Chapter V: Book EIGHT: A Mysterious Visitor (4)

_Who chooseth me must give and hazard all he hath._

Must give,--for what? for lead? hazard for lead?
This casket threatens: men, that hazard all
Do it in hope of fair advantages.
A golden mind stoops not to shows of dross;
I’ll then nor give nor hazard aught for lead.
What says the silver, with her virgin hue?

_Who chooseth me shall get as much as he deserves._

As much as he deserves!--Pause there, Morocco,
And weigh thy value with an even hand:
If thou be’st rated by thy estimation,
Thou dost deserve enough; and yet enough
May not extend so far as to the lady:
And yet to be afeard of my deserving,
Were but a weak disabling of myself.
As much as I deserve! Why, that’s the lady:
I do in birth deserve her, and in fortunes,
In graces, and in qualities of breeding;
But, more than these, in love I do deserve.
What if I stray’d no further, but chose here?
Let’s see once more this saying graved in gold:

_Who chooseth me shall gain what many men desire._

Why, that’s the lady; all the world desires her:
....... Deliver me the key;
Here do I choose, and thrive I as I may!

PORTIA.

There, take it, Prince, and if my form lie there,
Then I am yours. [_He unlocks the golden casket._

MOROCCO.

What have we here?
A carrion Death, within whose empty eye
There is a written scroll! I’ll read the writing.

[Reads] _All that glisters is not gold,--_
_Often have you heard that told:_
_Many a man his life hath sold,_
_But my outside to behold:_
_Gilded tombs do worms infold._
_Had you been as wise as bold,_
_Young in limbs, in judgment old,_
_Your answer had not been inscroll’d:_
_Fare you well; your suit is cold._

Cold, indeed; and labor lost;
Then, farewell, heat, and welcome, frost!--
Portia, adieu! I have too grieved a heart
To take a tedious leave: thus losers part.
[_Exit with train._

_Enter Prince of Arragon._

PORTIA.

Behold, there stand the caskets, noble Prince;
If you choose that wherein I am contain’d,
Straight shall our nuptial rites be solemnized:
But if you fail, without more speech, my lord,
You must be gone from hence immediately.

ARRAGON.

I am enjoin’d by oath to observe three things:
First, never to unfold to any one
Which casket ’t was I chose; next, if I fail
Of the right casket, never in my life
To woo a maid in way of marriage; lastly,
If I do fail in fortune of my choice,
Immediately to leave you, and be gone.

PORTIA.

To these injunctions everyone doth swear
That comes to hazard for my worthless self.

ARRAGON.

And so have I address’d me. Fortune now
To my heart’s hope!--Gold, silver, and base lead.

_Who chooseth me must give and hazard all he hath._

You shall look fairer, ere I give, or hazard.
What says the golden chest? ha! let me see:

_Who chooseth me shall gain what many men desire._

What many men desire!--That _many_ may be meant
By the fool multitude, that choose by show,
Not learning more than the fond eye doth teach;
Which pries not to the interior, but, like the martlet,
Builds in the weather on the outward wall,
Even in the force and road of casualty.
I will not choose what many men desire,
Because I will not jump with common spirits,
And rank me with the barbarous multitude.
Why, then to thee, thou silver treasure-house;
Tell me once more what title thou dost bear:

_Who chooseth me shall get as much as he deserves._

And well said too: for who shall go about
To cozen fortune, and be honorable
Without the stamp of merit? Let none presume
To wear an undeserved dignity.
O, that estates, degrees, and offices
Were not derived corruptly! and that clear honor
Were purchased by the merit of the wearer!
How many then should cover, that stand bare!
How many be commanded, that command!
How much low peasantry would then be glean’d
From the true seed of honor! and how much honor
Pick’d from the chaff and ruin of the times,
To be new-varnish’d! Well, but to my choice:

_Who chooseth me shall get as much as he deserves._

I will assume desert.--Give me a key,
And instantly unlock my fortunes here.
[_He opens the silver casket._

PORTIA.

Too long a pause for that which you find there.

ARRAGON.

What’s here? the portrait of a blinking idiot,
Presenting me a schedule! I will read it.--
How much unlike art thou to Portia!
How much unlike my hopes, and my deservings!

_Who chooseth me shall have as much as he deserves._

Did I deserve no more than a fool’s head?
Is that my prize? are my deserts no better?

PORTIA.

T’ offend, and judge, are distinct offices,
And of opposèd natures.

ARRAGON.

What is here?

_The fire seven times tried this:_
_Seven times tried that judgment is_
_That did never choose amiss._
_Some there be, that shadows kiss;_
_Such have but a shadow’s bliss:_
_There be fools alive, I wis,_
_Silver’d o’er; and so was this._

Still more fool I shall appear
By the time I linger here:
With one fool’s head I came to woo,
But I go away with two.--
Sweet, adieu! I’ll keep my oath,
Patiently to bear my wroth.
[_Exeunt Arragon and Train._

_Enter Bassanio._

BASSANIO.

So may the outward shows be least themselves:
The world is still deceived with ornament.
In law, what plea so tainted and corrupt,
But, being season’d with a gracious voice,
Obscures the show of evil?

* * * * *

There is no vice so simple, but assumes
Some mark of virtue on its outward parts:
How many cowards, whose hearts are all as false
As stayers of sand, wear yet upon their chins
The beards of Hercules and frowning Mars;
Who, inward search’d, have livers white as milk!
And these assume but valor’s excrement,
To render them redoubted. Look on beauty,
And you shall see ’t is purchased by the weight;
Which therein works a miracle in nature,
Making them lightest that wear most of it:
So are those crispèd snaky golden locks,
Which make such wanton gambols with the wind,
Upon supposèd fairness, often known
To be the dowry of a second head,
The skull that bred them in the sepulcher.
Thus ornament is but the guilèd shore
To a most dangerous sea; the beauteous scarf
Veiling an Indian feature; in a word,
The seeming truth which cunning times put on
T’ entrap the wisest. Therefore, thou gaudy gold,
Hard food for Midas, I will none of thee:
Nor none of thee, thou stale and common drudge
’Tween man and man: but thou, thou meager lead,
Which rather threatenest, than dost promise aught,
Thy plainness moves me more than eloquence;
And here choose I: Joy be the consequence!
[_Opening the leaden casket._

----What find I here?
Fair Portia’s counterfeit!
----Here’s the scroll,
The continent and summary of my fortune:--

_You that choose not by the view
Chance as fair, and choose as true:
Since this fortune falls to you,
Be content and seek no new.
If you be well pleased with this,
And hold your fortune for your bliss,
Turn you where your lady is,
And claim her with a loving kiss._

PORTIA.

You see me, Lord Bassanio, where I stand,
Such as I am: though, for myself alone,
I would not be ambitious in my wish,
To wish myself much better; yet, for you,
I would be trebled twenty times myself;
A thousand times more fair, ten thousand times more rich;
That, only to stand high on your account,
I might in virtues, beauties, livings, friends,
Exceed account: but the full sum of me
Is sum of--something; which, to term in gross,
Is an unlesson’d girl, unschool’d, unpracticed:
Happy in this, she is not yet so old
But she may learn; then happier in this,
She is not bred so dull but she can learn;
Happiest of all, in that her gentle spirit
Commits itself to yours to be directed,
As from her lord, her governor, her king.
Myself and what is mine to you and yours
Is now converted: but now I was the lord
Of this fair mansion, master of my servants,
Queen o’er myself; and even now, but now,
This house, these servants, and this same myself,
Are yours, my lord; I give them with this ring;
Which when you part from, lose, or give away,
Let it presage the ruin of your love,
And be my vantage to exclaim on you.

_From “The Merchant of Venice.”_

QUOTATIONS FROM SHAKESPEARE.

ADVERSITY.

SWEET are the uses of adversity;
Which, like the toad, ugly and venomous,
Wears yet a precious jewel in his head:
And this our life, exempt from public haunt,
Finds tongues in trees, books in the running brooks,
Sermons in stones, and good in everything.

“_As You Like It._”

REPUTATION.

GOOD name in man and woman, dear my lord,
Is the immediate jewel of their souls:
Who steals my purse steals trash; ’tis something, nothing;
’Twas mine, ’tis his, and has been slave to thousands;
But he that filches from me my good name
Robs me of that which not enriches him,
And makes me poor indeed.

“_Othello._”

FEAR OF DEATH.

COWARDS die many times before their death;
The valiant never taste of death but once.
Of all the wonders that I yet have heard,
It seems to me most strange that men should fear;
Seeing that death, a necessary end,
Will come when it will come.

“_Julius Cæsar._”

SHAKESPEARE’S POETRY.

FRANCIS JEFFREY.

FRANCIS JEFFREY was born in Edinburgh in 1773 and died in 1850. He
attended the schools of his native city and completed his education
in the Universities of Glasgow and Oxford, preparing himself for
the pursuit of law.

He was also a writer of essays and criticisms and attained high
rank as a judge and writer. He was at one time editor of the famous
“Edinburgh Review.”

SHAKESPEARE alone, when the object requires it, is always keen and worldly and practical; and yet, without changing his hand or stopping his course, scatters around him, as he goes, all sounds and shapes of sweetness, and conjures up landscapes of immortal fragrance and freshness, and peoples them with Spirits of glorious aspect and attractive grace. He is a thousand times more full of fancy and imagery and splendor than those who, in pursuit of such enchantments, have shrunk back from the delineation of character or passion, and declined the discussion of human duties and cares.

More full of wisdom and ridicule and sagacity than all the moralists and satirists that ever existed, he is also more wild, airy, and inventive, and more pathetic and fantastic, than all the poets of all regions and ages of the world. And he has all those elements so happily mixed up in him, and bears his high faculties so temperately, that the most severe reader cannot complain of him for want of strength or of reason, nor the most sensitive for defect of ornament or ingenuity. Everything in him is in unmeasured abundance and unequaled perfection; but everything is so balanced and kept in subordination, as not to jostle or disturb or take the place of another.

The most exquisite poetical conceptions, images, and descriptions are given with such brevity, and introduced with such skill, as merely to adorn, without loading, the sense they accompany. Although his sails are purple and perfumed, and his prow of beaten gold, they waft him on his voyage, not less, but more rapidly and directly than if they had been composed of baser materials. All his excellences, like those of Nature herself, are thrown out together; and, instead of interfering with, support and recommend each other. His flowers are not tied up in garlands, nor his fruits crushed into baskets; but spring living from the soil, in all the dew and freshness of youth; while the graceful foliage in which they lurk, and the ample branches, the rough and vigorous stem, and the wide-spreading roots on which they depend, are present along with them, and share, in their places, the equal care of their creator.

HOME.

HENRY W. GRADY.

HENRY W. GRADY was born in Georgia in 1851. While a student at the
University of Georgia, he excelled in debate. On graduation, he
determined to make journalism his life-work. As the editor of the
“Atlanta Constitution,” he rapidly grew into prominence as a
journalist and an orator. Mr. Grady died in 1889.

A FEW days later I visited a country home. A modest, quiet house sheltered by great trees and set in a circle of field and meadow, gracious with the promise of harvest; barns and cribs well filled and the old smoke-house odorous with treasure; the fragrance of pink and hollyhock mingling with the aroma of garden and orchard and resonant with the hum of bees and poultry’s busy clucking; inside the house, thrift, comfort, and that cleanliness that is next to godliness--the restful beds, the open fireplace, the books and papers, and the old clock that had held its steadfast pace amid the frolic of weddings, that had welcomed in steady measure the newborn babes of the family, and kept company with the watchers of the sick bed, and had ticked the solemn requiem of the dead; and the well-worn Bible that, thumbed by fingers long since stilled, and blurred with tears of eyes long since closed, held the simple annals of the family and the heart and conscience of the home.

Outside stood the master, strong and wholesome and upright; wearing no man’s collar; with no mortgage on his roof and no lien on his ripening harvest; pitching his crops in his own wisdom and selling them in his own time in his chosen market; master of his lands and master of himself. Near by stood his aged father, happy in the heart and home of his son. And as they started to the house, the old man’s hands rested on the young man’s shoulder, touching it with the knighthood of the fifth commandment and laying there the unspeakable blessing of an honored and grateful father.

As they drew near the door, the old mother appeared, the sunset falling on her face, softening its wrinkles and its tenderness, lighting up her patient eyes, and the rich music of her heart trembling on her lips, as in simple phrase she welcomed her husband and son to their home. Beyond was the good wife, true of touch and tender, happy amid her household cares, clean of heart and conscience, the helpmate and the buckler of her husband. And the children, strong and sturdy, trooping down the lane with the lowing herd, or, weary of simple sport, seeking, as truant birds do, the quiet of the old home nest.

And I saw the night descend on that home, falling gently as from the wings of the unseen dove. And the stars swarmed in the bending skies; the trees thrilled with the cricket’s cry; the restless bird called from the neighboring wood; and the father, a simple man of God, gathering the family about him, read from the Bible the old, old story of love and faith and then went down in prayer, the baby hidden amid the folds of its mother’s dress, and closed the record of that simple day by calling down the benediction of God on the family and the home!

And as I gazed, the memory of the great Capitol faded from my brain. Forgotten its treasure and its splendor. And I said, “Surely here--here in the homes of the people--is lodged the ark of the covenant of my country. Here is its majesty and its strength; here the beginning of its power and the end of its responsibility.” The homes of the people--let us keep them pure and independent, and all will be well with the Republic. Here is the lesson our foes may learn--here is work the humblest and weakest hands may do.

Let us in simple thrift and economy make our homes independent. Let us in frugal industry make them self-sustaining. In sacrifice and denial let us keep them free from debt and obligation. Let us make them homes of refinement in which we shall teach our daughters that modesty and patience and gentleness are the charms of woman. Let us make them temples of liberty, and teach our sons that an honest conscience is every man’s first political law; that his sovereignty rests beneath his hat, and that no splendor can rob him and no force justify the surrender of the simplest right of a free and independent citizen. And above all, let us honor God in our homes--anchor them close in His love. Build His altars above our hearthstones, uphold them in the set and simple faith of our fathers, and crown them with the Bible--that book of books in which all the ways of life are made straight and the mystery of death is made plain.

Let us keep sacred the Sabbath of God in its purity, and have no city so great, or village so small, that every Sunday morning shall not stream forth over towns and meadows the golden benediction of the bells, as they summon the people to the churches of their fathers, and ring out in praise of God and the power of His might. Let us keep the states of this Union in the current of the sweet old-fashioned, that the sweet rushing waters may lap their sides, and everywhere from their soil grow the tree, the leaf whereof shall not fade, and the fruit whereof shall not die.

Let us remember that the home is the source of our national life. Back of the national Capitol and above it stands the home. Back of the President and above him stands the citizen. What the home is, this and nothing else will the Capitol be. What the citizen wills, this and nothing else will the President be.

A PALACE IN A VALLEY.

DR. SAMUEL JOHNSON.

DR. SAMUEL JOHNSON was born at Lichfield, England, in 1709, and
died in 1784.

He was educated at Oxford, where he gained honor as a student in
spite of his poverty and defective eyesight.

After leaving college Johnson held a position as an usher, and
later was employed by some booksellers.

He gradually began a literary life, publishing some poems, and then
conducted “The Rambler” and “The Idler,” two periodicals.

He wrote the story of “Rasselas” to pay the expenses of his
mother’s funeral. His greatest work was a Dictionary of the English
Language.

Dr. Johnson’s character was a strange union of strength and
weakness. His manners were uncouth, but his conversation was rich
in wit and wisdom. His genius was recognized during the latter
years of his life.

YE who listen with credulity to the whispers of fancy and pursue with eagerness the phantoms of hope; who expect that age will perform the promises of youth, and that the deficiencies of the present day will be supplied by the morrow,--attend to the history of Rasselas, Prince of Abyssinia.

Rasselas was the fourth son of the mighty emperor in whose dominions the Father of Waters begins his course; whose bounty pours down the streams of plenty and scatters over half the world the harvests of Egypt.

According to the custom which has descended from age to age among the monarchs of the torrid zone, Rasselas was confined in a private palace, with the other sons and daughters of Abyssinian royalty, till the order of succession should call him to the throne.

The place which the wisdom or policy of antiquity had destined for the residence of the Abyssinian princes was a spacious valley in the kingdom of Amhara, surrounded on every side by mountains, of which the summits overhang the middle part. The only passage by which it could be entered was a cavern that passed under a rock. The outlet of the cavern was concealed by a thick wood, and the mouth which opened into the valley was closed with gates of iron.

From the mountains on every side rivulets descended that filled all the valley with verdure and fertility, and formed a lake in the middle inhabited by fish of every species, and frequented by every fowl whom Nature has taught to dip the wing in water. This lake discharged its superfluities by a stream which entered a dark cleft of the mountain on the northern side, and fell with dreadful noise from precipice to precipice till it was heard no more.

The sides of the mountains were covered with trees, the banks of the brooks were diversified with flowers; every blast shook spices from the rocks, and every month dropped fruits upon the ground. All animals that bite the grass, or browse the shrub, whether wild or tame, wandered in this extensive circuit, secured from beasts of prey by the mountains which confined them. On one part were flocks and herds feeding in the pastures; on another, all beasts of chase frisking in the lawns. All the diversities of the world were brought together, the blessings of nature were collected, and its evils extracted and excluded.

The valley, wide and fruitful, supplied its inhabitants with the necessaries of life, and all delights and superfluities were added at the annual visit which the emperor paid his children, when the iron gate was opened to the sound of music; and during eight days every one that resided in the valley was required to propose whatever might contribute to make seclusion pleasant, to fill up the vacancies of attention, and lessen the tediousness of time. Every desire was immediately granted. All the artificers of pleasure were called to gladden the festivity; the musicians exerted the power of harmony, and the dancers showed their activity before the princes, in hope that they should pass their lives in this blissful captivity, to which those only were admitted whose performance was thought able to add novelty to luxury. Such was the appearance of security and delight which this retirement afforded, that they to whom it was new always desired that it might be perpetual; and as those on whom the iron gate had once closed were never suffered to return, the effect of long experience could not be known. Thus every year produced new schemes of delight and new competitors for imprisonment.

The palace stood on an eminence raised about thirty paces above the surface of the lake. It was divided into many squares or courts, built with greater or less magnificence, according to the rank of those for whom they were designed. The roofs were turned into arches of massy stone, joined by a cement that grew harder by time, and the building stood from century to century deriding the rains and equinoctial hurricanes, without need of reparation.

This house, which was so large as to be fully known to none but some ancient officers who successively inherited the secrets of the place, was built as if suspicion herself had dictated the plan. To every room there was an open and secret passage; every square had a communication with the rest, either from the upper stories by private galleries, or by subterranean passages from the lower apartments. Many of the columns had unsuspected cavities, in which a long race of monarchs had deposited their treasures. They then closed up the opening with marble, which was never to be removed but in the utmost exigencies of the kingdom; and recorded their accumulations in a book which was itself concealed in a tower not entered but by the emperor, attended by the prince who stood next in succession.

Here the sons and daughters of Abyssinia lived only to know the soft vicissitudes of pleasure and repose, attended by all that were skilful to delight, and gratified with whatever the senses can enjoy. They wandered in gardens of fragrance and slept in the fortresses of security. Every art was practiced to make them pleased with their own condition. The sages who instructed them told them of nothing but the miseries of public life, and described all beyond the mountains as regions of calamity, where discord was always raging, and where man preyed upon man.

To heighten their opinion of their own felicity, they were daily entertained with songs, the subject of which was the happy valley. Their appetites were excited by frequent enumerations of different enjoyments, and revelry and merriment was the business of every hour from the dawn of morning to the close of even.

These methods were generally successful; few of the princes had ever wished to enlarge their bounds, but passed their lives in full conviction that they had all within their reach that art or nature could bestow, and pitied those whom fate had excluded from this seat of tranquillity.

Thus they rose in the morning and lay down at night, pleased with each other and with themselves,--all but Rasselas, who, in the twenty-sixth year of his age, began to withdraw himself from their pastimes and assemblies, and to delight in solitary walks and silent meditation. He often sat before tables covered with luxury, and forgot to taste the dainties that were placed before him; he rose abruptly in the midst of the song and hastily retired beyond the sound of music. His attendants observed the change and endeavored to renew his love of pleasure. He neglected their officiousness, repulsed their invitations, and spent day after day on the banks of rivulets sheltered with trees, where he sometimes listened to the birds in the branches, sometimes observed the fish playing in the stream, and anon cast his eyes upon the pastures and mountains filled with animals.

This singularity of his humor made him much observed. One of the sages, in whose conversation he had formerly delighted, followed him secretly, in hope of discovering the cause of his disquiet. Rasselas, who knew not that any one was near him, having for some time fixed his eyes upon the goats that were browsing among the rocks, began to compare their condition with his own.

“What,” said he, “makes the difference between man and all the rest of the animal creation? Every beast that strays beside me has the same bodily necessities with myself; he is hungry and crops the grass, he is thirsty and drinks the stream; his thirst and hunger are appeased, he is satisfied and sleeps; he rises again and is hungry; he is again fed and is at rest. I am hungry and thirsty, like him; but when thirst and hunger cease, I am not at rest; I am, like him, pained with want; but am not, like him, satisfied with fullness. The intermediate hours are tedious and gloomy; I long again to be hungry, that I may again quicken my attention. The birds peck the berries or the corn, and fly away to the groves, where they sit in seeming happiness on the branches and waste their lives in tuning one unvaried series of sounds. I likewise can call the lutanist and singer, but the sounds that pleased me yesterday weary me to-day, and will grow more wearisome to-morrow. I can discover within me no power of perception which is not glutted with its proper pleasure, yet I do not feel myself delighted. Man surely has some latent sense for which this place affords no gratification, or he has some desires distinct from sense, which must be satisfied before he can be happy.”

After this he lifted up his head, and, seeing the moon rising, walked toward the palace. As he passed through the fields and saw the animals around him, “Ye,” said he, “are happy, and need not envy me that walk thus among you, burdened with myself; nor do I, ye gentle beings, envy your felicity, for it is not the felicity of man. I have many distresses from which ye are free; I fear pain when I do not feel it; surely the equity of Providence has balanced peculiar sufferings with peculiar enjoyments.”

With observations like these the prince amused himself as he returned, uttering them with a plaintive voice, yet with a look that discovered him to feel some complacence in his own perspicacity, and to receive some solace of the miseries of life from consciousness of the delicacy with which he bewailed them. He mingled cheerfully in the diversions of the evening, and all rejoiced to find that his heart was lightened.

_From “Rasselas.”_

TRUE HEROISM.

LET others write of battles fought,
Of bloody, ghastly fields,
Where honor greets the man who wins,
And death the man who yields;
But I will write of him who fights
And vanquishes his sins,
Who struggles on through weary years
Against himself, and wins.

He is a hero stanch and brave
Who fights an unseen foe,
And puts at last beneath his feet
His passions base and low;
Who stands erect in manhood’s might,
Undaunted, undismayed,--
The bravest man who drew a sword
In foray or in raid.

It calls for something more than brawn
Or muscle to o’ercome
An enemy who marcheth not
With banner, plume, or drum,--
A foe forever lurking nigh,
With silent, stealthy tread;
Forever near your board by day,
At night beside your bed.

All honor, then, to that brave heart,
Though poor or rich he be,
Who struggles with his baser part,--
Who conquers and is free!
He may not wear a hero’s crown,
Or fill a hero’s grave;
But truth will place his name among
The bravest of the brave.

THE PEN.

EDWARD BULWER LYTTON.

BENEATH the rule of men entirely great
The pen is mightier than the sword. Behold
The arch enchanter’s wand!--itself a nothing
But taking sorcery from the master’s hand
To paralyze the Cæsars and to strike
The loud earth breathless! Take away the sword--
States can be saved without it.

_From “Richelieu.”_

CHARACTER OF WASHINGTON.

GEORGE BANCROFT.

GEORGE BANCROFT was born at Worcester, Mass., in 1800 and died in
1891.

He was graduated from Harvard College when he was seventeen,
bearing off the second honors of his class.

The following year he sailed for Europe and spent five years
studying under the most learned professors in Germany, France, and
Italy.

On his return to America he became a tutor at Harvard and was
afterwards connected with a classical school at Northampton.

He was deeply interested in the affairs of the nation, but refused
to enter public life, as he had decided to write a history of the
United States.

The first volume of this history appeared in 1834, and the series
occupied his time for many years.

Mr. Bancroft held the position of secretary of the navy for about a
year under President Polk. It was due to his efforts that the Naval
Academy at Annapolis, Md., was established.

He was appointed minister to England in 1846 and remained abroad
for three years.

He returned to this country and resumed his literary work. In 1867
he was appointed minister to Berlin by President Grant.

The “History of the United States” is without a rival. It is
generally accepted as an authority. Mr. Bancroft spared no pains in
his researches among old manuscripts, and his style is full of
interest.

AT eleven years old, left, an orphan, to the care of an excellent but unlettered mother, Washington grew up without learning. Of arithmetic and geometry he acquired just knowledge enough to be able to practice measuring land; but all his instruction at school taught him not so much as the orthography or rules of grammar of his own tongue. His culture was altogether his own work, and he was in the strictest sense a self-made man; yet from his early life he never seemed uneducated. At sixteen he went into the wilderness as surveyor, and for three years continued the pursuit, where the forest trained him, in meditative solitude, to freedom and largeness of mind; and Nature revealed to him her obedience to serene and silent laws.

In his intervals from toil, he seemed always to be attracted to the best men, and to be cherished by them. Fairfax, his employer, an Oxford scholar, already aged, became his fast friend. He read little, but with close attention. Whatever he took in hand, he applied himself to with care; and his papers, which have been preserved, show how he almost imperceptibly gained the power of writing correctly; always expressing himself with clearness and directness, often with felicity of language and grace.

Courage was so natural to him that it was hardly spoken of to his praise; no one ever at any moment of his life discovered in him the least shrinking from danger; and he had a hardihood of daring which escaped notice, because it was so enveloped by superior calmness and wisdom.

He was as cheerful as he was spirited; frank and communicative in the society of friends; fond of the fox-chase and the dance; often sportive in his letters; and liked a hearty laugh. This joyousness of disposition remained to the last, though the vastness of his responsibilities was soon to take from him the right of displaying the impulsive qualities of his nature, and the weight which he was to bear up was to overlay and repress his gayety and openness.

His hand was liberal; giving quietly and without observation, as though he were ashamed of nothing but being discovered in doing good. He was kindly and compassionate, and of lively sensibility to the sorrows of others; so that, if his country had only needed a victim for its relief, he would have willingly offered himself as a sacrifice. But while he was prodigal of himself, he was considerate for others; ever parsimonious of the blood of his countrymen.

His faculties were so well balanced and combined that his constitution, free from excess, was tempered evenly with all the elements of activity, and his mind resembled a well-ordered commonwealth; his passions, which had the intensest vigor, owned allegiance to reason; and with all the fiery quickness of his spirit his impetuous and massive will was held in check by consummate judgment. He had in his composition a calm which gave him, in moments of highest excitement, the power of self-control, and enabled him to excel in patience, even when he had most cause for disgust. Washington was offered a command when there was little to bring out the unorganized resources of the continent but his own influence, and authority was connected with the people by the most frail, most attenuated, scarcely discernible threads; yet, vehement as was his nature, impassioned as was his courage, he so restrained his ardor, that he never failed continuously to exert the attracting power of that influence, and never exerted it so sharply as to break its force.

His understanding was lucid, and his judgment accurate; so that his conduct never betrayed hurry or confusion. No detail was too minute for his personal inquiry and continued supervision; and at the same time he comprehended events in their widest aspects and relations. He never seemed above the object that engaged his attention; and he was always equal, without an effort, to the solution of the highest questions, even when there existed no precedents to guide his decision.

In this way he never drew to himself admiration for the possession of any one quality in excess; never made in council any one suggestion that was sublime but impracticable; never in action took to himself the praise or the blame of undertakings astonishing in conception, but beyond his means of execution. It was the most wonderful accomplishment of this man that, placed upon the largest theater of events, at the head of the greatest revolution in human affairs, he never failed to observe all that was possible, and at the same time to bound his aspirations by that which was possible.

Profoundly impressed with confidence in God’s providence, and exemplary in his respect for the forms of public worship, no philosopher of the eighteenth century was more firm in the support of freedom of religious opinion; none more tolerant, or more remote from bigotry; but belief in God and trust in His overruling power formed the essence of his character. Divine wisdom not only illumines the spirit, it inspires the will. Washington was a man of action, and not of theory or words; his creed appears in his life, not in his professions, which burst from him very rarely, and only at those great moments of crisis in the fortunes of his country, when Earth and Heaven seemed actually to meet, and his emotions became too intense for suppression; but his whole being was one continued act of faith in the eternal, intelligent, moral order of the Universe. Integrity was so completely the law of his nature, that a planet would sooner have shot from its sphere, than he have departed from his uprightness, which was so constant that it often seemed to be almost impersonal.

They say of Giotto, that he introduced goodness into the art of painting: Washington carried it with him to the camp and the cabinet, and established a new criterion of human greatness. The purity of his will confirmed his fortitude; and, as he never faltered in his faith in virtue, he stood fast by that which he knew to be just; free from illusions; never dejected by the apprehension of the difficulties and perils that went before him; and drawing the promise of success from the justice of his cause. Hence he was persevering, leaving nothing unfinished; free from all taint of obstinacy in his firmness; seeking and gladly receiving advice, but immovable in his devotedness to right.

Of a “retiring modesty and habitual reserve,” his ambition was no more than the consciousness of his power, and was subordinate to his sense of duty; he took the foremost place, for he knew, from inborn magnanimity, that it belonged to him, and he dared not withhold the service required of him; so that, with all his humility, he was by necessity the first, though never for himself or for private ends. He loved fame, the approval of coming generations, the good opinion of his fellow-men of his own time; and he desired to make his conduct coincide with their wishes; but not fear of censure, not the prospect of applause, could tempt him to swerve from rectitude; and the praise which he coveted was the sympathy of that moral sentiment which exists in every human breast, and goes forth only to the welcome of virtue.

This also is the praise of Washington, that never in the tide of time has any man lived who had in so great a degree the almost divine faculty to command the confidence of his fellow-men and rule the willing. Whereever he became known, in his family, his neighborhood, his county, his native state, the continent, the camp, civil life, the United States, among the common people, in foreign courts, throughout the civilized world of the human race, and even among the savages, he, beyond all other men, had the confidence of his kind.

NATIONAL HYMN.

SAMUEL FRANCIS SMITH.

SAMUEL FRANCIS SMITH was born in Boston in 1808, and died in 1895.

He attended the Boston Latin School, was graduated at Harvard College, and then studied for the ministry at the Andover Theological Seminary. While in Harvard he was a classmate of Oliver Wendell Holmes. At a reunion of his class, held many years after they had left college, Holmes read a poem which he had written for the occasion, called “The Boys,” and spoke of Mr. Smith in these words:

“He chanted a song for the brave and the free,
Just read on his medal, ‘My Country, of thee.’”

He referred to the poem beginning “My country, ’tis of thee,” the national hymn of America, written by Mr. Smith when he was a young theological student, and first sung at a children’s celebration, held on one Fourth of July, in the Park Street Church, Boston.

A collection of his hymns and poems has been published under the title of “Lyric Gems.”

MY country, ’tis of thee,
Sweet land of liberty,
Of thee I sing;
Land where my fathers died,
Land of the pilgrim’s pride,
From every mountain side
Let freedom ring.

My native country, thee--
Land of the noble free--
Thy name I love;
I love thy rocks and rills,
Thy woods and templed hills,
My heart with rapture thrills
Like that above.

Let music swell the breeze,
And ring from all the trees
Sweet freedom’s song;
Let mortal tongues awake;
Let all that breathe partake;
Let rocks their silence break--
The sound prolong.

Our fathers’ God, to thee,
Author of liberty,
To thee we sing:
Long may our land be bright
With freedom’s holy light;
Protect us by thy might,
Great God, our King.

THE LARK IN THE GOLD-FIELDS.

CHARLES READE.

CHARLES READE, the youngest of eleven children of John Reade, an English country squire, was horn in Ipsden in =1814=. His father and mother loved him dearly, but found it convenient, after the custom of the time, to intrust his early instruction and care to tutors and masters of boarding schools. Thus the memory of frequent floggings survived in the boy’s mind, as marking the thorny road of his first school days.

He entered Magdalen College in =1831= and three years later was appointed to a fellowship which he held for fifty years, until his death in =1884=. The income of this enabled him to strive for many years against disappointments and finally achieve fame as a writer. He toiled long and hard for recognition and it was not until he was nearly forty years of age that he became known.

In the meantime he had studied law and had written many plays which he had vainly tried to have accepted.

His first successful work of note was the brilliant comedy, “Masks and Faces.” This he turned later into the novel, “Peg Woffington.” His stories are throughout strong in dramatic situations and, despite his greater success as a novelist, he always considered himself primarily a playwright.

Like his friend Charles Dickens, he aimed in his writings to correct social abuses, and his literary lance was ever couched to aid the unfortunate.

He wrote “It’s Never too Late to =Mend=” to abolish the evils of the English prison system. Its success was tremendous, and later, when it was dramatized and produced at the Princess Theater, there was almost a riot in the audience.

“Hard Cash” was directed against the abuses in insane asylums; “Foul Play” dealt with those connected with the merchant shipping service; “Put Yourself in His Place” took up the hardships of the laboring man. Thus in his books he assailed the evils of his time.

First and always, however, he was a literary artist. He knew how to weave together hard, homely facts and romantic incidents so that his blows for right struck all the harder because of the reader’s absorbing interest in the plot of his story. “It would require a chemical analysis to separate the fiction from the reality,” said Justin McCarthy of Reade’s novels.

“The Cloister and the Hearth” is considered his greatest story.