Chapter VIII: Part I (3)

It will occasionally happen that an author is produced in a country who is charged with a special message for another country. There will be something in the cast of his mind, or in the nature of his subject, which renders his writings more immediately or more generally suitable to the people of a land other than his own. We might cite as an example Washington Irving, who, though a sound American patriot, was essentially an English author, and whose earlier works are so English that many English people read them to this day, we are told, who do not suspect that the author was not their countryman. Washington Irving owed his literary career to this fact! His seventeen years' residence abroad enabled him to enjoy part of the advantage which all great authors would derive from an International Copyright, that is to say, he derived revenue from _both_ countries. During the first half of his literary career, he drew the chief part of his income from England; during the second half, when his Sketch-Book vein was exhausted, and he was again an American resident, he derived his main support from America. If he had never resided abroad, we never should have had a Washington Irving; if he had not returned home, he would have been sadly pinched in his old age. Alone among the American authors of his day or of any day, he had the market of the world for his works; and he only, of excellent American authors, has received anything like a compensation for his labor. The entire proceeds of his works during his lifetime were $205,383, of which about one third came to him from England. His average income, during the fifty years of his authorship, was about four thousand dollars a year. Less than any other of our famous authors he injured his powers by over-production, and it was only the unsteadiness of his income, the occasional failure of his resources, or the dread of a failure, that ever induced him to take up his pen when exhausted nature cried, Forbear! Cooper, on the contrary, who was read and robbed in every country, wrote himself all out, and still wrote on, until his powers were destroyed and his name was a by-word.

A case similar in principle to that of Irving was Audubon, the indefatigable and amiable Audubon. The exceeding costliness of his "Birds of America" protected that work as completely as an International Copyright could; and, but for this, we never could have had it. Audubon enjoyed the market of the world! The price of his wonderful work was a thousand dollars, and, at that period, neither Europe nor America could furnish purchasers enough to warrant him in giving it to the press. But Europe _and_ America could! Europe and America _did_,--each continent taking about eighty copies. The excellent Audubon, therefore, was not ruined by his brave endeavor to honor his country and instruct mankind. He ended his days in peace in that well-known villa on the banks of the Hudson, continuing his useful and beautiful labors to the last, and leaving to his sons the means of perfecting what he left incomplete.

But to return to Herbert Spencer, the author of "Social Statics"; or, as we call it, Jeffersonian Democracy, illustrated and applied. Unconnected with the governing classes of his own country, escaping the universities, bred to none of the professions, and inheriting but a slender patrimony, he earned a modest and precarious livelihood by contributing to the periodicals, and wrung from his small leisure the books that England needed, but would not buy. An American citizen, Professor Youmans, felt all their merit, and perceived how adapted they were to the tastes and habits of the American mind, and how skilfully the ideas upon which America is founded were developed in them. He also felt, as we have heard him say, that, next to the production of excellent works, the most useful thing a man can do in his generation is to aid in giving them currency. Aided by other lovers of his favorite author, he was soon in a position to bear part of the heavy expense of stereotyping Mr. Spencer's works; and thus Messrs. Appleton were enabled, not only to publish them, but to afford the author as large a share of the proceeds as though he had been a resident of the United States. Thus Herbert Spencer, by a happy accident, enjoys part of the advantage which would accrue to all his brethren from an International Copyright; and we have the great satisfaction of knowing, when we buy one of his volumes, that we are not defrauding our benefactor.

Charles Scribner habitually pays English authors a part of the profit derived from their republished works. Max Mueller, Mr. Trench, and others who figure upon his list, derive revenue from the sale of their works in America. Mr. Scribner considers it both his duty and his interest to acquire all the right to republish which a foreign author can bestow; and he desires to see the day when the law will recognize and secure the most obvious and unquestionable of all rights, the right of an author to the product of his mind.

We trust Messrs. Ticknor and Fields will not regard it as an affront to their delicacy if we allude here to facts which recent events have in part disclosed to the public. This house, on principle, and as an essential part of their system, send to foreign authors a share of the proceeds of their works, and this they have habitually done for twenty-five years. The first American edition of the Poems of Mr. Tennyson, published by them in 1842, consisted of one thousand copies, and it was three years in selling; but upon this edition a fair acknowledgment in money was sent to the poet. Since that time, Mr. Tennyson has received from them a certain equitable portion of the proceeds of all the numerous editions of his works which they have issued. Mr. Fields, with great labor and some expense, collected from periodicals and libraries a complete set of the works of Mr. De Quincey, which the house published in twenty-two volumes, the sale of which was barely remunerative; but the author received, from time to time, a sum proportioned to the number of volumes sold. Mr. Fields has been recently gathering the "Early and Late Papers" of Mr. Thackeray, one volume of which has been published, to the great satisfaction of the public. Miss Thackeray has already received a considerable sum for the sale of the first edition. Mr. Browning, Mr. Hughes, Mr. Reade, the Country Parson, Mr. Kingsley, Mr. Matthew Arnold, Dr. John Brown, Mr. Mayne Reid, Mr. Dickens, have been dealt with in a similar manner; some of them receiving copyright, and others a sum of money proportioned to the sale or expected sale of their works. Nor has the appearance of rival editions been allowed to diminish the author's share of the profits realized upon the editions published with their consent. Mr. Tennyson counts upon the American part of his income with the same certainty as upon that which he derives from the sale of his works in England, although he cannot secure his Boston publishers the exclusive market of the United States. We dare not comment upon these facts, because, if we were to indulge our desire to do so, the passage would be certain "to turn up missing" upon the printed page, since Messrs. Ticknor and Fields live two hundred miles nearer the office of the Atlantic Monthly than we do. Happily, comment is needless. Every man who has either a conscience or a talent for business will recognize either the propriety or the wisdom of their conduct. Upon this rock of fair-dealing the eminent and long-sustained prosperity of this house is founded.

The following note appeared recently in "The Athenaeum":--

"May I, without egotism, mention in your paper that
Messrs. Harper, of New York, have sent me, quite
unsolicited, a money acknowledgment for reprinting, in
their cheap series, two of my novels, 'Lizzie Lorton of
Greyrigg' and 'Sowing the Wind.' At a time when so many
complaints are being made of American publishers, it
is pleasant to be able to record this voluntary act of
grace and courtesy from so influential a house.

"E. LYNN LINTON."

Complaints, then, are made of American publishers! This is pleasant. We say again, that, after diligent inquiry, we cannot hear of one instance of an English publisher sending money to an American author for anything but advance sheets. Mr. Longfellow is as popular a poet in England as Mr. Tennyson is in America, and he has, consequently, as before remarked, received considerable sums for early sheets, but nothing, we believe, upon the annual sale of his works, nothing from the voluntary and spontaneous justice of his English publishers. We have no right, perhaps, to censure men for not going beyond the requirements of law; but still less can we withhold the tribute of our homage to those who are more just than the law compels, and this tribute is due to several publishers on this side of the Atlantic. But then there remains the great fact against us, that England is willing to-day, and we are not, to throw the protection of international law around this most sacred interest of civilization.

Would that it were in our power to give adequate expression to the mighty debt we owe, as a people, to the living and recent authors of Europe! But who can weigh or estimate the invisible and widely diffused influence of a book? There are sentences in the earlier works of Carlyle which have regenerated American souls. There are chapters in Mill which are reforming the policy of American nations. There are passages in Buckle which give the key to the mysteries of American history. There are lines in Tennyson which have become incorporated into the fabric of our minds, and flash light and beauty upon our daily conversation. There are characters in Dickens which are extinguishing the foibles which they embody, and pages of Thackeray which kill the affectations they depict. What a colossal good to us is Mr. Grote's "History of Greece"! Miss Mulock, George Eliot, Charles Reade, Charlotte Bronte, Kinglake, Matthew Arnold, Charles Kingsley, Ruskin, Macaulay,--how could we spare the least of them? Take from our lives the happiness and the benefit which we have derived from the recent authors of Europe; take from the future the silent, ceaseless working of their spirits,--so antidotal to all that remains in us of colonial, provincial, and superstitious,--and what language could state, ever so inadequately, the loss we and posterity should experience? And let us not lay the mean unction to our souls that money cannot repay such services as these. It can! It can repay it as truly and as fully as sixpence pays for a loaf of bread that saves a shipwrecked hero's life. The baker gets his own; he is satisfied, and holy justice is satisfied. This common phrase, "making money," is a poor, mean way of expressing an august and sacred thing; for the money which fairly comes to us, in the way of our vocation, is, or ought to be, the measure of our worth to the community we serve. It is honor, safety, education, leisure, children's bread, wife's dignity and adornment, pleasant home, society, an independent old age, comfort in dying, and solace to those we leave behind us. Money is the representative of all the substantial good that man can bestow on man. And money justly earned is never withheld without damage to the withholder and to the interest he represents.

We often think of the case of Dion Boucicault, the one man now writing the English language who has shown a very great natural aptitude for telling a story in the dramatic form. For thirty years we have been witnessing his plays in the United States. A fair share of the nightly receipts of the theatres in which they were played would have enriched him in the prime of his talent, or, in other words, have delivered him from that temptation to over-production which has wellnigh destroyed his powers. He never received any revenue from us until he came here and turned actor. He gets a little money now by associating with himself an American friend, who writes a few sentences of a play, then brings it to New York and disposes of it to managers as their joint production. But what an exquisite shame it is for us to compel an artist to whom we owe so many delightful hours to resort to an artifice in order to be able to sell the product of his talent! Our injustice, too, damages ourselves even more than it despoils him; for if we had paid him fairly for "London Assurance" and "Old Heads and Young Hearts," if he had found a career in the production of plays, he might not have been lured from his vocation, and might have written twenty good plays, instead of a hundred good, bad, indifferent, and atrocious. We cheat him of our part of the just results of his lifetime's labor, and he flings back at us his anathema in the form of a "Flying Scud." Think of Sheridan Knowles, too, deriving nothing from our theatres, in which his dramas have been worn threadbare by incessant playing! To say that they are trash is not an infinitesimal fraction of an excuse; for it is just as wrong to steal paste as it is to steal diamonds. We liked the trash well enough to appropriate it. Besides, he really had the knack of constructing a telling play, which, it seems, is one of the rarest gifts bestowed upon man, and the one which affords the most intense pleasure to the greatest number of people.

Why, we may ask in passing, did the English stage languish for so many years? It was because the money that should have compensated dramatists enriched actors; because the dramatist that wrote "Black-eyed Susan" was paid five pounds a week, and the actor that played William received four thousand pounds during the first run of the play. In France, where the drama flourishes, it is the actor who gets five pounds a week, and the dramatist who gets the thousands of pounds for the first run; and this just distribution of profits is infinitely the best, in the long run, for _actors_.

There is still an impression prevalent in the world, that there is no connection between good work and good wages in this kind of industry. There was never a greater mistake. A few great men, exceptional in character as in circumstances, blind like Milton, exiled like Dante, prisoners like Bunyan and Cervantes, may have written for solace, or for fame, or from benevolence; but, as a rule, _nothing gets the immortal work from first-rate men but money_. We need only mention Shakespeare, for every one knows that he wrote plays simply and solely as a matter of business, to draw money into the treasury of his theatre. He was author and publisher, actor as well, and thus derived a threefold benefit from his labors. Moliere, too, the greatest name in the literature of France, and the second in the dramatic literature of the world, was author, actor, and manager. Play-writing was the career of these great men. It was their business and vocation; and it is only in the way of his business and vocation that we can, as a rule, get from an artist the best and the utmost there is in him. Common honesty demands that a man shall do his best when he works for his own price. His honor and his safety are alike involved. All our courage and all our cowardice, all our pride and all our humility, all our generosity and all our selfishness, all that can incite and all that can scare us to exertion, may enter into the complex motive that is urging us on when we are doing the work by which we earn our right to exist. Nothing is of great and lasting account,--not religion, nor benevolence, nor law, nor science,--until it is so organized that honest and able men can live by it. Then it lures talent, character, ambition, wealth, and force to its support and illustration. The whole history of literature, so far as it is known, shows that literature flourishes when it is fairly rewarded, and declines when it is robbed of its just compensation. Mr. Reade has admirably demonstrated this in his "Eighth Commandment," a little book as full of wit, fact, argument, eloquence, and delicious audacity as any that has lately appeared.

There has been but one country in which literature has ever succeeded in raising itself to the power and dignity of a profession, and it is the only country which has ever enjoyed a considerable part of the market of the world for its literary wares. This is France, which has a kind of International Copyright in its language. Educated Russia reads few books that are not French, and in every country of Christendom it is taken for granted that an educated person reads this language. Wherever in Europe or America or India or Australia many books are sold, some French books are sold. Here in New York, for example, we have had for many years an elegant and well-appointed French bookstore, in which the standard works of French literature are temptingly displayed, and the new works are for sale within three weeks after their publication in Paris. Many of our readers, too, must have noticed the huge masses of French books exhibited in some of the second-hand bookstores of Nassau Street. French books, in fact, form a very considerable part of the daily business of the bookstores in every capital of the world. Nearly one hundred subscribers were obtained in the United States for the _Nouvelle Biographie_ in forty-six volumes, the total cost of which, bound, was more than two hundred of our preposterous dollars. Besides this large and steady sale of their works in every city on earth, French authors enjoy a protection to their rights at home which is most complete, and they address a public accustomed to pay for new books a price, in determining which the author was considered. Mr. Reade informs us that a first-rate dramatic success in Paris is worth to the author six thousand pounds sterling, and that this six thousand pounds is very frequently drawn from the theatre after a larger sum has been obtained for the same work in the form of a novel.

What is the effect? Literature in France, as we have said, is one of the liberal professions. Literary men are an important and honorable order in the state. The press teems with works of real value and great cost. The three hundred French dramatists supply the theatres of Christendom with plays so excellent, that not even the cheat of "adaptation" can wholly conceal their merit. Great novels, great histories, great essays and treatises, important contributions to science, illustrated works of the highest excellence, compilations of the first utility, marvellous dictionaries and statistical works, appear with a frequency which nothing but a universal market could sustain. In whatever direction public curiosity is aroused, prompt and intelligent efforts are made to gratify it. Nothing more surprises an American inquirer than the excellent manner in which this mere task-work, these "booksellers' jobs," as we term them, are executed in Paris. That _Nouvelle Biographie_ of which we have spoken is so faithfully done, and is so free from any perverseness or narrowness of nationality, that it would be a good enterprise in any of the reading countries to publish a translation of it just as it stands. French literature follows the general law, that, as the volume of business increases, the quality of the work done improves. The last French work which the pursuit of our vocation led us to read was one upon the Mistresses of Louis XV., by Edmond and Jules de Goncourt. We need not say how such a subject as this would be treated by the cheated hirelings of the Yellow Cover. This work, on the contrary, is an intelligent historical study of a period when mistresses governed France; and the passages in the work which touch upon the adulterous tie which gave fair France over to these vampires are managed with a delicacy the most perfect. The present hope of France is in her literature. Her literary men are fast educating that interesting and virtuous people to the point when they will be able to regain their freedom and keep it safe from nocturnal conspirators. They would have done it ere now, but for the woful fact that only half of their countrymen can read, and are thus the helpless victims of a perjured Dutchman and his priests.

What the general knowledge of the French language has done for French literature, all of that, and more than that, an International Copyright law would do for the literature of Great Britain and the United States. Here are four great and growing empires, Great Britain, the United States, the Dominion of Canada, and the states of Australia, in which the same language is spoken and similar tastes prevail. In all these nations there is a spirit abroad which will never rest content until the whole population are readers, and those readers will be counted by hundreds of millions. Already they are so numerous, that one first-rate literary success, one book excellent enough to be of universal interest, would give the author leisure for life, if his rights were completely protected by international law. What a field for honorable exertion is this! And how can these empires fail to grow into unity when the cultivated intelligence of them all shall be nourished from the same sources, and bow in homage to the same commanding minds? Wanting this protection, the literature of both countries languishes. The blight of over-production falls upon immature genius, masterpieces are followed by labored and spiritless repetitions, and men that have it in them to inform and move mankind grind out task-work for daily bread. One man, one masterpiece, that is the general law. Not one eminent literary artist of either country can be named who has not injured his powers and jeoparded his fame by over-production. We do not address a polite note to Elias Howe, and ask him how much he would charge for a "series" of inventions equal in importance to the sewing-machine. We merely enable him to demand a dollar every time that _one_ conception is used. Imagine Job applied to for a "series" of Books of Job. Not less absurd is it to compel an author to try and write two Sketch-Books, two David Copperfields, two Uncle Toms, two Jane Eyres, or two books like "The Newcomes." When once a great writer has given such complete expression of his experience as was given in each of those works, a long time must elapse before his mind fills again to a natural overflow. But, alas! only a very short time elapses before his purse empties.

It was the intention of the founders of this Republic to give complete protection to intellectual property, and this intention is clearly expressed in the Constitution. Justified by the authority given in that instrument, Congress has passed patent laws which have called into exercise an amount of triumphant ingenuity that is one of the great wonders of the modern world; but under the copyright laws, enacted with the same good intentions, our infant literature pines and dwindles. The reason is plain. For a labor-saving invention, the United States, which abounds in everything but labor, is field enough, and the inventor is rewarded; while a great book cannot be remunerative unless it enjoys the market of the whole civilized world. The readers of excellent books are few in every country on earth. The readers of any one excellent book are usually very few indeed; and the purchasers are still fewer. In a world that is supposed to contain a thousand millions of people, it is spoken of as a marvel that two millions of them bought the most popular book ever published,--one purchaser to every five hundred inhabitants.

We say, then, to those members of Congress who go to Washington to do something besides make Presidents, that time has developed a new necessity, not indeed contemplated by the framers of the Constitution, yet covered by the Constitution; and it now devolves upon them to carry out the evident intention of their just and wise predecessors, which was, to secure to genius, learning, and talent the certain ownership of their productions. We want an international system which shall protect a kind of property which cannot be brought to market without exposing it to plunder,--property in a book being simply the right to multiply copies of it. We want this property secured, for a sufficient period, to the creator of the value, so that no property in a book can be acquired anywhere on earth unless by the gift or consent of the author thereof. There are men in Congress who feel all the magnitude and sacredness of the debt which they owe, and which their country owes, to the authors and artists of the time. We believe such members are more numerous now than they ever were before,--much more numerous. It is they who must take the leading part in bringing about this great measure of justice and good policy; and, as usual in such cases, some one man must adopt it as his special vocation, and never rest till he has conferred on mankind this immeasurable boon.

FOOTNOTES:

[2] Upon this expression Mr. Reade justly remarks: "This is a foolish and inapplicable phrase. Free trade is free buying and selling, not free stealing."

THE FLIGHT OF THE GODDESS.

A man should live in a garret, I think,
And have few friends, and be poorly clad,
With an old hat stopping the wind in the chink,
To keep the Goddess constant and glad.

Of old, when I walked on a rugged way,
And gave much work for but little bread,
The Goddess dwelt with me night and day,
Sat at my table, haunted my bed.

The narrow, mean attic, I see it now!--
Its window o'erlooking the city's tiles,
The sunset's fires, and the clouds of snow,
And the river wandering miles and miles.

Just one picture hung in the room,
The saddest story that Art can tell,--
Dante and Virgil in lurid gloom
Watching the Lovers float through Hell.

Wretched enough was I sometimes,
Pinched, and harassed with vain desires;
But thicker than clover sprung the rhymes
As I dwelt like a sparrow among the spires.

Midnight filled my slumbers with song;
Music haunted my dreams by day:
Now I listen and wait and long,
But the Delphian airs have died away!

I wonder and wonder how it befell:
Suddenly I had friends in crowds;
I bade the house-tops a long farewell;
"Good by," I cried, "to the stars and clouds!

"But thou, rare soul, that hast dwelt with me,
Spirit of Poesy! thou divine
Breath of the morning, thou shalt be,
Goddess! for ever and ever mine."

And the woman I loved was now my bride,
And the house I wanted was my own;
I turned to the Goddess satisfied,--
But the Goddess had somehow flown!

Flown, and I fear she will never return!
I'm much too sleek and happy for her,
Whose lovers must hunger, and waste, and burn,
Ere the beautiful heathen heart will stir!

I call,--but she does not stoop to my cry;
I wait,--but she lingers, and ah! so long!
It was not so in the years gone by,
When she touched my lips with chrism of song.

I swear I will get me a garret again,
And let the wee wife see the sunset's fires,
And lure the Goddess, by vigil and pain,
Up with the sparrows among the spires!

For a man should live in a garret aloof,
And have few friends, and be poorly clad,
With an old hat stopping the chink in the roof,
To keep the Goddess constant and glad!

THE THRONE OF THE GOLDEN FOOT.

Early on the morning of the 13th of September, 1855, a most fantastic and picturesque procession--in which the formal and arrogant simplicities of a nice Western civilization, and the grotesque and insolent ostentations of a crude Oriental barbarism, with all the splendid riddles of its far-fetched type-and-symbolry, were blended in a rich bizarreness--formed in the main street of the western suburb of "the Immortal City" of Amarapoora, and moved toward the palace of "him who reigns over the kingdoms of Thunaparanta, Tampadepa, and all the great umbrella-bearing chiefs of the Eastern countries,"--the Lord of Earth and Water, King of the Rising Sun, Lord of the Sacred White Elephant and of all white elephants, Master of the Celestial Weapon, and Great Chief of Life and Righteousness,--called, "for short," Mendoon-men, King of Ava. An imposing deputation of Woons and other grandees, with their respective "tails," were escorting the newly arrived Envoy of the Governor-General of India, and his suite, from their Residency on the south shore of the lake Toung-ah-mah-Eing below the city, to the Hall of the Throne of the Golden Foot, there to have audience of that great, glorious, and most excellent Majesty, whose dominions are bounded only by the imagination--and here and there a British customhouse; and whose excursions of dreadful power are stayed only by the forbearing fiat of Boodh--and now and then some British bayonets.

The escort was illustrious: there were the old Nan-ma-dau-Phra Woon, or Lord-Governor of the Queen's Palace; the Woondouk Mhoung Mhon, a minister of the second order in the High Court and Council; and the Tara-Thoogyi, or Chief Judge of Amarapoora; besides other magnificos of less note, but all very fine in their heavy, wide-sleeved court robes of crimson velvet, laced with a broad edging of Benares brocade. On their heads they wore high mitres, also of crimson velvet, curving backward in a volute, and encircled at the base with a coronet of tinsel spear-heads. It is the _ton_ at court to wear these mitres excessively tight, and to carry a little ivory blade, modelled like a shoe-horn, with which the cap of honor is drawn on, and all "vagrom" locks of hair "comprehended." The _tsalwe_ (a Burman badge of nobility, derived from the Brahminical triple cord, and having three, six, nine, or even twelve threads, according to the distinction conferred on the wearer), and a trumpet-shaped ear-tube of gold, complete the official costume.

The royal presents from England, guarded by the British-Indian cavalry escort, had been sent forward over a long bridge which spanned the southern end of the Toung-ah-mah, to await on the other side the arrival of the Envoy. There was a superb carriage for the King, which, being too wide to pass the bridge, was towed across the lake on a raft.

That was a brilliant scene, the passage of the lake; and the picturesque elements almost surpassed the fantastic;--the jolly-boats of the steamers, leading the way with the men of her Majesty's 84th, followed by the Zenobia's gig, bearing the Governor-General's letter, with the Honorable East India Company's jack saucily flaunting at the bow; then other gigs and cutters, with the Envoy's suite; and, lastly, a gorgeously gilded war-boat, carrying the Envoy and the Woons, with fifty Burman oarsmen rowing to a wild chant. The white spire and pinnacles of the Ananda temple, with its grove of noble cotton-trees and tall palms, sharply defined against the boldly diversified ranges of the Shan Mountains, formed the background of the picture, which derived rich color and grotesque action from the Burmese soldiers of the Envoy's guard lining the banks, and the hurly-burly of half-naked, splashing villagers, waist-deep in the lake,--_salvages coupes_.

First in the procession went the cases of royal presents, borne by Burmese porters on bamboo litters, and followed by four Arab horses and an English carriage for the King; next came the cavalry and infantry of the Envoy's Anglo-Indian escort, preceded by a band; behind these, the Secretary of the mission on an elephant, with the Governor-General's letter under the Company's jack; the Envoy (Major Phayre) in a _tonjon_, attended by the Nan-ma-dau Woon and the Woondouk on elephants; the British superintending surgeon in Pegu, and the Tara-Thoogyi; a British special deputy commissioner for the frontier, and one of the Tsa-re-dau-gyis, or Royal Scribes; and all the rest of the British officials, each paired with a Burmese _thoo-gyi_ or "great man," in a Burmese howdah.[3]

The route lay through the street called Ambassador's Row,--the very one by which the Chinese Envoys entered Amarapoora sixty years before,--toward the western central gate of the city. From lake to palace the way was fenced with troops; but such troops!--fishermen and convicts, old men and boys,--probably old women too, and girls,--the he and she Warts, Mouldys, Shadows, Feebles, and Bullcalfs of the Immortal City. At every cross street were officers on elephants, "men in gilt Mambrino helmets and mountebank costumes, decked out with triple buckram capes, and shoulder lappets, and paltry embroidery." But there were men in red jackets and _papier-mache_ helmets accompanying the procession, who appeared to be more at home with their arms than these motley musketeers. Inside the city the streets were flooded with water from a heavy rain the night before, and here the soldiers were propped on little stools of bamboo, to keep them out of the mud, while the officers occupied higher perches, each with his spittoon and his box of betel. A great rabble of spectators, of whom many were women,--not all uncomely or shabbily attired,--peeped through the endless white lattice, or thronged the cross-streets,--all still and silent, with wonder or suspicion.

Just as the escort, with fixed bayonets and martial music, turned up the street leading to the eastern gate of the palace, and, halting, faced inward for the party to pass, the procession of the Ein-she-men, or heir apparent, (Lord of the Eastern Palace,) came suddenly up from another road, and crossed before them to enter the enclosure,--a stale trick of Burmese jealousy and insolence to keep them waiting at the palace gate. Precedent, which is a god in Burmah, has bestowed a sort of respectability upon this exploit in bad manners, every British envoy having been treated so, from Fleetwood to Phayre. The prince himself was conspicuous in a massive gilded litter, borne by many sturdy fellows elaborately tattooed, while eight long-shafted gold umbrellas flashed over his head. When he had entered the gate, and it was closed behind him, his retinue, consisting of several hundred soldiers, performed some intricate and tedious evolutions, countermarching round an open circle, with the manifest purpose of magnifying the apparent strength of the force, as well as of prolonging the detention of the unwelcome strangers.

When Colonel Burney, who was sent as Resident to Ava in 1830, was detained by the same manoeuvre at the stockade which encircles the palace wall, some of his party were sharp enough to discover that many of the retainers, as well as of the elephants and bands of music, after passing in the suite of one prince, made a sly circuit to the rear, and appeared as part of the tail of another prince.

As the Envoy and his suite dismounted, noon was struck by alternate strokes on a great bell and a great drum, mounted on a square tower within the gate called "Ywe-dau-yoo-Taga," or the Royal Gate of the Chosen, because it is guarded by picked troops. By this gate they entered; but first the Envoy took the Governor-General's letter from the Secretary, and carried it himself. The Nan-ma-dau-Phra Woon and his august colleagues now threw off their shoes, and the Woondouk strove ineffectually to induce the representative of Great Britain to follow their loyal example. At four different points, as they advanced to the inner gate, they even dropped on their knees, and _shikhoed_, with their faces in the dust, toward the palace; and again Burmah pressed Bull to take part in the pious services, but the obstinate infidel _Kala_[4] would not; for you see the world has moved, and Anglo-Saxon backbones have stiffened, since Fleetwood wrote, in 1695: "As the palace gates were opened we fell down upon our knees, and made three bows (_shikhos_), which done, we entered the garden, the presents following; and having gone about half-way from the gate to the place where the king was seated, we made three bows again as before. When we got within fifteen yards of the king, we made three bows again, and were ordered to sit down." Between Fleetwood and Phayre are two wars, several annexations, "a lot" of custom-houses, and "no end" of bomb-shells.

The gilded colonnade, and the many-storied spire, conspicuous from all sides of the city; the great inner court, with its groups of tumblers, jugglers, and dancers, performing in the corners for the entertainment of privileged spectators; the dirty grand-staircase, where, to their lively disgust, the distinguished strangers, Envoy and all, had to leave their shoes; the long wings of the structure, curiously resembling the transepts of a cathedral; the choir-like centre; the altar-like throne; the tall, lacquered columns, picked out in red at the base, and all ablaze with gilding;--by these the great Hall of Audience was known; and here, on a carpet in the centre, facing the throne, the Envoy and his party seated themselves, doubling their legs behind them.

On a broad dais blazed the high throne, in all its barbaric gorgeousness of carving and gilding,--competing in splendor with the awful seats of Guadma in the temples, and surpassing the glory of the pulpit from which the High Poonghyi[5] chants the beatitudes of the Boodh. On the top it was luxuriously mattressed with crimson velvet, and on the left was a tall elbow-cushion for the king. A carved portal, with gilded lattice doors, opened from behind to the top level of the throne, which was wrought in a sort of mosaic of gold, silver, and mirror-work. A few small figures, representing the progenitors of the human race, occupied niches in the central band, while on the edge of the dais stood five royal emblems, in the shape of gilded shafts, with small gilt labels or scrolls, like flags, attached to them.

On each side of the dais were pew-like recesses, with railings; and rows of expanded white umbrellas, fringed with muslin valances, (the royal insignia,) were displayed along the walls behind the throne. The central hall or aisle, in which the gentlemen of the mission sat, was laid with velvet-pile carpet of Axminster or Lasswade; elsewhere there was matting merely, except where the more distinguished officers of the court had their separate carpets. A double row of young princes, in surcoats of gold and silver brocade, with gay silk _putsos_, occupied the centre aisle in front of the Envoy;--on the right, four sons of the King; on the left, four sons of the Crown Prince. Farther forward, near the steps of the dais, the Ein-she-men himself was installed, in a sort of couch or carved litter, scarcely raised above the floor. In his robes of Benares gold brocade, and his superb mitre set with precious stones, he sat still as an effigy, never turning round, but betraying his curiosity by the use he slyly made of a small looking-glass. Behind the pillars on each side, and a little in advance of the Englishmen, were the Woongyis, or principal minister of state, constituting the Hlwot-dau, the High Court and Council; and nearer to the steps of the dais were several elderly princes of the blood, "men of sensual aspect and heavy jowl, like the heads of some of the burlier Caesars,--or, with their stiff robes and jewelled tiaras, perhaps recalling certain of the old Popes."[6] Close to the Envoy's party were two of the _Atwen-woons_, or Ministers of the Interior (Household) Council, and some _Nekhan-daus_, "Royal Ears," besides other officers of the Palace and Hlwot-dau.

The Envoy, on taking his seat, had deposited the salver with the Governor-General's letter on a gilt stool covered with muslin, which had been placed there to receive it. Little gilt stands, containing trays of tobacco, pawn, _hlapet_, or pickled tea, and other curious confections, neatly set out in golden cups and saucers, together with water-goglets and gold drinking-cups, were then laid before the Kala guests, the water being faintly perfumed with musk.

At last, from some mysterious inner court of the palace came a burst of music. From the verandas behind the throne a party of musketeers filed in, and, taking position between the pillars on each side of the centre aisle, knelt down, with their double-barrelled pieces between their knees, and their hands clasped before them in an attitude of prayer.

As the last man entered the golden lattice doors, the doors rolled back into the wall, and the King was seen, mounting a stair leading from a chamber behind to the summit of the throne. He ascended slowly, using his golden-sheathed _dhar_ as a staff to his laboring steps; and no wonder, for his jewelled robe alone weighed one hundred pounds. Having dusted the _gudhi_ with his own hand, by means of a small _chowree_, or fly-flapper, he had brought with him, he took his seat on the left side of the throne, resting his elbow on the velvet cushion, which had been covered with a napkin. Then the Queen, who had followed him closely, seated herself by his side,--on the right, and a little behind him,--where she received from the hands of female attendants, who showed themselves but for a moment, the golden spittoon and other ungraceful conveniences, which, on all occasions and in all places, must be at the elbow of every Burmese dignitary. Next, she fanned herself for a few moments, and then she fanned the King; and finally, having been served with a lighted cheroot by the shy fingers of some mysterious maid of honor, she smoked in silent expectation.

The Lord of White Elephants and Righteousness is a portly man, with refined features, an agreeable and intelligent expression, and delicate hands. He wore a sort of long tunic, or surcoat, so thickly set with jewels that the material, a kind of light-colored silk, was overlaid and almost hidden. _Tha-ra-poo_, the crown, is a round tiara of similar material, in shape like an Indian morion, surmounted by a spire-like ornament several inches high, and expanding in flaps or wings over each ear.

The Queen, who, like all her predecessors, is her husband's half-sister, wore a perfectly close cap, covering hair and ears, and forming, as it rose, a conical crest, with the point curved forward in a volute, like the horn of a rhinoceros, or the large nipper of a crab's claw; close lappets hung over the cheeks. The rest of her Majesty's dress was oddly Elizabethan; the sleeves and skirt in "successive overlapping scalloped lappets"; around the throat a high collar, also scalloped or vandyked, and continued in front to the waist, where blazed a stomacher, or breast-plate, of great gems. Both cap and robe were stiff with diamonds. The Queen's name is Tsoo-phragyi, and she is the eldest daughter of her husband's father, King Tharawadi.

On a pedestal between their Majesties, in front of the throne, stood a great golden figure of the _Henza_, or Sacred Goose,--the national emblem.

When the awful pair had fairly entered, the Englishmen for the first time took off their hats; but the entire audience of subjects bowed their faces to the earth, and clasped their hands before them. "The two rows of little princes, who lay in file, doubled over one another like fallen books on a shelf, and the two Atwen-woons, grovelled forward, in their frog-like attitude, to a point about half-way to the throne."

Then some eight or ten Brahmins (two of whom are court astrologers), in white stoles, and white mitres encircled with gold leaves, entered the screened pew-like recesses near the throne, and struck up a choral chant in Sanscrit; which done, one of them immediately followed in a solo hymn in Burmese, which is thus translated by the Envoy, Major Phayre:--

1. "May the dangers and enmity which arise from the Ten Points be calmed and subdued! May the affliction of disease never attach itself to thee; and in accordance with the blessings declared in the sacred Pali, mayest thou be continually victorious! May thy life be prolonged for more than a hundred years, and may thy glory continue till the end of the world! Mayest thou enjoy whatever is propitious, and may all evil be far from thee,--O KING!

2. "Thy glorious reputation diffuses itself like the scent of the sandal-wood, and exceeds the refulgence of the moon! Lord of the Celestial Elephant,--of the Excellent White Elephant! Master of the Celestial Weapon! Lord of Life, and Great Chief of Righteousness! Lineal descendant of Mahatha-mada and Mahadha-mayadza! Like unto the Kings of the Universe, who governed the four great islands of the solar system, and were versed in charms and spells of fourteen descriptions, may thy glory be prolonged, and thy life be extended, to more than a hundred years! Mayest thou enjoy whatever is propitious, and may all evil be far from thee,--O KING!

3. "Great Chief of Righteousness! whose fame spreads like the fragrance of sandal-wood, and exceeds the glorious light of the moon,--in whom is concentrated all glory and honor,--who, with her Majesty, the Queen, the lineal descendant of anointed kings, happily governest all,--may thy rule extend, not only to the great Southern Island (the earth), which is tens of thousands of miles in extent, but to all the four grand and five hundred smaller Islands! May it equal the stability of the mountains Yoo-gan-toh, Myen-mo, and Hai-ma-garee; and until the end of the world mayest thou and thy descendants continue in unbroken line, unto the royal son and royal great-grandson, that thy glory may endure for countless ages! And may thy royal life be prolonged for more than a hundred years,--O KING!

4. "May our king be continually victorious! When the divine Buddha ascended the golden throne, all created beings inhabiting millions of worlds became his subjects, and he overcame all enemies. So may kings by hundreds and thousands, and tens of thousands, come with offerings of celestial weapons, white elephants, flying horses, virgins, and precious stones of divers sorts, and do homage to the Golden Feet, which resemble the germs of the lotos,--O KING!"

Now, even for an exploit in poetical license, that is sublimely cool, considering that a mere yesterday of thirty years has sufficed to strip the Throne of the Golden Foot of dominions which were the gradual acquisition of more than two bloody centuries of drunken lust, and that the dread Lord of Life and Master of the Celestial Weapon well knew that day that he no longer had access to the sea save through many leagues of British territory,--considering that the chronicle of the Burmese kings is one of the bloodiest chapters in the book of Time, a record of hell-engendered monsters, conceived in incest, brought forth in insanity, trained to the very sport of slaughter, and doomed to quick assassination or the most summary deposition and disgrace,--considering that even this "just and humane" Mendoon-men himself had deposed his cock-fighting brother, the Pagan-men, and sacked and burned his capital, and that even now he held him a close prisoner, poor and despised, in a corner of the fortified city,--and finally, that even as that paean of infatuation ascends to the besotted ears of the King, given up of God to believe lies, his own brother, the Ein-she-men, possessed of a devil of precedent, crouches like a tiger below the dais, and plots assassination and usurpation in his cunning bit of looking-glass.

The chants concluded, the Tara-Thoogyi read from a _parabeik_, or black note-book, an address to the King, stating that the offerings his Majesty purposed making to certain pagodas at the capital were ready. "Let them be dedicated!" said one of the officials solemnly; and the music was renewed. This dedication, the chant of the Brahmins, and the singular ceremony of _A-beit-theit_ (literally, a pouring out of water on a solemn occasion), together constitute the formal inauguration of a royal sitting. Then the Governor-General's letter was drawn from its cover, and read aloud by a Than-daugan, or Receiver of the Royal Voice, who also read the list of presents for the King and Queen. A railway model, contributed by Sir Macdonald Stephenson, was immediately produced and exhibited in the Hall,--the only one of the presents uncovered there,--and excited lively interest among the Burmese. All the readings were intoned in a high recitative, like the English Cathedral service; and the long-drawn "Phra-a-a-a!" (My Lord!) was delivered like the "Amen" of the Liturgy.

After this, his Majesty, without moving his lips, but speaking by an Atwen-woon, who discharged for that occasion the function of Royal Tongue, condescended to address to the Envoy three formal questions, prescribed by custom and precedent, thus:--

_Royal Tongue._ "Is the English ruler well?"

_Envoy._ "The English ruler is well."

_Receiver of the Royal Voice_ (in a loud tone). "By reason of your Majesty's great glory and excellence, the English ruler is well; and therefore, with obeisance, I represent the same to your Majesty."

_Royal Tongue._ "How long is it since you left the English country?"

_Envoy._ "It is now fifty-five days since we left Bengal, and have arrived, and lived happily, at the Royal City."

_Receiver of the Royal Voice._ "By reason of your Majesty's great glory and excellence it is fifty-five days since the Envoy left the English country, and he has now happily arrived at the Golden Feet. Therefore, with obeisance," &c., &c.

_Royal Tongue._ "Are the rain and air propitious, so that the people live in happiness and ease?"

_Envoy._ "The seasons are favorable, and the people live in happiness."

_Receiver of the Royal Voice._ "By reason of your Majesty's great glory and excellence, the rain and air are propitious, and the people live in happiness."

And here the awful conversation came to a profound close. Gifts were presently bestowed on all the officers of the mission;--to the Envoy a gold cup embossed with the zodiacal signs, a fine ruby, a tsalwe of nine cords, and a handsome putso; to other officers, a plain gold cup, ring, and putso, or a ring and putso only.

Then the King rose to depart, the Queen assisting him to rise, and afterward using the royal dhar to help herself up. "They passed through the gilded lattice, the music played again, the doors rolled out from the wall, and we were told that we might retire."

On the twenty-first, Major Phayre had a private interview, by appointment, with the King. The reception was almost _en famille_. As the Envoy approached the palace, he found the assembled court under a circular temporary building, called a _Mandat_, where music and dancing were going on,--the King half reclined on a kind of sofa in a room raised several feet above the level of the mandat. The Envoy was led forward and shown to a place among the ministers, who, as well as all the rest of the company, were seated on the ground,--only the dancers standing. Outside squatted guards in red jackets, with red _papier-mache_ helmets, and muskets with the buts resting between their legs. Eight couples of men and women were dancing. The King did not speak to Major Phayre, but, on the contrary, retired as he entered, and sent him word that he would see him in another room; where again he found his Majesty reclining on a sofa, no longer in imperial costume, but the ordinary garb of the country,--a silk putso, or waist-cloth, of gay colors, a white cotton jacket, reaching a little below the hips, and a single fillet of book-muslin twisted round his head. On his left, at a little distance, were some half-dozen of his sons, "of all ages up to sixteen years," crouching on the ground, with their chins touching it. A band of girls in fantastic court-dresses were in an anteroom, discoursing soft music on stringed instruments. One of the Atwen-woons, with several other officers of the court, and a few pages, had followed the Envoy, and now sat together near the end of the room. The King held up his hand, and the music ceased. He then requested the Envoy to notice some large imitation lotos-flowers in a vase; and as he spoke, the buds, which had been closed, suddenly expanded, and out of one of them flew a solitary sparrow. The king smiled, and one of the company said, "Each bud had a bird imprisoned, but they managed to escape, all but this one."

Then the King said to the Envoy, "Have you read the Mengala-thoot?"

"I have, your Majesty."

"Do you know the meaning of it?"

"I do. I have read the Burmese interpretation."

"How many precepts does it contain?"

"Thirty-eight."

"Do you remember them?"

The Envoy did not; so the King repeated some of the precepts of this summary of beatitude,--a sermon of Guadma's, containing thirty rules of life, against pride, anger, evil associates, and the like.