"Since then I never dared to beAs funny as I can."
"Since then I never dared to beAs funny as I can."
"Since then I never dared to beAs funny as I can."
Catch me being poetic again!
That very evening a letter was mailed to Sally Smith, announcing our coming; and in less than a week we started, lingering over the first part of our journey, that due preparation might be made for our entertainment. The last day and a half were to be an allegro movement.
The drive from Bucksport to Ellsworth was delightful; not the beginning of it, where twelve persons were crowded into a nine-passenger coach; where Blanch, looking like a wilted flower, sat wedged between two large, determined women; where my neighbor was a restless man who was constantly trying to get something out of the coat-pocket next me; and an aesthetic man, who insisted on looking past my nose at the prospect; and a tobacco-chewing man, as his breath in my face fully testified: all this was not delightful. But after we had entreated the driver, and been assisted to a perch on the coach-roof, then it was glorious.
Then we got airy tosses instead of dislocating jolts; saw the road unwind, turn by turn, from the woods; saw how the grating brake was put to the wheel while we crept over the brow of a steep pitch, then let go while we spun down the lower part and flew over the level.
The afternoon sun was behind us, and gilded the hills; but the hollows were full of transparent dusk with the crowding, overhanging woods. As we came up out of them, our horses strained forward to trample on a giant shadow-coach, with four shadow-horses, a shadow-driver, and two fly-away shadow-women in advance of every thing else.
Presently the boughs ceased to catch at our veils, the woods thinned and withdrew, houses appeared and multiplied, and we came out on to a long steep hill dipping to a river, whence another long steep hill rose at the other side. And built up and down, and to right and left, was a pretty town with all its white houses rose-red in the sunset. Well might it blush under our faithful eyes!
"Blanch," I said, "behold a town where, sixteen years ago, a Catholic priest almost won the crown of martyrdom. On the hill opposite, toward the south, stood the Catholic church that was burned, and the Catholic school-house that was blown up with gunpowder. There is the cottage where the priest lived. One August evening, when the sky was like a topaz with sunset, and the new moon was out, he baptized me there, and a little while after they broke his windows with stones. Further up the hill is the house from which, one rainy Saturday night, a mob of masked men dragged him. Ah well! that story is yet to be told."
The next morning early, we started on our last day's journey, and were driven through a rough country, the road dwindling till it seemed likely toimitate that avenue which narrowed till it turned into a squirrel-track and ran up a tree. At five o'clock, we stopped at a farm-house, which was also post-office; and there we got a man to take us to our journey's end.
"May be you'll take this letter with you," the postmaster said. "It's for Miss Smith."
Mrs.is never heard in that region.
I took that letter, and gazed at it a moment in wrathful silence. There was my annunciatory epistle written to Sally Smith more than a fortnight before!
"Allah il Allah!" sighed Blanch resignedly when I held up the letter to her view.
The road over which we now drove was streaked with grass that tempted the lowered nose of our Rozinante, and graceful clusters of buttercups brushed the slow spokes of our wheels. The forest primeval shut down, solid and precipitous, at our left, and at our right the scrubby spruces clambered and straggled over the ledges with the appearance of having just stopped to look at us; and in a little while we saw through their tops a log house that stood at the head of a rocky lane. A thin wreath of smoke curled from the stone chimney, curtains of spotless whiteness showed inside the tiny hinged windows, and a luxuriant hopvine draped all the wall next us. Not a rod back from the house, and drawn darkly against the sunset sky, was a picture very like Doré's bringing of the ark to Bethsames. A group of cattle stood there motionless, two low-bending spruce-trees unfurled their plumy branches over a square rock, and, as motionless as either, stood a tall, gaunt woman staring fixedly at us.
"Goodness gracious!" cried Blanch sharply, "the child will shoot us!"
Following her glance, I espied a tow-headed urchin of ten, may be, whom our coming had petrified in the act of getting through the bars at the foot of the lane. Against the lower bar rested his rifle, the muzzle looking us directly in the eye.
I seized upon him and changed his aim.
"Your name is Larkin," I said accusingly.
"Yes, ma'am!" he answered in a trembling voice.
"What are you here for?"
"Ma'am sent me to borrow Miss Smith's darn'-needle," he whimpered.
"You have come four miles through the woods to borrow a darning-needle?" I demanded.
"Yes, ma'am!" he answered, eagerly pointing to a huge needle with a blue yarn which was sewed into his blue drilling shirt-front.
"Is Mrs. Sally Smith alive?" I asked solemnly.
"Yes, ma'am!"
"Does she live in this house?"
"Yes, ma'am!"
"Does any one else live here?"
"Yes, ma'am!"
"Who?"
"Mr. Smith."
"Well, set your rifle down here in the corner of the fence, and look out how you aim it another time. There! now take this letter and carry it up to Mrs. Smith, and give her my compliments, and say that we would like a reply at her earliest convenience. We may be addressed at the foot of the lane, sitting on our trunks."
As I released his arm, he shot wildly up the lane, and tumbled headlong in at the weather-porch that guarded the northern door.
In a few minutes, a woman's head appeared and took an observation, while her two hands were visible smoothing her hair and rapidly adjusting an apron. Then the whole long figure emerged. At first she walked warily, stopping once or twiceas though about to turn back; then she gave a long look, and hurried down the lane, a broad smile breaking out, token of recognition. Her voice reached me first, "Well, I do declare, I'm tickled most to death to see you!"
With the last words came a mighty grip of the hands, and Sally looked at me with eyes overflowing with tears and gladness.
Most exquisite and dignified reader, didst thou ever think, when raising to thy lips the cut-glass goblet of iced water, poured from a silver pitcher filled at a faucet supplied through a leaden pipe that in its turn is fed by miles of underground aqueduct, that thou wouldst like rather to slake thy thirst at some natural spring bubbling over mossy stones and prostrate grasses? For once or twice, may be? If so, all hail! for thou art not quite a mummy. Underneath thy social swathings still beats a faint echo of the bounding pulse of some free-born ancestor, a sheik of the desert, a dusky forest-chief, a patriarch of the tents. Trampled on, thou wilt not turn to dust, but to fire; and the papyrus is unfinished on which shall be written the story of thy life.
There have been times, too, in which thou hast thought that not only thy drink was far-fetched and no sweeter for the fetching, but that the smiles, the welcomes, the fare-wells, the friendships were all stale and unrefreshing. Thou hast longed for the generous love, which, while it will bear nothing from thee, will bear all things for thee; for the honest hate that carries its blade in sight, and lurks not in sly and sanctimonious speech and downcast eyes; for the noble tongue that knows not how to tell the spirit of a lie and save the letter.
Here now before me were all these. Refreshing,n'est ce pas?and very delightful—for a time.
Blanch and I were whirled into the house in the midst of a tornado of welcomes, apologies, regrets, wonderings, and questions innumerable. But as we were whisked through the kitchen, I had time to see all the old landmarks; the great stone fire-place, with a mantel-piece nearly out of reach, the bed, with its bright patch-work quilt, the broom of cedar-boughs behind the door, the strip-bottom chairs, the large blocks to eke out with when more seats were needed, the rough walls, the immaculate neatness.
There were two rooms in the house, and we were suffered to sit only when we had reached the second. This was glorious with pictorial newspapers pasted over the log walls, with a Job's patience quilt on the bed, with two painted wooden chairs, and a chintz-covered divan, a rag mat on the floor, two brass candlesticks on the mantel-piece, a looking-glass six inches long, and a gay picture of a yellow-haired, praying Samuel, dressed in a blue night-gown, and kneeling on a red cushion.
Sally was so delightedly flustered by our coming that, as she said, she did not know whether she was on her head or her heels, a doubt which so sensibly affected her movements that she was every moment making little inconsequent rushes where she had no need to go, and repeating the same things over and over.
Presently she sat still with a start, and listened to a heavy step that came through the porch and into the kitchen.
"Sh-h-h! There he comes!" she whispered.
In fact, I had already caught a glimpse through the chimney-back of a man in his shirt-sleeves, whohung up a tattered straw hat, and took down from its nail a tin washbasin with a long handle, like a skillet.
"Sally!" he called out, splashing a dipperful of water into the basin.
"Whot?" returned Sally, with a facetious nod at me.
"Who's been here this afternoon? I see wagon-tracks down in the road."
"Boarders!" says Sally, with another nod and wink.
"Boarders? What for?" came in a tone of amazement; and through a chink in the rock chimney I could see his wet face turned, listening for her answer, and his dripping hands suspended.
"To get boarded," replied Sally succinctly.
Such an astounding announcement required immediate explanation, and Mr. Smith was coming in a dripping state to demand one, when his wife jumped up to intercept him.
"Guess who's come!" she said, stopping him in the entry.
"Who?" he asked in a stentorian whisper.
"Mary!" says dear Sally, with a little burst of gladness that brought tears to my eyes.
"Mary who?"—with the same preposterous feint of secrecy.
"Why, bobolink Mary, you great goose!"
"You don't say so!" exclaimed Mr. Smith, and as he spoke, his face, with wide-open eyes and mouth, appeared over Sally's shoulder, then disappeared instantly at sight of Blanch. Nor would our host permit me to come to him, nor make himself visible again till he had gone through a tremendous scrubbing and brushing, all of which was perfectly audible to us. Then he came in, sleek and shining, and gave us a hearty though embarrassed welcome, bowing before Blanch with a movement like the shutting up of a pocket-knife, and greatly confused on finding himself obliged to take her small hand.
I am bound to say that Blanch behaved exquisitely. She could not help being dainty and delicate; but she showed herself so unaffectedly delighted with every thing and every body that her daintiness was not remembered against her. Besides, she had the good taste not to try to imitate their rough ways, but remained simply herself.
Sally disappeared presently, and in a surprisingly short space of time returned to tell us, with a very red face, that supper was ready.
There was a momentary cloud of doubt over Blanch's face; but I went unfearing, and the event justified my confidence. The coarsest of delf, to be sure, and a cotton cloth, and steel forks, and a tin coffee-pot. But whatever could be polished shone like the sun, and whatever could be white was like snow. As to the supper, it was worthy of the pen of Mr. Secretary Pepys. The traditional delicacies of a country table are taken for granted; but the coffee was a glorious work of supererogation, and delicious enough to be handed about in the paradise of Mohammedans. Besides this, Sally, with a recollection of one of my mother's pretty ways, had laid a sprig of fragrant sweet-brier beside each plate, and with mine a drowsy dandelion just shutting its golden rays.
"You must excuse me for giving you deer meat," said our hostess with great humility; "I haven't any other kind on hand to-day; but to-morrow—"
She stopped short in the act of setting the dish on the table, unspeakably mortified by the incredulous stare with which Blanch regarded her.
"If you don't like it—" she began stammering.
We immediately explained that Blanch was simply astonished at an apology being offered with venison, whereat Sally grew radiant.
Mr. Smith did not appear at the table. He insisted that he had been to supper, but abstained from mentioning the day on which he last partook of that meal. Indeed, during all the time Blanch and I were in that house we never saw the master of it eat one mouthful.
"He never will sit down with folks," Sally whispered privately to me as we left the table.
When Sally said "he," pure and simple, she always meant her husband. She had a dim consciousness that there were other, nebulous masculines in the world; but to her mind Mr. Thomas Smith was the bright particular HE.
At eight o'clock we went to bed by the pure, pale twilight of June, and sank up to our eyes in feathers.
"Oh!" cried Blanch, "I'm going through to China!"
"Never mind!" I said encouragingly, "to-morrow we will put this absurd puff-ball underneath, and promote the straw-bed."
"Straw!" exclaimed a voice from the depths.
"Yes! pretty, yellow, shining straws, such as you suck mint-juleps through. Well, don't get excited! Straws such as your brother Tom sucks mint-juleps through. Good-night, honey!"
I heard her whisper a prayer. Then we dropped asleep peacefully; while with steadfast eyes of holy fire our angels kept watch and ward.
The next morning the unaccustomed stillness woke us early; and there was a long, golden beam of sunlight stretched across the bare floor. The hop-leaves hanging over the eastern window were translucent, and more gold than green, and all round their edges hung radiant drops of dew, slowly gathering and falling.
Blanch smiled, but said nothing, scarcely spoke a word to God, even, I think, but knelt and let her prayer exhale from her, like dew from the morning earth.
The kitchen was all in order when we went out. It was shaded, exquisitely clean, swept through by a soft draught, and finely perfumed by the new cedar broom which Thomas had made that morning. In the fire-place lay a heap of hard-wood coals in a solid glow, but the heat of them all went up chimney. The table was set for two, and breakfast ready all but cooking the eggs. Sally held a bowl of these in her hand, while, outside, the hens were making loud affidavit to their freshness.
After breakfast, Blanch put on a little scarlet sack, took her parasol, and went out to reconnoitre. Sally and I staid in the house and talked over old times, while she washed the dishes and I wiped them. Old times, even the happiest, are sad to recall, and we soon fell into silence. In that pause, Sally wrung out her dish-cloth, gave it a scientific shake that made it snap like a whip-lash, and hung it up on two nails to dry. Then she wiped her eyes on her sleeve.
"Land sakes!" she exclaimed, "what's that?" and rushed out doors, catching the broom on her way. I followed with the shovel, for "that" was a scream which unmistakably came from Blanch.
There was neither savage nor wild beast in sight, nor was Blanch visible; but there was a great commotion in the poultry-yard, and a large turkey-gobbler of a military appearance wasstrutting about in full feather and declaiming in some foreign language. It sounded like low Dutch. What he said seemed to make a great impression on the hens and geese, for they looked awe-struck.
Presently we espied Blanch at the very top of one of the highest board fences that ever was built, clinging for dear life.
"I don't know how I ever got here," she said piteously. "The last recollection I have is of that horrid creature ruffling himself all up and coming at me. Then I came right up. And that's all I know. But I can't get down again."
I got a little ladder and helped Blanch down from her dangerous perch, while Sally kept the turkey-gobbler at bay, standing, broom in hand, in that position called in heraldry rampant-regardant.
"He doesn't like scarlet very well," she remarked. "It isn't his favorite color."
Then we went to see Mrs. Partington, a large gray hen, which was that morning taking her first airing with a new brood. She had been set on goose-eggs, which had, naturally, hatched out goslings; but she did not know it.
"Now," said Sally, "if you want to see an astonished hen, come along."
There was a duck-pond near, and some instinct in the goslings led them that way. Mrs. Partington yielded, like a fond, indulgent mother, and clucked along full ofnaïveconsequence and good-nature. But at a little distance from the margin she paused, called her brood about her, and began to talk to them in a gray, comfortable, complacent voice. I suppose she was telling them how dangerous water is. They listened first with one side of their heads, then with the other, and two of them winked at each other, and made little irresistible shies toward the pond. They looked like green eggs on two sticks. The hen left off her lecture, clucked loudly, spread her wings, and ran after them. But the next instant a shriek broke from her bill; for, as every body knows, of course, the goslings all plunged headlong into the pond.
Poor Mrs. Partington was, indeed, an astonished hen. She was more: she was a transfixed hen. She stood gazing at them in horror, evidently expecting to see every one of them keel over and go to the bottom. But no; the little voyagers floated about quite at their ease, striking out with their tiny paddles, their downy backs and absurd little heads shedding the water beautifully.
"She must know now that they are goslings," said Blanch.
"Goslings? Not she!" answered Sally. "Ten to one she thinks that she is a goose. No, that hen will go down to the platter without finding out that she has been cheated."
We had a busy day. We went to see the frame-house that Mr. Smith had begun to raise, and Sally's dairy in the cellar of it; we promoted our straw-bed, filled our fireplace with pine boughs, thus cutting off the view through the chimney-back; unpacked our trunks and set up our graven images; and, when sunset was near, went out into the woods at the foot of Spruce Mountain to get a pail of water from a little Johannisberger of a spring there. The mountain was between us and the sunset, and the woods were in shadow; but up over the lofty tree-tops the red and golden lights floated past, and every little pool, among its treasures of reflected foliage, airy nest of bird, and bending flower, held warmly its bit of azure sky, and crimson or golden cloud.Presently we came to where, at the foot of a spruce-tree, our spring lay like a fire-opal, with that one spark down among its haunting shadows. A cool green darkness fell into it from the overhanging boughs, velvet mosses growing close rimmed it with a brighter emerald, gray of trunk, branch, and twig melted into it, milky little flowers nodded over at their milky little twins below, and in the midst burned that live coal of the sunset. When we plunged our tin pail into this spring, it was as though we were going to dip up jewels. But instantly we touched the water, it whitened all over with a silvery-rippled mail, the colors disappeared, and we brought up only crystal clearness. The next moment, though, the throbbing waters subsided, and the many-tinted enchantment stole tremulously back again.
When we went to bed that night, a shower was prowling about the horizon, and over on Spruce Mountain the wolves were howling back defiance to the thunders.
What a lovely, savage week it was that followed! Somewhere in it was dissolved a Sunday; but we were scarcely aware of it, there was so little to mark the day.
In that week we learned one fact that was new to us, and that was the profound melancholy that reigns in the woods. Looking back, we could recollect that the impression had always, though unconsciously, been the same. Is it that in the forest Pan alone is the chosen god? and that there is still mourned that day when
"The parting genius was with sighing rent."
Or is the sadness because He who once came down to walk among the trees, and call through the dews, comes no more?
Whatever may be the reason, melancholy is enthroned in the forest.
On one of those days, Blanch and I, after a severe dispute on the subject with Sally, did a washing. Sally said we shouldn't; but wash we would, and wash we did.
We rose at early white dawn, kilted up our wrappers, shouldered our clothes-bag, took soap, matches, and kindlings, and started. A path led us past the new frame-house and a grove beyond it to the wash-room. This was a noble apartment about forty rods long by thirty wide, and was walled in by cedar and pine columns with the branches and foliage left on, a great improvement on Solomon's building. The cornice was delicately traced against a pale-blue ceiling frescoed with silver, the most beautiful ceiling I have ever seen. The carpet was a green velvet pile, thickly diapered with small gold-colored and white flowers in an irregular pattern, and beaded all over with crystals. Near the door by which we entered was one of the most charming imitations of rustic scenery to be found at home or abroad. A huge granite boulder, broken and hollowed roughly, had a thread of sparkling water bubbling up through a rift in it, and overflowing its basin in a rivulet. Near this stood two forked poles with a large copper kettle suspended from a cross-pole. Underneath the kettle were the ashes of more than one fire. Countless birds flew about, singing as well as if they had been sent to Paris. On the whole, it was a picture which would have drawn a crowd at any exhibition.
Wood was there, covered from the dew with green boughs. We placed our kindlings, lighted them with a match scraped inside Blanch's slipper,and soon a blue column of smoke was rising straight into the morning air, and the flames were growing. Then we filled the great kettle with water from the fountain of Arethusa, and, as soon as it was warm, began to wash. For one hour there was nothing but silence and scrubbing; then a loud war-whoop through Sally's hands announced that breakfast was ready. By that time our clothes were all washed and bubbling in the boiler. Looking about then, we saw that every cedar pillar had a golden capital; cloth of gold was spread here and there in long stretches, and the frescoes had changed their shape, and, instead of silver, were rosy and golden.
Poor Sally, looking at us ruefully when we went in, asked to see our hands. They were worth looking at, all the skin being off the backs of them, and the insides puckered up into the most curious and complex wrinkles. We ate with glorious appetites, though, had another engagement with Sally, who wanted us to lie down to rest, and have our hands bandaged, and went back to find our clothes wabbling clumsily, but quite to our satisfaction. We upset our tubs and rinsed them, then set them up and filled with cold water again. Next we took each a clothes-stick, fished something from the kettle with it, ran with it boiling hot at the stick's end, and soused it into one of the tubs. We had to run a good many times, probably a mile in all. We squeezed the clothes out of this pickle, called by the initiated "boiled suds;" refilled our tubs, and performed that last operation "of rinsing," which took the puckered insides quite out of our hands, leaving them almost innocent of cuticle.
"My dear," said Blanch, as we spread our washing out on the green, "every woman on earth ought to do one washing. It would do their souls good, though it should temporarily damage their bodies. My laundress is a new being to me from this day. I mean to double her wages."
"Oh!" she exclaimed suddenly, and held up the bleeding forefinger of her left hand. "My ring! I have lost it; it is washed away."
The poor child looked distressed, and no wonder; for the missing cluster was asouvenir.
We set ourselves to search, but in vain. On each side of our grassy bench, three tubs of water had been spilt, and had wandered in devious ways, and to some distance. We sawed our sore fingers on the notched edges of the grass-blades, to no purpose.
"It was careless of you, Blanch," I said austerely. "You should have recollected that the ring was loose—"
A twinkle appeared in Blanch's eyes, if not on her finger. I followed the direction of her significant glance, and behold! where the lambentsolitairehad burned on my hand, was an aching void!
"My angel," said Blanch sweetly, "did you ever hear of diamond-washings?"
When Sunday came round a second time, we were aware of it. Every day had been to us like a crystal brimming cup overflowing to quench the day's thirst; but looking out into this Sunday, we saw only a golden emptiness.
Tears hung on Blanch's long eyelashes. "Think of all the blessed open church-doors," she said. "It makes me homesick. I want to go to mass. Even a fiddling, frescoed, full-dress mass would be better than none."
I quoted my friend, Sir Boyle Roche, "'Can a man be like a bird, in two places at once?' Besides, little one, if you were in town, it is not unlikely that you might stay at home all day because your new hat was not becoming, or because of the hot sun, or the east wind, or the mud, or the dust."
The dear child blushed. "But then one likes to know that one can go," she said meekly.
Sally and her husband were going five miles to meeting that day. They started early; and we watched them go soberly off in single file till the trees hid first the large brim of Sally's preposterous bonnet, then the crown of Mr. Smith's antique hat. Then we went in and prepared a little altar, with a statuette of the Virgin, a crucifix, candles and flowers, and, lifting up our hearts in that wild solitude, assisted at some far-away mass. There was no interruption, only a group of deer stood without, at the distance of a stone's throw, as motionless as gray marble statues, and watched us with soft, intent eyes. After we had got through and were sitting silently, the candles still burning, some Roman Catholic hummingbirds dashed in and sucked the honey out of the wild roses we had given our Lady, but left a sweet thought instead. When the buzz of their wings was gone, we heard robins and a bobolink outside, and a chorus of little twitterers singing a Laudate. "Amen!" said Blanch. The unclouded sunlight steeped the surrounding forest in sultry splendor, and clouds of perfume rose, like incense, from pine, and fir, and hemlock, from thousands of little blossoms, from plots of red and white clover, heavy with honey, from censers of anemones, and, threading all these sweets of sound, perfume, and sight together, was the bubbling voice of a brook murmuring Paters and Aves over its pebbles.
Blanch smiled, and repeated softly:
"The waters all over the earth rejoiceIn many a hushed and silvery voice;'In Jordan we covered Him, foot and crown,While the dove of the Spirit came fluttering down."'We steadied his keel at the crowded beach,When the multitude gathered to hear him teach;The feet of our Master we smoothly bore,And he walked the sea as a paven floor."'When the tempest lashed each foamy crest,At his 'Peace, be still!' we sank to rest.And we laughed into wine, when he came to seeThe marriage in Cana of Galilee.'"The stars that fade in the growing dayHave each a tremulous word to say;'We sang, we sang, as we hung aboveThe lowly cradle of Infinite Love.'"The low winds whisper, 'We fanned in his hairThe flame of an unseen aureole there.'And the lily, pallid with rapture, cries,'I blanched in the light of his fervent eyes!'"Voices of earth and air unite,Voices of day and voices of night,Flinging their memories into the wayOf the coming in of the dear Lord's day."O Christ! we join with them to blessThy name in love and thankfulness;And cry as we kneel before thy throne,We are all thine own! we are all thine own!"
"The waters all over the earth rejoiceIn many a hushed and silvery voice;'In Jordan we covered Him, foot and crown,While the dove of the Spirit came fluttering down."'We steadied his keel at the crowded beach,When the multitude gathered to hear him teach;The feet of our Master we smoothly bore,And he walked the sea as a paven floor."'When the tempest lashed each foamy crest,At his 'Peace, be still!' we sank to rest.And we laughed into wine, when he came to seeThe marriage in Cana of Galilee.'"The stars that fade in the growing dayHave each a tremulous word to say;'We sang, we sang, as we hung aboveThe lowly cradle of Infinite Love.'"The low winds whisper, 'We fanned in his hairThe flame of an unseen aureole there.'And the lily, pallid with rapture, cries,'I blanched in the light of his fervent eyes!'"Voices of earth and air unite,Voices of day and voices of night,Flinging their memories into the wayOf the coming in of the dear Lord's day."O Christ! we join with them to blessThy name in love and thankfulness;And cry as we kneel before thy throne,We are all thine own! we are all thine own!"
"The waters all over the earth rejoiceIn many a hushed and silvery voice;'In Jordan we covered Him, foot and crown,While the dove of the Spirit came fluttering down.
"'We steadied his keel at the crowded beach,When the multitude gathered to hear him teach;The feet of our Master we smoothly bore,And he walked the sea as a paven floor.
"'When the tempest lashed each foamy crest,At his 'Peace, be still!' we sank to rest.And we laughed into wine, when he came to seeThe marriage in Cana of Galilee.'
"The stars that fade in the growing dayHave each a tremulous word to say;'We sang, we sang, as we hung aboveThe lowly cradle of Infinite Love.'
"The low winds whisper, 'We fanned in his hairThe flame of an unseen aureole there.'And the lily, pallid with rapture, cries,'I blanched in the light of his fervent eyes!'
"Voices of earth and air unite,Voices of day and voices of night,Flinging their memories into the wayOf the coming in of the dear Lord's day.
"O Christ! we join with them to blessThy name in love and thankfulness;And cry as we kneel before thy throne,We are all thine own! we are all thine own!"
When Sally and Mr. Smith came home that afternoon, they were accompanied by a tall, stiff, severe man in black, at the first sight of whom Blanch and I got our hats for a walk. It was Elder Samson, come up to convert the idolaters. We knew well what hydra-headed discourse he had prepared to devour our patience, our charity, our civility even. Discretion was the better part of valor, we concluded, and fled, leaving, alas! the statuette of our Lady, with the candles burning beside her, and the wild roses clinging about and kissing her feet. If we had but known! But we did not then, nor till long afterward. When we came back, every thing was, apparently, as we had left it. But, when Sally came to town in the fall, she told how, the moment the elder saw our graven image, he flew into a holy rage, flung it, roses and all, out the window, and wouldhave flung the candles after it, if she had not rescued them by main force. The result was an illustration of the church militant, in which rather high words passed between Sally and the elder. Mr. Smith, feebly interposing to take the part of his clerical visitor, was routed utterly.
But meantime, in happy unconsciousness, Blanch and I walked down the road, and down and down the road, a mile, and another mile, and again a mile, through the green and flowery solitude, flecked and flickering with sunlight and shadow, the silence only softly stirred by a multitudinous rustling of leaves. Now and then we saw a deer by the road-side; and far away in the woods the foxes snarled and barked.
Our walk ended on a long log that bridged a brook, and there we stood and looked up to see the waters come down to us. Presently, instead of their flowing down, we seemed to float up. We were going up to the cradle of this dancing stream, to some enchanted land where the baby rivulet first saw the sun. We were going back, also, to our own childhood, floating up and up to careless days, leaving the heavy years behind.
When we came back from that far-away country, a little sea-sick with our journey, I turned to see Blanch looking at me with great attention.
"My dear," she said, "you are the most absurd figure I recollect to have seen in the whole course of my life. If it were not deplorable that human taste should be so perverted, I should find you ludicrous."
"So you have found it out," I replied, highly edified. "I have been thinking the same of you this week past. Of course any one with eyes can see that Sally in her straight gown and big apron, with her hair in a pug, is better dressed than we."
Blanch had brought Mr. Smith's pistol with her. She always took it when we went into the woods; for she considered herself a pretty good shot. She had at home a pasteboard target full of little holes, the best one about six inches from the centre, all made by shots fired by her at a distance of twenty feet.
She felt safer to take the pistol, she said; for if any animal were to attack us, she could be sure to wound if not to kill it. "No animal," she argued very sensibly, "could be dangerous at a distance of twenty feet or more. And if he should come within that, I could not fail hitting pretty near his head or heart. You see, I missed only six inches in the shooting-gallery, and a bear or a wolf would be much larger than my target."
When you want to convince others, always speak as though your proposition is unquestionable. Every body knows that the majority of persons in the majority of cases find it troublesome to think for themselves, and that if you are positive enough, you can make them believe any thing. If Blanch had been a shade less logical and decided, I might have submitted that a pasteboard target does not pounce upon you and hug you to death, or tear you into inch pieces while you are taking aim, and that with a wild live creature to glare back with two great threatening eyes into her one blue eye looking at him, like a murderous violet, over the pistol-barrel, her nerves might be shaken to the extent of another six inches from the mark. But her air was one of such perfect conviction that my subjunctive case expired without a sigh.
The tree-tops were still full of sunshine when we started to go home, but the road was shaded. Blanch seemed a little uneasy.
"I believe we'd be awful good to eat," she said apprehensively.Even in speaking, she stopped short, I stopped, we stopped all two, as the French say. Directly in front of us and not far away, sitting with an air of deliberation in the middle of the road, was a large, clumsy, shaggy beast that looked at us with an inexplicable expression. I had never had the pleasure of an introduction to this animal, but none was needed. I had seen his portrait on the outside of hair-oil bottles. The resemblance was striking.
Blanch turned very red, and raised her pistol.
"Shall I fire?" asked the little heroine in a stage-whisper.
"Fire!"
Her hand was trembling like a leaf in the wind; but she took beautiful aim, and I am bound to confess that her pasteboard target could not have received the attention with more unmoved tranquillity. The pistol went hard, though, and the pull she had to give the trigger brought the muzzle down, so that instead of the shot striking within six inches of the bear's heart or brain, it struck up a little puff of dust, and took off the devoted head of a buttercup about five feet from us.
"Have I hit him?" she asked breathlessly, opening her eyes. She had shut them very tight on firing.
She had not hit him; but he took the hint, and got himself clumsily out of the way. I thought he acted as though his feelings were hurt.
I have forgotten whether we ran. I am inclined to think that we did not. But we were not long in getting home, and then the elder was gone.
A pathetic little incident happened that week, which suggested many thoughts to us. Passing by a cleared space in the woods one afternoon, Mr. Smith saw a deer family quietly grazing there. Plentiful as these creatures were in that region, they never suffered a near approach; but this group looked at the intruder peacefully and showed no sign of alarm.
Is there on earth an animal more fierce and cruel than man in deed if not in intention? This man did not deliberately mean to perpetrate a fiendish act; but no otherwise could what he did be characterized. He did not want the venison, the skins, the graceful antlers; but he fancied it rather a fine thing to have that bounding target still for a moment. His rifle was over his shoulder; he lowered it, and took aim at the stag's stately front. There was a report; the creature gave one leap into the air, then fell, shot through the forehead.
Not even then did the others fly. While he loaded his rifle again, they bent over their prostrate companion, touching him, moved by what mute, incredulous grief, who can say? The marksman gleefully took aim again, and the doe fell with a bullet through her heart, and sobbed her life away. When Mr. Smith saw the young one put its head down to the mother's, for the first time some compunction touched his coarse, unsympathetic soul. But he had gone too far to retreat, and in a few minutes the fawn lay dead beside its mother.
Sally reproached her husband passionately when he told her the story of his wonderful feat.
"If dumb creatures were like men," she said, "the wild beasts would get up a mob to-night, and come here and lynch us; and not be to blame either!"
Blanch and I left Mr. Smith meekly taking his castigation, and went out to see his victims.
They lay where they had fallen, on the greensward, poor creatures! asad blot upon the peaceful scene, their innocent, happy lives quite ebbed away. We stood by them a little while in the sunny silence, and it seemed as though every thing living shrank from us. We had never before been out without seeing some form of that wild animal life with which the woods were teeming. But now there was no sound of skittish steps evading us, no glimpse of shadowy figures among the trees. All was silent and dead.
We went to the road-side, and, seating ourselves on the moss under an aspen-tree, mourned silently. And thinking of the slaughtered deer, I thought of the first death in Eden; and from that, of the first sin in the world; and from that, of all the sin and sorrow that is in the world; and from that, of Him who came to restore us to the true Eden, the city of real peace, and how he stays here unseen, and watches lest we kill or are killed; and then I thought, "The nearer one keeps to the place where he is, the better."
Blanch half reclined, leaning on her elbow, and her face looked like a pale flame in the flickering shadow of the tree above us. She stretched her hand and touched tenderly a lovely spray of partridge-berry that trailed over the moss, but did not break it. Then she looked up.
"Minnie," she said, "I'm homesick."
"So am I."
"When will we start?"
"To-morrow."
Voltaire, in his life of Milton, mentioned the fact that in his youth the poet witnessed at Milan the representation of a drama entitled,Adam; or, Original Sin, written by "a certain Gio. Battista Andreini," a Florentine, and dedicated to Marie de' Medici, Queen of France. The French writer stated that Milton must have taken with him to England a copy of the work. His account was repeated by other biographers of the great English poet, some of whom alluded to the Italian poem as "a farce." In consequence of their unfavorable judgment, the impression has prevailed that Milton was not indebted to Andreini for the conception of hisParadise Lost, but that the grandeur and sublimity of the invention belong solely to him. Andreini's work fell into oblivion soon after its production, and has remained unappreciated even by the author's countrymen; so that it is not surprising that the honors due the Catholic poet have not been rendered by English or American critics or readers.
The mystery, tragedy, or sacred drama ofAdam, composed by Andreini, was represented at Milan early in the seventeenth century, and was received with such enthusiasm that the author was invited to the French court by Queen Mary, and was there loaded with honors. A splendid edition of his work, dedicated to the queen, illustrated with plates and a portrait of the author, was issued at Milan in 1617. Such a receptionshows the estimation in which his production was held at the time. Defects which did not interfere with the grandeur of the original design impaired its popularity afterward. The author was numbered among theSeicentisti, and belonged to a school noted for its departure from simplicity; for false refinements and extravagant conceits. Under the influence of such writers as Marini, Lappi, Redi, etc., in an age of pedantry, poetry was removed from nature, and dragged from her proper sphere. But though Andreini lived amidst the prevalence of a corrupt taste, and hisstylewas in some degree tainted, it could not have been expected that any succeeding school, however correct, should trample under foot thesubstanceof his work, and slight its sublimity of conception, to which a more enlightened age should have done justice. Such justice, nevertheless, has been denied him.
After it had been forgotten more than two hundred years, a tardy acknowledgment of Andreini's merit was paid by a few Italian critics, and a small, unadorned edition of his work was again published at Lucano; but in such an unattractive form that it seems to have awakened little attention. A few copies of the first edition were sold as a great literary curiosity. One, purchased at a large price, affords us an opportunity of examining the claim so long buried in obscurity, and to see how much the author ofParadise Losthas really borrowed.
It is well known that Milton's first idea, in treating the subject, was to write a tragedy; and that he had actually composed some scenes before he finally resolved to transfer his pencil to a vaster canvas. The difference between the epic and dramatic form gave a great advantage to the English poet. All the ornaments of description, in whichParadise Lostis so rich, were denied to Andreini, since they could not be admitted into dialogue. That Milton saw and profited by Andreini's tragedy, can be proved not only by external testimony, but by evidence contained in almost every page of his work. We must look to the conception and to the expression of thought, in drawing the comparison between the two, which will conclusively show Andreini to be in truth the precursor of Milton, the original author of the design elaborated inParadise Lost. We will give an analysis of the drama, with extracts faithfully translated, rendering the literal sense of the original.[184]
The scene of the tragedy is in the terrestrial paradise. The interlocutors are the Eternal Father, Michael and a chorus of angels, Adam and Eve, Lucifer, the Prince of Hell, Satan, Beelzebub, the Seven Deadly Sins, besides various allegorical personages, such as the World and the Flesh, Hunger, Fatigue, Despair, Death, and Vainglory, with a chorus of infernal messengers and spirits of the elements. The author's own summary will give the most accurate idea of the piece. A chorus of angels in the prologue sing the glory of the eternal God, calling upon the new creation to praise him. The future advent of the Incarnate Word is dimly predicted. The Almighty is completing his vast work by the formation of man; the new being is welcomed in strains of jubilee and rejoicing by the shining choir about him, and the scene proceeds with solemnity and magnificence, in language elevated and sublime. The ecstasy of the newly created at the glory revealed to his senses by the celestial train who "cleave heaven with their wings of gold," and hisdevout aspirations of love and homage toward his Creator, are admirably expressed. Adam adores the ineffable mysteries of the Trinity and the coming Incarnation. The verse throughout this scene is in lyrical measures adapted to the subject, and to the emotions uttered.
Adam falls into sleep, and Eve is created and named "woman" by the eternal Father. A resemblance may be discovered by the curious between the ascent of the heavenly train from Eden, after the blessing is pronounced and the work completed, and a similar description in the seventh book ofParadise Lost. Adam then points out to Eve the wonders of the new world, rehearses the divine command and prohibition, and inspires her with love for the beneficent Being who gave them all: