""M™ 1 ™ Class _^l£01 Book __J^l45L_ Copyright ft COPYRIGHT DEPOSIT. READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE SELECTED AND EDITED BY JOHN CALVIN METCALF Poe Professor of English in the University of Virginia Author of English Literature and American Literature HENRY BRANTLY HANDY Professor of English in Richmond College B. F. JOHNSON PUBLISHING COMPANY ATLANTA RICHMOND DALLAS /ftp #) Copyright, 1919, BY B. F. JOHNSON PUBLISHING COMPANY S 1919 ICLA5 1.1753 ..^v PREFACE The present volume of selections is primarily intended to accompany a history of American literature. Biographical matter has therefore been omitted, and only such notes have been added as seem indispensable to a clear understanding of the text. After the Colonial and Revolutionary periods, the selections have been arranged in regional groups in accordance with the plan followed in most briefer histories of American literature. Only a few short extracts from Colonial prose are given, and these have been chosen because they have some intrinsic literary merit, which, after all, is the main thing to be considered in a survey course in American literature, however desirable it may be to learn history through chronicle and diary. The development of the American spirit in our writers and the essentially demo- cratic undercurrent in our literary art, a brief anthology like this should reveal to the reader. The real beginnings of nationalism are to be found in the literature of the Revolution, particularly in oratory, the patriotic ballad, and the satire ; consequently, the selections from this period are more numerous. The temptation to include others has been strong, but the spatial limitations of this volume have compelled the editors to resist it. In the National period proper, beginning with Irving, the largest repre- sentation has naturally been given to the writings of the standard New England group, the most significant contribution to Amer- ican literature until about 1870. Since then the Southern and Western writers have become increasingly prominent; the space allotted to these two groups in the followings pages is probably greater than in most volumes of this size. Acknowledgment is due the publishers who have generously permitted the use of copyrighted material : Houghton Mifflin Co, (3) 4 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE for selections from the writings of Hawthorne, Thoreau, Emer- son, Holmes, Longfellow, Whittier, Lowell, Harte, Sill, and Miss Murf ree ; Charles Scribner's Sons for poems of Sidney Lanier and Eugene Field; Lothrop, Lee & Shepard Co. for poems of Paul Hamilton Hayne ; D. Appleton & Co. for poems of William Cullen Bryant ; David McKay for poems of Walt Whitman ; The Bobbs- Merrill Co. for poems of James Whitcomb Riley; Small May- nard & Co. for poems of John B. Tabb ; Doubleday, Page & Co. for a story by O. Henry ; Harr Wagner Publishing Company for poems of Joaquin Miller. To students and readers who may use this volume we wish to express the hope that these selections may be supplemented by wider reading in the works of men and women, whether repre- sented here or not, who stand for the finer ideals in Amer- ican life. We cannot conclude this prefatory statement without grate- fully acknowledging the helpful interest of our former colleague, Dr. H. J. Eckenrode, of Richmond, in the preparation of this book. J. C. M. H. B. H. CONTENTS COLONIAL PERIOD PAGE COTTON MATHER The Charity of Master John Eliot ll WILLIAM BYRD The First Survey in the Dismal Swamp 14 Colonial Dentistry l5 JONATHAN EDWARDS The Young Lady in New Haven l 9 Farewell Sermon (Extracts) 20 THOMAS GODFREY The Wish M The Invitation 2 3 REVOLUTIONARY PERIOD BENJAMIN FRANKLIN Franklin's Early Reading 25 The Way to Wealth 20 PATRICK HENRY A Call to Arms 33 THOMAS JEFFERSON Opinion of France 37 First Inaugural Address & POEMS OF THE REVOLUTION Battle of the Kegs — Hopkinson 43 The Ballad of Nathan Hale 40 Columbia— Dwight 4» A Tory's Punishment— Trumbull 50 (5) 6 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE PAGE PHILIP FRENEAU The Indian Burying Ground 53 The Wild Honeysuckle 54 To a Honey Bee 55 CHARLES BROCKDEN BROWN Edgar Huntly's Indian Adventure 57 THE KNICKERBOCKER WRITERS JOSEPH RODMAN DRAKE The American Flag. 68 FITZ-GREEN HALLECK Death of Joseph Rodman Drake 70 Marco Bozzaris 7 1 WASHINGTON IRVING Rip Van Winkle 74 JAMES FENIMORE COOPER Running the Gauntlet 92 WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT Thanatopsis 107 To a Waterfowl 109 To the Fringed Gentian 1 10 Robert of Lincoln m THE NEW ENGLAND WRITERS DANIEL WEBSTER First Bunker Hill Oration 114 FRANCIS PARKMAN An Indian Banquet 129 RALPH WALDO EMERSON Concord Hymn 141 The Rhodora 142 Days 142 Forerunners 143 Voluntaries 144 Self-Reliance (Essay) 145 CONTENTS ' PAGE HENRY D. THOREAU Solitude J 7° NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE The Great Stone Face *7 6 HENRY W. LONGFELLOW A Psalm of Life W The Wreck of the Hesperus IQ 9 The Village Blacksmith 202 Excelsior ■ ** The Day Is Done 205 Paul Revere's Ride 3#7 Hiawatha *" The Republic — — -• 3 * 7 JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL The Vision of Sir Launf al * 2 *f The Present Crisis ^o The Courtin' f« L'Envoi 7g For an Autograph ** JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER Skipper Ireson's Ride ^ The Barefoot Boy **Z In School-Days g My Playmates JL Snow-Bound 5y OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES 270 Old Ironsides 2 g The Deacon? Masterpiece ;' or the Wonderful One-Hoss Shav . . 2* The Chambered Nautilus 2g g A Sun-Day Hymn • • • • • • • • • • ■■•*:: o_ The Autocrat of the Breakfast Table (Extract) 2»7 8 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE THE SOUTHERN WRITERS PAGE A SHEAF OF FAMOUS LYRICS The Star-Spangled Banner— Key 292 My Life Is Like the Summer Rose — Wilde 293 A Health— Pinkney 294 Resignation — Tucker 295 Florence Vane — Cooke 296 The Bivouac of the Dead— O'Hara 297 Maryland, My Maryland — Randall 300 Little Giffen — Ticknor 303 EDGAR ALLAN POE To Helen 304 Israfel 305 The Raven 307 Eldorado 31 1 Annabel Lee 3 l % The Cask of Amontillado 3^3 The Purloined Letter 321 SIDNEY LANIER Song of the Chattahoochee 343 The Marshes of Glynn 343 Tampa Robins 347 HENRY TIMROD The Cotton Boll 348 Magnolia Cemetery Ode 353 Spring 354 PAUL HAMILTON HAYNE The Mocking Bird 356 Aspects of the Pines 357 The Will and the Wing 358 A Dream of the South Winds 359 MINOR POETS ABRAM J. RYAN The Sword of Lee 360 JOHN REUBEN THOMPSON Music in Camp 362 Carcassonne !!!!!!!! 364 CONTENTS 9 PAGE JOHN BANISTER TABB Trysting-Place 366 Intimations 367 Kildee 367 MADISON CAWEIN The Whippoorwill 368 Evening on the Farm 369 PROSE WRITERS WILLIAM GILMORE SIMMS The Attack on the Blockhouse 371 JOHN PENDLETON KENNEDY The Master and Mistress of Swallow Barn 384 JOHN ESTEN COOKE An Incident at Governor Fauquier's Ball 391 HENRY WOODFIN GRADY The New South 407 GEORGE WASHINGTON CABLE New Orleans Before the Capture 415 JOEL CHANDLER HARRIS Mr. Rabbit Grossly Deceives Mr. Fox 421 MARY NOAILLES MURFREE The Gander-Pulling 424 JAMES LANE ALLEN Hemp 430 THOMAS NELSON PAGE The Old Virginia Lawyer 436 WILLIAM SIDNEY PORTER The Gift of the Magi 444 10 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE WRITERS OF MIDDLE AND WESTERN STATES PAGE ABRAHAM LINCOLN Gettysburg Speech 45 1 WALT WHITMAN O Captain, My Captain 452 As Toilsome I Wandered Virginia's Woods 453 When Lilacs Last in the Door-Yard Bloomed 453 BAYARD TAYLOR Bedouin Song 458 SAMUEL LANGHORNE CLEMENS The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County 459 BRET HARTE Tennessee's Partner 466 EDWARD ROWLAND SILL The Fool's Prayer 476 EUGENE FIELD Wynken, Blynken, and Nod 478 Little Boy Blue 479 JAMES WHITCOMB RILEY When She Comes Home 480 A Life Lesson 481 JOAQUIN MILLER Westward Ho 482 Columbus 483 Notes 485 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE THE COLONIAL PERIOD COTTON MATHER Born in Boston, Mass., 1663 ; died there, 1728 THE CHARITY OF MASTER JOHN ELIOT From Magnolia Christi Americana He that will write of Eliot must write of charity, or say noth- ing. His charity was a star of the first magnitude in the bright constellation of his virtues, and the rays of it were wonderfully various and extensive. His liberality to pious uses, whether public or private, went 5 much beyond the proportions of his little estate in the world. Many hundreds of pounds did he freely bestow upon the poor; and he would, with a very forcible importunity, press his neigh- bors to join with him in such beneficences. It was a marvellous, alacrity with which he embraced all opportunities of relieving any 10 that were miserable ; and the good people of Roxbury doubtless cannot remember (but the righteous God will !) how often, and with what ardors, with what arguments, he became a beggar to them for collections in their assemblies, to support such needy objects as had fallen under his observation. The poor counted *5 him their father, and repaired still unto him with a filial confi- dence in their necessities; and they were more than seven or eight, or indeed than so many scores, who received their portions of his bounty. Like that worthy and famous English general, he could not persuade himself "that fie had anything but what he 20 gave away," But fie drove a mighty trade at such exercises as he (U) 12 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE thought would furnish him with bills of exchange, which he hoped "after many days" to find the comfort of; and yet, after all, he would say, like one of the most charitable souls that ever lived in the world, "that looking over his accounts he could 5 nowhere find the God of heaven charged a debtor there." He did not put off his charity to be put in his last will, as many who therein show that their charity is against their will; but he was his own administrator; he made his own hands his executors, and his own eyes his overseers. It has been remarked that liberal 1 o men are often long-lived men ; so do they after many days find the bread with which they have been willing to keep other men alive. The great age of our Eliot was but agreeable to this remark ; and when his age had unfitted him for almost all employ- ments, and bereaved him of those gifts and parts which once he 15 had been accomplished with, being asked, "How he did?" he would sometimes answer, "Alas, I have lost everything; my understanding leaves me, my memory fails me, my utterance fails me; but, I thank God, my charity holds out still; I find that rather grows than fails!" And I make no question that at his 2 o death his happy soul was received and welcomed into the "ever- lasting habitations," by many scores, got thither before him, of such as his charity had been liberal unto. But besides these more substantial expressions of his charity, he made the odors of that grace yet more fragrant unto all that 2 5 were about him, by that pitifulness and that peaceableness which rendered him yet further amiable. If any of his neighborhood were in distress, he was like a "brother born for their adversity" ; he would visit them, and comfort them with a most fraternal sympathy; yea, 'tis not easy to recount how many whole days of 3 o prayer and fasting he has got his neighbors to keep with him, on the behalf of those whose calamities he found himself touched withal. It was an extreme satisfaction to him that his wife had attained unto a considerable skill in physic and surgery, which enabled her to dispense many safe, good, and useful medicines 10 15 THE COLONIAL PERIOD 13 unto the poor that had occasion for them; and some hundreds of sick and weak and maimed people owed praises to God for the benefit which therein they freely received of her. The good gentleman her husband would still be casting oil into the flame of that charity, wherein she was of her own accord abundantly forward thus to be doing of good unto all ; and he would urge her to be serviceable unto the worst enemies that he had in the world. Never had any man fewer enemies than he ! but once having delivered something in his ministry which displeased one of his hearers, the man did passionately abuse him for it, and this both with speeches and with writings that reviled him. Yet it happening not long after that this man gave himself a very dangerous wound, Mr. Eliot immediately sends his wife to cure him ; who did accordingly. When the man was well, he came to thank her, but she took no rewards ; and this good man made him stay and eat with him, taking no notice of all the calumnies with which he had loaded him— but by this carriage he mollified and conquered the stomach of his reviler. He was also a great enemy to all contention, and would ring aloud curfew bell wherever he saw the fires of animosity. When 2 he heard any ministers complain that such and such in their flocks were too difficult for them, the strain of his answer still was, "Brother, compass them!" and "Brother, learn the meaning of those three little words, bear, forbear, forgive." Yea, his inclina- tions for peace, indeed, sometimes almost made him to sacrifice 25 right itself. When there was laid before an assembly of ministers a bundle of papers which contained certain matters of difference and contention between some people which our Eliot thought should rather unite, with an amnesty u£on all their former quarrels, he (with some imitation of what Constantine did upon the like occasion) hastily threw the papers into the fire before them all, and, with a zeal for peace as hot as that fire, said imme- diately, "Brethren, wonder not at what I have done;^I did it on my knees this morning before I came among you." Such an bO 14 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE excess (if it were one) flowed from his charitable inclinations to be found among those peace-makers which, by following the example of that Man who is our peace, come to be called "the children of God." Very worthily might he be called an Irenaeus, 6 as being all for peace ; and the commendation which Epiphanius gives unto the ancient of that name did belong unto our Eliot ; he was "a most blessed and a most holy man." He disliked all sorts of bravery ; but yet with an ingenious note upon the Greek word in Colossians iii. 15, he propounded, "that peace might brave it 10 among us." In short, wherever he came, it was like another old John, with solemn and earnest persuasives to love ; and when he could say little else he would give that charge, "My children, love one another!" Finally, 'twas his charity which disposed him to continual 15 apprecations for, and benedictions on those that he met withal; he had an heart full of good wishes and a mouth full of kind blessings for them. And he often made his expressions very wittily agreeable to the circumstances which he saw the persons in. Sometimes when he came into a family, he would call for all 2 the young people in it, that so he might very distinctly lay his holy hands upon every one of them and bespeak the mercies of heaven for them all. WILLIAM BYRD Born at Westover, on the James River, Virginia, 1674 ; died there, 1744 THE FIRST SURVEY IN THE DISMAL SWAMP From The History of the Dividing Line It seems they were able to carry the line this day no further than one mile and sixty-one poles, and that whole distance was 2 5 through a miry cedar bog, where the ground trembled under their feet most frightfully. In many places, too, their passage was retarded by a great number of fallen trees, that lay horsing upon one another. 10 THE COLONIAL PERIOD 15 Though many circumstances occurred to make this an unwholesome situation, yet the poor men had no time to be sick, nor can one conceive a more calamitous case than it would have been to be laid up in that uncomfortable quagmire. Never were patients more tractable, or willing to take physic, than these honest fellows ; but it was from a dread of laying their bones in a bog that would spew them up again. That consideration also put them upon more caution about their lodging. They first covered the ground with square pieces of cypress bark, which now, in the spring, they could easily slip off the tree for that purpose. On this they spread their bedding ; but unhap- pily the weight and warmth of their bodies made the water rise up betwixt the joints of the bark, to their great inconvenience. Thus they lay not only moist, but also exceedingly cold, because their fires were continually going out. For no sooner was the !6 trash upon the surface burnt away, but immediately the fire was extinguished by the moisture of the soil, insomuch that it was great part of the sentinel's business to rekindle it again in a fresh place every quarter of an hour. Nor could they indeed do their duty better, because cold was the only enemy they had to 2 guard against in a miserable morass, where nothing can inhabit. We could get no tidings yet of our brave adventurers, not- withstanding we dispatched men to the likeliest stations to inquire after them. They were still scuffling in the mire, and could not possibly forward the line this whole day more than one mile and 25 sixty-four chains. Every step of this day's work was through a cedar bog, where the trees were somewhat smaller and grew more into a thicket. It was now a great misfortune to the men to find their provisions grow less as their labor grew greater; they were all forced to come to short allowance, and conse- 30 quently to work hard without filling their bellies. Though this was very severe upon English stomachs, yet- the people were so far from being discomfited at it that they still kept up their good-humor, and merrily told a young fellow in the company, READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE who looked very plump and wholesome, that he must expect to go first to pot, if matters should come to extremity. This was only said by way of jest, yet it made him thoughtful in earnest. However, for the present he returned them a very 5 civil answer, letting them know that, dead or alive, he should be glad to be useful to such worthy good friends. But, after all, this humorous saying had one very good effect, for that younker, who before was a little inclined by his constitution to be lazy, grew on a sudden extremely industrious, that so there might 10 be less occasion to carbonade him for the good of his fellow- travelers. ******* The surveyors and their attendants began now in good earnest to be alarmed with apprehensions of famine, nor could they I 5 forbear looking with some sort of appetite upon a dog that had been the faithful companion of their travels. Their provisions were now near exhausted. They had this morning made the last distribution, that so each might husband his small pittance as he pleased. Now it was that the fresh- 2 colored young man began to tremble every joint of him, having dreamed the night before that the Indians were about to barbecue him over live coals. The prospect of famine determined the people at last, with one consent, to abandon the line for the present, which advanced 25 but slowly, and make the best of their way to firm land. Accord- ingly, they sat off very early, and, by the help of the compass which they carried along with them, steered a direct westerly course. They marched from morning till night, and computed their journey to amount to about four miles, which was a great 30 way, considering the difficulties of the ground. It was all along a cedar-swamp, so dirty and perplexed that if they had not traveled for their lives they could not have reached so far. On their way they espied a turkey-buzzard, that flew pro- digeously high to get above the noisome exhalations that ascend THE COLONIAL PERIOD 17] from thai filthy place. This they were willing to understand as a good omen, according to the superstition of the ancients, who had great faith in the flight of vultures. However, after all this tedious journey, they could yet discover no end of their toil, which made them very pensive, especially after they had eat 6 the last morsel of their provisions. But to their unspeakable comfort, when all was hushed in the evening, they heard the cattle low and the dogs bark very distinctly, which, to men in that distress, was more delightful music than Faustina or Fari- nelli could have made. In the meantime, the commissioners could 10 get no news of them from any of their visitors, who assembled from every point of the compass. However long we might think the time, yet we were cautious of showing our uneasiness, for fear of mortifying our landlord. He had done his best for us, and, therefore, we were unwilling 15 he should think us dissatisfied with our entertainment. In the midst of our concern, we were most agreeably surprised, just after dinner, with the news that the Dismalites were all safe. These blessed tidings were brought to us by Mr. Swan, the Carolina surveyor, who came to us in a very tattered condition. 20 After very short salutations, we got about him as if he had been a Hottentot, and begun to inquire into his adventures. He gave us a detail of their uncomfortable voyage through the Dismal, and told us, particularly, they had pursued their journey early that morning, encouraged by the good omen of seeing the 25 crows fly over their heads ; that, after an hour's march over very rotten ground, they, on a sudden, began to find themselves among tall pines that grew in the water, which in many places was knee-deep. This pine swamp, into which that of Coropeak drained itself, extended near a mile in breadth; and though it 3 was exceedingly wet, yet it was much harder at bottom than the rest of the swamp ; that about ten in the morning they recovered firm land, which they embraced with as much pleasure as ship- wrecked wretches do the shore. 18 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE After these honest adventurers had congratulated each other's deliverance, their first inquiry was for a good house, where they might satisfy the importunity of their stomachs. Their good genius directed them to Mr. Brinkley's, who dwells a little to 5 the southward of the line. This man began immediately to be very inquisitive, but they declared they had no spirits to answer questions till after dinner. COLONIAL DENTISTRY From A Journey to the Land of Eden Major Mayo's survey being no more than halfdone, we were obliged to amuse ourselves another day in this place. And that 10 the time might not be quite lost, we put our garments and baggage into good repair. I, for my part, never spent a day so well during the whole voyage. I had an impertinent tooth in my upper jaw that had been loose for some time and made me chew with great caution. Particularly, I could not grind a biscuit but 15 with much deliberation and presence of mind. Tooth-drawers we had none amongst us, nor any of the instruments they make use of. However, invention supplied this want very happily, and I contrived to get rid of this troublesome companion by cutting a caper. I caused a twine to be fastened round the root 2 of my tooth, about a fathom in length, and then tied the other end to the snag of a log that lay upon the ground, in such a manner that I could just stand upright. Having adjusted my string in this manner, I bent my knees enough to enable me to spring vigorously off the ground, as perpendicularly as I could. 2 5 The force of the leap drew out the tooth with so much ease that I felt nothing of it, nor should have believed it was come away, unless I had seen it dangling at the end of the string. An undertooth may be fetched out by standing off the ground and fastening your string at due distance above you. And having 3 so fixed your gear, jump off your standing, and the weight of THE COLONIAL PERIOD 19 your body, added to the force of the spring, will prize out your tooth with less pain than any operator upon earth could draw it. This new way of tooth-drawing, being so silently and deliber- ately performed, both surprised and delighted all that were present, who could not guess what I was going about. I imme- diately found the benefit of getting rid of this troublesome com - panion by eating my supper with more comfort than I had done during the whole expedition. JONATHAN EDWARDS Born in East Windsor, Conn., 1703 ; died in Princeton, N. J., 1758 THE YOUNG LADY IN NEW HAVEN They say there is a young lady in New Haven who is beloved of that Great Being who made and rules the world, and that there are certain seasons in which this Great Being, in some way or other invisible, comes to her and fills her mind with exceeding sweet delight, and that she hardly cares for anything except to meditate on Him — that she expects after a while to be received up where He is, to be raised up out of the world and caught up into heaven ; being assured that He loves her too well to let her remain at a distance from Him always. There she is to dwell with Him, and to be ravished with His love and delight forever. Therefore, if you present all the world before her, with the richest of its treasures, she disregards and cares not for it, and is unmindful of any pain or affliction. She has a strange sweet- ness in her mind and singular purity in her affections ; is most just and conscientious in all her conduct; and you could not persuade her to do anything wrong or sinful, if you would give her all the world, lest she should offend this Great Being. She is of a wonderful sweetness, calmness and universal benevolence of mind, especially after this great God has manifested Himself to her mind. She will sometimes go about from place to place 20 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE singing sweetly, and seems to be always full of joy and pleasure ; and no one knows for what. She loves to be alone, walking in the fields and groves, and seems to have some one invisible always conversing with her. FAREWELL SERMON (Extracts) Your consciences bear me witness that while I had oppor- tunity I have not ceased to warn you, and set before you your danger. I have studied to represent the misery and necessity of your circumstances in the clearest manner possible. I have tried all ways that I could think of tending to awaken your consciences, and make you sensible of the necessity of your improving your time, and being speedy in flying from the wrath to come, and thorough in the use of means for your escape and safety. I have diligently endeavored to find out and use the most powerful motives to persuade you to take care for your own welfare and salvation. I have not only endeavored to awaken you, that you might be moved with fear, but I have used my utmost endeavors to win you: I have sought out acceptable words, that, if possible, I might prevail upon you to forsake sin, and turn to God, and accept of Christ as your Saviour and Lord. I have spent my strength very much in these things. But yet, with regard to you whom I am now speaking to, I have not been successful; but have this day reason to complain in those words, Jer vi. 29 : "The bellows are burnt, the lead is consumed of the fire, the founder melteth in vain, for the wicked are not plucked away." It is to be feared that all my labors, as to many of you, have served no other purpose but to harden you, and that the word which I have preached, instead of being a savor of life unto life, has been a savor of death unto death. Though I shall not have any account to give for the future of such as have openly and resolutely renounced my ministry as of a betrust- ment committed to me, yet remember you must give account for THE COLONIAL PERIOD 21 yourselves, of your care of your own souls, and your improve- ment of all means past and future, through your whole lives. God only knows what will become of your poor perishing souls, what means you may hereafter enjoy, or what disadvantages and temptations you may be under. May God in His mercy grant 5 that, however all past means have been unsuccessful, you may have future means which may have a new effect; and that the word of God, as it shall be hereafter dispensed to you, may prove as the fire and the hammer that breaketh the rock in pieces. However, let me now at parting exhort and beseech you not 10 wholly to forget the warnings you have had while under my ministry. When you and I shall meet at the day of judgment, then you will remember them: the sight of me, your former minister, on that occasion, will soon revive them to your memory, and that in a very affecting manner. O do not let that be the 15 first time that they are so revived ! You and I are now parting one from another as to this world ; let us labor that we may not be parted after our meeting at the last day. If I have been your faithful pastor (which will that day appear whether I have or no), then I shall be acquitted, and 20 shall ascend with Christ. O do your part that, in such a case, it may not be so that you should be forced eternally to part from me, and all that have been faithful in Christ Jesus ! This is a sorrowful parting that now is between you and me, but that would be a more sorrowful parting to you than this. This you 2 5 may perhaps bear without being much affected with it, if you are not glad of it; but such a parting in that day will most deeply, sensibly, and dreadfully affect you. ******* Having briefly mentioned these important articles of advice, 3 nothing remains, but that I now take my leave of you and bid you all farewell; wishing and praying for your best prosperity. I would now commend your immortal souls to Him who formerly committed them to me, expecting the day when I must meet you 22 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE before Him, who is the Judge of quick and dead. I desire that I may never forget this people, who have been so long my special charge, and that I may never cease fervently to pray for your prosperity. May God bless you with a faithful pastor, one that 5 is well acquainted with his mind and will, thoroughly warning sinners, wisely and skillfully searching professors, and conduct- ing you in the way to eternal blessedness. May you have truly a burning and shining light set up in this candlestick; and may you, not only for a season but during his whole life, and that 10 a long life, be willing to rejoice in his light. THOMAS GODFREY Born in Philadelphia, 1736; died in North Carolina, 1763 THE WISH I only ask a moderate fate, And, though not in obscurity, I would not, yet, be placed too high ; Between the two extremes I'd be, i 5 Not meanly low, nor yet too great, From both contempt and envy free. If no glittering wealth I have, Content of bounteous heaven I crave, For that is more 2 Than all the Indian's shining store, To be unto the dust a slave. With heart, my little I will use, Nor let pain my life devour, Or for a griping heir refuse : » Myself one pleasant hour. No stately edifice to rear; My wish would bound a small retreat, THE COLONIAL PERIOD 23 In temperate air, and furnished neat : No ornaments would I prepare, No costly labors of the loom Should e'er adorn my humble room ; To gild my roof I naught require 5 But the stern Winter's friendly fire. Free from tumultuous cares and noise, If gracious Heaven my wish would give, While sweet content augments my joys, Thus my remaining hours I'd live. 1 ° By arts ignoble never rise, The miser's ill-got wealth despise ; But blest my leisure hours I'd spend, The Muse enjoying, and my friend. THE INVITATION Haste, Sylvia, haste, my charming maid! 15 Let's leave these fashionable toys : Let's seek the shelter of some shade, And revel in ne'er fading joys. See, Spring in liv'ry gay appears, And winter's chilly blasts are fled ; 2 Each grove its leafy honors rears, And meads their lovely verdure spread. Yes, Damon, glad I'll quit the town ; Its gaieties now languid seem: Then sweets t© luxury unknown We'll taste, and sip th' untainted stream. In Summer's sultry noon-tide heat I'll lead thee to the shady grove, There hush thy cares, or pleas'd repeat Those vows that won my soul to love. 25 24 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE When o'er the mountain peeps the dawn, And round her ruddy beauties play, I'll wake my love to view the lawn, Or hear the warblers hail the day. 5 But without thee the rising morn In vain awakes the cooling breeze ; In vain does nature's face adorn — Without my Sylvia nought can please. At night, when universal gloom 1 ° Hides the bright prospects from our view, When the gay groves give up their bloom And verdant meads their lovely hue, Tho' fleeting spectres round me move, When in thy circling arms I'm prest, 15 I'll hush my rising fears with love, And sink in slumber on thy breast. The new-blown rose, whilst on its leaves Yet the bright scented dew-drop's found Pleas'd on thy bosom whilst it heaves, 2 ° Shall shake its heav'nly fragrance round. Then mingled sweets the sense shall raise, Then mingled beauties catch the eye : What pleasure on such charms to gaze, What rapture 'mid such sweets to lie ! 2 5 How sweet thy words ! But, Damon, cease, Nor strive to fix me ever here ; Too well you know these accents please, That oft have fill'd my ravish'd ear. Come, lead me to these promis'd joys 3 ° That dwelt so lately on thy tongue ; Direct me by thy well-known voice, And calm my transports with thy song ! THE REVOLUTIONARY PERIOD 25 THE REVOLUTIONARY PERIOD BENJAMIN FRANKLIN Born in Boston, 1706; died in Philadelphia, 1790 FRANKLIN'S EARLY READING From a child I was fond of reading, and all the little money that came into my hands was ever laid out in books. Pleased with the Pilgrim's Progress, my first collection was of John Bunyan's works in separate little volumes. I afterward sold them to enable me to buy R. Burton's Historical Collections; 5 they were small chapmen's books, and cheap, forty or fifty in all. My father's little library consisted chiefly of books in polemic divinity, most of which I read, and have since often regretted that, at a time when I had such a thirst for knowledge, more proper books had not fallen in my way, since it was now 10 resolved I should not be a clergyman. Plutarch's Lives there was, in which I read abundantly, and I still think that time spent to great advantage. There was also a book of De Foe's, called an Essay on Projects, and another of Dr. Mather's, called Essays to Do Good, which perhaps gave me a turn of thinking that had 15 an influence on some of the principal future events of my life. This bookish inclination at length determined my father to make me a printer, though he had already one son (James) of that profession. In 1717 my brother James returned from England with a press and letters to set up his business in Boston. 2 I liked it much better than that of my father, but still had a hankering for the sea. To prevent the apprehended effect of such an inclination, my father was impatient to have me bound to my brother. I stood out some time, but at last was persuaded, and signed the indentures when I was yet but twelve years old. 25 I was to serve as an apprentice till I was twenty-one years of age, only I was to be allowed journeyman's wages during the last year. 26 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE In a little time I made great proficiency in the business and became a useful hand to my brother. I now had access to better books. An acquaintance with the apprentices of booksellers enabled me sometimes to borrow a small one, which I was careful 5 to return soon and clean. Often I sat up in my room reading the greatest part of the night, when the book was borrowed in the evening and to be returned early in the morning, lest it should be missed or wanted. And after some time an ingenious tradesman, Mr. Matthew 1 ° Adams, who had a pretty collection of books and who frequented our printing-house, took notice of me, invited me to his library, and very kindly lent me such books as I chose to read. I now took a fancy to poetry, and made some little pieces ; my brother, thinking it might turn to account, encouraged me and put me on !5 composing occasional ballads. One was called The Lighthouse Tragedy, and contained an account of the drowning of Captain Worthilake, with his two daughters ; the other was a sailor's song, on the taking of Teach (or Blackbeard), the pirate. They were wretched stuff, in the Grub Street ballad style; and when they 20 were printed he sent me about the town to sell them. The first sold wonderfully, the event being recent, having made a great noise. This flattered my vanity ; but my father discouraged me by ridiculing my performances and telling me verse-makers were generally beggars. So I escaped being a poet, most probably a 25 very bad one; but as prose writing has been of great use to me in the course of my life and was a principal means of my advancement, I shall tell you how, in such a situation, I acquired what little ability I have in that way. There was another bookish lad in the town, John Collins by 30 name, with whom I was intimately acquainted. We sometimes disputed, and very fond we were of argument and very desirous of confuting one another, which disputatious turn, by the way, is apt to become a very bad habit, making people often extremely disagreeable in company by the contradiction that is necessary to THE REVOLUTIONARY PERIOD 27 bring it into practice; and thence, besides souring and spoiling the conversation, is productive of disgusts and perhaps enmities where you may have occasion for friendship. I had caught it by reading my father's books of dispute about religion. Persons of good sense, I have since observed, seldom fall into it, except 5 lawyers, university men, and men of all sorts that have been bred at Edinburgh. A question was once, somehow or other, started between Collins and me of the propriety of educating the female sex in learning, and their abilities for study. He was of opinion that 10 it was improper, and that they were naturally unequal to it. I took the contrary side, perhaps a little for dispute's sake. He was naturally more eloquent, had a ready plenty of words ; and sometimes, as I thought, bore me down more by his fluency than by the strength of his reasons. As we parted without settling 15 the point and were not to see one another again for some time, I sat down to put my arguments in writing, which I copied fair and sent to him. He answered, and I replied. Three or four letters of a side had passed, when my father happened to find my papers and read them. Without entering into the discus- 2 sion, he took occasion to talk to me about the manner of my writing; observed that, though I had the advantage of my antagonist in correct spelling and pointing (which I owed to the printing-house), I fell far short in elegance of expression, in method, and in perspicuity, of which he convinced me by several 2 5 instances. I saw the justice of his remarks, and thence grew more attentive to the manner in writing and determined to endeavor at improvement. About this time I met with an odd volume of the Spectator. It was the third. I had never before seen any of them. I 3 bought it, read it over and over, and was much delighted with it. I thought the writing excellent and wished, if possible, to imitate it. With this view I took some of the papers, and, making short hints of the sentiment in each sentence, laid them 28 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE by a few days, and then, without looking at the book, tried to complete the papers again, by expressing each hinted sentiment at length and as fully as it had been expressed before, in any suitable words that should come to hand. Then I compared 5 my Spectator with the original, discovered some of my faults, and corrected them. But I found I wanted a stock of words, or a readiness in recollecting and using them, which I thought I should have acquired before that time if I had gone on making verses ; since the continual occasion for words of the same import, 10 but of different length, to suit the measure, or of different sound for the rhyme, would have laid me under a constant necessity of searching for variety, and also have tended to fix that variety in my mind and make me master of it. Therefore, I took some of the tales and turned them into verse; and, after a time, when I 15 had pretty well forgotten the prose, turned them back again. I also sometimes jumbled my collections of hints into confusion, and after some weeks endeavored to reduce them into the best order' before I began to form the full sentences 4 and complete the paper. This was to teach me method in the arrangement of 2 thoughts. By comparing my work afterward with the original, I discovered many faults and amended them; but I sometimes had the pleasure of fancying that, in certain particulars of small import, I had been lucky enough to improve the method or the language, and this encouraged me to think I might possibly in 2 5 time come to be a tolerable English writer, of which I was extremely ambitious. My time for these exercises and for reading was at night, after work, or before it began in the morning, or on Sundays, when I contrived to be in the printing- house alone, evading as much as I could the common attendance 3 on public worship which my father used to exact of me when I was under his care, and which indeed I still thought a duty, though I could not, as it seemed to me, afford time to practice it. THE REVOLUTIONARY PERIOD 29 THE WAY TO WEALTH Courteous Reader: I have heard that nothing gives an author so great pleasure as to find his works respectfully quoted by other learned authors. This pleasure I have seldom enjoyed ; for, though I have been, if I may say it without vanity, an eminent author (of almanacs), annually, now a full quarter of a 5 century, my brother authors in the same way, for what reason I know not, have ever been very sparing in their applause and no other author has taken the least notice of me; so that, did not my writings produce me some solid pudding, the great deficiency of praise would have quite discouraged me. 1 ° I concluded at length that the people were the best judges of my merit, for they buy my works ; and, besides, in my rambles where I am not personally known, I have frequently heard one or other of my adages repeated with "As Poor Richard says" at the end of it. This gave me some satisfaction, as it showed not 15 only that my instructions were regarded, but discovered likewise some respect for my authority ; and I own that, to encourage the practice of remembering and reading those wise sentences, I have sometimes quoted myself with great gravity. Judge, then, how much I must have been gratified by an 2 incident I am going to relate to you. I stopped my horse lately where a great number of people were collected at an auction oi merchants' goods. The hour of the sale not being come, they were conversing on the badness of the times; and one of the company called to a plain, clean old man with white locks, "Pray, 2 5 Father Abraham, what think you of the times? Will not these heavy taxes quite ruin the country ? How shall we ever be able to pay them? What would you advise us to do?" Father Abraham stood up and replied, "If you would have my advice, I will give it to you in short ; for A word to the wise is enough, as Poor Richard says." They joined in desiring him to speak his mind, and gathering around him, he proceeded as follows : 30 30 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE "Friends," said he, "the taxes are indeed very heavy, and if those laid on by the government were the only ones we had to pay, we might more easily discharge them; but we have many others, and much more grievous to some of us. We are taxed 5 twice as much by our idleness, three times as much by our pride, and four times as much by our folly; and from these taxes the commissioners cannot ease or deliver us by allowing an abate- ment. However, let us hearken to good advice, and something may be done for us; God helps them that help themselves, as 10 Poor Richard says. I. "It would be thought a hard government that should tax its people one-tenth part of their time, to be employed in its service ; but idleness taxes many of us much more ; sloth, by bringing on diseases, absolutely shortens life. Sloth, like rust, consumes 15 faster than labor wears, while The used key is always bright, as Poor Richard says. But dost thou love life? Then do not squander time, for that is the stuff life is made of, as Poor Richard says. How much more than is necessary do we spend in sleep, forgetting that the sleeping fox catches no poultry, and 20 that there will be sleeping enough in the grave, as Poor Richard says. If time be of all things the most precious, wasting time must be, as Poor Richard says, the greatest prodigality ; since, as he elsewhere tells us, Lost time is never found again, and what we call time enough always proves little enough. Let us, then, 25 be up and be doing, and doing to the purpose; so by diligence shall we do more with less perplexity. Sloth makes all things difficult, but industry, all easy; and, He that riseth late must trot all day and shall scarce overtake his business at night; while Laziness travels so slowly that Poverty soon overtakes him. 30 Drive thy business, let not that drive thee; and, Early to bed, and early to rise, makes a man healthy, wealthy, and wise, as Poor Richard says. "So what signifies wishing and hoping for better times ? We make these times better if we bestir ourselves. Industry need THE REVOLUTIONARY PERIOD 31 not wish, and he that lives upon hopes will die fasting. There are no gains without pains ; then help, hands, for I have no lands ; or, if I have, they are smartly taxed. He that hath a trade hath an estate ; and he that hath a calling, hath an office of profit and honor, as Poor Richard says ; but then the trade must be worked 5 at and the calling followed, or neither the estate nor the office will enable us to pay our taxes. If we are industrious, we shall never starve; for, At the workingman's house hunger looks in, but dares not enter. Nor will the bailiff or the constable enter ; for Industry pays debts, while Despair increaseth them. What 10 though you have found no treasure, nor has any rich relation left you a legacy; Diligence is the mother of good luck, and God gives all things to Industry. Then plow deep while sluggards sleep, and you shall have corn to sell and to keep. Work while it is called to-day, for you know not how much you may be 15 hindered to-morrow. One to-day is worth two to-morrows, as Poor Richard says ; and, further, Never leave that till to-morrow which you can do to-day. If you were a good servant, would you not be ashamed that a good master should catch you idle? Are you, then, your own master? Be ashamed to catch yourself 2 idle, when there is so much to be done for yourself, your family, your country, your kin. Handle your tools without mittens; remember that The cat in gloves catches no mice, as Poor Richard says. It is true there is much to be done, and perhaps you are weak-handed; but stick to it steadily, and you will see great 2 5 effects; for, Constant dropping wears away stones; and, By diligence and patience the mouse ate in two the cable ; and, Little strokes fell great oaks. "Methinks I hear some of you say, Must a man afford himself no leisure? I will tell thee, my friend, what Poor Richard says : 30 Employ thy time well, if thou meanest to gain leisure ; and since thou art not sure of a minute, throw not away an hour. Leisure is time for doing something useful ; this leisure the diligent man will obtain, but the lazy man never; for, A life of leisure and a 32 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE life of laziness are two things. Many, without labor, would live by their wits only, but they break for want of stock ; whereas industry gives comfort and plenty and respect. Fly pleasures and they will follow you. The diligent spinner has a large 5 shift; and now I have a sheep and a cow, every one bids me good morrow. II. "But with our industry we must likewise be steady and careful, and oversee our own affairs with our own eyes, and not trust too much to others ; for, as Poor Richard says : 10 I never saw an oft-removed tree, Nor yet an oft-removed family, That throve so well as those that settled be. And again, Three removes are as bad as a fire; and again, Keep thy shop, and thy shop will keep thee; and again, If you would 1 5 have your business done, go ; if not, send ; and again : He that by the plow would thrive, Himself must either hold or drive. And again, The eye of the master will do more work than both his hands; and again, Want of care does us more damage than 2 want of knowledge; and again, Not to oversee workmen is to leave them your purse open. Trusting too much to others' care is the ruin of many ; for, In the affairs of this world men are saved, not by faith, but by the want of it. But a man's own care is profitable; for, If you would have a faithful servant and one 25 that you like, serve yourself. A little neglect may breed great mischief; for want of a nail the shoe was lost, for want of a shoe the horse was lost, and for want of a horse the rider was lost, being overtaken and slain by the enemy ; all for want of a lictle care about a horseshoe nail. 30 III. "So much for industry, my friends, and attention to one's own business; but to these we must add frugality, if we would make our industry more certainly successful. A man may, if THE REVOLUTIONARY PERIOD 33 he knows not how to save as he gets, keep his nose all his life to the grindstone, and die not worth a groat at last. A fat kitchen makes a lean will ; and Many estates are spent in the getting, Since women forsook spinning and knitting, 5 And men for punch forsook hewing and splitting. If you would be wealthy, think of saving as well as of getting. The Indies have not made Spain rich, because her outgoes are greater than her incomes. "Away, then, with your expensive follies, and you will not 10 then have so much cause to complain of hard times, heavy taxes, and chargeable families ; for Pleasure and wine, game and deceit, Make the wealth small, and the want great. And further, What maintains one vice would bring up two 15 children. You may think, perhaps, that a little tea or a little punch now and then, diet a little more costly, clothes a little finer, and a little entertainment now and then can be no great matter ; but remember, Many a little makes a mickle. Beware of little expenses; A small leak will sink a great ship, as Poor Richard 2 says; and again, Who dainties love shall beggars prove; and moreover. Fools make feasts and wise men eat them. PATRICK HENRY Born at Studley, Va., 1736; died at Red Hill, Va., 179S A CALL TO ARMS No man thinks more highly than I do of the patriotism, as well as the abilities* of the very worthy gentlemen who have just addressed the House. But different men often see the same 2 5 subject in different lights; and, therefore, I hope it will not oe 10 15 20 30 34 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE thought disrespectful to those gentlemen, if, entertaining as I do opinions of a character very opposite to theirs, I shall speak forth my sentiments freely and without reserve. This is no time for ceremony. The question before the House is one of awful moment to this country. For my own part, I consider it as nothing less than a question of freedom or slavery ; and in proportion to the magnitude of the subject ought to be the freedom of the debate. It is only in this way that we can hope to arrive at truth, and fulfill the great responsibility which we hold to God and our country. Should I keep back my opinions at such a time, through fear of giving offense, I should consider myself as guilty of treason toward my country, and of an act of disloyalty toward the Majesty of Heaven, which I revere above all earthly kings. Mr. President, it is natural to man to indulge in the illusion of hope. We are apt to shut our eyes against a painful truth, and listen to the song of that siren, till she transforms us into beasts. Is this the part of wise men, engaged in a great and arduous struggle for liberty? Are we disposed to be of the number of those who, having eyes, see not, and having ears, hear not, the thing? that so nearly concern their temporal salvation ? For my part, whatever anguish of spirit it may cost, I am willing to know the whole truth — to know the worst, and to provide for it. I have but one lamp by which my feet are guided, and that is the lamp of experience. T know of no way of judging of the future but by the past. And judging by the past, I wish to know what there has been in the conduct of the British ministry for the last ten years to justify those hopes with which gentlemen have been pleased to solace . themselves and the House. Is it that insidious smile with which our petition has been lately received? Trust it not, sir; it will prove a snare to your feet. Suffer not yourselves to be betrayed with a kiss. Ask your- selves how this gracious reception of our petition comports with those warlike preparations which cover our waters and darken THE REVOLUTIONARY PERIOD 35 our land. Are fleets and armies necessary to a work of love and reconciliation? Have we shown ourselves so unwilling to be reconciled that force must be called in to win back our love? Let us not deceive ourselves, sir. These are the implements of war and subjugation, the last arguments to which kings resort. 5 I ask, gentlemen, what means this martial array, if its purpose be not to force us to submission? Can gentlemen assign any other possible motive for it? Has Great Britain any enemy in this quarter of the world to call for all this accumulation of navies and armies? No, sir, she has none. They are meant 10 for us; they can be meant for no other. They are sent over to bind and rivet upon us those chains which the British ministry have been so long forging. And what have we to oppose to them? Shall we try argument? Sir, we have been trying that for the last ten years. Have we anything new to offer upon the 15 subject ? Nothing. We have held the subject up in every light of which it is capable ; but it has been all in vain. Shall we resort to entreaty and humble supplication? What terms shall we find which have not been already exhausted? Let us not, I beseech you, deceive ourselves longer. Sir, we 2 have done everything that could be done to avert the storm which is now coming on. We have petitioned ; we have remonstrated ; we have supplicated; we have prostrated ourselves before the throne, and have implored its interposition to arrest the tyran- nical hand of the ministry and Parliament. Our petitions have 2 5 been slighted ; our remonstrances have produced additional vio- lence and insult; our supplications have been disregarded, and we have been spurned, with contempt, from the foot of the throne ! In vain, after these things, may we indulge the fond hope of 30 peace and reconciliation. There is no longer any room for hope. If we wish to be free, — if we mean to preserve inviolate those inestimable privileges for which we have been so long contend- ing, — if we mean not basely to abandon the noble struggle in 36 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE which we have been so long engaged, and which we have pledged ourselves never to abandon, until the glorious object of our contest shall be obtained — we must fight! I repeat it, sir, we must fight! An appeal to arms and to the God of Hosts is 5 all that is left us! They tell us, sir, that we are weak — unable to cope with so formidable an adversary. But when shall we be stronger? Will it be the next week, or the next year? Will it be when we are totally disarmed, and when a British guard shall be 10 stationed in every house? Shall we gather strength by irresolu- tion and inaction? Shall we acquire the means of effectual resistance by lying supinely on our backs and hugging the delu- sive phantom of hope, until our enemies shall have bound us hand and foot? 15 Sir, we are not weak if we make a proper use of those means which the God of nature has placed in our power. Three millions of people armed in the holy cause of liberty, and in such a country as that which we possess, are invincible by any force which our enemy can send against us. Besides, sir, we 2 shall not fight our battles alone. There is a just God who presides over the destinies of nations, and who will raise up friends to fight our battles for us. The battle, sir, is not to the strong alone ; it is to the vigilant, the active, the brave. Besides, sir, we have no election. If we were base enough to desire it, 2 5 it is now too late to retire from the contest. There is no retreat but in submission and slavery ! Our chains are forged ! Their clanking may be heard on the plains of Boston ! The war is inevitable— and let it come ! I repeat it, sir, let it come ! It is vain, sir, to extenuate the matter. Gentlemen may cry, 30 Peace, peace— but there is no peace. The war is actually begun ! The next gale that sweeps from the North will bring to our ears the clash of resounding arms ! Our brethren are already in the field! Why stand we here idle? What is it that gentlemen wish? Is life so dear, or peace so sweet, as to be purchased at THE REVOLUTIONARY PERIOD 37 the price of chains and slavery ? Forbid it, Almighty God ! I know not what course others may take; but as for me, give me liberty or give me death ! THOMAS JEFFERSON Born at Shadwell, Albemarle County, Va-, 1743; died at Monticello, in the same county, 1826 OPINION OF FRANCE And here I cannot leave this great and good country without expressing my sense of its pre-eminence of character among the 5 nations of the earth. A more benevolent people I have never known, nor greater warmth and devotedness in their select friendships. Their kindness and accommodation to strangers is unparalleled, and the hospitality of Paris is beyond anything I had conceived to be practicable in a large city. Their eminence, 10 too, in science, the communicative disposition of their scientific men, the politeness of the general manners, the ease and vivacity of their conversation, give a charm to their society, to be found nowhere else. In a comparison of this, with other countries, we have the proof of primacy which was given to Themistocles after 1 5 the battle of Salamis. Every general voted to himself the first reward of valor, and the second to Themistocles. So, ask the traveled inhabitant of any nation, in what country on earth would you rather live ? Certainly, in my own, where are all my friends, my relations, and the earliest and sweetest affections 20 and recollections of my life. Which would be your second choice ? France. FIRST INAUGURAL ADDRESS Friends and fellow-citizens : Called upon to undertake the duties of the first executive office of our country, I avail myself of the presence of that 25 39 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE portion of my fellow-citizens which is here assembled to express my grateful thanks for the favor with which they have been pleased to look toward me, to declare a sincere consciousness that the task is above my talents, and that I approach it with 5 those anxious and awful presentiments which the greatness of the charge and the weakness of my powers so justly inspire. A rising nation, spread over a wide and fruitful land ; traversing all the seas with the rich productions of their industry ; engaged in commerce with nations who feel power and forget right; 10 advancing rapidly to destinies beyond the reach of mortal eye, — when I contemplate these transcendent objects, and see the honor, the happiness, and the hopes of this beloved country committed to the issue and the auspices of this day, I shrink from the contemplation and humble myself before the magnitude of the 15 undertaking. Utterly, indeed, should I despair, did not the presence of many whom I here see remind me that in the other high authorities provided by our Constitution I shall find resources of wisdom, of virtue, and of zeal, on which to rely under all difficulties. To you, then, gentlemen, who are charged 20 with the sovereign functions of legislation, and to those associ- ated with you, I look with encouragement for that guidance and support which may enable us to steer with safety the vessel in which we are all embarked, amid the conflicting elements of a troubled sea. 2 5 During the contest of opinion through which we have passed, the animation of discussion and of exertions has sometimes worn an aspect which might impose on strangers unused to think freely and to speak and to write what they think. But, this being now decided by the voice of the nation, enounced accord- 30 ing to the rules of the Constitution, all will, of course, arrange themselves under the will of the law, and unite in common efforts for the common good. All, too, will bear in mind this sacred principle, that, though the will of the majority is in all cases to prevail, that will, to be rightful, must be reasonable ; that the THE REVOLUTIONARY PERIOD 39 minority possess their equal rights, which equal laws must protect, and to violate [which] would be oppression. Let us, then, fellow-citizens, unite with one heart and one mind; let us restore to social intercourse that harmony and affection without which liberty and even life itself are but dreary things. And 5 let us reflect that having banished from our land that religious intolerance under which mankind so long bled and suffered, we have yet gained little if we countenance a political intolerance as despotic, as wicked, and capable of as bitter and bloody persecu- tions. During the throes and convulsions of the ancient world, 10 during Jthe agonized spasms of infuriated man, seeking through blood and slaughter his long-lost liberty, it was not wonderful that the agitation of the billows should reach even this distant and peaceful shore ; that this should be more felt and feared by some and less by others, and should divide opinions as to 15 measures of safety. But every difference of opinion is not a difference of principle. We have called by different names brethren of the same principle. We are all republicans ; we are all federalists. If there be any among us who would wish to dissolve this Union, or to change its republican form, let them 2 stand, undisturbed, as monuments of the safety with which error of opinion may be tolerated where reason is left free to combat it. I know, indeed, that some honest men have feared that a republican government cannot be strong ; that this government is not strong enough. But would the honest patriot, in the full 2 5 tide of successful experiment, abandon a government which has so far kept us free and firm, on the theoretic and visionary fear that this government, the world's best hope, may, by possibility, want energy to preserve itself ? I trust not. I believe this, on the contrary, the strongest government on earth. I believe it 30 is the only one where every man, at the call of the law, would fly to the standard of the law, and would meet invasions of public order as his own personal concern. Sometimes it is said that man cannot be trusted with the government of himself. 40 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE Can he, then, be trusted with the government of others? Or have we found angels in the form of kings, to govern him ? Let history answer this question. Let us, then, pursue with courage and confidence our own 5 federal and republican principles, our attachment to Union and representative government. Kindly separated by nature and a wide ocean from the exterminating havoc of one-quarter of the globe ; too high-minded to endure the degradations of the others ; possessing a chosen country, with room enough for all descend- 10 ants to the hundredth and thousandth generation; entertaining a due sense of our equal right to the use of our own faculties, to the acquisitions of our industry, to honor and confidence from our fellow-citizens, resulting not from birth but from our actions, and their sense of them; enlightened by a benign religion, pro- 15 fessed, indeed, and practised in various forms, yet all of them inculcating honesty, truth, temperance, gratitude, and the love of man; acknowledging and adoring an overruling Providence, which, by all its dispensations, proves that it delights in the happiness of man here, and his greater happiness hereafter : with 20 all these blessings, what more is necessary to make us a happy and a prosperous people ? Still one thing more, fellow-citizens, — a wise and frugal government, which shall restrain men from injuring one another, shall leave them otherwise free to regulate their own pursuits of industry and improvement, and shall not 25 take from the mouth of labor the bread it has earned. This is the sum of good government, and this is necessary to close the circle of our felicities. About to enter, fellow-citizens, on the exercise of duties which comprehend everything dear and valuable to you, it is proper 30 you should understand what I deem the essential principle [s] of this government, and, consequently, those which ought to shape its administration. I will compress them in the narrowest compass they will bear, stating the general principle, but not all its limitations. Equal and exact justice to all men, of whatever THE REVOLUTIONARY PERIOD 41 state or persuasion, religious or political ; peace, commerce, and honest friendship with all nations, entangling alliances with none ; the support of the State governments in all their rights, as the most competent administrations for our domestic concerns and the surest bulwarks against anti-republican tendencies; the 5 preservation of the General Government in its whole constitu- tional vigor, as the sheet-anchor of our peace at home and safety abroad; a jealous care of the right of election by the people, — a mild and safe corrective of abuses which are lopped by the sword of revolution, where peaceable remedies are unprovided ; absolute 10 acquiescence in the decisions of the majority, — the vital principle of republics, from which is no appeal but to force, the vital principle and immediate parent of despotism ; a well-disciplined militia, — our best reliance in peace and for the first moments of war, till regulars may relieve them; the supremacy of the civil 15 over the military authority ; economy in the public expense, that labor may be lightly burdened ; the honest payment of our debts and sacred preservation of the public faith; encouragement of agriculture and of commerce as its handmaid; the diffusion of information and arraignment of all abuses at the bar of the 20 public reason; freedom of religion, freedom of the press, and freedom of person under the protection of the habeas corpus; and trial by juries impartially selected. These principles form the bright constellation which has gone before us, and guided our steps through an age of revolution and reformation. The 2 5 wisdom of our sages and blood of our heroes have been devoted to their attainment. They should be the creed of our political faith, the text of civic instruction, the touchstone by which to try the services of those we trust; and should we wander from them in moments of error or alarm, let us hasten to retrace our 3 steps, and to regain the road which alone leads to peace, liberty, and safety. "I repair, then, fellow-citizens, to the post which you have assigned me. With experience enough in subordinate stations 42 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE to know the difficulties of this, the greatest of all, I have learned to expect that it will rarely fall to the lot of imperfect man to retire from this station with the reputation and the favor which bring him into it. Without pretensions to that high confidence 5 you reposed in our first and greatest revolutionary character, whose pre-eminent services had entitled him to the first place in his country's love and had destined for him the fairest page in the volume of faithful history, I ask so much confidence only as may give firmness and effect to the legal administration of 10 your affairs. I shall often go wrong, through defect of judg- ment. When right, I shall often be thought wrong by those whose position will not command a view of the whole ground. I ask your indulgence for my own errors, which will never be intentional; and your support against the errors of others, who 15 may condemn what they would not, if seen in all its parts. The approbation implied by your suffrage is a great consolation to me for the past; and my future solicitude will be to retain the good opinion of those who have bestowed it in advance, to conciliate that of others by doing them all the good in my power, 20 and to be instrumental to the happiness and freedom of all. Relying, then, on the patronage of your good will, I advance with obedience to the work, ready to retire from it whenever you become sensible how much better choice it is in your power to make. And may that Infinite Power which rules the destinies of 26 the universe lead our councils to what is best and give them a favorable issue for your peace and prosperity. THE REVOLUTIONARY PERIOD 43 POEMS OF THE REVOLUTION THE BATTLE OF THE KEGS By Francis Hopkinson (1737-1791) Gallants attend and hear a friend Trill forth harmonious ditty ; Strange things I'll tell which late befell In Philadelphia city. 'Twas early day, as poets say, 5 Just when the sun was rising; A soldier stood on a log of wood, And saw a thing surprising. As in amaze he stood to gaze, The truth can't be denied, sir, 10 He spied a score of kegs or more Come floating down the tide, sir. A sailor too in jerkin blue, This strange appearance viewing, First damned his eyes, in great surprise, 1 5 Then said, "Some mischief's brewing. "These kegs, Fm told, the rebels hold, Packed up like pickled herring ; And they're come down to attack the town, In this new way of ferrying." 20 The soldier flew, the sailor too, And scared almost to death, sir, Wore out their shoes, to spread the news, And ran till out of breath, sir. • 4 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE Now up and down throughout the town, Most frantic scenes were acted; And some ran here, and others there, Like men almost distracted. 5 Some fire cried, which some denied, But said the earth had quaked ; And girls and boys, with hideous noise, Ran through the streets half naked. Sir William he, snug as a flea, 10 Lay all this time a-snoring, ****** ****** Now in a fright, he starts upright, Awaked by such a clatter; I 5 He rubs both eyes, and boldly cries, "For God's sake, what's the matter?" At his bedside he then espied Sir Erskine at command, sir ; Upon one foot he had one boot, 2 ° And th' other in his hand, sir. "Arise, arise," Sir Erskine cries, "The rebels — more's the pity, Without a boat are all afloat, And ranged before the city. "The motley crew, in vessels new, With Satan for their guide, sir, Packed up in bags, or wooden kegs, Come driving down the tide, sir. 25 THE REVOLUTIONARY PERIOD 45 "Therefore prepare for bloody war, These kegs must all be routed, Or surely we despised shall be, And British courage doubted." The royal band now ready stand 6 All ranged in dread array, sir, With stomach stout to see it out, And make a bloody day, sir. The cannons roar from shore to shore, The small arms make a rattle ; 1 ° Since wars began I'm sure no man E'er saw so strange a battle. The rebel dales, the rebel vales, With rebel trees surrounded, The distant woods, the hills and floods, 1 5 With rebel echoes sounded. The fish below swam to and fro, Attacked from every quarter ; Why sure, thought they, the devil's to pay, 'Mongst folks above the water. 20 The kegs, 'tis said, though strongly made, Of rebel staves and hoops, sir, Could not oppose their powerful foes, The conquering British troops, sir. From morn to night these men of might Displayed amazing courage ; And when the sun was fairly down, Retired to sup their porridge. READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE A hundred men with each a pen, Or more upon my word, sir, It is most true would be too few, Their valor to record, sir. Such feats did they perform that day, Against these wicked kegs, sir, That years to come, if they get home, They'll make their boasts and brags, sir. THE BALLAD OF NATHAN HALE Anonymous The breezes went steadily through the tall pines, 1 A-saying, "Oh ! hu-ush !" a-saying, "Oh ! hu-ush !" As stilly stole by a bold legion of horse, For Hale in the bush ; for Hale in the bush. "Keep still !" said the thrush as she nestled her young, In a nest by the road ; in a nest by the road. 1 5 "For the tyrants are near, and with them appear What bodes us no good ; what bodes us no good." The brave captain heard it, and thought of his home In a cot by the brook ; in a cot by the brook. With mother and sister and memories dear, He so gayly forsook ; he so gayly forsook. Cooling shades of the night were coming apace, The tattoo had beat ; the tattoo had beat. The noble one sprang from his dark lurking-place, To make his retreat ; to make his retreat. 20 THE REVOLUTIONARY PERIOD 47 He warily trod on the dry rustling leaves, As he passed through the wood ; as he passed through the wood ; And silently gained his rude launch on the shore, As she played with the flood ; as she played with the flood. The guards of the camp, on that dark, dreary night, 5 Had a murderous will ; had a murderous will. They took him and bore him afar from the shore, To a hut on the hill ; to a hut on the hill. No mother was there, nor a friend who could cheer, In that little stone cell ; in that little stone cell. 10 But he trusted in love, from his Father above. In his heart all was well ; in his heart all was well. An ominous owl, with his solemn bass voice, Sat moaning hard by ; sat moaning hard by : "The tyrant's proud minions most gladly rejoice, For he must soon die : for he must soon die." 15 The brave fellow told them, no thing he restrained, — The cruel general ! the cruel general ! — His errand from camp, of the ends to be gained, 20 And said that was all ; and said that was all. They took him and bound him and bore him away, Down the hill's grassy side ; down the hill's grassy side. 'Twas there the base hirelings, in royal array, His cause did deride ; his cause did deride. Five minutes were given, short moments, no more, For him to repent ; for him to repent. He prayed for his mother, he asked not another, — To Heaven he went ; to Heaven he went. 48 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE The faith of a martyr the tragedy showed, As he trode the last stage ; as he trode the last stage. And Britons will shudder at gallant Hale's blood, As his words do presage ; as his words do presage. 5 "Thou pale king of terrors, thou life's gloomy foe, Go frighten the slave ; go frighten the slave ; Tell tyrants, to you their allegiance they owe. No fears for the brave ; no fears for the brave." COLUMBIA By Timothy Dwight (1752-1817) Columbia, Columbia, to glory arise, 10 The queen of the world, and the child of the skies ! Thy genius commands thee ; with rapture behold, While ages on ages thy splendors unfold. Thy reign is the last, and the noblest of time, Most fruitful thy soil, most inviting thy clime ; 1 5 Let the crimes of the east ne'er encrimson thy name, Be freedom, and science, and virtue thy fame. To conquest and slaughter let Europe aspire ; Whelm nations in blood, and wrap cities in fire ; Thy heroes the rights of mankind shall defend, 20 And triumph pursue them, and glory attend. A world is thy realm : for a world be thy laws, Enlarged as thine empire, and just as thy cause; On Freedom's broad basis, that empire shall rise, Extend with the main, and dissolve with the skies. 25 Fair Science her gates to thy sons shall unbar, And the east see thy morn hide the beams of her star. THE REVOLUTIONARY PERIOD 49 New bards, and new sages, unrivaled shall soar To fame unextinguished, when time is no more ; To thee, the last refuge of virtue designed, Shall fly from all nations the best of mankind ; Here, grateful to heaven, with transport shall bring 5 Their incense, more fragrant than odors of spring. Nor less shall thy fair ones to glory ascend, And genius and beauty in harmony blend ; The graces of form shall awake pure desire, And the charms of the soul ever cherish the fire; 10 Their sweetness unmingled, their manners refined, And virtue's bright image, instamped on the mind, With peace and soft rapture shall teach life to glow, And light up a smile in the aspect of woe. Thy fleets to all regions thy power shall display, The nations admire, and the ocean obey ; Each shore to thy glory its tribute unfold, And the east and the south yield their spices and gold. As the day-spring unbounded, thy splendor shall flow, And earth's little kingdoms before thee shall bow : While the ensigns of union, in trumph unfurled, Hush the tumult of war, and give peace to the world. Thus, as down a lone valley, with cedars o'erspread, From war's dread confusion I pensively strayed — The gloom from the face of fair heaven retired ; The winds ceased to murmur ; the thunders expired ; Perfumes, as of Eden, flowed sweetly along, And a voice, as of angels, enchantingly sung: "Columbia, Columbia, to glory arise, The queen of the world, and the child of the skies." 15 20 25 30 50 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE A TORY'S PUNISHMENT By John Trumbull (1750-1831) Meanwhile beside the pole, the guard A Bench of Justice had prepared, Where sitting round in awful sort The grand Committee hold their Court ; 5 While all the crew, in silent awe, Wait from their lips the lore of law. Few moments with deliberation They hold the solemn consultation ; When soon in judgment all agree, 1 ° And Clerk proclaims the dread decree ; "That 'Squire McFingal having grown The vilest Tory in the town, And now in full examination Convicted by his own confession, Finding no tokens of repentance, This Court proceeds to render sentence: That first the Mob a slip-knot single Tie round the neck of said McFingal, And in due form do tar nim next. And feather, as the law directs ; Then through the town attendant ride him In cart with Constable beside him. And having held him up to shame, Bring to the pole, from whence he came." Forthwith the crowd proceed to deck With halter'd noose McFingal's neck ; While he in peril of his soul Stood tied half -hanging to the pole ; Then lifting high the ponderous jar, Pour'd o'er his head the smoking tar. 20 25 30 THE REVOLUTIONARY PERIOD 51 With less profusion once was spread Oil on the Jewish monarch's head, That down his beard and vestments ran, And cover'd all his outward man. As when (so Claudian sings) the Gods 5 And earth-born Giants fell at odds, The stout Enceladus in malice Tore mountains up to throw at Pallas ; And while he held them o'er his head, The river, from their fountains fed, 10 Pour'd down his back its copious tide, And wore its channels in his hide : So from the high-raised urn the torrents Spread down his side their various currents ; His flowing wig, as next the brim, 1 5 First met and drank the sable stream ; Adown his visage stern and grave Roll'd and adhered the viscid wave ; With arms depending as he stood, Each cuff capacious holds the flood ; 2 From nose and chin's remotest end The tarry icicles descend ; Till all o'erspread, with colors gay, He glitter'd to the western ray, Like sleet-bound trees in wintry skies, - 6 Or Lapland idol carved in ice. And now the feather-bag display'd Is waved in^triumph o'er his head, And clouds him o'er with feathers missive, And down, upon the tar, adhesive: 30 Not Maia's son, with wings for ears, Such plumage round his visage wears, Nor Milton's six-wing'd angel gathers Such superfluity of feathers. 52 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE Now all complete appears our 'Squire, Like Gorgon or Chimaera dire ; Nor more could boast on Plato's plan To rank among the race of man, 5 Or prove his claim to human nature, As a two-legg'd unfeather'd creature. Then on the fatal cart, in state They raised our grand Duumvirate. And as at Rome a like committee, 10 Who found an owl within their city, With solemn rites and grave processions At every shrine perform'd lustrations; And lest infection might take place From such grim fowl with feather'd face, 15 All Rome attends him through the street In triumph to his country seat : With like devotion all the choir Paraded round our awful 'Squire; In front the martial music comes 2 Of horns and fiddles, fifes and drums, With jingling sound of carriage bells, And treble creak of rusted wheels. Behind, the crowd, in lengthen'd row With proud procession, closed the show. 25 And at fit periods every throat Combined in universal shout, And hail'd great Liberty in chorus, Or bawl'd "confusion to the Tories." Not louder storm the welkin braves 30 From clamors of conflicting waves; Less dire in Libyan wilds the noise When rav'ning lions lift their voice ; Or triumphs at town-meetings made, On passing votes to regulate trade. THE REVOLUTIONARY PERIOD 53 Thus having borne him round the town, Last at the pole they set him down; And to the tavern take their way To end in mirth the festal day. PHILIP FRENEAU Born in New York, 1752 ; died in New Jersey, 1832 THE INDIAN BURYING-GROUND In spite of all the learned have said, 5 I still by old opinion keep ; The posture that we give the dead Points out the soul's eternal sleep. Not so the ancients of these lands ; — The Indian, when from life released, 10 Again is seated with his friends, And shares again the joyous feast. His imaged birds, and painted bowl, And venison, for a journey dressed, Bespeak the nature of the soul, 15 Activity, that wants no rest. His bow for action ready bent, And arrows with a head of stone, Can only mean that life is spent, And noj: the old ideas gone. 2 ° Thou, stranger, that shall come this way, No fraud upon the dead commit, — Observe the swelling turf, and say, They do not lie, but here they sit. 54 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE Here still a lofty rock remains, On which the curious eye may trace (Now wasted half by wearing rains) The fancies of a ruder race. 5 Here still an aged elm aspires, Beneath whose far-projecting shade (And which the shepherd still admires) The children of the forest played. There oft a restless Indian queen 10 (Pale Shebah with her braided hair), And many a barbarous form is seen To chide the man that lingers there. By midnight moons, o'er moistening dews, In habit for the chase arrayed, 1 5 The hunter still the deer pursues, The hunter and the deer — a shade ! And long shall timorous Fancy see The painted chief, and pointed spear, And Reason's self shall bow the knee To shadows and delusions here. THE WILD HONEYSUCKLE Fair flower, that dost so comely grow, Hid in this silent, dull retreat, Untouched thy honied blossoms blow, Unseen thy little branches greet : 25 No roving foot shall crush thee here, No busy hand provoke a tear. THE REVOLUTIONARY PERIOD 55 By Nature's self, in white arrayed, She bade thee shun the vulgar eye, And planted here the guardian shade, And sent soft waters murmuring by ; Thus quietly thy summer goes, 5 Thy days declining to repose. Smit with those charms, that must decay, I grieve to see your future doom ; They died — nor were those flowers more gay, The flowers that did in Eden bloom ; 1 Unpitying frosts and Autumn's power Shall leave no vestige of this flower. From morning suns and evening dews At first thy little being came; If nothing once, you nothing lose, 15 For when you die you are the same ; The space between is but an hour, The frail duration of a flower. TO A HONEY BEE Drinking From a Glass of Wine and Drowning Therein Thou, born to sip the lake or spring, Or quaff the waters of the stream, 20 Why hither come, on vagrant wing? Does Bacchus tempting seem, — Did he for joy this glass prepare? Will I achnit you to a share ? Did storms harass or foes perplex, 2 5 Did wasps or king-birds bring dismay, — Did wars distress, or labors vex, Or did you miss your way? 56 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE A better seat you could not take Than on the margin of this lake. Welcome ! — I hail you to my glass : All welcome here you find; 5 Here let the cloud of trouble pass, Here be all care resigned. This fluid never fails to please, And drown the grief of men or bees. What forced you here we cannot know, 1 And you will scarcely tell, But cheery we would have you go And bid a glad farewell : On lighter wings we bid you fly, — Your dart will now all foes defy. 1 5 Yet take not, oh ! too deep a drink, And in this ocean die; Here bigger bees than you might sink, Even bees full six feet high. Like Pharaoh, then, you would be said To perish in a sea of red. Do as you please, your will is mine ; Enjoy it without fear, And your grave will be this glass of wine, Your epitaph — a tear ; Go, take your seat in Charon's boat ; We'll tell the hive, you died afloat. THE REVOLUTIONARY PERIOD 57 CHARLES BROCKDEN BROWN Born in Philadelphia, 1770; died there, 1810 EDGAR HUNTLY'S INDIAN ADVENTURE From Edgar Huntly; or, Memoirs of a Sleep-Walker I went forward, but my eyes were fixed upon the fire: pres- ently, in consequence of changing my station, I perceived several feet and the skirts of blankets. I was somewhat startled at these appearances. The legs were naked, and scored into uncouth figures. The moccasins which lay beside them and which 5 were adorned in a grotesque manner, in addition to other inci- dents, immediately suggested the suspicion that they were Indians. No spectacle was more adapted than this to excite wonder and alarm. Had some mysterious power snatched me from earth and cast me, in a moment, into the heart of the 10 wilderness? Was I still in the vicinity of my parental habita- tion, or was I thousands of miles distant? Were these the permanent inhabitants of this region, or were they wanderers and robbers? While in the heart of the mountain, I had enter- tained a vague belief that I was still within the precincts of 15 Norwalk. This opinion was shaken for a moment by the objects which I now beheld, but it insensibly returned: yet how was this opinion to be reconciled to appearances so strange and uncouth, and what measure did a due regard to my safety enjoin me to take? I now gained a view of four brawny and terrific figures, stretched upon the ground. They lay parallel to each other, on their left sides ; in consequence of which their faces were turned from me. Between each was an interval where lay a musket. Their right hands seemed placed upon the stocks of their guns, 25 as if to seize them on the first moment of alarm. The aperture through which these objects were seen was at the back of the cave and some feet from the ground. It was 20 10 15 58 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE merely large enough to suffer a human body to pass. It was involved in profound darkness, and there was no danger of being suspected or discovered as long as I maintained silence and kept out of view. Could I not escape, unperceived and without alarming the sleepers, from this cavern ? The slumber of an Indian is broken by the slightest noise; but if all noise be precluded, it is com- monly profound. It was possible, I conceived, to leave my present post, to descend into the cave and issue forth without the smallest signal. Their supine posture assured me that they were asleep. Sleep usually comes at their bidding, and if, perchance, they should be wakeful at an unseasonable moment, they always sit upon their haunches, and, leaning their elbows on their knees, consume the tedious hours in smoking. My peril would be great. Accidents which I could not foresee and over which I had no command might occur to awaken some one at the moment I was passing the fire. Should I pass in safety, I might issue forth into a wilderness of which T had no knowl- edge, where I might wander till I perished with famine, or 20 where my footsteps might be noted and pursued and overtaken by these implacable foes. These perils were enormous and imminent; but I likewise considered that I might be at no great distance from the habitations of men, and that my escape might rescue them from the most dreadful calamities. I determined 25 to make this dangerous experiment without delay. I came nearer to the aperture and had, consequently, a larger view^ of this recess. To my unspeakable dismay, I now caught a glimpse of one seated at the fire. His back was turned toward me, so that I could distinctly survey his gigantic form 30 and fantastic ornaments. ****** This interval of dreary foreboding did not last long. Some motion in him that was seated by the fire attracted my notice. T looked, and beheld him rise from his place and go forth from 10 THE REVOLUTIONARY PERIOD 59 the cavern. This unexpected incident led my thoughts into a new channel. Could not some advantage be taken of his absence? Could not this opportunity be seized for making my escape ? He had left his gun and hatchet on the ground. It was likely, there- fore, that he had not gone far and would speedily return. Might not these weapons be seized, and some provision be thus made against the danger of meeting him without, or of being pursued ? Before a resolution could be formed a new sound saluted my ear. It was a deep groan, succeeded by sobs that seemed struggling for utterance, but were vehemently counteracted by the sufferer. This low and bitter lamentation apparently pro- ceeded from some one within the cave. It could not be from one of this swarthy band. It must, then, proceed from a captive, whom they had reserved for torment or servitude and who had seized the opportunity afforded by the absence of him that 15 watched to give vent to his despair. I again thrust my head forward and beheld, lying on the ground, apart from the rest and bound hand and foot, a young girl. Her dress was the coarse russet garb of the country and bespoke her to be some farmer's daughter. Her features denoted 2 the last degree of fear and anguish, and she moved her limbs in such a manner as showed that the ligatures by which she was confined produced, by their tightness, the utmost degree of pain. My wishes were now bent, not only to preserve myself and to frustrate the future attempts of these savages, but likewise 25 to relieve this miserable victim. This could only be done by escaping from the cavern and returning with seasonable aid. The sobs of the girl were likely to rouse the sleepers. My appear- ance before her would prompt her to testify her surprise by some exclamation or shriek. What could hence be predicted but that 30 the band would start on their feet and level their unerring pieces at my head ? The girl's cheek rested on the hard rock, and her eyes were dim with tears. As they were turned toward me, however, I 60 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE hoped that my movements would be noticed by her gradually and without abruptness. This expectation was fulfilled. I had not advanced many steps before she discovered me. This moment was critical beyond all others in the course of my 5 existence. My life was suspended, as it were, by a spider's thread. All rested on the effect which this discovery should make upon this feeble victim. I was watchful of the first movement of her eye which should indicate a consciousness of my presence. I labored, by gestures 10 and looks, to deter her from betraying her emotion. My atten- tion was, at the same time, fixed upon the sleepers, and an anxious glance was cast toward the quarter whence the watchful savage might appear. I stooped and seized the musket and hatchet. The space beyond the fire was, as I expected, open to 15 the air. I issued forth with trembling steps. The sensations inspired by the dangers which environed me, added to my recent horrors and the influence of the. moon, which had now gained the zenith, and whose lustre dazzled my long-benighted senses, cannot be adequately described. 20* * * * * * * My progress was quickly checked. Close to the falling water, seated on the edge, his back supported by the rock and his legs hanging over the precipice, I now beheld the savage who left the cave before me. The noise of the cascade and the improb- 25 ability of interruption, at least from this quarter, had made him inattentive to my motions. * * * * * 5jC * Yet I did hesitate. My aversion to bloodshed was to be sub- dued but by the direst necessity. I knew, indeed, that the 30 discharge of a musket would only alarm the enemies who remained behind ; but I had another and a better weapon in my grasp. I could rive the head of my adversary, and cast him headlong, without any noise which should be heard, into the cavern. Still, I was willing to withdraw, to re-enter the cave, THE REVOLUTIONARY PERIOD 61 and take shelter in the darksome recesses from which I had emerged. Here I might remain, unsuspected, till these detested guests should depart. The hazards attending my re-entrance were to be boldly encountered and the torments of unsatisfied thirst were to be patiently endured rather than imbrue my hands 5 in the blood of my fellow-men. But this expedient would be ineffectual if my retreat should be observed by this savage. Of that I was bound to be incontestably assured. I retreated, there- fore, but kept my eye fixed at the same time upon the enemy. Some ill-fate decreed that I should not retreat unobserved. 10 Scarcely had I withdrawn three paces when he started from his seat, and, turning toward me, walked with a quick pace. The shadow of the rock and the improbability of meeting an enemy here concealed me for a moment from his observation. I stood still. The slightest motion would have attracted his notice. At 15 present, the narrow space engaged all his vigilance. Cautious footsteps and attention to the path were indispensable to his safety. The respite was momentary, and I employed it in my own defence. How otherwise could I act? The danger that impended 20 aimed at nothing less than my life. To take the life of another was the only method of averting it. The means were in my hand, and they were used. In an extremity like this my muscles would have acted almost in defiance of my will. The stroke was quick as lightning, and the wound mortal 25 and deep. He had not time to descry the author of his fate, but, sinking on the path, expired without a groan. The hatchet buried itself in his breast and rolled with him to the bottom of the precipice, * * * * * * *30 I thought upon the condition of the hapless girl whom I had left in the power of the savages. Was it impossible to rescue her? Might I not relieve her from her bonds and make her the companion of my flight ? The exploit was perilous, but not 62 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE impracticable. There was something dastardly and ignominious in withdrawing from the danger and leaving a helpless being exposed to it. A single minute might suffice to snatch her from death or captivity. The parents might deserve that I should 5 hazard or even sacrifice my life in the cause of their child. After some fluctuation, I determined to return to the cavern and attempt the rescue of the girl. The success of this project depended on the continuance of their sleep. It was proper to approach with wariness and to heed the smallest token which 10 might bespeak their condition. I crept along the path, bending my ear forward to catch any sound that might arise. I heard nothing but the half-stifled sobs of the girl. I entered with the slowest and most anxious circumspection. Everything was found in its pristine state. The girl noticed 15 my entrance with a mixture of terror and joy. My gestures and looks enjoined upon her silence. I stooped down, and, taking another hatchet, cut asunder the deer-skin thongs by which her wrists and ankles were tied. I then made signs for her to rise and follow me. She willingly complied with my directions ; but 20 her benumbed joints and lacerated sinews refused to support her. There was no time to be lost; I therefore lifted her in my arms, and, feeble and tottering as I was, proceeded with this burden along the perilous steep and over a most rugged path. [Huntly carries the girl to a deserted house on the edge of 2 5 the woods. Meanwhile, the Indians in the cave awake and, missing their prisoner, trail her rescuer to the cabin. While he is out reconnoitering, he observes them as they enter the house.J I now reflected that I might place myself, without being observed, near the entrance, at an angle of the building, and 30 shoot at each as he successively came forth. I perceived that the bank conformed to two sides of the house and that I might gain a view of the front and of the entrance without exposing myself to observation. I lost no time in gaining this station. The bank was as high as my breast. It was easy, therefore, THE REVOLUTIONARY PERIOD 63 to crouch beneath it, to bring my eye close to the verge, and, laying my gun upon the top of it among the grass, with its muzzle pointed to the door, patiently to wait their forthcoming. My eye and my ear were equally attentive to what was pass- ing. A low and muttering conversation was maintained in the 5 house. Presently I heard a heavy stroke descend. I shuddered, and my blood ran cold at the sound. I entertained no doubt but that it was the stroke of a hatchet on the head or breast of the helpless sleeper. It was followed by a loud shriek. The continuance of these 10 shrieks proved that the stroke had not been instantly fatal. I waited to hear it repeated, but the sounds that now arose were like those produced by dragging somewhat along the ground. The shrieks, meanwhile, were incessant and piteous. My heart faltered, and I saw that mighty efforts must be made to pre- 15 serve my joints and my nerves steadfast. All depended on the strenuous exertions and the fortunate dexterity of a moment. One now approached the door and came forth, dragging the girl, whom he held by the hair, after him. What hindered me from shooting at his first appearance I know not. This had 20 been my previous resolution. My hand touched the trigger, and, as he moved, the piece was leveled at his right ear. Perhaps the momentous consequences of my failure made me wait till his ceasing to move might render my aim more sure. Having dragged the girl, still piteously shrieking, to the 2 5 distance of ten feet from the house, he threw her from him with violence. She fell upon the ground, and, observing him level his piece at her breast, renewed her supplications in a still more piercing tone. Little did the forlorn wretch think that her deliv- erance was certain and near. I rebuked myself for having thus 30 long delayed. I fired, and my enemy sunk upon the ground without a struggle. Thus far had success attended me in this unequal contest. The next shot would leave me nearly powerless. If that, how- 64 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE ever, proved as unerring as the first, the chances of defeat were lessened. The savages within, knowing the intentions of their associate with regard to the captive girl, would probably mistake the report which they heard for that of his piece. Their 5 mistake, however, would speedily give place to doubts, and they would rush forth to ascertain the truth. It behooved me to provide a similar reception for him that next appeared. It was as I expected. Scarcely was my eye again fixed upon the entrance, when a tawny and terrible visage was stretched 10 fearfully forth. It was the signal of his fate. His glances, cast wildly and swiftly round, lighted upon me and on the fatal instrument which was pointed at his forehead. His muscles were at once exerted to withdraw his head and to vociferate a warning to his fellow; but his movement was too slow. The 1 5 ball entered above his ear. He stumbled headlong to the ground, bereaved of sensation, though not of life, and had power only to struggle and mutter. ******* There was now an interval for flight. Throwing my weapons 20 away, I might gain the thicket in a moment. I had no ammuni- tion, nor would time be afforded me to reload my piece. My antagonist would render my poniard and my speed of no use to me. Should he miss me as I fled, the girl would remain to expiate, by her agonies and death, the fate of his companions. 25 These thoughts passed through my mind in a shorter time than is demanded to express them. They yielded to an expedient suggested by the sight of the gun that had been raised to destroy the girl and which now lay upon the ground. I am not large of bone, but am not deficient in agility and strength. All that 30 remained to me of these qualities was now exerted; and, drop- ping my own piece, I leaped upon the bank and flew to seize my prize. It was not till I snatched it from the ground that the pro- priety of regaining my former post rushed upon my apprehen- THE REVOLUTIONARY PERIOD 65 sion. He that was still posted in the hovel would marK me through the seams of the wall and render my destruction sure. I once more ran toward the bank, with the intention to throw myself below it. All this was performed in an instant ; but my vigilant foe was aware of his advantage and fired through an 5 opening between the logs. The bullet grazed my cheek and produced a benumbing sensation that made me instantly fall to the earth. Though bereaved of strength and fraught with the belief that I had received a mortal wound, my caution was not remitted. I loosened not my grasp of the gun, and the posture 10 into which I accidentally fell enabled me to keep an eye upon the house and a hand upon the trigger. Perceiving my condi- tion, the savage rushed from his covert in order to complete his work ; but at three steps from the threshold he received my bullet in his breast. The uplifted tomahawk fell from his hand, and, 15 uttering a loud shriek, he fell upon the body of his companion. His cries struck upon my heart, and I wished that his better fortune had cast this evil from him upon me. 3|* SfE afC 3|S 3|C *|* *l* My anguish was mingled with astonishment. In spite of the 2 force and uniformity with which my senses were impressed by external objects, the transition I had undergone was so wild and inexplicable; all that I had performed, all that I had witnessed since my egress from the pit, were so contradictory to precedent events that I still clung to the belief that my thoughts were con- 2 5 fused by delirium. From these reveries I was at length recalled by the groans of the girl, who lay near me on the ground. I went to her and endeavored to console her. I found that, while lying in the bed, she had received a blow upon the side, which was still productive of acute pain. She was unable to 30 rise or to walk, and it was plain that one or more of her ribs had been fractured by the blow. I knew not what means to devise for our mutual relief. It was possible that the nearest dwelling was many leagues distant. 66 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE I knew not in what direction to go in order to find it, and my. strength would not suffice to carry my wounded companion thither in my arms. There was no expedient but to remain in this field of blood till the morning. 5 I had scarcely formed this resolution before the report of a musket was heard at a small distance. At the same moment, I distinctly heard the whistling of a bullet near me. I now remembered that of the five Indians whom I saw in the cavern I was acquainted with the destiny only of four. The fifth might 10 be still alive, and fortune might reserve for him the task of avenging his companions. His steps might now be tending hither in search of them. The musket belonging to him who was shot upon the threshold was still charged. It was discreet to make all the provision in 15 my power against danger. I possessed myself of this gun, and, seating myself on the ground, looked carefully on all sides to descry the approach of the enemy. I listened with breathless eagerness. Presently voices were heard. They ascended from that part 20 of the thicket from which my view was intercepted by the cottage. These voices had something in them that bespoke them to belong to friends and countrymen. As yet I was unable to distinguish words. Presently my eye was attracted to one quarter by a sound 25 as of feet trampling down bushes. Several heads were seen moving in succession, and at length the whole person was con- spicuous. One after another leaped over a kind of mound which bordered the field, and made toward the spot where I sat. This band was composed of ten or twelve persons, with each a gun 30 upon his shoulder. Their guise, the moment it was perceived, dissipated all my apprehensions. They came within the distance of a few paces before they discovered me. One stopped, and, bespeaking the attention of his followers, called to know who was there. I answered that THE REVOLUTIONARY PERIOD 67 I was a friend who entreated their assistance. I shall not paint their astonishment when, on coming nearer, they beheld me surrounded by the arms and dead bodies of my enemies. I sat upon the ground, supporting my head with my left hand, and resting on my knee the stock of a heavy musket. My 5 countenance was wan and haggard, my neck and bosom were dyed in blood, and my limbs, almost stripped by the brambles of their slender covering, were lacerated by a thousand wounds. Three savages, two of whom were steeped in gore, lay at a small distance, with the traces of recent life on their visages. Hard 1° by was the girl, venting her anguish in the deepest groans and entreating relief from the new-comers. One of the company, on approaching the girl, betrayed the utmost perturbation. "Good God!" he cried, "is this a dream? Can it be you? Speak!" 15 "Ah, my father! my father!" answered she, "it is I indeed." The company, attracted by this dialogue, crowded round the girl, whom her father, clasping in his arms, lifted from the ground and pressed, in a transport of joy, to his breast. This delight was succeeded by solicitude respecting her condition. 2 She could only answer his inquiries by complaining that her side was bruised to pieces. "How came you here?" — "Who hurt you ?"— "Where did the Indians carry you?"— were ques- tions to which she could make no reply but by sobs and plaints. My own calamities were forgotten in contemplating the fond- 2 5 ness and compassion of the man for his child. I derived new joy from reflecting that I had not abandoned her, and that she owed her preservation* to my efforts. The inquiries which the girl was unable to answer were now put to me. Every one inter- rogated me who I was, whence I had come, and what had given 30 rise to this bloody contest. I was not willing to expatiate on my story. The spirit which had hitherto sustained me began now to subside. My strength ebbed away with my blood. Tremors, lassitude, and deadly cold invaded me, and I fainted on the ground. 68 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE THE KNICKERBOCKER WRITERS 15 20 25 JOSEPH RODMAN DRAKE (1795-1820) THE AMERICAN FLAG When Freedom from her mountain height Unfurled her standard to the air, She tore the azure robe of night, And set the stars of glory there. 5 She mingled with its gorgeous dyes The milky baldric of the skies, And striped its pure celestial white With streakings of the morning light ; Then from his mansion in the sun 10 She called her eagle bearer down, And gave into his mighty hand The symbol of her chosen land. Majestic monarch of the cloud, Who rear'st aloft thy regal form, To hear the tempest trumpings loud And see the lightning lances driven, When strive the warriors of the storm, And rolls the thunder-drum of heaven. Child of the sun ! to thee 'tis given To guard the banner of the free, To hover in the sulphur smoke, To bid its blendings shine afar, Like rainbows on the cloud of war, The harbingers of victory ! Flag of the brave ! thy folds shall fly, The sign of hope and triumph high, THE KNICKERBOCKER WRITERS 69 When speaks the signal trumpet tone, And the long line comes gleaming on. Ere yet the life-blood, warm and wet, Has dimmed the glistening bayonet, Each soldier eye shall brightly turn To where thy sky-born glories burn, And, as his springing steps advance, Catch war and vengeance from the glance. And when the cannon-mouthings loud Heave in wild wreaths the battle shroud, And gory sabres rise and fall Like shoots of flame on midnight's pall, Then shall thy meteor glances glow, And cowering foes shall shrink beneath Each gallant arm that strikes below That lovely messenger of death. Flag of the seas ! On ocean wave Thy stars shall glitter o'er the brave; When death, careering, on the gale, Sweeps darkly round the bellied sail, And frighted waves rush wildly back Before the broadside's reeling rack, Each dying wanderer of the sea Shall look at once to heaven and thee, And smile to see thy splendors fly In triumph o'er his closing eye. 10 20 25 Flag of the free heart's hope and home ! By angel hands to valor given ; The stars have lit the welkin dome, And all thy hues were born in heaven. 3 Q 70 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE Forever float that standard sheet! Where breathes the foe but falls before us, With Freedom's soil beneath our feet, And Freedom's banner streaming o'er us ? FITZ-GREENE HALLECK (1790-1867) ON THE DEATH OF JOSEPH RODMAN DRAKE 5 Green be the turf above thee, Friend of my better days ! None knew thee but to love thee, Nor named thee but to praise. Tears fell when thou wert dying, 10 From eyes unused to weep, And long, where thou art lying, Will tears the cold turf steep. When hearts, whose truth was proven, Like thine, are laid in earth, 1 5 There should a wreath be woven To tell the world their worth ; And I who woke each morrow To clasp thy hand in mine, Who shared thy joy and sorrow, Whose weal and woe were thine; It should be mine to braid it Around thy faded brow, But I've in vain essayed it, And feel I cannot now. THE KNICKERBOCKER WRITERS 71 While memory bids me weep thee, Nor thoughts nor words are free, — The grief is fixed too deeply That mourns a man like thee. MARCO BOZZARIS At midnight, in his guarded tent, 5 The Turk was dreaming of the hour When Greece, her knee in suppliance bent, Should tremble at his power : In dreams, through camp and court, he bore The trophies of a conqueror ; 1 In dreams his song of triumph heard ; Then wore his monarch's signet ring : Then pressed that monarch's throne — a king; As wild his thoughts, and gay of wing, As Eden's garden bird. 15 At midnight, in the forest shades, Bozzaris ranged his Suliote band, True as the steel of their tried blades, Heroes in heart and hand. There had the Persian's thousands stood, 20 There had the glad earth drunk their blood On old Platsea's day ; And now there breathed that haunted air The sons of* sires who conquered there, With arms to strike and soul to dare, 25 As quick, as far as they. An hour passed on — the Turk awoke ; That bright dream was his last ; 72 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE He woke — to hear his sentries shriek, "To arms ! they come ! the Greek ! the Greek !" He woke — to die midst flame, and smoke, And shout, and groan, and saber stroke, 5 And death shots falling thick and fast As lightnings from the mountain cloud; And heard, with voice as trumpet loud, Bozzaris cheer his band: "Strike — till the last armed foe expires ; Strike — for your altars and your fires ; Strike — for the green graves of your sires ; God — and your native land !" They fought — like brave men, long and well ; They piled that ground with Moslem slain, 15 They conquered — but Bozzaris fell, Bleeding at every vein. His few surviving comrades saw His smile when rang their proud hurrah, And the red field was won ; 2 Then saw in death his eyelids close Calmly, as to a night's repose, Like flowers at set of sun. Come to the bridal-chamber, Death ! Come to the mother's, when she feels, For the first time, her first-born's breath ; Come when the blessed seals That close the pestilence are broke, And crowded cities wail its stroke; Come in consumption's ghastly form, The earthquake shock, the ocean storm ; Come when the heart beats high and warm With banquet song, and dance, and wine; THE KNICKERBOCKER WRITERS 73 And thou art terrible — the tear, The groan, the knell, the pall, the bier, And all we know, or dream, or fear Of agony are thine. But to the hero, when his sword 5 Has won the battle for the free, Thy voice sounds like a prophet's word; And in its hollow tones are heard The thanks of millions yet to be. Come, when his task of fame is wrought — 1 ° Come, with her laurel leaf, blood-bought — Come in her crowning hour — and then Thy sunken eye's unearthly light To him is welcome as the sight Of sky and stars to prisoned men ; 1 5 Thy grasp is welcome as the hand Of brother in a foreign land; Thy summons welcome as the cry That told the Indian isles were nigh To the world-seeking Genoese, 20 When the land wind, from woods of palm, And orange groves, and fields of balm, Blew o'er the Haytian seas. Bozzaris! with the storied brave Greece nurtured in her glory's time, 2 5 Rest thee — there is no prouder grave, Even in her own proud clime. She wore no funeral weeds for thee, Nor bade the dark hearse wave its plume Like torn branch from death's leafless tree 3 ° In sorrow's pomp and pageantry, The heartless luxury of the tomb ; 74 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE But she remembers thee as one Long loved and for a season gone ; For thee her poet's lyre is wreathed, Her marble wrought, her music breathed ; 5 For thee she rings the birthday bells ; Of thee her babe's first lisping tells ; For thine her evening prayer is said At palace couch and cottage bed ; Her soldier, closing with the foe, 1 ° Gives for thy sake a deadlier blow ; His plighted maiden, when she fears For him the joy of her young years, Thinks of thy fate, and checks her tears ; And she, the mother of thy boys, 1 5 Though in her eye and faded cheek Is read the grief she will not speak, The memory of her buried joys, And even she who gave thee birth Will, by their pilgrim-circled hearth, 2 Talk of thy doom without a sigh ; For thou art Freedom's now, and Fame's : One of the few, the immortal names, That were not born to die. WASHINGTON IRVING Born in New York, 1783; died at Sunnyside, on the Hudson River, 1859 RIP VAN WINKLE Whoever has made a voyage up the Hudson must remember 2 5 the Catskill Mountains. They are a dismembered branch of the great Appalachian family, and are seen away to the west of the river, swelling up to a noble height and lording it over the sur- rounding country. Every change of season, every change of THE KNICKERBOCKER WRITERS 75 weather, indeed, every hour of the day, produces some change in the magical hues and shapes of these mountains, and they are regarded by all the good wives, far and near, as perfect baro- meters. When the weather is fair and settled, they are clothed in blue and purple, and print their bold outlines on the clear 5 evening sky; but sometimes, when the rest of the landscape is cloudless, they will gather a hood of gray vapors about their summits, which, in the last rays of the setting sun, will glow and light up like a crown of glory. At the foot of these fairy mountains the voyager may have 1° descried the light smoke curling up from a village whose shingle roofs gleam among the trees, just where the blue tints of the upland melt away into the fresh green of the nearer landscape. It is a little village of great antiquity, having been founded by some of the Dutch colonists in the early times of the province, 15 just about the beginning of the government of the good Peter Stuyvesant (may he rest in peace!), and there were some of the houses of the original settlers standing within a few years,, built of small yellow bricks brought from Holland, with lattice windows, and gable fronts surmounted with weather-cocks. 2 In that same village, and in one of these very houses (which, to tell the precise truth, was sadly time-worn and weather- beaten), there lived many years since, while the country was yet a province of Great Britain, a simple, good-natured fellow of the name of Rip Van Winkle. He was a descendant of the Van 2 5 Winkles who figured so gallantly in the chivalrous days of Peter Stuyvesant, and accompanied him to the siege of Fort Christina. He inherited, however, but little of the martial character of his ancestors. I have observed that he was a simple, good-natured man; he was, moreover, a kind neighbor and an obedient, hen- 3 pecked husband. Indeed, to the latter circumstance might be owing that meekness of spirit which gained him such universal popularity ; for those men are most apt to be obsequious and con- ciliating abroad who are under the discipline of shrews at home. 76 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE Their tempers, doubtless, are rendered pliant and malleable in the fiery furnace of domestic tribulation; and a curtain lecture is worth all the sermons in the world for teaching the virtues of patience and long-suffering. A termagant wife may, therefore, 5 in some respects be considered a tolerable blessing; and if so, Rip Van Winkle was thrice blessed. Certain it is that he was a great favorite among all the good wives of the village, who, as usual with the amiable sex took his part in all family squabbles, and never failed, whenever they 1® talked those matters over in their evening gossipings, to lay all the blame on Dame Van Winkle. The children of the village, too, would shout with joy whenever he approached. He assisted at their sports, made their playthings, taught them to fly kites and shoot marbles, and told them long stories of ghosts, witches, and 15 Indians. Whenever he went dodging about the village, he was surrounded by a troop of them, hanging on his skirts, clambering on his back, and playing a thousand tricks on him with impunity ; and not a dog would bark at him throughout the neighborhood. The great error in Rip's composition was an insuperable aver- 2 sion to all kinds of profitable labor. It could not be from the want of assiduity or perseverance; for he would sit on a wet rock, with a rod as long and heavy as a Tartar's lance, and fish all day without a murmur, even though he should not be encouraged by a single nibble. He would carry a fowling-piece 25 on his shoulder for hours together, trudging through woods and swamps, and up hill and down dale, to shoot a few squirrels or wild pigeons. He would never refuse to assist a neighbor even in the roughest toil, and was a foremost man at all country frolics for husking Indian corn or building stone fences. The 30 women of the village, too, used to employ him to run their errands, and to do such little odd jobs as their less obliging husbands would not do for them: in a word, Rip was ready to attend to anybody's business but his own ; but as to doing family duty and keeping his farm in order, he found it impossible. THE KNICKERBOCKER WRITERS 77 In fact, he declared it was of no use to work on his farm; it was the most pestilent little piece of ground in the whole country; everything about it went wrong, and would go wrong, in spite of him. His fences were continually falling to pieces; his cow would either go astray or get among the cabbages ; weeds 5 were sure to grow quicker in his fields than anywhere else ; the rain always made a point of setting in just as he had some out- door work to do ; so that though his patrimonial estate had dwindled away under his management, acre by acre, until there was little more left than a mere patch of Indian corn and potatoes, 10 yet it was the worst-conditioned farm in the neighborhood. His children, too, were as ragged and wild as if they belonged to nobody. His son Rip, an urchin begotten in his own likeness, promised to inherit the habits, with the old clothes of his father. He was generally seen trooping like a colt at his mother's heels, 15 equipped in a pair of his father's cast-off galligaskins, which he had much ado to hold up with one hand, as a fine lady does her train in bad weather. Rip Van Winkle, however, was one of those happy mortals, of foolish, well-oiled dispositions, who take the world easy, eat 2 white bread or brown, whichever can be got with least thought or trouble, and would rather starve on a penny than work for a pound. If left to himself, he would have whistled life away in perfect contentment; but his wife kept continually dinning in his ears about his idleness, his carelessness, and the ruin he was 2 5 bringing on his family. Morning, noon, and night, her tongue was incessantly going, and everything he said or did was sure to produce a torrent of household eloquence. Rip had but one way of replying to all lectures of the kind, and that, by frequent use, had grown into a habit. He shrugged his shoulders, shook 3 his head, cast up his eyes, but said nothing. This, however, always provoked a fresh volley from his wife, so that he was fain to draw off his forces, and take to the outside of the house — the only side which, in truth, belongs to a henpecked husband. 78 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE Rip's sole domestic adherent was his dog Wolf, who was as much henpecked as his master ; for Dame Van Winkle regarded them as companions in idleness, and even looked upon Wolf with an evil eye, as the cause of his master's so often going astray. 5 True it is, in all points of spirit befitting an honorable dog, he was as courageous an animal as ever scoured the woods — but what courage can withstand the ever-during and all-besetting terrors of a woman's tongue? The moment Wolf entered the house his crest fell, his tail drooped to the ground, or curled between his 10 legs; he sneaked about with a gallows air, casting many a side- long glance at Dame Van Winkle, and at the least flourish of a broomstick or ladle he would fly to the door with yelping precipitation. Times grew worse and worse with Rip Van Winkle as years !5 of matrimony rolled on; a tart temper never mellows with age, and a sharp tongue is the only edged tool that grows keener by constant use. For a long while he used to console himself, when driven from home, by frequenting a kind of perpetual club of the sages, philosophers, and other idle personages of the village, which 2 held its sessions on a bench before a small inn, designated by a rubicund portrait of His Majesty George the Third. Here they used to sit in the shade through a long lazy summer's day, talking listlessly over village gossip, or telling endless sleepy stories about nothing. But it would have been worth any statesman's money 2 5 to have heard the profound discussions which sometimes took place, when by chance an old newspaper fell into their hands from some passing traveler. How solemnly they would listen to the contents, as drawled out by Derrick Van Bummel, the schoolmaster, a dapper, learned little man, who was not to be 3 daunted by the mobt gigantic word in the dictionary; and how sagely they would deliberate upon public events some months after they had taken place ! The opinions of this junto were completely controlled by Nicholas Vedder, a patriarch of the village, and landlord of the THE KNICKERBOCKER WRITERS 79 inn, at the door of which he took his seat from morning till night, just moving sufficiently to avoid the sun and keep in the shade of a large tree; so that the neighbors could tell the hour by his movements as accurately as by a sun-dial. It is true, he was rarely heard to speak, but smoked his pipe incessantly. His 5 adherents, however (for every great man has his adherents), perfectly understood him, and knew how to gather his opinions. When anything that was read or related displeased him, he was observed to smoke his pipe vehemently, and send forth short, frequent and angry puffs; but when pleased, he would inhale 10 the smoke slowly and tranquilly, and emit it in light and placid clouds, and sometimes, taking the pipe from his mouth, and letting the fragrant vapor curl about his nose, would gravely nod his head in token of perfect approbation. From even this stronghold the unlucky Rip was at length 15 routed by his termagant wife, who would suddenly break in upon the tranquility of the assemblage and call the members all to nought ; nor was that august personage, Nicholas Vedder himself, sacred from the daring tongue of this terrible virago, who charged him outright with encouraging her husband in habits 2 of idleness. Poor Rip was at last reduced almost to despair; and his only alternative, to escape from the labor of the farm and clamor of his wife, was to take gun in hand and stroll away into the woods. Here he would sometimes seat himself at the foot of 2 5 a tree and share the contents of his wallet with Wolf, with whom he sympathized as a fellow-sufferer in persecution. "Poor Wolf," he would say, "thy*mistress leads thee a dog's life of it; but never mind, my lad, while I live thou shalt never want a friend to stand by thee!" Wolf would wag his tail, look wist- 3 fully in his master's face, and if dogs can feel pity, I verily believe he reciprocated the sentiment with all his heart. In a long ramble of the kind on a fine autumnal day, Rip had unconsciously scrambled to one of the highest parts of the Catskill 80 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE Mountains. He was after his favorite sport of squirrel shooting, and the still solitudes had echoed and re-echoed with the reports of his gun. Panting and fatigued, he threw himself, late in the afternoon, on a green knoll, covered with mountain herbage, that 5 crowned the brow of the precipice. From an opening between the trees he could overlook all the lower country for many a mile of rich woodland. He saw at a distance the lordly Hudson, far, far below him, moving on its silent but majestic course, with the reflection of a purple cloud, or the sail of a lagging bark, here 10 and there sleeping on its glassy bosom, and at last losing itself in the blue highlands. On the other side he looked down into a deep mountain glen, wild, lonely, and shagged, the bottom filled with fragments from the impending cliffs, and scarcely lighted by the reflected rays 15 of the setting sun. For some time Rip lay musing on this scene; evening was gradually advancing; the mountains began to throw their long blue shadows over the valleys ; he saw that it would be dark long before he could reach the village, and he heaved a heavy sigh when he thought of encountering the terrors of Dame 2 Van Winkle. As he was about to descend, he heard a voice from a distance, hallooing, "Rip Van Winkle! Rip Van Winkle!" He looked around, but could see nothing but a crow winging its solitary flight across the mountain. He thought his fancy must have 25 deceived him, and turned again to descend, when he heard the same cry ring through the still evening air: "Rip Van Winkle! Rip Van Winkle !" — at the same time Wolf bristled up his back, and, giving a low growl, skulked to his master's side, looking fearfully down into the glen. Rip now felt a vague apprehen- 30 sion stealing over him; he looked anxiously in the same direction, and perceived a strange figure slowly toiling up the rock, and bending under the weight of something he carried on his back. He was surprised to see any human being in this lonely and THE KNICKERBOCKER WRITERS 81 unfrequented place, but supposing it to be some one of the neigh- borhood in need of assistance, he hastened down to yield it. On nearer approach, he was still more surprised at the singu- larity of the stranger's appearance. He was a short, square-built old fellow, with thick bushy hair, and a grizzled beard. His dress 5 was of the antique Dutch fashion — a cloth jerkin strapped around the waist — several pair of breeches, the outer one of ample volume, decorated with rows of buttons down the sides and bunches at the knees. He bore on his shoulders a stout keg, that seemed full of liquor, and made signs for Rip to approach 10 and assist him with the load. Though rather shy and distrustful of this new acquaintance, Rip complied with his usual alacrity; and mutually relieving one another, they clambered up a narrow gully, apparently the dry bed of a mountain torrent. As they ascended, Rip every now and then heard long rolling peals, like 15 distant thunder, that seemed to issue out of a deep ravine, or rather cleft between lofty rocks, toward which their rugged path conducted. He paused for an instant, but supposing it to be the muttering of one of those transient thunder-showers which often take place in mountain heights, he proceeded. Passing 2 through the ravine, they came to a hollow, like a small amphi- theater, surrounded by perpendicular precipices, over the brinks of which impending trees shot their branches, so that you only caught glimpses of the azure sky and the bright evening cloud. During the whole time Rip and his companion had labored on in 2 5 silence, for though the former marveled greatly what could be the object of carrying a keg of liquor up this wild mountain, yet there was something st/ange and incomprehensible about the unknown that inspired awe and checked familiarity. On entering the amphitheater, new objects of wonder pre- 30 sented themselves. On a level spot in the center was a company of odd-looking personages playing at ninepins. They were dressed in a quaint, outlandish fashion : some wore short doublets, others jerkins, with long knives in their belts, and most had enormous 10 15 82 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE breeches, of similar style with that of the guide's. Their visages, too, were peculiar : one had a large head, broad face, and small, piggish eyes; the face of another seemed to consist entirely of nose, and was surmounted by a white sugar-loaf hat set off with a little red cock's tail. They all had beards, of various shapes and colors. There was one who seemed to be the commander. He was a stout old gentleman, with a weatherbeaten countenance ; he wore a laced doublet, broad belt and hanger, high-crowned hat and feather, red stockings, and high-heeled shoes, with roses in them. The whole group reminded Rip of the figures in an old Flemish painting, in the parlor of Dominie Van Shaick, the village parson, and which had been brought over from Holland at the time of the settlement. What seemed particularly odd to Rip was that though these folks were evidently amusing themselves, yet they maintained the gravest faces, the most mysterious silence, and were, withal, the most melancholy party of pleasure he had ever witnessed. Nothing interrupted the stillness of the scene but the noise of the balls, which, whenever they were rolled, echoed along the 20 mountains like rumbling peals of thunder. As Rip and his companion approached them, they suddenly desisted from their play and stared at him with such fixed statue-like gaze, and such strange, uncouth, lack-luster counten- ances, that his heart turned within him and his knees smote 25 together. His companion now emptied the contents of the keg into large flagons, and made signs to him to wait upon the com- pany. He obeyed with fear and trembling; they quaffed the liquor in profound silence, and then returned to their game. By degrees, Rip's awe and apprehension subsided. He even ventured, when no eye was fixed upon him, to taste the beverage, which he found had much of the flavor of excellent Hollands. He was naturally a thirsty soul and was soon tempted to repeat the draught. One taste provoked another, and he reiterated his visits to the flagon so often that at length his senses were over- 30 THE KNICKERBOCKER WRITERS 83 powered, his eyes swam in his head, his head gradually declined, and he fell into a deep sleep. On awakening, he found himself on the green knoll from whence he had first seen the old man of the glen. He rubbed his eyes — it was a bright sunny morning. The birds were hopping and twittering among the bushes, and the eagle was wheeling aloft and breasting the pure mountain breeze. "Surely," thought Rip, "I have not slept here all night." He recalled the occurrences before he fell asleep. The strange man with a keg of liquor — the mountain ravine — the wild retreat among the rocks — the woebegone party at ninepins — the flagon — "Oh! that flagon! that wicked flagon!" thought Rip— "what excuse shall I make to Dame Van Winkle?" He looked round for his gun, but in place of the clean, well- oiled fowling piece, he found an old fire-lock lying by him, the barrel incrusted with rust, the lock falling off, and the stock worm-eaten. He now suspected that the grave roysters of the mountain had put a trick upon him, and, having dosed him with liquor, had robbed him of his gun. Wolf, too, had disappeared, but he might have strayed away after a squirrel or partridge. He whistled after him and shouted his name, but all in vain ; the echoes repeated his whistle and shout, but no dog was to be seen. He determined to revisit the scene of the last evening's gambol, and if he met with any of the party, to demand his dog and gun. As he rose to walk, he found himself stiff in the joints, and wanting in his usual activity. "These mountain beds do not agree with me," thoftght Rip, "and if this frolic should lay me up with a fit of the rheumatism, I shall have a blessed time with Dame Van Winkle." With some difficulty he got down into the glen; he found the gully up which he and his companion had ascended the preceding evening ; but to his astonishment a moun- tain stream was now foaminsf down it, leaping from rock to rock and filling the glen with babbling murmurs. He, however, made 84 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE shift to scramble up its sides, working his toilsome way through thickets of birch, sassafras, and witch-hazel and sometimes tripped up or entangled by the wild grapevines that twisted their coils and tendrils from tree to tree and spread a kind of network 5 in his path. At length he reached to where the ravine had opened through the cliffs to the amphitheater ; but no traces of such opening remained. The rocks presented a high, impenetrable wall, over which the torrent came tumbling in a sheet of feathery foam and 10 fell into a broad, deep basin, black from the shadows of the sur- rounding forest. Here, then, poor Rip was brought to a stand. He again called and whistled after his dog; he was only answered by the cawing of a flock of idle crows, sporting high in air about a dry tree that overhung a sunny precipice, and who, secure in 15 their elevation, seemed to look down and scoff at the poor man's perplexities. What was to be done? — the morning was passing away, and Rip felt famished for want of his breakfast. He grieved to give up his dog and gun ; he dreaded to meet his wife ; but it would not do to starve among the mountains. He shook 2 his head, shouldered the rusty firelock, and, with a heart full of trouble and anxiety, turned his steps homeward. As he approached the village, he met a number of people, but none whom he knew, which somewhat surprised him, for he had thought himself acquainted with every one in the country round. 25 Their dress, too, was of a different fashion from that to which he was accustomed. They all stared at him with equal marks of surprise, and whenever they cast their eyes upon him invari- ably stroked their chins. The constant recurrence of this gesture induced Rip, involuntarily, to do the same, when, to his astonish- 30 ment, he found his beard had grown a foot long! He had now entered the skirts of the village. A troop of strange children ran at his heels, hooting after him, and pointing at his gray beard. The dogs, too, none of which he recognized for his old acquaintances, barked at him as he passed. The very THE KNICKERBOCKER WRITERS 85 village was altered; it was larger and more populous. There were rows of houses which he had never seen before, and those which had been his familiar haunts had disappeared. Strange names were over the doors — strange faces at the windows — every- thing was strange. His mind now began to misgive him; he 5 doubted whether both he and the world around him were not bewitched. Surely this was his native village, which he had left but the day before. There stood the Catskill Mountains — there ran the silver Hudson at a distance — there was every hill and dale precisely as it had always been — Rip was sorely perplexed — 1° "That flagon last night," thought he, "has addled my poor head sadly !" It was with some difficulty he found the way to his own house, which he approached with silent awe, expecting every moment to hear the shrill voice of Dame Van Winkle. He 15 found the house gone to decay — the roof fallen in, the windows shattered, and the doors off the hinges. A half-starved dog that looked like Wolf was skulking about it. Rip called him by name, but the cur snarled, showed his teeth, and passed on. This was an unkind cut, indeed — "My very dog," sighed poor 20 Rip, "has forgotten me!" He entered the house, which, to tell the truth, Dame Van Winkle had always kept in neat order. It was empty, forlorn, and apparently abandoned. This desolateness overcame all his connubial fears — he called loudly for his wife and children — 25 the lonely chambers rang for a moment with his voice, and then all again was silence. He now hurried forth, and hastened to his old resort, the * little village inn — but it, too, was gone. A large rickety wooden building stood in its place, with great gaping windows, some of 30 them broken and mended with old hats and petticoats, and over the door was painted, "The Union Hotel, by Jonathan Doolittle." Instead of the great tree which used to shelter the quiet little Dutch inn of yore, there now was reared a tall naked pole, with 86 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE something on the top that looked like a red nightcap, and from it was fluttering a flag, on which was a singular assemblage of stars and stripes — all this was strange and incomprehensible. He recognized on the sign, however, the ruby face of King George, 5 under which he had smoked so many a peaceful pipe, but even this was singularly metamorphosed. The red coat was changed for one of blue and buff, a sword was stuck in the hand instead of a scepter, the head was decorated with a cocked hat, and underneath was painted in large characters, General 10 Washington. There was, as usual, a crowd of folk about the door, but none whom Rip recollected. The very character of the people seemed changed. There was a busy, bustling, disputatious tone about it, instead of the accustomed phlegm and drowsy tranquility. He 15 looked in vain for the sage Nicholas Vedder, with his broad face, double chin, and fair long pipe, uttering clouds of tobacco smoke instead of idle speeches; or Van Bummel, the schoolmaster, doling forth the contents of an ancient newspaper. In place of these, a lean, bilious-looking fellow, with his pockets full of 20 handbills, was haranguing vehemently about rights of citizens — election — members of Congress — liberty — Bunker's Hill — heroes of '76 — and other words that were a perfect Babylonish jargon to the bewildered Van Winkle. The appearance of Rip, with his long grizzled beard, his rusty 26 fowling-piece, his uncouth dress, and the army of women and children that had gathered at his heels, soon attracted the atten- tion of the tavern politicians. They crowded around him, eyeing him from head to foot with great curiosity. The orator bustled up to him, and drawing him partly aside, inquired "on which side 30 he voted?" Rip stared in vacant stupidity. Another short but busy little fellow pulled him by the arm, and rising on tiptoe, inquired in his ear, "whether he was Federal or Democrat." Rip was equally at a loss to comprehend the question; when a knowing, self-important old gentleman, in a sharp cocked hat, 10 THE KNICKERBOCKER WRITERS 87 made his way through the crowd, putting them to the right and left with his elbows as he passed, and planting himself before Van Winkle, with one arm akimbo, the other resting on his cane, his keen eyes and sharp hat penetrating, as it were, into his very soul, demanded, in an austere tone, "what brought him to the election with a gun on his shoulder, and a mob at his heels, and whether he meant to breed a riot in the village?" "Alas ! gentle- men," cried Rip, somewhat dismayed, "I am a poor quiet man, a native of the place, and a loyal subject of the king, God bless him!" Here a general shout burst from the bystanders — "A Tory! a Tory ! a spy ! a refugee ! hustle him ! away with him !" It was with great difficulty that the self-important man in the cocked hat restored order ; and having assumed a tenfold austerity of brow, demanded again of the unknown culprit what he came 15 there for, and whom he was seeking. The poor man humbly assured him that he meant no harm ; but merely came in search of some neighbors, who used to keep about the tavern. "Well — who are they ? — name them." Rip bethought himself a moment, and then inquired, "Where's 2 Nicholas Vedder?" There was silence for a little while, when an old man replied in a thin, piping voice, "Nicholas Vedder? why, he is dead and gone these eighteen years! There was a wooden tombstone in the churchyard that used to tell all about him, but that's rotten 2 5 and gone, too." "Where's Brom Dutcher?" "Oh, he went off to the army in the beginning of the war ; some say he was killed at the battle of Stony Point — others say he was drowned in a squall, at the foot of Antony's Nose. I 30 don't know — he never came back again." "Where's Van Bummel, the schoolmaster?" "He went off to the wars, too, was a great militia general, and is now in Congress." 10 88 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE Rip's heart died away, at hearing of these sad changes in his home and friends, and finding himself thus alone in the world. Every answer puzzled him, too, by treating of such enormous lapses of time and of matters which he could not understand: war — Congress — Stony Point — he had no courage to ask after any more friends, but cried out in despair, ''Does nobody here know Rip Van Winkle?" "Oh, Rip Van Winkle !" exclaimed two or three; "Oh, to be sure! that's Rip Van Winkle yonder, leaning against the Rip looked and beheld a precise counterpart of himself, as he went up the mountain : apparently as lazy, and certainly as ragged. The poor fellow was now completely confounded. He doubted his own identity, and whether he was himself or another 16 man. In the midst of his bewilderment, the man in the cocked hat demanded who he was, and what was his name ? "God knows," exclaimed he, at his wit's end; "I'm not myself — I'm somebody else — that's me yonder — no — that's some- body else, got into my shoes — I was myself last night, but I fell 20 asleep on the mountain, and they've changed my gun, and every- thing's changed, and I'm changed, and I can't tell what's my name, or who I am I" The bystanders began now to look at each other, nod, wink significantly, and tap their fingers against their foreheads. There 25 was a whisper, also, about securing the gun, and keeping the old fellow from doing mischief; at the very suggestion of which, the self-important man in the cocked hat retired with some pre- cipitation. At this critical moment a fresh, likely woman pressed through the throng to get a peep at the gray-bearded man. She 30 had a chubby child in her arms, which, frightened at his looks, began to cry. "Hush, Rip," criea she, "hush, you little fool, the old man won't hurt you." The name of the child, the air of the mother, the tone of her voice, all awakened a train of recollec- 10 THE KNICKERBOCKER WRITERS 89 tions in his mind. "What is your name, my good woman?" asked he. "Judith Gardenier." "And your father's name?" "Ah, poor man, his name was Rip Van Winkle; it's twenty years since he went away from home with his gun, and never has been heard of since — his dog came home without him; but whether he shot himself, or was carried away by the Indians, nobody can tell. I was then but a little girl." Rip had but one question more to ask; but he put it with a faltering voice : — "Where's your mother?" "Oh, she, too, had died but a short time since ; she broke a blood vessel in a fit of passion at a New England peddler." There was a drop of comfort, at least, in this intelligence. *5 The honest man could contain himself no longer. He caught his daughter and her child in his arms. "I am your father!" cried he— "Young Rip Van Winkle once— old Rip Van Winkle now ! — Does nobody know poor Rip Van Winkle !" All stood amazed, until an old woman, tottering out from 20 among the crowd, put her hand to her brow, and, peering under it in his face for a moment, exclaimed, "Sure enough ! it is Rip Van Winkle — it is himself. Welcome home again, old neighbor. Why, where have you been these twenty long years?" Rip's story was soon told, for the whole twenty years had 25 been to him but as one night. The neighbors stared when they heard it; some were seen to wink at each other, and put their tongues in their cheeks ; and the self-important man in the cocked hat, who, when the alarm was over, had returned to the field, screwed down the corners of his mouth, and shook his head — upon which there was a general shaking of the head throughout the assemblage. It was determined, however, to take the opinion of old Peter Vanderdonk, who was seen slowly advancing up the road. He 30 15 90 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE was a descendant of the historian of that name, who wrote one of the earliest accounts of the province. Peter was the most ancient inhabitant of the village and well versed in all the wonder- ful events and traditions of the neighborhood. He recollected & Rip at once and corroborated his story in the most satisfactory manner. He assured the company that it was a fact, handed down from his ancestor the historian, that the Catskill Moun- tains had always been haunted by strange beings. That it was affirmed that the great Hendrick Hudson, the first discoverer of 10 the river and country, kept a kind of vigil there every twenty years, with his crew of the Half-Moon, being permitted in this way to revisit the scenes of his enterprise and keep a guardian eye upon the river, and the great city called by his name. That his father had once seen them in their old Dutch dresses playing at ninepins in a hollow of the mountain; and that he himself had heard, one summer afternoon, the sound of their balls, like distant peals of thunder. To make a long story short, the company broke up and returned to the more important concerns of the election. Rip's 20 daughter took him home to live with her; she had a snug, well- furnished house, and a stout cheery farmer for a husband, whom Rip recollected for one of the urchins that used to climb upon his back. As to Rip's son and heir, who was the ditto of himself, seen leaning against the tree, he was employed to work on the 25 farm; but evinced an hereditary disposition to attend to anything else but his business. Rip now resumed his old walks and habits; he soon found many of his former cronies, though all rather the worse for the wear and tear of time ; and preferred making friends among the 30 rising generation, with whom he soon grew into great favor. Having nothing to do at home and being arrived at that happy age when a man can do nothing with impunity, he took his place once more on the bench at the inn door, and was reverenced as one of the patriarchs of the village, and a chronicle of the old THE KNICKERBOCKER WRITERS 91 times "before the war." It was some time before he could get into the regular track of gossip, or could be made to comprehend the strange events that had taken place during his torpor. How that there had been a revolutionary war — that the country had thrown off the yoke of old England — and that, instead of being 5 a subject of His Majesty, George III., he was now a free citizen of the United States. Rip, in fact, was no politician; the changes of states and empires made but little impression on him ; but there was one species of despotism under which he had long groaned, and that was — petticoat government; happily, that was 10 at an end; he had got his neck out of the yoke of matrimony and could go in and out whenever he pleased, without dreading the tyranny of Dame Van Winkle. Whenever her name was mentioned, however, he shook his head, shrugged his shoulders, and cast up his eyes; which might pass either for an expression 15 of resignation to his fate, or joy at his deliverance. He used to tell his story to every stranger that arrived at Mr. Doolittle's hotel. He was observed, at first, to vary on some points every time he told it, which was, doubtless, owing to his having so recently awaked. It at last settled down pre- 2 cisely to the tale I have related, and not a man, woman or child in the neighborhood but knew it by heart. Some always pre- tended to doubt the reality of it, and insisted that Rip had been out of his head, and that was one point on which he always remained flighty. The old Dutch inhabitants, however, almost 2 5 universally gave it full credit. Even to this day they never hear a thunderstorm of a summer afternoon about the Catskills, but they say Hendrick Hudson and his crew are at their game of ninepins; and it is a common wish of all henpecked husbands in the neighborhood, when life hangs heavy on their hands, that 3 they might have a quieting draught out of Rip Van Winkle's flagon. 92 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE JAMES FENIMORE COOPER Born in Burlington, N. J., 1789; died in Cooperstown, N. Y., 1851 RUNNING THE GAUNTLET From The Last of the Mohicans It is unusual to find an encampment of the natives, like those of the more instructed whites, guarded by the presence of armed men. Well informed of the approach of every danger while it is yet at a distance, the Indian generally rests secure under his 5 knowledge of the signs of the forest and the long and difficult paths that separate him from those he has most reason to dread. But the enemy who, by any lucky concurrence of accidents, has found means to elude the vigilance of the scouts, will seldom meet with sentinels nearer home to sound the alarm. In addition 10 to this general usage, the tribes friendly to the French knew too well the weight of the blow that had just been struck to appre- hend any immediate danger from the hostile nations that were tributary to the crown of Britain. When Duncan and David, therefore, found themselves in the 15 centre of the children, who played the antics already mentioned, it was without the least previous intimation of their approach. But so soon as they were observed the whole of the juvenile pack raised, by common consent, a shrill and warning whoop; and then sank, as it were, by magic, from before the sight of their 2 visitors. The naked, tawny bodies of the crouching urchins blended so nicely at that hour with the withered herbage that at first it seemed as if the earth had, in truth, swallowed up their forms ; though when surprise permitted Duncan to bend his look more curiously about the spot, he found it everywhere met by 2 5 dark, quick, and rolling eyeballs-. Gathering no encouragement from this startling presage of the nature of the scrutiny he was likely to undergo from the more mature judgments of the men, there was an instant when THE KNICKERBOCKER WRITERS 93 the young soldier would have retreated. It was, however, too late to appear to hesitate. The cry of the children had drawn a dozen warriors to the door of the nearest lodge, where they stood clustered in a dark and savage group, gravely awaiting the nearer approach of those who had unexpectedly come among 5 them. David, in some measure familiarized to the scene, led the way, with a steadiness that no slight obstacle was likely to disconcert, into this very building. It was the principal edifice of the village, though roughly constructed of the bark and branches of trees; 10 being the lodge in which the tribe held its councils and public meetings during their temporary residence on the borders of the English province. Duncan found it difficult to assume the necessary appearance of unconcern, as he brushed the dark and powerful frames of the savages who thronged its threshold; 15 but, conscious that his existence depended on his presence of mind, he trusted to the discretion of his companion, whose foot- steps he closely followed, endeavoring, as he proceeded, to rally his thoughts for the occasion. His blood curdled when he found himself in absolute contact with such fierce and implacable 2 enemies; but he so far mastered his feelings as to pursue his way into the centre of the lodge with an exterior that did not betray the weakness. Imitating the example of the deliberate Gamut, he drew a bundle of fragrant brush from beneath a pile that filled the corner of the hut and seated himself in silence. 2 5 So soon as their visitor had passed, the observant warriors fell back from the entrance, and, arranging themselves about him, they seemed patiently to await the moment when it might com- port with the dignity of the stranger to speak. By far the greater number stood leaning, in lazy, lounging attitudes, against 30 the upright posts that supported the crazy building, while three or four of the oldest and most distinguished of the chiefs placed themselves on the earth a little more in advance. 94 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE A flaring torch was burning in the place and sent its red glare from face to face and figure to figure as it waved in the currents of air. Duncan profited by its light to read the probable char- acter of his reception, in the countenances of his hosts. But 5 his ingenuity availed him little against the cold artifices of the people he had encountered. The chiefs in front scarce cast a glance at his person, keeping their eyes on the ground, with an air that might have been intended for respect, but which it was quite easy to construe into distrust. The men in shadow were 10 less reserved. Duncan soon detected their searching but stolen looks, which, in truth, scanned his person and attire inch by inch ; leaving no emotion of the countenance, no gesture, no line of the paint, nor even the fashion of a garment unheeded and without comment. 15 At length one whose hair was beginning to be sprinkled with gray, but whose sinewy limbs and firm tread announced that he was still equal to the duties of manhood, advanced out of the gloom of a corner, whither he had probably posted himself to make his observations unseen, and spoke. He used the language 20 of the Wyandots, or Hurons ; his words were, consequently, unin- telligible to Heyward, though they seemed, by the gestures that accompanied them, to be uttered more in courtesy than anger. The latter shook his head, and made a gesture indicative of his inability to reply. 2 5 "Do none of my brothers speak the French or the English?" he said in the former language, looking about him from counte- nance to countenance in hopes of finding a nod of assent. Though more than one had turned, as if to catch the mean- ing of his words, they remained unanswered. 30 "I should be grieved to think," continued Duncan, speaking slowly and using the simplest French of which he was the master, "to believe that none of this wise and brave nation understand the language that the 'Grand Monarque' uses when he talks to THE KNICKERBOCKER WRITERS 95 his children. His heart would be heavy did he believe his red warriors paid him so little respect !" A long and grave pause succeeded, during which no move- ment of a limb, nor any expression of an eye, betrayed the impression produced by his remark. Duncan, who knew that 6 silence was a virtue among his hosts, gladly had recourse to the custom, in order to arrange his ideas. At length the same warrior who had before addressed him replied, by dryly demand- ing in the language of the Canadas : — "When our Great Father speaks to his people, is it with the 10 tongue of a Huron ?" "He knows no difference in his children, whether the color of the skin be red, or black, or white," returned Duncan, evasively ; "though chiefly is he satisfied with the brave Hurons." "In what manner will he speak," demanded the wary chief, 15 "when the runners count -to him the scalps which five nights ago grew on the heads of the Yengeese?" "They were his enemies," said Duncan, shuddering involun- tarily; "and doubtless he will say, 'it is good; my Hurons are very gallant/ " 20 "Our Canada father does not think it. Instead of looking forward to reward his Indians, his eyes are turned backward. He sees the dead Yengeese, but no Huron. What can this mean ?" "A great chief, like him, has more thoughts than tongues. 25 He looks to see that no enemies are on his trail." "The canoe of a dead warrior will not float on the Horican," returned the savage, gloomily. "His ears are open to the Dela- wares, who are not our friends, and they fill them with lies." "It cannot be. See ; he has bid me, who am a man that knows 30 the art of healing, to go to his children, the red Hurons of the great lakes, and ask if any are sick !" Another silence succeeded this annunciation of the character Duncan had assumed. Every eye was simultaneously bent on 96 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE his person, as if to inquire into the truth or falsehood of the declaration, with an intelligence and keenness that caused the subject of their scrutiny to tremble for the result. He was, however, relieved again by the former speaker. 5 "Do the cunning men of the Canadas paint their skins?" the Huron coldly continued; "we have heard them boast that their faces were pale." "When an Indian chief comes among his white fathers," returned Duncan, with great steadiness, "he lays aside his buffalo 10 robe, to carry the shirt that is offered him. My brothers have given me paint, and I wear it." A low murmur of applause announced that the compliment to the tribe was favorably received. The elderly chief made a gesture of commendation, which was answered by most of his 15 companions, who each threw forth a hand and uttered a brief exclamation of pleasure. Duncan began to breathe more freely, believing that the weight of his examination was past; and as he had already prepared a simple and probable tale to support his pretended occupation, his hopes of ultimate success grew brighter. 20 After a silence of a few moments, as if adjusting his thoughts, in order to make a suitable answer to the declaration their guest had just given, another warrior arose and placed himself in an attitude to speak. While his lips were yet in the act of parting, a low but fearful sound arose from the forest, and was imme- 25 diately succeeded by a high, shrill yell, that was drawn out until it equaled the longest and most plaintive howl of the wolf. The sudden and terrible interruption caused Duncan to start from his seat, unconscious of everything but the effect produced by so frightful a cry. At the same moment, the warriors glided in a 30 body from the lodge, and the outer air was filled with loud shouts that nearly drowned those awful sounds which were still ringing beneath the arches of the woods. Unable to command himself any longer, the youth broke from the place and presently stood in the centre of a disorderly throng that included nearly every- THE KNICKERBOCKER WRITERS 97 thing having life within the limits of the encampment. Men, women, and children; the aged, the infirm, the active, and the strong, were alike abroad, some exclaiming aloud, others clapping their hands with a joy that seemed frantic, and all expressing their savage pleasure in some unexpected event. Though 5 astounded, at first, by the uproar, Heyward was soon enabled to find its solution by the scene that followed. There yet lingered sufficient light in the heavens to exhibit those bright openings among the tree-tops, where different paths left the clearing to enter the depths of the wilderness. Beneath 10 one of them a line of warriors issued from the woods and advanced slowly toward the dwellings. One in front bore a short pole, on which, as it afterward appeared, were suspended several human scalps. The startling sounds that Duncan had heard were what the whites have not inappropriately called the 15 "death halloo" ; and each repetition of the cry was intended to announce to the tribe the fate of an enemy. Thus far the knowledge of Heyward assisted him in the explanation; and as he now knew that the interruption was caused by the unlooked- for return of a successful war-party, every disagreeable sensa- 20 tion was quieted in inward congratulation for the opportune relief and insignificance it conferred on himself. When at the distance of a few hundred feet from the lodges, the newly arrived warriors halted. Their plaintive and terrific cry, which was intended to represent equally the waitings of the 2 5 dead and the triumph of the victors, had entirely ceased. One of their number now called aloud, in words that were far from appalling, though not more intelligible to those for whose ears they were intended than their expressive yells. It would be difficult to convey a suitable idea of the savage ecstasy with 30 which the news thus imparted was received. The whole encamp- ment in a moment became a scene of the most violent bustle and commotion. The warriors drew their knives, and flourish- ing them, they arranged themselves in two lines, forming a lane 98 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE 10 15 that extended from the war-party to the lodges. The squaws seized clubs, axes, or whatever weapon of offence first offered itself to their hands, and rushed eagerly to act their part in the cruel game that was at hand. Even the children would not be excluded ; but boys, little able to wield the instruments, tore the tomahawks from the belts of their fathers and stole into the ranks, apt imitators of the savage traits exhibited by their parents. Large piles of brush lay scattered about the clearing, and a wary and aged squaw was occupied in firing as many as might serve to light the coming exhibition. As the flame arose, its power exceeded that of the parting day and assisted to render objects at the same time more distinct and more hideous. The whole scene formed a striking picture, whose frame was com- posed of the dark and tall border of pines. The warriors just arrived were the most distant figures. A little in advance stood two men, who were apparently selected from the rest as the principal actors in what was to follow. The light was not strong enough to render their features distinct, though it was quite evident that they were governed by very different emotions. While one stood erect and firm, prepared to meet his fate like a hero, the other bowed his head, as if palsied by terror or stricken with shame. The high-spirited Duncan felt a powerful impulse of admiration and pity toward the former, though no opportunity could offer to exhibit his generous emotions. He watched his slightest movement, however, with eager eyes; and as he traced the fine outline of his admirably proportioned and active frame, he endeavored to persuade himself that if the powers of man, seconded by such noble resolution, could bear one harmless through so severe a trial, the youthful captive before him might hope for success in the hazardous race he was about to run. Insensibly the young man drew nigher to the swarthy lines of the Hurons and scarcely breathed, so intense became his interest in the spectacle. Just then the signal yell was given, and the 25 30 THE KNICKERBOCKER WRITERS 99 momentary quiet which had preceded it was broken by a burst of cries that far exceeded any before heard. The most abject of the two victims continued motionless; but the other bounded from the place at the cry with the activity and swiftness of a deer. Instead of rushing through the hostile lines, as had been 5 expected, he just entered the dangerous defile, and before time was given for a single blow, turned short, and leaping the heads of a row of children, he gained at once the exterior and safer side of the formidable array. The artifice was answered by a hundred voices raised in imprecations; and the whole of the 10 excited multitude broke from their order and spread themselves about the place in wild confusion. A dozen blazing piles now shed their lurid brightness on the place, which resembled some unhallowed and supernatural arena, in which malicious demons had assembled to act their bloody and 15 lawless rites. The forms in the background looked like unearthly beings, gliding before the eye and cleaving the air with frantic and unmeaning gestures; while the savage passions of such as passed the flames were rendered fearfully distinct by the gleams that shot athwart their inflamed visages. 20 It will easily be understood that amid such a concourse of vindictive enemies no breathing time was allowed the fugitive. There was a single moment when it seemed as if he would have reached the forest, but the whole body of his captors threw them- selves before him and drove him back into the centre of his 25 relentless persecutors. Turning like a headed deer, he shot, with the swiftness of an arrow, through a pillar of forked flame, and passing the whole multitude harmless, he appeared on the opposite side of the clearing. Here, too, he was met and turned by a few of the older and more subtle of the Hurons. Once 30 more he tried the throng, as if seeking safety in its blindness, and then several moments succeeded, during which Duncan believed the active and courageous young stranger was lost. Nothing could be distinguished but a dark mass of human 100 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE forms tossed and involved in inexplicable confusion. Arms, gleaming knives, and formidable clubs appeared above them, but the blows were evidently given at random. The awful effect was heightened by the piercing shrieks of the women and the 5 fierce yells of the warriors. Now and then Duncan caught a glimpse of a light form cleaving the air in some desperate bound, and he rather hoped than believed that the captive yet retained the command of his astonishing powers of activity. Suddenly the multitude rolled backward and approached the spot where he 10 himself stood. The heavy body in the rear pressed upon the women and children in front and bore them to the earth. The stranger reappeared in the confusion. Human power could not, however, much longer endure so severe a trial. Of this the captive seemed conscious. Profiting by the momentary opening, he darted from among the warriors, and made a desperate and what seemed to Duncan a final effort to gain the wood. As if aware that no danger was to be apprehended from the young soldier, the fugitive nearly brushed his person in his flight. A tall and powerful Huron, who had husbanded his forces, pressed 20 close upon his heels and with an uplifted arm menaced a fatal blow. Duncan thrust forth a foot, and the shock precipitated the eager savage headlong, many feet in advance of his intended victim. Thought itself is not quicker than was the motion with which the latter profited by the advantage; he turned, gleamed 25 like a meteor again before the eyes of Duncan, and at the next moment, when the latter recovered his recollection and gazed around in quest of the captive, he saw him quietly leaning against a small painted post, which stood before the door of the principal lodge. SO Apprehensive that the part he had taken 'in the escape might prove fatal to himself, Duncan left the place without delay. He followed the crowd, which drew nigh the lodges, gloomy and sullen, like any other multitude that had been disappointed in an execution. Curiosity, or perhaps a better feeling, induced him 15 THE KNICKERBOCKER WRITERS 101 to approach the stranger. He found him, standing with one arm cast about the protecting post and breathing thick and hard after his exertions, but disdaining to permit a single sign of suffering to escape. His person was now protected by immemorial and sacred usage, until the tribe in council had deliberated and deter- 5 mined on his fate. It was not difficult, however, to foretell the result, if any presage could be drawn from the feelings of those who crowded the place. There was no term of abuse known to the Huron vocabulary that the disappointed women did not lavishly expend on the 10 successful stranger. Ttiev flouted at his efforts and told him, with bitter scoffs, that his feet were better than his hands ; and that he merited wings, while he knew not the use of an arrow or a knife. To all this the captive made no reply; but was content to preserve an attitude in which dignitv was singularly blended with disdain. Exasperated as much by his composure as by his good-fortune, their words became unintelligible, and were succeeded by shrill, piercing yells. Just then the crafty squaw, who had taken the necessary precaution to fire the piles, made her way through the throng and cleared a place for herself 20 in front of the captive. The squalid and withered person of this hag might well have obtained for her the character of possessing more than human cunning. Throwing back her light vestment, she stretched forth her long skinny arm, in derision, and using the language of the Lenape, as more intelligible to the subject of her gibes, she commenced aloud : — "Look you, Delaware," she said, snapping her fingers in his face; "your nation is a race of women, and the hoe is better fitted to your hands than the gun. Your squaws are the mothers of deer ; but if a bear or a wild-cat or a serpent were born among you, ye would flee. The Huron girls shall make you petticoats, and we will find you a husband." A burst of savage laughter succeeded this attack, during which the soft and musical merriment of the younger females 25 30 102 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE strangely chimed with the cracked voice of their older and more malignant companion. But the stranger was superior to all their efforts. His head was immovable ; nor did he betray the slightest consciousness that any were present, except when his haughty eye 6 rolled toward the dusky forms of the warriors, who stalked in the background, silent and sullen observers of the scene. Infuriated at the self-command of the captive, the woman placed her arms akimbo ; and throwing herself into a posture of defiance, she broke out anew in a torrent of words that no art 1° of ours could commit successfully to paper. Her breath was, however, expended in vain; for although distinguished in her nation as a proficient in the art of abuse, she was permitted to work herself into such a fury as actually to foam at the mouth, without causing a muscle to vibrate in the motionless figure of 15 the stranger. The effect of his indifference began to extend itself to the other spectators; and a youngster, who was just quitting the condition of a boy to enter the state of manhood, attempted to assist the termagant by flourishing his tomahawk before their victim and adding his empty boasts to the taunts of 20 the woman. Then, indeed, the captive turned his face toward the light, and looked down on the stripling with an expression that was superior to contempt. At the next moment he resumed his quiet and reclining- attitude against the post. But the change of posture had permitted Duncan to exchange glances with the 25 firm and piercing eyes of Uncas. ^ Breathless with amazement and heavily oppressed with the critical^ situation of his friend, Heyward recoiled before the look, trembling lest its meaning might, in some unknown manner, hasten the prisoner's fate. There was not, however, any instant 3 cause^for such an apprehension. Just then a warrior forced his way into the exasperated crowd. Motioning the woman and children aside with a stern gesture, he took Uncas by the arm and led him toward the door of the council lodge. Thither all the chiefs, and most of the distinguished warriors, followed; THE KNICKERBOCKER WRITERS 103 among whom the anxious Heyward found means to enter with- out attracting any dangerous attention to himself. A few minutes were consumed in disposing of those present in a manner suitable to their rank and influence in the tribe. An order very similar to that adopted in the preceding interview was 5 observed ; the aged and superior chiefs occupying the area of the spacious apartment, within the powerful light of a glaring torch, while their juniors and inferiors were arranged in the back- ground, presenting a dark outline of swarthy and marked visages. In the very centre of the lodge, immediately under an opening 10 that admitted the twinkling light of one or two stars, stood Uncas, calm, elevated, and collected. His high and haughty carriage was not lost on his captors, who often bent their looks on his person, with eyes which, while they lost none of their inflexibility of purpose, plainly betrayed their admiration of the 15 stranger's daring. The case was different with the individual whom Duncan had observed to stand forth with his friend previously to the desperate trial of speed; and who, instead of joining in the chase, had remained, throughout its turbulent uproar, like a cringing statue, 2 expressive of shame and disgrace. Though not a hand had been extended to greet him, nor yet an eye had condescended to watch his movements, he had also entered the lodge, as though impelled by a fate to whose decrees he submitted, seemingly, without a struggle. Heyward profited by the first opportunity to gaze in 2 5 his face, secretly apprehensive he might find the features of another acquaintance ; but they proved to be those of a stranger, and, what was still more inexplicable, of one who bore all the distinctive marks of a Huron warrior. Instead of mingling with his tribe, however, he sat apart, a solitary being in a multitude, 3 his form shrinking into a crouching and abject attitude, as if anxious to fill as little space as possible. When each individual had taken his proper station and silence reigned in the place, the 104 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE gray-haired chief already introduced to the reader spoke aloud, in the language of the Lenni Lenape. "Delaware," he said, "though one of a nation of women, you have proved yourself a man. I would give you food; but he 5 who eats with a Huron should become his friend. Rest in peace till the morning sun, when our last words shall be spoken." "Seven nights, and as many summer days, have I fasted on the trail of the Hurons," Uncas coldly replied; "the children of the Lenape know how to travel the path of the just without 10 lingering to eat." "Two of my young men are in pursuit of your companion," resumed the other, without appearing to regard the boast of his captive; "when they get back, then will our wise men say to you, — 'live' or 'die/ " !5 "Has a Huron no ears?" scornfully exclaimed Uncas; "twice., since he has been your prisoner, has the Delaware heard a gun that he knows. Your young men will never come back!" A short and sullen pause succeeded this bold assertion. Dun- can, who understood the Mohican to allude to the fatal rifle of 20 the scout, bent forward in earnest observation of the effect it might produce on the conquerors ; but the chief was content with simply retorting: — "If the Lenape are so skilful, why is one of their bravest warriors here?" 25 "He followed in the steps of a flying coward, and fell into a snare. The cunning beaver may be caught." As Uncas thus replied, he pointed with his finger toward the solitary Huron, but without deigning to bestow any other notice on so unworthy an object. The words of the answer and the 30 air of the speaker produced a strong sensation among his auditors. Every eye rolled sullenly toward the individual indicated by the simple gesture, and a low, threatening murmur passed through the crowd. The ominous sounds reached the outer door, and the women and children pressing into the throng, no gap had been THE KNICKERBOCKER WRITERS 105 left, between shoulder and shoulder, that was not now filled with the dark lineaments of some eager and curious human countenance. In the meantime, the more aged chiefs, in the centre, com- muned with each other in short and broken sentences. Not a 5 word was uttered that did not convey the meaning of the speaker in the simplest and most energetic form. Again, a long and deeply solemn pause took place. It was known, by all present, to be the grave precursor of a weighty and important judgment. They who composed the outer circle of faces were on tiptoe to 10 gaze; and even the culprit for an instant forgot his shame in a deeper emotion, and exposed his abject features, in order to cast an anxious and troubled glance at the dark assemblage of chiefs. The silence was finally broken by the aged warrior so often named. He arose from the earth, and moving past the 15 immovable form of Uncas, placed himself in a dignified attitude before the offender. At that moment the withered squaw already mentioned moved into the circle, in a slow, sidling sort of a dance, holding the torch and muttering the indistinct words of what might have been a species of incantation. Though her 2 presence was altogether an intrusion, it was unheeded. Approaching Uncas, she held the blazing brand in such a manner as to cast its red glare on his person, and to expose the slightest emotion of his countenance. The Mohican maintained his firm and haughty attitude; and his eye, so far from deigning to meet her inquisitive look, dwelt steadily on the distance, as though it penetrated the obstacles which impeded the view and looked into futurity. Satisfied with her examination, she left him, with a slight expression of pleasure, and proceeded to practise the same trying experiment on her delinquent country- man. The young Huron was in his war paint, and very little of a finely moulded form was concealed by his attire. The light rendered every limb and joint discernible, and Duncan turned 25 30 106 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE away in horror when he saw they were writhing in irrepressible agony. The woman was commencing a low and plaintive howl at the sad and shameful spectacle, when the chief put forth his hand and gently pushed her aside. 5 "Reed-that-bends," he said, addressing the young culprit by name, and in his proper language, "though the Great Spirit has made you pleasant to the eyes, it would have been better that you had not been born. Your tongue is loud in the village, but in battle it is still. None of my young men strike the tomahawk 10 deeper into the war-post — none of them so lightly on the Yen- geese. The enemy know the shape of your back, but they have never seen the color of your eyes. Three times have they called on you to come, and as often did you forget to answer. Your name will never be mentioned again in your tribe — it is already 15 forgotten." As the chief slowly uttered these words, pausing impressively between each sentence, the culprit raised his face in deference to the other's rank and years. Shame, horror, and pride struggled in its lineaments. His eye, which was contracted with 20 inward anguish, gleamed on the persons of those whose breath was his fame; and the latter emotion for an instant predomi- nated. He arose to his feet, and baring his bosom, looked steadily on the keen, glittering knife that was already upheld by his inexorable judge. As the weapon passed slowly into his heart 25 he even smiled, as if in joy, at having found death less dreadful than he had anticipated, and fell heavily on his face at the feet of the rigid and unyielding form of Uncas. The squaw gave a loud and plaintive yell, dashed the torch to the earth, and buried everything in darkness. The whole shud- 30 dering group of spectators glided from the lodge like troubled sprites ; and Duncan thought that he and the yet throbbing body of the victim of an Indian judgment had now become its only tenants. THE KNICKERBOCKER WRITERS 107 WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT Born in Massachusetts, 1794; died in New York City, 1878 THANATOPSIS To him who in the love of Nature holds Communion with her visible forms, she speaks A various language ; for his gayer hours She has a voice of gladness, and a smile And eloquence of beauty, and she glides 5 Into his darker musings, with a mild And healing sympathy, that steals away Their sharpness, ere he is aware. When thoughts Of the last bitter hour come like a blight Over thy spirit, and sad images 10 Of the stern agony, and shroud, and pall, And breathless darkness, and the narrow house, Make thee to shudder, and grow sick at heart ; — Go forth, under the open sky, and list To Nature's teachings, while from all around — l5 Earth and her waters, and the depths of air — Comes a still voice — Yet a few days, and thee The all-beholding sun shall see no more In all his course ; nor yet in the cold ground, Where thy pale form was laid, with many tears, 20 Nor in the embrace of ocean, shall exist Thy image. Earth, that nourished thee, shall claim Thy growth, to be resolved to earth again, And, lost each human trace, surrendering up Thine individual being, shalt thou go 25 To mix forever with the elements, To be a brother to the insensible rock And to the sluggish clod, which the rude swain Turns with his share, and treads upon. The oak Shall send his roots abroad, and pierce thy mould. 108 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE Yet not to thine eternal resting-place Shalt thou retire alone, nor couldst thou wish Couch more magnificent. Thou shalt lie down With patriarchs of the infant world^with kings, 5 The powerful of the earth — the wise, the good, Fair forms, and hoary seers of ages past, All in one mighty sepulcher. The hills Rock-ribbed and ancient as the sun, — the vales Stretching in pensive quietness between; 10 The venerable woods — rivers that move In majesty, and the complaining brooks That make the meadows green ; and, poured round all, Old Ocean's gray and melancholy waste, — Are but the solemn decorations all 15 Of the great tomb of man. The golden sun, The planets, all the infinite host of heaven, Are shining on the sad abodes of death, Through the still lapse of ages. All that tread The globe are but a handful to the tribes 2 That slumber in its bosom. — Take the wings Of morning, pierce the Barcan wilderness, Or lose thyself in the continuous woods Where rolls the Oregon, and hears no sound, Save his own dashings — yet the dead are there : 2 5 And millions in those solitudes, since first The flight of years began, have laid them down In their last sleep — the dead reign there alone. So shalt thou rest, and what if thou withdraw In silence from the living, and no friend 3 o Take note of thy departure ? All that breathe Will share thy destiny. The gay will laugh When thou art gone, the solemn brood of care Plod on, and each one as before will chase His favorite phantom ; yet all these shall leave THE KNICKERBOCKER WRITERS 109 Their mirth and their employments, and shall come And make their bed with thee. As the long train Of ages glides away, the sons of men, The youth in life's green spring, and he who goes In the full strength of years, matron and maid, 5 The speechless babe, and the gray-headed man — Shall one by one be gathered to thy side, By those who in their turn shall follow them. So live, that when thy summons comes to join The innumerable caravan, which moves 10 To that mysterious realm, where each shall take His chamber in the silent halls of death, Thou go not, like the quarry-slave at night, Scourged to his dungeon, but, sustained and soothed By an unfaltering trust, approach thy grave, 15 Like one who wraps the drapery of his couch About him, and lies down to pleasant dreams. TO A WATERFOWL Whither, midst falling dew, While glow the heavens with the last steps of day, Far, through their rosy depths, dost thou pursue 20 Thy solitary way ? Vainly the fowler's eye Might mark thy distant flight to do thee wrong, As, darkly painted on the crimson sky, Thy figure floats along. 25 Seek'st thou the plashy brink Of weedy lake, or marge of river wide, Or where the rocking billows rise and sink On the chafed ocean-side? 110 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE There is a Power whose care Teaches thy way along that pathless coast — The desert and illimitable air — Lone wandering, but not lost. All day thy wings have fanned, At that far height, the cold, thin atmosphere, Yet stoop not, weary, to the welcome land, Though the dark night is near. And soon that toil shall end ; Soon shalt thou find a summer home, and rest, And scream among thy fellows ; reeds shall bend, Soon, o'er thy sheltered nest. Thou'rt gone, the abyss of heaven Hath swallowed up thy form ; yet, on my heart 15 Deeply hath sunk the lesson thou hast given, And shall not soon depart. He who, from zone to zone, Guides through the boundless sky thy certain flight, In the long way that I must tread alone 20 Will lead my steps aright. TO THE FRINGED GENTIAN Thou blossom bright with autumn dew, And colored with the heaven's own blue That openest when the quiet light Succeeds the keen and frosty night, Thou comest not when violets lean O'er wandering brooks and springs unseen, Or columbines, in purple dressed, Nod o'er the ground-bird's hidden nest. THE KNICKERBOCKER WRITERS 111 Thou waitest late and com'st alone, When woods are bare and birds are flown, And frost and shortening days portend The aged year is near his end. Then doth thy sweet and quiet eye 5 Look through its fringes to the sky, Blue — blue — as if that sky let fall A flower from its cerulean wall. I would that thus, when I shall see The hour of death draw near to me, *0 Hope, blossoming within my heart, May look to heaven as I depart. ROBERT OF LINCOLN r 20 Merrily swinging on brier and weed, Near to the nest of his little dame, Over the mountain-side or mead, 15 Robert of Lincoln is telling his name: Bob-o'-link, bob-o'-link, Spink, spank, spink; Snug and safe is that nest of ours, Hidden among the summer flowers. Chee, chee, chee. Robert of Lincoln is gayly drest, Wearing a bright black wedding-coat ; White are his shoulders and white his crest. Hear him call in his merry note : 2 6 Bob-o'-link, bob-o'-link, Spink, spank, spink; 112 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE Look, what a nice new coat is mine, Sure there was never a bird so fine. Chee, chee, chee. Robert of Lincoln's Quaker wife, 6 Pretty and quiet, with plain brown wings, Passing at home a patient life, Broods in the grass while her husband sings Bob-o'-link, bob-o'-link, Spink, spank, spink; ® Brood, kind creature ; you need not fear Thieves and robbers while I am here. Chee, chee, chee. Modest and shy as a nun is she ; One weak chirp is her only note. 1 5 Braggart and prince of braggarts is he, Pouring boasts from his little throat : Bob-o'-link, bob-o'-link, Spink, spank, spink; Never was I afraid of man ; Catch me, cowardly knaves, if you can ! Chee, chee, chee. 20 Six white eggs on a bed of hay, Flecked with purple, a pretty sight ! There as the mother sits all day, 25 Robert is singing with all his might : Bob-o'-link, bob-o'-link, Spink, spank, spink; Nice good wife, that never goes out, Keeping house while I frolic about. Chee, chee, chee. THE KNICKERBOCKER WRITERS 113 Soon as the little ones chip the shell, Six wide mouths are open for food ; Robert of Lincoln bestirs him well, Gathering seeds for the hungry brood. Bob-o'-link, bob-o'-link, 5 Spink, spank, spink; This new life is likely to be Hard for a gay young fellow like me. Chee, chee, chee. Robert of Lincoln at length is made 1 Sober with work, and silent with care ; Off is his holiday garment laid. Half forgotten that merry air : Bob-o'-link, bob-o'-link, Spink, spank, spink; 15 Nobody knows but my mate and I Where our nest and our nestlings lie. Chee, chee, chee. Summer wanes ; the children are grown ; Fun and frolic no more he knows ; 2 Robert of Lincoln's a humdrum crone; Off he flies, and we sing as he goes : Bob-o'-link, bob-o'-link, Spink, spank, spink; When you can pipe that merry old strain, 2 5 Robert of Lincoln; come back again. Chee, chee, chee. 114 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE THE NEW ENGLAND WRITERS DANIEL WEBSTER Born in New Hampshire, 1782; died in Massachusetts, 1852 THE FIRST BUNKER HILL ORATION This uncounted multitude before me and around me proves the feeling which the occasion has excited. These thousands of human faces, glowing with sympathy and joy, and from the impulses of a common gratitude turned reverently to heaven in 5 this spacious temple of the firmament, proclaim that the day, the place, and the purpose of our assembling have made a deep impression on our hearts. If, indeed, there be anything in local association fit to affect the mind of man, we need not strive to repress the emotions 10 which agitate us here. We are among the sepulchers of our fathers. We are on ground distinguished by their valor, their constancy, and the shedding of their blood. We are here, not to fix an uncertain date in our annals, nor to draw into notice an obscure and unknown spot. If our humble purpose had 15 never been conceived, if we ourselves had never been born, the 17th of June, 1775, would have been a day on which all sub- sequent history would have poured its light, and the eminence where we stand a point of attraction to the eyes of successive generations. But we are Americans. We live in what may 20 be called the early age of this great continent ; and we know that our posterity, through all time, are here to enjoy and suffer the allotments of humanity. We see before us a probable train of great events; we know that our own fortunes have been happily cast; and it is natural, therefore, that we should be moved by the contemplation of occurrences which have guided our destiny before many of us were born, and settled the condi- 25 THE NEW ENGLAND WRITERS 115 tion in which we should pass that portion of our existence which God allows to men on earth. ******* The great event in the history of the continent, which we are now met here to commemorate, that prodigy of modern 5 times, at once the wonder and the blessing of the world, is the American Revolution. In a day of extraordinary prosperity and happiness, of high national honor, distinction, and power, we are brought together, in this place, by our love of country, by our admiration of exalted character, by our gratitude for 10 signal services and patriotic devotion. The Society whose organ I am was formed for the purpose of rearing some honorable and durable monument to the memory of the early friends of American Independence. They have thought that for this object no time could be more pro- 15 pitious than the present prosperous and peaceful period ; that no place could claim preference over this memorable spot; and that no day could be more auspicious to the undertaking than the anniversary of the battle which was here fought. The foundation of that monument we have now laid. With solem- 20 nities suited to the occasion, with prayers to Almighty God for His blessing, and in the midst of this cloud of witnesses, we have begun the work. We trust it will he prosecuted, and that, springing from a broad foundation, rising high in massive solidity and unadorned grandeur, it may remain as long as Heaven 25 permits the works of man to last, a fit emblem, both of the events in memory of which it is raised and of the gratitude of those who have reared it. ******* We live in a most extraordinary age. Events so various 30 and so important that they might crowd and distinguish centuries are, in our times, compressed within the compass of a single life. When has it happened that history has had so much to record, in the same term of years, as since the 17th of June, 1775? Our 116 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE own revolution, which, under other circumstances, might itself have been expected to occasion a war of half a century, has been achieved; twenty-four sovereign and independent States erected; and a general government established over them, so safe, so 5 wise, so free, so practical, that we might well wonder its establish- ment should have been accomplished so soon, were it not far the greater wonder that it should have been established at all. Two or three millions of people have been augmented to twelve, the great forests of the West prostrated beneath the arm of success- 10 f u l industry, and the dwellers on the banks of the Ohio and the Mississippi become the fellow-citizens and neighbors of those who cultivate the hills of New England. We have a commerce that leaves no sea unexplored; navies which take no law from superior force; revenues adequate to all the exigencies of gov- 15 ernment, almost without taxation; and peace with all nations, founded on equal rights and mutual respect. Europe, within the same period, has been agitated by a mighty revolution, which, while it has been felt in the individual condition and happiness of almost every man, has shaken to the 20 centre her political fabric, and dashed against one another thrones which had stood tranquil for ages. On this, our continent, our own example has been followed, and colonies have sprung up to be nations. Unaccustomed sounds of liberty and free govern- ment have reached us from beyond the track of the sun; and at 25 this moment the dominion of European power in this continent, from the place where we stand to the south pole, is annihilated forever. In the meantime, both in Europe and America, such has been the general progress of knowledge, such the improvement in 30 legislation, in commerce, in the arts, in letters, and, above all, in liberal ideas and the general spirit of the age, that the whole world seems changed. Yet, notwithstanding that this is but a faint abstract of the things which have happened since the day of the battle of Bunker THE NEW ENGLAND WRITERS 117 Hill, we are but fifty years removed from it ; and we now stand here to enjoy all the blessings -of our own condition, and to look abroad on die brightened prospects of the world, while we still have among us some of those who were active agents in the scenes of [.775, and who are now here, from every quarter of 5 New England, to visit once more, and under circumstances so affecting, I had almost said so overwhelming, this renowned theater of their courage and patriotism. Venerable men ! you have come down to us from a former generation. Heaven has bounteously lengthened out your lives, 10 that you might behold this joyous day. You are now where you stood fifty years ago, this very hour, with your brothers and your neighbors, shoulder to shoulder, in the strife for your country. Behold, how altered! The same heavens are indeed over your heads ; the same ocean rolls at your feet ; but all else how changed ! 1 5 You hear now no roar of hostile cannon, you see no mixed volumes of smoke and flame rising from burning Charlestown. The ground strewed with the dead and the dying; the impetuous charge; the steady and successful repulse; the loud call to repeated assault; the summoning of all that is manly to repeated 2 resistance; a thousand bosoms freely and fearlessly bared in an instant to whatever of terror there may be in war and death — all these you have witnessed, but you witness them no more. All is peace. The heights of yonder metropolis, its towers and roofs, which you then saw filled with wives and children and country- 2 5 men in distress and terror and looking with unutterable emotions for the issue of the combat, have presented you to-day with the sight of its whole happy population, come out to welcome and greet you with a universal jubilee. Yonder proud ships, by a felicity of position appropriately lying at the foot of this mount, 30 and seeming fondly to cling around it, are not means of annoy- ance to you, but your country's own means of distinction and defence. All is peace; and God has granted you this sight of your country's happiness ere you slumber in the grave. He has 118 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE allowed you to behold and to partake the reward of your patriotic toils ; and he has allowed us, your sons and countrymen, to meet you here, and in the name of the present generation, in the name of your country, in the name of liberty, to thank you ! 5 But, alas ! you are not all here ! Time and the sword have thinned your ranks. Prescott, Putnam, Stark, Brooks, Read, Pomeroy, Bridge ! our eyes seek for you in vain amid this broken band. You are gathered to your fathers, and live only to your country in her grateful remembrance and your own bright 10 example. But let us not too much grieve that you have met the common fate of men. You lived at least long enough to know that your work had been nobly and successfully accom- plished. You lived to see your country's independence estab- lished, and to sheathe your swords from war. On the light of 15 Liberty you saw arise the light of Peace, like "another morn, "another morn, and the sky on which you closed your eyes was cloudless. But, ah ! Him ! the first great martyr in this great cause ! 20 Him ! the premature victim of his own self-devoting heart ! Him ! the head of our civil councils and the destined leader of our military bands, whom nothing brought hither but the unquench- able fire of his own spirit! Him! cut off by Providence in the hour of overwhelming anxiety and thick gloom ; falling ere he 2 5 saw the star of his country rise ; pouring out his generous blood like water, before he knew whether it would fertilize a land of freedom or of bondage ! — how shall I struggle with the emotions that stifle the utterance of thy name! Our poor work may perish; but thine shall endure! This monument may moulder 30 away; the solid ground it rests upon may sink down to a level with the sea; but thy memory shall not fail! Wheresoever among men a heart shall be found that beats to the transports of patriotism and liberty, its aspirations shall be to claim kindred with thy spirit. THE NEW ENGLAND WRITERS 119 But the scene amidst which we stand does not permit us to confine our thoughts or our sympathies to those fearless spirits who hazarded or lost their lives on this consecrated spot. We have the happiness to rejoice here in the presence of a most worthy representation of the survivors of the whole Revolu- 6 tionary army. Veterans ! you are the remnant of many a well-fought field. You bring with you marks of honor from Trenton and Mon- mouth, from Yorktown, Camden, Bennington, and Saratoga. Veterans of half a century! when in your youthful days you 10 put everything at hazard in your country's cause, good as that cause was, and sanguine as youth is, still your fondest hopes did not stretch onward to an hour like this ! At a period to which you could not reasonably have expected to arrive, at a moment of national prosperity such as you could never have foreseen, 15 you are now met here to enjoy the fellowship of old soldiers and to receive the overflowings of a universal gratitude. But your agitated countenances and your heaving breasts inform me that even this is not an unmixed joy. I perceive that a tumult of contending feelings rushes upon you. The images 20 of the dead, as well as the persons of the living, present them- selves before you. The scene overwhelms you, and I turn from it. May the Father of all mercies smile upon your declining years, and bless them ! And when you shall here have exchanged your embraces, when you shall once more have pressed the hands 2 5 which have been so often extended to give succor in adversity, or grasped in the exultation of victory, then look abroad upon this lovely land which your young valor defended and mark the happiness with which it is filled ; yea, look abroad upon the whole earth and see what a name you have contributed to give to your 30 country and what a praise you have added to freedom, and then rejoice in the sympathy and gratitude which beam upon your last days from the improved condition of mankind ! ******* 120 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE The 17th of June saw the four New England Colonies stand- ing here, side by side, to triumph or to fall together; and there was with them from that moment to the end of the war what I hope will remain with them forever, — one cause, one country, 5 one heart. The battle of Bunker Hill was attended with the most impor- tant effects beyond its immediate results as a military engagement. It created at once a state of open, public war. There could now be no longer a question of proceeding against individuals, as 10 guilty of treason or rebellion. That fearful crisis was past. The appeal lay to the sword, and the only question was whether the spirit and the resources of the people would hold out till the object should be accomplished. Nor were its general conse- quences confined to our own country. The previous proceed- 1 5 ings of the Colonies, their appeals, resolutions, and addresses had made their cause known to Europe. Without boasting, we may say, that in no age or country has the public cause been maintained with more force of argument, more power of illustration, or more of that persuasion which excited feeling and elevated principle 2 can alone bestow, than the Revolutionary state papers exhibit. These papers will forever deserve to be studied, not only for the spirit which they breathe, but for the ability with which they were written. To this able vindication of their cause, the Colonies had now 2 5 added a practical and severe proof of their own true devotion to it, and given evidence also of the power which they could bring to its support. All now saw that if America fell, she would not fall without a struggle. Men felt sympathy and regard, as well as surprise, when they beheld these infant states, remote, unknown, unaided, encounter the power of England, and, in the first considerable battle, leave more of their enemies dead on the field, in proportion to the number of combatants, than had been recently known to fall in the wars of Europe. Information of these events, circulating throughout the world. 30 THE NEW ENGLAND WRITERS 121 at length reached the ears of one who now hears me. He has not forgotten the emotion which the fame of Bunker Hill and the name of Warren excited in his youthful breast. Sir, we are assembled to commemorate the establishment of great public principles of liberty, and to do honor to the distin- 5 guished dead. The occasion is too severe for eulogy of the living. But, Sir, your interesting relation to this country, the peculiar circumstances which surround you and surround us, call on me to express the happiness which we derive from your presence and aid in this solemn commemoration. 10 Fortunate, fortunate man ! with what measure of devotion will you not thank God for the circumstances of your extraordi- nary life! You are connected with both hemispheres and with two generations. Heaven saw fit to ordain that the electric spark of liberty should be conducted, through you, from the New 15 World to the Old; and we, who are now here to perform this duty of patriotism, have all of us long ago received it in charge from our fathers to cherish your name and your virtues. You will account it an instance of your good fortune, sir, that you crossed the seas to visit us at a time which enables you to be 20 present at this solemnity. You now behold the field, the renown of which reached you in the heart of France and caused a thrill in your ardent bosom. You see the lines of the little redoubt thrown up by the incredible diligence of Prescott; defended, to the last extremity, by his lion-hearted valor; and within which 25 the corner-stone of our monument has now taken its posi- tion. You see where Warren fell, and where Parker, Gardner, McCleary, Moore, and other early patriots fell with him. Those who survived that day, and whose lives have been prolonged to the present hour, are now around you. Some of them you have 30 known in the trying scenes of the war. Behold ! they now stretch forth their feeble arms to embrace you. Behold ! they raise their trembling voices to invoke the blessing of God on you and yours forever. 122 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE Sir, you have assisted us in laying the foundation of this structure. You have heard us rehearse, with our feeble com- mendation, the names of departed patriots. Monuments and eulogy belong to the dead. We give them this day to Warren 5 and his associates. On other occasions they have been given to your more immediate companions in arms, to Washington, to Greene, to Gates, to Sullivan, and to Lincoln. W T e have become reluctant to grant these, our highest and last honors, further. We would gladly hold them yet back from the little remnant of 10 that immortal band. "Serns in coclum redeas." Illustrious as are your merits, yet far, O, very far distant be the day, when any inscription shall bear your name, or any tongue pronounce its eulogy ! The leading reflection to which this occasion seems to invite 15 us respects the great changes which have happened in the fifty years since the battle of Bunker Hill was fought. And it peculiarly marks the character of the present age that, in looking at these changes, and in estimating their effect on our condition, we are obliged to consider, not what has been done in our country 2 only, but in others also. In these interesting times, while nations are making separate and individual advances in improvement, they make, too, a common progress; like vessels on a common tide, propelled by the gales at different rates, according to their several structure and management, but all moved forward by one 25 mighty current, strong enough to bear onward whatever does not sink beneath it. A chief distinction of the present day is a community of opinions and knowledge amongst men in different nations, exist- ing in a degree heretofore unknown. Knowledge has, in our 30 time, triumphed, and is triumphing, over distance, over difference of languages, over diversity of habits, over prejudice, and over bigotry. The civilized and Christian world is fast learning the great lesson that difference of nation does not imply necessary hostility, and that all contact need not be war. The whole world THE NEW ENGLAND WRITERS 123 is becoming a common field for intellect to act in. Energy of mind, genius, power, wheresoever it exists, may speak out in any tongue, and the world will hear it. A. great chord of sentiment and feeling runs through two continents, and vibrates over both. Every breeze wafts intelligence from country to country, every 5 wave rolls it; all give it forth, and all in turn receive it. There is a vast commerce of ideas ; there are marts and exchanges for intellectual discoveries, and a wonderful fellowship of those individual intelligences which make up the mind and opinion of the age. Mind is the great lever of all things; human thought 10 is the process by which human ends are ultimately answered; and the diffusion of knowledge, so astonishing in the last half- century, has rendered innumerable minds, variously gifted by nature, competent to be competitors or fellow-workers on the theater of intellectual operation. l5 From these causes important improvements have taken place in the personal condition of individuals. Generally speaking, mankind are not only better fed and better clothed, but they are able also to enjoy more leisure ; they possess more refinement and more self-respect. A superior tone of education, manners, 2 and habits prevails. This remark, most true in its application to our own country, is also partly true when applied elsewhere. It is proved by the vastly augmented consumption of those articles of manufacture and of commerce which contribute to the comforts and the decencies of life ; an augmentation which 2 5 has far outrun the progress of population. And while the unexampled and almost incredible use of machinery would seem to supply the place of labor, labor still finds its occupation and its reward ; so wisely has Providence adjusted men's wants and desires to their condition and their capacity. Any adequate survey, however, of the progress made during the last half-century in the polite and the mechanic arts, in machinery and manufactures, in commerce and agriculture, in letters and in science, would require volumes. I must abstain 10 124 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE wholly from these subjects, and turn for a moment to the con- templation of what has been done on the great question of politics and government. This is the master topic of the age ; and during the whole fifty years it has intensely occupied the thoughts of men. The nature of civil government, its ends and uses, have been canvassed and investigated; ancient opinions attacked and defended; new ideas recommended and resisted, by whatever power the mind of man could bring to the controversy. From the closet and the public halls the debate has been transferred to the field ; and the world has been shaken by wars of unexampled magnitude and the greatest variety of fortune. A day of peace has at length succeeded; and now that the strife has subsided and the smoke cleared away, we may begin to see what has actually been done, permanently changing the state and condi- tion of human society. And, without dwelling on particular circumstances, it is most apparent that, from the before-mentioned causes of augmented knowledge and improved individual condi- tion, a real, substantial, and important change has taken place, and is taking place, highly favorable, on the whole, to human 20 liberty and human happiness. The great wheel of political revolution began to move in America. Here its rotation was guarded, regular, and safe. Transferred to the other continent, from unfortunate but natural causes, it received an irregular and violent impulse; it whirled 2 5 along with a fearful celerity; till at length, like the chariot-wheels in the races of antiquity, it took fire from the rapidity of its own motion and blazed onward, spreading conflagration and terror around. We learn from the. result of this experiment, how fortunate 30 W as our own condition, and how admirably the character of our people was calculated for setting the great example of popular governments. The possession of power did not turn the heads of the American people, for they had long been in the habit of exercising a great degree of self-control. Although the para- 10 THE NEW ENGLAND WRITERS 125 mount authority of the parent state existed over them, yet a large field of legislation had always been open to our Colonial assemblies. They were accustomed to representative bodies and the forms of free government; they understood the doctrine of the division of power among different branches, and the necessity of checks on each. The character of our countrymen, moreover, was sober, moral, and religious ; and there was little in the change to shock their feelings of justice and humanity, or even to disturb an honest prejudice. We had no domestic throne to overturn, no privileged orders to cast down, no violent changes of property to encounter. In the American Revolution, no man sought or wished for more than to defend and enjoy his own. None hoped for plunder or for spoil. Rapacity was unknown to it ; the axe was not among the instruments of its accomplishment; and we all know that it could not have lived a single day under any 15 well-founded imputation of possessing a tendency adverse to the Christian religion. It need not surprise us that, under circumstances less auspici- ous, political revolutions elsewhere, even when well intended, have terminated differently. It is, indeed, a great achievement; 2 it is the masterwork of the world to establish governments entirely popular on lasting foundations; nor is it easy, indeed, to introduce the popular principle at all into governments to which it has been altogether a stranger. It cannot be doubted, however, that Europe has come out of the contest, in which 2 5 she has been so long engaged, with greatly superior knowl- edge, and. in many respects, in a highly improved condi- tion. Whatever benefit has been acquired is likely to be retained, for it consists mainly in the acquisition of more enlightened ideas. And although kingdoms and provinces may be wrested from the hands that hold them in the same manner they were obtained; although ordinary and vulgar power may, in human affairs, be lost as it has been won ; yet it is the glorious prerogative of the empire of knowledge that what it gains it never loses. On the 30 10 126 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE contrary, it increases by the multiple of its own power; all its ends become means; all its attainments, helps to new conquests. Its whole abundant harvest is but so much seed wheat, and nothing has limited, and nothing can limit, the amount of ultimate product. Under the influence of this rapidly increasing knowledge, the people have begun, in all forms of government, to think and to reason on affairs of state. Regarding government as an institu- tion for the public good, they demand a knowledge of its opera- tions and a participation in its exercise. A call for the represen- tative system, wherever it is not enjoyed, and where there is already intelligence enough to estimate its value, is perseveringly made. Where men may speak out, they demand it; where the bayonet is at their throats, they pray for it. When Louis the Fourteenth said, "I am the State," he expressed the essence of the doctrine of unlimited power. By the rules of that system, the people are disconnected from the state; they are its subjects, it is their lord. These ideas, founded in the love of power and long supported by the excess and the abuse of it, are yielding, in our age, to other opinions ; and the civilized world seems at last to be proceeding to the conviction of that fundamental and manifest truth that the powers of govern- ment are but a trust, and that they cannot be lawfully exercised but for the good of the community. As knowledge is more and 25 more extended, this conviction becomes more and more general. Knowledge, in truth, is the great sun in the firmament. Life and power are scattered with all its beams. The prayer of the Grecian champion, when enveloped in unnatural clouds and darkness, is the appropriate political supplication for the people 30 of every country not yet blessed with free institutions: — "Dispel this cloud, the light of heaven restore, Give me to see, — and Ajax asks no more." We may hope that the growing influence of enlightened senti- 20 THE NEW ENGLAND WRITERS 127 ment will promote the permanent peace of the world. Wars to maintain family alliances, to uphold or to cast down dynasties, and to regulate successions to thrones, which have occupied so much room in the history of modern times, if not less likely to happen at all, will be less likely to become general and involve 5 many nations, as the great principle shall be more and more established that the interest of the world is peace, and its first great statute, that every nation possesses the power of establish- ing a government for itself. But public opinion has attained also an influence over governments which do not admit the popular 10 principle into their organization. A necessary respect for the judgment of the world operates, in some measure, as a control over the most unlimited forms of authority. It is owing, perhaps, to this truth that the interesting struggle of the Greeks has been suffered to go on so long, without a direct interference, either to 15 wrest that country from its present masters, or to execute the system of pacification by force, and, with united strength, lay the neck of Christian and civilized Greek at the foot of the barbarian Turk. Let us thank God that we live in an age when something has influence besides the bayonet, and when the 2 sternest authority does not venture to encounter the scorching power of public reproach. Any attempt of the kind I have mentioned should be met by one universal burst of indignation; the air of the civilized world ought to be made too warm to be comfortably breathed by any one who would hazard it. 2 5 ******* And now, let us indulge an honest exultation in the convic- tion of the benefit which the example of our country has pro- duced, and is likely to produce, on human freedom and human happiness. Let us endeavor to comprehend in all its magnitude, 30 and to feel in all its importance, the part assigned to us in the great drama of human affairs. We are placed at the head of the system of representative and popular governments. Thus far our example shows that such governments are compatible, 10 128 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE not only with respectability and power, but with repose, with peace, with security of personal rights, with good laws, and a just administration. We are not propagandists. Wherever other systems are pre- ferred, either as being thought better in themselves, or as better suited to existing conditions, we leave the preference to be enjoyed. Our history hitherto proves, however, that the popular form is practicable, and that with wisdom and knowledge men may govern themselves; and the duty incumbent on us is to preserve the consistency of this cheering example, and take care that nothing may weaken its authority with the world. If, in our case, the representative system ultimately fail, popular gov- ernments must be pronounced impossible. No combination of circumstances more favorable to the experiment can ever be 16 expected to occur. The last hopes of mankind, therefore, rest with us; and if it should be proclaimed that our example had become an argument against the experiment, the knell of popular liberty would be sounded throughout the earth. These are excitements to duty; but they are not suggestions 20 of doubt. Our history and our condition, all that is gone before us, and all that surrounds us, authorize the belief that popular governments, though subject to occasional variations, in form perhaps not always for the better, may yet, in their general character, be as durable and permanent as other systems. We 2 5 know, indeed, that in our country any other is impossible. The principle of free government adheres to the American soil. It is bedded in it, immovable as its mountains. And let the sacred obligations which have devolved on this generation, and on us, sink deep into our hearts. Those who 30 established our liberty and our government are daily dropping from among us. The great trust now descends to new hands. Let us apply ourselves to that which is presented to us, as our appropriate object. We can win no laurels in a war for inde- pendence. Earlier and worthier hands have gathered them all. 10 15 THE NEW ENGLAND WRITERS 129 Nor are there places for us by the side of Solon, and Alfred, and other founders of states. Our fathers have tilled them. But there remains to us a great duty of defence and preservation ; and there is opened to us, also, a noble pursuit, to which the spirit of the times strongly invites us. Our proper business is improvement. Let our age be the age of improvement. In a day of peace, let us advance the arts of peace and the works of peace. Let us develop the resources of our land, call forth its powers, build up its institutions, promote all its great interests, and see whether we also, in our day and generation, may not perform something worthy to be remembered. Let us cultivate a true spirit of union and harmony. In pursuing the great objects which our condition points out to us, let us act under a settled conviction, and an habitual feeling, that these twenty- four States are one country. Let our conceptions be enlarged to the circle of our duties. Let us extend our ideas over the whole of the vast field in which we are called to act. Let our object be, our country, our whole country, and nothing but our country. And, by the blessing of God, may that country itself become a vast and splendid monument, not of oppression and terror, but of Wisdom, of Peace, and of Liberty, upon which the world may gaze with admiration forever ! FRANCIS PARKMAN Born in Boston, 1823 ; died there, 1893 AN INDIAN BANQUET From The Oregon Trail Having been domesticated for several weeks among one of the wildest of the hordes that roam over the remote prairies, I had unusual opportunities of observing them, and flatter myself 25 that a sketch of the scenes that passed daily before my eyes may not be devoid of interest. They were thorough savages. Neither 20 130 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE their manners nor their ideas were in the slightest degree modi- fied by contact with civilization. They knew nothing of the power and real character of the white men, and their children would scream in terror when they saw me. Their religion, super- 6 stitions, and prejudices were the same handed down to them from immemorial time. They fought with the weapons that their fathers fought with, and wore the same garments of skins. They were living representatives of the "stone age"; for though their lances and arrows were tipped with iron procured from traders, 10 they still used the rude stone mallet of the primeval world. Great changes are at hand in that region. With the stream of emigration to Oregon and California, the buffalo will dwindle away, and the large wandering communities who depend on them for support must be broken and scattered. The Indians will 15 soon be abased by whiskey and overawed by military posts; so that within a few years the traveler may pass in tolerable security through their country. Its danger and its charm will have disappeared together. As soon as Raymond and I discovered the village from the 2 gap in the hills, we were seen in our turn ; keen eyes were con- stantly on the watch. As we rode down upon the plain, the side of the village nearest us was darkened with a crowd of naked figures. Several men came forward to meet us. I could distin- guish among them the green blanket of the Frenchman Reynal. 25 When we came up, the ceremony of shaking hands had to be gone through in due form, and then all were eager to know what had become of the rest of my party. I satisfied them on this point, and we all moved together toward the village. "You've missed it," said Reynal ; "if you'd been here day 30 before yesterday, you'd have found the whole prairie over yonder black with buffalo as far as you could see. There were no cows, though ; nothing but bulls. We made a 'surround' every day till yesterday. See the village there; don't that look like good living?" THE NEW ENGLAND WRITERS 131 In fact, I could see, even at that distance, long cords stretched from lodge to lodge, over which the meat, cut by the squaws into thin sheets, was hanging to dry in the sun. I noticed, too, that the village was somewhat smaller than when I had last seen it, and I asked Reynal the cause. He said that old Le Borgne had 5 felt too weak to pass over the mountains and so had remained behind with all his relations, including Mahto-Tatonka and his brothers. The Whirlwind, too, had been unwilling to come so far, because, as Reynal said, he was afraid. Only half a dozen lodges had adhered to him, the main body of the village setting 10 their chief's authority at naught and taking the course most agreeable to their inclinations. "What chiefs are there in the village now?" asked I. "Well," said Reynal, "there's old Red-Water, and the Eagle- Feather, and the Big Crow, and the Mad Wolf, and the Panther, 15 and the White Shield, and — what's his name? — the half-breed Shienne." By this time we were close to the village, and I observed that while the greater part of the lodges were very large and neat in their appearance, there was at one side a cluster of squalid, 20 miserable huts. I looked toward them and made some remark about their wretched appearance. But I was touching upon delicate ground. "My squaw's relations live in those lodges," said Reynal, very warmly ; "and there isn't a better set in the whole village." 2 5 "Are there any chiefs among them ?" "Chiefs?" said Reynal; "yes, plenty!" "What are their names ?" "Their names? Why, there's the Arrow-Head. If he isn't a chief, he ought to be one. And there's the Hail-Storm. He's 3 nothing but a boy, to be sure; but he's bound to be a chief one of these days." Just then we passed between two of the lodges, and entered 132 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE the great area of the village. Superb, naked figures stood silently gazing on us. "Where's the Bad Wound's lodge?" said I to Reynal. "There, you've missed it again! The Bad Wound is away 5 with the Whirlwind. If you could have found him here and gone to live in his lodge, he would have treated you better than any man in the village. But there's the Big Crow's lodge yonder, next to old Red- Water's. He's a good Indian for the whites, and I advise you to go and live with him." 1° "Are there many squaws and children in his lodge?" said I. "No; only one squaw and two or three children. He keeps the rest in a separate lodge by themselves." So, still followed by a crowd of Indians, Raymond and I rode up to the entrance of the Big Crow's lodge. A squaw came out 15 immediately and took our horses. I put aside the leather flap that covered the low opening, and, stooping, entered the Big Crow's dwelling. There I could see the chief in the dim light, seated at one side on a pile of buffalo-robes. He greeted me with a guttural, "How, cola!" I requested Reynal to tell him 2 that Raymond and I were come to live with him. The Big Crow gave another low exclamation. The announcement may seem intrusive, but, in fact, every Indian in the village would have deemed himself honored that white men should give such preference to his hospitality. 2 5 The squaw spread a buffalo-robe for us in the guest's place at the head of the lodge. Our saddles were brought in, and scarcely were we seated upon them before the place was thronged with Indians, crowding in to see us. The Big Crow produced his pipe and filled it with the mixture of tobacco and shongsasha, 30 or red willow bark. Round and round it passed, and a lively conversation went forward. Meanwhile, a squaw placed before the two guests a wooden bowl of boiled buffalo-meat ; but unhap- pily this was not the only banquet destined to be inflicted on us. One after another, boys and young squaws thrust their heads in, 10 THE NEW ENGLAND WRITERS 133 at the opening, to invite us to various feasts in different parts of the village. For half an hour or more we were actively engaged in passing from lodge to lodge, tasting in each of the bowl of meat set before us and inhaling a whiff or two from our enter- tainer's pipe. A thunder-storm that had been threatening for some time now began in good earnest. We crossed over to Reynal's lodge, though it hardly deserved the name, for it con- sisted only of a few old buffalo-robes, supported on poles, and was quite open on one side. Here we sat down, and the Indians gathered round us. "What is it," said I, "that makes the thunder?" "It's my belief," said Reynal, "that it's a big stone rolling over the sky." "Very likely," I replied; "but I want to know what the Indians think about it." 15 So he interpreted my question, which produced some debate. There was a difference of opinion. At last old Mene-Seela, or Red- Water, who sat by himself at one side, looked up with his withered face and said he had always known what the thunder was. It was a great black bird; and once he had seen it, in a 2 dream, swooping down from the Black Hills, with its loud roar- ing wings; and when it flapped them over a lake, they struck lightning from the water. "The thunder is bad," said another old man, who sat muffled in his buffalo-robe; "he killed my brother last summer." 2 5 Reynal, at my request, asked for an explanation; but the old man remained doggedly silent and would not look up. Some time after I learned how the accident occurred. The man who was killed belonged to an association which, among other mystic functions, claimed the exclusive power and privilege of fighting 30 the thunder. Whenever a storm which they wished to avert was threatening, the thunder-fighters would take their bows and arrows, their guns, their magic drum, and a sort of whistle, made out of the wing-bone of the war-eagle, and, thus equipped, run 134 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE out and fire at the rising cloud, whooping, yelling, whistling, and beating their drum, to frighten it down again. One afternoon a heavy black cloud was coming up, and they repaired to the top of a hill, where they brought all their magic artillery into play 5 against it. But the undaunted thunder, refusing to be terrified, darted out a bright flash, which struck one of the party dead as he was in the very act of shaking his long, iron-pointed lance against it. The rest scattered and ran yelling in an ecstasy of superstitious terror back to their lodges. 1 ° The lodge of my host, Kongra-Tonga, or the Big Crow, pre- sented a picturesque spectacle that evening. A score or more of Indians were seated around it in a circle, their dark naked forms just visible by the dull light of the smouldering fire in the middle. The pipe glowed brightly in the gloom as it passed from hand to 15 hand. Then a squaw would drop a piece of buffalo-fat on the dull embers. Instantly a bright flame would leap up, darting its light to the very apex of the tall conical structure, where the top of the slender poles that supported the covering of hide were gathered together. It gilded the features of the Indians, as with 2 animated gestures they sat around it, telling their endless stories of war and hunting, and displayed rude garments of skins that hung around the lodge; the bow, quiver, and lance, suspended over the resting-place of the chief, and the rifles and powder-horns of the two white guests. For a moment all would be bright as 2 5 day ; then the flames would die out ; fitful flashes from the embers would illumine the lodge, and then leave it in darkness. Then the light would wholly fade, and the lodge and all within it be involved again in obscurity. As I left the lodge next morning, I was saluted by howling 3 and yelping all around the village, and half its canine population rushed forth to the attack. Being as cowardly as they were clamorous, they kept jumping about me at the distance of a few yards, only one little cur about ten inches long having spirit enough to make a direct assault. He dashed valiantly at the THE NEW ENGLAND WRITERS 135 leather tassel which in the Dahcotah fashion was trailing behind the heel of my moccasin, and kept his hold, growling and snarling all the while, though every step I made almost jerked him over on his back. As I knew that the eyes of the whole village were on the watch to see if I showed any sign of fear, I walked 5 forward without looking to the right or left, surrounded wherever I went by this magic circle of dogs. When I came to Reynal's lodge I sat down by it, on which the dogs dispersed, growling, to their respective quarters. Only one large white one remained, running about before me and showing his teeth. I called him, 10 but he only growled the more. I looked at him well. He was fat and sleek ; just such a dog as I wanted. "My friend," thought I, "you shall pay for this! I will have you eaten this very morning !" I intended that day to give the Indians a feast, by way of 15 conveying a favorable impression of my character and dignity; and a white dog is the dish which the customs of the Dahcotah prescribe for all occasions of formality and importance. I con- sulted Reynal : he soon discovered that an old woman in the next lodge was owner of the white dog. I took a gaudy cotton hand- 2 kerchief, and, laying it on the ground, arranged some vermilion, beads, and other trinkets upon it. Then the old squaw was summoned. I pointed to the dog and to the handkerchief. She gave a scream of delight, snatched up the prize, and vanished with it into her lodge. For a few more trifles, I engaged the 25 services of two other squaws, each of whom took the white dog by one of his paws and led him away behind the lodges. Having killed him, they threw him into a fire to singe ; then chopped him up and put him into two large kettles to boil. Meanwhile, I told Raymond to fry in buffalo fat what little flour we had left, and 30 also to make a kettle of tea as an additional luxury. The Big Crow's squaw was briskly at work sweeping out the lodge for the approaching festivity. I confided to my host himself the task of inviting the guests, thinking that I might 136 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE thereby shift from my own shoulders the odium of neglect and oversight. When feasting is in question, one hour of the day serves an Indian as well as another. My entertainment came off at about 5 eleven o'clock. At that hour, Reynal and Raymond walked across the area of the village to the admiration of the inhabitants, carry- ing the two kettles of dog-meat slung on a pole between them. These they placed in the center of the lodge, and then went back for the bread and the tea. Meanwhile, I had put on a pair of 10 brilliant moccasins, and substituted for my old buck-skin frock a coat, which I had brought with me in view of such public occa- sions. I also made careful use of the razor, an operation which no man will neglect who desires to gain the good opinion of Indians. Thus attired, I seated myself between Reynal and 15 Raymond at the head of the lodge. Only a few minutes elapsed before all the guests had come in and were seated on the ground, wedged together in a close circle. Each brought with him a wooden bowl to hold his share of the repast. When all were assembled, two of the officials caHed "soldiers" by the white men 2 came forward with ladles made of the horn of the Rocky Moun- tain sheep and began to distribute the feast, assigning a double share to the old men and chiefs. The dog vanished with astonish- ing celerity, and each guest turned his dish bottom upward to show that all was gone. Then the bread was distributed in its 2 5 turn, and finally the tea. As the "soldiers" poured it out into the same wooden bowls that had served for the substantial part of the meal, I thought it had a particularly curious and uninviting color. "Oh," said Reynal, "there was not tea enough, so I stirred 3 some soot in the kettle to make it look strong." Fortunately, an Indian's palate is not very discriminating. The tea was well sweetened, and that was all they cared for. Now, the feast being over, the time for speechmaking was come. The Big Crow produced a flat piece of wood, on which THE NEW ENGLAND WRITERS 137 he cut up tobacco and shongsasha, and mixed them in due propor- tions. The pipes were filled and passed from hand to hand around the company. Then I began my speech, each sentence being interpreted by Reynal as I went on, and echoed by the whole audience with the usual exclamations of assent and 5 approval. As nearly as I can recollect, it was as follows: — "I had come," I told them, "from a country so far distant that at the rate they travel they could not reach it in a year." "How ! how !" "There the Meneaska were more numerous than the blades of 10 grass on the prairie. The squaws were far more beautiful than any they had ever seen, and all the men were brave warriors." "How ! how ! how !" I was assailed by twinges of conscience as I uttered these last words. But I recovered myself and began again. I 5 "While I was living in the Meneaska lodges, I had heard of the Ogillallah, how great and brave a nation they were, how they loved the whites, and how well they could hunt the buffalo and strike their enemies. I resolved to come and see if all that I heard was true." 2 "How ! how ! how ! how !" "As I had come on horseback through the mountains, I had been able to bring them only a very few presents." . "How!" "But I had enough tobacco to give them all a small piece. 2 5 They might smoke it and see how much better it was than the tobacco which they got from the traders." "How ! how ! how !" "I had plenty of powder, lead, knives, and tobacco at Fort Laramie. These I was anxious to give them, and if any of them 30 should come to the fort before I went away, I would make them handsome presents." "How! how! how! how!" Raymond then cut up and distributed among them two or 138 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE three pounds of tobacco, and old Mene-Seela began to make a reply. It was long, but the following was the pith of it : "He had always loved the whites. They' were the wisest people on earth. He believed they could do anything, and he 5 was always glad when any of them came to live in the Ogillallah lodges. It was true I had not made them many presents, but the reason of it was plain. It was clear that I liked them, or I never should have come so far to find their village." Several other speeches of similar import followed, and then, 10 this more serious matter being disposed of, there was an interval of smoking, laughing, and conversation. Old Mene-Seela sud- denly interrupted it with a loud voice: — "Now is a good time," he said, "when all the old men and chiefs are here together, to decide what the people shall do. We 1 5 came over the mountains to make our lodges for next year. Our old ones are good for nothing; they are rotten and worn out. But we have been disappointed. We have killed buffalo-bulls enough, but we have found no herds of cows, and the skins of bulls are too thick and heavy for our squaws to make lodges of. 2 There must be plenty of cows about the Medicine Bow Moun- tain. We ought to go there. To be sure, it is farther westward than we have ever been before, and perhaps the Snakes will attack us, for those hunting-grounds belong to them. But we must have new lodges at any rate; our old ones will not serve 2 5 for another year. We ought not to be afraid of the Snakes. Our warriors are brave, and they are all ready for war. Besides, we have three white men with their rifles to help us." This speech produced a good deal of debate. As Reynal did not interpret what was said, I could only judge of the meaning 3 by the features and gestures of the speakers. At the end of it, however, the greater number seemed to have fallen in with Mene- Seela's opinion. A short silence followed, and then the old man struck up a discordant chant, which I was told was a song of thanks for the entertainment I had given them. THE NEW ENGLAND WRITERS 139 "Now," said he, "let us go and give the white men a chance to breathe." So the company all dispersed into the open air, and for some time the old chief was walking round the village, singing his song in praise of the feast, after the custom of the nation. 5 At last the day drew to a close; and as the sun went down, the horses came trooping from the surrounding plains to be picketed before the dwellings of their respective masters. Soon within the great circle of lodges appeared another concentric circle of restless horses; and here and there fires glowed and 10 flickered amid the gloom on the dusky figures around them. I went over and sat by the lodge of Reynal. The Eagle-Feather, who was a son of Mene-Seela and brother of my host the Big Crow, was seated there already, and I asked him if the village would move in the morning. He shook his head and said that 15 nobody could tell, for, since old Mahto-Tatonka had died, the people had been like children that did not know their own minds. They were no better than a body without a head. So I, as well as the Indians themselves, fell asleep that night without knowing whether we should set out in the morning toward the country 2 of the Snakes. At daybreak, however, as I was coming up from the river after my morning's ablutions, I saw that a movement was contem- plated. Some of the lodges were reduced to nothing but bare skeletons of poles; the leather covering of others was flapping 2 5 in the wind as the squaws pulled it off. One or two chiefs of note had resolved, it seemed, on moving; and so having set their squaws at work, the example was follewed by the rest of the village. One by one the lodges were sinking down in rapid succession, and where the great circle of the village had been 30 only a few moments before, nothing now remained but a ring of horses and Indians, crowded in confusion together. The ruins of the lodges were spread over the ground, together with kettles, stone mallets, great ladles of horn, buffalo-robes, and 140 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE cases of painted hide, filled with dried meat. Squaws bustled about in busy preparation, the old hags screaming to one another at the stretch of their leathern lungs. The shaggy horses were patiently standing while the lodge-poles were lashed to their 5 sides, and the baggage piled upon their backs. The dogs, with tongues lolling out, lay lazily panting and waiting for the time of departure. Each warrior sat on the ground by the decaying embers of his fire, unmoved amid the confusion, holding in his hand the long trail-rope of his horse. 10 As their preparations were completed, each family moved off the grpund. The crowd was rapidly melting away. I could see them crossing the river, and passing in quick succession along the profile of the hill on the farther side. When all were gone, I mounted and set out after them, followed by Raymond, 15 and, as we gained the summit, the whole village came in view at once, straggling away for a mile or more over the barren plains before us. Everywhere glittered the iron points of lances. The sun never shone upon a more strange array. Here were the heavy-laden pack-horses, some wretched old women leading them, 2 and two or three children clinging to their backs. Here were mules or ponies covered from head to tail with gaudy trappings, and mounted by some gay young squaw, grinning bashfulness and pleasure as the Meneaska looked at her. Boys with miniature bows and arrows wandered over the plains, little naked children 2 5 ran along on foot, and numberless dogs scampered among the feet of the horses. The young braves, gaudy with paint and feathers, rode in groups among the crowd, often galloping, two or three at once along the line, to try the speed of their horses. Here and there you might see a rank of sturdy pedestrians stalk- 3 ing along in their white buffalo-robes. These were the dignitaries of the village, the old men and warriors, to whose age and exper- ience that wandering democracy yielded a silent deference. With the rough prairie and the broken hills for its background, the restless scene was striking and picturesque beyond description. THE NEW ENGLAND WRITERS 141 Days and weeks made me familiar with it, but never impaired its effect upon my fancy. As we moved on, the broken column grew yet more scattered and disorderly, until, as we approached the foot of a hill, I saw the old men before mentioned seating themselves in a line upon 5 the ground in advance of the whole. They lighted a pipe and sat smoking, laughing, and telling stories, while the people, stop- ping as they successively came up, were soon gathered in a crowd behind them. Then the old men rose, drew their buffalo-robes over their shoulders, and strode on as before. Gaining the top 10 of the hill, we found a steep declivity before us. There was not a minute's pause. The whole descended in a mass, amid dust and confusion. The horses braced their feet as they slid down, women and children screamed, dogs yelped as they were trodden upon, while stones and earth went rolling to the bottom. 1 5 In a few moments I could see the village from the summit, spread- ing again far and wide over the plain below. RALPH WALDO EMERSON Born in Boston, Mass., 1803; died at Concord, Mass., 1882 CONCORD HYMN Born in Boston, Mass., 1803; died in Concord, Mass., 1882 By the rude bridge that arched the flood, Their flag to April's breeze unfurled, Here once the embattled farmers stood, \ ^ And fired the shot heard round the world\ The foe long since in silence slept ; Alike the conqueror silent sleeps ; And Time the ruined bridge has swept Down the dark stream which seaward creeps. 25 142 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE On this green bank, by this soft stream, We set to-day a votive stone; That memory may their deed redeem, When, like our sires, our sons are gone. 5 Spirit, that made those heroes dare To die, and leave their children free, Bid Time and Nature gently spare The shaft we raise to them and thee. THE RHODORA On Being Asked Whence Is the Flower In May, when sea winds pierced our solitudes, 10 I found the fresh Rhodora in the woods, Spreading its leafless blooms in a damp nook, To please the desert and the sluggish brook. The purple petals, fallen in the pool, Made the black water with their beauty gay ; 15 Here might the redbird come his plumes to cool, And court the flower that cheapens his array. Rhodora ! if the sages ask thee why This charm is wasted on the earth and sky, Tell them, dear, that if eyes were made for seeing, 2 Then Beauty is its own excuse for being: Why thou wert there, O rival of the rose ! I never thought to ask, I never knew : But, in my simple ignorance, suppose The self-same Power that brought me there brought you. DAYS 25 Daughters of Time, the hypocritic Days, Muffled and dumb like barefoot dervishes, And marching single in an endless file, Bring diadems and fagots in their hands. THE NEW ENGLAND WRITERS 143 To each they offer gifts after his will, Bread, kingdoms, stars, and sky that holds them all. I, in my pleached garden, watched the pomp, Forgot my morning wishes, hastily Took a few herbs and apples, and the Day 5 Turned and departed silent. I, too late, Under her solemn fillet saw the scorn. FORERUNNERS Long I followed happy guides, I could never reach their sides ; Their step is forth, and, ere the day 10 Breaks up their leaguer, and away. Keen my sense, my heart was young, Right good-will my sinews strung, But no speed of mine avails To hunt upon their shining trails. 15 On and away, their hasting feet Make the morning proud and sweet ; Flowers they strew, — I catch the scent; Or tone of silver instrument Leaves on the wind melodious trace ; 2 Yet I could never see their face. On eastern hills I see their smokes, Mixed with mist by distant lochs. I met many travelers Who the road had surely kept; 25 They saw not my fine revelers, — These had crossed them while they slept. Some had heard their fair report, In the country or the court. Fleetest couriers alive 30 Never yet could once arrive, ■v. 144 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE As they went or they returned, At the house where these sojourned. Sometimes their strong speed they slacken, Though they are not overtaken; 5 In sleep their jubilant troop is near, — I tuneful voices overhear; It may be in wood or waste, — At unawares 'tis come and past. Their near camp my spirit knows 10 By signs gracious as rainbows. I thenceforward and long after Listen for their harp-like laughter, And carry in my heart, for days, Peace that hallows rudest ways. VOLUNTARIES (Extract) 15 In an age of fops and toys, Wanting wisdom, void of right, Who shall nerve heroic boys To hazard all in Freedom's fight, — Break sharply off their jolly games, 2 Forsake their comrades gay And quit proud homes and youthful dames For famine, toil, and fray? Yet on the nimble air benign Speed nimbler messages, 2 5 That waft the breath of grace divine To hearts in sloth and ease. So nigh is grandeur to our dust, So near is God to man, When duty whispers low, Thou must, The youth replies, / can. THE NEW ENGLAND WRITERS 145 SELF-RELIANCE I read the other day some verses written by an eminent painter which were original and not conventional. The soul always hears an admonition in such lines, let the subject be what it may. The sentiment they instill is of more value than any thought they may contain. To believe your own thought, to believe that what 5 is true for you in your private heart is true for all men, — that is genius. Speak your latent conviction, and it shall be the universal sense; for the inmost in due time becomes the out- most, — and our first thought is rendered back to us by the trumpets of the Last Judgment. Familiar as the voice of the 10 mind is to each, the highest merit we ascribe to Moses, Plato, and Milton is that they set at naught books and traditions, and spoke not what men, but what they thought. A man should learn to detect and watch that gleam of light which flashes across his mind from within, more than the luster of the firmament of 15 bards and sages. Yet he dismisses without notice his thought, because it is his. In every work of genius we recognize our own rejected thoughts: they come back to us with a certain alienated majesty. Great works of art have no more affecting lesson for us than this. They teach us to abide by our spontaneous impres- 2 sion with good-humored inflexibility then most when the whole cry of voices is on the other side. Else, to-morrow a stranger will say with masterly good sense precisely what we have thought and felt all the time, and we shall be forced to take with shame our own opinion from another. 2 5 There is a time in every man's education when he arrives at the conviction that envy is ignorance; that imitation is suicide; that he must take himself for better, for worse, as his portion; that though the wide universe is full of good, no kernel of nourishing corn can come to him but through his toil bestowed 30 on that plot of ground which is given to him to till. The power which resides in him is new in nature, and none but he knows 146 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE what that is which he can do, nor does he know until he has tried. Not for nothing one face, one character, one fact makes much impression on him, and another none. This sculpture in the memory is not without preestablished harmony. The eye B was placed where one ray should fall, that it might testify of that particular ray. We but half express ourselves and are ashamed of that divine idea which each of us represents. It may be safely . trusted as proportionate and of good issues, so it be faithfully imparted, but God will not have his work made manifest by 10 cowards. A man is relieved and gay when he has put his heart int© his work and done his best; but what he has said or done otherwise shall give him no peace. It is a deliverance which does not deliver. In the attempt his genius deserts him; no muse befriends ; no invention, no hope. 1 5 Trust thyself : every heart vibrates to that iron string. Accept the place the divine Providence has found for you, the society of your c@ntemporaries, the connection of events. Great men have always done so, and confided themselves childlike to the genius of their age, betraying their perception that the absolutely trust- 2 worthy was seated at their heart, working through their hands, predominating in all their being. And we are now men, and must accept in the highest mind the same transcendent destiny; and not minors and invalids in a protected corner, not cowards fleeing before a revolution, but guides, redeemers, and bene- 25 factors, obeying the Almighty effort, and advancing on Chaos and the Dark. ******* Whoso would be a man must be a nonconformist. He who would gather immortal palms must not be hindered by the name 30 of goodness, but must explore if it be goodness. Nothing is at last sacred but the integrity of your own mind. Absolve you to yourself, and you shall have the suffrage of the world. I remember an answer which when quite young I was prompted to make to a valued adviser, who was wont to importune me with THE NEW ENGLAND WRITERS 147 the dear old doctrines of the church. On my saying, What have I to do with the sacredness of traditions, if I live wholly from within? my friend suggested: "But these impulses may be from below, not from above." I replied: "They do not seem to me to be such; but if I am the Devil's child, I will live then from 5. the Devil." No law can be sacred to me but that of my nature. Good and bad are but names very readily transferable to that or this; the only right is what is after my constitution, the only wrong what is against it. A man is to carry himself in the presence of all opposition, as if everything were titular and 10 ephemeral but he. I am ashamed to think how easily we capitu- late to badges and names, to large societies and dead institutions. Every decent and well-spoken individual affects and sways me more than is right. I ought to go upright and vital, and speak the rude truth in all ways. If malice and vanity wear the coat 15 of philanthropy, shall that pass? If an angry bigot assumes this bountiful cause of Abolition and comes to me with his last news from Barbadoes, why should I not say to him: "Go loVe thy infant; love thy wood-chopper: be good-natured and modest: have that grace ; and never varnish your hard, uncharitable ambi- 2 tion with this incredible tenderness for black folk a thousand miles off. Thy love afar is spite at home. ,, Rough and graceless would be such greeting, but truth is handsomer than the affecta- tion of love. Your goodness must have some edge to it,— else it is none. The doctrine of hatred must be preached as the 2 5 counteraction of the doctrine of love when that pules and whines. I shun father and mother and wife and brother, when my genius calls me. T would write on the lintels of the door-post, Whtm. I hope it is somewhat better than whim at last, but we cannot spend the dav in explanation. Expect me not to show cause whv I seek or why I exclude company. Then, again, do not tell me, as a good man did to-dav, of my obligation to put all poor men in good situations. Are they my poor? T tell thee, thou foolish philanthropist, that I grudge the dollar, the dime, the cent, 1 10 148 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE give to such men as do not belong to me and to whom I do not belong. There is a class of persons to whom by all spiritual affinity I am bought and sold; for them I will go to prison, if need be; but your miscellaneous popular charities; the educa- tion at college of fools; the building of meeting-houses to the vain end to which many now stand ; alms to sots ; and the thou- sandfold Relief Societies ; — though I confess with shame I some- times succumb and give the dollar, it is a wicked dollar which by and by I shall have the manhood to withhold. Virtues are, in the popular estimate, rather the exception than the rule. There is the man and his virtues. Men do what is called a good action, as some piece of courage or charity, much as they would pay a fine in expiation of daily non-appearance on parade. Their works are done as an apology or extenuation 15 of their living in the world, — as invalids and the insane pay a high board. Their virtues are penances. I do not wish to expiate, but to live. My life is for itself and not for a spectacle. I much prefer tkat it should be of a lower strain, so it be genuine and equal, than that it should be glittering and unsteady. I 2 ° wish it to be sound and sweet, and not to need diet and bleeding. T ask primary evidence that you are a man, and refuse this appeal from the man to his actions. I know that for myself it makes no difference whether I do or forbear those actions which are reckoned excellent. I cannot consent to pay for a privilege 25 where I have intrinsic right. Few and mean as my gifts may be, I actually am, and do not need for my own assurance or the assurance of my fellows any secondary testimony. What I must do is all that concerns me, not what the people think. This rule, equally arduous in actual and in intellectual life, may serve for the whole distinction between greatness and meanness. It is the harder, because you will always find those who think they know what is your duty better than you know it. It is easy in the world to live after the world's opinion; it is easy in solitude to live after our own; but the great man 30 THE NEW ENGLAND WRITERS 149 is he who in the midst of the crowd keeps with perfect sweetness the independence of solitude. The objection to conforming to usages that have become dead to you is that it scatters your force. It loses your time and blurs the impression of your character. If you maintain a dead 5 church, contribute to a dead Bible-society, vote with a great party either for the government or against it, spread your table like base housekeepers, — under all these screens I have difficulty to detect the precise man you are. And, of course, so much force is withdrawn from your proper life. But do your work, and 10 I shall know you. Do your work, and you shall reinforce yourself. A man must consider what a blindman's-bufl is this game of conformity. If I know your sect, I anticipate your argument. I hear a preacher announce for his text and topic the expediency of one of the institutions of his church. Do I 15 not know beforehand that not possibly can he say a new and spontaneous word? Do I not know that, with all this ostenta- tion of examining the grounds of the institution, he will do no such thing? Do I not know that he is pledged to himself not to look but at one side, — the permitted side, not as a man, but 2 as a parish minister? He is a retained attorney, and these airs of the bench are the emptiest affectation. Well, most men have bound their eyes with one'or another handkerchief, and attached themselves to some one of these communities of opinion. This conformity makes them not false in a few particulars, authors 2 5 of a few lies, but false in all particulars. Their every truth is not quite true. Their two is not the real two, their four not the real four; so that every word they say chagrins us, and we know not where to begin to set them right. Meantime, nature is not slow to equip us in the prison-uniform of the party to 3 which we adhere. We come to wear one cut of face and figure, and acquire by degrees the gentlest asinine expression. There is a mortifying experience in particular which does not fail to wreak itself also in the general history ; I mean "the foolish face 150 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE of praise," the forced smile which we put on in company where we do not feel at ease in answer to conversation which does not interest us. The muscles, not spontaneously moved, but moved by a low usurping willfulness, grow tight about the outline of the 5 face with the most disagreeable sensation. For nonconformity the world whips you with its displeasure. And, therefore, a man must know how to estimate a sour face. The bystanders look askance on him in the public street or in the friend's parlor. If this aversation had its origin in contempt 10 and resistance like his own, he might well go home with a sad countenance ; but the sour faces of the multitude, like their sweet faces, have no deep cause, but are put on and off as the wind blows and a newspaper directs. Yet is the discontent of the multitude more formidable than that of the senate and the college. 15 It is easy enough for a firm man who knows the world to brook the rage of the cultivated classes. Their rage is decorous and prudent, for they are timid as being very vulnerable themselves. But when to their feminine rage the indignation of the people is added, when the ignorant and the poor are aroused, when the unintelligent brute force that lies at the bottom of society is made to growl and mow, it needs the habit of magnanimity and religion to treat it godlike as a trifle of no concernment. The other terror that scares us from self-trust is our con- sistency ; a reverence for our past act or word, because the eyes of others have no other data for computing our orbit than our past acts, and we are loath to disappoint them. But why should you keep your head over your shoulder? Why drag about this corpse of your memory, lest you contradict somewhat von have stated in this or that public place? Suppose you should contradict yourself; what then? It seems to be a rule of wisdom never to rely on your memory alone, scarcely even in acts of pure memory, but to bring the past for judgment into the thousand-eyed present, and live ever in a new day. In your metaphysics you have denied personality to the Deity ; yet 20 25 30 THE NEW ENGLAND WRITERS 151 when the devout motions of the soul come, yield to them heart and life, though they should clothe God with shape and color. Leave your theory, as Joseph his coat in the hand of the harlot, and flee. A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds, adored 5 by little statesmen and philosophers and divines. With con- sistency a great soul has simply nothing to do. He may as well concern himself with the shadow on the wall. Speak what you think now in hard words, and to-morrow speak what to-morrow thinks in hard words again, though it contradict everything you 10 said to-day. — "Ah, so you shall be sure to be misunderstood." — Is it so bad, then, to be misunderstood? Pythagoras was misun- derstood, and Socrates, and Jesus, and Luther, and Copernicus, and Galileo, and Newton, and every pure and wise spirit that ever took flesh. To be great is to be misunderstood. 15 I suppose no man can violate his nature. All the sallies of his will are rounded in by the law of his being, as the inequal- ities of Andes and Himmaleh are insignificant in the curve of the sphere. Nor does it matter how you gauge and try him. A character is like an acrostic or Alexandrian stanza; — read it 20 forward, backward, or across, it still spells the same thing. In this pleasing, contrite wood-life which God allows me, let me record day by day my honest thought without prospect or retro- spect, and, I cannot doubt, it will be found symmetrical, though I mean it not and see it not. My book should smell of pines 25 and resound with the hum of insects. The swallow over my window should interweave that thread or straw he carries in his bill into my web also. We pass for what we are. Character teaches above our wills. Men imagine that they communicate their virtue or vice only by overt actions, and do not see that virtue or vice emit a breath every moment. There will be an agreement in whatever variety of actions, so they be each honest and natural in their hour. For of one will, the actions will be harmonious, however unlike they seem. These 30 10 15 152 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE varieties are lost sight of at a little distance, at a little height of thought. One tendency unites them all. The voyage of the best ship is a zigzag line of a hundred tacks. See the line from a sufficient distance, and it straightens itself to the average tendency. Your genuine action will explain itself, and will explain your other genuine actions. Your conformity explains nothing. Act singly, and what you have already done singly will justify you now. Greatness appeals to the future. If I cas be firm enough to-day to do right and scorn eyes, I must have done so much right before as to defend me now. Be it how it will, do right now. Always scorn appearances, and you always may. The force of character is cumulative. All the foregone days of virtue work their health into this. What makes the majesty of the heroes of the senate and the field, which so fills the imagina- tion? The consciousness of a train of great days and victories behind. They shed an united light on the advancing actor. He is attended as by a visible escort of angels. That is it which throws thunder into Chatham's voice, and dignity into Wash- ington's port, and America into Adams's eye. Honor is vener- able to us because it is no ephemeris. It is always ancient virtue. We worship it to-day because it is not of to-day. We love it and pay it homage, because it is not a trap for our love and homage, but is self-dependent, self-derived, and, therefore, of an old immaculate pedigree, even if shown in a young person. I hope in these days we have heard the last of conformity and consistency. Let the words be gazetted and ridiculous henceforward. Instead of the gong for dinner, let us hear a whistle from the Spartan fife. Let us never bow and apologize more. A great man is coming to eat at my house. I do not 30 wish to please him; I wish that he should wish to please me. I will stand here for humanity, and though I would make it kind, I would make it true. Let us affront and reprimand the smooth mediocrity and squalid contentment of the times, and hurl in the face of custom and trade and office the fact which is the 20 25 THE NEW ENGLAND WRITERS 153 upshot of all history, that there is a great responsible Thinker and Actor working wherever a man works; that a true man belongs to no other time or place, but is the center of things. Where he is, there is nature. He measures you, and all men, and all events. Ordinarily, everybody in society reminds us of 6 somewhat else, or of some other person. Character, reality, reminds you of nothing else; it takes place of the whole creation. ******* Let a man then know his worth, and keep things under his feet. Let him not peep or steal, or skulk up and down with the 10 air of a charity-boy, a bastard, or an interloper, in the world which exists for him. But the man in the street, finding no worth in himself which corresponds to the force which built a tower or sculptured a marble god, feels poor when he looks on these. To him a palace, a statue, a costly book have an alien 15 and forbidding air, much like a gay equipage, and seem to say like that, "Who are you, sir?" Yet they all are his, suitors for his notice, petitioners to his faculties that they will come out and take possession. The picture waits for my verdict: it is not to command me, but I am to settle its claims to praise. That 20 popular fable of the sot who was picked up dead drunk in the street, carried to the duke's house, washed and dressed and laid in the duke's bed, and, on his waking, treated with all obsequious ceremony like the duke and assured that he has been insane, owes its popularity to the fact that it symbolizes so well the state of 25 man, who is in the world a sort of sot, but now and then wakes up, exercises his reason, and finds himself a true prince. Our reading is mendicant and sycophantic. In history, our imagination plays us false. Kingdom and lordship, power and estate are a gaudier vocabulary than private John and Edward 30 in a small house and common day's work; but the things of life are the same to both ; the sum total of both is the same. Why all this deference to Alfred, and Scanderbeg, and Gustavus? Suppose they were virtuous; did they wear out virtue? As 10 154 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE great a stake depends on your private act to-day as followed their public and renowned steps. When private men shall act with original views, the luster will be transferred from the actions of kings to those of gentlemen. The world has been instructed by its kings, who have so magnetized the eyes of nations. It has been taught by this colossal symbol the mutual reverence that is due from man to man. The joyful loyalty with which men have everywhere suffered the king, the noble, or the great proprietor to walk among them by a law of his own, make his own scale of men and things and reverse theirs, pay for benefits not with money but with honor, and represent the law in his person, was the hieroglyphic by which they obscurely signified their consciousness of their own right and comeliness, the right of every man. The magnetism which all original action exerts is explained when we inquire the reason of self-trust. Who is the Trustee? What is the aboriginal Self, on which a universal reliance may be grounded? What is the nature and power of that science- baffling star, without parallax, without calculable elements, which ^0 shoots a ray of beauty even into trivial and impure actions, if the least mark of independence appear? The inquiry leads us to that source, at once the essence of genius, of virtue, and of life, which we call Spontaneity or Instinct. We denote this primary wisdom as Intuition, whilst all later teachings are 2 5 tuitions. In that deep force, the last fact behind which analysis cannot go, all things find their common origin. For, the sense of being which in calm hours rises, we know not how, in the soul is not diverse from things, from space, from light, from time, from man, but one with them, and proceeds obviously 30 from the same source whence their life and being also proceed. We first share the life by which things exist, and afterward see them as appearances in nature, and forget that we have shared their cause. Here is the fountain of action and of thought. Here are the lungs of that inspiration which giveth man wisdom, THE NEW ENGLAND WRITERS 155 and which cannot be denied without impiety and atheism. We lie in the lap of immense intelligence, which makes us receivers of its truth and organs of its activity. When we discern justice, when we discern truth, we do nothing of ourselves, but allow a passage to its beams. If we ask whence this comes, if we seek 5 to pry into the soul that causes, all philosophy is at fault. Its presence or its absence is all we can affirm. Every man discrim- inates between the voluntary acts of his mind, and his involuntary perceptions, and knows that to his involuntary perceptions a perfect faith is due. He may err in the expression of them, 10 but he knows that these things are so, like day and night, not to be disputed. My willful actions and acquisitions are but roving ; — the idlest reverie, the faintest native emotion, command my curiosity and respect. Thoughtless people contradict as readily the statement of perceptions as of opinions, or rather 15 much more readily ; for, they do not distinguish between percep- tion and notion. They fancy that I choose to see this or that thing. But perception is not whimsical; it is fatal. If I see a trait, my children will see it after me, and in course of time all mankind, — although it may chance that no one has seen it before 2 me. For my perception of it is as much a fact as the sun. The relations of the soul to the divine spirit are so pure that it is profane to seek to interpose helps. It must be that when God speaketh he should communicate, not one thing, but all things; should fill the world with his voice; should scatter forth 25 light, nature, time, souls, from the center of the present thought ; and new date and new create the whole. Whenever a mind is simple and receives a divine wisdom, old things pass away, — means, teachers, texts, temples, fall; it lives now, and absorbs past and future into the present hour. All things are made 30 sacred by relation to it,— one as much as another. All things are dissolved to their center by their cause, and, in the universal miracle, petty and particular miracles disappear. If, therefore, a man claims to know and speak of God and carries you backward to 156 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE the phraseology of some old moldered nation in another country, in another world, believe him not. Is the acorn better than the oak which is its fullness and completion? Is the parent better than the child into whom he has cast his ripened being? Whence, 5 ]then, this worship of the past? The centuries are conspirators against the sanity and authority of the soul. Time and space are but physiological colors which the eye makes, but the soul is light; where it is, is day; where it was, is night; and history is an impertinence and an injury if it be anything more than a 10 j cheerful apologue or parable of my being and becoming. Man is timid and apologetic; he is no longer upright; he dares not say "I think," "I am," but quotes some saint or sage. He is ashamed before the blade of grass or the blowing rose. These roses under my window make no reference to former 15 roses or to better ones; they are for what they are; they exist with God to-day. There is no time to them. There is simply the rose ; it is perfect in every moment of its existence. Before a leaf-bud has burst, its whole life acts ; in the full-blown flower there is no more ; in the leafless root there is no less. Its nature 2 is satisfied, and it satisfies nature in all moments alike. But man postpones or remembers; he does not live in the present, but with reverted eye laments the past, or, heedless of the riches that surround him, stands on tiptoe to foresee the future. He cannot be happy and strong until he, too, lives with nature in 2 5 the present, above time. This should be plain enough. Yet see what strong intellects dare not yet hear God himself, unless he speak the phraseology of I know not what David, or Jeremiah, or Paul. We shall not always set so great a price on a few texts, on a few lives. We 30 are like children who repeat by rote the sentences of grandames and tutors, and, as they grow older, of the men and talents and characters they chance to see, — painfully recollecting the exact words they spoke; afterward, when they come into the point of view which those had who uttered these sayings, they understand THE NEW ENGLAND WRITERS 157 them and are willing to let the words go ; for, at any time, they can use words as good when occasion comes. If we live truly, we shall see truly. It is as easy for the strong man to be strong as it is for the weak to be weak. When we have new perception, we shall gladly disburden the memory of its hoarded treasures 5 as old rubbish. When a man lives with God, his voice shall be as sweet as the murmur of the brook and the rustle of the corn. And now at last the highest truth on this subject remains unsaid ; probably cannot be said ; for all that we say is the f ar-off remembering of the intuition. That thought, by what I can now 10 nearest approach to say it, is this. When good is near you, when you have life in yourself, it is not by any known or accustomed way ; you shall not discern the footprints of any other ; you shall not see the face of man ; you shallnot hear any name ; — the way, the thought, the good, shall be wholly strange and new. It shall 1 5 exclude example and experience. You take the way from man, not to man. All persons that ever existed are its forgotten ministers. Fear and hope are alike beneath it. There is some- what low even in hope. In the hour of vision, there is nothing that can be called gratitude, nor properly joy. The soul raised 2 over passion beholds identity and eternal causation, perceives the self-existence of Truth and Right, and calms itself with knowing that all things go well. Vast spaces of nature, the Atlantic Ocean, the South Sea,— long intervals of time, years, centuries — are of no account. This which I think and feel underlay every 25 former state of life and circumstances, as it does underlie my present, and what is called life, and what is called death. Life only avails, not the having lived. Power ceases in the instant of repose ; it resides in the moment of transition from a past to a new state, in the shooting of the gulf, in the darting 30 to an aim. This one fact the world hates, that the soul becomes; for that forever degrades the past, turns all riches to poverty, all reputation to shame, confounds the saint with the rogue. Why, then, do we prate of self-reliance? Inasmuch as the soul is 158 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE present, there will be power not confident but agent. To talk of reliance is a poor external way of speaking. Speak rather of that which relies because it works and is. Who has more obedience than I masters me, though he should not raise his 5 finger. Round him I must revolve by the gravitation of spirits. We fancy it rhetoric, when we speak of eminent virtue. We do not yet see that virtue is Height, and that a man or a company of men, plastic and permeable to principles, by the law of nature must overpower and ride all cities, nations, kings, rich men, 1 poets, who are not. This is the ultimate fact which we so quickly reach on this, as on every topic, the resolution of all into the ever-blessed One. Self-existence is the attribute of the Supreme Cause, and it con- stitutes the measure of good by the degree in which it enters into 1 5 all lower forms. All things real are so by so much virtue as they contain. Commerce, husbandry, hunting, whaling, war, eloquence, personal weight are somewhat, and engage my respect as examples of its presence and impure action. I see the same law working in nature for conservation and growth. Power is 2 o in nature the essential measure of right. Nature suffers nothing to remain in her kingdoms which cannot help itself. The genesis and maturation of a planet, its poise and orbit, the bended tree recovering itself from the strong wind, the vital resources of every animal and vegetable are demonstrations of the self- 2 5 sufficing, and therefore self-relying soul. Thus all concentrates: let us not rove; let us sit at home with the cause. Let us stun and astonish the intruding rabble of men and books and institutions by a simple declaration of the divine fact. Bid the invaders take the shoes from off their 3 feet, for God is here within. Let our simplicity judge them, and our docility to our own law demonstrate the poverty of nature and fortune beside our native riches. But now we are a mob. Man does not stand in awe of man, nor is his genius admonished to stay at home, to put itself in THE NEW ENGLAND WRITERS 159 communication with the internal ocean, but it goes abroad to beg a cup of water of the urns of other men. We must go alone. I like the silent church before the service begins better than any preaching. How far off, how cool, how chaste the persons look, begirt each one with a precinct or sanctuary ! So let us always 5 sit. Why should we assume the faults of our friend, or wife, or father, or child, because they sit around our hearth, or are said to have the same blood? All men have my blood, and I have all men's. Not for that will I adopt their petulance or folly, even to the extent of being ashamed of it. But your isola- 10 tion must not be mechanical, but spiritual; that is, must be elevation. At times the whole world seems to be in conspiracy to importune you with emphatic trifles. Friend, client, child, sickness, fear, want, charity, all knock at once at thy closet door and say, "Come out unto us." But keep thy state; come not 15 into their confusion. The power men possess to annoy me I give them by a weak curiosity. No man can come near me but through my act. "What we love that we have, but by desire we bereave ourselves of the love." If we cannot at once rise to the sanctities of obedience and 2 faith, let us at least resist our temptations ; let us enter into the state of war and wake Thor and Woden, courage and constancy, in our Saxon breasts. This is to be done in our smooth times by speaking the truth. Check this lying hospitality and lying affection. Live no longer to the expectation of these deceived 25 and deceiving people with whom we converse. Say to them, O father, O mother, O wife, O brother, O friend, I have lived with you after appearances hitherto. Henceforward I am the truth's. Be it known unto you that henceforward I obey no law less than the eternal law. I will have ro covenants but 30 proximities. I shall endeavor to nourish my parents, to support my family, to be the chaste husband of one wife, — but these relations I must fill after a new and unprecedented way. I appeal from your customs. I must -be myself. I cannot break 160 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE myself any longer for you, or you. If you can love me for what I am, we shall be the happier. If you cannot, I will still seek to deserve that you should. I will not hide my tastes or aver- sions. I will so trust that what is deep is holy that I will do 5 strongly before the sun and moon whatever only rejoices me, and the heart appoints. If you are noble, I will love you; if you are not, I will not hurt you and myself by hypocritical atten- tions. If you are true, but not in the same truth with me, cleave to your companions ; I will seek my own. I do this not selfishly, 10 but humbly and truly. It is alike your interest and mine, and all men's, however long we have dwelt in lies, to live in truth. Does this sound harsh to-day? You will soon love what is dictated by your nature as well as mine, and, if we follow the truth, it will bring us out safe at last. But so may you give !5 these friends pain. Yes, but I cannot sell my liberty and my power, to save their sensibility. Besides, all persons have their moments of reason, when they look out into the region of absolute truth; then will they justify me and do the same thing. The populace think that your rejection of popular standards 2 is a rejection of all standard, and mere antinomianism ; and the bold sensualist will use the name of philosophy to gild his crimes. But the law of consciousness abides. There are two confes- sionals, in one or the other of which we must be shriven. You may fulfill your round of duties by clearing yourself in the 2 5 direct, or in the reflex way. Consider whether you have satisfied your relations to father, mother, cousin, neighbor, town, cat, and dog; whether any of these can upbraid you. But I may also neglect this reflex standard and absolve me to myself. I have my own stern claims and perfect circle. It denies the name of 3 duty to many offices that are called duties. But if I can discharge its debts, it enables me to dispense with the popular code. If any one imagines that this law is lax, let him keep its commandment one day. And truly it demands something godlike in him who has cast THE NEW ENGLAND WRITERS 161 off the common motives of humanity, and has ventured to trust himself for a taskmaster. High be his heart, faithful his will, clear his sight, that he may in good earnest be doctrine, society, law to himself, that a simple purpose may be to him as strong as iron necessity is to others ! 5 If any man consider the present aspects of what is called by distinction society, he will see the need of these ethics. The sinew and heart of man seem to be drawn out, and we are become timorous, desponding whimperers. We are afraid of truth, afraid of fortune, afraid of death, and afraid of each other. Our age 10 yields no great and perfect persons. We want men and women who shall renovate life and our social state, but we see that most natures are insolvent, cannot satisfy their own wants, have an ambition out of all proportion to their practical force, and do lean and beg day and night continually. Our housekeeping is 15 mendicant, our arts, our occupations, our marriages, our religion we have not chosen, but society has chosen for us. We are parlor soldiers. We shun the rugged battle of fate, where strength is born. If our young men miscarry in their first enterprises, they lose 20 all heart. If the young merchant fails, men say he is ruined. If the finest genius studies at one of our colleges and^ is not installed in an office within one year afterward in the cities or suburbs of Boston or New York, it seems to his friends and to himself that he is right in being disheartened and in complaining 2 5 the rest of his life. A sturdy lad from New Hampshire or Vermont, who in turn tries all the professions, who teams it, farms it, peddles, keeps a school, preaches, edits a newspaper, goes to Congress, buys a township, and so forth, in successive years, and always, like a cat, falls on his feet, is worth a hundred 30 of these city dolls. He walks abreast with his days, and feels no shame in not "studying a profession," for he does not postpone his life but lives already. He has not one chance, but a hundred chances. Let a Stoic open the resources of man, and tell men 162 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE they are not leaning willows, but can and must detach themselves ; that with the exercise of self-trust, new powers shall appear; that a man is the word made flesh, born to shed healing to the nations, that he should be ashamed of our compassion, and that the 6 moment he acts from himself, tossing the laws, the books, idolatries and customs out of the window, we pity him no more, but thank and revere him, — and that teacher shall restore the life of man to splendor and make his name dear to all history. It is easy to see that a greater self-reliance must work a revo- 10 lution in all the offices and relations of men; in their religion; in their education ; in their pursuits ; their modes of living ; their association ; in their property ; in their speculative views. I. In what prayers do men allow themselves! That which they call a holy office is not so much as brave and manly. Prayer 1 5 looks abroad and asks for some foreign addition to come through some foreign virtue, and loses itself in endless mazes of natural and supernatural, and mediatorial and miraculous. Prayer that craves a particular commodity, — anything less than all good, — is vicious. Prayer is the contemplation of the facts of life from 2 the highest point of view. It is the soliloquy of a beholding and jubilant soul. It is the spirit of God pronouncing his works good. But prayer as a means to effect a private end is mean- ness and theft. It supposes dualism and not unity in nature and consciousness. As soon as the man is at one with God, he will 2 5 not beg. He will then see prayer in all action. The prayer of the farmer kneeling in his field to weed it, the prayer of the rower kneeling with the stroke of his oar, are true prayers heard throughout nature, though for cheap ends. Caratach, in Fletcher's Bonduca, when admonished to inquire the mind of 3 o the god Audate, replies, — "His hidden meaning lies in our endeavors; Our valors are our best gods." Another sort of false prayers are our regrets. Discontent THE NEW ENGLAND WRITERS 163 is the want of self-reliance : it is infirmity of will. Regret calam- ities, if you can thereby help the sufferer ; if not, attend your own work, and already the evil begins to be repaired. Our sympathy is just as base. We come to them who weep foolishly and sit down and cry for company, instead of imparting to them truth 5 and health in rough electric shocks, putting them once more in communication with their own reason. The secret of fortune is joy in our hands. Welcome evermore to gods and men is the self-helping man. For him all doors are flung wide: him all tongues greet, all honors crown, all eyes follow with desire. Our 1 love goes out to him and embraces him, because he did not need it. We solicitously and apologetically caress and celebrate him, because he held on his way and scorned our disapprobation. The gods love him because men hated him. 'To the persevering mortal," said Zoroaster, "the blessed Immortals are swift." 15 As men's prayers are a disease of the will, so are their creeds a disease of the intellect. They say with those foolish Israelites, "Let not God speak to us, lest we die. Speak thou, speak any man with us, and we will obey." Everywhere I am hindered of meeting God in my brother, because he has shut his own temple 2 doors, and recites fables merely of his brother's, or his brother's brother's God. Every new mind is a new classification. If it prove a mind of uncommon activity and power, a Locke, a Lavoisier, a Hutton, a Bentham, a Fourier, it imposes its classifi- cation on other men, and lo! a new system. In proportion to 25 the depth of the thought, and so to the number of the objects it touches and brings within reach of the pupil, is his complacency. But chiefly is this apparent in creeds and churches, which are also classifications of some powerful mind acting on the elemental thought of duty and man's relation to the Highest. Such is 30 Calvinism, Quakerism, Swedenborgism. The pupil takes the same delight in subordinating everything to the new terminology, as a girl who has just learned botany in seeing a new earth and new seasons thereby. It will happen for a time that the pupil 164 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE will find his intellectual power has grown by the study of his master's mind. But in all unbalanced minds the classification is idolized, passes for the end and not for a speedily exhaustible means, so that the walls of the system blend to their eye in the 5 remote horizon with the walls of the universe; the luminaries of heaven seem to them hung on the arch their master built. They cannot imagine how you aliens have any right to see, — how you can see ; "It must be somehow that you stole the light from us." They do not yet perceive that light, unsystematic, indomitable, 10 will break into any cabin, even into theirs. Let them chirp awhile and call it their own. If they are honest and do well, presently their neat new pinfold will be too strait and low, will crack, will lean, will rot and vanish, and the immortal light, all young and joyful, million-orbed, million-colored, will beam over 15 the universe as on the first morning. 2. It is for want of self-culture that the superstition of Travel- ing, whose idols are Italy, England, Egypt, retains its fascination for all educated Americans. They who made England, Italy, or Greece venerable in the imagination did so by sticking fast where 20 they were, like an axis of the earth. In manly hours we feel that duty is our place. The soul is no traveler ; the wise man stays at home, and when his necessities, his duties, on any occasion call him from his house or into foreign lands, he is at home still, and shall make men sensible by the expression of his countenance that 25 he goes the missionary of wisdom and virtue, and visits cities and men like a sovereign and not like an interloper or a valet. I have no churlish objection to the circumnavigation of the globe, for the purposes of art, of study, and benevolence, so that the man is first domesticated, or does not go abroad with the hope 30 of finding somewhat greater than he knows. He who travels to be amused, or to get somewhat which he does not carry, travels away from himself and grows old even in youth among old things. In Thebes, in Palmyra, his will and mind have become old and dilapidated as they. He carries ruins to ruins. THE NEW ENGLAND WRITERS 165 Traveling is a fool's paradise. Our first journeys discover to us the indifference of places. At home I dream that at Naples, at Rome, I can be intoxicated with beauty, and lose my sadness. I pack my trunk, embrace my friends, embark on the sea and at last wake up in Naples, and there beside me is the stern fact, the 5 sad self, unrelenting, identical, that I fled from. I seek the Vatican and the palaces. I affect to be intoxicated with sights and suggestions, but I am not intoxicated. My giant goes with me wherever I go. 3. But the rage of traveling is a symptom of a deeper unsound- 10 ness affecting the whole intellectual action. The intellect is vaga- bond, and our system of education fosters restlessness. Our minds travel when our bodies are forced to stay at home. We imitate; and what is imitation but the traveling of the mind? Our houses are built with foreign taste; our shelves are garnished 15 with foreign ornaments ; our opinions, our tastes, our faculties, lean and follow the Past and the Distant. The soul created the arts wherever they have flourished. It was in his own mind that the artist sought" his model. It was an application of his own thought to the thing to be done and the conditions to be observed. 2 And why need we copy the Doric or the Gothic model ? Beauty, convenience, grandeur of thought, and quaint expression are as near to us as to any, and if the American artist will study with hope and love the precise thing to be done by him, considering the climate, the soil, the length of the day, the wants of the 2 5 people, the habit and form of the government, he will create a house in which all these will find themselves fitted, and taste and sentiment will be satisfied also. Insist on yourself; never imitate. Your own gift you can present every moment with the cumulative force of a whole life's 30 cultivation ; but of the adopted talent of another, you have only an extemporaneous, half possession. That which each can do best, none but his Maker can teach him. No man yet knows what it is, nor can, till that person has exhibited it. Where is 15 166 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE the master who could have taught Shakespeare? Where is the master who could have instructed Franklin, or Washington, or Bacon, or Newton? Every great man is a unique. The Scipionism of Scipio is precisely that part he could not borrow. 5 Shakespeare will never be made by the study of Shakespeare. Do that which is assigned you, and you cannot hope too much or dare too much. There is at this moment for you an utterance brave and grand as that of the colossal chisel of Phidias, or trowel of the Egyptians, or the pen of Moses or Dante, but different 10 from all these. Not possibly will the soul all rich, all eloquent, with thousand-cloven tongue, deign to repeat itself; but if you can hear what these patriarchs say, surely you can reply to them in the same pitch of voice; for the ear and the tongue are two organs of one nature. Abide in the simple and noble regions of thy life, obey thy heart, and thou shalt reproduce the Foreworld again. 4- As our Religion, our Education, our Art look abroad, so does our spirit of society. All men plume themselves on the improvement of society, and no man improves. Society never advances. It recedes as fast on one side as it gains on the other. It undergoes continual changes; it is barbarous, it is civilized, it is christianized, it is rich, it is scien- tific; but this change is not amelioration. For everything that is given something is taken. Society acquires new arts and loses old instincts. What a contrast between the well-clad, reading, writing, thinking American, with a watch, a pencil, and a bill of exchange in his pocket, and the naked New Zealander, whose property is a club, a spear, a mat, and an undivided twentieth of a shed to sleep under! But compare the health of the two men, and you shall see that the white man has lost his aboriginal strength. If the traveler tell us truly, strike the savage with a broad axe and in a day or two the flesh shall unite and heal as if you struck the blow into soft pitch, and the same blow shall send the white to his grave. 30 THE NEW ENGLAND WRITERS 167 The civilized man has built a coach, but has lost the use of his feet. He is supported on crutches, but lacks so much support of muscle. He has a fine Geneva watch, but he fails of the skill to tell the hour by the sun. A Greenwich nautical almanac he has, and so being sure of the information when he wants it, the 5 man in the street does not know a star in the sky. The solstice he does not observe; the equinox he knows as little; and the whole bright calendar of the year is without a dial in his mind. His notebooks impair his memory ; his libraries overload his wit ; the insurance office increases the number of accidents ; and it may 10 be a question whether machinery does not encumber; whether we have not lost by refinement some energy, by a Christianity intrenched in establishments and forms some vigor of wild virtue For every Stoic was a Stoic; but in Christendom where is the Christian? 15 There is no more deviation in the moral standard than in the standard of height or bulk. No greater men are now than ever were. A singular equality may be observed between the great men of the first and of the last ages ; nor can all the science, art, religion, and philosophy of the nineteenth century avail to educate 2 greater men than Plutarch's heroes, three or four and twenty centuries ago. Not in time is the race progressive. Phocion, Socrates, Anaxagoras, Diogenes are great men, but they leave no class. He who is really of their class will not be called by their name, but will be his own man, and, in his turn, the founder of 25 a sect. The arts and inventions of each period are only its costume, and do not invigorate men. The harm of the improved machinery may compensate its good. Hudson and Bering accom- plished so much in their fishing boats as to astonish Parry and Franklin, whose equipment exhausted the resources of science 30 and art. Galileo, with an opera-glass, discovered a more splendid series of celestial phenomena than any one since. Columbus found the New World in an undecked boat. It is curious to see the periodical disuse and perishing of means and machinery which 15 168 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE were introduced with loud laudation a few years or centuries before. The great genius returns to essential man. We reckoned the improvements of the art of war among the triumphs of science, and yet Napoleon conquered Europe by the bivouac, 5 which consisted of falling back on naked valor and disencum- bering it of all aids. The Emperor held it impossible to make a perfect army, says Las Casas, "without abolishing our arms, magazines, commissaries, and carriages, until, in imitation of the Roman custom, the soldier should receive his supply of corn, 10 grind it in his handmill, and bake his bread himself." Society is a wave. The wave moves onward, but the water of which it is composed does not. The same particle does not rise from the valley to the ridge. Its unity is only phenomenal. The persons who make up a nation to-day next year die, and their experience with them. And so the reliance on Property, including the reliance on governments which protect it, is the want of self-reliance. Men have looked away from themselves and at things so long that they have come to esteem the religious, learned, and civil institu- tions as guards of property, and they deprecate assaults on these, because they feel them to be assaults on property. They measure their esteem of each other by what each has, and not by what each is. But a cultivated man becomes ashamed of his property, out of new respect for his nature. Especially he hates what he has, if he see that it is accidental, — came to him by inheritance, or gift, or crime; then he feels that it is not having; it does not belong to him. has no root in him, and merely lies there because no revolution or no robber takes it away. But that which a man is, does always by necessity acquire, and what the man acquires 30 is living property, which does not wait the beck of rulers, or mobs, or revolutions, or fire, or storm, or bankruptcies, but per- petually renews itself wherever the man breathes. "Thy lot or portion of life," said the Caliph AH, "is seeking after thee ; there- fore, be at rest from seeking after it." Our dependence on these 20 25 THE NEW ENGLAND WRITERS 169 foreign goods leads us to our slavish respect for numbers. The political parties meet in numerous conventions; the greater the concourse, and with each new uproar of announcement, The dele- gation from Essex ! The Democrats from New Hampshire ! The Whigs of Maine ! The young patriot feels himself stronger 6 than before by a new thousand of eyes and arms. In like manner the reformers summon conventions, and vote and resolve in multi- tude. Not so, O friends ! will the god deign to enter and inhabit you, but by a method precisely the reverse. It is only as a man puts off all foreign support and stands alone that I see him to l'Q be strong and to prevail. He is weaker by every recruit to his banner. Is not a man better than a town ? Ask nothing of men, and in the endless mutation, thou only hrm column must presently appear the upholder of all that surrounds thee. He who knows that power is inborn, that he is weak because he has looked for 16 good out of him and elsewhere, and so perceiving, throws himself unhesitatingly on his thought, instantly rights himself, stands in the erect position, commands his limbs, works miracles; just as a man who stands on his feet is stronger than a man who stands on his head. 2 So use all that is called Fortune. Most men gamble with her, and gain all and lose all, as her wheel rolls. But do thou leave as unawful these winnings, and deal with Cause and Effect, the chancellors of God. In the Will work and acquire, and thou hast chained the wheel of Chance and shalt sit hereafter out of 2 5 fear from her rotations. A political victory, a rise of rents, the recovery of your sick, or the return of your absent friend, or some other favorable event raises your spirits and you think good days are preparing for you. Do not believe it. Nothing can bring you peace but yourself. Nothing can bring you peace 30 but the triumph of principles. 170 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE HENRY DAVID THOREAU Born in Concord, Mass., 1817; died there, 1862 SOLITUDE From Walden This is a delicious evening, when the whole body is one sense and imbibes delight through every pore. I go and come with a strange liberty in Nature, a part of herself. As I walk along the stony shore to the pond in my shirt-sleeves, though it is cool 5 as well as cloudy and windy and I see nothing special to attract me, all the elements are unusually congenial to me. The bull- frogs trump to usher in the night, and the note of the whippoor- will is borne on the rippling wind from over the water. Sympathy with the fluttering alder and poplar leaves almost takes away my !0 breath; yet, like the lake, my serenity is rippled but not ruffled. These small waves raised by the evening wind are as remote from storm as the smooth reflecting surface. Though it is now dark, the wind still blows and roars in the wood, the waves still dash, and some creatures lull the rest with their notes. The 15 repose is never complete. The wildest animals do not repose, but seek their prey now; the fox, and skunk, and rabbit now roam the fields and woods without fear. They are Nature's watchmen, — links which connect the days of animated life. When I return to my house I find that visitors have been 2o there and left their cards, either a bunch of flowers, or a wreath of evergreen, or a name in pencil on a yellow walnut leaf or a chip. They who come rarely to the woods take some little piece of the forest into their hands to play with by the way, which they leave, either intentionally or accidentally. One has peeled a 2 5 willow wand, woven it into a ring, and dropped it on my table. I could always tell if visitors had called in my absence, either by the bended twigs or grass, or the print of their shoes, and generally of what sex or age or quality they were by some slight trace left, as a flower dropped, or a bunch of grass plucked and THE NEW ENGLAND WRITERS 171 thrown away, even as far off as the railroad, half a mile distant, or by the lingering odor of a cigar or pipe. Nay, I was frequently notified of the passage of a traveler along the highway sixty rods off by the scent of his pipe. There is commonly sufficient space about us. Our horizon 5 is never quite at our elbows. The thick wood is not just at our door, nor the pond, but somewhat is always clearing, familiar and worn by us, appropriated and fenced in some way and reclaimed from Nature. For what reason have I this vast range and circuit, some square miles of unfrequented forest, for my 1° privacy, abandoned to me by men? My nearest neighbor is a mile distant, and no house is visible from any place but the hill-tops within half a mile of my own. I have my horizon bounded by woods all to myself ; a distant view of the railroad where it touches the pond on the one hand, and of the fence 15 which skirts the woodland road on the other. But for the most part it is as solitary where I live as on the prairies. It is as much Asia or Africa as New England. I have, as it were, my own sun and moon and stars, and a little world all to myself. At night there was never a traveler passed my house, or knocked 2 at my door, more than if I were the first or last man ; unless it were in the spring, when at long intervals some came from the village to fish for pouts, — they plainly fished much more in the Walden Pond of their own natures and baited their hooks with darkness, — but they soon retreated, usually with light baskets, 2 5 and left "the world to darkness and to me," and the black kernel of the night was never profaned by any human neighbor- hood. I believe that men are generally still a little afraid of the dark, though the witches are all hung and Christianity and candles have been introduced. 30 Yet I experienced sometimes that the most sweet and tender, the most innocent and encouraging society may be found in any natural object, even for the poor misanthrope and most melan- choly man. There can be no very black melancholy to him who 172 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE lives in the midst of Nature and has his senses still. There was never yet such a storm but it was yEolian music to a healthy and innocent ear. Nothing can rightly compel a simple and brave man to a vulgar sadness. While I enjoy the friendship of the 5 seasons I trust that nothing can make life a burden to me. The gentle rain which waters my beans and keeps me in the house to-day is not drear and melancholy, but good for me, too. Though it prevents my hoeing them, it is far more worth than my hoeing. If it should continue so long as to cause the seeds 1 to rot in the ground and destroy the potatoes in the lowlands, it would still be good for the grass on the uplands, and, being good for the grass, it would be good for me. Sometimes, when I compare myself with other men, it seems as if I were more favored by the gods than they, beyond any deserts that I am 1 5 conscious of ; as if I had a warrant and surety at their hands which my fellows have not, and were especially guided and guarded. I do not flatter myself, but if it be possible they flatter me. I have never felt lonesome, or in the least oppressed by a sense of solitude but once, and that was a few weeks after I 2 o came to the woods, when, for an hour, I doubted if the near neighborhood of man was not essential to a serene and healthy life. To be alone was something unpleasant. But I was at the same time conscious of a slight insanity in my mood, and seemed to foresee my recovery. In the midst of a gentle rain while these 2 5 thoughts prevailed, I was suddenly sensible of such sweet and beneficent society in Nature, in the very patering of the drops and in every sound and sight around my house, an infinite and unaccountable friendliness all at once like an atmosphere sustain- ing me, as made the fancied advantages of human neighborhood 3 insignificant, and I have never thought of them since. Every little pine needle expanded and swelled with sympathy and befriended me. I was so distinctly made aware of the presence of something kindred to me, even in scenes which we are accus- THE NEW ENGLAND WRITERS 173 tomed to call wild and dreary, and also that the nearest of blood to me and humanest was not a person nor a villager, that T thought no place could ever be strange to me again. Some of my pleasantest hours were during the long rainstorms in the spring or fall, which confined me to the house for the 5 afternoon as well as the forenoon, soothed by their ceaseless roar and pelting; when an early twilight ushered in a long evening in which many thoughts had time to take root and unfold themselves. In those driving northeast rains which tried the village houses so, when the maids stood ready with mop and pail 1 in front entries to keep the deluge out, I sat behind my door in my little house, which was all entry, and thoroughly enjoyed its protection. In one heavy thunder-shower the lightning struck a large pitch-pine across the pond, making a very conspicuous and perfectly regular spiral groove from top to bottom, an inch 1 5 or more deep, and four or five inches wide, as you would groove a walking-stick. I passed it again the other day and was struck with awe on looking up and beholding that mark, now more distinct than ever, where a terrific and resistless bolt came down out of the harmless sky eight years ago. Men frequently say 2 to me, "I should think you would feel lonesome down there, and want to be nearer to folks, rainy and snowy days and nights especially." I am tempted to reply to such,— This whole earth which we inhabit is but a point in space. How far apart, think you, dwell the two most distant inhabitants of yonder star, the 2 ~> breadth of whose disk cannot be appreciated by our instruments ? Why should I feel lonely? Is not our planet in the Milky Way? This which you put seems to me not to be the most important question. What sort of space is that which separates a man from his fellows and makes him solitary? I have found that 30 no exertion of the legs can bring two minds much nearer to one another. What do we want most to dwell near to? Not to many men surely, the depot, the post-office, the bar-room, the meeting-house, the schoolhouse, the grocery, Beacon Hill, or the 174 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE Five Points, where men most congregate, but to the perennial source of our life, whence in all our experience we have found that to issue, as the willow stands near the water and sends out its roots in that direction. This will vary with different natures, 5 but this is the place where a wise man will dig his cellar. 5|C 5JC J|C JjC 5jC 5j» 5jC I find it wholesome to be alone the greater part of the time. To be in company, even with the best, is soon wearisome and dissipating. I love to be alone. I never found the companion 10 that was so companionable as solitude. We are, for the most part, more lonely when we go abroad among men than when we stay in our chambers. A man thinking or working is always alone, let him be where he will. Solitude is not measured by the miles of space that intervene between a man and his fellows. 1 5 The really diligent student in one of the crowded hives of Cam- bridge College is as solitary as a dervish in the desert. The farmer can work alone in the field or the woods all day, hoeing or chopping, and not feel lonesome, because he is employed ; but when he comes home at night he cannot sit down in a room 2 alone, at the mercy of his thoughts, but must be where he can "see the folks" and recreate, and, as he thinks, remunerate himself for his day's solitude; and hence he wonders how the student can sit alone in the house all night and most of the day without ennui and "the blues" ; but he does not realize that the student, 2 5 though in the house, is still at work in his field, and chopping in his woods, as the farmer in his, and in turn seeks the same recreation and society that the latter does, though it may be a more condensed form of it. Society is commonly too cheap. We meet at very short 3 intervals, not having had time to acquire any new value for each other. We meet at meals three times a day and give each other a new taste of that old musty cheese that we are. We have had to agree on a certain set of rules, called etiquette and politeness, to make this frequent meeting tolerable and that we need not come THE NEW ENGLAND WRITERS 175 to open war. We meet at the post-office, and at the sociable, and about the fireside every night ; we live thick and are in each other's way, and stumble over one another, and I think that we thus lose some respect for one another. Certainly less frequency would suffice for all important and hearty communications. Con- 5 sider the girls in a factory, — never alone, hardly in their dreams. It would be better if there were but one inhabitant to a square mile, as where I live. The value of a man is not in his skin, that we should touch him. I have heard of a man lost in the woods and dying of famine 10 and exhaustion at the foot of a tree, whose loneliness was relieved by the grotesque visions with which, owing to bodily weakness, his diseased imagination surrounded him, and which he believed to be real. So also, owing to bodily and mental health and strength, we may be continually cheered by a like but more normal 1 5 and natural society, and come to know that we are never alone. I have a great deal of company in my house, especially in the morning, when nobody calls. Let me suggest a few com- parisons, that some one may convey an idea of my situation. I am no more lonely than the loon in the pond that laughs so 20 loud, or than Walden Pond itself. What company has that lonely lake, I pray ? And yet it has not the blue devils, but the blue angels in it, in the azure tint of its waters. The sun is alone, except in thick weather, when there sometimes appear to be two, but one is a mock sun. God is alone, — but the devil, he 25 is far from being alone ; he sees a great deal of company ; he is legion. I am no more lonely than a single mullein or dandelion in a pasture, or a bean leaf, or sorrel, or a horse-fly, or a humble-bee. I am no more lonely than the Mill Brook, or a weathercock, or the north star, or the south wind, or an April 30 shower, or a January thaw, or the first spider in a new house. 176 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE Born in Salem, Mass., 1804; died in Plymouth, N. H., 1864 THE GREAT STONE FAoE One afternoon, when the sun was going down, a mother and her little boy sat at the door of their cottage, talking about the Great Stone Face. They had but to lift their eyes, and there it was plainly to be seen, though miles away, with the sunshine b brightening all its features. And what was the Great Stone Face? Embosomed amongst a family of lofty mountains, there was a valley so spacious that it contained many thousand inhabitants. Some of these good people dwelt in log huts, with the black forest *0 all around them, on the steep and difficult hillsides. Others had their homes in comfortable farm houses, and cultivated the rich soil on the gentle slopes or level surfaces of the valley. Others, again, were congregated into populous villages, where some wild, highland rivulet, tumbling down from its birthplace in the upper l*> mountain region, had been caught and tamed by human cunning and compelled to turn the machinery of cotton factories. The inhabitants of this valley, in short, were numerous, and of many modes of life. But all of them, grown people and children, had a kind of familiarity with the Great Stone Face, although some 2 possessed the gift of distinguishing this grand natural phenomenon more perfectly than many of their neighbors. The Great Stone Face, then, was a work of Nature in her mood of majestic playfulness, formed on the perpendicular side of the mountain by some immense rocks, which had been thrown 2 5 together in such a position as, when viewed at a proper distance, precisely to resemble the features of the human countenance. It seemed as if an enormous giant, or a Titan, had sculptured his own likeness on the precipice. There was the broad arch of the forehead, a hundred feet in height ; the nose, with its long bridge; 30 and the vast lips, which, if they could have spoken, would have THE NEW ENGLAND WRITERS 177 rolled their thunder accents from one end of the valley to the other. True it is, that if the spectator approached too near, he lost the outline of the gigantic visage, and could discern only a heap of ponderous and gigantic rocks, piled in chaotic ruin one upon another. Retracing his steps, however, the wondrous 5 features would again be seen ; and the farther he withdrew from them, the more like a human face, with all its original divinity intact, did they appear ; until, as it grew dim in the distance, with the clouds and glorified vapor of the mountains clustering about it, the Great Stone Face seemed positively to be alive. 10 It was a happy lot for children to grow up to manhood or womanhood with the Great Stone Face before their eyes, for all the features were noble, and the expression was at once grand and sweet, as if it were the glow of a vast, warm heart, that embraced all mankind in its affections, and had room for more. It was IB an education only to look at it. According to the belief of many people, the valley owed much of its fertility to this benign aspect that was continually beaming over it, illuminating the clouds, and infusing its tenderness into the sunshine. As we began with saying, a mother and her little boy sat at 2 their cottage-door, gazing at the Great Stone Face, and talking about it. The child's name was Ernest. "Mother," said he, while the Titanic visage smiled on him, "I wish that it could speak, for it looks so very kindly that its voice must needs be pleasant. If I were to see a man with such 25 a face, I should love him dearly." "If an old prophecy should come to pass," answered his mother, "we may see a man, some time or other, with exactly such a face as that." "What prophecy do you mean, dear mother?" eagerly inquired 30 Ernest. "Pray tell me all about it!" So his mother told him a story that her own mother had told to her, when she herself was younger than little Ernest; a story, not of things that were past, but of what was yet to come; a 178 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE story, nevertheless, so very old that even the Indians, who formerly inhabited this valley, had heard it from their fore- fathers, to whom, as they affirmed, it had been murmured by the mountain streams, and whispered by the wind among the tree- 5 tops. The purport was that, at some future day, a child should be born hereabouts, who was destined to become the greatest and noblest personage of his time, and whose countenance, in man- hood, should bear an exact resemblance to the Great Stone Face. Not a few old-fashioned people, and young ones likewise, in 10 the ardor of their hopes, still cherished an enduring faith in this old prophecy. But others, who had seen more of the world, had watched and waited till they were weary, and had beheld no man with such a face, nor any man that proved to be much greater or nobler than his neighbors, concluded it to be nothing 15 but an idle tale. At all events, the great man of the prophecy had not yet appeared. "O mother, dear mother!" cried Ernest, clapping his hands above his head, "I do hope that I shall live to see him !" His mother was an affectionate and thoughtful woman, and 2 felt that it was wisest not to discourage the generous hopes of her little boy. So she only said to him, "Perhaps you may." And Ernest never forgot the story that his mother told him. It was always in his mind, whenever he looked upon the Great Stone Face. He spent his childhood in the log-cottage where 2 5 he was born, and was dutiful to his mother, and helpful to her in many things, assisting her much with his little hands, and more with his loving heart. In this manner, from a happy yet often pensive child, he grew up to be a mild, quiet, unobtrusive boy, and sunbrowned with labor in the fields, but with more 30 intelligence brightening his aspect than is seen in many lads who have been taught at famous schools. Yet Ernest had had no teacher, save only that the Great Stone Face became one to him. When the toil of the day was over, he would gaze at it for hours, until he began to imagine that those vast features THE NEW ENGLAND WRITERS 179 recognized him, and gave him a smile of kindness and encourage- ment, responsive to his own look of veneration. We must not take upon us to affirm that this was a mistake, although the Face may have looked no more kindly at Ernest than at all the world 5 besides. But the secret was that the boy's tender and confiding simplicity discerned what other people could not see; and thus the love, which was meant for all, became his peculiar portion. About this time there went a rumor throughout the valley that the great man, foretold from ages long ago, who was to bear 10 a resemblance to the Great Stone Face, had appeared at last. It seems that, many years before, a young man had migrated from the valley and settled at a distant seaport, where, after getting together a little money, he had set up as a shopkeeper. His name — but I could never learn whether it was his real one, 15 or a nickname that had grown out of his habits and success in life — was Gathergold. Being shrewd and active, and endowed by Providence with that inscrutable faculty which develops itself in what the world calls luck, he became an exceedingly rich merchant, and owner of a whole fleet of bulky-bottomed ships. 20 All the countries of the globe appeared to join hands for the mere purpose of adding heap after heap to the mountainous accumulation of this one man's wealth. The cold regions of the north, almost within the gloom and shadow of the Arctic Circle, sent him their tribute in the shape of furs ; hot Africa sifted for 25 him the golden sands of her rivers, and gathered up the ivory tusks of her great elephants out of the forest; the East came bringing him the rich shawls, and spices, and teas, -and the effulgence of diamonds, and the gleaming purity of large pearls. The ocean, not to be behindhand with the earth, yielded up her 30 mighty whales, that Mr. Gathergold might sell their oil, and make a profit on it. Be the original commodity what it might, it was gold within his grasp. It might be said of him, as of Midas in the fable, that whatever he touched with his finger immediately glistened, and grew yellow, and was changed at 180 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE once into sterling metal, or, which suited him still better, into piles of coin. And, when Mr. Gathergold had become so very rich that it would have taken him a hundred years only to count his wealth, he bethought himself of his native valley, and resolved to go back thither, and end his days where he was born. With 5 this purpose in view, he sent a skilful architect to build him such a palace as should be fit for a man of his vast wealth to live in. As I have said above, it had already been rumored in the valley that Mr. Gathergold had turned out to be the prophetic personage so long and vainly looked for, and that his visage was 10 the perfect and undeniable similitude of the Great Stone Face. People were the more ready to believe that this must needs be the fact, when they beheld the splendid edifice that rose, as if by enchantment, on the site of his father's old weather-beaten farm- house. The exterior was of marble, so dazzlingly white that it 15 seemed as though the whole structure might melt away in the sunshine, like those humbler ones which Mr. Gathergold, in his younger playdays, before his fingers were gifted with the touch of transmutation, had been accustomed to build of snow. It had a richly ornamented portico, supported by tall pillars, beneath 20 which was a lofty door, studded with silver knobs, and made of a kind of variegated wood that had been brought from beyond the sea. The windows, from the floor to the ceiling of each stately apartment, were composed, respectively, of but one enor- mous pane of glass, so transparently pure that it was said to be 25 a finer medium than even the vacant atmosphere. Hardly anybody had been permitted to see the interior of this palace; but it was reported, and with good semblance of truth, to be far more gorgeous than the outside, insomuch that whatever was iron or brass in other houses was silver or gold in this; and 30 Mr. Gathergold's bedchamber, especially, made such a glittering appearance that no ordinary man would have been able to close his eyes there. But, on the other hand, Mr. Gathergold was now THE NEW ENGLAND WRITERS 181 so inured to wealth that perhaps he could not have closed his eyes unless where the gleam of it was certain to find its way beneath his eyelids. In due time, the mansion was finished ; next came the uphol- 5 sterers with magnificent furniture ; then, a whole troop of black and white servants, the harbingers of Mr. Gathergold, who, in his own majestic person, was expected to arrive at sunset. Our friend Ernest, meanwhile, had been deeply stirred by the idea that the great man, the noble man, the man of prophecy, after so 10 many ages of delay, was at length to be made manifest to his native valley. He knew, boy as he was, that there were a thou- sand ways in which Mr. Gathergold, with his vast wealth, might transform himself into an angel of beneficence, and assume a control over human affairs as wide and benignant as the smile 15 of the Great Stone Face. Full of faith and hope, Ernest doubted not that what the people said was true, and that now he was to behold the living likeness of those wondrous features on the mountain-side. While the boy was still gazing up the valley, and fancying, as he always did, that the Great Stone Face 20 returned his gaze and looked kindly at him, the rumbling of wheels was heard, approaching swiftly along the winding road. "Here he comes !" cried a group of people who were assem- bled to witness the arrival. "Here comes the great Mr. Gather- gold r 26 A carriage, drawn by four horses, dashed round the turn of the road. Within it, thrust partly out of the window, appeared the physiognomy of a little old man, with a skin as yellow as if his own Midas-hand had transmuted it. He had a low forehead, small, sharp eyes, puckered about with innumerable wrinkles, and 30 very thin lips, which he made still thinner by pressing them forcibly together. "The very image of the Great Stone Face!" shouted the people. "Sure enough, the old prophecy is true; and here we have the great man come, at last !" 182 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE And, what greatly perplexed Ernest, they seemed actually to believe that here was the likeness which they spoke of. By the roadside there chanced to be an old beggar-woman and two little beggar-children, stragglers from some far-off region, who, 5 as the carriage rolled onward, held out their hands and lifted up their doleful voices, most piteously beseeching charity. A yellow claw — the very same that had clawed together so much wealth — poked itself out of the coach-window, and dropt some copper coins upon the ground; so that, though the great man's 10 name seems to have been Gathergold, he might just as suitably have been nicknamed Scattercopper. Still, nevertheless, with an earnest shout, and evidently with as much good faith as ever, the people bellowed, — "He is the very image of the Great Stone Face !" 15 But Ernest turned sadly from the wrinkled shrewdness of that sordid visage, and gazed up the valley, where, amid a gath- ering mist, gilded by the last sunbeams, he could still distinguish those glorious features which had impressed themselves into his soul. Their aspect cheered him. What did the benign lips seem 2 to say? "He will come ! Fear not, Ernest ; the "man will come !" The years went on, and Ernest ceased to be a boy. He had grown to be a young man now. He attracted little notice from the other inhabitants of the valley ; for they saw nothing remark- 2 5 able in his way of life, save that, when the labor of the day was over, he still loved to go apart and gaze and meditate upon the Great Stone Face. According to their idea of the matter, it was a folly, indeed, but pardonable, inasmuch as Ernest was industrious, kind, and neighborly, and neglected no duty for the 30 sake of indulging this idle habit. They knew not that the Great Stone Face had become a teacher to him, and that the sentiment which was expressed in it would enlarge the young man's heart, and fill it with wider and deeper sympathies than other hearts. They knew not that thence would come a better wisdom than 10 THE NEW ENGLAND WRITERS 183 could be learned from books, and a better life than could be moulded on the defaced example of other human lives. Neither did Ernest know that the thoughts and affections which came to him so naturally, in the fields and at the fireside, and wherever he communed with himself, were of a higher tone than those which all men shared with him. A simple soul,— simple as when his mother first taught him the old prophecy,— he beheld the marvelous features beaming adown the valley, and still wondered that their human counterpart was so long in making his appear- ance. By this time poor Mr. Gathergold was dead and buried ; and the oddest part of the matter was, that his wealth, which was the body and spirit of his existence, had disappeared before his death, leaving nothing of him but a living skeleton, covered over with a wrinkled, yellow skin. Since the melting away of his 15 gold, it had been very generally conceded that there was no such striking resemblance, after all, betwixt the ignoble features of the ruined merchant and that majestic face upon the mountain- side. So the people ceased to honor him during his lifetime, and quietly consigned him to forgetfulness after his decease. Once 20 in a while, it is true, his memory was brought up in connection with the magnificent palace which he had built, and which had long ago been turned into a hotel for the accommodation of strangers, multitudes of whom came, every summer, to visit that famous natural curiosity, the Great Stone Face. Thus, Mr. 2 5 Gathergold being discredited and thrown into the shade, the man of prophecy was yet to come. It so happened that a native-born son of the valley, many years before, had enlisted as a soldier, and, after a great deal of hard fighting, had now become an illustrious commander. Whatever 30 he may be called in history, he was known in camps and on the battlefield under the nickname of Old Blood-and-Thunder. This war-worn veteran, being now infirm with age and wounds, and weary of the turmoil of a military life, and of the roll of the 184 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE drum and the clangor of the trumpet, that had so long been ringing in his ears, had lately signified a purpose of returning to his native valley, hoping to find repose where he remembered to have left it. The inhabitants, his old neighbors and their 5 grown-up children, were resolved to welcome the renowned warrior with- a salute of cannon and a public dinner ; and all the more enthusiastically, it being affirmed that now, at last, the likeness of the Great Stone Face had actually appeared. An aid-de-camp of Old Blood-and-Thunder, traveling through the 10 valley, was said to have been struck with the resemblance. More- over, the schoolmates and early acquaintances of the general were ready to testify, on oath, that, to the best of their recollection, the aforesaid general had been exceedingly like the majestic image, even when a boy, only that the idea had never occurred 15 to them at that period. Great, therefore, was the excitement throughout the valley; and many people, who had never once thought of glancing at the Great Stone Face for years before, now spent their time in gazing at it for the sake of knowing exactly how General Blood-and-Thunder looked. 20 On the day of the great festival, Ernest, with all the other people of the valley, left their work, and proceeded to the spot where the sylvan banquet was prepared. As he approached, the loud voice of the Rev. Dr. Battleblast was heard, beseeching a blessing on the good things set before them, and on the distin- 25 guished friend of peace in whose honor they were assembled. The tables were arranged in a cleared space of the woods, shut in by the surrounding trees, except where a vista opened east- ward, and afforded a distant view of the Great Stone Face. Over the general's chair, which was a relic from the home of 30 Washington, there was an arch of verdant boughs, with the laurel profusely intermixed, and surmounted by his country's banner, beneath which he had won his victories. Our friend Ernest raised himself on his tiptoes, in hopes to get a glimpse of the celebrated guest; but there was a mighty crowd about the tables anxious to hear the toasts and speeches, and to catch any word THE NEW ENGLAND WRITERS 185 that might fall from the general in reply ; and a volunteer com- pany, doing duty as a guard, pricked ruthlessly with their bayonets at any particularly quiet person among the throng. _ So Ernest, being of an unobtrusive character, was thrust quite into the background, where he could see no more of Old Blood-and- 5 Thunder's physiognomy than if it had been still blazing on the battlefield. To console himself, he turned toward the Great Stone Face, which, like a faithful and long-remembered friend, looked back and smiled upon him through the vista of the forest. Meantime, however, he could overhear the remarks of various 10 individuals, who were comparing the features of the hero with the face on the distant mountain-side. " 'Tis the same face, to a hair !" cried one man, cutting a caper for joy, "Wonderfully like, that's a fact!" responded another. ^ 15 "Like ! why, I call it Old Blood-and-Thunder himself, in a monstrous looking-glass!" cried a third. "And why not? ^ He's the greatest man of this or any other age, beyond a doubt." And then all three of the speakers gave a great shout, which communicated electricity to the crowd, and called forth a roar 20 from a thousand voices, that went reverberating for miles among the mountains, until you might have supposed that the Great Stone Face had poured its thunder-breath into the cry. All these comments, and this vast enthusiasm served the more to interest our friend; nor did he think of questioning that now, 25 at length, the mountain-visage had found its human counterpart. It is true, Ernest had imagined that this long-looked-for person- age would appear in the character of a man of peace, uttering wisdom, and doing good, and making people happy. But, taking an habitual breadth of view, with all his simplicity, he contended 30 that Providence should choose its own method of blessing man- kind, and could conceive that this great end might be effected even by a warrior and a bloody sword, should inscrutable wisdom see fit to order matters so. 186 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE "The general! the general!" was now the cry. "Hush! silence ! Old Blood-and-Thunder's going to make a speech." Even so; for, the cloth being removed, the general's health had been drunk amid shouts of applause, and he now stood upon 6 his feet to thank the company. Ernest saw him. There he was, over the shoulders of the crowd, from the two glittering epaulets and embroidered collar upward, beneath the arch of green boughs with intertwined laurel, and the banner drooping as if to shade his brow! And there, too, visible in the same 10 glance, through the vista of the forest, appeared the Great Stone Face ! And was there, indeed, such a resemblance as the crowd had testified? Alas, Ernest could not recognize it! He beheld a war-worn and weather-beaten countenance, full of energy, and expressive of an iron will ; but the gentle wisdom, the deep, broad, 15 tender sympathies, were altogether wanting in Old Blood-and- Thunder's visage ; and even if the Great Stone Face had assumed his look of stern command, the milder traits would still have tempered it. "This is not the man of prophecy," sighed Ernest, to himself, 20 as he made his way out of the throng. "And must the world wait longer yet ?" The mists had congregated about the distant mountain-side, and there were seen the grand and awful features of the Great Stone Face, awful but benignant, as if a mighty angel were sitting 25 among the hills, and enrobing himself in a cloud-vesture of gold and purple. As he looked, Ernest could hardly believe but that a smile beamed over the whole visage, with a radiance still brightening, although without motion of the lips. It was prob- ably the effect of the . western sunshine, melting through the 30 thinly diffused vapors that had swept between him and the object that he gazed at. But — as it always did — the aspect of his marvelous friend made Ernest as hopeful as if he had never hoped in vain. THE NEW ENGLAND WRITERS 187 "Fear not, Ernest," said his heart, even as if the Great Face were whispering to him, — "fear not, Ernest; he will come." More years sped swiftly and tranquilly away. Ernest still dwelt in his native valley, and was now a man of middle age. By imperceptible degrees, he had become known among the 5 people. Now, as heretofore, he labored for his bread, and was the same simple-hearted man that he had always been. But he had thought and felt so much, he had given so many of the best hours of his Hfe to unworldly hopes for some great good to man- kind, that it seemed as though he had been talking with the 10 angels, and had imbibed a portion of their wisdom unawares. It was visible in the calm and well-considered beneficence of his daily life, the quiet stream of which had made a wide green margin all along its course. Not a day passed by that the world was not the better because this man, humble as he was, had 15 lived. He never stepped aside from his own path, yet would always reach a blessing to his neighbor. Almost involuntarily, too, he had become a preacher. The pure and high simplicity of his thought, which, as one of its manifestations, took shape in the good deeds that dropped silently from his hand, flowed 20 also forth in speech. He uttered truths that wrought upon and moulded the lives of those who heard him. His auditors, it may be, never suspected that Ernest, their own neighbor and familiar friend, was more than an ordinary man ; least of all did Ernest himself suspect it; but, inevitably as the murmur of a 25 rivulet, came thoughts out of his mouth that no other human lips had spoken. When the people's minds had had a little time to cool, they were ready enough to acknowledge their mistake in imagining a similarity between General Blood-and-Thunder's truculent 30 physiognomy and the benign visage on the mountain-side. But now, again, there were reports and many paragraphs in the newspapers, affirming that the likeness of the Great Stone Face had appeared upon the broad shoulders of a certain eminent 188 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE statesman. He, like Mr. Gathergold and Old Blood-and- Thunder, was a native of the valley, but had left it in his early- days, and taken up the trades of law and politics. Instead of the rich man's wealth and the warrior's sword, he had but a 5 tongue, and it was mightier than both together. So wonder- fully eloquent was he, that whatever he might choose to say, his auditors had no choice but to believe him ; wrong looked like right, and right like wrong; for when it pleased him, he could make a kind of illuminated fog with his mere breath, and obscure 10 the natural daylight with it. His tongue, indeed, was a magic instrument: sometimes it rumbled like the thunder; sometimes it warbled like the sweetest music. It was the blast of war, — the song of peace; and it seemed to have a heart in it, when there was no such matter. In good truth, he was a wondrous 1 5 man ; and when his tongue had acquired him all other imaginable success, — when it had been heard in halls of state, and in the courts of princes and potentates, — after it had made him known all over the world, even as a voice crying from shore to shore, — it finally persuaded his countrymen to select him for the Pres- 2o idency. Before this time, — indeed, as soon as he began to grow celebrated, — his admirers had found out the resemblance between him and the Great Stone Face; and so* much were they struck by it, that throughout the country this distinguished gentleman was known by the name of Old Stony Phiz. The phrase was 25 considered as giving a highly favorable aspect to his political prospect; for, as is likewise the case with the Popedom, nobody ever becomes President without taking a name other than his own. While his friends were doing their best to make him Pres- ident, Old Stony Phiz,, as he was called, set out on a visit to 30 the valley where he was born. Of course, he had no other object than to shake hands with his fellow-citizens, and neither . thought nor cared about any effect which his progress through the country might have upon the election. Magnificent prepara- tions were made to receive the illustrious statesman ; a cavalcade THE NEW ENGLAND WRITERS 189 of horsemen set forth to meet him at the boundary line of the State, and all the people left their business and gathered along the wayside to see him pass. Among these was Ernest. Though more than once disappointed, as we have seen, he had such a hopeful and confiding nature, that he was always ready to believe 5 in whatever seemed beautiful and good. He kept his heart con- tinually open, and thus was sure to catch the blessing from on high, when it should come. So now again, as buoyantly as ever, he went forth to behold the likeness of the Great Stone Face. The cavalcade came prancing along the road, with a great 10 clattering of hoofs and a mighty cloud of dust, which rose up so dense and high that the visage of the mountain-side was com- pletely hidden from Ernest's eyes. All the great men of the neighborhood were there on horseback: militia officers, in uniform; the member of Congress; the sheriff of the county; 15 the editors of newspapers ; and many a farmer, too, had mounted his patient steed, with his Sunday coat upon his back. It really was a very brilliant spectacle, especially as there were numerous banners flaunting over the cavalcade, on some of which were gorgeous portraits of the illustrious statesman and the Great 20 Stone Face, smiling familiarly at one another, like two brothers. If the pictures were to be trusted, the mutual resemblance, it must be confessed, was marvelous. We must not forget to mention that there was a band of music, which made the echoes of the mountains ring and reverberate with the loud triumph of 2 5 its strains; so that: airy and soul-thrilling melodies broke out among all the heights and hollows, as if every nook of his native valley had found a voice, to welcome the distinguished guest. But the grandest effect was when the far-off mountain precipice flung back the music; for then the Great Stone Face itself 30 seemed to be swelling the triumphant chorus, in acknowledgment that, at length, the man of prophecy was come. All this while the people were throwing up their hats and shouting, with enthusiasm so contagious that the heart of Ernest 190 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE kindled up, and he likewise threw up his hat, and shouted, as loudly as the loudest, "Huzza for the great man! Huzza for Old Stony Phiz !" But as yet he had not seen him. "Here he is, now !" cried those who stood near Ernest. 5 "There ! There ! Look at Old Stony Phiz and then at the Old Man of the Mountain, and see if they are not as like as two twin-brothers !" In the midst of all this gallant array came an open barouche, drawn by four white horses; and in the barouche, with his 10 massive head uncovered, sat the illustrious statesman, Old Stony Phiz himself. "Confess it," said one of Ernest's neighbors to him, "the Great Stone Face has met its match at last !" Now, it must be owned that, at his first glimpse of the counte- 15 nance which was bowing and smiling from the barouche, Ernest did fancy that there was a resemblance between it and the old familiar face upon the mountain-side. The brow, with its massive depths and loftiness, and all the other features, indeed, were boldly and strongly hewn, as if in emulation of a more 20 than heroic, of a Titanic model. But the sublimity and state- liness, the grand expression of a divine sympathy, that illuminated the mountain visige, and etherealized its ponderous granite substance into spirit, might here be sought in vain. Something had been originally left out, or had departed. And, therefore, 25 the marvelously gifted statesman had always a weary gloom in the deep caverns of his eyes, as of a child that has outgrown its playthings, or a man of mighty faculties and little aims, whose life, with all its high performances, was vague and empty, because no high purpose had endowed it with reality. 30 Still, Ernest's neighbor was thrusting his elbow into his side, and pressing him for an answer. "Confess ! confess ! Is not he the very picture of your Old Man of the Mountain ?" "No !" said Ernest, bluntly, "I see little or no likeness." THE NEW ENGLAND WRITERS 191 "Then so much the worse for the Great Stone Face! answered his neighbor; and again he set up a shout for Old Stony Phiz. But Ernest turned away, melancholy, and almost despondent ; for this was the saddest of his disappointments, to behold a man 5 who might have fulfilled the prophecy, and had not willed to do so. Meantime, the cavalcade, the banners, the music, and the barouches swept past him, with the vociferous crowd in the rear, leaving the dust to settle down, and the Great Stone Face to be revealed again, with the grandeur that it had worn for untold 10 centuries. "Lo, here I am, Ernest!" the benign lips seemed to say. "I have waited longer than thou, and am not yet weary. Fear not ; the man will come." The years hurried onward, treading in their haste on one 15 another's heels. And now they began to bring white hairs, and scatter them over the head of Ernest; they made reverend wrinkles across his forehead, and furrows in his cheeks. He was an aged man. But not in vain had he grown old; more than the white hairs on his head were the sage thoughts in his 2 mind; his wrinkles and furrows were inscriptions that Time had graved, and in which he had written legends of wisdom that had been tested by the tenor of a life. And Ernest had ceased to be obscure. Unsought for, undesired, had come the fame which so many seek, and made him known in the great 2 5 world, beyond the limits of the valley in which he had dwelt so quietly. College professors, and even the active men of cities, came from far to see and converse with Ernest; for the report had gone abroad that this simple husbandman had ideas unlike those of other men, not gained from books, but of a higher tone, — 3 a tranquil and familiar majesty, as if he had been talking with the angels as his daily friends. Whether it were sage, states- man, or philanthropist, Ernest received these visitors with the gentle sincerity that had characterized him from boyhood, and 192 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE spoke freely with them of whatever came uppermost, or lay deepest in his heart or their own. While they talked together, his face would kindle, unawares, and shine upon them, as with a mild evening light. Pensive with the fulness of such discourse, 5 his guests took leave and went their way; and passing up the valley, paused to look at the Great Stone Face, imagining that they had seen its likeness in a human countenance, but could not remember where. While Ernest had been growing up and growing old, a boun- 10 tiful Providence had granted a new poet to this earth. He, likewise, was a native of the valley, but had spent the greater part of his life at a distance from that romantic region, pouring out his sweet music amid the bustle and din of cities. Often, however, did the mountains which had been familiar to him in 1 5 his childhood lift their snowy peaks into the clear atmosphere of his poetry. Neither was the Great Stone Face forgotten, for the poet had celebrated it in an ode, which was grand enough to have been uttered by its own majestic lips. This man of genius, we may say, had come down from heaven with wonderful 2 endowments. If he sang of a mountain, the eyes of all mankind beheld a mightier grandeur reposing on its breast, or soaring to its summit, than had before been seen there. If his theme were a lovely lake, a celestial smile had now been thrown over it, to gleam forever on its surface. If it were the vast old sea, even 2 5 the deep immensity of its dread bosom seemed to swell the higher, as if moved by the emotions of the song. Thus the world assumed another and better aspect from the hour that the poet blessed it with his happy eyes. The Creator had bestowed him, as the last best touch to his own handiwork. 3o Creation was not finished till the poet came to interpret, and so complete it. The effect was no less high and beautiful, when his human brethren were the subject of his verse. The man or woman, sordid with the common dust of life, who crossed his daily path, THE NEW ENGLAND WRITERS 193 and the little child who played in it, were glorified if he beheld them in his mood of poetic faith. He showed the golden links of the great chain that intertwined them with an angelic kindred; he brought out the hidden traits of a celestial birth that made them worthy of such kin. Some, indeed, there were who thought 5 to show the soundness of their judgment by affirming that all the beauty and dignity of the natural world existed only in the poet's fancy. Let such men speak for themselves, who undoubt- edly appear to have been spawned forth by Nature with a con- temptuous bitterness; she having plastered them up out of her 10 refuse stuff, after all the swine were made. As respects all things else, the poet's ideal was the truest truth. The songs of this poet found their way to Ernest. He read them after his customary toil, seated on the bench before his cottage-door, where for such a length of time he had filled his 15 repose with thought, by gazing at the Great Stone Face. And now as he read stanzas that caused the soul to thrill within him, he lifted his eyes to the vast countenance beaming on him so benignantly. "O majestic friend," he murmured, addressing the Great 20 Stone Face, "is not this man worthy to resemble thee?" The Face seemed to smile, but answered not a word. Now it happened that the poet, though he dwelt so far away, had not only heard of Ernest, but had meditated much upon his character, until he deemed nothing so desirable as to meet this 2 5 man, whose untaught wisdom walked hand in hand with the noble simplicity of his life. One summer morning, therefore, he took passage by the railroad, and, in the decline of the after- noon, alighted from the cars at no great distance from Ernest's cottage. The great hotel, which had formerly been the palace 30 of Mr. Gathergold, was close at hand, but the poet, with his carpet-bag on his arm, inquired at once where Ernest dwelt, and was resolved to be accepted as his guest. Approaching the door, he there found the good old man, hold- 194 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE ing a volume in his hand, which alternately he read, and then, with a finger between the leaves, looked lovingly at the Great Stone Face. "Good evening," said the poet. "Can you give a traveler a 5 night's lodging?" "Willingly," answered Ernest; and then he added, smiling, "Methinks I never saw the Great Stone Face look so hospitably at a stranger/' The poet sat down on the bench beside him, and he and Ernest 1 ° talked together. Often had the poet held intercourse with the wittiest and the wisest, but never before with a man like Ernest, whose thoughts and feelings gushed up with such a natural freedom, and who made great truths so familiar by his simple utterance of them. Angels, as had been so often said, seemed 15 to have wrought with him at his labor in the fields; angels seemed to have sat with him by the fireside; and, dwelling with angels as friend with friends, he had imbibed the sublimity of their ideas, and imbued it with the sweet and lowly charm of household words. So thought the poet. And Ernest, on the 20 other hand, was moved and agitated by the living images which the poet flung out of his mind, and which peopled all the air about the cottage-door with shapes of beauty, both gay and pensive. The sympathies of these two men instructed them with a profounder sense than either could have attained alone. 25 Their minds accorded into one strain, and made delightful music which neither of them could have claimed as all his own, nor distinguished his own share from the other's. They led one another, as it were, into a high pavilion of their thoughts, so remote, and hitherto so dim, that they had never entered it before, 30 and so beautiful that they desired to be there always. As Ernest listened to the poet, he imagined that the Great Stone Face was bending forward to listen, too. He gazed earnestly into the poet's glowing eyes. "Who are you, my strangely gifted guest?" he said. THE NEW ENGLAND WRITERS 195 The poet laid his finger on the volume that Ernest had been reading. "You have read these poems," said he. "You know me, then, — for I wrote them." Again, and still more earnestly than before, Ernest examined 5 the poet's features : then turned toward the Great Stone Face ; then back, with an uncertain aspect, to his guest. But his counte- nance fell ; he shook his head, and sighed. "Wherefore are you sad?" inquired the poet. "Because," replied Ernest, "all through life I have awaited 10 the fulfilment of a prophecy; and, when I lead these poems, I hoped that it might be fulfilled in you." "You hoped," answered the poet, faintly smiling, "to find in me the likeness of the Great Stone Face. And you are disap- pointed, as formerly with Mr. Gathergold, and Old Blood-and- I 5 Thunder, and Old Stony Phiz. Yes, Ernest, it is my doom. You must add my name to the illustrious three, and record another failure of your hopes. For — in shame and sadness do I speak it, Ernest — I am not worthy to be typified by yonder benign and majestic image." 2 "And why?" asked Ernest. He pointed to the volume. "Are not those thoughts divine?" "They have a strain of the Divinity," replied the poet. "You can hear in them the far-off echo of a heavenly song. But my life, dear Ernest, has not corresponded with my thought. I 25 have had grand dreams, but they have been only dreams, because I have lived — and that, too, by my own choice — among poor and mean realities. Sometimes even — shall I dare to say it? — I lack faith in the grandeur, the beauty, and the goodness, which my own works are said to have made more evident in 3 nature and in human life. Why, then, pure seeker of the good and true, shouldst thou hope to find me in yonder image of the divine?" 196 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE The poet spoke sadly, and his eyes were dim with tears. So, likewise, were those of Ernest. At the hour of sunset, as had long been his frequent custom, Ernest was to discourse to an assemblage of the neighboring 5 inhabitants in the open air. He and the poet, arm in arm, still talking together as they went along, proceeded to the spot. It was a small nook among the hills, with a gray precipice behind, the stern front of which was relieved by the pleasant foliage of many creeping plants, that made a tapestry for the naked rock, 10 by hanging their festoons from all its rugged angles. At a small elevation above the ground, set in a rich framework of verdure, there appeared a niche, spacious enough to admit a human figure, with freedom for such gestures as spontaneously accom- pany earnest thought and genuine emotion. Into this natural 15 pulpit Ernest ascended, and threw a look of familiar kindness around upon his audience. They stood, or sat, or reclined upon the grass, as seemed good to each, with the departing sunshine falling obliquely over them, and mingling its subdued cheerful- ness with the solemnity of a grove of ancient trees, beneath and 20 amid the boughs of which the golden rays were constrained to pass. In another direction was seen the Great Stone Face, with the same cheer, combined with the same solemnity, in its benignant aspect. Ernest began to speak, giving to the people of what was in 25 his heart and mind. His words had power, because they accorded with his thoughts; and his thoughts had reality and depth, because they harmonized with the life which he had always lived. It was not mere breath that this preacher uttered; they were the words of life, because a life of good deeds and holy 30 love was melted into them. Pearls, pure and rich, had been dissolved into this precious draught. The poet, as he listened, felt that the being and character of Ernest were a nobler strain of poetry than he had ever written. His eyes glistening with tears, he gazed reverentially at the venerable man, and said THE NEW ENGLAND WRITERS 197 within himself that never was there an aspect so worthy of a prophet and a sage as that mild, sweet, thoughtful countenance, with the glory of white hair diffused about it. At a distance, but distinctly to be seen, high up in the golden light of the setting sun, appeared the Great Stone Face, with hoary mists around it, 5 like the white hairs around the brow of Ernest. Its look of grand beneficence seemed to embrace the world. At that moment, in sympathy with a thought which he was about to utter, the face of Ernest assumed a grandeur of expres- sion, so imbued with benevolence, that the poet, by an irresistible 10 impulse, threw his arms aloft, and shouted, — "Behold! Behold! Ernest is himself the likeness of the Great Stone Face!" Then all the people looked, and saw that what the deep- sighted poet said was true. The prophecy was fulfilled. But 15 Ernest, having finished what he had to say, took the poet's arm, and walked slowly homeward, still hoping that some wiser and better man than himself would by and 'by appear, bearing a resemblance to the Great Stone Face. HENRY WADSWORTH LONGFELLOW Born at Portland, Me., 1807; died at Cambridge, Mass., 1882 A PSALM OF LIFE What the Heart of the Young Man Said to the Psalmist Tell me not, in mournful numbers, 2o Life is but an empty dream! — For the soul is dead that slumbers, And things are not what they seem. Life is real ! Life is earnest ! And the grave is not its goal ; 2 5 Dust thou art, to dust return est, Was not spoken of the soul. 198 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE Not enjoyment, and not sorrow, Is our destined end or way; But to act, that each to-morrow Find us farther than to-day. 5 Art is long, and Time is fleeting, And our hearts, though stout and brave, Still, like muffled drums, are beating Funeral marches to the grave. In the world's broad field of battle, 10 In the bivouac of Life, Be not like dumb, driven cattle ! Be a hero in the strife ! Trust no Future, howe'er pleasant! Let the dead Past bury its dead ! 15 Act, — act in the living Present! Heart within, and God o'erhead ! Lives of great men all remind us We can make our lives sublime, And, departing, leave behind us 2 Footprints on the sands of time ; Footprints, that perhaps another, Sailing o'er life's solemn main, A forlorn and shipwrecked brother, Seeing, shall take heart again. 2 5 Let us, then, be up and doing, With a heart for any fate; Still achieving, still pursuing, Learn to labor and to wait. THE NEW ENGLAND WRITERS 199 THE WRECK OF THE HESPERUS It was the schooner Hesperus, That sailed the wintry sea; And the skipper had taken his little daughter, To bear him company. Blue were her eyes as the fairy-flax, 5 Her cheeks like the dawn of day, And her bosom white as the hawthorn buds, That ope in the month of May. The skipper he stood beside the helm, His pipe was in his mouth, 10 And he watched how the veering flaw did blow The smoke now West, now South. Then up and spake an old sailor, Had sailed to the Spanish Main, "I pray thee, put into yonder port, 1 5 For I fear a hurricane. "Last night the moon had a golden ring, And to-night no moon we see !" The skipper, he blew a whiff from his pipe, And a scornful laugh laughed he. 20 Colder and colder blew the wind, A gale from the Northeast, The snow fell hissing in the brine, And the billows frothed like yeast. Down came the storm, and smote amain 2 5 The vessel in its strength; 200 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE She shuddered and paused, like a frighted steed, Then leaped her cable's length. "Come hither! come hither! my little daughter, And do not tremble so ; 5 For I can weather the roughest gale That ever wind did blow." He wrapped her warm in his seaman's coat Against the stinging blast ; He cut a rope from a broken spar, 1 o And bound her to the mast. "Q father ! I hear the church bells ring, Oh, say, what may it be?" " 'Tis a fog bell on a rock-bound coast !" — And he steered for the open sea. 1 5 "O father ! I hear the sound of guns, Oh, say, what may it be?" "Some ship in distress, that cannot live In such an angry sea!" "O father! T see the gleaming light, 2 ° Oh, sav, what may it be ?" But the father answered never a word, A frozen corpse was he. Lashed to the helm, all stiff and stark, With his face turned to the skies, 2 5 The lantern gleamed through the gleaming snow On his fixed and glassy eyes. THE NEW ENGLAND WRITERS 201 Then the maiden clasped her hands and prayed That saved she might be ; And she thought of Christ, who stilled the wave, On the Lake of Galilee. And fast through the midnight dark and drear, 5 Through the whistling sleet and snow, Like a sheeted ghost, the vessel swept Tow'rds the reef of Norman's Woe. And ever the fitful gusts between A sound came from the land ; ' ° It was the sound of the trampling surf On the rocks and the hard sea sand. The breakers were right beneath her bows, She drifted a dreary wreck, And a whooping billow swept the crew 1 6 Like icicles from her deck. She struck where the white and fleecy waves Looked soft as carded wool, But the cruel rocks, they gored her side Like the horns of an angry bull. Her rattling shrouds, all sheathed in ice, With the masts went by the board ; Like a vessel of glass, she stove and sank, Ho ! ho ! the breakers roared ! At daybreak, on the bleak sea beach, A fisherman stood aghast, To see the form of a maiden fair, Lashed close to a drifting mast. 20 25 10 202 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE The salt sea was frozen on her breast, The salt tears in her eyes ; And he saw her hair, like the brown seaweed, On the billows fall and rise. Such was the wreck of the Hesperus, In the midnight and the snow ! Christ save us all from a death like this, On the reef of Norman's Woe! THE VILLAGE BLACKSMITH Under a spreading chestnut tree The village smithy stands ; The smith, a mighty man is he, With large and sinewy hands; And the muscles of his brawny arms Are strong as iron bands. 15 His hair is crisp, and black, and long, His face is like the tan; His brow is wet with honest sweat, He earns whate'er he can, And looks the whole world in the face, For he owes not any man. Week in, week out, from morn till night, You can hear his bellows blow ; You can hear him swing his heavy sledge, With measured beat and slow, Like a sexton ringing the village bell, When the evening sun is low. And children coming home from school Look in at the open door ; 20 25 THE NEW ENGLAND WRITERS 203 They love to see the flaming forge, And hear the bellows roar, And catch the burning sparks that fly Like chaff from a threshing-floor. He goes on Sunday to the church, 5 And sits among his boys ; He hears the parson pray and preach, He hears his daughter's voice, Singing in the village choir, And it makes his heart rejoice. 10 It sounds to him like her mother's voice, Singing in Paradise ! He needs must think of her once more, How in the grave she lies ; And with his hard, rough hand he wipes 15 A tear out of his eyes. Toiling, — rejoicing, — sorrowing, Onward through life he goes; Each morning sees some task begin, Each evening sees it close ; Something attempted, something done, Has earned a night's repose. 20 Thanks, thanks to thee, my worthy friend, For the lesson thou hast taught ! Thus at the flaming forge of life Our fortunes must be wrought ; Thus on its sounding anvil shaped Each burning deed and thought ! 204 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE EXCELSIOR The shades of night were falling fast, As through an Alpine village passed A youth, who bore, 'mid snow and ice, A banner with the strange device, 6 Excelsior ! His brow was sad ; his eye beneath, Flashed like a falchion from its sheath, And like a silver clarion rung The accents of that unknown tongue, 10 Excelsior! In happy homes he saw the light Of household fires gleam warm and bright ; Above, the spectral glaciers shone, And from his lips escaped a groan, !5 Excelsior! "Try not the Pass !" the old man said ; "Dark lowers the tempest overhead, The roaring torrent is deep and wide !" And loud that clarion voice replied, 20 Excelsior! "Oh stay," the maiden said, "and rest Thy weary head upon this breast !" A tear stood in his bright blue eye, But still he answered, with a sigh, Excelsior! 25 "Beware the pine-tree's withered branch! Beware the awful avalanche !" THE NEW ENGLAND WRITERS 205 This was the peasant's last Good-night, A voice replied, far up the height, Excelsior ! At break of day, as heavenward The pious monks of Saint Bernard Uttered the oft-repeated prayer, A voice cried through the startled air, Excelsior! A traveler, by the faithful hound. Half-buried in the snow was found. Still grasping in his hand of ice That banner with the strange device, Excelsior! There in the twilight cold and gray, Lifeless, but beautiful, he lay, And from the sky, serene and far, A voice fell, like a falling star, Excelsior ! THE DAY IS DONE The day is done, and the darkness Falls from the wings of Night, 20 As a feather is wafted downward From an eagle in his flight. I see the lights of the village Gleam through the rain and the mist, And a feeling of sadness comes o'er me 2 5 That my soul cannot resist: 15 206 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE A feeling of sadness and longing That is not akin to pain, And resembles sorrow only As the mist resembles rain. 5 Come, read to me some poem, Some simple and heartfelt lay, That shall soothe this restless feeling, And banish the thoughts of day. Not from the grand old masters, 10 Not from the bards sublime, Whose distant footsteps echo Through the corridors of Time. For, like strains of martial music, Their mighty thoughts suggest 15 Life's endless toil and endeavor; And to-night I long for rest. Read from some humbler poet, Whose songs gushed from his heart, As showers from the clouds of summer, 20 Or tears from the eyelids start ; Who through long days of labor, And nights devoid of ease, Still heard in his soul the music Of wonderful melodies. 25 Such songs have power to quiet The restless pulse of care, And come like the benediction That follows after prayer. 10 THE NEW ENGLAND WRITERS 207 Then read from the treasured volume The poem of thy choice, And lend to the rhyme of the poet The beauty of thy voice. And the night shall be filled with music, And the cares that infest the day Shall fold their tents like the Arabs, And as silently steal away. PAUL REVERE'S RIDE Listen, my children, and you shall hear Of the midnight ride of Paul Revere, On the eighteenth of April, in Seventy-five; Hardly a man is now alive Who remembers that famous day and year. He said to his friend, "If the British march By land or sea from the town to-night, Hang a lantern aloft in the belfry arch Of the North Church tower as a signal light, — One, if by land, and two, if by sea; And I on the opposite shore will be, Ready to ride and spread the alarm Through every Middlesex village and farm, For the country-folk to be up and to arm." Then he said, "Good-night !" and with muffled oar Silently rowed to the Charlestown shore, ^ Just as the moon rose over the bay, Where swinging wide at her moorings lay The Somerset, British man-of-war ; A phantom ship, with each mast and spar 15 2Q> 208 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE Across the moon like a prison bar, And a huge black hulk, that was magnified By its own reflection in the tide. Meanwhile, his friend, through alley and street, 5 Wanders and watches with eager ears, Till in the silence around him he hears The muster of men at the barrack door The sound of arms, and the tramp of feet, And the measured tread of the grenadiers, 1 ° Marching down to their boats on the shore. Then he climbed the tower of the old North Church By the wooden stairs, with stealthy tread, To the belfry-chamber overhead, And startled the pigeons from their perch On the somber rafters, that round him made Masses and moving shapes of shade, — By the trembling ladder, steep and tall, To the highest window in the wall, Where he paused to listen and look down A moment on the roofs of the town, And the moonlight flowing over all. Beneath in the churchyard, lay the dead, In their night encampment on the hill, Wrapped in silence so deep and still That he could hear, like a sentinel's tread, The watchful night wind, as it went Creeping along from tent to tent, And seeming to whisper, "All is well !" 20 25 30 A moment only he feels the spell Of the place, and the hour, and the secret dread Of the lonely belfry and the dead ; 10 15 THE NEW ENGLAND WRITERS 209 For suddenly all his thoughts are bent On a shadowy something far away, Where the river widens to meet the bay, — A line of black that bends and floats On the rising tide, like a bridge of boats Meanwhile, impatient to mount and ride. Booted and spurred, with a heavy stride On the opposite shore walked Paul Revere. Now he patted his horse's side, Now gazed at the landscape far and near, Then, impetuous, stamped the earth, And turned and tightened his saddle-girth ; But mostly he watched with eager search The belfry-tower of the old North Church, As it rose above the graves on the hill, Lonely and spectral and somber and still. And, lo ! as he looks, on the belfry height A glimmer, and then a gleam of light ! He springs to the saddle, the bridle he turns, But lingers and gazes, till full on his sight 2 A second lamp in the belfry burns ! A hurry of hoofs in a village street, A shape in the moonlight, a bulk in the dark, And beneath, from the pebbles, in passing, a spark Struck out by a steed flying fearless and fleet : That was all ! And yet, through the gloom and the light, The fate of a nation was riding that night ; And the spark struck out by that steed, in his flight, Kindled the land into flame with its heat. He has left the village and mounted the steep, And beneath him, tranquil and broad and deep, 210 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE Is the Mystic, meeting the ocean tides ; And under the alders that skirt its edge, Now soft on the sand, now loud on the ledge, Is heard the tramp of his steed as he rides. 5 It was twelve by the village clock, When he crossed the bridge into Medford town. He heard the crowing of the cock, And the barking of the farmer's dog, And felt the damp of the river fog, 1 That rises after the sun goes down. It was one by the village clock, When he galloped into Lexington. He saw the gilded weathercock Swim in the moonlight as he passed, 15 And the meeting-house windows, blank and bare, Gaze at him with a spectral glare, As if they already stood aghast At the bloody work they would look upon. It was two by the village clock, 2 ° When he came to the bridge in Concord town. He heard the bleating of the flock, And the twitter of birds among the trees, And felt the breath of the morning breeze Blowing over the meadows brown. 2 5 And one was safe and asleep in his bed Who at the bridge would be first to fall, Who that day would be lying dead, Pierced by a British musket-ball. You know the rest. In the books you have read, How the British Regulars fired and fled, — THE NEW ENGLAND WRITERS 211 How the farmers gave them ball for ball, From behind each fence and farmyard wall, Chasing the red-coats down the lane, Then crossing the fields to emerge again Under the trees at the turn of the road, 5 And only pausing to fire and load. So through the night rode Paul Revere ; And so through the night went his cry of alarm To every Middlesex village and farm, — A cry of defiance and not of fear, 10 A voice in the darkness, a knock at the door, And a word that shall echo forevermore ! For, borne on the night-wind of the Past, Through all our history, to the last, In the hour of darkness and peril and need, 15 The people will waken and listen to hear The hurrying hoof-beats of that steed, And the midnight message of Paul Revere. THE SONG OF HIAWATHA (Selections) The Hunting of Pau-Puk-Keewis Full of wrath was Hiawatha When he came into the village, 2 o Found the people in confusion, Heard of all the misdemeanors, Of the cunning Pau-Puk-Keewis. Hard his breath came through his nostrils, Through his teeth he buzzed and muttered 2 5 Words of anger and resentment, Hot and humming, like a hornet "I will slay this Pau-Puk-Keewis, 212 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE Slay this mischief-maker !" said he. "Not so long and wide the world is, Not so rude and rough the way is, That my wrath shall not attain him, 6 That my vengeance shall not reach him !" Then in swift pursuit departed Hiawatha and the hunters On the trail of Pau-Puk-Keewis, Through the forest, where he passed it, 10 To the headlands where he rested; But they found not Pau-Puk-Keewis, Only in the trampled grasses, In the whortleberry-bushes, Found the couch where he had rested, 15 Found the impress of his body. From the lowlands far beneath them, From the Muskoday, the meadow, Pau-Puk-Keewis, turning backward, Made a gesture of defiance, 20 Made a gesture of derision ; And aloud cried Hiawatha, From the summit of the mountains : "Not so long and wide the world is, Not so rude and rough the way is, 25 But my wrath shall overtake you, And my vengeance shall attain you !" Over rock and over river, Through bush, and brake, and forest, Ran the cunning Pau-Puk-Keewis ; 30 Like an antelope he bounded, Till he came unto a streamlet In the middle of the forest, To a streamlet still and tranquil, That had overflowed its margin, THE NEW ENGLAND WRITERS 213 To a dam made by the beavers, To a pond of quiet water, Where knee-deep the trees were standing, Where the water-lilies floated, Where the rushes waved and whispered. 5 On the dam stood Pau-Puk-Keewis, On the dam of trunks and branches, Through whose chinks the water spouted, O'er whose summit flowed the streamlet. From the bottom rose the beaver, 1 ° Looked with two great eyes of wonder, Eyes that seemed to ask a question, At the stranger, Pau-Puk-Keewis. On the dam stood Pau-Puk-Keewis, O'er his ankles flowed the streamlet, 1 5 Flowed the bright and silvery water, And he spake unto the beaver, With a smile he spake in this wise : "O my friend Ahmeek, the beaver, Cool and pleasant is the water ; 2 Let me dive into the water, Let me rest there in your lodges ; Change me, too, into a beaver !" Cautiously replied the beaver, With reserve he thus made answer: 2 5 "Let me first consult the others, Let me ask the other beavers." Down he sank into the water, Heavily sank he, as a stone sinks, Down among the leaves and branches, 3 Brown and matted at the bottom. On the dam stood Pau-Puk-Keewis, O'er his ankles flowed the streamlet, Spouted through the chinks below him, 15 214 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE Dashed upon the stones beneath him, Spread serene and calm before him, And the sunshine and the shadows Fell in flecks and gleams upon him, 6 Fell in little shining patches, Through the waving, rustling branches. From the bottom rose the beavers, Silently above the surface Rose one head and then another, Till the pond seemed full of beavers, Full of black and shining faces. To the beavers Pau-Puk-Keewis Spake entreating, said in this wise : "Very pleasant is your dwelling, O my friends ! and safe from danger ; Can you not, with all your cunning, All your wisdom and contrivance, Change me, too, into a beaver ?" "Yes !" replied Ahmeek, the beaver, He the King of all the beavers, "Let yourself slide down among us, Down into the tranquil water." Down into the pond among them Silently sank Pau-Puk-Keewis ; 2 5 Black became his shirt of deer-skin, Black his moccasins and leggings, In a broad black tail behind him Spread his fox-tails and his fringes; He was changed into a beaver. 30 "Make me large," said Pau-Puk-Keewis, "Make me large and make me larger, Larger than the other beavers." "Yes," the beaver chief responded, "When our lodge below you enter, 20 10 THE NEW ENGLAND WRITERS 215 In our wigwam we will make you Ten times larger than the others." Thus into the clear, brown water Silently sank Pau-Puk-Keewis : Found the bottom covered over With the trunks of trees and branches, Hoards of food against the winter, Piles and heaps against the famine ; Found the lodge with arching doorway, Leading into spacious chambers. Here they made him large and larger, Made him largest of the beavers, Ten times larger than the others. "You shall be our ruler," said they; "Chief and king of all the beavers." 15 But not long had Pau-Puk-Keewis Sat in state among the beavers, When there came a voice of warning From the watchman at his station In the water-flags and lilies, 20 Saying, "Here is Hiawatha ! Hiawatha with his hunters !" Then they heard a cry above them, Heard a shouting and a tramping, Heard a crashing and a rushing, And the water round and o'er them Sank and sucked away in eddies, And they knew their dam was broken. On the lodge's roof the hunters Leaped, and broke it all asunder ; Streamed the sunshine through the crevice, Sprang the beavers through the doorway, Hid themselves in deeper water, In the channel of the streamlet ; 2 5 30 216 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE But the mighty Pau-Puk-Keewis Could not pass beneath the doorway ; He was puffed with pride and feeding, He was swollen like a bladder. 5 Through the roof looked Hiawatha, Cried aloud, "O Pau-Puk-Keewis ! Vain are all your craft and cunning, Vain your manifold disguises ! Well, I know you, Pau-Puk-Keewis!" 10 With their clubs they beat and bruised him, Beat to death poor Pau-Puk-Keewis, Pounded him as maize is pounded, Till his skull was crushed to pieces. Six tall hunters, lithe and limber, 15 Bore him home on poles and branches, Bore the body of the beaver ; But the ghost, the Jeebi in him, Thought and felt as Pau-Puk-Keewis, Still lived on as Pau-Puk-Keewis. 20 And it fluttered, strove, and struggled, Waving hither, waving thither, As the curtains of a wigwam Struggle with their thongs of deer-skin, When the wintry wind is blowing; 25 Till it drew itself together, Till it rose up from the body, Till it took the form and features Of the cunning Pau-Puk-Keewis Vanishing into the forest. 30 But the wary Hiawatha Saw the figure ere it vanished, Saw the form of Pau-Puk-Keewis Glide into the soft blue shadow Of the pine-trees of the forest ; THE NEW ENGLAND WRITERS 217 Toward the squares of white beyond it, Toward an opening in the forest, Like a wind it rushed and panted, Bending all the boughs before it, And behind it, as the rain comes, 5 Came the steps of Hiawatha. To a lake with many islands Came the breathless Pau-Puk-Keewis, Where among the water-lilies Pishnekuh, the brant, were sailing; 10 Through the tufts of rushes floating, Steering through the reedy islands. Now their broad black beaks they lifted, Now they plunged beneath the water, Now they darkened in the shadow, J 6 Now they brightened in the sunshine. "Pishnekuh !" cried Pau-Puk-Keewis. "Pishnekuh ! my brothers !" said he, "Change me to a brant with plumage, With a shining neck and feathers, 2 Make me large, and make me larger, Ten times larger than the others." Straightway to a brant they changed him, With two huge and dusky pinions, With a bosom smooth and rounded, 25 With a bill like two great paddles, Made him larger than the others, Ten times larger than the largest, Just as, shouting from the forest, On the shore stood Hiawatha. 3 Up they rose with cry and clamor, With a whir and beat of pinions, Rose up from the reedy islands, From the water-flags and lilies. 218 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE And they said to Pau-Puk-Keewis : "In your flying, look not downward, Take good heed and look not downward, Lest some strange mischance should happen, 5 Lest some great mishap befall you !" Fast and far they fled to northward, Fast and far through mist and sunshine, Fed among the moors and fen-lands, Slept among the reeds and rushes. 10 On the morrow as they journeyed, Buoyed and lifted by the South-wind, Wafted onward by the South-wind, Blowing fresh and strong behind them, Rose a sound of human voices, 15 Rose a clamor from beneath them, From the lodges of a village, From the people miles beneath them. For the people of the village Saw the flock of brant with wonder, 20 Saw the wings of Pau-Puk-Keewis Flapping far up in the ether, Broader than two doorway curtains. Pau-Puk-Keewis heard the shouting, Knew the voice of Hiawatha, 2 5 Knew the outcry of Iagoo, And, forgetful of the warning, Drew his neck in, and looked downward, And the wind that blew behind him Caught his mighty fan of feathers, 30 Sent him wheeling, whirling downward! All in vain did Pau-Puk-Keewis Struggle to regain his balance ! Whirling round and round and downward, He beheld in turn the village THE NEW ENGLAND WRITERS 219 And in turn the flock above him, Saw the village coming nearer, And the flock receding farther, Heard the voices growing louder, Heard the shouting and the laughter ; 5 Saw no more the flocks above him, Only saw the earth beneath him ; Dead out of the empty heaven, Dead among the shouting people, With a heavy sound and sullen, 1 Fell the brant with broken pinions. But his soul, his ghost, his shadow, Still survived as Pau-Puk-Keewis, Took again the form and features Of the handsome Yenadizze, 1 5 And again went rushing onward, Followed fast by Hiawatha, Crying: "Not so wide the world is, Not so long and rough the way is, But my wrath shall overtake you, 20 But my vengeance shall attain you !" And so near he came, so near him, That his hand was stretched to seize him, His right hand to seize and hold him, When the cunning Pau-Puk-Keewis 25 Whirled and spun about in circles, Fanned the air into a whirlwind, Danced the dust and leaves about him, And amid the whirling eddies Sprang into a hollow oak-tree, 3 Changed himself into a serpent, Gliding out through root and rubbish. With his right hand Hiawatha Smote amain the hollow oak-tree, 15 220 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE Rent it into shreds and splinters, Left it lying there in fragments. But in vain ; for Pau-Puk-Keewis, Once again in human figure, 5 Full in sight ran on before him, Sped away in gust and whirlwind, On the shores of Gitche Gumee, Westward by the Big-Sea-Water, Came unto the rocky headlands, To the Pictured Rocks of sandstone, Looking over lake and landscape. And the Old Man of the Mountain, He the Manito of Mountains, Opened wide his rocky doorways, Opened wide his deep abysses, Giving Pau-Puk-Keewis shelter In his caverns dark and dreary, Bidding Pau-Puk-Keewis welcome To his gloomy lodge of sandstone. 20 There without stood Hiawatha, Found the doorways closed against him, With his mittens, Minjekahwun, Smote great caverns in the sandstone, Cried aloud in tones of thunder, 25 "Open! I am Hiawatha!" But the Old Man of the Mountain Opened not, and made no answer From the silent crags of sandstone, From the gloomy rock abysses. 30 Then he raised his hands to heaven, Called imploring on the tempest, Called Waywassimo, the lightning, And the thunder, Annemeekee ; And they came with night and darkness, 15 THE NEW ENGLAND WRITERS 221 Sweeping down the Big-Sea- Water From the distant Thunder Mountains ; And the trembling Pau-Puk-Keewis Heard the footsteps of the thunder, Saw the red eyes of the lightning, Was afraid, and crouched and trembled. Then Waywassimo, the lightning, Smote the doorways of the caverns, With his war-club smote the doorways, Smote the jutting crags of sandstone, And the thunder, Annemeekee, Shouted down into the caverns, Saying, "Where is Pau-Puk-Keewis?" And the crags fell, and beneath them Dead among the rocky ruins Lay the cunning Pau-Puk-Keewis, Lay the handsome Yenadizze, Slain in his own human figure. Ended were his wild adventures, Ended were his tricks and gambols, 20 Ended all his mischief-making, All his gambling and his dancing, All his wooing of the maidens. Then the noble Hiawatha Took his soul, his ghost, his shadow, 2 5 Spake and said : "O Pau-Puk-Keewis, Never more in human figure Shall you search for new adventures ; Never more with jest and laughter Dance the dust and leaves in whirlwinds ; 3 But above there in the heavens You shall soar and sail in circles ; I will change you to an eagle, To Keneu, the great war-eagle, 222 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE Chief of all the fowls with feathers, Chief of Hiawatha's chickens." And the name of Pau-Puk-Keewis Lingers still among the people, 5 Lingers still among the singers, And among the story-tellers ; And in Winter, when the snow-flakes Whirl in eddies round the lodges, When the wind in gusty tumult 1 O'er the smoke-flue pipes and whistles, "There," they cry, "comes Pau-Puk-Keewis; He is dancing through the valleys, He is gathering in his harvest !" The Famine O the long and dreary Winter! O the cold and cruel Winter ! Ever thicker, thicker, thicker, Froze the ice on lake and river, Ever deeper, deeper, deeper, Fell the snow o'er all the landscape, 20 Fell the covering snow, and drifted Through the forest, round the village. Hardly from his buried wigwam Could the hunter force a passage ; With his mittens and his snow-shoes 2 5 Vainly walked he through the forest, Sought for bird or beast, and found none, Saw no track of deer or rabbit, In the snow beheld no footprints, In the ghastly, gleaming forest 30 Fell, and could not rise from weakness, Perished there from cold and hunger. O the famine and the fever ! 15 THE NEW ENGLAND WRITERS 223 O the wasting of the famine ! O the blasting of the fever ! O the wailing of the children ! O the anguish of the women ! All the earth was sick and famished ; 5 Hungry was the air around them, Hungry was the sky above them, And the hungry stars in heaven Like the eyes of wolves glared at them ! Into Hiawatha's wigwam 1 ° Came two other guests as silent As the ghosts were, and as gloomy, Waited not to be invited, Did not parley at the doorway, Sat there without word of welcome 1 5 In the seat of Laughing Water ; Looked with haggard eyes and hollow At the face of Laughing Water. And the foremost said : "Behold me ! I am Famine, Bukadawin I" 2 And the other said : "Behold me ! I am Fever, Ahkosewin !" And the lovely Minnehaha Shuddered as they looked upon her, Shuddered at the words they uttered, 2 5 Lay down on her bed in silence, Hid her face, but made no answer ; Lay there trembling, freezing, burning At the looks they cast upon her, At the fearful words they uttered. 3 ° Forth into the empty forest Rushed the maddened Hiawatha ; In his heart was deadly sorrow, In his face a stony firmness ; 16 224 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE On his brow the sweat of anguish Started, but it froze and fell not. Wrapped in furs and armed for hunting, With his mighty bow of ash-tree, r ° With his quiver full of arrows, With his mittens, Minjekahwun, Into the vast and vacant forest On his snow-shoes strode he forward. "Gitche Manito, the Mighty !" 10 Cried he with his face uplifted In that bitter hour of anguish, "Give your children food, O father ! Give us food, or we must perish ! Give me food for Minnehaha, For my dying Minnehaha I" Through the far-resounding forest, Through the forest vast and vacant Rang that cry of desolation, But there came no other answer 20 Than the echo of his crying, Than the echo of the woodlands, "Minnehaha ! Minnehaha !" All day long roved Hiawatha In that melancholy forest, 25 Through the shadow of whose thickets, In the pleasant days of Summer, Of that ne'er forgotten Summer, He had brought his young wife homeward From the land of the Dacotahs ; 30 When the birds sang in the thickets, And the streamlets laughed and glistened, And the air was full of fragrance, And the lovely Laughing Water Said with voice that did not tremble, THE NEW ENGLAND WRITERS 225 "I will follow you, my husband I" In the wigwam with Nokomis, With those gloomy guests that watched her, With the Famine and the Fever, She was lying, the Beloved, 6 She the dying Minnehaha. ''Hark !" she said ; "I hear a rushing, Hear a roaring and a rushing, Hear the Falls of Minnehaha Calling to me from a distance!" 10 "No, my child !" said old Nokomis, " 'Tis the night-wind in the pine-trees !" "Look I" she said ; "I see my father Standing lonely at his doorway, Beckoning to me from his wigwam, 15 In the land of the Dacotahs!" "No, my child !" said old Nokomis, " 'Tis the smoke, that waves and beckons !" "Ah !" said she, "the eyes of Pauguk Glare upon me in the darkness, 20 I can feel his icy fingers Gasping mine amid the darkness ! Hiawatha! Hiawatha!" And the desolate Hiawatha, Far away amid the forest, 25 Miles away among the mountains, Heard that sudden cry of anguish, Heard the voice of Minnehaha Calling to him in the darkness, "Hiawatha ! Hiawatha !" 30 Over snow-fields waste and pathless, Under snow-encumbered branches, Homeward hurried Hiawatha, Empty-handed, heavy-hearted, 226 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE Heard Nokomis moaning, wailing : " Wahonowin ! Wahonowin ! Would that I had perished for you, Would that I were dead as you are ! 5 Wahonowin! Wahonowin!" And he rushed into the wigwam, Saw the old Nokomis slowly Rocking to and fro and moaning, Saw his lovely Minnehaha 10 Lying dead and cold before him, And his bursting heart within him Uttered such a cry of anguish, That the forest moaned and shuddered, That the very stars in heaven 1 5 Shook and trembled with his anguish. Then he sat down, still and speechless, On the bed of Minnehaha, At the feet of Laughing Water, At those willing feet, that never 2 More would lightly run to meet him, Never more would lightly follow. With both hands his face he covered. Seven long days and nights he sat there, As if in a swoon he sat there, 2 5 Speechless, motionless, unconscious Of the daylight or the darkness. Then they buried Minnehaha; In the snow a grave they made her, In the forest deep and darksome, q Underneath the moaning hemlocks ; Clothed her in her richest garments, Wrapped her in her robes of ermine, Covered her with snow, like ermine ; Thus they buried Minnehaha. THE NEW ENGLAND WRITERS 227 And at night a fire was lighted, On her grave four times was kindled, For her soul upon its journey To the Islands of the Blessed. From his doorway Hiawatha 5 Saw it burning in the forest, Lighting up the gloomy hemlocks ; From his sleepless bed uprising, From the bed of Minnehaha, Stood and watched it at the doorway, 10 That it might not be extinguished, Might not leave her in the darkness. "Farewell !" said he, "Minnehaha ! Farewell, O my Laughing Water! All my heart is buried with you, 15 All my thoughts go onward with you! Come not back again to labor, Come not back again to suffer, Where the Famine and the Fever Wear the heart and waste the body. 20 Soon my task will be completed, Soon your footsteps I shall follow To the Islands of the Blessed, To the Kingdom of Ponemah, To the Land of the Hereafter !" 25 THE REPUBLIC From The Building of the Ship Thou, too, sail on, O Ship of State ! Sail on, O Union, strong and great ! Humanity with all its fears, With all the hopes of future years, Is hanging breathless on thy fate ! 228 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE We know what Master laid thy keel, What Workmen wrought thy ribs of steel, Who made each mast, and sail, and rope, What anvils rang, what hammers beat, 5 In what a forge and what a heat Were shaped the anchors of thy hope ! Fear not each sudden sound and shock, Tis of the wave, and not the rock ; Tis but the flapping of the sail, 1 ° And not a rent made by the gale ! In spite of rock and tempest's roar, In spite of false lights on the shore, Sail on, nor fear to breast the sea ! Our hearts, our hopes, are all with thee, 15 Our hearts, our hopes, our prayers, our tears, Our faith triumphant o'er our fears, Are all with thee,— are all with thee ! JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL Born in Cambridge, Mass., 1819; died there, 1891 THE VISION OF SIR LAUNFAL Peelude to Paet First Over his keys the musing organist, Beginning doubtfully and far away, 20 First lets his fingers wander as they list, And builds a bridge from Dreamland for his lay Then, as the touch of his loved instrument Gives hope and fervor, nearer draws his theme, First guessed by faint auroral flushes sent 2 5 Along the wavering vista of his dream. THE NEW ENGLAND WRITERS Not only around our infancy Doth heaven with all its splendors lie; Daily, with souls that cringe and plot, We Sinais climb and know it not. Over our manhood bend the skies ; Against our fallen and traitor lives The great winds utter prophecies : With our faint hearts the mountain strives ; Its arms outstretched, the druid wood Waits with its benedicite ; And to our age's drowsy blood Still shouts the inspiring sea. Earth gets its price for what Earth gives us ; The beggar is taxed for a corner to die in, The priest hath his fee who comes and shrives us, We bargain for the gtaves we lie in; At the Devil's booth are all things sold, Each ounce of dross costs its ounce of gold ; For a cap and bells our lives we pay, Bubbles we buy with a whole soul's tasking: 'Tis heaven alone that is given away, 'Tis only God may be had for the asking; No price is set on the lavish summer ; June may be had by the poorest comer. And what is so rare as a day in June? Then, if ever, come perfect days ; Then Heaven tries the earth if it be in tune, And over it softly her warm ear lays : Whether we look, or whether we listen, We hear life murmur, or see it glisten ; Every clod feels a stir of might, 229 10 15 20 25 30 230 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE An instinct within it that reaches and towers, And, groping blindly above it for light, Climbs to a soul in grass and flowers ; The flush of life may well be seen 5 Thrilling back over hills and valleys ; The cowslip startles in meadows green, The buttercup catches the sun in its chalice, And there's never a leaf nor a blade too mean To be some happy creature's palace ; 1 ° The little bird sits at his door in the sun, Atilt like a blossom among the leaves, And lets his illumined being o'errun With the deluge of summer it receives ; His mate feels the eggs beneath her wings, 1 5 And the heart in her dumb breast flutters and sings ; He sings to the wide world, and she to her nest, — In the nice ear of Nature which song is the best? Now is the high-tide of the year, And whatever of life hath ebbed away ?0 Comes flooding back with a ripply cheer, Into every bare inlet and creek and bay ; Now the heart is so full that a drop overfills it, We are happy now because God wills it ; No matter how barren the past may have been, 2 5 'Tis enough for us now that the leaves are green ; We sit in the warm shade and feel right well How the sap creeps up and blossoms swell ; We may shut our eyes, but we cannot help knowing That skies are clear and grass is growing ; 30 The breeze comes whispering in our ear, That dandelions are blossoming near, That maize has sprouted, that streams are flowing, That the river is bluer than the sky, 15 THE NEW ENGLAND WRITERS 231 That the robin is plastering his house hard by ; And if the breeze kept the good news back, For other couriers we should not lack ; We could guess it all by yon heifer's lowing, — • And hark ! how clear bold chanticleer, 5 Warmed with the new wine of the year, Tells all in his lusty crowing! Joy comes, grief goes, we know not how ; Everything is upward striving ; 'Tis as easy now for the heart to be true As for grass to be green or skies to be blue, — Tis the natural way of living : Who knows whither the clouds have fled? In the unscarred heaven they leave no wake ; And the eyes forget the tears they have shed, The heart forgets its sorrow and ache ; The soul partakes of the season's youth. And the sulphurous rifts of passion and woe Lie deep 'neath a silence pure and smooth, Like burnt-out craters healed with snow. 20 What wonder if Sir Launfal now Remembered the keeping of his vow ? Part First I. "My golden spurs now bring to me, And bring to me my richest mail, For to-morrow I go over land and sea 25 In search of the Holy Grail ; Shall never a bed for me be spread, Nor shall a pillow be under my head, Till I begin my vow to keep ; Here on the rushes will I sleep, 30 And perchance there may come a vision true 232 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE Ere day create the world anew." ■ Slowly Sir Launfal's eyes grew dim, Slumber fell like a cloud on him, And into his soul the vision flew. II. 5 The crows flapped over by twos and threes, In the pool drowsed the cattle up to their knees, The little birds sang as if it were The one day of summer in all the year, And the very leaves seemed to sing on the trees : 1 ° The castle alone in the landscape lay Like an outpOst of winter, dull and gray : 'Twas the proudest hall in the North Countree, And never its gates might opened be, Save to lord or lady of high degree ; 15 Summer besieged it on every side, But the churlish stone her assaults defied ; She could not scale the chilly wall, Though around it for leagues her pavilions tall Stretched left and right, Over the hills and out of sight ; Green and broad was every tent, And out of each a murmur went Till the breeze fell off at night. 20 25 III. The drawbridge dropped with a surly clang. And through the dark arch a charger sprang, Bearing Sir Launfal, the maiden knight, In his gilded mail, that flamed so bright It seemed the dark castle had gathered all Those shafts the fierce sun had shot over its wall In his siege of three hundred summers long, THE NEW ENGLAND WRITERS 233 And, binding them all in one blazing sheaf, Had cast them forth : so, young and strong, And lightsome as a locust-leaf, Sir Launfal flashed forth in his unscarred mail, To seek in all climes for the Holy Grail. 5 IV. It was morning on hill and stream and tree, And morning in the young knight's heart ; Only the castle moodily Rebuffed the gifts of the sunshine free, And gloomed by itself apart ; 1 The season brimmed all other things up Full as the rain fills the pitcher-plant's cup. V. As Sir Launfal made morn through the darksome gate, He was 'ware of a leper, crouched by the same, Who begged with his hand and moaned as he sate ; 5 And a loathing over Sir Launfal came ; The sunshine went out of his soul with a thrill, The flesh 'neath his armor 'gan shrink and crawl, And midway its leap his heart stood still Like a frozen waterfall ; 2 ° For this man, so foul and bent of stature, Rasped harshly against his dainty nature, And seemed the one blot on the summer morn, — So he tossed him a piece of gold in scorn . VI. The leper raised not the gold from the dust : 2 5 "Better to me the poor man's crust, Better the blessing of the poor, Though I turn me empty from his door ; 234 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE That is no true alms which the hand can hold ; He gives nothing but worthless gold Who gives from a sense of duty ; But he who gives but a slender mite, 5 And gives to that which is out of sight, That thread of the all-sustaining Beauty Which runs through all and doth all unite, — The hand cannot clasp the whole of his alms, The heart outstretches its eager palms, 10 For a god goes with it and makes it store To the soul that was starving in darkness before/' Pbelude to Part Second Down swept the chill wind from the mountain peak, From the snow five thousand summers old ; On open wold and hill-top bleak 15 It had gathered all the cold, And whirled it like sleet on the wanderer's cheek : It carried a shiver everywhere From the unleafed boughs and pastures bare ; The little brook heard it and built a roof 2 ° 'Neath which he could house him, winter-proof ; All night by the white stars' frosty gleams He groined his arches and matched his beams ; Slender and clear were his crystal spars As the lashes of light that trim the stars ; 25 He sculptured every summer delight In his halls and chambers out of sight; Sometimes his tinkling waters slipt Down through a frost-leaved forest-crypt, Long, sparkling aisles of steel-stemmed trees 30 Bending to counterfeit a breeze ; Sometimes the roof no fretwork knew But silvery mosses that downward grew ; THE NEW ENGLAND WRITERS 235 Sometimes it was carved in sharp relief With quaint arabesques of ice-fern leaf ; Sometimes it was simply smooth and clear For the gladness of heaven to shine through, and here He had caught the nodding bulrush-tops 6 And hung them thickly with diamond-drops, That crystaled the beams of moon and sun, And made a star of every one : No mortal builder's most rare device Could match this winter-palace of ice; 10 'Twas as if every image that mirrored lay In his depths serene through the summer day, Each fleeting shadow of earth and sky, Lest the happy model should be lost, Had been mimicked in fairy masonry * 5 By the elfin builders of the frost. Within the hall are song and laughter, The cheeks of Christmas grow red and jolly, And sprouting is every corbel and rafter With lightsome green of ivy and holly ; 2 o Through the deep gulf of the chimney wide Wallows the Yule-log's roaring tide ; The broad flame-pennons droop and flap And belly and tug as a flag in the wind ; Like a locust shrills the imprisoned sap, 2 5 Hunted to death in its galleries blind ; And swift little troops of silent sparks, Now pausing, now scattering away as in fear, Go threading the soot-forest's tangled darks Like herds of startled deer. 3 ° But the wind without was eager and sharp, Of Sir Launfal's gray hair it makes a harp, 236 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE And rattles and wrings The icy strings, Singing, in dreary monotone, A Christmas carol of its own, 5 Whose burden still, as he might guess, Was — "Shelterless, shelterless, shelterless!" The voice of the seneschal flared like a torch As he shouted the wanderer away from the porch, And he sat in the gateway and saw all night 10 The great hall-fire, so cheery and bold, Through the window-slits of the castle old, Build out its piers of ruddy light, Against the drift of the cold. Part Second I. There was never a leaf on bush or tree, 15 The bare boughs rattled shudderingly ; The river was dumb and could not speak, For the weaver Winter its shroud had spun. A single crow on the tree-top bleak From his shining feathers shed off the cold sun ; 2 Again it was morning, but shrunk and cold, As if her veins were sapless and old, And she rose up decrepitly For a last dim look at earth and sea. II. Sir Launfal turned from his own hard gate, 2 5 For another heir in his earldom sate ; An old, bent man, worn out and frail, He came back from seeking the Holy Grail ; Little he recked of his earldom's loss, No more on his surcoat was blazoned the cross, 10 THE NEW ENGLAND WRITERS 237 But deep in his soul the sign he wore, The badge of the suffering and the poor. III. Sir Launfal's raiment thin and spare Was idle mail 'gainst the barbed air, For it was just at the Christmas time; So he mused, as he sat, of a sunnier clime, And sought for a shelter from cold and snow In the light and warmth of long-ago ; He sees the snake-like caravan crawl O'er the edge of the desert, black and small, Then nearer and nearer, till, one by one, He can count the camels in the sun, As over the red-hot sands they pass To where, in its slender necklace of grass, The little spring laughed and leapt in the shade, And with its own self like an infant played, And waved its signal of palms. IV. "For Christ's sweet sake, I beg an alms ;" — The happy camels may reach the spring, But Sir Launfal sees only the grewsome thing, 2 The leper, lank as the rain-blanched bone, That cowers beside him, a thing as lone And white as the ice-isles of Northern seas In the desolate horror of his disease. V. And Sir Launfal said— "I behold in thee 25 An image of Him who died on the tree ; Thou also hast had thy crown of thorns, — Thou also hast had the world's buffets and scorns — 15 238 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE And to thy life were not denied The wounds in the hands and feet and side : Mild Mary's Son, acknowledge me; Behold, through him, I give to Thee !" VI. 5 Then the soul of the leper stood up in his eyes And looked at Sir Launfal, and straightway lie Remembered in what a haughtier guise He had flung an alms to leprosie, When he girt his young life up in gilded mail 1 And set forth in search of the Holy Grail. The heart within him was ashes and dust ; He parted in twain his single crust, He broke the ice on the streamlet's brink, And gave the leper to eat and drink : 15 'Twas a mouldy crust of coarse brown bread, 'Twas water out of a wooden bowl, — Yet with fine wheaten bread was the leper fed, And 'twas red wine he drank with his thirsty soul. 20 25 VII. As Sir Launfal mused with a downcast face, A light shone round about the place ; The leper no longer crouched at his side, But stood before him glorified, Shining and tall and fair and straight As the pillar that stood by the Beautiful Gate, — Himself the Gate whereby men can Enter the temple of God in Man. VIII. His words were shed softer than leaves from the pine, And they fell on Sir Launfal as snows on the brine, THE NEW ENGLAND WRITERS 239 That mingle their softness and quiet in one With the shaggy unrest they float down upon ; And the voice that was calmer than silence said, "Lo, it is I, be not afraid ! In many climes, without avail, 5 Thou hast spent thy life for the Holy Grail; Behold, it is here, — this cup which thou Didst fill at the streamlet for Me but now ; This crust is My body broken for thee, This water His blood that died on the tree; 1° The Holy Supper is kept, indeed, In whatso we share with another's need: Not what we give, but what we share, — For the gift without the giver is bare ; Who gives himself with his alms feeds three, — 15 Himself, his hungering neighbor, and Me." IX. Sir Launf al awoke as from a swound : — 'The Grail in my castle here is found ! Hang my idle armor up on the wall, Let it be the spider's banquet-hall ; 2 ° He must be fenced with stronger mail Who would seek and find the Holy Grail." X. The castle gate stands open now, And the wanderer is welcome to the hall As the hangbird is. to the elm-tree bough : No longer scowl the turrets tall, The Summer's long siege at last is o'er ; When the first poor outcast went in at the door, She entered with him in disguise, And mastered the fortress by surprise ; 25 240 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE There is no spot she loves so well on ground, She lingers and smiles there the whple year round ; The meanest serf on Sir Launfal's land Has hall and bower at his command ; 5 And there's no poor man in the North Cbuntree But is lord of the earldom as much as he. THE PRESENT CRISIS When a deed is done for Freedom, through the broad earth's aching breast Runs a thrill of joy prophetic, trembling on from east to west, 1 And the slave, where'er he cowers, feels the soul within him climb To the awful verge of manhood, as the energy sublime Of a century bursts full-blossomed on the thorny stem of Time Through the walls of hut and palace shoots the instantaneous throe, 15 When the travail of the Ages wrings earth's systems to and fro: At the birth of each new Era, with a recognizing start, Nation wildly looks at nation, standing with mute lips apart, And glad Truth's yet mightier man-child leaps beneath the Future's heart. 20* * * * * * * Once to every man and nation comes the moment to decide, In the strife of Truth with Falsehood, for the good or evil side; Some great cause, God's new Messiah, offering each the bloom or blight, 25 Parts the goats upon the left hand, and the sheep upon the right, And the choice goes by forever 'twixt that, darkness and that light. Hast thou chosen, O my people, on whose party thou shalt stand, Ere the Doom from its worn sandals shakes the dust against our land? THE NEW ENGLAND WRITERS 241 Though the cause of Evil prosper, yet 'tis Truth alone is strong. And, albeit she wander outcast now, I see around her throng Trotps of beautiful, tall angels, to enshield her from all wrong. Backward look across the ages and the beacon moments see, That, like peaks of some sunk continent, jut through Oblivion's 5 sea; Not an ear in court or market for the low foreboding cry Of those Crises, God's stern winnowers, from whose feet earth's chaff must fly ; Never shows the choice momentous till the judgment hath 10 passed by. Careless seems the great Avenger ; history's pages but record One death-grapple in the darkness 'twixt old systems and the Word; Truth forever on the scaffold, Wrong forever on the Throne, — 10 Yet that scaffold sways the future, and, behind the dim unknown, Standeth God within the shadow, keeping watch above his own. We see dimly in the Present what is small and what is great, Slow of faith how weak an arm may turn the iron helm of fate ; But the soul is still oracular; amid the market's din, 20 List the ominous stern whisper from the Delphic cave within, — "They enslave their children's children who make compromise with sin." ******* Then to side with Truth is noble when we share her wretched 25 crust, Ere her cause bring fame and profit, and 'tis prosperous to be just; Then it is the brave man chooses, while the coward stands aside, Doubting in his abject spirit, till his Lord is crucified, 30 And the multitude make virtue of the faith they had denied. 242 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE Count me o'er earth's chosen heroes, — they were souls that stood alone, While the men they agonized for hurled the contumelious stone, Stood serene, and down the future saw the golden beam incline 5 To the side of perfect justice, mastered by their faith divine, By one man's plain truth to manhood and to God's supreme design. By the light of burning heretics Christ's bleeding feet I track, Toiling up new Calvaries ever with the cross that turns not back, 10 And these mounts of anguish number how each generation learned One new word of that grand Credo which in prophet-hearts hath burned Since the first man stood God-conquered with his face to heaven 15 upturned. For Humanity sweeps onward : where to-day the martyr stands, On the morrow crouches Judas with the silver in his hands ; Far in front the cross stands ready and the crackling fagots burn, While the hooting mob of yesterday in silent awe return 2 To glean up the scattered ashes into History's golden urn. Tis as easy to be heroes as to sit the idle slaves Of a legendary virtue carved upon our fathers' graves ; Worshippers of light ancestral make the present light a crime ; — 2 5 Was the Mayflower launched by cowards, steered by men behind their time? Turn those tracks toward Past or Future, that make Plymouth Rock sublime? They were men of present valor, stalwart old iconoclasts, 30 Unconvinced by axe or gibbet that all virtue was the Past's; THE NEW ENGLAND WRITERS 243 But we make their truth our falsehood, thinking that hath made us free, Hoarding it in mouldy parchments, while our tender spirits flee The rude grasp of that great Impulse which drove them across the sea. 5 They have rights who dare maintain them; we are traitors to our sires, Smothering in their holy ashes Freedom's new-lit altar-fires; Shall we make their creed our jailer? Shall we, in our haste 10 to slay, From the tombs of the old prophets steal the funeral lamps away To light up the martyr-fagots round the prophets of to-day ? New occasions teach new duties; Time makes ancient good uncouth ; 1 5 They must upward still, and onward, who would keep abreast of Truth ; Lo, before us gleam her camp-fires! we ourselves must Pil- grims be, Launch our Mayflower, and steer boldly through the desperate 20 winter sea, Nor attempt the Future's portal with the Past's blood-rusted key. THE COURTIN' God makes sech nights, all white an' still Fur'z you can look or listen, Moonshine an' snow on field an* hill, All silence an* all glisten. Zekle crep' up quite unbeknown An' peeked in thru' the winder, An' there sot Huldy all alone, With no one nigh to hender. 2S 244 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE A fireplace filled the room's one side With half a cord o' wood in, — There warn't no stoves (tell comfort died), To bake ye to a puddin'. 5 i The wa'nut logs shot sparkles out Toward the pootiest, bless her! An' leetle flames danced all about The chiny on the dresser. • Agin the chimbley crook-necks hung, 1 An' in amongst 'em rusted The ole queen's-arm thet gran'ther Young Fetched back from Concord busted. The very room, coz she was in, Seemed warm from floor to ceilin', *5 An' she looked full ez rosy agin Ez the apples she was peelin'. 'Twas kin' o' kingdom-come to look On sech a blessed cretur, A dogrose blushin' to a brook 20 Ain't modester nor sweeter. He was six foot o' man, A I, Clear grit an' human natur' ; None couldn't quicker pitch a ton Nor dror a furrer straighter. 2 5 He'd sparked it with full twenty gals, Hed squired 'em, danced 'em, druv 'em, Fust this one, an' then thet, by spells,— All is, he couldn't love 'em. THE NEW ENGLAND WRITERS 245 But long o' her his veins 'ould run All crinkly like curled maple, The side she breshed felt full o' sun Ez a south slope in Ap'il. She thought no v'ice hed sech a swing 5 Ez hisn in the choir; Mv ! when he made Ole Hunderd ring, She knowed the Lord was nigher. An' she'd blush scarlit, right in prayer, When her new meetin'-bunnet 10 Felt somehow thru' its crown a pair O' blue eyes sot upon it. Thet night, I tell ye, she looked some! She seemed to 've gut a new soul, For she felt sartin-sure he'd come, Down to her very shoe-sole. She heered a foot, an' knowed it tu, A-raspin' on the scraper, — All ways to once her feelins flew Like sparks in burnt-up paper. 20 He kin' o' l'itered on the mat, Some doubtfle o' the sekle, His heart kep' goin' pity-pat, But hern went pity Zekle. An' yit she gin her cheer a jerk 25 Ez though she wished him furder, An' on her apples kep' to work, Parm' away like murder. 246 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE "You want to see my Pa, I s'pose?" "Wal ... no ... I come designin' " — "To see my Ma? She's sprinklin' clo'es Agin to-morrer's i'nin'." 5 To say why gals acts so or so, Or don't, would be presuming Mebby to mean yes an' say no Comes nateral to women. He stood a spell on one foot fust, 10 Then stood a spell on t'other, An' on which one he felt the wust He couldn't ha' told ye nuther. Says he, "I'd better call agin;" Says she, "Think likely, Mister;" 1 5 Thet last word pricked him like a pin, An' . . . Wal, he up an' kist her. When Ma bimeby upon 'em slips, Huldy sot pale ez ashes, All kin' o' smily roun' the lips 25 An' teary roun' the lashes. For she was jes' the quiet kind Whose naturs never vary, Like streams that keep a summer mind Snowhid in Jenooary. 2 5 The blood clost roun' her heart felt glued Too tight for all expressin', Tell mother see how metters stood, An' gin 'em both her blessin'. THE NEW ENGLAND WRITERS 247 Then her red come back like the tide Down to the Bay o' Fundy, An' all I know is they was cried In meetin' come nex' Sunday. L'ENVOI To the Muse Whither? Albeit I follow fast, 5 In all life's circuit I but find, Not where thou art, but where thou wast, Sweet beckoner, more fleet than wind ! I haunt the pine-dark solitudes, With soft brown silence carpeted, 10 And plot to snare thee in the woods : Peace I o'ertake, but thou art fled ! I find the rock where thou didst rest, The moss thy skimming feet hath prest; All Nature with thy parting thrills, 15 Like branches after birds new-flown; Thy passage hill and hollow fills With hints of virtue not their own ; In dimples still the water slips Where thou hast dipt thy finger-tips ; 2 Just, just beyond, forever burn Gleams of a grace without return ; Upon thy shade I plant my foot, And through my frame strange raptures shoot; All of thee but thyself I grasp; 25 I seem to fold thy luring shape, And vague air to my bosom clasp, Thou lithe, perpetual Escape! 248 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE FOR AN AUTOGRAPH Though old the thought and oft exprest, Tis his at last who says it best, — I'll try my fortune with the rest. Life is a leaf of paper white 5 Whereon each one of us may write His word or two, and then comes night. "Lo, time and space enough," we cry, "To write an epic !" so we try Our nibs upon the edge, and die. 1 ° Muse not which way the pen to hold, Luck hates the slow and loves the bold, Soon come the darkness and the cold. Greatly begin ! though thou have time But for a line, be that sublime, — 15 Not failure, but low aim, is crime. JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER Born in Haverhill, Mass., 1807 ; died in Hampton Falls, N. H., 1892 SKIPPER IRESON'S RIDE Of all the rides since the birth of time, Told in story or sung in rhyme, — On Apuleius's Golden Ass, Or one-eyed Calendar's horse of brass, 20 Witch astride of a human back, Islam's prophet on Al-Borak, — The strangest ride that ever was sped Was Ireson's, out from Marblehead! THE NEW ENGLAND WRITERS 249 Old Floyd Ireson, for his hard heart, Tarred and feathered and carried in a cart By the women of Marblehead ! Body of turkey, head of owl, Wings adroop like a rained-on fowl, 6 Feathered and ruffled in every part, Skipper Ireson stood in the cart. Scores of women, old and young, Strong of muscle, and glib of tongue, Pushed and pulled up the rocky lane, 01 Shouting and singing the shrill refrain : "Here's Flud Oirson, fur his horrd horrt, Torr'd an' futherr'd an' corr'd in a corrt By the women o' Marble'ead !" Wrinkled scolds with hands on hips, 15 Girls in bloom of cheek and lips, Wild-eyed, free-limbed, such as chase Bacchus round some antique vase, Brief of skirt, with ankles bare, Loose of kerchief and loose of hair, 20 With conch-shells blowing and fish-horns' twang, Over and over the Maenads sang: "Here's Flud Oirson, fur his horrd horrt, Torr'd an' futherr'd an' corr'd in a corrt By the women o' Marble'ead !" 2 5 Small pity for him ! — He sailed away From a leaking ship in Chaleur Bay, — Sailed away from a sinking wreck, With his own town's people on her deck ! "Lay by ! lay by" they called to him. 30 Back he answered, "Sink or swim! 250 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE Brag of your catch of fish again !" And off he sailed through the fog and rain ! Old Floyd Ireson, for his hard heart, Tarred and feathered and carried in a cart 5 By the women of Marblehead! Fathoms deep in dark Chaleur That wreck shall lie forevermore. Mother and sister, wife and maid, Looked from the rocks of Marblehead 1 ° Over the moaning and rainy sea, — Looked for the coming that might not be ! What did the winds and the sea-birds say Of the cruel captain who sailed away? — Old Floyd Ireson, for his hard heart, 1 5 Tarred and feathered and carried in a cart By the women of Marblehead ! Through the street, on either side, Up flew windows, doors swung wide ; Sharp-tongued spinsters, old wives gray, 2 ° Treble lent the fish-horn's bray. Sea-worn grandsires, cripple-bound, Hulks of old sailors run aground, Shook head, and fist, and hat, and cane, ^ And cracked with curses the hoarse refrain : 2 5 "Here's Flud Oirson, fur his horrd horrt, Torr'd an' futherr'd an' corr'd in a corrt By the women o' Marble'ead !" Sweetly along the Salem road Bloom of orchard and lilac showed. 30 Little the wicked skipper knew Of the fields so green and the skies so blue. THE NEW ENGLAND WRITERS 251 Riding there in his sorry trim, Like an Indian idol glum and grim, Scarcely he seemed the sound to hear Of voices shouting, far and near: "Here's Flud Oirson, fur his horrd horrt, 5 Torr'd an' futherr'd an' corr'd in a corrt By the women o' Marble'ead !" "Hear me, neighbors !" at last he cried, — "What to me is this noisy ride? What is the shame that clothes the skin 10 To the nameless horror that lives within? Waking or sleeping, I see a wreck, And hear a cry from a reeling deck ! Hate me and curse me, — I only dread The hand of God and the face of the dead !" 1 5 Said old Floyd Ireson, for his hard heart, Tarred and feathered and carried in a cart By the women of Marblehead ! Then the wife of the skipper lost at sea Said, "God has touched him! Why should we!" 2 Said an old wife mourning her only son, "Cut the rogue's tether and let him run !" So with soft relentings and rude excuse, Half scorn, half pity, they cut him loose, And gave him a cloak to hide him in, 2 5 And left him alone with his shame and sin. Poor Floyd Ireson, for his hard heart, Tarred and feathered and carried in a cart By the women of Marblehead ! 252 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE THE BAREFOOT BOY Blessings on thee, little man, Barefoot boy, with cheek of tan ! With thy turned-up pantaloons, And thy merry whistled tunes; 5 With thy red lip, redder still Kissed by strawberries on the hill ; With the sunshine on thy face, Through the torn brim's jaunty grace; From my heart I give thee joy, — 10 I was once a barefoot boy! Prince thou art, — the grown-up man Only is republican. Let the million-dollared ride ! Barefoot, trudging at his side, 15 Thou hast more than he can buy In the reach of ear and eye, — Outward sunshine, inward joy: Blessings on thee, barefoot boy ! Oh for boyhood's painless play, 20 Sleep that wakes in laughing day, Health that mocks the doctor's rules, Knowledge never learned of schools. Of the wild bee's morning chase, Of the wild-flower's time and place, Flight of fowl and habitude Of the tenants of the wood ; How the tortoise bears his shell, How the woodchuck digs his cell, And the ground mole sinks his well ; 30 How the robin feeds her young, How the oriole's nest is hung; Where the whitest lilies blow, THE NEW ENGLAND WRITERS 253 Where the freshest berries grow, Where the ground-hut trails its vine, Where the wood-grape's clusters shine ; Of the black wasp's cunning way, Mason of his walls of clay, 5 And the architectural plans Of gray hornet artisans! For, eschewing books and tasks, Nature answers all he asks ; Hand in hand with her he walks, 10 Face to face with her he talks, Part and parcel of her joy, — Blessings on the barefoot boy ! 15 20 Oh, for boyhood's time of June, Crowding years in one brief moon, When all things I heard or saw Me, their master, waited for. I was rich in flowers and trees, Humming-birds and honey-bees ; For my sport the squirrel played, Plied the snouted mole his spade ; For my taste the blackberry cone Purpled over hedge and stone ; Laughed the brook for my delight Through the day and through the night,— Whispering at the garden wall, Talked with me from fall to fall ; Mine the sand-rimmed pickerel pond, Mine the walnut slopes beyond, Mine, on bending orchard trees, Apples of Hesperides ! Still as my horizon grew, Larger grew my riches, too ; 25 254 READINGS IN AMERICAN LITERATURE All the world I saw or knew Seemed a complex Chinese toy, Fashioned for a barefoot boy ! Oh for festal dainties spread, 5 Like my bowl of milk and bread ; Pewter spoon and bowl of wood, On the door-stone, gray and rude ! O'er me, like a regal tent, Cloudy-ribbed, the sunset bent, 10 Purple-curtained, fringed with gold, Looped in many a wind-swung fold, While for music came the play Of the pied frogs' orchestra; And, to light the noisy choir, 15 Lit the fly his lamp of fire. I was monarch : pomp and joy Waited on the barefoot boy ! Cheerily, then, my little man, Live and laugh, as boyhood can ! 20 Though the flinty slopes be hard, Stubble-speared the new-mown sward, Every morn shall lead thee through Fresh baptisms of the dew ; Every evening from thy feet Shall the cool wind kiss the heat: All too soon these feet must hide Tn the prison cells of pride, Lose the freedom of the sod, Like the colt's for work be shod, 30 Made to tread the mills of toil, Up and down in ceaseless moil : Happy if their track be found