Chapter VII: Introduction (2)

The hours passed like minutes. Supper was long over, and we rose to depart; when I shook hands with Arthurine, she pressed mine gently. I was in the ninety-ninth heaven.

"Now, boys," cried worthy Moreland, as soon as we were in the streets, "it would really be a pity to part so early on so joyous an evening. What do you say? Will you come to my house, and knock the necks off half a dozen bottles?"

We agreed to this proposal; and, taking the old seaman between us, steered in the direction of his cabin, as he called his magnificent and well-furnished house.

"What a delightful family those Bowsends are!" exclaimed Moreland, as soon as we were comfortably seated beside a blazing fire, with the Lafitte and East India Madeira sparkling on the table beside us. "And what charming girls! 'You're getting oldish,' says I to myself the other day, 'but you're still fresh and active, sound as a dolphin. Better get married.' Margaret pleased me uncommonly, so I"--

"Yes, my dear Moreland," interrupted I, "but are you sure that you please her?"

"Pshaw! Five times a hundred thousand dollars! I tell you what, my lad, that's not to be met with every day."

"Fifty years old," replied I.

"Certainly, fifty years old, but stout and healthy; none of your spindle-shanked dandies--your Stauntons"--

But Staunton smokes cigars, and not Dutch pipes."

"I give that up. For Miss Margaret's sake, I'll burn my nose and mouth with those damned stumps of cigars."

"Drinks no whisky," continued I. "He is president of a temperance society."

"The devil fly away with him!" growled Moreland; "I wouldn't give up my whisky for all the girls in the world."

"If you don't, she'll always be fainting away," replied I, laughing.

"Ah! It's because I talked of the Monongahela that she began with her hystericals, and went away for all the evening! That's where the wind sits, is it? Well, you may depend I ain't to be done out of my grog at any rate."

And he backed his assertion with an oath, swallowing off the contents of his glass by way of a clincher. We sat joking and chatting till past midnight during which time I flattered myself that I gave evidence of considerable diplomatic talents. As we were returning home, however, Richards doubted whether I had not driven the old boy rather too hard

"No matter," replied I, "if I have only succeeded in ridding poor Margaret of him."

Cool, calculating Richards shook his head.

"I don't know what may come of it," said he; "but I do not think you are likely to find much gratitude for your interference."

The next day was taken up in arranging matters of business consequent on the arrival of Richards. At least ten times I tried to go and see Arthurine, but was always prevented by something or other; and it was past tea-time when I at last got to the Bowsends' house. I found Margaret in the drawing-room, deep in a new novel.

"Where is Arthurine?" I enquired.

"At the theatre, with mamma and Mr Moreland," was the answer.

"At the theatre!" repeated I in astonishment. They were playing Tom and Jerry, a favourite piece with the enlightened Kentuckians. I had seen the first scene or two at the New Orleans theatre, and had had quite enough of it.

"That really _is_ sacrificing herself!" said I, considerably out of humour.

"The noble girl!" exclaimed Margaret. "Mr Moreland came to tea, and urged us so much to go"--

"That she could not help going, to be bored and disgusted for a couple of hours."

"She went for my sake," said Margaret sentimentally. "Mamma would have one of us go."

"Yes, that is it," thought I. Jealousy would have been ridiculous. He fifty years old, she seventeen. I left the house, and went to find Richards.

"What! Back so early?" cried he.

"She is gone to the theatre with her mamma and Moreland."

Richards shook his head.

"You put a wasp's nest into the old fellow's brain-pan yesterday," said he. "Take care you do not get stung yourself."

"I should like to see how she looks by his side," said I.

"Well, I will go with you. The sooner you are cured the better. But only for ten minutes."

There was certainly no temptation to remain longer in that atmosphere of whisky and tobacco fumes. It was at the Bowery theatre. The light swam as though seen through a thick fog; and a perfect shower of orange and apple peel, and even less agreeable things, rained down from the galleries. Tom and Jerry were in all their glory. I looked round the boxes, and soon saw the charming Arthurine, apparently perfectly comfortable, chatting with old Moreland as gravely, and looking as demure and self-possessed, as if she had been a married woman of thirty.

"That is a prudent young lady," said Richards; "she has an eye to the dollars, and would marry Old Hickory himself, spite of whisky and tobacco pipe, if he had more money, and were to ask her."

I said nothing.

"If you weren't such an infatuated fool," continued my plain-spoken friend, I would say to you, let her take her own way, and the day after to-morrow we will leave New York."

"One week more," said I, with an uneasy feeling about the heart.

At seven the next evening I entered what had been my Elysium, but was now, little by little, becoming my Tartarus. Again I found Margaret alone over a romance. "And Arthurine?" enquired I, in a voice that might perhaps have been steadier.

"She is gone with mamma and Mr Moreland to hear Miss Fanny Wright."

"To hear Miss Fanny Wright! the atheist, the revolutionist! What a mad fancy! Who would ever have dreamed of such a thing!"

This Miss Fanny Wright was a famous lecturess, of the Owenite school, who was shunned like a pestilence by the fashionable world of New York.

"Mr Moreland," answered Margaret, "said so much about her eloquence that Arthurine's curiosity was roused."

"Indeed!" replied I.

"Oh! you do not know what a noble girl she is. For her sister she would sacrifice her life. My only hope is in her."

I snatched up my hat, and hurried out of the house.

The next morning I got up, restless and uneasy; and eleven o'clock had scarcely struck when I reached the Bowsends' house. This time both sisters were at home; and as I entered the drawing-room, Arthurine advanced to meet me with a beautiful smile upon her face. There was nevertheless a something in the expression of her countenance that made me start. I pressed her hand. She looked tenderly at me.

"I hope you have been amusing yourself these last two days," said I after a moment's pause.

"Novelty has a certain charm," replied Arthurine. "Yet I certainly never expected to become a disciple of Miss Fanny Wright," added she, laughing.

"Really! I should have thought the transition from Tom and Jerry rather an easy one."

"A little more respect for Tom and Jerry, whom _we_ patronize--that is to say, Mr Moreland and our high mightiness," replied Arthurine, trying, as I fancied, to conceal a certain confusion of manner under a laugh.

"I should scarcely have thought my Arthurine would have become a party to such a conspiracy against good taste," replied I gravely.

"_My_ Arthurine!" repeated she, laying a strong accent on the pronoun possessive. "Only see what rights and privileges the gentleman is usurping! We live in a free country, I believe?"

There was a mixture of jest and earnest in her charming countenance. I looked enquiringly at her.

"Do you know," cried she, "I have taken quite a fancy to Moreland? He is so good-natured, such a sterling character, and his roughness wears off when one knows him well."

"And moreover," added I, "he has five hundred thousand dollars."

"Which are by no means the least of his recommendations. Only think of the balls, Howard! I hope you will come to them. And then Saratoga; next year London and Paris. Oh! it will be delightful."

"What, so far gone already?" said I, sarcastically.

"And poor Margaret is saved!" added she, throwing her arms round her sister's neck, and kissing and caressing her. I hardly knew whether to laugh or to cry.

"Then, I suppose, I may congratulate you?" said I, forcing a laugh, and looking, I have no doubt, very like a fool.

You may so," replied Arthurine. "This morning Mr Moreland begged permission to transfer his addresses from Margaret to your very humble servant."

"And you?"--

"We naturally, in consideration of the petitioner's many amiable qualities, have promised to take the request into our serious consideration. For decorum's sake, you know, one must deliberate a couple of days or so."

"Are you in jest or earnest, Arthurine?"

"Quite in earnest, Howard."

"Farewell, then!"

"'Fare-thee-well! and if for ever Still for ever fare-thee-well!'"

said Arthurine, in a half-laughing, half-sighing tone. The next instant I had left the room.

On the stairs I met the beturbaned Mrs Bowsends, who led the way mysteriously into the parlour.

"You have seen Arthurine?" said she. "What a dear, darling child!--is she not? Oh! that girl is our joy and consolation. And Mr Moreland--the charming Mr Moreland! Now that things are arranged so delightfully, we can let Margaret have her own way a little."

"What I have heard is true, then?" said I.

"Yes; as an old friend I do not mind telling you--though it must still remain a secret for a short time. Mr Moreland has made a formal proposal to Arthurine."

I do not know what reply I made, before flinging myself out of the room and house, and running down the street as if I had just escaped from a lunatic asylum.

"Richards," cried I to my friend, "shall we start tomorrow?"

"Thank God!" exclaimed Richards. "So you are cured of the New York fever? Start! Yes, by all means, before you get a relapse. You must come with me to Virginia for a couple of months."

"I will so," was my answer.

As we were going down to the steam-boat on the following morning, Staunton overtook us, breathless with speed and delight.

"Wish me joy!" cried he. "I am accepted!"

"And I jilted!" replied I with a laugh. "But I am not such a fool as to make myself unhappy about a woman."

Light words enough, but my heart was heavy as I spoke them. Five minutes later, we were on our way to Virginia.

* * * * *

HYDRO-BACCHUS.

Great Homer sings how once of old
The Thracian women met to hold
To "Bacchus, ever young and fair,"
Mysterious rites with solemn care.
For now the summer's glowing face
Had look'd upon the hills of Thrace;
And laden vines foretold the pride
Of foaming vats at Autumn tide.
There, while the gladsome Evöe shout
Through Nysa's knolls rang wildly out,
While cymbal clang, and blare of horn,
O'er the broad Hellespont were borne;
The sounds, careering far and near,
Struck sudden on Lycurgus' ear--
Edonia's grim black-bearded lord,
Who still the Bacchic rites abhorr'd,
And cursed the god whose power divine
Lent heaven's own fire to generous wine.
Ere yet th' inspired devotees
Had half performed their mysteries,
Furious he rush'd amidst the band,
And whirled an ox-goad in his hand.
Full many a dame on earth lay low
Beneath the tyrant's savage blow;
The rest, far scattering in affright,
Sought refuge from his rage in flight.

But the fell king enjoy'd not long
The triumph of his impious wrong:
The vengeance of the god soon found him,
And in a rocky dungeon bound him.
There, sightless, chain'd, in woful tones
He pour'd his unavailing groans,
Mingled with all the blasts that shriek
Round Athos' thunder-riven peak.
O Thracian king! how vain the ire
That urged thee 'gainst the Bacchic choir
The god avenged his votaries well--
Stern was the doom that thee befell;
And on the Bacchus-hating herd
Still rests the curse thy guilt incurr'd.
For the same spells that in those days
Were wont the Bacchanals to craze--
The maniac orgies, the rash vow,
Have fall'n on thy disciples now.
Though deepest silence dwells alone,
Parnassus, on thy double cone;
To mystic cry, through fell and brake,
No more Cithaeron's echoes wake;
No longer glisten, white and fleet,
O'er the dark lawns of Taÿgete,
The Spartan virgin's bounding feet:
Yet Frenzy still has power to roll
Her portents o'er the prostrate soul.
Though water-nymphs must twine the spell
Which once the wine-god threw so well--
Changed are the orgies now, 'tis true,
Save in the madness of the crew.
Bacchus his votaries led of yore
Through woodland glades and mountains hoar;
While flung the Maenad to the air
The golden masses of her hair,
And floated free the skin of fawn,
From her bare shoulder backward borne.
Wild Nature, spreading all her charms,
Welcomed her children to her arms;
Laugh'd the huge oaks, and shook with glee,
In answer to their revelry;
Kind Night would cast her softest dew
Where'er their roving footsteps flew;
So bright the joyous fountains gush'd,
So proud the swelling rivers rush'd,
That mother Earth they well might deem,
With honey, wine, and milk, for them
Most bounteously had fed the stream.
The pale moon, wheeling overhead,
Her looks of love upon them shed,
And pouring forth her floods of light,
With all the landscape blest their sight.
Through foliage thick the moonshine fell,
Checker'd upon the grassy dell;
Beyond, it show'd the distant spires
Of skyish hills, the world's grey sires;
More brightly beam'd, where far away,
Around his clustering islands, lay,
Adown some opening vale descried,
The vast Aegean's waveless tide.
What wonder then, if Reason's power
Fail'd in each reeling mind that hour,
When their enraptured spirits woke
To Nature's liberty, and broke
The artificial chain that bound them,
With the broad sky above, and the free winds around them!
From Nature's overflowing soul,
That sweet delirium on them stole;
She held the cup, and bade them share
In draughts of joy too deep to bear.

Not such the scenes that to the eyes
Of water-Bacchanals arise;
Whene'er the day of festival
Summons the Pledged t' attend its call--
In long procession to appear,
And show the world how good they are.
Not theirs the wild-wood wanderings,
The voices of the winds and springs:
But seek them where the smoke-fog brown
Incumbent broods o'er London town;
'Mid Finsbury Square ruralities
Of mangy grass, and scrofulous trees;
'Mid all the sounds that consecrate
Thy street, melodious Bishopsgate!
Not by the mountain grot and pine,
Haunts of the Heliconian Nine:
But where the town-bred Muses squall
Love-verses in an annual;
Such muses as inspire the grunt
Of Barry Cornwall, and Leigh Hunt.
Their hands no ivy'd thyrsus bear,
No Evöe floats upon the air:
But flags of painted calico
Flutter aloft with gaudy show;
And round then rises, long and loud,
The laughter of the gibing crowd.

O sacred Temp'rance! mine were shame
If I could wish to brand thy name.
But though these dullards boast thy grace,
Thou in their orgies hast no place.
Thou still disdain'st such sorry lot,
As even below the soaking sot.
Great was high Duty's power of old
The empire o'er man's heart to hold;
To urge the soul, or check its course,
Obedient to her guiding force.
These own not her control, but draw
New sanction for the moral law,
And by a stringent compact bind
The independence of the mind--
As morals had gregarious grown,
And Virtue could not stand alone.
What need they rules against abusing?
They find th' offence all in the using.
Denounce the gifts which bounteous Heaven
To cheer the heart of man has given;
And think their foolish pledge a band
More potent far than God's command.
On this new plan they cleverly
Work morals by machinery;
Keeping men virtuous by a tether,
Like gangs of negroes chain'd together.

Then, Temperance, if thus it be,
They know no further need of thee.
This pledge usurps thy ancient throne--
Alas! thy occupation's gone!
From earth thou may'st unheeded rise,
And like Astræa--seek the skies.

MARTIN LUTHER.

AN ODE.

Who sits upon the Pontiff's throne?
On Peter's holy chair
Who sways the keys? At such a time
When dullest ears may hear the chime
Of coming thunders--when dark skies
Are writ with crimson prophecies,
A wise man should be there;
A godly man, whose life might be
The living logic of the sea;
One quick to know, and keen to feel--
A fervid man, and full of zeal,
Should sit in Peter's chair.

Alas! no fervid man is there,
No earnest, honest heart;
One who, though dress'd in priestly guise,
Looks on the world with worldling's eyes;
One who can trim the courtier's smile,
Or weave the diplomatic wile,
But knows no deeper art;
One who can dally with fair forms,
Whom a well-pointed period warms--
No man is he to hold the helm
Where rude winds blow, and wild waves whelm,
And creaking timbers start.

In vain did Julius pile sublime
The vast and various dome,
That makes the kingly pyramid's pride,
And the huge Flavian wonder, hide
Their heads in shame--these gilded stones
(O heaven!) were very blood and bones
Of those whom Christ did come
To save--vile grin of slaves who sold
Celestial rights for earthy gold,
Marketing grace with merchant's measure,
To prank with Europe's pillaged treasure
The pride of purple Rome.

The measure of her sins is full,
The scarlet-vested whore!
Thy murderous and lecherous race
Have sat too long i' the holy place;
The knife shall lop what no drug cures,
Nor Heaven permits, nor earth endures,
The monstrous mockery more.
Behold! I swear it, saith the Lord:
Mine elect warrior girds the sword--
A nameless man, a miner's son,
Shall tame thy pride, thou haughty one,
And pale the painted whore!

Earth's mighty men are nought. I chose
Poor fishermen before
To preach my gospel to the poor;
A pauper boy from door to door
That piped his hymn. By his strong word
The startled world shall now be stirr'd,
As with a lion's roar!
A lonely monk that loved to dwell
With peaceful host in silent cell;
This man shall shake the Pontiff's throne:
Him Kings and emperors shall own,
And stout hearts wince before

The eye profound and front sublime
Where speculation reigns.
He to the learned seats shall climb,
On Science' watch-tower stand sublime;
The arid doctrine shall inspire
Of wiry teachers with swift fire;
And, piled with cumbrous pains,
Proud palaces of sounding lies
Lay prostrate with a breath. The wise
Shall listen to his word; the youth
Shall eager seize the new-born truth
Where prudent age refrains.

Lo! when the venal pomp proceeds
From echoing town to town!
The clam'rous preacher and his train,
Organ and bell with sound inane,
The crimson cross, the book, the keys,
The flag that spreads before the breeze,
The triple-belted crown!
It wends its way; and straw is sold--
Yea! deadly drugs for heavy gold,
To feeble hearts whose pulse is fear;
And though some smile, and many sneer,
There's none will dare to frown.

None dares but one--the race is rare--
One free and honest man:
Truth is a dangerous thing to say
Amid the lies that haunt the day;
But He hath lent it voice; and, lo!
From heart to heart the fire shall go,
Instinctive without plan;
Proud bishops with a lordly train,
Fierce cardinals with high disdain,
Sleek chamberlains with smooth discourse,
And wrangling doctors all shall force,
In vain, one honest man.

In vain the foolish Pope shall fret,
It is a sober thing.
Thou sounding trifler, cease to rave,
Loudly to damn, and loudly save,
And sweep with mimic thunders' swell
Armies of honest souls to hell!
The time on whirring wing
Hath fled when this prevail'd. O, Heaven!
One hour, one little hour, is given,
If thou could'st but repent. But no!
To ruin thou shalt headlong go,
A doom'd and blasted thing.

Thy parchment ban comes forth; and lo!
Men heed it not, thou fool!
Nay, from the learned city's gate,
In solemn show, in pomp of state,
The watchmen of the truth come forth,
The burghers old of sterling worth,
And students of the school:
And he who should have felt thy ban
Walks like a prophet in the van;
He hath a calm indignant look,
Beneath his arm he bears a book,
And in his hand the Bull.

He halts; and in the middle space
Bids pile a blazing fire.
The flame ascends with crackling glee;
Then, with firm step advancing, He
Gives to the wild fire's wasting rule
The false Decretals, and the Bull,
While thus he vents his ire:--
"Because the Holy One o' the Lord
Thou vexed hast with impious word,
Therefore the Lord shall thee consume,
And thou shalt share the Devil's doom
In everlasting fire!"

He said; and rose the echo round
"In everlasting fire!"
The hearts of men were free; one word
Their inner depths of soul had stirr'd;
Erect before their God they stood
A truth-shod Christian brotherhood,
And wing'd with high desire.
And ever with the circling flame
Uprose anew the blithe acclaim:--
"The righteous Lord shall thee consume,
And thou shalt share the Devil's doom
In everlasting fire!"

Thus the brave German men; and we
Shall echo back the cry;
The burning of that parchment scroll
Annull'd the bond that sold the soul
Of man to man; each brother now
Only to one great Lord will bow,
One Father-God on high.
And though with fits of lingering life
The wounded foe prolong the strife,
On Luther's deed we build our hope,
Our steady faith--the fond old Pope
Is dying, and shall die.

TRADITIONS AND TALES OF UPPER LUSATIA.

No. II

THE FAIRY TUTOR.

Discreet Reader!

You have seen--and 'tis no longer ago than YESTERDAY!--you must well remember the picture--which showed you from the rough yet delicate--the humorous yet sympathetic and picturesque--the original yet insinuating pencil of a shrewd and hearty Lusatian mountaineer--the aerial, brilliant, sensitive, subtle, fascinating, enigmatical, outwardly--mirth-given, inwardly--sorrow-touched, congregated folk numberless--of the Fairies Proper!--showed them at the urgency of a rare and strange need--clung, in DEPENDENCY, to one fair, kind, good and happily-born Daughter of Man!--And what wonder?--The once glorious, but now forlorn spirits, leaning for one fate-burthened instant their trust upon the spirits ineffably favoured!--What wonder! that often as the revolution of ages brings on the appointed hour, the rebellious and outcast children of heaven must sue--to their keen emergency--help--oh! speak up to the height of the want, of the succour! and call it _a lent ray of grace_, from the rebellious and REDEEMED children of the earth!--And see, where, in the serene eyes of the soft Christian maiden, the hallowing influence shines!--Auspiciously begun, the awed though aspiring Rite, the still, the multitudinous, the mystical, prospers!--_Gratefully_, as for the boon inexpressibly worth--_easily_, as of their own transcending power--_promptly_, as though fearing that a benefit received could wax cold, the joyful Elves crown upon the bright hair of their graciously natured, but humanly and womanly weak benefactress--the wedded felicity of pure love!

And the imaginary curtain has dropped! Lo, where it rises again, discovering to view our stage, greatly changed, and, a little perhaps, our actors!--Once more, attaching to the HUMAN DRAMA, slight, as though it were structured of cloud, of air, the same light and radiant MACHINERY! Once more, only that They, whom you lately saw tranquil, earnest even to pathos--"now are frolic"--enough and to spare!--Once more--THE FAIRIES.

And see, too--where, centring in herself interest and action of the rapidly shifting scenery--ever again a beautiful granddaughter of Eve steps--free and fearless, and bouyant and bounding--our fancy-laid boards!--Ah! but how much unresembling the sweet maid!--_Outwardly_, for lofty-piled is the roof that ceils over the superb head of the modern Amazon, Swanhilda--more unlike _within_. Instead of the clear truth, the soul's gentle purity, the "plain and holy Innocence" of the poor fairy-beloved mountain child--SHE, in whose person and fortunes you are invited--for the next fifty minutes--to forget your own--harbours, fondly harbours, ill housemates of her virginal breast! a small, resolute, well-armed and well confederated garrison of unwomanly faults. Pride is there!--The iron-hard and the iron-cold! There Scorn--edging repulse with insult!--and envenoming insult with despair!--leaps up, in eager answer to the beseeching sighs, tears, and groans of earth-bent Adoration. And there is the indulged Insolency of a domineering--and as you will precipitately augur--an _indomitable_ Will! And there is exuberant SELF-POWER, that, from the innermost mind, oozing up, out, distilling, circulating along nerve and vein, effects a magical metamorphosis! turns the nymph into a squire of arms; usurping even the clamorous and blood-sprinkled joy of man--the tempestuous and terrible CHASE, which, in the bosom of peace, imaging war, shows in the rougher lord of creation himself, as harsh, wild, and turbulent! Oh, how much other than yon sweet lily of the high Lusatian valleys, the shade-loving Flower, the good Maud--herself looked upon with love by the glad eyes of men, women, children, Fairies, and Angels! oh, other indeed! And yet, have you, in this thickly clustered enumeration of unamiable qualities, implicitly heard the CALL which must fasten, which has fastened, upon the gentle Maud's _haughty_ antithesis--the serviceable regard, and--the FAVOUR, even of THE FAIRIES.

The FAVOUR!!

Hear, impatient spectator, the simple plot and its brief process. You are, after a fashion, informed with what studious, persevering, and unmerciful violation of all gentle decorum and feminine pity, the lovely marble-souled tyranness has, in the course of the last three or four years, turned back from her beetle-browed castle-gate, one by one, as they showed themselves there--a hundred, all worthily born--otherwise more and less meritorious--petitioners for that whip-and-javelin-bearing hand. You are NOW to know, that upon this very morning, an embassy from the willow-wearers all--or, to speak indeed more germanely to the matter, of the BASKET-BEARERS[22], waited upon their beautiful enemy with an ultimatum and manifesto in one, importing first a requisition to surrender; then, in case of refusal to capitulate, the announcement that HYMEN having found in CUPID an inefficient ally, he was about associating with himself, in league offensive, the god MARS, with intent of carrying the Maiden-fortress by storm, and reducing the aforesaid wild occupants of the stronghold into captivity--whereunto she made answer--

----our castle's strength
Will laugh a siege to scorn--

herself laughing outrageously to scorn the senders and the sent This crowning of wrong upon wrong will the Fairies, in the first place, wreak and right.

[Footnote 22: To German ears--to SEND A BASKET--is to REFUSE A PROPOSAL OF MARRIAGE.]

But further, later upon the same unlucky day, the Kingdom of Elves, being in full council assembled in the broad light of the sun, upon the fair greensward; ere the very numerous, but not widely sitting diet had yet well opened its proceedings--"tramp, tramp, across the land," came, flying at full speed, boar-spear in hand, our madcap huntress; and without other note of preparation sounded than their own thunder, her iron-grey's hoofs were in the thick of the sage assembly, causing an indecorous trepidation, combined with devastation dire to persons and--wearing apparel.

This wrong, in the second place, the Fairies will wreak and right.

And all transgression and injury, under one procedure, which is--_summary_; as, from the character of the judges and executioners, into whose hands the sinner has fallen, you would expect; sufficiently prankish too. With one sleight of their magical hand they turn the impoverished heiress of ill-possessed acres forth upon the highway, doomed to earn, with strenuous manual industry, her livelihood; until, from the winnings of her handicraft, she is moreover able to make good, as far as this was liable to pecuniary assessment, the damage sustained under foot of her fiery barb by the Fairy realm; comfort with handsome presents the rejected suitors; and until, thoroughly tame, she yields into her softened and opened bosom, now rid of its intemperate inmates, an entrance to the once debarred and contemned visitant--LOVE.

As to the way and style of the Fairy operations that carry out this drift, comparing the Two Tales, you will see, that omitting, as a matter that is related merely, not presented, that misadventure under the oak-tree--there is, in the chamber of Swanhilda, but a Fairy delegation active, whilst under the Sun's hill whole Elfdom is in presence; in that resplendent hollow, wearing their own lovely shapes; within the German castle-walls, in apt masquerade. There they were grave. Here, we have already said, that they are merry. There their office was to feel and to think. Here, if there be any trust in apparitions, they drink, and what is more critical for an Elfin lip--they eat!

Lastly, to end the comparisons for our well-bred, well-dressed, and right courtly cavalier, who transacted between the Fairy Queen and the stonemason's daughter, him you shall presently see turned into a sort of Elfin cupbearer or court butler; not without fairy grace of person and of mind assuredly; not without a due innate sense of the beautiful, as his perfumed name (SWEETFLOWER) at the outset warns you; and, as the proximity of his function to her Majesty's person--for we do not here fall in with any thing like mention of a king--would suggest, independently of the delicately responsible part borne by him in the action, the chief stress of which you will find incumbent upon his capable shoulders.

Such, in respect of the subject, is, thrice courteous and intelligent reader, the second piece of art, which we are glad to have the opportunity of placing before you, from our clever friend Ernst Willkomm's apparently right fertile easel. The second, answering to the first, LIKE and UNLIKE, you perceive, as two companion pictures should be.

But it would be worse than useless to tell you that which you have seen and that which you will see, unless, from the juxtaposition of the two fables, there followed--a moral. They have, as we apprehend, a moral--_i.e._ one moral, and that a grave one, in common between them.

Hitherto we have superficially compared THE FAIRIES' SABBATH and the FAIRY TUTOR. We now wish to develope a profounder analogy connecting them. We have compared them, as if ESTHETICALLY; we would now compare them MYTHOLOGICALLY--for, in our understanding, there lies at the very foundation of both tales A MYTHOLOGICAL ROOT--by whomsoever set, whether by Ernst Willkomm to-day, or by the population of the Lusatian mountains--three, six, ten centuries ago; or, in unreckoned antiquity, by the common Ancestors of the believers, who, in still unmeasured antiquity, brought the superstition of the Fairies out of central Asia to remote occidental Europe.

This ROOT we are bold to think is--"A DEEPLY SEATED ATTRACTION, ALLYING THE FAIRY MIND TO THE PURITY AND INTEGRITY OF THE MORAL WILL IN THE MIND OF MEN." And first for the Tale which presently concerns us:--THE FAIRY TUTOR.

SWEETFLOWER will beguile us into believing that the interposition of the Fairies in our Baroness's domestic arrangements, grows up, if one shall so hazardously speak, from TWO seeds, each bearing two branches--namely, from two wrongs, the one hitting, the other striking from, themselves--BOTH which wrongs they will AVENGE and AMEND. We take up a strenuous theory; and we deny--and we defy--SWEETFLOWER. Nay, more! Should our excellent friend, ERNST WILLKOMM, be found taking part, real or apparent, with SWEETFLOWER, we defy and we deny Ernst Willkomm. For in this mixed case of the Fairy wrong, we distinguish, first, INJURIES which shall be retaliated, and, as far as may be, compensated; and secondly, a SHREW, who is to be turned _into_ a WIFE, being previously turned _out of_ a shrew.

We dare to believe that this last-mentioned end is the thing uppermost, and undermost, and middlemost in the mind of the Fairies; is, in fact, the true and _the sole final cause_ of all their proceedings.

Or that the _moral heart_ of the poem--that root in the human breast and will, from which every true poem springs heavenward--is here the zeal of the spirits for _morally reforming Swanhilda_; is, therefore, that deep-seated attraction, which, as we have averred, essentially allies the inclination of the Fairies to the moral conscience in our own kind.

One end, therefore, grounds the whole story, although two and more are proposed by _Sweetflower_. It is one that _satisfies_ the moral reason in man; for it is no less than to cleanse and heal the will, wounded with error, of a human creature. That other, which he displays, with mock emphasis, of restitution to the downtrodden fairyhood, is an exotic, fair and slight bud, grafted into the sturdier indigenous stock. For let us fix but a steady look upon the thing itself, and what is there before us? a whim, a trick of the fancy, tickling the fancy. We are amused with a quaint calamity--a panic of caps and cloaks. We laugh--we cannot help it--as the pigmy assembly flies a thousand ways at once--grave councillors and all--throwing terrified somersets--hiding under stones, roots--diving into coney-burrows--"any where--any where"--vanishing out of harm's--if not out of dismay's--reach. In a tale of the Fairies, THE FANCY rules:--and the interest of such a misfortune, definite and not infinite, is congenial to the spirit of the gay faculty which hovers over, lives upon surfaces, and which flees abysses; which thence, likewise, in the moral sphere, is equal to apprehending resentment of a personal wrong, and a judicial assessment of damages--but NOT A DISINTERESTED MORAL END.

What is our conclusion then? plainly that the dolorous overthrow of the fairy divan is no better than an invention--the device of an esthetical artist. We hold that Ernst Willkomm has _gratuitously_ bestowed upon us the disastrous catastrophe; that he has done this, knowing the obligation which lies upon Fancy within her own chosen domain to _create_, because--there, Fancy listens and reads. The adroit Fairy delineator must wile over and reconcile the most sportive, capricious, and self-willed spirit of our understanding, to accept a purpose foreign to that spirit's habitual sympathies--a purpose solemn and austere--THE MORAL PURPOSE OF RESCUING A SIN-ENTANGLED HUMAN SOUL.

Or, if Ernst Willkomm shall guarantee to us, that the reminiscences of his people have furnished him with the materials of this tale; if he is, as we must needs hope, who have freely dealt with you to believe that he is--honest: honest both as to the general character, and the particular facts of his representations--if, in short, the Lusatian Highlanders do, sitting by the bench and the stove, aver and protest that the said Swanhilda did overturn both council-board and councillors--then we say, upon this occasion, that which we must all, hundreds of times, declare--namely, that _The Genius of Tradition_ is the foremost of artists; and further, that in this instance _an unwilled fiction_, determined by a necessity of the human bosom, has risen up _to mantle seriousness with grace_, as a free woodbine enclasps with her slender-gadding twines, and bedecks with her sweet bright blossoms, a towering giant of the grove.

It will perhaps be objected, that the moral purity and goodness that are so powerful to draw to themselves the regard and care of the spiritual people, are wanting in the character of the over-bold Swanhilda. We have said that her _faults_ are the CALL to the Fairies for help and reformation: but we may likewise guess that Virtue and Truth first won their love. It must be recollected that the faults which are extirpated from the breast of our heroine, are not such as, in our natural understanding of humanity, dishonour or sully. Taken away, the character may stand clear. It is quite possible that this gone, there shall be left behind a kind, good, affectionate, generous, noble nature.

We are free, or, more properly speaking, we are bound to believe, that thus the Fairies left Swanhilda.

As for Maud, we know--for she was told--that the Fairies loved her for herself ere they needed her aid. Hanging as it were upon that wondrous power to help which dwelt within her--her simple goodness--may we not say that the Fairies discover an ENFORCED attraction, when they afterwards approach the maiden for their own succour and salvation; as they do, a FREE attraction, when, in the person of Swanhilda, they disinterestedly attach themselves to reforming a fault for the welfare and happiness of her whom it aggrieves?

* * * * *

We will now proceed, as in our former communication, to adduce instances from other quarters, confirming the fairy delineations offered by our tale; or which may tend generally to bring out its mythological and literary character.

Two points would suggest themselves to us in the tale of the Fairy Tutor, as chiefly provoking comparison. The first is:--_The affirmed Presidency of the Fairies over human morals_, viewed as _a Shape of the Interest_ which they take in the uprightness and purity of the human will.

The second is:--

_The Manner and Style of their operations_: or, THE FAIRY WAYS. In which we chiefly distinguish--1, The active presence of the Sprites in a human habitation. 2, Their masquerading. 3, Their dispatch of human victuals. 4, The liability of Elfin limbs to human casualties. 5, The personality of that saucy Puck, our tiny ambassador elf.

We are at once tempted and restrained by the richness of illustration, which presents itself under all these heads. The necessity of limitation is, however, imperious. This, and a wish for simplicity, dispose us to throw all under one more comprehensive title.

Perhaps the reader has not entirely forgotten that in the remarks introductory to THE FAIRIES' SABBATH, having launched the question--what is a Fairy?--we offered him in the way of answer, _eight_ elements of the Fairy Nature. Has he quite forgotten that for one of these--it was the third--we represented the Spirit under examination, as ONE WHICH AT ONCE SEEKS AND SHUNS MANKIND?

The cursory treatment of this Elfin criterion will now compendiously place before the reader, as much illustration of the two above-given heads as we dare impose upon him.

The popular Traditions of entire Western Europe variously attest for all the kinds of the Fairies, and for some orders of Spirits partaking of the Fairy character, the singularly composed, and almost self-contradictory traits of a _seeking_ implicated and attempered with a _shunning_; of a shunning with a seeking. The inclination of our Quest will be to evidences of the _seeking_. The shunning will, it need not be doubted, take good care of itself.

The attraction of the Fairy Species towards our own is,

1. Recognised--in their GENERIC DESIGNATIONS.
2. Apparent--in their GOOD NEIGHBOURHOOD with us.
3. IN THEIR FREQUENTING AND ESTABLISHING THEMSELVES in the places of
our habitual occupancy and resort.
4. IN THEIR CALLING OR CARRYING US into the places of their Occupancy
and Resort; whether to return _hither_, or to remain
_there_.
5. BY THEIR ALIGHTING UPON THE PATH, worn already with some blithe or
some weary steps, OF A HUMAN DESTINY;--as friendly, or as unfriendly
Genii.

We collect the proofs: and--

1. Of their GENERIC APPELLATIVES, a Word!

One is tempted to say that THE NATIONS, as if conscious of the kindly disposition inhering in the spiritual existences toward ourselves, have simultaneously agreed in conferring upon them titles of endearment and affection. The brothers Grimm write--"In Scotland they [The Fairies] are called _The Good People, Good Neighbours, Men of Peace;_ in Wales--_The Family, The Blessing of their Mothers, The Dear Ladies;_ in the old Norse, and to this day in the Faroe islands, _Huldufolk_ (_The Gracious People;_) in Norway, _Huldre_;[23] and, in conformity with these denominations, discover a striving to be in the proximity of men, and to keep up a good understanding with them."[24]

[Footnote 23: May we for HULDRE read HULDREFOLK; and understand the _following_, or the _Folk_ of HULDRE? Huldre _means_ the Gracious Lady: she is a sort of Danish and Norwegian Fairy-Queen.--See GRIMM'S _German Mythology_, p. 168. First edition.]

[Footnote 24: The Brothers GRIMM: _Introduction to the Irish Fairy Tales_.]

2. THIS GOOD NEIGHBOURHOOD, to which these last words point, is interestingly depicted by the Traditions.

In Scotland and Germany the Fairies plant their habitation _adjoining_ that of man--"_under the threshold_"--and in such attached Fairies an alliance is unfolded with us of a most extraordinary kind. "The closest connexion" (_id est_, of the Fairy species with our own) "is expressed," say the Brothers Grimm, "by the tradition, agreeably to which the family of the Fairies ORDERED ITSELF ENTIRELY AFTER THE HUMAN to which it belonged; and OF WHICH IT WAS AS IF A COPY. These domestic Fairies _kept their marriages upon the same day_ as the Human Beings; _their children were born upon the same day_; and _upon the same day they wailed for their dead._"[25]

[Footnote 25: The Brothers GRIMM: _Introduction to the Irish Fairy Tales._]

Two artlessly sweet breathings of Elfin Table, from the Helvetian Dales,[26] lately revived to your fancy the sinless--blissful years, when gods with men set fellowing steps upon one and the same fragrant and unpolluted sward, until transgression, exiling those to their own celestial abodes, left these lonely--a nearer, dearer, BARBARIAN Golden Age--wherein the kindly Dwarf nation stand representing the great deities of Olympus.

[Footnote 26: See _The Dwarfs upon the Maple-Tree_, and _The Dwarfs upon the Crag-Stone_, in the former paper.]

The healthful pure air fans restoration again to us. We lay before you--

GERMAN TRADITIONS

No. CXLIX _The Dwarfs' Feet_.

"In old times the men dwelt in the valley, and round about them, in caves and clefts of the rock, the Dwarfs, _in amity and good neighbourhood_ with the people, for whom they performed by night many a heavy labour. When the country folk, betimes in the morning, came with wains and implements, and wondered that all was ready done, the Dwarfs were hiding in the bushes, and laughed out loud. Frequently the peasants were angry when they saw their yet hardly ripe corn lying reaped upon the field; but when presently after hail and storm came on, and they could well know that probably not a stalk should have escaped perishing, they were then heartily thankful to the provident Dwarfs. At last, however, the inhabitants, by their sin, fooled away the grace and favour of the Dwarfs. These fled, and since then has no eye ever again beheld them. The cause was this following:--A herdsman had upon the mountain an excellent cherry-tree. One summer, as the fruit grew ripe, it befell that the tree was, for three following nights, picked, and the fruit carried, and fairly spread out in the loft, in which the herdsman had use to keep his cherries. The people said in the village, that doth no one other than the honest dwarflings--they come tripping along by night, in long mantles, with covered feet, softly as birds, and perform diligently for men the work of the day. Already often have they been privily watched, but one may not interrupt them, only let them, come and go at their listing. By such speeches was the herdsman made curious, and would fain have wist wherefore the Dwarfs hid so carefully their feet, and whether these were otherwise shapen than men's feet. When, therefore, the next year, summer again came, and the season that the Dwarfs did stealthily pluck the cherries, and bear them into the garner, the herdsman took a sackful of ashes, which he strewed round about the tree. The next morning, with daybreak, he hied to the spot; the tree was regularly gotten, and he saw beneath in the ashes the print of many geese's feet. Thereat the herdsman fell a-laughing, and made game, that the mystery of the Dwarfs was bewrayed; but these presently after brake down and laid waste their houses, and fled deeper away into their mountain. They harbour ill-will toward men, and withhold from them their help. That herdsman which had betrayed the Dwarfs turned sickly and half-witted, and so continued until his dying day!"

There! Plucked amidst the lap of the Alps from its own hardily-nursed wild-brier, by the same tenderly-diligent hand[27] that brought home to us those other half-disclosed twin-buds of Helvetian tradition, you behold a third, like pure, more expanded blossom. Twine the three, young poet! into one soft-hued and "odorous chaplet," ready and meet for binding the smooth clear forehead of a Swiss Maud!--or fix it amidst the silken curls of thine own dove-eyed, innocent, nature-loving--Ellen or Margaret.

[Footnote 27: Of Professor Wyes.]

These old-young things--bequests, as they look to be--from the loving, singing childhood of the earth, may lawfully make children, lovers, and songsters of us all; and _will_, if we are _fond_, and hearken to them.

In that same "hallowed and gracious time," lying YON-SIDE our chronologies,

"When the world and love were young,
And truth on every shepherd's tongue,"

the men and the Dwarfs had unbroken intercourse of _borrowing and lending_. Many traditions touch the matter. Here is one resting upon it.

No. CLIV. _The Dwarfs near Dardesheim_.

"Dardesheim is a little town betwixt Halberstadt and Brunswick. Close to the north-east side, a spring of the clearest water flows, which is called the Smansborn,[28] and wells from a hill wherein formerly the Dwarfs dwelled. When the ancient inhabitants of the place needed a holiday dress, or any rare utensil for a marriage, they betook them to this Dwarf's Hill, knocked thrice, and with a well audible voice, told their occasion, adding--

'Early a-morrow, ere sun-light,
At the hill's door, lieth all aright.'

[Footnote 28: For LESSMANSBORN, _i.e._ LESSMANN'S WELL.]

The Dwarfs held themselves for well requited if somewhat of the festival meats were set for them by the hill. Afterward gradually did bickerings interrupt the good understanding that was betwixt the Dwarfs' nation and the country folk. At the beginning for a short season; but, in the end, the Dwarfs departed away; because the flouts and gibes of many boors grew intolerable to them, as likewise their ingratitude for kindnesses done. Thenceforth none seeth or heareth any Dwarfs more."

In _Auvergne_, Miss Costello has just now learned, how the men and the Fairies anciently lived upon the friendliest footing, nigh one another: how the _knowledge_ and _commodious use_ of the _Healing Springs_ was owed by the former to these Good Neighbours: how, of yore, the powerful sprites, by rending athwart a huge rocky mound, opened an _innocuous channel_ for _the torrent_, which used with its overflow to lay desolate arable ground and pasturage: how they were looked upon as being, in a general sense, _the protectors_ against harm of the country: and, in fine, how the two orders of neighbours lived in long and happy communion of kind offices with one another; until, upon one unfortunate day, the ill-renowned freebooter, Aymerigot Marcel, with his ruffianly men-at-arms, having approached, by stealth, from his near-lying hold, stormed the romantically seated rock-mansion of the bountiful pigmies: who, scared, and in anger, forsook the land. Ever since the foul outrage, only a straggler may, now and then, be seen at a distance.

Thus, too, the late _Brillat-Savarin_, from a sprightly, acute, brilliant Belles-letteriste, turned, for an hour, honest antiquary, lets us know how, upon the southern bank of the Rhone, flowing out from Switzerland, in the narrowly-bounded and, when he first quitted it, yet hidden valley of his birth:--The FAIRIES--elderly, not beautiful, but benevolent unmarried ladies--kept, while time was, open school in THE GROTTO, which was their habitation, for the young girls of the vicinity, whom they taught--SEWING.

3. We go on to exemplifying--ELFIN _Frequentation of, and Settlement with,_ MAN.

The Fairies are drawn into the houses and to the haunts of men by manifold occasions and impulses. They halt on a journey. They celebrate marriages. They use the implements of handicraft. They purchase at the Tavern--from the Shambles, or in open Market. They _steal_ from oven and field. They go through a house, blessing the rooms, the marriage-bed--and stand beside the unconscious cradle. They give dreams. They take part in the evening mirth. They pray in the churches. They seem to work in the mines. Drawn by magical constraint into the garden, they invite themselves within doors. They dance in the churchyard.[29] They make themselves the wives and the paramours of men; or the serviceable hobgoblin fixes himself, like a cat, in the house--once and for ever.

We present traditions for illustrating some of these points, as they offer themselves to us.

[Footnote 29:

"Part fenced by man, part by the ragged steep
That curbs a foaming brook, a GRAVE-YARD lies;
The hare's best couching-place for fearless sleep!
Where MOONLIT FAYS, far seen by credulous eyes,
ENTER, IN DANCE!"

WORDSWORTH.--_Sonnet upon an_ ABANDONED _Cemetery._]

THEY HALT ON A JOURNEY.

No. XXXV. _The Count of Hoia_.

"There did appear once to a count of Hoia, a little mauling in the night, and, as the count was alarmed, said to him he should have no fear: he had a word to sue unto him, and begged that he should not be denied. The count answered, if it were a thing possible to do, and should be never burthensome to him and his, he will gladly do it. The manling said--'There be some that desire to come to thee this ensuing night, into thy house, and to make their stopping. Wouldst thou so long lend them kitchen and hall, and bid thy domestics that they go to bed, and none look after their ways and works, neither any know thereof, save only thou? They will show them, therefore, grateful. Thou and thy line shall have cause of joy, and in the very least matter shall none hurt happen unto thee, neither to any that belong to thee.' Whereunto the count assented. Accordingly, upon the following night, they came like a cavalcade, marching over the drawbridge to the house; one and all--tiny folk, such as they use to describe the hill manlings. They cooked in the kitchen, fell too, and rested, and nothing seemed otherwise than as if a great repast were in preparing. Thereafter, nigh unto morn, as they will again depart, comes the little manling a second time to the count, and after conning him thanks, handed him a _sword_, a _salamander cloth_, and a _golden ring_, in which was RED LION set above--advertising him, withal, that he and his posterity shall well keep these three pieces, and so long as they had them all together, should it go with fair accordance and well in the county; but so soon as they shall be parted from one another, shall it be a sign that nothing good impendeth for the county. Accordingly, the red lion ever after, when any of the stem is near the point of dying, hath been seen to wax wan.

"Howsoever, at the time that Count Job and his brothers were minors, and Francis of Halle governor in the country, two of the pieces--viz., the Sword and the Salamander Cloth, were taken away; but the Ring remained with the lordship unto an end. Whither it afterwards went is not known."

THEY HOLD A WEDDING.

No.XXXI. _The Small People's Wedding Feast._

"The small people of the Eulenberg in Saxony would once hold a marriage, and for this purpose slipped in, in the night, through the keyhole and the window-chinks into the Hall, and came leaping down upon the smooth floor, like peas tumbled out upon the threshing-floor. The old Count, who slept in the high canopy bed in the Hall, awoke, and marvelled at the number of tiny companions; one of whom, in the garb of a herald, now approached him, and in well-set phrase, courteously prayed him to bear part in their festivity. 'Yet one thing,' he added, 'we beg of you. Ye shall alone be present; none of your court shall be bold to gaze upon our mirth--yea, not so much as with a glance.' The old Count answered pleasantly--'Since ye have once for all waked me up, I will e'en make one among you.' Hereupon was a little wifikin led up to him, little torch-bearers took their station, and a music of crickets struck up. The Count had much ado to save losing his little partner in the dance; she capered about so nimbly, and ended with whirling him round and round, until hardly might he have his breath again. But, in the midst of the jocund measure, all stood suddenly still; the music ceased, and the whole throng hurried to the cracks in the doors, mouse-holes, and hiding-places of all sorts. The newly-married couple only, the heralds, and the dancers, looked upward towards an orifice that was in the hall ceiling, and there descried the visage of the old Countess, who was curiously prying down upon the mirthful doings. Herewith they made their obeisance to the Count; and the same which had bidden him, again stepping forward, thanked him for his hospitality. 'But,' continued he, 'because our pleasure and our wedding hath been in such sort interrupted, that yet another eye of man hath looked thereon, henceforward shall your house number never more than seven Eulenbergs.' Thereupon, they pressed fast forth, one upon another. Presently all was quiet, and the old Count once again alone in the dark Hall. The curse hath come true to this hour, so as ever one of the six living knights of Eulenberg hath died ere the seventh was born."

THEY JOIN THE EVENING MIRTH.

No. xxxix. _The Hill-Manling at the Dance_.