UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA 
 
 GIFT OF 
 
 Redlands University
 
 j 4 

 
 AMERICAN PROSE 
 
 HAWTHORNE: IRVING: LONGFELLOW 
 
 WHITTIER : HOLMES : LOWELL 
 
 THOREAU : EMERSON 
 
 WITH INTRODUCTIONS AND NOTES 
 BY HORACE E. \SCUDDER 
 
 REVISED AND ENLARGED EDITION' 
 
 BOSTON AND NEW YORK 
 HOUGHTON MIFFLIN COMPANY 
 Cambtibfle
 
 HotrOHTON MIFFLIN COMPANY are the onty authorised publishers 
 of the works of LONGFELLOW, WHITTIER, LOWELL, HOLMES, EMER- 
 BON, THOREAU, an<l HAWTHORNE. All editions which, lack the 
 imprint or authorization of Houghton Mifflin Company are issued 
 without the consent and contrary to the wishes of the authors or 
 their heirs. 
 
 Copyright, 1880, 
 BT HOUGHTON, OSGOOD & 00 
 
 Copyright, 1891, 
 BY HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN & CO. 
 
 All rights reserved.
 
 73 
 64-5* 
 
 S45 
 
 PKEFACE. 
 
 IN making a selection of American Prose the prin 
 ciple which controlled in American Poems has been 
 followed. The book does not profess to be represen 
 tative of the authors included, but complete papers or 
 stories have been taken of a length permitting a fair 
 display of some of the author's characteristics. The 
 object has been to set before the reader some of the 
 higher forms of prose art as interpreted by American 
 writers, and to cultivate a taste for the enduring ele 
 ments of literature. As before, an attempt has been 
 made to lead the student from the simpler to the more 
 involved and subtle forms, and throughout the book 
 the literature of knowledge has been less regarded 
 than the literature of power. The best result will be 
 reached if those who use this volume are impelled to 
 ask for the fuller works of the authors whose acquain 
 tance as writers of prose they may here make. 
 
 In American Poems a brief biographical sketch of 
 each writer was given ; and since a similar plan in this 
 volume would have required some repetition, the edi 
 tor has preferred to make the introductions more gen- 
 eral in character, with a view to suggesting points of 
 critical inquiry in literature, for such a volume as this 
 
 353875
 
 IV PREFACE. 
 
 offers a good opportunity for directing young stu 
 dents toward a more thoughtful attention in reading. 
 Prose, with its familiar forms and its more intimate 
 relations to other studies, is often a better field for 
 practice in criticism than poetry, especially as the 
 student has the advantage of using it himself. The 
 writing of poetry frequently helps in a critical inter 
 pretation of poetical forms, but to most such exercises 
 have an element of unreality, while prose, as the 
 mother tongue of all, affords a material which is never 
 strange. It is worth while, therefore, to show the 
 young what fine qualities exist in that which all men 
 are using. 
 
 The more expanded character of prose makes anno 
 tation less necessary than in poetry. Besides, the 
 interruption of an obscure reference is less fatal to 
 enjoyment than in poetry. The editor, therefore, has 
 given fewer notes than in American JPoems, and has 
 purposely left work to be done by the reader, the 
 doing of which will add a zest to his reading. This is 
 most noticeable in the case of Emerson's essay on 
 Books. It would be an admirable exercise for any 
 young student to edit this paper by making full refer 
 ences to the array of points presented in it. A similar 
 exercise in local historical study could be found in 
 commenting upon Hawthorne's sketch of Howe's 
 Masquerade. 
 
 Acknowledgment is made to Messrs. G. P. Put 
 nam's Sons for their courtesy in permitting the use of 
 the selections from Irving' s Sketch Book.
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. PAOI 
 
 INTRODUCTION ...... 1 
 
 THE SNOW-IMAGE 6 
 
 THE GKEAT STONE FACE 27 
 
 BROWNE'S WOODEN IMAGE 53 
 
 HOWE'S MASQUERADE 70 
 
 WASHINGTON IRVING. 
 
 INTRODUCTION .89 
 
 RIP VAN WINKLE 3 
 
 LITTLE BRITAIN 120 
 
 HENRY WADSWORTH LONGFELLOW. 
 
 INTRODUCTION 141 
 
 THE VALLEY OF THE LOIRE 145 
 
 THE JOURNEY INTO SPAIN 155 
 
 JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER. 
 
 INTRODUCTION 165 
 
 YANKEE GYPSIES 168 
 
 THE BOY CAPTIVES 187 
 
 OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES. 
 
 INTRODUCTION 199 
 
 THE GAMBREL-ROOFED HOUSE .... 203 
 
 JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL. 
 
 INTRODUCTION . . . . . . . . ' . 227 
 
 MY GARDEN ACQUAINTANCE 230 
 
 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 255 
 
 BOOKS AND LIBRARIES . 285
 
 vi CONTENTS. 
 
 HENRY DAVID THOREAU. 
 
 INTRODUCTION 306 
 
 SOUNDS 311 
 
 BRUTE NEIGHBORS . . * 329 
 
 THE HIGHLAND LIGHT 342 
 
 RALPH WALDO EMERSON. 
 
 INTRODUCTION .< 367 
 
 BEHAVIOR 370 
 
 BOOKS . 391
 
 NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. 
 
 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 IT was Hawthorne's wont to keep note-books, in which he 
 recorded his observations and reflections ; sometimes he 
 spoke in them of himself, his plans, and his prospects. He 
 began the practice early, and continued it through life ; and 
 after his death selections from these note-books were pub. 
 lished in six volumes, under the titles : Passages from the 
 American Note-Books of Nathaniel Hawthorne, Passages 
 from the English Note-Books of Nathaniel Hawthorne, 
 and Passages from the French and Italian Note-Books of 
 Nathaniel Hawthorne. In these books, and in prefaces 
 which appear in the front of the volumes containing his col 
 lected stories, one finds many frank expressions of the interest 
 which Hawthorne took in his work, and the author appeals 
 very ingenuously to the reader, speaking with an almost 
 confidential closeness of his stories and sketches. Then the 
 Note-Books contain the unwrought material of the books 
 which the writer put out in his lifetime. One finds there 
 the suggestions of stories, and frequently pages of observa 
 tion and reflection, which were afterward transferred, almost 
 as they stood, into the author's works. It is very interesting 
 labor to trace Hawthorne's stories and sketches back to 
 these records in his note-books, and to compare the finished 
 work with the rough material. It seems, also, as if each 
 reader was admitted into the privacy of the author's mind. 
 That is the first impression, but a closer study reveals two
 
 2 NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. 
 
 facts very clearly. One is stated by Hawthorne himself in 
 his preface to The Snow-Image and other Twice-Told 
 Tales : " I have been especially careful [in my Introduc 
 tions] to make no disclosures respecting myself which the 
 most indifferent observer might not have been acquainted 
 with, and which I was not perfectly willing that my worst 
 enemy should know. ... I have taken facts which relate 
 to myself [when telling stories] because they chance to be 
 nearest at hand, and likewise are iny own property. And, 
 as for egotism, a person who has been burrowing, to his 
 utmost ability, into the depths of our common nature for the 
 purposes of psychological romance and who pursues his 
 researches in that dusky region, as he needs must, as well by 
 the tact of sympathy as by the light of observation will 
 smile at incurring such an imputation in virtue of a little 
 preliminary talk about his external habits, his abode, his 
 casual associates, and other matters entirely upon the sur 
 face. These things hide the man instead of displaying him. 
 You must make quite another kind of inquest, and look 
 through the whole range of his fictitious characters, good 
 and evil, in order to detect any of his essential traits." 
 
 There has rarely been a writer of fiction, then, whose per 
 sonality has been so absolutely separate from that of each 
 character created by him, and at the same time has so inti 
 mately penetrated the whole body of his writing. Of no 
 one of his characters, male or female, is one ever tempted 
 to say, This is Hawthorne, except in the case of Miles Cov- 
 erdale in The Blithedale Romance, where the circumstances 
 of the story tempt one into an identification ; yet all Haw 
 thorne's work is stamped emphatically with his mark. 
 Hawthorne wrote it, is very simple and easy to say of all 
 but the merest trifle in his collected works ; but the world 
 has yet to learn who Hawthorne was, and even if he had 
 not forbidden a biography of himself, it is scarcely likely 
 that any life could have disclosed more than he has chosen 
 himself to reveal.
 
 INTRODUCTION. 3 
 
 The advantage of this is that it leaves the student free to 
 concentrate his attention upon the writings rather than on 
 the man. Hawthorne, in the passage quoted above, speaks 
 of himself as one " who has been burrowing, to his utmost 
 ability, into the depths of our common nature for the pur 
 poses of psychological romance ; " and this states, as closely 
 as so short a sentence can, the controlling purpose and end 
 of the author. The vitality of Hawthorne's characters is 
 derived but little from any external description ; it resides 
 in the truthfulness with which they respond to some perma 
 nent and controlling operation of the human soul. Looking 
 into his own heart, and always, when studying others, in 
 search of fundamental rather than occasional motives, he 
 proceeded to develop these motives in conduct and life. 
 Hence he had a leaning toward the allegory, where human 
 figures are merely masks for spiritual activities, and some 
 times he employed the simple allegory, as in The Celestial 
 Railroad. More often in his short stories he has a spiritual 
 truth to illustrate, and uses the simplest, most direct means, 
 taking no pains to conceal his purpose, yet touching his 
 characters quietly or playfully with human sensibilities, and 
 investing them with just so much real life as answers the 
 purpose of the story. This is exquisitely done in The Snow- 
 Image. The consequence of this " burrowing into the 
 depths of our common nature " has been to bring much of 
 the darker and concealed life into the movement of his 
 stories. The fact of evil is the terrible fact of life, and its 
 workings in the human soul had more interest for Hawthorne 
 than the obvious physical manifestations. Since his obser 
 vations are less of the men and women whom everybody sees 
 and recognizes than of the souls which are hidden from 
 most eyes, it is not strange that his stories should often lay 
 bare secrets of sin, and that a somewhat dusky light should 
 seem to be the atmosphere of much of his work. Now and 
 then, especially when dealing with childhood, a warm, sunny 
 glow spreads over the pages of his books ; but the reader must
 
 4 NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. 
 
 be prepared for the most part to read stories which lie in 
 the shadow of life. 
 
 There was one class of subjects which had a peculiar in 
 terest for Hawthorne, and in a measure affected his work. 
 He had a strong taste for New England history, and he 
 found in the scenes and characters of that history favorable 
 material for the representation of spiritual conflict. He was 
 himself the most New English of New Englanders, and 
 held an extraordinary sympathy with the very soil of his 
 section of the country. By this sympathy, rather than by 
 any painful research, he was singularly acquainted with the 
 historic life of New England. His stories, based directly 
 on historic facts, are true to the spirit of the times in some 
 thing more than an archaeological way. One is astonished 
 at the ease with which he seized upon characteristic fea 
 tures, and reproduced them in a word or phrase. Merely 
 careful and diligent research would never be adequate to 
 give the life-likeness of the images in Howe's Masquerade. 
 
 There is, then, a second fact discovered by a study of 
 Hawthorne, that while one finds in the Note-Books, for ex 
 ample, the material out of which stories and sketches seem 
 to have been constructed, and while the facts of New Eng 
 land history have been used without exaggeration or distor 
 tion, the result in stories and romances is something far be 
 yond a mere report of what has been seen and read. The 
 charm of a vivifying imagination is the crowning charm of 
 Hawthorne's stories, and its medium is a graceful and often 
 exquisitely apt diction. Hawthorne's sense of touch as a 
 writer is very fine. He knows when to be light, and when 
 to press heavily ; a very conspicuous quality is what one 
 is likely to term quaintness, a gentle pleasantry which 
 seems to spring from the author's attitude toward his own 
 work, as if he looked upon that, too, as a part of the spirit 
 ual universe which he was surveying. 
 
 Hawthorne spent much of his life silently, and there are 
 touching passages in his note-books regarding his sense of
 
 INTRODUCTION. 5 
 
 loneliness and his wish for recognition from the world. His 
 early writings were short stories, sketches, and biographies, 
 scattered in magazines and brought together into Twice- 
 Told Tales, in two volumes, published, the first in 1837, 
 the second in 1842 ; Mosses from an Old Manse, in 1846 ; 
 The Snow-Image and other Twice- Told Tales, in 1851. 
 They had a limited circle of readers. Some recognized his 
 genius, but it was not until the publication of The Scarlet 
 Letter, in 1850, that Hawthorne's name was fairly before 
 the world as a great and original writer of romance. The 
 House of the Seven Gables followed in 1851 ; The Blithe- 
 dale Romance in 1852. He spent the years 1853-1860 in 
 Europe, and the immediate result of his life there is in Our 
 Old Home : A Series of English Sketches, published in 
 1863, and The Marble Faun, or the Romance of Monte 
 Beni, in 1860. For young people he wrote Grandfather's 
 Chair, a collection of stories from New England history, 
 The Wonder-Book and Tanglewood Tales, containing 
 stories out of classic mythology. There are a few other 
 scattered writings which have been collected into volumes 
 and published in the complete series of his works. 
 
 Hawthorne was born July 4, 1804, and died May 19, 
 1864. 
 
 The student of Hawthorne will find in G. P. Lathrop's 
 A Study of Hawthorne, and Henry James, Jr.'s Hawthorne, 
 in the series English Men of Letters, material which will 
 assist him. Dr. Holmes published, shortly after Haw 
 thorne's death, a paper of reminiscences which is included 
 in Soundings from the Atlantic ; and Longfellow welcomed 
 Twice- Told Tales with a glowing article in the North 
 American Review, xlviii. 59, which is reproduced in his 
 prose works. The reader will find it an agreeable task to 
 discover what the poets, Longfellow, Lowell, Stedman, and 
 others, have said of this man of genius.
 
 L 
 
 THE SNOW-IMAGE. 
 
 A CHILDISH MIRACLE. 
 
 ONE afternoon of a cold winter's day, when the sun 
 shone forth with chilly brightness, after a long storm, 
 two children asked leave of their mother to run out 
 and play in the new-fallen snow. The elder child was 
 a little girl, whom, because she was of a tender and 
 modest disposition, and was thought to be very beauti 
 ful, her parents, and other people who were familiar 
 with her, used to call Violet. But her brother was 
 known by the style and title of Peony, on account of 
 the ruddiness of his broad and round little phiz, which 
 made everybody think of sunshine and great scarlet 
 flowers. The father of these two children, a certain 
 Mr. Lindsey, it is important to say, was an excellent 
 but exceedingly matter-of-fact sort of man, a dealer in 
 hardware, and was sturdily accustomed to take what 
 is called the common-sense view of all matters that 
 came under his consideration. With a heart about as 
 tender as other people's, he had a head as hard and 
 impenetrable, and therefore, perhaps, as empty, as one 
 of the iron pots which it was a part of his business to 
 sell. The mother's character, on the other hand, had 
 a strain of poetry in it, a trait of unworldly beauty, 
 a delicate and dewy flower, as it were, that had sur 
 vived out of her imaginative youth, and still kept it
 
 THE SNOW-IMAGE. 7 
 
 self alive amid the dusty realities of matrimony and 
 motherhood. 
 
 So Violet and Peony, as I began with saying, be 
 sought their mother to let them run and play in the 
 new snow ; for, though it had looked so dreary and 
 dismal, drifting downward out of the gray sky, it had 
 a very cheerful aspect now that the sun was shining 
 on it. The children dwelt in a city, and had no wider 
 play-place than a little garden before the house, di 
 vided by a white fence from the street, and with a 
 pear-tree and two or three plum-trees overshadowing 
 it, and some rose-bushes just in front of the parlor 
 windows. The trees and shrubs, however, were now 
 leafless, and their twigs were enveloped in the light 
 snow, which thus made a kind of wintry foliage, with 
 here and there a pendent icicle for the fruit. 
 
 "Yes, Violet, yes, my little Peony," said their 
 kind mother ; " you may go out and play in the new 
 snow." 
 
 Accordingly, the good lady bundled up her darlings 
 in woolen jackets and wadded sacks, and put comfort 
 ers round their necks, and.a pair of striped gaiters on 
 each little pair of legs, and worsted mittens on their 
 hands, and gave them a kiss apiece, by way of a 
 spell to keep away Jack Frost. Forth sallied the two 
 children, with a hop-skip-and-jump that carried them 
 at once into the very heart of a huge snow-drift, 
 whence Violet emerged like a snow-bunting, while lit 
 tle Peony floundered out with his round face in full 
 bloom. Then what a merry time had they ! To look 
 at them, frolicking in the wintry garden, you would 
 have thought that the dark and pitiless storm had 
 been sent for no other purpose but to provide a new 
 plaything for Violet and Peony ; and that they them-
 
 8 NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. 
 
 selves had been created, as the snow-birds were, to 
 take delight only in the tempest, and in the white 
 mantle which it spread over the earth. 
 
 At last, when they had frosted one another all over 
 with handf uls of snow, Violet, after laughing heartily 
 at little Peony's figure, was struck with a new idea. 
 
 " You look exactly like a snow-image, Peony," said 
 she, " if your cheeks were not so red. And that puts 
 me in mind ! Let us make an image out of snow, 
 an image of a little girl, and it shall be our sister, 
 and shall run about and play with us all winter long. 
 Won't it be nice?" 
 
 " Oh, yes ! " cried Peony, as plainly as he could 
 speak, for he was but a little boy. "That will be 
 nice ! And mamma shall see it ! " 
 
 " Yes," answered Violet ; " mamma shall see the 
 new little girl. But she must not make her come into 
 the warm parlor ; for, you know, our little snow-sister 
 will not love the warmth." 
 
 And forthwith the children began this great busi 
 ness of making a snow-image that should run about : 
 while their mother, who was sitting at the window 
 and overheard some of their talk, could not help smil 
 ing at the gravity with which they set about it. They 
 really seemed to imagine that there would be no diffi 
 culty whatever in creating a live little girl out of the 
 snow. And to say the truth, if miracles are ever to 
 be wrought, it will be by putting our hands to the 
 work in precisely such a simple and undoubting frame 
 of mind as that in which Violet and Peony now under 
 took to perform one, without so much as knowing that 
 it was a miracle. So thought the mother ; and thought, 
 likewise, that the new snow, just fallen from heaven, 
 would be excellent material to make new beings of, if
 
 THE SNOW-IMAGE. 9 
 
 it were not so very cold. She gazed at the children a 
 moment longer, delighting to watch their little figures, 
 
 the girl, tall for her age, graceful and agile, and so 
 delicately colored that she looked like a cheerful 
 thought, more than a physical reality; while Peony 
 expanded in breadth rather than height, and rolled 
 along on his short and sturdy legs as substantial as an 
 elephant, though not quite so big. Then the mother 
 resumed her work ; what it was I forget, but she was 
 either trimming a silken bonnet for Violet, or darning 
 a pair of stockings for little Peony's short legs. 
 Again, however, and again, and yet other agains, she 
 could not help turning her head to the window to see 
 how the children got on with their snow-image. 
 
 Indeed, it was an exceedingly pleasant sight, those 
 bright little souls at their tasks ! Moreover, it was 
 really wonderful to observe how knowingly and skil 
 fully they managed the matter. Violet assumed the 
 chief direction, and told Peony what to do, while, with 
 her OWF delicate fingers, she shaped out all the nicer 
 parts of the snow-figure. It seemed, in fact, not so 
 much to be made by the children, as to grow up under 
 their hands, while they were playing and prattling 
 about it. Their mother was qtiite surprised at this ; 
 and the longer she looked the more and more surprised 
 she grew. 
 
 " What remarkable children mine are ! " thought 
 she, smiling with a mother's pride ; and, smiling at 
 herself, too, for being so proud of them. " What 
 other children could have made anything so like a lit 
 tle girl's figure out of snow at the first trial ? Well ; 
 
 but now I must finish Peony's new frock, for his 
 grandfather is coming to-morrow, and I want the lit 
 tle fellow to look handsome."
 
 10 NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. 
 
 So she took up the frock, and was soon as busily at 
 work again with her needle as the two children with 
 their snow-image. But still, as the needle travelled 
 hither and thither through the seams of the dress, the 
 mother made her toil light and happy by listening to 
 the airy voices of Violet and Peony. They kept talk 
 ing to one another all the time, their tongues being 
 quite as active as their feet and hands. Except at in 
 tervals, she could not distinctly hear what was said, 
 but had merely a sweet impression that they were in 
 a most loving mood, and were enjoying themselves 
 highly, and that the business of making the snow-im 
 age went prosperously on. Now and then, however, 
 when Violet and Peony happened to raise their voices, 
 the words were as audible as if they had been spoken 
 in the very parlor where the mother sat. Oh, how 
 delightfully those words echoed in her heart, even 
 though they meant nothing so very wise or wonderful, 
 after all ! 
 
 But you must know a mother listens with her heart 
 much more than with her ears ; and thus she is often 
 delighted with the trills of celestial music, when other 
 people can hear nothing of the kind. 
 
 " Peony, Peony ! " cried Violet to her brother, who 
 had gone to another part of the garden, " bring me 
 some of that fresh snow, Peony, from the very far 
 thest corner, where we have not been trampling. 1 
 want it to shape our little snow-sister's bosom with. 
 You know that part must be quite pure, just as it 
 came out of the sky ! " 
 
 " Here it is, Violet ! " answered Peony, in his bluff 
 tone, but a very sweet tone, too, as he came 
 floundering through the half -trodden drifts. "Here 
 is the snow for her little bosom. O Violet, how beau- 
 ti-f ul she begins to look ! "
 
 THE SNOW-IMAGE. 11 
 
 " Yes," said Violet, thoughtfully and quietly ; " our 
 snow-sister does look very lovely. I did not quite 
 know, Peony, that we could mak such a sweet little 
 girl as this." 
 
 The mother, as she listened, thought how fit and 
 delightful an incident it would be, if fairies, or, still 
 better, if angel-children were to come from paradise 
 and play invisibly with her own darlings, and help 
 them to make their snow-image, giving it the features 
 of celestial babyhood ! Violet and Peony would not 
 be aware of their immortal playmates, only they 
 would see that the image grew very beautiful while 
 they worked at it, and would think that they them 
 selves had done it all. 
 
 " My little girl and boy deserve such playmates, if 
 mortal children ever did ! " said the mother to her 
 self ; and then she smiled again at her own motherly 
 pride. 
 
 Nevertheless, the idea seized upon her imagination ; 
 and, ever and anon, she took a glimpse out of the win 
 dow, half dreaming that she might see the golden- 
 haired children of paradise sporting with her own 
 golden-haired Violet and bright cheeked Peony. 
 
 Now, for a few moments, there was a busy and 
 earnest, but indistinct hum of the two children's 
 voices, as Violet and Peony wrought together with one 
 happy consent. Violet still seemed to be the guiding 
 spirit, while Peony acted rather as a laborer, and 
 brought her the snow from far and near. And yet 
 the little urchin evidently had a proper understanding 
 of the matter, too ! 
 
 " Peony, Peony ! " cried Violet ; for her brother 
 was again at the other side of the garden. " Bring 
 me those light wreaths of snow that have rested on
 
 12 NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. 
 
 the lower branches of the pear-tree. You can clamber 
 on the snow-drift, Peony, and reach them easily. I 
 must have them to make some ringlets for our snow- 
 sister's head." 
 
 " Here they are, Violet ! " answered the little boy. 
 " Take care you do not break them. Well done ! 
 Well done ! How pretty ! " 
 
 " Does she not look sweetly ? " said Violet, with a 
 very satisfied tone ; " and now we must have some 
 little shining bits of ice, to make the brightness of her 
 eyes. She is not finished yet. Mamma will see how 
 very beautiful she is ; but papa will say, ' Tush ! non 
 sense ! come in out of the cold ! ' : 
 
 " Let us call mamma to look out," said Peony ; and 
 then he shouted lustily, " Mamma ! mamma ! ! mam 
 ma ! ! ! Look out and see what a nice little girl we 
 are making ! " 
 
 The mother put down her work, for an instant, and 
 looked out of the window. But it so happened that 
 the sun for this was one of the shortest days of the 
 whole year had sunken so nearly to the edge of the 
 world that his setting shine came obliquely into the 
 lady's eyes. So she was dazzled, you must under 
 stand, and could not very distinctly observe what was 
 in the garden. Still, however, through all that bright, 
 blinding dazzle of the sun and the new snow she 
 beheld a small white figure in the garden that seemed 
 to have a wonderful deal of human likeness about it. 
 And she saw Violet and Peony, indeed, she looked 
 more at them than at the image, she saw the two 
 children still at work ; Peony bringing fresh snow, 
 and Violet applying it to the figure as scientifically as 
 a sculptor adds clay to his model. Indistinctly as she 
 discerned the snow-child, the mother thought to her-
 
 THE SNOW-IMAGE. 13 
 
 self that never before was there a snow-figure so cun 
 ningly made, nor ever such a dear little girl and boy 
 to make it. 
 
 " They do everything better than other children," 
 said she, very complacently. " No wonder they make 
 better snow-images ! " 
 
 She sat down again to the work, and made as much 
 haste with it as possible ; because twilight would soon 
 come, and Peony's frock was not yet finished, and 
 grandfather was expected, by railroad, pretty early in 
 the morning. Faster and faster, therefore, went her 
 flying fingers. The children, likewise, kept busily at 
 work in the garden, and still the mother listened, 
 whenever she could catch a word. She was amused 
 to observe how their little imaginations had got mixed 
 up with what they were doing, and were carried away 
 by it. They seemed positively to think that the snow- 
 child would run about and play with them. 
 
 " What a nice playmate she will be for us, all win 
 ter long!" said Violet. "I hope papa will not be 
 afraid of her giving us a cold ! Shan't you love her 
 dearly, Peony?" 
 
 " Oh, yes ! " cried Peony. " And I will hug her, 
 and she shall sit down close by me, and drink some of 
 my warm milk ! " 
 
 " Oh, no, Peony ! " answered Violet, with grave wis 
 dom. " That will not do at all. Warm milk will not 
 be wholesome for our little snow-sister. Little snow- 
 people, like her, eat nothing but icicles. No, no, 
 Peony ; we must not give her anything warm to 
 drink ! " 
 
 There was a minute or two of silence ; for Peony, 
 whose short legs were never weary, had gone on a 
 pilgrimage again to the other side of the garden. All 
 of a sudden Violet cried out, loudly and joyfully,
 
 14 NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. 
 
 " Look here, Peony ! Come quickly ! A light has 
 been shining on her cheek out of that rose-colored 
 cloud ! and the color does not go away ! Is not that 
 beautiful ! " 
 
 " Yes ; it is beau-ti-ful," answered Peony, pronoun 
 cing the three syllables with deliberate accuracy. " O 
 Violet, only look at her hair ! It is all like gold ! " 
 
 " Oh, certainly," said Violet, with tranquillity, as 
 if it were very much a matter of course. " That color, 
 you know, conies from the golden clouds that we see 
 up there in the sky. She is almost finished now. But 
 her lips must be made very red, redder than her 
 cheeks. Perhaps, Peony, it will make them red if we 
 both kiss them ! " f 
 
 Accordingly, the mother heard two smart little 
 smacks, as if both her children were kissing the snow- 
 image on its frozen mouth. But, as this did not seein 
 to make the lips quite red enough, Violet next pro 
 posed that the snow-child should be invited to kiss 
 Peony's scarlet cheek. 
 
 " Come, 'ittle snow-sister, kiss me ! " cried Peony. 
 
 " There ! she has kissed you," added Violet, " and 
 now her lips are very red. And she blushed a little, 
 too!" 
 
 " Oh, what a cold kiss ! " cried Peony. 
 
 Just then came a breeze of the pure west-wind, 
 sweeping through the garden and rattling the parlor 
 windows. It sounded so wintry cold that the mother 
 was about to tap on the window-pane with her thimbled 
 finger, to summon the two children in, when they both 
 cried out to her with one voice. The tone was not a 
 tone of surprise, although they were evidently a good 
 deal excited ; it appeared rather as if they were very 
 much rejoiced at some event that had now happened,
 
 THE SNOW-IMAGE, 15 
 
 but which they had been looking for, and had reckoned 
 upon all along. 
 
 " Mamma ! mamma ! We have finished our little 
 snow-sister, and she is running about the garden with 
 us!" 
 
 " What imaginative little beings my children are ! " 
 thought the mother, putting the last few stitches into 
 Peony's frock. "And it is strange, too, that they 
 make me almost as much a child as they themselves 
 are ! I can hardly help believing, now, that the snow- 
 image has really come to life ! " 
 
 " Dear mamma ! " cried Violet, " pray look out and 
 see what a sweet playmate we have I " 
 
 The mother, being thus entreated, could no longer 
 delay to look forth from the window. The sun was 
 now gone out of the sky, leaving, however, a rich in 
 heritance of his brightness among those purple and 
 golden clouds which make the sunsets of winter so 
 magnificent. But there was not the slightest gleam 
 or dazzle, either on the window or on the snow ; so 
 that the good lady could look all over the garden, and 
 see everything and everybody in it. And what do 
 you think she saw there ? Violet and Peony, of course, 
 her own two darling children. Ah, but whom or what 
 did she see besides? Why, if you will believe me, 
 there was a small figure of a girl, dressed all in white, 
 with rose-tinged cheeks and ringlets of golden hue, 
 playing about the garden with the two children ! A 
 stranger though she was, the child seemed to be on as 
 familiar terms with Violet and Peony, and they with 
 her, as if all the three had been playmates during the 
 whole of their little lives. The mother thought to her 
 self that it must certainly be the daughter of one of 
 the neighbors, and that, seeing Violet and Peony in
 
 16 NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. 
 
 the garden, the child had run across the street to play 
 with them. So this kind lady went to the door, in 
 tending to invite the little runaway into her comfor 
 table parlor ; for, now that the sunshine was with 
 drawn, the atmosphere out of doors was already 
 growing very cold. 
 
 But, after opening the house-door, she stood an in= 
 stant on the threshold, hesitating whether she ought 
 to ask the child to come in, or whether she should 
 even speak to her. Indeed, she almost doubted whether 
 it were a real child, after all, or only a light wreath 
 of the new-fallen snow, blown hither and thither about 
 the garden by the intensely cold west-wind. There 
 was certainly something very singular in the aspect of 
 the little stranger. Among all the children of the 
 neighborhood, the lady could remember no such face, 
 with its pure white, and delicate rose-color, and the 
 golden ringlets tossing about the forehead and cheeks. 
 And as for her dress, which was entirely of white, and 
 fluttering in the breeze, it was such as no reasonable 
 woman would put upon a little girl, when sending her 
 out to play, in the depth of winter. It made this 
 kind and careful mother shiver only to look at those 
 small feet, with nothing in the world on them except 
 a very thin pair of white slippers. Nevertheless, airily 
 as she was clad, the child seemed to feel not the 
 slightest inconvenience from the cold, but danced so 
 lightly over the snow that the tips of her toes left 
 hardly a print in its surface ; while Violet could but 
 just keep pace with her, and Peony's short legs com 
 pelled him to lag behind. 
 
 Once, in the course of their play, the strange child 
 placed herself between Violet and Peony, and taking 
 a hand of each, skipped merrily forward, and they
 
 THE SNOW-IMAGE. 17 
 
 along with her. Almost immediately, however, Peony 
 pulled away his little fist, and began to rub it as if 
 the fingers were tingling with cold ; while Violet also 
 released herself, though with less abruptness, gravely 
 remarking that it was better not to take hold of hands. 
 The white-robed damsel said not a word, but danced 
 about, just as merrily as before. If Violet and Peony 
 did not choose to play with her, she could make just 
 as good a playmate of the brisk and cold west- wind, 
 which kept blowing her all about the garden, and took 
 such liberties with her that they seemed to have been 
 friends for a long time. All this while the mother 
 stood on the threshold, wondering how a little girl 
 could look so much like a flying snow-drift, or how a 
 snow-drift could look so very like a little girl. 
 
 She called Violet, and whispered to her. 
 
 " Violet, my darling, what is this child's name ? " 
 asked she. " Does she live near us ? " 
 
 " Why, dearest mamma," answered Violet, laugh 
 ing to think that her mother did not comprehend so 
 very plain an affair, " this is our little snow-sister, 
 whom we have just been making ! " 
 
 " Yes, dear mamma," cried Peony, running to his 
 mother, and looking up simply into her face. " This 
 is our snow-image ! Is it not a nice 'ittle child ? " 
 
 At this instant a flock of snow-birds came flitting 
 through the air. As was very natural, they avoided 
 Violet and Peony. But and this looked strange 
 * they flew at once to the white-robed child, fluttered 
 eagerly about her head, alighted on her shoulders, 
 and seemed to claim her as an old acquaintance. She, 
 on her part, was evidently as glad to see these little 
 birds, old Winter's grandchildren, as they were to see 
 her, and welcomed them by holding out both her
 
 18 NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. 
 
 hands. Hereupon, they each and all tried to alight 
 on her two palrns and ten small fingers and thumbs, 
 crowding one another off, with an immense fluttering 
 of their tiny wings. One dear little bird nestled ten 
 derly in her bosom ; another put its bill to her lips. 
 They were as joyous, all the while, and seemed as 
 much in their element as you may have seen them 
 when sporting with a snow-storm. 
 
 Violet and Peony stood laughing at this pretty 
 sight ; for they enjoyed the merry time which their 
 new playmate was having with these small-winged 
 visitants almost as much as if they themselves took 
 part in it. 
 
 " Violet," said her mother, greatly perplexed, " tell 
 me the truth, without any jest. Who is this little 
 girl?" 
 
 " My darling mamma," answered Violet, looking 
 seriously into her mother's face, and apparently sur 
 prised that she should need any further explanation, 
 " I have told you truly who she is. It is our little 
 snow-image, which Peony and I have been making. 
 Peony will tell you so, as well as I." 
 
 "Yes, mamma," asseverated Peony, with much 
 gravity in his crimson little phiz ; " this is 'ittle snow- 
 child. Is not she a nice one? But, mamma, her 
 hand is, oh, so very cold ! " 
 
 While mamma still hesitated what to think and 
 what to do, the street-gate was thrown open, and the 
 father of Violet and Peony appeared, wrapped in a 
 pilot-cloth sack, with a fur cap drawn down over his 
 ears, and the thickest of gloves upon his hands. Mr. 
 Lindsey was a middle-aged man, with a weary and 
 yet a happy look in his wind-flushed and frost-pinched 
 face, as if he had been busy all the day long, and was
 
 THE SNOW-IMAGE. 19 
 
 glad to get back to his quiet home. His eyes bright 
 ened at the sight of his wife and children, although 
 he could not help uttering a word or two of surprise 
 at finding the whole family in the open air, on so 
 bleak a day, and after sunset too. He soon perceived 
 the little white stranger, sporting to and fro in the 
 garden, like a dancing snow-wreath, a flock of snow 
 birds fluttering about her head. 
 
 " Pray, what little girl may that be ? " inquired this 
 very sensible man. " Surely her mother must be 
 crazy, to let her go out in such bitter weather as it 
 has been to-day, with only that flimsy white gown 
 and those thin slippers ! " 
 
 "My dear husband," said his wife, "I know no 
 more about the little thing than you do. Some 
 neighbor's child, I suppose. Our Violet and Peony," 
 she added, laughing at herself for repeating so absurd 
 a story, " insist that she is nothing but a snow-image, 
 which they have been busy about in the garden al 
 most all the afternoon." 
 
 As she said this, the mother glanced her eyes 
 toward the spot where the children's snow-image had 
 been made. What was her surprise, on perceiving 
 that there was not the slightest trace of so much labor ! 
 no image at all ! no piled-up heap of snow ! 
 nothing whatever save the prints of little footsteps 
 around a vacant space ! 
 
 " This is very strange ! " said she. 
 
 "What is strange, dear mother?" asked Violet. 
 " Dear father, do not you see how it is ? This is our 
 snow-image, which Peony and I have made, because 
 we wanted another playmate. Did not we, Peony?" 
 
 " Yes, papa," said crimson Peony. " This be our 
 'ittle snow-sister. Is she not beau-ti-ful? But she 
 gave me such a cold kiss ! "
 
 20 NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. 
 
 " Poh, nonsense, children ! " cried their good, hon 
 est father, who, as we have already intimated, had an 
 exceedingly common-sensible way of looking at mat 
 ters. " Do not tell me of making live figures out of 
 snow. Come, wife ; this little stranger must not stay 
 out in the bleak air a moment longer. We will bring 
 her into the parlor ; and you shall give her a supper 
 of warm bread and milk, and make her as comfortable 
 as you can. Meanwhile, I will inquire among the 
 neighbors ; or, if necessary, send the city crier about 
 the streets, to give notice of a lost child." 
 
 So saying, this honest and very kind-hearted man 
 was going toward the little white damsel, with the 
 best intentions in the world. But Violet and Peony, 
 each seizing their father by the hand, earnestly be 
 sought him not to make her come in. 
 
 " Dear father," cried Violet, putting herself before 
 him, " it is true what I have been telling you ! This 
 is our little snow-girl, and she cannot live any longer 
 than while she breathes the cold west-wind. Do not 
 make her come into the hot room ! " 
 
 "Yes, father," shouted Peony, stamping his little 
 foot, so mightily was he in earnest, " this be nothing 
 but our 'ittle snow-child ! She will not love the hot 
 fire ! " 
 
 " Nonsense, children, nonsense, nonsense ! " cried 
 the father, half vexed, half laughing at what he con 
 sidered their foolish obstinacy. " Run into the house, 
 this moment ! It is too late to play any longer now. 
 [ must take care of this little girl immediately, or she 
 will catch her death-a-cold ! " 
 
 " Husband ! dear husband ! " said his wife, in a 
 low voice, for she had been looking narrowly at 
 the snow-child, and was more perplexed than ever,
 
 THE SNOW-IMAGE. 21 
 
 " there is something very singular in all this. You 
 will think me foolish, but but may it not be that 
 some invisible angel has been attracted by the simpli 
 city and good-faith with which our children set about 
 their undertaking? May he not have spent an hour 
 of his immortality in playing with those dear little 
 souls ? and so the result is what we call a miracle. 
 No, no ! Do not laugh at ine ; I see what a foolish 
 thought it is ! " 
 
 " My dear wife," replied the husband, laughing 
 heartily, " you are as much a child as Violet and 
 Peony." 
 
 And in one sense so she was ; for all through life 
 she had kept her heart full of childlike simplicity and 
 faith, which was as pure and clear as crystal ; and, 
 looking at all matters through this transparent me 
 dium, she sometimes saw truths so profound that other 
 people laughed at them as nonsense and absurdity. 
 
 But now kind Mr. Lindsey had entered the garden, 
 breaking away from his two children, who still sent 
 their shrill voices after him, beseeching him to let the 
 snow-child stay and enjoy herself in the cold west-wind. 
 As he approached, the snow-birds took to flight. The 
 little white damsel, also, fled backward, shaking her 
 head, as if to say, " Pray do not touch me ! " and ro 
 guishly, as it appeared, leading him through the deep 
 est of the snow. Once, the good man stumbled, and 
 floundered down upon his face, so that, gathering him 
 self up again, with the snow sticking to his rough 
 pilot-cloth sack, he looked as white and wintry as a 
 snow-image of the largest size. Some of the neigh 
 bors, meanwhile, seeing him from their windows, won 
 dered what could possess poor Mr. Lindsey to be run 
 ning about his garden in pursuit of a snow-drift, which
 
 22 NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. 
 
 the west-wind was driving hither and thither ! At 
 length, after a vast deal of trouble, he chased the lit 
 tle stranger into a corner, where she could not possibly 
 escape him. His wife had been looking on, and, it 
 being nearly twilight, was wonder-struck to observe 
 how the snow-child gleamed and sparkled, and how 
 she seemed to shed a glow all round about her ; and 
 when driven into the corner, she positively glistened 
 like a star ! It was a frosty kind of brightness, too, 
 like that of an icicle in the moonlight. The wife 
 thought it strange that good Mr. Lindsey should see 
 nothing remarkable in the snow-child's appearance. 
 
 " Come, you odd little thing ! " cried the honest 
 man, seizing her by the hand, " I have caught you at 
 last, and will make you comfortable in spite of your 
 self. We will put a nice, warm pair of worsted stock 
 ings on your frozen little feet, and you shall have a 
 good thick shawl to wrap yourself in. Your poor 
 white nose, I am afraid, is actually frost-bitten. But 
 we will make it all right. Come along in." 
 
 And so, with a most benevolent smile on his saga 
 cious visage, all purple as it was with the cold, this 
 very well-meaning gentleman took the snow-child by 
 the hand and led her towards the house. She followed 
 him, droopingly and reluctant ; for all the glow and 
 sparkle was gone out of her figure ; and whereas just 
 before she had resembled a bright, frosty, star-gemmed 
 evening, with a crimson gleam' on the cold horizon, 
 she now looked as dull and languid as a thaw. As 
 kind Mr. Lindsey led her up the steps of the door, 
 Violet and Peony looked into his face, their eyes 
 full of tears, which froze before they could run down 
 their cheeks, and again entreated him not to bring 
 their snow-image into the house.
 
 THE SNOW-IMAGE. 23 
 
 " Not bring her in ! " exclaimed the kind-hearted 
 man. " Why, you are crazy, iny little Violet ! quite 
 crazy, my small Peony ! She is so cold, already, that 
 her hand has almost frozen mine, in spite of my thick 
 gloves. Would you have her freeze to death ? " 
 
 His wife, as he came up the steps, had been taking 
 another long, earnest, almost awe-stricken gaze at the 
 little white stranger. She hardly knew whether it 
 was a dream or no ; ljut she could not help fancying 
 that she saw the delicate print of Violet's fingers on 
 the child's neck. It looked as if, while Violet was 
 shaping out the image, she had given it a gentle pat 
 with her hand, and had neglected to smooth the im 
 pression quite away. 
 
 " After all, husband," said the mother, recurring to 
 her idea that the angels would be as much delighted 
 to play with Violet and Peony as she herself was, 
 " after all, she does look strangely lik^ a snow-image ! 
 I do believe she is made out of snow ! 
 
 A puff of the west-wind blew against he snow-child, 
 and again she sparkled like a star. 
 
 " Snow ! " repeated good Mr. Lindsey, drawing the 
 reluctant guest over his hospitable threshold. " No 
 wonder she looks like snow. She is half frozen, poor 
 little thing ! But a good fire will put everything to 
 rights." 
 
 Without further talk, and always with the same 
 best intentions, this highly benevolent and common- 
 sensible individual led the little white damsel droop 
 ing, drooping, drooping, more and more out of the 
 frosty air, and into his comfortable parlor. A Hei- 
 denberg stove, filled to the brim with intensely burn 
 ing anthracite, was sending a bright gleam through 
 the isinglass of its iron door, and causing the vase of
 
 24 NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. 
 
 water on its top to fume and bubble with excitement. 
 A warm, sultry smell was diffused throughout the 
 room. A thermometer on the wall farthest from the 
 stove stood at eighty degrees. The parlor was hung 
 with red curtains, and covered with a red carpet, and 
 looked just as warm as it felt. The difference betwixt 
 the atmosphere here and the cold, wintry twilight out 
 of doors, was like stepping at once from Nova Zembla 
 to the hottest part of India, o& from the North Pole 
 into an oven. Oh, this was a fine place for the little 
 white stranger ! 
 
 The common-sensible man placed the snow-child on 
 the hearth-rug, right in front of the hissing and fuming 
 stove. 
 
 " Now she will be comfortable ! " cried Mr. Lind- 
 sey, rubbing his hands and looking about him with the 
 pleasantest smile you ever saw. "Make yourself at 
 home, my child." 
 
 Sad, sad and drooping, looked the little white maiden, 
 as she stood on the hearth-rug, with the hot blast of 
 the stove striking through her like a pestilence. Once, 
 she threw a glance wistfully toward the windows, and 
 caught a glimpse, through its red curtains, of the snow- 
 covered roofs, and the stars glimmering frostily, and 
 all the delicious intensity of the cold night. The bleak 
 wind rattled the window-panes, as if it were summon 
 ing her to come forth. But there stood the snow-child, 
 drooping before the hot stove ! 
 
 But the common-sensible man saw nothing amiss. 
 
 " Come, wife," said he, " let her have a pair of thick 
 stockings and a woollen shawl or blanket directly ; and 
 tell Dora to give her some warm supper as soon as 
 the milk boils. You, Violet and Peony, amuse your 
 little friend. She is out of spirits, you see, at finding
 
 THE SNOW-IMAGE. 25 
 
 herself in a strange place. For my part, I will go round 
 among the neighbors, and find out where she belongs." 
 
 The mother, meanwhile, had gone in search of the 
 shawl and stockings ; for her own view of the matter, 
 however subtle and delicate, had given way, as it 
 always did, to the stubborn materialism of her hu&= 
 band. Without heeding the remonstrances of his two 
 children, who still kept murmuring that their little 
 snow-sister did not love the warmth, good Mr. Lindsey 
 took his departure, shutting the parlor-door carefully 
 behind him. Turning up the collar of his sack over 
 his ears, he emerged from the house, and had barely 
 reached the street-gate, when he was recalled by the 
 screams of Violet and Peony, and the rapping of a 
 thimbled finger against the parlor window. 
 
 " Husband ! husband ! " cried his wife, showing 
 her horror-stricken face through the window-panes. 
 " There is no need of going for the child's parents ! " 
 
 " We told you so, father ! " screamed Violet and 
 Peony, as he re entered the parlor. " You would bring 
 her in ; and now our poor dear beau-ti-f ul little 
 snow-sister is thawed ! " 
 
 And their own sweet little faces were already dis 
 solved in tears; so that their father, seeing what 
 strange things occasionally happen in this e\ery-day 
 world, felt not a little anxious lest his children might 
 be going to thaw too ! In the utmost perplexity, he 
 demanded an explanation of his wife. She could only 
 reply, that, being summoned to the parlor by the cries 
 of Violet and Peony, she found no trace of the little 
 white maiden, unless it were the remains of a heap of 
 snow, which, while she was gazing at it, melted quite 
 away upon the hearth-rug. 
 
 " And there you see all that is left of it ! " added 
 she, pointing to a pool of water in front of the stove.
 
 26 NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. 
 
 " Yes, father," said Violet, looking reproachfully at 
 him, through her tears, " there is all that is left of our 
 dear little snow-sister ! " 
 
 " Naughty father ! " cried Peony, stamping his foot, 
 and I shudder to say shaking his little fist at the 
 common -sensible man. " We told you how it would 
 be ! What for did you bring her in ? " 
 
 And the Heidenberg stove, through the isinglass of 
 its door, seemed to glare at poor Mr. Lindsey, like a 
 red-eyed demon, triumphing in the mischief which it 
 had done ! 
 
 This, you will observe, was one of those rare cases, 
 which yet will occasionally happen, where common- 
 sense finds itself at fault. The remarkable story of 
 the snow-image, though to that sagacious class of peo 
 ple to whom good Mr. Lindsey belongs it may seem 
 but a childish affair, is, nevertheless, capable of being 
 vnoralized in various methods, greatly for their edifica 
 tion. One of its lessons, for instance, might be, that 
 it behooves men, and especially men of benevolence, to 
 consider well what they are about, and, before acting 
 on their philanthropic purposes, to be quite sure that 
 they comprehend the nature and all the relations of 
 the business in hand. What has been established as 
 an element of good to one being may prove absolute 
 mischief to another ; even as the warmth of the parlor 
 was proper enough for children of flesh and blood, 
 like Violet and Peony, though by no means very 
 wholesome, even for them, but involved nothing 
 short of annihilation to the unfortunate snow-image. 
 
 But, after all, there is no teaching anything to wise 
 men of good Mr. Lindsey's stamp. They know every 
 thing, oh, to be sure ! everything that has been, 
 and everything that is, and everything that, by
 
 THE GREAT STONE FACE. 27 
 
 future possibility, can be. And, should some phenom 
 enon of nature or providence transcend their system, 
 they will not recognize it, even if it come to pass 
 under their very noses. 
 
 " Wife," said Mr. Lindsey, after a fit of silence, 
 "see what a quantity of snow the children have 
 brought in on their feet ! It has made quite a puddle 
 here before the stove. Pray tell Dora to bring some 
 towels and sop it up ! " 
 
 II. 
 
 THE GREAT STONE FACE. 
 
 ONE afternoon, when the sun was going down, a 
 mother and her little boy sat at the door of their cot 
 tage, 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 brighten 
 ing 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 all around 
 them, on the steep and difficult hillsides. Others had 
 their homes in comfortable farm-houses, and culti 
 vated 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 moun 
 tain region, had been caught and tamed by human cun 
 ning and compelled to turn the machinery of cotton- 
 factories. The inhabitants of this valley, in short, were
 
 28 NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. 
 
 numerous, and of many modes of life. But all of 
 them, grown people and children, had a kind of fa 
 miliarity with the Great Stone Face, although some 
 possessed the gift of distinguishing this grand natural 
 phenomenon more perfectly than many of their neigh 
 bors. 
 
 The Great Stone Face, then, was a work of Nature 
 in her mood of majestic playfulness, formed on the 
 perpendicular side of a mountain by some immense 
 rocks, which had been thrown together in such a posi 
 tion 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 sculp 
 tured 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 ; and the vast 
 lips, which, if they could have spoken, would have 
 rolled their thunder accents from one end of the val 
 ley 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 
 features would again be seen ; and the farther he with 
 drew 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 glori 
 fied vapor of the mountains clustering about it, the 
 Great Stone Face seemed positively to be alive. 
 
 It was a happy lot for children to grow up to man 
 hood 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
 
 THE GREAT STONE FACE. 29 
 
 mankind in its affections, and had room for more. It 
 was 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 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, " 1 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 a face, I should love 
 him dearly." 
 
 " If an old prophecy should come to pass," an 
 swered 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 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 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 mur 
 mured by the mountain streams, and whispered by 
 the wind among the tree-tops. The purport was, 
 that, at some future day, a child should be born here 
 abouts, who was destined to become the greatest and 
 noblest personage of his time, and whose countenance, 
 in manhood, should bear an exact resemblance to the
 
 80 NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. 
 
 Great Stone Face. Not a few old-fashioned people, and 
 young ones likewise, in 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 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 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 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 sun-browned with 
 labor in the fields, but with more intelligence bright 
 ening 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 be 
 came 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 recognized him, and 
 gave him a smile of kindness and encouragement, 
 responsive to his own look of veneration. We must
 
 THE GREAT STONE FACE. 31 
 
 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 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 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, 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. All the countries of 
 the globe appeared to join hands for the mere purpose 
 of adding heap after heap to the mountainous accu 
 mulation 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 him the golden sands of 
 her rivers, and gathered up the ivory tusks of her 
 great elephants out of the forests ; 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 behind 
 hand with the earth, yielded up her mighty whales,
 
 32 NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. 
 
 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 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 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 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 farmhouse. The exterior was of marble, so 
 dazzlingly white that it seemed as though the whole 
 structure might melt away in the sunshine, like those 
 humbler ones which Mr. Gathergold, in his young 
 play-days, 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 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
 
 THE GREAT STONE FACE. 33 
 
 stately apartment, were composed, respectively, of but 
 one enormous pane of glass, so transparently pure that 
 it was said to be 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 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 so 
 inured to wealth, that perhaps he could not have 
 closed his eyes unless where the gleam of it was cer 
 tain to find its way beneath his eyelids. 
 
 In due time, the mansion was finished ; next came 
 the upholsterers, with magnificent furniture ; then a 
 whole troop of black and white servants, the harbin 
 gers of Mr. Gathergold, who, in his own majestic per 
 son, 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 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 thousand 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 be 
 nignant as the smile 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
 
 34 NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. 
 
 Stone Face 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 assembled to witness the arrival. " Here comes 
 the great Mr. Gathergold ! " 
 
 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 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 ! " 
 
 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, as the car 
 riage 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 dropped some copper coins 
 upon the ground ; so that, though the great man's 
 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 ! "
 
 THE GREAT STONE FACE. 35 
 
 But Ernest turned sadly from the wrinkled shrewd 
 ness of that sordid visage, and gazed up the valley, 
 where, amid a gathering mist, glided by the last sun 
 beams, he could still distinguish those glorious features 
 which had impressed themselves into his soul. Their 
 aspect cheered him. What did the benign lips seem 
 to say ? 
 
 " He will come ! Fear not, Ernest ; the man wil] 
 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 remarkable 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, inas 
 much as Ernest was industrious, kind, and neigh 
 borly, and neglected no duty for the sake of indulging 
 this idle habit. They knew not that the Great Stone 
 Face had become a teacher to him, and that the senti 
 ment 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 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 affec 
 tions 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 marvellous features beaming adown the
 
 36 NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. 
 
 valley, and still wondered that their human counter- 
 part was so long in making his appearance. 
 
 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 ex 
 istence, 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 gold, it had been very generally conceded that 
 there was no such striking resemblance, after all, be 
 twixt 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 de 
 cease. Once 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 stran 
 gers, multitudes of whom came every summer to visit 
 that famous natural curiosity, the Great Stone Face. 
 Thus, Mr. 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, af 
 ter a great deal of hard fighting, had now become an 
 illustrious, commander. Whatever he may be called 
 in history, he was known in camp& and on the battle 
 field 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 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 na 
 tive valley, hoping to find repose where he reinem-
 
 THE GREAT STONE FACE. 3T 
 
 bered to have left it. The inhabitants, his old neigh 
 bors and their grown-up children, were resolved to 
 welcome the renowned warrior with a salute of can 
 non and a public dinner ; and all the more enthusias 
 tically, it being affirmed that now, at last, the likeness 
 of the Great Stone Face had actually appeared. An 
 aide-de-camp of Old Blood-and-Thunder, travelling 
 through the valley, was said to have been struck with 
 the resemblance. Moreover 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 majes 
 tic image, even when a boy, only that the idea had 
 never occurred to them at that period. Great, there 
 fore, 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. 
 
 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 dis 
 tinguished 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 eastward, and afforded 
 a distant view of the Great Stone Face. Over the 
 general's chair, which was a relic from the home of 
 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 
 
 5
 
 38 NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. 
 
 his victories. Our friend Ernest raised himself on 
 his tip-toes, 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 that might fall from the general in reply ; 
 and a volunteer company, doing duty as a guard, 
 pricked ruthlessly with their bayonets at any particu 
 larly 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-Thunder's physiognomy than if it had 
 been still blazing on the battle-field. To console him 
 self, he turned towards 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 individuals, who were comparing 
 the features of the hero with the face on the distant 
 mountain-side. 
 
 " 'T is the same face, to a hair ! " cried one man, 
 cutting a caper for joy. 
 
 " Wonderfully like, that 's a fact ! " responded an 
 other. 
 
 " Like ! why, I call it Old Blood-and-Thunder him 
 self 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 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
 
 THE GREAT STONE FACE. 39 
 
 more to interest our friend ; nor did he think of ques 
 tioning that now, at length, the mountain-visage had 
 found its human counterpart. It is true, Ernest had 
 imagined that this long-looked-for personage 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 that Providence should choose 
 its own method of blessing mankind, and could con 
 ceive that this great end might be effected even by a 
 warrior and a bloody sword, should inscrutable wis 
 dom see fit to order matters so. 
 
 " 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 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 droop 
 ing as if to shade his brow ! And there, too, visible 
 in the same glance, through the vista of the forest, 
 appeared the Great Stone Face ! And was there, in 
 deed, 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 en 
 ergy, and expressive of an iron will ; but the gentle 
 wisdom, the deep, broad, tender sympathies, were al 
 together 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.
 
 40 NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. 
 
 " This is not the man of prophecy," sighed Ernest 
 to himself, as he made his way out of the throng. 
 " And must the world wait longer yet ? " 
 
 The mists had congregated about the distant moun 
 tain-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 among the hills and 
 enrobing himself in a cloud-vesture of gold and pur 
 ple. 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 probably the effect of the western 
 sunshine, melting through the thinly diffused vapors 
 that had swept between him and the object that he 
 gazed at. But as it always did the aspect of his 
 marvellous friend made Ernest as hopeful as if he 
 had never hoped in vain. 
 
 " Fear not, Ernest," said his heart, even as if the 
 Great Face were whispering 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 people. Now, as here 
 tofore, 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 life to unworldly hopes for 
 some great good to mankind, that it seemed as though 
 he had been talking with the 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
 
 THE GREAT STONE FACE. 41 
 
 by that the world was not the better because this man, 
 humble as he was, had 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 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 sus 
 pected 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 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 physiognomy and the 
 benign visage on the mountain-side. But now, again, 
 there were reports and many paragraphs in the news 
 papers, affirming that the likeness of the Great Stone 
 Face had appeared upon the broad shoulders of a cer 
 tain eminent statesman. He, like Mr. Gathergold 
 and Old Blood-and-Thunder, was a native of the val 
 ley, 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 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 illu 
 minated fog with his mere breath, and obscure the
 
 42 NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. 
 
 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 man ; and 
 when his tongue had acquired him all other imagina 
 ble 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 per 
 suaded his countrymen to select him for the Presi 
 dency. Before this time, indeed, as soon as he be 
 gan 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 through 
 out the country this distinguished gentleman was 
 known by the name of Old Stony Phiz. The phrase 
 was considered as giving a highly favorable aspect to 
 his political prospects ; 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 President, Old Stony Phiz, as he was called, set 
 out on a visit to 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 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
 
 THE GREAT STONE FACE. 43 
 
 once disappointed, as we have seen, he had such a 
 hopeful and confiding nature, that he was always 
 ready to believe in whatever seemed beautiful and 
 good. He kept his heart continually 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 clattering of hoofs and a mighty cloud of dust, 
 which rose up so dense and high that the visage of 
 the mountain-side was completely hidden from Er 
 nest'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 ; 
 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 specta 
 cle, especially as there were numerous banners flaunt 
 ing over the cavalcade, on some of which were gor 
 geous portraits of the illustrious statesman and the 
 Great 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 
 marvellous. 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 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 it 
 self seemed to be swelling the triumphant chorus, in
 
 44 NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. 
 
 acknowledgment that, at length, the man of prophecy 
 was come. 
 
 All this while the people were throwing up their 
 nats and shouting, with enthusiasm so contagious that 
 the heart of Ernest kindled up, and he likewise 
 threw up his hat, and shouted, as loudly as the loud 
 est, " 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. " 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 raassive 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 countenance 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 depth 
 and loftiness, and all the other features, indeed, were 
 boldly and strongly hewn, as if in emulation of a more 
 than heroic, of a Titanic model. But the sublimity 
 and stateliness, the grand expression of a divine sym 
 pathy, that illuminated the mountain visage, and ethe- 
 realized its ponderous granite substance into spirit, 
 might here be sought in vain. Something had been 
 originally left out, or had departed. And therefore 
 the marvellously gifted statesman had always a weary 
 gloom in the deep caverns of his eyes, as of a child
 
 THE GREAT STONE FACE. 45 
 
 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. 
 
 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." 
 
 "Then so much the worse for the Great Stone 
 Face I " 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 disap 
 pointments, to behold a man who might have fulfilled 
 the prophecy, and had not willed to do so. Mean 
 time, the cavalcade, the banners, the music, the ba 
 rouches 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 gran 
 deur that it had worn for untold 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 
 ou one 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 mind ; 
 his wrinkles and furrows were inscriptions that Time 
 had graved, and in which he had written legends of
 
 46 NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. 
 
 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 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 husband 
 man had ideas unlike those of other men, not gained 
 from books, but of a higher tone, a tranquil and 
 familiar majesty, as if he had been talking with the 
 angels as his daily friends. Whether it were sage, 
 statesman, or philanthropist, Ernest received these 
 visitors with the gentle sincerity that had character 
 ized him from boyhood, and 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, 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 bountiful 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, how- 
 over, did the mountains which had been familiar to 
 him in his childhood lift their snowy peaks into the 
 clear atmosphere of his poetry. Neither was the 
 Great Stone Face forgotten, for the poet had cele-
 
 THE GREAT STONE FACE. 47 
 
 brated it in an ode which was grand enough to have 
 been uttered by its own majestic lips. The man of 
 genius, we may say, had come down from heaven with 
 wonderful 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 the deep immensity of its dread bosom 
 seemed to swell the higher, as if moved by the emo 
 tions of the song. Thus the world assumed another 
 and a 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. 
 Creation was not finished till the poet came to inter 
 pret, 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, 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 celes 
 tial birth that made them worthy of such kin. Some, 
 indeed, there were, who thought 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 un 
 doubtedly appear to have been spawned forth by Nature 
 with a contemptuous bitterness ; she having plastered 
 them up out of her refuse stuff, after all the swine were 
 made. As respects all things else, the poet's ideal was 
 the truest truth.
 
 48 NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. 
 
 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 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 benig- 
 nantly. 
 
 " O majestic friend," he murmured, addressing the 
 Great Stone Face, " is not this man worthy to resem 
 ble 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 med 
 itated much upon his character, until he deemed no 
 thing so desirable as to meet this 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 
 afternoon, alighted from the cars at no great distance 
 from Ernest's cottage. The great hotel, which had 
 formerly been the palace 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, holding 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 
 traveller a 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 GREAT STONE FACE. 49 
 
 The poet sat down on the bench beside him, and he 
 and Ernest 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 utter 
 ance of them. Angels, as had been so often said, 
 seemed to have wrought with him at his labor in the 
 fields ; angels seemed to have sat with him by the fire 
 side ; and, dwelling with angels as friend with friends, 
 he had imbibed the sublimity of their ideas, and im 
 bued it with the sweet and lowly charm of household 
 words. So thought the poet. And Ernest, on the 
 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 sym 
 pathies of these two men instructed them with a pro- 
 founder sense than either could have attained alone. 
 Their minds accorded into one strain, and made delight 
 ful 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, 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 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."
 
 50 NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. 
 
 Again, and still more earnestly than before, Ernest 
 examined the poet's features ; then turned towards the 
 Great Stone Face; then back, with an uncertain as 
 pect, to his guest. But his countenance fell; he 
 shook his head, and sighed. 
 
 " Wherefore are you sad ? " inquired the poet. 
 
 "Because," replied Ernest, "all through life I 
 have awaited the fulfilment of a prophecy ; and, when 
 I read 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 disappointed, as formerly with Mr. Gath- 
 ergold, and Old Blood-and-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 typi 
 fied by yonder benign and majestic image." 
 
 " 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 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 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 ? "
 
 THE GREAT STONE FACE. 51 
 
 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 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, 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 hu 
 man figure, with freedom for such gestures as sponta 
 neously accompany earnest thought and genuine emo 
 tion. Into this natural 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 cheerfulness with the solemnity of a grove 
 of ancient trees, beneath and 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 his heart and mind. His words hajd power, 
 because they accorded with his thoughts ; and his 
 thoughts had reality and depth, because they harmo 
 nized 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
 
 52 NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. 
 
 holy 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 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, ap 
 peared the Great Stone Face, with hoary mists around 
 it, 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 expression, so imbued with benevolence, 
 that the poet, 1 by an irresistible impulse, threw his 
 arms aloft, and shouted, 
 
 "Behold! Behold! Ernest is himself the like 
 ness 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 Ernest, having finished what he had 
 to say, took the poet's arm, and walked slowly home 
 ward, still hoping that some wiser and better man 
 than himself would by and by appear, bearing a re 
 semblance to the GREAT STONE FACE. 
 
 1 That the poet should have been the one to discover the re 
 semblance accords with the conception of the poet himself in 
 this little apologue. Poetic insight is still separable from integ 
 rity of character, and it was quite possible for this poet to see 
 the ideal beauty in another, while conscious of his own defect. 
 The humility of Ernest, as the last word of the story, completes 
 the certainty of the likeness.
 
 BROWNE'S WOODEN IMAGE. 53 
 
 III. 
 BROWNE'S WOODEN IMAGE. 
 
 [In his preface to The Marble Faun Hawthorne speaks 
 of the difficulty of reproducing American life in romance, 
 but in the story of Drowne's Wooden Image he has within 
 narrow limits achieved a more difficult task, that of transla 
 ting a Greek myth into the Yankee vernacular, without im 
 pairing the native flavor. In the course of the story he 
 laughingly refers to the myth of Pygmalion, the statuary of 
 Cyprus, who shunned the society of women, but became 
 so enamored of one of his own beautiful creations that he 
 besought Venus to give her life. The same theme, with a 
 wider and more subtle application, reappears in this little 
 story, and it is interesting to see how Hawthorne has avoided 
 the merely grotesque, and by the sincerity of the carver has 
 given dignity to the illusion. The personages of the story 
 appear in history. There was a Drowne, who was a carver, 
 and whose work, as Hawthorne reminds us, was to be seen 
 in Boston. He is known as Deacon Shem Drowne, and 
 died in 1774. From several allusions in the story, the 
 time may be made to be in King George II.'s reign, say 
 about 1760. The poet, William Morris, has told the story 
 of Pygmalion and the Image in The Earthly Paradise."} 
 
 ONE sunshiny morning, in the good old times of the 
 town of Boston, a young carver in wood, well known 
 by the name of Drowne, stood contemplating a large 
 oaken log, which it was his purpose to convert into 
 the figure-head of a vessel. And while he discussed 
 within his own mind what sort of shape or similitude 
 it were well to bestow upon this excellent piece of 
 timber, there came into Drowne's workshop a certain 
 Captain Hunnewell, owner and commander of the
 
 54 NA THANIEL HA WTHORNE. 
 
 good brig called the Cynosure, which had just returned 
 from her first voyage to Fayal. 
 
 " Ah ! that will do, Drowne, that will do ! " cried 
 the jolly captain, tapping the log with his rattan. " I 
 bespeak this very piece of oak for the figure-head of 
 the Cynosure. She has shown herself the sweetest 
 craft that ever floated, and I mean to decorate her 
 prow with the handsomest image that the skill of man 
 can cut out of timber. And, Drowne, you are the fel 
 low to execute it." 
 
 " You give me more credit than I deserve, Captain 
 Hun ne well," said the carver, modestly, yet as one con 
 scious of eminence in his art. " But, for the sake of 
 the good brig, I stand ready to do my best. And 
 which of these designs do you prefer ? Here," 
 pointing to a staring, half-length figure, in a white 
 wig and scarlet coat, " here is an excellent model, 
 the likeness of our gracious king. Here is the valiant 
 Admiral Vernon. 1 Or, if you prefer a female figure, 
 what say you to Britannia with the trident ? " 
 
 " All very fine, Drowne ; all very fine," answered 
 the mariner. " But as nothing like the brig ever 
 swam the ocean, so I am determined she shall have 
 such a figure-head as old Neptune never saw in his 
 life. And what is more, as there is a secret in the 
 matter, you must pledge your credit not to betray it." 
 
 "Certainly," said Drowne, marvelling, however, 
 
 1 Edward Vernon, 1684-1757, was a distinguished English 
 admiral. He saw a good deal of service in the West Indies, and 
 in 1739 took the town of Porto Bello ; and as the affair made 
 much noise and there was a brisk trade between Boston and the 
 West Indies, we may guess that Drowne found Admiral Vernon 
 a popular model for figure-heads. There was a tavern called 
 the Admiral Vernon on the lower corner of State Street and 
 Merchants' Row, Boston.
 
 DROWNE'S WOODEN IMAGE. 55 
 
 what possible mystery there could be in reference to 
 an affair so open, of necessity, to the inspection of all 
 the world as the figure-head of a vessel. " You may 
 depend, Captain, on my being as secret as the nature 
 of the case will permit." 
 
 Captain Hunnewell then took Drowne by the but 
 ton, and communicated his wishes in so low a tone 
 that it would be unmannerly to repeat what was evi 
 dently intended for the carver's private ear. We 
 shall, therefore, take the opportunity to give the reader 
 a few desirable particulars about Drowne himself. 
 
 He was the first American who is known to have 
 attempted in a very humble line, it is true that 
 art in which we can now reckon so many names al 
 ready distinguished, or rising to distinction. From 
 his earliest boyhood he had exhibited a knack, for 
 it would be too proud a word to call it genius, a 
 knack, therefore, for the imitation of the human figure 
 in whatever material came most readily to hand. The 
 snows of a New England winter had often supplied 
 him with a species of marble as dazzlingly white, at 
 least, as the Parian or the Carrara, and if less durable, 
 yet sufficiently so to correspond with any claims to 
 permanent existence possessed by the boy's frozen 
 statues. Yet they won admiration from maturer 
 judges than his school-fellows, and were, indeed, re 
 markably clever, though destitute of the native warmth 
 that might have made the snow melt beneath his hand. 
 As he advanced in life, the young man adopted pine 
 and oak as eligible materials for the display of his 
 skill, which now began to bring him a return of solid 
 silver as well as the empty praise tjhat had been an 
 apt reward enough for his productions of evanescent 
 snow. He became noted for carving ornamental
 
 56 NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. 
 
 pump-heads, and wooden urns for gate-posts, and dec 
 orations, more grotesque than fanciful, for mantel 
 pieces. No apothecary would have deemed himself 
 in the way of obtaining custom, without setting up a 
 gilded rno'rtar, if not a head of Galen or Hippocrates, 
 from the skilful hand of Drowne. 
 
 But the great scope of his business lay in the man= 
 ufacture of figure-heads for vessels. Whether it were 
 the monarch himself, or some famous British admiral 
 or general, or the governor of the province, or per 
 chance the favorite daughter of the ship owner, there 
 the image stood above the prow, decked out in gor 
 geous colors, magnificently gilded, and staring the 
 whole world out of countenance, as if from an innate 
 consciousness of its own superiority. These speci 
 mens of native sculpture had crossed the sea in all di 
 rections, and been not ignobly noticed among the 
 crowded shipping of the Thames, and wherever else 
 the hardy mariners of New England had pushed their 
 adventures. It must be confessed that a family like 
 ness pervaded these respectable progeny of Drowne's 
 skill ; that the benign countenance of the king resem 
 bled those of his subjects, and that Miss Peggy Ho- 
 bart, the merchant's daughter, bore a remarkable sim 
 ilitude to Britannia, Victory, and other ladies of the 
 allegoric sisterhood ; and, finally, that they all had a 
 kind of wooden aspect, which proved an intimate rela 
 tionship with the unshaped blocks of timber in the 
 carver's workshop. But at least there was no incon 
 siderable skill of hand, nor a deficiency of any attribute 
 to render them really works of art, except that deep 
 quality, be it of soul or intellect, which bestows life 
 upon the lifeless and warmth upon the cold, and 
 which, had it been present, would have made Drowne's 
 wooden image instinct with spirit.
 
 DROWNE'S WOODEN IMAGE. 57 
 
 The captain of the Cynosure had now finished his 
 instructions. 
 
 " And, Drowne," said he, impressively, " you must 
 lay aside all other business and set about this forth 
 with. And as to the price, only do the job in first- 
 rate style, and you shall settle that point yourself." 
 
 "Very well, Captain," answered the carver, who 
 looked grave and somewhat perplexed, yet had a sort 
 of smile upon his visage ; " depend upon it, I '11 do my 
 utmost to satisfy you." 
 
 From that moment the men of taste about Long 
 "Wharf and the Town Dock who were wont to show 
 their love for the arts by frequent visits to Drowne's 
 workshop, and admiration of his wooden images, be 
 gan to be sensible of a mystery in the carver's con 
 duct. Often he was absent in the daytime. Some 
 times, as might be judged by gleams of light from the 
 shop-windows, he was at work until a late hour of the 
 evening ; although neither knock nor voice, on such 
 occasions, could gain admittance for a visitor, or elicit 
 any word of response. Nothing remarkable, however, 
 was observed in the shop at those hours when it was 
 thrown open. A fine piece of timber, indeed, which 
 Drowne was known to have reserved for some work of 
 especial dignity, was seen to be gradually assuming 
 shape. What shape it was destined ultimately to 
 take was a problem to his friends and a point on 
 which the carver himself preserved a rigid silence. 
 But day after day, though Drowne was seldom noticed 
 in the act of working upon it, this rude form began to 
 be developed until it became evident to all observers 
 that a female figure was growing into mimic life. At 
 each new visit they beheld a larger pile of wooden 
 chips and a nearer approximation to something beau-
 
 58 NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. 
 
 tiful. It seemed as if the hamadryad of the oak had 
 sheltered herself from the unimaginative world within 
 the heart of her native tree ; and that it was only 
 necessary to remove the strange shapelessness that 
 had incrusted her, and reveal the grace and loveliness 
 of a divinity. Imperfect as the design, the attitude, 
 the costume, and especially the face of the image still 
 remained, there was already an effect that drew the 
 eye from the wooden cleverness of Drowne's earlier 
 productions and fixed it upon the tantalizing mystery 
 of this new project. 
 
 Copley, 1 the celebrated painter, then a young man 
 and a resident of Boston, came one day to visit 
 Drowne ; for he had recognized so much of moderate 
 ability in the carver as to induce him, in the dearth of 
 professional sympathy, to cultivate his acquaintance. 
 On entering the shop the artist glanced at the inflex 
 ible image of king, commander, dame, and allegory 
 that stood around, on the best of which might have 
 been bestowed the questionable praise that it looked 
 as if a living man had here been changed to wood, and 
 that not only the physical, but the intellectual and 
 spiritual part, partook of the stolid transformation. 
 But in not a single instance did it seem as if the 
 wood were imbibing f;he ethereal essence of humanity. 
 What a wide distinction is here ! and how far would 
 the slightest portion of the latter merit have outvalued 
 the utmost degree of the former ! 
 
 " My friend Drowne," said Copley, smiling to him 
 self, but alluding to the mechanical and wooden clev 
 erness that so invariably distinguished the images, 
 " you are really a remarkable person ! I have seldom 
 met with a man in your line of business that could do 
 1 John Singleton Copley was born in Boston in 1737.
 
 BROWNE'S WOODEN IMAGE. 59 
 
 so much ; for one other touch might make this figure 
 of General Wolfe, 1 for instance, a breathing and intel 
 ligent human creature." 
 
 " You would have me think that you are praising 
 me highly, Mr. Copley," answered Drowne, turning 
 his back upon Wolfe's image in apparent disgust. 
 " But there has come a light into my mind. I know, 
 what you know as well, that the one touch which you 
 speak of as deficient is the only one that would be 
 truly valuable, and that without it these works of 
 mine are no better than worthless abortions. There 
 is the same difference between them and the works of 
 an inspired artist as between a sign-post daub and one 
 of your best pictures." 
 
 " This is strange," cried Copley, looking him in the 
 face, which now, as the painter fancied, had a singular 
 depth of intelligence, though hitherto it had not given 
 him greatly the advantage over his own family of 
 wooden images. " What has come over you ? How 
 is it that, possessing the idea which you have now 
 uttered, you should produce only such works as 
 these?" 
 
 The carver smiled, but made no reply. Copley 
 turned again to the images, conceiving that the sense 
 of deficiency which Drowne had just expressed, and 
 which is so rare in a merely mechanical character, 
 must surely imply a genius, the tokens of which had 
 heretofore been overlooked. But no ; there was not a 
 trace of it. He was about to withdraw when his eyes 
 chanced to fall upon a half-developed figure which lay 
 in a corner of the workshop, surrounded by scattered 
 chips of oak. It arrested him at once. 
 
 1 General Wolfe, the hero of Quebec, was killed on the Plains 
 of Abraham, September 13, 1759.
 
 60 NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. 
 
 " What is here ? Who has done this ? " he broke 
 out, after contemplating it in speechless astonishment 
 for an instant. " Here is the divine, the life-giving 
 touch. What inspired hand is beckoning this wood 
 to arise and live ? Whose work is this ? " 
 
 " No man's work," replied Drowne. " The figure 
 lies within that block of oak, and it is my business to 
 find it." 
 
 " Drowne," said the true artist, grasping the carver 
 fervently by the hand, " you are a man of genius ! " 
 
 As Copley departed, happening to glance backward 
 from the threshold, he beheld Drowne bending over 
 the half-created shape, and stretching forth his arms 
 as if he would have embraced and drawn it to his 
 heart; while, had such a miracle been possible, his 
 countenance expressed passion enough to communicate 
 warmth and sensibility to the lifeless oak. 
 
 " Strange enough ! " said the artist to himself. 
 " Who would have looked for a modern Pygmalion in 
 the person of a Yankee mechanic ! " 
 
 As yet, the image was but vague in its outward pre 
 sentment ; so that, as in the cloud shapes around the 
 western sun, the observer rather felt or was led to 
 imagine, than really saw what was intended by it. 
 Day by day, however, the work assumed greater pre 
 cision, and settled its irregular and misty outline into 
 distincter grace and beauty. The general design was 
 now obvious to the common eye. It was a female fig 
 ure, in what appeared to be a foreign dress ; the gown 
 being laced over the bosom, and opening in front so as 
 to disclose a skirt or petticoat, the folds and inequali 
 ties of which were admirably represented in the oaken 
 substance. She wore a hat of singular gracefulness, 
 and abundantly laden with flowers, such as never grew
 
 DROWNE'S WOODEN IMAGE. 61 
 
 in the rude soil of New England, but which, with all 
 their fanciful luxuriance, had a natural truth that it 
 seemed impossible for the most fertile imagination to 
 have attained without copying from real prototypes. 
 There were several little appendages to this dress, such 
 as a fan, a pair of earrings, a chain about the neck, a 
 watch in the bosom, and a ring upon the finger, all of 
 which would have been deemed beneath the dignity of 
 sculpture. They were put on, however, with as much 
 taste as a lovely woman might have shown in her 
 attire, and could therefore have shocked none but a 
 judgment spoiled by artistic rules. 
 
 1 he face was still imperfect ; but gradually, by a 
 magic touch, intelligence and sensibility brightened 
 through the features, with all the effect of light gleam 
 ing forth from within the solid oak. The face became 
 alive. It was a beautiful, though not precisely reg 
 ular, and somewhat haughty aspect, but with a certain 
 piquancy about the eyes and mouth, which, of all ex 
 pressions, would have seemed the most impossible to 
 throw over a wooden countenance. And now, so far 
 as carving went, this wonderful production was com 
 plete. 
 
 " Drowne," said Copley, who had hardly missed a 
 single day in his visits to the carver's workshop, " if 
 this work were in marble it would make you famous at 
 once ; nay, I would almost affirm that it would make 
 an era in the art. It is as ideal as an antique statue, 
 and yet as real as any lovely woman whom one meets 
 at a fireside or in the street. But I trust you do not 
 mean to desecrate this exquisite creature with paint, 
 like those staring kings and admirals yonder? " 
 
 " Not paint her ! " exclaimed Captain Hunnewell, 
 who stood by; "not paint the figure-head of the
 
 62 NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. 
 
 Cynosure ! And what sort of a figure should I cut 
 in a foreign port with such an unpainted oaken stick 
 as this over my prow ! She must, and she shall, be 
 painted to the life, from the topmost flower in her hat 
 down to the silver spangles on her slippers." 
 
 " Mr. Copley," said Drowne, quietly, " I know no 
 thing of marble statuary, and nothing of the sculptor's 
 rules of art ; but of this wooden image, this work of 
 my hands, this creature of my heart," and here his 
 voice faltered and choked in a very singular manner, 
 " of this of her I may say that I know some 
 thing. A wellspring of inward wisdom gushed within 
 me as I wrought upon the oak with my whole strength, 
 and soul, and faith. Let others do what they may 
 with marble, and adopt what rules they choose. If I 
 can produce my desired effect by painted wood, those 
 rules are not for me, and I have a right to disregard 
 them." 
 
 " The very spirit of genius," muttered Copley to 
 himself. " How otherwise should this carver feel him 
 self entitled to transcend all rules, and make me 
 ashamed of quoting them ? " 
 
 He looked earnestly at Drowne, and again saw that 
 expression of human love which, in a spiritual sense, 
 as the artist could not help imagining, was the secret 
 of the life that had been breathed into this block of 
 wood. 
 
 The carver, still in the same secrecy that marked all 
 his operations upon this mysterious image, proceeded 
 to paint the habiliments in their proper colors, and 
 the countenance with nature's red and white. When 
 all was finished he threw open his workshop, and 
 admitted the towns-people to behold what he had done. 
 Most persons, at their first entrance, felt impelled to
 
 DROWNE'S WOODEN IMAGE. 63 
 
 remove their hats, and pay such reverence as was due 
 to the richly dressed and beautiful young lady who 
 seemed to stand in a corner of the room, with oaken 
 chips and shavings scattered at her feet. Then came 
 a sensation of fear ; as if, not being actually human, 
 yet so like humanity, she must therefore be something 
 preternatural. There was, in truth, an indefinable 
 air and expression that might reasonably induce the 
 query, Who and from what sphere this daughter of 
 the oak should be ? The strange, rich flowers of Eden 
 on her head ; the complexion, so much deeper and 
 more brilliant than those of our native beauties ; the 
 foreign, as it seemed, and fantastic garb, yet not too 
 fantastic to be worn decorously in the street ; the del 
 icately wrought embroidery of the skirt ; the broad 
 gold chain about her neck ; the curious ring upon her 
 finger ; the fan, so exquisitely sculptured in open 
 work, and painted to resemble pearl and ebony ; where 
 could Drowne, in his sober walk of life, have beheld 
 the vision here so matchlessly embodied ! And then 
 her face ! In the dark eyes and around the voluptuous 
 mouth there played a look made up of pride, coquetry, 
 and a gleam of mirthfulness, which impressed Copley 
 with the idea that the image was secretly enjoying the 
 perplexing admiration of himself and other beholders. 
 
 " And will you," said he to the carver, " permit this 
 masterpiece to become the figure-head of a vessel? 
 Give the honest captain yonder figure of Britannia, 
 it will answer his purpose far better, and send this 
 fairy queen to England, where, for aught I know, it 
 may bring you a thousand pounds." 
 
 " I have not wrought it for money," said Drowne. 
 
 " What sort of a fellow is this ! " thought Copley. 
 " A Yankee, and throw away the chance of making
 
 64 NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. 
 
 his fortune ! He has gone mad ; and thence has 
 come this gleam of genius." 
 
 There was still further proof of Drowne's lunacy, 
 if credit were due to the rumor that he had been seen 
 kneeling at the feet of the oaken lady, and gazing 
 with a lover's passionate ardor into the face that his 
 own hands had created. The bigots of the day hinted 
 that it would be no matter of surprise if an evil spirit 
 were allowed to enter this beautiful form and seduce 
 the carver to destruction. 
 
 The fame of the image spread far and wide. The 
 inhabitants visited it so universally that after a few 
 days of exhibition there was hardly an old man or a 
 child who had not become minutely familiar with its 
 aspect. Even had the story of Drowne's wooden image 
 ended here, its celebrity might have been prolonged 
 for many years by the reminiscences of those who 
 looked upon it in their childhood, and saw nothing 
 else so beautiful in after life. But the town was now 
 astounded by an event the narrative of which has 
 formed itself into one of the most singular legends 
 that are yet to be met with in the traditionary chim 
 ney-corners of the New England metropolis, where old 
 men and women sit dreaming of the past, and wag 
 their heads at the dreamers of the present and the 
 future. 
 
 One fine morning, just before the departure of the 
 Cynosure on her second voyage to Fayal, the com 
 mander of that gallant vessel was seen to issue from 
 his residence in Hanover Street. He was stylishly 
 dressed in a blue broadcloth coat, with gold-lace at 
 the seams and button-holes, an embroidered scarlet 
 waistcoat, a triangular hat, with a loop and broad 
 binding of gold, and wore a silver-hilted hanger at
 
 DROWNE'S WOODEN IMAGE. 65 
 
 his side. But the good captain might have been 
 arrayed in the robes of a prince or the rags of a beg 
 gar, without in either case attracting notice, while 
 obscured by such a companion as now leaned on his 
 arm. The people in the street started, rubbed their 
 eyes, and either leaped aside from their path, or stood 
 as if transfixed to wood or marble in astonishment. 
 
 " Do you see it ? do you see it ? " cried one, with 
 tremulous eagerness. " It is the very same ! " 
 
 " The same ? " answered another, who had arrived 
 in town only the night before. " Who do you mean ? 
 I see only a sea-captain in his shore-going clothes, and 
 a young lady in a foreign habit, with a bunch of beau 
 tiful flowers in her hat. On my word, she is as fair 
 and bright a damsel as my eyes have looked on this 
 many a day ! " 
 
 " Yes ; the same ! the very same ! " repeated the 
 other. " Drowne's wooden image has come to life ! " 
 
 Here was a miracle indeed ! Yet, illuminated by 
 the sunshine, or darkened by the alternate shade of 
 the houses, and with its garments fluttering lightly in 
 the morning breeze, there passed the image along the 
 street. It was exactly and minutely the shape, the 
 garb, and the face which the towns-people had so 
 recently thronged to see and admire. Not a rich 
 flower upon her head, not a single leaf but had had 
 its prototype in Drowne's wooden workmanship, al 
 though now their fragile grace had become flexible, 
 and was shaken by every footstep that the wearer 
 made. The broad gold chain upon the neck was iden 
 tical with the one represented on the image, and glis 
 tened with the motion imparted by the rise and fall 
 of the bosom which it decorated. A real diamond 
 sparkled on her finger. In her right hand she bore a
 
 66 NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. 
 
 pearl and ebony fan, which she flourished with a fan 
 tastic and bewitching coquetry that was likewise ex 
 pressed in all her movements as well as in the style of 
 her beauty and the attire that so well harmonized with 
 it. The face, with its brilliant depth of complexion, 
 had the same piquancy of mirthful mischief that was 
 fixed upon the countenance of the image, but which 
 was here varied and continually shifting, yet always 
 essentially the same, like the sunny gleam upon a bub 
 bling fountain. On the whole, there was something 
 so airy and yet so real in the figure, and withal so 
 perfectly did it represent Drowne's image, that peo 
 ple knew not whether to suppose the magic wood 
 etherealized into a spirit or warmed and softened into 
 an actual woman. 
 
 " One thing is certain," muttered a Puritan of the 
 old stamp, " Drowne has sold himself to the Devil ; 
 and doubtless this gay Captain Hunnewell is a party 
 to the bargain." 
 
 "And I," said a young man who overheard him, 
 " would almost consent to be the third victim, for the 
 liberty of saluting those lovely lips." 
 
 " And so would I," said Copley, the painter, " for 
 the privilege of taking her picture." 
 
 The image, or the apparition, whichever it might 
 be, still escorted by the bold captain, proceeded from 
 Hanover Street through some of the cross lanes that 
 make this portion of the town so intricate, to Ann 
 Street, thence into Dock Square, and so downward to 
 Drowne's shop, which stood just on the water's edge. 
 The crowd still followed, gathering volumes as it rolled 
 along. Never had a modern miracle occurred in such 
 broad daylight, nor in the presence of such a multi 
 tude of witnesses. The airy image, as if conscious
 
 DROWNE'S WOODEN IMAGE. 67 
 
 that she was the object of the murmurs and disturb 
 ance that swelled behind her, appeared slightly vexed 
 and flustered, yet still in a manner consistent with the 
 light vivacity and sportive mischief that were written 
 in her countenance. She was observed to flutter her 
 fan with such vehement rapidity that the elaborate 
 delicacy of its workmanship gave way, and it remained 
 broken in her hand. 
 
 Arriving at Drowne's door, while the captain threw 
 it open, the marvellous apparition paused an instant 
 on the threshold, assuming the very attitude of the 
 image, and casting over the crowd that glance of 
 sunny coquetry which all remembered on the face of the 
 oaken lady. She and her cavalier then disappeared. 
 
 " Ah ! " murmured the crowd, drawing a deep 
 breath, as with one vast pair of lungs. 
 
 "The world looks darker now that she has van 
 ished," said some of the young men. 
 
 But the aged, whose recollections dated as far back 
 as witch times, shook their heads, and hinted that our 
 forefathers would have thought it a pious deed to burn 
 the daughter of the oak with fire. 
 
 " If she be other than a bubble of the elements," 
 exclaimed Copley, " I must look upon her face again." 
 
 He accordingly entered the shop ; and there, in her 
 usual corner, stood the image, gazing at him, as it 
 might seem, with the very same expression of mirth 
 ful mischief that had been the farewell look of the 
 apparition when, but a moment before, she turned her 
 face towards the crowd. The carver stood beside his 
 creation, mending the beautiful fan, which by some 
 accident was broken in her hand. * But there was no 
 
 1 A slight touch to keep iii sight the mysterious affinity of lady 
 and image.
 
 68 NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. 
 
 longer any motion in the lifelike image, nor any real 
 woman in the workshop, nor even the witchcraft of a 
 sunny shadow, that might have deluded people's eyes 
 as it flitted along the street. Captain Hunnewell, too, 
 had vanished. His hoarse, sea-breezy tones, however, 
 were audible on the other side of a door that opened 
 upon the water. 
 
 " Sit down in the stern sheets, my lady," said the 
 gallant captain. " Come, bear a hand, you lubbers, 
 and set us on board in the turning of a minute-glass." 
 
 And then was heard the stroke of oars. 
 
 "Drowne," said Copley, with a smile of intelli 
 gence, " you have been a truly fortunate man. What 
 painter or statuary ever had such a subject ! No 
 wonder that she inspired a genius into you, and first 
 created the artist who afterwards created her image." 
 
 Drowne looked at him with a visage that bore the 
 traces of tears, but from which the light of imagina 
 tion and sensibility, so recently illuminating it, had 
 departed. He was again the mechanical carver that 
 he had been known to be all his lifetime. 
 
 " I hardly understand what you mean, Mr. Copley," 
 said he, putting his hand to his brow. " This image ! 
 Can it have been my work ? Well, I have wrought it 
 in a kind of dream ; and now that I am broad awake 
 I must set about finishing yonder figure of Admiral 
 Vernon." 
 
 And forthwith he employed himself on the stolid 
 countenance of one of his wooden progeny, and com 
 pleted it in his own mechanical style, from which he 
 was never known afterwards to deviate. He followed 
 his business industriously for many years, acquired a 
 competence, and in the latter part of his life attained 
 to a dignified station in the church, being remembered
 
 DROWNE' S WOODEN IMAGE. 69 
 
 in records and traditions as Deacon Drowne, the 
 carver. One of his productions, an Indian chief, 
 gilded all over, stood during the better part of a cen 
 tury on the cupola of the Province House, bedazzling 
 the eyes of those who looked upward, like an angel of 
 the sun. Another work of the good deacon's hand 
 a reduced likeness of his friend Captain Hunnewell, 
 holding a telescope and quadrant may be seen to 
 this day, at the corner of Broad and State Streets, 
 serving in the useful capacity of sign to the shop of a 
 nautical instrument maker. We know not how to ac 
 count for the inferiority of this quaint old figure as 
 compared with the recorded excellence of the Oaken 
 Lady, unless on the supposition that in every human 
 spirit there is imagination, sensibility, creative power, 
 genius, which, according to circumstances, may either 
 be developed in this world, or shrouded in a mask of 
 dulness until another state of being. To our friend 
 Drowne there came a brief season of excitement, kin 
 dled by love. It rendered him a genius for that one 
 occasion, but, quenched in disappointment, left him 
 again the mechanical carver in wood, without the power 
 even of appreciating the work that his own hands had 
 wrought. Yet, who can doubt that the very highest 
 state to which a human spirit can attain, in its loftiest 
 aspirations, is its truest and most natural state, and 
 that Drowne was more consistent with himself when 
 he wrought the admirable figure of the mysterious 
 lady, than when he perpetrated a whole progeny of 
 blockheads ? 
 
 There was a rumor in Boston, about this period, 
 that a young Portuguese lady of rank, on some occa 
 sion of political or domestic disquietude, had fled from 
 her home in Fayal and put herself under the protec-
 
 70 NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. 
 
 tion of Captain Hunnewell, on board of whose vessel, 
 and at whose residence, she was sheltered until a 
 change of affairs. This fair stranger must have been 
 the original of Drowne's Wooden Image. 
 
 IV. 
 HOWE'S MASQUERADE. 
 
 [THE second volume of Twice-Told Tales opens with 
 four Legends of the Province House, of which Howe's 
 Masquerade is the first. The introductory sketch of the 
 Province House is included in it. The story was first pub 
 lished in The United States Magazine and Democratic 
 Review, May, 1838, when the Province House was in the 
 state described in the sketch. Nothing remains of it now 
 hut a portion of the exterior walls, and it is almost com 
 pletely hemmed in by huildings. A history of the Province 
 House and of its occupants will be found in Drake's Old 
 Landmarks and Historic Personages of Boston. It would 
 be an excellent study to expand the historic allusions con 
 tained in the procession of governors. Hawthorne has 
 characterized these personages with great precision.] 
 
 ONE afternoon, last summer, while walking along 
 Washington street, my eye was attracted by a sign 
 board protruding over a narrow archway, nearly oppo 
 site the Old South Church. The sign represented the 
 front of a stately edifice, which was designated as the 
 " OLD PROVINCE HOUSE, kept by Thomas Waite." 
 I was glad to be thus reminded of a purpose, long 
 entertained, of visiting and rambling over the mansion
 
 HOWE'S MASQUERADE. 71 
 
 of the old royal governors of Massachusetts ; and en- 
 tering the arched passage, which penetrated through 
 the middle of a brick row of shops, a few steps trans 
 ported me from the busy heart of modern Boston into 
 a small and secluded court-yard. One side of this 
 space was occupied by the square front of the Pro 
 vince House, three stories high, and surmounted by a 
 cupola, on the top of which a gilded Indian was dis 
 cernible, with his bow bent and his arrow on the 
 string, as if aiming at the weathercock on the spire of 
 the Old South. The figure has kept this attitude for 
 seventy years or more, ever since good Deacon Drowne, 
 a cunning carver of wood, first stationed him on his 
 long sentinel's watch over the city. 
 
 The Province House is constructed of brick, which 
 seems recently to have been overlaid with a coat of 
 light-colored paint. A flight of red free-stone steps, 
 fenced in by a balustrade of curiously wrought iron, 
 ascends from the court-yard to the spacious porch, 
 over which is a balcony, with an iron balustrade of 
 similar pattern and workmanship to that beneath. 
 These letters and figures 16 P. S. 79 are wrought 
 into the iron-work of the balcony, and probably ex 
 press the date of the edifice, with the initials of its 
 founder's name. 1 A wide door with double leaves ad 
 mitted me into the hall or entry, on the right" of 
 which is the entrance to the bar-room. 
 
 It was in this apartment, I presume, that the an 
 cient governors held their levees, with vice-r^gal 
 pomp, surrounded by the military men, the council 
 lors, the judges, and other officers of the crown, 
 while all the loyalty of the province thronged to do 
 
 1 Peter Sargeant, a Boston merchant, who came from 
 in 1667, and was concerned in the overthrow of Audros.
 
 72 NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. 
 
 them honor. But the room, in its present condition, 
 cannot boast even of faded magnificence. The pan 
 elled wainscot is covered with dingy paint, and ac 
 quires a duskier hue from the deep shadow into which 
 the Province House is thrown by the brick block 
 that shuts it in from Washington Street. A ray of 
 sunshine never visits this apartment any more than 
 the glare of the festal torches which have been ex 
 tinguished from the era of the Revolution. The most 
 venerable and ornamental object is a chimney-piece 
 set round with Dutch tiles of blue-figured china, rep 
 resenting scenes from Scripture; and, for aught I 
 know, the lady of Pownall or Bernard may have sat 
 beside this fireplace, and told her children the story 
 of each blue tile. A bar in modern style, well re 
 plenished with decanters, bottles, cigar-boxes, and net 
 work bags of lemons, and provided with a beer-pump 
 and a soda-fount, extends along one side of the room. 
 At my entrance, an elderly person was smacking his 
 lips, with a zest which satisfied me that the cellars of 
 the Province House still hold good liquor, though 
 donbtless of other vintages than were quaffed by the 
 old governors. After sipping a glass of port sangaree, 
 prepared by the skilful hands of Mr. Thomas Waite, 
 I besought that worthy successor and representative of 
 so many historic personages to conduct me over their 
 time-honored mansion. 
 
 He readily complied ; but, to confess the truth, I 
 was forced to draw strenuously upon my imagination, 
 in order to find aught that was interesting in a house 
 which, without its historic associations, would have 
 seemed merely such a tavern as is usually favored by 
 the custom of decent city boarders and old-fashioned 
 country gentlemen. The chambers, which were prob
 
 HOWE'S MASQUERADE. 73 
 
 ably spacious in former times, are now cut up by 
 partitions, and subdivided into little nooks, each af 
 fording scanty room for the narrow bed and chair and 
 dressing-table of a single lodger. The great staircase, 
 however, may be termed, without much hyperbole, 
 a feature of grandeur and magnificence. It winds 
 through the midst of the house by flights of broad 
 steps, each flight terminating in a square landing- 
 place, whence the ascent is continued towards the 
 cupola. A carved balustrade, freshly painted in the 
 lower stories, but growing dingier as we ascend, bor 
 ders the staircase with its quaintly twisted and inter 
 twined pillars, from top to bottom. Up these stairs 
 the military boots, or perchance the gouty shoes, of 
 many a governor have trodden, as the wearers mounted 
 to the cupola, which afforded them so wide a view over 
 their metropolis and the surrounding country. The 
 cupola is an octagon, with several windows, and a 
 door opening upon the roof. From this station, as I 
 pleased myself with imagining, Gage may have beheld 
 his disastrous victory on Bunker Hill (unless one 
 of the tri-moun tains intervened), and Howe have 
 marked the approaches of Washington's besieging 
 army ; although the buildings, since erected in the 
 vicinity, have shut out almost every object, save the 
 steeple of the Old South, which seems almost within 
 arm's length. Descending from the cupola, I paused 
 in the garret to observe the ponderous white-oak 
 framework, so much more massive than the frames of 
 modern houses, and thereby resembling an antique 
 skeleton. The brick walls, the materials of which 
 were imported from Holland, and the timbers of the 
 mansion, are still as sound as ever ; but the floors and 
 other interior parts being greatly decayed, it is con-
 
 74 NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. 
 
 templated to gut the whole, and build a new house 
 within the ancient frame and brick-work. Among 
 other inconveniences of the present edifice, mine host 
 mentioned that any jar or motion was apt to shake 
 down the dust of ages out of the ceiling of one cham 
 ber upon the floor of that beneath it. 
 
 We stepped forth from the great front window 
 into the balcony, where, in old times, it was doubt 
 less the custom of the king's representative to show 
 himself to a loyal populace, requiting their huzzas 
 and tossed-up hats with stately bendings of his dig 
 nified person. In those days, the front of the Pro 
 vince House looked upon the street ; and the whole 
 site now occupied by the brick range of stores, as 
 well as the present court-yard, was laid out in grass- 
 plats, overshadowed by trees and bordered by a 
 wrought-iron fence. Now, the old aristocratic edifice 
 hides its time-worn visage behind an upstart modern 
 building ; at one of the back windows I observed some 
 pretty tailoresses, sewing, and chatting, and laugh" 
 ing, with now and then a careless glance towards 
 the balcony. Descending thence, we again entered 
 the bar-room, where the elderly gentleman above 
 mentioned, the smack of whose lips had spoken so 
 favorably for Mr. Waite's good liquor, was still 
 lounging in his chair. He seemed to be, if not a 
 lodger, at least a familar visitor of the house, who 
 might be supposed to have his regular score at the 
 bar, his summer seat at the open window, and his 
 prescriptive corner at the winter's fireside. Being of 
 a sociable aspect, I ventured to address him with a 
 remark, calculated to draw forth his historical remi 
 niscences, if any such were in his mind ; and it grati 
 fied me to discover, that, between memory and tradi-
 
 HOWE'S MASQUERADE. 75 
 
 tion, the old gentleman was really possessed of some 
 very pleasant gossip about the Province House. The 
 portion of his talk which chiefly interested me was the 
 outline of the following legend. He professed to have 
 received it at one or two removes from an eye-wit 
 ness ; but this derivation, together with the lapse 
 of time, must have afforded opportunities for many 
 variations of the narrative ; so that, despairing of lit 
 eral and absolute truth, I have not scrupled to make 
 such further changes as seemed conducive to the read 
 er's profit and delight. 
 
 At one of the entertainments given at the Province 
 House, during the latter part of the siege of Boston, 
 there passed a scene which has never yet been satis 
 factorily explained. The officers of the British army, 
 and the loyal gentry of the province, most of whom 
 were collected within the beleaguered town, had been 
 invited to a masked ball ; for it was the policy of Sir 
 William Howe to hide the distress and danger of the 
 period, and the desperate aspect of the siege, under an 
 ostentation of festivity. The spectacle of this even 
 ing, if the oldest members of the provincial court 
 circle might be believed, was the most gay and gor 
 geous affair that had occurred in the annals of the 
 government. The brilliantly lighted apartments were 
 thronged with figures that seemed to have stepped 
 from the dark canvas of historic portraits, or to have 
 flitted forth from the magic pages of romance, or at 
 least to have flown hither from one of the London 
 theatres, without a change of garments. Steeled 
 knights of the Conquest, bearded statesmen of Queen 
 Elizabeth, and high-ruffled ladies of her court, were 
 mingled with characters of comedy, such as a party- 
 colored Merry Andrew, jingling his cap and bells ; a
 
 76 NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. 
 
 Falstaff, almost as provocative of laughter as his pro 
 totype ; and a Don Quixote, with a bean-pole for a 
 lance and a potlid for a shield. 
 
 But the broadest merriment was excited by a group 
 of figures ridiculously dressed in old regimentals, 
 which seemed to have been purchased at a military 
 rag-fair, or pilfered from some receptacle of the cast- 
 off clothes of both the French and British armies. Por 
 tions of their attire had probably been worn at the 
 siege of Louisburg, and the coats of most recent cut 
 might have been rent and tattered by sword, ball, or 
 bayonet, as long ago as Wolfe's victory. One of these 
 worthies a tall, lank figure, brandishing a rusty 
 sword of immense longitude, purported to be no less 
 a personage than General George Washington ; and 
 the other principal officers of the American army, 
 such as Gates, Lee, Putnam, Schuyler, Ward, and 
 Heath, were represented by similar scarecrows. An 
 interview in the mock-heroic style, between the rebel 
 warriors and the British Commander-in-chief, was re 
 ceived with immense applause, which came loudest 
 of all from the loyalists of the colony. There was one 
 of the guests, however, who stood apart, eying these 
 antics sternly and scornfully, at once with a frown and 
 a bitter smile. 
 
 It was an old man, formerly of high station and 
 great repute in the province, and who had been a very 
 famous soldier in his day. Some surprise had been 
 expressed, that a person of Colonel Joliffe's known 
 whig principles, though now too old to take an active 
 part in the contest, should have remained in Boston 
 during the siege, and especially that he should consent 
 to show himself in the mansion of Sir William Howe. 
 But thither he had come, with a fair granddaughter
 
 HOWE'S MASQUERADE. 11 
 
 under his arm ; and there, amid all the mirth and buf 
 foonery, stood this stern old figure, the best sustained 
 character in the masquerade, because so well represent 
 ing the antique spirit of his native land. The other 
 guests affirmed that Colonel Joliffe's black puritanical 
 scowl threw a shadow round about him ; although in 
 spite of his sombre influence, their gayety continued to 
 blaze higher, like (an ominous comparison) the flick 
 ering brilliancy of a lamp which has but a little while 
 to burn. Eleven strokes, full half an hour ago, had 
 pealed from the clock of the Old South, when a rumor 
 was circulated among the company that some new 
 spectacle or pageant was about to be exhibited, which 
 should put a fitting close to the splendid festivities of 
 the night. 
 
 "What new jest has your Excellency in hand?" 
 asked the Rev. Mather Byles, whose Presbyterian 
 scruples had not kept him from the entertainment. 
 " Trust me, sir, I have already laughed more than be 
 seems my cloth, at your Homeric confabulation with 
 yonder ragamuffin general of the rebels. One other 
 such fit of merriment, and I must throw off my cler 
 ical wig and band." 
 
 " Not so, good Dr. Byles," answered Sir William 
 Howe ; " if mirth were a crime, you had never gained 
 your doctorate in divinity. As to this new foolery, I 
 know no more about it than yourself ; perhaps not so 
 much. Honestly now, Doctor, have you not stirred 
 up the sober brains of some of your countrymen to 
 enact a scene in our masquerade ? " 
 
 "Perhaps," slyly remarked the granddaughter of 
 Colonel Joliffe, whose high spirit had been stung by 
 many taunts against New England, "perhaps we are 
 to have a mask of allegorical figures. Victory, with
 
 78 NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. 
 
 trophies from Lexington and Bunker Hill, Plenty, 
 with her overflowing horn, to typify the present abun 
 dance in this good town, and Glory, with a wreath 
 for his Excellency's brow." 
 
 Sir William Howe smiled at words which he would 
 have answered with one of his darkest frowns, had 
 they been uttered by lips that wore a beard. He was 
 spared the necessity of a retort, by a singular inter 
 ruption. A sound of music was heard without the 
 house, as if proceeding from a full band of military 
 instruments stationed in the street, playing, not such 
 a festal strain as was suited to the occasion, but a slow 
 funeral march. The drums appeared to be muffled, 
 and the trumpets poured forth a wailing breath, 
 which at once hushed the merriment of the auditors, 
 filling all with wonder and some with apprehension. 
 The idea occurred to many, that either the funeral 
 procession of some great personage had halted in front 
 of the Province House, or that a corpse, in a velvet- 
 covered and gorgeously decorated coffin, was about to 
 be borne from the portal. After listening a moment, 
 Sir William Howe called, in a stern voice, to the 
 leader of the musicians, who had hitherto enlivened 
 the entertainment with gay and lightsome melodies. 
 The man was drum-major to one of the British regi 
 ments. 
 
 " Dighton," demanded the general, " what means 
 this foolery ? Bid your band silence that dead march ; 
 or, by my word, they shall have sufficient cause for 
 their lugubrious strains ! Silence it, sirrah." 
 
 " Please your Honor," answered the drum-major, 
 whose rubicund visage had lost all its color, " the fault 
 is none of mine. I and my band are all here together ; 
 and I question whether there be a man of us that
 
 HOWE'S MASQUERADE. 79 
 
 could play that march without book. I never heard 
 it but once before, and that was at the funeral of his 
 late Majesty, King George the Second." 
 
 " Well, well ! " said Sir William Howe, recovering 
 his composure ; " it is the prelude to some masquerad 
 ing antic. Let it pass." 
 
 A figure now presented itself, but among the many 
 fantastic masks that were dispersed through the apart 
 ments, none could tell precisely from whence it came. 
 It was a man in an old-fashioned dress of black serge, 
 and having the aspect of a steward, or principal do 
 mestic in the household of a nobleman, or great Eng 
 lish landholder. This figure advanced to the outer 
 door of the mansion, and throwing both its leaves wide 
 open, withdrew a little to one side and looked back 
 towards the grand staircase, as if expecting some per 
 son to descend. At the same time the music in the 
 street sounded a loud and doleful summons. The 
 eyes of Sir William Howe and his guests being di 
 rected to the staircase, there appeared, on the upper 
 most landing-place that was discernible from the bot 
 tom, several personages descending towards the door. 
 The foremost was a man of stern visage, wearing a 
 steeple-crowned hat and a skullcap beneath it ; a dark 
 cloak, and huge wrinkled boots that came half-way up 
 his legs. Under his arm was a rolled up banner, 
 which seemed to be the banner of England, but 
 strangely rent and torn ; he had a sword in his right 
 hand, and grasped a Bible in his left. The next figure 
 was of milder aspect, yet full of dignity, wearing a 
 broad ruff, over which descended a beard, a gown of 
 wrought velvet, and a doublet and hose of black satin. 
 He carried a roll of manuscript in his hand. Close 
 behind these two came a young man of very striking
 
 80 NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. 
 
 countenance and demeanor, with deep thought and 
 contemplation on his brow, and perhaps a flash of en 
 thusiasm in his eye. His garb, like that of his prede 
 cessors, was of an antique fashion, and there was a stain 
 of blood upon his ruff. In the same group with these 
 were three or four others, all men of dignity and evi 
 dent command, and bearing themselves like person 
 ages who were accustomed to the gaze of the multi 
 tude. It was the idea of the beholders, that these fig 
 ures went to join the mysterious funeral that had 
 halted in front of the Province House ; yet that sup 
 position seemed to be contradicted by the air of tri 
 umph with which they waved their hands, as they 
 crossed the threshold and vanished through the portal. 
 
 " In the Devil's name, what is this ? " muttered Sir 
 William Howe to a gentleman beside him ; " a pro 
 cession of the regicide judges of King Charles the 
 martyr ? " 
 
 " These," said Colonel Joliffe, breaking the silence 
 almost for the first time that evening, " these, if I 
 interpret them aright, are the Puritan governors 
 the rulers of the old, original democracy of Massachu 
 setts. Endicott, with the banner from which he had 
 torn the symbol of subjection, 1 and Winthrop, and 
 Sir Henry Vane, and Dudley, Haynes, Bellinghain, 
 and Leverett." 
 
 " Why had that young man a stain of blood upon 
 his ruff ? " asked Miss Joliffe. 
 
 " Because, in after years," answered her grand, 
 father, " he laid down the wisest head in England 
 upon the block, for the principles of liberty." 
 
 " Will not your Excellency order out the guard ? " 
 
 1 See Hawthorne's own story of The Red Cross in Grand 
 father's Chair.
 
 HOWE'S MASQUERADE. 81 
 
 whispered Lord Percy, who, with other British offi 
 cers, had now assembled round the general. " There 
 may be a plot under this mummery." 
 
 " Tush ! we have nothing to fear," carelessly replied 
 Sir William Howe. " There can be no worse treason 
 in the matter than a jest, and that somewhat of the 
 dullest. Even were it a sharp and bitter one, our best 
 policy would be to laugh it off. See, here come more 
 of these gentry." 
 
 Another group of characters had now partly de 
 scended the staircase. The first was a venerable and 
 white-bearded patriarch, who cautiously felt his way 
 downward with a staff. Treading hastily behind him, 
 and stretching forth his gauntleted hand as if to grasp 
 the old man's shoulder, came a tall, soldier-like figure, 
 equipped with a plumed cap of steel, a bright breast 
 plate, and a long sword, which rattled against the 
 stairs. Next was seen a stout man, dressed in rich 
 and courtly attire, but not of courtly demeanor ; his 
 gait had the swinging motion of a seaman's walk ; and 
 chancing to stumble on the staircase, he suddenly grew 
 wrathful, and was heard to mutter an oath. He was 
 followed by a noble-looking personage in a curled wig, 
 such as are represented in the portraits of Queen 
 Anne's time and earlier ; and the breast of his coat 
 was decorated with an embroidered star. While ad 
 vancing to the door; he bowed to the right hand and 
 to the left, in a very gracious and insinuating style ; 
 but as he crossed the threshold, unlike the early Puri 
 tan governors, he seemed to wring his hands with sor 
 row. 
 
 "Prithee, play the part of a chorus, good Dr. 
 Byles," said Sir William Howe. " What worthies 
 are these ? "
 
 82 NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. 
 
 " If it please your Excellency, they lived somewhat 
 before ray day," answered the Doctor ; " but doubtless 
 our friend, the Colonel, has been hand in glove with 
 them." 
 
 "Their living faces I never looked upon," said 
 Colonel Joliffe, gravely ; " although I have spoken 
 face to face with many rulers of this land, and shall 
 greet yet another with an old man's blessing, ere I die. 
 But we talk of these figures. I take the venerable 
 patriarch to be Bradstreet, the last of the Puritans, 
 who was governor at ninety, or thereabouts. The 
 next is Sir Edmund Andros, a tyrant, as any New 
 England school-boy will tell you; and therefore the 
 people cast him down from his high seat into a 
 dungeon. Then comes Sir William Phipps, shep 
 herd, cooper, sea-captain, and governor : may many 
 of his countrymen rise as high, from as low an origin ! 
 Lastly, you saw the gracious Earl of Bellamont, who 
 ruled us under King William." 
 
 " But what is the meaning of it all ? " asked Lord 
 Percy. 
 
 "Now, were I a rebel," said Miss Joliffe, half 
 aloud, "I might fancy that the ghosts of these ancient 
 governors had been summoned to form the funeral 
 procession of royal authority in New England." 
 
 Several other figures were now seen at the turn of 
 the staircase. The one in advance had a thoughtful, 
 anxious, and somewhat crafty expression of face ; and 
 in spite of his loftiness of manner, which was evi 
 dently the result both of an ambitious spirit and of 
 long continuance in high stations, he seemed not in 
 capable of cringing to a greater than himself. A few 
 steps behind came an officer in a scarlet and embroid 
 ered uniform, cut in a fashion old enough to have
 
 HOWE'S MASQUERADE. 83 
 
 been worn by the Duke of Marlborough. His nose 
 had a rubicund tinge, which, together with the twinkle 
 of his eye, might have marked him as a lover of the 
 wine-cup and good-fellowship ; notwithstanding which 
 tokens, he appeared ill at ease, and often glanced 
 around hitn, as if apprehensive of some secret mischief. 
 Next came a portly gentleman, wearing a coat of 
 shaggy cloth, lined with silken velvet ; he had sense, 
 shrewdness, and humor in his, face, and a folio vol 
 ume under his arm ; but his aspect was that of a man 
 vexed and tormented beyond all patience and harassed 
 almost to death. He went hastily down, and was fol 
 lowed by a dignified person, dressed in a purple velvet 
 suit, with very rich embroidery ; his demeanor would 
 have possessed much stateliness, only that a grievous 
 fit of the gout compelled him to hobble from stair to 
 stair, with contortions of face and body. When Dr. 
 Byles beheld this figure on the staircase, he shivered 
 as with an ague, but continued to watch him stead 
 fastly, until the gouty gentleman had reached the 
 threshold, made a gesture of anguish and despair, and 
 vanished into the outer gloom, whither the funeral 
 music summoned him. 
 
 *' Governor Belcher ! my old patron ! in his 
 very shape and dress ! " gasped Dr. Byles. " This is 
 an awful mockery ! " 
 
 "A tedious foolery, rather," said Sir William Howe, 
 with an air of indifference. " But who were the three 
 that preceded him ? " 
 
 " Governor Dudley, a cunning politician, yet his 
 craft once brought him to a prison," replied Colonel 
 Joliffe ; " Governor Shute, formerly a colonel under 
 Marlborough, and whom the people frightened out of 
 the province ; and learned Governor Burnet, whom 
 the Legislature tormented into a mortal fever."
 
 84 NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. 
 
 "Methinks they were miserable men, these royal 
 governors of Massachusetts," observed Miss Joliffe. 
 " Heavens, how dim the light grows ! " 
 
 It was certainly a fact that the large lamp which il 
 luminated the staircase now burned dim and duskily : 
 so that several figures, which passed hastily down the 
 stairs and went forth from the porch, appeared rather 
 like shadows than persons of fleshly substance. Sir 
 "William Howe and his guests stood at the doors of 
 the contiguous apartments, watching the progress of 
 this singular pageant, with various emotions of anger, 
 contempt, or half-acknowledged fear, but still with an 
 anxious curiosity. The shapes, which now seemed 
 hastening to join the mysterious procession, were rec 
 ognized rather by striking peculiarities of dress, or 
 broad characteristics of manner, than by any percepti 
 ble resemblance of features to their prototypes. Their 
 faces, indeed, were invariably kept in deep shadow. 
 But Dr. Byles, and other gentlemen who had long 
 been familiar with the successive rulers of the prov 
 ince, were heard to whisper the name of Shirley, of 
 Pownall, of Sir Francis Bernard, and of the well- 
 remembered Hutchinson ; thereby confessing that the 
 actors, whoever they might be, in this spectral march 
 of governors, had succeeded in putting on some distant 
 portraiture of the real personages. As they vanished 
 from the door, still did these shadows toss their arms 
 into the gloom of night, with a dread expression of 
 woe. Following the mimic representative of Hutchin 
 son came a military figure, holding before his face the 
 cocked hat which he had taken from his powdered 
 head ; but his epaulets and other insignia of rank 
 were those of a general officer ; and something in his 
 mien reminded the beholder of one who had recently
 
 HOWE'S MASQUERADE. 85 
 
 been master of the Province House, and chief of all 
 the land. 
 
 " The shape of Gage, as true as in a looking-glass ! " 
 exclaimed Lord Percy, turning pale. 
 
 " No, surely," cried Miss Joliffe, laughing hysteri 
 cally ; " it could not be Gage, or Sir William would 
 have greeted his old comrade in arms ! Perhaps he 
 will not suffer the next to pass unchallenged." 
 
 "Of that be assured, young lady," answered Sir 
 William Howe, fixing his eyes, with a very marked 
 expression, upon the immovable visage of her grand 
 father. " I have long enough delayed to pay the cere 
 monies of a host to these departing guests. The next 
 that takes his leave shall receive due courtesy." 
 
 A wild and dreary burst of music came through the 
 open door. It seemed as if the procession, which had 
 been gradually filling up its ranks, were now about to 
 move, and this loud peal of the wailing trumpets, and 
 roll of the muffled drums, were a call to some loiterer 
 to make haste. Many eyes, by an irresistible impulse, 
 were turned upon Sir William Howe, as if it were he 
 whom the dreary music summoned to the funeral of 
 departed power. 
 
 " See ! here comes the last ! " whispered Miss 
 Joliffe, pointing her tremulous finger to the staircase. 
 
 A figure had come into view as if descending the 
 stairs ; although so dusky was the region whence it 
 emerged, some of the spectators fancied that they had 
 seen this human shape suddenly moulding itself amid 
 the gloom. Downward the figure came, with a stately 
 and martial tread, and reaching the lowest stair was 
 observed to be a tall man, booted and wrapped in a 
 military cloak, which was drawn up around the face so 
 as to meet the flapped brim of a laced hat. The fea-
 
 86 NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. 
 
 tures, therefore, were completely hidden. But the 
 British officers deemed that they had seen that mili 
 tary cloak before, and even recognized the frayed em 
 broidery on the collar, as well as the gilded scabbard 
 of a sword which protruded from the folds of the 
 cloak, and glittered in a vivid gleam of light. Apart 
 from these trifling particulars, there were characteris 
 tics of gait and bearing which impelled the wondering 
 guests to glance from the shrouded figure to Sir Wil 
 liam Howe, as if to satisfy themselves that their host 
 had not suddenly vanished from the midst of them. 
 
 With a dark flush of wrath upon his brow, they saw 
 the general draw his sword and advance to meet the 
 figure in the cloak before the latter had stepped one 
 pace upon the floor. 
 
 *' Villain, unmuffle yourself ! " cried he. " You 
 pass no farther ! " 
 
 The figure, without blenching a hair's-breath from 
 the sword which was pointed at his breast, made a 
 solemn pause and lowered the cape of the cloak from 
 about his face, yet not sufficiently for the spectators 
 to catch a glimpse of it. But Sir William Howe had 
 evidently seen enough. The sternness of his counte 
 nance gave place to a look of wild amazement, if not 
 horror, while he recoiled several steps from the figure, 
 and let fall his sword upon the floor. The martial 
 shape again drew the cloak about his features and 
 passed on ; but reaching the threshold, with his back 
 towards the spectators, he was seen to stamp his foot 
 and shake his clinched hands ir the air. It was after 
 wards affirmed that Sir William Howe had repeated 
 that self-same gesture of rage and sorrow, when, for 
 the last time, and as the last royal governor, he passed 
 through the portal of the Province House.
 
 HOWE'S MASQUERADE. 87 
 
 " Hark! the procession moves," said Miss Joliffe. 
 
 The music was dying away along the street, and its 
 dismal strains were mingled with the knell of midnight 
 from the steeple of the Old South, and with the roar 
 of artillery, which announced that the beleaguering 
 army of Washington had intrenched itself upon a 
 nearer height than before. As the deep boom of the 
 cannon smote upon his ear, Colonel Joliffe raised him 
 self to the full height of his aged form, and smiled 
 sternly on the British general. 
 
 " Would your Excellency inquire further into the 
 mystery of the pageant ? " said he. 
 
 "Take care of your gray head ! " cried Sir William 
 Howe, fiercely, though with a quivering lip. " It has 
 stood too long on a traitor's shoulders ! " 
 
 " You must make haste to chop it off, then," calmly 
 replied the Colonel ; " for a few hours longer, and not 
 all the power of Sir William Howe, nor of his master, 
 shall cause one of these gray hairs to fall. The em 
 pire of Britain, in this ancient province, is at its last 
 gasp to-night ; almost while I speak it is a dead 
 corpse ; and methinks the shadows of the old gover 
 nors are fit mourners at its funeral ! " 
 
 With these words Colonel Joliffe threw on his cloak, 
 and drawing his granddaughter's arm within his own, 
 retired from the last festival that a British ruler ever 
 held in the old province of Massachusetts Bay. It 
 was supposed that the Colonel and the young lady 
 possessed some secret intelligence in regard to the 
 mysterious pageant of that night. However this 
 might be, such knowledge has never become general. 
 The actors in the scene have vanished into deeper ob 
 scurity than even that wild Indian band who scattered 
 the cargoes of the tea-ships on the waves, and gained a
 
 88 NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. 
 
 place in history, yet left no names. But superstition, 
 among other legends of this mansion, repeats the 
 wondrous tale, that on the anniversary night of Brit 
 ain's discomfiture, the ghosts of the ancient governors 
 of Massachusetts still glide through the portal of the 
 Province House. And, last of all, comes a figure 
 shrouded in a military cloak, tossing his clinched hands 
 into the air, and stamping his iron-shod boots upon the 
 broad freestone steps with a semblance of feverish 
 despair, but without the sound of a foot-tramp.
 
 WASHINGTON IRVING. 
 
 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 IRVING may be named as the first author in the United 
 States whose writings made a place for themselves in gen 
 eral literature. Franklin, indeed, had preceded him with 
 his autobiography, but Franklin belongs rather to the colo 
 nial period. It was under the influences of that time that 
 his mind and taste were formed, and there was a marked 
 difference between the Boston and Philadelphia of Frank 
 lin's youth and the New York of Irving's time. Politics, 
 commerce, and the rise of industries were rapidly changing 
 social relations and manners, while the country was still 
 dependent on England for its higher literature. It had 
 hardly begun to find materials for literature in its own past 
 or in its aspects of nature, yet there was a very positive ele 
 ment in life which resented foreign interference. There 
 were thus two currents crossing each other : the common life 
 which was narrowly American, and the cultivated taste 
 which was English, or imitative of England. Irving's first 
 ventures, in company with his brothers and Paulding, were 
 in the attempt to represent New York in literature upon the 
 model of contemporary or recent presentations of London. 
 "The town" in the minds of these young writers was that 
 portion of New York society which might be construed into 
 a miniature reflection of London wit and amusement. His 
 associates never advanced beyond this stage, but with Wash 
 ington Irving the sketches which he wrote under the signa-
 
 90 WASHINGTON IRVING. 
 
 ture of Jonathan Old Style and in the medley of Sal 
 magundi were only the first experiments of a mind capa 
 ble of larger things. After five or six years of trifling 
 with his pen, he wrote and published, in 1809, A History 
 of New York, by Diedrich Knickerbocker, which he be 
 gan in company with his brother Peter as a mere jeu d'es- 
 prit, but turned into a more determined work of humor, as 
 the capabilities of the subject disclosed themselves. Grave 
 historians had paid little attention to the record of New 
 York under the Dutch ; Irving, who saw the humorous 
 contrast between the traditional Dutch society of his day 
 and the pushing new democracy, seized upon the early 
 history and made it the occasion for a good-natured bur 
 lesque. He shocked the old families about him, but he 
 amused everybody else, and the book, going to England, 
 made his name at once known to those who had the making 
 there of literary reputations. 
 
 Irving himself was born of a Scottish father and English 
 mother, who had come to this country only twenty years 
 before. He was but little removed, therefore, from the tra 
 ditions of Great Britain, and his brothers and he carried on a 
 trading business with the old country. His own tastes werr 
 not mercantile, and he was only silent partner in the house ; 
 he wrote occasionally and was for a time the editor of a mag 
 azine, but his pleasure was chiefly in travel, good literature, 
 and good society. It was while he was in England, in 1818, 
 that the house in which he was a partner failed, and he was 
 thrown on his own resources. Necessity gave the slight spur 
 which was wanting to his inclination, and he began with 
 deliberation the career of an author. He had found himself 
 at home in England. His family origin and his taste for 
 the best literature had made him English in his sympathies 
 and tastes, and his residence and travels there, the society 
 which he entered and the friends he made, confirmed him in 
 English habits. Nevertheless he was sturdily American in 
 his principles ; he was strongly attached to New York and
 
 INTRODUCTION. 91 
 
 his American friends, and was always a looker-on in Eng 
 land. His foreign birth and education gave him significant 
 advantages as an observer of English life, and he at once 
 began the writing of those papers, stories, and sketches 
 which appeared iu the separate numbers of The Sketch 
 Book, in Bracebridge Hall, and in Tales of a Traveller. 
 They were chiefly drawn from material accumulated abroad, 
 but an occasional American subject was taken. Irving in 
 stinctively felt that by the circumstances of the time and the 
 bent of his genius he could pursue his calling more safely 
 abroad than at home. He remained in Europe seventeen 
 years, sending home his books for publication, and securing 
 also the profitable results of publication in London. During 
 that time, besides the books above named, he wrote the 
 History of the Life and Voyages of Christopher Columbus ; 
 the Voyages and Discoveries of the Companions of Colum 
 bus ; A Chronicle of the Conquest of Granada ; and The 
 Alhambra. The Spanish material was obtained while 
 residing in Spain, whither he went at the suggestion of the 
 American minister to make translations of documents relat 
 ing to the voyages of Columbus which had recently been 
 collected. Irving's training and tastes led him rather into 
 the construction of popular narrative than into the work of a 
 scientific historian, and, with his strong American affections, 
 he was quick to see the interest and value which lay in the 
 history of Spain as connected with America. He was emi 
 nently a raconteur, very skilful and graceful in the shaping 
 of old material ; his humor played freely over the surface of 
 Ms writing, and, with little power to create characters or 
 plots, he had an unfailing perception of the literary capabil 
 ities of scenes and persons which came under his observation. 
 He came back to America in 1832 with an established 
 reputation, and was welcomed enthusiastically by his friends 
 and countrymen. He travelled into the new parts of Amer 
 ica, and spent ten years at home, industriously working at 
 the material which had accumulated in his hands when
 
 92 WASHINGTON IRVING. 
 
 abroad, and had been increased during his travels in the 
 West. In this period he published Legends of the Con 
 quest of Spain ; The Crayon Miscellany, including his 
 Tour on the Prairies, Abbotsford and Newstead Abbey ; 
 Astoria ; a number of papers in the Knickerbocker Maga 
 zine, afterwards published under the title of Wolferfs 
 Roost ; and edited the Adventures of Captain Bonneville, 
 U. S. A., in the Rocky Mountains and the Far West. 
 
 In 1842 he went back to Spain as American minister, 
 holding the office for four years, when he returned to Amer. 
 ica, established himself at his home, Sunnyside on the banks 
 of the Hudson, and remained there until his death in 1859. 
 The fruits of this final period were Mahomet and his Suc 
 cessors, which, with a volume of posthumous publication, 
 Spanish Papers and other Miscellanies, completed the 
 series of Spanish and Moorish subjects which form a distinct 
 part of his writings ; Oliver Goldsmith, a Biography ; and 
 finally a Life of Washington, which occupied the closing 
 years of his life, years which were not free from physical 
 suffering. In this book Irving embodied his strong admira 
 tion for the subject, whose name he bore and whose blessing 
 he had received as a child ; he employed, too, a pen which had 
 been trained by its labors on the Spanish material, and, like 
 that series, the work is marked by good taste, artistic sense 
 of proportion, faithfulness, and candor, rather than by the 
 severer work of the historian. It is a popular and a fair 
 life of Washington and account of the war for independence. 
 
 Irving's personal and literary history is recorded in The 
 Life and Letters of Washington Irving, by his nephew, 
 Pierre M. Irving. His death was the occasion of many 
 affectionate and graceful eulogies and addresses, a number 
 of which were gathered into Irvingiana : a Memorial of 
 Washington Irving. 
 
 Rip Van Winkle is from Tlie Slcetch Book.
 
 INTRODUCTION TO RIP VAN WINKLE. 
 
 THE story of Rip Van Winkle purported to have been 
 written by Diedrich Knickerbocker, who was a humorous in 
 vention of Irving's, and whose name was familiar to the pub 
 lic as the author of A History of New York. The History 
 was published in 1809, but it was ten years more before 
 the first number of The Sketch Book of Geoffrey Crayon, 
 Gent., was published. This number, which contained Rip 
 Van Winkle, was, like succeeding numbers, written by Ir 
 ving in England and sent home to America for publication. 
 He laid the scene of the story in the Kaatskills, but he drew 
 upon his imagination and the reports of others for the scen 
 ery, not visiting the spot until 1833. The story is not ab 
 solutely new ; the fairy tale of The Sleeping Beauty in the 
 Wood has the same theme ; so has the story of Epimenides 
 of Crete, who lived in the sixth or seventh century before 
 Christ. He was said to have fallen asleep in a cave when 
 a boy, and to have awaked at the end of fifty-seven years, 
 his soul, meanwhile, having been growing in stature. There 
 is the legend also of the Seven Sleepers of Ephesus, Chris 
 tian martyrs who were walled into a cave to which they had 
 fled for refuge, and there were miraculously preserved for 
 two centuries. Among the stories in which the Harz Moun 
 tains of Germany are so prolific is one of Peter Klaus, a 
 goatherd who was accosted one day by a young man who 
 silently beckoned him to follow, and led him to a secluded 
 spot, where he found twelve knights playing, voiceless, at 
 skittles. He saw a can of wine which was very fragrant, 
 and, drinking of it, was thrown into a deep sleep, from 
 which he did not wake for twenty years. The story gives
 
 94 WASHINGTON IRVING. 
 
 incidents of his awaking and of the changes which he found 
 in the village to which he returned. This story, which was 
 published with others in 1800, may very likely have been 
 the immediate suggestion to Irving, who has taken nearly 
 the same framework. The humorous additions which he 
 has made, and the grace with which he has invested the 
 tale, have caused his story to supplant earlier ones in the 
 popular mind, so that Kip Van Winkle has passed into 
 familiar speech, and allusions to him are clearly understood 
 by thousands who have never read Irving's story. The 
 recent dramatizing of the story, though following the out 
 line only, has done much to fix the conception of the char 
 acter. The story appeals very directly to a common senti 
 ment of curiosity as to the future, which is not far removed 
 from what some have regarded as an instinct of the human 
 mind pointing to personal immortality. The name Van 
 Winkle was happily chosen by Irving, but not invented by 
 him. The printer of the Sketch Book, for one, bore the 
 name. The name Knickerbocker, also, is among the Dutch 
 names, but Irving's use of it has made it representative. In 
 The Author's Apology, which he prefixed to a new edition 
 of the History of New York, he says : " I find its very 
 name become a ' household word,' and used to give the 
 home stamp to everything recommended for popular accep 
 tation, such as Knickerbocker societies ; Knickerbocker in 
 surance companies ; Knickerbocker steamboats ; Knicker 
 bocker omnibuses, Knickerbocker bread, and Knickerbocker 
 ice ; and . . . New Yorkers of Dutch descant; prHrng them 
 selves upon being ' genuine Knickerbocker^' "
 
 I. 
 
 RIP VAN WINKLE. 
 
 A POSTHUMOUS WRITING OP DIEDRICH KNICKERBOCKER. 
 
 By Woden, God of Saxons, 
 
 From whence comes Wensday, that is Wodensday. 
 
 Truth is a thing that ever I will keep 
 
 Unto thylke day in which I creep into 
 
 My sepulchre. CAXTWBIOHT. 1 
 
 THE following tale was found among the papers of the late 
 Diedrich Knickerbocker, an old gentleman of New York, who 
 was very curious in the Dutch history of the province, and the 
 manners of the descendants from its primitive settlers. His his 
 torical researches, however, did not lie so much among books 
 as among men ; for the former are lamentably scanty on his 
 favorite topics ; whereas he found the old burghers, and still 
 more their wives, rich in that legendary lore so invaluable to 
 true history. Whenever, therefore, he happened upon a genuine 
 Dutch family, snugly shut up in its low-roofed farmhouse under 
 a spreading sycamore, he looked upon it as a little clasped vol 
 ume of black-letter, and studied it with the zeal of a book-worm. 
 
 The result of all these researches was a history of the province 
 during the reign of the Dutch governors, which he published 
 some years since. There have been various opinions as to the 
 literary character of his work, and, to tell the truth, it is not a 
 whit better than it should be. Its chief merit is its scrupulou... 
 accuracy, which indeed was a little questioned on its first appear 
 ance, but has since been completely established ; and it is now* 
 admitted into all historical collections, as a book of unquestion 
 able authority. 
 
 The old gentleman died shortly after the publication of his 
 work, and now that he is dead and gone, it cannot do much harm 
 
 1 William Cartwright, 1611-1643, was a friend and disciple of 
 Ben Jonson.
 
 96 WASHINGTON IRVING. 
 
 to his memory * to say that his time might have been much bet 
 ter employed in weightier labors. He, however, was apt to ride 
 his hobby his own way ; and though it did now and then kick up 
 the dust a little in the eyes of his neighbors, and grieve the spirit 
 of some friends, for whom he felt the truest deference and affec 
 tion ; yet his errors and follies are remembered " more in sorrow 
 than in anger," and it begins to be suspected that he never in 
 tended to injure or offend. But however his memory may be 
 appreciated by critics, it is still held dear by many folk, whose 
 good opinion is worth having ; particularly by certain biscuit- 
 bakers, who have gone so far as to imprint his likeness on their 
 new-year cakes ; 2 and have thus given him a chance for immor 
 tality, almost equal to the being stamped on a Waterloo Medal, 
 or a Queen Anne's Farthing. 8 
 
 1 The History of New York had given offence to many old 
 New Yorkers because of its saucy treatment of names which 
 were held in veneration as those of founders of families, and its 
 general burlesque of Dutch character. Among the critics was a 
 warm friend of Irving, Gulian C. Verplanck, who in a discourse 
 before the New York Historical Society plainly said : " It is 
 painful to see a mind, as admirable for its exquisite perception 
 of the beautiful as it is for its quick sense of the ridiculous, wast 
 ing the richness of its fancy on an ungrateful theme, and its 
 exuberant humor in a coarse caricature." Irving took the cen 
 sure good-naturedly, and as he read Verplanck's words just as 
 he was finishing the story of Rip Van Winkle, he gave them this 
 playful notice in the introduction. 
 
 2 An oblong seed-cake, still made in New York at New Year's 
 time, and of Dutch origin. 
 
 8 There was a popular story that only three farthings were 
 struck in Queen Anne's reign ; that two were in public keeping, 
 and that the third was no one knew where, but that its lucky 
 finder would be able to hold it at an enormous price. As a mat 
 ter of fact there were eight coinings of farthings in the reign of 
 Queen Anne, and numismatists do not set a high value on the 
 piece.
 
 RIP VAN WINKLE. 97 
 
 WHOEVER has made a voyage up the Hudson must 
 remember the Kaatskill Mountains. They are a dis 
 membered 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 surround 
 ing country. Every change of season, every change 
 of 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 barometers. When the 
 weather is fair and settled, they are clothed in blue 
 and purple, and print their bold outlines on the clear 
 evening sky ; but sometimes when the rest of the land 
 scape 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 1 mountains, the voyager 
 may have 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 time of the 
 province, just about the beginning of the government 
 of the good Peter Stuyvesant, 2 (may he rest in peace !) 
 and there were some of the houses of the original set 
 tlers standing within a few years, built of small yellow 
 
 1 A light touch to help the reader into a proper spirit for re 
 ceiving the tale. 
 
 2 Stuyvesant was governor of New Netherlands from 1647 to 
 1664. He plays an important part in Knickerbocker's History of 
 New York, as he did in actual life. Until quite recently a pea* 
 tree was shown on the Bowery, said to have been planted by 
 him.
 
 98 WASHINGTON IRVING. 
 
 bricks brought from Holland, having latticed windows 
 and gable fronts, surmounted with weathercocks. 
 
 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 Winkles 
 who figured so gallantly in the chivalrous days of 
 Peter Stuyvesant, and accompanied him to the siege 
 of Fort Christina. 1 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 
 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 conciliating abroad, 
 who are under the discipline of shrews at home. 
 Their tempers, doubtless, are rendered pliant and mal 
 leable 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, 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 talked those matters 
 
 1 The Van Winkles appear in the illustrious catalogue of 
 heroes who accompanied Stuyvesant to Fort Christina, and were 
 " Brimful of wrath and cabbage." 
 
 See History of New York, book VI. chap. viii.
 
 RIP VAN WINKLE. 99 
 
 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 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 Kip's composition was an insu 
 perable aversion to all kinds of profitable labor. It 
 could not be from the want of assiduity or persever 
 ance ; 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 en 
 couraged by a single nibble. He would carry a fowl 
 ing-piece 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 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 any 
 body's business but his own ; but as to doing family 
 duty, and keeping his farm in order, he found it im 
 possible. 
 
 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,
 
 100 WASHINGTON IRVING. 
 
 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 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 patri 
 monial estate had dwindled away under his manage 
 ment, acre by acre, until there was little more left 
 than a mere patch of Indian corn and potatoes, 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 be 
 gotten 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, equipped in a pair of his father's cast-off galli 
 gaskins, which he had much' ado to hold up with one 
 hand, as a fine lady does her train in bad weather. , 
 
 Kip Van Winkle, however, was one of those happy 
 mortals, of foolish, well-oiled dispositions, who take the 
 world easy, eat 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 bringing on his family. Morning, noon, 
 and night her tongue was incessantly going, and every 
 thing he said or did was sure to produce a torrent of 
 household eloquence. Rip had but one way of reply 
 ing to all lectures of the kind, and that, by frequent 
 use, had grown into a habit. He shrugged his shoul 
 ders, shook his head, cast up his eyes, but said no 
 thing. This, however, always provoked a fresh volley
 
 RIP VAN WINKLE. 101 
 
 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. 
 
 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 going so often astray. 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 mo 
 ment Wolf entered the house his crest fell, his tail 
 drooped to the ground, or curled between his 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 of matrimony rolled on ; a tart temper never 
 mellows with age, and a sharp tongue is the only edged 
 tool that grows keener with 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 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 to have heard the profound dis 
 cussions that sometimes took place, when by chance an 
 old newspaper fell into their hands from some passing
 
 102 WASHINGTON IRVING. 
 
 traveller. How solemnly they would listen to the con 
 tents, as drawled out by Derrick Van Bummel, the 
 school-master, a dapper learned little man, who was 
 not to be daunted by the most 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 con 
 trolled by Nicholas Vedder, a patriarch of the village, 
 and landlord of the inn, at the door of which he 
 took his seat from morning till night, just moving suf 
 ficiently 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 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 ob 
 served to smoke his pipe vehemently, and to send forth 
 short, frequent and angry puffs ; but when pleased, he 
 would inhale the smoke slowly and tranquilly, and 
 emit it in light and placid clouds ; and sometimes, tak 
 ing 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 routed by his termagant wife, who would sud 
 denly break in upon the tranquillity of the assemblage 
 and call the members all to naught ; 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 of idleness. 
 
 Poor Rip was at last reduced almost to despair;
 
 RIP VAN WINKLE. 103 
 
 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 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, whilst I live thou 
 shalt never want a friend to stand by thee ! " Wolf 
 would wag his tail, look wistfully in his master's face, 
 and if dogs can feel pity I verily believe he recipro 
 cated 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 Kaatskill Mountains. He was 
 after his favorite sport of squirrel shooting, and the 
 still solitudes had echoed and reechoed with the re 
 ports of his gun. Panting and fatigued, he threw 
 himself, late in the afternoon, on a green knoll, cov 
 ered with mountain herbage, that crowned the brow 
 of a 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 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 moun 
 tain glen, wild, lonely, and shagged, the bottom filled 
 with fragments from the impending cliffs, and scarcely 
 lighted by the reflected rays of the setting sun. For 
 some time Rip lay musing on this scene ; evening was 
 gradually advancing; the mountains began to throw
 
 104 WASHINGTON IRVING. 
 
 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 en 
 countering the terrors of Dame Van Winkle. 
 
 As he was about to descend, he heard a voice from 
 a distance, hallooing, " Rip Van Winkle ! Rip Van 
 Winkle ! " He looked round, but could see nothing 
 but a crow winging its solitary flight across the moun 
 tain. He thought his fancy must have 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 apprehension stealing 
 over him ; he looked anxiously in the same direction, 
 and perceived a strange figure slowly toiling up the 
 rocks, and bending under the weight of something he 
 carried on his back. He was surprised to see any 
 human being in this lonely and unfrequented place ; 
 but supposing it to be some one of the neighborhood 
 in need of his assistance, he hastened down to yield it. 
 
 On nearer approach he was still more surprised at 
 the singularity of the stranger's appearance. He was 
 a short, square-built old fellow, with thick bushy hair, 
 and a grizzled beard. His dress was of the antique 
 Dutch fashion : a cloth jerkin strapped round 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 
 shoulder a stout keg, that seemed full of liquor, and 
 made signs for Rip to approach and assist him with 
 the load. Though rather shy and distrustful of this 
 new acquaintance, Rip complied with his usual alao
 
 RIP VAN WINKLE. 105 
 
 rity ; and mutually relieving one another, they clam 
 bered up a narrow gully, apparently the dry bed of a 
 mountain torrent. As they ascended, Kip every now 
 and then heard long rolling peals like 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 a moment, but sup 
 posing it to be the muttering of one of those transient 
 thunder-showers which often take place in mountain 
 heights, he proceeded. Passing through the ravine, 
 they came to a hollow, like a small amphitheatre, sur 
 rounded 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 silence ; for though 
 the former marvelled greatly what could be the object 
 of carrying a keg of liquor up this wild mountain, yet 
 there was something strange and incomprehensible 
 about the unknown, that inspired awe and checked 
 familiarity. 
 
 On entering the amphitheatre, new objects of wonder 
 presented themselves. On a level spot in the centre 
 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 of them had enor 
 mous breeches of similar style with that of the guide's. 
 Their visages, too, were peculiar; one had a large 
 beard, 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
 
 106 WASHINGTON IRVING. 
 
 the commander. He was a stout old gentleman, with 
 a weather-beaten countenance ; he wore a laced doub 
 let, 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, 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 mys 
 terious 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 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, un 
 couth, lack-lustre countenances, that his heart turned 
 within him, and his knees smote together. His com 
 panion 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 re 
 turned 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 reiter 
 ated his visits to the flagon so often that at length his
 
 RIP VAN WINKLE. 107 
 
 senses were overpowered, his eyes swam in his head, 
 his head gradually declined, and he fell into a deep 
 sleep. 
 
 On waking, he found himself on the green knoll 
 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 breast, 
 ing 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 woe-begone 
 party at nine-pins 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 roisters of the mountain had 
 put a trick upon him, and, having dosed him with li 
 quor, had robbed him of his gun. Wolf, too, had dis 
 appeared, 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 even 
 ing'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," thought Rip, " and if this frolic should lay 
 me up with a fit of the rheumatism, I shall have a
 
 108 WASHINGTON IRVING. 
 
 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 iiis astonishment a 
 mountain stream was now foaming down it, leaping 
 from rock to rock, and filling the glen with babbling 
 murmurs. He, however, made 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 or tendrils from tree to tree, and 
 spread a kind of network in his path. 
 
 At length he reached to where the ravine had 
 opened through the cliffs to the amphitheatre ; 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 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 
 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 his 
 head, shouldered the rusty firelock, and, with a heart 
 full of trouble and anxiety, turned his steps home 
 ward. 
 
 As he approached the village he met a number of 
 people, but none whom he knew, which somewhat sur*
 
 RIP VAN WINKLE. 109 
 
 prised him, for he had thought himself acquainted 
 with every one in the country round. 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, invariably stroked their chins. The con 
 stant recurrence of this gesture induced Kip, involun 
 tarily, to do the same, when, to his astonishment, 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, not one of which he recognized for an old ac 
 quaintance, barked at him as he passed. The very 
 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, everything was 
 strange. His mind now misgave him ; he began to 
 doubt whether both he and the world around him 
 were not bewitched. Surely this was his native vil 
 lage, which he had left but the day before. There 
 stood the Kaatskill Mountains there ran the silver 
 Hudson at a distance there was every hill and dale 
 precisely as it had always been Rip was sorely per 
 plexed " That flagon last night," thought he, " has 
 addled my poor head sadly ! " 
 
 It was with some difficulty that 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 found the house gone to 
 decay the roof fallen in, the windows shattered, 
 and the doors off the hinges. A half-starved dog that
 
 110 WASHINGTON IRVING. 
 
 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 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 deso- 
 lateness overcame all his connubial fears he called 
 loudly for his wife and children the lonely cham 
 bers rang for a moment with his voice, and then again 
 all was silence. 
 
 He now hurried forth, and hastened to his old re 
 sort, the village inn but it, too, was gone. A large, 
 rickety wooden building stood in its place, with great 
 gaping windows, some of 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 that used to shelter the quiet 
 little Dutch inn of yore, there now was reared a tall 
 naked pole, with something on the top that- looked like 
 a red night-cap, 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, under which he had smoked so many a 
 peaceful pipe ; but even this was singularly metamor 
 phosed. The red coat was changed for one of blue 
 and buff, a sword was held in the hand instead of a 
 sceptre, the head was decorated with a cocked hat, 
 and underneath was painted in large characters, GEN 
 ERAL WASHINGTON. 
 
 There was, as usual, a crowd of folk about the door, 
 but none that Rip recollected. The very character of
 
 RIP VAN WINKLE. Ill 
 
 the people seemed changed. There was a busy, bus 
 tling, disputatious tone about it, instead of the accus 
 tomed phlegm and drowsy tranquillity. He 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 school-master, doling forth the contents 
 of an ancient newspaper. In place of these, a lean, 
 bilious-looking fellow, with his pockets full of hand 
 bills, was haranguing vehemently about rights of citi 
 zens elections members of congress liberty 
 Bunker's Hill heroes of seventy-six and other 
 words, which were a perfect Babylonish jargon to the 
 bewildered Van Winkle. 
 
 The appearance of Rip, with his long grizzled beard, 
 his rusty fowling-piece, his uncouth dress, and an army 
 of women and children at his heels, soon attracted 
 the attention of the tavern-politicians. They crowded 
 round him, eying him from head to foot with great 
 curiosity. The orator bustled up to him, and, draw 
 ing him partly aside, inquired " on which side he 
 voted ? " Rip started 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, 
 made his way through the crowd, putting them to the 
 right and left with his elbows as he passed, and plant 
 ing 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, de 
 manded in an austere tone, " what brought him to the 
 election with a gun on his shoulder, and a mob at his
 
 112 WASHINGTON IRVING. 
 
 heels, and whether he meant to breed a riot in the 
 village ? " " Alas ! gentlemen," 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 there for, and whom he was seeking ? The 
 poor man humbly assured him that he meant no harm, 
 but merely came therein search of some of his neigh 
 bors, who used to keep about the tavern. 
 
 " Well who are they ? name them." 
 
 Rip bethought himself a moment, and inquired, 
 " Where 's Nicholas Vedder ? " 
 
 There was a silence for a little while, when an old 
 man replied, in a thin, piping voice : " Nicholas Ved 
 der ! 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 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 storming of 
 Stony Point 1 others say he was drowned in a squall 
 at the foot of Antony's Nose. 2 I don't know he 
 never came back again." 
 
 1 On the Hudson. The place is famous for the daring assault 
 made by Mad Anthony Wayne, July 15, 1779. 
 
 2 A few miles above Stony Point is the promontory of An 
 tony's Nose. If we are to believe Diedrich Knickerbocker, it
 
 RIP VAN WINKLE. 113 
 
 " Where 's Van Bummel, the school-master ? " 
 
 " He went off to the wars too, was a great militia 
 general, and is now in Congress." 
 
 Kip'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, lean 
 ing against the tree." 
 
 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 man. 
 
 was named after Antony Van Corlear, Stuyvesant's trumpeter. 
 " It must be known, then, that the nose of Antony the trum 
 peter was of a very lusty size, strutting boldly from his counte 
 nance like a mountain of Golconda. . . . Now thus it happened, 
 that bright and early in the morning the good Antony, having 
 washed his burly visage, was leaning over the quarter railing of 
 the galley, contemplating it in the glassy wave below. Just at 
 this moment the illustrious sun, breaking in all his splendor 
 from behind a high bluff of the highlands, did dart one of his 
 most potent beams full upon the refulgent nose of the sounder 
 of brass the reflection of which shot straightway down, hissing 
 hot, into the water and killed a mighty sturgeon that was sport 
 ing beside the vessel ! . . . When this astonishing miracle came 
 to be made known to Peter Stuyvesant he ... marvelled ex 
 ceedingly ; and as a monument thereof, he gave the name of 
 Antony's Nose to a stout promontory in the neighborhood, and 
 it has continued to be called Antony's Nose ever since that 
 time." History of New York, book VI. chap. iv.
 
 114 WASHINGTON IRVING. 
 
 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 somebody else got into my shoes I 
 was myself last night, but I fell asleep on the moun 
 tain, and they 've changed my gun, and everything's 
 changed, and I 'm changed, and I can't tell what 's my 
 name, or who I am ! " 
 
 The bystanders began now to look at each other, 
 nod, wink significantly, and tap their fingers against 
 their foreheads. There 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 
 precipitation. At this critical moment a fresh, comely 
 woman pressed through the throng to get a peep at 
 the gray-bearded man. She had a chubby child in her 
 arms, which, frightened at his looks, began to cry. 
 " Hush, Rip," cried 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 recollections in his mind. " What is your 
 name, my good woman ? " asked he. 
 
 "Judith Gardenier." 
 
 " And your father's name ? " 
 
 " Ah, poor man, Rip Van Winkle was his name, 
 but 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 ; and he put 
 it with a faltering voice :
 
 RIP VAN WINKLE. 115 
 
 " 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 Eng 
 land peddler." 
 
 There was a drop of comfort at least, in this intel 
 ligence. 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 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 been to him but as one night. The neigh 
 bors 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 advan 
 cing up the road. He was a descendant of the histo 
 rian of that name, 1 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 
 wonderful events and traditions of the neighborhood. 
 He recollected Rip at once, and corroborated his story 
 1 Adrian Vanderdonk.
 
 116 WASHINGTON IRVING. 
 
 in the most satisfactory manner. He assured the 
 company that it was a fact, handed down from his 
 ancestor the historian, that the Kaatskill Mountains 
 had always been haunted by strange beings. That it 
 was affirmed that the great Hendrick Hudson, the first 
 discoverer of 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 moun 
 tain ; 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 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 farm ; but evinced an hereditary dis 
 position 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 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 be idle with impu 
 nity, he took his place once more on the bench at the 
 inn door, and was reverenced as one of the patriarchs
 
 RIP VAN WINKLE. 11T 
 
 of the village, and a chronicle of the old times " before 
 the war." It was some time before he could get into 
 the regular track of gossip, or could be made to com 
 prehend the strange events that had taken place dur 
 ing his torpor. How that there had been a revolu 
 tionary war that the country had thrown off the 
 yoke of old England and that, instead of being a 
 subject of his Majesty George the Third, 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 spe 
 cies of despotism under which he had long groaned, 
 and that was petticoat government. Happily that 
 was 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, how 
 ever, he shook his head, shrugged his shoulders, and 
 cast up his eyes, which might pass either for an ex 
 pression of resignation to his fate, or joy at his deliv 
 erance. 
 
 He used to tell his story to every stranger that ar 
 rived 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 precisely to the tale 
 I have related, and not a man, woman, or child in the 
 neighborhood but knew it by heart. Some always 
 pretended to doubt the reality of it, and insisted that 
 Rip had been out of his head, and that this was one 
 point on which he always remained flighty. The old 
 Dutch inhabitants, however, almost universally gave 
 it full credit. Even to this day they never hear a 
 thunder-storm of a summer afternoon about the Kaats-
 
 118 WASHINGTON IRVING. 
 
 kill, 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 they might have 
 a quieting draught out of Rip Van Winkle's flagon. 
 
 NOTE. 
 
 The foregoing Tale, one would suspect, had been suggested to 
 Mr. Knickerbocker by a little German superstition about the 
 Emperor Frederick der Rothbart, 1 and the Kypphaiiser moun 
 tain ; the subjoined note, however, which he had appended to the 
 tale, shows that it is an absolute fact, narrated with his usual 
 fidelity. 
 
 " The story of Rip Van Winkle may seem incredible to many, 
 but nevertheless I give it my full belief, for I know the vicinity 
 of our old Dutch settlements to have been very subject to mar 
 vellous events and appearances. Indeed, I have heard many 
 stranger stories than this, in the villages along the Hudson ; all 
 of which were too well authenticated to admit of a doubt. I have 
 even talked with Rip Van Winkle myself, who, when last I saw 
 him, was a very old venerable man, and so perfectly rational and 
 consistent on every other point, that I think no conscientious 
 person could refuse to take this into the bargain ; nay, I have 
 seen a certificate on the subject taken before a country justice 
 and signed with a cross, in the justice's own handwriting. The 
 story therefore, is beyond the possibility of doubt. 
 
 "D. K." 
 
 POSTSCRIPT. 
 
 The following are travelling notes from a memorandum-book 
 of Mr. Knickerbocker : 
 
 The Kaatsberg, or Catskill Mountains, have always been a re 
 gion full of fable. The Indians considered them the abode of 
 spirits, who influenced the weather, spreading sunshine or clouds 
 
 1 Frederick I. of Germany, 1121-1190, called Barbarossa, der 
 Rothbart (Redbeard or Rufus), was fabled not to have died but 
 to have gone into a long sleep, from which he would awake 
 when Germany should need him. The same legend was told by 
 the Danes of their Holger.
 
 RIP VAN WINKLE. 119 
 
 over the landscape, and sending good or bad hunting seasons. 
 They were ruled by an old squaw spirit, said to be their mother. 
 She dwelt on the highest peak of the Catskills, and had charge 
 of the doors of day and night to open and shut them at the 
 proper hour. She hung up the new moons in the skies, and cut 
 up the old ones into stars. In times of drought, if properly 
 propitiated, she would spin light summer clouds out of cobwebs 
 and morning dew, and send them off from the crest of the moun 
 tain, flake after flake, like flakes of carded cotton, to float in the 
 air ; until, dissolved by the heat of the sun, they would fall in 
 gentle showers, causing the grass to spring, the fruits to ripen, 
 and the corn to grow an inch an hour. If displeased, however, 
 she would brew up clouds black as ink, sitting in the midst of 
 them like a bottle-bellied spider in the midst of its web ; and 
 when these clouds broke, woe beticle the valleys ! 
 
 In old times, say the Indian traditions, there was a kind of 
 Manitou or Spirit, who kept about the wildest recesses of the 
 Catskill Mountains, and took a mischievous pleasure in wreaking 
 all kinds of evils and vexations upon the red men. Sometimes 
 he would assume the form of a bear, a panther, or a deer, lead 
 the bewildered hunter a weary chase through tangled forest and 
 among ragged rocks ; and then spring off with a loud ho ! ho ! 
 leaving him aghast on the brink of a beetling precipice or raging 
 torrent. 
 
 The favorite abode of this Manitou is still shown. It is a 
 great rock or cliff on the loneliest part of the mountains, and 
 from the flowering vines which clamber about it, and the wild 
 flowers which abound in its neighborhood, is known by the name 
 of the Garden Rock. Near the foot of it is a small lake, the 
 haunt of the solitary bittern, with water-snakes basking in the 
 sun on the leaves of the pond-lilies which lie on the surface. 
 This place was held in great awe by the Indians, insomuch that 
 the boldest hunter would not pursue his game within its pre 
 cincts. Once upon a time, however, a hunter, who had lost his 
 way, penetrated to the Garden Rock, where he beheld a number 
 of gourds placed in the crotches of trees. One of these he seized 
 and made off with it, but in the hurry of his retreat he let it 
 fall among the rocks, when a great stream gushed forth, which 
 washed him away and swept him down precipices, where he was 
 dashed to pieces, and the stream made its way to the Hudson, 
 and continues to flow to the present day ; being the identical 
 stream known by the name of the Kaaters-kill.
 
 120 WASHINGTON IRVING. 
 
 n. 
 
 LITTLE BRITAIN. 
 
 What I write is most true ... I have a whole booke of cases lying by me which 
 if I should sette foorth, some grave auntieuts (within the hearing of Bow bell) 
 would be out of charity with me. N ASHE. 
 
 IN the centre of the great city of London lies a 
 small neighborhood, consisting of a cluster of narrow 
 streets and courts, of very venerable and debilitated 
 houses, which goes by the name of LITTLE BRITAIN. 
 Christ Church School 1 and St. Bartholomew's Hospi 
 tal 2 bound it on the west; Smithfield 3 and Long 
 Lane on the north ; Aldersgate Street, like an arm of 
 the sea, divides it from the eastern part of the city ; 
 whilst the yawning gulf of Bull-and-Mouth Street sep 
 arates it from Butcher Lane, and the regions of New 
 gate. Over this little territory, thus bounded and 
 designated, the great dome of St. Paul's, swelling 
 above the intervening houses of Paternoster Row, 
 Amen Corner, and Ave Maria Lane, looks down with 
 an air of motherly protection. 
 
 This quarter derives its appellation from having 
 been, in ancient times, the residence of the Dukes of 
 Brittany. As London increased, however, rank and 
 fashion rolled off to the west, and trade, creeping on 
 
 1 More accurately Christ's Hospital, popularly known as The 
 Blue Coat School, an old and famous school originally intended 
 as a home for foundlings and fatherless children. Charles Lamb 
 in Essays of Elia has some charming papers, Recollections of 
 Christ's Hospital and Christ's Hospital Five and Thirty Years 
 Ago. 
 
 2 The earliest institution of the kind in London, founder 1 in 
 1102. 
 
 8 Famous as the scene of Wat Tyler's death, and of martyr 
 doms for religion under Henry VIII., Mary, and Elizabeth.
 
 LITTLE BRITAIN. 121 
 
 at their heels, took possession of their deserted abodes. 
 For some time Little Britain became the great mart 
 of learning, and was peopled by the busy and prolific 
 race of booksellers ; these also gradually deserted it, 
 and, emigrating beyond the great strait of Newgate 
 Street, settled down in Paternoster Row and St. Paul's 
 Churchyard, where they continue to increase and muL 
 tiply even at the present day. 
 
 But though thus falling into decline, Little Britain 
 still bears traces of its former splendor. There are 
 several houses ready to tumble down, the fronts of 
 which are magnificently enriched with old oaken carv 
 ings of hideous faces, unknown birds, beasts, and 
 fishes ; and fruits and flowers which it would perplex 
 a naturalist to classify. There are also, in Aldersgate 
 Street, certain remains of what were once spacious and 
 lordly family mansions, but which have in latter days 
 been subdivided into several tenements. Here may 
 often be found the family of a petty tradesman, with 
 its trumpery furniture, burrowing among the relics of 
 antiquated finery, in great, rambling, time-stained 
 apartments, with fretted ceilings, gilded cornices, and 
 enormous marble fireplaces. The lanes and courts also 
 contain many smaller houses, not on so grand a scale, 
 but, like your small ancient gentry, sturdily maintain 
 ing their claims to equal antiquity. These have their 
 gable ends to the street ; great bow-windows, with 
 diamond panes set in lead, grotesque carvings, and 
 low arched door- ways. 1 
 
 In this most venerable and sheltered little nest have 
 I passed several quiet years of existence, comfortably 
 
 1 It is evident that the author of this interesting communica 
 tion has included in his general title of Little Britain many of 
 those little lanes and courts that belong immediately to Cloth 
 Fair. Irving' 1 's Note.
 
 122 WASHINGTON IRVING. 
 
 lodged in the second floor of one of the smallest but 
 oldest edifices. 1 My sitting-room is an old wainscoted 
 chamber, with small panels, and set off with a miscel 
 laneous array of furniture. I have a particular re 
 spect for three or four high-backed claw-footed chairs,, 
 covered with tarnished brocade, which bear the marks 
 of having seen better days, and have doubtless figured 
 in some of the old palaces of Little Britain. They 
 seem to me to keep together, and to look down with 
 sovereign contempt upon their leathern - bottomed 
 neighbors : as I have seen decayed gentry carry a high 
 head among the plebeian society with which they were 
 reduced to associate. The whole front of my sitting- 
 room is taken up with a bow-window, on the panes of 
 which are recorded the names of previous occupants 
 for many generations, mingled with scraps of very in 
 different gentlemanlike poetry, written in characters 
 which I can scarcely decipher, and which extol the 
 charms of many a beauty of Little Britain who has 
 long, long since bloomed, faded, and passed away. 
 As I am an idle personage, with no apparent occu 
 pation, and pay my bill regularly every week, I am 
 looked upon as the only independent gentleman of the 
 neighborhood ; and, being curious to learn the internal 
 state of a community so apparently shut up within it 
 self, I have managed to work my way into all the con 
 cerns and secrets of the place. 
 
 Little Britain may truly be called the heart's core 
 of the city ; the stronghold of true John Bullism. It 
 is a fragment of London as it was in its better days, 
 with its antiquated folks and fashions. Here flourish 
 in great preservation many of the holiday games and 
 customs of yore. The inhabitants most religiously eat 
 
 1 It must be remembered that it is Geoffrey Crayon who is 
 writing, and not Washington Irving.
 
 LITTLE BRITAIN. 123 
 
 pancakes on Shrove Tuesday, hot-cross-buns on Good 
 Friday, and roast goose at Michaelmas ; they send 
 love-letters on Valentine's Day, burn the pope on the 
 fifth of November, 1 and kiss all the girls under the 
 mistletoe at Christmas. Roast beef and plum pudding 
 are also held in superstitious veneration, and port and 
 sherry maintain their grounds as the only true Eng 
 lish wines ; all others being considered vile, outlandish 
 beverages. 
 
 Little Britain has its long catalogue of city won 
 ders, which its inhabitants consider the wonders of 
 the world : such as the great bell of St. Paul's, which 
 sours all the beer when it tolls ; the figures that strike 
 the hours at St. Dunstan's clock ; the Monument ; 3 
 the lions in the Tower ; and the wooden giants 3 in 
 Guildhall. They still believe in dreams and fortune- 
 telling, and an old woman that lives in Bull-and-Mouth 
 Street makes a tolerable subsistence by detecting 
 stolen goods, and promising the girls good husbands. 
 They are apt to be rendered uncomfortable by comets 
 and eclipses ; and if a dog howls dolefully at night, it 
 is looked upon as a sure sign of a death in the place. 
 There are even many ghost stories current, particu 
 larly concerning the old mansion-houses ; in several 
 of which it is said strange sights are sometimes seen. 
 Lords and ladies, the former in full bottomed wigs, 
 hanging sleeves, and swords, the latter in lappets, 
 stays, hoops and brocade, have been seen walking up 
 and down the great waste chambers, on moonlight 
 
 1 The anniversary of the discovery of the Gunpowder Plot, 
 Pope's Day, as it was called, was observed in New England un 
 til near the end of the last century. 
 
 2 To commemorate the Great Fire of London, September, 1666. 
 1 Known as Gog and Magog.
 
 124 WASHINGTON IRVING. 
 
 nights ; and are supposed to be the shades of the an 
 cient proprietors in their court-dresses. 
 
 Little Britain has likewise its sages and great men. 
 One of the most important of the former is a tall, dry 
 old gentleman, of the name of Skryme, who keeps a 
 small apothecary's shop. He has a cadaverous coun 
 tenance, full of cavities and projections ; with a brown 
 circle round each eye, like a pair of horned spectaclesc 
 He is much thought of by the old women, who con- 
 sider him as a kind of conjuror, because he has two or 
 three stuffed alligators hanging up in his shop, and 
 several snakes in bottles. He is a great reader of 
 almanacs and newspapers, and is much given to pore 
 over alarming accounts of plots, conspiracies, fires, 
 earthquakes, and volcanic eruptions ; which last phe 
 nomena he considers as signs of the times. He has 
 always some dismal tale of the kind to deal out to 
 his customers, with their doses ; and thus at the same 
 time puts both soul and body into an uproar. He is a 
 great believer in omens and predictions ; and has the 
 prophecies of Robert Nixon l and Mother Shipton 2 by 
 heart. No man can make so much out of an eclipse, 
 or even an unusually dark day ; and he shook the tail 
 of the last comet over the heads of his customers and 
 disciples until they were nearly frightened out of their 
 wits. He has lately got hold of a popular legend or 
 prophecy, on which he has been unusually eloquent. 
 There has been a saying current among the ancient 
 
 1 Known as the Cheshire Idiot, a contemporary of Mother 
 Shipton, and reckoned a poet. See Memoirs of Extraordinary 
 Popular Delusions, by Charles Mackay, vol. i. pp. 196-201. 
 
 2 A woman said to have been living in Yorkshire in the time 
 of Henry VII., and to have had prophetic power. Many of her 
 prophecies, in rhyme, are in the mouths of half-educated people 
 in England to-day, and their fulfilment is looked for.
 
 'LITTLE BRITAIN. 125 
 
 sibyls, who treasure up these things, that when the 
 grasshopper on the top of the Exchange shook hands 
 with the dragon on the top of Bow Church steeple, 
 fearful events would take place. This strange con 
 junction, it seems, has as strangely come to pass. 
 The same architect has been engaged lately on the 
 repairs of the cupola of the Exchange, and the steeple 
 of Bow Church ; and, fearful to relate, the dragon 
 and the grasshopper actually lie, cheek by jole, in the 
 yard of his workshop. 
 
 " Others," as Mr. Skryme is accustomed to say, 
 "may go star-gazing, and look for conjunctions in 
 the heavens, but here is a conjunction on the earth, 
 near at home, and under our own eyes, which sur 
 passes all the signs and calculations of astrologers." 
 Since these portentous weathercocks have thus laid 
 their heads together, wonderful events had already oc 
 curred. The good old king, 1 notwithstanding that he 
 had lived eighty-two years, had all at once given up 
 the ghost ; another king had mounted the throne ; a 
 royal duke had died suddenly, 2 another, in France, 
 had been murdered ; 8 there had been radical meetings 
 in all parts of the kingdom ; the bloody scenes at 
 Manchester ; 4 the great plot in Cato Street ; 5 and, 
 
 1 George III., who died January 29, 1820, and was succeeded 
 by George IV. 
 
 2 The Duke of Kent, who died in 1820. 
 
 8 The Duke of Berri, second in succession to the crown, who 
 was assassinated in 1820. 
 
 4 There had been a period of great suffering in England and a 
 chronic discontent at the existing order of things, when in Au 
 gust, 1819, an immense meeting, in opposition to the govern 
 ment, was held at Manchester. Troops were on the ground, and 
 in a sudden panic the magistrates ordered a charge which had a 
 frightful result. 
 
 6 The Cato Street Conspiracy was a plot to murder all tha
 
 126 WASHINGTON IRVING. 
 
 above all, the queen had returned to England ! l All 
 these sinister events are recounted by Mr. Skryme, 
 with a mysterious look, and a dismal shake of the 
 head ; and being taken with his drugs, and associated 
 in the minds of his auditors with stuffed sea-monsters, 
 bottled serpents, and his own visage, which is a title- 
 page of tribulation, they have spread great gloom 
 through the minds of the people of Little Britain. 
 They shake their heads whenever they go by Bow 
 Church, and observe, that they never expected any 
 good to come of taking down that steeple, which in 
 old times told nothing but glad tidings, as the history 
 of Whittington and his Cat bears witness. 
 
 The rival oracle of Little Britain is a substantial 
 cheesemonger, who lives in a fragment of one of the 
 old family mansions, and is as magnificently lodged as 
 a round-bellied mite in the midst of one of his own 
 Cheshires. Indeed, he is a man of no little standing 
 and importance ; and his renown extends through 
 Huggin Lane, and Lad Lane, and even unto Alder- 
 ministers of the crown at a cabinet dinner to be held February 
 23, 1820, to fire the barracks, and make an assault upon the 
 Bank of England and the Tower. It was the scheme of a few 
 desperate men in the time of great popular discontent with the 
 government. 
 
 1 Caroline, queen of King George IV. She had gone to the 
 Continent in 1814, driven there by the persecution of her hus 
 band, then prince regent. She returned in 1820 to vindicate 
 her rights, and all England was divided into two parties upon 
 the question of her innocency. A bill was introduced into Parlia 
 ment for her deposition as qneen and her divorce from the king, 
 but finally failed. Her acquittal was followed by immense pop 
 ular rejoicings, but her own imprudence partly cooled the public 
 sympathy, and her death, in August, 1820, shortly after the 
 king's coronation, came in season to save her from further dis 
 aster.
 
 LITTLE BRITAIN. 127 
 
 /nanbury. His opinion is very much taken in affairs 
 of state, having read the Sunday papers for the last 
 half century, together with the " Gentleman's Maga 
 zine," Rapin's " History of England," and the " Naval 
 Chronicle." His head is stored with invaluable max 
 ims which have borne the test of time and use for 
 centuries. It is his firm opinion that " it is a moral 
 impossible," so long as England is true to herself, 
 that anything can shake her; and he has much to say 
 on the subject of the national debt, which, somehow 
 or other, he proves to be a great national bulwark 
 and blessing. He passed the greater part of his life 
 in the purlieus of Little Britain, until of late years, 
 when, having become rich, and grown into the dignity 
 of a Sunday cane, he begins to take his pleasure and 
 see the world. He has therefore made several excur 
 sions to Hampstead, Highgate, and other neighboring 
 towns, where he has passed whole afternoons in look 
 ing back upon the metropolis through a telescope, and 
 endeavoring to descry the steeple of St. Bartholomew's. 
 Not a stage-coachman of Bull-and- Mouth Street but 
 touches his hat as he passes ; and he is considered 
 quite a patron at the coach-office of the Goose and 
 Gridiron, St. Paul's churchyard. His family have 
 been very urgent for him to make an expedition to 
 Margate, but he has great doubts of those new gim- 
 cracks, the steamboats, and indeed thinks himself too 
 advanced in life to undertake sea-voyages. 
 
 Little Britain has occasionally its factions and divi 
 sions, and party spirit ran very high at one time in 
 consequence of two rival " Burial Societies " being set 
 up in the place. One held its meeting at the Swan 
 and Horse Shoe, 1 and was patronized by the cheese- 
 
 1 It is just possible that this may have been the Swan and
 
 128 WASHINGTON IRVING. 
 
 monger ; the other at the Cock and Crown, under the 
 auspices of the apothecary ; it is needless to say that 
 the latter was the most flourishing. I have passed an 
 evening or two at each, and have acquired much valu 
 able information, as to the best mode of being buried, 
 the comparative merits of churchyards, together with 
 divers hints on the subject of patent-iron coffins. I 
 have heard the question discussed in all its bearings 
 as to the legality of prohibiting the latter on account 
 of their durability. The feuds occasioned by these 
 societies have happily died of late ; but they were 
 for a long time prevailing themes of controversy, the 
 people of Little Britain being extremely solicitous 
 of funereal honors and of lying comfortably in their 
 graves. 
 
 Besides these two funeral societies there is a third 
 of quite a different cast, which tends to throw the 
 sunshine of good-humor over the whole neighborhood. 
 It meets once a week at a little old-fashioned house, 
 kept by a jolly publican of the name of Wagstaff, and 
 bearing for insignia a resplendent half-moon, with a 
 most seductive bunch of grapes. The old edifice is 
 
 Harp. " The Mitre was a celebrated music-house in London 
 House Yard at the northwest end of St. Paul's. When it ceased 
 to be a music-house the succeeding landlord, to ridicule its for 
 mer destiny, chose for his sign a goose stroking the bars of a 
 gridiron with his foot (the Goose and Gridiron) in ridicule of 
 the Swan and Harp, a common sign for the early music-houses. 
 Such an origin does the Taller give ; but it may also be a ver 
 nacular reading of the coat of arms of the Company of Musi 
 cians, suspended probably at the door of the Mitre wnen it was 
 a music-house. These arms are, a swan with his wings expanded, 
 within a double tressure, counter, flory, argent. This double 
 tressure might have suggested a gridiron to unsophisticated 
 passers-by." The History of Signboards, by Jacob Larwood 
 and John Camden Hotten, pp. 445, 446.
 
 LITTLE BRITAIN. 129 
 
 covered with inscriptions to catch the eye of the thirsty 
 wayfarer, such as " Truman, Hanbury, and Co.'s En 
 tire," " Wine, Rum, and Brandy Vaults," " Old Tom, 
 Rum and Compounds, etc." This indeed has been a 
 temple of Bacchus and Momus from time immemorial. 
 It has always been in the family of the Wagstaffs, so 
 that its history is tolerably preserved by the present 
 landlord. It was much frequented by the gallants 
 and cavalieros of the reign of Elizabeth, and was 
 looked into now and then by the wits of Charles the 
 Second's day. But what Wagstaff principally prides 
 himself upon is, that Henry the Eighth, in one of his 
 nocturnal rambles, broke the head of one of his ances 
 tors with his famous walking-staff. This, however, is 
 considered as a rather dubious and vainglorious boast 
 of the landlord. 
 
 The club which now holds its weekly sessions here 
 goes by the name of " The Roaring Lads of Little 
 Britain." They abound in old catches, glees, and 
 choice stories, that are traditional in the place, and 
 not to be met with in any other part of the metropolis. 
 There is a madcap undertaker who is inimitable at a 
 merry song ; but the life of the club, and indeed the 
 prime wit of Little Britain, is bully "Wagstaff himself. 
 His ancestors were all wags before him, and he has 
 inherited with the inn a large stock of songs and jokes, 
 which go with it from generation to generation as heir 
 looms. He is a dapper little fellow, with bandy legs 
 and pot belly, a red face, with a moist, merry eye, and a 
 little shock of gray hair behind. At the opening of 
 every club night he is called in to sing his " Confes 
 sion of Faith," which is the famous old drinking trowl 
 from " Gammer Gurton's Needle." 1 He sings it, to 
 
 1 Gammer Gurton's Needle is the name of a dramatic piece by
 
 130 WASHINGTON IRVING. 
 
 be sure, with many variations, as he received it from 
 his father's lips ; for it has been a standing favorite 
 at the Half-Moon and Bunch of Grapes ever since it 
 was written : nay, he affirms that his predecessors 
 have often had the honor of singing it before the no 
 bility and gentry at Christmas mummeries, when Lit- 
 tie Britain was in all its glory. 1 
 
 John Still, afterward Bishop of Bath and Wells, said to be the 
 second English comedy in point of time. It was written about 
 the time of Shakespeare's birth, and turns on the rustic adven 
 tures of Gammer Gurton, who lost her needle, a very precious 
 piece of property in those days, and found it finally in the 
 breeches of her man Hodge, where she had left it when at her 
 work. 
 
 1 As mine host of the Half-Moon's Confession of Faith may 
 not be familiar to the majority of readers, and as it is a speci 
 men of the current songs of Little Britain, I subjoin it in its 
 original orthography. I would observe, that the whole club al 
 ways join in the chorus with a fearful thumping on the table 
 and clattering of pewter pots. W. I. 
 
 " I cannot eate but lytle meate, 
 
 My stomacke is not good, 
 But sure I thinke that I can drinke 
 
 With him that weares a hood. 
 Though I go bare, take ye no care, 
 
 I nothing am a colde, 
 I stuff my skyn so full within, 
 
 Of joly good ale and olde. 
 Chorus. Backe and syde go bare, go bare, 
 Booth f oote and hand go colde, 
 But belly, God send thee good ale ynoughe 
 Whether it be new or olde. 
 
 " I have no rost, but a nut brawne toste, 
 
 And a crab laid in the f yre ; 
 A little breade shall do me steade, 
 
 Much breade I not desyre. 
 No frost nor snow, nor winde, I trowe, 
 
 Can hurte mee, if I wolde, 
 I am so wrapt and throwly lapt 
 
 Of joly good ale and olde. 
 Chorus. Backe and syde go bare, go bare, etc. 
 
 " And Tyb my wife, that, as her lyfe, 
 Loveth well good ale to seeke,
 
 LITTLE BRITAIN. 131 
 
 It would do one's heart good to hear, on a club 
 night, the shouts of merriment, the snatches of song, 
 and now and then the choral bursts of half a dozen 
 discordant voices, which issue from this jovial man 
 sion. At such times the street is lined with listeners, 
 who enjoy a delight equal to that of gazing into a 
 confectioner's window, or snuffing up the steams of a 
 cook shop. 
 
 There are two annual events which produce great 
 stir and sensation in Little Britain; these are St. 
 Bartholomew's Fair, 1 and the Lord Mayor's Day. 
 During the time of the fair, which is held in the 
 adjoining regions of Smithfield, there is nothing going 
 on but gossiping and gadding about. The late quiet 
 streets of Little Britain are overrun with an irruption 
 of strange figures and faces ; every tavern is a scene 
 of rout and revel. The fiddle and the song are heard 
 
 Full oft drynkes shee, tyll ye may see, 
 
 The teares run downe her cheeke. 
 Then doth she trowle to me the bowle, 
 
 Even as a mault-worme sholde, 
 Aiid sayth, sweete harte, I took my parte 
 
 Of this joly good ale and olde. 
 Chorus. Backe and syde go bare, go bare, etc. 
 
 " Now let them drynke, tyll they nod and winke 
 
 Even as goode fellowes sholde doe, 
 They shall not mysse to have the blisse, 
 
 Good ale doth bring men to ; 
 And all poore soules that have scowred bowles 
 
 Or have them lustily trolde, 
 God save the lyves of them and their wives, 
 
 Whether they be yonge or olde. 
 Chorus. Backe and syde go bare, go bare," etc. 
 
 1 A famous annual fair, so called because it was kept at Bar 
 tholomew Tide (St. Bartholomew's Day is August 24th), and 
 held within the precinct of St. Bartholomew in Smithfield. It 
 was for several centuries the great Cloth Fair of England. It 
 became afterward a kind of Carnival and finally, degenerating 
 into a public nuisance, died out of public notice.
 
 132 WASHINGTON IRVING. 
 
 from the tap-room, morning, noon, and night ; and at 
 each window may be seen some group of boon com 
 panions, with half-shut eyes, hats on one side, pipe in 
 mouth, and tankard in hand, fondling, and prosing, 
 and singing maudlin songs over their liquor. Even 
 the sober decorum of private families, which I must 
 say is rigidly kept up at other times among my neigh 
 bors, is no proof against this Saturnalia. There is 
 no such thing as keeping maid-servants within doors. 
 Their brains are absolutely set madding with Punch 
 and the Puppet Show; the Flying Horses; Signior 
 Polito ; l the Fire-Eater ; the celebrated Mr. Paap ; 
 and the Irish Giant. The children, too, lavish all 
 their holiday money in toys and gilt gingerbread, and 
 fill the house with the Lilliputian din of drums, trum 
 pets, and penny whistles. 
 
 But the Lord Mayor's Day 2 is the great anniver 
 sary. The Lord Mayor is looked up to by the inhabi 
 tants of Little Britain as the greatest potentate upon 
 earth ; his gilt coach with six horses as the summit 
 of human splendor ; and his procession, with all the 
 Sheriffs and Aldermen in his train, as the grandest of 
 earthly pageants. How they exult in the idea that 
 the King himself dare not enter the city without first 
 knocking at the gate of Temple Bar, and asking per 
 mission of the Lord Mayor : for if he did, heaven and 
 earth! there is no knowing what might be the con 
 sequence. The man in armor, who rides before the 
 
 1 The showman of a menagerie of that day. 
 
 2 On the 9th of November each year the mayor of London goes 
 up to Westminster to be sworn into office. The pageant was 
 once a striking and brilliant one, when it was significant of the 
 political importance of the city of London. It is still kept up, 
 but is a mere mockery of its old splendor.
 
 LITTLE BRITAIN. 133 
 
 Lord Mayor, and is the city champion, has orders to 
 cut down everybody that offends against the dignity of 
 the city ; and then there is the little man with a velvet 
 porringer on his head, who sits at the window of the 
 state-coach, and holds the city sword, as long as a pike 
 staff Odd's blood! If he once draws that sword, 
 Majesty itself is not safe ! 
 
 Under the protection of this mighty potentate, there 
 fore, the good people of Little Britain sleep in peace. 
 Temple Bar is an effectual barrier against all interior 
 foes ; and as to foreign invasion, the Lord Mayor has 
 but to throw himself into the Tower, call in the train 
 bands, and put the standing army of Beef-eaters 1 
 under arms, and he may bid defiance to the world ! 
 
 Thus wrapped up in its own concerns, its own habits, 
 and its own opinions, Little Britain has long flourished 
 as a sound heart to this great fungous metropolis. I 
 have pleased myself with considering it as a chosen 
 spot, where the principles of sturdy John Bullism 
 were garnered up, like seed corn, to renew the national 
 character, when it had run to waste and degeneracy. 
 I have rejoiced also in the general spirit of harmony 
 that prevailed throughout it ; for though there might 
 now and then be a few clashes of opinion between the 
 adherents of the cheesemonger and the apothecary, 
 and an occasional feud between the burial societies, yet 
 these were but transient clouds, and soon passed away. 
 The neighbors met with good-will, parted with a shake 
 of the hand, and never abused each other except 
 behind their backs. 
 
 1 The yeomen of the Royal Guard who are attached to the ser 
 vice of the Tower are popularly called Beef-eaters, a corruption, 
 we are told, of buffetiers, that is, personal attendants of the sov 
 ereign, who on high festivals were ranged near the royal side 
 board or buffet.
 
 134 WASHINGTON IRVING. 
 
 I could give rare descriptions of snug junketing 
 parties at which I have been present; where we 
 played at All-Fours, Pope-Joan, Tom-come-tickle-me, 
 and other choice old games ; and where we sometimes 
 had a good old English country dance to the tune 
 of Sir Roger de Coverley. 1 Once a year, also, the 
 neighbors would gather together, and go on a gypsy 
 party to Epping Forest. 2 It would have done any 
 man's heart good to see the merriment that took place 
 here as we banqueted on the grass under the trees. 
 How we made the woods ring with bursts of laughter 
 at the songs of little Wagstaff and the merry under 
 taker ! After dinner, too, the young folks would play 
 at blind-man's-buff and hide-and-seek; and it was 
 amusing to see them tangled among the briers, and to 
 hear a fine romping girl now and then squeak from 
 among the bushes. The elder folks would gather 
 round the cheesemonger and the apothecary to hear 
 them talk politics ; for they generally brought out a 
 newspaper in their pockets, to pass away time in the 
 country. They would now and then, to be sure, get 
 a little warm in argument; but their disputes were 
 always adjusted by reference to a worthy old umbrella- 
 maker, in a double chin, who, never exactly compre 
 hending the subject, managed somehow or other to 
 decide in favor of both parties. 
 
 All empires, however, says some philosopher or his- 
 
 1 In the time of Richard I. there was a Sir Roger of Calverley, 
 after whom a tune was named which was long the air of a coun 
 try dance, which by custom was invariably made the conclusion 
 of balls. The name underwent the slight change into the form 
 which it held in Addison's time, and he and Steele at Swift's 
 suggestion used it as the name of the knight whose character and 
 fortune constitute the most charming portion of The Spectator. 
 
 8 A famous royal preserve, sixteen miles from London.
 
 LITTLE BRITAIN. 135 
 
 torian, are doomed to changes and revolutions. Lux 
 ury and innovation creep in ; factions arise ; and fam 
 ilies now and then spring- up, whose ambition and in 
 trigues throw the whole system into confusion. Thus 
 in latter days has the tranquillity of Little Britain 
 been grievously disturbed, and its golden simplicity 
 of manners threatened with total subversion by the 
 aspiring family of a retired butcher. 
 
 The family of the Lambs had long been among the 
 most thriving and popular in the neighborhood ; the 
 Miss Lambs were the belles of Little Britain, and ev 
 erybody was pleased when Old Lamb had made money 
 enough to shut up shop, and put his name on a brass 
 plate on his door. In an evil hour, however, one of 
 the Miss Lambs had the honor of being a lady in at 
 tendance on the Lady Mayoress, at her grand annual 
 ball, on which occasion she wore three towering ostrich 
 feathers on her head. The family never got over it ; 
 they were immediately smitten with a passion for high 
 life ; set up a one-horse carriage, put a bit of gold lace 
 round the errand boy's hat, and have been the talk 
 and detestation of the whole neighborhood ever since. 
 They could no longer be induced to play at Pope-Joan 
 or blind-man's-buff ; they could endure no dances but 
 quadrilles, which nobody had ever heard of in Little 
 Britain ; and they took to reading novels, talking bad 
 French, and playing upon the piano. Their brother, 
 too, who had been articled to an attorney, set up for a 
 dandy and a critic, characters hitherto unknown in 
 these parts ; and he confounded the worthy folks ex 
 ceedingly by talking about Kean, 1 the opera, and the 
 *' Edinburgh Review." 
 
 1 Edmund Kean, a celebrated English tragedian, who died in 
 1833.
 
 136 WASHINGTON IRVING. 
 
 What was still worse, the Lambs gave a grand ball, 
 to which they neglected to invite any of their old 
 neighbors ; but they had a great deal of genteel com 
 pany from Theobald's Road, Red-Lion Square, and 
 other parts towards the west. There were several 
 beaux of their brother's acquaintance from Gray's Inn 
 Lane and Hatton Garden ; and not less than three Al 
 dermen's ladies with their daughters. This was not 
 to be forgotten or forgiven. All Little Britain was in 
 an uproar with the smacking of whips, the lashing of 
 miserable horses, and the rattling and the jingling 
 of hackney coaches. The gossips of the neighbor 
 hood might be seen popping their nightcaps out at 
 every window, watching the crazy vehicles rumble 
 by ; and there was a knot of virulent old cronies, that 
 kept a lookout from a house just opposite the retired 
 butcher's, and scanned and criticised every one that 
 knocked at the door. 
 
 This dance was a cause of almost open war, and the 
 whole neighborhood declared they would have nothing 
 more to say to the Lambs. It is true that Mrs. Lamb, 
 when she had no engagements with her quality ac 
 quaintance, would give little humdrum tea-junketings 
 to some of her old cronies, " quite," as she would say, 
 " in a friendly way ; " and it is equally true that her 
 invitations were always accepted, in spite of all pre 
 vious vows to the contrary. Nay, the good ladies 
 would sit and be delighted with the music of the Miss 
 Lambs, who would condescend to strum an Irish mel 
 ody for them on the piano ; and they would listen with 
 wonderful interest to Mrs. Lamb's anecdotes of Alder 
 man Plunket's family, of Portsokenward, and the 
 Miss Timberlakes, the rich heiresses of Crutched- 
 Friars ; but then they relieved their consciences, and
 
 LITTLE BRITAIN. 137 
 
 averted the reproaches of their confederates, by can 
 vassing at the next gossiping convocation everything 
 that had passed, and pulling the Lambs and their 
 rout all to pieces.- 
 
 The only one of the family that could not be made 
 fashionable was the retired butcher himself. Honest 
 Lamb, in spite of the meekness of his name, was a ,, 
 rough, hearty old fellow, with the voice of a lion, a head k* 
 of black hair like a shoe-brush, and a broad face mot- < 
 tied like his own beef. It was in vain that the daugh 
 ters always spoke of him as " the old gentleman," ad 
 dressed him as "papa," in tones of infinite softness, 
 and endeavored to coax him into a dressing-gown and 
 slippers, and other gentlemanly habits. Do what they 
 might, there was no keeping down the butcher. His 
 sturdy nature would break through all their glozings. 
 He had a hearty vulgar good-humor that was irrepres 
 sible. His very jokes made his sensitive daughters 
 shudder ; and he persisted in wearing his blue cotton 
 coat of a morning, dining at two o'clock, and having a 
 " bit of sausage with his tea." 
 
 He was doomed, however, to share the unpopularity 
 of his family. He found his old comrades gradually 
 growing cold and civil to him ; no longer laughing at 
 his jokes ; and now and then throwing out a fling at 
 " some people," and a hint about " quality binding." 
 This both nettled and perplexed the honest butcher ; 
 and his wife and daughters, with the consummate pol 
 icy of the shrewder sex, taking advantage of the cir 
 cumstance, at length prevailed upon him to give up 
 his afternoon's pipe and tankard at WagstafFs ; to sit 
 after dinner by himself, and take his pint of port a 
 liquor he detested and to nod in his chair in soli 
 tary and dismal gentility.
 
 138 WASHINGTON IRVING. 
 
 The Miss Lambs might now be seen flaunting along 
 the streets in French bonnets, with unknown beaux ; 
 and talking and laughing so loud that it distressed 
 the nerves of every good lady within hearing. They 
 even went so far as to attempt patronage, and actually 
 induced a French dancing-master to set up in the 
 neighborhood ; but the worthy folks of Little Britain 
 took fire at it, and did so persecute the poor Gaul that 
 he was fain to pack up fiddle and dancing-pumps, and 
 decamp with such precipitation that he absolutely for 
 got to pay for his lodgings. 
 
 I had flattered myself, at first, with the idea that 
 all this fiery indignation on the part of the community 
 was merely the overflowing of their zeal for good old 
 English manners, and their horror of innovation ; and 
 I applauded the silent contempt they were so vocif 
 erous in expressing, for upstart pride, French fashions, 
 and the Miss Lambs. But I grieve to say that I soon 
 perceived the infection had taken hold ; and that my 
 neighbors, after condemning, were beginning to follow 
 their example. I overheard my landlady importuning 
 her husband to let their daughters have one quarter 
 at French and music, and that they might take a few 
 lessons in quadrille. I even saw, in the course of a 
 few Sundays, no less than five French bonnets, pre 
 cisely like those of the Miss Lambs, parading about 
 Little Britain. 
 
 I still had my hopes that all this folly would grad 
 ually die away ; that the Lambs might move out of 
 the neighborhood ; might die, or might run away with 
 attorneys' apprentices ; and that quiet and simplicity 
 might be again restored to the community. But un 
 luckily a rival power arose. An opulent oilman died, 
 and left a widow with a large jointure and a family
 
 LITTLE BRITAIN. 139 
 
 of buxom daughters. The young ladies had long been 
 repining in secret at the parsimony of a prudent father, 
 which kept down all their elegant aspirings. Their 
 ambition, being now no longer restrained, broke out 
 into a blaze, and they openly took the field against the 
 family of the butcher. It is true that the Lambs, hav 
 ing had the first start, had naturally an advantage of 
 them in the fashionable career. They could speak a 
 little bad French, play the piano, dance quadrilles, and 
 had formed high acquaintances ; but the Trotters were 
 not to be distanced. When the Lambs appeared with 
 two feathers in their hats, the Miss Trotters mounted 
 four, and of twice as fine colors. If the Lambs gave a 
 dance, the Trotters were sure not to be behindhand : 
 and though they might not boast of as good company, 
 yet they had double the number, and were twice as 
 merry. 
 
 The whole community has at length divided itself 
 into fashionable factions, under the banners of these 
 two families. The old games of Pope-Joan and Tom- 
 come-tickle-me are entirely discarded ; there is no such 
 thing as getting up an honest country dance ; and on 
 my attempting to kiss a young lady under the mistle 
 toe last Christmas, I was indignantly repulsed ; the 
 Miss Lambs having pronounced it " shocking vulgar." 
 Bitter rivalry has also broken out as to the most fash 
 ionable part of Little Britain ; the Lambs standing 
 up for the dignity of Cross-Keys Square, and the Trot 
 ters for the vicinity of St. Bartholomew's. 
 
 Thus is this little territory torn by factions and in 
 ternal dissensions, like the great empire whose name 
 it bears ; and what will be the result would puzzle 
 the apothecary himself, with all his talent at prog 
 nostics, to determine ; though I apprehend that it
 
 140 WASHINGTON IRVING. 
 
 will terminate in the total downfall of genuine John 
 Bullism. 
 
 The immediate effects are extremely unpleasant to 
 me. Being a single man, and, as I observed before, 
 rather an idle good-for-nothing personage, I have been 
 considered the only gentleman by profession in the 
 place. I stand therefore in high favor with both parties, 
 and have to hear all their cabinet councils and mutual 
 backbitings. As I am too civil not to agree with the 
 ladies on all occasions, I have committed myself most 
 horribly with both parties, by abusing their opponents. 
 I might manage to reconcile this to my conscience, 
 which is a truly accommodating one, but I cannot tc 
 my apprehension if the Lambs and Trotters ever 
 come to a reconciliation, and compare notes, I am 
 ruined ! 
 
 I have determined, therefore, to beat a retreat in 
 time, and am actually looking out for some other nest 
 in this great city, where old English manners are still 
 kept up ; where French is neither eaten, drunk, danced, 
 nor spoken ; and where there are no fashionable fami 
 lies of retired tradesmen. This found, I will, like a 
 veteran rat, hasten away before I have an old house 
 about my ears ; bid a long, though a sorrowful, adieu 
 to my present abode, and leave the rival factions of 
 the Lambs and the Trotters to divide the distracted 
 empire of LITTLE BRITAIN.
 
 HENRY WADSWORTH LONGFELLOW. 
 
 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 WITH a single exception the prose writings of Longfellow 
 all belong to that period of his life which was connected 
 with his early travels in Europe and the beginning of his 
 professional career as a teacher of modern literature. In 
 1833 he published a translation of a paper on Ancient 
 French Romances by Paulin Paris, and an Essay on the 
 Moral and Devotional Poetry of Spain. A little later 
 appeared Outre-Mer. Between the publication of Outre- 
 Mer and Hyperion, which appeared in 1839, he contributed 
 several papers to periodicals which are included in the first 
 volume of his collected prose works under the title of Drift- 
 Wood, papers on Frithiof's Saga, Hawthorne's Twice- 
 Told Tales, The Great Metropolis, Anglo-Saxon Litera 
 ture, and Paris in the Seventeenth Century. A period of 
 six years includes these writings, and it was not until it 
 closed that he began the publication of original verse, his 
 poetic work before this having been in the form of transla 
 tion from the French and Spanish. His prose writings thus 
 precede, in time, his poetry, and they are intimately con 
 nected with his personal experience and observation as a 
 traveller and student. He came back from Europe freighted 
 with memories of the Old World, and at once began pour 
 ing from a full cup the generous wine of foreign vineyards. 
 Within the shelter of academic life, and under the impulse 
 of a catholic zeal for literature, he eagerly offered the trea 
 sures of art, legend, and history, which had been made his
 
 142 HENRY WADSWORTH LONGFELLOW. 
 
 own by the appropriating power of an appreciative taste, 
 and he inclosed most of his work within forms of literary 
 art which served to give continuity without involution. 
 Thus Outre-Mer is a record of travel, continuous in its geo 
 graphical outline, hut separated from ordinary itineraries by 
 noting less the personal accidents of the traveller than the 
 poetic and romantic scenes which, whether in the present or 
 in the past, marked the journey and transformed it into the 
 pilgrimage of a devotee to art. In Hyperion a more delibe 
 rate romance is intended, but the lights and shades of the 
 story are heightened or deepened by the passages of travel 
 and study, which form the background from which the 
 human figures are relieved. It is interesting to observe 
 how, as the writer was more withdrawn from the actual 
 Europe of his eyes, he used the Europe of his memory and 
 imagination to wait upon the movements of a profounder 
 study, the adventures of a human soul. These two books 
 and the occasional critical papers are characterized by a 
 strong consciousness of literary art. Life seems always to 
 suggest a book or a picture, and nature is always viewed in 
 its immediate relation to form and color. There is a singu 
 lar discovery of the Old World, and while European writ 
 ers, like Chateaubriand for example, were turning to Amer 
 ica for new and unworn images, Longfellow, reflecting the 
 awaking desire for the enduring forms of art which his 
 countrymen were showing, eagerly disclosed the treasures to 
 which the owners seemed almost indifferent. It is difficult 
 to measure the influence which his broad, catholic taste and 
 his refined choice of subjects have had upon American cul 
 ture, through the medium of these works and that large 
 body of his poetry which draws an inspiration from foreign 
 life. In one of his prose works he makes a character say, 
 in answer to a demand for a national literature : 
 
 " Nationality is a good thing to a certain extent, but uni 
 versality is better. All that is best in the great poets of all 
 countries is not what is national in them, but what is univer-
 
 INTRODUCTION. 143 
 
 sal. Their roots are in their native soil ; but their branches 
 wave in the unpatriotic air, that speaks the same language 
 unto al^ men, and their leaves shine with the illimitable 
 light that pervades all lands. Let us throw all the windows 
 open ; let us admit the light and air on all sides ; that we 
 may look toward the four corners of the heavens, and not 
 always in the same direction." 1 It is this universality of 
 interest which rendered the poet so open to the best which 
 older life and literature could afford, and he frankly re 
 flected it in his writings. " As the blood of all nations," he 
 continues, " is mingling with our own, so will their thoughts 
 and feelings finally mingle in our literature. We shall 
 draw from the Germans tenderness ; from the Spaniards 
 passion; from the French vivacity, to mingle more and 
 more with our English solid sense. And this will give us 
 universality, so much to be desired." 
 
 Ten years elapsed after the publication of Hyperion be 
 fore another, and his latest, prose work appeared. During 
 that period many of his well known shorter poems had 
 been issued and followed by The Spanish Student and 
 Evangeline. Two years after the publication of this, his 
 best known work, appeared Kavanagh, a Tale, in 1849. It 
 is a prose idyl, the scene laid in a New England, presuma 
 bly Maine, village, and the story gently reflecting the life of 
 a few typical characters. The style is simpler than in his 
 previous prose, and the positive presence of the old world 
 life has given place to a faint odor of the same which per 
 vades the atmosphere of the book. The stormy passions of 
 life are merely hinted at in the story, while the more pen 
 sive graces and romantic aspirations are made to form the 
 tints of the picture. The plot is only sketched, for it is in 
 the sentiment of the characters that the author, and conse 
 quently the reader, has his real interest. The student of 
 literature sees some traces in it of the influence of Jean 
 Paul Richter. It is less studied and less conscious, but its 
 material is quite as distinctly pure sentiment. 
 
 1 Kavanagh, xx.
 
 144 HENRY WADSWORTH LONGFELLOW. 
 
 With Kavanagh prose was left behind, and indeed after 
 this the poet trod with firmer step in verse, and with a more 
 marked individuality. That is to say, and the lesson is a 
 valuable one to students, so far he had been forming his 
 work upon models already created and had been advancing 
 as a student in literature while yet using creative power. 
 The long apprenticeship which he had been serving to great 
 masters was drawing to a close, and he was to stand forth 
 more distinctly as himself a master. There are few exam 
 ples in literature, none certainly in our own, so instructive 
 of the power which comes from admiration of great work, 
 and an imitation which is not servile but fresh, enthusiastic, 
 and with constant reference to new creation. The consum 
 mate mastery of poetic form which displays itself in the 
 sonnets, especially in Mr. Longfellow's latest work, may 
 be traced back step by step to the patient, untiring study of 
 the earlier days. With equal truth it may be said that the 
 final exclusion of prose from his composition was the result 
 of the gradual perfection of higher forms of art and the 
 withdrawal of his attention from the mere rescript of mate 
 rial to the creation of self-contained art. The attentive 
 reader will discover how closely Kavanagh borders upon the 
 poetic in form, for it is careless of the details which give 
 richness to prose romance, and careful only of the essential 
 facts in which poetry and prose alike are concerned. 
 
 The form of Hyperion and Kavanagh renders it inexpe 
 dient to select detached scenes from them. The two chap 
 ters which follow are both from Outre-Mer.
 
 THE VALLEY OF THE LOIRE. 
 
 Je ne COIIQOIS qu'une maniere de voyager plus agitable que d'aller a- cheval ; 
 c'est d'aller 4 pied. On part a son moment, on s'arrete a sa voloutt}, on fait taut 
 et si peu d 'exercise qu'on veut. 
 
 Quand on ne veut qu'arriver, on peut courir en chaise de poste ; mais quand on 
 veut voyager, il faut aller & pied. ROUSSEAU. 
 
 IN the beautiful month of October, I made a foot 
 excursion along the banks of the Loire, from Orleans 
 to Tours. This luxuriant region is justly called the 
 garden of France. From Orleans to Blois the whole 
 valley of the Loire is one continued vineyard. The 
 bright green foliage of the vine spreads, like the undu 
 lations of the sea, over all the landscape, with here 
 and there a silver flash of the river, a sequestered 
 hamlet, or the towers of an old chateau, to enliven 
 and variegate the scene. 
 
 The vintage had already commenced. The peas 
 antry were busy in the fields, the song that cheered 
 their labor was on the breeze, and the heavy wagon tot 
 tered by, laden with the clusters of the vine. Every 
 thing around me wore that happy look which makes 
 the heart glad. In the morning I arose with the lark ; 
 and at night I slept where sunset overtook me. The 
 healthy exercise of foot-travelling, the pure, bracing 
 air of autumn, and the cheerful aspect of the whole 
 landscape about me gave fresh elasticity to a mind not 
 overburdened with care, and made me forget not only 
 the fatigue of walking, but also the consciousness of 
 being alone.
 
 146 HENRY WADSWORTH LONGFELLOW. 
 
 My first day's journey brought me at evening to a 
 village, whose name I have forgotten, situated about 
 eight leagues from Orleans. It is a small, obscure ham 
 let, not mentioned in the guide-book, and stands upon 
 the precipitous banks of a deep ravine, through which 
 a noisy brook leaps down to turn the ponderous wheel 
 of a thatch-roofed mill. The village inn stands upon 
 the highway; but the village itself is not visible to 
 the traveller as he passes. It is completely hidden 
 in the lap of a wooded valley, and so embowered in 
 trees that not a roof nor a chimney peeps out to be 
 tray its hiding-place. It is like the nest of a ground- 
 swallow, which the passing footstep almost treads 
 upon, and yet it is not seen. I passed by without sus 
 pecting that a village was near ; and the little inn had 
 a look so uninviting that I did not even enter it. 
 
 After proceeding a mile or two farther I perceived, 
 upon my left, a village spire rising over the vineyards. 
 Towards this I directed my footsteps ; but it seemed 
 to recede as I advanced, and at last quite disappeared. 
 It was evidently many miles distant ; and as the path 
 I followed descended from the highway, it had grad 
 ually sunk beneath a swell of the vine-clad landscape. 
 I now found myself in the midst of an extensive vine 
 yard. It was just sunset ; and the last golden rays 
 lingered on the rich and mellow scenery around me. 
 The peasantry were still busy at their task ; and the 
 occasional bark of a dog, and the distant sound of an 
 evening bell, gave fresh romance to the scene. The 
 reality of many a daydream of childhood, of many a 
 poetic revery of youth, was before me. I stood at 
 sunset amid the luxuriant vineyards of France ! 
 
 The first person I met was a poor old woman, a lit 
 tle bowed down with age, gathering grapes into a large
 
 THE VALLEY OF THE LOIRE. 147 
 
 basket. She was dressed like the poorest class of 
 peasantry, and pursued her solitary task alone, heed 
 less of the cheerful gossip and the merry laugh which 
 came from a band of more youthful vintagers at a 
 short distance from her. She was so intently engaged 
 in her work, that she did not perceive my approach 
 until I bade .her good evening. On hearing my voice, 
 she looked up from her labor, and returned the saluta 
 tion ; and, on my asking her if there were a tavern or 
 a farm-house in the neighborhood where I could pass 
 the night, she showed me the pathway through the 
 vineyard that led to the village, and then added, with 
 a look of curiosity, 
 
 " You must be a stranger, sir, in these parts." 
 
 " Yes ; my home is very far f ron$ here." 
 
 " How far ? " 
 
 " More than a thousand leagues." 
 
 The old woman looked incredulous. 
 
 " I came from a distant land beyond the sea." 
 
 " More than a thousand leagues ! " at length re 
 peated she ; " and why have you come so far from 
 home ? " 
 
 " To travel, to see how you live in this country." 
 
 " Have you no relations in your own ? " 
 
 " Yes ; I have both brothers and sisters, a father 
 and " 
 
 " And a mother ? " 
 
 " Thank Heaven, I have." 
 
 " And did you leave her ? " 
 
 Here the old woman gave me a piercing look of 
 reproof ; shook her head mournfully, and, with a deep 
 sigh, as if some painful recollections had been awak 
 ened in her bosom, turned again to her solitary task. 
 I felt rebuked ; for there is something almost pro*
 
 148 HENRY WADSWORTH LONGFELLOW. 
 
 phetic in the admonitions of the old. The eye of age 
 looks meekly into my heart ! the voice of age echoes 
 mournfully through it! the hoary head and palsied 
 hand of age plead irresistibly for its sympathies ! I 
 venerate old age ; and I love not the man who can 
 look without emotion upon the sunset of life, when 
 the dusk of evening begins to gather over the watery 
 eye, and the shadows of twilight grow broader and 
 deeper upon the understanding ! 
 
 I pursued the pathway which led towards the vil 
 lage, and the next person I encountered was an old 
 man, stretched lazily beneath the vines upon a little 
 strip of turf, at a point where four paths met, forming 
 a crossway in the vineyard. He was clad in a coarse 
 garb of gray, with a pair of long gaiters or spatter 
 dashes. Beside him lay a blue cloth cap, a staff, and 
 an old weather-beaten knapsack. I saw at once that 
 he was a foot-traveller like myself, and therefore, 
 without more ado, entered into conversation with him. 
 From his language, and the peculiar manner in which 
 he now and then wiped his upper lip with the back 
 of his hand, as if in search of the mustache which was 
 no longer there, I judged that he had been a soldier. 
 In this opinion I was not mistaken. He had served 
 under Napoleon, and had followed the imperial eagle 
 across the Alps, and the Pyrenees, and the burning 
 sands of Egypt. Like every vieille moustache, he 
 spake with enthusiasm of the Little Corporal, and 
 cursed the English, the Germans, the Spanish, and 
 every other race on earth, except the Great Nation, 
 his own. 
 
 "I like," said he, "after a long day's march, to 
 lie down in this way upon the grass, and enjoy the 
 cool of the evening. It reminds me of the bivouacs
 
 THE VALLEY OF THE LOIRE. 149 
 
 of other days, and of old friends who are now up 
 there." 
 
 Here he pointed with his finger to the sky. 
 
 "They have reached the last etape before me, in 
 the long march. But I shall go soon. We shall all 
 
 meet again at the last roll-call. Sacre nom de ! 
 
 There 's a tear ! " 
 
 He wiped it away with his sleeve. 
 
 Here our colloquy was interrupted by the approach 
 of a group of vintagers, who were returning homeward 
 from their labor. To this party I joined myself, and 
 invited the old soldier to do the same ; but he shook 
 his head. 
 
 " I thank you ; my pathway lies in a different direc 
 tion." 
 
 " But there is no other village near, and the sun has 
 already set." 
 
 " No matter, I am used to sleeping on the greund. 
 Good night." 
 
 I left the old man to his meditations, and walked 
 on in company with the vintagers. Following a well- 
 trodden pathway through the vineyards, we soon de 
 scended the valley's slope, and I suddenly found my 
 self in the bosom of one of those little hamlets from 
 which the laborer rises to his toil as the skylark to 
 his song. My companions wished me a good night, 
 as each entered his own thatch-roofed cottage, and a 
 little girl led me out to the very inn which an hour or 
 two before I had disdained to enter. 
 
 When I awoke in the morning a brilliant autumnal 
 sun was shining in at my window. The merry song 
 of birds mingled sweetly with the sound of rustling 
 leaves and the gurgle of the brook. The vintagers 
 were going forth to their toil ; the wine-press was
 
 150 HENRY WADSWORTH LONGFELLOW. 
 
 busy in the shade, and the clatter .of the mill kept 
 time to the miller's song. I loitered about the village 
 with a feeling of calm delight. I was unwilling to 
 leave the seclusion of this sequestered hamlet; but 
 at length, with reluctant step, I took the cross-road 
 through the vineyard, and in a moment the little vil 
 lage had sunk again, as if by enchantment, into the 
 bosom of the earth. 
 
 I breakfasted at the town of Mer ; and, leaving the 
 high-road to Blois on the right, passed down to the 
 banks of the Loire, through a long, broad avenue of 
 poplars and sycamores. I crossed the river in a boat, 
 and in the after part of the day I found myself before 
 the high and massive walls of the chateau of Cham- 
 bord. This chateau is one of the finest specimens of 
 the ancient Gothic castle to be found in Europe. The 
 little river Cosson fills its deep and ample moat, and 
 above it the huge towers and heavy battlements rise in 
 stern and solemn grandeur, moss-grown with age, and 
 blackened by the storms of three centuries. Within, 
 all is mournful and deserted. The grass has over 
 grown the pavement of the courtyard, and the rude 
 sculpture upon the walls is broken and defaced. From 
 the courtyard I entered the central tower, and, ascend 
 ing the principal staircase, went out upon the battle 
 ments. I seemed to have stepped back into the pre 
 cincts of the feudal ages ; and, as I passed along 
 through echoing corridors, and vast, deserted halls, 
 stripped of their furniture, and mouldering silently 
 away, the distant past came back upon me ; and the 
 times when the clang of arms, and the tramp of mail- 
 clad men, and the sounds of music and revelry and 
 wassail echoed along those high-vaulted and solitary 
 chambers !
 
 THE VALLEY OF THE LOIRE. 151 
 
 My third day's journey brought me to the ancient 
 city of Blois, the chief town of the department of 
 Loire-et-Cher. This city is celebrated for the purity 
 with which even the lower classes of its inhabitants 
 speak their native tongue. It rises precipitously from 
 the northern bank of the Loire ; and many of its 
 streets are so steep as to be almost impassable for car 
 riages. On the brow of the hill, overlooking the roofs 
 of the city, and commanding a fine view of the Loire 
 and its noble bridge, and the surrounding country, 
 sprinkled with cottages and chateaux, runs an ample 
 terrace, planted with trees, and laid out as a public 
 walk. The view from this terrace is one of the most 
 beautiful in France. But what most strikes the eye of 
 the traveller at Blois is an old, though still unfinished, 
 castle. Its huge parapets of hewn stone stand upon 
 either side of the street ; but they have walled up the 
 wide gateway, from which the colossal drawbridge was 
 to have sprung high in air, connecting together the 
 main towers of the building, and the two hills upon 
 whose slope its foundations stand. The aspect of this 
 vast pile is gloomy and desolate. It seems as if the 
 strong hand of the builder had been arrested in the 
 midst of his task by the stronger hand of death ; and 
 the unfinished fabric stands a lasting monument both 
 of the power and weakness of man, of his vast 
 desires, his sanguine hopes, his ambitious purposes, 
 and of the unlooked-for conclusion, where all these 
 desires and hopes and purposes are so often arrested. 
 There is also at Blois another ancient chateau, to which 
 some historic interest is attached, as being the scene of 
 the massacre of the Duke of Guise. l 
 
 On the following day, I left Blois for Amboise ; 
 
 1 Blois was the place of meeting of the States General in 1588,
 
 152 HENRY WADSWORTH LONGFELLOW. 
 
 and, after walking several leagues along the dusty 
 highway, crossed the river in a boat to the little vil 
 lage of Moines, which lies amid luxuriant vineyards 
 upon the southern bank of the Loire. From Moines 
 to Amboise the road is truly delightful. The rich 
 lowland scenery, by the margin of the river, is verdant 
 even in October ; and occasionally the landscape is 
 diversified with the picturesque cottages of the vin 
 tagers, cut in the rock along the roadside, and over 
 hung by the thick foliage of the vines above them. 
 
 At Amboise I took a cross-road, which led me to 
 the romantic borders of the Cher and the chateau of 
 Chenonceau. This beautiful chateau, as well as that 
 of Chambord, was built by the gay and munificent 
 Francis the First. One is a specimen of strong and 
 massive architecture, a dwelling for a warrior ; but 
 the other is of a lighter and more graceful construc 
 tion, and was destined for those soft languishments of 
 passion with which the fascinating Diane de Poitiers 
 had filled the bosom of that voluptuous monarch. 
 
 The chateau of Chenonceau is built upon arches 
 across the river Cher, whose waters are made to sup 
 ply the deep moat at each extremity. There is a 
 spacious courtyard in front, from which a drawbridge 
 conducts to the outer hall of the castle. There the 
 armor of Francis the First still hangs upon the wall, 
 his shield, and helm, and lance, as if the chival 
 rous prince has just exchanged them for the silken 
 robes of the drawing-room. From this hall a door 
 opens into a long gallery, extending the whole length 
 of the building, across the Cher. The walls of the 
 
 and it was on December 23d of that year that Henry III. caused 
 the murder of the Duke of Guise, an event which grew out of 
 the violence of the religious wars of France.
 
 THE VALLEY OF THE LOIRE. 153 
 
 gallery are hung with the faded portraits of the long 
 line of the descendants of Hugh Capet ; and the win 
 dows, looking up and down the stream, command a 
 fine reach of pleasant river scenery. This is said to 
 be the only chateau in France in which the ancient 
 furniture of its original age is preserved. In one part 
 of the building you are shown the bed-chamber of 
 Diane de Poitiers, with its antique chairs covered with 
 faded damask and embroidery, her bed, and a portrait 
 of the royal favorite hanging over tlie mantelpiece. 
 In another you see the apartment of the infamous 
 Catherine de' Medici ; a venerable arm-chair and an 
 autograph letter of Henry the Fourth ; and in an old 
 laboratory, among broken crucibles, and neckless re 
 torts, and drums, and trumpets, and skins of wild 
 beasts, and other ancient lumber, of various kinds, 
 are to be seen the bed-posts of Francis the First ! 
 Doubtless the naked walls and the vast solitary cham 
 bers of an old and desolate chateau inspire a feeling 
 of greater solemnity and awe ; but when the antique 
 furniture of the olden time remains, the faded tap 
 estry on the walls, and the arm-chair by the fireside, 
 the effect upon the mind is more magical and de 
 lightful. The old inhabitants of the place, long gath 
 ered to their fathers, though living still in history, 
 seem to have left their halls for the chase or the tour 
 nament ; and as the heavy door swings upon its re 
 luctant hinge, one almost expects to see the gallant 
 princes and courtly dames enter those halls again, and 
 sweep in stately procession along the silent corridors. 
 Rapt in such fancies as these, and gazing on the 
 beauties of this noble edifice, and the soft scenery 
 around it, I lingered, unwilling to depart, till the rays 
 of the setting sun, streaming through the dusty win-
 
 154 HENRY WADSWORTH LONGFELLOW. 
 
 dows, admonished me that the day was drawing rap 
 idly to a close. I sallied forth from the southern gate 
 of the chateau, and, crossing the broken drawbridge, 
 pursued a pathway along the bank of the river, still gaz 
 ing back upon those towering walls, now bathed in the 
 rich glow of sunset, till a turn in the road and a clump 
 of woodland at length shut them out from my sight. 
 
 A short time after candle-lighting I reached the 
 little tavern of the Boule d'Or, a few leagues from 
 Tours, where I passed the night. The following morn 
 ing was lowering and sad. A veil of mist hung over 
 the landscape, and ever and anon a heavy shower burst 
 from the overburdened clouds, that were driven by 
 before a high and piercing wind. This unpropitious 
 state of the weather detained me until noon, when a 
 cabriolet for Tours drove up ; and taking a seat within 
 it, I left the hostess of the Boule d'Or in the middle 
 of a long story about a rich countess, who always 
 alighted there when she passed that way. We drove 
 leisurely along through a beautiful country, till at 
 length we came to the brow of a steep hill, which 
 commands a fine view of the city of Tours and its de 
 lightful environs. But the scene was shrouded by the 
 heavy drifting mist, through which I could trace but 
 indistinctly the graceful sweep of the Loire, and the 
 spires and roofs of the city far below me. 
 
 The city of Tours and the delicious plain in which 
 it lies have been too often described by other travel 
 lers to render a new description, from so listless a pen 
 as mine, either necessary or desirable. After a sojourn 
 of two cloudy and melancholy days, I set out on my 
 return to Paris, by the way of Vendome and Chartres. 
 I stopped a few hours at the former place, to exam 
 ine the ruins of a chateau built by Jeanne d'Albret,
 
 THE JOURNEY INTO SPAIN. 155 
 
 mother of Henry the Fourth. It stands upon the 
 summit of a high and precipitous hill, and almost 
 overhangs the town beneath. The French Revolution 
 has completed the ruin that time had already begun ; 
 and nothing now remains but a broken and crumbling 
 bastion, and here and there a solitary tower dropping 
 slowly to decay. In one of these is the grave of Jeanne 
 d'Albret. A marble entablature in the wall above 
 contains the inscription, which is nearly effaced, though 
 enough still remains to tell the curious traveller that 
 there lies buried the mother of the " Bon Henri." To 
 this is added a prayer that the repose of the dead may 
 be respected. 
 
 Here ended my foot excursion. The object of my 
 journey was accomplished ; and, delighted with this 
 short ramble through the valley of the Loire, I took 
 my seat in the diligence for Paris, and on the follow 
 ing day was again swallowed up in the crowds of the 
 metropolis, like a drop in the bosom of the sea. 
 
 IL 
 THE JOURNEY INTO SPAIN. 
 
 A Tissue de 1'yver que le joly temps de primavere commence, et qu'on voit 
 arbres verdoyer, fleurs espauouir, et qu'on oit les oisillons chanter en toute joie et 
 doulceur, tant que les verts bocages retentissent de leurs sons et que coeurs tristes 
 pensifs y dolens s'en esjouissent, s'eineuvent a delaisser deuil et toute tristesse, et 
 se parf orcent a valoir mieux. 
 
 LA PLAISANTE HISTOIEE DE GUERIN DE MONOLAVE. 
 
 SOFT - BREATHING Spring ! how many pleasant 
 thoughts, how many delightful recollections, does thy 
 name awaken in the mind of a traveller ! Whether 
 he has followed thee by the banks of the Loire or the 
 Guadalquivir, or traced thy footsteps slowly climbing
 
 156 HENRY WADSWORTH LONGFELLOW. 
 
 the sunny slope of Alp or Apennine, the thought of 
 thee shall summon up sweet visions of the past, and 
 thy golden sunshine and soft vapory atmosphere be 
 come a portion of his day-dreams and of him. Sweet 
 images of thee, and scenes that have oft inspired the 
 poet's song, shall mingle in his recollections of the 
 past. The shooting of the tender leaf, the sweet 
 ness and elasticity of the air, the blue sky, the 
 fleet-drifting cloud, and the flocks of wild fowl 
 wheeling in long-drawn phalanx through the air, and 
 screaming from their dizzy height, all these shall 
 pass like a dream before his imagination, 
 
 " And gently o'er his memory come at times 
 A glimpse of joys that had their birth in thee, 
 Like a brief strain of some forgotten tune." 
 
 It was at the opening of this delightful season of 
 the year that I passed through the South of France, 
 and took the road of St. Jean de Luz for the Spanish 
 frontier. I left Bordeaux amid all the noise and gay- 
 ety of the last scene of Carnival. The streets and 
 public walks of the city were full of merry groups in 
 masks, at every corner crowds were listening to the 
 discordant music of the wandering ballad-singer ; and 
 grotesque figures, mounted on high stilts, and dressed 
 in the garb of the peasants of the Landes of Gascony, 
 were stalking up and down like so many long-legged 
 cranes ; others were amusing themselves with the tricks 
 and grimaces of little monkeys, disguised like little 
 men, bowing to the ladies, and figuring away in red 
 coats and ruffles ; and here and there a band of chim 
 ney-sweeps were staring in stupid wonder at the mira 
 cles of a showman's box. In a word, all was so full 
 of mirth and merrimake, that even beggary seemed to 
 have forgotten that it was wretched, and gloried in 
 the ragged masquerade of one poor holiday.
 
 THE JOURNEY INTO SPAIN. 157 
 
 To this scene of noise and gayety succeeded the 
 silence and solitude of the Landes of Gascony. The 
 road from Bordeaux to Bayonne winds along through 
 immense pine forests and sandy plains, spotted here 
 and there with a dingy little hovel, and the silence is 
 interrupted only by the dismal hollow roar of the wind 
 among the melancholy and majestic pines. Occasion 
 ally, however, the way is enlivened by a market-town 
 or a straggling village ; and I still recollect the feel 
 ings of delight which I experienced, when, just after 
 sunset, we passed through the romantic town of Roque 
 fort, built upon the sides of the green valley of the 
 Douze, which has scooped out a verdant hollow for it 
 to nestle in, amid those barren. tracts of sand. 
 
 On leaving Bayonne the scene assumes a character 
 of greater beauty and sublimity. To the vast forests 
 of the Landes of Gascony succeeds a scene of pictur 
 esque beauty, delightful to the traveller's eye. Before 
 him rise the snowy Pyrenees, a long line of undu 
 lating hills, 
 
 " Bounded afar by peak aspiring bold, 
 Like giant capped with helm of burnished gold." 
 
 To the left, as far as the eye can reach, stretch the 
 delicious valleys of the Nive and Adour ; and to the 
 right the sea flashes along the pebbly margin of its 
 silver beach, forming a thousand little bays and inlets, 
 or comes tumbling in among the cliffs of a rock-bound 
 coast, and beats against its massive barriers with a 
 distant, hollow, continual roar. 
 
 Should these pages meet the eye of any solitary 
 traveller who is journeying into Spain by the road 
 I here speak of, I would advise him to travel from 
 Bayonne to St. Jean de Luz on horseback. At the 
 gate of Bayonne he will find a steed ready capari-
 
 158 HENRY WADSWORTH LONGFELLOW. 
 
 aoned for him, with a dark-eyed Basque girl for his 
 companion and guide, who is to sit beside him upon 
 the same horse. This style of travelling is, I believe, 
 peculiar to the Basque provinces ; at all events, I have 
 seen it nowhere else. The saddle is constructed with 
 a large frame-work extending on each side, and cov 
 ered with cushions ; and the traveller and his guide, 
 being placed on the opposite extremities, serve as a 
 balance to each other. We overtook many travellers 
 mounted in this way, and I could not help thinking it 
 a mode of travelling far preferable to being cooped 
 up in a diligence. The Basque girls are generally 
 beautiful ; and there was one of these merry guides 
 we met upon the road to Bidart whose image haunts 
 me still. She had large and expressive black eyes, 
 teeth like pearls, a rich and sunburnt complexion, and 
 hair of a glossy blackness, parted on the forehead, and 
 falling down behind in a large braid, so long as al 
 most to touch the ground with the little ribbon that 
 confined it at the end. She wore the common dress 
 of the peasantry of the South of France, and a large 
 gypsy straw hat was thrown back over her shoulder, 
 and tied by a ribbon about her neck. There was 
 hardly a dusty traveller in the coach who did not envy 
 her companion the seat he occupied beside her. 
 
 Just at nightfall we entered the town of St. Jean 
 de Luz, and dashed down its narrow streets at full 
 gallop. The little madcap postilion cracked his 
 knotted whip incessantly, and the sound echoed back 
 from the high dingy walls like the report of a pistol. 
 The coach-wheels nearly touched the houses on each 
 side of us ; the idlers in the street jumped right and 
 left to save themselves ; window-shutters flew open in 
 all directions ; a thousand heads popped out from eel-
 
 THE JOURNEY INTO SPAIN. 159 
 
 lar and upper story ; " Sacr-r-re matin I " shouted the 
 postilion, and we rattled on like an earthquake. 
 
 St. Jean de Luz is a smoky little fishing town, situ 
 ated on the low grounds at the mouth of the Nivelle, 
 and a bridge connects it with the faubourg of Si- 
 bourne, which stands on the opposite bank of the river. 
 I had no time, however, to note the peculiarities of 
 the place, for I was whirled out of it with the same 
 speed and confusion with which I had been whirled 
 in, and I can only recollect the sweep of the road 
 across the Nivelle, the church of Sibourne by the 
 water's edge, the narrow streets, the smoky-look 
 ing houses with red window-shutters, and "a very 
 ancient and fish-like smell." 
 
 I passed by moonlight the little river Bidasoa, 
 which forms the boundary between France and Spain ; 
 and when the morning broke, found myself far up 
 among the mountains of San Salvador, the most west 
 erly links of the great Pyrenean chain. The moun 
 tains around me were neither rugged nor precipitous, 
 but they rose one above another in a long, majestic 
 swell, and the trace of the ploughshare was occasion 
 ally visible to their summits. They seemed entirely 
 destitute of trees ; and as the season of vegetation had 
 not yet commenced, their huge outlines lay black, and 
 barren, and desolate against the sky. But it was a 
 glorious morning, and the sun rose up into a cloudless 
 heaven, and poured a flood of gorgeous splendor over 
 the mountain landscape, as if proud of the realm he 
 shone upon. The scene was enlivened by the dashing 
 of a swollen mountain-brook, whose course we fol 
 lowed for miles down the valley, as it leaped onward 
 to its journey's end, now breaking into a white cas 
 cade, and now foaming and chafing beneath a rustic
 
 160 HENRY WADSWORTH LONGFELLOW. 
 
 bridge. Now and then we drove through a dilapi 
 dated town, with a group of idlers at every corner, 
 wrapped in tattered brown cloaks, and smoking their 
 little paper cigars in the sun; then would succeed a 
 desolate tract of country, cheered only by the tinkle 
 of a mule-bell, or the song of a muleteer ; then we 
 would meet a solitary traveller mounted on horse 
 back, and wrapped in the ample folds of his cloak, 
 with a gun hanging at the pommel of his saddle. 
 Occasionally, too, among the bleak, inhospitable hills, 
 we passed a rude little chapel, with a cluster of ruined 
 cottages around it ; and whenever our carriage stopped 
 at the relay, or loitered slowly up the hillside, a crowd 
 of children would gather around us, with little images 
 and crucifixes for sale, curiously ornamented with rib 
 bons and bits of tawdry finery. 
 
 A day's journey from the frontier brought us to 
 Vitoria, where the diligence stopped for the night. I 
 spent the scanty remnant of daylight in rambling 
 about the streets of the city, with no other guide 
 than the whim of the moment. Now I plunged down 
 a dark and narrow alley, now emerged into a wide 
 street or a spacious market-place, and now aroused 
 the drowsy echoes of a church or cloister with the 
 sound of my intruding footsteps. But descriptions 
 of churches and public squares are dull and tedious 
 matters for those readers who are in search of amuse 
 ment, and not of instruction ; and if any one has ac 
 companied me thus far on my fatiguing journey 
 towards the Spanish capital, I will readily excuse him 
 from the toil of an evening ramble through the streets 
 of Vitoria. 
 
 On the following morning we left the town, long 
 before daybreak, and during our forenoon's journey
 
 THE JOURNEY INTO SPAIN. 161 
 
 the postilion drew up at an inn, on the southern slope 
 of the Sierra de San Lorenzo, in the province of Old 
 Castile. The house was an old, dilapidated tenement, 
 built of rough stone, and coarsely plastered upon the 
 outside. The tiled roof had long been the sport of 
 wind and rain, the motley coat of plaster was broken 
 and time-worn, and the whole building sadly out of re 
 pair ; though the fanciful mouldings under the eaves, 
 and the curious carved wood-work that supported the 
 little balcony over the principal entrance, spoke of 
 better days gone by. The whole building reminded 
 me of a dilapidated Spanish Don, down at the heel 
 and out at elbows, but with here and there a remnant 
 of former magnificence peeping through the loopholes 
 of his tattered cloak. 
 
 A wide gateway ushered the traveller into the inte 
 rior of the building, and conducted him to a low-roofed 
 apartment, paved with round stones, and serving both 
 as a courtyard and a stable. It seemed to be a neutral 
 ground for man and beast, a little republic, where 
 horse and rider had common privileges, and mule and 
 muleteer lay cheek by jowl. In one corner a poor 
 jackass was patiently devouring a bundle of musty 
 straw, in another, its master lay sound asleep, with 
 his saddle-cloth for a pillow ; here a group of muleteers 
 were quarrelling over a pack of dirty cards, and 
 there the village barber, with a self-important air, 
 stood laving the Alcalde's chin from the helmet of 
 Mambrino. On the wall, a little taper glimmered 
 feebly before an image of St. Anthony ; directly oppo 
 site these a leathern wine-bottle hung by the neck 
 from a pair of ox-horns ; and the pavement below was 
 covered with a curious medley of boxes, and bags, and 
 cloaks, and pack-saddles, and sacks of grain, and skins 
 of wine, and all kinds of lumber.
 
 162 HENRY WADSWORTH LONGFELLOW. 
 
 A small door upon the right led us into the inn- 
 kitchen. It was a room about ten feet square, and 
 literally all chimney ; for the hearth was in the centre 
 of the floor, and the walls sloped upward in the form 
 of a long, narrow pyramid, with an opening at the top 
 for the escape of the smoke. Quite round this little 
 room ran a row of benches, upon which sat one or 
 two grave personages smoking paper cigars. Upon 
 the hearth blazed a handful of fagots, whose bright 
 flame danced merrily among a motley congregation of 
 pots and kettles, and a long wreath of smoke wound 
 lazily up through the huge tunnel of the roof above. 
 The walls were black with soot, and ornamented with 
 sundry legs of bacon and festoons of sausages ; and as 
 there were no windows in this dingy abode, the only 
 light which cheered the darkness within came flicker 
 ing from the fire upon the hearth, and the smoky sun 
 beams that peeped down the long-necked chimney. 
 
 I had not been long seated by the fire, when the 
 tinkling of mule-bells, the clatter of hoofs, and the 
 hoarse voice of a muleteer in the outer apartment, an 
 nounced the arrival of new guests. A few moments 
 afterward the kitchen-door opened, and a person en 
 tered, whose appearance strongly arrested my atten 
 tion. It was a tall, athletic figure, with the majestic 
 carriage of a grandee, and a dark, sunburnt counte 
 nance, that indicated an age of about fifty years. His 
 dress was singular, and such as I had not before seen. 
 He wore a round hat with wide, flapping brim, from 
 beqeath which his long, black hair hung in curls upon 
 his shoulders ; a leather jerkin, with cloth sleeves, de 
 scended to his hips ; around his waist was closely 
 buckled a leather belt, with a cartouch-box on one 
 side ; r, pair of loose trousers of black serge hung in
 
 THE JOURNEY INTO SPAIN. 163 
 
 ample folds to the knees, around which they were 
 closely gathered by embroidered garters of blue silk ; 
 and black broadcloth leggins, buttoned close to the 
 calves, and strapped over a pair of brown leather 
 shoes, completed the singular dress of the stranger. 
 He doffed his hat as he entered, and, saluting the 
 company with a " Dios guarde d ustedes, caballeros " 
 (God guard you, gentlemen), took a seat by the fire, 
 and entered into conversation with those around him. 
 
 As my curiosity was not a little excited by the 
 peculiar dress of this person, I inquired of a travel 
 ling companion, who sat at my elbow, who and what 
 this new-comer was. From him I learned that he was 
 a muleteer of the Maragateria, a name given to a 
 cluster of small towns which lie in the mountainous 
 country between Astorga and Villaf ranca, in the west 
 ern corner of the kingdom of Leon. 
 
 " Nearly every province in Spain," said he, " has its 
 peculiar costume, as you will see, when you have ad 
 vanced farther into our country. For instance, the 
 Catalonians wear crimson caps, hanging down upon 
 the shoulder like a sack ; wide pantaloons of green 
 velvet, long enough in the waistband to cover the 
 whole breast ; and a little strip of a jacket, made of 
 the same material, and so short as to bring the pocket 
 directly under the armpit. The Valencians, on the 
 contrary, go almost naked : a linen shirt, white linen 
 trousers, reaching no lower than the knees, and a pair 
 of coarse leather sandals complete their simple garb ; 
 it is only in midwinter that they indulge in the luxury 
 of a jacket. The most beautiful and expensive cos 
 tume, however, is that of Andalusia ; it consists of a 
 velvet jacket, faced .with rich and various-colored em 
 broidery, and covered with tassels and silken cord ; a
 
 164 HENRY WADSWORTH LONGFELLOW. 
 
 waistcoat of some gay color; a silken handkerchief 
 round the neck, and a crimson sash round the waist ; 
 breeches that button down each side ; gaiters and 
 shoes of white leather ; and a handkerchief of bright- 
 colored silk wound about the head like a turban, and 
 surmounted by a velvet cap or a little round hat, with 
 a wide band, and an abundance of silken loops and 
 tassels. The Old Castilians are more grave in their 
 attire : they wear a leather breastplate instead of a 
 jacket, breeches and leggins, and a montera cap. This 
 fellow is a Maragato ; and in the villages of the Mar- 
 agateria the costume varies a little from the rest of 
 Leon and Castile." 
 
 " If he is indeed a Maragato," said I, jestingly, 
 "who knows but he may be a descendant of the 
 muleteer who behaved so naughtily at Cacabelos, as 
 related in the second chapter of the veracious history 
 of Gil Bias de Santillana?" 
 
 " I Quien sabe ? " 1 was the reply. " Notwithstand 
 ing the pride which even the meanest Castilian feels 
 in counting over a long line of good-for-nothing ances 
 tors, the science of genealogy has become of late a 
 very intricate study in Spain." 
 
 Here our conversation was cut short by the Mayoral 
 of the diligence, who came to tell us that mules were 
 
 o 
 
 waiting ; and before many hours had elapsed we were 
 scrambling through the square of the ancient city of 
 Burjros. On the morrow we crossed the river Duero 
 
 o 
 
 and the Guadarrama Mountains, and early in the 
 afternoon entered the " Heroica Villa," of Madrid, by 
 the Puerta de Fuencarral. 
 
 1 In Spanish use an inverted interrogation mark precedes a 
 question.
 
 JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER. 
 
 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 THE circumstances attending the production of most of 
 Whittier's prose writings have not been favorable to sus 
 tained composition. Much of his work has been in the form 
 of contributions to journals which he has edited, and the 
 three volumes which now constitute his collected prose 
 writings have been gathered from these occasional papers, 
 the only extended work being in Leaves from Margaret 
 Smith's Journal, an imitative work, suggested, no doubt, by 
 the successful Lady Willoughby's Diary. In that work he 
 has given a picture of the New England of the last quarter 
 of the seventeenth century, when a heroic life had become 
 somewhat hardened by prosperity and authority into intol 
 erance, and the superstitious alloy of religious life had 
 become prominent by the decline of a living faith. Him 
 self of Quaker descent and belief, he has touched kindly but 
 firmly the changing life of the day which culminated in the 
 witchcraft delusion and displayed itself in the persecution of 
 the Quakers. Yet the best life of the day, whether Puritan 
 or Quaker, is reproduced in the book, and the changing ele 
 ments of a transition period are all clearly presented. The 
 studied and imitative form of the book prevents it from 
 enjoying a wide popularity, but the genuineness of the spirit, 
 and the graceful style in which the Puritan maiden's diary 
 is preserved render it one of the best mediums for approach 
 ing a difficult period of New England history. The reader 
 will find it interesting to compare with it the historical
 
 166 JOHN GREEN LEAF WHITTIER. 
 
 record of Robert Pike, presented in The New Puritan* a 
 sketch by James S. Pike. 
 
 The subjects which are prominent in Whittier's verse 
 appear also in his prose. The superstitions of New Eng 
 land were treated of by him in a small volume which has 
 not been kept in print, The Supernaturalism of New Eng 
 land; the heroic lives of men and women content to be true 
 to duty and God, and gaining their distinction often by 
 their patience under suffering, are reproduced in a series of 
 papers entitled Old Portraits and Modern Sketches ; the 
 homely beauty of a life of toil is recorded in the papers 
 which make up the little volume, The Stranger in Lowell, 
 ' which was published in 1845 and has since been merged, in 
 part, in the first volume of his prose works, under the gen 
 eral title of Tales and Sketches. He was engaged at this 
 time in the conduct of a paper in Lowell, and the life about 
 him suggested occasional essays upon topics free from poli 
 tical feeling; two of the papers then published are here given, 
 and they serve in a measure to illustrate his interest in life 
 and history, for an unfailing attribute of his writing has been 
 his sympathy with homely forms of life about him ; and the 
 interest which he has shown in that part of history which 
 deals with the relations of the Indian to the white man. may 
 be referred in part to his traditional Quaker principle, in 
 part to his instinctive championship of the weak and 
 wronged. In a prefatory note to one of his prose volumes 
 he speaks lightly of his work, which, as there given, was 
 rather a relief from severer tasks than itself serious and 
 deliberate, but the spirit which pervades all his writings, 
 whether in prose or in verse, is the same, and the recrea 
 tions of a man of serious and simple purpose rarely fail to 
 disclose his character and temper. The absence of mere 
 
 1 The New Puritan. New England two hundred years ago. 
 Some account of the life of Robert Pike, the Puritan who de 
 fended the Quakers, resisted clerical domination, and opposed 
 the witchcraft persecution. By James S. Pike. New York, 
 Harper and Brothers, 1879.
 
 INTRODUCTION. 167 
 
 moods in Whittier's writings is a singular testimony to the 
 elevation of his common thought, and the simplicity of his 
 aims in literature appears quite as significantly in his desul 
 tory prose as in his more deliberate poetry. At no time 
 does the reader seem to pass out of the presence of an ear 
 nest man into that of a professional litterateur ; the care 
 lessness of literary fame which Whittier has shown may he 
 referred to the sincerity of his devotion to that which litera 
 ture effects, and he has written and sung out of a heart very 
 much in earnest to offer some help, or out of the pleasure 
 of his work. The careful student of his writings will always 
 value most the integrity of his life.
 
 YANKEE GYPSIES. 
 
 " Here 's to budgets, packs, and wallets ; 
 Here 's to all the wandering train." 
 
 BURNS. 1 
 
 I CONFESS it, I am keenly sensitive to " skyey in 
 fluences." 2 I profess no indifference to the move 
 ments of that capricious old gentleman known as the 
 clerk of the weather. I cannot conceal my interest in 
 the behavior of that patriarchal bird whose wooden 
 similitude gyrates on the church spire. Winter 
 proper is well enough. Let the thermometer go to 
 zero if it will ; so much the better, if thereby the very 
 winds are frozen and unable to flap their stiff wings. 
 Sounds of bells in the keen air, clear, musical, heart- 
 inspiring ; quick tripping of fair moccasined feet on 
 glittering ice pavements ; bright eyes glancing above 
 the uplifted muff like a sultana's behind the folds of 
 her yashmak ; 3 schoolboys coasting down street like 
 
 1 From the closing air in The Jolly Beggars, a cantata. 
 
 " A breath tho^u art 
 Servile to all the skyey influences, 
 That dost this habitation, where thou keep'st, 
 Hourly afflict." 
 
 Shakespeare : Measure for Measure, act III. scene 1. 
 8 " She turns and turns again, and carefully glances around 
 her on all sides, to see that she is safe from the eyes of Mussul 
 mans, and then suddenly withdrawing the yashmak she shines 
 upon your heart and soul with all the pomp and might of her 
 beauty." Kinglake's Eothen, chap. iii. In a note to Yashmak
 
 YANKEE GYPSIES. 169 
 
 mad Greenlanders ; the cold brilliance of oblique sun 
 beams flashing back from wide surfaces of glittering 
 snow, or blazing upon ice jewelry of tree and roof : 
 there is nothing in all this to complain of. A storm 
 of summer has its redeeming sublimities, its slow, 
 upheaving mountains of cloud glooming in the west 
 ern horizon like new-created volcanoes, veined with 
 fire, shattered by exploding thunders. Even the wild 
 gales of the equinox have their varieties, sounds of 
 wind-shaken woods and waters, creak and clatter of 
 sign and casement, hurricane puffs, and down-rushing 
 rain-spouts. But this dull, dark autumn day of thaw 
 and rain, when the very clouds seem too spiritless and 
 languid to storm outright or take themselves out of 
 the way of fair weather ; wet beneath and above, 
 reminding one of that rayless atmosphere of Dante's 
 Third Circle, where the infernal Priessnitz 1 adminis 
 ters his hydropathic torment, 
 
 " A heavy, curse'd, and relentless drench, 
 The land it soaks is putrid ; " 
 
 or rather, as everything animate and inanimate is 
 seething in warm mist, suggesting the idea that Na 
 ture, grown old and rheumatic, is trying the efficacy 
 of a Thomsonian steam-box 2 on a grand scale ; no 
 
 Kinglake explains that it is not a mere semi-transparent veil, 
 but thoroughly conceals all the features except the eyes : it ia 
 withdrawn by being pulled down. 
 
 1 Vincenz Priessnitz was the originator of the water-cure. 
 After experimenting upon himself and his neighbors he took up 
 the profession of hydropathy and established baths at his native 
 place, Grafenberg in Silesia, in 1829. He died in 1851. 
 
 2 Dr. Samuel Thomson, a New Hampshire physician, advo^ 
 cated the use of the steam bath as a restorer of the system when 
 diseased. He died in 1843 and left behind an autobiography 
 (Life, and Medical Discoveries) which contains a record of the 
 persecutions he underwent.
 
 170 JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER. 
 
 sounds save the heavy plash of muddy feet on the 
 pavements ; the monotonous, melancholy drip from 
 trees and roofs ; the distressful gurgling of water- 
 ducts, swallowing the dirty amalgam of the gutters ; 
 a dim, leaden-colored horizon of only a few yards in 
 diameter, shutting down about one, beyond which 
 nothing is visible save in faint line or dark projection ; 
 the ghost of a church spire or the eidolon of a chim 
 ney-pot, he who can extract pleasurable emotions 
 from the alembic of such a day has a trick of alchemy 
 with which I am wholly unacquainted. 
 
 Hark ! a rap at my door. Welcome anybody just 
 now. One gains nothing by attempting to shut out 
 the sprites of the weather. They come in at the key 
 hole ; they peer through the dripping panes ; they 
 insinuate themselves through the crevices of the case 
 ment, or plump down chimney astride of the rain 
 drops. 
 
 I rise and throw open the door. A tall, shambling, 
 loose-jointed figure ; a pinched, shrewd face, sun-brown 
 and wind-dried ; small, quick-winking black eyes, 
 there he stands, the water dripping from his pulpy 
 hat and ragged elbows. 
 
 I speak to him ; but he returns no answer. With 
 a dumb show of misery, quite touching, he hands 
 me a soiled piece of parchment, whereon I read what 
 purports to be a melancholy account of shipwreck 
 and disaster, to the particular detriment, loss, and 
 damnification of one Pietro Frugoni, who is, in conse 
 quence, sorely in want of the alms of all charitable 
 Christian persons, and who is, in short, the bearer 
 of this veracious document, duly certified and in 
 dorsed by an Italian consul in one of our Atlantic 
 cities, of a high-sounding, but to Yankee organs un 
 pronounceable, name.
 
 YANKEE GYPSIES. 171 
 
 Here commences a struggle. Every man, the Ma 
 hometans tell us, has two attendant angels, the 
 good one on his right shoulder, the bad on his left. 
 " Give," says Benevolence, as with some difficulty I 
 fish up a small coin from the depths of my pocket. 
 " Not a cent," says selfish Prudence ; and I drop it 
 from my fingers. " Think," says the good angel, " of 
 the poor stranger in a strange land, just escaped from 
 the terrors of the sea-storm, in which his little prop 
 erty has perished, thrown half-naked and helpless on 
 our shores, ignorant of our language, and unable to 
 find employment suited to his capacity." " A vile im 
 postor ! " replies the left-hand sentinel ; " his paper 
 purchased from one of those ready-writers in New York 
 who manufacture beggar-credentials at the low price 
 of one dollar per copy, with earthquakes, fires, or ship 
 wrecks, to suit customers." 
 
 Amidst this confusion of tongues I take another 
 survey of my visitant. Ha ! a light dawns upon me. 
 That shrewd, old face, with its sharp, winking eyes, is 
 no stranger to me. Pietro Frugoni, I have seen thee 
 before. /S7, signor, that face of thine has looked at 
 me over a dirty white neckcloth, with the corners of 
 that cunning mouth drawn downwards, and those 
 small eyes turned up in sanctimonious gravity, while 
 thou wast offering to a crowd of half-grown boys an 
 extemporaneous exhortation in the capacity of a travel 
 ling preacher. Have I not seen it peering out from 
 under a blanket, as that of a poor Penobscot Indian, 
 who had lost the use of his hands while trapping on 
 the Madawaska? Is it not the face of the forlorn 
 father of six small children, whom the " marcury doc 
 tors " had " pisened " and crippled ? Did it not be 
 long to that down-east unfortunate who had been
 
 172 JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER. 
 
 out to the " Genesee country " 1 and got the " fevern- 
 nager," and whose hand shook so pitifully when held 
 out to receive my poor gift ? The same, under all 
 disguises, Stephen Leathers, of Barrington, him, 
 and none other ! Let me conjure him into his own 
 likeness : 
 
 " Well, Stephen, what news from old Barrington ? " 
 
 " Oh, well, I thought I knew ye," he answers, not 
 the least disconcerted. " How do you do ? and how 's 
 your folks ? All well, I hope. I took this 'ere paper, 
 you see, to help a poor f urriner, who could n't make 
 himself understood any more than a wild goose. I 
 thought I 'd just start him for'ard a little. It seemed 
 a marcy to do it." 
 
 Well and shiftily answered, thou ragged Proteus. 
 One cannot be angry with such a fellow. I will just 
 inquire into the present state of his Gospel mission 
 and about the condition of his tribe on the Penobscot ; 
 and it may be not amiss to congratulate him on the 
 success of the steam-doctors in sweating the " pisen " 
 of the regular faculty out of him. But he evidently 
 has no wish to enter into idle conversation. Intent 
 upon his benevolent errand he is already clattering 
 down stairs. Involuntarily I glance out of the win 
 dow just in season to catch a single glimpse of him 
 ere he is swallowed up in the mist. 
 
 He has gone ; and, knave as he is, I can hardly 
 help exclaiming, " Luck go with him ! " He has 
 
 1 The Genesee country is the name by which the western part 
 of New York, bordering on Lakes Ontario and Erie, was known, 
 when, at the close of the last and beginning of this century, it 
 was to people on the Atlantic coast the Great West. In 1792 
 communication was opened by a road with the Pennsylvania 
 settlements, but the early settlers were almost all from New 
 England.
 
 YANKEE GYPSIES. 173 
 
 broken in upon the sombre train of my thoughts and 
 called up before me pleasant and grateful recollec 
 tions. The old farm-house nestling in its valley ; 
 hills stretching off to the south and green meadows to 
 the east ; the small stream which came noisily down 
 its ravine, washing the old garden-wall and softly lap 
 ping on fallen stones and mossy roots of beeches and 
 hemlocks ; the tall sentinel poplars at the gateway ; 
 the oak-forest, sweeping unbroken to the northern ho 
 rizon ; the grass-grown carriage-path, with its rude 
 and crazy bridge, the dear old landscape of my 
 boyhood lies outstretched before me like a daguerreo 
 type from that picture within, which I have borne 
 with me in all my wanderings. I am a boy again, 
 once more conscious of the feeling, half terror, half 
 exultation, with which I used to announce the ap 
 proach of this very vagabond and his " kindred after 
 the flesh." 
 
 The advent of wandering beggars, or "old strag 
 glers," as we were wont to call them, was an event 
 of no ordinary interest in the generally monotonous 
 quietude of our farm-life. Many of them were 
 well known ; they had their periodical revolutions 
 and transits ; we would calculate them like eclipses 
 or new moons. Some were sturdy knaves, fat and 
 saucy ; and, whenever they ascertained that the " men 
 folks " were absent, would order provisions and cider 
 like men who expected to pay for them, seating them 
 selves at the hearth or table with the air of Fal- 
 staff, " Shall I not take mine ease in mine inn ? " 
 Others, poor, pale, patient, like Sterne's monk, 1 came 
 creeping up to the door, hat in hand, standing there 
 
 1 Whom he met at Calais, as described in his Sentimental 
 Journey.
 
 174 JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER. 
 
 in their gray wretchedness with a look of heartbreak 
 and forlornness which was never without its effect on 
 our juvenile sensibilities. At times, however, we ex 
 perienced a slight revulsion of feeling when even these 
 humblest children of sorrow somewhat petulantly re 
 jected our proffered bread and cheese, and demanded 
 instead a glass of cider. Whatever the temperance 
 society might in such cases have done, it was not in 
 our hearts to refuse the poor creatures a draught of 
 their favorite beverage ; and was n't it a satisfaction 
 to see their sad, melancholy faces light up as we 
 handed them the full pitcher, and, on receiving it back 
 empty from their brown, wrinkled hands, to hear them, 
 half breathless from their long, delicious draught, 
 thanking us for the favor, as " dear, good children " ! 
 Not unfrequently these wandering tests of our benev 
 olence made their appearance in interesting groups of 
 man, woman, and child, picturesque in their squalid- 
 ness, and manifesting a maudlin affection which would 
 have done honor to the revellers at Poosie-Nansie's, 
 immortal in the cantata of Burns. 1 I remember some 
 who were evidently the victims of monomania, - 
 haunted and hunted by some dark thought, pos 
 sessed by a fixed idea. One, a black-eyed, wild-haired 
 woman, with a whole tragedy of sin, shame, and suf 
 fering written in her countenance, used often to visit 
 us, warm herself by our winter fire, and supply herself 
 
 1 The cantata is The Jolly Beggars, from which the motto 
 heading this sketch was taken. Poosie-Nansie was the keeper 
 of a tavern in Mauchline, which was the favorite resort of the 
 lame sailors, maimed soldiers, travelling ballad-singers, and ali 
 such loose companions as hang about the skirts of society. The 
 cantata has for its theme the rivalry of a " pigmy scraper with 
 his fiddle" and a strolling tinker for a beggar woman : hence 
 the maudlin affection.
 
 YANKEE GYPSIES. 175 
 
 with a stock of cakes and cold meat ; but was never 
 known to answer a question or to ask one. She never 
 smiled ; the cold, stony look of her eye never changed ; 
 a silent, impassive face, ft-ozen rigid by some great 
 wrong or sin. We used to look with awe upon the 
 " still woman," and think of the demoniac of Scrip 
 ture who had a " dumb spirit." 
 
 One I think I see him now, grim, gaunt, and 
 ghastly, working his slow way up to our door used 
 to gather herbs by the wayside and called himself doc 
 tor. He was bearded like a he-goat, and used to 
 counterfeit lameness ; yet, when he supposed himself 
 alone, would travel on lustily, as if walking for a 
 wager. At length, as if in punishment of his deceit, 
 he met with an accident in his rambles and became 
 lame in earnest, hobbling ever after with difficulty on 
 his gnarled crutches. Another used to go stooping, 
 like Bunyan's pilgrim, under a pack made of an old 
 bed-sacking, stuffed out into most plethoric dimen 
 sions, tottering on a pair of small, meagre legs, and 
 peering out with his wild, hairy face from under his 
 burden like a big-bodied spider. That " man with the 
 pack " always inspired me with awe and reverence. 
 Huge, almost sublime, in its tense rotundity, the fa 
 ther of all packs, never laid aside and never opened, 
 what might there not be within it ? With what flesh- 
 creeping curiosity I used to walk round about it at 
 a safe distance, half expecting to see its striped cover 
 ing stirred by the motions of a mysterious life, or that 
 some evil monsters would leap out of it, like robbers 
 from Ali Baba's jars or armed men from the Trojan 
 horse ! 
 
 There was another class of peripatetic philosophers 
 half pedler, half mendicant who were in the habifc
 
 176 JOHN GREENLEAF WHITT1ER. 
 
 of visiting us. One we recollect, a lame, unshaven, 
 sinister-eyed, unwholesome fellow, with his basket of 
 old newspapers and pamphlets, and his tattered blue 
 umbrella, serving rather as a walking-staff than as a 
 protection from the rain. He told us on one occasion, 
 in answer to our inquiring into the cause of his lame 
 ness, that when a young man he was employed on the 
 farm of the chief magistrate of a neighboring State ; 
 where, as his ill luck would have it, the governor's 
 handsome daughter fell in love with him. He was 
 caught one day in the young lady's room by her 
 father ; whereupon the irascible old gentleman pitched 
 him unceremoniously out of the window, laming him 
 for life, on a brick pavement below, like Vulcan on 
 the rocks of Lemnos. 1 As for the lady, he assured us 
 " she took on dreadfully about it." " Did she die ? " 
 we inquired, anxiously. There was a cunning twinkle 
 in the old rogue's eye as he responded, " Well, no, 
 she did n't. She got married." 
 
 Twice a year, usually in the spring and autumn, we 
 were honored with a call from Jonathan Plummer, 
 maker of verses, pedler and poet, physician and par 
 son, a Yankee troubadour, first and last minstrel 
 of the valley of the Merrimac, encircled, to my won 
 dering young eyes, with the very nimbus of immor 
 tality. He brought with him pins, needles, tape, and 
 cotton-thread for my mother ; jack-knives, razors, and 
 soap for my father ; and verses of his own composing, 
 coarsely printed and illustrated with rude wood-cuts, 
 for the delectation of the 'younger branches of the 
 family. No love-sick youth could drown himself, no v 
 
 1 It was upon the Isle of Lemnos that Vnlcan was flung by 
 Jupiter, according to the myth, for attempting to aid his mother 
 Juno.
 
 YANKEE GYPSIES. 177 
 
 deserted maiden bewail the moon, no rogue mount the 
 gallows, without fitting memorial in Plummer's verses. 
 Earthquakes, fires, fevers, and shipwrecks he regarded 
 as personal favors from Providence, furnishing the 
 raw material of song and ballad. Welcome to us in 
 our country seclusion, as Autolycus to the clown in 
 " Winter's Tale," 1 we listened with infinite satisfac 
 tion to his reading of his own verses, or to his ready 
 improvisation upon some domestic incident or topic 
 suggested by his auditors. When once fairly over the 
 difficulties at the outset of a new subject his rhymes 
 flowed freely, " as if he had eaten ballads, and all 
 men's ears grew to his tunes." His productions 
 answered, as nearly as I can remember, to Shake 
 speare's description of a proper ballad, " doleful 
 matter merrily set down, or a very pleasant theme sung 
 lamentably." He was scrupulously conscientious, de 
 vout, inclined to theological disquisitions, and withal 
 mighty in Scripture. He was thoroughly indepen 
 dent ; flattered nobody, cared for nobody, trusted no 
 body. When invited to sit down at our dinner-table 
 he invariably took the precaution to place his basket 
 of valuables between his legs for safe keeping. " Never 
 mind thy basket, Jonathan," said my father ; " we 
 shan't steal thy verses." " I 'm not sure of that," 
 returned the suspicious guest. " It is written, ' Trust 
 ye not in any brother.' " 
 
 Thou, too, O Parson B., with thy pale student's 
 brow and rubicund nose, with thy rusty and tattered 
 
 1 "He could never come better," says the clown in Shake 
 speare's The Winter's Tale, when Autolycus, the pedler, is an 
 nounced ; "he shall come in. I love a ballad but even too 
 well, if it be doleful matter merrily set down, or a very pleasant 
 tiling indeed and sung lamentably." Act IV. scene 4.
 
 178 JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER. 
 
 black coat overswept by white, flowing locks, with thy 
 professional white neckcloth scrupulously preserved 
 when even a shirt to thy back was problematical, 
 art by no means to be overlooked in the muster-roll of 
 vagrant gentlemen possessing the entrSe of our farm 
 house. Well do we remember with what grave and 
 dignified courtesy he used to step over its threshold, 
 saluting its inmates with the same air of gracious con 
 descension and patronage with which in better days 
 he had delighted the hearts of his parishioners. Poor 
 old man ! He had once been the admired and almost 
 worshipped minister of the largest church in the town 
 where he afterwards found support in the winter sea 
 son, as a pauper. He had early fallen into intemper 
 ate habits ; and at the age of three-score and ten, when 
 I remember him, he was only sober when he lacked 
 the means of being otherwise. Drunk or sober, how 
 ever, he never altogether forgot the proprieties of his 
 profession ; he was always grave, decorous, and gen 
 tlemanly ; he held fast the form of sound words, and 
 the weakness of the flesh abated nothing of the rigor 
 of his stringent theology. He had been a favorite 
 pupil of the learned and astute Emmons, 1 and was to 
 the last a sturdy defender of the peculiar dogmas of 
 his school. The last time we saw him he was holding 
 a meeting in our district school-house, with a vaga 
 bond pedler for deacon and travelling companion. 
 The tie which united the ill-assorted couple was doubt- 
 
 1 Nathaniel Emmons was a New England theologian of marked 
 character and power, who for seventy years was connected with 
 a church in that part of Wrentham, Mass., now called Franklin. 
 He exercised considerable influence over the religious thought of 
 New England, and is still read by theologians. He died in 184Q, 
 in his ninety-sixth year.
 
 YANKEE GYPSIES. 179 
 
 less the same which endeared Tarn O'Shanter to the 
 souter : l 
 
 " They had been fou for weeks thegither." 
 
 He took for his text the first seven verses of the con 
 cluding chapter of Ecclesiastes, furnishing in himself 
 its fitting illustration. The evil days had come ; the 
 keepers of the house trembled ; the windows of life 
 were darkened. A few months later the silver cord 
 was loosed, the golden bowl was broken, and between 
 the poor old man and the temptations which beset him 
 fell the thick curtains of the grave. 
 
 One day we had a call from a " pawky auld carle " 2 
 of a wandering Scotchman. To him I owe my first 
 introduction to the songs of Burns. After eating his 
 bread and cheese and drinking his mug of cider he 
 gave us Bonny Doon, Highland Mary, and Auld Lang 
 Syne. He had a rich, full voice, and entered heartily 
 into the spirit of his lyrics. I have since listened to 
 the same melodies from the lips of Dempster 3 (than 
 whom the Scottish bard has had no sweeter or truer 
 interpreter), but the skilful performance of the artist 
 
 1 Souter (or cobbler) Johnny, in Burns's poetic tale of Tarn 
 O'Shanter, had been fou or full of drink with Tarn for weeks 
 together. 
 
 2 From the first line of The Gaberlunzie Man, attributed to 
 King James V. of Scotland, 
 
 "The pawky auld carle came o'er the lee." 
 
 The original like Whittier's was a sly old fellow, as an English 
 phrase would translate the Scottish. The Gaberlunzie Man is 
 given in Percy's Reliques of Ancient Poetry and in Child's Eng 
 lish and Scottish Ballads, viii. 98. 
 
 8 William R. Dempster, a Scottish vocalist who had recently 
 sung in America, and whose music to Burns's song " A man 's a 
 man for a' that " was very popular.
 
 180 JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER. 
 
 lacked the novel charm of the gaberlunzie's singing in 
 the old farmhouse kitchen. Another wanderer made 
 us acquainted with the humorous old ballad of " Our 
 gude man cam hame at e'en." He applied for supper 
 and lodging, and the next morning was set at work 
 splitting stones in the pasture. While thus engaged 
 the village doctor came riding along the highway on 
 his fine, spirited horse, and stopped to talk with my 
 father. The fellow eyed the animal attentively, as if 
 familiar with all his good points, and hummed over a 
 stanza of the old poem : 
 
 " Our gude man cam bame at e'en, 
 
 And hame cam he ; 
 And there he saw a saddle horse 
 
 Where nae horse should be. 
 ' How cam this horse here ? 
 
 How can it be ? 
 How cam this horse here 
 
 Without the leave of me ? ' 
 ' A horse ? ' quo she. 
 'Ay, a horse,' quo he. 
 * Ye auld fool, ye blind fool, 
 And blinder might ye be, 
 'T is naething but a milking cow 
 
 My mamma sent to me.' 
 ' A milch cow ? ' quo he. 
 ' Ay, a milch cow,' quo she. 
 ' Weel, far hae I ridden, 
 
 And muckle hae I seen ; 
 But milking cows wi' saddles on 
 Saw I never nane.' " 1 
 
 That very night the rascal decamped, taking with 
 him the doctor's horse, and was never after heard of. 
 
 Often, in the gray of the morning, we used to see 
 one or more " gaberlunzie men," pack 011 shoulder 
 
 1 The whole of this song may be found in Herd's Ancient and 
 Modern Scottish Songs, ii. 172.
 
 YANKEE GYPSIES. 181 
 
 and staff in hand, emerging from the barn or other 
 outbuildings where they had passed the night. I was 
 once sent to the barn to fodder the cattle late in. the 
 evening, and, climbing into the mow to pitch down 
 hay for that purpose, I was startled by the sudden ap 
 parition of a man rising up before me, just discernible 
 in the dim moonlight streaming through the seams of 
 the boards. I made a rapid retreat down the ladder ; 
 and was only reassured by hearing the object of my 
 terror calling after me, and recognizing his voice as 
 that of a harmless old pilgrim whom I had known be 
 fore. Our farmhouse was situated in a lonely valley, 
 half surrounded with woods, with no neighbors in 
 sight. One dark, cloudy night, when our parents 
 chanced to be absent, we were sitting with our aged 
 grandmother in the fading light of the kitchen fire, 
 working ourselves into a very satisfactory state of 
 excitement and terror by recounting to eacli other 
 all the dismal stories we could remember of ghosts, 
 witches, haunted houses, and robbers, when we were 
 suddenly startled by a loud rap at the door. A strip 
 ling of fourteen, I was very naturally regarded as the 
 head of the household ; so, with many misgivings, 1 
 advanced to the door, which I slowly opened, holding 
 the candle tremulously above my head and peering 
 out into the darkness. The feeble glimmer played 
 upon the apparition of a gigantic horseman, mounted 
 on a steed of a size worthy of such a rider, colossal, 
 motionless, like images cut out of the solid night. 
 The strange visitant gruffly saluted me ; and, after 
 making several ineffectual efforts to urge his horse in 
 at the door, dismounted and followed me into the 
 room, evidently enjoying the terror which his huge 
 presence excited. Announcing himself as the great
 
 182 JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER. 
 
 Indian doctor, he drew himself up before the fire, 
 stretched his arms, clinched his fists, struck his broad 
 chest, and invited our attention to what he called his 
 " mortal frame." He demanded in succession all kinds 
 of intoxicating liquors ; and on being assured that we 
 had none to give him, he grew angry, threatened to 
 swallow my younger brother alive, and, seizing me by 
 the hair of my head as the angel did the prophet at 
 Babylon, 1 led me about from room to room. After an 
 ineffectual search, in the course of which he mistook 
 a jug of oil for one of brandy, and, contrary to my 
 explanations and remonstrances, insisted upon swal 
 lowing a portion of its contents, he released me, 
 fell to crying and sobbing, and confessed that he was 
 so drunk already that his horse was ashamed of him. 
 After bemoaning and pitying himself to his satisfac 
 tion he wiped his eyes, and sat down by the side of my 
 grandmother, giving her to understand that he was 
 very much pleased with her appearance ; adding that, 
 if agreeable to her, he should like the privilege of pay 
 ing his addresses to her. While vainly endeavoring 
 to make the excellent old lady comprehend his very 
 flattering proposition, he was interrupted by the return 
 of my father, who, at once understanding the matter, 
 turned him out of doors without ceremony. 
 
 On one occasion, a few years ago, on my return 
 from the field at evening, I was told that a foreigner 
 had asked for lodgings during the night, but that, in 
 fluenced by his dark, repulsive appearance, my mother 
 had very reluctantly refused his request. I found her 
 by no means satisfied with her decision. " What if a 
 son of mrne was in a strange land ? " she inquired, self- 
 reproachfully. Greatly to her relief, I volunteered to 
 1 See Ezekiel viii. 3.
 
 YANKEE GYPSIES. 183 
 
 go in pursuit of the wanderer, and, taking a cross-path 
 over the fields, soon overtook him. He had just been 
 rejected at the house of our nearest neighbor, and was 
 standing in a state of dubious perplexity in the street. 
 His looks quite justified my mother's suspicions. He 
 was an olive-complexioned, black-bearded Italian, with 
 an eye like a live coal, such a face as perchance looks 
 out on the traveller in the passes of the Abruzzi, 1 
 one of those bandit visages which Salvator 2 has 
 painted. With some difficulty I gave him to under 
 stand my errand, when he overwhelmed me with 
 thanks, and joyfully followed me back. He took his 
 seat with us at the supper- table ; and, when we were 
 all gathered around the hearth that cold autumnal 
 evening, he told us, partly by words and partly by 
 gestures, the story of his life and misfortunes, amused 
 us with descriptions of the grape-gatherings and fes 
 tivals of his sunny clime, edified my mother with a 
 recipe for making bread of chestnuts ; and in the morn 
 ing, when, after breakfast, his dark sullen face lighted 
 up and his fierce eye moistened with grateful emotion 
 as in his own silvery Tuscan accent he poured out his 
 thanks, we marvelled at the fears which had so nearly 
 closed our door against him ; and, as he departed, we 
 all felt that he had left with us the blessing of the 
 poor. 
 
 It was not often that, as in the above instance, my 
 mother's prudence got the better of her charity. The 
 regular " old stragglers " regarded her as an unfailing 
 friend ; and the sight of her plain cap was to them an 
 
 1 Provinces into which the old kingdom of Naples was divided. 
 
 2 Salvator Rosa was a Neapolitan by birth, and was said to 
 have been himself a bandit in his youth ; his landscapes often 
 contain figures drawn from the wild life of the region.
 
 184 JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER. 
 
 assurance of forthcoming creature-comforts. There 
 was indeed a tribe of lazy strollers, having their place 
 of rendezvous in the town of Barrington, New Hamp 
 shire, whose low vices had placed them beyond even 
 the pale of her benevolence. They were not uncon 
 scious of their evil reputation ; and experience had 
 taught them the necessity of concealing, under well- 
 contrived disguises, their true character. They came 
 to us in all shapes and with all appearances save the 
 true one, with most miserable stories of mishap and 
 sickness and all " the ills which flesh is heir to." It 
 was particularly vexatious to discover, when too late, 
 that our sympathies and charities had been expended 
 upon such graceless vagabonds as the " Barrington beg 
 gars." An old withered hag, known by the appella 
 tion of Hopping Pat, the wise woman of her tribe, 
 was in the habit of visiting us, with her hopeful 
 grandson, who had " a gift for preaching " as well as 
 for many other things not exactly compatible with 
 holy orders. He sometimes brought with him a tame 
 crow, a shrewd, knavish-looking bird, who, when in 
 the humor for it, could talk like Barnaby Rudge's 
 raven. He used to say he could " do nothin' at ex- 
 hortin' without a white handkercher on his neck and 
 money in his pocket," a fact going far to confirm 
 the opinions of the Bishop of Exeter and the Pusey- 
 ites generally, that there can be no priest without 
 tithes and surplice. 
 
 These people have for several generations lived dis 
 tinct from the great mass of the community, like the 
 gypsies of Europe, whom in many respects they closely 
 resemble. They have the same settled aversion to 
 labor and the same disposition to avail themselves of 
 the fruits of the industry of others. They love a wild,
 
 YANKEE GYPSIES. 185 
 
 out-of-door life, sing songs, tell fortunes, and have an 
 instinctive hatred of "missionaries and cold water." 
 It has been said I know not upon what grounds 
 that their ancestors were indeed a veritable importa 
 tion of English gypsyhood ; but if so, they have un 
 doubtedly lost a good deal of the picturesque charm 
 of its unhoused and free condition. I very much fear 
 that my friend Mary Russell Mitford, sweetest of 
 England's rural painters, who has a poet's eye for 
 the fine points in gypsy character, would scarcely 
 allow their claims to fraternity with her own vagrant 
 friends, whose camp-fires welcomed her to her new 
 home at Swallowfield. 1 
 
 " The proper study of mankind is man ; " and, ac 
 cording to my view, no phase of our common humanity 
 is altogether unworthy of investigation. Acting upon 
 this belief two or three summers ago, when making, 
 in company with my sister, a little excursion into the 
 hill-country of New Hampshire, I turned my horse's 
 head towards Barrington for the purpose of seeing 
 these semi-civilized strollers in their own home, and 
 returning, once for all, their numerous visits. Taking 
 leave of our hospitable cousins in old Lee with about 
 as much solemnity as we may suppose Major Laing 2 
 parted with his friends when he set out in search of 
 desert-girdled Timbuctoo, we drove several miles over 
 
 1 See in Miss Mitford's Our Village. 
 
 2 Alexander Gordon Laing was a major in the British army, 
 who served on the west coast of Africa and made journeys into 
 the interior in the attempt to establish commercial relations with 
 the natives, and especially to discover the sources of the Niger. 
 He was treacherously murdered in 1826 by the guard that 
 was attending him on his return from Timbuctoo to the coast. 
 His travels excited great interest in their day in England and 
 America.
 
 186 JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER. 
 
 a rough road, passed the Devil's Den unmolested, 
 crossed a fretful little streamlet noisily working its 
 way into a valley, where it turned a lonely, half- 
 ruinous mill, and, climbing a steep hill beyond, saw 
 before us a wide, sandy level, skirted on the west and 
 north by low, scraggy hills, and dotted here and there 
 with dwarf pitch-pines. In the centre of this desolate 
 region were some twenty or thirty small dwellings, 
 grouped together as irregularly as a Hottentot kraal. 
 Unfenced, unguarded, open to all comers and goers, 
 stood that city of the beggars, no wall or paling be 
 tween the ragged cabins to remind one of the jealous 
 distinctions of property. The great idea of its found 
 ers seemed visible in its unappropriated freedom. 
 Was not the whole round world their own ? and should 
 they haggle about boundaries and title-deeds? For 
 them, on distant plains, ripened golden harvests ; for 
 them, in far-off workshops, busy hands were toiling ; 
 for them, if they had but the grace to note it, the 
 broad earth put on her garniture of beauty, and over 
 them hung the silent mystery of heaven and its stars. 
 That comfortable philosophy which modern transcen 
 dentalism has but dimly shadowed forth that po 
 etic agrarianism, which gives all to each and each to 
 all is the real life of this city of unwork. To each 
 of its dingy dwellers might be not unaptly applied the 
 language of one who, I trust, will pardon me for quot 
 ing her beautiful poem in this connection : 
 
 " Other hands may grasp the field and forest, 
 Proud proprietors in pomp may shine, 
 
 Thou art wealthier, all the world is thine." * 
 But look ! the clouds are breaking. " Fair weather 
 1 From a poem, Why Thus Longing ? by Mrs. Harriet Wins- 
 low Sewall, preserved in Whittier's Songs of Three Centuries.
 
 THE BOY CAPTIVES. 187 
 
 cometh out of the north." The wind has blown away 
 the mists ; on the gilded spire of John Street glim 
 mers a beam of sunshine ; and there is the sky again, 
 hard, blue, and cold in its eternal purity, not a whit 
 the worse for the storm. In the beautiful present the 
 past is no longer needed. Reverently and gratefully 
 let its volume be laid aside ; and when again the 
 shadows of the outward world fall upon the spirit may 
 I not lack a good angel to remind me of its solace, 
 even if he comes in the shape of a Barrington beggar. 
 
 n. 
 
 THE BOY CAPTIVES. 
 
 AN INCIDENT OP THE INDIAN WAR OF 1695. 
 
 THE township of Haverhill, even as late as the close 
 of the seventeenth century, was a frontier settlement, 
 occupying an advanced position in the great wilder 
 ness, which, unbroken by the clearing of a white man, 
 extended from the Merrimac River to the French vil 
 lages on the St. Francois. A tract of twelve miles 
 on the river and three or four northwardly was occu 
 pied by scattered settlers, while in the centre of the 
 town a compact village had grown up. In the imme 
 diate vicinity there were but few Indians, and these 
 generally peaceful and inoffensive. On the breaking 
 out of the Narragansett War, 1 the inhabitants had 
 erected fortifications, and taken other measures for 
 
 1 The " Narragansett War " was a name applied to that part 
 ol King Philip's War which resulted from the defection of the 
 powerful tribe of Narragansetts, formerly allies of the English, 
 to the standard of the Indian chief.
 
 188 JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER. 
 
 defence ; but, with the possible exception of one man 
 who was found slain in the woods in 1676, none of the 
 inhabitants were molested ; and it was not until about 
 the year 1689 that the safety of the settlement was 
 seriously threatened. Three persons were killed in 
 that year. In 1690 six garrisons were established in 
 different parts of the town, with a small company of 
 soldiers attached to each. Two of these houses are 
 still standing. They were built of brick, two stories 
 high, with a single outside door, so small and narrow 
 that but one person could enter at a time ; the win 
 dows few, and only about two and a half feet long 
 by eighteen inches wide, with thick diamond glass se 
 cured with lead, and crossed inside with bars of iron. 
 The basement had but two rooms, and the chamber 
 was entered by a ladder instead of stairs ; so that the 
 inmates, if driven thither, could cut off communica 
 tion with the rooms below. Many private houses were 
 strengthened and fortified. We remember one fa 
 miliar to our boyhood, a venerable old building of 
 wood, with brick between the weather-boards and ceil 
 ing, with a massive balustrade over the door, con 
 structed of oak timber and plank, with holes through 
 the latter for firing upon assailants. The door opened 
 upon a stone-paved hall, or entry, leading into the 
 huge single room of the basement, which was lighted 
 by two small windows, the ceiling black with the 
 smoke of a century and a half ; a huge fireplace, cal 
 culated for eight-feet wood, occupying one entire side ; 
 while, overhead, suspended from the timbers, or on 
 shelves fastened to them, were household stores, farm 
 ing utensils, fishing-rods, guns, bunches of herbs 
 gathered perhaps a century ago, strings of dried ap 
 ples and pumpkins, links of mottled sausages, spare-
 
 THE BOY CAPTIVES. 189 
 
 ribs, and flitches of bacon ; the fire-light of an evening 
 dimly revealing the checked woollen coverlet of the 
 bed in one far-off corner, while in another 
 
 " The pewter plates on the dresser 
 
 Caught and reflected the flame as shields of armies the sun 
 shine." i 
 
 Tradition has preserved many incidents of life in 
 the garrisons. In times of unusual peril the settlers 
 generally resorted at night to the fortified houses, tak 
 ing thither their flocks and herds and such household 
 valuables as were most likely to strike the fancy or 
 minister to the comfort or vanity of the heathen ma 
 rauders. False alarms were frequent. The smoke of 
 a distant fire, the bark of a dog in the deep woods, a 
 stump or bush, taking in the uncertain light of stars 
 and moon the appearance of a man, were sufficient to 
 spread alarm through the entire settlement and to 
 cause the armed men of the garrison to pass whole 
 nights in sleepless watching. It is said that at Hasel- 
 ton's garrison-house the sentinel on duty saw, as 
 he thought, an Indian inside of the paling which 
 surrounded the building, and apparently seeking to 
 gain an entrance. He promptly raised his musket 
 and fired at the intruder, alarming thereby the entire 
 garrison. The women and children left their beds, 
 and the men seized their guns and commenced firing 
 on the supicious object ; but it seemed to bear a 
 charmed life, and remained unharmed. As the morn 
 ing dawned, however, the mystery was solved by the 
 discovery of a black quilted petticoat hanging on the 
 clothes-line completely riddled with balls. 
 
 As a matter of course, under circumstances of per 
 petual alarm and frequent peril, the duty of cultivate 
 
 1 Longfellow's Evangeline, lines 205, 206.
 
 190 JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER. 
 
 ing their fields, and gathering their harvests, and 
 working at their mechanical avocations, was danger 
 ous and difficult to the settlers. One instance will 
 serve as an illustration. At the garrison-house of 
 Thomas Dustin, the husband of the far-famed Mary 
 Dustin (who, while a captive of the Indians, and mad 
 dened by the murder of her infant child, killed and 
 scalped, with the assistance of a young boy, the entire 
 band of her captors, ten in number), the business of 
 brick-making was carried on. The pits where the 
 clay was found were only a few rods from the house ; 
 yet no man ventured to bring the clay to the yard 
 within the inclosure, without the attendance of a file 
 of soldiers. An anecdote relating to this garrison has 
 been handed down to the present time. Among its 
 inmates were two young cousins, Joseph and Mary 
 Whittaker ; the latter a merry, handsome girl, reliev 
 ing the tedium of garrison-duty with her light-hearted 
 mirthfulness and 
 
 "Making a sunshine in that shady place." l 
 Joseph, in the intervals of his labors in the double 
 capacity of brick-maker and man-at-arms, was assidu 
 ous in his attentions to his fair cousin, who was not 
 inclined to encourage him. Growing desperate, he 
 threatened one evening to throw himself into the gar 
 rison well. His threat only called forth the laughter 
 of his mistress ; and, bidding her farewell, he pro 
 ceeded to put it in execution. On reaching the well 
 he stumbled over a log ; whereupon, animated by a 
 
 1 " Her angel's face 
 
 As the great eye of heaven shyned bright 
 And made a sunshine in the shadie place ; 
 Did never mortal eye behold such heavenly grace." 
 Spenser : The Faery Queene, bk. I. canto iii. st. 4.
 
 THE BOY CAPTIVES. 191 
 
 happy idea, he dropped the wood into the water in 
 stead of himself, and, hiding behind the curb, awaited 
 the result. Mary, who had been listening at the door, 
 and who had not believed her lover capable of so rash 
 an act, heard the sudden plunge of the wooden Joseph. 
 She ran to the well, and, leaning over the curb and 
 peering down the dark opening, cried out, in tones of 
 anguish and remorse, " O Joseph, if you're in the land 
 of the living, I '11 have you ! " " I '11 take ye at your 
 word," answered Joseph, springing up from his hiding- 
 place and avenging himself for her coyness and cold 
 ness by a hearty embrace. 
 
 Our own paternal ancestor, owing to religious scru 
 ples in the matter of taking arms even for defence 
 of life and property, refused to leave his undefended 
 house and enter the garrison. The Indians frequently 
 came to his house ; and the family more than once in 
 the night heard them whispering under the windows, 
 and saw them put their copper faces to the glass to 
 take a view of the apartments. Strange as it may 
 seem, they never offered any injury or insult to the 
 inmates. 
 
 In 1695 the township was many times molested by 
 Indians, and several persons were killed and wounded. 
 Early in the fall a small party made their appearance 
 in the northerly part of the town, where, finding two 
 boys at work in an open field, they managed to sur 
 prise and capture them, and, without committing fur 
 ther violence, retreated through the woods to their 
 homes on the shore of Lake Winnipiseogee. Isaac 
 Bradley, aged fifteen, was a small but active and vig 
 orous boy ; his companion in captivity, Joseph Whit- 
 taker, was only eleven, yet quite as large in size, and 
 heavier in his movements. After a hard and painful
 
 192 JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER. 
 
 journey they arrived at the lake, and were placed in 
 an Indian family, consisting of a man and squaw and 
 two or three children. Here they soon acquired a 
 sufficient knowledge of the Indian tongue to enable 
 them to learn from the conversation carried on in their 
 presence that it was designed to take them to Canada 
 in the spring. This discovery was a painful one. 
 Canada, the land of Papist priests and bloody Indians, 
 was the especial terror of the New England settlers, 
 and the anathema maranatha 1 of Puritan pulpits. 
 Thither the Indians usually hurried their captives, 
 where they compelled them to work in their villages 
 or sold them to the French planters. Escape from 
 thence through a deep wilderness, and across lakes, 
 and mountains, and almost impassable rivers, without 
 food or guide, is regarded as an impossibility. The 
 poor boys, terrified by the prospect of being carried 
 still farther from their home and friends, began to 
 dream of escaping from their masters before they 
 started for Canada. It was now winter ; it would have 
 been little short of madness to have chosen for flight 
 that season of bitter cold and deep snows. Owing to 
 exposure and want of proper food and clothing, Isaac, 
 the eldest of the boys, was seized with a violent fever, 
 from which he slowly recovered in the course of the 
 winter. His Indian mistress was as kind to him as her 
 circumstances permitted, procuring medicinal herbs 
 and roots for her patient, and tenderly watching over 
 
 1 Anathema maranatha occurs at the close of St. Paul's first 
 epistle to the Corinthians, and in the English version is made to 
 appear as a composite phrase. It has so passed into common 
 use, maranatha being taken as intensifying the curse contained 
 in anathema. The words are properly to be divided, maranatha 
 signifying " The Lord eoineth."
 
 THE BOY CAPTIVES. 193 
 
 him in the long winter nights. Spring came at length ; 
 the snows melted ; and the ice was broken up on the 
 lake. The Indians began to make preparations for 
 journeying to Canada ; and Isaac, who had during his 
 sickness devised a plan of escape, saw that the time 
 of putting it in execution had come. On the evening 
 before he was to make the attempt he for the first 
 time informed his younger companion of his design, 
 and told him, if he intended to accompany him, he 
 must be awake at the time appointed. The boys lay 
 down as usual in the wigwam in the midst of the fam 
 ily. Joseph soon fell asleep ; but Isaac, fully sensi 
 ble of the danger and difficulty of the enterprise be 
 fore him, lay awake, watchful for his opportunity. 
 About midnight he rose, cautiously stepping over the 
 sleeping forms of the family, and securing, as he went, 
 his Indian master's flint, steel, and tinder, and a small 
 quantity of dry moose-meat and corn-bread. He then 
 carefully awakened his companion, who, starting up, 
 forgetful of the cause of his disturbance, asked aloud, 
 "What do you want?" The savages began to stir; 
 and Isaac, trembling with fear of detection, lay down 
 again and pretended to be asleep. After waiting 
 a while he again rose, satisfied, from the heavy breath 
 ing of the Indians, that they were all sleeping ; and 
 fearing to awaken Joseph a second time, lest he should 
 again hazard all by his thoughtlessness, he crept softly 
 out of the wigwam. He had proceeded but a few 
 rods when he heard footsteps behind him ; and, sup 
 posing himself pursued, he hurried into the woods, 
 casting a glance backward. What was his joy to see 
 his young companion running after him ! They has 
 tened on in a southerly direction as nearly as they 
 could determine, hoping to reach their distant home.
 
 194 JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER. 
 
 When daylight appeared they found a large hollow 
 log, into which they crept for concealment, wisely 
 judging that they would be hotly pursued by their 
 Indian captors. 
 
 Their sagacity was by no means at fault. The In 
 dians, missing their prisoners in the morning, started 
 off in pursuit with their dogs. As the young boys 
 lay in the log they could hear the whistle of the Indi 
 ans and the barking of dogs upon their track. It was 
 a trying moment ; and even the stout heart of the 
 elder boy sank within him as the dogs came up to the 
 log and set up a loud bark of discovery. But his 
 presence of mind saved him. He spoke in a low tone 
 to the dogs, who, recognizing his familiar voice, wagged 
 their tails with delight, and ceased barking. He then 
 threw to them the morsel of moose-meat he had taken 
 from the wigwam. While the dogs were thus diverted, 
 the Indians made their appearance. The boys heard 
 the light, stealthy sound of their moccasins on the 
 leaves. They passed close to the log ; and the "dogs, 
 having devoured their moose-meat, trotted after their 
 masters. Through a crevice in the log the boys 
 looked after them, and saw them disappear in the 
 thick woods. They remained in their covert until night, 
 when they started again on their long journey, taking 
 a new route to avoid the Indians. At daybreak they 
 again concealed themselves, but travelled the next 
 night and day without resting. By this time they 
 had consumed all the bread which they had taken, and 
 were fainting from hunger and weariness. Just at 
 the close of the third day they were providentially 
 enabled to kill a pigeon and a small tortoise, a part of 
 which they ate raw, not daring to make a fire, which 
 might attract the watchful eyes of savages. On the
 
 THE BOY CAPTIVES. 195 
 
 sixth day they struck upon an old Indian path, and, 
 following it until night, came suddenly upon a camp 
 of the enemy. Deep in the heart of the forest, under 
 the shelter of a ridge of land heavily timbered, a great 
 fire of logs and brushwood was burning ; and around 
 it the Indians sat, eating their moose-meat and smok 
 ing their pipes. 
 
 The poor fugitives, starving, weary, and chilled by 
 the cold spring blasts, gazed down upon the ample 
 fire, and the savory meats which the squaws were 
 cooking by it, but felt no temptation to purchase 
 warmth and food by surrendering themselves to cap 
 tivity. Death in the forest seemed preferable. They 
 turned and fled back upon their track, expecting every 
 moment to hear the yells of pursuers. The morning 
 found them seated on the bank of a small stream, their 
 feet torn and bleeding, and their bodies emaciated. 
 The elder, as a last effort, made search for roots, and 
 fortunately discovered a few ground-nuts (glycine 
 apios), which served to refresh in some degree him 
 self and his still weaker companion. As they stood 
 together by the stream, hesitating and almost despair 
 ing, it occurred to Isaac that the rivulet might lead to 
 a larger stream of water, and that to the sea and the 
 white settlements near it ; and he resolved to follow 
 it. They again began their painful march ; the day 
 passed, and the night once more overtook them. 
 When the eighth morning dawned, the younger of 
 the boys found himself unable to rise from his bed 
 of leaves. Isaac endeavored to encourage him, dug 
 roots, and procured water for him ; but the poor lad 
 was utterly exhausted. He had no longer heart or 
 hope. The elder boy laid him on leaves and dry grass 
 at the foot of a tree, and with a heavy heart bade him
 
 196 JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER. 
 
 farewell. Alone lie slowly and painfully proceeded 
 down the stream, now greatly increased in size by 
 tributary rivulets. On the top of a hill he climbed 
 with difficulty into a tree, and saw in the distance 
 what seemed to be a clearing and a newly-raised 
 frame building. Hopeful and rejoicing, he turned 
 back to his young companion, told him what he had 
 seen, and, after chafing his limbs awhile, got him upon 
 his feet. Sometimes supporting him, and at others 
 carrying him on his back, the heroic boy staggered 
 towards the clearing. On reaching it he found it 
 deserted, and was obliged to continue his journey. 
 Towards night signs of civilization began to appear, 
 the heavy, continuous roar of water was heard ; 
 and, presently emerging from the forest, he saw a 
 great river dashing in white foam down precipitous 
 rocks, and on its bank the gray walls of a huge stone 
 building, with flankers, palisades, and moat, over 
 which the British flag was flying. This was the fa 
 mous Saco Fort, built by Governor Phips, 1 two years 
 before, just below the falls of the Saco River. The 
 soldiers of the garrison gave the poor fellows a kindly 
 welcome. Joseph, who was scarcely alive, lay for a 
 long time sick in the fort ; but Isaac soon regained 
 his strength, and set out for his home in Haverhill, 
 which he had the good fortune to arrive at in safety. 
 
 Amidst the stirring excitements of the present day, 
 when every thrill of the electric wire conveys a new 
 subject for thought or action to a generation as eager 
 as the ancient Athenians for some new thing, simple 
 
 1 An interesting account of Sir William Phips will be found in 
 Parkman's Frontenac and Neio France under Louis XI V. Haw 
 thorne also tells his romantic story in Fanshawe and Other 
 Pieces.
 
 THE BOY CAPTIVES. 197 
 
 legends of the past like that which we have transcribed 
 have undoubtedly lost in a great degree their interest. 
 The lore of the fireside is becoming obsolete, and with 
 the octogenarian few who still linger among us will 
 perish the unwritten history of border life in New 
 England.
 
 OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES. 
 
 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 IN the early years of Dr. Holmes's career his literary 
 reputation rested on verse which seemed the playful pas 
 time of a professional man. To students in medicine, in 
 deed, he was known as a keen writer, and his published 
 papers upon professional topics showed how valuable was 
 his literary skill in presenting subjects of a scientific nature. 
 To the general public, however, his prose was known chiefly 
 through the medium of the popular lecture, and the impres 
 sion was easily created that he was a witty and humorous 
 writer with a turn for satire. It was not until he delivered 
 the as yet unpublished lectures on the English Poets of the 
 Nineteenth Century before the Lowell Institute in Boston, 
 in 1852, that the wider range of his thought and the pene 
 tration of his poetic insight were recognized. Five or six 
 years later a better occasion came, and in the first number 
 of The Atlantic Monthly was begun a series of prose 
 writings which, under various names, gave a new and im 
 portant place in literature to the author. The first of the 
 series was The Autocrat at the Breakfast- Table, the last, 
 The Poet at the Breakfast- Table, and in this the writer dis 
 tinctly says what the observant reader of the series will be 
 pretty sure to discover for himself : " I have unburdened 
 myself in this book, and in some other pages, of what I was 
 born to say. Many things that I have said in my riper 
 days have been aching in my soul since I was a mere child. 
 I say aching, because they conflicted with many of my
 
 200 OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES. 
 
 inherited beliefs, or rather traditions. I did not know then 
 that two strains of blood were striving in me for the mas 
 tery two! twenty, perhaps twenty thousand, for aught 
 I know but represented to me by two paternal and 
 maternal. But I do know this : I have struck a good many 
 chords, first and last, in the consciousness of other people. 
 I confess to a tender feeling for my little brood of thoughts. 
 When they have been welcomed and praised, it has pleased 
 me ; and if at any time they have been rudely handled and 
 despitefully treated, it has cost me a little worry. I don't 
 despise reputation, and I should like to be remembered as 
 having said something worth lasting well enough to last." 
 
 This passage briefly presents three very noticeable char 
 acteristics of Dr. Holmes's prose as contained in the series 
 of Atlantic papers and stories. They give the mature 
 thought of the writer, held back through many years for 
 want of an adequate occasion, and ripened in his mind dur 
 ing this enforced silence ; they illustrate the effect upon his 
 thought of his professional studies, which predisposed him 
 to treat of the natural history of man, and to import into 
 his analysis of the invisible organism of life the terms and 
 methods employed in the science of the visible anatomy and 
 physiology ; . and finally they are warm with a sympathy for 
 men and women, and singularly felicitous in their expres 
 sion of many of the indistinct and half-understood experi 
 ences of life. For their form it may be said that the 
 impression produced upon the reader of the Autocrat series, 
 which was finally gathered into a volume, is of a growth 
 rather than of a premeditated artistic completeness. The 
 first suggestion is found in the two papers under the title of 
 The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table, published in The 
 New England Magazine for November, 1831, and Janu 
 ary, 1832. These were written by Dr. Holmes shortly 
 after his graduation from college and before he entered on 
 his medical studies. They consist of brief, epigrammatic 
 observations upon various topics, the desultory talk of a per-
 
 INTRODUCTION. 201 
 
 on engrossing conversation at a table. The form is mono 
 logue with scarcely more than a hint at interruption, and 
 no attempt at characterizing the speaker or his listeners. 
 Twenty-five years later, when The Atlantic Monthly was 
 founded, the author remembering the fancy resumed it, 
 and under the same title began a series of papers which at 
 once had great favor and grew, possibly, beyond the writer's 
 original intention. Twenty-five years had not dulled the 
 wit and gayety of the exuberant young author ; rather, they 
 had ripened the early fruit and imparted a richness of fla 
 vor which greatly increased the value. The maturity was 
 seen not only in the wider reach and deeper tone of the 
 talk, but in the humanizing of the scheme. Out of the talk 
 at the breakfast-table one began to distinguish characters 
 and faces in the persons about the board, and before the 
 Autocrat was completed,. there had appeared a series of por 
 traits, vivid and full of interest. Two characters mean 
 while were hinted at by the author rather than described or 
 very palpably introduced, the Professor and the Poet. It 
 is not difficult to see that these are thin disguises for the 
 author himself, who, in the versatility of his nature, appeals 
 to the reader now as a brilliant philosopher, now as a man 
 of science, now as a seer and poet. The Professor at the 
 Breakfast-Table followed, and there was a still stronger 
 dramatic power disclosed ; some of the former characters 
 remained and others of even more positive individuality were 
 added ; a romance was inwoven and something like a plot 
 sketched, so that while the talk still went on and eddied 
 about greater subjects than before, the book which grew out 
 of the papers had more distinctly the form of a series of 
 sketches from life. It was followed by two novels, Elsie 
 Venner and The Guardian Angel. The talks at the 
 breakfast-table had often gravitated toward the deep themes 
 of destiny and human freedom ; the novels wrought the 
 same subjects in dramatic form, and action interpreted the 
 thought, while still there flowed on the wonderful, appar-
 
 202 OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES. 
 
 ently inexhaustible stream of wit, tenderness, passion, and 
 human sympathy. Once more, fourteen years after the 
 appearance of the first of the series, came The Poet at the 
 Breakfast- Table. A new group of characters, with slight 
 reminders of former ones, occupied the pages, again talk 
 and romance blended, and playfulness, satire, sentiment, 
 wise reflection, and sturdy indignation followed in quick 
 succession. 
 
 The Breakfast-Table series forms a group, independent 
 of the intercalated novels, and, with its frequent poems, may 
 be taken as an artistic whole. It is hardly too much to say 
 that it makes a new contribution to the forms of literary 
 art. The elasticity of the scheme rendered possible a com 
 prehensiveness of material ; the exuberance of the author's 
 fancy and the fullness of his thought gave a richness to the 
 fabric ; the poetic sense of fitness kept the whole within just 
 bounds. Moreover, the personality of the author was viv 
 idly present in all parts. There are few examples of litera 
 ture in the first person so successful as this. 
 
 In 1885 Dr. Holmes published another novel under the 
 title A Mortal Antipathy, and in 1890 Over the Teacups, a 
 series of papers like those in the Breakfast-Table volumes. 
 
 It is from The Poet at the Breakfast-Table that the fol 
 lowing episode is taken.
 
 I. 
 
 THE GAMBREL ^ROOFED HOUSE AND ITS 
 OUTLOOK. 
 
 A PANORAMA, WITH SIDE-SHOWS. 
 
 MY birthplace, the home of my childhood and ear 
 lier and later boyhood, has within a few months passed 
 out of the ownership of my family into the hands of 
 that venerable Alma Mater who seems to have re 
 newed her youth, and has certainly repainted her dor 
 mitories. In truth, when I last revisited that familiar 
 scene and looked upon the flammantia mania 2 of the 
 old halls, " Massachusetts " with the dummy clock- 
 dial, 3 " Harvard " with the garrulous belfry, 4 little 
 " Holden " 5 with the sculptured unpunishable cherubs 
 
 1 " Know old Cambridge ? Hope you do. 
 Born there ? Don't say so ! I was too. 
 (Born in a house with a gambrel-roof, 
 Standing still, if you must have proof, 
 ' Gambrel ? Gambrel ? ' Let me beg 
 You '11 look at a horse's hinder leg, 
 First great angle above the hoof, 
 That's the gambrel ; hence gambrel-roof.)" 
 
 Parson TurelVs Legacy in The Autocrat of 
 
 the Breakfast- Table. 
 2 Flame-red walls. 
 
 8 Early views of Massachusetts show the clock in apparent 
 activity. 
 
 4 Harvard Hall holds in its belfry tower the college bell. 
 6 Holden Chapel was built in 1744, and on the pediment front 
 ing the Common may be seen the arms of the Holden family of 
 England, with whose gift the chapel was built. It has long been 
 devoted to other uses.
 
 204 OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES. 
 
 over its portal, and the rest of my early brick-and- 
 mortar acquaintances, 1 I could not help saying to my 
 self that I had lived to see the peaceable establishment 
 of the Red Republic of Letters. 
 
 Many of the things I shall put down I have no 
 doubt told before in a fragmentary way, how many I 
 cannot be quite sure, as I do not very often read my 
 own prose works. But when a man dies a great deal 
 is said of him which has often been said in other 
 forms, and now this dear old house is dead to me in 
 one sense, and I want to gather up my recollections 
 and wind a string of narrative round them, tying them 
 up like a nosegay for the last tribute : the same blos 
 soms in it I have often laid on its threshold while it 
 was still living for me. 
 
 We Americans are all cuckoos, we make our 
 homes in the nests of other birds. I have read some 
 where that the lineal descendants of the man who 
 carted off the body of William Rufus, with Walter 
 Tyrrel's arrow sticking in it, have driven a cart (not 
 absolutely the same one, I suppose) in the New Forest 
 from that day to this. I don't quite understand Mr. 
 Ruskin's saying (if he said it) that he could n't get 
 along in a country where there were no castles, but I 
 do think we lose a great deal in living where there 
 are so few permanent homes. You will see how much 
 I parted with which was not reckoned in the price 
 paid for the old homestead. 
 
 I shall say many things which an uncharitable reader 
 might find fault with as personal. I should not dare 
 to call myself a poet if I did not ; for if there is any- 
 
 1 " There, in red brick, which softening time defies, 
 Stand square and stiff the Muses' factories." 
 
 An Indian Summer Reverie, by J. R. LowelL
 
 THE GAMBREL-ROOFED HOUSE. 205 
 
 thing that gives one a title to that name, it is that his 
 inner nature is naked and is not ashamed. But there 
 are many such things I shall put in words, not because 
 they are personal, but because they are human, and are 
 born of just such experiences as those who hear or 
 read what I say are like to have had in greater or less 
 measure. I find myself so much like other people that 
 I often wonder at the coincidence. It was only the 
 other day that I sent out a copy of verses l about my 
 great-grandmother's picture, and I was surprised to 
 find how many other people had portraits of their 
 great-grandmothers or other progenitors, about which 
 they felt as I did about mine, and for whom I had 
 spoken, thinking I was speaking for myself only. 
 And so I am not afraid to talk very freely with you, 
 my precious reader or listener. You too, Beloved, 
 were born somewhere and remember your birthplace 
 or your early home ; for you some house is haunted by 
 recollections ; to some roof you have bid farewell. 
 Your hand is upon mine, then, as I guide my pen. 
 Your heart frames the responses to the litany of 
 my remembrance. For myself it is a tribute of affec 
 tion I am rendering, and I should put it on record 
 for my own satisfaction, were there none to read or to 
 listen. 
 
 I hope you will not say that I have built a pillared 
 portico of introduction to a humble structure of narra 
 tive. For when you look at the old gambrel-roofed 
 house, you will see an unpretending mansion, such as 
 very possibly you were born in yourself, or at any rate 
 such a place of residence as your minister or some of 
 your well-to-do country cousins find good enough, but 
 not at all too grand for them. We have stately old 
 1 See Dorothy Q., a Family Portrait.
 
 206 OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES. 
 
 Colonial palaces l in our ancient village, now a city, 
 and a thriving one, square-fronted edifices that 
 stand back from the vulgar highway, with folded arms, 
 as it were ; social fortresses of the time when the twi 
 light lustre of the throne reached as far as our half- 
 cleared settlement, with a glacis before them in the 
 shape of a long broad gravel-walk, so that in King 
 George's time they looked as formidable to any but 
 the silk-stocking gentry as Gibraltar or Ehrenbreit- 
 stein to a visitor without the password. We forget all 
 this in the kindly welcome they give us to-day ; for 
 some of them are still standing and doubly famous, as 
 we all know. But the gambrel-roofed house, though 
 stately enough for college dignitaries and scholarly 
 clergymen, was not one of those old tory, Episcopal- 
 church-goer's strongholds. One of its doors opens di 
 rectly upon the green, always called the Common ; the 
 other, facing the south, a few steps from it, over a 
 paved footwalk, on the other side of which is the min 
 iature front yard, bordered with lilacs and syringas. 
 The honest mansion makes no pretensions. Accessible, 
 companionable, holding its hand out to all, comfortable, 
 respectable, and even in its way dignified, but not im 
 posing, not a house for his Majesty's Counsellor, or 
 the Right Reverend successor of Him who had not 
 where to lay his head, for something like a hundred 
 and fifty years it has stood in its lot, and seen the 
 generations of men come and go like the leaves of the 
 forest. I passed some pleasant hours, a few years 
 
 1 Such as what was known as the Bishop's Palace, the houses 
 on Brattle Street occupied in Colonial days by Brattle, the Vas 
 sals, Oliver, Ruggles, Lee, Sewall, and others. Most of the 
 occupants were tories and Church of England men, and the prin 
 cipal line of mansions went by the name of Church Row.
 
 THE. GAMBREL-ROOFED HOUSE. 207 
 
 since, in the Registry of Deeds and the Town Records, 
 looking up the history of the old house. How those 
 dear friends of mine, the antiquarians, for whose grave 
 councils I compose my features on the too rare Thurs 
 days 1 when I am at liberty to meet them, in whose 
 human herbarium the leaves and blossoms of past 
 generations are so carefully spread out and pressed 
 and laid away, would listen to an expansion of the fol 
 lowing brief details into an Historical Memoir ! 
 
 The estate was the third lot of the eighth " Squad 
 ron " (whatever that might be), and in the year 1707 
 was allotted in the distribution of undivided lands to 
 " Mr. ffox," the Reverend Jabez Fox, of Woburn, it 
 may be supposed, as it passed from his heirs to the 
 first Jonathan Hastings ; from him to his son, the 
 long-remembered College Steward ; from him in the 
 year 1792 to the Reverend Eliphalet Pearson, Pro 
 fessor of Hebrew and other Oriental languages in 
 Harvard College, whose large personality swam into 
 my ken when I was looking forward to my teens ; 
 from him to the progenitors of my unborn self. 
 
 I wonder if there are any such beings nowadays as 
 the great Eliphalet, with his large features and con 
 versational basso prqfundo, seemed to me. 2 His very 
 name had something elephantine about it, and it 
 seemed to me that the house shook from cellar to gar 
 ret at his foot-fall. Some have pretended that he had 
 Olympian aspirations, and wanted to sit in the seat 
 of Jove and bear the academic thunderbolt and the 
 aegis inscribed Christo et Ecclesice. It is a common 
 weakness enough to wish to find one's self in an 
 
 1 The day of meeting of the Massachusetts Historical Society. 
 
 2 See Dr. Holmes's reference to the great Eliphalet, in his 
 poem, The School-Boy, lines 256-262.
 
 208 OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES. 
 
 empty saddle; Cotton Mather was miserable all his 
 days, I am afraid, after that entry in his Diary : 
 " This Day Dr. SewaH was chosen President, for his 
 Piety." 
 
 There is no doubt that the men of the older gener 
 ation look bigger and more formidable to the boys 
 whose eyes are turned up at their venerable counte 
 nances than the race which succeeds them, to the same 
 boys grown older. Everything is twice as large, 
 measured on a three-year-old's three-foot scale as on 
 a thirty-year-old's six-foot scale ; but age magnifies 
 and aggravates persons out of due proportion. Old 
 people are a kind of monsters to little folks ; mild 
 manifestations of the terrible, it may be, but still, 
 with their white locks and ridged and grooved fea 
 tures, which those horrid little eyes exhaust of their 
 details, like so many microscopes, not exactly what 
 human beings ought to be. The middle-aged and 
 young men have left comparatively faint impressions 
 in my memory, but how grandly the procession of the 
 old clergymen who filled our pulpit from time to time, 
 and passed the day under our roof, marches before 
 my closed eyes! At their head the most venerable 
 David Osgood, the majestic minister of Medford, with 
 massive front and shaggy overshadowing eyebrows ; 
 following in the train, mild-eyed John Foster of 
 Brighton, with the lambent aurora of a smile about 
 his pleasant mouth, which not even the " Sabbath " 
 could subdue to the true Levitical aspect ; and bulky 
 Charles Stearns of Lincoln, author of " The Ladies' 
 Philosophy of Love. A Poem. 1797." (how I stared 
 at him ! he was the first living person ever pointed 
 out to me as a poet) ; and Thaddeus Mason Harris l 
 
 1 " I remember in my boyhood the little quaint old man, bent
 
 THE GAMBREL-ROOFED HOUSE. 209 
 
 of Dorchester (the same who, a poor youth, trudging 
 along, staff in hand, being then in a stress of sore 
 need, found all at once that somewhat was adhering 
 to the end of his stick, which somewhat proved to be 
 a gold ring of price, bearing the words, " God speed 
 thee, Friend ! "), already in decadence as I remember 
 him, with head slanting forward and downward as if 
 looking for a place to rest in after his learned labors ; 
 and that other Thaddeus, 1 the old man of West Cam 
 bridge, who outwatched the rest so long after they 
 had gone to sleep in their own churchyards, that it 
 almost seemed as if he meant to sit up until the morn 
 ing of the resurrection ; and, bringing up the rear, 
 attenuated but vivacious little Jonathan Homer of 
 Newton, who was, to look upon, a kind of expurgated, 
 reduced, and Americanized copy of Voltaire, but very 
 unlike him in wickedness or wit. The good-humored 
 junior member of our family always loved to make 
 him happy by setting him chirruping about Miles 
 Coverdale's Version, and the Bishop's Bible, and how 
 he wrote to his friend Sir Isaac (Coffin) about some 
 thing or other, and how Sir Isaac wrote back that he 
 was very much pleased with the contents of his letter, 
 and so on about Sir Isaac, ad libitum, for the ad 
 miral was his old friend, and he was proud of him. 
 The kindly little old gentleman was a collector of Bi- 
 
 almost incredibly, but still wearing a hale aspect, who used to 
 haunt the alcoves of the old library in Harvard Hall. It was 
 rumored among us that he had once been appointed private sec 
 retary to Washington, but had resigned from illness ; and it was 
 known that he was arranging and indexing for Mr. Sparks the 
 one hundred and thirty-two manuscript volumes of Washing 
 ton's correspondence." T. W. Higginson : Memoir of Thad 
 deus William Harris (son of T. M. H.). 
 
 1 Rev. Thaddeus Fiske, who died in 1855 at the age of 93.
 
 210 OLIVER WENDELL tiOLMES. 
 
 bles, and made himself believe he thought he should 
 publish a learned Commentary some day or other ; but 
 his friends looked for it only in the Greek Calends, 
 say on the 31st of April, when that should come 
 round, if you would modernize the phrase. I recall 
 also one or two exceptional and infrequent visitors 
 with perfect distinctness : cheerful Elijah Kellogg, a 
 lively missionary from the region of the Quoddy In 
 dians, with much hopeful talk about Sock Bason and 
 his tribe ; also Poor-house-Parson Isaac Smith, his 
 head going like a China mandarin, as he discussed 
 the possibilities of the escape of that distinguished 
 captive whom he spoke of under the name, if I can 
 reproduce phonetically its vibrating nasalities, of 
 " General Mmbongaparty," a name suggestive to my 
 young imagination of a dangerous, loose-jointed skel 
 eton, threatening us all like the armed figure of Death 
 in my little New England Primer. 
 
 I have mentioned only the names of those whose 
 images come up pleasantly before me, and I do not 
 mean to say anything which any descendant might 
 not read smilingly. But there were some of the black- 
 coated gentry whose aspect was not so agreeable to 
 me. It is very curious to me to look back on my 
 early likes and dislikes, and see how as a child I was 
 attracted or repelled by such and such ministers, a 
 good deal, as I found out long afterwards, according 
 to their theological beliefs. On the whole, I think 
 the old-fashioned New England divine softening down 
 into Arminianism was about as agreeable as any of 
 them. And here I may remark, that a mellowing 
 rigorist is always a much pleasanter object to contem 
 plate than a tightening liberal, as a cold day warming 
 up to 32 Fahrenheit is much more agreeable than a
 
 THE GAMBREL-ROOFED HOUSE. 211 
 
 warm one chilling down to the same temperature. 
 The least pleasing change is that kind of mental hern- 
 iplegia which now and then attacks the rational side 
 of a man at about the same period of life when one 
 side of the body is liable to be palsied, and in fact is, 
 very probably, the same thing as palsy, in another 
 form. The worst of it is that the subjects of it never 
 seem to suspect that they are intellectual invalids, 
 stammerers and cripples at best, but are all the time 
 hitting out at their old friends with the well arm, and 
 calling them hard names out of their twisted mouths. 
 
 It was a real delight to have one of those good, 
 hearty, happy, benignant old clergymen pass the Sun 
 day with us, and I can remember some whose advent 
 made the day feel almost like " Thanksgiving." But 
 now and then would come along a clerical visitor with 
 a sad face and a wailing voice, which sounded exactly 
 as if somebody must be lying dead up-stairs, who took 
 no interest in us children, except a painful one, as 
 being in a bad way with our cheery looks, and did 
 more to unchristianize us with his woebegone ways 
 than all his sermons were like to accomplish in the 
 other direction. I remember one in particular, who 
 twitted me so with my blessings as a Christian child, 
 and whined so to me about the naked black children 
 who, like the " Little Vulgar Boy," " had n't got no 
 supper and had n't got no ma," and had n't got no 
 Catechism, (how I wished for the moment I was a lit 
 tle black boy !) that he did more in that one day to 
 make me a heathen than he had ever done in a month 
 to make a Christian out of an infant Hottentot. 
 What a debt we owe to our friends of the left centre, 
 the Brooklyn and the Park Street and the Summer 
 Street ministers ; good, wholesome, sound - bodied,
 
 212 OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES. 
 
 sane-minded, cheerful-spirited men, who have taken 
 the place of those wailing poitrinaires with the ban 
 danna handkerchiefs round their meagre throats and a 
 funeral service in their forlorn physiognomies ! I 
 might have been a minister myself, for aught I know, 
 if this clergyman had not looked and talked so like an 
 undertaker. 
 
 All this belongs to one of the side-shows, to which 
 I promised those who would take tickets to the main 
 exhibition should have entrance gratis. If I were 
 writing a poem you would expect, as a matter of 
 course, that there would be a digression now and 
 then. 
 
 To come back to the old house and its former ten 
 ant, the Professor of Hebrew and other Oriental lan 
 guages. Fifteen years he lived with his family under 
 its roof. I never found the slightest trace of him 
 until a few years ago, when I cleaned and brightened 
 with pious hands the brass lock of " the study," which 
 had for many years been covered with a thick coat of 
 paint. On that I found scratched, as with a nail or 
 fork, the following inscription : 
 
 E PE 
 
 Only that and nothing more, but the story told itself. 
 Master Edward Pearson, then about as high as the 
 lock, was disposed to immortalize himself in monu 
 mental brass, and had got so far towards it, when a 
 sudden interruption, probably a smart box on the ear, 
 cheated him of his fame, except so far as this poor 
 record may rescue it. Dead long ago. I remember 
 him well, a grown man, as a visitor at a later period ; 
 and, for some reason, I recall him in the attitude of
 
 THE GAMBREL-ROOFED HOUSE. 213 
 
 the Colossus of Rhodes, standing full before a gener 
 ous wood-fire, not facing it, but quite the contrary, a 
 perfect picture of the content afforded by a blazing 
 hearth contemplated from that point of view, and, as 
 the heat stole through his person and kindled his 
 emphatic features, seeming to me a pattern of manly 
 beauty. What a statue gallery of posturing friends 
 we all have in our memory ! The old Professor him 
 self sometimes visited the house after it had changed 
 hands. Of course, my recollections are not to be 
 wholly trusted, but I always think I see his likeness 
 in a profile face to be found among the illustrations of 
 Rees's Cyclopedia. (See Plates, Vol. IV., Plate 2, 
 Painting, Diversities of the Human Face, Fig. 4.) 
 
 And now let us return to our chief picture. In the 
 days of my earliest remembrance, a row of tall Lom- 
 bardy poplars mounted guard on the western side of 
 the old mansion. Whether, like the cypress, these 
 trees suggest the idea of the funeral torch or the mon 
 umental spire, whether their tremulous leaves make us 
 afraid by sympathy with their nervous thrills, whether 
 the faint balsamic smell of their leaves and their 
 closely swathed limbs have in them vague hints of 
 dead Pharaohs stiffened in their cerements, I will not 
 guess ; but they always seemed to me to give an air of 
 sepulchral sadness to the house before which they 
 stood sentries. Not so with the row of elms which 
 you may see leading up towards the western entrance ; 
 I think the patriarch of them all went over in the 
 great gale of 1815 ; I know I used to shake the 
 youngest of them with my hands, stout as it is now, 
 with a trunk that would defy the bully of Crotona, or 
 the strong man whose liaison with the Lady Delilah 
 proved so disastrous.
 
 214 OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES. 
 
 The College plain would be nothing without its 
 elms. As the long hair of a woman is a glory to her, 
 so are these green tresses that bank themselves against 
 the sky in thick clustered masses, the ornament and 
 the pride of the classic green. You know the " Wash 
 ington elm," or if you do not, you had better rekindle 
 your patriotism by reading the inscription, which tells 
 you that under its shadow the great leader first drew 
 his sword at the head of an American army. In a 
 line with that you may see two others : the coral fan, 
 as I always called it from its resemblance in form to 
 that beautiful marine growth, and a third a little far 
 ther along. I have heard it said that all three were 
 planted at the same time, and that the difference of 
 their growth is due to the slope of the ground, the 
 Washington elm being lower than either of the others. 
 There is a row of elms just in front of the old house 
 on the south. When I was a child the one at the 
 southwest corner was struck by lightning, and one of 
 its limbs and a long ribbon of bark torn away. The 
 tree never fully recovered its symmetry and vigor, 
 and forty years and more afterwards a second thun 
 derbolt crashed upon it and set its heart on fire, like 
 those of the lost souls in the Hall of Eblis. Heaven 
 had twice blasted it, and the axe finished what the 
 lightning had begun. 
 
 The soil of the University town is divided into 
 patches of sandy and of clayey ground. The Com 
 mon and the College green, near which the old house 
 stands, are on one of the sandy patches. Four curses 
 are the local inheritance : droughts, dust, mud, and 
 canker-worms. I cannot but think that all the char 
 acters of a region help to modify the children born in 
 it. I am fond of making apologies for human nature,
 
 THE GAMBREL-ROOFED HOUSE. 215 
 
 and I think I could find an excuse for myself if I, too, 
 were dry and barren and muddy-witted and " cantan 
 kerous," disposed to get my back up, like those 
 other natives of the soil. 
 
 I know this, that the way Mother Earth treats a 
 boy shapes out a kind of natural theology for him. 
 I fell into Manichean ways of thinking from the 
 teaching of my garden experiences. Like other boys 
 in the country, I had my patch of ground, to which, 
 in the spring-time, I intrusted the seeds furnished me, 
 with a confident trust in their resurrection and glori 
 fication in the better world of summer. But I soon 
 found that my lines had fallen in a place where a 
 vegetable growth had to run the gauntlet of as many 
 foes and trials as a Christian pilgrim. Flowers would 
 not blow; daffodils perished like criminals in their 
 condemned caps, without their petals ever seeing day 
 light; roses were disfigured with monstrous protru 
 sions through their very centres, something that 
 looked like a second bud pushing through the middle 
 of the corolla ; lettuces and cabbages would not head ; 
 radishes knotted themselves until they looked like 
 centenarians' fingers ; and on every stem, on every 
 leaf, and both sides of it, and at the root of everything 
 that grew, was a professional specialist in the. shape 
 of grub, caterpillar, aphis, or other expert, whose busi 
 ness it was to devour that particular part, and help 
 murder the whole attempt at vegetation. Such expe 
 riences must influence a child born to them. A sandy 
 soil," where nothing flourishes but weeds and evil 
 beasts of small dimensions, must breed different qual 
 ities in its human offspring from one of those fat and 
 fertile spots which the wit whom I have once before 
 quoted described so happily that, if I quoted the pas-
 
 216 OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES. 
 
 sage, 1 its brilliancy would spoil one of ray pages, as a 
 diamond breastpin sometimes kills the social effect of 
 the wearer, who might have passed for a gentleman 
 without it. Your arid patch of earth should seem to 
 be the natural birthplace of the leaner virtues and the 
 feebler vices, of temperance and the domestic pro 
 prieties on the one hand, with a tendency to light 
 weights in groceries and provisions, and to clandes 
 tine abstraction from the person on the other, as op 
 posed to the free hospitality, the broadly planned bur 
 glaries, and the largely conceived homicides of our 
 rich Western alluvial regions. Yet Nature is never 
 wholly unkind. Economical as she was in my unpar- 
 adised Eden, hard as it was to make some of my floral 
 houris unveil, still the damask roses sweetened the 
 June breezes, the bladed and plumed flower-de-luces 
 unfolded their close-wrapped cones, and larkspurs 
 and lupins, lady's delights, plebeian manifestations 
 of the pansy, self-sowing marigolds, hollyhocks, the 
 forest flowers of two seasons, and the perennial lilacs 
 and syringas, all whispered to the winds blowing 
 over them that some caressing presence was around 
 me. 
 
 Beyond the garden was " the field," a vast domain 
 of four acres or thereabout, by the measurement of 
 after years, bordered to the north by a fathomless 
 chasm, the ditch the base-ball players of the present 
 era jump over ; on the east by unexplored territory ; 
 on the south by a barren inclosure, where the red 
 sorrel proclaimed liberty and equality under its dra- 
 peau rouge, and succeeded in establishing a vegetable 
 
 1 Possibly in reference to Douglas Jerrold's mot of a certain 
 fertile district : " Tickle it with a hoe and it will laugh with a 
 harvest."
 
 THE GAMBREL-ROOFED HOUSE. 217 
 
 commune where all were alike poor, mean, sour, and 
 uninteresting ; and on the west by the Common, not 
 then disgraced by jealous inclosures, which make it 
 look like a cattle-market. Beyond, as I looked round, 
 were the Colleges, the meeting-house, the little square 
 market-house long vanished ; the burial-ground where 
 the dead Presidents stretched their weary bones un 
 der epitaphs stretched out at as full length as their 
 subjects ; the pretty church where the gouty tories 
 used to kneel on their hassocks ; the district school- 
 house, and hard by it Ma'am Hancock's cottage, 
 never so called in those days, but rather " ten-footer ; " 
 then houses scattered near and far, open spaces, the 
 shadowy elms, round hilltops in the distance, and over 
 all the great bowl of the sky. Mind you, this was 
 the WORLD, as I first knew it ; terra veteribus cognita, 
 as Mr. Arrowsmith would have called it, if he had 
 mapped the universe of my infancy. 
 
 But I am forgetting the old house again in the 
 landscape. The worst of a modern stylish mansion is, 
 that it has no place for ghosts. I watched one build 
 ing hot long since. It had no proper garret, to be 
 gin with, only a sealed interval between the roof 
 and attics, where a spirit could not be accommo 
 dated, unless it were flattened out like Ravel, Brother, 
 after the mill -stone had fallen on him. There was 
 not a nook or a corner in the whole house fit to lodge 
 any respectable ghost, for every part was as open 
 to observation as a literary man's character and con 
 dition, his figure and estate, his coat and his counte 
 nance, are to his (or her) Bohemian Majesty on a 
 tour of inspection through his (or her) subjects' 
 keyholes. 
 
 Now the old house had wainscots, behind which the
 
 218 OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES. 
 
 mice were always scampering and squeaking and rat 
 tling down the plaster, and enacting family scenes and 
 parlor theatricals. It had a cellar where the cold slug 
 clung to the walls, and the misanthropic spider with 
 drew from the garish day; where the green mould 
 loved to grow, and the long, white potato-shoots went 
 feeling along the floor, if haply they might find the 
 daylight ; it had great brick pillars, always in a cold 
 sweat with holding up the burden they had been ach 
 ing under day and night for a century and more ; it 
 had sepulchral arches closed by rough doors that hung 
 on hinges rotten with rust, behind which doors, if 
 there was not a heap of bones connected with a mys 
 terious disappearance of long ago, there well might 
 have been, for it was just the place to look for them. 
 It had a garret, very nearly such a one as it seems to 
 me one of us has described in one of his books ; but 
 let us look at this one as I can reproduce it from 
 memory. It has a flooring of laths with ridges of 
 mortar squeezed up between them, which if you tread 
 on you will go to the Lord have mercy on you ! 
 where will you go to ? the same being crossed by 
 narrow bridges of boards, on which you may put your 
 feet, but with fear and trembling. Above you and 
 around you are beams and joists, on some of which 
 you may see, when the light is let in, the marks of the 
 conchoidal clippings of the broad-axe, showing the 
 rude way in which the timber was shaped as it came, 
 full of sap, from the neighboring forest. It is a realm 
 of darkness and thick dust, and shroud-like cobwebs 
 and dead things they wrap in their gray folds. For a 
 garret is like a sea-shore, where wrecks are thrown up 
 and slowly go to pieces. There is the cradle which 
 the old man you just remember was rocked in ; there
 
 THE GAMBREL-ROOFED HOUSE. 219 
 
 is the ruin of the bedstead he died on ; that ugly 
 slanting contrivance used to be put under his pillow 
 in the days when his breath came hard ; there is his 
 old chair with both arms gone, symbol of the desolate 
 time when he had nothing earthly left to lean on ; 
 there is the large wooden reel which the blear-eyed 
 old deacon sent the minister's lady, who thanked him 
 graciously, and twirled it smilingly, and in fitting sea 
 son bowed it out decently to the limbo of troublesome 
 conveniences. And there are old leather portman 
 teaus, like stranded porpoises, their mouths gaping in 
 gaunt hunger for the food with which they used to be 
 gorged to bulging repletion ; and old brass andirons, 
 waiting until time shall revenge them on their paltry 
 substitutes, and they shall have their own again, and 
 bring with them the fore-stick and the back-log of 
 ancient days ; and the empty churn with its idle 
 dasher, which the Nancys and Phoabes, who have left 
 their comfortable places to the Bridgets and Norahs, 
 used to handle to good purpose ; and the brown, 
 shaky old spinning-wheel, which was running, it may 
 be, in the days when they were hanging the Salem 
 witches. 
 
 Under the dark and haunted garret were attic 
 chambers which themselves had histories. On a pane 
 in the northeastern chamber may be read these names : 
 " John Tracy," " Robert Roberts," " Thomas Prince ; " 
 " Stultus " another hand had added. When I found 
 these names a few years ago (wrong side up, for the 
 window had been reversed), I looked at once in the 
 Triennial to find them, for the epithet showed that 
 they were probably students. I found them all under 
 the years 1771 and 1773. Does it please their thin 
 ghosts thus to be dragged to the light of day ? Has
 
 220 OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES. 
 
 " Stultus " forgiven the indignity of being thus char< 
 acterized ? 
 
 The southeast chamber was the Library Hospital. 
 Every scholar should have a book infirmary attached 
 to his library. There should find a peaceable refuge 
 the many books, invalids from their birth, which are 
 sent " with the best regards of the Author ; " the 
 respected, but unpresentable cripples which have lost 
 a cover ; the odd volumes of honored sets which go 
 mourning all their days for their lost brother ; the 
 school-books which have been so often the subjects of 
 assault and battery, that they look as if the police 
 court must know them by heart ; these, and still more 
 the pictured story-books, beginning with Mother 
 Goose (which a dear old friend of mine 1 has just 
 been amusing his philosophic leisure with turning 
 most ingeniously and happily into the tongues of 
 Virgil and Homer), will be precious mementos by and 
 by, when children and grandchildren come along. 
 What would I not give for the dear little paper-bound 
 quarto, in large and most legible type, on certain 
 pages of which the tender hand that was the shield of 
 my infancy had crossed out with deep black marks 
 something awful, probably about BEARS, such as once 
 tare two-and-forty of us little folks for making faces, 
 and the very name of which made us hide our heads 
 under the bed-clothes. 
 
 I made strange acquaintances in that book infirm 
 ary up in the southeast attic. The " Negro Plot " at 
 New York helped to implant a feeling in me which it 
 took Mr. Garrison a good many years to root out. 
 
 1 XrjvcfSta [Chenodia], or the classical Mother Goose. Argutos 
 inter strepere anser olores. [By Dr. Jacob Bigelow.] Cambridge; 
 Printed (not published), University Press, 1871.
 
 THE GAMBREL-ROOFED HOUSE. 221 
 
 M Thinks I to Myself," an old novel, which has been 
 attributed to a famous statesman, 1 introduced me to a 
 world of fiction which was not represented on the 
 shelves of the library proper, unless perhaps by " Cce- 
 lebs in Search of a Wife," or allegories of the bitter 
 tonic class, as the young doctor that sits on the other 
 side of the table would probably call them. I always, 
 from an early age, had a keen eye for a story with a 
 moral sticking out of it, and gave it a wide berth, 
 though in my later years I have myself written a 
 couple of " medicated novels," as one of my dearest 
 and pleasantest old friends wickedly called them, 
 when somebody asked her if she had read the last of 
 my printed performances. I forgave the satire for 
 the charming esprit of the epithet. Besides the works 
 I have mentioned, there was an old, old Latin alchemy 
 book, with the manuscript annotations of some ancient 
 Rosicrucian, in the pages of which I had a vague no 
 tion that I might find the mighty secret of the Lapis 
 Philosophorum, otherwise called Chaos, the Dragon, 
 the Green Lion, the Quinta JSssentia, the Soap of 
 Sages, the Vinegar of Philosophers, the Dew of Heav 
 enly Grace, the Egg, the Old Man, the Sun, the 
 Moon, and by all manner of odd aliases, as I am as 
 sured by the plethoric little book before me, in parch 
 ment covers browned like a meerschaum with the 
 smoke of furnaces and the thumbing of dead gold- 
 seekers, and the fingering of bony-handed book-misers, 
 and the long intervals of dusty slumber on the shelves 
 of the bouquiniste ; for next year it will be three cen 
 turies old, and it had already seen nine generations of 
 men when I caught its eye (Alchemice Doctrina) and 
 
 1 George Canning. The actual author of the novel was an 
 English clergyman, Rev. Edward Nares.
 
 222 OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES. 
 
 recognized it at pistol-shot distance as a prize, among 
 the breviaries and Heures and trumpery volumes of 
 the old open-air dealer who exposed his treasures un 
 der the shadow of St. Sulpice. I have never lost my 
 taste for alchemy since I first got hold of the " Palla 
 dium Spagyricum " of Peter John Faber, and sought 
 in vain, it is true through its pages for a clear, in 
 telligible, and practical statement of how I could turn 
 my lead sinkers and the weights of the tall kitchen 
 clock into good yellow gold, specific gravity 19.2, and 
 exchangeable for whatever I then wanted, and for 
 many more things than I was then aware of. One of 
 the greatest pleasures of childhood is found in the 
 mysteries which it hides from the skepticism of the 
 elders, and works up into small mythologies of its own. 
 I have seen all this played over again in adult life, 
 the same delightful bewilderment of semi-emotional 
 belief in listening to the gaseous promises of this or 
 that fantastic system, that I found in the pleasing mi 
 rages conjured up for me by the ragged old volume I 
 used to pore over in the southeast attic-chamber. 
 
 The rooms of the second story, the chambers of 
 birth and death, are sacred to silent memories. 
 
 Let us go down to the ground-floor. I should have 
 begun with this, but that the historical reminscences 
 of the old house have been recently told in a most in 
 teresting memoir by a distinguished student of our lo 
 cal history. l I retain my doubts about those " dents " 
 on the floor of the right-hand room, " the study " of 
 successive occupants, said to have been made by the 
 butts of the Continental militia's firelocks, but this 
 was the cause the story told me in childhood laid them 
 
 1 See Old Cambridge and New, by Thomas C. Amory. Bos 
 ton, 1871.
 
 THE GAMBREL-ROOFED HOUSE. 223 
 
 to. That military consultations were held in that room 
 when the house was General Ward's headquarters, 
 that the Provincial generals and colonels and other 
 men of war there planned the movement which ended 
 in the fortifying of Bunker's Hill, that Warren slept 
 in the house the night before the battle, that Presi 
 dent Langdon went forth from the western door and 
 prayed for God's blessing on the men just setting 
 forth on their bloody expedition, all these things 
 have been told, and perhaps none of them need be 
 doubted. 
 
 But now for fifty years and more that room has 
 been a meeting-ground for the platoons and companies 
 which range themselves at the scholar's word of com 
 mand. Pleasant it is to think that the retreating host 
 of books is to give place to a still larger army of vol 
 umes, which have seen service under the eye of a great 
 commander. For here the noble collection of him so 
 freshly remembered as our silver-tongued orator, our 
 erudite scholar, our honored College President, our 
 accomplished statesman, our courtly ambassador, are 
 to be reverently gathered by the heir of his name, 
 himself not unworthy to be surrounded by that august 
 assembly of the wise of all ages and of various lands 
 and languages. 1 
 
 Could such a many-chambered edifice have stood a 
 century and a half and not have had its passages of 
 romance to bequeath their lingering legends to the 
 after-time? There are other names on some of the 
 small window-panes, which must have had young flesh- 
 and-blood owners, and there is one of early date which 
 elderly persons have whispered was borne by a fair 
 woman, whose graces made the house beautiful in the 
 
 1 William Everett, at that time one of the College Faculty.
 
 224 OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES. 
 
 eyes of the youth of that time. One especially you 
 will find the name of Fortescue Vernon, of the class 
 of 1780, in the Triennial Catalogue was a favored 
 visitor to the old mansion ; but he went over seas, I 
 think they told me, and died still young, and the name 
 of the maiden which is scratched on the window-pane 
 was never changed. I am telling the story honestly, 
 as I remember it, but I may have colored it uncon 
 sciously, and the legendary pane may be broken before 
 this for aught I know. At least, I have named no 
 names except the beautiful one of the supposed hero 
 of the romantic story. 
 
 It was a great happiness to have been born in an 
 old house haunted by such recollections, with harm 
 less ghosts walking its corridors, with fields of waving 
 grass and trees and singing birds, and that vast terri 
 tory of four or five acres around it to give a child the 
 sense that he was born to a noble principality. It has 
 been a great pleasure to retain a certain hold upon it 
 for so many years ; and since in the natural course of 
 things it must at length pass into other hands, it is a 
 gratification to see the old place making itself tidy for 
 a new tenant, like some venerable dame who is getting 
 ready to entertain a neighbor of condition. Not long 
 since a new cap of shingles adorned this ancient mo 
 ther among the village now city mansions. She 
 has dressed herself in brighter colors than she has 
 hitherto worn, so they tell me, within the last few 
 days. She has modernized her aspects in several 
 ways ; she has rubbed bright the glasses through which 
 she looks at the Common and the Colleges ; and as 
 the sunsets shine upon her through the flickering 
 leaves or the wiry spray of the elms I remember from 
 my childhood, they will glorify her into the aspect she
 
 THE GAMBREL-ROOFED HOUSE. 225 
 
 wore when President Holyoke, father of our long 
 since dead centenarian, 1 looked upon her youthful 
 comeliness. 
 
 The quiet corner formed by this and the neighbor 
 ing residences has changed less than any place I can 
 remember. Our kindly, polite, shrewd, and humorous 
 old neighbor, who in former days has served the town 
 as constable and auctioneer, 2 and who bids fair to 
 become the oldest inhabitant of the city, was there 
 when I was born, and is living there to-day. By and 
 by the stony foot of the great University will plant 
 itself on this whole territory, and the private recol 
 lections which clung so tenaciously and fondly to the 
 place and its habitations will have died with those 
 who cherished them. 
 
 Shall they ever live again in the memory of those 
 who loved them here below ? What is this life with 
 out the poor accidents which made it our own, and by 
 which we identify ourselves ? Ah me ! I might like 
 to be a winged chorister, but still it seems to me I 
 should hardly be quite happy if I could not recall at 
 will the Old House with the Long Entry, and the 
 White Chamber (where I wrote the first verses 3 that 
 made me known, with a pencil, stems pede in uno, 
 pretty nearly), and the Little Parlor, and the Study, 
 and the old books in uniforms as varied as those o 
 the Ancient and Honorable Artillery Company used 
 to be, if my memory serves me right, and the front 
 yard with the stars of Bethlehem growing, flowerless, 
 among the grass, and the dear faces to be seen no more 
 there or anywhere on this earthly place of farewells. 
 
 1 Dr. Edward Augustus Holyoke, who died in 1829, aged 101 
 years. 
 
 2 Royall Morse. * Were not these Old Ironsides f
 
 226 OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES. 
 
 I have told ray story. I do not know what special 
 gifts have been granted or denied me ; but this I know, 
 that I am like so many others of my fellow-creatures, 
 that when I smile, I feel as if they must ; when I cry, 
 I think their eyes fill ; and it always seems to me that 
 when I am most truly myself I come nearest to them 
 and am surest of being listened to by the brothers 
 and sisters of the larger family into which I was born 
 so long ago. I have often feared they might be tired 
 of me and what I tell them. But then, perhaps, 
 would come a letter from some quiet body in some 
 out-of-the-way place, which showed me that I had said 
 something which another had often felt but never 
 said, or told the secret of another's heart in unburden 
 ing my own. Such evidences that one is in the high 
 way of human experience and feeling lighten the foot 
 steps wonderfully. So it is that one is encouraged to 
 go on writing as long as the world has anything that 
 interests him, for he never knows how many of his 
 fellow-beings he may please or profit, and in how 
 many places his name will be spoken as that of a 
 friend. 1 
 
 1 A pleasant paper of reminiscences of Cambridge will be 
 found in Lowell's Fireside Travels, entitled Cambridge Thirty 
 Years Ago. See also Dr. Holmes's Cinders from the Ashes, and 
 a short paper on The Old Court-House, by his brother, John 
 Holmes, in The Cambridge of 1776 ; and T. C. Amory's Old 
 Cambridge and New, already referred to.
 
 JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL. 
 
 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 IT has sometimes seemed to the casual observer that 
 Lowell had a divided interest in his literary life, passing 
 from poetry to prose, and back to poetry, as if he found it 
 difficult to determine in which direction his power lay. But 
 a closer student will remark how very large a proportion of 
 Lowell's prose is the record of his studies in poetry. His 
 first venture in literature was poetic, when he published, 
 not long after graduation from college, the volume of 
 poems, A Year's Life ; but the opening words of the dedi 
 cation of that book hint at studies which had been begun 
 long before, and were carried on with unflagging zeal 
 ever after. Three years later he published Conversations 
 on Some of the Old Poets, a book now out of print ; and 
 any one reading the titles of the papers which comprise the 
 six volumes of his prose writings will readily see how much 
 literature, and especially poetic literature, occupied his at 
 tention. Shakespeare, Dryden, Lessing, Rousseau, Dante, 
 Spenser, Wordsworth, Milton, Keats, Carlyle, Percival, 
 Thoreau, Swinburne, Chaucer, Emerson, Pope, these are 
 the principal subjects of his prose, and the range of topics 
 indicates the catholicity of his taste. 
 
 It is more correct, therefore, to regard Lowell as prima 
 rily a poet, who published also the results of a scholar 
 ship which busied itself chiefly about poetry. The com 
 ments of a poet about other poets are always of interest, 
 and the first question usually asked of a young poet is:
 
 228 JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL. 
 
 What master has he followed ? The answer is generally to 
 be found in the verse itself, which betrays the influence of 
 other and older poets. It is not too much to say that while 
 here and there one may trace special influences in Lowell's 
 poetry, as, for example, of Keats, the more noticeable 
 influence is in the converging force of the great features of 
 historic poetry, so that there is no echo of any one poet or 
 conscious imitation of a poetic school ; but poetry as inter 
 preted by the masters of song, in consenting form and 
 spirit, reappears in his verse. 
 
 It must not be inferred from this that the source of 
 Lowell's poetic inspiration is wholly or in great part liter 
 ary. It is only to say that as a poet he was also a pro 
 found student of poetry ; the great impulses which have 
 stirred other poets moved him also. These impulses are 
 nature, humanity, and literature ; we have noticed briefly 
 his studies in literature ; there the immediate result is less 
 distinguishable in his poetry than in his prose, the great 
 bulk of which, as noted, is composed of critical observa 
 tions on poetry. For his studies in nature we must look 
 most directly to his verse. There will be found the evi 
 dence of his keen delight, his quick ear and eye, his fine 
 apprehension ; and as poetry offers the most ready outlet 
 for enthusiasm in the phenomena of nature, so Lowell the 
 poet has sung of nature rather than written of her. But 
 one may find a small section of his essays devoted to this 
 field, and the paper which we have taken, My Garden Ac 
 quaintance, belongs in the group. 
 
 It was said of the great landscape painter of modern 
 days, by his disciple and interpreter, that in all his pictures 
 he introduced the human figure not for the sake of color, or 
 to hint at proportions, but because to him nature was empty 
 without the thought of humanity. This third great inspira 
 tion was the most prominent in Lowell's poetry, and it was 
 the cause of an important part of his prose writings. It is 
 not always to be distinguished from the bookish influences
 
 INTRODUCTION. 229 
 
 which we have noted, for in studying poetry he was alive 
 to the personality of the poets ; but it finds its strongest 
 expression in a few papers devoted to history and politics, 
 such as his papers on Witchcraft, New England Two Cen 
 turies Ago, A Great Public Character, Abraham, Lincoln, 
 and certain political essays originally published in maga 
 zines. 
 
 Throughout his prose works run the same characteristics 
 to be noted in his poetry ; but the form of prose is necessa 
 rily more favorable to the exhibition of powers of analysis 
 and of a discursive faculty which leads one to illustrate his 
 subject by frequent reference to matters of history or art. 
 The play upon words also belongs rather to prose than to 
 poetry, and in general we may say that the rambles of a 
 writer are freer and more natural within the unconstrained 
 limits of prose. Thus the associative power of Lowell's 
 mind, that gift which, abundantly fed by reading, enables 
 him to suggest indefinitely new combinations of thought, is 
 most delightfully displayed in his prose. The quickness 
 with which he seizes upon the natural suggestions of his 
 subject and the deftness with which he weaves them into 
 the changing web of his fabric constitute a surprise and 
 delight to the reader, and beneath all the subtlety of thought 
 and richness of fancy there is a substance of common sense 
 and sound judgment which commend themselves to our lat 
 est thought upon his work. 
 
 My Garden Acquaintance was first published in the 
 Atlantic Almanac for 1869. Abraham Lincoln appeared 
 in the North American Review for January, 1864 ; when 
 it was reprinted later a few changes were made and the 
 final paragraph was added. Books and Libraries was an 
 address given at the opening of the Free Public Library in 
 Chelsea, Mass., December 22, 1885.
 
 MY GARDEN ACQUAINTANCE. 
 
 ONE of the most delightful books in my father's 
 library was White's " Natural History of Selborne." 
 For me it has rather gained in charm with years. I 
 used to read it without knowing the secret of the 
 pleasure I found in it, but as I grow older I begin to 
 detect some of the simple expedients of this natural 
 magic. Open the book where you will, it takes you 
 out of doors. In our broiling July weather one can 
 walk out with this genially garrulous Fellow of Oriel 
 and find refreshment instead of fatigue. You have no 
 trouble in keeping abreast of him as he ambles along 
 on his hobby-horse, now pointing to a pretty view, 
 now stopping to watch the motions of a bird or an 
 insect, or to bag a specimen for the Honorable Daines 
 Barrington or Mr. Pennant. In simplicity of taste 
 and natural refinement he reminds one of Walton ; in 
 tenderness toward what he would have called the brute 
 creation, of Cowper. I do not know whether his descrip 
 tions of scenery are good or not, but they have made 
 me familiar with his neighborhood. Since I first read 
 him, I have walked over some of his favorite haunts, 
 but I still see them through his eyes rather than by 
 any recollection of actual and personal vision. The 
 book has also the delightfulness of absolute leisure. 
 Mr. White seems never to have had any harder work 
 to do than to study the habits of his feathered fellow- 
 townsfolk, or to watch the ripening of his peaches on
 
 MY GARDEN ACQUAINTANCE. 231 
 
 the wall. His volumes are the journal of Adam in 
 Paradise, 
 
 " Annihilating all that 's made 
 To a green thought in a green shade." 
 
 It is positive rest only to look into that garden of his. 
 It is vastly better than to 
 
 " See great Diocletian walk 
 In the Salonian garden's noble shade," 
 
 for thither ambassadors intrude to bring with them 
 the noises of Rome, while here the world has no en 
 trance. No rumor of the revolt of the American Col 
 onies seems to have reached him. " The natural term 
 of an hog's life " has more interest for him than that 
 of an empire. Burgoyne may surrender and welcome ; 
 of what consequence is that compared with the fact 
 that we can explain the odd tumbling of rooks in the 
 air by their turning over " to scratch themselves with 
 one claw " ? All the couriers in Europe spurring 
 rowel-deep make no stir in Mr. White's little Char 
 treuse ; 1 but the arrival of the house-martin a day ear 
 lier or later than last year is a piece of news worth 
 sending express to all his correspondents. 
 
 Another secret charm of this book is its inadvertent 
 humor, so much the more delicious because unsus 
 pected by the author. How pleasant is his innocent 
 vanity in adding to the list of the British, and still 
 more of the Selbornian,yawwo/ I believe he would 
 gladly have consented to be eaten by a tiger or a croc 
 odile, if by that means the occasional presence within 
 the parish limits of either of these anthropophagous 
 brutes could have been established. He brags of no 
 
 1 La Grande Chartreuse was the original Carthusian monas 
 tery in France, where the most austere privacy was maintained.
 
 232 JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL. 
 
 fine society, but is plainly a little elated by " having 
 considerable acquaintance with a tame brown owl." 
 Most of us have known our share of owls, but few can 
 boast of intimacy with a feathered one. The great 
 events of Mr. White's life, too, have that dispropor 
 tionate importance which is always humorous. To 
 think of his hands having actually been thought wor 
 thy (as neither Willoughby's nor Ray's were) to hold 
 a stilted plover, the Charadrfus himaniopus, with no 
 back toe, and therefore " liable, in speculation, to per 
 petual vacillations " ! I wonder, by the way, if meta 
 physicians have no hind toes. In 1770 he makes the 
 acquaintance in Sussex of " an old family tortoise," 
 which had then been domesticated for thirty years. 
 It is clear that he fell in love with it at first sight. 
 We have no means of tracing the growth of his pas 
 sion ; but in 1780 we find him eloping with its object 
 in a post-chaise. ' The rattle and hurry of the jour 
 ney so perfectly roused it that, when I turned it out 
 in a border, it walked twice down to the bottom of 
 my garden." It reads like a Court Journal : " Yes 
 terday morning H. R. H. the Princess Alice took an 
 airing of half an hour on the terrace of Windsor Cas 
 tle." This tortoise might have been a member of the 
 Royal Society, if he could have condescended to so 
 ignoble an ambition. It had but just been discovered 
 that a surface inclined at a certain angle with the plane 
 of the horizon took more of the sun's rays. The tor 
 toise had always known this (though he unostenta 
 tiously made no parade of it), and used accordingly to 
 tilt himself up against the garden-wall in the autumn. 
 He seems to have been more of a philosopher than 
 even Mr. White himself, caring for nothing but to 
 get under a cabbage-leaf when it rained, or the sun
 
 MY GARDEN ACQUAINTANCE. 233 
 
 was too hot, and to bury himself alive before frost, a 
 four-footed Diogenes, who carried his tub on his back. 
 There are moods in which this kind of history is 
 infinitely ref reshihg. These creatures whom we affect 
 to look down upon as the drudges of instinct are mem 
 bers of a commonwealth whose constitution rests on 
 immovable bases. Never any need of reconstruction 
 there ! They never dream of settling it by vote that 
 eight hours are equal to ten, or that one creature is 
 as clever as another and no more. They do not use 
 their poor wits in regulating God's clocks, nor think 
 they cannot go astray so long as they carry their 
 guide-board about with them, a delusion we often 
 practise upon ourselves with our high and mighty rea 
 son, that admirable finger-post which points every way 
 and always right. It is good for us now and then to 
 converse with a world like Mr. White's, where Man 
 is the least important of animals. But one who, like 
 me, has always lived in the country and always on the 
 same spot, is drawn to his book by other occult sym 
 pathies. Do we not share his indignation at that 
 stupid Martin who had graduated his thermometer no 
 lower than 4 above zero of Fahrenheit, so that in the 
 coldest weather ever known the mercury basely ab 
 sconded into the bulb, and left us to see the victory 
 slip through our fingers, just as they were closing 
 upon it ? No man, I suspect, ever lived long in the 
 country without being bitten by these meteorological 
 ambitions. He likes to be hotter and colder, to have 
 been more deeply snowed up, to have more trees and 
 larger blow down than his neighbors. With us de 
 scendants of the Puritans especially, these weather- 
 competitions supply the abnegated excitement of the 
 race-course. Men learn to value thermometers of the
 
 234 JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL. 
 
 true imaginative temperament, capable of prodigious 
 elations and corresponding dejections. The other day 
 (5th July) I marked 98 in the shade, my high water 
 mark, higher by one degree than I had ever seen it be 
 fore. I happened to meet a neighbor ; as we mopped 
 our brows at each other, he told me that he had just 
 cleared 100, and I went home a beaten man. I had 
 not felt the heat before, save as a beautiful exaggera 
 tion of sunshine ; but now it oppressed me with the 
 prosaic vulgarity of an oven. What had been poetic 
 intensity became all at once rhetorical hyperbole. I 
 might suspect his thermometer (as indeed I did, for 
 we Harvard men are apt to think ill of any gradua 
 tion but our own) ; but it was a poor consolation. 
 The fact remained that his herald Mercury, standing 
 a tiptoe, could look down on mine. I seem to glimpse 
 something of this familiar weakness in Mr. White. 
 He, too, has shared in these mercurial triumphs and 
 defeats. Nor do I doubt that he had a true country- 
 gentleman's interest in the weather-cock ; that his first 
 question on coming down of a morning was, like Bara- 
 bas's, 
 
 " Into what quarter peers my halcyon's bill ? " 
 
 It is an innocent and healthful employment of the 
 mind, distracting one from too continual study of him 
 self, and leading him to dwell rather upon the indi 
 gestions of the elements than his own. "Did the 
 wind back round, or go about with the sun?" is a 
 rational question that bears not remotely on the mak 
 ing of hay and the prosperity of crops. I have little 
 doubt that the regulated observation of the vane in 
 many different places, and the interchange of results 
 by telegraph, would put the weather, as it were, in our 
 power, by betraying its ambushes before it is ready
 
 MY GARDEN ACQUAINTANCE. 235 
 
 to give the assault. At first sight, nothing seems 
 more drolly trivial than the lives of those whose single 
 achievement is to record the wind and the temper 
 ature three times a day. Yet such men are doubtless 
 sent into the world for this special end, and perhaps 
 there is no kind of accurate observation, whatever 
 its object, that has not its final use and value for 
 some one or other. It is even to be hoped that the 
 specidations of our newspaper editors and their myriad 
 correspondence upon the signs of the political atmos 
 phere may also fill their appointed place in a well- 
 regulated universe, if it be only that of supplying 
 so many more jack-o'-lanterns to the future historian. 
 Nay, the observations on finance of an M. C. whose 
 sole knowledge of the subject has been derived from 
 a life-long success in getting a living out of the public 
 without paying any equivalent therefor, will perhaps 
 be of interest hereafter to some explorer of our cloaca 
 maxima, whenever it is cleansed. 
 
 For many years I have been in the habit of noting 
 down some of the leading events of my embowered 
 solitude, such as the coming of certain birds and the 
 like, a kind of memoires pour servir, after the 
 fashion of White, rather than properly digested nat 
 ural history. I thought it not impossible that a few 
 simple stories of my winged acquaintances might be 
 found entertaining by persons of kindred taste. 
 
 There is a common notion that animals are better 
 meteorologists than men, and I have little doubt that 
 in immediate weather-wisdom they have the advan 
 tage of our sophisticated senses (though I suspect a 
 sailor or shepherd would be their match}, but I have 
 seen nothing that leads me to believe their minds 
 capable of erecting the horoscope of a whole season,
 
 236 JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL. 
 
 and letting us know beforehand whether the winter 
 will be severe or the summer rainless. I more than 
 suspect that the clerk of the weather himself does not 
 always know very long in advance whether he is to 
 draw an order for hot or cold, dry or moist, and the 
 musquash is scarce likely to be wiser. I have noted 
 but two days' difference in the coming of the song- 
 sparrow between a very early and a very backward 
 spring. This very year I saw the linnets at work 
 thatching, just before a snow-storm which covered the 
 ground several inches deep for a number of days. 
 They struck work and left us for a while, no doubt in 
 search of food. Birds frequently perish from sudden 
 changes in our whimsical spring weather of which 
 they had no foreboding. More than thirty years ago, 
 a cherry-tree, then in full bloom, near my window, 
 was covered with humming-birds benumbed by a fall 
 of mingled rain and snow, which probably killed many 
 of them. It should seem that their coming was dated 
 by the height of the sun, which betrays them into 
 unthrifty matrimony ; 
 
 " So priketh hem Nature in hir corages ; " * 
 
 but their going is another matter. The chimney swal 
 lows leave us early, for example, apparently so soon 
 as their latest fledglings are firm enough of wing to 
 attempt the long rowing-match that is before them. 
 On the other hand the wild-geese probably do not 
 leave the North till they are frozen out, for I have 
 heard their bugles sounding southward so late as the 
 middle of December. What may be called local 
 migrations are doubtless dictated by the chances of 
 food. I have once been visited by large flights of 
 1 Chaucer's Canterbury Tales, Prologue, line 11.
 
 MY GARDEN ACQUAINTANCE. 237 
 
 cross-bills ; and whenever the snow lies long and deep 
 on the ground, a flock of cedar-birds comes in mid 
 winter to eat the berries on my hawthorns. I have 
 never been quite able to fathom the local, or rather 
 geographical partialities of birds. Never before this 
 summer (1870) have the king-birds, handsomest of 
 flycatchers, built in my orchard ; though I always 
 know where to find them within half a mile. The 
 rose-breasted grosbeak has been a familiar bird in 
 Brookline (three miles away), yet I never saw one 
 here till last July, when I found a female busy among 
 my raspberries and surprisingly bold. I hope she was 
 prospecting with a view to settlement in our garden. 
 She seemed, on the whole, to think well of my fruit, 
 and I would gladly plant another bed if it would help 
 to win over so delightful a neighbor. 
 
 The return of the robin is commonly announced 
 by the newspapers, like that of eminent or notorious 
 people to a watering-place, as the first authentic noti 
 fication of spring. And such his appearance in the 
 orchard and garden undoubtedly is. But, in spite of 
 his name of migratory thrush, he stays with us all 
 winter, and I have seen him when the thermometer 
 marked 15 degrees below zero of Fahrenheit, armed 
 impregnably within, 1 like Emerson's Titmouse, and as 
 cheerful as he. The robin has a bad reputation 
 among people who do not value themselves less for 
 being fond of cherries. There is, I admit, a spice of 
 vulgarity in him, and his song is rather of the Bloom- 
 field sort, too largely ballasted with prose. His ethics 
 are of the Poor Richard school, and the main chance 
 
 1 " For well the soul, if stout within, 
 Can arm impregnably the skin." 
 
 The Titmouse, lines 75, 76.
 
 238 JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL. 
 
 which calls forth all his energy is altogether of the 
 belly. He never has these fine intervals of lunacy 
 into which his cousins, the catbird and the mavis, are 
 apt to fall. But for a' that and twice as muckle 's a' 
 that, I would not exchange him for all the cherries 
 that ever came out of Asia Minor. With whatever 
 faults, he has not wholly forfeited that superiority 
 which belongs to the children of nature. He has a 
 finer taste in fruit than could be distilled from many 
 successive committees of the Horticultural Society, 
 and he eats with a relishing gulp not inferior to Dr. 
 Johnson's. He feels and freely exercises his right of 
 eminent domain. His is the earliest mess of green 
 peas ; his all the mulberries I had fancied mine. But 
 if he get also the lion's share of the raspberries, he is 
 a great planter, and sows those wild ones in the woods 
 that solace the pedestrian, and give a momentary calm 
 even to the jaded victims of the White Hills. He 
 keeps a strict eye over one's fruit, and knows to a 
 shade of purple when your grapes have cooked long 
 enough in the sun. During the severe drought a few 
 years ago the robins wholly vanished from my garden. 
 I neither saw nor heard one for three weeks. Mean 
 while a small foreign grape-vine, rather shy of bear 
 ing, seemed to find the dusty air congenial, and, 
 dreaming, perhaps of its sweet Argos across the sea, 
 decked itself with a score or so of fair bunches. I 
 watched them from day to day till they should have 
 secreted sugar enough from the sunbeams, and at last 
 made up my mind that I would celebrate my vintage 
 the next morning. But the robins, too, had somehow 
 kept note of them. They must have sent out spies, 
 did the Jews into the promised land, before I was sti 
 ring. When I went with my basket at least a dozen
 
 MY GARDEN ACQUAINTANCE. 239 
 
 of these winged vintagers bustled out from among the 
 leaves, and alighting on the nearest trees interchanged 
 some shrill remarks about me of a derogatory nature. 
 They had fairly sacked the vine. Not Wellington's 
 veterans made cleaner work of a Spanish town ; not 
 Federals or Confederates were ever more impartial in 
 the confiscation of neutral chickens. I was keeping 
 my grapes a secret to surprise the fair Fidele with, 
 but the robins made them a profounder secret to her 
 than I had meant. The tattered remnant of a single 
 bunch was all my harvest-home. How paltry it looked 
 at the bottom of my basket, as if a humming-bird 
 had laid her egg in an eagle's nest ! I could not help 
 laughing; and the robins seemed to join heartily in 
 the merriment. There was a native grape-vine close 
 by, blue with its less refined abundance, but my cun 
 ning thieves preferred the foreign flavor. Could I 
 tax them with want of taste ? 
 
 The robins are not good solo singers, but their 
 chorus, as, like primitive fire-worshippers, they hail 
 the return of light and warmth to the world, is unri 
 valled. There are a hundred singing like one. They 
 are noisy enough then, and sing, as poets should, with 
 no afterthought. But when they come after cherries 
 to the tree near my window, they muffle their voices, 
 and their faint pip pip pop ! sounds far away at the 
 bottom of the garden, where they know I shall not 
 suspect them of robbing the great black-walnut of its 
 bitter-rinded store. 1 They are feathered Pecksniffs, 
 to be sure, but then how brightly their breasts, that 
 look rather shabby in the sunlight, shine in a rainy day 
 
 1 The screech-owl, whose cry, despite his ill name, is one of 
 the sweetest sounds in nature, softens his voice in the same way 
 with the most beguiling mockery of distance. J. R. L.
 
 240 JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL. 
 
 against the dark green of the fringe-tree ! After they 
 have pinched and shaken all the life of an earthworm, 
 as Italian cooks pound all the spirit out of a steak, 
 and then gulped him, they stand up in honest self- 
 confidence, expand their red waistcoats with the virtu 
 ous air of a lobby member, and outface you with an 
 eye that calmly challenges inquiry. " Do I look like 
 a bird that knows the flavor of raw vermin ? I throw 
 myself upon a jury of my peers. Ask any robin if he 
 <jver ate anything less ascetic than the frugal berry of 
 the juniper, and he will answer that his vow forbids 
 him." Can such an open bosom cover such deprav 
 ity ? Alas, yes ! I have no doubt his breast was red 
 der at that very moment with the blood of my rasp 
 berries. On the whole, he is a doubtful friend in the 
 the garden. He makes his dessert of all kinds of ber 
 ries, and is not averse from early pears. But when 
 we remember how omnivorous he is, eating his own 
 weight in an incredibly short time, and that Nature 
 seems exhaustless in her invention of new insects hos 
 tile to vegetation, perhaps we may reckon that he does 
 more good than harm. For my own part, I would 
 rather have his cheerfulness and kind neighborhood 
 than many berries. 
 
 For his cousin, the catbird, I have a still warmer 
 regard. Always a good singer, he sometimes nearly 
 equals the brown thrush, and has the merit of keeping 
 up his music later in the evening than any bird of my 
 familiar acquaintance. Ever since I can remember, a 
 pair of them have built in a gigantic syringa near our 
 front door, and I have known the male to sing almost 
 uninterruptedly during the evenings of early summer 
 till twilight duskened into dark. They differ greatly 
 in vocal talent, but all have a delightful way of croon
 
 MY GARDEN ACQUAINTANCE. 241 
 
 ing over, and, as it were, rehearsing their song in an 
 undertone, which makes their nearness always unob 
 trusive. Though there is the most trustworthy wit 
 ness to the imitative propensity of this bird, I have 
 only once, during an intimacy of more than forty 
 years, heard him indulge it. In that case, the imita 
 tion was by no means so close as to deceive, but a free 
 reproduction of the notes of some other birds, espe 
 cially of the oriole, as a kind of variation in his own 
 song. The catbird is as shy as the robin is vulgarly 
 familiar. Only when his nest or his fledglings are 
 approached does he become noisy and almost aggres 
 sive. I have known him to station his young in a 
 thick cornel-bush on the edge of the raspberry-bed, 
 after the fruit began to ripen, and feed them there for 
 a week or more. In such cases he shows none of that 
 conscious guilt which makes the robin contemptible. 
 On the contrary, he will maintain his post in the 
 thicket, and sharply scold the intruder who ventures 
 to steal his berries. After all, his claim is only for 
 tithes, while the robin will bag your entire crop if he 
 get a chance. 
 
 Dr. Watts's statement that "birds in their little 
 nests agree," like too many others intended to form 
 the infant mind, is very far from being true. On the 
 contrary, the most peaceful relation of the different 
 species to each other is that of armed neutrality. 
 They are very jealous of neighbors. A few years ago 
 I was much interested in the housebuilding of a pair 
 of summer yellow-birds. They had chosen a very 
 pretty site near the top of a tall white lilac, within 
 easy eye-shot of a chamber window. A very pleasant 
 thing it was to see their little home growing with mu 
 tual help, to watch their industrious skill interrupted
 
 242 JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL. 
 
 only by little flirts and snatches of endearment, fru 
 gally cut short by the common-sense of the tiny house 
 wife. They had brought their work nearly to an end, 
 and had already begun to line it with fern-down, the 
 gathering of which demanded more distant journeys 
 and longer absences. But, alas ! the syringa, imme= 
 morial manor of the catbirds, was not more than 
 twenty feet away, and these "giddy neighbors " had, 
 as it appeared, been all along jealously watchful, 
 though silent, witnesses of what they deemed an intru 
 sion of squatters. No sooner were the pretty mates 
 fairly gone for a new load of lining, than 
 
 " To their unguarded nest these weasel Scots 
 Came stealing." 1 
 
 Silently they flew back and forth, each giving a venge 
 ful dab at the nest in passing. They did not fall-to 
 and deliberately destroy it, for they might have been 
 caught at their mischief. As it was, whenever the 
 yellow-birds came back, their enemies were hidden in 
 their own sight-proof bush. Several times their un 
 conscious victims repaired damages, but at length, 
 after counsel taken together, they gave it up. Per 
 haps, like other unlettered folk, they came to the con 
 clusion that the Devil was in it, and yielded to the 
 invisible persecution of witchcraft. 
 
 The robins, by constant attacks and annoyances, 
 have succeeded in driving off the blue-jays who used 
 to build in our pines, their gay colors and quaint, 
 noisy ways making them welcome and amusing neigh 
 bors. I once had the chance of doing a kindness to 
 a household of them, which they received with very 
 friendly condescension. I had had my eye for some 
 1 Shakespeare : King Henry V., act i. scene 2.
 
 MY GARDEN ACQUAINTANCE. 243 
 
 time upon a nest, and was puzzled by a constant flut 
 tering of what seemed full-grown wings in it whenever 
 I drew nigh. At last I climbed the tree, in spite of 
 angry protests from the old birds against my intru 
 sion. The mystery had a very simple solution. In 
 building the nest, a long piece of packthread had been 
 somewhat loosely woven in. Three of the young had 
 contrived to entangle themselves in it, and had become 
 full-grown without being able to launch themselves 
 upon the air. One was unharmed ; another had so 
 tightly twisted the cord about its shank that one foot 
 was curled up and seemed paralyzed ; the third, in 
 its struggles to escape, had sawn through the flesh of 
 the thigh and so much harmed itself that I thought it 
 humane to put an end to its misery. When I took 
 out my knife to cut their hempen bonds, the heads of 
 the family seemed to divine my friendly intent. Sud 
 denly ceasing their cries and threats, they perched 
 quietly within reach of my hand, and watched me in 
 my work of manumission. This, owing to the flutter 
 ing terror of the prisoners, was an affair of some deli 
 cacy ; but ere long I was rewarded by seeing one of 
 them fly away to a neighboring tree, while the cripple, 
 making a parachute of his wings, came lightly to the 
 ground, and hopped off as well as he could with one 
 leg, obsequiously waited on by his elders. A week 
 later I had the satisfaction of meeting him in the 
 pine-walk, in good spirits, and already so far recov 
 ered as to be able to balance himself with the lame 
 foot. I have no doubt that in his old age he ac 
 counted for his lameness by some handsome story of 
 a wound received at the famous Battle of the Pines, 
 when our tribe, overcome by numbers, was driven 
 from its ancient camping-ground. Of late years the
 
 244 JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL. 
 
 jays have visited us only at intervals ; and in winter 
 their bright plumage, set off by the snow, and their 
 cheerful cry, are especially welcome. They would 
 have furnished ^Esop with a fable, for the feathered 
 crest in which they seem to take so much satisfaction 
 is often their fatal snare. Country boys make a hole 
 with their finger in the snow-crust just large enough 
 to admit the jay's head, and, hollowing it out some 
 what beneath, bait it with a few kernels of corn. The 
 crest slips easily into the trap, but refuses to be pulled 
 out again, and he who came to feast remains a prey. 
 
 Twice have the crow-blackbirds attempted a settle 
 ment in my pines, and twice have the robins, who 
 claim a right of preemption, so successfully played 
 the part of border-ruffians as to drive them away, 
 to my great regret, for they are the best substitute we 
 have for rooks. At Shady Hill 1 (now, alas ! empty 
 of its so long-loved household) they build by hundreds, 
 and nothing can be more cheery than their creaking 
 clatter (like a convention of old-fashioned tavern- 
 signs) as they gather at evening 1 to debate -in mass 
 meeting their windy politics, or to gossip at their tent- 
 doors over the events of the day. Their port is grave, 
 and their stalk across the turf as martial as that of a 
 second-rate ghost in Hamlet. They never meddled 
 with my corn, so far as I could discover. 
 
 For a few years I had crows, but their nests are an 
 irresistible bait for boys, and their settlement was 
 broken up. They grew so wonted as to throw off a 
 great part of their shyness, and to tolerate my near 
 approach. One very hot day I stood for some time 
 within twenty feet of a mother and three children, 
 
 1 The home of the Nortons, in Cambridge, who were at the 
 time of this paper iu Europe.
 
 MY GARDEN ACQUAINTANCE. 245 
 
 who sat on an elm bough over my head gasping in the 
 sultry air, and holding their wings half-spread for 
 coolness. All birds during the pairing season become 
 more or less sentimental, and murmur soft nothings 
 in a tone very unlike the grind ing-organ repetition 
 and loudness of their habitual song. The crow is very 
 comical as a lover, and to hear him trying to soften 
 his croak to the proper Saint Preux 1 standard has 
 something the effect of a Mississippi boatman quoting 
 Tennyson. Yet there are few things to my ear more 
 melodious than his caw of a clear winter morning as 
 it drops to you filtered through five hundred fathoms 
 of crisp blue air. The hostility of all smaller birds 
 makes the moral character of the crow, for all his 
 deaconlike demeanor and garb, somewhat questiona 
 ble. He could never sally forth without insult. The 
 golden robins, especially, would chase him as far as I 
 could follow with my eye, making him duck clumsily 
 to avoid their importunate bills. I do not believe, 
 however, that he robbed any nests hereabouts, for the 
 refuse of the gas-works, which, in our free-and-easy 
 community, is allowed to poison the river, supplied 
 him with dead alewives in abundance. I used to 
 watch him making his periodical visits to the salt- 
 marshes and coming back with a fish in his beak to 
 his young savages, who, no doubt, like it in that con 
 dition which makes it savory to the Kanakas and 
 other corvine races of men. 
 
 Orioles are in great plenty with me. I have seen 
 seven males flashing about the garden at once. A 
 merry crew of them swing their hammocks from the 
 pendulous boughs. During one of these later years, 
 when the canker-worms stripped our elms as bare as 
 1 See Rousseau's La Nouivelle Heloise.
 
 246 JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL. 
 
 winter, these birds went to the trouble of rebuilding 
 their unroofed nests, and chose for the purpose trees 
 which are safe from those swarming vandals, such as 
 the ash and the button-wood. One year a pair (dis 
 turbed, I suppose, elsewhere) built a second nest in 
 an elm within a few yards of the house. My friend, 
 Edward E. Hale, told me once that the oriole rejected 
 from his web all strands of brilliant color, and I 
 thought it a striking example of that instinct of con 
 cealment noticeable in many birds, though it should 
 seem in this instance that the nest was amply pro 
 tected by its position from all marauders but owls 
 and squirrels. Last year, however, I had the fullest 
 proof that Mr. Hale was mistaken. A pair of orioles 
 built on the lowest trailer of a weeping elm, which 
 hung within ten feet of our drawing-room window, 
 and so low that I could reach it from the ground. 
 The nest was wholly woven and felted with ravellings 
 of woollen carpet in which scarlet predominated. 
 Would the same thing have happened in the woods ? 
 Or did the nearness of a human dwelling perhaps 
 give the birds a greater feeling of security? They 
 are very bold, by the way, in quest of cordage, and I 
 have often watched them stripping the fibrous bark 
 from a honeysuckle growing over the very door. But, 
 indeed, all my birds look upon me as if I were a mere 
 tenant at will, and they were landlords. With shame 
 I confess it, I have been bullied even by a humming 
 bird. This spring, as I was cleansing a pear-tree of 
 its lichens, one of these little zigzagging blurs came 
 purring toward me, couching his long bill like a 
 lance, his throat sparkling with angry fire, to warn 
 me off from a Missouri-currant whose honey he was 
 sipping. And many a time he has driven me out of
 
 MY GARDEN ACQUAINTANCE. 247 
 
 a flower-bed. This summer, by the way, a pair of 
 these winged emeralds fastened their mossy acorn-cup 
 upon a bough of the same elm which the orioles had 
 enlivened the year before. We watched all their pro 
 ceedings from the window through an opera-glass, and 
 saw their two nestlings grow from black needles with 
 a tuft of down at the lower end, till they whirled away 
 on their first short experimental flights. They be 
 came strong of wing in a surprisingly short time, and 
 I never saw them or the male bird after, though the 
 female was regular as usual in her visits to our petu 
 nias and verbenas. I do not think it ground enough 
 for a generalization, but in the many times when I 
 watched the old birds feeding their young, the mother 
 always alighted, while the father as uniformly re 
 mained upon the wing. 
 
 The bobolinks are generally chance visitors, tin 
 kling through the garden in blossoming-time, but this 
 year, owing to the long rains early in the season, their 
 favorite meadows were flooded, and they were driven 
 to the upland. So I had a pair of them domiciled in 
 my grass field. The male used to perch in an apple- 
 tree, then in full bloom, and, while I stood perfectly 
 still close by, he would circle away, quivering round 
 the entire field of five acres, with no break in his song, 
 and settle down again among the blossoms, to be hur 
 ried away almost immediately by a new rapture of 
 music. He had the volubility of an Italian charlatan 
 at a fair, and, like him, appeared to be proclaiming 
 the merits of some quack remedy. Opodeldoc-opo- 
 deldoc-try-Doctor-Lincoln's-opodeldoc ! he seemed to 
 repeat over and over again, with a rapidity that would 
 have distanced the deftest-tongued Figaro that ever 
 rattled. I remember Count Gurowski saying once,
 
 248 JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL. 
 
 with that easy superiority of knowledge about this 
 country which is the monopoly of foreigners, that we 
 had no singing-birds ! Well, well, Mr. Hepworth 
 Dixon 1 has found the typical America in Oneida and 
 Salt Lake City. Of course, an intelligent European 
 is the best judge of these matters. The truth is there 
 are more singing-birds in Europe because there are 
 fewer forests. These songsters love the neighborhood 
 of man because hawks and owls are rarer, while their 
 own food is more abundant. Most people seem to 
 think, the more trees, the more birds. Even Cha 
 teaubriand, who first tried the primitive-forest-cure, 
 and whose description of the wilderness in its imagi 
 native effects is unmatched, fancies the "people of 
 the air singing their hymns to him." So far as my 
 own observation goes, the farther one penetrates the 
 sombre solitudes of the woods, the more seldom does 
 he hear the voice of any singing-bird. In spite of 
 Chateaubriand's minuteness of detail, in spite of that 
 marvellous reverberation of the decrepit tree falling 
 of its own weight, which he was the first to notice, I 
 cannot help doubting whether he made his way very 
 deep into the wilderness. At any rate, in a letter to 
 Fontanes, written in 1804, he speaks of mes chevaux 
 paissant a quelque distance. To be sure Chateau 
 briand was apt to mount the high horse, and this may 
 have been but an afterthought of the grand seiyneur, 
 but certainly one would not make much headway on 
 horseback toward the druid fastnesses of the primaeval 
 pine. 
 
 The bobolinks build in considerable numbers in a 
 meadow within a quarter of a mile of us. A houseless 
 lane passes through the midst of their camp, and in 
 1 In his book of travels, New America.
 
 MY GARDEN ACQUAINTANCE. 249 
 
 clear westerly weather, at the right season, one may 
 hear a score of them singing at once. When they are 
 breeding, if I chance to pass, one of the male birds 
 always accompanies me like a constable, flitting from 
 post to post of the rail-fence, with a short note of re 
 proof continually repeated, till I am fairly out of the 
 neighborhood. Then he will swing away into the air 
 and run down the wind, gurgling music without stint 
 over the unheeding tussocks of meadow-grass and dark 
 clumps of bulrushes that mark his domain. 
 
 We have no bird whose song will match the night 
 ingale's in compass, none whose note is so rich as that 
 of the European blackbird ; but for mere rapture I 
 have never heard the bobolink's rival. But his opera- 
 season is a short one. The ground and tree sparrows 
 are our most constant performers. It is now late in 
 August, and one of the latter sings every day and all 
 day long in the garden. Till within a fortnight, a pair 
 of indigo-birds would keep up their lively duo for an 
 hour together. While I write, I hear an oriole gay as 
 in June, and the plaintive may-be of the goldfinch 
 tells me he is stealing my lettuce-seeds. I know not 
 what the experience of others may have been, but the 
 only bird I have ever heard sing in the night has been 
 the chip-bird. I should say he sang about as often 
 during the darkness as cocks crow. One can hardly 
 help fancying that he sings in his dreams. 
 
 " Father of light, what sunnie seed, 
 What glance of day hast thou confined 
 Into this bird ? To all the breed 
 This busie ray thou hast assigned ; 
 Their magnetism works all night, 
 And dreams of Paradise and light." 
 
 On second thought, I remember to have heard the
 
 250 JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL. 
 
 cuckoo strike the hours nearly all night with the reg 
 ularity of a Swiss clock. 
 
 The dead limbs of our elms, which I spare to that 
 end, bring us the flicker every summer, and almost 
 daily I hear his wild scream and laugh close at hand, 
 himself invisible. He is a shy bird, but a few days 
 ago I had the satisfaction of studying him through 
 the blinds as he sat on a tree within a few feet of me. 
 Seen so near and at rest, he makes good his claim to 
 the title of pigeon-woodpecker. Lumberers have a 
 notion that he is harmful to timber, digging little holes 
 through the bark to encourage the settlement of in 
 sects. The regular rings of such perforations which 
 one may see in almost any apple-orchard seem to give 
 some probability to this theory. Almost every season 
 a solitary quail visits us, and, unseen among the cur 
 rant bushes, calls Bob White, Bob White, as if he 
 were playing at hide-and-seek with that imaginary 
 being. A rarer visitant is the turtle-dove, whose plea 
 sant coo (something like the muffled crow of a cock 
 from a coop covered with snow) I have sometimes 
 heard, and whom I once had the good luck to see close 
 by me in the mulberry-tree. The wild-pigeon, once 
 numerous, I have not seen for many years. 1 Of sav 
 age birds, a hen-hawk now and then quarters himself 
 upon us for a few days, sitting sluggish in a tree after 
 a surfeit of poultry. One of them once offered me a 
 near shot from my study-window one drizzly day for 
 several hours. But it was Sunday, and 1 gave him 
 the benefit of its gracious truce of God. 
 
 Certain birds have disappeared from our neighbor 
 hood within my memory. I remember when the 
 
 1 They made their appearance again this summer (1870). 
 J. R. L.
 
 MY GARDEN ACQUAINTANCE. 251 
 
 whippoorwill could be heard in Sweet Auburn. The 
 night-hawk, once common, is now rare. The brown 
 thrush has moved farther up country. For years I 
 have not seen or heard any of the larger owls, whose 
 hooting was one of my boyish terrors. The cliff- 
 swallow, strange emigrant, that eastward takes his 
 way, has come and gone again in my time. The bank- 
 swallows, wellnigh innumerable during my boyhood, 
 no longer frequent the crumbly cliff of the gravel-pit 
 by the river. The barn-swallows, which once swarmed 
 in our barn, flashing through the dusty sun-streaks of 
 the mow, have been gone these many years. My 
 father would lead me out to see them gather on the 
 roof, and take counsel before their yearly migration, 
 as Mr. White used to see them at Selborne. Eheu 
 fugaces! Thank fortune, the swift still glues his 
 nest, and rolls his distant thunders night and day in 
 the wide-throated chimneys, still sprinkles the evening 
 air with his merry twittering. The populous heronry 
 in Fresh Pond meadows has wellnigh broken up, but 
 still a pair or two haunt the old home, as the gypsies 
 of Ellangowan their ruined huts, and every evening 
 fly over us riverwards, clearing their throats with a 
 hoarse hawk as they go, and, in cloudy weather, scarce 
 higher than the tops of the chimneys. Sometimes I 
 have known one to alight in one of our trees, though 
 for what purpose I never could divine. Kingfishers 
 have sometimes puzzled me in the same way, perched 
 at high noon in a pine, springing their watchman's 
 rattle when they flitted away from my curiosity, and 
 seeming to shove their top-heavy heads along as a man 
 does a wheelbarrow. 
 
 Some birds have left us, I suppose, because the 
 country is growing less wild. I once found a summer
 
 252 JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL. 
 
 duck's nest within a quarter of a mile of our house, 
 but such a trouvaille would be impossible now as 
 Kidd's treasure. And yet the mere taming of the 
 neighborhood does not quite satisfy me as an explana 
 tion. Twenty years ago, on my way to bathe in the 
 river, I saw every day a brace of woodcock, on the 
 miry edge of a spring within a few rods of a house, 
 and constantly visited by thirsty cows. There was no 
 growth of any kind to conceal them, and yet these 
 ordinarily shy birds were almost as indifferent to my 
 passing as common poultry would have been. Since 
 bird-nesting has become scientific, and dignified itself 
 as oology, that, no doubt, is partly to blame for some 
 of our losses. But some old friends are constant. 
 Wilson's thrush comes every year to remind me of 
 that most poetic of ornithologists. He flits before me 
 through the pine-walk like the very genius of solitude. 
 A pair of pewees have built immemorially on a jutting 
 brick in the arched entrance to the ice-house ; always 
 on the same brick, and never more than a single pair, 
 though two broods of five each are raised there every 
 summer. How do they settle their claim to the home 
 stead ? By what right of primogeniture ? Once the 
 children of a man employed about the place oologized 
 the nest, and the pewees left us for a year or two. I 
 felt towards those boys as the messmates of the An 
 cient Mariner J did towards him after he had shot the 
 albatross. But the pewees came back at last, and 
 one of them is now on his wonted perch, so near my 
 window that I can hear the click of his bill as he 
 snaps a fly on the wing with the unerring precision a 
 stately Trasteverina shows in the capture of her 
 smaller deer. The pewee is the first bird to pipe up 
 1 In Coleridge's poem of that name.
 
 MY GARDEN ACQUAINTANCE. 253 
 
 in the morning ; and during the early summer he 
 preludes his matutinal ejaculation of pewee with a 
 slender whistle, unheard at any other time. He sad 
 dens with the season, and, as summer declines, he 
 changes his note to eheu, pewee ! as if in lamentation. 
 Had he been an Italian bird, Ovid would have had a 
 plaintive tale to tell about him. He is so familiar as 
 often to pursue a fly through the open window into my 
 library. 
 
 There is something inexpressibly dear to me in these 
 old friendships of a lifetime. There is scarce a tree 
 of mine but has had, at some time or other, a happy 
 homestead among its boughs, and to which I cannot 
 
 say, 
 
 " Many light hearts and wings, 
 Which now be dead, lodged in thy living bowers." 
 
 My walk under the pines would lose half its summer 
 charm were I to miss that shy anchorite, the Wilson's 
 thrush, nor hear in haying-time the metallic ring of 
 his song, that justifies his rustic name of scythe-whet. 
 I protect my game as jealously as an English squire. 
 If anybody had oologized a certain cuckoo's nest I 
 know of (I have a pair in my garden every year), it 
 would have left me a sore place in my mind for weeks. 
 I love to bring these aborigines back to the mansue- 
 tude they showed to the early voyagers, and before 
 (forgive the involuntary pun) they had grown accus 
 tomed to man and knew his savage ways. And they 
 repay your kindness with a sweet familiarity too deli 
 cate ever to breed contempt. I have made a Penn- 
 treaty with them, preferring that to the Puritan way 
 with the natives, which converted them to a little He 
 braism and a great deal of Medford rum. If they 
 will not come near enough to me (as most of them
 
 254 JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL. 
 
 will), I bring them close with an opera-glass, a 
 much better weapon than a gun. I would not, if 1 
 could, convert them from their pretty pagan ways. 
 The only one I sometimes hare savage doubts about is 
 the red squirrel. I think he oologizes. I know he 
 eats cherries (we counted five of them at one time in 
 a single tree, the stones pattering down like the sparse 
 hail that preludes a storm), and that he gnaws oft' the 
 small end of pears to get at the seeds. He steals the 
 com from under the noses of my poultry. But what 
 would you have ? He will come down upon the limb 
 of the tree I am lying under till he is within a yard of 
 me. He and his mate will scurry up and . down the 
 great black-walnut for my diversion, chattering like 
 monkeys. Can I sign his death-warrant who has 
 tolerated me about his grounds so long ? Not I. Let 
 them steal, and welcome. I am sure I should, had I 
 had the same bringing up and the same temptation. 
 As for the birds, I do not believe there is one of 
 them but does more good than harm; and of how 
 many featherless bipeds can this be said ?
 
 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 255 
 
 II. 
 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 
 
 THERE have been many painful crises since the im 
 patient vanity of South Carolina hurried ten prosper 
 ous Commonwealths into a crime whose assured retri 
 bution was to leave them either at the mercy of the 
 nation they had wronged, or of the anarchy they had 
 summoned but could not control, when no thoughtful 
 American opened his morning paper without dreading 
 to find that he had no longer a country to love and 
 honor. Whatever the result of the convulsion whose 
 first shocks were beginning to be felt, there would still 
 be enough square miles of earth for elbow-room ; but 
 that ineffable sentiment made up of memory and 
 hope, of instinct and tradition, which swells every 
 man's heart and shapes his thought, though perhaps 
 never present to his consciousness, would be gone 
 from it, leaving it common earth and nothing more. 
 Men might gather rich crops from it, but that ideal 
 harvest of priceless associations would be reaped no 
 longer; that fine virtue which sent up messages of 
 courage and security from every sod of it would have 
 evaporated beyond recall. We should be irrevocably 
 cut off from our past, and be forced to splice the 
 ragged ends of our lives upon whatever new conditions 
 chance might leave dangling for us. 
 
 We confess that we had our doubts at first whether 
 the patriotism of our people were not too narrowly 
 provincial to embrace the proportions of national peril. 
 We felt an only too natural distrust of immense pub 
 lic meetings and enthusiastic cheers. 
 
 That a reaction should follow the holiday enthusi 
 asm with which the war was entered on, that it should
 
 256 JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL. 
 
 follow soon, and that the slackening of public spirit 
 should be proportionate to the previous over-tension, 
 might well be foreseen by all who had studied human 
 nature or history. Men acting gregariously are al 
 ways in extremes ; as they are one moment capable of 
 higher courage, so they are liable, the next, to baser 
 depression, and it is often a matter of chance whether 
 numbers shall multiply confidence or discouragement. 
 Nor does deception lead more surely to distrust of 
 men, than self-deception to suspicion of principles. 
 The only faith that wears well and holds its color in 
 all weathers is that which is woven of conviction and 
 set with the sharp mordant of experience. Enthusi 
 asm is good material for the orator, but the statesman 
 needs something more durable to work in, must be 
 able to rely on the deliberate reason and consequent 
 firmness of the people, without which that presence of 
 mind, no less essential in times of moral than of ma 
 terial peril, will be wanting at the critical moment. 
 Would this fervor of the Free States hold out ? Was 
 it kindled by a just feeling of the value of constitu 
 tional liberty ? Had it body enough to withstand the 
 inevitable dampening of checks, reverses, delays ? 
 Had our population intelligence enough to comprehend 
 that the choice was between order and anarchy, be 
 tween the equilibrium of a government by law and 
 the tussle of misrule by pronunciamiento ? Could a 
 war be maintained without the ordinary stimulus of 
 hatred and plunder, and with the impersonal loyalty 
 of principle ? These were serious questions, and with 
 no precedent to aid in answering them. 
 
 At the beginning of the war there was, indeed, oc 
 casion for the most anxious apprehension. A Presi 
 dent known to be infected with the political heresies,
 
 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 257 
 
 and suspected of sympathy with the treason, of the 
 Southern conspirators, had just surrendered the reins, 
 we will not say of power, but of chaos, to a successor 
 known only as the representative of a party whose 
 leaders, with long training in opposition, had none in 
 the conduct of affairs ; an empty treasury was called 
 on to supply resources beyond precedent in the history 
 of finance ; the trees were yet growing and the iron 
 un mined with which a navy was to be built and ar 
 mored ; officers without discipline were to make a 
 mob into an army; and, above all, the public opinion 
 of Europe, echoed and reinforced with every vague 
 hint and every specious argument of despondency by 
 a powerful faction at home, was either contemptuously 
 sceptical or actively hostile. It would be hard to 
 over-estimate the force of this latter element of disin 
 tegration and discouragement among a people where 
 every citizen at home, and every soldier in the field, 
 is a reader of newspapers. The peddlers of rumor in 
 the North were the most effective allies of the rebel 
 lion. A nation can be liable to no more insidious 
 treachery than that of the telegraph, sending hourly 
 its electric thrill of panic along the remotest nerves 
 of the community, till the excited imagination makes 
 every real danger loom heightened with its unreal 
 double. 
 
 And even if we look only at more palpable difficul 
 ties, the problem to be solved by our civil war was so 
 vast, both in its immediate relations and its future 
 consequences ; the conditions of its solution were so 
 intricate and so greatly dependent on incalculable and 
 uncontrollable contingencies ; so many of the data, 
 whether for hope or fear, were, from their novelty, 
 incapable of arrangement under any of the categories
 
 258 JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL. 
 
 of historical precedent, that there were moments of 
 crisis when the firmest believer in the strength and 
 sufficiency of the democratic theory of government 
 might well hold his breath in vague apprehension of 
 disaster. Our teachers of political philosophy, sol 
 emnly arguing from the precedent of some petty Gre 
 cian, Italian, or Flemish city, whose long periods of 
 aristocracy were broken now and then by awkward 
 parentheses of mob, had always taught us that demo 
 cracies were incapable of the sentiment of loyalty, of 
 concentrated and prolonged effort, of far-reaching 
 conceptions ; were absorbed in material interests ; im 
 patient of regular, and much more of exceptional re 
 straint ; had no natural nucleus of gravitation, nor any 
 forces but centrifugal ; were always on the verge of 
 civil war, and slunk at last into the natural almshouse 
 of bankrupt popular government, a military despotism. 
 Here was indeed a dreary outlook for persons who 
 knew democracy, not by rubbing shoulders with it 
 lifelong, but merely from books, and America only 
 by the report of some fellow-Briton, who, having 
 eaten a bad dinner or lost a carpet-bag here, had 
 written to The Times demanding redress, and draw 
 ing a mournful inference of democratic instability. 
 Nor were men wanting among ourselves who had so 
 steeped their brains in London literature as to mis 
 take Cockneyism for European culture, and contempt 
 of their country for cosmopolitan breadth of view, 
 and who, owing all they had and all they were to 
 democracy, thought it had an air of high-breeding to 
 join in the shallow epicedium that our bubble had 
 burst. 
 
 But beside any disheartening influences which might 
 affect the timid or the despondent, there were reasons
 
 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 259 
 
 enough of settled gravity against any over-confidence 
 of hope. A war which, whether we consider the 
 expanse of the territory at stake, the hosts brought 
 into the field, or the reach of the principles involved, 
 may fairly be reckoned the most momentous of mod 
 ern times was to be waged by a people divided at 
 home, unnerved by fifty years of peace, under a chief 
 magistrate without experience and without reputation, 
 whose every measure was sure to be cunningly ham 
 pered by a jealous and unscrupulous minority, and 
 who, while dealing with unheard-of complications at 
 home, must soothe a hostile neutrality abroad, waiting 
 only a pretext to become war. All this was to be 
 done without warning and without preparation, while 
 at the same time a social revolution was to be accom 
 plished in the political condition of four millions of 
 people, by softening the prejudices, allaying the fears, 
 and gradually obtaining the cooperation, of their un 
 willing liberators. Surely, if ever there were an 
 occasion when the heightened imagination of the his 
 torian might see Destiny visibly intervening in human 
 affairs, here was a knot worthy of her shears. Never, 
 perhaps, was any system of government tried by so 
 continuous and searching- a strain as ours during the 
 last three yeai-s ; never has any shown itself stronger ; 
 and never could that strength be so directly traced to 
 the virtue and intelligence of the people, to that 
 general enlightenment and prompt efficiency of public 
 opinion possible only under the influence of a political 
 framework like our own. We find it hard to under 
 stand how even a foreigner should be blind to the 
 grandeur of the combat of ideas that has been going 
 on here, to the heroic energy, persistency, and self- 
 reliance of a nation proving that it knows how much
 
 260 JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL. 
 
 dearer greatness is than mere power ; and we own that 
 it is impossible for us to conceive the mental and 
 moral condition of the American who does not feel 
 his spirit braced and heightened by being even a 
 spectator of such qualities and achievements. That a 
 steady purpose and a definite aim have been given to 
 the jarring forces which, at the beginning of the war, 
 spent themselves in the discussion of schemes which 
 could only become operative, if at all, after the war 
 was over ; that a popular excitement has been slowly 
 intensified into an earnest national will ; that a some 
 what impracticable moral sentiment has been made 
 the unconscious instrument of a practical moral end ; 
 that the treason of covert enemies, the jealousy of 
 rivals, the unwise zeal of friends, have been made not 
 only useless for mischief, but even useful for good ; 
 that the conscientious sensitiveness of England to the 
 horrors of civil conflict has been prevented from com 
 plicating a domestic with a foreign war ; all these 
 results, any one of which might suffice to prove great 
 ness in a ruler, have been mainly due to the good 
 sense, the good-humor, the sagacity, the large-minded- 
 ness, and the unselfish honesty of the unknown man 
 whom a blind fortune, as it seemed, had lifted from 
 the crowd to the most dangerous and difficult eminence 
 of modern times. It is by presence of mind in un 
 tried emergencies that the native metal of a man is 
 tested ; it is by the sagacity to see, and the fearless 
 honesty to admit, whatever of truth there may be in 
 an adverse opinion, in order more convincingly to 
 expose the fallacy that lurks behind it, that a reasoner 
 at length gains for his mere statement of a fact the 
 force of argument ; it is by a wise forecast which 
 allows hostile combinations to go so far as by the in-
 
 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 261 
 
 evitable reaction to become elements of his own power, 
 that a politician proves his genius for state-craft ; and 
 especially it is by so gently guiding public sentiment 
 that he seems to follow it, by so yielding doubtful 
 points that he can be firm without seeming obstinate 
 in essential ones, and thus gain the advantages of com 
 promise without the weakness of concession ; by so in 
 stinctively comprehending the temper and prejudices 
 of a people as to make them gradually conscious of 
 the superior wisdom of his freedom from temper and 
 prejudice, it is by qualities such as these that a 
 magistrate shows himself worthy to be chief in a 
 commonwealth of freemen. And it is for qualities 
 such as these that we firmly believe History will rank 
 Mr. Lincoln among the most prudent of statesmen 
 and the most successful of rulers. If we wish to 
 appreciate him, we have only to conceive the inevita 
 ble chaos in which we should now be weltering, had 
 a weak man or an unwise one been chosen in his 
 stead. 
 
 " Bare is back," says the Norse proverb, " without 
 brother behind it ; " and this is, by analogy, true of 
 an elective magistracy. The hereditary ruler in any 
 critical emergency may reckon on the inexhaustible 
 resources of prestige, of sentiment, of superstition, of 
 dependent interest, while the new man must slowly 
 and painfully create all these out of the unwilling 
 material around him, by superiority of character, by 
 patient singleness of purpose, by sagacious presenti 
 ment of popular tendencies and instinctive sympathy 
 with the national character. Mr. Lincoln's task was 
 one of peculiar and exceptional difficulty. Long 
 habit had accustomed the American people to the 
 notion of a party in power, and of a President as its
 
 262 JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL. 
 
 creature and organ, while the more vital fact, that the 
 executive for the time being represents the abstract 
 idea of government as a permanent principle superior 
 to all party and all private interest, had gradually 
 become unfamiliar. They had so long seen the pub 
 lic policy more or less directed by views of party, and 
 often even of personal advantage, as to be ready to 
 suspect the motives of a chief magistrate compelled, 
 for the first time in our history, to feel himself the 
 head and hand of a great nation, and to act upon 
 the fundamental maxim, laid down by all publicists, 
 that the first duty of a government is to defend and 
 maintain its own existence. Accordingly, a powerful 
 weapon seemed to be put into the hands of the oppo 
 sition by the necessity under which the administration 
 found itself of applying this old truth to new rela 
 tions. Nor were the opposition his only nor his most 
 dangerous opponents. 
 
 The Republicans had carried the country upon an 
 issue in which ethics were more directly and visibly 
 mingled with politics than usual. Their leaders were 
 trained to a method of oratory which relied for its ef 
 fect rather on the moral sense than the understanding. 
 Their arguments were drawn, not so much from expe 
 rience as from general principles of right and wrong. 
 When the war came, their system continued to be ap 
 plicable and effective, for here again the reason of the 
 people was to be reached and kindled through their 
 sentiments. It was one of those periods of excitement, 
 gathering, contagious, universal, which, while they 
 last, exalt and clarify the minds of men, giving to the 
 mere words country, human rights, democracy, a 
 meaning and a force beyond that of sober and logical 
 argument. They were convictions, maintained and
 
 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 263 
 
 defended by the supreme logic of passion. That pene 
 trating fire ran in and roused those primary instincts 
 that make their lair in the dens and caverns of the 
 mind. What is called the great popular heart was 
 awakened, that indefinable something which may be, 
 according to circumstances, the highest reason or the 
 most brutish unreason. But enthusiasm, once cold, 
 can never be warmed over into anything better than 
 cant, and phrases, when once the inspiration that 
 filled them with beneficent power has ebbed away, 
 retain only that semblance of meaning which enables 
 them to supplant reason in hasty minds. Among the 
 lessons taught by the French Revolution there is none 
 sadder or more striking than this, that you may make 
 everything else out of the passions of men except a 
 political system that will work, and that there is no 
 thing so pitilessly and unconsciously cruel as sincerity 
 formulated into dogma. It is always demoralizing to 
 extend the domain of sentiment over questions where 
 it has no legitimate jurisdiction ; and perhaps the se 
 verest strain upon Mr. Lincoln was in resisting a ten 
 dency of his own supporters which chimed with his 
 own private desires, while wholly opposed to his con 
 victions of what would be wise policy. 
 
 The change which three years have brought about 
 is too remarkable to be passed over without comment, 
 too weighty in its lesson not to be laid to heart. 
 Never did a President enter upon office with less 
 means at his command, outside his own strength of 
 heart and steadiness of understanding, for inspiring 
 confidence in the people, and so winning it for himself, 
 than Mr. Lincoln. All that was known of him was 
 that he was a good stump-speaker, nominated for his 
 availability, that is, because he had no history,
 
 264 JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL. 
 
 and chosen by a party with whose more extreme opin 
 ions he was not in sympathy. It might well be feared 
 that a man past fifty, against whom the ingenuity of 
 hostile partisans could rake up no accusation, must be 
 lacking in manliness of character, in decision of prin 
 ciple, in strength of will ; that a man who was at best 
 only the representative of a party, and who yet did 
 not fairly represent even that, would fail of political, 
 much more of popular, support. And certainly no 
 one ever entered upon office with so few resources of 
 power in the past, and so many materials of weakness 
 in the present, as Mr. Lincoln. Even in that half of 
 the Union which acknowledged him as President, 
 there was a large, and at that time dangerous, minor 
 ity, that hardly admitted his claim to the office, and 
 even in the party that elected him there was also a 
 large minority that suspected him of being secretly a 
 communicant with the church of Laodicea. 1 All that 
 he did was sure to be virulently attacked as ultra by 
 one side ; all that he left undone, to be stigmatized as 
 proof of lukewarmness and backsliding by the other. 
 Meanwhile he was to carry on a truly colossal war by 
 means of both ; he was to disengage the country from 
 diplomatic entanglements of unprecedented peril un 
 disturbed by the help or the hindrance of either, and 
 to win from the crowning dangers of his administra 
 tion, in the confidence of the people, the means of his 
 safety and their own. He has contrived to do it, and 
 perhaps none of our Presidents since Washington has 
 stood so firm in the confidence of the people as he 
 does after three years of stormy administration. 
 
 Mr. Lincoln's policy was a tentative one, and 
 rightly so. He laid down no programme which must 
 1 See Revelation, chapter 3, verse 15.
 
 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 265 
 
 compel him to be either inconsistent or unwise, no 
 cast-iron theorem to which circumstances must be 
 fitted as they rose, or else be useless to his ends. He 
 seemed to have chosen Mazarin's motto, Le temps et 
 moi. 1 The moi, to be sure, was not very prominent 
 at first ; but it has grown more and more so, till the 
 world is beginning to be persuaded that it stands for a 
 character of marked individuality and capacity for af 
 fairs. Time was his prime-minister, and, we began to 
 think, at one period, his general-in-chief also. At first 
 he was so slow that he tired out all those who see no 
 evidence of progress but in blowing up the engine ; 
 then he was so fast, that he took the breath away from 
 those who think there is no getting on safely while 
 there is a spark of fire under the boilers. God is the 
 only being who has time enough ; but a prudent man, 
 who knows how to seize occasion, can commonly make 
 a shift to find as much as he needs. Mr. Lincoln, as 
 it seems to us in reviewing his career, though we have 
 sometimes in our impatience thought otherwise, has 
 always waited, as a wise man should, till the right mo 
 ment brought up all his reserves. /Semper nocuit dif- 
 ferre paratis? is a sound axiom, but the really effi 
 cacious man will also be sure to know when he is not 
 ready, and be firm against all persuasion and reproach 
 till he is. 
 
 One would be apt to think, from some of the criti 
 cisms made on Mr. Lincoln's course by those who 
 mainly agree with him in principle, that the chief ob 
 ject of a statesman should be rather to proclaim his 
 adhesion to certain doctrines, than to achieve their 
 
 1 Time and I. Cardinal Mazarin was prime-minister of Louis 
 XIV. of France. Time, Mazarin said, was his prime-minister. 
 8 It is always bad for those who are ready to put off action.
 
 266 JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL. 
 
 triumph by quietly accomplishing his ends. In our 
 opinion, there is no more unsafe politician than a con 
 scientiously rigid doctrinaire, nothing more sure to 
 end in disaster than a theoretic scheme of policy that 
 admits of no pliability for contingencies. True, there 
 is a popular image of an impossible He, in whose plas 
 tic hands the submissive destinies of mankind become 
 as wax, and to whose commanding necessity the tough-* 
 est facts yield with the graceful pliancy of fiction ; but 
 in real life we commonly find that the men who con 
 trol circumstances, as it is called, are those who have 
 learned to allow for the influence of their eddies, and 
 have the nerve to turn them to account at the happy 
 instant. Mr. Lincoln's perilous task has been to carry 
 a rather shaky raft through the rapids, making fast 
 the unrulier logs as he could snatch opportunity, and 
 the country is to be congratulated that he did not 
 think it his -duty to run straight at all hazards, but 
 cautiously to assure himself with his setting-pole where 
 the main current was, and keep steadily to that. He 
 is still in wild water, but we have faith that his skill 
 and sureness of eye will bring him out right at last. 
 
 A curious, and, as we think, not inapt parallel, 
 might be drawn between Mr. Lincoln and one of the 
 most striking figures in modern history, Henry IV. 
 of France. The career of the latter may be more pic 
 turesque, as that of a daring captain always is ; but in 
 all its vicissitudes there is nothing more romantic than 
 that sudden change, as by a rub of Aladdin's lamp, 
 from the attorney's office in a country town of Illinois 
 to the helm of a great nation in times like these. The 
 analogy between the characters and circumstances of 
 the two men is in many respects singularly close. 
 Succeeding to a rebellion rather than a crown, Henry's
 
 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 267 
 
 chief material dependence was the Huguenot party, 
 whose doctrines sat upon him with a looseness dis 
 tasteful certainly, if not suspicious, to the more fanati 
 cal among them. King only in name over the greater 
 part of France, and with his capital barred against 
 him, it yet gradually became clear to the more far- 
 seeing even of the Catholic party that he was the only 
 centre of order and legitimate authority round which 
 France could reorganize itself. While preachers who 
 held the divine right of kings made the churches of 
 Paris ring with declamations in favor of democracy 
 rather than submit to the heretic dog of a Bearnois, 1 
 much as our soi-disant Democrats have lately been 
 preaching the divine right of slavery, and denouncing 
 the heresies of the Declaration of Independence, 
 Henry bore both parties in hand till he was convinced 
 that only one course of action could possibly combine 
 his own interests and those of France. Meanwhile 
 the Protestants believed somewhat doubtfully that he 
 was theirs, the Catholics hoped somewhat doubtfully 
 that he would be theirs, and Henry himself turned 
 aside remonstrance, advice and curiosity alike with a 
 jest or a proverb (if a little high, he liked them none 
 the worse), joking continually as his manner was. 
 We have seen Mr. Lincoln contemptuously compared 
 to Sancho Panza by persons incapable of appreciating, 
 one of the deepest pieces of wisdom in the profound- 
 est romance ever written ; namely, that, while Don 
 Quixote was incomparable in theoretic and ideal states 
 manship, Sancho, with his stock of proverbs, the ready 
 money of human experience, made the best possible 
 practical governor. Henry IV. was as full of wise saws 
 
 1 One of Henry's titles was Prince of Be*arn, that being the 
 old province of France from which he came.
 
 268 JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL. 
 
 and modern instances as Mr. Lincoln, but beneath all 
 this was the thoughtful, practical, humane, and thor 
 oughly earnest man, around whom the fragments of 
 France were to gather themselves till she took her 
 place again as a planet of the first magnitude in the 
 European system. In one respect Mr. Lincoln was 
 more fortunate than Henry. However some may think 
 him wanting in zeal, the most fanatical can find no 
 taint of apostasy in any measure of his, nor can the 
 most bitter charge him with being influenced by mo 
 tives of personal interest. The leading distinction be 
 tween the policies of the two is one of circumstances. 
 Henry went over to the nation ; Mr. Lincoln has stead 
 ily drawn the nation over to him. One left a united 
 France ; the other, we hope and believe, will leave a 
 reunited America. We leave our readers to trace the 
 further points of difference and resemblance for them 
 selves, merely suggesting a general similarity which 
 has often occurred to us. One only point of melan 
 choly interest we will allow ourselves to touch upon. 
 That Mr. Lincoln is not handsome nor elegant, we 
 learn from certain English tourists who would consider 
 similar revelations in regard to Queen Victoria as 
 thoroughly American in their want of bienseance. It 
 is no concern of ours, nor does it affect his fitness for 
 the high place he so worthily occupies ; but he is cer 
 tainly as fortunate as Henry in the matter of good 
 looks, if we may trust contemporary evidence. Mr. 
 Lincoln has also been reproached with Americanism 
 by some not unfriendly British critics ; but, with all 
 deference, we cannot say that we like him any the 
 worse for it, or see in it any reason why he should 
 govern Americans the less wisely. 
 
 People of more sensitive organizations may be
 
 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 269 
 
 shocked, but we are glad that in this our true war of 
 independence, which is to free us forever from the Old 
 World, we have had at the head of our affairs a man 
 whom America made, as God made Adam, out of the 
 very earth, unancestried, unprivileged, unknown, to 
 show us how much truth, how much magnanimity, and 
 how much statecraft await the call of opportunity in 
 simple manhood when it believes in the justice of God 
 and the worth of man. Conventionalities are all very 
 well in their proper place, but they shrivel at the touch 
 of nature like stubble in the fire. The genius that 
 sways a nation by its arbitrary will seems less august 
 to us than that which multiplies and reinforces itself 
 in the instincts and convictions of an entire people. 
 Autocracy may have something in it more melodra 
 matic than this, but falls far short of it in human 
 value and interest. 
 
 Experience would have bred in us a rooted distrust 
 of improvised statesmanship, even if we did not believe 
 politics to be a science, which, if it cannot always com 
 mand men of special aptitude and great powers, at 
 least demands the long and steady application of the 
 best powers of such men as it can command to master 
 even its first principles. It is curious, that, in a coun 
 try which boasts of its intelligence the theory should 
 be so generally held that the most complicated of 
 human contrivances, and one which every day be 
 comes more complicated, can be worked at sight by 
 any man able to talk for an hour or two without stop 
 ping to think. 
 
 Mr. Lincoln is sometimes claimed as an example of 
 a ready-made ruler. But no case could well be less in 
 point ; for, besides that he was a man of such fair- 
 mindedness as is always the raw material of wisdom,
 
 270 JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL. 
 
 he had in his profession a training precisely the oppo 
 site of that to which a partisan is subjected. His ex 
 perience as a lawyer compelled him not only to see 
 that there is a principle underlying every phenomenon 
 in human affairs, but that there are always two sides 
 to every question, both of which must be fully under 
 stood in order to understand either, and that it is of 
 greater advantage to an advocate to appreciate the 
 strength than the weakness of his antagonist's position. 
 Nothing is more remarkable than the unerring tact with 
 which, in his debate with Mr. Douglas, he went straight 
 to the reason of the question ; nor have we ever had a 
 more striking lesson in political tactics than the fact, 
 that opposed to a man exceptionally adroit in using 
 popular prejudice and bigotry to his purpose, excep 
 tionally unscrupulous in appealing to those baser mo 
 tives that turn a meeting of citizens into a mob of 
 barbarians, he should yet have won his case before a 
 jury of the people. Mr. Lincoln was as far as possi 
 ble from an impromptu politician. His wisdom was 
 made up of a knowledge of things as well as of men ; 
 his sagacity resulted from a clear perception and hon 
 est acknowledgment of difficulties, which enabled him 
 to see that the only durable triumph of political opin 
 ion is based, not on any abstract right, but upon so 
 much of justice, the highest attainable at any given 
 moment in human affairs, as may be had in the bal 
 ance of mutual concession. Doubtless he had an 
 ideal, but it was the ideal of a practical statesman, 
 to aim* at the best, and to take the next best, if he is 
 lucky enough to get even that. His slow, but singu 
 larly masculine, intelligence taught him that precedent 
 is only another name for embodied experience, and 
 that it counts for even more in the guidance of com-
 
 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 271 
 
 munities of men than in that of the individual life. 
 He was not a man who held it good public economy to 
 pull down on the mere chance of rebuilding better. 
 Mr. Lincoln's faith in God was qualified by a very 
 well-founded distrust of the wisdom of man. Perhaps 
 it was his want of self-confidence that more than any 
 thing else won him the unlimited confidence of the 
 people, for they felt that there would be no need of 
 retreat from any position he had deliberately taken. 
 The cautious, but steady, advance of his policy during 
 the war was like that of a Roman army. He left be 
 hind him a firm road on which public confidence could 
 follow ; he took America with him where he went ; 
 what he gained he occupied, and his advanced posts 
 became colonies. The very homeliness of his genius 
 was its distinction. His kingship was conspicuous by 
 its workday homespun. Never was ruler so absolute 
 as he, nor so little conscious of it ; for he was the in 
 carnate common-sense of the people. With all that 
 tenderness of nature whose sweet sadness touched 
 whoever saw him with something of its own pathos, 
 there was no trace of sentimentalism in his speech or 
 action. He seems to have had but one rule of con 
 duct, always that of practical and successful politics, 
 to let himself be guided by events, when they were 
 sure to bring him out where he wished to go, though 
 by what seemed to unpractical minds, which let go the 
 possible to grasp at the desirable, a longer road. 
 
 Undoubtedly the highest function of statesmanship 
 is by degrees to accommodate the conduct of commu 
 nities to ethical laws, and to subordinate the conflict 
 ing self-interests of the day to higher and more per 
 manent concerns. But it is on the understanding, 
 and not on the sentiment, of a nation that all safe
 
 272 JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL. 
 
 legislation must be based. Voltaire's saying, that " a 
 consideration of petty circumstances is the tomb of 
 great things," may be true of individual men, but it 
 certainly is not true of governments. It is by a mul 
 titude of such considerations, each in itself trifling, but 
 all together weighty, that the framers of policy can 
 alone divine what is practicable and therefore wise. 
 The imputation of inconsistency is one to which every 
 sound politician and every honest thinker must sooner 
 or later subject himself. The foolish and the dead 
 alone never change their opinion. The course of a 
 great statesman resembles that of navigable rivers, 
 avoiding immovable obstacles with noble bends of con 
 cession, seeking the broad levels of opinion on which 
 men soonest settle and longest dwell, following and 
 marking the almost imperceptible slopes of national 
 tendency, yet always aiming at direct advances, always 
 recruited from sources nearer heaven, and sometimes 
 bursting open paths of progress and fruitful human 
 commerce through what seem the eternal barriers of 
 both. It is loyalty to great ends, even though forced 
 to combine the small and opposing motives of selfish 
 men to accomplish them ; it is the anchored cling to 
 solid principles of duty and action, which knows how 
 to swing with the tide, but is never carried away by it, 
 that we dsmaud in public men, and not sameness 
 of policy, or a conscientious persistency in what is im 
 practicable. For the impracticable, however theoreti 
 cally enticing, is always politically unwise, sound 
 statesmanship being the application of that prudence 
 to the public business which is the safest guide in that 
 of private men. 
 
 No doubt slavery was the most delicate and embar 
 rassing question with which Mr. Lincoln was called
 
 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 273 
 
 on to deal, and it was one which no man in his posi 
 tion, whatever his opinions, could evade ; for, though 
 he might withstand the clamor of partisans, he must 
 sooner or later yield to the persistent importunacy of 
 circumstances, which thrust the problem upon him at 
 every turn and in every shape. 
 
 It has been brought against us as an accusation 
 abroad, and repeated here by people who measure 
 their country rather by what is thought of it than by 
 what it is, that our war has not been distinctly and 
 avowedly for the extinction of slavery, but a war rather 
 for the preservation of our national power and great 
 ness, in which the emancipation of the negro has been 
 forced upon us by circumstances and accepted as a 
 necessity. We are very far from denying this ; nay, 
 we admit that it is so far true that we were slow to 
 renounce our constitutional obligations even toward 
 those who had absolved us by their own act from the 
 letter of our duty. We are speaking of the govern 
 ment which, legally installed for the whole country, 
 was bound, so long as it was possible, not to overstep 
 the limits of orderly prescription, and could not, with 
 out abnegating its own very nature, take the lead in 
 making rebellion an excuse for revolution. There 
 were, no doubt, many ardent and sincere persons who 
 seemed to think this as simple a thing to do as to lead 
 off a Virginia reel. They forgot, what should be for 
 gotten least of all in a system like ours, that the ad 
 ministration for the time being represents not only 
 the majority which elects it, but the minority as well, 
 a minority in this case powerful, and so little ready 
 for emancipation that it was opposed even to war. 
 Mr. Lincoln had not been chosen as general agent of 
 an anti-slavery society, but President of the United
 
 274 JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL. 
 
 States, to perform certain functions exactly defined by 
 law. Whatever were his wishes, it was no less duty 
 than policy to mark out for himself a line of action 
 that would not further distract the country, by raising 
 before their time questions which plainly would soon 
 enough compel attention, and for which every day 
 was making the answer more easy. 
 
 Meanwhile he must solve the riddle of this new 
 Sphinx, or be devoured. Though Mr. Lincoln's policy 
 in this critical affair has not been such as to satisfy 
 those who demand an heroic treatment for even the 
 most trifling occasion, and who will not cut their coat 
 according to their cloth, unless they can borrow the 
 scissors of Atropos, 1 it has been at least not unworthy 
 of the long-headed king of Ithaca. 2 Mr. Lincoln had 
 the choice of Bassanio 3 offered him. Which of the 
 three caskets held the prize that was to redeem the 
 fortunes of the country ? There was the golden one 
 whose showy speciousness might have tempted a vain 
 man ; the silver of compromise, which might have de 
 cided the choice of a merely acute one; and the 
 leaden, dull and homely-looking, as prudence al 
 ways is, yet with something about it sure to attract 
 the eye of practical wisdom. Mr. Lincoln dallied 
 with his decision perhaps longer than seemed needful 
 to those on whom its awful responsibility was not to 
 rest, but when he made it, it was worthy of his cau 
 tious but sure-footed understanding. The moral of 
 the Sphinx-riddle, and it is a deep one, lies in the 
 childish simplicity of the solution. Those who fail in 
 guessing it, fail because they are over-ingenious, and 
 
 1 One of the three Fates. 
 
 2 Odysseus, or Ulysses, the hero of Homer's Odyssey. 
 8 See Shakespeare's Merchant of Venice.
 
 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 275 
 
 cast about for an answer that shall suit their own no 
 tion of the gravity of the occasion and of their own 
 dignity, rather than the occasion itself. 
 
 In a matter which must be finally settled by public 
 opinion, and in regard to which the ferment of preju 
 dice and passion on both sides has not yet subsided to 
 that equilibrium of compromise from which alone a 
 sound public opinion can result, it is proper enough 
 for the private citizen to press his own convictions 
 with all possible force of argument and persuasion ; 
 but the popular magistrate, whose judgment must be 
 come action, and whose action involves the whole 
 country, is bound to wait till the sentiment of the 
 people is so far advanced toward his own point of 
 view, that what he does shall find support in it, in 
 stead of merely confusing it with new elements of di 
 vision. It was not unnatural that men earnestly de 
 voted to the saving of their country, and profoundly 
 convinced that slavery was its only real enemy, should 
 demand a decided policy round which all patriots 
 might rally, and this might have been the wisest 
 course for an absolute ruler. But in the then unset 
 tled state of the public mind, with a large party de 
 crying even resistance to the slaveholders' rebellion as 
 not only unwise, but even unlawful ; with a majority, 
 perhaps, even of the would-be loyal so long accus 
 tomed to regard the Constitution as a deed of gift 
 conveying to the South their own judgment as to pol 
 icy and instinct as to right, that they were in doubt at 
 first whether their loyalty were due to the country or 
 to slavery ; and with a respectable body of honest and 
 influential men who still believed in the possibility of 
 conciliation, Mr. Lincoln judged wisely, that, in 
 laying down a policy in deference to one party, he
 
 276 JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL. 
 
 should be giving to the other the very fulcrum for 
 which their disloyalty had been waiting. 
 
 It behooved a clear-headed man in his position not 
 to yield so far to an honest indignation against the 
 brokers of treason in the North as to lose sight of the 
 materials for misleading which were their stock in 
 trade, and to forget that it is not the falsehood of 
 sophistry which is to be feared, but the grain of truth 
 mingled with it to make it specious, that it is not 
 the knavery of the leaders so much as the honesty of 
 the followers they may seduce, that gives them power 
 for evil. It was especially his duty to do nothing 
 which might help the people to forget the true cause 
 of the war in fruitless disputes about its inevitable 
 consequences. 
 
 The doctrine of State rights can be so handled by 
 an adroit demagogue as easily to confound the distinc 
 tion between liberty and lawlessness in the minds of 
 ignorant persons, accustomed always to be influenced 
 by the sound of certain words, rather than to reflect 
 upon the principles which give them meaning. For, 
 though Secession involves the manifest absurdity of 
 denying to a State the right of making war against 
 any foreign power while permitting it against the 
 United States ; though it supposes a compact of mu 
 tual concessions and guaranties among States without 
 any arbiter in case of dissension ; though it contra 
 dicts common-sense in assuming that the men who 
 
 o 
 
 framed our government did not know what they meant 
 when they substituted Union for Confederation ; 
 though it falsifies history, which shows that the main 
 opposition to the adoption of the Constitution was based 
 on the argument that it did not allow that indepen 
 dence in the several States which alone would justify
 
 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 277 
 
 them in seceding ; yet, as slavery was universally 
 admitted to be a reserved right, an inference could be 
 drawn from any direct attack upon it (though only in 
 self-defence) to a natural right of resistance, logical 
 enough to satisfy minds untrained to detect fallacy, 
 as the majority of men always are, and now too much 
 disturbed by the disorder of the times, to consider that 
 the order of events had any legitimate bearing on the 
 argument. Though Mr. Lincoln was too sagacious to 
 give the Northern allies of the Eebels the occasion 
 they desired and even strove to provoke, yet from the 
 beginning of the war the most persistent efforts have 
 been made to confuse the public mind as to its origin 
 and motives, and to drag the people of the loyal States 
 down from the national position they had instinctively 
 taken to the old level of party squabbles and antipa 
 thies. The wholly unprovoked rebellion of an oli 
 garchy proclaiming negro slavery the corner-stone of 
 free institutions, and in the first flush of over-hasty 
 confidence venturing to parade the logical sequence of 
 their leading dogma, " that slavery is right in princi 
 ple, and has nothing to do with difference of com 
 plexion," has been represented as a legitimate and 
 gallant attempt to maintain the true principles of de 
 mocracy. The rightful endeavor of an established 
 government, the least onerous that ever existed, to 
 defend itself against a treacherous attack on its very 
 existence, has been cunningly made to seem the wicked 
 effort of a fanatical clique to force its doctrines on 
 an oppressed population. 
 
 Even so long ago as when Mr. Lincoln, not yet con 
 vinced of the danger and magnitude of the crisis, was 
 endeavoring to persuade himself of Union majorities at 
 the South, and to carry on a war that was half peace
 
 278 JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL. 
 
 in the hope of a peace that would have been all war, 
 while he was still enforcing the Fugitive Slave Law, 
 under some theory that Secession, however it might 
 absolve States from their obligations, could not es 
 cheat them of their claims under the Constitution, and 
 that slaveholders in rebellion had alone among mortals 
 the privilege of having their cake and eating it at the 
 same time, the enemies of free government were 
 striving to persuade the people that the war was an 
 Abolition crusade. To rebel without reason was pro 
 claimed as one of the rights of man, while it was care 
 fully kept out of sight that to suppress rebellion is the 
 first duty of government. All the evils that have 
 come upon the country have been attributed to the 
 Abolitionists, though it is hard to see how any party 
 can become permanently powerful except in one of 
 two ways, either by the greater truth of its princi 
 ples, or the extravagance of the party opposed to it. 
 To fancy the ship of state, riding safe at her constitu 
 tional moorings, suddenly engulfed by a huge kraken 
 of Abolitionism, rising from unknown depths and 
 grasping it with slimy tentacles, is to look at the nat 
 ural history of the matter with the eyes of Pontop- 
 pidan. 1 To believe that the leaders in the Southern 
 treason feared any danger from Abolitionism, would 
 be to deny them ordinary intelligence, though there 
 can be little doubt that they made use of it to stir the 
 passions and excite the fears of their deluded accom 
 plices. They rebelled, not because they thought slav 
 ery weak, but because they believed it strong enough, 
 not to overthrow the government, but to get posses 
 sion of it ; for it becomes daily clearer that they used 
 rebellion only as a means of revolution, and if they 
 1 A Danish antiquary and theologian.
 
 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 279 
 
 got revolution, though not in the shape they looked 
 for, is the American people to save them from its con 
 sequences at the cost of its own existence? The elec 
 tion of Mr. Lincoln, which it was clearly in their 
 power to prevent had they wished, was the occasion 
 merely, and not the cause of their revolt. Abolition 
 ism, till within a year or two, was the despised heresy 
 of a few earnest persons, without political weight 
 enough to carry the election of a parish constable ; 
 and their cardinal principle was disunion, because 
 they were convinced that within the Union the posi 
 tion of slavery was impregnable. In spite of the 
 proverb, great effects do not follow from small causes, 
 that is, disproportionately small, but from ade 
 quate causes acting under certain required conditions. 
 To contrast the size of the oak with that of the parent 
 acorn, as if the poor seed had paid all costs from its 
 slender strong-box, may serve for a child's wonder ; 
 but the real miracle lies, in that divine league which 
 bound all the forces of nature to the service of the 
 tiny germ in fulfilling its destiny. Everything has 
 been at work for the past ten years in the cause of 
 anti-slavery, but Garrison and Phillips have been far 
 less successful propagandists than the slaveholders 
 themselves, with the constantly growing arrogance of 
 their pretensions and encroachments. They have 
 forced the question upon the attention of every voter 
 in the Free States, by defiantly putting freedom and 
 democracy on the defensive. But, even after the 
 Kansas outrages, there was no wide-spread desire on 
 the part of the North to commit aggressions, though 
 there was a growing determination to resist them. 
 The popular unanimity in favor of the war three years 
 ago was but in small measure the result of anti-slavery
 
 280 JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL. 
 
 sentiment, far less of any zeal for abolition. But 
 every month of the war, every movement of the allies 
 of slavery in the Free States, has been making Aboli 
 tionists by the thousand. The masses of any people, 
 however intelligent, are very little moved by abstract 
 principles of humanity and justice, until those prin 
 ciples are interpreted for them by the stinging com 
 mentary of some infringement upon their own rights, 
 and then their instincts and passions, once aroused, 
 do indeed derive an incalculable reinforcement of 
 impulse and intensity from those higher ideas, those 
 sublime traditions, which have no motive political 
 force till they are allied with a sense of immediate 
 personal wrong or imminent peril. Then at last the 
 stars in their courses begin to fight against Si sera. 
 Had any one doubted before that the rights of human 
 nature are unitary, that oppression is of one hue the 
 world over, no matter what the color of the oppressed, 
 had any one failed to see what the real essence of 
 the contest was, the efforts of the advocates of slav 
 ery among ourselves to throw discredit upon the fun 
 damental axioms of the Declaration of Independence 
 and the radical doctrines of Christianity, could not 
 fail to sharpen his eyes. 
 
 While every day was bringing the people nearer to 
 the conclusion which all thinking men saw to be inev 
 itable from the beginning, it was wise in Mr. Lincoln 
 to leave the shaping of his policy to events. In this 
 country, where the rough and ready understanding of 
 the people is sure at last to be the controlling power, 
 a profound common-sense is the best genius for states 
 manship. Hitherto the wisdom of the President's 
 measures has been justified by the fact that they have 
 always resulted in more firmly uniting public opinion.
 
 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 281 
 
 One of the tilings particularly admirable in the public 
 utterances of President Lincoln is a certain tone of 
 familiar dignity, which, while it is perhaps the most 
 difficult attainment of mere style, is also no doubtful 
 indication of personal character. There must be 
 something essentially noble in an elective ruler who 
 can descend to the level of confidential ease without 
 losing respect, something very manly in one who can 
 break through the etiquette of his conventional rank 
 and trust himself to the reason and intelligence of 
 those who have elected him. No higher compliment 
 was ever paid to a nation than the simple confidence, 
 the fireside plainness, with which Mr. Lincoln always 
 addresses himself to the reason of the American people. 
 This was, indeed, a true democrat, who grounded him 
 self on the assumption that a democracy can think. 
 " Come, let us reason together about this matter," has 
 been the tone of all his addresses to the people ; and 
 accordingly we have never had a chief magistrate who 
 so won to himself the love and at the same time the 
 judgment of his countrymen. To us, that simple con 
 fidence of his in the right-mindedness of his fellow- 
 men is very touching, and its success is as strong an 
 argument as we have ever seen in favor of the theory 
 that men can govern themselves. He never appeals 
 to any vulgar sentiment, he never alludes to the hum 
 bleness of his origin ; it probably never occurred to 
 him, indeed, that there was anything higher to start 
 from than manhood ; and he put himself on a level 
 with those he addressed, not by going down to them, 
 but only by taking it for granted that they had brains 
 and would come up to a common ground of reason. 
 In an article lately printed in The Nation, Mr. Bay 
 ard Taylor mentions the striking fact, that in the
 
 282 JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL. 
 
 foulest dens of the Five Points he found the portrait 
 of Lincoln. The wretched population that makes its 
 hive there threw all its votes and more against him, 
 and yet paid this instinctive tribute to the sweet hu 
 manity of his nature. Their ignorance sold its vote 
 and took its money, but all that was left of manhood 
 in them recognized its saint and martyr. 
 
 Mr. Lincoln is not in the habit of saying, " This is 
 my opinion, or my theory," but " This is the conclu 
 sion to which, in my judgment, the time has come, and 
 to which, accordingly, the sooner we come the better 
 for us." His policy has been the policy of public 
 opinion based on adequate discussion and on a timely 
 recognition of the influence of passing events in shap 
 ing the features of events to come. 
 
 One secret of Mr. Lincoln's remarkable success in 
 captivating the popular mind is undoubtedly an un 
 consciousness of self which enables him, though under 
 the necessity of constantly using the capital /, to do 
 it without any suggestion of egotism. There is no 
 single vowel which men's mouths can pronounce with 
 such difference of effect. That which one shall hide 
 away, as it were, behind the substance of his dis 
 course, or, if he bring it to the front, shall use merely 
 to give an agreeable accent of individuality to what 
 he says, another shall make an offensive challenge to 
 the self-satisfaction of all his hearers, and an unwar 
 ranted intrusion upon each man's sense of personal 
 importance, irritating every pore of his vanity, like 
 a dry northeast wind, to a goose-flesh of opposition 
 and hostility. Mr. Lincoln has never studied Quin- 
 tilian ; l but he has, in the earnest simplicity and un 
 affected Americanism of his own character, one art 
 1 A famous Latin writer on the Art of Oratory.
 
 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 283 
 
 % 
 
 of oratory worth all the rest. He forgets himself so 
 entirely in his object as to give his / the sympathetic 
 and persuasive effect of We with the great body of 
 his countrymen. Homely, dispassionate, showing all 
 the rough-edged process of his thought as it goes 
 along, yet arriving at his conclusions with an honest 
 kind of every-day logic, he is so eminently our repre 
 sentative man, that, when he speaks, it seems as if the 
 people were listening to their own thinking aloud. 
 The dignity of his thought owes nothing to any cere 
 monial garb of words, but to the manly movement 
 that comes of settled purpose and an energy of reason 
 that knows not what rhetoric means. There has been 
 nothing of Cleon, still less of Strepsiades 1 striving to 
 underbid him in demagogism, to be found in the pub 
 lic utterances of Mr. Lincoln. He has always ad 
 dressed the intelligence of men, never their prejudice, 
 their passion, or their ignorance. 
 
 On the day of his death, this simple Western attor 
 ney, who according to one party was a vulgar joker, 
 and whom the doctrinaires among his own supporters 
 accused of wanting every element of statesmanship, 
 was the most absolute ruler in Christendom, and this 
 solely by the hold his good-humored sagacity had laid 
 on the hearts and understandings of his countrymen. 
 Nor was this all, for it appeared that he had drawn 
 the great majority, not only of his fellow-citizens, but 
 of mankind also, to his side. So strong and so per 
 suasive is honest manliness without a single quality of 
 romance or unreal sentiment to help it ! A civilian 
 
 1 Two Athenian demagogues, satirized by the dramatist Aris 
 tophanes.
 
 284 JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL. 
 
 during times of the most captivating military achieve 
 ment, awkward, with no skill in the lower technicali 
 ties of manners, he left behind him a fame beyond 
 that of any conqueror, the memory of a grace higher 
 than that of outward person, and of a gentlemanliness 
 deeper than mere breeding. Never before that star 
 tled April morning did such multitudes of men shed 
 tears for the death of one they had never seen, as if 
 with him a friendly presence had been taken away from 
 their lives, leaving them colder and darker. Never 
 was funeral panegyric so eloquent as the silent look 
 of sympathy which strangers exchanged when they 
 met on that day. Their common manhood had lost a 
 kinsman.
 
 III. , 
 
 BOOKS AND LIBRARIES. 
 
 A FEW years ago my friend, Mr. Alexander Ire 
 land, published a very interesting volume which he 
 called The Book - Lover 1 s Enchiridion, the hand 
 book, 1 that is to say, of those who love books. It 
 was made up of extracts from the writings of a great 
 variety of distinguished men, ancient and modern, m 
 praise of books. It was a chorus of many voices in 
 many tongues, a hymn of gratitude and praise, full 
 of such piety and fervor as can be paralleled only in 
 songs dedicated to the supreme Power, the supreme 
 Wisdom, and the supreme Love. Nay, there is a glow 
 of enthusiasm and sincerity in it which is often pain 
 fully wanting in those other too commonly mechani 
 cal compositions. We feel at once that here it is 
 out of the fulness of the heart, yes, and of the head 
 too, that the mouth speaketh. Here was none of that 
 compulsory commonplace which is wont to charac 
 terize those " testimonials of celebrated authors," by 
 means of which publishers sometimes strive to linger 
 out the passage of a hopeless book toward its requi- 
 escat 2 in oblivion. These utterances which Mr. Ire- 
 
 1 Handbook is a translation of the Greek word enchiridion, 
 
 2 It was once more common than now to place upon tomb 
 stones the Latin words Requiescat in pace: May he rest in 
 peace.
 
 286 JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL. 
 
 land has gathered lovingly together are stamped with 
 that spontaneousness which is the mint-mark of all 
 sterling speech. It is true that they are mostly, as 
 is only natural, the utterances of literary men, and 
 there is a well-founded proverbial distrust of herring 
 that bear only the brand of the packer, and not that 
 of the sworn inspector. But to this objection a cynic 
 might answer with the question, " Are authors so 
 prone, then, to praise the works of other people that 
 we are to doubt them when they do it unasked ? " 
 Perhaps the wisest thing I could have done to-night 
 would have been to put upon the stand some of the 
 more weighty of this cloud of witnesses. But since 
 your invitation implied that I should myself say 
 something, I will endeavor to set before you a few of 
 the commonplaces of the occasion, as they may be 
 modified by passing through my own mind, or by hav 
 ing made themselves felt in my own experience. 
 
 The greater part of Mr. Ireland's witnesses testify 
 to the comfort and consolation they owe to books, to 
 the refuge they have found in them from sorrow or 
 misfortune, to their friendship, never estranged and 
 outliving all others. This testimony they volunteered. 
 Had they been asked, they would have borne evi 
 dence as willingly to the higher and more general uses 
 of books in their service to the commonwealth, as well 
 as to the individual man. Consider, for example, 
 how a single page of Burke may emancipate the 
 young student of politics from narrow views and 
 merely contemporaneous judgments. 1 Our English 
 ancestors, with that common-sense which is one of the 
 
 1 An interesting reference to Burke as a political thinker will 
 be found in Mr. Lowell's paper, The Place of the Independent in 
 Politics, in his volume of Political Essays,
 
 BOOKS AND LIBRARIES. 287 
 
 most useful, though not one of the most engaging, 
 properties of the race, made a rhyming proverb, which 
 says that 
 
 " When land and goods are gone and spent 
 Then learning is most excellent ; " 
 
 and this is true so far as it goes, though it goes per 
 haps hardly far enough. The law also calls only the 
 earth and what is immovably attached to it real l 
 property, but I am of opinion that those only are real 
 possessions which abide with a man after he has been 
 stripped of those others falsely so called, and which 
 alone save him from seeming and from being the mis 
 erable forked radish to which the bitter scorn of Lear 
 degraded every child of Adam. 2 The riches of schol 
 arship, the benignities of literature, defy fortune and 
 outlive calamity. They are beyond the reach of thief 
 or moth or rust. As they cannot be inherited, so 
 they cannot be alienated. But they may be shared, 
 they may be distributed, and it is the object and office 
 of a free public library to perform these beneficent 
 functions. 
 
 " Books," says Wordsworth, " are a real world," 8 
 and he was thinking, doubtless, of such books as are 
 not merely the triumphs of pure intellect, however 
 supreme, but of those in which intellect infused with 
 the sense of beauty aims rather to produce delight 
 than conviction, or, if conviction, then through intui 
 tion rather than formal logic, and, leaving what Donne 
 wisely calls 
 
 1 What is personal property or estate, as distinguished from 
 real? 
 
 2 See King Lear, Act IIL sc. 4 ; but see King Henry /F., 
 Part II., Act III. sc. 2. 
 
 8 In what poern ?
 
 288 JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL. 
 
 " Unconcerning things, matters of fact," l 
 to science and the understanding, seeks to give ideal 
 expression to those abiding realities of the spiritual 
 world for which the outward and visible world serves 
 at best but as the husk and symbol. Am I wrong in 
 using the word realities ? wrong in insisting on the 
 distinction between the real and the actual ? in assum 
 ing for the ideal an existence as absolute and self- 
 subsistent as that which appeals to our senses, nay, 
 so often cheats them, in the matter of fact? How 
 very small a part of the world we truly live in is 
 represented by what speaks to us through the senses 
 when compared with that vast realm of the mind 
 which is peopled by memory and imagination, and 
 with such shining inhabitants ! These walls, these 
 faces, what are they in comparison with the countless 
 images, the innumerable population which every one 
 of us can summon up to the tiny show-box of the 
 brain, in material breadth scarce a span, yet infinite 
 as space and time ? and in what, I pray, are those we 
 gravely call historical characters, of which each new 
 historian strains his neck to get a new and different 
 view, in any sense more real than the personages of 
 fiction ? Do not serious and earnest men discuss 
 
 1 A line in the poem Of the Progress of the Soul. The passage 
 should be read in full. 
 
 " We see in authors, too stiff to recant, 
 A hundred controversies of an ant ; 
 And yet one watches, starves, freezes, and sweats, 
 To know but catechisms and alphabets 
 Of unconcerning things, matters of fact, 
 How others on our stage their parts did act, 
 What Caesar did, yea, and what Cicero said : 
 Why grass is green, or why our blood is red, 
 Are mysteries which none have reached unto ; 
 In this low form, poor soul, what wilt thou do ? 
 Oh ! when wilt thou shake off this pedantry, 
 Of being taught by sense and fantasy ? "
 
 BOOKS AND LIBRARIES. 289 
 
 Hamlet as they would Cromwell or Lincoln ? Does 
 Caesar, does Alaric, hold existence by any other or 
 stronger tenure than the Christian of Bunyan, or the 
 Don Quixote of Cervantes, or the Antigone of Sopho 
 cles? Is not the history which is luminous because 
 of an indwelling and perennial truth to nature, be 
 cause of that light which never was on sea or land, 1 
 really more true, in the highest sense, than many a 
 weary chronicle with names and date and place in 
 which " an Amurath to Amurath succeeds " ? Do we 
 know as much of any authentic Danish prince as of 
 Hamlet ? 
 
 But to come back a little nearer to Chelsea and the 
 occasion that has called us together. The founders 
 of New England, if sometimes, when they found it 
 needful, an impracticable, were always a practical 
 people. Their first care, no doubt, was for an ade 
 quate supply of powder, and they encouraged the 
 manufacture of musket bullets by enacting that they 
 should pass as currency at a farthing each, a coin 
 age nearer to its nominal value and not heavier than 
 some with which we are familiar. Their second care 
 was that " good learning should not perish from among 
 us," and to this end they at once established the 
 Grammar (Latin) School 2 in Boston, and soon after 
 the college at Cambridge. The nucleus of this was, 
 as you all know, the bequest in money by John Har 
 vard. Hardly less important, however, was the legacy 
 of his library, a collection of good books, inconsider- 
 
 1 See Wordsworth's poem, Elegiac Stanzas suggested ly a 
 Picture of Peele Castle in a Storm. 
 
 3 An interesting account of this school may be read in The 
 Oldest School in A merica, containing a notable historical address 
 by Phillips Brooks.
 
 290 JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL. 
 
 able measured by the standard of to-day, but very 
 considerable then as the possession of a private per 
 son. From that little acorn what an oak has sprung, 
 and from its acorns again what a vocal forest, as old 
 Howell would have called it ! old Howell, whom I 
 love to cite, because his name gave their title to the 
 Essays of Mia, 1 and is borne with slight variation 
 by one of the most delightful of modern authors. It 
 was, in my judgment, those two foundations, more 
 than anything else, which gave to New England char 
 acter its bent, and to Boston that literary supremacy 
 which, I am told, she is in danger of losing, but which 
 she will not lose till she and all the world lose Holmes. 
 The opening of a free public library, 2 then, is a 
 most important event in the history of any town. A 
 college training is an excellent thing ; but, after all, 
 the better part of every man's education is that which 
 he gives himself, and it is for this that a good library 
 should furnish the opportunity and the means. I have 
 sometimes thought that our public schools undertook 
 to teach too much, and that the older system, which 
 taught merely the three R's, and taught them well, 
 leaving natural selection to decide who should go 
 farther, was the better. However this may be, all 
 
 1 Mr. Lowell here conjectures that Lamb, who was at home 
 in quaint English literature, adopted his signature of Elia from 
 the EpistoloE Ho-Eliance of James Howell, a writer of the former 
 half of the seventeenth century ; but Lamb himself, in a letter 
 to his publishers, states that he took the name of Elia, which he 
 tells them to pronounce Ellia, from a former fellow-clerk of his 
 at the India House, an Italian named Elia. 
 
 2 It would be an interesting study for any one to trace the 
 rise and growth of public libraries in the United States. Abun 
 dant material will be founrl in a Special Report issued by the 
 Bureau of Education at Washington in 1876.
 
 BOOKS AND LIBRARIES. 291 
 
 that is primarily needful in order to use a library is 
 the ability to read. I say primarily, for there must 
 also be the inclination, and, after that, some guidance 
 in reading well. Formerly the duty of a librarian 
 was considered too much that of a watch-dog, to keep 
 people as much as possible away from the books, and 
 to hand these over to his successor as little worn by 
 use as he could. Librarians now, it is pleasant to see, 
 have a different notion of their trust, and are in the 
 habit of preparing, for the direction of the inexperi 
 enced, lists of such books as they think best worth 
 reading. Cataloguing has also, thanks in great mea 
 sure to American librarians, become a science, and 
 catalogues, ceasing to be labyrinths without a clew, 
 are furnished with finger-posts at every turn. Sub 
 ject catalogues again save the beginner a vast deal of 
 time and trouble by supplying him for nothing with 
 one at least of the results of thorough scholarship, the 
 knowing where to look for what he wants. I do not 
 mean by this that there is or can be any short cut to 
 learning, but that there may be, and is, such a short 
 cut to information that will make learning more easily 
 accessible. 
 
 But have you ever rightly considered what the mere 
 ability to read means ? That it is the key which ad 
 mits us to the whole world of thought and fancy and 
 imagination ? to the company of saint and sage, of the 
 wisest and the wittiest at their wisest and wittiest mo 
 ment? That it enables us to see with the keenest 
 eyes, hear with the finest ears, and listen to the sweet 
 est voices of all time ? More than that, it annihilates 
 time and space for us; it revives for us without a 
 miracle the Age of Wonder, endowing us with the 
 shoes of swiftness and the cap of darkness, so that we
 
 292 JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL. 
 
 walk invisible like Fern-seed, 1 and witness unharmed 
 the plague 2 at Athens or Florence or London ; ac 
 company Caesar on his marches, or look in on Catiline 
 in council with his fellow-conspirators, or Guy Favvkes 
 in the cellar of St. Stephen's. We often hear of peo 
 ple who will descend to any servility, submit to any 
 insult, for the sake of getting themselves or their chil 
 dren into what is euphemistically called good society. 
 Did it ever occur to them that there is a select society 
 of all the centuries to which they and theirs can be 
 admitted for the asking, a society, too, which will not 
 involve them in ruinous expense, and still more ruin 
 ous waste of time and health and faculties ? 
 
 Southey tells us that, in his walk one stormy day, 
 he met an old woman, to whom, by way of greeting, 
 he made the rather obvious remark that it was dread 
 ful weather. She answered, philosophically, that, in 
 her opinion, " any weather was better than none ! " 
 I should be half inclined to say that any reading was 
 better than none, allaying the crudeness of the state 
 ment by the Yankee proverb, which tells us that, 
 though " all deacons are good, there 's odds in dea 
 cons." Among books, certainly, there is much variety 
 of company, ranging from the best to the worst, from 
 Plato to Zola ; and the first lesson in reading well is 
 that which teaches us to distinguish between litera 
 ture and merely printed matter. The choice lies 
 wholly with ourselves. We have the key put into 
 our hands; shall we unlock the pantry or the ora- 
 
 1 Any good collection of fairy tales will enable one to re 
 count the stories which make use of the shoes, the cap, and the 
 fern-seed. 
 
 2 Thucydides describes the plague at Athens ; Defoe, the 
 plague at London.
 
 BOOKS AND LIBRARIES. 293 
 
 tory? There is a Wallachian legend which, like 
 most of the figments of popular fancy, has a moral in 
 it. One Bakala, a good-for-nothing kind of fellow in 
 his way, having had the luck to otter a sacrifice espe 
 cially well pleasing to God, is taken up into heaven. 
 He finds the Almighty sitting in something like the 
 best room of a Wallachian peasant's cottage there 
 is always a profound pathos in the homeliness of the 
 popular imagination, forced, like the princess in the 
 fairy tale, to weave its semblance of gold tissue out 
 of straw. On being asked what reward he desires 
 for the good service he has done, Bakala, who had 
 always passionately longed to be the owner of a bag 
 pipe, seeing a half worn-out one lying among some 
 rubbish in a corner of the room, begs eagerly that it 
 may be bestowed on him. The Lord, with a smile of 
 pity at the meanness of his choice, grants him his 
 boon, and Bakala goes back to earth delighted with 
 his prize. With an infinite possibility within his 
 reach, with the choice of wisdom, of power, of beauty 
 at his tongue's end, he asked according to his kind, 
 and his sordid wish is answered with a gift as sordid. 
 Yes, there is a choice in books as in friends, and the 
 mind sinks or rises to the level of its habitual society, 
 is subdued, as Shakespeare says of the dyer's hand, 
 to what it works in. 1 Cato's advice, cum bonis am- 
 bula (consort with the good), is quite as true if we 
 extend it to books, for they, too, insensibly give away 
 their own nature to the mind that converses with 
 them. They either beckon upwards or drag down. 
 Du gleichst dem Geist den du begreifst? says the 
 World Spirit to Faust, and this is true of the ascend- 
 
 1 Sonnet cxi. 
 
 2 Thou 'rt like the Spirit whom thou conceivest.
 
 294 JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL. 
 
 ing no less than of the descending scale. Every book 
 we read may be made a round in the ever-lengthen 
 ing ladder by which we climb to knowledge, and to 
 that temperance and serenity of mind which, as it is 
 the ripest fruit of Wisdom, is also the sweetest. But 
 this can only be if we read such books as make us 
 think, and read them in such a way as helps them to 
 do so, that is, by endeavoring to judge them, and thus 
 to make them an exercise rather than a relaxation of 
 the mind. Desultory reading, except as conscious 
 pastime, hebetates the brain and slackens the bow 
 string of Will. It communicates as little intelligence 
 as the messages that run along the telegraph wire to 
 the birds that perch on it. Few men learn the high 
 est use of books. After lifelong study many a man 
 discovers too late that to have had the philosopher's 
 stone availed nothing without the philosopher to use 
 it. Many a scholarly life, stretched like a talking 
 wire to bring the wisdom of antiquity into communion 
 with the present, can at last yield us no better news 
 that the true accent of a Greek verse, or the transla 
 tion of some filthy nothing scrawled on the walls of 
 a brothel by some Pompeian idler. And it is cer 
 tainly true that the material of thought reacts upon 
 the thought itself. Shakespeare himself would have 
 been commonplace had he been paddocked in a thinly- 
 shaven vocabulary, and Phidias, had he worked in 
 wax, only a more inspired Mrs. Jarley. A man is 
 known, says the proverb, by the company he keeps, 
 and not only so, but made by it. Milton makes his 
 fallen angels grow small to enter the infernal council 
 room, 1 but the soul, which God meant to be the spa 
 cious chamber where high thoughts and generous aspi 
 1 See Paradise Lost, Book I. lines 775-798.
 
 BOOKS AND LIBRARIES. 295 
 
 rations might commune together, shrinks and narrows 
 itself to the measure of the meaner company that is 
 wont to gather there, hatching conspiracies against 
 *our better selves. We are apt to wonder at the 
 scholarship of the men of three centuries ago, and at 
 a certain dignity of phrase that characterizes them. 
 They were scholars because they did not read so many 
 things as we. They had fewer books, but these were 
 of the best. Their speech was noble because they 
 lunched with Plutarch and supped with Plato. We 
 spend as much time over print as they did, but in' 
 stead of communing with the choice thoughts of 
 choice spirits, and unconsciously acquiring the grand 
 manner of that supreme society, we diligently inform 
 ourselves, and cover the continent with a cobweb of 
 telegraphs to inform us, of such inspiring facts as 
 that a horse belonging to Mr. Smith ran away on 
 Wednesday, seriously damaging a valuable carryall ; 
 that a son of Mr. Brown swallowed a hickory nut 
 on Thursday ; and that a gravel bank caved in and 
 buried Mr. Robinson alive on Friday. Alas, it is we 
 ourselves that are getting buried alive under this 
 avalanche of earthy impertinences! It is we who, 
 while we might each in his humble way be helping 
 our fellows into the right path, or adding one block 
 to the climbing spire of a fine soul, are willing to 
 become mere sponges saturated from the stagnant 
 goose-pond of village gossip. This is the kind of 
 news we compass the globe to catch, fresh from Bung- 
 town Centre, when we might have it fresh from 
 heaven by the electric lines of poet or prophet \ l It is 
 
 1 It might not be uninstructive for one to make such compu 
 tations as these : How much time does it take to read my cus 
 tomary local newspaper ? What is the shortest time I can give
 
 296 JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL. 
 
 bad enough that we should be compelled to know so 
 many nothings, but it is downright intolerable that 
 we must wash so many barrow-loads of gravel to find 
 a grain of mica after all. And then to be told that* 
 the ability to read makes us all shareholders in the 
 Bonanza Mine of Universal Intelligence I 
 
 One is sometimes asked by young people to recom 
 mend a course of reading. My advice would be that 
 they should confine themselves to the supreme books 
 in whatever literature, or still better to choose some 
 one great author, and make themselves thoroughly 
 familiar with him. For, as all roads lead to Rome, 
 so do they likewise lead away from it, and you will 
 find that, in order to understand perfectly and weigh 
 exactly any vital piece of literature, you will be 
 gradually and pleasantly persuaded to excursions and 
 explorations of which you little dreamed when you 
 began, and will find yourselves scholars before you are 
 aware. For remember that there is nothing less 
 profitable than scholarship for the mere sake of 
 scholarship, nor anything more wearisome in the at 
 tainment. But the moment you have a definite aim, 
 attention is quickened, the mother of memory, and 
 all that you acquire groups and arranges itself in an 
 order that is lucid, because everywhere and always it 
 is in intelligent relation to a central object of con 
 stant and growing interest. This method also forces 
 upon us the necessity of thinking, which is, after all, 
 
 to it and get the really important things out of it ? How many 
 numbers of my newspaper would correspond in time of reading 
 with Shakespeare's Tempest f How much should I remember of 
 the papers a month afterward ? how much of The Tempest ? But 
 newspapers are not to be despised ; only we are to study econ 
 omy in the using of them.
 
 BOOKS AND LIBRARIES. 207 
 
 the highest result of all education. For what we 
 want is not learning, but knowledge; that is, the 
 power to make learning answer its true end as a 
 quickener of intelligence and a widener of our intel 
 lectual sympathies. I do not mean to say that every 
 one is fitted by nature or inclination for a definite 
 course of study, or indeed for serious study in any 
 sense. I am quite willing that these should " browse 
 in a library," as Dr. Johnson called it, to their hearts' 
 content. It is, perhaps, the only way in which time 
 may be profitably wasted. But desultory reading 
 will not make a " full man," as Bacon understood it, 
 of one who has not Johnson's memory, his power of 
 assimilation, and, above all, his comprehensive view of 
 the relations of things. " Read not," says Lord Bacon 
 in his Essay of Studies? " to contradict and confute ; 
 nor to believe and take for granted ; nor to find talk 
 and discourse ; but to weigh and consider. Some books 
 are to be tasted, others to be swallowed, and some 
 few to be chewed and digested ; that is, some books 
 are to be read only in parts ; others to be read, but 
 not curiously [carefully], and some few to be read 
 wholly and with diligence and attention. Some books 
 also may be read by deputy" This is weighty and 
 well said, and I would call your attention especially 
 to the wise words with which the passage closes. The 
 best books are not always those which lend themselves 
 to discussion and comment, but those (like Mon 
 taigne's Essays) which discuss and comment our 
 selves. 
 
 I have been speaking of such books as should be 
 
 1 It is in this essay that the reference to the "full man" 
 occurs, and as the essay is not long, it would be a good one to 
 commit to memory.
 
 298 JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL. 
 
 chosen for profitable reading. A public library, of 
 course, must be far wider in its scope. It should con 
 tain something for all tastes, as well as the material 
 for a thorough grounding in all branches of know 
 ledge. It should be rich in books of reference, in 
 encyclopaedias, 1 where one may learn without cost of 
 research what things are generally known. For it is 
 far more useful to know these than to know those that 
 are not generally known. Not to know them is the 
 defect of those half-trained and therefore hasty men 
 who find a mare's nest on every branch of the tree of 
 knowledge. A library should contain ample stores of 
 history, which, if it do not always deserve the pomp 
 ous title which Bolingbroke gave it, of philosophy 
 teaching by example, 2 certainly teaches many things 
 profitable for us to know and lay to heart ; teaches, 
 among other things, how much of the present is still 
 held in mortmain by the past ; teaches that, if there 
 be no controlling purpose, there is, at least, a sternly 
 logical sequence in human affairs, and that chance has 
 but a trifling dominion over them ; teaches why things 
 are and must be so and not otherwise, and that, of all 
 hopeless contests, the most hopeless is that which fools 
 are most eager to challenge, with the Nature of 
 Things; teaches, perhaps more than anything else, 
 the value of personal character as a chief factor in 
 what used to be called destiny, for that cause is strong 
 
 1 A capital subject for discussion would be on the compara 
 tive merits of the many encyclopaedias to be found in a good 
 public library ; not to determine which was the best, but what 
 was the characteristic of each. 
 
 2 There is another suggestive definition of history made by 
 the English historian E. A. Freeman, and used as a motto on 
 the title-page of the various Johns Hopkins University Studies in 
 Historical and Political Science.
 
 BOOKS AND LIBRARIES. 299 
 
 which has not a multitude but one strong man behind 
 it. History is, indeed, mainly the biography of a few 
 imperial men, and forces home upon us the useful 
 lesson how infinitesimally important our own private 
 affairs are to the universe in general. History is 
 clarified experience, and yet how little do men profit 
 by it ; nay, how should we expect it of those who so 
 seldom are taught anything by their own ! Delusions, 
 especially economical delusions, seem the only things 
 that have any chance of an earthly immortality. I 
 would have plenty of biography. It is no insignificant 
 fact that eminent men have always loved their Plu 
 tarch, since example, whether for emulation or avoid 
 ance, is never so poignant as when presented to us in 
 a striking personality. Autobiographies are also in 
 structive reading to the student of human nature, 
 though generally written, by men who are more inter 
 esting to themselves than to their fellow-men. I have 
 been told that Emerson and George Eliot agreed in 
 thinking Rousseau's Confessions the most interesting 
 book they had ever read. 
 
 A public library should also have many and full 
 shelves of political economy, for the dismal science, 
 as Carlyle called it, if it prove nothing else, will go 
 far towards proving that theory is the bird in the 
 bush, though she sing more sweetly than the night 
 ingale, and that the millennium will not hasten its 
 coming in deference to the most convincing string of 
 resolutions that were ever unanimously adopted in 
 public meeting. It likewise induces in us a profound 
 and wholesome distrust of social panaceas. 
 
 I would have a public library abundant in transla 
 tions of the best books in all languages, for, though 
 no work of genius can be adequately translated, be-
 
 300 JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL. 
 
 cause every word of it is permeated with what Milton 
 calls " the precious life-blood of a master spirit " which 
 cannot be transfused into the veins of the best trans 
 lation, yet some acquaintance with foreign and ancient 
 literatures has the liberalizing effect of foreign travel. 1 
 He who travels by translation travels more hastily 
 and superficially, but brings home something that is 
 worth having, nevertheless. Translations properly 
 used, by shortening the labor of acquisition, add as 
 many years to our lives as they subtract from the pro 
 cesses of our education. Looked at from any but the 
 aesthetic point of view, translations retain whatever 
 property was in their originals to enlarge, liberalize, 
 and refine the mind. At the same time I would have 
 also the originals of these translated books, as a temp 
 tation to the study of languages, which has a special 
 use and importance of its own in teaching us to under 
 stand the niceties of our mother-tongue. The prac 
 tice of translation, by making us deliberate in the 
 choice of the best equivalent of the foreign word in 
 our own language, has likewise the advantage of con 
 tinually schooling us in one of the main elements of a 
 good style, precision ; and precision of thought is 
 not only exemplified by precision of language, but is 
 largely dependent on the habit of it. 
 
 In such a library the sciences should be fully repre 
 sented, that men may at least learn to know in what 
 a marvellous museum they live, what a wonder-worker 
 is giving them an exhibition daily for nothing. Nor 
 let Art be forgotten in all its many forms, not as the 
 antithesis of Science, but as her elder or fairer sister, 
 
 1 Emerson, in his essay entitled Books, in the volume Society 
 fid Solitude, has something to say about translations, and his 
 remark often is quoted.
 
 BOOKS AND LIBRARIES. 301 
 
 whom we love all the more that her usefulness cannot 
 be demonstrated in dollars and cents. I should be 
 thankful if every day-laborer among us could have 
 his mind illumined, as those of Athens and of Flor 
 ence had, with some image of what is best in archi 
 tecture, painting, and sculpture, to train his crude 
 perceptions and perhaps call out latent faculties. I 
 should like to see the works of Ruskin within the 
 reach of every artisan among us. For I hope some 
 day that the delicacy of touch and accuracy of eye 
 that have made our mechanics in some departments 
 the best in the world, may give us the same supremacy 
 in works of wider range and more purely ideal scope. 
 
 Voyages and travels I would also have, good store, 
 especially the earlier, when the world was fresh and 
 unhackneyed and men saw things invisible to the 
 modern eye. They are fast-sailing ships to waft away 
 from present trouble to the Fortunate Isles. 
 
 To wash down the drier morsels that every library 
 must necessarily offer at its board, let there be plenty 
 of imaginative literature, and let its range be not 
 too narrow to stretch from Dante to the elder Dumas. 
 The world of the imagination is not the world of ab 
 straction and nonentity, as some conceive, but a world 
 formed out of chaos by a sense of the beauty that is 
 in man and the earth on which he dwells. It is the 
 realm of Might-be, our haven of refuge from the short 
 comings and disillusions of life. It is, to quote Spen 
 ser, who knew it well, 
 
 " The world's sweet inn from care and wearisome turmoil." 
 
 Do we believe, then, that God gave us in mockery 
 this splendid faculty of sympathy with things that are
 
 302 JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL. 
 
 a joy forever ? 1 For my part, I believe that the love 
 and study of works of imagination is of practical 
 utility in a country so profoundly material (or, as we 
 like to call it, practical) in its leading tendencies as 
 ours. The hunger after purely intellectual delights, 
 the content with ideal possessions, cannot but be good 
 for us in maintaining a wholesome balance of the 
 character and of the faculties. I for one shall never 
 be persuaded that Shakespeare left a less useful leg 
 acy to his countrymen than Watt. We hold all the 
 deepest, all the highest satisfactions of life as tenants 
 of imagination. Nature will keep up the supply of 
 what are called hard-headed people without our help, 
 and, if it come to that, there are other as good uses 
 for heads as at the end of battering rams. 
 
 I know that there are many excellent people who 
 object to the reading of novels as a waste of time, if 
 not as otherwise harmful. But I think they are try 
 ing to outwit nature, who is sure to prove cunninger 
 than they. Look at children. One boy shall want a 
 chest of tools, and one a book, and of those who want 
 books one shall ask for a botany, another for a ro 
 mance. They will be sure to get what they want, 
 and we are doing a grave wrong to their morals by 
 driving them to do things on the sly, to steal that 
 food which their constitution craves and which is 
 wholesome for them, instead of having it freely and 
 frankly given them as the wisest possible diet. If 
 we cannot make a silk purse out of a sow's ear, so> 
 neither can we hope to succeed with the opposite 
 experiment. But we may spoil the silk for its legiti 
 mate uses. I can conceive of no healthier reading 
 
 1 The first line of Keats's poem Endymion suggested this 
 phrase.
 
 BOOKS AND LIBRARIES. 303 
 
 for a boy, or girl either, than Scott's novels, or 
 Cooper's, to speak only of the dead. I have found 
 them very good reading at least for one young man, 
 for one middle-aged man, and for one who is growing 
 old. No, no banish the Antiquary, banish Leather 
 Stocking, and banish all the world ! 1 Let us not go 
 about to make life duller than it is. 
 
 But I must shut the doors of iny imaginary library 
 or I shall never end. It is left for me to say a few 
 words of cordial acknowledgment to Mr. Fitz for his 
 judicious and generous gift. I have great pleasure 
 in believing that the custom of giving away money 
 during their lifetime (and there is nothing harder for 
 most men to part with, except prejudice) is more com 
 mon with Americans than with any other people. 
 It is a still greater pleasure to see that the favorite 
 direction of their beneficence is towards the founding 
 of colleges and libraries. My observation has led me 
 to believe that there is no country in which wealth is 
 so sensible of its obligations as our own. And, as 
 most of our rich men have risen from the ranks, may 
 we not fairly attribute this sympathy with their kind 
 to the benign influence of democracy rightly under 
 stood? My dear and honored friend, George Wil 
 liam Curtis, told me that he was sitting in front of 
 the late Mr. Ezra Cornell in a convention, where one 
 of the speakers made a Latin quotation. Mr. Cornell 
 leaned forward and asked for a translation of it, 
 which Mr. Curtis gave him. Mr. Cornell thanked 
 him, and added, " If I can help it, no young man 
 shall grow up in New York hereafter without the 
 
 1 In Shakespeare's King Henry IV., Part I., Act II. sc. 4, will 
 be found the phrase which was in Mr. Lowell's mind when he 
 wrote this.
 
 304 JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL. 
 
 chance, at least, of knowing what a Latin quotation 
 means when he hears it." This was the germ of 
 Cornell University, 1 and it found food for its roots in 
 that sympathy and thoughtfulness for others of which 
 I just spoke. This is the healthy side of that good 
 nature which democracy tends to foster, and which is 
 so often harmful when it has its root in indolence 
 or indifference ; especially harmful where our public 
 affairs are concerned, and where it is easiest, because 
 there we are giving away what belongs to other peo 
 ple. It should be said, however, that in this country 
 it is as laudably easy to procure signatures to a sub 
 scription paper as it is shamefully so to obtain them 
 for certificates of character and recommendations to 
 office. And is not this public spirit a national evolu 
 tion from that frame of mind in which New England 
 was colonized, and which found expression in these 
 grave words of Robinson and Brewster, 2 " We are 
 knit together as a body in a most strict and sacred 
 bond and covenant of the Lord, of the violation of 
 which we make great conscience, and by virtue 
 whereof we hold ourselves strictly tied to all care of 
 each other's good and of the whole " ? Let us never 
 forget the deep and solemn import of these words. 
 The problem before us is to make a whole of our 
 many discordant parts, our many foreign elements; 
 and I know of no way in which this can better be 
 done than by providing a common system of educa 
 tion, and a common door of access to the best books 
 by which that education may be continued, broadened, 
 
 1 The motto about the seal of Cornell University indicates 
 Mr. Cornell's conception of that institution. 
 
 2 In a letter signed jointly by them to Sir Edwin Sandys, to 
 be found in Bradford's History of Plymouth Plantation, page 20.
 
 BOOKS AND LIBRARIES. 305 
 
 and made fruitful. For it is certain that, whatever 
 we do or leave undone, those discordant parts and 
 foreign elements are to be, whether we will or no, 
 members of that body which Robinson and Brewster 
 had in mind, bone of our bone, and flesh of our flesh, 
 for good or ill. I am happy in believing that demo 
 cracy has enough vigor of constitution to assimilate 
 these seemingly indigestible morsels, and transmute 
 them into strength of muscle and symmetry of limb. 1 
 
 There is no way in which a man can build so secure 
 and lasting a monument for himself as in a public 
 library. Upon that he may confidently allow " Re- 
 surgam " 2 to be carved, for, through his good deed, 
 he will rise again in the grateful remembrance and in 
 the lifted and broadened minds and fortified characters 
 of generation after generation. The pyramids may 
 forget their builders, but memorials such as this have 
 longer memories. 
 
 Mr. Fitz has done his part in providing your library 
 with a dwelling. It will be for the citizens of Chelsea 
 to provide it with worthy habitants. So shall they, 
 too, have a share in the noble eulogy of the ancient 
 wise man : " The teachers shall shine as the firmament, 
 and they that turn many to righteousness as the stars 
 forever and ever." 
 
 1 For a fuller statement of Mr. Lowell's faith, see his address 
 Democracy. 
 
 2 This Latin word, " I shall rise again," reappears in the word 
 resurrection.
 
 HENRY DAVID THOREAU. 
 
 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 THERE died at Concord, Massachusetts, in the year 1862, 
 a man of forty-five who, if one were to take his word for it, 
 need never have gone out of the little village of Concord to 
 see all that was worth seeing in the world. Lowell, in his 
 My Garden Acquaintance, reminds the reader of Gilbert 
 White, who, in his Natural History of Selborne, gave mi 
 nute details of a lively world found within the borders of a 
 little English parish. Alphonse Karr, a French writer, has 
 written a book which contracts the limit still further in 
 A Journey round my Garden, but neither of these writers 
 so completely isolated himself from the outside world as 
 did Thoreau, who had a collegiate education at Harvard, 
 made short journeys to Cape Cod, Maine, and Canada, 
 acted for a little while as tutor in a family on Staten Island, 
 but spent the best part of his life as a looker-on in Concord, 
 and during two years of the time lived a hermit on the 
 shores of Walden Pond. He made his living, as the phrase 
 goes, by the occupation of a land surveyor, but he followed 
 the profession only when it suited his convenience. He did 
 not marry ; he never went to church ; he never voted ; he 
 refused to pay taxes ; he sought no society ; he declined 
 companions when they were in his way, and, when he had 
 anything to say in public, went about from door to door and 
 invited people to come to a hall to hear him deliver his 
 word. 
 
 That he had something to say to the world at large is
 
 INTRODUCTION. 307 
 
 made pretty evident by the books which he left, and it ia 
 intimated that the unpublished records of his observation 
 and reflection are very extensive. Thus far his published 
 writings are contained in ten volumes. The first in appear 
 ance was A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers. 
 It was published in 1849 and built upon the adventures of 
 himself and brother ten years before, when, in a boat of 
 their own construction, they had made their way from Con 
 cord down the Concord River to the Merrimack, up that to 
 its source, and back to the starting point. It will readily 
 be seen that such an excursion would not yield a bookful of 
 observation, and though Thoreau notes in it many trivial 
 incidents, a great part of the contents is in the reflections 
 which he makes from day to day. He comes to the little 
 river with its sparse border of population and meagre his 
 tory, and insists upon measuring antiquity and fame by it. 
 All of his reading he tests by the measure of this stream, 
 and undertakes to show that the terms " big " and " little " are 
 very much misapplied, and that here on this miniature scale 
 one may read all that is worth knowing in life. His voy 
 age is treated with the gravity which one might use in re 
 cording a journey to find the sources of the Nile. 
 
 Between the date of the journey and the publication of 
 the book, Thoreau was engaged upon an experiment still 
 more illustrative of his creed of individuality. In 1845 he 
 built a hut in the woods by Walden Pond, and for two 
 years lived a self-contained life there. It was not alto 
 gether a lonely life. He was within easy walking distance 
 of Concord village, and the novelty of his housekeeping at 
 tracted many visitors, while his friends who valued his con 
 versation sought him out in his hermitage. Besides and 
 beyond this Thoreau had a genius for intercourse with 
 humbler companions. There have been few instances in 
 history of such perfect understanding as existed between 
 him and the lower orders of creation. It has been said of 
 him : " Every fact which occurs in the bed [of the Concord
 
 308 HENRY DAVID THOREAU. 
 
 River], on the banks, or in the air over it ; the fishes, and 
 their spawning and nests, their manners, their food ; the 
 shad-flies which fill the air on a certain evening once a year, 
 and which are snapped at by the fishes so ravenously that 
 many of these die of repletion; the conical heaps of small 
 stones on the river-shallows, one of which heaps will some 
 times overfill a cart, these heaps the huge nests of small 
 fishes ; the birds which frequent the stream, heron, duck, 
 sheldrake, loon, osprey ; the snake, muskrat, otter, wood- 
 chuck, and fox on the banks ; the turtle, frog, hyla, and 
 cricket which made the banks vocal, were all known to 
 him, and, as it were, townsmen and fellow-creatures. . . . 
 His power of observation seemed to indicate additional 
 senses. He saw as with microscrope, heard as with ear- 
 trumpet, and his memory was a photographic register of 
 all he saw and heard. . . . His intimacy with animals sug 
 gested what Thomas Fuller records of Butler the apiolo- 
 gist, that ' either he had told the bees things or the bees 
 had told him ; ' snakes coiled round his leg ; the fishes swam 
 into his hand, and he took them out of the water ; he pulled 
 the woodchuck out of its hole by the tail, and took the 
 foxes under his protection from the hunters." 3 
 
 Walden, published in 1854, is the record of Thoreau's 
 life in the woods, and inasmuch as that life was not ex 
 hausted in the bare provision against bodily wants, nor in 
 the observation even of what lay under the eye and ear, but 
 was busied about the questions which perplex all who would 
 give an account of themselves, the record mingles common 
 fact and personal experience, the world without and the 
 world within. Thoreau records what he sees and hears in 
 the woods, but these sights and sounds are the texts for 
 sermons upon human life. He undertook to get at the ele 
 mentary conditions of living, and to strip himself as far as 
 he could of all that was unnecessary. In doing this he dis 
 covered many curious and ingenious things, and the unique 
 1 Emerson's Biographical Sketch.
 
 INTR OD UCTION. 309 
 
 method which he took was pretty sure to give him glimpses 
 of life not seen by others. But the method had its disad 
 vantages, and chiefly this, that it was against tha common 
 order of things, and therefore the results reached could not 
 be relied upon as sound and wholesome. 
 
 The great value of Walden, and indeed of all Thoreau's 
 books, is not in the philosophy, which is often shrewd and 
 often strained and arbitrary, but in the disclosure made of 
 the common facts of the world about one. He used to say, 
 " I think nothing is to be hoped from you, if this bit of 
 mould under your feet is not sweeter to you to eat than any 
 other in this world, or in any world ; " and the whole drift 
 of his writing is toward the development of the individual 
 in the place where he happens to be. Thoreau's protesting 
 attitude, and the stout resistance which he made to all in 
 fluences about him except the common ones of nature, be 
 tray themselves in the style of his writing. He has a way, 
 almost insolent, of throwing out his thoughts, and growling 
 forth his objections to the conventions of life, which ren 
 ders his writing often crabbed and inartistic. There is a 
 rudeness which seems sometimes affected, and a carelessness 
 which is contemptuous. Yet often his indifference to style 
 is a rugged insistence on the strongest thought, and in his 
 effort to express himself unreservedly he reaches a force 
 and energy which are refreshing. 
 
 A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers and 
 Walden were the only writings of Thoreau published in 
 his lifetime. He printed contributions to the magazines 
 from time to time, and out of these and his manuscripts 
 have been gathered eight other volumes, Excursions in Field 
 and Forest, The Maine Woods, Cape Cod, Letters to Va 
 rious Persons, A Yankee in Canada, Early Spring in 
 Massachusetts, Summer, and Winter. To Excursions was 
 prefixed a biographical sketch by R. W. Emerson, which 
 gives one a very vivid portrait of this unique man. Cape 
 Cod, which is the record of a walk taken the length of the
 
 310 HENRY DAVID THOREAU. 
 
 Cape, and Walden are likely to remain as the most finished 
 and agreeable of Thoreau's books. All of his writings, 
 however, will be searched for the evidence which they give 
 of a mind singular for its independence, its resolute con 
 fronting of the problems of life, its insight into nature, its 
 isolation, and its waywardness. 
 
 The first two papers which follow are from Walden j 
 the third is from Cape Cod,
 
 SOUNDS. 
 
 I DID not read books the first summer; I hoed 
 beans. Nay, I often did better than this. There 
 were times when I could not afford to sacrifice the 
 bloom of the present moment to any work, whether of 
 the head or hands. I love a broad margin to my life. 
 Sometimes, in a summer morning, having taken my 
 accustomed bath, I sat in my sunny doorway from 
 sunrise till noon, rapt in a revery, amidst the pines 
 and hickories and sumachs, in undisturbed solitude and 
 stillness, while the birds sang around or flitted noise 
 less through the house, until by the sun falling in at 
 my west window, or the noise of some traveller's 
 wagon on the distant highway, I was reminded of the 
 lapse of time. I grew in those seasons like corn in 
 the night, and they were far better than any work of 
 the hands would have been. They were not time sub 
 tracted from my life, but so much over and above my 
 usual allowance. I realized what the Orientals mean 
 by contemplation and the forsaking of works. For 
 the most part I minded not how the hours went. The 
 day advanced as if to light some work of mine ; it 
 was morning, and lo, now it is evening, and nothing 
 memorable is accomplished. Instead of singing like 
 the birds, I silently smiled at my incessant good for- 
 tune. As the sparrow had its trill, sitting on the 
 hickory before my door, so had I my chuckle or sup-
 
 312 HENRY DAVID THOREAU. 
 
 pressed warble which he might hear out of my nest. 
 My days were not days of the week, bearing the 
 stamp of any heathen deity, nor were they minced into 
 hours and fretted by the ticking of a clock ; for I live 
 like the Puri Indians, of whom it is said that "for 
 yesterday, to-day, and to-morrow they have only one 
 word, and they express the variety of meaning by 
 pointing backward for yesterday, forward for to-mor 
 row, and overhead for the passing day." This was 
 sheer idleness to my fellow-townsmen, no doubt ; but 
 if the birds and flowers had tried me by their stand 
 ard, I should not have been found wanting. A man 
 must find his occasions in himself, it is true. The nat 
 ural day is very calm, and will hardly reprove his 
 indolence. 
 
 I had this advantage, at least, in my mode of life 
 over those who were obliged to look abroad for amuse 
 ment, to society and the theatre, that my life itself 
 was become my amusement and never ceased to be 
 novel. It was a drama of many scenes and without 
 an end. If we were always indeed getting our living, 
 and regulating our lives according to the last and best 
 mode we had learned, we should never be troubled 
 with ennui. Follow your genius closely enough and 
 it will not fail to show you a fresh prospect every 
 hour. Housework was a pleasant pastime. When 
 my floor was dirty, I rose early, and, setting all my 
 furniture out of doors on the grass, bed and bedstead 
 making but one budget, dashed water on the floor, 
 and sprinkled white sand from the pond on it, and 
 then with a broom scrubbed it clean and white ; and by 
 the time the villagers had broken their fast, the morn- 
 ing sun had dried my house sufficiently to allow me to 
 move in again, and my meditations were almost unin-
 
 SOUNDS. 313 
 
 terrupted. It was pleasant to see my whole household 
 effects out on the grass, making a little pile like a 
 gypsy's pack, and my three-legged table, from which 
 I did not remove the books and pen and ink, standing 
 amid the pines and hickories. They seemed glad to 
 get out themselves, and as if unwilling to be brought 
 in. I was sometimes tempted to stretch an awning 
 over them and take my seat there. It was worth the 
 while to see the sun shine on these things, and hear 
 the free wind blow on them ; so much more interest 
 ing most familiar objects look out of doors than in the 
 house. A bird sits on the next bough, life-everlast 
 ing grows under the table, and blackberry vines run 
 round its legs ; pine cones, chestnut burs, and straw 
 berry leaves are strewn about. It looked as if this 
 was the way these forms came to be transferred to our 
 furniture, to tables, chairs, and bedsteads, because 
 they once stood in the midst of them. 
 
 My house was 011 the side of a hill, immediately on 
 the edge of the larger wood, in the midst of a young 
 forest of pitch-pines and hickories, and half a dozen 
 rods from the pond, to which a narrow footpath led 
 down the hill. In my front yard grew the straw 
 berry, blackberry, and life-everlasting, johnswort and 
 goldenrod, shrub-oaks and sand-cherry, blueberry and 
 groundnut. Near the end of May, the sand-cherry 
 (cerasus piimila) adorned the sides of the path with 
 its delicate flowers arranged in umbels cylindrically 
 about its short stems, which last, in the fall, weighed 
 down with good-sized and handsome cherries, fell 
 over in wreaths like rays on every side. I tasted 
 them out of compliment to Nature, though they were 
 scarcely palatable. The sumach (rhus glabra) grew 
 luxuriantly about the house, pushing up through the
 
 314 HENRY DAVID THOREAU. 
 
 embankment which I had made, and growing five or 
 six feet the first season. Its broad, pinnate, tropical 
 leaf was pleasant though strange to look on. The 
 large buds, suddenly pushing out late in the spring 
 from dry sticks which had seemed to be dead, devel 
 oped themselves as by magic into graceful green and 
 tender boughs, an inch in diameter ; and sometimes, 
 as I sat at my window, so heedlessly did they grow 
 and tax their weak joints, I heard a fresh and tender 
 bough suddenly fall like a fan to the ground, when 
 there was not a breath of air stirring, broken off by 
 its own weight. In August, the large masses of ber 
 ries, which, when in flower, had attracted many wild 
 bees, gradually assumed their bright, velvety, crimson 
 hue, and by their weight again bent down and broke 
 the tender limbs. 
 
 As I sit at my window this summer afternoon, 
 hawks are circling about my clearing ; the tantivy of 
 wild pigeons, flying by twos and threes athwart my 
 view, or perching restless on the white pine boughs 
 behind my house, gives a voice to the air ; a fishhawk 
 dimples the glassy surface of the pond and brings up 
 a fish ; a mink steals out of the marsh before my door 
 and seizes a frog by the shore ; the sedge is bending 
 under the weight of the reed-birds flitting hither and 
 thither ; and for the last half hour I have heard the 
 rattle of railroad cars, now dying away and then 
 reviving like the beat of a partridge, conveying travel 
 lers from Boston to the country. For I did not live 
 so out of the world as that boy, who, as I hear, was 
 put out to a farmer in the east part of the town, but 
 ere long ran away and came home again, quite down 
 at the heel and homesick. He had never seen such a 
 dull and out-of-the-way place ; the folks were all gone
 
 SOUNDS. 815 
 
 off ; why, you could n't even hear the whistle ! I 
 doubt if there is such a place in Massachusetts 
 now : 
 
 " In truth, our village has become a butt 
 For one of those fleet railroad shafts, and o'er 
 Our peaceful plain its soothing sound is Concord." 
 
 The Fitchburg Railroad touches the pond about a 
 hundred rods south of where I dwell. I usually go to 
 the village along its causeway, and am, as it were, 
 related to society by this link. The men on the 
 freight trains, who go over the whole length of the 
 road, bow to me as to an old acquaintance, they pass 
 me so often, and apparently they take me for an 
 employee ; and so I am. I too would fain be a track- 
 repairer somewhere in the orbit of the earth. 
 
 The whistle of the locomotive penetrates my woods 
 summer and winter, sounding like the scream of a 
 hawk sailing over some farmer's yard, informing me 
 that many restless city merchants are arriving within 
 the circle of the town, or adventurous country traders 
 from the other side. As they come under one hori 
 zon, they shout their warning to get off the track to 
 the other, heard sometimes through the circles of two 
 towns. Here come your groceries, country ; your 
 rations, countrymen ! Nor is there any man so inde 
 pendent on his farm that he can say them nay. And 
 here 's your pay for them ! screams the countryman's 
 whistle ; timber like long battering rams going twenty 
 miles an hour against the city's walls, and chairs 
 enough to seat all the weary and heavy laden that 
 dwell within them. With such huge and lumbering 
 civility the country hands a chair to the city. All the 
 Indian huckleberry hills are stripped, all the cran 
 berry meadows are raked into the city. Up comes the
 
 316 HENRY DAVID THOREAU. 
 
 cotton, down goes the woven cloth ; up comes the silk, 
 down goes the woollen ; up come the books, but down 
 goes the wit that writes them. 
 
 When I meet the engine with its train of cars mov 
 ing off with planetary motion, or, rather, like a 
 comet, for the beholder knows not if with that velocity 
 and with that direction it will ever revisit this system, 
 since its orbit does not look like a returning curve, 
 with its steam cloud like a banner streaming behind 
 in golden and silver wreaths, like many a downy 
 cloud which I have seen, high in the heavens, unfold 
 ing its masses to the light, as if this travelling 
 demigod, this cloud-compeller, would ere long take the 
 sunset sky for the livery of his train ; when I hear 
 the iron horse make the hills echo with his snort like 
 thunder, shaking the earth with his feet, and breath 
 ing fire and smoke from his nostrils (what kind of 
 winged horse or fiery dragon they will put into the 
 new Mythology I don't know), it seems as if the earth 
 had got a race now worthy to inhabit it. If all were 
 as it seems, and men made the elements their servants 
 for noble ends ! If the cloud that hangs over the 
 engine were the perspiration of heroic deeds, or as 
 beneficent as that which floats over the farmer's fields, 
 then the elements and Nature herself would cheerfully 
 accompany men ou their errands and be their escort. 
 
 I watch the passage of the morning cars with the 
 same feeling that I do the rising of the sun, which is 
 hardly more regular. Their train of clouds stretching 
 far behind and rising higher and higher, going to hea 
 ven while the cars are going to Boston, conceals the 
 sun for a minute and casts my distant field into the 
 shade, a celestial train beside which the petty train of 
 cars which hugs the earth is but the barb of the spear.
 
 SOUNDS. 317 
 
 The stabler of the iron horse was up early this winter 
 morning by the light of the stars amid the mountains, 
 to fodder and harness his steed. Fire, too, was 
 awakened thus early to put the vital heat in him and 
 get him off. If the enterprise were as innocent as it is 
 early ! If the snow lies deep they strap on his snow- 
 shoes, and with the giant plough plough a furrow from 
 the mountains to the seaboard, in which the cars, like 
 a following drill-barrow, sprinkle all the restless men 
 and floating merchandise in the country for seed. All 
 day the fire steed flies over the country, stopping only 
 that his master may rest, and I am awakened by his 
 tramp and defiant snort at midnight, when in some 
 remote glen in the woods he fronts the elements in 
 cased in ice and snow ; and he will reach his stall 
 only with the morning star, to start once more on his 
 travels without rest or slumber. Or, perchance, at 
 evening, I hear him in his stable blowing off the 
 superfluous energy of the day, that he may calm his 
 nerves and cool his liver and brain for a few hours of 
 iron slumber. If the enterprise were as heroic and 
 commanding as it is protracted and unwearied ! 
 
 Far through unfrequented woods on the confines of 
 towns, where once only the hunter penetrated by day, 
 in the darkest night dart these bright saloons without 
 the knowledge of their inhabitants ; this moment 
 stopping at some brilliant station-house in town or 
 city, where a social crowd is gathered, the next in the 
 Dismal Swamp, scaring the owl and fox. The start- 
 ings and arrivals of the cars are now the epochs in the 
 village day. They go and come with such regularity 
 and precision, and their whistle can be heard so far, 
 that the farmers set their clocks by them, and thus 
 one well-conducted institution regulates a whole coun-
 
 318 HENRY DAVID THOREAU. 
 
 try. Have not men improved somewhat in punctual 
 ity since the railroad was invented ? Do they not talk 
 and think faster in the depot than they did in the 
 stage-office ? There is something electrifying in the 
 atmosphere of the former place. I have been aston 
 ished at the miracles it has wrought ; that some of 
 my neighbors who, I should have prophesied, once for 
 all, would never get to Boston by so prompt a convey 
 ance, are on hand when the bell rings. To do things 
 " railroad fashion " is now the by-word : and it is 
 worth the while to be warned so often and so sincerely 
 by any power to get off its track. There is no stop 
 ping to read the riot act, no firing over the heads of 
 the mob, in this case. We have constructed a fate, an 
 Atropos, 1 that never turns aside. (Let that be the 
 name of your engine.) Men are advertised that at a 
 certain hour and minute these bolts will be shot to 
 ward particular points of the compass ; yet it inter 
 feres with no man's business, and the children go to 
 school on the other track. We live the steadier for 
 it. We are all educated thus to be sons of Tell. The 
 air is full of invisible bolts. Every path but your 
 own is the path of fate. Keep on your own track, 
 then. 
 
 What recommends commerce to me is its enterprise 
 and bravery. It does not clasp its hands and pray to 
 Jupiter. I see these men every day go about their 
 business with more or less courage and content, doing 
 more even than they suspect, and perchance better 
 employed than they could have consciously devised. 
 
 1 In the classic mythology there were three Fates who pre 
 sided over the life and death of mankind : Clotho, that spun the 
 thread of birth, Lachesis, that measured it, and Atropos, the 
 inflexible Fate that cut it off.
 
 SOUNDS. 319 
 
 I am less affected by their heroism who stood up for 
 half an hour in the front line at Buena Vista, than by 
 the steady and cheerful valor of the men who inhabit 
 the snow-plough for their winter quarters ; who have 
 not merely the three o'clock in the morning courage, 
 which Bonaparte thought was the rarest, but whose 
 courage does not go to rest so early, who go to sleep 
 only when the storm sleeps or the sinews of their iron 
 steed are frozen. On this morning of the Great 
 Snow, perchance, which is still raging and chilling 
 men's blood, I hear the muffled tone of their engine 
 bell from out the fog bank of their chilled breath, 
 which announces that the cars are coming, without 
 long delay, notwithstanding the veto of a New Eng 
 land northeast snow-storm, and I behold the plough 
 men covered with snow and rime, their heads peering 
 above the mould-board which is turning down other 
 than daisies and the nests of field-mice, like bowlders 
 of the Sierra Nevada, that occupy an outside place in. 
 the universe. 
 
 Commerce is unexpectedly confident and serene, 
 alert, adventurous, and unwearied. It is very natural 
 in its methods withal, far more so than many fantastic 
 enterprises and sentimental experiments, and hence its 
 singular success. I am refreshed and expanded when 
 the freight train rattles past me, and I smell the 
 stores which go dispensing their odors all the way 
 from Long Wharf to Lake Champlain, reminding me 
 of foreign parts, of coral reefs, and Indian oceans, and 
 tropical climes, and the extent of the globe. I feel more 
 like a citizen of the world at the sight of the palm leaf 
 which will cover so many flaxen New England heads 
 the next summer, the Manilla hemp and cocoa-nut 
 husks, the old junk, gunny bags, scrap iron, and rusty
 
 320 HENRY DAVID THOREAU. 
 
 nails. This car-load of torn sails is more legible and 
 interesting now than if they should be wrought into 
 paper and printed books. Who can write so graphi 
 cally the history of the storms they have weathered as 
 these rents have done ? They are proof-sheets which 
 need no correction. Here goes lumber from the 
 Maine woods, which did not go out to sea in the last 
 freshet, risen four dollars on the thousand because of 
 what did go out or was split up ; pine, spruce, cedar, 
 first, second, third, and fourth qualities, so lately all of 
 one quality, to wave over the bear and moose and cari 
 bou. Next rolls Thomaston lime, a prime lot, which 
 will get far among the hills before it gets slacked. 
 These rags in bales of all hues and qualities, the 
 lowest condition to which cotton and linen descend, 
 the final result of dress, of patterns which are now 
 no longer cried up, unless it be in Milwaukee, as 
 those splendid articles, English, French, or American 
 prints, ginghams, muslins, etc., gathered from all 
 quarters both of fashion and poverty, going to become 
 paper of one color or a few shades only, on which for 
 sooth will be written tales of real life, high and low, 
 and founded on fact ! This closed car smells of salt 
 fish, the strong New England and commercial scent, 
 reminding me of the Grand Banks and the fisheries. 
 Who has not seen a salt fish, thoroughly cured for 
 this world, so that nothing can spoil it, and putting 
 the perseverance of the saints to the blush ? with 
 which you may sweep or pave the streets, and split 
 your kindlings, and the teamster shelter himself and 
 his lading against sun, wind, and rain behind it, 
 and the trader, as a Concord trader once did, hang it 
 up by his door for a sign when he commences busi 
 ness, until at last his oldest customer cannot tell surely
 
 SOUNDS. 321 
 
 whether it be animal, vegetable, or mineral, and yet it 
 shall be as pure as a snow-flake, and, if it be put into 
 a pot and boiled, will come out an excellent dun fish 
 for a Saturday's dinner. Next Spanish hides, with 
 the tails still preserving their twist and the angle of 
 elevation they had when the oxen that wore them 
 were careering over the pampas of the Spanish main, 
 a type of all obstinacy, and evincing how almost 
 hopeless and incurable Are all constitutional vices. I 
 confess that practically speaking, when I have learned 
 a man's real disposition, I have no hopes of changing 
 it for the better or worse in this state of existence. 
 As the Orientals say, " A cur's tail may be warmed, 
 and pressed, and bound round with ligatures, and 
 after a twelve years' labor bestowed upon it, still it 
 will retain its natural form." The only effectual cure 
 for such inveteracies as these tails exhibit is to make 
 glue of them, which I believe is what is usually done 
 with them, and then they will stay put and stick. 
 Here is a hogshead of molasses or of brandy directed 
 to John Smith, Cuttingsville, Vermont, some trader 
 among the Green Mountains, who imports for the 
 farmers near his clearing, and now perch?,nce stands 
 over his bulk-head and thinks of the last arrivals on 
 the coast, how they may affect the price for him, tell 
 ing his customers this moment, as he has told them 
 twenty times before this morning, that he expects 
 some by the next train, of fine quality. It is adver 
 tised in the " Cuttingsville Times." 
 
 While these things go up other things come down. 
 Warned by the whizzing sound, I look up from my 
 book and see some tall pine, hewn on far northern 
 hills, which has whiged its way over the Green Moun 
 tains and the Connecticut, shot like an arrow through
 
 322 HENRY DAVID THOREAU. 
 
 the township within ten minutes, and scarce another 
 eye beholds it ; going 
 
 " To be the mast 
 Of some great ammiral." 1 
 
 And hark ! here comes the cattle train bearing the cat 
 tle of a thousand hills, sheepcots, stables, and cow= 
 yards in the air, drovers with their sticks, and shep 
 herd boys in the midst of their flocks, all but the 
 mountain pastures, whirled along like leaves blown 
 from the mountains by the September gales. The air 
 is filled with the bleating of calves and sheep, and the 
 hustling of oxen, as if a pastoral valley were going by. 
 When the old bell-wether at the head rattles his bell, 
 the mountains do indeed skip like rams and the little 
 hills like lambs. A car-load of drovers, too, in the 
 midst, on a level with their droves now, their vocation 
 gone, but still clinging to their useless sticks as their 
 badge of office. But their dogs, where are they ? It 
 is a stampede to them ; they are quite thrown out ; 
 they have lost the scent. Methinks I hear them 
 barking behind the Peterboro Hills, or panting up the 
 western slope of the Green Mountains. They will not 
 be in at the death. Their vocation, too, is gone. 
 Their fidelity and sagacity are below par now. They 
 will slink back to their kennels in disgrace, or per 
 chance run wild and strike a league with the wolf and 
 the fox. So is your pastoral life whirled past and 
 away. But the bell rings, and I must get off the track 
 and let the cars go by ; 
 
 What 's the railroad to me ? 
 I never go to see 
 
 Where it ends. 
 
 
 
 1 Milton : Paradise Lost, i. 293, 294.
 
 SOUNDS. 323 
 
 It fills a few hollows, 
 
 And makes banks for the swallows ; 
 
 It sets the sand a-blowing, 
 
 And the blackberries a-growing, 
 
 but I cross it like a cart-path in the woods. I will 
 not have my eyes put out and my ears spoiled by its 
 smoke and steam and hissing. 
 
 Now that the cars are gone by and all the restless 
 world with them, and the fishes in the pond no longer 
 feel their rumbling, I am more alone than ever. For 
 the rest of the long afternoon, perhaps, my meditations 
 are interrupted only by the faint rattle of a carriage 
 or team along the distant highway. 
 
 Sometimes, on Sundays, I heard the bells, the Lin 
 coln, Acton, Bedford, or Concord bell, when the wind 
 was favorable, a faint, sweet, and, as it were, natural 
 melody, worth importing into the wilderness. At a 
 sufficient distance over the woods this sound acquires 
 a certain vibratory hum, as if the pine needles in the 
 horizon were the strings of a harp which it swept. 
 All sound heard at the greatest possible distance pro 
 duces one and the same effect, a vibration of the uni 
 versal lyre, just as the intervening atmosphere makes 
 a distant ridge of earth interesting to our eyes \>y the 
 azure tint it imparts to it. There came to me in this 
 case a melody which the air had strained, and which 
 had conversed with every leaf and needle of the wood, 
 that portion of the sound which the elements had 
 taken up and modulated and echoed from vale to vale. 
 The echo is, to some extent, an original sound, and 
 therein is the magic and charm of it. It is not merely 
 a repetition of what was worth repeating in the bell, 
 but partly the voice of the wood ; the same trivial 
 words and notes sung by a wood-nymph.
 
 324 HENRY DAVID THOREAU. 
 
 At evening, the distant lowing of some cow in the 
 horizon beyond the woods sounded sweet and melodi 
 ous, and at first I would mistake it for the voices of 
 certain minstrels by whom I was sometimes serenaded, 
 who might be straying over hill and dale ; but soon I 
 was 'not unpleasantly disappointed when it was pro 
 longed into the cheap and natural music of the cow. 
 I do not mean to be satirical, but to express my appre 
 ciation of those youths' singing, when I state that I 
 perceived clearly that it was akin to the music of the 
 cow, and they were at length one articulation of Nature. 
 
 Regularly at half-past seven, in one part of the 
 summer, after the evening train had gone by, the 
 whippoorwills chanted their vespers for half an hour, 
 sitting on a stump by my door, or upon the ridge-pole 
 of the house. They would begin to sing almost with 
 as much precision as a clock, within five minutes of a 
 particular time, referred to the setting of the sun, 
 every evening. I had a rare opportunity to become 
 acquainted with their habits. Sometimes I heard 
 four or five at once in different parts of the wood, by 
 accident one a bar behind another, and so near me 
 that I distinguished not only the cluck after each 
 note, but often that singular buzzing sound like a fly 
 in a spider's web, only proportionally louder. Some 
 times one would circle round and round me in the 
 woods a few feet distant, as if tethered by a string, 
 when probably I was near its eggs. They sang at 
 intervals throughout the night, and were again as 
 musical as ever just before and about dawn. 
 
 When other birds are still, the screech owls take up 
 the strain, like mourning women their ancient u-lu-lu. 1 
 
 1 The simple form of mourning, an elemental succession of 
 sounds, which both in Greek and in Latin gave rise to nouns and 
 verbs descriptive of mourning.
 
 SOUNDS. 325 
 
 Their dismal scream is truly Ben Jonsonian. 1 Wise 
 midnight hags ! It is no honest and blunt tu-whit tu- 
 who of the poets, but, without jesting, a most solemn 
 graveyard ditty, the mutual consolations of suicide 
 lovers remembering the pangs and the delights of 
 supernal love iii the infernal groves. Yet I love to 
 hear their wailing, their doleful responses, trilled 
 along the woodside ; reminding me sometimes of 
 music and singing-birds ; as if it were the dark and 
 tearful side of music, the regrets and sighs that would 
 fain be sung. They are the spirits, the low spirits 
 and melancholy forebodings, of fallen souls that once 
 in human shape night-walked the earth and did the 
 deeds of darkness, now expiating their sins with their 
 wailing hymns or threnodies in the scenery of their 
 transgressions. They give me a new sense of the va 
 riety and capacity of that nature which is our com 
 mon dwelling. Oh-o-o-o-o that I never had been 
 bor-r-r-r-nf sighs one on this side of the pond, and cir 
 cles with the restlessness of despair to some new perch 
 on the gray oaks. Then that I never had been 
 bor-r-r-r-n I echoes another on the farther side with 
 tremulous sincerity, and bor-r-r-r-n I comes faintly 
 from far in the Lincoln woods. 
 
 I was also serenaded by a hooting owl. Near at 
 hand you could fancy it the most melancholy sound in 
 Nature, as if she meant by this to stereotype and make 
 permanent in her choir the dying moans of a human 
 being, some poor weak relic of mortality who has 
 left hope behind, and howls like an animal, yet with 
 human sobs, on entering the dark valle}^ made more 
 awful by a certain gurgling melodiousness, I find 
 myself beginning with the letters gl when I try to 
 1 As iu The Masque of Queens.
 
 326 HENRY DAVID THOREAU. 
 
 imitate it, expressive of a mind which has reached 
 the gelatinous mildewy stage in the mortification of 
 all healthy and courageous thought. It reminded me 
 of ghouls and idiots and insane howlings. But now 
 one answers from far woods in a strain made really 
 melodious by distance, Hoo hoo Aoo, hoorer hoo ; 
 and indeed for the most part it suggested only pleas 
 ing associations, whether heard by day or night, sum 
 mer or winter. 
 
 I rejoice that there are owls. Let them do the idi 
 otic and maniacal hooting for men. It is a sound 
 admirably suited to swamps and twilight woods which 
 no day illustrates, suggesting a vast and undeveloped 
 nature which men have not recognized. They repre 
 sent the stark twilight and unsatisfied thoughts which 
 all have. All day the sun has shone on the surface of 
 some savage swamp, where the single spruce stands 
 hung with usnea lichens, and small hawks circulate 
 above, and the chickadee lisps amid the evergreens, 
 and the partridge and rabbit skulk beneath ; but now 
 a more dismal and fitting day dawns, and a different 
 race of creatures awakes to express the meaning of 
 Nature there. 
 
 Late in the evening I heard the distant rumbling of 
 wagons over bridges, a sound heard farther than 
 almost any other at night, the baying of dogs, and 
 sometimes again the lowing of some disconsolate cow 
 in a distant barn-yard. In the mean while all the 
 shore rang with the trump of bullfrogs, the sturdy 
 spirits of ancient wine-bibbers and wassailers, still 
 unrepentant, trying to sing a catch in their Stygian 
 lake, if the Walden nymphs will pardon the com 
 parison, for though there are almost no weeds, there 
 are frogs there, who would fain keep up the hilarious
 
 SOUNDS. 327 
 
 rules of their old festal tables, though their voices 
 have waxed hoarse and solemnly grave, mocking at 
 mirth, and the wine has lost its flavor, and become 
 only liquor to distend their paunches, and sweet intox 
 ication never comes to drown the memory of the past, 
 but mere saturation and waterloggedness and disten- 
 tion. The most aldermanic, with his chin upon a 
 heart-leaf, which serves for a napkin to his drooling 
 chaps, under this northern shore quaffs a deep draught 
 of the once scorned water, and passes round the cup 
 with the ejaculation tr-r-r-oonk, tr-r-r-oonk, tr-r-r- 
 oonk ! and straightway comes over the water from 
 some distant cove the same password repeated, where 
 the next in seniority and girth has gulped down to his 
 mark ; and when this observance has made the circuit 
 of the shores, then ejaculates the master of ceremo 
 nies, with satisfaction, tr-r-r-oonk! and each in his 
 turn repeats the same down to the least distended, 
 leakiest, and flabbiest paunched, that there be no mis 
 take ; and then the bowl goes round again and again, 
 until the sun disperses the morning mist, and only the 
 patriarch is not under the pond, but vainly bellowing 
 troonk from time to time, and pausing for a reply. 
 
 I am not sure that I ever heard the sound of cock 
 crowing from my clearing, and I thought that it 
 might be worth the while to keep a cockerel for his 
 music merely, as a singing-bird. The note of this 
 once wild Indian pheasant is certainly the most 
 remarkable of any bird's, and if they could be natu 
 ralized without being domesticated, it would soon be 
 come the most famous sound in our woods, surpassing 
 the clangor of the goose and the hooting of the owl ; 
 and then imagine the cackling of the hens to fill the 
 pauses when their lords' clarions rested ! No wonder
 
 328 HENRY DAVID THOREAU. 
 
 that man added this bird to his tame stock, to say 
 nothing of the eggs and drumsticks. To walk in a 
 winter morning in a wood where these birds abounded, 
 their native woods, and hear the wild cockerels crow 
 on the trees, clear and shrill for miles over the re 
 sounding earth, drowning the feeble notes of other 
 birds, think of it ! It would put nations on the 
 alert. Who would not be early to rise, and rise ear 
 lier and earlier every successive day of his life, till he 
 became unspeakably healthy, wealthy, and wise ? This 
 foreign bird's note is celebrated by the poets of all 
 countries along with the notes of their native song 
 sters. All climates agree with brave Chanticleer. 
 He is more indigenous even than the natives. His 
 health is ever good, his lungs are sound, his spirits 
 never flag. Even the sailor on the Atlantic and Paci 
 fic is awakened by his voice; but its shrill sound 
 never roused my slumbers. I kept neither dog, cat, 
 cow, pig, nor hens, so that you would have said there 
 was a deficiency of domestic sounds; neither the 
 churn, nor the spinning wheel, nor even the singing 
 of the kettle, nor the hissing of the urn, nor children 
 crying, to comfort one. An old-fashioned man would 
 have lost his senses or died of ennui before this. Not 
 even rats in the wall, for they were starved out, or 
 rather were never baited in, only squirrels on the 
 roof and under the floor, a whippoorwill on the ridge 
 pole, a blue-jay screaming beneath the window, a hare 
 or woodchuck under the house, a screech-owl or a cat- 
 owl behind it, a flock of wild geese or a laughing loon 
 on the pond, and a fox to bark in the night. Not 
 even a lark or an oriole, those mild plantation birds, 
 ever visited my clearing. No cockerels to crow nor 
 hens to cackle in the yard. No yard ! but unfenced
 
 BRUTE NEIGHBORS. 329 
 
 Nature reaching up to your very sills. A young for 
 est growing up under your windows, and wild sumachs 
 and blackberry vines breaking through into your cel 
 lar ; sturdy pitch-pines rubbing and creaking against 
 the shingles for want of room, their roots reaching 
 quite under the house. Instead of a scuttle or a blind 
 blown off in the gale, a pine-tree snapped off or 
 torn up by the roots behind your house for fuel. In 
 stead of no path to the front-yard gate in the Great 
 Snow, no gate, no front yard, and no path to the 
 civilized world ! 
 
 II. 
 BRUTE NEIGHBORS. 
 
 WHY do precisely these objects which we behold 
 make a world ? Why has man just these species of 
 animals for his neighbors ; as if nothing but a mouse 
 could have filled this crevice ? I suspect that Pilpay 
 & Co. 1 have put animals to their best use, for they 
 are all beasts of burden, in a sense, made to carry 
 some portion of our thoughts. 
 
 The mice which haunted my house were not the 
 common ones, which are said to have been introduced 
 into the country, but a wild native kind not found in 
 the village. I sent one to a distinguished naturalist, 
 and it interested him much. When I was building, 
 one of these had its nest underneath the house, and 
 before I had laid the second floor, and swept out the 
 shavings, would come out regularly at lunch time and 
 pick up the crumbs at my feet. It probably had 
 
 1 That is, the fable - writers, of whom Pilpay, a Brahmin, 
 enjoys in the East the distinction which has been given to .ZEsop 
 in the "West.
 
 330 HENRY DAVID THOREAU. 
 
 never seen a man before ; and it soon became quite 
 familiar, and would run over my shoes and up my 
 clothes. It could readily ascend the sides of the room 
 by short impulses, like a squirrel, which it resembled 
 in its motions. At length, as I leaned with my elbow 
 on the bench one day, it ran up my clothes, and along 
 rny sleeve, and round and round the paper which held 
 my dinner, while I kept the latter close, and dodged 
 and played at bo-peep with it ; and when at last I 
 held still a piece of cheese between my thumb and 
 finger, it came and nibbled it, sitting in my hand, and 
 afterward cleaned its face and paws, like a fly, and 
 walked away. 
 
 A phoebe soon built in my shed, and a robin for 
 protection in a pine which grew against the house. In 
 June the partridge (Tetrao umbellus), which is so 
 shy a bird, led her brood past my windows, from the 
 woods in the rear to the front of my house, clucking 
 and calling to them like a hen, and in all her behavior 
 proving herself the hen of the woods. The young 
 suddenly disperse on your approach, at a signal from 
 the mother, as if a whirlwind had swept them away, 
 and they so exactly resemble the dried leaves and 
 twigs that many a traveller has placed his foot in the 
 midst of a brood, and heard the whir of the old bird 
 as she flew off, and her anxious calls and mewing, or 
 seen her trail her wings to attract his attention, with 
 out suspecting their neighborhood. The parent will 
 sometimes roll and spin round before you in such a 
 dishabille that you cannot, for a few moments, de 
 tect what kind of creature it is. The young squat 
 still and flat, often running their heads under a leaf, 
 and mind only their mother's directions given from a 
 distance, nor will your approach make them run again
 
 BRUTE NEIGHBORS. 331 
 
 and betray themselves. You may even tread on them, 
 or havs your eyes on them for a minute, without dis 
 covering them. I have held them in my open hand 
 at such a time, and still their only care, obedient to 
 their mother and their instinct, was to squat there 
 without fear or trembling. So perfect is this instinct, 
 that once, when I had laid them on the leaves again, 
 and one accidentally fell on its side, it was found with 
 the rest in exactly the same position ten minutes 
 afterward. They are not callow like the young of 
 most birds, but more perfectly developed and preco 
 cious even than chickens. The remarkably adult yet 
 innocent expression of their open and serene eyes is 
 very memorable. All intelligence seems reflected in 
 them. They suggest not merely the purity of infancy, 
 but a wisdom clarified by experience. Such an eye 
 was not born when the bird was, but is coeval with 
 the sky it reflects. The woods do not yield another 
 such a gem. The traveller does not often look into 
 such a limpid well. The ignorant or reckless sports 
 man often shoots the parent at such a time, and leaves 
 these innocents to fall a prey to some prowling beast 
 or bird, or gradually mingle with the decaying leaves 
 which they so much resemble. It is said that when 
 hatched by a hen they will directly disperse on some 
 alarm, and so are lost, for they never hear the mother's 
 call which gathers them again. These were my hens 
 and chickens. 
 
 It is remarkable how many creatures live wild and 
 free, though secret, in the woods, and still sustain 
 themselves in the neighborhood of towns, suspected by 
 hunters only. How retired the otter manages to live 
 here ! He grows to be four feet long, as big as a 
 small boy, perhaps without any human being getting
 
 332 HENRY DAVID THOREAU. 
 
 a glimpse of him. I formerly saw the raccoon in the 
 woods behind where my house is built, and probably 
 still heard their whinnering at night. Commonly I 
 rested an hour or two in the shade at noon, after 
 planting, and ate my lunch, and read a little by a 
 spring which was the source of a swamp and of a 
 brook, oozing from under Brister's Hill, half a mile 
 from my field. The approach to this was through a 
 succession of descending grassy hollows, full of young 
 pitch-pines, into a larger wood about the swamp. 
 There, in a very secluded and shaded spot, under a 
 spreading white-pine, there was yet a clean, firm 
 sward to sit on. I had dug out the spring and made 
 a well of clear gray water, where I could dip up a 
 pailful without roiling it, and thither I went for this 
 purpose almost every day in midsummer, when the 
 pond was warmest. Thither, too, the woodcock led 
 her brood, to probe the mud for worms, flying but a 
 foot above them down the bank, while they ran in a 
 troop beneath ; but at last, spying me, she would 
 leave her young and circle round and round me, 
 nearer and nearer till within four or five feet, pretend 
 ing broken wings and legs, to attract my attention, 
 and get off her young, who would already have taken 
 \\p their march, with faint wiry peep, single file 
 through the swamp, as she directed. Or I heard the 
 peep of the young when I could not see the parent 
 bird. There, too, the turtle-doves sat over the spring, 
 or fluttered from bough to bough of the soft white- 
 pines over my head ; or the red squirrel, coursing 
 down the nearest bough, was particularly familiar and 
 inquisitive. You only need sit still long enough in 
 some attractive spot in the woods that all its inhabi 
 tants may exhibit themselves to you by turns.
 
 BRUTE NEIGHBORS. 333 
 
 I was witness to events of a less peaceful character. 
 One day when I went out to my woodpile, or rather 
 my pile of stumps, I observed two large ants, the one 
 red, the other much larger, nearly half an inch long, 
 and black, fiercely contending with one another. 
 Having once got hold, they never let go, but strug 
 gled and wrestled and rolled on the chips incessantly. 
 Looking farther, I was surprised to find that the chips 
 were covered with such combatants, that it was not a 
 duellum, but a bellum, a war between two races of 
 ants, the red always pitted against the black, and fre 
 quently two red ones to one black. The legions of 
 these Myrmidons covered all the hills and vales in 
 my wood-yard, and the ground was already strewn 
 with the dead and dying, both red and black. It was 
 the only battle which I have ever witnessed, the only 
 battle-field I ever trod while the battle was raging ; 
 internecine war; the red republicans on the one hand, 
 and the black imperialists on the other. On every 
 side they were engaged in deadly combat, yet without 
 any noise that I could hear, and human soldiers never 
 fought so resolutely. I watched a couple that were 
 fast locked in each other's embraces, in a little sunny 
 valley amid the chips, now at noon-day prepared to 
 fight till the sun went down or life went out. The 
 smaller red champion had fastened himself like a vise 
 to his adversary's front, and through all the tumblings 
 on that field never for an instant ceased to gnaw at 
 one of his feelers near the root, having already caused 
 the other to go by the board ; while the stronger 
 black one dashed him from side to side, and, as I saw 
 on looking nearer, had already divested him of several 
 of his members. They fought with more pertinacity 
 than bull-dogs. Neither manifested the least disposi-
 
 334 HENRY DAVID THOREAU. 
 
 tion to retreat. It was evident that their battle-cry 
 was Conquer or die. In the mean while there came 
 along a single red ant on the hillside of this valley, 
 evidently full of excitement, who either had dispatched 
 his foe or had not yet taken part in the battle, prob 
 ably the latter, for he had lost none of his limbs, 
 whose mother had charged him to return with his 
 shield or upon it. Or perchance he was some Achil 
 les, who had nourished his wrath apart, and had now 
 come to avenge or rescue his Patroclus. 1 He saw this 
 unequal combat from afar, for the blacks were 
 nearly twice the size of the red, he drew near with 
 rapid pace till he stood on his guard within half an 
 inch of the combatants ; then, watching his opportu 
 nity, he sprang upon the black warrior, and com 
 menced his operations near the root of his right fore 
 leg, leaving the foe to select among his own members ; 
 and so there were three united for life, as if a new 
 kind of attraction had been invented which put all 
 other locks and cements to shame. I should not have 
 wondered by this time to find that they had their 
 respective musical bands stationed on some eminent 
 chip, and playing their national airs the while, to excite 
 the slow and cheer the dying combatants. I was my 
 self excited somewhat even as if they had been men. 
 The more you think of it, the less the difference. And 
 certainly there is not the fight recorded in Concord 
 history, at least, if in the history of America, that will 
 bear a moment's comparison with this, whether for 
 
 1 In Homer's Iliad, Achilles, in a sullen wrath against Aga 
 memnon, remains in his tent and refuses to engage in battle, 
 until Patroclus, his friend whom he armed, has been killed by 
 Hector, when he goes out to avenge the death on the Trojan 
 chief.
 
 BRUTE NEIGHBORS. 335 
 
 the numbers engaged in it, or for the patriotism and 
 heroism displayed. For numbers and for carnage it 
 was an Austerlitz or Dresden. Concord Fight ! Two 
 killed on the patriots' side, and Luther Blan chard 
 wounded ! Why, here every ant was a Buttrick, 
 *' Fire ! for God's sake, fire ! " and thousands shared 
 the fate of Davis and Hosmer. There was not one 
 hireling there. I have no doubt that it was a princi 
 ple they fought for, as much as our ancestors, and not 
 to avoid a three-penny tax on their tea ; and the 
 results of this battle will be as important and memo 
 rable to those whom it concerns as those of the battle 
 of Bunker Hill, at least. 
 
 I took up the chip on which the three I have par 
 ticularly described were struggling, carried it into my 
 house, and placed it under a tumbler on my window- 
 sill, in order to see the issue. Holding a microscope 
 to the first-mentioned red ant, I saw that, though he 
 was assiduously gnawing at the near fore-leg of his 
 enemy, having severed his remaining feeler, his own 
 breast was all torn away, exposing what vitals he had 
 there to the jaws of the black warrior, whose breast 
 plate was apparently too thick for him to pierce ; and 
 the dark carbuncles of the sufferer's eyes shone with 
 ferocity such as war only could excite. They strug 
 gled half an hour longer under the tumbler, and when 
 I looked again the black soldier had severed the heads 
 of his foes from their bodies, and the still living heads 
 were hanging on either side of him like ghastly tro 
 phies at his saddle-bow, still apparently as firmly fas 
 tened as ever, and he was endeavoring with feeble 
 struggles, being without feelers and with only the 
 remnant of a leg, and I know not how many other 
 wounds, to divest himself of them ; which at length,
 
 336 HENRY DAVID THOREAU. 
 
 after half an hour more, he accomplished. I raised 
 the glass, and he went off over the window-sill in that 
 crippled state. Whether he finally survived that 
 combat, and spent the remainder of his days in some 
 Hotel des Invalides, 1 I do not know ; but I thought 
 that his industry would not be worth much thereafter. 
 I never learned which party was victorious, nor the 
 cause of the war ; but I felt for the rest of that day 
 as if I had had my feelings excited and harrowed by 
 witnessing the struggle, the ferocity and carnage, of a 
 human battle before my door. 
 
 Kirby and Spence 2 tell us that the battles of ants 
 have long been celebrated and the date of them re 
 corded, though they say that Huber is the only mod 
 ern author who appears to have witnessed them. 
 "2Eneas Sylvius," say they, " after giving a very cir 
 cumstantial account of one contested with great obsti 
 nacy by a great and small species on the trunk of a 
 pear-tree," adds that " ' This action was fought in the 
 pontificate of Eugenius the Fourth, in the presence of 
 Nicholas Pistoriensis, an eminent lawyer, who related 
 the whole history of the battle with the greatest fidel 
 ity.' A similar engagement between great and small 
 ants is recorded by Olaus Magnus, in which the small 
 ones, being victorious, are said to have buried the 
 bodies of their own soldiers, but left those of their gi 
 ant enemies a prey to the birds. This event happened 
 previous to the expulsion of the tyrant Christiern the 
 Second from Sweden." The battle which I witnessed 
 
 1 The Hotel des Invalides in Paris was founded in 1670, by 
 Louis XIV., as a home for disabled and infirm soldiers, and in 
 a crypt under the church connected with it is the tomb of Na 
 poleon. 
 
 2 In their Introduction to Entomology.
 
 BRUTE NEIGHBORS. 337 
 
 took place in the Presidency of Polk, five years before 
 the passage of Webster's Fugitive-Slave Bill. 
 
 Many a village Bose, fit .only to course a mud-tur 
 tle in a victualling cellar, sported his heavy quarters 
 in the woods, without the knowledge of his master, 
 and ineffectually smelled at old fox burrows and 
 woodchucks' holes ; led perchance by some slight cur 
 which nimbly threaded the wood, and might still in 
 spire a natural terror in its denizens ; now far be 
 hind his guide, barking like a canine bull toward some 
 small squirrel which had treed itself for scrutiny, then 
 cantering off, bending the bushes with his weight, 
 imagining that he is on the track of some stray mem 
 ber of the jerbilla family. Once I was surprised to 
 see a cat walking along the stony shore of the pond, 
 for they rarely wander so far from home. The sur 
 prise was mutual. Nevertheless the most domestic 
 cat, which has lain on a rug all her days, appears 
 quite at home in the woods, and, by her sly and 
 stealthy behavior, proves herself more native there 
 than the regular inhabitants. Once, when berrying, 
 I met with a cat with young kittens in the woods, 
 quite wild, and they all, like their mother, had their 
 backs up and were fiercely spitting at me. A few 
 years before I lived in the woods there was what was 
 called a " winged cat " in one of the farmhouses 
 in Lincoln nearest the pond, Mr. Gilian Baker's. 
 When I called to see her in June, 1842, she was gone 
 a-hunting in the woods, as was her wont (I am not 
 sure whether it was a male or female, and so use the 
 more common pronoun), but her mistress told me that 
 she came into the neighborhood a little more than a 
 year before, in April, and was finally taken into their 
 house ; that she was of a dark brownish-gray color,
 
 338 HENRY DAVID THOREAU. 
 
 with a white spot on her throat, and white feet, and 
 had a large bushy tail like a fox ; that in the winter 
 the fur grew thick and flatted out along her sides, 
 forming strips ten or twelve incke* long by two and 
 a half wide, and under her chin like a muff, the upper 
 side loose, the under matted like felt, and in the 
 spring these appendages dropped off. They gave me 
 a pair of her " wings," which I keep still. There is 
 no appearance of a membrane about them. Some 
 thought it was part flying-squirrel or some other wild 
 animal, which is not impossible, for, according to nat 
 uralists, prolific hybrids have been produced by the 
 union of the marten and domestic cat. This would 
 have been the right kind of cat for me to keep, if I 
 had kept any; for why should not a poet's cat be 
 winged as well as his horse ? 
 
 In the fall the loon ( Colymbus glacialis^) came, as 
 usual, to moult and bathe in the pond, making the 
 woods ring with his wild laughter before I had risen. 
 At rumor of his arrival all the Mill-dam sportsmen 
 are on the alert, in gigs and on foot, two by two and 
 three by three, with patent rifles and conical balls and 
 spy-glasses. They come rustling through the woods 
 like autumn leaves, at least ten men to one loon. 
 Some station themselves on this side of the pond, 
 some on that, for the poor bird cannot be omnipres 
 ent; if he dive here he must come up there. But 
 now the kind October wind rises, rustling the leaves 
 and rippling the surface of the water, so that no 
 loon can be heard or seen, though his foes sweep the 
 pond with spy-glasses, and make the woods resound 
 with their discharges. The waves generously rise 
 and dash angrily, taking sides with all waterfowl, and 
 our sportsmen must beat a retreat to town and shop
 
 BRUTE NEIGHBORS. 339 
 
 and unfinished jobs. But they were too often success 
 ful. When I went to get a pail of water early in the 
 morning I frequently saw this stately bird sailing out 
 of iny cove within a few rods. If I endeavored to 
 overtake him in a boat, in order to see how he would 
 manoeuvre, he would dive and be completely lost, so 
 that I did not discover him again, sometimes, till the 
 latter part of the day. But I was more than a match 
 for him on the surface. He commonly went off in a 
 rain. 
 
 As I was paddling along the north shore one very 
 calm October afternoon, for such days especially they 
 settle on to the lakes, like the milkweed down, having 
 looked in vain over the pond for a loon, suddenly one, 
 sailing out from the shore toward the middle a few 
 rods in front of me, set up his wild laugh and be 
 trayed himself. I pursued with a paddle and he 
 dived, but when he came up I was nearer than before. 
 He dived again, but I miscalculated the direction he 
 would take, and we were fifty rods apart when he 
 came to the surface this time, for I had helped to 
 widen the interval ; and again he laughed long and 
 loud, and with more reason than before. He manoeu 
 vred so cunningly that I could not get within half a 
 dozen rods of him. Each time, when he came to the 
 surface, turning his head this way and that, he coolly 
 surveyed the water and the land, and apparently chose 
 his course so that he might come up where there was 
 the widest expanse of water and at the greatest dis 
 tance from the boat. It was surprising how quickly 
 he made up his mind and piit his resolve into execu 
 tion. He led me at once to the widest part of the 
 pond, and could not be driven from it. While he 
 was thinking one thing in his brain, I was endeavor-
 
 340 HENRY DAVID THOREAU. 
 
 ing to divine his thought in mine. It was a pretty 
 game, played on the smooth surface of the pond, a 
 man against a loon. Suddenly your adversary's 
 checker disappears beneath the board, and the prob 
 lem is to place yours nearest to where his will appear 
 again. Sometimes he would come up unexpectedly 
 on the opposite side of me, having apparently passed 
 directly under the boat. So long-winded was he and 
 so unweariable, that when he had swum farthest he 
 would immediately plunge again, nevertheless ; and 
 then no wit could divine where in the deep pond, be 
 neath the smooth surface, he might be speeding his 
 way like a fish, for he had time and ability to visit 
 the bottom of the pond in its deepest part. It is said 
 that loons have been caught in the New York lakes 
 eighty feet beneath the surface, with hooks set for 
 trout, though Walden is deeper than that. How 
 surprised must the fishes be to see this ungainly vis 
 itor from another sphere speeding his way amid their 
 schools ! Yet he appeared to know his course as 
 surely under water as on the surface, and swam much 
 faster there. Once or twice I saw a ripple where he 
 approached the surface, just put his head out to re 
 connoitre, and instantly dived again. I found that it 
 was as well for me to rest on my oars and wait his 
 reappearing as to endeavor to calculate where he 
 would rise ; for again and again, when I was straining 
 my eyes over the surface one way, I would suddenly 
 be startled by his unearthly laugh behind me. But 
 why, after displaying so much cunning, did he invari 
 ably betray himself the moment he came up by that 
 loud laugh ? Did not his white breast enough betray 
 him ? He was indeed a silly loon, I thought. I could 
 commonly hear the plash of the water when he came
 
 BRUTE NEIGHBORS. 341 
 
 up, and so also detected him. But after an hour he 
 seemed as fresh as ever, dived as willingly and swam 
 yet farther than at first. It was surprising to see 
 how serenely he sailed off with unruffled breast when 
 he came to the surface, doing all the work with his 
 webbed feet beneath. His usual note was this demo 
 niac laughter, yet somewhat like that of a waterfowl ; 
 but occasionally, when he had balked me most success 
 fully and come up a long way off, he uttered a long- 
 drawn unearthly howl, probably more like that of a 
 wolf than any bird ; as when a beast puts his muzzle 
 to the ground and deliberately howls. This was his 
 looning, perhaps the wildest sound that is ever 
 heard here, making the woods ring far and wide. I 
 concluded that he laughed in derision of my efforts, 
 confident of his own resources. Though the sky was 
 by this time overcast, the pond was so smooth that I 
 could see where he broke the surface when I did not 
 hear him. His white breast, the stillness of the air, 
 and the smoothness of the water were all against him. 
 At length, having come up fifty rods off, he uttered 
 one of those prolonged howls, as if calling on the god 
 of loons to aid him, and immediately there came a 
 wind from the east and rippled the surface, and filled 
 the whole air with misty rain, and I was impressed 
 as if it were the prayer of the loon answered, and his 
 god was angry with me ; and so I left him disappear 
 ing far away on the tumultuous surface. 
 
 For hours, in fall days, I watched the ducks cun 
 ningly tack and veer and hold the middle of the pond, 
 far from the sportsman ; tricks which they will have 
 less need to practise in Louisiana bayous. When 
 compelled to rise they would sometimes circle round 
 and round and over the pond at a considerable heightj
 
 342 HENRY DAVID THOREAU. 
 
 from which they could easily see to other ponds and 
 the river, like black motes in the sky ; and when I 
 thought they had gone off thither long since, they 
 would settle down by a slanting flight of a quarter of 
 a mile on to a distant part which was left free ; but 
 what beside safety they got by sailing in the middle 
 of Walden I do not know, unless they love its water 
 for the same reason that I do. 
 
 III. 
 THE HIGHLAND LIGHT. 
 
 THIS lighthouse, known to mariners as the Cape Cod 
 or Highland Light, is one of our " primary sea-coast 
 lights," and is usually the first seen by those approach 
 ing the entrance of Massachusetts Bay from Europe. 
 It is forty-three miles from Cape Ann Light, and 
 forty-one from Boston Light. It stands about twenty 
 rods from the edge of the bank, which is here formed 
 of clay. I borrowed the plane and square, level and 
 dividers of a carpenter who was shingling a barn near 
 by, and using one of those shingles made of a mast, 
 contrived a rude sort of quadrant, with pins for sights 
 and pivots, and got the angle of elevation of the 
 bank opposite the lighthouse, and with a couple of 
 codlines the length of its slope, and so measured its 
 height on the shingle. It rises one hundred and ten 
 feet above its immediate base, or about one hundred 
 and twenty-three feet above mean low water. Graham, 
 who has carefully surveyed the extremity of the Cape, 
 makes it one hundred and thirty feet. The mixed
 
 THE HIGHLAND LIGHT. 343 
 
 sand and clay lay at an angle of forty degrees with 
 the horizon, where I measured it, but the clay is gen 
 erally much steeper. No cow nor hen ever gets down 
 it. Half a mile farther south the bank is fifteen or 
 twenty-five feet higher, and that appeared to be the 
 highest land in North Truro. Even this vast clay 
 bank is fast wearing away. Small streams of water 
 trickling down it at intervals of two or three rods 
 have left the intermediate clay in the form of steep 
 Gothic roofs fifty feet high or more, the ridges as 
 sharp and rugged-looking as rocks ; and in one place 
 the bank is curiously eaten out in the form of a large 
 semicircular crater. 
 
 According to the lighthouse keeper, the Cape is 
 wasting here on both sides, though most on the east 
 ern. In some places it had lost many rods within the 
 last year, and, erelong, the lighthouse must be moved. 
 We calculated, from his data, how soon the Cape 
 would be quite worn away at this point, "for," said 
 he, " I can remember sixty years back." We were 
 even more surprised at this last announcement that 
 is, at the slow waste of life and energy in our infor 
 mant, for we had taken him to be not more than 
 forty than at the rapid wasting of the Cape, and we 
 thought that he stood a fair chance to outlive the 
 former. 
 
 Between this October and June of the next year, I 
 found that the bank had lost about forty feet in one 
 place, opposite the lighthouse, and it was cracked 
 more than forty feet farther from the edge at the last 
 date, the shore being strewn with the recent rubbish. 
 But I judged that generally it was not wearing away 
 here at the rate of more than six feet annually. Any 
 conclusions drawn from the observations of a few
 
 344 HENRY DAVID THOREAU. 
 
 years or one generation only are likely to prove false, 
 and the Cape may balk expectation by its durability. 
 In some places even a wrecker's foot-path down the 
 bank lasts several years. One old inhabitant told us 
 that when the lighthouse was built, in 1798, it was 
 calculated that it would stand forty-five years, allow 
 ing the bank to waste one length of fence each year, 
 " but," said he, "there it is " (or rather another near 
 the same site, about twenty rods from the edge of the 
 bank). 
 
 The sea is not gaining on the Cape everywhere, for 
 one man told me of a vessel wrecked long ago on the 
 north of Provincetown whose " bones " (this was his 
 word) are still visible many rods within the present 
 line of the beach, half buried in sand. Perchance 
 they lie alongside the timbers of a whale. The gen 
 eral statement of the inhabitants is that the Cape is 
 wasting on both sides, but extending itself on particu 
 lar points on the south and west, as at Chatham and 
 Monomoy beaches, and at Billingsgate, Long, and 
 Race points. James Freeman stated in his day that 
 above three miles had been added to Monomoy Beach 
 during the previous fifty years, and it is said to be 
 still extending as fast as ever. A writer in the " Mas 
 sachusetts Magazine," in the last century, tells us 
 that " when the English first settled upon the Cape, 
 there was an Island off Chatham, at three leagues' dis 
 tance, called Webb's Island, containing twenty acres, 
 covered with red-cedar or savin. The inhabitants of 
 Nantucket used to carry wood from it ; " but he adds 
 that in his day a large rock alone marked the spot, 
 and the water was six fathoms deep there. The 
 entrance to Nauset Harbor, which was once in East 
 ham, has now travelled south into Orleans. The
 
 THE HIGHLAND LIGHT. 345 
 
 islands in Wellfleet Harbor once formed a continuous 
 beach, though now small vessels pass between them. 
 And so of many other parts of this coast. 
 
 Perhaps what the Ocean takes from one part of the 
 Cape it gives to another, robs Peter to pay Paul. 
 On the eastern side the sea appears to be everywhere 
 encroaching on the land. Not only the land is under 
 mined, and its ruins carried off by currents, but the 
 sand is blown from the beach directly up the steep 
 bank where it is one hundred and fifty feet high, and 
 covers the original surface there many feet deep. If 
 you sit on the edge you will have ocular demonstra 
 tion of this by soon getting your eyes full. Thus the 
 bank preserves its height as fast as it is worn away. 
 This sand is steadily travelling westward at a rapid 
 rate, " more than a hundred yards," says one writer, 
 within the memory of inhabitants now living ; so that 
 in some places peat-meadows are buried deep under 
 the sand, and the peat is cut through it ; and in one 
 place a large peat-meadow has made its appearance on 
 the shore in the bank covered many feet deep, and 
 peat has been cut there. This accounts for that great 
 pebble of peat which we saw in the surf. The old 
 oysterman had told us that many years ago he lost a 
 " crittur " by her being mired in a swamp near the 
 Atlantic side east of his house, and twenty years ago 
 he lost the swamp itself entirely, but has since seen 
 signs of it appearing on the beach. He also said that 
 he had seen cedar stumps " as big as cart-wheels " (!) 
 on the bottom of the Bay, three miles off Billingsgate 
 Point, when leaning over the side of his boat in plea 
 sant weather, and that that was dry land not long ago. 
 Another told us that a log canoe known to have been 
 buried many years before on the Bay side at East
 
 346 HENRY DAVID THOREAU. 
 
 Harbor in Truro, where the Cape is extremely narrow, 
 appeared at length on the Atlantic side, the Cape hav 
 ing rolled over it, and an old woman said, "Now, 
 you see, it is true what I told you, that the Cape is 
 moving." 
 
 The bars along the coast shift with every storm, 
 and in many places there is occasionally none at 
 all. We ourselves observed the effect of a single 
 storm with a high tide in the night, in July, 1855. 
 It moved the sand on the beach opposite the light 
 house to the depth of six feet and three rods in width 
 as far as we could see north and south, and carried it 
 bodily off no one knows exactly where, laying bare in 
 one place a large rock five feet high which was invisi 
 ble before, and narrowing the beach to that extent. 
 There is usually, as I have said, no bathing on the 
 back side of the Cape, on account of the undertow, 
 but when we were there last, the sea had, three months 
 before, cast up a bar near this lighthouse, two miles 
 long and ten rods wide, over which the tide did not 
 flow, leaving a narrow cove, then a quarter of a mile 
 long, between it and the shore, which afforded excel 
 lent bathing. This cove had from time to time been 
 closed up as the bar travelled northward, in one 
 instance imprisoning four or five hundred whiting and 
 cod, which died there, and the water as often turned 
 fresh and finally gave place to sand. This bar, the 
 inhabitants assured us, might be wholly removed, and 
 the water six feet deep there in two or three days. 
 
 The lighthouse keeper said that when the wind 
 blowed strong on to the shore, the waves ate fast into 
 the bank, but when it blowed off they took no sand 
 away ; for in the former case the wind heaped up the 
 surface of the water next to the beach, and to pre-
 
 THE HIGHLAND LIGHT. 347 
 
 serve its equilibrium a strong undertow immediately 
 set back again into the sea which carried with it the 
 sand and whatever else was in the way, and left the 
 beach hard to walk on ; but in the latter case the 
 undertow set on, and carried the sand with it, so that 
 it was particularly difficult for shipwrecked men to get 
 to land when the wind blowed on to the shore, but 
 easier when it blowed off. This undertow, meeting 
 the next surface wave on the bar which itself has 
 made, forms part of the dam over which the latter 
 breaks, as over an upright wall. The sea thus plays 
 with the land, holding a sand-bar in its mouth awhile 
 before it swallows it, as a cat plays with a mouse ; but 
 the fatal gripe is sure to come at last. The sea sends 
 its rapacious east wind to rob the land, but before the 
 former has got far with its prey, the land sends its 
 honest west wind to recover some of its own. But, 
 according to Lieutenant Davis, the forms, extent, and 
 distribution of sand-bars and banks are principally 
 determined, not by winds and waves, but by tides. 
 
 Our host said that you would be surprised if you 
 were on the beach when the wind blew a hurricane 
 directly on to it, to see that none of the drift-wood 
 came ashore, but all was carried directly northward 
 and parallel with the shore as fast as a man can walk, 
 by the inshore current, which sets strongly in that 
 direction at flood tide. The strongest swimmers also 
 are carried along with it, and never gain an inch 
 toward the beach. Even a large rock has been moved 
 half a mile northward along the beach. He assured 
 us that the sea was never still on the back side of the 
 Cape, but ran commonly as high as your head, so that 
 a great part of the time you could not launch a boat 
 there, and even in the calmest weather the waves run
 
 348 HENRY DAVID THOREAU. 
 
 six or eight feet up the beach, though then you could 
 get off on a plank. Champlain and Poutrincourt 
 could not land here in 1606, on account of the swell 
 (la houlle), yet the savages came off to them in a 
 canoe. In the Sieur de la Borde's Relation des Co* 
 raibes, my edition of which was published at Amster 
 dam in 1711, at page 530 he says : 
 
 " Couroumon a Caraibe, also a star [i. e. a god], 
 makes the great lames a la mer, and overturns canoes. 
 Lames a la mer are the long vagues which are not 
 broken (entrecoupees), and such as one sees come to 
 land all in one piece, from one end of a beach to 
 another, so that, however little wind there may be, a 
 shallop or a canoe could hardly land (aborder terre) 
 without turning over, or being filled with water." 
 
 But on the Bay side the water even at its edge is 
 often as smooth and still as in a pond. Commonly 
 there are no boats used along this beach. There was a 
 boat belonging to the Highland Light which the next 
 keeper after he had been there a year had not launched, 
 though he said that there was good fishing just off 
 the shore. Generally the life boats cannot be used 
 when needed. When the waves run very high it is 
 impossible to get a boat off, however skilfully you 
 steer it, for it will often be completely covered by the 
 curving edge of an approaching breaker as by an 
 arch, and so filled with water, or it will be lifted up 
 by its bows, turned directly over backwards, and all 
 the contents spilled out. A spar thirty feet long is 
 served in the same way. 
 
 I heard of a party who went off fishing back of 
 Wellfleet some years ago, in two boats, in calm wea 
 ther, who, when they had laden their boats with fish, 
 and approached the land again, found such a swell
 
 THE HIGHLAND LIGHT. 349 
 
 breaking on it, though there was no wind, that they 
 were afraid to enter it. At first they thought to pull 
 for Provincetown, but night was coming on, and that 
 was many miles distant. Their case seemed a desper 
 ate one. As often as they approached the shore and 
 saw the terrible breakers that intervened, they were 
 deterred. In short, they were thoroughly frightened. 
 Finally, having thrown their fish overboard, those in 
 one boat chose a favorable opportunity, and succeeded, 
 by skill and good luck, in reaching the land ; but they 
 were unwilling to take the responsibility of telling the 
 others when to come in, and as the other helmsman 
 was inexperienced, their boat was swamped at once, 
 yet all managed to save themselves. 
 
 Much smaller waves soon make a boat " nail-sick," 
 as the phrase is. The keeper said that after a long 
 and strong blow there would be three large waves, 
 each successively larger than the last, and then no 
 large ones for some time, and that, when they wished 
 to land in a boat, they came in on the last and largest 
 wave. Sir Thomas Browne (as quoted in Brand's 
 Popular Antiquities, p. 372), on the subject of the 
 tenth wave being " greater or more dangerous than 
 any other," after quoting Ovid, 
 
 " Qui venit hie fluctus, fluctus supereminet omncs 
 Posterior 110110 est, uudecimo que prior," 
 
 says, " Which, notwithstanding, is evidently false i 
 nor can it be made out either by observation either 
 upon the shore or the ocean, as we have with diligence 
 explored in both. And surely in vain we expect reg 
 ularity in the waves of the sea, or in the particular 
 motions thereof, as we may in its general reciproca 
 tions, whose causes are constant, and effects therefore
 
 350 HENRY DAVID THOREAU. 
 
 correspondent ; whereas its fluctuations are but mo 
 tions subservient, which winds, storms, shores, shelves, 
 and every interjaceiicy, irregulates." 
 
 We read that the Clay Pounds were so called " be 
 cause vessels have had the misfortune to be pounded 
 against it in gales of wind," which we regard as a 
 doubtful derivation. There are small ponds here, 
 upheld by the clay, which were formerly called the 
 Clay Pits. Perhaps this, or Clay Ponds, is the origin 
 of the name. Water is found in the clay quite near 
 the surface ; but we heard of one man who had sunk 
 a well in the sand close by, " till he could see stars at 
 noonday," without finding any. Over this bare High 
 land the wind has full sweep. Even in July it blows 
 the wings over the heads of the young turkeys, which 
 do not know enough to head against it ; and in gales 
 the doors and windows are blown in, and you must 
 hold on to the lighthouse to prevent being blown into 
 the Atlantic. They who merely keep out on the 
 beach in a storm in the winter are sometimes rewarded 
 by the Humane Society. If you would feel the full 
 force of a tempest, take up your residence on the top 
 of Mount Washington, or at the Highland Light, in 
 Truro. 
 
 It was said in 1794 that more vessels were cast 
 away on the east shore of Truro than anywhere in 
 Barnstable County. Notwithstanding that this light 
 house has since been erected, after almost every storm 
 we read of one or more vessels wrecked here, and 
 sometimes more than a dozen wrecks are visible from 
 this point at one time. The inhabitants hear the 
 crash of vessels going to pieces as they sit round their 
 hearths, and they commonly date from some memora 
 ble shipwreck. If the history of this beach could be
 
 THE HIGHLAND LIGHT. 351 
 
 written from beginning to end, it would be a thrilling 
 page in the history of commerce. 
 
 Truro was settled in the year 1700 as Dangerfield. 
 This was a very appropriate name, for I afterward 
 read on a monument in the graveyard, near Pamet 
 River, the following inscription : 
 
 Sacred 
 
 to the memory of 
 
 57 citizens of Truro, 
 
 who were lost in seven 
 
 vessels, which 
 
 foundered at sea in 
 
 the memorable gale 
 
 of Oct. 3d, 1841. 
 
 Their names and ages by families were recorded on 
 different sides of the stone. They are said to have 
 been lost on Georges Bank, and I was told that only 
 one vessel drifted ashore on the back side of the Cape, 
 with the boys locked into the cabin and drowned. It 
 is said that the homes of all were " within a circuit of 
 two miles." Twenty-eight inhabitants of Dennis were 
 lost in the same gale ; and I read that " in one day, 
 immediately after this storm, nearly or quite one hun 
 dred bodies were taken up and buried on Cape Cod." 
 The Truro Insurance Company failed or want of 
 skippers to take charge of its vessels. But the sur 
 viving inhabitants went a-fishing again the next year 
 as usual. I found that it would not do to speak of 
 shipwrecks there, for almost every family has lost 
 some of its members at sea. " Who lives in that 
 house ? " I inquired. " Three widows," was the reply. 
 The stranger and the inhabitant view the shore with 
 very different eyes. The former may have come to 
 see and admire the ocean in a storm ; but the latter
 
 352 HENRY DAVID THOREAU. 
 
 looks on it as the scene where his nearest relatives 
 were wrecked. When I remarked to an old wrecker 
 partially blind, who was sitting on the edge of the 
 bank, smoking a pipe, which he had just lit with a 
 match of dried beach-grass, that I supposed he liked 
 to hear the sound of the surf, he answered : " No, I 
 do not like to hear the sound of the surf." He had 
 lost at least one son in "the memorable gale," and 
 could tell many a tale of the shipwrecks which he had 
 witnessed there. 
 
 In the year 1717 a noted pirate named Bellamy 
 was led on to the bar off Wellfleet by the captain of 
 a snow which he had taken, to whom he had offered 
 his vessel again if he would pilot him into Province- 
 town Harbor. Tradition says that the latter threw 
 over a burning tar barrel in the night, which drifted 
 ashore, and the pirates followed it. A storm coming 
 on, their whole fleet was wrecked, and more than a 
 hundred dead bodies lay along the shore. Six who 
 escaped shipwreck were executed. " At times, to this 
 day " (1793), says the historian of Wellfleet, 1 " there 
 are King William and Queen Mary's coppers picked 
 up, and pieces of silver called cob-money. The vio 
 lence of the seas moves the sands on the outer bar, so 
 that at times the iron caboose of the ship [that is, Bel 
 lamy's] at low ebbs has been seen." Another tells us 
 that " for many years after this shipwreck, a man of 
 a very singular and frightful aspect used every spring 
 and autumn to be seen travelling on the Cape, who 
 was supposed to have been one of Bellamy's crew. 
 The presumption is that he went to some place where 
 money had been secreted by the pirates, to get such 
 a supply as his exigencies required. When he died, 
 
 1 Levi Whitman in Mass. Hist. Soc. Coll., 1st series, vol. iii.
 
 THE HIGHLAND LIGHT. 353 
 
 many pieces of gold were found in a girdle which he 
 constantly wore." 
 
 As I was walking on the beach here in my last 
 visit, looking for shells and pebbles, just after that 
 storm which I have mentioned as moving the sand to 
 a great depth, not knowing but I might find some 
 cob-money, I did actually pick up a French crown 
 piece, worth about a dollar and six cents, near high 
 water mark, on the still moist sand, just under the 
 abrupt, caving base of the bank. It was a dark slate 
 color, and looked like a flat pebble, but still bore a 
 very distinct and handsome head of Louis XV., and 
 the usual legend on the reverse, Sit JVomen Domini 
 Benedictum (Blessed be the Name of the Lord), a 
 pleasing sentiment to read in the sands of the sea 
 shore, whatever it might be stamped on, and I also 
 made out the date, 1741. Of course, I thought at 
 first that it was that same old button which I have 
 found so many times, but my knife soon showed the 
 silver. Afterwards, rambling on the bars at low tide, 
 I cheated my companion by holding up round shells 
 (Scutellce) between my fingers, whereupon he quickly 
 stripped and came off to me. 
 
 In the Revolution, a British ship of war called the 
 Somerset was wrecked near the Clay Pounds, and all 
 on board, some hundreds in number, were taken pris 
 oners. My informant said that he had never seen any 
 mention of this in the histories, but that at any rate 
 he knew of a silver watch, which one of those prison 
 ers by accident left there, which was still going to tell 
 the story. But this event is noticed by some writers. 
 
 The next summer I saw a sloop from Chatham drag 
 ging for anchors and chains just off this shore. She 
 had her boats out at the work while she shuffled about
 
 354 HENRY DAVID THOREAU. 
 
 on various tacks, and, when anything was found, drew 
 up to hoist it on board. It is a singular employment, 
 at which men are regularly hired and paid for their 
 industry, to hunt to-day in pleasant weather for an 
 chors which have been lost, the sunken faith and 
 hope of mariners, to which they trusted in vain ; now, 
 perchance, it is the rusty one of some old pirate's ship 
 or Norman fisherman, whose cable parted here two 
 hundred years ago ; and now the best bower anchor 
 of a Canton or a California ship, which has gone 
 about her business. If the roadsteads of the spiritual 
 ocean could be thus dragged, what rusty flukes of 
 hope deceived and parted chain-cables of faith might 
 again be windlassed aboard ! enough to sink the find 
 er's craft, or stock new navies to the end of time. 
 The bottom of the sea is strewn with anchors, some 
 deeper and some shallower, and alternately covered 
 and uncovered by the sand, perchance with a small 
 length of iron cable still attached, to which where 
 is the other end ? So many unconcluded tales to be 
 continued another time. So, if we had diving-bells 
 adapted to the spiritual deeps, we should see anchors 
 with their cables attached, as thick as eels in vinegar, 
 all wriggling vainly toward their holding-ground. 
 But that is not treasure for us which another man has 
 lost ; rather it is for us to seek what no other man has 
 found or can find, not be Chatham men dragging 
 for anchors. 
 
 The Annals of this voracious beach ! who could 
 write them, unless it were a shipwrecked sailor ? 
 How many who have seen it have seen it only in the 
 midst of danger and distress, the last strip of earth 
 which their mortal eyes beheld ! Think of the amount 
 of suffering which a single strand has witnessed. The
 
 THE HIGHLAND LIGHT. 355 
 
 ancients would have represented it as a sea-monster 
 with open jaws, more terrible than Scylla and Charyb- 
 dis. An inhabitant of Truro told me that about a 
 fortnight after the St. John was wrecked at Cohasset 
 he found two bodies on the shore at the Clay Pounds. 
 They were those of a man and a corpulent woman. 
 The man had thick boots on, though his head was off, 
 but " it was alongside." It took the finder some 
 weeks to get over the sight. Perhaps they were man 
 and wife, and whom God had joined the ocean cur 
 rents had not put asunder. Yet by what slight acci 
 dents at first may they have been associated in their 
 drifting. Some of the bodies of those passengers 
 were picked up far out at sea, boxed up and sunk ; 
 some brought ashore and buried. There are more 
 consequences to a shipwreck than the underwriters 
 notice. The Gulf Stream may return some to their 
 native shores, or drop them in some out-of-the-way 
 cave of Ocean, where time and the elements will write 
 new riddles with their bones. But to return to land 
 again. 
 
 In this bank, above the clay, I counted in the sum 
 mer two hundred holes of the bank swallow within a 
 space six rods long, and there were at least one thou 
 sand old birds within three times that distance, twit 
 tering over the surf. I had never associated them in 
 my thoughts with the beach before. One little boy 
 who had been a-bird's-nesting had got eighty swallows' 
 eggs for his share ! Tell it not to the Humane Soci 
 ety. There were many young birds on the clay be 
 neath, which had tumbled out and died. Also there 
 were many crow-blackbirds hopping about in the dry 
 fields, and the upland plover were breeding close by 
 the light-house. The keeper had once cut off one's
 
 356 HENRY DAVID THOREAU. 
 
 wing while mowing, as she sat on her eggs there. This 
 is also a favorite resort for gunners in the fall to shoot 
 the golden plover. As around the shores of a pond 
 are seen devil's-needles, butterflies, etc., so here, to 
 my surprise, I saw at the same season great devil's- 
 needles of a size proportionably larger, or nearly as 
 big as my finger, incessantly coasting up and down 
 the edge of the bank, and butterflies also were hover 
 ing over it, and I never saw so many dor-bugs and 
 beetles of various kinds as strewed the beach. They 
 had apparently flown over the bank in the night, and 
 could not get up again, and some had perhaps fallen 
 into the sea and were washed ashore. They may have 
 been in part attracted by the lighthouse lamps. 
 
 The Clay Pounds are a more fertile tract than 
 usual. We saw some fine patches of roots and corn 
 here. As generally on the Cape, the plants had little 
 stalk or leaf, but ran remarkably to seed. The corn 
 was hardly more than half as high as in the interior, 
 yet the ears were large and full, and one farmer told 
 us that he could raise forty bushels on an acre with 
 out manure, and sixty with it. The heads of the rye 
 also were remarkably large. The shadbush (Amelan- 
 cAier), beach plums, and blueberries ( Vaccinium 
 fennsylvanicum^), like the apple-trees and oaks, were 
 very dwarfish, spreading over the sand, but at the 
 same time very fruitful. The blueberry was but an 
 inch or two high, and its fruit often rested on the 
 ground, so that you did not suspect the presence of 
 the bushes, even on those bare hills, until you were 
 treading on them. I thought that this fertility must 
 be owing mainly to the abundance of moisture in the 
 atmosphere, for I observed that what little grass there 
 was was remarkably laden with dew in the morning,
 
 THE HIGHLAND LIGHT. 357 
 
 and in summer dense imprisoning fogs frequently last 
 till midday, turning one's beard into a wet napkin 
 about his throat, and the oldest inhabitant may lose his 
 way within a stone's throw of his house or be obliged 
 to follow the beach for a guide. The brick house 
 attached to the lighthouse was exceedingly damp at 
 that season, and writing-paper lost all its stiffness in 
 it. It was impossible to dry your towel after bathing, 
 or to press flowers without their mildewing. The air 
 was so moist that we rarely wished to drink, though 
 we could at all times taste the salt on our lips. Salt 
 was rarely used at table, and our host told us that his 
 cattle invariably refused it when it was offered them, 
 they got so much with their grass and at every breath, 
 but he said that a sick horse or one just from the 
 country would sometimes take a hearty draught of 
 salt water, and seemed to like it and be the better for 
 it. 
 
 It was surprising to see how much water was con 
 tained in the terminal bud of the seaside golden rod, 
 standing in the sand early in July, and also how tur 
 nips, beets, carrots, etc., flourished even in pure sand. 
 A man travelling by the shore near there not long 
 before us noticed something green growing in the pure 
 sand of the beach, just at high water mark, and on 
 approaching found it to be a bed of beets flourishing 
 vigorously, probably from seed washed out of the 
 Franklin. Also beets and turnips came up in the sea 
 weed used for manure in many parts of the Cape. 
 This suggests how various plants may have been dis 
 persed over the world to distant islands and conti 
 nents. Vessels, with seeds in their cargoes, destined 
 for particular ports, where perhaps they were not 
 needed, have been cast away on desolate islands, and,
 
 358 HENRY DAVID THOREAU. 
 
 though their crews perished, some of their seeds have 
 been preserved. Out of many kinds a few would find 
 a soil and climate adapted to them, become natural 
 ized, and perhaps drive out the native plants at last, 
 and so fit the land for the habitation of man. It is 
 an ill wind that blows nobody any good, and for the 
 time lamentable shipwrecks may thus contribute a new 
 vegetable to a continent's stock, and prove on the 
 whole a lasting blessing to its inhabitants. Or winds 
 and currents might effect the same without the inter 
 vention of man. What are the various succulent 
 plants which grow on the beach but such beds of beets 
 and turnips, sprung originally from seeds which per 
 haps were cast on the waters for this end, though we 
 do not know the Franklin which they came out of ? 
 In ancient times some Mr. Bell (?) was sailing this 
 way in his ark with seeds of rocket, saltwort, sand- 
 wort, beach-grass, samphire, bayberry, poverty-grass, 
 etc., all nicely labelled with directions, intending to 
 establish a nursery somewhere ; and did not a nursery 
 get established, though he thought that he had failed? 
 About the lighthouse I observed in the summer the 
 pretty Poly gala polygama, spreading ray-wise flat on 
 the ground, white pasture thistles (Oirsium pumi- 
 lum), and amid the shrubbery the Smilax glauca, 
 which is commonly said not to grow so far north; 
 near the edge of the banks about half a mile south 
 ward, the broom crowberry (Empetrum Conradii)^ 
 for which Plymouth is the only locality in Massachu 
 setts usually named, forms pretty green mounds four 
 or five feet in diameter by one foot high, soft 
 springy beds for the wayfarer ; I saw it afterward in 
 Provincetown ; but prettiest of all the scarlet pimper 
 nel, or poor man's weather-glass (^Anagallis amen*
 
 THE HIGHLAND LIGHT. 359 
 
 sis), greets you in fair weather on almost every square 
 yard of sand. From Yarmouth I have received the 
 Chrysopsis falcata (golden aster), and Vaccinium 
 stamineum (deerberry or squaw huckleberry), with 
 fruit not edible, sometimes as large as a cranberry 
 (Sept. 7). 
 
 The Highland Lighthouse, 1 where we were staying, 
 is a substantial -looking building of brick, painted 
 white, and surmounted by an iron cap. Attached to 
 it is the dwelling of the keeper, one story high, also of 
 brick, and built by government. As we were going 
 to spend the night in a lighthouse, we wished to make 
 the most of so novel an experience, and therefore told 
 our host that we would like to accompany him when 
 he went to light up. At rather early candle-light he 
 lighted a small Japan lamp, allowing it to smoke 
 rather more than we like on ordinary occasions, and 
 told us to follow him. He led the way first through 
 his bedroom, which was placed nearest to the light 
 house, and then through a long, narrow, covered pas 
 sage-way, between whitewashed walls like a prison 
 entry, into the lower part of the lighthouse, where 
 many great butts of oil were arranged around ; thence 
 we ascended by a winding and open iron stairway, 
 with a steadily increasing scent of oil and lamp- 
 smoke, to a trap-door in an iron floor, and through 
 this into the lantern. It was a neat building, with 
 everything in apple-pie order, and no danger of any 
 thing rusting there for want of oil. The light con 
 sisted of fifteen argand lamps, placed within smooth 
 concave reflectors twenty-one inches in diameter, and 
 arranged in two horizontal circles one above the other, 
 
 1 The lighthouse has since been rebuilt, and shows a Fresnel 
 light. H. D. T.
 
 360 HENRY DAVID THOREAU. 
 
 facing every way excepting directly down the Cape. 
 These were surrounded, at a distance of two or three 
 feet, by large plate-glass windows, which defied the 
 storms, with iron sashes, on which rested the iron cap. 
 All the iron work except the floor was painted white. 
 And thus the lighthouse was completed. We walked 
 slowly round in that narrow space as the keeper 
 lighted each lamp in succession, conversing with him 
 at the same moment that many a sailor on the deep 
 witnessed the lighting of the Highland Light. His 
 duty was to fill and trim and light his lamps, and 
 keep bright the reflectors. He filled them every morn 
 ing, and trimmed them commonly once in the course 
 of the night. He complained of the quality of the oil 
 which was furnished. This house consumes about 
 eight hundred gallons in a year, which cost not far 
 from one dollar a gallon ; but perhaps a few lives 
 would be saved if better oil were provided. Another 
 lighthouse keeper said that the same proportion of 
 winter-strained oil was sent to the southernmost light 
 house in the Union as to the most northern. For 
 merly, when this lighthouse had windows with small 
 and thin panes, a severe storm would sometimes break 
 the glass, and then they were obliged to put up a 
 wooden shutter in haste to save their lights and reflec 
 tors, and sometimes in tempests, when the mariner 
 stood most in need of their guidance, they had thus 
 nearly converted the lighthouse into a dark lantern, 
 which emitted only a few feeble rays, and those com 
 monly on the land or lee side. He spoke of the anxi 
 ety and sense of responsibility which he felt in cold 
 and stormy nights in the winter, when he knew that 
 many a poor fellow was depending on him, and his 
 lamps burned dimly, the oil being chilled. Some-
 
 THE HIGHLAND LIGHT. 361 
 
 times he was obliged to warm the oil in a kettle in his 
 house at midnight, and fill his lamps over again, for 
 he could not have a fire in the lighthouse, it produced 
 such a sweat on the windows. His successor told me 
 that he could not keep too hot a fire in such a case. 
 All this because the oil was poor. A government 
 lighting the mariners on its wintry coast with summer- 
 strained oil, to save expense ! That were surely a 
 summer-strained mercy. 
 
 This keeper's successor, who kindly entertained me 
 the next year, stated that one extremely cold night, 
 when this and all the neighboring lights were burning 
 summer oil, but he had been provident enough to 
 reserve a little winter oil against emergencies, he was 
 waked up with anxiety, and found that his oil was 
 congealed, and his lights almost extinguished ; and 
 when, after many hours' exertion, he had succeeded in 
 replenishing his reservoirs with winter oil at the wick 
 end, and with difficulty had made them burn, he 
 looked out and found that the other lights in the 
 neighborhood, which were usually visible to him, had 
 gone out, and he heard afterward that the Pamet 
 River and Billingsgate Lights also had been extin 
 guished. 
 
 Our host said that the frost, too, on the windows 
 caused him much trouble, and in sultry summer nights 
 the moths covered them and dimmed his lights ; some 
 times even small birds flew against the thick plate 
 glass, and were found on the ground beneath in the 
 morning with their necks broken. In the spring of 
 1855 he found nineteen small yellowbirds, perhaps 
 goldfinches or myrtle-birds, thus lying dead around 
 the lighthouse ; and sometimes in the fall he had seen 
 where a golden plover had struck the glass in the
 
 362 HENRY DAVID THOREAU. 
 
 night, and left the down and the fatty part of its 
 breast on it. 
 
 Thus he struggled, by every method, to keep his 
 light shining before men. Surely the lighthouse 
 keeper has a responsible, if an easy, office. When his 
 lamp goes out, he goes out ; or, at most, only one such 
 accident is pardoned. 
 
 I thought it a pity that some poor student did not 
 live there, to profit by all that light, since he would 
 not rob the mariner. " Well," he said, " I do some 
 times come up here and read the newspaper when they 
 are noisy down below." Think of fifteen argand 
 lamps to read the newspaper by ! Government oil ! 
 light enough, perchance, to read the Constitution by ! 
 I thought that he should read nothing less than his 
 Bible by that light. I had a classmate 1 who fitted for 
 college by the lamps of a lighthouse, which was more 
 light, we think, than the University afforded. 
 
 When we had come down and walked a dozen rods 
 from the lighthouse, we found that we could not get 
 the full strength of its light on the narrow strip of 
 land between it and the shore, being too low for the 
 focus, and we saw only so many feeble and rayless 
 stars ; but at forty rods inland we could see to read, 
 though we were still indebted to only one lamp. 
 Each reflector sent forth a separate " fan " of light, 
 one shone on the windmill, and one in the hollow, 
 while the intervening spaces were in shadow. This 
 light is said to be visible twenty nautical miles and 
 more, from an observer fifteen feet above the level of 
 the sea. We could see the revolving light at Race 
 Point, the end of the Cape, about nine miles distant, 
 
 1 C. G. Thomas, who lately died iii Cambridge, where he was 
 commonly called Lighthouse Thomas.
 
 THE HIGHLAND LIGHT. 363 
 
 and also the light on Long Point at the entrance of 
 Provincetown Harbor, and one of the distant Plym 
 outh Harbor Lights, across the Bay, nearly in a range 
 with the last, like a star in the horizon. The keeper 
 thought that the other Plymouth Light was concealed 
 by being exactly in a range with the Long Point 
 Light. He told us that the mariner was sometimes 
 led astray by a mackerel fisher's lantern, who was 
 afraid of being run down in the night, or even by a 
 cottager's light, mistaking them for some well-known 
 light on the coast, and, when he discovered his mis 
 take, was wont to curse the prudent fisher or the wake 
 ful cottager without reason. 
 
 Though it was once declared that Providence, placed 
 this mass of clay here on purpose to erect a light 
 house on, the keeper said that the lighthouse should 
 have been erected half a mile farther south, where 
 the coast begins to bend, and where the light could 
 be seen at the same time with the Nauset Lights, and 
 distinguished from them. They now talk of building 
 one there. It happens that the present one is the 
 more useless now, so near the extremity of the Cape, 
 because other lighthouses have since been erected 
 there. 
 
 Among the many regulations of the Lighthouse 
 Board, hanging against the wall here, many of them 
 excellent, perhaps, if there were a regiment stationed 
 here to attend to them, there is one requiring the 
 keeper to keep an account of the number of vessels 
 which pass his light during the day. But there are 
 a hundred vessels in sight at once, steering in all di 
 rections, many on the very verge of the horizon, and 
 he must have more eyes than Argus, and be a good 
 deal farther-sighted, to tell which are passing his
 
 364 HENRY DAVID THOREAU, 
 
 light. It is an employment in some respects best 
 suited to the habits of the gulls which coast up and 
 down here, and circle over the sea. 
 
 I was told by the next keeper, that on the 8th of 
 June following, a particularly clear and beautiful 
 morning, he rose about half an hour before sunrise, 
 and having a little time to spare, for his custom was 
 to extinguish his lights at sunrise, walked down 
 toward the shore to see what he might find. When 
 he got to the edge of the bank he looked up, and, to 
 his astonishment, saw the sun rising, and already part 
 way above the horizon. Thinking that his clock was 
 wrong, he made haste back, and though it was still 
 too early by the clock, extinguished his lamps, and 
 when he had got through and come down, he looked 
 out the window, and, to his still greater astonishment, 
 saw the sun just where it was before, two thirds above 
 the horizon. He showed me where its rays fell on 
 the wall across the room. He proceeded to make a 
 fire, and when he had done, there was the sun still at 
 the same height. Whereupon, not trusting to his 
 own eyes any longer, he called up his wife to look at 
 it, and she saw it also. There were vessels in sight 
 on the ocean, and their crews, too, he said, must have 
 seen it, for its rays fell on them. It remained at 
 that height for about fifteen minutes by the clock, 
 and then rose as usual and nothing else extraordinary 
 happened during that day. Though accustomed to 
 the coast, he had never witnessed nor heard of such 
 a phenomenon before. I suggested that there might 
 have been a cloud in the horizon invisible to him, 
 which rose with the sun, and his clock was only as 
 accurate as the average ; or perhaps, as he denied the 
 possibility of this, it was such a looming of the sun
 
 THE HIGHLAND LIGHT. 365 
 
 as is said to occur at Lake Superior and elsewhere. 
 Sir John Franklin, for instance, says in his Narrative, 
 that when he was on the shore of the Polar Sea, the 
 horizontal refraction varied so much one morning 
 that " the upper limb of the sun twice appeared at 
 the horizon before it finally rose." 
 
 He certainly must be a sun of Aurora to whom the 
 sun looms, when there are so many millions to whom 
 it glooms rather, or who never see it till an hour after 
 it has risen. But it behooves us old stagers to keep 
 our lamps trimmed and burning to the last, and not 
 trust to the sun's looming. 
 
 This keeper remarked that the centre of the flame 
 should be exactly opposite the centre of the reflectors, 
 and that accordingly, if he was not careful to turn 
 down his wicks in the morning, the sun falling on the 
 reflectors on the south side of the building would set 
 fire to them, like a burning-glass, in the coldest day, 
 and he would look up at noon and see them all lighted ! 
 When your lamp is ready to give light, it is readiest 
 to receive it, and the sun will light it. His successor 
 said that he had never known them to blaze in such 
 a case, but merely to smoke. 
 
 I saw that this was a place of wonders. In a sea 
 turn or shallow fog while I was there the next sum 
 mer, it being clear overhead, the edge of the bank 
 twenty rods distant appeared like a mountain pasture 
 in the horizon. I was completely deceived by it, and 
 I could then understand why mariners sometimes ran 
 ashore in such cases, especially in the night, suppos 
 ing it to be far away, though they could see the land. 
 Once since this, being in a large oyster boat two or 
 three hundred miles from here, in a dark night, when 
 there was a thin veil of mist on land and water, we
 
 366 HENRY DAVID THOEEAU. 
 
 came so near to running on to the land before our 
 skipper was aware of it, that the first warning was 
 my hearing the sound of the surf under my elbow. 
 I could almost have jumped ashore, and we were 
 obliged to go about very suddenly to prevent strik 
 ing. The distant light for which we were steering, 
 supposing it a lighthouse five or six miles off, came 
 through the cracks of a fisherman's bunk not more 
 than six rods distant. 
 
 The keeper entertained us handsomely in his soli 
 tary little ocean-house. He was a man of singular 
 patience and intelligence, who, when our queries 
 struck him, rung as clear as a bell in response. The 
 lighthouse lamps a few feet distant shone full into 
 my chamber, and made it as bright as day, so I knew 
 exactly how the Highland Light bore all that night, 
 and I was in no danger of being wrecked. Unlike 
 the last, this was as still as a summer night. I 
 thought as I lay there, half awake and half asleep, 
 looking upward through the window at the lights 
 above my head, how many sleepless eyes from far out 
 on the Ocean stream mariners of all nations spin 
 ning their yarns through the various watches of the 
 night were directed toward my couch.
 
 RALPH WALDO EMERSON. 
 
 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 RALPH WALDO EMERSON was born in Boston, May 25, 
 1803. His father, his grandfather, and his great-grand 
 father were all ministers, and, indeed, on both his father's 
 and mother's side he belonged to a continuous line of minis 
 terial descent from the seventeenth century. At the time of 
 his birth, his father, the Rev. William Emerson, was minis 
 ter of the First Church congregation, but on his death a fc~y 
 years afterward, Ralph Waldo Emerson, a boy of seven, 
 went to live in the old manse at Concord, where his grand 
 father had lived when the Concord fight occurred. The old 
 manse was afterward the home at one time of Hawthorne, 
 who wrote there the stories which he gathered into the vol 
 ume, Mosses from, an Old Manse. 
 
 Emerson was graduated at Harvard in 1821, and after 
 teaching a year or two gave himself to the study of divinity. 
 From 1827 to 1832 he preached in Unitarian churches, and 
 was for four years a colleague pastor in the Second Church 
 in Boston. He then left the ministry and afterward devoted 
 himself to literature. He travelled abroad in 1833, in 1847, 
 and again in 1872, making friends among the leading think 
 ers during his first journey, and confirming the friendships 
 when again in Europe ; with the exception of these three 
 journeys and occasional lecturing tours in the United States, 
 he lived quietly at Concord until his death, April 27, 1882. 
 
 He had delivered several special addresses, and in his 
 early manhood was an important lecturer in the Lyceum
 
 368 RALPH WALDO EMERSON.- 
 
 courses which were so popular, especially in New England, 
 forty years ago, but his first published book was Nature, in 
 
 1839. Subsequent prose writings were his Essays, under 
 that title, and in several volumes with specific titles, Repre 
 sentative Men, and English Traits. In form the prose is 
 either the oration or the essay, with one exception. Eng 
 lish Traits records the observations of the writer after his 
 first two journeys to England ; and while it may loosely be 
 classed among essays, it has certain distinctive features 
 which separate it from the essays of the same writer; there 
 is in it narrative, reminiscence, and description, which make 
 it more properly the note-book of a philosophic traveller. 
 
 It may be said of his essays as well as of his deliberate 
 orajions that the writer never was wholly unmindful of an 
 audience ; he was conscious always that he was not merely 
 delivering his mind, but speaking directly to men. One is 
 aware of a certain pointedness of speech which turns the 
 writer into a speaker, and the printed words into a sounding 
 voice. 
 
 He wrote poems when in college, but his first publication 
 of verse was through The Dial, a magazine established in 
 
 1840, and the representative of a knot of men and women 
 of whom Emerson was the acknowledged or unacknow. 
 ledged leader. The first volume of his poems was pub 
 lished in 1847, and included those by which he is best 
 known, as The Problem, The Sphinx, The Rhodora, The 
 Humble Bee, Hymn Sung at the Completion of the Con 
 cord Monument. After the establishment of the Atlantic 
 Monthly in 1857, he contributed to it both prose and poetry, 
 and verses published in the early numbers, mere enigmas to 
 some, profound revelations to others, were fruitful of discus 
 sion and thought ; his second volume of poems, May Day 
 and other Pieces, was not issued until 1867. Since then a 
 volume of his collected poetry has appeared, containing most 
 of those published in the two volumes, and a few in addi 
 tion. We are told, however, that the published writings of
 
 INTRODUCTION. 369 
 
 Emerson bear but small proportion to the unpublished. 
 Many lectures have been delivered, but not printed ; many 
 poems written, and a few read, which have never been pub 
 lished. The inference from this, borne out by the marks 
 upon what has been published, is that Mr. Emerson set a 
 high value upon literature, and was jealous of the preroga 
 tive of the poet. He is frequently called a seer, and this 
 old word, indicating etymologically its original intention, is 
 applied well to a poet who saw into nature and human life 
 with a spiritual power which made him a marked man in 
 his own time, and one destined to an unrivalled place in lit 
 erature. He fulfilled Wordsworth's lines : 
 
 " With an eye made quiet by the power 
 Of harmony, and the deep power of joy, 
 We see into the life of things."
 
 BEHAVIOR. 
 
 GRACE, Beauty, and Caprice 
 
 Build this golden portal ; 
 
 Graceful women, chosen men, 
 
 Dazzle every mortal : 
 
 Their sweet and lofty countenance 
 
 His enchanting food ; 
 
 He need not go to them, their forms 
 
 Beset his solitude. 
 
 He looketh seldom in their face, 
 
 His eyes explore the ground, 
 
 The green grass is a looking-glass 
 
 Whereon their traits are found. 
 
 Little he says to them, 
 
 So dances his heart in his breast, 
 
 Their tranquil mien bereaveth him 
 
 Of wit, of words, of rest. 
 
 Too weak to win, too fond to shun 
 
 The tyrants of his doom, 
 
 The much-deceived Endymion 
 
 Slips behind a tomb. 
 
 THE soul which animates Nature is not less signifi- 
 cantly published in the figure, movement, and gesture 
 of animated bodies, than in its last vehicle of articulate 
 speech. This silent and subtile language is Manners ; 
 not what, but how. Life expresses. A statue has no 
 tongue, and needs none. Good tableaux do not need 
 declamation. Nature tells every secret once. Yes, 
 but in man she tells it all the time, by form, attitude, 
 gesture, mien, face, and parts of the face, and by the 
 whole action of the machine. The visible carriage or 
 action of the individual, as resulting from his organi 
 zation and his will combined, we call manners. What 
 are they but thought entering the hands and feet, con 
 trolling the movements of the body, the speech and 
 behavior ?
 
 BEHA VIOR. 371 
 
 There is always a best way of doing everything, if 
 it be to boil an egg. Manners are the happy ways of 
 doing things ; each once a stroke of genius or of love, 
 now repeated and hardened into usage. They form 
 at last a rich varnish, with which the routine of life is 
 washed, and its details adorned. If they are super 
 ficial, so are the dewdrops which give such a depth to 
 the morning meadows. Manners are very communi 
 cable ; men catch them from each other. Consuelo, 
 in the romance, 1 boasts of the lessons she had given 
 the nobles in manners, on the stage ; and, in real life, 
 Talma 2 taught Napoleon the arts of behavior. Genius 
 invents fine manners, which the baron and the baron 
 ess copy very fast, and, by the advantage of a palace, 
 better the instruction. They stereotype the lesson 
 they have learned into a mode. 
 
 The power of manners is incessant, an element 
 as unconcealable as fire. The nobility cannot in any 
 country be disguised, and no more in a republic or a 
 democracy than in a kingdom. No man can resist 
 their influence. There are certain manners which are 
 learned in good society, of that force, that, if a person 
 have them, he or she must be considered, and is every 
 where welcome, though without beauty, or wealth, or 
 genius. Give a boy address and accomplishments, 
 and you give him the mastery of palaces and fortunes 
 where he goes. He has not the trouble of earning or 
 owning them ; they solicit him to enter and possess. 
 We send girls of a timid, retreating disposition to the* 
 boarding-school, to the riding-school, to the ball-room, 
 or wheresoever they can come into acquaintance and 
 nearness of leading persons of their own sex ; where 
 
 1 Of the same name, by George Sand. 
 
 2 A celebrated actor.
 
 372 RALPH WALDO EMERSON. 
 
 they might learn address, and see it near at hand. 
 The power of a woman of fashion to lead, and also to 
 daunt and repel, derives from their belief that she 
 knows resources and behaviors not known to them ; 
 but when these have mastered her secret, they learn to 
 confront her, and recover their self-possession. 
 
 Every day bears witness to their gentle rule. People 
 who would obtrude, now do not obtrude. The medi 
 ocre circle learns to demand that which belongs to a 
 high state of nature or of culture. Your manners are 
 always under examination, and by committees little 
 suspected, a police in citizens' clothes, but are 
 awarding or denying you very high prizes when you 
 least think of it. 
 
 We talk much of utilities, but 't is our manners that 
 associate us. In hours of business, we go to him who 
 knows, or has, or does this or that which we want, and 
 we do not let our taste or feeling stand in the way. 
 But this activity over, we return to the indolent state, 
 and wish for those we can be at ease with ; those who 
 will go where we go, whose manners do not offend us, 
 whose social tone chimes with ours. When we reflect 
 on their persuasive and cheering force ; how they rec 
 ommend, prepare, and draw people together ; how, in 
 all clubs, manners make the members ; how manners 
 make the fortune of the ambitious youth ; that, for the 
 most part, his manners marry him, and, for the most 
 part, he marries manners ; when we think what keys 
 they are, and to what secrets ; what high lessons arid 
 inspiring tokens of character they convey ; and what 
 divination is required in us, for the reading of this 
 fine telegraph, we see what range the subject has, and 
 what relations to convenience, power, and beauty. 
 
 Their first service is very low, when they are the
 
 BEHA VIOR. 373 
 
 minor morals : but 't is the beginning of civility, to 
 make us, I mean, endurable to each other. We prize 
 them for their rough-plastic, abstergent force ; to get 
 people out of the quadruped state ; to get them washed, 
 clothed, and set up on end; to slough their animal 
 husks and habits ; compel them to be clean ; overawe 
 their spite and meanness, teach them to stifle the base, 
 and choose the generous expression, and make them 
 know how much happier the generous behaviors are. 
 
 Bad behavior the laws cannot reach. Society is 
 infested with rude, cynical, restless, and frivolous per 
 sons who prey upon the rest, and whom a public opinion 
 concentrated into good manners forms accepted by 
 the sense of all can reach : the contradictors and 
 railers at public and private tables, who are like ter 
 riers, who conceive it the duty of a dog of honor to 
 growl at any passer-by, and do the honors of the house 
 by barking him out of sight ; I have seen men who 
 neigh like a horse when you contradict them, or say 
 something which they do not understand : then the 
 overbold, who make their own invitation to your 
 hearth ; the persevering talker, who gives you his 
 society in large, saturating doses ; the pitiers of them 
 selves, a perilous class ; the frivolous Asmodeus, 
 who relies on you to find him in ropes of sand to 
 twist ; the monotones ; in short, every stripe of ab 
 surdity; these are social inflictions which the magis 
 trate cannot cure or defend you from, and which must 
 be intrusted to the restraining force of custom, and 
 proverbs, and familiar rules of behavior impressed on 
 young people in their school-days. 
 
 In the hotels on the banks of the Mississippi, they 
 print, or used to print, among the rules of the house, 
 that " no gentleman can be permitted to come to the
 
 374 RALPH WALDO EMERSON. 
 
 public table without his coat ; " and in the same coun 
 try, in the pews of the churches, little placards plead 
 with the worshipper against the fury of expectoration. 
 Charles Dickens self-sacrificingly undertook the refor 
 mation of our American manners in unspeakable par 
 ticulars. I think the lesson was not quite lost ; that 
 it held bad manners up, so that the churls could see 
 the deformity. Unhappily, the book had its own de 
 formities. It ought not to need to print in a reading- 
 room a caution to strangers not to speak loud ; nor to 
 persons who look over fine engravings, that they 
 should be handled like cobwebs and butterflies' wings ; 
 nor to persons who look at marble statues, that they 
 shall not smite them with canes. But, even in the 
 perfect civilization of this city, such cautions are not 
 quite needless in the Athenaeum and City Library. 
 
 Manners are factitious, and grow out of circum 
 stance as well as out of character. If you look at the 
 pictures of patricians and of peasants, of different 
 periods and countries, you will see how well they 
 match the same classes in our towns. The modern 
 aristocrat not only is well drawn in Titian's Venetian 
 doges, and in Roman coins and statues, but also in the 
 pictures which Commodore Perry brought home of 
 dignitaries in Japan. Broad lands and great interests 
 not only arrive to such heads as can manage them, but 
 form manners of power. A keen eye, too, will see 
 nice gradations of rank, or see in the manners the 
 degree of homage the party is wont to receive. A 
 prince who is accustomed every day to be courted and 
 deferred to by the highest grandees, acquires a corre 
 sponding expectation, and a becoming mode of receiv 
 ing and replying to this homage. 
 
 There are always exceptional people and modes.
 
 BEHAVIOR. 375 
 
 English grandees affect to be farmers. Claverhouse 
 is a fop, and, under the finish of dress, and levity of 
 behavior, hides the terror of his war. But Nature 
 and Destiny are honest, and never fail to leave their 
 mark, to hang out a sign for each and for every qual 
 ity. It is much to conquer one's face, and perhaps 
 the ambitious youth thinks he has got the whole secret 
 when he has learned that disengaged manners are 
 commanding. Don't be deceived by a facile exterior. 
 Tender men sometimes have strong wills. We had, 
 in Massachusetts, an old statesman, who had sat all 
 his life in courts and in chairs of state, without over 
 coming an extreme irritability of face, voice, and bear 
 ing ; when he spoke, his voice would not serve him ; it 
 cracked, it broke, it wheezed, it piped : little cared he ; 
 he knew that it had got to pipe, or wheeze, or screech 
 his argument and his indignation. When he sat down, 
 after speaking, he seemed in a sort of fit, and held on 
 to his chair with both hands ; but underneath all this 
 irritability was a puissant will, firm and advancing, 
 and a memory in which lay in order and method like 
 geologic strata every fact of his history, and under the 
 control of his will. 
 
 Manners are partly factitious, but, mainly, there 
 must be capacity for culture in the blood. Else all 
 culture is vain. The obstinate prejudice in favor of 
 blood, which lies at the base of the feudal and mon 
 archical fabrics of the Old World, has some reason 
 in common experience. Every man mathematician, 
 artist, soldier, or merchant looks with confidence 
 for some traits and talents in his own child, which he 
 would not dare to presume in the child of a stranger. 
 The Orientalists are very orthodox on this point. 
 "Take a thorn-bush," said the emir Abdel-Kader,
 
 876 RALPH WALDO EMERSON. 
 
 " and sprinkle it for a whole year with water ; it will 
 yield nothing but thorns. Take a date-tree, leave it 
 without culture, and it will always produce dates. 
 Nobility is the date-tree, and the Arab populace is a 
 bush of thorns." 
 
 A main fact in the history of manners is the won 
 derful expressiveness of the human body. If it were 
 made of glass, or of air, and the thoughts were written 
 on steel tablets within, it could not publish more truly 
 its meaning than now. Wise men read very sharply 
 all your private history in your look and gait and be 
 havior. The whole economy of nature is bent on ex 
 pression. The tell-tale body is all tongues. Men are 
 like Geneva watches with crystal faces which expose 
 the whole movement. They carry the liquor of life 
 flowing up and down in these beautiful bottles, and 
 announcing to the curious how it is with them. The 
 face and eyes reveal what the spirit is doing, how old 
 it is, what aims it has. The eyes indicate the antiquity 
 of the soul, or, through how many forms it has already 
 ascended. It almost violates the proprieties, if we say 
 above the breath here, what the confessing eyes do 
 not hesitate to utter to every street passenger. 
 
 Man cannot fix his eye on the sun, and so far seems 
 imperfect. In Siberia, a late traveller found men 
 who could see the satellites of Jupiter with their un 
 armed eye. In some respects the animals excel us. 
 The birds have a longer sight, beside the advantage 
 by their wings of a higher observatory. A cow can 
 bid her calf, by secret signal, probably of the eye, to 
 run away, or to lie down and hide itself. The jockeys 
 say of certain horses, that " they look over the whole 
 ground." The out-door life, and hunting, and labor, 
 give equal vigor to the human eye. A farmer looks
 
 BEHAVIOR. 377 
 
 out at you as strong as the horse ; his eye-beam is like 
 the stroke of a staff. An eye can threaten like a 
 loaded and levelled gun, or can insult like hissing or 
 lacking ; or, in its altered mood, by beams of kind 
 ness, it can make the heart dance with joy. 
 
 The eye obeys exactly the action of the mind. 
 When a thought strikes us, the eyes fix, and remain 
 gazing at a distance ; in enumerating the names of 
 persons or of countries, as France, Germany, Spain, 
 Turkey, the eyes wink at each new name. There 
 is no nicety of learning sought by the mind which 
 the eyes do not vie in acquiring. " An artist," said 
 Michel Angelo, " must have his measuring tools not 
 in the hand, but in the eye ; " and there is no end to 
 the catalogue of its performances, whether in indolent 
 vision (that of health and beauty), or in strained vi 
 sion (that of art and labor). 
 
 Eyes are bold as lions, roving, running, leaping, 
 here and there, far and near. They speak all lan 
 guages. They wait for no introduction ; they are no 
 Englishmen ; ask no leave of age or rank ; they re 
 spect neither poverty nor riches, neither learning nor 
 power, nor virtue, nor sex, but intrude, and come 
 again, and go through and through you, in a moment 
 of time. What inundation of life and thought is dis 
 charged from one soul into another, through them ! 
 The glance is natural magic. The mysterious com 
 munication established across a house between two 
 entire strangers, moves all the springs of wonder. 
 The communication by the glance is in the greatest 
 part not subject to the control of the will. It is the 
 bodily symbol of identity of nature. We look into 
 the eyes to know if this other form is another self, 
 and the eyes will not lie, but make a faithful confes-
 
 378 RALPH WALDO EMERSON. 
 
 sion what inhabitant is there. The revelations are 
 sometimes terrific. The confession of a low, usurping 
 devil is there made, and the observer shall seern to 
 feel the stirring of owls, and bats, and horned hoofs, 
 where he looked for innocence and simplicity. 'T is 
 remarkable, too, that the spirit that appears at the 
 windows of the house does at once invest himself in 
 a new form of his own, to the mind of the beholder. 
 
 The eyes of men converse as much as their tongues, 
 with the advantage, that the ocular dialect needs no 
 dictionary, but is understood all the world over. 
 When the eyes say one thing, and the tongue another, 
 a practised man relies on the language of the first. 
 If the man is off his centre, the eyes show it. You 
 can read in the eyes of your companion, whether 
 your argument hits him, though his tongue will not 
 confess it. There is a look by which a man shows he 
 is going to say a good thing, and a look when he has 
 said it. Vain and forgotten are all the fine offers 
 and offices of hospitality, if there is no holiday in the 
 eye. How many furtive inclinations avowed by the 
 eye, though dissembled by the lips ! One comes away 
 from a company, in which, it may easily happen, he 
 has said nothing, and no important remark has been 
 addressed to him, and yet, if in sympathy with the 
 society, he shall not have a sense of this fact, such a 
 stream of life has been flowing into him, and out from 
 him, through the eyes. There are eyes, to be sure, 
 that give no more admission into the man than blue 
 berries. Others are liquid and deep, wells that a 
 man might fall into ; others are aggressive and de 
 vouring, seem to call out the police, take all too much 
 notice, and require crowded Broadways, and the se 
 curity of millions, to protect individuals against them.
 
 BEHA VIOR. 379 
 
 The military eye I meet, now darkly sparkling under 
 clerical, now under rustic, brows. "Tis the city of 
 Lacedaemon ; 't is a stack of bayonets. There are 
 asking eyes, asserting eyes, prowling eyes ; and eyes 
 full of fate, some of good, and some of sinister, 
 omen. The alleged power to charm down insanity, or 
 ferocity in beasts, is a power behind the eye. It must 
 be a victory achieved in the will, before it can be sig 
 nified in the eye. 'T is very certain that each man 
 carries in his eye the exact indication of his rank in 
 the immense scale of men, and we are always learning 
 to read it. A complete man should need no auxilia 
 ries to his personal presence. Whoever looked on 
 him would consent to his will, being certified that his 
 aims were generous and universal. The reason why 
 men do not obey us, is because they see the mud at 
 the bottom of our eye. 
 
 If. the organ of sight is such a vehicle of power, the 
 other features have their own. A man finds room in 
 the few square inches of the face for the traits of all 
 his ancestors ; for the expression of all his history, 
 and his wants. The sculptor, and Winckelmann, and 
 Lavater, will tell you how significant a feature is the 
 nose ; how its form expresses strength or weakness 
 of will and good or bad temper. The nose of Ju 
 lius Caesar, of Dante, and of Pitt suggest " the ter 
 rors of the beak." What refinement, and what 
 limitations, the teeth betray ! " Beware you don't 
 laugh," said the wise mother, " for then you show all 
 your faults." 
 
 Balzac left in manuscript a chapter, which he called 
 " Theorie de la demarche" in which he says : " The 
 look, the voice, the respiration, and the attitude or 
 walk are identical. But, as it has not been given to
 
 380 RALPH WALDO EMERSON. 
 
 man, the power to stand guard, at once, over these 
 four different simultaneous expressions of his thought, 
 watch that one which speaks out the truth, and you 
 will know the whole man." 
 
 Palaces interest us mainly in the exhibition of man 
 ners, which in the idle and expensive society dwelling 
 in them are raised to a high art. The maxim of 
 courts is that manner is power. A calm and resolute 
 bearing, a polished speech, and embellishment of tri 
 fles, and the art of hiding all uncomfortable feeling, 
 are essential to the courtier, and Saint Simon, and 
 Cardinal de Retz, and Roederer, and an encyclopedia 
 of Memoires will instruct you, if you wish, in those 
 potent secrets. Thus, it is a point of pride with kings 
 to remember faces and names. It is reported of one 
 prince, that his head had the air of leaning down 
 wards, in order not to humble the crowd. There are 
 people who come in ever like a child with a piece of 
 good news. It was said of the late Lord Holland, 
 that he always came down to breakfast with the air 
 of a man who had just met with some signal good for 
 tune. In Notre Dame the grandee took his place 
 on the dais, with the look of one who is thinking of 
 something else. But we must not peep and eavesdrop 
 at palace-doors. 
 
 Fine manners need the support of fine manners in 
 others. A scholar may be a well-bred man, or he may 
 not. The enthusiast is introduced to polished scholars 
 in society, and is chilled and silenced by finding him 
 self not in their element. They all have somewhat 
 which he has not, and, it seems, ought to have. But 
 if he finds the scholar apart from his companions, it 
 is then the enthusiast's turn, and the scholar has no 
 defence, but must deal on his terms. Now they must
 
 BEHA VIOR. 381 
 
 fight the battle out on their private strength. What 
 is the talent of that character so common, the suc 
 cessful man of the world, in all marts, senates, and 
 drawing-rooms ? Manners : manners of power ; sense 
 to see his advantage, and manners up to it. See him 
 approach his man. He knows that troops behave as 
 they are handled at first ; that is his cheap secret ;., 
 just what happens to every two persons who meet on 
 any affair, one instantly perceives that he has the key 
 of the situation, that his will comprehends the other's 
 will, as the cat does the mouse, and he has only to use 
 courtesy, and furnish good-natured reasons to his vic 
 tim to cover up the chain, lest he be shamed into re 
 sistance. 
 
 The theatre in which this science of manners has a 
 formal importance is not with us a court, but dress- 
 circles, wherein, after the close of the day's business, 
 men and women meet at leisure, for mutual entertain 
 ment, in ornamented drawing-rooms. Of course, it 
 has every variety of attraction and merit ; but, to 
 earnest persons, to youths or maidens who have great 
 objects at heart, we cannot extol it highly. A well- 
 dressed, talkative company, where each is bent to 
 amuse the other, yet the high-born Turk who came 
 hither fancied that every woman seemed to be suffer 
 ing for a chair ; that all talkers were brained and ex 
 hausted by the de-oxygenated air ; it spoiled the best 
 persons : it put all on stilts. Yet here are the secret 
 biographies written and read. The aspect of that 
 man is repulsive ; I do not wish to deal with him. 
 The other is irritable, shy, and on his guard. The 
 youth looks humble and manly : I choose him. Look 
 on this woman. There is not beauty, nor brilliant say 
 ings, nor distinguished power to serve you ; but all see
 
 382 RALPH WALDO EMERSON. 
 
 her gladly ; her whole air and impression are health 
 ful. Here coine the sentimentalists, and the invalids. 
 Here is Elise, who caught cold in coming into the 
 world, and has always increased it since. Here are 
 creep-mouse manners ; and thievish manners. " Look 
 at Northcote," said Fuseli ; " he looks like a rat that 
 has seen a cat." In the shallow company, easily ex 
 cited, easily tired, here is the columnar Bernard : the 
 Alleghanies do not express more repose than his be 
 havior. Here are the sweet, following eyes of Cecile : 
 it seemed always that she demanded the heart. No 
 thing can be more excellent in kind than the Corin 
 thian grace of Gertrude's manners, and yet Blanche, 
 who has no manners, has better manners than she ; 
 for the movements of Blanche are the sallies of a 
 spirit which is sufficient for the moment, and she can 
 afford to express every thought by instant action. 
 
 Manners have been somewhat cynically defined to 
 be a contrivance of wise men to keep fools at a dis 
 tance. Fashion is shrewd to detect those who do not 
 belong to her train, and seldom wastes her attentions. 
 Society is very swift in its instincts, and, if you do not 
 belong to it, resists and sneers at you ; or quietly 
 drops you. The first weapon enrages the party at 
 tacked ; the second is still more effective, but is not 
 to be resisted, as the date of the transaction is not 
 easily found. People grow up and grow old under 
 this infliction, and never suspect the truth, ascribing 
 the solitude which acts on them very injuriously to 
 any cause but the right one. 
 
 The basis of good manners is self-reliance. Neces 
 sity is the law of all who are not self-possessed. Those 
 who are not self-possessed obtrude and pain us. Some 
 men appear to feel that they belong to a Pariah caste.
 
 BEHA VIOR. 383 
 
 They fear to offend, they bend and apologize, and 
 walk through life with a timid step. 
 
 As we sometimes dream that we are in a well- 
 dressed company without any coat, so Godfrey acts 
 ever as if he suffered from some mortifying circum 
 stance. The hero should find himself at home, wher 
 ever he is ; should impart comfort by his own security 
 and good-nature to all beholders. The hero is suffered 
 to be himself. A person of strong mind comes to per 
 ceive that for him an immunity is secured so long as 
 he renders to society that service which is native and 
 proper to him, an immunity from all the observ 
 ances, yea, and duties, which society so tyrannically im 
 poses on the rank and file of its members. " Euripi 
 des," says Aspasia, " has not the fine manners of 
 Sophocles : " but," she adds, good-humoredly, " the 
 movers and masters of our souls have surely a right 
 to throw out their limbs as carelessly as they please on 
 the world that belongs to them, and before the crea 
 tures they have animated." l 
 
 Manners require time, as nothing is more vulgar 
 than haste. Friendship should be surrounded with 
 ceremonies and respects, and not crushed into corners. 
 Friendship requires more time than poor busy men 
 can usually command. Here comes to me Roland, 
 with a delicacy of sentiment leading and inwrapping 
 him like a divine cloud or holy ghost. 'T is a great 
 destitution to both that this should not be entertained 
 with large leisures, but contrariwise should be balked 
 by importunate affairs. 
 
 But through this lustrous varnish, the reality is ever 
 shining. 'T is hard to keep the what from breaking 
 through this pretty painting of the how. The core 
 1 Laiidor, Pericles and Aspasia.
 
 384 RALPH WALDO EMERSON. 
 
 will come to the surface. Strong will and keen per- 
 ception overpower old manners, and create new ; and 
 the thought of the present moment has a greater value 
 than all the past. In persons of character we do not 
 remark manners, because of their instantaneousness. 
 We are surprised by the thing done, out of all power 
 to watch the way of it. Yet nothing is more charming 
 than to recognize the great style which runs through 
 the action of such. People masquerade before us in 
 their fortunes, titles, offices, and connections, as aca 
 demic or civil presidents, or senators, or professors, or 
 great lawyers, and impose on the frivolous, and a good 
 deal on each other, by these fames. At least, it is a 
 point of prudent good manners to treat these reputa 
 tions tenderly, as if they were merited. But the sad 
 realist knows these fellows at a glance, and they know 
 him ; as when in Paris the chief of the police enters a 
 ball-room, so many diamonded pretenders shrink and 
 make themselves as inconspicuous as they can, or give 
 him a supplicating look as they pass. " I had re 
 ceived," said a sibyl, "I had received at birth the 
 fatal gift of penetration ; " and these Cassandras are 
 always born. 
 
 Manners impress as they indicate real power. A 
 man who is sure of his point carries a broad and con 
 tented expression, which everybody reads. And you 
 cannot rightly train one to an air and manner except 
 by making him the kind of man of whom that manner 
 is the natural expression. Nature forever puts a pre 
 mium on reality. What is done for effect is seen to 
 be done for effect ; what is done for love is felt to be 
 done for love. A man inspires affection and honor, 
 because he was not lying in wait for these. The 
 things of a man for which we visit him, were done in
 
 BEHA VIOR. 385 
 
 the dark and the cold. A little integrity is better 
 than any career. So deep are the sources of this sur 
 face-action, that even the size of your companion seems 
 to vary with his freedom of thought. Not only is he 
 larger, when at ease, and his thoughts generous, but 
 everything around him becomes variable with expres 
 sion. No carpenter's rule, no rod and chain, will 
 measure the dimensions of any house or house-lot : go 
 into the house : if the proprietor is constrained and 
 deferring, 't is of no importance how large his house, 
 how beautiful his grounds, you quickly come to the 
 end of all ; but if the man is self-possessed, happy, and 
 at home, his house is deep-founded, indefinitely Large 
 and interesting, the roof and dome buoyant as the sky. 
 Under the humblest roof, the commonest person in 
 plain clothes sits there massive, cheerful, yet formi 
 dable like the Egyptian colossi. 
 
 Neither Aristotle, nor Leibnitz, nor Junius, nor 
 Champollion has set down the grammar-rules of this 
 dialect, older than Sanscrit ; but they who cannot yet 
 read English, can read this. Men take each other's 
 measure, when they meet for the first time, and 
 every time they meet. How do they get this rapid 
 knowledge, even before they speak, of each other's 
 power and dispositions ? One would say that the per 
 suasion of their speech is not in what they say, or, 
 that men do not convince by their argument, but by 
 their personality, by who they are, and what they said 
 and did heretofore. A man already strong is listened 
 to, and everything he says is applauded. Another 
 opposes him with sound argument, but the argument 
 is scouted, until by and by it gets into the mind of 
 some weighty person ; then it begins to tell on the 
 community.
 
 386 RALPH WALDO EMERSON. 
 
 Self-reliance is the basis of behavior, as it is the 
 guaranty that the powers are not squandered in too 
 much demonstration. In this country, where school 
 education is universal, we have a superficial culture, 
 and a profusion of reading and writing and expres 
 sion. We parade our nobilities in poems and ora 
 tions, instead of working them up into happiness,, 
 There is a whisper out of the ages to him who can 
 understand it, " Whatever is known to thyself 
 alone has always very great value." There is some 
 reason to believe that, when a man does not write his 
 poetry, it escapes by other vents through him, instead 
 of the one vent of writing; clings to his form and 
 manners, whilst poets have often nothing poetical 
 about them except their verses. Jacobi said, that 
 " when a man has fully expressed his thought, he has 
 somewhat less possession of it." One would say, the 
 rule is, What a man is irresistibly urged to say, 
 helps him and us. In explaining his thought to others, 
 he explains it to himself : but when he opens it for 
 show, it corrupts him. 
 
 Society is the stage on which manners are shown ; 
 novels are their literature. Novels are the journal or 
 record of manners ; and the new importance of these 
 books derives from the fact that the novelist begins to 
 penetrate the surface, and treat this part of life more 
 worthily. The novels used to be all alike, and had 
 a quite vulgar tone. The novels used to lead us on to 
 a foolish interest in the fortunes of the boy and girl 
 they described. The boy was to be raised from a 
 humble to a high position. He was in want of a wife 
 and a castle, and the object of the story was to supply 
 him with one or both. We watched sympathetically, 
 step by step, his climbing, until, at last, the point is
 
 BEHA VIOR. 387 
 
 gained, the wedding day is fixed, and we follow the 
 gala procession home to the bannered portal, when the 
 doors are slammed in our face, and the poor reader is 
 left outside in the cold, not enriched by so much as an 
 idea, or a virtuous impulse. 
 
 But the victories of character are instant, and vic 
 tories for all. Its greatness enlarges all. We are 
 fortified by every heroic anecdote. The novels are as 
 useful as Bibles, if they teach you the secret, that the 
 best of life is conversation, and the greatest success is 
 confidence, or perfect understanding between sincere 
 people. 'T is a French definition of friendship, rien 
 que s^entendre, good understanding. The highest 
 compact we can make with our fellow is, " Let there 
 be truth between us two for evermore." That is the 
 charm in all good novels, as it is the charm in all good 
 histories, that the heroes mutually understand, from 
 the first, and deal loyally and with a profound trust in 
 each other. It is sublime to feel and say of another, 
 I need never meet, or speak, or write to him : we need 
 not reinforce ourselves, or send tokens of remem 
 brance : I rely on him as on myself : if he did thus, or 
 thus, I know it was right. 
 
 In all the superior people I have met, I notice di 
 rectness, truth spoken more truly, as if everything of 
 obstruction, of malformation, had been trained away. 
 What have they to conceal ? What have they to ex 
 hibit ? Between simple and noble persons there is al 
 ways a quick intelligence : they recognize at sight, and 
 meet on a better ground than the talents and skills 
 they may chance to possess, namely, on sincerity and 
 uprightness. For, it is not what talents or genius 
 a man has, but how he is to his talents, that consti 
 tutes friendship and character. The man that stands
 
 388 RALPH WALDO EMERSON. 
 
 by himself, the universe stands by him also. It is re 
 lated of the monk Basle, that, being excommunicated 
 by the Pope, he was, at his death, sent in charge of an 
 angel to find a fit place of suffering in hell ; but such 
 was the eloquence and good-humor of the monk, that 
 wherever he went he was received gladly, and civilly 
 treated, even by the most uncivil angels : and when 
 he came to discourse with them, instead of contradict 
 ing or forcing him, they took his part, and adopted 
 his manners ; and even good angels came from far, to 
 see him, and take up their abode with him. The an 
 gel that was sent to find a place of torment for him 
 attempted to remove him to a worse pit, but with no 
 better success ; for such was the contented spirit of 
 the monk, that he found something to praise in every 
 place and company, though in hell, and made a kind 
 of heaven of it. At last the escorting angel returned 
 with his prisoner to them that sent him, saying that 
 no phlegethon could be found that would burn him ; 
 for that in whatever condition, Basle remained incor 
 rigibly Basle. The legend says, his sentence was re 
 mitted, and he was allowed to go into heaven, and 
 was canonized as a saint. 
 
 There is a stroke of magnanimity in the correspond 
 ence of Bonaparte with his brother Joseph, when the 
 latter was King of Spain, and complained that he 
 missed 'in Napoleon's letters the affectionate tone 
 which had marked their childish correspondence. " I 
 am sorry," replies Napoleon, "you think you shall 
 find your brother again only in the Elysian Fields. 
 It is natural that at forty he should not feel towards 
 you as he did at twelve. But his feelings towards you 
 have greater truth and strength. His friendship has 
 the features of his mind."
 
 BEHA VIOR. 389 
 
 How much we forgive in those who yield us the 
 rare spectacle of heroic manners ! We will pardon 
 them the want of books, of arts, and even of the gen 
 tler virtues. How tenaciously we remember them ! 
 Here is a lesson which I brought along with me in 
 boyhood from the Latin School, and which ranks with 
 the best of Roman anecdotes. Marcus Scaurus was 
 accused by Quintus Varius Hispanus, that he had ex 
 cited the allies to take arms against the Republic. 
 But he, full of firmness and gravity, defended himself 
 in this manner : " Quintus Varius Hispanus alleges 
 that Marcus Scaurus, President of the Senate, excited 
 the allies to arms : Marcus Scaurus, President of the 
 Senate, denies it. There is no witness. Which do 
 you believe, Romans ? " " Utri creditis, Quirites ? " 
 When he had said these words, he was absolved by 
 the assembly of the people. 
 
 I have seen manners that make a similar impression 
 with personal beauty ; that give the like exhilaration, 
 and refine us like that ; and, in memorable experi 
 ences, they are suddenly better than beauty, and make 
 that superfluous and ugly. But they must be marked 
 by fine perception, the acquaintance with real beauty. 
 They must always show self-control : you shall not be 
 facile, apologetic, or leaky, but king over your word ; 
 and every gesture and action shall indicate power at 
 rest. Then they must be inspired by the good heart. 
 There is no beautifier of complexion, or form, or be- 
 liavior, like the wish to scatter joy and not pain 
 around us. 'T is good to give a stranger a meal, or a 
 night's lodging. 'T is better to be hospitable to his 
 good meaning and thought, and give courage to a 
 companion. We must be as courteous to a man as 
 we are to a picture, which we are willing to give the
 
 390 RALPH WALDO EMERSON. 
 
 advantage of a good light. Special precepts are not 
 to be thought of: the talent of well-doing contains 
 them all. Every hour will show a duty as paramount 
 as that of my whim just now ; and yet I will write it, 
 that there is one topic peremptorily forbidden to 
 all well-bred, to all rational mortals, namely, their 
 distempers. If you have not slept, or if you have 
 slept, or if you have headache, or sciatica, or leprosy, 
 or thunder-stroke, I beseech you, by all angels, to hold 
 your peace, and not pollute the morning, to which all 
 the housemates bring serene and pleasant thoughts, by 
 corruption and groans. Come out of the azure. 
 Love the day. Do not leave the sky out of your land 
 scape. The oldest and the most deserving person 
 should come very modestly into any newly awaked 
 company, respecting the divine communications, out of 
 which all must be presumed to have newly come. An 
 old man, who added an elevating culture to a large 
 experience of life, said to me : " When you come into 
 the room, I think I will study how to make humanity 
 beautiful to you." 
 
 As respects the delicate question of culture, I do 
 not think that any other than negative rules can be 
 laid down. For pqsitive rules, for suggestion, Nature 
 alone inspires it. Who dare assume to guide a youth, 
 a maid, to perfect manners ? the golden mean is so 
 delicate, difficult, say frankly, unattainable. What 
 finest hands would not be clumsy to sketch the genial 
 precepts of the young girl's demeanor ? The chances 
 seem infinite against success ; and yet success is con 
 tinually attained. There must not be secondariness, 
 and 't is a thousand to one that her air and manner 
 will at once betray that she is not primary, but that 
 there is some other one or many of her class, to whom
 
 BOOKS. 391 
 
 she habitually postpones herself. But Nature lifts 
 her easily, and without knowing it, over these impos 
 sibilities, and we are continually surprised with graces 
 and felicities not only unteachable, but undescribable. 
 
 II. 
 
 BOOKS. 
 
 IT is easy to accuse books, and bad ones are easily 
 found ; and the best are but records, and not the 
 things recorded ; and certainly there is dilettanteism 
 enough, and books that are merely neutral and do 
 nothing for us. In Plato's " Gorgias," Socrates 
 says : " The shipmaster walks in a modest garb near 
 the sea, after bringing his passengers from ^gina or 
 from Pontus, not thinking he has done anything ex 
 traordinary, and certainly knowing that his passengers 
 are the same, and in no respect better than when he 
 took them on board." So it is with books, for the 
 most part ; they work no redemption in us. The 
 bookseller might certainly know that his customers 
 are in no respect better for the purchase and con 
 sumption of his wares. The volume is dear at a dol 
 lar, and, after reading to weariness the lettered backs, 
 we leave the shop with a sigh, and learn, as I did, 
 without surprise, of a surly bank director, that in 
 bank parlors they estimate all stocks of this kind as 
 rubbish. 
 
 But it is not less true that there are books which 
 are of that importance in a man's private experience, 
 as to verify for him the fables of Cornelius Agrippa, 
 of Michael Scott, or of the old Orpheus of Thrace,
 
 892 RALPH WALDO EMERSON. 
 
 books which take rank in our life with parents and 
 lovers and passionate experiences, so medicinal, so 
 stringent, so revolutionary, so authoritative, books 
 which are the work and the proof of faculties so com 
 prehensive, so nearly equal to the world which they 
 paint, that, though one shuts them with meaner ones, 
 he feels his exclusion from them to accuse his way of 
 living. 
 
 Consider what you have in the smallest chosen 
 library. A company of the wisest and wittiest men 
 that could be picked out of all countries, in a thou 
 sand years, have set in best order the results of their 
 learning and wisdom. The men themselves were hid 
 and inaccessible, solitary, impatient of interruption, 
 fenced by etiquette ; but the thought which they did 
 not uncover to their bosom friend is here written out 
 in transparent words to us, the strangers of another 
 age. 
 
 We owe to books those general benefits which come 
 from high intellectual action. Thus, I think, we often 
 owe to them the perception of immortality. They 
 impart sympathetic activity to the moral power. Go 
 with mean people, and you think life is mean. Then 
 read Plutarch, and the world is a proud place, peopled 
 with men of positive quality, with heroes and demi 
 gods standing around us, who will not let us sleep. 
 Then, they address the imagination : only poetry 
 inspires poetry. They become the organic culture of 
 the time. College education is the reading of certain 
 books which the common-sense of all scholars agrees 
 will represent the science already accumulated. If 
 you know that, for instance in geometry, if you 
 have read Euclid and Laplace, your opinion has 
 some value ; if you do not know these, you are not
 
 BOOKS. 393 
 
 entitled to give any opinion on the subject. When 
 ever any sceptic or bigot claims to be heard on the 
 questions of intellect and morals, we ask if he is famil 
 iar with the books of Plato, where all his pert objec 
 tions have once for all been disposed of. If not, he 
 has no right to our time. Let him go and find him 
 self answered there. 
 
 Meantime the colleges, whilst they provide us with 
 libraries, furnish no professor of books ; and, I think, 
 no chair is so much wanted. In a library we are sur 
 rounded by many hundreds of dear friends, but they 
 are imprisoned by an enchanter in these paper and 
 leathern boxes ; and, though they know us, and have 
 been waiting two, ten, or twenty centuries for us, 
 some of them, and are eager to give us a sign, and 
 unbosom themselves, it is the law of their limbo that 
 they must not speak until spoken to ; and as the 
 enchanter has dressed them, like battalions of infan 
 try, in coat and jacket of one cut, by the thousand 
 and ten thousand, your chance of hitting on the right 
 one is to be computed by the arithmetical rule of Per 
 mutation and Combination, not a choice out of 
 three caskets, but out of half a million caskets all 
 alike. But it happens in our experience, that in this 
 lottery there are at least fifty or a hundred blanks to 
 a prize. It seems, then, as if some charitable soul, 
 after losing a great deal of time among the false 
 books, and alighting upon a few true ones which made 
 him happy and wise, would do a right act in naming 
 those which have been bridges or ships to carry him 
 safely over dark morasses and barren oceans, into the 
 heart of sacred cities, into palaces and temples. This 
 would be best done by those great masters of books 
 who from time to time appear, the Fabricii, the
 
 394 RALPH WALDO EMERSON. 
 
 Seldens, Magliabecchis, Scaligers, Mirandolas, Bayles, 
 Johnsons, whose eyes sweep the whole horizon of learn 
 ing. But private readers, reading purely for love of 
 the book, would serve us by leaving each the shortest 
 note of what he found. 
 
 There are books ; and it is practicable to read them, 
 because they are so few. We look over with a sigh 
 the monumental libraries of Paris, of the Vatican, and 
 the British Museum. In 1858, the number of printed 
 books in the Imperial Library at Paris was estimated 
 at eight hundred thousand volumes; with an annual 
 increase of twelve thousand volumes ; so that the 
 number of printed books extant to-day may easily 
 exceed a million. It is easy to count the number of 
 pages which a diligent man can read in a day, and 
 the number of years which human life in favorable 
 circumstances allows to reading ; and to demonstrate 
 that, though he should read from dawn till dark, for 
 sixty years, he must die in the first alcoves. But 
 nothing can be more deceptive than this arithmetic, 
 where none but a natural method is really pertinent. 
 I visit occasionally the Cambridge Library, and I can 
 seldom go there without renewing the conviction that 
 the best of it all is already within the four walls of 
 my study at home. The inspection of the catalogue 
 brings me continually back to the few standard writ 
 ers who are on every private shelf ; and to these it 
 can afford only the most slight and casual additions. 
 The crowds and centuries of books are only commen 
 tary and elucidation, echoes and weakeners of these 
 few great voices of Time. 
 
 The best rule of reading will be a method from 
 nature, and not a mechanical one of hours and pages. 
 It holds each student to a pursuit of his native aim,
 
 BOOKS. 395 
 
 instead of desultory miscellany. Let him read what 
 is proper to him, and not waste his memory on a 
 crowd of mediocrities. As whole nations have derived 
 their culture from a single book, as the Bible has 
 been the literature as well as the religion of large por 
 tions of Europe, as Hafiz was the eminent genius 
 of the Persians, Confucius of the Chinese, Cervantes 
 of the Spaniards ; so, perhaps, the human mind would 
 be a gainer, if all the secondary writers were lost, 
 say, in England, all but Shakespeare, Milton, and 
 Bacon, through the prof ounder study so drawn to 
 those wonderful minds. With this pilot of his own 
 genius, let the student read one, or let him read many, 
 he will read advantageously. Dr. Johnson said; 
 " Whilst you stand deliberating which book your son 
 shall read first, another boy has read both; read 
 anything five hours a day, and you will soon be 
 learned." 
 
 Nature is much our friend in this matter. Nature 
 is always clarifying her water and her wine. No fil 
 tration can be so perfect. She does the same thing 
 by books as by her gases and plants. There is always 
 a selection in writers, and then a selection from the 
 selection. In the first place, all books that get fairly 
 into the vital air of the world were written by the 
 successful class, by the affirming and advancing class, 
 who utter what tens of thousands feel though they 
 cannot say. There has already been a scrutiny and 
 choice for many hundreds of young pens, before the 
 pamphlet or political chapter which you read in a 
 fugitive journal comes to your eye. All these are 
 young adventurers, who produce their performance to 
 the wise ear of Time, who sits and weighs, and, ten 
 years hence, out of a million of pages reprints one.
 
 396 RALPH WALDO EMERSON. 
 
 Again it is judged, it is winnowed by all tlie winds of 
 opinion, and what terrific selection has not passed on 
 it before it can be reprinted after twenty years, 
 and reprinted after a century ! it is as if Minos and 
 Rhadamanthus had indorsed the writing. 'T is there 
 fore an economy of time to read old and famed books. 
 Nothing can be preserved which is not good ; and I 
 know beforehand that Pindar, Martial, Terence, Galen, 
 Kepler, Galileo, Bacon, Erasmus, More, will be supe 
 rior to the average intellect. In contemporaries, it is 
 not so easy to distinguish betwixt notoriety and fame. 
 
 Be sure, then, to read no mean books. Shun the 
 spawn of the press or the gossip of the hour. Do not 
 read what you shall learn, without asking, in the 
 street and the train. Dr. Johnson said he " always 
 went into stately shops ; " and good travellers stop at 
 the best hotels ; for, though they cost more, they do 
 not cost much more, and there is the good company 
 and the best information. In like manner, the scholar 
 knows that the famed books contain, first and last, 
 the best thoughts and facts. Now and then, by rarest 
 luck, in some foolish Grub Street is the gem we want. 
 But in the best circles is the best information. If 
 you should transfer the amount of your reading day 
 by day from the newspaper to the standard authors 
 But who dare speak of such a thing ? 
 
 The three practical rules, then, which I have to 
 offer, are, 1. Never read any book that is not a 
 year old. 2. Never read any but famed books. 3. 
 Never read any but what you like ; or, in Shakes 
 peare's phrase, 
 
 " No profit goes where is no pleasure ta'en : 
 In brief, sir, study what you most affect." 
 
 Montaigne says, " Books are a languid pleasure ; "
 
 BOOKS. 397 
 
 but I find certain books vital and spermatic, not leav 
 ing the reader what he was : he shuts the book a richer 
 man. I would never willingly read any others than 
 such. And I will venture, at the risk of inditing a 
 list of old primers and grammars, to count the few 
 books which a superficial reader must thankfully use. 
 Of the old Greek books, I think there are five 
 which we cannot spare : 1. Homer, who, in spite of 
 Pope and all the learned uproar of centuries, has 
 really the true fire, and is good for simple minds, is 
 the true and adequate germ of Greece, and occupies 
 that place as history, which nothing can supply. It 
 holds through all literature, that our best history is 
 still poetry. It is so in Hebrew, in Sanscrit, and 
 in Greek. English history is best known through 
 Shakespeare ; how much through Merlin, Robin Hood, 
 and the Scottish ballads ! the German, through the 
 Nibelungenlied, the Spanish, through the Cid. Of 
 Homer, George Chapman's is the heroic translation, 
 though the most literal prose version is the best of all. 
 2. Herodotus, whose history contains inestimable an 
 ecdotes, which brought it with the learned into a sort 
 of disesteem ; but in these days, when it is found that 
 what is most memorable of history is a few anecdotes, 
 and that we need not be alarmed though we should 
 find it not dull, it is regaining credit. 3. ^Esehylus, 
 the grandest of the three tragedians, who has given 
 us under a thin veil the first plantation of Europe. 
 The " Prometheus " is a poem of the like dignity and 
 scope as the Book of Job, or the Norse Edda. 4. Of 
 Plato I hesitate to speak, lest there should be no end. 
 You find in him that which you have already found in 
 Homer, now ripened to thought, the poet converted 
 to a philosopher, with loftier strains of musical wis-
 
 398 RALPH WALDO EMERSON. 
 
 dom than Homer reached ; as if Homer were the 
 youth, and Plato the finished man ; yet with no less 
 security of bold and perfect song, when he cares to 
 use it, and with some harp-strings fetched from a 
 higher heaven. He contains the future, as he came 
 out of the past. In Plato, you explore modern Eu 
 rope in its causes and seed, all that in thought, 
 which the history of Europe embodies or has yet to 
 embody. The well-informed man finds himself anti 
 cipated. Plato is up with him too. Nothing has es 
 caped him. Every new crop in the fertile harvest of 
 reform, every fresh suggestion of modern humanity, is 
 there. If the student wish to see both sides, and jus 
 tice done to the man of the world, pitiless exposure of 
 pedants, and the supremacy of truth and the religious 
 sentiment, he shall be contented also. Why should 
 not young men be educated on this book ? It would 
 suffice for the tuition of the race, to test their un 
 derstanding, and to express their reason. Here is 
 that which is so attractive to all men, the literature 
 of aristocracy, shall I call it ? the picture of the 
 best persons, sentiments, and manners, by the first 
 master, in the best times, portraits of Pericles, 
 Alcibiades, Crito, Prodicus, Protagoras, Anaxagoras, 
 and Socrates, with the lovely background of the Athe 
 nian and suburban landscape. Or who can overesti 
 mate the images with which Plato has enriched the 
 minds of men, and which pass like bullion in the cur 
 rency of all nations ? Read the " Phffido," the " Pro 
 tagoras," the " Phaedrus," the " Tiinams," the " Re 
 public," and the " Apology of Socrates." 5. Plu 
 tarch cannot be spared from the smallest library ; 
 first, because he is so readable, which is much ; then, 
 that he is medicinal and invigorating. The lives of
 
 BOOKS. 399 
 
 Cimon, Lycurgus, Alexander, Demosthenes, Phocion, 
 Marcellus, and the rest, are what history has of best. 
 But this book has taken care of itself, and the opinion 
 of the world is expressed in the innumerable cheap 
 editions, which make it as accessible as a newspaper. 
 But Plutarch's " Morals " is less known, and seldom 
 reprinted. 1 Yet such a reader as I am writing to can 
 as ill spare it as the " Lives." He will read in it the 
 essays " On the Daemon of Socrates," " On Isis and 
 Osiris," " On Progress in Virtue," " On Garrulity," 
 " On Love," and thank anew the art of printing, and 
 the cheerful domain of ancient thinking. Plutarch 
 charms by the facility of his associations ; so that it 
 signifies little where you open his book, you find your 
 self at the Olympian tables. His memory is like the 
 Isthmian Games, where all that was excellent in 
 Greece was assembled, and you are stimulated and 
 recruited by lyric verses, by philosophic sentiments, 
 by the forms and behavior of heroes, by the worship 
 of the gods, and by the passing of fillets, parsley and 
 laurel wreaths, chariots, armor, sacred cups, and uten 
 sils of sacrifice. An inestimable trilogy of ancient 
 social pictures are the three " Banquets " respectively 
 of Plato, Xenophon, and Plutarch. Plutarch's has 
 the least approach to historical accuracy ; but the 
 meeting of the Seven Wise Masters is a charming 
 portraiture of ancient manners and discourse, and is 
 as clear as the voice of a fife, and entertaining as a 
 French novel. Xenophon's delineation of Athenian 
 manners is an accessory to Plato, and supplies traits 
 of Socrates ; whilst Plato's has merits of every kind, 
 
 1 After the first publication of this essay the book was issued 
 under the editorship of Professor Goodwin of Harvard, and 
 with an introduction by Mr. Emerson.
 
 400 RALPH WALDO EMERSON. 
 
 being a repertory of the wisdom of the ancients on 
 the subject of love, a picture of a feast of wits, not 
 less descriptive than Aristophanes, and, lastly, con 
 taining that ironical eulogy of Socrates which is the 
 source from which all the portraits of that philoso 
 pher current in Europe have been drawn. 
 
 Of course a certain outline should be obtained of 
 Greek history, in which the important moments and 
 persons can be rightly set down ; but the shortest is 
 the best, and if one lacks stomach for Mr. Grote's vo 
 luminous annals, the old slight and popular summary 
 of Goldsmith or of Gillies will serve. The valuable 
 part is the age of Pericles and the next generation. 
 And here we must read the " Clouds " of Aristopha 
 nes, and what more of that master we gain appetite 
 for, to learn our way in the streets of Athens, and 
 to know the tyranny of Aristophanes, requiring more 
 genius and sometimes not less cruelty than belonged 
 to the official commanders. Aristophanes is now very 
 accessible, with much valuable commentary, through 
 the labors of Mitchell and Cartwright. An excellent 
 popular book is J. A. St. John's " Ancient Greece ; " 
 the " Life and Letters " of Niebuhr, even more than 
 his Lectures, furnishes leading views ; and Winckel- 
 mann, a Greek born out of due time, has become 
 essential to an intimate knowledge of the Attic 
 genius. The secret of the recent histories in German 
 and in English is the discovery, owed first to Wolff, 
 and later to Boeckh, that the sincere Greek history of 
 that period must be drawn from Demosthenes, espe 
 cially from the business orations, and from the comic 
 poets. 
 
 If we come down a little by natural steps from the 
 master to the disciples, we have, six or seven centuries
 
 BOOKS. 401 
 
 later, the Platonists, who also cannot be skipped, 
 Plotinus, Porphyry, Proclus, Synesius, Jamblichus. 
 Of Jamblichus the Emperor Julian said that " he was 
 posterior to Plato in time, not in genius." Of Ploti 
 nus, we have eulogies by Porphyry and Longinus, and 
 the favor of the Emperor Gallienus, indicating the 
 respect he inspired among his contemporaries. If any 
 one who had read with interest the " Isis and Osiris " 
 of Plutarch should then read a chapter called " Provi 
 dence," by Synesius, translated into English by Thomas 
 Taylor, he will find it one of the majestic remains of 
 literature, and, like one walking in the noblest of tem 
 ples, will conceive new gratitude to his fellow-men, and 
 a new estimate of their nobility. The imaginative 
 scholar will find few stimalants to his brain like these 
 writers. He has entered the Elysian Fields ; and the 
 grand and pleasing figures of gods and demons and 
 demoniacal men, of the " azonic " and the " aquatic 
 gods," demons with fulgid eyes and all the rest of the 
 Platonic rhetoric, exalted a little under the African 
 sun, sail before his eyes. The acolyte has mounted 
 the tripod over the cave at Delphi ; his heart dances, 
 his sight is quickened. These guides speak of the 
 gods with such depth and with such pictorial details, 
 as if they had been bodily present at the Olympian 
 feasts. The reader of these books makes new acquain 
 tance with his own mind ; new regions of thought are 
 opened. Jamblichus's " Life of Pythagoras " works 
 more directly on the will than others ; since Pytha 
 goras was eminently a practical person, the founder of 
 a school of ascetics and socialists, a planter of colo 
 nies, and nowise a man of abstract studies alone. 
 
 The respectable and sometimes excellent transla 
 tions of Bohii's Library have done for literature what
 
 402 RALPH WALDO EMERSON. 
 
 railroads have done for internal intercourse. I do not 
 hesitate to read all the books I have named, and all 
 good books, in translations. What is really best in 
 any book is translatable, any real insight or broad 
 human sentiment. Nay, I observe that, in our Bible, 
 and other books of lofty moral tone, it seems easy and* 
 inevitable to render the rhythm and music of the ori 
 ginal into phrases of equal melody. The Italians 
 have a fling at translators, i traditori traduttori; 
 but I thank them. I rarely read any Latin, Greek, 
 German, Italian, sometimes not a French book in the 
 original, which I can procure in a good version. I 
 like to be beholden to the great metropolitan English 
 speech, the sea which receives tributaries from every 
 region under heaven. I should as soon think of swim 
 ming across Charles River when I wish to go to Bos 
 ton, as of reading all my books in originals, when I 
 have them rendered for me in my mother tongue. 
 
 For history there is great choice of ways to bring 
 the student through early Rome. If he can read 
 Livy, he has a good book ; but one of the short Eng 
 lish compeuds, some Goldsmith or Ferguson, should 
 be used, that will place in the cycle the bright stars 
 of Plutarch. The poet Horace is the eye of the Au 
 gustan age; Tacitus, the wisest of historians; and 
 Martial will give him Roman manners, and some 
 very bad ones, in the early days of the Empire ; 
 but Martial must be read, if read at all, in his own 
 tongue. These will bring him to Gibbon, who will 
 take him in charge, and convey him with abundant 
 entertainment down with notice of all remarkable 
 objects on the way through fourteen hundred years 
 of time. He cannot spare Gibbon, with his vast read 
 ing, with such wit and continuity of mind, that,
 
 BOOKS. 403 
 
 though never profound, his book is one of the conven 
 iences of civilization, like the new railroad from ocean 
 to ocean, and, I think, will be sure to send the 
 reader to his " Memoirs of Himself," and the " Ex 
 tracts from my Journal," and " Abstracts of my Read 
 ings," which will spur the laziest scholar to emulation 
 of his prodigious performance. 
 
 Now having our idler safe down as far as the fall 
 of Constantinople in 1453, he is in very good courses : 
 for here are trusty hands waiting for him. The cardi 
 nal facts of European history are soon learned. There 
 is Dante's poem, to open the Italian Republics of the 
 Middle Age; Dante's "Vita Nuova,"to explain Dante 
 and Beatrice ; and Boccaccio's " Life of Dante," 
 a great man to describe a greater. To help us, 
 perhaps a volume or two of M. Sismondi's " Italian 
 Republics" will be as good as the entire sixteen. 
 When we come to Michel Angelo, his Sonnets and 
 Letters must be read, with his Life by Vasari, or, in 
 our day, by Herman Grimm. For the Church, and 
 the Feudal Institution, Mr. Hallam's " Middle Ages " 
 will furnish, if superficial, yet readable and conceiv 
 able outlines. 
 
 The " Life of the Emperor Charles V.," by the use 
 ful Robertson, is still the key of the following age. 
 Ximenes, Columbus, Loyola, Luther, Erasmus, Me- 
 lanchthon, Francis I., Henry VIII., Elizabeth, and 
 Henry IV. of France, are his contemporaries. It is a 
 time of seeds and expansions, whereof our recent civi 
 lization is the fruit. 
 
 If now the relations of England to European affairs 
 bring him to British ground, he is arrived at the very 
 moment when modern history takes ,new proportions. 
 He can look back for the legends and mythology to
 
 404 RALPH WALDO EMERSON. 
 
 the " Younger Edda " and the " Heimskringla " of 
 Siiorro Sturleson, to Mallet's " Northern Antiquities," 
 to Ellis's " Metrical Romances," to Asser's " Life of 
 Alfred " and Venerable Bede, and to the researches of 
 Sharon Turner and Palgrave. Hume will serve him 
 for an intelligent guide, and in the Elizabethan era he 
 is at the richest period of the English mind, with the 
 chief men of action and of thought which that nation 
 has produced, and with a pregnant future before him. 
 Here he has Shakespeare, Spenser, Sidney, Raleigh, 
 Bacon, Chapman, Jonson, Ford, Beaumont and 
 Fletcher, Herbert, Donne, Herrick ; and Milton, Mar- 
 Veil, and Dryden, not long after. 
 
 In reading history, he is to prefer the history of 
 individuals. He will not repent the time he gives to 
 Bacon, not if he read the " Advancement of Learn 
 ing," the " Essays," the " Novuin Organum," the 
 " History of Henry VII.," and then all the " Letters " 
 (especially those to the Earl of Devonshire, explain 
 ing the Essex business), and all but his "Apoph 
 thegms." 
 
 The task is aided by the strong mutual light which 
 these men shed on each other. Thus, the works of 
 Ben Jonson are a sort of hoop to bind all these fine 
 persons together, and to the land to which they belong. 
 He has written verses to or on all his notable contem 
 poraries; and what with so many occasional poems, 
 and the portrait sketches in his " Discoveries," and 
 the gossiping record of his opinions in his conversa 
 tions with Drummond of Hawthornden, he has really 
 illustrated the England of his time, if not to the same 
 extent, yet much in the same way, as Walter Scott 
 has celebrated the persons and places of Scotland. 
 Walton, Chapman, Herrick, and Sir Henry Wotton 
 write also t;o the times.
 
 BOOKS. 405 
 
 Among the best books are certain Autobiographies : 
 as St. Augustine's Confessions ; Benvenuto Cellini's 
 Life ; Montaigne's Essays ; Lord Herbert of Cher- 
 bury's Memoirs ; Memoirs of the Cardinal de Retz ; 
 Rousseau's Confessions ; Linnaeus's Diary ; Gibbon's, 
 Hume's, Franklin's, Burns's, Alfieri's, Goethe's, and 
 Haydon's Autobiographies. 
 
 Another class of books closely allied to these, and 
 of like interest, are those which may be called Table- 
 Talks : of which the best are Saadi's Gulistan ; 
 Luther's Table-Talk ; Aubrey's Lives ; Spence's An 
 ecdotes ; Selden's Table-Talk ; Boswell's Life of 
 Johnson ; Eckermann's Conversations with Goethe ; 
 Coleridge's Table-Talk ; and Hazlitt's Life of North- 
 cote. 
 
 There is a class whose value I should designate as 
 favorites : such as Froissart's Chronicles ; Southey's 
 Chronicle of the Cid ; Cervantes ; Sully's Memoirs ; 
 Rabelais ; Montaigne ; Izaak Walton ; Evelyn ; Sir 
 Thomas Browne ; Aubrey ; Sterne ; Horace Walpole ; 
 Lord Clarendon ; Doctor Johnson ; Burke, shedding 
 floods of light on his times ; Lamb ; Landor ; and De 
 Quincey, a list, of course, that may be easily swelled, 
 as dependent on individual caprice. Many men are 
 as tender and irritable as lovers in reference to these 
 predilections. Indeed, a man's library is a sort of 
 harem, and I observe that tender readers have a 
 great pudency in showing their books to a stranger. 
 
 The annals of bibliography afford many examples 
 of the delirious extent to which book-fancying can go, 
 when the legitimate delight in a book is transferred to 
 a rare edition or to a manuscript. This mania reached 
 its height about the beginning of the present century. 
 For an autograph of Shakespeare one hundred and
 
 406 RALPH WALDO EMERSON. 
 
 fifty-five guineas were given. In May, 1812, the 
 library of the Duke of Roxburgh was sold. The 
 sale lasted forty-two days, we abridge the story 
 from Dibdin, and among the many curiosities was 
 a copy of Boccaccio published by Valdarfer, at Venice, 
 in 1471 ; the only perfect copy of this edition. Among 
 the distinguished company which attended the sale 
 were the Duke of Devonshire, Earl Spencer, and the 
 Duke of Marlborough, then Marquis of Blandford. 
 The bid stood at five hundred guineas. " A thousand 
 guineas," said Earl Spencer. " And ten," added the 
 marquis. You might hear a pin drop. All eyes 
 were bent on the bidders. Now they talked apart, 
 now ate a biscuit, now made a bet, but without the 
 least thought of yielding one to the other. But to 
 pass over some details, the contest proceeded until 
 the marquis said, "Two thousand pounds." The 
 Earl Spencer bethought him like a prudent general 
 of useless bloodshed and waste of powder, and had 
 paused a quarter of a minute, when Lord Althorp 
 with long steps came to his side, as if to bring his 
 father a fresh lance to renew the fight. Father and 
 son whispered together, and Earl Spencer exclaimed, 
 " Two thousand two hundred and fifty pounds ! " An 
 electric shock went through the assembly. " And 
 ten," quietly added the marquis. There ended the 
 strife. Ere Evans let the hammer fall, he paused , 
 the ivory instrument swept the air ; the spectators 
 stood dumb, when the hammer fell. The stroke of 
 its fall sounded on the farthest shores of Italy. The 
 tap of that hammer was heard in the libraries of 
 Rome, Milan, and Venice. Boccaccio stirred in his 
 sleep of five hundred years, and M. Van Praet groped 
 in vain among the royal alcoves in Paris, to detect 
 a copy of the famed Valdarfer Boccaccio.
 
 BOOKS. 407 
 
 Another class I distinguish by the term Vocabula 
 ries. Burton's " Anatomy of Melancholy " is a book of 
 great learning. To read it is like reading in a diction 
 ary. 'T is an inventory to remind us how many classes 
 and species of facts exist, and in observing into what 
 strange and multiplex byways learning has strayed, to 
 infer our opulence. Neither is a dictionary a bad 
 book to read. There is no cant in it, no excess of 
 explanation, and it is full of suggestion, the raw 
 material of possible poems and histories. Nothing is 
 wanting but a little shuffling, sorting, ligature, and 
 cartilage. Out of a hundred examples, Cornelius 
 Agrippa " On the Vanity of Arts and Sciences " is a 
 specimen of that scribatiousness which grew to be the 
 habit of the gluttonous reader of his time. Like the 
 modern Germans, they read a literature while other 
 mortals read a few books. They read voraciously, 
 and must disburden themselves ; so they take any gen 
 eral topic, as, Melancholy, or Praise of Science, or 
 Praise of Folly, and write and quote without method 
 or end. Now and then out of that affluence of their 
 learning comes a fine sentence from Theophrastus, or 
 Seneca, or Boethius, but no high method, no inspiring 
 efflux. But one cannot afford to read for a few sen 
 tences ; they are good only as strings of suggestive 
 words. 
 
 There is another class, more needful to the present 
 age, because the currents of custom run now in an 
 other direction, and leave us dry on this side, I 
 mean the Imaginative. A right metaphysics should 
 do justice to the coordinate powers of Imagination, 
 Insight, Understanding, and Will. Poetry, with its 
 aids of Mythology and Romance, must be well allowed 
 for an imaginative creature. Men are ever lapsing 
 into a beggarly habit, wherein everything that is not
 
 408 RALPH WALDO EMERSON. 
 
 ciphering, that is, which does not serve the tyrannical 
 animal, is hustled out of sight. Our orators and 
 writers are of the same poverty ; and, in this rag-fair, 
 neither the Imagination, the great awakening power, 
 nor the Morals, creative of genius and of men, are 
 addressed. But though orator and poet be of this hun 
 ger party, the capacities remain. We must have sym 
 bols. The child asks you for a story, and is thankful 
 for the poorest. It is not poor to him, but radiant 
 with meaning. The man asks for a novel, that is, 
 asks leave for a few hours to be a poet, and to paint 
 things as they ought to be. The youth asks for 
 a poem. The very dunces wish to go to the theatre. 
 What private heavens can we not open, by yielding 
 to all the suggestion of rich music ! We must have 
 idolatries, mythologies, some swing and verge for 
 the creative power lying coiled and cramped here, 
 driving ardent natures to insanity and crime if it do 
 not find vent. Without the great arts which speak to 
 the sense of beauty, a man seems to me a poor, naked, 
 shivering creature. These are his becoming draperies, 
 which warm and adorn him. Whilst the prudential 
 and economical tone of society starves the imagination, 
 affronted Nature gets such indemnity as she may. 
 The novel is that allowance and frolic the imagination 
 finds. Everything else pins it down, and men flee for 
 redress to Byron, Scott, Disraeli, Dumas, Sand, Bal 
 zac, Dickens, Thackeray, and Reade. Their educa 
 tion is neglected ; but the circulating library and the 
 theatre, as well as the trout-fishing, the Notch Moun 
 tains, the Adirondack country, the tour to Mont Blanc, 
 to the White Hills, and the Ghauts, make such 
 amends as they can. 
 
 The imagination infuses a certain volatility and in-
 
 BOOKS. 409 
 
 toxication. It has a flute which sets the atoms of our 
 frame in a dance, like planets ; and, once so liberated, 
 the whole man reeling drunk to the music, they never 
 quite subside to their old stony state. But what is 
 the imagination ? Only an arm or weapon of the in 
 terior energy ; only the precursor of the reason. 
 And books that treat the old pedantries of the world, 
 our times, places, professions, customs, opinions, his 
 tories, with a certain freedom, and distribute things, 
 not after the usages of America and Europe, but after 
 the laws of right reason, and with as daring a freedom 
 as we use in dreams, put us on our feet again, and 
 enable us to form an original judgment of our duties, 
 and suggest new thoughts for to-morrow. 
 
 " Lucrezia Floriani," " Le Peche de M. Antoine," 
 " Jeanne," and " Consuelo," of George Sand, are 
 great steps from the novel of one termination, which 
 we all read twenty years ago. Yet how far off from 
 life and manners and motives the novel still is ! Life 
 lies about us dumb ; the day, as we know it, has not 
 yet found a tongue. These stories are to the plots of 
 real life what the figures in " La Belle Assemblee," 
 which represent the fashion of the month, are to por 
 traits. But the novel will find the way to our interi 
 ors one day, and will not always be the novel of cos 
 tume merely. I do not think it inoperative now. 
 So much novel-reading cannot leave the young men 
 and maidens untouched ; and doubtless it gives some 
 ideal dignity to the day. The young study noble be 
 havior ; and as the player in " Consuelo " insists that 
 he and his colleagues on the boards have taught 
 princes the fine etiquette and strokes of grace and 
 dignity which they practise with so much effect in 
 their villas and among their dependents, so I often
 
 410 RALPH WALDO EMERSON. 
 
 see traces of the Scotch or the French novel in the 
 courtesy and brilliancy of young midshipmen, colle 
 gians, and clerks. Indeed, when one observes how 
 ill and ugly people make their loves and quarrels, 't is 
 pity they should not read novels a little more, to im 
 port the fine generosities, and the clear, firm conduct, 
 which are as becoming in the unions and separations 
 which love effects under shingle roofs as in palaces 
 and among illustrious personages. 
 
 In novels the most serious questions are beginning 
 to be discussed. What made the popularity of " Jane 
 Eyre," but that a central question was answered in 
 some sort? The question there answered in regard 
 to a vicious marriage will always be treated according 
 to the habit of the party. A person of commanding 
 individualism will answer it as Rochester does, as 
 Cleopatra, as Milton, as George Sand do, magni 
 fying the exception into a rule, dwarfing the world 
 into an exception. A person of less courage, that is, 
 of less constitution, will answer as the heroine does, 
 giving way to fate, to conventionalism, to the ac 
 tual state and doings of men and women. 
 
 For the most part, our novel-reading is a passion for 
 results. We admire parks and high-born beauties, 
 and the homage of drawing-rooms, and parliaments. 
 They make us sceptical, by giving prominence to 
 wealth and social position. 
 
 I remember when some peering eyes of boys discov 
 ered that the oranges hanging on the boughs of an 
 orange-tree in a gay piazza were tied to the twigs by 
 thread. I fear 't is so with the novelist's prosperities. 
 Nature has a magic by which she fits the man to his 
 fortunes, by making them the fruit of his character. 
 But the novelist plucks this event here, and that for-
 
 BOOKS. 411 
 
 tune there, and ties them rashly to his figures, to 
 tickle the fancy of his readers with a cloying success, 
 or scare them with shocks of tragedy. And so, on 
 the whole, 't is a juggle. We are cheated into laugh 
 ter or wonder by feats which only oddly combine acts 
 that we do every day. There is no new element, no 
 power, no furtherance. 'T is only confectionery, not 
 the raising of new corn. Great is the poverty of their 
 inventions. She was beautiful, and he fell in love. 
 Money, and killing, and the Wandering Jew, and 
 persuading the lover that his mistress is betrothed to 
 another, these are the mainsprings ; new names, 
 but 110 new qualities in the men and women. Hence 
 the vain endeavor to keep any bit of this fairy gold, 
 which has rolled like a brook through our hands. A 
 thousand thoughts awoke ; great rainbows seemed to 
 span the sky, a morning among the mountains ; 
 but we close the book, and not a ray remains in the 
 memory of evening. But this passion for romance, 
 and this disappointment, show how much we need 
 real elevations and pure poetry : that which shall 
 show us, in morning and night, in stars and moun 
 tains, and in all the plight and circumstance of men, 
 the analogons of our own thoughts, and a like impres 
 sion made by a just book and by the face of Nature. 
 
 If our times are sterile in genius, we must cheer us 
 with books of rich and believing men who had atmos 
 phere and amplitude about them. Every good fable, 
 every mythology, every biography from a religious 
 age, every passage of love, and even philosophy and 
 science, when they proceed from an intellectual integ 
 rity, and are not detached and critical, have the im 
 aginative element. The Greek fables, the Persian 
 history (Firdusi), the " Younger Edda " of the Scan"
 
 412 RALPH WALDO EMERSON. 
 
 dinavians, the " Chronicle of the Cid," the poem of 
 Dante, the Sonnets of Michel Angelo, the English 
 drama of Shakespeare, Beaumont and Fletcher, and 
 Ford, and even the prose of Bacon and Milton, in 
 our time, the Ode of Wordsworth, and the poems and 
 the prose of Goethe, have this enlargement, and in 
 spire hope and generous attempts. 
 
 There is no room left, and yet I might as well 
 not have begun as to leave out a class of books which 
 are the best : I mean the Bibles of the world, or the 
 sacred books of each nation, which express for each 
 the supreme result of their experience. After the 
 Hebrew and Greek Scriptures, which constitute the 
 sacred books of Christendom, these are the Desatir 
 of the Persians, and the Zoroastrian Oracles 5 the Ve- 
 das and Laws of Menu ; the Upanishads, the Vishnu 
 Purana, the Bhagvat Geeta, of the Hindoos ; the 
 books of the Buddhists ; the " Chinese Classic," of 
 four books, containing the wisdom of Confucius and 
 Mencius. Also such other books as have acquired a 
 semi-canonical authority in the world, as expressing 
 the highest sentiment and hope of nations. Such are 
 the " Hermes Trismegistus," pretending to be Egyp 
 tian remains ; the " Sentences " of Epictetus ; of 
 Marcus Antoninus ; the " Vishnu Sarma " of the 
 Hindoos ; the " Gulistan " of Saadi ; the " Imitation 
 of Christ," of Thomas a Kempis ; and the " Thoughts " 
 of Pascal. 
 
 All these books are the majestic expressions of the 
 universal conscience, and are more to our daily pur 
 pose than this year's almanac or this day's newspaper. 
 But they are for the closet, and to be read on the 
 bended knee. Their communications are not to be 
 given or taken with the lips and the end of the tongue,
 
 BOOKS. 413 
 
 but out of the glow of the cheek, and with the throb 
 bing heart. Friendship should give and take, soli 
 tude and time brood and ripen, heroes absorb and 
 enact them. They are not to be held by letters 
 printed on a page, but are living characters translat 
 able into every tongue and form of life. I read them 
 on lichens and bark ; I watch them on waves on the 
 beach ; they fly in birds, they creep in worms ; I de 
 tect them in laughter and blushes and eye-sparkles of 
 men and women. These are Scriptures which the 
 missionary might well carry over prairie, desert, and 
 ocean, to Siberia, Japan, Timbuctoo. Yet he will 
 find that the spirit which is in them journeys faster 
 than he, and greets him on his arrival, was there 
 already long before him. The missionary must be 
 carried by it, and find it there, or he goes in vain. 
 Is there any geography in these things? We call 
 them Asiatic, we call them primeval; but perhaps 
 that is only optical ; for Nature is always equal to 
 herself, and there are as good eyes and ears now in 
 the planet as ever were. Only these ejaculations of 
 the soul are uttered one or a few at a time, at long 
 intervals, and it takes millenniums to make a Bible. 
 
 These are a few of the books which the old and the 
 later times have yielded us, which will reward the 
 time spent on them. In comparing the number of 
 good books with the shortness of life, many might 
 well be read by proxy, if we had good proxies ; and 
 it would be well for sincere young men to borrow a 
 hint from the French Institute and the British Asso 
 ciation, and, as they divide the whole body into sec 
 tions, each of which sits upon and reports of certain 
 matters confided to it, so let each scholar associate 
 himself to such persons as he can rely on, in a literary
 
 414 RALPH WALDO EMERSON. 
 
 club, in which, each shall undertake a single work or 
 series for which he is qualified. For example, how 
 attractive is the whole literature of the " Roman de 
 la Rose," the " Fabliaux," and the gaie science of 
 the French Troubadours ! Yet who in Boston has 
 time for that ? But one of our company shall under 
 take it, shall study and master it, and shall report on 
 it, as under oath ; shall give us the sincere result, as 
 it lies in his mind, adding nothing, keeping nothing 
 back. Another member, meantime, shall as honestly 
 search, sift, and as truly report, on British mythology, 
 the Round Table, the histories of Brut, Merlin, and 
 Welsh poetry ; a third on the Saxon Chronicles, Rob 
 ert of Gloucester, and William of Malmesbury ; a 
 fourth, on Mysteries, Early Drama, " Gesta Romano- 
 rum," Collier, and Dyce, and the Camden Society. 
 Each shall give us his grains of gold, after the wash 
 ing ; and every other shall then decide whether this 
 is a book indispensable to him also.
 
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