Class. r , , , . - Gwriglitl^" Ic'^ . COPYRIGHT DEPOSm CATHCARTS LITERARY READER a Jlatiual of ISnglisj} iLtterature ^6^/ PiEING TYPICAL SELECTIONS FROM SOME OF THE BEST BRITISH AND AMERICAN AUTHORS FROM SHAKE- SPEARE TO THE PRESENT TIME, CHRONO- LOGICALLY ARRANGED, WITH BIOGRAPH- ICAL AND CRITICAL SKETCHES, AND NUMEROUS NOTES, Etc. By GEORGE R. CATHCART WITH PORTRAITS ssa^^i^^ APR 23 1892^ \V^«?" -if.Yr!*\. NEW YORK . : • CINCINNATI • : • CHICAGO AMERICAN BOOK COMPANY u Copyright, Wk, by IVISON, BLAKEMAN, TAYLOR, & Co. Copyright, 189B, by AMERICAN Book Company. mnitoemts Press: John Wilson and Son, Cambridge. PREFACE IT is now more than seventeen years since the first edition of the '' LITERARY READER " was presented to the pubHc. At that time the Compiler declared that he had not designed to make the work a compendium of EngHsh literature, but rather to provide a means of acquiring a fair knowledge of that literature for those who might not be able to pursue a special course of study in it. It was recognized that in the catalogue of school studies, literature then held but a humble place; its value to the mass of scholars had been undervalued, — it had long been esteemed a branch of knowledge really useful only to the few who aspire to a liberal education. Public sentiment had, fortunately, undergone a change touching this matter within a few years, and the book was pre- pared in the avowed hope of furthering that change, and of confirming literature in its true place among school studies. It is no small satisfaction to be able to record that the success of the '* Literary Reader " in its original edi- tion was such as to justify this hope; and a new edition is now put forth, embodying such changes and improve- ments as the higher and severer demands of the time seem to make necessary. This work, not less than the former edition of the '' Literary Reader," is intended iv PREFACE for the use of schools as a text-book, by the means of which the learner may acquire, simultaneously, proficiency in reading and no inconsiderable familiarity with some of the best pages of English literature. Still, it is believed that, even more than in its former shape, the book will be found serviceable by the general reader. The recognition of distinctively scientific writers as contributors to letters is continued. In its early days science was dry and almost repellent to all save its favored students ; but its modern exponents have not failed to see the importance of presenting it in attractive guise, and the writings of Agassiz, Gray, Dana, Lyell, Tyndall, Huxley, and others abound in passages of great beauty even when judged by the standards of pure literature. Among the leading features of this revision are the Definitions and Outline of Study, which form the intro- duction to the book; the chapter on the Beginnings of English Literature, which covers the period previous to the time when our language took its permanent form ; and the subdivision of our literature into the four great periods of Elizabethan Literature, the Literature of the Commonwealth and Restoration, the Literature of the Eighteenth Century, and the Literature of the Nineteenth Century. The biographical and critical notices have been rewritten and much extended, and an introductory chapter has been prepared to each of the four grand divisions of our literature. Each one of these periods is marked by distinct and definite outlines ; each one has its own char- acter, and arranges itself in something like systematic order around certain great central names. It has there- fore been possible to make the book orderly and con- tinuous in its character, and to give it an historical PRhFACE V perspective which shows forth the masters and master- pieces of our literature in. their true proportions. The portraits which adorn the volume have been drawn by Mr. Jacques Reich. They form a series remarkable for fullness, authenticity, and artistic merit. The Compiler acknowledges, as formerly, his obligations to Messrs. G. P. Putnam's Sons, Messrs. D. Appleton and Company, and Messrs. J. R. Osgood and Company, and their successors, for their courtesy in permitting the use of selections from their copyright editions of American writers. He also acknowledges his many obligations to his friend Mr. Henry D. Harrower for the editorial super- vision of the work, which has been entirely in his charge ; to him are to be credited in large measure such improve- ments as may appear in the revision. G. R. C. New York, January, 1892. CONTENTS Preface Definitions and Outline of Study Page iii xi I The Beginnings of English Literature II The Elizabethan Literature . William Shakespeare 19 1. Othello's Speech to the Senate 21 2. The Winning of Jiihet .... 23 3. Wolsey on the Vicissitudes of Life 24 4. Hamlet's Soliloquy 25 5. Polonius's Advice to his Son . . 26 6. Tiie Seven Ages of Man ... 27 7. Mercy 28 8. England ..,.,.... 29 9. The Mind ... . . , . 29 10. Perfection .... 29 ir. Ingratitude rebuked ..... 30 12. Five Sonn"fets 31 Ben Jonson 34 1. On Shakespeare ...... 36 2. On the Portrait of Shakespeare . 39 3. Hymn to Diana ...... 39 4. Two Epitaphs ....... 40 5. Tiie Noble Nature .... 40 Francis Bacon 1. Of Friendship ....... 2. Of Goodness and Goodness of Nature 3. Of Learning ...... A Garland of Elizabethan Lyrics . 1. The Gifts of God (George Her- bert) 2. The Happy Life (Henry Wotton) 3. Death, the Leveler (James Shir- ley) 4. On the Tombs in Westminster Abbey (Francis Beaumont) 5. Melancholy (John Fletcher) . . 6. To Dianeme (Robert Herrick) . 7. To Lucasta, on going to the Wars (Richard Lovelace) .... Notable Contemporary Writers . Ill The Literature of the Commonwealth and the Restoration John Milton ........ 61 I. The Invocation and Introduction to " Paradise Lost " . = . . 62 2 Adam and Eve's Morning Hymn 64 3. May Morning ...... 66 4. Lycidas 66 John Dryden 73 I. Song for St. Cecilia>Day . . . 74 2 Mac Flecknoe 77 3. Ode to the Memory of Mrs Anne Killigrew ........ Three Contemporary Songs . , . 1. The Retreat (Henry Vaughan) . 2. A Supplication (Abraham Cowley) 3. Song of the Emigrants \n Ber- muda (Andrew Marvel!) Notable Contemoorary Writer<5 59 Vlll CONTENTS IV The Literature of the Eighteenth Century Jonathan Swift o Philosophers and Projectors . . Joseph Addison 1. Indian Traditions of the World of Spirits . 2. The Spacious Firmament . . . Alexander Pope 1. The Present Condition of Man vindicated 2. Greatness 3. Elegy to the Memory of an Unfor- tunate Lady . . 4. On the Poet Gay, in Westminster Abbey Benjamin Franklin Remembrances of My Boyhood . Samuel Johnson ....... 1. A Palace in a Valley 2. The Discontent of Rasselas , . Oliver Goldsmith I. The Sagacity of the Spider . . . 93 94 100 106 107 109 no 2. Tlie Deserted Village .... 3. Home Edmund Burke 1. On Conciliation with America . 2. The Decay of Chivalrous Sent! ment » . . . William Cowper ...... 1. Alexander Selkirk 2. Apostrophe to England • . 3. On Mercy. ..-.,.. Edward Gibbon Arabia ......... Thomas Jefferson 1. The Character of Washington . 2. A Profession of Political Faith Robert Burns 1. Man was made to Mourn . 2. Despondency ....,, 3. To a Mountain Daisy . . . , 4. Bannockburn ..... Notable Contemporary Writers Page . 88 142 • 145 146 . 148 153 154 156 157 IS9 160 168 169 171 173 174 177 179 i8i 183 The Literature of the Nineteenth Century W^alter Savage Landor .... 1 . Oliver Cromwell and Walter Noble 2. Rose Aylmer = 3. The One Gray Hair ..... William Wordsworth 1. The Boy and the Owls . <, . . 2. Ruth 3. The Solitary Reaper 4. She was a Phantom of Delight . Sir Walter Scott 1. Sir Walter Raleigh and Queen Elizabeth 2. Lochinvar 3. The Last Minstrel 4. Love of Country ...... 5. A Serenade .... .... Sydney Smith 1. The Pleasures of Knowledge . . 2. Wit and Wisdom ...... 3. The Science of Government . . Samuel Taylor Coleridge .... I. The Importance of Method. 191 192 200 200 202 204 205 208 209 213 218 219 220 224 226 229 230 2- Kubla Khan ..... 3. Dead Calm in the Tropics 4 Severed Friendship . 5. Youth and Age , . r 6. The Good Great Man Charles Lamb .... 1. The Origin of Roast Pig 2. The Old Familiar Faces Daniel Webster. . . . 1. The Battle of Bunker Hill 2. Eulogium on Washington 3. The American Union Washington Irving . 1. Ichabod Crane . . 2. The Discovery of America Lord Byron o . . . . 1. Modern Greece . . 2. Rome . . . ■ . 3. The Ocean .... 4. I saw Thee weep . . William CuUgn Bryant I. The Death of the Flowers 187 234 236 237 238 239 240 241 246 247 248 251 254 256 257 266 271 272 274 275 277 278 279 CONTENTS IX Page 2. Thanatopsis 280 3 To a Waterfowl 283 Thomas Carlyle 285 1. Execution of Marie-Antoinette . 2S6 2. Night View of a City 2S9 3. The Reign of Terror 291 Ralph Waldo Emerson .... 293 1. Napoleon Bonaparte 294 2. Good-by, Proud World .... 298 3. The Sea 299 4. Concord Fight 300 Sir Edward Lytton Bulwer . . . 301 1. On Revolution 302 2. The Surrender of Grenada . . . 305 Elizabeth Barrett Browning . .310 1. A Dead Rose 311 2. Sleep . . 312 3. The Cry of the Children . . . . 314 Henry Wadsworth Longfellow . 315 1. The Wreck of the " Hesperus " . 316 2. The Ship of State 319 3. Disaster 320 4. The Launching of the Ship . . . 321 5. The Village Blacksmith .... 322 6. A Northland Picture .... 324 British Historians 389 Thomas Babington Macaulay . 391 1. The Puritans 392 2. The Progress of England . . . 396 James Anthony Froude ... 398 1. Execution of Sir Thomas More 399 2. The Book of Job ..... 401 American Historians 406 William Hickling Prescott . . 408 1. The Valley and City of Mexico 409 2. The Colonization of America . 411 George Bancroft 415 The Discovery of the Mississippi . 416 John Lothrop Motley .... 421 Historic Progress 422 British Scientists 428 Sir Charles Lyell 430 The Dismal Swamp 431 John Tyndall 436 An Address to Students .... 437 Thomas Henry Huxley ... 443 Scientific Education 444 Page John Greenleaf Whittier .... 328 T. Maud Muller 329 2. The Barefoot Boy 334 3. Winter 337 Oliver Wendell Holmes .... 338 1. On Amateur Writers 339 2. Under the Violets 345 Alfred Tennyson 347 1. The Charge of the Light Brigade . 348 2. Lady Clara Vere de Vere . . 350 3. Arden shipwrecked 352 4. Widow and Child 353 5. The Days that are no more . . . 354 Edgar Allan Foe 355 1. Annabel Lee 356 2. From " The Raven " 357 3. The Bells 358 John Ruskin 362 1. Water 363 2. The Clouds 367 James Russell Lowell 370 1. My Garden Acquaintance . . . 371 2. Democracy 375 3. Yussouf 383 4. An Licident in a Railroad Car . . 384 5. The Heritage 387 American Scientists 450 Louis J. R. Agassiz 451 America the Old World .... 452 Asa Gray 458 How Certain Plants capture In- sects . 459 James Dwight Dana 464 Knowledge of Nature ..... 465 British Novelists 471 William Makepeace Thackeray 473 Last Days of Colonel Newcome . 474 Charles Dickens 479 Mr. Pickwick's Dilemma .... 480 "George Eliot" 486 Doctor Lydgate 487 American Novelists 496 James Fenimore Cooper . . 497 The Indian Adoption 499 Nathaniel Hawthorne .... 503 Mosses from an Old Manse . . . 504 CONTENTS Page The Sonnet 507 A Group of British Sonnets . . 508 1. On Milton (William Words- worth) 508 2. Night and Death (Joseph Blanco White) 509 3. On first Looking into " Chap- man's Homer " (John Keats) 509 4. On the Castle of Chillon (Lord Byron) 510 5. When We are All asleep (Rob- ert Buchanan) 510 6. The Grasshopper and the Cricket (Leigh Hunt) . . 511 7. Immortality (Westland Mar- ston) 512 8. How do I love Thee? (Eliza- beth Barrett Browning) . . 512 9. " Retro Me, Sathana! " (Dante Gabriel Rossetti) .... 513 10. The Buoy-Bell (Charles Tenny- son-Turner) 513 11. The First Kiss (Theodore Watts) I14 12. Ozymandias (Percy Bysshe Shelley) , . 514 13. "Timor Mortis conturbat Me" (Sir Noel Baton) . . . . 515 Page 14. The Dead (Mathilde Blind) . 515 15. Substance and Shadow (John Henry Newman) .... 516 16. Don Quixote (Austin Dobson) 516 17. Sorrow (Aubrey de Vere) . . 517 18. Guns of Peace (Miss Mulock) . 517 19. On His Blindness (John Mil- ton) S18 Some American Sonnets .... 519 1. The Street (James Russell Lowell) 519 2. Return (Lillah Cabot Perry) . 519 3. Mazzini (Helen Hunt Jack- son) 520 4. Orpheus (Margaret Fuller) . . 520 5. " Full Many Noble Friends " (James Russell Lowell) . . 521 6. Night (James Gates Percival). 521 7. Holy Land (Richard Watson Gilder) 522 S. At Last (Paul Hamilton Hayne) 522 9. To a Friend (Richard Henry Stoddard) . 523 10. Science (Edgar Allan Poe) . . 524 11. There never yet was Flower (James Russell Lowell) . . 524 Notable Contemporary Writers 525 Cathcarts Literary Reader DEFINITIONS AND OUTLINE OF STUDY "HPHE literature of any language is the whole body of -*- its written productions, both of knowledge and of imagination. The term belles-lettres (elegant letters) is applied to that part of literature which consists of works of taste, sentiment and imagination. It therefore includes poetry and eloquence, and excludes works of science and of mere research. Literature divides itself into the two forms of expression, — prose and poetry. Prose is the direct, ordinary, unmetncal form of speech and writing. Poetry is elevated or impassioned expression, in metri- cal and verse form. It is of two types, — rhymed verse, and blank (unrhymed) verse. Verse is a term frequendy used as synonymous with poetry, but in its technical sense a verse (Lat. versa, turned) is one line of a poem. Rhythm is an harmoulous succession of vocal sounds, and is, therefore, a necessary characteristic of poetry. It is often found xii CATHCART'S LITERARY READER in lofty and imaginative prose. '' If Burke and Bacon were not poets," said Thomas Moore, " then I know not what poetry means." Literature may be narrative, descriptive, expository, or persuasive,; or it may be all of these. Thus, in their main features, history, biography, and books of travel are both narrative and descriptive ; the essay, the formal treatise, and works of science are expository, and, generally, descriptive ; oratory and poetry are persuasive, and may par- take of the other qualities above-named. II Style is the method of expressing thought in language. The characteristics of good style are ( i ) clearness, (2) force. and (3) elegance. These characteristics depend upon — 1. the choice of words, (ytt) as to their derivation, {b) as to their shades of meaning, (<;) as to their mutual fitness of association; 2. the order of zuords in the sentence, {a) as direct, or grammatical, (/;) as indirect, or rhetorical ; Thus, " Thy dying eyes were closed by foreign hands," is a sentence arranged in the usual or '' grammatical " order ; while the same sentence rhetorically arranged is, '' By foreign hands thy dying eyes were closed " (p. 113). 3. tJie construction of the sentence, — {a) the loose sentence, it?) the period ; Thus, " We came to our journey's end, at last, with no small difficulty, after much fatigue, through deep roads and bad DEFINITIONS AND OUTLINE OF STUDY xiii weather," is a loose sentence ; that is, it can be brought to a close at any of the points marked by the comma. Herbert Spencer reconstructs the sentence into a period as follows : " At last, with no small difficulty, and after much fatigue, we came, through deep roads and bad weather, to our journey's end." 4. devices of arrangement of the parts of the sentence, (<^) simple devices, such as repetition, antithesis, simile, suspense, climax, {b) the oblique devices that are aft'orded by the figures of speech, the more important of which are metaphor, personification, metonymy, and synecdoche. (a) Repetition may be of words or phrases, and often adds greatly to force. Thus : " By foreign hands thy dying eyes were closed, By foreign hands thy decent limbs composed, By foreign hands thy humble grave adorned 5 By strangers honored, and by strangers mourned." Antithesis is the balancing of opposites in a sentence, affording by the contrast a powerful emphasis. Thus: " He was a learned man among lords, and a lord among learned men." — Johnson. Simile is the formal and direct likening of one thing to another, and is chiefly used for purposes of ornament. It is direct comparison, — as: " Flowers are lovely; love is flowerdike''^ (p. 238). Suspense is that arrangement of words which holds the attention of the reader by leaving the sense incomplete until the sentence is closed, — as : " Deep in the shady sadness of a vale, Far sunken from the healthy breath of morn. Far from the fiery noon, and eve's one star. Sat gray -haired Satiirny — Keats. xiv CATHCART'S LITERARY READER Climax (Lat. climax, a ladder) is such an arrangement of the parts of a sentence that these rise step by step in importance and dignity, — as : " The cloud-capt towers, the gorgeous palaces, The solemn temples, the great globe itself. Yea, all which it inherit, shall dissolve." — Tempest iv. i. Anticlimax is the reverse of climax, and produces, by a series of descending steps, an impression of absurdity. It may be em- ployed for purposes of ridicule, as in VV^aller's lines : '* And thou, Dalhousie, thou great god ot war, Lieutenant-colonel to the Earl of Mar ! '' (b) A figure of speech (oblique device) is the use of a word or expression in a different sense from that which properly belongs to it, for the sake of giving life or em- phasis to an idea. Metaphor is equivalent to simile, with the words of likeness omitted, — as : {simile) " flowers are lovely ; love is /lower-like j {metaphor) Friendship is a sheltering tree." Metaphors should never be mixed. That is, the image raised in the mind must not, until it is completed, be broken in upon by another. Thus, m the frequently cited couplet of Addison : " I bridle in my struggling Muse with pain, That longs to launch mto a nobler strain,'" the first line is not open to objection, since the word " Muse " is used by metonymy (see below) for Pegasus, the winged horse of the Muses ; but the mtroduction, m the second line, of a new figure, that of a ship, confuses the sense and violates good taste. The metaphor can always be converted into simile. Personification is that figure which attributes the charac- teristics of a living being to inanimate things, — as: DEFINITIONS AND OUTLINE OF STUDY xv " Righteousness and peace have kissed each other; " " The sea saw it, and fled." — Psalms. Apostrophe, vision, allegory, and fable are figures of speech which may all be considered as varieties of personification. Apostrophe is direct address to the thing personified, — generally to something absent as though present : " Chillon! thy prison is a holy place." — Byrox. "O Death! where is thy sting? O Gravel where is thy victory?" I Cor. XV. 55. Vision speaks of absent or past things indirectly, and as though present : '• 'T is she ! but why that bleeding bosom gored ? Why dimly gleams the visionary sword?" (p. 112.) Allegory is a prolonged personification in narrative form. Bunyan's " Pilgrim's Progress," and Spenser's " Faerie Queen," are allegories. The FABLE is a brief allegory. Metonymy is that figure by which one thing is brought to mind under the name of another. Thus: "The pen is mightier than the sword." Here "the pen" stands for in- tellectual strength, and "the sword" for physical strength. Synecdoche is that figure of speech by which a part is put for the whole, thus giving a more convenient or more accurate presentation of the idea. Thus, " A fleet of ten sail'' offers a striking picture of a fleet at sea, and avoids the possible conception of ten ships in dock. 5. varieties of tJiougJit and feeling that do not affect the arrangement of the parts of the sentence. Irony is the assertion of an opinion, or the expression of an emotion, in such a tone, or under such circumstances, as to imply the opposite. Thus: xvi CATHCARTS LITERARY READER " Here under leave of Brutus and the rest, For Brutus is an honorable man^ So are they all, all honorable inen^ Come I to speak in Caesar's funeral." Shakespeare : Julius Ccssar, iii. 2. Satire and sarcasm are also types of expression that depend rather upon the spirit than upon the structure of the sentences in which they are conveyed. Hyperbole is exaggerated expression, and is generally used to increase the impressiveness of what is said. Thus, " And this man Is now become a god I . . . He doth bestride the narrow world Like a colossus." Shakespeare Julius Ccesar, 1. 2. Allusion (Lat. alluderc, to play with or about) is such a use of terms as brings to mind something not explicitly mentioned. Thus, " So Lycidas sunk low, but mounted high, Through the dear might of Him that walked the waves " (p. 72). Allusion is to be distinguished from reference, in which the thing brought to mind is directly mentioned. Ill The following Outline of Study ^ may be found helpful In the literary examination of the texts gathered together in this volume. 1. What is the literary nature of the piece? Is it prose, or poetry? Descriptive, expository, or what? 1 The accounts of the several Periods of our literature, and the Sketches of the various authors, are intended to be merely informatory. While pupils ought to be possessed of the main features of these, the class exercise should be confined to literary study of the successive extracts. DEFINITIONS AND OUTLINE OF STUDY xvii 2. What is the intent of the author, i. e., what is the central thought of the piece? Does this thought find complete expression? Is it developed in an orderly progression ? 3. Look closely into the vocabulary of the lesson. Which predominate in it, — words of Saxon, or words of Latin origin? (For any etymologies you do not know, consult Webster's International Dictionary.) In the sentence of paragraph substitute Saxon words for those of Latin origin. What is the resulting effect upon the style of the sentence? Is it clearer, or stronger, or more graceful? Reverse the process in the next sentence. 4. Consider the meanings of terms, especially in the case of qualifying words. Reconstruct the sentence of paragraph by substituting synonyms for all em- phatic words. Are the changes of meaning for the better? Why? or why not? Are the rhythm and taste- fulness of the sentence improved? 5. Invert the grammatical order of words, in the sentence of the paragraph, from direct to indirect. Is the rhetorical order the stronger? Is it suitable to the nature of the subject and to the context? In the sentence of paragraph reverse the process. Is the author's meaning made clearer by the change, or not? 6. Point out a period in paragraph . Can you convert it into a loose sentence ? What is the effect of the change? Is the sentence clearer, or not? Stronger, or weaker? If the piece is a poem it will afford exercise in reconstruction, both grammatical and rhetorical, by means of paraphrasing. This may be applied to the stanza, or to the whole selection, and will often make clear what would else seem obscure. xviii CATHCARTS LITERARY READER Paraphrase the poem on page . Is the composi- tion lengthened? Why? Does fitness require that any of the poetic terms should find substitutes when repro- duced in the prose form? 7. What figures of speech can you point out in para- graph page ? Name them. Define them. Could the same thought in any instance be expressed with as much grace and force without the figure? Are the several figures well carried out? Convert the metaphor in the sentence into a simile. Change the allusion in sentence to direct rejerence. 8. Note the general qualities of the style of the selection, (^a) as to clearness. Is the phraseology simple, or verbose? The treatment specific, or vague? Do you detect faults of tautology or circumlocution? (^) as to force. Is any strength of the piece due to antitheses, repetitions, suspense, or climax? (^) as to elegance. Is the arrangement of words and phrases harmonious, and therefore pleasurable to the ear? If not, express the same meaning in words of your own. THE BEGINNINGS OF ENGLISH LITERATURE A N historical account of English literature would have -^^^ for its outline a description of the best books of all kinds that have been written in the English language. It would therefore necessarily involve some account of the history of the language itself, — of its beginnings, so far as they can be traced, of its successive modifications, and of the several influences that have affected it. The English language was formed and grew to its ma- turity in the British Islands. It is now spoken in our own country and in British colonies and dependencies through- out the world, — in all by more than one hundred millions of people. By the close of the twentieth century it will doubtless be the language of three times that number of men. The speech from which our present English derives the greater part of its structural characteristics was spoken fourteen hundred years ago in the lowland countries bor- dering upon the Baltic and North seas. In Schleswig there is a district which still bears the name of Angeln. The speech of the inhabitants of this region was rough and guttural, and consisted at the most of about t^vo thou- sand words. The language of the lowlanders of to-day is Teutonic, and so was that of their ancestors, the Angles, Jutes, and Saxons, of whom we are speaking. It did not in those early times have the name English, but was most probably called Deiitsch, or TeiUish. About the middle 2 CATHCART'3 LITERARY READER of the fifth century this speech was carried by advent- urers and colonists across the North Sea to the shores of Britain. These invaders from the mainland found the island that is now called Great Britain peopled by a race of men who spoke a strange language, and who were poor, half- barbarous, and unable to offer much resistance to the encroachments of the new-comers. Little by little the native Britons were driven southward and westward, until at last they found refuge in Cornwall and Wales, and their lands were possessed by their Teutonic conquerors. The language of the conquered Britons was Celtic ; and it is noteworthy that very few words of it have found their way into the English vocabulary. The three groups of Teutons who thus colonized the most of England settled themselves in different parts of the island. They used different dialects of the same lan- guage, and these dialects continued distinct from one an- other for several centuries. Then, by reason of growth of population, community of interest, and the closer relations which resulted, the three dialects merged into a common speech, — one which could for the first time properly be called English. It is a familiar fact that the first literary utterances of every language take the form of verse, and accord- ingly the earliest Anglo-Saxon composition of which we have any record is the " Beowulf," the authorship of which is unknown. Its date has been variously placed in the fifth, sixth, and seventh centuries ; the doubt as to its period arising out of the fact that it was not committed to writing until about the beginning of the eighth century. It is a war-poem, composed to celebrate the heroic deeds of Beowulf, who, hearing that the Danish king was har- assed by the attacks of a man-eating monster, set sail from Sweden to bring him succor. After many advent- THE BEGINNINGS OF ENGLISH LITERATURE 3 ures, Beowulf slays the monster, returns home, there to lead a long life of good deeds crowned with honor. The poem consists of several thousand lines, and is allitera- tive ; that is, three or more accented words in each line begin with the same letter. Thus, an old poem has these lines : — " But in a Ma.y ;//orning on Afsdvern hills, I was -zt/eary of 'Z£/andering and laent me to rest Under a dro2Ld <^ank dy a <$'urn-side ; And as I /ay and /eaned, and /ooked on the waters, I j-lumbered in a j'leeping, it j-ounded so merry." All early English verse is of this alliterative form, — the end-rhyme of poetry as we know it having a much later origin. The earliest poem that may fairly be regarded as Eng- lish is the metrical paraphrase of the Pentateuch and the New Testament by Ccedinon, a monk of Whitby. Ac- cording to the legend, Caedmon was employed in menial service about the stables of the ancient monastery. Obey- ing what he believed to be the behests of a supernatural vision, Caedmon set himself to sing of " Creation, and the Beginning of All Things." Report of his verse coming to the ears of his superiors, they caused him to be educated. His translation was put into writing, and was read, memor- ized, and recited for a thousand years. It was composed probably in the seventh century^ but was not printed until the seventeenth. By general consent of critics, the most striking passages of this first English poem occur in the earlier part, where Caedmon sings of the rev^olt of the angels and the fall of man. These are the themes of Milton's great epic, and since Milton was well acquainted with the possessor of the Caedmon MS., we may fairly conjecture that tlie Puritan poet derived some inspiration from the w^ork of his predecessor. 4 CATHC/IRT'S LITERARY READER As Caedmon was the first English poet, so Bcsda, or as he is generally called, the Venerable Bede, was the first writer of English prose. He also was a monk, and was born in the latter part of the seventh century. Bseda entered at an early age the monastery of Jarrow. He wrote voluminously, and mainly in Latin. He was, how- ever, the author of one English book, — a translation of the Gospel of Saint John. Upon this, according to the tradition, Baeda was engaged up to the hour of his death. This first English prose work is unfortunately lost. Two works of Old English, written later than the Nor- man invasion, deserve notice, because they show little evidence of the influence that the Norman-French was destined to have upon our language. These are Laya- mon's " Brut," and Ormin's ** Ormulum." Layamon was a priest who, about the year 1200, translated from the French a poem entitled " Brut." It purports to be a chronicle of British events from the time of the Roman invasion to the end of the seventh century. In the whole course of this metrical translation there are only about two-score words of Latin origin, and even of these several were in familiar use in English before the Norman Con- quest. The vocabulary of this translation is, accordingly, Saxon-English of a very pure type ; and the work serves to show at once how much and how little our language was capable of in strength, amplitude, and beauty before it had absorbed the French-Latin element. The " Ormulum," supposed to have been written, about the year 1225, by a monk named Ormin, is a rhythmic version of the Gospels. It is still freer than Layamon's work from words of Latin origin, and shows our language in a state of considerable advance over the English of any preceding writer. The following verses will give some notion of the nature of the vocabulary: — THE BEGINNINGS OF ENGLISH LITERATURE 5 Icc^ hafe wennd inntill Ennglissh / have wended^ into E?iglish Goddspelless hallghe lare GospeVs holy lore Affter thatt little witt tatt me After the little wit that )ne Mill Drihhtin hafethth lenedd. My Lord hath lefit. It remains to speak of the most extensive prose work of the centuries immediately preceding and following the Conquest. This work, known as " The Saxon Chronicle," was written, not by one, but by a succession of monastic authors. It was, as its name denotes, an historical record of events ; and as might be expected from the circum- stances of its authorship, has a peculiar value as showing the changing conditions of our language, as respects both vocabulary and structure, throughout the long period of time covered by it. It is the first history of any Teutonic people written in language of their own. From the date of the Norman invasion (1066) there was not, in two centuries and a half, any original English com- position that is worthy of mention. The speech of our forefathers was, during this period, undergoing its greatest change. The rigorous administration of the Conqueror suf- ficed to insure political order, but unity of intellectual life was wanting. The very strength, however, of the monarchy, together with the absence of religious differences, worked powerfully for the interfusion of the two elements of the population. Those of the English who desired to move among the educated and titled classes, and to associate with persons of authority or influence, found it necessary to acquire some knowledge of the French tongue. Little ^ Ormin, in his spelling, doubles every consonant that has a short vowel before it, thus affording useful clews to pronunciation in his time. - turned 6 CATH CART'S LITERARY READER by little, Norman words began to creep into every-day English speech. French was the language of the court, of parliament, and of the colleges ; and very soon a smat- tering of the new language became a badge of gentility. English had been in the main a spoken language, while the Norman-French was written extensively. Having to that extent the better chance of survival, it was only a question of time for a considerable element of French to become infused into the language of the common people. Old English inflections began to drop away, and to give place to the fixed and more rational forms of the French- Latin. Moreover, the common necessities of life demanded that the rulers and the ruled should have intelligible inter- course with one another when they met at church, at fairs, and in the market-place. The French wars were espe- cially influential in the same way, because they brought into very close relations the Saxon bowman and his Nor- man lord. In all these cases men were obliged to talk with each other. '* Every man turned himself into a walk- ing phrase-book." The Norman used English synonyms for his French words ; and whenever an Englishman spoke with a Norman, he sought in his turn French equivalents for the words of his vernacular. And so our language began to swarm with words that went in couples. The traces of this are to be seen in our present vocabulary, where we find such pairs of words as will and testament, aid and abet, pray and beseech, acknowledge and confess, and dissemble and cloak, most of which have come down to us in the set forms of expression of the church and the law of England.^ The English people held fast to their own speech, but 1 In this way our language has come into possession of a wealth of synonyms such as no other tongue affords. These pairs of words, providing for the use of what Swift calls "proper words in proper places," enable us to give expression to the nicest shades of meaning. THE BEGINNINGS OF ENGLISH LITERATURE 7 they inevitably adopted many French words as time passed. This process went on for several hundred years ; and then, about the middle of the fourteenth century, it seemed as if the English language would not absorb any more French, The loss of Normandy in 1204 had given to the ruling class and the mass of the people of England a common political interest, and the whole tendency of religious teaching was to break down the barriers between them. Finally, by act of parliament (1362), both French and Latin were made to give place to English in the courts of law. The Latin contribution to our language, which resulted from the Conquest, imparted to it a new quality, and gave it wider powers of expression. So true is this that we may say that until this element was thoroughly transfused into the original English the writings of Shakespeare were impossible. This is still truer of Milton. His most pow- erful thoughts are written in lines the most telling words in which are almost always Latin. This may be illustrated by the following verses from " Lycidas " (see page 69) : "It was tha.t fata/ and perfidious bark, Built in the eclipse, and rigged with curses dark. That sunk so low that sacred head of thine." On the other hand, it is to be observed that whole sen- tences can be made containing only words of English origin, while it is impossible to do this with Latin or other foreign words. In the following passage from ** Macbeth " there is but one Romance word : — " Go bid thy 7Jiistress, when my drink is ready, She strike upon the bell. Get thee to bed ! — Is this a dagger which I see before me, The handle toward my hand ? Come ! let me clutch thee ! — I have thee not; and yet I see thee still." 8 CATHCART'S LITERARY READER It is further to be noted that the names of classes of things and of generalizations are mainly of Latin origin; while the names of particular things are Anglo-Saxon. Thus color is a general term, and of Latin origin, while ird, yellow, black, white, gj'eeu, brown, are Saxon and par- ticular; nujuber is general, while ofie, two, tJiree, four, five, six, etc., are particular; move is general, while leap, spring, slip, slide, fall, walk, run, swim, ride, creep, crawl, fly, are particular. The first prose writer of the fourteenth century was Sir John Mandeville (i 300-1 372). He has been called the '' Father of English Prose," since, though not the first of the writers of prose in our language, he is the first whose work survives. He was educated to be a physician, but from early manhood seems to have been seized with a passion to see " cities of men, manners, climates, councils, governments." He wrote a narrative of his travels, first in Latin, then in French, and finally in English, in order that, as he said, " every man of my nation may understand it." Many copies of this work were circulated in manu- script, but it was not put into type until the year 1499, — that is, about twenty-five years after Caxton set up his printing-press in London. Mandeville's narrative tells of his journeyings from one end to the other of the world as then known ; and while it is probably authentic in general outline, the account is defaced by stories of marvelous scenes and preposterous adventures.^ ^ Some notion of his style may be derived from the following passage in the introduction to his work : — " And for als moche as it is long tyme passed, that ther was no generalle Passage ne Vyage over the See ; and many Men desiren for to here speke of the holy Lond, and han thereof gret Solace and Comfort ; I John Maundevylle, Knyght, alle be it I be not worthi, that was born in Englond, in the Town of Seynt Albones, passed the See, in the Zeer of our Lord Jesu Crist MCCCXXII, in the Day of Seynt Michelle; and hidre to [hitherto] have heen longe tyme over the See, and have seyn and gon thorghe manye dyverse Londes, and many Provynces and Kingdomes and lies, and have passed thorghe Tartarye, Percye [Persia], Ermonye [Armenia] the litylle and THE BEGINNINGS OF ENGLISH LITERATURE The most influential writer of prose was Jo/m Wyclif ( 1 324-1 384). His fame rests upon the translation of the Latin version of the Scriptures, in the making of which many hands were employed under his supervision. This work was completed only a short time before his death. The words and the style of Wyclif's translation were of permanent service in giving fixity to the best English usage of his day. This was the first translation of the whole Bible- into our language. ^ the grete ; thorghe Lybye, Caldee, and a gret partie of Ethiope ; thorghe Amazoyne [Amazonia], Inde the lasse and the more, a gret partie; and thorghe out many othere lies, that ben abouten Inde ; where dwellen many dyverse Foikes, and of dyverse Ma- neres and Lawes, and of dyverse Schappes of men. Of whiche Londes and lies, I schalle speke more pleynly hereaftve." 1 Comparing Wyclif's translation of the opening verses of St. Luke xxiv. with the latest English rendering, we may see some of the changes our lan- guage has undergone in a period of five hundred years. 1380 But in o day of the woke ful eerli thei camen to the grave, and broughten swete smelling spices that thei hadden arayed. And thei founden the stoon turnyd awey fro the grave. And thei geden in and foundun not the bodi of the Lord Jhesus. And it was don, the while thei weren astonyed in thought of this thing, lo twey men stodun bisidis hem in schynyng cloth. And whanne thei dredden and bowiden her semblaunt into erthe, thei seiden to hem, what seeken ye him that lyveth with deede men ? He is not here ; but he is risun : have ye minde how he spak to you whanne he was yit in Golilee, and seide, for it behoveth mannes sone to be bitakun into the hondis of synful men : and to be crucifyed: and the thridde day to rise agen ? And thei bithoughten on hise wordis, and thei geden agen fro the grave: and teelden alle these thingis to the ellevene and to alle othere. And there was Marye Maudeleyn and Jone and Marye of James, and othere wymmen that weren with hem, that seiden to Apostlis these thingis. 1880 But on the first day of the week, at early dawn, they came unto the tomb, bringing the spices which they had pre- pared. And they found the stone rolled away from the tomb. And they entered in, and found not the body of the Lord Jesus. And it came to pass, while they were perplexed thereabout, behold, two men stood by them in dazzling apparel : and as they were affrighted, and bowed down their faces to the earth, they said unto them, Why seek ye the living among the dead? He is not here, but is risen : remember how he spake unto you when he was yet in Galilee, saying that the Son of man must be delivered up into the hands of sinful men, and be crucified, and the third day rise again. And they remembered his words, and returned from the tomb, and told all these things to the eleven, and to all the rest. Now they were Mary Magdalene, and Joanna, and Mary the mother of James ; and the other women with them told these things unto the apostles. ^,« meat. Chaucer's greatest work is ^ the " Canterbury Tales," which is a 10 CATHCART'S LITERARY READER The greatest figure in the poetry of the fourteenth century was Geoffrey Chancer (1328-1400). The accounts of his early life are not very full ; but we know that, owing perhaps to his handsome presence, as well as to his powers and attainments, he early found favor at court. He traveled extensively on the Continent, espe- cially in France and Italy, and had '^. a most varied experience as soldier, "^l^ \< > J',y' ambassador, and member of parlia- collection of stories in verse. The finest part of this work is the Prologue; the noblest story is the " Knightes Tale." The Prologue is the work of a great literary artist, drawing from nature with incompar- able force, sureness, and freedom. It is worthy of note that in 1362, when Chaucer was a very young man, the session of the House of Commons was first opened with a speech in English ; and thus he wrote at a time when our language was freshest and newest. He was closely familiar with Italian literature ; and it is undoubtedly due to this that in his hands English w^as proved to be rich in sweetness and harmony, no less than in force. Tennyson thus refers to him : — " Dan^ Chaucer, the first warbler, whose sweet breath Preluded those melodious bursts that fill The spacious times of great Elizabeth With sounds that echo still." The lesser poets of this period were William Langlande (1332-1400), who used the alliterative form, and whose ^ a poetical title of honor = master THE BEGINNINGS OF ENGLISH LITERATURE ii principal work was "The Vision of Piers the Plowman; " y^?/^;/ Gower (133 5-1408), author of a poem entitled " The Lover's Confession; " and JoJm Barbo?cr (13 16-1396), a Scottish poet, whose best-remembered work is entitled '* The Bruce." In the fourteenth century the English lan- guage attained a high degree of finish, force, and freedom, though the sentences of its prose writers are long and awkward. Civil wars convulsed England in the fifteenth century, and the cultivation of letters met little encouragement. Accordingly we find in this period no great work in prose or verse. But if no new literature appeared, that which had already been produced took deeper root and spread wider its branches, mainly through the endeavors of Wil- liam Caxton (1412-IZ192), the ''Father of the English Press," as he has been called. He began to print books in London in the year 1474. This man, whose name has very great significance in the history of our literature, had long been a writer when he took up the business of printing. He was not only author and printer, but com- positor, proof-reader, binder, and publisher as well. Cax- ton's press produced about fifty important works, nearly all of them in English. A number of his publications were translations, made by Caxton himself, of notable for- eign books. He printed the poems of Chaucer and of Gower, and the " History of King Arthur," by Sir Thomas Malory. From the last-named work Tennyson has drawn the stories which form the groundwork of his ** Idylls of the King." .In the preface to his translation of the ^Eneid of Virgil (published in 1490), Caxton says that he can not understand old books that were written when he was a boy ; that " the olde Englysshe is more lykc to dutcJie than englysshe," and that " our langage now used varyeth ferre from that whiche was used and spoken when I was borne." 12 CATHCy^RTS LITERARY READER The sixteenth century was remarkable for its production of anonymous ballads, which were widely circulated among the common people. "King Lear" and " The Babes in Wood " are the best known of these popular pieces. The first half of this century witnessed also the dawn of a new era in poetry, marked by the appearance of Sir TJioinas Wyatt ( 1 503-1 542) and of the Earl of Surrey (15 17- 1547). Both these writers had passed many years in Italy. They had learned, like Chaucer, to appreciate the greatness of Italian literature, and they have been called *' the first reformers of English meter and style." Surrey translated part of Virgil in blank verse, and he shares with Wyatt the credit of introducing the sonnet into our literature, A generation later than these appeared Edmund Spenser (1552- 1 599), the ''poet's poet," who, though the prede- cessor of Shakespeare by but a few years, must yet be reckoned, chiefly on account of his archa- isms of style and the nature of his subjects, as belonging to an earlier epoch. He was the study of Shake- speare, and the poetical master of Cowley and of Milton. Spenser's earliest work was a set of twelve pastoral poems entitled "The Shep- heard's Calendar; " but his fame rests on his great allegory of " The Faerie Queene." The propagation of the several moral virtues is the professed object of this poem. It is written in a stanza of nine lines, since known as the Spenserian stanza. This is so skillfully constructed, and so well adapted to our language, that it is much used by our later poets. Spenser is very fond of alliteration. Thus he has, — THE BEGINNINGS OF ENGLISH LITERATURE 13 " What man that sees the ever- whirling wheele " — " To thee, O greatest goddesse, onely great " — " Derived by due descent " — and similar examples may be found in almost every stanza of the six books into which the poem is divided. Two prose writers of this time deserve notice. Sir TJiomas More (1480-1535) wrote in a plain, strong, nerv- ous style, " The Life and Reign of Edward V." This is the first work deserving the name of history that appeared in our language, and is an admirable example of classic English prose. Hallam speaks of the language of this work as '' pure and perspicuous, well-chosen, without vul- garisms, and without pedantry." The work, however, which comes first to mind at the mention of More's name is his " Utopia," — a description, as its title denotes, of the land of Nowhere. This favored country is a republic, the idea of which More borrowed from Plato, and in it there are no taverns, no fashions, no wars, and no lawyers. William Tyndale ii^'^^-i ^16) is famous for his trans- lation of the New Testament and of parts of the Old. His English is remarkably pure and vigorous. Very few of the words used in his translation have become obsolete, and the work is therefore a landmark in the history of our language. This brief sketch of the Beginnings of English Litera- ture brings us to a consideration of the literature of the Elizabethan reign. Certain conditions and influences of the last quarter of the sixteenth century and the first years of the seventeenth strongly disposed English letters to the dramatic form of expression, as will presently ap- pear. For several centuries theatrical representation had been rude and spectacular. It had consisted chiefly of exhibitions of the martyrdoms of saints, and of miracle- 14 CATHCARTS LITERARY READER plays, in the successive scenes of which the events of scripture and of prophecy, beginning with the creation, and ending with the destruction of the world, were shown forth. These spectacles grew up under monastic patron- age, being performed sometimes within the enclosures of monasteries, and sometimes in the churches themselves. As the English people increased in numbers, and im- proved in the arts of life, these religious plays were pro- duced in greater pomp and greater excellence of form. Then, as time passed, something new and different was demanded by the popular taste, and by gradual steps the so-called "moral plays" supplanted those of a religious character. In the new drama virtues and vices usurped the places thitherto held by angels and demons, and before long even these ceased to be offered as abstractions, — personified qualities yielding room to the proper persons of the drama. Next came translations of the ancient trage- dies and comedies; then crude plays founded on Italian romance. Companies of strolling players traveled from place to place, performing in town-halls or in such other buildings as could give accommodation to their audiences. The first regular public theater in England was estab- lished just outside of the city limits of London in the year 1575. The number of the players and the pros- perity of the playhouse steadil}^ increased. Among the signatures to a memorial addressed to the Queen's Council a few years later by the actors of the *' Blackfriars Play- house " is the name of William Shakespeare. THE ELIZABETHAN LITERATURE 15 II THE ELIZABETHAN LITERATURE SHAKESPEARE - BACON I LOVE the old melodious lays Which softly melt the ages through, The songs of Spenser's golden days, Arcadian Sidney's silvery phrase, Sprinkling our noon of time with freshest morning dew. Whittier 'IT 7HAT is called the " Elizabethan literature " is that ^^ body of classic English prose and verse which, making its appearance in the latter half of the reign of Elizabeth, continued through that of James and that of his son. Before the time of Shakespeare the language spoken in England had been subject to a succession of modifica- tions, both in internal structure and by accretions from without, so radical that the speech of Shakespeare would scarce have been intelligible to the Englishman of Chau- cer's day. Yet the Elizabethan English is the tongue that we speak; and we may therefore say that our language previous to about the middle of the sixteenth century was making, but not made, — was in a formative condition. The foregoing chapter has given in outline some account of this earlier English, and of the causes which led to the successive steps in the development of our language. It is largely due to the great literary figures of the Eliz- abethan time that the mold of our speech is substan- tially fixed. They gave to us a standard for guidance, and have themselves become classics for later generations to l6 CATHCARTS LITERARY READER appeal to. Bacon wrote philosophy in Latin, doubting of the permanence of what he left in English ; for he knew the changes the vernacular had suffered, and could not foresee that further changes would not make his own vocabulary obsolete. It is not every generation that affords us even one great poet or great philosopher, and critics have loved to spec- ulate upon the causes that produced in a single age such figures as those of Shakespeare, Jonson, Drayton, Bacon, Hooker, and Donne. The invention of printing, the re- vival of letters, the rise of the middle class, the great voyages of discovery, — all these seemed to prefigure a great intellectual uprising. Conflict of old with new must ever sharpen the minds of men and broaden the view. Nor had there been lacking precursors of this literary outbreak. Spenser and Marlowe were Shakespeare's im- mediate predecessors. The age of Elizabeth was especially one of change. The imaginations of men w^ere inflamed by the voyages of Drake and Raleigh, so that even the commoner sort took on some boldness of act and loftiness of thought. It was an age of luxury in dress, equipage, and manners ; court pageants, masques, and revels were so frequent as to become almost a commonplace. Men were then surrounded, as Lamb says, by " visible poetry." Wealthy nobles were generous patrons of letters. Eliza- beth, herself no mean scholar, smiled approval upon the stage, and Shakespeare began his great dramatic creations. There was then no reading public, no newspaper press or periodical literature. Only by means of the drama could authorship gain the ear of the public. It was but natural, therefore, that literature should adapt itself to the stage, which afforded to the poet the only means of livelihood, apart from patronage, that in that day he could hope for. The striking characteristics of the Elizabethan litera- ture seem to be these : it was creative, imaginative ; great THE ELIZABETHAN LITERATURE 1 7 breadth of view and of thought were in it ; and it was intensely human, real, natural. There was, as we have seen, abundant reason in the circumstances of the time why its writers should exercise creative power, though nothing that can account for their happy possession of it. They lived in an imaginative age, and in both poet and philosopher imagination gave insight into spiritual truths, and supplied also the power of inventing, devis- ing, and shaping; that is, intellectual creativeness. This is seen equally in the sprightliest fancies of Shakespeare, the deepest speculations of Bacon, or the loftiest flights of Milton, who came after them. In a large way, Milton's great epic. Bacon's whole method, and any one of Shake- speare's plays, is a creation. Change and vicissitude gave large scope to men's minds. New lands were opening to the colonist; false philosophy was losing its hold on the higher intellects ; " creation widened in man's view." The age called for men of insight and foresight, men who could analyze and combine. Accordingly, the thinking of Bacon and of Shakespeare was never one-sided, — it was with the whole mind, not with one or with a few faculties of it. The sagest philosophizing of Bacon is continually lighted up with fanciful touches and subtile conceits. Raleigh could command by sea or land, could write charming verse, found a colony, hold his own in parliament, or pen grave history. Bacon was statesman and jurist as well as philosopher; and that Shakespeare's mind had as many facets as a diamond, is shown by the endeavor of the curious to make him out, from his own writings, a member, at one time or another, of each of the learned professions, and a holder of opposite creeds in religion. He was, indeed, " a universal, round man." This literature dealt with men as they are, fools and wise, bad and good, high and low. The drama in whicii l8 CATHCARTS LITERARY READER they were pictured forth, appealed to the thoughts and passions of natural flesh-and-blood hearers. In the whole gamut of Shakespeare's music there is not an untruthful note; from young Gobbo to Portia, from Macbeth to the drunken Porter, every figure is human, every action and word proper to its place. This is because Shakespeare's mind was free from that exaggeration which is a necessary element of caricature. His characters do not act upon one unvarying rule of conduct, but, as always happens in real life, are swayed from this, as the drama progresses, by a mixture of motives and impulses, by change of situ- ation, and by mere incident. This it is that gives the element of essential truth to Shakespeare's presentations, which are so varied, exhibiting the whole range of hu- man passions, that they appeal to every phase of moral sentiment. So, also. Bacon's ambition in publishing his '' Essays " was, as he wrote in his preface to that work, to bring the matters he treated of "home to men's minds and bosoms." Wise saws and instances modern and ancient brighten every page of these counsels of his. In a word, the Elizabethan literature depicts or ideal- izes human nature in its virtues, vices, passions, weak- nesses, and strength; in its hopes, fears, thoughts, and fancies. It holds the mirror up to Nature, and shows to us Nature's image faithfully reflected in it. It is, after the brief Old-English Introduction, the first and best chapter in the unfinished volume of our literature. SHAKESPEARE I9 SHAKESPEARE 1564-1616 William Shakespeare, dramatist and poet, was born at Stratford-on- Avon, England, in April, 1564. Of his early life almost nothing is known. It is believed that he was a student in the free school at Stratford, and that in his youth he assisted his father in the latter's business, which was that of a wool-dealer and glover. That he formally entered upon any definite call- ing, we have no proof ; but critics have found evidence in his writings of his familiarity with various professions : Malone, one of his acutest commenta- tors, firmly insisted that Shakespeare was a lawyer's clerk. At the age of 20 CATHCART'S LITERARY READER eighteen he married Anne Hathaway, who was eight years his senior. Of this union only a vague report that it proved uncongenial has come down to us. In 1586 or 1587 Shakespeare seems to have gone to London, and two years later appears as one of the proprietors of the Blackfriars Theatre. In the few years next following he became known as a playwright, and in 1593 he published his first poem, "Venus and Adonis." The dates of publication of his plays are not settled beyond doubt, but the best authorities place *• Henry VI." first, and "The Tempest" last, all included between 1589 and 161 1. Shakespeare was an actor as well as a writer of plays, and remained on the stage certainly as late as 1603. Two years later he bought a hand- some house at Stratford, and lived therein, enjoying the friendship and re- spect of his neighbors, till his death in 1616. Meager as is the foregoing sketch, it yet embodies, with a few trifling exceptions, all the known facts as to Shakespeare's life. A mist seems to have settled over " the most illustrious of the sons of man," almost wholly hiding his personality from curious and admiring posterit)'. Of many of his contemporary writers, and of some who preceded him, comparatively full particulars have come down to us : Edmund Spenser stands out con- spicuous among the bright lights of the Elizabethan age ; the genial face and the personal habits of " rare Ben Jonson " are almost familiar to us ; and even of Chaucer, the father of English literature, we possess a reason- ably distinct portraiture : but Shakespeare, t/ic vian, is lost to us in the dark- ness of the past. The name of Shakespeare is so pre-eminently famous, standing out in the firmament of literature " like the moon among the lesser stars," that no attempt to convey an idea of his greatness seems to be necessary here. We content ourselves, therefore, with quoting the opinions of a few of those who have been worthy to judge him. Dr. Samuel Johnson says : " The stream of time, which is continually washing the dissolvable fabrics of other poets, passes without injury by the adamant of Shakespeare." Thomas De Quincey says : " In the gravest sense it may be affirmed of Shakespeare that he is among the modern luxuries of life; it was his pre- rogative to have thought more finely and more extensively than all other poets combined." Lord Jeffrey says ; "More full of wisdom and ridicule and sagacity than all the moralists that ever existed, he is more wild, airy, and inventive, and more pathetic and fantastic than all the poets of all regions and ages of the world." Lord Macaulay pronounced Shakespeare " the greatest poet that ever lived," and esteemed " Othello," the play from which our first selection is taken, as " perhaps the greatest work in the world." Thomas Carlyle bears this characteristic testimony •■ " Of this Shakespeare of ours, perhaps the opinion one sometimes hears a little idolatrous! y expressed is, in fact, the right one ; I think the best judgment is slowly point- ing to the conclusion that Shakespeare is the chief of all poets hitherto, the SHAKESPEARE 21 greatest intellect who, in our recorded world, has left record of himself in the way of literature. On the whole, I know not such a power of vision, such a faculty of thought, if we take all the characters of it, in any other man — such a calmness of depth, placid, joyous strength, all things imaged in that great soul of his so true and clear, as in a tranquil, unfathomable sea ! " OTHELLO'S SPEECH TO THE SENATE Most potent, grav^e, and reverend signiors, My very noble and approved good masters, — That I have ta'en away this old man's daughter, It is most true ; true, I have married her ; The very head and front of my offending Hath this extent, no more. Rude am I in speech. And little blessed with the set phrase of peace ; For since these arms of mine had seven years' pith. Till now some nine moons wasted, they have used Their dearest action in the tented field ; And little of this great world can I speak. More than pertains to feats of broil and battle ; And therefore little shall I grace my cause In speaking for myself. Yet, by your gracious patience, I will a round unvarnished tale deliver Of my whole course of love ; what drugs, what charms. What conjuration, and what mighty magic (For such proceeding I am charged withal ^), I won his daughter with. . . . Her father loved me ; oft invited me ; Still questioned me the story of my life From year to year ; the battles, sieges, fortunes That I have passed. I ran it through, even from my boyish days To the very moment that he bade me tell it. Wherein I spake of most disastrous chances, 1 here a preposition = 7o/th 22 CATHC/1RTS LITERARY READER Of moving accidents by flood and field, Of hair-breadth 'scapes i' the imminent deadly breach ; Of being taken by the insolent foe, And sold to slavery ; of my redemption thence. And portance ^ in my travel's history ; Wherein of antres ^ vast, and deserts idle. Rough quarries, rocks, and hills whose heads touch heaven, It was my hint to speak ; — such was the process ; — And of the cannibals that each other eat — The anthropophagi, and men whose heads Do grow beneath their shoulders. This to hear. Would Desdemona seriously incline : But still the house affairs would draw her thence ; Which ever as she could with haste despatch, She 'd come again, and with a greedy ear Devour up my discourse : which I observing, Took once a pliant hour, and found good means To draw from her a prayer of earnest heart, That I would all my pilgrimage dilate, Whereof by parcels she had something heard. But not intentively.^ I did consent ; And often did beguile her of her tears When I did speak of some distressful stroke That my youth suffered. My story being done. She gave me for my pains a world of sighs : She swore — In faith, 't was strange, 't was passing strange ; 'T was pitiful, 't was wondrous pitiful : She wished she had not heard it ; yet she wished That Heaven had made her such a man : she thanked me ; And bade me, if I had a friend that loved her, I should but teach him how to tell my story, And that would woo her. Upon this hint, I spake : She loved me for the dangers I had passed ; And I loved her, that she did pity them. This only is the witchcraft I have used. 1 demeanor, conduct 2 caverns ^ intently, closely SHAKESPEARE 23 THE WINNING OF JULIET 1 Juliet. Thou know'st the mask of night is on my face : Else would a maiden blush bepaint my cheek For that which thou hast heard me speak to-night. Fain would I dwell on form ; fain, fain deny What I have spoke : but farewell comphment ! FJost thou love me ? I know thou wilt say, Ay : And I will take thy word ; yet, if thou swear'st, Thou mayst prove false ; at lovers' perjuries, They say, Jove laughs. O gentle Romeo, If thou dost love, pronounce it faithfully : Or if thou think'st I am too quickly won, I '11 frown and be perverse, and say thee nay, So thou wilt woo ; but else, not for the world. In truth, fair Montague, I am too fond ; And therefore thou mayst think my 'havior light. But trust me, gentleman, I '11 prove more true Than those that have more cunning to be strange. I should have been more strange, I must confess. But that thou overheard'st, ere I was 'ware, My true love's passion : therefore pardon me ; And not impute this yielding to light love. Which the dark night hath so discovered. Romeo. Lady, by yonder blessed moon I swear. That tips with silver all these fruit-tree tops — Juliet. O, swear not by the moon, the inconstant moon. That monthly changes in her circled orb. Lest that thy love prove likewise variable. Romeo. What shall I swear by? Juliet. Do not swear at all, Or, if thou wilt, swear by thy gracious self, 1 An extract from the love scene in the garden, in the play of " Romeo and Juliet." Romeo, concealed in the garden at night, is discovered by Juliet listening to her declaration of love for him 4 CATHCART'S LITERARY READER Which is the god of my idolatry, And I '11 believe thee. Romeo. If my heart's dear love — Juliet. Well, do not swear : although 1 joy in thee, I have no joy of this contract to-night ; It is too rash, too unadvised, too sudden : Too like the lightning, which doth cease to be Ere one can say. It lightens. Sweet, good-night ! This bud of love, by summer's ripening breath, May prove a beauteous flower when next we meet. Good-night, good-night ! as sweet repose and rest Come to thy heart, as that within my breast ! Romeo. O, wilt thou leave me so unsatisfied? Juliet. What satisfaction canst thou have to-night? Romeo. The exchange of thy love's faithful vow for mine. Juliet. I gave thee mine before thou didst request it : And yet I would it were to give again. Romeo. Wouldst thou withdraw it? for what purpose, love? Juliet. But to be frank, and give it thee again. And yet I wish but for the thing I have : My bounty is as boundless as the sea. My love as deep ; the more I give to thee, The more I have, for both are infinite. WOLSEY ON THE VICISSITUDES OF LIFE Farewell, a long farewell, to all my greatness. This is the state of man ; to-day he puts forth The tender leaves of hope, to-morrow blossoms, And bears his blushing honors thick upon him ; The third day comes a frost, a killing frost ; 1 Cardinal Wolsey held high offices of state under King Henry VIII. Being suddenly deprived of all his honors by the king, Shakespeare rep- resents him as uttering this speech. SHAKESPEARE 25 And, when he thinks, good easy man, full surely His greatness is a- ripening, — nips his root, And then he falls, as I do. I have ventured, Like little wanton boys that swim on bladders, This many summers in a sea of glory ; But far beyond my depth ; my high-blown pride At length broke under me ; and now has left me. Weary, and old with service, to the mercy Of a rude stream, that must forever hide me. Vain pomp and glory of this world, I hate ye ; I feel my heart new opened : O, how wretched Is that poor man that hangs on princes' favors ! There is, betwixt that smile we would aspire to, That sweet aspect of princes, and their ruin. More pangs and fears, than wars or women have : And when he falls, he falls like Lucifer, Never to hope again. HAMLET'S SOLILOQUY To BE, or not to be, — that is the question : — Whether 't is nobler in the mind to suffer The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune ; Or to take arms against a sea of troubles,^ And, by opposing, end them ? — To die, — to sleep, — No more ; — and, by a sleep, to say we end The heart-ache and the thousand natural shocks That flesh is heir to, — 't is a consummation Devoutly to be wished. To die ; — to sleep ; — To sleep ! perchance to dream ; — ay, there 's the rub : For in that sleep of death what dreams may come. When we have shuffled off this mortal coil,^ 1 to fake ■ ■ . troubles ; what is the rhetorical fault ? - care, trouble 26 CATH CARTS LITERARY READER Must give us pause ; there 's the respect That makes calamity of so long life : For who would bear the whips and scorns of time, The oppressor's wrong, the proud man's contumely, The pangs of despised love, the law's delay, The insolence of office, and the spurns That patient merit of the unworthy takes, When he himself might his quietus make With a bare bodkin ? Who would fardels ^ bear. To grunt and sweat under a weary life, But that the dread of something after death — The undiscovered country, from whose bourn "^ No traveler returns — puzzles the will. And makes us rather bear those ills we have Than fly to others that we know not of? Thus conscience does make cowards of us all. And thus the native hue of resolution Is sicklied o'er with the pale cast of thought, And enterprises of great pith and moment. With this regard, their currents turn awry. And lose the name of action. POLONIUS'S ADVICE TO HIS SON Give thy thoughts no tongue, Nor any unproportioned thought his^ act. Be thou familiar, but by no means vulgar. The friends thou hast, and their adoption tried. Grapple them to thy soul with hooks of steel ; But do not dull thy palm with entertainment Of each new-hatched, unfledged comrade. Beware Of entrance to a quarrel ; but, being in, 1 burdens ^ for its, which was seldom used in Shakespeare's time - limits, boundary SHAKESPEARE 2y Bear it, that the opposer may beware of thee. Give every man thine ear, but few thy voice : Take each man's censure/ but reserve thy judgment. Costly thy habit as thy purse can buy, But not expressed in fancy ; rich, not gaudy, For the apparel oft proclaims the man ; And they in France, of the best rank and station, Are most select and generous, chief in that. Neither a borrower nor a lender be : For loan oft loses both itself and friend. And borrowing dulls the edge of husbandry. This above all, — to thine own self be true ; And it must follow, as the night the day. Thou canst not then be false to any man. Farewell ; my blessing season this in thee. THE SEVEN AGES OF MAN All the world 's a stage, And all the men and women merely players : They have their exits and their entrances ; And one man in his time plays many parts. His acts being seven ages. At first, the Infant, Mewling and puking in the nurse's arms. And then, the whining School-boy, with his satchel, And shining morning face, creeping like snail Unwillingly to school. And then, the Lover, Sighing like furnace, with a woful ballad Made to his mistress' eyebrow. Then a Soldier ; Full of strange oaths, and bearded like the pard, Jealous in honor, sudden and quick in quarrel. Seeking the bubble reputation Even in the cannon's mouth. And then, the Justice, 28 CATHCART'S LITERARY READER In fair round belly with good capon lined, With eyes severe, and beard of formal cut, Full of wise saws and modern instances ; And so he plays his part. The sixth age shifts Into the lean and slippered Pantaloon, With spectacles on nose, and pouch on side ; His youthful hose, well saved, a world too wide For his shrunk shank ; and his big manly voice, Turning again toward childish treble, pipes And whistles in his sound. Last scene of all, That ends this strange eventful history, Is second childishness and mere oblivion, Sans teeth, sans eyes, sans taste, sans everything. MERCY The quality of Mercy is not strained ; It droppeth, as the gentle rain from heaven. Upon the place beneath. It is twice blessed ; It blesseth him that gives and him that takes. 'T is mightiest in the mightiest ; it becomes The throned monarch better than his crown. His scepter shows the force of temporal power. The attribute to awe and majesty, Wherein doth sit the dread and fear of kings ; But Mercy is above this sceptered sway, — It is enthroned in the hearts of kings. It is an attribute to God himself; And earthly power doth then show likest God's AVhen mercy seasons justice. Therefore, Jew, Though justice be thy plea, consider this, — That, in the course of justice, none of us Should see salvation. We do pray for mercy ; And that same prayer doth teach us all to render The deeds of mercy. St/AKESPEARE 29 ENGLAND This royal throne of kings, this sceptered isle, This earth of majesty, this seat of Mars, This other Eden, demi-paradise ; This fortress, built by Nature for herself, Against infection and the hand of war ; This happy breed of men, this little world ; This precious stone set in the silver sea, Which serves it in the office of a wall, Or as a moat defensive to a house, Against the envy of less happier lands, This blessed plot, this earth, this realm, this England. THE MIND For 't is the mind that makes the body rich : And as the sun breaks through the darkest clouds. So honor peereth in the meanest habit. What ! is the jay more precious than the lark. Because his feathers are more beautiful? Or is the adder better than the eel. Because his painted skin contents the eyes? O no, good Kate : neither art thou the worse For this poor furniture and mean array. PERFECTION To gild refined gold, to paint the lily, To throw a perfume on the violet. To smooth the ice, or add another hue Unto the rainbow, or with taper-light To seek the beauteous eye of heaven to garnish. Is wasteful and ridiculous excess. 30 CATHCART'S LITERARY READER INGRATITUDE REBUKED But, O, What shall I say to thee, Lord Scroop ? thou cruel, • Ingrateful, savage and inhuman creature ! Thou that didst bear the key of all my counsels, That knew'st the very bottom of my soul, That almost mightst have coined me into gold Wouldst thou have practised on me for thy use — May it be possible that foreign hire Could out of thee extract one spark of evil That might annoy my finger ? 'T is so strange That, though the truth of it stands off as gross As black from white, my eye will scarcely see it. Treason and murder ever kept together, xAs two yoke- devils sworn to cither's purpose. Working so grossly in a natural cause, That admiration did not whoop at them : But thou, 'gainst all proportion, didst bring in Wonder to wait on treason and on murder : And whatsoever cunning fiend it was That wrought upon thee so preposterously Gave thee no instance ^ why thou shouldst do treason. Unless to dub thee with the name of traitor. If that same demon that hath gulled thee thus Should with his lion gait walk the whole world He might return to vasty Tartar back. And tell the legions, " I can never win A soul so easy as that Englishman's." O, how hast thou with jealousy ^ infected The sweetness of affiance ^ ! Show men dutiful ? Why, so didst thou. Seem they grave and learned ? Why, so didst thou. Come they of noble family? Why, so didst thou. Seem they religious? 1 reason ^ suspicious vigilance ^ confidence, trust SHAKESPEARE Why, so didst thou. Or are they spare in diet, . Free from gross passion or of mirth or anger, Constant in spirit, not swerving with the blood, Garnished and decked with modest complement,' Not working wath the eye without the ear, And, but in purged judgment, trusting neither? Such and so finely bolted ^ didst thou seem. And thus thy fall hath left a kind of blot To mark the full-fraught man and best indued ^ With some suspicion. I will w^eep for thee ; For this revolt of thine, methinks, is like Another Fall of Man. FIVE SONNETS 4 XVIII. Eternal Lines Shall I compare thee to a summer's day? Thou art more lovely and more temperate : Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May, And summer's lease hath all too short a date : Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines. And often is his gold complexion dimmed : And every fair from fair sometime declines. By chance, or nature's changing course, untrimmed. But thy eternal summer shall not fade Nor lose possession of that fair thou owest ; ^ Nor shall Death brag thou wanderest in his shade, When in eternal lines to time thou growest. So long as men can breathe, or eyes can see. So long lives this, and this gives life to thee. 1 completeness "^ sifted ^ endowed * See The Sonnef, p. 508. ° ownest 32 CATHCARTS LITERARY READER LXV. Time and Love Since brass, nor stone, nor earth, nor boundless sea, But sad Mortality o'ersways their power : How with this rage shall Beauty hold a plea, Whose action is no stronger than a flower? O, how shall summer's honey breath hold out Against the wreckful siege of battering days, When rocks impregnable are not so stout. Nor gates of steel so strong, but Time decays? O fearful meditation ! where, alack ! Shall Time's best jewel from Time's chest lie hid? Or what strong hand can hold his swift foot back ? Or who his spoil ^ of Beauty can forbid ? O, none ; unless this miracle have might ; — That in black ink my love may still shine bright. XCI. An Appraisement Some glory in their birth, some in their skill. Some in their wealth, some in their body's force, Some in their garments, though new-fangled ill, Some in their hawks and hounds, some in their horse ; And every humor hath his adjacent pleasure. Wherein it finds a joy above the rest : But these particulars are not my measure ; All these I better in one general best. Thy love is better than high birth to me. Richer than wealth, prouder than garments' cost. Of more delight than hawks or horses be ; And, having thee, of all men's pride I boast : Wretched in this alone, — that thou mayst take All this away, and me most wretched make. 1 spoiling, destruction SHAKESPEARE 33 CXVl. True Love Let me not to the marriage of true minds Admit impediments. Love is not love Which alters when it alteration finds, Or bends with the remover to remove : O, no ! it is an ever-fixed mark That looks on tempests and is never shaken ; It is the star to every wandering bark, Whose worth 's unknown, although his height be taken. Love 's not Time's fool, though rosy lips and cheeks Within his bending sickle's compass come; Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks. But bears it out e'en to the edge of doom. If this be error and upon me proved, I never writ, nor no man ever loved. CXLVI. Soul and Body Poor soul, the center of my sinful earth. Fooled by those rebel powers that thee array, Why dost thou pine within, and suffer dearth. Painting thy outward walls so costly gay? Why so large cost, having so short a lease, Dost thou upon thy fading mansion spend? Shall worms, inheritors of this excess. Eat up thy charge? Is this thy body's end? Then, soul, live thou upon thy servant's loss. And let that pine to aggravate ^ thy store ; Buy terms divine in selling hours of dross ; Within be fed, without be rich no more : So shalt thou feed on death, that feeds on men ; And, death once dead, there 's no more dying then. 1 increase 3 34 CATH CARTS LITERARY READER BEN JONSON 1574-1637 Benjamin Jonson, as he was christened, — Ben Jonson, as he preferred to call himself, and as all the world knows him, — was born of somewhat humble parentage at Westminster in the year 1574. Of his early life the outline is faint and the details are meager ; but we know that at the expense of friends of his deceased father, who had been a clergyman, he studied at Westminster School, and for a brief time at Cambridge University ; that being then com- pelled to work at his stepfather's trade, that of a bricklayer, and finding this occupation one that, as he himself says, he " could not endure," he left it to JONSON 35 enlist in the army, then serving in Flanders, preferring the lot of a private soldier to an employment so little suited either to his attainments or to his temperament. Though Jonson^istinguished himself for bravery in the field, this does not appear to have advanced his personal fortunes. Having by some means secured a discharge from military service, he next, according to the generally received account, took some minor parts upon the London stage, and was also engaged in correcting, recasting, and writing plays, though yet under age. What success attended upon these labors does not appear, but it is certain that Jonson's progress was interrupted by the event of a duel in which he became involved, and which resulted in the killing of his opponent. Charged with murder and imprisoned, he was eventually released, though under what circumstances has never been explained. In 1596, at the age of twenty-two, Jonson produced his first ambitious dramatic composition, " Every Man in His Humor." This play, in its original form, was not favorably received, but being amended and partly rewritten, the popular verdict was reversed when, three years later, and partly by the influence and help of Shakespeare, it was again put before the public. This drama and *' The Alchemist " are the only plays of Jon- son's which have kept the stage. Other dramas of notable merit were " Sejanus," "Catiline," and "Volpone;" and besides these he put forth from time to time very many epigrams, lyrics, and minor poems. James I. favored and distinguished the poet in many ways, — he was made poet laureate in 1619, and was employed by the court and by the city of London in little dramatic schemes for pageants, revels, farces, and the like. His various " masques," as he called them, prepared for these entertainments, exhibit the finest fancy and originality. Jonson was the inventor of these court amusements throughout the reign of James, and at intervals during the reign of Charles, who, like his predecessor, was Jonson's generous patron. To the very close of his life the poet's literary activity was great. One of his last productions, a pastoral poem entitled "The Sad Shepherd," has a well-deserved reputation for the simplicity and great beauty of its diction. Jonson's declining days were clouded with misfortune. He was stricken with paralysis, and influential enemies at court were able to delay and partly to cut off his salary as laureate. Clamorous creditors pursued the old poet, and to satisfy these he was compelled to write begging letters to many friends and former patrons. Death released him from these ills on the 6th of August, 1637. A pavement-stone over his grave in Westminster Abbey bears the brief legend : " O Rare Ben Jonson ! " General consent accords to Ben Jonson the second place among the dramatists of his time. That as a poet also he was second, some judgments have denied. To say that he stands next to Shakespeare seems superlative praise when we consider how much greater was the latter than any of his contemporaries ; but the originality, versatility, and amount of his work, and his vast and solid learning, entitle Jonson to the distinction. A suggestive comparison between Jonson and Shakespeare is aff"orded in the oft-quoted 36 CATHCARTS LITERARY READER account of Fuller; "Many were the wit-contests betwixt him (Shake- speare] and Ben Jonson, which two I beheld like a Spanish great galleon and an English man-of-war. Master Jonson (like the former) was built far higher in learning ; solid, but slow in his performances. Shakespeare (like the latter) lesser in bulk, but lighter in sailing, could turn with all tides, and take advantage of all winds, by the quickness of his wit and invention." These " wit-contests " were mostly enacted at the Mermaid Tavern, where Beaumont, Fletcher, Selden, Donne, and other shining lights in the literary heavens of that day were wont to get together. The mention of Jonson's name at once calls up in the mind that of Shakespeare, since it is to Jonson that we owe much of the little that we know, or have from scanty relics been able to infer, of the personality of the Master Dramatist. Ben Jonson was loud and self-assertive, hot-blooded, and often irritable ; but that he was, as some have declared, arrogant, envious, and unlovable, can hardly be credited when we reflect that he was the intimate companion of the contemporary poets, and when we read and read again such glowing and unstinted tributes as are found in his lines on Drayton and on Shakes- peare, which are given in pages following. What finer apostrophe can liter- ature show than that of these lines to the memory of the poet he has just called " Master ; " — " Triumph, my Britain ! Thou hast one to show To whom all scenes of Europe homage owe. He was not of an age, but for all time ! " ON SHAKESPEARE [To the Memory of my Beloved Master, William Shakespeare, and What he hath Left us.] To draw no envy, Shakespeare, on thy name Am I thus ample to thy book and fame ; While I confess thy writings to be such As neither man nor muse can praise too much. 'T is true, and all men's suffrage. But these ways Were not the paths I meant unto thy praise ; For silliest ignorance on these may light, Which, when it sounds at best, but echoes right ; Or bhnd affection, which doth ne'er advance The truth, but gropes, and urgeth all by chance ; JONSON 37 Or crafty malice might pretend this praise, And think to ruin, where it seemed to raise. . . . But thou art proof against them, and, indeed, Above the ill-fortune of them, or the need. I therefore will begin : Soul of the age 1 The applause, delight, the wonder of our stage ! My Shakespeare, rise ! I will not lodge thee by Chaucer, or Spenser, or bid Beaumont lie A little further off, to make thee room : Thou art a monument without a tomb, And art alive still, while thy book doth live, And we have wits to read, and praise to give. That I not mix thee so, my brain excuses, I mean with great but disproportioned muses : For, if I thought my judgment were of years,^ I should commit ^ thee surely with thy peers,^ And tell how far thou didst our Lily outshine. Or sporting Kyd, or Marlowe's mighty line. And, though thou hadst small Latin and less Greek, From thence ^ to honor thee I will not seek For names, but call forth thund'ring Eschylus, Euripides, and Sophocles to us, Pacuvius, Accius, him of Cordova dead, To live again, to hear thy buskin tread And shake a stage : or when thy socks were on, Leave thee alone for the comparison Of all that insolent Greece or haughty Rome Sent forth, or since did from their ashes come. Triumph, my Britain, thou hast one to show To whom all scenes of Europe homage owe. He was not of an age, but for all time ! And all the muses still were in their prime When, like Apollo, he came forth to warm Our ears, or like a Mercury to charm ! 1 short-lived ^ contemporaries 2 compare * z. e. from among modern writers 38 CATHCARTS LITERARY READER Nature herself was proud of his designs, And joyed to wear the dressing of his hnes ! Which were so richly spun, and woven so fit, As, since, she will vouchsafe no other wit. The merry Greek, tart Aristophanes, Neat Terence, witty Plautus, now not please ; But antiquated and deserted lie, As they were not of Nature's family. Yet must I not give Nature all ; thy art. My gentle Shakespeare, must enjoy a part. For though the poet's matter nature be, His art doth give the fashion : and, that he Who casts ' to write a living line, must sweat, (Such as thine are) and strike the second heat Upon the muse's anvil ; turn the same. And himself with it, that he thinks to frame ; Or for the laurel, he may gain a scorn ; For a good poet 's made, as well as born. And such wert thou ! Look how the father's face Lives in his issue ; even so the race Of Shakespeare's mind and manners brightly shines In his well-torned ^ and true-filed lines ; In each of which he seems to shake a lance. As brandished at the eyes of ignorance. Sweet Swan of Avon ! what a sight it were To see thee in our water yet appear, And make those flights upon the banks of Thames That so did take Eliza and our James ! But stay, I see thee in the hemisphere ^ Advanced, and made a constellation there ! Shine forth, thou star of poets, and with rage, Or influence, chide, or cheer the drooping stage, Which, since thy flight from hence, hath mourned like night. And despairs day, but for thy volume's light. 1 casts about, attempts 2 well-turned ^ /^ ^_ i^ the heavens JONSON 39 ON THE PORTRAIT OF SHAKESPEARE This figure that thou here seest put, It was for gentle Shakespeare cut, Wherein the graver had a strife With Nature, to outdo the life : O could he but have drawn his wit As well in brass as he has hit His face, the print would then surpass All that was ever writ in brass : But since he can not, reader, look Not on his picture, but his book. • HYMN TO DIANA Queen and huntress, chaste and fair, Now the sun is laid to sleep. Seated in thy silver chair State in wonted manner keep : Hesperus entreats thy light. Goddess excellently bright. Earth, let not thy envious shade Dare itself to interpose ; Cynthia's shining orb w^as made Heaven to clear when day did close Bless us then with wished sight. Goddess excellently bright. Lay thy bow of pearl apart And thy crystal-shining quiver ; Give unto the flying hart Space to breathe, how short soever : Thou that mak'st a day of night, Goddess excellently bright ! 40 CATH CARTS LITERARY READER TWO EPITAPHS I. On the Countess of Pembroke Underneath this sable hearse ^ Lies the subject of all verse, Sidney's sister, Pembroke's mother ; Death ! ere thou hast slain another, Learn'd and fair and good as she, Time shall throw a dart at thee. II. On Michael Drayton Do, pious marble, let thy readers know What they, and what their children owe To Drayton's name ; whose sacred dust We recommend unto thy trust. Protect his memory, and preserve his story ; Remain a lasting monument of his glory. x\nd when thy ruins shall disclaim To be the treasurer of his name ; His name, that can not die, shall be An everlasting monument to thee. THE NOBLE NATURE It is not growing hke a tree In bulk, doth make man better be ; Or standing long an oak, three hundred year, To fall a log at last, dry, bald, and sere : A lily of a day Is fairer far in May, Although it fall and die that night — It was the plant and flower of light. In small proportions we just beauties see ; And in short measures life may perfect be. 1 a black canopj^, beneath wKxch the coffin was placed BACON 41 BACON 1561-1626 The calendar of the life of Francis Bacon can be set down in small com- pass. He was born in London in 1561, son to Sir Nicholas Bacon, Lord Keeper of the Seals. He was admitted to Cambridge University at the age of thirteen, where he studied three years, after which for about two years he lived upon the Continent, chiefly in France and Italy. At the age of eight- een he was recalled to England by the sudden death of his father. Casting about him for an occupation in life, he applied for advice and aid to the Cecils, who, though distant relatives of his, and maintaining outward shows of regard, appear not only at this time, but throughout Bacon's career, to have been little friendly to their kinsman. While his predilections ran rather to a studious life than to one of affairs, young Bacon nevertheless set himself, upon the advice of his cousin, to the reading of the law. He was admitted to practice in 1582, and speedily drew upon him many eyes for 42 CATH CARTS LITERARY READER the solidity of his parts, the cogency of his logic, and the eloquence of his address. It is therefore no occasion of wonder to find him soon afterward a member of the House of Commons, where for many years he bore an im- portant part in all debates and business. His name is specially identified with laws to prevent the enclosure of common lands and the conversion of tilled fields into pastures and parks ; to restrict the royal prerogative and the encroachments of Lords upon Commons ; as well as with measures looking to civil freedom, religious toleration, and to the union of Scotland with England. That he was eloquent we may know from the testimony of Ben Jonson, who reports that "the fear of every man who heard him was lest he should make an end." The higher rewards of public life did not come to Bacon till he was past the middle age. He was made successively solicitor-general, attorney-general, keeper of the seals, and lord chancellor, receiving the last of these appointments in 1618. Three years thereafter he was tried by the House of Lords on charges of bribery and corruption as a judge, and was convicted, deprived of his office, fined and imprisoned. King James, however, speedily ordered his release and remitted his fine, and Bacon retired to the country to pursue the more congenial life of student and philosopher. Here he died in 1626. Witty and pointed sayings stick in the minds of men, and few lines in literature are more familiar than Pope's upon Bacon, — " The wisest, brightest, meanest of mankind." No doubt, to very many this line has sufficed for an estimate of the great philosopher. But Pope was a satirist not always very scrupulous in the aiming of his shafts, and in recent years the harsher judgments of Bacon's personal character have been many of them revised, in keeping with that passage in his will which says, " For my name and memory, I leave it to foreign nations, and to my own country after some time has passed over." On his trial before the House of Lords, at which he was not present, being confined with sickness, Bacon was accused of receiving bribes from litigants having suits before him. The evidence of this was slender in amount and doubtful in motive, and he stren- uously denied the charge, though admitting his acceptance of fees and pres- ents after his decisions had been rendered. This, which w^ould now be universally condemned, was then the uniform practice. Nearly all offices, civil and ecclesiastical, were unsalaried, and, without gifts and fees, could not have been maintained. It was a system that Bacon himself saw the evils of, and plainly condemned when, after his trial, he wrote, " I was the justest judge that was in England this fifty years, but it was the justest censure that was in Parliament this two hundred years." It is worthy of note that of his very many judicial decisions not one has been reversed. At the request of King James he wrote a letter confessing to slackness, but deny- ing corruption. Bacon died a comparatively poor man in an age when judges, bishops, and statesmen enriched themselves by unblushing venality. The charge so often made against Bacon of ingratitude to benefactors turns chiefly on the case of the Earl of Essex, who, it is alleged, had given BACOhl 43 him a landed estate, only to be rewarded later on by prosecution even to the death at the hands of Bacon. There is evidence that the lawyer's services to Essex were great, and for years unrequited, and that finally, having no money for payment, the earl made over to Bacon a small property which the latter was reluctant to receive, saying plainly, " My Lord, I see I must hold land of your gift; but do you know the manner of doing homage in law ? It is always with saving of faith to the king." When, at a later time, and in spite of curbings and counselings from Bacon, Essex put himself at the head of treasonable conspiracies and uprisings against Elizabeth, it became the duty of Bacon, as an officer of the Crown, to take part in the prosecution of the earl. The manner and the terms of Bacon's address in the perform- ance of this duty show clearly how painful it was to him. A man's writings must tell of his character, and these in Bacon's case demand some mitiga- tion of the severe censures that have so long passed current of him. It is through the approval of the learned few that the method of phi- losophy which bears Bacon's name has secured common accepfance. His Noviwi Orgamim, written in Latin, was published in 1620, and upon this work his overshadowing reputation rests. In it he elaborates and estab- lishes the inductive method of reasoning, — that is, from particular facts to general laws. Up to his time the world's thought had been dominated and restricted by the method of Aristotle, which was deductive, — that is, from cause to effect. To the Baconian method are largely due the material progress and scientific advance of modern times. The work by which Bacon is familiarly known is his " Essays, or Counsels Civil and Moral," written in English. When first published, in 1597, these Essays were ten in number, but the volume was expanded from time to time until, in the edition published in the last year of the philosopher's life, there were fifty-eight. It is from this book that the following selections are taken. OF FRIENDSHIP It had been hard for him that spake it to have put more truth and untruth together in few words than in that speech, •' U'ho- soever is dehghted in solitude is either a wild beast or a god." For it is most true that a natural and secret hatred and aversa- tion^ towards society in any man hath somewhat of the savage beast ; but it is most untrue that it should have any character at all of the divine nature, except it proceed, not 'out of a pleasure ^ aversion 44 CATH CARTS LITERARY READER in solitude, but out of a love and desire to sequester a man's self for a higher conversation, such as is found to have been, falsely and feignedly, in some of the heathen, — as Epimenides the Candian, Numa the Roman, Empedocles the Sicilian, and Apol- lonius of Tyana, — and, truly and really, in divers of the ancient hermits and holy fathers of the Church. But little do men perceive what solitude is, and how far it ex- tendeth; for a crowd is not company, and faces are but a gal- lery of pictures, and talk but a tinkling cymbal, where there is no love. The Latin adage meeteth with it a little. Magna civitas, 7nagna solitudo [A great city is a great solitude] , — because in a great town friends are scattered, so that there is not that fellow- ship, for the most part, which is in less neighborhoods. But we may go further, and affirm most truly that it is a mere and mis- erable solitude to want true friends, without which the world is but a wilderness ; and even in this sense also of solitude, whoso- ever in the frame of his nature and affections is unfit for friend- ship, he taketh it of the beast, and not from humanity. A principal fruit of friendship is the ease and discharge of the fullness and swelUngs of the heart, which passions of all kinds do cause and induce. We know diseases of stoppings and suffoca- tions are the most dangerous in the body ; and it is not much otherwise in the mind. You may take sarza ^ to open the liver, steel to open the spleen, flowers of sulphur for the lungs, casto- reum for the brain ; but no receipt openeth the heart but a true friend, to whom you may impart griefs, joys, fears, hopes, suspi- cions, counsels, and whatsoever lieth upon the heart to oppress it, in a kind of civil shrift or confession. . . . The parable of Pythagoras is dark, but true, Co7' ne edito — " Eat not the heart." Certainly, if a man would give it a hard phrase, those that want friends to open themselves unto are cannibals of their own hearts. But one thing is most admirable ^ (wherewith I will conclude this first fruit of friendship), which is, that this communicating of a man's self to his friend works two contrary effects, for it redoubleth joys, and cutteth griefs in 1 sarsaparilla - wonderful BACON 45 halves. For there is no man that miparteth his joys to his friend but he joyeth the more, and no man that imparteth his griefs to his friend but he grieveth the less. So that it is, in truth, of operation upon a man's mind of Uke virtue as the alche- mists use to attribute to their stone for man's body, that it work- eth all contrary effects, but still to the good and benefit of nature. But yet without praying in aid of alchemists, there is a manifest image of this in the ordinary course of nature ; for, in bodies, union strengtheneth and cherisheth any natural action, and, on the other side, weakeneth and dulleth any violent im- pression. And even so is it of minds. The second fruit of friendship is healthful and sovereign ^ for the understanding, as the first is for the affections. For friend- ship maketh indeed a fair day in the affections from storm and tempests, but it maketh daylight in the understanding out of darkness and confusion of thoughts. Neither is this to be un- derstood only of faithful counsel, which a man receiveth from his friend ; but before you come to that, certain it is that whoso- ever hath his mind fraught with many thoughts, his wits and un- derstanding do clarify and break up in the communicating and discoursing with another : he tosseth his thoughts more easily ; he marshaleth them more orderly; he seeth how they look when they are turned into words ; finally, he waxeth wiser than himself, and that more by an hour's discourse than by a day's meditation. It was well said by Themistocles to the King of Persia ''that speech was like cloth of Arras opened and put abroad, whereby the imagery doth appear in figure ; whereas in thoughts they lie but as in packs." Neither is this second fruit of friendship, in opening the understanding, restrained^ only to such friends as are able to give a man counsel (they, indeed, are best) ; but even without that a man learneth of himself, and bringeth his own thoughts to light, and whetteth his wits as against a stone, which itself cuts not. In a word, a man were better relate himself to a statua or picture than to suffer his thoughts to pass in smother.^ 1 efficacious 2 restricted ^ suppression 46 CATHCARTS LITERARY READER Add now, to make this second fruit of friendship complete, that other point, which lieth more open, and falleth within vulgar observation — which is, faithful counsel from a friend. Heracli- tus saith well, in one of his enigmas, " Dry light is ever the best." And certain it is that the light that a man receiveth by counsel from another is drier and purer than that which cometh from his own understanding and judgment, which is ever infused and drenched in his affections ^ and customs : so as there is as much difference between the counsel that a friend giveth and that a man giveth himself as there is between the counsel of a friend and of a flatterer ; for there is no such flatterer as is a man's self, and there is no such remedy against flattery of a man's self as the liberty of a friend. Counsel is of two sorts : the one concerning manners, the other concerning business. For the first, the best preservative to keep the mind in health is the faithful admonition of a friend. The calling of a man's self to a strict account is a medicine sometime too piercing and corrosive, reading good books of morality is a little flat and dead, observing our faults in others is sometimes unproper for our case ; but the best receipt (best, I say, to work, and best to take) is the admonition of a friend. It is a strange thing to behold what gross errors and extreme absurdities many (especially of the greater sort) do commit for want of a friend to tell them of them, to the great damage both of their fame and fortune ; for, as Saint James saith, they are as men " that look sometimes into a glass, and presently forget their own shape and favor." ^ x\s for business, a man may think, if he will, that two eyes see no more than one ; or that a gamester seeth always more than a looker-on ; or that a man in anger is as wise as he that hath said over the four-and-twenty letters ; or that a musket may be shot off as well upon the arm as upon a rest ; and such other fond and high imaginations to think himself all in all : but when aU is done, the help of good counsel is that which setteth business straight. And if any man think that he will take counsel, but it shall be by pieces — asking counsel in 1 propensities ^ a loose quotation from Saint James i. 23, 24 BACON 47 one business of one man, and in another business of another man — it is well (that is to say, better, perhaps, than if he asked none at all) ; but he runneth two dangers : one, that he shall not be faithfully counseled — for it is a rare thing, except it be from a perfect and entire friend, to have counsel given but such as, shall be bowed and crooked to some ends which he hath that giveth it ; the other, that he shall have counsel given hurtful and unsafe (though with good meaning), and mixed partly of mis- chief and partly of remedy — even as if you would call a physician that is thought good for the cure of the disease you complain of, but is unacquainted with your body, and therefore may put you in way for a present cure, but overthroweth your health in some other kind, and so cure the disease and kill the patient. But a friend that is wholly acquainted with a man's estate will beware, by furthering any present business, how he dasheth upon other inconvenience. And therefore rest not upon scattered counsels ; they will rather distract and mislead than settle and direct. After these two noble fruits of friendship (peace in the af- fections and support of the judgment) followeth the last fruit, which is, like the pomegranate, full of many kernels ; I mean aid, and bearing a part in all actions and occasions. Here the best way to represent to life the manifold use of friendship is to cast and see how many things there are which a man can not do him- self; and then it will appear that it was a sparing speech of the ancients to say " that a friend is another himself," for that a friend is far more than himself. Men have their time, and die many times in desire of some things which they principally take to heart, — the bestowing of a child, the finishing of a work, or the like. If a man have a true friend, he may rest almost secure that the care of those things will continue after him ; so that a man hath, as it were, two lives in his desires. A man hath a body, and that body is confined to a place ; but where friendship is, all offices of life are, as it were, granted to him and his deputy, for he may exercise them by his friend. How many things are there which a man can not, with any face ^ or comehness ^ say or do 1 confidence 2 propriety 48 CATHCART'S LITERARY READER himself ! A man can scarce allege his own merits with modesty, much less extol them ; a man can not sometimes brook to suppli- cate or beg, and a number of the like ; but all these things are graceful in a friend's mouth, which are blushing in a man's own. So, again, a man's person hath many proper relations, which he can not put off. A man can not speak to his son but as a father ; to his wife, but as a husband ; to his enemy, but upon terms : whereas a friend may speak as the case requires, and not as it sorteth with the person. But to enumerate these things were endless. I have given the rule : where a man can not fitly play his own part, if he have not a friend he may quit the stage. OF GOODNESS, AND GOODNESS OF NATURE I TAKE goodness in this sense, — the affecting^ of the weal of men, which is what the Grecians call philanthropia ; and the word " humanity," as it is used, is a little too light to express it. Goodness I call the habit \ and goodness of nature, the in- clination. This, of all virtues and dignities of the mind, is the greatest, being the character of the Deity; and without it man is a busy, mischievous, wretched thing, no better than a kind of vermin. Goodness answers to the theological virtue charity, and admits no excess but error. The desire of power in excess caused the angels to fall ; the desire of knowledge in excess caused man to fall ; but in charity there is no excess ; neither can angel or man come in danger by it. The inclination to goodness is imprinted deeply in the nature of man, insomuch that, if it issue not towards men, it will take unto other living creatures; as it is seen in the Turks, a cruel people, who nevertheless are kind to beasts, and give alms to dogs and birds ; insomuch as, Busbechius reporteth, a Christian boy in Constantinople had liked to have been stoned for gagging, in a waggishness, a long-billed fowl. Errors, indeed, in this virtue 1 desiring BACON 49 of goodness or charity, may be committed. The ItaHans have an ungracious proverb, lanto biion, che val niente [So good that he is good for nothing]. And one of the doctors of Italy, Nicho- las Machiavel, had the confidence ^ to put in writing, almost in plain terms, " That the Christian faith had given up good men in prey to those that are tyrannical and unjust;" which he spake because, indeed, there was never law or sect or opinion did so magnify goodness as the Christian religion doth : it is good to take knowledge of the errors of a habit so excellent. Seek the good of other men, but be not in bondage to their faces or fancies ; for that is but facility or softness, which taketh an honest mind prisoner. Neither give thou ^sop's cock a gem, who would be better pleased and happier if he had a. barley-corn. The example of God teacheth the lesson truly : " He sendeth his rain, and maketh his sun to shine, upon the just and unjust ; " but he doth not rain wealth, nor shine honor and virtues, upon men equally. Common benefits are to be communicated with all, but pecuUar benefits with- choice.^ And beware how, in making the portraiture, thou breakest the pattern ; for divinity maketh the love of ourselves the pattern, the love of our neigh- bors but the portraiture. *' Sell all thou hast, and give it to the poor, and follow me : " but sell not all thou hast, except thou come and follow me, — that is, except thou have a vocation wherein thou mayest do as much good with little means as with great ; for otherwise, in feeding the streams thou driest the fountain. Neither is there only a habit of goodness directed by right reason : but there is in some men, even in nature, a disposition toward it ; as, on the other side, there is a natural malignity ; for there be ^ that in their nature do not affect the good of others. The lighter sort of malignity turneth but to a crossness or froward- ness,^ or aptness to oppose, or difficileness, or the like ; but the deeper sort to envy and mere mischief. Such men, in other men's calamities, are, as it were, in season, and are ever on the loading part ; not so good as the dogs that licked Lazarus' sores, 1 boldness ^ ^ chosen few ^ those understood * contrariety 4 50 CATHCART'S LITERARY READER but like flies that are still ' buzzing upon anything that is raw ; misanthropi,^ that make it their practice to bring men to the bough, and yet have never a tree for the purpose in their gar- dens, as Timon had.^ Such dispositions are the very errors of human nature : and yet they are the fittest timber to make great politics of; like to knee- timber, that is good for ships that are ordained to be tossed, but not for building houses that shall stand firm. The parts and signs of goodness are many. If a man be gra- cious and courteous to strangers, it shows he is a citizen of the world, and that his heart is no island cut off from other lands, but a continent that joins to them. If he be compassionate towards the afflictions of others, it shows that his heart is like the noble tree that is wounded itself when it gives the balm. If he easily pardons and remits offenses, it shows that his mind is planted above injuries, so that he can not be shot.^ If he be thankful for small benefits, it shows that he weighs men's minds, and not their trash. But, above all, if he have Saint Paul's per- fection, that he would wish to be anathema from Christ for the salvation of his brethren, it shows much of a divine nature, and a kind of conformity with Christ himself. OF LEARNING Learning taketh away the wildness, and barbarism, and fierce- ness of men's minds : though a little superficial learning doth rather work a contrary effect. It taketh away all levity, temerity, and insolency, by copious suggestion of all doubts and difficulties, and acquainting the mind to balance reasons on both sides, and to turn back the first offers and conceits of the kind, and to accept of nothing but examined and tried. It taketh away vain ' always ^ ^n obsolete plural ^ Compare Shakespeare's "Timon of Athens/' Act v. Sc. 2. — "I have a tree, which grows here in my close/' etc. ^ changed, swerved BACON 51 admiration of anything, which is the root of all weakness : for all things are admired either because they are new or because they are great. For novelty, no man wadeth in learning or contem- plation thoroughly, but with that printed in his heart, " I know nothing." Neither can any man marvel at the play of puppets, that goeth behind the curtain, and adviseth well of the motion. And as for magnitude, as Alexander the Great, after that he was used to great armies and the great conquest of the spacious provinces in Asia, when he received letters out of Greece, of some fights and services there, which were commonly for a passage, or fort, or some walled town at the most, he said, '' It seemed to him that he was advertised^ of the batde of the frogs and the mice, that the old tales went of ; " — so certainly, if a man meditate upon the universal frame of Nature, the earth with men upon it, the divineness of souls excepted, will not seem much other than an ant-hill, where some ants carry com, and some carry their young, and some go empty, and all to and fro^ a little heap of dust. It taketh away or mitigateth fear of death, or adverse fortune, which is one of the greatest impediments of virtue and imperfec- tions of manners. For if a man's mind be deeply seasoned with the consideration of the mortality and corruptible nature of things, he will easily concur with Epictetus, who went forth one day and saw a woman weeping for her pitcher of earth that was broken ; and went forth the next day and saw a woman weeping for her son that was dead ; and thereupon said, " Yesterday I saw a fragile thing broken; to-day I have seen a mortal thing die." And therefore Virgil did excellently and profoundly couple the knowl- edge of causes and the conquest of all fears together. ^ literally, " turned toward," and hence, apprised, informed 2 to and fro ; that is, backward and forward upon, etc. 52 CATHCART'S LITERARY READER A GARLAND OF ELIZABETHAN LYRICS I. The Gifts of God When God at first made man, Having a glass of blessings standing by ; Let us (said He) pour on him all we can : Let the world's riches, which dispersed lie, Contract into a span. So strength first made a way ; Then beauty flowed, then wisdom, honor, pleasure : When almost all was out, God made a stay. Perceiving that, alone of all His treasure, Rest in the bottom lay. For if I should (said He) Bestow this jewel also on my creature, He would adore my gifts instead of me. And rest in Nature, not the God of Nature : So both should losers be. Yet let him keep the rest. But keep them with repining restlessness : Let him be rich and weary, that at least, If goodness lead him not, yet weariness May toss him to my breast. George Herbert 11. The Happy Life How happy is he born and taught That serveth not another's will ; Whose armor is his honest thought And simple truth his utmost skill ! ELIZABETHAN LYRICS S3 Whose passions not his masters are, Whose soul is still prepared for death, Not tied unto the world with care Of pubhc fame, or private breath ; Who envies none that chance doth raise Or vice ; who never understood How deepest wounds are given by praise ; Nor rules of state, but rules of good : Who hath his life from rumors freed, Whose conscience is his strong retreat ; Whose state can neither flatterers feed, Nor ruin make accusers great ; Who God doth late and early pray More of His grace than gifts to lend ; And entertains the harmless day With a well-chosen book or friend ; — This man is freed from servile bands Of hope to rise, or fear to fall ; Lord of himself, though not of lands ; And having nothing, yet hath all. Henry Wotton HI. Death, the Leveler The glories of our blood and state Are shadows, not substantial things ; There is no armor against fate ; Death lays his icy hand on kings : Scepter and crown Must tumble down. And in the dust be equal made With the poor crooked scythe and spade. 54 CATH CART'S LITERARY READER Some men with swords may reap the field, And plant fresh laurels where they kill : But their strong nerves at last must yield ; They tame but one another still : Early or late They stoop to fate, And must give up their murmuring breath When they, pale captives, creep to death. The garlands wither on your brow ; Then boast no more your mighty deeds ; Upon Death's purple altar now See where the victor victim bleeds : Your heads must come To the cold tomb ; Only the actions of the just Smell sweet, and blossom in their dust. James Shirley IV. On the Tombs in Westminster Abbey Mortality, behold and fear What a change of flesh is here ! Think how many royal bones Sleep within these heaps of stones ; Here they lie, had realms and lands. Who now want strength to stir their hands. Where from their pulpits sealed with dust They preach, " In greatness is no trust." Here 's an acre sown indeed With the richest royalest seed That the earth did e'er suck in Since the first man died for sin : Here the bones of birth have cried " Though gods they were, as men they died ! ELIZABETHAN LYRICS 55 Here are sands, ignoble things, Dropped from the ruined sides of kings : Here 's a world of pomp and state Buried in dust, once dead by fate. Francis Beaumont V. Melancholy Hence, all you vain delights, As short as are the nights Wherein you spend your folly : There 's naught in this life sweet If man were wise to see 't. But only Melancholy, O sweetest Melancholy ! Welcome, folded arms and fixed eyes, A sigh that piercing mortifies ! A look that 's fastened on the ground, A tongue chained up without a sound ! Fountain heads and pathless groves, Places which pale passion loves ! Moonlight walks, when all the fowls Are warmly housed, save bats and owls ! A midnight bell, a parting groan ! These are the sounds we feed upon ; Then stretch our bones in a still gloomy valley ; Nothing 's so dainty-sweet as lovely Melancholy. John Fletcher VI. To Dmneme Sweet, be not proud of those two eyes Which starlike sparkle in their skies ; Nor be you proud, that you can see All hearts your captives ; yours yet free 56 CATHCART'S LITERARY READER Be you not proud of that rich hair Which wantons with the lovesick air ; Whenas that ruby which you wear, Sunk from the tip of your soft ear, Will last to be a precious stone W^hen all your world of beauty 's gone. Robert Herrick Cj^^rt ^^Sayric^^^^ VII. To LUCASTA, ON GOING TO THE WaRS Tell me not, Sweet, I am unkind That, from the nunnery Of thy chaste breast and quiet mind. To war and arms I fly. True, a new mistress now I chase. The first foe in the field ; And with a stronger faith embrace A sword, a horse, a shield. NOTABLE CONTEMPORARY H^RITERS 57 Yet this inconstancy is such As you too shall adore ; I could not love thee, Dear, so much, Loved I not Honor more. Richard Lovelace NOTABLE CONTEMPORARY WRITERS Sir Walter Raleigh, 1552-1618, soldier and courtier; author of "A History of the World." Richard Hooker, 1 553-1 598, Anglican divine; author of "A Treatise on the Laws of Ecclesiastical Polity." Sir Philip Sidney, 1 554-1586, courtier, soldier, and scholar; author of " The Arcadia," " A Defense of Poesy," and several beautiful sonnets. Samuel Daniel, 1 562-1619, author of a poetical " History of the Civil Wars," and of many minor poems. Michael Drayton, 1563-1631, poet; author of "The Shepherd's Gar- land," " England's Heroical Epistles," and other works. Christopher Marlowe, 1 563-1 593, dramatic poet; important plays were " Faustus," '' Tamburlaine," and " Edward IL" Sir Henry Wotton, 1 568-1 639, diplomatist and poet; wrote many lyrics of a high order of merit. See " The Happy Life," page 52. John Donne, 1573-1631; distinguished Anglican divine; numerous satires, epistles, and short poems. Robert Burton, 1 578-1640, a retired and laborious scholar; famous for his " Anatomy of Melancholy." Lord Herbert of Cherbury, 1 581-1648, theologian and historian; "History of Henry VIII." and '' de Veritate'' are his most im- portant works. Philip Massinger, 1 584-1 640, playwright; "A New Way to Pay Old Debts " and " The Renegado " are the best of his dramas. William Drummond, 1585-1649, Scotch poet; author of "The Flow- ers of Zion," and of many beautiful sonnets. Francis Beaumont, 1586-1615, joint author, with John Fletcher, 1 576-1625, of more than fifty tragedies and comedies. See poems, pages 54, 55. 58 CATHC/IRT'S LITERARY READER John Ford, 1586-1639, dramatist; two of bis plays of a high order of excellence are " The Broken Heart " and " Love's Sacrifice." Thomas Hobbes, 1 588-1679, metaphysician and logician; his "Trea- tise on Human Nature" and his " Letter on Liberty and Necessity" are his chief productions. Robert Herrick, 1 591 -1674, author of many beautiful lyrics. See '•To Dianeme," page 55. George Herbert, 1 593-1632, Anglican clergyman, and author of many sacred songs. See " The Gifts of God," page 52. James Shirley, 1 594-1666, the last of the Elizabethan dramatists; author of many comedies. See " Death, the Leveler," page 53. Edmund "Waller, 1605-1687, politician and poet; wrote an Ode to Cromwell, and many love-songs. LITERATURE OF THE COMMON IVEALTH 59 III THE LITERATURE OF THE COMMONWEALTH AND THE RESTORATION MILTON — DRYDEN ^ I ^HE last seventy-five years of the seventeenth century -^ witnessed the execution of Charles I., the rise and fall of the Commonwealth, the Restoration, and the Revo- lution of 1688, — a series of upheavals and changes that were not dynastic merely, but accompanied by equally radical alterations in the manners and thought of the Eng- lish people. The literature of that time bears internal evidence of changes in intellectual and spiritual habitudes quite as great as those other changes that affected the for- tunes of the State. Milton, a reformer in religion and in politics, gave voice in both prose and verse to the spirit that animated the Puritans; Dryden, a satirist and critic of literature, con- formed to and reflected the spirit of the Restoration. Each in his sphere was pre-eminent. Milton, as Matthew Arnold well expresses it, was '' the last of the Immortals." He was filled with the poetic ardor and imaginative power of the Elizabethan classics, though representing a later and very different school of thought. His prose is little read. It consists mainly of controversial tracts incentive to reform in church and state. The style of these is archaic, and to the modern sense more difficult than the earlier prose of Bacon. These pamphlets were put forth before the Civil War; his great poems did not appear until after the Restoration, in 1660. In Dryden this order seems to have been reversed ; he was a poet first, an 6o CATHCART'S LITERARY READER essayist afterwards. It is interesting to note that Dryden had some acquaintance with his great predecessor, but he was little influenced by Milton. There could not, indeed, have been much community of sentiment between the two. By general consent of competent judges, English prose as we know it had its beginnings at the time of the Resto- ration. There is to be discovered in the essays of Dryden a structure of the sentence and a use of terms which, as modified by Swift and Ad- dison, and developed after them by Johnson and the group of writers who sur- rounded him, became finally our own literary form. Other prose writers of note were few in the time we are considering. Baxter and Bun- yan, each in his peculiar field of religious work, Locke in metaphysics, and Newton in science, were the principal figures. Far greater influ- ence upon the speech of the English people was exercised by the pulpit in the finished and powerful sermons of such divines as Burnet, Fuller, and Jeremy Taylor. The seventeenth century marks the close of our early poetical style, — of which we see the consummation in Mil- ton, — and the opening of the modern period, whose herald was Dryden. Herbert, Marvell, and Cowley had natural- ness and simplicity of thought; but the style of Dryden and his followers was a distinct advance in clearness of expression. English letters were, in these two or three generations, in a transitional state, — the old was passing away, the new was gradually but surely superseding it. J^ddd'^^W^/l MILTON 61 MILTON I 608- I 674 John Milton — clariim et venerabile nomen — was born in London in December, 1608, and died November, 1674. He was the son of John Milton, a respectable scrivener. The younger John entered Christ's College, Cam- bridge, at the age of sixteen, and became distinguished during his University career for his brilliant poetical abilities. He was destined for the service of <$^^ fVlvUtrrx. the Church; but on arriving at manhood he found — to quote his own words — " what tyranny had invaded the Church, and that he who would take orders must subscribe Slave." He therefore turned his thoughts to the law, but soon abandoned it, and gave his undivided attention to literature. The death of his mother, in 1637, affected his health, and he sought to re- store it by travel. He visited several Continental countries, and while in Italy made the acquaintance of Galileo. Returning to England in 1639, he 62 CATHCART'S LITERARY READER found the nation in a fever of political excitement, and lost no time in de- claring himself with reference to the momentous questions then under dis- cussion. In 1641 and 1642 he published his first polemical treatises, which made a profound impression. The most important of these was the " Areo- pagitica, a Speech for the Liberty of Unlicensed Printing," in which Milton eloquently appeals to parliament to abolish the censorship of books. It was a written, not a spoken "speech." Milton took its title from the name of the supreme tribunal of justice of ancient Athens, the Areopagus, the edifice of which stood on the Hill of Ares (Mars). His political pamphlets brought Milton into prominence, and led to his being appointed, in 1649, Latin Sec- retary to the Council of State, which office he held eight years. During that period he wrote his famous " Eikonoklastes " and several other works. In 1660 the monarchy was re-established, and thenceforward he took no part in public life. " Paradise Lost," was written after he had become totally blind, which happened in 1652, the great epic being dictated to his daughter. It repre- sents the only successful attempt ever made to construct a drama whose principal personages are supernatural ; in this character it stands above others unapproached. To the student it offers a field whose exploration never ceases to be delightful. In design, if not in execution, it is one of the noblest poetical products of human genius. Comtis, a lyrical drama, and Samson Agonistes ("Samson in Struggle") are in blank verse. V Allegro (" The Cheerful Man ") and // Pensieroso ("The Meditative Man") are complementary poems of great beauty of form. Lycidas^ the last of our selections from Milton, has been called " the touch- stone of taste," the implication being that he who can not admire it has no taste for poetry. THE INVOCATION AND INTRODUCTION TO "PARADISE LOST" Of man's first disobedience, and the fruit Of that forbidden tree, whose mortal ^ taste Brought death into the world, and all our woe, With loss of Eden, till one greater Man Restore us, and regain the blissful seat. Sing, heavenly Muse, that on the secret top 1 deadly MILTON 63 Of Oreb, or of Sinai, didst inspire Tliat shepherd/ who first taught the chosen seed In the beginning how the Heavens and Earth Rose out of Chaos : or, if Sion hill Delight thee more, and Siloa's brook that flowed Fast by the oracle of God, I thence Invoke thy aid to my adventurous song. That with no middle flight intends to soar Above the Aonian mount, while it pursues Things unattempted yet in prose or rhyme. And chiefly thou, O Spirit, that dost prefer Before all temples the upright heart and pure. Instruct me, for thou know'st ; thou from the first Wast present, and, with mighty wings outspread, Dove-like sat'st brooding on the vast abyss, And mad' St it pregnant : what in me is dark Illumine ; what is low raise and support ; That to the height of this great argument I may assert eternal Providence, And justify the ways of God to man. Say first, for Heaven hides nothing from thy view. Nor the deep tract of Hell ; say first, what cause Moved our grand parents, in that happy state. Favored of Heaven so highly, to fall off From their Creator, and transgress his will. For ^ one restraint, lords of the world besides ? Who first seduced them to that foul revolt? The infernal Serpent : he it was, whose guile, Stirred up with envy and revenge, deceived The mother of mankind, what time his pride Had cast him out from Heaven, with all his host Of rebel angels ; by whose aid, aspiring To set himself in glory above his peers, He trusted to have equaled the Most High, ^ Moses - but for 64 CATHCART'S LITERARY READER If He opposed ; and, with ambitious aim Against the throne and monarchy of God, Raised impious war in Heaven, and battle proud, With vain attempt. Him the Ahiiighty Power Hurled headlong flaming from the ethereal sky, With hideous ruin and combustion, down To bottomless perdition, there to dwell In adamantine chains and penal fire. Who durst defy the Omnipotent to arms. ADAM AND EVE'S MORNING HYMN These are thy glorious works. Parent of good, Almighty ! Thine this universal frame. Thus wondrous fair ; Thyself how wondrous then ! Unspeakable, who sit'st above these heavens To us invisible, or dimly seen In these thy lovv^est works ; yet these declare Thy goodness beyond thought, and power divine. Speak, ye who best can tell, ye sons of light, Angels ; for ye behold Him, and with songs And choral symphonies, day without night. Circle his throne rejoicing ; ye, in Heaven : On Earth join, all ye creatures, to extol Him first, him last, him midst, and without end. Fairest of stars, last in the train of night. If better thou belong not to the dawn. Sure pledge of day, that crown'st the smiling morn With thy bright circlet, praise him in thy sphere. While day arises, that sweet hour of prime. Thou Sun, of this great world both eye and soul. Acknowledge him thy greater ; sound his praise In thy eternal course, both when thou climb'st. And when high noon hast gained, and when thou fall'st. MILTON 65 Moon, that now meet'st the orient Sun, now fly'st, With the fixed stars, fixed in their orb that flies ; And ye five other wandering fires, that move In mystic dance not without song, resound His praise, who out of darkness called up light. Air, and ye elements, the eldest birth Of Nature's womb, that in quaternion ^ run. Perpetual circle, multiform ; and mix And nourish all things ; let your ceaseless change Vary to our great Maker still new praise. Ye mists and exhalations, that now rise From hill or steaming lake, dusky or gray. Till the sun paint your fleecy skirts with gold, In honor to the world's great Author rise ; Whether to deck with clouds the uncolored sky, Or wet the thirsty earth with faUing showers, Rising or falling still advance his praise. His praise, ye winds, that from four quarters blow, Breathe soft or loud ; and wave your tops, ye pines. With every plant, in sign of worship, wave. Fountains, and ye that warble as ye flow Melodious murmurs, warbling, tune his praise. Join voices, all ye living souls : ye birds. That singing up to Heaven-gate ascend, Bear on your wings and in your notes his praise. Ye that in waters glide, and ye that walk The earth, and stately tread, or lowly creep ; Witness if I be silent, morn or even, To hill or valley, fountain or fresh shade, Made vocal by my song, and taught his praise. Hail, Universal Lord, be bounteous still To give us only good ; and if the night Have gathered aught of evil or concealed, Disperse it, as now light dispels the dark ! 1 referring to i\\e four so-called "elements " of ancient philosophy — air, earth, water, and fire s 66 CATHCART'S LITERARY READER MAY MORNING Now the bright morning star, day's harbinger, Comes dancing from the East, and leads with her The flowery May, who from her green lap throws The yellow cowslip, and the pale primrose. Hail bounteous May ! that dost inspire Mirth, and youth, and warm desire ; Woods and groves are of thy dressing, Hill and dale doth boast thy blessing. Thus we salute thee with our early song, And welcome thee and wish thee long. How charming is divine philosophy ! Not harsh and crabbed, as dull fools suppose, But musical as is Apollo's lute. And a perpetual feast of nectared sweets. Where no crude surfeit reigns. LYCIDAS Yet once more, O ye laurels, and once more, Ye myrtles brown, with ivy never sere, I come to pluck your berries harsh and crude. And with forced fingers rude Shatter your leaves before the mellowing year. Bitter constraint, and sad occasion dear Compels me to disturb your season due : For Lycidas is dead, dead ere his prime, Young Lycidas, and hath not left his peer. 1 Elegy on a friend, Edward King, drowned in the Irish Channel MILTOH 6y Who would not sing for Lycidas? he knew Himself to sing, and build the lofty rhyme. He must not float upon his watery bier Unwept, and welter to the parching wind, Without the meed of some melodious tear. Begin then, Sisters of the sacred well ^ That from beneath the seat of Jove doth spring, Begin, and somewhat loudly sweep the string. Hence with denial vain and coy excuse ! So may some gentle muse With lucky words favor my destined urn. And, as he passes, turn And bid fair peace be to my sable shroud. For we were nursed upon the self- same hill, Fed the same flock by fountain, shade, and rill. Together both, ere the high lawns appeared Under the opening eyelids of the morn. We drove a-field, and both together heard What time the gray fly winds her sultry horn. Battening our flocks with the fresh dews of night ; Oft till the star, that rose at evening bright. Toward Heaven's descent had sloped his westering wheel. Meanwhile the rural ditties were not mute. Tempered to the oaten flute ; Rough satyrs danced, and fauns with cloven heel From the glad sound would not be absent long ; And old Damoetas ^ loved to hear our song. But, O the heavy change, now thou art gone, Now thou art gone, and never must return ! Thee, Shepherd, thee the woods, and desert caves With wild thyme and the gadding vine o'ergrown, J the Muses ^ Virgil's personification of a herdsman 68 CATHCART'S LITERARY READER And all their echoes, mourn. The willows and the hazel copses green Shall now no more be seen Fanning their joyous leaves to thy soft lays : — As killing as the canker to the rose, Or taint- worm to the weanling herds that graze, Or frost to flowers, that their gay wardrobe wear When first the whitethorn blows ; Such, Lycidas, thy loss to shepherds' ear. Where were ye. Nymphs, when the remorseless deep Closed o'er the head of your loved Lycidas ? For neither were ye playing on the steep Where your old bards, the famous Druids, lie. Nor on the shaggy top of Mona ^ high. Nor yet where Deva'^ spreads her wizard stream. Ay me ! I fondly dream — Had ye been there — for what could that have done ? What could the muse herself that Orpheus bore, The muse herself, for her enchanting son. Whom universal nature did lament. When by the rout that made the hideous roar His gory visage down the stream was sent, Down the swift Hebrus to the Lesbian shore? Alas ! what boots it with incessant care To tend the homely, slighted, shepherd's trade, And strictly meditate ^ the thankless muse ? Were it not better done, as others use, To sport with Amaryllis * in the shade. Or with the tangles of Neaera's* hair? Fame is the spur that the clear spirit doth raise (That last infirmity of noble mind) To scorn delights and live laborious days ; 1 Anglesea ^ the river Dee ^ devote one's self to * names used by Horace and Virgil to personify a sweetheart MILTON 6g But the fair guerdon when we hope to find, And think to burst out into sudden blaze, Comes the bhnd Fury i with the abhorred shears And sUts the thin-spun hfe. " But not the praise " Phoebus replied, and touched my trembling ears ; " Fame is no plant that grows on mortal soil. Nor in the glistering foil ^ Set off to the world, nor in broad rumor lies ; But lives and spreads aloft by those pure eyes And perfect witness of all-judging Jove ; As he pronounces lastly on each deed, Of so much fame in heaven expect thy meed." O fountain Arethuse,^ and thou honored flood Smooth-sliding Mincius,^^ crowned with vocal reeds ! That strain I heard was of a higher mood : But now my oat * proceeds, x\nd listens to the herald of the sea That came in Neptune's plea ; He asked the waves, and asked the felon winds, " What hard mishap hath doomed this gentle swain? " And questioned every gust of rugged wings That blows from off each beaked promontory : They knew not of his story ; And sage Hippotades ^ their answer brings. That not a blast was from his dungeon strayed ; The air was calm, and on the level brine Sleek Panope ^ with all her sisters played. '•' It was that fatal and perfidious bark Built in the eclipse, and rigged with curses dark. That sunk so low that sacred head of thine." ^ 1 Atropos, fabled to cut the thread of life 2 mirror 3 Sicilian and Italian rivers, here referred to as synonymous with the pastorals of Theocritus and Virgil * pipe, /. e. song ^ a sea-nymph ^ ^olus, god of the winds "? See page 7 70 CATHCART'S LITERARY READER Next Camus,^ reverend sire, went footing slow, His mantle hairy, and his bonnet sedge,^ Inwrought with figures dim, and on the edge Like to that sanguine flower ^ inscribed with woe : "Ah ! who hath reft," quoth he, " my dearest pledge ! " Last came, and last did go The pilot of the Galilean lake ; ^ Two massy keys he bore of metals twain (The golden opes, the iron shuts amain) : He shook his mitered locks, and stern bespake : " How well could I have spared for thee, young swain, Enow of such as, for their bellies' sake. Creep and intrude and climb into the fold ! Of other care they little reckoning make Than how to scramble at the shearers' feast. And shove away the worthy bidden guest ; Blind mouths ! that scarce themselves know how to hold A sheep-hook, or have learned aught else the least That to the faithful herdman's art belongs ! What recks it them ? what need they ? They are sped ; And when they Hst, their lean and flashy songs Grate on their scrannel ^ pipes of wretched straw ; The hungry sheep look up, and are not fed. But, swoln with wind and the rank mist they draw. Rot inwardly, and foul contagion spread. Besides what the grim wolf with privy paw Daily devours apace, and nothing said : — But that two-handed engine at the door Stands ready to smite once, and smite no more." Return, Alpheus, the dread voice is past That shrunk thy streams ; return, Sicilian muse. And call the vales, and bid them hither cast 1 the river Cam, personification of Cambridge University - covered with weed * Saint Peter ^ the iris ^ thin, poor 71 MILTON Their bells and flowerets of a thousand hues. Ye valleys low, where the mild whispers use Of shades, and wanton winds, and gushing brooks On whose fresh lap the swart-star ^ sparely looks ; Throw hither all your quaint enameled eyes That on the green turf suck the honeyed showers And purple all the ground with vernal flowers. Bring the rathe ^ primrose that forsaken dies. The tufted crow-toe, and pale jessamine. The white pink, and the pansy freaked with jet. The glowing violet, The musk-rose, and the well-attired woodbine, With cowslips wan that hang the pensive head, And every flower that sad embroidery wears : Bid amaranthus all his beauty shed. And daflbdilhes fill their cups with tears To strew the laureat ^ hearse where Lycid lies. For, so to interpose a little ease. Let our frail thoughts dally with false surmise ; Ay me ! whilst thee the shores and sounding seas Wash far away — where'er thy bones are hurled, Whether beyond the stormy Hebrides Where thou perhaps, under the whelming tide, Visitest the bottom of the monstrous world ; Or whether thou, to our moist vows denied, Sleep'st by the fable of Bellerus ^ old. Where the great Vision of the guarded mount Looks toward Namancos and Bayona's hold — Look homeward. Angel, now, and melt with ruth : And, O ye dolphins, waft the hapless youth ! Weep no more, woeful shepherds, weep no more, For Lycidas, your sorrow, is not dead, Sunk though he be beneath the watery floor ; So sinks the day-star in the ocean bed, 1 the dog-star 2 early ^ laureled •* a Cornish giant 72 CATHCART'S LITERARY READER And yet anon repairs his drooping head And tricks his beams, and with new-spangled ore Flames in the forehead of the morning sky : So Lycidas sunk low, but mounted high Through the dear might of Him that walked the waves ; ^ Where, other groves and other streams along, With nectar pure his oozy locks he laves, And hears the unexpressive '^ nuptial song In the blest kingdoms meek of joy and love. There entertain him all the saints above In solemn troops, and sweet societies, That sing, and, singing, in their glory move. And wipe the tears forever from his eyes. Now, Lycidas, the shepherds weep no more ; Henceforth thou art the Genius of the shore In thy large recompense, and shalt be good To all that wander in that perilous flood. Thus sang the uncouth swain to the oaks and rills, While the still morn went out with sandals gray ; He touched the tender stops of various quills, With eager thought warbling his Doric ^ lay : And now the sun had stretched out * all the hills, And now was dropped into the western bay : At last he rose, and twitched his mantle blue : — To-morrow, to fresh woods and pastures new ! Books are not absolutely dead things, but do contain a potency of life in them to be as active as that soul was whose progeny they are ; nay, they do preserve as in a vial the purest efficacy and extraction of that living intellect that bred them. — Froj/i the "A reopagitica . ' ' i Note the special aptness of this fine allusion. ^ pastoral - inexpressible * Meaning? DRYDEN 73 DRYDEN 1631-1701 The father of John Dryden was a Puritan of Northamptonshire and a man of considerable means and good family. The poet was born in the year 1631. Of his earlier years we know little beyond the facts that he was a pupil at Westminster School and that he took his degree at Cambridge. His first appearance as a candidate for poetical honors was in the year 1658, when, upon the death of Cromwell, he published his verses laudatory of the Puritan leader. Upon the Restoration of Charles II. the poet was suffi- ciently impartial in the distribution of his favors to put forth a congratu- latory ode upon that "happy event." Throughout the decade following, Dryden maintained himself chiefly by writing for the dramatic stage, pro- ducing during this time more than a score of plays. In 1668 he was made poet-laureate, which place he held till the Revolution of 1688, when the honor was transferred to Shadwell. In the reign of James, Dryden had embraced the Catholic faith, and could therefore hardly complain when the laureateship was withdrawn from him. This change, however, gave him the opportunity to display his mastery of satire, as well as to gratify his resent- ment, in the poem " Mac Flecknoe," in which he mercilessly ridicules his 74 CATHCART'S LITERAR) READER successor's poetic pretensions. While he was laureate the income of that post sufficed to render Dryden's circumstances somewhat easy; but heap- pears throughout his life to have been more or less needy, often using his pen for gain rather than for fame, — as, indeed, he frankly avowed was the fact in all his writing for the stage. He died, of a complication of disorders, on the 1st of May, 1701. His dramatic works, though forming a considerable part of Dryden's liter- ary remains, have contributed scarcely anything to his fame as a poet. This rests chiefly upon his translations from the Latin poets, notably the " yEneid " of Virgil, upon his satires, odes, and shorter poems, and upon his contributions to literary criticism. He was the first of English writers to lay down a system of general rules by which the merits of a composition might be determined, as well as the first to define the limits within which the license of poetical translation should properly confine itself. He seems also to have been the first to combine poetry with philosophy, — a method still further developed in the writings of Pope. Most of Dryden's satires were prompted by political enmities or rivalries. His best-known production in this field is entitled " Absalom and Achitophel," in which the principal vic- tims of his invective were the Duke of Buckingham and the Earl of Shaftes- bury. The most important of his prose writings is his " Essay on Dramatic Poetry." His so-called " Fables," which were merely tales in verse, and his second ode for St. Cecilia's day, both written shortly before his death, so far from showing any decay of the poet's powers, are justly regarded as superior to much of his earlier work. The bent of Dryden's mind was argumentative and controversial. He was not a poet of the emotions, nor did Nature in any of her aspects appeal to him as an interpreter. The whole body of his verse contains little to indi- cate sensibility to things simple and natural, and nothing that is pathetic. It has accordingly been a favorite criticism upon his translations that they lose in the rendering much of the tender charm of the originals. SONG FOR ST. CECILIA'S DAYi From harmony, from heavenly harmony This universal frame began : When nature underneath a heap Of jarring atoms lay. 1 This poem was written in 1687 for the occasion of the annual celebra- tion of St. Cecilia's day by a London musical society. Ten years later, and for'the same object, Dryden wrote his longer ode, entitled, "Alexander's Feast; or, the Power of Music." Saint Cecilia is the patron saint of music, and to her has been ascribed the invention of the organ. DRYDEN 75 And could not heave her head, The tuneful voice was heard from high, Arise, ye more than dead ! Then cold, and hot, and moist, and dry In order to their stations leap, And music's power obey. From harmony, from heavenly harmony This universal frame began : From harmony to harmony Through all the compass of the notes it ran. The diapason^ closing full in man. What passion can not music raise and quell ! When Jubal ^ struck the chorded shell His listening brethren stood around. And, wondering, on their faces fell To worship that celestial sound. Less than a god they thought there could not dwell Within the hollow of that shell That spoke so sweetly and so well. What passion can not music raise and quell ! The trumpet's loud clangor Excites us to arms, With shrill notes of anger And mortal alarms. The double, double, double beat Of the thundering drum Cries, " Hark ! the foes come ; Charge, charge, 'tis too late to retreat ! " The soft complaining flute In dying notes discovers » 1 the entire compass of tones 2 See Genesis iv. 21. \ ^e CATHCART'S LITERARY READER The woes of hopeless lovers, Whose dirge is whispered by the warbling lute. Sharp violins proclaim Their jealous pangs and desperation, Fury, frantic indignation, Depth of pains, and height of passion For the fair, disdainful dame. But O, what art can teach, What human voice can reach The sacred organ's praise? Notes inspiring holy love. Notes that wing their heavenly ways To mend -^ the choirs above. Orpheus could lead the savage race. And trees uprooted left their place Sequacious ^ of the lyre : But bright Cecilia raised the wonder higher : When to her Organ vocal breath was given An angel heard, and straight appeared — Mistaking earth for heaven ! Gi'cDid Chorus As from the power of sacred lays The spheres began to move, • And sung the great Creator's praise To all the blest above ; So when the last and dreadful hour This crumbling pageant shall devour. The trumpet shall be heard on high. The dead shall live, the living die, And music shall untune the sky. 1 amend, assist 2 following, attendant upon DRYDEN ;; MAC FLECKNOEi All human things are subject to decay, And when fate summons, monarchs must obey. This Flecknoe found, who, hke Augustus, young Was called to empire, and had governed long ; In prose and verse was owned, without dispute, Through all the realms of Nonsense, absolute. This aged prince, now flourishing in peace. And blest with issue of a large increase ; Worn out with business, did at length debate To settle the succession of the state : And, pondering, which of all his sons was fit To reign, and wage immortal war with wit. Cried, " 'T is resolved ; for nature pleads, that he Should only rule that most resembles me. Shadwell alone my perfect image bears, Mature in dulness from his tender years : Shadwell alone, of all m.y sons, is he Who stands confirmed in full stupidity. The rest to some faint meaning make pretense. But Shadwell never deviates into sense. Some beams of wit on other souls may fall, Strike through, and make a lucid interval ; But Shadwell' s genuine night admits no ray. His rising fogs prevail upon the day. ... Heywood and Shirley ^ were but types of thee. Thou last great prophet of tautology. Even I, a dunce of more renown than they. Was sent before but to prepare thy way ; 1 Mac Flecknoe, /. e. son of Flecknoe. This piece well illustrates Dryden's powers as a satirist. He lampoons Thomas Shadwell by the pre- tense that the mantle of Flecknoe, a mere scribbler, has fallen to him by rightful inheritance. This satire, said to have suggested to Pope the idea which was developed in his "Dunciad," while sufficiently bitter, yet lacks the virulence which deformed most of Dryden's polemical writings. 2 Heywood and Shirley were minor dramatists of the time. 78 CATHCART'S LITERARY READER And, coarsely clad in Norwich drugget, came To teach the nations in thy greater name." — . . . Here stopt the good old sire, and wept for joy, In silent raptures of the hopeful boy. All arguments, but most his plays, persuade That for anointed dulness he was made. ODE TO THE MEMORY OF MS. ANNE KILLIGREWi Thou youngest virgin-daughter of the skies, Made in the last promotion of the blest ; Whose palms, new plucked from paradise, In spreading branches more sublimely rise, Rich with immortal green above the rest : Whether, adopted to some neighb'ring star, Thou roU'st above us, in thy wand'ring race. Or, in procession fixed and regular, Mov'st with the heavens' majestic pace ; Or, called to more superior bliss, Thou tread'st, with seraphims,- the vast abyss : Whatever happy region is thy place. Cease thy celestial song a little space ; Thou wilt have time enough for hymns divine, Since heaven's eternal year is thine. Hear, then, a mortal muse thy praise rehearse. In no ignoble verse ; But such as thy own voice did practice here, When thy first fruits of poesy were given ; To make thyself a welcome inmate there : While yet a young probationer, And candidate ^ of heaven. 1 Dr. Johnson said of this poem, " It is undoubtedly the noblest ode that our language ever has produced." - See Webster's Dictionary for the correct plural form. 3 literally, " one clothed in white " DRYDEN 79 If by traduction ^ came thy mind.. Our wonder is the less to find A soul so charming from a stock so good ; Thy father was transfused into thy blood : So wert thou born into a tuneful strain,^ An early, rich, and inexhausted vein. But if thy pre-existing soul Was formed, at first, with myriads more, It did through all the mighty poets roll, Who Greek or Latin laurels wore. And was that Sappho last, which once it was before.^ If so, then cease thy flight, O heaven-born mind ! Thou hast no dross to purge from thy rich ore : Nor can thy soul a fairer mansion find. Than was the beauteous frame she left behind : Return to fill or mend the choir of thy celestial kind. May we presume to say, that, at thy birth. New joy was sprung in heaven, as well as here on earth? For sure the milder planets did combine On thy auspicious horoscope to shine. And e'en the most malicious were in trine.* Thy brother-angels at thy birth Strung each his lyre and tuned it high, That all the people of the sky Might know a poetess was born on earth. And then, if ever, mortal ears Had heard the music of the spheres. And if no clustering swarm of bees On thy sweet mouth distilled their golden dew, 1 inheritance 2 hereditary disposition 3 Dryden here pays a lofty compliment to the subject of his verse by declaring that, if the doctrine of metempsychosis be true, the soul of Mrs, Killigrew must be identical with that of Sappho. "* trine,/.*?, the aspect of planets distant 120° from one another. The poet was credulous of the pretensions of judicial astrology. 80 CATHCART'S LITERARY READER 'Twas that such vulgar miracles Heaven had not leisure to renew : For all thy blest fraternity of love Solemnized there thy birth, and kept thy holiday above. Now all those charms, that blooming grace, The well-proportioned shape, and beauteous face. Shall never more be seen by mortal eyes ; In earth the much-lamented virgin lies. Not wit, nor piety could fate prevent ; Nor was the cruel destiny content To finish all the murder at a blow. To sweep at once her life and beauty too ; But, like a hardened felon, took a pride To work more mischievously slow, And plundered first, and then destroyed.^ O double sacrilege on things divine. To rob the relic, and deface the shrine ! But thus Orinda '^ died : Heaven, by the same disease, did both translate ; As equal were their souls, so equal was their fate. Meantime her warlike brother on the seas His waving streamers to the winds displays. And vows for his return with vain devotion pays. Ah, generous youth, that wish forbear. The winds too soon will waft thee here ! Slack all thy sails, and fear to come ; Alas ! thou know'st not thou art wrecked at home ! No more shalt thou behold thy sister's face. Thou hast already had her last embrace ; But look aloft, and if thou kenn'st from far Among the Pleiads a new-kindled star, 1 Mrs. Killigrew died of the small-pox. '^ Mrs. Katherine Philips, a contemporary poetess. CONTEMPORARY SONGS 8l If any sparkles than the rest more bright ; 'T is she that shines in that propitious ^ hght ! When in mid-air the golden trump shall sound, To raise the nations under ground : When in the valley of Jehoshaphat, The judging God shall close the book of fate ; And there the last assizes keep, For those who wake and those who sleep : . . . The sacred poets first shall hear the sound, And foremost from the tomb shall bound. For they are covered with the lightest ground ; And straight, with inborn vigor, on the wing. Like mountain larks, to the new morning sing. There thou, sweet saint, before the choir shalt go, As harbinger of heaven, the way to show. The way which thou so well hast learnt below. THREE CONTEMPORARY SONGS I. The Retreat Happy those early days, when I Shined in my angel-infancy ! Before I understood this place Appointed for my second race, Or taught my soul to fancy aught But a white, celestial thought ; When yet I had not walked above A mile or two from my first love. And looking back, at that short space Could see a gHmpse of His bright face ; 1 The rising of the constellation of the Pleiades was looked upon by the ancients as an indication of safe navigation. 82 CATHCART'S LITERARY READER When on some gilded cloud or flower My gazing soul would dwell an hour, And in those weaker glories spy Some shadows of eternity ; Before I taught my tongue to wound My conscience with a sinful sound, Or had the black art to dispense A several sin to every sense, But felt through all this fleshly dress Bright shoots of everlastingness. O how I long to travel back. And tread again that ancient track ! That I might once more reach that plain Where first I left my glorious train ; From whence th' enlightened spirit sees That shady City of Palm-trees ! But ah ! my soul with too much stay Is drunk, and staggers in the way : — Some men a forward motion love, But I by backward steps would move ; And, when this dust falls to the urn. In that same state I came, return. Henry Vaughan II. A Supplication Awake, awake, my lyre ! And tell thy" silent master's humble tale In sounds that may prevail ; Sounds that gentle thoughts inspire : Though so exalted she And I so low^ly be, Tell her, such different notes make all thy harmony. CONTEMPORARY SONGS 83 Hark ! how the strings awake : And, though the moving hand approach not near, Themselves with awful fear A kind of numerous trembling make. Now all thy forces try ; Now all thy charms apply ; Revenge upon her ear the conquests of her eye. Weak lyre ! thy virtue sure Is useless here, since thou art only found To cure, but not to wound, And she to wound, but not to cure. Too weak, too, wilt thou prove My passion to remove ; Physic to other ills, thou 'rt nourishment to love. Sleep, sleep again, my lyre ! For thou canst never tell my humble tale In sounds that will prevail, Nor gentle thoughts in her inspire ; All thy vain mirth lay by, Bid thy strings silent lie. Sleep, sleep again, my lyre, and let thy master die. Abraham Cowley III. Song of the Emigrants in Bermuda Where the remote Bermudas ride In the ocean's bosom unespied. From a small boat that rowed along The listening winds received this song : " What should we do but sing His praise That led us through the watery maze. 84 CATHCARTS LITERARY READER Where He the huge sea monsters wracks, That hft the deep upon their backs, Unto an isle so long unknown, And yet far kinder than our own ? He lands us on a grassy stage. Safe from the storm's and prelate's rage : He gave us this eternal spring Which here enamels everything, And sends the fowls to us in care On daily visits through the air. He hangs in shades the orange bright Like golden lamps in a green night. And does in the pomegranates close Jewels more rich than Ormus shows : He makes the figs our mouths to meet. And throws the melons at our feet ; But apples plants of such a price No tree could ever bear them twice. With cedars chosen by His hand From Lebanon He stores the land. . . . He cast (of which we rather boast) The gospel's pearl upon our coast ; And in these rocks for us did frame A temple where to sound His name. O let our voice His praise exalt Till it arrive at heaven's vault, Which then perhaps, rebounding, may Echo beyond the Mexique bay ! " Thus sung they in the English boat A holy and a cheerful note : And all the way, to guide their chime, With falling oars they kept the time. Andrew Marvell NOTABLE CONTEMPORARY IVRITERS 85 ^f^i^!^ /li/m^^ NOTABLE CONTEMPORARY WRITERS Joseph Hall, 1 574-1656, Bishop of Norwich; theologian; author of '• Divine Meditations." John Selden, 1 584-1654, politician and antiquarian; his best thought is embodied in his "Table Talk." Izaak Walton, 1593-1683, left several brief biographies, and " The Complete Angler." Sir William Davenant, 1605-1668, poet, controversialist and drama- tist ; his best-known poem is " Gondibert." Sir Thomas Browne, 1605-1682, physician, and theologian; author of •• Essays on Vulgar Errors " and other works. Thomas Fuller, 1608-1661, English clergyman; his more iniportant works are " Church History," and " The Worthies of England and Wales." Edward Hyde, first Earl of Clarendon, 1608- 1674, Lord Chancellor of England ; wrote " A History of the Great Rebellion." James Harrington, 1611-1677, diplomatist and political philosopher; author of " A Project for the Estal^lishment of a Republic," " Oceana," and other works. S6 CATHCART'S LITERARY READER Samuel Butler, 1612-16S0, famous as the author of " Hudibras," a poetical burlesque upon the absurdities and fanaticisms of the republicans of that time, and particularly of the extravagances of the Presbyterians. Jeremy Taylor, 16 13-1667, eminent and eloquent Anglican theolo- gian and bishop; his sermons were learned and powerful, and are regarded as of the highest rhetorical excellence; of his works those most read are his " Holy Living '' and '• Holy Dying." Richard Baxter, 1615-1691, learned theologian, and defender of religious liberty; prolific writer; his most famous book is "The Saints' Everlasting Rest.'" Abraham Cowley, 1618-1667, poet and essayist; translator of the odes of Anacreon ; author of the epic poem '• Davideis." See " A Supplication," page 82. Andrew Marvell, 1 620-1 678, diplomatist and poet; friend of Mil- ton; wrote '• Thoughts in a Garden," and many short poems. See the " Song of the Emigrants in Bermuda," page 83. Algernon Sidney, 1621-1683, republican controversialist; his best- known work is " Discourses on Government." Henry Vaughan, 1 621-1695, wrote many devotional poems. See '•The Retreat,'" page 81. John Bunyan, 1628- 1688, religious enthusiast and preacher; left, among other writings, " Grace Abounding in the Chief of Sinners," autobiographical in character; "The Holy War ;" and his cele- brated allegory " Pilgrim's Progress." Samuel Pepys, 1632-1713, secretary to the English Admiralty Board ; famous for his " Diary," written in cipher, which affords a wonder- ful picture of the state of society in his day. John Locke, 1632-1704, politician, theologian, moral philosopher, and essayist ; his more important works are " A Treatise on Civil Government," " Letters on Toleration," " Essay on Education," and especially his " Essay on the Human Understanding." William Wycherley, 1640-17 15, left several comedies, among them '•The Country Wife" and "The Plain Dealer." Sir Isaac Newton, 1642-1727, mathematician and philosopher; his "Treatise on Optics"' and his "Principles of Natural Philosophy" are the more important of his works. Gilbert Burnet, 1643-1715, Bishop of Salisbury; politician and divine; his best-known work is "A History of My Own Times." Thomas Otway, 1651-1685, tragic dramatist, and author of "The Orphan " and " Venice Preserved." NOTABLE CONTEMPORARY iVRITERS «7 Nathaniel Lee, 165 7-1 691, author of eleven tragedies, the best known of which are ''The Rival Queens " and " The Death of Alexander." William Congreve, 1670 -1729, comic dramatist; among his more familiar plays are "The Old Bachelor," "Love for Love," "The Mourning Bride," and " The Way of the World." 88 CATHCART'S LITERARY READER IV LITERATURE OF THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY SWIFT — BURNS "pNGLISH literature of the eighteenth century has -*-— ^ certain broad characteristics which easily set it off, as a whole, as something very different from all that had gone before it. We have already seen that English prose gave, in the essays of Dryden, some signs of what it was to become. This writer died in I/OI, and to those who succeeded him in the century then opening, it remained to develop and fix the form of our prose literary ex- pression. Verse, to be sure, plays an important part in the literature of the eighteenth century, but it does not rule the imaginations of its writers, it is only imagination's servant. Shakespeare, Milton, and Dryden, each in his time, was easily predominant over his contemporaries ; but the characteristic figures of the literature of the last century are not its poets, but its prose writers, — Swift, Addison, Richardson, Gibbon, Fielding, and Johnson. Swift was a witty rhymester, and Johnson could make verses, but neither of these was, or thought himself, a poet. Roughly speaking, then, the prime distinction of eighteenth-century literature was its mastery of the prose form as a vehicle of general thought. Prose had been an- tiquated and without any accepted standard of excellence ; it was left by the writers of the last century in the finished form of present usage. Two instrumentalities contributed chiefly to this : one of them was the introduction of periodical literature, and LITERATURE OF THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY the other was the appearance of the reahstic novel. One of the most beneficent results of the Revolution of 1688 was that it brought about the freedom of the press. The ten years succeeding the abolition of state censorship saw the publication in London of a score of little weekly and semi-weekly papers, in themselves of little account, yet showing an awakening intellectual appetite for something that the decaying stage could not supply. Reading, it seemed, was no longer to be exclusively a privilege of the polite few. In 1702 the first English daily paper, such as it was, made its appearance. It was of meager proportions, hardly more than a leaflet, and its text was made up of gossip of court and town, a variety of small-talk, and some few scraps of news. ^^^*^^.JM^.\ \^^^^iJM? Then came De Foe with his Weekly Review de- voted mainly to politics, and then Steele with The Jh y ^ J^ >^ Tatler and The Spectator. ^ ^ ^^ r^ T^^^^ To the latter both Steele and Addison contributed in essays dealing lightly with an endless variety of subjects, but especially with those of a social and literary nature. The most famous of Addison's contributions to TJie Spectator were his " Sir Roger de Coverley " papers, into which were woven many charming little scenes of real life. The circula- tion of TJie Spectator increased from three thousand to thirty thousand in the three years of the paper's exist- ence ; and as each copy of it had many readers, it would 90 C/ITHCART'S LITERARY READER be hard to overestimate its favorable influence upon the manners, habits, and thought of that time. Steele, at a later day, published The Guardian, for which both Pope and Addison wrote, and Swift edited The Examiner. Be- tween these and Dr. Johnson's Rambler, forty years later, more than a hundred periodical papers were issued in London, most of them of little, a few of them of consid- erable, influence, but all of them contributory to the establishment of English prose and to the difl"usion of information amongst a reading public then for the first time coming into being. Johnson founded The Rambler in 1750, and conducted it, almost unaided, for two years. His Idler consisted of a series of papers contributed by him a few years later to the columns of the Lon- don Chronicle. From these little beginnings have grown up the modern new^spaper and the whole of pe- riodical literature. The only one of De Foe's romances which survives as a classic is his "Robinson Crusoe," published in 1719. The modern novel, the romance of the afl"ections, had its rise with Richardson, Fielding, and Smollett. Richardson produced " Pamela" in 1740, "Clarissa Harlowe" in 1748, and " Sir Charles Grandison" six years later. Fielding published "Joseph Andrews" in 1742, "Tom Jones" in 1749, and LITERATURE OF THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY 91 ''Amelia" in 1751. Smollett's novels appeared between the years 1748 and 1771. All of these works had ex- traordinary popularity; but with the exception of Gold- smith's " Vicar of Wakefield," no novel of a high order of excellence followed them until the time of Sir Walter Scott. A little later than this remarkable group of novelists there appeared another trio equally remarkable, but in a different department of literature, that of history, in the persons of Hume, Robertson, and Gibbon. Hume was an essayist and a philosopher as well as an historian. Gibbon is admitted to have produced the greatest his- torical work of his century. Robertson, though the pos- sessor of an excellent style, is now but little read. The influence of these histori- ans, especially that of Gib- bon, upon English style was profound. There was in this period no school of dramatic lit- erature, and only a few plays appeared that are of notable merit. Addison's ** Cato " is never acted, and seldom read. Goldsmith's ''She Stoops to Conquer," and Sheridan's "Rivals" and " School for Scandal " are almost the only plays of the century that stand out above the general level of mediocrity. Verse was abundant, poetry rare. The spirit of the age was unromantic, and whatever is merely practical takes on the prose form. The first poet of the century was Pope, the last was Burns. Between them were Cowper and Gray, 92 CATHCART'S LITERARY READER both of them meditative, and out of harmony with the time. *' It is more difficult," says Palgrave, " to charac- terize the Enghsh poetry of the eighteenth century than that of any other. For it was not only an age of spon- taneous transition, but it included such vast contempo- raneous differences as lie between Pope and Collins, Burns and Cowper. Yet we may clearly trace three leading moods or tendencies, — the aspects of courtly or educated life, represented by Pope and carried to exhaustion by his followers; the poetry of nature and of man, viewed through a cultivated, and at the same time an impassioned frame of mind, by Collins and Gray ; lastly, the study of vivid and simple narrative, including natural description, begun by Gay and Thomson, pursued by Burns and others in the north, and established in England by Goldsmith, Percy, Crabbe, and Cowper. Great varieties in style accompanied these diversities in aim. Poets could not always distinguish the manner suitable for subjects so far apart; and the union of the language of courtly and of common life, exhibited most conspicuously by Burns, has given a tone to the poetry of that century which is best explained by reference to its historical origin." Speaking generally of the literature of this age, we may say that, while it fell short of the highest intellectual beauty, it yet had great vitality and success, and that it was of cultivated form and remarkable fullness and variety. SM/IFT 93 SWIFT 1 667- 1 745 Jonathan Swift was born in Dublin, in November, 1667, and died in October, 1745. At Dublin University, where he was matriculated, Swift distinguished himself by his contempt for college laws and neglect of his studies ; and only by special grace did he receive his degree of B. A., in 1685. He entered the family of Sir William Temple in the capacity of secretary. ^maU: ^fi^- In the same household "Stella," immortalized in Swift's writings, was a dependant. " Stella " was a Miss Hester Johnson, whose tutor Swift after- wards became, and to whom, many years later, he was privately married. In 1694 Swift was admitted to deacon's orders, and a few years later went to Ireland as chaplain to Lord Berkeley. Here he occupied various ecclesi- astical offices, and in 17 13 was made Dean of St. Patrick's. He began his career in literature as a writer of political tracts, and was secretly employed by the government to write in its behalf. In 1704 he published "The Tale 94 CATHCART'S LITERARY READER of a Tub." From that time till 1725 he lived in England, and was mainly engaged in political controversy. In 1726 appeared "Gulliver's Travels," and at frequent intervals thereafter his other writings, prose and poetry. In 1740 he evinced the first symptoms of the madness which clouded his closing years. From early manhood Swift was subject to fits of vertigo ac- companied by deafness, and it was his daily custom to take prolonged walks in the hope of warding off these attacks. It is charitable to suppose that his extraordinary arrogance, his morbid vanity, and his overbearing and passion- ate disposition were to some extent attributable to bodily afflictions. Swift's character was compounded of contradictory traits. What was needful econ- omy in his youth approached to avarice in his age ; yet he was habitually an alms-giver, and devised extensive charitable projects : he was so negligent of study at Dublin that his degree was grudgingly yielded to him ; yet so intense in later application and so finished in attainment that Oxford was glad to confer upon him a higher distinction. By nature indolent, he was scrupulous in his attention to the details of duty, however irksome ; though constitutionally a satirist and scoffer, there can be no question that he was sincerely devout ; and while affecting a dislike of Ireland and the Irish, he said truly of himself, as Dr. Johnson writes, that " Ireland was his debtor. Nor can the Irish be charged with ingratitude to their benefactor ; for they reverenced him as a guardian, and obeyed him as a dictator." As to Swift's rank as a writer, it is not easy to define it ; but of his extra- ordinary abilities there is no room for doubt. He was, perhaps, the greatest master of satire that has ever written in English. His originality is remark- able, — probably no writer of his time borrowed so little from his predeces- sors, — and his versatility — for he succeeded in every department of litera- ture that he attempted — is not less wonderful. All things considered, his " Gulliver's Travels " must be regarded as his greatest work, though sev- eral eminent critics, including Hallam, have found it inferior to "The Tale of a Tub." Perhaps these words of Lord Jeffrey best embody the general estimate of Dean Swift as a literary man : " In humor and in irony, and in the talent of debasing and defiling what he hated, we join with the world in thinking the Dean of St. Patrick's without a rival." We give an extract from "Gulliver's Travels " which illustrates his best manner as a satirist. PHILOSOPHERS AND PROJECTORS I WAS received very kindly by the warden, and went for many days to the academy. Every room hath in it one or more projectors, and I beheve I could not be in fewer than five hundred rooms. SH/IFT 95 The first man I saw was of a meager aspect, with sooty hands and face, his hair and beard long, ragged, and singed in several places. His clothes, shirt, and skin were all of the same color. He had been eight years upon a project for extracting sunbeams out of cucumbers, which were to be put into vials hermetically sealed, and let out to warm the air in raw, inclement summers. He told me he did not doubt in eight years more that he should be able to supply the governor's gardens with sunshine at a reasonable rate ; but he complained that the stock was low, and entreated me to give him something as an encouragement to ingenuity, especially since this had been a very dear season for cucumbers. I made him a small present, for my lord had furnished me with money, on purpose, because he knew their practice of begging from all who go to see them. I saw another at work to calcine^ ice into gunpowder, who likewise showed me a treatise he had written concerning the malleability of fire, which he intended to publish. There was a most ingenious architect, who had contrived a new method for building houses, by beginning at the roof and workitig downw^ards to the foundation ; which he justified to me by the like practice of those two prudent insects, the bee and the spider. In another apartment I was highly pleased with a projector who had found a device of ploughing the ground with hogs, to save the charges of ploughs, cattle, and labor. The method is this : in an acre of ground, you bury, at six inches distance, and eight deep, a quantity of acorns, dates, chestnuts, and other masts ^ or vegetables, whereof these animals are fondest ; then you drive six hundred or more of them into the field, where in a few days they will root up the whole ground in search of their food, and make it fit for sowing. It is true, upon experi- ment they found the charge and trouble very great, and they had little or no crop. However, it is not doubted that this invention may be capable of great improvement. ^ to pulverize by means of heat 2 mas^ consists of beechnuts and acorns ; this word has no plural 96 CATHCART'S LITERARY READER I went into another room, where the walls and ceilings were all hung round with cobwebs, except a narrow passage for the artist to go in and out. At my entrance he called aloud to me not to disturb his webs. He lamented the fatal mistake the world had been so long in, of using silk-worms, while we had such plenty of domestic insects who infinitely excelled the former, because they understood how to weave as well as spin. And he proposed, further, that by employing spiders, the charge of dyeing silks would be wholly saved ; whereof I was fully convinced when he showed me a vast number of flies most beautifully colored, where- with he fed his spiders ; assuring us that the webs would take a tincture from them ; and as he had them of all hues, he hoped to fit everybody's fancy, as soon as he could find proper food for the flies, of certain gums, oils, and other glutinous matter, to give a consistence to the threads. There was an astronomer who had undertaken to place a sun-dial upon the great weathercock on the town- house, by adjusting the annual and diurnal motions of the earth and sun, so as to answer and coincide with all accidental turning of the winds. I visited many other apartments, but shall not trouble my reader with all the curiosities 1 observed, being studious of brevity. I had hitherto only seen one side of the academy, the other being appropriated to the advancers of speculative learning, of whom I shall say something when I have mentioned one illustri- ous person more, who is called among them the universal artist. He told us he had been thirty years employing his thoughts for the improvement of human life. He had two large rooms full of wonderful curiosities, and fifty men at work ; some were con- densing air into a dry tangible substance, by extracting the niter, and letting the aqueous or fluid particles percolate ; others, soft- ening marble for pillows and pin-cushions ; others, petrifying the hoofs of a living horse to preserve them from foundering. The artist himself was at that time busy upon two great designs : first, to sow land with chaff, wherein he afiirmed the true seminal SIVIFT 97 virtue to be contained, as he demonstrated by several experiments which I was not skillful enough to comprehend. The other was, by a certain composition of gums, minerals, and vegetables, out- wardly applied, to prevent the growth of wool upon two young lambs ; and he hoped in a reasonable time to propagate the breed of naked sheep all over the kingdom. We crossed a walk to the other part of the academy, where, as I have already said, the projectors in speculative learning resided. The first professor I saw was in a very large room, with forty pupils about him. After salutation, observing me to look earn- estly upon a frame which took up the greatest part of both the length and breadth of the room, he said, perhaps I might wonder to see him employed in a project for improving speculative knowl- edge by practical and mechanical operations. But the world would soon be sensible of its usefulness, and he flattered himself that a more noble, exalted thought never sprang in any other man's head. Every one knew how laborious the usual method is of attaining to arts and sciences, whereas, by his contrivance, the most ignorant person, at a reasonable charge, and with a little bodily labor, may write books in philosophy, poetry, politics, law, mathematics, and theology, without the least assistance from genius or study. He then led me to the frame, about the sides whereof all his pupils stood in ranks. It was twenty feet square, placed in the middle of the room. The superficies ^ was com- posed of several bits of wood, about the bigness of a die, but some larger than others. They were all linked together by slender wires. These bits of wood were covered on every square with paper pasted on them ; and on these papers were written all the words of their language in their several moods, tenses, and declensions, but without any order. The professor then desired me to observe, for he was going to set his engine at work. The pupils, at his command, took each of them hold of an iron handle, whereof there were forty fixed round the edges of the frame, and 1 the surface ; the exterior part or face of a thing 7 98 CATHCART'S LITERARY READER giving them a sudden turn, the whole disposition of the words was entirely changed. He then commanded six-and-thirty of the lads to read the several lines softly as they appeared upon the frame, and where they found three or four words together that might make part of a sentence, they dictated to the four remain- ing boys, who were scribes. This work was repeated three or four times, and at every turn the engine was so contrived, that the words shifted into new places as the square bits of wood moved upside down. Six hours a day the young students were employed in this labor ; and the professsor showed me several volumes in large folio, already collected, of broken sentences, which he intended to piece together, and out of those rich materials to give the world a complete body of all arts and sciences, which, however, might be still improved, and much expedited, if the public would raise a fund for making and employing five hundred such frames in Lagado, and oblige the managers to contribute in common their several collections. He assured me that this invention had employed all his thoughts from his youth ; that he had emptied the whole vocab- ulary into his frame, and made the strictest computation of the general proportion there is in books, between the numbers of particles, nouns, and verbs, and other parts of speech. I made my humblest acknowledgments to this illustrious person for his great communicativeness, and promised, if ever I had the good fortune to return to my native country, that I would do him justice, as the sole inventor of this wonderful machine, the form and contrivance of which I desired leave to delineate upon paper. I told him, although it were the custom of our learned in Europe to steal inventions from each other, who had thereby at least this advantage, that it became a controversy which was the right owner, yet I would take such caution that he should have the honor entire without a rival. We next went to the school of languages, where three pro- fessors sat in consultation upon improving that of their own country. SIVIFT 99 The first project was to shorten discourse by cutting polysyl- lables into one, and leaving out verbs and participles ; because, in reality, all things imaginable are but nouns. The other was a scheme for entirely abolishing all words whatsoever; and this was urged as a great advantage in point of health as well as brevity : for it is plain that eve'ry word we speak is in some degree a diminution of our lungs by corrosion, and consequently contributes to the shortening of our lives. An expedient was therefore offered, that since words are only names for things, it would be more convenient for all men to carry about them such things as were necessary to express the particular business they are to discourse on. And this invention would certainly have taken place, to the great ease as well as health of the subject, if the women, in conjunction with the vulgar and illiterate, had not threatened to raise a rebellion, unless they might be allowed the hberty to speak with their tongues, after the manner of their forefathers ; such constant irreconcilable enemies to science are the common people. The common fluency of speech in many men, and most women, is owing to a scarcity of matter, and a scarcity of words ; for whoever is a master of language, and hath a mind full of ideas, will be apt in speaking to hesitate upon the choice of both ; whereas common speakers have only one set of ideas, and one set of words to clothe them in ; and these are always ready at the mouth ; so people come faster out of church when it is almost empty, than when a crowd is at the door. An old miser kept a tame jackdaw, that used to steal pieces of money and hide them in a hole, which the cat observing, asked " Why he would hoard up those round shining things that he could make no use of ? " "Why," said the jackdaw, " my master has a whole chest full, and makes no more use of them than I." [OO CATHCART'S LITERARY READER ADDISON 1672-1719 Joseph Addison was born in 1672, and died in 17 19. His name is a synonym of rhetorical elegance ; and to say that the style of a composition is '* Addisonian " is to give it the highest praise for finish and classic regu- larity. Addison's style, however admirable it may have seemed to his con- J^. Jc/^A^zr% temporaries, cannot safely be taken as a model by a writer of the present day ; it is cold and elaborate, and conveys an idea of formality which is not in harmony with the spirit of later literature. Addison's fame as a writer rests mainly on his contributions to The Spectator, The Tatler, and The Guardian, — periodicals which clearly illustrate the manners and morals of the time^ and which contain many of the finest specimens of English literary workmanship. To these periodicals Addison was the principal contributor, and with these his name will have its most enduring association. He was a poet and a dramatist ; but except perhaps his tragedy of" Cato," his efforts ADDISON lOI in these departments of literature are not held in very high esteem by the critics of to-day. Addison led an easy and somewhat luxurious life. He held a high otfice under government, had an ample income, and in the literary society of that brilliant period occupied, by general acquiescence, a foremost rank. No student of English literature can afford to neglect the essays of Addison, which illustrate the very best literary achievements of English writers in delicacy of sentiment and felicity of expression. The following estimate of Addison is from the pen of Macaulay : — "As an observer of life, of manners, of all shades of human character, he stands in the first class. And what he observed he had the art of communi- cating in two widely different ways. He could describe virtues, vices, habits, whims, as well as Clarendon. But he could do something better. He could call human beings into existence, and make them exhibit themselves. If we wish to find anything more vivid than Addison's best portraits, we must go either to Shakespeare or to Cervantes. " But what shall we say of Addison's humor, — of his sense of the ludi- crous ; of his power of awakening that sense in others, and of drawing mirth from incidents which occur every day, and from little peculiarities of temper and manner such as may be found in every man ? We feel the charm. We give ourselves up to it. But we strive in vain to analyze it. " The manner of Addison is as remote from that of Swift as from that of Voltaire. He neither laughs out like the French wit, nor, like the Irish wit, throws a double portion of severity into his countenance while laughing inly; but preserves a look peculiarly his own, — a look of demure severity, dis- turbed only by an arch sparkle of the eye, an almost imperceptible elevation of the brow, an almost imperceptible curl of the lip. We own that the humor of Addison is, in our opinion, of a more delicious flavor than the humor of either Swift or Voltaire. Thus much, at least, is certain, that both Swift and Voltaire have been successfully mimicked, and that no man has yet been able to mimic Addison. " But that which chiefly distinguishes Addison from Swift, from Voltaire, from almost all the other great masters of ridicule, is the grace, the noble- ness, the moral purity, which we find even in his merriment. Severity, gradually hardening and darkening into misanthropy, characterizes the works of Swift. The nature of Voltaire was, indeed, not inhuman ; but he vener- ated nothing. Neither in the masterpieces of art, nor in the purest examples of virtue ; neither in the Great First Cause, nor in the awful enigma of the grave, could he see anything but subjects for drollery. The more solemn and august the theme, the more monkey-like was his grimacing and chatter- ing. The mirth of Swift is the mirth of Mephistopheles ; the mirth of Vol- taire is the mirth of Puck. If, as Soame Jenyns oddly imagined, a portion of the happiness of seraphim and just men made perfect be derived from an exquisite perception of the ludicrous, their mirth must surely be none other than the mirth of Addison, — a mirth consistent with tender compassion for all that is frail, and with profound reverence for all that is sublime." 102 CATHCART'S LITERARY READER INDIAN TRADITIONS OF THE WORLD OF SPIRITS The American Indians believe that all creatures have souls, not only men and women, but brutes, vegetables, nay, even the most inanimate things, as stocks and stones. They believe the same of all the works of art, as of knives, boats, looking-glasses ; and that, as any of these things perish, their souls go into another world, which is inhabited by the ghosts of men and women. For this reason they always place by the corpse of their dead friend a bow and arrow, that he may make use of the souls of them in the other world, as he did of their wooden bodies in this. How absurd soever such an opinion as this may appear, our European philosophers have maintained several notions al- together as improbable. I shall only instance Albertus Magnus,^ who in his dissertation upon the loadstone, obser\dng that fire will destroy its magnetic virtues, tells us that he took particular no- tice of one as it lay glowing amidst an heap of burning coals, and that he perceived a certain blue vapor to arise from it, which he believed might be the substantial form ; that is, in our West-Indian phrase, the soul of the magnet. There is a tradition among the Indians, that one of their countrymen descended in a vision to the great repository of souls, or, as we call it here, to the other world ; and that upon his return he gave his friends a distinct account of everything he saw among those regions of the dead. A friend of mine, whom I have formerly mentioned, prevailed upon one of the inter- preters of the Indian kings, to inquire of them, if possible, what tradition they have among them of this matter; which, as w^ell as he could learn by those many questions w^hich he asked them at several times, was in substance as follows. The visionary,^ whose name was Marraton, after having trav- eled for a long space under an hollow mountain, arrived at length on the confines of this world of spirits, but could not enter 1 A Dominican friar and bishop of the twelfth century. He was an eminent mechanician and mathematician, and is said to have been a searcher after the philosopher's stone. ^ i. e. the dreamer ADDISON 103 it by reason of a thick forest made up of bushes, brambles, and pointed thorns, so interwoven with one another, that it was im- possible to find a passage through it. Whilst he was looking about for some track or pathway that might be worn in any part of it, he saw a huge lion couched ^ under the side of it, who kept his eye upon him in the same posture as when he watches for his prey. The Indian immediately started back, whilst the lion rose with a spring, and leaped towards him. Being wholly desti- tute of all other weapons, he stooped down to take up a huge stone in his hand ; but to his infinite surprise grasped nothing, and found the supposed stone to be only the apparition of one. If he was disappointed on this side, he was as much pleased on the other, when he found the lion, which had seized on his left shoulder, had no power to hurt him, and was only the ghost of that ravenous creature which it appeared to be. He no sooner got rid of his impotent enemy, but he marched up to the wood, and after having surveyed it for some time, en- deavored to press into one part of it that was a little thinner than the rest ; when again, to his great surprise, he found the bushes made no resistance, but that he walked through briers and bram- bles with the same ease as through the open air ; and, in short, that the whole wood was nothing else but a wood of shades. He immediately concluded that this huge thicket of thorns and brakes was designed as a kind of fence or quickset hedge to the ghosts it enclosed ; and that probably their soft substances might be torn by these subtle points and prickles, which were too weak to make any impressions in flesh and blood. With this thought he re- solved to travel through this intricate wood ; when by degrees he felt a gale of perfumes breathing upon him, that grew stronger and sweeter in proportion as he advanced. He had not pro- ceeded much farther, when he observed the thorns and briers to end, and give place to a thousand beautiful green trees covered with blossoms of the finest scents and colors, that formed a wilderness of sweets, and were a kind of lining to those rugged scenes which he had before passed through. As he was coming 1 couchant, recumbent 104 CATHCARTS LITERARY READER out of this delightful part of the wood, and entering upon the plains it enclosed, he saw several horsemen rushing by him, and a little while after heard the cry of a pack of dogs. He had not listened long before he saw the apparition of a milk-white steed, with a young man on the back of .it, advancing upon full stretch after the souls of about an hundred beagles, that were hunting down the ghost of an hare, which ran away before them with an unspeakable swiftness. As the man on the milk-white steed came by him, he looked upon him very attentively, and found him to be the young prince Nicharagua, who died about half a year be- fore, and by reason of his great virtues was at that time lamented over all the western parts of America. He had no sooner got out of the wood, but he was entertained with such a landscape of flowery plains, green meadows, running streams, sunny hills, and shady vales, as were not to be repre- sented by his own expressions, nor, as he said, by the concep- tions of others. This happy region was peopled with innumerable swarms of spirits, who applied themselves to exercises and diver- sions, according as their fancies led them. Some of them were tossing the figure of a coit ^ ; others were pitching the shadow of a bar ; others were breaking ^ the apparition of a horse ; and multitudes employing themselves upon ingenious handicrafts with the souls of departed utensils, for that is the name which in the Indian language they give their tools when they are burned or broken. As he traveled through this delightful scene, he was very often tempted to pluck the flowers that rose everywhere about him in the greatest variety and profusion, having never seen sev- eral ^ of them . in his own country ; but he quickly found, that though they were objects of his sight, they were not liable to^ his touch. He at length came to the side of a great river, and being a good fisherman himself, stood upon the banks of it some time to look upon an angler that had taken a great many shapes of fishes, which lay flouncing up and down by him. I should have told my reader that this Indian had been for- ^ quoit 3 having . . . several: Meaning? 2 taming, disciplining ^ liable to, here usedin the sense of "subject to " ADDISON 105 merly married to one of the greatest beauties of his country, by whom he had several children. This couple were so famous for their love and constancy to one another, that the Indians to this day, when they give a married man joy of his wife, wish they may live together like Marraton and Yaratilda. Marraton had not stood long by the fisherman, when he saw the shadow of his beloved Yaratilda, who had for some time fixed her eyes upon him before he discovered her. Her arms were stretched out towards him, floods of tears ran down her eyes ; her looks, her hands, her voice called him over to her ; and at the same time seemed to tell him that the river was impassable. Who can de- scribe the passion, made up of joy, sorrow, love, desire, aston- ishment, that rose in the Indian upon the sight of his dear Yaratilda? He could express it by nothing but his tears, which ran like a river down his cheeks as he looked upon her. He had not stood in this posture long, before he plunged into the stream that lay before him; and finding it to be nothing but the phan- tom of a river, walked on the bottom of it till he rose on the other side. At his approach Yaratilda flew into his arms, whilst Marraton wished himself disencumbered of that body which kept her from his embraces. After many questions and endearments on both sides, she conducted him to a bower which she had dressed with all the ornaments that could be met with in those blooming regions. She had made it gay beyond imagination, and was every day adding something new to it. As Marraton stood astonished at the unspeakable beauty of her habitation, and rav- ished with the fragrancy that came from every part of it, Yaratilda told him that she was preparing this bower for his reception, as well knowing that his piety to his God, and his faithful dealing towards men, would certainly bring him to that happy place whenever his life should be at an end. She then brought two of her children to him, who died some years before, and resided with her in the same delightful bower. The tradition tells us further, that he had afterwards a sight of those dismal habitations which are the portion of ill ^ men after 1 evil I06 CAT H CART'S LITERARY READER death ; and mentions several molten seas of gold into which were plunged the souls of barbarous Europeans, who put to the sword so many thousands of poor Indians for the sake of that precious metal. But having already touched upon the chief points of this tradition, and exceeded the measure of my paper, I shall not give any further account of it. THE SPACIOUS FIRMAMENT The spacious firmament on high. With all the blue ethereal sky, And spangled heavens, a shining frame, Their great Original ^ proclaim. The unwearied sun, from day to day. Does his Creator's power display, And publishes to every land The work of an Almighty hand. Soon as the evening shades prevail, The moon takes up the wondrous tale, And, nightly, to the listening earth, Repeats the story of her birth ; While all the stars that round her burn, And all the planets in their turn, Confirm the tidings as they roll, And spread the truth from pole to pole. What though, in solemn silence, all Move round the dark terrestrial ball? What though no real voice, nor sound, Amid their radiant orbs be found ? In reason's ear they all rejoice, And utter forth a glorious voice ; Forever singing, as they shine, " The hand that made us is divine." 1 Originator, Creator POPE 107 POPE 1 688- 1 744 Alexander Pope, the most eminent poet of his time, was born in 1688, and died in 1744. He inherited a considerable fortune and lived in studi- ous retirement in his villa at Twickenham. Afflicted with a bodily de- formity, concerning which he was keenly sensitive, he mingled but little in J.(fa]^ the great world, but contented himself with the society which sought him in his home. He was essentially a man of letters, giving his whole time and thought to literary pursuits. Notoriously petulant, a peculiarity which his feeble health goes far toward excusing, he was continually involved in quar- rels with contemporary writers; and some of his most brilliant verse was written under the inspiration of personal animosity. His most considerable work was the translation of Homer's " Iliad," which in some respects is unsurpassed by any previous or subsequent version. Of his original com- I08 CATHCART'S LITERARY READER positions "The Essay on Man " is that by which he is best known. From this work are taken the first two of our selections. Johnson, in his "Lives of the Poets," makes the following comparison between Pope and his great predecessor, Dryden : " Pope professed to have learned his poetry from Dryden, whom, whenever an opportunity was presented, he praised through his whole life with unvarying liberality ; and perhaps his character may receive some illustration if he be compared with his master. '' Integrity of understanding and nicety of discernment were not allotted in a less proportion to Dryden than to Pope. The rectitude of Dryden's mind was sufficiently shown by the dismission of his poetical prejudices, and the rejection of unnatural thoughts and rugged numbers. But Dryden never desired to apply all the judgment that he had. He wrote, and professed to write, merely for the people ; and when he pleased others, he contented himself. He spent no time in struggles to rouse latent powers ; he never attempted to make that better which was already good, nor often to mend what he must have known to be faulty. He wrote, as he tells us, with very little consideration. When occasion or necessity called upon him, he poured out what the present moment happened to supply, and, when once it had passed the press, ejected it from his mind ; for when he had no pecuniary interest, he had no further solicitude. " Pope was not content to satisfy ; he desired to excel, and therefore always endeavored to do his best. He did not court the candor, but dared the judgment, of his reader, and, expecting no indulgence from others, he showed none to himself- He examined lines and words with minute and punctilious observation, and retouched every part with indefatigable dili- gence, till he had left nothing to be forgiven. "Of genius — that power which constitutes a poet; that quality without which judgment is cold and knowledge is inert ; that energy which collects, combines, amplifies, and animates — the superiority must, with some hesita- tion, be allowed to Dryden. It is not to be inferred that of this poetical vigor Pope had only a little because Dryden had more ; for every other writer since Milton must give place to Pope ; and even of Dryden it must be said that if he has brighter paragraphs, he has not better poems. Dryden's performances were always hasty, either excited by some external occasion or extorted by domestic necessity. The dilatory caution of Pope enabled him to condense his sentiments, to multiply his images, and to accumulate all that study might produce or chance might supply. If the flights of Dryden, therefore, are higher. Pope continues longer on the wing. If of Dryden's fire the blaze is brighter, of Pope's the heat is more regular and constant. Dryden often surpasses expectation, and Pope never falls below it. Dryden is read with frequent astonishment, and Pope with perpetual delight." POPE 109 THE PRESENT CONDITION OF MAN VINDICATED Heaven from all creatures hides the book of Fate, All but the page prescribed, their present state ; From brutes what men, from men what spirits know, Or who could suffer being here below ? The lamb thy riot ^ dooms to bleed to- day, Had he thy reason, would he skip and play? Pleased to the last, he crops the iiowery food. And iicks the hand just raised to shed his blood. O bHndness to the future ! kindly given, That each may fill the circle marked by Heaven ; Who sees with equal eye, as God of all, A hero perish or a sparrow fall ; Atoms or systems into ruin hurled. And now a bubble burst, and now a world. Hope humbly, then ; with trembling pinions soar ; Wait the great teacher. Death ; and God adore. What future bliss. He gives not thee to know. But gives that hope to be thy blessing now. Hope springs eternal in the human breast ; Man never is, but always to be blest ; The soul, uneasy and confined from home, Rests and expatiates- in a hfe to come. Lo the poor Indian, whose untutored mind Sees God in clouds, or hears Him in the wind ; His soul proud Science never taught to stray Far as the solar walk ^ or milky way ; Yet simple Nature to his hope has given, Behind the cloud-topped hill, an humbler heaven ; Some safer world in depth of woods embraced. Some happier island in the watery waste. 1 feasting ; an obsolete meaning 2 roves at will 3 walk; /. e. track, — put for the courses of the planets no CATHCART'S LITERARY READER Where slaves once more their native land behold, No fiends torment, no Christians thirst for gold. To BE, contents his natural desire, He asks no angel's wing, no seraph's fire : But thinks, admitted to that equal sky, His faithful dog shall bear him company. Go, wiser thou ! and in thy scale of sense Weigh thy opinion against Providence ; Call imperfection what thou fanciest such, Say, here He gives too little, there too much : Destroy all creatures for thy sport or gust,^ Yet cry, if Man 's unhappy, God 's unjust ; If man alone engross not Heaven's high care, Alone made perfect here, immortal there : Snatch from His hand the balance and the rod, Rejudge His justice, be the god of God. In pride, in reasoning pride, our error Hes ; All quit their sphere, and rush into the skies. Pride still is aiming at the blest abodes, Men would be angels, angels would be gods. Aspiring to be gods, if angels fell. Aspiring to be angels, men rebel : And who but wishes to revert ^ the laws Of order sins against th' Eternal Cause. GREATNESS Honor and shame from no condition rise ; Act well your part, there all the honor lies. Fortune in men has some small difference made One flaunts in rags, one flutters in brocade ; The cobbler aproned, and the parson gowned, The friar hooded, and the monarch crowned. 1 gratification ^ reverse POPE III '' What differ more," you cry, '' than crown and cowl? " I '11 tell you, friend ! a wise man and a fool. You '11 find, if once the monarch acts the monk. Or, cobbler-like, the parson will be drunk, Worth makes the man, and want of it the fellow : The rest is all but leather or prunella.^ Go ! if your ancient but ignoble blood Has crept through scoundrels ever since the flood, Go ! and pretend your family is young, Nor own your fathers have been fools so long. What can ennoble sots or slaves or cowards? Alas ! not all the blood of all the Howards. Look next on greatness ! say where greatness lies ? "Where, but among the heroes and the wise?" Heroes are much the same, the point 's agreed, From Macedonia's madman to the Swede ; ^ The whole strange purpose of their lives, to find Or make an enemy of all mankind ! Not one looks backward, onward still he goes. Yet ne'er looks forward farther than his nose. No less alike the politic and wise ; All sly slow things, with circumspective eyes : Men in their loose unguarded hours they take. Not that themselves are wise, but others weak. But grant that those can conquer, these can cheat ; 'T is phrase absurd to call a villain great : Who wickedly is wise, or madly brave. Is but the more a fool, the more a knave. Who noble ends by noble means obtains, Or, failing, smiles in exile or in chains. Like good Aurehus ^ let him reign, or bleed ^ Like Socrates, that man is great indeed. 1 a kind of woolen stuff 2 The allusion is to Alexander the Great and Charles XII. of Sweden. ^ Marcus Aurelius Antoninus, the Roman emperor ^ bleed, perish, die 112 CATHCARTS LITERARY READER ELEGY TO THE MEMORY OF AN UNFORTUNATE LADYi What beckoning ghost along the moonhght shade Invites my steps, and points to yonder glade ? 'T is she ! — but why that bleeding bosom gored, Why dimly gleams the visionary sword? O ever beauteous, ever friendly ! tell. Is it, in heaven, a crime to love too well? To bear too tender, or too firm a heart? To act a lover's, or a Roman's part ? Is there no bright reversion - in the sky For those who greatly think, or bravely die ? Why bade ye else, ye Powers, her soul aspire Above the vulgar flight of low desire ? Ambition first spnmg from your blest abodes ; The glorious fault of angels and of gods ; Thence to their images on earth it flows. And in the breasts of kings and heroes glows. Most souls, 't is true, but peep out once an age. Dull, sullen prisoners in the body's cage : Dim lights of life, that burn a length of years Useless, unseen, as lamps in sepulchers ; Like eastern kings a lazy state they keep. And, close confined to their own palace, sleep. From these perhaps (ere Nature bade her die) Fate snatched her early to the pitying sky. 1 This Elegy, published in 17 17, is one of Pope's most consummate efforts, and in pathetic power surpasses any other poem of his. Much conjecture and investigation as to the identity of the "Unfortunate Lady" have resulted in the general conclusion among critics that the situation upon which the poem is based is fictitious. Yet certitude is lacking ; and consid- ering the gravity of the theme, and the fine ardor and delicate pathos of the piece, it is difficult to believe that art so perfect would disguise itself in need- less artifice. 2 future reward POPE As into air the purer spirits flow, And sep'rate from their kindred dregs below ; So flew her soul to its congenial place, Nor left one virtue to redeem her race. But thou, false guardian of a charge too good, Thou, mean deserter of thy brother's blood ! See on these ruby lips the trembhng breath, These cheeks now fading at the blast of death : Cold is that breast which warmed the world before. And those love-darting eyes must roll no more. Thus, if eternal justice rules the ball, Thus shall your wives, and thus your children fall ; On all the line a sudden vengeance waits. And frequent hearses shall besiege your gates. There passengers shall stand, and, pointing, say, (While the long funerals blacken all the way) " Lo these were they whose souls the Furies steeled. And cursed with hearts unknowing how to yield. Thus unlamented pass the proud away, The gaze of fools, and pageant of a day ! So perish all whose breast ne'er learned to glow For others' good, or melt at others' woe." What can atone, O ever-injured shade. Thy fate unpitied, and thy rites unpaid ? No friend's complaint, no kind domestic tear Pleased thy pale ghost, or graced thy mournful bier. •By foreign hands thy dying eyes were closed, By foreign hands thy decent limbs composed. By foreign hands thy humble grave adorned, By strangers honored, and by strangers mourned ! What though no friends in sable weeds appear. Grieve for an hour, perhaps, then mourn a year, And bear about the mockery of woe To midnight dances, and the public show? What though no weeping Loves thy ashes grace, Nor polished marble emulate thy face ? 8 113 114 CATHCART'S LITERARY READER What though no sacred earth allow thee room, Nor hallowed dirge be muttered o'er thy tomb ? Yet shall thy grave with rising flowers be drest, And the green turf lie lightly on thy breast : There shall the morn her earliest tears bestow, There the first roses of the year shall blow ; While angels with their silver wings o'ershade The ground, now sacred by thy reliques made. So, peaceful, rests, without a stone, a name. What once had beauty, titles, wealth and fame. How loved, how honored once, avails thee not, To whom related, or by whom begot ; A heap of dust alone remains of thee, T is all thou art, and all the proud shall be ! Poets themselves must fall, like those they sung. Deaf the praised ear, and mute the tuneful tongue. E'en he, whose soul now melts in mournful lays. Shall shortly want the generous tear he pays ; Then from his closing eyes thy form shall part. And the last pang shall tear thee from his heart, Life's idle business at one gasp be o'er, The muse forgot, and thou be loved no more. ON THE POET GAY, IN WESTMINSTER ABBEY Of manners gentle, of affections mild ; In wit a man ; simplicity, a child : . . . Above temptation in a low estate. And uncorrupted e'en among the great : A safe companion, and an easy friend, Unblamed through life, lamented in thy end — These are thy honors ! not that here thy bust Is mixed with heroes, or with kings thy dust ■ But that the worthy and the good shall say, Striking their pensive bosoms, " Here lies Gay." FRANKLIN IIS FRANKLIN 1 706-1 790 Benjamin Franklin was born in Boston, Mass., in the year 1706, the youngest son and the youngest child but two in a family of seventeen chil- dren. His father, who was a tallow-chandler by trade, at first designed his youngest son for the ministry of religion; and accordingly sent the lad for a year to the grammar-school of his native place, and afterwards for some time to a private instructor; but finding that his straitened means would not en- able him to carry out his first intention, he set the boy at work as an assistant in his own business. This employment was one that young Franklin found very irksome. He himself tells how he can not remember a time when he was unable to read, and how from his earliest years he was always "of a bookish inclination." Partly to gratify this inclination, and partly to make Il6 CATHCART'S LITERARY READER the most convenient disposition for his son, Franklin's father bound him apprentice, at the age of eleven, to an elder brother, James by name, who was a printer. For the five or six years following, Benjamin worked at his trade in his brother's office, devoting his leisure to reading, and especially to endeavors to perfect himself in the art of putting his thoughts on paper, of which he says he was " extremely ambitious." To his reading, at this time, of Cotton Mather's " Essays to do Good," he modestly attributes his lifelong inclination to works of utility and beneficence. During the years of his apprenticeship his brother James treated him with rigor, and even with cruelty. Of this, in old age, Franklin said : " I fancy his harsh and tyrannical treatment of me might have been a means of impressing me with that aversion to arbitrary power that has stuck to me through my whole life." At last the boy ran away, taking ship to New York, and thence to Philadelphia, where he heard there might be employment for him at his trade. This was in October, 1723. Being by nature prudent and by training thrifty, Franklin found himself at the age of thirty well established in business in the city of his adoption, and he now began to take an active interest in public affairs. His counsels were so sagacious and his services so useful that step by step he rose in popular esteem, holding in succession many offices of influence and trust, until in 1757 he was sent to London as the agent of the Pennsylvania Plan- tations. Here his labors in behalf of the people of Pennsylvania were so shrewdly directed and so influential that one after another all the Ameri- can colonies put him in charge of their interests. Unable, however, to avert the conflict which he foresaw and foretold, Franklin returned home on the eve of the Revolutionary War. But his stay in America was short, for he undertook a mission to Paris, as the agent of the revolted colonies, to secure the alliance and support of France. This accomplished, he took up his residence in that country as American ambassador, remaining till he had negotiated the treaty in which the independence of the United States was acknowledged. Franklin died in Philadelphia in April, 1790. His works are voluminous, consisting of letters on philosophical subjects, on which a large part of his fame rests, essays and tracts, moral, historical, political, and commercial, and his Autobiography, from which our selection is taken. Lord Jeffrey thus characterizes Franklin : — "In one point of view, the name of Franklin must be considered as standing higher than any of the others which illustrated the eighteenth century. Distinguished as a statesman, he was equally great as a philoso- pher, thus uniting in himself a rare degree of excellence in both those pur- suits, to excel in either of which is deemed the highest praise. Nor was his pre-eminence in the one pursuit of that doubtful kind which derives its value from such an uncommon conjunction. His efforts in each were suffi- cient to have made him greatly famous had he done nothing in the other. Much as has been given to the world of this great man's works, each succes- sive publication increases our esteem for his virtues, and our admiration of FRANKLIN 11/ his understanding. The distinguishing feature of his understanding was great soundness and sagacity, combined with extraordinary quickness of penetration. He possessed also a strong and lively imagination, which gave his speculations, as well as his conduct, a singularly original turn. The peculiar charm of his writings, and his great merit, also, in action, consisted in the clearness with which he saw his object, and the bold and steady pur- suit of it by the surest and the shortest road. He never suffered himself in conduct to be turned aside by the seductions of interest or vanity, or to be scared by hesitation and fear, or to be misled by the arts of his adversaries. Neither did he, in discussion, ever go out of his way in search of ornament, or stop short from dread of the consequences. He never could be caught, in short, acting absurdly or writing nonsensically. At all times, and in everything he undertook, the vigor of an understanding at once original and practical was distinctly perceivable. " His style has all the vigor and even conciseness of Swift, without any of his harshness. It is in no degree more flowery, yet both elegant and lively. The wit, or rather humor, which prevails in his works, varies with the sub- ject. Sometimes he is bitter and sarcastic ; oftener gay, and even droll, re- minding us in this respect far more frequently of Addison than of Swift, as might be naturally expected from his admirable temper or the happy turn of his imagination. When he rises into vehemence or severity, it is only when his country or the rights of men are attacked, or when the sacred ties of humanity are violated by unfeeling or insane rulers. There is nothing more delightful than the constancy with which those amiable feelings, those sound principles, those truly profound views of human affairs make their appear- ance at every opportunity, whether the immediate subject be speculative or practical, of a political or of a more general description." REMEMBRANCES OF MY BOYHOOD ^ I Dear Son,^ — I have ever had pleasure in obtainmg any Httle anecdotes of my ancestors. Imagining it may be equally agree- able to you to know the circumstances of my life, I sit down to write them for you. To which I have besides some other inducements. Having emerged from the poverty and obscurity in which I was born and bred to a state of affluence and some 1 from Franklin's Autobiography, begun in 1771 '^ William Franklin, then Governor of New Jersey Il8 CATHCART'S LITERARY READER degree of reputation in the world, and having gone so far through Hfe with a considerable share of fehcity, the conducing means I made use of (which with the blessing of God so well suc- ceeded), my posterity may like to know, as they may find some of them suitable to their own situations, and therefore fit to be imitated. , . . Hereby, too, I shall indulge the inclination, so natural in old men, to be talking of themselves and their own past actions ; and I shall indulge it without being tiresome to others who through respect to age might conceive themselves obliged to give me a hearing ; since this may be read or not as any one pleases. And lastly (I may as well confess it, since my denial of it will be believed by nobody), perhaps I shall a good deal gratify my own vanity. Indeed, I scarce ever heard or saw the introductory words, " Without vanity, 1 may say," etc., but some vain thing immediately followed. Most people dislike vanity in others, whatever share they have of it themselves ; but I give it fair quarter wherever I meet with it, being persuaded that it is often productive of good to the possessor, and to others that are within his sphere of action ; and therefore in many cases it would not be altogether absurd if a man were to thank God for his vanity among the other comforts of life. . . . My elder brothers were all put apprentices to different trades. I was put to the grammar-school at eight years of age, my father intending to devote me, as the tithe i of his sons, to the service of the church. My early readiness in learning to read (which must have been very early, as 1 do not remember when I could not read), and the opinion of all his friends that I should cer- tainly make a good scholar, encouraged him in this purpose of his. My uncle Benjamin, too, approved of it, and proposed to give me all his short-hand volumes of sermons, I suppose as a stock to set up with, if I would learn his character.'-^ I continued, however, at the grammar-school not quite one year, though in 1 /y///^, literally " tenth," — a humorous reference to his father's ten sons '^ i. e., his system of short-hand. Franklin elsewhere says, " He had formed a short-hand of his own, which he taught me." FRANKLIN 1 19 that time I had risen gradually from the middle of the class ot that year to be the head of it, and, further, was removed into the next class above it, in order to go with that into the third at the end of the year. But my father, in the meantime, from a view of the expense of a college education, which, having so large a f.imily, he could not well afford, and the mean living many so educated were afterwards able to obtain, — reasons that he gave to his friends in my hearing, — altered his first intention, took me from the grammar-school, and sent me to a school for writing and arithmetic, kept by a then famous man, Mr. George Brownell, very successful in his profession generally, and that by mild, en- couraging methods. Under him I acquired fair writing pretty soon, but I failed in the arithmetic, and made no progress in it. At ten years old I was taken home to assist my father in his business, which was that of a tallow-chandler^ and soap-boiler, — a business he was not bred to, but had assumed on his arrival in New England,^ and on finding his dyeing trade would not main- tain his family, being in little request. ^Accordingly, I was em- ployed in cutting wick for the candles, filling the dipping- mold and the molds for cast candles, attending the shop, going of errands, etc. I disliked the trade, and had a strong inclination for the sea ; but my father declared against it. However, living near the water, I was much in and about it, learned early to swim well and to manage boats ; and when in a boat or canoe with other boys, I was commonly allowed to govern, especially in any case of difficulty. And upon other occasions I was generally a leader among the boys, and sometimes led them into scrapes, of which I will mention one instance, as it shows an early projecting ^ public spirit, though not then justly conducted. There was a salt marsh that bounded part of the mill-pond, on the edge of which, at high- water, we used to stand to fish for 1 Compare the etymology oi candle and kindle. - "Josiah, my father, married young, and carried his wife, with three children, into New England about 1682." Their former home had been at Eton, in Northamptonshire, England. ^ projecting = full of projects I20 CATHCART'S LITERARY READER minnows. By much trampling, we had made it a mere quag- mire. My proposal was to build a wharf there fit for us to stand upon, and I showed my comrades a large heap of stones which were intended for a new house near the marsh, and which would very w^ell suit our purpose. Accordingly, in the evening, when the workmen were gone, I assembled a number of my play- fellows, and working with them diligendy, like so many emmets, sometimes two or three to a stone, we brought them all away and built our little wharf. The next morning the workmen were surprised at missing the stones, which were found in our wharf. Inquiry was made after the removers ; we were discovered, and complained of ; several of us were corrected by our fathers ; and though I pleaded the usefulness of the work, mine convinced me that nothing was useful which was not honest. . . . I continued thus employed in my father's business for two years, — that is, till I was twelve years old ; and my brother John, who was bred to that business, having left my father, married, and set up for himself at Rhode Island, there was all appearance that I was destined to supply his place and become a tallow- chandler. But my dislike to the trade continuing, my father was under apprehensions that if he did not find one for me more agree- able, I should break away and get to sea, as his son Josiah had done, to his great vexation. He therefore sometimes took me to walk with him and see joiners, bricklayers, turners, braziers, etc., at their work, that he might observe my inclination and endeavor to fix it on some trade or other on land. It has ever since been a pleasure to me to see good workmen handle their tools ; and it has been useful to me, having learned so much by it as to be able to do little jobs myself in my house when a workman could not readily be got, and to construct little machines for my ex- periments while the intention of making the experiment was fresh and warm in my mind. ... From a child I was fond of reading, and all the little money that came into my hands was ever laid out in books. Pleased with the " Pilgrim's Progress," my first collection was of John Bunyan's works, in separate little volumes. I afterwards sold FRANKLIN 121 them to enable me to buy R. Burton's '' Historical Collections; " they were small chapmen's ^ books, and cheap, forty or fifty in all. My father's little library consisted chiefly of books in po- lemic divinity, most of which I read, and have since often re- gretted that, at a time when I had such a thirst for knowledge, more proper ^ books had not fallen in my way, since it was now resolved I should not be a clergyman. " Plutarch's Lives " there was, in which I read abundantly, and I still think that time spent to great advantage. There was also a book of De Foe's, called an "Essay on Projects," and another of Dr. Mather's, called " Essays to do Good," which perhaps gave me a turn of thinking that had an influence on some of the principal future events of my life. This bookish inclination at length determined my father to make me a printer, though he had already one son (James) of that profession. In 171 7 my brother James returned from Eng- land with a press and letters, to set up his business in Boston. I liked it much better than that of my father, but still had a han- kering for the sea. To prevent the apprehended effect of such an inclination, my father was impatient to have me bound to my brother. I stood out some time, but at last was persuaded, and signed the indentures when I was yet but twelve years old. I was to serve as an apprentice ^ till I was twenty-one years of age, only I was to be allowed journeyman's wages during the last year. In a little time I made great proficiency in the busi- ness, and became a useful hand to my brother, I now had ac- cess to better books. An acquaintance with the apprentices of booksellers enabled me sometimes to borrow a small one, which I was careful to return soon and clean. Often I sat up in my room reading the greatest part of the night, when the book was borrowed in the evening and to be returned early in the morning, lest it should be missed or wanted. 1 chapmen, peddlers ; that is, cheap editions of books for popular sale by hawkers and peddlers 2 suitable 3 From Lat. apprehendere, "to take hold of" (with the mind), to learn; compare apprehended, two sentences above. 122 CATHCART'S LITERARY READER And after some time an mgenious ^ tradesman, Mr. Matthew Adams, who had a pretty collection of books, and who frequented our printing-house, took notice of me, invited me to his library, and very kindly lent me such books as I chose to read. I now took a fancy to poetry, and made some little pieces. My brother, thinking it might turn to account, encouraged me, and put me on composing occasional ballads. One was called " The Lighthouse Tragedy," and contained an account of the drowning of Captain Worthilake, with his two daughters ; the other was a sailor's song, on the taking of Teach (or Blackbeard), the pirate. They were wretched stuff, in the Grub Street ^ ballad style ; and when they were printed he sent me about the town to sell them. The first sold wonderfully, the event being recent, having made a great noise. This flattered my vanity ; but my father discouraged me by ridiculing my performances and telling me verse-makers were generally beggars. So I escaped being a poet, — most probably a very bad one ; but as prose-wTiting has been of great use to me in the course of my life, and was a principal means of my advancement, I shall tell you how, in such a situation, I acquired what little ability I have in that way. II There was another bookish lad in the town, John Collins by name, with whom I was intimately acquainted. We sometimes disputed, and very fond we were of argument, and very desirous of confuting ^ one another, — which disputatious turn, by the way, is apt to become a very bad habit, making people often extremely disagreeable in company, by the contradiction that is necessary to bring it into practice ; and thence, besides souring and spoiling the conversation, is productive of disgust, and perhaps enmities 1 This word was once much used in cases where we write ingeiiiions. 2 This was a London street of two hundred years ago, the home of literary hacks; hence, the name was one of contempt. ^ Define dispute, argue, confute. FRAhlKLlN 123 where you may have occasion for friendship. Persons of good sense, I have since observed, seldom fall into it, except lawyers, university men, and men of all sorts that have been bred at Edinborough. . . . About this time I met with an odd volume of the " Spectator." ^ It was the third. I had never before seen any of them. I bought it, read it over and over, and was much delighted with it. I thought the writing excellent, and wished, if possible, to imitate it. With this view I took some of the papers, and mak- ing short hints of the sentiment in each sentence, laid them by a few days, and then, without looking at the book, tried to com- plete the papers again by expressing each hinted sentiment at length, and as fully as it had been expressed before, in any suita- ble words that should come to hand. Then I compared my "Spectator" with the original, discovered some of my faults, and corrected them. But I found I wanted a stock of words, or a readiness in recollecting and using them, which I thought I should have acquired before that time if I had gone on making verses ; since the continual occasion for words of the same im- port, but of different length, to suit the measure, or of different sound for the rhyme, would have laid me under a constant ne- cessity of searching for variety, and also have tended to fix that variety in my mind and make me master of it. Therefore I took some of the tales and turned them into verse, and after a time, when I had pretty well forgotten the prose, turned them back again. I also sometimes jumbled my collections of hints into confusion, and after some weeks endeavored to reduce ^ them into the best order, before I began to form the full sen- tences and complete the paper. This was to teach me method in the arrangement of thoughts. By comparing my work after- wards with the original, I discovered many faults and amended them ; but I sometimes had the pleasure of fancying that, in certain particulars of small import, I had been lucky enough to improve the method or the language ; and this encouraged me 1 See page 89 ■2 reduce, here used literally = bring back 124 CATHCARTS LITERARY READER to think I might possibly in time come to be a tolerable Eng- lish writer, of which I was extremely ambitious. My time for these exercises and for reading was at night, after work, or be- fore it began in the morning, or on Sundays, when I contrived to be in the printing-house alone, evading as much as I could the common attendance on public worship which my father used to exact of me when I was under his care, and which indeed I still thought a duty, though I could not, as it seemed to me, afford time to practice it. . . . While I was intent on improving my language, I met with an English grammar (I think it was Greenwood's), at the end of which there was^ two little sketches of the arts of rhetoric and logic, the latter finishing with a dispute in the Socratic method ; and, soon after, I procured Xenophon's " Memorable Things of Socrates," wherein are many instances of the same method. I found this method safest for myself and very embarrassing to those against whom I used it ; therefore I took a delight in it, practiced it continually, and grew very artful and expert in draw- ing people, even of superior knowledge, into concessions, the consequences of which they did not foresee, entangling them in difficulties out of which they could not extricate themselves, and so obtaining victories that neither myself nor my cause always deserved. I continued this method some few years, but gradually left it, retaining only the habit of expressing myself in terms of modest diffidence ; never using, when I advanced anything that may pos- sibly be disputed, the words certainly, undotibtedly, or any others that give the air of positiveness to an opinion, but rather say, I conceive or apprehend a thing to be so and so ; it appears to me, or, 1 should think it so or so, for such and such reasons ; or, / imagine it to be so ; or, it is so, ij I am not mistaken. This habit, I believe, has been of great advantage to me when I have had occasion to inculcate my opinions, and persuade men into measures that I have been from time to time engaged in pro- moting ; and as the chief ends of conversation are to inform or ^ This was permissible usage in Franklin's day. FRAhlKLIN 125 to be informed, to please or to persuade, I wish well-meaning, sen- sible men would not lessen their power of doing good by a posi- tive, assuming manner, that seldom fails to disgust, tends to create opposition, and to defeat every one of those purposes for which speech was given us, — to wit, giving or receiving infor- mation or pleasure. For if you would inform, a positive and dogmatical manner m advancing your sentiments may provoke contradiction and prevent a candid attention. If you wish in- formation and improvement from the knowledge of others, and yet at the same time express yourself as firmly fixed in your present opinions, modest, sensible men, who do not love dispu- tation, will probably leave you undisturbed in possession of your error. And by such a manner, you can seldom hope to recom- mend yourself in pleasing your hearers, or to persuade those whose concurrence you desire. ... My brother had, in 1720 or 1721, begun to print a news- paper. It was the second that appeared in America, and was called the New England Conrant. The only one before it was the Boston News- Letter} I remember his being dissuaded by some of his friends from the undertaking, as not likely to succeed, one newspaper being, in their judgment, enough for America. At this time there are not less than five-and-twenty. He went on, however, with the undertaking, and after having worked in composing the types and printing off the sheets, I was employed to carry the papers through the streets to the customers. He had some ingenious men among his friends, who amused themselves by writing little pieces for this paper, which gained it credit and made it more in demand, and these gentlemen often visited us. Hearing their conversations, and their ac- counts of the approbation their papers were received with, I was excited to try my hand among them ; but being still a boy, and 1 This was written from recollection, after the lapse of half a century. The Boston Gazette and the (Philadelphia) American Weekly Mercury wexQ both commenced in 17 19. The New England Conrant was therefore the fourth newspaper that appeared in America. 126 CATHCARTS LITERARY READER suspecting that my brother would object to printing anything of mine in his paper if he knew it to be mine, I contrived to dis- guise my hand, and, writing an anonymous paper, I put it in at night under the door of the printing-house. It was found in the morning and communicated to his writing friends when they called in as usual. They read it, commented on it in my hear- ing, and I had the exquisite pleasure of finding it met with their approbation, and that in their different guesses at the author, none were named but men of some character ^ among us for learning and ingenuity. I suppose now that I was rather lucky in my judges, and that perhaps they were not really so very good ones as I then esteemed them. Encouraged, however, by this, I wrote and conveyed in the same way to the press several more papers, which were equally approved ; and I kept my secret till my small fund of sense ^ for such performances was pretty well exhausted, and then I dis- covered ^ it, when I began to be considered "^ a little more by my brother's acquaintance, and in a manner that did not quite please him, as he thought, probably with reason, that it tended to make me too vain. And perhaps this might be one occasion of the differences that we began to have about this time. Though a brother, he considered himself as my master, and me as his apprentice ; and, accordingly, expected the same service from me as he would from another, while I thought he demeaned me too much in some he required of me, who from a brother expected more indulgence. Our disputes were often brought before our father, and I fancy I was either generally in the right, or else a better pleader, because the judgment was generally in my favor. But my brother was passionate, and had often beaten me, which I took extremely amiss ; and, thinking my appren- ticeship very tedious, I was continually wishing for some oppor- * reputation 2 sense, ability, capacity ^ This verb was generally used in Franklin's time in the sense of to show, to make kno7vn. 4 to be considered, to be regarded with consideration, to be respected FRANKLIN 1 27 tunity of shortening it, which at length offered in a manner unexpected. One of the pieces in our newspaper on some pohtical point, which I have now forgotten, gave offense to the Assembly. He was taken up, censured, and imprisoned for a month, by the Speaker's warrant, — I suppose, because he would not discover his author. I too was taken up and examined before the council ; but though I did not give them any satisfaction, they contented themselves with admonishing me, and dismissed me, considering me, perhaps, as an apprentice who was bound to keep his master's secrets. During my brother's confinement, which I resented a good deal, notwithstanding our private differences, I had the manage- ment of the paper; and I made bold to give our rulers some rubs in it, which my brother took very kindly, while others be- gan to consider me in an unfavorable light, as a young genius that had a turn for libeling and satire. My brother's discharge was accompanied with an order of the House (a very odd one), *' that James Franklin should no longer print the paper called the New England Couranty There was a consultation held in our printing-house among his friends what he should do in this case. Some proposed to evade ^ the order by changing the name of the paper ; but my brother seeing inconveniences in that, it was finally concluded on as a better way, to let it be printed for the future under the name of Benjamin Fr-a.nklin ; and to avoid ^ the censure of the Assembly, that might fall on him as still printing it by his apprentice, the contrivance was that my old indenture should be returned to me, with a full discharge on the back of it, to be shown on occasion ; ^ but to secure to him the benefit of my service, I was to sign new indentures for the remainder of the term, which were to be kept private. A very flimsy scheme it was ; however, it was imme- 1 evade . . . avoid; discriminate these verbs. - Compare case in the first sentence of this paragraph. What is the etymology ? 128 CATHCARTS LITERARY READER diately executed, and the paper went on accordingly, under my name, for several months. At length a fresh difference arising between my brother and me, T took upon me to assert my freedom, presuming that he would not venture to produce the new indentures. It was not fair in me to take this advantage, and this I therefore reckon one of the first errata^ of my life ; but the unfairness of it weighed little with me when under the impressions of resentment for the blows his passion too often urged him to bestow upon me, though he was otherwise not an ill-natured man : perhaps I was too saucy and provoking. When he found I would leave him, he took care to prevent my getting employment in any other printing-house of the town, by going round and speaking to every master, who accordingly re- fused to give me work. I then thought of going to New York, as the nearest place where there was a printer; and I was rather^ inclined to leave Boston when I reflected that I had already made myself a little obnoxious to the governing party. I determined on the point, but my father now residing with my brother, I was sensible that if I attempted to go openly, means would be used to prevent me. My friend Collins, therefore, undertook to man- age a little for me. He agreed with the captain of a New York sloop for my passage. So I sold some of my books to raise a little money, was taken on board privately, and as we had a fair wind, in three days I found myself in New York, — near three hundred miles from home, a boy of but seventeen, without the least recommendation to or knowledge of any person in the place, and with very little money in my pocket. 1 Account for Franklin's use of this technical term. 2 rather, more willingly. Etymology .'' and see the adjective rathe, Milton, page 71 JOHNSON 29 SAMUEL JOHNSON 1 709-1 784 Samuel Johnson, a distinguished figure in the English literature of his time, was born in 1709 and died in 1784. He compiled a well-known " Dictionary of the English Language," and wrote verse, essays, and biog- raphies, including his celebrated " Lives of the Poets." He was the con- temporary of Goldsmith, Burke, Sheridan, and many famous literary men appearance," with a suggestion of the pre- ternatural. Wordsworth here uses it to signify a spirit of almost super- natural beauty, — a new shade of meaning; and this line is quoted by Webster to illustrate it. 14 2IO CATHCART'S LITERARY READER Her eyes as stars of twilight fair ; Like twilight's, too, her dusky hair ; But all things else about her drawn From May-time and the cheerful dawn ; A dancing shape, an image gay, To haunt, to startle, and waylay. I saw her upon nearer view, A spirit, yet a woman too ! Her household motions light and free, And steps of virgin-liberty ; A countenance in which did meet Sweet records, promises as sweet ; A creature not too bright or good P'or human nature's daily food. For transient sorrows, simple wiles, Praise, blame, love, kisses, tears, and smiles. And now I see with eye serene The very pulse of the machine ; A being breathing thoughtful breath, A traveler between life and death : The reason firm, the temperate will, Endurance, foresight, strength, and skill ; A perfect woman, nobly planned To warn, to comfort, and command ; And yet a spirit still, and bright With something of an angel light. SCOTT 211 SCOTT T771-1832 Sir Walter Scott, the most famous of historical novelists, was born in Edinburgh in 177 1, and died in 1832. He studied at the University of Edin- burgh, read law, and in 1792 was called to the Bar. In 1799 he was appointed sheriff, in 1806 was made clerk of the Court of Session, and in 1820, when he was forty-nine years old, received a baronetcy. His first literary effort -^^/Zk.,.^^^ 7^>c^ was a translation of some of Burger's ballads, which was published in 1796. Other translations followed, with three or four original poems ; but not until 1805 did Scott attain the place of literary eminence which he afterwards held and adorned. His first great success was " The Lay of the Last Minstrel," which appeared in that year, and was received with almost universal praise. " Marmlon," " The Lady of the Lake," " Rokeby," and other poems were issued in quick succession, each confirming his poetical reputation and spreading his fame. But Scott is better known to the world as a novelist 212 CATHCART'S LITERARY READER than as a poet. In 1814 " Waverley " was published at Edmburgh, and instantly attracted attention. No author's name appeared on the title-page, and the public was left in doubt as to the source of so brilliant a book. This was naturally increased, the next year, by the appearance of "Guy Mannering," and, at brief intervals, of its successors. Scott was suspected of the authorship of these books, but stoutly denied it ; and not till many years later did he admit the fact. In all the history of literature there is no record of such labors as his ; one admires with equal warmth his lofty sense of honor, his unyielding forti- tude, and his almost superhuman power of application, all shown under the burden of most grievous difficulties. The secret of Scott's success may be said to lie in his felicitous employment of common topics, images, and expressions. No writer before him had so vividly illustrated the character- istics of Scottish life and character. Not conspicuously surpassing all other novelists in single qualities, Scott yet possessed and combined all the qualities necessary for his work in nice and harmonious adjustment. While his novels fascinate us with all the charms of romance, they are also a store- house of information as to the life of the times they treat of Hutton, in his Life of Scott, thus comments on this aspect of the novel- ist's work : — " The most striking feature of Scott's romances is that, for the most part, they are pivoted on public rather than mere private interests and passions. With but few exceptions, — 'The Antiquary,' 'St. Ronan's Well,' and 'Guy Mannering' are the most important, — Scott's novels give us an imaginative view, not of mere individuals, but of individuals as they are affected by the public strifes and social divisions of the age. And this it is which gives his books so large an interest for old and young, soldiers and statesmen, the w-orld of society and the recluse alike. You can hardly read any novel of Scott's and not become better aware what public life and politi- cal issues mean. And yet there is no artificiality, no elaborate attitudinizing before the antique mirrors of the past, like Bulwer's, no dressing-out of clothes-horses like G. P. R. James. The boldness and freshness of the present are carried back into the past, and you see Papists and Puritans, Cavaliers and Roundheads, Jews, Jacobites, and freebooters, preachers, schoolmasters, mercenary soldiers, gypsies, and beggars, all living the sort of life which the reader feels that in their circumstances, and under the same conditions of time and place and parentage, he might have lived too. Indeed, no man can read Scott without being more of a public man, whereas the ordinary novel tends to make its readers rather less of one than before." SCOTT 213 SIR WALTER RALEIGH AND QUEEN ELIZABETH 1 At this moment the gates opened, and ushers began to issue forth in array, preceded and flanked by the band of Gentlemen Pensioners.^ After this, amid a crowd of lords and ladies, yet so disposed around her that she could see and be seen on all sides, came Elizabeth herself, then in the full glow of what in a sover- eign was called beauty, and who would in the lowest walk of life have been truly judged to possess a noble figure, joined to a striking and commanding physiognomy. She leant on the arm of Lord Hunsdon, whose relation to her by her mother's side often procured him such distinguished marks of Elizabeth's friendship. The young cavalier we have so often mentioned ^ had probably never yet approached so near the person of his sovereign, and he pressed forward as far as the line of warders permitted, in order to avail himself of the present opportunity. His companion, on the contrary, cursing his imprudence, kept pulling him backward, till Walter shook him off impatiently, letting his rich cloak drop carelessly from one shoulder ; a natural action, which served, however, to display to the best advantage his well-proportioned person. Unbonneting * at the same time, he fixed his eager gaze on the queen's approach, with a mixture of respectful curiosity and modest yet ardent admiration, which suited so well with his fine features that the warders, struck with his rich attire and noble countenance, suffered him to approach the ground over which the queen was to pass, somewhat closer than was permitted to ordi- nary spectators. Thus the adventurous youth stood full in Elizabeth's eye, — an eye never indifferent to the admiration which she deservedly excited among her subjects, or to the fair proportions of exter- nal form which chanced to distinguish any of her courtiers. 1 The selection is from " Kenilworth." 2 attendants of the sovereign, who were paid from the pension fund •^ Raleigh, afterwards Sir Walter Raleigh ^ doffing his hat 2 14 CATHCART'S LITERARY READER Accordingly, she fixed her keen glance upon the youth, as she approached the place where he stood, with a look in which sur- prise at his boldness seemed to be unmixed with resentment, while a trifling accident happened which attracted her attention toward him yet more strongly. The night had been rainy, and just where the young gentleman stood, a small quantity of mud mterrupted the queen's passage. As she hesitated to pass on, the gallant,^ throwing his cloak from his shoulders, laid it on the miry spot, so as to insure her passing over it dry-shod. Elizabeth looked at the young man, who accompanied this act of devoted courtesy with a profound reverence, and a blush that overspread his whole countenance. The queen was confused, blushed in her turn, nodded her head, hastily passed on, and embarked in her barge without saying a word. " Come along, Sir Coxcomb," said Blount,^ " your gay mantle will need the brush to-day, I wot."^ "This cloak," said the youth, taking it up and folding it, ''shall never be brushed while in my possession." " And that will not be long, if you learn not a little more economy." Their discourse was here interrupted by one of the band of Pensioners. " I was sent," said he, after looking at them atten- tively, "to a gentleman who hath no cloak, or a muddy one. You, sir, I think," addressing the younger cavalier, " are the man ; you will please to follow me." "He is in attendance on me," said Blount, — "on me, the noble Earl of Sussex's Master of Horse." " I have nothing to say to that," answered the messenger ; " my orders are directly from her Majesty, and concern this gen- tleman only." So saying, he walked away, followed by Walter, leaving the others behind, Blount's eyes almost starting from his head with the excess of his astonishment. At length he gave vent to it in an exclamation, — " Who in the world would have 1 A richly-attired, courtier-like man. Derivation ? 2 a companion of Raleigh 3 " I wot," an obsolete form = " I know " (A.-S. wdt). SCOTT 215 thought this ! " And shakmg his head with a mysterious air, he walked to his own boat, embarked, and returned to Deptford. The young cavaHer was, in the mean while, guided to the water- side by the Pensioner, who showed him considerable respect, — a circumstance which, to persons in his situation, may be considered as an augury ^ of no small consequence. He ushered him into one of the wherries which lay ready to attend the queen's barge, which was already proceeding up the river with the advantage of that flood-tide of which, in the course of their descent, Blount had complained to his associates. The two rowers used their oars with such expedition, at the signal of the Gentleman Pensioner, that they very soon brought their little skiffs under the stern of the queen's boat, where she sat beneath an awning, attended by two or three ladies, and the nobles of her household. She looked more than onc'e at the wherry in which the young adventurer was seated, spoke to those around her, and seemed to laugh. At length one of the attendants, by the queen's order appar- ently, made a sign for the wherry to come alongside, and the young man was desired to step from his own skiff into the queen's barge, which he performed with graceful agility at the fore part of the boat, and was brought aft to the queen's presence, the wherry at the same time dropping to the rear. The youth under- went the gaze of majesty not the less gracefully that his self-pos- session was mingled with embarrassment. The muddied cloak still hung upon his arm, and formed the natural topic with which the queen hitroduced the conversation. " You have this day spoiled a gay mantle in our service, young man. We thank you for your service, though the manner of offer- ing it was unusual and something^ bold." •' In a sovereign's need," answered the youth, " it is each Hege- man's duty to be bold." "That was well said, my lord," said the queen, turning to a grave person who sat by her, and answered with a grave inclina- tion of the head and something of a mumbled assent. '• Well, 1 omen, favorable sign - Derivation? '^ here an adverb — j-^w^7£//^a/ 2l6 CATHCART'S LITERARY READER young man, your gallantry shall not go unrewarded. Go to the wardrobe-keeper, and he shall have orders to supply ^ the suit which you have cast away in our service. Thou shalt have a suit, and that of the newest cut ; I promise you, on the word of a princess." '' May it please your Grace," said Walter, hesitating, " it is not for so humble a servant of your Majesty to measure out your bounties ; but if it became me to choose — " *'Thou wouldst have gold, I warrant me," said the queen, in- terrupting him. " Fie, young man ! I take shame to say that in our capital such and so various are the means of thriftless folly that to give gold to youth is giving fuel to fire, and furnishing them with the means for self-destruction. If I hve and reign, these means of unchristian excess shall be abridged. Yet ihou mayst be poor," she added, "or thy parents may be. It shall be gold if thou wilt, but thou shalt answer to me for the. use of it." Walter waited patiently until the queen had done, and then modestly assured her that gold was still less in his wish than the raiment her Majesty had before offered. " How, boy," said the queen, " neither gold nor garment ! What is it thou wouldst have of me, then? " " Only permission, madam, — if it is not asking too high an honor, — permission to wear the cloak which did you this trifling service." '' Permission to wear thine own cloak, thou silly boy 1 " said the queen. " It is no longer mine," said Walter. " When your Majesty's foot touched it, it became a fit mantle for a prince, but far too rich a one for its former owner." The queen again blushed ; and endeavored to cover, by laugh- ing, a slight degree of not unpleasing surprise and confusion. ''Heard you ever the like, my lords? The youth's head is turned with reading romances ; I must know something of him, 1 make good the loss of SCOTT 217 that I may send him safe to his friends. What is thy name and birth?" " Raleigh is my name, most gracious queen ; the youngest son of a large but honorable family in Devonshire." "Raleigh?" said Ehzabeth, after a moment's recollection; "have we not heard of your service in Ireland?" " I have been so fortunate as to do some service there, madam," replied Raleigh, — "scarce, however, of consequence sufficient to reach your Grace's ears." " They hear further than you think for," said the queen, gra- ciously, " and have heard of a youth who defended a ford in Shannon against a whole band of rebels until the stream ran purple with their blood and his own." " Some blood I may have lost," said the youth, looking down; " but it was where my best is due, and that is in your Majesty's service." The queen paused, and then said hastily, " You are very young to have fought so well and to speak so well. But you must not escape your penance for turning back Masters, — the poor man hath caught cold on the river ; for our order reached him when he had just returned from certain visits to London, and he held it a matter of loyalty and conscience instantly to set forth again. So hark ye. Master Raleigh, see thou fail not to wear thy muddy cloak, in token of penitence, till our pleasure be further known. And here," she added, giving him a jewel of gold in the form of a chessman, " I give thee this to wear at the collar." Raleigh, to whom nature had taught intuitively, as it were, those courtly arts which many scarce acquire from long experience, knelt, and as he took from her hand the jewel, kissed the fingers which gave it. 2l8 CATHCART'S LITERARY READER LOCHINVAR — LADY HERON'S SONQi O, YOUNG Lochinvar is come out of the west, Through all the wide Border his steed was the best, And save his good broadsword he weapons had none ; He rode all unarmed, and he rode all alone. So faithful in love, and so dauntless in war. There never was knight Uke the young Lochinvar. He stayed not for brake, and he stopped not for stone, He swam the Eske River where ford there was none ; But, ere he alighted at Netherby gate, The bride had consented ; the gallant came late : For a laggard in love, and a dastard in war. Was to wed the fair Ellen of brave Lochinvar. So boldly he entered the Netherby hall. Among bridesmen and kinsmen, and brothers and all : Then spoke the bride's father, his hand on his sword (For the poor craven bridegroom spoke never a word), " O, come ye in peace here, or come ye in war. Or to dance at our bridal, young Lord Lochinvar?" " I long wooed your daughter, my suit you denied ; — Love swells like the Solway, but ebbs like its tide, — And now I am come, with this lost love of mine, To lead but one measure, drink one cup of wine. There are maidens in Scotland more lovely by far, That would gladly be bride to the young Lochinvar.'" The bride kissed the goblet ; the knight took it up, He quaffed off the wine, and he threw down the cup. She looked down to blush, and she looked up to sigh. With a smile on her lips and a tear in her eye. ^ from " Marmion " SCOTT 219 He took her soft hand, ere her mother could bar, — " Now tread we a measure ! " said young Lochmvar. So stately his form, and so lovely her face. That never a hall such a galliard ^ did grace ; While her mother did fret, and her father did fume, And the bridegroom stood dangling his bonnet and plume ; And the bride -maidens whispered, " 'T were better by far To have matched our fair cousin with young Lochinvar." One touch to her hand, and one word in her ear, When they reached the hall-door, and the charger stood near ; So light to the croupe "^ the fair lady he swung, So light to the saddle before her he sprung ! " She is won ! we are gone, over bank, bush, and scaur ; ^ They'll have fleet steeds that follow," quoth young Lochinvar. There was mounting 'mong Graemes of the Netherby clan ; Forsters, Fenwicks, and Musgraves, they rode and they ran : There was racing, and chasing, on Cannobie Lee, But the lost bride of Netherby ne'er did they see. So daring in love, and so dauntless in war, Have ye e'er heard of gallant like young Lochinvar? THE LAST MINSTREL The way was long, the wind was cold, The Minstrel was infirm and old : His withered cheek, and tresses gray. Seemed to have known a better day ; The harp, his sole remaining joy. Was carried by an orphan boy : a lively dance - crupper, place back of the saddle ^ rocky steep 220 CATHCART'S LITERARY READER The last of all the Bards was he, Who sung of Border chivalry ; For, well-a-day ! their date was fled, His tuneful brethren all were dead ; And he, neglected and oppressed, Wished to be with them, and at rest. No more, on prancing palfrey^ borne, He caroled, light as lark at morn ; No longer, courted and caressed, High placed in hall, a welcome guest, He poured, to lord and lady gay. The unpremeditated lay : Old times were changed, old manners gone A stranger fills the Stuarts' throne ; The bigots of the iron time ^ Had called his harmless art a crime. A wandering harper, scorned and poor, He begged his way from door to door ; And tuned, to please a peasant's ear, The harp a king had loved to hear. LOVE OF COUNTRY Breathes there the man with soul so dead. Who never to himself hath said, " This is my own, my native land? " Whose heart hath ne'er within him burned As home his footsteps he hath turned, From wandering on a foreign strand ? If such there breathe, go, mark him well • For him no minstrel raptures swell ! 1 a saddle-horse ^ i- e. the Puritans of the Commonwealth SCOTT 221 High though his titles, proud his name, Boundless his wealth as wish can claim : Despite those titles, power, and pelf, The wretch, concentered all in self. Living, shall forfeit fair renown. And doubly dying, shall go down To the vile dust, from whence he sprung, Unwept, unhonored, and unsung. A SERENADE Ah ! County Guy, the hour is nigh, The sun has left the lea, The orange-flower perfumes the bower. The breeze is on the sea. The lark, his lay who trilled all day. Sits hushed his partner nigh ; Breeze, bird, and flower confess the hour, - But where is County Guy? The village maid steals through the shade Her shepherd's suit to hear ; To Beauty shy, by lattice high, Sings high-born Cavalier. The star of love, all stars above. Now reigns o'er earth and sky, And high and low the influence know, — But where is County Guy? 222 CATHCART'S LITERARY READER SYDNEY SMITH 1771-1845 Sydney Smith's name is a synonym of wit ; but he has left behind him evidences of far higher powers than those which are called into exercise in the effort to amuse. He was born at Woodford, Essex, England, in 1771, and died in 1845. He was educated at Oxford, took holy orders, and held a curacy in Wiltshire ; in 1796 he retnoved to Edinburgh, where, in conjunction with Brougham and other distinguished men, he founded the Edinburgh Review. Removing to London in 1804, he continued to write for the Review, and speedily won a brilliant reputation as a critic. Ecclesiastical preferment came often to him, and at the time of his death he was Canon Residentiary of St. Paul's Cathedral. His writings were mainly in the form SYDNEY SMITH 223 of sermons ; but he wrote many notable letters on political and religious questions which go far toward justifying Everett's opinion that if Smith " had not been known as the wittiest man of his day, he would have been accounted one of the wisest." It is believed that his Letters on Catholic Eman- cipation w^ere largely instrumental in pushing that measure to success. Macaulay said of him : " He is universally admitted to have been a great reasoner, and the greatest master of ridicule that has appeared among us since Swift." The distinguished critic, George Saintsbury, makes in a recent article the following estimate of Sydney Smith's work : " The memorials and evidences of his peculiar, if not unique, genius consist of three different kinds : reported or remembered conversations, letters, and formal literary work. He was once most famous as a talker ; but conversation is necessarily the most per- ishable of all things, and its recorded fragments bear keeping less than any other relics. . . . The best letters are always most like the actual conversa- tion of their writers, and probably no one ever wrote more as he talked than Sydney Smith. The specially literary qualities of his writing for print are here too in great measure ; and on the whole, nowhere can the entire Sydney be better seen. Of the three satirists of modern times with whom he may not unfairly claim to rank — Pascal, Swift, and Voltaire — he is most like Voltaire in his faculty of presenting a good thing with a preface which does not in the least prepare you for it, and then leaving it without the slightest attempt to go back on it, and elaborate it, and make sure that his hearer has duly appreciated it and laughed at it. And of the two, though the palm of concentration must be given to Voltaire, the palm of absolute simplicity musi be given to Sydney Smith. Hardly any of his letters are without these un- forced flashes of wit. . . . " Sydney Smith had no false modesty, and in not a few letters to Jeffrey he speaks of his own contributions to the Edinburgh Review with the greatest freedom, combating and quite refusing to accept his editor's suggestion as to their flippancy and fantasticality, professing with much frankness that this is the way he can write and no other, and more than once telling Jeffrey that whatever they may think in solemn Scotland, his, Sydney's, articles are a great deal more read in England and elsewhere than any others. Although there are maxims to the contrary effect, the judgment of a clever man, not very young, and tolerably familiar with the world, on his own work, is very seldom far wrong. Sydney Smith's articles are by far the most interesting of those contributed to the Review by any one before the days of Macaulay. They are also by far the most distinct and original. . . . Here was a man who, for goodness as well as for cleverness, for sound practical wisdom as well as for fantastic verbal wit, has had hardly a superior and very few equals." 224 CATHCART'S LITERARY READER THE PLEASURES OF KNOWLEDGE It is noble to seek truth, and it is beautiful to find it. It is the ancient feeling of the human heart, that knowledge is better than riches; and it is deeply and sacredly true. To mark the course of human passions as they have flowed on in the ages that are past ; to see why nations have risen, and why they have fallen ; to speak of heat, and light, and the winds ; to know what man has discovered in the heavens above and in the earth beneath ; to hear the chemist unfold the marvelous properties that the Creator has locked up in a speck of earth; to be told that there are worlds so distant from our own that the quickness of light, traveling from the world's creation, has never yet reached us ; to wander in the creations of poetry, and grow warm again with that eloquence which swayed the democracies of the old world ; ^ to go up with great reasoners to the First Cause of all, and to perceive, in the midst of all this dissolution and decay and cruel separation, that there is one thing unchangeable, in- destructible, and everlasting ; — it is worth while in the days of our youth to strive hard for this great discipline ; to pass sleep- less nights for it ; to give up for it laborious days ; to spurn for it present pleasures ; '^ to endure for it afflicting poverty ; to wade for it through darkness, and sorrow, and contempt, as the great spirits of the world have done in all ages and all times. 1 appeal to the experience of any man who is in the habit of exercising his mind vigorously and well, whether there is not a satisfaction in it which tells him he has been acting up to one of the great objects of his existence? The end of nature has been answered ; his faculties have done that which they were created to do, — not languidly occupied upon trifles, not ener- vated by sensual gratification, but exercised in that toil which is so congenial to their nature, and so worthy of their strength. ^ /. e. the ancient world 2 Compare Milton, p. 68 " To scorn delights, and live laborious days." SYDNEY SMITH 225 A life of knowledge is not often a life of injury and crime. Whom does such a man oppress ? with whose happiness does he interfere? whom does his ambition destroy? and whom does his fraud deceive? In the pursuit of science he injures no man, and in the acquisition he does good to all. A man who dedicates his life to knowledge, becomes habituated to pleasure which carries with it no reproach ; and there is one security that he will never love that pleasure which is paid for by anguish of heart, — his pleasures are all cheap, all dignified, and all innocent ; and, as far as any human being can expect permanence in this changing scene, he has secured a happiness which no malignity of for- tune can ever take away, but which must cleave to him while he lives, ameliorating every good, and diminishing every evil of his existence. I solemnly declare, that, but for the love of knowledge, I should consider the life of the meanest hedger and ditcher preferable to that of the greatest and richest man in existence ; for the fire of our minds is like the fire which the Persians burn on the moun- tains, — it flames night and day, and is immortal, and not to be quenched ! Upon something it must act and feed, — upon the pure spirit of knowledge, or upon the foul dregs of polluting passions. Therefore, when I say, in conducting your understanding, love knowledge with a great love, with a vehement love, with a love coeval with^ life, what do I say but love innocence ; love virtue ; love purity of conduct ; love that which, if you are rich and great, will sanctify the providence which has made you so, and make men call it justice ; love that which, if you are poor, will ren- der your poverty respectable, and make the proudest feel it unjust to laugh at the meanness of your fortunes ; love that which will comfort you, adorn you, and never quit you, — which will open to you the kingdom of thought, and all the boundless regions of conception, as an asylum against the cruelty, the injustice, and the pain that may be your lot in the outer world, — that which 1 coeval with, " of the same age as ; " /. e. as long as IS 226 CATH CART'S LITERARY READER will make your motives habitually great and honorable, and light up in an instant a thousand noble disdains at the very thought of meanness and of fraud ? Therefore, if any young man have embarked his life in the pur- suit of knowledge, let him go on without doubting or fearing the event : let him not be intimidated by the cheerless beginnings of knowledge, by the darkness from which she springs, by the diffi- culties which hover around her, by the wretched habitations in which she dwells, by the want and sorrow which sometimes jour- ney in her train ; but let him ever follow her as the angel that guards him, and as the genius ^ of his life. She will bring him out at last into the light of day, and exhibit him to the world comprehensive in acquirements, fertile in resources, rich in imagi- nation, strong in reasoning, prudent and powerful above his fel- lows in all the relations and in all the offices of life. WIT AND WISDOM There is an association in men's minds between dullness and wisdom, amusement and folly, which has a very powerful influence in decision upon character, and is not overcome without consider- able difficulty. The reason is, that the outward signs of a dull man and a wise man are the same, and so are the outward signs of a frivolous man and a witty man ; and we are not to expect that the majority will be disposed to look to much more than the out- ward sign. I beheve the fact to be, that wit is very seldom the only eminent quality which resides in the mind of any man ; it is commonly accompanied by many other talents of every descrip- tion, and ought to be considered as a strong evidence of a fertile and superior understanding. Almost all the great poets, orators, and statesmen of all times have been witty. 1 good spirit SYDNEY SMITH 22/ The meaning of an extraordinary man is, that he is eight men, not one man ; that he has as much wit as if he had no sense, and as much sense as if he had no wit ; that his conduct is as judi- cious as if he were the dullest of human beings, and his imagina- tion as briUiant as if he were irretrievably ruined. But when wit is combined with sense and information ; when it is softened by benevolence, and restrained by strong principle ; when it is in the hands of a man who can use it and despise it, who can be witty, and something much better than witty, who loves honor, justice, decency, good-nature, morality, and religion, ten thousand times better than wit ; — wit is then a beautiful and delightful part of our nature. There is no more interesting spectacle than to see the effects of wit upon the different characters of men ; than to observe it expanding caution, relaxing dignity, unfreezing coldness, — teaching age and care and pain to smile, — extorting reluctant gleams of pleasure from melancholy, and charming even the pangs of grief. It is pleasant to observe how it penetrates through the coldness and awkwardness of society, gradually bring- ing men nearer together, and, like the combined force of wine and oil, giving every man a glad heart and a shining countenance. Genuine and innocent wit like this is surely the flavor of the mind! Man could direct his ways by plain reason, and support his life by tasteless food ; but God has given us wit and flavor, and laughter and perfumes, to enliven the days of man's pilgrimage, and to " charm his painful steps over the burning marl." THE SCIENCE OF GOVERNMENT It would seem that the science of government is an unap- propriated region in the universe of knowledge. Those sciences with which the passions can never interfere are considered to be attainable only by study and by reflection ; while there are not many young men who doubt of their ability to make a constitu- tion or to govern a kingdom, at the same time there can not, 228 CATHCART'S LITERARY READER perhaps, be a more decided proof of a superficial understanding than the depreciation of those difficulties which are inseparable from the science of government. To know well the local and the natural man ; to track the silent march of human affairs ; to seize, with happy intuition, on those great laws which regulate the prosperity of empires ; to reconcile principles to circumstances, and be no wiser than the times will permit; to anticipate the effects of every speculation ^ upon the entangled relations and awkward complexity of real life ; and to follow out the theorems ^ of the senate to the daily comforts of the cottage, is a task which they will fear most who know it best, — a task in which the great and the good have often failed, and which it is not only wise, but pious and just, in common men to avoid. Great men hallow a whole people, and lift up all who live in their time. What Irishman does not feel proud that he has lived in the days of Grattan? Who has not turned to him for comfort, from the false friends and open enemies of Ireland? No gov- ernment ever dismayed him, the world could not bribe him, he thought only of Ireland, lived for no other object, dedicated to her his beautiful fancy, his elegant wit, his manly courage, and all the splendor of his astonishing eloquence. He was so born and so gifted that poetry, forensic skill, elegant literature, and all the highest attainments of human genius were within his reach ; but he thought the noblest occupation of a man was to make other men happy and free ; and in that straight line he went on for fifty years, without one side -look, without one yielding thought, without one motive in his heart which he might not have laid open to the view of God and man. From the '^ Ediubm-gh Eevieiv,'' 1820. 1 Meaning } ^ established principles COLERIDGE 229 COLERIDGE 1 772-1834 Samuel Taylor Coleridge was born at Ottery St. Mary, Devonshire, where his father was vicar, in 1772, and died in 1834. He spent two years at Cambridge, but did not complete his course. A little later, being in London without resources or employment, he enlisted in a dragoon regiment. One day he wrote a Latin verse on the stable- wall, which fact coming to j/\ P, Ccr^ C. '^ '4-^ the knowledge of his captain, the latter procured his release from the ser- vice. Entering on a literary and political career, Coleridge published his first work, "The Fall of Robespierre: An Historical Drama," in 1794, and soon after several pamphlets, in which he advocated democratic and Uni- tarian doctrines. With vSouthey and Lovell he projected a Pantisocracy, or communistic republic, to be established in Pennsylvania ; but the scheme came to naught, and Coleridge settled down as a writer on the Morning Post, in support of the Government. In 1798 he visited Germany, and studied there diligently. In 181 2 his series of Essays called "The Friend" 230 CATHCART'S LITERARY READER was published, and in 1816 " Christabel." He had acquired the habit of opium-eating, which obtained the mastery over him and reduced him to a condition of unproductive indolence. He passed the last eighteen years of his life in retirement. So able a judge as De Quincey has said that Coleridge's was "the largest and most spacious intellect, the subtlest and most comprehensive, that has yet existed among men." "Of Coleridge's poetry, in its most matured form and in its best speci- mens, the most distinguishing characteristics are vividness of imagination and subtlety of thought, combined with unrivalled beauty and expressive- ness of diction, and the most exquisite melody of verse. With the ex ception of a vein of melancholy and meditative tenderness, flowing rather from a contemplative survey of the mystery, — the strangely mingled good and evil, — of all things human, than connected with any individual interests, there is not in general much of passion in his compositions, and he is not well fitted, therefore, to become a very popular poet, or a favorite with the multitude. There is nothing in his poetry of the pulse of fire that throbs in that of Burns ; neither has he much of the homely every-day truth, the proverbial and universally applicable wisdom of Wordsworth. Coleridge was, far more than either of these poets, 'of imagination all compact.' But rarely, on the other hand, has there existed an imagination in which so much originality and daring were associated and harmonized with so gentle and tremblingly delicate a sense of beauty." — G. L. Craik. THE IMPORTANCE OF METHOD What is that which first strikes us, and strikes us at once, in a man of education, and which, among educated men, so instantly distinguishes the man of superior mind, that (as was observed with eminent propriety of the late Edmund Burke) " we cannot stand under the same archway during a shower of rain, without finding him out"? Not the weight or novelty of his remarks; not any unusual interest of facts communicated by him : for we may suppose both the one and the other precluded by the short- ness of our intercourse, and the triviality of the subjects. The difference will be impressed and felt, though the conversation should be confined to the state of the weather or the pavement. Still less will it arise from any peculiarity in his words and phrases. Unless where new things necessitate new terms, he will avoid an unusual word as a rock. It must have been among COLERIDGE 231 the earliest lessons of his youth, that the breach of this precept, at all times hazardous, becomes ridiculous in the topics of ordi- nary conversation. There remains but one other point of dis- tinction possible ; and this must be, and in fact is, the true cause of the impression made on us. It is the unpremeditated and evidently habitual arrangement of his words, grounded on the habit of foreseeing, in each integral part, or (more plainly) in every sentence, the whole that he then intends to communicate. However irregular and desultory ^ his talk, there is method in the fragments. Listen, on the other hand, to an ignorant man, though perhaps shrewd and able in his particular calling, whether he be describ- ing or relating."^ We immediately perceive that his memory alone is called into action, and that the objects and events recur in the narration in the same order, and with the same accom- paniments, however accidental or impertinent,^ in which they had first occurred to the narrator. The necessity of taking breath, the efforts of recollection, and the abrupt rectification of its failures, produce all his pauses ; and with exception of the '' and then," the '' and there," and the still less significant " and so," they constitute likewise all his connections. Our discussion, however, is confined to method as employed in the formation of the understanding, and in the constructions of science and literature. It would indeed be superfluous to attempt a proof of its importance in the business and economy of active or domestic life. From the cotter's hearth or the work- shop of the artisan to the palace or the arsenal, the first merit, that which admits neither substitute nor equivalent, is, that every- thing be in its place. Where this charm is wanting, every other merit either loses its name, or becomes an additional ground of accusation and regret. Of one, by whom it is eminently pos- sessed, we say proverbially, he is like clock-work. The resem- blance extends beyond the point of regularity, and yet fells short 1 Derivation ? 2 Note the distinction between description and narration. 3 used here in the literal sense 232 CATHCART'S LITERARY READER of the truth. Both do, indeed, at once divide and announce the silent and otherwise indistinguishable lapse of time. But the man of methodical industry and honorable pursuits does more ; he realizes its ideal divisions, and gives a character and individuality to its moments. If the idle are described as killing time, he may be justly said to call it into life and moral being, while he makes it the distinct object, not only of the consciousness, but of the conscience. He organizes the hours, and gives them a soul ; and that, the very essence of which is to fleet away, and ever- more to have been, he takes up into his own permanence, and communicates to it the imperishableness of a spiritual nature. Of the good and faithful servant, whose energies, thus directed, are thus methodized, it is less truly affirmed that he lives in time, than that time lives in him. His days, months, and years, as the stops and punctual marks ^ in the records of duties performed, will survive the wreck of worlds,^ and remain extant w^hen time itself shall be no more. But as the importance of method in the duties of social life is incomparably greater, so are its practical elements proportionably obvious, and such as relate to the will far more than to the under- standing. Henceforward, therefore, we contemplate its bearings on the latter. The difference between the products of a well-disciplined and those of an uncultivated understanding, in relation to what we will now venture to call the science of method, is often and admirably exhibited by our great dramatist. I scarcely need refer my readers to the Clown's evidence, in the first scene of the second act of " Measure for Measure," or to the Nurse in " Romeo and Juliet." . . . The absence of method, w^hich characterizes the uneducated, is occasioned by an habitual submission of the understanding to 1 punctual marks; i. e. points of demarcation ^ survive the wreck of worlds — Compare the lines of Addison's " Cato : " " But thou shalt flourish in immortal youth, Unhurt amidst the war of elements, The wreck of matter, and the crush of worlds," COLERIDGE 233 mere events and images as such, and independent of any power in the mind to classify or appropriate them. The general accom- paniments of time and place are the only relations which persons of this class appear to regard in their statements. As this con- stitutes their leading feature, the contrary excellence, as distin- guishing the well-educated man, must be referred to the contrary habit. Method, therefore, becomes natural to the mind which has been accustomed to contemplate, not things only, or for their own sake alone, but likewise and chiefly the relations of things, either their relations to each other, or to the observer, or to the state and apprehensions of the hearers. To enumerate and analyze these relations, with the conditions under which alone they are discoverable, is to teach the science of method. . . . Exuberance of mind, on the one hand, interferes with the forms of method ; but sterility of mind, on the other, wanting the spring and impulse to mental action, is wholly destructive of method itself. For in attending too exclusively to the relations which the past or passing events and objects bear to general truth, and the moods of his own thought, the most intelligent man is sometimes in danger of overlooking that other relation, in which they are likewise to be placed to the apprehension and sympathies of his hearers. His discourse appears like soliloquy intermixed with dialogue. But the uneducated and unreflecting talker overlooks all men- tal relations, both logical and psychological ; and consequently precludes all method which is not purely accidental. Hence the nearer the things and incidents in time and place, the more distant, disjointed, and impertinent to each other, and to any common purpose, will they appear in his narration ; and this from the want of a staple, or starting-post, in the narrator him- self; from the absence of the leadmg thought, which, borrowing a phrase from the nomenclature of legislation, I may not inaptly call the initiative. On the contrary, where the habit of method is present and effective, things the most remote and diverse in time, place, and outward circumstance are brought into mental con- tiguity and succession, the more striking as the less expected. 234 CATHCART'S LITERARY READER KUBLA KHAN; OR, A VISION IN A DREAM i A FRAGMENT In Xanadu did Kubla Khan A stately pleasure-dome decree : Where Alph,^ the sacred river, ran Through caverns measureless to man Down to a sunless sea. So twice five miles of fertile ground With walls and towers were girdled round : And there were gardens bright with sinuous ^ rills Where blossomed many an incense-bearing tree ; And here were forests ancient as the hills, Enfolding sunny spots of greenery. 1 Coleridge makes the following reference to this poem : " In consequence of a slight indisposition, an anodyne had been prescribed for the author, from the effect of which he fell asleep in his chair at the moment he was reading the following sentence, or words of the same substance, in Purchas's ' Pil- grimage ': ' Here the Khan Kubla commanded a palace to be built, and a stately garden thereunto : and thus ten miles of fertile ground were inclosed with a wall.' The author continued for about three hours in a profound sleep, at least of the external senses, during which time he has the most vivid confidence that he could not have composed less than from two to three hundred lines, — if that indeed can be called composition in which all the images rose up before him as things, with a parallel production of the corre- spondent expressions, without any sensation or consciousness of effort. On awaking he appeared to himself to have a distinct recollection of the whole, and taking his pen, ink, and paper, instantly and eagerly wrote down the lines that are here preserved. At this moment he was unfortunately called out and detained above an hour, and on his return to his room, found to his no small surprise and mortification, that though he still retained some vague and dim recollection of the general purport of the vision, yet, with the excep- tion of some eight or ten scattered lines and images, all the rest had passed away like the images on the surface of a stream into which a stone had been cast, but, alas! without the after restoration of the latter." The fragment is generally ranked among the finest specimens of purely imaginative poetry in our language. ^ Alpheus, the underground river of ancient mythology, frequently referred to by the poets. (See Milton, p. 70.) '^ Etymology ? COLERIDGE 235 But oh ! that deep romantic chasm which slanted Down the green hill athwart a cedarn cover ! A savage place ! as holy and enchanted As e'er beneath a waning moon was haunted By woman waihng for her demon-lover ! And from this chasm, with ceaseless turmoil seething, As if this earth in fast thick pants were breathing, A mighty fountain momently was forced ; Amid whose swift half- intermitted burst Huge fragments vaulted like rebounding hail, Or chaffy grain beneath the thresher's flail : And 'mid these dancing rocks at once and ever It flung up momently the sacred river. Five miles meandering with a mazy motion Through w^ood and dale the sacred river ran, Then reached the caverns measureless to man, And sank in tumult to a lifeless ocean ; And 'mid this tumult Kubla heard from far Ancestral voices prophesying war ! The shadow of the dome of pleasure Floated midway on the w^aves ; Where was heard the mingled measure From the fountain and the caves. It was a miracle of rare device, — A sunny pleasure-dome with caves of ice ! A damsel with a dulcimer ^ In a vision once I saw : It was an Abyssinian maid. And on her dulcimer she played. Singing of Mount Abora. 1 Note the frequent use of alliteration, as in " Her symphony and song," " His flashing eyes, his floating hair ! " The dulcimer is a stringed instrument. The word is of mixed etymology, from Latin dulcis, "sweet," and Greek melos, "melody." 236 CATHCART'S LITERARY READER Could I revive within me Her symphony and song, To such a deep deUght t' would win me That, with music loud and long, I would build that dome in air, That sunny dome ! those caves of ice ! And all who heard should see them there, And all should cry. Beware ! Beware ! His flashing eyes, his floating hair ! Weave a circle round him thrice. And close your eyes with holy dread. For he on honey- dew hath fed. And drunk the milk of Paradise. DEAD CALM IN THE TROPICS 1 The fair breeze blew, the white foam flew, The furrow followed free ; We were the first that ever burst Into that silent sea. Down dropt the breeze, the sails dropt down, 'T was sad as sad could be ; And we did speak only to break The silence of the sea ! All in a hot and copper sky, The bloody Sun, at noon. Right up above the mast did stand, No bigger than the Moon. Day after day, day after day, We stuck, nor breath nor motion ; As idle as a painted ship Upon a painted ocean. 1 from " The Ancient Mariner " COLERIDGE 237 Water, water, everywhere, And all the boards did shrink ; Water, water, everywhere, Nor any drop to drink. The very deep did rot : O Christ ! That ever this should be ! Yea, slimy things did crawl with legs Upon the slimy sea. SEVERED FRIENDSHIP Alas ! they had been friends in youth ; But whispering tongues can poison truth ; And constancy lives in realms above ; And life is thorny ; and youth is vain ; And to be wroth with one we love Doth work like madness in the brain. And thus it chanced, as I divine, With Roland and Sir Leoline. Each spake words of high disdain And insult to his heart's best brother : They parted — ne'er to meet again ! But never either found another To free the hollow heart from paining, — They stood aloof, the scars remaining, Like cliffs which had been rent asunder ; A dreary sea now flows between ; — But neither heat nor frost nor thunder Shall wholly do away, I ween,^ The marks of that which once hath been. ^ A.-S. winan, " to think, to imagine 238 CATH CARTS LITERARY READER YOUTH AND AGE Verse, a breeze 'mid blossoms straying, Where Hope clung feeding — like a bee — Both were mine ! Life went a- Maying With Nature, Hope, and Poesy, When I was young ! When I was young ? — Ah woful When ! Ah ! for the change 'twixt Now and Then ! This breathing house not built with hands, This body that does me grievous wrong, O'er aery cliffs and glittering sands How lightly then it flashed along : Like those trim skiffs, unknown of yore, On winding lakes and rivers wide. That ask no aid of sail or oar, That fear no spite of wind or tide ! Naught cared this body for wind or weather When Youth and I lived in 't together. Flowers are lovely ; Love is flower-like ; Friendship is a sheltering tree ; O, the joys that came down shower-like, Of Friendship, Love, and Liberty, Ere I was old ! Ere I was old? Ah woful Ere, Which tells me. Youth 's no longer here ! O, Youth ! for years so many and sweet 'T is known that Thou and I were one, I '11 think it but a fond conceit — It can not be, that Thou art gone ! Thy vesper-bell hath not yet tolled : — And thou wert aye a masker bold ! What strange disguise hast now put on To make believe that thou art gone? COLERIDGE 239 I see these locks in silvery slips, This drooping gait, this altered size : But Springtide blossoms on thy lips, And tears take sunshine from thine eyes ! Life is but thought : so think I will That Youth and I are housemates still. Dewdrops are the gems of morning. But the tears of mournful eve ! Where no hope is, life 's a warning That only serves to make us grieve When we are old : — That only serves to make us grieve With oft and tedious taking-leave. Like some poor nigh-related guest That may not rudely be dismissed, Yet hath outstayed his welcome while, And tells the jest without the smile. THE GOOD GREAT MAN " How seldom, friend, a good great man inherits Honor and wealth, with all his worth and pains I It seems a story from the world of spirits When any man obtains that which he merits, Or any merits that which he obtains." For shame, my friend ! renounce this idle strain ! What wouldst thou have a good great man obtain? Wealth, title, dignity, a golden chain? Or heap of corses which his sword hath slain ? Goodness and greatness are not means, but ends. Hath he not always treasures, always friends. The good great man? Three treasures — love, and light, And calm thoughts, equable as infant's breath ; And three fast friends, more sure than day or night — Himself, his ^^laker, and the angel Death. 240 CATHCART'S LITERARY READER LAMB 1775-1835 Charles Lamb, essayist and humorist, was born in London, 1775, and died in 1835. His literary fame rests in the main upon his "Essays of Elia." The delicate grace and flavor of these papers can not be described. His style has the charm which comes from perfect ease and self-possession, and ^^z^^^n ^ m. -N his humor is of the ripest and richest kind. In all his writings there is great delicacy of feeling and happiness of expression. No other writer, save per- haps Goldsmith, enters so closely into his readers' hearts, and so warms them with his genial personality. De Quincey says : " In the literature of every nation we are naturally disposed to place in the highest rank those who have produced some great LAMB 241 and colossal work, — a 'Paradise Lost,' a ' Hamlet,' a 'Novum Organum,' — which presupposes an effort of intellect, a comprehensive grasp, and a sustaining power, for its original conception, corresponding in grandeur to that effort, different in kind, which must preside in its execution. But after this highest class, in which the power to conceive and the power to execute are upon the same scale of grandeur, there comes a second, in which brilliant powers of execution, applied to conceptions of a very inferior range, are allowed to establish a classical rank. Every literature possesses, besides its great national gallery, a cabinet of minor pieces, not less perfect in their polish, possibly more so. . . . Lamb I hold to be, as with respect to English literature, that \Vhich La Fontaine is with respect to French. For though there may be little resemblance otherwise, in this they agree, that both were wayward and eccentric humorists; both confined their efforts to short flights; and both, according to the standards of their several countries, were occa- sionally, and in a lower key, poets." THE ORIGIN OF ROAST-PIG Mankind, says a Chinese manuscript, — w^iich my friend was obliging enough to read and explain to me, — for the first seventy thousand ages ate their meat raw, clawing or biting it from the living animal, just as they do in Abyssinia to this day. This period is not obscurely hinted at by their great Confucius in the second chapter of his '' Mundane Mutations,"" where he desig- nates a kind of golden age by the term Cho-fajig, literally the Cooks' Holiday. The manuscript goes on to say, that the art of roasting, or rather broiling (which I take to be the elder brother) , was accidentally discovered in the manner following. The swineherd Ho-ti, having gone out into the woods one morning, as his manner was, to collect mast for his hogs, left his cottage in the care of his eldest son, Bo -bo, a great lubberly boy, who, being fond of playing with fire, as youngsters of his age commonly are, let some sparks escape into a bundle of straw,, which, kindling quickly, spread the conflagration over every part of their poor mansion, till it was reduced to ashes. Together with the cottage (a sorry antediluvian 1 make-shift of a building, 1 Etymology ? 16 242 CATHCART'S LITERARY READER you may think it), what was of much more importance, a fine litter of new-tarrowed ^ pigs, no less than nine in number, per- ished. China pigs have been esteemed a luxury all over the East, from the remotest periods that we read of. Bo-bo was in the utmost consternation, as you may think, not so much for the sake of the tenement, which his father and he could easily build up again with a few dry branches and the labor of an hour or two at any time, as for the loss of the pigs. While he was thinking what he should say to his father, and wringing his hands over the smoking remnants of one of those untimely sufferers, an odor assailed his nostrils, unlike any scent which he had before experienced. What could it proceed from? Not from the burnt cottage, — he had smelt that smell before ; indeed, this was by no means the first accident of the kind which had occurred through the negligence of this unlucky young fire- brand. Much less did it resemble that of any known herb, weed, or flower. A premonitory moistening at the same time over- flowed his nether lip. He knew not what to think. He next stooped down to feel the pig, if there were any signs of life in it. He burnt his fingers, and to cool them he applied them in his booby fashion to his mouth. Some of the crumbs of the scorched skin had come away with his fingers, and for the first time in his life (in the world's life, indeed, for before him no man had known it) he tasted — crackling /^ Again he felt and fumbled at the pig. It did not burn him so much now, still he licked his fingers from a sort of habit. The truth at length broke into his slow understanding that it was the pig that smelt so, and the pig that tasted so delicious ; and surrendering himself up to the new-born pleasure, he fell to tearing up whole handfuls of the scorched skin wnth the flesh next it, and was cramming it down his throat in his beastly fashion, when his sire entered amid the smoking rafters, armed with retributory cudgel, and finding how affairs stood, began to rain blows upon the young rogue's shoulders, as thick as hail- 1 new-born ^ cracJding, the crisp rind of roasted pork LAMB 243 stones, which Bo-bo heeded not any more than if they had been flies. His father might lay on, but he could not beat him from his pig till he had fairly made an end of it, when, becoming a little .more sensible of his situation, something like the following dialogue ensued : — ''You graceless whelp, what have you got there devouring? Is it not enough that you have burnt me down three houses with your dog's tricks, and be hanged to you ! but you must be eat- ing fire, and I know not what? What have you got there, I say?" " O father, the pig, the pig ! do come and taste how nice the burnt pig eats." The ears of Ho-ti tingled with horror. He cursed his son, and he cursed himself that ever he should beget a son that should eat burnt pig. Bo-bo, whose scent was wonderfully sharpened since morning, soon raked out another pig, and fairly rending it asun- der, thrust the lesser half by main force into the fists of Ho-ti, still shouting out, " Eat, eat, eat the burnt pig, father ; only taste ! — O Lord ! " — with such-like barbarous ejaculations, cramming all the while as if he would choke. Ho-ti trembled in every joint while he grasped the abominable thing, wavering whether he should not put his son to death for an unnatural monster, when the crackling scorching his fingers, as it had done his son's, and applying the same remedy to them, he in his turn tasted some of its flavor, which, make what sour mouths he would for pretense, proved not altogether displeas- ing to him. In conclusion (for the manuscript here is a little tedious), both father and son fairly sat down to the mess, and never left off till they had dispatched all that remained of the litter. Bo- bo was strictly enjoined not to let the secret escape, for the neighbors would certainly have stoned them for a couple of abom- inable wretches, who could think of improving upon the good meat which God had sent them. Nevertheless, strange stories got about. It was observed that Ho-ti's cottage was burnt down more frequently than ever. Nothing but fires from this time for- 244 CATHCART'S LITERARY READER ward. Some would break out in broad day, others in the night- time ; and Ho-ti himself, which was more remarkable, instead of chastising his son, seemed to grow more indulgent to him than ever. At length they were watched, the terrible mystery dis- covered, and father and son summoned to take their trial at Pekin, then an inconsiderable assize town. Evidence was given, the obnoxious food itself produced in court, and verdict about to be pronounced, when the foreman of the jury begged that some of the burnt pig, of which the culprits stood accused, might be handed into the box. He handled it, and they all handled it ; and burning their fingers, as Bo-bo and his father had done before them, and nature prompting to each of them the same remedy, against the face of all the facts, and the clearest charge which judge had ever given, — to the surprise of the whole court, townsfolk, strangers, reporters, and all present, — without leaving the box, or any manner of consultation whatever, they brought in a simultaneous verdict of Not Guilty. The judge, who was a shrewd fellow, winked at the manifest iniquity of the decision ; and when the court was dismissed, went privately, and bought up all the pigs that could be had for love or money. In a few days his Lordship's town house was observed to be on fire. The thing took wing, and now there was nothing to be seen but fires in every direction. Fuel and pigs gr&\Y enor- mously dear all over the district. The insurance-offices one and all shut up shop. People built slighter and slighter every day, until it was feared that the very science of architecture would in no long time be lost to the world. Thus this custom of firing houses continued till, in process of time, says my manuscript, a sage arose, like our Locke, who made a discovery that the flesh of swine, or indeed of any other animal, might be cooked {l)iinit, as they called it), without the necessity of consuming a whole house to dress it. Then first began the rude form of a gridiron. Roasting by the string or spit came in a century or two later, — I forget in whose dynasty. By such slow degrees, concludes the manuscript, do the most useful and seemingly the most obvious arts make their way among mankind. LAMB 245 Without placing too implicit faith in the account above given, it must be agreed, that if a worthy pretext for so dangerous an experiment as setting houses on fire (especially in these days) could be assigned in favor of any culinary object, that pretext and excuse might be found in roast pig. Of all the delicacies in the whole niiindus edibilis^ I will main- tain it to be the most delicate. In comparing modern with ancient manners, we are pleased to compliment ourselves upon the point of gallantry, — a certain obsequiousness or deferential respect which we are supposed to pay to females as females. I shall be disposed to admit this when, in polite circles, I shall see the same attentions paid to age as to youth, to homely features as to handsome, to coarse complexions as to clear ; to the woman as she is a woman, not as she is a beauty, a fortune, or a title. I shall begin to believe that there is some such principle influ- encing our conduct when more than one- half of the drudgery and coarse servitude of the world shall cease to be performed by women. I shall believe it to be influential when I can shut my eyes to the fact that in England women are still occasionally — hanged. I shall believe in it when actresses are no longer subject to be hissed off a stage by gendemen. I shall believe in it when Dorimant - hands a fishwife across the kennel,^ or assists the apple-woman to pick up her wandering fruit, which some unlucky dray has just dissipated. Until that day comes, I shall never believe this boasted point to be anything more than a conventional fiction, — a pageant got up between the sexes, in a certain rank and at a certain time of life, in which both find their account equally. 1 Lat. " world of what is edible." 2 the leading character in an old play entitled " The Man of Mode ^ canal, gutter 246 CATHCART'S LITERARY READER THE OLD FAMILIAR FACES I HAVE had playmates, I have had companions, In my days of childhood, in my joyful school-days ; All, all are gone, the old familiar faces. I have been laughing, I have been carousing, Drinking late, sitting late, with my bosom cronies ; All, all are gone, the old familiar faces. I loved a love once, fairest among women : Closed are her doors on me, I must not see her, — All, all are gone, the old familiar faces. I have a friend, a kinder friend has no man : Like an ingrate, I left my friend abruptly, — Left him, to muse on the old familiar faces; Ghost-like, I paced round the haunts of my childhood, Earth seemed a desert I was bound to traverse, Seeking to find the old familiar faces. Friend of my bosom, thou more than a brother, Why wert thou not born in my father's dwelling? So might we talk of the old familiar faces, How some they have died, and some they have left me, And some are taken from me ; all are departed : All, all are gone, the old familiar faces. IVEBSTER 247 WEBSTER 1 782-1 852 Daniel Webster was born in Salisbury, New Hampshire, in 1782, and died seventy years later at Marshfield, in Massachusetts. As an orator and statesman he is chiefly known; but his writings, fragmentary though they are, deservedly rank among the best specimens of our literature. Evarts C2i .C^^- y^^^t^J^ has said of him: "In the sphere of literature Webster has a clear title to be held as one of the greatest authors and writers of our mother tongue that America has produced. I propose to the most competent critics of the na- tion that they can find nowhere six octavo volumes of printed literary pro- duction of an American that contain as much noble and as much beautiful imagery, as much warmth of rhetoric and of magnetic impression upon the 248 CATHCART'S LITERARY READER reader, as are to be found in the collected writings and speeches of Daniel Webster." Of Webster's oratory, Choate tells us : " Addressing masses by tens of thousands, in the open air, on the urgent political questions of the day ; or designated to lead the meditations of an hour devoted to the remembrance of some national era, or of some incident marking the progress of the nation, and lifting him up to a view of what is, and what is past, and some indistinct revelations of the glory that lies in the future, or of some great historical name, just borne by the nation to his tomb, — in such scenes, unfettered by the laws of forensic or parliamentary debate; multitudes uncounted lifting up their eyes to him ; some great historical scenes of America around, all symbols of her glory and art and power and fortune there ; voices of the past, not unheard; shapes beckoning from the future, not unseen, — some- times that mighty intellect, borne upwards to a height and kindled to an illumination which we shall see no more, wrought out, as it were in an instant, a picture of vision, warning, prediction: the progress of- the nation; the contrasts of its eras ; the heroic deaths ; the motives to patriotism ; the maxims and arts imperial by which the glory has been gathered and may be heightened, — wrought out, in an instant, a picture to fade only when all record of our mind shall die." Our first selection is from an article which Webster contributed to the North Atnerican Reviexv, and the second is from his memorable speech at the centennial celebration of the birthday of Washington. THE BATTLE OF BUNKER HILL^ No national drama was ever developed in a more interesting and splendid first scene. The incidents and the result of the battle itself were most important, and indeed most wonderful. As a mere battle, few surpass it in whatever engages and interests the attention. It was fought on a conspicuous eminence, in the immediate neighborhood of a populous city, and consequently in the view of thousands of spectators. The attacking army moved over a sheet of water to the assault. The operations and move- 1 One of the first and one of the most celebrated battles of the Revolu- tionary War, fought June 17, 1775. ^^ i^ commemorated by a granite obelisk, two hundred and twenty feet high, on the battle-ground in Charlestown, Mass., the corner-stone of which was laid by Lafayette in 1825. IVEBSTER 249 ments were of course all visible and all distinct. Those who looked on from the houses and heights of Boston had a fuller view of every important operation and event than can ordinarily be had of any battle, or than can possibly be had of such as are fought on a more extended ground, or by detachments of troops acting in different places, and at different times, and in some measure independently of each other. When the British columns were advancing to the attack, th6 flames of Charlestown (fired, as is generally supposed, by a shell) began to ascend. The specta- tors, far outnumbering both armies, thronged and crowded on every height and every point which afforded a view of the scene, themselves constituted a very important part of it. The troops of the two armies seemed like so many combatants in an amphi- theater. The manner in which they should acquit themselves was to be judged of, not, as in other cases of military engage- ments, by reports and future history, but by a vast and anxious assembly already on the spot, and waiting with unspeakable concern and emotion the progress of the day. In other battles the recollection of wives and children has been used as an excitement to animate the warrior's breast and nerve his arm. Here was not a mere recollection, but an actual presence of them, and other dear connections, hanging on the skirts of the battle, anxious and agitated, feeling almost as if wounded themselves by every blow of the enemy, and putting forth, as it w^ere, their own strength, and all the energy of their own throbbing bosoms, into every gallant effort of their warring friends. But there was a more comprehensive and vastly more impor- tant view of that day's contest than has been mentioned, — a view, indeed, which ordinary eyes, bent intently on what was immediately before them, did not embrace, but which was per- ceived in its full extent and expansion by minds of a higher order. Those men who were at the head of the colonial coun- cils, who had been engaged for years in the previous stages of the quarrel with England, and who had been accustomed to look forward to the future, were well apprised of the magnitude of the 250 CATHCART'S LITERARY READER events ^ likely to hang on the business of that day. They saw in it, not only a battle, but the beginning of a civil war of unmeas- ured extent and uncertain issue. All America and all England were likely to be deeply concerned in the consequences. The individuals themselves, who knew full well what agency they had in bringing affairs to this crisis, had need of all their courage, — not that disregard of personal safety in which the vulgar suppose true courage to consist, but that "high and fixed moral sentiment, that steady and decided purpose, which enables men to pursue a distant end, with a full view of the difficulties and dangers before them, and with a conviction that, before they must arrive at the proposed end, should they ever reach it, they must pass through evil report as well as good report, and be liable to obloquy^ as well as to defeat. Spirits that fear nothing else fear disgrace ; and this danger is necessarily encountered by those who engage in civil war. Unsuccessful resistance is not only ruin to its authors, but is esteemed, and necessarily so, by the laws of all countries, trea- sonable. This is the case, at least, till resistance becomes so general and formidable as to assume the form of regular war. But who can tell, when resistance commences, whether it will attain even to that degree of success? Some of those persons who signed the Declaration of Independence, in 1776, described themselves as signing it " as with halters about their necks." If there were grounds for this remark in 1776, when the cause had become so much more general, how much greater was the hazard when the battle of Bunker Hill was fought ! These considera- tions constituted, to enlarged and liberal minds, the moral sub- limity of the occasion ; while to the outward senses, the movement of armies, the roar of artillery, the brilliancy of the reflection of a summer's sun from the burnished armor of the British columns, and the flames of a burning town, made up a scene of extraordi- nary grandeur. 1 issues, results 2 from Lat. obloqui, " to speak against;" hence reproach, odium IVEBSTER 251 EULOGIUM ON WASHINGTON I RISE, gentlemen, to propose to you the name of that great man, in commemoration of whose birth and in honor of whose character and services we are here assembled. I am sure that I express a sentiment common to every one present when I say, that there is something more than ordinarily solemn and affecting on this occasion. We are met to testify our regard for him whose name is inti- mately blended with whatever belongs most essentially to the prosperity, the liberty, the free institutions, and the renown of our country. That name was of power to rally a nation, in the hour of thick-thronging public disasters and calamities ; that name shone, amid the storm of war, a beacon- light, to cheer and guide the country's friends ; it flamed, too, like a meteor, to repel her foes. That name, in the days of peace, was a loadstone, attract- ing to itself a whole people's confidence, a whole people's love, and the whole world's respect ; that name, descending with all time, spreading over the whole earth, and uttered in all the lan- guages belonging to the tribes and races of men, will forever be pronounced with affectionate gratitude by every one in whose breast there shall arise an aspiration for human rights and human liberty. We perform this grateful duty, gentlemen, at the expiration of a hundred years from his birth, near the place so cherished and beloved by him, where his dust now reposes, and in the capital which bears his own immortal name. All experience evinces that human sentiments are strongly affected by associations. The recurrence of anniversaries, or of longer periods of time, naturally freshens the recollection, and deepens the impression, of events with which they are historically connected. Renowned places, also, have a power to awaken feeling, which all acknowledge. No x^merican can pass by the fields of Bunker Hill, Monmouth, and Camden as if they were ordinary spots on the earth's surface. Whoever visits them feels the sentiment of love of country kindling anew, as if the spirit 252 CATHCART'S LITERARY READER that belonged to the transactions which have rendered these places distinguished still hovered round with power to move and excite all who in future time may approach them. But neither of these sources of emotion equals the power with which great moral examples affect the mind. When sublime virtues cease to be abstractions, when they become embodied in human character, and exemplified in human conduct, we should be false to our own nature, if we did not indulge in the spontane- ous effusions of our gratitude and our admiration. A true lover of the virtue of patriotism delights to contemplate its purest models ; and that love of country may well be suspected which affects to soar so high into the regions of sentiment as to be lost and absorbed in the abstract feeling, and becomes too elevated, or too refined, to glow with fervor in the commendation or the love of individual benefactors. iVll this is unnatural. It is as if one should be so enthusiastic a lover of poetry as to care nothing for Homer or Milton ; so passionately attached to eloquence as to be indifferent to Tully ^ and Chatham ; ^ or such a devotee to the arts, in such an ecstasy with the elements of beauty, propor- tion, and expression, as to regard the masterpieces of Raphael and Michael Angelo ^ with coldness or contempt. We may be assured, gentlemen, that he who really loves the thing itself loves its finest exhibitions. A true friend of his country loves her friends and benefactors, and thinks it no degra- dation to commend and commemorate them. The voluntary outpouring of public feeling made to-day,^ from the north to the south, and from the east to the west, proves this sentiment to be both just and natural. In the cities and in the villages, in the public temples and in the family circles, among all ages and sexes, gladdened voices to-day bespeak grateful hearts and a freshened ^ /. e. Cicero, Marcus Tidliiis, the Roman orator 2 William Pitt, first Earl of Chatham, 1708-1778 ^ Raphael and Michael Angelo, celebrated Italians, — the former as a painter, and the latter as a sculptor and an architect ; both were born in the latter part of the fifteenth century ^ Washington's birthday, 1S32 IVEBSTER 253 recollection of the virtues of the father of his country. And it will be so in all time to come, so long as public virtue is itself an object of regard. The ingenuous ^ youth of America will hold up to themselves the bright model of Washington's example, and study to be what they behold ; they will contemplate his charac- ter till all its virtues spread out and display themselves to their delighted vision, as the earliest astronomers, the shepherds on the plains of Babylon, gazed at the stars till they saw them form into clusters and constellations ^ overpowering at length the eyes of the beholders with the united blaze of a thousand lights. Gentlemen, we are at the point of a century from the birth of Washington ; and what a century it has been ! During its course the human mind has seemed to proceed with a sdrt of geometric velocity,^ accomplishing for human intelligence and human free- dom more than had been done in fives or tens of centuries preceding. W^ashington stands at the commencement of a new era, as well as at the head of the new world. A century from the birth of Washington has changed the world. The country of Washington has been the theater on which a great part of that change has been wrought ; and Washington himself a prin- cipal agent by which it has been accomplished. His age and his country are equally full of wonders, and of both he is the chief. If the prediction of the poet, uttered a few years before his birth, be true ; if indeed it be designed by Providence that the proudest exhibition of human character and human affairs shall be made on this theater of the Western world ; if it be true that, — " The four first acts already past, A fifth shall close the drama with the day ; Time's noblest offspring is the last," * — 1 free-born 2 Etymology ? 3 i. e. by geometrical ratio ; as 2-4-8-16, etc., and not by arithmetical ratio, as 2-4-6-8, etc. * The lines are from an ode on the " Future of America," written by Bishop Berkeley on the eve of his coming to this country in 1728. The line preceding those quoted by Webster, — " Westward the course of empire takes its way," — is so familiar as to be hackneyed, and is generally misquoted. 254 CATHCART'S LITERARY READER how could this imposing, swelhng, final scene be appropriately opened, how could its intense interest be adequately sustained, but by the introduction of just such a character as our Washington? Washington had attained his manhood when that spark of liberty was struck out in his own country, which has since kindled into a flame and shot its beams over the earth. In the flow of a century from his birth, the world has changed in science, in arts, in the extent of commerce, in the improvement of navigation, and in all that relates, to the civilization of man. But it is the spirit of human freedom, the new elevation of individual man, in his moral, social, and political character, leading the whole long train of other improvements, which has most remarkably distinguished the era. Society, in this century, has not made its progress, hke Chinese skill, by a greater acuteness of ingenuity in trifles; it has not merely lashed itself to an increased speed round the old circles of thought and action ; but it has assumed a new character ; it has raised itself from beneath governments to participation /;/ governments ; it has mixed moral and political objects with the daily pursuits of individual men, and, with a freedom and strength before altogether unknown, it has apphed to these objects the whole power of the human understanding. It has been the era, in short, when the social principle has triumphed over the feudal principle ; when society has main- tained its rights against military power, and established, on foundations never hereafter to be shaken, its competency to govern itself. THE AMERICAN UNION i I HAVE not allowed myself, sir, to look beyond the Union, to see what might lie hidden in the dark recess behind. Nor could I regard him as a safe counsellor in the affairs of this government whose thoughts should be mainly bent on considering, not how from a speech delivered in the United States Senate, January 26, 1S30 JVEBSTER 255 the Union may be best preserved, but how tolerable might be the condition of the people when it shall be broken up and de- stroyed. While the Union lasts, we have high, exciting, gratifying prospects spread out before us, for us and our children. Beyond that I seek not to penetrate the veil. God grant that, in my day at least, that curtain may not rise ! God grant that, on my vision never may be opened what lies behind ! When my eyes shall be turned to behold for the last time the sun in heaven, may they not see him shining on the broken and dishonored fragments of a once glorious Union ; on States dissevered, discordant, belligerent ; on a land rent with civil feuds, or drenched, it may be, in fraternal blood. Let their last feeble and lingering glance rather behold the gorgeous ensign of the republic, now known and honored throughout the earth, still full-high advanced ; its arms and trophies streaming in all their original luster, not a stripe erased or polluted, not a single star obscured ; bearing for its motto no such miserable interrogatory as "What is all this worth? " nor those other words of delusion and folly, of '' Liberty first, and Union afterwards;" but everywhere, spread all over in characters of living light, and blazing on all its ample folds, as they float over the sea and over the land, and in every wind under the whole heavens, that other sentiment dear to every true American heart, — " Liberty and Union, — now and for- ever, — one and inseparable." Our fathers raised their flag against a power to which, for purposes of foreign conquest and subjugation, Rome, in the height of her glory, is not to be compared, — a power which has dotted the surface of the whole globe with her possessions and military posts, whose morning drum-beat, following the sun in his course, and keeping pace with the hours, circles the earth with one continuous and unbroken strain of the martial airs of England. 256 CATHCART S LITERARY READER IRVING I 783-1 859 No name in our literary annals is more fondly cherished than that of Washington Irving, one of the earliest and most distinguished of American writers. He was born in New York in 1783, and died at Sunnyside, his home on the Hudson, in 1859. He began his literary career by contributing to the columns of the Morning Chronicle, of which his brother, Dr. Peter Irving, was editor. His health failing, he went to Europe, where he remained ^^^2^.^^^^!^'^^ ^"^^^""^^^5^^ % two years. On his return he was admitted to the Bar, but gave little atten- tion to his profession. In 1807 appeared the first number of Sahnagnndi ; or, the Whim- Whams and Opinions of Launcelot Langstaff and Others, — a semi-monthly periodical of light and agreeable character, which was very popular during its existence of less than two years. In 1809 the famous " History of New York, by Diedrich Knickerbocker," was published, and had a m.ost cordial reception. The next year Washington Irving became a partner in the mercantile business conducted by his brothers ; but in 18 12 the firm failed, and the young author returned to literary labors. IRVING 257 "The Sketch-Book" appeared in 1819, and established his fame in Eng- land and America. " Bracebridge Hall," "The Conquest of Granada," "The Life of Columbus," and other works, were issued at intervals prior to 1832. In 1S42 he was appointed United States Minister to Spain, and held that office four years. After his return he wrote a " Life of Goldsmith," "The Life of Washington," and "Mahomet and his Successors." It is safe to say that no American author has been so generally and heartily loved as Washington Irving, and he was as popular in Great Britain as at home. His style is a model of ease, grace, and refinement. Thackeray pays this tribute to the character of Irving : " In his family gentle, generous, good- humored, affectionate, self-denying ; in society a delightful example of com- plete gentlemanhood, quite unspoiled by prosperity, never obsequious to the great (or, worse still, to the base and mean, as some public men are forced to be in his and other countries), eager to acknowledge every con- temporary's merit, always kind and affable with the young members of his calling, in his professional bargains and mercantile dealings delicately hon- est and grateful. He was at the same time one of the most charming mas- ters of our lighter language, the constant friend to us and our nation, to men of letters doubly dear, not for his wit and genius merely, but as an exemplar of goodness, probity, and a pure life." Our extracts are from "The Sketch-Book" and "The Life of Columbus." ICHABOD CRANE In the bosom of one of those spacious coves which indent the eastern shore of the Hudson, at that broad expansion of the river denominated by the ancient Dutch navigators the Tappan Zee, and where they ahvays prudently shortened sail, and im- plored the protection of Saint Nicholas when they crossed, there Ues a small market-town or rural port, which by some is called Greensburgh, but which is more generally and properly known by the name of Tarry Town. This name was given, we are told, in former days, by the good housewives of the adjacent country, from the inveterate propensity of their husbands to linger about the village tavern on market-days. Be that as it may, I do not vouch for the fact, but merely advert to it, for the sake of being precise and authentic. Not far from this village, perhaps about 17 2S8 CATHCARTS LITERARY READER two miles, there is a little valley, or rather lap of land, among high hills, which is one of the quietest ])laces in the whole world. A small brook glides through it, with just murmur enough to lull one to repose ; and the occasional whistle of a quail, or tapping of a woodpecker, is almost the only sound that ever breaks in upon the uniform tranquillity. I recollect that, when a stripling, my first exploit in squirrel- shooting was in a grove of tall walnut-trees that shades one side of the valley. I had wandered into it at noon-time, when all nature is peculiarly quiet, and was startled by the roar of my own gun as it broke the Sabbath stillness around, and was pro- longed and reverberated by the angry echoes. If ever I should wish for a retreat, whither I might steal from the world and its distractions, and dream quietly away the remnant of a troubled life, I know of none more promising than this little valley. From the listless repose of the place, and the peculiar char- acter of its inhabitants, who are descendants from the original Dutch settlers, this sequestered glen has long been known by the name of Sleepy Hollow, and its rustic lads are called the Sleepy Hollow Boys throughout all the neighboring country. \ drowsy, dreamy influence seems to hang over the land, and to perv^ade the very atmosphere. Some say that the place was bewitched by a high German doctor, during the early days of the settlement ; others, that an old Indian chief, the prophet or wizard of his tribe, held his powwows there before the country was discovered by Master Hendrick Hudson. ^ Certain it is, the place still con- tinues under the sway of some witching power, that holds a spell over the minds of the good people, causing them to walk in a continual revery. They are given to all kinds of marvelous beliefs ; are subject to trances and visions ; and frequently see strange sights, and hear music and voices in the air. The whole neighborhood abounds with local tales, haunted spots, and twilight superstitions ; stars shoot and meteors glare oftener across the valley than in any other part of the country, and the 1 Henry Hudson, the English navigator who discovered the Hudson River in 1609 IRVING 259 nightmare, with her whole nine fold,^ seems to make it the favorite scene of her gambols. The dominant spirit, however, that haunts this enchanted region, and seems to be commander-in-chief of all the powers of the air, is the apparition of a figure on horseback without a head. It is said by some to be the ghost of a Hessian trooper, whose head had been carried away by a cannon-ball, in some nameless battle during the Revolutionary War ; and who is ever and anon seen by the country folk, hurrying along in the gloom of night, as if on the wings of the wind. His haunts are not con- fined to the valley, but extend at times to the adjacent roads, and especially to the vicinity of a church at no great distance. Indeed, certain of the most authentic historians of those parts, who have been careful in collecting and collating ^ the floating facts concerning this specter, allege that, the body of the trooper having been buried in the church-yard, the ghost rides forth to the scene of battle in nightly quest of his head ; and that the rushing speed with which he sometimes passes along the Hollow, like a midnight blast, is owing to his being belated, and in a hurry to get back to the church-yard before daybreak. Such is the general purport of this legendary superstition, which has furnished materials for many a wild story in that region of shadows ; and the specter is known, at all the country firesides, by the name of the Headless Horseman of Sleepy Hollow. It is remarkable that the visionary propensity I have mentioned is not confined to the native inhabitants of the valley, but is unconsciously imbibed by every one who resides there for a time. However wide awake they may have been before they entered that sleepy region, they are sure, in a little time, to inhale the witching influence of the air, and begin to grow imaginative, — to dream dreams and see apparitions. I mention this peaceful spot with all possible laud ; ^ for it is in such little retired Dutch valleys, found here and there embosomed 1 Irving's " nine fold " must be construed to mean " nine foals,'" — a grotesque addition to make tiie fancy more alarming. 2 collecting . . . collating; discriminate ^ laudation, praise 26o CATHCART'S LITERARY READER in the great state of New York, that population, manners, and customs remain fixed ; while the great torrent of migration and improvement which is making such incessant changes in other parts of this restless country sweeps by them unobserved. They are like those little nooks of still water which border a rapid stream ; where we may see the straw and bubble riding quietly at anchor, or slowly revolving in their mimic harbor, undisturbed by the rush of the passing current. Though many years have elapsed since I trod the drowsy shades of Sleepy Hollow, yet I question whether I should not still find the same trees and the same families vegetating in its sheltered bosom. In this by-place of Nature there abode, in a remote period of American history, that is to say, some thirty years since, a worthy wight of the name of Ichabod Crane ; who sojourned, or, as he expressed it, " tarried," in Sleepy Hollow, for the purpose of instructing the children of the vicinity. He was a native of Con- necticut, — a state which supplies the Union with pioneers for the mind as well as for the forest, and sends forth yearly its legions of frontier woodsmen and country schoolmasters. The cogno- men ^ of Crane was not inapplicable to his person. He was tall, but exceedingly lank, with narrow shoulders, long arms and legs, hands that dangled a mile out of his sleeves, feet that might have served for shovels, and his whole frame most loosely hung together. His head was small, and flat at top, with huge ears, large green glassy eyes, and a long snipe nose, so that it looked like a weather- cock perched upon his spindle neck to tell which way the wind blew. To see him striding along the profile of a hill on a windy day, with his clothes bagging and fluttering about him, one might have mistaken him for the genius of famine descending upon the earth, or some scarecrow eloped from a cornfield. His school-house was a low building of one large room, rudely constructed of logs ; the windows partly glazed, and partly patched with leaves of old copy-books. It was most ingeniously secured at vacant hours by a withe ^ twisted in the handle of the surname ^ a band of twigs IRVING 261 door, and stakes set against the window-shutters ; so that, though a thief might get in with perfect ease, he would find some embarrassment in getting out, — an idea most probably borrowed by the architect, Yost Van Houten, from the mystery of an eel- pot. The school-house stood in a rather lonely but pleasant situ- ation, just at the foot of a woody hill, with a brook running close by, and a formidable birch-tree^ growing at one end of it. From hence the low murmur of his pupils' voices, conning over their lessons, might be heard in a drowsy summer's day, like the hum of a beehive, interrupted now and then by the authoritative voice of the master, in the tone of menace or command ; or, peradventure, by the appalling sound of the birch, as he urged some tardy loiterer along the flowery path of knowledge. Truth to say, he was a conscientious man, and ever bore in mind the golden maxim, " Spare the rod, and spoil the child." Ichabod Crane's scholars certainly were not spoiled. I would not have it imagined, however, that he was one oi those cruel potentates of the school, who joy in the smart of theii subjects ; on the contrary, he administered justice with discrimi- nation rather than severity ; taking the burden off the backs of the weak, and laying it on those of the strong. Your mere puny stripling, that winced at the least flourish of the rod, was passed by with indulgence ; but the claims of justice were satisfied by inflicting a double portion on some little tough, wrong-headed, broad-skirted Dutch urchin, who sulked and swelled and grew dogged and sullen beneath the birch. All this he called " doing his duty by their parents;" and he never inflicted a chastise- ment without following it by the assurance, so consolatory to the smarting urchin, that " he would remember it, and thank him for it, the longest day he had to live." '^formidable birch-free. Note the humorous suggestiveness of the phrase. 262 CATHCART'S LITERARY READER n. When school-hours were over, he was even the companion and playmate of the larger boys ; and on holiday afternoons would convoy some of the smaller ones home, who happened to have pretty sisters, or good housewives for mothers, noted for the comforts of the cupboard. Indeed, it behooved him to keep on good terms with his pupils. The revenue arising from his school was small, and would have been scarcely sufficient to furnish him with daily bread, for he was a huge feeder, and, though lank, had the dilating powers of an anaconda ; but to help out his main- tenance, he was, according to country custom in those parts, boarded and lodged at the houses of the farmers whose children he instructed. With these he lived successively a week at a time ; thus going the rounds of the neighborhood, with all his worldly effects tied up in a cotton handkerchief. That all this might not be too onerous on the purses of his rustic patrons, who are apt to consider the costs of schooling a grievous burden, and schoolmasters as mere drones, he had vari- ous ways of rendering himself both useful and agreeable. He assisted the farmers occasionally in the lighter labors of their farms ; helped to make hay ; mended the fences ; took the horses to water ; drove the cows from pasture ; cut wood for the winter fire. He laid aside, too, all the dominant dignity and absolute sway with which he lorded it in his little empire, the school, and became wonderfully gentle and ingratiating He found favor in the eyes of the mothers by petting the children, particularly the youngest ; and like the lion bold, which whilom ^ so magnani- mously the lamb did hold, he would sit with a child on one knee, and rock a cradle with his foot for whole hours together. . In addition to his other vocations, he was the singing-master of the neighborhood, and picked up many bright shillings by instructing the young folks in psalmody.^ It was a matter of no little vanity to him, on Sundays, to take his station in front of the 1 once, formerly - Give the double etymology. /RISING 263 church gallery, with a band of chosen singers ; where, in his own mind, he completely carried away the palm from the parson. Certain it is, his voice resounded far above all the rest of the con- gregation ; and there are peculiar quavers still to be heard in that church, and which may even be heard half a mile off, quite to the opposite side of the mill-pond, on a still Sunday morning, which are said to be legitimately descended from the nose of Ichabod Crane. Thus by divers little makeshifts in that ingenious way which is commonly denominated " by hook and by crook," the worthy pedagogue got on tolerably enough, and was thought, by all who understood nothing of the labor of head-work, to have a wonderfully easy life of it. The schoolmaster is generally a man of some importance in the female circle of a rural neighborhood, being considered a kind of idle gentleman-like personage, of vastly superior taste and accomplishments to the rough country swains, and, indeed, inferior in learning only to the parson. His appearance, there- fore, is apt to occasion some little stir at the tea-table of a farm- house, and the addition of a supernumerary dish of cakes or sweetmeats, or, peradventure, the parade of a silver tea-pot. Our man of letters, therefore, was pecuHarly happy in the smiles of all the country damsels. How he would figure among them in the churchyard, between services on Sundays ! gathering grapes for them from the wild vines that overran the surround- ing trees ; reciting for their amusement all the epitaphs on the tombstones ; or sauntering, with a whole bevy of them, along the banks of the adjacent mill-pond ; while the more bashful country bumpkins ^ hung sheepishly back, envying his superior elegance and address. From his half itinerant life, also, he was a kind of traveling gazette, carrying the whole budget of local gossip from house to house ; so that his appearance was always greeted with satisfac- tion. He was, moreover, esteemed by the women as a man of great erudition, for he had read several books quite through, and was a perfect master of Cotton Mather's " History of New 1 bumpkins (See Webster for the etymology of this word.) 264 CATHCART'S LITERARY READER England Witchcraft," — in which, by the way, he most firmly and potently believed. He was, in fact, a mixture of small shrewdness and simple credulity. His appetite for the marvelous, and his powers of digesting it, were equally extraordinary ; and both had been increased by his residence in this spell-bound region. No tale was too gross or monstrous for his capacious swallow. ^ It was often his delight, after his school was dismissed in the afternoon, to stretch himself on the rich bed of clover bordering the little brook that whimpered by his school-house, and there con over old Mather's direful tales until the gathering dusk of the evening made the printed page a mere mist before his eyes. Then, as he wended ^ his way, by swamp and stream and awful woodland, to the farm-house where he happened to be quartered, every sound of nature, at that witching hour, fluttered his excited imagina- tion, — the moan of the whippoorwill from the hill-side ; the boding cry of the tree-toad, that harbinger of storm ; the dreary hooting of the screech-owl, or the sudden rustling in the thicket of birds frightened from their roost. The fireflies, too, which sparkled most vividly in the darkest places, now and then startled him, as one of uncommon brightness would stream across his path ; and if by chance a huge blockhead of a beetle came winging his blundering flight against him, the poor varlet^ was ready to give up the ghost, with the idea that he was struck with a witch's token. His only resource on such occasions, either to drown thought or drive away evil spirits, was to sing psalm- tunes ; and the good people of Sleepy Hollow, as they sat by their doors of an evening, were often filled with awe at hearing his nasal melody, in "linked sweetness long drawn out,"* floating from the distant hill, or along the dusky road. Another of his sources of fearful pleasure was, to pass long winter evenings with the old Dutch wives as they sat spinning by the fire, with a row of apples roasting and spluttering along the hearth, and listen to their marvelous tales of ghosts and ^ voracity; /. e. greedy credulity '^ a lowly creature (compare valet) 2 What is the commoner form? * from Milton's "L'Allegro" IRVING 265 goblins, and haunted fields, and haunted brooks, and haunted bridges, and haunted houses, and particularly of the headless horseman, or Galloping Hessian of the Hollow, as they some- times called him. He would delight them equally by his anec- dotes of witchcraft, and of the direful omens and portentous sights and sounds in the air which prevailed in the earlier times of Connecticut ; and would frighten them wofully with specula- tions upon comets and shooting stars ; and with the alarming fact that the world did absolutely turn round, and that they were half the time topsy-turvy ! But if there was a pleasure in all this, while snugly cuddling in the chimney-corner of a chamber that was all of a ruddy glow from the crackling wood-fire, and where, of course, no specter dared to show his face, it was dearly purchased by the terrors of his subsequent walk homewards. What fearful shapes and shadows beset his path amidst the dim and ghastly glare of a snowy night ! With what wistful look did he eye every trem- bling ray of light streaming across the waste fields from some distant window ! How often was he appalled by some shrub covered with snow, which, like a sheeted specter, beset his very path ! How often did he shrink with curdling awe at the sound of his own steps on the frosty crust beneath his feet, and dread to look over his shoulder, lest he should behold some uncouth being tramping close behind him ! And how often was he thrown into complete dismay by some rushing blast, howling among the trees, in the idea that it was the Galloping Hessian on one of his nightly scourings ! All these, however, were mere terrors of the night, phantoms of the mind, that walk in darkness ; and though he had seen many specters in his time, and been more than once beset by Satan in divers shapes, in his lonely perambulations, yet day- light put an end to all these evils ; and he would have passed a pleasant life of it, in despite of the devil and all his works, if his path had not been crossed by a being that causes more per- plexity to mortal man than ghosts, goblins, and the whole race of witches put together, and that was — a woman. 266 CATHCART'S LITERARY READER THE DISCOVERY OF AMERICA It was on Friday morning, the 12 th of October, 1492, that Columbus first beheld the New World. i\s the day dawned he saw before him a level island, several leagues in extent, and covered with trees hke a continual orchard. Though apparently uncultivated, it was populous, for the inhabitants were seen issuing from all parts of the woods and running to the shore. They were perfectly naked, and as they stood gazing at the ships, appeared by their attitudes and gestures to be lost in astonishment. Columbus made signals for the ships to cast anchor, and the boats to be manned and armed. He entered his own boat, richly attired in scarlet, and holding the royal standard ; whilst Martin Alonzo Pinzon and Vincent Janez, his brother, put off in company in their boats, each with a banner of the enterprise emblazoned with a green cross, having on either side the letters F. and Y., the initials of the Castilian monarchs Fernando and Ysabel, surmounted by crowns. As he approached the shore, Columbus, who was disposed for all kinds of agreeable impressions, was delighted with the purity and suavity of the atmosphere, the crystal transparency of the sea, and the extraordinary beauty of the vegetation. He beheld, also, fruits of an unknown kind upon the trees which overhung the shores. On landing, he threw himself on his knees, kissed the earth, and returned thanks to God with tears of joy. His exam- ple was followed by the rest, whose hearts indeed overflowed with the same feelings of gratitude. Columbus, then rising, drew his sword, displayed the royal standard, and assembUng round him the two captains, with Rod- rigo de Escobedo, notary of the armament, Rodrigo Sanchez, and the rest who had landed, he took solemn possession in the name of the Castilian sovereigns, giving the island the name of San Salvador. Having complied with the requisite forms and cere- monies, he called upon all present to take the oath of obedience IRVING 267 to him, as admiral and viceroy representing the persons of the sovereigns. The feehngs of the crew now burst forth in the most extrava- gant transports. They had recently considered themselves devoted men, hurrying forward to destruction ; they now looked upon themselves as favorites of fortune, and gave themselves up to the most unbounded joy. They thronged around the admiral with overflowing zeal, some embracing him, others kissing his hands. Those who had been most mutinous and turbulent during the voyage were now most devoted and enthusiastic. Some begged favors of him, as if he had already wealth and honors in his gift. Many abject spirits, who had outraged him by their insolence, now crouched at his feet, begging pardon for all the trouble they had caused him, and promising the blindest obedience • for the future. The natives of the island, when, at the dawn of day, they had beheld the ships hovering on their coast, had supposed them monsters which had issued from the deep during the night. They had crowded to the beach, and watched their movements with awful anxiety. Their veering about, apparently without effort, and the shifting and furling of their sails, resembling huge wings, filled them with astonishment. When they beheld their boats approach the shore, and a number of strange beings clad in glit- tering steel, or raiment of various colors, landing upon the beach, they fled in affright to the woods. Finding, however, that there was no attempt to pursue nor molest them, they gradually recovered from their terror, and approached the Spaniards with great awe, frequently prostrating themselves on the earth, and making signs of adoration. During the ceremonies of taking possession, they remained gazing in timid admiration at the complexion, the beards, the shining armor, and splendid dress of the Spaniards. The admiral partic- ularly attracted their attention, from his commanding height, his air of authority, his dress of scarlet, and the deference which was paid him by his companions ; all which pointed him out to be the commander. 268 CATHCARTS LITERARY READER When they had still further recovered from their fears, they approached the Spaniards, touched their beards, and examined their hands and faces, admiring their whiteness. Columbus was pleased with their gentleness and confiding simplicity, and suffered their scrutiny with perfect acquiescence, winning them by his benignity. They now supposed that the ships had sailed out of the crystal firmament which bounded their horizon, or had descended from above on their ample wings, and that these mar- velous beings were inhabitants of the skies. The natives of the island were no less objects of curiosity to the Spaniards, differing as they did from any race of men they had ever seen. Their appearance gave no promise of either wealth or civilization, for they were entirely naked, and painted with a variety of colors. With some it was confined merely to a part of the face, the nose, or around the eyes ; with others it extended to the whole body, and gave them a wild and fantastic appearance. Their complexion was of a tawny or copper hue, and they were entirely destitute of beards. Their hair was not crisped, like the recently discovered tribes of the African coast, under the same latitude, but straight and coarse, partly cut short above the ears, but some locks were left long behind and falling upon their shoulders. As Columbus supposed himself to have landed on an island at the extremity of India, he called the natives by the general appel- lation of Indians, which was universally adopted before the true nature of his discovery was known, and has since been extended to all the aboriginals of the New World. The islanders were friendly and gentle. Their only arms were lances, hardened at the end by fire, or pointed with a flint, or the teeth or bone of a fish. There was no iron to be seen, nor did they appear acquainted with its properties ; for when a drawn sword was presented to them, they unguardedly took it by the edge. Columbus distributed among them colored caps, glass beads, hawks' bells, and other trifles, such as the Portuguese were accustomed to trade with among the nations of the Gold Coast of Africa. They received them eagerly, hung the beads round IRVING 269 their necks, and were wonderfully pleased with their finery, and with the sound of the bells. The Spaniards remained all day on shore, refreshing themselves after their anxious voyage amidst the beautiful groves of the island, and returned on board late in the evening, delighted with all they had seen. On the following morning, at break of day, the shore was thronged with the natives; some swam off to the ships, others came in light barks, which the}' called canoes, formed of a single tree, hollowed, and capable of holding from one man up to the number of forty or fifty. These they managed dexterously with paddles, and, if overturned, swam about in the water with perfect unconcern, as if in their natural element, righting their canoes with great facility, and baling them with calabashes.^ They were eager to procure more toys and trinkets, not, apparently, from any idea of their intrinsic value, but because everything from the hands of the strangers possessed a super- natural virtue in their eyes, as having been brought from heaven ; they even picked up fragments of glass and earthenware as valu- able prizes. They had but few objects to offer in return, except parrots, of which great numbers were domesticated among them, and cotton yarn, of which they had abundance, and would ex- change large balls of five and twenty pounds' weight for the merest trifle. The avarice of the discoverers was quickly excited by the sight of small ornaments of gold worn by some of the natives in their noses. These the latter gladly exchanged for glass beads and hawks' bells ; and both parties exulted in the bargain, no doubt admiring each other's simplicity. As gold, however, was an ob- ject of royal monopoly in all enterprises of discovery, Columbus forbade any traffic in it without his express sanction ; and he put the same prohibition on the traffic for cotton, reser\dng to the Crown all trade for it, wherever it should be found in any quantity. He inquired of the natives where this gold was procured. They answered him by signs, pointing to the south, where, he 1 gourds from the calabash-tree 270 CATHCARTS LITERARY READER understood them, dwelt a king of such wealth that he was served in vessels of wrought gold. He understood, also, that there was land to the south, the southwest, and the northwest ; and that the people from the last-mentioned quarter frequently proceeded to the southwest in quest of gold and precious stones, making in their way descents upon the islands, and carrying off the inhabi- tants. Several of the natives showed him scars of wounds re- ceived in battles with these invaders. It is evident that a great part of this fancied intelligence was self-delusion on the part of Columbus ; for he was under a spell of the imagination, which gave its own shapes and colors to every object. He was persuaded that he had arrived among the islands de- scribed by Marco Polo ^ as lying opposite Cathay, in the Chinese Sea, and he construed everything to accord with the account given of those opulent regions. Thus the enemies which the natives spoke of as coming from the northwest he concluded to be the people of the mainland of Asia, the subjects of the great Khan of Tartary, who were represented by the Venetian traveler as accustomed to make war upon the islands and to enslave their inhabitants. The country to the south, abounding in gold, could be no other than the famous island of Cipango ; and the king, who was served out of vessels of gold, must be the monarch whose magnificent city and gorgeous palace, covered with plates of gold, had been extolled in such splendid terms by Marco Polo. The island where Columbus had thus, for the first time, set his foot upon the New World, was called by the natives Guanahane. It still retains the name of San Salvador, which he gave to it, though called by the English Cat Island. The light which he had seen the evening previous to his making land may have been on Watling's Island, which lies a few leagues to the east. San Salvador is one of the great cluster of the Lucayos, or Bahama Islands, which stretch southeast and northwest from the coast of Florida to Hispaniola, covering the northern coast of Cuba. 1 A renowned Venetian traveler, born about 1252. He was the first Euro- pean that entered China or made any extended journey into Central Asia. BYRON 271 BYRON I 788-1 824 George Gordon, Lord Byron, was born in 1788, and died in 1824. In youth he was precocious, manifesting remarkable intellectual power, but giving evidence also of a wild and ungovernable temper. Leaving Trinity College, Cambridge, at the age of nineteen, he prepared a volume of poems for publication, which, under the title of " Hours of Idleness," was severely ridiculed by the Edinburgh Review. A year later appeared Byron's reply, " English Bards and Scotch Reviewers," — one of the most powerful and scorching satires ever written. Having traveled for two years on the Con- tinent, Byron returned to England, and in 1812 published the first two cantos of " Childe Harold," which is generally esteemed his greatest work. In 1816 he left England, which he declared he would never revisit. He spent some time at Geneva with literary friends, and then settled in Italy, where he wrote " Manfred,'' the concluding canto of " Childe Harold,'' 272 CATHCARTS LITERARY READER "Mazeppa," and the first part of " Don Juan." In 1820 he was associated with Shelley and Leigh Hunt in the publication of a periodical called The Liberal, in which '-The Vision of Judgment" was first printed. In 1823 he went to Greece, where he intended to aid the Greeks in their resistance to Turkish oppression. But he was seized with epilepsy, and rheumatic fever ensuing, he died April 19, 1824. Byron's poems are marvels of energy and spirit, glittering with poetical beauties and epigrammatic expression. He possesses, in the words of Matthew Arnold, to an extraordinary degree " the virtues of sincerity and strength." But a profound morbidness pervades his poems, and the thoughtful reader feels himself, as he ponders their passionate, defiant philosophy, to be in the presence of an unhealthy mind. Taine's criticism is acute : " No such great poet has had so narrow an imagination; he could not metamorphose himself into another. They are his own sorrows, his own revolts, his own travels, which, hardly transformed and modified, he intro- duces into his verses. He does not invent, he observes ; he does not create, he transcribes. His copy is darkly exaggerated, but it is a copy. ' I could not write upon anything,' says he, * without some personal experience and foundation.' You will find in his letters and note-book, almost feature for feature, the most striking of his descriptions. The capture of Ismail, the shipwreck of Don Juan, are, almost word for word, like two accounts of it in prose. If none but cockneys could attribute to him the crimes of his heroes, none but blind men could fail to see in him the sentiments of his characters. This is so true, that he has not created more than one." MODERN GREECE Clime of the unforgotten brave ! Whose land from plain to mountain cave Was freedom's home or glory's grave ! Shrine of the mighty ! can it be, That this is all remains of thee ? Approach, thou craven crouching slave : Say, is not this Thermopylae ? -^ 1 Thermopylae. A mountain defile in Greece where Leonidas (480 B.C.), at the head of three hundred Spartans, withstood the whole force of the Persian army for three days. It is said that more than twenty thousand Persians perished in the memorable combat, and only one Greek survived. This battle is thought to afford the finest recorded instance of heroic bravery. BYRON These waters blue that round you lave, O servile offspring of the free, — Pronounce what sea, what shore is this ? The gulf, the rock of Salamis ! ^ These scenes, their story not unknown. Arise and make again your own ; Snatch from the ashes of your sires The embers of their former fires ; And he who in the strife expires Will add to theirs a name of fear, That tyranny shall quake to hear, And leave his sons a hope, a fame, They too will rather die than shame ; For freedom's battle, once begun, Bequeathed by bleeding sire to son, Though baffled oft, is ever won. Bear witness, Greece, thy living page, Attest it many a deathless age ! While kings, in dusty darkness hid. Have left a nameless pyramid ; Thy heroes, though the general doom Hath swept the column from their tomb, A mightier monument command, — The mountains of their native land ! There points thy muse to stranger's eye The graves of those that can not die. 'Twere long to tell, and sad to trace, Each step from splendor to disgrace ; Enough, — no foreign foe could quell Thy soul, till from itself it fell ; Yes ! self-abasement paved the way To villain ^ bonds and despot sway. 273 1 Salamis. This refers to a celebrated naval battle between the Greeks and the Persians, where the latter were disastrously defeated. slavish, servile 18 2/4 CATHCART'S LITERARY READER ROME O Rome ! my country ! city of the soul ! The orphans of the heart must turn to thee, Lone mother of dead empires ! and control / In their shut breasts their petty misery. What are our woes and sufferance ^ ? Come and see The cypress, hear the owl, and plod your way O'er steps of broken thrones and temples, ye, Whose agonies are evils of a day, — A world is at our feet as fragile as our clay ! The Niobe ^ of nations ! there she stands. Childless and crownless, in her voiceless woe ; An empty urn within her withered hands, Whose holy dust was scattered long ago ; The Scipios' tomb contains no ashes now ; The very sepulchers he tenantless Of their heroic dwellers ; dost thou flow, Old Tiber, through a marble wilderness? Rise, with thy yellow waves, and mantle ^ her distress. The Goth, the Christian, Time, War, Flood, and Fire, Have dealt upon the seven-hilled city's pride ; * She saw her glories star by star expire. And up the steep barbarian monarchs ride. Where the car climbed the Capitol ; far and wide Temple and tower went down, nor left a site ; Chaos of ruins ! who shall trace the void. O'er the dim fragments cast a lunar ^ light, And say, " Here was, or is," where all is doubly night? 1 suffering, misery 2 the fabled wife of Tantalus, struck dumb with grief 3 cover, as with a mantle * dealt upon . . . pride ; i. e. have worked their pleasure upon, etc. ^ /. e. even a feeble light BYRON 275 The double night of ages, and of her, Night's daughter, Ignorance, hath wrapt and wrap All round us ; we but feel our way to err : The ocean hath its chart, the stars their map, And Knowledge spreads them on her ample lap ; But Rome is as the desert, where we steer Stumbling o'er recollections ; now we clap Our hands, and cry " Eureka ! it is clear," — When but some false mirage of ruin rises near. Alas ! the lofty city ! and alas ! The trebly hundred triumphs ! and the day When Brutus made the dagger's edge surpass The conqueror's sword in bearing fame away ! Alas for Tully's voice, and Virgil's lay. And Livy's pictured page ! — but these shall be Her resurrection ; all beside — decay. Alas for Earth, for never shall we see That brightness in her eye she bore when Rome was free ! THE OCEAN Roll on, thou deep and dark blue Ocean, roll ! Ten thousand fleets sweep over thee in vain ; Man marks the earth with ruin, — his control Stops with the shore ; — upon the watery plain The wrecks are all thy deed, nor doth remain A shadow of man's ravage, save his own, When, for a moment, like a drop of rain, He sinks into thy depths with bubbling groan. Without a grave, unknelled, uncofifined, and unknown.^ ^ Compare Scott's "Unwept, unhonored, and unsung," page 221. 2/6 CATHCARTS LITERARY READER His stej^s are not upon thy paths, — thy fields Are not a spoil for him, — thou dost arise And shake him from thee ; the vile strength he wields For earth's destruction thou dost all despise, Spurning him from thy bosom to the skies. And send'st him, shivering in thy playful spray And howling, to his gods, where haply lies His petty hope in some near port or bay. And dashest him again to earth : — there let him lay.-^ The armaments which thunderstrike the walls Of rock-built cities, bidding nations quake And monarchs tremble in their capitals. The oak leviathans, whose huge ribs make Their clay creator the vain title take Of lord of thee, and arbiter of war, — These are thy toys, and as the snowy flake They melt into thy yeast of waves, which mar Alike the Armada's pride or spoils of Trafalgar.^ Thy shores are empires, changed in all save thee, — Assyria, Greece, Rome, Carthage, what are they? Thy waters wasted them while they were free, And many a tyrant since ; their shores obey The stranger, slave, or savage ; their decay Has dried up realms to deserts ; — not so thou ; — Unchangeable save to thy wild waves' play, — Time writes no wrinkle on thine azure brow, — Such as creation's dawn beheld, thou rollest now. Thou glorious mirror, where the Almighty's form Glasses itself in tempests ; in all time. Calm or convulsed, — in breeze, or gale, or storm. Icing the pole, or in the torrid clime 1 Note the bad grammar '■^ This line refers to two historical naval battles in which the British were victorious. BYRON 277 Dark-heaving ; — boundless, endless, and sublime, — The image of Eternity, — the throne Of the Invisible ; e'en from out thy slime The monsters of the deep are made : each zone Obeys thee : thou goest forth, dread, fathomless, alone. And I have loved thee. Ocean ! and my joy Of youthful sports was on thy breast to be Borne, like thy bubbles, onward : from a boy I wantoned with thy breakers, — they to me Were a delight ; and if the freshening sea Made them a terror, — 't was a pleasing fear. For I was as it were a child of thee. And trusted to thy billows far and near, And laid my hand upon thy mane, — as I do here. I SAW THEE WEEP I SAW thee weep, — the big bright tear Came o'er that eye of blue ; And then methought it did appear A violet dropping dew; I saw thee smile, — the sapphire's blaze Beside thee ^ ceased to shine ; It could not match the living rays That filled that glance of thine. As clouds from yonder sun receive A deep and mellow dye. Which scarce the shade of coming eve Can banish from the sky. Those smiles unto the moodiest mind Their own pure joy impart ; Their sunshine leaves a glow behind That lightens o'er the heart. 1 i. e. compared with thee 2;8 CATHCART'S LITERARY READER BRYANT 1 797-1 878 William Cullen Bryant was born in Cummington, Massachusetts, in 1797, and died in New York City in 1878, from the effects of a sunstroke. At the age of ten he made translations from the Latin poets, which were published, and three years later wrote " The Embargo," a satirical poem of much merit. He studied law, and practiced that profession for some time in C^7^o^:&^yM> Great Barrington, Massachusetts. His early productions were regarded as the work of a precocious genius which would surely spend itself in these premature efforts ; but the appearance of " Thanatopsis," which was written in his nineteenth year, and was published in the North American Review, proved conclusively that he was not a mere youthful prodigy. In 1S25 he removed to New York, and, with a partner, established the N'ew York Review and Athen(^um Magazine, to which he contributed some of his best poems. BRYANT 279 The next year he became editor of the Evening Post, which place he held at the time of his death. In England his poetry is held in high esteem ; " Thanatopsis," " To a Waterfowl," and " Green River " have received especial praise from leading English critics. Bryant was distinctively a student and interpreter of Na- ture ; all her aspects and voices were familiar to him, and are reproduced in his poetry with a solemn and ennobling beauty which has never been attained by any other American poet. Washington Irving says: "Bryant's writings transport us into the depths of the solemn primeval forest ; to the shores of the lonely lake; the banks of the wild, nameless stream ; or the brow of the rocky upland rising like a promontory from amidst a wide ocean of foliage; while they shed around us the glories of a climate fierce in its extremes, but splendid in all its vicissitudes." In many respects his verse resembles Wordsworth's, but its spirit is less introspective. Another striking charac- teristic of Bryant's poetry is its lofty moral tone, — the eloquence of a great intellect warmed and controlled by high and pure impulses. THE DEATH OF THE FLOWERS The melancholy days are come, the saddest of the year, Of wailing winds, and naked woods, and meadows brown and sear. Heaped in the hollows of the grove the withered leaves lie dead ; They rustle to the eddying gust and to the rabbit's tread. The robin and the wren are flown, and from the shrubs the jay. And from the wood-top calls the crow through all the gloomy day. Where are the flowers, the fair young flowers, that lately sprang and stood In brighter light and softer airs, a beauteous sisterhood ? Alas ! they all are in their graves ; the gentle race of flowers Are lying in their lowly beds, with the fair and good of ours. The rain is falling where they lie, but the cold November rain Calls not from out the gloomy earth the lovely ones again. The wind-flower and the violet, they perished long ago, And the brier-rose and the orchis died amid the summer's glow ; But on the hill the golden-rod, and the aster in the wood. And the yellow sunflower by the brook in autumn beauty stood, 28o CATHCART'S LITERARY READER Till fell the frost from the clear cold heaven, as falls the plague on men, And the brightness of their smile was gone from upland, glade, and glen. And now, when comes the calm mild day, as still such days will come. To call the squirrel and the bee from out their winter home ; When the sound of dropping nuts is heard, though all the trees are still. And twinkle in the smoky light the waters of the rill. The south-wind searches for the flowers whose fragrance late he bore. And sighs to find them in the wood and by the stream no more. And then I think of one who in her youthful beauty died, The fair meek blossom that grew up and faded by my side. In the cold moist earth we laid her, when the forest cast the leaf, And we wept that one so lovely should have a life so brief; Yet not unmeet it was that one, like that young friend of ours. So gentle and so beautiful, should perish with the flowers. THANATOPSIS To him who in the love of Nature holds Communion with her visible forms, she speaks A various language ; for his gayer hours She has a voice of gladness, and a smile And eloquence of beauty ; and she glides Into his darker musings with a mild And gentle sympathy that steals away Their sharpness ere he is aware. When thoughts Of the last bitter hour come like a blight Over thy spirit, and sad images BRYANT 281 Of the stern agony, and shroud, and pall, And breathless darkness, and the narrow house. Make thee to shudder and grow sick at heart. Go forth unto the open sky, and list To Nature's teachings, while from all around — Earth and her waters, and the depths of air — Comes a still voice : Yet a few days, and thee The all-beholding sun shall see no more In all his course ; nor yet in the cold ground, Where thy pale form was laid with many tears, Nor in the embrace of ocean, shall exist Thy image. Earth, that nourished thee, shall claim Thy growth, to be resolved to earth again, And, lost each human trace, surrendering up Thine individual being, shalt thou go To mix forever with the elements ; To be a brother to the insensible rock. And to the sluggish clod which the rude swain Turns with his share and treads upon. The oak Shall send his roots abroad, and pierce thy mold. Yet not to thy eternal resting-place Shalt thou retire alone, — nor couldst thou wish Couch more magnificent. Thou shalt lie down With patriarchs of the infant ^ world, — with kings, The powerful of the earth, — the wise, the good, Fair forms and hoary seers of ages past. All in one mighty sepulcher. The hills, Rock-ribbed and ancient as the sun ; the vales. Stretching in pensive quietness between ; The venerable woods ; rivers that move In majesty, and the complaining brooks. That make the meadows green ; and, poured round all, Old ocean's gray and melancholy waste, — 1 the young, that is, the ancient world 282 CATHCART'S LITERARY READER Are but the solemn decorations all Of the great tomb of man. The golden sun, The planets, all the infinite host of heaven, Are shining on the sad abodes of death Through the still lapse of ages. All that tread The globe are but a handful to the tribes That slumber in its bosom. Take the wings Of morning, traverse Barca's desert sands, . Or lose thyself in the continuous woods Where rolls the Oregon, and hears no sound Save his own dashings, — yet the dead are there. And miUions in those solitudes, since first The flight of years began, have laid them down In their last sleep ; — the dead reign there alone. So shalt thou rest ; and what if thou withdraw In silence from the living, and no friend Take note of thy departure ? All that breathe Will share thy destiny. The gay will laugh When thou art gone, the solemn brood of care Plod on, and each one, as before, will chase His favorite phantom ; yet all these shall leave Their mirth and their employments, and shall come And make their bed with thee. As the long train Of ages glide away, the sons of men — The youth in life's green spring, and he who goes In the full strength of years, matron and maid. The bowed with age, the infant in the smiles And beauty of its innocent age cut off — Shall one by one be gathered to thy side By those who in their turn shall follow them. So live, that when thy summons comes to join The innumerable caravan that moves To the pale realms of shade, where each shall take His chamber in the silent halls of death, • Thou go not, like the quarry-slave at night, Scourged to his dungeon ; but, sustained and soothed BRYANT 283 By an unfaltering trust, approach thy grave Like one who wraps the drapery of his couch About him, and hes down to pleasant dreams. TO A WATERFOWL Whither, midst falling dew. While glow the heavens with the last steps of day, Far, through their rosy depths, dost thou pursue Thy solitary way ? Vainly the fowler's eye Might mark thy distant flight to do thee wrong, As, darkly limned ^ upon the crimson sky. Thy figure floats along. Seek'st thou the plashy brink Of weedy lake, or marge of river wide, Or where the rocking billows rise and sink On the chafed ocean side? There is a Power whose care Teaches thy way along that pathless coast, — The desert ^ and illimitable air, — Lone wandering, but not lost. x\ll day thy wings have fanned, At that far height, the cold, thin atmosphere ; Yet stoop not, weary, to the welcome land. Though the dark night is near. 1 outlined - adj. empty, vacant ; compare Gray, " And waste its sweetness on the desert air." 284 CATHCART'S LITERARY READER And soon that toil shall end ; Soon shalt thou find a summer home, and rest, And scream among thy fellows ; reeds shall bend Soon o'er thy sheltered nest. Thou 'rt gone, the abyss of heaven Hath swallowed up thy form ; yet on my heart Deeply hath sunk the lesson thou hast given. And shall not soon depart : He who, from zone to zone. Guides through the boundless sky thy certain flight, In the long way that I must tread alone. Will lead my steps aright. Here, in the quiet earth, they laid apart No man of iron mold and bloody hands. Who sought to wreak upon the cowering lands The passions that consumed his restless heart : But one of tender spirit and delicate frame, Gentlest, in mien and mind, Of gentle womankind, Timidly shrinking from the breath of blame : One in whose eyes the smile of kindness made Its haunt, like flowers by sunny brooks in May, Yet, at the thought of others' pain, a shade Of sweeter sadness chased the smile away. From " The Conqueror s Grave CARLYLE 285 CARLYLE 1795-1881 Thomas CarlylI was born in Scotland in 1795, and died in London February 5, 1881. He was the son of a Dumfriesshire farmer. He studied at Edinburgh University, and is said to have intended to enter the ministry, but abandoned the purpose. His first essays in literature consisted of con- tributions to several magazines. Next he translated Goethe's " Wilhelm ^'^^t^HvX^ K^CiAjL^ Meister," and in his labors acquired a warm and lasting love for German literature. " Sartor Resartus," in which he laid the first substantial founda- tion of his fame, was published in book form in 1834. It is a characteristic composition, exhibiting the originality and brilliancy of his thought, and the peculiarities and force of his style, in full relief. Three years later appeared his " History of the French Revolution." Among his later works are " Past and Present," "Cromwell's Letters and Speeches," Lives of Schiller and Sterling, and "The Life of Frederick the Great." 286 CATHCART'S LITERARY READER Lowell's discriminating judgment of Carlyle is in these words : "The lead- ing characteristics of an author who is in any sense original may commonly be traced more or less clearly to his earliest works. Everything that Car- lyle wrote during this first period thrills with the purest appreciation of what- ever is brave and beautiful in human nature, with the most vehement scorn of cowardly compromise with things base; and yet, immitigable as his demand for the highest in us seems to be, there is always something reas- suring in the humorous sympathy with mortal frailty which softens condem- nation and consoles for shortcoming. '* By degrees the humorous element in his nature gains ground, till it overmasters all the rest. Becoming always more boisterous and obtrusive, it ends at last, as such humor must, in cynicism. In proportion as his humor gradually overbalanced the other qualities of his mind, Carlyle's taste for the eccentric, amorphous, and violent in men became excessive, disturbing more and more his perception of the more commonplace attributes which give consistency to portraiture. His ' French Revolution ' is a series of lurid pictures, unmatched for vehement power, but all is painted by eruption- flashes in violent light and shade. There are no half-tints, no gradations. Of his success, however, in accomplishing what he aimed at, which was to haunt the mind with memories of a horrible political nightmare, there can be no doubt. Carlyle's historical compositions are wonderful prose-poems, full of picture, incident, humor, and character, where we grow familiar with his conception of certain leading personages, and even of subordinate ones, if they are necessary to the scene, so that they come out living upon the stage from the dreary limbo of names ; but this is no more history than are the historical plays of Shakespeare." EXECUTION OF MARIE-ANTOINETTE i On Monday, the 14th of October, 1793, a Cause is pending in the Palais de Justice, in the new Revolutionary Court, such as these old stone walls never witnessed, — the Trial of Marie- Antoinette.2 The once brightest of Queens, now tarnished, defaced, forsaken, stands here at Fouquier-Tinville's Judgment- 1 from the " History of the French Revolution " 2 Marie-Antoinette, Queen of France, was condemned by the Revolu- tionary Tribunal of the French Republicans, and was executed on the i6th October, 1793. (See Burke, page 150.) Her husband, Louis XVL, had been guillotined on the 21st of January preceding. CARLYLE 287 bar, answering for her life. The Indictment was dehvered her last night. To such changes of human fortune what words are adequate? Silence alone is adequate. ... Marie-Antoinette, in this her abandonment and hour of ex- treme need, is not wanting to herself, the imperial woman. Her look, they say, as that hideous indictment was reading, continued calm ; " she was sometimes observed moving her fingers, as when one plays on the piano." You discern, not without inter- est, across that dim Revolutionary Bulletin itself, how she bears herself queen-like. Her answers are prompt, clear, often of Laconic brevity ; resolution, which has grown contemptuous without ceasing to be dignified, veils itself in calm words. "You persist then in denial?" — "My plan is not denial; it is the truth I have said, and I persist in that." . . . At four o'clock on Wednesday morning, after two days and two nights of interrogating, jury-charging, and other darkening of counsel, the result comes out, — sentence of Death ! " Have you anything to say?" The Accused shook her head, without speech. Night's candles are burning out ; and with her, too. Time is finishing, and it will be Eternity and Day. This Hall of Tinville's is dark, ill-lighted except where she stands. Silently she withdraws from it, to die. Two Processions, or Royal Progresses, three-and-twenty years apart, have often struck us with a strange feeling of contrast. The first is of a beautiful Archduchess and Dauphiness, quitting her mother's city, at the age of fifteen, towards hopes such as no other Daughter of Eve then had. " On the morrow," says Weber, an eye-witness, " the Dauphiness left Vienna. The whole city crowded out ; at first with a sorrow which was silent. She appeared ; you saw her sunk back into her carriage, her face bathed in tears ; hiding her eyes now with her handkerchief, now with her hands ; several times putting out her head to see yet again this Palace of her Fathers, whither she was to return no more. She motioned her regret, her gratitude, to the good Nation, which was crowding here to bid her farewell. Then arose not only tears, but piercing cries, on all sides. Men and 28S CATHCART'S LITERARY READER women alike abandoned themselves to such expression of their sorrow. It was an audible sound of wail, in the streets and avenues of Vienna. The last Courier that followed her disap- peared, and the crowd melted away." The young imperial Maiden of Fifteen has now become a worn, discrowned Widow of Thirty-eight, gray before her time. This is the last Procession : " Few minutes after the Trial ended, the drums were beating to arms in all Sections ; at sunrise the armed force was on foot, cannons getting placed at the extremi- ties of the Bridges, in the Squares, Crossways, all along from the Palais de Justice to the Place de la Revolution. By ten o'clock, numerous patrols were circulating in the Streets ; thirty thou- sand foot and horse drawn up . under arms. At eleven, Marie- Antoinette was brought out. She had on an undress of pique blanc (white pique) ; she was led to the place of execution in the same manner as an ordinary criminal : bound on a Cart, accompanied by a Constitutional Priest in Lay dress, escorted by numerous detachments of infantry and cavalry. These, and the double row of troops all along her road, she appeared to regard with indifference. On her countenance there was visible neither abashment nor pride. To the cries of Vive la Repnblique (Live the Republic !) and Down with Tyranny, which attended her all the way, she seemed to pay no heed. She spoke little to her Confessor. The tricolor Streamers on the house-tops occu- pied her attention, in the Streets du Roule and Saint-Honor^ ; she also noticed the Inscriptions on the house-fronts. On reach- ing the Place de la Revolution her looks turned towards the Jardin National, whilom Tuileries ; her face at that moment gave signs of lively emotion. She mounted the Scaffold with courage enough ; at a quarter past Twelve, her head fell ; the Executioner showed it to the people, amid universal long- continued cries of Vive la Republique'' CARLYLE 289 NIGHT VIEW OF A CITYi I LOOK down into all that wasp-nest or bee-hive, and witness their wax-laying and honey- making, and poison-brewing, and choking by sulphur. From the Palace esplanade, where music plays while His Serene Highness is pleased to eat his victuals, down the low lane, where in her door- sill the aged widow, knit- ting for a thin livelihood, sits to feel the afternoon sun, I see it all. Couriers arrive bestrapped and bebooted, bearing Joy and Sorrow bagged-up in pouches of leather; there, top-laden, and' with four swift horses, rolls in the country Baron and his house- hold ; here, on timber-leg, the lamed Soldier hops painfully along, begging alms : a thousand carriages, and wains,^ and cars, come tumbling- in with Food, with young Rusticity, and other Raw Produce, inanimate or animate, and go tumbling out again with Produce manufactured. That living flood, pouring through these streets, of all qualities and ages, knowest thou whence it is coming, whither it is going? From Eternity onwards to Eternity ! These are apparitions : what else ? Are they not souls rendered visible : in Bodies, that took shape and will lose it, melting into air? Their solid Pavement is a Picture of the Sense ; they walk on the bosom of Nothing, blank Time is behind them and before them. Or fanciest thou, the red and yellow Clothes-screen yonder, with spurs on its heels and feather in its crown, is but of To-day, without a Yesterday or a To-morrow ; and had not rather its Ancestor alive when Hengst and Horsa overran thy Island? Friend, thou seest here a living link in that Tissue of History, which inweaves all Being : watch well, or it will be past thee, and seen no more. These fringes of lamplight, struggling up through smoke and thousand-fold exhalation, some fathoms into the ancient region of Night, what thinks Bootes of them, as he leads his Hunting-dogs over the Zenith in their leash of sidereal fire? That stifled hum of Midnight, when Traffic has lain down 1 from " Sartor Resartus " 2 wain, wagon ; these words have a common origin 19 290 CATHCART'S LITERARY READER to rest ; and the chariot-wheels of Vanity, still rolling here and there through distant streets, are bearing her to Halls roofed-in, and lighted to the due pitch for her ; and only Vice and Misery, to prowl or to moan like night-birds, are abroad : that hum, I say, like the stertorous,^ unquiet slumber of sick Life, is heard in Heaven ! O ! under that hideous coverlet of vapors, and putrefactions, and unimaginable gases, what a Fermenting-vat lies simmering and hid ! The joyful and the sorrowful are there ; men are 'dying there, men are being born ; men are praying, — on the other side of a brick partition, men are cursing ; and around them all is the vast, void Night. The proud Grandee still Hngers in his perfumed saloons, or reposes within damask curtains ; Wretchedness cowers into truckle-beds, or shivers hunger-stricken into its lair of straw; in obscure cellars, Rouge-et-Noir'^ languidly emits its voice-of-destiny to haggard hungry villains ; while Coun- cilors of State sit plotting, and playing their high chess-game, whereof the pawns are Men. The Lover whispers his mistress that the coach is ready; and she, full of hope and fear, glides down, to fly with him over the borders : the Thief, still more silently, sets-to his pick-locks and crowbars, or lurks in wait till the watchmen first snore in their boxes. Gay mansions, with supper-rooms and dancing-rooms, are full of light and music and high-swelling hearts ; but, in the condemned cells, the pulse of life beats tremulous and faint, and bloodshot eyes look out through the darkness, which is around and within, for the light of a stern last morning. Six men are to be hanged on the mor- row ; their gallows must even now be o' building. Upwards of five-hundred-thousand two-legged animals without feathers lie round us, in horizontal position ; their heads all in nightcaps, and full of the foolishest dreams. Riot cries aloud, and staggers and swaggers in his rank dens of shame ; and the Mother, with streaming hair, kneels over her pallid, dying infant, whose cracked lips only her tears now moisten. — All these heaped and 1 from Lat. stertcrc, hoarsely breathing 2 red-and-black, — a gambler's game CARLYLE 291 huddled together, with nothing but a Uttle carpentry and masonry between them : — crammed- in, Uke salted fish, in their barrel ; — or weltering, shall I say, hke an Egyptian pitcher of tamed vipers, each struggling to get its head above the others : such work goes on under that smoke- counterpane ! — But I sit above it all ; I am alone with the Stars ! THE REIGN OF TERRORS We are now, therefore, got to that black precipitous abyss, whither all things have long been tending; where, having now arrived on the giddy verge, they hurl down, in confused ruin ; headlong, pellmell, down, down ; — till Sansculottism have con- summated itself; and in this wondrous French Revolution, as in a Doomsday, a World have been rapidly, if not born again, yet destroyed and engulfed. Terror has long been terrible; — but to the actors themselves it has now become manifest that their appointed course is one of Terror; and they say, "Be it so." So many centuries had been adding together, century transmit- ting it with increase to century, the sum of Wickedness, of False- hood, Oppression of man by man. Kings were sinners, and Priests were, and people. Open-Scoundrels rode triumphant, be-diademed, be-coronetted, be-mitered ; or the still fataller species of Secret- Scoundrels, in their fair-sounding formulas, speciosities, respectabilities, hollow within : the race of quacks was grown many as the sands of the sea. Till at length such a sum of quackery had accumulated itself as, in brief, the Earth and the Heavens were weary of. Slow seemed the Day of Settlement; coming on, all imper- ceptible, across the bluster and fanfaronade of Courtierisms, Conquering-Heroisms, Most Christian Grand Monai^qneisms, Well-beloved Pompadourisms : yet, behold, it was always coming : behold, it has come, suddenly, unlooked for by any man ! The harvest of long centuries was ripening and whitening so rapidly i from the " History of the French Revolution " 292 CATHCARTS LITERARY READER of late ; and now it is grown 7vhite, and is reaped rapidly, as it were, in one day — reaped in this Reign of Terror ; and carried home to Hades and the Pit ! Unhappy Sons of Adam ! it is ever so ; and never do they know it, nor will they know it. With cheerfully-smoothed countenances, day after day, and generation after generation, they, calling cheerfully to one another " Well- speed-ye," are at work sowing the wind. And yet, as God lives, they shall reap the ivhirlwind ; no other thing, we say, is possi- ble, — since God is a Truth and His World is a Truth. A HIGHLY interesting lean, little old man, of alert though slightly stooping figure ; no crown but an old military cocked hat ; no scepter but a walking-stick cut from the woods ; and for royal robes a mere soldier's blue coat with red facings, and sure to have a good deal of Spanish snuff on the breast of it ; rest of the apparel dim, unobtrusive in color or cut, ending in high over- knee military boots, which may be brushed, but are not permitted to be blackened or varnished. The man is not of godlike physiognomy, any more than of im- posing stature or costume : close-shut mouth with thin lips, prom- inent jaws and nose, receding brow, by no means of Olympian height ; head, however, is of long form, and has superlative gray eyes in it. Not what is called a beautiful man, nor yet, by all appearance, what is called a happy. On the contrary, the face bears evidence of many sorrows, as they are termed, of much hard labor done in this world, and seems to anticipate nothing but more still coming. Most excellent potent brilliant eyes, swift- darting as the stars, steadfast as the sun ; gray, we said, of the azure-gray color ; large enough, not of glaring size ; the habitual expression of them vigilance and penetrating sense. The voice, if he speak to you, is of similar physiognomy, clear, melodious, and sonorous ; all tones are in it, from that of ingenuous inquiry, graceful sociality, light-flowing banter (rather prickly for most part) , up to definite word of command, up to desolating word of rebuke and reprobation. A Picture of the King, from " F^-ederick the Great** EMERSON 293 EMERSON I 803-1882 Ralph Waldo Emerson was born in Boston in 1803, and died at his home in Concord, April 28th, 18S2. He graduated at Harvard College in 182 1, and after pursuing a course of theological study, became pastor of the Second Unitarian Church of Boston. His ministry was brief, however; a difference of opinion as to points of doctrine arose between himself and his f'(fv^\ ^ people, and he resigned his charge. Retiring to the town of Concord, he devoted himself to the study of mental and moral philosophy. His first published writings — " Man Thinking," " Literary Ethics," and " Nature, an Essay " — attracted the attention of thoughtful readers. In 1847 he pub- lished his first volume of poems. He is best known by his " Essays " and his '* Representative Men." His impress on the thought of his time was great ; and though he failed to win a numerous following, he did much towards molding the ethical opinions of New England. His books have been widely read in England and Germany- 294 CATH CART'S LITERARY READER Professor John Nichol thus estimates Emerson : " The concentration of his style resembles that of a classic, but, as with others who have adopted the aphoristic mode of conveying their thoughts, he everywhere sacrifices unity to riches of detail. His essays are bundles of loose ideas tacked to- gether by a common title, handfuls of scraps tossed down before his audi- ence like the contents of a conjuror's hat. He delights in proverbs and apt quotations; he exaggerates, loves a contradiction for itself, and prefers a surprise to an aigument. His eye is keen, but its range is narrow, and he is ignorant of the fact. His taste is constantly at fault, and an incessant straining after mots often leads him into caricature. His judgments of those whose lives and writings do not square with his theories are valueless; and in dealing with foreign languages he betrays the weakness of his scholar- ship. His soundest judgments relate to the men around him, of whom he is at once the panegyrist and the censor. All that is weak and foolish in their mode of life he condemns, all that is noblest and most hopeful he applauds. " His faults are manifest ; a petulant irreverence, frequent superficiality, a rash bravery, an inadequate solution of difficulties deeming itself adequate, are among the chief. But he is original, natural, attractive, and direct; limpid in his phrase, and pure in fancy. His best eloquence flows as easily as a stream. In an era of excessive reticence and cautious hypocrisy he lives within a case of crystal where there are no concealments. We never suspect him of withholding half of what he knows, or of formularizing for our satisfaction a belief which he does not sincerely hold. He is transparently honest and honorable. His courage has no limits. Isolated by force of character, there is no weakness in his solitude. He leads us into a region where we escape at once from deserts and from noisy cities ; for he rises above without depreciating ordinary philanthropy, and his philosophy at least endeavors to meet our daily wants. In every social and political con- troversy he has thrown his weight into the scale of justice, on the side of a rational and progressive liberty." NAPOLEON BONAPARTE Napoleon understood his business. Here was a man who in each moment and emergency knew what to do next. It is an immense comfort and refreshment to the spirits, not only of kings, but of citizens. Few men have any next; they Uve from hand to mouth, without plan, and are ever at the end of their line, and, after each action, wait for an impulse from abroad. EMERSON 295 Napoleon had ^ been the first man of the world, if his ends had been purely public. As he is, he inspires confidence and vigor by the extraordinary unity of his action. He is firm, sure, self-denying, self-postponing, sacrificing every- thing to his aim, — money, troops, generals, and his own safety also ; not misled, like common adventurers, by the splendor of his own means. " Incidents ought not to govern policy," he said, "but policy incidents." '^To be hurried away by every event, is to have no political system at all." His victories were only so many doors, and he never for a moment lost sight of his way onward in the dazzle and uproar of the present circumstance. He knew what to do, and he flew to his mark. He would shorten a straight line to come at his object. Hor- rible anecdotes may, no doubt, be collected from his history, of the price at which he bought his successes ; but he must not, therefore, be set down as cruel, but only as one who knew no impediment to his will : not bloodthirsty, not cruel ; but woe to what thing or person stood in his way ! " Sire, General Clarke can not combine with General Junot for the dreadful fire of the Austrian battery." " Let him carry the battery." " Sire, every regiment that approaches the heavy artillery is sacrificed. Sire, what ord ers ? " " Forward ! forward ! ' ' In the plenitude of his resources every obstacle seemed to vanish. ''There shall be no Alps," he said; and he built his perfect roads, climbing by graded galleries their steepest preci- pices, until Italy was as open to Paris as any town in France. Having decided what was to be done, he did that with might and main.2 He put out all his strength. He risked everything, and spared nothing, — neither ammunition, nor money, nor troops, nor generals, nor himself. If fighting be the best mode of adjusting national differences (as large majorities of men seem to agree), certainly Bonaparte was right in making it thorough. ''The grand principle of war," he said, "was, that an army ' had = would have ; a poetic form 2 A.-S. mcBgen, strength ; the two words of this phrase, jnight and main, are of common origin. 296 CATHCART'S LITERARY READER ought always to be ready, by day and by night, and at all hours, to make all the resistance it is capable of making." He never economized his ammunition, but on a hostile position rained a torrent of iron, — shells, balls, grape-shot, — to annihilate ^ all defense. He went to the edge of his possibility, so heartily was he bent on his object. It is plain that in Italy he did what he could, and all that he could ; he came several times within an inch of ruin, and his own person was all but lost. He was flung into the marsh at Areola. The Austrians were between him and his troops in the confusion of the struggle, and he was brought off with desperate efforts. At Lonato and at other places he was on the point of being taken prisoner. He fought sixty battles. He had never enough. Each victory was a new weapon. " My power would fall, were I not to sup- port it by new achievements. Conquest has made me what I am, and conquest must maintain^ me." He felt, with every wise man, that as much life is needed for conservation as for creation. We are always in peril, always in a bad plight, just on the edge of destruction, and only to be saved by invention and courage. This vigor was guarded and tempered by the coldest prudence and punctuality. A thunderbolt in the attack, he was found in- vulnerable in his intrenchments. His very attack was never the inspiration of courage, but the result of calculation.-^ His idea of the best defense consisted in being always the attacking party. " My ambition," he says, "was great, but was of a cold nature." Everything depended on the nicety of his combinations : the stars were not more punctual than his arithmetic. His personal attention descended to the smallest particulars. " At Montebello I ordered Kellermann to attack with eight hundred horse ; and with these he separated the six thousand Hungarian grenadiers before the very eyes of the Austrian cavalry. This cavalry was half a league off, and required a quarter of an hour to arrive on the field of action ; and I have observed it is always these quar- ters of an hour that decide the fate of a battle." 1 Derivation.? EMERSON 297 Before he fought a battle Bonaparte thought Httle about what he should do in case of success, but a great deal about what he should do in case of a reverse of fortune. The same prudence and good sense marked all his behavior. His instructions to his secretary at the palace are worth remembering : '' During the night, enter my chamber as seldom as possible. Do not awake me when you have any good news to communicate ; with that there is no hurry : but when you bring bad news, rouse me instantly, for then there is not a moment to be lost." His achievement of business was immense, and enlarges the known powers of man. There have been many working kings, from Ulysses to William of Orange, but none who accomplished a tithe of this man's performance. To these gifts of nature Napoleon added the advantage of having been born to a private and humble fortune. In his later days he had the weakness of wishing to add to his crowns and badges the prescription ^ of aristocracy ; but he knew his debt to his austere education, and made no secret of his contempt for the born kings, and for " the hereditary donkeys," as he coarsely styled the Bourbons. He said that, in their exile, ^' they had learned nothing, and forgot nothing." Bonaparte had passed through all the degrees of military service ; but, also, was citizen before he was emperor, and so had the key to citizenship. His remarks and estimates discovered the information and justness of measurement of the middle class. Those who had to deal with him found that he was not to be imposed upon, but could cipher as well as another man. When the expenses of the empress, of his household, of his palaces, had accummulated ^ great debts. Napoleon examined the bills of the creditors himself, detected overcharges and errors, and reduced the claims by considerable sums. His grand weapon, namely, the millions whom he directed, he owed to the repre- sentative character which clothed him. He interests us as he stands for France and for Europe ; and he exists as captain and 1 prescription, here used in the legal sense of " immemorial sanction " '^ from Lat. cumtilus, a heap 298 CATHCART'S LITERARY READER king only as far as the Revolution or the interests of the indus- trious masses found an organ and a leader in him. In the social interests he knew the meaning and value of labor, and threw himself naturally on that side. The principal works that have survived him are his magnificent roads. He filled his troops with his spirit, and a sort of freedom and companionship grew up between him and them, which the forms of his court never permitted between the officers and himself. They per- formed under his eye that which no others could do. The best document ^ of his relation to his troops is the order of the day on the morning, of the battle of xA-usterHtz, in which Napoleon promises the troops that he will keep his person out of reach of fire. This declaration, which is the reverse of that ordinarily made by generals and sovereigns on the eve of a battle, suffi- ciently explains the devotion of the army to their leader. GOOD-BY, PROUD WORLD! GooD-BY, proud world ! I 'm going home ; Thou art not my friend ; I am not thine : Too long through weary crowds I roam, — A river ark on the ocean brine, Too long I am tossed like the driven foam ; But now, proud world, I 'm going home. Good by to Flattery's fawning face ; To Grandeur with his wise grimace : To upstart Wealth's averted eye ; To supple Office, low and high ; To crowded halls, to court and street, To frozen hearts, and hasting feet, To those who go, and those who come, Good by, proud world, I 'm going home. 1 document = ofiticial evidence, EMERSON 299 I go to seek my own hearth-stone, Bosomed m yon green hills alone ; A secret lodge in a pleasant land, Whose groves the frolic fairies planned, Where arches green, the livelong day. Echo the blackbird's roundelay,^ And evil men have never trod A spot that is sacred to thought and God. O, when I am safe in my sylvan home, I mock at the pride of Greece and Rome ; And when I am stretched beneath the pines. Where the evening star so holy shines, I laugh at the lore and the pride of man. At the sophist schools, and the learned clan ; For what are they all in their high conceit, When man in the bush with God may meet? THE SEA Behold the Sea, The opaline, the plentiful and strong, Yet beautiful as is the rose in June, Fresh as the trickling rainbow of July : Sea full of food, the nourisher of kinds. Burger of earth, and medicine of men ; Creating a sweet cUmate by thy breath. Washing out harms and griefs from memory,''^ And, in thy mathematic ebb and flow, Giving a hint of that which changes not. Rich are the sea-gods : —who gives gifts but they? 1 lit. " a little round;" /. e. a song whose burden is repeated 2 an allusion to Exodus iii. 2-5 3 Compare^" Balm of hurt minds r — Mac de^/i, ii. 2- 300 C AT H CARTS LITERARY READER They grope the sea for pearls, but more than pearls : They pluck Force thence, and give it to the wise. For every wave is wealth to Daedalus, ^ Wealth to the cunning artist who can work This matchless strength. Where shall he find, O waves ! A load your Atlas shoulders can not lift ! CONCORD FIGHT 2 By the rude bridge that arched the flood, Their flag to April's breeze unfurled. Here once the embattled farmers stood. And fired the shot heard round the world. The foe long since in silence slept ; Alike the conqueror silent sleeps ; And Time the ruined bridge has swept Down the dark stream which seaward creeps. On this green bank, by this soft stream. We set to-day a votive stone, That memory may their deed redeem. When, like our sires, our sons are gone. Spirit, that made those heroes dare To die, and leave their children free, Bid Time and Nature gently spare The shaft we raise to them and thee. ^ a skilful craftsman of Grecian mythology 2 This hymn was composed for the occasion of the unveiling of a monu- ment to commemorate the fight at Concord, April 19, 1775. BULIVER 30] BULWER 1805-1873 Sir Edward Bulwer (Lord Lytton) was born in 1805, and died in 1873. He graduated at Trinity College, Cambridge, in 1826. In 1832 he entered Parliament, continuing a member till 1841; in 1852 he was re elected to a seat in that body, where he served until his elevation to the peerage. In 1856 he was chosen Lord Rector of the University of Glasgow. At a very ^^^/-^^W.. early age he began to write verses, and long before he reached his majority, had published a volume. His first book, " Ismael, an Oriental Tale," bears the date of 1820. It was followed by several volumes of verse, and his first novel, ** Falkland," appeared in 1827. The next year he gave to the world his famous novel, " Pelham," which established his reputation. It was sur- passed in merit, however, by some of his subsequent works, especially by " Rienzi " and by •' The Caxtons." Bulwer distinguished himself in almost every department of literature, — as poet, essayist, novelist, and dramatist. Two of his plays, " The Lady of Lyons " and " Richelieu," are among the most popular of the modern stage. 302 CATHCARTS LITERARY READER When he died, in January, 1873, ^^^^^ ^ short, painful ilhiess, Bulwer left three finished works, "The Coming Race," "The Parisians," and " Kenelm Chillingly," besides an uncompleted historical romance entitled " Paiisanias, the Spartan." "These," says Professor Minto, "had freshness enough to be the'work of youth, and power enough to shame no veteran. The molding force whose operation is traced in ' The Parisians,' is the society of imperial and democratic France; in 'Chillingly,' the society of England in relation to its representative institutions. The leading purpose is kept well in view throughout both works, and the tendencies to corrup- tion analyzed and presented with admirable skill. These last works show no falling off of power ; he is as vviid as ever in description, as fertile as ever in the invention of humorous and melodramatic situation. . . . The fact that in the fiftieth year of his authorship, after publishing at least fifty separate works, most of them popular, Bulwer had still vigor and freshness enough to make a new anonymous reputation with ' The Coming Race,' would seem to indicate that critics had not fairly gauged his versatility. . . . His freshness of thought, brilliancy of invention, breadth and variety of portraiture, gave him a just title to his popularity ; and, with all allowance for superficial affectations, his generous nobility of sentiment made his influence as wholesome as it was widespread." ON REVOLUTION! "My dear boy," cried Riccabocca, kindly, " the only thing sure and tangible to which these writers would lead you lies at the first step, and that is what is commonly called a Revolution. Now, I know what that is. I have gone, not indeed through a revolution, but an attempt at one." Leonard raised his eyes towards his master with a look of profound respect and great curiosity. ''Yes," added Riccabocca, and the face on which the boy gazed exchanged its usual grotesque and sardonic expression for one animated, noble, and heroic. "Yes, not a revolution for chimeras/ but for that cause which the coldest allow to be good, and which, when successful, all time approves as divine, — 1 from " My Novel " ^ foolish fancies BULGER 303 the redemption of our native soil from the rule of the foreigner ! I have shared in such an attempt. And," continued the Italian, mournfully, " recalling now all the evil passions it arouses, all the ties it dissolves, all the blood that it commands to flow, all the healthful industry it arrests, all the madmen that it arms, all the victims that it dupes, I question whether one man really honest, pure, and humane, who has once gone through such an ordeal, would ever hazard it again, unless he was assured that the victory was certain, — ay, and the object for which he fights not to be wrested from his hands amidst the uproar of the elements that the battle has released." The Italian paused, shaded his brow with his hand, and remained long silent. Then, gradually resuming his ordinary tone, he continued : — " Revolutions that have no definite objects made clear by the positive experience of history, — revolutions, in a word, that aim less at substituting one law or one dynasty for another, than at changing the whole scheme of society, have been little attempted by real statesmen. Even Lycurgus ^ is proved to be a myth who never existed. Such organic changes are but in the day-dreams of philosophers who lived apart from the actual world, and whose opinions (though generally they were very benevolent, good sort of men, and wrote in an elegant, poetical style) one would no more take on a plain matter of life than one would look upon Virgil's Eclogues as a faithful picture of the ordinary pains and pleasures of the peasants w^ho tend our sheep. Read them as you would read poets, and they are delightful. But attempt to shape the world according to the poetry, and fit yourself for a madhouse. The farther off the age is from the realization of such projects, the more these poor philosophers have indulged them. Thus, it was amidst the saddest corruption of court manners that it became the fashion in Paris to sit for one's picture with a crook in one's hand, as Alexis or Daphne. Just as liberty was fast dying out of Greece, and the successors 1 the Spartan lawgiver, supposed to have lived about 850 b. c. 304 CATHCART'S LITERARY READER of Alexander were founding their monarchies, and Rome was growing up to crush in its iron grasp all states save its own, Plato withdraws his eyes from the world, to open them in his dreamy Atlantis.-^ Just in the grimmest period of Enghsh history, with the ax hanging over his head, Sir Thomas More gives you his Utopia.^ Just when the world is to be the theater of a new Sesostris,^ the sages of France tell you that the age is too enlight- ened for war, that man is henceforth to be governed by pure rea- son and live in a paradise. Very pretty reading all this to a man like me, Lenny, who can admire and smile at it. But to you, to the man who has to work for his living, to the man who thinks it would be so much more pleasant to live at his ease in a phalan- stery* than to work eight or ten hours a day; to the man of talent and action and industry, whose future is invested in that tranquillity and order of a state in which talent and action and industry are a certain capital, — why, the great bankers had better encourage a theory to upset the system of banking ! Whatever disturbs society, yea, even by a causeless panic, much more by an actual struggle, falls first upon the market of labor, and thence affects prejudicially every department of intelligence. In such times the arts are arrested, Hterature is neglected, people are too busy to read anything save appeals to their passions. And capital, shaken in its sense of security, no longer ventures boldly through the land, calling forth all the energies of toil and enter- prise, and extending to every workman his reward. Now, Lenny, take this piece of advice. You are young, clever, and aspiring : men rarely succeed in changing the world ; but a man seldom fails of success if he lets the world alone, and resolves to make the best of it. You are in the midst of the great crisis of your life ; it is the struggle between the new desires knowledge ex- 1 Plato's idea of a perfect state is unfolded in the " Laws " and the " Republic." Atlantis \Yas a fabled great island of the west, referred to by Plato, Pliny, and others. 2 See pages 13 and 399. ^ a supposed king of Egypt, who conquered the whole world ^ a community of socialists, as proposed by Fourier {stt phalanx) BU LIVER 305 cites, and that sense of poverty which those desires convert either into hope and emulation, or into envy and despair. I grant that it is an up-hill work that lies before you ; but don't you think it is always easier to climb a mountain than it is to level it ? These books call on you to level the mountain ; and that mountain is the property of other people, subdivided amongst a great many proprietors and protected by law. At the first stroke of the pickax it is ten to one but what you are taken up for a trespass. But the path up the mountain is a right of way uncontested. You may be safe at the summit before (even if the owners are fools enough to let you) you could have leveled a yard. It is more than twa thousand years ago," quoth the doctor, '' since poor Plato began to level it, and the mountain is as high as ever ! " Thus saying, Riccabocca came to the end of his pipe, and stalking thoughtfully away, left Leonard Fairfield trying to ex- tract light from the smoke. THE SURRENDER OF GRENADA 1 Day dawned upon Grenada, and the beams of the winter sun, smiling away the clouds of the past night, played cheerily upon the murmuring waves of the Xenil and the Darro. Alone upon a balcony commanding a view of the beautiful landscape, stood Boabdil,^ the last of the Moorish kings. He had sought to bring to his aid all the lessons of the philosophy he had so ardently cultivated. " What are we," said the musing prince, " that we should fill the earth with ourselves, — we kings ! Earth resounds with the 1 from " Leila " 2 Boabdil, the last Moorish king of Grenada. Ferdinand of Aragon dethroned him, 1491. For nearly eight centuries the Moors had held pos- session of Grenada, which was the last province of the Peninsula recovered by the Christians. 20 306 CATHC/iRrS LITERARY READER crash of my falling throne ; on the ear of races unborn the echo will live prolonged. But what have I lost? Nothing that was necessary to my happiness, my repose ; nothing save the source of all my wretchedness, the Marah of my life ! Shall I less en- joy heaven and earth, or thought and action, or man's more material luxuries of food and sleep, — the common and cheap desires of all? At the worst, I sink but to a level with chiefs and princes; I am but leveled with those whom the multitude admire and envy. . . . But it is time to depart." So saying, he descended to the court, flung himself on his barb,i and, with a small and saddened train, passed through the gate which we yet survey, by a blackened and crumbling tower, overgrown with vines and ivy; thence, amid gardens, now appertaining to the convent of the victor faith, he took his mournful and unnoticed way. . When he came to the middle of the hill that rises above those gardens, the steel of the Spanish armor gleamed upon him as the detachment sent to occupy the palace marched over the summit in steady order and profound silence. At the head of the van- guard rode, upon a snow-white palfrey,^ the Bishop of Avila, followed by a long train of barefooted monks. They halted as Boabdil approached, and the grave bishop saluted him with the air of one who addresses an infidel and an inferior. With the quick sense of dignity common to the great, and yet more to the fallen, Boabdil felt, but resented not, the pride of the eccle- siastic. ''Go, Christian," said he, mildly; "the gates of the Alhambra are open, and Allah has bestowed the palace and the city upon your king. May his virtues atone the faults of Boabdil ! " So saying, and waiting no answer, he rode on, with- out looking to the right or the left. The Spaniards also pursued their way. The sun had fairly risen above the mountains, when Boabdil and his train beheld, from the eminence on which they were, the whole armament of Spain ; and at the same moment, louder than ^ ba7'b, a Barbary horse 2 Lat. paraveredjis, a saddle-horse for state occasions BU LIVER 307 the tramp of horse or the clash of arms, was heard distinctly the solemn chant of Te Dei/m, which preceded the blaze of the un- furled and lofty standards. Boabdil, himself still silent, heard the groans and acclamations of his train ; he turned to cheer or chide them, and then saw, from his own watch-tower, with the sun shining full upon its pure and dazzling surface, the silver cross of Spain. His Alhambra was already in the hands of the foe ; while beside that badge of the holy war waved the gay and flaunting flag of Saint Jago, the canonized Mars of the chivalry of Spain. \t that sight the king's voice died within him; he gave the rein to his barb, impatient to close the fatal ceremonial, and slackened not his speed till almost within bowshot of the first rank of the army. Never had Christian war assumed a more splendid and impos- ing aspect. Far as the eye could reach extended the glittering and gorgeous lines of that goodly power, bristling with sun- lighted spears and blazoned banners ; while beside murmured and glowed and danced the silver and laughing Xenil, careless what lord should possess, for his little day, the banks that bloomed by its everlasting course. By a small mosque halted the flower of the army. Surrounded by the arch-priests of that mighty hierarchy, the peers and princes of a court that rivaled the Roland of Charlemagne, was seen the kingly form of Fer- dinand himself, with Isabel at his right hand, and the high-born dames of Spain, relieving, with their gay colors and sparkling gems, the sterner splendor of the crested helmet and polished mail. Within sight of the royal group, Boabdil halted, composed his aspect so as best to conceal his soul, and a Httle in advance of his scanty train, but never in mien and majesty more a king, the son of Abdallah met his haughty conqueror. At the sight of his princely countenance and golden hair, his comely and commanding beauty, made more touching by youth, a thrill of compassionate admiration ran through that assembly of the brave and fair. Ferdinand and Isabel slowly advanced to meet their late rival, — their new subject ; and as Boabdil would have dismounted, the Spanish king placed his hand upon 3o8 CAT H CARTS LITERARY READER his shoulder. '' Brother and prince," said he, '•' forget thy sor- rows ; and may our friendship hereafter console thee for reverses against which thou hast contended as a hero and a king ; resist- ing man, but resigned at length to God." Boabdil did not affect to return this bitter but unintentional mockery of compliment. He bowed his head, and remained a moment silent; then motioning to his train, four of his officers approached, and, kneeling beside Ferdinand, proffered to him, upon a silver buckler, the keys of the city. "O king!" then said Boabdil, '' accept the keys of the last hold which has resisted the arms of Spain. The empire of the Moslem is no more. Thine are the city and the people of Grenada; yielding to thy prowess, they yet confide in thy mercy." "They do well," said the king; "our promises shall not be broken. But since we know the gallantry of Moorish cavaliers, not to us, but to gentler hands, shall the keys of Grenada be surrendered." Thus saying, Ferdinand gave the keys to Isabel, who would have addressed some soothing flatteries to Boabdil, but the emotion and excitement were too much for her compassionate heart, heroine and queen though she was ; and when she lifted her eyes upon the calm and pale features of the fallen monarch, the tears gushed from them irresistibly, and her voice died in murmurs. A faint flush overspread the features of Boabdil, and there was a momentary pause of embarrassment, which the ]\Ioor was the first to break. " Fair Queen," said he, with mournful and pathetic dignity, " thou canst read the heart that thy generous sympathy touches and subdues : this is my last, but not least glorious, conquest. But I detain ye ; let not my aspect cloud your triumph. Suffer me to say farewell." "Farewell, my brother," replied Ferdinand, "and may fair fortune go with you ! Forget the past ! " Boabdil smiled bitterly, saluted the royal pair with profound respect and silent reverence, and rode slowly on, leaving the army below, as he ascended the path that led to his new princi- BU LIVER 309 pality beyond the Alpuxarras. As the trees snatched the Moorish cavalcade from the view of the king, Ferdinand ordered the army to recommence its march ; and trumpet and cymbal presently sent their music to the ear of the Moslem. Boabdil spurred on at full speed, till his panting charger halted at the little village where his mother, his slaves, and his faithful wife, Armine (sent on before), awaited him. Joining these, he proceeded without delay upon his melancholy path. They ascended that eminence which is the pass into the Alpuxarras. From its height, the vale, the rivers, the spires, and the towers of Grenada broke gloriously upon the view of the little band. They. halted mechanically and abruptly; every eye was turned to the beloved scene. The proud shame of baffled warriors, the tender memories of home, of childhood, of fatherland, swelled every heart, and gushed from every eye. Suddenly the distant boom of artillery broke from the citadel, and rolled along the sun-lighted valley and crystal river. A universal wail burst from the exiles ; it smote, it overpowered the heart of the ill-starred king, in vain seeking to wrap himself in Eastern pride or stoical philosophy. The tears gushed from his eyes, and he covered his face with his hands. The band wound slowly on through the solitary defiles ; and that place, where the king wept at the last view of his lost empire, is still called The Last Sigh of the Moor. 310 CATHCART'S LITERARY READER MRS. BROWNING 1809- 1 86 1 Elizabeth Barrett was born in Hertfordshire, England, in 1809, ^^^^ died at Florence in 1861. At the age of ten years she began to compose, and seven years later put forth her first volume, " An Essay on Mind, with other Poems." These juvenile productions did not warrant the expectation of such literary triumphs as she afterwards achieved. But these preliminary 2(yziy^y7 exercises were perhaps essential to the great and enduring work in which she was about to engage. This work is represented to the public by several vol- umes of poems, —issued between 1838 and the year of her death, — " The Seraphim," The " Romaunt of the Page," " The Drama of Exile," etc. In 1846 Miss Barrett became the wife of Robert Browning. Although distinct- ively a poet Mrs. Browning was not merely a poet. Her scholarship was extensive and accurate, and some of her critical papers entitle her to high rank as a writer of prose. For several years the poets had their home in Italy, and Mrs. Browning, sympathizing ardently with the Italian heart in its MRS. BROWNING 31I struggles toward political independence, wrote many of her finest poems on Italian themes and inspired by Italian enthusiasm. Her last work of mag- nitude was " Aurora Leigh," — a long poem, in which she gave vehement, though somewhat mystical and obscure, expression to her opinions as to the mission of woman. " The poetry of this writer," says George Barnett Smith, " is distinguished for its emotional spirit; had her imagination equaled her capacity for feel- ing, she might have taken rank with the highest of our poets. Sensibility and intuition, those endowments of supreme importance to writers of genius, whose greatness is to grow in proportion to their understandings and inter- pretation of human life, were in her united in a degree seldom witnessed. To her it was not always necessary to understand the wrong which she beheld ; she saw it and hated it, and she has helped men by her writings to do something towards making an end of it. ' The Cry of the Children ' is a striking illustration of her keen feeling and eloquent power as a philan- thropist. . . . Her poetry is that which refines, chastens, and elevates. Much of it is imperishable ; and although she did not reach the height of the few mighty singers of all time, she has shown us the possibility of the highest forms of the poetic art being within the scope of woman's genius." A DEAD ROSE O Rose ! who dares to name thee ? No longer roseate now, nor soft, nor sweet ; But barren and hard, and dry as stubble-wheat, Kept seven years in a drawer, — thy titles shame thee. The breeze that used to blow thee Between the hedgerow thorns, and take away An odor up the lane, to last all day, — If breathing now, unsweetened would forego thee. The sun that used to smite thee. And mix his glory in thy gorgeous urn, Till beam appeared to bloom and flower to burn, — If shining now, with not a hue would light thee. 312 CATH CARTS LITERARY READER The dew that used to wet thee, And, white first, grew incarnadined/ because It lay upon thee where the crimson was, — If dropping now, would darken where it met thee. The fly that lit upon thee. To stretch the tendrils of its tiny feet Along the leafs pure edges after heat, — If lighting now, would coldly overrun thee. The bee that once did suck thee, And build thy perfumed ambers up his hive, And swoon in thee for joy, till scarce alive, — If passing now, would blindly overlook thee. The heart doth recognize thee. Alone, alone ! The heart doth smell thee sweet, Doth view thee fair, doth judge thee most complete, — Though seeing now those changes that disguise thee. Yes, and the heart doth owe thee More love, dead rose ! than to such roses bold As Julia wears at dances, smiling cold ! — Lie still upon this heart, which breaks below thee ! SLEEP Of all the thoughts of God that are Borne inward unto souls afar. Along the Psalmist's music deep. Now tell me if that any is For gift or grace surpassing this, — " He giveth his beloved sleep ? " ^ carnation-colored, crimson ^ Psalm cxvii. 2 MRS. BROIVNING 313 What would we give to our belov'd ? The hero's heart, to be unmoved, — The poet's star-tuned harp, to sweep, — The patriot's voice, to teach and rouse, — The monarch's crown, to Hght the brows? " He giveth his beloved sleep." What do we give to our belov'd? A httle faith, all undisproved, — A little dust to overweep, — And bitter memories, to make The whole earth blasted for our sake ; " He giveth his beloved sleep." " Sleep soft, belov'd ! " we sometimes say, But have no tune to charm away Sad dreams that through the eyelids creep ; But never doleful dream again Shall break the happy slumber when ^' He giveth his beloved sleep." O earth, so full of dreary noises ! O men, with wailing in your voices ! O delved gold the wallers heap ! O strife, O curse, that o'er it fall ! God strikes a silence through you all, And '^giveth his beloved sleep." His dews drop mutely on the hill. His cloud above it saileth still. Though on its slope men sow and reap ; More softly than the dew is shed, Or cloud is floated overhead, " He giveth his beloved sleep." For me, my heart, that erst did go Most like a tired child at a show, 314 CATHCART'S LITERARY READER That sees through tears the jugglers leap, Would now its wearied vision close, Would childlike on his love repose Who "giveth his beloved sleep." THE CRY OF THE CHILDREN i Do ye hear the children weeping, O my brothers, Ere the sorrow comes with years? They are leaning their young heads against their mothers, And that can not stop their tears. The young lambs are bleating in the meadows. The young birds are chirping in the nest, The young fawns are playing with the shadows, The young flowers are blowing towards the west ; But the young, young children, O my brothers. They are weeping bitterly ! — They are weeping in the playtime of the others, In the country of the free. And well may the children weep before you ! They are weary ere they run ; They have never seen the sunshine, nor the glory Which is brighter than the sun : They know the grief of man, without his wisdom ; ^ They sink in man's despair, without his calm, — Are slaves, without the liberty in Christdom, — Are martyrs, by the pang without the palm, — Are worn, as if with age, yet unretrievingly The blessings of its memory can not keep, — Are orphans of the earthly love and heavenly : Let them weep ! let them weep ! 1 from a poem on the factory children of England 2 Note the fine series of antitheses here begun. LONGFELLOW 315 LONGFELLOW 1807-1882 Henry Wadsworth Longfellow was born in Portland, Maine, in 1807, and died at his home in Cambridge, Mass., March 24th, 1882. He grad- uated from Bowdoin College in the class of 1825, of which Nathaniel Haw- thorne and Franklin Pierce were members. The next year he was appointed Professor of Modern Languages in this institution, and in 1835 was elected to the chair of Belles-Lettres in Harvard University, which position he held for many years, finally resigning it in order that he might give his attention wholly to literature. Between these two dates he spent much time in Europe in the studv of modern languages and literature Longfellow s poetry is distinguished by refinement and grace rather than by vigor of thought or expression. His sympathies were quick and strong; and this fact, together with the directness and simplicity of his verse, accounts mainly for the popularity of his writings, not only in this country, but in England also. He was an accomplished student of foreign literature, and translated many poems from the Spanish, German, and Scandinavian lan- guages into his own graceful measures. He was one of the most mfluential founders of American literature, as well as one of its brightest ornaments. George William Curtis thus speaks of the poet: "While the magnetism of Longfellow's touch lies in the broad humanity of his sympathy, which 3l6 CATHCART'S LITERARY READER leads him neither to mysticism nor cynicism, and which commends his poetry to the universal heart, his artistic sense is so exquisite that each of his poems is a valuable literary study. The literary style of an intellect- ually introverted age or author will always be somewhat obscure, however gorgeous ; but Longfellow's mind takes a simple, childlike hold of life, and his style never betrays the inadequate effort to describe thoughts or emo- tions that are but vaguely perceived, — which is the characteristic of the best sensational writing. Indeed, there is little poetry by the eminent con- temporary masters which is so ripe and racy as his. He does not make rhetoric stand for passion, nor vagueness for profundity. His literary scholarship also, his delightful familiarity with the pure literature of all languages and times, must rank Longfellow among the learned poets. Yet he wears this various knowledge like a shining suit of chain-mail to adorn and strengthen his gait, like Milton, instead of tripping and clumsily stumb- ling in it, as Ben Jonsoii sometimes did. He whips out an exquisitely pointed allusion that flashes like a Damascus rapier, and strikes nimbly home ; or he recounts some weird tradition, or enriches his line with some gorgeous illustration from hidden stores ; or merely unrolls, as Milton loved to do, the vast perspective of romantic association by recounting, in meas- ured order, names which themselves make music in the mind, — names not musical only, but fragrant, — " ' Sabean odors from the spicy shore Of Araby the Blest.' " THE WRECK OF THE "HESPERUS" It was the schooner " Hesperus " That sailed the wintry sea ; And the skipper had taken his little daughter To bear him company. Blue were her eyes as the fairy- flax, Her cheeks like the dawn of day, And her bosom white as the hawthorn buds That ope in the month of May. The skipper he stood beside the helm, His pipe was in his mouth, And he watched how the veering flaw did blow The smoke, now west, now south. LONGFELLOIV 317 Then up and spake an old sailor, Had sailed the Spanish Main/ " I pray thee put into yonder port, For I fear a hurricane. '' Last night the moon had a golden ring, And to-night no moon we see ! " The skipper, he blew a whiff from his pipe, And a scornful laugh laughed he. Colder and louder blew the wind, A gale from the northeast ; The snow fell hissing in the brine. And the billows frothed like yeast. Down came the storm, and smote amain The vessel in its strength ; She shuddered and paused, like a frighted steed, Then leaped her cable's length. " Come hither ! come hither ! my little daughter. And do not tremble so : « For I can weather the roughest gale That ever wind did blow." He wrapped her warm in his seaman's coat Against the stinging blast ; He cut a rope from a broken spar. And bound her to the mast. " O father ! I hear the church-bells ring, O say what may it be? " '' 'Tis a fog-bell on a rock-bound coast ! " And he steered for the open sea. 1 Main, the great, or main, sea, as distinguished from its arms 3l8 CATHCART'S LITERARY READER " O father ! I hear the sound of guns, O say what may it be? " " Some ship in distress, that can not live In such an angry sea ! " " O father ! I see a gleaming light, O say what may it be ? " But the father answered never a word, — A frozen corpse was he. Lashed to the helm, all stiff and stark, With his face turned to the skies, The lantern gleamed through the gleaming snow On his fixed and glassy eyes. Then the maiden clasped her hands, and prayed That saved she might be ; And she thought of Christ, who stilled the wave On the Lake of Galilee. And fast through the midnight dark and drear. Through the whistling sleet and snow. Like a sheeted ghost, the vessel swept Towards the reef of Norman's Woe.^ And ever the fitful gusts between A sound came from the land ; It was the sound of the trampling surf On the rocks and the hard sea-sand. The breakers were right beneath her bows, She drifted a dreary wreck ; And a whooping billow swept the crew Like icicles from her deck. 1 a reef off the coast of Massachusetts LONGFELLOIV 319 She struck where the white and fleecy waves Looked soft as carded wool ; But the cruel rocks, they gored her side Like the horns of an angry bull. Her rattling shrouds, all sheathed in ice, With the masts went by the board ; Like a vessel of glass, she stove and sank, " Ho ! ho ! " the breakers roared ! At daybreak, on the bleak sea-beach, A fisherman stood aghast, To see the form of a maiden fair Lashed close to a drifting mast. The salt sea was frozen on her breast, The salt tears in her eyes ; And he saw her hair, like the brown sea-weed, On the billows fall and rise. Such was the wreck of the '' Hesperus," In the midnight and the snow ! Christ save us all from a death like this, On the reef of Norman's Woe ! THE SHIP OF STATE Thou too sail on, O Ship of State ! Sail on, O Union, strong and great ! Humanity, with all its fears. With all the hopes of future years. Is hanging breathless on thy fate ! We know what Master laid thy keel, What Workmen wrought thy ribs of steel, 320 CATHCART'S LITERARY READER Who made each mast, and sail, and ropCj, What anvils rang, what hammers beat, In what a forge and what a heat Were shaped the anchors of thy hope 1 Fear not each sudden sound and shock, — 'T is of the wave and not the rock ; 'T is but the flapping of the sail. And not a rent made by the gale ! In spite of rock, and tempest's roar. In spite of false lights on the shore, Sail on, nor fear to breast the sea ! Our hearts, our hopes, are all with thee ; Our hearts, our hopes, our prayers, our tears, Our faith triumphant o'er our fears, Are all with thee, — are all with thee ! DISASTER Never stoops the soaring vulture On his quarry ^ in the desert. On the sick or wounded bison, But another vulture, watching From his high aerial lookout. Sees the downward plunge, and follows ; And a third pursues the second. Coming from the invisible ether. First a speck, and then a vulture. Till the air is dark with pinions. So ^ disasters come not singly ; But as if they watched and waited, Scanning one another's motions ; 1 prey 2 Note the nice correspondence of parts in the whole of this fine com- parison. LONGFELLOM/ 321 When the first descends, the others Follow, follow, gathering flock-wise Round their victim, sick and wounded, First a shadow, then a sorrow. Till the air is dark with anguish. THE LAUNCHING OF THE SHIP All is finished ! and at length Has come the bridal day Of beauty and of strength. To-day the vessel shall be launched ! With fleecy clouds the sky is blanched, And o'er the bay, Slowly, in all his splendors dight,i The great Sun rises to behold the sight. The Ocean old, Centuries old. Strong as youth, and as uncontrolled, Paces restless to and fro, Up and down the sands of gold. His beating heart is not at rest ; And far and wide. With ceaseless flow. His beard of snow Heaves with the heaving of his breast. He waits, impatient, for his bride. There she stands. With her foot upon the sands, Decked with flags and streamers gay. In honor of her marriage day, 1 arrayed ; the verb is archaic : compare Milton's " The clouds in thou- sand liveries dight." 322 CATHCARTS LITERARY READER Her snow-white signals, fluttering, blending. Round her like a veil descending, Ready to be The bride of the gray old Sea. Then the master, With a gesture of command, Waved his hand ; And at the word. Loud and sudden there was heard. All around them and below. The sound of hammers, blow on blow. Knocking away the shores ^ and spurs. And see ! she stirs ! She starts, — she moves, — she seems to feel The thrill of life along her keel, And, spurning with her foot the ground. With one exulting, joyous bound, She leaps into the Ocean's arms ! THE VILLAGE BLACKSMITH Under a spreading chestnut-tree The village smithy stands ; The smith, a mighty man is he. With large and sinewy hands ; And the muscles of his brawny arms Are strong as iron bands. His hair is crisp, and black, and long, His face is like the tan ; His brow is wet with honest sweat. He earns whate'er he can. props LONGFELLOIV 3^3 And looks the whole world in the face, For he owes not any man. Week in, week out, from morn till night, You can hear his bellows blow ; You can hear him swing his heavy sledge. With measured beat and slow, Like a sexton ringing the village bell, When the evening sun is low. And children coming home from school Look in at the open door ; They love to see the flaming forge. And hear the bellows roar, And catch the burning sparks that fly Like chafl" from a threshing-floor. He goes on Sunday to the church. And sits among his boys ; He hears the parson pray and preach, He hears his daughter's voice Singing in the village choir, And it makes his heart rejoice. It sounds to him like her mother's voice. Singing in Paradise ! He needs must think of her once more. How in the grave she lies ; And with his hard, rough hand he wipes A tear out of his eyes. Toiling, — rejoicing, — sorrowing. Onward through life he goes ; Each morning sees some task begin, Each evening sees it close ; Something attempted, something done, Has earned a night's repose. 324 CATHCART'S LITERARY READER Thanks, thanks to thee, my worthy friend, For the lesson thou hast taught I Thus at the flaming forge of Hfe Our fortunes must be wrought ; Thus on its sounding anvil shaped Each burning deed and thought ! A NORTHLAND PICTURE There is something patriarchal still ^ lingering about rural Hfe in Sweden, which renders it a fit theme for song. Almost prime- val simplicity reigns over that Northern land, — almost primeval solitude and stillness. You pass out from the gate of the city, and, as if by magic, the scene changes to a wild, woodland land- scape. Around you are forests of fir. Overhead hang the long, fan-like branches, trailing with moss, and heavy with red and blue cones. Under foot is a carpet of yellow leaves; and the air is warm and balmy. On a wooden bridge you cross a little silver stream ; and anon come forth into a pleasant and sunny land of farms. Wooden fences divide the adjoining fields. Across the road are gates, which are opened by troops of chil- dren. The peasants take off their hats as you pass ; you sneeze, and they cry, "God bless you." The houses in the villages and smaller towns are all built of hewn timber, and for the most part painted red. The floors of the taverns are strewn with the fra- grant tips of fir-boughs. In many villages there are no taverns, and the peasants take turns in receiving travelers. The thrifty housewife shows you into the best chamber, — the walls of which are hung round with rude pictures from the Bible, — and brings you her heavy silver spoons, — an heirloom, — to dip the curdled milk from the pan. You have oaten cakes baked some months 1 This sketch was written in 1835, ^^ a preface to some translations of Swedish verse. The piece has the prose form, but it is the prose of a poet and interpreter of Nature. LONGFELLOIV 325 before ; or bread with anise-seed and coriander in it, or perhaps a Httle pine bark. Meanwhile the sturdy husband has brought his horses from the plow, and harnessed them to your carriage. Solitary travelers come and go in uncouth one-horse chaises. Most of them have pipes in their mouths, and hanging around their necks in front a leather wallet, in which they carry tobacco and the great bank- notes of the country, as large as your two hands. You meet, also, groups of peasant women, traveling homeward or town- ward in pursuit of work. They walk barefoot, carrying in their hands their shoes, which have high heels under the hollow of the foot, and soles of birch bark. . . . In the churchyard are a few flowers, and much green grass ; and daily the shadow of the church-spire, with its long, tapering finger, counts the tombs, representing a dial-plate of human life, on which the hours and minutes are the graves of men.^ The stones are flat and large and low, and perhaps sunken, like the roofs of old houses. On some are armorial bearings ; '^ on others only the initials of the poor tenants, with a date, as on the roofs of Dutch cottages. They aU sleep with their heads to the west- ward. Each held a lighted taper in his hand when he died ; and in his coffin were placed his little heart- treasures, and a piece of money for his last journey. Babes that came lifeless into the world were carried in the arms of gray-haired old men to the only cradle they ever slept in ; and in the shroud of the dead mother were laid the little garments of the child that lived and died in her bosom. And over this scene the village pastor looks from his window in the stillness of midnight, and says in his heart, " How quietly they rest, all the departed I " Near the church-yard gate stands a poor-box, fastened to a post by iron bands and secured by a padlock, with a sloping wooden roof to keep off the rain. If it be Sunday, the peasants sit on the church-steps and con their psalm-books. Others are 1 shadow . . . me?i. In this beautiful fancy, which gives so much ideality to what was commonplace before, the poet is plainly disclosed to us, ^ heraldic emblems 326 CATHCART'S LITERARY READER coming down the road with their beloved pastor, who talks to them of holy things from beneath his broad-brimmed hat. . . . The women carry psalm-books in their hands, wrapped in silk handkerchiefs, and listen devoutly to the good man's words. But the young men, like Gallio,^ care for none of these things. They are busy counting the plaits in the kirtles of the peasant girls, their number being an indication of the wearer's wealth. It may end in a wedding. . . . Nor must I forget the suddenly changing seasons of the Northern clime. There is no long and lingering spring, unfold- ing leaf and blossom one by one ; no long and lingering autumn, pompous with many-colored leaves and the glow of Indian summers. But winter and summer are wonderful, and pass into each other. The quail has hardly ceased piping in the corn, when winter from the folds of trailing clouds sows broadcast over the land snow, icicles, and rattling hail. The days wane apace. Ere long the sun hardly rises above the horizon, or does not rise at all. The moon and the stars shine through the day ; only, at noon, they are pale and wan, and in the southern sky a red, fiery glow, as of sunset, burns along the horizon, and then goes out. And pleasantly under the silver moon, and under the silent, solemn stars, ring the steel shoes of the skaters on the frozen sea, and voices, and the sound of bells. And now the Northern Lights begin to burn, faintly at first, like sunbeams playing in the waters of the blue sea. Then a soft crimson glow tinges the heavens. There is a blush on the cheek of night. The colors come and go; and change from crimson to gold, from gold to crimson. The snow is stained with rosy light. Twofold from the zenith, east and west, flames a fiery sword ; and a broad band passes athwart the heavens like a summer sunset. Soft purple clouds come sailing over the sky, and through their vapory folds the winking stars shine white as silver. With such pomp as this is Merry Christmas ushered in, though only a single star heralded the first Christmas. 1 Acts xviii. 17 LONGFELLOW 327 And ill memory of that day the Swedish peasants dance on straw; and the peasant girls throw straw^s at the timbered roof of the hall, and for every one that sticks in a crack shall a groomsman come to their wedding. Merry Christmas, indeed ! For pious souls there shall be church songs and sermons ; but for Swedish peasants, brandy and nut-brown ale in wooden bowls, and the great Yule-cake ^ crowned with a cheese, and garlanded with apples, and upholding a three-armed candlestick over the Christmas feast. . . . And now the glad, leafy midsummer, full of blossoms and the song of nightingales, is come ; and in ev'ery village there is a May-pole fifty feet high, with wreaths and roses and ribands streaming in the wind, and a noisy weathercock on top, to tell the village whence the wund cometh, and whither it goeth. The sun does not set till ten o'clock at night ; and the children are at play in the streets an hour later. The windows and doors are all open, and you may sit and read till midnight without a candle. O how beautiful is the summer night, which is not night, but a sunless yet unclouded day, descending upon earth with dews, and shadows, and refreshing coolness ! How beau- tiful the long, mild twilight, which like a silver clasp unites to-day with yesterday ! How beautiful the silent hour, when Morning and Evening thus sit together, hand in hand, beneath the starless sky of midnight ! From the church -tower in the public square the bell tolls the hour, with a soft, musical chime ; and the watchman, whose watch-tower is the belfry, blow^s a blast in his horn for each stroke of the hammer, and four times, to the four corners of the heavens, in a sonorous voice he chants, — " Ho ! watchman, ho ! Twelve is the clock ! God keep our town From fire and brand And hostile hand ! Twelve is the clock ! " 1 Yiile, from Swedish Jul, " Christmas ; " compare, in Webster, the etymology oi jolly. 328 CATHCART'S LITERARY READER WHITTIER 1807- JOHN Greenleaf Whittier, the " Quaker poet," was born in Haverhill, Massachusetts, in 1807. His youth was spent at his native farmstead, where his educational opportunities were of the slenderest. He possessed a keen J appetite for knowledge, however, and the age of twenty-one found him edit- ing a newspaper at Boston, A year later he went to Hartford, to take charge of the Neiv England Weekly. In 1831 he returned to Haverhill, where he remained five years, serving the state as representative in the legislature through two terms. From boyhood he had been deeply inter- ested in the subject of slavery, and his convictions of the sinfulness of that institution were strengthened with his growth. He was an original member of the American Antislavery Society, and having been appointed one of its secretaries, he took up his residence at Philadelphia in 1836, and for four years wrote constantly for antislavery periodicals. In 1840 he established himself at Amesbury, Massachusetts, which has ever since been his home. His first volume, " Legends of New England, in Prose and Verse," was pub- U^HITTIER 329 lished in 1831. This has been followed, at frequent intervals, by nearly thirty volumes, mostly of verse. During the civil war he poured forth a multitude of stirring lyrics, which helped not a little to sustain and energize public sentiment; and the literature of the antislavery struggle, from its beginning to its end, had in him an active and efficient contributor. Whittier's earlier poems deal largely with the colonial annals of New England, and some of the most interesting traditions of that region have been preserved for posterity in his graphic and vigorous lines. Two of Whittier's poems have enjoyed exceptional popularity, — "Maud Muller" and " Snow-bound;" the first tells the story of a universal experience; the second affords the most faithful and finished pictures of winter life in rural New England that have ever been drawn by a poet. No American poet is so free as Whittier from obligations to English writers; his poems show no evidence of appropriation, or of that assiduous study of masterpieces which generally entails some unconscious imitation of form. He is original and American. One principal charm of his poetry consists in its catholicity; he sings not of himself, but for humanity, and his voice is heeded as if it bore a special call to all who hear it. MAUD MULLER Maud Muller, on a summer's day, Raked the meadow sweet with hay. Beneath her torn hat glowed the wealth Of simple beauty and rustic health. Singing, she wrought, and her merry glee The mock-bird echoed from his tree. But, when she glanced to the far-off town, White from its hill-slope looking down, The sweet song died, and a vague unrest And a nameless longing filled her breast, — A wish, that she hardly dared to own, For something better than she had known. 330 CATHCART'S LITERARY READER The Judge rode slowly down the lane, Smoothing his horse's chestnut mane. He drew his bridle in the shade Of the apple-trees, to greet the maid, And ask a draught from the spring that flowed Through the meadows across the road. She stooped where the cool stream bubbled up, And filled for him her small tin cup, And blushed as she gave it, looking down On her feet so bare, and her tattered gown. "Thanks ! " said the Judge ; " a sweeter draught From a fairer hand was never quaffed." He spoke of the grass, and flowers, and trees, Of the singing birds and the humming bees ; Then talked of the haying, and wondered whether The cloud in the west would bring foul weather. And Maud forgot her brier-torn gown, And her graceful ankles bare and brown ; And listened, while a pleased surprise Looked from her long-lashed hazel eyes. At last, like one who for delay Seeks a vain excuse, he rode away. Maud Muller looked and sighed : " Ah, me ! That I the Judge's bride might be ! *^ He would dress me up in silks so fine. And praise and toast me at his wine. IVHITTIER 331 ^' My father should wear a broadcloth coat ; My brother should sail a painted boat. " I 'd dress my mother so grand and gay, And the baby should have a new toy each day. '' And I 'd feed the hungry and clothe the poor, And all should bless me who left our door." The Judge looked back as he climbed the hill, And saw Maud Muller standing still. " A form more fair, a face more sweet, Ne'er hath it been my lot to meet. " And her modest answer and graceful air, Show her wise and good as she is fair. '' Would she were mine, and I to-day, Like her, a harvester of hay : " No doubtful balance of rights and wrongs, Nor weary lawyers with endless tongues, " But low of cattle and song of birds, And health and quiet and loving words." But he thought of his sisters, proud and cold. And his mother, vain of her rank and gold. So, closing his heart, the Judge rode on, And Maud was left in the field alone. But the lawyers smiled that afternoon When he hummed in court an old love-tune ; And the young girl mused beside the well, Till the rain on the unraked clover fell. 332 CATHCART'S LITERARY READER He wedded a wife of richest dower, Who lived for fashion, as he for power. Yet oft, in his marble hearth's bright glow, He watched a picture come and go : And sweet Maud Muller's hazel eyes Looked out in their innocent surprise. Oft when the wine in his glass was red He longed for the wayside well instead ; And closed his eyes on his garnished rooms. To dream of meadows and clover blooms. And the proud man sighed, with a secret pain, " Ah, that I were free again ! " Free as when I rode that day. Where the barefoot maiden raked her hay." She wedded a man unlearned and poor. And many children played round her door. But care and sorrow and childbirth pain Left their traces on heart and brain. And oft, when the summer sun shone hot On the new- mown hay in the meadow lot. And she heard the little spring brook fall Over the roadside, through the wall. In the shade of the apple-tree again She saw a rider draw his rein ; And, gazing down with timid grace. She felt his pleased eyes read her face. U/HITTIER 333 Sometimes her narrow kitchen walls Stretched away into stately halls ; The weary wheel to a spinet turned,^ The tallow candle an astral ^ burned, And for him who sat by the chimney lug,^ Dozing and grumbling o' er pipe and mug, A manly form at her side she saw, And joy was duty, and love was law. Then she took up her burden of life again, Saying only, " It might have been ! " Alas for maiden, alas for Judge, For rich repiner and household drudge ! God pity them both ! and pity us all, Who vainly the dreams of youth recall. For of all sad words of tongue or pen. The saddest are these : " It might have been ! " Ah, well ! for us all some sweet hope lies, Deeply buried from human eyes ; And, in the hereafter, angels may Roll the stone from its grave away ! 1 The zueary . . . turned ; i. e. the spi7iJi2Jig-\\h.ee\ to a spinet, — a musical instrument 2 astral, "star-like," — the name of a brilliant lamp ^ chimney corner 334 CATHCART'S LITERARY READER THE BAREFOOT BOY Blessings on thee, little man, Barefoot boy, with cheek of tan ! With thy turned up pantaloons, And thy merry whistled tunes ; With thy red lip, redder still Kissed by strawberries on the hill ; With the sunshine on thy face, Through thy torn brim's jaunty grace ; From my heart I give thee joy, — I was once a barefoot boy ! Prince thou art, — the grown-up man Only is republican. Let the million-dollared ride ! Barefoot, trudging at his side, Thou hast more than he can buy In the reach of ear and eye, — Outward sunshine, inward joy ; Blessings on thee, barefoot boy ! O for boyhood's painless play. Sleep that wakes in laughing day, Health that mocks the doctor's rules, Knowledge, never learned of schools, Of the wild bee's morning chase, Of the wild-flowers' time and place, Flight of fowl and habitude Of the tenants of the wood ; How the tortoise bears his shell, How the woodchuck digs his cell. And the ground-mole sinks his well ; How the robin feeds her young, How the oriole's nest is hung ; Where the whitest lilies blow, Where the freshest berries grow. IV HIT TIER 335 Where the ground-nut trails its vine, Where the wood-grape's clusters shine ; Of the black wasp's cunning way, Mason of his walls of clay. And the architectural plans Of gray hornet artisans ! — For, eschewing books and tasks, Nature answers all he asks ; Hand in hand with her he walks, Face to face with her he talks, Part and parcel of her joy, — Blessings on the barefoot boy ! O for boyhood's time of June, Crowding years in one brief moon, When all things I heard or saw. Me, their master, waited for. I was rich in flowers and trees. Humming-birds and honey-bees; For my sport the squirrel played. Plied the snouted mole his spade ; For my taste the blackberry cone Purpled over hedge and stone ; Laughed the brook for my delight Through the day and through the night. Whispering at the garden wall. Talked with me from fall to fall ; Mine the sand-rimmed pickerel pond, Mine the walnut slopes beyond, Mine, on bending orchard trees. Apples of Hesperides ! ^ Still as my horizon grew, Larger grew my riches too ; All the world I saw or knew 1 the fabled daughters of Hesperus, whose gardens yielded golden fruit 336 CATHCART'S LITERARY READER Seemed a complex Chinese toy Fashioned for a barefoot boy ! O for festal dainties spread. Like my bowl of milk and bread, — Pewter spoon and bowl of wood, On the door-stone, gray and rude ! O'er me, like a regal tent. Cloudy-ribbed, the sunset bent. Purple-curtained, fringed with gold, Looped in many a wind- swung fold ; While for music came the play Of the pied ^ frogs' orchestra ; And, to light the noisy choir, Lit the fly his lamp of fire. I was monarch : pomp and joy AVaited on the barefoot boy ! Cheerily, then, my little man, Live and laugh, as boyhood can ! Though the flinty slopes be hard. Stubble-speared the new- mown sward, Every morn shall lead thee through Fresh baptisms of the dew ; Every evening from thy feet Shall the cool wind kiss the heat : All too soon these feet must hide In the prison cells of pride, Lose the freedom of the sod, Like a colt's for work be shod. Made to tread the mills of toil. Up and down in ceaseless moil : ^ Happy ^ if their track be found Never on forbidden ground ; 1 spotted like the coat of a piper 2 grimy labor 3 Expand this elliptical expression. IVHITTIER 337 Happy if they sink not in Quick and treacherous sands of sin. Ah ! that thou couldst know thy joy Ere it passes, barefoot boy ! WINTER Shut in from all the world without, We sat the clean-winged hearth about, Content to let the north-wind roar In baffled rage at pane and door, While the red logs before us beat The frost-hne back with tropic heat ; And ever, when a louder blast Shook beam and rafter as it passed, The merrier up* its roaring draught The great throat of the chimney laughed. The house-dog, on his paws outspread, Laid to the fire his drowsy head ; The cat's dark silhouette ^ on the wall A couchant tiger's seemed to fall ; And, for the winter fireside meet, Between the andirons' straddling feet. The mug of cider simmered slow. The apples sputtered in a row, And, close at hand, the basket stood With nuts from brown October's wood. Etymology? See Webster. 22 338 CATHCART'S LITERARY READER HOLMES 1809- Oliver Wendell Holmes, one of the wittiest and wisest of American writers, was born in Cambridge, Massachusetts, in 1809, and graduated at Harvard University in 1829. He began the study of law ; but feeling a stronger bent toward the profession of medicine, applied himself zealously to preparation for its practice. In 1836, having spent several years in study ^My^s^i"^^' abroad, he received his medical degree ; two years later was appointed to a professorship in the Dartmouth Medical School ; and in 1847 succeeded Dr. Warren as Professor of Anatomy in Harvard University. His first considerable literary effort was a poem delivered before the Phi Beta Kappa Society of Harvard in 1836. It received warm praise from com- petent critics, and its success undoubtedly confirmed his inclination for literary labors. The first edition of his collected poems was published in the same year, and many editions have followed it in this country and in HOLMES 339 England. He confined his efforts in earlier years almost exclusively to long poems like "Urania" and "Astraea," — metrical essays, melodious, polished, and glittering with wit; but in later days he has been content to throw off short lyrics and "occasional pieces." The most conspicuous characteristic of HoUnes's verse is humor, of indescribable and rarely equaled delicacy and brilliancy. Several of his humorous poems, like the " One-Hoss Shay," have by common consent been elevated to the rank of classics in our American literature. Not less felici- tous has he been in a few pieces in which a fine pathos relieves the glow of his wit. He was one of the founders of the Atlantic Monthly, and in its first years was a regular contributor to its pages. For it he wrote *' The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table," and later, "The Professor" and "The Poet at the Breakfast-Table," a series of papers which are unique in our literature, combining the rarest qualities of the light esSay, — freshness of thought, deftness of touch, keen but good-humored satire, and a pervading atmosphere of wit that keeps the reader in a state of continual exhilara- tion and expectancy. In his "Fable for Critics" Lowell had these lines upon Holmes : — There 's Holmes, who is matchless among you for wit, — A Leyden-jar always full-charged, from which flit The electrical tingles of hit after hit. His are just the fine hands, too, to weave you a lyric Full of fancy, fun, feeling, or spiced with satiric In so kindly a measure that nobody knows What to do but just join in the laugh, friends and foes."' ON AMATEUR WRITERS If I were a literary Pope sending out an Encyclical,^ I would tell inexperienced persons that nothing is so frequent as to mis- take an ordinary human gift for a special and extraordinary en- dowment. The mechanism of breathing and that of swallowing are very wonderful, and if one had seen and studied them in his own person only, he might well think himself a prodigy. Every- body knows these and other bodily faculties are common gifts ; but nobody except editors and school-teachers, and here and there a literary man, knows how common is the capacity of rhyming and 1 a general letter 340 CATHCART'S LITERARY READER prattling in readable prose, especially among young women of a certain degree of education. In my character of Pontiff, I should tell these young persons that most of them labored under a delusion. It is very hard to believe it ; one feels so full of in- telligence and so decidedly superior to one's dull relations and schoolmates ; one writes so easily, and the lines sound so prettily to one's self; there are such felicities of expression, just like those we hear quoted from the great poets ; and besides, one has been told by so many friends that all one had to do was to print and be famous ! Delusion, my poor dear, delusion at least nine- teen times out of twenty, — yes, ninety-nine times in a hundred. But as private father- confessor, I always allow as much as I can for the one chance in the hundred. I try not to take away all hope, unless the case is clearly desperate, and then to direct the activities into some other channel. Using kind language, I can talk pretty freely. I have coun- seled more than one aspirant after literary fame to go back to his tailor's board or his lapstone. I have advised the dilettanti^ whose foolish friends praised their verses or their stories, to give up all their deceptive dreams of making a name by their genius, and go to work in the study of a profession which asked only for the diligent use of average, ordinary talents. It is a very grave responsibility which these unknown correspondents throw upon their chosen counselors. One whom you have never seen, who lives in a community of which you know nothing, sends you specimens more or less painfully voluminous of his writings, which he asks you to read over, think over, and pray over, and send back an answer informing him whether fame and fortune are awaiting him as the possessor of the wonderful gifts his writings manifest, and whether you advise him to leave all, — the shop he sweeps out every morning, the ledger he posts, the mortar in which he pounds, the bench at which he urges the reluctant plane, — and follow his genius whithersoever it may lead him. The next correspondent wants you to mark out a whole course of i Italian ; literally, those who delight in the fine arts, — hence, amateurs HOLMES 341 life for him, and the means of judgment he gives you are about as adequate as the brick which the simpleton of old carried round as an advertisement of the house he had to sell. My advice to all young men that write to me depends somewhat on the handwriting and spelling. If these are of a certain character, and they have reached a mature age, I recommend some honest manual calling, such as they have very probably been bred to, and which will at least give them a chance of becoming Presi- dent of the United States by and by, if that is any object to them. What would you have done with the young person who called on me a good many years ago, — so many that he has probably forgotten his literary effort, — and read as specimens of his lit- erary workmanship lines like those which I will favor you with presently? He was an able-bodied, grown-up young person, whose ingenuousness interested me ; and I am sure if I thought he would ever be pained to see his maiden effort in print, I would deny myself the pleasure of submitting it to the reader. The following is an exact transcript of the lines he showed me, and which I took down on the spot : — " Are you in the vein for cider ? Are you in the tune for pork ? Hist ! for Betty 's cleared the larder, And turned the pork to soap." Do not judge too hastily this sincere effort of a maiden Muse. Here was a sense of rhythm, and an effort in the direction of rhyme ; here was an honest transcript of an occurrence of daily life, told with a certain idealizing expression, recognizing the existence of impulses, mysterious instincts, impelling us even in the selection of our bodily sustenance. But I had to tell him that it wanted dignity of incident and grace of narrative, that there was no atmosphere to it, nothing of " the light that never was," and so forth.^ I did not say this in these very words, but I i An allusion to Wordsworth's lines : — " The light that never was, on sea or land, The consecration, and the poet's dream." 342 CATHCART'S LITERARY READER gave him to understand, without being too hard upon him, that he had better not desert his honest toil in pursuit of the poet's bays.^ This, it must be confessed, was a rather discouraging case. A young person hke this may pierce, as the Frenchmen say, by and by, but the chances are all the other way. I advise aimless young men to choose some profession without needless delay, and so get into a good strong current of human affairs, and find themselves bound up in interests with a compact body of their fellow-men. I advise young women who write to me for counsel, — perhaps I do not advise them at all ; only sympathize a little with them, and listen to what they have to say (eight closely written pages on the average, which I always read from beginning to end, thinking of the widow's cruse, and myself in the character of Elijah),^ and — and — Come now, I don't believe Methuselah would tell you what he said in his letters to young ladies, written when he was in his nine hundred and sixty- ninth year. But, dear me ! how much work all this private criticism in- volves ! An editor has only to say '' respectfully declined," and there is the end of it. But the confidential adviser is expected to give the reasons of his likes and dislikes in detail, and some- times to enter into an argument for their support. That is more than any martyr can stand ; but what trials he must go through, as it is ! Great bundles of manuscripts, verse or prose, which the recipient is expected to read, perhaps to recommend to a publisher, at any rate to express a well-digested and agree- ably flavored opinion about; which opinion, nine times out of ten, disguise it as we may, has to be a bitter draught; every form of egotism, conceit, false sentiment, hunger for notoriety, and eagerness for display of anserine plumage ^ before the ad- miring public j — all these come in by mail or express, covered with postage-stamps of so much more cost than the value of the waste words they overlie, that one comes at last to groan and change color at the very sight of a package, and to dread the 1 /. erything about the book speaks of a person who had broken free from the narrow littleness of "the peculiar people." The language, as we said, is full of strange words. The hero of the poem is of a strange land and parentage, — a Gentile certainly, not a Jew. The life, the man- ners, the customs, are of all varieties and places : Egypt, with its river and its pyramids, is there ; the description of mining points to Phoenicia ; the settled life in cities, the nomad Arabs, the wan- dering caravans, the heat of the tropics, and the ice of the north, all are foreign to Canaan, speaking of foreign things and foreign people. No mention, or hint of mention, is there throughout the poem of Jewish traditions or Jewish certainties. We look to find the three friends vindicate themselves, as they so well might have done, by appeals to the fertile annals of Israel, to the Flood, to the cities of the plain, to the plagues of Egypt, or the thunders of Sinai. But of all this there is not a word ; they are passed by as if they had no existence ; and instead of them, when witnesses are required for the power of God, we have strange un-Hebrew stories of the Eastern astronomic mythology, the old wars of the giants, the imprisoned Orion, the wounded dragon, " the sweet influences of the seven stars," and the glittering fragments of the sea-snake Rahab trailing across the northern sky. Again, God is not the God of Israel, but the father of mankind ; we hear noth- ing of a chosen people, nothing of a special revelation, nothing of peculiar privileges ; and in the court of heaven there is a Satan, not the prince of this world and the enemy of God, but the angel of judgment, the accusing spirit whose mission was to walk to and fro over the earth, and carry up to heaven an account of the sins of mankind. We can not believe that thoughts of this kind arose out of Jerusalem in the days of Josiah. The scenes, the names, and the incidents are all contrived as if to baffle curiosity, — as if, in the very form of the poem, to teach us that it is no story of a single thing which happened once, but that it belongs to humanity itself, and is the drama of the trial of man, with Almighty God and the angels as the spectators of it. FROUDE 405 No reader can have failed to have been struck ^ with the sim- phcity of the opening. Still, calm, and most majestic, it tells us everything which is necessary to be known in the fewest pos- sible words.^ The history of Job was probably a tradition in the East ; his name, like that of Priam in Greece, the symbol of fallen greatness, and his misfortunes the problem of philoso- phers. In keeping with the current belief, he is described as a model of excellence, the most perfect and upright man upon the earth, "and the same was the greatest man in all the East." So far, greatness and goodness had gone hand in hand together, as the popular theory required. The details of his character are brought out in the progress of the poem. He was " the father of the oppressed, and of those who had none to help them." When he sat as a judge in the market-places, " righteousness clothed him" there, and "his justice was a robe and a diadem." He " broke the jaws of the wicked, and plucked the spoil out of his teeth ; " and, humble in the midst of his power, he " did not despise the cause of his man-servant, or his maid-servant, when they contended with him," knowing that " He who had made him had made them." Above all, he was the friend of the poor; "the blessing of him that was ready to perish came upon him," and he " made the widow's heart to sing for joy." Setting these characteristics of his daily life by the side of his unaffected piety, as it is described in the first chapter, we have a picture of the best man who could then be conceived ; not a hard ascetic,^ living in haughty or cowardly isolation, but a warm figure of flesh and blood, a man full of all human loveliness, and to whom God himself bears the emphatic testimony, that " there was none like him upon the earth, a perfect and upright man, who feared God and eschewed evil." 1 "can have . . . struck:" Note the unhappy diction. 2 " There was a man in the land of Uz, whose name was Job ; and that man was perfect and upright, and one that feared God, and eschewed evil." '^ an austere person, rigid in religiosity 406 CATHCART'S LITERARY READER THREE AMERICAN HISTORIANS PRESCOTT BANCROFT— MOTLEY THE phrase " historical perspective " means no more than this, — that there must be sufficient remoteness of the events discussed to permit of the collection of all possible testimony concerning them ; to enable us to see the relations between things that have not before been thought of together ; and to allow of an examination into causes and conditions without bias from interest or passion. When we reflect that our total population only two cen- turies ago was less than that of some of our second-rate cities to-day, we may see that history, so far as it has to do with our own country and its people, must confine itself within limits that are relatively narrow. American history, in the true sense, is, in fact, restricted to the colonial, the revolutionary, and the early constitutional periods. Two of the most distinguished of American historians — Prescott and Motley, from whose works selections are here made — have accordingly found, in other lands and earlier times, themes most congenial to their peculiar aptitudes and talents. With one exception, — that of Draper, in his "Intellectual Development of Europe," — all other nota- ble American historians have directed their researches and studies to the history of our own country. The principal works that are devoted to the colonial period are the histories of New England by Palfrey and Fiske. Dealing specially with the wars with England are Lossing's two ** Field Books," Cooper's *' Naval History," and Fiske's ** American Revolution." General and com- prehensive histories of the United States are those of Bancroft, Hildreth, and McMaster. Still more detailed and exhaustive of the general subject is the '* Narrative HISTORICAL SUMMARY 407 and Critical History of the United States," edited and compiled by Mr. Justin Winsor, of Cambridge. Two political memoirs — those of Benton and Blaine — afford interesting and valuable historical materials. Of the many works called forth by the events and results of the Civil War, permanent value must attach to the volumes of Davis upon the Southern side, and of Grant upon the part of the North, though both were actors in the struggle, and wrote under the limitations which that fact involved. Biographies of leaders in public affairs have a value that is mainly historical. From the letters, diaries, and reported conversations of such men a deeper insight into the causes of things can be got than from the records of public transactions. Thus the "Autobiography" of Jef- ferson, John Adams's " Letters to his Wife," and the cor- respondence of Franklin, together with the last part of his " Autobiography," give not only the best idea of the men who wrote them, but the fullest knowledge of the affairs they took part in. American history owes much to the biographies of Washington by Irving, Henry C Lodge, and Chief-Justice Marshall ; of Franklin by James Parton and Jared Sparks ; of Jefferson by Parton and H. S. Randall ; of Hamilton by Lodge and John T. Morse ; of Samuel Adams by J. K. Hosmer ; and of Gonverneiir Morris by Theodore Roose- velt. Lives of Patrick Henry, Benedict Arnold, and La- fayette are contained in Sparks's series of " American Biographies." 408 CATHCART'S LITERARY READER PRESCOTT 1 796-1 859 William Hickling Prescott, grandson of Colonel William Prescott, commander of the patriot troops at the battle of Bunker Hill, was born at Salem, Mass., in 1796, and died in 1859. He graduated from Harvard in 1814, having won distinction by his attainments in the classics. An accident at college occasioned injuries which resulted finally in almost total blindness. He spent two years in Europe, and returned with the purpose of devoting himself to historical labors. His first work, "The History of Ferdinand and Isabella," was published in 1838, and was reprinted in France, Germany, and Spain. The author was soon afterwards elected a member of the Spanish Royal Academy of History. In 1843 he gave to the world his " History of the Conquest of Mexico," and m 1847 the "History of the Conquest of Peru." In 1850 Prescott visited Europe, traveling in Great Britain and on the Continent. Five years later the first two volumes, and in 1858 the third, of the " History of the Reign of Philip the Second of Spain " were issued ; but he did not live to complete the work. In addition to the histories PRESCOTT ' 409 named above, Prescott contributed to our literature a volume of "Biograph- ical and Critical Miscellanies," which includes a valuable essay on Spanish Literature. His style is well suited to historical composition, presenting a happy compound of loftiness, brilliancy, and elegance. His unfinished work, " The History of Philip the Second," is generally accounted his best. Prescott's success is due in part to his genius and indomitable industry, and in part to the steady concentration of his powers on his several arduous under- takings. Many of his narrative passages are as enthralling as any romance, yet their author never allows himself to forget that he is writing history. THE VALLEY AND CITY OF MEXICO 1 The troops, refreshed by a night's rest, succeeded, early on the following day, in gaining the crest of the sierra of Ahualco, which stretches like a curtain between the two great mountains on the north and south. Their progress was now comparatively easy, and they marched forward with a buoyant step as they felt they were treading the soil of Montezuma.'-^ They had not advanced far, when, turning an angle of the sierra, they suddenly came on a view which more than compen- sated the toils of the preceding day. It was that of the Valley of Mexico, or Tenochtitlan, as more commonly called by the natives ; which, with its picturesque assemblage of water, wood- land, and cultivated plains, its shining cities and shadowy hills, was spread out like some gay and gorgeous panorama before them. In the highly rarefied atmosphere of these upper regions, even remote objects have a brilliancy of coloring and a distinct- ness of outUne which seem to annihilate distance. Stretching far away at their feet were seen noble forests of oak, sycamore, and cedar, and beyond, yellow fields of maize and the towering maguey, intermingled with orchards and blooming gardens ; for 1 from "The Conquest of Mexico " 2 The Montezumas were the Aztec, or native, rulers of Mexico. They built fine cities and temples, and were able and powerful monarchs In 1519 Cortez with an army of Spaniards invaded the country and conquered it. 4IO • CATH CARTS LITERARY READER flowers, in such demand for their rehgious festivals, were even more abimdant in this populous valley than in other parts of Anahuac. In the center of the great basin were beheld the lakes, occupying then a much larger portion of its surface than at present ; their borders thickly studded with towns and hamlets, and, in the midst, like some Indian empress with her coronal of pearls, — the fair city of Mexico, with her white towers and pyramidal temples, reposing, as it were, on the bosom of the waters, — the far-famed ''Venice of the Aztecs." High over all rose the royal hill of Chapultepec, the residence of the Mex- ican monarchs, crowned with the same grove of gigantic cypresses which at this day fling their broad shadows over the land. In the distance beyond the blue waters of the lake, and nearly screened by intervening foliage, was seen a shining speck, the rival capital of Tezcuco, and still farther on, the dark belt of porphyry, girdling the valley around, like a rich setting which Nature had devised for the fairest of her jewels. Such was the beautiful vision which broke on the eyes of the Conquerors. And even now, when so sad a change has come over the scene ; when the stately forests have been laid low, and the soil, unsheltered from the fierce radiance of a tropical sun, is in many places abandoned to sterility ; when the waters have re- tired, leaving a broad and ghastly margin white with the incrus- tation of salts, while the cities and hamlets on their borders have moldered into ruins, — even now that desolation broods over the landscape, so indestructible are the lines of beauty which Nature has traced on its features, that no traveler, however cold, can gaze on them with any other emotions than those of astonishment and rapture. What, then, must have been the emotions of the Spaniards when, after working their toilsome way into the upper air, the cloudy tabernacle parted before their eyes, and they beheld these fair scenes in all their pristine magnificence and beauty? It was like the spectacle which greeted the eyes of Moses from the sum- mit of Pisgah, and, in the warm glow of their feelings, they cried out, " It is the promised land ! " PRESCOTT 411 But these feelings of admiration were soon followed by others of a very different complexion, as they saw in all this the evi- dences of a civilization and power far superior to anything they had yet encountered. The more timid, disheartened by the prospect, shrunk from a contest so unequal, and demanded, as they had done on some former occasions, to be led back again to Vera Cruz. Such was not the effect produced on the sanguine spirit of the general.^ His avarice was sharpened by the display of the dazzling spoil at his feet ; and if he felt a natural anxiety at the formidable odds, his confidence was renewed as he gazed on the lines of his veterans, whose weather-beaten visages and battered armor told of battles won and difficulties surmounted, while his bold barbarians, with appetites whetted by the view of their enemies' country, seemed like eagles on the mountains, ready to pounce upon their prey. By argument, entreaty, and menace he endeavored to restore the faltering courage of the soldiers, urging them not to think of retreat, now that they had reached the goal for which they had panted, and the golden gates were opened to receive them. In these efforts he was well seconded by the brave cavaliers, who held honor as dear to them as fortune ; until the dullest spirits caught somewhat of the enthu- siasm of their leaders, and the general had the satisfaction to see his hesitating columns, with their usual buoyant step once more on their march down the slopes of the sierra. THE COLONIZATION OF AMERICA It is not easy at this time to comprehend the impulse given to Europe by the discovery of America. It was not the gradual acquisition of some border territory, a province or a kingdom, that had been gained, but a new world that was now thrown open to the European. The races of animals, the mineral treasures, the vegetable forms, and the varied aspects of nature, man in the ^ Cortez 412 C/ITHCART'S LITERARY READER different phases of civilization, filled the mind with entirely new sets of ideas, that changed the habitual current of thought, and stimulated it to indefinite conjecture. The eagerness to explore the wonderful secrets of the new hemisphere became so active that the principal cities of Spain were, in a manner, depopulated, as emigrants thronged one after another to take their chance upon the deep. It was a world of romance that was thrown open ; for, whatever might be the luck of the adventurer, his reports on his return were tinged with a coloring of romance that stimulated still higher the sensitive fancies of his countrymen, and nourished the chimerical sentiments of an age of chivalry. They listened with attentive ears to tales of Amazons, which seemed to realize ^ the classic legends of antiquity ; to stories of Patagonian giants ; to flaming pictures of an E/ Dorado (Golden Land), where the sands sparkled with gems, and golden pebbles as large as birds' eggs were dragged in nets out of the rivers. Yet that the adventurers were no impostors, but dupes, too easy dupes, of their own credulous fancies, is shown by the ex- travagant character of their enterprises ; by expeditions in search of the magical Fountain of Health, of the golden Temple of Doboyba, of the golden Sepulchers of Yenu, — for gold was ever floating before their distempered vision, and the name of Castilla del Oro (Golden Castle), the most unhealthy and unprofitable region of the Isthmus, held out a bright promise to the unfor- tunate settler, who too frequently instead of gold found there only his grave. In this realm of enchantment all the accessories served to maintain the illusion. The simple natives, with their defenceless bodies and rude weapons, were no match for the European war- rior, armed to the teeth in mail. The odds were as great as those found in any legend of chivalry, where the lance of the good knight overturned hundreds at a touch. The perils that lay in the discoverer's path, and the sufferings he had to sustain, were scarcely inferior to those that beset the knight- errant. Hunger and thirst and fatigue, the deadly effluvia of the morass, with its 1 i. e. make real ; hence, to convert from fable to fact PRESCOTT 413 swarms of venomous insects, the cold of mountain snows, and the scorching sun of the tropics, — these were the lot of every cavaHer who came to seek his fortunes in the New World. It was the reality of romance. The life of the Spanish adventurer was one chapter more, and not the least remarkable, in the chronicles of knight-errantry. The character of the warrior took somewhat of the exaggerated coloring shed over his exploits. Proud and vainglorious, swelled with lofty anticipations of his destiny, and an invincible confi- dence in his own resources, no danger could appall and no toil could tire him. The greater the danger, indeed, the higher the charm ; for his soul reveled in excitement, and the enterprise without peril wanted that spur of romance which was necessary to rouse his energies into action. Yet in the motives of action meaner influences were strangely mingled with the loftier, the temporal with the spiritual. Gold was the incentive and the recompense, and in the pursuit of it his inflexible nature rarely hesitated as to the means. His courage was sullied with cruelty, the cruelty that flowed equally, strange as it may seem, from his avarice and his religion ; religion as it was understood in that age, — the religion of the Crusader. It was the convenient cloak for a multitude of sins, which covered them even from himself. The Castilian, too proud for hypocrisy, committed more cruelties in the name of religion than were ever practised by the pagan idolater or the fanatical Moslem. The burning of the infidel was a sacrifice acceptable to Heaven, and the conversion of those who survived amply atoned for the foulest offenses. It is a melancholy and mortifying consideration that the most uncom- promising spirit of intolerance — the spirit of the Inquisitor at home, and of the Crusader abroad — should have emanated from a religion which preached '' peace upon earth, and good-will towards man ! " What a contrast did these children of southern Europe present to the Anglo-Saxon races, who scattered themselves along the great northern division of the Western Hemisphere ! For the principle of action with these latter was not avarice, nor 414 CATHCART'S LITERARY READER the more specious pretext of proselytism ; ^ but independence, — independence religious and political. To secure this, they were content to earn a bare subsistence by a life of frugality and toil. They asked nothing from the soil but the reasonable returns of their own labor. No golden visions threw a deceitful halo around their path, and beckoned them onwards through seas of blood to the subversion of an unoffending dynasty. They were content with the slow but steady progress of their social polity.^ They patiently endured the privations of the wilderness, watering the tree of liberty with their tears and with the sweat of their brow, till it took deep root in the land and sent up its branches high towards the heavens, while the communities of the neigh- boring continent, shooting up into the sudden splendors of a tropical vegetation, exhibited, even in their prime, the sure symptoms of decay. It would seem to have been especially ordered by Providence that the discovery of the two great divisions of the American hemisphere should fall to the two races best fitted to conquer and colonize them. Thus the northern section was consigned to the Anglo-Saxon race, whose orderly, industrious habits found an ample field for development under its colder skies and on its more rugged soil; while the southern portion, with its rich tropical products and treasures of mineral wealth, • held out the most attractive bait to invite the enterprise of the Spaniard. How different might have been the result, if the bark of Colum- bus had taken a more northerly direction, as he at one time meditated, and landed its band of adventurers on the shores of what is now free America. 1 the making of converts ^ constitution, organization BANCROFT 415 BANCROFT 1 800-1 891 George Bancroft was born at Worcester, Massachusetts, in 1800, and died in 1891. In 181 7 he graduated at Harvard, bearing off, despite his tender age, the second honors of his class. The next year he went to Ger- many, where he studied under the direction of Heeren, Schlosser, and other eminent scholars. In 1823 he made his first public literary essay in a volume rr'. ji t>" --^il of poems, and in the next year put forth a translation of Heeren's " Reflec- tions on the Politics of Ancient Greece." About this time he associated him- self with the late Dr. Joseph G. Cogswell in the establishment of the Round Hill School at Northampton. The life of a teacher, however, proved uncon- genial to him, although the school enjoyed a fair degree of prosperity. He next turned his attention to historical study and the discussion of public questions. In 1838 he was appointed Collector of the Port of Boston ; he was an unsuccessful candidate for Governor of Massachusetts in 1844, and in 1845 was made Secretary of the Navy. This office he held about a year, 4l6 CATHCART'S LITERARY READER effecting many reforms in the department. In 1846 he became Minister to England, and remained abroad till 1849. From that time till the date of his appointment as Minister to Berlin by President Grant, he devoted himself to the completion of his "History of the United States." The first volume of this work had been published in 1S34, and the suc- ceeding volumes followed at long intervals. In preparing those volumes which treat of the years immediately preceding the Revolution, he had the use of a vast number of manuscripts to which no earlier historian had access. His natural qualifications, reinforced by wide reading, for the historian's work were exceptionally great. It has been charged by some English critics that his democratic prejudices are too manifest in his History; but this allegation has had little weight with his own countrymen. His style is scholarly yet not pedantic, in narrative animated and picturesque, and in philosophical passages weighty and temperate. THE DISCOVERY OF THE MISSISSIPPI All the disasters which had been encountered, far from dimin- ishing the boldness of De Soto/ served only to confirm his obsti- nacy by wounding his pride. Should he, who had promised greater booty than Mexico or Peru had yielded, now return as a defeated fugitive, so naked that his troops were clad only in skins and mats of ivy? The search for some wealthy region was renewed ; the caravan marched still farther to the west. For seven days it struggled through a wilderness of forests and marshes, and at length came to Indian settlements in the vicinity of the Mississippi. The lapse of nearly three centuries has not changed the character of the stream. It was then described as more than a mile broad, flowing with a strong current, and, by the weight of its waters, forcing a channel of great depth. The water was always muddy ; trees and timber were continually float- ing down the stream. The Spaniards were guided to the Mississippi by the natives ; and were directed to one of the usual crossing-places, probably at 1 Fernando de Soto, the Spanish explorer, discovered the Mississippi River in 1541, and died in Louisiana the year following. By^NCROFT 417 the lowest Chickasa Bluff, not far from the thirty-fifth parallel of latitude. The arrival of the strangers awakened curiosity and fear. A multitude of people from the western banks of the river, painted and gayly decorated with great plumes of white feathers, the warriors standing in rows with bow and arrows in their hands, the chieftains sitting under awnings as magnificent as the artless manufactures of the natives could weave, came rowing down the stream in a fleet of two hundred canoes, seeming to the admiring Spaniards " like a fair army of galleys." They brought gifts of fish and loaves made of the fruit of the persimmon. At first they showed some desire to offer resistance ; but, soon becoming conscious of their relative weakness, they ceased to defy an enemy who could not be overcome, and suf- fered injury without attempting open retaliation. The boats of the natives were too weak to transport horses • almost a month expired before barges large enough to hold three horsemen each were constructed for crossing the river. At length the Spaniards embarked upon the Mississippi, and were borne to its western bank. The Dacotah tribes, doubtless, then occupied the country southwest of the Missouri. De Soto had heard its praises ; he believed in its vicinity to mineral wealth, and he determined to visit its towns. In ascending the Mississippi the party was often obliged to wade through morasses ; at length they came, as it would seem, upon the district of Little Prairie, and the dry and elevated lands which extend towards New Madrid.^ Here the rehgions of the invaders and the natives came in contrast. The Spaniards were adored as children of the Sun, and the blind were brought into their presence, to be healed by the sons of light. " Pray only to God, who is in heaven, for whatsoever ye need," said De Soto in reply; and the sublime doctrine which, thousands of years before, had been proclaimed in the deserts of Arabia, now first found its way into the prairies of the Far West. ^ /. e. the vicinity of what is now sontheastern Missouri 27 4l8 CATHCART'S LITERARY READER The wild fruits of that region were abundant ; the pecan-nut, the mulberry, and the two kinds of wild plums, furnished the natives with articles of food. At Pacaha, the northernmost point which De Soto reached near the Mississippi, he remained forty days. The spot can not be identified ; but the accounts of the amusements of the Spaniards confirm the truth of the narrative of their ramblings. Fish were taken, such as are now found in the fresh waters of that region ; one of them, the spade-fish, — the strangest and most whimsical production of the muddy streams of the west, so rare that, even now, it is hardly to be found in any museum, — is accurately described by the best historian of the expedition. An exploring party, which was sent to examine the regions to the north, reported that they were almost a desert. The country still nearer the Missouri was said by the Indians to be thinly inhabited ; the bison abounded there so much that no maize could be cultivated, and the few inhabitants were hunters. De Soto turned, therefore, to the west and northwest, and plunged still more deeply into the interior of the continent. The high- lands of White River, more than two hundred miles from the Mississippi, were probably the limit of his ramble in this direction. The mountains offered neither gems nor gold ; and the disap- pointed adventurers marched to the south. They passed through a succession of towns, of which the position can not be fixed, till at length we find them among the Tunicas, near the hot springs and saline tributaries of the Washita. It was at Autiamque, a town on the same river, that they passed the winter ; they had arrived at the settlement through the country of the Kappaws. The native tribes, everywhere on the route, were found in a state of civilization beyond that of nomadic hordes. They were an agricultural people, with fixed places of abode, and subsisted upon the produce of the fields more than upon the chase. Igno- rant of the arts of life, they could offer no resistance to their unwelcome visitors ; the bow and arrow were the most effective weapons with which they were acquainted. They seem not to BANCROFT 419 have been turbulent or quarrelsome ; but as the population was moderate, and the earth fruitful, the tribes were not accustomed to contend with each other for the possession of territories. Their dress was, in part, mats wrought of ivy and bulrushes, or of the bark and lint of trees ; in cold weather they wore mantles woven of feathers. The settlements were by tribes, — each tribe occupied what the Spaniards called a province ; their villages were generally near together, but were composed of few habitations. The Spaniards treated them with no other forbear- ance than their own selfishness demanded, and enslaved such as offended, employing them as porters and guides. On a slight suspicion, they would cut off the hands of numbers of the natives,,for punishment or intimidation; while the young cavaliers, from desire of seeming valiant, ceased to be merciful, and exulted in cruelties and carnage.^ The guide who was unsuc- cessful, or who purposely led them away from the settlements of his tribe, would be seized and thrown to the hounds. Sometimes a native was condemned to the flames. Any trifling considera- tion of safety would induce the governor to set fire to a hamlet. He did not delight in cruelty ; but the happiness, the life, and the rights of the Indians were held of no account. The approach of the Spaniards was heard with dismay, and their departure hastened by the suggestion of wealthier lands at a distance. In the spring of the following year De Soto determined to descend the Washita to its junction,^ and to get tidings of the sea. As he advanced he was soon lost amidst the bayous and marshes which are found along the Red River and its tributaries. Near the Mississippi he came upon the country of Nilco,^ which was well peopled. The river was there larger than the Guadalquivir at Seville. At last he arrived at the province where the Washita, already united with the Red River, enters the Mississippi. The province was called Guachoya.^ 1 Etymology ? 2 i. e. with the Mississippi, as De Soto then supposed ^^ JVilco, Guachoya, — these are the Spanish spellings of Indian sounds. 420 CATHCART'S LITERARY READER De Soto anxiously inquired the distance to the sea ; the chief- tain of Guachoya could not tell. Were there settlements extend- ing along the river to its mouth ? It was answered that its lower banks were an uninhabited waste. UnwiUing to believe so dis- heartening a tale, De Soto sent one of his men with eight horse- men to descend the banks of the Mississippi and explore the .country. They traveled eight days, and were able to advance I not much more than thirty miles, they were so delayed by the I frequent bayous, the impassable canebrakes, and the dense woods. The governor received the intelligence with concern ; he suf- fered from anxiety and gloom. His horses and men were dying around him, so that the natives were becoming dangerous ene- mies. He attempted to overawe a tribe of Indians near Natchez by claiming a supernatural birth, and demanding obedience and tribute. ''You say you are the child of the Sun," repHed the undaunted chief; " dry up the river, and I will believe you. Do you desire to see me? Visit the town where I dwell. If you come in peace, I will receive you with special good-will ; if in war, I will not shrink one foot back." But De Soto was no longer able to abate the confidence ^ or punish the temerity of the natives. His stubborn pride was changed by long disappointments into a wasting melancholy, and his health sunk rapidly and entirely under a conflict of emotions. A malignant fever ensued, during which he had little comfort, and was neither visited nor attended as the last hours of life demand. Believing his death near at hand, he held the last solemn inter\new with his faithful followers ; and yielding to the wishes of his companions, who obeyed him to the end, he named a successor. On the next day he died.* 1 assurance, self-reliance 2 The surviving members of this expedition built boats and found their way down the Mississippi to the Gulf. MOTLEY 421 MOTLEY 1814- 1877 John Lothrop Motley, the historian, was born in Dorchester, Massa- chusetts, in 1814, and died in England in June, 1877. Graduating at Harvard College at the age of seventeen, he went to Europe, where he spent several years in preparation for a task to which he had early devoted him- self, — the writing of a " History of the Rise of the Dutch Republic." ^fUAlsL^. Young as he was, he had already produced two romances, "Morton's Hope ; or, The Memoirs of a Provincial," and '* Merry-Mount : A Romance of the Massachusetts Colony," — both long since forgotten. After fifteen years of arduous labor he finished his " History," and its reception on both sides of the Atlantic was exceptionally cordial. Everett said of it that it was, in his judgment, "a work of the highest merit," and placed "the name of Motley by the side of those of our great American historical trio, — Ban- croft, Irving, and Prescott." The success of this History — the work of a 422 CATHCART'S LITERARY READER young and unknown writer — was immediate. Motley at once set about a new enterprise, the results of which appear in " The History of the United Netherlands," in which the career of the young nation, the story of whose birth had been told in the previous work, is described with equal spirit and accuracy. In 1874 Motley's third historical work, "The Life and Death of John of Barneveld," was published; and at the time of his death he was at work on a " History of the Thirty Years' War." In common with the eminent historians with whom Everett classed him, Motley possessed in rare combination the highest intellectual qualifications for his work. He was especially remarkable for a certain breadth of mind which impelled him to take comprehensive and exhaustive views of his subject. His style is full of vigor and grace, and in dramatic quality it is surpassed by that of no other historian of this century. It would be, per- haps, impossible to indicate any other historical works than his, of compar- atively modern issue, touching which the judgment of critics has been so generally favorable. Some foreign reviewers have charged him with exces- sive severity in his denunciation of Spanish despotism ; but with this exception, his candor and conscientious accuracy have never been im- pugned. Motley was appointed United States Minister to Austria by Presi- dent Lincoln, and was later transferred to England, where he represented the American government with conspicuous ability. HISTORIC PROGRESS We talk of History. No man can more highly appreciate than I do the noble labors of your Society/ and of others in this country, for the preservation of memorials belonging to our brief but most important past. We can never collect too much of them, nor ponder them too carefully, for they mark the era of a new civilization. But that interesting past presses so closely upon our sight that it seems still a portion of the present ; the glimmering dawn preceding the noontide of to-day. I shall not be misunderstood, then, if I say that there is no such thing as human history. Nothing can be more profoundly, sadly true. The annals of mankind have never been written, 1 The selection is from an address delivered before the New York Histori- cal Society in December 1868, the subject being " Historic Progress and American Democracy." MOTLEY 423 never can be written ; nor would it be within human capacity to read them if they were written. We have a leaf or two torn from the great book of human fate as it flutters in the storm- winds ever sweeping across the earth. We decipher them as we best can with purblind eyes, and endeavor to learn their mys- tery as we float along to the abyss ; but it is all confused bal)ble, hieroglyphics of which the key is lost. Consider but a moment. The island on which this city stands is as perfect a site as man could desire for a great commercial, imperial city. Byzantium,^ which the lords of the ancient world built for the capital of the earth ; which the temperate and vigorous Turk in the days of his stern military discipline plucked from the decrepit hands which held the scepter of Caesar and Constantine, and for the succession to which the present lords of Europe are wrangling, — not Byzantium, nor hundred-gated Thebes,^ nor London nor Liverpool, Paris nor Moscow, can surpass the future certainties of this thirteen- mile-long Manhattan. And yet it was but yesterday — for what are two centuries and a half in the boundless vista of the past ? — that the Mohawk and the Mohican were tomahawking and scalping each other throughout these regions, and had been doing so foi* centuries ; while the whole surface of this island, now groaning under mil- lions of wealth which oppress the imagination, hardly furnished a respectable hunting-ground for a single sachem, in his war- paint and moccasins, who imagined himself proprietor of the soil. But yesterday Cimmerian ^ darkness, primeval night. To-day, grandeur, luxury, wealth, power. I come not here to-night to draw pictures or pour forth dithyrambics * that I may gratify 1 This was the orighial name of Constantinople. The beauty and con- venience of its situation were observed by the Emperor Constantine, who made it the capital of the Eastern Roman Empire a. d. 328, and called it Constantinopolis, z. E/^5^^*vtv ^ . ^-^ju^.s