order to determine whether it were actually iron or some other metal. In so doing, a small movable lid, like the screen of a keyhole, was pushed aside, disclosing a little round aperture underneath. Archibald pushed the nail into it, thereby informing himself

Starting point is 18:27:05 that the hole went straight into the wall for a distance greater than the length of the nail, but how much greater and what was at the end of it he could only conjecture. We must imagine him now standing upon a chair with a nail in his hand, casting about in his mind for some means of probing this mysterious and unexpected hull to the bottom. At this juncture he happens to glance up. upward, and meets the intent regard of his pictured ancestor, who seems to have been silently watching him all this time, and only to be prevented by unavoidable circumstances from speaking out, and telling him what to do next. And there is that constant forefinger pointing

Starting point is 18:27:56 at what? At the cavity in the floor, of course, but not at that alone. For if you observe, This same newfound hull in the wall is a third point in the straight line between the end of the forefinger and the hiding place of the silver rod. Furthermore, the hull is, as nearly as can be estimated without actual measurement, three feet distant from the forefinger and five feet from the rod. The problem of three above and five below has solved itself in the twinkling of a an eye, and it only remains to act accordingly. Archibald sprang to the floor in no small excitement, but the first thing that he did was to

Starting point is 18:28:47 see that both his doors were securely fastened. Then he advanced upon the mystery with heightened color and beating heart, his imagination reveling in the wildest forecasts of what might be in store, and an nun turning him cold with sickening apprehension, lest it should prove to be nothing after all. But no, something there must be, some buried secret, now to live once more for him and for him only. The secret whereof dim legends had come down through the obscurity of 200 years, the secret too of old Sir Charles in the frame yonder, the man of magic repute, what could it be? Some talisman, some volume of the black art, perhaps, which would enable him to vanish at will into thin air, and to travel with the speed of a wish from place

Starting point is 18:29:51 to place, to become a veritable enchanter, endowed with all supernatural powers. With hands slightly tremulous from eagerness, he pushed back the bit of plank, and drew forth the silver rod, then mounted on the chair and applied it to the hull, which it fitted accurately.

Starting point is 18:30:14 Before pushing it home, he paused a moment. In all the stories he had read, the possessors of magic secrets had acquired the same only in exchange for something supposed to be equally valuable, namely their own souls. It was not to be expected that Archibald would be able to modify the terms of the bargain in his own case. Was he then prepared to pay the price? Every human being

Starting point is 18:30:44 probably is called upon to give a more or less direct answer to this question at some epoch of their lives, and were not for curiosity and skepticism and an unwillingness to profit by the experience of others, very likely that answer might be more often favorable to virtue than it actually is. Archibald did not hesitate long, whether he decided to disbelieve in any danger, whether he resolved to brave it whatever it might be, or whether, having got thus far, he had not sufficient control over his inclinations to resist going further.

Starting point is 18:31:29 At all events, he drew in his breath, set his boyish lips, and drove the silver rod into the aperture with right goodwill. It turned slowly as it entered, the curve of its spiral, following the corresponding windings of the hull. Inward it twisted like a snake, until only some two inches still projected. As the searcher after forbidden mysteries continued to press, something seemed to give way within, and at the same instant, an odd shuffling sound caused him to

Starting point is 18:32:08 glance sharply over his left shoulder. What was the matter with the mantelpiece? The whole of the right jam seemed to have started forward nearly a foot, while the left jam had retired by a corresponding distance into the wall. The hearth, with the fire burning upon it, remained meanwhile undisturbed. At first, Archibald imagined that the mantelpiece was going to fall, perhaps bringing down the whole partition with it, but when he had got over the first shock of surprised sufficiently to make an examination, he found that the entire structure of massive gray stone was swung upon a concealed pivot, round which it turned independently of the brickwork of the fireplace. The silver rod had released the spring by which the mechanism was held in check,

Starting point is 18:33:07 and an unsuspected doorway was thus revealed, opening into the very substance of the apparently solid wall. On getting down from his chair, he had no difficulty in pulling forward the jam, far enough to satisfy himself, that there was a cavity of unknown extent behind, and from out of this cavity breathed a strange dry air, like the sigh of a mummy. As for the darkness in there, it was almost substantial, as of the central chamber in the great pyramid. Archibald may well have had some misgivings, for he was only a boy, and this happened more than 60 years ago, when ghosts and goblins had not come to be considered such indefensible humbugs as they are now. Nevertheless, he was of a singularly intrepid temperament, and besides, he had passed the turning point in this adventure a few minutes ago.

Starting point is 18:34:13 nothing therefore would have turned him back now come what might of it he would see this business to an end it was however impossible to see anything without a light it would be necessary to fetch one of the rush candles from the table in the corridor it was a matter of half a minute for the boy to go and return then he edged himself through the opening and was standing in a kind of a kind of a minute for the boy to go and return then he edged himself through the opening and was standing in a kind of vaulted tunnel directly behind the fireplace, the warmth of which he could feel when he laid his hand on the bricks on that side. The tunnel, which extended along the interior of the wall toward the left, was about six feet in height by two and a half in width. Archibald could walk in it quite easily, but in the first place he scrutinized the mechanism of the revolving mantelpiece. It was a was an extremely ingenious and yet simple device, and so accurately fitted in all its parts that after so many years they still worked together, almost as smoothly as when new. After Archibald had poured a little of his gun oil into the joints of the hinges and

Starting point is 18:35:33 along the grooves, he found that the heavy stone structure would open and close as noiselessly and easily as his own jaws. It could be opened from the inside by using the silver rod in a hole corresponding to that on the outside. And having practiced this opening and shutting until he was satisfied that he was thoroughly master of the process, he put the rod in his pocket, pulled the jam gently together behind him,

Starting point is 18:36:03 and candle in hand, set forth along the tunnel. After walking ten paces, he came face up against a little. a wall lying at right angles to the direction in which he had been moving. Peering cautiously round the corner, he saw at the end of a shallow embrasure, a ponderous door of dark wood braced with iron, standing partly open with a key in the keyhole, as if someone had just come out, and in his haste had forgotten to shut and lock the door behind him. Archibald now slowly opened it to its full extent. It creaked as it moved, and the draught of air made his candle flicker,

Starting point is 18:36:48 and caused strange shadows to dance for a moment in the unexplored void beyond. In another breath, Archibald had crossed the threshold, and arrived at the goal of his pilgrimage. At first he could see very little, but there could be no doubt that he was in a room, which seemed to be of large extent and for the existence of which he could by no means account the reader who has been better informed will already have assigned it its true place in that unexplained region mentioned some pages back between the blind court and the east chamber groping his way cautiously about Archibald presently discerned a burnished sconce affixed to the wall in which having placed his candle the light was reflected over the room so that the objects it contained stood dimly forth it was a room of fair extent and considerable height and was apparently furnished in a style of quaint and sombre magnificence such as no other apartment in malmaison could show the arched ceiling was supported by vast oaken beams the floor was was inlaid with polished marbles. The walls, instead of being hung with tapestry, were painted

Starting point is 18:38:15 in distemper with a lifelike figure subjects, representing, as far as the boy could make out, some weird incantations seen. At one end of the room stood a heavy cabinet, the shelves of which were piled with gold and silver plate, richly chased, and evidently of great value. here in fact seemed to have been deposited many of the precious heirlooms of the family, which had disappeared during the Jacobite rebellions, and were supposed to have been lost. The cabinet was made of ebony, inlaid with ivory, as was also a broad round table in the center of the Rome. In a niche opposite the cabinet gleamed a complete suit of 16th century armor, and so dry was the atmosphere of the apartment that scarce a spot of rust appeared upon the polished surface,

Starting point is 18:39:15 which, however, like every other object in the room, was overlaid with fine dust. A bed with embroidered coverlet and heavy silken curtains stood in a deep recess to the left of the cabinet. Upon the table lay a number of papers and parchments, some tied up in bundles, others lying about in disorder. One was spread open with a pen thrown down upon it, and an antique inkhorn standing near. And upon a stand beside the bed was a gold enameled snuff-box with its lid up, and containing, doubtless, the dusty remnant of some George II Rappay. At all these things Archibald gazed in thoughtful silence. This room had been left at a moment's warning, generations ago.

Starting point is 18:40:10 Since then, this strange dry air had been breathed by no human nostrils. These various objects had remained untouched and emotionless. Nothing but time had dwelt in the chamber. And yet, what a change, subtle but mighty, had been wrought. Mere stillness, mere absence of life, was an appalling thing, the boy thought. And why had this secret been suffered to pass into oblivion? And why had fate selected him to discover it? And now what use would he make of it? At all events, said the boy to himself, it has become my secret and shall remain mine,

Starting point is 18:40:56 and no fear but the occasion will come when I shall know what use to make of it. He felt that meanwhile it would give him power, security, wealth also, if he should ever have occasion for it. And with a curious sentiment of pride, he saw himself thus mystically designated as the true heir of Malmaison, the only one of his age and generation who had been permitted to stand on inequality with those historic and legendary ancestors to whom the secret of this chamber had given the name and fame of wizards. Henceforth, Archibald was as much a wizard as they, or might there after all be a power in necromancy that he yet dreamed not of? Was it possible that even now those old enchanters held their meetings here,

Starting point is 18:41:53 and would question his right to force his way among them? As this thought passed through the boy's mind, he was moving slowly forward, his eyes glancing, now here, now there, when all at once the roots of his hair were stirred with an emotion, which, if not fear, was certainly far removed from tranquility. From the darkest corner of the room, he had seen a human figure silently and stealthily creeping toward him. Now as he fixed his eyes upon it, it stopped and seemed to return his stare. His senses did not deceive him, there it stood, distinctly outlined, though its features were indistinguishable by reason of the shadow that fell upon them. But what living thing, living with mortal life at least, could exist in a room that had been closed for 60 years?

Starting point is 18:42:54 Now, certainly this Archibald, who had not yet completed his 14th year, possessed a valiant soul. all, that all his flesh yearned for instant flight does not admit of a doubt. And had he fled, this record would never have been written. Fly, however, he would not, but would step forward, rather, and be resolved what manner of goblin confronted him. Forward, therefore, he stepped, and, behold, the goblin was but a reflection of himself in a tall mirror, which the obscurity and his own agitation had prevented him from discerning.

Starting point is 18:43:37 The revulsion of feeling thus occasioned was so strong that for a moment all strength forsook the boy's knees. He stumbled and fell, and his forehead struck the corner of the ebony cabinet. He was on his feet again in a moment, but his forehead was bleeding, and he felt strangely giddy. The candle, too, was getting near its end. It was time to bring this first visit to a close. He took the candle from the sconce,

Starting point is 18:44:08 passed out through the door, traverse the tunnel, and thrust the silver key into the keyhole. The stone door yielded before him. He dropped what was left of the candle and slipped through the opening into broad daylight. The first object whose dazzled eyes rested upon was the figure of Miss Kate Battledown. In returning from his visit to the corridor,

Starting point is 18:44:34 he must have forgotten to lock the room door after him. She was standing with her back toward him, looking out of the window, and was apparently making signs to someone outside. Noiselessly, Archibald pushed the mantelpiece back into place, thanks to the oiling he had given the hinges, no sound betrayed the movement. The next moment Kate turned round, and seeing him started and cried,

Starting point is 18:45:02 Oh! Good morning, Mistress Kate, said Archibald. Archibald! Well, you were not here a moment ago. Well, then how did you get here? Archibald made a gesture toward the door leading to the covered stairway. No, no, said Kate, it is locked, and the key is on this side. She had been coming toward him, but now stopped and regarded him with terror in her looks.

Starting point is 18:45:32 What is the matter, Kate? You are all over blood, Archibald. What has happened? Are you—oh, what are you? She was ready to believe him a ghost. What am I? repeated the boy, sluggishly. That odd giddiness was increasing, and he scarcely knew whether he was asleep or awake. Who was he indeed? What had happened? Who was that young woman in front of him? What?

Starting point is 18:46:03 Archibald, Archie, speak to me. Why do you look so strangely? Me not know, said Archie and began to cry. Mistress Kate turned pale and began to back toward the door. Me want my kitty, blubbered Archie. Kate stopped. you want me me want my idl kitty my idl bindle kitty they put my kitty in the hole into darden me want her to play with And with this, and with the tears streaming down his cheeks, poor Archie toddled forward with the uncertain step and outstretched arms of a little child.

Starting point is 18:46:48 But Kate had already gained the door, and was running, screaming across the next room, and so down the long corridor. Poor Archie toddled after, his baby heart filled with mourning for the brindled cat that had been buried in the back garden seven years before. Seven years? Or was it only yesterday? End of Section 37. End of Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Volume 17.

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