ei SI CORNELL UNIVERSITY LIBRARY Cornell University Library CB57 .R28 1890 Martyrdom of man,/,,'?,y,, Winit'SSll.S™''*- 3 1924 029 764 739 olln Cornell University Library The original of tliis book is in tine Cornell University Library. There are no known copyright restrictions in the United States on the use of the text. http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924029764739 THE MARTYRDOM OF MAN. WINWOOD READE. TWELFTH EDITION. New York. PETER ECKLER, PUBLISHER, 35 Fulton Street. PREFACE. In 1862-3 I made a tour in "Western Africa, and afterward desired to revisit that strange country with the view of opening new ground, and of studying religion and morality among the natives. I was, how- ever, unable to bear a second time the great expense of African traveling, and had almost given up the hope of becoming an explorer, when I was introduced by Mr. Bates, the well-known Amazon traveler, and Secretary of the Royal Geographical Society, to one of its Asso- ciates, Mr. Andrew Swanzy, who had long desired to do something in the cause of African Discovery. He placed unlimited means at my disposal, and left me free to choose my own route. I traveled in Africa two years (1868-'70), and made a journey which is mentioned in the text. The narrative of my travels will be pub- lished in due course ; I allude to them now in order to show that I have had some personal experience of sav- ages, and I wish also to take the first opportunity of thanking Mr. Swanzy for his assistance, which was given not only in the most generous, but also in the most graceful, manner. "With respect to the present work, I commenced it intending to prove that Negroland or TtiTier Africa is not cut off from the main stream of events, as writers of philosophical history have always maintained, but that it is connected by means of Islam 4 PREFACE. with the lands of the East, and also that it has, by means of the slave-trade, powerfully influenced the moral history of Europe, and the political history of the United States. But I was gradually led from the history of Africa into writing the history of the world. I could not describe the Negroland of ancient times without describing Egypt and Carthage. From Egypt I was drawn to Asia and to Greece, from Carthage I was drawn to Rome. That is the first chapter. Next, having to relate the progress of the Mahometans in Central Africa, it was necessary for me to explain the nature and origin of Islam; but that religion cannot be understood without a previous study of Christianity and Judaism, and those religions cannot be understock without a study of religion among savages. That i: the second chapter. Thirdly, I sketched the history of the slave-trade, which took me back to the dis- coveries of the Portuguese, the glories of Venetian commerce, the Revival of the Arts, the Dark Ages, and the Invasion of the Germans. Thus finding that my outline of Universal History was almost complete, 1 determined in the last chapter to give a brief summary of the whole, filling up the parts omitted, and adding to it the materials of another work suggested several years ago by the " Origin of Species." One of my rea- sons for revisiting Africa was to coUect materials for this work, which I had intended to call " The Origin of Mind." However, Mr. Darwin's " Descent of Man " has left little for me to say respecting the birth and in- fancy of the faculties and affections. I, therefore, mere- ly foUow in his footsteps, not from blind veneration for a great master, but because I find that his conclusions are confirmed by the phenomena of savage life. On certain minor points I venture to dissent from Mr. Dar- PBEFACE. • win's views, as I shall show ia my personal narrative, and there is probably much in this work of which Mr. Darwia wiU disapprove. He must, therefore, not be made responsible for all the opinions of his disciple. I intended to have given my authorities in fuU, with notes and elucidations, but am prevented from doing so by want of space, this volume being already larger than it should be. I wish therefore to impress upon the reader that there is scarcely anything in this work which I can claim as my own. I have taken not only facts and ideas, but phrases and even paragraphs, from other writers. I cannot pay all my debts in fuU, but I must at least do myseK the pleasure to mention those authors who have been my chief guides. On Egypt, Wilkin- son, Bawhnson's Herodotus, Bunsen; Ethiopia or Abyssinia, Bruce, Baker, Lepsius ; Carthage, Heeren's African Nations, Niebuhr, Mommsen ; East Africa, Vincent's Periplus, Guillain, Hakluyt Society's Publica- tions; Moslem Africa (Central), Park, Caillie, Den- ham and Clapperton, Lander, Barth, Ibn Batuta, Leo Africanus ; Guinea and South Africa, Azurara, Barros, Major, Hakluyt, Purchas, Livingstone ; Assyria, Sir H. EawUnson, Layard ; India, Max Miiller, Weber ; Persia, Heeren's Asiatic Nations ; Central Asia, Bumes, Wolff, Vambery; Arabia, Niebuhr, Caussin de Perceval, Sprenger, Deutsch, Muir, Burckhardt, Burton, Pal- grave ; Palestine, Dean Stanley, Eenan, DoUinger, Spinoza, Eobinson, Neander; Greece, Grote, 0. Miiller, Curtius, Heeren, Lewes, Taine, About, Becker's Charicles ; Rome, Gibbon, Macaulay, Becker's GaUus ; Dark Ages, HaUam, Guizot, Robertson, Prescott, Lroig ; Philosophy of History, Herder, Buckle, Comte, Lecky, MiQ, Draper; Science, Darwin, LyeU, Herbert Spencer, Huxley, TyndaU, Vestiges of Creation, Wal- e PBEFAOE. lace, Tylor, and Lubbock. All tbe works of the above- named authors deserve to be carefully read by the student of Universal History, and in them he will find references to the original authorities, and to all writers of importance on the various subjects treated of in this work. As for my religious sentiments, they are ex- pressed in opposition to the advice and wishes of several literary friends, and of the publisher, who have urged me to alter certain passages \diich they do not Uke, and which they believe will provoke against me the anger of the pubhc. Now, as a literary workman, I am thankful to be guided by the knowledge of ex- perts, and I bow to the decisions of the great public, for whom alone I write, whom alone I care to please, and in whose broad unbiased judgment I place i"^ plicit trust. But in the matter of religion, I listen to no remonstrance, I acknowledge no decision, save that of the divine monitor within me. My conscience is my adviser, my audience, and my judge. It bade me write as I have written, v/ithout evasion, without dis- guise ; it bids me to go on as I have begun, whatever the result may be. If, therefore, my religious opinions should be condemned, without a single exception, by every reader of the book, it will not make me regret having expressed them, and it wiR not prevent me from expressing them again. It is my earnest and sincere conviction that those opinions are not only true, but also that they tend to elevate and purify the mind. One thing, at all events, I know, that it has done me good to wi-ite this book ; and therefore I do not think that it can injure those by whom it will be read. TABLE OF CONTENTS. Egypt, WeBtem Asia, T> ■> PereianB, Till/ ufreeks. The Macedoniana, Alexandria, Tlie Phoenicians, Carthage and Borne, Boman Africa, The Araba, CHAPTEB I. VAB. PAoa 9-55 65-62 62-69 69-89 89-102 102-113 112-118 11&-159 159-167 167-169 CHAPTER n. BELiaiOH. The Natural History of Religion, The Israelites, The Jews, The Prophets, - Character at Jesus, • The Christians, Arabia, Mecca, Character of Mahomet, Description of Africa, The Mahometans in Central Afriea, 170-187 187-203 203-219 319-326 226-233 233-255 255-259 259-263 26S-274 274-290 S80-S01 o OONTENTS. CHAFTEB m. LIBXBTT. PAU Ancient Europe, .... 802-304 Invasion of the Qennans, 804r^05 The Castle, .... 805-310 The Town, 810-312 The Church, 812-319 Venice, - ■ ... 819-838 Arab Spain, - - . . - 823-339 The Portuguese WacovereM, • 839-344 The Slave Trade, 844-351 Abolition in Europe, - . . . 851-373 Abolition in America, 878-390 Materials of Human History, ■ 890-806 CHAPTER IV. INTBLLBCT. Animal Period of the Earth, Origin of Man, and Early History, Summary of Universal History, • The Future of the Human Bace, The Beligion of Beason aad of Love 807-420 430-463 462-502 602-511 611-S44 CHAJPTEE L WAB. The land of Egypt is six hundred miles long, and is botinded by two ranges of naked limestone hills, which sometimes approach, and sometimes retire from, each other, leaving between them an average breadth of seven miles. On the north they widen and disappear, giving place to a marshy meadow plain which extends to the Mediterranean Coast. On the south they are no longer of limestone, but of granite ; they narrow to a point; they close in tiU they almost touch; and through the mountain gate thus formed the river Nile leaps with a roar iuto the valley, and runs due north toward the sea. In the winter and spring it rolls, a languid stream, through a dry and dusty plain. But in the summer an extraordinary thing happens. The river grows troubled and swift; it turns red as blood, and then green; it rises, it swells, tiU at length, overflowing its banks, it covers the adjoining lands to the base of the hiUs on either side. The whole valley becomes a lake, from which the villages rise Kke islands, for they are built on artificial mounds. This catastrophe was welcomed by the Egyptians with religious gratitude and noisy mirth. When their fields had entirely disappeared, they thanked the gods and kept their harvest-home. The tax-gatherers meas- ured the water as if it were grain, and announced 10 THE WATEB HABVEST. what the crops and the budget of the next year would be. Gay barges with painted sails conTeyed the merry husbandmen from village to village, and from fair to fair. It was then that they had their buU-fights, their boat-tournaments, their wrestHng- matches, their bouts at siugle-stick and other athletic sports. It was then that the thimble-riggers and jack- puddings, the blind harpers and negro minstrels from Central Airica amused the holiday-hearted crowd. It was then that the old people sat over draughts and dice-box in the cozy shade, while the boys played at mora, or pitch-and-toss, and the girls at a game of ball, with forfeits for the one who missed a catch. It was then that the house-father bought new doUs for the children, and amulets, or gold ear-rings, or neck- laces of porcelaiu bugles, for the wife. It was then that the market stalls abounded with joiuts of beef and venison, and with geese hanging down in long rows, and with chickens hatched by thousands under heaps of dung. Salted quails, smoked fish, date sweet- meats, doura cakes and cheese ; leeks, garlic, cucumber . and onions; lotus-seeds mashed ia milk, roasted stalks of papyrus, jars of barley beer and palm wine, with many other kinds of food — were sold in unusual pienty at that festive time. It was then also that the white-robed priests, bear- iag the image of a god, and singing hymns, marched with solemn procession to the water-side, and cast ia a sacrifice of gold. For the water which had thus risen was their Hfe. Egypt is by nature a rainless desert, which the Nile, and the Nile only, converts into a garden every year. Far, far away in the distant regions of the south, in the deep heart of Africa, lie two inland seas. These THE SOUBOES OF THE NILE. 11 are the head waters of the Nile ; its sources are in the sky. For the clouds, laden with waters coUeeted out of many seas, sail to the African equator, and fctre pour down a ten months' rain. This ocean of falling water is received on a region sloping toward the north, and is conveyed by a thousand channels to the vast rocky cisterns which form the Speke and Baker Lakes. They, filled and bursting, cast forth the Nile, and drive it from them through a terrible and thirsty land. The hot air lies on the stream and laps it as it flows. The parched soil swallows it with open pores ; but ton after ton of water is supplied from the gigantic reservoirs behind, and so it is enabled to cross that vast desert which spreads from the latitude of Lake Tchad to the borders of the Mediterranean Sea. The existence of the Nile is due to the Nyanza Lakes alone, but the inundation of the river has a distinct and separate ca-use. Jn that phenomenon the lakes are not concerned. Between the NUe and the mouth of the Arabian Gulf are situated the highlands of Abyssinia, rising many thousand feet above the level of the sea, and intercepting the clouds of the Indian Ocean in their flight toward the north. From these mountains, as soon as the rainy season has set in, two great rivers come thundering down their dried-up beds, and rush into the Nile. The main stream is now forced impet- uously along; in the Nubian desert its swelling waters are held in between walls of rock ; as soon as it reaches the low-lying lands of Egypt it naturally overflows. The Abyssinian tributaries do even more than this. The waters of the White Nile are transparent and pure ; but the Atbaxa and Blue Nile bring down from their native land a black sUt, which the flood strews 12 THE PHILOSOPHY OF LEISURE. over the whole valley as a kind of top-dressing or manure. On that rich and unctuous mud, as soon as the waters have retired, the natives cast their seed. Then their labors are completed; no changes of weather need afterward be feared, no anxious looks are turned toward the sky; simshine only is required to fulfill the crop, and in Egypt the sun is never covered by a cloud. Thus, were it not for the White Nile, the Abyssinian rivers would be drank up by the desert ; and were it not for the Abyssinian rivers, the "White Nile would be a barren stream. The Eiver is created by the rains of the equator; the Land by the tropical rains condensed in one spot by the Abyssinian mountain pile. In that fair Egyptian valley, fattened by a foreign soil, brightened by eternal sunshine, watered by terres- trial rain, the natives were able to obtain a year's food ia return for a few days' toU, and so were provided with that wealth of time which is essential for a nation's growth. A people can never rise from low estate as long as they are engrossed in the paiaful struggle for daily bread. On the other hand, leisure alone is not suffi- cient to effect the self-promotion of men. The savage of the primeval forest bums down a few trees every year, his women raise an easy crop from the ashes which mingle with the soU. He basks all day in the sunshine, or prostrates himself in his canoe with his arms behind his head and a fishing-line tied to his big toe. "When the meat-hunger comes upon him he takes up bow and arrow and goes for a few days iato the bush. His life is one long torpor, with spasms of activity. Century follows century, but he does not change. Again, the shepherd tribes roam from pasture AaraOULTURAL MONOGAMT. 18 to pasture : tlieir flocks and herds yield them food and dress, and houses of hair, as they call their tents. They have little work to do; their time is almost entirely their own. They pass long hours in slow con- Tersation, in gazing at the heavens, in the sensuous, passive Oriental reverie. The intellectual capacities of such men are by no means to be despised, as those who have lived among them are aware. They are skillful interpreters of Nature's language, and of the human heart; they compose beautiful poems; their religion is simple and sublime; yet time passes on, and they do not advance. The Arab sheik of the present day lives precisely as Abraham did three thousand years ago; the Tartars of Central Asia are the Scythians whom Herodotus described. It is the first and indispensable condition of human progress that a people shaU be married to a single land : that they shall wander no more from one region to another, but remain fixed and faithful to their soil. Then if the Earth-wife be fruitful, she wiU bear them children by hundreds and by thousands ; and then calamity wiU come and teach them by torture to invent. The Egyptians were islanders, cut off from the rest of the world by sand and sea. They were rooted in their valley; they lived entirely upon its fruits; and, happily, these fruits sometimes failed. Had they always been able to obtain enough to eat, they woidd have remained always in the semi-savage state. It may appear strange that Egypt should have suf- fered from famine, for there was no country in the ancient world where food was so abimdant and so cheap. Not only did the land produce enormous crops of com; the ditches and hollows which were filled by W THE LAW OF MASSAOBE. the overflowing Nile supplied a harvest of wholesome and nourishing aquatic plants ; and on the borders of the desert thick groves of date pahns, which love a neutral soil, embowered the villages, and formed Kve granaries of fruit. But however plentiful food may be in any country, the population of that country, as Malthus discovered, will outstrip it ia the long run. If food is unusually cheap, population wiU increase at an unusually rapid rate, and there is no limit to its ratio of increase ; no hmit, that is to say, except disease and death. On the other hand, there is a Hmit to the amount of food that can be raised, for the basis of food is land, and land is a fixed quantity. Unless some discovery be made by means of which provisions may be manu- factured with as much facility as children, the whole earth will some day be placed in the same predica- ment as the island in which we live, which has out- grown its food-producing power, and is preserved from starvation only by means of foreign com. At the time we speak of, Egypt was irrigated by the Nile in a natural, and therefore imperfect, manner. Certain tracts were overflooded, others were left com- pletely dry. The valley was filled with people to the brim. When it was a good Nile, every ear of com, every bunch of dates, every papyrus stalk and lotus root, was pre-engaged. There was no waste and no surplus store. But sometimes a bad Nile came. The bread of the people depended on the amount of inundation, and that on the tropical rains, which vary more than is usually supposed. If the rainy season in the Abyssinian highlands happened to be slight, the river could not pay its full tribute of earth and water to the valley below ; and if the rainfaU was GOD UASE AtL MEN UNEQUAL. 15 unusually seTere, houses were swept away, cattle were drowned, and the water, instead of returning at the usual time, became stagnant on the fields. In either case, famine and pestilence invariably ensued. The plenty of ordinary years, like a baited trap, had pro- duced a luxuriance of human life, and the massacre was proportionally severe. Encompassed by the wil- derness, the unfortunate natives were unable to escape : they died ia heaps; the vaUey resembled a field of battle ; each village became a charnel-house ; skeletons sat grinning at street comers, and the winds clattered among dead men's bones. A few survivors lingered miserably through the year, browsing on the thorny shrubs of the desert, and sharing with the vultures their horrible repast. God made aU men equal is a fine-sounding phrase, and has also done good service in its day ; but it is not a scientific fact. On the contrary, there is nothing so certain as the natural inequality of men. Those who outlive hardships and sufferings which fall on aU alike owe their existence to some superiority, not only of body, but of mind. It will easUy be conceived that among such superior-minded men there would be some who, stimulated by the memory of that which was past, and by the fear of that which might return, would strain to the utmost their ingenuity to control and guide the fickle river which had hitherto sported with their lives. We shall not attempt to trace out their inventions step by step. Humble in its beginnings, slow in its im- provements, the art or science of hydraulics was finaUj mastered by the Egyptians. They devised a system of dikes, reservoirs, and lock-canals, by means of which the excessive waters of a violent Nile were turned from 16 FAMINE THE MOTHEB OF ASTEONOMT. the fields and stored up to supply the wants of a dry year; thus also the precious fluid was conveyed to tracts of land lying above the level of the river, and was (istributed over the whole valley with such precis- ion that each lot or farm received a just and equal share. Next, as the inundation destroyed all land- marks, surveying became a necessary art, in order to settle the disputes which broke out every year. And as the rising of the waters was more and more carefully observed, it was found that its commencement coincid- ed with certain aspects of the stars. This led to the study of astronomy and the discovery of the solar year. Agriculture became a mathematical art : it was ascertained that so many feet of water would yield so many quarters of com ; and thus, before a single seed was sown, they could count up the harvest as correctly a,s if it had been already gathered in. A natural consequence of all this was the separation of the inventor class, who became at first the counsel- ors, and afterward the rulers, of the people. But while the men of mind were battling with the forces of Nature, a contest of another kind was also going on. Those who dwell on the rich banks of a river flowing throucli desert lands are always liable to be attacked by the wandering shepherd hordes who resort to the water-side in summer, when the wilderness pasture is dried up. There is nothing such tribes desire better than to con- quer the corn-growing people of the river lands, and to make them pay a tribute of grain when the crops are taken in. The Egyptians, as soon as they had won their harvest from the flood, were obliged to defend them against the robbers of the desert, and out of such wars arose a military caste. These allied themselves with the intellectual caste, who were aJso priests, for OBUBLTY THE NUBSB OF OrVILIZATION. 17 among the primitive nations religion and science were invariably combined. In this manner the bravest and wisest of the Egyptians rose above the vulgar crowd, and the nation was divided into two great classes, the rulers and the ruled. Then oppression continued the work which war and famine had begun. The priests announced, and the ar- mies executed, the divine decrees. The people were reduced to servitude. The soldiers discovered the gold and emerald mines of the adjoining hills, and filled their dark recesses with chained slaves and savage over- seers. They became invaders: they explored distant lands with the spear. Communications with Syria and the fragrant countries at the mouth of the Red Sea, first opened by means of war, were continued by means of commerce. Foreign produce became an element of Egyptian life. The privileged classes foimd it neces- sary to be rich. Formerly the priests had merely salt- ed the bodies of the dead ; now a fashionable corpse must be embalmed at an expense of two hundred and fifty pounds, with asphalt from the Dead Sea and spices from the Somauli groves ; costly incense must be burnt on the altars of the gods ; aristocratic heads must re- cline on ivory stools ; fine ladies must glitter with gold ornaments and precious stones, and must be served by waiting-maids and pages with woolly hair and velvety black skins. War and agriculture were no longer suffi- cient to supply these patrician wants. It was no longer sufficient that the people should feed on dates and the coarse doura bread, while the wheat which they raised was sold by their masters for gewgaws and perfumes. Manufactures were established; slaves labored at a thousand looms; the linen goods of Egypt became celebrated throughout the world. Laboratories were 18 JESUmOAL NATUBE. opened ; remarkable discoveries were made. The Egyp- tian priests distilled brandy and sweet waters. They used the blow-pipe, and were far advanced in the chem- ical processes of art. They fabricated glass mosaics, and CDimterfeited precious stones and porcelain of ex- quisite transparency and delicately blended hues. With the fruits of these inventions they adorned their daily Ufe, and attracted into Egypt the riches of other lands. Thus when Nature selects a people to endow them with glory and with Avealth, her first proceeding is to massacre their bodies; her second, to debauch their minds. She begins with famine, pestilence, and war ; next, force and rapacity above ; chains and slavery be- low. She uses evil as the raw material of good; though her aim is always noble, her earliest means are base and cruel. But, as soon as a certain point is reached, she washes her black and bloody hands, and uses agents of a higher kind. Having converted the animal in- stinct of seK-defense into the ravenous lust of wealth and power, that also she transforms into ambition of a pure and lofty kind. At first, knowledge is sought only for the things which it will buy : the daUy bread indis- pensable to Hfe, and those trinkets of body and mind which vanity demands. Yet those low desires do not always and entirely possess the human soul. Wisdom is like the heiress of the novel, who is at first courted only for her wealth, but whom the fortune-hunter learns afterward to love for herseK alone. At first sight there seems little in the arts and sciences of Egypt which cannot be traced to the eu/- lightened selfishness of the priestly caste. For, in the earlier times, it was necessary for the priests to labor unceasingly to preserve the power which they had usurped. It was necessary to overawe not only the LABOR LOVED. 19 people who worked in the fields, But their own danger- ous allies, the military class ; to make religion not only mysterious, but magnificent: not only to predict the precise hour of the rising of the waters, or the eclipses of the moon, but also to adopt and nurture the fine arts, to dazzle the pubhc with temples, moniunents, and paintings. Above all, it was necessary to prepare a system of government which should keep the laboring classes in subjection, and yet stimulate them to labor indefatigably for the state, which should strip them of aU the rewards of industry and yet keep that industry aHve. Expediency will therefore account for much that the Egyptian intellect produced; but it certainly will not account for aU. The invention of hieroglyphics is alone sufficient to prove that higher motives were at work than mere political calculation and the appetite for gold. For writing was an invention which at no time could have added in a palpable manner to the wealth or power of the upper classes, and which yet could not have been finished to a system without a vast expenditure of time and toU. It could not have been the work of a single man, but of several laboring in the same direction, and in its early beginnings must have appeared as unpractical, as truly scientific to them, as the study of solar chemistry and the obser- vation of the double stars to us. Besides, the in- tense and faithful labor which is conspicuous in all the Egyptian works of art could only have been in- spired by that enthusiasm which belongs to noble minds. We may fairly presume that Egypt once possessed its chivalry of the intellect, its heroic age, and that the vio- lent activity of thought generated by the love of life, and developed by the love of power, was raised to its 20 THE EGYPTIAN EMPIRE. full zenitli by the passion for art and science, for the beautiful and the true. At first the Nile valley was divided into a number of independent states, each possessing its own corporation of priests and soldiers, its own laws and system of taxa- tion, its own tutelary god and shrine ; but each a mem- ber of one body, united by the beHef in one religion, and assembling from time to time to worship the na- tional gods in an appointed place. There, according to general agreement, ratified by solemn oaths, all feuds were suspended, all weapons laid aside. There, also, under the shelter of the sanctuary, property was secure, and the surplus commodities of the various districts could be conveniently interchanged. In such a place, frequented by vast crowds of pilgrims and traders, a great city would naturahy arise ; and such, it seems probable, was the origin of Thebes. But Egypt, which possesses a simple undivided form, and which is nourished by one great arterial stream, appears destined to be surmounted by a single head, and we perceive in the dim dawn of history a revolu- tion taking place, and Menes, the Egyptian Charle- magne, founding an empire upon the ruins of local governments, and inspiring the various tribes with the sentiment of nationaUty. Thebes remained the sacred city; but a new capital, Memphis, was built at the other end of the valley, not far from the spot where Cairo now stands. By degrees the Egyptian empire assumed a consoli- dated form. A regular constitution was established and a ritual prescribed. The classes were organized in a more effective manner, and were not at fiirst too strictly fixed. All were at hberty to intermarry, excepting only the swineherds, who were regarded as unclean. THE ESTATES. 21 The system of the government became masterly, and the servitude of the people became complete. Designs of imperial magnitude were accomplished, some of them gigantic but useless, mere exploits of naked hu- man strength ; others were structures of true grandeur and utility. The valley was adorned with splendid monuments and temples ; colossal statues were erected, which rose above the houses, like the towers and spires of our cathedral toTvns. An army of laborers was em- ployed against the NUe. The course of the mighty stream was altered ; its waters were snatched from its bosom, and stored up in the Lake Moeris, an artificial basin, hollowed out of an extensive swamp, and thence were conducted by a system of canals into the neigh- boring desert, which they changed to smiling fields. For the Sahara can always be revived. It is barren only because it receives no rain. The Empire consisted of three estates : the Monarch, the Army, and the Church. There were in theory no Kmits to the power of the king. His authority was de- rived directly from the gods. He was called the Sun ; he was the head of the religion and the State ; he was the supreme judge and lawgiver ; he commanded the army and led it to war. But in reaUty his power was controlled and reduced to mere pageantrj' by a parlia- ment of priests. He was elected by the military class ; but as soon as he was crowned he was initiated into the mysteries and subjected to the severe discipline of the holy order. No slave or hireling might approach his person : the lords in waiting, with the state parasol, and the ostrich-feather fans, were princes of the blood ; his other attendants were invariably priests. The royal time was filled and measured by routine : laws were laid down in the holy books for the order and nature of 22 KING. his occupations. At daybreak he examined and de- spatched his correspondence ; he then put on his robes and attended divine service in the temple. Extracts were read from those holy books which contained the sayings and actions of distinguished men, and these were followed by a sermon from the High Priest, He extoUed the virtues of the reigning sovereign, but criti- cised severely the lives of those who had preceded him ; a post-mortem examination to which the king knew that he would be subjected in his turn. He was forbidden to commit any kind of excess : he was restricted to a plain diet of veal and goose, and to a measured quantity of wine. The laws hung over him day and night ; they governed his public and private actions ; they followed him even to the recesses of his chamber, and appointed a set time for the embraces of his queen. He could not punish a single person except in accordance with the code ; the judges took oath be- fore the king that they would disobey the king if he or- dered them to do anything contrary to law. The min- istry were responsible for the actions of their master, and they guarded their own safety. They made it im- possible for him to forfeit that reverence and affection which the ignorant and religious always entertain for their anointed king. He was adored as a god when hving, and when he died he was mourned by the whole nation as if each man had lost a well-beloved child. During seventy-two days the temples were closed; lamentations filled the air ; and the people fasted, ab- staining from flesh and wine, cooked food, ointments baths, and the company of their wives. The army appears to have been severely disciplined. To run twenty miles before breakfast was part of the ordinary drill. The amusements of the soldiers were Aiure. 23 athletic sports and martial games. Yet they were not merely fighting men : they were also farmers ; each warrior received from the state twelve acres of choice land : these gave him a solid interest in the prosperity of the fatherland and in the maintenance of civil peace. The most powerful of the three estates was undoubt- edly the Church. In the priesthood were included not only the ministers of religion, but also the whole civil service and the Uberal professions. Priests were the royal chroniclers and keepers of the records, the en- gravers of inscriptions, physicians of the sick, and em- balmers of the dead, lawyers and lawgivers, sculptors and musicians. Most of the skilled labor of the coun- try was vmder their control. In their hands were the linen manufactories and the quarries between the Cat- aracts. Even those posts in the army which required a knowledge of arithmetic and penmanship were sup- plied by them ; every general was attended by young priest scribes, with papyrus rolls in their hands and reed pencils behind their ears. The clergy preserved the monopoly of the arts which they had invented ; the whole intellectual life of Egypt was in them. It was they who, with their NUometers, took the measure of the waters, proclaimed good harvests to the people, or bade them to prepare for hungry days. It was they who studied the diseases of the country, compiled a Pharmacopoeia, and invented the signs which are used LQ our prescriptions at the present day. It was they who judged the Uving and the dead, who enacted laws which extended beyond the grave, who issued passports to paradise, or condemned to eternal infamy the memo- ries of men that were no more. Their power was immense ; but it was exercised with justice and discretion : they issued admirable laws, and 24 OHUECH. taught the people to obey them by the example of theii o-vvn humble, self-denying lives. Under the tutelage of these pious and enlightened men, the Egyptians became a prosperous and also a highly moral people. The monumental paintings re- veal their whole life, but we read in them no brutal or licentious scenes. Their great rivals, the Assyrians, even at a later period, were accustomed to impale and flay ahve their prisoners of war. The Egyptians grant- ed honors to those who fought gallantly against them. The penalty for the murder of a slave was death ; this law exists without parallel in the dark slavery annals both of ancient and of modem times. The pardoning power in cases of capital offense was a cherished pre- rogative of royalty with them, as with us; and with them also, as with us, when a pregnant woman was con- demned to death the execution was postponed until after the birth of the guiltless child. It is a sure crite- rion of the civilization of ancient Egypt that the sol- diers did not carry arms except on duty, and that the private citizens did not carry them at all. Women were treated with much regard. They were allowed to join their husbands in the sacrifices to the gods : thf bodies of man and wife were uni„«I in the tomb. When a party was given, the guests were received by ^she host and hostess seated side by side in a large arm- chair. In the pamtings their mutual affection is por- trayed. Their fond manners, their gestures of endear- ment, the caresses which they lavish on their children, form sweet and touching scenes of domestic life. Crimes could not be compounded, as in so many other ancient lands, by the payment of a fine. The man who witnessed a crime without attempting to prevent it was punished as a partaker. The civil laws were adminis- TBIAL OF THE DEAD. 26 tered in such a manner that the poor could haye re- course to them as well as the rich. The judges received large salaries, that they might be placed above the temptation of bribery, and might never disgrace the im- age of Truth which they wore around their necks, sus- pended on a golden chaiu. But, most powerful of all, to preserve the moraHty of the people by giving a tangible force to public opinion, and by impeachiug those sins agaiost society which no legal code can touch, was that sublime police institu- tion, the Trial of the Dead. "When the corpse had been brought back from the embahning-house, it was encased in a sycamore coffin covered with flowers, placed iu a sledge and drawn by oxen to the sacred lake. The hearse was followed by the relatives of the deceased, the men imshom and casting dust upon their heads, the women beating their breasts and singing mournful hymns. On the banks of the lake sat forty-two judges in the shape of a cres- cent ; a great crowd was assembled ; in the water float- ed a canoe, and within it stood Charon the ferryman awaiting the sentence of the chief judge. On the other side of the lake lay a sandy plain, and beyond it a range of long low hUls, in which might be discerned the black mouths of the caverns of the dead. It was in the power of any man to step forward and accuse the departed before the body could be borne across. If the charge was held to be proved, the body was denied burial in the consecrated ground, and the crowd silently dispersed. If a verdict of not guilty was returned, the accuser suffered the penalty of the crime alleged, and the ceremony took its course. The relatives began to sing with praises the biography of the deceased: they sang in what maimer he had 2 26 THE PAINTED TOMB. been brought up from a child till he came to man's estate, how pious he had been toward the gods, how righteous he had been toward men. And if this were true, if the man's Hfe had indeed been good, the crowd joined in chorus, clapping their hands, and sang back ia return that he would be received into the glory of the just. Then the cojffin was laid in the canoe, and the silent ferryman pHed his oar, and a priest read the service of the dead ; and the body was deposited in the cemetery caves. If he was a man of rank, he was laid in a chamber of his own, and the sacred artists painted on the waUs an illustrated catalogue of his possessions, the principal occupations of his life, and scenes of the society in which he moved. For the priests taught that since Hfe is short and death is long, man's dwelling-house is but a lodging, and his eternal habitation is the tomb. Thus the family vault of the Egyptian was his picture-gaUery, and thus the manners and customs of this singular people have, like their bodies, been preserved through long ages, by means of religious art. There are also still existing on the walls of the temples, and in the grotto tombs, grand historical paintings, which illuminate the terse chronicles en- graved upon the granite. Among these may be re- marked one subject in particular, which appears to have been a favorite with the artist and the public, for it again and agaia recurs : The Egyptians, distinguish- ed always by their smooth faces and shaven heads, are pursuing an enemy with long beards and flowing robes, who are surrounded by flocks and herds. The Egyp- tians here show no mercy ; they appear aUve with fury and revenge. Sometimes the victor is depicted with a Bcomfnl air, his foot placed upon the neck of a pro&- THE CHILDEEN OF THE DESEBT. 27 tijxte foe ; sometimes he is piercing the body through and through with a spear. Certain sandals have also been discovered, in which the figure of the same enemy is paiated on the inner sole, so that the foot trod upon the portrait when the sandal was put on. Those bearded men had inflicted on Egypt long years of dreadful disaster and disgrace. They were the Be- douins of the Arabian peninsula ; a pastoral race, who wandered eternally in a burning land, each tribe or clan within an orbit of its own. When they met they fought, the women uttering savage cries, and cursing their husbands if they retreated from the foe. Accus- tomed to struggle to the death for a handful of withered grass, or for a httle muddy water at the bottom of a well, what a rich harvest must Egypt have appeared to them ! In order to obtain it they were able to suspend all feuds, to take an oath of alliance, and to unite into a single horde. They descended upon their prey and seized it at the first swoop. There does not appear to have been even one great battle, and this can be ex- plained, if, as is probable enough, the Egyptians before that invasion had never seen a horse. The Arab horse, or rather mare, lived in her master's tent, and supped from the calabash of milk, and lay down to sleep with the other members of the family. She was the playmate of the children ; on her the cruel, the savage Bedouin lavished the one tender feeling of his heart. He treasured up in his mind her pedigree as carefully as his own ; he composed songs in honor of his beloved steed, his friend, his companion, his ally. He sang to her of the gazelles which they had hunted down, and of the battles which they had fought togeth- er ; for the Arab horse was essentially a beast of war. When the signal was given for the charge, when the 28 THE HOUSE OF WAB. rider, loudly yeUing, couclied his spear, she snorted and panted, and bounded in the air. "With tail raised and spreading to the wind, with neck beautifully arched, mane flapping, red nostrils dilating, and glaring eyes, she rushed like an arrow into the midst of the mel^e. Though covered with wounds, she would never turn restive or try to escape ; but if her master was com- pelled to take to flight, she would carry him tiH she dropped down dead. It is quite possible that when the mounted army ap- peared in the river plain, the inhabitants were para- lyzed with fright, and beheved them to be fabulous an- imals, wiuged men. Be that as it may, the conquest was speedy and complete ; the imperial Memphis was taken ; Egypt was enslaved ; the king and his family and court were compelled to seek a new home across the sandy seas. On the south side of the Nubian desert was the land of Ethiopia, the modem Soudan, which had been con- quered by the Egyptians, and which they used as an emporium ia their caravan trade with Central Africa and the shores of the Red Sea. But it could be reached only by means of a journey which is not without danger at the present day, and which must have been inex- pressibly arduous at a time when the camel had not been introduced. The Nile, it is true, flows through this desert, and joias Ethiopia to Egypt with a silver chain. But from the time of its leaving Soudan until it reaches the black granite gate which marks the Egyptian frontier, it is confined within a narrow, crooked, hollow way. Nav%ation is impossible, for its bed is contiuually broken up by rocks, and the stream is walled in; it eannot overflow its banks. The reign of the Sahara ia THE TEBRIBLE SAHABA. 29 uninterrupted, undisturbed. On all sides is the desert, the brown shining desert, the implacable waste. Above is a ball of fire ascending and descending in a steel- blue sky; below a dry and scorching sea which the wind ripples into gloomy waves. The air is a cloud which rains fire, for it is dim with perpetual dust — each molecule a spark. The eye is pained and dazzled ; it can find no rest. The ear is startled ; it can find no sound. In the soft and yielding sand the footstep perishes vmheard; nothing murmurs, nothing rustles, nothing sings. This silence is terrible, for it conveys the idea of death, and all know that in the desert death is not far off. When the elements become active they assume peculiar and portentous forms. If the wind blows hard, a strange storm arises ; the atmosphere is pervaded by a dull and lurid glare; pillars of sand spring up as if my magic, and whirl round and round in a ghastly and fantastic dance. Then a mountain ap- pearing on the horizon spreads upward in the sky, and a darkness more dark than night falls suddenly upon the earth. To those who gasp with swelled tongues and blackened Hps in the last agonies of thirst, the mirage, like a mocking dream, exhibits lakes of trans- parent water and shady trees. But the wells of this desert are scanty, and the waters found in them are salt. The fugitives concealed the images of the gods, and, taking with them the sacred animals, embarked upon their voyage of suffering and woe. After many weary days they again sighted land: they an-ived on the shores of Ethiopia, the country of the blacks. Once more their eyes were refreshed with green pastures ; once more they listened to the rustling of the palms, and drank the sweet waters of the NUe. Tet soon they 80 THE BLACK COUNTKT. discovered that it was not their o^ ^f ^'T^^'^' ^* J^' not their own beloved land. In Egyp , Nature was a gentle handmaid; here she was a cx.el and capricious queen The sky flashed and beUowed agamst them; the rain feU in torrents, and battered down the houses of the Ethiopians— wretched huts like hay-ricks, round in body, with a cone-shaped roof, built of grass and mud. The lowlands changed beneath the flood, not into meadows of flowers and fields of waving com, but into a pestilential morass. At the rising of the dog- star came a terrible fly, which drove even the wild beasts from the river banks, and destroyed all flocks and herds. At that evil season the Egyptian colonists were forced to migrate to the forests of the interior, which were filled with savage tribes. Here were the Troglo- dytes, who Hved under ground; an ointment was their only dress; their language resembling the hissing of serpents and the whistling of bats. Every month they indulged in a carouse ; every month they opened the veins of their sheep and drank of the warm and gurg- ling blood as if it had been delicious wine. They made merry when they buried their dead, and, roaring with laughter, cast stones upon the corpse until it was con- cealed from view. Here were the root-eaters, the tidg- eaters and the seed-eaters, who lived entirely on such wretched kinds of food. Here were the ekphant-eaters, who, sitting on the tops of trees like birds, watched the roads, and when they had sighted a herd, crept after it, and hovered round it tiU the sleepy hour of noon ar- rived. Then they selected a victim, stole up to it snake -Kke from behind, hamstrung the enormous creature with a dexterous cut from a sharp sword and, as it lay helpless on the ground, feasted upon morsels of its Hve and palpitating flesh. Here were ifr •> THE NOBLE SAVAGE. 31 lo BABYLON THE GREAT. regions bordering on the Tigris. Ecbatana was their capital. They were renowned for their luxury, and especially for their robes of flowing silk. Their priests were called Magi, and formed a separate tribe or caste ; they were di-essed in white, lived only on vegetables, slept on beds of leaves, worshiped the sun, and the element of fire, as symbols of the Deity, and followed the precepts of Zoroaster. The Empire of the Medes was bounded on the west by the Tigris. They in- herited the Assyrian provinces in Central Asia, the boundaries of which are not precisely known. The civilization of Nineveh had been derived from Babylon, a city famous for its rings and gems, which were beautifully engraved, its carpets in which the figures of fabulous animals were interwoven, its magni- fying glasses, its sun-dials, and its Uterature printed in cuneiform characters on clay tablets, which were then baked in the oven. Many hundreds have lately been deciphered, and are found to consist chiefiy of mihtaiy despatches, law papers, royal game-books, observatory reports, agricultural treatises, and religious documents. In the partition of Assyria, Babylon obtained Mesopo- tamia, or the Land-between-the-Eivers, and Syria, in- cluding Phoenicia and Palestine. Nebuchadnezzar was the founder of the Empire ; he routed the Egyptians, he destroyed Jerusalem, transplanted the Jews on account of their rebeUion, and reduced Tyre after a memorable siege. He built a new Babylon, as Augus- tus built a new Eome, and the city became one of the wonders of the world. It was a vast fortified district, five or six times the area of London, interspersed with parks and gardens and fields, and inclosed by walls on which six chariots could be driven side by side. Its position in a flat coimtry made it resemble in the dis- KIOH AS OKCEStlS. 61 tance a mountain with trees waving at the top. These were the hanging gardens, a grove of large trees planted on the square surface of a gigantic tower, and ingeniously watered from below. Nebuchadnezzar erected this extraordinary structure to please his wife, who came from the highlands of Media, and who, weary of the interminable plains, coveted meadows on mountaia tops, such as her native land contained. The Euphrates ran through the center of the city, and was crossed by a stone bridge, which was a marvel for its time. But more wonderful still, there was a kind of Thames Tunnel passing underneath the river, and con- necting palaces on either side. The city was united to its provinces by roads and fortified posts ; rafts inflated with sMns, and reed boats pitched over with bitumen, floated down the river with timber from the mountains of Armenia, and stones for purposes of building. A canal, large enough for ships to ascend, was dug from Babylon to the Persian Gulf ; and on its banks were innumerable machines for raising the water and spreading it upon the soil. The third kingdom was that of the Lydians, a people in manners and appearance resembHng the Greeks. They did not consider themselves behind the rest of the world. They boasted that they had invented dice, coin, and the art of shopkeeping, and also that the famous Etruscan state was a colony of theirs. They inhabited Asia Minor, a sterile, rugged table-land, but possessing a western coast enriched by nature, and covered with the prosperous cities of the Asiatic Greeks. Hitherto Ionia had never been subdued, but the cities were too jealous of one another to combine, and Croesus was able to conquer them one by one, This was the man whose wealth is still celebrated in a 62 THE PEBSIAN SHEPHERDS. proverb ; he obtained his gold from the washings of a sandy stream. Croesus admired the Greeks; he was the first of the lion-htmters, and invited all the men of the day to visit him at Sardis, where he had the pleas- are of hearing ^sop teU some of his own fables. He was anxious that his capital should form part of the grand tour which had already become the fashion of the Greek philosophers, and that they should be able to say, when they returned home, that they had not only seen the pyramids of Egypt and the ruias of Troy, but also the treasure-house of Orcesus. When he received a visit from one of these sages in cloak and beard he would show him his heaps of gold and silver, and ask him whether, in all his travels, he had ever seen a happier man ; to which question he did not always receive a very courteous reply. After long wars, peace was estabhshed between the Babylonians, the Lydians, and the Modes, on a lasting and secure foundation. The royal families were united by marriage ; alliances, defensive and offensive, were made and ratified on oath. Egypt was no longer able to invade ; and there was a period of delicious calm in that stormy Asiatic world, broken only by the plaintive voices of the poor Jewish captives who sat by the waters of Babylon and sang of the Holy City that was no more. In the twinkling of an eye all this was changed. A band of hardy mountaineers rushed out of the recesses of Persia, and swept like a wind across the plains. They were dressed in leather from top to toe ; they had never tasted fruit nor wine ; they had never seen a market; they knew not how to buy or seU. They were taught only three things — to ride on horseback, to hurl the javelin, and to speak the truth. THE EHPntS. 63 All Asia was covered with blood and flames. The allied kingdoms fell at once. India and Egypt were soon afterward added to this empire, the greatest that the world had ever seen. The Persians used to boast that they ruled from the land of uninhabitable heat to the land of uninhabitable cold; that their dominion began in regions where the sun frizzled the hair and blackened the faces of the natives, and ended in a land where the air was filled with snow like feathers, and the earth was hard as stone. The Persian empire was in reality bounded by the deserts which divided Egypt from Ethiopia on the south, and from Carthage on the west ; by the desert which divided the Punjaub from Bengal ; by the steppes which lay on the other side of the Jaxartes ; by the Mediterranean, the Caspian, and the Black seas. Darius, the third emperor, invented a system of provincial government which, though imperfect when viewed by the wisdom of modem times, was far supe- rior to any that had preceded it in Asia. He ap- pointed satraps or pachas to administer the conquered - provinces. Each of these viceroys received with his commission a map of his province engraved on brass. He was at once the civil governor and commander of the troops ; but his power was checked and supervised by a secretary or clerk of the accounts ; and the prov- ince was visited by Eoyal Commissioners once a yeaot'- The troops in each province were of two kinds ; some garrisoned the cities ; others, for the most part cavalry, lived, like the Roman legions, always in a camp : it was their office to keep down brigands, and to convoy the royal treasure from place to place. The troops were subsisted by the conquered people : this formed part of the tribute, and was collected at the point of 64 THE king's HAIUBS. the sword. There was also a fixed tax in money and in kind, which was received by the clerk of the ac- counts, and despatched to the capital every year. The Great King still preserved in his habits some- thing of the nomad chief. He did not reside aU the year in one spot. He wintered at Babylon ; but in the summer the heat was terrible in that region ; the citi2;ens retired to their cellars ; and the king went to Susa, which was situated on the hills ; or to Bcbatana, the ancient capital of the Medes ; or to Persepolis, the true hearth and home of the Persian race. When he approached one of these cities the Magi same forth to meet him, dressed all in white and singing hymns. The road was strewn with myrtle boughs and roses, and silver altars with blazing frankincense were placed by the wayside. His palaces were built of precious woods ; but the naked wood was never permitted to be seen : the walls were covered with golden plates, the roof with silver tiles. The courts were adorned with white, green, and blue hangings, fastened with cords of fine linen to pil- lars of marble by silver rings. The gardens were filled with rare and exotic plants ; from the cold bosom of the snow-white stone, fountains sprang upward, spark- ling in the air ; birds of gorgeous plumage flashed from tree to tree, resembling flowers where they perched. And as the sun sank low ia the heavens, and the shadows on the earth grew deep, the voice of the nightingale was heard in the thicket, and the low coo- ing of the dove, Soimds of laughter proceeded from the house ; lattices were opened ; ponderous doors swung back, and out poured a troop of houris which a Persian poet only would venture to describe. For there might be seen the fair Circassian, with cheeks like the apple BMBABBAS DE KIOHESSE. 65 in its rosy bloom ; and the Abyssinian damsel, "with warm brown skia and voluptuous drowsy eyes ; the Hin- doo girl, with lithe and undulating form, and fingers which seemed created to caress ; the Syrian, with aqui- Hne and haughty look ; the Greek, with features bright- ened by intellect and vivacity ; and the home-bom beauty prepared expressly for the harem, with a com- plexion as white as the milk on which she had been fed, and a face ia form and expression resembling the full moon. All these dear charmers belonged to the king, and no doubt he often wished haK of them away. For if he felt a serious passion rising in his breast, etiquette compelled him to put it down. Inconstancy was en- joined on him by law. He was subjected to a rotation of kisses by the regulated science of the harem. Cere- mony interdicted affection and caprice. He suffered from unvarying variety, and the monotony of eternal change. The whole empire belonged to him, and all its inhabitants where his slaves. If he happened to be struck to the heart by a look cast from under a pair of black-edged eyelids ; if he became enamored of a high- bosomed virgin, with a form Kke the oriental wUlow, he had only to say the word : she was at once taken to the apartments of the women, and her parents received the congratulations of their friends. But then he was not allowed to see his beloved for a twelvemonth: sis months she must be prepared with the oil of myrrh, sii months with the sweet odors, before she was suffi- ciently purified and perfumed to receive the au^st embraces of the king, and to soothe a passion which meanwhile had ample time to cool. The Great King slept on a splendid couch, overspread by a vine of branching gold, with clusters of rubies 66 THE PEBSIAN ABMT. representing grapes. He wore a dress of purple and white, with scarlet trowsers, a girdle like that of a wo- man, and a high tiara encircled by a sky-blue turban. He lived in a prison of rich metal and dazzling stone ; around him stood the courtiers with their hands wrap- ped in their robes, and covering their mouth lest he should be polluted by their base-bom breath. Those who desired to speak to his majesty prostrated them- selves before Tn'm on the ground. If any one entered uncalled, a hundred sabers gleamed in the aii* : unless the king stretched out his scepter, the intruder would be killed. An army sat down to dinner in the palace every day, and every day a herd of oxen was killed for them to eat. These were only the household troops. But when the Great King went to war, the provinces sent in their contingents, and then might be seen, as in some great exhibition, a collection of warriors from the four quarters of the earth. Then might be seen the Inunor- tals, or Persian life-guards; their arms were of gold and silver, their standards were of silk : then might be seen the heavy-armed Egyptian troops, with long wooden shields reaching to the ground; the Greeks from Ionia, with crested helmets and breastplates of bronze ; the fur-clad Tartars of the steppes, who " raised hair " like the Eed Indians, a people probably belong- ing to the same race ; the Ethiopians of Africa, with fleecy locks, clad in the skins of lions, and armed with throw-sticks and with stakes, the points of which had been hardened in the fire, or tipped with horn or stone ; the Berbers, in their four-horse chariots ; the camel cavalry of Arabia, each camel being mounted by two archers sitting back to back, and thus prepared for the enemy on either side ; the wild horsemen of the Per- PBS OAKP. 67 man bilk, who caught the enemy with their lassos ; the black-skinned but straight-haired aborigines of India, with their bows of the bamboo, and their shields made of the sldns of cranes ; and, above all, the Hindoos, dressed in white muslin, and seated on the necks of elephants, which were clothed in Indian steel, and which looked like moving mountains, with snakes for hands. Towers were erected on their backs, in which sat bowmen, who shot down the foe with unerring aim, while the elephants were taught to charge, to trample down the opposing ranks in heaps, and to take up armed men in their trunks and hand them to their riders. Sometimes huge scythes were fastened to their trunks, and they mowed down regiments as they marched along. The army was also attended by packs of enormous bloodhounds to hunt the fugitives when a victory had been gained, and by falcons, which were trained to fly at the eyes of the enemy to baffle them, or even blind them as they were fightiug. When this enormous army began to march, it devour- ed the whole land over which it passed. At night the camp fires reddened the sky as if a great city was in flames. In the morning, a Kttle after daybreak, a tnim- pet sounded, and the image of the sun cased in crystal, and made of burnished gold, was raised on the top of the king's pavilion, which was built of wood, covered with cashmere shawls, and supported on silver poles. As soon as the ball caught the first rays of the rising sun, the march began. First went the chariot with the altar and the sacred fire, drawn by eight milk-white horses, driven by charioteers, who walked by the side with golden wands. The chariot was followed by a horse of extraordinary magnitude, which was cailed the Charger of the Sun. The king followed with the 68 THB MABOH. ten thousand Immortals, and with his wives in covered carriages drawn by mules, or in cages npon camels. Then came the army, without order or precision; and there rose a dust which resembled a white cloud, and which could be seen across the plain for miles. The enemy, when this cloud drew near, could distinguish within it the gleaming of brazen armor; and they could hear the soimd of the lash, which was always part of the military music of the Persians. When a battle was fought, the king took his seat on a golden throne, surrounded by his secretaries, who took notes during the engagement, and recorded every word which fell from the foyal Hps. This army was frequently required by the Persians. They were a restless people, always lusting after war. Vast as their empire was, it was not large enough for them. The courtiers used to assure an enterprising monarch that he was greater than aU the kings that were dead, and greater than those that were yet un- born; that it was his mission to extend the Persian territory as far as God's heaven reached, in order that the sun might shine on no land beyond their borders. Hyperbole apart, it was the aim and desire of the kings to annex the plains of Southern Russia, and so to make the Black Sea a lake in the interior of Persia ; and to conquer Greece, the only land in Europe which really merited their arms. In both these attempts they completely failed. The Eussian Tartars, who had no fixed abode, whose houses were on wheels, decoyed the Persian army far into the interior, eluded it in pursuit, harassed and almost destroyed it in retreat. The Greeks defeated them in pitched battles on Greek soil, and defeated their fleets in Greek waters. This contest, which lasted many years, to the Greeks GBEEOE. 69 was a matter of life and death. ; but it was merely an episode in Persian history. The defeats of Plataea and Salamis caused the Great King much annoyance, and cost him a shred of land and sea. But it did not directly affect the prosperity of his empire. What was the loss of a few thousand slaves and of a few himdred Phoenician and Egyptian and Ionian ships to him? Indirectly, indeed, it decided the fate of Persia by developing the power of the Greeks ; but ruined in any case that empire must have been, like all others of its kind. The causes of its fall must be sought for within, and not without. In the natural course of events, it would have become the prey of some people Hke the Parthian Highlanders or the wandering Turks. The Greek wars had this result : the empire was conquered at an earlier period than would otherwise have been the case ; and it was conquered by a European instead of an Asiatic power. There is no problem in history so interesting as the unparalleled development of Greece. How was it that so smaU a country could exert so remarkable an influ- ence on the course of events and on the intellectual progress of mankind? The Greeks, as the science of language clearly proves, belonged to the same race as the Persians themselves. Many centuries before history begins, a people migrated from the Highlands of Central Asia, and overspread Europe on the one side, on the other side Hindostan. Celts and Germans, Russians and Poles, Bomans and Greeks, Persians and Hindoos, all sprang from the loins of a shepherd tribe inhabiting the table-land of the sources of the Oxus and Jaxartes, and are quite distinct from the Assyrians, the Arabs, and Phoenicians, whose ancestors descended into the plains of Western Asia from the table-land of 70 THE ABTAN8. the soxirces of the Tigris and Euphrates. It is also inferred from the evidence of language that at some remote period the Egyptians belonged to the same stock as the mountaineers of Armenia, the Chinese to the same stock as the Highlanders of Central Asia ; and that at a period still more remote the Turanian or Chinese Tartar, the Aryan or Indo-European, and the Shemitic, races and languages were one. Upon' this last point philologists are not agreed, though the balance of authority is in favor of the view expressed. But as regards the descent of the EngKsh and Hindoos from the same tribe of Asiatic mountaineers, that is now as much a fact of history as the common descent of the Enghsh and the Normans from the same race of pirates on the Baltic shores. The Celts migrated first into Europe : they were followed by the Grseco-ItaJian people, and then by the German-Sclavonians, the Per- sians and Hindoos remaining longest in their primeval homes. The great difference between the various breeds of the Indo-European race is partly due to their iatermisture with the natives of the countries which they colonized and conquered. In India the Aryans found a black race, which yet exist in the lulls and jungles of that country, and who yet speak languages of their own, which have nothing in common with the noble Sanscrit. Europe was inhabited by a people of Tartar origin, who still exist as the Basques of the Pyrenees, and as the Finns and Lapps of Scandinavia. It is probable that these people also were intruders of comparatively recent date, and that a yet more prime- val race existed on the gloomy banks of the Danube and the Rhine, in huts built on stakes in the shallow waters of the Swiss lakes, and in the mountain caverns of France and Spain. The Aryans, who migrated into OBIGIN OP GEEEK GEOTUS. 71 India, certainly intermarried with the blacks, and there can be no reasonable doubt that the Celts who first migrated iato Europe took the ■wives as well as the lands of the natives. The aborigines were therefore largely absorbed by the Celts, to the detriment of that race, before the arrival of the Germans, whose blood remained comparatively pure. We may freely use the doctrine of intermarriage to explain the difference ia color between the sepoy and his officer. We may apply it — though with less con- fidence — to explain the difference in character and aspect between the Irish and the English ; but we do not think that the doctrine will help us much toward expounding the genius of Greece. And it the supe- riority of that people was not dependent in any way on race distinctions, inherent or acquired, it must have been in some way connected with locality and other incidents of Hfe. A glance at the map is sufficient to explain how it was that Greece became civilized before the other European lands. It is nearest to those coimtries in which civili- zation first arose. It is the border land of the East and West. The western coast of Asia and the eastern coast of Greece lie side by side ; the sea between them is nar- row, the islands like stepping stones across a brook. On the other hand a moimtain wall extends in the form of an arc from the Adriatic to the Black Sea, and shuts off Europe from Greece, which is thus compelled to grow toward Asia as a tree grows toward the light. Its coasts are indented in a peculiar maimer by the sea. Deep bays and snug coves, forming hospitable ports, abound. The character of the ^gean is mUd and humane ; its atmosphere is clear and favorable for those who navi- gate by the eye from island to island, and from point to 72 THE GEOGRAPHY OF GEEEOE. point. The purple shell fish, so much in request with Phoenicians for their manufactures, was found upon the coasts of Greece. A trade was opened between the two lands, and with trade there came arithmetic and let- ters to assist the trade, and from these a desire on the part of the Greeks for more luxury and more knowledge. All this was natural enough. But how was it that whatever came into the hands of the Greeks was used merely as raw material, that whatever they touched was transmuted into gold ? How was it that Asia was only their dame's school, and that they discovered the higher branches of knowledge for themselves ? How was it that they who were taught by the Babylonians to divide the day into twelve hours, afterward exalted astronomy to the rank of an exact science ? How was it that they who received from Egypt the canon of pro- portions, and the first ideas of the portraiture of the human form, afterward soared into the regions of the ideal, and created in marble a beauty more exquisite than can be found on earth — a vision, as it were, of some unknown, yet not unimagiued, world. The mountains of Greece are disposed in a peculiar manner, so as to inclose extensive tracts of land which assume the appearance of large basins or circular hol- lows, level as the ocean, and consisting of rich alluvial soil, through which rise steep insulated rocks. The plaia subsisted a numerous population ; the rock be- came the Aeropohs or citadel of the chief town, and the mountains were barriers against invasion. Other dis- tricts were parceled out by water in the same manner ; their frontiers were swift-streaming rivers, or estuaries of the sea. Each of these cantons became an independ- ent city state, and the natives of each canton became warmly attached to their fatherland. Nature had given THE CLIMATE. 73 them ramparts which they knew how to use. They de- fended with obstinacy the river and the pass ; if those were forced, the citadel became a place of refuge and resistance ; and it the worst came to the worst, they could escape to inaccessible mountain caves. Each of these states possessed a constitution of its own, and each was home-made, and differed slightly from the rest. It may be imagined what a variety of ideas must have risen in the process of their manufac- ture. The laws were debated in a general assembly of the citizens ; each community within itself was full of intellectual activity. Self-development and independence are too often ac- companied by isolation ; and nations, like individuals, become torpid when they retire from the world. But this was not the case with Greece. Though its people were divided into separate states, they all spoke the same language and worshiped the same gods ; and there existed certain institutions which at appointed times assembled them together as a nation. Greece is a country which possesses the most extra- ordinary climate in the world. "Within two degrees of latitude it ranges from the beech to the pahn. In the morning the traveler may be shivering in a snow-storm, and viewing a winter landscape of naked trees ; in the afternoon he may be sweltering beneath a tropical sun, with oleanders blooming around him, and oranges shin- ing in the green foliage like balls of gold. From this variety of cHmate resulted a variety of produce which stimulated the natives to barter and exchange. A cen- tral spot was chosen as the market-place, and it was made, for the common protection, asanctuary of Apollo. The people when they met for the purposes of trade per- formed at the same time religious rites, and also amused 74 THE QAMES. themselves, in the rude maimer of the age, with boxing, wrestling, running races, and throwing the spear ; or they listened to the minstrels, who sang the ballads of ancient times, and to the prophets or inspired pohticians, who chanted predictions in hexameters. That sanctuary became in time the famous oracle of Delphi ; and those sports expanded into the Olympian games. To the great fair came Greeks from all parts of the land ; and when chariot races were introduced, it became neces- sary to make good roads from state to state, and to bmld bridges across the streams. The administration of the sanctuary, the laws and regulations of the games, and the management of the public fund subscribed for the expenses of the fair, could only be arranged by means of a national councU, composed of deputies from all the states. This congress was called the Amphicty- onic League, which, soon extending its powers, enacted national laws, and, as a Supreme Court of Arbitration, decided aU questions that arose between state and state. At Olympia, the inhabitants of the coast displayed the scarlet cloth and the rich trinkets which they had obtain- ed from Phoenician ships. At Olympia, those who had been kidnaped into slavery, and had afterward been ransomed by their friends at home, related to an eager crowd the wonders which they had seen in the enchant- ed regions of the East. And then throughout all Greece there was an inward stirring and a hankering after the unknown, and a de- sire to achieve great deeds. It began with the expedi- tion of Jason — an exploring voyage to the Black Sea ; it culminated in the siege of Troy. In such countries as the Grecian states, where the area is small, the community flourishing, and the fron- THE EMIGKATION. 75 tier inexorably defined, the law of population operates with unusual force. The mountain walls of the Greek cantons, like the deserts which surrounded Egypt, not only kept out the enemy, but also kept in the natives ; they were not only fortresses, but prisons. In order to exist, the Greeks were obliged to cultivate every inch of soil. But when this had been done, the popidation stiU continued to increase ; and now the land could no longer be increased. In those early days they had no manufactures, mines or foreign commerce, by means of which they could supply themselves, as we do, with food from other lands. In such an emergency, the Govern- ment, if it act at aU, has only two methods to pursue. It must either strangle or bleed the population : it must organize infanticide or emigration. The first method was practiced to some extent, but, happily, the last was now within their power. The Ti'O- jan war had made them acquainted with the Asiatic xoast, and overcrowded states began to send forth colo- nies by pubKc act. The emigrants consisted chiefly, as may be supposed, of the poor, the dangerous and the discontented classes. They took with them no women ; they went forth, like the buccaneers, sword in hand. They swooped down on the Ionian coast ; there was at that time no power in Asia Minor which was able to re- sist them. They obtained wives, sometimes by force, sometimes by peaceable arrangement with the natives. In course of time the coast of Asia Minor was lined with rich and flourishing towns. The mother country continued to pour forth colonies, and colonies also found- ed colonies. The Greeks sailed and settled in every direction. They braved the dark mists and the inclem- ent seasons of the Black Sea, and took up their abode among a people whose faces were almost concealed in 76 THE COLONIES. furs, who dwelt at the mouths of great rivers, and culti- vated boundless plains of wheat. This wheat the Greeks exported to the mother country, with barrels of the salted tunny fish, and the gold of Ural, and even the rich products of the Oriental trade which were brought across Asia from India or China by the waters of the Oxus to the Aral Sea, from the Aral to the Cas- pian Sea by land, from the Caspian to the Black Sea by the Volga and the Don. But where Italy dipped her arched and lovely foot in the blue waters of an untroubled sea, beneath the blue roof of an unclouded sky ; where the flowers never perished; where eternal summer smiled; where mere existence was voluptuous, and life itself a sensual joy : there the Greek cities clustered richly together ; cities shining with marble, and built in fairy forms ; before them the deep, tranquil harbor ; behind them violet valleys, myrtle groves, and green lakes of waving com. When a band of emigrants went forth, they took with them fire kindled on the city hearth. Although each colony was independent, it regarded with rever- ence the mother state, and aU considered themselves with pride not foreigners, but Greeks ; for Greece was not a country, but a people : wherever the Greek lan- guage was spoken, that was Greece. They aU spoke the same grand and harmonious language — although the dialects might differ ; they had the same bible, for Homer was in aU their hearts, and the memory of their youthful glory was associated in their minds with the Tznion of Greek warriors beneath the walls of Troy. The chief colonial states were represented at the meet- ings of the Amphictyonic League, and any Greek from the Crimea to Marseilles might contend at the Olym- pian games with the fuU rights of a Spartan or Athe- THE GTMNASIUM. 7? nian, a privilege which the Great King could by no means have obtained. The intense enthusiasm which was excited by the Olympian games was the chief cause of the remarkable development of Greece. The man who won the olive garland on that celebrated course was famous forever afterward. His statue was erected in the public haU at Delphi ; he was received by his native city with aU the honors of a formal triumph ; he was not allowed to enter by the gates ; a part of the city wall was beaten down. The city itself became, during five years, the talk of Greece, and wherever its people traveled they were welcomed with congratulations and esteem. The passion for praise is innate in the human mind. It is only natural that, throughout the whole Greek world, a spirit of eager rivalry and emulation should prevail. In every city was established a gymnasium where crowds of young men exercised themselves naked. This institution was originally intended for those only who were in training for the Olympian games, but afterward it became a part of daUy life, and the Greeks went to the gymnasium with the same regu- larity as the Romans went to the bath. At first the national prizes were only for athletes, but at a later period the principle of competition was extended to books and musical compositions, paintings, and statues. There was also a competition in rich and elegant display. The carriages and retinues which were exhibited upon the course excited a de- sire to obtain wealth, and gave a useful impulse to foreign commerce, manufactures, and mining opera- tions. The Greek world was composed of mimicipal aris- tocracies, societies of gentlemen living in towns, with 78 THE MABKET-PIAOE. their farms in the neighborhood, and having all their work done for them by slaves. They themselves had nothing to do but to cultivate their bodies by exercise in the gymnasium, and their minds by conver- sation in the market-place. They lived out of doors, while their wives remained shut up at home. In Greece, a lady could only enter society by adopting a mode of hfe which iu England usually facilitates her exit. The Greeks spent little money on their wives, their houses, or their food : the rich men were expected to give dramatic entertainments, and to contribute a company or a man-of-war for the protection of the city. The market-place was the Greek club. There the merchants talked their business : the labors of the desk were then unknown. The philosopher ia- structed his pupils under the shade of a plane tree, or strolling up and down a garden path. Minghng with the song of the cicada from the boughs might be heard the chipping of the chisel from the workshop of the sculptor, and the laughter and shouts from the gymnasium. And sometimes the tinkle of a harp would be heard ; a crowd would be collected ; and a rhapsodist would recite a scene from the Iliad, every word of which his audience knew by heart, as an audience at Naples or Milan know every bar of the opera which is about to be performed. Sometimes a citizen would announce that his guest, who had just arrived from the Sea of Azov or the Pillars of Hercules, would read a paper on the manners and customs of the barbarians. It was in the city that the book was first read and the statue exhibited — the rehearsal and the private view ; it was in Olympia that they were pub- lished to the nation. When the public murmured in delight aroimd a picture of Xeuxis or a statue of THE BEUOION. 79 Praxiteles, when they thundered in applause to an ode by Pindar or a lecture by Herodotus, how many hundreds of young men must have gone home with burning brows and throbbing hearts, deroured by the love of fame. And when we consider that though the geographical Greece is a small country, the true Greece — that is to say, the land inhabited by the Greeks — was in reality a large country — when we consider with what an im- mense number of ideas they must have been brought in contact on the shores of the Black Sea, in Asia Minor, in Southern Italy, in Southern France, in Egypt, and in Northern Africa — when we consider that, owing to those noble contests of Olympia, city was ever con- tending against city, and within the city man against man — there is surely no longer anything mysterious in the exceptional development of that people. Education in Greece was not a monopoly; it was the precious privilege of all the free. The business of religion was divided among three classes. The Priests were merely the sacrificers and guardians of the sanc- tuary : they were elected, like the mayors of our market towns, by their feUow-citizens, for a limited time only, and without their being withdrawn from the business of ordinary hfe. The Poets revealed the nature, and portrayed the character, and related the biography, of the gods. The Philosophers undertook the education of the young ; and were also the teachers and preachers of morality. If a man wished to obtain the favor of the gods, or to take divine advice, he went to a priest ; if he desired to turn his mind to another, though scarcely a better, world, he took up his Homer or his Hesiod; and if he suffered from sickness or mental affliction, he sent for a philosopher. It will presently be shown that the philosophers in- 80 THE AGE OP MABBIiE. yaded the territory of the poets, who were defended by the Government and by the mob, and that a religious persecution was the result. But the fine arts were free ; and the custom which came into vogue of erectiug statues to the gods, to the victors of the games, and to other Oustrious men, favored the progress of sculpture, which was also aided by the manners of the land. The gymnasium was a school of art. The eyes of the sculptor reveled on the naked form, not purchased, as ia London, at eighteenpence an hour, but visible in marvelous perfection at all times and in every pose. Thus ever present to the eye of the artist, it was ever present to his brain, and flowed forth from his fingers in lovely forms. As art was fed by nature, so nature was fed by art. The Greek women placed statues of ApoUo or Narcissus in their bedrooms, that they might bear children as beautiful as those on whom they gazed. Such children they prayed the gods to give them ; for the Greeks loved beauty to distraction, and regarded ugliness as sin. They had exhibitions of beauty, at which prizes were given by celebrated artists who were appointed to the judgment-seat. There were towns in which the most beautiful men were elected to the priesthood. There were connoisseurs, who formed companies of soldiers composed exclusively of comely young men, and who could plead for the Ufe of a beau- tiful youth amid the wrath and confusion of the battle- field. The Persian wars gave a mighty impulse to the in- tellect of Greece. In., ^-o-l "^fore that period Greek art had been uncouth ; it was then that the Age of Marble really commenced, and that Phidias molded the ideas of Homer into noble forms. It was then that Athens, having commanded the Greeks in the War of Indepen- THE CITY OF THE VIOLET OEOWN. 81 dence, retained the supremacy, and became the center of the nation. Athens had died for Greece; it had been burned by the Persians to the ground, and from those glorious ashes arose the Athens of history — the City of the Yiolet Crown. To Athens were summoned the great artists; to Athens came every young man who had talent and ambition ; to Athens every Greek who could afford it sent his boys to school. The Academy was planted with wide-spreading plane trees and olive-groves, laid out in walks, with fountaius, and surrounded by a wall. A theater was built entirely of masts which had been taken from the enemy. A splen- did harbor was constructed— a harbor which was iu itself a town. All that fancy could create, all that money could command, was lavished upon the city and its environs — the very mile-stones on the roads were works of art. The Persians assisted the growth of Greece, not only by those iavasions which had favored the union, aroused the ardor, multipHed the desires, and ennobled the ambition of the Greek people, but also by their own conquests. Their failure in Europe and their success ia Asia were equally profitable to the Greeks. Trade and travel were much facilitated by their extensive rule. A Government postal service had been estab- lished : royal couriers might be seen every day gaUop- iag at full speed along the splendid roads which united the provinces of the Punjaub and Afghanistan and Bokhara on one side of the Euphrates, and of Asia Minor, Syria and Egypt on the other side of that river with the imperial palaces at Babylon, Susa, Ecbatana and PersepoUs. Oaravanseries were fitted up for the reception of travelers in lonely places where no other houses were to be found. Troops of mounted police 4* 82 THE UNIVEBSITY OF EQTPT. patroled the roads. In desert tracts thousands of earthen jars, filled with water and planted up to their necks in sand, supplied the want of wells. The old system of national isolation and closed ports was bat- tered down. The Greeks were no longer forbidden to enter the Phoenician ports, or compelled to trade ex- clusiyely at one Egyptian town. Greek merchants were able to join in the caravan trade of Central Asia, and to traffic on the shores of the Indian Ocean. Philoso- phers, taking with them a venture of oil to pay ex- penses, could now visit the learned countries of the East with more profit than had previously been the case. Siuce that country was deprived of its independence, the priests were inclined to encourage the cultivated curiosity of their new scholars. Egypt from the earUest times had been the University of Greece. It had been visited, according to tradition, by Orpheus and Homer; there Solon had studied law- making ; there the rules and principles of the Pythago- rean order had been obtained; there Thales had taken lessons in geometry; there Democritus had laughed and Xenophanes had sneered. And now every in- tellectual Greek made the voyage to that counti-y; it was regarded as a part of education, as a pilgrimage to the cradle-land of their mythology. To us Egypt is a land of surpassing interest ; but to us it is merely a charnel-house, a museum, a valley of ruins and dry bones. The Greeks saw it alive. They saw with their own eyes the solemn and absurd rites of the temple — the cat salemnly enthroned, the tame crocodiles being fed, Ibis mummies being packed up in red jars, scribes carving the animal language upon the granite. They wandered in the mazes of the Labyrinth ; they gazed on the mighty Sphinx couched on the yellow sands THE GBEEK8 IN ASIA- 83 with a temple between its paws ; they entered the great hall of Karnak, filled with columns like a forest, and paved with acres of solid stone. In that countiy He- rodotus resided several years, and took notes on his wooden tablets of everythiog that he saw, ascertained the existence of the Niger, made inquiries about the sources of the Nile, collated the traditions of the priests of Memphis with those of Thebes. To Egypt came the divine Plato, and drank long and deeply of its an- cient lore. The house in which he lived at HeHopolis was afterward shown to travelers; it was one of the sights of Egypt in Strabo's day. There are some who ascribe the whole civilization of Greece, and the rapid growth of Greek literature, to the free trade which ex- isted between the two lands. Greece imported all its paper from Egypt, and without paper there would have been few books. The skins of animals were too rare, and their preparation too expensive, to permit the growth of a Uterature for the people. Gradually the Greeks became dispersed over the whole Asiatic world, and such was the influence of their superiority that countries in which they had no political power adopted much of their culture and their manners. They surpassed the inhabitants of Asia as much in the arts of war as in those of peace. They served as mercenaries in every land; wherever the kettle-drum was beaten they assembled in crowds. It soon became evident to keen observers that the Greeks were destiued to iuherit the Persian world. That vast empire was beginning to decay. The char- acter of the ruling people had completely changed. It is said that the Lombards of the fourth generation were terrified when they looked at the portraits of their savage ancestors, who, with their hair shaved behind, 84 PEBSUN DECLINE. and hanging down over their mouths in front, had issued from the dark forests of Central Europe, and had streamed down from the Alps upon the green Itahan plains. The Persians soon ceased to be the rude and simple mountaineers who had scratched their heads with wonder at the sight of a silk dress, and who had been unable to understand the object of changing one thing for another. It was remarked that no people adopted more readily the customs of other nations. Whenever they heard of a new luxury they made it their own. They soon became distinguished for that exquisite and refined pohteness which they retain at the present day; their language cast off its guttural sounds and became melodious to the ear. Time went on, and their old virtues entirely departed. They made use of gloves and umbrellas when they walked out in the sun ; they no longer hunted except in bateaux, slaughtering without danger or fatigue the lean, mangy creatures of the parks. They painted their faces and penciled their eyebrows, and wore bracelets and collars, and dined on a variety of entrees, tasting a little here and a httle there, drank deep, yawned half the day in their harems, and had vahts de chambre to help them out of bed. Their actions were Hke water, and their words were like the wind. Once a Persian's right hand had been a pledge which was never broken; now no one could rely on their most solemn oaths. A country in which polygamy prevails can never en- joy a weU-ordered constitution. There is always an uncertainty about succession. The kingdom does not descend by rule to the eldest son, but to the son of the favorite wife; it is not determined beforehand by a national law, constant and unchangeable, given forth from the throne and ratified by the estates ; it may be SEBAQUO INTBiaUB. 85 decided suddenly and at any moment in that hour when men are weak and yielding, women sovereign and strong ; when right is often strangled by a fond em- brace, and reason kissed to sleep by rosy hps. The fatal Yes is uttered and cannot be revoked. The heir is appointed, and an injustice has been done. But the rival mother has yet a hope ; the appointed heir may die. Then the seraglio becomes a nursery of treason ; the harem administration is stirred by dark whispers ; the cabinet of women and eunuchs is cajoled and bribed. A crime is committed, and is revenged. The whole palace smells of blood. The king trembles on his throne. He himself is never safe ; he is always encir- cled by soldiers ; he never sleeps twice in the same place ; his dinner is served in sealed trays ; a man stands at his left hand who tastes from the cup before he dares to raise it to his lips. The satrap form of government is far superior to that of vassal kings. As long as the system of inspection is kept up there is no comparison between the two. But if once the satrapies are allowed to become hered- itary there is no difference between the two. In the latter days of the Persian Empire the satraps were no longer supervised by Koyal Visitors and Clerks of the Accounts. Each of these viceroys had his body-guard of Persians, and his army of mercenary Greeks. Some- times they fought against each other ; sometimes they even contested for the throne. As for the subject na- tions, they were by no means idle ; revolts broke out in aU directions. Egypt enjoyed a long interlude of inde- pendence, though afterward again reduced to servitude. The Indians appear to have shaken themselves free, and to have attained the position of allies. Many prov- inces still recognized the Emperor as their suzerain and 86 BETBEAT OF THE TEN THOUSAND. lord, but did not pay him any tribute. When he tra> eled from Susa to Persepolis he had to go throi^h a rocky pass where he paid a toll. The King of Persia could not enter Persia Proper ^vithout buying the per- mission of a little shepherd tribe. A remarkable event now occurred. A Pretender to the throne hired a Greek army, led it to Babylon, and defeated the Great King at the gates of his palaca The empire was won, but the Pretender had fallen in the battle; his Persian adherents went over to the other side ; the Greeks were left without a commander, and without a cause. They were in the heart of Asia, cut off from their home by swift-streaming rivers and burn- ing plains of sand. They were only ten thousand strong, yet, in spite of their desperate condition, they cut their way back to the sea. That glorious victory, that still more glorious retreat, exposed the true state of affairs to public view ; and it became known all over Greece that the Persian Empire could be had. But Greece, unhappily, was subject to vices and abuses of its own, and was not in a position to take ad- vantage of the weakness of its neighbor. The intellectual achievements of the Greeks have been magnificently praised. And when we consider what the world was when they found it, and what it was when they left it, when we review their productions in connection with the time and the circumstances under which they were composed, we are forced to ac- knowledge that it would be difficult to exaggerate their excellence. But the splendor of their just renown must not bHnd us to their moral defects, and to their exceed- ing narrowness as politicians. In the arts and letters they were one nation ; and their jealousy of one another only served to stimtilate GREEK DISHONESTY. 87 tiheir inventiveness and industry. But in polities this envious spirit had a very different effect ; it divided them, it weakened them ; the Ionian cities were en- slaved again and agaia because they could not com- bine. And one reason of their not being able to com- bine was this : they never trusted one another. It was their inveterate dishonesty, their want of faith, their disregard for the sanctity of oaths, their hankering after money, which had much to do with their disunion, even ia the face of danger. There are some who desire to persuade us that the Greeks whom the Bomans de- scribed were entirely a different race from the Greeks of the Persian wars. But an unprejudiced study of original authorities gives no support to such a theory. From the pirates to the orators, from the heroic and treacherous Ulysses to the patriotic and venal Demos- thenes, we find almost all their best men tainted with the same disease. Polybius complains that the Greek statesmen would never keep their hands out of the tilL In the retreat of the Ten Thousand a little banter is exchanged between a Spartan and an Athenian which illustrates the state of public opinion in Greece. They have come to a country where it is necessary to rob the natives in order to provide themselves with food. The Athenian says, that, as the Spartans are taught to steal, now is the time for them to show that they have prof- ited by their education. The Spartan replies, that the Athenians will no doubt be able to do their share, as the Athenians appoint their best men to govern the State, and their best men are invariably thieves. The same kind of pleasantry, no doubt, goes on in Greece at the present day ; to rob a foreigner in the mountains, and to filch the money from the public chest, are looked apon, in that coimtry, as " little affairs " which are not o8 TTRAMfY OF ATHENS. disgraceful so long as they are not found out. But the modem Greeks are degenerate in every way. The ancient Greeks surpassed them, not only in sculpture and in metaphysics, but also in duplicity. With their fine phrases and rhetorical expressions, they have even swindled history, and obtained a vast amount of admi- ration under false pretenses. The narrowness of the Greeks was not less strongly marked. When Athens obtained the supremacy, a wise and just policy might have formed the Greeks into a nation. But Pericles had no sympathies beyond the city walls : he was a good Athenian, but a bad Greek. He removed the federal treasury from Delphi to Athens, where it was speedily emptied on the public works. Since Athens had now become the imiversity and cap- ital of Greece, it appears not unjust that it should have been beautified at the expense of Greece. But it must be remembered that the Athenians considered them- selves the only pure Greeks, and no Athenian was allowed to marry a Greek who was not also an Athenian. Heavy taxes were laid on the allies, and were not spent entirely on works of art. Besides the money that was purloined by government officials, large sums were dis- tributed among the citizens of Athens, as payment for attending the law courts, the parliament, and the thea- ter. It was also ordered that aU cases of importance should be tried at Athens ; and judicial decisions then, as now, were looked upon at Athens as salable articles belonging to the Court, The Greeks soon discovered that the Athenians were harder masters than the Per- sians. They began to envy the fate of the Ionian cities, whose mimicipal rights were undisturbed. They rose up against their tyrant : long wars ensued ; and finally the ships of Athens were burnt, and its walls THE king's aeohees. 89 beaten down to the music of flutes. Then Sparta be- came supreme, also tyrannised, and also fell ; and then Thebes followed its example, till at last all the states of Greece were so exhausted that the ambition of suprem- acy died away, and each city cared only for its own life. The jealousy and distrust which prevented the union of the Greeks, and the constant wars in which they were engaged, sufficiently explain how it was they did not conquer Persia ; and by this time Persia had dis- covered how to conquer them. When Xerxes was on his famous march, he was told by a Greek that if he chose to bribe the orators of Greece, he could do with that country what he pleased, but that he woidd never conquer it by force. This method of making war was now adopted by the king. When AgesUaus the Spar- tan had already begun the conquest of the Persian Em- pire, ten thousand golden coias marked with the effigy of a bowman were sent to the demagogues of Athens, Corinth, and Thebes. Those cities at once made war upon Sparta, and AgesUaus was recalled, driven out of Asia, as he used to say, by ten thousand of the king's archers. In this manner the Greek orators, who were often very eloquent men, but who never refused a bribe, kept their coimtry continually at war, till at last it was in such an enfeebled state that the Persian had no longer anything to fear, and even used his influence in making peace. The land which might have been the mistress of the East passed under the protectorate of an empire in its decay. It was now that a new power sprang iato hfe. Mac- edonia was a hilly country on the northern boundaries of Greece ; and a Greek colony having settled there in ancient times, the reigning house and the language of 90 MACEDONIA. the Court were Hellenic ; the mass of the peoples were barbarians. It was an old head placed on young shoulders ; the intellect of the Greek united with the strength and siaews of wild and courageous mountain- eers. The celebrated Philip, when a young man, had passed some time in Greece ; he had seen what could be done with money ia that country; he conjectured what might be done if the money were sustained by arms. When he became king of Macedon, he made himself presi- dent of the Greek confederation, obtaining by force and skillful address, by bribery and intrigue, the position which Athens and Sparta had once possessed. He was preparing to conquer Persia, and to avenge the ancient wrongs of Greece, when he was murdured ; and Alex- ander, like Frederick the Great, inherited an army dis- ciplined to perfection, and the great design for which that army had been prepared. Alexander reduced and garrisoned the rebellious Greece, passed over into Asia Minor, defeated a Per- sian army at the Granicus, marched along the Ionian coast and crossed over the snowy range of Taurus, which the Persians neglected to defend. He heard that the Great King was behind him with his army entangled in the mountains. He went back, won the battle of Issus, and took as prisoners the mother and the wife and the daughter of Darius. He passed into Syria and laid siege to Tyre, the Cherbourg of the Persians, and took it after seven months : this gave him possession of the Mediterranean Sea. He passed down the Syrian coast, crossed the desert — a three days' journey — ^which separates Palestine from Egypt, received the submis- sion of that satrapy, made arrangements for its admin- istration, visited the oracle of Jupiter Ammon in the ALEXAKDKB Am) DAIIIU& 91 Sahara, and returned to Tyre. Thence making a long detour to avoid the sandy deserts of Arabia, he entered the plains of Mesopotamia, inhabited only by the ostrich and the wild ass, and marched toward the ruins of Nine- veh, near which he fought his third and last great bat- tle with the Persians. He proceeded to Babylon, which at once opened its vast gates. He restored the Ohal- daean priesthood, and the old idolatry of Belus. He took Susa, Ecbatana, and Persepolis, the other three palatial cities, reducing the highlanders who had so long levied black mail on the Persian monarchs. He pursued Darius to the moist forest-covered shores of the Caspian Sea, and inflicted a terrible death on the assassins of that iU-fated king. The Persian histories relate that Alexander discovered Darius apparently dead upon the ground. He alighted from his horse ; he raised his enemy's head upon his knees ; he shed tears and kissed the expiring monarch, who opened his eyes and said, " The world has a thousand doors through which its tenants continually enter and pass away." " I swear to you," cried Alexander, " I never wished a day like this ; I desired not to see your royal head in the dust, nor that blood should stain these cheeks." The legend is a fiction, but it illustrates the character of Alexander. Such legends are not related of Genghis Khan, or of Tamerlane, by the people whom they con- quered. He now marched by Mushed, Herat, and the reedy shores of Lake Zurrah to Candahar and Cabul. He entered that delightful land in which the magpies flut- tering from tree to tree and the white daisies shining in the meadow grass reminded the soldiers of their home. Turning again toward the north, he climbed over the lofty back of the Hindoo Koosh where the 92 ALEXANDEb'S MIIilTAEY TOUB. people are kept inside their houses half the year by snow, and descended into the province of Bactria, a land of low waving hiUs, destitute of trees, and covered only with a dry kind of grass. But as he passed on, crossing the muddy waters of the Oxus, he arrived at the oases of Bokhara and Samarcand, regions of garden-land with smiling orchards of fruit-trees and poplars rustling their silvery leaves. Finally he reached the banks of the Jaxartes, the frontier of the Persian Empire. Beyond that river was an ocean of salt and sandy plains inhabited by wild Tartar or Turkish tribes who boasted that they neither reposed beneath the shade of a tree nor of a king, who lived by rapine like beasts of prey, and whose wives rode forth to attack a passing caravan if their husbands happened to be robbing elsewhere — a practice which gave rise to the romantic stories of the Amazons. These people came down to the banks of the river near Khojend and challenged Alexander to come across and have a fight. He inflated the soldiers' tents, which were made of skins, formed them iato rafts, paddled across and gave the Tartars as much as they desired. He returned to Afghanistan and marched through the western passes into the open plains of the Punjaub, where, perhaps, at some future day, hordes of drilled Mongols and Hindoo sepoys will fight under Russian and EngUsh officers for the empire of the Asiatic world. He built a fleet on the Indus, sailed down it to its mouth, despatched his general Nearchus to the Per- sian Gulf by sea, while he himself marched back through the terrific deserts which separate Persia from the Indus. So ended Alexander's journey of conquest, which was marked, not only by heaps of bones on battle-fields ALEXANDEE AT BABYLON. 93 and by the blackened ashes of mined to-wns, but also by cities and colonies which he planted as he passed. The memory of that extraordinary man has never perished in the Bast ; the Turcomans still speak of his deeds of war as if they had been performed a few years ago : in the tea booths of Bokhara, it is yet the custom to read aloud the biography in Terse of Secun- der Booni, by some beUeved to be a prophet, by others one of the behevLag genii. There are stiU existing chiefs in the vaUeys of the Oxus and the Indus who claim to be heirs of his royal person, and tribes who boast that their ancestors were soldiers of his army, and who refuse to give their children in marriage to those who are not of the same descent. He returned to Babylon and there found ambas- sadors from aU parts of the world waiting to offer hirn the homage of their masters. His success was in- credible ; it had not met with a single check ; the only men who had ever given him cause to be alarmed were his own countrymen and soldiers; but these also he had mastered by his s kill and strength of mind. The Macedonians had expected that he would ad- here to the constitution and customs of their own country, which gave the king small power in time of peace, and allowed full liberty and even Hcense of speech on the part of the nobles round the throne. But Alexander now considered himself, not king of Macedonia, but Emperor of Asia, and successor of Darius the King of Kings. They had supposed that lie would give them the continent to plunder as a car- cass, that they would have nothing to do but to plun- der and enjoy. They were disappointed and alarmed when they found that he was reappointing Persian gentlemen as satraps, everywhere treating the con- 94 alexandek'b chabacteb. qnered people with indulgence, everywhere Itevying native troops. They were disgusted and alarmed when they saw him put on the tiara of the Great Kiug, and the woman's girdle, and the white and purple robe, and burst into fierce wrath when he ordered that the ceremony of prostration should be performed in his presence, as it had been in that of the Persian king. In aU this they saw only the presumption of a man intoxicated by success. But Alexander knew weU that he could only govern an empire so immense by secur- ing the allegiance of the Persian nobles ; he knew that they would not respect him unless they were made to humble themselves before him after the manner of their country, and this they certainly would not do un- less his own officers did the same. He, therefore, at- tempted to obtain the prostration of the Macedonians, and alleged, as a pretext for so extraordinary a de- mand, the oracle of Ammon, that he was the son of Jove. It is possible, indeed, that he believed this himseK ; for his vanity amoimted to madness. He could not endure a candid word, and was subject, under wine and contradiction, to fits of ungovernable rage. At Samarcand he murdered Chtus, who had insulted hiTin grossly, but who was his friend and associate, and who had saved his hfe. It was a drunken action ; and his repentance was as violent as his wrath. For Alex- ander was a man of extremes : his magnanimity and his cruelty were without bounds. If he forgave, it was right royally; if he punished, he poimded to the dust, and scattered to the winds. Yet, with all his faults, it is certain that he had some conception of the art of governing a great empire. Mr. Grote complains that "he had none of that sense of correlative right and Alexander's pouoy, 95 obligation which characterized the free Greeks;" but Mr. Grote describes Alexander too much from the Athenian point of view. In all municipalities, in all aristocratic bodies, in aU corporate assemblies, in aU robber communities, in all savage families or clans, the privileged members have a sense of correlative right and obligation. The real question is. How far, and to what extent, this feeliug prevails outside the little circle of selfish reciprocity and mutual admira- tion. The Athenians did not include their slaves in their ideas of correlative right and obligation; nor their prisoners of war, when they passed a public de- cree to cut off all their thumbs, so that they might not be able to handle the pike, but might still be able to handle the oar; nor their allies, when they took their money and spent it all upon themselves. Alexander committed some criminal and despotic acts, but it was his noble idea to blot out the word "bar- barian" from the vocabulary of the Greeks, and to amalgamate them with the Persians. Mr. Grote de- clares that Alexander intended to make Greece Per- sian, not Persia Greek. Alexander certainly intended to make Greece a satrapy, as it was afterward made a Boman province. And where wotdd have been the loss? The independence of the various Greek cities had one time assisted the progress of the nation. But that time was past. Of late they had made use of their freedom only to indulge in civil war. All that was worthy of being preserved in Greece was its lan- guage and its culture, and to that Alexander was not indifferent. He sent thirty thousand Persian boys to school, and so laid the foundations of the sovereignty of Greek ideas. He behaved toward the conquered people, not as a robber, but as a sovereign. The wis- 96 WHAT HE DID, dom of his policy is clearly proved by tlie praises ol the Oriental writers and by the blame of the Greeks, who looked upon barbarians as a people destined by nature to be slaves. But had Alexander governed Persia as they desired, the land would have been in a continual state of insurrection, and it would have been impossible for him, even had he Uved, to have imdertaken new designs. The story that he wept because there were no more worlds for him to conquer would seem to imply that, after the conquest of the Persian empire, there was nothing left for him in the way of war but to go out savage-hunting in the forests of Europe, the steppes of Tartary, or the deserts of Central Africa. How- ever, there still remained a number of powerful and attractive states — even if we place China entirely aside as a land which could not be touched by the stream of events, however widely it might overflow. Alexander, no doubt, often reflected to himself that, after all, he had only walked in the footsteps of other men. It was the genius of his father which had given him possession of Greece ; it was the genius of the Persians which had planted the Asia that he had gathered. It is true that he had conquered the Persian Empire more thoroughly than the Persians had ever been able to conquer it themselves. He had not left behiad him a single rock fortress or forest den unearned, a single tribe imtamed. Tet stiU he had not been able to pass the frontiers which they had fixed. He had once attempted to do so, and had failed. When he had reached the eastern river of the Punjaub, or Land of the Five Streams, he stood on the brink of the empire, with the Himalayas on his left, and before him a wide expanse of sand. Beyond that AND MIGHT HATE DONE. 97 desert was a country which the Persians had never reached. There, a river as mighty as the Indus took its course toward the sea through a land of surpassing beauty and enormous wealth. There ruled a Idng who rode on a white elephant and who wore a mail coat composed entirely of precious stones ; whose wives slept on a thousand sUken mattresses and a thousand golden beds. The imagiaation of Alexander was inflamed by these glo^ving tales. He yearned to discover a new world ; to descend upon a distant and unknown people like a god ; to enter the land of diamonds and rubies, of gleaming and transparent robes — ^the India of the Indies, the romantic, the half- fabulous Bengal. But the soldiers were weaiy of collecting plunder which they could not carry, and refused to march. Alexander spent three days in his tent in an agony of anger and distress. He established garrisons on the banks of the Indus ; there could be Mttle doubt that some day or other he would resume his lost design. There was one country which had sent him no ambassadors. It was Arabia FeHx, situated at the mouth of the Red Sea, abounding in forests of those tearful trees which shed a yellow fragrant gum grateful to the gods, burnt in their honor on all the altars of the world. Arabia was also enriched by the monopoly of the trade between Egypt and the coast of Malabar. It was filled with rich cities. It had never paid tribute to the Persians. On the land side it was pro- tected by deserts and by wandering hordes who drank from hidden wells. But it could easily be approached by sea. On the opposite side of the Arabian gulf lay Ethio- pia, reputed to be the native land of gold, but chiefly 98 ms FLAILS. attractive to a vainglorious and emulative man, from the fact that a Persian emperor had attempted its con- quest, and had failed. There was also Carthage, the great republic of the West ; and there were rich silver mines in Spain. And can it be supposed that Alexander would remain content when he had not yet made the circuit of the Grecian world ? Was there not Sicily, which Athens had attempted to conquer, and in vain? Eome had not yet become great, but the Italian city states were already famed in war. Alexander's uncle had in- vaded that country, and had been beaten back. He declared that Alexander had fallen on the chamber of the women, and he on the chamber of the men. This sarcasm followed the conqueror into Central Asia, and was flung in his teeth by Clitus on that night of drunkenness and blood, every incident of which must have been continually present to his mind. We might therefore fairly infer, even if we had no evidence to guide us, that Alexander did not consider his career accomplished. But, in point of fact, we do know that he had given orders to fit out a thousand ships of war ; that he intended one fleet to attack Arabia from the Indian Ocean, and another to attack Carthage from the Mediterranean Sea. He had al- ready arranged a plan for connecting Egypt with his North African possessions that were to be ; and had he lived a few years longer, the features of the world -might have been changed. The Italians were imcon- querable if united ; but there was at that time no supreme city to unite them as they were afterward united against Pyrrhus. It is at least not impossible that Alexander might have conquered Italy ; that the peninsula might have become a land of independent HIS njiNBSs. 99 onltiTated cities like the Yenice, and Genoa, and Florence of tlie Middle Ages ; that Greek might have been eetabhshed as the reigning language, and Latin remaiaed a rustic dialect, and finally died away. It is, at all events, certain that, in a few more years, Alexander would have made Carthage Greek; and that event alone would have profotmdly influenced the career of Rome. However, this was not to be. Alexander went out in a boat among the marshes in the neighborhood of Babylon, and caught a fever, the first symptoms of which appeared after a banquet, which had been kept up all the night and the whole of the foUowing day. At that time the Arabian expedition was prepared, and Nearchus the admiral was under sailing orders. Day after day the king continued to send for his officers to give orders, and to converse about his future plans. But the fever gradually increased, and while yet in the possession of his sense he was deprived of the power of speech. The physicians announced that there was no longer any hope. And then were forgotten aU the crimes and follies of which he had been guilty — his assumption of the honors of a god, the murder of his bosom friend. The Macedonian soldiers came in to In'm weeping, to bid him the last farewell. He sat up and saluted them man by man as they marched past his bedside. When this last duty had been discharged, he threw back his weary frame. He expired on the evening of the next day. The night, the dark murky night, came on. None dared hght a lamp ; the fires were extinguished. By the glimmering of the stars and the faint beams of the homed moon, the young nobles of the household wer« 100 HIB DEATH. seen 'wandering like maoiiacs through the town. On the roofs of their honses the Babylonians stood grave and silent with folded hands, and eyes turned toward heaven, as if awaiting a supernatural event. High aloft in the air the trees of the hanging gardens waved their moaning boughs, and the daughters of Babylon sang the dirge of the dead. In that sorrowful hour the conquerors could not be distinguished from the con- quered ; the Persians lamented their just and merciful master ; the Macedonians their greatest, bravest king. In an apartment of the palace an aged woman was lying on the ground ; her hair was torn and disheveled ; a golden crown had fallen from her head. " Ah I who will now protect my girls ? " she said. Then, vailing her face and turning from her granddaughters, who wept at her feet, she stubbornly refused both food and Hght. She who had survived Darius was unable to survive Alexander. In famine and darkness she sat ; and on the fifth day she died. Alexander's body lay cold and stiff. The Egyptian and Chaldsean embahners were commanded to do their work. Yet long they gazed upon that awful corpse before they could venture to touch it with their hands. Placed in a golden coffin, shrouded in a bed of fragrant herbs, it remained two years at Babylon, and was then carried to Egypt to be buried in the oasis of Ammon, But Ptolemy stopped it on the road, and interred it at Alexandria ia a magnificent temple, which he bmlt for the purpose, and surrounded with groves for the celebration of funereal rites and military games. Long afterward, when the dominion of the Macedonians had passed away, there came Eoman emperors, who gazed upon that tomb with reverence and awe. The golden coffin had been sold PAETrnON OP THE KMPIBK. 101 by a degenerate Ptolemy, and had been changed for one of glass, through which the body could be seen. Ai^ustus placed upon it a nosegay and a crown Septimius Severus had the coffin sealed up in a vault Then came the savage Caracalla, who had massacred half Alexandria, because he did not like the town. He ordered the vault to be opened, and the coffin to be exposed, and aU feared that some act of sacrilege would be committed. But those august remains could touch the better feehngs which existed even in a monster's heart. He took off his purple robe, his imperial ornaments, all that he had of value on his person, and laid them reverently upon the tomb. The empire of Alexander was partitioned into three great kingdoms: that of Egypt and Gyrene; that of Mace- donia, including Greece ; and that of Asia, the capital of which was at first on the banks of the Euphi-ates, but was afterward unwisely transferred to Antioch. In these three kingdoms, and in their numerous depend- encies, Greek became the language of government and trade. It was spoken aU over the world : on the shores of Malabar, ui the harbors of Ceylon, among the Abyssinian mountains, in the distant Mozambique. The shepherds of the Tartar steppes loved to listen to recitations of Greek poetry ; and Greek tragedies were performed to Brahmin " houses," by the waters of the Indus. The history of the Greeks of Inner Asia, however, soon comes to an end. Sandracottus, the Eajah of Bengal, conquered the Greek province of the Punjaub. The rise of the Parthian power cut off the Greek kingdom of Bokhara from the Western World, and it was destroyed, according to the Chinese histori- ans, by a powerful horde of Tartars, a hundred and thirty years after its foundation. 102 ALEXAKDIUA. We can now return to African soil, and we find that a city of incomparable splendor has arisen, founded by Alexander, and bearing his name. For, as he was on his way to the oasis of Ammon, traveling along the sea- coast, he came to a place a little west of the Nile's mouth where an island close to the shore, and the pecuhar formation of the land, formed a natural harbor, while a little way inland was a large lagoon communicating with the Nile. A few houses were scattered about, and this, he was told, was the village of Ehacotis, where in the old days the Pharaohs stationed a garrison to prevent the Greek pirates from coming on shore. He saw that the spot was well adapted for a city, and with his usual impetuosity went to work at once to mark it out. When he returned from the oasis, the building of the city had begim, and in a few years it had become the residence of Ptolemy, and the capital of Egypt. It filled up the space beween the sea and the lagoon. On the one side, its harbor was filled with ships which came from Italy and Greece and the lands of the Atlantic with amber, timber, tin, wine, and oil. On the other side were the cargo boats that came fi'om the Nile with the precious stones, the spices, and the beau- tiful fabrics of the East. The island on which stood the famous lighthouse was connected with the mainland by means of a gigantic mole, furnished with draw- bridges and forts. It is on this mole that the modem city stands : the site of the old Alexandria is sand. When Ptolemy the First, one of Alexander's generals, mounted the throne, he applied himself with much caution and dexterity to that difficult problem, the government of Egypt. Had the Greeks been the first conquerors of the country it is doubtful whether the wisest policy would have kept its natives quiet and TWO FACES UKDEB ONE HAT. 103 content. For they were, like the Jews, a proud, ignorant, narrow-minded, reKgious race, who looked upon themselves as the chosen people of the gods, and upon all foreigners as unclean things. But they had been taught wisdom by misfortune : they had felt the bitterness of an Oriental yoke; the feet of the Per- sians had been placed upon their necks. On the other hand, the Greeks had lived for centuries among them, and had assisted them in all their revolts against the Persian king. During their interlude of independence the towns had been garrisoned partly by Egyptian and partly by Greek soldiers; the two nations had grown accustomed to each other. Persia had finally re-enslaved them, and Alexander had been welcomed as the saviour of their country. The golden chaiu of the Pharaohs was broken. It was impossible to restore the Une of ancient kings. The Egyptians, therefore, cheerfully submitted to the Ptolemies, who reciprocated this kindly feeling to the full They patronized the Egyptian religion, they built many temples in the ancient style, they went to the city of Memphis to be crowned, they sacrificed to the Nile at the rising of the waters, they assumed the divine titles of the Pharaohs. The priests were content, and in Egypt the people were always guided by the priests. The Rosetta Stone, that remarkable monument which, with its inscription in Greek, in the Egyptian vernacu- lar, and in the sacred hieroglyphics, has afforded the means of deciphering the mysterious language of the Nile, was a memorial of gratitude from the Egyptian priests to a Greek king, to whom, in return for favors conferred, they erected an image and a golden shrine. But while the Ptolemies were Pharaohs to the Egyp- 104 THE CONQUEST OF NATUBB. tdaois, they were Greeks to the colonists of Alexandria ; and they founded or favored that school of thought upon which modern science is established. There is a great enterprise in which men have always been unconsciously engaged, but which they wiU pur- sue with method as a vocation and an art, which they win devoutly adopt as a religious faith as soon as they realLze its glory. It is the conquest of the planet on which we dwell; the destruction or domestication of the savage forces by which we are tormented and en- slaved. An episode of this war occurring in ancient Egypt has been described ; the war itself began with the rise of our ancestors into the human state ; and when, drawing fire from wood or stone, they made it serve them night and day, the first great victory was won. But we can conquer Nature only by obeying her laws, and in order to obey those laws we must first learn what they are. Storms and tides, thunder and lightning and eclipse, the movement of the heavenly bodies, the changing as- pects of the earth, were among aU ancient people re- garded as divine phenomena. In the Greek world there was no despotic caste, but the people clung fondly to their faith, and the study of Nature which began in Ionia was at first regarded with abhorrence and dismay. The popular religion was supported by the genius of Homer. The Hiad and the Odyssey were not only re- garded as epic poems, but as sacred writ; even the geography had been inspired. However, when the Greeks began to travel, the old legends could no longer be received. It was soon discovered that the places visited by Ulysses did not exist, that there was no Eiver Ocean which ran roimd the earth, and that the earth was not shaped like a round saucer with the oracle of A GREEK VOLTAIRE. 105 Delphi in its center. The Egyptians laughed in the faces of the Greeks, and called them children, when they talked of their gods of yesterday, and so well did their pupils profit by their lesson that they soon laughed at the Egyptians for believing in the gods at aU. Xenophanes declaimed against the Egyptian myth of an earth-walk- ing, dying, resuscitated god. He said that if Osiris was a man, they should not worship him ; and that if he was a god, they need not lament his sufferings. This re- markable man was the Voltaire of Greece ; there had been free-thinkers before his time, but they had re- served their opinions for their disciples. Xenophanes declared that the truth should be made known to all. He lived, like Voltaire, to a great age ; he poured forth a multitude of controversial works ; he made it his busi- ness to attack Homer, and reviled him bitterly for hav- ing endowed the gods of his poems with the passions and propensities of men ; he denied the old theory of the Golden Age, and maintained that civilization was the work of time and of man's own toil. Hia -views were no doubt distasteful to the vulgar crowd by whom he was surrounded ; and even to cultivated and imagi- native minds which were simk in sentimental idolatry, blinded by the splendor of the Homeric poems. He was, however, in no way interfered with ; religious per- secution was imknown in the Greek world except at Athens. In that city free-thought was especially un- popular, because it was imported from abroad. It was the doctrine of those talented lonians who streamed into Athens after the Persian wars. When one of these philosophers announced, in his open-air sermon in the market-place, that the Sun, which the common people believed to be alive — ^the bountiful god Helios which ehone both on mortals and immortals — ^was nothing but 106 THE ATHENIAN INQUISITION. a mass of red-hot iron ; when he declared that those celestial spirits, the stars, were only revol-ving stones ; when he asserted that Jupiter, and Venus, and Apollo, Mars, Juno, and Minerva, were mere creatures of the poet's fancy, and that, if they really existed, they ought to be despised ; when he said that over aU there reigned, not Bhnd Fate, but a supreme All-seeing Mind — great wrath was excited among the people. A prophet went about uttering oracles in a shriU voice, and procured the passing of a decree that all who denied the religion of the city, or who philosophized in matters appertain- ing to the gods, should be indicted as state criminals. This law was soon put in force. Damon and Anaxago- ras were banished; Aspasia was impeached for blas- phemy, and the tears of Pericles alone saved her ; Soc- rates was put to death : Plato was obliged to reserve pure reason for a chosen few, and to adulterate it with revelation for the generality of his disciples ; Aristotle fled from Athens for his hfe, and became the tutor of Alexander. Alexander had a passion for the Eiad. Hia edition had been corrected by Aristotle ; he kept it ia a pre- cious casket which he had taken from the Persian king, and it was afterward known as the " edition of the casket." When he invaded Asia, he landed on the plains of Troy, that he might see the ruins of that cele- brated town, and that he might hang a garland upon the tomb of Achilles. But it was not poetry alone that he esteemed; he had imbibed his master's universal tastes. When staying at Ephesus, he used to spend hours in the studio of ApeUes, sitting down among the boys who ground colors for the great painter. He de- lighted in everything that was new and rare. He in- vented exploration. He gave a large sum of money to THB LIBBABY AT ALEXANDRIA. 107 Aristotle to assist him in composing the History of An- imals, and employed a number of men to coUect for him in Asia. He sent him a copy of the astronomical records of the Babylonians, although by that time they had quarreled, Hke Dionysius and Plato, Frederick and Voltaire. It is taken for granted that Alexander was the one to blame, as if philosophers were immacidate, and private tutors never in the wrong. The Ptolemies were not unworthy followers of Alex- ander. They established the Museum, which was a kind of college, with a haU where the professors dined together, with corridors for promenading lectures, and a theater for scholastic festivals and pubHc disputa- tions. Attached to it also was the Botanical Garden, filled with medicinal and exotic plants ; a menagerie of wild beasts and rare birds ; and the famous Library, where seven hundred thousand volumes were arranged on cedar shelves, and where hundreds of clerks were continually at work, copying from scroll to scroll, gluing the separate strips of papyrus together, smoothing with pumice-stone and blackening the edges, writing the titles on red labels, fastening ivory tops on the sticks round which the roUs were wrapped. All the eminent men of the day were invited to take up their abode at the Museum, and persons were de- spatched into all countries to collect books. It was dangerous to bring original manuscripts into Egypt ; Ihey were at once seized and copied, and only the cop- ies were returned. The city of Athens lent the auto- graph editions of their dramatists to one of the Ptole- mies, and saw them no more. It was even said that philosophers were sometimes detaiued in the same manner. Soon after the wars of Alexander, the " barbarians " 108 THE MUSEUM. were seized with a desire to make known to their conquerors the history of their native lands. Berosus, a priest of Babylon, compiled a history of Chaldsea ; Menander, the Phoenician, a history of Tyre; and Manetho wrote in Greek, but from Egyptian sources, a history which Egyptology has confirmed. It was at the Museum also that the Old Testament was trans- lated under royal patronage into Greek, and at the same time the Zoroastrian Bible, or Zend Avesta. There was some good work done at the Museum. Among works of imagiaation, the pastorals of Theoc- ritus haTe alone obtained the approbation of posterity. But it was in Alexandria that the immortal works of the preceding ages were edited and arranged, and it was there that language was first studied for itself, that lexicons and grammars were first compiled. It . was only ui the Museum that anatomists could some- times obtairi the corpse of a criminal to dissect ; else- where they were forced to content themselves with monkeys. There Eratosthenes, the Inspector of the Earth, elevated geography to a science, and Euchd produced that work which, as Macaulay would say, " every schoolboy knows." There the stars were care- fully catalogued and mapped, and chemical experiments were made. Expeditions were sent to Abyssinia to ascertain the causes of the inundation of the Nile. The Greek intellect had hitherto despised the realities of life : it had been considered by Plato unworthy of a mathematician to apply his knowledge to so vulgar a business as mechanics. But this was corrected at Alexandria by the practical tendencies of Egyptian science. The Suez Canal was reopened, and Archim- edes taught the Alexandrians to apply his famous screw to the irrigation of their fields. These Egyptian SCIENCE IN ALEXANDHU. 109 pumps, as they were then called, were afterward used by the Eomans to pump out the water from their silver mines in Spain, No doubt, most of the Museum professors were pitiful " GrsBculi," narrow-minded pedants, such as are always to be found where patronage exists ; parasites of great libraries, who spend their lives in learning the wrong things. No doubt much of the astronomy was astrological, much of the medicine was magical, much of the geography was mythical, and much of the chemistry was alchemical, for they had already begun to attempt the transmutation of metals, and to search for the elixir vitsB and the philosopher's stone. No doubt physics were much too metaphysical, in spite of the example which Aristotle had given of founding philosophy on experiment and fact; and the alliance between science and labor, which is the true secret of modem civilization, could be but faintly carried out in a land which was imder the fatal ban of slavery. Yet, with all this, it should be remembered that from Alexandria came the science which the Arabs restored to Europe, with some additions, after the Crusades. It was in Alexandria that those works were composed which enabled Copernicus to lay the keystone of astronomy, and which emboldened Columbus to sail across the western seas. The history of the nation under the Ptolemies re- sembles its history imder the PhU-Hellenes. Egypt and Asia were again rivals, and again contested fcr the vineyards of Palestine and the forests of Lebanon. Alexander had organized a brigade of elephants for his army of the Indus, and these animals were after- ward invariably used by the Greeks in war. Pyrrhus took them to Italy, and the Carthaginians adopted 110 THE ELEPHANTINE BBIOADE. the idea from Mm. The elephants of the Asiatic Greeks were brought from Hindostan, The Ptolemies, Uke the Carthaginians, had elephant forests at their own doors. Shooting-boxes were built on the shores of the Red Sea : elephant-huntiag became a royal sport. The younger members of the herd were entrap- ped in large pits, or, driven into inclosures cunningly contrived, were then tamed by starvation, shipped off to Egypt and drilled into beasts of war. On the field of battle the African elephants, distinguished by their huge flapping ears and their convex brows, fought against the elephants of India, twisting their trunks together, and endeavoring to gore one another with their tusks. The Indian species is unanimously described as the larger animal and the better soldier of the two. The third Ptolemy made two briUiant campaigns. In one, he overran Greek Asia, and brought back the sacred images and vessels which had been carried off by the Persians centuries before. In the other, he made an Abyssinian expedition resembling the achieve- ment of Napier. He landed his troops in Annesley Bay, which he selected as his base of operations, and completely subdued the moimtaineers of the plateau, carrying the Egyptian arms, as he boasted, where the' Pharaohs themselves had never been. But the policy of the Ptolemies was, on the whole, a poUcy of peace. Their wars were chiefly waged for the purpose of obtaining timber for their fleet, and of keeping open their commercial routes. They encouraged manufac- tures and trade, and it was afterward observed that Alexandria was the most industrious city in the world. "Idle people were there unknown. Some were em- ployed in the blowing of glass, others in weaving of DESPOTIO DECAY. Ill linen, and others in the manufacture of the papyrus. Even the blind and the lame had occupations suited to their condition." The glorious reigns of the first three Ptolemies extended over nearly a century, and then Egypt began again to decline. Such must always be the case where a despotic government prevails, and where everything depends on the taste and temper of a single man. As long as a good king sits upon the throne all is welL A gallant service, an intellectual production, merit of every kind is recognized at once. Corrupt tax-gatherers and judges are swiftly punished. The enemies of the people are the enemies of the king. His palace is a court of justice always open to his children; he wiU not refuse a petition from the meanest hand. But, sooner or later, in the natural course of events, the scepter is handed to a weak and vicious prince, who empties the treasury of its accumulated wealth; who plunders the courtiers, allowing them to indemnify themselves on those that are beneath them ; who dies, leaving behind him a legacy of wickedness, which his successors are forced to accept. Oppression has now become a custom, and custom is the tyrant of kings. In Egypt the prosperity of the land depended entirely on the government. Unless the public works were kept in good order half the land was wasted, haK the revenue was lost, halt the inhabitants perished of starvation. But the dikes could not be repaired and the screw pumps could not be worked without expense ; and so it the treasury was empty the inland revenue ceased to flow in. The king could stiU live in luxury on the receipts of the foreign trade ; but the Hfe of the people was devoured, and the ruin of the country was at hand. The Ptolemies became invariably tyrants 112 A FKIEND OF EOME. and debaucli^es ; perhaps the incestuous marriages practiced in that family had something to do with the degeneration of the race. The Greeks of Alexandria became half Orientals, and were regarded by their brethren of Europe with aversion and contempt. One by one the possessions of Egypt abroad were lost. The condition of the land became deplorable. The empire which had excited the envy of the world became deficient in agriculture, and was fed by foreign com. Alexandria ghttered with wealth which it was no longer able to defend. The Greeks of Asia began to fix their eyes on the corrupt and prostrate land. Armies gathered on the horizon Hke dark clouds; then was seen the flashing of arms ; then was heard the rattling of distant drums. The reigning Ptolemy had but one resource. In that same year a great battle had been fought, a great empire had fallen, on the African soil. For the first time in history the sun was seen rising in the west. Toward the west ambassadors from Egypt went forth with silks and spices and precious stones. They re- turned, bringing with them an ivory chair, a coarse garment of purple, and a quantity of copper coiu. These humble presents were received in a delirium of joy. The Koman Senate accorded its protection, and Alexandria was saved. But its independence was forfeited ; its individuality became extinct. Here endeth the history of Egypt ; let us travel to another shore. There was a time when the waters of the Mediter- ranean were silent and bare ; when nothing disturbed the sohtude of that blue and tideless sea but the weed which floated on its surface and the gull which touched it with its wing. A tribe of the Canaanites, or people of the plain, PHCENIOIA. 113 driven hard by tlieir foes, fled over the Lebanon and took possession of a narrow strip of land, shut off by itself between the moiintaias and the sea. The agricultural resources of the little country were soon outgrown, and the Phoenicians were forced to gather a harvest from the water. They invented the fishing-line and net; and when the fish could no longer be caught from the shore, they had to foUow them out to sea or starve. They hollowed trunks of trees with ax and fire into canoes ; they bound logs of wood to- gether to form a raft, with a bush stuck in it for a saU. The Lebanon mountains supplied them with timber; in time they discovered how to make boats with keels, and to sheathe them with copper, which they found also in their mountains. From those heights of Leb- anon the island of Cyprus could plainly be seen, and the current assisted them across. They colonized the island; it supplied them with pitch, timber, copper and hemp, everything that was required in the archi- tecture of a ship. With smacks and cutters they fol- lowed the tunny-fish in their migrations; they dis- covered villages on other coasts, pillaged them, and carried off their inhabitants as slaves. Some of these, when they had learned the language, offered to pay a ransom for their release ; the arrangement was accom- pHshed under oath, and presents as tokens of good-will were afterward exchanged. Bach party was pleased to obtain something which his own country did not produce ; and thus arose a system of barter and ex- change. The Phoenicians, from fishermen, became pirates ; and from pirates, traders ; from simple traders they be- came also manufacturers. Purple was always the fashionable color in the East; and they discovered 114 THE FOBPLE-TEADE. two kinds of shell-fish which yielded a handsome dye, One species was found on rocks, the other under water. These shells they collected by means of divers and pointer-dogs. When the supply on their own coast was exhausted they obtained them from foreign coasts, and as the shell yielded but a small quantity of fluid, and therefore was iaconvenient to transport, they pre- ferred to extract the dyeing material on the spot where the shells were found. This led to the estabhshment of factories abroad, and permanent settlements were made. Obtaining wool from the Arabs and other shep- herd tribes, they manufactured woven goods, and dyed them with such skill that they found a ready market in Babylonia and Egypt. In this manner they purchased from those countries the produce and manufactures of the East, and these they sold, at a great profit, to the inhabitants of Europe. When they sailed along the shores of that savage continent, and came to a place where they intended to trade, they hghted a fire to attract the natives, pitched tents on shore, and held a six days' fair, exhibiting in their bazaar the toys and trinkets manufactured at Tyre expressly for their naked customers, with purple robes and works of art in tinted ivory and gold, for those who, like the Greeks, were more advanced. At the end of the week they went away, sometimes kid- napping a few women and children to " fill up." But in the best trading locaHties, the factory system pre- vailed; and their estabhshments were planted in the Grecian Archipelago, and in Greece itself, on the marshy shores of the Black Sea, in Italy, Sicily, the African coast and Spain. Then becoming bolder and more skillful, they would no longer be imprisoned within the lake-like waters of DIBOOTEBT OP THE ATLANTia 115 the land-locked sea. They sailed out through the Straits of Gibraltar, and beheld the awful phenomenon of tides. They sailed on the left hand to Morocco for ivory and gold-dust, on the right hand for amber and tin to the ice-creeks of the Baltic and the foamiug waters of the British Isles. They also opened up an inland trade. They were the first to overcome the ex- clusiveness of Egypt, and were permitted to settle in Memphis itself. Their quarter was called the Syrian camp ; it was built round a grove and chapel sacred to Astarte. Their caravan routes extended iu every di- rection toward the treasure countries of the East. "Wandering Arabs were their sailors, and camels were their ships. They made voyages by sand, more dan- gerous than those by sea, to Babylon through Pahnyra, or Tadmor, on the skirts of the desert ; to Arabia FeKx and the market city of Petra; and to Gerrha, a city built entirely of salt, on the rainless shores of the Per- sian Guli Phoenicia itself was a narrow, imdulating plain, about a hundred miles in length, and at the most not more than a morning's ride in breadth. It was walled in by the mountains on the north and east. To those who sailed along its coast it appeared to be one great city interspersed with gardens and fields. On the lower slopes of the hills beyond gleamed the green vineyard patches and the villas of the merchants. The offing was whitened with sails; and iu every harbor was a grove of masts. But it was Tyre which, of aJl the cities, was the queen. It covered an island which lay at anchor off the shore. The Greek poet Nonnus has prettily described the mingHng around it of the sylvan and marine. "The sailor furrows the sea with his oar," he says, "and the plowman the soil; the lowing of 116 INTBODUOnON OF THE A, B, a oxen and the singing of birds answer the deep roar oi the main; the wood-nymph under the tall trees hears the voice of the sea-nymph calling to her from the wares ; the breeze from the Lebanon, while it cools the rustic at his mid-day labor, speeds the mariner who is outward bound." These Canaanitish men are fairly entitled to our gratitude and esteem, for they taught our intellectual ancestors to read and wiite. Wherever a factory trade is carried on it is found convenient to employ natives as subordinate agents and clerks. And thus it was that the Greeks received the rudiments of education. That the alphabet was invented by the Phoenicians is improbable in the extreme ; but it is certain that they introduced it into Europe. They were intent only on making money, it is true ; they were not a literary or artistic people ; they spread knowledge by accident, like birds dropping seeds. But they were gallant, hardy, enterprising men. Those were true heroes who first sailed through the sea-vaUey of Gibraltar into the vast ocean and breasted its enormous waves. Their unceasing activity kept the world aUve. They offered to every country something which it did not pos- sess. They roused the savage Briton from his torpor with a rag of scarlet cloth, and stirred hiTn to sweat in the dark bowels of the earth. They brought to the satiated Indian prince the luscious vnnes of Syria and the Grecian isles in goblets of exquisitely painted glass. From the amber-gatherers of the Baltic mud to the nutmeg-growers of the equatorial groves, from the mulberry plantations of the Celestial empire to the tin mines of Cornwall, and the silver miaes of Spain, emulation was excited, new wants were created, whole nations were stimulated to industry, by means of the Phoenicians. OKEEOE VEESTJS TYBE. 117 Shipbuildiiig and navigation were their inventions, and for a long time were entirely ia their hands. Phoenician shipwrights were employed to build the fleet of Sennacherib ; Phcenician mariners were em- ployed by Necho to sail round Africa. But they could not forever monopolize the sea. The Greeks built ships on the Phoenician model and soon showed their masters that kidnappiag and piracy was a game at which two could play. The merchant kings who possessed the whole commercial world were too wise to stake their prosperity on a single province. They had no wish to tempt a siege of Tyre which might resemble the siege of Troy. They quickly retired from Greece and its islands, and the western coast of Asia Minor and the margin of the Black Sea. They allowed the Greeks to take the foot of Italy, and the eastern half of Sicily, and did not molest their isolated colonies, Gyrene in Africa, and Marseilles in Southern Gaul. But in spite of all their prudence and precautions the Greeks supplanted them entirely. The Phoenicians, hke the Jews, were vassals of necessity and by position : they Kved half way between two empires. They found it cheaper to pay tribute than to go to war, and submitted to the Emperor of Syria for the time being, sending their money with equal indifference to Nineveh or Memphis. But when the empire was disputed, as in the days of Nebuchadnezzar and of Necho, they were compelled to choose a side. Like the Jews, they chose the wrong one, and old Tyre and Jerusalem were demolished at the same time. From that day the Phoenicians began to go down the hill ; and under the Persians their ships and sailors were forced to do service in the royal navy. This wag 118 OABTHAQE. the hardest kind of tribute that they could be made to pay, for it deprived them not only of their profits, but of the means by which those profits were obtaiQed. In the Macedonian war they went wrong again ; they chose the side of the Persians, although they had so often rebelled against them, and Tyre was severely handled by its conqueror. But it was the foundation of Alexandria which ruined the Phoenician cities, as it ruined Athens. From that time Athens ceased to be conmiercial, and became a University. Tyre also ceased to be commercial, but remained a celebrated manufactory. Under the Roman empire it enjoyed the monopoly of the sacred purple, which was afterward adopted by the popes. It prospered under the caliphs; its manufactories in the Middle Ages were conducted by the Jews ; but it fell before the artOlery of the Turks, to rise no more. The secret of the famous dye was lost, and the Vatican changed the color of its robes. But whUe Phoenicia was decHning in the East, its great colony, Carthage, was risiug in the West. This city had been founded by malcontents from Tyre. But they kindly cherished the memories of their mother- land ; and, like the Pilgrim Fathers, always spoke of the country which had cast them forth as Home. And after a time aU the old wrongs were forgotten, all angry feelings died away. Every year the Cartha- ginians sent to the national temple a tenth part of their revenues as a free-will offering. During the great Persian wars, when on aU sides empires and kingdoms were falling to the ground, the Phoenicians refused to lend their fleet to the Great King to make war upon Carthage. When Tyre was besieged by Alexander, the nobles sent their wives and THE ATLAS. 119 children to Carthage, where they were tenderly re- ceived. The Africa of the ancients, the modem Barbary, lies between the Sahara and the Mediterranean Sea. It is protected from the ever-encroaching waves of the sandy ocean by the Atlas range. In its western parts this monntain waU is high and broad, and covered with eternal snow. It becomes lower as it runs toward the west, also drawing nearer to the sea, and dwindles and dwindles, till finally it disappears, leaving a wide, unprotected region between Barbary and Egypt. Over this the Sahara flows, forming a desert barrier tract, to all intents and purposes itself a sea, dividing the two lands from each other as com- pletely as the MediteiTanean divides Italy and Greece. This land of North Africa is in reality a part of Spain ; the Atlas is the southern boundary of Europe ; gray cork trees clothe the lower sides of those magnificent mountains; their summits are covered with pines, among which the cross-bill flutters, and in which the European bear may still be found. The flora of the range, as Dr. Hooker has lately shown, is of a Spanish type ; the Straits of Gibraltar is merely an accident ; there is nothing in Morocco to distinguish it from Andalusia. The African animals which are there found are desert-haunting species : the antelope and gazelle, the lion, the jackal, and the hyena, and certain species of the monkey tribe ; and these might have easily found their way across the Sahara from oasis to oasis. It is true that in the Carthaginian days the elephant abounded in the forests of the Atlas ; and it could not have come across from Central Africa, for the Sahara before it was a desert was a sea. It is probable that the elephant of Barbary belonged to the 120 THE BERRElia same species as the small elephant of Europe, the bones of which have been discovered in Malta and certain caves of Spain; and that it outlived the European kind on account of its isolated position in the Atlas, which was thinly inhabited by savage tribes. But it did not long withstand the power of the Eomans. Pliny mentions that in his time the forests of Morocco were being ransacked for ivory, and Isidore of Seville, in the seventh century, observes, that "there are no longer any elephants in Mauri- tania." In Morocco the Phoenicians were settled only on the coast. The Eegency of Tunis and part of Algeria is the scene on which the tragedy of Carthage was per- formed. In that part of Africa the habitable country must be divided into three regions : first, a com region, lying be- tween the Atlas and the sea, exceedingly fertile, but narrow in extent; secondly, the Atlas itseK, with its timber stores and elephant preserves ; and thirdly, a plateau region, of poor sandy soU, affording a meager pasture ; interspersed with orchards of date trees ; abounding in ostriches, lions, and gazelles, and gradu- ally fading away into the desert. Africa belonged to a race of men whom we shall caU Berbers or Moors, but who were known to the ancients under many names, and who stiU exist as the Kabyles of Algeria, the ShdUuhs of the Atlas, and the Tuaricks or tawny Moors of the Sahara. Their habits depended on the locality in which they dwelt. Those who lived in the Tell or region of the coast cultivated the soil and lived in towns, some of which appear to have been of considerable size. Those who inhabited the plateau region led a free Bedoiiin life, wandering from place to THE COLONIES OF OAETHAGE. 121 place with flocks and herds, camping under oblong huts, which the Romans compared to boats turned upside down. In holes and caverns of the mountains dwelt a miserable black race, apparently the aborigines of the country, and represented to this day by the Bock Tibboos. They were also found on the outskirts of the desert, and were hunted by the Berbers in four-horse chariots, caught aUve, and taken to the Carthage mar- ket to be sold. The Phoenician settlements were at first iadependent of one another ; but Carthage gradually obtained the supremacy as Tyre had obtained it in Phoenicia. The position of Utica toward Carthage was precisely that of Sidon toward Tyre. It was the more ancient city of the two, and it preserved a certaia kind of position without actual power. Carthage and Utica, like Tyre and Sidon, were at one time always spoken of together. The Carthaginians began by paying a quit-rent or custom to the natives, but that did not last very long ; they made war, and exacted tribute from the original possessors of the soil. "When Carthage suffered from over-population, colonies were dispatched out west along the coast, and down south into the interior. These colonies were more on the Boman than the Greek pattern; the emigrants built cities and inter- married freely with the Berbers ; for there was no dif- ference of color between them and little difference of race. In course of time the whole of the habitable re- gion was subdued; the Tyrian factory became a mighty empire. Many of the roving tribes were broken in ; the others were driven into the desert or the wild Mo- rocco. A hne of fortified posts and block-houses pro- tected the cultivated land. The desire to obtain red cloth and amber and blue beads secured the aUegianoe 122 THE PEEIPLUS OF HANNO. of many unconquerable desert tribes, and by their means, although the camel had not yet been introduced, a trade was opened up between Carthage and Timbuctoo. Negro slaves bearing tusks of ivory on their shoulders and tied to one another, so as to form a chain of flesh and blood, were driven across the terrible desert ; a caravan of death, the route of which was marked by bones bleaching in the sun. Gold-dust also was brought over from those regions of the Niger ; and the Carthaginian traders reached the same land by sea. For they were not content, Kke the Tynans, to trade only on the Mo- rocco Coast as far as Mogadore. By good fortune there has been preserved the log-book of an expedition which sailed to the wood-covered shores of Guinea ; saw the hiUs covered with fire as they always are in the dry season, when the grass is being burned ; heard the mu- sic of the natives in the night, and brought home the skins of three chimpanzees which they probably Idlled near Sierra Leone. When Phoenicia died, Carthage inherited its settle- ments on the coasts of Sicily and Spain and on the adjoining isles. Not only were these islands valuable possessions in themselves — Malta as a cotton planta- tion, Elba as an iron mine, Majorca and Minorca as a recruiting ground for slingers — they were also useful as naval stations to preserve the monopoly of the western waters. The foreign policy of Carthage was very different from that of the motherland. The Phoenicians had maintained an army of mercenaries, but had used them only to protect theu* country from the robber kings of Damascus and Jerusalem. They had many ships of war, but had used them only to convoy their round- beUied ships of trade, and to keep off the attacks of OYBENE. 123 the Greek and Etruscan pirates. Their settlements were merely fortified factories ; they made no attempt to reduce the natives of the land. If their settlements grew into colonies they let them go. But Carthage founded many colonies and never lost a single one. Situated among them, possessing a large fleet, it was able both to pimish and protect : it defended them in time of war ; it controlled them in time of peace. A poUcy of concession had not saved the Phoenicians from the Greeks ; and now these same Greeks were settling in West and displaying immense activity. The Carthaginians saw that they must resist or be ruined: and they went to war as a matter of business. They first put down the Etruscan rovers, in which undertak- ing they were assisted by the events which occurred on the Itahan main. They next put a stop to the spread of the Greek power in Africa itself. Half-way between Algeria and Egypt, in the midst of the dividing sea of sand, is a coast oasis formed by a table-land of sufficient height to condense the vapors which float over from the sea, and to chill them into rain. There was a hole in the sky above it, as the na- tives used to say. To this island-tract came a band of Greeks, directed thither by the oracle at Delphi, where geography was studied, as a part of the system. They estabhshed a city and called it Cyrene. The land was remarkaby fertile, and afforded them three harvests in the course of the year. One was gath- ered on the coast meadows, which were watered by the streams that flowed down from the hiUs ; a second on the hillsides ; a third on the surface of the plateau, which was about two thousand feet above the level of the sea. Cyrenaica produced the sUpMum, or assafceti- da, which, like the balm of GUead, was one of the spo- 124 THE GAEDENS OF THE HESPEEIDES. eifics of antiquity, and which is really a medicine ol value. It was found in many parts of the world; for instance, in certain districts of Asia Miaor, and on the summit of the Hindoo Koosh. But the assafcetida of Cyrene was the most esteemed ; its juice, when dried, was worth its weight in gold ; its leaves fattened cattle, and cured them of aU diseases. Some singular pits or chasms existed in the lower part of the Cyrene hills. Their sides were perpendicidar walls of rock ; it appeared impossible to descend to the bottom of the precipice; and yet when the traveler peeped over the brink, he saw, to his astonishment, that the abyss beneath had been sown with herbs and com. Hence rose the legend of the Gardens of the Hesperides. Cyrene was renowned as the second medical school of the Greek world. It produced a noted free-thinker, who was a companion of Socrates, and the founder of a schooL It was also famous for its barbs, which won more than one prize in the chariot races of the Grecian games. It obtained the honor of more than one Pindaric ode. But, owing to internal dissension, it never became great. It was conquered by Persia, it submitted to Alexander, and Carthage speedily checked its growth toward the west by taking the desert which lay between them, and which it then garrisoned with nomad tribes. The Carthaginians hitherto had never paid tribute, and they had never suffered a serious reverse. Alcibiades talked much of invading them when he had done with Sicily, and the young men of his set were at one time always drawing plans of Carthage in the dust of the mar- ket-place at Athens ; but the Sicilian expedition failed. The affection of the Tyrians preserved them from Cam- bysea. Alexander opportunely died. Pyrrhus in Sicily THE SICILIAN WAES. 125 began to collect ships to sail across, but he who tried to take up Italy with one hand and Carthage with the other, and who also excited the enmity of the SicOiau Greeks, was not a very dangerous foe. Agathocles of Syracuse invaded Africa, but it was the action of a des- perate and defeated man, and bore no result. Sicily was long the battle-field of the Cai-thaginians, and ultimately proved their ruin. Its western side be- longed to them ; its eastern side was held by a number of independent Greek cities, which were often at war with one another. Of these Syracuse was the most im- portant ; its ambition was the same as that of Carthage — to conquer the whole island, and then to extend its rule over the flourishing Greek towns on the south ItaHan coast. Hence followed wars, generation after genera- tion, till at length the Carthaginians obtained the upper hand. Already they were looking on the island as their own, when a new power stepped upon the scene. The ancient Tuscans or Etruscans had a language and certain arts peculiar to themselves ; and Northern Italy was occupied by Celtic Gauls. But the greater part of the peninsula was inhabited by a people akin to the Greeks, though differing much from them in char- acter, dwelling in city states, using a form of the Phoe- nician alphabet, and educating their children in public schools. The Greek cities on the coast diffused a cer- tain amount of culture through the land. A rabble of outlaws and run-away slaves banded to- gether, built a town, fortified it strongly, and offered it as an asylum to all fugitives. To Eome fled the over- beaten slave, the thief with his booty, the murderer with blood-red hands. This city of refuge became a War- tovm, to use an African phrase : its citizens alternately fought and farmed ; it became the dread and torment of 126 THE ROMAN KOBBEKS. the neighborhood. However, it contained no women, and it was hoped that, in course of time, the generation of robbers would die out. The Eomans offered their hands and hearts to the daughters of a neighbiring Sa- bine city. The Sabiaes declined, and told them they had better make their city an asylum for run-away women. The Eomans took the Sabiae girls by force ; a war ensued, but the relationship had been established ; the women reconciled their fathers to their husbands, and the tribes were united ia the same city. The hospitality which Eome had offered in its early days, in order to sustain its hfe, became a custom and a policy. The Eomans possessed the art of converting their conquered enemies into aUies, and this was done by means of concessions which cities of respectable ori- gin would have been too proud to make. Their military career was very different from that of the Persians, who swept over a continent in a few months. The Eomans spent three centuries in estab- hshing their rule within a circle of a hundred mUes round the city. Whatever they won by the sword they secured by the plow. After every successful war they demanded a tract of land, and on this they planted a colony of Eoman farmers. The municipal governments of the conquered cities were left undisturbed. The Eo- mans aimed to establish, at least in appearance, a fede- ration of states, a United Italy. At the time of the first Punic War, this design had nearly been accomplished. WUd tribes of Celtic shepherds still roamed over the rich plains at the foot of the Alps ; but the ItaKan bor- oughs had acknowledged the supremacy of Eome. The Greek cities on the southern coast had, a few years be- fore, called over Pyrrhus, King of Epirus, a soldier of fortune, and the first general of the day. But the legion THE ALAJffEBTINES. 127 broke the Macedonian phalanx, and the broadsword vanqiiished the Macedonian spear. The Greek cities were no longer independent, except in name. Pyrrhus returned to Greece, and prophesied of Sicily, as he left its shores, that it would become the arena of the Punic and the Roman arms. In the last war that was ever waged between the Sy- racusans and the Carthaginians, the former had em- ployed some mercenary troops belonging to the Mamer- tines, an Itahan tribe. When the war was ended these soldiers were paid off and began to march home. They passed through the Greek town of Messina on their road, were hospitably received by the citizens, and pro- vided with quarters for the night. In the middle of the night they rose up and massacred the men, manied the widows, and settled down as rulers of Messina, each soldier beneath another man's vine and fig-tree. A Ro- man regiment stationed at Rhegium, a Greek town on the ItaKan side of the straits, heard of this exploit, considered it an excellent idea, and did the same. The Romans marched upon Rhegium, took it by storm, and executed four hundred of the soldiers in the Forum. The King of Syracuse who held the same position in eastern Sicily as Rome on the peninsula, marched against Messina. The Mamertine bandits became alarm- ed : one party sent to the Carthaginians for assistance, another party sent to Rome, declaring that they were kinsmen, and desiring to enter the Italian league. The Roman Senate rejected this request on account of its " manifest absurdity." They had just punished their soldiers for imitating the Mamertines : how, then, could they interfere with the punishment of the Mamertines ? But in Rome the people possessed the sovereign power of making peace or war. There was a 128 THE TWO GREAT EEPUBLIOS. scarcity of money at that time : a raid on Sicily would yield plimder ; and troops were accordingly ordered to Messina. For the first time Romans went outside Italy: the vanguard of an army which subdued the world. The Carthaginians were already in Messina: the Romans drove them out, and the war began. The Syracusans were defeated in the first battle, and then went over to the Roman side. It became a war between Asiatics and Europeans. The two great republics were already well acquaiated with each other. In the apartment of the ^diles in the capitol was preserved a commercial treaty between Carthage and Rome, iuscribed on tables of brass, in old Latin ; in the time of Polybius, it could scarcely be understood, for it had been drawn up twenty-eight years before Xerxes iavaded Greece. When Pyrrhus invaded Italy, the Carthaginians had taken the Roman side, for the Greeks were their hereditary enemies. There were Carthaginian shops in the streets of Rome, a city in beauty and splendor far inferior to Carthage, which was called the metropolis of the Western World. The Romans were a people of warriors and small farmers, quaint in their habits, and simple in their tastes. Some Carthaginian ambassadors were much amused at the odd fashion of their banquets, where the guests sang old ballads in turn, while the piper played, and they discovered that there was only one service of plate in Rome, and that each senator borrowed it when he gave a dinner. Yet there were already signs that Rome was inhabited by a giant race : the vast aque- ducts had been constructed ; the tunnel-Kke sewers had been hollowed out ; the streets were paved with smooth and massive slabs. There were many temples and statues to be seen ; each temple was the monument of AEMY OF CAETHAGE. 129 a great victory ; eacli statue was the memorial of a hero who had died for Rome. The Carthaginian army was composed entirely of mercenary troops. Africa, Spain, and Gaul were their recruiting groimds, an inexhaustible treasury of war- riors as long as the money lasted, which they received as pay. The Berbers were a splendid Cossack cavalry ; they rode without saddle or bridle, a weapon ia each hand ; on foot they were merely a horde of savages with elephant-hide shields, long spears, and bearskins floatinf^ from their shoulders. The troops of Spain were the best infantry that the Carthaginians pos- sessed ; they wore a white uniform with purple facings ; they fought with pointed swords. The Gauls were brave troops, but were badly armed ; they were naked to the waist ; their cutlasses were made of soft iron, and had to be straightened after every blow. The Balearic islands supplied a regiment of sUngers, whose balls of hardened clay whizzed through the air like bullets, broke armor, and shot men dead. We read much of the Sacred Legion in the Sicilian wars. It was composed of young nobles, who wore dazzling white shields and breastplates which were works of art ; who, even in the camp, never drank except from goblets of silver and of gold. But this corps had apparently become extinct, and the Carthagrnians only officered their troops, whom they looked upon as ammunition, and to whom their orders were de- livered through interpreters. The various regiments of the Carthaginian army had therefore nothing in common with one another, or with those by whom they were led. They rushed to battle in confusion, " with soimds discordant as their various tribes," and with no higher feeling than the hope of plunder, or the l30 ABMY OF ROME. excitement whicli the act of fighting arouses in the brave soldier. In Eome the army was the nation : no citizen could take office unless he had served in ten campaigns. AH spoke the same language ; aU were inspired by the same ambition. The officers were often smaU farmers Uke the men ; but this civil equality produced no iU effects ; the discipline was most severe. It was a maxim that the soldier should fear his officer more than he feared his foe. The drill was unremitting ; when they were in winter quarters they erected sheds in which the soldiers fenced with swords cased ia leather, with buttons at the point, and hurled javelins, also buttoned, at one another. These foils were double the weight of the weapons that were actually used. When the day's march was over, they took pickax and spade, and built their camp like a town, with a twelve-foot stockade around it, and a ditch twelve feet deep, and twelve feet broad. When the red mantle was hung before the general's tent, each soldier said to himseK, " Perhaps to-day I may win the golden crown." Laughing and jesting they rubbed their limbs with oil, and took out of their cases the bright helmets and the poHshed shields which they used only on the battle-day. As they stood ready to advance upon the foe, the general would address them in a vigorous speech : he would teU them that the greatest honor which could befaU a Koman was to die for his coimtry on the field, and that glorious was the sorrow, enviable the woe, of the matron who gave a husband or a son to Rome. Then the trumpets pealed ; and the soldiers charged, first firing a voUey of javelins, and then comir^ to close quarters with the cold steeL The chief fault of the Roman military system at that time was in the HOME BULE OF OABTHAOS. 131 arrangement of the chief command- There were two commanders-in-chief, possessing equal powers, and it sometimes happened that they were both present on the same spot, that they commanded on alternate days, and that their tactics differed. They were appointed only for the year ; and when the term drew near its end, a consul would often fight a battle at a disadvan- tage, or negotiate a premature peace, that he might prevent his successor from reaping the fruits of his twelve months' toil. The Carthaginian generals had thereby an advantage ; but they also were liable to be recalled, when too successful, by the jealous and dis- trustful Government at home. The finances of Carthage were much greater than those of Borne, but her method of making war was more costly and a great deal of money was stolen and wasted by the men in power. In Carthage the highest offices of state were openly bought from a greedy and dangerous populace, just as in Pompey's time tables were set out in the streets of Eome at which candidates for office paid the people for their votes. But at this time bribery was a capital offense at Bome. It was a happy period in Boman history, the interlude between two aristocracies. There had been a time when a system of hereditary castes prevailed ; when the ple- beians were excluded from all share in the public lands, and the higher offices of state ; when they were often chained in the dungeons of the nobles, and marked with scars upon their backs ; when Bomans drew swords on Bomans, and the tents of the people whitened the Sacred Hill. But the Licinian Laws were carried ; the orders were reconciled ; plebeian consuls were elected ; and two centuries of prosperity, harmony and victory prepared Bome for the prodigious contest in which she was now engaged. 132 HOSEE EXILE OF BOMB. To her subject people Carthage acted as a tyrant. She had even deprived the old Phoenician cities of their liberty of trade. She woidd not allow them to bidld walls for fear they shoidd rebel, loaded them with heavy burdens grievous to be borne, treated the colonial provinces as conquered lands, and sent decayed nobles, as governors, to wring out of the people aU they could. If the enemies of Carthage invaded Africa, they would meet with no resistance except from Carthage herseK; and they would be joined by thousands of Berbers who longed to be revenged on their oppressors. But if the enemies of Borne invaded Italy, they would find everywhere walled cities ready to defend their liberties, and having liberties to defend. No tribute was taken by Borne from her allies except that of military service, which service was rewarded with a share of the harvest that the war brought in. The Carthaginians were at a greater distance from the seat of war than the Eomans, who had only to sail across a narrow strait. However, this was counter- balanced by the superiority of the Punic fleet. At that time the Carthaginians were completely masters of the sea; they boasted that no man could wash his hands in the salt water without their permission. The Bomans had not a single decked vessel, and in order to transport their troops across the straits they were obhged to borrow triremes from the Italian-Greeks. But their marvelous resolution and the absolute neces- sities of the case overmastered their deficiencies and their singular dislike of the sea. The wreck of a Carthaginian man-of-war served them as a model; they ranged benches along the beach and drilled sailers who had just come from the plow's tail tc the service oi THE FIRST NAVAl BATTLE. 133 the oar. Tlie vessels were rudely built and the men clumsy at their work ; and when the hostile fleets firsi met, the Carthaginians burst into loud guffaws. With- out taking order of battle they flew down upon the Romans, the admiral leading the van in a seven-decker that had belonged to Pyrrhus ; on they went, each ship in a bed of creamy foam, flags flying, trumpets blow- ing, and the negroes singiug and clanking their chains as they labored at the oar. But presently they per- ceived some odd-looking machines on the forecastles of the Roman ships : they had never seen such things before, and this made them hesitate a little. But when .they saw in what a lubberly fashion the ships were worked, their confidence returned; they dashed in among the Roman vessels, which they tried to rip up with their aquiline prows. As soon as they came to close quarters the machines feU down upon them with a crash, tore open their decks and grappled them tightly in their iron jaws, forming at the same time a gangway over which the Roman soldiers poured. The sea-fight was made a land-fight ; and only a few ships, with beaks aU bent and broken, succeeded in making, theu- escape. They entered the harbor of Carthage, their bows covered with skins, the signal of defeat. However, by means of skillful maneuvering, the invention of Duilius was made of no avail, and the Carthaginians for many years remained the masters of the sea. Twice the Roman fieets were entirely de- stroyed ; and their treasury was now exhausted. But the undaunted people fitted out a fleet by private subscription, and so rapidly was this done that the trees, as Floras said, were transformed into ships. Two hundred five-deckers were ready before the enemy knew they had begun to build; and so the Carthaginian 134 END OF THE FIRST FUNIC WAE. fleet was one day surprised, in no fighting condition, by the Romans, for the vessels were laden to the gunwales with com, and only sailors were on board ; the whole fleet was taken or sunk, and the war was at an end. Yet, when all was added up, it was found that the Romans had lost two hundred vessels more than the Carthaginians. But Rome, even without large ships, could always reinforce Sicily; while the Carthagiaians, without a fuU fleet, were completely cut off from the seat of war ; and they were unable to rebuild in the manner of the Romans. The war in Sicily had been a drawn game. Hamilcar Barca, although imconquered, received orders to nego- tiate for peace. The Romans demanded a large indemnity to pay for the expenses of the > war ; and took the Sicilian settlements which Carthage had held four hundred years. Peace was made, and the mercenary troops were sent back to Carthage. Their pay was in arrears, and there was no money left. Matters were so badly managed that the soldiers were allowed to retain their arms. They burst into mutiny, ravaged the country, and besieged the capital. The veterans of Hamilcar could only be conquered by Hamilcar himself. He saved Carthage, but the struggle was severe. Vener- able senators, ladies of gentle birth, innocent children, had fallen into the hands of the brutal mutineers and had been crucified, torn to pieces, tortured to death in a hundred ways. During those awful orgies of Spendius and Matho, the Roman war had almost been forgotten ; the disasters over which men had mourned became by comparison happiness and peace. The destruction of the fleet was viewed as a slight calamity when death was howling at the city gates. At last THE MEECENABT WAB. 135 Hamilcar trimnphed, and the rebels were cast to the elephants, who kneaded their bodies with their feet and gored them with their tusks ; and Carthage, exhausted, faint from loss of blood, attempted to repose. But all was not yet over. The troops that were stationed ia Sardinia rebelled, and Hamolcar prepared to sail with an armament against them. The Romans had acted in the noblest manner toward the Carthaginians during the civil war. The Italian merchants had been allowed to supply Carthage with provisions, and had been forbidden to communi- cate with the rebels. When the Sardinian troops mutinied, they offered the island to Rome ; the city of Utica had also offered itself to Rome ; but the Senate had refused both applications. And now, suddenly, as if possessed by an evil spirit, they pretended that the Carthaginian armament had been prepared against Rome, and declared war. When Carthage, in the last stage of misery and prostration, prayed for peace in the name of all the pitiful gods, it was granted. But Rome had been put to some expense on account of this intended war ; they must therefore pay an additional indemnity, and surrender Corsica and Sardinia. Poor Carthage was made to bite the dust, indeed. Hamilcar Barca was appointed commander-in-chief. He was the favorite of the people. He had to the last remained unconquered in Sicily. He had saved the city from the mutineers. His honor was unstained ; his patriotism was pure. In that hour of calamity and shame, when the city was hung with black; when the spacious docks were empty and bare ; when there was woe in every face, and 136 THE CJITT IN BLA.OK. the memory of death in every house — faction was forced to be silent, and the people were permitted to be heard, and those who loved their country more than their party rejoiced to see a Man at the head of affairs. But Hamilcar knew well that he was hated by the lead- ers of the Government, the politicians by profession, those men who had devoured the gold which was the very heart of Carthage, and had brought upon her by their dishonesty this last distressing war; those men who, by their miserable suspicions and intrigues, had ever deprived their best generals of their commands as soon as they began to succeed, and appointed generals whom they — and the enemy — had no cause to fear. To him was intrusted by the patriots the office of re- generating Carthage. But how was it to be done? Without money he was powerless ; without money he could not keep his army together ; without money he could not even retain his command. He had been given it by the people ; but the people were~ accustomed to be bribed. Gold they must have from the men in power : if he had none to give, they would go to those who had. His enemies he knew would be able to em- ploy the state revenues against him. What could he do? Where was the money to be found ? He saw be- fore him nothing but defeat, disgrace, and even an ignominious death; for in Carthage they sometimes crucified their generals. Often he thought that it would be better to give up pubhc Hfe, to abandon the corrupt and ruined city, and to sail for those sweet islands which the Carthaginians had discovered in the Atlantic Sea. There the earth was always verdant, the sky was always pure. No fiery sirocco blew, and no cold rain fell, in that delicious land. Odoriferous balm dripped from the branches of the trees; canary birds sai^ The fortunate iSLANDa. 137 amoug the leaves ; streams of silver water rippled down- ward to the sea. There Nature was a calm and gentle mother ; there the turmoils of the world might be for- gotten ; there the weary heart might be at rest. Yet how could he desert his fatherland in its afflic- tion? To him the nation turned its sorrowful eyes; on Tn'm the people called as men call upon their gods. At his feet lay the poor, torn, and wounded Carthage ; the Carthage once so beautiful and so strong ; the Car- thage who had fed him from her full breast with riches and with power ; the Carthage who had made him what he was. And should he, who had never turned his back upon her enemies, desert her now? Then a glorious idea flashed in upon his brain. He saw a way of restoring Carthage to her ancient glory ; ot making her stronger than she had ever been; of making her a match for Rome. He announced to the senate that he intended to take the army to Tangiers to reduce a native tribe which had caused some trouble in the neighborhood. He quickly made all the arrange- ments for the march. A few vessels had been prepared for the expedition to Sardinia. These were command- ed by his brother ; and he ordered that these should be sailed along the coast side by side with the army as it marched. It might have appeared strange to some persons that he should require ships to make war against a tribe of Moors on land. But there was no fear of his enemies suspecting his design. It was so strange and wild that when it had been actually accom- plished they could scarcely believe that it was reaL The night before he marched he went to the Great Temple to offer the sacrifice of propitiation and en- treaty. He took with him his son, a boy nine years of age. "When the libations and other rites were ended. 138 THE HOUSE OF BAAL. — THE BOY'S OATH. and the victiin lay divided on tlie altar, he ordered the attendants to withdraw ; he remained alone with his son. The temple of Baal was a magnificent building, sup- ported by enormous columns, covered with gold, or formed of a glass-Hke substance, which began to glitter and sparkle in a curious manner as the night came on. Around the temple walls were idols representing the Phoenician gods ; prominent among them was the hid- eous statue of Moloch, with its downward sloping hands, and the fiery furnace at its feet. There also might be seen beautiful Greek statues, trophies of the Sicilian wars, especially the Diana which the Carthaginians had taken from Segesta, which was afterward restored to that city by the Romans, which Verres placed in his celebrated gaUery, and Cicero in his celebrated speech. There also might be seen the famous brazen buU which an Athenian invented for the amusement of Phalaris. Himian beings were put inside ; a fire was lit under- neath ; and the throat was so contrived that the shrieks and groans of the victims made the bull bellow as if he were alive. The first experiment was made by King Phalaris upon the artist; and the last by the people upon King Phalaris. Hamilcar caressed his son and asked him if he would like to go to the war : when the boy said Yes, and showed much delight, Hamilcar took his little hands and placed them upon the altar and made him swear that he would hate the Romans to his dying day. Long years afterward, when that boy was an exile in a for- eign land, the most glorious, the most unfortunate of men, he was accused by his royal host of secretly in- triguing with the Romans. He then related this cir- cumstance, and asked if it was likely that he would ever be a friend to Rome. aiLYEB SPAIN. 139 namilcaiT marched. The politicians supposed that le was merely engaged in a third-rate war, and were qul'-e easy in their minds. But one day there came a courier from Tangiers. He brought tidings which plunged the whole city in a tumult of wonder and ex- citement. The three great streets which led to the market-place were filled with streaming crowds. A multitude collected round the city hall, in which sat the senators anxiously deliberating. Women appeared on the roofs of the houses and bent eagerly over the para- pets, while men ran along bawling out the news. Ha- milcar Barca had gone clean off. He was no longer in Africa. He had crossed the sea. The Tangier expe- dition was a trick. He had taken the army right over into Spain, and was fighting with the native chiefs who had always been the friends and allies of Carthage. By a strange fortuity, Spain was the Peru of the ancient world. The horrors of the mines in South America, the sufferings of the Indians, were copied, so to speak, from the early history of the people who inflicted them. When the Phoenicians first entered the harbors of Andalusia, they found themselves in a " land where silver was used as iron. They laded their vessel with the precious metal to the water's edge, cast away their wooden lead-weighted anchor, and substituted a lump of pure silver in its stead. After- ward factories were established ; arrangements were made with the chiefs for the supply of labor, and the mining was conducted on scientific principles. The Carthaginians succeeded the Phoenicians and remained, like them, only on the coast. It was Hamilcar's design to conquer the whole country, to exact tribute from the inhabitants, to create a Spanish army. His success was splendid and 140 HAOTOBAL. complete. The peninsula of Spain became almost entirely a Punic province. Hanulcar built a city which he called New Carthage, the Oarthagena of modem times, and discovered in its neighborhood rich mines of silver-lead, which have lately been re- opened. He acquired a private fortime, formed a native army, fed his party at Carthage, and enriched the treasury of the state. He administered the prov- ince nine years, and then, dying, was succeeded by his brother, who, after governing or reigning a few years, also died. Hannibal, the son of Hamilcar, became Viceroy of Spain. It appears strange that Rome should so tamely have allowed the Carthaginians to take Spain. The truth was that the Romans, just then, had enough to do to look after their own affairs. The Gauls of Lombardy had furiously attacked the Italian cities, and had called to their aid the Gauls who lived beyond the Alps. Before the Romans had beaten off the bar- barians, the conquest in Spain had been accomplished. The Romans, therefore, accepted the fact, and con- tented themselves with a treaty by which the govern- ment of Carthage pledged itself not to pass beyond the Ebro. But Hannibal cared nothing about treaties made at Carthage. As Hamilcar, without orders, had invaded Spain, so he, without orders, invaded Italy. The ex- pedition of the Gauls had shown him that it was possible to cross the Alps, and he chose that extra- ordinary route. The Roman army was about to embark for Spain, which, it was supposed, would be the seat of war, when the news arrived that Hannibal had alighted in Italy, with elephants and cavalry, like a man descending from the clouds. HANNIBAL. 141 If wars were always decided by individual exploits and pitched battles, Hannibal would have conquered [taly. He defeated the Romans so often and so thoroughly that at last they found it their best policy not to fight with him at aU. He could do nothing, then, but sweep over the country with his Cossack cavalry, plunder, and destroy. It was impossible for him to take Rome, which was protected by walls strong as rocks, and by rocks steep as walls. When he did march on Rome, encamping within three miles of the city, and raising a panic during an after- noon, it was done merely as a ruse to draw away the Roman army from the siege of Capua. But it did not have even that effect. The army before Capua re- mained where it was, and another army appeared, as if by magic, to defend the city. Rome appeared to be inexhaustible, and so in reality it was. Hannibal knew well that Italy could be conquered only by Italians. So great a general could never have supposed that, with a handful of cavalry, he could subdue a country which had a million armed men to bring into the field. He had taken it for granted that if he could gain some success at first he would be joined by the subject cities. But in spite of his great victories, they remained true to Rome. Nothing shows so clearly the immense resources of the Italian Republic as that second Punic war. Hannibal was in their country, but they employed against him only a portion of their troops ; a second army was in Sicily waging war against his Greek allies; a third army was in Spain, attacking his operations at the base, pulling Carthage out of Europe by the roots. Added to which it was now the Romans who ruled the sea. When Scipio had taken New Carthage and conquered 142 soiFio. Spain, lie crossed over to Africa, and Hannibal was of necessity recalled. He met, on the field of Zama, a general ■v^hose genins was little inferior to his own, and who possessed an infinitely better army. Hannibal lost the day, and the fate of Carthage was decided. It was not the battle which did that : it was the nature and constitution of the state. In itself, the battle of Zama was not a more ruinous defeat than the battle of Cannae. But Carthage was made of different stuff from that of Home. How could a war between those two people have ended otherwise than as it did? Rome was an armed nation fighting ia Italy for hearth and home, in Africa for glory and revenge. Carthage was a city of merchants, who paid men to fight for them, and whose army was dissolved as soon as the exchequer was exhausted. Rome could fight to its last man : Carthage could fight only to its last doUar. At the begirming of both wars the Cartha- ginians did wonders; but as they became poor they became feeble ; their strength dribbled out with their gold; the refusal of Alexandria to negotiate a loan perhaps injured them more deeply than the victory of Scipio. The fall of the Carthaginian empire is not a matter for regrei Outside the walls of the city existed hope- less slavery on the part of the subjects, shameless ex- tortion on the part of the officials. Throughout Africa Carthage was never named without a curse. In the time of the mercenary war, the Moorish women, taking oath to keep nothing back, stripped off their gold ornaments and brought them all to the men who were resistiog their oppressors. That city, that Carthage, fed like a vulture upon the land. A corrupt and grasping aristocracy, a corrupt and turbulent populace, FALL OF CABTHAQE. 143 divided between them the prey. The Carthaginian customs were barbarous in the extreme. When a battle had been won they sacrificed their handsomest prisoners to the gods; when a battle had been lost, the children of their noblest families were cast into the furnace. Their Asiatic character was strongly marked. They were a people false and sweet- worded, effeminate and cruel, tyrannical and servile, devout and licentious, merciless in triumph, faint-hearted in danger, divinely heroic in despair. Let us therefore admit that, as an imperial city, Carthage merited her fate. But henceforth we must regard her from a different point of view. In order to obtain peace she had given up her colonies abroad, her provinces at home, her vessels and elephants of war. The empire was reduced to a municipality. Nothing was left but the city and a piece of ground. The merchant princes took off their crowns and went back into the glass and pui-ple business. It was only as a town of manufacture and trade that Carthage con- tinued to exist, and as such her existence was of un- mixed service to the world. Hannibal was made prime minister, and at once set to work to reform the constitution. The aristocratic party informed the Eomans that he was secretly stir- ring up the people to war. The Komans demanded that he should be surrendered ; he escaped to the court of Antiochus, the Greek king in Asia Minor, and there he did attempt to raise war against Kome. The Senate were justified in expeUing him from Carthage, for he was reaUy a dangerous man. But the persecution to which he was afterward subjected was not very credit- able to their good fame. Driven fi-om place to place, Jie at last took refuge ui Bithj-nia, on the desolate 144 THE POOE, Ha,TED OLD MAM. shores of the Black Sea; and a Eoman consul, who wished to obtain some notoriety by taking home the great Carthaginian as a show, commanded the prince, imder whose protection he was Uving, to give him up. When Hannibal heard of this, he took poison, saying, "Let me deliver the Eomans from their cares and anxieties, siace they think it too tedious and too dan- gerous to wait for the death of a poor, hated old man." The news of this occurrence excited anger in Eome ; but it was the presage of a greater crime which was soon to be committed in the Roman name. There was a Berber chief named Masinissa who had been deprived of his estates, and who, during the war, had rendered important services to Rome. He was named King oi Numidia, and it was stipulated in the treaty that the Carthaginians shoidd restore the lands and cities which had belonged to him and to his an- cestors. The lands which they had taken from him were accordingly surrendered, and then Masinissa sent in a claim for certain lands which he said had been taken from his ancestors. The wording of the treaty was ambiguous. He might easily declare that the whole of the seacoast had belonged to his family ia ancient times ; and who could disprove the evidence of a tradition? He made no secret of his design; it was to drive the Phoenician strangers out of Africa, and to reign at Carthage in their stead. He soon showed that he was worthy to be called the King of Numidia and the Friend of Rome. He drilled his bandits into soldiers ; he taught his wandering shep- herds to tiU the groTind. He made his capital, Con- stantine, a great city ; he opened schools in which the sons of native chiefs were taught to read and write in the Punic tongue. He allied himself with the powers HOME m THE EAST. 145 of Morocco and the Atlas. He reminded the Berbers that it was to them the soil belonged ; that the Phoe- nicians were intruders who had come with presents in their hands and with promises in their mouths, de- claring that they had met with trouble in their own country, and praying for a place where they might repose from the weary sea. Their fathers had trusted them; their fathers had been bitterly deceived. By force and by fraud the Carthaginians had taken aU the lands which they possessed ; they had stolen the ground on which their city stood. In the meantime Kome advanced into the East. As soon as the battle of Zama had been fought, Alexandria demanded her protection. This brought the Romans iuto contact with the Grseco-Asiatic world ; they found it in much the same condition as the English found Hindostan, and they conquered it in much the same manner. Time went on. The generation of Hannibal had almost become extinct. In Carthage war had become a tradition of the past. The business of that city was again as flourishing as it had ever been. Again ships sailed to the coasts of Cornwall and Guinea ; again the streets were lined with the workshops of iudustrious artisans. Such is the vis medicatrix, the restoring power of a widely extended commerce, combined with active manufactures and the skillful management of soil, that the city soon regained its ancient wealth. The Bomans had imposed an enormous indemnity, which was to be paid off by instaUments extending over a series of years. The Carthaginians paid it off at once. But in the midst of all their prosperity and hap- piness there were grave and anxious hearts. They 7 146 OATO THE CENS0BI0U8. saw ever before them the menacing figure of Masinissa. The very slowness of his movements was portentous. He was in all things deUberate, gradual and calm. From time to time he demanded a tract of land : if it was not given up at once, he took it by force. Then, waiting as if to digest it, he left them for a while in peace. They were bound by treaty not to make war against the Friend of Eome. They therefore petitioned the Senate that commissioners should be sent, and the boundary definitely settled. But the Senate had no desire that Carthage shoidd be left in peace. The commissioners were instructed to report in such a manner that Masinissa might be encouraged to con- tinue his depredations. They brought back astonish- ing accounts of the magnificence and activity of the African metropolis; and among these commissioners there was one man who never ceased to declare that the country was in danger, and who never rose to speak in the House without saying before he sat down ; " And it is my opinion, fathers, that Carthage must be destroyed." Cato the censor has been called the last of the old Romans. That class of patriot farmers had been ex- tinguished by Hannibal's invasion. In order to live during the long war they had been obliged to borrow money on their lands. When the war was over, the prices of everything rose to an unnatural height ; the farmers could not recover themselves, and the Roman law of debt was severe. They were ejected by thou- sands ; it was the favorite method to turn the women and children out of doors while the poor man was working ia the fields. Italy was converted into a plantation : slaves in chains tilled the land. No change K0MAN8 A. LA MODE. 147 was made in the letter of the constitution, but the com- monwealth ceased to exist. Society was now composed of the nobles, the money-merchants or city men, and a mob Hke that of Carthage, which lived on salable votes, sometimes raging for agrarian laws; and which was afterward fed at Government expense, hke a wild beast, every day. At this time a few refined and intellectual men began to cultivate a taste for Greek literature and the fine arts. They collected libraries, and adorned them with busts of celebrated men, and antiques of Corin- thian bronze. Crowds of imitators soon arose, and the conquests in the East awakened new ideas. In the days of old, the Romans had been content to decorate their door-posts with trophies obtained in single com- bat, and their halls with the waxen portraits of their ancestors. The only spoils which they could then dis- play were flocks and herds, wagons of rude structure, and heaps of spears and helmets. But now the arts of Greece and the riches of Asia adorned the triumphs of their generals, and the reign of taste and luxury com- menced. A race of dandies appeared, who wore semi- transparent robes, and who were always passing their hands in an affected manner through their hair ; who lounged with the languor of the Sybarite, and who spoke with the lisp of Alcibiades. The wives of sen- ators and bankers became genteel, kept a herd of ladies' maids, passed hours before their full-length silver mirrors, bathed in asses' milk, rouged their cheeks and dyed their hair, never went out except in palan- quins, gabbled Greek phrases, and called their slaves by Greek names, even when they happened to be of Latin birth. The houses of the great were paved with mosaic floors, and the painted walls were works of art ; 148 THE EOMAN BADEN-BADEN. sideboards were covered with gold and silTsr plate, witli vessels of amber, and the tinted Alexandrine glass. The bathrooms were of marble, with the water issuing from silver tubes. New amusements were invented, and new customs began to reign. An academy was established, in which five hundred boys and girls were taught Castanet dances, of anything but a decorous kind. The dinner hour was made later ; and instead of sitting at table, they adopted the style of lying down to eat on sofas inlaid with tortoise-sheU and gold. It was chiefly in the luxuries of the cuisine that the Romans exhibited their wealth. Prodigious prices were paid for a good Greek cook. Every patrician villa was a castle of gastronomical delight: it was provided with its salt- water tank for fish and oysters, and an aviary which was filled with field-fares, ortolans, nightingales, and thrushes ; a white dove-cot, like a tower, stood beside the house, and beneath it was a dark dimgeon for fattening the birds ; there was also a poultry ground, with pea-fowl, guiuea-fowl, and pink-feathered flamin- goes imported from the East ; while an orchard of fig-trees, honey-apples, and other fruits, and a garden in which the trees of cypress and yew were clipped into fantastic shapes, conferred an aspect of rural beauty on the scene. The hills round the Bay of Naples were covered with these villas; and to that charming region it became the fashion to resort at a certain season of the year. In such places gambling, drinking, and love-making shook off all restraints. Black-eyed soubrettes tripped perpetually about with billets-doux in Greek; the rattle of the ivoiy dice- box could be heard in the streets, like the click of biUiard balls in the Parisian boulevards ; and majiy a oato'b ltttle fabm. 149 boat with purple sails, and with garlands of roses twined round its mast, floated softly along the water, laughter and sweet music sounding from the prow. Happily for Cato's peace of mind, he died before the casino, with its cachuca, or cancan, or whatever it might have been, was introduced, and before the fashions of Asia had been added to those of Greece. But he lived long enough to see the GrsBCO-maniacs triumphant. In earlier and happier days he had been able to expel two philosophers from Kome ; but now he saw them swarming iu the streets with their ragged cloaks and greasy beards, and everywhere obtaining seats as domestic chaplains at the tables of the rich. He could now do no more than protest in his bitter and extravagant style against the corruption of the age. He prophesied that as soon as Rome had thoroughly imbibed the Greek philosophy she would lose the em- pire of the world; he declared that Socrates was a prating, seditious fellow, who well deserved his fate; and he warned his son to beware of the Greek physi- cians, for the Greeks had laid a plot to kill aU the Eomans, and the doctors had been deputed to put it into execution with their medicines. Cato was a man of an iron body, which was covered with honorable scars ; a loud, harsh voice, greenish- gray eyes, foxy hair, and enormous teeth, resembling tusks. His face was so hideous and forbidding that, according to one of the hundred epigrams that were composed against him, he would wander forever on the banks of the Styx, for hell itseK would be afraid to let him in. He was distinguished as a general, as an orator, and as an author ; but he pretended that it was his chief ambition to be considered a good farmer. He lived in a little cottage on his Sabine estate, and 150 A DISSOLUTE PEIG. went in the morning to practice as an advocate in the neighboring town. When he came home he stripped to the skin, and worked in the fields with his slaves, drinking, as they did, the vinegar-water, or the thin sour wine. In the evening he used to boil the turnips for his supper while his wife made the bread. Although he cared so Uttle about external things, if he gave an entertainment, and the slaves had not cooked it or waited to his liking, he used to chastise them with leather thongs. It was one of his maxims to sell his slaves when they grew old — the worst cruelty that a slave-owner can commit. "For my part," says Plu- tarch, " I should never have the heart to sell an ox that had grown old in my service, stiU less my aged slave." Cato's old-fashioned virtue paid very well. He gratified his personal antipathies, and obtained the character of the people's friend. He was always im- peaching the great men of his country, and was him- self impeached nearly fifty times. The man who sets up as being much better than his age is always to be suspected ; and Cato is perhaps the best specimen of the rugged hypocrite and austere charlatan that history can produce. This censor of morals bred slaves for sale. He made laws against usury, and then turned usurer himseK. He was always preaching about the vanity of riches, and wrote an excellent work on the best way of getting rich. He degraded a Eoman knight for kissing his wife in the daytime in the pres- ence of his daughter, and he himself, while he was living imder his daughter-in-law's roof, bestowed his favors on one of the servant-girls of the establish- ment, and allowed her to be impudent to her young mistress. " Old age," he once said to a gray-headed THE AIABMIST. 151 debauchee, "has deformities enough of its own. Do not add to it the deformity of "vice." At the time of the amorous affair above mentioned Cato was nearly eighty years of age. On the other hand, he was a most faithful servant to his country ; he was a truly religious man, and his god was the commonwealth of Bome. Nor was he destitute of the domestic virtues, though sadly defi- cient in that respect. He used to say that those who beat their wives and children laid their sacrilegious hands on the holiest things in the world. He edu- cated his son himself, taught him to box, to ride, to swim, and wrote out for him a history of Home in large pothook characters, that he might become acquainted at an early age with the great actions of the ancient Eomans. He was as careful in what he said before the child as if he had been in the presence of the vestal virgins. This Cato was the man on whom rests chiefly the guilt of the murder which we must now relate. In pub- lic and in private, by direct denunciation, by skillful in- uendo, by appealing to the fears of some and to the interests of otheus, he labored incessantly toward his end. Once, after he had made a speech against Car- thage in the senate, he shook the skirt of his robe as if by accident, and some African figs fell upon the ground. When all had looked and wondered at their size and beauty, he observed that the place where they grew was only three days' sail from Eome. It is possible that Cato was sincere in his alarms, for he was one of the few survivors of the second Punic war. He had felt the arm of Carthage in its strength. He coidd remember that day when even Romans had turn- ed pale ; when the old men covered their faces with 152 THE ilONEYED INTEKEST. their mantles ; when the young men clambered on the waUs ; when the women ran wailing round the temples of the gods, praying for protection, and sweeping the shrines with their hair ; when a cry went forth that Hannibal was at the gates ; when a panic seized the city ; when the people, coUecting on the roofs, flimg tiles at Roman soldiers, beheving them to be the enemy al- ready in the town ; when aU over the Campagna could be seen the smoke of ricks and farmhouses mounting in the air, and the wild Berber horsemen dnTing herds of cattle to the Punic camp. Besides, it was his theory that the annihilation of for- eign powers was the building up of Rome. He used to boast that, in his Peninsular campaign, he had demol- ished a Spanish town a day. There were in the senate many enlightened men, who denied that the prosperity of Rome could be assisted by the destruction of trading cities ; and Carthage was defended by the Scipio party. But the influence of the banker class was employed on Cato's side. They wanted every penny that was spent in the Mediterranean world to pass through their books. Carthage and Corinth were rival firms which it was to their profit to destroy. These money-mongers possessed great power in the senate and the state, and at last they carried the day. It was privately resolved that Carthage should be attacked as soon as an oppor- tunity occurred. Thus, in Africa and in Italy, Masinissa andCato pre- pared the minds of men for the deed of blood. It was as if the Furies of the slaughtered dead had entered the bodies of those two old men and kept them aKve be- yond their natural term. Cato had done his share. It was now Masinissa's turn. As soon as he was assur- ed that he would be supported by the Romans he struck PEACE AT ANY PKIOE. 153 again and again the wretched people, who were afraid to resist, and yet who soon saw that it would be foUy to submit. It was OYident that Eome would not inter- fere. If Massinissa was not checked, he would strip them of their corn-fields ; he would starve them to death. The war party at last prevailed : the city was fortified and armed. Masinissa descended on their viUas, their gardens, and their farms. Driven to despair, the Car- thaginians went forth to defend the crops which their own hands had sown. A great battle was fought, and Masinissa was victorious. On a hill near the battle-field sat a young Roman offi- cer, Scipio ^miUanus, a relative of the man who had defeated Hannibal. He had been sent over from Spain for a squadron of elephants, and arrived at Masinissa' s camp at this interesting crisis. The news of the battle was soon despatched by him to Eome. The treaty had now been broken, and the senate declared war. The Carthaginians fell into an agony of alarm. They were now so broken down that a vassal of Rome could defeat them in the open field. What had they to expect in a war with Eome ? Ambassadors were at once dis- patched with full powers to obtain peace — peace at any price — ^from the terrible Republic. The envoys presented themselves before the senate ; they offered the submis- sion of the Carthaginians, who formally disowned the act of war, who had put the two leaders of the war-party to death, who desired nothing but the alliance and good- will of Eome. The answer which they received was this : " Since the Carthaginians are so well advised, the senate returns them their country, their laws, their sepulchers, their Uberties, and their estates, if they will surrender three hundred sons of their senators as hostar ges, and obey the orders of the consuls." 154 THE ORDEKS OF THE CONSULS. The Eoman army had akeady disembarked. When the consuls landed on the coast no resistance was made. They demanded provisions. Then the city gates were opened, and long trains of bullocks and mules, laden with corn, were driven to the Eoman camp. The hosta- ges were demanded. Then the senators brought forth their children and gave them to the city ; the city gave them to the Romans; the Eomans placed them on board the galleys, which at once spread their sails and departed from the coast. The roofs of the palaces of Carthage were crowded with women who watched those receding sails with straining eyes and outstretched arms. Never more would they see their beloved ones again. Yet they would not, perhaps, have grieved so much at the children leaving Carthage had they known what was to come. The city gates agaia opened. The senate sent its council to the Eoman camp. A company of venerable men clad in purple, with golden chains, presented them- selves at headquarters, and requested to know what were the " orders of the consuls." They were told that Carthage must disarm. They returned to the city and at once sent out to the camp all their fleet-material and artillery, all the military stores in the public magazines, and aU the arms that could be found in the possession of private individuals. Three thousand catapults and two hundred thousand sets of armor were given up. They again came out to the camp. The military council was assembled to receive them. The old men saluted the Eoman ensigns, and bowed low to the con- Bvla, placing their hands upon their breasts. The or- ders of the consuls, they said, had been obeyed. Was there anything more that their lords had to command? The senior consul rose up and said that there was DESPAIB. 165 sometliiiig more. He was instructed by the Eoman senate to inform the senators of Carthage that the city must be destroyed .... but that, ia accordance with the promise of the Eoman senate, their country, their laws, their sepulchers, their liberties, and their estates would be preserved, and they might build another city, only it must be without walls, and at a distance of at least ten miles from the sea. The Carthaginians cast themselves upon the ground, and the whole assembly fell into confusion. The consul explained that he could exercise no choice ; he had received his orders, and they must be carried out. He requested them to return and apprise their fellow-townsmen. Some of the senators remained in the Eoman camp ; others ventured to go back. When they drew near the city the people came running out bo meet them, and asked them the news. They answered only by weeping and beating their foreheads, and stretching out their hands and calling on the gods. They went on to the senate house ; the members were summoned ; an enormous crowd gathered in the market-place. Presently the doors opened ; the sena- tors came forth, and the orders of the consuls were announced. And then there arose in the air a fierce, despairing shriek, a yeU of agony and rage. The mob rushed through the city, and tore limb from limb the Italians who were living in the town. With one voice it was resolved that the city should be defended to the last. They would not so tamely give up their beautiful Carthage, their dear and venerable home beside the sea. If it was to be burned to ashes, their ashes should be mingled with it, and their enemies' as welL AH the slaves were set free. Old and young, rich 156 SIEGE OF OAKTHAGE. and poor, worked together, day and night, forging anna> The public bidldiags were pulled down to prociire timber and metal. The women cut off their hair to make strings for the catapults. A humble message was sent in the true Oriental style to the consul, praying for a httle time. Days passed, and Carthage gave no signs of life. Tired of waiting, the consul marched toward the city, which he expected to enter like an open village. He found, to his horror, the gates closed, and ^ the battlements bristling with artillery. Carthage was strongly fortified, and it was held by men who had abandoned hope. The siege lasted more than three years. Cato did not live to see his darling wish fulfilled. Masinissa also died while the siege was going on, and bitter was his end. The pohcy of the Eomans had been death to aU his hopes. His dream of a great African empire was dissolved. He sullenly refused to co-operate with the Eomans : it was his Carthage which they had decreed should be leveled to the ground. There was a time when it seemed as if the great city would prove itseK to be impregnable : the siege was conducted with small skill or vigor by the Roman generals. More than one reputation found its grave before the walls of Carthage. But when Scipio ^milianus obtained the command, he at once dis- played the genius of his house. Perceiving that it would be impossible to subdue the city as long as smugghng traders could run into the port with pro- visions, he constructed a stone mole across the mouth of the harbor. Having thus cut off the city from the sea, he pitched his camp on the neck of the isthmus, for Carthage was built on a peninsula, and so cut it off completely from the land. For the first time in tha KEIGN OF TERBOE. 157 siege, the blockade was complete : the city was in- closed in a stone and iron cage. The Carthaginians in their fury brought forth the prisoners whom they had taken in their sallies, and hurled them headlong from the walls. There were many in the city who protested against this outrage. They were denoxmced as traitors ; a Eeign of Terror commenced ; the men of the mod- erate party were crucified in the streets. The hideous idol of Moloch found victims ia that day ; children were placed on its outstretched and downward sloping hands and rolled off them into the fieiy furnace which was burning at its feet. Nor were there wanting patriots who sacrificed themselves upon the altars, that the gods might have compassion upon those who survived. But among these pestilence and famine had begun to work, and the sentiaels could scarcely stand to their duty on the walls. Gangs of robbers went from house to house and tortured people to make them give up their food ; mothers fed upon their children ; a terrible disease broke out ; corpses lay scattered in the streets ; men who were burying the dead fell dead upon them ; others dug their o'^vn graves, and laid down in them to die ; houses in which aU had per- ished were used as public sepulchers, and were quickly fiUed. And then, as if the birds of the air had carried the news, it became known all over Northern Africa that Carthage was about to fall. And then, from the dark and dismal comers of the land, from the wasted frontiers of the desert, from the snow lairs and caverns of the Atlas, there came creeping and crawling to the coast the most abject of the human race — black, naked, withered beings, their bodies covered with red paint, their hair cut in strange fashions, their language com 158 THE ASSAULT. posed of muttering and whistling sounds. By day ttey prowled round the camp, and fought with the dogs for the offal and the bones. If they found a skin, they roasted it on ashes, and danced round it in glee, wriggling their bodies, and uttering abominable aries When the feast was over, they cowered together on their hams, and fixed their gloating eyes upon the city, and expanded their blubber lips, and showed their white fangs. At last the day came. The harbor walls were carried by assault, and the Eoman soldiers pressed into the narrow streets, which led down to the water side. The houses were six or seven stories high ; and each house was a fortress, which had to be stormed. Lean and haggard creatures, with eyes of flame, defended their homesteads from room to room, onward, upward, to the death struggle on the broad, flat roof. Day followed day, and still that horrible music did not cease : the shouts and songs of the besiegers, the yells and shrieks of the besieged, the moans of the wounded, the feeble cries of children divided by the sword. Night followed night, and still the deadly work went on : there was no sleep and no darkness ; the Romans lighted houses, that they might see to kilL Six days passed thus, and only the citadel was left. It was a steep rock in the middle of the town ; a temple of the God of HeaJing crowned its summit. The rock was covered with people, who could be seen extending their arms to heaven, and uniting with one another in the last embrace. Their piteous lamentations, Uke the cries of wounded animals, ascended in the air, and behind the iron circle which inclosed them could be heard the crackling of the fire and the dull boom of fall- ing beams. THE FIELD OP BLOOD. 159 The soldiers were weary ynih smiting ; they were filled with blood. Nine tenths of the inhabitants had been already killed. The people on the rock were offered thedr lives ; they descended with bare hands, and passed under the yoke. Some of them ended their days ia prison ; the greater part were sold as slaves. But ia the temple on the summit of the rocky hill nine hundred Roman deserters, for whom there could be no pardon, stood at bay. The trumpets sounded ; the soldiers clashing their bucklers with their swords, and uttering the war-cry, alala ! dala I advanced to the attack. Of a sudden the sea of steel recoiled; the standards reeled ; a long tongue of flame sprang forth upon them through the temple door. The deserters had set the building on fire, that they might escape the ignominious death of martial law. A man dressed in purple rushed out of the temple with an oUve branch in his hand. This was Has- drubal, the commander-in-chief, and the Robespierre of the Reign of Terror. His life was given him ; he would do for the triumph. And as he bowed the knee before the consul, a woman appeared on the roof of the temple with two children in her arms. She poured forth some scornful words upon her husband, then plunged with her children into the flames. Carthage burned seventeen days before it was entirely consumed. Then the plow was passed over the soil, to piit an end in legal form to the existence of the city. House might never again be built, com might never again be sown, upon the ground where it had stood. A hundred years afterward Julius CsBsar founded another Carthage, and planted a Roman colony therein. But it was not built upon the same spot ; the old site remained accursed; it was a browzing 160 JUGUETHA. AKD JUBA. groimd for cattle, a field of blood. When recently the remains of the city walls were disinterred, they were found to be covered with a layer of ashes from four to fire feet deep, filled with haK-charred pieces of wood, fragments of iron, and projectiles. The possessions of the Carthaginians were formed into a Eoman province, whicli was called Africa. The governor resided at Utica, which, with the other old Phoenician towns, received municipal rights, but paid a fixed stipend to the state exchequer. The terri- tory of Carthage itself became Eoman domain land, and was let on lease. Italian merchants fiocked to Utica in great numbers and reopened the inland trade ; but the famous sea trade was not revived. The Britons of Cornwall might in vain gather on high places and strain their eyes toward the west. The ships which had brought them beads and purple cloth would come again no more. A descendant of Masinissa, who inherited his genius, defied the Roman power in a long war. He was finally conquered by Sylla and Marius, caught, and carried off to Eome. Appareled in barbaric splen- dor, he was paraded through the streets. But when the triumph was over, his guards rushed upon him and struggled for the finery in which he had been dressed. They tore the rings from his ears with such force that the flesh came away ; they cast him naked into a dungeon under groimd. " O Eomans, you give me a cold bath 1 " were the last words of the valiant Jugurtha. The next Numidian prince who appeared at a triumph was the young Juba, who had taken the side of Pompey against Caesar. " It proved to be a happy captivity for him," says Plutarch, " for of a barbarous ROME IN AI3I0A. 161 and unlettered Numidian, he became a historian worthy to be numbered among the learned men of Greece." When the empire became established, the kingdoms of Numidia, of Gyrene, and of Egypt were swept away. Airica was divided into seven fniitful provinces, ranging along the coast from Tripoli to Tangiers. Egypt was made a province, with the tropical line for its southern frontier. The oasis of Cyrene, with its fields of assafce- tida, was a middle station between the two. But still the history of Northern Africa and the history of Egypt remain distinct. The Eoman empire, though held together for a time by strong and skillful hands, was divided by customs and modes of thought arising out of language into the Greek and Latin worlds. In the countries which had been civilized by the Romans, Latin had been introduced. In the countries which, before the Eoman conquest, had been conquered by Alexander, the Greek language maintained its ground. Greece, Macedonia, Asia Minor, Syria, Egypt, and Cyrene belonged to the Greek world : Italy, Gaul, Spain, and Africa belonged to the Latin world. Greek was never spoken in Eoman Carthage except by a few merchants and learned men. Latin was never spoken in Alexandria except in the law courts and at Govern- ment House. "Whenever there was a partition of the empire, Egypt was assigned to one emperor, Carthage to the other. In the church history of Africa, the same phenomenon may be observed. The church of Africa was the daughter of the church of Eome, and was chiefly occupied with questions of discipline and law. The church of Egypt was essentially a Greek church ; it was occupied entirely with definitions of the undefinable, and solutions or problems in theology. 162 THE ROMAN COENHELD. In one respect, howeTer, the histories of Egypt and Africa are the same. They were both of them corn- fields, and both of them were ruined by the Bomans. In the early days of the empire there was a noble reform in provincial affairs resembling that which OUve accomplished in British India when he visited thai coimtry for the last time. There was then an end to that tyrant of prey who under the republic had con- trived in a few years to extort an enormous fortime from his proconsulate, and who was often accompanied by a wife more rapacious than himself ; who returned to Borne with herds of slaves, and cargoes of bullion and of works of art. Governors were appointed with fixed salaries ; the Boman law was everywhere intro- duced ; vast sums of money were expended on the pubhc works. Unhappily, this did not last. Bome was devoured by a population of mean whites, the result of foreign slavery, which invariably degrades labor. This vast rabble was maintained by the state ; rations of bread and oil were served out to it every day. When the evil time came, and the exchequer was exhausted, the governors of Africa and Egypt were required to send the usual quantity of grain aU the same, and to obtain their percentage as best they could. They were transformed into satraps or pachas. The great land- owners were accused of conspiracy, and their estates escheated to the crown. The agriculturalists were re- duced to serfdom. There might be a scarcity of food in Africa, but there must be none in Bome. Every year were to be seen the huge ships lying in the harbors of Alexandria and Carthage, and mountains of com piled high upon the quays. When the seat of empire was transferred to the Bosphorus, the evil THE GAMF, FKE3EBTES. 163 became greater stilL Each province was forced to do ■ double work. There was now a populace in Constan- tinople which was fed entirely by Egypt, and Africa supported the populace of Borne. "While the Egyptian fellah and the Moorish peasant were laboring in the fields, the sturdy beggars of Byzantium and Borne were amusing themselves at the circus, or basking on marble in the sun. But Africa was not only a plantation of com and oil for their imperial majesties, the Italian lazzaroni: it also contained the preserves of Bome. The Hon was a royal beast ; it was licensed to feed upon the flock of the shepherd, and upon the shepherd himself if it pre- ferred him. The unfortimate Moor could not defend his life without a violation of the game laws, which were quite as ferocious as the Hon. It wiU easily be imagined that the Eoman rule was not agreeable to the native pop- ulation. They had fallen beneath a power compared with which that of the Carthaginians was feeble and kind ; which possessed the strength of civilization with- out its mercy. But when that power began to dechne they hfted up their heads, and joined the foreign in- vaders as soon as they appeared, as their fathers had joined the Eomans in the ancient days. These invaders were the Yandals, a tribe of Germans from the North, who had conquered Spain, and who, now pouring over the Gibraltar Straits, took Carthage and ruled there a hundred years. The Eomans strug- gled hard to regain their cornfields, and the old duel of Borne and Carthage was resumed. This time it was Cai-thage that was triumphant. It repelled the Bo- mans when they invaded Africa. It became a naval power, scoured the Mediterranean, reconquered Sicily and Sardinia, plundered the shores of Italy, and en- 164 BEUBABTDS AKD THE VANDAIfl. camped beneath the motilderrng walk of Bome. The gates of the city were opened ; and the bishop of Eome, attended by his clergy, came forth in solemn proces- sion to offer the submission of Eome, and to pray for mercy to the churches and the captiyes. Doubtless, in that army of Germans and Moors, by whom they were received, there were men of Phoenician descent who had read in history of a similar scene. Eome was more fortunate than ancient Carthage : the city was sacked, but it was not destroyed. Not long afterward it was taken by the Goths. Kings dressed in furs sat opposite each other on the thrones of Carthage and of Eome. The Emperor of the East sent the celebrated Beli- sarius against the Carthaginian Vandals, who had be- come corrupted by luxury, and whom he speedily sub- dued. Thus Africa was restored to Eome ; but it was a Greek-speaking Eome ; and the citizens of Carthage still felt themselves to be under foreign rule. Besides, the war had reduced the country to a wilderness. One might travel for days without meeting a human being in those fair coast lands which had once been filled with olive groves, and vineyards, and fields of waving com. The savage Berber tribes pressed more and more firrcely on the cultivated territory which still remained. It is probable that, if the Arabs had not come, the Moors would have driven the Byzantines out of the land, or at least have forced them to remain as prison- ers behind their walls. With the invasion of the Arabs, the proper history of Africa begins. It is now that we are able for the first time to leave the coasts of the Mediterranean and the banks of the Nile, and to penetrate into that vast and mysterious world of which the ancient geographers had but a faint and incorrect idea BEBBEBS Am) NEGBOES. 165 It is evident enough from the facts which have been adduced in the foregoing sketch that Egypt and Car- thage contributed much to the Human Progress : Egypt by instructiag Greece ; Carthage by drawing forth Rome to the conquest of the world. But these countries did little for Africa itself. The ambition of Egypt was with good reason turned to- ward Asia ; that of Carthage toward Europe. The in- fluence of Carthage on the regions of the Niger was similar to that of Egypt on the negro regions of the Nile. In each case it became the fashion for the na- tive chiefs to wear Egyptian Unen, or the Tyrian pur- ple, and to decorate their wives with beads, which are often discovered by the negroes of the present day in ancient and forgotten graves. Elephants were hunted, and gold pits were dug, in Central Africa, that these luxuries might be procured ; but the chief article of ex- port was the slave ; and this commodity was obtained by means of war. The negroes have often been ac- cused of rejecting the civilization of the Egyptians and Carthaginians, but they were never brought into con- tact with those people. The intercourse between them was conducted by the intermediate Berber tribes. Those Berber tribes who inhabited the regions ad- joining Egypt and Cyrene appear to have been in some degree improved. But they were a roving people, and civilization can never ripen under tents. Something, however, was accomplished among those who were set- tled in cities or the regions of the coast. That the Berber race possesses a remarkable capacity for cul- ture has been amply proved. It is probable that Ter- ence was a Moor. It is certain that Juba, whose works have been unfortunately lost, was of unmixed Berber blood. Reading and writing were common among 166 THE AFBIOAN OH0BOH. them, and they used a character of their own. "Win*/ the Bomans took Carthage they gave the public library and archives to the Berber chiefs. At one time it seemed as if Barbary was destined to become a civil- ized province after the pattern of Spain and Gaul. Numidian princes adopted the culture of the Greeks ; and Juba was placed on his ancestral throne that he might tame his wild subjects into Roman citizens. But this movement soon perished, and the Moorish chiefs fell back into their bandit hfe. The African chtirch has obtained imperishable fame. In the days of suffering it brought forth martyrs whose fiery ardor and serene endurance have never been sur- passed. In the days of victory it brought forth minds by whose imperial writings thousands of cultivated men have been enslaved. But this church was, for the most part, confined to the walled cities on the coast, to the farming villages in which the Punic speech was still preserved, and to a few Moorish tribes who lived under Eoman rule. In the days of St. Augustine, Christian- ity was in its zenith ; and St. Augustine complains that there were himdreds of Berber, chiefe who had never heard the name of Christ. Even ia Eoman Africa the triumph of Christianity was not complete. In Car- thage itself, Astarte and Moloch were still adored ; and a barefooted monk could not show himself in the streets without being pelted by the populace. At a later date the Moorish tribes became a heretical and hostile sect ; the religious persecutions of the Arian Vandals were succeeded by the persecutions of the Byzantine Greeks. Christianity was divided and almost dead when the Arabs appeared ; and the church which had withstood ten imperial persecutions succumbed to the tax which the conquerors imposed on " the people of the book." afrioa's place in history. 167 The failure of Christianity in Africa was o-wing to the imperfection of the Eoman conquest. Their occu- pation was of a purely military kind and it did not em- brace an extensive area. The Romans were entirely distinct from the natives in manners and ideas. It was natural that the Berbers should reject the religion of a people whose language they did not understand, whose tyranny they detested, and whose power most of them defied. But the Arabs were accustomed to deserts; they did not settle, like the Eomans and Carthaginians, on the coast ; they covered the whole land ; they pene- trated into the recesses of the Atlas ; they pursued their enemies into the depths of the Sahara. But they also mingled persuasion with force. They believed that the Berbers were Arabs Hke themselves, and invited them, as kinsmen, to accept the mission of the prophet. They married the daughters of the land ; they gathered round their standards the warriors whom they had defeated, and led them to the glorious conquest of Spain. The two people became one ; the language and religion of the Arabs were accepted by the Moors. With this event, the biography of ancient Africa is closed, and the history of Asiatic Africa begins. But I have in this work a twofold story to unfold. I have to describe Tlie Dark Gontinent; to show in what way it is connected with Universal History ; what it has received, and what it has contributed, to the de- velopment of man. And I have aLso to sketch in broad outhne the human history itself. This task has been forced upon me in the course of my inquiries. It is impossible to measure a tributary and to estimate its value with precision, except by comparing it with the other affluents, and by carefully mapping the maia stream. In writing a history of Africa I am compelled to write 168 CIVILIZING WAS. the history of the world, in order that Africa's true position may be defined. And now, passing to the general questions discussed in this chapter, it will be observed that War is the chief agent of civilization in the period which I have attempted to portray. It was war which drove the Egyptians into those frightful deserts m the midst of which their Happy VaUey was discovered. It was war which, under the Persians, opened lands which had been either closed against foreigners or jealously held ajar. It was war which colonized Syria and Asia Minor with Greek ideas, and which planted in Alexandria the experimental philosophy which wiU win for us in time the dominion of the earth. It was war which united the Greek and Latin worlds into a splendid harmony of empire. And when that ancient world had been overcome by langour, and had fallen into Oriental sleep ; when nothing was taught in the schools which had not been taught a hundred years before ; when the rapacity of tyrants had extin- guished the ambition of the rich and the industry of the poor ; when the Church also had become inert, and roused itseK only to be cruel — then again came War across the Rhine and the Danube and, the Alps, and laid the foundations of European life among the ruins of the Latin world. In the same manner Asia awoke as if by magic, and won back from Europe the lands which she had lost. But this latter conquest, though effected by means of war, was preserved by means of Bdigion, an element of history which must be analyzed with scientific care. In the next chapter I shall explain the origin of the religious sentiment and theory in savage Ufe. I shall sketch the early career of the three great Shemitic creeds, and the characters of three men — Moses, Jesus, and Mahomet — who, what- PEOSPEOTUS. 169 ever may have been their faults, are entitled to the eternal gratitude of the human race. Then, resuming the history of Africa, I shall follow the course of Islam over the Great Desert into the Soudan, and shall de- scribe its progress in that coimtry by means of the sword and of the school, something of which I have seen and studied under both forms. OHAPTEB n. KEUaiON. When the poet invokes in his splendid frenzy the shining spheres of heaven, the mnrmnring fountains, and the rushing streams; when he calls upon the earth to hearken and bids the wild sea listen to his song ; when he communes with the sweet secluded valleys and the haughty-headed hiUs, as if those in- animate objects were aUve, as if those masses of brute matter were endowed with sense and thought — we do not smile, we do not sneer, we do not reason, but we feeL A secret chord is touched within us ; a slumber- ing sympathy is awakened into life. Who has not felt an impulse of hatred, and perhaps expressed it ia a senseless curse, against a fiery stroke of sunlight, or a sudden gust of wind ? Who has not felt a pang of pity for a flower torn and trampled ia the dust ; a shell dashed to fragments by the waves ? Such emo- tions or ideas last only for a moment; they do not belong to us ; they are the fossil fancies of a bygone age : they are a heritage of thought from the child- hood of our race. For there was a time when they possessed the human mind. There was a time when the phrases of modem poetry were the facts of ordi- nary hfe. There was a time when man lived in fellow- ship with Nature, believing that all things which moved or changed had minds and bodies kindred to his own. To those primeval people the sun was a great being, THE LIVE ELEMENTS. 171 who brightened them in his pleasure, and who scorched them in his wrath. The earth was a sleeping monster ; sometimes it rose a little and turned itself in bed. They walked upon its back when Uving ; they were put into its beUy when they died. Fire was a savage ani- mal, which bit when it was touched. The birds and beasts were foreigners, possessing languages and cus- toms of their own. The plants were dumb creatines, with characters good or bad, sometimes gloomy in aspect, malignant in their fruit, sometimes dispensing wholesome food and pleasant shade. These various forms of Nature they treated precisely as if they had been men. They sometimes adorned a handsome tree with bracelets lite a girl ; they offered up prayers to the fruit-trees, and made them presents to coax them to a hberal return. They for- bade the destruction of certaiu animals which they revered on account of their wisdom, or feared on ac- count of their fierceness, or valued on account of their utUity. They submitted to the tyranny of the more formidable beasts of prey, never venturing to attack them, for fear the nation or species should re- taliate ; but made them propitiatory gifts. In the same manner they offered sacrifices to avert the fury of the elements, or in gratitude for blessiags which had been bestowed. But often a courageous people, when in- vaded, would go to war, not only vnth the tiger and the bear, but with powers which, to them, were not less himian-hke and real. They would cut with their swords at the hot wind of the desert, hurl their spears into the swoUen river, stab the earth, flog the sea, shoot their arrows at the flashing clouds, and build up towers to carry heaven by assault. But when through the operation of the law of m DBEAM EEVELATION. growth the intellectual faculties of men become im- proTed, they begin to observe their own nature, and ia course of time a curious discovery is made. They ascertain that there is something which resides within them entirely independent and distinct from the body in which it is contained. They perceive that it is this mind, or soul, or genius, or spirit, which thinks, and desires, and decides. It commands the body, as the chief commands the slave. While the body is asleep, it is busy weaving thoughts in the sleeper's brain, or wanders into other lands, and converses with people whom he, while awake, has never seen. They hear words of wisdom issuing from the toothless mouth of a decrepit old man. It is evident that this soul does not grow old, and therefore it does not die. The body, it is clear, is only a garment which is in time destroyed, and then where does its inmate go ? When a loved one has been taken, she haunts the memory of him who weeps till the image imprinted on the heart is reflected on the curtain of the eye. Her vision appears, not when he is quite asleep, as in an ordinary dream, but as he is passing into sleep. He meets her in the twilight land which divides the world of darkness from the world of day. He sees her form distinctly ; he clasps it in his arms ; he hears the ac- cents of her sweet and gentle voice ; he feels the pressure of her lips upon his own. He awakes, and the illusion is dispelled ; yet with some it is so complete that they firmly believe it was a spirit whom they saw. Among savages it is not love which can thus excite the imagination and deceive the sense; but rever- ence and fear. The great chief is dead. His vision appears in a haK-waking dream : it threatens and it speaks. The dreamer believes that the form and the GHOST WOKSHIP. 178 voice axe real, and therefore he believes that the great chief still exists. It is thus that the grand idea is bom. There is Hfe after death. When the house or garment of the body is destroyed, the soul wanders forth into the air. Like the wind, it is unseen ; like the wind, it can be soft and kind; Kke the wind, it can be terrible and cruel. The savage then be- lieves that the pains of sickness are inflicted by the hand which so often inflicted pain upon him when it was in the flesh ; and he also believes that, in battle, the departed warrior is stiU fighting with unseen weapons at the head of his own clan. In order to obtain the good-will of the Father-spirit, prayers are offered up to him, and food is placed beside his grave. He is, in fact, still recognized as king, and to such phantom monarchs the distiactive title of God is as- signed. Each chief is deified and worshiped when he dies. The offerings and prayers are established by rule ; the reigning chief becomes the family priest ; he pretends to receive communications from the dead, and issues laws iu their name. The deeds of valor which the chiefs performed in their Hfetime are set to song ; their biographies descend from generation to genera^ tion, changing in their course, and thus a regular reli- gion and mythology are formed. It is the nature of man to reason from himseK out- ward. The savage now ascribes to the various forms of matter souls or spirits, such as he imagines that he has discovered in himseH. The food which he places at the grave has a soul or essence, and it is this which is eaten by the spirit of the dead, while the body of the food remains unchanged. The river is now mere water, which may dry up and perish, but there dwells within it a soul which never dies ; and so with every- 174 GHOSTS BECOME GODS. thing that lives and moves, from the blade of grass which shivers in the wind, to the star which slowly moves across the sky. But as men become more and more capable of general ideas, of classing facts into systems, and of ananging phenomena into groups, they believe in a god of the forests, a god of the waters, and a god of the sky, instead of ascribing a separate god to every tree, to every river, and to every star. Nature is placed under the dominion of a Federa- tion of Deities. In some cases the ancestor gods are identified with these ; in others, their worship is kept distinct. The trees and the animals which were once worshiped for themselves from love or fear are now supposed to be objects of affection to the gods, and axe held sacred for their sake. These gods are looked upon as kings. Their char- acters are human, and are reflected from the minds of those who have created them. Whatever the arith- metical arrangement of the gods may be — single or triune, dual or plural — they are in all coimtries and in all times made by man in his own image. In the plural period, some of the gods are good, and some are bad; just as there are good and evil kings. The wicked gods can be softened by flattery and presents; the good ones can be made fierce by neglect. The wicked gods obtain the largest offerings and the longest prayers, just as in despotic countries the wicked kings obtain the most liberal presents — which are merely taxes in disguise. The savage has been led by indigestion and by dreams to beheve in the existence of the soul after death, or, using simpler language, to believe in ghosts. At first these souls or ghosts have no fixed abode ; they live among the graves. At a later period the MANUFAOTUEE OF ANOTHER WOBLD. 175 savage invents a world to whicli the ghosts depart, and in which they reside. It is situated under ground. In that world the ghosts Mve precisely as they hved on earth. There is no retribution and no reward for the actions of the earthly life; that life is merely continued ia another region of the world. Death is in fact regarded as a migration in which, as in all migrations, the emigrants preserve their relative positions. When a man of importance dies, his family furnish him with an outfit of slaves and wives, and pack up in his grave his arms and ornaments and clothes, that he may make his appear- ance in the under-world in a manner befitting his rank and fortune. It is beheved that the souls of the clothes, as well as of the persons sacrificed, accompany him there ; and it is sometimes beheved that aU the clothes which he has worn in his hfe wiU then have their resurrection-day. The imder-world and the upper-world are governed by the same gods, or unseen kings. Man's Ufe in the upper-world is short: his hfe in the under- world is long. But as regards the existence of the worlds themselves, both are eternal, without begianing and without end. This idea is not a creation of the ripened intellect, as is usually supposed. It is a pro- duct of hmited experience, the expression of a seeming fact. The savage did not sec the world begin : there- fore it had no beginning. He has not seen it grow older : therefore it will have no end. The two worlds adjoin each other, and the frontier between them is very faintly marked. The gods often dress themselves in flesh and blood and visit the earth ix> do evil or to do good : to make love to women, to te)!3W!e??t .tihftir enemies, to converse with their favorites 176 DIVINE HYBBID8 and friends. On the other hand, there are men who possess the power of leaving their bodies in their beds and of passing into the other world to obtain divine poisons, which they mahgnantly employ. The ghosts of the dead often come and sit by their old firesides and eat what is set apart for them. Sometimes a de- parted spirit win re-enter the family, assuming a body which resembles in its features the one he previously wore. Distinguished heroes and prophets are often supposed to be hybrids or mulattoes, the result of a union between a woman and a god. Sometimes it is beheved that a god has come down on earth, out of love for a certain nation, to offer himseK up as a sacrifice, and so to quench the blood-thirst of some sullen and revengeful god who has that nation in his power. Sometimes a savage people beheve that their kings are gods, who have deigned to take upon themselves a perishable body for a time ; and there are countries in which a stiU more remarkable superstition prevails. The royal body even is immortal. The king never eats, never sleeps, and never dies. This kind of mon- arch is visible only to his priests. When the people wish to present a petition, he gives them audience seated behind a curtain, from beneath which he thrusts out his foot in token of assent. When he dies, he is secretly buried by the priests, and a new puppet is elected in his stead. The savage lives in a strange world, a world of special providences and divine interpositions, not hap- pening at long intervals and for some great end, but every day and almost at every hour. A pain, a dream, a sensation of any kind, a stroke of good or bad luck ; whatever, in short, does not proceed from man ; whai- ever we ascribe, for want of a better word, to ohanoe- FAITH. 177 by him ascribed to the direct iaterierence of the gods. He kaows nothing about the laws of Nature. Death itself is not a natural event. Sooner or later men make the gods angry and are Mlled. It is difficult for those who have not lived among savages to perfectly realize their faith. "When told that his gods do not exist, the savage merely laughs in mild wonder at such an extraordinary observation being made. It seems quite natural to him that his gods should be as his parents and grandparents have de- scribed : he believes, as he breathes, without an effort ; he feds that what he has been taught is true. His creed is ia harmony with his intellect, and cannot be changed until his intellect is changed. If a god m a dream, or through the priests, has made him a promise, and the promise is broken, he does not on that account doubt the existence of the god. He merely supposes that the god has told a He. Nor does it seem stranff» to him that a god should teU a He. His god is only gigantic man, a sensual, despotic king, who orders his subjects to give him the first fruits of the fields, the firstlings of the flock, virgins for his harem, human bodies for his cannibal repasts. As for himself, he is the slave of that god or king : he prays, that is to say, he begs ; he sings hymns, that is to say, he flatters ; ht/ sacrifices, that is to say, he pays tribute — chiefly out of fear, but partly in the hope of getting something better in return — long life, riches, and fruitful wives. He is usuaUy afraid to say of the gods what he thinks, or even to utter their real names. But sometimes he gives vent to the hatred which is burning in his heart. Writhing on a bed of sickness, he heaps curses on the god who he declares is " eating his inside ; " and when converted prematurely to a higher creed, his god is stiD 178 CONDENSATION INTO TJNITY. to him the invisible but human king. " Oh, Allah ! " a Somauh woman was heard to say, " Oh, Allah ! may thy teeth ache like mine ! oh, Allah ! may thy gums be sore as mine!" That Christian monarch, the late King Peppel, once exclaimed, when he thought of his approaching end, that if he could see God he would kiU him at once, because he made men die. The arithmetical arrangement of the gods depends entirely upon the iuteUectual faculties of the people concerned. In the period of Thing-worship, as it may be termed, every brook, tree, hiU, and star is itself a living creature, benevolent or malignant, asleep or awake. In the next stage, every object and phe- nomenon is inhabited or presided over by a genius or spirit ; and with some nations the virtues and the vices are also endowed with personality. As the reasoning powers of men expand, their gods diminish •- "timber, and rule over larger areas, till finally it is poiueived that there is unity in Nature, that every- thing which exists is a part of one harmonious whole. It is then asserted that one Being manufactured the world, and rules over it supreme. But at first the Great Being is distant and indifferent ; " a god sitting outside the universe ; " and the old gods become viceroys to whom he has deputed the government of the world. They are afterward degraded to the rank of messengers or angels, and it is believed that God is everywhere present ; that he fills the earth and sky ; that from him directly proceeds both the evil and the good. In some systems of behef, however, he is believed to be the Author of good alone, and the dominion of evU is assigned to a rebeUious angel or a rival god. So far as we have gone at present, there has been REUaiON AOT) MORAUrr. 179 no question of morality. All doctrines relating to the creation of the world, the government of man by superior beings, and his destiay after death, are conjectures which have been given out as facts, handed down with many adornments by tradition, and accepted by posterity as "revealed religion." They are theories more or less rational, which un- civilized men have devised, in order to explaia the facts of life, and which civilized men believe that they believe. These doctrines are not iq themselves of any moral value. It is of no consequence, morally speaMng, whether a man believes that the world has been made by one god or by twenty. A savage is not of necessity a better man because he believes that he lives under the dominion of invisible tyrants, who will compel him, some day or other, to migrate to another land. There is a moral sentiment in the human breast which, like intelligence, is born of obscure instincts, and which gradually becomes developed. Since the gods of men are the reflected images of men, it is evident that as men become developed in morality the character of their gods wiU also be improved. The king of a savage land punishes only offenses against himseK and his dependants. But when that people become more civilized, the king is regarded as the representative of pubhc law. In the same manner the gods of a savage people demand nothing from their subjects but taxes and homage. They punish only heresy, which is equivalent to treason ; blasphemy, which is equivalent to insult ; and the withliolding of tribute and adora- tion, which is equivalent to rebeUion. And these are the offenses which, even among civilized nations, the gods are supposed to punish most severely. But the 180 PBI80N AHD PALACE. ciTiEzed gods also require that men shall act justly to one another. They are still despots, for they ordei men to flatter them, and to give them money. But they are not mere selfish despots : they will reward those who do good, they wiU punish those who do evil, to their fellow-men. That vice should be sometimes triumphant, and virtue sometimes in distress, creates no difficulty to the savage mind. If a good man meets with misfortune, it is supposed that he is being punished for the sins of an ancestor or a relative. In a certain stage of barbarism, society is composed not of individuals, but of famihes. If a murder be committed, the avengers of blood kill the first man they meet belonging to the guilty clan. If the life cannot be obtained in that generation, the feud passes on, for the family never dies. It is considered Just and proper that children should be pimished for the sins of their fathers, unto the third and fourth generation. In a higher state of society, this family system dis- appears ; individualism becomes established. And as soon as this point is reached, the human mind takes a vast stride. It is discovered that the moral govern- ment of this world is defective, and it is supposed that poetical justice will be administered in the next. The doctrine of rewards and punishments in a future state comes into vogue. The world of ghosts is now divided into two compartments. One is the abode of malignant spirits, the kingdom of darkness and of pain, to which are condemned the blasphemers and the rebels, the murderers and the thieves. The other is the habita- tion of the gods, the kingdom of joy and light, to which angels welcome the obedient and the good. They are dressed in white robes, and adorned with golden LOYALTY AND PIETY. 181 crowns; they dwell eternally in tlie Koyal Presence, gazing upon Ms lustrous countenance, and singing his praises in chorus round the throne. To the active European mind, such a prospect is not by any means inyiting ; but Heaven was invented in the East, and in the East to be a courtier has always been regarded as the supreme felicity. The feelings of men toward their god, in the period to which we have now arrived, are precisely those of an Eastern subject toward his ting. The Oriental king is the Lord of all the land ; his subjects are his children and his slaves. The man who is doomed to death kisses the fatal fir- man, and submits with reverence to his fate. The man who is robbed by the king of all that he has earned win fold his hands and say, " The king gave, and the king taketh away. Blessed be the name of the king I" The man who lives in a distant province, who knows the king only by means of the taxes which are collected in his name, will snatch up his arms if he hears that his sacred person is in danger, and will defend him as he defends his children and his home. He will sacri- fice his Hfe for one whom he has never seen, and who has never done him anything but harm. This kind of devotion is called loyalty when ex- hibited toward a king ; piety when exhibited toward a god. But in either case the sentiment is precisely the same. It cannot be too often repeated that god is only a special name for king ; that rehgion is a form of gov- ment, its precepts a code of laws ; that priests are gatherers of divine taxes, officers of divine poUce ; that men resort to churches to fall on their knees and to sing hymns from the same servile propensity which makes the Oriental delight in .prostrating himself before the throne; that the noble enthusiasm which inspires 182 THE SCTENOE OP BELIGION. men to devote themselves to the service of their god, and to suffer death rather than deny his name, is identical with the devotion of the faithful subject who, to serve his royal master, gives up his fortune or his lifs without the faintest prospect of reward. The re- ligious sentiment, about which so much has been said, has nothing distinctive in itself. Love and fear, self- denial and devotion, existed before those phantoms were created which men call gods; and men have merely apphed to invisible kings the sentiments which they had previously felt toward their earthly kings. If they are a people ia a savage state, they hate both kings and gods within their hearts, and obey them only out of fear. If they are a people in a higher state, love is mingled with their fear, producing an affec- tionate awe which, in itself, is pleasing to the mind. That the worship of the unseen king should survive the worship of the earthly king is natural enough ; but even that wiU not endure for ever ; the time is coming when the crowned idea will be cast aside and the des- potic shadow disappear. By thus translating, or by retranslating, god into king, piety into loyalty, and so on ; by bearing in mind that the gods were not abstract ideas to our ancestors, as they are to us, but hona-fide men, differing only from men on earth in their invisibility and other magic powers ; on noting that the moral disposition of a god is an image of the moral sense of those who worship him — their ieau-ideal of what a king should be ; that the number and arrangement of the gods depend ex- clusively on the intellectual faculties of the people concerned, on their knowledge of Nature, and perhaps, to some extent, on the political forms of government under which they live ; above all, by remembering that CEEEB OIASSmOATION. 183 there is a gradual development in supernatural ideas — the student of comparative religion will be able to sift and classify with ease and clearness dense masses of mythology. But he must understand that the various stages overlap. Just as saOing vessels and four-horse coaches are stiU used in this age of steam, and as stone implements were stiU to be found in use long after the age of iron had set in, so, in the early period of god- beUef, thing-worship stiU to a certain extent endured. In a treaty between Hannibal and Philip of Macedonia, which Polybius preserved, the contracting parties take oath with one another "in the presence of Jupiter, Juno and Apollo ; in the presence of the Deity of the Carthaginians and of Hercules and of lolaus ; in the presence of Mars, Triton and Neptune ; in the presence of aU the gods who are with us in the camp ; and of the sun, the moon, and the earth; tJie rivers, the lakes, and the waters." In the time of Socrates the Athenians re- garded the sun as an individual. Alexander, according to Arrian, sacrificed not only to the gods of the sea, but " the sea itseK was honored with his munificence." Even in Job, the purest of aU monotheistic works, the stars are supposed to be live creatures which sing around the heavenly throne. Again, in those countries where two distinct clasoes of men exist, the one intellectual and learned, the other illiterate and degraded, there will be in reality two religions, though nominally there may be only one. Among the ancient Sabseans, the one class adored spirits who inhabited the stars, the other class adored the stars themselves. Among the worshipers of fire, that element to one class was merely an emblem, to the other an actual person. Wherever idols or images are used, the same phenomenon occurs. These idols 184: mOLATBT AND DOLLATET. are intended by the priests as aids to devotion, as books for those who cannot read. But the savage be- lieves that his god inhabits the image, or even regards the image as itseK a god. His feelings toward it are those of a child toward her doU. She knows that it is filled with sawdust and made of painted wood, and yet she loves it as if it were alive. Such is precisely the illusion of the savage, for he possesses the imagination of a child. He talks to his idol fondly, and washes its face with oil or rum ; beats it if it wiU not give him what he asks; and hides it in his waistcloth if he is going to do something which he does not wish it to see.' There is one other point which it is necessary to ob- serve. A god's moral disposition, his ideas of right and wrong, are those of the people by whom he is created. Wandering tribes do not, as a rule, consider it wrong to rob outside the circle of their clan ; their god is therefore a robber like themselves. If they settle in a fertile country, pass into the agricultural state, build towns, and become peaceful citizens with property of their own, they change their views respect- ing theft, and accordingly their god forbids it in his laws. But it sometimes happens that the sayings and doings of the tent-gods are preserved in writings which are accepted as revelation by the people of a later and a better age. Then may be observed the curious and by no means pleasing spectacle of a people outgrowing their religion, and believing that their god performed actions which would be punished with the gallows if they were done by men. The mind of an ordinary man is in so imperfect a condition that it requires a creed: that is to say, a theory concerning the unknown and the unknowable PBATBB. 185 in which it may place its deluded faith and be at rest. But whatever the creed may be, it should be one which is on a level with the intellect, and which inquiry will strengthen, not destroy. As for minds of the highest order, they must ever re- main in suspension of judgment and in doubt. Not only do they reject the absurd traditions of the Jews, but also the most ingenious attempts which have been made to explain, on rational and moral grounds, the origin and purpose of the universe. Intense and long- continued labor reveals to them this alone : that there are regions of thought so subtle and so sublime that the human mind is unable therein to expand its wings, to exercise its strei^h. But there is a wide specula- tive field in which man is permitted to toil with the hope of rich reward, in which observation and experi- ence can supply materials to his imagination and his reason. In this field two gi'eat discoveries have been already made. First, that there is a unity of plan in Nature ; that the universe resembles a body in which all the limbs and organs are connected with one another : and secondly, that all phenomena, physical and moral, are subject to laws as invariable as those which regulate the rising and setting of the son. It is in reality as foolish to pray for rain or a fair wind as it would be to pray that the sun should set in the middle of the day. It is as foolish to pray for the healing of a disease or for daily bread as it is to pray for rain or a fair wind. It is as foolish to pray for a pure heart or for mental repose as it is to pray for help in sickness or misfortune. AH the events which occur upon the earth result from Law : even those actions which are entirely dependent on the caprices of the memory, or the impulse of the passions, are shown by statistics to be, when taken in 186 WHO MADE GOD? the gross, entirely independent of the human will. As a stagle atom, man is an enigma ; as a whole, he is a mathematical problem. As an individual, he is a free agent ; as a species, the offspring of necessity. The unity of the universe is a scientific fact. To as- sert that it is the operation of a single Mind is a con- jecture based upon analogy, and analogy may be a deceptive guide. It is the most reasonable guess that can be made, but stiU it is no more than a guess ; and it is one by which nothing, after all, is really gained. It tells us that the earth rests upon the tortoise; it does not teU us on what the tortoise rests. God issued the laws which manufactured the universe, and which rule it in his growth. But who made God ? Theolo- gians declare that he made himself; and materialists declare that Matter made itself ; and both utter barren phrases, idle words. The whole subject is beyond the powers of the human intellect in its present state. All that we can ascertain is this : that we are governed by physical laws which it is our duty as scholars of Nature to investigate ; and by moral laws which it is our duty as citizens of Nature to obey. The dogma of a single Deity who created the heavens and the earth may therefore be regarded as an imper- fect method of expressing an undoubted truth. Of all religious creeds it is the least objectionable, from a scientific point of view. Yet it was not a Greek who first discovered or invented the one god, but the wild Bedouin of the desert. At first sight this appears a very extraordinary fact. How, in a matter which de- pended entirely upon the intellect, could these bar- barians have preceded the Greeks, so far their superiors in every other respect? The anomaly, however, can be easily explained. In the first theological epoch NATUBE IN THE NUDE. 187 every object and every phenomenon of Nature was sup- posed to be a creature ; in the second epoch, the dwel- ling or expression of a god. It is evident that the more numerous the objects and phenomena, the more numerous would be the gods ; the more difficult it would be to unravel Nature, to detect the connection between phenomena, to discover the unity which imderlies them all. In Greece there is a remarkable variety of climate and contour : hills, groves, and streams diversify the scene; ragged snow-covered peaks, and warm coast lands with -waving palms, lie side by side. But in the land of the Bedouins Nature may be seen in the nude. The sky is uncovered ; the earth is stripped and bare. It is as difficult for the inhabitants of such a coujitry to beheve that there are many gods as for the people of such a land as Greece to believe that there is only one. The earth and the wells and some uncouth stones, the sun, the moon, and the stars, are almost the only mate- rials of superstition that the Bedouin can employ ; and that they were so employed we know. Stone worship and star idolatry, with the adoration of ancestral shades, prevailed within Arabia in ancient times, and even now are not extinct. " The servant of the sun " was one of the titles of their ancient kings. Certain honors are yet paid to the morning star. But in that country the one-god beUef was always that of the higher class of minds, at least within historic time ; it is therefore not incorrect to term it the Arabian creed. We shall now proceed to show in what maimer that belief, having mingled with foreign elements, became a national re- ligion ; and how fi-om that religion sprang two other religions, which overspread the world. Long after the building of the Pyramids, but before the dawn of Greek and Roman life, a Bedouin sheik. 188 THE SHEIK ABBAHAH. named Abraham, accompanied by his nephew Ttot, migrated from the plains which lie between the Tigris and Euphrates, crossed over the Syro-Arabian desert, and entered Canaan, a country about the size of "Wales, lying below Phoenicia, between the desert and the Mediterranean Sea. They found it inhabited by farmers and vine-dressers, liTing in walled cities, and subsisting on the produce of the soil. But only a por- tion of the country was imder cultivation : they discov- ered wide pastoral regions unoccupied by men, and wandered at their pleasure from pasture to pasture, and from plain to plain. Their flocks and herds were nourished to the full, and multiplied so fast that the Malthusian law came into force : the herdsmen of Abra- ham and Lot began to struggle for existence ; the land could no longer bear them both ; it was therefore agreed that each should select a region for himself. A similar arrangement was repeated more than once in the life- time of the patriarch. When his illegitimate sons grew up to man's estate, he gave them cattle, and sent them off in the direction of the East. At certain seasons of the year he encamped beneath the walls of cities, and exchanged the wool of his flocks for flour, oil, and wine. He established friendships with the native kings, and joined them in their wars. He was honored by them as a prince, for he could bring three hundred armed slaves into the fleld, and his circle of tents might fairly be regarded as a town. Before their canvas doors sat the women spinning wool, and singing the Mesopotamian airs, while the aged patri- arch, in the Great Tent which served as the foram and the guest-house, measured out the rations for the day, gave orders to the young men about the stock, and sat in judgment on the cases which were brovight before him, as king and father, to decide. ELOAH OB AIiLAH. 189 He bought from the people of the land a field and a cave, in which he buried his wife, and in which he was afterward Jiimself interred. He was succeeded by Isaac as head of the family. Esau and Jacob, the two sons of Isaac, appear to have been equally powerful and rich. Up to this time the children of Abraham were Be- douin Arabs — ^nothing more. They worshiped Eloah or AUah, sometimes erecting to him a rude altar, on which they sacrificed a ram or kid ; sometimes a stone piUar, on which they poured a drink, and then smeared it with oil to his honor and glory ; sometimes they planted a sacred tree. The life which they led was precisely that of the wandering Arabs who pasture their flocks on the outskirts of Palestine at the present day. Not only Ishmael, but also Lot, Esau, and various other Abra- hamites of lesser note became the fathers of Arubian tribes. The Beni-Israel did not differ in manners and rehgion from the Beni-Ishmael, the Beni-Esau, and the Beni-Lot. It was the settlement of the clan in a for- eign country, the influence of foreign institutions, which made the Israehtes a peculiar people. It was the sale of the shepherd boy, at first a house-slave, then a prisoner, then a favorite of the Pharaoh, which created a destiny for the House of Jacob, separated it from the Arab tribes, and educated it iato a nationality. When Joseph became a great man, he obtained permission to send for his father and his brethren. The clan of seventy ' persons, with their women and their slaves, came across the desert by the route of the Syrian caravan. The old Arab, in his coarse woolen gown, and with his staff in his hand, was ushered into the royal presence. He gave the king his blessing in the solemn manner of the East, and, after a short conversation, was disniissed with 190 MXJLTIPLrED ESCEEDINGLT. a splendid gift of land. When Jacob died, his embalmed corpse was carried up to Canaan with an Egyptian escort, and buried in the cave which Abraham had bought. Joseph had married the daughter of a priest of HehopoHs, but his two sons did not become Egyp- tians ; they were formally admitted into the famUy by Jacob himself before he died. When Joseph also died, the connection between the laraehtes and the court came to an end. They led the life of shepherds in the fertile pasture lands which had been bestowed upon them by the king. In course of time the twelve families expanded into twelve tribes, and the tribe itself became a nation. The government at Memphis observed the rapid increase of this people with ajarm. The Israelites belonged to the same race as the hated Hyskos, or shepherd kings. With their long beards and flowing robes, they reminded the Egyp- tians of the old oppressors. It was argued that the Bedouins might agaia invade Egypt, and in that case the IsraeHtes would take their side. By the way of precaution, the IsraeHtes were treated as prisoners of war, disarmed, and employed on the pubUc works. And as they stDl continued to increase, it was ordered that all their male children should be killed. It was doubt- less the intention of the Government to marry the girls to Egyptians as they grew up, and so to exterminate the race. One day the king's daughter, as she went down with her girls to the Nile to bathe, found a Hebrew child ex- posed on the waters in avoidance of the new decree. She adopted the boy, and gave him an Egyptian name. He was educated as a priest, and became a meiiiber of the University of Hehopohs. But although his face was shaved and he wore the surplice, Moses remained a SINAI 191 Hebrew in his heart. He was so overcome by passion when he saw an Egyptian ill-using an Israelite that he killed the man upon the spot. The crime became known : there was a hue and cry ; he escaped to the peninsula of Sinai, and entered the family of an Arab sheik. The peninsula of Sinai lies clasped between two arms of the Eed Sea. It is a wilderness of mountains cov- ered with a thin almost transparent coating of vegeta- tion, which serves as pasture to the Bedouin flocks. There is one spot only — the oasis of Feiran — where the traveler can tread on black soft earth, and hear the warbUng of birds among trees, which stand so thickly together that he is obhged, as he walks, to part the branches from his face. The peninsula had not escaped the Egyptian arms ; tablets may yet be seen on which are recorded in paintings and hieroglyphics five thou- sand years old the victories of the Pharaohs over the people of the land. They also worked mines of copper in the mountains, and heaps of slag still remain. But most curious of aU are the Sinaitic inscriptions, as they are called ; figures of animals rudely scrawled on the upright surface of the black rocks, and mysterious sen- tences in an undeciphered tongue. Among the hiUs which crown the high plateau, there is one which at that time was called the Mount of God. It was holy ground to the Egyptians, and also to the Arabs, who ascended it as pilgrims, and drew off their sandals when they reached the top. Nor is it strange that Sinai should have excited reverence and dread ; it is, indeed, a weird and awful land. Vast and stem stand the mountains, with their five granite peaks point- ing to the sky ; avalanches, like those of the Alps, but of sand, not of snow, rush down their naked sides with 192 MOSES IN EXILE. a clear and tilildiiig soimd, resembling convent bells ; a peculiar property resides in the air ; the human voice can be heard at a surprising distance, and swells out into a reverberating roar ; and sometimes there rises from among the hills a dull, booming sound like the dis- tant firing of heavy guns. Let us attempt to realize what Moses must have felt when he was driven out of Egypt into such a harsh and rugged land. Imagioe this man, the adopted son of a royal personage, the initiated priest, sometimes turning the astrolabe toward the sky, perusing the papyrus scroll, or watching the crucible and the alembic ; some- times at the great metropoKs enjoying the busy turmoil of the streets, the splendid pageants of the court, re- clining in a carpeted gondola, or staying with a noble at his country house. In a moment aU is changed. He is alone on the mountain side, a shepherd's crook in his hand. He is a man dweUing in a tent ; he is married to the daughter of a barbarian ; his career is at an end. Never more will he enter that palace where once he was received with honor, where now his name is uttered only with contempt. Never more will he discourse with grave and learned men in the peaceful college gardens, beneath the willows that hang over the Fountain of the Sun. Never more wiU he see the people of his tribe whom he loves so dearly, and for whom he endures this miserable fate. They will suffer, but he will not see them ; they will mourn, but he will not hear them — or only in his dreams. In his dreams he hears them and he sees them, alas ! too well. He hears the whist- ling of the lash and the convulsive sobs and groans. He sees the poor slaves toUing in the field, their hands brown with the clammy clay. He sees the daughters of Israel carried off to the harem with struggling arms MOSES ON THE MOUNT. 193 and streaming hair ; and then, O lamentable sight I the chamber of the woman in labor — the seated, shudder- ing, writhing form — ^the mother struggling against maternity — ^the tortured one dreading her release — ^for the king's officer is standing by the door, and as soon as the male child is bom its life is at an end. The Arabs with whom he was liraig were also chil- dren of Abraham, and they related to him legends of the ancient days. They told him of the patriarchs who lay buried in Canaan with their wives ; they told him of Eloah whom his fathers had adored. Then, as one who returns to a long-lost home, the Egyptian priest returned to the simple faith of the desert, to the God of Abraham, of Isaac, and of Jacob. As he wandered on the mountain heights he looked to the west and he saw a desert : beyond it lay Egypt, the house of captiv- ity, the land of bondage. He looked to the east and he saw a desert : beyond it lay Canaan, the home of his ancestors, a land of peace and soon to be a land of hope. For now new ideas rose tumultuously within him, he began to see visions and to dream dreams. He heard voices and beheld no form ; he saw trees which blazed with fire and yet were not consumed. He be- came a prophet ; he entered the ecstatic state. Meanwhile the king had died ; a new Pharaoh had moimted on the throne ; Moses was able to return to Egypt and to carry out the great design which he had formed. He announced to the elders of the people, to the heads of houses, and the sheiks of tribes, that Eloah the God of Abraham had appeared to him in Si- nai and had revealed his true name — ^it was Jehovah — and had sent liim to Egypt to bring away his people, to carry them to Canaan. The elders believed in his mission and accepted him as thek chief. He went to 194 EXOUUS. Pharaoh and delivered the message of Jehovah ; the king received it as he would have received the message of an Arab chief : gods were plentiful in Egypt. But whenever a pubhc calamity occurred Moses declared that Jehovah was its author, and there were Egyptians who declared that their own gods were angry with them for detaining a people who were irreligious, filthy in their habits, and affected with unpleasant diseases of the skin. The king gave them permission to go and offer a sacrifice to their desert god. The Israelites stole avray, taking with them the mummy of Joseph and some jewelry belonging to their masters. Guides marched in front bearing a lighted apparatus like that used in Alexander's camp, which gave a pillar of smoke by day and a flame by night. Moses led them via Su ez into Asia, then along the weed-strewn, shell-strewn shore of the Red Sea to the wilderness of Sinai and the Mount of God. There with many solemn and imposing rites he delivered laws which he said had been issued to him from the clouds. He assembled the elders to represent the people, and drew up a contract between them and Jehovah. It was agreed that they should obey the laws of Jehovah, and pay the taxes which he might impose, while he engaged on his part to protect them from danger in their march through the desert, and to give them possession of the Promised Land. An ark or chest of accacia wood was made in the Egyptian fetyle, and the agreement was deposited therein with the ten fundamental laws which Moses had engraved on stone. A tent of dyed skins was prepared and fitted with church furniture by voluntary subscription, partly out of stolen goods. This became the temple of the people and the residence of Jehovah, who left his ovm dwelling above the vaulted sky that he might be able TABEENACIiE. 1115 to protect them on the way. Moses appointed his brother Aaron and his sons to serve as priests ; they wore the surplice, but to distinguish them from Egyp- tian priests they were ordered not to shave their heads. The men of Levi, to which tribe Moses himseK belong- ed, were set apart for the service of the sacred tent. They were in reality his body-guard, and by their means he put down a mutiny at Sinai, slaughtering three thou- sand men. When thus the nation had been organized, the march began. At daybreak two silver trumpets 'were blown, the tents were struck, the tribes assembled under their respective banners, and the men who bore the ark went first with the guides to show the road and to choose an encampment for the night. The Israehtes crossed a stony desert, suffering much on the way. Water was scarce ; they had no provisions, and were forced to subsist on manna or angels' bread, a gummy substance which exudes from a desert shrub, and is a pleasant syrup and a mild purge, but not a nourishing article of food. As they drew near the land of Canaan, the trees of the desert, the palm and the acoacia, disappeared. But the earth became carpeted with green plants, and spot- ted with red anemones, like drops of blood. Here and there might be seen a patch of corn, and. at last, in the distance, rounded hills with trees standing against the sky. They encamped, and a man from each tribe was deputed to spy the land. In six weeks they return- ed bringing with them a load of grapes. Two scouts only were in favor of invasion. The other ten declared the land was a good land, as the fruits shovred — a land flovring with milk and honey ; but the people were like giants; their cities were walled and very great j the 196 PEOMISED LAND. Israelites were as grasshoppers in comparison, and would not be able to prevail against them. This opinion was imdoubtedly correct. The children of Israel were a rabble of field slaves, who had never takec a weapon ia their hands. The business before them was by no means to their taste ; and it was not what Moses had led them to expect. He had agreed on the part of Jehovah to give them a land. They had expected to find it unoccupied and prepared for their reception like a new house. They did not require a prophet to inform them that a country should be theirs if they were strong enough to take it by the sword ; and this it was clear they could not do. So they poured forth the vials of their anger and their grief. They lifted up their voice and cried ; they wept aU the night. "Would to God they had died ia the wilderness I Would to God they had died in Egypt I Jehovah had brought them there that they might fall by the sword, and that their wives and little ones might be a prey. They would choose another captain ; they would go back to Egypt. Joshua and Caleb, the two scouts who had recommended invasion, tried to cheer them up, and were nearly stoned to death for their pains. Next day the people of Canaan marched out against them, a skir- mish took place, and the Israelites were defeated. They went back to the desert, and wandered forty years in the shepherd or Bedouin state. And then there was an end of that miserable race who were always whining tmder hardship, hankering after the fleshpots of the old slave life. In their stead rose up a new generation — ^genuine children of the desert — ^who could live on a few dates soaked in butter and a mouthful of milk a day ; who were prac- ticed from their childhood in predatory wars ; to whom THE MSINa GENEHATION. 197 rapine was a business, and massacre a sport. The conquest of Canaan was an idea irhich they had im- bibed at their mothers' breasts, and they were now quite ready for the work. Moses, before his death, drew up a second agreement between Jehovah and the people. It was to the same effect as the covenant of Sinai. Loyalty and taxes were demanded by Jehovah ; long life, success in war, and fruitful crops were pro- mised in return. Within this contract was included a code of laws which Moses had enacted from time to time, in addition to the ten commandments ; and this second agreement was binding not only on those who were present, but on their posterity as well. Moses died ; Joshua was made commander-in-chief ; and the IsraeHtes began their march of war. This time they approached the land, not from the south, but from the east. The river Jordan rises in the Lebanon mountains, haJf-way between Tyre and Damascus ; it runs due south, and ends its curling, twisting course in the dismal waters of the Dead Sea. Its basin belongs to the desert, for it does not overflow its banks. Along the coast of the Mediterranean Sea, parallel to the valley of the Jordan, Kes a fertile strip of land with- out good harbors, but otherwise resembling Phoenicia, from which it is divided by two large promontories, the Tyrian Ladder and the White Cape. And, thirdly, hetween the naked valley of the Jordan, and this corn-producing line of coast, there rises a table-land of limestone formation, honeycombed with caves, watered by running streams of no great size, in- tersected by ravines and also by flat extensive valley plains. The coast belonged to the Philistines ; the basin of 198 OCCUPATION. the Jordan and the pastoral regions on the south to roving Arab tribes; the table-land was inhabited by farmers whose towns and villages were always perched on the tops of hills, and who cultivated the vine on terraces, each vineyard being guarded by a watch- tower and a wall ; the valley plains were inhabited by Canaanites or lowlanders, who possessed cavalry and iron chariots of war. The Israelites differed from other Bedouin tribes in one respect: they were not mounted, and they were unable to stand their ground against the horsemen of the plain. The Philistines, a warhke people, probably of the Aryan race, also retained their independence. The conquests of the Israehtes were confined to the land of the south, the Jordan valley and the mountain regions; though even in the highlands the conquest under Joshua was not complete. However, the greater part of Palestine was taken, and partitioned among the IsraeKtish tribes. Some of these inclined to the pastoral and others to the agricultural condition ; and each was governed by its own sheik. During four hundred years Ephxaim remained the dominant tribe, and with Ephraim the high priest took up his abode. At a place called Shiloh there was erected an inclosure of low stone walls, over which the sacred tent was drawn. This was the oracle establishment, or House of God, to which all the tribes resorted three times a year to celebrate the holy feasts with prayer, and sacri- fice, and psalmody, and the sacred dance. The Levites had no political power, and no share in civil life ; but they had cities of their own, and they also traveled about hke mendicant friars from place to place, performing certain functions of religion, and sup- ported by the alms of the devout. THE DELPHI OF THE HEBREWS. 199 It was owing to these two institutious, tlie oracle and the monkish order, that the nationality of Israel was preserved. Yet though it escaped extiaction it did not retain its unity and strength. So far from extending their conquests, after their first inroad under Joshua, the Israelites constantly lost ground. They were divided iato twelve petty states, always jealous of one another, and often engaged in civil war. The natives took advantage of these dissensions, and subdued them one by one. Now and then a hero would arise, rouse them to a war of independence, and rule over them as judge for a few years. Then again they would fall apart, and again be conquered, sometimes paying tri- bute as vassals, sometimes hiding in the mountain caves. However, at last there came a change. The temporal and spiritual powers, united in the hands of Moses, were divided at his death. Joshua became the general of Jehovah ; the high priest became his grand vizier. Joshua could do nothing of importance without consulting the high priest, who read the commands of the Divine Sheik in the light and play of Urim and Thummim, the oracular shining stones. On the other hand, the high priest could not issue laws ; he could only give decisions and replies. But now a Nazarite, or servant of the church, named Samuel, usurped the office, or, at aU events, the powers, of high priest which belonged to the family of Aaron, and also obtained the dignity of President or Judge. He professed to be the recipient of private instructions from Jehovah, and issued laws in his name, and went round on circuit judging the twelve tribes. In his old age he delegated this office to his sons, who gave false judgments and took bribes. The elders of the people came to Samuel, and asked him to ap- point them a king. 200 POPE SAMUEL. Samuel had established a Papacy, intending to make it hereditary in his house, and now the eTJl conduct of his sons frustrated all his hopes. He protested iu the name of Jehovah against this change in the con- stitution; he appealed to his own blameless life; he drew a -vivid picture of the horrors of despotism ; but in vain. The people persisted in their demand ; they were at that time in the vassal state ; and their liege lords, the Philistines, did not permit them to have smiths lest they should make weapons and rebeL Samuel himself had united the tribes, and had inspired them with the sentiments of nationality. They yearned to be free ; and they observed that they lost battles because their enemies were better officered than themselves. They saw that they needed a military chief who would himself lead them to the charge, instead of sacrificing a sucking lamb, or kneeling on a neighboring hill with his hands up in the air. Samuel, still protesting, elected Satd to the royal office. The young man was gladly accepted by the people on account of his personal beauty, and, as he belonged to the poorest family of the poorest tribe in Israel, Samuel hoped that he would be able to pre- serve the real power in his own hands. But it so happened that Saul was not only a brave soldier and a good general, he was also at times a " god-intoxicated man," and did not require a third person to bring him the instructions of Jehovah. He made himself the Head of the Church, as well as of the State, and Samuel was compelled to retire into private life. It is for this reason that Saul's character has been so bitterly attacked by the priest-historians of the Jews. For what, after all, are the crimes of which he was guilty? He administered the battle-offering himself, A GOD-INTOXICATED MAN. 201 and he spared the life of a man whom Samuel had commanded him to kill as a human sacrifice to Jeho- vah. Saul was by no means faultless, but his charac- ter was pure as snow when compared with that of his successor. David was undoubtedly the gi-eater general of the two, yet it was Saul who laid the foundations of the Jewish kingdom. It was Saul who conquered the Philistines and won freedom for the nation with no better weapons than their mattocks, and their axes, and their sharpened goads. Saul's persecution of David is the worst stain upon his hfe ; yet if it be true that David had been in Saul's lifetime privately anointed king, he was guilty of treason, and deserved to die. But that story of the anointing might have been invented afterward, to justify his succession to the throne. At first David took refuge with the Philistines and fought against his own countrymen. Next he turned brigand, and was joined by aU the criminals and out- laws of the land. The cave of AduUam was his lair, whence he sallied forth to levy black mail on the rich farmers and graziers of the neighborhood, cutting their throats when they refused to pay. At the same time, he was a very religious man, and never went on a plun- dering expedition without consulting a little image, which revealed to him the orders and wishes of Jehovah, just as the Bedouins always pray to Allah before they commit a crime, and thank him for his assistance when it has been successfully performed. Saul was succeeded by his son Ishbosheth, who was accepted by eleven tribes. But David, supported by his own tribe, and by his band of well-trained robbers, defied the nation, and made war upon his lawful king. He had not the shadow of a claim ; however, with 202 A PIOUS BEIGAOT). the help of treason and assassination lie finally obtained the crown. His military genius had then full scope. He took Jerusalem, a pagan stronghold which, during four hundred years, had maintained its independence. He conquered the coast of the PhilistiQes, the plains of Canaan, the great city of Damascus, and the tribes of the desert far and near. He garrisoned Arabia Petrsea. He ruled from the Euphrates to the Bed Sea. This man after God's own heart had a well-stocked harem, and the usual intrigues took place. He disia- herited his eldest son, and left the kingdom to the son of his favorite wife ; a woman for whom he had committed a crime which had offended the not over- delicate Jehovah. The nation seemed taken by sur- prise, and Solomon, iu order to preserve the undivided affections of his people, at once killed his brother and his party, a coronation ceremony not uncommon in the East. The wisdom of Solomon has become proverbial. But whatever his iatellectual attainments may have been, he did not possess that kind of wisdom which alone is worthy of a king. He did not attempt to make his monarchy enduring, his people prosperous and content. He was a true oriental Sultan, sleek and sensual, luxurious and magnificent, short-sighted and unscmpulous, cutting down the tree to eat the fruit. The capital of a despot is always favored, and with the citizens of Jerusalem he was popular enough. They were, in a measure, his guests and companions, the inmates of his house. They saw their city en- circled with enormous walls, and paved with slabs of black and shioing stone. Their eyes were dazzled, and their vanity delighted, with the splendid buildingo ORTENTAI. WISDOM. 20S which he raised : the ivory palace, the cedar palace, and the temple. The pUgrims who thronged to the sanctuary from all quarters of the land, and the travel- ers who came for the purposes of trade, brought wealth into the city Foreign commerce was a court monopoly; but the city was a part of the court. Outside the city walls, however, or at least beyond the circle of the city lands, it was a very different affair. The rural districts were severely taxed ; especially those at a dis- tance from the capital. The tribes of Israel, which, but a few years before, had been on terms of complete equality among themselves, were now trampled under foot by this upstart of the House of Judah. The tribe of Ephraim, which had so long enjoyed supremacy, became restless beneath the yoke. While Solomon yet reigned, the standard of revolt was raised ; as soon as he died, this empire of a day dissolved. Damascus became again an independent state. The Arabs cut the road to the Bed Sea. The King of Egypt, who had probably been Solomon's liege lord, despatched an army to fetch away the treasures of the temple and the palace. The ten tribes seceded, and two distinct king- doms were established. The ten tribes of Israel, or the kingdom of the North, extended over the lands of Samaria and GaUlee. Its capital was Sechem ; its sanctuary, Mount Gerizim. Judah and Benjamin, the royal tribes, occupied the highlands of Judsea. Jerusalem was their capital; its temple was their sanctuary, and the Levites, whom the Israelites had discarded, were their priests. It is needless to relate the wars which were almost inces- santly being waged between these two miserable king- doms. When the Empire of the Tigris took the place cf Egypt as suzerain of Syria, btth Israel and Judah 204: A CHANGE OF MASTERS. sent their tribute to Nineveli ; and, as the cuneiform history relates, both of them afterward rebelled. Sen- nacherib marched against them, and carried off the ten tribes into captivity. Judaea was more mountainous, and on that account more difficult to conquer than the land of the North. The Jews, as they may now be called, defended themselves stoutly; and a camp plague broke up the army before Jerusalem. By this occur- rence, Egypt also was preserved from conquest. At that time, Sethos, the priest, was king ; and the sol- diers, whose lands he had taken, refused to fight. Both the Egyptians and the Jews ascribed their escape to a miracle performed by their respective gods. Great events now took place. The Assyrian Empire fell to pieces, and Nineveh was destroyed. The Medes inherited its power on the east of the Euphrates ; the Chaldseans inherited its power on the west. Egypt, under the Phil-Hellenes, was again spreading into Asia, and a terrific duel took place be- tween the two powers. The Jews managed so well that when the Egyptian star was in the ascendant they took the side of Babylon ; and when the Baby- lonians had won the battle of Carchemish, the Jews intrigued with the fallen nation. Nebuchadnezzar gave them repeated warnings; but at last his pa- tience was exhausted, and he leveled the rebellious city to the ground. Some of the citizens escaped to Egypt ; the aristocracy and priesthood were carried off to Babylon ; the peasants alone were left to cultivate the soil At Babylon there was a collection of captive kings, each of whom was assigned his daily allowance and his throne. In this palace of shadows the unfortunate Jehoiachin ended his days. But the Jewish people BY THE WATEBS OF BABILON. 205 were not treated as captives or as slaves, and they soon began to thrive. "When the ten tribes seceded they virtually aban- doned their religion. They withdrew from the temple, which they had once acknowledged as the dwelling of Jehovah ; they had no hereditary priesthood ; they had no holy books ; and so as soon as they ceased to possess a coimtry they ceased to exist as a race. But the Jews preserved their nationality intact. Moses had been an Egyptian priest, and the unity of God was a fundamental article of that religion. The unity of God was also the tenet of the more intelligent Arabs of the desert. Whether therefore we regard that great man as an Egyptian or as an Arab it can scarcely be doubted that the views which he held of the Deity were as truly unitarian as those of Mahomet and Abd- ul-Wahhab. It is, however, qxiite ceriain that, to the people whom he led, Jehovah was merely an invisible Bedouin chief who traveled with them in a tent, who walked about the camp at night, and wanted it kept clean, who maneuvered the troops in battle, who de- lighted in massacres and human sacrifice, who murder- ed people in sudden fits of rage, who changed his mind, who enjoined petty larceny and employed angels to tell Hes, who, in short, possessed all the vices of the Arab character. He also possessed their ideal virtues, for he prohibited immorality, and commanded them to be hospitable to the stranger, to be charitable to the poor, to treat with kindness the domestic beast and the cap- tive wife. It was impossible for Moses to raise their minds to a nobler conception of the Deity ; it would have been as easy to make them see Roman noses when they looked into a mirror. He therefore made use of their superSt) 206 THE CHAEACTEK OP JEHOVAH. tion in order to rule them for their own good, and de- scended to trumpetings and fire-tricks, which chamber moralists may condemn with virtuous indignation, but which those who have known what it is to command a savage mob will not be inclined to criticise severely. When the settlement in Canaan took place, the course of events gave rise to a theory about Jehovah, which not only the Israehtes held, but also the PhUis- tines. It was believed that he was a mountain god, and could not fight on level ground. He was unlike the pagan gods in one respect, namely, that he ordered his people to destroy the groves and idols of his rivals, and threatened to punish them if they worshiped any god but him. However, as might be supposed, although the Israelites were very loyal on the mountains, they worshiped other gods when they fought upon the plains. Whenever they won a battle they sang a song in honor of Jehovah, and declared that he was " a man of war;" but when they lost a battle they supposed that Baal or Dagon had trodden Jehovah under foot. The result of this was a mixed rehgion : they worshiped Jehovah; but they worshiped other gods as well. Solomon declared, when he opened the temple, that Jehovah filled the sky, that there were no other gods but he. But this was merely Oriental flattery. Solo- mon must have believed that there were other gods, because he worshiped other gods. His temple was in fact a Pantheon ; and altars were raised on the Mount of OHves to Moloch and Astarte. After the reign of Solomon, however, the Jews became a ci\alized people ; a literary class arose. Jerusalem, situated on the high- way between the Euphrates and the Nile, obtained a place in the Asiatic world. The minds of the citizens became elevated and refined, and that reflection of THE OHABACTEK IMPEOYES. 207 their minds which they called Jehovah assumed a pure and noble form ; he was recognized as the one God, the Creator of the world. During all these years Moses had been forgotten, but now his code of laws (so runs the legend) was dis- covered in a comer of the temple ; and laws of a higher kind, adapted to a civilized people, were issued under his name. The idols were broken, the foreign priests were expelled. It was in the midst of this great rehgi- ous revival that Jerusalem was destroyed ; and it may well be that the law which forbade the Jews to render homage to a foreign king was the chief cause of their contumacy and their dispersal. It was certainly the cause of all their subsequent calamities : it was their loyalty to Jehovah which provoked the destruction of the city by the Bomans; it was their fidehty to the law which brought down upon them all the ciu'ses of the law. The reformation in the first period had been by no means complete : there had been many relapses and backshdings, and they therefore readily believed that the captivity was a judgment upon them for their sins. By the waters of Babylon they repented with bitter tears; in a strange land they returned to the God of their fathers, and never deserted him again. Hence- forth religion was their patriotism. Education became general ; divine worship was organized ; schools and synagogues were established wherever Jews were to be found. And soon they were to be found in all the cities ol the Eastern vs^orld. They had no land, and therefor? adopted commerce as their pursuit ; they became f trading and a traveling people; and the financial sabilities w^hicjj they displayed obtained them ens plojment in the jiouseholds aud treasuries of king* 208 THE GKEEK DYNASTI. The dispersion of the Jews must be dated from this period, and not from the second destruction of the city. When Cyrus conquered Babylon he restored to the Jews their golden candlesticks and holy Tessels, and allowed them to return home, and rendered them assist- ance, partly from rehgious sympathy, for the Jews made him believe that his coming had been predicted by their prophets, and partly from motives of pohcy. Palestine was the key to Egypt, against which Cyrus had designs ; and it was wise to plant in Palestine a people on whom he could rely. But not all the Jews availed themselves of his decree. The merchants and officials who were now making their fortunes by the waters of Babylon were not inclined to return to the modest farmer life of Judaea. Their piety was warm and sin- cere ; but it was no longer combined with a passion for the soil. They began to regard Jerusalem as the Mahometans regard Mecca. The people who did re- turn were chiefly the fanatics, the clergy, and the paupers. The harvest, as we shall find, was worthy of the seed. Beneath the Persian yoke the Jews of Judsea were content, and paid their tribute with fideUty. They could do so without scruple, for they identified Ormuzd with Jehovah, took lessons in theology from the doctors of the Zend Avesta, and recognized the Great King as God's Viceroy on earth. But when the Persian Empire was broken up, Palestine was again tossed upon the waves. The Greek Kings of Alexandria and Antioch repeated the wars of Nebuchadnezzar and Necho. Again Egypt was worsted, and Syria became a province of the Graeco- Asiatic Empire. The Government en- couraged emigration into the newly conquered lands, and soon Palestine was covered with Greek towns and THE MACCABEES. 209 filled ■with Greek settlers. Judsea alone remained, like an island ia the flood : European culture was detested by the doctors of the law, who inflicted the same penalty for leamiag Greek as for eating pork. They therefore resisted the spread of civilization ; and Jeru- salem was closed against the Greeks. In the Hellenic world toleration was the universal rale. An oracle at Delphi had expressed the opinion of aU when it declared that the proper rehgion for each man was the religion of his fatherland. Governments, therefore, did not interfere with the religious opinions of the people ; but, on the other hand, the religiona of the people did not interfere with their civil duties We allow the inhabitants of the holy city of Benares to celebrate the rites of their pilgrimage in their own manner, and to torture themselves in moderation, but we should at once commence what they would call a religious persecution if they were to purify the town by destroying the shops of the beef-butchers and other institutions which are an abomination in their eyes. Antiochus Epiphanes was by nature a humane and enlightened prince ; he attempted to Europeanize Jerusalem ; he could do this only by abolishing the Jewish laws ; he could abolish their laws only by de- stroying their religion ; and thus he was gradually drawn into barbarous and useless crimes of which he afterward repented, but which have gained him the reputation of a Nero. At first, however, it appeared as if he would succeed. The aristocratic party of Jerusalem were won over to the cause. A gymnasium was erected, and Jews, with artificial foreskins, appeared naked in the arena. Eiots broke out. Then royal edicts were issued forbidding circumcision, the keeping of the Sabbath, and the use 210 THE CHOSEN PEOPLE. of the law. A pagan altar was set up in the Holy of Holies, and swine were sacrificed upon it to the Olympian Jove. The riots increased. Then a Greek regiment garrisoned the city ; all new-bom children that were found to be circumcised were hurled with their mothers from the walls ; altar pork was offered as a test of loyalty to the elders of the church, and those who refused to eat were put to death with tortures too horrible to be described. And now the Jews no longer raised riots: they rebelled. The empire was at that time in a state of weakness and disorder ; and under the gallant Maccabees the independence of Judsea was achieved. Yet it is only in adversity that the Jews can be admired. As soon as they obtained the power of self-government they showed themselves unworthy to possess it, and ia the midst of a civil war they were enveloped by the Eoman power, which had extended them its protection in the period of the Maccabees. The senate placed Herod the Great, an Arab prince, upon the throne. Herod was a man of the world, and his poKcy re- sembled that of the Ptolemies in Egypt. He built the temple at Jerusalem, and a theater at Cesarea, in which city he preferred to dweU. The kingdom at his death was divided between his three sons : they were merely rajahs under the rule of Rome ; and the one who governed Judsea having been removed for misbehavior, that county was attached to the pro-consulate of Syria. A lieutenant-govemor was appointed to reside in the turbulent district to collect the revenues and maintain order. The position of the first commandant whom Russia sends to garrison Bokhara will resemble that of the Procurator who took up his winter quarters at Jerusalem. THE BTUDY OF THE LAW. 211 Those Jews of Judaea, those Hebrews of the Hebrews, regarded all the Gentiles as enemies of God ; they considered it a sia to hve abroad, or to speak a foreign language, or to rub their Hmbs with foreign oil. Of all the trees, the Lord had chosen but one vine ; and of all the flowers, but one Uly ; and of aU the birds, but one dove ; and of all the cattle, but one lamb ; and of aU builded cities, only Sion ; and among all the multitude of people, he had elected the Jews as a peculiar treasure, and had made them a nation of priests and holy men. For their sake God had made the world. On tlieii- account alone empires rose and fell. Babylon had triumphed because God was angry with his people ; Babylon had fallen because he had forgiven them. It may be imagined that it was not easy to govern such a race. They acknowledged no king but Jehovah, no laws but the precepts of their holy books. In paying tribute, they yielded to absolute necessity ; but the tax- gatherers were looked upon as unclean creatures ; no respectable men would eat with them or pray with them ; their evidence was not accepted in the courts of justice. Then- own government consisted of a Sanhedrim or Council of Elders, presided over by the High Priest. They had power to administer their own laws, but could not inflict the punishment of death without the permission of the Procurator. AU persons of con- sideration devoted themselves to the study of the Law. Hebrew had become a dead language, and some learning was therefore requisite for the exercise of this profession, which was not the prerogative of a SLQgle class. It was a rabbinical axiom that the crown of the kingdom was deposited in Judah, and the 212 BADDUGEES. crown of the priesthood in the seed of Aaron, but that the crown of the law was common to all Israel. Those who gained distinction as expounders of the sacred books were saluted with the title of Eabbi, and were called scribes and doctors of the law. The people were ruled by the scribes, but the scribes were re- cruited from the people. It was not an idle caste — an estabhshed Church — ^but an order which was filled and refilled with the pious, the earnest, and ambitious members of the nation. There were two great religious sects which were also political parties, as must always be the case where law and religion are combiued. The Sadducees were the rich, the indolent, and the passive aristocrats ; they were the descendants of those who had belonged to the Greek party in the reign of Antiochus, and it was said that they themselves were tainted with the Greek philosophy. They professed, however, to belong to the conservative Scripture and origirial Mosaic school. As the Protestants reject the traditions of the ancient Church, some of which have doubtless descended viva voce from the apostolic times, so aU traditions, good and bad, were rejected by the Sadducees. As Protestants always inquire respecting a custom or doctrine, " Is it in the Bible ? " so the Sadducees would accept nothing that could not be shown them in the law. They did not believe in heaven and hell, because there was nothing about heaven and hell in the books of Moses. The morality which their doctors preached was cold and pure, and adapted only for enlightened minds. They taught that men should be virtuous without the fear of punishment, and with- out the hope of reward, and that such virtue alone is of any worth. PHAEISEES. 213 The Pharisees were mostly persona of low birth. They were the prominent representatives of the popu- lar beUef ; zealots in patriotism, as well as in religion : the teaching, the preaching, and the proselytizing party. Among them were to be found two kinds of men. Those Puritans of the Commonwealth with lank hair, and sour Tisage, and upturned eyes, who wore somber garments, and sniffled through their noses, and garnished their discourse with Scripture texts, were an exact reproduction, so far as the difference of place and period would allow, of certain Jerusalem Pharisees who vailed their faces when they wei;t abroad, lest they should behold a woman or some unclean thiug ; who strained the water which they drank for fear they should swallow the forbidden knat ; who gave alms to the sound of trumpet, and uttered long prayers in a loud voice ; who wore texts embroidered on their robes and bound upon their brows ; who followed minutely the observances of the ceremonial law ; who added to it with their traditions ; who lengthened the hours and deepened the gloom of the Sabbath day, and increased the taxes which it had been ordered to pay upon the altar. On the other hand, there had been among the Puritans many men of pure and gentle lives, and a similar class existed among the Pharisees. The good Pharisee, says the Talmud, is he who obeys the law because he loves the Lord. They addressed their God by the name of " Father " when they prayed- " Do onto others as you would be done by" was an adage often on their Bps. That is the law, they said, all the rest is mere commentary. To the Pharisees belonged aU that was best and all that was worst in the Hebrew religious life. 214 ORIGIN OF THE DEVIL. The traditions of tlie Pharisees related partly to ceremonial matters, which in the -written law were already diffuse and intricate enough. But it must also be remembered that without traditions the Hebrew theology was barbarous and incomplete. Before the captivity the doctrine of rewards and punishments in a future state had not been known. The Scheol of the Jews was a land of shades, in which there was neither joy nor sorrow, in which aU ghosts or souls dwelt pro- miscuously together. When the Jews came in contact with the Persian priests they were made acquainted with the heaven and hell of the Avesta. It is prob- able, indeed, that without foreign assistance they would in time have developed a similar doctrine for themselves. Already, in the Psalms and Book of Job, are signs that the Hebrew miad was ia a transition state. When Ezekiel declared that the son should not be responsible for the iniquity of the father, nor the father for the iniquity of the son ; that the righteous- ness of the righteous should be upon him, and that the wickedness of the wicked should be upon him — he was preparing the way for a new system of ideas in regard to retribution. But as it was, the Jews were indebted to the Avesta for their traditional theory of a future life ; and they also adopted the Persian ideas of the resurrection of the body, the rivalry of the BvU spirit, and the approaching destruction and renovation of the world. The Satan of Job is not a rebellious angel, stiU less a contending god: he is merely a mischievous and malignant sprite. But the Satan of the restored Jews was a powerful Prince who went about like a roaring lion, and to whom this world belonged. He was copied from ATirimn.Ti, the God of Darkness, who was ever A MONOPOLIZED DEITY. 21G contending with Ormuzd, the God of Light. The Persians beheved that Ormuzd would finally triumph, and that a prophet would be' sent to annoimce the gospel or good tidings of his approaching victory. Terrible calamities would then take place : the stars would fall down from heaven ; the earth itself would be destroyed. After which it would come forth new from the hands of the Creator; a kind of Millenium would be established; there would be one law, one language, one government for men, and universal peace would reign. This theory became blended in the Jewish minds with certain expectations of their own. In the days of captivity their prophets had predicted that a Messiah or anointed King would be sent, that the kingdom of David would be restored, and that Jerusalem would become the headquarters of God on earth. All the nations would come to Jerusalem to keep the feast of tabernacles and to worship God. Those who did not come should have no rain ; and as the Egyptians could do without rain, if they did not come they should have the plague. The Jewish people would become one vast priesthood, and aU nations would pay them tithe. Their seed would inherit the Gentiles. They would suck the milk of the Gentiles. They would eat the riches of the Gentiles. These same unfortunate Gentiles would be their plowmen and their vinedressers. Bowing down would come those who afflicted Jerusalem, and would hck the dust off her feet. Strangers would build up her waUs, and kings would minister unto her. Many people and strong nations would come to see the Lord of Hosts in Jerusalem. Ten men in that day would lay hold of the skirt of a Jew, saying, We will go with you, for we have heard that God is with vou. It 216 THE MESSIAH THEOKT. was an idea worthy of the Jews that they shotild keep the Creator to themselves in Jerusalem, and make their fortunes out of the monopoly. In the meantime these prophecies had not been fulfilled ; and the Jews were in daily expectation of the Messiah, as they are stiU, and as they are likely to be for some time to come. It was the belief of the vulgar that this Messiah would be a man belonging to the family of David, who would hberate them from the Romans, and become their king ; so they were always on the watch, and whenever a remarkable man ap- peared they concluded that he was the son of David, the Holy One of Israel, and were ready at once to proclaim him king, and to burst into rebellion. This illusion gave rise to repeated riots or revolts, and at last brought about the destruction of the city. But among the higher class of minds the expectation of the Messiah, though not less ardent, was of a more spiritual kind. They believed that the Messiah was that prophet often called the Son of Man, who would be sent by God to proclaim the defeat of Satan, and the renovation of the world. They interpreted the prophets after a manner of their own: the kingdom foretold was the kingdom of heaven, and the new Jerusalem was not a Jerusalem on earth, but a celestial city, buUt of precious stones and watered by the Stream of Life. Such were the hopes of the Jews. The whole nation trembled with excitement and suspense : the mob of Judsea awaiting the Messiah or King who should lead them to the conquest of the world ; the more noble- minded Jews of Palestine, and especially the foreign Jews, awaiting the Messiah or Son of Man, who should proclaim the approach of the most terrible of all events. JEWS AOT) GENTHiES. 217 There were many pious men and women who withdrew entirely from the cares of ordinary life, and passed their days in watching and in prayer. The Neo-Jewish or Persian-Hebrew religion, with its sublime theory of a single god, with its clearly defined doctrine of rewards and punishment, with its one grand duty of faith or allegiance to a diyiae king, was so at- tractive to the mind on account of its simpHcity that it could not fail to conquer the discordant and jarring creeds of the Pagan world, as soon as it should be prop- agated in the right manner. There is a kind of Natu- ral Selection in religion ; the creed which is best adapt- ed to the mental world wiU invariably prevail ; and the mental world is being gradually prepared for the recep- tion of higher and higher forms of rehgious Hfe. At this period Europe was ready for the reception of the one-god species of beHef, but it existed only in the Jew- ish area, and was there confined by artificial checks. The Jews held the doctrine that none but Jews could be saved ; and most of them looked forward to the eter- nal torture of Greek and Eoman souls with equanimity, if not with satisfaction. They were not in the least de- sirous to redeem them ; they hoarded up their religion as they did their money ; and considered it a heritage, a patrimony, a kind of entailed estate. There were some Jews in foreign parts who esteemed it a work of piety to bring the Gentiles to a knowledge of the true God ; and as it was one of the popular amusements of the Romans to attend the service at the Synagogue a convert was occasionally made. But such cases were, very rare ; for ia order to embrace the Jewish reUgion it was necessary to undergo a dangerous operation, to abstain from eating with the pagans — in short, to be- come a Jew. It was therefore indispensable for the 218 THE PASSOYEE. success of the Hebrew religion that it should be di- vested of its local customs. But however much the Pharisees and Sadducees might differ on matters of tradition, they were perfectly agreed on this point, that the ceremonial laws were necessary for salvation. These laws could never be given up by Jews unless they first became heretics ; and this was what event- ually occuiTcd. A schism arose among the Jews : the sectarians were defeated and expelled. Foiled in their first object, they cast aside the law of Moses, and of- fered the Hebrew religion without the Hebrew ceremo- nies to the Greek and Eoman world. We shall now sketch the character of the man who prepared the way for this remarkable event. It was a custom in Israel for the members of each family to meet together once a year that they might celebrate a sacred feast. A lamb roasted whole was placed upon the table, and a cup of wine was filled. Then the eldest son said, " Father, what is the mean- ing of this feast ? " And the father replied that it was held in memory of the sufferings of their ancestors, and of the mercy of the Lord their God. For while they were weeping and bleeding in the land of Egypt there came his voice unto Moses and said that each father of a family should select a lamb without blemish from his flock, and should kiU it on the tenth day of the month Akib, at the time of the setting of the sun ; and should put the blood in a basin, and should take a sprig of hyssop and sprinkle the door posts and lintel with the blood ; and should then roast the lamb and eat it with unleavened bread and bitter herbs : they should eat it as if in haste, each one standing, with his loins girt, his sandals on his feet, and his staff in his hand. That night the angel of the Lord slew the first-bora of the JESUS ENTEETNa JEEUSAUBaL 219 Egyptians; and that night Israel was delivered from her bonds. When the father had thus spoken, the lamb was eaten, and four cups of wine were drank, and the family sang a hymn. At this beautiful and solemn festival all persons of the same kin endeavored to meet together ; and Hebrew pilgrims from aU parts of the world jour- neyed to Jerusalem. When they came within sight of the Holy City, and saw the temple shining in the dis- tance like a mountain of snow, some clamored with cries of joy, some uttered low and painful sobs. Draw- ing closer together, they advanced toward the gates singiag the Psalms of David, and offering up prayers for the restoration of Israel. At this time the subscriptions from the various churches abroad were brought to Jerusalem, and were carried to the Temple treasury in solemn state ; and at this time, also, the citizens of Jerusalem witnessed a procession which they did not hke so weU. A company of Eoman soldiers escorted the Heutenant-governor, who came up from Cesarea for the festival, that he might give out the vestments of the High Priest, which, being the insignia of government, the Eomans kept under lock and key. It was the nineteenth year of the reign of Tiberius CsBsar ; Pontius Pilate had taken up his quarters in the city, and the time of the Passover was at hand. Not only Jerusalem, but also the neighboring villages, were filled with pilgrims, and many were obliged to en- camp in tents outside the walls. It happened one day that a sound of shouting was heard ; the men ran up to the roofs of their houses, and the maidens peeped through their latticed windows. A young man mounted on a donkey was riding toward 220 THE GOT OF PBOPHEOT. the city. A crowd streamed out to meet him, and a crowd followed him behind. The people cast their mantles on the road before him, and also covered it with green boughs. He rode through the city gates straight to the temple, dismounted and entered the holy building. In the outer courts there was a kind of bazaar in connection with the temple worship. Pure white lambs, pigeons, and other animals of the requisite age and appearance, were there sold; and money mer- chants, sitting at their tables, changed the foreign coin with which the pilgrims were provided. The young man at once proceeded to upset the tables and to drive their astonished owners from the temple, while the crowd shouted, and the httle gamins, who were not the least active in the riot, cried oitt, " Hurrah for the son of David ! " Then people suffering from diseases were brought to him, and he laid his hands upon them, and told them to have faith and they would be healed. When strangers inquired the meaning of this dis- turbance, they were told that it was Joshua, or, as the Greek Jews called him, Jesus the Prophet of Nazareth. It was believed by the common people that he was the Messiah. But the Pharisees did not acknowledge his mission. For Jesus belonged to Galilee, and the na- tives of that country spoke a vile patois, and their orthodoxy was in bad repute. " Out of Galilee," said the Pharisees with scorn, " out of Galilee there cometh no prophet." All persons of imaginative mmds know what it is to be startled by a thought ; they know how ideas flash into the mind, as it from without ; and what physical excitement they can at times produce. They also know ORACLES ESTABLISHED AND rnNEBAMr. 221 what it is to be possessed by a sentiment, a deep, over- powering conviction of things to come. They know how often such presentiments are true ; and also how often they are false. The prophet or seer is a man of strong imaginative powers, which have not been calmed by education. The ideas which occur to his mind often present them- selves to his eyes and ears in corresponding sights and sounds. As one in a dream, he hears voices and sees forms ; his whole mien is that of a man who is pos- sessed ; his face sometimes becomes transfigured, and appears to glow with light ; but usually the symptoms are of a more painful Mnd, such as foaming of the mouth, writhing of the limbs, and a bubbling ebullition of the voice. He is sometimes seized by these violent ideas agaiast his will. But he can, to a certain extent, produce them by long fasting and by long prayer ; or, in other words, by the continued concentration of the mind upon a siagle point ; by music, dancing and fmuigations. The disease is contagious, as is shown by the anecdote of Saul among the prophets; and similar scenes have been frequently witnessed by trav- elers in the East. Prophets have existed in aU countries and at all times ; but the gift becomes rare ia the same propor- tion as people learn to read and write. Second-sight in the highlands disappeared before the school ; and so it has been in other lands. Prophets were numerous in ancient Greece. In the Homeric period they op- posed the royal power, and constituted another au- thority by the grace of God. Herodotus alludes to men who went about prophesying in hexameters. Thucydides says that while the Peloponnesians were ravaging the lands of Athens, there were prophets 222 PEOPHETS AS POLITICIANS. withia the city uttering all kinds of oracles, some foi going out, and some for remaining in. It was a prophet who obtained the passing of that law under which Socrates was afterward condemned to death. In Greece, in Egypt, and in Israel, the priests adopted and localized the prophetic power. The oracles of Ammon, Delphi and Shiloh bore the same relation to individual prophets as an Established Church to itinerant preach- ers. Syria was especially fertile in prophets. Marius kept a Syrian prophetess named Martha, who attended him in aU his campaigns. It matters nothing what the Syrian rehgion might be ; the same phenomenon again and again recurs. Balaam was a prophet before Israel was estabhshed. Then came the prophets of the Jews ; and they again have been succeeded by the Christian cave-saint and the Moslem dervish, whom the Arabs have always regarded with equal veneration. But it was among the Jews, from the time of Samuel to the captivity, that prophets or dervishes were most abun- dant. They were then as plentiful as politicians ; and politicians, in fact, they were, and prophesied against each other. Some would be for peace, and some would be for war ; some were partisans of Egypt, others were partisans of Babylon. The prophetic ideas differ in no respect from those of ordinary men, except in the sub- lime or ridiculous effect which they produce on the pro- phetic mind and body. Sometimes the predictions of the Jewish prophets were fulfilled, and sometimes they were not. To use the Greek phrase, their oracles were often of base metal ; and in such a case the unfortunate dervish was jeered at as a false prophet, and would in his turn reproach the Lord for having made him a foo] before men. The Jewish prophet was an extraordinary being. He ANGEL AND BEAST. 223 was something more and something less than a man. He spoke like an angel ; he acted like a beast. As soon as he received his mission, he ceased to wash. He often retired to the mountains, where he might be seen skipping from rock to rock like a goat ; or he wander- ed ia the desert with a leather girdle round his loias, eating roots and wild honey ; sometimes browsing on grass and flowers. He always adapted his actions to the idea which he desired to convey. He not only taught in parables, but performed them. For instance, Isaiah walked naked through the streets to show that the Lord would strip Jerusalem, and make her bare. Ezekiel cut off his hair and beard and weighed it in the scales : a third part he burnt with fire ; a third part he strewed about with a knife ; and a third part he scat- tered to the wind. This was also intended to iJlustrate the calamities which would befaU the Jews. Moreover, he wore a rotten girdle as a sign that their city woidd decay, and buttered his bread in a manner we would rather not describe, as a sign that they would eat defil- ed bread among the Gentiles. Jeremiah wore a wooden yoke, as a sign that they should be taken into captivity. As a sign that the Jews were guilty of wantonness in worshiping idols, Hosea cohabited three years with a woman of the town ; and as a sign that they committed adultery in turning from the Lord their God, he went and hved with another man's wife. Such is the ludicrous side of Jewish prophecy ; yet it has also its serious and noble side. The prophets were always the tribunes of the people, the protectors of the poor. As the tyrant reveled in his palace on the taxes extorted from industrious peasants, a strange fig- ure would descend from the moimtains, and, staMng to the throne, would stretch forth a lean and swarthy arm, 224 THE PEOPHET AND THE FOOB. and denounce him in the name of Jehovah, and bid him repent, or the Lord's wrath should fall upon him, and dogs should drink his blood. In the first period of the Jemsh life, the prophets exercised these functions of censor and of tribune, and preached loyalty to the God who had brought them up out of Egypt with a strong hand. They were also intensely fanatical, and publish- ed Jehovah's wrath, not only against the king who was guilty of idolatry and vice, but also against the king who took a census, or imported horses, or made treaties of friendship with his neighbors. In the second period the prophets declared the unity of God, and exposed the foUy of idol-worship. They did even more than this. They opposed the ceremonial law, and preach- ed the religion of the heart. They declared that God did not care for their Sabbaths and their festivals, and their new moons, and their prayers, and church serv- ices, and ablutions, and their sacrifices of meat and oil, and of incense from Arabia, and of the sweet cane from a far country. " Cease to do evil," said they ; " learn to do well ; relieve the oppressed ; judge the fatherless plead for the widow." It is certain that the doctrines of the great prophets were heretical. Jeremiah flatly declared that in the day that God brought them from the land of Egypt, he did not command them concern- ing bumt-ofi'erings or sacrifices ; and this statement would be of historical value, if prophets always spoke the truth. They were bitter adversaries of the kings and priests, and the consolers of the oppressed. " The Lord hath appointed me," says one whose oracles have been edit- ed with those of Isaiah, but whose period was later, and whose true name is not known, " the Lord hath ap- poiated me to preach good tidings unto the meek ; he A FBOFHET UABTIB. 225 hath sent me to bind up the broken-hearted, to pro- claim liberty to the captives, to give unto them that mourn beauty for ashes, the oil of joy for lamentation, the garment of praise for the spirit of heaviness." The aristocracy who lived by the altar did not receive these attacks in a spirit of submission. There was a law ascribed to Moses, hke all the otlier Jewish laws, but undoubtedly enacted by the priest party under the kings, that false prophets should be put to death ; and though it was dangerous to touch prophets, on account of the people, who were always on their side, they were frequently subjected to persecution. Urijah fled from King Jehoiakim to Egypt ; armed men were sent after Iiitti ; he was arrested, brought back and killed. Zachariah was stoned to death iti the courts of the Temple. Jeremiah was formally tried, and was acquit- ted ; but he had a narrow escape : he was led, as he re- marked, like a sheep to the slaughter. At another time he was imprisoned ; at another time he was let down by ropes into a dry well ; and there is a tradition that he was stoned to death by the Jews in Egypt, after all. The nominal Isaiah chants the requiem of such a mar- tyr in a poem of exquisite beauty and grandeur. The prophet is described as one of hideous appearance, so that people hid their faces from him : " Ms visage was marred more than any man, and his form more than the sons of men." The people rejected his mission and re- fused to acknowledge him as a prophet. " He was de- spised and rejected of men, a man of sorrows and acquaint- ed loith grief." He was arraigned on a charge of false prophecy ; he made no defense, and he was put to death. "He was oppressed and afflicted, yet he opened not his mouth : he was brought as a lamb to the slav/ghter, and as a sheep before her shearers is dumb, so he opened 226 THE PBOPHET OP NAZAEETH. not his mouth. He was taken from the prison to the judg- ment; he was cut off from the land oftlie living." It was believed by the Jews that the death of such a man was accepted by God as a human sacrifice, an atonement for the sins of the people, just as the priest m the olden time heaped the sias of the people on the scape goat, and sent him out into the wilderness. " He bare the sins of many, and made intercession for the transgressors. The Lord hath laid on Mm the iniquity of usdXL. Surely, he hath home our griefs, and hath carried our sorrows. His soul was made an offering for sin. He was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities, and with his stripes we are healed." There are many worthy people who think it a very extraordinary thing that this poem can be used, almost word for word, to describe the rejected mission and martyrdom of Jesus. But as the Hebrew prophets re- sembled one another, and were tried before same tri- bunal, under the same law, the coincidence is not surprising. A poetical description, iu vague and general terms, of the rebellion of the EngHsh people and the execution of Charles I., would apply equally well to the rebellion of the French people and the execution of Louis XYI. The prophet of Nazareth did not differ in tempera- ment and character from the noble prophets of the ancient period. He preached, as they did, the religion of the heart ; he attacked, as they did, the ceremonial laws ; he offered, as they did, consolation to the poor ; he poiu'ed forth, as they did, invectives against the rulers and the rich. But his predictions were entirely different from theirs, for he hved, theologically speaking, La another world. The old prophets could only urge men to do good, that the Lord might make them prosper- BBIGHT SIDE OP THB 227 Otis on earth, or, at the most, that they might obtain an everlasting name. They could only promise to the people the restoration of Jerusalem and the good things of the Gentiles ; the reconciliation of Judah and Ephra- im, and the gathering of the dispersed. The morality which Jesus preached was also supported by promises and threats, but by promises and threats of a more ex- alted kind ; it was also based upon seK-interest, but upon seK-interest appKed to a future life. For this he was indebted to the age in which he lived. He was superior as a prophet to Isaiah, as Newton as an astrono- mer was superior to Kepler, Kepler to Copernicus, Copernicus to Ptolemy, Ptolemy to Hipparchus, and Hipparchus to the unknown Egyptian or Chaldsean priest who first began to register eclipses and to catalogue the stars. Jesus was a carpenter by trade, and was urged by a prophetic caU to leave his workshop and to go forth into the world, preaching the gospel which he had re- ceived. The current fancies respecting the approaching destruction of the world, the conquest of the Evil Power, and the reign of God had fermented in his mind, and had made him the subject of a remarkable hal- lucination. He beheved that he was the promised Messiah or Son of Man, who would be sent to prepare the world for the kingdom of God, and who would be appointed to judge the souls of men, and to reign over them on earth. He was a man of the people, a rustic and an artisan : he was also an imitator of the ancient prophets, whose works he studied, and whose words were always on his lips. Thus he was led as man and prophet to take the part of the poor. He sympathized deeply with the outcasts, the afflicted, and the oppressed. To children and to women, to all who suffered and shed tears ; to all from whom men turned with loathing and 228 OHABAOTEB OF JESUB. contempt; to the girl of evil life, who bemoaned hei shame ; to the tax-gatherer, who crouched before his God in humihty and woe ; to the sorrowful in spirit and the weak in heart ; to the weary and the heavy-laden — Jesus appeared as a shining angel with words sweet as the honeycomb, and bright as the golden day. He laid his hands on the heads of the lowly ; he bade the sor- rowful be of good cheer, for the day of their dehverance and their glory was at hand. If we regard Jesus only in his relations with those whose brief and bitter hves he purified from evil, and illumined with ideal joys, we might beheve him to have been the perfect type of a meek and suffering saint. But his character had two sides, and we must look at both. Such is the imperfection of human nature, that extreme love is counterbalanced by extreme hate; every virtue has its attendant vice, which is excited by the same stimulants, which is nourished by the same food. Martyrs and persecutors resemble one another ; their miads are composed of the same materials. The man who will suffer death for his rehgious faith will en- deavor to enforce it even unto death. In fact, if Chris- tianity were true, rehgious persecution would become a pious and charitable duty ; if God designs to punish men for their opinions, it would be an act of mercy to mankind to extinguish such opinions. By burning the bodies of those who diffuse them many souls would be saved that woidd otherwise be lost, and so there would be an economy of torment in the long run. It is there- fore not surprising that enthusiasts should be intolerant. Jesus was not able to display the spirit of a persecutor in his deeds ; but he displayed it in his words. Behov- ing that it was in his power to condemn his feUow- creatures to eternal torture, he did so condemn by DABK BIDE. 229 anticipation all the rich, and almost all the learned men among the Jews. It was his belief that God reigned in heaven, but that Satan reigned on earth. In a few years God would invade and subdue the earth. It was therefore his prayer, " Thy kingdom come ; thy will be done on earth, as it is in heaven." God's vdU was not at that time done on earth, which was in the possession of the Prince of Darkness. It was evident, therefore, that all prosperous men were favorites of Satan, and that the unfortunate were favorites of God. Those would go with their master to eternal pain ; these would be rewarded by their master with eternal joy. He did not say that Dives was bad, or that Lazarus was good, but merely that Dives had received his good things on earth, and Lazarus his evil things on earth ; that after- ward Lazarus was rewarded, and Dives tormented. Dives might have been as virtuous as the Archbishop of Canterbury, who is also clothed in fine hnen, and who fares sumptuously every day ; Lazarus might have been as vicious as the Lambeth pauper, who prowls round the palace gates, and whose mind, like his body, is fuU of sores. Not only the inoffensive rich were doomed by Jesus to heU-fire, but also all those who did anything to merit the esteem of their feUow-men. Even those that were happy and enjoyed life — unless it was in his own company — were lost souls. " Woe unto you that are rich," said he, " for ye have received your con- solation. Woe unto you that are full, for ye shall hun- ger. Woe unto you that laugh now, for ye shall mourn and weep. Woe unto you when aU men shall speak well of you, for so did their fathers of the false proph- ets." He also pronounced eternal punishment on all those who refused to join him. " He that beUeveth and is baptized," said he, " shall be saved. He that be- lieveth not shall be damned." 236 MOBAL INVESTMENTS. He supposed that when the kingdom of God was es- tablished on earth, he would reign over it as viceroy. Those who wished to live under him in that kingdom must renounce all the pleasures of Satan's world. They must sell their property, and give the proceeds to the poor; discard all domestic ties; cultivate self-abase- ment, and do nothing which could possibly raise them in the esteem of other people. For they could not serve two masters : they could not be rewarded in the kingdom of this world, which was ruled by Satan, and also in the new kingdom, which would be ruled by God. If they gave a dinner, they were not to ask their rich friends, lest they should be asked back to dinner, and thus lose their reward. They must ask only the poor, and for that benevolent action they would be recom- pensed hereafter. They were not to give alms in pubhc, or to pray in pubhc ; and when they fasted, they were to pretend to feast ; for if it was perceived that they were devout men, and were praised for their devotion, they would lose their reward. Bobbery and violence they were not to resist. If a man smote them on one cheek, they were to offer him the other also ; if he took their coat, they were to give him their shirt ; if he forced them to go with him one mile, they were to go with hiTTi two. They were to love their enemies, to do good to them that did them evil ; and why ? Not be- cause it was good so to do, but that they might be paid for the same with compound interest in a future state. It might be supposed that as in the philosophy cf Jesus poverty was equivalent to virtue, and misery a passport to eternal bhss, sickness would be also a bea- tific state. But Jesus, Kke the other Jews, beheved that disease proceeded from sin. In Palestine it was THE MIEACtE DOOTOB. 231 always held that a priest or a prophet was the best physician, and prayer, with the laying on of hands, the most efficacious of all medicines. Among the sins of Asa it is mentioned that, ha-ving sore feet, he went to a doctor instead of to the Lord. Jesus informed those on whom he laid his hands that their sias were forgiven them, and warned those he healed to sin no more, lest a worse thing should come upon them. Such theologi- cal practitioners have always existed in the East, and exist there at the present day. A text from the Koran written on a board and washed off into a cup of water is considered God's own physic ; and as the patient be- lieves in it, and as the mind can sometimes influence the body, the disease is occasionally healed up on the spot. The exploits of the miracle doctor are exaggerated in his lifetime, and after his death it is declared that he restored sight to men that were bom bHnd, cleansed the lepers, made the lame to walk, cured the incurable, and raised the dead to life. In Jerusalem the scribe had succeeded to the seer. The Jews had already a proverb, " A scholar is greater than a prophet." The supernatural gift was regarded with suspicion ; and if successful with the vulgar, ex- cited envy and indignation. In the East, at the pres- ent day, there is a permanent hostility between the moUah, or doctor of the law, and the dervish, or illiterate " man of God." Jesus was, in poiat of fact, a dervish ; and the learned Pharisees were not incHned to admit the authority of one who spoke a rustic patois and misplaced the h, and who was no doubt, like other prophets, uncouth in his appearance and uncleanly in his garb. At Jerusalem Jesus completely failed ; and this failure appears to have stung him into bitter abuse of his successful rivals, the missionary Pharisees, and 232 IIABNESS. into the wildest extravagance of speech. He caUed the learned doctors a generation of "vipers, whited sepul- chers, and serpents ; he declared that they should not escape the damnation of heU. Because they had made the washing of hands before dinner a religious ablu- tion, Jesus, with equal bigotry, would not wash his hands at all, though people eat with the hand in the East, and dip their hands in the same dish. He told his disciples that if a man called another a fool, he would be in danger of heU-fire; and whoever spoke against the Holy Ghost, it would not be forgiven him " neither in this world nor in the world to come." He said that if a man had done anything wrong with his hand or his eye, it were better for him to cut off his guilty hand, or to pluck out his guilty eye, rather than go with his whole body into heU. He cursed a fig-tree because it bore no fruit, although it was not the season of fruit — an action as rational as that of Xerxes, who flogged the sea. He retorted to those who accused him of breaking the Sabbath, that he was above the Sabbath. It is evident that a man who talked in such a manner, who believed that it was in his power to abrogate the laws of the land, to forgive sins, to bestow eternal hap- piness upon his friends, and to send all those who differed from Tiim to everlasting flames, would lay him- seK open to a charge of blasphemy ; and it is also evi- dent that the generation of vipers would not hesitate to take advantage of the circumstance. But whatever share personal enmity might have had in the charges that were made against him, he was lawfully condemned, according to Bible law. He declared in open court that they would see him descending in the clouds at the right hand of the power of God. The high priest tore WAirraG. 233 his robes in horror ; false prophecy and blasphemy had been uttered to his face. After the execution of Jesus his disciples did not re- turn to Galilee; they waited at Jerusalem for his second coming. They believed that he had died as a hiunan sacrifice for the sias of the people, and that he would speedily retmm with an army of angels to estab- hsh the kingdom of God on earth. Already in his lifetime the simple creatures had begun to dispute about the dignities which they should hold at court ; and Jesus, who was not less simple than themselves, had promised that they should sit on twelve thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel. He had assured them again and again, in the most positive language, that this event would take place in their own lifetime. "Verily, verily," he said, "there are some standing here who shall not taste of death tLU they see the Son of Man coming in his kingdom." They therefore re- mained at Jerusalem, and scrupulously followed his commands. They established a community of goods, or at least gave away their superfluities to the poorer members of the church, and had charitable arrange- ments for relieving the sick. They admitted prose- lytes with the ceremony of baptism. At the evening repast which they held together, they broke bread and drank wine in a certain solemn manner, as Jesus had been wont to do, and as they especially remembered he did at the last supper. But in all respects they were Jews, just as Jesus himseK had been a Jew. They attended divine service in the temple ; they offered up the customary sacrifices ; they kept the Sabbath ; they abstained from forbidden meats. They held merely the one dogma, that Jesus was the Messiah, and that he would return in power and glory to judge the earth. 234 THE LIBERAL PABTY. Jerusalem was frequented at the time of the pil- grimage by thousands of Jews from the great cities of Europe, North Africa and Asia-Minor. These pilgrims were of a very different class from the fisher- men of Galilee. They were Jews in rehgion, but they were scarcely Jews in nationality. They were members of great and flourishing municipalities, they enjoyed political liberty and civil rights. They prayed in Greek, and read the Bible in a Greek trans- lation. Their doctrine was tolerant and latitudinariab. At Alexandria there was a school of Jews who had mingled the metaphysics of Plato with their own theology. Many of these Greek Jews became con- verted, and it is to them that Jesus owes his reputa- tion, Christianity its existence. The Palestine Jews desired to reserve the Gospel to the Jews ; they had no taste or sympathy for the Gentiles, from whom they Hved entirely apart, and who were associated in their minds with the abominations of idolatry, the payment of taxes, and the persecution of Antiochus. But these same Gentiles, these poor benighted Greeks and Eo- mans, were the compatriots and feUow-citizens of the Hellenic Jews, who therefore entertained more liberal ideas upon the subject. Two parties accordingly arose : the conservative or Jewish party, who would receive no converts except according to the custom of the orthodox Jews in such cases ; and the Greek party, who agitated for complete freedom from the law of Moses. The latter were headed by Paul, an enthusias- tic and ambitious man, who refused to place himself under the rule of the twelve apostles, but claimed a special revelation. A conference was held at Jerusa- lem, and a compromise was arranged to the effect that pagan converts should not be subjected to the rite of QEEEK ELEMENTS. 235 circumcision, but that they should abstain from pork and oysters, and should eat no animals which had not been killed by the knife. But the compromise did not last. The church diverged ia discipline and dogma more and more widely from its ancient form, till ia the second century the Christians of Judsea, who had faith- fully followed the customs and tenets of the twelve apostles, were informed that they were heretics. Dur- ing that interval a new religion had arisen. Chris- tianity had conquered paganism, and paganism had corrupted Christianity. The legends which belonged to Osiris and ApoUo had been applied to the life of Jesus. The single Deity of the Jews had been ex- changed for the Trinity, which the Egyptians had invented, and which Plato had idealized into a philo- sophic system. The man who had said, "Why caRest thou me good? there is none good but one, that is God," had now himself been made a god, or the third part of one. The Hebrew element, however, had not been entirely cast off. With some little inconsistency the Jewish sacred books were said to be inspired, and nearly all the injunctions contaiaed in them were dis- obeyed. It was heresy to deny that the Jews were the chosen people ; and it was heresy to assert that the Jews would be saved. The Christian religion was at first spread by Jews, who, either as missionaries or in the course of their ordiaary avocations, made the circuit of the Mediter- ranean world. In all large towns there was a Ghetto, or Jews' quarter, ia which the traveler was received by the people of his own race. There was no regular clergy among the Jews, and it was their custom to allow, and even to iavite, the stranger to preach in their synagogue. Doctrines were not strictly defined, 236 THE GHETTO. and they listened without anger, and perhaps with some hope, to the statement, that Jesus of Nazareth was the Messiah, and that he would shortly return to establish his kingdom upon earth. But when these Christians began to preach that the eating of pork was not a deadly sin, and that God was better pleased with a sprinkle than a slash, they were speedily stigmatized as heretics, and all the Jewries in the world were closed against them. Those strange religious and commercial communities, those landless colonies which an Oriental people had established all over the world, from the Ehone and the Ehine to the Oxus and Jaxartes ; which corresponded regularly among themselves, and whose members re- cognized each other, wherever they might be and in whatever garb, by the solemn phrase, Hear, Israd, there is one God I afforded a model for the Christian churches of the early days. The primitive Christians did not, indeed, Hve together in one quarter, like the Jews, but they gathered together for purposes of wor- ship and administration in set places at appointed times. They did not establish commercial relations with the Christians in other towns, but they kept up an active social correspondence, and hospitably enter- tained the foreign brother who brought letters of in- troduction as credentials of his creed. Traveling, though not always free from danger, was imobstructed in those days ; coasters sailed frequently from port to port, and the large towns were connected by paved roads with a posting-house at every six-mile stage. All inn-keepers spoke Greek ; it was not necessary to learn Latin even in order to reside at Rome. And now we return to that magnificent city which was adorned with the spoils of a hundred lands, into BOMB. 237 wMcTi streamed all tlie wealth, the energy, and the am- bition of the East and "West. Ostia-on-the-sea, where the ancient citizens had boiled their salt, was now a great port, in which the grain from Egypt and Carthage was stored up ia huge bidldiags, and to which, in the summer and autumn, came ships from aJl parts of the world. The road to Eome was fifteen miles ia length, and was lined with villas and with lofty tombs. Out- side the city, on the neighboring hiUs, were gardens open to the public; and from these hiEs were con- ducted streams, by subterranean pipes, into the town, where they were trained to run Kke rivulets, making everywhere a pleasant murmur, here and there reposing in artificial grottoes, or dancing as fountains in the air. The streets were narrow, and the tail houses buried them ia deep shade. They were Uned with statues ; there was a population of marble men. Flowers glittered on roofs and balconies. Vast palaces of green, and white, and golden-tiated marble were sur- rounded by venerable trees. The Via Sacra was the Eegent Street of Rome, and was bordered with stalls, where the silks and spices of the East, the wool of Spain, the glasswares of Alexandria, the smoked fish of the Black Sea, the wines of the Greek isles, Cretan apples, Alpine cheese, the oysters of Britain, and the veined wood of the Atlas, were exposed for sale. In that splendid thoroughfare a hundred languages might be heard at once, and as many costumes were displayed as if the universe had been invited to a fancy bah. Sometimes a squadron of the Imperial Guard would ride by — ^flaxen-haired, blue-eyed Germans, covered with shiniag steel. Then a procession of pale-faced, shaven Egyptian priests, bearing a statue of Isis, and singing melancholy hymns. A Greek philosopher 238 A STEOMi DOWN THE VIA LAEGA. would next pass along with abstracted eyes and ragged cloak, followed by a boy with a pile of books. Men from the East might be seen with white turbans and flowing robes, or in sheepskin mantles, with high black caps; and perhaps, beside them, a tattooed Briton gaping at the shops. Then would come a palanquin with curtains half-drawn, carried along at a swinging pace by sturdy Cappadocian slaves, and, within, the fashionable lady with superoUious; half-closed eyes, holding a crystal ball between her hands to keep them cool. Next, a senator in white and purple robe, re- ceiving, as he walked along, the greetings and kisses of his friends and chents, not always of the cleanest kind. So crowded were the streets that carriages were not allowed to pass through them in the daytime. The only vehicles that appeared were the carts employed in the public works; and as they came rolling and grinding along, bearing huge beams and blocks of stone, the driver cracked his whip and pushed people against the wall, and there was much squeezing and confusion, during which pickpockets, elegantly dressed, their hands covered with rings, were busy at their work, pretending to assist the ladies in the crowd. People from the coimtry passed toward the market, their mules or asses laden vdth panniers in which purple grapes and golden fruits were piled up in profusion, and refreshed the eye, which was dazzled by the stony glare. Hawkers went about offering matches in ex- change for broken glass ; and the keepers of the cook- shops called out in cheerful tones, " Smoking sausages ! " " Sweet boiled peas ! " " Honey wine, honey wine ! " And then there was the crowd itseE : the bright-eyed, dark-browed Roman people, who played in the shade at dice, or mora, like the old Egyptians ; who lounged EOME BliEEPINa. 239 througli the temples, which were also the nmseums, to look at the curiosities ; or who stood ia groups reading the advertisements on the walls and the programmes, which annoimced that on such and such a day there jTould be a grand performance in the circus, and that all would be done ia the best style. A blue awning, with white stars, in imitation of the sky, would shade them from the sun; trees would be transplanted, a forest would appear upon the stage ; giraffes, zebras, elephants, lions, ostriches, stags, and wild boars would be hunted down and killed ; armies of gladiators would contend ; and, by way of after-piece, the arena would be filled with water, and a naval battle would be per- formed — ships, soldiers, woimds, agony, and death being admirably real. So passed the Roman street-life day, and with the first hours of darkness the noise and turmoil did not cease ; for then the travehng-carriages rattled toward the gates, and carts fiUed with dimg — the only export of the city. The music of serenades rose softly ia the air, and sounds of laughter from the tavern. The night watch made their rounds, their armor rattling as they passed. Lights were extinguished, householders put up their shutters, to which beUs were fastened, for burglaries frequently occurred. And then for a time the city would be almost still. Dogs, hated by the Romans, prowled about sniffing for their food. Men of prey from the Pontiae Marshes crept stealthily along the black side of the street, signaling to one another with sharp whistles or hissing sounds. Sometimes torches would flash agaiast the waUs as a knot of young gallants reeled home from a debauch, breaking the noses of the street statues ou their way. And at such fin hour there were men and. women who stole forth 240 THE CATACOMBS. from their various houses, and, with mantles covering their faces, hastened to a lonely spot in the suburbs, and entered the mouth of a dark cave. They passed through long galleries, moist with damp and odorous of death, for coffins were ranged on either side in tiers, one above the other. But soon sweet music sounded from the depts of the abyss ; an open chamber came to view, and a tomb covered with flowers, laid out with a repast, encircled by men and women, who were appareled in white robes, and who sang a psalm of joy. It was in the Catacombs of Borne where the dead had been buried in the ancient times that the Christians met to discourse on the progress of the faith ; to recount the trials which they suffered in their homes ; to con- fess to one another their sins and doubts, their carnal presumption, or their lack of faith ; and also to relate their sweet visions of the night, the answers to their earnest prayers. They listened to the exhortations of their elders, and perhaps to a letter from one of the apostles. They then supped together as Jesus had supped with his disciples, and kissed one another when the love-feast was concluded. At these meetings there was no distinction of rank; the high-bom lady em- braced the slave whom she had once scarcely regarded as a man. Hunuhty and submission were the cardinal virtues of the early Christians ; slavery had not been forbidden by the apostles because it was the doctrine of Jesus that those who were lowest iu this world would be the highest in the next ; his theory of heaven being earth turned upside down. Slavery therefore was es- teemed a state of grace, and some Christians appear to have rejected the freedman's cap on religious grounds, for Paul exhorts such persons to become free if they can ; advice which slaves do not usually require. THE GOOD TIDINGS. 241 As time passed on, the belief of the first Christians that the end of the world was near at hand became fainter, and gradually died away. It was then declared that God had favored the earth with a respite of one thousand years. In the meantime, the gospel or good tidings which the Christians announced was this : There was one God, the Creator of the world. He had long been angry, with men because they were what he had made them. But he sent his only begotten son into a comer of Syria ; and because his son had been mur- dered his wrath had been partly appeased. He would not torture to eternity all the soids that he had made ; he would spare at least one in every miUion that were bom. Peace unto earth and good-will unto men if they would act in a certain manner ; if not, fire and brimstone and the noisome pit. He was the Emperor of Heaven, the tyrant of the skies ; the pagan gods were rebels, with whom he was at war, although he was AU-power- ful, and whom he allowed to seduce the souls of men, although he was All-merciful. Those who joined the army of the cross might entertain some hopes of be- LQg saved ; those who followed the faith of their fathers woidd follow their fathers to hell-fire. This creed with the early Christians was not a matter of haK-beHef and metaphysical debate, as it is at the present day, when Catholics and Protestants discuss hell-fire witii cour- tesy and comfort over filberts and port wine. To those credulous and imagiaative minds God was a live king, hell a place in which real bodies were burned with real flames, which was filled with the sickenii^ stench of roasted flesh, which resounded with agoni2ing shrieks. They saw their fathers and mothers, their sisters and their dearest friends, huriying onward to that fearful pit unconscious of danger, laughing and singing, lured 242 THE MIBSIONAEY AGE. on by the fiends whom they called the gods. They felt as we should feel were we to see a blind man walMng toward a river bank. Who would have the heart to turn aside and say it was the business of the police to interfere? But what was death, a mere momentary pain, compared with tortures that would have no end ? Who that could hope to save a soul by tears and sup- pUcations would remain quiescent, as men do now, shrugging their shoulders and saying that it is not good taste to argue on religion, and that conversion is the office of the clergy ? The Christians of that period felt more and did more than those of the present day, not because they were better men, but because they be- lieved more ; and they believed more because they knew less. Doubt is the offspring of knowledge : the savage never doubts at all. In that age the Christians believed much, and their lives were rendered beautiful by sympathy and love. The dark, deep river did not exist, it was only a fancy of the brain, yet the impulse was not less reaL The heart-throb, the imploring cry, the swift leap, the trem- bling hand outreached to save, the transport of deHght, the ecstasy of tears, the sweet, calm joy that a man had been wrested from the jaws of death — are these less beautiful, are these less real, because it afterward ap- peared that the man had been in no danger after aU ? In that age every Christian was a missionary. The soldier sought to win recruits for the heavenly host ; the prisoner of war discoursed to his Persian jailer ; the slave girl whispered the gospel in the ears of her mistress as she built up the mass of towered hair ; there stood men in cloak and beard at street comers, who, when the people, according to the manners of the day, invited them to speak, preached not the doctrines HEA.TENLT ILLUSIONS. 243 of the Painted Porch, but the words of a new and strange philosophy; the young wife threw her arms round her husband's neck and made him agree to be baptized, that their souls might not be parted after death. How awful were the threats of the Heavenly Despot ; how sweet were the promises of a hfe beyond the gra^e. The man who strove to obey the law which was written on his heart, yet often fell for want of sup- port, was now promised a rich reward it he would per- se's ore. The disconsolate woman, whose age of beauty and triumph had passed away, was taught that if she became a Christian her body, in all the splendor of its youth, would rise again. The poor slave, who sick- ened from weariness of a life in which there was for him no hope, received the assurance of another hfe in which he would find luxury and pleasiu'e when death released him from his woe. Ah, sweet fallacious hopes of a barbarous and poetic age I Illusion still cherished, for mankind is yet in its romantic youth ! How easy it would be to endure without repining the toils and troubles of this miserable hfe if indeed we could be- hove that, when its brief period was past, we should be united to those whom we have loved, to those whom death has snatched away, or whom fate has parted from us by barriers cold and deep and hopeless as the grave. If we could believe this, the shortness of life would comfort us — how quickly the time flies by! — and we should welcome death. But we do not behove it, and so we chng to our tortured lives, dreading the dark Nothingness, dreading the dispersal of our elements into cold unconscious space. As drops in the ocean of water, as atoms in the ocean of air, as sparks in the ocean of fire within the earth, our minds do their ap- pointed work and serve to build up the strength and 244 THE ATHEISTS. beauty of the one great Human Mind vrhicli grows from century to century, from age to age, and is perhaps itself a mere molecule ■within some higher mind. Soon it was whispered that there was in Rome a secret society which worshiped an unknown God. Its members wore no garlands on their brows ; they never entered the temples ; they were governed by laws which strange and fearful oaths bound them ever to obey ; their speech was not as the speech of ordinary men ; they buried instead of burning the bodies of the dead ; they married, they educated their children, after a man- ner of their own. The politicians who regarded the Established Church as essential to the safety of the State became alarmed. Secret societies were forbid- den by the law, and here was a society in which the tutelary gods of Home were denounced as rebels and usurpers. The Christians, it is true, preached passive obedience and the divine right of kings ; but they pro- claimed that all men were equal before God, a danger- ous doctrine in a community where more than half the men were slaves. The idle and superstitious lazzaroni did not love the gods, but they beheved in them ; and they feared lest the " atheists," as they called the Chris- tians, would provoke the vengeance of the whole divine federation against the city, and that all would be in- volved in the common ruin. Soon there came a time when every public calamity, an epidemic, a fire, a fam- ine, or a flood, was ascribed to the anger of the offend- ed gods. And then arose imperial edicts, popular com- motions, and the terrible street-cry of Christiani ad Lames! But the persecutions thus provoked were fitful and brief, and served only to fan the flame. For to those who believed in heaven — not as men now believe, with TO THE LIONS WITH THE OHBISTIAira. 245 a slight tincture of, perhaps, unconscious doubt, but as men believe in things which they see and hear and feel and know — death was merely a surgical operation, with the absolute certainty of consequent release from pain, and of entrance into unutterable bHss. The Christians, therefore, encountered it with joy ; and the sight of their cheerful countenances as they were being led to execu- tion induced many to inquire what this belief might be which could thus rob death of its dreadfulness and its despair. But the great moralists and thinkers of the Empire looked coldly down upon this new religion. In their pure and noble writings they either allude to Christian- ity with scorn, or do not allude to it at all. This cir- cumstance has occasioned much surprise : it can, how- ever, be easUy explained. The success of Christianity among the people, and its want of success among the philosophers, were due to the same cause — the super- stition of the Christian teachers. Among the missionaries of the present day there are many men who, in earnestness and self devotion, are not inferior to those of the ApostoUc times. Yet they almost invariably fail : they are too enlightened for their congregations. "With respect to their own religion, indeed, that charge cannot be justly brought against them. Set them talking on the forbidden apple, Noah's ark, the sun standing still to facilitate murder, the donkey preaching to its master, the whale swallowing and ejecting Jonah, the immaculate con- ception, the water turned to wine, the fig-tree withered by a curse, and they will reason like children, or, in other words, they wiU not reason at all : they will merely repeat what they have been taught by their mammas. But when they discourse to the savage 246 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH. concerning his belief, they use the logic of Voltaire, and deride witches and men possessed in a style which Jesus and the twelve apostles, the Fathers ol the church, the popes of the Middle Ages, and Martin Luther himself, would have accounted blasphemous and contrary to Scripture. Now it is impossible to persuade an adult savage that his gods do not exist ; and he considers those who deny their existence to be ignorant foreigners, unacquainted with the divine con- stitution of his country. Hence he laughs in his sleeve at all that the missionaries say. But the primitive Christians behaved in gods and goddesses, satyrs and nymphs, as imphcitly as the Pagans them- selves. They did not deny, and they did not dis- believe, the miracles pei-formed in pagan temples. They allowed that the gods had great power upon earth, but asserted that they would have it only for a time ; that it ceased beyond the grave ; that they were rebels ; and that God was the rightful king. Here, then, were two classes of men whose intellects were precisely on the same level. Each had a theory, and the Christian theory was the better of the two. It had definite promises and threats ; and, without being too high for the vulgar comprehension, it re- duced the scheme of the universe to order and har- mony, resembling that of the great empire under which they lived. But to the philosophers of that period it was merely a new and noisy form of superstition. Experience has amply proved that minds of the highest order aro sometimes unable to shake off the ideas which they imbibed when they were children ; but to those of whom we speak Christianity was offered when their powers of reflection were matured, and it was naturally OHRIBTIAN SUPERSTITIONS. 247 rejected vnth. contempt. They knew that the pagan gods did not exist. Was it Ukely that they wonld sit at the feet of those who still beheved in them ? They had long ago abandoned the religious legends of their own country; they had shaken off the spell which Homer, with his splendid poetry, had laid upon their minds. Was it likely that they would believe in the old Arab traditions, or in these tales of a god who took upon himseK the semblance of a Jew, and suffered death upon the gaUows for the redemption of man- kind? They had obtained, by means of intellectual research, a partial perception of the great truth, that events result from secondary laws. Was it Ukely that they would join a crew of devotees who prayed to God to make the wind blow this way or that way, to give them a dinner, or to cure them of a pain ? When the Tiber overflowed its banks, the Pagans declared that it was owing to the wrath of the gods against the Chris- tians : the Christians retorted that it was owing to the wrath of God against the idolaters. To a man Kke Pliny, who studied the phenomena with his note-book in his hand, where was the difference between the two ? In the Greek world Christianity became a system of metaphysics as abstract and abstruse as any son of HeUas could desire. But in the Latin world it was never the religion of a scholar and a gentleman. It was the creed of the uneducated people, who flung them- selves into it with passion. It was something which belonged to them and them alone. They were not acquainted with Cicero or Seneca ; they had never tasted intellectual dehghts, for the philosophers scorned to instruct the vulgar crowd. And now the vulgar crowd found teachers who interpreted to them the Jewish books, who composed for them a magnificent Hterature of 248 A RELIGION OF THE PEOPLE. sermons and epistles and controversial treatises, a literature of enthusiasts and martyrs, -written in blood and fire. The people had no share in the politics of the Empire ; but now they had politics of their own. The lower orders were enfranchised ; women and slaves were not excluded. The barbers gossiped theolog- ically. Children played at church in the streets. The Christians were no longer citizens of Eome. God was their Emperor ; Heaven was their fatherland. They despised the pleasures of this life ; they were as emi- grants gathered on the shore waiting for a wind to waft them to another world. They rendered unto CsBsar the things that were Caesar's, for so it was written they should do. They honored the King, for such had been the teaching of St. Paul. They regarded the Emperor as God's vicegerent upon earth, and diso- beyed him only when his commands were contrary to those of God. But this limitation, which it was the busi- ness of the bishops to define, made the Christians a dan- gerous party in the state. The Emperor Constantine, whose title was unsound, entered into aUiance with this powerful corporation. He made Christianity the re- ligion of the state, and the bishops peers of the realm. In the days of tribulation it had often been pre- dicted that when the Empire became Christian war would cease, and men would dwell in brotherhood together. The Christian rehgion united the slave and his master at the same table and in the same embrace. On the pavement of the Basilica men of aU races and of all ranks knelt side by side. If any one were in sickness and affliction, it was sufficient for him to declare him- seK a Christian : money was at once pressed into his hands; compassionate matrons hastened to his bed- side. Even at the time when the Pagans regarded CHEISTIAN YIKTUE. 249 the new sect with most abhorrence, they were forced to exclaim, " See how these Christians love one another ! " It was reasonable to suppose that the victory of this religion would be the victory of love and peace. But what was the actual result ? Shortly after the estabhshment of Christianity as a state religion, there was uproar and dissension in every city of the Empire ; then savage persecutions, bloody wars, until a Pagan historian could observe to the polished and iatellectual coterie for whom alone he wrote, that now the hatred of the Christians against one another sur- passed the fury of savage beasts against man. It is evident that the virtues exhibited by those who gallantly fight against desperate odds for an idea win not be invariably displayed by those who, when the idea is realized, enjoy the spoil. It is evident that bishops who possess large incomes and great authority win not always possess the same qualities of mind as those spiritual peers who had no distinction to expect except that of being burnt alive. In aU great movements of the mind there can be but one heroic age, and the heroic age of Christianity was past. The church became the state concubine ; Christianity lost its democratic character. The bishops, who should have been the tribunes of the people, became the creatures of the Crown. Their lives were not always of the most creditable kind; but their virtues were per- haps more injurious to society than their vices. The mischief was done, not so much by those who in- trigued for places and rioted on tithes at Constanti- nople, as by those who often with the best intentions endeavored to make all men think alike " according to the law." It was the Christian theory that God was a king, and 250 CHBISTIAN LAW. that he enacted laws for the government of men on earth. Those laws were contained in the Jewish books, but some of them had been repealed, and some of them were exceedingly obscure. Some were to be understood in a hteral sense, others were only meta- phorical. Many cases might arise to which no text or precept could be with any degree of certainty applied. What, then, was to be done ? How was God's wiU to be ascertained? The early Christians were taught that by means of prayer and faith their questions would be answered, their difficulties would be solved. They must pray earnestly to God for help ; and the ideas which came into their heads, after prayer, would be emanations from the Holy Ghost. In the first age of Christianity the church was a re- public. There was no distinction between clergymen and laymen. Each member of the congregation had a right to preach, and each consulted God on his own accoxmt. The spiritus privatus everywhere prevailed. A committee of presbyters or elders, with a bishop or chairman, administered the affairs of the community. The second period was marked by an important change. The bishop and presbyters, though still elect- ed by the congregation, had begun to monopoKze the pulpit ; the distinction of clergy and laity was already made. The bishops of various churches met togethei at councils or synods to discuss questions of discipline and dogma, and to pass laws ; but they went as repre- sentatives of their respective congregations. In the third period the change was more important ettiU. The congregation might now be appropriately termed a flock : the spiritus privatus was extinct ; the priests were possessed of traditions which they did not impart to the laymen; the Water of Life was kept in a OLBBGT AND LAITT. 251 sealed vessel; there was no salvation outside the church ; no man could have God for a father unless he had also the church for a mother, as even Bossuet long afterward declared; excommunication was a sentence of eternal death. Henceforth disputes were only be- tween bishops and bishops, the laymen following their spiritual leaders, and often using material weapons on their behalf. In the synods the bishops now met as princes of their congregations, and imder the influence of the Holy Ghost {spiritu sancto suggerente) issued im- perial decrees. The penalties inflicted were of the most terrible nature to those who believed that heU- fire and purgatory were at the disposal of the priest- hood; while those who entertained doubts upon the subject allowed themselves to be cursed and damned with equanimity. But when the church became united with the state, the secular arm was at its disposal, and was vigorously used. The bishops were all of them ignorant and supersti- tious men, but they could not aU of them think alike. And as it to insure dissent, they proceeded to define that which had never existed, and which, if it had ex- isted, could never be defined. They described the topography of heaven. They dissected the godhead, and expounded the immaculate conception, giving lec- tures on celestial impregnations and miraculous obstet- rics. They not only said that three was one, and that one was three : they professed to explain how that curious arithmetic combination had been brought about. The indivisible had been divided, and yet was not divided; it was divisible, and yet it was indivisible ; black was white, and white was black ; and yet there were not two colors, but one color ; and whoever did not believe it would be damned. In the midst of all 252 FATHER AND SON. this subtle stuJBf, the dregs and rinsings of the Platonie school, Arius thundered out the common-sense but heretical assertion that the Father had existed before the Son. Two great parties were at once formed. A coimcil of bishops was convened at Nice to consult the Holy Ghost. The chair was taken by a man who wore a wig of many colors, and a silken robe embroidered with golden thread. This was Constantino the Great, Patron of Christianity, Nero of the Bosphorus, mur- derer of his wife and son. The discussion was noisy and abusive, and the Arians lost the day. Tet the matter did not end there. Constantius took up the Arian side. Arian missionaries converted the Vandals and the Goths. Other emperors took up the Catholics, and they converted the Franks. The court was divided by spiritual eunuchs and theological intrigues ; the provinces were laid waste by theological wars, which lasted three hundred years. What a world of woe and desolation ; what a deluge of blood, because the Greeks had a taste for metaphysics ! The Arian difference did not stand alone ; every province had its own schism. Caste sympathy induced the emperors to protect the Pagan aristocracy from the fury of the bishops ; but the heretics belonged chiefly to the subject nationalities. The Nestorians were men of the Shemitic race : the Jacobites were Egyptians ; the Donatists were Berbers. Of such a nature was the treatment which these people received, that they were ready at any time to join the enemies of the Empire, whoever they might be. Difference of nationahty oc- casioned difference in mode of thought. Difference in mode of thought occasioned difference in religious creed. Difference in religious creed occasioned contro- versy, riots, and persecution. Persecution intensified THE HEKBIIOS. 253 distinctions of nationality. Sucli, then, was the state of rehgion ia the Grecian world. In the West the church, overwhelmed by the barbarians, was display- ing virtues ia adversity, and was laying the foundations of a majestic kingdom. But as for the East, Chris- tianity had lived in vain. In Constantinople and in Greece it had done no good. In Asia, Barbary, and Egypt it had done harm. Its peace was apathy ; its activity was war. Instead of heahng the old wounds of conquest, it opened them afresh. It was not enough that the peasants of the ancient race, once masters of the soU, should be crushed with taxes ; a new instru- ment of torture was invented ; their priests were taken from them ; their altars were overthrown. But the day of vengeance was at hand. Soon they would enjoy, under rulers of a different religion, but of the same race, that freedom of the conscience which a Christian government refused. The Byzantine Empire in the seventh century in- cluded Greece and the islands, with a part of Italy. In Asia and Africa its possessions were those of the Turkish Empire before the cession of Algiers. There was a Greek viceroy of Egypt ; there were Greek gov- ernors in Egypt and Asia Minor, Carthage, and Cyrene. The capital was fed with Egyptian com, and enriched by silken manufactures, for two Nestorian monks had brought the eggs of the silkwonn from China in hollow canes. These eggs had been hatched under lukewarm dung, and the culture of the cocoon had been establish- ed for the first time on European soil. The eastern boundary of the Empire was sometimes the Tigris, sometimes the Euphrates; the land of Mesopotamia, which lay between the rivers, was the subject of con- tinual war between the Byzantines and the Persians. 254 THE BYZANTINES AND THE PEESIAN8. Alexander the Great had not been long dead before the Parthians, a race of hardy mountaineers, occupied the lands to the east of the Euphrates, made them- selves famous in their wars with Eome, and estaL-lished a wide empire. In the third century it was broken up iato petty principalities, and a private citizen who claimed to be heir-at-law of the old Persian kings headed a party, seized the crown, restored the Zoro- astrian religion, and raised the Empire to a state of power and magnificence scarcely inferior to that of the Great Kings. But the Greeks were still in Asia Minor and Egypt ; and it became the hereditary ambition of the Persians to drive them back into their own country. In the seventh century Chosroes the Second accom- plished this idea, and restored the frontiers of Cambyses and the first Darius. He conquered Asia Minor, Syria, and Egypt. He carried his arms to Gyrene, and ex- tinguished the last glimmer of culture in that ancient colony. HeracHus, the Byzantine Emperor, was in de- spair. While the Persians overran his provinces in Asia, a horde of Cossacks threatened him in Europe. Constantinople, he feared, would soon be surrounded, and it already suffered famine from the loss of Egypt, as Rome had formerly suffered when the Vandals plun- dered it of Africa. He determined to migrate to Carthage, and had already packed up, when the Patri- arch persuaded him to change his mind. He obtained peace from Persia by sending earth and water in the old style, and by promising to pay as tribute a thou- sand talents of gold, a thousand talents of silver, a thousand silk robes, a thousand horses, and a thousand virgins. But instead of collecting these commodities he collected an army, and suddenly dashed into the heart of Persia. Chosroes recalled his troops from the newly ARABIA. 255 conquered lands, but was defeated by the Greeks, and was in his turn compelled to sue for ignominious peace. In the midst of the triumphs which HeracKus celebrated at Constantinople and Jerusalem, an obscure town on the confines of Syria was pillaged by a band of Arab horsemen, who cut in pieces some troops which advanced to its relief. This appeared a trifling event, but it was the commencement of a mighty revolution. In the last eight years of his reign HeracHus lost to the Saracens the provinces which he had recovered from the Persians. The peninsula of Arabia is almost as large as Hia- dostan, but does not contain a single navigable river. It is for the most part a sterile table-land fun'owed by channels which in winter roar with violent and muddy streams, and which in summer are completely dry. In these stream-beds at a little depth below the surface there is sometimes a stratum of water which, breaking out here and there into springs, creates a habitable island ia the waste. Such a fruitful wadi or oasis is some- times extensive enough to form a town, and each town is in itself a kingdom. This stony green-spotted land was divided into Arabia Petrsea on the north, and Ara- bia Deserta on the south. The north supphed Constan- tinople, and the south supplied Persia, with mercenary troops ; the leaders on receiving their pay estabhshed courts at home, and rendered homage to their imperial masters. The princes of Arabia Deserta ruled in the name of the Chosroes. The princes of Arabia Petrssa were proud to be called the lieutenants of the Csesars. In the southwest comer of the peninsula there is a range of hills sufficiently high to intercept the passing clouds, and rain them down as streams to the Indian Ocean and the Ked Sea. This was the land of Yemen or Sabsea, renowned for its groves of frankincense and 256 MEBCHANT PKINOES. for the wealth of its merchant kings. Its forests m ancient times were inhabited by squalid negro tribes who lived on platforms in the trees, and whose savage stupor was ascribed to the drowsy influence of the scented air. The country was afterward colonized by men of the Arab race, who built ships and estabhshed factories on the East Coast of Africa, on the coast of Malabar, and in the island of Ceylon. They did not navigate the Eed Sea, but despatched the India goods, the African ivory and gold dust, and their own fragrant produce by camel caravan to Egypt, or to Petra, a great market city in the north. The Pharaohs and the Persian kings did not inter- fere with the merchant princes of Yemen. In the days of the Ptolemies a few Greek ships made the Indian voyage, but could not compete with the Arabs, who had so long been established in the trade. But the Eoman occupation of Alexandria ruined them com- pletely. The just and moderate government of Augus- tus, and the demand for Oriental luxuries at Eome, excited the enterprise of the Alexandrine traders, and a Greek named Hippalus made a remarkable discovery. He observed that the winds or monsoons of the Indian Ocean regularly blew during six months from east to west, and six months from west to east. He was bold enough to do what the Phoenicians themselves had never done. He left the land, and sailed right across the ocean to the Indian shore with one monsoon, re- turning with the next to the mouth of the Ked Sea. By means of this ocean route the India voyage could be made in half the time, the goods were thereby cheap- ened, the demand was thereby increased, the India Ocean was covered with Greek vessels, a commercial revolution was created, the coasting and caravan trade THE LAND OF REFUQE. 257 of the Arabs came to an end, the Eomans destrojed Aden, and Yemen withered up and remained independ- ent only because it was obscure. Arabia had always been a land of refuge ; for in its terrible deserts security might always be found. To Arabia had fled the Priests of the Sun after the victo- ries of Alexander and the restoration of Babjlonian idolatry. To Arabia had fled thousands of Jews after the second destruction of Jerusalem. To Arabia had fled thousands of Christians who had been persecuted by Pagan, and still more by Christian, emperors. The land was divided among independent princes, many of them were Christians and many of them were Jews. There is nothing more conducive to an enlightened skepticism, and its attendant spirit, toleration, than the spectacle of various religious creeds, each maintained by intelligent and pious men. A king of Arabia, FeUx, in the fourth century, received an embassy from the Byzantine em- peror, with a request that Christians might be allowed to settle ia his kingdom, and also that he would make Christianity the religion of the state. He assented to the first proposition ; with reference to the second, he replied, " I reign over men's bodies, not over their opin- ions. I exact from my subjects obedience to the government ; as to their religious doctrine, the judge of that is the great Creator." But it came to pass that a king of the Jewish per- suasion succeeded to the throne ; he persecuted his Christian subjects, and made war on Christian kings, burning houses, men, and gospels, wherever he could find them. A Christian Arab made his escape, trav- eled to Constantinople, and, holding up a charred testament before the throne, demanded help in the name of the Eedeemer. The emperor al once pre- 258 ABYSSINIA. pared for war, and despatched an envoy to his faithful ally, the Negus of Abyssinia. The old kingdom of Ethiopia had escaped Cambysea and Alexander, and had lost its independence to the Ptolemies only for a time. The Romans made an Abyssinian expedition with complete success, but with- drew from the savage country in disdain. Ethiopia was left to its own devices, which soon became of an Africanizing nature. The priests kept the king shut up in his palace, and, when it suited their convenience, sent him word, in the African style, that he must be tired, and that it would be good for him to sleep; upon which he migrated to the lower world, with his favorite wives and slaves. But there was once a king named Ergamenes, who had improved his mind by the study of Greek philosophy, and who, when he received the message of the priests, soon gave them a proof that they were quite mistaken, and that, so far from being sleepy, he was wide awake. He ordered them to collect in the Golden Chapel, and then, marching in with his guards, he put them all to death. From that time Abyssinia became a military kingdom. As the princes of Numidia had used elephants after the de- struction of the Carthaginian republic, so the Abyssin- ians used them in pageantry and war long after the days of the Ptolemies, who had first shown them how the huge beasts might be entrapped. Hindoos were probably employed by the Ptolemies, as they were by the Carthaginians, for the management of the elephan- tine stud. In the fourth century two shipwrecked Christians converted the king and his people to the new religion — a beneficial event, for thus they were brought into connection with the Roman empire. The Patriarch of Alexandria was the Abyssinian Pope, as he EPISOOPAL SAUTA. 269 is at the present day ; and during all these years he has never ceased to send them their Aboona or Arch- bishop, This ecclesiastic is regarded with much rev- erence ; he costs six thousand dollars ; he is never iiUowed to smoke ; and, by way of blessing, he spits upon his congregation, who believe that the episcopal virtue resides in the saliva, and not, as we think, in the fingers' ends. Abyssinia had still its ancient seaport in Annesley Bay, and sent trading vessels to the India coast. The Byzantine emperor having made his proposals through the Patriarch of Alexandria, and having received from the Negus a favorable reply, despatched a fleet of transports down the Bed Sea ; the king filled them with his brigand troops; Yemen was invaded and subdued, and now it was the Christians who began to persecute. Another Arab prince ran off for help, and he went to the Persian king, who at first refused to take the country as a gift, saying it was too distant and too poor. However, he at last ordered the prisons to be opened, and placed all the able-bodied convicts they contained at the disposal of the prince. The Abyssinians were driven out, but they returned and reconquered the land. Chosroes then sent a regular army with orders to kill aU the men with black skins and curly hair. Thus Yemen became a Persian pro- vince ; and no less than three great religions, that of Zoroaster, that of Moses, and that of Jesus, were rep- resented in Arabia. Midway between Yemen and Egypt is a sandy val- ley two miles in length, surrounded on all sides by naked hiUs. No gardens or fields are to be seen ; no trees, except some low brushwood and the accacia of the desert. On all sides are barren and sunburnt rocks. 260 THE WONDERFUL WELL. But in the midst of this valley is a wonderful well. It is not that the water is unusually cool and sweet ; con- noisseurs pronounce it "heavy" to the taste; but it affords an inexhaustible supply. No matter what quantity may be drawn up, the water in the well remains always at the same height. It is probably fed by a perennial stream below. This valley, on account of its well, was made the halting-place of the India caravans, and there the goods changed carriers — the South dehvered them over to the North. As the North and South were frequently at war, the valley was hallowed with solemn oaths for the protection of the trade. A sanctuary was estabhshed ; the well Zemzem became sacred ; its fame spread ; it was visited from all parts of the land by the diseased and the devout. The tents of the vaUey tribe became a city of importance, enriched by the custom receipts, dues of protection, and the carrier hire of the caravans. When the navigation of the Ked Sea put an end to the carrying trade by land, the city was deserted ; its iohabitants returned to the wander- ing Bedouin Hfe. In the fifth century, however, it was restored by an enterprising man, and the shrine was rebuilt. Mecca was no longer a wealthy town ; it was no longer situated on one of the highways of the world ; but it manufactured a celebrated leather, and sent out two caravans a year — one to Syria, and one to Abyssinia. Some of the Meccans were rich men • Byzantine gold pieces and Persian copper coins circu- lated in abundance; the ladies dressed themselves in silt, had Chinese looking-glasses, wore shoes of per fumed leather, and made themselves odorous of musk. It was the fame of Mecca as a holy place which brought this wealth into the town. The citizens lived THE TKUCE OF GOD. 261 upon the pilgrims. However, they esteemed it a pioua duty to give hospitality, if it was required, to the "guests of God, who came from distant cities on their lean and jaded camels, fatigued and harassed with the dirt and squalor of the way." The poor pil- grims were provided during six days with pottage of meat and bread and dates ; leather cisterns filled with water were also placed at their disposal. During four months of the year there was a Truce of God, and the Arab tribes, suspending their hostilities, journeyed toward Mecca. As soon as they entered the Sacred Valley they put on their palmers' weeds, pro- ceeded at once to the Caaba, or House of God, walked round it naked seven times, kissed the black stone, and drank the waters of the famous well. Then a kiud of Eisteddfod was held. The young men com- bated iu martial games ; poems were recited, and those which gained the prize were copied with illuminated characters, and hung up on the Caaba before the golden-plated door. There was no regular government in the holy city, no laws that could be enforced, no compulsory courts of justice, and no pubhc treasury. The city was com- posed of several families or clans belonging to the tribe of the Corayshites, by whom New Mecca had been founded. Each family inhabited a cluster of houses siirrounding a courtyard and well, the whole inclosed by sohd walls. Each family was able to go to war, and to sustain a siege. If a murder was com- mitted, the injured family took the law into its own hands ; sometimes it would accept a pecuniary com- pensation — there was a regular tariff — but more fre- quently the money was refused. They had a belief that, if blood was not avenged by blood, a small winged 262 MEOOA. insect issued from the skull of the murdered person, and fled screeching through the sky. It was also a point of honor on the part of the guilty clan to protect the murderer, and to adopt his cause. Thus blood feuds arose easily, and died hard. The head of the family was a despot, and enjoyed the power of life and death over the members of his own house. But he had also severe responsibilities. It was his duty to protect those who dwelt within the circle of his yard ; aU its imnates called hiTin " Father ; " to all of them he owed the duties of a parent. If his son was little better than a slave, on the other hand his slave was almost equal to a son. It sometimes hap- pened that masterless men, travelers, or outcasts, required his protection. If it was granted, the stranger entered the family, and the father was accoimtable for his debts, dehcts, and torts. The body of the delta- quent might be tendered ia Keu of fine or feud, but this practice was condemned by pubKc opinion ; and, in all semi-savage communities, public opinion has con- siderable power. There was a town-haU, in which councils were held to discuss questions relating to the common welfare of the federated families ; but the minority were not boimd by the voice of the majority. If, for instance, it was decided to make war, a single family could hold aloof. In this town-hall marriages were celebrated, circum- cisions were performed, and young girls were invested with the dress of womanhood. It was the starting place of the mihtia and the caravans. It was near the Caaba, and opened toward it : in Mecca the church was closely united to the state. Throughout all time, Mecca had preserved its inde- pendence and its reUgion ; the ancient idolatry had THE HOUSE OF OOD. 263 there a sacred home. The Meccans recognized a single Creator, AUah Taala, the Most High God, whom Abra- ham, and others before Abraham, had adored. But they believed that the stars were live beings, daughters of the Deity, who acted as intercessors on behaK of men ; and to propitiate their favor, idols were made to represent them. Within the Caaba, or around it, were also images of foreign deities and of celebrated men ; a picture of Mary with the child Jesus in her lap was painted on a column, and a portrait of Abraham, with a bundle of divining arrows in his hands, upon the wall. Among the Meccans, there were many who regarded that idolatry with abhorrence and contempt ; yet to that idolatry their town owed all that it possessed, its wealth and its glory, which extended round a cres- cent of a thousand miles. They were therefore obKged, as good citizens, to content themselves with seeking a simpler reKgion for themselves, and those who did pro- test against the Caaba gods were persuaded to silence by their families, or, if they would not be silent, were banished from the town, under penalty of death if they returned. But there rose up a man whose convictions were too strong to be hushed by the love of family or to be quelled by the fear of death. Partly owing to his age and dignified position and unblemished name, partly owing to the chivalrous nature of his Patriarch or Pa- tron, he was protected agaiust his enemies, his life was saved. Had there been a government at Mecca, he would unquestionably have been put to death ; and as it was, he narrowly escaped. Mahomet was a poor lad subject to a nervous disease which made him at first unfit for anything except the despised occupation of the shepherd. When he grew MAHOMET. up he became a commercial traveler, acted as agent for a rich widow, twenty-five years older than himself and obtained her hand. They Hved happily together for many years; they were both of them exceedingly religious people, and in the Khamadan, a month held sacred by the ancient Arabs, they used to live in a cave outside the town, passing the time in prayer and medi- tation. The disease of his childhood returned upon him in his middle age ; it affected his mind ia a strange man- ner, and produced illusions on the senses. He thought he was haunted, that his body was the house of an evil spirit. " I see a light," he said to his wife, " and I hear a sound. I fear that I am one of the possessed." This idea was most distressing to a pious man. He be- came pale and haggard, he wandered about on the hiU near Mecca, crying out to God for help. More than once he drew near the edge of a cliff, and was tempted to hurl himself down, and so put an end to his misery at once. And then a new idea possessed his mind. He Hved much in the open air, gazing on the stars, watching the dry ground grow green beneath the gentle rain, survey- ing the firmly rooted mountains, and the broad, ex- panded plain ; he pondered also on the rehgious legends of the Jews, which he had heard related on his journeys, at noonday beneath the palm tree by the well mouth, at night by the camp fire; and as he looked and thought, the darkness was dispelled, the clouds dis- persed, and the vision of God in soMtary grandeur rose up within his mind ; and there came upon him an im- pulse to speak to God, there came upon him a belief that he was a messenger of God sent on earth to restore the reUgion of Abraham, which the Pagan Arabs had tiEOErvES ms mission. 265 polluted with their idolatry, the Christians hi making Jesus a divinity, the Jews in corrupting their holy books. In the brain of a poet stanzas will sometimes arise fully formed without a conscious effort of the will, as once happened to Coleridge in a dream ; and so into Mahomet's half-di'eaming mind there flew golden- wing- ed verses, echoing to one another in harmonious sound. At the same time he heard a Voice ; and sometimes he saw a human figure ; and sometimes he felt a noise in his ears like the tinkling of bells, or a low deep hum, as if bees were swarming round his head. At this period of his life, every chapter of the Koran was de- livered, in throes of pain. The paroxysm was preceded by depression of spirits ; his face became clouded ; his extremities turned cold ; he shook like a man in an ague, and called for a covering. His face assumed an ex- pression horrible to see ; the vein between his eyebrows became distended ; his eyes were fixed ; his head moved to and fro, as if he were conversing ; and then he gave forth the oracle or sudra. Sometimes he would fall, like a man intoxicated, to the ground ; but the ordinary conclusion of the fit was a profuse perspiration, by which he appeared to be relieved. His sufferings were at times unusually severe ; he used often to speak of the three terrific sudras which had given him grey hairs. His friends were alarmed at Ms state of mind. Some ascribed it to the eccentricities of poetical genius; others declared that he was possessed of an evil spirit ; others said he was insane. When he began to preach against the idols of the Caaba, the practice of female in- fanticide, and other evil customs of the town ; when he declared that there was no divine being but God, and that he was the messenger of God; when he related 266 PEEAOHES. the ancient legends of the prophets, which he said had been told hJTn by the angel Gabriel, there was a general outburst of merriment and scorn. They said he had picked it all up from a Christian who kept a jeweler's shop in the town. They requested him to perform miracles ; the poets composed comic ballads, which the people sang when he began to preach; the women pointed at him with the finger ; it became an amuse- ment of the children to pelt Mahomet. This was per- haps the hardest season of his hfe; ridicule is the most terrible of all weapons. But his wife encouraged him to persevere, and so did the Voice, which came to hiTn and sang : " By the brightness of the mom that rises, and by the darkness of the night that descends, thy God hath not forsaken thee, Mahomet. For know that there is a life beyond the grave, and it will be better for thee than thy present life ; and thy Lord wiU give thee a rich reward. Did he not find thee an orphan, and did he not care for thee ? Did he not find thee wandering in error, and hath he not guided thee to truth? Did he not find thee needy, and hath he not enriched thee? Wherefore oppress not the orphan, neither repulse the beggar, but declare the goodness of the Lord." This Voice was the echo of Mahomet's conscience, and the expression of his ideas. Owing to his peculiar constitution, his thoughts became audible as soon as they became intense. So long as his mind remained pure, the Voice was that of a good angel ; when after- ward guilty wishes entered his heart, the voice became that of Mephistopheles. Mahomet's family did not accept his mission ; his converts were at first chiefiy made among the slaves. But soon these converts became so numerous among THE PRICE OF BLOOD. 267 all classes that the Meccans ceased to ridioule Mahomet, and began to hate him. Nor did he attempt to in- gratiate himself in their affections. "He called the living, fools; the dead, denizens of hell-fire." The heade of families took counsel together. They went to Abu Talib, the Patriarch of the house to vehich Mahomet belonged, and offered the price of blood, and then double the price of blood, and then a stalwart young man, for Mahomet's life, and then, being always refused, went off, declaring that there would be • war. Abu Talib adjured Mahomet not to ruin the family. The prophet's hp quivered ; he burst into tears ; but he said he must go on. Abu Tahb hinted that his protection might be withdrawn. Then Mahomet declared that if the sun came down on his right hand, and the moon on his left, he would not swerve from the work which God had given him to do. Abu Talib, finding him in- flexible, assured him that his protection should never be withdravTn. In the meantime, the patriarchs re- turned and said, "What is it that you want, Mahomet? Do you wish for riches ? we will make you rich. Do you wish for honor ? we vsoU make you the mayor of the town. Mahomet rephed with a chapter of the Koran. They then assembled in the town-hall, and entered into a solemn league and covenant, to keep apart from the family of Abu Tahb. It was sent to Coventry. None would buy with them nor sell with them, eat with them nor drink with them. This lasted for three years; but when as people passed by the house they heard the cries of the starving children from behind the walls, they relented, and sold them grain. There was one member of the family, Abu Laheb, who withdrew from it at that juncture, and became Mai Dmet'a most inveterate foe 268 MORE, GIVE ME MORE. Each family agreed also to punish its own Mahomet- ans. Many were exposed to the glow of the mid-day sun on the scorching gravel outside the town, and to the torments of thirst. A mulatto slave was tortured by a great stone being placed on his chest, during which he cried out continually, "There is only one God ! There is only one God ! " Mahomet recommended his disciples to escape to Abyssinia, " a land of righteous- ness, a land where none were wronged." They were Idndly received by the Negus, who refused to give them up in spite of the envoys with presents of red leather who were sent to him from Mecca with that request. During the period of the sacred month, Mahomet used often to visit the encampments of the pilgrims outside the town. He announced to them his mission, he preached on the unity of God, and on the terrors of the judgment-day. " God has no daughters," said he, "for how can he have daughters when he has no spouse? He begetteth not, neither is he begotten. There is none but he. O beware, ye idolaters, of the time that is to come, when the sun shall be folded up, when the stars shall fall, when the mountains shall be made to pass away, when the children's hair shall grow white with anguish, when souls Kke locust swarms shall rise from their graves, when the girl who hath been buried ahve shall be asked for what crime she was put to death, when the books shall be laid open, when every soul shall know what it hath wrought. O the striking ! the striking ! when men shall be scattered as moths in the wind. And then Allah shall cry to Hell, Art thou JiUedfiM? And Hell shall cry to Allah, JHore, give me more/" But there followed him everywhere a squint-eyed man, fat, with flowing locks on both sides of his head, THE HEOIRA. and clothed in raiment of fine Aden stu£f. When Mahomet had finished his sermon, he wotdd say, "This fellow's object is to draw you away from the gods to his fanciful ideas; wherefore, foUow him not, O my brothers, neither listen to him." And who should this be but his uncle, Abu Lahebl Where- upon the strangers would reply. Your own kinsmen ought to know you best. Why do they not beHeve you, if what you say is true ? In return for these kind offices, Mahomet promised his uncle that he should go down to be burned in flaming fire, and that his wife should go too, bearing a load of wood, with a cord of twisted palm fibres roimd her neck. And now two great sorrows fell upon Mahomet. He lost almost at the same time his beloved wife, and the noble-hearted parent of his clan. The successor of Abu Tahb continued the protection, yet Mahomet felt in- secure. His religion also made but small progress. The fact is that he failed at Mecca as Jesus had failed at Jerusalem. He had made a few ardent disciples, who spent the day at his feet, or in reading snatches of the Koran, scrawled on date-leaves, shoulder-blades of sheep, camel-bones, scraps of parchment, or tablets of smooth white stone. But he had not so much as shaken the ruling idolatry, which was firmly based on custom and self-interest. No doubt his disciples would in course of time have diffused his religion throughout Arabia. Islam was formed; Islam was alive; but Mahomet himself would never have witnessed its triumph had it not been for a curious accident which now occurred. The Arabs belonging to that city which was afterward called Medina had conquered a tribe of Jews. These had consoled themselves for the bitter- ness of their defeat by declaring that a great prophet, 270 THE GENTLE PEOPHBT. the Messiah, would soon appear, and would ayenge them upon aU their foes. The Arabs believed them and trembled, for they stood in great dread of the book which the Jews possessed, and which they supposed to be a magical composition. So when certain pilgrims from Medina heard Mahomet announce that he was a messenger from God, they took it for granted that he was the man, and determined to steal a march upon the Jews by securing him for themselves. At their re- quest he sent a missionary to Medina ; the townsmen were converted, and invited him to come and hve among them. In a dark ravine near Mecca, at the midnight hour, his Patriarch, or Father, delivered him solemnly into their hands. Mahomet was now no longer a citizen of Mecca; he was no longer "protected;" he had changed his nationality; and he was hunted hke a deer before he arrived safely in his new home. Had Mahomet been killed in that celebrated flight, he would have been classed by historians among the glori- ous martyrs and the gentle saints. His character be- fore the Hegira resembled the character of Jesus. In both of them we find the same bUnd insanity, com- pounded of loyalty to God, love for man, and inordinate self-conceit ; both subject to savage fits of wrath, and, having no weapons but their tongues, consigning souls by wholesale to heU-fire. Both also humbling them- selves before God, preaching the rehgion of the heart, leading pure, unblemished lives, devoting themselves to a noble cause, uttering maxims of charity and love at strange variance with their occasional invectives. Of the Hfe of Jesus it is needless to speak ; if he had any vices, they have not been recorded. But the conduct of Mahomet at Mecca was apparently not less pure. He was married to an old woman ; polygamy was a cus- THE GOSPEL or THE SWORD. 271 torn of the land ; his passions were starong, as Was after- ward too plainly shown, yet he did not take a second wife as long as his dear Khadijah was alive. He nev- er frequented the wine-shop, or looked at the dancing- girls, or talked abroad in the bazaars. • He was more modest than a virgin behind the curtain. When he met children, he would stop and pat their cheeks ; he followed the bier that passed hini in the street ; he visited the sick ; he was kind to his inferiors ; he would accept the invitation of a slave to dinner ; he was never the first to withdraw his hand when he shook hands ; he was humble, gentle and kind ; he waited always on himself, mending his own clothes, milking his own goats ; he never struck any one in his life. When once asked to curse some one, he said, " I have not been sent to curse, but to be a mercy to mankind." He reproached himself in the Koran for having behaved unkindly to a beggar, and so immortalized his own offense. He is- sued a text, " Use no violence in religion." But this text, with many others, he afterward ex- punged. When he arrived at Medina, he found himseU at the head of a small army, and he began to publish his gospel of the sword. Henceforth we may admire the statesman or the general ; the prophet is no more. It will hence be inferred that Mahomet was hypocriti- cal, or at least inconstant. But he was constant through- out his nfe to the one object which he had in view, the spread of his religion. At Mecca it could best be spread by means of the gentle virtues ; he therefore ordered hss disciples to abstain from violence, which would on- ly do them harm. At Medina he saw that the Caaba idolatry could not be destroyed except by force ; he therefore felt it his duty to make use of force. He obeyed his conscience both at Mecca and Medina ; for 272 ACHIEVEMENTS OF MAHOMET. the conscience is merely an organ of the intellect, and is altered, improTed or vitiated, according to the educa- tion which it receives and the incidents which act upon it. And now Mahomet's gloiy expanded, and at the same time his virtue declined. He broke the Truce ol God ; he was not always true to his plighted word. As Moses forbade the Israelites to marry with the Pa- gans, and then took unto himseK an Ethiopian wife, so Mahomet broke his own marriage laws, commencing the career of a voluptuary at fifty years of age. His Koran sudras were now official manifestos, legal regula- tions, delivered in an extravagant and stilted style, dif- fering much from that of his fervid oracles at Mecca. But whatever may have been his private defects, when we regard him as a ruler and lawgiver we can only won- der and admire. He established for the first time in history a United Arabia. In the moral life of his coun- trymen he effected a remarkable reform. He abolished drunkenness and gambling, vices to which the Arabs had been specially addicted. He abolished the prac- tice of infanticide, and also succeeded in rendering its memory detestable. It is said that Oumar, the fierce apostle of Islam, shed but one tear in his life, and that was when he remembered how, in the days of dark- ness, his child had beat the dust off his beard Mith her little hand as he was laying her in the grave. Polyga- my and slavery he did not prohibit ; but whatever laws he made respecting women and slaves were made with the view of improving their condition. He removed that facility of divorce by means of which an Arab could at any time repudiate his wife ; he enacted that no Most lem should be made a slave, that the children of a slave girl by her master should be free. Instead of re- pining that Mahomet did no more, we have reason tc EMPIEE OF THE CALIPHS. 273 be astonished tliat he did so much. His career is the best example that can be given of the influence of the Individual in human history. That single man created the glory of his nation, and spread his language over haK the earth. The words which he preached to jeer- ing crowds twelve hundred years ago are now being studied by scholars or by devotees in London and Paris and Berlin ; in Mecca, where he labored ; in Medina, where he died ; in Constantinople, in Cairo, in Fez, in Timbuctoo, in Jerusalem, in Damascus, in Bassora, in Bagdad, in Bokhara, in Cabul, in Calcutta, in Pekin ; in the steppes of Central Asia, in the islands of the Indian Archipelago, in lands which are as yet unmarked up- on our maps, in the oases of thirsty deserts, in obscure villages situated by unknown streams. It was Mahom- et who did all this, for he uttered the book which car- ried the language, and he prepared the army which carried the book. His disciples and successors were not mad fanatics, but resolute and sagacious men, who made shrewd friendship with the malcontent Christians among the Greeks, and with the persecuted Jews in Spain, and who in a few years created an empire which extended from the Pyrenees to the Hindoo Koosh. This empire, it is true, was soon divided, and soon became weak in aU its parts. The Arabs could con- quer, but they could not govern. Separate sovereign- ties or caliphates were established in Babylonia, Egypt, and Spain; while provinces, such as Morocco or Bokhara, frequently obtained independence by rebel- lion. It is needless to describe at length the history of the caliphs and their successors ; it is only the twice- told tale of the Euphrates and the Nile. The caliphs were at first Commanders of the Faithful in reality; but they were soon degraded, both in Cairo and Bagdad, 274 THE DAEK CONTINENT. to the position of the Roman Pope at the present time. The Government was seized by the Prsstorian Guards, who, in Bagdad, were descended from Turk- ish prisoners or negroes imported from Zanzibar ; and in Egypt from Mamelukes or European slaves, brought in their boyhood from the wild countries surrounding the Black Sea, trained up from tender years to the practice of arms, the sons of Christian parents, but branded with a cross on the soles of their feet, that they might never cease to tread upon the emblem of their native creed. However, by means of the Arab conquest, the East was united as it had never been before. The Euphrates was no longer a Hue of partition betwen two worlds. Arab traders established their factories on both sides of the Indian Ocean and along the Asiatic shores of the Pacific. Men from aU countries met at Mecca once a year. The religion of the Arabs conquered nations whom the Arabs themselves had never seen. When the Mahometan Turks of Central Asia took Constantinople, and reduced the caJiphates to prov- inces, although the people of Mahomet were driven back to their wilderness, the strength and glory of his religion was increased. In the same manner the conquest of Hindostan was an achievement of Islam, in which the Arabs bore no part ; and in Africa also we shall find that the Koran reigns over extensive regions which the Arabs visit only as travelers and merchants. Once upon a time, Morocco and Spain were one country, and Eui'ope extended to the Atlas mountains, which stood upon the shores of a great salt sea. Beyond that ocean, to the south, lay the Dark Conti- nent, surrounded on aU sides by water, except on the northeast, where it was joined to Asia near Aden by THE OKEAT PLATEAU. 2 1 > an isthmus. A geological revolution converted the African ocean into a sandy plain, and the straits of Bab-el-Mandeb and Gibraltar were torn open by the retreating waves. But the Sahara, though no longer under water, is stiU in reality a sea; the true Africa commences on its southern coast, and is entirely dis- tinct from the European-like countries between the Mediterranean and the Atlas, and from the strip of garden-land which is cast down every year in the desert by the Nile. The Black Africa, or Soudan, is a gigantic table-land ; its sides are built of granite mountains, which surround it with a parapet or brim, and which send down rivers on the outside toward the sea, on the inside into the plateau. The outside rivers are brief and swift; the inside rivers are long and sluggish in their course, winding in all directions, collecting into enormous lakes, and sometimes flowing forth through gaps in the parapet to the Sahara or the sea. A table-land is seldom so uniform and smooth as the word denotes. The African plateau is inter- sected by mountain ranges and ravines, juts into vol- canic isolated cones, varies much in its cHmate, its as- pect, its productions, and in its altitude above the sea. It may be divided into platforms or river basins which are true geographical provinces, and each of which should be labeled with the names of its explorers. There is the platform of Abyssinia, which belongs to Bruce; the platform of tlie White Nile, including the lakes of Burton (Tanganyika), of Speke (Victoria Nyanza), and of Baker (Albert Nyanza) ; the platform of the Zambezi, with its lakes Nyassa and Ngami, dis- covered by Livingstone, the greatest of African explor- ers ; the pla^orm of the Congo, including the regions of Western Equatorial Africa, hitherto unexplored; the 276 THE iFBlCANS. platform of South Africa (below 20°S.), which enjoys an Australian climate, and also Australian wealth in its treasure-fiUed mountains and its wool-abounding plains ; and lastly, the platform of the Niger, which deserves a place, as wiU be shown, iu universal history. The dis- coverers of the Niger in its upper parts are Park (who first saw the Niger), CaiUie, and myself ; m its centi-al and eastern parts, Laiag, who first reached Timbuctoo ; Caillie, who first returned from it; Denham, Olapperton, Lander, and Barth. The original inhabitants of Africa were the Hotten- tots, or Bushmen, a dwarfish race who have restless, rambling, ape-like eyes, a click in their speech, and bodies which are the wonder of anatomists. They are now found only on the South African platform, or perhaps here and there on the platform of the Congo. They have been driven southward by the negroes, as the Esquimaux in America were driven north by the Bed Indians, and the Finns in Europe by the Celtic tribes, while the negroes themselves have yielded in some parts of Africa to Asiatic tribes, as the Celts in Gaul and Britain yielded to the Germans. These negroes are sometimes of so deep a brown that the sldn appears to be quite black ; sometimes their skin is as light as a mulatto's ; the average tint is a rich deep bronze. Their eyes are dark, though blue eyes are occasionally seen ; their hair is black, though sometimes of a rusty red, and is always of a wooUy texture. To this rule there are no exceptions ; it is the one constant character, the one infallible sign, by which the race may be detected. Their lips are not invariably thick ; their noses are frequently well formed. In physical appearance they differ widely from one another. The inhabitants of the swamps, the dark forests, and NEGEO PHYSIQUE. 277 the mountains, are flat-nosed, long-armed, thia-calved, with mouths like muzzles, broad splay feet, and pro- jecting heels. It was for the most part from this class that the American slave markets were supplied; the negroes of the States and the "West Indies represent the African in the same manner as the people of the Pontine marshes represent the inhabitants of Italy. The negroes of South Africa stand at the opposite ex- treme. Enjoying an excellent climate and a wholesome supply of food, they are superior to most other people of their race. Yet it is certain that they are negroes, for they have wooUy hair, and they do not differ in language or manners fi-om the inhabitants of the other platforms. When the Portuguese first traded on the African coasts, they gave the name Caffres (or Pagans) to the negroes of Guinea as well as to those of the Cape and the Mozambique. It is quite an accident that the name has been retained for the latter tribes alone ; yet such is the power of a name, that the CafEres and negroes are universally supposed to be distinct. It is impossible, however, to draw any line between the two. Pure negroes are born on the coast of Guinea and in the interior with complexions as Ught, with limbs as symmetrical, and with features as near to the European standard, as can be fotmd in aU Gaffraria. Between the hideous beings of the Nile and Niger deltas and the robust shepherds of the south, or the aristocratic chieftains of the west, there is a wide difference, no doubt, but the intermediate gradations exist. There is also much variety among the negroes in respect to manners, mental condition, political government, and mode of life. Some tribes live only on the fruit of net and spear, eked out with insects, and berries, and shells. Property is ill-defined among them ; if a man makes a 278 NEGRO STATES canoe, the otliers use it when they please ; if he bnilds a better houfie than his neighbors, they pull it down. Others, though stiU in the hunting condition, have gar- dens of plantains and cassada. In this condition the head man of the village has little power, but property is secured by law. Other tribes are pastoral, and resemble the Arabs in their laws and customs; the patriarchal system prevails among them. There are regions in which the federal system prevails; many villages are leagued together ; and the head men, act- ing as deputies of their respective boroughs, meet in congress to debate questions of foreign policy, and to enact laws. Large empires exist in the Soudan. In some of these the king is a despot, who possesses a a powerful body-guard, equivalent to a standing army, a court, with its regulations of etiquette, and a well- ordered system of patronage and surveillance. In others he is merely an instrument in the hands of priests or military nobles, and is kept concealed, giving audience from behind a curtain to excite the veneration of the vulgar. There are also thousands of large walled cities resembling those of Europe in the Middle Ages, or of ancient Greece, or of Italy before the supremacy of Rome, encircled by pastures and by arable estates, and by farming villages, to which the citizens repair at the harvest time to superintend the labor of their slaves. But such cities, with their villeggiatura, their municipal government, their agora, or forum, then fortified houses, their feuds and street frays of Capulet and Montague, are not indigenous in Africa; their existence is comparatively modem, and is due to the influence of Religion. An African village (old style) is usually a street of huts, with walls like hurdles, and the thatch projecting THE AFEICAN HDl. 279 BO that its owner ma,j sit beneath it in sun or rain. The door is low ; one has to crawl ia order to go in. There are no windows ; the house is a single room. In its midst bums a fire which is never suffered to go out, for it is a Hght in darkness, a servant, a companion, and a guardian angel ; it purifies the miasmatic air. The roof and walls are smoke-dried, but clean ; ia one cor- ner is a pile of wood neatly cut up into billets, and in another is a large earthen jar filled with water, on which floats a gourd or calabash, a vegetable bowl. Spears, bows, quivers, and nets hang from pegs upon the walls. Let us suppose that it is night : four or five black forms are lying ia a circle with their feet toward the fire, and two dogs with pricked-up ears creep close to the ashes, which are becoming gray and cold. The day dawns; a dim light appears through the crevices and crannies of the walls. The sleepers rise and roU up their mats, which are their beds, and place on one side the round logs of wood which are their piUows. The man takes down his bow and arrows from the wall, fastens wooden rattles round his dogs' necks, and goes out into the bush. The women replen- ish the fire, and lift up an inverted basket whence sally forth a hen and her chickens, which make at once for the open door to find their daily bread for themselves outside. The women take hoes, and go to the planta- tion, or they take pitchers to fill at the brook. They wear round the waist, before and behind, two httle aprons made from a certain bark, soaked and beaten until it is as flexible as leather. Every man has a plan- tation of these cloth trees round his hut. The unmarried girls wear no clothes at all ; but they are allowed to decorate themselves with bracelets and anklets of iron, flowers ia their ears, necklaces of red berries like coral 280 THE CALM. girdles of white shells, hair oUed and padded out with the chignon, and sometimes white ashes along the parting. The ladies fill their pitchers, and take their morniag bath, discussing the merits or demerits of their hus- bands. The air is damp and cold, and the trees and grass are heavy with dew ; but presently the sun begins to shine, the dewdrops fall, heavy and large as drops of rain; the birds chirp; the flowers expand their drowsy leaves, and receive the morning calls of butter- flies and bees. The forest begins to buzz and hum like a great factory awaking to its work. When the sun is high, boys come from the bush with vegetable bottles frothing over with palm wine. The cellar of the African, and his glass and china shop, and his clothing warehouse, are in the trees. In the midst of the village is a kind of shed, a roof supported on bare poles. It is the palaver-house, in which at this hour the old men sit, and debate the affairs of state or decide law suits, each orator holding a spear when he is speaking, and planting it in the ground before him as he resumes his seat. Oratory is the African's one fine art : his deUvery is fluent ; his harangues, though diffuse, are adorned with phrases of wild poetry. That building is also the clubhouse of the elders, and there, when business is over, they pass the heat of the day, seated on logs which are smooth and shiny from use. At the hour of noon their wives or children bring them palm wine, and present it on their knees, clapping their hands in token of respect. And then all is stiU ; it is the hour of silence and tranquility; the hour which the Portuguese call the calm. The sun sits en- throned on the summit of the sky ; its white light is poured upon the earth ; the straw thatch shines like snow. The forest is silent ; all nature sleeps. THE DANOE. 281 Then down, down, down sinks the sun, and its raya shoot slantwise through the trees. The hunters return, and their friends run out and greet them as if they had been gone for years, murmuring to them in a kind of baby language, caUing them by their names of love, shaking their right hands, caressing their faces, patting them upon their breasts, embracing them in aU ways ex- cept with the hps, for the kiss is unknown among the Africans. And so they toy and babble and laugh with one another till the sun turns red, and the air turns dusky, and the giant trees cast deep shadows across the street. Strange perfumes arise from the earth ; fireflies sparkle ; gray parrots come forth from the forest, and fly screaming round, intending to roost in the neighbor- hood of man. The women bring their husbands the gourd-dish of boiled plantains or bush-yams, made hot with red pepper, seasoned with fish or venison sauce. And when this simple meal is ended, boom ! boom ! goes the big drum ; the sweet reed fiute pipes forth ; the girls and lads begin to sing. In a broad clean- swept place they gather together, jumping up and down with glee ; the young men form in one row, the women in another, and dance in two long hnes, retreating and advancing with graceful imdulations of their bodies, and arms waving in the air. And now there is a squealing, wailing, unearthly sound, and out of the wood, with a hop, skip, and jump, comes Mumbo Jumbo, a hideous mask on his face and a scourge in his hand. Woe to the wife who would not cook her husband's dinner, or who gave him saucy words ; for Mumbo Jumbo is the censor of female morals. WeU the guilty ones know him as they run screaming to their huts. Then again the dance goes on, and if there is a moon it does not cease throughout the night. 282 AN AFKICAN CROCKFOBD'S. Such is the picturesque part of savage life. But it is not savage life ; it merely hes upon the surface as paint lies upon the skin. Let us take a walk through that same village on another day. Here, in a hut, is a young man with one leg in the stocks, and with his right hand bound to his neck by a cord. The palm wine, and the midnight dance, and the furtive caresses of Asua over- powered his discretion ; he was detected, and now he is " put in log," If his relatives do not pay the fine, he will be sold as a slave ; or if there is no demand for slaves in that country, he will be killed. Has friends reprove him for trying to steal what the husband was willing to sell ; and might he not have guessed that Asua was a decoy ? Another day the palaver-house has the aspect of a Crockford's. An old man, who is one of the village grandees, is spinning nuts for high stakes, and has drank too much to see that he is overmatched. He loses his mats, his weapons, his goats, and his fowls, his plantation, liis house, his slaves whom he took prisoners in his young and warlike days, his wives, and his children, and his aged mother who fed him at her breast — all are lost, all are gone. And then, with flushed eyes and trembling hand, he begins to gamble for himseK. He stakes his right leg, and loses it. He may not move it until he has won it back, or untU it is redeemed. He loses both legs ; he stakes his body, and loses that also, and becomes a bond-servant, or ji sold as a slave. Let us give another scene. A young man of family has died ; the whole village is convulsed with grief and fear. It does not appear natural to them that a man should die before he has grown old. Some malignant power is at work among them. Is it an evil spiiit whom THE ORDEAL. 283 they have unwittingly offended, and who is takiag its revenge, or is it a witch ? The great fetich-man has been sent for, and soon he arrives, followed by his dis- ciples. He wears a cap waving with feathers, and a party-colored garment covered with charms ; horns of gazelles, shells of snails, and a piece of leopard's liver wrapped up in the leaves of a poison-giving tree. His face is stained with the white juice from a dead man's Drain. He rings an iron bell as he enters the town, and at the same time the dnun begins to beat. The drum has its language, so that those who are distant from the village understand what it is saying. With short, lively sounds it summons to the dance ; it thun- ders forth the alarm of fire or war, loudly and quickly, with no interval between the beats ; and now it tolls the hour of judgment and the day of death. The fetioh- man examines the dead man, and says it is the work of a witch. He casts lots with knotted cords ; he mutters incantations ; he passes roimd the villagers, and points out the guilty person, who is usually some old woman whom popular opinion has previously suspected and is ready to condemn. She is, however, allowed the bene- fit of an ordeal : a gourd fiUed vnth tTie red boater is given her to drink. If she be innocent, it acts as an emetic; if she be guilty, it makes her fall senseless to the ground. She is then put to death with a variety of tor- tures : burnt alive, or torn Hmb from limb ; tied on the beach at low water to be drowned by the rising tide ; rubbed with honey and laid out in the sun ; or buried in an ant-hiU, the most horrible death of all. These examples are sufficient to show that the lite of the savage is not a happy one ; and the existence of each clan or tribe is precarious in the extreme. They are hke the wild animals, engaged from day to night in 284 THE MOSIiEai NEGBO. seeking food, and ever watchful against the foes bj whom they are surrounded. The men who go out hunt- ing, the girls who go with their pitchers to the village brook, are never sure that they will return ; for there is always war with some neighboring village, and their method of making war is by ambuscade. But besides these real and ordinary dangers, the savage believes himself to be encompassed by evil spirits, who may at any moment spring upon him in the guise of a leopard, or cast down upon him the dead branch of a tree. In order to propitiate, these invisible beings, his life is en- tangled with intricate rites ; it is turned this way and that way as oracles are delivered, or as omens appear. It is impossible to describe, or even to imagine, the tremulous condition of the savage mind ; yet the trav- eler can see from their aspect and manners that they dwell in a state of never-ceasing dread. Let us now suppose that a hundred years have passed, and let us visit that village again. The place itself, and the whole country around, has been trans- formed. The forest has disappeared, and in its stead are fields covered with the glossy blades of the young rice ; with the tall red tufted maize, with the millet and the Guinea corn ; with the yellow flowers of the tobacco plant, growing in wide fields ; and with large shrub- beries of cotton, the snowy wool peeping forth from the expanding leaves. Before us stands a great town surrounded by walls of red clay, flanked by towers, and with heavy wooden gates. Day dawns, and the women come forth to the brook decorously dressed in blue cotton robes passed over the hair as a hood. Men ride forth on horseback, wearing white turbans, and swords suspended on their right shoulders by a crimson sash. They are the tmmised descendants of the forest THE SCHOOL. 286 savage ; their faces are those of pure negroes, but the expression is not the same. Their manners are grave and composed'; they salute one another, saying in the Arabic, " Peace be with you." The palaver-house or town-hall is also the mosque; the parliamentary de- bates and the law trials, which are there held, have all the dignity of a rehgious service ; they are opened with prayer, and the name of the Creator is often solemnly invoked by the orator or advocate, while all the elders touch their foreheads with their hands, and murmur in response, Amina ! Amina ! (Amen, Amen). The town is pervaded by a bovine smell, sweet to the nostrils of those who have traveled long in the beefless lands of the people of the forest. Sounds of industry may also be heard ; not only the clinking of the black- smith's hammer, but also the rattHng of the loom, the thumping of the clothmaker, and the song of the cord- wainer as he sits cross-legged making saddles or shoes. The women, with bow, and distaff, and spindle, are turning the soft tree wool into thread ; the work in the fields is done by slaves. The elders smoke or take snuff in their verandas, and sometimes study a page of the Koran. When the evening draws on there is no sound of flute and drum. A bonfire of brushwood is lighted in the market-place, and the boys of the town collect around it with wooden boards in their hands, and bawl their lessons, swaying their bodies to and fro, by which movement they imagine the memory is assist- ed. Then rises a long, loud, harmonious cry, " Come to prayers, come to prayers. Come to security. God is great. He Hveth,and he dieth not. Come to prayera O thou Bountiful!" La ilah ilia Allah . Mohammed Basal Allah. Allahu Akbaru. Allahn Akbar. 286 KORAN LAW. Such towns as these may be less interesting to the traveler than the Pagan villages ; he finds them merely a secondhand copy of Eastern hfe. But though they are not so picturesque, their inhabitants are happier and better men. Violent and dishonest deeds are no longer arranged by pecuniary compensation. Hus- bands can no longer set wife-traps for their friends ; adultery is treated as a criminal offense. Men can no longer squander away their relatives at the gaming ta- ble, and stake their own bodies on a throw. Men can no longer be tempted to vice and crime imder the in- fluence of palm wine. Women can no longer be married by a great chief in herds, and treated Kke beasts of burden and lite slaves. Each wife has an equal part of her husband's love by law ; it is not permitted to forsake and degrade the old wife for the sake of the young. Each wife has her own house, and the husband may not enter until he has knocked at the door and re- ceived the answer, Bismillah, in the name of God. Every boy is taught to read and write in Arabic, which is the religious and official language in Soudan, as Latin was in Europe in the Middle Ages ; they also write their own language with the Arabic character, as we write ours with the Eoman letters. In such coun- tries, the policy of isolation is at an end ; they are open to all the Moslems in the world, and are thus connected with the lands of the East. Here there is a remark- able change, and one that deserves a place in history. It is a movement the more interesting since it is still actively going on. The Mahometan religion has already overspread a region of Negroland as large as Eui'ope. It is firmly established not only in the Africa of the Mediterranean and the Nile, and in the oases of the Sahara, but also throughout that part of the Oonti- THE GREAT BIVER. 287 nent whicli we have termed the platform of the Niger. In 1797 Mvmgo Park discovered the Niger, in the heart of Africa, at a point where it was as broad as the Thames at "Westminster ; in 1817 Een4 CaiUie crossed it at a point considerably higher up ; in 1822 Major Laiag attempted to reach it by strUciag inland from Sierra Leone, but was forced by the natives to return when he was only fifty miles distant from the river; and in 1869 I made the same attempt, was turned back at the same place, but made a fresh expedition, and reach- ed the river at a higher point than CaiUie or Park. But my success also was iacomplete, for native wars made it impossible for me to reach the source, though it was near at hand ; and that stiU remains, a splendid prize for one who wiU waUc in my footsteps as I walked in those of Laing. The source of the Niger, as given in the maps, was fixed by Laing from native information, which I ascertained to be correct. There is no doubt that this river rises in the backwoods of Sierra Leone, at a distance of only two hundred miles from the coast. It runs for some time as a foaming hill-torrent, bearing ob- scure and barbarous names, and, at the point where I found it, glides into the broad cahn breast of the plateau, and receives its illustrious name of the Johba, or Great Eiver. It flows northeast, and enters the Sahara, as if intend- ing, Kke the Nile, to pour its waters into the Mediterra- nean Sea. But suddenly it turns toward the east, so that Herodotus, who heard of it when he was at Mem- phis, supposed that it joined the Nile ; and such was the prevailing opinion not only among the Greeks, but also among the Arabs in the Middle Ages. They did not know that the eccentric river again wheels round. 288 THE NIQEE PLATFOBM. flows toward the sea near which it rose, passes through the latitude of its birth, and, having thus described three quarters of a circle, debouches by many mouths into the Bight of Benin. So singular a course might weU bafSe the speculations of geographers and the in- vestigations of explorers. The people who dwell on the banks of the river do not know where it ends. I was told by some that it went to Mecca, but by others that it went to Jerusalem, Mungo Park's own theory was ludicrously incorrect ; he believed that the Congo was its mouth ; others declared that it never reached the sea at all. It was Lander who discovered the mouth of the Niger, at one time as mysterious as the sources of the NUe, and so estabUshed the hypothesis which Keichard had advanced, and which Mannert had declared to be " contrary to nature." The Niger platform or basin is flat, with here and there a line of rolUng hills containing gold. The vege- tation consists of high coarse grass and trees of small stature, except on the banks of streams, where they grow to a larger size. The palm-oil tree is not found on this plateau, but the shea-butter or taJlow tree abounds in natural plantations, which will some day prove a source of enormous wealth. As the river flows on, these trees disappear, the plains widen and are smoothed out ; the country assumes the character of the Sahara. The negroes who inhabited the platform of the Niger lived chiefly on the banks of the river, subsisting on lotus-root and fish. like all savages, they were jealous and distrustful ; their intercourse was that of war. But nature, by means of a curious contrivance, has render- ed it impossible for men to remain eternally apart. Common salt is one of the mineral constituents of the THE PHILOSOPHY OF SALT. 289 hnman body, and savages, who live chiefly on vegetable food, are dependent upon it for their lives. In Africa, children may be seen sucking it like sugar. " Come and eat with us to-day," says the hospitable African ; " we are going to have salt for dinner." It is not in all countries that this mineral food is to be found ; but the saltless lands in the Soudan contain gold dust, ivory, and slaves ; and so a system of barter is arranged, and isolated tribes are brought into contact with one another. The two great magazines are the desert and the ocean. At the present day, the white powdery English salt is carried on donkeys and slaves to the upper waters of the Niger, and is driving back the crystaline salt of the Sahara. In the ancient days, the salt of the plateau came entirely from the mines of BUma and Toudeyni, in the desert, which were occupied and worked by negro tribes. But at a period far remote, before the founda- dations of Carthage were laid, a Berber nation, now called the Tuaricks, overspread the desert, and con- quered the oases and the mines. This terrible people are yet the scourge of the peaceful farmer and the pass- ing caravan. They camp in leather tents; they axe armed with lance and sword, and with shields, on which is painted the image of a cross. The Arabs call them "the muffled ones," for their mouths and noses are covered with a bandage, sometimes black, sometimes white, above which sit in deep sockets, Uke ant-lions in their pits, a pair of dark, cruel, sinister-looking eyes. They levy tolls on aU travelers, and murder those who have the reputation of unusual wealth, as they did Miss Tinne, whose iron water-tanks they imagined to be filled with gold. When they poured down on the Sahara, they were soon attracted by the rich pastures and aUuvial plains of the Black Country. In course of 290 THE BAGDAD OF THE WEST. time their raids were converted into conquests, and they established a line of kingdoms from the Niger to the Nile, in the border land between the Sahara and the parallel 10° N. Timbuctoo, Haoussa, Bomou, Bag- hirmi, Waday, Darfur, and Kordofan, were the names of these kingdoms ; in all of them Islam is now the religion of the state ; ah of them belong to the Asiatic world. The Tuaricks of the Soudan were merely the ruling caste, and were much darkened by harem blood ; but they communicated freely with their brethren of the desert, who had dealings with the Berbers beyond the Atlas. When the Andalusia of the Arabs became a polite and civilized land, crowds of ingenious artisans, descended from the old Roman craftsmen, or from Greek emigrants, or from their Arab apprentices, took architecture over to North Africa. The city of Morocco was fiUed ■with magnificent palaces and mosques; it became the metropolis of an independent kingdom ; it was called the Bagdad of the West; its doctors were as learned as the doctors of Cordova, its musicians as skill- ful as the musicians of Seville. A wealthy and power- ful Morocco could not exist without its influence being felt across the desert ; the position of Timbuctoo ia reference to Morocco was precisely that of Meroe to Memphis, or to Thebes. The Sahara, it is tme, is much wider across from Morocco to Timbuctoo than from Egypt to Ethiopia, but the introduction of camels brought the Atlas and the Niger near to one another. The Tuaricks, who had previously lived on horses, under whose beUies they tied water bottles of leather when they went on a long joiirney, had been able to cross the desert only at certain seasons of the year; but now with the aid of the camel, which they at once adopted ABAB EXFLOBEBS. 291 and &om which thej bred the famous Mehara strain, they could cross the Sahara at its widest part in a few days. A regular trade was established between the two countries and was conducted by the Berbers. Arab merchants, desirous of seeing with their own eyes the wondrous land of ivory and gold, took passage in the caravans, crossed the yeUow seas, sprang from their camels upon the green shores of the Soudan, and kneel- ing on the banks of the Niger, with their faces turned toward Mecca, dipped their hands in its waters and praised the name of the Lord. They journeyed from city to city, and from court to court, and composed works of travel which were read with eager delight aU over the Moslem world, from Spain to Hiadostan. The Arabs thronged to this newly discovered world. They built factories; they established schools; they con- verted dynasties. They covered the river with masted vessels ; they built majestic temples with graceful min- aret and swelling dome. Theological colleges and pub- lic Kbraries were founded ; camels came across the des- ert laden with books; the negroes swarmed to the lec- tures of the moUahs ; Plato and Aristotle were studied by the banks of the Niger, and the glories of Granada were reflected at Timbuctoo. That city became the refuge of political fugitives and criminals from Morocco. In the sixteenth century the Emperor despatched across the desert a company of arquebusiers, who, with their strange, terrible weapons, everywhere triumphed, Kke the soldiers of Cortes and Pizarro in Mexico and Peru. These musketeers made enormous conquests, not for their master, but for themselves. They estabHshed an oli- garchy of their own ; it was afterward dethroned by the natives, but there yet exist men who, as Barth informs us, are called the descendants of the musketeers and 292 THE PAIR. who wear a distinctive dress. But that imperial expe- dition was the last exploit of the Moors. After the conquest of Granada by the Christians, and of Algeria by the Turks, Morocco, encompassed by enemies, be- came 'a savage and isolated land ; Timbuctoo, its com- mercial dependent, fell into decay, and is now chiefly celebrated as a cathedral town. The Arabs carried cotton and the art of its manufac- ture into the Soudan, which is one of the largest cotton- growing areas ia the world. Its Manchester is Kano, which manufactures blue cloth and colored plaids, clothes a vast negro population, and even exports its goods to the lands of the Mediterranean Sea. Denham and Clapperton, who first reached the lands of Haoussa and Bomou, were astonished to find among the negroes magnificent courts; regiments of cavalry, the horses caparisoned in silk for gala days, and clad in coats of mail for war ; long trains of camel laden with salt, and natron, and com, and cloth, and cowry shells, which form the currency, and kola nuts, which the Arabs call " the coffee of the negroes." They attended with won- der gigantic fairs at which the cotton goods of Man- chester, the red cloth of Saxony, double-barreled guns, razors, tea and sugar, Nuremberg ware, and writing- paper were exhibited for sale. They also found mer- chants who offered to cash their biUs upon houses at Tripoli ; and scholars acquainted with Avicenna, Aver- roes, and the Greek philosophers. The Mahometan religion was spread in Central Africa to a great extent by the traveling Arab mer- chants, who were welcomed everywhere at the negro or semi-negro courts, and who frequently converted the pagan kings by working miracles — that is to say, Jby means of events which accidentally followed their MOSIiEM MISSI0NAEIE8. 293 solemn prayers, suoh . as the healing of a disease, rain in the midst of a drought, or a victory in war. But the chief instrument of conversion was the schooL It is much to the credit of the negroes that they keenly appreciate the advantages of education ; they appear to possess an instinctive veneration and affection for the book. Wherever Mahometans settled, the sons of chiefs were placed under their tuition ; a Mahometan quarter was estabhshed ; it was governed by its own laws ; its sheik rivaled in power and finally surpassed the native kings. The machinery of the old pagan court might still go on ; the negro chief might receive the magnificent title of sultan ; he might be surrounded by albinoes and dwarfs, and big-headed men and buf- foons ; he might sit in a cage, or behind a curtain in a palace with seven gates, and receive the ceremonial visits of his nobles, who stripped off a garment at each gate, and came into his presence naked, and cowered on the ground, and clapped their hands, and sprinkled their heads with dust, and then turned round and sat with their backs presented in reverence toward him, as if they were unable to bear the sight of his counte- nance shining like a weU-blacked boot. But the Arab or Moorish sheik would be in reality the king, deciding aU questions of foreign policy, of peace and war, of laws and taxes, and commercial regulations, holding a position resembling that of the Gothic generals who placed Libius Sevems and Augustulus upon the throne ; of the mayors of the palace beside the Merovingian princes ; of the Company's servants at the court of the Great Mogid. And when the Mo- hometans had become numerous, and a fitting season had arrived, the sheik would point out a well-known Koran text, and would proclaim war against the sur- iBi ABAB8 ON THE EAST COASl rounding pagan kings, and so the movemei* -..t'sst nad been commenced by the school would be continued by the sword. It may, however, be doubtful whether the Arab mer- chants alone would have spread Islam over the Niger plateau. On the east coast of Africa they have pos- sessed settlements from time immemorial. Before the Greeks of Alexandria sailed into the Indian Ocean ; before the Tyrian vessels, with Jewish supercargoes, passed through the straits of Bab-el-Mandeb, the Ai-abs of Yemen had established factories ia the Mozambique, and on the opposite coast of Malabar, and carried on a trade between the two lands, seUing to the Indians ivory, ebony, slaves, beeswax, and gold-dust, brought down ia quills from the interior by the negroes, to whom they sold ia return the sugar, beads, and blue cotton goods of Hindostan. In the period of the caKphs these settlements were strengthened and in- creased, in consequence of civil war, by fugitive tribes from Oman, and other parts of the Arabian Peninsula. The emigrants made Africa their home ; they built large towns, which they surrounded with orchards of the orange-tree, and plantations of the date ; they in- troduced the culture of tobacco, sugar-cane and cotton. They were loved and revered by the negroes ; they made long journeys into the interior for the purposes of trade. Tet their religion has made no progress ; and they do not attempt to convert the blacks. Their towns resemble those of the Europeans ; they dwell apart from the natives, and above them. The Mahometans who entered the Niger regions were not only the Arab merchants, but also the Ber- bers of the desert, who, driven by war, or instigated by ambition, poured into the Soudan by tribes, seized THE FOtlLAS. 295 lands and women, and formed mulatto nationalities. Of these tlie Foulas are the most famous. They were originally natives of Northern Africa; having inter- married during many generations with the natives, they have often the appearance of pure negroes ; but they always caU themselves white men, however black their skins may seem to be. In the last century they were dispersed in small and puny tribes. Some wandered as gipsies, seUing wooden bowls ; others were roaming shepherd clans, paying tribute to the native kings, and suffering much Ol-treatment. In other parts they lived a bandit Life. Sometimes, but rarely, they resided in towns which they had con- quered, pursued commerce, and tilled the soil. Tet in war they were far superior to the negroes : if only they could be united, the most powerful kingdoms would be unable to withstand them. And, finally, their day arrived. A man of their own race returned from Mecca, apUgrim and a prophet, gathered them like wolves beneath his standard, and poured them forth on the Soudan. The pilgrimage to Mecca is incumbent only on those who can afford it ; but hiindreds of devout negroes every year put on their shrouds and beg their way across the Continent to Massowah. There taking out a few grains of gold-dust cunningly concealed between the leaves of their Korans, they pay their passage across the Eed Sea, and tramp it from Jedda to Mecca, feeding as they go on the bodies of the camels that have been left to die, and whose meat is lawful if the throat be cut before the animal expires. As soon as the negroes, or Takrouri, as they are called, arrive in the Holy City, they at once set to work, some as porters, and some as carriers of water in leather skins ; 296 THE NEGBOES IN MECCA. others manufacture baskets and mats of date leaves; others establish a market for firewood, which they col- lect in the neighboring hiUs. They inhabit miserable huts, or ruined houses in the quarter of the lower classes, where the sellers of charcoal dweU, and where locusts are sold by the measure. Some of these poor and industrious creatures spread their mats in the cloisters of the Great Mosque, and stay aU the time beneath that sacred and hospitable roof. They are subject to exclamatory fits and pious convulsions so common among the negroes of the Southern States. Often they may be seen prostrate on the pavement, beating their foreheads against the stones, weeping bit- terly, and pouriQg forth the wildest ejaculations. The Great Mosque at Mecca is a spacious square, surrounded by a colonnade. In the midst of the quadrangle is the smaU building which is called the Caaba. It has no windows ; its door, which is seldom opened, is coated with silver ; its padlock, once of pure gold, is now of silver gUt. On its threshold are placed every night various small wax candles and perfuming pans filled with aloeswood and musk. The walls of the building are covered with a vail of black silk, tucked up on one side, so as to leave exposed the famous Black Stone which is niched in the wall out- side. The vaU is not fastened close to the building, so that the least breath of air causes it to wave in slow, undulating movements, hailed with prayer by the kneeling crowd around. They believe that it is caused by the wings of guardian angels, who will transport the Caaba to Paradise when the last trumpet sounds. At a little distance from this building, is the Zemzem well, and while some of the pilgrims are standing by its mouth waiting to be served, or walking round the Caaba, THE GKEAT MOSQtTE. 297 or stooping to kiss the stone, other scenes may be ob- served in the cloisters and the square ; and as in the Temple at Jerusalem, these are not all of the most edi- fying nature. Children are playing at games, or feed- ing the wild pigeons, which long immunity has render- ed tame. Numerous schools are going on, the boys chanting in a loud voice, and the master's baton some- times faUing on their backs. In another comer, a re- ligious lecture is being deKvered. Men of all nations are clustered in separate groups ; the Persian heretics with their caps mounting to heaven, and their beards descending to the earth ; the Tartar, with obHque eyes and rounded Umbs, and light silk handkerchief tied round his brow ; Turks with shaven faces, and in red caps ; the lean Indian pauper, begging with a miserable whine ; and one or two wealthy Hindoo merchants, not guiltless of dinners given to infidels, and of iced cham- pagne. At the same time, an active business is being done in sacred keepsakes ; rosaries made of camel bone, bottles of Zemzem water, dust collected from behind the vaU, toothsticks made of a fibrous root, such as that which Mahomet himself was wont to use, and coarsely executed pictures of the Caaba. Mecca itseK, like most cities frequented by strangers, whether pilgrims or mar- iners, is not an abode of righteousness and virtue. As the Tartars say of it, " The torch is dark at its foot," and many a pilgrim might exclaim with the Arabian Ovid: " I set out in the hopes of lightening my sins. And returned, bringing home with me a fresh load of transgressions.'' But the very wickedness of a Holy City deepens real enthusiasm into severity and wrath. When Abd-ul- Wahhab saw taverns opened in Mecca itself, and the inhabitants alluring the pilgrims to every kind of vice ; "JDS ABD-UL-WAHHAB. when he fotmd that the sacred places were made a show ; that the mosque was inhabited by guides and of- ficials who were as greedy as beasts of prey; that wealth, not piety, was the chief object of consideration in a pilgrim — he felt as Luther felt at Rome. The dis- gust which was excited in his mind by the manners of the day was extended also to the doctrines that were in vogue. The prayers that were offered up to Mahomet and the saints resembled the prayers that were once offered up to the Daughters of Heaven, the Intercessors of the ancient Arabs. The pilgrimages that were made to the tombs of holy men were the old journeys to the ancestral graves. The worship of One God, which Ma- homet had been sent to restore, had again become ob- scured ; the days of darkness had returned. He preach- ed a Unitarian revival ; he held up as his standard and his guide the Koran, and nothing but the Koran ; he founded a puritan sect which is now a hundred years of age, and stiU remains an element of power and disturb- ance in the East. Danfodio, the Black Prophet, also went out of Mec- ca, his soul burning with zeal. He determined to reform the Soudan. He forbade, like Abd-ul-Wahhab, the smoking of tobacco, the wearing of ornaments and finery. But he had to contend with more gross abuses still. In many negro lands which professed Islam palm wine and miEet beer were largely consumed ; the women did not vaU their faces, nor even their bosoms ; immodest dances were performed to the profane music of the drum ; learned men gained a Uvehhood by wiiting charms ; the code of the Koran was often sup- planted by the old customary laws. Danfodio sent let- ters to the great kings of Timbuctoo, Haoussa, and Bomou, commanding them to reform their own lives THE BLACK PEOPHET. 299 and those of their subjects, or he would chastise them in the name of God. They received these instructions from an untaown man as the King of Kings received the letter of Mahomet, and their fate resembled his. Danfodio united the Foula tribes into an army, which he LQspired with his own spirit. Thirsting for plunder ajid paradise, the Poulas swept over the Soudan ; they marched into battle with shouts of frenzied joy, singing hymns and waving their green flags, on which texts of the Koran were embroidered ia letters of gold. The empire which they estabhshed at the beginning of this century is now crumbling away ; but the fire is still burning on the frontiers. Wherever the Foulas are settled in the neighborhood of pagan tribes, they are extending their power ; and although the immediate ef- fects are disastrous, villages being laid ia ashes, men slaughtered by thousands, women and children sold as slaves, yet m the end these crusades are productive of good : the villages are converted into towns ; a new land is brought withia the sphere of commercial and religious intercourse, and is added to the Asiatic world. The phenomenon of a religious Tamerlane has been repeated more than once ia Central Africa. The last example was that of Oumar the Pilgrim, whose capital was Segou, and whose conquests extended from Tim- buctoo to the Senegal, where he came iatc contact with French artillery, and forever lost his prestige as a pro- phet. But we are taught by the science of history that these military empires can never long endure. It is probable that the Mahometan Soudan will in time be- come a province of the Turks. Central Africa, as we have shown, received its civilization, not from Egypt, but from the grand Morocco of the Middle Ages. Egypt has always lived with its back to Africa, its eyes, 300 THE TURKS IN APRIOA. and often its hands, on Syria and Arabia. Abyssinia was not subdued by the caliphs, because it was not coveted by them ; and there was Httle communication between Egypt and Soudan. Mehemet-Ali was the first to re-estabhsh the kingdom of the Pharaohs in Ethio- pia, and to organize negro regiments. Siace his time the Turkish power has been gradually spreading toward the interior, and the expedition of Baker, Pacha, what- ever may be its immediate result, is the harbinger of great events to come. Should the Turks be driven out of Europe, they would probably become the Emperors of Africa, which in the interests of civilization would be a fortunate occurrence. The Tiirkish government is undoubtedly defective in comparison with the govern- ments of Europe; but it is perfection itself in com- parison with the governments of Africa. If the Egyp- tians had been allowed to conquer Abyssinia, there would have been no need of an Abyssinian expedition; and nothing but Egyptian occupation will put an end to the wars which are always being waged and always have been waged in that country between bandit chiefs. Those who are anxious that Abyssinian Christianity should be preserved need surely not be alarmed, for the Pope of Abyssinia is the Patriarch of Cairo, a Turkish subject; and the Aboona or archbishop has always been an Egyptian. But the Turks no longei have it in their power to commit actions which Euro- peans would condemn. They now belong to the civil- ized system ; they are subject to the Law of Opinion. Already they have been compelled by that mysterious power to suppress the slave-making wars which were formerly waged every year from Kordofan and Sen- naar, and which are stiU being waged from the inde- pendent kingdoms of Darfor, Waday, Baghirmi, and PBOSPEOTDB. 901 Bomou. Wherever the Turks reign, a European is allowed to travel; wherever a European travels, a word is spoken on behalf of the oppressed. That word enters the newspapers, passes into a diplomatic remonstrance, becomes a firman, and a governor or com- mandant in some sequestered province of an Oriental Empire suffers the penalty of his misdeeds. It should be the policy of European powers to aid the destruc- tion of all savage kingdoms, or at least never to inter- fere on their behalf. It has now been shown that a vast region within the Dark Continent, the world beyond the sandy ocean, is governed by Asiatic laws, and has attained an Asiatic civilization. We must next pass to the Atlantic side, and study the effects which have been produced among the negroes by the intercourse of Europeans. It will be found that the transactions on the coast of Guinea belong not only to the biography of Africa, but also to universal history, and that the domestication of the negro has indirectly assisted the material progress of Europe, and the development of its morality. The programme of the next chapter will be as follows : The rise of Europe out of darkness ; the discovery of West- em Africa by the Portuguese; the institution of the slave trade ; and the history of that great repubUcan and phnanthropic movement which won its fii'st victory in the abolition of the slave trade, 1807 ; its last, in the taking of Bichmond, 1865. CHAPTER in UBEBTT. The history of Europe in aoicient times is the history of those lands which adjoin the Mediterranean Sea. Beyond the Alps lay a vast expanse of marsh and forest, through which flowed the swift and gloomy Elune. On the right side of that river dwelt the Germans ; on its left, the Celtic Gauls. Both people, in maimers and customs, resembled the Red Indians. They lived in round wigwams, with a hole at the top to let out the smoke. They hunted the white-maned bison and the brown bear, and trapped the beaver, which then built its lodges by the side of every stream. They passed their spare time in gambling, drunkenness, and torpor ; while their squaws cut the firewood, culti- vated their garden-plots of grain, tended the shaggy- headed cattle, and the hogs feeding on acorns and beech-mast, obedient to the horn of the mistress, but savage to strangers as a pack of wolves. At an early period, however, the Gauls came into contact with the Plicenicians and the Greeks ; they served in the Car- thaginian armies, and acquired a taste for trade ; they learned the cultivation of the vine, and some of the metallic ajrts; their priests, or learned men, employed the Greek characters in writing. But the Gauls had a mania for martial glory, and often attacked the peace- ful Greek merchants of Marseilles. The Greeks at last called in the assistance of the Romans, who not onlj BOMAN QiJJL. 303 made war on the hostile tribes, but on the peaceful tribes as well. Thus commenced the conquest of Gaul It was completed by Caesar, who used that coimtry as an exercise ground for his soldiers, and prepared them, by a hundred battles, for the mighty combat in which Pompey was overthrown. Military roads were made across the Alps ; Eoman colonies were despatched into the newly conquered land ; Italian farmers took up their abode in the native towns, and the chiefs were required to send their sons to school. Thus the Eomans obtained hostages, and the Celts were pleased to see their boys neatly dressed in white garments edged with purple, displaying their proficiency on the waxen tablets and the counting board. In a few generations the Celts had disappeared. On the banks of the Ehone and the Seine magnificent cities arose, watered by aqueducts, surrounded by gar- dens, adorned with Hbraries, temples, and public schools. The inhabitants called themselves Eomans, and spoke with patriotic fervor of the glorious days of the Eepubhc. Meanwhile the barbarians beyond the Ehine re- mained in the savage state. They often crossed the river to invade the land which had ripened into wealth before their eyes ; but the frontier was guarded by a chain of camps ; and the Germans, armed only with clumsy spears, and wooden shields, could not break the line of Eoman soldiers, who were dressed in steel, who were splendidly disciplined, and who had military engines. The Gauls had once been a warlike people ; they now abandoned the use of arms. The Empire insured them against invasion in return for the taxes ^hich they paid. But there came a time when the tribute of the pro- 304: THE ANCIENT GERMANS. ~ Tinces no longer returned to the provinces to be ex- pended on the public buildings and the frontier garri- sons and the military roads. The rivers of gold which had so long flowed into Eome at last dried up ; the empire became poor, and yet its expenses remained the same. The Praetorian Guards had stiU to be paid ; the mob of the capital had still to be rationed with bread, and bacon, and wine, and oil, and costly shows. Accordingly the provinces were made to suffer. Ex- orbitant taxes were imposed ; the aldermen and civil councilors of towns were compelled to pay enormous fees in virtue of their office, and were forbidden to evade such expensive honors by enlisting in the army, or by taking holy orders. The rich were accused of crimes, that their property might be seized ; the crops in the fields were gathered by the police. A blight fell upon the land. Men would no longer labor, since the fruits of their toil might at any time be taken from them. Cornfield and meadow were again covered with brambles and weeds, the cities were deserted, grass grew in all the streets. The province of Gaul was taxed to death, and then abandoned by the Komana The Government could no longer afford to garrison the Ehine frontier; the legions were withdrawn, and the Germans entered. The invading armies were composed of free men, who, imder their respective captains or heads of clans, had joined the standard of some noted warrior chief. The spoil of the army belonged to the army, and was divided according to stipulated rules. The king's share was large, but more than his share he might not have. When the Germans, instead of returning with their booty, remained upon the foreign soil, they par- titioned the land in the same maimer as they parti- THE CASTLE KINGS. 306 tioned the cattle and the slaves, the gold crosses, the silver chalices, the vases, the tapestry, the fine Hnen, and the purple robes. An immense region was allotted to the king ; other tracts of various sizes to the generals and captains (or chiefs and chieftains), according to the number of men whom they had brought into the field; and each private soldier received a piece of ground. But the army, although disbanded, was not extinct ; its members remained under martial law ; the barons or generals were bound to obey the king when he summoned them to war ; the soldiers to obey their ancient chiefs. Sometimes the king and the great barons gave lands to favorites and friends on similar conditions, and at a later period money was paid in- stead of military service, thus originating Bent. The nobles of Boman Gaul lived within the city except during the villeggiatura in the autumn. The German lords preferred the country, and either fortified the Boman villas, or built new castles of their own. They surrounded themselves with a bodyguard of per- sonal retainers ; their prisoners of war were made to till the ground as serfs. And soon they reduced to much the same condition the German soldiers, and seized their humble lands. In that troubled age none could hold property except by means of the strong arm. Men found it difficult to preserve their Uves, and often presented their bodies to some powerful lord in return for protection, lq return for daily bread. The power of the king was nominal ; sovereignty was broken and dispersed ; Europe was divided among castles ; and in each castle was a prince who owned no authority above his own, who held a high court of jus- tice in his hall, issued laws to his estates, lived by the court fees, by taxes levied on passing caravans, and by 306 THE OASTLE A HOME. ransoms for prisoners, sometimes obtained in fair war, sometimes by falling upon peaceful trayelers. Dark deeds were done within those ivy-covered towers which now exist for the pleasure of poets and pilgrims of the picturesque. Often from turret chambers and grated windows arose the shrieks of violated maidens and the shrieks of tortured Jews. Yet castle-life had also its brighter side. To cheer the solitude of the isolated house, minstrels and poets and scholars were courted by the barons, and were offered a peaceful chamber, and a place of honor at the board. In the towns of ancient Italy and Greece there was no family ; the home did not exist. The women and children dwelt together in secluded chambers ; the men lived a club hfe in the baths, the porticos, and the gynmasia. But the castle lord had no companions of his own rank ex- cept the members of his own family. On stormy days, when he could not hunt, he found a pleasure in danc- ing his httle ones upon his knee, and in telling them tales of the wood and weald. Their tender fondlings, and their merry laughs, their haK-formed voices, which attempted to pronounce his name — all these were sweet to him. And by the love of those in whom he saw his own image mirrored, in whom his own childhood ap- peared to live again, he was drawn closer and closer to his wife. She became his counselor and friend ; she softened his rugged manners ; she soothed his fierce wrath ; she pleaded for the prisoners and captives, and the men condemed to die. And when he was absent, she became the sovereign lady of the house, ruled the vassals, sat in the judgment-seat, and often defended the castle in a siege. A charge so august coidd not but elevate the female mind. Women became queens, The Lady was created. Within the castle was formed THE CASTLE AN ACADEMT. 307 that ^aaid manner of gentleness mingled with hauteur which art can never simulate, and which ages of dig- nity can alone confer. The barons dwelt apart from one another, and were often engaged in private war. Yet they had sons to educate and daughters to marry, and so a singular kind of society arose. The king's house or court, and the houses of the great barons, became academies to which the inferior barons sent their boys and girls. The young lady became the attendant of the Dame, and was instructed in the arts of playing on the vir- ginals, of 'preparing simples, and of heahng wounds; of spinning, sewing and embroidery. The young gentle- man was at first a Page. He was taught to manage a horse with grace and skill, to use bow and sword, to sound the notes of venery upon the horn, to carve at table, to ride full tilt against the quintaine with his lance in rest, to brittle a deer, to find his way through the forest by the stars in the sky and by the moss upon the trees. It was also his duty to wait upon the ladies, who tutored his youthful mind in other ways. He was trained to deport himself with elegance ; he was nur- tured in all the accomplishments of courtesy and love. He was encouraged to select a mistress among the dames or demoiselles; to adore her in his heart, to serve her with patience and fidelity, obeying her least commands; to be modest in her presence ; to be silent and discreet. The reward of aU this devotion was of no ethereal kind, but it was not quickly or easily bestowed ; and vice almost ceases to be vice when it can only be gratified by means of long discipline in virtue. When the page had arrived at a certain age, he was clad in a brown frock; a sword was fastened to his side, and he obtained the title of Esquire. He attended 808 OHIYALBY. his patron knight on military expeditions, until he was old enough to be admitted to the order. Among the ancient Germans of the forest, when a young man came of age, he was solemnly invested with shield and spear. The ceremony of knighthood at first was noth- ing more. Every man of gentle birth became a knight, and then took an oath to be true to God and to the ladies and to his plighted word ; to be honorable in all his actions; to succor the oppressed. Thus, within those castle-colleges arose the sentiment of Honor, the institution of Chivalry, which, as an old poet wrote, made women chaste and men brave. The women were worshiped as goddesses, the men were revered as heroes. Each sex aspired to possess those qualities which the other approved. Women admire, above all things, courage and truth ; and so the men became courageous and true. Men admire modesty, virtue and refinement ; and so the women became virtuous, and modest, and refined. A higher standard of propriety was required as time went on : the manners and cus- toms of the Dark Ages became the vices of a later period ; imchastity, which had once been regarded as the private wrong of the husband, was stigmatized as a sin against society, and society found a means of taking its revenge. At first the notorious woman was Lasulted to her face at tournament and banquet; or knights chalked an epithet upon her castle-gates, and then rode on. In the next age she was shunned by her own sex; the discipline of social life was established as it exists at the present day. Though it might some- times be relaxed in a vicious court, at least the ideal of right was preserved. But in the period of the Trou- badours, the fair sinners resembled the pirates of the ^omeric age. Their pursuits were of a dangerous, but THE BEKBB. 309 not of a dishonorable, nature ; they might sometimes lose their lives ; they never lost their reputation. We must now descend from ladies and gentlemen to the people in the field, who are sometimes forgotten by historians. The castle was built on the summit of a hiU, and a village of serfs was clustered round its foot. These poor peasants were often hardly treated by their lords. Often they raised their brown and homy hands and cursed the cruel castle which scowled upon them from above. Humbly they made obeisance, and bit- terly they gnawed their lips, as the baron rode down the narrow street on his great war-horse, which would always have its fill of corn when they would starve, followed by his beef-fed varlets, with faces red from beer, who gave them jeering looks, who called them by nicknames, who contemptuously caressed their daugh- ters before their eyes. Yet it was not always thus ; the lord was often a true nobleman, the parent of theii village, the godfather of their children, the guardian ol their happiness, the arbiter of their disputes. When there was sickness among them, the ladies of the castle often came down, bringbg them soups and spiced mor- sels with their own white hands ; and the castle was the home of the good chaplain, who told them of the happier world beyond the grave. It was there also that they enjoyed such pleasures as they had. Sometimes they were called up to the castle to feast on beef and beer in commemoration of a happy anniver- sary or a Christian feast. Sometimes theu- lord brought home a caravan of merchants whom he had captured on the road ; and while the strange guests were quak- ing for the safety of their bales, the people were being amused with the songs of the minstrels, and the tricks of the jugglers, and the antics of the dancing-bear. 310 TOUBNAMENT. And sometimes a tournament was held . the lords and ladies of the neighborhood rode over to the castle ; turf-banks were set for the serfs and a galleiy was erected for the ladies, above whom sat enthroned the one who was chosen as the Queen of Beauty and of Love. Then the heralds shouted, " Love of ladies, sphnteriug of lances I stand forth, gallant knights ; fair eyes look upon your deeds!" And the knights took up their position in two lines fronting one another, and sat motionless upon their horses like pillars of iron, with nothing to be seen but their flaming eyes. The trum- pets flourished : " Laissez aller," cried a voice; and the knights, with their long spears in rest, dashed furiously against each other, and then pHed battle-ax and sword, to the great delight and contentment of the populace. In times of war the castle was also the refuge of the poor, and the villagers fled behind its walls when the enemy drew near. They did not then reflect that it was the castle which had provoked the war ; they viewed it only as a hospitable fortress which had saved their hves. It was, therefore, in many cases, regarded by the people not only with awe and veneration, but also with a sentiment of filial love. It was associated with their pleasures and their secmity. But in course of time a rival arose to alienate the affections, or to strengthen the resentment, of the castle serfs. It was the Town. In the days of the RepubUc and in the first days ol the Empire, all kinds of skilled labor were in the hands of slaves ; in every palace, whatever was re- quired for the household was manufactured on the premises. But before the occupation of the Germans, a free class of artisans had sprung up, in what manner is not precisely known ; they were probably the de- scendants of emancipated slaves. This class divided THE TOWN. 311 into guilds and corporations, contiaued to inhabit the towns ; they manufactured armor and clothes ; they traveled as pedlars about the country, and thus acquired wealth, which they cautiously concealed, for they were in complete subservience to the castle lord. They could not leave their property by will, dispose of their daughters in marriage, or perform a single busi- ness transaction, without the permission of their liege. But little by little their power increased. When war was beiog waged, it became needful to fortify the town; for the town was the baron's estate, and he did not wiyh his property to be destroyed. "When once the biurghers were armed and their town walled, they were able to defy their lord. They obtained charters, sometimes by revolt, sometimes by purchase, which gave them the town to do with it as they pleased ; to olect their own magistrates, to make their own laws, and to pay their liege-lord a fixed rent by the year, instead of being subjected to loans, and benevo- lences, and loving contributions. The Roman Law, which had never quite died out, was now revived ; the old municipal ins'titutions of the Empire were restored. UnhappUy, the citizens often fought among themselves, and towns joined barons in destroying towns. Yet their influence rapidly increased, and the power of the castle was diminished. Whenever a town received privileges from its lord, other towns demanded that the same rights should be embodied in their charter, and rebelled if their request was refused. . Trade and indus- try expanded ; the products of the bvu'gher enterprise and skill were offered in the castle haUs for sale. The lady was tempted with silt and velvet ; the lord, with chaias of gold, and Damascus blades, and snits of Milan steel ; the children clamored for the a^eet vhite 312 ABOLITION. powder which was brought from the countries of the East. These new tastes and fancies impoverished the nobles. They reduced their estabHshments ; and the discarded retainers, in no sweet temper, went over to the town. And there were others who went to the town as well. In classical times the slaves were unable to rebel with any prospect of success. In the cities of Greece every citizen was a soldier ; in Rome an enormous army served as the slave police. But in the scattered castle states of Europe, the serfs could rise against their lords, and often did so Tidth effect. And then the town was always a place of refuge ; the runaway slave was there welcomed ; his pursuers were duped or defied ; the file was appUed to his collar ; his blue blouse was taken off; his hair was suffered to grow; he was made a burgher and a free man. Thus the serfs often had the power to rebel, and always the power to escape; in consequence of which they ceased to be serfs and became tenants. In our own times we have seen emancipation presented to slaves by a victorious party in the House of Commons, and by a victorious army in the United States. It has, there- fore, been inferred that slavery in Europe was abolished in the same manner, and the honor of the movement has been bestowed upon the Church. But this is reading history upside down. The extinction of vUlenage was not a donation, but a conquest ; it did not descend from the court and the castle; it ascended from the village and the town. The Church, however, may claim the merit of having mitigated slavery in its worst days, when its horrors were increased by the pride of conquest and the hostility of race. The clergy belonged to the conquered people, whom they THE POPE. 313 protected from liarsli usage to tlie best of their ability. They taught as the Moslem doctors also teach, and as even the pagan Africans beheye, that it is a pious action to emancipate a slave. But there is no reason to suppose that they ever thought of abolishing slavery, and they could not have done so had they wished. Negro slavery was established by subjects of the Church in defiance of the Church. EeHgion has httle power when it works against the stream, but it can give to streams a power which they othenvise would not possess, and it can unite their scattered waters into one majestic flood. Eome was taken and sacked, but never occupied, by the barbarians. It stiU belonged to the Romans ; it stUl preserved the traditions and the genius of empire. Whatever may have been the origin of British or Celtic Christianity, it is certain that the English were converted by the Papists; the first Archbishop of Canterbury was an Italian; his converts became mis- sionaries, entered the vast forests of pagan Ger- many, and brought nations to the feet of Eome. The aUiance of Pepin and the Eoman See placed also the French clergy under the dominion of the Pope, who was acknowledged by Alcuin, the adherent of Charle- magne, to be the " Pontiff of God, vicar of the apostles, heir of the Fathers, prince of the Church, guardian of the only dove without stain." The ordinance of clerical celibacy increased the efficacy of the priesthood and the power of the Pope. The ranks of the clergy were recruited, generation after generation, from the most intelligent of the lay- men in the lower classes, and from those among the upper classes who were more inclined to intellectual pursuits than to military life. These men, divided as 314 THE MONKS. they were from family comiections, ceased to be Ger- mans, Englishmen, or Frenchmen, and became catholic or imiversal-hearted men, patriots of religion, children of the Church. And those enthusiastic laymen who had adopted an ascetic isolated life, or had gathered together in volimtary associations, those hermits and monks, who might have been so dangerous to the Established Church, were welcomed as aUies. No mean jealousy in the Boman Church divided the priest and the prophet, as among the ancient Jews ; the moUah and dervish, as in the East at the present time. The monks were allowed to preach, and to elect their own monastery priests ; they were gradually formed into regular orders, and brought within the discipline of ecclesiastic law. The monks of the East, who could live on a handful of beans, passed their lives in weaving baskets, in prayer and meditation. But the monks of the West, who lived in a colder climate, re- quired a different kind of food ; and as at first they had no money, they could obtain it only by means of work. They labored in the fields in order to live ; and that which had arisen from necessity was continued as apart of the monastic discipline. There were also begging friars, who journeyed from land to land, These were the first travelers in Europe. Their sacred character preserved their lives from aU robbers, whether noble or plebeian, and the same exemption was accorded to those who put on the pilgrim's garb. The smaller pil- grimage was that to Eome ; the greater, that to the Holy Land, by which the palmers obtained remission of their sins, and also were shown by the monks of Egypt, Sinai, and Palestine, many interesting relics, and vest- iges of supernatural events. They were shown the barns which Joseph had bmlt, vulgarly called the THE PILGRIMS. 315 Pyramids ; the bush which had burned before Moses and was not consumed, and the cleft out of which he peeped at the " back parts " of Jehovah ; the pillar of salt which was once Lot's wife, and which, though the sheep continually hcked it out of shape, was continu- ally restored to its pristine form ; the rains of the temple which Samson oTerthrew; the well where Jesus used to draw water for his mother when he was a little boy, and where she used to wash his clothes ; the manger in which he was bom, and the table on which he was circumcised ; the caves in which the disciples concealed themselves during the crucifixion, and the cracks in the ground produced by the earthquake produced by that event ; the tree on which Judas hanged himself, and the house in which he resided, which was siuTOund- ed by the Jews with a waU that it might not be injured by the Oliristians. It was not only the rich who imdertook this pilgrim- age ; many a poor man begged his way to the Holy Land. When such a person was ready to depart, the village pastor clad him in a cloak of coarse black serge, with a broad hat upon his head, put a long staff in his hand, and himg around him a scarf and scrip. He was conducted to the borders of the parish in solemn procession, with cross and holy water ; the neighbors parted from him there with tears and benedictions. He returned with cockle shells stitched in his hat, as a sign that he had been across the seas ; and with a branch of palm tied on to his staff, as a sign that he had been to Jerusalem itself. He often brought also rehcs and beads ; a bag of dust to hang at the bedside of the sick ; a phial of oil from the lamp which hung over the Holy Sepulcher, and perhaps a spKnter of the true cross. When the Saracens conquered Palestine and Egypt, 316 THE HOLT LAND. they did not destroy the memorials of Jesus, for they reverenced him as a prophet. Pious Moslems made also the pilgrimage to Jerusalem ; and the Christians were surprised and edified to see the turbaned infidels removing their sandals, like Moses on Mount Sinai, and prostrating themselves upon the pavement before the tomb. The caHphs were sufficiently enhghtened to en- courage and protect the foreign enthusiasts, who filled the land with gold ; and although the palmers were ex- empt from " passage " and " pontage " and other kinds of black-mail levied by the barons on lay travelers, they found it more easy and more safe to travel in Asia than in Europe. The passion for the pilgrimage of Pal- estine, which had gradually increased since the days of Helena and Jerome, burst forth as an epidemic at the close of the tenth century. The thousand years assign- ed in Revelations as the lifetime of the earth was about to expire. It was believed that Jesus would ap- pear in Jerusalem, and there hold a grand assize ; thou- sands bestowed their property upon the Church, and crowded to the Holy Land. While they thus lived at Jerusalem, and waited for the second coming, continually looking up at the sky and expecting it to open, there came, instead, a host of men with yeUow faces and oblique sHt-shaped eyes, who took the Holy City by assault, drove the Arabs out of Syria, killed many pUgiims, stripped them of all their money; and if they found none outside their bodies, probed them with daggers, or administered emetics, in the hope of finding some within. When the pilgrims returned, they related their sufferings, and showed their scars. The anger of Christendom was aroused. A cru- sade was preached, and the enthusiasm which every- where prevailed enabled the Church to exercise unusual THE CEUSADES. 317 powers. The Pope decreed that the men of the cross should be hindered by none. Creditor might not arrest ; master might not detain. To those who joined the ar- my of the Church absolution was given ; and paradise was promised in the Moslem style to those who died in the campaign. The tidings flew from castle to castle, and from town to town ; there was not a land, however remote, which escaped the infection of the time. In the homely language of the monk of Mahnesbury, "the Welshman left his hunting, the Scotch his fellowship with vermin, the Dane his driaking party, the Norwe- gian his raw fish." Europe was torn up from its foun- dations and hurled upon Asia. Society was dissolved. Monks, not waiting for the permission of their superi- ors, cast off their black gowns and put on the buff jer- kin, the boots, and the sword. The serf left his plow ia the farrow, the shepherd left his flock ia the field. Men servants and maid servants ran from the castle. Wives iasisted upon going with their husbands ; and if their husbands refused to take them, went with some one else. Murderers, robbers, and pirates declared that they woidd wash out their sins ia pagan blood. In some cases, the poor rustic shod his oxen Uke horses, and placed his whole family ia a cart ; and whenever he came to a castle or a town, iaquired whether that was Jerusalem. The barons sold or mortgaged their estates, indifferent about the fature, hopiag to win the wealth of Eastern princes with the sword. During two hundred years, the natives of Europe appeared to have no other object than to conquer or keep possession of the Holy Land. The Christian knights were at length driven out of Asia ; ia the meantime Europe was transformed. The kiags had taken no part in the first crusades ; the es- 318 THE CROWN. tates of tlie barons had been purchased partly by them, and partly by the burghers. An alliance was made be- tween Crown and Town. The sovereignty of the castle was destroyed. Judges appointed by the king traveled on circuit through the land ; the Eoman law, from mu nicipal, became national ; the barons became a nobility residing chiefly at the court; the middle class came into life. The burghers acknowledged no sovereign but the king ; they officered their own trainbands ; they collected their own taxes ; they were represented in a national assembly at the capital. New tastes came into vogue ; both mind and body were indulged with dainty foods. The man of talent, whatever his station, might hope to be ennobled ; the honor of knighthood was re- served by the king, and bestowed upon civihans. The spices of the East, the sugar of Egypt and Spaiu, the silk of Greece and the islands, were no longer occasion- al luxuries, but requirements of daily hfe. And since it was considered unworthy of a gentleman to trade, the profits of commerce were monopolized by the third es- tate. Education was required for mercantile pursuits ; it was at first given by the priests, who had previously taught laymen only to repeat the pater-noster and the credo, and to pay tithes. Schools were opened in the towns, and universities became secular. The rich mer- chants took pride iu giving their sons the best educa- tion that money could obtain, and these yoirng men were not always disposed to follow commercial pursuits. They adopted the study of the law, cultivated the fine arts, made experiments in natural philosophy, and were often sent by their parents to study in the land beyond the Alps, where they saw something which was ia itself an education for the burgher mind — merchants dwell- ing in palaces, seated upon thrones, govemiag great THE BUKQHEB8. 319 cities, commanding fleets and armies, negotiating on equal terms with the proudest and most powerful mon- archs of the North. Italy, protected by its mountaiu barrier, had not been so frequently flooded by barbarians as the prov- inces of Gaul and Spain. The feudal system was there established in a milder form, and the cities retained more strength. Soon they were able to attack the castle lords, to make them pull down their towers, and to live like peaceable citizens within the walls. The Emperor had little power ; Florence, Genoa, and Pisa grew into powerful city states resembling those of Italy before the rise of ancient Rome, but possessing manu- factures which, in the time of ancient Italy, had been confined to Egypt, China, and Hindostan. The origin of Venice was different from that of its sister states. In the darkest days of Italy, when a horde of savage Huns, with scalps dangling from the trappings of their horses, poured over the land, some citizens of Padua and other adjoining towns took refuge in a cluster of islands in the lagoons which were formed at the mouths of the Adige and the Po. From Rialto, the chief of these islands, it was three miles to the mainland ; a mile and a half to the sandy break- water which divided the lagoons from the Adriatic. At high water the islands appeared to be at sea ; but when the tide declined, they rose up from the midst of a dark green plain in which blue gashes were opened by the oar. But even at high water the lagoons were too shallow to be entered by ships, except through certain torturous and secret channels ; and even at low water they were too deep to be' passed on foot. Here, then, the Venetians, were secure from their foes, like the lake-dweUers of ancient times. 820 VENICE. At first they were merely salt-boilers and fishermen, and were dependent on the mainland for the materials of life. There was no seaport in the neighborhood to send its vessels for the salt which they prepared ; they were forced to bring everything that they required for themselves. They became seamen by necessity ; they almost lived upon the water. As their means improved, and as their wants expanded, they bought fields and pastures on the main ; they extended their commerce, and made long voyages. They learned in the dock- yards of Constantinople the art of building taU ships ; they conquered the pirates of the Adriatic Sea. The princes of Syria, Egypt, Barbary, and Spain, were aH of them merchants, for commerce is an aristocratic occupation in the East. With them the Venetians opened a trade. At fii'st they had only timber and slaves to offer in exchange for the wondrous fabrics and rare spices of the East. In raw produce Europe is no match for Asia. The Yenetians, therefore, were driven to invent; they manufactured furniture and woolen cloth, armor and glass. It is evident, from the old names of the streets, that Venice formerly was one great workshop ; it was also a great market city. The crowds of pilgrims resorting to Eome to visit the tombs of the martyrs, and to kiss the Pope's toe, had suggest- ed to the Grovemment the idea of fairs, which were held within the city at stated times. The Venetians estab- lished a rival fair in honor of St. Mark, whose remains, revered even by the Moslems, had been smuggled out of Alexandria in a basket of pork. They took their materials, like MoUere, wherever they could find them ; stole the corpse of a Patriarch from Constantinople, and the bones of a saint from Milan. They made re- ligion subservient to commerce ; they declined to make THE BEUO BUSINESS. 321 oommerce subservient to religion. The Pope forbade them to trade with infidels ; but the infidel trade was their lite. Siamo Veneziani poi Cristiani, they replied. The Papal nuncios arrived in Venice, and excommuni- cated two hundred of the leading men. In return they were ordered to leave the town. The fleets of the Venetians, like the Phoenicians of old, sailed in all the European waters, from the wheat fields of the Crimea to the ice-creeks of the Baltic. In that sea the pirates were at length extinct; a number of cities along its shores were united in a league. Bruges in Flanders was the emporium of the Northern trade, and was supplied by Venetian vessels with the commodities of the South. The Venetians also traveled over Europe, and established their financial colonies in all great towns. The cash of Europe was in their hands ; and the sign of three golden balls declared that Lombards lent money within. During the period of the Crusades, their trade with the East was interrupted ; but it was exchanged for a commerce more profitable still. The Venetians in their galleys conveyed the armies to the Holy Land, and also supplied them with provisions. Besides the heavy sums which they exacted for such services, they made other stipulations. Whenever a town was taken by the Crusaders, a suburb or street was assigned to the Venetians ; and when the Christians were expelled, the Moslems consented to continue the arrangement. In all the great Eastern cities, there was a Venetian quarter containing a chapel, a bath-house, and a factory, ruled over by a magistrate or consul. Constantinople, during the Crusades, had been taken by the Latins, with the assistance of the Venetians, and had been recovered by the Greeks, with the assistance 322 THE BLOWING STKEET8. of the Genoese. The Yenetians were expelled from the Black Sea, but obtained the Alexandria trade. In the fifteenth century the Black Sea was ruined, for its caravan routes were stopped by the Turkish wars> Egypt, which was supplied by sea, monopolized the India trade, and the Venetians monopolized the trade of Egypt. "Venice became the nutmeg and pepper shop of Europe ; not a single dish could be seasoned, not a tankard of ale could be spiced, without adding to its gains. The wealth of that city soon became enormous ; its power, south of the Alps, supreme. Times had changed since those poor fugitives first crept in darkness and sorrow on the islands of the wild lagoon, and drove stakes into the sand, and spread the reeds of the ocean for their bed. Around them the dark lone waters, sighing, soughing, and the sea-bird's melancholy ciy. Around them the dismal field of slime, the salt and somber plain. On that cluster of islands had arisen a city of surpassing loveliness and splendor. Great ships lay at anchor in its marble streets ; their yards brushed sculptured balconies and the walls of palaces as they swept along. Branching off from the great thoroughfares, bustling with commerce, magnificent with pomp, were sweet and silent lanes of water, lined with summer palaces and with myrtle gar- dens, sloping downward to the shore. In the fashion- able quarter was a lakelike space — the Park of Venice — ^which every evening was covered with gondolas ; and the gondohers in those days were slaves from the East, Saracens or negroes, who sang sadly, as they rowed, the music of their homes — ^the camel-song of the Sahara, or the soft minor airs of the Soudan. The government of Venice was a rigid aristocracy. Venice therefore has no Santa Groce ; it can boast of ABAB SPAIN. 823 few illustrious names. Howewer, its Aldine Press and its poems in color were not unworthy contributions to the reTiral of ancient learning and the creation of modem art. The famous wanderings of Marco Polo had also excited among learned Venetians a peculiar taste for the science of exploration. All over Europe they corresponded with scholars of congenial tastes, and urged those princes who had ships at theii- disposal to undertake voyages of enterprise and discovery. Among their correspondents there was one who carried out their ideas too well. Yenice was not so much in- jured by the potentates who assembled at Cambray as by a single man who lived in a lonely spot on the south- west coast of the Spanish peninsula. That country had been taken from the natives by the Carthaginians, from the Carthaginians by the Romans, from the Eomans by the Goths, from the Goths by the Arabs and the Moors. It was the first province of the Holy Empii-e of the CaJiphs to shake itself free, and to crown a monarch of its own. The Arabs raised Spain to a height of prosperity which it has never since attained ; they covered the land with palaces, mosques, hospitals, and bridges ; and with enormous aqueducts which, penetrating the sides of mountains, or sweeping on lofty arches across valleys, rivaled the monuments of ancient Rome. The Arabs imported various tropical fruits and vegetables, the aulture of which has departed with them. They grew, prepared, and exported sugar. They discovered new mines of gold and silver, quicksilver and lead. They extensively manufactured silks, cottons, and merino woolen goods, which they despatched to Constantinople by sea, and which were thence diffused through the valley of the Danube over savage Christendom, "When 324 THE OONQUEBED 0HEISI1AN8. Italians began to nayigate the Mediterranean, a line of ports was opened to them from Tarragona to Cadiz. The metropolis of this noble coimtry was Cordo-va. It stood in the midst of a fertile plain washed by the waters of the Guadalquivir. It was encircled by sub- urban towns ; there were ten nules of lighted streets. The great mosque was one of the wonders of the mediseval world ; its gates embossed with bronze ; its myriads of lamps made out of Christian bells ; and its thousand columns of variegated marble supporting a roof of richly carved and aromatic wood. At a time when books were so rare in Europe that the man who possessed one often gave it to a church, and placed it on the altar pro remedio animcB suob, to obtain remis- sion of his sins ; at a time when three or four hundred parchment scrolls, were considered a magnificent endow- ment for the richest monastery ; when scarcely a priest in England could translate Latin into his mother tongue ; and when even in Italy a monk who had picked up a smattering of mathematics was looked upon as a magician — here was a country in which every child was taught to read and write ; in which every town possessed a public hbrary ; in which book collect- ing was a mania ; in which cotton and afterward linen paper was manufactured in enormous quantities ; in which ladies earned distinction as poets and gram- marians, and ia which even the blind were often scholars ; in which men of science were making chemi- cal experiments, using astrolabes in the observatory, inventing flying machines, studying the astronomy and algebra of Hindostan. When the Goths conquered Spain, they were re- conquered by the clergy, who established or revived the Roman Law. But to that excellent code they added THE EEF0GBES. 326 jome special enactments relating to pagans, heretics, and Jews. With nations as with individuals, the child is often the father of the man ; intolerance, which ruined the Spain of Philip, was also its vice in the Gothic days. On the other hand, the prosperity of Spain be- neath the Arabs was owing to the tolerant spirit of that people. Never was a conquered nation so mercifully treated. The Christians were allowed by the Arab laws free exercise of their religion. They were employed at court ; they held office ; they served ia the army. The caliph had a body-guard of twelve thousand men, picked troops, splendidly equipped; and a third of these were Christians. But there were some ecclesi- astics who taught their congregations that it was sinful to be tolerated. There were fanatics who, when they heard the cry of the muezzin, " There is no God but God, and Mahomet is the messenger of God," would sign the cross upon their foreheads and exclaim in a loud voice, " Keep not thou silence, O God, for lo thine enemies make a tumult, '^nd they that hate thee have lifted up the head ; " and so they would rush iuto the mosque, and disturb the public worship, and announce that Mahomet was one of the false prophets whom Christ had foretold. And when such blasphemers were put to death, which often happened on the spot, there was an epidemic of martyr-suicide such as that which excited the wonder and disgust of the younger Pliny. And soon both the contumacy of the Christians and the evil passions of the Moslems, which that contumacy excited, were iacreased by causes from without. When Spain had first been conquered, a number of Gothic nobles, too proud to submit on any terms, retreated to the Asturias, taking with them the sacred relics from Toledo. They found a home in mountain ravines 326 THE INTADEES. clothed with chestnut woods, and divided by savage torrents foaming and gnashing on the stones. Here the Christians estabhshed a kingdom, discovered the bones of a saint which attracted pilgrims from all parts of Europe, and were joiaed from time to time by foreign volunteers^ and by the disaffected from the Moorish towns. The Cahph of Cordova was a Commander of the Faithful ; he united the spiritual and temporal powers in his own person ; he was not the slave of Mamelukes or Tm-kish guards. But he had the right of naming his successor from a numerous progeny, and this cus- tom gave rise, as usual, to seragho intrigue and civil war. The empire broke up into petty states, which were engaged in continual feuds with one another. Thus the Christians were enabled to invade the Mos- lem territory with success. At first they made only plundering forays ; next they took castles by surprise or by storm and garrisoned them strongly; and then they began slowly to advance upon the land. By the middle of the ninth century they had reached the Douro and the Ebro. By the close of the eleventh they had reached the Tagus under the banner of the Cid. In the thirteenth century the kingdom of Granada alone was left. But that kingdom lasted two hundred years. Its existence was preserved by causes similar to those which had given the Christians their success. Portugal, Arragon, Leon, and Castile, were more jealous of one another than of the Moorish kingdom. Granada was unaggressive ; and at the same time it belonged to the European family. There was a difference in language, rehgion, and domestic institu- tions between Moslem and Christian Spain ; yet the manners and mode of thought in both countries wer« THE TTTTT. OF TEAES. 327 the same. The cavaliers of Granada were acknow- ledged by the Spaniards to be "gentlemen, though Moors." The Moslem knight cultivated the sciences of courtesy and music, fought only with the foe on equal terms, esteemed it a duty to side with the weak and to succor the distressed, mingled the name of his mistress with his Allah Akhar ! as the Christians cried. Ma Dame et mon Dieu I wore in. her remembrance an embroidered scarf or some other gage of love, mingled with her ia the graceful dance of the Zambra, serenaded her by moonlight as she looked down from the balcony. Granada was defended by a cavalry of gallant knights, and by an infantry of sturdy mountaiaeers. But it came to its end at last. The marriage of Ferdinand and Isabella united all the crowns of Spain. After eight centuries of almost incessant war, after three thousand seven hundred battles, the long crusade was ended ; Spaia became once more a Christian land ; and Boabdil, pausing on the Hill of Tears, looked down for the last time on the beautiful Alhambra, on the city nestling among rose gardens, and the dark cypress waving over Moslem tombs. His mother reproached him for weepiug as a woman the kingdom he had not defended as a man. He rode down to the sea and crossed over into Africa. But that country also was soon to be iavaded by the Christians. That part of the Peninsula which is called Portugal preserved its independence and its dialect from the encroachments of Castile. While the kingdom of Granada was yet alive, the Portuguese monarch, hav- ing driven the Moors from the banks of the Tagus, resolved to pursue them into Africa. He possessed an excellent crusade machinery, and naturally desired to apply it to some purpose. In Portugal were troops of 828 BENBY THE NATIOATOB. military monks, who had sworn to fight with none but unbelievers. In Portugal were large revenues granted or bequeathed for that purpose alone. In Portugal the passion of chivalry was at its height ; the throne was surrounded by knights panting for adventure. It is related that some ladies of the English court had been grossly insulted by certain cavaHers, and had been unable to find champions to redress their wrongs. An equal number of Portuguese knights at once took ship, sailed to London, flung down their gauntlets, overthrew their opponents in the lists, and returned .to Lisbon, having received from the iajured ladies the tenderest proof of their gratitude and esteem. It seems that already there had risen between Portugal and England that diplomatic friendship which has lasted to the present day. A commerce of wine for wool was estabHshed between the ports of the Tagus and the Thames ; and with this commerce the pirates of Ceuta continually interfered. Ceuta was one of the PDlars of Hercules; it sat opposite Gibraltar, and commanded the straits. The King of Portugal prepared a fleet ; great war-gaUeys were buUt having batteries of mangonels or huge crossbows, with winding gear, stationed in the bow ; great beams, Kke battering rams, swung aloft ; and jars of quicklime and soft soap to fling in the faces of the enemy. The fleet sailed forth, rustling with flags, beating drums, and blowing Saracen horns ; the passage to Ceuta was happily made; the troops were landed, and the pirate city taken by assault. Among those who distinguished themselves in this exploit was the Prince Henry, a younger son of the king. He was not only a brave knight, but also a dis- tinguished scholar ; his mind had been enriched by THE UBKABT. 329 study of the works of Cicero, Seneca, and Pliny, and by the Latin translations of the Greek geographers. He now stepped on that mysterious continent which had been closed to Christians for several hundred years. He questioned the prisoners respecting the interior. They described the rich and learned cities of Morocco ; the Atlas mountains, shining with snow ; and the sandy desert on their southern side. It was there the ancients had supposed all Hfe came to an end. But now the Prince received the astounding intelli- gence that beyond the Sahara was a land inhabited entirely by negroes ; covered with fields of com and cotton ; watered by majestic rivers, on the banks of which rose cities as large as Morocco, or Lisbon, or Seville. In that country were gold mines of prodigious wealth ; it was also a granary of slaves. By land it could be reached in a week from Morocco by a courier mounted on a swift dromedary of the desert, which halted not by day or night. There were regular caravans or camel-fleets, which passed to and fro at certain seasons of the year. The Black Country, as they called it, could also be reached by sea. If ships sailed along the desert shore toward the south, they would arrive at the mouths of wide rivers, which flowed down from the gold-bearing lulls. This conversation decided Prince Hemy's career. To discover this new world beyond the desert became the object of his hfe. He was Grand Master of the Order of Christ, and had ample revenues at his dis- posal ; and he considered himself justified in expending them on this enterprise, which would result in the con- version of many thousand Pagans to the Christian faith. He retired to a castle near Cape St. Vincent, where the sight of the ocean continually inflamed his thoughts. 330 THE EXPLOEATIOll. It was a cold, bleak headland, with a few juniper trees scattered here and there ; all other vegetation had been withered by the spray. But Prince Henry was not alone. He iavited learned men from all countries to reside with him. He established a court, in which weather-beaten pilots might discourse with German mathematicians and ItaUan cosmographers. He bmlt an observatory, and founded a naval school. He col- lected a library, in which might be read the manuscript of Marco Polo, which his elder brother had brought from Venice ; copies on vellum of the great work of Ptolemy ; and copies also of Herodotus, Strabo, and other Greek writers, which were being rapidly transla- ted into Latin under the auspices of the Pope at Home. He had also a collection of maps and sea-charts en- graved on marble or on metal tables, and paiated upon parchment. At a Uttle distance from the castle was the harbor and town of Sagres, from which the vessels of the Prince went forth with the cross of the order painted on their sails. They sailed down the coast of the Sahara ; on their right was a sea of darkness, on their left a land of fire. The gentlemen of the household who commanded the ships did not beHeve in the country of green trees be- yond the ocean of sand. Instead of pushing rapidly along, they landed as soon as they detected any signs of the natives — ^the old people of Masuiissa and Jugurtha — and attacked them crying, Portugal 1 Portugal ! and having taken a few prisoners returned home. In every expedition the commander made it a point of honor to go a Uttle further than the preceding expedition. Sev- eral years thus passed, and the Black Country had not been foimd. The Canary Islands were already known to the Spaniards ; but the Portuguese discovered Porto OETHODOX GEOGBAPHI. 331 Santo and Madeii-a. A shipload of emigrants was de- spatched to the former island, and among the passen- gers was a female rabbit in an interestiog situation. She was turned down with her yoimg ones on the island ; and there being no checks to rabbit-population, they increased with such rapidity that they devoured every green thing, and drove the colonists across into Madeira. In that island the colonists were more fortunate; in- stead of importing rabbits they introduced the vine from Cyprus, and the sugar-cane from Sicily ; and soon Madeira wine and sugar were articles of export from Lisbon to London and to other ports. Li the mean- time the expeditions to Africa became exceedingly un- popular. The priests declared that the holy money was beng scandalously wasted on the dreams of a lonely madman. That castle on the Atlantic shore, which wiU ever be revered as a sacred place in the annals of man- kind, was then regarded with abhorrence and contempt. The common people beHeved it to be the den of a ma- gician, and crossed themselves in terror when they met in their walks a swarthy, strong-featured man, with a round barret cap on his head, wrapped in a large man- tle, and wearing black buskins with gUt spurs. Often they saw him standing on the brink of the cliff, gazing earnestly toward the sea, his eyes shaded by his hand. It was said that on fair nights he might be seen for hours and hours on a Tower of Babel which he had built, holding a strange weapon in his hands, and turn- ing it toward the different quarters of the sky. There was an orthodox geography at that period founded upon statements in the Jewish writings, and by the Fathers of the Church. The earth was in the center of the uni- verse, the sun and the moon and the stars humbly re- volving round it. Jerusalem was in the precise center d32 aou>. of the earth. In Eastern India was the Terrestrial Par- adise, situated on high ground, and surrounded by a wall of fire, reaching to the sky. St. Augustine, Lao- tantius, and Oosmas Indicopleustes opposed the anti- podes as being contrary to Scripture ; and there could not be people on the other side of the earth, for how would they be able to see the Son of God descending in his glory ? It was also generally believed that there was a torrid zone, an impassable belt on both sides of the equator, which Providence had created for the lower animals, and in which no man could live. It was to this fiery land that the Prince kept sending vessel after vessel The Portuguese did not see what would come of these expeditions except to make widows and orphans. " The Prince seems to think," said they, " that because he has discovered two desert islands he has conferred a great blessing upon us ; but we have enough uncultivated land without going across the seas for more. His own father, only a httle while ago, gave land to a nobleman of Germany, on condition that he should people it with emigrants. But Dom Henry sends men out of Portugal instead of asking them in. Let us keep to the country that God has given us. It may be seen how much better suited those lands are for beasts than men by what happened with the rab- bits. And even if there are in that unfound land as many people as the Prince pretends, we do not know what sort of people they are ; and if they are like those in the Canaries, who jump from rock to rock, and throw stones at Christian heads, of what use is it to conquer a land so barren, and a people so contemptible? " However, an incident occurred which produced a revolution in popular and ecclesiastic feeMng. The prisoners captured on the desert coast offered a ransom GOLD. 833 for their release; and this ransom consisted of negro slaves and gold. The place where this metal first made its appearance was called the Golden Eiver. It was not in reality a river, but an arm of the sea, and the gold had been brought from the mines of Bambouk in the country of the negroes. Its discovery created an intense excitement; the priests acknowledged that it could not have been placed there for the use of the wild animals. Companies were formed and were licensed by the Crown, which assigned to the Prince a fifth part of the cargoes returned. He himself cared little for the gold ; but the discovery of this precious metal, of which India was proverbially the native land, su^ested the idea that by following the coast of Africa the Indies might be reached by sea. Letters and maps which he received from his Venetian correspondents encouraged him in this belief, and he obtained without delay a Bull from the Pope granting to the Crown of Portugal all lands that its subjects might discover as far as India inclusive, with license to trade with infidels, and absolu- tion for the souls of those that perished in these semi- commercial, semi-crusading expeditions. The practice of piracy was now partly given up ; the Portuguese, like the Phoenicians of old, traded in one place and kidnapped in another. The commodities which they brought home were gold-dust, sealskins, and negroes. Yet still they did not reach the negro land, till at last a merchant of Lagos, one time an equerry in the Prince's service, knowing his old master had explo- ration at heart more than trade, determined to push on, without loitering on the desert coast. He was re- warded with the sight of trees growing on the banks of a great river, which Prince Henry and his cosmogra- phers supposed to be the Nile. On one side were the 334 DISOOYEEY OF THE SEKEGAIi. brown men of the desert with long tangled hair, lean, and fierce in expression, living on milk, wandering with their camels from place to place. On the other side were large, stout, comely men, with hair like wool, skins black as soot, hving in villages and cultivating fields of com. The Portuguese had now discovered the coast of Guiaea, and they were obliged to give up their preda- tory practices. Instead of an open plain in which knights habited in armor and men dressed in quilted cotton jackets could fight almost with impunity agaiast naked Moors, they entered rivers the banks of which were lined with impenetrable jungles. The negroes, perched in trees, shot down upon them from above, or attacked the ships' boats in mid channel vdth their swift and light canoes. The Portuguese had no fire- locks, and the crossbow bolt was a poor missile com- pared with the arrows which the negroes dipped in a poison so subtle that as soon as the wounded man drank he died, the blood bursting from his nose and ears. A system of barter was therefore established, and the negroes showed themselves disposed to trade. The Gold Coast was discovered ; a fort and a chapel were built at Ehnina, where a commandant was ap- pointed to reside. This ancient settlement has just been ceded to the Enghsh by the Ihitch. The ships carried out copper bracelets, brass basins, knives, rat- tles, looking-glasses, colored silks, and woolen goods, green Eouen cloth, coral, figured velvet, and dainty napkins of Flanders embroidered with gold brocade, receiving chiefly gold-dust in exchange. This trade was farmed out to a company for five years, on condi- tion that the company should each year explore to a certain distance along the coast. THE HOUSE OF MINES. — OOLUMBUS. 335 The excitement which followed the discovery of gold- dust, and the institution of the House of Miues, gradu- ally died away. The noble Prince Henry was no more. The men who went out to the coast were not of the class who devote their Hves to the chivalry of enter- prise. An official who had just returned from Elmina being presented to the King, His Majesty asked liim how it was that although he had lived in Africa his face and hands were so white. The gentleman replied that he had worn a mask and gloves during the whole period of his absence in that stdtry land ; upon which the king told him what he thought he was fit for in words too vigorous to be translated. This same king, John the Second, was a vigorous-minded man, and in him the ambition of Prince Henry was revived. He found in a chest belonging to the late king a series of letters from a Venetian gentleman giving much information about the India trade, and earnestly advising him to prose- cute his explorations along the coast. The Kbrarians of St. Mark had also sent maps in which the termination of the continent was marked. The king sent out new expeditions and fostered the science of nautical astrono- my. A Jew named Zacuto and the celebrated Martin Behem unproved the mariner's compass, and modified the old Alexandrian astrolabe, so that it might be used at sea. Wandering knights from distant lands volun- teered for these expeditions, desiring to witness the tropical storms and the strange manners of the New World, as it was called. Many skillful mariners and pilots visited Lisbon, were encouraged to remain, and became naturalized Portuguese. Among these was the glorious Christopher Columbus, who made more than one voyage to the Gold Coast, married a Portuguese jlady, and lived for some time in the Azores. It was his 336 OOVILHAM. conviction that the eastern coast of Asia could be reached by sailiag due west across the ocean. It was his object, not to discover a new land, but to reach by sea the country which Marco Polo had visited by land. He eventually sailed with letters to the Emperor ol China in his pocket, and came back from the West India islands thinking that he had been to Japan. He made his proposals ia the first place to the king, who referred it to a council of learned men. There were now two plans for saihng to India before the court : the one by following the African coast, the other by sailing west across the ocean. But expeditions of all kinds were at that time unpopular in Lisbon. The Guinea trade did not pay, ^.nd it was strenuously urged at the council that the West African Settlements should be abandoned. The friends of exploration were obhged to stand on the defensive. They could not carry the proposal of Colum- bus ; it was aU that they could do to save the African expeditions. But" when Columbus had won for Castile the east coast of Asia (as was then supposed), the king perceived that if he wished to have an Indian empire he must set to work at once. He accordingly conducted the naval expeditions with such vigor that the Cape of Storms was discovered, was then called the Cape of Good Hope, and was then doubled, though without im- mediate result, the sailors forcing their captain to return. The king also sent a gentleman named Covilham to visit the countries of the East by land. His instruc- tions were to trace the Yenetian trade in drugs and spices to its source, and to find out Prester John. Covilham went to Alexandria in the pilgrim's garb, but instead of proceeding to the Holy Land, he passed on to Aden, and sailed round the Indian Ocean or the Green Sea, that Lake of Wonder with the precious INDIA. 337 ambergris floating on its waters and pearls strewed upon its bed, whitened with the cotton sails of the Arab vessels, of the Guzerat Indians, and even of the Chinese, whose four-masted junks were sometimes to be seen lying in the Indian harbors with great wooden anchors dangRng from their bows. The east coast of Africa, as low down as Madagascar, or the Island of the Moon, was Uned with large towns in which the Arabs resided as honored strangers, or iu which they ruled as kings. On this coast Covilham obtaiaed information respecting the Cape. He then crossed over to the India shore ; he sailed down the coast of Malabar from city to city, and from port to port. He was astounded and bewildered by what he saw : the activity and grand- eur of the commerce ; the magnificence of the courts ; the half-naked kings blazing with jewels, saying their prayers on rosaries of precious stones, and using golden goblets as spittoons ; the elephants with pictures drawn in bright colors on their ears, and with jugglers in towers on their backs ; the enormous temples filled with lovely girls ; the idols of gold with ruby eyes ; the houses of red sandal wood ; the scribes who wrote on palm leaves with iron pens ; the pilots who took observations with instruments unknown to Europeans ; the huge bundles of cinnamon or cassia in the warehouses of the Ajab merchants ; the pepper vines trailing over trees ; and drugs which were priceless in Europe growing in the fields like com. He returned to Cairo, and there found two Jews, Kabbi Abraham and Joseph the Shoemaker, whom the king had sent to look after him. To them he gave a letter for the king, in which he wrote that " the ships which saUed down the coast of Guinea might be sure of reaching the termination of the Continent by keep- 338 PEESTEB JOHN. on to the south ; and that when they arrived in the Eastern ocean, they must ask for Sofala and the Island of the Moon." Covilham himself did not return. He had accom- plished one part of his mission ; he had traced the Venetian commerce to its source ; but he had now to find out Prester John. A fable had arisen, ia the Dark Ages, of a great Christian king ia Central Asia ; and when it was clearly ascertaiaed that the Grand Khan was not a Christian, and that none of the Tartar priaees could possibly be Christians, as they could not keep Lent, having no fish or vegetables iu their country, it was hoped that Prester John, as the myth was called, might be found elsewhere. Certain pilgrims were met with at Jerusalem who were almost negroes in appearance. Their baptism was of three kinds — of fire, of water, and of blood : they were sprinkled, they were circumcised, they were seared on the forehead with a red-hot iron in the form of a cross. Their king, they said, was a good Christian and a hater of the Moslems, and was descended from the Queen of Sheba. This swarthy king, the ancestor of Theodore, could be no other than Prester John ; and Covilham felt it his duty to bear him the greetings of his master before he went home to enjoy that reputation which he had so gloriously earned, and to take a part in the great discoveries that were soon to be made. But the King of Abyssinia wanted a tame white man. He gave his visitor wife and lands ; he treated him with honor ; but he would not let him go. This kind of complimentary captivity is a danger to which African travelers are always exposed. It is the glory and pride of a savage king to have a white man at his court. And so Covilham was detained, and he died in Abys- TABOO DA GAHA. 339 sinia. But he lived to hear that Portugal had risen in a few years to be one of the great European powers, and that the flag he loved was waving above those castles and cities which he had been the first of his na- tion to behold. His letter arrived at the same time as the ship of Dias, who had doubled the Cape. The king determined that a final expedition should be sent, and that India should be reached by sea. It was a fete day in Lisbon. The flags were flying on every tower ; the fronts of the houses were clothed in gorgeous drapery, which swelled and floated ia the wind; stages were erected on which mysteries were performed ; bells were ringing, artillery boomed. Mar- ble balconies were crowded with ladies and cavaliers, and out of upper windows peeped forth the faces of girls, who were kept in semi-Oriental seclusion. Pres- ently the sound of trumpets could be heard ; and then came in view a thousand friars, who chanted a Ktany, while behind them an immense crowd chanted back in response. At the head of this procession rode a gentle- man richly dressed ; he was followed by a hundred and forty-eight men in sailors' clothes, but barefooted, and . carrying tapers in their hands. On they went tiU they reached the quay where the boats, fastened to the shore, swayed to and fro with the movement of the tide, and strained at the rope as if striving to depart. The sailors knelt. A priest of venerable appearance stood before them, and made a general confession, and absolved them in the form of the Bull which Prince Henry had obtained. Then the wives and mothers embraced their loved ones, whom they bewailed as men about to die. And all the people wept. And the children wept also, though they knew not why." Thirty-two months passed, and again the water-side MO UBBON BEJ0ICB8. was crowded, and the guns fixed, and the bells rang Again Vasco da Oama marched in procession through the streets ; and behind him walked, with feeble steps, but with triiunph gleaming in their eyes, fifty-five men — the rest were gone. But in that procession were not only Portuguese, but also men with white turbans and brown faces ; and sturdy blacks, who bore a chest whiuh was shown by their straining muscles to be of enoimous weight ; andia his hand the Captaia-General held a letter which was written with a pen of iron on a golden leaf, and which addressed the king of Portugal and Guinea in these words : " Vasco da Oama, a gentle- man of thy house, came to my country, of whose coming 1 was glad. In my country there is phnty of cinnamon, doves, pepper, and precious stones. The things which 1 am desirous . to have out of thy country are silver, gold, coral, and scarlet." That night all the houses ia Lisbon were ffluminated; the gutters ran with wine ; the skies, for miles round, were reddened with the light of bonfires. The king's men brought ten pounds of spices to each sailor's wife, to give away to her gossips. The sailors themselves were surrounded by crowds, who- sat silent and open- mouthed, Ustening to the tales of the great waters and the marvelous lands where they had been. They told of the wonders of the Guinea coast, and of the men near the Cape, who rode on oxen and played sweet music on the flute ; and of the birds which looked like geese, and brayed like donkeys, and did not know how to fly, but put up their wings like sails, and scud- ded along before the wind. They told how as they sailed on toward the south, the north star sank and sank, and grew fainter and fainter, until at last it disappeared, and they entered a new world, and sailed beneath VENICE IN DBSPAIB. 'dii strange sties; and how, when they had doubled the Cape, they again saw sails on the horizon, and the north star again rose to view. They told of the cities on the Eastern shore, and of their voyage across the Indian Ocean, and of that joyful morning when, through the gray mists of early dawn, they discerned the hills of CaHcut. And then they sank their voices, and their eyes grew grave and sad as they told of the horrors of the voyage ; of the long, long nights off the stormy Cape, when the wind roared, and the spray lashed through the rigging, and the waves foamed over the bulwarks, and the stones that were their cannon-shot crashed from side to side, and the ships, like Hve creatures, groaned and creaked, and hour after hour the sailors were forced to labor at the pumps till their bones ached, and their hands were numbed by cold. They told of treacherous pilots in the Mozambique, who plotted to run their ships ashore ; and of the Indian pirates, the gipsies of the sea, who sent their spies on board. They told of that new and horrible disease which, when they had been long at sea, made their bodies turn putrid and the teeth drop from their jaws. And as they told of those things, and named the souls who had died at sea, there rose a cry of lamentation, and widows in new garments fled weep- ing from the crowd. That night the Venetian ambassador sat down and wrote to his masters that he had seen vessels enter Lis- bon harbor laden with spices and with India drugs. His next letter informed them that a strong fleet was being prepared, and that Vasco da Gama intended to conquer India. The Venetians saw that they were ruined. They wrote to their ally, the Sultan of Egypt, and implored him to bestir himself. They gave hivr\ 342 MAJTESTIO CBIMB. artillery to send to the India princes. They offered to open the Suez canal at their own expense, that their ships might arrive ui the Indian Ocean before the Por- tuguese. On the other hand, came the terrible Albu- querque, who told the Sultan to beware, or he would destroy Mecca and Medina, and turn the Nile into the Red Sea. The Indian Ocean became a Portuguese lake. There was scarcely a town upon its shores which had not been saluted by the Portuguese bombardiers. Not a vessel could cross its waters without a Portu- guese passport. As a last resource, the Venetians offer- ed to take the India produce off the king's hands, and to give him a fair price. This offer was declined, and Lisbon, instead of Venice, became the marketplace of the India trade. The gi'eat cities on the Euphrates, the Tigris, and the Nile, fell into decay ; the caravan trade of Central Asia decHned ; the throne of commerce was transferred from the basin of the Mediterranean to the basin of the Atlantic ; and the Oceanic powers, though rigidly excluded from the commerce itself, wers greatly benefited by the change. They had no longer to sail through the straits of Gibraltar ; Lisbon was al- most at their doors. The achievements of the Portuguese were stupendous — for a time. They established a chain of forts all down the western coast of Africa, and up the east coast of the Red Sea ; then round the Persian Gulf, down the coast of Malabar, up the coast of Coromandel, among the islands of the Archipelago, along the shores of Siam and Burmah to Canton and Shanghai. With handfuls of men they defeated gigantic armies ; with petty forts they governed empires. But from first to last they were murderers and robbers, without foresight, without compassion. Our eyes are at first blinded to their vices THE poet's geotto. 343 by the glory of their deeds ; but as the light fades, their nakedness and horror are revealed. We read of Arabs who had received safe-conducts, and who made no re- sistance, being sewed up in sails and cast into the sea, or being tortured ia body and mind by hot bacon being dropped upon their flesh ; of crocodiles being fed with Uve captives for the amusement of the soldiers, and being so well accustomed to be fed that whenever a whistle was given they raised their heads above the water. We read of the wretched natives taking refuge with the tiger of the jungle and the panther of the hills ; of mothers being forced to pound their children to death in the rice mortars, and of other children being danced on the point of spears, which it was said was teaching the yoimg cocks to crow. The generation of heroes passed away; the generation of favorites began. Courtiers accepted offices in the Indies with the view of extorting a fortune from the natives as rapidly as could be done. It was remarked that humanity and justice were virtues which were always left behind at the Cape of Good Hope by passengers for India. It was remarked that the money which they brought home was like excommunicated money, so quickly did it dis- appear. And as for those who were content to love their coxmtry and to serve their king, they made enemies of the others, and were ruined for their pains. Old soldiers might be seen in Lisbon wandering through the streets in rags, dying in the hospitals, and crouched before the palace which they had filled with gold. Men whose names are now worshiped by their countrymen were then despised. Minds which have won for them- selves immortality were darkened by sorrow and dis- grace. In the island of Macao, on the Chinese coast, there is a grove paved with soft green velvet paths, and 3M THE 8CBAMBLE FOB COLONIES. roofed witli a dome of leaves which even the rays of a tropical sun cannot pierce through. In the midst is a grotto of rocks, roimd which the roots of gigantic trees clamber and coil ; and in that silent hermitage a poor exile sat and sang the glory of the land which had cast him forth. That exile was Camoens ; that song was the Lusiad. The vast possessions of the Spaniards and Portu- guese were united under Philip the Second, who closed the port of Lisbon against the heretical and rebellious natives of the Netherlands. The Dutch were not a people to undertake long voyages out of curiosity, but when it became necessary for them in the way of busi- ness to explore unknown seas they did so with effect. Since they could not get cinnamon and ginger, nutmegs and cloves at Lisbon, they determined to seek them in the lands where they were grown. The English fol- lowed their example, and so did the French. There was for a long period incessant war within the tropics. At last things settled down. In the "West and East Indies the Spaniards and Portuguese still possessed an extensive empire ; but they no longer ruled alone. The Dutch, the English, and the French obtained settle- ments in North America and the West India Islands, in the peninsula of Hindostan, and the Indian Archi- pelago, and also on the coast of Guinea. West Africa is divided by nature into pastoral regions, agricultural regions, and dense forest moun- tains, or dismal swamps, where the natives remain in a savage and degraded state. The hiUs and fens are the slave preserves of Africa, and are hunted every year by the pastoral tribes, with whom war is a profession. The captives are bought by the agricultural tribes, and are made to labor in the fields. This indigenous slave THE SLAVE TBASE. 345 trade exists at the present time, and has existed during hundreds of years. The Tuaricks or Ta-wny Moors, iohabiting the Sahara on the borders of the Soudan, made frequent forays into that country for the purpose of obtaining slaves, exacted them as tribute from conquered chiefs, or some- times bought them fairly with horses, salt, and woolen clothes. When Barbary was inhabited by rich and luxurious people, such as the Carthaginians, who on one occasion bought no less than five thousand negroes for their gaUeys, these slaves must have been obtained in prodigious numbers, for many die in the middle passage across the desert, a journey which kills even a great number of the camels that are employed. The negroes have at aU times been highly prized as domestic and ornamental slaves, on account of their docility and their singular appearance. They were much used in ancient Egypt, as the monumental pictures show ; they were articles of fashion both in Greece and Bome. Throughout the Middle Ages they were exported from the East Coast to India and Persia, and were formed into regiments by the Caliphs of Bagdad. The Yenetians bought them ia Tripoli and Tunis, and sold them to the Moors of Spain. "When the Moors were expelled, the trade still went on ; negroes might still be seen in the markets of Seville. The Portuguese discovered the slave-land itself, and imported ten thousand negroes a year before the discovery of the New World. The Spaniards, who had often negro slaves in their posses- sion, set some of them to dig in the mines at St. Domingo; it was found that a negro's work was as much as four Indians', and arrangements were made for importing them from Africa. When the Dutch, the EngHsh, and the French obtained plantations in 346 THE COAST. America, tliey also required negro labor, and made settlements in Guinea ia order to obtain it. Angola fed the Portuguese Brazil ; Elmiua fed tbe Dutch Man- hattan ; Cape Coast Castle fed Barbadoes, Jamaica and Virginia ; the Senegal fed Louisiana and the French Antilles; even Denmark had an island or two in the West Indies, and a fort or two upon the Gold Coast. The Spaniards alone, having no settlements in Guinea, were supplied by a contract or Assiento, which at one time was enjoyed by the British crown. We shall now enter into a more particular description of this trade, and of the coast on which it was carried on. Sailing through the Straits of Gibraltar, on the left hand for some distance is the fertile country of Moroc- co, watered by streams descending from the Atlas range. Then comes a sandy shore, on which breaks a savage surf; and when that is passed, a new scene comes to view. The ocean is discolored; a peculiar smell is detected in the air ; trees appear as if standing in the water; and small black specks, the canoes of fishermen, are observed passing to and fro. The first region, Senegambia, stiU partakes of the desert character. With the exception of the palm and the gigantic Adansonia, the trees are for the most part stunted in appearance. The country is open, and is clothed with grass, where antelopes start up from their forms Hke hares. Here and there are clumps of trees, and long avenues mark the water courses, which are often dry, for there are only three months' rain. The Interior abounds with gum-trees, especially on the borders of the desert. The people are Mahometans, fight on horseback, and dwell in towns fortified with walls and hedges of the cactus. In this country the French are masters, and have laid the foun- THE BIGHTS. 847 iaidons of a military empire ; an Algeria on a smaller scale. But as we pass toward the south the true character of the coast appear&. A mountain wall runs parallel with the sea, and numberless rivers leap down the hill slopes, and flow toward the Atlantic through forest- covered and alluvial lands, which they themselves have formed. These rivers are tidal, and as soon as the salt water begins to mingle with the fresh their banks are hned with mangrove shrubberies, forming an intricate bower-work of stems, which may be seen at low water encrusted with oysters, thus said by sailors to grow on trees. The mountain range is sometimes visible as a blue outline in the distance ; or the hills, which are shaped like an elephant's back, draw near the shore ; or rugged spurs jut down with their rocks of torn and tUted granite to the sea. The shore is sculptured into curves ; and all along the coast runs a narrow line of beach, sometimes dazzling white, sometimes orange yellow, and sometimes a deep cinnamon red. This character of coast extends from Sierra Leone to the Volta, and includes the ivory coast, the pepper coast, and the gold coast. Then the country again flattens ; the mountain range retires and gives place to a gigantic swamp, through which the Niger debouches by many mouths into the Bight of Benin, where, accord- ing to the old sailor adage, " few come out, though many go in." It is indeed the unhealthiest region of an unhealthy coast. A network of creeks and lagoons unite the various branches of the Niger, and the marshes are filled with groves of palm-oil trees, whose yellow bunches are as good as gold. But in the old day the famous red oil was only used as food, and the sinister name of the Slave Coast indicates the com- modity which it then produced. 34:8 DAHOMEY. Aga.Ti the hills approach the coast, and now thej tower up as mountains. The Peak of Cameroons is situated on the line ; ii is nearly as high as the Peak of Tenerifife ; the flowers of Abyssinia adorn its upper sides, and on its lofty summit the smOjie of the volcano steals mist-like across a sheet of snow. A little lower down, the primeval forest of the Gorilla Country resembles that of the opposite Brazil ; but is less gorgeous in its vegetation, less abundant in its Hfe. Farther yet to the south, and a brighter land appears. We now enter the Portuguese province of Angola. The land, far into the interior, is covered with farm-houses and coffee plantations, and smOing fields of maize. San Paolo de Loanda is stOl a great city, though the colony has decayed; though the convents have fallen into ruin, though oxen are stalled in the college of the Jesuits. Below Angola, to the Cape of Good Hope, is a waterless beach of sand. The West Coast of Africa begins with a desert inhabited by Moors ; it ends with a desert inhabited by Hottentots. In the last century, a trifling trade was done in ivory and gold ; but these were only accessories ; the Guinea trade signified the trade in slaves. At first the Euro- peans kidnapped the negroes whom they met on the beach, or who came off to the ships in their canoes ; but the "treacherous natives" made reprisals; the practice was, therefore, given up, and the trade was conducted upon equitable principles. It was found that honesty was the best pohcy, and that it was cheaper to buy men than to steal them. Besides the settlements which were made by Europeans, there were many native ports upon the Slave Coast, and, of these, Whydah, the seaport of Dahomey, was the most im- portant. When a slave vessel entered the roads, it THE AMAZONS. 349 fired a gun, the people crowded down to the beach, the ship's boat landed through an ugly surf, and the skipper made his way to a large tree iu the vicinity of the land- ing-place, where the governor of the town received him in state, and regaled him with trade-gin, by no means the most agreeable of all compoimds. The capital was situated at a distance of sixty miles, and the captain would be carried there in a hammock, taking with him some handsome silks and other presents for the king. This monarch Hved by hunting his neighbors and by seUing them to Europeans. There was a regular war- season, and he went out once a year, sometimes ia one direction, sometimes ia another. Kings in Africa have frequently a body-guard of women. A certain king of Dahomey had developed this iastitution into female regiments. These women are nominally the king's wives ; they are iu reality old maids — the only speci- mens of the class upon the continent of Africa ; they are excellent soldiers— hardy, savage, and courageous. In the siege of Abbeokuta, the other day, an Amazon cKmbed up the wall ; her right arm was cut clean off, and as she feU back she pistoled a man with her left. When the king returned from his annual campaign, he sent to all the white men at "Whydah, who received the special title of the " king's friends," and invited them up to witness his " customs," and to purchase his slaves. In the first place, the king murdered a number of his captives to send to his father as tokens of regard ; and the traders were mortified to see good flesh and blood being wasted on religion. However, slaves were always in abundance. They were also obtained from the settle- ments upon the coast. The Portuguese Angola could alone be dignified with the name of colony. The Dutch, English, and French settlements were merely 350 THE MIDDLE PASSAGE. fortified factories, half castle, half shop, in which the agents lived, and ia which the dry goods, rum, tobacco, trade-powder and muskets were stored. There were native traders who received a quantity of such goods on tru&t, and traveled into the interior till they came to a war-town. They then ordered so many slaves, and laid down the goods. The chief ordered out the militia, made a night march, attacked a village just before the dawn, kiUed those who resisted, carried off the rest in irons manufactured at Birmingham, and handed them over to the trader, who drove them down to the coast. They were then warehoused in the fort dungeons, or in biiildings called " barracoons," prepared for their recep- tion; and as soon as a vessel was ready, they were marked and shipped. On board they were packed on the lower deck like herrings in a cask. The cargo sup- posed that it also resembled herrings in being exported as an article of food. The slaves believed that all white men were cannibals ; that the red caps of the trade were dyed in negro blood, and that the white soap was made of negro brains. So they often refused to eat ; upon which their mouths were forced open with an instrument know|i in surgery as speculum oris, and used in cases of lockjaw ; and by means of this ingenious contrivance they breakfasted and dined against their will. Exercise also being conducive to health, they were ordered to jump up and down in their fetters ; and if they declined to do so, the appKcation of the cat had the desired effect, and made them exercise not only their limbs, but also their lungs, and so promoted the circulation of the blood and the digestion of the horse- beans on which they were fed. Yet such was the ob- stinacy of these savage creatures, that many of them sulked themselves to death ; and sometimes, when in- A CHBISTIAN LAND. 351 JtaXged with an airing on deck, the ungrateful wretches would jump overboard, and, as they sank, waved their hands in triiunph at having made their escape. On reaching the West Indies they were put into regular schools of labor, and gradually broken in ; and they then enjoyed the advantage of dweUing in a Christian land. But their temporal happiness was not increased. If a lady put her cook into the oven because the pie was overdone ; if a planter soused a slave in the boiling sugar ; if the runaway was hunted with bloodhounds, and then flogged to pieces and hung alive in chains ; if the poor old worn-out slave was turned adrift to die — the West Indian laws did not interfere. The slave of a planter was "his money;" it was only when a man killed another person's slave that he was punished ; and then only by a fine. It may be said, without exaggera- tion, that dogs and horses now receive more protection in the British dominions than negroes received in the last century. In order to understand how so great a moral revolu- tion has been wrought we must return for a moment to the Middle Ages. We left the burgher class in alliance with the kings, possessing liberal charters, making their own laws, levying their own taxes, commanding their own troops. Their sons were not always merchants like themselves ; they invaded the intellectual do- minions of the priests ; they became lawyers, artists, and physicians. Then another change took place. Standing armies were iuvented, and the middle class were re-enslaved. Their municipal rights were taken from them ; troops were stationed in their towns ; the nobles collected roimd the king, who could now reward their loyalty with lucrative and honorable posts : the command of a 352 THE PHILOSOPHEES. regiment, or tlie administration of a province. Heavj taxes were imposed on tlie burghers and the peasants, and these supported the nobles and clergy, who were exempt. Aristocracy and monarchy became fast friends, and the Crown was protected by the thunders of the Church. The rebellion of the German monk estabhshed an idol of ink and paper, instead of an idol of painted wood or stone ; the Protestant beHeTed that it was his duty to study the Bible for himself, and so education was spread throughout the countries of the Reformed Eeligion. A desire for knowledge became general, and the academies of the Jesuits were founded in self- defense. The enlargement of the reading class gave the Book that power which the pulpit once enjoyed, and in the hands of Voltaire the Book began to preach. The fallacies of the Syrian religion were exposed ; and with that religion fell the doctrine of passive obedience and divine right ; the doctrine that imbelievers are the enemies of God ; the doctrine that men who adopt a particular profession are invested with magical powers which stream into them from other men's finger ends ; the doctrine that a barbarous legal code was issued viva voce by the Creator of the world. Such notions as these are stiE held by thousands in private life, but they no longer enter into the policy of states or dictate statutes of the realm. Yoltaire destroyed the authority of the Church ; and Rousseau prepared the way for the destruction of the Crown. He believed in a dreamland of the past, which had never existed ; he appealed to imaginary laws of Nature. Yet these errors were beneficial in their day. He taught men to yearn for an ideal state, which they with their own efforts might attain ; he inspired them THE EEBELUON. 853 with the sentiment of Liberty, and with a rererence for the Law of Eight. Virtuous principles, abstract ideas — ^the future Deities of men — were now for the first time lifted up to be adored. A thousand hearts palpi- tated with excitement ; a thousand pens were drawn ; the people that slumbered in sorrow and captivity heard a voice biddiag them arise ; they strained, they struggled, and they burst their bonds. Jacques Bonhomme, who had hitherto gone on all fours, dis- covered to his surprise that he also was a biped ; the world became more Hght ; the horizon widened ; a new epoch opened for the human race. The anti-slavery movement, which we shall now briefly sketch, is merely an episode in that great rebellion against authority which began in the night of the Middle Ages; which sometimes assumed the form of reHgious heresy, sometimes of serf revolt; which gradually established the municipal cities, and raised the slave to the position of the tenant ; which gained great victories in the Protestant Eeformation, the two English Eevolutions, the American Eevolution, and the French Eevolution ; which has destroyed the tyranny of governments in Europe, and which wiU in time de- stroy the tyranny of religious creeds. Li the middle of the eighteenth century negro slavery, although it had frequently been denounced in books, had not attracted the attention of the English people. To them it was something in the abstract, something which was done beyond the seas. But there rose an agitation which brought up its distant horrors in vivid pictures before the mind, and produced an outcry of anger and disgust. It had been the custom of the Virginian or West Lidian planter, when he left his tobacco or sugar estate 354 SLAVEEY IN LONDON. for a holiday in England, to wear very broad hats and very wide trowsers and to be accompanied by those slaves, who used to bring him his coffee ia the early morning, to brush away the blue-tailed fly from his siesta, and to mix him rum and water when required The existence of such attendants was somewhat anoma- lous in this island, and friends would often observe with a knowing air it was lucky for him that Sambo was not up to English law. That law, indeed, was un- defined. Slavery had existed in England and had died out of itself, in what manner and at what time no one could precisely say. It was, however, a popular im- pression that no man could be kept as a slave if he were once baptized. The planters enjoyed the same kind of reputation which the nabobs afterward ob- tained; a yellow skin and a bad heart were at one time always associated with each other. The negroes were often encouraged to abscond, and to offer them- selves before the font. They obtained as sponsors respectable weU-to-do men, who declared that they would stand by their godsons if it came to a case at law. The planters were in much distress, and, in order to know the worst, went to Messrs. York and Talbot, the Attorney and the Sohcitor-General for the time being, and requested an opinion. The opinion of York and Talbot was this : that slaves breathing English air did not become free ; that slaves on being baptized did not become free; and that their masters could force th«m back to the plantations when they pleased. The planters, finding that the law was on their side, ai once used it to the full. Advertisements appeared in the newspapers offering rewards for runaway slaves. Negroes might be seen being dragged along the streets la open day ; they were bought and sold at the Poultry ITABTiiAH OOEPUS. 866 Compter, an old city jail. Free men of color were no longer safe ; kidnapping became a regular pursuit. There was a young man named Granville Sharp, whose benevolent heart was touched to the quick by the abominable scenes which he had witnessed more than once. He could not believe that such was real- ly English law. He examined the question for him- self, and, after long search, discovered precedents which overthrew the opinion of the two great lawyers. He published a pamphlet in which he stated his case ; and not content with writing, he also acted in the cause, aiding and abetting negroes to escape On one occa- sion a Virginian had disposed of an unruly slave to a skipper bound for the "West Indies. The vessel was lying in the river ; the unfortimate negro was chained to the mast ; when Granville Sharp climbed over the side with a writ of Habeas Corpus in his hand. James Somerset's body was given up, and with its panting, shuddering, hopeful, fearful soul inside, was produced before a Court of Justice, that Lord Mansfield might decide to whom it belonged. The trial was argued at three sittings, and excited much interest throughout the land. It ended in the liberation of the slave. Several hundred negroes were at once bowed out by their masters into the street, and wandered about, sleeping in glass-houses, seated on the door-steps of their former homes, weeping and cursing Granville Sharp. It was resolved to do something for them, and a grant of land was obtained from the native chiefs at the mouth of the Sierra Leone River : a company was formed ; four hundred destitute negroes were sent out ; and, as it there were no women in Africa, fifty " imfor- tunates " were sent out with them. The society of these ladies was not conducive to the moral or physical well- 866 OLABESON being of the emigrants, eighty-four of whom died before they sighted land, and eighty-six in the first four months after landing. The philanthropists thus produced a middle passage at which a slave trader would have been aghast. In a short time the white women were dead, and the GranviUes, as they are traditionally called upon the coast, adopted savage hfe. But the settle- ment was re-peopled from another source. In the American Revolutionary "War, large numbers of negroes had flocked to the royal standard, attracted by the proclamation of the British generals. These runaway slaves were sent to Nova Scotia, where they soon be- gan to complain ;, the climate was not to their taste, and they had not received the lands which had been promised them. They were then shipped off to Sierra Leone. They landed, siaging hymns, and pitched their tents on the site of the present town. The settlement was afterward recruited with negroes in thousands out of slave ships ; but the American element may yet be detected in the architecture of the native houses and in the speech of the inhabitants. In the meantime the slave-trade was being actively discussed. Among those who felt most deeply on the question was Dr. Peckard, of St, John's CoUege, Cam- bridge, who being, in 1785, Yice Chancellor, gave as a subject for the Latin essay, "Anne liceat invitos in servi- tutem dare ? " — Is it right to make men slaves against their will ? Among the candidates was a certain bachelor of arts, Mr. Thomas Clarkson, who had gained the prize for the best Latin essay the year before, and was desirous of keeping up his reputation. He therefore took unusual pains to collect materials respecting the African slave- trade, to which he knew Dr. Peckard's question referred. THE PRIZE ESSAT. i67 He borrowed the papers of a deceased friend who had been in the trade, and conversed with officers who had been stationed in the West Indies. He read Benezet's Historical Account of Guinea, and was thence guided to the original authorities which are contained in the large folios of Hakluyt and Purchas. These old voya- ges, written by men who were themselves slavers, con- tain admirable descriptions of native customs, and also detailed accounts of the way in which the man-trade was carried on. Clarkson possessed a vivid imagination and a tender heart ; these narratives filled him with horror and alarm. The pleasure of research was swal- lowed up in the pain that was excited by the facts before him. It was one gloomy subject from morning to night. In the day-time he was iineasy ; at night he had little rest. Sometimes he never closed his eyes from • grief. It became not so much a trial for academical reputation as for the production of a work which might be useful to injured Africa. He always slept with a candle in the room, that he might get up and put down thoughts which suddenly occurred to him. At last he finished his painful task, and obtained the prize. He went to Cambridge, and read his essay in the Senate House. On his journey back to London, the subject continually engrossed his thoughts. " I became," he says, " very seriously affected upon the road. I stopped my horse occasionally, and dismounted and walked. I frequently tried to persuade myself, in these intervals, that the contents of my essay could not be true. Com- ing ia sight of Wades MiU, in Hertfordshire, I sat down disconsolate on the turf by the roadside and held my Lorse. Here a thought came into my mind that if the contents of the essay were true, it was time that some person should see these calamities to their end." 358 WHiBEKFOEOB. On arriving in London he heard for the first time of the labors of Granville Sharp and others. He de- termined to give up his intention of entering the Church, and to devote himself entirely to the destruc- tion of the slave-trade. At this time a Committee was formed for the purpose of prepariag the public mind for abolition. Granville Sharp, to whom more than to any other individual the abolition of the slave-trade is due, became the president, and Clarkson was deputed to collect evidence. He called on the leading men of the day, and endeavored to engage their sympathies in the cause. His modest, subdued demeanor, the sad, almost tearful expression of his face, which the painter of his portrait has fortimately seized, the earnestness and passion with which he depicted the atrocities of the slave-hunt in Africa and the miseries of the slave-hold at sea, secured him attention and respect from all ; and among those with whom he spoke was one whose fame is the purest and best that parliamentary history re- cords. WiUiam Wilberforce was the son of a rich merchant at Hull, and inherited a large fortune. He went to Cambridge, and was afterward elected member for his native city, an honor which cost him eight thousand pounds. He became a member of the fashionable clubs, and chiefly frequented Brookes', where he be- came a votary of faro tiU his winnings cured him of his taste for play. He soon obtained a reputation in the House and the salon. He had an easy flow of lan- guage, and a voice which was melody itself. He was a clever mimic and an accomplished musician. He pos- sessed the rare arts of poKshed raillery and courteous repartee. Madame de Stael declared that he was the wittiest man in England. But presently he withdrew? THE AWAKENINQ. 859 from her society and that of her fi'iends, because it was brilliant and agreeable. He also took his name off aU his clubs. He was traveling on the Continent with Pitt, who was his bosom friend, when a change came over him. In the days of his childhood he had been sent to reside with an aunt who was a gi-eat admirer of Whitefield's preaching, and kept up a friendly connec- tion with the early Methodists. He was soon infected with her ideas, and " there was remarked in him a rare and pleasing character of piety in his twelfth year." This excited much consternation among the other members of his famUy. His mother at once came up to London and took him home. "If BOly turns Methodist," said his grandfather, "he shall not have a sixpence of miue." We are informed that theatrical diversions, card parties, and sumptuous suppers (at the fashionable hour of six in the evening), obliterated these impressions for a time. They were not, how- ever, dead, for the perusal of Doddridge's " Eise and Progress " was sufficient to revive them. This amiable and excellent young man became the prey of a morbid superstitition. Often in the midst of enjoyment his conscience told him he was not, in the true sense of the word, a Christian. " I laughed, I sang, I was ap- parently gay and happy, but the thought would steal across me. What madness is aU this : to continue easy in a state in which a sudden call out of the world would consign me to everlasting misery, and that when eternal happiness is within my grasp." The sinful worldling accordingly reformed. He declined Sunday visits ; he got up earUer in the morning ; he wrestled continually in prayer; he began to keep a common- place book, serious and profane, and a Christian duty paper. He opened himself completely to Pitt, and 360 THE METHODIST. said he believed the Spirit was in him. Mr. Pitt was apparently of a different opinion, for he tried to reason hini out of his convictions. "The fact is," says Mr. WUberforce, " he was so absorbed in politics that he had never given himself time for due reflection in religion. But, among other things, he declared to me that Bishop Butler's work raised in his mind more doubts than it had answered." Now if that was the character of Pitt's iatellect, we must venture to think that the more he reflected on religion the less he would have believed in it. Superstition iutensifles a man. It makes him more of what he was before. An evU-natured person who takes fright at hell-fire becomes the most malevolent of human beiags. Nothing can more clearly prove the natural beauty of Wilberforce's character than the fact that he preserved it unimpaired in spite of his Method- istic principles. It would be unjust to deny that after he became a Methodist he became a wiser and a better man. His intellect was strengthened, his affections were sweetened, by a faith the usual tendency of which is to harden the heart and to soften the head. He en- deavored to control a human, and therefore sometimes irritable, temper; he laid down for himseK the rule " to manifest rather humility in himself than dissatis- faction at others;" and so well did he succeed that a female friend observed, "If this be madness, I hope that he win bite us all." Yet there was a flaw in Wilberforce's brain, or he could never have supposed that a man might be sent to hell for playing the piano. He soon showed that in another age he might have been an excellent inquisitor ; and inquisitors there were not less pure-hearted, net less benevolent, in private life than Wilberforce him- THE ROYAL PEOCLAMATION. Sft* self. He desired to do something in public for the glory of God, and he believed it was his mission to reform the manners of the age. When a man of fashion was always a gambler, and when all the clubs in St. James street were hells ; when speeches were often incoherent in the House after dinner; when comic songs were composed against Mr. Pitt, not because he had a mistress, but because he had none; when ladies called adultery "a little affair;" when the Prince of Wales was a young man about town, grazing on the middle classes — it cannot be ques- tioned that, from the Eoyal Family downward, there was room for improvement. The reader will perhaps feel curious to learn m what manner Mr. Wilberforce commenced his laudable but difficult crusade. He obtained a Eoyal Proclamation for the discouragement of vice and immorality ; and letters from the secre- taries of state to the lords-lieutenant, expressing His Majesty's pleasure that they recommend it to the justices throughout their several counties to be active in the execution of the laws against immoralities. He also started a society to assist in the enforcement of the proclamation, as a kind of amateur detective corps, to hunt up indecent and blasphemous pubKcations. And that was what he called reforming the maimers of the age. Happily, the slave-trade question began to be dis- cussed, and Mr. Wilberforce obtained a cause which was worthy of his noble nature. The miseries of Africa had long attracted his attention ; even in his boyhood he had written on the subject for the daily journals. Lady Middleton, who had heard from an eye-witness of the horrors of slavery, had begged ^lirn to bring it before Parliament. Mr. Pitt had also ad- 362 THE COMMITTEE. vised him to take up the question, and he had agreed to do so whenever an opportunity should occur. This happened before hia acquaintance with Clarkson, to whom he said at their first interview that aboKtion wa-, a question near his heart. A short time after, there was a dinner at Mr. Bennet Langton's, at which Sir Joshua Eeynolds, Boswell, Wiadham, and himself were present. The conversation turned upon the African slave-trade, and Clarkson exhibited some specimens of cotton cloth manufactured by the na- tives in their own looms, the plant being grown in their own fields. AU the guests expressed themselves on the side of abolition, and Mr. Wilberforce was asked if he would briag it forward in the House. He said that he would have no objection to do so when he was better prepared for it, providing no more proper person could be found. The Committee now went to work in earnest, and held weekly meetings at Mr. Wilberforce's house. Clarkson was sent to Bristol and Liverpool, where he collected much information, though not without diflS- culty, and even, as he thought, danger of his hfe. A commission was appointed by the Lords of the Privy Council to coUect evidence. It was stated by the Liverpool and planter party that not only the colonial prosperity, but the commercial existence, of the nation was at stake ; that the Guinea trade was a nursery for British seamen ; that the slaves offered for sale were criminals and captives who would be eaten if they were not bought ; that the middle passage was the happiest period of a negro's life ; that the sleeping apartments on board were perfumed with frankincense ; and that the slaves were encouraged to disport themselves on deck with the music and dances of their native land. THE GIANTS AND THE PIGMIES. 363 On the other hand, the committee proved from the muster rolls which Clarkson had examined that the Guinea trade was not the nursery of British seamen, but its grave ; and they pubhshed a picture of an Afri- can slaver, copied from a vessel which was lying in the Mersey, and certain measurements were made, which, being put iato feet and inches, justified the statement of a member ia the House, that never was so much human suffering condensed into so small a space. Lord Chancellor Thurlow and two other members of the Cabinet were opposed to abolition, and therefore Mr. Pitt could not make it a Government measure ; and so although it was called the battle between the giants and the pigmies ; although Pitt, Fox, Burke, Sheridan, Wiadham, and WUberforce, the greatest orators and statesmen of the day, were on one side, and the two members for Liverpool on the other, the brute votes went with the pigmies, and the bill was lost. But now the nation was beginning to be moved. The committee distributed books, and hired columns ia the newspapers. They sealed their letters with a negro in chains kneeling, and the motto, " Am I not a man and a brother ? " "Wec^wood made cameos with the same design ; ladies wore them in their bracelets or their hair-pins ; gentlemen had them inlaid in gold on the hds of their snuff-boxes. Cowper sent to the committee the weU-known poem, "Fleecy locks and black complexion;" the committee printed it on the finest hot-pressed paper, folded it up in a small and neat form, gave it the appropriate title of " A subject for conversation at the tea-table," and cast it forth by thousands upon the land. It was set to music, and sung as a street ballad. People crowded at shop win- dows to see the picture of the ship in which the poor 864 CEIL DE BCEOT. negroes were packed like herrings in a cask. A mur- mur a,rose, and grew louder and louder ; three hundred thousand persona gave up drinking sugar in their tea ; indignation meetings were held; and petitions were sent into Parliament by the ton. Everything seemed to show that the nation had begun to loathe the trade in flesh and blood, and would not be appeased till it was done away. And then came events which made the sweet words Liberty, Humanity, Equality, sound harsh and ungrateful to the ear; which caused those who spoke much of philanthropy and eternal justice to be avoided by their friends, and perhaps supervised by the police ; which rendered negroes and emancipation a subject to be discussed only with sneers and shakings of the head. When the slave-trade question had first come up, Mr. Pitt proposed to the French Government that the two nations should unite in the cause of abolition. Now in France the peasantry themselves were slaves ; and the negro trade had been bitterly attacked in books which had been burned by the public executioner, and the authors of which had been excommunicated by t)>.e Pope. Mr. Pitt's proposal was at once declined by the coterie of the (Eil de Boeuf. In the meantime it was discovered that the French nation was heavily in debt ; there was a loss of nearly five million sterling eveiy year; a fact by no means surprising, for the nobles and clergy paid no taxes ; each branch of trade was an indolent monopoly ; and poor Jacques Bonhomme bore the weight of the court and army on his back. Chan- cellors of the Exchequer one after the other were ap- pointed, and attempted ia vain to grapple with the difficulty. As a last resource, the House of Commons was revived, that the debt of bankrupt despotism might THE TENNIS COUBT. 865 be accepted by the nation. A Parliament was opened at Versailles; lawyers and merchants dressed in black walked in the same procession, and sat beneath the same roof with the haughty nobles, rustling with feath- ers, shining with gold, and wearing swords upon their thighs. But the commoners soon perceived that they had only been summoned to vote away the money of the nation ; they were not to interfere with the laws. Their debates becoming offensive to the king, the Hall in which they met was closed against them. They then gathered in a Tennis Court, called themselves the Na- tional Assembly, and took an oath that they would not dissolve until they had regenerated France. Troops were marched into Versailles ; a coup d'etat was evi- dently in the wind. And then the Parisians arose ; the army refused to fight against them ; the Bastille was destroyed ; the National Assembly took the place of the (Eil de Bceuf ; democracy became the Mayor of the Palace. A constitution was drawn up, and was accepted by the king. The nobility were deprived of their feudal rights; church property was resumed by the nation ; taxes were imposed on the rich as well as on the poor ; the peasantry went out shooting every Sun- day; the country gentlemen fled from their chateaux to foreign courts, where wars began to brew. Such was the state of affairs in France when "WUberforce sug- gested that Clarkson should be sent over to Paris to negotiate with the leading members of the National Assembly. There was in Paris a Society called the Friends of the Blacks ; Condorcet and Brissot were among its conductors. Clarkson, therefore, was san- guine of success ; but it was long before he could obtain a hearing. At last he was invited to dinner at the house of the Bishop of Chartres, that he might there 866 THE BANQimr. meet Mirabeau and Sieyes, the Due de Eochefoucauld, Petion de Villeneuve, and Bergasse, and talk the matter over. But when the guests met, a much more interest- mg topic was in everybody's mouth. The king at that time lived at Versailles, a little town inhabited entirely by his servants and his body-guards. The Parisians for some time had been uneasy ; they feared that he would escape to Metz, and that civil war would then break out. There was a rumor of a bond signed by thousands of the aristocrats to fight on the king's side. The Guards had certainly been doubled at Versailles, and a Flanders regiment had marched iato the town with two pieces of cannon. Officers appeared ia the streets in strange uniforms, green faced with red ; and they did not wear the tricolor cockade which had al- ready been adopted by the French nation. And while these uneasy looks were turned toward Versailles, an LQcident took place which heightened the alarm. On October 1 a banquet had been given by the Guards to the officers of the Flanders regiment. The tables were spread in the court theater ; the boxes were filled with spectators. After the champagne was served, and the health of the Royal Family had been drank, the wine and the shouting turned aU heads ; swords were drawn and waved naked iu the air ; the tricolor cockades were trampled under foot ; the band struck up the tender and beautiful baUad, Richard I my King I the world is aM forsaking thee/ the Queen came in and walked round the tables, bowing, and bestowing her sweetest smiles; the bugles sounded the charge; the men from different regiments were brought ia; all swore aloud they would protect the king, as if he were just then ia danger of his hfe ; and some young ensigns carried by assault certain boxes which expressed dis- ST. DOMINGO. 367 sent at these proceedings. This was the subject of conversation at the dinner to which Clarkson was in- vited ; and the next day the women of Paris marched . upon Versailles ; the king was taken to the Tiiileries : and the National Assembly became supreme — imder favor of the mob. After several weeks Clarkson at last received a defi- nite reply. The Eevolution, he was told, was of more importance than the abolition of the slave-trade. In Bordeaux, Marseilles, Eouen, Nantes, and Havre, there were many persons in favor of that trade. It would be said that abolition would be making a sacrifice to England. The British Parliament had as yet done aothing, and people doubted the sincerity of Pitt. Mr. Clarkson asked whether if the question were postponed to the next legislature it would be more diffi- cult to carry it then than now. "The question produced much conversation, but the answer was unan- imous the people would daUy more and more admire their constitution, and that by the constitution certain soHd and fixed principles wovdd be established, which would inevitably lead to the abolition of the slave-trade ; and if the constitution were once fairly established, they would not regard the murmurs of any town or province." Clarkson was not the only envoy who was defeated by the planter interest on French soil. In the flourish ing colony of St. Domingo there were many mulatto planters, free and wealthy men, but subject to de- grading disabilities. When they heard of the Eev- olution, they sent Oge to Paris with a large sum of money as a present to the National Assembly, and a ■petition for equal rights. The President received him i?nd his coippauioii:; v^^'^i c ■'. Tiril-fv; he liarle them take 368 THE JACOBINS. courage ; the Assembly knew no distinction between black and white ; aU men were created free and equal But soon the planters began to intrigue, the politicians to prevaricate and to postpone. Oge's patience was at last worn out ; he declared to Clarkson that he did not care whether their petition was granted them or not. " We can produce," he said, " as good soldiers on our estates as those in France. If we are once forced to desperate measures, it will be in vain to send thou- sands across the Atlantic to bring us back to our former state." He finally returned to St. Domingo, armed his slaves, was defeated, and broken on the wheel. Then the slaves rose and massacred the whites, and the cause of abohtion was tarnished by their crimes. In England the tide of feeUng turned ; a panic fell upon the land. The practical disciples of Rousseau had formed a club in Paris, the members of which met in a Jacobin church, whence they took their names. This club became a kind of caucus for the arrangement of elections, to decide the measures which should be brought forward in the National Assembly, and to preach unto aU men the gospel of liberty, equahty, fraternity. It had four hundred daughter societies in Prance ; it corresponded with thousands of secret societies abroad ; it had missionaries in the army, spies in foreign lands. It desired to create a universal repub- lic ; it grew in power, in ambition, and in bravado ; it cast at the feet of the kings of Europe the head of a king ; it offered the friendship and aid of Prance to aU people who would rise against their tyrants. Thomas Paine, who used to boast that he had created the American Eevolution with his pamphlet, "Common Sense," now tried to create an English Revolution with his " Rights of Man." In the loyal towns his effigy, THOMAS PAINE. 369 with a rope round its neck, was flogged with a cart whip, while the market-bell tolled, and the crowd sung the national anthem, with three cheers after each verse. In other towns, No King ! Liberty ! Equality ! were scribbled on the walls. The soldiers were everywhere tampered with, and the kiag was mobbed. Pitt, the projector of reform biUs, became a tyrant. Burke, the champion of the American Eevolution, became a Tory. It was not a time to speak of abolition, which was regarded as a revolutionary measure. And such in reahty it was, though accidentally associated in England with rehgion and philanthropy, on account of the char- acter of its leaders. It was pointed out that the atheist philosophers had all of them begun by sympa- thizing with the negroes ; one of Thomas Paine's first productions was an article against slavery. The committee was declared to be a nest of Jacobins ; their pubhcations were denounced as poisonous. There was a time when the king had whispered at a levee, " How go on your black clients, Mr. Wilberforce ? " But now the philanthropist was in disgrace at court. At this time poor Clarkson's health gave way, and he was carried oflf the field. And then from Paris came terri- ble news ; the people were at last avenged. The long black night was followed by a blood-red dawn. The nobles who had fled to foreign courts had returned with foreign troops ; the kings of Europe had fallen on the new republic, the common enemy of all. The people feared that the old tyranny was about to be replaced, and by a foreign hand ; they had now tasted liberty ; they knew how sweet it was ; they had learned the joy of eating all the com that they had sown ; they had known what it was to have their own firelocks and 370 THE QUTLLOTTNE. their own swords, and to feel that they, the poor and hungry serfs, were the guardians of their native land. They had learned to kiSs the tricolor ; to say Five la nation! to look forward to a day when their boys, now growing up, might harangue from the Tribune, or sit upon the Bench, or grasp the field-marshal's baton. And should aU this be undone ? Should they be made to return to their boiled grass and their stinging nettle soup ? Should the days of privilege and oppression be restored? The nation arose and drove out the in- vaders. But there had been a panic, and it bore its fruits. What the Jacobins were to Pitt, the aristocrats were to Danton and Eobespierre. Hundreds of royalists were guillotined, but then thousands had plotted the overthrow of the Eepublic, thousands had intrigued that France might be a conquered land. Such at least was the popular behef ; the massacres of Septem- ber, the execution of the king and queen, were the result of fear. After which, it must be owned, there came a period when suspicion and slaughter had become a habit; when blood was shed to the sound of laughter; when heads, greeted with roars of recognition, were popped out of the little national sash-window, and tumbled into the sawdust, and then were displayed to the gallery in the windows, and to the pit upon the square. The mere brute energy which lay at the bot- tom of the social mass rose more and more toward the top; and at length the leaders of the people were hideous beings in red woolen caps, with scarcely an idea in their heads or a feeling in their hearts ; ardent lovers of liberty, it is true, and zealots for the father- land ; scarcely taking enough from the treasury to fiU their bellies and to clothe their backs (Marat, when killed, had elevenpence halfpenny in his possession), VIOTOBT. 371 but mere senseless fanatics, who crashed that liberty which they tried to nurse ; who governed only by the guillotiae, which they considered a sovereign remedy for all political disorders; who killed aU the great men the RepubUc had produced, and were finally guillotined themselves. The death of Eobespierre closed the Revolution ; the last mob-rising was extin- guished by the artillery of Buonaparte. The Jacobins fell into disrepute ; there was a cry of " Down with the Jacobins!" stones were hurled in through their windows ; the orators were hustled and beaten as they sallied forth, and the ladies who knitted in the gallery were chastised in a manner scarcely suited for adults. The age of revolutions for a time was past ; Buonaparte became Dictator ; the English reign of terror was dis- pelled ; the abolitionists again raised their voices on behalf of the negro, and in 1807 the slave-trade was abolished. That traffic, however, was only abolished so far as EngHsh vessels and English markets were con- cerned, and Government now commenced a long series of negotiations with foreign powers. In course of time the other nations prohibited the slave-trade, and conceded to Great Britain the police control of the Guinea coast, and the right of search. A squadron of gunboats hovered round the mouths of rivers, or sent up boating expeditions, or cruised to and fro a httle way out at sea, with a man always at the mast-head with a spy-glass in his hand, scanning the horizon for a sail When a sail was sighted, the gunboat got up steam, bore down upon the vessel, ordered her to heave to, sent a boat on board, and overhauled her papers. If they were not correct, or if slaves were on board, or even if the vessel was fitted up in such a way as to have the appearance of a slaver, she was taken as a 372 THE SENTIMENTAL SQDADKON. prize , the sailors were landed at tlie first convenient spot; tlie slaver was sold, and tlie money thereby obtained, vnih a bounty on each captured slave, was divided among the officers and crew. The slaves were discharged at Sierra Leone, where they formed them- selves into various townships according to their nationalities, spoke their own language, elected their own chiefs, and governed themselves privately by their own laws. Opinion acting as the only method of coercion — a fact deserving to be noted by those who study savage man. However, this was only for a time. All these imported negroes were educated by the mis- sionaries, and they now support their own church ; the native langiiages and distractions of nationality are gradually dying out ; the descendants of naked slaves are many of them clergymen, artisans, shopkeepers, and merchants ; they call themselves Englishmen, and such they feel themselves to be. However ludicrous it may seem to hear a negro boasting about Lord Nel- son and Waterloo, and declaring that he must go home to England for his health, it shows that he possesses a kind of emulation, which, with proper guidance, will make him a true citizen of his adopted country, and leave him nothing of the African except his skin. But the slave trade was not extiaguished by the " sentimental squadron." The slavers could make a profit if they lost four cargoes in every five ; they could easily afford to use decoys. While the gunboat was giving chase to some old tub with fifty diseased and used-up slaves on board, a cKpper with several hun- dreds in her holds would dash out from her hiding- place among the mangroves, and scud across the open sea to Cuba and Brazil THB COLONIES. 373 It was impossible to blockade a continent, but it was easy to inspect estates. The negroes were purchased as plantation hands ; a contraband laborer was not a thing to be concealed. There were laws in Cuba and Brazil against negro importation, but these existed only for the benefit of the officials. The bribery prac- tice was put an end to in Brazil about 1852 ; that great market was forever closed ; slavers were ruined ; African chiefs became destitute of rum ; and this branch of commerce began to look forlorn. Tet still Cuba cried, More ! Give me more ! still the profits were so large that the squadron was defeated and the man-supply obtained. HaK a million of money a year, and no small amount of men, did that one island cost Great Britain. Yet still it might be hoped that even Cuba would be filled in time ; that the public opinion of Europe would act upon Madrid ; that in time it would imitate Brazil. But in 1861 there happened an event which made the Cubans turn their back on Spain, and look with longing eyes the other way ; and a beautiful vision uprose before their minds. They dreamed of a new empire to which Cuba would belong, and to which slavery in a state of mediseval beauty would be restored. It was only a dream ; it was quickly dispelled ; they awoke to find Liberty standing at their doors ; and there now she stands waiting for her time to come. "When Great Britain was teasing the colonies into resistance, it was often predicted that they would not unite. There was Kttle community of feeling between the old Dutch famihes of New York ; the Quakers of Pennsylvania ; the yeomen of New England, who were descended from Roundheads ; and the country gentle- men of Virginia, who were descended from Cavaliers. 374 THE UNION. But when the king closed Boston port, and the vessels moldered in the docks, and the shops were closed, and the children of fishermen and sailors began to cry for bread, the colonies did unite with one heart and one hand to feed the hunger of the noble town ; and then to besiege it for its own sake, and to drive the red coats back into their ships. Yet when the war was over, and the squirrel guns had again been hung upon the wall, and the fire of the conflict had died out, the old jealousy reappeared. A loose-jointed league was tried and came to nought. The nation existed; the nation was in debt ; union could not be dispensed with. But each colony approached this union as a free and sovereign state. If one colony had chosen to remain apart, the others would not have interfered; if one colony after entering the Union had chosen to with- draw, its right to do so would not have been denied. In European countries, repubKcan or royal, the source of authority is the nation ; all powers not formally transferred reside with the Assembly or the Crown. In America, however, it was precisely the reverse ; all powers not dehvered to the central government were retained by the contracting states. At the time of the Eevolution, negro slavery existed in the colonies without exception. But it did not enter the economy of Northern life. Slavery will only pay when labor can be employed in gangs beneath an over- seer, and where work can be found for a large number of men without cessation throughout the year. In the culture of rice, sugar, cotton, and tobacco, these condi- tions exist ; but in corn-growing lands labor is scanty and dispersed, except at certain seasons of the year. Slaves in the North were not employed as field hands, but only as domestic servants in the houses of the rich- THE CONSOITtmON. 376 Chey could therefore be easily dispensed with ; aiiHt was proposed by the Northern delegates, when tLo constitution was being prepared, that the African slave- trade should at once be abolished, and certain mea- sures should be taken with a view to the gradual emancipation of the negro. Upon this question Vir- ginia appears to have been divided. But Georgia and the CaroUnas at once declared that they would not have the slave-trade aboKshed ; they wanted more slaves ; and unless this species of property were guar- anteed, they would not enter the Union at all They demanded that slavery should be recognized and pro- tected by the constitution. The Northerners at once gave in ; they only requested that the words slave and slavery might not appear. To this the Southerners agreed, and the contract was delicately worded, but it was none the less stringent. It was made a clause of the constitution that the slave-trade should not be sup- pressed before the year 1808. It might then be made the subject of debate and legislation — not before. It was made a clause of the constitution that if the slaves of any state rebelled, the national troops shoidd be employed against them. It was made a clause of the constitution that if a slave escaped to a free state, the authorities of that state should be obliged to give him up. And lastly, slave-owners were allowed to have votes in proportion to the number of their slaves. Such was the price which the Northerners were to pay for nationality — a price which their descendants found a hard and heavy one to pay. The Fathers of the country ate sour grapes, and the children's teeth we^e set on edge. But the Southerners had not yet finished. The colo- nies possessed, accorduig to their charters, certain re- 376 THE SOUTH. gions in the wilderness out West, and these thej delivered to the nation. A special proviso was made, however, by South Carolina and by Georgia, that at no future time should slavery be forbidden in the terri- tories which they gave up of their own free-will ; and these territories in time became slave states. It is therefore evident that the South intended from the first to preserve, and also to extend, slavery. It must be confessed that their pohcy was candid and consistent, and of a piece throughout. They refused to enter the Union unless their property was guaranteed; they threatened to withdraw from the Union whenever they thought that the guarantee was about to be evaded or withdrawn. The clauses contained in the constitution were binding on the nation ; but they might be revoked by means of a constitutional amendment, which could be passed by the consent of three fourths of the states. Emigrants continually poured iato the North, and these again streamed out toward the West. It was evident that in time new states would be formed, and that the original slave states would be left in a minority. These states were purely agi-ieultural ; they had no commerce ; they had no manufactures. Indigo, rice, and tobacco were the products on which they Hved ; and the mar- kets for these were in a bad state. The East Indies had begun to compete with them ia rice and indigo ; the demand for tobacco did not increase. There was a general languor in the South ; the young men did not know what to do. Slavery is a wasteful and costly in- stitution, and requires large profits to keep it alive it seemed on the point of dying in the South, when there came a voice across the Atlantic crying for cotton, in loud and hungry tones ; and the fortime of the South was made. OOTTON. 377 In the seventeenth century the town of Manchester was abeady known to fame. It was the seat of the woolen manufacture, which was first mtroduced from Flanders into England in the reign of Edward the Third. It bought yam from the Irish, and sent it back to them as hnen. It imported cotton from Cyprus and Smyrna, and worked it into fustians, vermilions, and dimities. In the middle of the eighteenth century the cotton industry had become important. In thou- sands of cottages surrounding Manchester might be heard the rattle of the loom, and the humming of the one-thread wheel, which is now to be seen only in the opera of Martha. Invention, as usual, arose from ne- cessity; the weavers could not get sufficient thread, and were entirely at the mercy of the spinsters. Spinning machines were accordingly invented : the water frame, the spinning jenny, and the mule. And now the weav- ers had more thread than they could use, and the power loom was invented to preserve the equilibrium of supply and demand. Then steam was applied to machinery ; the factory system was established ; htm- dred-handed engines worked aU the day; and yet more laborers were employed than had ever been employed before; the soft white wool was carded, spun, and woven in a trice; the cargoes from the East were speedily devoured ; and now raw material was chiefly in demand. The American cotton was the best in the market; but the quantity received had hitherto been small. The picking out of the small black seeds was a long and tedious operation A single person could not clean more than a pound a day. Here, then, was an opening for Yankee ingenuity ; and Whitney invented his famous saw-gin, which tore out the seeds as quick as lightning with its iron teeth ; land and slaves 378 STATE BIGHTS. abounded in the South ; the demand from Manchester became more and more hungry — ^it has never yet been completely satisfied — and, under King Cotton, the South commenced a new era of wealth, vigor, and prosper- ity as a slave plantation. The small holdings were unable to compete with the large estates, on which the slaves were marshaled and drilled like convicts to their work ; society in the South soon became composed of the planters, the slaves, and the mean whites who were too proud to work Hke negroes, and who led a kind of gipsy Hfe. WhUe the iateUect of the North was invent- ing machinery, opening new lands, and laying the foun- dations of a hterature, the Southerners were devoted entirely to pohtics ; and by means of their superior ability they ruled at "Washington for many years, and almost monopolized the offices of state. When America commenced its national career there were two great sects of politicians : those who were in favor of the central power, and those who were in favor of state rights. In the course of time the national sentiment increased, and with it the authoriiy of the President and Congress ; but this centralizing movement was re- sisted by a certain party at the North, whose patriotism could not pass beyond the state house and the city hall. The Southerners were invariably provincial in their feehngs ; they did not consider themselves as belonging to a nation, but a league ; they inherited the sentiments of aversion and distrust with which their fathers had entered the Union ; threats and provisos were always on their lips. The Executive, it was true, was in theii- hands, but the House of Representatives belonged to the Nox-th. In the Senate the states had equal powers, irrespective of size and population. In the Lower House the states were merely sections of the country ; population NEOK AND NEOK. 379 was the standard of the voting power. The South had a smaller population than the North ; the Southerners were therefore a natural minority, and only preserved their influence by allying themselves with the State- Eights party in the North. The free states were divid- ed ; the slave states voted as one man. In the North pohtics was a question of sentiment, and sentiments naturally differ. In the South pohtics was a matter of life and death ; their bread depended on cotton ; their cotton depended on slaves ; their slaves depended on the balance of power. The history of the South withia the Union is that of a people struggling for existence, by means of political devices, against the spirit of the nation and the spirit of the age. By an- nexation, purchase, and extension, they kept pace with the North ia its rush toward the West. Free states and slave states ran neck and neck toward the shores of the Pacific. The North obtaiaed Vermont, Ohio, In- diana, Illinois, Maine, Michigan, Iowa, Wisconsin and California. The South obtained Tennessee, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, Missouri, Arkansas, Florida and Texas. Whenever a territory became a state, the nation possessed the power of rejecting, and therefore of modifying, its constitution. The Northern poUticians made an effort to prohibit slavery in all new states ; the South as usual threatened to secede, and the Union which had been manufactured by a com- promise was preserved by a compromise. It was agreed that a line should be drawn to the Pacific along the parallel 36° 30' ; that all the states which should afterward be made below the Hne should be slave- holding, and aU that were made above it should be free. But this compromise was not, Uke the compromise of the constitution, binding on the nation, and only to be 380 W. L. GAEKISON. set aside "Dy a constitutional amendment. It was simplj a parliamentary measure, and as such could be repealed at any future session. However, it satisfied tlie South ; the North had many things to think of; and all r&- mained quiet for a time. But only for a time. The mysterious principle which constitutes the law of pro- gi'ess produces similar phenomena in various countries at the same time, and it was such an active period ol the human mind which produced about forty years ago a Parisian Revolution, the great reform bill, and the American agitation against slavery. There was a man in a Boston garret. He possessed some paper, pens and ink, and little else besides ; and even these he could only use in a fashion of his own. He had not what is called a style ; nor had he that rude power which can cast a glow on jagged sentences and uncouth words. This poor garreteer, a printer in his working hours, relied chiefly on his type for hght and shade, and had much recourse to capital letters, itahcs, and notes of exclamation, to sharpen his wit, and to strengthen his tirades. But he had a cause, and his heart was in that cause. When W. L. Gajnison com- menced his Liberator the government of Georgia set a price upon his head, he was mobbed in his native city, and slavery was defended in Faneuil HaU itself, sacred to tlie memory of men who cared not to live unless they could be free. The truth was that the Northerners dis- liked slavery, but nationaUty was dear to them ; and they beheved that an attack upon the " domestic insti- tution" of the South endangered the safety of the Union. But the abolitionists became a sect ; they in- creased in numbers and in talent ; they would admit ol no compromise ; they cared Httle for the country itseh so long as it was stained. They denounced the consti- THE LIBERTY FANATICS. 381 tulion as a covenant with death and an agreement with hell. No union with slaveholders ! they cried. No union with midnight robbers and assassins ! Hitherto the war between the two great sections of the country had been confined to politicians. The Southerners had sent their boys to Northern colleges and schools. At- tended by a retiuue of slaves they had passed the summer at Saratoga or Newport, and sometimes the winter at New York. But now their sons were insulted, their slaves decoyed from them, by these new fanatics ; and the South went North no more. Abolition socie- ties were everywhere formed, and envoys were sent iato the slave states to distribute abolition tracts and to pubUsh abolition journals, and to excite, if they could, a St. Domingo insurrection. The Northerners were shocked at these proceedings and protested angrily against them. But soon there was a revulsion of feel- ing in their minds. The wild-beast temper arose in the South, and went forth lynching aU it met. North- erners were flogged and even killed. Negros were burned aUve. And so the meetings of abolitionists were no longer interrupted at the North ; mayors and selectmen no longer refused them the use of public halls. The sentiment of aboHtion was, however, not yet widely spread. There were few Northerners who preferred to give up the Union rather than live under a piebald constitution, or who considered it just to break a solemn compact in obedience to an abstract law. But there now rose a strong and resolute party who de- clared that slavery might stay where it was, but that it must go np farther. The South must be content with what it had. Not another yard of slave soil should be added to the Union. On the other hand, the South could not accept such terms. Slavery ex- 382 THE PLAIWATIONS. tension was necessary for their lives. More land they must have or they could not exist. There was waste land in abundance at the South ; but it was dead. Their style of agriculture was precisely that which is pursued in Central Africa. They took a tract from the wilderness and planted it again and agaia with cotton and tobacco till it gave up the ghost, and would yield no more. They then moved on and took in another piece. Obliged to spend all their cash in buying prime slaves at two hundred pounds a piece, they could not afford to use manure or to rotate then- crops ; they could not afford to employ so costly a species of labor on anything less lucrative than sugar, cotton, and tobacco. Besides, if slavery were not to be extended they would be surroimded and hemmed ia by free states ; the old contract would be annulled. Already the South were in the minority. The free states and slave states might be equal ia number ; but they were not equal in population and prosperity. The Noi-th- emer who traveled down South was astonished to find that the cities of the maps were villages, and the vil- lages clusters of log huts. Fields covered with weeds, and moss-grown ruins, showed where flourishing farms once had been. He rode through vast forests and cy- press swamps, where hundreds of mean whites HveJ like Eed Indians, hunting and fishing for their daily bread, eating clay to keep themselves alive, prowling round plantations to obtain stolen food from the slaves. He saw plantations in which the labor was conducted with the terrible discipline of the prison and the hulks ; and where as he galloped past the line of hoeing slaves, so close that he splashed them with mud, they hoed on, they toiled on, not daring to raise their eyes from the ground. From early dawn to dusky eve it was so THE KANSAS QUESTION. 383 with these poor wretches ; no soimd broke the silence of those fearful fields but the voice of the overseer and the cracking of the whip. And out, far away, ia the lone "Western lands, by the side of dark rivers, among trees from which drooped down the dull gray Spanish moss, the planters went forth to hunt ; there were well- known coverts where they were sure to find ; and as the traveler rode through the dismal swamp he might perhaps have the fortune to see the game : a black animal on two legs, running madly for its Hfe, and behind it the sounding of a horn, and the voices of hounds ia full cry — a chase more iafemal than that of the Wild Huntsman who sweeps through the forest with his spectral crew. But the end of aU this was at hand. Kansas, a tract of rich prairie land, was about to become a territory, and would soon become a state. It was situated above the 36° 30' line, and therefore belonged to the North. But the Southerners coveted this Naboth's vineyard ; their power at Washington was great just then ; they determined to strike out the line which had been in the first place demanded by themselves. With much show of justice and reason, they alleged that it was not fair to establish the domestic institutions of a country with- out consulting the inhabitants themselves. They pro- posed that, for the future, the question of slavery or free soil should be decided by a majority of votes among the settlers on the spot. This proposal became law, and then commenced a race for the soU. In Boston a political society was formed for the exporta- tion to Kansas of Northern men. In the slave state Missouri blue lodges were formed for a similar piirpose, and hundreds of squatters, dressed in flannel shirts, and huge boots up to their knees, and skin caps on their 884 REBELLION OF THE NORTH. heads, bristling with revolvers and bowie knives, stepped across the border. For the first time, the people of the North and South met face to face. A guerilla warfare soon broke out ; the New Englanders were robbed and driven back ; they were murdered, and their scalps paraded upon poles by Border ruffians. The whole countiy fell iato a distracted state. The Southerners pursued their slaves iato Boston itseK, and dragged them back according to the law. A mad abohtionist invaded Virginia with a handful of men, shot a few peaceful citizens, and was hanged. A time of terror f eU upon the South ; there was neither Hberty of print nor liberty of speech ; the majority reigned ; and the man who spoke against it was lynched upon the spot. A Southerner assaulted and battered a Northener on the floor of the Senate. The North at last was thoroughly aroused. The people itself began to stir ; a calm, patient, law-abiding race, slow to be moved ; but when once moved, swerving never till the thing was done. A presidential election was at hand, and a Northerner was placed in the chair. The South under- stood that this was not a casual reverse, which might be redeemed when the four years had passed away. It was to them a sign that the days of their power had forever passed. The temper of the North was not to be mistaken. It had at last rebelled ; it would suffer tyranny no more. Mr. Lincoln's terms were concilia- tory in the extreme. Had the South been moderate in its demands, he would have been classed with those statesmen who added compromise to compromise, and so postpone the evil, but inevitable, day. He was not an abohtionist. He offered to give them any guarantee they pleased — a constitutional amendment, if they de- sired it — that slavery as it stood should not be SECESSION. 385 interfered with. He oflfered to bring in a more stringent law, by which their fugitive slaves should be restored. But on the matter of extension he was firm. The Southerners demanded that a line should again be drawn to the Pacific ; that aJl south of that line should be made slave soil, and that slavery shoidd be more clearly recognized by the central government, and more firmly guaranteed. These terms were not more ex- travagant than those which their fathers had obtained. But times had changed ; the sentiment of nationality was now more fully formed; Uncle Tom had been written ; the American people were heartily ashamed of slavery ; they refused to give it another lease. The ultimatum was declined; the South seceded, and the North flew to arms, not to emancipate the negro, but to preserve the existence of the nation. They would not, indeed, submit to slavery extension ; they preferred disunion to such a disgrace. But they had no inten- tion when they went to war of destroying slavery in the states where it existed ; they even took pains to prove to the South that the war was not an anti-slavery crusade. The negros were treated by the Northern generals, not as men, but as contraband of war ; even Butler in New Orleans did not emancipate the slaves ; a general who issued a proclamation of that nature was reprimanded by the Government, although he only followed the example of British generals in the Revolu- tionaiy war. But as the contest became more severe and more prolonged, and all hopes of reconciliation were at an end, slavery became identified with the South in the Northern mind, and was itself regarded as a foe. The astute and cautious statesman at the head of affairs perceived that the time had come ; the con- stitution was suspended during the war ; and so, in all 586 THE KESXJLT. l^ality and with due form, he set free in one day foni million slaves. It is impossible to view without compassion the mis- fortunes of men who merely followed in the footsteps of their fathers, and were in no sense more guilty than Washington and Jefferson, who remained slaveholders to their dying day. It was easy for Great Britain to pay twenty millions ; it was easy for the Northern States to emancipate their slaves, who were few in number, and not necessary to their Ufe. But it was im- possible for the South to abandon slavery. The money of a planter was sunk in flesh and blood. Yet the Southern politicians must be blamed for their crazy ambition, and their blind ignorance of the world. In- stead of preparing, as the Cuban planters are preparing now, for those changes which had been rendered inevit- able by the progress of mankind, they supposed that it was in their power to defy the Spirit of the Age, and to establish an empire on the pattern of ancient Eome They firmly beheved that, because they could not exist without seUing cotton, Great Britain could not exist without buying it from them ; which is hke a shop- keeper supposing he could ruin his customers by putting up his shutters. It may console those who yet lament the Lost Cause if we picture for their benefit what the Southern empire would have been. There would have been an aristocracy of planters, herds of slaves, a servile press, a servile pulpit, and a rabble of mean whites formed into an army. Abolition societies would have been established in the North, to instigate slaves to rebel or run away ; a cordon of posts with a system of passports would have been estabhshed in the South. Border raids would have been made by fanatics on the one side, and by deperadoes on the THE LOST CAUSE. 387 other. Sooner or later there must have been a war. Filibustering expeditions to Mexico and Cuba would have brought about a war with Spain, and perhaps with France. It was the avowed intention of the planters, when once their empire was established, to import labor from Africa ; to reopen the trade as ia the good old times. But this, Great Britain would certainly have not allowed ; and thus, again, there would have been war. Even if the planters would have displayed a httle common-sense, which is exceedingly improbable, and so escaped extirpation from without, their system of culture would have eaten up their lands. But happily such hypotheses need no longer be discussed ; a future of another kind is in reserve for the Southern States. America can now pursue with untarnished reputation her glorious career, and time wiU soften the memories of a conflict the original guilt of which must be ascribed to the founders of the nation, or, rather, to the conditions by which those great men were mastered and controlled. I have now accomplished the task which I set mysjlt to do. I have shown, to the best of my ability, what kind of place in universal history Africa deserves to hold. I have shown that not only Egypt has assisted the development of man by educating Greece, Carthage by leading forth Eome to conquest, but that even the obscure Soudan, or land of the negros, has also playod its part in the drama of European Hfe. The slave-trade must be estimated as a war ; though sruel and atrocious in itself, it has, like most wars, been of service to mankind. I shall leave it to others to trace out in detail the influence of the negro in the Human Progress. It wiU be sufficient to. observe that the grandeur of West Indian commerce in the last gen- 388 FurnsE of tee taavo. eration, and of the cotton manufacture at the present time, could not have been obtained without the assist- ance of the negro ; and that the agitation on bis behalf, which was commenced by Granville Sharp, has assisted much to expand the sympathies and to educate the heart of the Anglo-Saxon people, who are somewhat inclined to pride of color and prejudice of race. Eespecting the prospects of the negro, it is difficult for me to form an opinion ; but what I have seen of the Africans in their native and semi-civilized condition iaclines me to take a hopeful view. The negros are imitative to an ex- traordinary degree, and imitation is the first principle of progress. They are vain and ostentatious, ardent for praise, keenly sensitive to blame. Their natural wants, indeed, are few; they inlierit the sober appetites of their fathers, who lived on a few handfuls of rice a day ; but it win, I believe, be found that when they enjoy the same inducements to work as other men, when they can hope to distinguish themselves in the Parliament, the pulpit, or in social hfe, they will become, as we are, the slaves of an idea ; and wiU work day and night to obtain something which they desire, but do not posi- tively need. Whether the negroes are equal in average capacity to the white man, and whether they produce men of genius, is an idle and unimportant question ; they can at least gain their livelihood as laborers and artisans ; they are therefore of service to their country ; let them have fair play, and they wiU find their right place, whatever it may be. As regards the social ques- tion, they will, no doubt, like the Jews, intermarry al- ways with their own race, and will thus remain apart. But it need not be feared that they wiU become hostile to those with whom they reside. Experience has shown that whenever aliens are treated as citizens, they be- FUTCBE OF AFRICA. 389 come citizens, whatever may be their religion or their race. It is a mistake to suppose that the civilized negro calls himself an African, and pines to return to his ancestral land. If he be bom in the States, he calls himself an American ; he speaks with an American ac- cent ; he loves and he hates with an American heart. It is a question frequently asked of African travelers, What is the future of that great contiuent? In the first place, with respect to the West Coast, there is lit- tle prospect of great changes taking place for many years to come. The commerce iu palm oil is import- ant, and win increase. Cotton will be received in large quantities from the Soudan. The Eastern coast of Africa, when its resources have been developed, will be a copy of the Western Coast. It is not probable that Exu-opean colonies will ever flourish in these golden but unwholesome lands. The educated negros will in time monopolize the trade, as they can live at less expense than Europeans, and do not suffer from the climate. They may, perhaps, at some future day, possess both coasts, and thence spread with bible and musket into the interior. This prospect, however, is vmcertaiu, and in any case exceedingly remote. That part of Africa which Hes above the parallel 10° North belongs to the Eastern Question. Whatever may be the ultimate destiny of Egypt, Algeria, and Morocco, win be shared by the regions of the central Niger, from Haussa to Timbuctoo. That part of the continent which lies below the par- allel 20° South already belongs, in part, and wiU entirely belong, to settlers of the Anglo-Saxon race. It resem- bles Australia, not only in its position with respect to the Equator, but also in its natural productions. It is a land of wool and mines, without great navigable 390 FUTUKE OF THE EAKTR. riyers; interspersed with sandy deserts, and enjoying a wholesome though sultry air. "Whatever may be the future of Australia will also be the future of Southern Africa. Between these two lines intervenes a region inhabited for the most part by pagan savages, thinly scattered over swamp and forest. This concealed continent, this unknown world, will, at some far-off day, if my surmises prove correct, be invaded by three civiliziag streams : by the British negros from the coasts ; by the Mahom- etan negros in tobe and tui'ban from the great empires of the Niger region ; and by the farmers and graziers and miners of South Africa. When, therefore, we speculate on the future of Africa, we can do no more than bring certain regions of that continent within the scope of two general questions : the future of our colonies, and the future of the East ; and these lead us up to a greater question stiU, the fu- ture of the European race. Upon this subject I shall offer a few remarks ; and it is obvious that in order to form some conception of the future, it is necessary to understand the present and the past. I shall therefore endeavor to ascertain what we have been and what we are. The monograph of Africa is ended. I shall make my sketch of history complete, adding new features, passing quickly over the parts that have been already drawn. I shall search out the origin of man, determine his actual condition, speculate upon his future destiny, and discuss the nature of his rela- tions toward that Unknown Power of whom he is the offspring and the slave. I shall examine this planet and its contents with the cahn curiosity of one whose sentiments and passions, whose predilections and an- tipathies, whose hopes and fears, are not interested in MATEEIALS OF HI8T0BT. 391 the question. I shall investigate without prejudice ; I shall state the results without reserve. Wtat are the materials of human history? What are the earliest records which throw light upon the origin of man? AH written documents are things of yesterday, whether penned on prepared sMns, papyrus rolls, or the soft inner bark of trees ; whether stamped on terra-cotta tablets, carved on granite obelisks, or en- graved on the smooth surface of upright rocks. Writ- ing, even in its simplest picture form, is an art which can be invented only when a people have become ma- ture. The oldest books are therefore comparatively mod- em, and the traditions which they contain are either false or but little older than the books themselves. AH travelers who have collected traditions among a wild people know how little that kind of evidence is worth. The savage exaggerates whenever he repeats, and in a few generations the legend is transformed. The evidence of language is of more value It ena- bles us to trace back remotely divided nations to their common birthplace, and reveals the amount of culture, the domestic institutions, and the religious ideas, which they possessed before they parted from one another. Yet languages soon die, or rather become metamor- phosed in structure as well as in vocabulary ; the oldest existing language can throw no light on the condition of primeval man. The archives of the earth also offer us their testi- mony; the graves give up their dead, and teach us that man existed many thousand years ago, in company with monstrous animals that have long since passed away ; and that those men were savages, using weapons and implements of stone, yet possessing even then a laste 392 HUMAN HIEROaLTPmOS. for ornament and art, wearing shell bracelets, and draw- ing rude figures upon horns and stones. The manners and ideas of such early tribes can best be inferred by a study of existing savages. The missionary who re- sides among such races as the Bushmen of Africa or the Botocudos of Brazil may be said to live in prehis- toric times. But as regards the origin of man, we have only one document to which we can refer, and that is the body of man himself. There, in unmistakable characters, are inscribed the annals of his early Ufe. These hieroglyphics are not to be fully deciphered without a special preparation for the task ; the alphabet of an- atomy must first be mastered, and the student must be expert in the language of all living and fossil forms. One fact, however, can be submitted to the uninitiated eye, and it will be sufficient for the purpose. Look at a skeleton, and you will see a little bone curled down- ward between the legs, as if trying to hide itself away. That bone is a relic of pre-human days, and announces plainly whence our bodies come. We are all of us naked under our clothes, and we are all of us tailed under our skins. But when we descend to the man- like apes, we find that, with them as with us, the tail is effete and in disuse ; and so we follow it downward and downward imtil we discover it in all its glory in the body of the fish ; being there present, not as a relic or rudimentary organ, as in man and the apes ; not a mere appendage, as in the fox ; not a secondary instru- ment, a spare hand, as in certain monkeys, or a fiy- flapper, as in the giraffe, but as a primary organ of the very first importance, endowing the fish with its loco- motive powers. Again, we examine the body of the fish, and we find in it also rudimentary organs as use- OKIGHN OP MAN. 393 less and incongraous as the tail in man ; and thus we descend step by step, until we arrive at the very bottom of the scale. The method of development is still being actively dis- cussed, but the/arf is placed beyond a doubt. Since the "Origin of Species" appeared, philosophical naturalists no longer deny that the ancestors of man must be sought for in the lower kingdom. And, apart from the evidence which we carry with us in our own persons, which we read in the taU-bone of the skeleton, in the hair which was once the clothing of our bodies, in the naUs which were once our weapons of defense, and in a hundred other facts which the scalpel and the micro- scope disclose ; apart from the evidence of our own voices, our incoherent groans and cries — analogy alone would lead us to to believe that mankind had been de- veloped from the lowest forms of life. For what is the history of the individual man ? He begins Ufe as an ambiguous speck of matter which can in no way be dis- tinguished from the original form of the lowest animal or plant. He next becomes a cell; his life is precisely that of the animalcule. Cells cluster round this pri- mordial cell, and the man is so far advanced that he might be mistaken for an undeveloped oyster ; he grows stiU more, and it is clear that he might even be a fish ; he then passes into a stage which is common to all quadrupeds, and next assumes a form which can only belong to quadrupeds of the higher type. At last the hour of birth approaches ; coiled within the dark womb he sits, the image of an ape; a caricature of the man that is to be. He is bom, and for some time he walks only on all fours ; he utters only inarticulate sotinds ; and even in his boyhood his fondness for climbing t ees woidd seem to be a rehc of the old arboreal life. Si ice. 394 TAILED MINDS. therefore, every man has been himself in such a state that the most experienced observer could not with the aid of the best microscopes have declared whether he was going to be man or plant, man or animalcule, mau or mollusc, man or lobster, man or fish, man or reptile,