Chapter X: Brown Bread And Bonnyclabber (3)

At last we reached the top of the ascent. The descent on the other side was a worthy pendant to it. We halted on the crest to enjoy the landscape before us. From the base of the height a level plain spread away for miles, unbroken save by a cluster of lofty perpendicular white rocks, each rising independently from the level plain. On the top of the highest of these rocks stood a little town, the smoke from its chimneys mingling with the clouds. This was Acoma.

We descended slowly and carefully. A brisk trot of about two miles brought us to two lofty natural columns, through which the trail passed. They seemed the pillars of a gigantic portal—a resemblance which had struck the Indians, for they named it El Puerto: The Gate. We had now reached the base of the inhabited rock. An excavation near the base was pointed out to us by Salvador as the trace of an attempt to mine the position by the Spanish invaders! I think the story rather a doubtful one.

I judged the rock to be about two hundred and fifty feet in height. The path up the rocky side to the village was steep and narrow. No wheeled vehicle has ever entered the Pueblo. The primitive _carreta_, with its clumsy wheels of solid disks cut from the trunk of some gigantic cotton‐ wood, stopped short at the base—going thus far and no further. Provisions and other necessaries are packed up on the backs of surefooted donkeys. Water for drinking purposes is carried up on the heads of the Indians in large earthen vessels named _tinajas_; for other uses rain‐water is carefully gathered in natural tanks or hollows in the summit of the rock. There is a bypath or short‐cut up to the Pueblo which the Acomas generally use when unburdened or in a hurry. A glance showed us that it was only practicable for Acoma Indians. This short‐cut is in the most nearly perpendicular of any of the rocky sides. It consists of holes in the smooth and vertical side of the rock, in which the Indians place their hands and feet, and climb up after the fashion of sailors clambering up rigging, and with no less rapidity.

We returned to the common highway, which now seemed by comparison a flowery path of dalliance. It was slow and tiresome work, however. After a rest or two, to breathe our animals and ourselves, we finally reached the comparatively level space, some acres in area, on the summit of the rock.

Here we were met by Francisco, our guide’s son, the governor, matadores, alguazils, and other functionaries of the Pueblo. This is as good a place as any other to say that the governor and all other officials are elected annually. They were dressed in the usual Pueblo fashion. Their heads were uncovered. They were draped in large blankets, which gave them a very dignified appearance.

We received a most cordial reception. The commandant had been a good friend to the Acomas—had protected them in their little trading operations, and helped them in the long, hard winters when their granaries were empty. The entire male population was assembled in the Plaza or central square. The squaws and children were at their front doors, that is to say, on the roofs, for the entrance to a Pueblo’s dwelling is from above.

A fire for the dragoons to cook their rations by was made in the centre of the Plaza. The horses were picketed around. A contribution of corn and firewood was levied by the governor for the use of the escort. The Indians came in cheerful, laughing groups, bearing their _costals_ of corn or their bundles of wood. The escort being provided for, we went to the house of Francisco, the most comfortable house in the Pueblo; for Francisco was the wealthiest member of the little community. The governor’s dwelling was a poor one, and himself a poor man who was unable to entertain us as comfortably as Francisco could. He accompanied us thither.

Francisco’s dwelling, like most of the others in the Pueblo, was a two‐ storied adobe building, whitewashed inside and out. The mode of access was a ladder placed against the outer wall of the lower story. Having reached the top of this, you walk across the roof and enter the house by a door on the second story, the façade of which is somewhat retired from the front line of the first.

Here we found some rosy, apple‐faced squaws, engaged in culinary and other domestic operations. One was kneeling grinding corn with the primitive _matata_. They smiled with all their countenances on us; and a half‐dozen of the whitest sets of teeth, that dentist or dentifrice never touched, gleamed a bright welcome to us. They wore the usual dark woollen robe, made of two pieces, about five feet long and three broad, sewed together at one of the narrow ends, but with an aperture for the head to pass through. The robe is then gathered round the waist and tied with a string. Their nut‐brown arms were bare, and encircled at the wrist by from one to a dozen brass rings; their feet were bare. The thick swathing of buckskin, with which they wrap their lower limbs when journeying, and which gives them the appearance of being terribly swollen, were laid aside, much to the furthering of a graceful effect.

We were invited to descend to the sitting‐room, situated beneath, through a very narrow trap‐door. Don Juan walked fearlessly toward the aperture. We begged him to pause before he rushed into a place whence he could never hope to return. The Indians understood the joke, and enjoyed it hugely.

So the Don entered the aperture, and by judicious squeezing actually succeeded in passing. His coat‐tails got through about the same time as his head. The others, being of the lean and hungry‐looking kind, had no difficulty in descending.

From the room into which we had descended ventilation was completely excluded. Light was only admitted through one or two small panes of glass in apertures like port‐holes in the walls.

We took seats on sheep‐skins spread in a circle around the floor. The commandant made known his business in passable Spanish; the governor replied, through Francisco, as interpreter. The worthy Don intervened, from time to time, between the high contracting parties, when there was a lack of language or danger of misunderstanding. The business was completed satisfactorily and in short order.

While the floor was being set for dinner—tables not being in vogue here—we endeavored to obtain the Acoma’s idea of the antiquity of the Pueblo. Francisco, though he had learned to read and write, had not got beyond the Indian idea of time, space, or number. There is no medium between “many” and “few”—very far, _muy lejos_; and near, _cerca_.

“How many years old is the Pueblo?”

“_Muchos años._—Many years.”

“About how many?”

“Who knows, señor?” with a shrug. “A great many.”

“Who is the oldest man in the Pueblo?”

“The cacique.”

The cacique, we were informed, is the official historian of the Pueblo. His records consist only in oral traditions, which he teaches to a youth selected for the purpose, who is to succeed him in his office when he dies.

“Is the cacique very old?”

“Si, señor! Very old.”

It is useless to ask an Indian how old he or any other Indian is, as he never knows. So we did not ask how old the cacique was.

“Was the cacique he succeeded very old?”

“Yes, sir; very old.”

“Was the Pueblo in existence as long as he can remember?”

“Yes, sir; and as long as the cacique before him and the cacique before him could remember. But we shall have the cacique here shortly, and then after dinner we’ll have a good big talk about the many years ago.”

Francisco, the governor, and his father now engaged in an earnest conversation in their Indian tongue, the result of which was that Francisco unlocked a vast trunk, of antique form and solidity, and took therefrom a pile of manuscript, which he handed us with great solemnity. The Indians looked upon this venerable pile with great reverence. It was probably the first time it had been touched by “outsiders.” We owed the permission to examine it to the many kind acts the commandant had performed for the Acomas.

The first portion of the manuscript examined was a Missal. The Office of the Mass was copied in Latin in a fair plain hand, the work of some Spanish missionary. The ink had turned yellow, but the text was clear and legible throughout. Nothing in the MS. Missal indicated the date of its writing. A further examination of the venerable pages furnished us some information. Besides the Missal, they comprised a register in Spanish of births, marriages, and deaths. The earliest written record of the Pueblo which we found is the record of a baptism, 1725.

Having gleaned what knowledge we could from the precious manuscripts, they were carefully and reverently put away in the ponderous chest, and secured by a padlock nearly as large as a travelling satchel.

Dinner was now served. It was very good. It consisted of a chicken stew, good white bread, and very passable tea. The stew was made so intensely hot, however, by _chile colorado_,(229) that I did not enjoy it as much as I might have done had it been less fiery. I never could relish _chile_ either _colorado_ or _verde_. But on this occasion, I determined to eat it if it burned me to a shell to show my appreciation of Acoma hospitality!

The cacique—an old, white‐haired, blear‐eyed Indian, at least ninety—came in toward the close of the meal, accompanied by the youth whom he was instructing in the historical and legendary lore of the Pueblo. He evinced no inclination to be communicative, but showed a determination to make a rousing meal—something to which he was evidently not accustomed. After dinner he devoted himself to smoking our cigars; but not a word could we get out of him about the history of Acoma. Joe said that as a story‐teller he considered the cacique a decided failure.

The governor signified that he was now ready to show us the church. So thither we proceeded.

The church is, of course, of adobe. It was unused at the time we visited it. No priest had been attached to the Pueblo for some years. But it was not suffered to fall into decay. On one side of the altar was a painting of the Virgin and Child; on the other, one of S. Joseph. On the ceiling above the altar were large paintings of the sun and moon. Here we got another chronological glimmer—the last we found. It was an inscription which stated that the church had been renovated in 1802. The Indians told us it was done by some artist‐priest who came from far away—probably Spain or Italy. There are a pair of bells in the belfry. The Acoma tradition is that these bells were a gift to the Pueblo from a Queen of Spain. Of course they do not know the date of their reception. They say, however, that it was some time before the renovation of the church.

We next went to the southern edge of the rock to look at the “short cut” from above. This was not easy or pleasant pedestrianism. The rock here ceased to be level, throwing up sharp craggy points. The Indians stepped from point to point, erect and graceful and without difficulty. The pale faces were compelled by a due discretion to abandon erect attitudes, and proceed bending down, and using hands as well as feet. A look down the rocky side was sufficient. The commandant shook his head, and said in Spanish:

“That is no way for a white man to come up”—a remark which the Indians seemed to consider remarkably humorous. They laughed and “how‐how”‐ed vehemently.

As we returned, we remarked that on one side of the rock it was bevelled down from the summit about forty or fifty feet, and then resumed its general steep and vertical character. Some houses were situated near the superior edge of this bend. A thrill ran through me from head to foot as I saw a child roll from the front of one of the houses down the incline.

“He will be dashed to atoms!” I cried in horror.

The Indians looked in the direction to which I frantically pointed, and then united in a good‐humored laugh.

Soon another urchin, and another, and another followed the first, who picked himself up just at the deadly brink, and mounted the incline, to roll down again and again, as we used to on a hillside in snow with our sleds, in our younger days. This was play for the infantine Acomas. They were “keeping the pot a‐bilin’.”

The Indians told us that no fatal accident had ever happened to any Acoma either while rolling down the dread incline “in pretty, pleasant play,” or climbing the steep path the mere sight of which had made us dizzy. Tradition records that only one Indian ever “went over the side.” He was saved by a projecting stump catching him by the breech‐clout and holding him suspended until he was rescued—unhurt.

Our next visit was the _Estufa_. Here the sacred fire was burning. The _Estufa_ was an underground apartment. We descended through a trap‐door, which also served as a chimney, and down a smoke‐begrimed ladder. The chamber was some thirty feet in length and perhaps fifteen in width. We were informed that it was the general place of meeting—the public hall—the club‐room of the Pueblo. It was pretty hot and not very sweet down there. We found four Indians seated around the fire, each with a loom in front of him, weaving a blanket. Their only covering was the breech‐clout. The Indians told us, through Don Juan, that these men watched the fire, which was always kept burning—waiting for the coming of Montezuma. They were relieved by four others at stated times. We shook hands with the naked watchers, and “how‐how”‐ed with them in the usual way.

“Do you think Montezuma will come?” asked Joe, through Don Juan, of one of the vigilants.

The worthy, shrugging his naked shoulders, looked up sidewise at Joseph, and replied:

“_Quizas? Quien sabe?_—May be! Who knows?”

Joe withdrew. We all followed him. We had now seen all the lions of the Pueblo of Acoma. “Boots and saddles” and “to horse” were sounded, and with many hand‐shakes, some embraces, and general “how‐hows,” we bade adieu to the hospitable Acomas and their rocky home, and began our return march.

New Publications.

THE LIFE OF DEMETRIUS AUGUSTIN GALLITZIN, PRINCE AND PRIEST. By
Sarah M. Brownson. With an Introduction by O. A. Brownson, LL.D.
New York: Pustet. 1872.

Women of talent and cultivation make admirable biographers. In religious biography we know of nothing more charming than the lives written by Mère Chauguy. In recent English literature, the Lives of Mother Margaret Mary O’Halloran, by a lady whose name is unknown to us, and of S. Jane Frances de Chantal, by Miss Emily Bowles, are among the most perfect specimens of this very agreeable species of writing which we have met with in any language. This new and carefully prepared biography of a priest who was illustrious both by birth and Christian virtue, by a lady already known as the author of several works of fiction, well deserves to be classed with the best of its kind in English Catholic literature. It is a work of thorough, patient, and conscientious labor, and for the first time adequately presents the history and character of Prince Gallitzin in their true light. Certainly, we never knew before how truly heroic and admirable a man was this Russian prince who came to pass his life as a missionary in the forests which crowned in his day the summit of the Alleghanies in Pennsylvania. The charm of a biography is found in a certain fulness and sprightliness of style and manner, a picturesqueness and ideality of ornament and coloring, a warmth and glow of sentiment, which give life and reality to the narrative. Miss Brownson still possesses the juvenile _élan_ which naturally finds its expression in the style we have indicated, and has also attained that sobriety and maturity of judgment which give it the rightly subdued tone and finish. In several matters of considerable delicacy which she has been obliged to handle, we think she has shown tact and discretion, while at the same time using enough of the freedom of a historian to bring out the truth of facts and events which needed to be told in order to make a veritable record and picture of the life of her subject. The prince is fortunate in his biographer. Would it were the lot of every great man in the church to find a similar one! Miss Brownson’s book seems to us the best religious biography which has been written by anyone of our American Catholic authors. We would like to see more works of this sort from feminine writers, to whom we are already so much indebted for works both of the graver and the lighter kind, and particularly from Miss Brownson, who has fully proved her ability in the volume before us.

BIBLIOGRAPHIA CATHOLICA AMERICANA. A list of works written by
Catholic authors and published in the United States. By Rev.
Joseph M. Finotti. Part I., 1784 to 1820 inclusive. New York: The
Catholic Publication Society. 1872. 8vo. pp. 319.

It was said of Bartlett’s _Dictionary of Americanisms_ that it was the first dictionary that a man could read through with pleasure. The same in the way of bibliography may be said of this; for, if any of our readers supposes that the title tells the truth, he is mistaken. It is not a mere _list_, as the author modestly calls it. Some twelve years ago, Mr. Shea published in one of our Catholic papers a list of titles of “The First Catholic Books printed in this County,” coming down to the same date and including the same period as our author, and giving sixty‐eight titles. This meagre beginning of American Catholic bibliography has in F. Finotti’s hands grown to nearly five hundred titles, including some few imprints later than 1820.

It is not merely a collection of titles of Catholic works, but of all works by Catholic authors printed in the country, with notes of the highest interest to Catholics who care at all for what was done by our fathers in the faith in this republic. Biographical notices, notices of celebrated books, accounts of controversies of the time, anecdotes illustrative of Catholic life in the earlier days, notes of Catholic printers and journalists, all find their place in these notes, in which the abundant knowledge of our earlier men and times, and things acquired by the patient and loving research of years, fairly bubble out spontaneously. It is not a history indeed, but to the historian will be invaluable as an authority and a guide.

On some points this work is absolutely exhaustive. The collection of pamphlets and works growing out of the Hogan affair in Philadelphia, considering their perishable nature, is perfectly wonderful, and his library alone can enable any one to go thoroughly into the history of that unhappy matter which was destructive to so many souls.

Of the writings and publications of the celebrated Mathew Carey, we have also here by far the most accurate and comprehensive account ever drawn up, comprising nearly twenty‐five pages.

Many will be amazed to see how many sterling Catholic books were issued early in the century, and thus be able to judge of the zeal and true religious feeling of the little body of Catholics who so generously sustained the publishers, as well as of the public spirit of a man like Bernard Dornin—in our mind, as in F. Finotti’s, the type of what a Catholic publisher should be. Of him as of many other Catholics our author gives biographical notices that we should look for in vain in all the cyclopædias and biographical dictionaries. Book notices often end with the assertion that the book should be in every family; we hardly suppose the publishers ready to supply every Catholic family in the country with a copy, for the edition is small, and must be taken up at once. It is by no means merely a book for the Dryasdust collector or antiquarian. It must find its place in the libraries of many of our gentlemen who love their religion and love books, as well as in our college libraries. We trust that it will impel all to endeavor to have some of the early printed Catholic books, as matters of laudable pride. If they can even find some that have escaped the Argus eyes of the reverend collector and his associate book‐hunters, they will, we trust, be good enough Christians to bear with equanimity even that severe trial to a bibliographer.

This _Bibliography_ commends itself to those interested in the bibliography of the country or the history of printing in the United States.

In the _Historical Magazine_ some months since there was a Bibliography of works on Unitarianism, but it was silent as to Father Kohlmann’s work, and to a sermon by a Catholic clergyman of Pittsburg. So, too, Sabin’s _Bibliopolist_ recently gave a list of books printed in Brooklyn, but was silent as to a _Catholic Doctrine_ printed there in 1817, as well as of Coate’s very curious _Reply_ to Rev. F. Richards’ supposed reasons for becoming a Catholic.

There is one strange point about American bibliography, and that is that the laborers in it have been almost exclusively from Europe. Ludewig gave the _Bibliography of Indian Languages_ and that of Local History; O’Callaghan, that of American Bibles; Harisse, that of the earliest American; Rich was a pioneer in the same field; and now Finotti gives us the Catholic element. Where are our native bibliographers?

LE LIBERALISME. LECONS DONNEES A L’UNIVERSITE LAVAL. Par l’Abbé
Benjamin Paquet, Docteur en Theologie, et Professeur à la Faculté
de Theologie. Quebec: De l’Imprimerie du _Canadien_. Brochure, pp.
100. 1872.

Lower Canada, considered both in respect to the condition of the Catholic Church therein, and to the political well‐being of its people, is an eminently fortunate region, despite the rigor of its climate. It is especially pre‐eminent in respect to the Catholic education given to young men of the leisured classes, and others who go through the intermediate and higher courses. Laval University is truly a splendid institution among many others which make Quebec an _unique_ city in Northern America. These remarks are suggested by the pamphlet before us, which is a specimen of the sound and opportune instruction given at the Laval University. The Lectures contained in it give an exposition which is both learned and clear of that most important portion of the Syllabus which relates to the errors of modern liberalism condemned in the Pontifical Acts of Pius IX. When will the Catholics of the United States enjoy privileges similar to those which are the portion of the Catholics of Lower Canada? The Abbé Paquet’s Lectures were delivered as a part of his course on the law of nature and of nations, and were attended not only by his pupils, but by a numerous and select audience, several of whom requested their publication. We have already sufficiently expressed our approbation of their doctrine and style, and they have been favorably noticed in Europe. We are confident that a considerable number of our readers will hasten to procure them, and receive great profit from their perusal.

CARDINAL WISEMAN’S WORKS. New Edition, first 3 vols. New York: P.
O’Shea.

This is a reissue of a new London edition which we most cordially commend. The first two volumes, containing the _Lectures on the Connection between Science and Revealed Religion_, have already been noticed in these pages. The third volume contains the splendid treatise on the Holy Eucharist. Cardinal Wiseman was a great writer, a great prelate, and a remarkably devout and holy man. His works are among our choicest treasures, and as such ought to be everywhere circulated and continually perused by those who wish to imbue their minds with the purest doctrine and the most valuable knowledge.

THE LIFE OF S. AUGUSTINE, BISHOP, CONFESSOR, AND DOCTOR OF THE
CHURCH. By P. E. Moriarty, D.D. Ex‐Assistant General O.S.A.
Philadelphia: Cunningham. 1873.

This is a popular biography, though proceeding from the pen of a learned man, and showing marks of erudition. The sketch is a complete one, and shows great power of generalization and condensation in the writer, with vigor and impetus of style. It is not, however, minute in respect to the saint’s public life, or his great work as a philosopher and doctor of the church. This could not be expected in a work of moderate size adapted for popular reading. There is, however, a brief summary of the saint’s writings, with a synopsis, and an account of the Augustinian Order, all of which are of interest and value to the general reader.

PHOTOGRAPHIC VIEWS; OR, RELIGIOUS AND MORAL TRUTHS REFLECTED IN
THE UNIVERSE. By F. X. Weninger, D.D., S.J. New York: P. O’Shea.
1873.

A handsomely printed volume, with a very ornamental title‐page quite appropriate to the nature of the book. The views of truth presented in this book are expressed in aphorisms. Good taste, poetic sensibility, spiritual wisdom, and the purest Christian feeling are their chief characteristics. We are disposed to think this the best of F. Weninger’s works. There are many persons who take great delight in aphorisms of this kind, and we think all such readers will like this book. It is good also as a help to meditation, and a treasury of short spiritual readings for those who have not time for long ones; and will be useful to those who like to stop occasionally in more laborious occupations of the mind, and gather a little spiritual nosegay.

MEMOIRS OF MADAME DESBORDES‐VALMORE. By the late C. A. Sainte‐
Beuve. With a Selection from her Poems. Translated by Harriet W.
Preston. Boston: Roberts Brothers. 1873.

Madame Valmore was one of those poets of the affections who

“Learn in suffering what they teach in song.”

No one can look for a moment at her portrait as depicted in this touching book without feeling that the thorn is continually pressing against her gentle breast. Her poetry and her letters are the very outcry of impassioned love and grief. “I am like the Indian that sings at the stake,” she says. One of her volumes is entitled _Tears_, every line of which is a pensive sigh. Her poems are full of “the charm of that melancholy which M. de Segur calls _the luxury of grief_.” M. Michelet says: “She alone among us had the _gift of tears_—that gift which smites the rock and assuages the thirst of the soul!” M. Sainte‐Beuve calls her “the _Mater Dolorosa_ of poetry,” but that title, consecrated to a higher, diviner type of sorrow, is one that most of us would shrink from applying to ordinary mortals.

It would almost seem as if the highest, purest notes—“half ecstasy, half pain”—only spring from the soul overshadowed by sorrow, as the eyes of some birds are darkened when they are taught to sing. Mme. Valmore herself, in allusion to a brother poet, wonders “if actual misery were requisite for the production of notes that so haunt one’s memory.”

The tombs among which she used to play as a child in the old churchyard at Douai seem to have cast their funereal shadows over her whole life—shadows that lend to her sad muse so attractive a charm. One of her poems thus begins:

“Do not write. I am sad and would my life were o’er.
A summer without thee?—Oh! night of starless gloom!—
I fold the idle arms that cannot clasp thee more—
To knock at my heart’s door, were like knocking at a tomb.
Do not write.”

Mme. Valmore’s nature was eminently feminine. Her heart was her guide. She was a being of impulse and sympathy. But her instincts were so delicate and true that they were to her what reason and philosophy are to colder natures. Her imagination was thoroughly Catholic. It is only Catholicity that develops souls of such tender grace and beauty, and she was brought up under its influences. A cheerful piety, Catholic in tone, seems to have pervaded her life, and consoled and sustained her in its many dark hours. She loved to pray in the deserted aisle of some shadowy church full of mystery and peace. “She had her Christ—the Christ of the poor and forsaken, the prisoner and the slave, the Christ of the Magdalen and the good Samaritan, a Christ of the future of whom she herself has sung in one of her sweetest strains:

‘He whose pierced hands have broken so many chains,’ ”

—a line that appeals to all who have sinned and been forgiven!

In her last years she thus writes: “I see at an immense distance the Christ who shall come again. His breath is moving over the crowd. He opens his arms wide, but there are no more nails—no more for ever!”

Her devotion to Mary is constantly peeping out in her letters. After visiting a church at Brussels, she writes thus to her daughter: “To‐day we saw the black Virgin with the Child Jesus also black like his mother. These Madonnas wring my heart with a thousand reminiscences. They are nothing in the way of art, but they are so associated with my earliest and sweetest faiths that I positively adore those stiff pink‐lined veils and wreaths of perennial flowers made of cambric so stout that all the winds of heaven could never cause a leaf to flutter.”

She writes her brother: “Lift up your hat when you pass the Church of Notre Dame, and lay upon its threshold the first spring flowers you find.”

One of the most touching features of her life is her devotedness to this brother, an old soldier and pensioner in the hospital at Douai, whom she aided out of her own scanty purse, and still more by the moral support she was continually giving him in the most delicate manner; trying to ennoble his unfortunate past so as to give him dignity in his own eyes—a thing so often forgotten in our intercourse with those who are in danger of losing their self‐respect.

Mme. Valmore’s charity and sympathies were not confined to her own kindred. They responded to every appeal. The condemned criminal and prisoners of every degree excited the compassion of her heart. At a time of great distress at Lyons, she says she is “ashamed to have food and fire and two garments when so many poor creatures have none.” And yet she seems not to have had too many of the comforts of life herself. One Christmas eve she speaks of kneeling on her humble hearth—“a hearth where there is not much fire save that of her own loving, anxious heart—” to pray.

It is sad to see a woman with such a refined, poetical nature, and a heart sensitive to the last degree, condemned to a fate so chilling and unkind. But she never lost courage. Living in narrow lodgings, and on limited means, she contrived to give a certain artistic air to everything around her, and received her visitors with polished ease and self‐possession, hiding her griefs under the grace of her manner and the vivacity of her conversation. Her courage and fortitude were admirable under adverse circumstances and such afflictions as the loss of her daughters. No book not strictly religious could teach a more forcible lesson of patient, cheerful endurance—how “to suffer and be strong.” The work is elegantly translated, and is a welcome addition to the lives of celebrated French ladies already issued by the same publishers.

THE ENGLISH IN IRELAND IN THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY. By James Anthony
Froude, M.A. In 2 vols. Vol. I. New York: Scribner, Armstrong &
Co. 1873.

We have here the first volume of a new and very elaborate work by the adventurous historian of England, and chivalrous champion of Henry VIII. and his daughter Elizabeth. It might perhaps have been hoped that enough had been said of Mr. Froude in these columns, and that our readers had done with him. His reputation as a faithful historian had been sorely damaged, and indeed irretrievably ruined, by several indignant critics in England, in Scotland, and in Ireland, as well as in the United States (by the short, sharp and decisive onslaught of Mr. Meline); so that it has been an actual surprise to the literary world to find him once more tempting Providence in a new book, heralded and advertised by a course of lectures in New York. But this is the nature of the man: he must surprise and startle, or he dies; he must provoke the most wondering and angry contradiction and comment, and gratify the small feminine spite that possesses him, provided he can sting and wound like a hornet. For him, to scold is to live.

The present volume, although entitled _The English in Ireland in the Eighteenth Century_, is in fact occupied, for more than two hundred pages, with an account of the dealings of his country with Ireland during the XVIIth century, and presents his views of Irish history at the notable periods of the insurrection—or alleged “massacre”—in 1641, as well as the short reign of James II. The narrative ends at the time of the small French invasion under Thurot, shortly after the middle of the XVIIIth century; leaving Still to be treated the whole era of the Volunteering, the Insurrection of ’98, and the Union, so‐called. Indeed, if the author carry forward his subject into the present century, as he has carried it backward into the one before the last, he will have the great famines to deal with, and the multitudinous emigration; so that we may expect a vast picture, covering the whole canvas, portraying from the strictly English point of view that ghastly history in its full perspective. The Froude theory is, on the whole, quite simple; nothing can be more easily understood. It is, in few words, that the English nation having been “forced by situation and circumstances” to take charge of Ireland and its people, when it suited the English to change their religion, or to come back to it, or to change it again, they were bound in duty to compel the Irish to change along with them each time, by means of pains and penalties, from heavy fines to transportation and death on the gallows; also that the English having a strong wish to possess themselves of all the lands of Ireland, everything was lawful and right to effect that object. The reader will remark, with surprise (and the more surprise, the better for Froude), that in his lectures lately delivered in New York, which were a kind of abstract of the work then in press, he did not venture _to say_ before an intelligent audience of freemen some of the things which he has dared to print in the book then just ready to burst upon the world. For example, he did not say, even before the “Christian young men,” such words as these which are found in the book (p. 609):

“The consent of man was not asked when he was born into the world: his consent will not be asked when his time comes to die. _As little_ has his consent to do with the laws which, while he lives, he is bound to obey.”

This sentiment he perhaps thought it unnecessary to enunciate here; because, in fact, he intended it solely for the Irish, not by any means for the Americans, although it reads like a universal maxim for the human race. Again, he did not think it necessary to say in so plain words what he has laid down clearly enough in this passage (p. 213):

“No government need _keep terms_ with such a creed [meaning the Catholic Church] when there is power to abolish it. To call the repression of opinions which had issued so many times in blood and revolt _by the name of religions persecution_ is mere abuse of words.”

ELEVATIONS POÉTIQUES ET RELIGIEUSES. Par Marie Jenna. Deuxième
Edit. 2 vols. Paris: Adrien le Clerc et Cie. 1872.

As the eye lingers upon a beautiful landscape, spring clad and fair in the clear light of the new‐risen sun; as the ear loiters unwilling to lose the last echoed link of some simple melting melody; as the hand tarries loth to quit the gentle grasp that speaks unspoken sympathy, so have we—reluctant to lose such fair pictures, such moving lays, such deep and tender feeling—lingered and loitered and tarried with Marie Jenna, “the Poet of the Vosges.” Gifted with the nice perception of a true poet, Marie Jenna clothes the simplest ideas in language of such rare delicacy, so fresh, tender, vivid, and withal so musical, that mind, heart, eye, and ear, all are at once engaged. A bird, a butterfly, a flower, gains new interest in her hands; she flings a grace around it, she vests it with a dignity it never had before; she makes it live again. Take, for instance, the opening stanzas of “Le Papillon”:

“Pourquoi t’approcher en silence
Et menacer mon vol joyeux?
Par quelle involontaire offense
Ai‐je pu déplaire à tes yeux?

“Je suis la vivante étincelle
Qui monte et descend tour à tour;
La fleur à qui Dieu donne une aile,
Un souffle, un regard, un amour.

“Je suis le frère de la rose;
Elle me cache aux importuns,
Puis sur son cœur je me repose
Et je m’enivre de parfums.

“Ma vie est tout heureuse et pure,
Pourquoi désires‐tu ma mort?
Oh! dis‐moi, roi de la nature,
Serais‐tu jaloux de mon sort?

“Va, je sais bien que tu t’inclines
Souvent pour essuyer des pleurs,
Que tes yeux comptent les épines
Où je ne vois rien que des fleurs.

“Je sais que parfois ton visage
Se trouble et s’assombrit soudain,
Lorsqu’en vain je cherche un nuage
Au fond de l’horizon serein.

“Mais Celui dont la main divine
A daigné nous former tous deux,
Pour moi parfuma la colline,
Et de loin te montra les cieux.

“Il me fit deux ailes de flamme,
A moi, feu follet du printemps;
Pour toi, son fils, il fit une âme
Plus grande que le firmament.

“Ecoute ma voix qui t’implore,
Loin de moi détourne tes pas...
Laisse moi vivre un jour encore,
O toi qui ne finiras pas!

“Mon bonheur à moi, c’est la vie,
La liberté sous le ciel bleu,
Le ruisseau, l’amour sans envie:
Le tien ... c’est le secret de Dieu.”

What can be fresher or more charming than this naïve, earnest appeal for life and liberty? And again, in “Pour un Oiseau,” beginning with:

“Il est à toi, c’est vrai ... Frère, veux tu qu’il meure?
Sa beauté, sa chanson, tout est là ... dans ta main;
Et l’arbuste où sa voix gazouillait tout à l’heure
Au bosquet, si tu veux, sera muet demain.

“Tu le tiens: sa faiblesse à ta force le livre;
Mais aussi ta pitié peut le laisser aller;
Ne le fais pas mourir! il est si bon de vivre
Lorsque l’été commence et qu’on peut s’envoler,”

we find the same delicacy of thought, the same rippling, flowing language; and what joyousness and how cheery it sounds: _il est si bon de vivre_.

But Marie Jenna strikes deeper chords, awakes more solemn strains, than these; and through them all, the graver as the lighter, binding them in one harmonious whole, there sings out the same clear note of firm, enlightened faith that never wavers; it penetrates each thing she handles, giving that breadth and largeness to her field of view that it alone can give. In some beautiful stanzas, “Beati qui lugeant,” she draws near to one bowed down with sorrow, and fearlessly, yet oh! how tenderly touching the wound because she knows its cure, she speaks:

“Va, ton sein cache en vain le glaive qui le blesse:
J’ai compris ton silence et j’ai prié pour toi.
Laisse aller ta fierté comme un poids qui t’oppresse,
Et pleure devant moi.

“Il est, je le sais bien, des jours où la souffrance
Trouve en sa solitude une âpre volupté;
Et le monde léger voit passer en silence
Sa pâle majesté.

“Et la main d’un ami s’arrètant incertaine,
N’ose écarter les plis de son voile de deuil.
Il est des maux si grands, que la parole humaine
Expire sur le seuil.

“Mais deux jours sont passés; il est temps que je vienne;
Oh! laisse un front d’ami penché sur ta douleur!
Ne te détourne pas: Mets ta main dans la mienne,
Ton âme sur mon cœur.

“Si je ne t’apportais qu’une amitié fidèle,
Mes pas avec respect s’éloigneraient d’ici.
J’attendrais que la tienne enfin se souvint d’elle,
Mais j’ai souffert aussi...

“Je ne te dirai point cette vaine parole
Que la douleur accueille en son muet dédain.
Non, ce que j’ai pour toi, c’est un mot qui console,
C’est un secret divin.”

Already we seem to see awaked attention, a gleam of hope flit across the stern, wan face that marks such helpless, hopeless misery; now softening the hard, cold look that bid defiance to all sorrow, repelled all sympathy; now changing it to one of anxious longing and of mute entreaty for the proffered gift, _le mot qui console_. And see, or is it fancy only, or are there really tears now falling, “gemlike, the last drops of the exhausted storm”? Space forbids us to give it in its fulness, this _secret divin_, to curtail it would spoil it: so we send the reader to the original, and would ask him only if in the last stanza he does not hear two voices singing:

“Heureux les affligés! dit la Vérité même.
Heureux, c’est vrai, mon Dieu! quand vous avez parlé.
Nous voulons bien souffrir si le bonheur suprême,
Est d’être consolé.”

Then look at this exquisite little picture, “L’Enfant Ressuscité.” Rarely have we met with one more pathetic. It is very delicately painted, with shades so subtile that, in the simplicity of the whole, we are apt to overlook them. And here also we have a glimpse of that reverential love for childhood that is by no means the least characteristic trait of Marie Jenna:

“Elle avait tant gémi, sa mère, et tant pleuré!
Tant pressé sur son sein le front décoloré,
Que dans le corps glacé l’âme était revenue,
Et qu’en bénissant Dieu, palpitante, éperdue,
Comme un trésor qu’on cache elle avait emporté
Dans ses deux bras tremblants l’enfant ressuscité!
Trois mois s’étaient passés depuis.....mais, chose étrange!
On eut dit que le ciel avait fait un échange.
L’enfant penchait son front comme un bouton flétri,
Et depuis ces trois mois, jamais il n’avait ri.
Il préférait aux jeux l’ombre silencieuse;
Sa mère en l’embrassant n’osait pas être heureuse....

“Des volets entr’ouverts s’élancent des chansons;
Dans les clochers frémit la voix des carillons.
Ecoute, mon Louis, ces chants, ces joyeux rires....
Vois; c’est le jour de l’an; dis ce que tu désires.
Chaque enfant pour étrenne a des jouets nouveaux.
En veux‐tu de pareils? en veux‐tu de plus beaux?
Veux‐tu ce bélier gris qu’on traîne et qui va paître
Au printemps dans les prés l’herbe qui vient naître?
Mais regarde plutôt; des pinceaux, des couleurs,
Qui d’un papier tout blanc font un bouquet de fleurs.
Oh! vois donc ce ballon de laine tricolore
Qui s’élève et retombe et se relève encore!
Tu n’aimes pas courir..... Que puis‐je te donner?
Dis.....ta mère à présent ne sait plus deviner.
Veux‐tu ce sabre d’or qui déjà ferait croire
Que mon petit Louis médite une victoire?
Aimes‐tu ce chalet d’un long toit recouvert?
Mais non....qu’en ferais‐tu? Veux‐tu ce livre ouvert,
Où près de chaque histoire on regarde une image,
Ou l’on rit, où l’on pleure, où l’on devient plus sage?
Ah! voici des oiseaux! tu les aimerais mieux!
Les oiseaux sont vivants; tu les ferais heureux!
Si tu voulais des lisandes roses fleuries,
J’en saurais bien trouver, Louis, pour que tu ries.
Réponds; je t’aime tant! n’oses‐tu me parler?
Tu pleurais ce matin; je veux te consoler.
Dis‐moi ce doux secret pendant que je l’embrasse.
Que veux‐tu, mon Louis? Et l’enfant, à voix basse:
Des ailes pour m’envoler!”

No one can fail to be struck with the sudden stillness that follows the mother’s anxious striving to drive away the cloud that would hang over her little one; with the awe and fear, too, that fill her heart; with the mystery in the whispered answer of the strange mysterious child given back from death in answer to her passionate prayer. It sets us thinking of that other mother whose grief so touched the Master’s heart that he spoke the word, “and he that was dead sat up and began to speak. And he delivered him to his mother.” Did that young man go home so grave, with never a smile to light his face, so strangely altered, that, after the first burst of gladness, his mother, clasping him to her bosom, dared not rejoice?

Of the more serious pieces, perhaps not one equals in force “La plus grande Douleur.” It is the old tale, always new though so oft repeated: the old tale that startles, shocks, and brings sharp pain as for the first time it comes home to each one, telling that that strong bond which binds friends closer, draws classes nearer, makes nations firmer, has snapped and riven two hearts asunder; that the newly‐awakened intellect first meeting early faith has turned aside, has chosen a road far other than that on which till now both friends had travelled hand in hand; that that “little superficial knowledge of philosophy that inclines man’s mind to atheism” has come between them like an icy barrier, chilling the old friendship and making everything so dark and strange which before was warmth and light between them; and with effect so drear, so piercing, too, and sharp, that the unchanged heart feels any pain than that would be light to bear:

“Oui mon Dieu! nous pouvons, sans que l’âme succombe,
Laisser notre bonheur à ce passé qui tombe;
Nous pouvons au matin former un rêve pur,
Tout d’amour et de paix, tout de flamme et d’azur,
Puis livrer les débris de sa beauté ravie
A ce vent du désert, qui laisse notre vie
Sans fleur et sans épi comme un champ moissonné;
Meliner notre front pâle et découronné,
Et devenir semblable à cette pauvre plante
Qui n’est pas morte encore, et qui n’est plus vivante,
Nous pouvons voir gisant sur un lit de douleur,
Celui qui nous restait, l’ami consolateur,
Compter chaque moment de son heure dernière,
Poser nos doigts tremblants sur sa froide paupière,
Et baiser son visage, et nous dire; Il est mort!
Nous le pouvons, mon Dieu! Parfois le cœur est fort.

“Mais aimer une autre âme, et la trouver si belle
Qu’on frémit de bonheur en se penchant vers elle,
Puis un jour contempler d’un regard impuissant
Sur sa beauté céleste une ombre qui descend;
De cette âme où passaient les souffles de la grâce,
Sentir parfois monter quelque chose qui glace,
Douter, prier tous bas, pleurer d’anxiété,
Craindre, espérer..... Longtemps marcher à son côté
Sans oser voir au fond.... Puis un jour où l’on ose,
Reculer de partout où le regard se pose,
Où fut le feu sacré toucher de froids débris,
Murmurer en tremblant un langage incompris
Où Dieu passa, chercher sa lumineuse trace,
Et n’y trouver plus rien ... rien! pas même un soupir,
Pas un cri douloureux vers l’aube qui s’efface,
C’est trop souffrir!”

The two volumes before us contain many poems, both short and long, of such great freshness and beauty, so full of original turns and delicate touches, that it is difficult to choose from amongst them. However, we have said enough to give a fair notion of Marie Jenna’s style, and quite enough to show that it is her own, with its own peculiar charm. And so our task is done. If it be said that, having uttered only praise and found no fault, we have but half fulfilled the critic’s task, we answer that we never meant the tone of criticism. All know that man’s most perfect work is not without its blemish; but in our first walk through so fair a garden, meeting new beauties on every side, it would have been ungracious in us to have sought defects: that task we leave to others. Ours has been to welcome, and to tell of fresh flowers of much loveliness offered to us from across the sea, with the certainty that no one can read her “Elévations Poétiques” without feeling that he is indebted for some real enjoyment to the charming “Poet of the Vosges.”

THE TWO YSONDES, AND OTHER VERSES. By Edward Ellis. London:
Pickering. 1872.

It takes but a short while to read this thin volume; nor will any one with a taste for true poetry find the perusal a task. The author undoubtedly possesses “the vision and the faculty divine,” and belongs to the subjective school of which Tennyson is king—a school peculiarly capable of teaching a subjective age. The more the pity, then, say we, that Mr. Ellis should have made his chief poem, “The Two Ysondes,” hang on the idea that love is fate. His “Two Ysondes” are the two “Isolts” of Tennyson; but Tennyson does not attempt to excuse the passion of Mark’s wife for Tristrem. Our author makes it originate in Tristrem and Ysonde having “drunk,” “by an evil chance,” a philtre which had been placed “in Tristrem’s charge” as “a wedding‐gift for Ysonde and King Mark” (p. 7). Now, it may be said that this does away with the guilty aspect of the romance, and throws over the whole a veil of faëry. Yes; but we insist that it is, therefore, the more mischievous, as teaching the doctrine of fatality.

Neither is this the only, or even the most, objectionable feature of the poem; for, together with descriptions of emotions and caresses which would be chaste if the theme were lawful love, all idea of sin is kept away, and especially as regards its eternal consequences. There is not a word about remorse during life, or of repentance at death. But Tristrem dies in despair of beholding the object of his passion; and Ysonde, in turn, expires on the breast of her dead lover, declaring that she will “go with him _beyond the bars of fate_.”

Now, we should not have troubled ourselves to make these strictures but that Mr. Ellis shows powers for the misuse of which he will be very responsible. Moreover, as is clear from some of his shorter lyrics, particularly “At a Shrine,” his mind has a religious bent, with (of course) Catholic sympathies.

With regard to his verse, it is less Tennysonic than his thought. Better if, while originating metres (with which we have no quarrel whatever), he modelled both his lines and his diction on the peerless accuracy of England’s laureate.

Books And Pamphlets Received.

From KELLY, PIET & CO., Baltimore: The Money God. By M. A.
Quinton.

From LYNCH, COLE & MEEHAN, New York: English Misrule in Ireland: A
Course of Lectures. By V. Rev. T. N. Burke, O.P. 12mo. pp. 299.

From J. A. MCGEE, New York: “Thumping English Lies”: Froude’s
Slanders on Ireland and Irishmen. With Preface and Notes by Col.
J. E. McGee, and Wendell Phillips’ Views of the Situation. 12mo.
pp. 224.—Half Hours with Irish Authors: Selections from Griffin,
Lover, Carleton, and Lever. 12mo. pp. 330.

From A. D. F. RANDOLPH, New York: Christ at the Door. By Susan H.
Ward. 12mo, pp. 232.

From J. B. LIPPINCOTT & CO., Philadelphia: Expiation. By Mrs.
Julia C. R. Dorr.

From J. R. OSGOOD & CO., Boston: The Romance of the Harem. By Mrs.
A. H. Leonowens. 12mo. pp. viii.‐277.

From ROBERTS BROS., Boston: What Katy Did. By Susan
Coolidge.—Thorvaldsen: His Life and Works. By Eugene Plon. 12mo.
pp. xvi.‐320.—The World Priest. By Leopold Schefer. 12mo. pp.
xv.‐371.

From THE AUTHOR: Sermon at the Month’s Mind of the Most Rev. M. J.
Spalding, D.D., Preached at the Church of the American College
(Rome). By the V. Rev. Dr. Chatard, Rector. Paper, 8vo. pp. 30.

From E. H. BUTLER & CO., Philadelphia: The Etymological Reader. By
Epes Sargent and Amasa May.

From S. D. KIERNAN, Clerk, Department of Public Instruction:
Report of the Board of Public Instruction of the City and County
of New York, for the year ending Dec. 31, 1871; with Addenda to
May, 1872.—Manual of the Department of Public Instruction, 1871‐2.
18mo, pp. 262.

From HOLT & WILLIAMS, New York: Sermons by the Rev. H. R. Hawes,
M.A. 12mo, pp. xiv. 347.

From AMERICAN BAPTIST SOCIETY, Philadelphia: The Baptist Short
Method, with Inquirers and Opponents. By Rev. C. T. Hiscox, D.D.
18mo, pp. 216.

From HURD & HOUGHTON, New York: The City of God and the Church
Makers. By R. Abbey. 12mo, pp. xx. 315.

From BURNS, OATES & CO., London (New York: Sold by The Catholic
Publication Society): The Life of Monseigneur Berneux, Bishop of
Capse. Vicar‐Apostolic of Corea. By M. l’Abbé Pichon. Translated
from the French, with a Preface by Lady Herbert.

From JOHN HODGES, London: (New York: Sold by The Catholic
Publication Society): The Lives of the Saints. By Rev. S. Baring‐
Gould, M.A. March.