Chapter XII (3)

Our landing is beset by the usual mob of yelling vagabonds, eager to lighten our pockets by means of worthless native "curiosities," "antiques" manufactured a month before, or vociferous offers to show us "all ze fine sight of ze town, ver' sheap." Just as we have succeeded in fighting our way through the hurly-burly a venerable old Smyrniote with a long white beard, in whom we recognize one of our fellow-passengers on the steamer, accosts us with a low bow: "Want see ze old shursh, genteelmen? All ze Signori Inglesi go see zat. You wish, I take you zere one minute."

"All right!" shouts P---- with characteristic impetuosity: "I'm bound to see all I can in the time. Drive on, old boy: I'm your man."

Away we go, accordingly, along the deep, narrow, tunnel-like streets, flanked on either side by tall blank houses such as meet one at every turn in Cairo or Djeddah or Jerusalem, between whose projecting fronts the sunny sky appears like a narrow strip of bright blue ribbon far away overhead, while all below is veiled in a rich summer twilight of purple shadow, like that which fills the interior of some vast cathedral. But ever and anon a sudden break in the ranked masses of building gives us a momentary glimpse of the broad shining sea and dazzling sunlight, which falls upon many a group that a painter would love to copy--tall, gaunt Armenians, whose high black caps and long dark robes make their pale, hollow faces look doubly spectral; low-browed, sallow, bearded Russians; brawny English sailors, looking down with a grand, indulgent contempt upon those unhappy beings whom an inscrutable Providence has doomed to be "foreigners;" stolid Turks, tramping onward in silent defiance of the fierce looks cast at them from every side; sinewy Dalmatians, with close-cropped black hair; dapper Frenchmen, with well-trimmed moustaches, casting annihilating glances at the few ladies who happen to be abroad; and barefooted Greeks, with little baskets of fruit or fish perched on their heads--ragged, wild-eyed and brigand-like as the lazzaroni who rose from the pavement of Naples at the call of Masaniello.

"Awful rascals some of these fellows look, eh?" remarks P---- in a stage whisper.

"Yes, their faces are certainly no letter of recommendation. There is some truth, undoubtedly, in the _last_ clause of the old proverb: 'Greek wines steal all heads, Greek women steal all hearts, and Greek men steal everything.'"

But at this moment our attention is drawn to a crowd a little way ahead, the centre of attraction being apparently a good-looking young Greek from the Morea, whose jaunty little crimson cap with its hanging tassel sets off very tastefully his dark, handsome face and the glossy black curls which surround it. He is leaning against the pillar of a gateway in an attitude of unstudied grace that would charm an Italian painter, and singing, to the accompaniment of his little three-stringed guitar, a lively Greek song, of which we only come up in time to catch the last verse:

Look in mine eyes, lady fair:
There your own image you'll see.
Open my heart and look there:
_There_ too your image will be.

The coppers that chink into the singer's extended hat show how fully his efforts are appreciated; but at this moment P----, with the free-and-easy command of a true John Bull, elbows his way through the throng, and calls out: "Holloa, Johnny! we only got the fag-end of that song. Tip us another, and here's five piastres for you" (about twenty-five cents).

The musician seems to understand him, and with a slight preliminary flourish on his instrument pours forth, in a voice as clear and rippling as the carol of a bird, a song which may be thus translated:

Men fret, men toil, men pinch and pare,
Make life itself a scramble,
While I, without a grief or care,
Where'er it lists me ramble.
'Neath cloudless sun or clouded moon,
By market-cross or ferry,
I chant my lay, I play my tune.
And all who hear are merry.

When summer's sun unclouded shines,
And mountain-shadows linger,
I watch them dance among the vines
As quicker moves my finger;
And so they sport till day is o'er,
And black-robed Night advances,
And where the maidens tripped before,
The lovely moonbeam dances.

When 'neath the rush of winter's rain
The dripping forests welter,
The shepherd opes his door amain,
And gives me food and shelter.
I touch my chords, I trill my lay,
The firelight glances o'er us,
And wind and rain, in stormy play,
Join in with lusty chorus.

'Mid rustling leaves, 'neath open sky,
I live like lark or swallow:
There's not a bird more free to fly
Than I am free to follow.
And when grim Death his bow shall bend,
My mortal course suspending,
Oh may my life, howe'er it end,
Have music in its ending!

Such music, supplemented by such a voice, strongly tempts us to remain and hear more; but our impatient guide urges us onward, and in another minute we stand before the dark, low-browed archway of the old church which we have come to see.

The quaint architecture of the outside is strange and old-world enough, but when we enter, the dim interior, haunted by weird shadows and ghostly echoes, has quite an unearthly effect after the bustling life of the city. As is usual in Greek and Russian churches, there are no seats of any kind, the whole interior being one wide bare space, dimly lighted by the two tall candles on the altar and a few little oil-lamps attached to the pictures of saints adorning the walls. The decorations have that air of tawdry finery which is the most displeasing feature of the Eastern churches; but the four frescoes at the farther end (representing the Adoration of the Magi, our Lord's Baptism, the Crucifixion, and the Descent into Hell), rude as they are, have a grim power which takes hold of our fancy at once. Dante himself might approve the last of the four, in which the lurid atmosphere, the hideous contortions of the demons, and the surging flight of the half-awakened dead, with their blank faces and stony eyes, contrast magnificently with the grand calmness of the divine Figure in the centre--a perfect realization of the noble words of Milton:

Some howled, some shrieked,
Some bent their fiery darts at thee, while Thou
Sat'st unappalled in calm and sinless peace.

The only occupant of the building is a tall, dignified-looking priest, who at once takes upon himself the part of expositor; but he is suddenly interrupted by the hurried entrance of a man who whispers something in his ear. The priest instantly vanishes into the sacristy, and, reappearing with something like a casket under his arm, goes hastily out, muttering as he passes us some words which my comrade interprets as "Follow me."

We obey at once; but, in truth, it is no light matter to do so, for the good father sets off at a pace which, considering the heat of the day and the weight of his trailing robes, is simply astounding. Up one street, down another, round a corner, along a narrow lane--on he rushes as if bent upon rivalling that indefatigable giant who "walked round the world every morning before breakfast to sharpen his appetite."

"By Jove!" mutters P----, mopping his streaming face for the twentieth time, "what he's going to show us ought to be something special, by the hurry he's in to get to it. Anyhow, it's a queer style of showing us the way, to go pelting on like that, and leave us to take care of ourselves. I'll just halloo to him to slacken speed a bit."

But just as he is about to do so the priest halts suddenly in front of a high, blank wall of baked clay, in the midst of which a door opens and swallows him as if by magic. We come tearing up a moment later, and are about to enter at his heels when our way is unexpectedly barred by an ugly old Greek with one eye and with a threadbare crimson cap pulled down over his lean, sallow face, which looks very much like a half-decayed cucumber. "What do you want?" he growls, eying us from head to foot with the air of a bulldog about to bite.

We explain our errand, and are electrified with the information that we have been on the point of intruding ourselves into a private house; that the priest's business there is to pray over the master of it, who is dangerously ill; and that, in short, we have been "hunting upon a false scent" altogether. Having imparted this satisfactory information, Cerberus shuts the door in our faces (which are sufficiently blank by this time), and leaves us to think over the matter at our leisure.

"Confound the old mole!" growls P---- wrathfully: "if he didn't want us, why on earth did he tell us to follow him, I should like to know?"

"Are you quite sure that he _did_ say so?" ask I. "What were the Greek words that he used?"

"'Mê akolouthei,' or something like that."

"Which means, '_Don't_ follow,'" I retort, transfixing the abashed offender with a look of piercing reproach. "If _that's_ all that's left of your Greek, you'd better buy a lexicon and take a fresh start. However, there's nobody to tell tales if _we_ don't, that's one comfort."

And so ends the first and last of our adventures in Cyprus.

DAVID KER.

NEIGHBORLY LOVE.

Eine Welt zwar bist du, O Rom; doch ohne die Liebe
Wäre die Welt nicht die Welt, wäre denn Rom auch nicht Rom.--GOETHE:
_Elegy I_.

"Maytide in Rome! The air 's a mist of gold,
In rainbow colors are the fountains springing,
The streets are like a garden to behold,
And in my heart a choir of birds are singing.
Haste to thy window, love: I wait for thee.
High o'er the narrow lane our glance may meet,
Our stretched hands all but clasp. Hither to me,
And make the glory of the hour complete.

"No sound, no sign! The bowed blinds are not stirred.
I dare not cry, lest from the common street
Some passing idler catch one sacred word
That's dedicate to her. How may I greet
My love to-day? how may I lure her near?
Ah! I will write my message on her wall
In living sunshine. She shall see and hear:
The silent fire of heaven shall sound my call."

He draws his casement: on the glittering glass
A captured sunbeam flashes sudden flame:
Between her blinds demure he makes it pass:
Its joyous radiance tells her whence it came.
She feels its presence like a fiery kiss;
Mantling her face leaps up the maiden's blood;
She flies to greet him. Oh immortal bliss!
For ever thus is old Rome's youth renewed.

EMMA LAZARUS.

OUR MONTHLY GOSSIP.

POE AND MRS. WHITMAN.

Burns's Highland Mary, Petrarch's Laura, and other real and imaginary loves of the poets, have been immortalized in song, but we doubt whether any of the numerous objects of poetical adoration were more worthy of honor than Mrs. Sarah Helen Whitman, the friend and defender of Edgar A. Poe. That he should have inspired so deep and lasting a love in the heart of so true and pure a woman would alone prove that he was not the social pariah his vindictive enemies have held up to the world's wonder and detestation. The poet's love for Mrs. Whitman was the one gleam of hope that cheered the last sad years of his life. His letters to her breathed the most passionate devotion and the most enthusiastic admiration. One eloquent extract from his love-letters to Mrs. Whitman will suffice. In response to a passage in one of her letters in which she says, "How often have I heard men, and even women, say of you, 'He has great intellectual power, but no principle, no moral sense'!" he exclaims: "I love you too truly ever to have offered you my hand, ever to have sought your love, had I known my name to be so stained as your expressions imply. There is no oath which seems to me so sacred as that sworn by the all-divine love I bear you. By this love, then, and by the God who reigns in heaven, I swear to you that my soul is incapable of dishonor. I can call to mind no act of my life which would bring a blush to my cheek or to yours."

Carried away by the ardor and eloquent passion of her poet-lover, and full of the sweetest human sympathy and the tenderest human charity for one so gifted but so unfortunate, Mrs. Whitman, against the advice of her relatives and friends, consented to a conditional engagement. It was in relation to this engagement, and the cause of its being broken off, that one of the most calumnious stories against Poe was told, and believed both in America and in Europe, but especially in England. Why the engagement was broken, and by whom, still remains buried in mystery, but that Poe was guilty of any "outrage" at her house upon the eve of their intended marriage was emphatically denied by Mrs. Whitman. She pronounced the whole story a "calumny." In a letter before me she says: "I do not think it possible to overstate the gentlemanly reticence and amenity of his habitual manner. It was stamped through and through with the impress of nobility and gentleness. I have seen him in many moods and phases in those 'lonesome, latter years' which were rapidly merging into the mournful tragedy of death. I have seen him sullen and moody under a sense of insult and imaginary wrong. I have _never_ seen in him the faintest indication of savagery and rowdyism and brutality."

Some of the most tenderly passionate of Mrs. Whitman's verses were inspired by her affection for Poe. She wrote six sonnets to his memory, overflowing with the most exalted love and generous sympathy. The first of these sonnets ends thus:

_Thou_ wert my destiny: thy song, thy fame,
The wild enchantments clustering round thy name,
Were my soul's heritage--its regal dower,
Its glory, and its kingdom, and its power.

When malice had exhausted itself in heaping obloquy upon the name of the dead poet, it was the gentle hand of woman that first removed the odium from his memory. It was Mrs. Whitman--who loved him and whom he loved--that dared to penetrate the "mournful corridors" of that sad, desolate heart, with its "halls of tragedy and chambers of retribution," and tell the true but melancholy story of the unhappy master of the Raven. It was she who generously came forward as "one of the friends" of him who was said to have no friends. She was his steady champion from first to last. Whether it was some crackbrain scribbler who tried to prove Poe "mad," some accomplished scholar who endeavored to disparage him in order to magnify some other writer, or some silly woman who attempted to foist herself into notice by relating "imaginary facts" concerning the poet's hidden life, Mrs. Whitman was always ready to defend her dead friend.

One of the most touching incidents in Poe's early life was his affection and fidelity to Mrs. Helen Stannard, who had completely won the sensitive boy's heart by her kindness to him when he came to her house with her son, a favorite school-friend. This lady died under circumstances of peculiar sorrow, and her young admirer was in the habit of visiting her grave every night. It was she--"the one idolatrous and purely ideal love" of his passionate boyhood--who inspired those exquisite lines, "Helen, thy beauty is to me." Mr. Richard Henry Stoddard, in his article on Poe published in _Harper's Monthly_ for May, 1872, says, in allusion to Mrs. Stannard: "The memory of this lady _is said_ to have suggested the most beautiful of his minor poems, 'Helen,' though I am not aware _that Poe ever countenanced the idea_." As Mrs. Whitman had distinctly stated in _Edgar Poe and his Critics_ that Mrs. Stannard _had_ inspired the poem, she addressed a note to Mr. Stoddard upon the subject, to which he sent the following reply: "MY DEAR MRS. WHITMAN: So many months have elapsed since I wrote the paper on Poe about which you write that I am unable to remember what I said in it. I certainly had no intention to discredit any statement that you made in _Edgar Poe and his Critics_, and if I have done so I am sorry for it, and ask your forgiveness."

In one of Mrs. Whitman's letters, now lying before me, she says: "So much has been written, and so much still continues to be written, about Poe by persons who are either his avowed or secret enemies, that I joyfully welcome every friendly or impartial word spoken in his behalf. His enemies are uttering their venomous fabrications in every newspaper, and so few voices can obtain a hearing in his defence. My own personal knowledge of Mr. Poe was very brief, although it comprehended memorable incidents, and was doubtless, as he kindly characterized it in one of his letters of the period, 'the most earnest epoch of his life;' and such I devoutly and emphatically believe it to have been. You ask me to furnish you with extracts from his letters, literary or otherwise. There are imperative reasons why these letters cannot and _ought_ not to be published at present--not that there was a word or a thought in them discreditable to Poe, though some of them were imprudent, doubtless, and liable to be construed wrongly by his enemies. They are for the most part strictly _personal_. The only extract from them of which I have authorized the publication is a fac-simile of a paragraph inserted between the 68th and 69th pages of Mr. Ingram's memoir in Black's (Edinburgh) edition of the complete works of Poe. The paragraph in the original letter (dated November 24, 1848) consists of only eight lines: 'The agony which I have so lately endured--an agony known only to my God and to myself--seems to have passed my soul through fire, and purified it from all that is weak. Henceforward I am strong: this those who love me shall see, as well as those who have so relentlessly endeavored to ruin me. It needed only some such trials as I have just undergone to make me what I was born to be by making me conscious of my own strength.' This and a protest against the charge of indifference to moral obligations so often urged against him, which I permitted Mr. Gill to extract for publication from a long letter filled with eloquent and proud remonstrance against the injustice of such a charge, are the only passages of which I have authorized the publication. Other letters have been published without my consent. I have endeavored to reconcile myself to the unauthorized use of private letters and papers, since the effect of their publication has been on the whole regarded as favorable to Poe."

It was Mrs. Whitman who first attempted to trace Edgar Poe's descent from the old Norman family of Le Poer, which emigrated to Ireland during the reign of Henry II. of England. Lady Blessington, through her father, Edmund Power, claimed the same illustrious descent. The Le Poers were distinguished for being improvident, daring and reckless. The family originally belonged to Italy, whence they passed to the north of France, and went to England with William the Conqueror. In a letter dated January 3, 1877, Mrs. Whitman says: "For all that I said on the subject I _alone_ am responsible. A distant relative of mine, a descendant, like myself, from Nicholas le Poer, had long ministered to my genealogical proclivities by stories which from my childhood had vaguely haunted and charmed my imagination. When I discovered certain facts of Poe's history of which he had previously made little account, he seemed greatly impressed by my theory of our relationship. Of course I endowed him with my traditional heirlooms. John Savage, who wrote some fine papers on Poe, which I _think_ appeared in the _Democratic Review_, perhaps in 1858, said to a friend of mine that the things most interesting and valuable to him in my little book (_Poe and his Critics_) were its genealogical hints."

When M. Stephane Mallarmé, an enthusiastic admirer of Poe's, undertook to translate his works into French, he addressed Mrs. Whitman a complimentary letter, from which the following passages are translated: "Whatever is done to honor the memory of a genius the most truly divine the world has seen, ought it not first to obtain your sanction? Such of Poe's works as our great Baudelaire left untranslated--that is to say, the poems and many of the literary criticisms--I hope to make known to France. My first attempt, 'Le Corbeau,' of which I send you a specimen, is intended to attract attention to a future work now nearly completed. I trust that the attempt will meet your approval, but no possible success of my future design could cause you, madam, a satisfaction equal to the joy, vivid, profound and absolute, caused by an extract from one of your letters in which you expressed a wish to see a copy of my 'Corbeau.' Not only in space--which is nothing--but in _time_, made up for each of us of the hours we deem most memorable in the past, your wish seemed to come to me from _so_ far, and to bring with it the most delicious return of long cherished memories; for, fascinated with the works of Poe from my infancy, it has been a long time that your name has been associated with his in my earliest and most intimate sympathies. Receive, madam, this expression of a gratitude such as your poetical soul may comprehend, for it is my inmost heart that thanks you."

Mrs. Whitman translated Mallarmé's inscription intended for the Poe monument in Baltimore. The last verse was thus rendered:

Through storied centuries thou shall proudly stand
In the Memorial City of his land,
A silent monitor, austere and gray,
To warn the clamorous brood of harpies from their prey.

E.L.D.

A LITTLE PERVERSITY IN WOMEN.

MRS. PHILIP MARKHAM. PHILIP MARKHAM.
MISS ETHEL ARNOLD. FRANK BEVERLY.

(The four have been dining together and discussing the people
they had met some hours before at a reception.)

_Philip Markham._ At all events, I call her a very beautiful woman.--Don't you say so, Beverly? I am telling Miss Arnold that I considered Miss St. John handsome.

_Mrs. Markham._ Oh, Philip, how can you say so?

_Beverly._ I admired her immensely.

_Mrs. M._ (with a shrug). Oh, I dare say. A round, soulless face, a large waist--

_Philip._ You women have no eyes. She has cheeks (to quote Cherbuliez) like those fruits one longs to bite into, a pair of fine eyes, well-cut lips--(Breaks off and laughs).

_Mrs. M._ (severely). Pray go on.

_Philip._ Not while you regard me with that virtuous air of condemnation.

_Mrs. M._ I confess I saw nothing to admire in the girl except that she looked healthy and strong.

_Miss Arnold._ Nor did I. Moreover, she had the fault of being badly dressed.

_Beverly._ She was beautiful, then, not by reason of her dress, as most of your sex are, but in spite of it. You women always underrate physical beauty in each other.

_Mrs. M._ (pretending not to have heard Beverly's remark). Yes, Ethel, very badly dressed, and her hair was atrociously arranged.

_Philip._ Oh, we did not look at her hair, we were so much attracted by her face and figure.

_Mrs. M._ (piqued). Take my advice, Ethel, and never marry. While we were engaged Philip never thought of seeing beauty in any girl except myself: now he is in a state of enthusiasm bordering upon frenzy over every new face he comes across.

_Beverly._ He knows, I suppose, that you do not mind it--that you are the more flattered the more he admires the entire sex.

_Mrs. M._ Of course I do not _mind_ it: the only thing is--

_Philip._ Well, what is the only thing, Jenny?

_Beverly._ You remember, Cousin Jenny, I was talking the other day about the perversity of your sex. You either cannot or will not understand your husbands: they hide nothing, extenuate nothing, yet you fail to grasp the idea of that side of their minds which is at once the best and the most dangerous. If Philip did not regard all women with interest, and some with particular interest, he could not have had it in his head to be half so much in love with you as he is.

_Philip._ That is true, Frank--so true that we won't ask how you found it out.

_Miss A._ You men always stand by each other so faithfully! Now, I have observed these traits among my married friends: the husbands invariably give a half sigh at the sight of a beautiful girl, implying, "Oh, if I were not a married man!" while the wives, on meeting a man who attracts admiration, as uniformly believe that, let him be ever so handsome, clever or fascinating, he cannot compare with their own particular John.

_Mrs. M._ That is true, Ethel; and it shows how much more faithful women are than men.

_Philip._ Now, Jenny, that is nonsense.

_Beverly._ Oh, I dare say there is a soupçon of truth in it. But I think I could give wives a recipe for keeping their husbands' affections, which, unpopular although it might be, would yet prove salutary.

_Miss A._ Give it by all means, Mr. Beverly. Anything so beneficial would naturally be popular.

_Beverly._ Pardon me, no. Were I to suggest a pilgrimage, a fast, or scourgings even, the fair sex would undertake the remedy at once, for they like some éclat about their smallest doings. All I want them to do is to correct their little spirit of self-will and cultivate good taste.

_Mrs. M._ Women _self-willed_! Most women have no will at all.

_Beverly._ I never saw a woman yet who had not a will; and I am the last person to deny their right to it. What I suggest is that they suit it to the requirements of their lives, not let it torment them by going all astray, by delighting in its errors and persisting in its chimeras.

_Miss A._ I grant the first, that we have wills, but I do insist that we have good taste.

_Beverly._ Now, then, we will consider this abstract question. I maintain that, considering their interest in women and their natural zest in pursuing them, men show more right up-and-down faithfulness and devotion to their obligations than women do.

_Philip._ Hear! hear!

_Miss A._ Oh, if you start upon the hypothesis that man is a being incapable of--

_Beverly._ Not at all. You must, however, grant at the outset that man is the free agent in society--has always been since the beginning of civilization. He has made all the laws, enjoying complete immunity to suit the requirements of his wishes and needs, yet everybody knows that, in spite of the clamor of the woman-suffragists, all the laws favor women. The basis of every system of civilized society proves that men are inclined to hold themselves strictly to their obligations toward your sex. There is no culprit toward whom a jury of men are less lenient than one who has manifested any light sense of his domestic duties. Is not that true?

_Mrs. M._ I suppose it is. But it ought to be so, of course. It is impossible for men to be good enough to their wives.

_Beverly._ Just so. But what I claim is, that while every man holds, at least theoretically, to the very highest ideal of a man's duties in the marriage relation, very few wives render their husbands' existences so altogether happy that these obligations become not only the habit but the joy of their lives.--Don't interrupt me, Jenny.--Not but what the lovely creatures are willing--nay, anxious--to do so, but just at the point of accomplishment their little failings of blindness and perversity come in. They are determined to retain their husbands' complete allegiance, but their devices and contrivances are mostly dull blunders. Considering what a frail tie, based on illusion, binds the sexes, my wonder as a bachelor is that men are, as a rule, as faithful to their wives as they seem to be.

_Philip._ We have been friends, Frank, for fifteen years, and I married your first cousin, but notwithstanding all that Jenny will insist now that I give up your acquaintance.

_Mrs. M._ No, Philip, I am not angry with Frank: I only feel sorry for him.

_Miss A._ So do I. Yet I am curious to know, Jenny, what he means by saying that wives' devices to keep their husbands' love are mostly dull blunders.

_Beverly._ I am waiting for a chance to develop my views. I know plenty of men who are absolutely loyal to their wives--faithful to the smallest obligation of married life--yet who regard their marriage as the great folly of their youth. Now, a woman's intuitions ought to be, it seems to me, so clear and unerring that she should never permit her face and voice to become unpleasant to her husband. And this effect generally comes from the absurdity of her attempts to hold him to her side: they have ended by repelling him. Now, if your sex would only remember that we are horribly fastidious, and that it is necessary to behave with good taste--

_Mrs. M._ Oh! oh! Monster!

_Miss A._ Barbarian!

_Beverly._ I will give you an instance. In our trip up and down the Saguenay last summer you both remember the bridal couple on board the boat?

_Philip._ I remember the bride, a charming creature. The young fellow could not compare with her in any qualities of cleverness or good looks.

_Beverly._ Perhaps not. At the same time, he was her superior in some nice points. Pretty although the bride was, and enviable as we considered his good-luck, one could not help wincing for him when this delicate, refined little creature "showed off" before the crowd of indifferent passengers. At table she put her face so close to his, and when they stood or sat together on deck she hung about him in such a way, that, as I noticed over and over, it brought the blood to his cheeks and made him ashamed to raise his eyes. Depend upon it, that young man, in spite of his infatuation, said within himself a hundred times on his wedding-journey, "Poor innocent little darling! she has no idea of the attention she attracts to us."

_Mrs. M._ (eagerly). Yes, she did know all about it. She was so proud of being newly married that if everyone with whom she came in contact would not allude to her position she made a point of confiding the fact that she was a bride of a week, and actually wore me out with pouring her raptures into my ears.

_Miss A._ Jenny, you should not have told that. It will confirm Mr. Beverly in his cynicism regarding her want of taste.

_Philip._ I remember the morning the young fellow and I walked into Chicoutimi together that I said to him, "Lately married, I believe?" and he only nodded stiffly and pointed out the falls in the distance.

_Beverly._ Now, it is a deliciously pretty blunder for a bride to proclaim her good-luck, but it is a blunder nevertheless. For six months a man forgives it: after that he has no fondness for being paraded as a part and parcel of a woman's belongings. By that time he has probably found out that she is not all gushing unconsciousness. Besides this adorable innocence I observed something else in this pretty bride. Despite her fresh raptures, she was capable of jealousy: if her husband left her for an hour he found her a trifle sullen on his return.

_Miss A._ She had nobody else.

_Mrs. M._ She naturally wanted to feel that he was interested in nothing besides her.

_Beverly._ But she should not have shown it. This is another perverse and suicidal inconsistency on a woman's part: she should never exhibit these small meannesses of pique, sullen tempers, jealousy, to her husband, since they place her wholly at a disadvantage, making her less attractive than the objects she wishes to detach him from.

_Mrs. M._ (a little embarrassed and looking toward her husband deprecatingly, at which he laughs and shakes his head). Woman is a creature of impulse. She does not study what it is most politic for her to do: she gives herself utterly--she simply asks for everything in return.

_Beverly._ Does she give herself utterly? Does she not generally keep an accurate debit-and-credit account of what is due to her? Then the moment she feels her rights infringed upon, what is her usual course? She holds it her prerogative to set out upon a course of conduct eminently qualified to displease the very man whom it is her interest and her salvation to please.

_Mrs. M._ But he should try as well to please her.

_Beverly._ That is begging the question. Besides, her requirements are unreasonable. She holds too tight a rein: a man is never safe after he feels that strain at the bit. Now even you, Jenny--whom I hold up as a model of a wife--you will not let Philip express his admiration for a pretty woman without--

_Mrs. M._ (eagerly). I delight in having him admire any one whom I consider worthy of admiration. I do not like to see any man run away with by an infatuation for mere outside beauty.

_Beverly._ Yet "mere outside beauty" is clearly the most important gift Nature has bestowed upon women.

_Mrs. M._} Oh! oh! oh!
_Miss A._}

_Philip._ What is your recipe, Frank, for putting an end to disagreements between husbands and wives?

_Beverly._ Wives are to give up studying their own requirements, and try to understand their husbands.

_Miss A._ And what will the result be?

_Beverly._ All men, instead of remaining bachelors like myself, will become infatuated with domestic life. No man could resist the prospect of being constantly caressed, waited upon, admired, flattered. And once married, a man's own home would become so fascinating a place to him that he would never, except against his will, exchange it for his club or the drawing-room of his neighbor's wife.

_Miss A._ And in return are husbands prepared to give up a nice sense of their own requirements and study to understand their wives?

_Beverly._ Not at all: they are far too stupid to understand their wives: there is something too fine and elusive about a woman's intellect and heart to be attained by one of our sex. Besides, are things ever equal--two souls ever just sufficiently like and unlike exactly to understand each other? Let women perfect themselves in the art of giving happiness, and the good action will command its own reward.

_Miss A._ Do you comprehend, Jenny, what the full duty of woman is? For my part, I think it is better to go on in the old way, since it is said that "a mill, a clock and a woman always want mending." I think women have their own little requirements.

_Mrs. M._ (who has left her seat and gone round to her husband, and is cracking his almonds with an air of being anxious to conciliate him). The fact is, Ethel, you unmarried women know nothing at all about it.

L.W.

ORGANIZATIONS FOR MUTUAL AID.

A French gentleman, M. Court, has lately published in _La Religion Laïque_ a series of articles upon this subject that have attracted much attention. He proposes the establishment of a national fund for the support of the aged and infirm, managed by eight members chosen annually, half by the Chamber of Deputies, half by the Senate. The fund is to be raised by legacies and donations; by a gift from the state of ten millions of francs; by a percentage deducted by the state, the departments and the communes from the pay of those who contract to furnish materials for building, to do work, etc.; by a tax upon all who employ servants or other laborers (one franc a month for each employé); and by a deduction from collateral inheritances (_successions collatérals_). In time, about every member of the community would be subjected directly or indirectly to taxation for the support of the institution, and would have a right to its benefits.

To the ordinary mind the plan appears wholly impracticable from its magnitude, if for no other cause; but it is evidently presented in good faith, and is further proof of the general growth of the sentiment that capital owes a debt to the labor of the world which cannot be satisfied with the mere payment of wages. Most of the "sick funds" or other provisions for the care of disabled workmen in great industrial establishments owe their origin to the initiative of the proprietor. M. Godin, the founder of the _Familistère_, a palatial home for the families of some five hundred men employed in his iron-works at Guise, was one of the first to institute a fund for mutual assistance and medical service, supported by means of a tax of twenty cents a month on the salary of each workman. Foreseeing the troubles that would arise should he attempt to manage this fund in the interest of his men, he wisely refused to have any share in this work, and induced them to elect a board of managers from their own number having entire responsibility in the matter. The board is composed of eighteen members, each of whom receives from M. Godin an indemnity of five francs a month for time lost in visiting the sick, committee-work, etc.

"The assessment," writes M. Godin, "for the support of the fund to which the workmen consented amounted to about one per cent. of their earnings. The chief of the establishment at the same time contributed all the money resulting from fines for spoiling work and for infractions of the rules of the manufactory. Thanks to this combination, the three principal causes of discord between patron and workman on the subject of relief-funds are removed. First, mistrust and suspicion are avoided. The managers of the treasury are of their own number, and therefore the workmen feel perfectly free to hold them to strict account for every sou received or disbursed. Second, as the fines for breaking the rules are devoted to the fund, the workmen themselves are the sole gainers. This teaches them to respect the rules, and they are little disposed to side with the refractory when they oppose a fine. Third, fines for spoiling work cause no ill-will; indeed, they are submitted to with a good grace. The fine benefits the fund; and, moreover, as in the case of fines for breaking rules, the workman has always a jury of his peers to appeal to: the board of managers is always at hand to approve or disapprove of the fine."

The fund thus administered has proved a great blessing to those who have claims upon it, and the members of the board have worked together over twelve years in the most exemplary harmony; or, in M. Godin's words, it has "parfaitement fonctionné sans conflits, sans contestations d'aucune sorte, et de manière à donner d'excellentes résultats." The average yearly receipts have been eighteen thousand nine hundred francs; average disbursements, eighteen thousand seven hundred and ninety-four francs. Possibly these facts and figures may be of service to some of our chiefs of industry who are studying to improve the condition of their employés.

M.H.

NEW YORK AS AN ART-PATRON.

That cities, like individuals, have idiosyncrasies that may be defined and estimated, and that may be depended upon to lead to the adoption of a certain line of action by the community in view of a certain set of circumstances, is a fact which is continually receiving fresh illustrations. The attitude of New York toward Mr. Theodore Thomas is a case in point. There is among the works of the Scottish poet Alexander Wilson, better known as the "American Ornithologist," a ballad entitled "Watty and Meg; or, The Wife Reformed." Its moral is for all to read. Watty's measure of domestic felicity was but scant, and when the burden laid upon him became greater than he could bear he determined to leave the cause of his misery:

Owre the seas I march this morning,
Listed, tested, sworn an' a',
Forced by your confounded girning.
Farewell, Meg! for I'm awa'.

In view of losing her husband and victim, Meg repented and swore to mend her ways, conceding even Watty's stipulation to keep the family purse:

Lastly, I'm to keep the siller:
This upon your saul you swear.

Mr. Thomas gave New York no such opportunity, and she is now lamenting him as Tom Hood's "female Ranter" mourns "The Lost Heir," "for he's my darlin' of darlin's." She wonders why he did not continue

Sitting as good as gold in the gutter, a-playing at making dirt-pies:
I wonder he left the court, where he was better off than all the other
young boys,
With two bricks, an old shoe, nine oyster-shells and a dead kitten by
way of toys.

And, in truth, Mr. Thomas got little more from the city he has for twenty-five years clung to and taught. If he came back, is it not likely he might meet with the Lost Heir's reception? In the Scotch ballad also we are left in uncertainty as to the genuineness of Meg's tears and promised reform; and in any case no one can blame Mr. Thomas for announcing his intention only after it was beyond alteration.

It is not that New York cares for the money which would have kept him. When did it refuse money when its sympathies were aroused? Look at its magnificent charities, its help to Chicago, to famine-stricken China, and the thousands that were daily poured into the hands of the sufferers from yellow fever in the South. Religion is supported with the same munificent liberality. But when literature, music or art are to be sustained, the community becomes either flighty or apathetic. The best of New York's monuments are the gifts either of societies formed upon the basis of a common sentiment with which society at large has no active sympathy, or of men of other nationalities. It has been broadly hinted that New York would never have acquired the Cesnola collection of Cypriote pottery, gems and statuary had it not found a competitor in England. The luxury of beating the Britishers was too tempting to be declined, and led to a result which might not have been reached had the question been nothing more than one of art and art-education. Competition supplied the stimulus which should have been furnished by a sense of the desirability of securing a collection so rich and in every way, historically and artistically, so valuable. The New York public, again, was never really interested in the Castellani collection. It grudged the additional entrance-fee of twenty-five cents levied by the trustees of the Metropolitan Museum. No leader arose to open its eyes to the true value of a complete collection of majolica and mediæval jewelry. The only known authority upon the subject of ceramics proved to be a blind leader of the blind, and the only result of Mr. Clarence Cook's interference was to leave the aforesaid gentleman in the melancholy plight of a plucked crow. The collection was reshipped to Europe while the feathers were still flying, and the public felt itself to be a gainer to the extent of witnessing a piece of good sport. No sense of loss spoiled its enjoyment of the fun.

When, some months ago, it was announced that a college of music was to be founded, New York scarcely paused to examine the plans of the proposed building. The scheme fell prone to the ground upon the day of its birth. The few who were in earnest communicated none of their fire to the community at large. Society looked upon Mr. Thomas in a precisely similar manner. It complacently regarded him as the greatest conductor of the age, and its complacency was fed by its having an imaginary proprietary interest in him. But while the few who really understood him and the themes he handled bowed to him as their Apollo, the many had no real homage to pay either of heart or head. He educated the people, and the people believed in him and in the dictum of judges more competent than they. But he was always above them, the men of influence and wealth who in all such matters represent and _are_ society. He led them to lofty heights, but no sooner had they reached one than he was seen flying to another loftier still and still more perilous. He worked, moreover, as only a genius and an enthusiast could work. He began by winning his auditors. He went down to their level, humored them, pleased them, and then filled their ears with music that was ravishing even when only partially intelligible. Insensibly they grew to like it, and although defections were large and many refused to rise above the "popular" standard, there is no doubt that he succeeded in elevating the taste of the general public. Year by year he was bringing his audiences nearer to himself, and year by year he was winning new converts from the love of the meretricious and flashy to that of the noble and pure.

He alone derived no benefit from his labors. He had no adequate support, no relief from the most sordid and worrying cares of life. He found himself almost forced into competition that was degrading. Had he entered into it he would have thrown down with his own hand the structure he had spent his life in rearing. He was alternately warmed by the admiration and love of a few and chilled by general apathy, and has chosen wisely in going where he will at least be lifted above the necessity of struggling for subsistence. New York has lost him, but had it known that Cincinnati was trying to coax him away it would have let him go never.

It is singular that the matter of making New York attractive to the lovers of art and music is never looked at by its wealthy citizens from the commercial point of view. Art and music exert influences that can be computed upon strict business principles, and the policy of neglecting them is extremely short-sighted. Every addition to the attractions of a city, and especially of a city essentially commercial, is an addition to its prosperity. The prestige that would have accrued to New York, and the wealth that would certainly have been attracted to it, had it adopted Cincinnati's course of action, would unquestionably have far more than compensated for the outlay attending the endowment of a college of music and the engagement of Theodore Thomas. With this assumption the idiosyncrasy of New York may be viewed in full. Like the prudent merchant of moderate attainments and medium culture, it is not far-seeing when a question arises not strictly in its line of business. Sympathetic, outwardly decorous, keenly sensitive, full of pity for the suffering, New York enters the field of art in a purely mercantile spirit. It has no love, but only that peculiar kind of affection that is the outgrowth of triumph over a rival. An individual parallel might be found in the case of the old gentleman who haunted the auction-rooms and filled his house with loads of vases, bronzes and the like. "It's not the things I care for," he said, "but there isn't a millionaire in the city I haven't outbid in getting them together."

J.J.

ONE OF THE SIDE ISSUES OF THE PARIS EXPOSITION.

Slowly, but not the less surely, does the succession of international industrial expositions strengthen the sentiment of peace among the nations. Those who were interested in observing how gradually our civilization is becoming industrial can remember during the Centennial Exposition several notable instances of this. The Exposition of Paris and the recent arbitration at Berlin have both stimulated the thought of Europe in this direction, and the following instances of the direction it is taking will be of interest, especially as they are such as are not likely to be noticed by the regular correspondents.

A pamphlet has been published at Foix, one of the provincial towns of France, entitled, _Les Rondes de la Paix_. It was written by M. Adolphe de Lajour, and its scope will appear from the following extract: "Why not declare Constantinople and the Straits neutral? Why not declare Constantinople the city for congresses of _unity_--the metropolis, the Washington, of the United States of the two worlds? Why from the various populations, differing in race, in manners, in religion and in language, who inhabit the Balkan peninsula, should not a confederation of the United States of the Danube be created on the model of Switzerland?"

In the Exposition itself a printed sheet has been distributed, entitled "La Marseillaise de la Paix." It was printed by the associated compositors in the office of M.A. Chaix, who has recently organized his establishment so that a share in the profits is accorded to the workers. The first two verses of this new version will suffice to show its character:

Allons, enfant de la patrie,
La jour de gloire est arrivé.
De la Paix, de la Paix chérie,
L'etendard brillant est levé! (_bis_)
Entendez-vous vers nos frontières,
Tous les peuples ouvrant leurs bras,
Crier à nos braves soldats:
Soyons unis, nous sommes frères!
Plus d'armes, citoyens, rompez vos bataillons!
Chantez,
Chantons!
Et que la Paix féconde nos sillons!

Pourquoi ces fusils, ces cartouches?
Pourquoi ces obus, ces canons?
Pourquoi ces cris, ces chants farouches,
Ces fiers défis aux nations? (_bis_)
Pour nous Français, oh! quelle gloire,
De montrer au monde dompté,
Que les droits de l'humanité
Sont plus sacrés que la victoire!
Plus d'armes, etc.

E.H.

LITERATURE OF THE DAY.

Superstition and Force: Essays on the Wager of Law, the Wager of Battle, the Ordeal, Torture. By Henry C. Lea. Third Edition, revised. Philadelphia: Henry C. Lea.