The Beluga has a wide geographical range, being found upon our northern and northwestern shores in great numbers. Their southern limit seems to be the St. Lawrence, and in search of food they venture up this river beyond the mouth of the Saguenay, and often in water but little over their own depth. On the western coast they also enter the great rivers, and have been captured up the Yukon seven hundred miles from its mouth. In their columnar movements they somewhat resemble the porpoise,—long processions being frequently seen, composed of three in a row, perhaps led by a single whale.
Among the Samoyeds, at Chabanova, on the Siberian coast, the white-whale fisheries amount to fifteen hundred or two thousand pood of train-oil a year. On the coasts of Nova Zembla and Spitzbergen they are captured by enormous nets made of very stout material; and the Tromsoe vessels alone have taken in a single season over two thousand one hundred and sixty-seven white whales, valued at about thirty thousand dollars. Magdalen a Bay is a favorite place for them, and often three hundred are taken at a single haul in the powerful nets. Here and in most of the northern localities the entire body is utilized,—the carcass being used in the manufacture of guano. So perfectly are the bodies preserved by the cold of these northern regions that if they cannot be removed at the time of capture they are secured in the ensuing season.
As the boat reached mid-stream, where the wind was blowing against the current, great rollers were met with, that tossed the light craft about like a ball. But this was evidently the play-ground of the Beluga, and dead ahead the white forms were seen darting about in the inky water with startling distinctness, while faint puffs were occasionally borne down on the wind.
Gradually we neared them, and suddenly a white dome appeared on the weather bow. Then came the command and ensuing scene chronicled at the commencement of this paper.
We were perfectly familiar with whaling-terms, and as the game was struck we construed Captain Sam's impressive "git aft" to mean "starn all," and even in that moment of stumbling and drenching felt a sense of disappointment in the suppression of a time-honored term. To omit "There she blows!" was enough; but to substitute "git aft" for "starn all" was a libel on the chroniclers of the "Whaler's Own Book."
There was little time, however, for regrets. Our combined weight had raised the bow a trifle, yet not enough to prevent the sea from coming in; and, as the skipper, who was laboring with the steering-oar, said, the small whaler was "hoopin' along, takin' everything as it came, and askin' no questions." Now by the slight slacking of the line we were high on a wave, the crest of which was dashed in our faces in the mad race; now down in a hollow, taking the next sea bodily and plunging through it, causing the oars and harpoons to rattle as if they were the very bones of the boat shaking in fear and terror.
In a short time she was a third full of water, and the amateur whalers were invited to man the pumps—namely, two tin basins—and bale the St. Lawrence out as fast as it came in. The maddened animal soon carried us beyond the area of heavy seas, and preparations were made for taking in the slack. The boat was still rushing along at an eight-knot rate; and, as the whale showed no signs of weakening, it was Captain Sam's opinion that nothing short of the lance would stop him.
"Jest lay holt of the line, will ye?" sung out Captain Sol, passing the slack aft, and four pairs of arms hauled the boat nearer the game, that was far ahead. At first this only spurred the creature to further endeavors; but the steady pull soon told, and, after an amount of labor that can only be compared to sawing a cord of wood with a dull implement, the white head of the Beluga came in sight.
"Steady, now!" shouted Captain Sol, releasing his hold and picking up the lance. "Now, then, work her ahead."
A final haul, and the boat was fairly alongside of the fleeing animal, careening violently under its rapid rushes; and, in response to the order "Git to wind'ard," we sprang to the weather rail. A moment of suspense, a quick motion of the lance, and the great white body of the whale rose from the water and fell heavily back, beating it into foam in its convulsive struggles.
"She dies hard," said Captain Sol, shaking the water from the creases of his oil-skin as the boat rounded to at a safe distance from the dying whale. "But," he continued, lighting a match by biting the sulphur and puffing violently at a short, black pipe, "that ain't nothing to what they do sometimes: is it, Sam?"
"I ain't denyin' of it," was the reply of that individual, who was now sculling the boat about the whale in a great circle.
"I've seen," continued the skipper, "a white whale smash a bot so clean that ye'd thought it had been through a mill; and it was a caution haow we didn't go with it. That was a curious year," he added. "Something happened to drive the whales up here so thick that the hull river was alive with 'em, and of course we was for reapin' the harvest. When we struck the rip-rap—as they call the tide agin' the wind—it was jest alive with 'em, puffin' and snortin' on all sides. I had three harpoons aboard, besides a rifle, and in a minute I had two foul, with buoys after 'em, and as one big feller came up alongside to blow I let him have it with the rifle.
"Naow," he went on, "whether they heard it or not I can't say, but I heard a yell from Sam jest in time to look and see a whale rise I'll 'low twenty foot clean out of the water. Then there was a kind of a rush, and Sam and me went down, and when we riz it was gone. The critter had hopped clean over that bot as slick as nothing. That kinder tuck the peartness aout of us, so to speak; but later in the day I got aout the gun ag'in, havin' broke the lance, and in killin' the critter she jumped on the bot, and—wall, Sam and me we lit aout, and was picked up after a spell; but that bot, there wasn't enough of her to make kindlin'-wood of.
"They ain't vicious like," continued the skipper, "but clumsy, and if yaou git in the way ye're bound to git hurted. Round the bend at Bic Island one came ashore one time and got left every tide, so she was aout of water an hour or so every day. Heaps of city folks went to see her, and one chap came along and let on haow she couldn't be alive aout of water, and poked her like with a stick. Wall, it ain't for me to say haow many feet she knocked him, but when she fetched him with her flukes it was a Tuesday, and I guess he thought he'd reached the turnin'-p'int of Friday when he hauled himself aout of the mud.
"No, they won't exactly live aout of water, but they'll stand it a like of three weeks if yaou splash 'em every hour or so. They sent one to England that way. They ain't fish. Whales' milk's good, if cream is.
"But the best bit of whalin'," continued the communicative Captain Sol, "that I ever see in these 'ere parts was done by that identical old chap in the starn there."
"When Sol ain't talkin', gentlemen," retorted the person thus alluded to, "ye'll know he's sick,"
"Wall," said Captain Sol, laughing, "I'll spin the yarn, and yaou kin go back on it if yaou kin. As I was sayin', we was aout one day I think a couple o' miles below Barnaby Island. I was a-mummin' for'ard, kinder sleep-in' on and by, and Sam at the helm, when we see a bot a-slidin' into the ripple right ahead of us, and in a minute a couple of white heads was dodgin' up a little to the wind'ard. Sam trimmed the sheet and hauled the Howlin' Mary—that's what we called the bot—-on the wind, and the other bot did the same, both of us makin' for the same spot. I see it was nip and tuck; and, knowin' that Sam was a master-hand, I says. ' Sam, yaou take the iron.' So we shifted.
"The other bot had a trifle the weather-gage of us, but both of us, mind ye, makin' for where we thought the critter was comin' up to blow, and in a minute, sure enough, up it come. This 'ere other bot shot right across aour bows; but, Lord bless ye, it would take a proper good Injun to beat Sam, for he up, hauls back, and let fly the harpoon clean over the other hot, takin' the critter right alongside the blow-hole so neat that the line fell across the other bot.—Naow, deny it if yaou kin," said Captain Sol, turning to his friend.
"Ye're a master-hand at talkin'," retorted Captain Sam. "I ain't denyin' of it; but it was luck, good luck, that's all."
By this time the white whale had succumbed, and lay upon the surface motionless and dead; and upon the boat being hauled alongside the huge creature was taken in tow and soon stranded upon the beach, where the valuable parts were secured,—the liver and blubber for the oil, and the thick, white skin that was to be tanned and made into leather or used in the manufacture of various articles.
The evening following, upon invitation, we visited the cabin of Captain Sol, who was a widower and kept bachelor's hall, so to speak. We found him seated on a keg, by the side of an enormous caldron that might have contained the witches' compound, judging from the strange forms of steam that arose from it, while the lurid flames beneath, fed by the oily drippings, lent a still greater weirdness to the scene.
"Good-evenin', gentlemen," said the captain, rising quickly as we entered. "I was settin' here in a sog like, and didn't hear ye. It's a master-night, and we're goin' to have good weather to-morrow. If yaou want to try it ag'in, ye're welcome.
"Sam? Sartin; he's goin'. Him and me's jest like the figger ten: if yaou haul off the one we ain't good for nothin'. If yaou want to see a faithful friend, jest clap yer eyes on Sam Whittlefield. And that ain't all," continued the skipper, looking around and speaking low. "Ye might not think it, for he's master-modest, but Sam's got larn-in' that there ain't many in aonr taown kin grapple with. Yaou oughter see his lib'ry. A full set o' the records of Congress from 1847 up to 1861; and he'd have had 'em all, only he jined the navy and couldn't keep 'em up. Then there's a history by Mister Parley, and a hull secretaryfull of books of all kinds. Oh, Sam's literary; there ain't no gittin' raound that.
"Yaou might hear him speak of their son John? Wall, he was a chip o' the old block. He was as wild a yonker as they make 'em; but Sam never laid the whip on him; he argued with him and eddicated him on a literary principle. When John did anything reckless like, the old lady'd fetch aout a sartin book, called 'The Terrible Suffering of Sary Perbeck,'—like enough ye've heard on it,—and I tell ye that tuck the conceit aout of him. She belonged to old Quaker stock of Paris, Maine, and she kept it up till John was a man grown and she lost her eyesight. She made a good boy of him; but the poor feller went down with the rest in the gale of 1875, on the Grand Banks. John had hard luck. The first v'yage he made, the schooner was struck by a sea on the Banks, capsized, and rolled completely under, comin' up the other side, so't the men below dropped out of their bunks on ter the ceilin', and then back ag'in as she righted.[A] The hatches were battened down, and they found John lashed to the wheel, half drowned. The next trip all hands foundered. They reckoned she went down at the anchorage.
[Footnote A: The schooner Daniel A. Burnam had a similar experience in 1877. She rolled completely over and righted herself without the loss of a man.]
"Have some beans, won't ye?" asked the skipper abruptly, as if he had been deluded by some trick into a gloomy frame of mind and was determined to shake it off then and there. "Them is the real New England beans," he continued, taking a black bean-pot with a wooden spoon from the ashes. "There's the bone and sinner of New England's sons right here. I'm master-fond of 'em; never sails withaout a pot or so. Every time I see a pot it makes me think of old Joe Muggridge, a deacon of aour taown. He beat me once years ago in 'lection for hog-reeve; but I don't bear no ill feelin'. He was deacon of the First Baptist, and captain of one of the biggest coasters in aour parts, and that fond of beans that folks believed he'd 'a' died if he couldn't have had 'em. Wall, it so happened one fall that there came on a powerful gale on the Georges, and a power of hands was lost. A good many bots got carried away from the schooners, and one dory with two men from Boothbay was picked up by one of these ocean-steamers bound in for New York, and that's the way the yarn got told. They'd been withaout food and water for three days, and were abaout givin' up; but the steamer-folks tuck 'em in and steamed for port.
"The next mornin' it was blowin' fresh and lively, and the lookout sighted a schooner lyin' to a couple of miles to the lew'ard, reefed daown close, and a flag flyin', union down,—signal of distress. Thinkin' they were sinkin', the captain of the steamer put towards her, and rounded to half a mile off and called for volunteers to git aout the bot. Half a dozen brave fellers sprang to the davits, and among 'em aour Boothbay boys. They'd been in a fix, ye see, and was eager to help the rest of sufferin' humanity. She was rollin' so that it tuck 'em nigh an hour to git the bot over, and then two men fell overboard; but finally they got off toward the schooner, all hands givin' 'em three cheers.
"It was a hard pull, and a nasty sea, but they kept at it, and in half an hour was within hailin'-distance. Then the third officer of the steamer stood up and sung aout, 'Schooner ahoy!' 'Ay, ay!' says a man in the schooner's fore-riggin', and the men see naow that she was ridin' like a duck and as dry as a sojer. 'Are ye in distress?' sung aout the officer. 'Yas,' came from the man in the riggin'. 'Flounderin'?' shouted the officer ag'in. 'No,' sung out old man Muggridge, for it was him: 'next thing to it. We're aout o' beans. Kin ye spare a pot?'
"Wall," continued Captain Sol, reddening with the roar of laughter that accompanied the recollection, "it ain't for me, bein' a perfesser of religion, to let on what the men in the bot said, but it had a master-effect on the deacon, for afore them rescuers got back to the steamer he'd shook aout his reefs and was haulin' to the east'ard.
"Wall," said the old skipper, banking the fire with a shovelful of sand, as his visitors rose to go, "to-morrow, then, at early flood, sharp."
The early flood was that dismal time when the phantom mists of night still cling to the earth, and low-lying clouds of fog cover the river, only to be dispersed by the coming day. Cold and cheerless as it was, it found us again launching the whale-boat, and, when the sail was trimmed aft and pipes lighted, we rushed into the fog and headed down the river to meet the rising sun.
The mist was so dense that only the glimmer of Captain Sol's pipe could be seen for'ard, appearing like an intermittent eye gleaming through the fog that settled upon our oil-skins in crystal drops and ran in tiny rivulets down the creases into the boat. For a mile we scudded along before the west wind through the gloom, and then a wondrous change commenced. Soft gleams of light shot from the horizon upward, the dark-blue heavens assumed a lighter tint, the pencilled rays growing broader and fusing together, producing a strange and rapidly-spreading nebulous light. The cloud of low-lying mist now became a brassy hue, seemingly heated to ignition, and then from its very substance appeared to rise a fiery, glowing mass that flooded the river with a golden radiance.
"It's a master-sight," quoth Captain Sol between the puffs, as the change went on and the fog began to break before the rising sun. "I ain't no likin' for fogs. Ye see——" But here the skipper stopped, as a peculiar sound and then another, the puffing of the white whale, was heard.
The boat was hauled on the wind, the mast unshipped, and, harpoon in hand, Captain Sol stood braced for the affray. The ripple seemed alive with the ghostly creatures, their white forms darting here and there, while the puffing came fast and furious.
"Stand by to git aft!" whispered the harpooner, and that moment, instead of a white head, the entire body of a Beluga rose in front of the boat, clearing the water in a graceful leap.
Quick as thought the skipper hurled his weapon. It struck with a sounding thud, a wing shot, and the great creature fell heavily, impaled in mid-air, to rush away, bearing boat and white-whalers far down the river toward the sea.
* * * * *
A Virginia Lady of the Old School.
Among the many beautiful and fascinating women who adorned Richmond society at the beginning of the present century there were few more remarkable and interesting than Mrs. Mayo, the wife of Colonel John Mayo, founder of the bridge at Richmond that bears his name. She was the daughter of John De Hart, of New Jersey, an eminent lawyer and a member of the first Continental Congress. Bellville, the home of Colonel and Mrs. Mayo, in the suburbs of Richmond, was the seat of elegant and boundless hospitality. No person of distinction ever came to Richmond without calling at Bellville, the entrée to which was an unquestioned passport to the best society of the city.
Mrs. Mayo's eldest daughter, Maria, was the most celebrated Virginia belle of her day. She never gave a decided answer to any of her numerous suitors, and the story goes that one evening three gentlemen met at her house, and after a very pleasant visit they returned to Richmond together. One of them asked the others why they went there, as he was engaged to Miss Mayo and expected shortly to marry her. The other gentlemen also said they had hopes of winning the fair lady. The first gentleman determined to have the matter settled, and accordingly went to her house the following day and sought an interview with Mrs. Mayo. He told her he had her daughter's consent, and asked hers. Mrs. Mayo replied she was sorry she could not give her consent, and the gentleman then understood that the mother and daughter were in perfect accord in the matter of the young lady's love-affairs. In this way Miss Mayo kept on hand a regiment of admirers, who formed a sort of reserve-corps. When John Howard Payne, the author of "Home, Sweet Home," visited Richmond, he was a frequent guest at the Mayo mansion. He wrote a poem, in which he described himself as falling asleep in a grove and all the months of the year appearing to him. The month of June was the first, and he finally winds up with May, which he described in very glowing language, ending with the line,—
Sweet May, oh, I could love thee ever.
Maria Mayo is said to have refused more than a hundred suitors before she accepted General Winfield Scott, who courted her when he was a member of the Richmond bar as Mr. Scott. After entering the army he continued his addresses, and was refused successively as Captain Scott and Colonel Scott, and it was only as General Scott, the victorious hero of Lundy's Lane, that he at last won the hand of the much-admired belle.
Mr. William Henry Haxall, a very agreeable gentleman of Richmond, relates that on one occasion he visited Mrs. Scott soon after one of her trips to Europe. He went in the evening at nine o'clock, and after some time, when he thought he had paid a call sufficiently long, he slyly looked at his watch, and, to his amazement, found it was one o'clock. On his apologizing for the length of his visit, Mrs. Scott assured him she never retired before one or two o'clock, but that she had no idea it was so late, Mr. Haxall being one of the most agreeable gentlemen she had ever met, when in fact he had not spoken a dozen words, but was a charmed listener to her interesting description of her travels abroad.
In 1828, Mrs. Mayo, in the sixty-eighth year of her age, undertook a voyage to Europe in a sailing-vessel. After her arrival, she passed most of her time in Paris, where she was the recipient of very flattering attentions and the intimate friend and guest of some of the best families of the nobility, especially those of General La Fayette and his son George Washington, of the Count de Ségur, and of M. de Neuville, minister of marine, of whom Mrs. Mayo wrote, January 10, 1829, "He lives in one of the palaces in grand style, and we see there all the people of the court as often as it suits us." She renewed also her friendship with many French families whom she had known in Richmond as refugees during the French Revolution, and their attentions and evident pleasure at the reunion seem to have been peculiarly gratifying to her. She returned to Richmond in 1829, and lived at Bellville until that elegant mansion was destroyed by fire in 1842. After her return, she confined her entertainments almost exclusively to handsome dinner-parties, at which she presided with exceeding grace and elegance, and where it was said that, though the wines were fine, the flavor and brilliancy of the conversation were far superior. She never retired without a candle and writing-materials at her bedside, and if during the night any new idea or bright thought arose, she would immediately strike a light and jot it down. She retained her mental vigor and personal attractions until her death in 1843, in the eighty-second year of her age.
The following instances will serve to illustrate Mrs. Mayo's great nerve and self-possession. She was accustomed to drive daily to the bridge to collect the toll of the preceding day, consisting generally of silver of various denominations, which she put in a bag and deposited in the bank. Her driver Moses was a favorite negro, who had a weakness for drink: he had several times tried her fortitude and temper severely by upsetting her into a gully by the roadside leading to Bellville, fortunately with no serious consequences to her, unfortunately with none to himself. On one occasion, Mrs. Mayo, being too late for the bank, and intending to pass the night at the residence of her daughter Mrs. Cabell, took the bag of silver and placed it in a closet in her room, which was at the back of the house and opening on a porch. During the night she was awakened by a noise, and perceived the figure of a man in her room. Pretending sleep, she quietly watched his movements until she saw him enter the closet, when she arose quickly, and, rushing rapidly across the room, shut and locked the closet door in an instant, and called loudly for her son-in-law Dr. Cabell, who was in the adjoining room. On his hurried entrance, she informed him that she had a man in the closet, and that he must go for a policeman, —which was done, and the door opened, when, to their astonishment, there stood the trusted Moses. Mrs. Mayo, horrified, exclaimed, "Oh, Moses, how could you try to rob me!" Moses, hanging his head, dropped on his knees, and, in beseeching tones, replied, "Misses, it warn't Moses: it was the debbil;" and the old lady forgave him.
At a time when the whole State was in consternation from an apprehended insurrection of the slaves, when families far and near were flocking to the cities for protection, and patrols were scouring the country day and night, Mrs. Mayo was entirely alone at Bellville, with no white person in the neighborhood. Her friends in vain besought her to go to Richmond. At length matters became so threatening that some gentlemen, discussing the subject one night, concluded that it was too unsafe for Mrs. Mayo, and determined to ride out and insist upon her returning with them to the city. They reached Bellville about midnight, and, as they rode up, a window was raised, showing that the brave proprietress was on the qui vive. She demanded, in a quiet, fearless voice, "Who is there?" They explained the object of their visit, but pleaded and remonstrated ineffectually. She refused to accompany them, saying she had no fear, and could protect herself; which she did boldly and safely until the danger and alarm had passed away.
Mystifications of Authoresses.
"Don't you think," wrote the author of "Evelina" to her sister, "there must be some wager depending among the little curled imps who hover over us mortals, of how much flummery goes to turn the head of an authoress?" For at that time little Fanny Burney, twenty-six years of age, was enjoying such an ovation as had never before come within the experience of woman. She had written a book which all London was reading, quoting, and discussing admiringly without the least idea of the author's identity; and Fanny could not meet an acquaintance, could not receive a letter, could not attend a party of friends, without being asked, "Have you read 'Evelina'? Is it not charming?" Anonymity was in this case the cleverest ruse for an absolute enjoyment of the results of her work. One after another her family and outside friends, from the great Dr. Johnson down, were admitted to a share of the delightful secret. All who knew that "Little Burney" was at the bottom of this fascinating mystery were as eager as she herself for nattering comments and conjectures, and there were nudgings of elbows, "nods and becks and wreathed smiles," when "Evelina" was mentioned. It would have been no wonder if the little girl's head had been turned as she hugged her surprise and happiness to her swelling little heart. When the murder was out, and she was fêted and honored, called to court and compelled to courtesy thankfully at the ponderous compliments of great personages, she must have felt that the bloom of the peach was rubbed off and the bubble of the champagne departed.
In most cases strangers may not intermeddle with the joy of authorship. Spoken praise carries off the rose and puts a thorn in its place. One of our famous novelists, whom we will call Brown, happened to catch sight in a strange city of the sign, "Autographs of distinguished authors for sale," He thought to himself he would test his own market value, and accordingly entered the shop.
"Have you the autograph of Mr. Brown?" he inquired.
"Oh, yes."
"What is the price?" he asked.
"One for two cents, or two for three cents," was the reply.
He was in the habit of declaring afterward that he could have borne the one for two cents, but that the two for three cents stung him bitterly. Such is fame; and no wonder that young authoresses often begrudge a complete surrender of their identity to the Juggernaut car of public curiosity and criticism, and begin either anonymously or with a pseudonyme. A masculine nom de plume has of late been a favorite device with the fair sex, partly for the reason that it is supposed to confer an ampler ease, and partly from an idea that male writers command a readier hearing and higher prices than female. We see a great many Henris, Georges, and the like on the title-pages of books which are a flimsy veil to conceal the pretty feminine figure behind.
After Miss Burney had set the fashion, women pressed boldly forward into literary ranks, although the author of "Waverley" absorbed in a great degree the curiosity of the reading public. Miss Austen, whose work is destined, in the opinion of good judges, to survive with the language, made her first venture, like the author of "Evelina," anonymously; but it created no such furore. This was "Sense and Sensibility," published in 1811; but she had already written "Northanger Abbey" and "Pride and Prejudice," although they were not published until years afterward. No one supposed her to be more than an every-day bright and observant young lady. Like other English girls of her class, it was her habit to sit in the drawing-room with the ladies of the family after eleven o'clock each day, ready to receive visitors. Instead of having needle-work in her hand, Jane had a pen, which was often dropped just in the midst of one of her clear, incisive pictures of the Woodhouses, Knightleys, and Bennets, as neighbors who might have served for the originals of those characters were announced. Feminine tact instantly obliterated every sign of literary occupation: the quill was thrown aside, and her sister's canvases and embroidery were strewn over the writing-table to cover every scrap of paper.
The famous pseudonyme of George Sand, which seems so characteristic of the writer, was a matter of accident. When Madame Dudevant, tired of her domestic rôle, went to Paris to take up a literary career, her mother-in-law, Baroness Dudevant, said to her, with incredulous horror,—
"Is it true that it is your intention to print books?"
"Yes, madame."
"Well, I call that an odd notion."
"Yes, madame."
"That is all very good and very fine; but I hope you are not going to put the name that I bear on the covers of printed books."
"Oh, certainly not, madame: there is no danger."
When the publisher wanted a signature for "Indiana" which should show that it was by one of the authors of "Rose et Blanche," which she had written in collaboration with Sandeau under the name of Jules Sand, the author retained the Sand and prefixed George to it as a simple and rustic title.
The Brontés when about to publish their poems took the names "Currer, Ellis, and Acton Bell," each keeping her initials. This choice, wrote Charlotte, was "dictated by a sort of conscientious scruple at assuming names positively masculine, while we did not like to declare ourselves women, because, without at the time suspecting that our mode of writing and thinking was not what is called 'feminine,' we had a vague impression that authoresses were likely to be looked on with prejudice." The London "Athenaeum," which was one of the few papers that noticed the little book, spoke of the work of the three "brothers." Even after "Jane Eyre," "Wuthering Heights," and "Agnes Grey" were printed, the secret of the triple identity was jealously kept, until a vexatious tangle of their names, and a claim from certain publishers that the three authors of the three books were one person and that all the novels were by the author of "Jane Eyre," roused Charlotte and Anne Bronte to the point of setting off for London to show Smith and Elder that they were honest and fair. Up to this time the publishers had not known whether they were women or men. "On reaching Mr. Smith's," writes Mrs. Gaskell, "Charlotte put his own letter into his hands,—the same letter which had excited so much disturbance at Haworth Parsonage only twenty-four hours before. 'Where did you get this?' said he, as if he could not believe that the two young ladies dressed in black, of slight figures, looking pleased yet agitated, could be the embodied Currer and Acton Bell for whom curiosity had been hunting so eagerly in vain." The secret, however, was not disclosed, except to the publishers. Until "Shirley" was published, opinion was much divided as to the probable sex of Currer Bell, but "Shirley" was declared to be written by a woman; and, this suggestion once started, questions of identity soon settled themselves. Charlotte went to London again, and this time was introduced to all the literary people in the town. It was not until her third visit, however, that she attended a lecture of Thackeray's, and at the close found that the audience, instead of withdrawing, had formed themselves into two lines and drawn back to see the famous authoress as she passed out. "During this passage through the 'cream of society,' Miss Bronté's hand trembled to such a degree that her companion feared lest she should turn faint and be unable to proceed." Ellis and Acton Bell were in their early graves, and all the splendor of her fame could hardly lighten by a breath the weight of that lonely sorrow of Charlotte.
The story of George Eliot's pseudonyme has been too recently told to require allusion, except to point out its practical value to herself, shielding as it did her susceptibilities,—in fact, guarding like a chrysalis the first strivings, the flutter into full life, of that immortal winged thing it concealed.
Several of our own female writers have chosen a masculine nom de plume, and guarded it consistently, like Saxe Holm, etc. Miss Murfree is, we believe, the first whose disguise editors as well as the general public failed to pierce. Now that the critical faculty begins to play more surely upon the works of Charles Egbert Craddock, it may be said that a woman's love of romance and picturesqueness shades off into haze and unreality some of the pictures of life which a man's experience and surer knowledge would have made vivid by fewer and more vigorous strokes. However, as long as she chose, Miss Murfree held her secret beyond the reach of discovery, because nobody questioned it; her disclosure was piquant, and the state of surprise into which she threw her admirers was so utter that the full story of it ought to be told, although we are not empowered to tell it here.
The Abuse of Adjectives.
It is a great pity that the fairy willow whistle which blew everything into its proper place should have burst with its first note, for there would be such ample opportunity nowadays for the display of its peculiar functions. Why, for instance, should modern novel-writers turn the patient adjective into an overworked little drudge, and compel it to do thrice the labor that it can effectually perform? Fifty years ago it led a life of respected ease, and was only called on when it could be of some real use to the author; now it knows no respite from its ever-increasing tasks, and too often bears upon its weak shoulders the real burden of the book. Formerly we were told that Tilburina had golden hair and blue eyes, or raven hair and black eyes, as the case might be; and, that matter being settled, we heard little more upon the subject. Now the hair and eyes appear anew on every page, and are apparently considered the most important element in the story.
Who has not been struck with the slighting manner in which Sir Walter describes his heroines' charms? Edith Bellenden, we are asked to believe, was fair without insipidity; Julia Mannering, who is to Waverley what Rosalind is to Shakespeare, is hardly credited with being beautiful at all; while when it comes to his heroes Sir Walter is even more strikingly ineloquent. "A slender young man," or "a young man of genteel appearance," is sometimes all that is vouchsafed to us, the rest being happily left to our imagination. Among modern writers, Trollope alone manifests this curious indifference to the hair, eyes, noses, and mouths of his dramatis personae. What was the color of Grace Crawley's hair, or of Lily Dale's eyes? What did Archdeacon Grantby look like, or who shall venture to describe the immortal Mrs. Proudie? George Eliot, on the contrary, inclines, especially in her later books, to a lavish use of adjectives; and the aspiring authoress of to-day may cite Gwendolen's "long brown glance" as being quite as strained as any effort of her own. But then we can no more approach George Eliot by copying a few of her mannerisms than we can become Napoleons by wearing an old coat, or William the Thirds by cultivating an inordinate taste for green peas.
To all, however, who wish to behold this tendency in its fullest and freest development, we would recommend the perusal of a novel by Rhoda Broughton, called "Second Thoughts,"—a bright, vivacious, almost witty little book, marred only by its ineradicable defects of style. The heroine, Gillian Latimer, is described over and over again, with as much emphasis on every feature as if she were one of Madame Tussaud's pet creations and had nothing but her outward appearance to suggest the real woman she aspires to be. On her eyes alone more adjectives are brought to bear than would have sufficed Scott for all the orbs in Waverley. They are "gray eyes," "great gray eyes," "angry gray eyes," "steel-gray eyes," and "displeased gray eyes;" also "grave eyes," "sparkling eyes," "clear eyes," "blazing eyes," "proud eyes," "great eyes," "aching eyes," "large bright eyes," "drooped eyes," "eager young eyes," "angry eyes," "steel-colored eyes." "sad, leave-taking eyes," "flashing eyes," and "proud, dewy eyes." Upon one occasion she "lifts the fair stars of her gray eyes" into her lover's face; on another, she scorches him badly with "gray eyes like furious fires." The hero himself, a most quiet, commonplace young doctor, is not above a little eye-work on his own account. He has alternately "serious eyes," "cross eyes," "quiet, shrewd eyes," "coldly just, bright eyes," "steady eyes," "calm eyes," "fiery eyes," "town-tired eyes,"—which is quite a novelty in the list,—and "eyes of burning choler," to say nothing of eyes that "burn like fire," while he "grows pale as ashes," which must have given him the effect of a conflagration, especially as he stands once "all beflamed with sunset."
Next to the supreme question of eyes we hear most about Gillian's "blonde head," and her "flaxen head," her "flax head," her "bowed flax head," her "tossed head," her "wilful head," her "fair head," and her "well-poised head," while to match these maidenly attributes she has a "fair Sphinx face," a "tragic pale face," a "serious face," a "humiliated white face," a "flaming face," a "hotly-flushed face," a "sweetly apologetic face," and a "flower-textured face." Moreover, being a very remarkable girl, she is endowed with a "severe young figure," and a "gracious figure," whatever that may mean, while her "lily-fair" and "delicate-cold" hands have "satiny backs," and are "small and capable" as well. She is never merely pretty like other women, but she has "ripe June beauty." and a "robust yet delicate beauty." If she loses her temper, which happens rather often in the course of the story, she manifests the same by the "red scorn of her look," or by her "beautiful vexed eyes," which resemble a "sudden angry gray arrow,"—imagine an angry gray arrow,—or by "flaming out into crimson anger," or "with wreathed neck and flaming cheek," or "with enkindled eye and vermeil cheek," both of which expressions we would recommend to lovers of simplicity.
If she is sad, however, she "lifts the drowned stars of her impatient, suffering eyes," or lowers them with a "moist look;" or she strays in "confused red misery," or in a "passionate scarlet hurry," which is as extraordinary in its way as an angry gray arrow. When her father dies, she stands "long and craped," with a "black elbow" resting on the chimney-place; while her various methods of blushing take up half the volume. Never, indeed, was there a heroine who blushed so much about so little. Sometimes it is merely a matter of "flaming cheeks," or of the "young roses of her cheeks," or of the "mortified carmine of her cheeks," or of her "hot bloom," or of her "beautiful hot red roses." Sometimes it is the "deep color of mingled shame and joy;" while on more especial occasions we are assured that her face is "made all of poppies," that it "changes from poppy-color to milk, and back from milk to poppy-color," that it "keeps shifting from frightened white to mortified red, and back again," and, better than all, that "cheek and chin and pearl-fair throat grow all one rose-red flame," with which triumph of compound adjectives we will close our quotations, only remarking that Gillian's blushing chin rivals the achievement of Ursula in "John Halifax," who, we are gravely told, colored over her throat, neck, and arms.
All honor to the lady Olivia, who has taught us how to make a rational inventory of a woman's charms! "Item, two lips indifferent red; item, two gray eyes with lids to them; item, one neck, one chin, and so forth." To these let us add, item, one blush indifferent rosy, and then have done with the subject forever.
* * * * *
"Nathaniel Parker Willis." By Henry A.Beers.
"Edgar Allan Poe." By George E. Woodbury.
(American Men of Letters Series.)
Boston: Houghton, Mifflin & Co.
The American Men of Letters Series is giving us some excellent biographies, well written, the facts well assimilated and grouped, and the whole treatment so accurate and graphic as to be full not only of instruction but of entertainment. Formerly American biography was so deficient in just those qualities which endear English biographical literature to us, that we were inclined to believe that the fault was inherent in Americans and American life, that our days and works lacked picturesqueness and color and left no salient points for the chronicler to seize. We now see that the meagre harvests of former biographers were due to their hasty and superficial generalizations. For at least three of the volumes in this series—the life of James Fenimore Cooper and the two now before us—may be favorably compared with the best work in the English Men of Letters Series, which is indeed high praise. Unusual and striking as were the incidents in the life of Cooper, they had completely dropped out of sight of the present generation. The biographers of Willis and Poe had no such advantage. Willis is still remembered, not only as a litt?teur and journalist, but as a man about town, while legend has never ceased to be busy with the memory of Poe, so that the traditions of his strange career are curiously linked to and incorporated with his best-known works.
The present estimate of Willis as a literary man is so slight that it seems almost like impaling a butterfly to apply critical tests to his writings. Professor Beers has nevertheless made it a profitable and interesting study to follow him through his career, which was, upon the whole, singularly fortunate. Few authors have possessed so happy a knack of making the present moment both enjoyable and profitable. His personal endowments were all in his favor, and no sooner was he launched in Europe than he gained a great social success. England, in particular, opened some of its pleasantest circles to him. Not only did Lady Blessington take him up, but he became a favorite with many of the most lofty and exclusive members of the aristocracy. Never was opportunity more auspicious, for Willis was a born worshipper of refinements and luxuries. He had starved in America for beauty and color, and dear to him were all these adjuncts of a highly-civilized life. It was his mission to reproduce for Americans lively impressions in letters to newspapers at home, and in stories and sketches, in which he drew freely not only upon his own experiences, but upon all the hints and suggestions he could pick up. His industry and ingenious expedients were well rewarded: in fact, one is a little surprised to find that in 1842 he was writing four articles monthly for four magazines, and receiving one hundred dollars for each, which makes a sum total of almost five thousand a year. He was, besides, handsomely paid for his books both in England and at home, and had generally on hand some writing for illustrated volumes of travel, so that for many years he may easily be said to have made seven or eight thousand a year.
No greater contrast to Willis—the man of the world, who knew how to turn every habit, talent, and instinct to account—could be found than poor Poe, all whose opportunities were wasted, spoiled, or flung away. It is the most difficult thing in the world to arrive at anything like a complete idea of the identity of so fantastic a man as the author of the "Raven." The faults, inconsistencies, and contradictions of his character perplex and dismay one the more closely one looks into his letters and the minor incidents of his career. Mr. Woodbury has, however, acquitted himself well in this difficult task, and has in many cases separated truth from long-accepted fiction and given us a clear picture of what has hitherto been blurred and distorted by unfaithful friends and foes. The story is a most hopeless and pitiful one, its gloom brightened and its bitterness sweetened by but few of the consolations which belong to average human lives. The causes of this are apparent enough: they were constituents of Poe's brain and heart; but for him to have been otherwise organized would have been for his unique work to have had no existence.
Recent Fiction.
"Troubled Waters: A Problem of To-Day." By Beverley Ellison Warner.
Philadelphia: J.B. Lippincott Company.
"A Marsh Island," By Sarah Orne Jewett. Boston: Houghton, Mifflin & Co.
"The Duchess Emilia." By Barrett Wendell. Boston: James R. Osgood & Co.
"Across the Chasm." "Within the Capes." New York: Charles Scribner's Sons.
"One of the Duanes." By Alice King Hamilton. Philadelphia: J.B. Lippincott
Company.
"Tales from Many Sources." Vols. I. and II. New York: Dodd, Mead & Co.
There is a generous use of good material in Mr. Warner's novel, the scene of which is laid in a New England manufacturing town, with all the sharp and diversified social contrasts, the eager strifes and competitions, that belong to such a community, clearly portrayed. The author calls his story "A Problem of To-Day," and it is his study to press home to the consciousness of the reader the series of dull and wearing miseries, the bitter discouragements and pathetic misfortunes, which pursue the working-man whose most faithful labor insures him no secure hold upon future comfort and prosperity. It is both the strength and the weakness of the book that its most prominent figure, Richard Wilton, is a wealthy mill-owner who has risen to his position in a way which makes him an unfair representative of the class of capitalists. A man without intellect or humanity, without faith, without law, a robber of the dead, a despoiler of the widow and orphan, a successful impostor, a remorseless brute who takes pleasure in outraging and crushing his subordinates, would naturally be a bad master and make his work-people miserable by heaped-up tyrannies. His faults are not the inevitable outgrowth of a position of power and the conflict between capital and labor, but are the result of his own individual depravity. But this man's personality is a powerful one, and his personality is the motive of most of the dramatic events which crowd the pages. The history of the "strike" which follows the reduction of wages at Trade Lawn Mills is faithfully and vigorously given. Mr. Warner evidently knows the temper of workingmen, their patience and impatience, their trials, temptations, and weaknesses. He gauges with pitiful fidelity the faults of character and purpose which make almost every "strike" contain within itself the germs of collapse and failure. The plot is cleverly conceived and successfully carried out. That the bubble which has for a time floated Richard Wilton's frauds and crimes bursts at last, and that the villain is brought to well-merited disgrace, is a matter of course. Trade Lawn Mills pass into the hands of their rightful owners, and certain co-operative ideas which are an essential ingredient of the story and its applied moral are carried out. The author attaches high importance to co-operative schemes, and finds in them the clear solution of the vexing questions concerning the future of the workingman. As an offset to the somewhat dark and troubled pictures of life which the story presents, there are sunny and pleasant passages in which a High-Church clergyman and a young lady by the name of Sydney Worthington figure. The whole book is, in fact, inspired by a spirit of hopefulness and a sure belief that divine order overrules the efforts, successes, and failures of the humblest human being and that a way of deliverance is sure to come.
If "A Marsh Island" shows no distinct advance upon Miss Jewett's earlier work, it is yet a pretty, artistic product which delicately emphasizes the author's best points and gives us her distinct charm without any waste of effects. Her feeling for rural life and her clear comprehension of rural people were never better displayed than in this little story. A generous play of late-summer and autumn radiance lights up its every nook and corner; it is mellow with warm color and odorous of late fruits and flowers. We cannot help finding the artist visitor, that product of the bloom of Boston civilization, a little hackneyed and time-worn. He has surely done his part in literature, and may retire to the heaven of the dilettante. But all the inhabitants of Marsh Island are human and attractive, and the untiring industries of the well-ordered household soothe one like the rhythm of a song. The bizarre, incongruous, but, upon the whole, satisfactory specimen of New England "help" which Miss Jewett generally introduces finds an excellent example here in the person of Temperance Kipp. Squire Owen is a genial man, so overflowing with generous nature that he can afford to fill out the more meagre humanities of his wife, who has susceptibilities, tempers, and moods. "They used to tell a story," he one day remarks to Mrs. Owen, with great satisfaction, when she has a distinct grievance about clothes,—"I do' know but you've heard it, —about old Sergeant Copp an' his wife, that was always quarrellin'. Somebody heard her goin' on one day. Says she, 'I do wish somebody'd give me a lift as fur as Westmarket. I do feel's if I ought to buy me a cap. I ain't got a decent cap to my back: if I was to die to-morrow, I ain't got no cap that's fit to lay me out in.' 'Blast ye,' says he, 'why didn't ye die when ye had a cap?'" The more impassioned side of life does not suit Miss Jewett so well as the humorous and pastoral; but each detail about her heroine is attractive, and nothing in recent fiction, is more true, touching, and womanly than Doris's journey to Westmarket in the autumnal dawn to keep her lover at home from the fishing-banks.
"The Duchess Emilia" is one of those stories which ought to be withdrawn from the province of criticism by the fact of their being the delight of the reader, thrilling him with their weirdness and firing his imagination by their splendid audacity. If the attention is so feebly grasped as to permit one to reason about an impossible situation, it becomes at once extravagant and absurd. One would require to be considerably carried away by illusion to be moved by Mr. Wendell's story. The hero is a New-Englander, born of mad parents (they met while both were patients in an insane asylum); and this inherited curse would seem to be enough for any hero to totter under. It becomes unimportant, however, when we discover that he has furthermore been taken possession of at birth by the spirit of a wicked and fascinating Italian duchess, who wishes to expiate her crimes before leaving this mundane sphere. One might readily expect some startling effects from the development of a plot thus removed from the haven of probabilities and set afloat in a sea of the wildest romance. The Duchess Emilia's repentance, however, seems to have ended the interest of her career, and her good deeds are appallingly dull; in fact, her whole personality thins away into insignificance.
"Across the Chasm" opens with fair promise, and our introduction to Virginia life and a talkative old negro "somewhar up in de nineties" is one which we should be glad to follow up by further acquaintance. This serves, however, merely as preamble, and in the next chapter we are transported to a city called Washington, although for characteristic flavor it might as well be any other place, and we enter upon the events attending a young lady's entrance into society. This might all be very pretty and pleasant, except for the deadly seriousness of the author. It is entirely frivolous and unimportant, but frivolity may be made charming and full of suggestion. Points of etiquette and behavior engage the minds, hearts, and passions of the personages of the story. It is a sort of animated illustration of the little book called "Don't." For example, "Don't leave your overcoat and rubbers in the hall when you go to make a call on a lady for the first time," receives practical exemplification when Major King, a high-toned Southerner, with unbuttoned frock-coat and baggy trousers, pays a visit to the heroine. He not only takes off his overcoat and rubbers, but tilts his chair, stays till midnight, and in every way calls down the wrath of that accomplished prig Mr. Louis Gaston, who is a high-toned Northerner. This yawning gulf between the generous faults of the South and the fastidious Phariseeism of the North is the problem of the book. The story is slight, wholly conventional, and rather commonplace, but it is gracefully told, and the conversations are not without interest.
Mr. Howard Pyle's "Within the Capes" belongs to a widely different category from the pretty feminine Southern sketch, and is quite equal to the most insatiable requirements, containing half a dozen successful kinds of fiction in itself. As a love-story, it is charming; as a sea- and shipwreck- and treasure-finding-story, it offers a fair challenge not only to Russell, but to Stevenson himself; while as a detective-story it is as good as most. The adventures are related by the hero, one Captain Tom Granger, who toward the end of his long life feels a desire to have his strange history live in his own version, and not in the fables of the gossips. A characteristic quaintness of expression gives validity to the narrative, with plenty of homely enforcement of Tom Granger's wit and wisdom.
"One of the Duanes" offers a vivid picture of the life which goes on among the officers and officers' wives and daughters who make up a little world within a world at our army and naval stations. Mrs. Hamilton has depicted the interests and excitements, the gossip and the scandals, in a way which impresses the reader as being faithful and without exaggeration. The story is interesting, and the book is thoroughly readable and enjoyable.
Two or three little volumes containing the best short stories that have been published ought to be a desirable addition to any library-table, to be picked up by a chance caller or read aloud on a rainy evening. And "Tales from all Sources" fairly well answer one's requirements of what such collections should contain, being grave and gay, bizarre and frivolous, to suit the various tastes. We should be glad to see Bulwer's "The Haunted and the Haunters" (called in some editions "The House and the Brain") reproduced in such a collection. The fault of this series, if it be a fault, is that most of the stories are well within the recollection of any one who has read the English magazines for the past few years, —"The Black Poodle," for example, and "The Pavilion on the Links," being matters of yesterday. However, both are sufficiently good to command a second reading.