The first issue of The Oxford and Cambridge Magazine
Burne-Jones wrote to his cousin Maria Choyce in 1855, telling her about the magazine, and in the letter lists the authors for each of the pieces in the first issue,
and many in the second (quoted in Georgiana Burne-Jones, Memorials, p. 121-123.) Due in part to this letter, the January issue is the only issue of The Oxford and Cambridge
Magazine
This first issue of the magazine put the Brotherhood in contact with some of the leading artists of the period. Copies were sent to Ruskin and Tennyson, and it was Burne-Jones's “Essay on the Newcomes” in this issue that first caught DGR's attention.
The first letter of each entry in the Magazine is ornamental, and in this issue and the
Life of William Morris.
The Books of William Morris.
We often complain, and hear others complain, that the minds of this age are incapable of strong and patient intellectual effort; that they
fritter themselves away in easy flights; that reader and writer alike disport themselves in the novel, the review, the leading article, till they lose both taste
and power for soberer and weightier work. Popular history, we say, is but a series of sparkling and stimulating sketches, popular poetry but
“short swallow-flights of song
” skimming the very base of that Aonian mount above which Milton’s muse soared
with no middle flight. Much, or all of this, in more genial moments, we allow to be true, but call it the necessity of the time, which we must hopefully, not
querulously, adapt ourselves to. How should it be otherwise in this nineteenth century, in the midst of which God has placed us, with its whirl of conflicting
principles, its tossing sea of VOL. I. Bsorrows and aspirations
,” or of the men of the past,—solely as in contrast or other relation to
ourselves;*battles of the crows and kites
,” ever remembering that knowledge is not good in itself, but only as it makes us good,
and must be content to learn from the novelist, or let the novelist take his place; for the age has said,—We will have nothing more to do with
phantoms, incoherent and inconceivable, however logical; we want to see men as they were and are; not with motives, but with impulses; not equations, with so many
virtues minus so many vices, but men, with infinite possibilities of good and evil; we want to see them, not that we may satisfy a flippant curiosity, but that we
may gauge ourselves by them, that we may know why we are what we are, why they were other than we. If you cannot satisfy us, we must seek those
who can; though they should call themselves Magazine writers, nay Novelists; it matters little whether the acts recorded be truly told, in their minutiae of place
and time and agent, so that the feelings and impulses be truly portrayed. Thus many in these days think and say; not without just cause given. For example, take
the age of Elizabeth, a time the most interesting to us of all times in English history, perhaps in world-history; its men and women were so truly English, so
truly noble;
Not challenging any comparison with these men, but thankfully accepting the hint they have given, I purpose to call the attention of the readers of our magazine, for a short time, in this and subsequent numbers, to the life and acts of the man who was looked upon by his contemporaries as the star of Elizabeth’s court and time; the most perfect character, perhaps, of whom history has taken note: the courtier, the Christian, the scholar, the warrior, the friend of Spenser and Raleigh; the incomparable Sir Philip Sydney. I have no transcendental aim; I shall endeavour, for my own good and yours, to set Sir Philip Sydney before you as he looked and spoke, and wrote, and was; to give you glimpses of the times he lived in, and the men and women he was associated with; to teach you the lessons his life has taught me, and especially that most important lesson of his life (in these days) that a man may be a true servant of his country and his queen, an accomplished gentleman, a thorough scholar, alive to all the interests (called secular) of his fellow-men, and yet none the less, but by much the more, a true servant of Christ. I know not whether I shall succeed; I know I shall not fail utterly, for the effort will be good both for myself and you, and therefore I have heart and hope to begin.
*See
†Mr. Parker’s advertising sheet gives hope of a still more interesting contribution to the history of this time, shortly forthcoming.
We need not give the genealogists too hard measure. Many a Jabez, “more honourable than his brethren
,”
lies hid for us, a jewel in the dustheap, in the pages of those pedantic old pedigree-makers. The very names, the Fulke Fitz Warrens, and the Warren de
l’Isles, that bristle over the pages of
,” and he did not hesitate to own its influence.chevalier sans puer et sans reproche
does acknowledg that his cheefest honour is to be a Dudlei.” The perfunctory, copy-book morality of Horace and such writers, was not then in vogue; a man might thank God for a noble ancestry, as his heart told him to do, without rebuke of conscience for unseemly and pharisaical pride. A man is
There were those of bad repute as well as of good, even among his mother’s ancestry, the De l’Isles; the first of that name who has an
habitation in history, was “ *
† “accounted one of the evil Councillors
” of an evil monarch: Brian de l’Isle, who
received nobility and dignity from King John. But we find no stain upon the valour of the race, and but that one upon their patriotism. Gerard, the evil
Councillor’s great grandson (I think), was conspicuous in all Edward III.’s wars in Scotland and France. He was at Creçy, at Calais, at
Poictiers, right through the peace of Bretigny: and many another mighty cleaver of helmets (whom it were needless to invoke) he numbered in his kith and kin.
Beside the De l’Isles, we find among the family heroes the stalwart figure of Richard Beauchamp, “my Lord of Warwick,” known to
the French at Agincourt and Bordeaux, and to us mostly through Shakespeare: also John Talbot, my Lord of Shrewsbury, who died a soldier’s death at
Chastillion, rather than survive defeat; and the Beauchamps and Talbots upward to the time when they left their Norway forests with Rolf the Ganger, and upward
still to the beginning of things. One of the daughters of the Talbots, Viscounts Lisle (in whom the family centers), marries (temp. Edw. IV.) one Edward Grey,
probably a “King’s poor cousin,” who is thereupon made Baron, and afterwards Viscount Lisle; again the family centers in a
daughter, by name of Elizabeth, and she marries Edmund Dudley, a powerful man of law of that day: known to us not vox populi and the young king’s consent adjudged him as soon as his master was dead. He was beheaded amid universal acclamation,
in the second year of Henry VIII. There was a little son of his, six years old, John Dudley; to whom his father perhaps was indulgent enough when he had leisure,
and who must have been sorely puzzled by his ignominious transit. He grows up; a valiant youth of good parts; goes to France with Charles Brandon Duke of Suffolk
to fight the Duke of Bourbon; being valiant as I said, he is knighted at 22; Sir John Dudley. The King notices him; “bluff” King Hal, who
“loved a man;” honour grows upon him; he is master of the armory; he is master of Horse to pale-faced Anne of Cleves, our new queen; a
Viscount (De l’Isle by title, for he represents his grandmother’s family); Lord High Admirall for life; one dignity following close upon
another: waging war, meantime, as the Baillies of “Eddenborow” and the Dauphin at Boulogne can testify, successfully by land and sea. So his
honour grows; and the block whereon he shall lay his head is yet in the heart of the oak, in the depth of the forest. An ambitious man, who, being high, dreams
of being higher, perhaps highest: (for the times are big with all manner of possibilities:) not very clear in his convictions, but blustering and impetuous in the
utterance of them, selling himself, body and soul, to the impulse of the moment; a lion in battle, in his heart of hearts a coward; not scrupulous of means, but
by temperament after which marriage there were certain gentlemen that did strive who should first take away a
goose’s head which was hanged alive on two cross-posts.
” All that follows we know, how the gentle lady Jane Dudley is caught
away from her oriel window and “Plato his Phaedo,” into a vortex of plot and intrigue, a Queen against her will, against her judgment: how
the plain good sense of Englishmen declares against cajolery, even for a Protestant succession: and our blustering Duke rides out through Shoreditch, distrusting
his doings and his party; “The people throng to see us, but none biddeth us God speed.
” We remember his spasmodic effort to
save himself, by setting up Queen Mary’s standard at the market-cross whither he had gone to set up Queen Jane’s; we remember his arrest at
King’s College, and that uneasy struggle to win himself a respite by vehemently abjuring all he had vehemently professed; overdoing it even to the
last, and impetuously declaring that he deserved to die a thousand such deaths, that he died in the true Catholic faith; and so, “dastard-like,
with Peter, he
” Not pitied he, more than his father on that spot forty-three years ago; for he drags down
with him to death the innocent, the gifted, the loving and loveable Jane Grey, sweetest saint that ever suffered for sins not her own.
This Duke’s children, by his wife Jane Guildford, of the old De la Warr stock, were
Sir Philip’s father’s genealogy has no names in it so eminent for good or ill as some we have touched upon. There was a William de
Sidne, an Angevin friend and servant of our Angevin King, Henry II.; and there was a William Sidnei, sprung lineally from him,—a Flodden-hero, who
received knighthood from Henry VIII., and the manor of Penshurst in Kent from Edward VI. He has issue, four daughters,—
And one son—Henry Sidney, the father of Sir Philip, one of the noblest to the many noble gentlemen of that the most compleat young gentleman of the court;
” being knighted, (no empty title in those days,) he marries the lady
Mary, the great Duke’s daughter; for knighthood raises a man to the level of the highest. But troublous times are at hand; the boy-king dies in his
friend’s arms. Sir Henry is in no mind for plotting; he retires, full of sad thought, with his young wife, to the beech-woods of Penshurst. His friend
and king is gone; those nearest to him are engaged in an unlawful struggle, which cannot end but in failure and destruction; his allegiance, as a true Christian
man, is due to one whom he can scarcely regard but as an enemy to the true Christian faith. They can do nothing but sit still and wait, though with heavy heart,
they two; and as messenger after messenger comes in, like those who burst upon Job, each with his freight of dolorous tidings, what wonder if the gentle
Mary’s heart sank utterly within her, if she resigned, as for ever, all thought of this world’s happiness? Her father put to an ignominious
death; her noble young brother, and that sweet sister-in-law, whom she has but lately taken to her love: these are heavy blows indeed; but she has a brave heart;
her stay is in God, and her help in tending that sick brother, John, who has come to them from prison, as a brand plucked from the burning; alas! only to smoulder
slowly away, instead of being caught in sudden blaze. Other hope too she has,—to be better fulfilled; and, in these dull November days, God cheers her
with a son, a richer and dearer blessing than aught He has taken away. To her children, her husband, and her God, life shall henceforth be given. The mischance of
sickness has “cast a
Henry Sidney is respected, even trusted, by the Queen; he is sent to Ireland, two years after her accession, as Vice-Treasurer, and is connected therewith,
as Justice, Deputy, Governor (under Mary and Elizabeth), for eleven years: resident there, or at Ludlow, for he is also Lord President of the Marches of
Wales—a post more of a sinecure than his Irish one. What he does in Ireland time would fail us to tell. How he routs the insurgent Scots of
Ulster—killing James Macconnel, their leader, with his own hand, and thus winning those “
He had three sons :— *
† See
And four daughters, but one of Alt-Deutsch Theologie, which some have objected to as not very probable, has its counterpart in Ed. Rev., July
[ To be continued.]
So sings rare Ben Jonson. It is worth noticing, that Milton has introduced a similar cold conceit into his epitaph on Shakespeare, which, fortunately, is perfect enough without it.
Altogether disbelieving, and reprehending with the strongest indignation, the doctrine upon which so many of the critics of the present day
seem to act, however they might shrink from maintaining it in so many words, that the reviewer, by virtue of his office, is superior to the writer reviewed, and
knowing full well not only at what an infinite height above me is the poet upon whom I have taken on myself to pass a judgment, but also that a critique upon him,
which by any partiality can be called adequate, is utterly beyond my power, it is with the greatest diffidence that I approach my subject. But whatever I shall
advance will have been carefully weighed, and will be the result of several years’ almost uninterrupted reading of the Author. Would that every reviewer of
a great writer could say as much.
The essay will extend through three numbers,—a length which it is hoped will not appear too great to the reader, if he reflects how great a work it is
to criticise a great poet—to be in some sort an interpreter between him and the public. Indeed, as it is, there will be but too good cause for complaint of
the criticism attempted here, as sketchy and imperfect. The first part will be devoted to the Miscellaneous
In commenting upon the Miscellaneous Poems, I have the choice of two methods; either to make meagre remarks upon many, or to examine a very few at greater
length. The latter appears to me beyond doubt to be preferred. Accordingly, I shall particularize only three;
No fitter poem than
The Palace of Art.
Morte d’Arthur.
I will now explain in what sense I said that the poet is a musician other than as he is a lover of music. There have been those, surely a few only who have
despised, or affected to despise, the mere language, whether of poetry or prose, maintaining that the matter is all in all, or at least so entirely principal, as to
make the words, provided they are perspicuous, of little importance. Again there are others, perhaps a few likewise, who feel and acknowledge an altogether magical
power in language. The generality come between these extremes, affected considerably by verbal force and sweetness, but very far from comprehending the full
significance of words. In the second class I would place myself. Much verse do I know with good, even original, sentiments given in lucid and forcible language, to
which I cannot yield the name of poetry, though at first somewhat puzzled to render a reason for my refusal, till supplied by Carlyle, who tells me that poetry is
song,—that is, that poetry requires as one essential the free, spontaneous flow of music. Here I would I could dive deep into the mystery of music, and
fully explain why ancient philosophers by musical (μουδικός) meant good and
orderly, show the intimate union they saw or felt between the measured flow of musical sounds and the good actions and peaceful thoughts of a well-regulated life. In
default of this, I ask the reader to call back to his memory the sense of moral good which has made him happy while listening to some quiet melody, and with the
recollection of this within him, let him read
“Willows whiten, aspens quiver, Little breezes dusk and shiver Through the wave that runs for ever By the island in the river, Flowing down to Camelot.” “By the margin, willow-veil’d Slide the heavy barges, trail’d By slow horses, and unhail’d The shallop flitteth, silken-sail’d Skimming down to Camelot” “In the stormy east-wind straining, The pale yellow woods were waning, The broad stream in his banks complaining Heavily the low sky raining, Over tower’d Camelot” “Heard a carol, mournful, holy, Chaunted loudly, chaunted lowly, Till her blood was frozen slowly And her eyes were darken’d wholly, Turn’d to tower’d Camelot”
In
A poetical Vision, as it is most difficult for the poet to employ, so is it not easy for the critic to describe what it is. Whatever it may have in common with
the dreams of sleep, it has so much distinct from them that it is upon no account to be classed simply among them. Two characteristics alone, its continuity and
sequence, are sufficient to distinguish it from them.
The second, from
though it is worthy of notice that this is the only passage in that poem which contains unmistakeably any feature peculiar to sleeping dreams.
On the other hand the continuity and sequence point to a day dream, the Vision of Inspiration, which poets really see, even in these later days. But whatever
is its nature, it has been by universal consent conceded to the poet, though it has proved one of the most unmanageable and perilous of all his instruments. Young
poets are constantly taking it in feeble and unskilful hands to their own hurt. Alas, their dreams are too often of men neither waking nor sleeping, nor indeed in any
other state which the rest of the world knows of. But in nothing is Tennyson more felicitous than in his treatment of visions. Consistent, significant and beautiful,
they yet so remind the reader of his own dreams as to convince him that the poet writes from experience. His narration of actual dreams is exact. I give a few
examples.
.
“And then to bed, where half in doze I seem’d To float about a glimmering night and watch A full sea, glazed with muffled moonlight, swell On some dark shore just seen that it was rich.”
“When in the down I sink my head, Sleep, Death’s twin-brother, times my breath; Sleep, Death’s twin-brother, knows not Death Nor can I dream of thee as dead: I walk as ere I walk’d forlorn, When all our path was fresh with dew, And all the bugle breezes blew Reveilleé to the breaking morn. But what is this? I turn about, I find a trouble in thine eye Which makes me sad I know not why, Nor can my dream resolve the doubt: But ere the lark hath left the lea I wake, and I discern the truth, It is the trouble of my youth That foolish sleep transfers to thee.”
But
And here will be the fittest place for me to endeavour to answer that charge of obscurity which I regard as entirely unfounded, if not presumptuous. For it does not imply merely difficulty, but unnecessary unintelligibility, the consequence either of ignorance of the subject, or of indolence, or of affectation.
Now, let us first consider what a poet is. Is he a man like ourselves? Has he our thoughts and feelings? Does he speak like common men? Yes, we answer
emphatically, yes; it is the very circumstance that he sympathizes with us, that he knows what we think and feel, and puts our thoughts and feelings into language,
that makes us so love and honour him; makes us look upon him as a brother and a king. But he does not stop here. The great poet has a mind of such wide range as to
comprehend the thoughts and feelings of all mankind; as nothing is too low, so nothing is too high for him; workman and monarch, clown and philosopher, he understands
and speaks for all. Who shall dare to attempt to limit his power? Who shall be bold, presumptuous enough to say, “Thus far, but no farther; thou
shalt speak to me of things which I can at once understand, of every-day matters, of loves and marriages, of births and deaths; but if thou speakest to me of
things beyond me, of things not apparent to the senses, or easily apprehended by the reason, then I will stop my ears, and call thee fool to thy
face.”
No one surely would dare to use express language so presumptuous, yet in effect this is being said to poets every day. But to such a one I
would answer, Who art thou that thou shouldest define the limits of that which thou oughtest rather humbly to receive and gladly to welcome? Thinkest thou that the
poet was sent into the world gifted with the faculty divine merely to please men
If, then, any one is inclined to call Tennyson obscure and affected, let him question himself whether he is acquainted with the subject of the poem; and, if he
finds that he is not, let him try to master it; and, when he has mastered it, I confidently predict that he will be even amazed to discover how felicitously it is
treated, just at the proper length, and in the most forcible and precise language.—I will now give the promised explanation of
Such of my readers as are acquainted with the
“Let the soul be likened to a nature composed of a pair of winged horses and a charioteer. Now all the horses and the charioteers of the gods are both
themselves good and of good descent, but the rest are of a mixed quality. And in the first place with respect to us, it is our guiding principle that drives the pair
of horses; in the second place, of these horses, the one is good and noble,
I need now scarcely say, that these horses represent severally the good and the bad inclinations of our nature, while the charioteer is the guiding principle,
which Plato would have called reason, but which perhaps we should rather call conscience. In the passage in
A sated party of pleasure, waiting for the feeling of satiety to pass away; for it is that which is signified by the rising of the fountain. Then follows a scene of voluptuousness, which I doubt not every reader will now easily make out for himself, and in which I will draw attention to one thing only, the exquisite description of the music, partly under the terms of form and colour, asking him to bear in mind what I said before about the union of the arts.
But now a change comes over the dream:
This last line is perhaps the most strange and difficult in Tennyson; but I propose the following interpretation with little hesitation. The “awful rose of dawn” signifies
primarily the red morning; in an extended sense Though the mills of God grind slowly, yet they grind exceeding small.”
And, meanwhile, “A
vapour, heavy, hueless, formless, cold, Comes floating on for many a month and year, Unheeded,
” as the unspoken witness of the red dawn. This
is the gradual coming on of old age, unnoticed amid the pleasures of youth. The dream is broken—and linked again. “A grey and gap-toothed
man, as lean as death,
” the youth of the former part of the poem, “rides slowly across a withered heath,
”
and no longer to a palace, but to “a ruined ruin.
” I earnestly wish that I had space to examine minutely the speech of the old
man; I can particularize one characteristic only, its bitter, intense misanthropy, and must entreat the reader to study it most carefully for himself. For the
present, I content myself with saying, that the soul,—that soul, which in the young man was winged, “and would have
flown,
” is now in the old man utterly debased, —even its faculties of enjoyment are lost, except the very lowest,—it can
comfort itself with only this, “Eat and drink, for to-morrow thou diest,
” and with hating and cursing its fellows. Then comes
“a further change; Once more uprose the mystic mountain range,
” and below is beheld the spectacle of the unceasing work of
life and death, and the old man has passed through death from Behold it was a crime Of sense avenged by sense that wore with time.
” His wickedness was a
sensuality that wrought its own punishment, by destroying, as time went on, the faculties of sensual pleasure. But another, a sterner, voice replies,
“The crime of sense became The crime of malice, and is equal blame.
” Sensuality became deliberate hatred of his fellow men,
and is worthy of equal punishment. Then the third speaks, “He had not wholly quenched his power; A little grain of conscience made him sour.
”
He had not quite destroyed the spiritual life within him, and what is not destroyed may yet spring up and flourish; and it was even this remnant of conscience that
made him hate himself and his fellows for their wickedness. What shall be his sentence? “Is there any hope?
” And from that high
land pealed an answer, but in a tongue no man could understand,
Judgment had been given, but what it was no man knew, neither would the calm and silent universe, bearing, as of old, its unheeded testimony, reveal aught.
Such is the interpretation I venture to offer of this mysterious poem; a poem which, if I understand it rightly, I do not hesitate to call one of the very finest ever written. If my explanation is incorrect, I have but to beg the reader’s indulgence on account of its acknowledged difficulty.
The quality which I proceed to notice may not improbably have escaped many readers. In grace, in softness, in tenderness, Tennyson has never been surpassed.
This would be very generally admitted; but his capacity for satire appears to have attracted little attention. This is strange; for issued gorged with
knowledge,
”—as also in “The Brook,” where old Philip praises “his plough, his cows, his hogs,
his dogs,” “his hens, his geese, his guinea-hens,
” and, after telling a tale about nothing, full of “hows,” concludes with
the whole “coltish chronicle,”—strong and bitter, and with a one-sided truth, in
If my criticism has been necessarily fragmentary even upon these three short poems, much more must it be such upon
Farther than this I can comment only upon three points, all connected with and illustrating one another, and all, to a great degree, meeting in one centre,
Ida—the poetical aim of
Many men, if not the generality, seem to be fond of calling the poet an idealist, somewhat as a term of reproach, and of contrasting him, somewhat to his
disadvantage, with practical men. And practical men, according to such, are politicians, generals, lawyers, men of business,—men who can secure the
interest, in some cases of others, but if not that, then of themselves. And by interests they understand power, reputation, wealth. And in this sense such men are
practical. But there is another sense of the word, a higher, and so a truer sense, in which these men may or may not deserve this epithet—which has then
become a very honourable one, a more honourable than which cannot be accorded. For what is the strict meaning of practical? not only its etymological, but ραξις is moral action, and
a practical man is he who performs moral actions. And here for moral, to adapt a phrase translated from Greek to a Christian age and country, we may fairly substitute
spiritual or religious. Who then are the practical men in this sense of the word? Men who can buy cheap and sell dear, gain fortunes, high rank, popularity? clearly
not necessarily so; certainly not, if these have been gained at the expense of truth, honour, benevolence—any part of virtue. No, not such men, but men
very different; in the highest sense such as St. Paul and St. Augustine—men who discover to their fellows the comparative worth of heaven and earth, and
the impolicy—to take a low ground, because worldly men prize themselves for their policy—of sacrificing the former for the latter. These have
not all been powerful, honoured or wealthy; but, on the contrary, have been in penury, in disgrace often—sometimes have seemed to find their reward in
imprisonment, and scourging, and death. They seem to have taken poor care of themselves; yet were they none the less the most practical men of the earth. And below
these, but in a very high, almost the first rank, are poets and their brethren in art, who strive to refine and spiritualize mankind by the love of beauty. They may
have their impracticalities; but so far as they aim at raising and ennobling first themselves, and then the rest of the world, so far they are practical. Accordingly
we must not be surprised to find a practical end in poems. Indeed I should be inclined to refuse the name of a great poem to any that had not a distinct and well
sustained moral purpose. And such a purpose, and that, in the present day, one of the most important, is to be found in
The number of love poems is legion. “Old song which poet ever singeth, Of which the listening world is never weary,” as Alexander Smith
says, whose own poetry is almost solely upon this one subject. And he speaks truly too, as a little consideration will show, with the reasons thereof. And of all
poets, I know none whose treatment of love combines so much tenderness, purity, passion, and intellectuality as Tennyson’s. One at least of these qualities
shines out in all his delineations,—intellectuality and passion are predominant in
This, together with the third point, will be made plain, if we examine at some length the character of Ida, who is at once the chief figure and the centre of
the love poetry in VOL. I. C
The dancers swept merrily by me on that night of Lady Lacy’s ball eleven years ago, and fanned me pleasantly as they bounded past
to the tune of instruments, and there was nothing in all this to make me peevish, and fretful, and morose; yet I stood aside moodily, taking no part in the dancing,
nor the talk—and though I asked myself often how it was that I felt so evil-minded on that night, yet I needed no answer, knowing well the reason, that it
was because of my cousin Gertrude, and her troop of flatterers, and because she slighted me openly, putting me to shame before all who knew our betrothal; and because
I could not help thinking that somehow her love had grown cold of late. And some there were who rated me for my gloomy looks, and pestered me with silly questionings,
to which I lent little heed or answer. And all the while Gertrude was hidden from me by a ring of satellites, but her silver laugh and jesting troubled me heavily.
“To-morrow,” said I, “I will speak to her kindly and firmly, and if it must be so, release her whatever comes to me.” I
had fancied moreover that her father’s manner was shy and altered to me when I crossed him in the Hall; for he passed by me with unwonted coldness, and
left the house immediately. Two gentlemen were talking in a low tone to one another, close at hand, but, though I moved to be out of overhearing, I had unconsciously
caught the substance of their conversation, earnest and grave—some great failures in the north had followed the strikes, and certain great city houses were
said to be deeply involved in the
I would leave now; where was the hostess, my firm, most constant protector in all boyish scrapes? in the glance I gave round the room I saw that Gertrude was not there: I was at her ladyship’s side presently, and held out my hand. “So soon, Charlie, you must be ill; upon my word you look so, let me”—“No, dear Lady Lacy, there is positively nothing the matter with me, a slight headache perhaps;” and as I urged this it came upon me indeed quick and throbbing—“my father said he should want me at a very early hour in the morning, and I cannot fail him.” “It is not much past twelve,” she said; “you are not generally so particular about sleep. Poor boy!” I saw she was aware of more than she expressed. A kind look and kinder pressure. “I am sorry I prepared such an entertainment for you, Charlie; good bye.”
Yet I could not go without saying “good-night” to my beautiful cousin, who caused me such secret sorrow, but knew it not. Passing the
refreshment room I saw her, as I thought, sitting in the cool, for her face was scarlet with the flush of dancing, and slightly bent, but another step discovered that
she was not alone, and what I saw besides I say not: then I passed out straightway into the night, where the snow lay deep upon the ground on that February morning,
feeling not heart-broken and crushed as I used to think I should feel, if any great distress fell upon me, but full of
“No home, no food all the day long,’” and yet our dogs are housed and fed! Oh! there should be echo of these words, reverberation deep and hollow, through every happy home at midnight, when the lights are out, and all men are at once alone,—“No home;” “no food.” Is it true? Question the winds that blow over cities at night-time, what voices they bear along with them. Is it enough, oh! good people, to thank God night and morning for home and life?—will it be asked ever at any time, chiefly at one great time, “Where is thy brother?”—will it be answered, “Am I my brother’s keeper?”
Alas! poor heart of mine, how should I ever comfort it again! already I was changed, even in this brief time. I said within myself, “Since no good sleep can come to me this night, I will walk among the streets till morning, and see the woe of the great city”—and while the words were yet within my mind, I struck upon it unawares.
“Oh! Richard—Dickey, doan’t—mercy! you’ll hurt the child—oh!”— God! the cry that went up shrieking to thy heaven—oh! didst Thou hear it? yet there came down no thunder nor fire, nor did the ground beneath open and consume. She had gone down before that fearful blow, her poor head striking, as it fell, against the projecting window-frame—surely she is dead: three or four men came out of the tap-room at the cry, for it was keen and piercing. I saw that they were drunk, all of them, like the monster who had done this evil deed; he stood leaning against the wall, all unconscious, muttering curses. I was kneeling upon the snow beside her now; it was a cruel sight beneath the wretched glimmer of the lamp-light—her cheek and mouth were full of blood; as I raised her head it flowed over me; presently I think she would have choked in the swoon: her bonnet fell from her to the ground as I lifted her, and her hair, wet with the trampled snow, was long and raven black. I took no heed to the inarticulate gabble round me; I knew the wretch had staggered towards me, making the dark air black with oaths, that his silly, half-witted comrades were doing their feeble best to lead him back, and once my arm received a kick meant for the helpless form it shielded:—but my eyes were upon her countenance trying to trace below the signs of want and famine, the lines of what must once have been tender, well-nigh beautiful.
The noise of the sliding and staggering of their feet was stopped by the swinging to of the door. I followed the direction of her arm to reach the
“Wot’s up ’ere, Sir?—a woman drunk I ’spose.”
“Oh! policeman, look down here—look at this child.” He stooped and disengaged it tenderly enough for the man. “Why it’s dead, sir, stone dead—but not cold yet; may be she killed it herself a-fallin.” “No, no, no; the man’s in there, in there, her husband, who struck her down.” There was horror upon my face I know, and pride of experience in his voice as he answered, “Why, bless yer, sir, these things ’appens plenty enough; every night pretty nigh.” “See her looked to and sheltered for the night, and from the brute in there.” Then I left money with him, and hurried away.
It began again to snow thickly, coming slantwise against the cheek, so that I was fain lower my head awhile, and let the storm pass by. A dull and heavy sound of the quarters came from time to time from the churches, and at long intervals a traveller would pass rapidly, and, saving this, I seemed already alone in the great streets, yet I knew this could not be; somewhere in desolate bye-lanes I knew there was homeless woe, but a terror of the unknown evil chained me to the great thoroughfares, and I never left them.
An hour more and I was leaning against the parapet of Waterloo Bridge, where I have often stood since then, in dreams; as I have stood once in reality, by
another river in another city, watching not the river nor the rush of the rough water, which lay indeed viewless far below, known only by reflection from dim lamps on
bridges beyond, but watching the flow of silence and the darkness, as I could not from the narrow streets—darkness and silence infinite, most unlike that
we meet on trackless moors, and on high mountain tops, but laden with the pestilence of huddled crowds, and
So standing trancedly, gathering in great store of fearful imagination for dreams to come, there fell upon my ear a sound of confused voices from the south
side as of people quarrelling, which at times grew shrill and then ceased again, and recommenced. I hurried across the bridge as fast as my feet would bear me, in the
snow, towards the direction of the noise, for the intervening space could not be great: turning the corner of the second street, the cries were again distinct, as if
a door had suddenly opened, close at hand now; the cries of a young girl uppermost in wild supplication. “Oh! mother, mother, loose me, let me
go—I can’t go home, loose me, let me go;” and they were answered by curses and reproaches, and names,
Two acts of the great city tragedy that is played every night; but “enough,” I said, “enough, I can bear no more horrors, for
surely the worst misery is not simple homelessness, nor cold nor hunger, but something worse than all these together; oh! far worse.” And remorse came upon
me for all the years of my life, spent in thoughtless indifference to misery so near me, and a cowardly dread lest I should not go unpunished. I was very cold, and
eyesore with the bitter wind, as I retraced my steps towards the abbey. As I passed the house which I had left five hours before, the upper windows were still
a-light, and upon the drawn blinds great shadows fell at intervals. The dancing went on still: how well I knew the life that was passing there! at another time I
could have laughed, fancying the little tumult of pride and passion there enacting, how little! Yet there was present to my mind then only a sense of injustice and
wrong, of happiness unmerited and misery undeserved, a feeling of monstrous hard inequality that, coming with the vividness of a new emotion on my overstrained
sympathy, sent me for the moment reeling down precipitate gulfs of thought, leading I knew
In the deep darkness of the fog I saw a carriage drive up, and by and by the form of one I knew stept out of the wide doorway, shawled close against the night air, but not to be mistaken by me; an officer, whom I also knew, discharged my duty, more gallantly, I confessed, and gracefully, than I had ever done it, bowed low, and so returned.
The morning came at length, gloomy and bringing a fall of frozen sleet, but I was glad of its coming in any form, however wretched. One by one the gas-lights
were put out, and at street corners were little gatherings of men and boys, making their spare, comfortless breakfast, before the day’s labour: the growth
of the new morning was marked more by the increase of passing feet than of light. Rapidly I made my way homewards now; my father wanted me early, and I had never
failed him; it was yet good time when I reached home, for the window-blinds were down, and the shutters still unclosed. I knocked, and as if some one were that moment
at the door, it opened immediately, even before I had ceased to rap. “Why John,” I said, “you have’nt been sitting up and
watching for me, have you?” for the old man looked ill, and shivered violently, I thought, with cold, but it was not so. “Is my father
up?” Before he answered, the door of the first room in the hall opened, and our physician came forward and took me by the hand. I was speechless, because
of the old man’s trembling and the presence of our physician; the latter led me into the room, closed the door, and caught me by both hands. “I
have melancholy news for you, Mister Charles; can you bear it? rest upon this chair
When I was again conscious I found myself in my own room upon my bed, where I remained two days and nights in deep oblivion of all things. Neither in all that
time did I undress or partake of any food, but lay quiet and still as they laid me, sleeping deeply nearly all the time; but in the morning of the third day, so soon
as the gloming had melted into fuller daylight through the windows, I rose and passed into my father’s presence—he bade me be there early, and I
came. Now ever since the Lord Christ rose from the grave upon the third day, it has not ceased to happen with the dead that all the beauty of their former days should
be renewed for a little space in their countenance, more purified and cleansed than it had ever been in youth and life, and all the sin and evil passed away utterly,
and after that the change, and the corruptible given to corruption. And it was so with him; for as I stood bending above his face, white as the whitest marble, I saw
the features crowned with a greater beauty than they had ever had in life. There a full hour afterwards they found me, and led me away unresistingly; but in
Yet beneath the surface of my tranquillity there ran an undercurrent of turbulent doubtings, so that oftentimes I caught myself longing for the morrow, that I
might see Gertrude, and tell her all that I had resolved upon, and release her from our childish engagement. How I loved her, yet the close presence of that other
grief nerved me to support this also. At night I was sore troubled with dreams, more than I had ever been before; kept awaking from them, and then sleeping on again,
and continuing the vision that had startled me; they changed and glided from one to another form with that mocking semblance of reason that makes them so real;
towards morning came one that I remembered afterwards, because of what followed. I had gone down the street in which we lived, and passed immediately into a strange
country I had never seen before; for miles away it was overgrown with a forest of funeral plumes instead of trees; suddenly some one was laughing above me, and the
laugh, I thought, was Gertrude’s, and looking up, I saw her standing on a platform that was near me; and while I yet looked there was another had come
beside her, and they were both laughing together, I thought, at me. Whereat I grew angry, and an inexpressibly painful sensation came over me, while quickly, quite
imperceptibly, I was struggling in water, and they still above me, leaning over the parapet of a bridge and laughing. I caught a rope that hung from the summit to
within a foot above my head, and while my hand closed upon it, it became suddenly, I thought, a pistol, and with a quick, sharp clapping at my ear, shot me through;
and the laughter died away upon the parapet far above me. I woke with the pain in my head as if I had been really shot, while my heart
Poor old John, the oldest servant of our house, who had known my father from a child. I bade him enter; I scarcely think he could have slept all night. Then I dressed carefully, breakfasted, and bade all the servants God speed. I would have given them some memorials of my father and of me, but could not honestly, for everything was to be sold, everything, so completely ruined were we. So I spoke to them and talked about their future prospects, and wept as they sobbed again to part with me; for my father was gentle to his servants, and spoke ever kindly to them, and they had remained, all of them, many years in our house.
The last two or three hours were busily spent in gathering together and destroying whatever papers or letters I had, whose use or pleasure had gone, and this
had left me little time for thinking; but once in the street, no longer face to face with bitter memories, the perplexities of my future came upon me with the fury of
a whirlwind. I had determined to see Gertrude that morning, to release her from her early promise, made when the world was all beyond her and unknown, and in days
when I was her hero all unrivalled. I could not blame her, not much at least, that she found many more brilliant than I had ever been; no, I would act as bravely and
manfully that morning as became my father’s son: yet my resolution nearly choked my life. I tried to think of her father’s moneyed pride, and my
own ruin, but could not; now that I was going to give up my treasure I felt only how I loved it, yet I had not come without counting the cost. Through the long week
that followed my father’s burial I had come through bitter tribulation and searing of the heart to what I had determined. Yet as I neared the street in
which
I walked through many needless streets, because of the violent beating at my heart; and when it had somewhat ceased, I began to near the house of my doom. I
had reached it soon, and was at the door; it opened to let some one pass out. “Is Miss Aymas at home?” “Yes, sir.”
“I wish to see her alone, you need not give my name, say a gentleman wishes to see her for a few moments.” The servant led me into the
drawing-room. I entered, and was quite alone. As I crossed the room the reflection of my mourning dress, in a full length mirror, quite startled me; a foolish fright,
but my heart stood ready to leap at everything. There was the water-colour I had commissioned a young artist friend of mine to paint for her, hanging in the room. I
had never seen it, and now approached it, if by any means it could divert my overstrained expectation. There was drawn the figure of a lonely man standing before a
city, iron-walled and turretted, and garrisoned with a multitude that stood above the gates; but the background of the city was fire, and those thousand or more who
kept the gates stood black against the yellow light, and the fire,
How hotly the fire was burning there behind the walls, in the city of Dis, upon the brows of that solitary man it struck hotly, but upon my brows how cold drops of moisture hung! But I gathered breath and spoke passionately. “Oh, Gertrude, you have been very cruel to me in my bitterness.” For a moment a cataract of tears stood ready to fall, and I could not see for them. She laid her hand convulsively upon my arm, and said,“I must stop no more; I cannot bear to see you after all that I have done; we ought not to have met in this way, you will see why, when you read my father’s letter; try to forgive me sometime.” And when I looked again she was gone.
The seasons came and went continually, as in the former days. I saw the changing of the moon, and the rising and falling of old constellations, as in the beginning of years; and round about the land the ancient winds were blowing and the old sea waves beating, when I left my country, for my great woe had not fallen upon them, nor caused that that dark river should cease to flow for other men as it had ceased for me. There was not anything in all the earth to comprehend my woe.
Away, and across the sea to France, flying from that city of homeless streets weak and sick, and going mad, for I did not mistake the signs that visited me too
surely, a startling crushing sense of memory leaving me altogether—and one fixed thought that never left me, but came soothing me at all hours of the day
and night—a prophetical
By the river bank at length, changed from when I stood there last, but that was long, long ago: there was a moving in the chimes, and they rang out the hour of four, and a quick, immemorial pang shot through me, and I was falling—falling—falling.
The fragrance of freshly-gathered flowers was about me as I lay softly somewhere when life returned to me; my eyes rested on unfamiliar objects. I was lying on
a bed in some strange room; it seemed my waking had been
But, as days and weeks went on, these also passed away, and I lay weak indeed, and not far from the limits of life and death, but my understanding darkened no
more. So about the end of summer, I sat upright near the window of the room, and Onore was with me, for she seldom left her place beside me, and quietly I drew from
her all that had happened, and how it had come to pass that I was there: then she told me how in the last winter, on a February morning early, at the end of the
month, the 28th—she should never forget the day—her father was called up (he was a physician) to see the body of a young man, an Englishman they
said, who had been rescued from the river an hour before, and lay at the station close at hand, and, as they thought, dead. And because he pitied me so deeply for my
woe-worn face, and desolation, and because the
Every day we sat together, and spoke of many things, not any longer of past sorrow; and she told me of her hitherto life, which I most longed to hear, and of her father’s goodness and his noble acts; and here she blushed and her sweet voice trembled; never voice of singing bird, or wind among the trees was more musical than hers. I thought of her as of the King’s daughter in the Song of songs, “Her lips are like a thread of scarlet, and her speech is comely.” She looked most queenly from her dark and regal eyes.
One day towards the end of the year, she took out of her writing-desk some letters of her mother’s, and read them to me, for she loved to talk of
her mother, and to dwell upon the fact that she was an Englishwoman; from her she had learnt to speak so easily, and as she read on, with her voice ringing clear,
events, and names, and dates caused me to bend all my listening to their purport, and forget the voice for a little while; they were all familiar to me, nay, my own
name came over and over again, I wondered if I were really sane, and whether my madness had indeed quite passed away. How I was listening now, trembling lest it
should not be true, and I be cheated and fooled with accidents; but as she read on I was more confirmed, and laughed with a laugh of triumph, and held her fast,
crying, “Onore, it was your cousin that you saved.” No more, for a faint feeling passed through me and rapidly left me. Then I told her all my
life past for the first time, omitting nothing; and there, in the morning of the New Year, I spoke also of my love for her,
It is a morning in May upon the hill of Canteleu; we are walking, my wife and I, talking lowly from the depth of happiness, upon the brow of the winding road.
And below us is the valley and the river, and the city of the towers, and all above the heavens are overlaid with happy blue. A wind is somewhere passing in the upper
air, driving the thin white clouds in furious whirls
I was the master-mason of a church that was built more than six hundred years ago; it is now two hundred years since that church vanished from the
face of the earth; it was destroyed utterly,—no fragment of it was left; not even the great pillars that bore up the tower at the cross, where the choir
used to join the nave. No one knows now even where it stood, only in this very autumn-tide, if you knew the place, you would see the heaps made by the earth-covered
ruins heaving the yellow corn into glorious waves, so that the place where my church used to be is as beautiful now as when it stood in all its splendour. I do not
remember very much about the land where my church was; I have quite forgotten the name of it, but I know it was very beautiful, and even now, while I am thinking of
it, comes a flood of old memories, and I almost seem to see it again,—that old beautiful land! only
Now the great Church, and the
All the figures in the porch were finished except one, and I remember when I woke that morning my exultation at the thought of my Church being so nearly
finished; I remember, too, how a kind of misgiving mingled with the exultation, which, try all I could, I was unable to shake off; I
We were by his bed-side, Margaret and I; I stood and leaned over him, and my hair fell sideways over my face and touched his face; Margaret kneeled beside me,
quivering in every limb, not with pain, I think, but rather shaken by a passion of earnest prayer. After some time (I know not how long), I looked up from his face to
the window underneath which he lay; I do not know what time of the day it was, but I know that it was a glorious autumn day, a day soft with melting, golden haze: a
vine and a rose grew together, and trailed half across the window, so that I could not see much of the beautiful blue sky, and nothing of town or country beyond; the
vine leaves were touched with red here and there, and three over-blown roses,
It was just beneath the westernmost arch of the nave, there I carved their tomb: I was a long time carving it; I did not think I should be so long at first, and I said, “I shall die when I have finished carving it,” thinking that would be a very short time. But so it happened after I had carved those two whom I loved, lying with clasped hands like husband and wife above their tomb, that I could not yet leave carving it; and so that I might be near them I became a monk, and used to sit in the choir and sing, thinking of the time when we should all be together again. And as I had time I used to go to the westernmost arch of the nave and work at the tomb that was there under the great, sweeping arch; and in process of time I raised a marble canopy that reached quite up to the top of the arch, and I painted it too as fair as I could, and carved it all about with many flowers and histories, and in them I carved the faces of those I had known on earth (for I was not as one on earth now, but seemed quite away out of the world). And as I carved, sometimes the monks and other people too would come and gaze, and watch how the flowers grew; and sometimes too as they gazed, they would weep for pity, knowing how all had been. So my life passed, and I lived in that abbey for twenty years after he died, till one morning, quite early, when they came into the church for matins, they found me lying dead, with my chisel in my hand, underneath the last lily of the tomb.
I have a wish to record the master-facts of my life—facts not the less real and important, to myself at least, because the joys
and sorrows of which they are composed are difficult to be set forth in words, to be separated from the unformed quarry of feelings and half-thoughts. They are what
has given me, who am poor and unknown, memories for the sake of which I would not change my identity with that of the brightest genius, and hopes which are full of
the life which is “the life indeed”—the life of revived death. Oh the malignity of that first devil’s
lie—“Ye shall not surely die!” Surely, surely everything here points to death as the path of life. They who have slain their
ambition, their selfish hopes, their passions, these are the conquerors who are “dead,” and whose life is “hid with Christ in
God.” But let me go on to say how a nature strong and passionate, while scorning what is false and base, was yet long in attaining aught that is true and
pure.
I am not particularly remarkable for anything. The prevailing quality which I have observed in myself being a very great degree (so I consider it) of impressibleness, which has had the effect of making me very shy and reserved. My observation during the first part of my life fell upon men rather
than upon nature, owing to a peculiar education. For I am constitutionally very delicate; was sent to school late, and passed all my schooldays in my native place,
one of the largest manufacturing towns in England. True it is that I have watched many times the smoke-drifts rushing swiftly across the streets, pursuing and
pursued, with shapes more quickly changing, fiercer and more fantastic than those of the slow white clouds above them; true that I have seen the
Being then such an one, reserved, timid, and, though I knew it not, selfish, I removed, at the usual age, to the University. It should be added, that at this
time I was fond of poetry, a poet, and cherishing an almost insane pride in my art and confidence in my power. This contributed to my shyness and taciturnity, and I
fear to my selfishness. At the University I renewed my acquaintance with Arnetage, a young man whom I had known at school, and who had quitted school a year before
myself. Arnetage is dead now, and so is she; and it is well, for death alone could measure the love wherewith I loved them both.
In no long time my acquaintance with Arnetage deepened into true and lasting love. I loved him for his beauty, his intellect, his splendid temper, his
everlasting cheerfulness. He loved me too, I know not why; but so it was, that surrounded by the brilliant and the gay, himself the most brilliant and the gayest, he
turned to quiet timid me, and sought to make me
But there was friendship, and more than friendship between us. He told me the history of his whole life, a tale of heroic habitudes, gentle and self-forgetful;
told in such an unconscious way, that I also forgot while listening to mark its nobleness, feeling as if he were myself. Amongst other things, he related how he had
been from a boy betrothed to his cousin Margaret, who lived in our town with her widowed father and a maiden aunt: how he had rebelled against this betrothal with his
whole soul, had seen Margaret for a long time only to dislike her, but at length had been so won upon by her beauty and her perfect mind, that his dislike had changed
to love: how, a few months before I knew him at college, he had declared to Margaret his scruples and his love: how Margaret had owned at once the same scruples,
ending in the same love. All this did he pour into my wondering ear, so that I listened as to a revelation, eagerly longing to experience the same blessedness. For
then I knew not love—that mightiest magician, who can lift
At the end of my own career at the University I returned to my native town, which was, as I have said, one of the largest in England. And now comes the grand
incident of my life. I was walking one day in one of the suburbs, where I had not often been, for it was divided by the greatest extent of the town from the part
where I lived myself. It was an uncertain day, towards the close of autumn; there seemed a mist of light about the clouds; it was raining in the distance, but
sometimes the sun broke forth irregularly, drawing northward across the fields long shadows of chestnut and poplar, and striking the red bricks of the nearer houses
into vivid light. A large house, with its garden in front, at the end of a short street into which I turned, was thus struck by the sunlight as I began to approach
it. In the midst of the sudden brightness, the flower shrubs and glittering trees of the garden, my eyes fell upon a form which instantly fascinated their gaze: it
was the form of a lady—a face perfectly beautiful, the eyes uplifted in joyful surprise towards the sudden light, the rich dark hair glowing a purple
beneath the sun, the white dress radiant. The look was of surprise and pleasure, but did not dissipate the tokens of tranquil power and dignity which I immediately
understood would be the usual expression. I approached in breathless eagerness. No one else was in the street, and I longed, I knew not why, to be nearer. I wished my
footsteps were noiseless as I went crashing along the wet gravel; but, as I reached nearly opposite, without apparently perceiving me, the beautiful
It did not strike me then, nor for many months after, that the quarter of the town where this circumstance occurred was the same in which Arnetage had told me that his cousin lived. But I found that the angel’s face, which was even yet among the most cherished possessions of my imagination, had faded, or changed, and become identified with beautiful presence in the garden. I found myself indescribably affected by that face. I thought of nothing else. I talked to that image in murmurous words. I fancied the beautiful unknown in various situations of peril and difficulty, in which I was to appear the rescuer. I was, and am, poor; and at the time in question, was very proud, indeed morbidly sensitive on the subject of money. She, I concluded, from what I had seen, must be comparatively wealthy. I am ashamed to have to say that it cost me a struggle to imagine myself even in that poor way dependent upon her, whom I now felt that I loved with all the passion of my nature, and to whom I hoped one day to owe all the happiness of my life. Never did lover feel more hopelessly the curse of poverty than I did. I summoned round her in imagination, trembling the while with apprehension, whole troops of wealthy and fortunate suitors, legions of tempters, matchmakers and formalists,—round her, who, as I found it hard to realize, was ignorant of my very existence; while the only consolation for my mingled pride and terror was to see her imaginarily cast down from wealth, deserted by the world, and discovering me the only faithful. I mention this that you may perceive to what I was reduced by passion, which could find no issue, self-corroding and hopeless.
I can well recall the second visit I paid to that neighbourhood. The interval between that and the first
Thus the winter wore lingeringly away. In the spring, Arnetage returned from a tour on the Continent, in which he had been engaged ever since I left college. A little time before his return, I had grown desperate, and had concocted a notable scheme for gaining access to the abode of the unknown. From the door-plate, I had long ago ascertained that the family name was Stuart, and heard one day accidentally, from a picture-dealer, that Mr. Stuart possessed a picture that was the pride of the town. Now, I had some skill in judging of pictures, and my opinion was held of value. Could I not call with my friend the picture-dealer, for the purpose of inspecting the picture? Perhaps he did not know Mr. Stuart; perhaps his Mr. Stuart and mine were different individuals; perhaps, as had already been the case with many such a scheme of mine, I should not venture to propose it at all. But just then I was full of it, meditating and resolving, when Arnetage stood before me.
He expressed himself shocked at my pale and altered looks, but soon seemed to forget them in an account of his travels and adventures, which he gave with delightful animation and humour. It was late when he rose to depart.
“Well,” said he, giving me his hand, “I have cheered you up a
little tonight; and to-morrow, to complete the healing process, I mean to introduce
“Margaret Stuart,” said I, “why I thought her name was Arnetage.” It was all over. A dulness, a torpor, almost a swoon, had fallen upon me, after
Arnetage’s departure, during the time when my mind refused to contemplate the greatness of my misfortune. I had found that my best beloved friend was my
rival, that was all that I could realize; but this dull torpor was penetrated, shot through by sharpest pangs, and these gradually increased in intensity and
frequency until I awoke to my situation, as I have often been awaked from an actual sleep by bodily pain. And now began a long and terrible struggle of love, pride,
jealousy, and friendship, which lasted throughout the hours of darkness. As the sun’s rim appeared, I at length slept, thinking that I had conquered myself
by coming to the following resolution; that no one should ever know of my love; that I would not even attempt to forget Margaret, but would love her still, and love
her fervently and purely, even as I loved Arnetage; and that I would strive to find my happiness in witnessing the happiness of the two whom best I loved on earth,
accustoming myself to love them for their love of one another. I awoke next morning from a heavy and troubled sleep, full of brave resolutions, and prayed fervently,
as I had need. In those fiery hours of the preceding night, my old agonized love, in which I had writhed as in fire, seemed finally to have burned itself out. I
shuddered at myself, when I thought of the past—of my mad self-torments. It seemed, indeed, like an evil, yet irresistibly fascinating dream. So, when
Arnetage came to conduct me to the presence of his Margaret, I found myself full of virtue and self-pity; and, as it were, above him, on a little moral hill,
wherefrom calmly to survey him,
I went then, and stood face to face with the magnificent beauty, which I thought I knew so well. I saw the noble opulence of face and form, the commanding tranquillity, which I had pictured but too well; I heard the full measured tones of that sweet rich voice, and met the gaze of those large meditating eyes. I marked too the quiet love that was between them; how noble they both were, how calmly regardful of one another. Love, that had burst like an angry wave into my poor breast, had flowed without agitation into those vast and gulf-like hearts. I felt myself inconceivably insignificant. I looked at Arnetage serenely smiling, and found it hard to love him. In spite of everything, the old sore was reopening, the old wasting miserable agony was coming back. I took dim note of other things. There was furniture lavish and gorgeous; there was the picture—a portrait whose eyes followed me everywhere. There were also some other people in the room. A good-natured nervous old gentleman tried to talk to me. He was Margaret’s father. An oldish, vixenish, foolishly acute-looking lady thought she was scrutinizing me closely. She was Margaret’s aunt, and of her more hereafter.
On our way back, Arnetage asked me with anxious confidence what I thought of his cousin.
“Perfectly beautiful, and you ought to be very happy.” I spoke bitterly and foolishly, for did not his broad-beaming smile speak of love, trust, and full happiness?
However, after a while I succeeded in recovering something of the resolutions of the morning. It was impossible to look upon the glorious being before me, so
thoroughly possessed by his own love, and yet so delicately kind and affectionate to me, and regard him
After this, I saw Arnetage daily. We renewed as much as possible our old college life. We read together, we walked together, we talked together. Arnetage, as I
had discovered at college, was a poet, and had now produced a great number of pieces more or less finished, and we spent many happy hours in criticising and
correcting these, deciding between various readings, amending rhymes, and reconstructing stanzas; occasionally engaged in eager debate. I had long since given up the
dream of being a poet myself, but it gave me no pang of envy to see my friend nearing the goal which I could only behold afar off. Arnetage introduced me to his
father—his mother was dead years ago—a fine specimen of the English merchant, frank and honourable, like his son; a keen judge of character,
inured to the most vigorous and responsible exertions, full of benevolence and hospitality. He had raised himself to great opulence, and was enabled to achieve
Now it came to pass that a certain great reviewer happened to be in want of a victim whose dissection should add a zest to his forthcoming number. What could be
fairer game than the first book of a young poet, particularly of one who presumptuously dared to put his name upon his work, thereby doing despiteful defiance to the
critical might, and offering the better mark for the critical arrows. Besides, the upstart pretended to high aspirations and imaginings, and, as the great reviewer
had it, “manifested the usual spirit of restless discontent with the things that be,” meaning to signify a certain unreasonable dislike to cant
and tyranny and hypocrisy. So the great reviewer first attempted to classify, to catalogue, the book, and failing in that, perhaps even to his own dissatisfaction,
The news that the great merchant’s credit was tottering spread all over the town, and at length reached the ears of Mr. Stuart, to whom it occasioned
no small disquiet. For the father of my friend had always been to Mr. Stuart an oracle and lode-star, and he had been wont to look with pride upon his future alliance
with the Arnetages. To hear that he was falling shocked Mr. Stuart very greatly. He was however reassured after a personal interview with Mr. Arnetage. But the aunt,
who had him very much under control, being perfectly incompetent to form a notion of the real state of things, and being a person of some imagination of a kind,
immediately upon hearing the rumours in circulation, had a vision of Mr. Arnetage in the Court of Insolvency. How was this mental fact to bear upon the destinies of
Margaret and my friend? The good lady might have become reconciled even to the dismal result she had conjured up, for she had discernment enough to see that Arnetage
was vigorous and alert, and might raise a goodly structure of wealth even from the ruins of his
Mr. Stuart was a good deal staggered, especially at the considerate estimate of his intended son-in-law in the Review, for he, too, entertained the most
unbounded reverence for printed words. He could not, however, all at once divest himself of the long habit of looking forward to the future alliance as a desirable
thing; but his sister’s incessant remonstrances so far succeeded in counterbalancing his usual good nature, that he managed the next time Arnetage came to
give him a tolerably cool reception. This was enough for Arnetage, whose pride was then in an unusually active condition; he kept himself away from visiting the
Stuarts for more than a fortnight, and then suddenly returned, and abruptly demanded that a day should be fixed for his union with Margaret. The reply from her father
was courteous, to the effect that the marriage could not take place until
So he went, I accompanying him to the water-side. We paced together the small and unfrequented pier, pending the arrival of the steamer, the sea-weed bulbs cracking
beneath our feet; for it was his whim to embark not at Liverpool, but at one of the numerous villages further out towards the sea. Here I told him of my resolution to
abide in Liverpool until he returned, adding, that I had already secured lodgings. He seemed surprised, and said, that he hoped nevertheless I should see Margaret
often, and write to him all particulars about her. I promised this with eagerness; though alas, my real object in removing to Liverpool was to get away from the place
where she was, for I mistrusted myself in his absence. I longed, for a moment, to tell him all that lay concealed within me, but now the mighty steamer was rapidly
sweeping down along with the tide, which was fast
I found that not without reason had I mistrusted myself; even when Arnetage was with me, keeping alive by word and look my love for him, even then the selfishness in my breast had arisen again and again in opposition to the honourable course I strove to keep before me. And now he was gone, and I could see my soul’s idol alone; alone I could behold those large and humid eyes, that to him used to kindle or to dissolve, raining, as it were, tears of light and love; and those lips that grew richer in pathos, with the answer that hung upon them when he spoke: I could listen alone to that voice which to him would vibrate with pride and tenderness. What if they should beam and melt, and vibrate to me at the mention of him? How could I dare, then, to see her? I saw her once, once only, and the consequences to me were awful. To avoid committing folly, I was compelled to leave her suddenly, and fling myself into the first railway train for Liverpool. And there I sat sad, depressed and trembling with the violent effort it had cost me to leave her presence. Every soaring bird, every tree and field, every house and church, which I thanked heaven that we rushed so quickly by, seemed to bear a message and remembrance from Margaret. In Liverpool my only comfort was to pace the little pier where Arnetage and I had stood, hearing the sea-weed burst beneath my feet, looking toward the sea and cloud, calling upon his name. Arnetage, Arnetage! Oh wild, wide, lone, and barren sea, and shadows untasted by the sun! were not ye even as the darkness over me, in which I struggled with cries and tears, stretching abroad blind hands of supplication.
I wrote to Arnetage twice, and heard from him once; he wrote from Greece, and said that he was about to sail for
A hasty message came to me that Margaret was suddenly and seriously ill. None knew what ailed her; some said she pined for Arnetage. I knew that she did not. Hers was not the love that had to do with pining and common regrets for absence. Did not her eye that one day kindle with joy and love to me at the mention of his name, as if he had been with her? But she grew thin, and weakened day by day. Perhaps the vessel was too full of love and happiness, and holy faith. But she weakened very swiftly, and the best thing people said of it was, that she was too good for this world. Indeed, she vanished more than died. As for me, it was enough, and too much, to pace the street in front of the house, as I used to do of old, looking constantly at the candle that burned all night behind the blind of her room; now bright, now dimmer, and again brighter. I paced about sternly and mechanically, thinking only of her, and of the loss to me; thinking of Arnetage only, with a dull sort of speculation as to the manner in which he would receive the news. The people of the house knew that I was there, and humoured me; sometimes coming out to tell me that she was better. At length some one came, and said that she wished to speak to me. In an instant the thought of Arnetage came upon my mind with full force, and I shuddered, actually dreading, lest I should profane that angel’s death-bed with an outbreak of passion. I went, as if walking in a dream, into the parlour, where was the aunt weeping, and the father.
“Do you think,” I began vacantly, “that she wishes to see me?”
“To be sure, that is what you have just been told,” began the old man testily, hurriedly adding, “why good heavens, how ill you look!”
The next moment I had fallen heavily upon the floor. I came to my senses
I visited her grave once, once only for many years. I dared not go again until long years had passed away. And this was the reason. I said to myself one
morning, the first on which I found myself able to walk—this day I will go to the grave, but not yet. So I waited all that day, feeling horrible, and full
of earthy power. I was obliged to see several people, and had often to put the strongest restraint upon myself lest I should scream and sob aloud. In the evening I
went to the grave. It was in the suburb, not very far from my house, on the other side of the hill, whereon stood the long row of poplars turned in sickness from the
reeking smoke that was withering them. The sun was setting on the other side of the town, as I had often watched him in my early days: the sun, I say, was setting,
slipping down sadly into the dense smoke of the horizon, and casting sheets of pale yellow over the higher parts of the western sky. There was scarce another colour,
until this sank into a bloody, ghastly, smoke-traversed region, wherein was the dying king of heaven himself. The cold gravestone was bathed in this pale yellow
light, the freshly turned soil about was yellow and clayey, and mixed with trodden grass: it was autumn again, and the trees and paths were filled with yellow leaves.
I moved about mournfully, mournfully; read the epitaph, looked long and sadly at the grave, thinking how much love she that lay below had awakened in me, and how she
had died without knowing it. I came away resolved never to return, “for the sky will never be blue, nor the earth be happy, while I am by, and she will be
troubled among the dead. She cannot be mine even
I have said that Arnetage was to go to Italy, from his last letter. I had written to him since, both when Margaret’s illness came on, and when she grew worse and after her death. But no answer came. About three weeks after the funeral, I was sitting alone in my room, in Liverpool, reading the exquisite narrative of the death of Guy, in the Heir of Redcliffe. My tears were dropping fast; and I was half praying at times for peace and patience like Amy’s. Suddenly I heard a step ascending to my room—a step which caused me, I knew not why, with trepidation to hide the volume I was reading. A knock, and the door was opened ere I could reply. Arnetage entered, as I half expected, yet most feared, thinking it impossible. He sat himself heavily down, and I observed that his face was stern and rigid, the noble features having an exaggerated appearance, as if carved in marble; he was worn to a shadow and looked shockingly ill. His first word was—“Margaret?”
“She is well,” said I, with such nervous eagerness that I seemed to make of the words but one syllable. I had with unconsciousness, and by some instinct, spoken as if he had not read, and I had not written, the letters of her illness and death. The next moment I recollected them, and this added excessive confusion to my manner. He looked at me as if I were very far off, his brow deepened in sternness, and he broke a long silence in a deep measured tone:—
“I half guess how it is; so will ask no more now, but tell you at once why you see me, and why you see me thus. My last letter told you that I was
about to sail for Italy. Since then, if you have written, I have received no letters, and no wonder, for I never reached the destination I pointed out to you. To
Italy I went, but it seems that I carried with me the seeds of the plague from the Greek islands; and instead of
“Here then I remained until I had mustered strength to walk along the beach, upon the sand beneath the high pile of rounded stones stretching far away leagues long, curving with the curved shore, which even this calm sea had been heaping up during the ages of its being. I had also penetrated inland for some distance among the vines and olives, and might have prolonged my stay until recovered health made me really fit for departure, but it was not to be so.
“One evening I had been watching with pleasure the long strokes of the
“But that night I dreamt that the moon was rising over the waters in great lustre, so that the whole sea was living, and defined with rolling golden
light, all except one tract far, far to the east, behind the moon, where there seemed to be a residue of mist and infinite space. Out of this there emerged, suddenly,
and with great swiftness, coming towards me,—I was standing on the shore, above that ridge of smooth round boulders, a large dark object, which I could not
at first make out. It neared and neared, however, with inconceivable rapidity, until I was able to discover what it was. It was a large two-masted vessel, but with
only the stumps of its masts remaining, and without a scrap of canvass, or rigging, or gear of any sort to be seen about it. Without any visible propulsion it was
moving straight and swift for the shore just where I stood. Close above it, and exactly accompanying it, flew a black cloud, sending forth rain in long undiminishing
streams, until the deck-planking was soaked, and torrents were pouring from the ports. The sky above was cloudless and serene. Upon the deck of this strange ship
appeared two figures—a man at the helm deeply muffled, and in the bows a lady kneeling, whose features I somehow could not discern, although her face was
uncovered, and her hair thrown back lank and dripping. I made out, however, that she wore an aspect of deadly palor, and I remember that I thought
“I awoke startled, and saw the moon sinking, and the two beech trees, with the moon behind them, tossing and nodding towards me with huge plumes, and many a ghastly chasm among their leaves, through which lolled long inane faces, open-mouthed, mocking me. Then I saw that the fantastic shadow dance of their leaves was flickering on the floor, and up to my bed. And it came upon me that she whom I had seen was, could be, no other than Margaret, and that I had indeed seen a vision, a portent summoning me away. The impression remained strong in the morning, though I had slept again; and I did not try to reason it away, but set forth straightway homewards, obeying destiny; and am here, expecting anything, fully able to bear anything, should it be that Margaret is dead.”
Thus a dream had power to work upon the habitually, though calmly, enthusiastic temperament of my friend.
“My brother, my brother,” I cried,
He took the announcement calmly, as if he had been long nerved to it, and patiently inquired into the circumstances of her illness and death. We sat very late
that night, and next morning he was to go on to our native town. And that night, partly to divert his sorrow, partly to relieve myself of an intolerable burden, I
told him the story of my own love for Margaret, concealing nothing. I knew that it was selfish to obtrude my own miseries upon him then; but he was so calm, so
majestic in his self-control, and the weight hung so heavy upon me that I could not refrain; and I was afterwards glad that I obeyed the impulse. He wept at my
tale,—he who had shed no tear for himself; and I felt, as I concluded, that the old hysterical agony had ceased within me, never to revive, and that I
could henceforth
Arnetage went into the world, sternly and uncompromisingly fulfilling every duty. We were inseparable; we often talked unreservedly of Margaret, and imperceptibly my soul grew more and more attuned to his heroic pitch. But ever he grew paler and thinner; and one word of solemn prophecy was ever on his unmoved lips. “He who hath seen a spirit, a spirit shall soon become.” True, for within the year he was lying by the side of Margaret.
I am now alone upon earth—alone in the midst of men, alone in converse with those two blessed ones, whom I see in heaven; but whether my time here be long or short, matters nothing.
Let a man’s heart be never so steeled against didactic, philosophical, or descriptive poetry; nay, let him even profess to consider
all love-poetry as a thing which it is contemptible to read, and shameful to write: it will still go hard, but you shall find such a man accessible to the simple
narrative of the heroic ballad. With what delight will even your real lover of poetry, your critical appreciates of its various provinces, your faithful student of
it, turn in days like these to the national songs of his fatherland, and the early unskilled numbers of those true poets of the people, whose names are countless and
unknown; to those legends, so old and yet so young, which tell of the cradling of the nations, and how
So we think that Professor Longfellow’s new poem has come out at a fortunate conjuncture, and the
We will try to give a brief outline of the poem, interspersed with a few quotations, hoping by this means to induce our readers to take up the book itself. As Master of the Ceremonies, we introduce you to the latest production of an eminently healthy poet, and advise you to cultivate its acquaintance. Read the book once, and you will like it; read it again, and it will grow upon you.
This promised Deliverer was no other than Hiawatha, the son of Mudjekeewis the West Wind, and Wenonah, the first-born child of Nokomis, who bore her among the
Prairie lilies, after falling from the full moon upon the meadow. The West Wind proved faithless, as Nokomis had warned her daughter, so that Wenonah brought forth
her son in sorrow, and died in anguish. Hiawatha was thus left to the care of his grandmother, who instructed him in the history of his parentage, and all else
connected with the false West Wind. So when Hiawatha grew to manhood his heart was hot, like a living coal, against his cruel father; and having equipped himself in
his magic mittens and moccasons, he strode fiercely westward. Earth and sky seemed full of burnings and lurid vapour as he went on his way, outstripping the deer and
the bison, till he found his father. Many days he talked with him, and listened to his boastings, and at last he demanded vengeance for the wrong done to his mother;
and after a hard contest of three days, Mudjekeewis ceased retreating, and made peace with his son. Cheerfully did the young warrior return, his spirit now at rest,
and all nature seeming pleasant round him. On his way home he bought arrows of the old man in the land of the Dacotahs,
Now Hiawatha’s chief friends were the sweet singer Chibiabos, a man both brave and tender, pliant and stately, and the very strong man Kwasind, who
in his youth was a lonely child, and spent much time in prayer and fasting. The musician sang so sweetly that all sounds of nature borrowed sweetness from his
singing, and all men were melted with his pathos;
And the strong man Hiawatha loved, for “his strength allied to goodness,” so that these three consulted much together “how the
tribes of men might prosper,” and the first exploit of the Deliverer and the very strong man was to clear the river of all obstacles, so that they made the
passage of it safe for the people. Then we have Hiawatha’s fishing, and how he overcame the King of the Fishes, the great Sturgeon. And next comes his
great
Then comes the blessing of the cornfields, performed by Minnehaha in the darkness of night, alone, without garments, going round the enclosure. The husking of
the maize too is described, “the gamesome labour of the young men and the women,” at which they work with much merriment, watched by the old men
and warriors who sit smoking under the pine trees. In those days Hiawatha drew the attention of the people to notice how the old traditions and the very names of the
dead fade away, together with much wisdom and craft, for want of
With strong magic the medicinemen raise Chibiabos from the bottom of the lake, and set him on the four days’ journey of the dead men, at the end of which he reached the land of ghosts and shadows. And at this time Hiawatha taught men the medicinal powers of herbs, and the cure of all diseases. He has fresh trouble now with the idle Paupuk Keewis, who introduces hazard, and causes such mischief with gambling, and insults Hiawatha so grievously, that he resolves to put him to death. After a long chase, and after the gambler has many times changed his form, Hiawatha kills him, and restores order to the village. Next the strong man meets his death, being killed by the pigmies, who hated him for his strength, and managed to hit him on the crown of the head, his only vulnerable point, as he floats sleeping down the river.
And now comes the beginning of the end. How the ghosts come, uninvited, to the wigwam of Hiawatha, crouch in the shadows, and snatch the choicest portions of
the evening meal, returning to the shadows in unbroken silence. Long they stay there, silent always, never moving by day, but fetching fuel every night; till at last,
on hearing them sob grievously, Hiawatha inquires if any want of hospitality
Hiawatha rushes into the empty forest for wood:
But there was no other answer
Her dying thoughts revert to her father’s home; she hears the falling water of Minnehaha, from which she was named, and sees her father standing
lonely at his doorway; Nokomis nursing her hears but the night wind, sees but the smoke. Then said Minnehaha,
Far off he hears this agonizing death-cry, and returns to mourn her loss. “Farewell,” said he, “Minnehaha!
With such noble devotion does Hiawatha mourn his wife.
Meantime the white men approach, heralded by reports of Iagoo, who gets no credit for them, owing to his well-known character. Nevertheless, he speaks truly,
and Hiawatha confirms his statements, who says that he has seen in a vision the westward marches
But his own people he saw forgetful of his counsels,—
The white men came amicably, and were well received and hospitably entertained.
Hiawatha confirms the message of the white prophet, the Black-robed Chief, and bids farewell to his people. He launches his canoe, and, bidding it speed
westward, leaves the land of his lifetime, the place of his labours and teaching. And all the people said “Farewell for ever!”
And the forests sighed, and the waves sobbed, and the heron screamed,
and their voice was—
So ends one of the noblest pieces of legend it has ever been our lot to read or hear. We take it for granted that Mr. Longfellow has Indian authority for all
the incidents, but the narration
There seems to us an increase of power in this poem over any hitherto displayed by Mr. Longfellow. We had seen his great success in short lyrics, his moderate power in the drama, and his exquisite versification in Evangeline, which presents perhaps the only specimen of English hexameter not looking as awkward as French blank verse, but comporting itself almost like a native. We had seen too his narrative power in the same poem, that touching tale of Acadie; but we were not prepared for so much of it as is shown in the Song of Hiawatha. Thoroughly has he caught the spirit of the legend, and well performed his labour of love. Henceforth the Ojibway and the Dacotah are to us realities, men of like passions with ourselves. In our own dear mother-tongue their sweet singer Nawadaha has spoken to us, and the voice has gone direct from his heart to ours.
This last and greatest work of Mr. Thackeray has been completed now some six months, and, in the meantime, has been subjected to both public and
private criticism with, I believe, one unvarying judgment of commendation, that he has indeed performed his labour excellently, and done a good work for society in
giving us this story of our manner of life so faithfully and tenderly. One looks now, at last, for an escape from that old imputed charge of bitterness and wayward
choosing of the evil only in his delineation of life; it was fast becoming meaningless from its very frequency, and I fear also an occasion sometimes for the most
pitiful twaddle and conversational hypocrisy. Alas, those brilliant formulas in which we sometimes fold our criticisms and condemnations, and suffer them to pass from
mouth to mouth, without question or gainsay, how are they not the cause of infinite injustice to others, and to ourselves of loss irreparable? It is but a little time
ago that the name of Thackeray seemed an accepted text in perpetuum
Finding, therefore, in this story a wonderfully faithful picture of the great world as it passes daily before us, many-sided, deeply intricate; finding so much mystery of our manifold human life unfolded, and the veil of its complexity drawn aside, not without deepest awe and veneration; how should we do other than listen reverently, and be thankful for the gift, and speak unlimited praise of it, heeding neither charge of extravagance, nor custom of detraction.
Regarding then, this masterpiece of all novel writing, in which is fulfilled, not indeed for the first time, but to an hitherto unreached limit, all that one
looked to see this literature set before it for an aim, one is impelled, by associations connected with its very completeness to a retrospect of the first beginnings
of fiction, and the need that gave occasion to its birth full half a century ago. For it was then, while as our fathers were sorely troubled and perplexed with the
problem of this strange universe, that by a mighty reaction this new literature came into being. Sorely tired were they, even as we are sometimes to this very day,
only more sadly, hopelessly, for they were now jaded and weary, and sick to death of unbelief, and doubtings of their unbelief, and questionings, if at length, at any
time, “the riddle of the painful earth” would solve itself, suffering greatly in a fire of tribulation more than we, their children, have ever
seen, revolutions and rebellions, and the overthrow of ancient ways and uprooting of many dead forms, out of which life and vitality had departed long ago; till, from
universal gloom and darkness of the understanding there grew up hardness of heart and isolation, selfish and untender. Therefore, they began to look for comfort and
tranquillity otherwhere than in the outward relations of the world, to find
The world of half a century back was filled with Werthers, speechless, voiceless, suffering in mute agony until Goëthe came, a heaven-sent
interpreter, who set their discordant voices to a tune, and fashioned their murmurings into articulate speech; the fame of that first utterance of his shall testify
how truly he had comprehended, and spoken for them; and from that time to this, through truthful yearnings and desire for sympathy, through fashion, which is the
curse of all things good; through dilettantism, the latest born of an evil brood in an evil time; through puerilities, senilities, imbecilities, there has not ceased
one perpetual flow of novels and romances to that degree that one would think all conceivable combinations of plot and counterplot had been exhausted at length; and
yet they go on multiplying, representing nearly half the literature of the people, and all the literature of many, till in this year of grace where can we limit their
remote influences, where define their subtle working upon our personal, that is, our real education; for good or evil, directly or indirectly, they share in the
education of all, they form all the experience of many: however fashioned at the first, through whatever silly transformations they have
Now I well know that novels, and what is ignorantly called “light reading,” find little favour with many as an acknowledged element in
education, that parents and tutors are especially jealous of its influence, cannot be brought to look upon it as not altogether evil, cannot believe that a genius, a
great man, a hero in the highest sense, is to be found in its whole history; and perhaps this is not altogether to be blamed or wondered at: seeing what this fiction
has hitherto been, in so many instances, it would indeed be strange if any good could come of it. Looking back upon a whole dreary waste of barren, false idealism,
Day after day, looking at the high
destinies which yet await literature, which literature will ere long address herself with more decisiveness than ever to fulfil, it grows clearer to us that the
proper task of literature lies in the domain of belief, within which poetic fiction, as it is charitably named, will have to take a quite new figure if allowed a
settlement there. Whereby were it not reasonable to prophesy that this exceeding great multitude of novel writers, and such like, must in a new generation
gradually do one of two things, either retire into nurseries, and work for children, minors, and semifatuous persons of both sexes, or else, what were far better,
sweep their novel fabric into the dust-eart, and betake them, with such faculty as they have, to understand and record what is true, of which surely there is, and
for ever will be, a whole infinitude unknown to us, of infinite importance to us. Poetry will more and more come to be understood as nothing but higher knowledge,
and the only genuine romance for grown persons Reality.
” Yes verily,—
And indeed it was high time to waken to a comprehension of this truth, to leave off for ever dreaming, as if life were a lengthened summer afternoon, and we
were meant to cease altogether at its expiring. Oh! life and reality, shall we ever know them as they are? Here at least not wholly, their dark wisdom is far
withdrawn from us at the feet of God; but something surely, either by symbol or the darkness of similitude, is yet possible, something whereby we may discern the
dream within the dream, and choose the true: thus much may we surely take for granted, that this lifeyesterday nor yet to-morrow, but is chiefly and above all a continual to-day, whose true expression is present action, present virtue; and this primary fact, this, the essence of what is signified by life, we have
strangely forgotten at times, been strangely unfaithful to our post in these “foremost files of time,” looking backwards, looking onwards for
some golden year, with a world neglected at our feet, forgetting—
Too much life has perished surely on this road to Eldorado; too much precious breath in sighing after days that never come again, in aspirations after others
that may never come; it was time to ask—
But now, at last, to all who understand the signals of the future, there is audible upon the winds a gathering cry for life, “more life and
fuller;” a great awakening from evil dreams and long deathful slumbers in sepulchres, of things past; a reprieve at length from vigils for a dawn that will
not come, a general ascending from the valley of dry bones into the upper air, in a new world, which is the old still, among other faces happy with real laughter,
sanctified with real sorrow, beautiful with the crimson flow of life—contemplating which, and all the widening, deepening sympathy and brotherhood
involved in it, like a new land to some Columbus, I cannot but feel hopefully, speak hopefully for the present and the coming years and their hidden destiny; cannot,
above all, but speak thankfully and with deepest reverence for such great names as Tennyson and Holman Hunt, Ruskin and Carlyle, and Kingsley, and many others who
have led on this most
When we think upon heroic men, conquerors, prophets, poets, painters, musicians, it is for the most part in the light of difference, as being
specially conquerors, prophets, or any other, that we dwell upon them, seldom if ever in the light of unity, as being all of them comprehended under
the one idea of greatness; and herein I believe we are unconscious of a certain oversight and imperfectness of conception; for it seems that the
foundation and root of difference lies not so much in the kind or quality of their genius as in the form of it—the mode or manner in which it shall be
manifested; that like as one same Spirit informs the diverse personalities of men, so also does one same stream of inspiration, visible in no two souls alike, inhabit
the great amongst us; which mode and manner of their appearance are governed and fashioned by the wants of the age in which they live, the spaciousness or narrowness
of the circle in which they revolve, and the great idea in their time growing into fact among men: from which it would follow, that in so far as any genius nears to
perfection in its finite and particular developement, so far might we justly reason that it nears to universality, so that if such and such things were not to happen
and such again to intervene, it would not be lost nor darkened but
What a change it is to be brought face to face with human character, to bid farewell, as we surely shall now do, to idealities, to be cheated no longer with
far-off abstractions. I protest that in the Waverley Novels and whole historical romance school that followed them, one looks in vain for anything to sympathize with;
one cannot love these attributes, “icily, regular, splendidly null,” that are invested with a temporary personality; this is not
character—to sum up human life by epithet on epithet, after the fashion of our history-writers, is but to dwell upon the very surface of things, and remain
there, catalogue-making, after all. We, my brothers, are not sheaves of well-assorted attributes, but inconsistent half-formed wills not to be so measured nor
described: sometimes brave, I think, we all are, sometimes cowardly too, generous and illiberal, merciful and tyrannous, by turn and turn about in the self-same day,
and we have no brotherhood with these embodied attributes, we desire a biographer for our own poor mazed life, one who shall hold up a mirror to ourselves, mingling
the sweet and bitter, the light
Strange that the world has grown so old maturing systems of religion and philosophy that have not taught us wisdom: it seems we are yet at the beginning of years; what know we of our nearest neighbour? appearance only and outward seeming, nothing more; we have known him, it may be twoscore years, have seen him always calm, grave, and business-like, the last man in all the world to be accused of sentiment, and romance; and his likeness hanging there, the very image of his hard unmoved face, we call successful, a happy effort of the painter: yet, it may be, the curtain and the pillar and the cushioned chair are as much belonging to him as that cold face. The painter saw him not, nor we either, as he looked once, for a single moment it may be, when his divinity was revealed through clouds and darkness, in passionate working of his features at an outrage offered, or a love flung back unrequited, or a friend turned false to him. Behold we know nothing of him for ever; that hour revealed him in silence, henceforward he is locked up and sealed against a time to come.
I shall abstain altogether from quotation or digest of the history in the Newcomes
And first of the central purpose of the book for which I imagine it was mainly written, reaching to the very heart and core of social disease, unhappy wedded
life—the marriages that are not made in heaven, but if anywhere out of this strange world, why least of all in Heaven. Of all marvels in this same universe
that pass our poor philosophy I doubt not this of marriage is the very strangest, seeing to what end it has arrived at last, and from what beginning! Were one to ask
the sober question now at this late hour, why was it first ordained, how would he be answered? would it solve the problem we see before us daily? Suppose he should
answer to this result—“It was ordained to bear the burden of a great mystery, the secret of the marriage of the Lamb, that we might not be
without a continual symbol whereby to comprehend that holy union, that when the Bridegroom came we might know him and receive him worthily.” Mysticism! say
you: not so, but forgotten truth. What if it should indeed be found at last that not mere palpable finite evil is the harvest of godless marriages, not broken hearts
nor spotted life nor dishonoured children only, but that we have done infinite dishonour and despite to the holy thing it signified? How will it be then? Who shall
lay damages and plead and give sentence then? Does that story of Christ’s marriage with his people come home to us pure and holy? is there no darkness in
our comprehension of the type? If men would learn to believe of all things here that they are but dim revelations of a hidden glory, that every finite thing in this
vast universe is linked by ultimate
The plot of the story teems with marriages that should never have been made, differing in extent of subsequent misery, according to the degree of good or evil natures brought together. There is Madame de Florae, holy, prayerful, self-sacrificing—her life has been a painful vigil; she has been dying daily; hardly after forty years can she say tranquilly, “when the end comes with its great absolution I shall not be sorry.” How then shall it be with Clive, paired, but not matched with his foolish little wife? she cannot understand him, has no companionship for him; after all our indignation she is perhaps thoughtless more than selfish, or if selfish, capable of transformation; she deserved at least a better fate; yet they might have lived not unhappily, spite of all this. But Clive was not in love with her—loved some one else too surely, and, knowing this, it was an evil step to take—thoughtlessly, carelessly cruel; in the sight of their elders it seemed an excellent match— money and youth, and beauty and amiable indifference—and behold the end! But what shall be said of the marriage in high life? what of the domestic hearth and family bosom of Sir Barnes Newcome, Bart. of Newcome? if the last was sufficiently heart-rending, what shall be said of this? Too truly it is an old story; we have seen it elsewhere also: above all others, one is before me in all the memory of its painted horrors—Hogarth’s Marriage à la Mode, which seems its painted counterpart.
It is a subject of regret that the narrow limits of a single essay do not admit of a fuller investigation into these social questions; so shallow and
I refer principally to that episode in Clive’s life where he makes known to his father the desire of his heart to become a painter, and dedicate his
life to that end; and the good Colonel loving his son so that he would gladly die for him, cannot be brought to see it with the eyes of his son. Can understand him
adopting it for amusement’s sake, refined dilettantism; but to be a painter by profession—to live by the labour of his hands
so, this he cannot comprehend, this society and immaculate respectability cannot endure. So poor Clive has a hard battle to fight; even Ethel can give him no
sympathy, views his dreamland through a London fog. After all our rhapsodies about soul, what do we really sacrifice for it? We, men who have written so many volumes
upon it and its immortal nature, who have called it by such high-sounding names for the sake of naming it, though none should ever express it worthily save with lips
covered and deep silence, calling it Shekinah, and the articulate voice of God, heard louder than thunder and the voice of waters; sweeter than any wind. And yet for
that evil genius Fashion, we could darken this Shekinah, close our ears against that clear-sounding voice for ever. Respectability? When shall we waken from this
nightmare and dream of phantomswhat is the best thing to do, and the most thought of, but rather how and in what manner and degree of excellence it is to be
done. I claim at once an express assent to the position, that the work we do we do not for ourselves, nor our own pleasure nor advancement, but in the name of Christ,
according to his commandment; and then for our children’s sake, that we may make them better, happier; and then for the sake of all who have gone before
us, that the travail and sorrow of their hard battle may not be unfruitful, may not become the desolation of wasted energy. It is the only premise upon which I can
worthily found the conclusion that our work, whatsoever it be, must be the best of its kind, the noblest we can offer. So the former question frames itself anew:
“What is the best that any man can give?” And God has given us an answer, “that in which he finds most happiness,“ for
this testimony he has sealed with truth.
And is this the question, O fathers, that you ask your children, and teach them to ask themselves, “what they have most happiness in?“—not transitory, idle pleasure, but enduring happiness; hence what they are most fitted for, what they can do best, what they can honour God most by doing. If this were the first inquiry, and were made the law and final cause in all our choice of action, I think we should meet less and less with those palpable signs of hurry and indifference, and listlessness and utter weariness, which face us at every turn, and paralyse alike art and government, and social relations,—a wide and fruitful subject for after development. Here, unhappily, is room only for hasty notice, and a promise that the question shall be taken up at some future time.
Of Thackeray’s manner and style of writing a few words, the characteristics, I conceive, to be principally two, Humour and Pathos, most noble in
combination: and first, of his humour, we meet it continually in gentle irony and glancing satire, as well as more directly in his open, laughing cheerfulness: it is
for this, chiefly, that he is no favourite with religious parties; being such as they are, we will not regret it too severely: thus at least one agrees with them that
it is a hard thing to be laughed at, and thus far with him also, that it is a hard thing not to laugh. Perhaps people differ more about jesting, and its proper
conditions of object, manner and place, than about really serious things: this Babel of laughter sadly wants a music-master—one to strike the key-note and
lead off the noisy chorus; for people will laugh, and who shall refuse them? “Laughter is like sunshine
,” says Carlyle; only let
us keep in memory that story of the Apes by the Dead Sea. Like all else in Babel it lacks a reasonable soul at times, and in want of this will have to be taught
roughly its proper whereabouts, lest it trespass upon holy ground; for laughter is not first nor best: love and faith, and hope and long-suffering, and self-sacrifice
are raised high above its inarticulate din. For the sake of Him who gave them we will never laugh at these, and because we read not ever that He laughed while
dwelling among men; but at whatsoever is mean and proud, and selfish and over-reaching, and hypocritical, laughter long and loud that shall strike the stars.
Sin truly is very foul and fearful; in its effects terrible, crushing the heart of man with overwhelming hopelessness, and oftentimes the terror of wickedness
cannot but be uppermost in thought; yet it were a good thing also, and a sign of greater constancy and stronger faith, to feel how utterly contemptible it is, how
laughable and ridiculous its miserable existence, and
Of his pathos what shall I say? so true, so musical, one would not think that human speech were so very musical; it exalts him everywhere into highest poetry;
as colour glorifies everything it overlays, so does the great sympathising heart everything it comes near and dwells with. In those scenes between the Colonel and his
son, chiefly in that one after Clive knows of Ethel’s betrothal, and his father’s noble offer of sacrifice, and again in the reconciliation at
the close of the book; they speak like man to man, in the very simplest words, because of the agony of the hour, but there is sweetest music in every word. And those
letters of Madame de Florae, so full of the memory of an ancient sorrow, and a life that has been dying daily, “One supports the combats of life, but they
are long, and one comes from them very wounded: ah! when shall they be over?” Alas! for ill-fated, un-forgotten love, colouring all the background of their
lives with a melancholy twilight gloom, beautiful, profound: in all story I remember not anywhere the like, from that first parting for life to that last shriek,
Léonore, how full is it of the anguish of enduring memory! au revoir, J. J., it is not for long.
So let us end, not as having completed the half of our task, nor spoken that half well, as became the subject, but withal faithfully. This book has gone forth
now upon a great embassy, gone forth from us into the future, bearing with it the seal and signature of truth; for even while the memory of its sweet pages is yet
abiding, and we think upon all these things, the gain, the suffering, and the loss, and all the tumult of our life, even now the days are gathering in and closing
upon us, and presently, very shortly, we shall be called the past, and our deeds good or evil will be judged of men in other years. This book also will be a record of
us; flesh of our flesh will read it, and see what manner of men their fathers were. Will they speak lovingly, kindly of us, remembering the good to our account, the
evil to their own? Will they stretch forth hands of blessing, not remembering the sorrow nor the curse we have handed down to them, so much heavier than we received
ourselves, by the weight of all our evil days? Will they forgive us all these things? Is it also our wont so to deal with our
Thackeray will, I doubt not, one day be numbered with the great naturalists in all time, a lesser Shakespeare in golden and coloured chronicles, in a goodly company of painters, poets, and musicians, all who have ever burned with consuming love for men, or struck the key-note of human triumph and lamentation into loud pæans and enduring song.
A few words concerning Mr. Doyle’s illustrations. I have something also to say previously upon the entire subject of illustrations, which may be
fairly spoken here. Engravings have of late become a very essential feature in book-making, so that their very frequency alone, as testifying the direction of public
taste, requires that this long silence and oblivion of their merits should be broken, and they should be forthwith acknowledged as a subject of criticism. I fear
almost we have too many of them, being such as they for the most part are; that generally there is too much work for the engraver, too little thought from the artist:
any drawings are good for children, only certain ones for men; dogs and cows and houses and trees, the more generalized the better for spelling-books; but not such as
these, something widely different from these, for men. In looking over a vast majority of book engravings, one is struck with the same want of purpose and absence of
interest and particular truth, which attaches to that dreary mountain of fiction and false romance we were just now condemning; about as separably interesting they
seem as the stones in a pyramid; alas! one grieves to say, but for such as these the desert and illimitable sand-sea is the place of their ultimate abiding, the
inevitable destiny of labour without thought. More than enough truly have we of these useless illustrations that can tell us no new thing, perfectly, that is quite a different matter, unattainable, a proud word, ever doomed for mockery and defeat, but that it should be the best we can give, the fruit
of the travail of our soul; and this we look for vainly. I think if we all understood the kind of labour it necessitates to produce a slight engraving, we should be
less tolerant of this thoughtless multiplication of purposeless designs. No happy or wholesome work, nay, in steel engraving positively injurious, is the condition of
our having them; and then moreover, to let pass the matter of bodily injury, which no man may do with impunity, and consider it upon higher ground, it becomes at once
a simple and palpable choice of good or evil: no spiritual or imaginative work this copying of other men’s thoughts, nothing here satisfying
Some few years ago
Out of oblivion, for the sake of justice, I have made this memorial of a forgotton picure; not for invidious distinction, or because it is the ony articulate
voice among so many: it serves to exemplify my meaning about story in pictures. There is one more I cannot help noticing, for its marvellous beauty, a
Now the want I have complained of, a want of purpose, and the power of making the drawing tell its story well, is the very last to be charged against Mr. Doyle;
from such a happy combination of author and artist as so rarely occurs much was to be expected, and has accordingly been fulfilled. Yet what does apply in what I have
said is this, that a certain kind of mechanical demand (how far necessary to a book published by numbers I
More particularly I would specify the initials to chapters— Vol. I. c.xxvi. xxx. xxxvi. Illustrations to pp. 45, 75, 165, 317. Vol. II. c.iii. iv. vi. xx. xxviii. xxxi. Illustrations pp. 59, 71, 178, 249.
This book exhibits Mr. Kingsley in no new light. We are accustomed to find him, at every successive appearance, adopting a new mode of
expression for the thoughts that are in him, and bringing the same great general truths to bear on a new subject. But from this book we learn nothing more of the
author, except that he is still what he was; as full of life, as large-hearted and earnest, as “careful of the right,” as we have known him all
along; older, of course, and less impetuous, and more disposed to see the providence of God in the things that are. As a preacher Mr. Kingsley’s merit is
quite distinct from that of those who are ordinarily regarded as princes in that art. Here is no touch of fine writing, no word of ornament; vigorous, scholarly
English, of course, living man to living men; simple village souls, perhaps, but every one of them
standing in the confluence of eternities, every one of them redeemed by Christ’s death, sought after by the Spirit of God, sought after by the tempting
Devil.
Perhaps in this book there is a more sustained opposition to the popular religious sentiment of the day than in Mr. Kingsley’s former volumes of
sermons. In the first ten sermons that popular sentiment is shown to be contrary to the old formularies of the English Church, particularly to the Church Catechism,
the wisest summary of things necessary and useful to be taught which any church can show; wisest in the principles it starts from, in the order of its lessons; wise
in what it leaves out, as well as in what it
*
conscious of God's reconcilement to him? Far from it; God loves him already, and he is to believe
that, whether conscious of it or no, and to live a godly, righteous and sober life, loving God and his neighbour, as the Catechism tells him how,
doing his clear duty with a single heart, and trusting in God that he shall never be confounded. We may see the wisdom of the Catechism, too, in the order of its teaching; in that it “tells him of the love, before it tells
him of the wrath; of the order, before it tells him of the disorder; of the right, before the wrong; of the health, before the disease; of the freedom, before the
bondage; of the truth, before the lies; of the light, before the darkness; in one word, it tells him first of the eternal and good God, who was, and is, and shall be
to all eternity, before and above the evil devil.”—P. 44.
This is the chief lesson to be learnt from these ten sermons; but both in these, and in the other twelve, many equally important principles are dwelt upon, which
every reader of Mr. Kingsley, and of his guide and friend, Mr. Maurice, is familiar with. That the relations between man and man, between
W.L.H.
*The great lesson of that much misunderstood Poem,“